#literally cannot navigate em

[sistarstarly]

i need tumblr to stop with these interacting ads that take up the whole screen and also the fuck ass monopoly ad that is conveniently where i’d place my finger while scrolling and even if i’m scrolling it’ll always click the ad

[kvetchinglyneurotic]

Semi-coherent Nope thought of the day: the way that the Haywoods and Ricky/Jupe understand and react to Jean Jacket is an extension of the way they navigate the experience of working in Hollywood as POC.

Ricky cannot differentiate his identity and experiences from the narratives which Hollywood has imposed on him: he's the Asian kid from Gordy's Home and Kid Sheriff; he still calls himself Jupe and runs a theme park based on a role he played as a child. He relates to the Gordy's Home incident not through the lens of his own memories but the media around it — the SNL sketch he describes to Emerald, the memorabilia in the hidden shrine in his office. It's his inability to conceptualize the world outside the lens of spectacle that prevents him from understanding what Jean Jacket is and why she behaves the way she does — he starts from the assumption that he can make her into a theme park attraction and works backwards from there.

In contrast, the Haywoods and OJ in particular are characterized by their ability to see things as they are, and their insistence that others do the same with them: they make a deliberate effort to combat the erasure of Black people in Hollywood — and their own ancestors in particular — by recounting the history of Haywoods' Hollywood Horses at the start of each safety meeting rather than resigning themselves to being the nameless "horse guys." Similarly, OJ refuses to accept the official narrative surrounding his father's death — that the coin that killed him fell out of a prop plane — when it contradicts his own memories of the event, and it's his trust in his own judgement, coupled with his refusal to anthropomorphize animals (including extraterrestrial ones) is what allows him to accurately predict Jean Jacket's behaviour. Neither Jupe nor the Haywoods deserve to be treated the way they are under the Hollywood system, but OJ and Em find a way to avoid being (literally) consumed by it, while Jupe does not.

[codecicle]

are you actually 14 ?? garfield are you /srs or /j (I will be honest. I haven't looked under a readmore on your pinned until now because its just. a lot. blinkers are a lot for me, cannot look at em. and what?)

I've said some stuff in your tags before that I am now. So Unsure about

not about you don't even worry. but about posts. and I'm like. fuck.

i am! i try to be as transparent as possible about it because this account is very very separated from irl me (so i dont have to worry about internet saftey AS MUCH ((i still try dw)) as i would with a site with my real face or name or anything like that) and it can help other people in this fan space where there is . A lot of adults figure out how to navigate conversations with me in normal/respectful way

with that being said, i am very capable of standing up for myself and explaining when things make me uncomfortable! so if you're worried about any tags you've ever left or anything you've said i promise if I had a problem i would've said something!! i understand it's the adult's responsibility to draw that line but also i really am just chill with it in general. jokes and otherwise are totally fine and anything you've said ive most likely laughed at and that's it. as long as you're not sending me literal explicit dms or asks I really don't mind the thirsting in tags lmao GOD knows I've done it. worlds biggest faggot over here

also i didn't consider the blinkers would prevent people from seeing that! ill see if i can reformat it a bit so people can see the warning above the cut without the flashing :] thanks for telling me <3

[shurisneakers]

Okay before I start I just want to say that I love you and I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve read Harmless. I literally just finished rereading it last week and I miss it already. BUT THEN I FOUND OUT YOU POSTED THE FIRST TWO CHAPTERS OF UNSOLVED AND I AM ALREADY ADDICTED!

Also FYI this is gonna be a long ask and I’m sorry 😬

But hear me out, okay. As soon as I read the first two chapters of unsolved I thought of this story. A couple years ago my mom and I had this ghost show craze and the things people claim to have gone through is insane (I’m not really sure whether I believe in ghosts and stuff or not, tbh) But anyway this one show (which I can’t remember the name of) did a segment on this graduate student who was renting an apartment from her professor at a discount rate sometime during the late 90s/early 2000s. She moves in and starts being followed and watched by a shadow person/poltergeist who does poltergeist shit like open cabinets, steal keys, bang on things, etc. Most notably though, it steals a whole block of cheese which she was using to make mac and cheese. She tears the kitchen apart to find it, knowing that she just had it on the counter beside her, but cannot find it. Weeks later she opens her utensil drawer and there’s the block of cheese, molded. (I don’t know if you’re looking for actual cases or making them up or a bit of both)

So anyway, I had some thoughts on how Bucky and his partner would potentially respond to this story (all of which is potentially very lame and cringy so I’m sorry in advance for that, too.)

Okay, so my thoughts are that Bucky asks what kind of cheese it was and the reader thinks ‘why the fuck does this matter?’ But she replies something like “idk, she’s a poor college student so probably velveeta or some shit.” He says “that shit doesn’t mold! It’s got enough preservatives in it to kill and mummify a horse!” and she’s like “well maybe it was some other cheese, then” already exasperated at the frivolous line of questioning. But he continues to be a little shit and says something like “maybe she didn’t look for it in the utensils drawer” and she responds, incredulously, with “she would have had to get a fucking fork at some point” and he says “maybe she got ’em from take out” and she’s like “she’s a poor grad student?!” And he’s like “it’s called living beyond your means. Maybe she didn’t care about her credit score.” And the reader is sure that she’s gonna have an aneurysm. Also I know he would steal cheese or some other food item from Sam or Clint or the reader later just to fuck with ‘em.

Thanks for putting up with my rambling 😊

HIIIII VIOLET ❤️❤️ I just wanted to say that I see your reblogs all the time in my notifications and i appreciate it so so much. Thank you reading my fics, it really means the world to me!!

I do make up the cases in Unsolved! i didn't want to accidentally disrespect anybody or beliefs, and that becomes a tricky area to navigate when you're using IRL cases so i thought that fiction was the best way to go about it

Why did I think you were going to tell me that the professor was living in the dorm and just screwing with her. Like those other cases where food disappears from kitchens and the homeowners realise that there's someone else living in the home with them

you're absolutely right, he would call out the stupidest fucking details and the kind of cheese is most definitely at the top. i LOVE this exchange you've written-- it really does feel like them especially the whole "she's a fucking grad student??????" part lmfafhfhf

I'd love to turn this or something similar into a mini drabble one of these days, if you'd be okay with that!

thank you so so much for this ask. i loved it and read it like 15 times today. and thank you for the time and effort you spend in reblogging my nonsense, i appreciate you so much ❤️❤️❤️

[beautifulduckweed]

Book Review: Daniel Cabot Puts Down Roots

The Premise:

It’s 1973 in New York City, and slacker music critic Daniel Cabot is basically married to his extremely hot pediatrician BFF, Alex Savchenko. Alas, in tried and true idiot fashion, neither of them have any idea what to do about it. Alex is prickly and is of the (CORRECT) opinion that feelings are bad and they should feel bad and the best way to handle them is to jam ’em in a corner and tell them to think about what they’ve done until they either behave or go away. Daniel is sunny, open-hearted, and isn’t like, opposed to feelings, but also, like, what are feelings, whomst can say. They’re both turbo in love, everyone around them knows it, and they sooooooorta know it but also, in classic Cat Sebastian weapons-grade idiots style, have no idea what to do with it. Along the way, Daniel helps build a community garden next to his literally crumbling East Village apartment, Alex faces new challenges at his clinic, and they both navigate their way, slowly and at a slant, towards each other’s hearts.

Comes out November 15. You can find purchase links here.

Dramatis Personae:

Daniel Cabot: Some of you may recognize Daniel as Tommy Cabot’s son from Tommy Cabot Was Here. He’s a sweet-natured freewheeling dude, but also struggling to find meaning in his life. His Boston Brahmin-esque family (they’re not the Kennedys, but also are not-NOT the Kennedys) have some awesome members, mostly his immediate family, but the extended members are…shall we say…more of a mixed bag. He’s managed to dodge serving in Vietnam thanks to the machinations of his mother, and boy he has some real mixed feelings about that. He loves fucking his friends, and he really wants to fuck Alex, except, uh, Alex is…more than a friend? Or is he? Anyway, until Daniel sorts his shit out, he figures he can haul a bunch of heavy stuff around and rehabilitate the vacant lot next to apartment and into a garden.

Alex Savchenko: A Ukrainian whose family fled war and chaos for New York City when he was a child, Alex is prickly, autistic, and fiercely loyal. He’s particular, difficult, and is all-too conscious about this fact, which is why he finds Daniel’s acceptance, loyalty, and gung-ho willingness to accommodate a bit bewildering. He’s convinced he’s Bad At People, but he can’t afford to lose Daniel, who is Good At People, and also his feelings are no longer obeying orders, in fact his feelings are in open revolt, so what’s a guy to do?

Co-starring: Tommy Cabot (I would die for him); Patricia Cabot, Daniel’s mom (I would also die for her); Daniel’s absolutely terrible grandmother; assorted friends, lovers, and neighbors; the got-damn city of New York itself.

Commentary:

This book blew me the fuck out of a giant funk I’ve been in since about July, during which I didn’t manage to finish any new books and baaarely managed to scrape through a couple of beloved KJ Charles rereads (two of which I did as canon review for the KJ Charles exchange, ha). I cannot express how much I love it. As with all of the other books in the Cabot-verse, it features:

Sweater wearing (including a sweater vest, ah, Alex my beloved)

A plot that consists of “people are generally very sweet to each other and have a lot of feelings that they don’t know what to do with”

Crying (though less than Tommy Cabot)

And as with all of my favorite Cat Sebastian novels, this story is all about idiots coming to realize that they do in fact love each other and have for a while now, but now they need to work out the shape of what it looks like, and what their lives together look like. Like, it’s immediately obvious within five pages of the book that Daniel and Alex are basically an old married couple, they just haven’t gotten around to fucking yet, and also they are buried in denial.

And then, oh god. They do get around to fucking. And it is glorious. This is one of the highest heat books Sebastian has put out yet, either on par with or hotter than Peter Cabot, so if you liked that aspect of Peter Cabot, you are gonna have a Very Good Time with Daniel Cabot.

A note about the sense of place in this story: that mention of New York as a side character is not a joke. I’ve only been to NYC twice, so it’s not like I’m some kind of expert, but goddd the sense of place I got from this book was next-level. I could picture the diners, the restaurants, the buildings, the streets; I could smell Daniel’s apartment. Sebastian pulls off an act of wizardry with this; of all the books I’ve read of hers, this is the one most firmly anchored in a sense of place, and I love it, because it’s pretty clear she loves it. She even has a note in the acknowledgements about the apartment she lived in that’s the basis for Daniel’s apartment. Love it (though mildly concerned about her health after living with so much mold).

Anyway it might be too much to say that Daniel Cabot cleared my skin, watered my crops, etc. etc. but it for goddamn sure patched over some sore spots in my heart and fixed my reading brain. Since I’ve finished it in mid-October, I have gone on to finish three other novels, which is more than I’ve managed to do between June and October. Part of me wants to go back and reread it already. (The other part recognizes that I have over twenty library books checked out and I should probably get a move on those first.)

(But also. This book.)

TL;DR:

Daniel Cabot, more than any other romance novel I’ve read in a long time—or possibly ever—is about two people who love each other a whole lot, and then learn to negotiate what they want with and from each other; along the way, they figure out where their boundaries lie, and how those boundaries make their relationship stronger. It takes a lot of bravery to bring up what you need in order to feel safe and nurtured, and the fact that these two do it—allow themselves to be fully and truly vulnerable with each other—makes me absolutely goddamn feral. Just. Fuckin’ read this book already.

[thefanficmonster]

Few Too Many

Corpse Husband x Reader (Female)

Warnings: Swearing, In-game violence and death, Suggestive comments

Genre: Protective fluff, Humor, RPF (Real Person Fic)

Summary: Jealousy is a dangerous thing, especially when the jealous person is armed with a gun....in a game of Counter Strike. At least Y/N’s friend will now know not to mess around and flirt with her, especially not with Corpse around.

Requested by 🐐 Anon. Hi dear! Thank you so much for your request! Sorry it’s taken me so long to complete and post your request but here it finally is! I didn’t want to make it IRL violence to avoid triggering anyone while I also felt it’d be very ooc for Corpse to beat someone up but I still hope you enjoy the fic if you come across it and read it! Love, Vy ❤

“Hey everyone!“ Y/N greets her squad as they all customize their characters while I sit there, observing and unknowing of what I’m supposed to do. “I invited Corpse to play with us today, hope y’all don’t mind.”

“Of course not! Nice to finally meet you, Corpse. We’ve heard a ton about you from Y/N, thanks for making our girl the happiest she’s ever been.“ One of her friends says, the tone of his voice suggesting he’s only half-joking with the dad like comment he made.

“Nice to meet you too, man. Glad I’m the one she gave the chance of making her happy. That’s all I ever wanna do.“ Though it may sound cheesy, as guys, her friends can probably read into how genuinely I mean what I’ve said.

Dating a girl with only guy friends has it’s pros and cons. Which outweigh which is still up for debate since I’m still researching, but so far so good in my opinion. This is the first time I’m interacting with them directly so I’ve still got a long way to go in terms of getting to know them and the details of their relationship with Y/N better. Regardless, I at least know they can easily understand me and put themselves in my shoes if I ever ‘mess things up’ with Y/N and she goes to complain to them - something that will most likely never happen. I’d never dare make this girl upset. Chances are, if I do, her friends won’t get to me on time - I would deliver my own punishment just the way I think I deserve it. However, there’s also the chance of them getting super protective of her and ganging up on me over something as small as a fight. By the many things and stories Y/N’s shared with me about them, I believe they wouldn’t think twice about kicking someone’s ass for her. They’re not massive dudes - I’ve seen pictures of them - but I for one don’t ever wanna see em angry.

“Ay bro, what’d you do to score our best girl? You must know what she likes. If so please, by all means, do tell.“ One of them, not the one who was previously talking, speaks up, his words making me furrow my brows in both confusion and irritation.

I open my mouth to complain as I slowly start cracking my knuckles when Y/N and her friends beat me to it. Thing is, Y/N’s friend group consists of three guys and her and yet four voices scolded the guy that made that suggestive comment. That being said, this guy probably isn’t considered to be one of her friends, at least not one that’s a permanent part of her friend group.

“Seth, cut it out!“ The guy I was previously speaking to says sharply before softening his tone to refer to me, “Sorry about my brother, excuse his lack of brain cells, please.“

Just then, I also receive a message from someone. Checking my phone, turns out it’s Y/N who by the way is currently in the living room while I’m in the recording room. Her text reads:

Y/N ~ Ignore Seth. I told Leo to not invite him but he’s still here somehow

I send her back a quick reassuring text before answering the guy I now know is named Leo, “No worries, it’s fine.”

“See? The guy can take a joke, you’re all just freaking out over nothing!“ Seth laughs, reminding me and the others of how loud he is compared to us.

Despite acting like it’s no big deal, I can’t help but admit to myself that this behavior of Seth’s has awoken a deeply buried suspicion of mine that’s not only mine but also arises in every guy whose girlfriend hangs out with a lot of guys. It’s not that I don’t trust Y/N - she could literally blindfold me and tell me to walk through a pool of lava, promising it wouldn’t hurt and I’d do it - but we all know about that saying that every guy in a group with one girl has liked said girl at least once.

Disturbing to think these four, including Seth five, dudes could’ve possibly been my competition at some point. It’s nice that they’re all super chill about it, mostly cause some of them have girlfriends as I was told.

Nevertheless, we get over that hiccup and carry on with the small talk and preparations for the game. Since it’s my first time playing CSGO, Y/N, Leo and her other friend Clancy explain the mechanics to me in detail to avoid me getting confused mid-game and getting myself killed. When they finish, we start the round and wait for the game’s algorithm to separate us into two teams which Y/N jokingly refers to as cops and robbers. Unfortunately, the end result of that separation ends up being me getting put in the terrorists’ force with Leo and Clancy while Y/N’s with the FBI, partnered with Seth and her other friend Evan.

“Alright, team, we shall now disperse. Corpse, remember, if you see more than one of them, radio in and lay low, we’ll be with you as soon as possible.“ Leo informs me as he runs off in one direction, Clancy going in the opposite. I confirm I understand and go along my way too, heading for this ancient looking structure that looks like it could belong in an old-timey movie. 

Walking in, I realize the place is way bigger than it appeared on the outside. A quick look up confirms that there are three fucking floors above, not to mention that the ground floor is huge. Luckily, there are many crates and barrels to hide behind if I come across an FBI agent. I sure as hell hope it’s Y/N, I could maybe even try talking her into giving me a second chance at life and pretend she never saw me. Come to think of it though, I’d probably prefer getting killed by her rather than her friends - especially Seth.

Given that we’re in a Discord call, I can hear all the conversation going on. They are all quiet though, I can just periodically hear the mumbles of someone muttering to themselves as they navigate the map cautiously out of fear of running into their opponent unprepared. The silence is put to an end though when Seth speaks up, addressing Y/N.

“Yo, your boyfriend’s with the terrorists, ain’t he? That’s like the universe giving you a sign that y’all shouldn’t be together.“ The fucker laughs at his own joke while I can literally hear Y/N rolling her eyes.

“Have you heard of Romeo and Juliet, Seth?“ She asks sarcastically, almost getting a chuckle out of me but I suppress it to avoid getting caught listening in.

“Yeah, they both die at the end. Fucking boooriiinngg.“ Just then, I spot two silhouettes entering the building. Aiming my gun at them reveals their names - just the people I’m currently involuntarily eavesdropping on. Seth and Y/N don’t notice me though so I quickly duck behind a crate and prepare to radio in when Seth continues verbally torturing Y/N and dancing on my last nerves, “I personally think the friends-to-lovers trope is far more interesting...“

Did this guy just- no, he’s gotta be fucking kidding me

I’m left with my jaw hanging in disbelief at this guy’s audacity. I have no doubt Y/N’s about to put him in his place herself but I just gotta have my own chat with this guy. And by ‘chat’ I mean I mindlessly rush out from behind the crate towards where I saw him and Y/N and open fire on him.  I hear his startled and upset screams with Y/N’s laughter in the background. She doesn’t try to stop me as a teammate of his should and would, instead she just observes the scene unfold, laughing her ass off.

“Yo man what the fuck was that for?!“ I hear Seth’s yell but only faintly since the sound of gunshots is still echoing through my headphones. Yeah, I’m not done shooting this fucker.

“Corpse...Corpse, buddy...“ Y/N manages through fits of laughter she cannot tame, “That’s a few too many bullets, he’s already dead.”

“And that was a few too many comments for him to be let off the hook.” I answer as sharply as I can with the new-formed smile on my face. What can I say, her happiness is contagious.

“Well, you got your first kill in CSGO. Good job, babe! I’m super proud of you!” She cheers for me, clapping her hands excitedly. 

“Nah that was my first overkill.“ I quickly add, with a more threatening tone: “And it won’t be my last.”

“Let’s just hope there aren’t few too many of these overkills either.“ She snickers.

“That doesn’t depend on me, babe.“ I say smugly, suggestively enough for Seth to pick up the dropped hint. Mother fucker’s officially been put in his place and I couldn’t possibly be happier - with the added bonus of getting a ton of laughter out of Y/N who also decides to walk away, leaving me unharmed but promising to shoot to kill next time she sees me.

I’m ok with that. She could kill me anyday.

@maat-the-prescriptive  @simonsbluee  @save-the-sky  @itsminniekat  @hacker-ghost  @bi-andready-tocry  @imtiredaffff  @jazzkaurtheglorious  @hereforbeebo  @fandomgirl17  @chrysanthykios  @maehemscorpyus  @loraleiix  @letsloveimagines  @annshit  @i-cant-choose-a-username-help  @enigmaticmaze  @divine-artemis  @waterlilypat  @idontknowwhatthisisfam  @evi-ka  @classyandfabulous00  @redperson58  @lilysdaydreams @solowheein  @mythicalamphitrite  @axen-gers  @luckygirl144  @nj01  @buddyemily   @the-albino-lioness  @stardream14  @gdhdkfnn  @nomadicgypsyy  @preciousskye  @fluffysuicideunicornsworld  @o-kaelin  @manacharlotte  @awkward-youtube-trash  @lolalee24  @bonky-beerns  @meme-lord-and-savior-sebastian  @strawbrinkofdeath  @teenloves  @tams0527  @browneyespinkhair  @starstruckllamapuppy  @daisychains012  @y0ulooked  @tinytacosuitcaseflap @supernatural-is-my-only-life  @jula-pauline  @melodykitty  @just-that-bi-girl  @crazybutconfidentaf  @lowellshade @alphakees  @bellero  @weallneednamjesus  @starryhanji  @boiled-onionrings  @husherstan  @fockingwhore  @melaningoddessthings  @prettypastelpetals  @haleypearce  @godwhyamiawkward  @y-napotat  @daisychainyoonmin  @little-miss-rebel3  @free-wheelin-bi-sexual  @redmoon261 @darkacademic2  @wiseflamingoqueen  @into-the-end  @namikhai-i  @nastiablr  @thelittleplantlover  @mirktuan  @dont-hyuck @jjk-bunny  @vintagegothlover  @easygoingtheatre  @itsrandombooklover  @miiaivi  @emmybaybee  @befourgolden  @jjk-is-my-shit  @eternalteaaars  @spacebadgerx  @princesslunalight  @acequinn14  @samm48  @misselsbells06 @simp-lykawa  @fo-love  @marishimomura-blog  @therealglenncoco  @cinnamonbun332  @killtherandomness  @sanshinexxxsan  @fee-btheweeb  @press-lay  @cathleenpotgieter16  @jazzydoesstuff  @moonlxghtbay  @forestrain2000  @hyunjinhugs  @blood-of-fandoms  @lovellylies  @ukiyolixx  @simpforhpcharacters  @chrisdylan17  @parkerjisung  @pedernille  @theodonyous  @wineandionysus  @malfoystilinskii05  @morbid-x  @coryisagee  @jessewa26  @scoobydooluver97 @mindintheskies365  @raeanneinwonderland  @indecisive-empanada  @gluttonypalace  @loriane2503  @btsiguess-kpop  @khaoticbunny  @lucidlycactus  @smiithys  @rottenroyalebooks  @kpopgirlbtssvt  @fangirl-tc27  @fr0z3n-1  @notmesimpingfortechno  @shotarosleftpinky  @kunoi-chan  @idk-whats-wrong-with-me  @yikeroonie  @goldenstarofthunderclan  @poetry-and-tea  @ama-do-writing-stuff  @wishbonewolf  @emeraldxhope  @t0xick1tty  @kusuinko  @speakyourselfloveyourself  @sophia902103  @lo-manburg  @classsykittykat  @dmgama  @depressedpuppythatneedscoffee  @btsiguess-kpop  @akaashi-baby  @gun-jong-simp  @geschichtenfee  @yerapotato-wp  @browneyedgirl365  @thysagclub  @sparklycloudnight  @helloatomicshadow  @queentorresstuff @vtte @val-gal  @lucy-bunny17  @aaliyahh0  @katluckybear  @boyleanti  @straybids  @franchesca-791  @cosmicstorm19  @averyisbackinthetrashcan  @aomi-nabi  @xlanawriter  @allensimpsforcorpse

[subjectsix]

Hi Kip! Ik you don’t really do shipping stuff oof, but do you have any non-romantic headcanons for Jesse and Emily?

Bonus if it’s Jesse, Dylan, and Emily just,,, hanging out as a lil family

hecka yeah I love doing stuff like this lemme roll the marbles in my brain around skdjfhkjdshf

emily and jesse specifically

- Emily defo helped Jesse settle in after the lockdown lifted on the House, both with internal stuff (paychecks and how she gets them, benefits, etc) and external stuff (picking an apartment, helping set it all up, showing her around the city)-- Jesse already knows NYC a decent amount and can navigate on her own just fine, obviously, but she's genuinely settling in now-- this is home and she's putting down roots, and Emily makes that a lot less frightening

- relatedly there's a lot of inside jokes (inside jokes!! jesse cant believe she's somewhere permanent enough to have inside jokes again) about how different the two of them are-- jesse will eat anything, doesn't care to cook much, drinks whatever coffee, is fine picking up the cheapest furniture and dragging it in off the sidewalk, having no bedframe-- Emily is like please literally let me just purchase you some cookware or something. a coffee grinder. some coffee beans. you get paid a director salary you can buy a big couch. a tv. you can get takeout. you don't have to survive on gas station snack runs and cereal. its all in good fun and gets the two of them to crack up anytime it comes up in conversation. jesse starts to play into it when she gets more comfortable.

- big "sit in silence and just do your own thing in the same room" type friends, as well as "the other is rambling and I'm happily listening" types-- even jesse, who is realizing she has a lot to say and is comfortable enough to say it

- neither of these fools get enough sleep so sometimes they'll just explore what new york has to offer at weird hours or message each other to be like "hey happy 3am"

- jesse likes to explore places or do things she probably technically legally can't but the excuse of "hey I'm director right it'll be fine" and emily's insatiable need to have questions answered has resulted in them doing so much dumb crap. polaris encourages it because she helps them get away with it. girls stop exploring the unused subway tunnels they dont all belong to the bureau. who's going to stop them tho they seem so innocent or well meaning! go rulebreakers go

- they have very different movie tastes but like showing each other their faves bc they usually end up liking them, they just never saw it themselves

- jesse cannot read emily's handwriting even a little bit. jesse doesn't like texting bc she avoided it even on her burner phone. phone calls it is!

- Emily loves taking care of plants and she and Jesse will go pick out some a lot-- Jesse's apartment ends up having tons of plants in it.

add a brother in there for funsies

- Dylan takes a long time to warm up to Emily. Part of him wants to befriend her, but way more of him can't get over her being Head of Research for the Bureau or her inquisitiveness-- he's been asked enough questions in his life and doesn't want to be observed ever again.

THAT SAID. I think Dylan and Emily have a lot more in common than they realize. I think they think similarly (as in, the way they process things) and that people tend to treat them both in extremes-- as children or as jerks. They also both have a tangled messy relationship with Darling. So there's a lot to bond over, it just takes time, bc Dylan is being extremely cautious/defensive. Emily doesn't mind, which helps a lot-- she never tries to force a connection, just leaves the door open for one.

- [sit in silence happily gang part 2]

- Dylan has a tendency to say or describe things that should make no sense, but Jesse usually understands as his sister, and Emily usually understands bc shes Just Like That

- actually em and dylan had really similar interests as kids, they discover. very tentative and careful bonding occurs over beloved books and movies. they start swapping book recommendations. em shows him her favorite quiet unknown used book store and it becomes a common haunt for him.

- I headcanon Em as an only child, so she's genuinely fascinated watching Jesse and Dylan interact sometimes. Relatedly, if one of the Fadens shares an embarrassing or funny tidbit about the other to Emily, they'll just start one upping each other. Emily sometimes tries to bait them into doing this.

- Dylan convinced the two to play card games with him. This is how he discovered both Emily and Jesse are extremely competitive. He'd be lying if he said he wasn't a little scared.

[xenosagaepisodeone]

Please may we have some josei recs?

okok I've put some thought into this and here are some lesser known titles I really like

Udon no Hito - I genuinely adore this one (it's drawn by est em!). It is a sensual, slow burn romance between a somewhat older cafeteria worker and a university student at the school she works. cooking, serving and sharing food is suffused into how they express their affection

Ohana Holoholo - The daily life of a woman who lives with her bisexual former girlfriend, and her son.

Shuumatsu no Sadako-san - two little girls traversing a post apocalyptic wasteland befriend Sadako from the ring. Very recent serialization - only one chapter out so far.

The Net Generation Teacher - A 25 year old high school teacher finds that some of his students may be being catfished using photos of him crossdressing from when he was 20. drama ensues. Very recent serialization - hard to tell where it may go but I like what I’ve seen so far.

Shiki no Zenjitsu - deliriously underrated series of oneshots about firsts in relationships (all kinds) with other people

Love My Life - A lesbian ponders on her relationship with her girlfriend, only to find her parents are gay as well. intended as a nuanced look into gay culture in japan. Very important to know that all of Ebine Yamaji’s work are great and deal with similar themes but for the sake of keeping the list short I’m listing the work she’s known the most for.

Hibari no Asa - CW for implied sexual assault. follows a 14 year old girl named Hibari as she attempts to navigate the expectations and assumptions people place on her because of how they perceive her body. this one is very much written from a personal place and I cannot recommend it enough if you are able to handle the subject matter.

Zassou Tachi yo Taishi wo Idake - a short but sweet and realistic SOL about a group of high school girls and the very odd lives they lead.

Gomashio to Pudding - I’m reading this one right now! 22 year old factory worker drunkenly marries an old man, antics ensue. I feel like I should disclose that the pacing isnt great and there are a bit of shoujo tropes (that the mangaka lampshades), but it’s still a nice read.

My Broken Mariko - Upon hearing about the suicide of her best friend, heartbroken and distressed Tomoyo Shiino reflects on her relationship with her friend while on a journey to spread her ashes in the ocean. CW for implied csa

Plica-chan - I will always recommend this one in the hopes that someone picks it up and scans the rest of the chapters. It follows the life of a lonely lesbian looking for love in Japan. it can be a little dark as the titular Plica reflects on the relationships between men and women, as well as her own isolation.

Pieta - Slow burn yuri manga about two very troubled girls who come to find comfort in one another. A classic.

Helter Skelter - written by none other than queen Kyoko Okazaki, Helter Skelter follows the life of high fashion model Liliko as she finds her mind and body falling apart in the twilight of her career.

In Clothes Called Fat - a Moyoco Anno banger. a series about a woman who is suffering from an eating disorder -- comes from a very personal place. you may find the ending less than satisfactory.

Honey and Clover - a group of friends in art school experience the many pitfalls and triumphs of growing up -- I feel like most people are already familiar with Chika Umino's work, but I very much enjoyed this series growing up.

Kakukaku Shikajika - an autobiographical story of how Akiko Higashimura (of Kuragehime fame!!!) cultivated her artistic identity, and the people who helped her along the way. it's, bittersweet, sharply reflective, a little remoseful, but above all, very heartfelt.

My Life With You - ok this isn’t explicitly josei but it is LITERALLY published otasune fanfiction and I feel like everyone should experience it

[asuka--langley--soryu]

hey do you know any blogs/sites etc that „explain” nge episode by episode? not the plot but rather the symbolism and themes

oh man anon I dearly wish I could say yes but unfortunately if something like this exists then I don’t know about it :/ instead what I can offer are some links to some meta/analysis/essays and hopefully that might help or at least give you a place to start? 

so there is always the evageeks wiki which can provide a basic amount of info on some thematic elements, and at the very least is reasonably good for lore explanations. I feel kind of eyeroll about evageeks and their general community perspective, but if you need a good jumping off point i think this might be useful for that. 

when i first started this blog there was a user called ritsumaya who put out some realllyyy interesting and in-depth meta. they deleted a while ago unfortunately but i believe most of their stuff as been archived at @ritsumaya2. None of the posts are tagged or organized in any way so it’s a little hard to navigate but worth perusing/searching through imo.

Someone did reupload their analysis of asuka specifically in a slightly more readable format so I’ll link that here separately. I 100% rec checking it out, it has some really really good thoughts on her character and informed a lot of my own interpretations back in the day. I do think they go a little too into the pathologizing angle which (if it wasn’t clear from my last post lol) I don’t agree with and largely ignore, but, aside from that, I think it’s super interesting. 

in terms of other blogs, off the top of my head qmisato and adamworu put out good meta p often and also have organized tagging systems, so you might want to look at their stuff. i’m gonna glance through my archive and tag some of the meta ive rb-ed in the past, and will try to consistently tag it from now on so as to have somewhere to reference in the future. Plus I probably should have been doing that already but im like yknow a big carnival idiot and consistently cannot keep organized no matter how potentially beneficial it would be for me :) 

There are some papers on nge in my thesis sources drive, so if youre looking for something a lil more academic/theory based then you could check those out. Specifically I recommend the Ortega and Napier essays.  Link for that’s here. 

theres def other blogs on here im forgetting, as well as just other sources in general. pls feel free to drop recs in the replies if you have em!! this was just the stuff i could pull from the top of my head/knew where to find so its by no means comprehensive and i am by no means the like end all be all in nge meta archiving. also, as usual, i’m not sanctioning 100% of every word written in the things I rec, so dont hold me to their opinions. 

i hope this helps at least a little bit! 

(ps: ik reddit has analysis threads or whatever but i’ve never read anything on there id recommend so ymmv on that front ) 

(pps: also ive never watched any of those youtube video essays or whatever about nge and never will [im just like instinctively repelled by anime youtubers that arent miss watchmojo dot com top 10 list lady] so i have literally no idea about their quality on any level. ik they exists and maybe could be helpful to you if you prefer a non-written resource?) 

[tickle-bugs]

I had two people ask for some advice on starting up/running a blog, so I thought I’d make a little post for anyone else looking for advice! There’s no one right way to run a blog and I am by no means an expert. This is just a compilation of some of the things I’ve learned :) 

Feel free to add advice to this!

- The first thing is something I cannot stress enough. Write for yourself first. You will be absolutely miserable if you’re only writing for attention. I’m not saying it’s easy, but it’s so incredibly important. If you don’t like a prompt, fandom, or scenario? You don’t have to write for it! A personal example: I’m a theatre kid and total musical nerd. I could probably write some compelling Dear Evan Hansen or Hamilton headcanons if I wanted to, but I don’t. That’s fine! I’m allowed to say I won’t write for it and deny prompts/requests for those fandoms. 

- Set boundaries. This is a very mixed community with all sorts of creators and participants with hands in different baskets. Don’t want minors to interact? Put minors DNI in your bio. SFW only? Put it in the bio. No RP? Bio. This goes for private conversations/askbox/other interactions as well. If someone comes into your askbox/dms and says something that makes you uncomfy, shut it down. 

- My advice is more geared towards writing than art or video, but I suppose you could apply this advice as well. Make what makes you happy! If you’re only in one fandom, feel free to stay there and make content for it. Multi-fandom? Excellent! Completely non-fandom? Epic! Make the content that you want to see and the content that makes you happy to create, especially if you’re in a more niche fandom/area. 

- Organization. ...I’ll admit this one is more of a personal pet peeve than something urgent, but it is something that people positively respond to. If you have some sort of consistency/organization to your blog, it’ll make it easier and more enjoyable for people to navigate. Make a fandom list/indicate your fandoms somehow (mostly for prompt purposes. people can’t read your mind, so it’s important to tell them what you will write for and what you won’t, however you want to do that)! 

Make a masterpost/link your fic tag! Use a fic tag of some kind. Give your fics summaries and leave a little bit of the fic above the ‘read more’ to intrigue folks (look at #my fics and my masterpost for basic examples of how I do this, if you need!). Use read mores. Please use read mores (if you can, idk if they’re on mobile. regardless no one wants to encounter a three thousand word block of text on their dash). (No seriously though, organize your blog, even if it’s super simple. literally just a ‘mine’ or ‘my fics’ or ‘[pseud] writes’ and a fandom tag. It’ll make it easier for people to find your stuff and support you)

- Practice general internetiquette. Please remember that the people in this community are real people with feelings, boundaries, and lives outside of the blog that they run. Be genuine and people will respond to you! Don’t manipulate people into likes/reblogs/attention. No one wants to be on the other end of that. Being in this community isn’t a transaction or a mosh pit, it’s an experience.  

- Be ever-so-liberal with the block button. Someone’s user makes you uncomfortable? They give you bad vibes? They’re a minor/older than you and you don’t want them interacting with your content? You don’t wanna see their blog for some reason? Block em. This goes for anons too. That’s what the button is for. Don’t feel guilty for using it. Use it. 

- How you write is 100% a personal choice and not really something that I can give advice on, but embrace your style! take prompts if you want, or don’t. Write oneshots, series, drabbles, or novels. Write romantic, or don’t. Etc. Change things up if you feel like it. Do what you want. Your blog, your style, your rules. 

- Numbers matter. Don’t let them define you. This is a bit of a harder one to explain, but I will try. I often say that I don’t care about numbers, and I really don’t, but that’s not to say that I don’t see them and they have zero effect on me. I absolutely notice and am bummed if a fic doesn’t get notes, or at least the notes that I was expecting. That is entirely normal and okay to experience. What isn’t okay, though, is creating for the sake of getting notes/numbers/attention (re: write for yourself first, internetiquette). If you find yourself relying on tumblr for gratification and a reward, I implore you to take a break. I’m not your therapist or your parent, I’m not gonna tell you what to do, but when you make things only for the sake of notes, people notice. Celebrate your milestones. Know that it’s okay to be bummed about low notes/celebrate getting plenty. Just make sure that you don’t depend on the numbers for your happiness, or you will be miserable.

- You’re (probably) doing this for free. You are providing people content: a service. Produce as much or as little as you’re comfy with, but always remember that. No one is entitled to what you make. If someone asks you for headcanons, sends a prompt when prompts are closed, etc, and you don’t feel like fulfilling it? You have no obligation to do that. Getting commissioned is another story entirely, but as long as you’re making free content, you have zero obligation to do anything for anyone and certainly no time constraints. It can take me months to finish prompts, and that’s okay. I do them when I do them and I fill them how I want to. If my prompts are closed, I deny new ones until I’m ready to accept them. Make yourself happy first.

- How you interact with others is up to you! It’s generally considered good practice to like/reblog your mutuals fics/art, but this is not necessarily a hard and fast rule. I veeeeeery rarely reblog fics for fandoms that I’m not in, even from my mutuals. What you can do to show your support (and you should try and show support somehow. No one is in competition. Everyone’s in your boat, whether they have no followers or 1k) is send an ask/reply to the post/leave tags to let the author know you liked it. Like the fic and don’t reblog it, if you don’t want to. Just make sure you show your mutuals (and others in general!) roughly the same support they show you, however you decide to do that. Treat others how you want to be treated, as cheesy as it sounds :)

- Don’t repost content that isn’t yours without express permission from the original creator, and credit them appropriately. If you see a cute piece of tickle art and the artist doesn’t want it reposted? Don’t repost it. Don’t post fics/videos/gifs that aren’t yours (obviously if it’s like a scene from a movie/a clip on youtube that’s different, but don’t take credit for things you didn’t make, including ideas). Can’t tell you how frustrating it is to have work stolen from you. Don’t be that person. ‘Credit to original artist’ and ‘credit unknown’ is total bullshit btw. Link/tag the creator in the original post and make it clear you don’t own the content. Best practice is to ask the original creator if they’re okay with reposting, work inspired by or connected to theirs, etc. This goes doubly for saving/downloading someone’s fics. 

- It is not illegal for a minor to have normal, nonsexual, healthy friendships with people older than them. There’s a weird attitude that minors have nothing of value to offer adults besides a relationship/sex, which is...not true? Minors are thinking, living human beings with feelings, thoughts, and opinions. You can talk to them like normal people, because they are. Just obviously don’t talk about/introduce sex or endanger them. Minors don’t bring up sex/activities you’re underage for with an adult. IDK this isn’t a seminar just...don’t be weird. Adults can offer great life experience, support systems, and the basic joys and needs of human connection. Minors can too. Mind your business unless someone’s actually in danger. The next point is a caveat, though: 

- If you’re a minor, don’t interact with NSFW blogs/blogs with ‘Minors DNI’, NSFW blogs don’t interact with minors, etc etc. Not your parent or whatever but this is pretty common sense and it’s for everyone’s safety, but especially the NSFW person. internettiquette!

- If you use your TK blog as a side blog (meaning you have another blog as your main blog, not two separate accounts) and don’t want your main exposed, that is up to you. I recommend not liking posts. Also, follow people that you trust. These actions route through your main blog and your main will show up in the notes. You can reblog from a sideblog. If you want to send an ask “as your tk blog”, send an anon and sign it somehow, like ‘hey :) // @/tickle-bugs’. It should tag you in the post so you get a notification when it’s answered!

- Find your people! As an anxious person this one has been hard for me, so I know it’s hard for a lot of people. Fandom is literally a community of shared interest. Peachy and I have an iron bond almost two years later and we met talking over shared interests. You can absolutely find your people here. If someone makes you happy, strike up a conversation! Send an ask! You never know what doors it might open or whose day you might improve :)

- If you were an anon/lurker on someone’s blog and they inspired you to write/submit/start your own, sign your messages!! the common form that I see is either an emoji or [noun/context of the ask]!anon (prodigal!anon (i miss u every day), butterfly!anon, etc.) Let us know how to find and support you!! Those messages produce good brain juice. 

- The big finale: Have fun. If you’re not having fun here, maybe you could tweak something to make things enjoyable. Running a blog is like driving a car. Keep your hands on the wheel, respectfully indicate your intentions (flashing lights optional), and be safe. Poebody’s nerfect, y’know. If you make a mistake, course correct. I’m by no means perfect. Your favs aren’t either. Just do your best and have a good time :)

@rosytickles and the anon in my inbox, I hope this helps! Thank you for asking me, I’m very honored that you value my opinon/experience/advice. I apologize if I come off as preachy or aggressive, I envisioned grabbing my younger self by the lapels and shaking me vigorously while I wrote this. Probably a bad idea. 

Anywho, hope it helps. Anyone with questions, additions, or comments, my askbox is open! Just be constructive, is all I ask. 

[zelihatrifles]

the Ground Beneath Her Feet

“Five mysteries hold the key to the unseen: the act of love, and the birth of a baby, and the contemplations of great art, and being in the presence of death or disaster, and hearing the human voice lifted in song. These are the occasions when the bolts of the universe fly open and we are given a glimpse of what is hidden; an eff of the ineffable.” Instances of all five you can find in this stellar epic by none other than Rushdie, and we readers smell the eff by contemplating upon this great art that the novel is. I cannot imagine what a tremendous amount of scholarship and sheer toil went behind this single work. But all of it seems so effortless on the surface! That is because Rushdie, like Vina Apsara, follows this philosophy: “The art that conceals art: the most flamboyant rock star in the world was a devotee of the philosophy of artistic direction. Never let ‘em see how you do it, that was her creed. She once said to me: What do they want to know, how? That’s not for them to know. It’s my job to do it and theirs to applaud.”

Breathlessly turning the pages in spite of imminent college exams, i literally drowned myself in Rushdie’s words, Vina and Ormus’s music which was their true way of love, Rai’s commentary and more secret love and the canvas of the world of the East, the West and the other-world. “Disorientation is loss of the East. Ask any navigator: the east is what you sail by. Lose the east and you lose your bearings, your certainties, your knowledge of what is and what may be, perhaps even your life. Where was that star you followed to that manger? That’s right. The east orients. That’s the official version. The language says so, and you should never argue with the language.” The East and the West keep on sparring and making love throughout the novel as the characters physically and metaphorically flit through space and time.

“When we stop believing in the gods we can start believing in their stories, I retort. There are of course no such things as miracles, but if there were and tomorrow we woke up to find no more believers on earth, no more devout Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Jews, why the, sure, the beauty of the stories would be a thing we could focus on because they wouldn’t be dangerous any more, they would become capable of compelling the only belief that leads to truth, that is, the willing, disbelieving belief of the reader in the well-told tale.” The novel flies you through so much - so many beliefs, practices, non-beliefs but there is absolutely no time to question the practical implausibility of the events or motivations. It is the perfect suspension of disbelief. It is "India, where houses are made of mud and dreams".

“In all the old stories, in different ways, the point is always reached after which the gods no longer share their lives with mortal men and women, they die or wither away or retire. They vacate the stage and leave us alone upon it, stumbling over our lines. This, the myths hint, is what a mature civilisation is: a place where the gods stop jostling and shoving us and seducing our womenfolk and using our armies to have their poxy quarrels in our children’s blood; a time when they move back, still leering, still priapic, still whimsical, from the realm of the actual to the land of so to speak - Olympus, Valhalla - leaving us free to do our best or worst without their autocratic meddling.” Best or worst - it can be either, but this is the gift of free will that we are left with at the end of all disasters and all miracles, after of course some more disorientation accompanying the end of such an epic novel like this.

[alittleemo]

I wanted to leave valentine asks in all of your inboxes but it’s late and im tired so im making an appreciation type post instead!!!! long post under the cut bc i dont want to subject yall to that lol

@shades-of-blue- faith you add so much positivity to my day and you show so much love for me and all of your other mutuals and i hope you know how lovely you are <3 i love your art series and how positively u interact w your mutuals and followers, and seeing u in my notifications reminds me that other people are interested in what im saying and it really means a lot to me so thank u, sending u all of my love <3

@lunawedlers- audrey you bring so many new movies and shows to my dash and i adore it. you are so kind and supportive of others and your talent is out of this world and it brightens my day to interact w you or even see u on my dash and u deserve the world and all of its beauty. I may have no idea still what the plot of succession is but i thought i saw Tom when i was watching Star Wars the other day and thought of u and i think thats what love is yk? (it wasnt actually him but its the thought that counts <3). i love u sm bestie, im rlly glad we’re friends <3

@12monthoctober- grace you have always been one of my fav mutuals, you show so much consideration for others and your enthusiasm for the AO3 remakes brings me so much joy and u are such a friendly, supportive, and caring force on my dash and i love u and miss u. you were one of my first mutuals and quite honestly in the early months i was on tumblr and we were mutuals were able to ground me and bring me so much joy and ive stolen so much of my music taste from skam nt and the fact we already had similar tastes rlly enhances the vibe. I love seeing u on my dash and on my Spotify bar and i hope u are doing well, i love u sm <3 

@lesbeanfatou- clara you provide such a chaotic and kind whirlwind force on my dash everyday, and your boundless love for all of your friends and followers is so wonderful to behold. literally the joy i had in u immediately following me back and interacting w me in the beginning meant the world to me and i hope u know im here for u always. your love for 1d passed on to me and now i actually follow the convo when ppl talk abt them and my sister and bestie love me for it and ive saved too many of ur reaction images to use myself so ty for that too <3 love u queen u deserve the sun and all of her stars

@coffee-and-moo- grace i literally cannot describe how much joy i get from seeing your Star Wars and marvel posts on my dash, u share and encapsulate so many of my fav interests that i feel like we were destined to be mutuals. your enthusiasm inspires me and i love seeing u on my dash and in my notes—i feel like at this point we are equally spam liking each other’s posts and i love u sm for it bc i see posts to rn specifically for u now lol. you are so lovely and sweet and i hope the world is treating u well and i love u <3

@pianoandcookiedoughlover- you’re such a lovely presence on my dash, and it means so much to me that u took time to check on me after some of my rant posts, j the feeling of knowing other people care enough to check in and your calm, rational way of looking at situations was so important to me. im so excited for skam colorado s2 and i hope you’re doing well and ily <3 (also ive taken to calling u honey in my head bc of ur profile pic color/bc u have no name displayed lol but if u would prefer smth else lmk!!)

@maade-of-stardust- val you were my first mutual and literally the rush i got from a person following me for the first time fueled me for weeks. we don’t talk a lot but i love seeing u on my dash and your fics are incredible and deserve so much love and attention considering all of the love you’re put into them. I hope you are doing well, there are so many people who love and care for u and i love u <3

@paint-dreamscapes-on-the-wall- iris you are such a sweet person, and i still havent forgotten how u took time to give me phoebe bridgers recommendations when i didnt expect to get any—your thoughtfulness and excellent music choices really brightened my life a lot. i happened to find skam boston in the middle of quarantine (may or June i think??), and waiting for your updates everyday grounded me and added a sense of stability to my life as i watched graciela navigate her season. u are such a lovely being and i love u a lot <3

@fakieu- aj u are so creative and your sense of humor is immaculate and you have been such a positive influence on me (that sounds weird lmao but fr your calmness and creativity have inspired me and helped me so much). skam dc was the first remake i actually listened to with music, and i j have to say literally my music taste this summer was almost entirely stolen from u, so i appreciate that a lot. I hope you’re doing well and that school isnt beating u down to much, love u <3

@womenstan and @nori-in-pink- we haven’t interacted a lot but both of u are so sweet and the support u have for your friends and the enthusiasm u have for others is so affirming and rlly helped me feel like people cared about what i had to say here. em- it meant the world to me that u actually made something out of my gif suggestions, i have lots of ideas bouncing around but actually seeing them was mind blowing and i loved them. courtney- i love the cheerfulness u bring to my dash and u are such a lovely soul and i hope u are both doing well

[wherevermyway]

the FiVE:RACHA project (1/7) // black mirror AU // 18+

chapter one: freedom series navigation: [desktop] [mobile]

⚠ POTENTIAL TW: READ WITH CAUTION! ⚠ pairings: lee minho x kim seungmin | hwang hyunjin x lee felix x yang jeongin | bang chan x seo changbin x han jisung rating: explicit! 18+ warnings/tags: creator chose not to use archive warnings, descent into madness, horror, thriller, technological implants, blood and gore, alcohol abuse, some sexual content in later chapters but it’s not, like, smut. word count: 3,101 also on AO3

PS: i made a carrd for this. check it out if you’re interested!

originally posted: 26 december 2020

Several years ago, five men created a website for South Korea's international rap sensation, 3RACHA. The website, The FiVE:RACHA Project, was almost as popular as the group themselves. About two years after the website went live, FiVE:RACHA had the opportunity to meet 3RACHA.

Immediately after they meet, the members of FiVE:RACHA and 3RACHA go missing. The FiVE:RACHA Project website is down. Their Twitter account has been deactivated, and 3RACHA stops posting. A few months after their meetup, it was announced that 3RACHA had disbanded. Nobody knows what happened to either group.

Nobody knows, until now.

For some, modern day fame comes at a price that is too high to pay.

disclaimer: this is a work of fiction! any reference to persons in this work of fiction are purely coincidental. the characters referenced from Stray Kids are  interpretations loosely based on their personalities in the group and do  not represent the real people behind the personas. if this, or any of  the content included in the warnings above make you uncomfortable,  please stop reading now.

// note: with other darker stuff i post, i’m not totally sure i’ll post the entirety of this fic on tumblr. if not, i’ll do a little notice post for people interested to keep following it on AO3.

...Do you wish to proceed? To learn the truth of FiVE:RACHA and 3RACHA?

What is the true price of fame?

A Foreword:

Several years ago, there was a fan site, The FiVE:RACHA Project, dedicated to South Korea’s most famous rap group, 3RACHA. One day, it went down without notice. The site, as well as their Twitter account with over four million followers, was almost as well-known as the rap group itself.

3RACHA mysteriously disbanded several months after FiVE:RACHA went down. Nobody has seen or heard from the members of either group since the disbandment. There are several theories and myths surrounding the disappearances of both groups, but most of them are incorrect.

Be aware that, no, FiVE:RACHA did not go down because the site moderators were bored of 3RACHA. No, 3RACHA did not disband because Supreme Entertainment was about to collapse due to widespread fraud and their political scandals within the Korean government.

The stories of FiVE:RACHA and 3RACHA are very much deeply intertwined within each other, and the truth is uncomfortable to witness.

This novel’s authors, comprised of some of the most loyal fans of both groups, will remain anonymous and stay in hiding due to fear of being caught by the one responsible for the disappearances. An individual outside of our group found a Shinyu of someone involved in this, someone discarded in the Han River many years ago. How the implant survived with no living host for so long is beyond remarkable.

In case the Shinyu is defunct or replaced by the time you’re reading this, allow us to explain. The name comes from “close friend” in Japanese, likely as a play on words for how close the implant gets to its host, both physically and socially. The Shinyu was created in Tokyo in 2025; it is a small technological implant embedded under the skin of the right side of everyone’s temples.

Everyone has one placed at thirteen, and it encodes all of our visual, tactile, and auditory data, syncing it to our phones and uploading it to personal servers in the cloud. The data is encrypted, and requires access from both the Shinyu and the phone to decipher. It allows us to integrate technology into our daily lives, records our memories and important moments, but there is a price we all pay for this. Critics have been outspoken about this since its inception, but the governments never listened.

Alas, we digress. The Shinyu is vital to uncovering so much information that has been hidden and speculated on after all this time. Regardless of our personal opinions regarding the ethics of the device, we are grateful that we were able to obtain one of the implants. It has been vital to connect a lot of the missing pieces of the greater picture.

The authors have spent years decoding the information from this implant. Thanks to an anonymous source, we were able to obtain the personal computer of someone in FiVE:RACHA, personal cell phones of both groups, access to the database of Supreme Entertainment and its defunct myIdol data, some declassified legal information, and archives of both FiVE:RACHA and 3RACHA’s Twitter accounts.

Why have we chosen to extrapolate all of this data in the form of a novel? Perhaps we would like it to serve as a modern day parable for the plights of technology being so intricately interwoven between us all now. We, as humans, are now one with technology. Technology is literally embedded into us. It is astounding that technology allows us to interact so closely with famed idols now, beyond some barriers that critics have denounced for being inappropriate or unhealthy.

Some of us may pay the ultimate price for this.

Some of us, unfortunately, already have.

However interconnected we are with technology and how close we can get to those of which we idolize in society, though, humans will still crave entertainment. That is why this was written almost as a work of fiction. Those that pay attention to the story will be rewarded. Maybe not immediately, and maybe only after self-reflection, but readers will be rewarded. That much can be promised.

Above all else, we cannot stress enough that modern day fame and convenience comes at a price that is too high for some to pay. Stay safe, err on the side of caution. Disconnect from your Shinyu if you choose to proceed any further, because you never know who is watching.

— Curators of The FiVE:RACHA Project

One: Freedom

Nobody really knows who exactly manages FiVE:RACHA, just that it’s a group of five fans that run a fansite for the popular rap group 3RACHA. Their website is the most well-known and widely used out of the millions of fans that are out there. It always has live updates for the members: Bang Chan, Seo Changbin, and Han Jisung. There are daily paparazzi photos of at least one of them slapped up on the front page, embedded social media posts from each of the members updated as soon as they post, and hard-to-find facts about each of them.

Hell, one of the FiVE:RACHA members went through and coded up a section of the site dedicated to decoding natal charts for each of the members. Again, like most things about FiVE:RACHA, the source of this information was a mystery. Nobody’s sure exactly how they obtained 3RACHA’s birth times and locations. Some had speculated that it happened the same day the government had announced that there was a security breach of some of their databases, because the timing was oddly convenient.

To most casual fans, it sometimes felt really fucking weird to have so much information on idols readily available at their fingertips. However, to 3RACHA’s most dedicated, most obsessed fans, it was perfect. Exactly what they wanted. Their work seemed well-appreciated by the broader community, since the amount of Twitter followers FiVE:RACHA had was comparable to 3RACHA’s following, nearly half of their total count: 4,100,000 to 8,500,000.

There was nothing else that could compare to the controlled insanity that The FiVE:RACHA Project had to offer.

The FiVE:RACHA website was an international sensation, known to most 3RACHA fans, even those that opposed it. There was even a small, but growing, fanbase for the members of FiVE:RACHA, something that was slightly worrisome to them, but they had remained anonymous for so long, they weren’t really overtly concerned over it.

“This article is bullshit, man. ‘Controlled insanity’? None of this is controlled, it’s just insanity.”

Idle hums and trills of various electronics thrum in a dark room. Two young men stare at several computer monitors in a daze, lost in their own worlds as a ticker tape-like feed of coding and statistics flew past them on screen.“Let ‘em talk, dude,” the younger-looking man with blue hair scoots away from his computer and sighs. “Fuckin’ gossip rags. Anyway, I can’t stare at this CSS anymore. I can’t figure out why the embedded feeds are busted. Can you take over on this, Seung?”

The slightly older man with short, shaggy black hair rolls his neck, snapping some joints, not bothering to look away from his screens. “Yeah, yeah,” he stops poring over the article written about them on one screen, tabbing away to another. He cracks the knuckles in his fingers, and waves his hand in the air as he taps a couple of keys on his keyboard. “Go take a break, Jeongin. Hyunjin was looking for you, anyways. Probably got something good from a source of his, since he’s in one of his giddy moods.”

As Seungmin settles into his work, Jeongin chuckles as he stands up and stretches. He takes a couple steps over to the other computer desk and pats the older man on the back. “Thanks, dude,” he says with a smile and walks out of the server room, out into the hallway that leads into the open living room of their flat. The ambient humming of the room stops as he shuts the door, now replaced by the sound of his feet shuffling, the muffled noises echoing against the hardwood floor.

Five men all lived and worked in this large apartment together: Yang Jeongin, Kim Seungmin, Hwang Hyunjin, Lee Felix, and Lee Minho. Collectively, this was where they lived and breathed The FiVE:RACHA Project. Running the largest, most extensive fansite for South Korea’s most famous rap group, 3RACHA, was more than a full-time job. They all equally poured their hearts and souls into maintaining the website and their Twitter account. It proved to be almost too much for five people alone to handle as their shifts sometimes went from twelve hours and bled into sixteen, sometimes twenty-four hour shifts.

Minho, the leader, didn’t trust anyone but the original five to the project, however. Jeongin could hear the oldest man’s airy voice echo in his ears: “I trusted the four of you with this. Now, it’s devolved into something I don’t even recognize. There’s no way anyone deserves to see what we’ve done. Imagine if it got out that we were the ones in charge of this monstrosity?”

Jeongin glided into the kitchen, and pulled his phone out of his back pocket, eyeing the time. 13:36. He had another hour left of his shift, and he was exhausted after yesterday’s all-nighter. 33 hours of work, with only a small nap in between was rough on anyone, and he was starting to feel it, physically. His Shinyu Implant would ping him once every hour that he was very low on sleep, reminding him that it was unhealthy to go without sleep for so long and that he would not be able to drive. As he slinked his way to the fridge, he shoved his phone back into his pocket and yawned. He opened the fridge, the contents in the shelves of the door clattering as they abruptly shifted around.

The first thing he saw was a bottle of unsweetened coffee and, while he knew he shouldn’t drink caffeine within a few hours of hopeful sleep, Jeongin went against his instincts and reached for the bottle anyways. As he opened it, the cracking of the seal reverberated against all of the hard surfaces and sounded much louder than it should have, startling the man awake a bit.

He hated unsweetened coffee, but there was no way he would make it through another hour or so of coding maintenance without it. Jeongin polished off the entire bottle within seconds, grimacing in disgust the entire time. He tapped his right temple twice, and grumbled. “Set reminder, after work: grocery shopping. Have Hyunjin drive. Add to list: energy drinks. The good kind, none of that berry-flavoured shit.” A very faint, nearly inaudible ding responds after he’s done speaking, and Jeongin moves to discard the bottle into the recycling bin.

“Innie?” Almost as if the devil himself heard Jeongin’s request, a familiar voice rounded the corner of the kitchen. “Oh, good, I thought that was you. Anyway, you won’t believe the content I got from Yeji at Seoul Scoop, dude,” the lanky, beacon-like blond grins wildly at Jeongin, walking into the kitchen. “I actually got a photo of Chan and Changbin looking awfully close at KNECT’s backstage event a couple days ago. Think they were celebrating their recent win a little too hard.”

Hyunjin proudly slaps a grainy photo down on the countertop, where Changbin is sitting in Chan’s lap, arms wrapped around the older man’s neck. Sure, it could easily be explained away as friendly closeness, since everyone knew that all of the guys were very close friends, and the area was cramped. The photo, however, would cause a lot of panic within the community.

Jeongin smirked as he eyed the photo, taking it into his fingers and bringing it up close to his face. “The shippers are going to have a field day over this, you know.”

“I know,” Hyunjin shakes some of his hair out of his face as he arrogantly places a hand on his hip, shifting his weight to one side. “It’ll be great traffic for the site. I’ll have Seungmin put it on the front page later.” He takes a couple of steps closer to Jeongin and pulls the younger man to his chest, stroking his hair down. “I love you, but you look like shit. Why not call it a little early today?”

Jeongin shook his head, burying his nose into the older man’s shoulder, letting his eyes flutter shut with a sigh. “Seungmin and I are trying to fix a string of broken code that’s causing the social media feed to bug out a little bit. Definitely wanna have that fixed before we upload this.”

A clattering of keys startles both of the younger men, causing them to look behind Hyunjin. “Don’t worry about it, Jeongin,” a third voice speaks from the entrance of the kitchen. “Seriously, you worked really hard yesterday, and I’m sure we’ll manage. I’ll be sure to wake up Felix a little earlier and we’ll fix the coding.”

“You’re home early, Minho,” Jeongin chuckles once as he nods. “Figured you’d be stuck in the office for a few more hours.”

“Nah,” Minho dismissively waves his hand in the air as he walks over to the sink, rinsing his hands. “Seungmin called me earlier and said you were nodding off at your desk, asked me to come home early.”

A look of guilt washed over Jeongin’s face. “Shit, my bad.”

“Don’t apologize,” Minho smiles as he towels off his hands. “I appreciate all of the work you did yesterday; completely revamping the social media section was hard. But I can’t have you possibly miscode something and have it break the site because you’re running low on sleep. You’ve started getting pings, haven’t you?”

Jeongin sheepishly nods his head and mumbles an affirmation.

Hyunjin rolls his eyes and elbows the young man in the side. “I thought I told you to take a nap, dude?”

“I did!” Jeongin whines. “It was, like, a half-hour, though.”

Both Hyunjin and Minho roll their eyes at Jeongin. “Get out of here,” Minho scoffs, walking towards the server room. “Go to bed. I don’t wanna see you back in the server room until tomorrow morning.”

Jeongin opens his mouth to protest, but Hyunjin drags him away, up the stairs towards their bedroom. A ping comes from his implant, a transparent box popping up in the lower right-hand corner of his vision. The soft voice of the AI reverberates against his skull, allowing him to hear it as if it were a real voice whispering into his ear. It reads off the notification from his display.

“Movement away from workplace detected. Reminder: grocery shopping later, have Hyunjin drive. Would you like me to pull up your list?”

“No.” A low grumble comes up from Jeongin’s throat as he taps his temple twice to dismiss the notification. “Hyunjin,” he sighs, “we’ve gotta go grocery shopping.”

“You’re too tired,” Hyunjin shakes his finger without turning to look at Jeongin. “The grocery store will still be there tomorrow.”

“I’m out of my energy drinks, though,” the younger man protests.

Hyunjin smiles, opening the door to their bedroom and whispers. “I’ll be sure to get some for you. Go cuddle up with Felix and get some sleep.”

“Hyunjin, I—” Jeongin is cut off as the older man grabs his wrist, pulling him into his chest. They share a brief kiss before Hyunjin guides him into the bedroom.

“Shh, Lixie is sleeping.”

There’s a shuffling that comes from the bedsheets, and a sleepy voice grumbles. “Not anymore.”

“Aw, mornin’, babe,” Hyunjin says with a smile. “Sorry to wake you. Minho’s probably gonna come ask for you in a bit, anyways, though.”

Felix rolls over, sitting upright as he runs his hands through his brassy blond hair. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” Jeongin sighs as he makes his way over to the bed, bringing an arm up to the blond and wrapping him in a lazy hug as he pulls them down to the bed.

The blond lets out a soft laugh. “Don’t worry about it, man,” he turns his head to face the bluenette and offers him a quick peck on the lips. “I couldn’t sleep much, anyways. Finding out about that myIdol rumour yesterday had my brain going kind of wild.”

“You heard about it too, huh?” Hyunjin says, colliding down onto the bed opposite of Felix. “Someone at Seoul Scoop told me about it this morning. It lets fans connect with their idols, like they’re actually directly messaging them.”

“That’s weird,” the bluenette sleepily grumbles into Felix’s shoulder.

“I think so, too.” Felix says with a frown as he nuzzles his head against Jeongin’s forehead, staring up into the ceiling.

Hyunjin shrugs with indifference. “I dunno, I think it’s pretty interesting.”

Jeongin lifts his head and stares down Hyunjin with a smirk. “You just want to pretend like Changbin cares about you.”

The older blond frowns as he flips off Jeongin. “Like you wouldn’t want Jisung to send you a ‘Have a wonderful day, bestie!’ message?”

The youngest member flops back down onto the bed. “Okay, that’s fair. It’s still weird, though. Seems so artificial and fake, I guess.”

“Well,” Hyunjin sits up, offering a hand out to Felix, “I’ll have more information on it tomorrow, probably. Why don’t you let yourself sleep for a while?” Felix takes the hand offered to him, and both men stand up. “Lixie and I will go out and get some groceries and get you those nasty energy drinks you like so much.”

Jeongin grumbles as he wiggles his way up to the pillows, half-asleep and irritated from the loss of warmth from Felix. “Just not the berry ones, okay?”

“I’ll see what we can do,” Hyunjin says with a smirk before he spins on his heel and walks out of the room. “Love you, Innie!”

“Don’t worry,” Felix leans down to kiss Jeongin’s forehead, “I’ll make sure he doesn’t get the kinds you hate. Let yourself actually sleep, too. We’ll make it all work out, okay?”

Jeongin mutters some sort of incoherent affirmation as he lets his heavy eyelids flutter shut. Seungmin would be able to fix the CSS by himself, he figured, trying not to worry too much about how broken small parts of the site were. He heard Felix say something else as he quickly faded off into sleep, but it didn’t register fully as he sank into the abyss.

There were a lot of sleepless nights ahead of them, whether FiVE:RACHA felt it coming or not.

[argentdandelion]

The True Power of NEO: Part 1

Series Thesis: Mettaton had decent reasons to think confronting the human in his NEO form was a good idea, and to think he’d survive the encounter and be a hero. However, he didn’t fully think it through, and his desire for a humanoid form warped his reasoning.

The series is organized as follows. (Use the tag "The True Power of NEO" to navigate.) Part 1: Mettaton’s reasoning. Part 2: Where everything went wrong, and why. (General Trends) Part 3:Where everything went wrong, and why. (Specific Details) Part 4: And yet...his death is meaningful.

Introduction

Mettaton has a unique role in the Genocide Route. He’s a Genocide Route-exclusive boss, who makes a dramatic speech about his “anti-human functions not being entirely removed” and transforms into Mettaton NEO. He has an exclusive battle theme, and a speech acknowledging the genocidal human’s crimes. Still, for all his build-up, he dies in one hit, and gives the genocidal human however much EXP is necessary to reach LV 19.

His battle is strange for other reasons, too. On the Genocide Route, Mettaton claims his Mettaton NEO form was made for human extermination and his boxy form is more “photogenic”, but, on other routes, he makes the opposite claim. The latter claim makes more sense, given his boxy form’s very high defenses and how his body is described as invulnerable. Despite supposedly being made for extermination, Mettaton NEO goes down in one strike, even if one barely hits him in a near-Genocide Route. Mettaton’s body also explodes when he dies, but it deals no damage.

Why? Why is his fight so strange? Why would he ever think fighting the Human was a good idea?

Tactics

Tactic 1: Mettaton is the Bomb (Literally)

Tactic 1 Summary: Mettaton would block the CORE’s exit by self-destruction of his body. This would block the human’s progress or at least buy a lot of time to evacuate others, and contact Asgore to get him to absorb the human SOULs and fight the Human. It’s possible Mettaton would survive his body’s self-destruction, assuming he didn’t fuse with his body.

Mettaton (in his NEO/EX form) is one of only three enemies to explode when he dies. (Tsundereplane and Mad Mew Mew are the others) Mettaton’s explosion could theoretically be weaponized: in fact, it’s plausible it was upgraded (if hastily) for this.

First, Mettaton NEO’s explosion lasts for a while. Tsundereplane, Mad Mew Mew’s, Mettaton EX, and Mettaton NEO’s explosions last one, four, seven, and eight seconds, respectively.

Second, it’s big. Mettaton EX’s, NEO’s, and Mad Mew Mew’s explosions all turn the whole screen white and then black for several seconds, suggesting a huge, blinding explosion. In contrast, Tsundereplane’s explosion doesn’t cover the whole screen, and its death makes the screen flash white very briefly.

Third, in addition to lasting one second longer than in his EX form, Mettaton NEO’s explosion grows faster when triggered. For Mad Mew Mew and Mettaton EX, the explosion only starts after they are done speaking, but Mettaton NEO’s text is still on-screen when the explosion starts. (Note: When Mettaton EX is damaged, his arms fall off, and his arm sockets smoke. Tsundereplane also has mini-explosions as it dies and says its last words, before crashing to make a much bigger explosion.)

Furthermore, in the Neutral/Pacifist Route, Mettaton's body is left behind after he explodes, and it’s trashed beyond repair. Yet, in the near-Genocide/Genocide Route, his body isn’t left behind, although it logically would. If his body’s explosion were upgraded to be stronger, that might explain the lack of a corpse: his body became shrapnel that stuck to the ceiling. 1

Thus, he could plausibly block the CORE’s only exit through self-destructing. At the very least, this would massively delay the Human. It’s vital: it gives more time to evacuate New Home, if the human still has a chance to get there, or to contact Asgore, have him absorb six human SOULs, and wipe out the genocidal human.

Mad Mew Mew survives the explosion and dismemberment of her body, so Mettaton, too, surely would survive his body exploding. If he could set his body to self-destruct by timer, he could easily leave his body near the entrance, and then phase out of his body and go through walls to flee. If there was no timer, he might survive if it were a physical explosion, since ghosts are immune to physical attacks.

Blocking the exit by body explosion ahead of time is sensible, reasonably low-risk, and seems to fit Mettaton’s and Alphys’ motives.

For Alphys, one should note that in the Genocide Route some floors of Hotland are inaccessible through laser traps, and the elevator to New Home won’t work.2 Given her hacking abilities and the fact she’s leading the evacuation, Alphys most likely did that. In fact, she had so thoroughly blocked off sections of Hotland that, had she evacuated Muffet from her den as planned and sealed the den’s exit, the Human couldn’t leave Hotland at all. Additionally, since the MTT resort elevator to New Home won’t work, the human has to take the long way around though an unpopulated area (the CORE). For Mettaton, indirect tactics are in-character for him. He does re-arrange the CORE in the Neutral/Pacifist Routes, perhaps to ensure the human will encounter the mercenaries he hired, and he offers a lot of money to Muffet for the Human’s SOUL. Therefore, it would make sense Alphys would tell Mettaton to seal the CORE exit, or that Mettaton would decide to do so on his own.

Tactic 2: Offense Over Defense

Tactic 2 Summary: Mettaton made a decent choice in choosing his Mettaton NEO mode, because it could (in theory) hit hard and fast but still take a few hits. (Slightly less well-supported than Tactic 1.)

Although Mettaton EX is not invulnerable, he's a fairly difficult boss. He can attack with a larger volume and variety of bullets, in versatile combat patterns with unique combat mechanisms (the fast-forward/rewind technique). He uses a unique SOUL mode, too, and if Mettaton only fights the human once in the Genocide Route, the human would have no practice with this mode. (like for Undyne). Mettaton’s a pretty formidable foe, even when he's focusing on glamour and dancing rather than killing the human as quickly as possible.

Mettaton has very good stats, too. His boxy mode has 9999 HP, 30 AT, and 255 DEF, while his Mettaton EX and NEO forms have 1,600 HP, 47 AT, 47 DF, and 30,000 HP, 90 AT, and 9 DF, respectively. While Mettaton NEO's defense is much lower than the other forms, he has the most HP and AT. In theory, Mettaton NEO is a mode that emphasises offense over defense, but can still take several hits. If Mettaton strikes hard enough, he wouldn’t need to fight for very long. Furthermore, assuming Mettaton NEO has a higher AT stat than Mettaton EX and was more focused on killing a human, he might actually succeed. (That's not even counting the possibility he could dodge or fly)

Tactic 3: “You wouldn’t kill a human, would you?”

Tactic 3 Summary: Believing the human would be reluctant to kill someone who looks humanlike, Mettaton takes on a humanlike form. If the human cannot kill Mettton, they would be drained of the will to exterminate, or quit after “killing” him. Of course, Mettaton would actually survive since he’s a ghost. (Least plausible interpretation, since Mettaton thinks the human is a “threat to humanity”)

Mettaton thinks the human might be reluctant to kill someone who looks so humanlike. The human would be unable to kill Mettaton, and thus be drained of the will to exterminate, or quit after “killing” him. (see real players quitting after killing Papyrus; now apply it in-universe to someone who looks shockingly humanoid)

Humans have a deep-seated aversion to killing their own kind, to the point killing humans comes at a high psychological cost. Indeed, according to the book The Most Dangerous Animal: "[...]the most traumatic form of killing involves looking a person in the eyes while taking his life. It is an experience that often haunts men for the rest of their lives.” Soldiers sometimes get PTSD even when killing in self-defense or in defense of others, and their turmoil is surely greater when killing those who don’t pose a threat. (e.g., children) Psychologically, the easiest way to dodge this and exterminate vast swaths of people is to conceive of them as non-humans: as wild beasts, vermin, pests, or simply “monsters”. Although Papyrus, Undyne, and Sans look pretty humanoid, Mettaton NEO/EX are definitely the most human-like, due to the humanlike face and body.

Due to his admiration of human culture, Mettaton might have known about this tendency, and made it part of his plan. Taking on a suddenly very humanlike form would confront the human with an aversion to killing other humans. Furthermore, if he couldn’t (or didn’t) attack, the Human wouldn’t be able to justify attacking him in self-defense. Progress on the Genocide Route is only possible through clearing out areas and exterminating bosses, and the Human can make no exceptions. If the human cannot kill Mettaton NEO, they’ll lose the will to fight (or at least for exterminating).

His plan hinges on a human not wanting to kill humans/someone who looks so humanoid. In any case, if Mettaton hasn’t fused with his body yet, a physical strike cannot hurt him, and he will survive if his body is destroyed.

(If you liked this content, check out the author's Patreon and Ko-Fi. The links on the ArgentDandelion blog sidebar.)

As for why it's not visible...video game limitations. For example, Toriel notices when Frisk is hurt, despite Frisk's sprite showing no damage, and when Toriel fights Frisk, the room has no scorch marks, despite the volley of fireballs.  ↩︎

In other routes, a manticore says: "The elevator goes straight to the capital. [New Home] But it stopped working." (If inspected, it says “in use”, no matter the route)  ↩︎

[bleakcreek]

If it’s almost the end of the year, and we think i can safely say that this has been an AMAZING year for fic in the rhink fandom! there have been so many incredible new authors, on top of authors that have been around for years who are still writing about our boys, and i wanted to give a little bit of recognition to some of my personal favorite fics written in 2019!

i am not in any way implying these are “the best” fics, just the ones that i’ve personally enjoyed. i’m mostly sticking to either completed mutli-chapter fics or longer one-shots, and i’m limiting myself to no more than one fic per author so i spread the love.

without further ado, my (personal) top rhink fics of 2019. (behind a cut, because this post is very long.)

-

If You’re Wondering If I Want You To by @ssodangdark Rating: Teen Chapters: 5 Words: 10,234

Summary: “The year is 2006 — you just crafted the perfect away message, The Fray is playing on your clock radio, and you're trying to figure out what band t-shirt to wear to school today. Meanwhile, two teenage boys meet for the first time and navigate their feelings for one another through the songs on one of their iPods.”

this fic is everything you could want in a high school au. it’s sweet, and full of pining, and comes with it’s own built-in soundtrack. i can’t recommend this fic enough. this fic is so sweet, you might get a cavity reading it.

Honorable Mentions: most of em’s other fics are oneshots, so i wanted to feature a longer fic, but i also have to acknowledge her oneshots too! Three’s a Crowd (rhett/link/jessie) and Chris Springs are two of my favorite fics and i would highly recommend reading them.

-

Don’t Hold Back by @likeaswitchinheat Rating: Explicit Chapters: 26 Words: 86,501

Summary: “Link has a lot of responsibilities resting on his gorgeous shoulders. It’s Rhett’s job to unburden him of all that. When Link is Rhett’s, he doesn’t have to think about a thing. Rhett will take care of him.”

laika is another ridiculously prolific author, and i’m actually ashamed that it took me until a few weeks ago to read this fic even though it’s been finished for months. this fic is basically half shameless filth and half feelings and angst, which is pretty much exactly what i look for in a fic. 

Honorable Mentions: i absolutely love all of laika’s oneshots, of which there are far too many to name, but i’ll put myself on blast for my particular tastes by giving special mention to Man Bites Dog and Selfie. 

-

Candids by @captainsourwolf Rating: Explicit Chapters: 8 Words: 19,635

Summary: “Rhett is a photographer fresh out of SCAD. He lands his first gig soon after graduation, just a simple print ad for a high school advertising their new senior class wear. At the shoot he meets in-demand fashion model Link Neal. It's tense from the start. Rhett ends up being his photographer on most of his shoots, and at every single one Rhett starts a collection of candid shots that he keeps for himself, in a box of trinkets he finds comforting.”

i absolutely loved this fic. i loved the premise, and the slowburn and build up, and the tender longing between rhett and link in this fic. i’m such a slut for pining, which is why this ultimately won out over a couple of elizabeth’s other fics, which are also very good. 

Honorable Mentions: a very close second for this my favorite fic of elizabeth’s was None Like This, but i ultimately had to give it to Candids because i’m a sucker for that softness. Aftercare and hump a little also deserve to be mentioned, too, if you’re looking for oneshots. 

-

Rhinestone Cowboy by @soho-x Rating: Explicit Chapters: 15 Words: 26,439

Summary: “If he was honest with himself, he could admit the glamour of being on tour for one of Country Music’s biggest acts had clouded his better judgement. He’d quickly dismissed all apprehensions regarding living in a conversion van for three months, instead focusing on the idea of working a stage during a live show, standing in the wings while country maverick Roy Walker played to crowds bigger than the population of the town Rhett grew up in. It was a dream come true for a small town boy like him.”

this fic hooked me right from the first chapter! i was absolutely in love with the premise of rhett and link as country music stars, and this fic did not disappoint. if you like tender slowburn and pining, you’ll absolutely love this fic. it killed me in the sweetest possible way.

Honorable Mentions: for how recently em jointed the fandom, she’s written a ton of fic! Stolen Moments, No Good Very Bad, #Dormlife, and Only For Your Very Space (unfinished) are some of my other favorites from her.

-

Apartment 69 by @apparentlynotreallyfinnish Rating: Explicit Chapters: 18 Words: 86,501

Summary: “Link has it all figured out. He has a plan for his life. He has a nice girlfriend and a nice job and a nice routine. It really doesn't mean anything that sometimes he gets off on watching men fuck each other. He's just curious. But when a famous gay porn star moves next door to him, his perfect plans start to fall apart.”

appa is one of the most prolific writers in the fandom, so it was really hard to narrow it down to just one fic from her. i actually almost put another fic of hers on here instead, but apartment 69 was the first fic of hers that i read, so i felt like i had to give it the edge over incognito if only for that.

this fic had me on the edge of my seat with every update, and it should be a testament to how much i loved this fic that i was genuinely shocked by how long it was, because i could have sworn it was less than 10 chapters. that’s how quickly i tore through it all.

Honorable Mentions: while i didn’t officially include them, i also want to mention her fics Incognito, I Only Want You to See Me (unfinished), NSFW, Wingman, and Let Me Be Your Light, as well as her entire library of oneshots. she is INCREDIBLY prolific so you can easily spend weeks going through her ao3 page and never run out of things to read.

-

remember that time in college I found your handcuffs? by @egocentrifuge Rating: Explicit Chapters: 3 Words: 10,435

Summary: “Rhett feels antsy, wants to leave this entire conversation about the fetish gear he found in their dorm behind, but he still wants to know despite his better judgement.

“Okay, the - dom? takes control of a scene. Why wouldn’t the dom just do whatever he wants?”

“Because it’s all about trust, man.” Link’s face is open and sincere in that way he only gets when he believes in something; Rhett can’t look away. “The sub trusts the dom to make it good for them, and so the dom does their best to. It can be a lot of pressure, but it’s - good, too, being able to make someone feel safe and taken care of, you know? For someone to be willing to be that vulnerable…”

Something in the way Link says it trickles warmly down Rhett’s spine, and he puts his beer down.

“Alright,” he says firmly. “Fine. I don’t understand it completely but that’s - that’s fine. As long as you’re both happy or whatever.” There are more questions Rhett wants to ask, but it’s - too much, for some reason. Not just knowing weird kinky details of Link’s sex life, but the way he’s talking about it.

It's twenty years before they discuss it again.”

eggsy has the market cornered on a very particular genre i like to call “porn that makes you cry.” this fic mostly gets the spot because a lot of eggsy’s other fics are much shorter and/or not on ao3, and for purposes of a fic rec, i really wanted to give something long enough to really sink your teeth into, but i an assure you that every single one of their fics should and would be on here if i didn’t limit myself to one fic per author.

eggsy packs an incredibly amount of feeling into a small amount of words, and strikes a perfect balance between hot, angsty, and loving. i cannot recommend eggsy’s work enough.

Honorable Mentions: what of eggsy’s fics isn’t an honorable mention? Reciprocation, You Know What They Say, Men Who Dress Like They Do in California, Reprobates, Unbuttoned, and literally everything on their tumblr (which has a lot of stuff that isn’t on their ao3).

-

The Murmur of Yearning by @its-mike-kapufty Rating: Explicit Chapters: 35 Words: 108,811

Summary: “When burnt-out professor Link Neal is offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that whisks him to the farthest reaches of the world, he isn't as ready as he thought he would be for the biting cold or the overwhelming darkness of Antarctica. Though at least he'd been given fair warning of those hazards.

The same couldn't be said of his new boss and research partner.”

mike has so many amazing fics that it by all rights should have been impossible to narrow it down to my one favorite, but honestly, this was a surprisingly easy choice. in spite of how much i love every single fic of mike’s, this one was so beautifully written and poignant, and i don’t think any other fic has ever made me cry the way this fic did. it hurts — in the best possible way.

i started reading this fic one evening after work, and was so captivated by it that i stayed up until 3 am, passed out midway through a chapter, then went home early from work the next day (sick! i was legitimately sick!) and laid in bed with a fever reading through the rest of this fic. the last written work i plowed through with that kind of speed and determination was harry potter and the deathly hallows...ten years ago. 

Honorable Mentions: truthfully i could just link to mike’s whole ao3 page here, but i have to at least give special mention to You Have (1) New Message for making me sob (and being the first fic of mike’s that i read), Feel Good for being delightfully fluffy and soft, Untethered for being so incredibly creative and exciting and having me on the edge of my seat for the entire month it was coming out, and And Sundowns Mend Rhett for making me feel things, as mike is wont to do. 

-

The Traveler by @the-average-bear Rating: Mature Chapters: 13 Words: 52,712

Summary: “Rhett's on a journey.”

this fic is probably tied with The Murmur of Yearning for my favorite rhink fic of all time, but i had to give The Traveler the edge only because it’s not...quite an au, and while both fics gave me a lot of feelings, this fic focuses on the rhett and link we know and love. it explores what might have been and what could be — and it touches on my favorite genre of fiction, which is sci-fi. 

rhett finds himself accidentally traveling between timelines, exploring what his life could have been like under different circumstances. the build up to the rhink content is slow, and while there’s some smut, it’s pretty minimal, so this is a very different type of fic than a lot of the others here. but god, if you want to feel every feeling possible about these boys, if you want to cry, if you want to be overwhelmed by how much rhett loves link (and vice versa)...? 

please, please read this fic. 

Honorable Mentions: a lot of their other stuff is from pre-2019 so it’s kind of cheating to rec them on a post of the best fics of 2019, but seriously, please read any and all of their stuff. 

-

More Honorable Mentions: i was going to do a lot more, but this list got really long and time consuming and i wasn’t able to do as many as i wanted. but some other authors i absolutely adored this year (in no particular order) are:

Rhincoln | @bloodbros

evenlypaced | @youdidinthedark

cockymclaughlin | @cockymclaughlin

pringlesaremydivision | @pringlesaremydivision

ohmyflavors | (not sure if they have a tumblr?)

LinksLipsSinkShips | @linkslipssinkships

missingparentheses | @missingparentheses

festivalofpudding | @festival-of-pudding

RileyRooin | @rileyrooin

crackers4jenn | @crackers4jenn

TheMouthKing | @themouthking

chronicallyilltrashcan | @chronicallyilltrashcan

[aethelflaedladyofmercia]

Of Aliens and Alpha Centauri: Space in Good Omens (1/3)

. So just yesterday, in one of the many discussions of Alpha Centauri and the practicality of our two favorite disasters running off together, @theniceandaccurategoodomensblog raised the perfectly valid question: “Why are we assuming there are no aliens?” And I said I had a lot of thoughts on the subject. This meta is the result of those thoughts and questions.

Broadly, the question of whether or not there would be aliens comes down to “what is the purpose of all that space in the Good Omens universe?” Everything we see is focused on Earth and the creation and destruction thereof, which, when you consider the scale of the whole universe, is really not that Big a story at all.

But the treatment of space is a little different depending on which version you use as your source material. If you try to combine the book and the TV show, you get some contradictions.

So I’m going to tackle each separately, starting with the book below the break, pulling together all my observations and thoughts on What does Good Omens really have to say about space?

I’m not going to do this on a strict schedule, but I have three parts planned and will post them as I find the time to write them!

(Source: I’m a huge sci-fi nut and think way too hard about everything, but I’m not any kind of expert. Other insights and comments are 10000% welcome.)

Good Omens Book

The book has, perhaps, the simplest approach to space: it’s barely mentioned.

For those unfamiliar, there is no mention of Alpha Centauri, or running away, or Crowley helping create stars/nebulae/whatever it is he made. Unless I missed one, all references to space in the book are:

The Earth is a Libra (p.17)

Crowley’s amazing drunken rant about the bird and the spaceship (p.54-57)

Adam and The Them talking about aliens and how aliens are now all about peace and harmony and being some kinda space cops “They all have this bright blue light around ‘em and go around doing good. Sort of g’lactic policemen, going round tellin’ everyone to live in universal harmony and stuff” (p. 156, part of a slightly longer discussion)

Newt meeting aliens who talk about peace and harmony while being some kinda space cops (p. 197-199)

That’s it; Crowley (then Crawly) doesn’t even ask about putting the Tree on the Moon, the line is instead “why not put it on top of a high mountain or a long way off?” (p.10).

Just because it’s simple, however, doesn’t mean we can’t learn a great deal.

Humanity has watched the stars for all of our history; they can be used to navigate, to tell time; the constellations are used to record stories; astrology attempts to make sense of the chaos of everyday life through the motions of heavenly bodies. The motions of the stars and planets has been calculated and recorded for as long as we’ve had enough knowledge of math to do that (so ancient Sumeria and Egypt, and by ancient I mean 4-5 thousand years ago), while less predictable events such as eclipses and comets have been taken as  ill omens or signs of Heavenly disfavor.*

The prevailing model in the West was geocentric (Earth in the center) and contained what we call the “Heavenly Spheres”; Earth was a globe surrounded by clear layered spheres, and across each sphere one of the seven planets moved in its predictable track. (The seven planets were: The sun, the moon, Mars, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter and Saturn - a planet being defined as a “wandering heavenly body that does not follow the fixed course of all the other stars”). Beyond all these was the final sphere, containing all the stars like a painted ceiling, and all moving together, rotating around a point near Polaris, the North Star.

The stars were predictable, but mysterious, unexplainable - but they existed to serve the story of mankind because why else would they exist? 

This mindset carries into Good Omens - at least the book, and probably the Radio Drama as well (I haven’t heard it in ages, but I don’t think it deviated from the major points). The universe is vast and huge and filled with “loads of buggerall” (p. 56) - Aziraphale’s comments confirm that, at the very least, angels and demons are confident that the universe is a vast vacuum (matching our modern ideas of cosmology) and also that it has a physical end somewhere (due to the way space-time curves, this might not necessarily be the case).**

And yet.

All these vast loads of burgerall are slated to be destroyed along with the Earth, aren’t they?

It certainly seems they were created at the same time. We know that there had only been “rather more than seven” days as of the start of the book, and that “rain hadn’t been invented yet” (p. 9). The language suggests not only that Earth is a new thing, but that there isn’t another planet out there that already experienced days and rain. Crowley, at least, believes that God created the whole universe (p. 373) and there seems nothing in the book to contradict this.

As for Armeggedon, it’s referenced as the “final test” and as “testing everything to destruction” and so forth (p. 48). At the final showdown on the airbase, Metatron refers to the great plan of a world lasting six thousand years (p. 352), and again this could refer to Earth only, or it could be the universe as a whole. In fact, as a general rule, the book simply conflates the earth and the universe, as if they were the same thing. And they are. Much like in the more Medieval and Classical worldview outlined above, there could be lots of stars and things out there but they only serve as a backdrop to the real important things going on here on Earth. Everything was created at the same time, and the only reason it might not be destroyed all at once is if the winning side decides they like the view and want to keep it.

The only hint that there might be more to the universe than Heaven, Hell and the little stage for their cold war (Earth) is the appearance of the aliens to Newt.

And yet, what are they described as? One is “stubby and green,” the one that talks to Newt is “a yellow toad dressed in kitchen foil...wearing the kind of mirror-finished sunglasses that Newt had always thought of as Cool Hand Luke shades” and the third is “a pepper pot.”

Two aliens as designed by a child, one clearly doing some vague Space Cop look, and a Dalek. The ship itself “looked like every cartoon of a flying saucer Newt had ever seen” (p. 197). I never ever got the impression these aliens were anything other than figments summoned from Adam’s head, spouting buzzwords he’d seen in New Aquarian (acid rain, albedo, polar ice caps) while acting like cops do in movies. And their message “We give you a message of universal peace and cosmic harmony an’ suchlike” (p. 198) - the “an’” instead of “and” is one of the distinguishing marks of how Adam and The Them talk. This is another one of his stories and games, played out on a much wider scale.***

My primary conclusion here would be that aliens cannot exist in the Book!Omens universe. The universe is the backdrop, Earth is where the real drama plays out. The universe has only existed for 6,000 years, not nearly enough time for other life to have evolved separately. God could have created life on the other worlds, but there is no indication that this ever happened, that there are other playgrounds on which this fight is being acted out - Crowley and Aziraphale never even consider the possibility that they’ll be reassigned elsewhere. It’s Earth, and then eternity in Head Office, no other options.

Book Omens: Other Possibilities?

I do think there is one alternative possible for Book!Omens: if we are willing to throw away the strictly supernatural elements of the book, it could be re-envisioned as a sci-fi story, in which God, angels, and demons are actually super-dimensional aliens who, by Clark’s Third Law, are sufficiently advanced to be indistinguishable from actual angels and demons. I refer to this as the Stargate Interpretation.****

More accurately, God would have to be the super-dimensional being, and would have created the Earth as a place to let the story play out; the angels and demons are then direct creations who buy 100% into the narrative they are given. Everything else can still exist - Lucifer rebels because of the same reasons, takes along all the unsatisfied angels, Heaven and Hell are only concerned with Earth because that’s all they’ve been told to concern themselves with. Their afterlives exist still, but only because humans were created to fit into that system.

Meanwhile, literally anything could be going on in the rest of the universe. There could be alien races thousands of years older than the earth. There could be galactic empires. Who knows? Not people on Earth. Our world was isolated from all that by superdimensional shenanigans.

But, and this is important, in order to maintain the illusion, angels and demons must be kept as much in ignorance of all this as humans. Might lead you to question the power of the being with the Ineffable Plans if those plans only extend to the edge of the solar system and don’t even go particularly far back in time.

Now, do I think this is the best headcanon for the book? Nope. This is a supernatural story, the threat of Heaven and Hell is so looming and menacing because there’s no other force out there, nowhere to appeal except the “higher authority” that isn’t, apparently, listening, and there’s no option to escape just by relocating to a new world. I think trying to force the Stargate Interpretation on it would diminish the story, and I really don’t think it’s what the authors intended at all.

However, I also think this would make for a very interesting fanfic in the hands of the right writer. Book Aziraphale or Crowley suddenly discovering that the scope of Head Office’s powers is much more limited than they’d thought? Who knows about this - have the Archangels and Lords of Hell been covering this up to keep the lower-level angels and demons from rebelling? Would their “miraculous” powers still operate the same on these alien worlds? Are there other beings out there more powerful? Or going the other direction - are there other worlds also playing out their own little pantomime of Eden and Armageddon? Are they created by the same God, or other members of the same race, and what are the implications either way? Does each world have an Aziraphale and a Crowley, or is the main GO world the first to screw up the Apocalypse so badly they survive it - and what is the implication of that?

There’s a whole lot of scope for interesting AUs out of this, and I’d be rather surprised if no one has written any, seeing as the book came out thirty years ago. (If any are available on AO3, send us links - this sounds a bit niche, but I’d love for fans to be able to find these!) I would consider them AUs though; the default assumption of the book is no aliens and including them is a deviation, just as adding in Hogwarts or Charles Xavier’s school while keeping everything else the same is a deviation.

However, in the TV series, space is certainly more present in the narrative, and the Stargate Interpretation doesn’t work as well. Can we reach any clear conclusions? I’ll attempt to find out in my next meta!

(Too important to footnote: We know that Atlantis vanished (p.372) so most likely Adam’s aliens did as well. There is, still, the possibility that they continued to exist after the end of the world. I think their somewhat shoddy appearance and very cliched dialogue suggest the aliens would, at best, continue to cycle through similar interactions to what we saw with Newt until Adam either “deactivated” or “updated” them. What would they do then? Did he create entire races and homeworlds for them or - as I rather suspect - did he just make the one ship full and then move on to the next?)

-- Footnotes --

*Note: the math for predicting eclipses has also existed for thousands of years, but was more difficult for ancient cultures to confirm because only a fraction of eclipses are visible from a certain spot. Several ancient cultures were eventually able to work out the pattern, notably ones that either ruled over a lot of land or else had good information exchange with their neighbors. Comets took a LOT longer, and indeed as late as the 16th century many believed each comet was unique and traveled linearly through the solar system, never to return. Edmond Halley (working partly from observations by Isaac Newton) was able to demonstrate that comets did in fact orbit the sun, and predicted the return of the comet now named for him in 1758. He also was the first to observe and describe the proper motion of stars, that is, the fact that they don’t actually travel in one large fixed group. 

**Also, I find it delightful that, along with thinking dolphins are fish, Aziraphale says the bird crossing the universe would need a generation starship - which as a sci-fi trope has been somewhat out of fashion since the 1970s, in favor of faster-than-light starships. This alone says volumes about his taste in literature and science.

***The fact that the alien refers to its own message as “one of them pheonomena” (p.198) - a term Shadwell uses - does suggest that Newt’s own imagination is filling in the gaps left by Adam.

****Just gonna go ahead and out myself as a lifelong Stargate fan don’t mind me. That said, Terry Pratchett also explores a world made in this style in his pre-Discworld novel, Strata, which contains a flat world in a sci-fi setting, where everything operates according to a medieval worldview. It is a fascinating read, not least for the inclusion of several elements that would later find a permanent home in the Discworld series. If you can find it, read it.

tagging the commenters who said yesterday they would be interested:

@sarahthecoat​ @ineffableove​ @akawestruck​