#ive been considering different versions of an au as well. one where the characters find themselves in that world with a partner mon

[lycansprites]

infodump the sweet tooth au pretty please

HI sorry Ive been trying to answer this for days literally but Tumblr is allergic to copy and pasting

Im assuming this is in response to my post about the Marvel x DC x Sweet Tooth AU that me n my boyfriend and best friend are working on bc I haven't publicly posted about any of my actual S2TH AUs 🤸‍♂️

SO reminder Im putting on all of my posts about it, this is by nature a no-powers AU. Vigilantes and heroes do not traditionally exist here but we do keep some of that heirarchy and structure we see from it.

Also, a lot of these thoughts are my own and not concrete yet because my AU partners are still watching the show (as opposed to me having watched it twice over now) so things are subject to change hehe

Our version of the world probably is a little fundamentally different in that once the Sick breaches all of the continents in modern day, it's actually a LOT slower to spread at first. This means that it didn't really hit globally, it kind of grew behind the scenes- as did hybrid birth. We know from the show that if you contain the Sick you contain hybrid birth (more or less) so the hybrids that were born in the early days were taken away from their parents and disappeared. The general public didn't know about this but some people began to catch on.

Enter: Justice League (Avengers?)

A group of adults who noticed the appearance and subsequent disappearance of hybrid babies, which also leads to learning about a literal doomsday virus growing steadily without the government warning the people. Most of them are higher up, government or scientists or parents of hybrid kids themselves. The Justice League are the ones who begin researching and doing detective work and overall just working towards both saving hybrids and finding a cure for the Sick.

They bring news of the virus to the public (or, depending what we figure out for the Marvel side, it could be the Avengers team that really takes it to the news) and things spiral from there. The further the Sick spreads and the faster it does, the more hybrids are born worldwide and the Government can no longer keep it secret. And hybrid disappearances are not only noticed, but prevalent. This much doesn't actually change from the show.

Enter: Teen Titans

Kids / Teens, most of them connected to their mentors or parents of the Justice League. These guys are frustrated with how hands off the League is approaching hybrid disappearances and take matters into their own hands. Imagine sort of like the Animal Army, working on the ground to free hybrids, except its a little earlier into the spread of the Sick; either right before or right after the Great Crumble. Some of them get cut off from their parents/guardians when they realize theyve been stealing their findings / research in order to go after bases keeping hybrids.

Enter: Young Justice

This is where the last born humans and the first few years of hybrids begin to mix. This is well after the Great Crumble now; we've got humans and hybrids that the Teen Titans rescued, or that the Justice League helped to keep safe, that aren't willing to live life in solitude or on the run. They're kinda like a more chaotic Animal Army except literally, animal. Theyre brash and ignorant and a little quick to jump the gun and run into situations head first but somehow they haven't died yet!

And that's. Kinda really all I've got so far besides the specifics on which characters are hybrids and which aren't. We haven't really explored where Marvel or X-Men come into play which is Ironic considering the AU started as an AU of Zenith and I's Marvel and X-Men crossover au thing. Thats mostly because we're waiting for everyone to know the whole story / finish the show first so we can properly discuss and share ideas!!

[allexiaah]

Hi, pokemon anon again here! I loved getting to hear about your au! I'd love to hear more about Laurie and the other characters you have ideas for. I'm also interested in your ideas for Claudette and a legendary pokemon you mentioned, but I'd hate to push for too much in one post. Sorry if I'm prying too much.

Hi again!! I’m very happy that you find some of these thoughts interesting. If this gets long again, and it might, knowing me, I’ll put it all under a readmore (EDIT: I DEFINITELY need to put it all under a readmore lol.) I’ll go one at a time here. Also, don’t worry! You’re not prying at all, I’m having a blast getting to share some of these, and it’s really nice to have interest in them <3

Also, are you alright going by Pokemon anon? Sometimes I give names to my anons when I get multiple asks from one, and that one is fitting. If not, please let me know ^^

A lot of these are bare-bones misc ideas that I have and still need to flesh out still—like most of them are, in all fairness—but they’re mostly just snippets. So i’ll share a few of the ones I do have, as well as maybe pokemon I think could fit those characters.

- Starting with Laurie, while I’m not sure if she’d necessarily have one of her own, I like the idea of an Absol having a particular interest in her. Absol’s always been an intriguing pokemon to me because of its dex entries stating that it can sense danger and disasters, and was (and potentially still is) mistakenly seen to be a bringer of said danger. The pokemon Platinum Absol entry says “Rumored to sense danger with its horn, it became a target. It fled deep into the mountains.”

- While the entries go from vague, talking simply about danger, to specifically about Absol being capable of sensing NATURAL disasters, I like to think that, as a whole, it’s able to sense not only natural disasters but distress and danger as a whole, if potentially to a lesser degree.

- Keeping this in mind, I like the thought of an Absol taking interest in Laurie, possibly more so before the events of the movies, a month or so in advance, maybe, if that’s something that still happens. The closer to the night Michael comes home, the bolder the Absol gets, letting itself be seen and maybe even approaching Laurie directly. I think it’s an interesting concept and dynamic between her and the Absol. Maybe it’s trying to warn her, or maybe it’s just especially curious about the specific “danger” Laurie is going to face in the future. I’m not too sure about it myself, but I bet she’s a little put off when she does manage to catch a glimpse of it looking right back at her.

- The basic idea I had for Feng is that she’s a VERY competitive trainer, and once a previous champion of her region, or some other high-up position in her region, until she spiralled and lost that title. Is now missing, though she’s out there somewhere.

In terms of pokemon, I feel like Feng is definitely the kind of trainer that goes for strength in terms of pokemon. She’s a fan of dragon types and steel types, I think. The more powerful the pokemon, the better. I don’t have a definitive team for her, but some pokemon that I think fit her character and that I can see her having would be Luxray, Rotom (?), Salamence, Gengar, Nidoking or Nidoqueen, Weavile/sneasel, Metagross (Mega?), Garchomp or Haxorus. If I had to pick a starter for her, I’d say Greninja, Empoleon, Typhlosion or Charizard (Probably a mega,) Though i’m heavily leaning towards Greninja.

- I think she’d have a very well-rounded team that covers its weaknesses pretty well. Definitely a formidable trainer to face, and one very difficult to beat. You’re definitely going to come out of that battle with a good beating even if you DO manage to win. She’s no stranger to strategy, especially when it comes to typing, but she prefers to brute-force her battles where she can. Probably has a good array of damaging moves on her pokemon, and only a few stat-changing or field-altering abilities, but still does have them. You never know when you need to switch up your strategy in a pokemon battle.

- I tend to lean away from the more recent licensed characters, and licensed characters as a whole, because a good chunk of them I don’t know well enough through the media they come from, and I know someone having hcs for something they’re not entirely familiar with tends to piss people off, even if it’s not really warranted most of the time. I make an exception for Steve here simply because I've seen Stranger Things and I feel like I have a decent enough grasp on his character. Enough to have ideas for him at least!

- I feel like Steve is probably not unlike most trainers you meet. Very much a pushover, just a touch of Ash Ketchum vibes. He’s stubborn but does his best. He is a more formidable trainer than he looks, and I feel like his pokemon don’t always have the strength required to beat the tougher foes they meet, but he’s pretty good at thinking up interesting and unheard of strategies and tricks with the resources at his disposal. If your opponent isn’t expecting you to use your moves creatively, they’ll have a hard time adapting to them. He’s probably interesting to watch in a battle.

- Thinking about Steve and the Stranger Things world as a whole, I’ve started wondering just now about him and Nancy potentially having experience—or at least knowledge— of Ultra Beasts around their hometown, posing as a parallel to the upside down. Maybe they choose to look more into them, and eventually work trying to seal off those wormholes. That would be neat!

- I think Elodie would be an archaeologist who works to uncover old ruins and artifacts. She’s particularly fascinated with Unown and old relics depicting ancient or unknown pokemon and deities.

- I could see Steve having a Psyduck/golduck, Ludicolo, Quagsire, Exeggutor (Kanto specifically), or Riolu on his team.

-Mienshao, Cinccino, Cradily, Spiritomb and Golurk are a few of the pokemon I think she might have as partners.

- About the legendary/mythical idea I had for Claudette, I feel like if a Shaymin ever did run into her or the other way around, it would be curious and take a liking to her very quickly. It wouldn’t surprise me if at least one lived in the woods near her, considering how well it’s said they can hide, blending in perfectly to patches of flowers. It’s known as the gratitude feeling and is said to usher in feelings of gratitude. I think it might go the other way around, too—I think Shaymin are attracted to people who show gratitude openly. It’s pretty much a given that one would be curious about her lol.

- I think Claudette would be VERY intrigued by it, because mythicals and legendaries likely aren’t well-documented, and I doubt Claudette would have ever seen one—No photos to look at, or at least that are easily accessible, so she probably assumes it’s a pokemon she’s never seen and leaves it at that. She’d be especially kind to it, same as she is to any other pokemon, and I think it would grow affectionate towards her and stop by sometimes.

- More of a personal touch, but seeing as people are always gunning for legendaries and mythicals in their games, I like to interpret that as mythical and legendary pokemon being highly sought after, which they probably are. I mean, they’re all powerful pokemon on the level of gods, most of the time, with stronger powers than most pokemon. I doubt they catch a break in the presence of most trainers, so it’s probably a good starting point if you’re not trying to shove ‘em into a pokeball from the get go. I think they’d be good friends, and enjoy each others’ company. I don’t think it would be around constantly, since it’s a wild pokemon and Shaymin in particular are said to be migratory, but it definitely comes around a decent amount. I think Claudette would be awestruck if she ever had the opportunity to witness its purifying abilities. Is probably just as amazed by its ability to leave flowers (or accelerate their growth?) where it walks. I think it’s very cool of her to have like.. ~15 pokemon that aren’t even technically hers that are ready to kill for her at the drop of a hat because a homegirl’s just. Too nice. I love her with my whole heart.

Shaymin is one of my all-time favorite mythicals (If not my absolute fave,) And I think that they wouldn’t mind Claudette. One thing about Shaymin specifically is that in the games, one of its dex entries reads, and I quote, “The flowers all over its body burst into bloom if it is lovingly hugged and senses gratitude.” That makes me want to cry! It’s so sweet!! The thought of loving shaymin hugs makes my heart melt. I just love them so much.

From both an appearance and dex standpoint, Shaymin is just a very sweet friend and I think one would probably trust Claudette. I mean, look at that face!! Baby <3

I’m glad I get to type these out for someone who's interested in them, so thank you! even if they take forever to get to—I’m sorry about that. ^^’’ I spend a lot of time taking my little jot notes and writing them out into something with substance, but it’s worth it, I think. I might get a little bit wordy to get my points across in a way that feels right to how I see it in my head, but hopefully it’s not too bad. Ty again for the interest, anon! It was good to take a teensy bit of a more in-depth look at the few hcs I had for some of the other characters. <3

[infinitelytheheartexpands]

My laptop is currently updating, so while I have that working in the background, I wanted to share a series of six short, mostly-opera-inspired autobiographical narratives/prose poems I wrote last April and May:

I would kill to have some wine right now.

There is a bottle of red wine sitting on the kitchen counter. My father bought it when he went to the store the other day─ don’t ask me what day it was, I don’t remember, the days already blend together as is─ and I have considered pouring even just a little bit into a glass and downing it.

And then proceeding to throw the glass against the wall and shatter it.

I’ve been contemplating doing that a lot lately.

True, I would kill to have some wine, but if I did go ahead and pour even just a little bit into a glass, and down it, and possibly then proceed to throw the glass against the wall and shatter it, I would most likely be killed before I had the chance to kill.

Kill or be killed. We are all trying our very best to do neither these days, but it happens anyway.

I am sixteen years old. As I start writing this, I am nine days away from turning seventeen. For me, alcohol consumption is thus not only not approved by the Parents, but also illegal. But then again, so is voting blue in the 2020 US Presidential election. That is also something neither approved by the Parents nor legal for me. But I digress.

Thirty-one, twenty-nine, thirty-one again, sixteen now, that makes sixty, ninety-one, one hundred and seven days since I watched one of my classmates get drunk at a New Year’s Eve party. She downed a whole bottle of peach wine (I didn’t even know that was a thing) and looked at me with her red eyes and silver-sequined halter top and curly dark brown hair in a high ponytail. You’re more beautiful than Jesus she told me and you’ll go to the moon on a rocketship. I laughed.

I laugh when something’s so unexpected I can’t do anything else. I laughed when I first heard Notre Dame Cathedral had caught fire because it seemed so ludicrous that I couldn’t do anything else. Notre Dame on fire? You can’t be serious, it can’t be serious.

It was serious.

I’m not sure if she was.

A little part of me wishes she were.

When I was in sixth grade, I told the same girl I thought her hair was luscious. Sixth-grade me didn’t know the word had a sexual connotation; the girl did and was offended.

Maybe a little part of me did know, somehow.

***

As I write this next part, I am working on a paper about state-sponsored censorship. I have picked this topic because it is a fascinating topic, it fits the requirements for the paper─ write about a major global problem─, and because I feel censored myself.

Expressing anything that conflicts with the Parents’ thoughts and opinions is strictly forbidden. If you are different, you are ostracized. I am different, so I am ostracized.

I am too proud, too strong to succumb. But it still hurts.

As I write this, I am listening to Act IV of Rossini’s Guillaume Tell, an opera about liberation, appropriate for both me and my paper. At this moment, Hedwige is calling on God, ‘the hope of the hopeless’, to save her husband and break the yoke of oppression that binds Switzerland.

It’s very nice, and the sentiment is good and true, and it works for her and Mathilde and Jemmy and the Swiss women, but it does not work for me. I lost my faith a long time ago. Ironically, it is French grand opéra, the genre to which Guillaume Tell belongs, that is partially responsible for my loss of faith.

It was impossible for me to watch Verdi’s Don Carlos for the first time in eighth grade and Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots in tenth and not be horrified by the things people do in the name of religion, to kill people senselessly just because they believe slightly differently than them─ even their own daughters (as is the finale of Les Huguenots).

How can a good God allow such things?

Do I realize these works are fictional? Yes. But do I know they are based on history, on real events? Yes.

“These things are meant to happen; they are all in God’s plan.” Well, can God just not find another way to make what’s meant to happen happen? I cannot believe in a God that allows these things to happen. To say that an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good God who can allow such things exists is a lie.

***

Now that Guillaume Tell is over, I am listening to another grand opéra, Les vepres siciliennes, albeit in its Italian version, I vespri siciliani. Another opera about occupation and liberation, but a liberation that comes at a horrible cost: the entire French ruling class is massacred by the Sicilians at the end of the opera.

If I didn’t care, I would stage my own personal ‘massacre’: I would turn my back, walk out the front door with the possessions I most needed to survive on my own, and never come back.

But I do care. They may not care, but I do.

One of my greatest curses is that I care about what I care about too much. My heart is too deep to not care.

There are some battles that are not worth being fought.

If a massacre is your only recourse to accomplish something, perhaps you should not do that thing. Or, at least try to find another way.

Right now, I am at the beginning of Act III, at Monforte’s aria “In braccio alle dovizie”. In the original French, it’s called “Au sein de la puissance”. At the breast of power.

Monforte is the hated French governor of Sicily, the revolutionaries’ primary target. When he sings this, he has just learned that one of the main revolutionaries, Arrigo, is his long-lost illegitimate son.

By rape.

‘The breast of power’ indeed.

Just like with a massacre, if rape is your only recourse to accomplish something, perhaps you should not do that thing either.

Just a thought.

I’m a woman. What do I know, in the eyes of many out there?

One of my friends said that Verdi gave Monforte his just deserts, but also overly beautiful music. “He couldn’t help it, though, not when his Dad Music Instincts were activated.”

I feel guilty listening to the aria, even though it is truly a beautiful piece and the recording I’m listening to─ a 1989 recording from the Teatro alla Scala, with Giorgio Zancanaro as Monforte─ is absolutely gorgeous.

Can we separate the music from the character, the art from the artist? I do not know. Everyone has something utterly heinous to someone else. Once we stop separating the art from the artist, where do we begin again? And yet, I do not want to support people who do horrible things to others.

Perhaps it is all relative.

Perhaps everything is.

Perhaps nothing is absolute at all.

That frightens me.

***

Today is Rome’s 2,773rd birthday. As a six-year Latin student and future classics and history double-major, this is cause for celebration.

If things were normal and I were at school, my Latin teacher would bring birthday cake for all the Latin students, and we’d eat it and sing “Felix dies natalis, Roma”. Happy Birthday, Rome.

But things are not normal, and I’m at home multitasking between this and a presentation script for that paper, and still listening to I vespri siciliani.

Now I’m at the end of Act IV. Everyone is celebrating the impending marriage of Arrigo to Duchess Elena, one of the Sicilian revolutionary leaders. Sicilian and French, united at last. Everything is set to work out.

But there’s still Giovanni da Procida, the other major revolutionary leader, who is hellbent on revenge. He sees this wedding as the perfect opportunity to strike down the French once and for all.

And thus, the massacre.

Everything can be set to work out, but there is always something that comes up. A massacre, a pandemic, a set of internal troubles that bring a proud empire to its ruin.

Now I’m in Act V, at Elena’s bolero ‘Merce, dilette amiche’. She has no idea about Procida’s plans; she’s just excited to marry Arrigo and bring peace to her beloved Sicily at last. I think I’m going to change operas again after this is over; the act is rather uneven (though I still very much like it) and I would prefer not to listen to everything falling apart today.

I debate listening to Berlioz’s Les Troyens, the closest thing to an opera about the founding of Rome and a masterpiece itself. But there is still too much about collateral damage for my tastes today: one kingdom falls and another loses its benevolent queen, all in the name of a supposedly greater destiny. And that’s just based on the first third of the Aeneid. I wrote an essay about that first third once for English class, using that thesis; my English teacher said it was one of the best essays he’d ever read. But I digress.

After a quick refresher on the synopsis, I decide to change styles and go with a story from the heyday of the Roman Empire: Handel’s Agrippina. Lots of plotting, but everyone gets what they want in the end and it ends happily for all. No collateral damage here. I am weary of that.

Sometimes I feel like collateral damage.

It’s tough to remember that you’re the master of your own story, not just a side character or a scapegoat in so many others’.

Everyone in this opera knows they’re the masters. That’s the problem. But it ultimately works out.

I want nothing more than for it to work out for me. It hasn’t yet.

But I have a feeling it will.

***

I got maybe halfway through the first act of Agrippina yesterday. I love Baroque opera, but I guess only in small doses.

No matter.

Today I’m listening to the beginning of Act II of Verdi’s Don Carlo. This is the fourth time in a row I’ve listened to it.

I read John Green’s Turtles All The Way Down recently. The main character frequently finds herself stuck in ‘thought spirals’, where she keeps thinking more and more about the same thing. I have those too, although I tend to picture my mind more as a bullet train: it always moves hundreds of miles an hour, faster than I can control, from one thought to the next. I constantly find myself retracing the figurative map of my mind to figure out what I was thinking about, what I need to remember but simply cannot. And it’s like my mind keeps returning to the same stations a lot; these are my equivalent to the spirals.

This opera, this moment, is one of my frequent stations.

Make that five times in a row now. This will be the last, I promise myself.

In this scene, a group of monks chant, praying for the rest of the dead Emperor Charles V, whom, I note with a smile, was himself a character in one of Verdi’s earliest operas, Ernani. In that opera, he sings an aria where he confronts his destiny as the next Holy Roman Emperor. My legacy will live throughout the ages, he sings.

Including in two different Verdi operas.

But there I go again on another bullet-train route.

The monks are singing now, their stark minor-major shifts making me feel as if I am there, in the cloister of San Yuste or in any of the great cathedrals of Spain, looking up into the vaults of the ceiling, of heaven itself, seemingly. The only lights come from candles in my mental picture, and I gaze up, my head uncovered, my mind only partially spellbound, more by the visual beauty and the history than by any religious feeling.

I am a heathen.

I have only been inside a Catholic church once, when I was fourteen; it was an impromptu side trip during a school-sponsored tour of colleges in St. Louis. One of the chaperones said the Cathedral Basilica had can’t-miss art, and thus managed to get a large section of the attendees to come with her.

She was right. It was one of the most beautiful places I’d ever seen. And that was all I thought.

Okay, that’s a lie. I did wonder what it would be like to be able to have faith again, to be able to kneel in one of the pews, and pray, and believe, as my ancestors have done before me; after all, if religion were something you inherited in your blood, then I would be half-Catholic.

But I cannot kneel and pray and believe.

In this scene, one of the monks claims that Charles V fell because he was too proud, because he believed that he was greater than God. If a god exists, I do not claim to be greater than them. I am not perfect, not by a long shot.

He did not die because he did not believe in God. He died because everyone dies, even those who are supposedly the greatest of us.

God alone is great, the monk proclaims. I do not, cannot believe that. We are all great to begin with, but some of us are led to believe we are not.

We are the masters. I must remember that.

And I realize that I have let it play a sixth time.

Sometimes I am not the master of my own mind.

***

The sixth time was the last.

Now I am at the end of the act, listening to the showdown between Filippo II, King of Spain, and Rodrigo, Marquis di Posa. Filippo is the guardian of the way things are; Verdi called Rodrigo an anachronism, and indeed, he was the only principal character who never existed.

Rodrigo, he said, was at least two centuries ahead of his time.

I don’t know what exactly Verdi’s feelings were about this, but personally, I do not think this is a bad thing. Progressivism is often progressivism in any age.

At any rate, Rodrigo, who has recently returned from Spanish-held Flanders, has taken his chance─ a rare private meeting with the King, who is confused as to why Rodrigo has never approached him for favors like all the other courtiers─ to confront him about the horrific conditions of Flanders and its people. Give them liberty, he pleads.

No. I have given them the same peace I have given Spain.

A horrible peace!, Rodrigo fires back. The peace of the tomb!

We should not have to suffer until death.

Let history not say of you, “He was a Nero.” A murderer of innocents, a torturer of the defenseless, an occupier, a denier of liberty─ perhaps the greatest torture of all.

I once watched a video in which a director said, “To live in an occupied country is to live only half a life.” I would say that to live in an occupied country, or even any place where you cannot be free, cannot live fully as yourself, is not even that. It is to barely live at all. It is to merely have a beating heart and breath.

To live in spite of this, to simply be as you wish, is the ultimate act of defiance.

[inyoursheets]

2, 16, 18, 23!

Tell us about what you’re most looking forward to writing – in your current project, or a future project

wow ok this is surprisingly hard to answer! confronting! im not even sure, there isn’t anything specific ive got planned out that im excited to write. i don’t have any future projects planned out yet. or. i mean.....there are some things at the tips of my writing fingers but i can’t allow myself to think about them properly yet bc i need to focus on and commit to finishing warm water. and my thesis (ugh).

there are some things from warm water that ive already written that im excited to share, but right now im in a place where writing just isn’t going smoothly, so whenever i have an idea (like the eloquent “sweatpants dick” note i took recently) (my only contribution that day) im not all that confident or excited about it bc im afraid the actual writing itself will be a pain? that i’ll drag my feet for days and it won’t come easy and i’ll hate every second of it -- until things click and the words start flowing, not unlike this post describes. idk i keep really wanting to write and sitting down for it and then it just--won’t happen. or if i do actually try putting pen to paper i just start hating it all, which i don’t want.

so! this is a sad note to end on! here’s some vague things i am looking forward to: i’m looking forward to being excited about writing in general! i’m looking forward to writing something i’m proud of, either in terms of plot or theme or characterization or dialogue or whatever! i’m also looking forward to having that oh-my-god-the-words-are-flowing-from-me moment, regardless of the result tbh, bc i just love that feeling of loving writing and having it come easily. that’s what im excited about -- being excited about writing again.  

Tried anything new with your writing lately? (style, POV, genre, fandom?)

ok so i have this terrible writing tendency to not know how to not describe every single action characters make -- every movement, every gesture. particularly on first drafts i feel the urge to describe it all, otherwise i can’t continue. i know that it’s not always necessary to write what happens every single second of a scene, but i can’t seem to stop?

idk if im explaining what i mean correctly -- there’s probably terms for this that i dont know -- but someone who i think manages to do the opposite of what i do very well is @fairhairedkings, who is really good at time jumps and not going overboard w the minute-to-minute descriptions, the way i tend to.

i know it can be pretty tiresome and it’s one of the things that annoys me a lot about my own writing, both in terms of reading it (it can be plain boring?) and for the writing itself. it blocks me! but i can’t seem to stop doing it, feel like i’m glazing over things otherwise or lose track of where im going. i have to keep reminding myself that leaving out certain things doesn’t mean that nothing happens or that people assume nothing happens.

so, to answer the question, ive tried to be a bit more concise with it’s hidden in heartbeats, exhales and in the hope of open hands when i started writing it. that fic is a product of being fed up with my other WIPs and it didn’t take more than a week from its initial idea to the finished product, so i really wanted it to be a quickie, and i thought something tight and concise could work for the plot. i didn’t actually manage to succeed though, still ended up describing just about every action there, too. i don’t think i’ll ever manage to write something concise tbh. i do bad with time jumps, i do bad with less is more, which is unfortunate, bc less can truly, truly be more. so! im gonna try this again some time!

Do any of your stories have alternative versions? (plotlines that you abandoned, AUs of your own work, different characterisations?) Tell us about them.

mmm well, warm water originally didn’t include mutual pining -- beth wasn’t supposed to be in love with rio yet, we were gonna watch her fall in love slowly, while he already felt things. but then i ended up almost turning that entirely on its head and now we’ve got the mess that is that this fic in its current state lol. there’s also an AU to warm water that i briefly considered bc of you which i won’t go into now bc of possible spoilers -- but ive considered things!!! 

also for it’s hidden in heartbeats, it was supposed to be more about petty!rio and haha, look, exes trying to get “revenge”, and to be light and funny, but i realized that idk how relationships work, let alone how exes work, so i couldn’t really find any good reasons for them splitting up, at least nothing that could generate comedy, so it ended up getting fairly angsty? idk why this keeps happening -- me planning to do something rom com-esque and it developing into something wayyyyy angstier, but it did!

What’s the story idea you’ve had in your head for the longest?

oh wow idek! ive definitely been working on warm water the longest, so i guess technically that one, but there are some other ideas that have been drifting near the surface that have been there longer and are very underdeveloped and need time and nourishment and attention and love, all of which i can’t give them yet bc im trying to stay focused on warm water and thesis writing. maybe the beth/stan friendship snippet ive got hidden in somewhere in my docs!

thank youuuu for indulging me!!! meta writing asks!!!!

[writingpuddle]

Hello I read all of out of the ashes so far in three days and let me tell you I ❤️ it! I normally steer clear of high school au type things bc they stray too far from canon for me but what this has developed into is so perfect and I am excited to see where it is going.. this fic(fics?) is one of the best representations of the characters I have seen and I genuinely appreciate and respect the effort to stay true to the characters - you’ve done a great job.. so many fics will be so OOC for me that I literally have to stop reading them because it doesn’t do the characters or the story justice. I’m very excited for your next update and to hopefully see some more Neil and Andrew alone time (not sexy alone time, just like where they get the chance to actually interact!! Lol).. and side note but your depiction of neils time in the nest was one of the most realistic I’ve seen as well - maybe realistic is the wrong word but I just mean like most true to the story.. anyway thank you for writing!! :)

Also side note I was stalking out your top posts and I saw the one where you mentioned people giving compliments that compare one persons writing to others and talking them down aren’t good.. and I hope my compliment didn’t make you uncomfortable that I just sent or come across harsh like that.. I guess I didn’t mean to say that other people write the characters poorly or worse or wrong or anything like that.. just like.. how I’ve seen the characters aged or the things they prioritize or how they interact with others in other fics does not mesh with the characterization (is that a word) of them in the actual books.. at least to me, I don’t mean to say they’re bad or anything like that, just that I really appreciate how gifted you are at sticking to character and understanding the actions and thought processes that the characters have in different situations based on who they are.. okay I’m done - sorry if I made you uncomfortable!!!

hello friend! thank you so much for sending me this. i totally understand that we all have interpretations we prefer--its not necessarily a put-down, just a personal preference. there’s some ooc interpretations that i still find fun and enjoyable, and some that im just not interested because they do not vibe with me. i just don’t like conflict and therefore try to avoid situations where something could be interpreted as an insult to somebody else, you know?

but i am very glad you like my interpretation!!! and considering how much i loved the original series, it feels good to hear that you feel ive done the characters justice in this new version. pressure points/the out of the ashes series has been my baby for so long i genuinely don’t know what i’ll do when i finish it. though i suppose its probably still going to be a couple years before i have to deal with that 🙈 im so glad you like it!!!!

[inflashback]

all the ones you want to do 👀

well, here’s everything except the ones i’ve answered, you asked for it

theyre mostly about my youngmabel au, which i will ramblr about for free if anyones interested :’)

What is that one scene that you’ve always wanted to write but can’t be arsed to write all of the set-up and context it would need? (consider this permission to write it and/or share it anyway)

i’ve, for a really really long time, wanted to write like. a scene where laura kinney and henry sutter Talk Their Shit Out, but that would take so so long and i’m not motivated... sorry laura and henry. okay i think the rest of these will b about mabel but. gotta stick with my idiots.

Share a sentence or paragraph from your writing that you’re really proud of (explain why, if you like)

this is from my young mabel story !!

“[Mabel] stops banging her head when she feels a stab of anxiety slash through her stomach. It’s not hers, that much is obvious-- it’s a soft golden feeling, the nerves, the-- 

The girl in the front of her mind, with hair cut just below her ears. Small scatterings of pimples across her face. She has a smile without sharp teeth; she cracks her knuckles when she’s bored or needs to fidget; she owns a pair of overalls she wears at least twice a week in the summer, when she’s in the mood to run around the fields outside her home, barefoot, with a friend or a girlfriend, when she wants to smoke a cigarette or two (she’d kicked the habit exactly three weeks ago today, she’s really proud of herself and her sister is, too), her sister’s name is Mónica and her name is Anna, Anna, Anna, Anna, Anna--

Anna Limon, Anna Limon, Anna Limon.”

the reverance to which mabel says anna’s name has always Hit Me for personal reasons and this scene i think is good. that is all

What character that you’re writing do you most identify with?

right now? either vera or mabel. vera is... not Right, and not Wanted by the outside world, so she’s angry and stupid to combat it. and mabel just... loves Her Person more than anything in the world, so there’s that. 

What character do you have the most fun writing?

again, mabel!! she’s so fun and angry all the time and it’s so freeing to just be able to do whatever the hell you WANT with a character

What do you think are the characteristics of your personal writing style? Would others agree?

Uh!! I think i use a lot of metaphor and write a lot of physical affection :’) i’m not sure if others would agree but that’s pretty basic!!

Is what you like to write the same as what you like to read?

yeah...

Are you more of a drabble or a longfic kind of writer? Pantser or plotter? 

i write a lot of drabbles, but my proudest works are my long fic!!! i also plot way too much and i love to do it.

Do you wish you were the other?

i have no idea what this means but... yeah i guess? How would you describe your writing process?

pace around my entire house looping one (1) song thinking of one (1) scene. figure out exactly what it would take to get the characters to that point. write like 2000 words, fall asleep, cant make words for the next three years.

What do you envy in other writers?

oh god, everything. i don’t know how to make my words flow like certain people do, RIVER

Do you want your writing to be famous?

god no. my stories are mine.

Do you share your writing online? (Drop a link!) Do you have projects you’ve kept just for yourself?

yes! here! there’s one story i’ve only shared with two people and that’s my borderline-ridiculous ‘beetlejuice with lab rats and gay shit and werewolves’ au, it’s the most self indulgent thing i’ve ever written and i love it so much.

At what point in writing do you come up with a title?

usually while listening to songs!! fr example my most recent posted fic is a lyric from ‘cop car’ by mitski because the line ‘i get mean when i’m nervous / like a bad dog’ makes me think of mabel, thus that fic came into existence.

Which is harder: titles or summaries (or tags)?

SUMMARIES i hate summaries usually i just paste in whatever i’ve got as the first sentence.

Tried anything new with your writing lately? (style, POV, genre, fandom?)

not really? new fandom but. i got my bread and butter, dude, i don’t feel like branching out. writing’s just a hobby i’m okay at.

Do you think readers perceive your work - or you - differently to you? What do you think would surprise your readers about your writing or your motivations?

i don’t think so !! like some of the stuff is personal and you can’t really understand from an outside POV, but. most of it is just dorky found family stuff!

Do any of your stories have alternative versions? (plotlines that you abandoned, AUs of your own work, different characterisations?) Tell us about them.

oh dear god yes... i mean. obvs river youre asking this youre aware of my aus. but i have a billion aus, theyre my favorite thing to write and ive got at least three for every fandom i’m in. i have an au for my lab rat beetlejuice au, too, which i’ll get around to writing someday.

Is there something you always find yourself repeating in your writing? (favourite verb, something you describe ‘too often’, trope you can’t get enough of?)

ALL I DO IS DESCRIBE PEOPLE’S TEETH AND PHYSICAL AFFECTION. uhh i use the phrase ‘bared their teeth / had far too many teeth / smiled with too many teeth’ a lot, its because i find it the easiest descriptor for monsters and i like to write about monsters.

Tell us the meta about your writing that you really want to ramble to people about (symbolism you’ve included, character or relationship development that you love, hidden references, callbacks or clues for future scenes?)

ohh god okay youngmabel take three. anna wears soft reds and lots of layers-- to contrast mabel, who wears a thin nightgown and has a bright green color palette. this is largely because mabel has been made to show herself to everyone who’s tried to control her (sally, aurora silver, etc) while anna hides in herself. anna specifically wears one of mónica’s old sweaters, because she can hide and protect herself with her family, while mabel cant. also i love mónica im so hype to have her in the series. mabel also repeats things in groups of threes (”hello, hello, hello, anna, hello, hello, hello”) because she’s fae. i love her. ough and i cant wait for the character development you guys rnt ready fr this dumb series

What other medium do you think your story would work well as? (film, webcomic, animated series?)

I WOULD LOVE FR IT TO BE AN ANIMATED SERIES but also it as a film would rock.... yeahhhhh

Do you reread your old works? How do you feel about them?

my xmen ones, yeah. they’re really comforting for me. i feel like i wanna give my kid self a big big hug.

What’s the story idea you’ve had in your head for the longest?

probs the daemons au or the agents of shield / xmen crossover.. those both gave baby abbey a lot of fun hours.

Would you say your writing has changed over time?

yeah! ive gotten better i think

OKAY RAMBLE OVER THANKS RIV

[vandorens-archive]

ten questions tag | i was tagged by: @mshelleys, @emdrabbles, @pe-ersona, @evergrcen and @septemberliterature. thank you so much, and i’m so sorry i’m getting to this so late!

everything is under the cut!

@mshelleys

i. if you could change the genre of one of your wips, what would you change it to and how would the story/characters change?

So, trahison already features a ghost and a brief stay at a manor. have i considered turning it into a full fledged horror because of that? perhaps.

ii. do you think of your characters as actors playing a part in a movie or as people in history actually doing things that effect the future?

i think of them as actors playing in one long, crazy, unpredictable play. 

iii. role swap your protagonist and antagonist but keep their personalities the same; how different would your story be?

honestly, not different at all, because when it comes to it, the subject of trahison’s antagonist (s) is pretty complex. 

iv. are any of your characters based on you, family, friends, or someone else you know?

oh, absolutely. my characters range between self inserts, to characters i wish i was more like, to characters that are essentially walking, talking, breathing love letters to the people i care about.  

v. how long have you had your main protagonist(s) of your wip(s)?

I’ve been working with marin, nate and ruby for years, long before they were even called that and were a part of a dystopian crime novel (don’t ask). antoine joined them soon after, followed a while later by beth and isadora, and miles was invented during the plotting stage. 

vi. do you prefer to write chronologically or just make a bunch of scenes and order them after they’re written?

it depends on what i’m working on and how serious i am about it, but if we’re only talking about trahison, then chronologically!

vii. imagine the problem in your wip is sorted out, how would the protagonist recount the story to their children if they asked?

with a far away look in his eyes and an uncharacteristic fondness in his voice, marin would turn to his children, and tell them how extraordinary his friends were during his university years—their zeal, their inquisitiveness, and conveniently leaving out the uncomfortable loyalty they all had towards each other, until time and life’s commands separated them. 

viii. favorite (non-spoilery) line(s) of your current wip(s)?

This small bit of description, albeit a little purple prose-y, is one that i’m very, very proud of.

“ The morning rain had made its grave in the dirt, the bittersweet smell—like exotic black tea—rising into the air. It was the night pluviophiles came to dance. If I think hard, I can still taste the ghost of the raindrops on my tongue and sense Beth’s radiating warmth beside me; its own ghost ” - trahison, chapter three

ix. if your wip was a movie, could you see it be done in the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, or 2010s? why that decade in particular?

so, fun fact, i hadn’t decided when to set trahison (see: the big question mark in my plotting notebook) but i have recently made up my mind and decided to set it in the seventies! if it was a film, then i could see it being made in seventies france! very a la the dreamers.

x. are you able to just make up a story on the spot, or do you need help (plot generators or other outside influences)?

sometimes i’ll take the help of prompts or media, but otherwise i just come up with things on my own!

@emdrabbles

i. what do the names of your main characters mean? did you pick them for the meaning or another reason?

i picked the trahison characters’ names based on two things: how much it related to the character’s backstory or personality, and how pleasing it sounded out loud. here are the meanings of their names:

marin — of the sea

ruby — deep red; precious stone; behold a son

elizabeth — god is my oath

nathaniel — gift from god

antoine — priceless one; beyond praise

isadora — gift of Isis

ii. what book are you currently reading?

I’m currently reading the time machine by h.g wells!

iii. last sentence written?

“ When the end of the world comes — I’ll film it ” — copycat, or the one where i predict the future. 

iv. who are some of your faceclaims?

i usually don’t use faceclaims, but if i had to choose:

marin van doren (trahison) — timor simakov

eloi hill (psychophantia) — maxence danet fauvel

cass parker (penny lane) — monica tomas

v. gimme some worldbuilding facts!!

alright, here’s one: in the world of psychophantia, not only is the magic system and your powers controlled by your morals, but so is your social ranking, your education, and any future you may have—to an extent. 

vi. do you outline? if so, do you have a specific method?

i’m a plotter and only really work well with a solid outline, however, my outlines range from a series of messy, incoherent bullet points to meticulous scene-by-scene planning based around the three act structure. this post is my go to for plotting assistance! 

vii. favourite author?

Like every tumblr user ever, i love donna tartt and maggie stiefvater, but i’m also a huge fan of f.scott fitzgerald, agatha christie and vera caspary!

viii. what is your oldest wip?

trahison! It went through many, many changes — from changes in genre to changes in character names, and there’s still a possibility that it could change even further. 

ix. what is your favourite wip?

every wip i reblog under my #others. tag! You all are so damn talented!

x. where do you get your inspiration from?

everywhere around me! from conversations i have with people, from films and books i consume, from the music on the radio — i like that anything and everything can inspire me to create.

@pe-ersona

i. in one sentence, explain your current wip!

a group of secretive students attempt to become immortal, only to uncover the worst parts of themselves — and each other — as they do. 

ii. was writing your main interest or did you have other interests?

although writing is my main interest (see: my social media bio on every platform ever), i also like to journal, sew, cook and make videos! my interests usually do have to do with the intention of creation. 

iii. what’s your favorite genre to write? to read?

I love writing horror and mysteries. those are my favourite genres, but i also love reading a good contemporary romance!

iv. what is one goal you have for your wip this year? how’s that goal going?

to finish the first draft! so far, not so bad, though i do wish i could write more, but unfortunately, time constraints plus school restrict me from doing so. 

v. how old is your wip? or when did you start writing your wip?

trahison is nearly three years old, but i only started writing the current version of it a year ago. 

vii. what scene made you cry or laugh or both?

these lines made me laugh out loud the first time i wrote them:

“ Up the stairs stumbled Miles, my slovenly genius roommate. He grinned at the giggles and winked at the exasperated stares. 

The gall of him! 

I wanted to be him. 

He managed to find his balance enough to reach our dorm. I immediately stepped back to let him in, and to make sure I was in no association with his uncomposed state. Nate gave a disapproving look at his back as he staggered in. 

I took another step back, raised a pointed eyebrow, and closed the door ” — trahison, chapter three

vii. how many ocs does your wip have? who’s your favourite?

my main wip, trahison, has six main characters. out of the main six, my favourite has to be nathaniel. he is very much the epitome of pure, and sometimes i wonder how he ended up in the middle of such a dark plot. 

vii. you have a brand new idea for a wip, what do you do? 

brainstorm, brainstorm, brainstorm. scribble down whatever the hell pops up in my brain, attempt to link it together by a thin string of yarn, cross my fingers and hope for the best.

ix. you are having your first book-signing, where are you?

i’m in a small bookstore, nestled in a corner near the storage room. almost no one knows about this town, so the line is small but chatty, fans exchanging theories and analysing certain paragraphs. the sight of them makes me feel warm inside. 

x. you have the ability to live in any book, publishing or not, what would it be?

would it be too cliche to say the harry potter universe? other than that, other worlds i would love to be a part of is the world in my novel penny lane, or in midst of a detective story.

@evergrcen / @septemberliterature

i. how did you come up with your wip’s title? what does it mean in relation to the story?

okay, so i discovered the word ‘trahison’ after hearing my french teacher say it, and immediately knew i had to use it for something. ‘trahison’ means betrayal or treason in french, which is one of the main themes in the novel. 

ii. do you title your chapters? if so, what’s your favourite?

I don’t, but I would love to!!

iii. what’s a recent line you really like?

Not a very dramatic or noteworthy line, but here’s one from a poem i’m writing:

“ So the two of you get in the car, proceeding to have an argument with the radio ” — examples of easy solutions, or the one where the internet has no answers. 

iv. are there any writing-related quotes you really like?

“i think a lot of art is trying to make someone love you” — keaton henson

v. do you have an idea for a cover design for your story?

A black background with serif text, that’s it. It’s simple. It’s mysterious. It’s the type of vibe I want to exude. 

vi. what sort of au can you imagine your story being?

...dark academia au anyone?

just kidding. in all seriousness, though, i can see a royalty/political au for trahison, or a medieval fantasy au!

vii. which oc would be the most angry with you as the writer?

eloi. i really need to give that poor boy a break. 

viii. if you had to tell the story from a different pov, which character would you choose?

ruby! she’s the token enigma of trahison, so i think her point of view would be very interesting to see. 

ix. what would be your oc’s taste in music if they lived in our world?

OKAY let’s see:

marin — classic rock, so the who, queen, def leppard.etc

ruby — that one person who you’re pretty sure only listens to classical music, but is actually very attuned to modern day music. she would mostly listen to female singer-songwriters, so take lorde, marina, lana del rey, and other such artists. 

beth — take one look at her playlist, and you’ll see that ninety five percent of it is mitski, while the other five percent is bedroom pop. she would like very tender, calm, cry to in bed music. 

Antoine — same as marin, but add other modern day music artists with eclectic sounds, such as twenty one pilots, arctic monkeys, that sort of thing.

nathaniel — classical music, instrumentals, and film soundtracks make up his playlist. if it has sung words, he won’t listen to it. has little to no understanding of modern day music and is too scared to find out more about it.

isadora — 2000’s diva pop plays in the background of her life. rihanna is her go to whenever she gets to control the party. Don’t be surprised if ‘rich girl’ by gwen stefani starts playing in your head at the sight of her. 

x. what’s one personal goal you want to achieve by the end of the story?

finishing it with pride!

[porchwood]

Hi just so I understand cause i keep waiting for it and it doesnt seem likely to happen have you kind of fallen out of love with wtm? and everlark in general tbh? cause ive been following you for a while now and you always had lil quotes and pictures and things that reminded you inspired you whatever it was about katniss and wtm and now alllll it is is gadge i followed you because personally i love what you did with everlark and im just wondering if thats gone and not foreseeable any time soon?

I’ve been thinking a lot about how to answer this… It’s afair question - to a point. If you’re more of a drop-in person (like me) thanlive-on-the-dash, coming back to find my blog awash in Gadge might have beenquite upsetting. There are several reasons for the current state of things:

1. Life has been driving me into the ground since December26, 2013. (Yes, going on six straight years.) If you were a WtM reader from thebeginning, you may recall that I was pretty energetic and prolific in 2012-2013.Oh, there were tough times, but nothing like what started on the aforementioneddate (a car accident where I was in the “bystander” vehicle and it still got totaled)and has continued relentlessly ever since. Sometimes adversity leads to greatcreativity and sometimes it turns you into a depressed, exhausted, reclusivelump, and the past 5+ years have seen periods of both from me. These past 18months have been exceptionally awful (and expensive), resulting in very littlewriting at all, about any pairing.

2. Writing WtM takes a lot out of me. I don’t know whether thisis common knowledge or not, but it’s the gospel truth. I love that world, Ilove that version of Everlark, but every chapter requires so much hard work, itmakes me tired just to think of it. Not to mention, over the past couple of chaptersEverlark have been pushing for more intimacy than the plot/timeline allows, andso I’ve been struggling with how I want to handle that. Do I fight them andstick to the plan? (I can’t advance the timeline for several reasons.) Do I tryto figure out a cheat for them? They’ve got minds of their own and have changedmy plans multiple times, but this is something they genuinely can’t have, and Ihave to fight them on it. ☹ Which is sad, frustrating, and exhausting.

3. I’m a multi-pairing shipper, and have been from about 3chapters into WtM. Which means that my Everlark fics almost always feature asecondary pairing (or more than one), and sometimes I’ll get a plot bunny for afic about a pairing other than Everlark. Most writers in the THG fandom exclusivelywrite their OTP, whatever the plot bunny, but I find that some plot bunnies don’tfit Everlark as well as they do another pairing. (This is why I’ll never write aBeauty and the Beast Everlark fic unless Katniss is the “Beast,” if you will.)

4. The Everlark fandom is…tricky. I’ve never fit in there. Idon’t write Everlark the way the majority of fans see them (except for Peetabeing “sweet,” I guess), I hated the movies (I refuse to see MJ 1 or 2), and I’vemanaged to really rub some people the wrong way over the years –unintentionally, and for a variety of reasons – all of which leaves me feeling kinda down about Everlark in general. Don’t misunderstand me: I love Everlarkand WtM, but it’s really isolating to be this sad little island of unpopularopinions and unwelcome side-ships. That’s the part I really wish I could makeyou understand. For six years I’ve had Christopher Plummer in my head saying, “You’llnever be one of them,” and he’s so, cruelly, right. I want to cry every time Ithink of Embracing the Season (my E-rated Everlark modern AU oneshot for Lovein Panem - lots of daring for me!) because I poured heart and soul into that andit still wasn’t the Everlark that people wanted.

5. About a year and a half ago (when Strawberry Time reallytook off of its own accord) I participated in Gadge Day 2017, working my buttoff to find and schedule (and tag) over 100 carefully chosen Gale/Madge/Gadge aestheticposts, and for lack of a better way to say it: it turned on my Gadge-dar. After that, thosekinds of posts just leapt out at me whenever I had a chance to scroll, and forseveral months I wasn’t sure what to do with that. With a little encouragementfrom @ghtlovesthg, I came up with #march madgeness – wherein I turned my Tumblrinto Madge/Gadge-land for one month, and it was a blast. (Side-stepping Gadgefor a moment: Madge is a highly underappreciated and underused character,especially in fic/on Tumblr and I love splashing the dash with Madge-love.) Thenext month I launched a run of pent-up Everlark posts (i.e., regularprogramming), but I missed my Madge, so I instituted #madge monday – one day aweek when I could splash the dash with Madge/Gadge. At every juncture I gavepeople tags to block if they didn’t want to see this content (though I stillget unfollows every time I post, alas). I participated in last summer’s THG Reread– on the fringe of it, but my posts (reblogs and meta) were strongly Everlark-focusedagain during that time. So there’s definitely still been Everlark on my blog,but if you’re just dropping in (or for that matter, glancing at my archive), you’regoing to see a majority of Madge/Gadge.

6. Frankly, Gadge is fun. It’s a completely different dynamicthan Everlark, with less pressure to create something transcendent, and whenthe chips are down, I’m more likely to work on something that isn’t my six-years-runningopus. This spring, in the midst of lots of awfulness, I finally wrote a piecethat I’ve had in my head for years – The Best Part of Waking Up – with a differentpairing featured in each drabble “chapter,” including Gadge, Luka/Johanna (whoI’ve been wanting to put out there for AGES) and Jack/Raisa. I haven’t beenable to write quickly in years, and I think I finished those three “chapters”in about two days, maybe three. I completed the Raisa drabble in a couple ofhours and I consider it one of the best things I’ve ever written. (Honestly, ifa pairing was going to topple Everlark in my heart, it would be Jack/Raisa, i.e.,Mr. Everdeen/Mrs. Mellark. I love them to distraction.) Once upon a time I could drabble/sprint Everlark too – notoften, but I could manage it. Maybe it’ll happen again someday, but for thetime being, when I write in quick eager bursts, it’s usually about aside-pairing.

7. Because I just need to say it: about a year ago, I set up a secondary Tumblr for almost all my side-interests and ships outside of THG. When I first joined Tumblr, porchwood was just a fun page where I posted whatever struck my fancy (pretty things, funny things, whatever I liked), and over the next few years, I honed it into a pretty “writer’s notebook” for WtM and my other THG fics (related quotes, aesthetic posts, writing check-ins, etc.). When Star Wars: The Force Awakens came out, I shared a handful of posts pertaining to a new ship (not a new direction for my blog or writing, just sharing my excitement) and it was made very clear to me that people didn’t want to see that content on my page. So when I started watching Voltron: Legendary Defender, I had a sneaking suspicion people wouldn’t want to hear about those ships either. So I started an entirely new Tumblr for that content, and every so often I accidentally post something to the wrong page, which I immediately correct in horror, but people still unfollow. Point being: this blog is THG (and a few personal life updates) ONLY, with a pretty consistent aesthetic. I hide literally everything else that I’m interested in so you don’t have to be bothered by it. Is it really so unacceptable for me to have side-ships (complementary to the main pairing, not threatening to them) in the same universe??

8. Believe it or not, I’ve been working on WtM all along,just not making any massive strides. I tried to chip away at the current chapterduring Camp Nanowrimo last July, and it was a disaster. I thought joining awriting group would be helpful, but I didn’t realize that Camp Nano is basicallya lot of writing sprints in which you try to churn out as many words aspossible, which you then report to your “cabin” – and that’s the onlyinteraction with your fellow writers. I can’t write like that anymore (seeabove) and especially not when it comes to WtM, so I got discouraged veryquickly and sort of drifted away. I reattempted Nano on my own in April and wrotealmost 15K words, but in that instance I was really just using the Nano platform toset and reach a goal (which I didn’t ☹ ); I wasn’t in a cabin and didn’t interact with anyother writers, except my friend @ghtlovesthg, who read the finished portion.

9. I want to finish this dang chapter so much, and frankly, theonly way that’s going to happen is if life gets a little better and I holemyself up with my laptop for hours on end for weeks at a time – and somemagical being comes to support/cheer/comfort me while I do so. It’s currentlysitting at about 25K and I anticipate it will need to be at least double that,which is beyond ridiculous, but that’s the nature of WtM. The chapters are asmany words as it takes.

TL, DR: I still love Everlark and I’m still working on WtM, but my life has been extremely difficult for a very long time and I don’t have a great Everlark lifeline. Gadge and all my other ships are fun, and most of the Gadge you see on my Tumblr is aesthetic stuff for themed days/months/occasions. Anything non-THG goes on my sideblog.

[sun-summoning]

just some sarada and sakura stories 

i. future

sarada’s favourite version of dress up involves taking parts of her mother’s gear that she no longer uses, particular armour that’s too big for her and a cat mask of porcelain that has been long put to rest. sarada runs around the house draped in black and with the mask on her face, leaping from one piece of furniture to the other while explaining that the floor is lava. 

when sakura enters the room, walking over said lava, sarada turns to her dinosaur and rabbit teammates and tell them that lady blossom is here and that they mustn’t fall for the tricks hidden in her apron.

her mother raises an eyebrow at her. “am i supposed to be the bad guy?”

“yes, mama!”

“what should i do?”

“bad guy things, duh.”

her mother laughs and agrees and soon she has sarada struggling in her embrace.

“no, mama!” sarada yells. “too tight!”

her mother loosens her grip but still holds on to her. “i have you now,” she declares in her evil voice.

“you’ll never get away with this!”

“and time for my secret move,” her mother continues. sarada tenses. “kiss attack!” soon her mother is pressing sloppy kisses to her forehead and cheeks and sarada starts to giggle because she’s ticklish. she yells that she concedes and when her mother’s barrage subsides, sarada pouts at her. 

“when i’m bigger, i’m going to be way stronger,” she declares.

“i’m sure you will, sweetheart.”

“i’m going to smash the ground like you can, mama.” she bites her lip. “when i’m bigger, will you show me how to do that?”

her mother makes a fist and grins and sarada makes one too. “you bet i will.”

-

ii. modern au

when sarada comes home and finds her mother using her laptop, she panics and almost trips on her feet as she grabs the computer away. 

“sarada!” her mother yelps in surprise. she frowns, more concerned that annoyed. “what are you doing--”

“why are you using my laptop?!”

her mother blinks. “you mentioned that you wanted to take a trip together during your school holidays, so i was just doing some research,” she explains. 

she speaks so slowly, so calmly, that sarada remembers that maybe she needed to relax.

“you kids these days.” her mother just shakes her head. “so attached to your devices.”

sarada pouts. “i’m not--”

her mother just pulls her down to the couch, gently prying away the laptop and settling it over both of their laps. she goes through a few tabs, showing sarada some places she was thinking of bringing her. they discuss their family trip and how fun it would be to go to the beach together and bury papa in the sand, and when they’re done, her mother glances at sarada and asks:

“and what was with that reaction earlier, missy?” her mother closes the laptop and puts it on the table. she turns her body and sarada grimaces, realizing they’re about to have a serious discussion. great. “are you hiding something?”

“no!” but sarada answers too quickly. she curses herself, because what kind of ninja would be so poor at hiding information. her mother raises an eyebrow, and knowing that the world’s strongest kunoichi probably has ways of making her talk, sarada rubs the back of her neck and admits almost indiscernibly, “i, um, write, you know, like, stuff.”

“what was that?”

“i like to write.”

when sarada looks up, her mother is nodding and smiling. “can i read--”

“no!” 

her mother isn’t even remotely fazed by all her yelling. “alright then--”

“like, it’s fan fiction.” sarada doesn’t even want to consider how red her face must be right now. “just. stuff. modern aus. fantasy aus. whatever. stop asking questions, mama, jeez!”

-

iii. inheritance

“mama!” sarada yells from the attic. “ma!” she yells again when she gets no repsonse. “maaaaaaaa!”

“yeah?” sakura shouts from downstairs.

“mama, i found your old forehead protector!” sarada has the decency to stand at the edge of the attic entrance. 

“what was that?”

“your forehead protector!”

“what?”

“your forehead protector!”

“oh! okay?”

“can i use it?”

“can you what?”

“can i use it?”

“what--”

“what is wrong with the two of you?!” her father growls when he stomps down the hallway. 

he looks up the ladder at sarada, glaring at her, and then turns his furious gaze to the office where he knows her mother is. “stop yelling across the house!” he scolds. her mother comes into view, having come a little closer so they could try having a quieter conversation. her father continues chiding them, but her mother lets out a guilty giggle that sarada can’t help but share.

“we are very sorry anata,” her mother says. 

“yeah.” sarada tries not to grin too widely. “sorry papa.”

he just rolls his eyes when they start laughing again and walks away. 

her mother soon joins her in the attic. “what were you saying, sweetheart?”

sarada holds up the forehead protector she’d found in a box of her mother’s old things. based on the photos she’s seen, this is the one her mother used when she was in her teens. it’s a little scratched up, but to sarada that just adds to its wonder. her mother took down some of her biggest bads wearing this thing.

can i use this? she wants to ask, but sarada shakes her head. “i’m going to use this,” she declares. 

her mother rests a hand on her head. “yeah?”

“yeah,” sarada says. “is that okay?”

“of course it is.”

-

iv. picture frame

one day sarada finds a box of old photographs and wonders why they’ve never been framed. they’re clearly from her childhood, sometimes featuring her grandparents or naruto or ino, but mostly they’re of her and her mother. when she asks why they’re in a box, her mother looks sad.

“i didn’t want to remind you of the fact that it was just the two of us,” her mother admits.

sarada looks at the first few: her and her mother having a picnic, her and her mother at the beach, her and her mother with their garden. they’re all close-ups, selfies taken by her mother or with a tripod, reminding sarada that it really was just the two of them for quite some time.

“and i didn’t want to hurt your father like that either.”

sarada’s lips thin. her mother has always been painfully kind, and sarada hates hearing about the sacrifices she’s made for for her. 

“but,” her mother continues, “i couldn’t stop myself.” she shrugs. “really, these photos were just for me.” she moves to take the box back but sarada shakes her head and brings it to her chest.

“no,” sarada whines. “they’re mine now.” her mother raises an eyebrow and sarada just shrugs. “fine. they’re ours. can i take a few and frame them?”

her mother just smiles. “take whichever ones you want.”

-

v. “because we have you..."

sarada reads a lot, from ninjutsu scrolls to medical texts to trashy romance novels. she can’t help but enjoy the excessiveness of the latter books, and sometimes she wonders how her parents were able to be away from each other for so long.

“were you ever worried?” sarada asks her mother. it might be rude, but her curiosity is getting the better of her. and she knows their bond. sarada could never ask her father something like this without the mood dampening severely. with her mother, they can turn this into a joke.

“worried that he’d what, cheat on me?”

“yeah.”

her mother actually snorts. “oh, no, not at all.”

“really?” sarada glances at the novel she’d been reading. the husband had stayed faithful during his years away from his wife, but that didn’t stop the drama caused by another character implying infidelity. “how come?”

“how come i believed my husband would be faithful to me, his wife?” 

sarada rolls her eyes. “you don’t have to be a smartass.”

her mother laughs. “i’m not trying to be,” she teases. “many reasons. he would never do that to you, for one.”

“that wouldn’t have anything to do with me...”

“it would have everything to do with you,” her mother points out. “he would never do anything to hurt our family. you father loves you so much, sarada.”

“but it’s not about me.”

“well and he wouldn’t do anything to hurt me either.” her mother stops folding the laundry. she glances at sarada’s novel and rolls her eyes at its cheesy cover. “sasuke loves me,” she says. she sounds a little exasperated, as if she’d had to have this conversation too many times, but for her child, she’d power through it once more. “before i was his wife, i was his friend and i was his teammate, and he would never do something to damage our relationship like that.”

“oh.” sarada rubs her neck and wonders why she had to ask about this at all. “o--okay.”

“and besides,” her mother continues, “that’s just not who your father is. something like infidelity -- it’s entirely out of character for him.”

-

vi. through her eyes

one morning sarada looks at herself and wonders what she might be like had she had green eyes. 

it’s a simple thing, but sarada thinks it would make many changes to her life.

for one, she thinks people would have seen her mother in her with a little less struggle. sarada gets it. she’s every bit her father from his colouring to his attitude to his sharingan. but that’s it. nurture was the biggest part of her upbringing and sarada is just like her mother in so many ways undetectable ways.

she probably wouldn’t have been so doubtful during her adolescence, either. deep down, sarada knows her idea was, ultimately, really stupid. 

glasses? glasses? she thought she might have had a different mother because of glasses? she doesn’t even want to think about how needlessly convoluted the story would have been, how insulting it would have been to everyone involved, and how utterly absurd it all would be had her stupid, stupid glasses theory been true.

what was she even thinking?

she hurt her mother with those doubts, but her mother is so painfully, foolishly kind and barely spared the apology a moment of thought.

sarada looks at her reflection and thinks she looks like her father, but if she concentrates for a moment, she sees her mother there too.

she’s there in the way sarada smiles, the way she stays confident and leads and comforts others when need be. 

she’s there in the way sarada’s hands seek to help those in need. she shatters the ground like her mother, mends wounds like her mother. she doesn’t have the same medical precision, but her mother taught her enough first aid.

and she’s there in the way sarada looks out and is able the best in others. she’s there in sarada’s capacity for hope.

-

vii. freestyle

when sarada becomes hokage she gains access to a lot more information. she knows she can learn more about her clan’s heritage, but she also feels like that’s something she should address with her father personally. they’ve discussed a few things, but he seems to think he’s protecting her from something so sarada has learned to just leave him alone.

there is one piece of information that catches her off guard though. she goes straight to her parents’ house and with her father out tending to the garden, she sits across from her mother. she drops her hat onto the table and asks her mother:

“why didn’t you become hokage?”

her mother blinks. she’s retired but she’s still one of the finest kunoichi this world has ever seen and she maintains her soft smile. “what do you mean, darling?”

sarada rolls her eyes. “stop that.”

“stop what?”

“pretending.”

“i’m not--”

“i know it was unofficial, but there are still some records,” sarada points out. “tsunade-sama and kakashi asked you to be the next hokage. what...what happened?”

“what happened?” her mother echoes, still grinning. she rolls her eyes as if this is a silly question and then she shrugs. “lots of things really.”

“don’t give me that.”

“it’s true.”

“mama--”

“you happened, sarada.” it sounds like a jab, but her mother reaches across the table to hold her hand. she smiles the way she does when she wants sarada to understand something, but sarada can’t quite comprehend this.

sarada has wanted this role for so long that sometimes she doesn’t remember why she ever did. and to find out it was offered to her mother long ago? and her mother declined it? 

“the hokage must devote so much of their time and their life to the village,” her mother explains. she’s said this before to sarada. “i couldn’t do that. i didn’t want to have to be away from you. maybe i’m selfish, choosing you over this village, but i made the right choice and i know it.” she touches sarada’s cheek. “after all, look at what you’ve become.”

sarada wonders what her life would have been like had her mother taken up the mantle when it was offered to her.

would her father have left? would the world still be the same had he not gathered the intel he did in his absence? would she and her mother still have been close? probably not. the seventh loves boruto and boruto loves him too, but their bond is so tense and awkward and love or not, their relationship could never compare to what sarada has with her mother.

sarada considers all the past hokage, so many of them childless, and the ones that did have families ended up fairly estranged. would that have been her and her mother? if her mother had been the seventh, would she have been painting obscenities on the mountain? and god forbid, if her father still had to leave too, what then? would she have been raised by her grandparents? would she--

"i never wanted the role, anyway,” her mother clarifies. 

sarada can’t help but snort, because according to the seventh, even her father once made a comment about one day being hokage.

“i wanted to be stronger, i wanted to make the world a better place, and i wanted to make sure your father was happy,” her mother summarizes. “and then when you came along, all i wanted was to make sure you had the best life i could offer you.”

which, sarada understands, she never could have done as hokage. 

“oh,” sarada breathes. “o--okay.”

her goals were so simple it’s almost baffling, but her mother has always been a fairly simple woman. sarada nods and wonders why this revelation is so reeling. maybe it’s because given the importance of being hokage to sarada, the fact that her mother could decline it so easily implies just so much.

“you’re my baby,” her mother says.

“mom.”

“you are!” 

“ugh--”

“oh stop that.” her mother rolls her eyes. “you think because you’re hokage now, you aren’t my little girl?” she shakes her head. “you’ll always be my baby, sarada.”

“yeah, yeah...”

sarada stays a bit longer, asking about how they’re doing and how boring retirement is and if they’ve developed new old people hobbies. eventually the sun starts to set and her father comes back inside and says he’ll get dinner started. when they ask sarada to join, she declines gently. she slacked off the whole afternoon, after all, just chatting with her mother. 

“you did it, by the way,” sarada tells her as she stands. she grabs her hat off the table and her mother stands too, pulling sarada into her arms. 

“did what, sweetheart?”

sarada grins. “you gave me the best life you could offer. thank you, mama.”

-

fin

[nycto-draggo]

https://hamsterboy3.tumblr.com/post/162993100292/ive-got-a-question-is-post-game-asgoriel

Actually @hamsterboy3​, send this to @safeundertale. The pussies over there blocked me, but I'm not done with this fucking tangent, and I don't actually have shit to do today.

So, mod "A relationship that isn’t built on mutual respect is an unhealthy one" chara! Tell me more about how Asgoriel is on a level with fontcest!

You know, the incest ship that 60% of this garbage fandom obsesses over!

The one that people will make up AUs just to add more 'content' to!

The one that the creator of Underswap left social media because of how badly it poisoned their own creation!

The one that basically turned Undertale to 2010s gaming as supernatural is to TV shows!

The one where Sans and Papyrus both are flanderized beyond belief just to appeal to 15 y/os' sexual fantasies!

The reason this fucking fandom gives no shits about the dozens of other unique characters in Undertale!

Yes, that's right! All of that is true [give or take on '60%']!

Now tell me more about how a ship encouraging an estranged couple making amends and getting back together [@nightnurse57​ will especially know my point here] is JUST AS BAD as incest, which plenty of poor children out there have been forced into and traumatized by in real life, to the point they have trust issues and trouble functioning at all in social situations?

How Asriel being able to see his parents put aside their past problems and get along again is as abhorrent as two flanderized, gary-stu versions of Sans- from different AUs where the rest of Undertale's characters may as well not exist- fucking eachother, conceiving and birthing a child, and having that child in a relationship with YET ANOTHER SANS LIKE THE ABOVE?

Oh, but y'know, I guess I'm wrong! fontcest is actually fine compared to asgoriel! How dare a husband and wife that aren't even legally divorced make up after a fight? [Just kidding, all the above points are right, and you're fucking stupid. How dare you step on the hands of people trying to have some wishful thinking.]

So, moving on from that; Mod "non canon gay ships are kinky and sinful?" sans!

You seem to be pretty fired up about defending flanderization, mister "asexuality is not a sexuality" aphobic smear on the reputation of otherkin. So tell me-

Just how rare is it to find "fan x celebrity" on pornhub? Hmm? In a COMPLETELY UNRELATED NOTE, what's the underlying theme of Papyrus x Mettaton?

How about "employee x boss' ex-wife"? After all, that's what Sans and Toriel are to eachother. Not lovers, just two people that get together now and then to talk about puns. Sans doesn't even tell her about himself beyond Papyrus, nor does the reverse happen when you consider he doesn't know who she really is until meeting her in person. If we're going to put an accurate analogy to this, it's an online 'relationship' where neither party actually talks about themself, just events in their lives. That lack of trust doesn't go very far in real life, let me tell you. I've seen plenty of examples.

Oh yeah, and the fact Sans canonically sees Toriel as an 'old lady'. Real surprising how much of this fandom is into cougar chasers!

Side note: "What Im Saying Is The Game Doesnt Ever Mention They Had Sex". That's kind of, like, fucking retarded [No, I mean the actual slow-to-process-information definition] to say. If Asgore and Toriel have a canonical, biological child, they had their kind's equivalent of sex. End of discussion. That is how biology works.

But I'll be honest here: I skimmed through information about your blog. You cherry-pick ships that the fandom swoons over and aren't straight up illegal, you support aphobia [also fuck you for that, that's gross], and your piddly counterarguments are so fucking stupid that when someone like me comes along, all you can do is block me, effectively running away from the debate entirely. Clearly you'd be perfect politicians by today's standards.

So, unlike @hamsterboy3 said,

I do not agree with your blog as a concept.

Yes, pedophilia shouldn't exist, but you're fucking liars about being against character erasure, as you support content that is nothing but it.

I have been banned from sites and games before simply for speaking my mind, and honestly? I do not give a shit, because I actually have the balls to call out idiocy like yours with no filter added.

I do not support you guys, and hating on Asgoriel when you support the likes of papyton and soriel is absolutely disgusting.

ABSOLUTELY SEE THIS AS HATE TOWARDS YOU *THINGS*.

I, too, am simply trying to educate- in the way a parent will physically discipline a child that has done something going drastically against the rules they've outlined.

If you have any questions or wish to say something, then oops, you cowards already blocked me.