#plus I get the feeling the twist at the end with neil showing up was setting us up for more future mafia plot!

[fortheloveofexy]

look I know nora said we're only getting one more book but tbh I am just waiting for the day she pops back on here to begrudgingly tell us that tsc2 got too long and she's had to split it in half (again)

[animentality]

(Leaps in askbox now its clear) Howdy! I'm curious about your opinions on the companions, like initial thoughts and now that you've clocked in an unhealthy (affectionate) amount of hours? We know what you'd change but how about everyone as is? Thanks!

Alrighty, I can finally answer this one...

Ok.

Man. This is gonna be a long one.

We're gonna start with the shorter opinions first.

Minthara:

I have not done a run where Minthara was alive in Act 2. I literally know almost nothing about her.

I think she's hot and has the sexiest voice of all the female characters, but I know nothing about her story, other than she was a lesbian with Orin. I do wanna try and romance her, but.

Who knows if I'll ever get around to it.

Minsc:

I get that he's a fan favorite from the old games, but I kind of hate him. He feels like fanservice, and I didn't get a nostalgia boner for him, so he does nothing for me as a character.

I honestly kill him. Not out of malice, just more out of, why even have him be here?

Plus I tend to go through the entire game without swapping my party members, because I'm pretending it's a real dnd campaign.

And I ain't changing my team comp for this weirdo who only shows up at the very end.

Sorry to his hamster when I kill him, though.

Jaheira:

She's ok. I don't hate her, but she doesn't do it for me. I don't get why she's Russian. And apparently the only Russian in the whole game.

She also feels like fanservice.

Plus she fucking drops ice storms on everyone's goddamn HEADS when they're already in Hunger of Hadar, and honestly?

We have beef. I let her die sometimes, for that crime specifically. I also skip her house, because it doesn't have good loot, besides the scimitars, and I don't play races or classes that use scimitars. like ever.

Halsin:

I like Halsin generally, he's inoffensive to me, but his "romance" is so bad. It's shallow, it feels tacked on, which it was, and everyone knows how much I HATE how little his sexual trauma is focused on.

I romanced him twice, and both times, I was underwhelmed and kind of shrugged him off.

He should just be a fling option like Mizora. He shouldn't have become a "romance" option. It's fine for him to be a big buff bear hippie that you can fuck, but a companion?

He's got nothing to do with Act 3. It's a detriment to his character and the game, tbh.

Ok, that's the smaller ones out of the way. Now mains:

Astarion:

I got into BG3 for Astarion.

I fully admit it. I saw a scene of him screaming at Tav for blasting him with the sun beam from the githyanki creche, and it was funny as fuck.

Neil Newbon is highly charismatic, and truly elevates a character I don't find that physically attractive. His personality and enthusiasm shine through, and his voice acting is superb. And I am a sucker for angst and redemption and themes of abuse and breaking free of toxic relationships. And darkly, I admit. I do like the more twisted nature of his backstory, the way he had to use his body to survive, has a bad relationship with sex, and was tortured repeatedly. As anyone who reads my writing knows...I am a disgusting sadistic pervert.

That being said.

I no longer like Astarion. Well. No. I like Astarion.

I don't like his fans, or his rhetoric. Astarion has the better writing of BG3, but the lack of nuance from his fans annoys the shit out of me, and overexposure to him as a character, since Tumblr and TikTok are obsessed with him?

No me gusta. I don't hate him as a character, but I can't stand to see Astarion is so perfect posts. He's not, and that's the whole point. He's awful, but you people don't appreciate that. I don't want to see Astarion x Tav headcanons. And I especially do not care about the BookTok crowd being obsessed with him because they just like a dommy vampire, and disrespect his narrative with absolutely no self awareness.

BookTok Astarion is SO GODDAMN BORING. They really just reduce him to a hot dommy vampire daddy, and that's why I never take BookTok recs. Pure garbage.

So. TL;DR - I got BG3 for him, but overexposure to his fans made me be significantly less interested in him. It's a good thing. If I was obsessed with Astarion, I'd be forced to interact with his fans. Thank god for Gortash... I'm free of that prison.

Lae'zel:

I loved Lae'zel the minute she was mean to me.

She's hot as fuck, like seriously, so hot, her neck makes me sweat something fierce, and her voice is sultry and raspy and hostile. just how i like my women.

But I admit...she's too fucking meta. gameplay wise, she's probably the strongest companion you can have for DPS...so I admit...I've had her on my teams so much, that I am sick of her.

And again! It's not because she's badly written. I actually think her character is really strong, and really awesome. I also think her arc is amazing, going from this devoted cult member to basically saying I'm going to fucking kill a god.

I actually teared up a little at the creche this one time, when I had to beg her to stay, and she was like, you knew I had no other path to follow, but this one, or something like that.

But.

But I have beaten the game with her in my party like three times. I've had her in my party on Honor mode like...a million times.

So, tl;dr - I love her to death, but gameplay wise, she's so strong that I can't play her anymore.

Shadowheart:

Ok...I admit it.

I don't like Shadowheart. I find her boring visually, because she's just this generically hot white girl. She was designed to be the companion that all straight cis white men would want to see naked, and that's fine but uh.

Does absolutely nothing for me.

I don't care for her personality either. I don't like her lines, all coy and vaguely condescending. I don't really like how mean she is to you, and it's different from Lae'zel, because at least Lae'zel came from a warrior culture that doesn't put much value on flowery language. Lae'zel makes sense.

Shadowheart is an amnesiac who's just mean to you because.

I also don't care for her story, at all.

Don't care about Shar's Gauntlet or her kidnapped backstory. Don't give a shit about her parents. Don't care that she's scared of wolves or that her hand hurts.

I like the overarching thematic bridge that her character exists on, specifically that the gods will demand everything of you, and will hurt you for their own amusement.

But as a companion...no.

I have never been interested in romancing her. I never have her on the party, except to get that achievement.

I also don't like clerics. I think they're kind of weak, tbh. They're heal bots. They're really only good for spirit guardians, glyph of warding, and removing status effects. Just don't care for that. I'm an all dps team, we have no room for healers.

TL;DR: I don't think Shadowheart is interesting design wise, story wise, or gameplay wise.

Karlach:

I loved Karlach the moment I saw her, I fell deeper in love with her the second I heard her voice, and I knew I would die and kill for her, when I saw her excited "I love you" confession scene.

Seriously.

I have said this before, and I will say it again.

Out of all of these characters, romanceable or not...

I would only marry Karlach in REAL LIFE. I'd never date a man like Gortash or Astarion. I might be friends with Gale, but he's too smart to be my boyfriend.

But Karlach. She brings the wife energy. She could throw me over her shoulder and bash me against the concrete, and I would say thank you, ma'am.

she's also so fucking fun to play. barbarian options in bg3 are so goddamn funny. you can intimidate everyone and just break shit. it's great. you can also constantly throw people AT PEOPLE. And it's great. She's way more fun than Lae'zel because of it.

No notes. Top tier character design. My wife.

But also FUCK the developers for only giving her two fucking quests, one of which is a FETCH IT quest and the other is just a lame boss fight.

And FUCK THEM for only originally giving her an ending where she either dies or becomes a mindflayer. WHY.

And the Avernus ending still annoys me, because the ENTIRE PARTY should be there too.

FUCK YOU LARIAN. Why do you hate Karlach???? You're monsters. She's never done anything wrong, and yet all you do, is wrong her.

Bullshit.

Wyll:

Ok.

Hard truth time.

Wyll is the hottest male companion.

Like.

No cap. Everyone who says Gale, or Astarion, or Halsin-

Incorrect. It's Wyll. He is literally so hot, with the white eye and those sexy throat scars. Hrrrrrrr.

Also, controversial opinion. I actually like his devil form.

I think it makes him even hotter. I do wish he had wilder hair, though.

That being said...

He's horribly underwritten.

I went in, thinking, he's so kind and nice and hot...and then I was disappointed by how little they gave him.

He, like Karlach, got hit with the cut content curse.

And it's so ugly.

And gross.

And honestly, I suspect it's racist.

But yeah.

I think he's really sweet and I like romancing him and all. But they didn't dedicate any time or effort to his romance, and I hate that. But not him. Never him.

TL;DR - my first impression of Wyll was wow, he's hot, I wanna know more about him, and my last impression is, wow, he's so hot, I hate that he has nothing going on because Larian simply didn't bother to give him shit to do.

Gale

Alright, I left Gale for last, because he has the MOST complicated relationship with me.

So I initially missed Gale, because my friend failed the strength check to get him out of the portal.

So for a while, I didn't even know he existed.

Then I started to see more of him on Tiktok and Tumblr, and I was like oh...ok. So...we missed him. Damn.

So I decided to try romancing him fairly early on....only to find out...

I absolutely despised that when he dies, he killed me with necrotic damage.

That pissed me off. In the early days, when I was new to the game, I think I once had a whole team wipe, because Gale and Lae'zel went down, and then Karlach went rampaging, set me on fire, and then died to Gale's necrotic...which is funny in hindsight, but it was annoying at the time.

The eating magical items thing was mildly annoying, but that was far worse.

I pretty much never ran Gale for a long period of time.

As the Dark Urge, I'd often kill him, in fact, just so I wouldn't have to deal with his Arcane Hunger.

And honestly, initially, I kind of disliked his personality too.

I think the first scene I ever saw of him was when you tell him he's ok in bed, and his response is like, I guess I'll go kill myself.

And honestly, I thought he had incel vibes because of it. Then add to the fact that he's rude to you, no matter what, when he needs his third item...and also add that to the annoying gameplay, PLUS the fact.

That I was rocking Sorceror and Warlock for most of my early runs, so didn't need a wizard...I said, no. No Gale.

I don't like Gale.

BUT.

Here's the thing, right?

I got into Gortash... and then I stepped away from Astarion. Started being obsessed with the Dark Urge...

And then I noticed that all of my Durgetash friends were super into Gale, and I didn't get why...

But then weavewithshadow specifically alerted me to the fact that... there are Gale and Gortash parallels...specifically, that they're both brilliant, scruffy, are blinded by ambition, can't appreciate the things they have, and keep chasing after things they can't quite reach.

And then I was like...ok, maybe I've been harsh on him...

So I did his romance...and I felt bad.

Because he's actually very sweet.

And his voice is reallllly lovely when it's soft and fond.

He's a poet...and then I felt bad for all the times I had chewed off his arm.

And honestly, with experience...I now know what to feed him. Mostly garbage magic items like Komira's dumb locket or the ring of color spray from the harpies' nest, or those dumb boots that electrify the water you stand in.

Plus, I'm smart enough to know how to keep Gale alive now, so the necrotic thing isn't an issue.

So.

So. TL;DR I had a very complicated relationship with Gale, first with his mechanics, then with this random out of context scene where he's kind of nasty to you. But I came around, and honestly...right now...I like him more than Astarion.

All he wants to do is...live.

And I relate to that.

And his romance scenes are nice, and he has more of an arc than most of the other companions, Astarion aside.

So there you go, anon.

This took forever to write.

Thanks for the ask, though.

[flyersheartbreaker]

Forever By Your Side| Isaac Ratcliffe

a/n: this is my first imagine that I am officially publishing! I am very excited to share all of my writing content and series with you guys :)

Pair: Isaac Ratcliffe x reader

Summary: Watching your boyfriend Isaac get seriously hurt during one of his home games and watching him battle through the toughest injury a hockey player could battle, so he can continue on with dream playing in the NHL

Warnings: Hockey Injuries, Cussing, Cute Fluff

Word Count: 3,321 words

It was just another ordinary Sunday afternoon watching a game live from the PPL center here in Allentown, Pennsylvania or so I thought. The game was going really well with the Phantoms up 3-1 on the Hershey Bears half way through the second period. There was your beloved star-studded boyfriend number 19 carrying the puck up against the boards through the neutral zone when suddenly bam everything went to complete silence, except for that shear sound that you wish you could so badly get out of you head.

I jumped out of my seat and darted up the stairs from the lower-level seats that I was sitting in with some of the other girlfriends. I can hear the god-awful scream ringing in my ears over and over again that was coming down from ice level. The crowd was silent, so quiet that you could probably hear a pin drop and when that happens you know for a fact that it isn’t good. Nothing ever good comes from silence at a time like this and I needed to get down to the locker rooms as quick as possible.

Isaac got hit hard up against the boards and fell awkwardly down to the ground, and his right foot looked like it twisted the wrong way. He's had rough collisions before, but never like this. Isaac is a big dude that you surely didn’t want to ending up colliding with, but this time it looked like Isaac got the wrong end of the play. I never in my life ever heard him yell in absolute pain like the wat he was when the trainers and his teammates were trying to help his 6-foot-6 body off of the ice.

My heart was in my stomach as I was racing down the stairs that would lead me to the home locker rooms. I quickly flashed my team badge to the security guard Frank without saying a word. He must have known it wasn’t good either, as he told me to breathe and be careful myself as I jumped down the last few steps.

If Isaac had a season ending injury, it would kill him. He was just heating up and playing his best hockey yet and working his ass off day in and day out so he could eventually make the Flyers roster within this season or even next season for sure. But if his season is over that means his chances of getting to the NHL level could be too and that would just destroy him completely.

As soon as I rounded the corner to the trainer's office, I saw him being helped on to the examine table. His face was as red as a cherry, and he was in a lot of pain. The trainers quickly started icing the area the best that they could as they slowly untied his skate and too it off of him.

“He is definitely going to need some X-Rays done immediately and possibly an MRI as well depending on what the results of the X-Rays are.” The Phantoms trainer Brian Grogesky said to Neil who was one of the Phantoms physicians.

“Jeff and Robert are on their way down from the press box and getting the emergency X-Ray equipment ready. In the mean time you need to relax the best that you can Isaac.” Neil said to Isaac as Isaac tried his best laying down comfortably on the examine table.

Both Brian and Neil noticed me standing outside of the door of the trainer's room and signaled me to come on in, in hopes that Isaac could ease up and relax a little bit more with me by his side.

“Hello, y/n! Looks like we got a live one here and that big boy landed pretty hard on that ankle of his.” Brian said trying to make light of the situation.

Isaac sat up on his elbow and looked me dead in the eyes. I can see and feel the pan behind them, my heart sank even more for him. I just want him to be okay, I want him to be able to play the rest of this season, he worked way too fucking hard for this to happen to him.

“Hey babes, how is the pain?” I said walking over to Isaac and grabbing his hand while kissing him ever so lightly and carefully.

“It's a bitch babe if I am being honest. I’m trying not to think of the worst, but I can’t help it. This isn’t fair, why me? Why fucking me?” Isaac said in more frustration.

“Isaac, don’t get too far ahead of yourself. We don’t know the actual results just yet. But whatever the outcome is you can come back from it stronger than ever. Hockey injuries is sometimes apart of the game as silly and stupid as it sounds, but you’re a fighter and you got this.” Neil said as he placed another bag of ice on Isaac’s ankle.

“They are right babe, your team trainers, physicians and any other doctors have your best interests. Let’s get you into the X-Ray room and then go from there okay big guy.” I said while planting another kiss onto Isaac’s lips.

Jeff brought in some crutches for Isaac to use, so they can take him down the hall to get the X-Rays taking care of. I am hoping that is all that Isaac is going to need and that whatever it is, it's a quick recovery.

After a few short minutes Isaac was crutching back out of the X-Ray room with a look of disappointment on his face.

“Oh no babe...how bad is it?” I asked him while he collects himself.

“It’s not broken...but they are sending me for an MRI early tomorrow morning to see if that shows up with anything and then go from there.” He said in a low tone.

“Well, that is a plus sign that it isn’t broken. You got to be positive about this honey, you need to be optimistic. You can't be negative. Everything is going to work out for the best. Hopefully it's just a minor sprain and you will be back on the ice in no time.” You told Isaac as you wrapped yourself around his side.

All of Isaac’s staff and trainers helped Isaac out of the arena and to his car and safety got him into the passenger seat while, I got into Isaac’s driver's seat.

“Alright, make sure when you get home you put more ice on that ankle for at least 15-20 mins on and then same time off. Do it throughout the night if you can and also, make sure you are using the crutches as much as possible and for the love of God Isaac do not put any pressure on that ankle until after we get the MRI results and see exactly what is going on. We don’t want to make the injury any worse than what it could already be. Try to get some much-needed rest and we will see you in the morning.” Brian said closing the passenger door.

The ride back to Isaac’s apartment complex was extremely quiet. I didn’t know what to say or what to do, so I just let Isaac sit there and pounder in his thoughts alone without me distracting him. Which probably wasn’t a good idea, because I know my boyfriend, I know for a fact that he is thinking the worst possible scenario that he could think of right now.

I helped Isaac out of the car and into the elevators up to his apartment and got him comfortably settled on the couch with his foot/ankle elevated and two ice packs placed on the injured area.

“Do you want or need anything? You want me to bring out another pair of comfy clothes for you?” You asked Isaac as you placed a pillow behind his head/back and placed a blanket right by him as well.

“No, I’m fine...” He whispered as scrolled on his iPad to rewatch the ending of the game and rewatch highlights and the moment of his injury.

You so badly, wanted to say something along the lines to him like "babe don’t be watching that now, it wasn’t your fault, there was nothing that you could have done to prevented that from happening, so on and on.” But deep down you knew nothing would make him feel better until he knew what the main results were. And as the night went on, you could see the realization hit him that this was going to keep him out for a while. He just looked sad, and drained.

After a couple of hours, another X-Ray, and an MRI later, you and Isaac were sitting there waiting in the trainer's office for the results from both the trainer and team doctors.

Both Brian and Jeff walk in with a folder which I assume held the test results for Isaac’s ankle/foot.

“Well, the good news is the second X-Ray that we took this morning once again showed that there was no brake in both the ankle and the foot.” Brian said.

“And what about the MRI? What did the MRI show?” Isaac asked nervously.

I grabbed Isaac’s hand and interlocked his fingers with mine. I could see the look on both Brian’s, Jeff’s, and even Coach Gordon’s face that this news that they are about to give doesn’t seem to be very promising.

Jeff cleared his throat ever so calmly and spoke. “The MRI came back with a high ankle sprain injury which means we really don’t have a timetable for you to return to at this point of time. This type of injury is extremely difficult to recover from quickly. So, with that being said we need to place you on injury reserve indefinitely until we get more of a clear view on this injury.”

“Out indefinitely...so that could mean that I might be done for the season?” Isaac ever so softly spoke.

“Unfortunately, yes Rat...I am so sorry and with it being late into the season already we don’t want to risk anything further and do anymore damage to the ankle. Brian, Jeff and myself all agreed on shutting you down for the remainder of this year. So, it’s better for you to take this time to heal carefully and properly and then eventually rehab it back to full strength without any other necessary tests or worse case scenario surgeries. Then once you have healed properly, we can train and get you back to 100 percent for next year's rookie and training camp.” Coach Scott Gordon said while looking at both Isaac and myself.

My heart broke ever so much for Isaac, this isn’t fair. I know injuries can be a part of the game sometimes, but why did this have to happen to Isaac and why now?! He has been killing it day in and day out since being drafted in 2017. He deserves his chance at playing at the NHL and now with this setback is he ever going to make it to that level?

The ride to Isaac’s apartment was once again a quiet one and this time I don’t blame him. I mean how is he supposed to react to something like this? What is he supposed to say or do when your head coach, trainer and team doctor shut you completely down for God knows how long.

Isaac settled down on the couch and tossed his crutches to side and unstrapped his high ankle boot so he can comfortably rest his ankle on the pillow in front him.

"Baby, I am so fucking sorry that is happening, it’s not right nor is it fair to you." I said, resting my head on his shoulder while getting cozy next to him.

"What if this is it for me? What if I can't play anymore after this?" He asks, eyes filling with tears.

"Hey, hey, hey, don't say that.  You being negative will only make that happen. You are a fighter Rat...you are one tough, strong as hell hockey player who will power through this. I promise you that." I said grabbing his hand and interlocking our fingers together, while placing a kiss on his hand.

A tear rolls down his cheek ever so slightly. "All I wanted to do was be that excitement that both the Lehigh and Philly fans need. All I wanted ever so badly was to have my chance to make it to the NHL level and it got taken away from me. Why do bad things happen to good people?" Isaac asked broken and frustrated.

Once he started crying, I had lost it. Nothing I could do, or say would take that pain away from him and it just broke my heart. I went into the kitchen and I just cried as grabbed him more ice packs from the freezer. How am I supposed to look at the man that I love, and not have my heart shatter like glass when I look into those eyes that were once so shiny, and bright, but now shows nothing at all?  I have no idea the pain he is going through or the frustrating emotions he is now going through as well and I feel terrible.

I eventually collected myself and walked back out into the living room and ever so easily and softly place the ice packs on the injured area and took my seat back on the couch next to Isaac.

"That's the crappy thing about life.” I breathed as I took a deep breathe myself and continued on. “For some reason, it always attacks the good ones, and praises the hell out of the bad ones." I sob, wiping away not only my own tears but also his tears once again. "We'll get through this. I promise. It'll be hard, and it'll be long, but we're going to pull through this." I tell him as I run my hand through his hair.

He squeezes my other hand tightly. "What if during my time out things don’t get better and I need to get surgery, and it's worse than they thought? That could happen. What if they see that my injury is worse than what they thought and that I am out on the shelf even longer and I completely miss this upcoming season as well? Or worse they tell me that I can't do this anymore?" He asks, gasping for air. "I don't want that to happen and I'm scared to death that it will."

I snuggled beside him even more then I already was, resting my head on his chest, sobbing harder than I was before, because I honestly hate when he thinks that he isn’t good enough or he thinks his career is over because of a minor setback or in this case a possible major setback. "Then we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, okay? Just for now, it's a bump in the road. No journey to greatness is a smooth one Isaac. Whatever the hell happens next, we'll face it together as a team, because I am not leaving your side and letting you fight this injury alone. I know that you so badly want to break and that you feel like this the end of the road, but you need to keep pushing and listen to the training staff and follow their instructions."

"I love you so much." He tells me, sniffling. "Thank you for helping me with this, baby, I couldn’t do this without you" Isaac said while planting a soft and slow kiss on my lips

"I'll help you through anything. No matter what." I said while smiling and kissing him softly back.

It was battle to get Isaac’s ankle back to a healthy, normal, and stable ankle for a hockey player at his height and weight but we were able to do it. It was a long road and journey until Isaac was back out on the ice skating again and preparing himself for this upcoming training camp season.

Isaac looked and felt good, until one day right before the Flyers condensed training camp something didn’t seem right with him.

Isaac met up with Flyers trainer Jim McCrossin and after a deep examination we found out that Isaac was suffering from a fractured rib and a collapsed lung. We don’t know how exactly this had happen or when it happened. It could have been from when he fell during his ankle injury or from being hit during Rookie Camp, we don’t have the answers right now. And once again, here I am watching my boyfriend being completely destroyed and devastated all over again.

Isaac became instantly depressed, and much worst this time around because he knew there was no chance of making the Flyers squad this season and who knew when he could lace up for the Phantoms season as well. But thank God for Jim McCrossin who helped Isaac get the right and special care that he needed and got him completely healthy so he could play for the rest of this Phantoms season as well.

Isaac was getting game day dressed for a home game here in Allentown. I sat on the bed and watched/admire him as he fixes his tie in the mirror.

"Try not to worry about tonight so much baby, you are going to absolutely kill it out there like always. Once you get out on that ice, I have no doubt in my mind you will play just like how you used to before all of these setbacks. And just remember that no matter how easy, or how hard tonight’s game is going to be I'll be here for you always. But also, please promise me one thing, that if you don’t feel right to let your staff know immediately because I never want to see you get hurt like this again.” I said walking up behind him and wrapping my arms around his torso.

"I promise babe, I know that I need to take my health more seriously and whatever happens, happens. One day I will make my dream a reality and officially play in the NHL, but for the time being I got to focus on the now and my health." He said as he spun around and kissed me.

Watching Isaac warm up made my heart race and beat fast. But it was all worth seeing him back out there skating with the team and his boys. He looked so good and happy out on the ice and that is all that I could ever ask for.

The journey was extremely hard and long this past summer and fall for both Isaac and I, but in the end it definitely made us a stronger unit in our relationship and it has totally made Isaac a stronger hockey player both physically and mentally.

After the game, I bolted down to the locker room this time excitedly to see my boyfriend, not in a complete shear panic like last time and waited for Isaac to come out after he was done with the media.

The door swung open and I immediately saw Isaac and jumped right into arms like a little high school girl. “Babeee, you were beyond amazing tonight! I am so very proud of you, how are you feeling?” I asked nervously but giddy at the same time.

Isaac picked me up and kissed me ever so passionately before answering any of my questions that I just threw at him. “I felt good and still feel good. It was awesome to be back out on that ice again playing with the boys in front of our home crowd, their excitement and energy helped out a lot. But truthfully, I couldn’t have done any of this without you, y/n. I love you so much and I can’t wait to continue this amazing hockey journey with you right by myside.”

[knox-knocks]

a hunger inside

an among us au >:) tw: death and violence (no foxes die, only ocs)

read it on ao3

Andrew finds him in the hallway, attempting an escape through the vent in the floor. Andrew’s eyes flick to the corner of the room where the camera is, but it is dark and lifeless, no blinking red light to indicate that someone is watching. Of course, that is why Andrew chose to linger in this part of the ship, after all. No one is ever watching these cameras, so he is free to smoke his cigarettes in peace.

“The vents, huh?” he says and leans against the cool metal wall of the ship and lights the cigarette. He’s almost out. As soon as his job here is done, he’ll have to stop by the closest pit stop for another pack.

Orange jumps at the sound of Andrew’s voice, twisting around in the tiny space the vents allow. It’s not much bigger than him, and he has to wiggle through in order to get out. Andrew watches him, cigarette forgotten between his fingertips, and takes note of the dark red staining his orange space suit, seeping into the fabric.

Andrew tips his head and behind Orange he can see two feet sticking out from the darkness, dripping the same red liquid that’s currently splashed all over him. Andrew is no idiot, and it doesn’t take a genius to know that the liquid is blood and the legs belong to a dead man.

“Faster way to get around,” Orange – Josten, he remembers – says after a tense pause. Andrew can’t see his expression past the dark screen of his visor, instead his own unimpressed face is reflected back at him, distorted in the curve of the helmet.

Andrew has never seen the man underneath the orange suit. He’s been aboard the Space Enterprise for a couple months now and hasn’t so much as taken off his helmet. Which wasn’t a cause for alarm – not at first – because technically it was a rule that you had to be wearing your space suit at all times in case of emergencies, though no one actually did. Except for Josten.

What struck Andrew as strange was that Josten didn’t take it off even to eat. In fact, Andrew has never seen him eat with the others in the cafeteria, not once, in the months since he’s joined the crew.

“I suppose you’re the one the others are worrying about, then,” Andrew says and takes a drag off his cig before it dies. “The imposter.”

“You’re not supposed to smoke in here,” Josten says, neatly dodging the question. His voice is staticky over the mic, more artificial than human.

Andrew looks past at the victim half-eaten by the darkness. Josten subtly shifts his weight, an unsubtle attempt to hide the body, but the damage is done and Andrew has already seen it.

“I won’t tell if you don’t,” Andrew says. He stares at where he thinks Josten’s eyes should be, and meets his own even expression instead.

Josten doesn’t move so Andrew sighs and pushes up from where he’s leaning against the wall. Josten’s back straightens, and he makes an abortive move, as if reaching for a weapon. Said weapon must still be stuck in whatever poor sap whose blood saturated the floor, because Josten’s hands remain empty, and Andrew unstabbed.

“Go get cleaned up,” Andrew says and stubs out his cigarette against his fatigues. The ashes smear against the black fabric, near invisible. “I’ll cover for you.”

“Why?” Josten says in that robotic voice of his.

“Because now you owe me one,” says Andrew.

“I thought we were even.” Josten mimes a movement reminiscent of raising a cigarette to his mouth, a clumsy mimicry in his bulky suit. “‘I won’t tell if you don’t.’”

“Yes,” Andrew says. “But now I’m covering for you as well. So you owe me.”

It is eerie, the way Andrew can’t see his face to read his reactions, and wonders if this is how his crewmates feel about him. Andrew, always so tightlipped and apathetic, even when the crew started getting picked off one by one. He didn’t join up too much longer after the others, but he’d picked up on their unease almost immediately. Andrew doesn’t care though; he isn’t here to make friends. He is here to do his job.

Josten is the first to break. He turns, stiff, and walks down the hall to the sleeping chambers. Andrew watches him go and waits a few more minutes to give him a bit more time. He’s not really sure why. He could have left when he saw Josten climbing into the vent and pretend he never saw the body, or he could have simply reported exactly what he witnessed.

But it often gets boring on the Enterprise, and perhaps Andrew is intrigued, maybe he wants to see where this goes. Plus, it might come in handy to have the resident murderer indebted to him.

Andrew reports the body over the comm link and makes his way to the cafeteria.

_ _

It was Green who was killed, though Andrew never bothered to learn the man’s real name. The remaining crewmates are dragged from their tasks to deliberate over the murder, while Andrew watches over the chaos and waits for Josten to join them. In the end he points his finger at Red, who has no alibi except for her claim to be down in Navigation at the time of the murder. But the others do not listen and in their panic, they are quick to vote her out.

Her screams of terror and pleading are cut short by the hiss of the chamber door sealing shut. It is Yellow who slams the ejection button, and Andrew watches as Red is spat into the black vacuum of space. Yellow flinches when the air is forced out of her lungs and her blood boils in her veins, but Andrew does not.

Ten crewmates turn to eight in a day, and the others are soothed enough to go back to their assignments. At least until Andrew finds Josten stuffing Yellow’s crumpled form into one of the cupboards in Storage a few days later.

“We have to stop meeting like this,” Andrew says smoothly, and Josten flips around, quite literally caught in the act. He’s still holding the knife, but he lowers it when he sees Andrew.

“I owe you two?” he says.

“One,” Andrew replies. Josten tips his head, a strangely animal action with the giant space helmet on. “I want your name.”

Josten hesitates.

“Your full name.”

“Neil,” he says slowly, as if trying it out. “Neil Josten.”

“Neil,” Andrew repeats, and he quite likes the taste of it on his tongue. It tastes a little of danger, like the iron-tang of blood. “Now show me your face, and we will be even.”

Neil is slow in taking off his helmet, and Andrew watches in rapt attention as the vents blow out a stream of oxygen and steam as the seals release and Neil twists the helmet off.

Andrew wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but Neil looks normal. At least, he has a nose and a mouth, and reddish-brown hair falling into his eyes. It’s as his gaze is tracking the movement of his auburn curls that Andrew spots the reason Neil was so hesitant to take off his helmet.

His eyes are a bright, crimson red, glittering and dark under the fringe of his hair. Undeniably alien.

Andrew takes a step forward and grabs Neil by the chin. He brings his face down closer to his own and moves it side to side, studying him. Aside from the eyes, his face is also marked by deep gouges and circular scars on either side of his face. He is very attractive, and Andrew feels a slow, tight pull in his navel. He would quite like to take this man apart, bit by bit. Neil is silent as he lets Andrew look his fill.

“There’s a vent in the corner of the room, to the left,” Andrew says, releasing Neil’s face. “I’d be quick if I were you.”

Neil narrows those red eyes of his before reattaching his helmet and following Andrew’s directions. He has the vent open and one leg in when he turns back and says, “Why do you never talk to any of the others?”

Andrew gives him a thin, close-mouthed smile and says nothing.

He doesn’t report the body. He lets Purple find it, and he and Neil meet the others in the cafeteria together. His suit his clean, no traces of the blood that had been previously splattered down his front. His helmet is on, but he’s not the only one hiding their face so no one mentions it.

“Minyard,” the man in the white suit says. Andrew is pretty sure his name is Folkson or Falkner or something. His face his pale, eyes stretched wide, and his lips tremble as he talks. He’s the oldest out of all of them, and has taken the helm. “Where were you?”

“With Josten,” Andrew says. “We were clearing out the oxygen tanks in O2.”

“That’s not usually a two-person job,” Lime says suspiciously.

Andrew levels a look at her. “It is if you do it properly.”

“We need to figure this out,” Cyan snaps, and Andrew wracks his brain for their name. He comes up blank. “We’ve been getting picked off for weeks and we still have no fucking clue as to why.”

“They might not be human,” Pink says in his quiet voice, thin as a thread. He clutches his gloves in his hands, turning them over and over. “What if this is a game to them?”

Andrew hedges a look toward Neil but he is still, silent.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Cyan says, and rolls their eyes. “We need to stay focused before we lose the mission.”

“You give a lot of orders and not a lot of answers,” Folkson or Falkner gripes.

“I could say the same for you,” Cyan replies coolly.

Andrew lets them bicker. He said his piece, and both he and Neil are cleared. After all, Pink saw them on the cameras, and they were no one near the body when Purple found it. In fact, no one was around, and soon the suspicion turns to Purple. Their pleas fall on deaf ears as they are locked in the ejection chamber and Cyan presses the button.

The others whisper around them, desperate prayers to a God that has no place in the depths of space. Let us be right, they murmur. Please, this time, let us be right.

_ _

The first time Andrew kisses Neil, they are in the showers and he has just scrubbed the last of Falkner’s blood off of him. Red turns to pink as it runs off of him, over the white tiles, and down the drain. Andrew knows someone will stumble across the body and report it soon, but he doesn’t care.

Neil’s voice is different when he’s not wearing the helmet, and so is his gasp when Andrew pushes him against the still-dripping wall and presses their mouths together in a bruising kiss. He has a grip on his t-shirt, one in his hair, and he angles their mouths together in a way that has Neil scrabbling against the wall for support.

“Andrew,” he says, and the sound is long, drawn out. Neil tips his head back against the wall and Andrew mouths at his neck, his skin warm from the blood pumping life through his body.

Neil is a killer, the imposter among them, but his skin still bruises and his body still reacts to Andrew’s touch. He kisses him, again and again and again, each one harsher than the last.

Andrew only pulls away when Neil’s tongue darts out to touch his bottom lip. He takes a step back. He needs to be more careful. He shouldn’t be letting Neil get close like this, it’s too dangerous. Too easy to slip up.

Neil’s eyes are blown, his cheeks flushed. “I think we should blame Lime,” he says, breathless.

Andrew presses another kiss to his mouth and resists the urge to sink his teeth into Neil’s lip. Dangerous.

Once under control, Andrew says, “There will be four of us left, after this.”

Neil nods, suddenly solemn. He almost looks regretful. He opens his mouth, closes it.

“Let’s go,” he says without meeting Andrew’s eyes, and Andrew has the feeling that he was going to say something else. Before he can ask, though, Neil is already pulling on his gear.

In the end, they can’t decide who to eject, and Lime is safe. For now.

_ _

“I didn’t do that one,” Neil says quietly, peering down at Lime’s twisted body at the bottom of the stairs. Her neck is broken, blonde hair falling over a face slackened by death, though still etched with fear. Andrew imagines her eyes widening, mouth opening in a scream as hands wrap around her throat, shoving her down the stairs. The image is not difficult to conjure.

“Must have tripped,” Andrew replies. He looks at Neil in the corner of his eyes, and a thrill goes through him when he sees the now-familiar bloodred of his gaze.

“I suppose we report this to the others,” Neil says the same moment Cyan enters the room with Pink in tow.

“Get away from him,” Cyan snarls, and it takes a moment for Andrew to realize that they’re talking to him. “He is the imposter. You – Orange.”

Desperation makes people clumsy, sloppy, and Andrew sees that they are very afraid. Neil looks alarmed – and extremely guilty standing over the body. Never mind Andrew was also caught red-handed, Cyan and Pink surround Neil and Neil only.

So they don’t suspect Andrew at all.

“You killed Gen,” Cyan says, voice shrill. They leap at Neil, and with Pink’s help they corner him against the wall as Andrew watches on. “And I’m willing to bet you were plotting to kill Black too. Lure him down and execute him here.”

“What of it?” Neil says through clenched teeth. Cyan has his arms pinned to his sides, and there is nowhere for him to go. They force him back, crowding him into the ejection chamber. Neil jerks in their grip, but Cyan holds tight. Pink grapples with the panel on the wall to open the door, but his shaking hands slide helplessly over the smooth panel. He finally finds a grip and gets the door open.

“Look at his eyes,” Pink cries. “I told you. I told you he wasn’t human.”

“Shut up,” Cyan grits and shoves Neil into the chamber. Neil struggles, bucking in a last-ditch effort to get out of Cyan’s grip, but it’s useless. They found their imposter, and now they’re going to kill him. His wide red eyes meet Andrew’s calm ones, and he rams his body into Cyan’s, desperate.

Cyan grunts at the impact and looks over their shoulder at Andrew. “Black,” They hiss. “Minyard, help – ”

Andrew smiles, revealing the rows of razor-sharp teeth he has so carefully hid from everyone until now. Pink sees it first and screams, but it’s cut off when Andrew lunges and sinks his fangs in his slender neck. Blood gushes into his mouth, and it tastes so sweet. Pinks chokes, hands fluttering ineffectually at his sides as Andrew tears out his throat.

Cyan watches with horror, but before they can do anything, Neil is already there, his arms wrapped around their neck. He forces their head back at such a steep angle that Cyan cries out in pain, and shakes them like a ragdoll. It is easy now that they have the element of surprise, and Neil snaps Cyan’s neck with ease. They slump to the ground and Neil stares at their body, chest heaving from the fight.

“You,” he says, still out of breath, eyes traveling up to Andrew’s. “You’re the other one.”

Andrew licks his lips, blood dripping from his face, his sharpened teeth, and Neil tracks the movement. “Yes,” he says simply.

Neil grins. “Good. I would have hated killing you.”

“You never would have gotten close.” Andrew steps over Pink’s still-twitching body and hooks his fingers in the thick collar of Neil’s space suit. “Yes or no?”

Neil’s eyes are dilated, black enveloping red. “You already know my answer,” he says, voice heavy.

Andrew’s grip on him tightens. “Say it anyway.”

“Yes,” Neil says and Andrew yanks him in for a fierce kiss. Neil makes a sound low in his throat, guttural, and Andrew swallows it. He’s sure he nicks Neil with his teeth now that he’s not so concerned about keeping them hidden, but Neil doesn’t seem to mind. He is happy licking the blood from Andrew’s lips.

Neil’s eyes flash red and Andrew’s teeth bare in a sharp smile. Game over.

[thetenthdimension]

Mixtape Tips (I Live in the Past)

Why even bother with CD mixtapes these days when you have spotify? Well, you have total freedom to do what you like with them. You can make edits, insert skits and quotes, remix, anything you like. Also, Neil Young can take his music off Spotify, but it’s much more difficult for him to take your CDs away from you. I also go on holiday a lot to rural areas with no phone signal, so some physical media which isn’t taking up storage space on my phone is always a plus. I use CDburnerXP to make my discs.

Opening Sting

I always like to begin with something that gives the tape a bit of personality. If it’s a parody or comment on something people recognise, then all the better, as it helps them connect with it. It also makes it clear off the bat you’ve put some effort in.

Big intro

Always start with a big, thesis song. Then, abig second song or slight twist second song. Take it down slightly, if appropriate, for the third.

People’s attention span is 15-20 minutes

I try and keep in mind that most people will get bored after 15-20 minutes of the same thing. So therefore, I organise each part of the tape into batches of 3-5 songs, each of which have their own little structure to them, with rises and falls. That way, you avoid anything getting too samey.

Make sure no small cutaways are shorter than ten seconds

I always like putting audio snippets from films, TV shows, live shows, anything in there. However, my hard work tends to fall by the wayside a little if people aren’t paying attention. Try and keep that in mind when you’re being clever.

Balancing known Vs unknown

People like songs they’ve heard before, and won’t have too much patience for that record you pulled out the basement. But if you’re just putting in the same old stuff they’ve already heard you’ll get bored and they’ll think you’re basic. Strike a balance. I try and make sure every 3-4 songs, there’s a surefire hit.

Three minutes is a really long time for a joke song

It might be funny in your heard to put Baby by Justin Bieber into your heavy metal tape, and it is for the first 30 seconds. Then people realise they have to listen to the whole thing and glaze over, and you start to regret it. Just put a 30 second clip in there if you must, it makes the point just as well.

If you have a cover don't make it one that'll make people want to listen to the original

People have instant access to music. If you put something in there that makes people think “oh, I really want to listen to SONG B now”, then they just can. Scum.

Look up similar playlists online and see if you've missed anything

Do your research.

Check for radio edits/live versions

A lot of the time, a radio edit is just as good but shorter, which allows time for other stuff. But be wary of cutting down people’s favourites, and slicing Pink Floyd songs into pieces. Also, sometimes an epic song becomes more epic live.

Check intros/outs to make sure you have good transitions

3 piece ender

I always like to do the ends of my tapes in a set of three. I feel it gives it a sense of a climactic set piece.

Twist/joke or obvious song ending

Usually I’ll go for the big, obvious song to end on, a crowd pleaser that lets everyone know that this is the end, and hopefully they’ll feel they’ve had their fill. Also, a twist at the end can be good.

The first one I’m going to be covering in detail is my most recent, it’s called “Drag Hype Mix”. I’m not sure who else is going to be on Tumblr in 2022 reading about how to make CDs.

Don we now our gay apparal: This is a mashup of Pentatonix’s “Deck The Halls”. It starts with the buildup as though it would go into the first proper line, but then it just has the lyric “don we now our gay apparal”. Big buildup to a joke.

Cheap Thrills: Following on from the opening sting, a song about prettying up and going out.

I’m Beautiful: A Bette Midler deep cut, live version. I’m going obscure early, because it starts with such a big and obvious song.

Pimenta: A song by a brazilian, in Portuguese. For a friend.

You Got The Love: The original version. The synths fit better into the mix and the FatM version is on another mix.

Let the Music Play: This is a disco song called “let the music play”, but in the final chorus, I mixed in RuPaul shouting “let the music play!” in keeping with the theme.

212: In an interview, Azalea said she specifically makes music for gay people, and this is her biggest song. I could have included the clip but the nuances would just get lost in the room. It also slaps, meaning it works well after the Ru shouting buildup, which comes at the end of that song.

Attention to Me: After a RuPaul song, and a song screaming about how much this girl wants her pussy ate, it was time to bring it down. 

Born to Be Alive: Didn’t want it down for too long.

Big Iron Synthwave: This is a synthwave cover of Big Iron I found. I could have included the original, but I’m trying to keep the energy going a bit, and it helps it mesh into everything a bit. Big Iron is on here because the trans folk love Fallout: New Vegas, so it needs to be on here.

Chain Gang: This is a real obscure one. It’s a doowop song about being part of a chain gang and goes “that’s the sound of the men/working on the chain gang”. Big Iron set the scene for it.

Coming Round the Mountain: This comes from a TV show, and has Daniel Radcliffe essentially performing a drag version of this country classic. After the obscure one, you need something recognisable. We’re still in the country/old timey section of the tape. So much glamboyant music is supposed to sound flashy and new that I wanted some hint of the olden days just to segment things.

March of the Black Queen: Again, we’re breaking things up, but bringing it back slowly. This one is here for the classic rock lovers after all that other stuff.

Mamma Mia: Crowd pleaser. Originally, between this and MotBQ I had a cabaret song called Das Lila Lied, which was a performance of the first LGBT song, dating back to Germany in the 1920s. Berlin/Germany is so notoriously within the gay scene I wanted something german, and I found this. But it just didn’t fit and I couldn’t pretend it did. I stuck it after MotBQ so it kinda meshed, then I stuck in a crowd pleaser afterwards to sugar the pill too. But Mamma Mia and MotBQ work back to back, both are 70s.

Jaja Ding Dong: Mamma Mia was the first proper Eurovision song, so we follow it with a Eurovision homage. I couldn’t fit this one on my Eurovision mix but I wanted it in my CD case.

Black Magic: ALL THE GIRLS ON THE BLOCK KNOCKING AT MY DOOR is a good, shouty opener to bring us back to reality and the next section of the tape.

Straight Up: Notorious drag race lip sync, I added in some audio from the lip sync itself into the song to live up to the Drag Hype name.

Bang Bang (my baby shot me down) - Scarlet Envy: I spent forever in 2019 going through tonnes and tonnes of covers of this song, knowing in my heart there was a hyperbolic gay cover of it. There was. Ramping up the drag aspect.

Girados: Big song in South America. Obscure but instant. I like to have a curveball near the end just to stop things being too predictable.

Montero: We’re about to go into the final stretch, so it’s important to try and get the room on side a bit before going into two obscure but fitting songs.

Bimbo Doll: It’s this psychotic, absurdly graphic spiritual successor to Barbie Girl by Aqua. I was originally gonna have Barbie Girl here but I had it on another tape, then I found this.

Hi, I'm Tila! Life's full of glitter/Giving up my ego raises my libido/My bag is Gucci/To match my perfect coochie/Glamour is my hobby/F*ck my pornstar body

The character aspect of this is also in keeping with the tape’s purpose. By this time, everyone would be drunk as hell and get into this.

Goth Girl: I was doing a yin/yang thing here. I really wondered whether to have pink or black in front. In the end, I figured Bimbo into Just Wanna was too similar so the finale wouldn’t quite pack the punch, but also, I figured it just made sense this way round in my gut.

Girls just wanna have fun: Big, crowd pleasing ender.

The second is “Barn Dance, Pardner”. I made this specifically for me and my friends, but it was a request of one specific friend who loves this type of music. I shall contrast the previous one in many, many ways.

Thank God I’m a Country Boy: It starts with a good opener thesis. John Denver shouts/sings to the crowd

Well life on the farm is kinda laid back/Ain't much an old country boy like me can't hack/It's early to rise, early in the sack/I thank God I'm a country boy

It’s both an opening song AND an opening sting.

Galway Girl: This is a Steve Earle song, really popular before Ed Sheeran kicked it out of all search results forever. My friends all like this song. However, the issue is that anyone who hasn’t heard this song would end up with an itching for the Ed version.

In Hell I’ll Be In Good Company: Taking it a little slower and stripped back for the third track, but with a good, whistling, finger clicking tune to it.

Head Over Boots: First obscure song. Pretty instant.

Day of My Return: but coming out of the obscurity pretty quick for a song me and my friends love. Prominent fiddle

Riverdance: an instrumental that builds and builds to a great climax. I tend to avoid instrumentals where possible, but this is a pretty famous one, and it’s very good. It’s also great fiddle music, which a barn dance playlist needs. Also, it meshes nicely with DomR.

Footloose (Blake Shelton): a good cover that fits the theme. After the instrumental, you need a crowd pleaser. This is a recognisable song and also a stormer.

Chicken Fried: Friend loves this song. It’s also a massive one, with 100m youtube plays.

Devil’s Dance Floor: God I regret putting this pile of garbage in here. It was big on youtube and it has electric guitars, so I thought everyone else might like it, and it would act as a climax to the buildup since riverdance. Instead, it was a miserable failure. 

Yellow Rose of Texas: stripped back, simple Elvis song. This was one I wanted in there because I love this song to pieces, and it works.

Hills of Donegal: down and back up, to a fast paced song my friends like. 

Dust in a Baggie: after the friend crowd pleaser, this fast paced but obscure song fits neatly in. It also features a refrain about “twenty long years for some dust in a baggie” that makes it easy to latch onto.

Cotton Fields: stripped back simple song, a bit like YRoT. Another song I love to pieces. 

I wanna be in the Cavalry: another stripped back song, but this has a marching band playing a snare to give it a bit more of a kick.

Ring of Fire: after Dust/Cotton/Cavalry all being obscure, a crowd pleaser, but in a similar musical vein. Easy to have some low key songs in a row when they lead up to a crowd pleaser. I also like to dip in and out of the low key ones, then have a properly low key section later on.

Down at the Twist and Shout: a request by the friend, and a stormer after the low key songs.

Achy Breaky Heart: I don’t care, it’s amazing, and Billy Ray is amazing. Another stormer after DatTaS.

Country Girl shake it for me: a sleazy, upbeat, obscure song, to counteract the dumbass, upbeat, popular song everyone just hated.

Islands in the Stream: taking it down for the final three.

Take Me Home: still taking it down, but with a great singalong. Could have ended it here.

Wagon Wheel: this is the proper ending, a song me and my friends all adore to pieces. I’ve ended it with low key songs, but ones which are proper singalong anthems. Two of them in a row really kick ass for a spectacular end.

Key and Peele - Country Music: A joke twist ending after all that soppy stuff. It’s also a sort of Easter Egg to the friend who requested it, who first showed me that sketch, and loves country music.

This next one is Theatre Darliing. I did four of these, called Theatre Darling, Theatre Darliing, Theatre Darliiing, and Theatre Darlivng. The idea being that these are all songs that could be in a musical, and have a singalong/dance feel to them.

Song of the Lonely Mountain: This is a cover by a youtuber named Peter Hollens. I love the atmosphere of the Neil Finn version at the end of the first hobbit film, but I Finn does it far too high and soft. After tonnes of searching, I found this guy who does it more like Thoren does in the film. It resonates with my friend group somewhat because we all like it and have sung it together, and also, it’s a striking intro. It also starts with a masculine song, which as we see as we go on, I was trying to balance the masculine/feminine songs a lot here.

Heaven is a place on earth: this could have been the opener, with it’s explosive start. This is why it’s in the second position, those who haven’t been immediately won over will see this as the real opener.

Diamonds and Rust: After two big epic songs, taking it down.

Bend and Snap: from the legally blonde musical. There had to be some musical representation. It also serves as a counterpoint to the masc opener.

The Longest Time: This is actually a mashup, including the bit in How I Met Your Mother where multiple Ted and Barneys sing it together, into the main song. This is taking it down a bit after B&S. Starting it with a sitcom moment also leads it on nicely from the musical number.

Lady of the Night: An obscure song that’s got a great 80s metal cheese to it.

Mean Green Mother from Outspace: From Little Shop of Horrors. Staying stupid and fun.

Wish I Had An Angel: More intense and serious now. We’ve moved onto the next bit.

It’s My Life: Carrying on serious and intense

Ziggy Stardust: Still serious, less intense.

All That Jazz: After Bowie, we had a lead into a full out glam cabaret number

Rumour Has It: A more modern cabaret-style number

Take me to Church: The culmination of the serious part of the mix

Living Next Door to Alice: Not a massive change of tempo, but it is a dumb glam song that people swear loudly to when they sing it. Taking away the seriousness a bit, but not too much, considering what’s coming up.

Somewhere over the Rainbow: Tempo even lower. Back to serious after a bit of relief. I feel this gives it a bit more punch.

Drumming song: Florence gives this some gravitas and majesty, after the stripped down uke song.

Seven Seas of Rhye: FaTM allows us back to the big soundscapes of glam

Babooshka: building on the previous

The Sound of Silence: A big, dramatic ender

Gimme Gimme Gimme: I love Brian David Gilbert. Each of the Theatre Darling tapes end with BDG covering ABBA, since he is the greatest Theatre Darling. This is the twist ender.

Here is No Butch Zone! I include the timecodes on this one because they’re relevant to the story. (Note - I’m updating this in December 2023. The original post is from July 2022. I have posted nothing in the meantime and this is far from my first update. This appears to me my passion project). This mixtape is my “soft girl” mixtape.

Cardigan - Taylor Swift: It’s not the first song on Folklore, but it was the first single from that album cycle, so to me, it feels like the first song. It’s also a big song to start it off. I’m expecting this playlist to be chosen mostly by queer people so obviously they’d love this. It also starts with some clacking noises into a piano, which adds a bit of mysterious buildup.

All Shook Up - Avila: This is a cover of a popular song, done in the soft girl style. This should win you people over.

October Passed Me By - Girl in Red: During my research, GIR was a popular “soft girl” band, so I wanted this near the top. Also, did I mention the queer people thing? Blush - Wolf Alice: One of the softest songs on here. However, it’s also more synthy towards the end. So that helped me select the next song.

The Trip - Still Corners: Eagle-eyed nerds will notice this song is shorter than the original. I felt this song was too long, and the last 90 seconds-ish has no soft girls in it. So I cut it down, fading it out towards the end. Since this song fades anyway, this wasn’t a massive deal. However, I kept in the bit where most of the instruments cut out, and some of the soaring synth lines, because if you’re a fan of the song, you would notice if they were gone.

Dancing in the Dark - Lucy Dacus: This is a faster and more energetic song, which is good to follow The Trip. Also, another cover, to allow the straights to follow along and not get too bored.

Cool About It - Boygenius: I debated putting two Lucy Dacus projects together, but I decided that it was probably fine since they’re very different songs, and it will allows nerds to feel smart when they announce loudly that Lucy Dacus was in Boygenius, even though everyone already knows. It also brings it down a bit after DitD.

Linger - The Cranberries: It’s been a while since a big song was done in the original style. We’re also building up a bit here.

Indigo - Kississipi: This is there because I love this song to pieces, and to allow a bit of boys-are-pretty representation in there as well, considering the amount of gay. I put this before the big indie song, because it’s also an indie song.

There is a Light that Never Goes Out - Dum Dum Girls: This is the obvious midpoint song, to me. It’s there to stick a big stirring of the pot in the middle to stop everything getting boring. It’s energetic and cool. It also continues the theme of cute girl covers of boy songs.

Elastic Heart - Sia: It’s a big song, but it’s also functionally there because it continues the stirring of the pot. I figured of her big songs, this was the most soft girl.

Home to Newfoundland - Evelyn Jess: So many of the songs I wanted in here were country songs. This serves as a crash down to Earth, and it’s also got a bit of tempo to it so it doesn’t feel like too much of a dramatic switch in tone and pace.

Take These Chains from my Heart - Roseanne Cash: Continuing the cover theme. This is also REALLY slow and gentle, so bringing it down another notch.

Dogsong - The Be Good Tanyas: The BGTs were one of the reasons behind making this playlist. God, I love them so much. An extremely soft and quiet song.

Gold - Trixie Mattel: A great country song by a biological woman that picks up the pace a little again.

Love You For a Long Time - Maggie Rogers: We’re still in the country zone. Still picking it up. It’s also less minimalist, so we’re adding layers.

Light Enough to Travel - The Be Good Tanyas: Here to increase the pace again.

Meet in the Middle - Daisy Chute: Ending my beloved country portion with an obscure favourite of mine. It’s bringing the tempo down, but it’s got a fair amount of instrumentation, which will be important as we go on.

The Kraken - Katie Dey: Almost as obscure unless you’re a total dweeb who loves video game essayists or victorian poetry. But extremely slow and gentle, but with loads of vocal processing. It’s also short, and a kinda cool song.

Mo Ghra Thu - Jessica Brett: Still obscure, soz. But extremely slow and pretty. Tonnes of reverb on the voice. 

Hotline Bling - Billie Eilish: Aaaaand a really popular song. This is the ending to the covers theme. A girl covering a “rap” song on a ukelele. I was considering ending on this, but then I realised the better ender would be the song below.

My Immortal (Band Version) - Evanescence: It starts slow and solo, then builds up to a full rock band. Then it ends with a few bars of just Amy on her own. A great ender, taking the theme so far, running with it, but giving it some dramatic bite towards the end.

Some others: Gay Dungeon Synth Take II

Rainbow Boogie Explosion

And the one I made specifically for myself

[armorsleevedsinglehit]

madara’s voice and other sundries

naoya uchida embodies madara for me. i love the way he speaks very slowly (and often softly!) and with genuine Intent, but that he also has these moments when you can hear the anger and grief and just unhinged rage in his voice, especially in his battle cries at the end of ep 366 and his screaming “you bastards killed izuna” in 368. you can just feel how powerful madara is from naoya uchida’s voice alone; you feel that he’s ancient, that he’s been through tragedy after tragedy and become hardened and bitter, that there’s this immeasurable weight behind his words. and i love that when he speaks you feel like he has all the time in the world to deliver his words (something i think that he and hashirama share, which really distinguishes them from the rest of the characters. you really get the sense that they’re from a different time).

A kind of odd thing that i debated on when i started this blog was how madara’s speaking voice would translate to written text, in a way that still felt true to his character, because there’s so much that uchida conveys with his voice that you just can’t do through text. and then there are other logistical issues as well, like, how strong of a writer is he? how is he at expressing his emotions on this blog, which is meant to be a personal space for him? i struggled with this to maybe a surprising extent, but i wanted to make sure more than anything that his character consistently gets through in the way he expresses himself. this medium, madara’s blog, is such an interesting challenge for me. madara is at most late 30s here; he’s been through a lot, but he’s not the same character that we meet in episode 322 who has died and been brought back to life multiple times. he still has that very human quality to him, which i wanted to show in the way he talks on here. you may or may have not noticed that madara doesn’t use a lot of commas, and yes, i know how grammar works; the lack of commas was a conscious choice on my part. i try to have him write mostly short, simple sentences, because he feels to me like the type of person who wants to just get to the point quickly when he’s talking about his own issues. i don’t see him as a particularly eloquent or talented writer, so it can sometimes be really hard to get across everything he feels in his heart and his mind with just his words. but it also forces me to simplify my own words and ideas, which i feel is gradually making me a stronger writer. (i have noticed myself omitting commas in my other writing, a lot of which is academic, so that’s something to watch out for lol.)

but all that aside, let’s actually talk about madara’s voice. because it’s one thing to hear naoya uchida’s voice and be like “okay, that’s really nice,” but if you’re reading a fic and madara has a piece of dialogue, what exactly does that sound like? i’d argue that finding that voice is actually super hard, especially if you just watch the sub and don’t speak japanese, because you’re not fully able to translate all the little twists and tones and inflections that uchida puts into the character. 

so you have that slow, soft voice, but it’s often got a very rough quality to it as well, both from overuse (he gets hoarse easily) and because the katon has fried his vocal chords. and at least in my headcanon he smokes (not religiously- he smoked way more during the war), so that definitely gives him a rasp, a bit of a crackling quality. but i also feel that he’s got kind of an unexpected range, partly because he’s usually speaking way down at the bottom of it (listen to naoya uchida’s regular voice; it’s much higher than madara’s!) plus quite a bit of vocal fry; he tends to purr. he’s got a voice well suited for jazz (because i adore jazz and i do whatever i want on my blog), if jazz even exists in the naruto universe. i don’t know exactly how to describe it but his voice has a sort of old-timey feel to it, the way an old radio announcer from the 1940s sounds (though possibly less excitable). the way he speaks definitely sounds like he’s from another time.

and i think he has a nice singing voice too! he doesn’t sing much, only very quietly to himself when he thinks no one else is listening, and he’s not professionally trained, but if he were to really belt it out (especially in his teenage days- before he ruined his lungs a bit) he’d have a nice, powerful, distinct voice with a bit of a growl to it. my mind always goes to oingo boingo era danny elfman, or maybe a cross between him and pete burns. (COMPLETELY unrelated side note, if you’ve ever wondered about modern au madara’s wardrobe, just look at literally any image of pete burns from the 1980s. i mean...come on.)

i also quickly want to give a quick shoutout to neil kaplan and xander mobus, who voiced adult and child madara in the english dub, because i think they both did a great job. kaplan obviously took inspiration from uchida’s performance (even though he kind of sounds like he’s got a cold the whole time) and i find xander mobus’ raspy texas drawl kind of incredibly charming. his performance (especially his little outbursts) makes me think that madara trained himself to speak in a more professional manner when he got to be clan leader, and before that, he spoke very informally- lots of “ain’t” and its equivalent. 

anyway, after all this, i am only really able to come up with descriptions and real-world approximations to what i feel like madara’s voice should sound like...but i think that’s okay, because naoya uchida provides a stunningly good interpretation, and besides that, everyone who reads the manga or watches the show will have their own interpretations as well. (i feel like i’m wrapping up a youtube video essay as i type the next sentence.) really though, let me know what you think!! do you have any madara voice headcanons that you’re dying to share? 

[maddestzoomer]

honey and glass

chapter one - early morning thoughts

read on ao3

summary: The feelings Max has for Eleven both alarm and attract her. Now that the girl she likes has moved away, it's time Max comes to terms with her emotions.

warnings: swearing, violence, homophobia, neil hargrove being an asshole, grief, general angst

word count: 2.3k

a.n.

- i thought this would be a really cute concept, so i decided to turn it into a story :) if you end up with any thoughts, feelings, or helpful criticisms about this concept, feel free to share them by either messaging me or leaving them in the comments! <3

OCTOBER 21st, 1986

Who do you think of in the early mornings?

When the sun flirts with the treetops and your throat aches with dryness, who lingers in the back of your mind?

For Max, it's almost always Eleven. Sometimes it's Billy and sometimes it's even her dad, Sam, but more often than not, it's flashes of that lovely brunette.

Now, though, thoughts of El don't just happen in the early mornings when one's brain is foggy and grey. It happens when she reads a comic or when she skates past the destroyed remnants of Starcourt. It happens when she hangs out with Lucas or when she listening to sappy '80s love songs.

Oddly enough, thoughts of El almost always come whirl around Max's mind when she's around a girl named Robin.

The two had gotten to know one another rather awkwardly, both being sat down on a stretcher as firefighters and other EMS workers buzzed like busy bees around them. There's no better way to meet a new friend than through shared trauma, right?

Robin tried to comfort the shocked, crying Max through distracting stories, but the words got jumbled and the stories turned soupy. Enough so that Max ended up laughing a bit, though it was a sad laugh. It was a laugh that still held pained tears in her eyes- but it was better than nothing.

Over the months, the two had gotten closer; sort of becoming the female friendship equivalent of Steve and Dustin.

Their friendship is pleasant and comforting. Robin acts almost as though she were the big sibling Max never got to (and will never again get to) have. Plus, it was nice to have another girl around after Eleven left.

Max was pulled from her thoughts as she heard Neil walk down the hallway, all slow feet and heavy steps. She felt her chest grow tight and her stomach twist as she clenched her jaw.

Ever since Billy's death, Neil has been absolute hell to be around. An almost constant haze of alcohol and cigarette smoke follows him like a kicked dog, making him sour at his best and raging at his worst.

Max gripped her blanket tightly as Neil walked past her door, which was thankfully closed.

It's officially been a year since she moved from California, now being October in Hawkins. One full rotation around the Sun was enough to completely toss her world upon its head.

It was strange to think about how different her life was when she was back in California. All the people she didn't know, all the feelings she didn't have.

A soft sigh escaped her lips as she sat up, swinging her legs over the side of the bed. Sometimes she thought about what her life would have been if she'd stayed in California and lived with her dad- but she didn't like paying much mind to those thoughts given how little they changed anything.

Her feet were greeted with cold floors, earning a soft cringe from Max as she stood up. Walking to her dresser, she got out a pair of jeans and an old, sun-bleached t-shirt.

It was Saturday, and Max's plans for the day were relatively nonexistent, though she did know she'd like to stop by and visit with Robin for a little while.

She had a few questions she needed answering and she figured (hoped, mostly) Robin may have been able to help.

She got dressed, then brushed her hair and teeth before washing her face with cold water.

Today felt heavy, which was strange. Normally, once the sun greeted the sky, icky feelings were banished to a corner of Max's mind until the moon again rose. It was easier that way; to smile and laugh without worrying, even if it wasn't genuine.

Maybe the icky feeling had to do with the questions Max wanted to ask Robin, or maybe it had to do with the fact Max hardly got any sleep.

Whatever it was, though, Max didn't want to think about it much longer, and so she ignored it.

Max was fantastic at ignoring feelings. Some would call it compartmentalizing, but Max would call it self preservation.

She grabbed her jean jacket, shouldering it on before slipping on a pair of shoes, then picking her skateboard up. It was still early- 7:48 am to be more specific- so she figured the rest of the party would still be sleeping, but probably not Robin. The girl was the queen of rising early in the morning.

Slowly, she came from her room, already smelling early morning cigarette smoke and misplaced anger.

Her stomach twisted in knots as she heard some rummaging in the kitchen- a glass fall and then some mumbled curses.

Just then, she decided breakfast wouldn't be a priority today. Quietly, she closed her door again before heading to her window.

She opened the window, biting down on her bottom lip as it squeaked open.

Softly, she huffed as she tossed her skateboard from the window, then jumping down with an uncomfortable thud.

Fall whispers in the chilly early morning air, telling of the winter that's to come.

Max runs a hand through her thick hair, picking her board up before beginning to walk to the road where she could ride.

If she were being completely honest, Max seriously isn't a morning person- but she can appreciate how quiet the world becomes when the sun has just barely risen and how it can feel like the world is yours, even if only for a little while.

. . .

If there was one thing Max was usually thankful for, it's the fact Robin doesn't live all that far from her house- Only a fifteen-minute ride on skateboard.

Today, however, Max wasn't as thankful for her friend's close residence. Maybe this wasn't the right thing to do... but who else could she turn to? Who did she trust enough to tell her secret to?

Secrets are what define people, as opposed to what one decides to show the world. There's a type of safety that comes with secret-keeping- but there's also insecurity and doubt.

So... how would the world react to a girl loving another girl?

That single thought made Max chew on the flesh inside her cheek, beginning to feel her pulse quicken. What even was love, anyway? Max knew gay people existed- men who loved men and women who loved women. After all, she was raised near San Francisco.

Robin had already come out to Max.

Well- sort of.

Max had jokingly asked Robin if she was crushing on anyone, to which Robin grew quiet. Quiet enough for it to become worrisome.

Max became stressed when she saw Robin beginning to drift off, and so she immediately apologized for asking a seemingly invasive question, which only made Robin chuckle a little awkwardly

"I... uh," Robin let out a sharp breath, smiling faintly "You wouldn't know her."

Her?

Max didn't press Robin any further after that. She felt she didn't need to, and on top of that, she didn't want to make Robin any more uncomfortable than she already clearly was.

That was a couple of months ago, and the topic of sexuality hasn't come up since. That isn't to say Max hasn't thought about what Robin said.

Max thought of her interaction with Robin often. It was the reason Max hoped talking with Robin would help answer some of her questions... But at the same time, the questions she had made her feel uncomfortably queasy.

The very last thing Max wanted to do would be to damage her friendship between her and Robin, and there was a part of her that thought the questions she had would make the older girl want to sever their friendship.

Max swallowed down harshly as she realized she was nearing Robin's street.

Worst comes to worst- Max can decide not to ask the questions. She can just say something about her wanting to get out of the house- something about Neil being in a predictably bad mood- which really wouldn't be a lie... just, sort of double-speaking.

The feeling of unease only grew stronger as she skated closer to her friend's home. For a quick moment, she considered turning around.

Fuck- Was this even appropriate- to show up at your friend's house unannounced at nearly 8 in the morning with questions one fears the answers to?

Maybe it was.

Max stomped her foot on the ground a few times until she was at a stop, then bent over and grabbed her board. She already felt her chest growing tighter, and so she took a deep breath.

She stared at her friend's house for a few moments (studying it, thinking of the conversation ahead, contemplating what the actual fuck is next) before beginning to walk up the home's cement path and to the porch, where she felt her heart quicken slightly more with every step

Then, taking another deep breath, she raised her arm and gently knocked on the door.

Max knew Robin's mom wouldn't be home just yet considering she was a nurse who worked the night-shift, which made things ever-so-slightly easier.

Robin's mom, Lily, was a lovely woman, but it was better if it was only her and Robin- especially considering Max didn't know what her friend's reaction would be. And, on top of it, she didn't have much longer to think about those possibilities.

"Oh- Hey, Max!" A messy-haired Robin greeted with a smile as she opened the door. "What are you doing here?" Her tone wasn't at all angry or bothered, just genuinely curious.

"I just needed to get out of the house." Max said as Robin moved from the doorway, wordlessly welcoming the younger girl into her home.

"Fair enough." Robin said, closing the door. She knew what Max's home life was like.

"Want some french toast? I accidentally made extra." By 'accidentally made extra', Robin actually meant she was fine with sacrificing some of her food for Max.

"Uh, yes, please." Max replied softly, slipping her shoes off and setting her skateboard down at the doorway. Seeing Robin helped to extinguish some of that anxiety- but still, part of it remained, floating around in her brain.

Max found herself glancing around the home a few times to pictures of a baby Robin and to the occasional small, somewhat floral painting. The house's aesthetic was so completely opposite of Robin's- all peach walls and sea-foam carpets with an almost constant lingering smell of bleach.

"You have any plans for today?" Robin asked, glancing over her shoulder as she walked to the kitchen.

Max shook her head as she followed. "No. Not yet, anyway."

"Good, cause' I want you to hang out with me today." Robin turned away, grabbing a spatula so she could put two slices on a plate.

Max frowned a bit, smiling slightly. "And what does 'hanging out' entail?"

"I dunno," Robin said with a small chuckle, placing the plate down on the kitchen's counter. "I just wanna get out of the house for today. I hate being cooped up all the time."

Robin, unsurprisingly, hates staying in one place for too long. She likes going on walks and driving around- exploring and such. There's almost never enough to see and do, especially in a town as boring and conservative as Hawkins.

"Alright then."

Robin added another two pieces of french toast to a different plate, then went to a drawer to grab out two forks. The whole time she did this, Max watched her quietly. Even though Robin was always fun and interesting to spend time with, Max still simply couldn't stop thinking of what her reaction might be.

But Robin likes girls too, right? So what kind of homophobic hypocrite would one have to be to push away a young girl with questions of her sexuality?

"Want some coffee?" Robin asked, which earned a small smile and nod from Max. There weren't many people she knew who'd offer a 14-year-old coffee. She liked it, though. It made her feel more adult in some ways, even though it was only a beverage.  

Silence again fell over the two as Robin prepared for the two to eat. The silence wasn't uncomfortable (at least not to Robin), but it did feel strange to Max.

Glancing to the clock on the wall, Max saw it was a little past 8 now. Fuck.

Getting the question out of the way now might be better, right? If Robin reacts badly, Max can just have the whole day to herself to process possibly losing a friend.

Max ran a hand through her hair, wishing she could simply pause her thoughts. Slowly, she trod over to the counter. Inside, her feelings felt brewed and blended- unable to make any one distinct emotion.

"What kind of creamer do you want? We have French Vanilla and Pumpkin Spice." Robin said, making her way over to the fridge.

Max didn't bother answering the question. Instead, she simply stared at the egg-shell white of the counter, contemplating what the everliving fuck she should do. Her back was turned to Robin, which was comforting in an offbeat way.

Her mind couldn't stop jumping from two opposites- from thinking Robin will in no way help and will think she's weird to thinking she will actually be able to help given she sort of implied she likes girls.

"Robin?" Max finally croaked out, her voice sounding unfamiliarly insecure. She harshly bit down on the inside of her bottom lip upon feeling Robin's eyes land on her. At that moment, she wished she could shrink down and disappear or simply, that she never spoke in the first place.

Robin frowned once she heard Max's tone, just how peculiar it sounded. Almost automatically, something felt off. "Umm... Yeah?"

Just say it.

Just say it.

It's not that hard.

It's not that fucking hard.

"How do you know you like girls?"

[palmett-hoes]

since the first step in achieving your goals is to state them aloud, here's a list of aftg fics/ au s that i'd like to write some day

- pre-canon fic from aaron's perspective spanning the twins' first meeting till they're drafted by the foxes and graduate high school. i'm increasingly enamored with aaron as a character as well as with an outside perspective of andrew's actions and i think it would be very interesting to look at the foundation on which their fraught relationship is built and first developed

- even more pre-canon fic. andrew's early life in foster care. yes, we all know about the most... gruesome things that were done to him, but i believe that there is plenty more that has affected and shaped him, especially in relation to my interpretation of andrew as an autistic poc. this would not be a happy fic.

- anastasia au. neil as anya, andrew as dimitri. possibly a plot amalgamation from both the animated movie and the stage show, with changes as i see fit. (no, neil is not the prince of russia). what i find most compelling about this au is the story of neil and andrew as childhood friends and then the angst of having andrew, as an adult, teaching an amnesiac neil how to act like a noble while being convinced that neil is an imposter. good shit

- art school/dance club au. the foxes attend the palmetto school of art at prestigious edgar allen university. they're considered the school's charity cases, and they are NOT friends. andrew is a studio arts major with a concentration in sculpture who works in the campus coffee shop in the mornings and frequents night clubs that employ pretty boys in the evenings. neil is attending college completely on his father's dime, PROVIDED he study what his father wants, despite his desire to study dance and music. going crazy without an outlet, neil takes a secret job as a go-go dancer. look. this may slightly possibly be a result of me having planned to party hardy this summer, then having my plans ruined by the virus :c

- 1950s High School au. the 1950s aesthetics fucking rock even though the 1950s fucking sucked. kinda wanna tackle both. plus, andrew already has that james dean bad boy fast car appeal

- an exploration of mary and nathan's relationship and history. i get that neil's parents are both super taboo and both really really awful people, but i have questions and i want to answer them

- neil never returns from baltimore. in order to keep his deals, permanently, andrew kills riko and tetsugi, and gets over 20 years in prison. when he gets out, he just wants to be alone, but it seems there's a ghost haunting him. this was conceived for MAXIMUM angst, no getting around it. i got the idea from a badacts fic and it has haunted me ever since

- post-canon sexuality exploration fic. i have a real passion for quality sex education and healthy experimentation, and neil very clearly didn't get the chance for either. yet at the end of the books he finds himself in a very intense sexual relationship. i just really want to give him the opportunity to find out how desire works for him and what he likes, on his own terms. i read a lot of fics where neil's desires seem to be completely dependent on andrew's initiaton, and while i do believe that andrew is the only person neil is attracted to and will ever be attracted to, i also want to explore how his sexuality manifests on its own. the vibe i'm going for is, uh, HornySweet (tm), but also with a lot of genuine eductional material. i want this is to be something that offers real information to its readers that may have been inaccessible for a lot of people, on topics like like sexual hygiene, maturbation, and sex toys in a non-fetishy way. this will be very very E rated, but like,, in a very earnest and goofy way because sex and sexuality is neat and cool but it's also not all serious perfect fucking. it's just,, a topic that deserves to be DISCUSSED

- mobster au. andrew, having never met aaron, takes a job for the moriyamas to track down a runaway asset. Neil. upon completion, they make andrew the butcher's apprentice, and pull neil back into the fold as a commodity rather than a person. lots of violence, lots of shady underground dealings, lots of plotting, lots of secrets.

i'm gonna put some more under the cut, ones that i don't feel as strong a drive towards right now or that i haven't thought as much about. if you (yes, YOU) like any of these, or are interested in any of these, or wanna hear more about any of these, or are even inspired to write something yourself by any of these please, PLEASE, say something in the notes, or send me a message, or an ask or anything. ANYTHING. i am stuck inside, all the time, and i am so, so lonely. i answer from hoob-gooblin

- princess bride au. come ON. princess bride is one of the most romantic AND most snarky movies of all time, and andreil literally invented love and devotion sooooooo it's a perfect match. "yes or no" vs "as you wish" kings of consent and communication and unconventional love declarations. also,, he may not be how I imagine andrew, but a young cary elwes in dramatic black pirate getup is DEFINITELY a valid andrew

- hozier au. sometimes,, i listen to an album, and imagine a fic that encompases the whole thing. nothing speaks louder to me than hozier's discography. (also, yes, i am gay). maybe a little bit inside llewyn davis. neil wanders through a small town and takes up some small jobs, but sings his heart out through twisted metaphors once a week in a hole in the wall bar staffed by a very short, dead eyed veteran

- prince and the pauper au. on a stealth recon mission in enemy territory, andrew encounters a local lord who happens to have his face. in a moment of desperation to save himself from arrest, andrew knocks the lord out and assumes his identity. he returns to the castle just in time for prince moriyama to arrive with a shifty-eyed, red-headed handservant in tow. lord aaron of columbia, meanwhile, wakes up on a ship manned by crown traitor and fugitive kevin day, calling him by a name he's never heard before, and then he's in the hands of the guerilla rebel forces that have been attacking the kingdom. i watched barbie princess and the pauper as a child and that movie fucking slaps

- little mermaid/beauty and the beast/bride of the rose beast/ladyhawke au. in a last ditch attempt to escape his father, neil trades his voice and his tail for legs and washes ashore on a small kingdom with horrible secrets. because he cannot speak, read or write, prince aaron employs neil to serve the monster in the catacombs, the prince's twin brother. the twins are under a curse that turns them into terrifying monsters, andrew by day and aaron by night. aaron's affliction is a secret, as is andrew's humanity. this is such a hodgepodge idea lol. did neil also have to be a mermaid for this to work? no. is he? hell yeah

- new york private school/twin swap au. aaron wins a scholarship to a prestigious school that will guarantee him a future, but then he relapses. convinced he just needs a little more time to get clean, he makes a deal with his volatile new brother, andrew, to stand in for him at the school just until he can his shit together. neil and ichirou moriyama have been raised together their entire lives, always under the knowledge that ichirou will inherit the family empire with nathaniel as his right hand. they hate the idea, but they have no way to escape, and now neil is being harassed by ichirou's bitchass estranged brother at their stupid, fancy private school. LISTEN, we as a fandom do NOT take enough advantage of the twin swap possibilities presented to us. pathetic

- post-canon fic where ichirou, realizing that the life of a mob boss is a lonely one, decides that he needs... a friend. however, because of the nature of his work, he can't just make friends with anyone, so he decides to make friends with neil. without consulting neil first. cue a lot of very weird, very awkward coffee dates where neil is convinced he's about to be disposed of, and ichirou just wants to know about his cats. the thing i like about ichirou is he’s a complete blank slate. i can make him a good guy, a bad guy, an ally, the Big Bad

- Kill Bill au. mary survives a bullet to the head and wakes up from a coma over a year later. with nothing left to lose, she sets out to single-handedly dismantle the wesninski circle. good thing she used to be its top assassin

- single dad andrew au. except look, look, stay with me here, okay, aaron is his son, and he's adopted nicky and kevin. LISTEN. STAY WITH ME. JUST THINK ABOUT IT. tbh the idea comes from my interpretation of the andrew/neil/kevin dynamic as distincly parental, then extending that interpretation to andrew's protection over the rest of his family.

- fashion au. andrew is a fashion designer and photographer who frequently works with allison reynolds. one day she brings around a short, twitchy assistant who looks like she just plucked him out of an alley. somehow, he becomes andrew's muse. i watch a lot of fashion competition shows

- ghibli. either howl's moving castle (andrew as sophie, neil as howl) or spirited away (?). maybe both idk

- legally blonde au. legally blonde is so good guys

[wheredidthe80sgo]

Should I read All For The Game?

A fan’s perspective, in case you were wondering whether or not you needed this mafia-sports series in your life (hint: I think you do).

(This post was made by a fan for people who may want to become fans. I was unsure about first reading something so different to other books I’ve read, so I thought that I should just put this out there for people who might feel the same way.)

Reasons to read AFTG:

1. The fandom: I’m starting with one of my favourite things about AFTG. While the fandom is small, it’s dedicated. There is fanart and textposts and fanfiction all over the place from these dedicated people. It was so nice to read a book series and walk into a place where other people are already there, and continuing to contribute to it. And from my pov, there really isn’t that much drama which is nice (although I am on the outskirts).

2. The writing: considering you won’t find AFTG in your local bookstore as it wasn’t published by a company, the writing and storytelling is well done. Sure, it reads like a fanfiction, but sometimes it’s nice to read something self-indulgent rather than literary masterpiece. Nora did well with the world-building and the grammar and spelling is all correct (which I wanted to mention since the writing was something I was hesitant about when reading it for the first time).

3. The actual storyline: yes, it has the Japanese mafia and a made up sport, but AFTG is nothing if not entertaining. There are twists and turns which I did not expect (the end of The Raven King anyone?) and there’s always something to keep you guessing and wanting more. It might sound ridiculous, but watching Neil Josten run from the yakuza is good fun. And, like I said before, this is no literary masterpiece like Dickens or Tolstoy, so just go with it and have fun.

4. The characters: the cast of characters is one thing I love especially about these books. Yes, most of them are assholes, but somehow you fall in love with them one by one. Our protagonist, Neil Josten, is one hell of a messed up kid, and yet makes you laugh and cry many times, or maybe that’s just me. Andrew Minyard, our blond midget, is, in my one opinion, the most interesting character in the series, and certainly provides the books with something... unique. Surrounding our two leads is the Palmetto State Foxes, and a lot of them: Andrew’s twin, Aaron; their cousin, Nicky; Kevin Day, former Exy superstar; Dan Wilds, team captain and badass; Matt Boyd, Dan’s boyfriend and resident Bro; Renee Walker, good girl with a mysterious past; Allison Reynolds, beautiful heiress; Seth Gordon, absolute asshole and Allison’s sometimes boyfriend; Wymack, coach; Abby, team nurse; and Bee Dobson, their therapist. The Foxes are an extremely dysfunctional bunch, yet come together as a family (eventually). They’re moving in times, hilarious in others, and always, always brilliant. Along with the main characters, there are side characters, such as Jean Moreau and Jeremy Knox, who absolutely steal your hearts while being present in less than ten scenes (less than five for Jeremy!!). Also, if you try hard enough, the characters can all be very gay. Personally, out of all of the characters mentioned above, the only straight ones to me are Aaron and Wymack, but it’ s really up to your personal opinion. The fandom certainly has a lot of opinions on this.

5. The sports: now, I’m not a huge sports fan, but when I tell you I actually got excited for the Exy matches, I mean it. A brutal lacrosse-type game, Exy is complicated and hard to understand, yet keeps you excited. Yes, it has lots of subplots related to the yakuza, but AFTG is a sports series at heart, and Exy is certainly fun. Plus, Kevin and Neil’s over-the-top obsessions are certainly a great running gag and guaranteed to make you laugh and/or sigh at least once.

6. The relationships: finally, we arrive. As a hopeless romantic, I always need romance in my books to keep me interested, and AFTG certainly delivers. On your first read, it may not be as obvious who the intended romance is, but by the time you get to the third book (spoiler alert!!) Andrew and Neil kick off their romance and it is beautiful. Featuring one of only two representations of demisexual characters I’ve ever seen in books, AFTG is romantic and very gay while featuring things like PTSD, assault and consent throughout. I may not be the best person to talk about this, but the way consent is handled is absolutely beautiful. If you research the fandom, you would know that one of the main things Andrew and Neil are known for is ‘yes or no’. The subtle way these two handle their relationship is a great way to represent consent, showing how it doesn’t need to spoil the mood. Not only does the series have great romantic relationships, but also familial connections. The Foxes are super dysfunctional (especially a few people in particular), but they do end up being a found family, which is always something to look forward to.

7. The aesthetic: orange, white and black, cigarettes, rooftops, gay pining, knives and guns; need I say more?

Although!! While I love these books for everything they are, I understand that other people have different experiences so I feel like I should mention there are a few things in the series that could potentially trigger people, so I just want to add a trigger warning: mentions of rape/abuse, drugs and alcohol use, homophobia, explicit violence, swearing, sex (not so explicit) , use and mention of things like knives and guns, quite a bit of torture (mainly talked about, or described in flashbacks except for one scene in the third book). All of the Foxes have traumatic backstories and as they’re being targeted by the yakuza so some really bad things happen over the series to a few characters. 

In conclusion (if you didn’t want to read all that), All For The Game is one of my favourite book series of all time, so of course I’m a little biased, but it truly is a good series. Very much something to read when you don’t want to take it too seriously, it has a dedicated fan base with great characters, relationships and a killer aesthetic. Everyone should say thank you Nora Sakavic for bringing this into our world (although we all collectively disregarded her canon pretty quickly). Yes, it has fanfic tropes (quite a few, now that I think about it) and it gets pretty ridiculous and cringe-worthy sometimes, but it also means a lot to a lot of people like me, and hopefully, if you’d like, it could mean something to you too.

[legobiwan]

Gotta to ask, do have any TV show, book o fanfiction reviews (especially Losing So Much and Undead Chosen One AU, love those fics) for these pressing times?

So for fanfics, I made a rec post a few days ago that might be instructive. Also, if you search my blog for #fic rec or #fic recs, anything not in that post will show up. As I’ve said, I’ve been a little out of the fanfiction consumption side of things the past few months, which is why I have reached out for suggestions. 

TV! Okay, so a rundown of shows I have enjoyed that are non-Star Wars. 

Psych (hilarious and at times poignant. The whole cast is fantastic, but James Roday especially is a damn good actor and shines in the few-and-far-between serious moments on the show. Plus, I am a complete sap for stories focusing on the relationship between parents and their adult children.) 

Russian Doll (captivating story and an easy binge. Think Groundhog day, but with more drugs and cats and based in New York.)

Santa Clarita Diet (season 3 lags a little, but it’s a great twist on the whole zombie thing and Sheila and Joe’s relationship is actually really fun to watch. Lotta gore, though.)

Slings and Arrows (Canadian show featuring Paul Gross as an eccentric theater director in a faux-Stratford Shakespeare Festival organization. Each season features a different play as the backdrop of the show, and if you’ve ever worked for an arts non-profit as a performer or admin or both, you will definitely appreciate how they portray the ever-present war between both sides and the eternal struggles of art vs. business. Plus, it’s just damn funny and you know, Shakespeare.)

Due South (speaking of Paul Gross. This is an oldie, but a goodie, 1990s-style buddy-cop/fish-out-of-water show that is both funny and heartfelt. I grew up on it and it holds a special place in my heart.)

Bojack Horseman (holy shit, this show. What started out as a zany portrayal of entertainment life in LA turned into one of the most piercing social commentaries on gender issues, death, addiction, mental health, sexuality, and inherited trauma. It gets dark in the later seasons, and the next-to-last episode of the whole series is one of the most haunting existential things I have ever watched on television. But it is fucking brilliant and funny and really holds no punches. Plus, if you are familiar with LA at all, the little references are especially hilarious.)

Umbrella Academy (I’m probably preaching to the choir here, but this is a great show if you haven’t checked it out yet.)

Agents of SHIELD (If you’re not in the Marvel fandom, I don’t know how much you’ll dig this, but I personally enjoyed a lot of it, especially Phil Coulson. The first few seasons are a little campy, but it gets darker later on with the digital reality arc and I really found myself enjoying it. Also, this was the first show I treadmill-binged, so it has a place in my heart for helping me to totally reimagine my gym routine.)

Dead Like Me (so someone recommended Dead to Me, and because I’m Very Smart, I ended up starting the wrong show. But this has been an intriguing watch, a very different take on life-after-death which is quite raw at times, but always interesting, especially as it kills off the 18-year-old protagonist at the start. Season 2 isn’t quite matching up to Season 1, but I’ll finish it off sometime in the next week or so.)

Farscape (this is quality Scifi television. Weird, amazing characters, amazing arcs, amazing aliens - definitely an underrated show of its genre)

Daria (ah, this one. There are a lot of reasons this show is personally hilarious to me, but let’s just say that it’s a full-on 90s disaffection cartoon that is smart with a highly relatable protagonist.)

Metalocalypse (this show is 100% over-the-top weird and I am here for it. Plus, Mark Hammill is a VA in it!)

Broadchurch (David Tennant in his glorious natural accent in a British detective series. Season 1 is amazing, emotionally raw and captivating television. I had a hard time trying to get through Season 2 and actually haven’t finished. But the first season is definitely worth it.)

Frasier (ah, a classic. The later seasons after “the event” aren’t as good but Seasons 1-5 are excellent and the humor is out of this world. Great show and one that stands up to multiple viewings.)

There are other shows I enjoy, like Brooklyn99 and 30Rock that I assume are more well-known on this site, and thus I haven’t included them on this list. I’m also not including the shows I watched that were fine, but I didn’t feel enthusiastic about (Witcher, Jessica Jones are the first two that come to mind). I’m also sure I’m forgetting something or somethings. 

Books! I read too many books. I have no idea how to rec books except in terms of things I’ve read recently (at least, books that aren’t specialized music-academic offerings). Olga Tokarczuk’s writing is fabulous, I highly recommend any of her works. Going older, I read Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man a few months back and that was superb. Another book I read a while back that stuck with me was Tom Wolfe’s Bonfire of the Vanities. Olivia Laing’s The Lonely City also sticks out as a recent favorite. Neil Gaiman’s American Gods is also great, and to be honest (here comes some heresy), it’s a better book than Good Omens. Since I move a lot, I tend to read books and then give them away, but beyond my Shakespeare, Tintin, and Harry Potter collection, one of the few books that I always carry with me is David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas, which is a singularly haunting and fascinating novel and I am transfixed every time.

In terms of Star Wars books? That’s pretty easy. Kenobi, Dark Rendezvous, Plagueis, Master and Apprentice, and - pending the conclusion - Thrawn. Shatterpoint was also excellent. There are other SW books I’ve enjoyed, but these have been the easy standouts of the lot.

[forestwater87]

A moment to chat about “The Butterfinger Effect” (obv spoilers for S4e17)

Wow, so a lot of people fucking haaaaaated this episode. And since I’m addicted to That Discourse, I had to say something because I think they’re super wrong. (And this isn’t me just being a total Camp Camp fangirl here; like, the pee episode was bad. That was bad tv and bad for all the senses. There have been mediocre and even shitty episodes of this show; this just wasn’t one of them.)

There are a couple different points of criticism aimed at this episode, and while there’s one I’d like to take a deep dive into in particular I might as well take some shots at the others real fast:

The moral was too obvious: god, you guys whine all day and night that you wanna see Max show character growth and whenever he displays it you hate how it’s done. This show has never been one for subtlety. I mean, the climate change ep? This is how the show works; it’s part of its twisted-Saturday-morning-cartoons charm, it’s the most efficient way to get a point across in a short runtime, and it was the set up for the joke at the end of the episode.

It didn’t advance the plot: bitch what plot are you talking about???

Not enough dad//vid: listen I’ve made my thoughts about the fandom’s idea of dad//vid incredibly clear at this point, so let’s just:

The most common argument, though, is that it’s all so very “unrealistic” and “out of character.”

Considering the show’s concept of “realistic” involves squirrel armies (hey, another mediocre episode! See, I can call them when I see them) and a universe-destroying space octopus, I’m not sure how to rebut that without another Bianca del Rio gif. So, the out-of-character accusation. 

Listen, characterization is hard as balls. Everyone fucks it up sometimes, and not every characterization in every episode is gonna work for you. 

But you know who nailed it this time? Eddy Goddamn Rivas, the writer for this episode, that’s who.

In fact, I’d argue that the entire point of the episode is that it’s not Space/Race Kid’s new interest that caused the majority of the changes, or some sort of mystical “butterfly/finger effect,” but Nurf’s attempt to put things back to “normal.” He caused the thing he was trying to prevent -- which happens to dovetail perfectly with the moral of accepting change and not letting it freak you out.

This episode is brilliant, and plays with the canon characterizations of all our campers while staying true to them, and I’m gonna show you how.

Under a cut, because not everyone has time for that shit. But first, a juicy preview of the sexy discourse to come:

Space Kid

This one is the easiest to defend, because Space Kid is just . . . Race Kid. Aside from maybe having an idea that he’s cooler than he used to believe he was -- which makes sense, because why do people buy fancy sports cars except that they think it makes them look cool? -- we’ve seen his tendency to latch onto an interest and go 110%. 

Reasonable, hilarious, and adorable. I actually don’t think anyone has any problem with Race Kid, so this is a quickie. 

As for why he dropped it so fast: I mean, hasn’t everyone gotten really into something before deciding it wasn’t as fun as an old hyperfixation? I’ve been coming back to the Camp Camp well since 2016 because it’s just so much fun.

Nurf

Nurf is the one I think people are sleeping on. All the time, always, but especially in this episode. The summary hints that Max is the one unable to handle the idea of change -- something this entire season has been working towards, and I literally just realized change has been a thematic thread throughout several of the episodes and that’s really cool -- but it’s actually Nurf who can’t stand the thought of things being different.

And, in trying to prevent the “butterfinger effect,” he sets it in motion. The irony is delicious, and his head in a fishbowl makes me laugh every goddamn time.

(Also, “A battle of wits is not my strong suit” was just hysterical. Nurf is full of great lines and y’all need to stop ignoring what a comedic goldmine this kid is.)

Preston

Oh, I’m sorry, are we shocked that Preston would jump at the chance to be admired by people, even if it means doing something he doesn’t particularly enjoy?

Were we all in comas during the episode this very season that was literally only about this exact thing?

As to why he’d pick football: he’s a theater kid addicted to the corniest, most cliche tropes. When he got a taste of power by bullying Nurf -- which was also totally in character, because honestly, Preston is not a very nice kid -- of course he went to the thing that in every 80s teen movie meant “cool bully who’s super popular”: the sports jock.

Add to that getting positive recognition from Campbell -- who we’ll get to -- and this swap is totally in-character, and entirely kicked off by the power rush he got from finally getting to be the one who bullies instead of being bullied. 

Nurf created his own worst nightmare by being afraid of change. This episode is fucking brilliant.

Harrison

To nobody’s surprise, Harrison is a sadist who thinks he’s hot shit.

He’s emotionally traumatized Neil to win an argument, he’s made Max vomit up, just, like, so many things and shown zero remorse, and got an unflappable sense of self-worth that skates right off the edge into total egotism.

These are the things we love about him. (And yes, obviously his arrogance comes from a deep well of insecurity, but that only exacerbates why he’d absolutely refuse to help Nurf, because it gives him a chance to be better than someone.)

As for why he’d choose to model himself after goth!Max . . . 

Honestly, this one doesn’t entirely make sense to me. He’s never shown any particular interest in Max. The only thing I can assume is that . . . well, actually Max was right, and at least in Harrison’s eyes, he is at the top of the social hierarchy. And he got there by giving zero fucks about what anyone thinks of him.

Which is what Harrison did, by refusing to help Nurf. We come full circle!

(WAIT: When Max asks why he’s acting like . . . you know, him, Harrison’s response is, “Why? It’s not making you insecure, is it?” While we could take this as “I’m coming for your shtick,” it could also imply that Max’s general Maxyness makes Harrison feel insecure about who he is. Which explains why, as soon as he’s offered a chance to emulate someone who makes him feel insecure, he chooses Max.)

Ered

Nerris and Ered have established themselves as friends, and she at least has expressed a token interest in playing DnD before. She’s listened to Nerris talk about this stuff enough to repeat it at times -- albeit incorrectly -- and so, when there’s “nothing better to do,” she tries something her friend is super into and finds it really fun and embraces it.

I can attest that DnD totally turns you into a massive, shameless nerd. It’s just that awesome.

Plus, she’s too cool to give a shit if people think she’s being nerdy, so of course she’s not embarrassed about being seen dressed like a Viking; in “Ered Loses Her Cool,” she had that moment of growth where she decided that her coolness comes from her happily choosing to be herself. 

Also, she gets to carry an axe around. So like, extra cool points for that.

Nerris

Nerris is gonna grow up to be a band geek, and she’ll especially enjoy the theatricality of marching around in parades while dressed like a Christmas Nutcracker. It’s like being a real-life bard.

This is the only one that really has a “supernatural” level to its change, except maybe the counselors (yes, I’ve come around on Neil; I’ll defend him at the end). While everyone else can be explained by psychological and in-character reasons, I have no idea what caused her to suddenly have this whole getup. I’d chalk it down to her seeing everyone else trying something new and being interested in upping her LARPing game, except she explicitly says she doesn’t know where it came from.

It’s one of the few that doesn’t make perfect sense, but I don’t really mind it because it’s such a top-tier episode otherwise.

Dolph

This is another one with questionable backing in the rest of the canon. However, I think it works less on a characterization basis than on an archetypical one. 

Hear me out: how many artists actually make it professionally? And how many of them end up falling back on something solid and lucrative and artistically unfulfilling to pay the bills? Some people are of course lucky enough to land their dream job, and others are lucky enough to find something close enough to that dream job to make money while still doing something creative and adjacent to their interests (becoming an art teacher, for example).

But in Hollywood, at least, the idea is that you’re either a professional artist who Makes It, a starving artist who’s sacrificing for their dream, or a total corporate sellout who abandons their soul for the sake of profit. A child, especially one with a father so unsupportive of his artistic interests, would only have the Hollywood idea of success to fall back on, which means if Dolph was tying to think of a way to “grow up” and stop wasting his time on being an artist, of course he’d jump straight into the most famously corrupt, artistically soulless type of job possible.

The problem here, of course, is that I don’t know what triggered it; like Nerris, I don’t really see a clear line from motivation to new hobby. However, it works really well at poking fun of the “artist to sellout” pipeline portrayed in popular media, so I certainly can’t be mad at it.

Also, look at these credit scores:

David’s score is either astoundingly good -- 825 out of 850 -- or astoundingly bad -- 325 out of 850 -- depending on what that first number is. Gwen’s credit is pretty bad, which isn’t surprising considering she’s working at Camp Campbell, but I’m still proud of her for being either the second- or third-highest person at the camp.

None of the campers should have credit, so these numbers are just goofy, but I’m as shocked by Nikki’s “exceptional” credit as I am by Nurf’s “literally not on the chart by 298 numbers” rating. Assuming Dolph made at least the campers’ scores up, and we know he’s pretty good friends with Nikki, I assume he gave her a higher score because he likes her, Max’s is trash because their relationship is rocky at best, and Nurf’s is just petty and spiteful because he bullies Dolph, and I just love it. 

(I assume Mr. Campbell’s credit is in negative numbers, and QM doesn’t exist on any official records.)

Counselors & Campbell

Campbell, I’m going to argue, makes sense.

This? Not so much.

I have no idea what Gwen’s talking about -- “I need her showing. We all agreed to it”???? -- and literally none of this makes sense in any understanding of characterization or anything, but my counterpoint would be:

Look how cute Gwen looks dressed up like David.

“Mumble, grumble, aliens!” and something about Mormons in David’s cheery voice adds 5 years to my life.

David’s floof is now beard.

David is wearing plaid.

QM. Just . . . QM.

Did I mention that Gwen looks so fucking good here? I swoon. So hot. Babe. Step on me, mommy.

Anyway. Campbell. 

He’s not what you’d call . . . nurturing, by any means, so at first this weird dad!swap is totally out of left field. However, he has proven himself to be . . . well, not a great caretaker, but someone who does put in the effort when he has to, and is surprisingly good at dealing with the kiddos when forced.

He’s also proven himself to be remarkably introspective, starting back in Season 3. He does to an extent feel bad about what he’s done, and to varying extents wants to make amends for it. So when he starts talking about legacy, and what a man leaves behind -- 

-- I can’t say I’d be all that surprised if he stumbled upon Preston trying to be “cool” with sports camp and decided (probably with the help of whatever supernatural strangeness came over the other counselors) that he wants to have a better impact on this camp than a bunch of broken-down equipment, a pile of debts, and a “son” who’s disappointed in him. 

Listen, what I’m trying to say is that I will die defending my Trash Grandpa and there’s nothing you can do to stop me. There’s good in him!!!! I CAN SEE IT!!!!!!!!!!

On a less “Campbell is my dad” note, as a rather stereotypical Manly Man(TM), he’d be best served helping some weedy little brat become more traditionally masculine. i’m saying Campbell was great at football in high school and is in part reliving his glory days, okay?

Nikki

Oh, come on. Nikki’s always shown an interest in science, and particularly in the mayhem it causes. When Neil is out of commission, and she sees that everyone else is doing major hobby swaps -- including Ered, who I believe she still sees as her idol -- why wouldn’t she want to join in on the fun in the most destructive way possible?

The show didn’t say she was a good scientist, after all. 

Neil

Remember when I said I couldn’t defend Neil? WELL SURPRISE BITCHES, TURNS OUT I CAN! 

(I didn’t realize it until halfway through writing this post, to be fair.)

But think about it: the boy does not respond well to his mind being freaked. We have observed this.

This is not a good reaction to an unsolvable logical problem.

I’m just saying, there’s not a huge difference between these pictures. Neil doesn’t do well when his brain is overloaded with things he doesn’t understand, and everyone around him turning into different people -- which is how it must look from their perspective, even if I can sit here and explain it in ways that make sense at least to me -- broke the poor boy’s brain.

He’s a very fragile ecosystem, our little Neil. You must protect him from thinking too many thinks and getting overheated.

So . . . yeah. This episode is rad, way more of it makes sense in terms of the characters’ motivations than people are giving it credit for, and the ones that don’t make a ton of sense are at least funny and clever enough to be overlooked, at least in this broad’s humble opinion.

[hunnywrites]

Chapter Four: Lifeguards On Duty

Summary: The town of Hawkins has been turned upside down with the news that Will Byers has suddenly gone missing. Teddi Larsson and Billy Hargrove are gonna get to the bottom of things. Season one AU.

Pairing: Billy Hargrove/OFC

A/N: I guess I’m bumping the rating on this to mature now. I should throw out a disclaimer that I sort of hate writing smut so that’s why it’s so brief. We’re also getting our first glimpse of papa bear Hopper. Trust and believe that if he could legally adopt Teddi and Billy he totally would. Hope you enjoy!

Once Teddi and Billy made sure that Dustin, Lucas and Eleven made it home safe, they headed back to Billy’s place. The lights inside the living room where on. Probably Susan waiting up for Billy and Max to come home. Teddi parked her van a little ways down the street and hurried to the back side of the house to Billy’s window. She rubbed at her arms roughly to try and warm herself up as she waited for him to let her in. 

His light flicked on, and Billy quietly opened his window and helped pull Teddi inside. “Sorry,” he muttered. “It’s already on the news about Will. Susan had a million questions.” Teddi pulled her puffy jacket off and plopped down onto Billy’s bed. 

“Is Max okay?” she asked quietly. 

Billy sat next to her and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her close to his chest. “She’s gonna be okay. It’ll just take awhile. Susan’s making her hot chocolate.” he said with a small laugh. Like he thought it was funny that Susan seemed to think hot chocolate could fix the fact that Max’s friend was dead. 

Teddi’s eyes burned. Her bottom lip was trembling again. She clasped a hand tightly over her mouth to try and quiet the sob that escaped her. Will was dead. He was gone. She would never see him again. And the last image she had of him was his body being pulled out of the quarry. She felt Billy place a kiss on the top of her head, and his hand rubbing slow circles on her back as she cried. Teddi knew that he hated it when people cried. He would always say that he never knew what to do. But he was better at comforting than he thought. All she needed was for him to sit there with her. 

She cried for Will. And for Joyce and Johnathan. She cried for Mike, Lucas, Max and Dustin. Even El. Why did life have to be so unfair? Why did Will have to be taken so young? Why had Benny felt so alone that he had killed himself? Why did she, Billy and Max have to live in such terrible households? 

Eventually her crying quieted. Teddi wiped roughly at her eyes and sniffed loudly. “...You want me to get Susan to make you some hot chocolate?” Billy asked lowly, a hint of teasing in his voice. Teddi let out a soft laugh and shook her head. 

“I’m okay...god, I should probably head home.”

“Stay,” he said into her hair. “You shouldn’t have to be alone tonight.” 

Teddi sniffed again and frowned up at him. “What about Neil and Susan? We’ll get caught.” 

“Let me worry about it. We can skip school tomorrow. Go out to the lake or something.” His hand moved from her shoulder to her waist, and he picked Teddi up with ease. She twisted around and settled onto his lap, straddling him. She idly played with the collar of his jean jacket as she considered his offer. Maybe Will’s death had made her realize that life was short. Maybe this was a seize the moment type of thing. Maybe it was because she felt so vulnerable. Or maybe it was the way Billy was softly nipping at her neck, his fingers digging gently into her hips...

“I don’t wanna do this anymore.” Teddi said suddenly. Billy pulled away from her almost as if she had slapped him. 

He blinked a few times. “...You don’t want to do what anymore?” he asked carefully. 

“This. Us,” Billy only frowned and she shook her head. “I mean...god, what do I mean?” she asked herself, her hands grabbing onto his jacket tightly. “I don’t want to see other people anymore. I want you. Us. I want you to take me out on a real date. Even if it’s just to fool around at the drive in,” she said with a soft laugh. “I mean, I…” why couldn’t she just say the words? She felt it. She knew she did. 

“...Are you saying you love me, Larsson?” he wasn’t teasing her. He said it quietly, as if someone was trying to listen in on what they were saying. 

Teddi let out a relieved sigh. The fact that Billy knew exactly what she was trying to say solidified her decision to speak her mind. It also gave her the boost of confidence she needed. “I love you.” she repeated. 

Billy smirked at her, pressing two fingers behind his ear and turning his head. “Sorry. I don’t think I heard that. You mind repeating it?” 

Teddi smiled, rolling her eyes and giving his shoulder a playful shove. “Shut up, dick.” Billy chuckled, pulling Teddi to him and kissing her deeply. There was a small part of her that worried he wouldn’t say it back. She sort of expected it. Billy had grown up with the idea that showing genuine affection made him look weak. And while he had made leaps and bounds in that area, he still had issues every now and then. He didn’t have any trouble with physical affection, but the emotional affection was still a sore subject. 

Billy’s hand ran up and under the back of Teddi’s shirt, his fingers drawing circles on her skin. She pulled away from him and took his face gently in her hands. “...And don’t feel like you have to say it back, okay?” she added shyly. 

Billy shook his head. He tucked a strand of Teddi’s sandy blonde hair behind her ear. “But I do,” he said. Teddi’s heart was hammering so hard in her chest she was positive that he could probably feel it. There was a second where his guard went up again. He almost looked like he regretted saying it. But it was gone in a flash. He knew he was safe with Teddi. 

That casual smirk was back. “Guess it’s you and me ‘till the end then, Larsson.”

“‘Till the end…” Teddi mused with a smirk of her own. “...I don’t know. Not sure if I’ll be able to stand you for that long.” she teased. Billy scoffed and tossed Teddi off of his lap and back onto his bed. 

He hovered over her, Teddi’s hands finding a home on his biceps. “If I have to put up with your mouth then you have to put up with me.” he grumbled, kissing her again. “How ‘bout I put that Kate Bush shit you like on and we consummate this thing?” 

Teddi fell into a fit of giggles. She covered her mouth to quiet her laughter and nodded. “Took the words right out of my mouth.” she teased.

Something about the way Billy touched her that night was different than usual. It was almost like he was afraid he might break her. Her own hands felt like they couldn’t stop shaking. It was more than just her nerves being shot from the night’s events. It was like the two of them saying those three little words had somehow changed the entire dynamic of their relationship. 

Their movements were clumsy. The pair shared quiet laughter each time their heads knocked together or when Teddi bit down on Billy’s lip just a little too hard. The butterflies in Teddi’s stomach were almost overwhelming. Her stomach flipped and turned with every touch, every kiss, and every slow rock of Billy’s hips. Teddi’s fingers wound themselves into Billy’s hair as that wonderfully warm feeling joined the butterflies in her stomach. His fingers dug softly into her hips, his nails leaving small crescent moons in her skin.

Teddi’s eyes still ached from all the crying she had done earlier that night. Her eyelids were drooping sleepily as she curled up at Billy’s side. He was smoking and talking to her about something. She couldn’t really make out what. For the first time in days her mind seemed clear. Empty. Eventually she drifted off into a deep sleep. She didn’t dream that night.

---

Billy woke up the next morning with a start. Someone was knocking on his bedroom door. “Billy?” Susan called softly. Teddi stirred gently next to him. He shot out of bed, quickly getting dressed before popping his head out of his door. Susan smiled at him somewhat nervously, her hands fiddling together as she hovered awkwardly out in the hall. “Could you do me a favor? Max is staying home today, and I have errands to run...could you maybe watch her? I’ve been so worried since we heard the news about Will…” she swallowed thickly. “She’s not speaking much. I don’t think she’ll be much of a bother.”

“Yeah,” Billy nodded. “Sure, Susan. No problem,” Susan could drive Billy crazy on a good day. Now with everything going on and the added fact that he had a naked, sleeping Teddi in his bed made him want to all but shove Susan out of the house. “I’ll see you later, huh?” he shut his door, whirling around to focus on Teddi. He almost didn’t want to wake her up. She looked so peaceful. 

He crawled back into bed, wrapping an arm around her middle and burying his face in her neck. “Ted, come on. Time to wake up. Susan’s gone so we’re in the clear.” much like Billy, Teddi wasn’t much of a morning person. Teddi let out a whine like groan and turned over, hiding her face in her pillow. 

“Can’t we just stay here?” she asked, her voice muffled. 

Billy let out a chuckle. “Yeah, sure,” he pulled his shirt over his head. “But as much as I don’t want you to, you should probably put this on. Max’s is staying home.” 

Teddi grumbled, snatching his shirt and slipping it on. As if on cue Max knocked on Billy’s door before slowly peeking inside. “...Can you give me a ride to Mike’s?”

“Now? It’s seven AM.” Billy muttered, his lips clamped around a cigarette as he lit it. 

“He says it’s important. Something about Will and El.” she explained. Billy only rolled his eyes. Max looked over at Teddi, who was bundled up under the covers, with a pleading look. “Teddi, make him give me a ride.”

Billy scoffed. “She can’t make me do anything, Max.”

If Teddi was given 900 guesses as to what Mike could possibly have to say about Will and El she probably wouldn’t be able to guess. So she was pretty intrigued by it. Plus, she wanted to check in on Eleven after the way Mike had treated her the night before at the quarry. “Come on, Billy. Let’s give her a ride. What’s the worst that can happen?”

Billy shot her a look. “You honestly have to ask that?” he looked over at Max, and then back at Teddi. This wouldn’t be a fight he’d win. “Jesus, fine. I’ll take you.” Max was out of the room and down the hall to change nearly before Billy could even agree. He looked over at Teddi, who was failing to hide a smile. “...You don’t make me do anything.” he repeated firmly.

“No, no of course not.” she said, crawling over him to get out of bed. 

Mrs. Wheeler wasn’t home when they arrived. Mike said she took Holly out to run errands and wouldn’t be back for a few hours. “We have to get El to school. So she can call Will.” he explained as he lead Teddi, Billy and Max down to the basement. 

Teddi and Billy shared a look. “...What do you mean so she can call Will?” Teddi asked carefully. 

“That body they pulled out of the water last night wasn’t Will.” Mike said firmly.

“Mike…” Max said with a soft sigh.

“No! You have to trust me. Last night Eleven called Will on my walkie. He’s still alive. He was singing that song he likes so much. But she can’t call him for long. So we need a bigger radio.”

“The AV club.” Max said, as if it were obvious.

“Exactly. So we’re trying to disguise El so we can get her there without anyone noticing her.” as the four of them entered the basement, Lucas and Dustin were fitting a blonde wig on Eleven’s head. She smiled when she saw Teddi, Billy and Max.

“Oh yeah, that’s not conspicuous at all.” Billy said sarcastically. Teddi elbowed him harshly in his side. Eleven was hovering awkwardly, her fingers fidgeting with each other as her wide eyes surveyed each person in the room.

Teddi leaned forward, resting her hands on her knees. “What do you think, El? I’m digging the new look.”

El smiled softly and nodded. “Pretty.” 

“Very pretty,” Teddi agreed with a smile. “...Has Mike been feeding you?”

Lucas let out a snort. “He gives her half of whatever his mom makes him.” he said. Mike shot him a cold look.

Teddi held out her hand. “Come on, I’ll make you something while these guys finish up their grand scheme. Can’t call Will on an empty stomach, right?” The thing was, Teddi wasn’t much of a cook. She lived off things you could pop in a microwave and fast food. But she figured anything she could make would be better than Mike’s lukewarm leftovers. 

“So...how are things with Mike? Did he apologize?” Teddi asked as she started to rummage through the kitchen cabinets.

Eleven nodded. “Yes.”

Teddi looked over her shoulder at the girl and smiled. “...You don’t talk much, huh?” she asked. El shook her head, a shy smile forming on her lips. “That’s okay. I can talk enough for the both of us. At least that’s what Billy says,” she said with a soft snort. 

There wasn’t much in the way of microwaveable food. Which didn’t really surprised Teddi much since it was Karen Wheeler’s kitchen. Eventually she pulled out a box of Eggos from the freezer, holding it up to Eleven. “How ‘bout it?” 

Eleven noticeably perked up and nodded. “A girl after my own heart. I’ll make you my super special breakfast of champions.” she popped four waffles into the toaster. 

“You can’t feed her waffles and coke.” Billy said as he walked into the kitchen. 

“And what should I feed her?” Teddi asked, grabbing a can of coke and a jar of strawberry jam from the fridge. Eleven watched the exchange quietly, observing the two teens. 

“I don’t know...what do kids with superpowers eat?”

Teddi rolled her eyes. “What do you think they eat? Radioactive rocks?” Billy pulled a face at her. Teddi spread the jam on each waffle, stacking them onto a plate and topping it off with some whipped cream. “There ya go, Ellie Bean.” El looked at the treat with wide eyes before digging in. 

Billy groaned beside her. “If you name it you’ll get attached, Ted.” he warned in a sort of sing songy way.

Teddi shot him a look. “She is not an it, Billy. And will you stop it with that already? I’m being nice.” El wasn’t paying attention to them anymore. She was nearly shovelling the waffles into her mouth like she hadn’t eaten in days. 

Billy opened his mouth to argue, but Max and the rest of the kids came running up the stairs. Max looked between Billy and Teddi, taking in their angry expressions. “...What are you two bickering about now?” 

“Nothing.” they said at the same time. 

Billy gave Teddi one last look before turning to Mike. “Can we get this over with? Go get in the car.” he ordered, shooing the kids through the kitchen and out the front door. Eleven shoved the last bite of waffles in her mouth, wiping some excess whipped cream away with the back of her hand. She smiled up happily at Teddi before running off to join her friends in the van. 

If you name it you’ll get attached. Teddi scoffed at Billy’s words. And why couldn’t she? What was so wrong with that? Eleven didn’t have anyone. Why couldn’t that be Teddi? She knew that this was probably some deep, psychological thing that a therapist would have a field day with. Trying to make up for the shitty childhood she had and all that. 

She didn’t really care. 

---

Teddi and Billy dropped the kids and their bikes off at the middle school. They promised that once El got in contact with Will they would ride their bikes back to Mikes and call them to tell them what happened. Now the pair were at a diner that sat on Hawkin’s main street. 

“You think they’ll find anything?” Teddi asked, absently stirring her strawberry milkshake with her straw. She had her own doubts. Mainly because they had seen Will’s body the night before. If he was really alive, how could anyone possibly explain something like that? 

“Nope.” Billy answered firmly. His mouth was full with chilli cheese fries. 

Teddi let out a loud sigh and sunk further into her seat. “Can’t you be a little more optimistic?” 

“Nope,” he repeated, taking a large swig of coke. He let out a soft sigh when he saw the sad look on Teddi’s face. “...What do you think they’ll find, Ted? I mean, you saw Will’s body-”

“I know. I know...I don’t know what I expect. I just hope they find something. For their sake, I guess.” 

Their conversation was cut off when there was a loud knock on the window beside them. Chief Jim Hopper was looking down at the two teens with a stern look, his hands on his hips and his jaw set tightly. “Great…” Billy muttered. 

Hopper walked into the diner and over to the two teens. He wasn’t in his uniform, which Teddi found a little odd. “Aren’t you two supposed to be in school?” he asked, checking his watch. 

Billy and Teddi exchanged a look. “...We’re sad about Byers.” Billy said eventually. 

Teddi rolled her eyes. “We are sad about Will.” she shot Billy a dirty look. 

“You know, Powell and Callaghan are looking for you two. They’re over at the high school questioning your friends.”

Billy noticeably tensed up. “Questioning us for what? We haven’t done shit.”

Hopper looked over his shoulder quickly before sliding into the booth next to Teddi. “Barb Holland’s missing. We got a call from Karen Wheeler. She says you’re the last ones to see her.”

Teddi’s eyes widened. “Barb’s missing?” she asked. This was a nightmare. An absolute nightmare. “What do you mean she’s missing? I thought she was sick.”

Hopper raised an eyebrow. “Who said she was sick?” 

Billy let out a low groan and sunk in his seat. “Nice going, Larsson.” he muttered.

Teddi glared over at Billy. When she turned back to Hopper her expression softened. Teddi was more confused than she had ever been. There had been so many twists and turns the past few days that she barely knew which way was up. But she knew that Hopper would listen. He might not believe her, but he would listen. “Barb didn’t come to school yesterday. Nancy was worried because I guess Barb left the party early-”

“We were already gone by then.” Billy interjected, earning another glare from Teddi.

“So I told her that maybe Barb was just sick or something. She cut her hand-”

Hopper held up his hand to stop her. “She cut her hand? How?” 

“...Shotgunning a beer.” Teddi said, not meeting the chief’s eyes. Now it was Billy’s turn to glare at her.

Thankfully Hopper only gave what passed as a stern look before moving on. “But you two haven’t seen her since this party? Haven’t heard from her?”

Teddi shook her head. “We left to go pick up Max just after she cut her hand. And he probably couldn’t pick her out of a lineup,” she jabbed a thumb in Billy’s direction. He didn’t argue. “Do you think something bad happened? Do you think it’s related to what happened to Will?” 

Hopper gave her an odd sort of look. Like somehow they were both in on the same secret and he didn’t want anyone else to know that they were in on it. But it was gone in a flash. “What happened to Will was an accident. It’s horrible, and it’s sad, but it was an accident. We’re gonna get to the bottom of what happened to Barb. And until then I want you two to keep your noses where they belong, okay? No more parties after curfew, and no more skipping school,” 

Teddi and Billy both shifted awkwardly. Hopper reached over and took one of Billy’s fries. “I’m gonna look the other way this time. But I want you two back in school tomorrow. And you stop worrying so much, kid,” he put a gentle hand on Teddi’s shoulder. “You’re gonna give yourself a stroke.”

“That’s what I’ve been telling her.” Billy said with a smug look. Teddi rolled her eyes. 

Hopper looked over at Teddi with a sort of teasing smile. “See? You know if it’s serious if me and him are agreeing. You two stay safe, okay? I gotta get going,” he rose from the booth, turning and pointing a finger at each of them. “School tomorrow.” he reminded them. Billy gave a mock salute and Hopper was off. 

There was a long silence before Teddi finally spoke up. “We need to do something.” 

Billy let out a sigh. “Like what, Ted? Go monster hunting?” 

“Exactly.”

“Teddi-” 

Teddi leaned across the table and looked at Billy with a tired expression. “Did you see Hop’s face when I brought up Will? It’s like he knows something. Maybe he knows what we know, and he just doesn’t want to say it.” 

“You mean about the Demo…” he drifted off, clearly not able to remember the name. 

“Demogorgon,” Teddi finished for him. Billy gave her a look. One that said ‘do you hear how crazy you sound?’ Of course she knew that. But she was past the point of caring. “They said that Will drowned, Billy. What are the chances that Will drowns and Barb runs away? You know that Quarry. We used to hang out there all the time in middle school. If you fell into it you would be dead before you hit the water. Every single bone in your body would break. You saw his body. Did it look like anything was broken to you?”

Billy couldn’t argue that point. There had been this rumor when they were kids that some guy had fallen into the quarry back in the 60’s, and when the cops dragged his body out of the water he looked like a jellyfish. Will definitely hadn’t looked like that. He hadn’t had a scratch on him. 

Billy took another bite of his chili fries before thoughtfully looking over at Teddi. “Well, what’s the plan, Teddi Bear? We’re gonna go camp out in the woods until something tries to kill us?” 

---

“This is one of the dumbest fucking things I’ve ever done,” Billy muttered. “And that includes the time we were gonna run away to Disneyland when we were ten.” Billy and Teddi were sitting in Teddi’s van. They had driven a little ways into the woods, not far enough to lose their way from the main road, but far enough in that no one driving past could see them. 

“...That was a pretty decent plan.” Teddi defended. It wasn’t. Somehow they had seemed to think they could actually walk to California with nothing but some clothes and their toothbrushes shoved into their backpacks. Hopper had found them about twenty minutes into their grand escape plan. He took them to the bakery down the street from the police station, bought them both donuts and talked to them about what things were like at home before he took them back to school. Steve had been pretty pissed that they hadn’t invited him along. 

Billy turned in his seat and pointed back where there was a bottle of kerosene and a can of Billy’s hairspray they had tossed into the back of the van. “How can you say any plan is worse than this?” he asked. 

“It was your idea to be Smokey Bear’s worst nightmare, Hargrove. Not mine,” she argued. Teddi shut the van off and hopped out. Billy grabbed the kerosene and hairspray and got out behind her, muttering angrily. “Besides, we have to be able to defend ourselves somehow, right?”

Billy gave her a tired look. “Defend ourselves against the make believe monster? Oh, sure,” he turned to the woods that sat before them. “Watch out, Demogorgons! Lifeguards on duty!” he called sarcastically.

“Be quiet!” Teddi hissed out, slapping her hand over his mouth. “If there is something out there it’ll know that we’re here!” 

Billy rolled his eyes and pushed Teddi’s hand away. “Let’s just get this over with.” he muttered. 

Teddi let out an annoyed huff and took off ahead of Billy. She hated when he got like this. All grouchy and stubborn. It was rare that it was aimed in her direction, but Teddi was never one to put up with Billy’s attitude. 

Billy’s jaw tightened as he watched his girlfriend venture further into the woods without him. He let out an annoyed breath out of his nose and followed after her, nearly stomping like a toddler having a tantrum. Teddi flicked on her flashlight, the bright beam illuminating their path. 

Billy was firm in his belief that there wasn’t anything in the woods. But still, he had to admit he felt a little uneasy the further they walked. It wasn’t too far. If he turned around he could probably still see the outline of Teddi’s van. But he couldn’t help but feel like they shouldn’t be there. Like they were trespassing almost. 

He felt like they were being watched. The little hairs on the back of his neck were standing on end. Billy tried his hardest to make his eyes adjust to the dark. He couldn’t see anything or anyone. But there was something out there. He could hear something moving around them. Getting closer. 

Teddi jumped a little when she felt Billy’s hand gently touch her arm. He had caught up to her, taking a step or two ahead as if he were trying to shield her from something. She opened her mouth to let out some sassy comment when Billy held a finger up to his lips to quiet her. She frowned up at him, watching in confusion as he surveyed the area around them. He started fumbling for the lighter in his jean jacket. 

“Billy, what-” Teddi’s question was cut off by a horrible screech. It was that same horrible sound they had heard the night Will went missing. It was close. Teddi’s entire body started to tingle. Her hands couldn’t stop shaking. The scream had been so loud she could hear a quiet ringing in her ears. 

Billy wrapped his hand around Teddi’s wrist and he pulled her closer to him. “We’re going back to the van.” it wasn’t a suggestion. Teddi wasn’t going to argue. There was a loud snap somewhere nearby. Teddi jumped at the sound. Something was coming towards them. Slowly. 

Teddi couldn’t help herself. She shined the light of her flashlight to their left. The beam of light was shaky, but she saw a flash of something moving over behind the trees. She let out a small gasp, and Billy’s hand tightened around her. 

“What the fuck is that?” Billy asked. He was breathing heavily. He pushed Teddi further behind him and took on a defensive stance. It was an animal, he thought. It was too big to be a coyote. Too thin to be a bear. Whatever it was, he was sure it was stalking them. 

There was another loud snap. Teddi pointed the flashlight out in front of them. She’d caught it this time. Neither of them knew what they were looking at. It was...a creature. Nothing they’d ever seen before. It was on all fours. It had paused mid stride. It had a long, thin, almost sort of gangly grey body. It didn’t have a face. It’s head almost looked like a flower that hadn’t bloomed just yet. 

Teddi’s hands were shaking so badly she almost dropped the flashlight. She felt Billy’s entire body go tense. Her heart was pounding so loudly in her ears that she almost hadn’t heard him. “When I tell you to run, you run back to the van and you don’t look back.” 

The monster slowly rose to its feet before them. It easily had to be seven feet tall. Teddi suddenly noticed the way that its long, thin fingers ended in sharp points. She thought she would be sick. It’s face opened, revealing six red petal like appendages that were lined with rows of tiny, sharp teeth. It let out that horrible scream again. Billy told her to run. She did. She knew that Billy was behind her as she carried herself back through the woods and to the van. The monster wasn’t far behind them. Teddi let out a startled gasp as it screeched again, stumbling over some branches. 

Her van was close by. She could see it through her blurry, tear filled vision. Teddi willed her legs to move faster. She couldn’t let herself think about what would happen if that thing caught her. 

Billy was telling her to get in the van. He had slowed down behind her. Teddi threw the driver’s side door open as Billy came to a stop in front of the van. He held up the lighter to the can of hairspray, a large flame shooting out in front of him and towards the creature. 

It screeched again. Like it was in pain. Teddi started the van, screaming for Billy to get in. He didn’t let up with his makeshift flamethrower until he was safely back inside next to her. “Hit it.” He said firmly.

“What?” Teddi asked helplessly. She felt like she couldn’t catch her breath. 

“Run the fucking thing over!” He yelled. 

Teddi slammed her foot down on the gas. There was a loud crunch. The entire van lurched forward as she collided with the monster. She was sure the front of her van had been crushed. It felt like she had run into a semi truck. Teddi threw the van into reverse and sped backwards towards the main road before taking off down the street. 

She didn’t let up on the gas until Mirkwood was no longer in view. 

[theselkiesea]

March 2020 Book Wrap-Up

Favourite book: Worlds of You: Poetry & Prose by Beau Taplin

Worst book: The Pied Piper of Hamelin by Russell Brand

Most disappointing: The Furies by Katie Lowe

Graphic Novels - 2 Novels - 5 Poetry - 4

Ratings: 5 stars - one, 4 stars - three, 3 stars - two, 2 stars - five and 1 stars - zero

So March has been fun, right guys?....Yeah it’s been a real shit show. Like last year March hasn’t been a good reading month at all but with current world circumstances right now I’m not bothered too much by that. I didn’t find any new five star books (though I did read an old favourite), a couple of really good ones and a lot of ‘meh’ ones. Let’s see if April can turn things around.

I have chosen to talk about Worlds of You: Poetry & Prose by Beau Taplin, Cursed: An Anthology of Dark Fairy Tales by various authors, The Furies by Katie Lowe and The Diamond of Drury Lane by Julia Golding.

Worlds of You: Poetry & Prose

I wasn’t expecting much from this, even though I enjoyed his first collection of poems - I just needed something easy and light to get me started with March. And boy this took me by surprise.

I went through a lot last year, and some of it sometimes still gets to be and a lot of that emotional stress and feelings and thoughts I had at that time were shown in a lot of these poems. I cried three times (not sobbing, just a few tears) as I related so hard to them. I’ll pop a couple of the ones that fucked me below, and my rating for this was 4.72 stars.

“Sadly, too many of us stay together far longer than we should because it's easier to say, "I love you," than it is to say, "I don't.”

***

“I think I keep telling myself you never loved me at all because it is far less terrifying a prospect than the possibility you did, you really, truly did, but all of a sudden, and for no particular reason, you woke up one day and stopped.”

Cursed: An Anthology of Dark Fairy Tales

This was a lot of fun! The first story was a nice little taste of what I was expecting and then I got Neil Gaiman's story and I felt so invested. I would have finished this in one day if I hadn't been working. My favourites from the collection are Troll Bridge, Henry and the Snakewood Box, Skin, Wendy Darling, Look Inside and New Wine. Not every story is an exact retelling of your classic fairy tales but there are Snow White, Hansel and Gretel, Peter Pan and Red Riding Hood inspirations. There was only one 5 star story and a few that came close but altogether I think each one blends well. I loved all the gore and creepy moments but it's not all doom and gloom! There are some happy endings and a lot of funny scenes. The stories started to lose speed towards the end but my whole experience with Cursed was so enjoyable and so I ended up giving it four stars.

The Furies

I loved the cover of this book so much, I thought it was gorgeous and I got a signed edition from W H Smith so I was happy. It sat on my shelf for a while but then I got the audiobook to help me push my interest in it. I had been listening to it since February so it pretty much took me a month to get through.

This was so disappointing. The characters were flat and boring, the witchcraft element wasn’t that strong, the plot was just ok, I didn’t invest in the girl’s friendship. There were a couple of really good moments but the ending was so anticlimactic. Two stars.  

The Diamond of Drury Lane

I'm a little tired, stressed out and worrying about the world. I can't seem to concentrate on anything right now and although I have so so many unread books right now all I want to do is turn to my favourite book series of all time. I've mentioned the Cat Royal Series a couple of times but I've never really talked about what it's about and why I love it. It's my comfort book series and everyone is talking about feel good books the now, I've got so many of your posts to catch up on! . The series is set in the 1790's and follows a young orphan girl called Cat Royal who is taken in and lives her life in London's Theater Royal on Drury Lane. There are six books plus a novella. Her adventures start in London but she travels to France, America and Jamaica and meets wonderful people and makes horrible enemies. She's amazing, one of the best female characters I've ever read and I believe she is the perfect role model for young woman. She's smart, loyal, cares deeply about her friend's, talented and brave. She's not perfect, trouble follows her everywhere but she always manages to escape her captors. There are three boys in this book that are shipped with her (there isn't a lot of 'romance' in the series). And the guy I ship her with has tried to kill her a bunch of times cause I love problematic relationships...but like they have such a great twisted chemistry! The books deal with racism in a respectful and smart way and talks about the class system. I wanted to be Cat so bad. I wanted to have red hair because of her, I explored writing and tried out some drama clubs. She has been a huge influence on my life, I don't think I would have turned out the way I have if it wasn't for her. I will reread this series for the rest of my life and imagine Cat being in a relationship with Billy.

[kitcat-italica]

The State of My Ships (please also read the caveats at the end)

My shipping pendulum is swinging away from Thorki. It makes me sad, but I know there's nothing for it. We can't help who we ship, or which fandoms we like.

I think the Thorki fandom, and the Avengers fandom in general, has reached that critical point of toxicity. When any fandom stays around long enough, divisions among its fans are all but inevitable. Add in the fact that hate and tribalism is addictive to our brains once it takes hold of us, and the anonymity + rewards of extreme opinions that the internet provides, and soon enough you've made fandom a not-fun place to be. Even with the people who are supposedly "on my side" with their opinions are hating the "other side" while calling others out for doing the same thing and I'm just. So. Tired of it.

I think the Avengers fandom has opened itself up to this for two main reasons: its longevity/perpetuity, and its subject matter of conflict. The longevity is kinda self-explanatory? Since it's this perpetually-running machine of movie after movie after movie, and now we're getting Disney+ TV shows into the mix too...it just feels exhausting to me rather than exhilarating. I think the fact that Infinity War/Endgame ended the stories of lots of my favorite characters (often in brutal, unforgiving ways) just compounds the exhaustion for me.

But as for the subject matter, that's to do with how the storytellers think that crazy twists, gut-wrenching deaths, boatloads of angst and suffering, and constant infighting among the heroes is what people love about the story. Newsflash: it's not! It may be what gets people to pay attention to something not usually on their entertainment radar, or gets them to preorder an opening night ticket rather than waiting for the second or third weekend. But it's not what makes us care. It's not what makes us fall in love. The characters and the team are what does that! And if you're just gonna break them apart and rip our hearts out every time they get to a happier place together, it's gonna turn people away. Maybe not enough for the bean counters to notice, but it'll happen to an extent. It's been happening for me, as much as I tried to fight against that, because I didn't want to lose a fandom's place in my heart.

But now Good Omens has wormed its way into my wittle fandom heart, and said heart has grown three sizes. I have noticed that Aziraphale/Crowley and Thor/Loki do share some surprising similarities (two magical immortal beings hanging out on Earth, trying to blend in and grudgingly working together to save their home while bickering all the way) (yes I think I have a fandom Type 😆). But, I think the two reasons why Avengers has become toxic and exhausting, are the two reasons why Good Omens hasn't.

The longevity/perpetuity? Not an issue at all, because it's a miniseries, and was always intended as such. There won't be a second season, because the complete story was already told in the first one. So there probably won't be any further material to divide people as time goes on. We're all still in love with the same stuff. Plus, having that sense of completeness is so satisfying to me! All stories need to end, and it's a shame that because of the business side of entertainment, successes tend to drag themselves into overstaying their welcomes because it'll make the producers more money in the meantime. So Neil, if I ever get wind that you're making GO Season 2, I'll be worried. Part of me will be excited, but I'll be mostly worried. Take note.

Then there's the subject matter and approaches to conflict. In this respect, Good Omens is the complete opposite of Avengers. Instead of the constant mean-spirited conflict that Avengers builds its stories on, Good Omens builds its story on love and friendship carrying people through.

Avengers' idea of good storytelling is: Let's have Steve and Tony TRY TO KILL EACH OTHER! Let's have sweet teenage Peter Parker HAVE A MENTAL BREAKDOWN! Let's have everyone quip to COVER UP THEIR PTSD! Let's have Loki DIE IN FRONT OF THOR FOR THE THIRD TIME! Let's have EVERYONE LOSE A LOVED ONE AND BECOME FROZEN WITH GRIEF FOR HALF OF THE NEXT MOVIE!

Meanwhile, Good Omens says: Let's have Aziraphale and Crowley decide to save the world because they've grown rather fond of the place. Let's have the Antichrist name his Hellhound "Dog" and turn it into an adorable terrier who loves him forever. Let's have the Four Horseman be defeated by the belief of four eleven-year-olds that they can make the world a better place. Let's have Adam stop the Apocalypse and save everyone by rejecting the dad who was never there for him, in favor of the dad who was. Let's have the most formidable forces of Heaven and Hell be defeated by a Witch/Witchfinder couple who love each other, a Witchfinder/Psychic Prostitute couple who (secretly) loves each other, four kids and a dog who all love each other, and an angel and a demon who love each other.

On one hand, we can end a story with a broken and battered team of heroes saving the day by punching it really hard, mourning whoever died this time, and going their separate ways. On the other hand, we can end a story with two old people moving in together, two young people finally forging their own destiny, a boy and his dog running off to have fun, and two immortal beings eating good food and drinking champagne. All of them gently, peacefully celebrating the world they still get to live in—especially the fact that they get to live in it together.

I've got a new job as a crisis counselor, which is quite emotionally demanding. Forgive me if I want my entertainment at the end of the day to feel like a warm fuzzy blanket, rather than like walking in the dark through a floor full of Lego pieces.

*A caveat: I am by no means done with writing the main Thorki story I've been working on for the past few years, What Makes a Marriage. That fire is too out of control to be extinguished in my heart. But I think it's an exception because 1. It's an AU that's pretty far removed from canon, and 2. I always strive to have the gentleness in that story come to the fore, even if there's darkness on the edges. I've just been procrastinating on the next chapter because I last left our boys in a super dark place, and I need to build up the emotional bandwidth to write how they climb back toward the light.

Part of building up that bandwidth has been me writing the Softest, Sweetest, Fluffiest fics about the Ineffable Husbands, so if you're only here for WMAM and are tired of my GO headcanons and gif reblogs, don't worry! It's all for your benefit too, in some roundabout way. And I do what I want 🙂

**A second caveat: I am still here to talk about all the Thorki things, if you ever want to reach out! It's just probably not gonna be the main focus of what I reblog or post about anymore. But I still adore the lovely parts of that side of fandom, and the lovely people I've met who feel the same ❤️❤️❤️❤️

[aj-the-satyr]

All the Questions......

So Tag games...... Used to do ‘em a lot then kinda fell off writing for a while and then it got quiet. Well now I got tagged in 3 of those 11/11/11 things. You know the ones answer 11 questions, ask 11 more to the 11 people you tag. Well I’m not going to tag anyone other than the 3 people asking @writersblockandapotoftea @carrotgirl-1 and @rosewinterborn and say thankyou for doing so. So here goes..... the goat tries to get through all 33 questions.

1) Do you hide any secrets in your books that only a few people will find?

Hmm.... I suppose that I have a habit of making the names of both things and characters have deeper meanings. Like Grigory Zmeya, his last name means snake and he is a snake shifter type person. So stuff like that.

2) If you could ask one successful author three questions about their writing, writing process or books what would they be?

Not sure about this. I’ve read interviews with many authors where they have dispensed their advice and advice is not a one size fits all thing but I would lie to ask more personal things like favorite characters, Least favorite scene to write and most surprising side character. Stuff like that.

3) Do you have a library membership?

Nope.

4) Ebooks, yay or nay?

Used them and they are fine but I am the old school like to have the physical book in my hands kinda goat.

5) What feeling do you want your readers to get from what you write?

Wow, deep question. Enjoyment? Other than that I’d like them to have feelings for different characters, to pick favorites, to hate some and love some. I suppose I’d like my characters to be memorable but I will settle for the “That was Good” feeling after reading, even if nothing gets carried with them.

6) What time of day are you most productive?

Considering how many times I’ve written my snippets after 10pm and into the wee hours of the morning, I’d say then.

7) What is your writing Kryptonite?

Myself really. There are times I just get conflicted about my writing and rather than just let it flow and let the characters lead I will find myself deleting things and starting over many times. I’m trying to do that less but it’s hard sometimes to just let go and see what happens at the keyboard.

8) Which scenes are your favorite to write?

Huh....... I’m a dialogue heavy writer trying to get more description into my scenes so I favor just talking but am trying to change that a little.

9) What comes first in your development/outlining process plot or characters?

Well considering I don’t outline anymore (Used to waaaaay back) It would have to be characters. Make the characters and pop them in a setting. Plot will happen, hopefully.

10) What is your favorite novel to film/TV adaptadion?

Comic books count right? I love the Constantine TV show. Shame it got cancelled, love the fact they brought the character back for Legends of Tomorrow and the fact he might be getting his own show again is awesome. Love Constantine.

11) Do you think yourself as more of an artist or entertainer?

Neither really. Not something I’ve ever thought about, since you are asking me to think about it...... entertainer??

Right onto the second set of questions gonna add a read more break here to avoid taking up huge chunks of Tumblr real estate and for those people that don’t really care what this old goat has to say

12) Play fuck, marry, kill with Gandalf, Aragon and Arwen.

Er........ Kill Gandalf.... no wait he’ll come back for revenge..... Kill Aragon..... man that would be hard to do..... Kill Arwen then? But I wanted to marry her.......... Man...... Kill Aragon with Gandalf’s help, fuck Gandalf as payment and then go off to marry Arwen. Problem solved.

13) If you had to set fire to a famous building, which one would you set alight?

The Vatican?

14) If you could bring someone back from the dead who would it be?

It would be Sandra, a friend I made for a brief time on the internet who I RP’d with and had a good rapport with. She died of cancer at 20 I think, it’s hard to think about. I do always remember that I talked to her through her brother in her final days and managed to make her smile, something her brother told me she hadn’t done for weeks. Crying typing this. Yeah. Fuck yeah I’d bring her back and let her live her life. Fuck Cancer.

15) Which fictional Universe would you go into?

Star Trek. No need for money, could sit at a cafe and write all day. Great.

16) Where would you go if the world ended?

Hell. Oh wait that’s not what you were asking. Er...... nowhere. No point if it’s all gone is there? I’d stay here and still be a loner. Wow..... fun goat answers.

17) What’s you alignment?

Chaotic Neutral.

18) Lovecraft or Shelly?

Er....... as much as I love Cosmic Horror Mary Shelly was one of the most badass goths there has been. Plus the whole creating the sci-fi genre as a fuck you to Lord Byron. She is amazing and doesn’t get enough respect.

19) What’s the weirdest food you have eaten?

Sea Urchin or deep fried shrimp heads not sure which I think was weirder.

20) How do you want to die?

Die? I’m immortal. Or is that immoral? One of those.

21) Who is your least favorite character to write?

Probably The Professor since he’s a homophobic bigot who killed his own son’s boyfriend (Though he claims that was merely an accidental oversight of his grander plan) since he is not a very nice character at all. Makes my skin crawl.

22) What’s your favourite fairy tale?

Can’t say that I really have one. None of them resonate anymore, neither the grimdark originals or the fluffed up modern takes. I do however enjoy the book Dragon’s Bait by VIvian Vande Velde which is about a 15yr old girl who is put out as a sacrifice to a Dragon and ends up allying with the dragon and seeking revenge.

One more set. Almost there with the goat interrogation.

23) When did you know you wanted to be a writer?

Probably in University where I started writing a little something called “Space Gerbils” and was sending it out via email to about a dozen internet friends. They were hooked, I thought it was garbage but voila! The spark ignited. Heavily got into tabletop RPGs at the same time so that probably helped my desire for storytelling.

24) What book/Book series have you always meant to read but have not yet?

The Long Earth series by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter. I have a boxed set of them all but I just haven’t cracked the cover yet.

25) Who’s you favourite writer? 

Published? Either Sir Terry Pratchett or Eoin Colfer. But a special shoutout goes to @yuutfa for Caster. They are a wonderful storyteller and got many an emotion from me while I was reading an early draft.

26) What was your favourite book as a child?

It is one that sits on my shelf this very moment. It is called “Science Fantasy Stories” and is a collection of short stories that I read many times over as a child, back when I would consume a book a day almost.

27) Favorite music to work to?

Soundcloud generally has my back but it does sometimes throw up the odd track that makes me question if its algorithm has developed some sort of twisted intelligence Black Mirror style.

28) Hogwarts House?

Ah..... this question. I’ve read the books, saw a couple of the movies (Did not like the movies) and enjoyed every step of the way. I bought my first Harry Potter books when they were selling the first 3 as a set so I jumped in to see what the fuss was about. Never once have I thought about what House I would be in. Never. So Imma gonna say Slytherin.

29) Hobbies?

Writing?? Generally I play vidja games. Current faves being Monster Hunter World (PC), Endless Legend (PC) and Crash team racing nitro fueled (PS4) and I also daydream scenes with my characters in them. Trying to get back into reading regularly again.

30) Where do you draw Inspiration from?

Everywhere I guess. From random conversations to ideas had after playing games, watching TV or reading books. Sometimes I’m not sure where the inspiration comes from but I am just trying to let myself go at those moments, run with it. Who cares if The Simpsons already did it? Truly new ideas aren’t new anyway. (Except maybe for theoretical physics, that shit is bananas) I mean one of my characters basically declared themselves to be a God (At least in my head) after I read an article on Retrocausality. Inspiration can come from anywhere. Use it!

31) What do you consider your aesthetic to be?

Look I can barely spell that word you want me to have one as well?

32) Favorite mythology?

Favorite mythology of AJ the Satyr................

33) What do you think influences your work the most?

My co author?? But seriously working things out with them has been very helpful but also there’s this little writing discord that I’m part of that is really welcoming and a great source of inspiration and ideas. But all in all I think Neil Gaiman influences me the most when he answered a question about how he does it. He told the person asking that you just write everything down that happens in the first draft and then when you go back and rewrite you make it look like you knew what you were doing all along.

Right. One Goat, 33 Questions. And I won! Not tagging anyone else but I want this to get me going on these tag games. I can’t just hide in the dark corners of Tumblr anymore. I must face the light! Has @notanotherhour done this yet??

[shelby-bach-books]

Ever Afters Reading List

Dear Addison (of Charlotte, NC),

You mailed me a lovely note, asking me to recommend a fairy tale series like The Ever Afters that you might enjoy. I’ve been thinking about how to answer you for a while now. Then I realized you didn’t include your return address, so I am answering you via the internet.

I have bad news: you are asking the wrong person.

(Don’t worry—good news will come later because that’s how I roll.)

Authors aren’t the best at recognizing what books are similar to our own series, mostly because we’re too close to our own books. (Kind of like how a bunch of people will tell you that you look like so-and-so, and you don’t see how you and so-and-so look similar AT ALL, except maybe that you have the same hair color.)

And to be perfectly honest, in the early days of writing The Ever Afters, I would sometimes read what someone said was a lot like my series, and when I started to read them...it didn’t always feel like a compliment. I didn’t finish some of them, because they annoyed me so much.

I have since returned to some of those books, and I’ve realized that they’re realized that they’re not as annoying as I thought. Actually, they’re well-written and highly entertaining. They just weren’t the book *I* wanted to write, but similar enough where reading them could have tugged me a bit off-track, especially if I enjoyed them enough to emulate them.

So, in that way, me getting annoyed was the defense mechanism of my creativity—keeping my mental compost bin clear of influences that weren’t right for The Ever Afters.

So, that brings us to the good news I mentioned before: you may be asking the wrong person, but you’re asking me at the right time. Now, four years after I finished OEAE, I’m better read, and my opinion is less influenced than it was in say, 2012.

Anyway, that said, my answer is: What other books you like depends on what you liked about my books.

Like the Virgo I am, I have compiled an exhaustive list of recommendations (see below). It’s a mix of books I outright loved and books I came to love later on—and possibly a few books I just think more people should read.

With this list, I hope for two things: first, that you actually see this, and second, that you find some solid summer reading out of this list.

Thanks for writing, Addison!

Shelby

—

Straight Fairy Tale Retellings (i.e. one at a time)

- Robin McKinley’s Beauty and Rose Daughter and Spindle’s End (Chalice is also good, and The Blue Sword—but they’re not retellings)

- Gail Carson Levine’s Ella Enchanted and Ever (also loved the Two Princesses of Bamarre, but it’s also not a retelling)

- Diane Zahler’s the Thirteenth Princess among others

- Edith Pattou’s East

- Heather Dixon’s Entwined

- Shannon Hale’s The Goose Girl

Mash-Up Retellings (i.e. more than one):

Olden Days ReMix:

- Patricia C. Wrede’s Dealing with Dragons series

- Grace Lin’s Where The Mountain Meets the Moon

- Catherynne Valente’s The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making

- Neil Gaiman’s Stardust

- Adam Gidwitz’s A Tale Dark and Grimm

Modern-Day Twists (Adult, but I read them first in high school/college):

- Elizabeth Ann Scarborough’s The Godmother’s Apprentice

- Kathryn Wesley’s The 10th Kingdom

- John Connolly’s The Book of Lost Things

Romance-heavy, lush and lovely world:

- Marissa Meyer’s the Lunar Chronicles series

- Holly Black’s Tithe and The Darkest Part of the Forest

Well-paced plot of several tangled fairy tales, humor AND mystery:

- Michael Buckley’s The Sisters Grimm

Personal Transformation (ALL THE FEELS):

- Anne Ursu’s Breadcrumbs

- Patrick Ness’s A Monster Calls

- Matthew Kirby’s Icefall

Magical beasties, and also dynamic and believable sibling relationships:

- Brandon Mull’s Fablehaven

- Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi: The Spiderwick Chronicles

Modern-Day DESTINY IS UPON YOU YOUNGLING series, with multiple kids growing up together through friendship and adventures:

- anything by Rick Riordan (but The Lightning Thief is still my fave)

- Suzanne Collins’s Gregor the Overlander series

- Shannon Messenger’s Keeper of the Lost Cities series

- Rachel Hawkins’s Hex Hall series

- John Stephan’s The Books of Beginning series

- Colin Meloy and Carson Ellis’s The Wildwood Chronicles

Follow Your Dreams, Lena-style:

- Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonsong and Dragonsinger

Austen Retellings:

- funny and magical and middle grade: Stephanie Burgis’s Kat, Incorrigible (plus the other two)

- Funny and rom-com: Shannon Hale’s Austenland

- Beautifully captured, keenly felt scifi world: Diana Peterfreund’s For the Darkness Shows the Stars

Lady Warriors:

- anything by Tamora Pierce, but especially Protector of the Small and the Trickster series

- Kristen Cashore’s Graceling and Fire and Bitterblue

Plot Twists like whoa:

- Jennifer Nielsen’s The False Prince