#no thoughts just rotating them in my mind like rotisserie chicken

[loadednachosao3]

Tuco/Nacho btw. if you even care

[crimeronan]

every day i wake up like "hey brain, what are we gonna think about today?? something fresh and new, i trust??" and my brain goes ":)" and i go "Something Fresh And New, I Trust??" and my brain goes ":)))" and i sigh and say "luz and hunter??" and my brain says "luz and hunter :)"

[quietwingsinthesky]

raw (2016) midamoul au is this anything

[spaceagebachelormann]

zigmar i come to you humbly on this fine evening with the simple request that you give me some sort of might duck sustenance por favor and muchas gracias

they can be incoherent and stupid and goofy and silly to the max i just need to rotate this little kids like rotisserie chickens in my mind (esp fulton portman and julie)

random miscellaneous tmd thoughts !

✧ warnings: some of them may be ooc ngl

✧ additional info: u got it pookums 😈😈😈🙏 also these can be read as either platonic or romantic (not luis)

✧ m.list — nav.

♡ charlie conway !

the most insane taste in music literally ever

bro goes from madonna to death metal SO FAST

but ngl his playlist is always the best and he always gets to play music whenever u go anywhere

but oh my god he’d love pierce the veil in present day

HES ALSO LIKE SOMEHOW AMAZING AT MATH. but he cannot do science for literal shit

also his clothing style changes js like his music taste

will literally be kurt cobain one day and morrissey the next (hed hate morrissey though)

♡ adam banks !

every team sleepover/event/literally anything could js be a spontaneous hangout is always at his house

it’s because he’s rich and his house is huge as fuck and he has every board game known to man

just do not play uno because a fight always breaks out (charlie is always part of it)

he’s always the one who ends the fight also

he has this very calming presence that’s so nice to be around and him js talking to whoever got into a fight immediately helps calm them down

also weirdly good at comforting in the middle of the night but never during the day??

♡ lester averman !

he would watch full house religiously prove me wrong

his favourite character is obviously joey because they are one in the same

everyone on the team and their mother has been forced to watch full house while he’s been at their house/vice versa

he can also cook like. decently well !! it’s not something he’d prefer to do but he will for his friends if they’re tired or smth

♡ fulton reed !

this little shit

he is so unbelievably competitive over the smallest things it’s actually insane

typa guy to race u to see who can get to one side of the room first and start genuinely tweaking if he doesn’t win

at sleepovers he refuses to fall asleep first even if it’s just by a few minutes

he could be dead to the world but still have his eyes open cause he refuses to let u win (unless ur his s/o cause he might consider it that way)

♡ connie moreau !

she is definitely a theatre kid idc

her favourite musicals are probably grease, hairspray and heathers

she likes female main characters!!

everytime she gets into a new fandom she immediately starts thinking abt what it’d be like a musical and probably wanted to be a composer at some point

would 100% beg to use the aux on a road trip and then blast hamilton loud as balls

she wholeheartedly believes six is a top tier musical and she will DIE on this hill

(fun fact i’ve met andrea macasaet <3)

♡ guy germaine !

modern day guy would’ve loved basic white girl music

“life is too short to pretend to hate taylor swift” —him

also 100% a britney spears girlie. and nsync and every stereotypical white girl artist

but i wholeheartedly believe britney would be his favourite and he has her whole discography on cassette, cd, vinyl, u name it he has a britney spears collection

also his ass is NOT straight 💀 i’ve never met a straight man who listens to britney spears

♡ julie gaffney !

lowkey a regina george multitude if she wasn’t kinda. yk. a bad person

she’s a mix of cher and regina

everyone at the fancy ass boarding school literally loves her because she’s calm, smart pretty nice etc etc she’s just a really great person to be around

shes that one student who has every assignment finisher a week early, all a’s and 100% in every subject WITHOUT being mean abt it!!

her ass is friends with the whole student population and knows every well and knows all the drama but won’t tell everyone if she thinks it’s too personal (it’s it’s random petty nonsense she tells the team)

♡ ken wu !

secretly rlly good friends with julie but nobody knows even though they do not try to hide it at all

literally wander the halls talking abt whatever just for everyone to be like “y’all are friends???”

also this man secretly loves lana del rey

him and julie will sit on his bedroom floor and literally tell him the most insane and jaw dropping gossip she heard that day while lana is playing in the background

everytime someone asks his favourite lana song he says grandfather please stand on the shoulders of my father while he’s deep-sea fishing on did you know that there’s a tunnel under ocean blvd to fuck with them

♡ dean portman !

is actually very very good at math!!

he was a tutor for the 9th/10th graders for a bit to get volunteer hours and also cause he just likes doing math

you’d expect it to be like doing homework with ur dad and the poor kid is in tears while deans like “WHATS NINE. TIMES TWO.” but he’s actually surprisingly patient

if he’s explained something a few times and they still don’t get it he’ll just try it a different way until they get it and work them through the problem

has rlly strong relationships with the 9th and 10th graders cause of this and is essentially their older brother figure

the amount of 14/15 year olds that he’s given relationship advice too is insane (id be one of the 14 year olds probably)

♡ luis mendoza !

his type is secretly quiet girls cause he finds them rlly interesting and likes the thought of them being happy around him but quiet around everyone else

he’s like yes girl be urself with me

it all stemmed from the girl he liked in 8th grade who helped pick up his pencils when she accidentally knocked his pencil case out of his hand (she was a quiet nerdy girl)

like a whole year later and he’s still trying to rizz her up 💀

he’s one of those guys who takes forever to lose feelings

the girl is actually good friends with him btw

♡ dwayne robertson !

i feel like he is fucking AMAZING at baking

his icon is dolly parton and he heard berry pie so he immediately learned how to bake

if someone he knows has a birthday he either bakes the birthday cake or brings them something he made depending on how close he is with them

and holy shit it’s the most amazing thing u will ever taste and nothing will ever compare

yes he’s one of those guys who will go on an 18 minute tangent on how amazing dolly parton is if someone talks shit about her (same i love dolly)

[subtlybrilliant]

Ok, so, I have to shout into the void abt this, bc I just went and played all three endings of the quest (Ascended Astarion, Enemy Astarion, and Spawn Astarion), and I am EMOTIONAL.

Ascended Astarion is so SAD, he becomes exactly what he most hated and feared about Cazador, and while he thinks he’s found eternal freedom, it is just a different kind of powerlessness. (Also big shout out to Larian for the framing of that scene, with the chains in the foreground symbolizing that. A+ 🤌).

If you stop the ritual while he’s in the midst of it, he turns hostile and will kill you. I wanted to play thru and see if he would stop, but he killed Talvii (my Tav, his Beloved) and welp. Clearly the worst ending for my playthru to have. So we reloaded!

Spawn Astarion is my personal favorite ending; the dialogue lines kill me, and it is the one where we retain the Astarion we’ve grown to know and love, even tho it comes at a cost (once the tadpole’s gone, idk what happens. I am assuming he goes back to not being able to be in sunlight, etc etc.). But it is the ending I like most for him and my Tav. At least they are together and (for the most part) free to make their own choices. And the romance scene after! 😭 I wish it gave more options to just provide comfort tho- I feel like he would benefit from a debriefing conversation after (no pun intended), and would have liked to see that healing. (Brb gonna go find some fic to read).

Me? Replaying the Cazador palace sequences bc Astarion feelings?

It’s more likely than you think

[were-changing-cake-vaults]

Who’d Even Look Me In The Eye

“You realize we’re screwed, yeah? There’s no getting out of this unscathed, Wem. We’re dead meat.”

He laughs, an empty little breath. “We’ve been screwed since the beginning, Squiddo.”

Hello and welcome to my partykillers manifesto. They rotate in my head like rotisserie chickens constantly so it was inevitable that this fic would be written lmao

This isn’t ship! At best this is a doomed toxic friendship trying to mend itself and failing. If it came off as ship, uhhhhhh. Whoops I guess. Idk interpret it as you want ig I just didn’t intend it to be romantic.

Content warning for mention of vomiting and general lifesteal violence, title from Kiss Me, Son Of God by They Might Be Giants (which is THE Team Nuke song. To me)

Please reblog if u liked it and enjoy!!!

Wemmbu is sitting on the edge of the crater that used to be 4C’s base when Squiddo finds him. He’s idle, swinging his legs back and forth over the yawning gap below, leaning back on his arms as if he were simply enjoying a nice sunset. Conveniently, the sun is in fact setting, orange and pink hues filtering through Squiddo’s glasses. The final few rays reflect off of Wemmbu’s polished crown, scattering light like pockmarks of the wreckage.

Squiddo doesn’t approach him right away. She wasn’t exactly looking for the man- they were simply wandering, as a Squiddo often does, their feet guiding them as thoughts ran wild in their brain. Her feet and scattered mind brought her here either by coincidence or fate, and it’s never in her favor when she walks into a situation blind like that. Around Wemmbu especially, with how he can change at the drop of a hat, laughing one moment and snarling another. It’s best to watch him carefully, first, see how he’s acting when he thinks he’s alone before entering the fray. For that reason, Squiddo hides behind one of the boulders that came careening down in the explosion, hidden eyes trained on the man twenty feet away from them.

They don’t find it strange that he’s devoid of any tension while surveying the wreckage. This is his coup de grace, his shining achievement; a monument of his sheer power in a world that wants to beat him down. There’s a fondness in Wemmbu’s eyes as he casts them across the landscape, soft smile reaching them without any effort. Contrastly, if Squiddo weren’t focusing on analyzing him as if he were some sort of crossword puzzle that was being particularly difficult, they’re pretty sure they would be full to the brim with a manic sort of regret- small fits of laughter would bubble up from somewhere in her chest, despite a lack of a smile. And then she would probably vomit over the edge, because guilt does that to them.

Here’s the difference between Wemmbu and Squiddo, as partnered as they are: Squiddo never wanted this. The first time, when it was just a mean move on the chessboard in a family diner, it was fine. It was funny, even, to watch as people she had just gotten to know fall lifeless, their souls yanked backwards at a million miles per hour. That was part of the game everyone had agreed to play. This—the air strike, the destruction, the days of stress, the sound of Wemmbu’s screaming demands echoing through their head—was a step too far for them, even if 4C had agreed to it, and she had initially been willing to pitch in. Maybe it was because working on the nuke itself had worn them down to skin and bones, sleep abandoning them in moments of need, but something had switched in her head upon watching the TNT fall from the sky. Something in them screamed wrongness, and suddenly, instead of pride welling up at finally getting the damn thing working, regret surged into her for letting this happen. For having a hand in it. The sharpness in Wemmbu’s voice as he made his ultimatum—something he never clued her and 4C on—only solidified that feeling in her stomach.

Speaking of Wemmbu, he’s still just sitting there, kicking his legs. From this angle, Squiddo can’t entirely read his face, but there seems to be no tension as far as they can tell. He’s in his element, something she hasn’t seen from him since the nuke went off. It’s not odd in any manner, it’s just…off putting. Disconcerting. Something Squiddo can’t make an accurate prediction out of. But if fate brought them here, surely it meant something, the same way it must’ve meant something for them to join lifesteal in the first place, so she steadies her resolve and lifts herself from the crouching position she took upon seeing him.

They can tell exactly when he’s alerted to their presence- in an instant, his posture tenses, fingers digging into the rough terrain. His crown jostles a bit as he silently tries to locate the sound. It’s easily missable, those little quirks, but Squiddo knows Wemmbu better than anyone else on this server. She’s had to pay attention to those quirks for days on end, before. She can read him like a book if he lets them. Knowing him, he won’t give them the chance.

“Y’know I can hear your footsteps, Squiddo,” he calls out without moving.

“How’d you know it was me?” They reply, but they know the answer already. Wemmbu just huffs a laugh in response. So far, the tension in the air is minimal- both of them are holding their breath, keeping it light as if their friendship hasn’t been atomized three times over. She can almost pretend that nothing has changed, if it weren’t for the visual reminder in front of them.

Wemmbu doesn’t keep the game up for long, though. “Why are you here?” he asks, and the familiar sarcastic bite to his voice makes itself known between words. It’s less of a question and more of a challenge, a test to see if they’re worthy of his presence. “I thought you hated me, or something.”

That’s odd, Wemmbu getting vulnerable so quickly. Squiddo knows it’s an act, his way of lowering her own guard so he can lure them in, but she’s not entirely mad about it. As much as they wish he would just take the hits as is rather than scheming his way out of every mildly uncomfortable situation, they know it’s in his nature to put up the front as quickly as possible. Usually, the banter lasts longer, is the thing. He’s particularly bothered by them being here. They don’t know if they like that or not.

Instead of lingering on it, though, she moves on, ignoring the sentence that was tacked onto his question. “You know me. I wander. Ended up wandering here.”

“Right.” Translation: cut the bullshit, Squiddo.

The huff that comes out of her is a mix of frustration and relief. It’s still the same old Wemmbu, and that’s both good and bad news. Which Wemmbu it is, Squiddo doesn’t know, but they’ll take their chances on it being the one that won’t kill her on sight.

He doesn’t move when she walks up to the edge and sits down next to him. His sword, if he’s even got one on him, stays in his inventory. The only change between either of them is that Squiddo starts swinging their legs in sync with his, hands gripping the edge of the crater to keep balance. She pointedly doesn’t look down- as much as she dislikes Wemmbu’s lack of tells, she doesn’t want to show her own, and the queasiness would eliminate her already weak poker face.

For a long moment, both of them just watch the sun set in front of them. The air smells of smoke and iron, the lingering traces of their actions hanging heavy on their shoulders. Grass has begun to creep through the cracks in the rock, nature claiming the wreckage as its own once again. For anyone else, it’s beautiful. To Squiddo, it still is, but the gentle beauty is easily trampled by fear and guilt.

It’s Wemmbu who breaks the silence, voice flat and casual. “I don’t regret a thing, you know.”

Her tone is similarly flat. No tells. “Distinctly aware of that, yep.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” he continues, leaning back on his palms, soft smile gracing his face again, “it was hell. Building the nuke, I mean. Those schematics are burned into my retinas to the point where I could rebuild it blindfolded. I tried to, once. Spoke caught me before I could finish.”

“Were you gonna use it?”

He shrugs. Lets the silence between them simmer, as if he’s just enjoying the view. Knowing him, he probably is.

“Eh. Wouldn’t’ve done much, probably. Most likely would’ve just blown up in my face.”

More silence. Something Squiddo knows about Wemmbu: he doesn’t trust silence. This situation is probably eating him alive, with the way they’re dancing around the metaphorical elephant. It’s eating them alive, too, waiting for his reaction, for him to settle on a mood. She swallows her desire to just start crying, or laughing, or something. Now’s not the time for that. Now is the time to just get on with it, either by playing the game of chess he’s laid out with this conversation, or push him off the cliff while he’s vulnerable.

Her voice is steady when she speaks. “I don’t know if I regret it or not.”

“What, like it wasn’t exciting?”

“Our definitions of exciting are very different, Wemmbu.”

He chuckles at that, as if it’s another late night at the launch site and they’re goofing around again. “Squiddo. Squiddo. You can be mad all you want, but you can’t deny it wasn’t at least a little bit fun.”

He’s trying to get a rise out of her, she knows. She hates that it’s working. She hates that they’re sliding back into normalcy. She hates that she can imagine 4C next to her, swinging his legs in time with her. She lets that hate seep into her next words.

“Fun?! Fun was when Zam and Minute were dressed as the FNaF animatronics celebrating my fake birthday. Fun was when you would be away and me and 4C would dick around the launch site like children. Fun was 4C undulating in the wiring! Fun was messing with the secret controls! Fun was filling spawn with water! You?,” Squiddo gestures to the landscape in front of them, shadows forming as the sun dips below the horizon, “This? This was a living nightmare, Wemmbu! And I-“

She cuts herself off with a huff, falling back onto the rocky soil behind her. Tears are making their glasses fog up, so she takes them off, pressing her palms into her eyes to ward off any frustration. The breath they didn’t know they were holding releases from their chest. Wemmbu doesn’t move from his spot on the cliff edge, nor does he pull out a weapon of some kind. He must be in a really good mood today, if he’s not killing her for that jab against him.

In front of them, the sun finally dips below their view of the horizon. Stars speckle the darkening sky. In any other situation, Squiddo could watch them for hours; in this one, they break the silence with a quiet, wavering conviction.

“You realize we’re screwed, yeah? There’s no getting out of this unscathed, Wem. We’re dead meat.”

He laughs, an empty little breath. “We’ve been screwed since the beginning, Squiddo.”

She knew this. Those same words have been going through their head over and over, spurring her to pace, get out, go somewhere. Hearing it from him, though, is a heavy weight on her chest, one that makes the regret swirling in her stomach do flips.

“Then why’d you do it?”

“What else was I supposed to do?”

“I don’t know, not set an ultimatum that couldn’t be fulfilled?”

By the sound of rocks rustling and pebbles tumbling down the side of the crater, Wemmbu has finally stood up. He takes the time to dust himself off, hands brushing against fabric in an almost rhythmic manner. If Squiddo opens her eyes, she can see him standing over her, arms crossed and eyes unreadable, assessing her as if she’s under a microscope. It doesn’t worry her as much as the fact that her eyes were closed around Wemmbu does.

After what feels too long of an analysis, he speaks, falling into his typical tone of monologue. “Power is a fickle thing, Squiddo. It’s not just you have it or you don’t. You have to earn it in a manner that no one has done before, and it never lasts as long as you want it to. But oh, I wanted it. I joined the race for power on a server where everyone has done everything to get it. I had to take the risk.

And you know, maybe it wasn’t worth it. You said it best. We’re fucked. No matter what we do, in the long run, there’s no getting out of this alive. But I have at least some time left before it all goes to hell, so I’m gonna make it count. Every second of it.”

The difference between Wemmbu and Squiddo, as partnered as they will be: Squiddo never wanted this.

Wemmbu holds out a gloved hand. The black contrasts nicely with the neon purple of his skin, bloodstains barely noticeable. Most of that blood is probably Minute’s, if they had to guess. “You’re along for the ride, as much as you claim innocence. Might as well stop crying about it and make it count too.”

They take his hand, hoisting themself up with his help. That heavy feeling hasn’t left their chest, but it’s something Squiddo knows how to live with by now.

“Never said I was claiming innocence, Wem. I was just mad.”

“Aren’t we all, Squiddo, aren’t we all.”

The reason Squiddo keeps teaming with Wemmbu, as different as they are: neither of them know when to stop.

For a long moment, they both just stand there, looking over the crater. In the moonlight, it takes on an eerie sense of calm, a silent mourning underneath the cover of night. That calm washes over Squiddo as she watches the patches of grass away in the breeze. Then Wemmbu turns to leave, shoving a hand in an unseen pocket and placing the other on their shoulder.

“You never answered my question, by the way.”

This time, it’s her who lets out the huff of a laugh. “About hating you? Can’t. I try not to hold grudges, if you can believe it.”

He laughs back in reply, a hearty thing combined with a layer of sarcasm. “God, you sound like Minute, the freak. I don’t think that man is capable of having a mean bone in his body.”

“I have no clue how he’s survived this long, honestly.”

It’s nice, as much as Squiddo doesn’t want it to be, talking to Wemmbu again. Her mind brought her here, and it’s probably because she needed it- she cares about her other server mates, of course, but the same way she knows Wemmbu, he knows her. No one else can rile up their audacity the way he can. No one else can make her feel okay with living in a war zone like lifesteal. Ash tried, but Ash is a different breed of player, and works on a different playing field. Squiddo sticks with what she knows, and she knows Wemmbu, as unfortunate as that can be.

And yes, they’re screwed, but for a moment, underneath the sparkling navy sky, Squiddo pretends that both of them have more time than they do.

[hellsite-detective]

Okay, this is weird, but. I have tried– and failed– to reference a certain post a few times, and I would really like to know it.

I don't know the exact wording, but it was a short post, and I think the text was about teens spinning their blorbos in their minds/thoughts.

It's not a lot, which I'm sorry about.

readin' this request, i knew exactly what my client was askin' for. personally, the amount of times i've referenced "rotatin' my blorbos in my head like a microwave" was just too much to count. so i had to find this one. if not for my client, then for the blorbos from my shows. i began by searchin' any variation of the microwave phrase on google, but it was comin' up short. i tracked down a few variations, but not the exact origin of the microwave phrasing. i did manage to find a variation on this post, but it just wasn't what i was lookin' for.

on the off chance this was the post you wanted, i'm linkin' it here. otherwise, i'm gonna open this one up to the tumblr masses. if anyone has any information on where the microwave phrasing originated, any lead at all, send it my way, and i'll continue the search. enjoy this for now! sorry i couldn't be more of a help! have a great day!

Pose Case: Gone Cold

[insanelyadd]

OKAY SO THE FRESH ANALYSIS

ME DEARLY BELOVED FOLLOWERS, you probably started wondering why I like Fresh so much. Why I have been lovingly rotating him in my mind like a rotisserie chicken.

SO ANYWAYS I AM GOING TO DO MY BEST TO WRITE DOWN EVERYTHING I’VE READ ABOUT HIM. This is not complete simply because I haven’t read EVERYTHING on the old RP blog CQ ran for him. This is also mostly from the perspective of his character so other facts like Fresh using he/they pronouns and having furby bombs and canonically liking kissing (okay actually that does play into his character slightly) won’t be the primary focus of this analysis. This also, All, my own interpretation.

This analysis will be in three sections: His original characterization, his Monologue, and finally what could be inferred about how how his character changed due to the Event that gave us the Monologue.

His Original Characterization

The first thing you need to know about Fresh is that his goofy 90s persona was chosen specifically because they thought it would be non-threatening. This plays into a major part of his personality, which is that, baseline, everything he does is for survival. Once everything needed for that is met and taken care of the next major component is that he does whatever he wants to do to entertain himself.

He possesses people to live, but torments people on occasion (not too often, making enemies would go against the survival thing, unless he’s assessed that they would be a harmless enemy perhaps). All his weapons are innocuous at first glance to once again pass himself off as non threatening (oh hey the furby bombs come into play here, huh, he also uses a wiffle bat).

He doesn’t feel most emotions, but he can feel a few, (and at one point CQ said that the longer Fresh is in the same host the more he can feel? Not sure if that still applies, take that with a grain of salt) but those emotions are fear, anger, and amusement primarily (though affection and others are not off the table, it would just take A Lot of work for him to get to that point). Primarily his emotions that he portrays are all ones he’s imitating based on what he thinks are non threatening reactions. He easily pretends to be chipper or indignant but he doesn’t truly feel most of these emotions. According to posts written by CQ he is not genuinely flirty though him imitating “safe” emotions might put him in situations where he does that (most likely just to entertain himself, which is the primary reason he likes kissing. He doesn’t understand why kissing is meant to be important and does it because he’s amused by people’s reactions to it. Absolutely no thoughts [about kissing] behind those glasses.)

He is also very full of himself. He thinks he’s better than other people (but obviously he recognizes that as being a negative/”unsafe” thing to voice so he keeps it to himself and privately believes it). He thinks he’s better and deserves good things (this is directly stated in The Monologue), which is another reason he amuses himself by scaring people. IT’S IS ALSO A RESULT OF ANOTHER MAJOR COMPONENT OF HIS PERSONALITY: He has an ideology that people are primarily driven by selfishness. This is likely a direct result of him being a literal parasite who needs to harm others to live. He is really unable/unprepared to comprehend that people can care about others so much that they would put their loved ones before themselves. When this is challenged it typically makes him irrationally angry and ready to hurt people (even ones he “pretends” are his friends, and even though this contradicts his need to survive at any cost) to prove to them that they should never trust anyone. This is also why on occasion in a few comics CQ has done Fresh will offer up being possessed to desperate people with the lure that they won’t feel pain anymore (which is implied to be a lie because people who can read souls and Fresh himself say they can hear the host screaming, possibly in agony).

THE MONOLOGUE

Okay so I’m going to explain the events leading up to The Monologue, and then I’m going to share the whole monologue here, then I will analyze it (plus here is the link to the post with the monologue and a more in-depth recap of events from Fresh’s old RP blog)

There was a huge multi-blog RP event (these used to be very common, I don’t go to the RP scene anymore though so I’m not sure if they stopped or I just stopped seeing them, basically a whole bunch of blogs get together to RP through one big common event, typically a party that they are all attending) called the LoveBall that Fresh went to with the plan to infect as many people as possible with parasites he produced and from there infect the whole multiverse (which he claims is to “help” them all). Fresh directly states that he’s not a Sans here, even though this was before his redesign when he was still possessing one (STARES DIRECTLY AT EVERYONE CLAIMING I AM A SANS SIMP FOR LOVING FRESH).

Anyways he gets confronted by another Not Sans, who takes him to The Last Corridor (judgement hall) and Fresh is sure he’s going to die, though he still tries to act unbothered. They talk a bit and it is revealed to Fresh that he is a fictional character (he could see the whole multiverse was code too which is a fun detail), he’s clearly taken aback but still tries to play it off as it’s explained to him that him and the other Not-Sans and everyone they’ve ever known are Nothing, and that it would be for the best if he doesn’t try to get OUR attention.

SO NOW WE COME TO THE MONOLOGUE ITSELF WHICH IS SO GOOD THAT I WANT TO EAT IT. Anyways:

…….I’ve thought about a lot of stuff lately. Ya know. All these inner thoughts I ignore or avoid listenin to. And I realized. Ya know. Maybe I wasn’t lookin to ‘help everyone’. It was some excuse, ya know? I like messin with people. I like the concept that in some way, I’m more clever, or amusing, or hilarious, or-…. simply put, I’m BETTER then the rest of em. I’m better and I deserve to get what I want, and I wanna mess with people and I want to hurt people, and since, ey, I gotta possess people to survive, I might as well ENJOY the process as well, ya know dawg? I wanted to take over the multiverse because yeah, it extended far beyond somethin so noble as ‘helpin’ people, I wanted to take over because I COULD, and because it was FUN, and because I couldn’t be STOPPED. I wanted the power to enslave E͏̷͏V̨̀͜E̸͠͠R̡̢͠Y̸͢͟T҉̢͠H͏͜͞Ì̴̕N̡̨̕G͡. The power to enslave everything. But. I can’t do that. Can I?

B̷͠E͢͝͡C̕͠͝Ą҉̀́̀U̡̢S̀͏E҉́͢͟ ̷͜͞Ó̡̢F̢̧͝ ̶Ỳ̨́O̢̢̢Ù̶͡.̨̛ ̵͜͜R͏̷͢Ì́Ǵ͝͞H̡̡͟T́͞?̛͜͠ You’re the voices Error hears. Aren’tcha. The voices Error always talks about. Always chats with. You’re ONE OF THEM. BEYOND THE CODE. YOU’RE WHAT I WAS WARNED ABOUT. YOU’RE WHAT HE WAS TALKING ABOUT. BEYOND ALL OF MY KNOWN EXISTENCE. BEYOND ‘THE GAME’. You’re toying with Error. Askin him questions. We’re all your toys. Every single thing I’ve seen, every Universe, every single creature I’ve come across or possessed, every bit of data…. is something you are capable of manipulating, right? And now.I got your attention. Just like he warned me against.

….y-ya know. I won’t stop. Right. I’m gonna keep possessin peeps, and runnin around and having a radical time.

That’s what you WANT, right?? That’s what you’re lookin for, to be amused, and have a laugh! Well you’re in luck! THATS WHAT THE FRESH IS HERE TO DO! No worries, my good ol chums!!I’ll keep it up. Everything.

Right?? THATS WHY YOU’RE TALKING TO ME NOW. Right?? You are amused by me!!! Ah hahaha wicked brah! I’m glad! I’ll just- keep–

I-I…. I’ll just. Keep up my dated lingo. I’ll heelie right into every situation and make a joke of myself, and then when peeps drop their guard I’ll do somethin creepy or hilarious– OR BOTH! Ah hahahahahahaha. That’s what you want. THATS WHAT YOU WANT?

….don’t kill me. Don’t kill me. Or worse. Whatever you’re capable of….

I… I’ll do what you want!!

I PROMISE. just….just.

Don’t kill me. Please.

So one of my favorite details here in the monologue is the fact that it starts with him outright stating that he thinks he’s better than everyone else and it ends with him begging us not to kill him. His hubris hit an unmovable wall at 100 mph.

I really feel like the monologue speaks for itself, so onto the next part!

Post Event Characterization Implications

So one of the things that could probably be inferred by this is that all three of his major motivators, His Need to Survive, His Want To be Entertained/Amused, and His Ideology of Selfishness are basically shoved into a blender. I’m sure he still believes in inherent selfishness but his ego about it should be at least slightly bruised, knowing that he’s just as microscopic and inconsequential as anyone else in the multiverse. As for his need to survive and want to be entertained, they’ve both been subverted to different extents. His want to be entertained is completely subverted where instead of being the one being entertained by bothering people, he is now the one wanting to do the entertainment because they believe it is necessary for their survival.

I imagine he is being eaten alive every day by the worry that he’s not being interesting enough and will be abandoned and effectively killed for not entertaining us enough. Though he might be able to push that out of his mind most of the time to continue what he normally does, because he might be able to convince himself that we have to like him for who he is to some extent or he wouldn’t have gotten this far, which seems very plausible given how good he is at hiding his fear and anxiety during his confrontation with the other Not-Sans.

Anyways he’s a bastard and he’s great and I am unfortunately in love with him. He probably wouldn’t be down for it but I will still imagine holding his hand and then picking him up and slam dunking him into a trash can (lovingly).

[cabezadeperro]

Hello. (!!!!!!!) I am marathoning your Jango-long-works because I keep on turning the (stunning) way you write this man in my mind like a rotisserie chicken strapped to a wind turbine. I’m just, like. what is this guy’s deal?? Because I adore (adoreeeeeee), the way you write him as he’s like. Inescapable. (In the sense that im reading ‘ships in the night’ and I love how we’re getting a glimpse into his days pre-bounty hunter, pre-new-lungs, pre-‘my rage has simmered down’). Like, his line about: “Jango finished the job because that's why he’s being paid to do—and he has very little now, but his honor is one of those things.” I want to put it under a microscope because, why is he clinging to this job when surely he could have looked for allies? I feel like he feels such an overwhelming sense of. Guilt? Grief? Responsibility? For how Galidraan went, and he does use ‘selfish’ to refer to himself, could that mean he can’t relate or engage with that Mandalorian, even if their goals partially align, because that will be further defeat and he can’t take it. In short, (and thank you for your patience with my rambling! Feel free to reply or not, public or private is fine) the way he Will fulfill a contract but No he is not your mandalor (or he doesn’t even feel particularly patriotic) is such an odd thing that is deeply compelling and I admire (and it’s maddening) how the narrative (your writing style) is not out to Deus Ex Machina him to get himself fixed. I really love how you show the broken/competent/grim parts of him while also keeping him unapologetically himself (but maybe I am still firmly stuck in that harrowing scene he has with the Goran about Arla, that I’m realising now I’m unconsciously putting next to ‘ships in the night’ even if their timelines differ).

Anyway!! I realise I should close an ask with an actual ‘?’, so: did you have any goals when you set out to write ‘ships in the night’ and ‘Arla and Jango revenge road trip’, and if yes, is there any ‘director’s cut comment’ that you’d like to share?? 🤩🤩🤩

HIIII

i was going to answer privately, but when you do that the ask disappears into the ether forever, and i wanted to have some way to save this skdghkgh

thank you so much for reading and for reaching out!! it makes me very happy that you want to talk about those two fics specifically--i'm pretty proud about them and not that many people have read them dfdsfkj (understandable! they're very niche and no one owns me anything lol).

under the cut because this got Long lol

wecome to the "rotating jango fett like a rotisserie chicken" club. it's hard work but someone has to do it. he's my little meow meow and lives rent free in my brain etc etc. i think he's such an interesting character and has so much potential in the little we see him both in the movies and in other materials (like the comics or the videogame), and i don't want to judge other people's versions of the character but i feel like sometimes the fandom doesn't do him justice. he's just so Interesting, i want to study him like the bug. he's key for The Star War but at the same time he's kind of like illegible--kind of like a blank space but not. we know what he did, we know what happened to him, but we don't actually know any of his whys, and i find that fascinating.

his character as it first appears in the prequels is also very interesting. i love how still and quiet and bland and polite he is! he's just some guy (tm), nothing to see here.

iirc ships in the night was actually written as part of an event. it was a gift for a friend, and that meant that i knew i could get more personal with where i took the story. i thought that it would be interesting to explore his character when he was no longer jango fett, mand'alor, but he also wasn't jango fett, bounty hunter yet. your 20s are a Weird time, and i think that in his case they had to be even weirder. it may be because i personally just got "finished" with mine (i wrote those fics right before turning 30 lol), but i find that decade very interesting. there's a lot of change, a lot of shedding layers of dead skin and old personalities and trying out things and messing up and becoming one thing or another, and in jango's case (someone who's severely traumatised, who's lost and lost and lost, who hasn't actually had the time or the space to grieve properly) those years would be even more key for who he became afterwards. he's very raw. he's very scared and still grieving. but there's also this--coldness about him, this ability to intellectualise and dissect and actively ignore his sense of right and wrong until it scabs over and he can forget he ever had one. he's very young and very clever and completely ruthless, and he has nothing to lose anymore.

also, we don't actually know that much about what happened to him between escaping the spice freighter and doing that job for dooku. a decade goes by, and he becomes the Best Bounty Hunter In The Galaxy TM, and we just have no idea of what actually happens to him, or what he does.

that was also my thought process behind monsterkilling i believe? (sorry, it's been a while lol). i just wanted to write something about jango and arla, about arla finding out what happened to him and just deciding to find jango. i think i didn't quite do her justice, but i wanted to explore what would happen if the fact that she needs to take care of her little brother would make it through the trauma and the programming. they're both incredibly messed up and they don't really know each other anymore, and at the same time they're the only ones left. (also: arla's song in that fic is apple tree by marika hackman, and the last scene with the quince tree and the tombs is directly inspired by the song.)

so yeah. with both fics i think i wanted to explore ideas of growing up, change, vulnerability, grief and trauma. i wanted to write about connecting to people despite yourself, about hurting them and getting hurt in turn, and about taking in both the hurt you give and the hurt you receive and deciding what to do with all of it.

anyway! this is a lot! thank you for everything, for your comments as well ❤️❤️❤️ they made me very happy!!!!

[oopsiedaisiesbaby]

Okay I was thinking about Bucky with a breeding/pregnancy kink (and Gale loves it too) but it’s in a normal universe where Mpreg isn’t and thing and what if Gale starts to get depressed that he can’t actually get pregnant and have John’s babies?

Like it first starts off with John saying stuff like “Gonna fill you up, get you pregnant, put my baby inside you” while he’s fucking Gale and they’re both super into it but pretty soon the dirty talk starts to get more specific like about how round and full Gale’s belly is going to be and how John will take such good care of him and how he’s gonna give him so many babies and keep him barefoot and pregnant and how beautiful their babies are gonna be looking just like their mama and Gale starts to get sad that it can’t actually happen, isn’t going to happen. And then one time while John is fucking him, he’s rambling about how he’s gotta put Gale in the right position that makes it more likely for him to get pregnant and that he’s gonna come deep inside him and keep it inside so it holds and then after he does he doesn’t let Gale’s legs down from where he’s holding them up behind his shoulders and when Gale tries to put them down he says “gotta let it hold for a bit so it takes” like he’s so serious about it and Gale breaks down sobbing and John starts freaking out “wait did I hurt you baby?” And Gale just shakes his head and manages to get out “I can’t get pregnant, John” and then John has a horrifying thought like what if Gale has hated this the whole time and doesn’t like being feminized or fetishized and feels insulted and belittled by it- and John starts apologizing “I’m so sorry doll I thought you liked it I never wanted to offend or insult you or make you uncomfortable” and then Gale gets a little short with him and snaps “NO I WANT it all to be real, to be possible. I want that for us so badly” and then that just breaks John’s heart all over again 💔

Do you live in my brain??? 👀

I’ve definitely explored some of this in the KMITD series, but without the angst of Gale being cut up about not being able to get pregnant, I’m sold!

I’m picturing him with his sad, wet cat eyes looking at himself in the mirror, pushing out his belly and holding it and getting all teary. Wandering in the baby section of stores, but specifically the areas dedicated to pregnancy products or maternity clothes and aching with longing.

They go to a couple of baby showers for friends and he cries in the car afterwards and John feels useless because he doesn’t know how to help. Like, if Buck wants a kid, they can definitely make that happen but he starts getting into his feelings about not being able to get Gale pregnant. Lots of feelings of inadequacy for both of them.

The breeding/pregnancy kink used to be the quickest most mind blowing way to get them both off but now they have to avoid it and then the sex in general dies down until they’re rarely having sex, if it all. Many deep conversations have to be had and idk how exactly they would process/cope with it, but they would definitely get through it together. Maybe they get Gale a moon bump and get serious about adopting or surrogacy and secretly act like Buck is pregnant at home???

This is gonna rotate in my head like a rotisserie chicken for a while 🙌

[tyrantisterror]

Hello my wonderful friend who has a really fleshed out fantasy setting and two books done in it with a third along the way! I'm here to ask you that one question that everyone asks of published fantasy authors: Do you have any good tips for starting out with building a fantasy setting?

I think - at least for me - the guiding word in this is "fantasy," as in "personal desires you have, no matter how unrealistic they may be." Things you wish existed even if they can't, things you wish would happen even if the actual ramifications of them might be horrible, things that you daydream about. I think most bad fantasy settings come about because people fill them with things they think they're obligated to include - "Well, we've gotta have elves and dwarves, even though I have no desire to write anything about them or think about them as unique beings in any way, because you can't have fantasy without elves and dwarves." A good fantasy world is built out of things you want to have in it.

Like, to go with something topical (and avoid talking about my own stuff for fear of being conceited), Dungeon Meshi is a fine example of this, because there isn't a single element in that manga that doesn't bear the thumbprints of the story's author rotating it over and over in her mind for hours like a rotisserie chicken. She has dwarves and elves and hobbit-analogues because she WANTED them and had ideas about what to do with them. Every creature that appears in the story is one that the author has clearly thought about from MANY angles, in a depth creatures rarely get, because they weren't there by obligation - they were there because she WANTED them there.

To build a compelling fantasy world, you have to fill it with things that compel you, and then get a little insane about it. Just get absolutely deranged about those blorbos, really dive into the deep end in a way that seems almost too self indulgent. Do that and you'll be doing better than, like, 90% of the fantasy writers in the world really.

[skippygiraffee]

Hi, I'm the Raileon anon from a while back. Thank you for answering my ask! I loved reading your thoughts, and I hope you don't mind if I ask you for some more. You mentioned Leon and Raihan were both fascinating characters to you separately as well, and I wanted to ask why you felt Raihan was fascinating? I have my own reasons ofc, but I'd be delighted to hear yours as well.

I absolutely never mind, thank you for the ask!! (even if it takes me a while to answer things sldjfksjf). genuinely I love talking about these characters, all the SWSH characters (and SuMo) really, and talking about Raihan is top tier for me. under the cut because it's both long and I have included images from the manga as little Raihan treats :3

in regards to Raihan, what a character, yeah? when I got this ask I immediately went into chat with @beammeupbroadway and we had the following exchange (she's the Furby icon, I'm the first message):

and to elaborate a little, we're all introduced to Raihan in the framing of him being Leon's rival, and we're not really reintroduced to him until midway through the game. so for a while we're left with this impression that Raihan is the hotheaded rival to Leon, setting them up with the same sort of framing as like Hop vs Bede (which is more a rivalry than with the player I argue) or even Red vs Blue (certainly with the Charizard and the color imagery at play with both Raihan and Leon's designs). Raihan is, at his core, a peek at what someone looks like when they grow up in the shadow of someone else.

it's stated in game he has different interests, hobbies, a career, but he's still Leon's rival Raihan. where his job as a Gym Leader and his work with the Hammerlocke Vault serve the narrative purpose of bringing the player closer to Leon and closer to solving the mystery of the Darkest Day, rather than things that allow us a better view of Raihan. not to discredit those moments, because they absolutely do allow us as to see more of Raihan, but I guess I want to argue that the game just uses them as a jumping off point to get to Leon. even Raihan's accomplishments as a Gym Leader and battler are framed within the context of him being so good he could be Champion of another region, but he can't beat Leon. from a world building and audience perspective I think it's interesting to see, but man, picturing that as how he's painted in Galar, in universe? where all of these insanely amazing accomplishments are pushed aside to market himself as Leon's rival I think genuinely ruined his self image, his self esteem, and the way he views anything he does. Raihan's social media presence got started because of Leon, even if he sometimes takes random pictures of sand storms, and the only thing removed from Leon is his love of fashion and history, but we don't even get to see a lot of that as the audience/player of the game because it's not relevant to the story in most cases, and definitely isn't relevant to Leon. this was definitely a little rambly, but at least right here I just think that like Raihan being literally overshadowed by Leon makes him fascinating to rotate around like a rotisserie chicken, because you take one whiff of that guy and you can tell he was spiced up with self loathing and angst strong enough to turn the average character into a straight up villain

ties to Leon aside, the little things about Raihan I adore ARE those little hobbies he has. fashion, history, social media all are super interesting, and ignoring the Gym Trainer battle with WEATHER EFFECTS INSIDE THE TAPESTRY VAULT aside it's clear he is a trusted expert on the matter. Sonia goes to him, even if it's a way to get the player closer to Leon Raihan is the one who grants access to the vault, and anyone who loves tapestries is immediately boosted in my books

his characterization in the manga is really cool, and I adore manga Raihan a lot. it's actually when I really fell in love with his character because he's given a lot of really neat moments, where he's kind of this key player in having everything come together. also he was a trouble maker when he was younger!!! which I think is a logical reaction to being pitted against the literal undefeated Champion for so long. but, allow me to picture that below:

I also love him spraying himself in the face with a potion after being poisoned by Eternatus in the manga. like yeah he's confused, but literally no other character is brought up, only Raihan which is funny to me

also him and Piers are just buddies!! which is neat, especially since in the post game of the base SWSH titles they're shown not to really have interacted that much

he's also super polite to Melony (my beloved Mummy Melony scene), and he's overall pretty fleshed out, with being both serious and goofy, while having this odd tension with Leon when it comes to serious moments

like it shows a lot of complicated things brewing under the surface for him, even in the manga, and I love how it keeps his characterization in tact, while expanding on it in a way that feels natural

I think in short, there's an argument to be made that Raihan could have been left as this one dimensional rival to Leon whose only purpose to push the player along their journey. a road block as a Gym Leader, a helper as the keeper of the vault, but nothing more. and yet he's a pretty fleshed out character, who has other stuff going for him. he could be so many things, and yet he's Raihan, the dragon guy who loves fashion, is a bit silly, but also takes things as serious as they need to be taken. who had a bit of a rebellious streak when he was younger, to the point Rose knows about it in depth. where, in game, he can flip from smiling like :3 to hunching over in the stadium yelling out moves. he's cool, like undeniably, but also not, and I love that skdjfklsfd. I think Raihan is a testament to the subtle ways the Pokemon writers can dish out characterization without explicitly writing things in, and I love him for it

[chizelkreq]

I never got what people meant by all the things they said about their blorbos I just thought they liked them and were exaggerating but like I get it now laios dunmeshi I am rotating him in my mind like a rotisserie chicken I am shaking crying throwing up about him I am shaking him around like a dog with a toy

[v1ctory-or-sovngarde]

𝖇𝖗𝖚𝖙𝖊

was playing through this scene with the expansion and there we some new voice lines that were very soft ♡ so I had to write it because they were rotating in my head like rotisserie chicken… tldr Kaidan making an offer to Miz’ri

“Stay with me tonight. You know I'll be there in the morning.”

There. All the pent up longing, the desire–finally out in the open. His heart was hammering madly in his chest. It wasn't just him, right? There was something almost palpable between them. The easy way they bantered (or flirted?), the fact that she went out of her way to protect him–her guard dog–and to offer her hand when he needed it. The electricity that crackled between them when they rested by each other's side. 

“Kai, I…” Miz’ri’s face was flush; she flicked her gaze away sheepishly and he felt a painful twinge of doubt. maybe he had just imagined it after all. “I…If we…” She seemed to be struggling for words. It wasn't often she was rendered speechless.

“...Yes?”

“If you really feel that way about me, I…” Miz'ri rubbed her arm. “I mean, I think you should know something first.”

Like what? The fact she ate dragon souls? That she played with deadly magic for a hobby? He couldn't imagine anything that would change how he felt. She had even afforded him grace and forgiveness about his time with the Blooded Dawn. Surely, anything she had to admit, he could…

Her voice was uncharacteristically small. “I want to be with you,” she murmured, “but…I've never…been with anyone else before.” 

He'd never seen her blush so hard. Kaidan wasn't sure he heard her correctly. “You…really?” he blinked at her in surprise. But she was so beautiful, he thought. Surely someone, anyone, must have pursued her in the past. 

She nodded, making fleeting eye contact, but didn't say anything further. She was waiting for something. 

“...I’ll be honest, I wasn't expecting that,” he admitted after a moment.

“Must be my sparkling personality.” Words he'd said to her about his own lack of a love life. She gave him a little grin, and he smiled back softly. “Does that change your mind?” she ventured.

“No,” he blurted out, then attempted to regain his composure, clearing his throat. “It’s just, ah…I don't understand how you could, for the first time…with a brute like me,” he managed. Right. A brute, that's exactly what he was. Before he could linger much more on the thought, Miz'ri reached out, gingerly placing her palm on his cheek. Her gaze was sad, pleading.

“You're not a brute. Not to me.”

He found himself blinking down at her again, his cheek warm where she was touching him. Gods, he'd do anything to make her keep touching him. Kaidan placed his hand over her own, engulfing it, and squeezed. 

“.....”

“I, um. I want to go slow.”

“I can do slow.”

“And gentle.”

“I can be gentle,” he breathed, moving to cup her face in his hands. Looking her in the eyes for so long made him feel nearly dizzy with desire. With every passing moment, the need to pull her into his arms became stronger. She relaxed a little with his reassurance. “...Can I kiss you?”

“I've been hoping you would.”

Slowly, as not to scare her away, he leaned in to press his lips against hers. With others, he'd never felt so close to them before finding himself in bed. The others had been fun, sure, but this wasn't the same. Something strange and tender was blossoming inside him, and it fluttered blissfully when she kissed him back. He was vaguely aware of her hands resting on his breastplate and suddenly, for once, felt smothered in his armor. He wanted to feel it all. Kaidan broke away long enough to unclasp his cloak and let it fall to their feet. Miz'ri let out a nervous laugh, still flushed but now a little more curious. He gave her a chaste kiss. 

“You know you're blushing, dragonborn?” A wolfish grin crept across his face. “Let's see how long we can keep that up.”

[pastself]

The marriage proposal what-if lives in my head and has no plans to move out, I cannot escape it!

Do you have any thoughts or vibes or headcanons how and if Tony will understand why he fucked up?

He understood that he fucked up when Peter used the safeword and also with all the consequences afterwards, but does he understand why it hurt Peter the way it did? Does he understand that Peter tried so hard for the relationship and for him, and put in the effort to really understand Tony as a person with his greatness and his anxiety and his flaws?

Like, Tony is afraid that Peter will leave him, he wants Peter to stay with him, and is ready to do almost everything so that Peter stays. But do everything possible so that my partner does not leave me is not the same as I understand what my partner needs as a person and what he needs in a relationship .

I'm sorry for rambling, I just love your story very much and all the what ifs are rotating in my head like a rotisserie chicken.

Thank you so much for writing and publishing this great story!

Glad to hear that AU is out there ~bothering people as much as it did me! Your ask made me really stop and think it through further. Now, excuse me while I take a massive deep dive. (FYI - this ask refers to the deleted proposal scene for Want for Nothing, which would have veered the fic into a whole other direction)

Thinking about this ask, I had to break it down into a few parts. One, did Tony know he would hurt Peter? (The safewording confirmed to him that he did, but did he anticipate it?) Two, was he okay with hurting Peter? And, to your original question, three, does he understand why it would hurt Peter?

Quickly—the answers to those are: he was 90% sure, yes he was, and no he doesn't.

Then comes the issue of their dynamic. Does Tony understand that he's been forced into the role of caretaker? Does he understand that that role is creating a power dynamic ultimately not healthy for their partnership? Moreover, does Peter understand that? Does Peter understand that his silences contributed to Tony's spiral?

Again, quickly—the answers to all those are "not yet." The way Want for Nothing actually went, Peter came to those realizations by Chapter 9, and Tony feels them too, but is still trying to make them compute. (If you're reading this in the far future, this was written as the fic is one chapter away from the epilogue.)

With that established, let me go through the whys of it all.

In this proposal-AU, things would have spiraled even further before this proposal and Tony would have been even more swamped by guilt over how Peter is being treated. He sees Peter closing himself off — not just from the press, but the world. Making his life completely insulated with Tony at the core of it. (Yes, that's also happening to him — you, dear reader, understand that, he does not.) Tony also sees that Peter is incredibly stubborn and will never leave him. While Peter thinks he's staying out of love, Tony doesn't quite buy that. Peter may believe he loves Tony, sure, but he wouldn't if he were in his right mind. He wouldn't if the press hadn't changed their relationship into a YA melodrama us-against-the-world. Instead, Peter should have realised that all Tony has done is make Peter's life worse. Tony also believes (somewhat correctly) that Peter is motivated by sheer righteous principle. Peter would rather suffer in silence out of principle than do the right thing of dumping Tony.

Thus, Tony has, in his mind, trapped Peter in a gilded cage.

And he never wanted that.

But Tony also can't hurt Peter by breaking up with him, because that would just prove all the press right about Peter and would make Peter's life worse. He also just really, really loves Peter too much, too selfishly, to let him go.

Until, that is, he turns 49, his eyes blurry with alcohol, and he's standing in a room filled with a crowd treating Peter Parker like a ten-cent whore.

(Again, even if Peter were literally a prostitute, this would still not be okay—you know what I mean.)

When Tony goes to get that ring, he is mainly thinking, "fuck all these people, I'll show them." But he's also thinking that this might, finally, be enough to show Peter what he's signing up for for the rest of his life.

(Tony also fundamentally can't acknowledge how much he is hurt by his friends' behavior. That's way in the background.)

But the permission he gives himself — drunk — for hurting Peter is that this will fix things for Peter. Peter will either be Tony's husband and entitled to respect, even if he doesn't get it; or Peter will be free to dump Tony, with the entire world understanding exactly how much cash he'd given up and gaining the high ground in the process.

(For the record, Tony made that ring for Peter about two weeks after giving him the apartment. He made it with no immediate plans to use it, but ready nonetheless and already desperately sure he wanted Peter around as long as he could have him. But the hazy, crazy future Tony'd envisioned grew dim after Chapter 3.)

But, while the drunk decision to risk it all had seemed fine, the sobering realization he might have succeeded?

That was a very different thing. That was something he really didn't want, after all.

So, his reaction swings back right to "I'll do anything to keep you." And, yes, that aspect is a problem. He doesn't yet understand that, rather than "anything," what Peter needs is trust and a partnership. Moreover, Peter doesn't understand that yet. Worse, after the end of the little reconcile they had, Peter turns "fixing Tony's friends" into a problem Tony has to solve, which will NOT help long term.

Peter isn't at the stage where he can be a reliable partner. He is letting Tony take on everything alone, and while he's supporting Tony emotionally, he isn't helping him address his real issues. Tony had been wallowing, in his own way, for weeks. All the signs had been there. These kinds of dramatic, destructive outbursts don't come out of nowhere, after all. But Peter just didn't know how to handle Tony's problems when he had had so many of his own issues paralyzing him.

They were both hurting in different ways and both trying to spare the other, thus making it worse. Of course Peter doesn't want to be like this. In the main fic, obviously, he gets to this realization first— and he would have gotten there in this AU too, with time. But this proposal sets him way back, mentally, and he just can't.

The only thing keeping them together is the much worse thought of being apart. Without alcohol numbing his senses and without wallowing in self-pity, Tony's initial "let me fix this to keep you" will evolve into his more natural "let me fix these things you didn't even know needed fixing, because I understand you." Specifically, it would be Tony who would realize that Peter has to have a voice in the public sphere and agency to shape his image. That Peter would only be happy and truly free once he had that power.

So, almost a mirror to the main fic, Tony would encourage media interaction for Peter's benefit and Peter would go along with it for Tony (and out of desperation to do anything to fix things). And, just as in the main fic, it would empower Peter which, in turn, would alleviate Tony's concerns.

It would only be then, seeing Tony being ~better, that Peter would finally understand how much his own silences had impacted their relationship.

This success would also help reestablish their earlier dynamic: giving Tony that confidence that he can give Peter what he needs, and Peter the confidence that he can just ask without worrying about Tony's reactions. That's kind of the foundation of their relationship, after all.

Oh, and therapy. I think they'd at least go to a few couple sessions to get this far, because they really really need the external encouragement to reach this kind of clarity. Jessica alone wouldn't have managed.

Thanks for the lovely ask, anon! I loved writing this out fully (and hope you had your cut-for-length mode on <3 )

[sarcasticbeanie]

tenzing tharkay for the ask game!!

First impression this guy slammed the door in. gently nudged the person blocking him to the side. has an eagle on his hand. then coolly and mockingly snubbed a room full of rich white folk. Is there anything more to say? Love at first sight. I didn't even think he was an important character I just enjoyed his character introduction so much. I was like: man this dude is really cool. he's cynical and mocking but patient with his explanations when talking to Temeraire. the book summary says there's going to be a betrayal but I hope it's not him. hope he survives, too, 'cause the survival rates of side characters have Not been high so far.

Impression now He's hypercompetant. he's a leftist. he can throw chairs "coolly". He's noticeably not a pathetic meow meow but he is my babygirl. But what made me really like him is that - he's so lonely. It's something that has seeped into his bones and he doesn't need or want anything else - or at least that's what he tells himself. Then William Laurence offered a hand, wishing for them to be equals, exchanging his own loyalty - and Tharkay went. fuck. now I have to actually like this guy. Then Temeraire objected when Tharkay volunteered himself for a dangerous mission - and Tharkay went. huh. ok I guess they do care for me. then after doing one (1) mission with Laurence and Co., he went. yeah. guess I have to follow this idiot anywhere now. I love seeing lonely characters realize that they have a place,, that they can still care for others, and be loved and cared for in return. Tharkay is just my specialest guy. he's so important to me. To me. I start kicking my feet and giggling whenever he comes on page. that's my little guy... (40 yr old man)

Favorite moment Clenches fists there're so many of them. but if I had to choose it might just be his entrance? like in my answer to question one. love at first sight and all that. aside from that... any of his rescues if either Laurence or Tem were all so fun. his sections are just a whole lot of competency and I enjoy that a lot. but I also really appreciated him getting rescued by Laurence in book 8,, listen. i love putting characters in bad situations sometimes. and I thrive on hurt/comfort.

Idea for a story Oh, I'm boring. I'm just rotating him like a rotisserie chicken in my mind... I really want the prequels of this guy. Was he once naive and hopeful? Does he remember his mother? How did he feel after being scorned by his own family? Did he make friends, or did he make his journey forever alone? Were there any companions he viewed as important? He's as tight-lipped as a pistachio with no crack and just as hard to open. But I want to know more about him and delve into his past and psyche. and i'm also thinking about willzing. I've seen a lot of fics in which Laurence is panicking and angsting about his feelings while struggling with his own thoughts on honor, and I want to see a Tharkay version of this... is this guy actually good at self-reflection and acknowledging his own feelings? or does he have to struggle with his long habit of loneliness and his constant experience of being spurned? does he yearn for more from his and Laurence's relationship, or is he content enough with what he thinks he can get? discuss.

Unpopular opinion I have nothing against it!! But. I just don't feel the sexually and romantically dominant vibes from this guy? a lot of wonderful and awesome fics depict him as someone who's in charge, confident, sure in his romantic and sexual endeavors (which is great and very good food), but I don't think he's particularly domineering or even too experienced in sexual and romantic acts. the man's probably busy bouncing around all over the place tangled up in schemes and spying and missions and whatnot. and I think if you ask him to be entirely clear in his own feelings and to proffer them all directly he'd explode into 10 billion little pieces.

Favorite relationship Willzing. They're just very fun to me. I'm holding them up and swinging them around like ferrets.

Favorite headcanon He's demiromantic and demisexual. To me. He's slow to trust but he falls hard after, but only if you've built up a sufficient, steady, and long-term relationship (platonic) beforehand. Personally, I think it would be funny if that happened in. the final book or something.