#man if only there was some kind of system for people to block tags of content they dont wanna see.....

[nyababymao]

[EN/VIET translations]

hey so what if neteyam had done what neytiri did and went into the battle pregnant(knowingly or not)-

[brighterdaysarebeforeus]

Soooooooo...basically a rewrite of Hobie's entire part in the movie? Except more awkward teenager and much, much more rambling. This does feel a bit all over the place so...enjoy, if you wanna.

Meeting Gwen for the first time wasn’t anything particularly memorable or anything like that, Hobie didn’t think. It was a simple thing, really; LYLA had found an anomaly, Miguel had reluctantly put Hobie on the case, Hobie had gone out of his way to ramble on about how he wasn’t a cog in Miguel’s system (man looked like he wanted to punt Hobie out of the office, and that just added more pleasure to his insubordination), and then Jess had sort of insisted that Gwen tag along to learn how to inter-dimensional travel and also how to deal with the anomalies as they occurred. Her exact words, if he remembered right, were “she needs to learn how to deal with these things in a team setting, and also maybe get some more friends her own age” or something similar that Gwen had immediately protested against.

He’d protested as well, as if it would change anything, as if these two would take him any serious. Hobie told them that he didn’t believe in teams, or in teamwork, and Jess put her hand on his shoulder, looked him in the eye, and told him very sternly to get over himself. Miguel was in the back, rubbing his hand over his face with one hand and waving the other at them in a motion that screamed ‘just go’. The mission itself was fine, easy job for a sole Spider let alone two Spider-People, but Gwen had been pricklier than he’d been expecting. He thought she was spunky, but particularly withdrawn for a Spider, and she’d snapped at him several times before the mission had ended. Afterwards, they’d gone their separate ways and he didn’t think too much about her, focusing on being the one and only Spider-Man (Spider-Punk, the newspaper headlines screamed, and he’d hated the name with a passion when he was younger, but found the title had grown on him over the years) in Camden.

Then they got paired together again. And again. And again. There’d been a genuine moment of concern that Miguel and Jess were punishing him for something, because they kept sticking him together with this small wisp of a child who looked like she wanted to bite his head off any time he asked her anything remotely personal, whether it be about her family or even her favorite kind of music. Hobie couldn’t even begin to figure her out, but decided that if he kept pushing, especially if they kept getting put on missions together, she’d have to crack eventually, right?

(It was worse when he realized she was actually older than him, even if it was only by three months. She held it over him for days, blocking his every question and prompt with “I don’t have to tell you anything, I’m older than you are.” Like a kid. Like a little kid, and how in the hell was she older than he was? It was unjust, it was.)

The sad part was, Hobie wasn’t even sure when things changed, with Gwen. Rather, he wasn’t quite sure why they had changed, though far be it from him to criticize someone’s changing of their mind. They’d gone on a mission, catching an inter-dimensional Doc Ock in some bizarre backwards universe made up of graffiti art that had her particularly subdued and snappish with him; she’d just given a thirty second rant that had cut Hobie deeper than he’d wanted to admit and they were swinging around searching for the Doc in a strained silence that had lasted until they’d found the fucker; at some point in the fight, the Doc had her pinned and Hobie’d yelled for her to cover her ears, and used his guitar to blast the scientist off of her at the last second, using his regular webs to yank her from where she’d been embedded in the ground; they’d, somehow, ended up victorious back at HQ and handed the Doc to Margo to send back to the proper dimension, went to Miguel and Jess to report their success. Hobie set his watch to his home dimension, the portal had opened up, and then —

“Hey, can I…” He’d half-turned to Gwen, eyes wide on his mask to showcase his paying attention as Gwen held her left arm tightly in her right hand, pointedly not looking at him and using the longer left side of her hair to cover her face. She’d taken off her mask, though Hobie had never really felt comfortable enough in the Spider Society to do so very often, and he could see the uncertainty in her face as she finally spit out, “can I…crash with you? For a bit?”

“Like, in my dimension?” Hobie’d asked, and she rolled her eyes so hard that her head followed the motion automatically. Something warm and pleased grew in his chest as she pushed past him roughly, muttering something sarcastic under her breath, and he didn’t even notice Jess watching them from behind as he nudged her shoulder playfully while they walked through the portal together.

Gwen started hanging around more after that, even when they had to keep moving from abandoned house to abandoned house in order to keep a roof over their head for the night. She didn’t stay over every night, but it was often enough to leave some of her shit laying around for him to trip over. He discovered she like playing drums and incorporated her into his band, more or less the only permanent member aside from him despite the inter-dimensional shenanigans. ‘Gwen’ became ‘Gwennifer’ (she threw her drumstick at him) which then became ‘Guinevere’ (he’d barely dodged the swing she leveled at him for that) became ‘Gwendolyn’ (she’d webbed his mouth shut) became ‘Gwendy’ (she rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, but he’d caught the pleased look on her face for that one). Over time, she started opening up about her dad, her indefinitely on-hold Spider-Woman work in her home ‘verse, her Peter…

Miles.

The name lit up something at the back of his head, the first time she’d mentioned it, and Hobie couldn’t for the life of him figure out what it was. It wasn’t until she mentioned something about a particle collider that it came rushing to Hobie; he was Miguel’s “original anomaly”, the one who had apparently weakened the multiverse apart enough for the Spider Society to be kept busy damn near constantly. Hobie could respect a Spider who could throw the multiverse into chaos like that, even if was accidental and wasn’t even his fault to begin with. He tried prompting her, through trial and error, into talking about Miles damn near constantly; it worked better than he’d hoped, and for a hot minute all she would talk about was Miles. What he looked like, what he’d say, the way he’d stuck his hand to her hair when he’d first gotten his powers and she’d had to cut it off on the sides (“and you kept the hairstyle?” “Fuck off, Hobart — ” “Ew, no thanks mate, ‘o the fuck is Hobart — ”). She talked about him so much that Hobie felt like he knew the damn kid all on his own without ever having met him.

And then Gwen got herself assigned to a mission in his universe. Not only that, but she was allowing herself to miss her friend enough to stop off to visit when she went, though she had a brief moment of panic before she’d left and she’d called him for ‘moral support’ or whatever it was she’d hissed at him when she called. Hobie felt proud of her for that, even though he couldn’t find his chucks the day she left and he nearly brained himself tripping over her damn jumper when he headed to the bathroom.

It was her first mission on her own, officially, and Hobie was pulling out damn near every trick in the book to keep him from worrying. He was sitting at her drum set where they had it set up in a practice warehouse, listlessly banging on the cymbals when his watch went off a second time. Heart jumping up into his throat, Hobie answered the call and whipped his way into Mumbatten, which was exactly where Gwen was not supposed to be at this current moment. He’d barely even taken the time to suit up, nearly forgot to grab his damn guitar, and didn’t even pause to take in the situation before strumming the thing and bursting through what looked like a barrier. He’d heard Gwen and Pavitr shout, but he’d landed with his back to them and then he’d gotten rushed by Pav the second he caught his breath.

Then he’d turned fully, pushed Pav off of him, and nearly swallowed his tongue when he caught a good, solid look of him, dressed in his black suit with pops of red; it had to be Miles, the Spider-Man-Who-Wasn’t-Supposed-To-Exist-In-Earth-1610-Specifically, which for some reason both was a surprise and yet was completely expected.

“This the kid from 1610?” He asked first, like he wasn’t fully aware of who Miles was to begin with. Gwen’s head rolled, a sure sign she was rolling her eyes, and he’d glanced her way briefly before looking back at Miles, who was complaining to Gwen. He’d gotten close enough when Pav thanked him for destroying the barrier in time to hear him (“I weakened it!”) and shot a quick demonstration of “use your whole palm, mate, not just your fingertips”, complete with hand visuals. Miles looked, low-key through his mask, like he wanted to strangle him. Gwen looked away, but Hobie could tell her shoulders were shaking from held-back laughter.

He wanted to crawl into a small hole for a minute. For a hot second, Hobie debated the pros and cons of potentially just jumping back through the portal and going home, there were three Spiders to deal with the Dalmatian over there, he wasn’t really needed for this, was he? He was distracted for all of two seconds before remembering there was supposed to be a fight going on, and he was supposed to be helping, and that Miles was standing in front of him.

So, naturally, once he was back online and fully focused, he opened his mouth and immediately put his foot in it.

“What’s up with his suit, is he bleeding from the armpits?”

“Wha-Who even is this guy?” Gwen introduced them quickly, Hobie talking even faster as they prepared to fight the Dalmatian-looking dude in front of them, and though Miles looked slightly lost (“I thought you hated labels?”), Hobie had hope that they’d be able to get along swell.

Then he stuck his foot in it again.

“Gwendy, you left your jumper ‘round my place.”

“What’s a jumper?”

“It’s a sweater!”

“How many sweaters do you own?”

And, because he couldn’t keep his damn mouth shut to save his own damn life even as Gwen clearly tried to salvage that mess, Hobie continued.

“And your toothbrush.” He kind of wanted to die. What was the deal with this spotty dude? Hobie wondered if the dude would shoot him into another dimension if he asked him nicely enough. He hated asking nice though, and it was pretty obvious this guy happened to be the villain of the week (as it were), so his best bet was staying here. Shame, that. He was really fucking things up right about now, and he just knew Gwen was gonna give him shit for it later too.

Things happened…weirdly fast after that. They fought the Dalmatian, they lost the Dalmatian, Mumbatten’s AlcheMax began crumbling and they had to save the people. Normal Spider stuff, and Hobie was glad for the distraction — well, not glad glad, he didn’t want Mumbatten to fall apart and Pav was far too little a Spider to be dealing with this kind of cosmic mess — just because Miles took off with Pavitr and left him and Gwen to hold the building up. Even better, Gwen was all the way over there, so she couldn’t even give him shit for how he’d been acting the fool in front of Miles.

God, he just hoped it wasn’t noticeable. To Miles, at least.

Then after the building collapsing was the bridge falling apart, and Miles diving to save the Inspector. Hobie had skid to a stop next to Gwen, the both of them staring down as Pav tried to save the bus and his girl, and Miles tried to save the Inspector. Gwen’s eyes were wide, taking up the entirety of her face as she held onto the railing in a death grip with one hand, the other still outstretched; she’d grabbed Miles then, right before Hobie had gotten there, and for a moment he wasn’t sure why she’d done it.

“He’ll be aces, yea?” Hobie said to her quietly, eyes still on the bridge.

“It’s a canon event. He’s interfering with it.” Gwen said somberly, and Hobie scoffed with a roll of his eyes — she sounded just like Miguel, there, for a hot moment, and he wondered if he should begin extracting them both before the man’s ideals managed to get in any deeper — but Gwen didn’t seem to notice him. When the bridge finished collapsing, she didn’t hesitate to jump over the rail, yelling for Miles as she did so. Hobie followed after her, beelining his way to Pav first to help him with the bus. Once it was on solid ground, relatively speaking, the passengers disembarking and Pavitr trying to smooth things over with his girl, Hobie turned on time to see Gwen lift a giant piece of rubble to reveal —

Miles. Holding a small child, with the Inspector right behind him. Both were fine, probably filled with adrenaline but relatively unharmed, and Pav’s girl was rushing past them all to embrace her father. Hobie followed her, not to the Inspector, but to Miles; Miles, who had been facing Gwen, who hadn’t heard him approach and therefore wasn’t anticipating it when Hobie grabbed his shoulders from behind and shook him eagerly.

“Miles, my guy!” He said cheerfully, and even the city cheered for them (and wasn’t that just novel, that’s never happened to Hobie before), and then —

There was a hole, big and black and looking similar to the spots on the Spot, sucking in pieces of Mumbatten. There was Jess, and her team of Spiders trying to keep it contained (points to Spider Society!) and her just blatantly blowing off Miles in a way that made Hobie’s hackles rise and ordering them all back to HQ to talk to Miguel (negative points for their diligent leaders!). Panic spiked at that, briefly, for Hobie; he leaned on Miles and tried to get him out of it, get them both out of it, but Miles shrugged him off in order to practically run into the belly of the beast with his fist in the air like he’d won something. Hobie dropped his face into his palm, but followed along anyway. Just to see what was going to happen.

Miles looked slightly awed when he took off his mask, which was kind of an ego boost, if Hobie was being honest; his whispered comment was met with one of his own comebacks (“how are you even cooler under the mask?” “I was this cool the whole time.”) that made Gwen press her lips together as she repressed her snort of laughter. Hobie glowered at her slightly, and she rolled her eyes in the opposite direction. Even Jess looked somewhat amused, and Hobie grunted softly at both of them.

He tried, honest to god, he tried so hard to keep Miles from meeting Miguel. Once he’d realized that Gwen had met with Miles and yet told him nothing about the Spider Society, told him nothing about how he fit into all of this as the supposed “original anomaly” (he had ThoughtsTM about Miguel’s thought process, is all, ThoughtsTM that he didn’t necessarily have time to delve into at this specific moment) — he couldn’t let him walk in blind. Miles didn’t deserve the way Miguel was gonna treat him on a normal day, short-tempered and blunt as the man was, let alone a day where a mission was fucked up bad enough that the BBG got away and another dimension was in peril of nonexistence. There was just no time to prepare him, not right at this moment, and he’d completely messed up his entrance to begin with so it wasn’t even like Miles would wanna even listen to anything Hobie had to say, let alone believe it, so…Hobie stalled.

Easily reaching out and grabbing anything potentially useful, Hobie distracted Miles as best he could. Bet this don’t even do anything. Why’d you wanna join up anyway? (The scoff Miles gave him when Hobie told him to make his own watch was not cute, Hobie did not find it endearing at all, and he was shit at lying to himself) What’s your set up — loving parents? (He was thankful Gwen was walking ahead of them for that one and not paying them any attention; the way he’d leaned on that unused portal more or less broadcasted his interest, especially combined with the way he’d fallen through it. He was also infinitely grateful Miles was too preoccupied to notice that blatant display). Hell, he even planted himself in front of the damn kid, sitting in the chair and stretching his legs out onto the table top so that Miles wouldn’t advance anymore, and felt his heart flutter in his chest when Miles simply pushed past him without even stopping.

Then it stopped when Miguel showed up, acting more Miguel-ish than usual. Miles greeted him brightly, holding up the empanada he’d gotten from the cafeteria, but Miguel was having none of it at the moment. Hobie glared at him out of the corner of his eye when he threw the empanada, then dipped out of sight in order to steal more tech that he needed; he lost track of what was happening all the way up to the loud crashing noise, and he’d popped his head back over to see Miguel yelling at both Gwen and Miles. Sniffing irritably, Hobie opened his mouth and was cut off immediately by Peter Parker from Earth 616 making his appearance. Miles was happy to see him, Hobie could hear it in his voice, and against his better judgement he went back to what he was doing.

When Miguel trapped Miles, way before literally trapping him in a cage, Hobie made his way to Miles’ side while keeping a small distance from him. He kept his eyes on him, watching how he ranted against Miguel’s idea of ‘keeping to the canon’, how he fought against the idea of letting one person die just to save others, how he argued that as Spider-Man they should be able to do both. Watched how he turned to his original allies, Peter 616 and Gwen and even Peni, and how they all couldn’t look him in the eye for longer than a few seconds. Encouraged him when it seemed like he needed it (“Here we go.” “Hobie, you’re not helping.” “Good.”). Miles realized it was a trap a second too late, and once Miguel had him caged, chaos began to descend upon them all. His friends were yelling at Miguel, who was yelling back, and Miles was panicking. He couldn’t break himself out, and Hobie’d had enough.

“Oi, Peter Pan.” Hobie hissed at him, and Miles stared at him with wide eyes. He didn’t touch the digital net, all too aware of the fact that it would draw attention from the others, but he spread his hands out just in front of it. Hobie repeated his advice from earlier, complete with visual demonstration, without speaking out loud. “Use your palms.” Miles seemed to take a breath at that, his shoulders lowering from around his ears as he pressed his hands fully against the barrier, palms and all. Since Hobie was the only one paying attention, he knew to brace himself when electricity started crackling up and down Miles’ arms; when the barrier exploded, he was the only one who wasn’t knocked over aside from Miles, who seemed to freeze for a sec when he realized he was free. He chuckled, smiling proudly when Miles’ wide brown eyes met his again, without the barrier this time.

Then Miles turned heel and booked it down the corridor, where the door was wide open and awaiting his exit. Hobie sort of regretted that breaking the door so it would stay open meant that the other Spiders also had easy access to go after Miles, but they were still trying to pick themselves up off the floor and that gave Miles a solid four second head start. It was the best Hobie could do for him, given the situation, along with one last thing.

Miguel yelled for everyone to go after Miles, and they complied. Hobie activated his watch, creating a portal to his home ‘verse. Sneering at all the Spiders rushing past him, Hobie shouted “for the record, I quit!” and threw his watch off once he was safely in the portal.

He crash landed towards the edge of the bed in the room, close enough to where he was aiming originally. Sighing heavily, Hobie sprawled out on the bed and listened to the drones flying overhead, watched as their lights illuminated the room he was staying in currently. Gwen’s jumper was still on the floor where she’d left it, her shoes dropped carelessly two feet beside it. (Seriously, her shoes were right there, did she really have to take his?) With a soft sigh and a quiet groan, he pulled himself back up, stretched, and started pulling shit out of his pockets. He’d actually grabbed a lot more things than he’d needed, courtesy of trying to hold the door for Miles, and he tossed aside the things he didn’t need in order to get started. Several other watches dropped out of his pocket as well, the ones he’d made before staying on him for safekeeping — one for him, one for Pav, one for Gwen.

Just because Miles didn’t want to make his own watch didn’t mean Hobie couldn’t make one for him.

[bucky-fricking-barnes]

Heroes in Our Midst

Title: Heroes in Our Midst

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Reader

Word Count: 3.9k

Warnings: None, mostly fluff!

Summary: You invite the confused veteran at the grocery store to your Friendsgiving, but maybe you should’ve done a background check first.

A/N: Happy (belated) American Thanksgiving to those who celebrate! I’m so thankful for each and every one of you. I hope that everyone, whether you are celebrating today or not, is safe, healthy, and surrounded by those they love (and that love them back). Dividers are by @firefly-graphics​

The man in the baseball cap has been staring at the stuffing for five minutes now, and you’re on a deadline. You don’t really want to tell him that he’s in the way and that he’s completely blocking the bags you need for your Friendsgiving, nor do you want to reach out and force your way in. He looks lost, the poor thing, and it’s when he flinches at the pre-recorded holiday message over the PA system that you decide to intervene.

“You can’t go wrong with Stove Top,” you say, stepping a little closer. He frowns, turning to face you just enough for you to see his profile. 

What a jawline, you hum to yourself, and you, thankfully, manage not to say it out loud despite the fact that you’re running on only four hours of sleep. The holidays did you dirty this year.

“I’m sorry?” he asks.

And what a voice! You melt a little at the deep timbre of it.

You gesture at the red box to his left. “Stove Top. It’s pretty easy to make and it doesn’t taste half bad. It’s not homemade by any means, but it’ll do if you’re in a pinch.”

“Right.” He clears his throat and picks up a singular box, then sets it in his cart as if it might break if he weren’t careful.

Peering past him, you frown at his bounty. Along with the stuffing, this broad-shouldered man has selected a pitiful rotisserie chicken, a slightly smushed sweet potato pie, and a dented can of cranberry sauce. No doubt it was one of the last ones in the bin. People in your neighborhood apparently really love cranberries, much to your dismay. His isn’t the Thanksgiving dinner you would have chosen, but you remind yourself that not everyone is as lucky as you.

Some people spend the holidays all by themselves. A pang goes through your heart as the man steps down the aisle, finally allowing you to load up on the bags of stuffing you’ve been waiting on.

You toss four into your already overflowing cart and you’re reaching for a fifth when you feel the man’s eyes on you. Silently, you glance over in his direction before grabbing the bag and adding it to your bounty.

“Do you need another recommendation?” you ask, hoping that’s the only reason he’s watching you. There’ve been too many stories about creeps on the news lately and your heart skips a beat at the thought.

“You definitely look like someone who knows what they’re doing,” he replies. He nods at the cart and you grip the handle a little tighter.

“I’ve got a big family. And a boyfriend,” you add, just for good measure. “He’s waiting on me in the car.”

The man shakes his head and holds up his hands. “I’m not trying to hit on you, miss. I’m sorry if I gave the wrong impression. I’ve…” He clears his throat again and drops his hands, glancing back at his almost-empty shopping cart. “I’ve never done this before.”

“Done what? Shopped for a Thanksgiving dinner?”

“Something like that. Think you could help me out?”

Carefully, you push your cart closer so you can get a better look at his. He’s wearing dog tags, you notice, and a swell of sympathy makes your chest tight.

Of course, you think, and you could almost kick yourself. No wonder he’s so overwhelmed by all of the options.

“Well, the first thing I’ll need to know is how many people you’re cooking for. That’s a big factor,” you tell him.

Now that you’re closer, you’re able to get a clearer view of his face. He’s got kind eyes to go with the sharp jawline and beautiful voice, and you smile a little as he glances down at his purchases.

“Just me,” he says. “I couldn’t find a turkey small enough, hence the chicken.”

You frown. “Just you? That’s it?” He nods in confirmation and you purse your lips for a moment. “Honestly? You’re better off just getting one of the pre-packed meals by the deli or just going out to eat. Cooking a whole Thanksgiving dinner for yourself is a whole lot of hassle and a lot of stress for nothing.”

He shifts a little. “I’d rather cook as much as I can. This is the first Thanksgiving I’ve had in a long time. I want it to be…” The man trails off, seemingly at a loss for what he wants.

“That’s understandable,” you say, nodding and offering him a small smile. “I noticed your dog tags. Where were you stationed?”

Automatically, he reaches up to tuck them inside his shirt, out of view. “Europe.”

“And you didn’t have Thanksgiving there?”

Your poor attempt to make conversation falls flat and the man forces a tight smile. “Is my dinner a completely lost cause?”

“Not necessarily. You’ve got a good foundation, you just need some fixings to spruce it up a bit. Some mashed potatoes, green beans, a salad, some mac-n-cheese, another pie…” He nods along, as if making a mental checklist as you speak. “That’s if you’re really dead set on this whole cooking thing, and obviously that’s more than just one person can eat. You’ll have a lot of leftovers to tide you over, which isn’t always a bad thing. Of course, there’s always another option…”

“Which is?” he asks.

The song changes overhead from a newer Christmas song to one of the classics and you can’t stop the next words that come out of your mouth,

“Come to my house for dinner.”

He seems just as surprised as you do, and you want to crawl into a hole. You scramble to correct yourself before the man, a complete stranger, can run away and tell all his friends and family about the weird girl in the grocery store who invited him to her house on one of the biggest holidays of the year when all he wanted was to know which brand of boxed mashed potatoes to buy.

“Of course, I’m sure you have other plans. I wouldn’t want to make you feel uncomfortable, I’m not even really sure why I said that. I don’t normally—”

“I’d love to come, if it’s a genuine offer,” the man says, cutting you off. He smiles softly, a gratefulness shining in his eyes, even from underneath the baseball cap. “I’d hate to intrude on you and your family, though, or your fella. Boyfriend, I mean.”

You swallow thickly, looking down at your cart. “Well, it’s— I actually don’t have a boyfriend. That was more of a let’s-scare-off-the-creeps-with-a-fake-boyfriend type thing, you know?”

“I’m… familiar with the tactic.”

By the way he says that, however, you’re not really sure he is. It’s endearing that he’s trying to save face in front of you, and you smile a little. When you lift your head, he’s watching you.

“I can text you my address, and what time to be there,” you add. “No pressure if something else comes up. I’m actually celebrating later this weekend with my friends—you know, Friendsgiving—so you’ve got some time to think about it. You don’t even need to bring anything if you don’t want. I usually do a lot of cooking and everyone else just brings something to drink or their leftovers from their own family dinners. It started out as a potluck, but it’s grown into something more over the past few years.”

His posture relaxes slightly. “That sounds nice.”

Smiling a little more, you hold out your hand. “Phone?”

After a beat, the man digs into the pocket of his jacket and pulls out something you haven’t seen in years. You manage to hold back your laugh, but the surprised noise can’t be helped. He looks a little shocked at the high-pitched outburst, then embarrassed.

“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to make you feel bad, it’s just… I haven’t seen anyone with a Nokia in years. I mean, I think my grandpa probably still has one at his house… somewhere. We got him onto one of those little cheap smart phone things for senior citizens a few years ago.”

The tips of the mans ears are a bright pink as he hands the phone over to you, and you quickly start maneuvering your way to his contacts list. It takes a minute, but you finally get your name and number in, then hand it back.

“Y/N?” he reads, glancing up at you.

You nod. “And you’re…”

“Steve.” He stands a little straighter, a little taller, and you catch a glimpse of the great soldier he must be. “My name’s Steve.”

“It’s nice to meet you Steve. Send me a text so I have your number, okay? Then I can text back with the info. If you change your mind, though, there’s no need. I don’t want you to feel pressured to come, especially since we just met. I know that stranger danger is still a thing for adults.”

Nodding, he pockets his phone and grabs hold of his cart again. “It was nice to meet you, Y/N. Maybe I’ll see you soon. Thanks for the help with the stuffing.”

You can’t help but smile. He’s genuine, that’s for sure, and you watch him push his cart forward and turn the corner toward the produce section before finishing your own shopping. There’s a little bit more pep in your step as you head toward the registers.

Three days after Thanksgiving, Steve shows up for your annual Friendsgiving. He’s not the first person you’ve welcomed today, but you know for a fact that he’s been waiting outside near the bus stop for at least a half hour before he’d come up to the door.

Poor guy must be freezing out there.

“Hi! I’m glad you came!” You step out of the way so he can come in, then shut the door behind him.

Steve stands tall in the little entryway of your apartment. He’s got a bright blue tupperware bowl in his hands and he looks entirely out of place, so you decide to take a gentler, less enthusiastic approach. For someone who hasn’t had a real Thanksgiving in a long time, your cramped apartment filled with strangers, festive decorations, music, and several different kinds of cooking food is sure to overwhelm.

“Hey,” you say, coming around from behind him. You soften your smile and hope he perceives it as genuine. It is, of course, but you don’t want to seem unsure of your invitation, not after he’s made the effort to come and even bring something to share. “I really am glad you came. Do you want to put your dish in the kitchen? I can get you something to drink. Then you still have something to hold onto?”

He seems a little taken aback that you’d even noticed his tight grip on the bowl, but he nods anyway and follows you as you weave your way into your galley-style kitchen. Your neighbor is at the stove, stirring a pot of mac-n-cheese, and she smiles wide when Steve fills in the doorway behind you.

“You must be grocery store guy. We’ve been waiting for you,” she tells him.

You gape at her and whack the side of her arm. She laughs. “Gloria! Enough! Focus on the food, please! If you’re just going to gossip and spill my secrets, I’ll take care of the cooking myself!”

“No, we’re not having a repeat of last year,” she chides, still grinning. “You turn into a real mother hen when you’re in the kitchen. We all offer to help and yet you still complain that no one’s helping you!”

Steve’s cheeks are pink when you turn back to him, and you have a feeling it’s not just from the heat of the kitchen. Your own face feels a little warmer than it should and you force away the nervousness that bubbles up in your throat, instead trying to focus on clearing a spot for Steve’s contribution.

He sets the bowl down in the empty space you create and you try to sneak a peek. The silicone lid isn’t clear and your mind whirls with ways to ask him what he’d made, especially since he hadn’t seemed like the type of guy that can cook.

"Something to drink?” you finally offer, glancing up at him. “We’ve got beer, wine, juice, soda, coffee, water… Pretty much everything. There’ll be more options once everyone gets here.”

“Water’s fine, thanks.”

Nodding, you set about getting him a paper cup and scribbling his name on it with Sharpie, then making sure he gets his drink. You hand it off as the door opens and your work friends step in, cheering as the song changes to a newer favorite right as they arrive. 

“I hate to just leave you like this, but I need to go say hi to them,” you say. “If you want, there should be some serving spoons you can use for whatever you brought. You can figure out what works best since it’s your dish.” You gesture towards the drawer next to the stove as you back towards the kitchen doorway, and Steve obediently nods. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

“I’ll be fine,” he assures you, a small smile on his face. “I don’t need a babysitter. I’ll get the lay of the land soon enough.”

You try to take Steve’s words to heart as you head back to the living area. It doesn’t take long before you’re sucked into conversations and shenanigans with your friends, however, and when you finally remember you’d ditched him with Gloria, of all people, forty-five minutes have passed and you’ve finished the drink you’d poured just before his arrival. 

Grabbing the empty cup, you hightail it back to the kitchen, only to find him leaning against the counter and nodding along with one of her long-winded stories. He looks up when you stumble into the room and offers you a concerned look, but you quickly wave him off when he reaches out to help you. From the way he looks you over, you can tell he thinks you’re drunk, but you don’t know how to explain that you’re just frantic that Gloria is spilling your deepest, darkest secrets to the cutest guy you’ve met in months.

“Oh! Y/N! I was just telling Steve that story about my great aunt who worked for the USO during World War II,” Gloria says, and you glance over at her, confused.

“That’s great. I don’t think I remember that one. Did Steve tell you he was a veteran?”

Gloria’s brows furrow and she looks between you and Steve. He’s suddenly very interested in the empty cup in his hands and your stomach drops. Nerves set in as Gloria makes some paltry excuse for the two of you, then pulls you into the tiny hallway off the living area.

You wrench your arm from her grip in front of your closed bedroom door. “Gloria! What’s wrong with you? I mention that Steve’s a veteran and you suddenly start acting weird? I’m trying to make him feel welcome and you’re not helping!”

She shakes her head at you, scoffing lightly. Amusement twinkles in her eyes. “You have no idea who you invited, do you?”

The nerves are back, extinguishing any frustration you might have held with her. “What— I mean, I know he’s a nice enough guy. I didn’t exactly do a background check, but you’re starting to make me wish I had! Why?” you hiss.

“Y/N, that’s Steve Rogers.”

The name sounds vaguely familiar, but it doesn’t exactly ring any bells, so you just stare at her. “Okay? Does he work for the government or something? Is he a spy? Do I need to call the cops?”

She rolls her eyes and pulls her phone out of the pocket of her apron. You watch in silence, looking between the screen and the doorway to the kitchen. You can just barely see Steve still leaning against the counter, his shoulders slumped. Your heart clenches a little at the sight. 

He looks so lonely.

“Here,” Gloria says, shoving her phone into your hands.

You almost drop it, but you quickly right it and start reading. With every word that you’re able to process, your heart starts beating faster and faster. 

Captain America? World War II? Frozen in ice? Born in 1918?

“Holy—”

This time when you glance back at the kitchen, Steve is gone. You shove the phone back at your neighbor and hurry back down the hallway to see if he’d just moved out of your view to refill his cup, but there’s no sign of him at all. 

The living room is filled with your friends chatting, leaning into each other, snapping pictures in front of your decorations, and chowing down on the appetizers, but there’s no Steve. You’re turning in circles when you catch a glimpse of him out the window. His cap is back on and his head bowed as he walks back down the street, his hands in his pockets. He looks every bit like he’s making a run for it, albeit a casual one.

Heart pounding, you throw on the first pair of shoes you can find and race out the door. You’ve never taken the two flights of stairs faster, but Steve is still turning the corner when you finally make it out onto the street.

Curse his long legs!

You have to push your way through the early evening crowds, throwing out “excuse me’s” and apologies every which way until you finally catch up with him a few meters away from the stairs down to the subway.

“Steve!”

You grab at the arm of his jacket. He pushes you away from him on instinct, sending you flying into another passerby. His reflexes are quick, however, because he’s steadied you before you’re even halfway to the ground and the other person is only a few steps away. They grumble at the both of you and you and Steve both send them half-hearted apologies as he leads you out of the flow of traffic.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking. Sometimes I forget—” He shakes his head. “Are you okay? I should’ve been paying better attention.”

“I’m fine,” you reassure him. “I’m more worried about you! Why did you leave without saying goodbye? Is everything okay?”

He drops his gaze to the pigeon scavenging around the discounted pumpkins nearby. “I’m fine, Y/N. You should be back in your apartment. It’s freezing out here, and it’s getting dark.”

In your rush to get out the door and catch up with him, you hadn’t thought to grab a jacket, but you hadn’t processed the cold until now. You shiver, and he quickly sheds his own to drape over your shoulders.

“You left your bowl,” you dumbly tell him.

The corner of his mouth crooks up, but it’s sad. “Don’t worry about it. I can get another.”

You shake your head. “Steve, I— Why did you leave? Is it because of something I did? Or something someone said? I promise that they’re all good people, it’s just sometimes when they drink, they get a little—”

“It’s not anything you or your friends did,” he says. “I promise. They were all wonderful and Gloria was very nice to me. I’m grateful that you welcomed me into your home even though we barely knew each other. Most people wouldn’t do something like that, not nowadays.”

“Then why?”

He sighs and looks up through the windows of the store behind you, watching the customers aimlessly browse the aisles for a long moment. Steve doesn’t meet your eyes when he speaks again, but you watch him fervently, searching for any sign of dishonesty or distress.

“Because I was worried that you’d be uncomfortable around me now that you know who I am,” he finally answers.

You shake your head again. “I don’t understand. Who you are? I know who you are. I mean, I already did, before Gloria showed me that article.”

His jaw clenches and you draw the jacket tighter around you when he steps away and adjusts his cap against a chilly breeze. His face and ears are pink from the cold, too. It’s not quite winter yet, but it’s rearing its ugly head.

“You’re Steve,” you continue, closing the distance between the two of you. “And you’re my dinner guest.”

“Y/N—”

“If we made you uncomfortable, then I understand you wanting to leave. You have every right to go home, if that’s the case. But my perception of you hasn’t changed now that I know more about your past. Knowing all the amazing, wonderful, selfless things you’ve done makes me want you to stay even more now, because it reminds me that it’s people like you that I’m thankful for. Who knows, I may not even be here if it weren’t for you saving New York.”

You take a beat, catching your breath a little in the cold evening air. “Steve,” you continue, as earnest as you can, “I want you to stay. Please.”

He ducks his head and you have to crane your neck to see his face underneath the brim of his hat. If the lights from the shop were a little brighter, you might be certain that there are tears in his eyes, but you’ll play it off as a trick of shadows for his sake.

“I’m more than just that guy in the article. They exaggerated things, and I am a veteran. I’ve done things I’m not proud of,” he tells you, and you nod. After a moment, you hold out your hand.

“Then it’s a pleasure to meet you, Steve Rogers. I’d really like to get to know you. All of you, not just the published stuff, if that’s okay.”

Steve stares at your outstretched hand for several moments, and you’re inwardly cringing and trying to think of a graceful way to recover when he finally shakes it. You have to hold back a relieved sigh as you smile.

“I don’t suppose I could invite you to my Friendsgiving for a second time?” you ask.

Much to your surprise, Steve chuckles. His hand is warm around yours and you shiver once he drops it. You tuck your hands into the pockets of his coat as the two of you turn and start walking back towards your apartment. He measures his stride to keep step alongside you, his body a barrier between you and the surging flow of people on the sidewalk, and you glance up at him with a smile.

“Well, I did leave my bowl,” he says, smiling down at you.

“Of course. That’s irreplaceable, so you’ll have to come back and get it. And while you’re here, you might as well stay for some dinner. I’d hate to send you home hungry.”

He holds open the door to your building and you duck under his arm into the overpowering warmth of the lobby. “Of course,” Steve replies. “That would be rude.”

“And I’d hate to have you think I’m a bad host.” You’re still smiling as you head up the stairs and open the apartment door, and you and Steve are greeted once again by your friends, most of which had never even realized that you’d disappeared. They’re none the wiser to your little escapade, and to Steve’s identity, but that’s just another thing that you’re thankful for.

Thank you for reading! If you liked this, please consider reblogging my work so that others can enjoy it too.

I do not consent to have my work posted, translated, or published to any third party site or app. If anyone sees my work anywhere other than my personal tumblr, Patreon, or ao3 accounts, it has been reposted without my permission.

If you want to support me further, consider buying me a ko-fi! My ko-fi is also under my SPN fanfiction blog, but I promise it’s me.

If you would like to be added to my tags, please send me a message or an ask! I tag for Everything, Bucky Barnes, Steve Rogers, Thor Odinson, and Peter Parker.

[cozylittleartblog]

ok i can't find any of the posts but hi if you're here from twitter here's a crash course of tumblr etiquette

reblog! reblog reblog reblog. if your post count is lower than your likes count you're doing it wrong. this is the website of having interests so reblog shit u like, we even have a tag system so you can organize things and find them again later! post limit is 250 posts daily, go nuts. edit - also, there is no algorithm here. we spread things ourselves or they don't get spread. Reblog!

change your icon from the default and have SOME kind of bio. there are bots around here. empty blogs get blocked by most people.

it is 400% ok to reblog old posts. yes even posts that are years old. we can turn off reblogs here, if someone didn't want you reblogging a post they wouldn't let you. you can reblog things multiple times in a row, even. if you want to put Cursed Pikachu Man (you'll likely get acquainted with him) on your follower's dashboards 12 times in a row nobody and nothing is stopping you.

post tags are for talking and rambling as much as they are organizing things, but keep in mind that tumblr only tracks the first 20 tags. so whether you are making an Original Post or Reblogging Something For Later, put your important tags first AND THEN ramble. the tags are also very long, 139 characters i believe. Per Tag. cough cough and creatives Really like it when you say stuff in your reblog tags cough cough

settings > dashboard > preferences. best stuff first? turn that shit off. your dashboard is now chronological and you can easily scroll to wherever you left off last. unless you follow like 500 people in which case lmao rip

6. you can send people both direct messages AND asks - DMs work like they do on any website. Asks are like sending somebody a piece of fan mail they can respond to publicly, or privately if you don't send it anonymously. Do not use the anonymous feature to be mean.

7. you do not need to censor words here. say kill. it's ok.

8. there is a blacklist feature. you can blacklist both entire tags, and words from posts. settings > account, it's under "content you see". if you don't want to see something you can get rid of it forever instead of complaining. enjoy.

9. if you make things: tag fandom, characters, and ships if applicable. add any medium or blog organizational tags after that. add spoiler tags if relevant. this all goes in the Tags bar at the bottom of the post, NOT in the text content of the post itself. ez pattern to remember.

feel free to add on fellow tumblr elders we need to get the newbies acquainted

[virovirokun-has-adhd]

Hollow Shell of a Man

"Oh if only there were words to describe how disappointed I am in you"

[ABOUT]

Names ::

-> Fizziepop! [or just Fizz for short ehehe]

-> Viro

& more

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

he / xem / h3 / vi / ren / it / zomb / static / mach / they

transmasc , genderfluid , catboy , luniboy , demiboy , cybrgender

lesboy , demirose , a-spec , qplatonic , aesthetic attraction , ambiamorous , robosexual

[#flags 4 me tag] \\ [gender & tertiary attraction] \\ [pronouns.page]

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

ADHDer + minor sensory issues

-! taken & in a polycule !-

-! w/ @mayday-mayd4y & Malware @m0memto-mori <3 !-

"Strong believer of being queer being about defying societal norms about gender and sexuality and not about depending on feeling love at all"

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

[LINKS]

Discord Servers Masterlist

Tags <- (outdated)

FIXATIONS , DNI & MORE UNDER THE CUT

[FIXATIONS]

=ordered by how intensely I'm fixated=

Transformers

Regretevator

ULTRAKILL

Electric Dreams

Gravity Falls

Pressure

Lone Echo

Mogai/Liom Community

RotTMNT

Ponytown

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

[DNI]

anti any of my fixations

queerphobic / exclusionary towards any of my identities

-- (including polyamory , ace/aro , mspec identities , mspec lesbians & gays , lesboy && xenogenders)

radfems.

ableist

proship/comship / pedos / tcest

disrespectful to others' beliefs

zionist / neo nazi / racist

dsmp stans / apologists / "kinnies" (cc&c!) [genuine system kinnies are fine] / ect. *

anti system / plural & anti endogenic/non-traumagenic system

anti kink

-- (this isnt just u thinking some kinks are gross this is genuine lowkey kink-shaming with no respect or regard for the kink haver's feelings)

nsfw/porn blogs

-- (unless i follow you first ig)

-- (i'm kinda sticky on these grounds, but im ok with valveplug)

*(for clarification idc if you still watch old dsmp creators' content (other than dream ofc bash that pedo's skull in) idc, i still watch Ranboo & stuff so as long as you're not trying to apologise for their wrongdoings / saying they've done nothing wrong, you can interact. Additionally if you support Dream or Wilbur for their wrongdoings stay the fuck off my blog and do not fucking interact. We support Shelby/Shubble here whole heartedly)

[OTHER]

I occasionally use Cybertronian terms or slang in my everyday speech, whether its referencing a body part

- (helm=head, processor=brain, servo=hand, optics=eyes)

- or to replace swearing (frag=fuck, scrap=shit/crap)

- or just talking about Primus in the place of Jesus/God or whatever

I oftentimes struggle with tone in text so tonetags are immensely helpful :D

I meow a lot, I sometimes refer to "cat brain" when my brain stops working like a human's brain should and I forget things

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

[HOUSEKEEPING]

=just some general rules i have=

Don't DM/PM me out of the blue. (duhh)

Don't send hatemail or things you know/think might trigger me.

Don't do the above to any of my moots/friends/partners either, if you do this you will be blocked as soon as I find out what you've done.

Stay in your lane, don't interfere with conversations / rb threads that's just common sense.

If I didn't reference you directly then I am very most likely not talking about you.

I only roleplay with people I'm closest to. (usually my partners)

Be kind obviously

[SIDEBLOGS]

@kingalice-not-so-villain-au - Sona AU with my good friend @bananabiskit

@fizziedraws - art blog

Old Pinned Post =]

[OTHER SOCIALS]'

FlipAnim

================================================

IMAGE BRACKET

[longeyelashedtragedy]

For the send a character ask: Granit Xhaka XD

@perfectpiety here you go!!!

favorite thing about them: HOW to even answer this??? i think granit might be as close to "perfect" as a human can get. first of all let's get out of the way how stupid gorgeous he is and has been for basically his entire adult life--my personal favorite granit aesthetic era is his early bratty twink time at arsenal (if he's wearing 29, you know he's extra fine) but he's stunning in any era. his cheekbones should probably be arrested. the side dish to this is how fucking awful he looks in his selfies 😂 he's way too young to take such bad photos of himself. there's some legend that quilters would purposely make a mistake in their quilt to show humility--that only god can be perfect--while i don't know if this is a true story, maybe granit's selfies are the contemporary version of this 😂

as for the REST of it...

who the fuck is this man? he's so strong and solid while not being an asshole, toxic man with no emotions. he operates on a value system that feels almost archaic sometimes, but in a good way, like he'd probably lie his nice coat over a puddle for mikel to step on in the rain. he truly seems to have the most golden heart. But he has a heart of molten gold—more lethal than the hard form.  More alive.  Overtaking everything it touches. His natural leadership and charisma are truly insane. My sister is a little like him in this way, and it's always truly fascinating to watch--someone who just naturally commands the attention, leads a conversation, even the most experienced and hardened team captain seems to defer to granit for the team talks. while "taking over everything and commanding the attention" is often a really annoying and unlikeable quality, for people for whom it comes that naturally you can't even hate them for it because they're not trying to be pushy or an asshole. they're just a born leader.

i also used to think he was kind of a himbo, but i feel like i owe him an apology because he actually seems quite intelligent and serious. he's one of those footballers who can give an actual academic subject answer for "what was your favorite subject in school" (math lol)

least favorite thing about them: that he DOESN'T PLAY FOR ARSENAL ANYMORE

favorite line: anytime he calls mikel a "freak, in a positive way"? in his open mic video during covid season, where someone scores and he goes "FUCK ME! THAT'S FOOTBALL GUYS!" uhhh...his entire "if you don't have the balls to play, stay home" speech in 2022? when he told alex iwobi "i only listen albanian music" in his #29 days cause that was such a lie lmao. in terms of international duty: when he was hyping up the team before the penalties vs france in euro 2020 and yelled "WE ARE CLEARLY THE BETTER TEAM HERE". or...most iconically...looking at the serbian bench and mouthing "Ta qifsha nonen ne pidh"...thanks to my scholarly pursuits of albanian i did not need a translator for that ;). or wait...in colney carpool...whatever the fuck that weird thing he said about giraffes was 😂

brotp: well...granit and his actual brother taulant? hahaha. i love him with anyone he was friends with at arsenal (gabby j modelling his clothing line, anyone?) with carlos cuesta, with ricci rodriguez, xherdan shaqiri, and breel embolo (always ready to throw down with vs the serbian nt). his history with yann sommer...i love granit's Friendships

notp: ok...please don't hate me. i don't mean "notp" as in like, eww, i hate this, i'd never read about it, i'd block the tags, etc. i just don't personally ship granit and martin. i think they were a great influence on each other as like...captain and vice-captain, and i loved seeing their interactions there. i just didn't really see sexual chemistry between them, if that makes sense. i certainly have read some granit and martin fics and enjoyed them! i just don't ship it really.

otp: i mean...

X H A K A R T E T A

do i need to stay more? two hearts that beat as one. one's heart is the other's home. mikel saving granit, shaping and transforming him, understanding him...sometimes it makes me think of the story in plato's symposium (don't worry everyone--i got a C+ in classical philosophy this is the only thing i remember or understood) from aristophanes where he talks about how zeus cut ppl in two and they have to roam around looking to find their "other half" so they could be complete...Xhakarteta be like that.

and also. how they both own each other, dominate each other, submit to the other. granit in charge in bed yet all in service of mikel. granit's utter, wide-eyed devotion to mikel in interviews. the way mikel saw the beast and the angel within, and loved the beast and showed the world the angel. UGHGHGGHGGHGGHG

random headcanon: i don't think granit would like, label his sexuality as anything? i think he just does what feels right.

unpopular opinion: i've definitely expressed this before but i do not--sincerely do not--agree with the popular view that granit would "lose control" when he got physical. for example (sorry veronika hahaha) when he chokes ashley westwood. if you look at his body language there--or even in like november 2022 vs chelsea where he kind of flung chalobah around--it's honestly a body that is very IN control of itself. he just came at these games from a very different mindset. he's naturally aggressive, goal-oriented, here to both win but also defend the honor of both himself and the team, so-- confident in his value system, he didn't care what he had to do to make it happen.

i've genuinely never seen granit appear "out of control," and i've watched a lot of aggressive granit compilations hahaha. i think mikel did help him find maturity about this, and i think putting him in a less defensive role really helped. granit defending = license to Murder

(frivolous bonus: i think he looked hot with the bleached hair! like he looked kind of deranged and so it grew on me...it definitely doesn't suit him hahaha)

song i associate with them: i don't really have one...maybe kangë e shahirav by mc kresha/lyrical son, and/or future lovers by madonna, but only bc i've listened to these songs a lot when writing fics about him lol

favorite picture of them: hOW do u expect me to do the impossible!!!!! how about these 2, the first with granit in my two favorite colors of course (and i love the 2nd one because he looks like he just woke up lol)

[maxbeta360]

Personal masterpost / 2nd intro

Max,Chief,Master Chief,Spartan He/Him | fictionkin/fictive & general machine alterhuman

I’m a boiling hot mess when it comes to alterhuman labels. I really can’t put my identity into words but I’m going to try here

As you might’ve picked up already, I am Master Chief but I am also an Xbox360, Or atleast somehow connected to one…? It feels like my brain is running as an Xbox engine but my body is the body I have in source/canon

This ‘Xbox self’ only stores really dated games from between 2001-2014. I have other games but the most prominent ones are Minecraft Beta and Halo 1 - 5. The only exception of time after 2014 that still affects my identity is Halo Infinite for some reason. I have lots memories from that source and I’m not sure why

Old Microsoft game marketing is a huge visual representation of my identity. The oversaturated green, the hit or miss edginess of gaming stores at the time, and just the general nostalgia of it all is me in a way. I also really like old YouTube and old Tumblr because it just reminds me of the time where I belonged :]

So basically I am like a time capsule of early gaming and the early internet XD (I will never say XD again I am so sorry)

I also really love the “eerie” liminal space of Minecraft Beta :] It kind of became a safe haven for me. I love the empty atmosphere that only the old games had

I’m a binary trans man btw. I am not transmasc. The term doesn’t match my experience but I have nothing against it

I’m hetroflexable but I usually just say I’m straight to simplify it

I’m nonspeaking in my cannon and when I front but I have no issue typing or writing my words

Age is a weird thing for me. The body is around young adult age but I’m like 9 or something? But not in a human way. More like a 9 year old game disc that is still going strong

I’m part of a system btw. I feel like that’s important to share. Uhh both me and the main guy (host) don’t really talk about it because we know it’s confusing to other people and the last thing we would want is to confuse people. Plus we’re both figuring it all out for ourselves

You’ve probably seen the main guy before if you’re on fictionkin & nonhuman tumblr. He interacts with a lot of my post and I do the same so you’ll see him around on my blog

DNI / BYI

DNI if you are; H0mophobic, Transph0bic, T3erf, R@dqueer, pr0ship, anything of the sort

Hard DNI if you support ai generated content. Also if I accidentally reblog ‘art’ that’s ai generated, please tell me. I often miss the signs

BYI Info that’s a little less harsh

I try my best to add alt text to my posts with images in them but don’t expect it in every post

I am not a fan of the Halo TV Series and I am not a fan of depictions of me without my helmet on so If you are a mutual and you reblog something like that (which is fine) I would really appreciate it if you used the #max don’t look hashtag? Because I have that tag blocked :]

And that’s about it. Thanks for sticking to the end or scrolling to the bottom at least

Image credit | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |

“and the universe said I love you because you are love.”

[standardquip]

4 years of running BentoVid & RICE (an extremely long & meandering retrospective about survey data) This is an entry that's part history about the fanvid server I run that hosts a [now] feedback event [then contest] called RICE, and part data analysis from 4 years of pre-RICE survey data and one post-RICE survey from a particularly "problematic" year of the event. Read the entry as it was intended on dreamwidth by clicking the link above, or expand the cut tag and hope the html I pasted into tumblr displays correctly. [edit: it doesn't, but it's readable if you don't care about line breaks.]

Preface

Or, the time I accidentally influenced an entire industry through a survey question (click to read more) In 2015, I created a website called fursuitreview.com (FSR). Fursuits (one of a kind whole body animal costumes) are expensive and it was hard to keep track of makers that didn't have huge followings. I didn't want to run a review page, but only two existed prior to mine. One had died completely several years before, and the other one updated so infrequently it was almost useless (it, too, eventually died after FSR took off). The other two pages were a victim of putting too much work on themselves. The first had several questions reviewers had to answer and assign points. The moderators would average all the points for each review and give the overall review a score out of ten. This ensured consistency in the scores across all reviews. It was an amazing system but it would simply take too long to do myself (plus I'm terrible at math). Both sites were not actually sites - they were user accounts on furaffinity.net (and sometimes tumblr or livejournal) - which required write-ins to copy a big block of text and hope they got the format right (they rarely did, which meant moderators would have to correct it). FSR started out on furaffinity, but very quickly moved to a wordpress website. I thought very carefully on how I would keep manhours and costs down. I decided to not have any user accounts at all, nor would I bother with a numbered rating system (I instead went with a "positive / neutral / negative" system because that's really what everything boils down to anyway). I devised the least amount of questions I could in order to pry the information I wanted out of fursuit buyers when they wrote in. This resulted in two sections: wear satisfaction, and visual satisfaction. Each section had several sample questions to help guide the writer. "Wear satisfaction" was like, do you like how it fits you? how is the ventilation? how is the vision? Visual satisfaction was questions about looks.

Example screenshot of the FSR "wear Satisfaction" questions from 2020+

When people submitted a review, I would read over them all and make sure everything was copacetic before publishing it. Back then (before 2020), I was a one-man operation so I read literally every single review coming in. I noticed that some writers would mention lining in some of the fursuit parts. Most parts are unlined - it's just faux fur and the backing of that will be up against a wearer's skin. Lining is unnecessary and can ultimately make the costume much hotter - but it does make everything look really nice and marginally more comfortable to wear. After a few of these, I added "Does the item have lining?" to the list of sample questions.

Does the item have lining?

Surely nothing bad could happen from such an innocuous question!! (upside down smiley face goes here)

I must take a break here to mention that I had no experience doing literally anything that FSR required to run. I had bought 3-4 fursuits and thought it would be nice to keep track of my opinions of them. Everything else, from coding a website to writing survey questions, I had taught myself. I had some very very basic wordpress experience from a personal roleplaying character wiki wordpress site for myself, but that was it. FSR was a learn by doing experience. And boy, was it an experience. Writing, reading, reviewing, editing, customer service... FSR had me dealing with it all, and I'm surprised it gained as much traction as it did throughout that process.

So, needless to say, I had no idea what "survey bias" was.

Weeks, possibly months, later, I was browsing twitter keeping up with FSR social stuff, when I came across a tweet from a rather well-known maker (I believe it was either beetlecat or beastcub) asking other fursuit makers why customers were suddenly asking for their fursuits to be lined. I wish I had a link to this tweet, but I no longer have a twitter account. (If you happen to find it, do link it in the comments!) It didn't hit me at first. I watched the thread and the responses roll in. As other makers replied, the sense of dread was very slowly overtaking me. Could FSR really have that much influence? Could just a single little sentence really cause so much strife? Yes, it did, and yes... It did. Once I connected the dots, I edited the sample questions. No longer is it simply "Does the item have lining?" Now it is: "If it is lined, what material was used? Does it absorb sweat appropriately? Does it make cleaning easier?" But I went through a few iterations before I got to that wording. I believe my first edit was something like "(Note: most fursuits aren't lined)", but that didn't properly imply that you shouldn't be asking your maker for lining. After this lining snafu, I had to go through all of my questions and determine what I was accidentally influencing, how that could change what customers ask of their makers, and if I really needed that information in the review to begin with. I also, finally, learned about survey bias, and took some time to read up a little more on how to craft survey questions. And, of course, I had to come to grips with the fact that, yes, FSR was big. And it had influence. My little side project was a staple of the community and people counted on it to make very expensive purchases. Maker reputations and business operations began to live or die by the reviews we pulled in. FSR got to be too big and too much stress for me, so I ended up giving full ownership of the site to someone else in 2022 or 2023 (it was a long transition and I'm not sure when the public announcement was made). However, as of today (31 March 2024), fursuitreview.com is still fundamentally unchanged from how I was running it - including the review form. Nowadays, I have nothing to do with the site. I couldn't deal with the stress and responsibility once it grew to be a community cornerstone. Unfortunately, history may be repeating itself with the project I replaced FSR with...

A brief history of BentoVid (and RICE)

I have been editing anime music videos (AMVs) since 2001. I took a hiatus from the community from 2009ish to 2018. Despite that, I still managed to make at least one video every year. In 2018, I tried to get back into the community and realized it had almost completely changed. Discord was a thing now, and it seemed most of the activity was on there. I joined a few servers, but long story short they all weren't great. In a fit of frustration and annoyance, I did the classic move of going "Screw this, I'll do it myself!"

Bender (from Futurama): Fine! I'll start my own chatroom with blackjack and hookers! I glossed over it, but this is exactly how FursuitReview.com also started.

BentoVid (called AMV Sashimi back then) was created in September 2020. Back then, I did have high hopes. I did "plan" (finger quotes) on becoming a large community, but it was like how anyone plans on winning the lottery, you know? You don't actually expect it to happen. I thought that realistically I'd get maybe 30 members and it'd be just a chill hangout spot. But in 2021, we reached the fabled 100 members. Then 200. We broke 400 this year. And outside the very first year, I didn't actively promote. BentoVid has grown purely from word of mouth since 2021. On the other side of Discord was an annual AMV contest related to a particular anime convention. I first joined it in 2019. It was... okay... But not great. 2020 went even worse. The contest was going through a transition period and had a coordinator that, to put it mildly, was not well-liked. The concept behind the contest (which had been running for several years - I think 2005? Possibly even earlier) was great though. It was a contest focused on peer review. All the editors that submitted to the contest were the judges and voted on the winner. It was a blind contest, so nobody knew who made what, but only people who submitted to the contest could view and vote on the videos. The feedback was cruel. People did not hold back. Still, it was helpful, and I excelled my skills a lot by participating. The contest's discord server, however, went unmoderated and the coordinator made some very bizarre decisions. Another "Screw it, I'll do it myself" event occurred. RICE - Rewards imagined by a community of editors - was born by taking that other contest and implementing all the feedback participants had been complaining about for years. February 2021 was the first RICE. I had never run a contest before. Just like FSR (from the preface story), this was a trial by fire. I made at least one huge mistake every year the contest ran. But ultimately people liked RICE, and word of mouth about it (and the server) grew ever faster because of it. I had taken efforts to specifically NOT advertise RICE outside the BentoVid discord server, but that didn't stop it from growing.

4 years of RICE survey data

Partly due to my inexperience and partly due to my history with FSR, I put out RICE feedback surveys at every opportunity. I am actually not that into data. I don't analyze this stuff and I have no particular interest in collecting data at every turn for random things. I just find feedback surveys somewhat convenient and useful for my purposes. Sorry to people who are into that! XD

Pre-RICE survey data from 2021 - 2024

I have a small survey when people submit videos to RICE. It has (mostly) the same questions every year. Vivafringe helped me go through the data, and here are the results. (links to a google sheet) 2021 - 2023, the optional survey was on the same page as video submission questions. In 2024, I finally realized google form sections existed and I put it on a totally different page. I went from a 100% response rate to 58%. What a huge difference! But still inspiring to see so many people went out of their way to answer regardless. Here's my personal takeaways: US vs Non-US I personally thought there were more international editors participating, but it seems to hover around 20%. Do people keep their videos a secret? It looks like most of the survey respondents actually do attempt to keep their videos secret from everyone. However, almost as many people admit at least one person they know who will also be in RICE knows what their video is. I honestly thought it'd be the other way around, with more people sharing betas before RICE, so this is actually pretty cool to see. Thoughts on blind judging This question was multiple choice with only one answer allowed, so they had to choose which meant most to them. Most people seem to appreciate blind judging, but don't go out of their way to keep themselves blind during the event. (~70% combined) A large minority of people admit that guessing who made what during the event is part of the fun for them. (~25%) One possible answer was that blind judging is never truly blind - interesting to note only one person ever selected this and it was in 2023. Main reason for entering RICE? Another multiple choice answer where they had to select the "main" reason. Most people join RICE because they like the BentoVid community. However, almost as many people join because they like peer review. I'm flattered! lol But, in all seriousness, I really expected those results would be flipped, with peer review outranking BentoVid. Categories A multiple checkbox question for which categories your submitted vid belongs to, according to the editor. I mostly only care about theme, coordinator's choice, and live-action. Theme has submissions starting at 18% in 2021 and gradually going up to 29% in 2024. 2023 is an outlier with 39%. Coordinator's choice is very low. 1 - 3 videos. This is mixed news for me. On one hand, I think it's great people don't feel the need to pander to me (or maybe they don't know how). On the other hand... Please pander to me! XD Live-action is something I would like to see more of... The discord server started out as an AMV server and its audience is still mostly AMV editors. But I really want BentoVid (and RICE, by extension) to be about all fanvids and vidding (Hence the name change from AMV Sashimi to BentoVid). Long story short, live-action vids are obviously a very small minority that get submitted (5 - 9 videos each year), but they fluctuate between years. If you like live-action fanvids and want to join an active discord server... Please join us! lol How did you learn about RICE? This question was a small text field people could write whatever they wanted in. No surprise people learned about it from inside BentoVid. Next highest was word of mouth-related answers like "discord," "another discord server" or "friends". A little interesting was when AWA or POE were specifically mentioned (two popular AMV contests), but this was only twice for each.

Post-RICE survey data

2021 and 2022 had a feedback survey, but it was just one text block that asked for comments. Very few people ever filled this out and it was not very actionable feedback. 2023 was the first post-RICE feedback survey with actual guided questions, and it's because 2023 was... quite the year.

Understatement.

What happened during 2023 RICE?

Remember the contest I mentioned that RICE was based on? While RICE was thriving, that contest was floundering. The other contest, which for the rest of this blog I will call "HOST," happens in September - October, while RICE happens in February - March. 2022 HOST was another transition year for them. The old coordinator ("Elder") took over the contest after so many complaints about the coordinator that succeeded them ("Junior"). As far as I know, everyone was happy with Junior's leaving, but unfortunately it wasn't pretty. We weren't kind to Junior. Bridges were burned. Elder had some great ideas on how to bring HOST back up to its former glory days. But, procrastination got the better of them, so the contest started out very poorly. Then, during the contest, they had an extremely public and embarrassing meltdown. A number of people withdrew from the contest because of it. A totally different person ("Kidd") had to take over mid-event. The discord server went through an emergency restructure so Elder didn't have any special permissions anymore. Kidd was an absolute gem and managed to run the rest of the contest on their own very smoothly (Kidd continued through 2024 and deserves accolades). But the already negative reputation of HOST definitely turned into a dumpster fire after that. It was no surprise that RICE got touted as a good alternative. I was expecting more RICE entries than the previous year but. Boy. I was just not prepared. 2023 RICE saw 56 editors and 76 videos. The prior year was only 32 editors and 45 videos. RICE does not scale well. Moreover, I was experiencing horrible health issues at the time and really should have delayed or cancelled RICE due to them. Consequently, some people did not have a good experience with RICE. I thought the entire year was ruined. I made a pretty involved post-RICE survey due to it. This survey was mostly questions with text boxes where people wrote exactly what they were feeling. This made the answers a lot more personal and detailed. I will not be sharing the raw 2023 survey data. The complaints were about:

Too many videos for too short a time period

Some people were rude in the discord when discussing categories

Some people attacked one of the people giving critique in a voice call

I tried to enforce [very badly worded] content restrictions very late into the submission window. This had editors unnecessarily scrambling to re-edit things and ultimately ended up with multiple versions of videos in the contest [which should not have happened and that is entirely on me]

To me, the responses of the 2023 survey looked pretty dire. I immediately made changes to RICE following them. While RICE had started out as an improved version of HOST, I also had wanted the goal to be rewards for BentoVid server regulars. That's why I really didn't want to advertise it outside the server. I also never pinged \@Everyone or made a special role to get updates about it. The intent was if you were around the server, you'd know it was coming, and that was that. I wanted the good peer review and critique so we could all improve. I also wanted to see amazing videos. But what I DIDN'T want - and was (surprisingly!) NEVER concerned with - was lots of randos who didn't care about BentoVid. I explicitly never posted about RICE on a-m-v.org (despite people asking me to), and I never mentioned RICE outside my own server until after 2022 HOST. And even then it was really only in DM or if someone else had brought it up first. I still try to not advertise RICE, but I'm not as tight-lipped as I used to be. Still, it's primarily in DM. But anyway, I'm rambling now - the point is that RICE grew outside of the BentoVid bubble. People were joining RICE who did not care about BentoVid as a whole and I had to figure out how to handle that. My previous RICE messaging of "feedback event but also contest!" was fine for BentoVid regulars. We mostly knew what we liked and understood eachother because we hung out all the time. But for people new to RICE and/or the server, they had no idea and came in with false expectations. My two main takeaways from the 2023 Post-RICE survey were: 1. Because of my health issues and the mass increase of participants, the Discord server went (essentially) completely unmoderated during RICE. Because RICE (and BentoVid) is usually closely moderated, many conversations/debates went on a lot longer than they should have (because no moderators stepped in), which caused a lot of stress for participants. 2. The messaging of RICE was conflicting and led people to false expectations. People were essentially expecting HOST but "run better." "HOST but run better" is an over-generalization of how RICE works. It's actually quite different from HOST, but without the context of being a BentoVid regular, one wouldn't have that information. The first would be solved simply by me being present. Myself and most my staff could not be present during 2023 (honestly I'm surprised RICE ran as well as it did without us. Speaks a lot to our community!). To deal with the second point, I decided to focus on clearing up and changing RICE's messaging. Clearing the messaging had a few purposes:

More clearly differentiate RICE from HOST

Discourage non-regulars from joining without being super exclusionary about it

Discourage overtly competitive people from joining RICE

Encourage feedback-orientated participants

Focus more on accessibility (as RICE already applied VPR to all entries, it made sense to extend accessibility in other ways)

I took the survey responses very seriously, and as such, rushed to make announcements of what the changes would be. I ended up announcing them the same month RICE ended - March. Proof here (that is a discord link). You can read the initial announcement there in the BentoVid server, but I ended up changing things even more, so here's the summary of what the changes ended up being:

Very strict content restrictions (slightly relaxed later)

Focus on feedback event FIRST (took out all mentions of "contest" and "best" on the website, replacing them with "event" and "most-liked" )

No cash prizes at all (previously it was a $175 pool)

More emphasis on what exactly the server culture is like and what you can expect (basically: RICE is stressful, it's full of server regulars, prepare yourself if you're new)

Permanent categories got permanent names (previously everything was able to be voted on and changed)

All winners only get one award (previously there were multiple designs and names made for each award)

We added CWs as well as VPRs into the RICE expectations

Everything possible was outlined on the website. I literally wrote out the schedule and everything that you could expect to happen, how it all worked, etc.

The fallout from 2023 RICE continued throughout the entire year. It seemed negative feelings regarding it rolled out into other issues BentoVid was having (behind the scenes, especially in the staff channels) and overall I was really not feeling great about RICE. I was seriously considering 2024 RICE being the last one I ever ran.

2023 Post-RICE survey analysis

During 2024 RICE prep (which started in October 2023), I went through the 2023 feedback again. I asked some vague questions to random people about how they felt about 2023 RICE, and their answers (most of which were not negative at all) really had me questioning my perception of the entire thing. I gave the 2023 post-RICE survey data to a friend of mine who used to analyze that kind of thing for a living (Vivafringe). I went through the answers and redacted personal information, summarizing answers if necessary, before giving it to him. As part of the analysis, I asked him a bunch of questions and he looked over all the data to answer those questions. Again, I will not share the actual data here (even anonymized), but I will share the analysis he provided. Full disclosure: Viva did participate in 2023 RICE.

Analysis of Negative Experiences

Did more people have a negative or positive time in 2023?

to answer this I didn't do any fancy analysis. I read the responses and just did a vibe check of "negative" (pretty clearly had a bad time), "neutral" (had some things they didn't like, but gave other positive feedback or just in general didn't seem like they gave a shit one way or the other), "positive" ("vars you're the best" type comments) I think "neutral" people, if you actually asked them, would say they had a positive time, but it's hard to say for sure anyway I rated 7/25 negative, 7/25 neutral, 11/25 positive notably a lot of people didn't respond to this survey and the non respondants were likely positive/neutral. So I don't think you should read those numbers and assume 28% of people had a negative experience the overwhelming complaint from basically everyone was too many videos for the time they had - 5/6 people with "negative" feedback were returnees - 2/6 of the people who wanted "competitive" contest had negative opinions. No real signal there I think

I said the complaints about the VCs were really bad though?

I count 4 people that complained about the vcs my takeaway from reading this is basically: - moderate the vcs from now on, advertise them as critique/nice/whatever (you already are doing this but just saying I agree) - if you get 76 vids again, give more time to watch stuff I don't know how you solve chat getting tense, that was another common complaint

Category drama? Context: some people were very vocal about RICE needing fixed categories like typical AMV contests

I read the category stuff and broadly classified them as wanting "fixed" cats, "unfixed" cats, or "neutral" as you might expect most people didn't give a strong opinion on it, 10/25 were neutral 5 people wanted fixed, 6 people explicitly wanted to keep things as it was now (unfixed) if you read "neutral" as support for the status quo, which I do, I think the way you're doing it is fine. especially because a lot of the fixed cat people (3/6) had negative experiences and won't be here this year

I expected a smaller turnout for 2024 RICE. All I was really hoping for were more editors than in 2022 (which only had 32). Editors in 2023: 56 Editors in 2024: 43 (+3 more if we count DQs) A 17 - 23% loss, depending on how you count this. My thoughts: 1. That's not that bad, to be honest 2. If we treat 2023 as an outlier, 2024 is an acceptable and expected amount of growth from 2022. 3. One of the main complaints in 2023 was that there were too many videos, so 2024 numbers are more desirable in this context.

Other data collected from 2023 RICE

While I was mostly concerned about the negative experiences, I thankfully had the foresight to ask some other questions about RICE that gave us some valuable data.

Kollab vs frame.io = kollab wins by landslide

Direction for rice: contest vs feedback = 15/22 say feedback

Will you make an account on a website to do rice stuff? 12/25 say no

basically everyone answered the "what does rice do differently" question with "the feedback is a lot better". So a way to make rice better is to streamline process for providing feedback.

How long people spend on RICE vids:

10/21 (of the people that responded) started working on their rice vid 1 month or longer in advance

the competitive people ("A contest where the best of the best wins") seem kind of in the middle, time wise. 3/6 spent less than 1 month, 2/6 spent 2 months exactly, 1 didn't respond.

there were 8 newcomers, but basically same conclusion. 4/8 started more than a month in advance. 3/8 took a few weeks

Google docs & PSVs RICE offers a google doc with video information instead of trying to put it all in a filename. We also offered detailed VPRs and CWs, and, in some cases, alternate versions of videos that are more friendly for photosensitive users (called PSVs).

3/25 people said they used the VPRs.

18/25 people used the infosheet

4/25 used the CWs

3/25 used PSVs

What about 2024 Post-RICE survey data?

I collected that. This blog entry is already the size of a novel so I'll put it in another entry, I guess. Stay tuned! (Don't hold your breath though) I will exit this entry with the following results from that survey: If you participated in 2023 RICE, what would you say your overall experience was? 15/18 answered overall positive 2/18 said they did not participate in 2023 1/18 said neutral 0/18 said overall negative If you participated last year (2023), would you say your experience THIS year (2024) was: 9/17 answered overall better than last year 7/17 said about the same as last year 1/17 said did not participate last year 0/17 said overall worse than last year Your overall 2024 RICE experience was: 17/18 answered positive 1/18 said neutral 0/18 said negative 0/18 said boring 2024 RICE had 43 editors and 62 videos.

[dumbdomb]

I also feel maybe you should try and clarify a bit more what you mean on your pinned post

(Not hate)

can you suggest how i could better clarify the beginning portion of my pinned, in a way that would satisfy appropriately and accurately? i've rewritten my pinned many times... it feels unfair to be constantly held to such a higher standard than anyone else around here. people are always trying to make me responsible for their own ignorance or unwillingness to just ask for me to clarify. i cannot simply say "cis men dni" or "wlw dni" bc neither are applicable to me, as a queer androgynous person. i am followed by and mutuals with lesbians, tfems, and other wlw aligned or sapphic people. this has never been an issue, no one has ever inquired about this, even in a vague or general sense. this is also from my pinned...

i am ok with cis, trans, intersex, and nonbinary people interacting with my blog. i'm ok with straight, gay, and queer people. allo, aro, and ace people are welcome here. this is all over my blog and consistently how i've posted here. but i have to create boundaries when people only see me as a woman, or a man. i have to create these boundaries when straight men only interact with my original images. i have to take a stance on certain kinks when they are the only ones continuously disregarding my boundaries and forcing their kinks on me. i have talked about all of this many times and at great length.

i've been told not to, or how to, tag my posts. what labels to use or not use. telling me not to censor tags, when they don't understand how the tagging system on here works. telling me not to post at all. sending hate and ignoring any response i've given to it in the past. most people are looking to find fault with me for some reason that actually has nothing to do with me, and is really about what lies in their own heart. i don't send hate to anyone, i discourage people from ever sending hate of any kind to anyone for any reason whatsoever. yet some people still come and send me hate, try to control my blog...

whatever happened to sending a nicely worded message, if you wanted clarification, and if not- blocking and closing the page without making an issue and escalating how you speak with someone you've already decided to dislike? i don't appreciate people trying to start discourse or arguments with me, i'm here to be friendly and have a nice time with people who like similar things. if you don't like me or my blog, that's ok, then simply move on with your day.

all i did was reblog a rather tame post, using specifically sapphic tags... "stone top" and "pillow princess" and i didn't try to contact this person or anything else. she asked why i had reblogged her post, and i cleared up the confusion. but she was still upset with me, asking me to delete the post from my blog and to block her- which i have done.

[tea-with-evan-and-me]

I like your page, but for the last couple of days, it's been all about Emma and the domestic case. It's a little too much tbh (similar to the gftwd page when it was all about Frances). I think we all agree that we don't like her, so why waste our energy on her. Even if everyone in Hollywood would cancel her, Evan would probably stick up for her. I rather read some damn tea about the man. For example Alexia sexy blog about him.

i think it's worth talking about since i am sure you're not the only one who feels this way, not just about this topic but certainly about others. as far as i'm concerned it is perfectly fine to not be interested or enjoy certain topics we cover on this blog and want to sit them out; it's conversational, and more often than not there are multiple different topics simultaneously going on. i am here for discussion, and as i said in the beginning, this blog belongs to those that send messages in and engage as much as it does to me, and no reasonable topic will be barred. that means i am not always going to be at the steering wheel, but chances are i will have something to say.

i think the interesting thing i have learned over the past couple of months is that every week or two we kind of focus on a different topic, but it just happens organically. we also talk about things that seem to not be accepted on other platforms. and that's kind of the beauty of it: if you wanna talk about alexia, you can just send me an ask and we will talk about it. i see you don't follow me, and i am not cluttering evan's tags with the 20 DV discussion posts. or any posts, because i seldom tag anymore. so many new, bothersome (now blocked) people found me in the wake of the haley/evan reveal and they were sending in nasty, hateful things about her. i have probably deleted well over 100 asks. i don't need those followers. i would rather engage with the really cool, fun people who are already here.

also, it tickles me that whenever someone wants to burn me they compare me to gftwd, like she is donald trump or something lol ironically though, her page quite literally began as an effort to expose frances' misbehavior. so it was not unreasonable that all her posts were about fran, that was literally what any follower of hers signed up for. and so long as the critique was fair, there's nothing wrong with it. the issue that myself and many others found was the direction it ultimately took, in regards to the type of comments and criticism being made. i also think it's apples to oranges if someone were to compare the two, but that's because of my own personal belief system and how i feel about domestic abuse. i will outright tell you that i could not give a rat's ass if someone comes here and says something diabolical about emma, because she did something i view as evil, and the people who perpetrate a narrative that shames, blames and accuses a victim of DV are absolute scum in my eyes. i see frances as an irritant, a pest with a grating internet persona - but ultimately, she is nothing to lose sleep over. and i do not let people come on here and say cruel things about her for that reason.

[troonwolf]

Anyway this post is about me:

So I want to make some things very clear. 

I am doing this because I am sick of the gossip and badmouthing. This person has a much larger audience than me, many that are in the same fandoms as me and who sometimes interact with my art. I plan to open commissions in the future because I’m in desperate financial need, and someone smearing me like this (and name-dropping me, which I know he does in private) could seriously hurt my ability to earn in fandom spaces.

Additionally, I find it ridiculous that someone who claims to hate “toxic callout fandom culture” and etc, is doing to me exactly what he complains other people do: lying, exaggerating, and misrepresenting events to make someone look “problematic” and essentially unperson them in fandom.

With that said-

I have never harassed mywitchcultblr (the author of that post).

I have never sent them messages about Disney, Marvel, Ao3, whether on anon or personally. 

I in fact have never sent anyone messages about Marvel, Disney, Ao3, or ANYTHING else related to fandom.

Nor do I consider “all Ao3 users paedophiles”. I use Ao3. My boyfriend uses Ao3. My friends and mutuals use Ao3- this also goes for Disney and Marvel. Tons of people around me love those things.

No one around me cares that I sometimes criticise those things. When I do criticise those things, it’s always some dumb shitpost that I intentionally leave untagged so that it’s isolated in my own space.

The only time I ever approached mywitchcultblr about “discourse”, was to do with natural systems and DID, because I myself have DID. Even then I was civil, the conversation was over in a few messages, and we never spoke about it again.

When I first met Ann, his blog was a lot different from what it is now. There was barely any NSFW or kink, barely any fandom discourse. He just posted about fandom and LGBT stuff.

When he became involved in fandom discourse, began constantly posting untagged NSFW, being defensive when people asked him to tag things, and overall saying and doing things that made me uncomfortable or that I did strongly disagree with, I just blocked him.

We didn’t argue.

I didn’t send him any messages.

I didn’t send him any anons.

I blocked him and moved on. I set a boundary and moved on. That’s what you’re meant to do, right? Then why am I still hearing about it a year later?

Despite the fact I am just some guy he knew for a few months, he has this obsession with me as some kind of fallen father figure in his personal narrative. I’m always referred to as “someone I looked up to who disappointed me.”

This is inappropriate. I am no one’s role model. I didn’t consent to be your father figure and told you on several occasions how severely mentally ill I am. This would be parasocial if I was a bigger blogger but since I’m just some guy, it’s not quite that but still not healthy or reasonable. 

We were in each other’s lives for a few months and talked occasionally. That’s it.

We didn’t even argue or have a real “falling out”. I blocked him. There was no interaction. But ever since then he spreads more exaggerations and lies about me and I’m tired of it.

Don’t take the word of someone who knew me less than a few months, that I’m a toxic harasser, just because I stopped feeling comfortable on his blog and blocked him for my own comfort.

I wish him no ill will but I do wish he’d stop projecting his father issues onto me, and I don’t say that to be funny. it’s extremely weird and uncomfortable to be put in this situation of “I idolised you because you’re an older queer man in fandom and I’m going to make that your problem if you don’t live up to my ideals.”

I’m just some guy. I’m in my 30s, childless, homeless, gay, majorly spangled in the head. No one should be looking up to me. I shouldn’t be held accountable for other people’s made up versions of me. I think we can all agree that isn’t fair.

If he was just calling me a buzzkill or cynical or annoying, I’d fully agree with those statements lmao! But to say I’m toxic and that people around me will be harassed for disagreeing with me is an exaggeration of my character.

I also want to add that my boyfriend has attempted messaging him in order to have a civil discussion on why he keeps lying about me when it's been practically a year since I blocked him, but Ann doesn't respond.

Anyway, that’s all folks.

[keybord-caps]

Pinned Post

Hi, Welcome to our system, disorders, and extra stuff blog. our fun awesome blog where we have pawblems and issues and hold more personal things tied to our identity as parts and a whole. We like to keep this blog super nice and tidy and organized, so if the amount of tags we have and use is a bit overwhelming, I do apologize! It's so nice and tidy...

We do experience Delusional Attachments/Overlaps, also ig known as being an IRL and it effects the system in various ways.

Try to harrass us for literally anything and you get blocked. Try to be weird about us being a system, having overlaps, having disorders, etc and you get blocked. We don't have time nor energy to waste on stupid shit anymore. We WILL Thrive.

Stay Hydrated, Fed, Vitamined, make sure you Rest, take your Meds, and keep yourself and those around you that you care for safe. High, Low, No or Fluxating Empathy, your feelings still matter.

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⇩ It/She/He/Co/Code/

⇦ Xenoflux

⇧ Idemromantic Aspec Omni

⇨ Made of a LOT of things, we don't even know !!!

⇩ Regresses! She has a blog for this

Co-Host+Caretaker

⇦ Doug Eiffel

⇧ 34

⇨ Human

⇩ He/Him

⇦ Cis Man

⇧ Bi?

⇨ Prefers people he isnt close to to call him Eiffel

⇩ We call him a horse because of a joke made about his source

Frontkeeper

⇦ Mikhail

⇧ 26 [?]

⇨ Mostly Human-Looking Demon

⇩ He/It/Cri/Crime/Pun/Punishment/Bun/Bunself/Nib/Nibble/Bi/Bite

⇦ Genderunholy, Bungender, Rabbitgender

⇧ Arospec+Aspec Gay

⇨ His area is right outside of front, easy to get into front. He has a guy who stays with him

⇩ Has prosthetics that line up with some parts of the body the brain has weird feelings about [Wants To Remove Them]

Gatekeeper

⇦ Chicago

⇧ None

⇨ Mechanical+Computer Dragon

⇩ It/He/She [doesnt care]

⇦ ???

⇧ ???

⇨ Technically always in front

⇩ Is Up !

Blog Links + Credits

Main Blog

Maxwell's Regression Blog

Divider Masks made by azure-recesses

NPD Flag made by npdflag

BPD Flag made by dragoneating

Icon Mask made by azure-recesses

BPD System Flag in icon made by sadowife

NPD System Flag in icon made by outergodly

System Tags

-blurry : Signed off as blurry. for when we are ! Blurry

-[name] : used for headmates without a specific tag

LOLCAT Pawgrammer : Maxwell posts

Comms Horse : Eiffel Post

Daemonic Rabbit : Mikhail Posts

Mechanical Dragon : Chicago Posts

Caps Folder : General System's Favs

Maxwell Folder : Maxwell's favs

Eiffel Folder : Eiffel's favs

Mikhail Folder : Mikhail's favs

Chicago folder : Chicago's favs

General Organization Tags

booting up : our posts

rebooting : reblogs

.txt : posts with text

.png : posts with image[s]

.gif : posts with gif[s]

.mp4 : posts with video[s]

.mp3 : posts with audio[s]

.jar : posts with poll[s]

.bat : posts with link[s], only for saving 'important' ones

Tarot Desk : important system to us

Mosiac Symphony : important system to us

Specific Kinds of Posts Tags

Userboxes : Posts with Userboxes we align with

Disorder Flags : Flags based on Disorders

System Flags : Flags based on Systems

Role Flags : Flags based on Roles

Headmate Flags : Flags based on types of Headmates

Gender Flags : Flags based on Genders

Orientation Flags : Flags Based on Orientation

Attraction Flags : Flags based on Attraction

Other Flags : Flags based on Other Things :D A Catch-All

DNI List

Zoos/Pedos/MAPs/NoMAPS + Pro contact harmful paraphilias

Zionists, Racists, Israel Supporters

Believe in Personality Disorder Abuse [Narc Abuse, Borderline Abuse, Histrionic Abuse, ETC]

Transphobes, Transmeds, Terfs, Radfems

Homohobes, Queerphobes

Anti-Mogai, Anti-Xenogenders, Anti-Neopronouns

anti-mspec gays+lesbians, anti contradictory labels

Com+Proshippers

TransID, Radqueer

Nontraumagenics [Mixed Origins Included], Endos, Tulpamancers, Endo Positives/Supporters [We dont think anyones really faking, just dont wanna interact]

Pro Harrassment or Doxxing of Anyone

We also block based on vibes and sometimes just not liking something👍

I can and will add to this list. I also have the forget disorder so things may be missing

Our earlier message about selfcare applies for people on the dni as well. You can grow no matter what. Wether you want to or not. Its pawsible. Shit gets better. ♡

[faygeleh-system]

credit !

key: j / art / benjamin

System Questions

When did you discover that you were a system?

we actually "discovered" we were a system about... 8 years ago, i think? when we were around 13? and at the time the system as a whole was very, very different. i dont think any of our current alters existed then, including myself, at least not in the same way we do now. the old host at the time was a very immature person (i dont hold it against him - again. literally 13) and didnt handle our system in a way that was responsible, tbh. When I took over at approx age 15, i made the mistake of suppressing our entire system, blocking them out, pretending i didnt notice them or that they weren't there. i basically gaslight myself into thinking we arent a system, writing off all of our symptoms as parts of my other disorders. i only just started accepting that we were a system again about two years ago, and only really let lose earlier this year.

Are you polyfragmented?

yep! we have fragments that come and go somewhat frequently

How did you discover that you were a system?

we've "discovered" we were a system a few separate times. the first time that i "discovered" was actually a re-discovery after doing some internal searching, when i felt like two previous names we had gone by were not just other names, but entirely different people. after a lot of self-searching, meditation, and discussion among ourselves, we've concluded this is true and that they were previous hosts. the first shared memory, as far as we can remember, of an "original discovery" was that previous mention at 13. the previous host had discussed it with an old friend, who was also a system .

How do you communicate with your system?

i struggle to communicate because i dont have access to the headspace - at least not to the same extent that everyone else seems to. i basically communicate through things exactly like this (see others in the "answering questions" tag); basically just writing a lot and letting anyone else use the keyboard as much as they want to I basically "manage" the headspace, if we want to phrase it that way. I consider it my personal responsibility to make sure we are all as safe as we can be, fronting or not, and making sure that we front responsibly. We may talk in the headspace, or through writing, like J mentioned.

Do you know how many alters are in your system?

We have four primary alters, with a few fragments and some "others" who choose not to make themselves known.

Do you have any introjects or non-human alters?

we're all some variation of non-human, mostly dogs and/or cats of some kind ; whether as our actual species or spiritually through therianism, etc :3c i am also a fictive but don't like to discuss my source We've recently started to suspect that I'm an introject of an abusive friend we had in high school. I think I look a lot like her, we're the same age, and if I had to pick a birthday I've always felt like it was in December; her birthday is in November, but we had an extremely traumatizing incident with her happen in December of 2019. I am almost certain I existed prior to this (maybe as a fragment?), maybe even as early as 2017. But to be fully honest I do not really remember much prior to December 2019 aside from a few shared memories that J also has. There are also a lot of differences between myself and this friend, namely that I am very strictly a gay man and she is a lesbian trans woman, but otherwise there are enough similarities that I could see our brain splitting to create some kind of "alternate version" of her...? Not sure.

Who fronts the most?

me, usually, but co-front frequently with art and Ben as we've previously mentioned

How often do you switch?

this is a really difficult question to answer , tbh? i wanna say "a lot", as in, at least a couple times a week, if not more - but we also struggle a lot with amnesia and time gaps, so its hard to say for sure

Are you open about being a system or do you mask in front of others?

it depends on who? we absolutely mask around people we don't know or don't trust irl, i.e. at work or around strangers . however our closest friends and my gf all know about us being a system, and we're open about it online since most of our online presence is about trying to be open and authentic and positive, so that includes all of us (:

How do you feel about being in a system?

after years of surpressing im trying so hard to learn to be okay with it. not that i dislike any of my alters - if anything i love them like family, and we get along so well - but its a direct result of the worst trauma of my life and is so hard to think about. some part of me i guess still feels some shame for the trauma i endured as a child. idk.

Do you have a system journal? If so, do your headmates have different handwriting?

this blog is the closest thing we have to a journal, so kinda? but we dont physically write often enough to say who's handwriting looks like what tbh

Is your amnesia strong or mild?

Very strong. For all of us.

Are there relationships within your system? This can be siblings, parents, or romantic partners.

None of us are in romantic relationships with each other, but both I and J consider ourselves "older brother" figures for our little, Red. He's six and struggles to be function alone, and we're very overprotective of him for the sake of his safety.

What do you like most about being in a system?

we work really well together as a unit, which i am incredibly thankful for, especially after how hard we (mainly i) tried to suppress it for so long

What are your thoughts on how DID is represented in media?

its... bad lol. ive never seen a single representation of DID in mainstream media that's even trying to be sensitive or positive representation - it's just serial killers, abusers, "crazy people", etc - we don't get to just exist in any way. this is honestly a big part of why it took me so long to accept being a system again.

[lost-technology]

Heh, heh, I want to analyze this. I picked Legato because of how people are here about words and policing their own communities, but now I'm thinking of scenarios... Elendira - I'd say she'd get some mileage, but she probably wouldn't stick around long enough to cause a Cat. 5 catastrophe. Tumblr staff would nuke her. Maybe she gets off a very grisly fictional story about the very detailed murder of J.K. Rowling first, though. It is applauded by the horror fans of the site. Arguments arise about violence and whether or not this user is actually planning something in real life. However it it gets the attention of Staff, some of which may harass her on other sites she goes to... Livio and Razlo, both ways: I am not very familiar with Systems and the unique challenges that they face. There would be an uproar (similar to the political fallout in the U.S. concerning Christi Noem) when Razlo talks about killing a puppy. No one can figure out whether or not this is a real account or a troll account. Legato - Blue hair does not a member or an ally make, and even if it does, well, what he used wasn't just the old timey common language that is now slur-territory that is forgiveable because that *was* the language back then and everyone is reminded to respect historical queer culture. Oh, no, he uses modern-terminology, fully aware. People see him as religious, in a cult and just aren't standing for his bigoted shit. Vash - I've actually seen this on the site and blocked the person harping on it because I found them annoying in my precious Trigun tag. I assume that this is about his flirting and harassment in the '98 anime and BLR. He may try to weasel out of it by telling you, quite humbly, that he used to drink a LOT back then. He's also a changed man (as of Stampede). Knives - No one thinks he's for real. Everyone interprets his calls to exterminate mankind for the good of the universe as some kind of over the top fake-environmentalist skit, like the "Captain Planet!" sketch on Robot Chicken. Wolfwood - He encourages children to smoke! Possibly gets into religious arguments, too, depending upon the incarnation. Likes to Bible-fight with religionblr for the hell of it, but misquotes Scripture all the time. Used to like picking fights with fedora-atheists on other forums back in the 2000s for fun. A little obnoxious, but not a threat. Most tumblrites think he's pretty cool, actually. Bernardelli Insurance Blog - One word: Capitalism. Rem - starts out as one of the interesting science-interest bloggers around here. She's like bogleech, revretch or headspace-hotel or any of the number of veterinarians on this site. She runs the sideblog "is-the-plant-video-cute" to answer people's questions on viral videos and pictures regarding whether or not the Plants in them are having a good time or are being abused. She also is well-loved as someone who teaches hacking and piracy. However, things blow up for her when she tries to whistleblow SEEDS on the Tesla-incident. Agents within the company try to shut her down or propagandazie a twisting of her words. Regular tumblr users have questions about the extent of her own involvement in the project and it becomes a whole thing. She manages to upload photographs of the Subject in a last ditch to get the information out there. After that, she mysteriously disappears, her blogs going silent. The Nebraskas - pick fights and cause problems for people on purpose. Eventually they are blocked by most users until they have only each other as mutuals. They have their own discord. No Cat. 5 as no one sees or talks to them anymore.

Inspired by this clusterfuck:

[letitrainathousandflames]

Hey sorry to bother. You reblogged something from Lychgate who has an nsfw Twitter (dickgate) where he posts a bunch of really graphic clonecest. He’s a know fetishizer of clones and clonecest.

I truly, dearly hope you reconsider supporting him.

Hi! Thank you for the warning. I don't "support" him or anyone, per se - I see art I like and reblog it. I'm sorry, but I'll have to do a small rant. Firstly: do I fall in the "fetishizer of clones" category? Because most of what I do here is ogle over them and write graphic smut of them with self-insert reader characters. Anyway, moving on:

When I reblog art from the small internet artists here, I'm not raising a flag or promoting them or anything, I'm just... slapping some pretty/cool/funny art on my blog bc I liked it, y'know? My reblog of some person's doodle doesn't - and shouldn't - mean an immediate display of my agreeing with everything this person says and thinks.

In fact, we share glimpses of each other's thoughts, headcanons, opinions with a reblog and we move on to the next one. I have mutuals who like all sorts of things I don't - soup, hiking, the brithish royalty, hunting. I still reblog their stuff, and that doesn't mean our opinions on those topics align.

Of course, I'm always grateful for warnings about me accidentally rebbloging content from a terf/nazi/homophobe/pedophile/scammer, etc, etc. because then I can erase said post and report the user who made it to try make Tumblr a safer community. Disagreeing on whether soup is good isn't the same as disagreeing on lgbt rights.

But when it comes to shipping... man, I don't really care, y'know? Since the clones are all adults, this falls to me in the "ship and let ship" category, and I really lack the mental energy to get into the whole debate of what artist is writing/drawing what about people who, at the end of the day, are still nothing but [adult] fictional characters.

Because here's the deal: who really cares about how or with whom these characters are being shipped? "The children"? They shouldn't be looking at art marked as 18+ in an account that says "no minors". People (like myself) with squicks/triggers/traumas? Tags and blocking systems exist precisely to aid you with that. I use them and I love it. People that Don't Like that ship and want everyone to stop shipping it because they said so? Tags and blocking, again.

I didn't mean to soapbox on your ask, anon, and I'm not even defending Lychgate here bc I don't really care enough about him or this debate to do so tbh.

But I want to emphasize that I only appreciate these kind of warnings when they are about serious, actively damaging stuff, like me accidentally spreading crypto-terf posts bc they're disguised as feminism, or me having some creepy teen groomer's pokemon content on my blog bc they made a funny joke.

I know your intentions are good, but shipping discourse of adult ships is, in my particular opinion, not that important. I don't even ship clones, nor do I care when I see works in which they are shipped. I'm just... detached enough to see they are fictional characters that anyone can get to play with in their own sandbox the way they see fit, and that's none of my business.

That's my stance on adult ships of - and I repeat it - fictional characters. Again, this is not a dig at you or any other person squicked/triggered by clone shipping, nor is a pro clone shipping post. In fact, I'm not pro or against anything when it comes to adult ships - i'm over 30 and way too tired to be screaming about any of this anymore as I did in my teens. Now I just wanna sit here and vibe.

Thanks for the heads-up, and for the opportunity for me to talk about this. Please understand that I mean all of this in the most polite and cordial manner, and expect the same in any further communication between us that may follow. Good night and have a great rest of week.

[lolabangtan]

If I have to scroll past 1 more dom!Seokjin fic I will scream like a pterodactyl into the void. I haven't read anything new for him in months! So I'm rereading old stuff. Thank you for having stuff to read. I only read sub!idol or non-kinky vanilla idol (if it's smut anyway and by no means do I only read smut) and the pickings are EXTREMELY slim. Which honestly... is weird. I'm a grown ass woman with a grown ass sex life and the extreme obsession with dom!idol in the BTS fandom is... weird. So very far removed from real life where there is huge expression of diverse sexual behavior and femdom ain't rare and not all kinks are related to BDSM and plenty of people also have vanilla sex. If an alien only ever read BTS fanfic they could be forgiven for thinking that male dom/female sub BDSM sex was the only kind of sex available on earth. Anyway, thanks for having stuff to read.🌹

Hello there!!!

Well, I can't say I don't feel exactly the same way. I do read only sub!idol or vanilla smut, but it still has the same dynamics, and it's not a fanfiction issue; even before BDSM (or whatever some dom idol fics are) men have always been expected to take the lead sexually. It's more than just sex, it's a dynamic rooted in our society. Also, I believe that the concept of "a man who takes care of you in bed will also do it outside of it" is often taken as "if your guy doesn't get dominant and take care of everything he doesn't care about you". They've taught women to seek that submissive role because of what it "means" in the overall relationship – protection, babying, being someone's priority. Naturally, this eventually leads to normalising it and seeing it as the standard while everything else is just a deviation.

We must understand that a social construct always has a stage where it's not normalised yet. BDSM dynamics weren't always as popular and standardised as they're now, so they were seen as "that cool thing people feel uncomfortable about." like, Lucía, of course it makes me uncomfortable to hear that you want Jungkook to choke you because you never felt your father's love 💀

So, this exciting dynamic is still normative enough (since it follows the giving man and receiving woman narrative, which is what we've been taught means he loves us) also means that now "they like it rough".

I for example kept thinking that I of course wanted a dominant sexual partner. I never even considered the possibility that my dissatisfaction wasn't because I wasn't very sexual but because that sort of thing wasn't for me. But I was a woman, and therefore I had to be submissive if not vanilla-on the receiving end.

This is something you’ll see in probably all fandoms. In mxf ships, the man is dominant. In mxm ships, the most masculine conforming character is the one picked to be dominant while the other one is left to literally be ‘the woman in the relationship’. This disgusting mindset is deeply rooted in misogyny, homophobia, heteronormativity, and transphobia. It’s not just ‘well most women like being choked 🤪’. Then we’d have to get into people who’s never had sex/BDSM sex proclaiming to be experts (when most of them don’t even use/know about the basic colour system for safe words), polluting the mind of minors telling them they have to enjoy being treated roughly in bed if they don’t want to get called ‘vanilla’ (god forbid lmao), and reinforcing the idea that women must take on a submissive/passive role in any aspect of a relationship while still taking an active role when it comes to babying/caring for others (the whole ‘fight his demons for him’ stuff is a whole different universe and I'm too lazy to even address it)

The other day I complained that dxm!bts fanfics are never tagged properly, just like female!readers or any other tag that people see as the standard. I have dm!bts blocked and I STILL have to overlook them when I fish for fics. It’s exhausting. Just so you realise how normalised it is for women to be expected to behave like that.

What I want to say is, the ‘natural’ tendency of women being submissive and men being dominant isn’t natural at all, it’s constructed. Meaning: you don’t inherit it at birth, you slowly assume it into your sub conscience, and thus it feel biological. But it’s funny because when one talks about biological behaviour (or inherited behaviour) it’s incorrect to use tendencies. Tendencies are ALWAYS social/learned, that’s why they aren’t a law.

BY THE WAY I have a request of yours I got a while ago that I still have to finish but it’s there and I haven’t forgotten lovely :’) <3