#one of my favorite games ever created and it's so hard to talk about bc it's best played as blind as possible

[kcdoos]

GHOST TRICK HEADS WE WON

[some-stars]

i have my askbox closed rn bc of the scam spam so @petralemaitre sent me this meme directly:

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers! Spread the self-love 💞

i have 62 to choose from but honestly i already know what my favorite 2 things i've ever written are so this will be fairly quick.

A quite unlosable game (dark angel, alec/max, alec/various): this is it! this is the favorite! it's my most beloved show of all time and i had Things to Say and it took me ten years (off and on) but i did say them! very well! i started it in 2008 so my memories are vague but i wrote it pretty much in order--the first idea i had was the almost-pubescent X5s being lectured on how their hormones were going to be manipulated. it was a science fiction story for me, before anything else, because it's a science fiction show that didn't get a chance to explore SO much of the juiciest most interesting concepts it put forth. and it was also me thinking about how the show at first fumbled, then did SO right by the eye-rollable "max goes into heat" concept. like when it comes up in the second episode it's treated completely as a joke, but when it happens again at the end of the first season--when we've bought in to the basic premise and established trust--it's treated as the terrible, sad violation that it is. so i thought, well, how could i pursue that thread further? and. so. yeah. love this story forever, best thing i ever wrote, does exactly what i wanted it to do and does it almost perfectly.

The absolute absurdity of end-series items (house of leaves): my other favorite thing i've ever written! i don't think this is quite as perfectly executed, but it's pretty close, and certainly no one else has done it better so that makes it successful by default. house of leaves is one of my favorite books of all time and i have SO many thoughts about it and all the things that it DOES. some of which the culture at large has acknowledged and much of which i've never seen anyone else talk about, the latter specifically being how rich and welcoming it is to feminist interpretations. which i could never manage to write the essay about that i wanted to, but it's all just in this fic instead.

children's work (the witcher, geraskefer): gonna cheat and put the whole series. it's kind of hard for me to love this one because i can see ALL the seams, especially in the second and third stories where i was trying so many new things as a writer and flailing around so much. but taken as a whole it's the longest single work i've ever created, and the response to it utterly blew me away. people loved this series, so so so much, it's been four years and i kind of still can't process it. this is the story that i think about when i feel like i've never had any kind of effect on the world and nothing i've ever done mattered to anyone. because this series made a lot of people very happy, and that's nice. (also i LOVE when i can come into a fandom and write something that nobody's done before. it boosts my ego like crazy. not that the concept of the fic itself is original--i lifted a LOT of the emotional beats from an extremely good SPN fic i read way back in the day--but no one had done a serious take on it in witcher fandom yet.)

felt it in my fists (teen wolf, allison/lydia): i was Deep into this show for like half of one summer, but i hated (and continue to hate) sterek so there was not a lot on offer for me. but there was femslash! idk, i just really like this story and it's special to me for reasons i can't really identify.

put on the red light (deadpool & wolverine): i don't necessarily like this MORE than my other fics in the fandom but i do feel like it's different and therefore special. it's very rare for me to write explicit high-key emotional conflict and fighting, bc it tends to give me bad anxiety, but MAN i loved writing the big screaming fight in this one. they both fully believe they're breaking up because the other one betrayed them in the most painful way imaginable, and it's awful, and i love it.

im not gonna send the meme to anyone else but if you are reading this please consider yourself tagged!

[gornackeaterofworlds]

ask game ask game! 8, 9, 28, 33 pretty please!

Hi lucky!!!! Ask game ask game!!!

8.) Which turtle is usually your favorite?

Hard to say, I haven't actually watched a ton of TMNT. But Leo or Donnie. Pissy asshole daddy's boy and tired slightly deranged mother hen are always safe bets, some interpretations of raph are too angry or not angry enough for my liking, and I might be in the well but there's some interpretations of Mikey that i dislike enough for me to not say him

9.) Who is your favorite version-specific turtle?

Augh this is really hard. Rise? Leo. There's so much angst and sadness crammed into this little man. Bay? Raph. Similar reasoning, but he's a huge man

28.) What is one thing you would like to see explored more in TMNT art/fics?

Oh man I hope no one feels called out bc you should make what you wanna make. I don't have any peeves with art really, but in writing I really crave a reader that isn't fucking stupid just for plot convenience. I can understand that in-universe it might be a logical decision, but if it just causes agonizing miscommunications or fights, which I really try to avoid, I'm not going to feel connected reading it. And I was talking with a friend today also, wanting more actual gender neutral reader stuff haha. Things like more androgynous and comfortable clothing(no heels, bras with hooks, jewelry, dresses, specifically mentioned clothing, lace, etc), ambiguity about genitals(I've seen very gn fics only use descriptions that can apply to afabs and amabs both), that kind of thing. I'm a fem fluid person, so I suffer less, but genderless and masc people kinda get shunted. Last peeve, I want realistic height comparisons. I know most people aren't as short as me, 4'11, but you're not "standing on your tiptoes" and kissing a 6'5 man on the cheek, or having a 6'8 man barely lean to rest his head on yours/your shoulder. It pulls me out immediately

33.) What is your favorite thing you've made for TMNT?

This is so hard!!! Torture!!!!!! I've made so much, but it's hard because I...really don't like a lot of what I've made. I never have, I don't think I ever will. Artwise? Uhhh. I honestly can't say. Every time I try to say a piece, I find something to pick apart. The first gift for khaya, I don't like something about it. The second gift, there's something else. Any set of au stuff I've done, there's mistakes I made. Story/writing wise? Butterfly Effect. Ofc Danii created it, and the comic is outdated, simple and I don't like it, but this is a full story here. It's an iteration, the length of TV shows. It consumes me.

[christotokos]

💫 🤍 🕯️☯️ 🧿

💫 what is your favorite kind of comment/feedback?

play-by-play comments and/or long comments/reviews. i like hearing how readers felt at certain times, but i also love a carefully composed, long comment/review. even if it has some "i don't like x" i like hearing an explanation as long as it's not just being negative. i like these bc it gives me insights on how readers things, on how my writing is and i like observations.

i know not everyone's into them but these kinds of comments are things i'd like to print out and put on my fridge.

🤍 what's one fic of yours you think people didn't "get"?

hard to say. i think my readership now understands me a lot more than when i started out but there is certainly a subset of readers who are very upset that i don't have soda/steve as anything close to endgame 99% of the time whether they get angry that soda/ivy is happening — going so far as to comment to me telling me that ivy's barely there presence in chpt. 40 was making the fic "unreadable" — to being annoyed that i usually have soda/sandy happen. and i don't understand why they express this to me in ways that are increasingly rude or don't seem to understand that i view sandy like almost anyone else and that's not ever going to change.

🕯️ was there a fic that was really hard on you to write, or took you to a place you didn't think it would take you?

trap au. i'm still working on the next part, but i had no clue that writing dallas as an active serial killer would be so... interesting in how he views things? making things omegaverse certainly brings about a change in things, but making it omegaverse in this way brought to the forefront ideas around prey drive and hunting, and how dallas' viewpoint while fucked up... makes more sense if you think of him as a feral alpha who's been repressing more of those feral instincts and once they're allowed to really metasize, he winds up violent in a different way and in a way that if he expressed it almost makes sense if you view him as a wild animal.

he's a wild animal who's been forced not to, essentially, hunt the way he's supposed to. and now that he is doing it, ofc he's healthier. but it's also insanely, you know, harmful.

☯️ how do you think engaging with each other through tumblr, twitter, comments, kudos, creates healthy fandom experiences? How do you deal with that if you're not a social person/experience social anxiety?

honestly, and i'm guilty of this at times myself, being on tumblr is not a good fandom experience for fandom in general but in particular, this fandom bc not only is it small but many corners of this fandom encourage surveilling others or at least having to know what's going on or else you'll suddenly be hit with waves of harassment out of nowhere. either you don't engage on looking at others and then i suddenly have anons calling me the n-word and trying to call me a pedo bc i wrote something they didn't like and someone with obvious mental problems will make escalatingly alarming posts about me though we've never interacted or interacted years ago once or twice or i keep an eye out but find myself reading hurtful comments about me, people i know, and blocking a lot but it still makes for misery at the end of the day.

i don't like it. it brings out the worst behavior for everyone involved, and i wish we could go back to forums. (and i mean. i do have one.)

i do however, think ask games like this, posting in a small group on discord or tumblrs like this, kudos and comments should be curated more and be healthier. i think comments really encourage conversation, being able to talk to friends in small groups help. i don't enjoy fandom being this fractured but frankly, until there's some sort of control exerted so less people under eighteen and less people who've solely been socialized on line occurs, it's all we got.

🧿 what steps do you take to not take things personally if a fic doesn't do well, or if your writing/posting/sharing experience isn't going how you'd like it to?

take a break, block people, whine in private (having a public sideblog or posts with a dedicated tag where you whine in public is not a good idea. that's not private.), keep my cool in public as best i can and move on. things also have a weird shelf life online; it's shocking to me that my main soc au fic, while i've stopped receiving comments (you guys can comment completed fics!!!!!!) it receives consistent kudos to the point it's close to my #2 fic. so you really never know.

[kart0]

August 15th - My 22nd Birthday

Can't say it was a perfect day, or even a good day. It went pretty shitty, as it usually does. Nothing too bad, but small things added up and then I just couldn't hold myself together anymore. I've been dealing with pain in my arms for quite some time now, went to the doctor twice, and now started physical therapy. Haven't been able to draw and had to postpone some commissions which took a toll on me. Can't draw to relax, nor play games, nor cook, nor do literally anything.

My dad got mad at me for a mistake he did.

Tried to bake some cupcakes to give to my friends at uni but everything went wrong, I worked so hard on it, left my wrists burning in pain only to just fail.

My classmates sung happy birthday to me, which would've been nice if we were in a private room, instead of being in class with every single colleague of mine and even the professor. Whom which I highly dislike. It was very embarrassing and I felt weird.

I wanted to walk alone home to wind down but one of my friends insisted on walking together because it was my birthday and I shouldn't be alone, but I really needed some alone time to get myself together.

Couldn't find my favorite comfort ramen ( neoguri ) for weeks and it's been driving me crazy.

I didn't have lunch bc I was stressed with the cupcakes, only to end up deciding not to take them with me, so I was hangry and sad.

Some people I considered dear friends didn't even send me a happy birthday message, and even planned a birthday party to a different friend whose birthday is in a few days.

I was so upset, we went out for dinner and just seeing my dad made me start crying again. I didn't get to enjoy any of the food because I was crying and couldn't taste anything and that made me even more upset. And it was very painful to hold chopsticks so I ended up only having 3 slices of sashimi for dinner.

I couldn't stop crying at all and ended up sobbing for two hours straight, even though I was trying my hardest to stop. I couldn't control myself.

We went to the movies and watched Coraline, and I managed to distract myself and just pay attention to my favourite movie ever.

We got home, cut my cake and talked a bit about silly things and funny stories and that's when I finally felt content.

I think I don't really like celebrating my birthday. I don't like being the center of attention, and I create these high expectations that people will do these crazy things and love me and it'll be fun and amazing and perfect. Which obviously just makes room for disappointment.

I like the day before my birthday, and the day after my birthday, but never my birthday. I always, always get sad.

I do think it's no one's fault, tho. Just unlucky, and a coincidence. But it does make me wonder if I will ever have a good, happy birthday celebration.

Idk, I hope so. I mean, at least one, c'mon.

Anyways, I cried a bit more writing this, but I feel way better. My eyes are super puffy and sore and burning, and I'm just tired. At least I don't have classes tomorrow... I still need to wakeup early for my physiotherapy tho. Anyways. This was definitely a year... Very bad things happened, but also very good things. It balances out.

I'm happier than before and honestly, I think it's been a very long time since I've felt anywhere close to this. I'm glad I'm still here.

Hoping I will have an even greater year next.

[seethesunny]

Hi, lovely! Here’s some for the ask game. 🍓🥤🌻🪐

Hi friend, happy Saturday 🤲🏼❤ thank u lots for the ask! I always get bored haha

🍓 ⇢ how did you get into writing fanfiction? 

This is funny because I've always been a creative kid, so I would create my own stories inside my head and they eventually turned into some of the shows/books I liked- sometimes a mixture- and at the time I didn’t know that was called fanfiction! I have the vivid memory of snatching my mom's lavender Nokia cellphone to write in a notes app, that happened until I fell into the role-playing world for years and that only cemented my love for it, I fully got into writing seriously around five years since that but never posted, it was for that same group of friends only. So that's my backstory! I had given up on it for a number of reasons but I'm back in the fanfiction pit lol

🥤 ⇢ recommend an author or fanfic you love

Since I've been a tessjoel girlie from the beginning I'm pulling some of the hidden gems on FF dot net that some new fans may not know! These are all videogame tlou.

Starting with one of my favorite fics EVER (it is a habit to reread it monthly) written by Raff who is a legend and was a pioneer for them. This is an au that's technically canon compliant for the tone, a very straight-forward summary: Ellie is Tess and Joel's daughter, this is the little glimpses of how they raise her in the QZ:

@kokureno and I gush over this particular fic nonstop, college au with romcom elements, what's not to love?

This one is a curious case because while I read it previously, my mind was blown away when I finally read Dirt (also recommend it) then came back to it. Tess and Joel share a vulnerable moment and Tess realizes there is more to him than what she thought, pretty spot on character analysis:

This one is a Tess lives au AND a babyfic, and you know how hard it used to be to find babyfics for them specifically? Aside from signs (originally from FFnet), I wasn't that lucky and this was a blessing:

Someone said missing scene fic about a very necessary topic aka Joel and Ellie bringing up Tess during their journey? The old man HAS feelings??? Anyway, this is 100% canon to me:

This one is for those who are fans of Tess’s backstory in the old tlou storyline where she was the main antagonist/villain, which means she had a brother who was killed; in my heart this will always be her OG origin story honestly. Plus, Joel also opens up about his own loss:

Don't you love it when there's a recurring theme in your fic???? Tess and Joel's lives when they're running out of time, Tommy appears too, canon compliant:

Okay this one is on AO3 too, I get that, however I first found it here and anyway it has now been buried so! I'm showing it again. Tess's centered fic were a rarity so I know this one like the back of my hand, the most juicy gritty QZ life angst, it's also an origin story about her AND a character study, go wild:

Another one on AO3, but hear me out this IS them at their true core and a required reading for everyone to understand them and their dynamic perfectly, it's pretty sad and there's not much comfort but that's why it's so good. Also, the queen herself (amb) wrote it and this is my special dedication to her bc she cemented this Fandom alongside Raff and she's the best at pulling our heartstrings:

Those are some of my favs. I can't include every single one cause it would take me ages but there are so many more there that are worth a read. If you love them most at their ambiguous nature, the early fics filled the void and nurtured the mind.

🌻 ⇢ tag someone you appreciate but don't talk to on a regular basis

A really talented artist around here who's outstanding at what she does, ily chica @betweentwoceremonials

🪐 ⇢ name three good things going on in your life right now

Last year I had an awful infection and it took me a while to get rid of it, but I did some medical analysis a few weeks ago and now I'm fine 🥳

This spot is for the people I love and love me in return, I never take it for granted!

Not to get too pessimistic bc I try to keep it light but I never thought I would reach my 20s and yet- I'm still here, and I'm proud of myself for it

[maddy011901]

hi, i'm maddy 🪡

(previously known as omfgdany)

ao3

sims 4 gallary id: maddy011901

💌 a list of things you might see on my blog (this is a fandom blog, first and foremost)

embroidery

sims 4 posting (builds, cas, challenges, legacy, etc...)

arcane

amazing digital circus

disney dreamlight valley

total drama island

goodtimeswithscar

tubbo

kyrio cifer

redacted audio (gavin is my favorite)

hermitcraft!!!

aesthetic posts

yuurivoice (alphonse, by beloved)

the last of us (ellie is my ride or die)

genshin impact (only got into it bc of venti, he's my baby)

anime (my current top 5: banana fish, fruits basket, psycho-pass, black butler, & )

other mcyt (it is still mostly tubbo)

one direction (I'm not a larrie anymore but my faves are harry & louis)

taylor swift (die hard swiftie since debut ~ top five albums in no peticular order: evermore, speaknow, ttpd, reputation & folklore)

high fantasy books (idk how to read /j)

fnaf (I've been a fan since around fnaf 2! freddy is my fave)

stim boards

barbie movies

bratz dolls (I've had a fixation on them since i was a kid)

obey me (I'm in love with asmodeus and beelzebub)

music & musicians (i'm not particularly picky about music so expect all kinds of stuff)

the scream movies (HUGE fan of the 1st 4...i feel realty neutral about 5 and 6)

sanrio (i like cute, sweet things)

pokemon (i like fairy and grass types but my favorite pokemon is Ditto lol)

birds (one of my special interests from when I was a kid that has recently resurfaced lol)

game of thrones & house of the dragon (i have complicated feelings)

good omens

the narnia movies (idk how to feel about the remakes but i am hopeful!)

resident evil games (i like the stage plays too!)

the mcu (loki stan, bucky stan, wanda stan, peter stan)

other roleplay asmr (this is something very personal to me so i don't really talk about it lol)

2000s and 2010s "nostalgia"

dragon ball (the og anime, my bf introduced me to it and I fell in love)

anime tiddies

fanart (i love reblogging fanart)

fanfic (i write & reblog fanfic!)

🐰 about me 🌷

i don't really retire from fandoms (unless i have a negative experience) so i blog about an endless number of fandoms

all pronouns means i am comfortable with any and/or all pronouns being used for me!! (i think i'm agender?)

Dany is not my real name, i started going by it online in 2019/2020 :) my real name is Maddy, idc which i am called ~ i have also gone by the names Kitty, Raye, & Bambi online, feel free to call me whatever you'd like

my favorite color is #f3859f

my special interest is a fantasy world i created when i was a little kid and i am currently writing a fantasy book series based on it

I'm a capricorn

I am in a relationship <3

my favorite characters are almost always "the blonde one" (they're at least "blonde coded")

my favorite number is 19

i'm a tumblr veteran (my first ever tumblr account was made in 2013/2014)

I've been writing fanfiction since i was 10 (i was writing it before i even knew it was a thing lol) my first fanfic was a walking dead fanfic i also made edit tv/movie trailers for lol

age regressor but I don't really post about it online

I am not active on other social medias outside of my personal insta and occasional twitter use

My blog speaks for itself for the most part. I'm a chronic reblogger

i've been writing as a hobby since childhood, including original fiction/fantasy works and fanfic and poetry

🎀 other info 🧸

i was diagnosed with "level 1 autism" in 2020 but i think i am actually more like level 2 tbh

i use my queue for reblogs (most of the time) so i don't clog up feeds and stuff :)

if you feel the need to block me, for whatever reason, that is okay

if you appear to be a bot (no pfp, no posts/reblogs, no bio, no recent activity, etc) i WILL block you

my asks are closed because they make me anxious

i don't have a dni list because if i dont want you to interact with me i will just block you

i am not comfortable sharing much about my personal life. that being said might reblog/like/follow things related to myself or my personal life

i am queer (for now I'm going with agender bisexual, but that is subject to change)

i frequently use tone indicators

💘 tags 💭

tags stayed the same post name change lol

dany rambles - exactly what it sounds like, just rambles

dany's diary - personal posts (this is a more recent tag, older posts won't have it)

dany vents - vent posts (i also tags these as "vent" and "vent post")

dany writes - posts about my writing but not my wips/fics/etc themselves

dany's q - posts from my queue

simming with dany (sims 4 posting lol)

💬 socials 🍓

tiktok (shitposting&theonlyglimpsyougetintomypersonalife)

twitter (taylorswiftstanaccount)

pinterest (fandomfaves&myaesthetic)

spotify (music!!!)

[stuck-in-the-ghost-zone]

MAC!!! GOOD EVENING!!!!!! im thinking soo hard abt interesting fairytale things rn but also. i would LOVE to hear abt ur danny phantom thing?(images aren't loading for me but i think? graphic novel? normal novel?? 👀) ??????!!!! i'm peripherally interested in dp on the basis that my beloved mutual (u) is into it & im!!!! curious!!!! whys it so good!!!! tell me!! free infodump card for u 👀👀👀

THIS ASK IS A MISTAKE. BEWARE. FUCK. DUDE I COULD TALK ABOUT DANNY PHANTOM FOR SO LONG IM NOT EVEN KIDDING IVE GOT . NEARLY 20 YEARS WORTH OF LOVE FOR THIS SHOW. I AM 23 YESRS OLD. THATS HOW SERIOUS I AM . IM.*THE* DANNY PHANTOM GUY THERES A REASON ALL OF MY USERNAMES ARE DP REFERENCES. ohhhh my god. where do i even fucking start. i guess ill start with agit but im still so overwhelmed with love that i have not fully processed yet so prepare for this to be a total fucking mess of words

so. the show ended in.. 2007. and. god the last episode sucks so fucking bad. bad enough that the fandom as a whole collectively agrees it does not exist it never happened . phantom planet isnt real phantom planet cant hurt you if you dont look at it or think about it ever. i could go on a whole. rant about how much phantom planet sucks but instead ill just say butch hartman (<< creator of the show) is a fucking. annoying awful person and he was greedy + wanted more money from nickelodeon than they were willing to give him so they gave him a hard limit on episodes before the shoe would be canceled. so. season 3 goes downhill SO fast and ends with the fucking disaster that is phantom planet . and !!! you know how disappointing it is to have your facorite show have a garbage ending!! it sucks!! so then there was like. a HUGE HUGE long silence where there was. 0 canon content bc hartman considered it a flop and kind of just. abandoned it until he wanted clout (there were a few gameboy games that came out after the show ended + some nickelodeon games that included danny as a character + butch made a youtube channel where he would spout absolute death of the author garbage about the show every time he wanted attention but it was mostly dead silence) UNTIL. AGIT. A GLITCH IN TIME IS THE FIRST CANON SHOW COMPLIANT CONTENT THAT HAS BEEN RELEASED SINCE 200 GODDAMN 7. FUCK . and not only is it canon compliant it is ALSO A CONTINUATION OF MY FAVORITE EPISODE IN THE WHOLE SERIES.

so. my favorite episode. is ultimate enemy. it was one of the 4 movie-length episodes and the basic premise is. danny uses his ghodt powers to cheat on a huge standardized test and this sets off a butterfly effect reaction that leads to a timeline where his family + friends get killed in an explosion and he loses his mind and turns into the worlds most powerful villain <3 you can see why i like it so much im sure (<< guy who has a documented chronic weakness for stories where a good guy turns bad etc)

SO AT THE END OF THE EPISODE. Dan (the evil future danny) is trapped and locked away forever . but at the end of the ep theres a scene that hints to a possible future episode where he escapes !!!! so there was always a teased sequel but this sequel was never created due to aforementioned. budget issues and cancellation. etc. buggest disappointment of my life. UNTIL AGIT !!!!!!!!!!!!!

it was released. july of this year . and i am just reading it now bc its been burning a hole in my bedside table bc it never felt like the right time to read it until this morning for some reason. and fuck its so good its literally everything i wanted.

i dont know how involved butch hartman was in the creation of it but the author (gabriela epstein) is obviously someone who cares deeply about the show and the characters and im so fucking happy about it she did an incredible job. i literally had to pause a handful of times in the first few pages just because the characters and dialogue were written so well and it was like SUCH a breath of fresh air (the fandom is. so bad. its so bad. because its been around for so long people have such insane warped takes on a lot of the characters and its become completely unbearable to me ive had to block the tag and its so painful. this is literally the only reason i am not reblogging dp content constantly. i have to filter it through artists i know can handle the characters properly. if i was not nerfed by the awful fandom it would be 24/7/365 dp lockdown and id be so unbearable) OH ALSO not only is agit a continuation of my alltime favorite episode, it also retcons the garbage pile that is phantom planet in a way that acknowledges that it was a real thing that happened but going back on it in a way that feels so so so so natural for the show. so it wasnt a throwaway "no that was bad lets forget about it" it was a well crafted well thought out "this was real and it sucked and the characters remember it BUT we can play with timeline so things will continue as normal" and . holy shit it was so fucking good. i will begrudgingly acknowledge phantom planets existence if only for agit.

uhhhhhhhh fuck this is so long and i am running our of directed steam so if i keep talking i will just start rambling about the intricacies and holy shit dude i could literally talk about danny phantom for hours and hours and hours and hours if theres anything else u want to know i am the guy . i am the guy forever

[aquilathefighter]

Trope Game

Hiii i finally have spoons for this!! thanks for the tags @seiya-starsniper @immacaria @altair214 <3

Rules: How much do these tropes affect your decision to click on a fic?

-10 -> very dissuaded

0 - don't care either way

+10 -> very enticed

nope -> if it's a hard no and you'd never click on a fic with that tag or or you even have the tag blocked or you'd insta click out of the fic if it wasn't tagged

Bonus points for explaining the rating and whether it's conditional.

Age gap: +3

its a sometimes food for me, i just have to be in the mood for it or it has to be well done, whether it's clear we're playing in the space of sexy fantasy or something a bit more unethical

Codependency: -5

brings up some yucky feelings for me. if it's done by an author i trust i might still click though!

Obsession/Possessiveness, jealousy: +4

it can be sexy and i like when characters talk through it

Opposites (grumpy/sunshine etc): +8

*gestures at most of my favorite ships*

Enemies to lovers, Enemies with benefits: 0

eh just not really my thing!

Friends with benefits: +4

its a fun thing and i love a pwp where they're just buds. but i do really prefer more romantic pairings personally

Sex to feelings: +7

love the exploration of what happens when it becomes not 'just sex'. also smut yummy

Fake dating/relationship: +10

oh my god this is my favorite trope e v e r. the number of spirk fics where they have to pretend to be bfs/husbands bc of the aliens i've read..

Friends to lovers: +9

CLASSIC. i love a beautiful foundation of two people who really know each other well realizing their affection for each other have evolved into something different!! only knocked off a point bc sometimes its really amatonormative in that the romantic relationship is seen as more/better than the platonic relationship and i do not vibe with that.

Found Family: +1

i could take it or leave it for the most part but if it's done well its certainly appreciated!

Hurt/Comfort: +10

afjdskaf;jsda i dont even have an explanation other than i like to hit characters with hammers and then nurse them back to health

Love Triangle: -8

i just think its kind of played out and very rarely do the dynamics catch my interest

Poly, open relationships: 0

i tend to get really fixated on one pairing so its kinda hard for me to get really excited about them?? all the power to poly ships but i just have very few of them (e.g. mcspirk)

Mistaken/hidden identity: +3

it can be fun! love some drama but if its simply misunderstanding i get a bit frustrated. more phantom type hidden identity pls

Pregnancy: -1

kidfic is generally a squick for me on account of me never wanting to get pregnant in my entire life ever and some personal stuff, but if its more about the relationship between the pregnant person and their partner(s) i'm down! and breeding kink ofc, thats a whole other thing

Second Chance: +7

people who have history between them giving it another try? trying to move past the ways they hurt each other??? yesssss

Slowburn: -2

this is more about the fact that i simply do not have the brain power to read 100K+ fics a lot of the time!! when i do have the capacity i love reading a slowburn but unfortunately i expend a lot of reading spoons on work on account of being an academic at all

Soulmates: -4

man im such a pessimist but i personally find the idea of predestined people you're gonna fall in love with kind of depressing? much more a fan of love being a thing you create between people

i am probably the last one to do this XD take this as an open invitation if you would like to do this game and haven't been tagged!

[callixton]

writing ask: 10, 25, 28 !

god tumblr deleted a mostly finished response, but still - thank you!!

10. Has a piece of writing ever "haunted" you?Has your own writing haunted you? What does that mean to you?

constantly, yeah. lines, themes, concepts that get caught in my head and won’t leave. siken is a particular offender when it comes to specific lines. for my own, there’s plenty that i would say “haunts” me, though part of it is probably down to the many unfinished ghosts of stories i have drifting around my head.

for fanfic, copse immediately comes to mind. the one really did a number on me, and i hope that some day i can return to finish it out but. it’s one of the few things where i know almost everything that happens and i can see it when i close my eyes. i also think it’s special for letting me articulate the kind of attraction i experience and relationships i want before i knew it myself — the way the character’s talk about it is something i return to often. one of my first queer original works, he of wood, also effects me in a similar way. i don’t know when/if it’ll ever be the right time to come back and finish it, but it lives with me all of the time.

25. What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story?

oh my god, too many to count. i have a bad habit of focusing too much on these and not enough on the story, actually, but i’m trying to break it. it’s also hard to know what will end up being irrelevant before the story is done. but! i know that frey from my guardian angel story named himself after his favorite video game character as a pre-teen and i don’t imagine the details of that will ever be relevant

28. Who is the most delightful character you've ever written? Why?

ooh, delightful. that’s not how i usually think about my characters, that’s very fun framing. probably harry, from a project working-ly just titled ‘weird,’ which i’d love to return to sometime bc i haven’t actually done that much on it yet. she’s a rare animal courier in a story mostly created so i can play around with worldbuilding and more experimental fantasy, and they’re a wonderfully strange & intense kid who befriends a ghost

[gigiviv]

got inspired by @violaceum-vitellina-viridis to do this ask game! 

feel free to do one for yourselves y’all

- Song of the year? spotify wrapped says vore by sleep token but I will probs say everything eventual by spiritbox bc they were still my top artist (continuing from last year too <3)

- Album of the year? spirit box’s eternal blue album

- Favorite musical artist / group you started listening to this year? jungle and alien stage. the dead tongues I just recently discovered and their latest album hit hard for me so that’s cool

- Movie of the year? I didn’t see many this year. maybe dune pt. 2. saw that 3 times

- TV show of the year? rewatched house m.d.

- Episode of TV or webisode that defined the year for you? house m.d.’s everybody dies episode. probably uh. a morbid choice. but I still see it as relatively hopeful given the entire clusterfuck that was this year

- Favorite actor of the year? mmm don’t have one

- Game of the year? mouthwash or outer wilds

- Best month for you this year? haha. maybe uh. the beginning of this year? I can’t quite remember it so it must’ve not been that bad

- Something that made you cry this year? the tornadoes that touched down on one of my irl bestie’s property before the hurricane hit this year. let’s not do that again. ever.

- Something you want to do again next year? enjoy my creative hobbies. maybe form new relationships. I’m open to discovering more things to ground myself next year

- Talk about a new friend you made this year didn’t make a new one. but reestablished bonds with my old friends so we’re all good

- How was your birthday this year? not great. I distinctly remember being disappointed due to irl circumstances. but w/e

- Favorite book you read this year? ooooo this is a good one. the machineries of empire series - ninefox gambit, raven stratagem, revenant gun & hexarchate stories by yoon ha lee

- What’s a bad habit you picked up this year? procrastination is soooo bad. executive dysfunction has hit harder than ever and it’s just. so damn difficult to get out of bed most days when not actively working

- Post a picture from the beginning of the year

(shitty iphone 6 quality bc I didn’t upgrade until later on in the year </3)

- Post a picture from the end of the year

(purposefully blurry pic for halloween spookiness </3)

- A memorable meal this year? bday dinners & probs the upcoming nye dinner w/ irl friends

- What’re you excited about for next year? nothing lmfao. I just want it to be easier. to not hit so hard in the beginning. my saturn return is next year too so. hahaha. we’ll see where it goes

- What’s something you learned this year? financial stress will ruin you very, very, quickly

- What’s something new about your place of residence (room, home, or general location) now vs the start of the year? uh. it’s gotten worse. but still got a roof over our heads. so. yay?

- Favorite place you visited this year? didn’t travel but my irl bestie’s places are always good places to relax at

- If you could send a message to yourself back on the first day of the year, what would it be? girl (gn) SAVE YOUR MONEY. you will need it. esp for end of the year surprises. also don’t trust the family luck, it’s all bad

- Did you keep any New Year’s Resolutions? I didn’t make any. survived. ig that’s a good thing

- Did you create any characters (in games, art, or writing) this year? Describe one yes! seffi’s birth mother, I fleshed them out fully into their own character instead of just a wishy-washy concept

[virtualitythegamer]

Meet the Creator (Tumblr version) + Face Reveal

Disclaimer: I made this bc it's for a school assignment haha and I'm also taking this as an opportunity to do an about me post for my Tumblr page. To my teacher for this assignment, I hope you don't mind this especially the account I'm using for the activity🥹🥹🥹. Anyway, thanks for understanding 💗

ABOUT ME

Name: Lei

Birthday: 7/18

Age: 16

Pronouns: she/her

Nationality: 🇵🇭

Zodiac Sign: Cancer

Personality Type: INFP

Gender: Genderfluid

Sexual Orientation: Bisexual

My Emojis: 🎧🐈‍⬛🎮💀💜🍕

FAVORITE...

Colors? Purple, green, & black

Music Genre? Pop, indie, modern rock, hip-hop, video game music, & honestly anything that slaps

Movie Genre? Comedy, psychological thriller, fantasy, & musical

Season? Winter

Food? Pizza, takoyaki, noodles, and spicy stuff in general

Hobbies? Gaming, journaling, graffiti art, listening to music, & content creating

Video Games? Persona series, Honkai: Star Rail, Pokemon, Love and Deepspace, Episode, Skullgirls, The World Ends With You series, and The Legend of Zelda series

LIKES

• video games in general

• music

• content creating

• fan edits

• graffiti art

• art in general

• literature

• good food

• grunge

• dark academia

• psychology

• plushies

DISLIKES

• vegetables

• toxicity & lies (both irl and online)

• bad writing in media

• discrimination in general

• plagiarism

• using AI as your own

• lack of authenticity as a person

• hot weather

• being judged and misunderstood

• bad wi-fi

FUN FACTS ABOUT ME

• My name "Lei" is more of a nickname to my "longer" actual first name. I've been called by my nickname by a lot of people in general since it's easier than my actual first name.

• I came up with the online name "Virtuality" (or Virtual for short) because it's supposed to be like a general reference to video games and technology (ironic cuz I'm in HUMSS haha, not that I regret it)

• The reason I took up HUMSS instead of STEM is because I heard HUMSS was better for aspiring psychologists so I took HUMSS.

• I'm a procrastinator by heart so it's sometimes hard for me to stay productive, whether it's with school work or creating content.

• I took up content creating as a hobby because I want to be able to express my interests more freely especially when it comes to video games. It's honestly hard for me sometimes to talk about them irl because there's not a lot of people that share the same interests I have so content creating has been my safe space ever since.

AND BECAUSE YOU MADE IT THIS FAR

Here is my carrd so you can check out more info about it (will update it when I have the time but for now have this one haha)

Thanks for reading and have a good day!

[atyd1960]

Marauders era characters and ships as SOUR songs with little to no explanation cause I’m not at all concerningly obsessed w Olivia!!

Brutal as Peter

- I already said on multiple occasions that I think Peter would be Olivia’s n.1 fan

- I’m so insecure I think, that I’ll die before I drink

- I don’t stick up for myself, I’m anxious and nothing can help

- All I did was try my best, this the kinda thanks I get?

Traitor as Crystalflower/Azkaban Wolfstar

- continuing with the Peter is an OR fan narrative thanks to @rmoony01 hehe

- Brown guilty eyes and little white lies

- Loved you at your worst, but that didn’t matter

- Ain’t it funny, all the twisted games, all the questions you used to avoid?

- God I wish that you had thought this through before I went and fell in love with you.

Driver’s License as post break-up Jegulus (Regulus’ PoV)

- You’re probably with that blonde (redhead) girl who always made me doubt, she’s so much older than me, she’s everything I’m insecure about

- You said forever, now I drive alone past your street

- Today I drove through the suburbs, and pictured I was driving home to you

- Can’t drive past the places we used to go to, cause I still fucking love you, babe!

- I kinda wanna quote every single line but I’ll stop here:(

1 Step Forward, 3 Steps Back as 5th year ATYD Wolfstar (specific I know)

- You got me fucked up in the head boy, never doubted myself so much

- Am I pretty am I fun boy? I hate that I give you power over that kinda stuff

- I’d leave you but the rollercoaster’s all I ever had

Good 4 u as Post breakup Marylily (Mary’s PoV)

[They broke up even tho they were in love bc Mary had a lot of internalised homophobia&religious trauma that Lily didn’t really know how to handle]

- Well good for you I guess you moved on really easily, you found a new girl (guy) and it only took a couple weeks

- Now you can be a better man (girl) for your brand new girl (man)

- G4U, you look happy and healthy- not me! If you ever cared to ask

- Remember when you swore to God I was the only person who ever got you? Well screw that! And screw you!

Enough For You as Grant

- I don’t usually talk about Grant but like… my boy just wanted Remus to love him the way he always loved Remus and meanwhile Remus was 2 busy being traumatized by his ex and it makes me so sad

- I wore makeup when we dated cause I thought you’d like me more if I looked like the other prom queens I know that you loved before

- Tried so hard to be everything that you liked, just for you to say you’re not the compliment type

- I knew how you took your coffee and your favorite songs by heart

- I read all of your self help books so you’d think that I was smart

- But don’t tell me you’re sorry, boy, feel sorry for yourself, cause someday I’ll be everything to somebody else

[gonna go cry now xoxoxo]

Jealousy, Jealousy as Marlene

- I kinda wanna throw my phone across the room, cause all I see are girls too good to be true

- I know their beauty’s not my lack, but it feels like that weight is on my back, and I can’t let it go

- I’m so sick of myself

- I see everyone getting all the things I want and I’m happy for them but then again I’m not

- Got a pretty face, a pretty boyfriend too, I wanna be you so bad

Favorite Crime as post prank Wolfstar

- Doe eyed as you buried me, one heart broke, four hands bloody

- The things I did just so I could call you mine, the things you did… well I hope I was your favorite crime

- I crossed my heart as you crossed the line

- everything we broke and all the trouble that we made, but I say that I hate you with a smile on my face

Hope ur ok as all the Marauders!

- Nothing’s forever, nothing’s as good as it seems

- When the clouds won’t iron out and the monsters creep into your house and every door is hard to close… well, I hope you know how proud I am you were created with the courage to unlearn all of their hatred, but, god, I hope that you’re happier today- cause I love you, and I hope that you’re ok.

[rollforjackass]

i'm gonna go ahead and answer all the questions from this fic writer ask game here, because. why not! i'm bored and i'm not used to talking about my own writing. gotta cut the cord on that shame game sometime.

(and if y'all wanna answer some yourself, the post is linked above! absolute guarantee i will send some if you do bc i'm nosy like that)

💘 - Is there any posted fic you want to rework/re-edit/re-write?

oh god yes, a lot of them. i've got chronic perfectionism.

if i were to be kind to myself and narrow it down to one, my poor little Person of Interest fic deadman's switch was my first venture into the fandom i would come to adore, and it could definitely do with some tuning up. with a few rare exceptions, i've never liked post-episode fics that just recap the events of the episode with a few extra sentences of meta thrown in the mix, and unfortunately, i think that's exactly what i did with this fic. i don't think it deserves a complete do-over, but a re-work with a new direction and a concrete destination would do it good.

💫 - what is your favorite kind of comment/feedback?

any and every, but the ones where people share their favorite quotes and tell me what it made them think of and expound on their personal theories and thoughts, AGH!!!! i adore those!!!! go off about all the things you love about the characters and your scenarios for missing scenes, i promise you i am enjoying it immensely!!!!!

🌈 - is there a fic that you worked *really fucking hard on* that no one would ever know? maybe a scene/theme you struggled with?

i mean, by default i feel like i'm a bit of a tryhard with my writing and i feel like that's fairly obvious a lot of the time (for better or for worse 😬). but i guess the one that's outwardly the most relaxed bit of writing and was actually really difficult was the burning question, because. how the hell am i supposed to translate a groupchat format into a fic and keep all the nuances of technology, i.e. nickname changes & people sending walls of text, that are meant to be funny??????

it took me Forever to settle on formatting that i felt maintained the spirit of the jokes, and there's so many folks that think groupchat fics are cringe that i don't think anyone would consider how much effort i had to put into it for a now quite outdated joke lmao. i love groupchat fics myself, though, so i am content with the cringe.

🦋 - what are you most insecure about when you post a fic?

always always ALWAYS characterization. i have the fandom attention span of a mayfly and the combination pizza hut/taco bell that is ADHD/autism to boot, so i pick up strong attachments to characters/media quickly and write my feelings almost as fast as i feel them. which means lots of one-offs that are barely two seasons into a series/one movie into a trilogy. i'm always worried that i'm missing the mark by a mile because i was too impatient to reach a Big Backstory Reveal, or that i've latched onto a single trait not indicative of the whole.

🌻 - what makes you want to give up on writing? what makes you keep going?

what makes me want to give up: the Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known. i used to be super confident in putting myself out there, but i haven't always had support for my special interests and i've rarely had anyone willing to read my writing when asked. makes it hard to enjoy what i'm doing when i've got that annoying little earworm asking me what people would think if they ever eventually read it, even when it's a self-indulgent little thing that i don't plan on posting.

what makes me keep going: i love writing, plain and simple. i love to borrow people's habits, their thoughts, their dreams and hopes and fears and nightmares; i love to see the world from new perspectives. and the idea that what i have to say might connect with people, that people might recognize parts of the characters and stories that they care for in my writing, is pretty damn intoxicating, too.

🌿 - how does creating make you feel?

there's a book series i loved as a kid called The Secrets of Droon, which is about three kids who discover a staircase to another world in their basement, and writing has always felt like that to me. i open the door, and i am somewhere else. these other worlds don't need me to be there for events to unfold, but i can still try to change the things that i don't like if i wanted to. and nobody needs to know that i've been to these worlds, but if i mentioned 'hey i've been to another world', someone somewhere might be interested in what i saw.

idk if that makes sense shdjk but i just!! i like writing. i like seeing what would happen if i changed something. and it feels amazing when something i care about deeply connects with people i don't even know, and who don't know me. it's scary to venture into other worlds, but there's always the chance of finding yourself - and finding new friends - down that magic staircase!!

🍉 - in what ways has writing helped you process trauma and/or navigate through your own life?

whoof, i mean. how hasn't it.

i had a very difficult upbringing that left me absurdly angry with the world and only able to conceive of living as fighting for survival. i wrote stories where i could escape and be free, and i wrote stories where the fight was all there was so i could feel less alone. hell, my first favorite character on tumblr was gabriel from supernatural, running away from his family and still loving them even when it hurt, and writing stories where he was happy or angry or sad felt like validating those feelings in myself. i could fix his problems, even if mine weren't that easy.

these days i struggle with a lot that's out of my control, like PTSD with a very hard-to-avoid trigger. but writing is something that i can curate, that i can tailor to a situation. it's completely in my hands. so when i'm going through something, i can always pick up a pen and scribble out the strong feelings in a way that makes sense to me, if not to anyone else, and then i can close that book or tear the page out or burn it, whatever i want to do with it. i can shuffle through the life of a fictional character and find the times when they felt the way i did, and wonder how they got through it, and sometimes in doing so, i find ways that i can, too.

it certainly helps that i've found myself a good number of favorite characters who go through a lot but still remain hopeful. ones who make a place for themselves in the world that is safe and good, who manage to find the best in people even when being shown their worse.

🎀 - give yourself a compliment about your own writing

i like that i'm willing to try my hand at pretty much anything and give it every ounce of passion i've got, no matter how short a time i may have been in a fandom or how different a character might be from the ones i'm used to writing. tech geek with conflicting superiority/inferiority complexes? sure thing. prim and proper angel who's secretly a bitch? give it a whirl. chain-smoking self-sabotaging magician who's a time capsule of the 80s? devoted dad with apeshit anxiety? codependent gay cannibals? fuck it, we ball.

🎈 - describe your style as a writer; is it fixed? does it change?

mmmm depends on how you define style. i want to say that it's generally all the same, but i do think i change tone A Lot, based on who i'm writing about. partially because i bounce between a lot of british and american shows and i tend to try to adopt the vernacular of the culture the media is based in to make the story more immersive, but also based on the tone and overall themes of the piece, i.e. who's hurt and who's comforting and what their relationship looks like, if one's more comedic or they both are or neither of them are.

i'm a bit of a metaphor & simile hound, for sure, that part's pretty fixed. i tend to like comparing simple things to grandiose ones, if only because i write 90% hurt/comfort and the things i always remember most about times when i've been hurting are the gestures that the comforter doesn't even remember making later on. i think i have consistent struggles in certain areas and consistent strengths in others. but i almost never want the version of me who wrote for, say, Good Omens, writing for Mission Impossible, because to me those are two wildly different atmospheres with wildly different stakes and baseline truths. if that makes sense? so i do try to switch up my style when i feel like it's appropriate.

🎉 - how often do you celebrate completing & posting a work? how often do you give yourself the credit/validation that you seek from others when you post? (if you don't, you should!)

i don't think i celebrate much at all, per se. it's always more of a relief that i've gotten all of the most pressing ideas out of my head for the moment than it is an accomplishment, i guess? i'll probably start trying to celebrate now, though.

as for credit/validation, i don't really know how to measure that. i'm able to acknowledge that i've sent something out into the world to bear scrutiny, and i'm usually able to like what i've written once it's out there, so i guess i give myself credit that way??

💞 - what's the most important part of a story for you? the plot, the characters, the worldbuilding, the technical stuff (grammar etc), the figurative language

characters. always the characters. sometimes to the detriment of the rest of the story.

idk, i tend to start stories because something about a character's reactions/choices grabbed my attention, and flesh out a scenario around how those reactions/choices would be seen by others vs how the character would see it themselves, so the character is always at the heart of my storytelling. i'm always thinking about the faces we put on for different people vs the ones we wear when we're alone. i usually find that as long as i follow a character's patterns of behavior, priorities, and methods of self-expression, the story writes itself.

💝 - what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

i don't really have expectations when i post, but the outpouring of love i received for Red Witness was definitely a shocker!! i mean, i'd never even heard of The Mentalist while it was airing from 2008-2015, so i was definitely a latecomer to the fandom, but apparently a lot of folks either rewatched it when the pandemic started or remembered it fondly enough to be excited about me writing for it, so that was a lovely surprise!!

🤍 - what's one fic of yours you think people didn't "get"?

i mean, one of the things i love about writing for fandom is all the variation in opinions and the different takes on what parts of canon are rock-solid vs which should be different, so i don't think it's possible for people to not "get" a fic. it's just one lens through which a set of events and people can be viewed.

that said, i suppose waiting for the hammer to fall didn't land the way i'd hoped it would, as far as my investment in the ideas i was trying to convey vs audience engagement goes, but i can definitely see why it wasn't "gotten". i spent a lot more time trying to mimic the style and feel of Good Omens and relying on that style to convey my ideas for me than i did figuring out how to explain what, exactly, those ideas were.

my intention was to explore "how does someone as buttoned-up as aziraphale, who has lived millennia in peaceful denial, come to terms with an impending confrontation that he absolutely can't avoid or weasel out of?", and that's still something that is very enticing to me, but the fact that he had been in denial his whole existence wasn't something that aziraphale would have been able to recognize on his own. so the execution fell far short of the mark, and i ended up with a few snippets of passable wit and imitative texture that couldn't have connected with a reader even with an operator on the line.

so, as far as the message of the fic goes, i suppose people didn't "get" that one, but it takes reliable postage to deliver a message and i left off all the stamps. (do we think there's been enough methods-of-communication metaphors for one day? everyone's knees sufficiently slapped?)

🕯️ - was there a fic that was really hard on you to write, or took you to a place you didn't think it would take you?

come together (over me) was a BRUTAL undertaking for a number of reasons, which is also why it hasn't been updated in two fucking years, for all my vain intent to finish it.

not only was it my first ever attempt at a multi-chapter fic, but it was also a long and involved discussion of the many different ways that grief can affect people that i started writing less than a year after losing a friend of mine to a tragic accident (which was also the way the mighty nein lost mollymauk). i started writing it in the first place in an attempt to comfort my partner at the time, for whom molly was an all-time favorite, so i was pushing myself obsessively to meet the perfect balance of canon-accurate and partner-approved characterizations, and giving myself a lot of grief about it.

at the same time, the outpouring of shock and despair from the Critical Role fandom was like nothing i had ever experienced before. this was the first PC death of their 2nd campaign, under circumstances that meant it would be a permanent one, and on top of that, mollymauk was - at the time - the only openly queer character in the party. people had become understandably attached.

unfortunately, though, IMO, this meant a large portion of the fandom deified him to unrecognizable extremes. to a lot of new enthusiasts, he became a saintly sacrificial lamb unjustly slaughtered, or worse, "bury your gays" in action (it was a random encounter at a time when the party cleric was away giving birth. just saying). people who disagreed or people who didn't like him all that much were met with outrage. wars of righteous indignation were waged. lines in the sand were drawn. it was a mess.

all this to say, a fledgling fan trying to be as canon-accurate as possible in my characterizations of people who'd known mollymauk, and of mollymauk himself, for this fic centered around what was now the most controversial fandom event i'd ever seen firsthand, had a higher-than-usual chance of getting me absolutely obliterated on the internet. the horror.

so overall, while i did get a lovely response from what i did end up posting, the circumstances of writing it were unexpectedly exhausting. i had a lot of great ideas, still have a solid outline for the rest of it, and i like what i managed to get done, but just thinking about continuing it (especially so long after it was relevant and after so much has been revealed in canon since) is. haunting

💥 - find your least kudos'd fic - say something wonderful about it.

oh Time Doesn't Stop. (but it should), we're really in it now.

my dear, sweet, first ever foray into posting on ao3, i'm still quite proud of you. it's one of the few times i've felt like i could say more with absence than with explanation. it's a time capsule of confidence in myself and in my skills, and i think i did a pretty good job depicting the ways that constantine both self-destructs and lashes out when faced with a situation that he can't worm his way out of. i like the fact that i let each section in the 5+1 format have room to breathe, rather than trying to blend them together into a seamless narrative; it feels more authentic to me, like time has actually been passing.

🍭 - why did you start writing?

re: writing in general, i genuinely can't remember. i've been writing stories since i was old enough to read them. maybe i've always wanted to create something that thinks the same way i do?

re: fanfiction, because i was an insatiable bookworm as a kid and there were never enough stories about the characters and settings i loved to satisfy me, so i decided to start making them up myself. it ain't a party until obi-wan kenobi is helping a larvitar set up a picnic for every legendary pokemon plus dustfinger from Inkheart.

💎 - why is writing important to you?

i don't really have a good answer for this, because i can't think of a reason it wouldn't be, honestly. i guess the closest thing would be: it's important because i've never been good at speaking my thoughts and feelings out loud, but on paper i can say exactly what i mean and have a better chance of being understood. no need for facial expressions that might be misconstrued, no way for anyone to misread my tone of voice, just uncomplicated self-expression.

it also means that i get to share my passions with folks who are just as passionate as i am, and that i have a less awkward social avenue for expressing my appreciation of their candor. integrating and crediting headcanons you adored into your personal interpretation of canon, writing something inspired by a one-off post because it made you feel something...there can be such confounding social rules around complimenting people when you do it verbally or in person, it's nice to be able to say "thank you for caring as much as you do!" by just. applying your craft.

📡 - why is writing and sharing your writing important for fandom?

because of what i said for the last question, it's all a way of sharing how you feel!!! people write because they feel strongly about a subject, whether they love canon or despise it, whether they want to refute a popular characterization they disagree with or expand on an AU that's been making the rounds. not to quote spongebob, but there's love in every stitch, whether you love the way you think about a character/a story or you love the way somebody else does.

it's also a way of preserving fandom over time, as well as the present moment! fan fiction started because of Star Trek fans in the 70s and they're still making trek shows today, the critical receptions of which are strongly influenced by fan interpretations so time-honored as to become gospel!! (snw you know what you did.) writing fics and sharing them with each other is a tradition of story-telling that will outlast us by centuries, and it is damned wonderful to know that what we leave behind are affirmations of love and dedication.

🪄 - what is your post-writing/sharing aftercare? How do you take care of yourself or celebrate yourself when you've finished a fic?

my aftercare is closing out the tab and running away from my computer sdhjk. i'm always very anxious about posting my work, and that's before sharing links or putting it anywhere else, so i usually post any writing i've gotten done right before i go to bed, and then in the morning i can read it with fresh eyes and a calmer brain and pat myself on the back for getting it done. that's a celebration in its way. other than that, drinking water is probably what i do the most after completing something.

🎙️ - which one of your fics would you like someone to make a pod-fic of?

actually, somebody already MADE a podfic of my groupchat fic the burning question, which would have been my answer!!!! the wonderful frecklebomb absolutely made my life when they put that together with their friends, i've never felt anything less than absolute joy remembering it.

🤲 - what do YOU get out of writing?

catharsis, baby! i write a lot of hurt/comfort to fill in gaps that i find myself thinking about between episodes/movies/chapters, and it often ends up being very therapeutic. i get the double pleasure of comforting someone and imagining being comforted, with the cherry on top that is narrative completion (at least by my standards).

💋 - when you leave comments on a fic, do you want to hear back from the writer?

i wouldn't call it a priority when i'm leaving those comments, but it's always lovely when they do reply. i'm a collector of joy, knowing with certainty that i've "repaid" someone for their labor of love is never a bad thing, but i definitely don't expect or seek it. hoard all those compliments for a rainy day, y'all deserve them!!

☯️ - how do you think engaging with each other through tumblr, twitter, comments, kudos, creates healthy fandom experiences? How do you deal with that if you're not a social person/experience social anxiety?

"healthy" really comes down to your point of view in fandom, but i do think that multi-platform engagement for fic authors lets you exercise a level of boundary-setting on social media relationships that the rise of tiktok has sort of blown out of the water.

i'm very tired so i'm not sure i could explain my thought process properly if i tried, but basically, going from an author's works on ao3 to their tumblr/twitter often feels like a delightful sneak peek into the mind behind the magic, while going from an author's tumblr/twitter to their works on ao3 can be like walking into a neighbor's studio and realizing they're michelangelo reincarnated. either way, multi-form engagement makes you value them as a person as much as you value the fruits of their labors.

on a less labyrinthine note, getting a message or comment from someone who read your stuff and loved it can be really comforting! someone who liked your work is among the followers who see your fandom theories and wildly thirsty tags. no matter how self-conscious you may get about Being Perceived, you now have at least one person who liked what they perceived.

that's what comforts me, anyway, as someone who is frequently anxious about making bad impressions and bothering people. it also encourages me to send off that complimentary message i've been thinking about sending for ages, even if i only do it anonymously. if i think i would appreciate getting a message like that, then it's worth doing.

🧿 - what steps do you take to not take things personally if a fic doesn't do well, or if your writing/posting/sharing experience isn't going how you'd like it to?

i really can't stress enough how much i write and post for myself more than for a potential audience. i tell the story that i want to read, not the one i've seen people wishing for. if the two end up being one and the same, that's the best feeling in the world, but it's not the motivating factor behind me writing/posting/sharing.

sometimes i do get less engagement on a fic than i thought i might and it makes me worry that i misread a character, or i write something that i find really funny that never gets commented on, but then i have to remind myself that i only post in the first place when i like it enough to post. if it's up, i've decided i liked it. i didn't decide it was perfect, and i didn't mind-read the fandom to figure out what they're looking for in a fic, and i don't need to as long as it's good enough for me. that's really the only step i take, i guess.

💌 - share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

rubbing my grubby little paws together because OH BOY, i have a Mission Impossible benji & ilsa hurt/comfort dawning-friendship fic coming down the pipes that is very soft and sweet to me, and involves benji braiding ilsa's hair because she's failed miserably at doing it on her own and she's never had anyone to do it for her. it's my sweet angel baby right now, at least until good omens comes out in 24 hours and my synapses misfire to permanently sear the word 'GAY' behind my eyes.

[rollercoasterwords]

any fave fox recommendations atm???

loving the hand that feeds🫶

hi thank u!! assuming 'fox' is meant to be 'fic' in which case - yes!! rubbing my evil little hands together oh i am so excited

oneshots

hackery by orphan_account - hackery!!! hackery hackery hackery. hackery <3 if u read one thing from this list PLEASE let it be hackery. under 2k words and changed me forever. picked me up and threw me against the wall and ripped out my spine and ate it. i re-read this allll the time because it is just so fucking good. dorcas/lily are at a party that gets ambushed during the first war. go fucking. read it right now.

i would kill for some company (temporarily) by lesbianregulusblack (@lesbiansiriusblack hi liv i am talking abt this again) - beautiful + dark + gorey pandalily fic where pandora is a vampire and lily is a human and it's very hard to say which one of them is more fucked up (check tags on this one - when i say dark + gorey i mean it i gasped as i read and i am a horror enthusiast!)

bibliomancy by redsnake05 - listen ok just LISTEN. yes this is irma pince/minerva mcgonagall. yes it is also irma pince/helga hufflepuff. just. LISTEN. this is one of the most unique stories i have ever read in this fandom. the writer created this whole lore where librarians are like. these otherworldly eternal beings and it follows irma pince's immortal life as she tends the hogwarts library and just. i love it. i love it so much.

completed fics

Notes on a resurrection by newleaves - ok this one is a drarry fix-it fic where unspeakable draco malfoy accidentally raises harry's dad from the dead. and harry's mum. and harry's favorite dada teacher. and--well, u get the picture. i am not kidding when i say this is one of my favorite fics EVER like ever ever ever the lovely @simmy75 recommended it to me and i am now eternally grateful to her bc it altered my brain chemicals permanently. Like. i will try not to go on and on but this is one of the most beautifully and uniquely written stories i have ever read!! it is complex and confusing and feels like trying to put a puzzle together because draco is SUCH an unreliable narrator and just!!! please go read it. even if u are not a drarry fan this fic is AMAZING

Of Memories and Milk Thievery by moonymoment (@blurryayse hi jude i already yelled at u abt how much i love this) - this is the most recent like. longer completed marauders fic that i've read and it!!! is!!!! so!!! good!!! perfect balance of angst and sweetness and jude's writing makes me run around in circles like a dog chasing its own tail. remus + sirius are exes co-parenting teddy + they are both so petty that it leads to shenanigans + confrontations + tears + a poorly-thought-out parent-trap style plot by teddy + harry.

wips

i feel a bit silly even putting this one down because if u follow me on tumblr then surely u are aware of it but! the only fanfic that i'm currently reading that i am like. actually regularly keeping up with is crimson rivers by zeppazariel (@zeppazariel hi zar my sister still needs to read the new ch but once she does she is going to agree w me about the bagel bc i am RIGHT) bc i am reading it along with my sister! hunger games jegulus au, if u aren't already reading this then u are missing out i promise u it is soooooo fun (for angst-enjoyers. for everyone else...well.)

however! i also have...18 ongoing wips that i have like. started reading but have not had time to keep up with simply because. that is so many. and life is so busy. and also ao3 doesn't send me emails even tho i'm subscribed for some reason (if anyone knows how to fix this please help meeeee)

but anyway here are some of my favorites of those that i've started for anyone looking for some wips to get into!!

Invisible String by a1phab3ts0up - dorlene pirate au!!! dorlene pirate au <3 enemies to lovers <3 dorcas and marlene are rival pirate captains who reluctantly agree to work together !!! background wolfstar and jegulus and marylily! i absolutely cannot WAIT to catch up on this

honey honey by aeoneskova (@aeoneskova) - au where marlene survives the first war and raises harry. i've only read the first chapter but this is like. at the top of my list for once i have more time to read longer fics bc the first chapter was so fucking good!!!

A Darling, A Demon, A Lamb by brightened - this one is a very dark alice/lily first war fic told from lily's pov. very very heavy so please check warnings + everything if u decide to read - i love angst and i love dark fics and this is beautifully written so i'm kind of obsessed <3 currently on hiatus but the day it comes back i will be devouring it posthaste

when it's warm again by moonymoment (@blurryayse hello again jude. i have only made it through the first two ch of this i think but rest assured that i will once again become a cat dragging dead birds to ur doorstep once i have time to sit down and finish it <3 ) - another moonymoment fic!! because nobody is doing it like jude!! mermaid remus and human sirius <3 kicking and screaming and jumping up and down and chewing on my fingers. (also this one is almost done!!! one ch to go??? wowowowowow)

[strawberrymilkgeorge]

Part Six. Movies and Speedruns

warnings: swearing, many memes word count: 3.8k (not including pictures) (wow okay ash pop off!) 

behind the screen (irl!dream x f!reader) series masterlist ultimate masterlist

A/N: LETS ALL JUST AGREE TO NOT LOOK AT THE DATES ON TWEETS AND STUFF BC SOME CHAPTERS ARE SO SCUFFED WITH DATES!!!! JUST KNOW THIS STORY STARTS MID NOVEMBER!!!!!!!! (in a world where covid doesn’t exist btw)

**********

.

**********

Unknowingly and unintentionally, Y/n let out a big sigh as she poured a glass of water.

"What's wrong, Y/n?" Naomi asked gently, coming up behind her and hugging her tightly.

"Peter."

Naomi hummed, a sign that she was waiting for Y/n to lead the conversation so she could follow because if it were up to Naomi, she would immediately start trash-talking Peter and she wasn't sure if that was the vibe right now or not.

Y/n shook her head in disbelief as she jumped up to sit on the counter. "He got so mad when he found out I slept over at Karl's."

"I'm sorry, Y/n. I wish you would just cut him off completely."

"I don't know. I know I should but... part of me wonders if he could ever go back to how he was when I met him. I would probably date that guy again but not who he turned out to be."

Naomi looked horrified. "No. You sound like you're considering hearing him out. No, is that a joke? He's a bad person."

"I'm not," Y/n reassured. "I'm just thinking hypothetically. Probably because I miss having someone..."

"Y/n, you have a ton of thirsty people in your mentions. If you really want someone that bad, just scroll through, land on one and I bet they're a million times better than that sack of burned potatoes."

Y/n rolled her eyes but smiled lightly. "Most of those are jokes."

"Not all of them," she teased.

"I know you're going to tell me anyway so just say it. Who specifically do you think isn't joking?"

"Dream," Naomi sang.

"Okay, crazy." Y/n reached over, staying seated on the counter as she grabbed a bowl from a cabinet on her left. She then leaned all the way right, reaching as far as she could, but couldn't quite grab a cereal box from the top of the refrigerator.

Naomi rolled her eyes as she helped, handing Y/n the box. She even went the extra step to get Y/n a spoon and the milk because she was that nice. "I'm not joking. Neither is he. Karl and I have talked about it and we both agree."

Y/n paused at her friend's words, her hand hovering over the milk that Naomi held out for her. "You guys gossip about my love life?"

Naomi set the milk next to Y/n, tired of holding it out for her. "Of course? Like we don't do that about Karl? Or you and him about me?"

She couldn't argue there.

"Karl says there's a different vibe from Dream when you join calls and I believe it. I mean, I've seen it during streams myself so I can only imagine how much more obviously in love with you he is during private calls.

"That 'vibe' is Karl's delusional mind creating things. He's too scared to talk to cameragirl so he's projecting onto Dream and I."

"Yeah, okay," Naomi agreed sarcastically.

Y/n huffed. "Besides, he's in Florida. I'm in North Carolina, in case you weren't aware."

"So you're saying if you lived in the same state, you'd date him?"

"I didn't say that." She honestly had never thought of it. Sure she liked hanging out with Dream and her stomach got butterflies when he talked directly to her and he made her smile harder than anyone ever had and he—

And she didn't like him like that. She had only officially met the guy like a week and a half ago and she didn't know what he looked like. There was no way you could catch feelings for someone without seeing them.

Naomi's expression fell again. "Distance doesn't matter, anyway."

"I swear if you say something about George I will slap you," she threatened through a smile and Naomi gave her an innocent grin back.

"If you're lonely, get on Tinder, not Peter. Or get on Dream. I have no qualms with that."

"Peter isn't even an option, Naomi." Y/n sighed, ignoring the comment about Dream.  "Also," she swallowed the last of her cereal and set the bowl down with a clank. "I'm gonna tell Peter I don't want to be friends anymore. Dream and George can be added to the list of Peter haters."

"You talked to them about it?"

She nodded. "You know how I have little gossip sessions with George? Well, Dream was there too this time."

"Well, of course Dream would hate Peter. We've established that he likes you."

"No, no, you and Karl delusionally hypothesized that."

Naomi tapped the counter methodically, a sign Y/n knew to signal that she was thinking hard. "Somehow, one day, I'll prove he does."

"Good luck."

"Wanna watch a movie?"

"Yes," Y/n perked up. "Go pick something, I'll get blankets."

She went to her room, grabbing her favorite cuddling blankets. She started leaving her room when she heard a ding on her open desktop, signaling that she had a call incoming from Discord. Cool timing.

"I'll be just a second, Naomi!" she called across the house before dropping the blankets on her bed and sliding her headset on, answering the call from Dream. "Hi, Dream!" She sat on her chair and tucked her knees to her chest.

"Hi," he greeted sweetly. "How are you doing today?"

"Much better than when we last talked. How are you?"

"Great now that I'm talking to you," he said smoothly. Y/n rolled her eyes but smiled anyway. "Are you busy?"

"Unfortunately, yes. My roommate and I are about to watch a movie."

"Ooh, what movie?"

"Not sure yet. Any suggestions?"

"Dark Knight. Unless you wanted me to say, like, Tangled or something."

"Yeah, girls' night is exclusively princess movies. Do you know nothing?"

"Apparently," he said with a laugh.

"What's up?"

"Oh, well, I was just gonna see if you wanted to be on call later with me, George, and Sapnap while I stream speedruns, but you're hanging out with your roommate so nevermind."

"Oh," Y/n deflated. "That sounds fun."

"I can push it back if you want to be part of it. If not, that's fine. I just thought it would be cool."

"No, no, no I really do want to, but I don't want you to have to push it back. When were you planning on starting?"

"In about an hour."

"I'll just join later if you're still playing. If that's okay that I come late."

"No. You have to be on time or not at all," he joked. "Of course that's fine," he assured. "And if I'm not playing anymore, you can still join... we usually talk for forever after we play games and it's fun. I would, er, we would love for you to hang out with us."

Y/n couldn't help the large smile on her face from staying even after they hung up and she walked back into the living room with her pile of blankets. She couldn't help it even when Naomi pointed it out and asked why she was so happy.

"Oh, uh, I've been invited to join Dream and them later for a stream."

"That vague answer doesn't warrant the shit-eating grin you have."

Y/n shrugged and cuddled more into her blankets. "What movie did you pick?"

*****

As the end credits rolled across the screen, Y/n yawned and looked over to Naomi in the dark. She was out like a light. Y/n stood up and made sure Naomi was covered in the blanket and she had a pillow. She crept back to her room and slid her headphones on, pulling up Discord where she saw the three boys' names still in a voice call.

She pulled up Twitch on her second monitor and looked for Dream's stream. It was already about an hour in. She clicked on it and her headphones echoed with the sound of George and Sapnap laughing like they said the funniest thing in the world.

"Shut up," Dream muttered. "Guys, what were the coords for the portal? Seriously, come on."

"Nobody tell him," George joked.

"George!"

"Where's Bugsyyyy?" Sapnap whined. "I want her to make fun of you with us."

"Half the stuff we're making fun of him for is about his big fat crush on her so..."

"George!" Dream yelled again. "No, it's not!"

Y/n smiled as she heard that, knowing it was a joke but laughing at the way Dream laughed at the accusation. She knew it wasn't serious or else they wouldn't talk about it on stream. George and Sapnap teased a lot, but certainly, they wouldn't out someone's crush in front of a hundred thousand viewers live.

"Oh!" Sapnap spoke out loud as George laughed loudly, both reading the text at the same time. "Speaking of..."

Dream waited for either of the two boys to elaborate but neither of them offered one. "What happened?"

"Bugsy texted us," George said off-handedly, typing a response to her. "She's coming in a second."

"Oh."

"What do you mean 'oh'?" Sapnap laughed.

"You guys have a groupchat?"

"Aw, jealous?" George asked.

Y/n joined at that moment, the first sentence coming from her Discord instead of Twitch being from Sapnap saying, "Would it make you more jealous to know our group name is Bugsy's Boys?"

"No, Sapnap, that's the one with Karl," George corrected. "The one with just you, me, and her is Bugsy's Boyfriends."

"WhAT?"

"I still don't approve of that, by the way," Y/n commented.

"Bugsy!!" Sapnap giggled happily. "You're finally here!"

"BUGSY!" George cheered.

"Hi guys!" Y/n laughed at the enthusiasm she was greeted with. "Hi, Dream!"

There was a few seconds of silence before, "Dream!!" George yelled right before the death screen appeared on the Twitch tab still opened on Y/n's right screen. "You idiot, what are you doing?! Why did you throw that run??"

She covered her mouth with the hoodie collar and laughed. "Off to a great start, bud."

"NO!" Dream yelled, knocking something, or somethings, off his desk. "Noooo! I didn't throw it, George, I FELL! Oh, that was going to be such a good run."

"What happened? How did you miss that huge ravine?" George asked while laughing. "It was literally right in the open. You didn't even try to use your water bucket."

"I-I was... I was distracted."

"By what? The completely open field with nothing blocking your vision?" Sapnap criticized with a laugh as well.

Y/n giggled to herself before letting her eyes trail to his chat, which was filled with the same accusations and guesses.

user5: BUGSY!

user2: DISTRACTED BY BUGSYS VOICE

user4: imagine saying hi so cutely that you make a man fall into a ravine

user1: are they dumb? obviously bugsy saying hi made his brain short-circut

user6: guys stop it wasn't bc she said hi. it was the g i g g l e

user3: DISTRACTED BY BUGSY!!!!

user8: HI BUGSY

user10: how to kill a man: hire bugsy to giggle and say hi directly to him

Y/n immediately blushed and covered her face again. She really had a habit of hiding even when no one could see her.

"Oh my gosh," Dream groaned, leaving the world and starting a new one. "Oh. My. Gosh. That's so annoying. I was doing so good."

"Oh," Sapnap laughed. "I understand now."

"What? What did I miss?" George asked.

"Just read chat," Sapnap explained. "They have the answer. Dream, your chat is so smart. Thanks for solving the mystery, chat!"

"No, they aren't ri— that isn't true!" Dream defended. "Chat, shut up."

"You sure?" Y/n asked teasingly, watching as his character paused when she started talking. Was she really making him this flustered just by talking? Surely not. He was just playing into the joke. He continued playing without saying anything, which made George and Sapnap laugh more.

The subject eventually changed and the atmosphere quickly became more relaxed and chill. Tonight was not a feral night like George had texted in all caps.

"Hey George," Y/n started, biting on her hoodie string with a smile because she knew Naomi would hear this when she watched the VOD the next day. "My roommate says hello."

"Oh my gosh," he muttered, making her laugh. "Let it go."

"Wow, I guess that's one way to treat your fans..."

"Fine," he sighed. "Tell her I say hello."

"Well, not if you don't mean it," Y/n teased.

"Yeah, George, you sound so unenthusiastic?" Sapnap asked.

"He's just flustered," Dream commented. "It's okay George, you can have feelings."

"Dream, you fell into a ravine because Bugsy said hi."

"Oh, come on! That's not—I just— I missed the jump! That's it!"

"I'm not flustered or unenthusiastic, I'm just tired, okay?" George explained, ignoring Dream, a yawn spilling out of him to prove it.

Y/n smiled. "Well, you could always let me give her your number if you really want..."

"No. If she had Discord you could give her that but not my phone number."

"Wait, really?" Y/n gasped. "Seriously?"

George laughed lightly. "Yeah, sure, why not?"

"YES! Okay, a huge win for the girls. Well, a huge loss for the fangirls but a huge win for the girls of this apartment."

"Oh my gosh," he muttered and she could practically see him rubbing his face in embarrassment.

"I'll send you her hashtag when she makes one so you know who to add back."

"She's going to make an account just to talk to George?" Sapnap giggled.

"Yes, dude!" Y/n defended. "She at least wants to be his friend, let her shoot her shot!"

Dream ended the steam soon after, not being able to focus enough to beat the end on any of his runs. He had streamed for just under two hours so he seemed to be getting tired as well. George went to bed soon after and after 20 minutes of talking with Sapnap and Dream, Sapnap mysteriously disappeared.

Y/n was about to leave as well, not wanting Dream to feel obligated to stay on the call with her when he spoke up.

"Does Naomi actually like George?"

"Yeah, she does."

"Then I want him to accept her love."

Y/n laughed. "How is he with long-distance relationships?"

"Well, he and I do just fine..." Dream joked. "Oh, not what you meant. I don't know, you guys are the ones that talk about each other's love lives apparently."

"You're still bitter about that?"

"Yes!"

"Suck it up," she laughed. "Naomi would do probably anything to date him so I doubt distance is a problem for her."

"George's sleep schedule is completely messed up, so the time difference wouldn't matter too much. And when he comes to America they can meet in person."

"Wait, he's coming to America?" Y/n gasped happily. "When?"

"There's no set date, but yeah eventually. He'll probably just come to Florida but we've all talked about having a huge meetup with a lot of our friends."

"Oh... cool..."

"Bug? You know you'd be invited to that, right?"

"Oh, really?" she smiled.

"Of course. You're part of the group now."

"Sick," she muttered to herself, but he heard.

"Bug, you're one of my favorite people, do you know that?"

She blushed. "Really?"

"Really."

"You barely know me, Dream."

"Yeah, well, I know enough to know that I'm sorta attached to you."

"Attached to me? In what way?"

He suddenly sounded nervous as if his brain caught up with what his mouth was saying. "I don't know, nevermind."

"No, Dream, what do you mean?" her voice was soft and understanding and it made him feel safe.

"I just... I don't know. I care about you a lot. We met only, what, like a week or two ago, and I already worry about you a lot. Playing games doesn't feel the same anymore unless you're playing with us."

"To be fair, we have been tweeting at each other for much longer than a week or two."

"Yeah, that's true. But it's not the same as actually talking to you."

She smiled shyly. "I care about you a lot too, Clay." His name sounded strange as if it suddenly made everything much more serious. "Sorry, that just kinda slipped. I won't call you Clay if you don't want me to—"

"No, it's okay, it, uh, I like hearing you... say it. But, uh, you can call me whatever you want."

She smiled widely at the nervousness in his voice and the hard pounding of her heart. "I've heard from multiple people that you never stop talking about me."

He laughed timidly. "Maybe. Do you talk about me?"

"Ask Karl," she giggled. "My guess is yes." Her stomach felt tingly and her hands shook lightly. Why did she feel like this all of a sudden? It was late, she reasoned. That, or it was because Naomi had planted the seed of curiosity in her mind. Did Dream like her? No... right?

"I'm sorry if my chat was making you uncomfortable at the beginning when I died..."

"Don't worry, I wasn't uncomfortable."

"It was true, by the way," he paused, "what they were saying. Just... in case you were wondering."

Y/n couldn't wipe the smile off her face, which was growing painful at this point. "What, my voice makes your brain short-circut? That was one comment I saw."

Dream laughed. "More like your entire presence, but... yeah I guess so."

How is someone supposed to respond to something like that? The sweetness in his voice almost made her sick but in a good way.

And just like when he named her Minecraft flower something sweet knowing that no one would see it, why was he still playing up the joke when no one was around?

Not knowing what to say, she decided to let him in on a little secret. "If it matters, you're one of my favorite people too."

"It does."

There was a deathly moment of tense silence as if both of them were screaming to say something but neither did.

"Basically, if we do have a meet-up, I'll sue you if you don't come."

Y/n laughed. "My pockets are empty, sir, so... good luck."

He laughed and it was music to her ears.

"Are you not nervous to show everyone your face? Like, if or when we do all get together."

"Not really. Especially not if it's just to our friends. Are you?"

"Yeah," she admitted.

"Why?"

She sighed. "I'm sure people have me painted in a specific way in their heads and I've seen fanart of me that is way different and way more attractive than I am. I just don't want to let anyone down by not living up to their expectations."

"Bug," Dream said softly, "you couldn't let anyone down."

"You don't know that."

"You can't disappoint real friends or real fans with the way you look."

"To be clear, Dream," she laughed nervously, afraid she would sound conceited, "I don't think I'm ugly. I like the way I look. I'm happy with me. But that doesn't mean I can't still let people down."

"Different than expected doesn't mean disappointing."

His words smacked her in the gut. He was right. Reality and imagination are very different. Neither has to be better or worse than the other. She could look the complete opposite of how someone expects but that doesn't mean they will be either disappointed OR pleased. And why does it matter anyway? If she likes how she looks, who cares what other people think?

"It's also scary to think of getting recognized in public," she admitted. "Being recognized from the start is one thing because it starts off slowly with only a few people knowing your face but if the first time people see your face is when you have millions of fans, the recognition would be overwhelming."

"That's true. I don't think I would mind that much, though."

"Of course not, you're you."

"What does that mean?"

"You like the spotlight."

"I guess. Not all the time."

"Well, what about you?" she asked. "Are you afraid of people knowing what you look like?"

"No. I want to do a face reveal soon but I don't know how I would do it. I want to do it at some kind of event or something but I don't know."

"I need to schedule around when you do it because you'll break the internet. Give us content creators a warning so we can prepare to not get viewers for a week."

Dream laughed. "Oh come on."

"Twitter would just be full of the same picture of you in every single tweet."

"It won't be that big of a deal."

"Something tells me your millions and millions of subs say otherwise."

"Whatever," he said. "As if you wouldn't break the internet too."

"Maybe for a day or two. But you'd break everything for weeks."

"Sure." There was a long pause before Dream softly said, "Karl's lucky."

"How so?"

He didn't speak for a moment, almost like he wasn't prepared for that question because he didn't mean to be heard. "I wish I could know you the way he does."

"You could. He and I knew each other in person first so it's different. You and I could get there eventually."

"You think so?"

"I know so. I trust you a scary amount for someone I met weeks ago."

"I didn't mean to sound like I'm trying to pressure you into showing me your face or telling me your name. I didn't mean like he gets to know what you look like and I don't. I meant, like, I wish we could hang out in person because I prefer that over talking in Discord."

"I get it, Clay. I feel the same way," Y/n said softly. There were a few moments of silence before she spoke again.

"Oh, gosh, it's already four."

Y/n's head snapped to look at her clock, which read 3:57am. "Already?" she whispered. "Dang."

As if acknowledging the time changed the atmosphere, it suddenly felt like 4am. Her back ached from her shifting in her chair so much over the last few hours, never being able to find a good position. The house was eerily quiet and all she heard was the low hum of the heater. The house felt stale, not used to its occupants being so alert and awake at that hour.

"I should probably go to bed..."

"Yeah, me too," Dream agreed. His voice sounded tired. "Thanks for joining us, it was really fun with you."

"Thanks for inviting me. Sorry I made you die. Hopefully you'll still let me back again."

"You're always invited to barge into my streams. Actually."

Y/n giggled again and mentally slapped herself for sounding like a little kid. "Well, you too. You can interrupt my streams anytime."

"I'll hold you to that."

"Goodnight, Clay."

"Goodnight, Bug."

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