#ooc: i'm sorry this isn't the first post on the blog. it took a long while to write it out.

[confusingangels]

IN HIS YOUTH, Rob Cantor would often feel left out and forgotten. It was because of this that he decided to start a band with a high school friend named Zubin Sedghi, who would go on to invite another person (who they knew through a mutual friend) named Andrew Horowitz. After this, the three would end up being contacted by Bora Karaca, who had an interest in joining the band after seeing them start it.

They would agree to letting Bora in, and he would be appointed Lead Guitarist. It was around this time as well that they would meet Steve Gallagher, who also was interested in joining a band.

The four members would let Steve in, and he was appointed the Drummer. However, after a short while of him being in the band, he would leave abruptly. No one quite knew why. Perhaps he just did not want to be the Drummer anymore, because of creative differences or something similar.

After he left, the remaining members began looking for a new Drummer, which they found through one of Bora's old friends from school, Ross Federman, who was interested in drumming.

They held a sort of, 'audition', mainly because at the time there was another man who wanted to join who appeared more skilled to Ross.

However, they heard Ross play, and they wanted him in the band more. And so he joined, and the completed band would be named Tally Hall, after a closed food court which was close to where the members (besides Andrew) grew up.

They would tour around the United States upon completing their first album, Marvin's Marvelous Mechanical Museum in 2005, which was named after a museum that they would visit consisting of old, coin-operated machines and a lot of interesting items.

But after a while, things began to get..a little strange.

During concerts, someone would almost always mess up a couple songs in some way. No one knew what was happening, but it started to get a little worrying after a while.

Stranger things would happen as well. Someone suddenly bolting off stage when performing, instruments being dropped, them playing the songs off-tune and barely singing the lyrics. A lot of things happened.

One day, on stage, everything was going normal; things were being played well, everyone looked happy, nothing looked wrong.

But something felt off. Very, very off.

During 'Just Apathy', Rob seemed..almost scared to start singing. Nobody knew why until nearly the end of the song when he collapsed on stage.

Everyone immediately set their instruments down and ran up to him, and people in the back of the crowd would try and peer forward to see what was going on, why they had suddenly stopped playing.

There was a curtain lowered, and the five members didn't come back out again that night.

After three days of that incident happening, a band member (Most likely Zubin Sedghi, the media is lost) would go on to talk about what was next for the band.

Someone would say, “Oh, Rob's fine. We were just really excited to play that night, is all,” when he would infact not be fine.

Tally Hall would go on to play one more concert before suddenly going on a break. All they would say about it is, “We're terribly sorry to anyone excited to go to our future concerts, but we have decided to go on a break for a while.”

No one's quite sure how long they would be on break for, but whenever they would appear on a radio show or an interview, Rob would not be there. Fans started to get concerned; the man was, essentially, completely wiped off the face of the earth, as he didn't post on any of his social medias either.

They still don't really know what happened to Rob. He was just..gone. He had posted something only once, three days after the break, and then never again.

Missing posters started to appear around town, even; but no one would ever call the number, because no one had information on him.

Those posters would get more faded every day and eventually just disappear.

Nobody knew if he was even still alive, and they still don't.

But, eight months after the break, the Tally Hall recording studio would start to receive mysterious packages and letters that were highly believed by the band members to be sent by Rob.

Ross would often be the one opening them, and the contents would vary from scribbled out drawings and messages to stuffed animals and even more.

These would severely unnerve Ross, and so he never told any of the other members about these things until the third one came in; a package with four stuffed animals, each one with a note on it to each Tally.

We're not quite sure what they were, as they never said, only showing the box as proof of a send-in from somebody.

The post that contained the image of the box read, “We got a rather strange package in today. The address wasn't specific at all, so we don't know how it could have possibly been delivered here.”

But the rest of the packages and letters are a different story.

For now, no one has seen Rob in a long while. We hope he'll show up again in something soon.

[chordata-on-alterhumanity]

best way to have/cause memories, if possible?

Hey! Sorry this took so long for me to get to. I've had a ton going on and I really wanted to properly sit down and collect my thoughts to give you an answer. That said, I'm just me and I'm bound to not be able to look at this from every possible perspective, so I'm sure other people will think of things that should be said about the topic or tips on how to make/find memories as a linker that I can't think of, so if someone reads this and thinks of smth additional, please add it in a reply or reblog of this post!!!

-didn't proofread this. Sorry about typos!-

(edits this almost a month after posting) I just realized that i answered this pertaining to otherlinking even though the ask doesn't specify that... I guess my mind assumed that's what it's talking about because I mostly talk about linking on this blog currently. Hope that was the case or my information is helpful regardless. Anyway, edit end -

Memories as an otherlinker can be made or come to be through a wide range of causes. They can be intentionally crafted or come unexpectedly. What really matters isn't the way they're gathered, but how they feel. A memory needs to feel "right", "correct", "true". You can try spending a lot of time convincing yourself that xy event happened as your linktype, but if it doesn't sit right (i.e. feels out of character, too ideal to be realistic, etc), it'll be a lot harder for you to incorporate it into your linktype's past.

For me, personally, memories seem to ring the most true if I don't have to do much thinking about them. I like the random sort of memory aquisition most. I'll have a random thought, I briefly question if it's connected to my linktype, and if it fits, I feel it fits. If it doesn't fit, I get a negative feeling. The exact feeling can vary in both form (distaste, discomfort, irritation, annoyance, ...) and strength (mild to strong). I can also feel neutrally about it. I tend to not view memories as mine if they make me feel neutral or negative. The positive ones, I consider.

Once I have such a memory than can stick to my linktype because it feels "right" (in character, I feel good about it), I can let that sit for a while or immediately start thinking about the story around it. Why did that happen/Why was that a thing? It's basically the same process as before. Whatever explanation feels "right" can most easily lead to more memories.

Otherlink memories don't have to be memories of specific events, btw. It can also just be general knowledge. That's called noema, with the plural version being noemata (this term was coined for otherkin but is free to use for experiences from other groups as far as I know). Like, you can remember that your favourite pair of shoes was red, but you don't know that because you remember an exact moment where you put on your shoes. You can remember a fact, not an event. But remembering a fact can lead to remembering events and vice versa!

Triggers for creating/getting memories can be utterly random. I'm so sorry I can't give you specific tips there. I'll talk about my experience for a little.

For my Raihan linktype, I had the random thought that it'd be funny if Raihan had a Beautifly, and then I thought "Well actually why not?". It felt ooc at first, but then I realized it's exactly something that fits into the Raihan I am. This spun into a whole bunch of memories, going off of my relationship to Beautifly, my living situation, how I wasn't particularly fond of being seen in public with it because it didn't fit my public image, but that conflicted with how I loved spending time with it in nature. Then the - you can call it worldbuilding at this point - rolled off away from Beautifly and to other people I don't have in canon and how I met them. A vacation in the Hoenn region, meeting a Tropius there... Can you see what I mean with one thing leading to the next?

What I just described wasn't information I sat down for and gathered within a day. It instead happened over weeks, months. Once you find a memory that feels right, don't rush into finding the next. Let your mind process it for a while and get comfortable. If you rush things, from my experience, it becomes harder to find more potential memories that feel true.

Dreams about your linktype can also be triggers for memories! They're very potent ones because dreams come with feelings, so it becomes easier to adapt the experienced events as memories because there's already an emotional connection there. I don't recommend blindly accepting all dreams as memories, though. Dreams can be non-sensical, chaotic, and also uncomfortable or downright nightmares. Do yourself a favor and dismiss dreams/nightmares that'll drag you down if you dwell on them. Or at least think it through properly first.

It's also helpful to try searching for memories that are related to, or a re-interpretation of your irl life. For example, if you really like bugs, you can think about whether or not you caught bugs in your linktype's childhood. Or let current events inspire you, i.e. whatever weather it is where you're at - are there any memorable things that happened as your linktype while in similar weather? Walking through rainy puddles while in a large city as your linktype, having your clothes blown in your face by windy weather, roasting in the sun during sunny we... Think about the most special or most mundane things. Or inbetween. Anything could be your inspiration and lead you to ideas that resonate as memories!

If you decide something's a memory, and then later realize that it doesn't fit after all, feel free to change your mind on it. You can "drop" memories.

I'm trying to think of more, but I think that's all I got... I hope this helps!

[aelaer]

Hey dear, do you still play the ask game? If you don’t mind, here’s 🎁💡💘? Thank you so much for your answer!!!

From this post.

This one actually reminded me that it existed and I finally had a couple hours of energy to answer them yayyyy.

💘 Is it easier to write angst or fluff? I can write both, so long as neither is romantic in nature ahahahah. I don't know if either is easier or harder in nature--it more depends on my mood? I think it's harder to write a contained plot with fluff that isn't wildly OOC with the characters I write. It's definitely possible, and done quite well by some authors, but I think it can be harder. There's more angsty situations presented in canon and by the nature of their personalities.

💡How many WIPs do you currently have? Oh boy. So I am *not* counting the ones in the LOTR fandom that have remained untouched for like, a decade, haha. RIP LOTR. With the MCU... *sigh*

Ones that have a lot of content for them (one-shots are over 50% done, multi-chaptered fics have at least 20k written): 4 pieces

One-shots that have a scene written for them that I'm still planning to finish and publish: 2 pieces

Multi-chaptered fics that are unlikely to ever be finished/published due to being crossovers that I was way too ambitious about: 2 pieces

One-shots that have outlines that I still plan on completing: 3 pieces (these are all prompt fics requested in 2019 and 2020... I'm so sorry... the asker likely isn't even in the fandom anymore, lmao)

One-shots that are remaining prompt asks that have nothing planned yet: 2 pieces (including the new 2022 one from blossom, I'm so sorry, lord know when I'll get to it with this current schedule)

Floating snippets that are just ideas with no set plot to them, and thus may never be published beyond this blog: 3 pieces. Snippets really.

So 6-16 depending on what you count as a WIP.

🎁 Have a piece of a WIP you want to share? I posted two of the snippets in the other asks. Here's one from a one-shot that's like 90% done, I just need to figure out how I want to end it (which is harder than I'd like -- endings can be rough for me. Will probably need to ask my beta for her ideas because it hasn't gone anywhere for 2 years >.<)

.....

It was during one passing group, just as he was about to give his excuses, that Wong learned that the kid had super-hearing. A rather unfortunate time to discover such a fact.

And once Peter learned the news, it was just a matter of a few texts before every Avenger knew.

"We'd like to help out," Tony said, being the first to call Wong. Wong had given his number to a couple Avengers on the off-chance Stephen was wounded while working with them. He hadn't expected his number to be used in this fashion.

"Us sorcerers handle our own affairs," was Wong's gruff reply. "Besides, aren't you supposed to be retired?"

"Special occasion."

Wong said, "We're fine," and hung up before Tony could retort, then sighed. Stephen would be displeased if Iron Man ended up dying after all the work he did to save him in the multiple future fiasco. He was just happy Stephen managed to get to 16 million (and severely lower the amount of time it took to get everyone who left back), but that was another topic altogether.

Then Tony gave out Wong's number to the others.

"It really would be no trouble," Steve said. "We consider all of you our allies after Thanos."

"You're supposed to be retired, too," was Wong's exasperated retort.

A pause. "Well, I did pass on the mantle of Captain America to Sam, sure, but that doesn't mean I don't go out in the field here and there. Just less public."

Wong hung up on him, too.

"We really would like to see him safe," was Bruce's call.

Bruce was a little harder to hang up on; he had been visiting the New York Sanctum frequently for meditation purposes, to better understand and work with the other side of his personality and come to some sort of balance with it. According to Stephen, Bruce had achieved something like this on his own in other futures, but he was certain the resources at Kamar-Taj could help him achieve this faster and with potentially better results.

Still, Bruce Banner was not a sorcerer. "I appreciate the offer, Doctor Banner, but this is a matter for our order," he told him, then hung up before the other could retort.

"It's pretty slow right now; you'd be doing everyone a favor in letting us help," Natasha admitted when she called.

Wong pulled the phone away from his face to sigh; if it weren't for the very slim chance of Stephen potentially calling him, he would have turned off the damn thing. "Weren't you supposed to retire from field work, too?"

"People like me never retire," she answered. "Think on it, Wong."

He grimaced and hung up.

"You have to let us help!" was Peter's plea. Peter had been barred from the Sanctum until the issue was settled—Wong knew that Stephen wouldn't want the kid involved—but apparently Tony Stark was more than happy to give Peter Parker his phone number, as well.

"Stephen would want you to stay out of this," he told the kid without ceremony, and hung up on him, too, though he felt a little bad doing it.

This was getting ridiculous. The other Masters had decided the Avengers shouldn't be involved, but if they had to endure what Wong was enduring, maybe they'd change their minds. Besides, the extra eyes wouldn't be a bad thing to have, at least in Wong's opinion. 

By the time a sixth call from an Avenger in under an hour occurred, Wong was ready. He positioned himself in the Masters' strategy room as they discussed leads and next steps, then let the phone ring beside the others.

They caved in less than two hours.