#not that we can ask them bc theyre dead in a dust mine!!

[constantvariations]

Since tumblr decided to be a dick and not put my last post in rwde and I don't feel like retyping all my tags, here's those tags expanded as their own post

So. Themes. Super important for a story if you want to have any depth. Super easy to fuck up

What always sniped my snout about the trailers is how the Black Trailer is the strongest in terms of story because its theme is made abundantly clear and the path ahead exciting. "Are casualties acceptable in the name of a good cause?" has been asked a thousand times and gotten a thousand answers. It's a difficult enough question in real life but even harder in fiction because of how grounded it has to be in the worldbuilding and plot and characters

That last one starts off so well, too. Adam is firmly in Camp Casualties while Blake holds a more tentative counter position. In just a few minutes with minimal dialogue, the writers established the base of these characters and what their entire story would be about. This setup promised a veritable feast of drama and philosophy, made even spicier by the obvious bond the two shared

Yet the Black Trailer may as well be a fart in the wind for all the show cared. Not only does Adam not properly appear until three years in, he can no longer perform his original function as thematic counterpart due to Cinder calling the shots the moment the events of the BT are over. All the casualties seen are of the White Fang themselves, sacrificed on the altar of Cinder and Salem’s plan to... gain power and destroy the world, I think?

(Hard to remember when we, both hero and audience, had to wait almost a decade for the reason the story is happening, and the payoff just sank the show further into debt)

As bad as that is, nothing is more disappointing than Blake never being able to explore and embody her own theme. Whenever she gets challenged on her stance, not once does she rise to the occassion and proclaim why she's right to believe what she believes. The only thing she believes is that Adam (violence) is wrong and needs to be stopped. She doesn't face any hardships or loss for choosing peace over violence, instead getting handed victory after victory because her opposition keeps getting hit with the stupid cupid stick

The closest Adam and Blake ever got to fulfilling that original theme is at Beacon, and it's so weak and shallow and overshadowed by "mY dArLiNg" that it's hardly worth talking about. The writers' choice to switch from "are casualties acceptable" to "running away is the only way to protect your friends" with no bridge or closure is truly astounding

They could have done both. Even a world told through the narrow narrative lens is big enough to contain multiple themes at once, and they can be used in tandem to create insane amounts of depth. RWBY was a highly ambitious and very large project, so having multiple themes was pretty much guaranteed, but because the writers lacked skill and passion, they subtracted themes instead of building them, and the entire show is worse off for it

[chrysalizzm]

i uh. realized people follow me now because of uh. you’re human tonight on ao3 asdjgfs

i have content!! behind the scenes content as promised. i do outlines for my fics as a general rule of thumb just because i personally can’t write things to a satisfying finish if i don’t Do That, and so - here are my chapter/plot outlines for you’re human tonight ^^ (i have no idea if this is interesting content or not i thought i’d put it out there because i think outlines are kinda fun hhhh)

chap 1 fundy

subtitle: an inkling

fundy makes an iron golem gone wrong, dream makes it go boom

chap 2 purpled

subtitle: uh oh social interaction

purpled shelters a fugitive, gets his house explosion-proofed as thanks

this is probably gonna be the only chapter with a funny title hh oh well

update: it’s not and i’m pleased with myself for branching out with my dry humor

chap 3 sapnap

subtitle: dust to dust

sapnap’s dying via wither effect, and he knows respawn’s around the corner but goddamn if it doesn’t hurt til then. dream skids in around the nether fortress corner, drops all his weapons cradles sapnap’s head in his hands, has always taken death much harder than anyone sapnap’s ever met. at the last few seconds, when death creeps up like a shroud, dream starts to hum to him hoarsely, pressing his forehead to sapnap’s, and in the final moments sapnap doesn’t hurt at all. the last thing he hears is dream whimpering. he visits dream’s bunker the next day, knocks on the door over and over, but there’s no sign of life there. sapnap shrugs, bites his lip out of guilt for forcing dream to sit there watching him die (if temporarily), and moves on.

the chapter that introduces dream’s primary ability of soothing hurts. put a lot of emphasis on the fact that sapnap ached up until the moment dream started humming, because for dream to do that is pretty frivolous considering once sapnap died he’d respawn and the hurt would just disappear but dream wanted sapnap to have a peaceful last few seconds. emphasize how abnormal it is that withering stops hurting. 

chap 4 ponk

subtitle: beaches dry of sugarcane

dream visits ponk after george burns down the first tree. when ponk arrives to the second tree to move in, he realized dream made the tree flourish, grow healthier and bigger. 

chap 5 sam

subtitle: fuck this shit i’m out (edit: the official subtitle is “oh god oh fuck”, i changed it last-minute)

dream picks sam’s brain for manhunt strategies while the latter is mining for redstone. sam stumbles upon a spawner and reels back, trips, nearly misses the moment dream sweeps him behind him and his eyes flash beneath the mask and when sam gets back up, dazed, there’s nothing but the splay of cobwebs all over the walls. 

chap 6 punz

subtitle: lines drawn

in an unrelated skirmish, punz drives his sword up to the hilt in dream’s chest, relying on respawn for dream to not feel any pain and for punz to get paid. dream doesn’t die. this is understandably alarming. 

can we get some funnies in chap? just a few laughs?? a lil funny for mr luke punz man?

can we get some panicky dry humor for real tho because punz strikes me as someone who copes with morbid humor and dream spluttering up blood is def a situation that punz would not know how to deal with

chap 7 wilbur

subtitle: so about that date

wilbur makes platonic moves on dream while dream fake texts his fiance under the table. wilbur also accidentally vents to dream about his little brother tommy and how afraid he is that tommy will get himself hurt for how reckless he is. dream siphons some of his anxiety from him, smiles as they depart from one another. wilbur notes that dream is shaking when they leave. 

chap 8 skeppy

subtitle: get wrecked noob

dream walks skeppy through some pvp. when skeppy demands a rematch w tommy and gets a lil stage fright kinda sorta thing, dream siphons his anxiety and his nerves and goes full soccer mom with bad and skeppy loses 5-2 but like!! he won!! against tommyinnit!! HH

is there any mental image nearly as powerful as dream wastaken, the soccer mom

chap 9 jack

subtitle: mandatory volunteering

after tommy goes on another one of his destructive rampages lmao, dream enlists jack, newest-comer, to help him rebuild stuff bc underclassmen have to do whatever upperclassmen tell them to do thems just the rules. after rebuilding a statue near the community house, dream pats it fondly, and when tommy sneaks back to set in on fire for shits and giggles, he finds that it’s fuckin fireproofed AGAIN

rebuild efforts, i promised monuments rebuilt so thats what theyre gonna fuckin Get

chap 10 antfrost

subtitle: twist the knife

ant on what ends up being an unpublicized manhunt: dream stops the manhunt because he’s triggered a raid and by the time the hunters get there, alarmed by the screaming and the fire and dream’s unresponsiveness, the villagers are all dead and there are raider corpses everywhere and dream is lying near the bell on his side, whimpering. (what the hunters don’t know - dream tried to fight off the raid but was overwhelmed and witnessed the village get slaughtered, he took the pain of the villagers that weren’t dead but were dying.)

segment: There’s a reason they do the manhunts, and it’s not just for them to horse around and try to kill one another for a few days. Antfrost is the newcomer but he’s always been good at reading people and from the outset he knew that Dream was someone filled to the brim with the restlessness that characterizes humans, that never-settling wanderlust, and his brain works too fast for the rest of his body sometimes, and he just needs an outlet. It’s part of why he eggs Tommy on in their little war games, why he holds onto those discs even though he doesn’t need them, why he gets that delighted look on his face when someone tells him that Tommy’s griefed them or stolen from them or otherwise ruined their morning. Antfrost thinks the only times he’s ever really seen Dream silent, Dream waiting, Dream unmoving, are when Dream is 

chap 11 karl

subtitle: head in the shallows

karl, sapnap, george, and dream have a sleepover after mcc 11. karl, nearest to dream, wakes up when dream starts tossing and turning from a nightmare. when he tries to shake dream awake, dream’s eyes fly open and he slams his fist into the wall behind him and the earth, the literal earth, the entire slab of it, shudders like an earthquake. sapnap and george sleep like the dead, so it’s just karl and dream staring at one another. finally karl asks, concerned, “do you want some tea or water or anything?”

chap 12 hbomb

subtitle: a maid’s burden

“i want to dress up as a maid for fundy,” says hbomb with false bravado. fundy’s fiance levels a very impassive look at him for an awkward minute or two and just when hbomb thinks he’s misread dream and fundy’s relationship dream says “i’ll get you a wig” and the entire chapter is just dream idly twisting the fabric of reality to get hbomb the items he needs to put the outfit together

pranks, i promised pranks, theyre gonna get pranks

chap 13 alyssa

subtitle: message in a bottle (edit: official subtitle is “ship in a bottle”)

alyssa’s leaving, at least temporarily. 

alyssa tells dream it’s getting dangerous on his server, doesn’t relish the expression that brings to his face, but he holds her hands and nods and bids her safe journey. when alyssa returns, running for something (later we’ll learn she had heard that dream was bad, that he might be dying), she finds that her house is completely inaccessible by everyone save her, placed in complete stasis by someone. 

start of the chapters leading up to festival arc. build unresolved tension in this one. 

chap 14 niki

subtitle: life doesn’t discriminate

wilbur and tommy are relentless, they waste no time; niki is willing to wait for it. 

the night before the duel, she goes to dream and holds a sword to his throat and demands he call it off, even though she knows it’ll mean little because of respawn, tells him she won’t stop hunting him down until he gives up l’manberg. dream smiles a little sadly and pats her hand and her fright, her rage, it simmers back down, and the anger that had swarmed her and made dream out to be the devil dies down until it’s just her friend, who was playing along with tommy til it got serious and he got cocky, who’s just as in over his head as she is, and maybe niki’s soft but she likes that about herself, that she’s always the first to forgive. niki is looking at the healing cut on dream’s neck, uncovered by any bandages, when dream shoots tommy, a clean shot that causes no suffering.

a long chapter, probably. i think at some point in this i want to mention niki’s respect for dream for apologizing during the first pet war, for not letting things get any bigger until fundy came back. some parallels can be drawn here - that dream let the fire die down in the initial stages of the pet war, that dream won’t let go of the l’manberg war now, and it occurs to niki that she doesn’t know dream nearly as well as she thinks she does if she expected him to act exactly the way he did during the pet war. she’s got what she’s wanted - dream’s remorse, proof of dream’s humanity - even though it’s not in the form niki wanted it. 

chap 15 eret

subtitle: crown of thorns

the king in name only consults with the true leader. 

they’re both upset about pogtopia’s exile, eret arguably more so because they think their early betrayal of l’manberg somehow butterfly-effected into the current dumpster fire, and as they talk eret works themself into a full panic attack reflecting on things that were, things that could’ve been - and the tide washes out all of a sudden, and eret’s left with the same looming hollowness they’d been feeling before, no dregs of the panic, they’ve never had a panic attack that left them feeling normal after - but dream is now wheezing like he’s about to die and eret immediately walks him through the panic attack, levelheaded even as they’re confused out of their mind. 

chap 16 quackity

subtitle: water to blood

quackity is a snake in the grass. 

quackity at schlatt’s side during the few weeks of his presidency. he knows schlatt from before, has been his friend, so he knows when his friend is acting off. the cynical, straight-faced humor is still there, his completely bland delivery and brazen showmanship, but it’s twisted to the left somehow, to make it so that those qualities that make up his friend have rotted, hurt people. quackity eventually goes to dream after schlatt first overdoses with a lot of questions, maybe even to confess that his allegiance has begun to shift because he can’t go to pogtopia and he can’t go to schlatt - and dream just gives him a long, sad look before lightly patting quackity’s shoulder and says “i can’t guarantee anything - just that you’ll be safe” and shooing him off and as quackity heads back to manberg he realises all the hostile mobs are avoiding him like the fucking plague. 

it’s big q!!!! fattest ass in the cabinet!!!!! pog!!!

fun fact this chapter’s subtitle was almost “chekhov’s gun” until november fucking 16th of 2020

chap 17 tommy

subtitle: most disputes die and no one shoots

tommy learns how a legacy dies.

a compendium of tommy watching the madness consume wilbur. it needs to be emphasized in this chapter that wilbur becomes an entirely different person when they’re ejected from manberg, that he becomes obsessed with the legacy he’s created and watching it crumble is what twists him; when dream gives tommy his crossbow, tommy, out of desperation and a need to have an older sibling again, asks what’s wrong with wilbur; dream’s face hardens and he asks tommy to take dream to wilbur. it’s a terse meeting, the only one they have before techno and before wilbur completely loses it and demands the tnt; wilbur says a lot of things tommy doesn’t understand (it’s complex mythological jargon hinting at dream’s status as a god but could be misconstrued to refer to dream’s status as simply the world owner) and at one point wilbur sneers, “are you trying to play god, dream?” and dream lurches forward and grabs wilbur by the wrist, and there’s a completely silent moment where tommy feels the air suck out of his lungs and there’s an off buzzing in his ears and he fancies he hears something that sounds, just a bit, like dream, whispering desperately wilbur wilbur wilbur it’s me it’s me listen listen listen then a shrieking, acrid wave of no and tommy reels back and when he looks up dream has staggered back, his hand to his mouth, blood dripping from somewhere beneath his mask, sounding like he’s gagging or maybe he’s sobbing, as wilbur shrieks in a voice that is entirely not his “get out get out if i can’t have l’manberg...” and tommy understands, finally, as dream sprints out. that’s not wilbur.

a distinction needs to be made perfectly clear in this chapter, as with schlatt’s chapter: it’s not them. they’ve been twisted out of control by something bigger than them, something that wants to toy with the young god running an oasis of peace for his people. it doesn’t need to be outright said in this fic; in another we can delve into the madness and who did it and why. for now, just make it clear it’s not explicitly anyone’s fault.

chap 18 techno

subtitle: colosseum

dream had to let techno in first, you know. 

techno and dream have interacted often - the duel, the championships, they’re friends more than acquaintances now. but techno was called in by someone wearing his brother’s face that he honestly doesn’t recognize from his voice and when he arrives at spawn, before tommy fetches him, he sees dream sitting cross legged waiting for him and they talk about the situation, dream giving techno a quick brief. when tommy comes, crying “techno, this way, this way to pogtopia”, and crossbow bolts are being fired at techno, dream gives him a lil wave goodbye (or what techno thinks is a lil wave goodbye but what actually turns out to be putting a swiftness effect on him).

“that’s not my brother, dream,” says techno, and dream’s mouth wobbles and he says, hoarse, “i know.”

techno Suspects, but only knows that dream has world-manipulating powers and thus standard minor god powers. he doesn’t let dream know he suspects. 

chap 19 bad

subtitle: run devil run

bad trusts dream, perhaps against his better judgement. 

dream comes to visit bad and skeppy on neutral grounds in the interim leading up to the festival that everyone on the server is side-eyeing and side-stepping. bad considers his friend and the owner of the world as he gives dream an impromptu tour through the escape route he and skeppy have dug out, wonders with a little reproach how dream could let things get to this point, then, soft, gentle as always, acknowledges that dream is only human kindly. when he says that, though, dream’s face crumples, as though those words hurt him more than any criticism bad’s given him in the time he’s known him, as though bad had driven a blade into his heart, and bad doesn’t understand but he lets dream run away from that. when a small flock of creepers explode over the tunnel the night before the festival and bad grumbles that he has to fix it, he learns dream left him with a fortified escape tunnel.

a/n: i’m sure the irony isn’t lost on you.

chap 20 tubbo

subtitle: cadmean victory

what say the sacrificial lamb?

tubbo is coming to terms with the fact that he might not make it out of office in one piece and it’s not his first time respawning but the older members of the server always, always did their best to shield the younger ones from death. he runs into dream by complete coincidence while he’s avoiding pogtopia (mostly wilbur) and manberg (mostly schlatt), caught between two strangers wearing his friends’ faces. he looks at dream, who looks back at him impassively, and tubbo starts to cry, because it finally hits him that even with his death and respawn nothing will be fixed, nothing can change, the poison’s run too deep into the veins of dream’s beautiful little world and now nothing can be right anymore and it feels like he’s shattering into tiny, aching shards - and then dream kneels before him, takes his hands, presses his forehead to them, sighs like his heart’s breaking, and tubbo feels a small calm thread back into him as dream stands abruptly, jittery. dream, with hands that shake, grips tubbo’s shoulder, hovers for a second, then his head jerks up and he bolts into the forest, clambering up a tree with admirable ease and disappearing away into the leaves as schlatt suddenly emerges from the bushes nearby with a joyous, plastic “hey! tubbo!”

chap 21 george

subtitle: lantern burns low

a moment in the night; george is visited by a specter. 

dream comes, pale, and asks george if there is anything wrong, is everything okay with you? takes george’s caught-off-guard face in his hands and says george george george, are you - and george catches a glimpse of dream’s powers (is he safe safe does he hurt no but fear but anxiety there are dregs hush now quiet now he is safe all quiet quiet quiet he’s safe) and he says, stricken even as the constant thrum of nervous energy he’d kept with him fades out, “dream what was that,” and dream presses his hands to his mask where his eyes are and says, despairingly, “they don’t get to have you too,” and staggers back out. 

george is the first person dream overtly “comes out” to. this is also why george doesn’t see dream til the festival. 

chap 22 schlatt

subtitle: the empty throne

dream visits schlatt in his office. 

schlatt, possessed by madness, has no idea what he’s saying but it feels right, it’s exactly right, everything is in his hands, and when dream approaches, his hands facing up, is he there is he there yes yes yes tainted polluted this is twisted this is madness madness madness dream reels back, shaking, and schlatt leans in and leers, not even knowing what he’s saying, “you can’t even fix it, young god,” and relishes the way all the color drains from dream’s face.

=)

chap 23 dream (edit: this monster ended up being split into three for pacing purposes and also if i left it together it was gonna be. h. 14K WORDS. also the drama of a cliffhanger at what most people thought was going to be the last chapter was too good to pass up don’t @ me

subtitle: do you feel like a young god?

running, running, running again

finale!! dream takes everyone’s old hurts into himself, takes the madness from schlatt and wilbur, promptly passes the hell out because no one should be doing that, wakes up, gets the shit hugged out of him, and explains a little, and gets told that he’s loved over and over. 

i uh! take questions! i like talking about this story, there’s a lot i still want to show, and even apart from that i just really love mcyt haha

[clearskiiess]

I actually have the best idea for your "talk about" ask meme. Do 1-40 please 💕💗💞💟❤️💖 Give Us Your Autobiography

1  - talk about the first time you watched your favorite movie.

already answered !

2 - talk about your first kiss.

damn well that aint happened yet. lol

3 - talk about the person you’ve had the most intense romantic feelings for.

hGGGG probably my best friend and crush miriam. god im fucking in love with her omfg gO DODKLHFSHFDJDKHK i wont ramble too much but omffhjfkfjkdhfkjd thnak god shes not on tumblr or id die eeeehggGGGH like we flirt a lot but we’re not dating quite yetaaa ghddgh

4 - talk about the thing you regret most so far.

nothing bitchesssss 😎🤘 i regret not getting into good music earlier maybe.

5 - talk about the best birthday you’ve had.

already answered!

6 - talk about the worst birthday you’ve had.

uhhhghghgh not really a bad one i can remember ! all of them have been good, some better than others ofc but theyre still good even if i dont get prezzies.

7 - talk about your biggest insecurity.

ohufuibfhkbkjbjk probably my art and drumming and writing opps.

8 - talk about the thing you are most proud of.

already answered !

9 - talk about little things on your body that you like the most.

already answered!

10 -  talk about the biggest fight you’ve ever had.

damn probably me and my mum, we fight kind of often but yeah djldfkjjkdjkdkj those are probably the worst fights i have. or me and my dad

11 - talk about the best dream you’ve ever had.

already answered!

12 - talk about the worst dream you’ve ever had.

damn uh kinda dont wanna answer, too personal sorry eee

13 - talk about the first time you had sex/how you imagine your first time.

idk really, just being with someone i really like or even love and its just super fun and casual, and like just exploring it? yeah

14 - talk about a vacation.

ooo when me n the fam went to europe when i was 10 and we went to paris for 4 days, then germany for 2 weeks and norway i think 1 or 2 weeks? it was bloody awesome omfG it was great !!!! my family is big on travel so we usually use our money on it.

15 - talk about the time you were most content in life.

already answered !

16 - talk about the best party you’ve ever been to.

eh not really? maybe friend’s parties as a child but thats kinda it. dont really go to parties yet eee

17 - talk about someone you want to be friends with.

already answered !

18 - talk about something that happened in elementary school.

uh thats primary right? well, nothing interesting i remember in year 6 i loved warrior cats and me n my friends would roleplay it a lot at school, everyone thot we were weird but i didnt care ahah.

19 - talk about something that happened in middle school.

well thats high school for me so, nothing interesting either. maybe that one time with my old friend domi and maya and it was yr 7, i was 13 i was staying home cause i was sick af. and maya called me up, obviously trying not to laugh. and she was like “domis broken his leg! help help! what do i do” and im like uh. why are you calling me??? call the ambulance or get a teacher to do it for christs sake! i dont even believe you. and she was like yeah look! and sent me a fucking photoshopped pic of him lying at the bottom of the stairs, it made me fucking laugh so hard i was like, bro you expect me to believe you? ok buddy. bye. and hung up it was funny af

20 - talk about something that happened in high school.

^^^ answered above lol.

21 - talk about a time you had to turn someone down.

ggghHHHH ok i had to turn down my friend austin in yr 7  bc domi was pressuring me to go out with him cause i told him about how i used to like him, but for some reason that meant i still liked him to him??? so he kept going on abt it saying ask him out etc so i caved in and did and the date was so shitty i just faked sick and left and we didnt talk for a bit, but thats long gone and we’ve made up now lol, just good friends

22 - talk about your worst fear.

already answered ! 

23 - talk about a time someone turned you down.

hgg not happened yet,,, thank god 

24 - talk about something someone told you that meant a lot.

well whenever someone compliments me on anything really or says im their best friend like??? psjksfjkdjkhfsdjlfds ok dead,,, or when they say i love u i jusT DIE

25 - talk about an ex-best friend.

already answered!

26 - talk about things you do when you’re sick.

already answered !

27 - talk about your favorite part of someone else’s body.

uh??? idk hands. i love hands a lot. and collarbones. and lips. and eyes. and eyebrows. and legs, and tummies and - ok ill shuT Up

28 - talk about your fetishes.

dont really have any. maybe hands

29 - talk about what turns you on.

hands. teehee

30 - talk about what turns you off.

i dunno,  any bdsm like at all ahahaha. srry bros

31 - talk about what you think death is like.

i dunno really? sometimes i feel like its nothing, like we’ll just die and stop functioning and just rot and become one with the earth. but sometimes i feel like maybe there is an afterlife, like not what we think but yea? like i dunno.

32 - talk about a place you remember from your childhood.

ohh boy , well one is this river near my house, or creek really. i love it a lot its great, i love going there and watching the birds and hearing the water rush.

33 - talk about what you do when you are sad.

eh, kinda just cry my eyes out and listen to music or watch a good movie and then i feel a bit better.

34 - talk about the worst physical pain you’ve endured.

uh well as of recently i can remember, was when i got jaw surgery in april this year. now this shit was fucking horrible, for a month and a half my face was puffed like a balloon and bruises everywhere, and i literally could not eat cause i couldnt bloody move my mouth! i was confined to my bed and i lost so much weight bc i could barely eat and i was throwing up old blood and shit during that time and i couldnt fucking sit up without drooling cause i couldnt control it it was so fucking gross man. at least i look better now but it was hell lmfao.

35 - talk about things you wish you could stop doing.

uhhh idk maybe staying up all night n shit, i dont think anything else? maybe avoiding school too. oh , and ofc get rid of my depression hahah

36 - talk about your guilty pleasures.

eeeeeee nothing rlly? i dont feel guilty abt shit, i shouldnt

37 - talk about someone you thought you were in love with.

uhm i guess my ex bf tyler, well gf at the time but yea, i loved him a whole lot dkjfdhdhfhkdj but we were only 12-13 yknow and he lived in the us so it was rlly sucky. but it was a good time, just some experience

38 - talk about songs that remind you of certain people.

damn well, sweet child o mine by gnr reminds me of my friend claudia, she LOVES stuff like gnr and ac/dc, motley crue etc. and for u maxie, killer queen def ! and gold dust woman for me friend mazzy,,,, and in my life omg for miriam sjdjdjdjfkg

39 - talk about things you wish you’d known earlier.

already answered !

40 - talk about the end of something in your life.

already answered !

tYSM BBY MAXIE ILYSM