#maybe i’ll do a compilation of silly comics

[ahntherootvessel]

Thinkin……… moar ahn comics for comic fair i got accepted in………

[artbychromo]

Fan Artist Interview!

oh my gosh @anchoviesinthenightsky ;w;!!!!! I’m amazed you made this, what a sweet thing to do, ahaha. It took me a hot minute to actually answer these, since this time of year is a little wild... 😅

Feelin’ kind of shy, so I’m just going to tag @umbreonix​... Could be fun to look back on?

How many pieces of art do you make in a month? in a year? :’) It depends... If I’m excited about a fandom, I’ll usually play around with a new idea each week. But if I’m between fandoms/too busy IRL, that usually drops to just one piece per month. So... ~4 pieces in a good month, and 20 pieces per year? (also, do animations count as just 1 piece? because the 2 animatics I’ve done took a CHUNK of time to finish, ahahaha)

How many of those do you upload? If I finish a piece, I usually upload it lmaO. So like, 90% of things? For fun, here are some luberto WIPs that I’m not sure I’ll get around to finishing any time soon... 

How many fandoms have you created art for and what are they? Oh god, I don’t think I could count... My most recent/involved fandoms were: Luca, Breath of the Wild, Dorohedoro, My Hero Academia, The Adventure Zone, Haikyuu!!... I’ve also done one-off pieces for like, Castlevania, Six of Crows, She-Ra, and whatever else. A looooot of personal D&D art. And then we get into like, long-ago days of doodling Bleach and Naruto on my homework 😂

What are your top 5 fanart pieces based on likes/engagement? Awww... 1. this piece I did for the TAZ finale  2. a very silly Haikyuu comic 3. this!! comic about sassy Revali that the voice actor himself commented on!!! 4. a sweet piece with Jesper and Wylan from Six of Crows 5. ooo my “phantasmal and respendent” TAZ piece

What piece of fanart do you wish had gotten more attention? why? Considering I usually draw for rarepairs and OCs, I’m pretty content with how much attention my stuff has gotten. 😅 Buuuuut I guess since it’s that time of year, it would be nice to see my Over the Garden Wall piece get a little love:

And I think my first Luca fanart has a kind of charm that’s overlooked ;v;

What piece of fanart have you spent the most time on? LMAO my kallende D&D animatic took ~6 months to finish!! And this rilas epilogue piece took about a month, on-and-off.

What's your favorite kind of comment to get? Any comments!!!! Are wonderful!!! But oh geez questions in my replies/inbox that start a conversation are AMAZING. And I do melt over big rambly blocks of tags... Or any comments that highlight a specific part of the drawing, like an expression or gesture or outfit, haha. 

What’s the angstiest piece of art you’ve made? Mmm none of my stuff gets too angsty... I did this disappointed Revali when I was tired and sad, and ooo this rilas piece was done after Silas died in our D&D meet (but then we were all okay haha)

What's the fluffiest piece of art you've made? uhhHHHH all I draw is fluff!!!!! One of these ones, maybe?

Do you create crossover pieces? If so, what’s the craziest one you’ve created? uhhhh I think in my freshman year of college I drew an FMA x A Very Potter Musical crossover. And I draw AUs sometimes!! Like that rilas sea monster AU!

Have you ever received hate on a piece of art? Only like... twice? In my history of this blog? Guess it says something that I remember that though, boooo

Do you create smut? If so what kind? um! yes, but just doodles, and for my eyes only, haha. I don’t think any of it’s very good >>””

Have you ever had art stolen? I think I’ve had stuff stolen and put into youtube compilations? not sure otherwise

Have you ever had a fic written based off your art? Yes ;;;;;w;;;;;!!!!!!! Thank you Eli!!!!! ;;;;;w;;;;!!!! And I think there have been little things, like bits from my art making it into people’s fics... :3c

What’s your all time favorite ship? It’s cheating maybe since they’re OCs, but rilas will always be special :>

What’s a WIP that you want to finish, but don’t think you ever will? I don’t know about WIP, but there are a few pieces I’ve posted that I want to re-do pretty badly because I’m just not satisfied with them. But then, I always prioritize new pieces over that sort of exercise when I have creative energy...

What are your strengths as an artist? I think, when I put effort into it, my posing/compositions can be pretty effective at being either dynamic or tender. I like to think my background in graphic design gave me an eye for like... presenting things in an interesting way. And expressions, I get very picky with them, ahaha. 

What are your weaknesses as an artist? Everything!!! Everything. My style is super inconsistent, which can be nice as far as flexibility, but really it means my stuff never turns out quite how I imagine because I just don’t have that much control. Clothing and folds frustrate me endlessly. And even though I get some nice comments on it, I think I need to work on my understanding of color & light a lot; I usually have to “fix” my muddy colors with lots of adjustment layers and overlays. Lately I’ve noticed a pattern, where I imagine a big, beautiful, dramatic piece in my mind, and it doesn’t turn out nearly like I expect in the end;; 

What are your favorite tools to make art with? tbh my most fluid stuff comes from just good ol’ pencils and a sketchbook, but I’ve been using a wacom tablet and photoshop for a while. My friend let me use their iPad & procreate last month and it was?? So cool, I’d love to try that out more.

What colors do you like to use the most? Why? I see a lot of warm oranges and yellows in my recent stuff, haha. I think it just fits well with the literal emotional warmth I’m trying to capture. 6.6

What are your feelings on creating comics? They’re intimidating, but rewarding! The few times I’ve managed to finish a comic, even a simple one, it’s been so fun!!!! And they seem to always get more engagement... but my ideas & energy usually lean more toward, you know, single-frame-art.

What was the first fandom you created art for? uhhhHHH the earliest "fandom” I remember drawing is homestar runner LMAO I think the first fanart I posted online was for... Hetalia, maybe? 

What’s your favorite piece of art you’ve ever made? oh....... there’s no way I could choose. I’ll just throw this bokuOi haikyuu art here because it’s definitely a contender:

[lovely-v]

LOTR (films) Review

So I finally watched the LOTR films (20 years later). I’m super excited to review these because I read the books very recently so I feel at least a little prepared to voice some opinions. Overall I loved the films, here’s a very long (but by no means exhaustive) compilation of my thoughts, which are of course, totally subjective:

(Warning: a lot of me saying “well, actually, in the book...”)

THINGS I LIKED

- Casting! not much to say here, I thought the casting was great. One of my favorite actors that I didn’t think i’d have a huge opinion on was David Wenham as Faramir. I was kinda ambivalent on him when I saw pictures but i thought he did a great job. he showed his quality.

- Music. so much has been said about the films on the music front. I can’t offer too much original insight but when a bit of the Shire theme started to play as Frodo tries to make his way up Mount Doom I cried a little.

- Boromir and Aragorn. I liked the scene where they interact a little in Rivendell. I also like how Aragorn saves Boromir in the Moria battle and gives him this little nod of friendship. I think the films did a great job portraying the dynamic they have where Aragorn is clearly suspicious of Boromir’s motivations but grows to respect him to the point where he doesn’t even blame Boromir for being corrupted by the ring because he understands that, at heart, Boromir is a good person. 

- Sam and Frodo in Osgiliath. I expected to be kind of annoyed with the way this plot point played out (I knew ahead of time that it strayed from the book), but I actually liked it a lot. As I’ll say later, there’s some gripes I have with the way the films extremely play up the disagreements between Frodo and Sam, but I loved the scene where Frodo pulls the sword on Sam and then seems so defeated when he realizes what he’s done. I was pleasantly surprised by how emotional this scene made me. It’s admittedly A Lot, but it was done nicely, especially in conjunction with Sam’s “there’s good in this world” speech.

- Treatment of the ending. I almost think I should dislike the ending as it is in the movies, but my heart is soft and I like that they sugarcoated it a bit. I know the whole point of the Scouring of the Shire and Frodo’s depression conveys a lot about war and trauma and I think that is important, but after watching these things for twelve hours I just wanted Frodo & co. to be happy and I was kinda relieved that they cut the Scouring. Does that make me weak and perhaps bad at film analysis? yes. do I care? no. I was also very glad that the movies didn’t portray how depressed Sam was about losing Frodo in the end. Yes, he cries, but when he walks home to his family he seems happy and in the books that scene came off so much bleaker. I definitely liked the lighter tone.

THINGS I WAS NEUTRAL ON/DIDN’T LIKE

- Arwen. (Neutral) I don’t hate her, I don’t love her. I think the story she and Aragorn have is compelling and I 100% get why the filmmakers decided to add it to give her character more depth, but it felt misplaced at times. maybe it’s just because it was the only storyline I didn’t know in depth, but the scenes with the Arwen/Aragorn flashbacks felt a bit confusing and disorienting. Don’t have anything against Arwen as a character though, I think she’s pretty alright.

- Gimli. (Complicated thoughts) I want to start off by saying I don’t dislike Gimli. I like him a lot! I just think the movies did him a bit dirty. He had some good movie-exclusive moments, but I think his character really fell into this place of being the butt of too many jokes. Would have liked to see some more serious Gimli development, especially with his relationship to Legolas. Their friendship felt too much like subtext here, whereas it’s explored far more in the books.

- Two Towers Pacing. (Didn’t really like). The pacing of TTT was...weird. maybe I’m going into this with a closed mind because of the books, but it was odd to have the movie begin with Frodo and Sam and then have them only appear for a few rapid scenes after that. I think the fact that a WHOLE LOT of what happens to Frodo and Sam in TTT is moved to RotK is what makes it feel that way? In the books, Two Towers ends with Sam discovering that Frodo isn’t dead from Shelob’s sting, and I was surprised by how long it took the movies to get to that part. However, I will give the films a little leeway because I think they needed Frodo & Sam content for RotK, since most of what happens in that book is them walking through Mordor basically starving and dying. Doesn’t make for great cinema I guess, so they had to put the whole Shelob/Cirith Ungol saga into the final film. Still, I think there’s a weird lack of Frodo and Sam’s presence in TTT.

- The go home/missing bread arc. (Full of rage abt this one) yeah. so. my criticism of this is gonna sound pretty tired because people complain and complain about this part of RotK. but I’m gonna complain some more!! I don’t think the split between Frodo and Sam does anything for the plot. I really don’t. I guess it emphasizes the fact that Sam doesn’t understand how much Frodo is projecting onto Gollum, but it’s just. unnecessary angst? They had enough angst in the Osgiliath scene! Which I actually liked! And it simply doesn’t make a lot of sense for Frodo to suspect Sam of eating the bread when Sam had already offered Frodo his own food and made it clear that he would very much starve if it meant making sure Frodo could eat. But what I hate most about this scene is not that Frodo gets mad and tells Sam to go home. No. It’s that Sam actually... thinks about doing that? he actually? goes down the staircase? emotionally this is bad because Sam clearly cared enough about Frodo to follow him this far, to nearly drown for him, so why would he leave now. Practically this is bad because 1. how would Sam get out of Mordor alone and 2. where would he go. He turns around almost immediately, yes, but what was his plan. where was he going. why.

THINGS I LOVED

- For Frodo! This line, and every other shoutout to Frodo. In the books, they didn’t really actively talk about/worry about Frodo (and Sam) as much as they do in the movies. I like that they talk about Frodo more in the movies! I like that they’re thinking about him! I know it was implied that they were in the books, but I really like how it’s shown here. I think it gave a more complete picture of how much they all care about him on a personal level in addition to just needing him to succeed from a pragmatic standpoint. 

- Merry and Pippin! I feel like Merry and Pippin were so well rounded in the films. I’ve heard criticism about them being turned into comic relief characters (which they always were a little bit) but it honestly didn’t feel that way to me. They had a bit of a rough start because the films didn’t make their motives for going with Frodo as deep as the books did, but I think that by TTT they were absolutely amazing characters in every scene. In RotK their respective arcs hit really well and the scene where Pippin is singing to Denethor? *chef’s kiss* poetic. beautiful. sad. idk man I just feel like I have such a newfound appreciation for Merry and Pippin.

- Parallels! people have pointed out the parallel of Frodo and Sam’s hands before (drowning scene/mount doom scene) and I love how the movie did that. Just stunning. Also! The moving of the Smeagol & Deagol scene to RotK surprised me because in the books it was like,,,at the beginning of Fellowship, but I think the placement of it in the movies really helped emphasize the similarities between Smeagol & Deagol and Frodo & Sam (and how much Frodo fears this similarity.) There were a lot of other well done parallels between storylines and a few bits of dialogue that were repeated with great timing, but I can’t remember all of them at the moment.  

Edit: here’s one I remembered! when Frodo wakes up after being rescued and sees Gandalf, he says Gandalf’s name in a very similar tone to the one he used at the very beginning of Fellowship. It was a nice little subtle connection.

- I can’t carry it for you...alright this is self-indulgent. everyone knows I love this line. I’m just so glad it made it into the movie intact. Sean Astin’s delivery was amazing. I cheered. My mom cheered. It’s a raw line and it makes me feel secret emotions...like if shrimp colors were feelings. that line makes me feel shrimp feelings. idk i’m so tired i just watched twelve hours of movies this review is decreasing in quality by the minute but i’m about done for now anyway

Various silly afterthoughts

- I would have liked to see Sam kiss Frodo’s hands at least once. This happens 50 thousand times in the books, they could have given me one scene. one little extended edition scene. Please Peter Jackson I’m dyin’ out here

- They literally made Gollum so hateable. kinda the point yes, but I was so on board with Sam’s murderous rage. I know why Gollum’s a profoundly complex character, I know why Frodo pities him, I know why murder is bad, but I too would throw hands with that creature. also he literally body shamed Sam so much what was that skdjksdjksd. Sam is lovely. let him commit a small homicide. 

- the scene where merry and pippin drink the tall boy juice (as someone once referred to it in the tags of one of my posts)... not accurate to the books (since they don’t ever drink it with the end goal of getting tall) but so accurate to life. if I found some water that made me taller than my friends? let me at it

- Frodo panicking when he falls into the spider webs. so real bestie. i felt just as panicked watching that. i am terrified of spiders and Elijah Wood did an amazing job doing exactly what i’d do in the situation. yelping a lot and falling down.

- I feel like it’s never stated that Sam’s a gardener (or at least that he’s specifically Frodo’s gardener) until he tells Faramir he is. Did I miss this. Or do they really never say.  are you just meant to know. are you just meant to pick up gardener vibes from him.

*

This has been a very chaotic lotr movie review. Thanks for reading.

[tomatograter]

How do ya capture the "voice" of homestuck characters so well? Besides studying the comic, is there any other media you consume to really get in their head?

First off: Thanks, i’m happy you enjoy my stuff! Secondly… there ARE a few steps i take to the madness.

I basically come from a Dungeon master/Open-world roleplay management background, so when approaching HS cast voices and trying to understand a character to write a story for them i usually take into account 1.INSPIRATIONS, 2.INTERESTS & due to homestuck’s nature, 3.INTERPRETATIONS (As opposed to “player intent”- Hussie’s work is an amalgam of himself and the public input.)

Rereading their logs/sections always helps when you’re trying to figure out their language, pacing, and a bit of their temperament, but getting too lost on mimicking their messages as-is without looking into the character itself may risk leaving them ringing hollow or repetitive (specially for the section of the public that may be more familiar with this character than you are. This is something that may matter to you or not, if you WANT this work to appeal to a specific public or are just messing around.) Because it may just come down to mindless quirk indulgence. In my experience, readers are more forgiving & enthralled by creators who, while not following the specifics of a character’s quirk to a T maintain a sense of internal logic that is congruent with what is shown throughout their appearances. Some AU’s specifically remix, remove or substitute these aspects, and the reason why people usually don’t complain about it is that “it makes sense- given (x) and (x) context.” Like kidswap aus, etc. 

Another thing about Quirks is that they can very easily be broken. Having a grasp of how quirk rules affect a character based on their emotional state and how it changes over time is more valuable than internalizing a hard set of rules that never changes. (Ex: Sollux’ quirk evolves over time. So does Aradia’s, as she changes bodies. June’s quirk takes on Vriska-like qualities after they begin chatting, Vriska uses 8’s and exclamation points more liberally and/or nonsensically when she’s angry/distressed/desperate, Jake’s transatlantic slang and embellishment of speech is mostly at the backseat unless he’s pretending/anxious/overwhelmed, otherwise he’s pretty simple.) Knowing how to break a quirk is just as good as knowing how to write it - traditional prose in fics *may not use quirks at all*, but they’re so good at grasping the particular intonation a character uses when stringing words together at a given situation that you don’t mind that at all. It’s a smooth adaptation.

[GREAT RESOURCE: this google drive has a compilation of all logs between characters in Homestuck separated by participants but usually only lists them on one-on-one basis, so you may wanna look at groupchats in the original comic. I think the epilogues section may be still unfinished. I forget who originally posted it on twitter but i know they have a dedicated tumblr, i’ll edit this if someone can name their blog]

“INSPIRATIONS” are usually how i define character personalities by their distinct mix of archetypes. This is the “PROTAGONIST”, “GOTH GIRL”, “SILLY GIRL”, “COOL GUY”, “WEIRDO”, “GAMER GIRL”, “CODING WANNABE” and other such little buzzwords that HS will throw around in reference to each of its characters, and that usually, but not always, function as a setup to subvert the expectations based on that character come a certain point in the story. Where does the character you’re trying to write fall into, when you try to describe them in these terms? Does their story humour this definition, reject it, destroy it, or evolve it? Does this seem like a genuine fact about them, or a facade? Why do you think that is? (Asking questions is my preferred way of pulling apart and understanding a character, this may work differently for you.)

“INTERESTS” is where i look into for that chunky, fatty, well-grilled meat that goes in the middle of a character’s text. Homestuck characters are defined by what they like, what they aspire to be, and what they fail at becoming(& how that shapes their actions going forwards). Interacting with the media they like may not always be the way, but having a general idea of how it functions and what it means to them is usually very helpful. I was already familiar with a lot of things my favorite characters enjoy, and thus it was easier for me to get attached to them. I also had to watch a lot of shitty movies sometimes. You win some, you lose some.

EX: It’s easier to write Dave’s pov if you have a good grasp of the pop culture & economics he so often references. (What he likes) It’s easier to write Rose’s pov when you’ve searched a bit of armchair psychology wikipedia definitions and familiarized yourself with the genre and existential questions usually involved in Eldritch Horror, and how it evolved outside of Lovecraft. (What she aspires to be like) It’s easier to write Jake when you understand his persona is a collage of juvenile and outdated archetypes taken from action flicks & shitty mainstream comicbooks, that he ultimately fails to ever live up to and hinders his development as a kid at odds with self-imposed traditional masculinity, dreading to publicize the big “Gay” word. (What he fails at becoming)

It’s always useful to ask yourself “Why does this character like (x)” and what that particular thing may say about them. It doesn’t have to be a big groundbreaking revelation, just put yourself into their shoes and try to reverse engineer what you’re presented about them vs their environment, personal issues, and you might just find yourself understanding why they do what they do. 

“Karkat probably likes cheesy romantic comedies because they’re peak middleclass normalass media for someone who’s ostracized from troll society and is purposefully a shithead to keep people away”

“Terezi probably likes dragons because they’re FUCKING COOL but also whoops here’s all this historic lore about Redglare and their lusus and a tragic sense of JUST1C3”

“Aradia probably grapples with the concept of mortality and the ephemeral nature of life, so she’s really into the morbid observation of disasters & archeology & bones, i guess? Is this because she died really young? Oh. Maybe yeah.”

But if you find the above too hard to access on your own, that’s where 

INTERPRETATIONS come in to make this process smoother in the case you just wanna write an extended cast thing and frankly you could not give less of a shit about (x)’s lore, you just want to have a sense of what people like about them, and why people read about them, and how you can purposefully adapt that into your text so socmedia user halfucker69 isn’t crying on your mentions for 11 whole threaded comments about how you did their babyboybaby wrong. I can’t exactly point to you where you can FIND meta because this highly depends on the character, and sometimes you just have to make your own food, but you’ll be good if you try to look into creators who post about these characters, whose thoughts or fan media seem to be congruent with your idea of said character or solid enough that you can easily see how it’s been developed from point A to point B. Interact with more fanworks. Find out what works for you and what doesn’t. “Character study” is a whole genre of fanfic, if you don’t wanna go for shippy stuff - but a lot of “shippy stuff” has its own valuable edge to seeing how people internalize a character, and shouldn’t be as easily dismissable as it is. Again, you’ll have to rely on your own sense of internal logic here - you can’t take EVERY work as the universal truth, but trying stuff out will give you a better sense of who you think this character is.

Then you have to get around trying to write it, which is easier said than done. A lot of times writing about a character will lead you to understanding them better, and you may even find yourself disagreeing with things past-you said when you were first beginning to think about them, and that’s ok. You only get better at writing by asking better questions and then writing some more. Take your time with it. I hope this helps!

[crispy-ghee]

Predator/ME Lore: The 5 Tenets of the Biotic Guardian

I’ve been doing a lot of worldbuilding/thinking around Jagged-Tooth and how he was raised at the Biotic Temple as a child, thanks to a silly back and forth comic I’m doing with Isei, and I’m working on compiling and editing a bunch of my thoughts on it (it’s pretty heavy worldbuilding), but I at least managed to shove together some stuff about the 5 Biotic Tenets and put it up on the Predator/ME site. 

The 5 Tenets are general principles written by the founder of the Biotic Temple, Guardian Vahyadu, to help a Temple-Trained biotic live an honorable and balanced life in Yautja society. They center around self-control and good decision making. 

Read about them here!

Since I can’t draw, maybe I’ll try to type up more worldbuilding stuff this weekend. There’s so much shit about the biotic temple in my head.

[ashen-crest]

Tazlo Fluff #16: Aftermath

Tazlo Fluff is a side drabble series about Cal and Emry pre-book events. For the main story, please see The Stray Spirit!

Setting: the day of their break-up and onward (both POVs)

Synopsis: Emry and Cal deal with the break-up in different ways.

Words: 1,114

TW/CW: low self-esteem/depression/maybe dissociation, alcohol - to be safe, I’m hiding the whole thing under the cut.

TSS Taglist: @crystallized-ink​, @little-boats-on-a-lake​, @semblanche​, @theramwrites​, @wordsbycreed​, @pretend-im-normal​, @mel-writes-with-her-dragons​, @wildswrites​, @ladywithalamp​, @ettawritesnstudies​, @mj-comics​, @cecilsstorycorner​, @write-your-own-stories​

Note #1: This is a reminder to please look at the TW/CW before reading this one.

Note #2: This contains major spoilers for the inter-personal conflicts in the main story of The Stray Spirit.

Note #3: This is in fact the last Tazlo Fluff post! If you’re coming to the party late, no worries- I’ll be creating a post compiling links to every issue soon.

Looking back, it was a wonder Emry had even made it to the Dancing Rabbit that night.

It was the first night of Sada, and everyone must have assumed his stumbling gait was due to a few pre-celebration drinks. The rain, as light as was, also hid the tears streaking his face.

He didn’t know how he pulled it together to perform at the tavern, on the uncomfortable stool in the dusty corner in front of all the people who had no idea, no idea, what Cal had just said to him. Had he actually sung anything? He must have. They had all laughed along at some point- surely he had made one of his usual jokes. Probably something about Sada and luck. He knew all about Sada and luck.

It wasn’t until he reached the bar where the mask started to crack.

��“What would you like?” Bron made to grab a mug for ale- Emry’s usual.

 “Stronger, please.” The request rasped in his throat. That was just the singing, right? He must have sung a lot.

Bron frowned.

 “Thought you didn’t like anything stronger?”

 “I do today.”

Bron glanced out at the patrons.

 “Mr. Karic…where is Ms. Breslin?”

Emry struggled to take a breath.

 “I’ll take that drink now-“

Bron pulled the glass away and turned to the woman seated at the corner of the bar.

 “Marko Stell, do you know him?”

 “Yeah, sort of-“

 “Find the man, now.”

That was the last coherent thing Emry heard before his head was down on the bar, his breath coming in dry, painful sobs. He had run out of tears hours ago, leaving nothing but grief grasping his throat and the physical pain of self-hatred streaking through his arms and down to his thumbs.

 “Thank you for calling me…” Someone tugged at his arm. “Stef, can you get his other side, please…”

The pain didn’t leave. Every time he woke up and thought maybe he could shrug it off, like he did with the memory of everything else he’d done wrong in his life, Cal’s words poured into his veins like molten lead, and he let their weight drag him back down to sleep.

Sometimes he’d wake up to a bowl of soup or a piece of bread on his nightstand. They held no appeal, but he tried them anyway before hiding back under the covers.

Then one morning, he woke instead to Marko yelling his name and shaking his shoulders, his roommate’s wild and panicked gaze piercing through his glasses.

 “What is it? What’s going on?” Emry sat up and whipped around. “Is the place on fire?”

 “What?” Marko caught his breath. “No, nothing’s on fire!”

Emry touched his pounding head and winced.

 “Then what’s happening?”

 “I just…” Marko slouched back. Had his friend always looked so drawn? “I usually knock on the door and say hello, just to make sure you’re- but then you didn’t say anything back, and I thought…I thought…”

The realization drowned out Emry’s headache.

 “Oh- Marko, no, I’d never-,” he grabbed his friend’s arm, “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you, I’d never do that.”

 “What was I supposed to think, Emry?” Marko took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “You’ve been in here for three days.”

 “Three days?” Emry looked out the window. He had thought at least one day, maybe two… “I’ll get up. I’ll get up today, I promise.”

Several hours later, he was sitting outside with Marko and Stef. Between the two of them, they had bought him enough food to make up for the past four days and then some. He tried small bites of most of it to appease them, while they muttered back and forth.

 “Don’t do it, Stef-“

 “We have to know, she’s our friend, too.”

 “Not now.”

 “No, now.” Stef turned to Emry. “What on earth happened between you and Cal?”

---

 “That’s why he refused to move to Vornik with you?” Sorina set down her wine glass. “Because he has to join the Auric Guild?”

Cal nodded over the rim of her own glass. They were sitting in a cafe in Vornik, watching the carriages roll by. As silly as Sorina could be sometimes, there was one thing to be said about her- when Cal had asked her to accompany her to Vornik twenty minutes before the carriage was supposed to leave, she had packed her bags without question.

“But that’s…” Sorina resumed swirling her wine as she thought aloud. “There’s only, what, twenty members of the Guild in the whole province? That’s impossible.”

 “Improbable.”

 “Whatever. Numbers aside- it’s not like the Guild never performs here in Vornik. It might not be as good of an opportunity as Tazlo, what with their Sada and all, but-“

 “It’s his family,” Cal said. Remembering the conversation pulled her insides taut, but she pushed through it. “According to him, he can’t come home until he’s a Guild member- it’s this stupid ultimatum they gave him- and if they find him-“

 “How would they find him? I thought he was from Senne.”

 “They’re the river route Karics.”

 “Oh, them. Yeah, they’d be everywhere, wouldn’t they?”

 “So if they find him and discover that he’s been this hopeless failure in Tazlo this whole time- to use his words…” Cal trailed off, unable to stop picturing the shame that had weighed down his shoulders as he had explained it all to her.

And she had said- she can’t believe she had said-

 “So what did you say back?”

Cal took a strained breath.

 “I told him I couldn’t do a long-distance relationship with someone who was going to spend the rest of their life hiding.” Her voice caught in her throat. “That it was Vornik or nothing.”

Emry’s last words still echoed in her ears- please don’t make me choose, Cal, please don’t make me choose-

 “Good for you.” Sorina flipped her long hair over her shoulder. “What a red flag, honestly. It’s a good thing you got out of all that before it got worse. Hopeless failure doesn’t sound far off the mark, if you ask me…”

Under the table, Cal’s hand clenched. Above, she grabbed her wine, drained the glass, and nodded.

 “Right.”

 “Besides, you don’t want to be chained to some washed-up musician, do you?” Sorina gestured to the streets. “You’re in Vornik now. I’m sure there’s plenty of good, successful men around here to toss around.”

 “Sure.”

 “I’m serious! I give it two weeks until you completely forget about that idiot. He didn’t deserve you, anyway.”

Sorina returned to Tazlo the following day, leaving Cal in an empty, silent room with absolutely nothing to do but cry.

[unfriendlyamazon]

tagged in this thanks to @dominocity and i spend more time looking at my ao3 stats then i care to admit...

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

36 works on AO3, plus one on my super secret (not really) second AO3 so I don’t contaminate my fandoms.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

165,078

3. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Baby Dragon - jurassic park if it was a romcom

Liking You and Me - this one is one of the earliest kaijou fics i wrote (besides the one i deleted), and i don’t even know if i like it anymore... but i get frequent kudos and comments so i guess it’s good!

In Awe of Flowers - they don’t even kiss!!! also @jadenvargen drew me a comic in the comments and i never thanked him for it because i was too scared to talk to him and tagging him now so long after the fact seems pretty ridiculous but um thank you jay for real.

Sweater Weather - kaijou for when you had a bad day

A Hand to Hold - kaijou hand kink this one i am actively embarrassed of (also, before i saw the light on trans joey)

4. Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I try really hard to! If the fic is really old I don’t (i don’t know why i can’t explain it), but I really appreciate when people take the time to comment and I want them to know it.

5. What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

I don’t... really have any?? I write plenty of angsty situations. Competitionverse (my duke/seto business business au) is probably the angstiest one and the one I have the worst plans for. I have some secret fanfic of 1930s gangster Joey that I’ve kind of put out in the world so maybe that?

6. What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

Haaahaha what drew me back to fanfiction after not writing it for at least a decade was domestic portraits of kaijou so, like, that’s what I write. Probably Baby Dragon or In Awe of Flowers.

7. Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

Not crossovers but I write... a lot of AUs and in fact did an entire compilation one year for NaNoWriMo I never finished. Most niche is the Black Tapes AU that yes I do have a full outline for including timelines for every characters and how they intersect with the grand conspiracy, and maybe the wildest is Long Way to a Small Angry Planet just for making Joey a feathered reptile alien.

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?

I’ve gotten some comments over writing Duke as non-binary and kind of a weird one on my super secret FE3H fanfiction fighting me on a plot point??

9. Do you write smut? If so what kind?

I didn’t, but now I do. I don’t post 90% of what I write, which is maybe weirder?  It’s been really good to be pushed there by friends and develop that part of my writing, so maybe I’ll post more. Probably not tho. I feel like I’ve branded myself as the KaiJou hand kink person but I still don’t write it enough to be anyone’s go-to.

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

No?? I don’t think so???

11. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No but it’d be super cool.

12. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I guess not technically. Me and @saggiclowns bounce ideas off each other, write fanfiction for each other’s fanfiction, and have definitely developed things together, so maybe that counts? But our IP is individualized.

13. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

I have almost exclusively written KaiJou so you think that’d be the obvious answer. I think my actual all time favorite ship that sends me to the moon is probably Marceline/Bubblegum from Adventure Time (the history!!!! the animosity!!!!! the friendship!!!!!!!), I just... don’t want to read AT fanfiction.

14. What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Hahahaaaaaaa. I am WIP queen!! Back in the day I’d start a hundred fanfics just to abandon them! The same’s true of today I just don’t post every thought that comes into my head. Star Trek AU deserves so much more of my attention and I do have a plan for it and I bought a special little Star Trek notebook to keep all my thoughts ideas and notes in and then when it comes to writing it I struggle.

15. What are your writing strengths?

Genuinely, to toot my own horn, I feel I write very naturalistic dialogue and for the longest time writing dialogue was the easiest thing in the world to me, to the point that sometimes I would skip over anything else. Also, gosh I love world building. I could go from a blank screen to a fully articulated society complete with maps, pantheons, and intricate histories for every location. The problem is then writing it.

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

I tend to get very stuck on things and struggle to skip over them. Last year’s NaNoWriMo was a testament to that, and I kept rewriting and getting frustrated and will inevitably end up trashing the whole thing. I pick up new ideas constantly and then discard them for the next thought in my head. It’s part of why I’ve only really let myself write one shots and short fic, but I do have some longer WIP I’d love to actually finish.

17. What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

This is a tricky one and I’ve read and listened to a lot of people talk about how other non-fluent languages are presented in all kinds of different art. I personally don’t have a strong opinion. Best practice is to find someone who is fluent in that language to help you translate it (and there used to be whole blogs dedicated to helping people with this, I don’t know if they’re still around), but that doesn’t mean I’ve never jammed anything into a translator.

18. What was the first fandom you wrote for?

This... is interesting because the answer is YuGiOh. Back in my middle school days my friends were very into ygo and wrote silly like chat formatted fics that we posted on DeviantArt (???) that were just really bad and stupid and silly, and the only reason I even thought about ygo was because all my friends liked it. The first fandom I actually really got involved in was Teen Titans, and ATLA I was, like, a recognizable presence. I fell off extremely hard probably thanks to college and have spent most of my life focusing on original fiction and writing my own characters. Then my best friend sent me a piece of fanart that unlocked my childhood memories, and here we are now, in the only fandom.

19. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

I wrote Bite Hard and it might be one of the best things I’ve written... and now I’ve kind of repurposed it into an original fiction??? I think the main characters might always be buddies no matter how much I’ve manipulated them, but it’s kind of spun off into it’s own thing? That’s what fanfiction’s for! Experimentation, playing with ideas, having a sandbox to build in! And then I EL James it and make millions! (jk)

@saggiclowns doesn’t post to AO3 that much, and i don’t know if @danieco even has an AO3 but they are extremely good writers!! also if you write fic, please share your own!

[hackedmotionsensors]

Hey I feel like you’ve already answered this but what are some of your favorite iron man or Captain America comics and why? What story lines would you recommend? I’m curious about the more modern stuff. What’s some of your fav comic artists when it comes to marvel?

OKAY SO. 

holy shit this got long so UNDER THE READ MORE WE GO

This is always kind of a hard question to answer because I personally have not read everything in regards to either Iron man or Captain America. I’ve read the Tales of Suspense stories a lot because I keep trying to start over from the very beginning. And that’s not always helpful if you just wanna dip your toes or give Iron Man/Cap a go.

So what I CAN tell you is here’s what I did when I was first getting into comics around 2012.

I went to Borders/Barnes and Noble and a I read a bunch of the compilations they had in the store. Someone has already done the work FOR you so its really easy to just pick up a book and read from there. 

I started out with Invincible Iron Man  (I’m gonna link to Amazon but I suggest not buying from them because Bezos is a demon [comixology is owned by amazon as well but it is a convenient app]) 

Marvel has its own comics app but if you also read and pay for other comics its not ideal. There are places to “read comic books online” and for older stuff I definitely do this now but for newer comics I’ll try to pay for them especially if its indie. Support indie comics!!! 

Anyway. Invincible Iron Man. A polarizing story in terms of Iron Man lore. But its definitely an easy one to get into and read especially if you’re coming in from MCU and are just testing things. You don’t necessarily need to know all of his history but it covers the basics. 

Next I’d try Demon in a Bottle It’s the original alcoholism arc. A must read for general Tony’s lore. This isn’t the one where he ends up a hobo on the street where Cap helps him escape from a burning building. But this is where he goes off the rails the first time. Bethany Cabe is his current girlfriend and tries to help him. And he kind of recovers. I’m not sure this is exactly a FAVORITE but it has a lot of the important shit for Tony. His temper is something that doesn’t get talked a lot about I think but he DEFINITELY has one. The art is very..........lol its not BAD per say but its also not like wow what gorgeous art. 

Another important Tony lore is Armor Wars So you wanna read the first few times Tony and Steve fight about REAL SHIT. This is it. This is the classic story where he realizes his tech is being used by bad guys and HE’S THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN STOP THEM NO CAP NOT EVEN YOU BECAUSE YOU’RE A GOOD GUY AND I MIGHT HAVE TO GET DIRTY. It has the classic Steve sitting in a dark room waiting for Tony to come back with his date and then throwing his shield at Tony going “I don’t want your trash”

It also has a lot of good Tony being in a morally grey area. *chef’s kiss* 

And then basically read all the fun stuff with Kurt Busiek in Vol 3 (This isn’t an amazon link but the marvel database so you know roughly where to start) 

VOLUME THREE HAS SUCH HITS LIKE

The Sentient Armor: Tony accidentally kills Whiplash in a lightning storm. The Armor comes to life. The armor falls in love with Tony and WANTS TO BECOME ONE WITH TONY. Tony does not want this. Tony is beat up and kidnapped and taken by the armor to a deserted island. The Armor is like Tony I love you so much GET IN ME NOW. Tony is about to die from a heart attack. The armor RIPS ITS HEART OUT AND SHOVES IT INTO TONY. Bye Tony I love you now we’re one forever. RIP

Tiberius Stone’s 2 arcs (they’re not in consecutive order but they’re both hella gay): Tony’s old boarding school friend shows up again and is a TV mogul and is DEFINITELY NOT Slandering Tony in the press or blowing up his buildings or framing him for MURDER oh my god Tiberius is a pain in the ass and we definitely boned down as teenagers but he would never frame me for MURDER but his TV devices that seep into your brain like the boob tube thing from Batman Forever are pretty suspicious. Oh no Tiberius IS a bad guy and he got me naked (why?) and hooked the both of us up to the TV machine and now we’re trapped in his horny tv dream why am I dressed like Alice in Wonderland???  ALSO HE SLEPT WITH MY GIRLFRIEND!!!!??

(This is why I will FOREVER get upset that Killian in Iron Man 3 isn’t Tiberius Stone. He IS LITERALLY FOLLOWING THE TIBERIUS STONE PLAYBOOK INCLUDING THE PHYSICAL LOOK WHAT THE ACTUAL HELL MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE FEIGE YOU OWE ME MONEY!!!!)

Also at the beginning of Vol 3. Tony gets the absolute holy hell bejesus shit beat out of him. And that lasts for a WHILE and seeps into the Avengers Vol 3 (which you should also read its fun and I like that George Perez actually tries to make people look ethnically diverse but also you can tell Clint from Cap)

There’s also a part in vol 3 where Monica from FRIENDS shows up at a party and that’s a wild thing that happened.

But basically I think you can start just about anywhere with Iron Man and have a good time if you’re a deep Tony fan. He has a lot of great stories and its why he’s my favorite. Even this last run with Slott I still KIND OF LIKE ANYWAY??? bc its Tony. Its not always written to what a lot of long standing Iron Man fans would say is canon but I mean.....he’s got 57 years worth of comics behind him so he’s bound to change here and there. He was once a super villain, died, brought over as a teenager from an alternate timeline, and then merged with another Tony I forget the details but its silly lol

Side universe reading Iron Man Noir, Ultimates (Hickman’s run is very fun but also Ultimates 1 and 2. DO NOT READ ULTIMATUM IT IS GROSS, I HAVE READ IT FOR YOU ALMOST EVERYONE DIES ITS GROSS.

Ultimates is literally half of the basis for the MCU. Don’t read Ultimates Iron Man tho. Not only is it written by a creep its also extremely stupid and doesn’t even really make sense in terms of what happens later in Ultimates. It basically gets RetConned immediately.

Also Ultimates universe has Gregory Stark. Tony’s fun evil twin brother who for some reason is blonde. I can’t really give you a specific story to read with Ultimates because its the most god awful confusing universe to try and find stories from so I literally don’t even remember. I’d check an Ultimates fan blog for that.

AS FOR CAPTAIN AMERICA.

I love Steve Rogers. I really do. I think he’s a fun character. B U T. His comics for me can be very boring. He has some great arcs as someone who is supposed to be a representation of what a GOOD AMERICA can aspire to or whatever. But America often times SUCKS A LOT (our current times being very obvious). Cap definitely fights for what he believes and so that’s why he often takes off the garb of Captain America and runs around in a slutty v neck and a cape as Nomad. Or when he comes back from the dead and his BFF is the new Cap (WITHA  KNIFE) and wears the sexy Secret Avengers uniform. Very sexy. We stan the Colonel Rogers uniform very much. But his early comics are a lot of “OH MY GOD I KILLED BUCKY ITS ALL MY FAULT BUCKY!!!!! RICK JONES PUT ON BUCKYS CLOTHES THIS ISNT CREEPY I PROMISE”

A GREAT run in Avengers is the Cap’s Kooky Quartet or as I call Cap Joins the Baby Sitters Club. This goes WAYYYYYY back to Avengers 17 

It runs for a very good while before Giant-man and Wasp come back because Giant Man can’t shrink back down lmfao idiot. But its a lot of fun and establishes Cap as being a really good leader even tho he’s thrown into the hot seat because he was out on a mission and everyone else was like “We’re taking a vacay bye Cap. Good luck with the kids” *John Mulaney doing Andy Cohen impression* HUH WHAT WHY

I have no idea what to Rec really lol I know @sineala is part of a SteveTony 616 discord and they do readings every month(?) of either very SteveTony based arcs or specifically Steve or Tony arcs. But I think they have a better grasp of Steve stories than I do.

I would say most recently the run with Mark Waid and Chris Samnee as the artist is a VERY good read. The story is pretty nice and dry lol but the art. Holy shit.

I know there are a bunch of artists that really REALLY get Cap but Chris Samnee is probably my number one favorite Cap artist. Even his sort of retro style works with Cap SO WELL. And I like Mark Waid’s writing. Or at least I don’t think I’ve ever been really mad at it like with Dan Slott or Gillen (We will never forgive for what he did to Tony’s backstory and taking Maria from him) lol

Uh...but as far as I could tell the entire run where Bernie is his girlfriend is VERY good. She first shows up in Captain America 247 . Cap is an illustrator on the side (or as his main job) and man what a dope. His art habits are worse than mine like get a desk Steve. But this arc through Bernie goes through a lot of Steve being kind of stuck in the past and not knowing how to embrace the modern or future and Bernie is there being the coolest fucking chick in the world who’s studying to be a lawyer, watches Wrestling, listens to Bruce Springsteen (I think lol I forget), dunks on Cap for being a weirdo old dude. Very put together woman of the 80s. She proposes to Cap and because I think the writers changed he’s like I HAVE TO LEAVE IMMEDIATELY BYE. 

This isn’t on any of the main timelines but its a good read Captain America Man Out Of Time. Basically Cap coming to grips with the future and realizing the past sucked ew. lol Also he listens to Radiohead which Tony gives him a personal concert for because of course he does.

And then of course there’s this fucking TOME of a story Captain America: The Winter Soldier .

Im gonna sound a little negative but I don’t mean it against anyone’s favorite but I have the most exhausting time trying to read this story. I’ve tried at least three times lol. I think maybe Brubaker’s weird obsession with the Cold War (Remember when he called people who were yelling at Slott for being a creep a ‘Bunch of Commies’) is just so fucking heavy handed that I can’t personally get through it. I would much rather watch the movie.

HOWEVER. There’s good old Bucky coming back from the dead. Natasha. Sam Wilson. Sharon Carter. All big players in this story. So uh lol good luck with this one. If you’re also a Bucky fan this is a must read but as I only peripherally like Bucky I don’t care to read this one. 

So I’d check out this arc.

Also a personal fave of mine is 

It starts here on Captain America 402 . Its the best story IN THE WORLD. ITS SO ICONIC. NOTHING CAN COMPETE. I LOVE CAPWOLF SO MUCH lol

[vapidsoup]

anxiety coping mechanisms!

hey guys lately i’ve been relapsing on my panic disorder bc i moved to a new city for uni. nowadays, i feel like i’ve improved a lot since the first day of the move, and i’d like to make a wholesome and hopefully helpful post about things that have helped me calm down during these tough times. if you suffer from anxiety, depression or panic disorders, maybe test these out and see if it helps! we should all stick together and try to help each other during our difficult moments in life, after all! Oh, and please please please feel free to add your own coping mechanisms!! i’d love to hear some more helpful advice! So, without further ado:

when i am anxious I:

Distract myself with skill-focused hobbies. When I was younger and had panic attacks, simply reading my favorite book would help calm me down. Nowadays, I can’t seem to focus on reading when I’m anxious so it’s no longer helpful. Instead, my brain needs an activity which forces it to reallocate its thought process completely, so doing something that requires focus, quick thinking or your total attention is preferable. For me, I find this in drawing, difficult video games, puzzles, or podcasts, but it could be anything that forces you to shift mental gears.

Spend time with loved ones. This one is not always helpful depending on how bad the anxiety is, but I found effective when I can feel it creeping up. Talking to your mother or father, siblings, or of course friends can also help distract from negative feelings. Don’t just talk! Do an activity together, like playing a board game, signing karaoke, even going out together if you feel bold enough. If you surround yourself with supportive and entertaining people, sometimes you may not even notice your anxiety melt away.

Consume positive media. Say you’re too antsy to leave the house or even talk to anyone. That’s totally okay. Sometimes, all you need to start feeling better is your laptop! Watching a funny show has really helped calm me down because it’s a positive experience. I find that stories and music with dark, depressing and negative tones only serve to feed my anxiety. AVOID NEGATIVE VIBES! Stand-up comedy, happy/energetic songs, or even vine compilations can help turn your mood around. During my first week alone, I rewatched 6 seasons of the office. It helped a lot, believe it or not! If you have a friend to watch it with, even better.

Mind my breathing. This is the oldest trick in the book and yet I forget to control my breathing every time. If you find yourself on the verge of or during a panic attack, take deep, regulated breaths. Don’t think about anything else. Just in. And out. In. And out. Concentrate on breathing deeply and regularly for as long as you have to.

Take a shower or bath. A surprisingly helpful trick, in my experience. Warm, soothing water can help calm you down. Washing yourself is also a good physical distraction, especially when movements are repeated, like scrubbing your hair. Lose yourself to the task!

If possible, stay in a comforting environment. This could be just me, but my thoughts are at their worst when it’s nighttime. That’s why I like to stay in a brightly illuminated space when I’m feeling bad. It’s not much, but it does help. I find great comfort in my room, so staying in my comfy bed with stuffed animals has helped calm me down.

Make stuff up! This doesn’t apply to everyone, but I have found that creation has been an excellent means of coping with anxiety. If you are the creative type (regardless of any assumed skill), I strongly encourage you to think of projects you would like to do, and develop them. Are you into writing? Try thinking of a story you would like to tell! A poem you could write! Musician? Try writing some lyrics or even compose your own piece! Artist? Daydream about your dream projects. I would personally recommend working on a story. This entails world-building, characters, plot, settings, specific scenes. most of the ideas I’ve had for stories, tv shows, video games and comic books were born and developed been during times of mental crisis. Whether it’s a script, painting, youtube video, or melody, try to unleash the creator within. It is an astoundingly effective distraction.

And most importantly,

Remember that this, too, shall pass. This simple thought has been the most important aid when dealing with my panic disorder. When I was 10, I went through a terrible time, mentally, and had panic attacks nearly every day. My mother would always tell me the story of a wise king, adored by all and renowned for his seemingly perfect mind. When asked by his subjects the secret to his leadership skills, he pointed at the ring he wore on his finger. Engraved in it were the words “this, too, shall pass.” Whenever he felt powerful and invincible, the ring reminded him to think of the future and prepare for adversities. And when he felt powerless, hopeless, alone, utterly despaired, the ring was a reminder that everything is temporary. One day, things will get better, it could even be tomorrow. So he should never give up the fight because nothing is forever. That story really resonated with me. At my worst, I have to tell myself “This will pass. These emotions are strong and seem like the end of me, but soon I’ll feel better and know that this is nothing.” And sure enough, when the panic passes (because it ALWAYS passes), I think “now I can see how much better I feel. The next time I feel anxious, I must remember how I feel right now, and know that I will feel this way again.” So, when you think the situation is hopeless, know that this, too, shall pass.

These are only some of the tricks I’ve used throughout my whole life to get through panic attacks. Notice how most of these tips are about distracting yourself from the anxiety. During panic attacks or anxious bouts, obsessing over whatever problems you may have, even if they seem urgent or inescapable, rarely helps. The goal of these exercises are to help put you in a different, more reasonable state of mind, which you can later use to tackle adversities in a realistic and healthy way. So really, it’s all about letting yourself breathe, cool down and reset.

So, I hope that this silly post has helped! I wish you all the best!

[thatsmrfantastic-archived]

9. Do you enjoy putting your muse through angst? What do you think would break their heart the most?

Late munday questions answered fndkfnjfdnjk adulting is hard

Do I enjoy putting Reed through angst --- to be completely honest??? nOPE. with a little bit of extra nOPE in my coffee thanks :V

All kidding aside I actually believe the Four has been through enough. Like, let’s take a summary of the big events that have really REALLY freaking traumatized them.

1) going to space and getting blasted by cosmic rays, physically being altered then having to not only work through that but also face it. Like, their NASA shuttle made it back to earth battered, probably on fire and stumbling out of the wreckage there’s Reed, who can’t probably walk or move properly cause he feels like literal silly putty, susan can’t see herself, johnny’s just ON FIRE and Ben’s this thing made of god knows what kind of astral rock and just. Yeah. I can’t even begin to process how you’d react to going through something that traumatic. anyways, somehow they do.

2) Victor. I don’t even need to compile all the stuff he’s done to Reed emotionally and physically but the fact that he’s blamed Reed, for every failure, every fuck up in his life. That’s a lot to deal with. I think probably at one point Reed might have even blamed himself. What if I did? What if I completely destroyed a person’s opportunity to be great? A person’s possibility? Man, I’ll come back to that cause yeah. It’s a huge, huge feel and aspect of my interpretation of this character. 

3) Civil War. Wow, I won’t even recount the comics cause they’re pretty messed up. But basically Reed’s marriage and his team, his family, almost falls entirely apart. Sue sides with Captain America. Reed sides with Tony. It’s a mess. Poor Johnny and Ben are on the sidelines like Sue and Reed’s children like MOM DAD PLEASE DON’T FIGHT. It’s hard for Reed to talk about and he’s apologized since but he still stands by the fact anything he did, he did with the best interest of his family in mind. How people can’t see that is beyond me. 

4) Though not apart of the films I’ve developed my own timelines/verses/headcanons about Reed and his family during Infinity War and Endgame. Reed and Sue basically lose their family in the snap. That’s probably the most angsty thing I’ve ever developed for his character. I took inspiration from the film A Quiet Place that John Krasinski (my faceclaim for Reed’s) in and the quote “if we can’t protect them - then who are we?” like the worst thing that could ever happen to a parent is the loss of a child. Imagine losing two. And your brother in law. And your best friend. Unlike in Civil War though I imagine Reed and Sue would gravitate towards one another fiercely because couples usually do that or distance each other from themselves completely when they lose a child. 

There’s more things to happen to the team canonically wise, sure but those are my top four most dramatic/angsty in a sense?

As for what would break Reed’s heart the most, I can list it right here:

- The loss of an immediate family member. Certain issue’s of the FF have shown Reed doesn’t deal with loss well, especially one in battle he felt he should have been able to prevent. 

- Failure. Although it’s cheesy, the quote failure is not an option is a quote my muse feels deeply. He’s so guilt ridden about previous colossal mistakes he’s made that he feels he has to make amends forever and prevent anything of the sort from happening again. This is where his need to fix everyone’s problems and people please comes from too. 

- Keeping someone from reaching their full potential. Reed’s said so many times to people he dreams of making a better world and helping people reach their goals and dreams. That’s why he started the future foundation, to give children access to unbiased education and something to reach for. That’s why he can’t bring himself to ever really hurt or kill victor because he questions: what if something I said or did really DID hurt him? Or stop his development? What if everything that’s ever happened to my family is all MY FAULT? So he keeps cutting victor slack and hoping, maybe someday he’ll see he never meant to discourage him from greatness, he just wanted to see him become the best version of himself. Something great AND good. 

[seasonofthegeek]

To the Top

Today’s drabble is dedicated to the fantastic @twindoodle to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY MONTH! I hope your October is amazing and wonderful just like you are, friend! <3

“Can you make snowballs?”

Todoroki looked up from his book in mild surprise. “I don’t know.”

“You’ve never tried, even when you were a child?” Momo asked, setting her pencil down beside her notepad.

“No.”

“Oh.” She picked her pencil back up and neatly wrote something on her notepad and then moved to her book, flipping to the next page.

Todoroki felt an awkward silence settle between them and he hated it. He was well aware that his social skills weren’t always in the normal range but he had trouble fighting what felt natural. 

“You’re not weird, Todoroki-kun,” Midoriya had said as they took a break from sparring in the training room the week before. “I think maybe you just react to things differently. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

“That sounds like a roundabout way of saying I’m weird,” he had replied dryly, watching Midoriya’s eyes widen comically as his hands flailed and he tried to explain himself better.

It had become easier to talk to Midoriya though. Maybe because he didn’t demand Todoroki act in any way but how he did or maybe it was a matter of practice. He hadn’t had a lot of practice with talking to other people recreationally. 

He glanced across the table at Momo. She wasn’t demanding either. He enjoyed the time they got to spend together and it was nice to study with someone who was on his level.

“I guess I could try,” he murmured.

She blinked up in surprise, her pencil pausing in the middle of a word. “Try what?”

He felt his face warm in a way he wasn’t familiar with. Odd. “The snow.”

“Oh! Sure.” She looked around them for a moment at the empty study room. “Maybe we could go to the training room when we both reach a stopping point?”

“That’s fine. Let me know.” He stared down at his book until he felt her return her attention to her own work. He felt a little off-kilter, as if the axis his entire existence balanced on had shifted a few degrees to the left. Was it the way she’d looked at him? That seemed like such a silly thing to make him feel this way. He wasn’t blind. He could see that she was beautiful but there were a lot of beautiful people in the world. Surely that wasn’t it, not entirely. 

He dared a glance at her notepad, trying to discreetly read what she’d been working on from his side vantage point. He saw different names at the tops of columns, names of their classmates, his being the first. Below the names were lists of weapons and other offensive items with numbers written to the side. Curiosity got the better of him. 

“What are you working on?”

Momo flushed and a pretty pink raced across her cheeks as she half-covered the notepad with her arm and then thought better of it, exposing it again. “Well, I...I’m still trying to learn how to trust myself and think on my feet more,” she began with a determined nod, “but I thought it might be beneficial to try to plan ahead a little.”

“You’re coming up with things you can create to enhance our classmates’ quirks if you were teamed up with them,” he clarified.

“Yes. I know battles are still fought on instinct but...” She trailed off with a small wave of her hand.

Todoroki felt the corner of his lip quirk. “This is a really smart idea. It’s always good to be prepared.”

The pink of her cheeks darkened and Momo bowed her head in thanks.

“Is that why you asked about snowballs?”

“Well, yes,” she nodded. “I know your quirk is really powerful on its own but in a situation where someone needed to be stopped but there were a lot of civilians around, it isn’t exactly safe.”

He looked down at his closed fist. “No, I guess it isn’t.”

“Not to say you don’t have fantastic control over it because you do,” she quickly added, “but I was thinking if you could create something softer with your ice, like a snowball, with the right density and something that could shoot it without melting it, it could be a helpful deterrent to slow down a criminal but not severely injure an innocent bystander if they came into the line of fire, or well, ice, in this case.”

“That’s...not something I’ve given much thought to.” He looked at her with sincerity. “Thank you, Yao-Momo. It really isn’t a surprise you’re top of the class.”

“In the practical,” she reminded him. “When it comes to the physical parts of the exams, I’m still ending up towards the middle.”

“Then maybe we can both help each other.”

She gave him a skeptical look. “You’re already second in the class. I’m not sure how much I can help you because I...” She bit her lip as if to cut off the words.

“Because you don’t want me taking your place?” he asked.

Momo raised her chin. “That’s assuming you could.”

Todoroki felt a small smile begin. “Something I can work on then.”

“And I’ll work on moving up in battle simulations so I can get to the top there too.”

“You’re teasing me.”

“A bit,” she admitted. “Although I do really want to move up.”

Todoroki closed his book. “Then let’s go see if I can make snow and if you can create something that can let us use it in the future.”

“The future?” she asked tentatively, closing her own book and notepad.

“We should probably team up to defend our spots at the top. That would be the wise thing to do.”

There was something in his eyes that seemed almost playful, though Todoroki’s expression was as neutral as it usually was. 

“Absolutely,” she agreed, already compiling mental notes of the items she wanted to create even as she felt her cheeks warm again as he held out a hand in an offer to carry her books. “I can carry them.”

“I know you’re capable,” he nodded, hand still out. “I was only trying to be nice.”

Momo could practically hear Ashido yelling in her head just to hand him the dang books so she did with an embarrassed smile. Todoroki took them in stride and they walked to the training room together with matching blushes.  

Buy me a cherry coke?

[halloweennut]

Wonder (Part 2)

part two kids! featuring my other oc as well

Wonder gets an update. 

Even without the threat of becoming an app, and with the generally increased freedom of being in McDuck Labs, Wonder still felt closed off. There was nothing she wanted more than to go and actually experience what she saw videos and pictures of, and her questions and curiosity only increased as the days and weeks went by. She had learned and had grown more, but there were so many variables that couldn’t be accounted for, how much she still hadn’t been able to experience for herself. Having her questions answered was nice, but there’s only so much she could ask.  

“Dr. Gearloose?” Wonder asked quietly, not wanting to disturb him too much from his concentration, but it looked like he had spaced off in the middle of a schematic. She considered following up with asking him when he last slept, but he responded.

“Yes, Wonder? I’m a little busy right now,” he replied, tapping his pencil on the blue paper. Truthfully, he could use a distraction from the block he had.

“Oh, nevermind then. I can ask later,” she said, pulling up the queue of ocean videos she had. “Just another silly question, I guess.”

“Your questions are only occasionally silly,” Gyro turned to face her, tossing the pencil into a cup. “What do you want to know today?”

Wonder took down the queue, focusing her camera on Gyro. It was the only way she could establish eye contact. Well, not really. She activated her rudimentary hologram program. Wonder hadn’t used it since she was back at Waddle and desperate to move around. The avatar she had crafted herself was a greenfinch, but the light source made it blue and a little pixelated. She had told Gyro about the capabilities she had been programmed with, as well as ones she adopted from other Waddle programs and what she had developed herself, including the hologram application. But after weeks of only dealing with her as a computer, Gyro still looked a little taken aback to see her like that and almost physically there as the hologram settled in 3D space, sitting on a chair - not really sitting but projecting that they were.

“How would I...How would you - Do you know how to make a full, life-size body?” Wonder stuttered out. “It’s not that I’m ungrateful for the computing system and everything you’ve gone out of your way to do for me, but-”

“It’s starting to get small again, isn’t it?” Gyro interjected. The hologram nodded. “And you want to be able to actually learn things first hand so you don’t have to keep asking questions.”

The hologram nodded again. “I know it’s a selfish thing to ask. You have all your other projects for your job, only so much grant money, and I could always just get a RAM and processor upgrade instead - that might help.”

“You’ve been here for weeks now, and you underestimate me? I thought you knew better,” Gyro replied with a shrug. “We’ll start schematics for it soon. It’ll be a technological marvel, honestly, and if it works, who knows the other possibilities we’ll have with the tech that gets developed.”

“With what tech?” The hologram tilted its head. Gyro stared at her like it was the most obvious question in the world.

“That’s a silly question,” Gyro said, pulling out a blank sheet of blue panning paper from a drawer. “Your next upgrade, Wonder, obviously. A whole body with the specifications of your current computing system, but we’ll probably expand that too.”

“Really? You’ll do it?” Wonder exclaimed, the hologram leaping from the chair. “Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!”

The hologram lunged forward, arms outstretched to wrap around Gyro’s legs, but phased halfway through before pulling back sheepishly. The thank you hug would have to wait until she was corporeal.

---

It had taken months of research, tests, midnights and cups of coffee, but Wonder’s body was finished. Based completely off her hologram and real-life proportions and other biometrics on greenfinches in her age group, if Gyro and Fenton hadn’t compiled her hardware and made her feathers themselves, they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between the android and a person. Well, the lack of breathing was a good sign, but it wasn’t on and Wonder hadn’t been uploaded to it. Everything had been taken into account to make her look as lifelike as possible, but now the only thing left was to start everything up.

“Okay, the last diagnostic has cleared, we’re all set you two,” Fenton said, looking over at Gyro and Wonder’s screen from his tablet. Gyro had just finished attaching the cables and wires between the body and computer and quickly made sure they were secure, as well as the old shirt they had put on the new body until they could get her proper clothing.

“Ready, Wonder?” Gyro asked. The response was a quickly chirped yes, and he nodded. “Initiate download and system start-up.”

“See you soon,” Fenton said and started the program to get the body running as Wonder’s screen went dim, her files leaving down and out through the cords. A few minutes later, there was a ping, and Wonder’s eyes fluttered open. She blinked a few times, calibrating her nervous system and senses, and then let her eyes focus on the lab, then on Gyro and Fenton, who stood apprehensively over her head.

“Hello,” she whispered, vocal cords not yet fully warmed up. Gyro grinned triumphantly that so far everything was working, masking relief that Fenton fully wore on his face. After she felt more confident in her limbs Wonder slowly sat up on the table. Gyro and Fenton quickly moved to support her, unsure of how stable she was just yet.

“Careful, Wonder,” Gyro warned. “Don’t move unless you’re completely sure. You took a while to make, so let’s not injure ourselves.”

Wonder nodded, and carefully swung her legs off the table, using the two as support as she dropped down to the cold floor of the lab. Her eyes went wide at the sensation - her first feeling of cold!

“The floor’s cold,” she said, excitement in her voice. Fenton laughed.

“Well, her nervous system is functioning,” he said. “Sorry the first thing you felt wasn’t the best.”

“She’ll have plenty of first things, Fenton,” Gyro said. Wonder held his forearm, taking a moment note the feeling of feathers, before trying her first step. She paused at the tug of cords at her neck, which Fenton quickly took care of. Once she was untethered, Wonder continued, latching onto Gyro’s arm as she slowly moved a few feet, stumbling once or twice before she felt confident enough to let go and walk on her own. Fenton excitedly tapped Gyro’s arm as they watched, grin wide as Gyro looked on in approval, monitoring her limb adaptation. Wonder turned to face them with a wide smile - a little goofy and ever so slightly lopsided - and ran to them, tripping at the new mode of movement as she launched into them in a hug.

“Oof!” was a conjoined sound of surprise as she either ran into stomach or knees, hands reaching to support and pat her back in return. Gyro let himself smile a little, knowing how long she’d wanted to do this.

“Well, how do you like it? Everything working well?” Gyro asked, kneeling down to check her ocular reflexes with a small light. She nodded - her pupils dilated normally, good - but shivered.

“Everything is great, still getting used to the cold though,” Wonder replied, wrapping her arms around her middle, but enjoying the feeling of old cotton and her very own feathers under her fingertips. “But it’s wonderful to feel real things!”  

“It is a little chilly down here, isn’t it?” Fenton responded. “Let’s look into getting you a coat until you’re used to things.”

“And probably real clothes too,” Gyro said, looking around. He saw Manny enter the room, luckily. “Manny, give me your lab coat.”

Manny looked over - he had been aware of everything happening that day, and had been put in charge of other lab duties - and tapped out a reply of ‘why?’ Gyro stared at him.

“Just give me your coat, Manny. It’s for Wonder,” Gyro explained. With a shrug, Manny took it off and draped it over her shoulders. She tucked her arms into the sleeves and found it comically huge on her. The sleeve dangled below her hands and the coat dragged behind her by at least a foot. Gyro started to roll up the sleeves to the wrist. “Well, it’ll do for now.”

“I know we want to hold off on introducing her to everyone,” Fenton said, “but maybe we should get Penelope involved.”

“Why? We’re perfectly capable of taking care of Wonder,” Gyro replied, looking at him incredulously. Wonder had meandered over to Manny to properly thank him for the coat and to shake his hoof. “I don’t see why we have to involve that know-it-all.”

“I mean obviously we’re capable, but Penelope knows clothing better than we do,” he explained. “Also, we’d look a little creepy shopping in a misses section of a store with no one with us.”

“That’s actually a good point,” Gyro conceded with a sigh. “You go get her, explain everything, and I’ll finish up the tests on Wonder to make sure everything is going well.”

Fenton nodded, and with a quick wave to Wonder, headed upstairs.

---

“So, you’re telling me that you and Gyro essentially adopted an AI, gave it a body, and now you want me to buy them clothing?” Penelope asked during the elevator ride down. Fenton nodded.

“Well, we haven’t adopted her exactly, if anything she’s almost like another intern that Gyro took on,” Fenton said. “But I know he definitely cares more than he lets on. Like with Lil Bulb. Also, I just helped with her, and while yes, I am concerned with her welfare, this isn’t exactly a joint thing. Besides, saying it like that makes it sound like Gyro and I are in a relationship, which we’re not.”

“Right,” the hen replied. “Well, I’m willing and able to buy them clothes. But on one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m their aunt and/or godmother. No exceptions,” she stipulated. “None of my other friends have kids for me to spoil yet, and I have the need to be someone’s cool lesbian aunt.”

“Deal. You’ll have to clear it with Gyro, but I think he’ll be resistant,” Fenton agreed, running a hand through his hair. She shrugged.

“I’ll buy them clothing anyway, but even if he doesn’t agree I’m going to assume the role.”

The lift stopped and the doors opened to the lab. Wonder was fiddling with a puzzle cube while Gyro monitored her motor functions and visual processing. The two looked up at them - Gyro with defeated disdain and Wonder with curiosity. Penelope paused a second before walking forward. “Hello, Gyro.”

“Penelope,” he greeted, deadpan, placing his clipboard down as he turned to face her. “I assume Fenton told you everything?”

“You assume correctly,” she replied, stopping in front of Wonder, and crouched down so she was eye to eye with her, and extended out a hand. “Hello there. I’m Penelope.”

Wonder took her hand and gave it a gentle shake. “I’m Wonder. It’s very nice to meet you.”

“It’s nice to meet you too, Wonder,” Penelope smiled. “Now, Fenton asked me to go and get you a wardrobe so you’re not running around in some old lab coat. Any preferences?”

“Not that I can think of. But I love the color blue!” Wonder answered. Penelope nodded, stepping back to get a better look at her in terms of sizing and what color range of blue would match her feathers best.

“I can work with that,” the hen said, very self-assured before turning back to Gyro and Fenton. “I’ll be back in two hours. Also, Gyro, whether you like it or not, I’m her aunt now. I was going to have you agree to that, but now you don’t have a choice. Sorry. Ta-ta now.”

While Gyro sputtered in frustration at her assumption of kinship, Penelope patted Wonder on the head and made her way back up.

---

Two hours later, Penelope arrived back in the lab. While Gyro and Fenton expected maybe two bags at most, she arrived with at least several, most of them being from Toulouse’s boutique. Fenton’s eyes went wide at the bags as she set them on a worktable, looking very triumphant.

“How much did you-”

“Well, I said I would get her a wardrobe and I did,” Penelope said. “She’s covered until next season, then we’ll look into fall and winter clothing.”

“Isn’t this excessive?” Gyro asked, Wonder grabbing a bag and peering into the contents. There was a mix of different clothing articles, in different shades of blue and just as many fabrics. Penelope looked at him confused.

“That sounds impossible. Like I wasn’t going to get her a whole closet worth of things. Besides, I don’t trust your or Fenton’s fashion sense,” Penelope replied. “But if it makes you feel better, one of the bags is a full outfit for today, plus accessories and pyjamas.”

She plucked a bag from the pile and handed it to Wonder, who gasped in excitement, grabbing it with a thank you and running to the bathroom to change.

“I hate to say it, but thank you, Penelope,” Gyro said. “I know Wonder appreciates it.”

“Not a problem.” Penelope picked up a folder she had slipped into one of the bags. “I also arranged for a birth certificate and adoption papers to be made for her. The paperwork is all here. Please fill it out and have it on my desk no later than Friday. I’d rather have her in the system sooner than later so we can get a paper trail of her existence going, albeit falsified.”

Gyro flipped open the folder - there was a blank birth certificate and other state-related paperwork concerning Wonder and her life. He decided he didn’t want to know how Penelope got a hand on these or how she planned on falsifying the records to prove Wonder’s existence.

“I’m a good secretary,” she said, unprompted but as though she read his thoughts, but before he could answer she turned towards the bathroom. “Wonder? You ready?”

A second later, Wonder came out, shirt and lab coat folded in her arms. Instead, she was wearing a robin’s egg blue pleated skirt and a light blue short-sleeved button-up, a necklace with a little strawberry charm, and a pair of dark blue high-top sneakers. Penelope cooed, gently clapping her hands together.

“Aw, Wonder you look great, kiddo!” Fenton encouraged, taking the coat and shirt from her. She smiled, ducking her head shyly. “Someone get a camera, we need to document Wonder’s first day!”

Manny tapped out a quick response, grabbing his phone from the counter and motioning for the two of them to pose. Penelope pushed Gyro over. “Go on, you’re her guardian too. You should be in there.”

“I was heading over, Glider,” he snipped, forcefully adjusting his vest as he made his way to Wonder’s side, Lil Bulb following close behind, hopping up onto her shoulder. Wonder looked at Gyro and Fenton and smiled. Gyro, strangely gentle, smiled back, and in a fatherly way ruffled the feathers on her head, just as Manny snapped the picture.

---

Meeting Scrooge happened earlier than either of them planned, only a few hours after Penelope had met Wonder. They hadn’t expected him to come down to the labs anytime soon, but apparently, he had been curious as to why Gyro hadn’t interrupted any board meetings with a new invention recently. Of course, Wonder was the first thing he noticed when he came down to the lab to question them.

“Gyro, Fenton, why is there a child in your very dangerous labs? And where are her parents?” Scrooge asked, flatly, immediately going to one of the few obvious solutions. “Gyro, I thought we agreed on no necromancy.”

“She’s not a reanimated corpse,” Gyro quickly explained. “While I certainly could reanimate reconnected tissue, this isn’t the case.”

“Technically she is animated though! But not how you think?” Fenton added, nervous.

“Can you two stop with the riddles, please? What does that even mean?” Scrooge ordered. The two looked at each other and then back at Wonder. She walked over to him.

“I’m Wonder,” she introduced herself, extending a hand. “I’m an Artificial Intelligence program that Dr. Gearloose and Mr. Crackshell-Cabrera gave a physical form to. It’s very nice to meet you, Mr. McDuck.”

It was a blunt explanation, and it still left Scrooge confused. Blankly, he shook her hand. “It’s nice to meet you as well. Can I have a word with those two privately for a moment?”

Wonder nodded, grabbing Manny with a plea to come play chess in another section of the lab with her, and Scrooge turned to the two in confusion and irritation.

“Further explanation, now. And spare me the science talk - layman’s terms. I’m not even sure what an “artificial intelligence program” is.”

The explanation of what artificial intelligence was, then the full, nothing withheld explanation about Wonder took twenty minutes. Gyro and Fenton pulled up their research and her tests results: 

“Wonder is essentially a 14-year-old finch in every way except she’s made of carbon steel and synthetic feathers.” 

“See? She’s just like a human person, but smarter.” 

“Mr. McDuck, imagine the biotechnical possibilities we have access to with the progress we made making her a body.”

“She’s so much safer here than at Waddle. Her program is far too advanced to be in that mess of a company.”

Pinching the bridge of his beak, Scrooge held up a hand to stop the two of them from continuing. Fenton’s worry was clear on his face, but Gyro was unreadable, save for a hard stare. “I get it, you two. Waddle doesn’t know she’s here?”

“No. We made sure of that and we monitor Waddle’s search attempts,” Gyro said. Waddle Tech had made a big to-do about the Wonder Assistant program going missing from their labs, with a full, large-scale search and questioning. But in the past month, it had died down since there had been no leads. Fenton had made sure that the company firewalls were at the highest level of protection to assure no probing attempts were made. Scrooge sighed.

“And where is Wonder going to live now? Do either of you have an idea about how to raise a child? She can’t stay here in the lab,” Scrooge asked. “And what about records with the state for her?”

“Penelope gave us paperwork to fill out. Birth certificate, adoption papers, everything,” Fenton replied, but then lowered his head, resting it on his hand. “Where is she going to stay? I don’t have any room in my house.”

“Obviously with me. I have the financial means and the spare room in my apartment,” Gyro said. Scrooge raised an eyebrow. “Besides, I’ve already filled out most of the adoption papers.  And while, yes, my experience with children is...limited... it's not rocket science, and Fenton is good with kids. He can help if I need it.”

“Which I am more than capable of doing!”

“Not to mention, I’m one of the few people who can take care of her machinery and knows how,” Gyro continued over Fenton. “It’s the only option that makes sense. She’d be safe in my care.”

“Gyro, it’s not that I don’t think you’re capable but -” Scrooge paused, looking at the hardset, determined gaze of Gyro and the half-pleading look on Fenton’s, and sighed. “Fine. But one of us who knows about Wonder will check in on her and you whenever we please. She’s a child, and needs to be treated and raised as such, understand?”

“Fair enough,” Gyro agreed with a nod.

“And Fenton, make sure he does that,” Scrooge said. Fenton nodded wholeheartedly. Scrooge smiled lightly. “Don’t let me down, you two. Now I think I should like a proper introduction to your ward.”

[wispy-selfship-eden]

Youtuber AU (Harem)

Welp, this is based off of my future dream of ‘if i ever got more involved in YouTube’ XD I hope everyone enjoys! because I just think I’d be casual with YouTube, you know? but anyways, here we go!

>> This AU would start if I had proper equipment and time, and would be alive since middle school. It was mostly to privately post shitposts and videos of my friends and the things I do to them that make me annoying X’D.

         - I filmed secretly in school. If i wanted to do it out in the open, it’s always with the teacher’s permission. Either that or it’s the perfect place for posting school project related stuff :D

>> After graduating 8th Grade, the Youtube channel was dead for two years since I got preoccupied with starting High School ^^;; During the time, I eventually forgot it existed.

☆ That’s when until near the end of Sophomore year, while allowing myself to suffer under schoolwork, my love for anime and whatnot motivated me to create a channel! And that’s when I found and polished my old channel and privately stored away the middle school videos; renewing it!

☆ My official Youtuber name becomes “[}| AniMania |{]” (The emoticons will come in later on)

☆ @lovesick-au-lait would be one of my greatest friends and eventually become my Youtube partner :D She also runs her own really nice channel where she posts Speed drawings/paintings of her art <3

☆ Most of my content is related to anime, manga, and franchises I’m into ^^ I do skits, fandubs (of comics, specific anime scenes, or even fanfiction readings XD), and various discussions on the things I love. Very rarely do I do a vlog tho uwu; Showing my real self is, at first, uncomfortable.

And now, we move on to my bois~ <3

Izuku Midoriya:

🍀 Izuku tries to post a video biweekly. Other than that, it’s not as much impulsively.

🍀 He mostly focuses on analyzing heroic figures! Not just from Marvel or DC or other fandoms, but also in real life as well! It’s incredible how in depth he does his research and how he doesn’t leave out other opinions.

🍀 Other videos consist of training videos, or training how to do certain moves because HE BUFF A F LIKE LOOK AT HIM. *insert eyes emoji here*

🍀 Sometimes Finnian (Black Butler) shows himself in videos as he’s Izuku’s ‘assistant’ in moving props around c:

🍀 He collaborates with me not only because he’s a sweetheart but his vice is so soothing and cute it makes the female viewers giddy.

🍀 We both met up when he was still in middle school. I supported him all the way in helping him grow and push forward.

Yoosung Kim:

🐶 He’s become one of the most prominent gamers on Youtube. Sure he doesn’t post as frequently due to his up and coming job as a Veterinarian, but he still makes his videos worth it.

🐶 He often collaborates with Soujiro’s channel, especially when playing either LOLOL or Elder Tale (he still would rather play the former)

🐶 Of course, his content is mostly gaming! Especially MMORPGs (they take your soul, but the pain is so g o o d and irresistible.) However, he is up for trying new kinds of games and different genres :D

🐶 I sometimes game with him too! But seriously, there are compilation videos of him when he’s gaming. From ‘hilariously silly’ to ‘hilariously raging’. Sometimes, there is no in-between.

🐶 Since we share the most hobbies with each other, he is a guest star in my videos the most! Especially since he’s such a cutesy guy, like a k-pop star sometimes.

🐶 We met when  began rebooting my channel. Because I reached a subscriber milestone, I was going to buy an actual RPGMaker program and I bumped into Yoosung. (My boy--why are you outside at flipping 6 AM in the morning?? ??)

Soujiro Seta:

⚔️ He is also a fellow Youtube gamer, mostly focusing on Elder Tale, along with playing with Yoosung, Shiroe, and Naotsugu! He does play other MMORPGs but it’s just not the same ^^

⚔️ I have a headcanon since he’s a samurai in Elder Tale, maybe he has potential talent to handle real samurai swords in real life? Like how to polish them, sharpen them, and how to wield them? It’s pretty epic. He’s called the ‘real-life samurai’ through his journey in indulging himself in that C: <3

⚔️ Other than that, he also co-hosts on my channel since he barely posts anything else on his own ^^;

⚔️ He works in my skits very frequently XD Because he’s like a shoujo manga protagonist, at the very least a character from any shoujo thing lol

⚔️ He is actually my comment patrol. After a day or two of posting a video, he checks on the comments I get. let’s just say... sometimes they’re not so good for the other people. :p

Isami and Takumi Aldini:

🍝 Uh they run a cooking channel c: It’s pretty obvious since they attended Totsuki Academy. I’ll just say after the whole rebellion Arc in the manga, graduating came and was almost smooth sailing. They decided to help out at Chef Shinomiya’s at one of the branches in America for the next few years!

🍝 Of course most of their videos are Italian dishes, but with their creative, experimental minds, they make the crappy foods of America they hear about, make it gourmet and healthier, and just much more appealing.

- They helped saved lives o__o Seriously.

🍝  They’re the most popular cooking channel because not only do they live up to their credentials, they’re also flipping handsome and charming (but with the viewers, that applies to just Takumi sometimes).

🍝 I first met them after I was inspired to attempt to cook a dish they’ve already made for my channel milestone! Me and @lovesick-au-lait uhhh... let’s just say survived and the food was edible ^^; Then, i decided to try and cook for something for dinner, and Isami, and eventually Takumi as well, bumped into me when I was trying to look for a good box of pasta.

🍝 Now they sometimes invite me onto their channel to be their taste tester! Our banter knows no bounds.

Finnian:

🎍 Finnian doesn’t have a channel, but he loves to assist with props and preparations!

🎍 He definitely loves being the camera man ^^; though we had a few incidents where he’d break a few (or break things during videos pfft)

🎍 He’s a part of skits and the occasional comic dub because he’s so cute!! He tends to play the best friend role, but then again he’s the best friend that gets some ;D

🎍 There are actually compilation videos of him and his screw ups on camers XD just all of his hilarious moments in general, adding on by the year.

🎍 For the sake of having a more enthralling American experience, he’s my roommate in the house as a condition a part of the study abroad contract.

Armin Arlert, Peter Parker, and Death the Kid:

📑 A very unlikely trio! They run a channel together c: Sure it has its occasional setbacks and whatnot, but in the end, they make things work.

📑 Strict video uploading times; never misses the mark on its precise hour and day. You can think Death the Kid for that ^^;

📑 They run an educational channel ^^ But almost all facts or things you’ve never once thought to be well-informed about, they bring it to the table and make it so intriguing! It certainly is better than the school textbook sometimes c:

📑 Armin and Peter definitely handle the science and mathematical aspects. Death the Kid can do the same when the two aren’t available, but he focuses on History and Literature and the other Arts. Classy.

📑 And of course they take part in my channel too! But they also help me out with vlogs!

💗 Milestones are definitely switched up, one idea for every occasion! It has all of my lovely boys (or however many can show up) being there behind my camera too!

💗 Live streams are sometimes a hilarious mess. Especially some of the comments I’d get, usually pertaining to flattering me or one of my lovely men. Let’s just say, many blunt objects had to be put away to reisst temptation of irreversible consequences lol

💗 Going to cons is also an adventure! But hey with our own expertise areas, it definitely is worth the experience.

💗 It was actually difficult coming together to form a romantic cohort only we could pull off. But with  the help of other youtubers @shiroe-is-my-baby and @self-shipping-angel, it all works out when we’re able to reveal ourselves, with pride c:

💗 Then our videos become popular for another reason: for the multitude of shipping moments.

💗 Youtube has never been this fun and I would want to continue with them for as long as it does!

[tyrantisterror]

The ATOM Create A Kaiju Contest

All fifty ATOM Kaiju files are now up on Horror Flora for the world to see.  You can now look at the designs, stats, and brief bios of the fifty-some kaiju that will appear in my novel-in-progress, The Atomic Time of Monsters.   But the event that gives the novel its name – the titular atomic time period – has far, far more than that.  In fact, while only fifty or so monsters appear in the novel itself, at least six times that number will be running around just outside the pages – the unseen kaiju of ATOM.  But I’ll level with you – I can draw kaiju for days, and have literally done so since about mid-December 2016, but I’ll never be able to draw up 300+ solid kaiju concepts.  I mean, ok, maybe if I keep at it till I die, but I have a lot of other stuff I want/need to do.  So that’s where this contest comes in.

Like some of the best fiction, I’ve left a tantalizing gap in my story for other writers to fill in.  Like a narcissist, I’m hoping people would want to fill in their gap.  There are literally dozens if not hundreds of monsters left unseen – how would you like to give them a face?

THE RULES:

1.  You may create and submit up to FIVE different kaiju for the contest.  They must be your own creations – no plagiarism will be tolerated.  You can cheekily reference pre-existing monsters though – we all know the 50+ canonical monsters in ATOM do.

2.  The kaiju you create must specifically be created for this contest  - no repurposing characters you made for other, wildly different stories.  It’s more gratifying to my ego of a fun thought experiment that way.

3. The kaiju must fit the design aesthetics, story themes, and overall tone of ATOM's kaiju. They should feel like B movie monsters from 1950's/60's pop culture.  The better they match this aesthetic, more likely you will win the contest.

4. The kaiju must also fit the setting ATOM.  Remember that “kaiju” has a story specific definition beyond being just a big animal, that most dinosaurs didn’t exist in ATOM’s world (i.e. no feathery t.rexes), and that the alien fauna of Mars, Venus, and the various made up planets follow very specific body plans.  The Atomic Time of Monsters starts in 1954 and ends in 1968 – your entry has to take place in that rough time frame.  I plan on posting some ATOM Bonus Files between now and the deadline that explain aspects of the setting in more detail.

5. The kaiju should add something meaningful to the world of ATOM. What would be the point of having another fire-breathing t.rex monster?  The more unique and interesting your kaiju is, the more likely you will win the contest.

6. The kaiju must be independent of the main plot of ATOM - not "Tyrantis's long lost evil brother who's the strongest kaiju in the world". These should be to Tyrantis's story what War of the Gargantuas is to Godzilla's movies – heroes (well, monsters) of another story in the same world.

7. Your kaiju must have some sort of description of its physical appearance and its personality - you can submit a drawing or a written description (or both!) for the physical appearance depending on what you’re most comfortable with.

The Deadline for this contest is MARCH 16, 2017.  You have roughly two months to work on your submission(s).  To enter you just have to make me aware of your submission - tag me in a tumblr post, send me a message, etc.  It can be on tumblr or on another website - so long as it exists and I can access it, it works.  It

But what about the prizes, you ask?  Well, I’ll put that information (along with some other rambling suggestions and tips) after the cut, but the biggest prize will be making a whole shitload of weird retro kaiju.

Ok, so: PRIZES, PRIZES, PRI-ZIZZES!

RUNNER UP PRIZES:  I will sketch every kaiju entered in the contest, and compile them all in a great big post with a few sentences of commentary on each one.  Every person who enters the contest gets this prize.

THE TOP 5 WINNERS: I will fully illustrate my top 5* favorite kaiju entries and publish them – WITH CREDIT – on HorrorFlora.com as ATOM Bonus Files.  This means they will be considered SEMI-CANONICAL in ATOM’s lore – you will retain rights over your creation, of course, but they’ll also be considered part of the ATOM expanded universe.  *Note: I may increase or decrease this number depending on how many entries the contest gets, or if I just love a crap load more monster than just 5.

THE GOLD MEDAL WINNER: The creator of the winning entry will not only get the prizes from the previous tiers, but will also get to choose one movie for me to liveblog.  It can be any movie – good or bad – so long as 1. I can legally view it in the United States and 2. I don’t have to go into a porno shop to legally view it (thank glarnbodin for bringing up this possibility when I was brainstorming prizes).

TIPS

I’ve got a few tips, but one is so important it needs to be more than a bullet point.  The most important tip for this contest is as follows: I’m looking for Beeruses, not Brolys.

What do I mean by that?  Well, firstly, you need to watch Dragon Ball Z.  Secondly, the hit anime Dragon Ball Z had several non-canonical movies made by people who weren’t the main creator/writer of the manga the anime was based off of.  These movies had to fit in the gaps of the original story, and theoretically hoped to add something new and worthwhile to the story.  Most of them did not succeed.

Broly is the main villain of three of these movies, and basically was defined purely in relation to the main characters: he was like the hero, Goku, except bigger, more powerful than anyone else, and evil.  He didn’t really have a strong motivation, or any personality at all beyond “hates everything and loves destroying stuff”.  He was only defined by his ridiculously immense strength and how violent he was.  Overall, he contributed very little, didn’t fit the tone of the larger story, and yet was deeply connected too/defined by the main plot – the opposite of what my contest rules ask for.

By contrast, Lord Beerus, a villain introduced in a later movie, brought a lot more to the table.  He fit well within the canonical world of the story, both in design and his over the top yet complex personality (unlike Broly, Beerus has many solid motivations and a many dimensions to his character).  While he was somewhat connected to the plot of the overall story, he was also fairly distant – he had never met the main character before, and neither one of them knew much about the other.  The story of their conflict was similar to previous stories in Dragon Ball Z, and yet had several twists that made it feel utterly unique.  Beerus contributed a lot to the world and cast dynamics of the story, fit in with its tone, and was disconnected enough to what came before to feel like he was adding something new.  The only reason he’s not a shining example of what I’m going for (well, other than him not being a kaiju) is that he was made up by the original creator of Dragon Ball Z.

But still, the point stands: I’m looking for Beeruses, not Brolys.

In fact, I had to change my original pitch for this contest because of this rule.  Originally I thought of this as the “Lost Projects of ATOM” – making the ATOM equivalents of weird, cut kaiju from the Godzilla series.  But while I was thinking of oddities like Mogu and Majin Tuol, I realized most people would think of characters like Bagan – the Brolys of the Godzilla world.  This is why one of the rules of the contest is that the kaiju have to be separated from Tyrantis’s story in ATOM – if your monster isn’t a foe of Tyrantis, there’s less of a risk of them taking things to Broly style “I made a monster that’s bigger and meaner version of your monster” antics.

So one final time:  Beeruses, not Brolys.

Now, the other tips:

• ATOM’s aesthetics are mainly drawn from pop culture of the 1950’s and 60’s.  The obvious main inspiration would be the giant monster movies of that time period – the Showa Godzilla movies, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, Them!,  The Deadly Mantis, etc. – but other sci-fi and horror stories of that time period apply as well.  This includes movies that were rereleased in this decade – King Kong was made in the 30’s, but was rereleased in theaters in the 50’s to great success – as well as other forms of media published at the time, like comic books, novels, and even some songs.  Silver Age monster comics from Marvel, like Tales to Astonish and other great titles by Jack Kirby, are just as entwined in ATOM’s DNA as Godzilla. • You can also work some modern design sensibilities here and there.  Tyrantis’s overbite is far more common in dinosaur art from the 70’s and 80’s, while creatures like Pathogen and the Writhing Flesh owe a lot to body horror movies of the 80’s and video games like Resident Evil.  These elements shouldn’t be the PRIMARY aesthetic, however – the 50’s/60’s vibe is still more important to capture. • ATOM works on Hollywood Science and, even more than that, child logic.  Scientific accuracy is far from a priority – science is something ATOM uses occasionally for flavor, rather than an essential ingredient.  Feel free to get weird, silly, and stupid to an extent . • Kaiju in ATOM are always characters and need to be expressive in some way.  That’s important to the story’s theme – even the most wicked monsters in the story (with one possible exception) have a sympathetic side to them, and they need to be able to show it. • If you looked closely at the rules, you’ll notice an inherent contradiction: entries will be judged both in how they fit the story, and paradoxically in how they add something new to it.  This might feel like a bit of give and take – a retrosaur would definitely fit, but might feel redundant, while, say, a giant lion might add something new but feel out of place.  Don’t be scared to embrace one of the two at the expense of the other: you can make up to five entries to hedge your bets, and you might actually do a lot better focusing on some of the required elements anyway.

You can also feel free to adapt some monster concepts I failed to make work, including (but not limited to - check my old DA gallery or my thirty day kaiju challenges on my art tumblr for more):

Giant grasshoppers

Giant rabbits

A Sabre Tooth Tiger Monster

Basically any amphibians

Basically any birds

A giant gila monster

Giant shrews

Most mammals really

Finally, here are some links to things that helped inspire ATOM’s aesthetic, so they may inspire you in turn:

[esbielle]

Today I question myself again. What’s new? 

Except that I was thinking about my future a lot. I’ve always, always had a great concern about what I want to do because I simply can’t see myself in one particular job. I either see myself everywhere or nowhere. Some people who know me say that I’ll probably end up making my own comic, written and drawn by me, and I’ll do the voice acting as well for the ‘CD drama’ or the animated adaptation. Some even say that I’d go as far as to animate all myself. Well, thank you, but I certainly don’t have the ability to do that.

The point is people expect big from me. A couple of months ago, my violin teacher seemed a bit… disappointed (?) because I didn’t dedicate myself entirely to music, saying that music flows through my veins and that were I to follow the musician path, I’d do great. Today he told me that he could perfectly see me working in Japan, maybe in the manga or anime industry, what with all the things I do now–learning Japanese, practicing some voice acting, having done graphic design, not giving up on drawing, etc. And I do admit that it is tempting to want to aim so high, but… I don’t… I don’t really have enough confidence to want to follow such a goal.

But that’s the thing. I don’t actually… have a goal. I really don’t know where I’m going with all the things I’m doing, I just do them because I like to. I must admit that, when I was younger, one of my biggest dreams was to become a singer or an actress. Big problem is that I sort of don’t want to live most of my life on tours and I don’t want to kiss anyone I don’t like (yeah, yeah, I still make a huge fuss about kissing, gee, I’d make a whole post about why I don’t want to kiss just anyone and the huge contradiction that I am). But I didn’t just want that. I wanted to be a writer, an archeologist, an anthropologist, a philosopher, a psychologist, a linguist, a guitarist, an opera singer, a dancer, a gymnast, a swimmer, a chemist, a botanist, an artist, a journalist, a photographer, a sociologist… wait, why am I saying this as if it was something of the past? I still want to be all that. But of course I can’t!  My fragile ankles won’t let me be an athlete or a dancer, much less a gymnast. For the rest, I could study the careers but it would take me so much time… 

What is it with me and time? I take too much time to do stuff, I take very little to learn new things, I feel like I am running out of it, I feel like there is still so much left… I forget about it. I’m too conscious about it. My present is now and I’m wasting it. My past is full of my doubts and lost impulses. My future is uncertain and unpredictable. I get the feeling… no, I’d rather not say it. But… really, how much time do I have left? Years? Months? Days? Hours? Maybe… just seconds? I can’t know for certain when or how I’ll die. I know. I know I can’t. There is just so much I can’t do… So much… Time is still running and it can’t stop. I know, and yet, what do I do with it? Worry about the little things, waste it in my thoughts that don’t help me arise but help me sink further into darkness. Think, doubt, think, doubt, think, doubt. I need more time and… I don’t want anymore. I’m so tired already. Can’t it all just… stop? Can I stop worrying so much for what’s to come and actually enjoy my present? Can I stop doubting myself so much? Can I stop being afraid of people? Can I stop hating myself so much? Can I even stop thinking so low of myself?

No.

I can’t… I can’t stop any of it. I may be able to control it, make everything less loud than it is now. But it won’t leave. It’s always there. I can still enjoy myself. I can have faith in my knowledge, sometimes. I can be fascinated by human nature and the complexity of emotions. I can laugh at myself and my silliness, even look myself in the mirror and think my eyes are pretty. It’s all here. All those sides, be them good, be them bad, be them whatever. It’s all me.

So here I am. This… huge compilation of diverse interests that keep accumulating over time. Someone who doesn’t follow one clear path not because they can’t see it, but because they see so many. This person who is desperate to be certain that life is really worth something, that the world can change and become the place we really deserve. Unless it is already the exact way we deserve it…