#posting stuff that has been stuck in drafts for weeks/months | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

aethercurrent · 2 months ago

Text

If you've been around, I just finished Time Travel AU. If you're from AO3, you know what this post is and you can skip further down to read more. If you don't know what Time Travel AU is, it's a long FFXIV fanfic I've been working on for the better part of six years. Five and a half of which it's been online to read.

This post is to document some of the early plotting that I never talked about written down into a coherent-ish(?) post. Mostly to get it out of my system and to hopefully stave off the absolute breakdown I'll have once that "it's finished after six years" thing settles in.

Let's start this off with something funnier, because this a looooooooong post: the name.

(That isn't a word, for the record. I just mashed two nouns together to be funny.)

And then, finally, being a class clown at heart, I follow that up with:

It wasn't too long, and that joke that took me half a minute to come up with stuck around. It still makes me chuckle.

But, I suppose now we go back to a couple months before that conversation took place.

The first idea for the AU started rotating in my head a few days after finishing Shadowbringers. I’m kind of a sucker for time travel of any sort (a good chunk of my favourite media of all time includes it somehow!), and another thing I enjoy is enemies to “unfortunately, we’re on the same side for a while”.

So, as one does after a game thoroughly rearranges their brain, I started throwing darts at random points and saw what started sticking.

The first major things decided for the fic at that early conception stage were the following points:

the time travellers are WOL, Exarch, Ryne, Elidibus

the Final Days were caused by the star itself

Hythlodaeus (shade or real deal) is involved (maybe as 14th?)

Hydaelyn and Zodiark are non-violently undone by the end

it ends with a city by the Crystal Tower on the Source

I started drafting a few ideas for it over a couple weeks while waiting for 5.1.

Initially I genuinely wasn’t sure if the WOL in the story was going to be Meteor or my own WOL (every iteration of her has been in this fic, but when it started she was actually still a male Seeker… he’s the jumpy conjurer tagging along in the Praetorium; and the Dunesfolk, Highlander, and the Hrothgar are all obvious or hidden in the background, too). It took me a while before I settled on Meteor, mostly because I don’t want to ship her with NPCs, really. Also, Catboy Lahen was extremely jumpy and wouldn’t have been able to keep him being a time traveller and an Ascian secret for long. I needed someone made of sterner stuff, sorry Catboy Lahen.

The party was a proper light party at that stage, too, even before I settled on Meteor (Meteor / Ryne as tank, Exarch as healer, Ryne / Lahen and Elidibus as DPS)… and then dropped that once I started getting into the more detailed part of plotting.

By the time 5.1 rolled around I begrudgingly accepted that the WOL was going to be the 14th member of the Convocation, but I’ll be the first to admit that I didn’t like that. I still don’t like it, actually. I would’ve liked the WOL being a genuine random soul choosing the road and becoming modern day Azem just as Venat and her successor were before them, instead of having it just be Venat’s successor 2 electric boogaloo.

I also finally accepted the clown’s nose and admitted that my favourite Ascian was Lahabrea because he was a good villain back when I started in the last couple days of 2014. I was disappointed that after how much Emet-Selch and Elidibus got and were getting throughout the end of Stormblood and Shadowbringers, Lahabrea still hadn’t gotten much of anything else. Yes. The first time I met one of my now better friends, she joined call for Endwalker fanfest and the first thing she ever heard from me was me straight up bursting into tears over FFIV references and Pandaemonium.

A few more plot points were also starting to come together:

I wanted Emet-Selch and Lahabrea as POV characters

Hythlodaeus definitely was going to be one as well

he was going to have sat by and watched all of history

he was going to be tempered by Hydaelyn and Zodiark

Unukalhai, if not a POV character, was going to be somewhat important

the party was going to try saving some NPCs who died (success rate varying)

Meteor’s characterisation started to crystallise a bit more

because of that, they were going to try and substantially alter the Steppe section

Lahabrea would be explosive early on, leading to him being taken out of 2.55

Minfilia vanished before she could catch on to Ascian shenanigans

Ysayle would catch on to that, though

It’s glossed over in the finished fic because it’s mostly irrelevant, but as I worked on on the plot draft more and more, I noticed that the party accidentally fit into the elemental chart rather neatly:

Lahabrea as lightning; most volatile and destructive party member

Emet-Selch as fire; also fairly temperamental and not easy to work with

Elidibus as wind; easier to handle but still fairly dangerous

Meteor as earth; unmoving object that can bury a lot of things if they want to

Exarch as water; that one was mostly a “river of time” joke, I won’t lie

Ryne as ice; it’s the closest to light and once she’s determined she’s unyielding

Hythlodaeus as light; absolute stasis due to his circumstances

Unukalhai as darkness; always on the move and always thinking

A lot of the character dynamic comes from that! Emet-Selch and Lahabrea don’t get along, Elidibus manages to get along with both of them. Ryne as the most interesting mortal out of the bunch as far as Emet-Selch is concerned stems from a fire and ice joke that ran away with me; him and the Exarch butting heads is a water and fire joke. The reason why Ryne was the one to surprise Elidibus comes from the fact that she’s a solid ice wall to his wind, and so on and so forth.

That’s also why Unukalhai remains closer to the Ascians to some degree, while Hythlodaeus has absolutely no qualms whatsoever interacting with mortals as long as his restrictions are adhered to even if he doesn’t like them in the end.

It became extremely less relevant as time went on, but a lot of the early fic can be traced to that elemental balance.

Along with the elemental balance of the team, I started working on the magic system for the Ancients. I was extremely stuck on the sidequests in Amaurot and how two of them dealt with the WOL not being able to use creation magicks. I thought it was interesting that it seemed as if the one making clothes didn’t use a concept crystal, while in one you were handed one to summon those funny slimes.

The final point was that you had to catch a cubus for one while you didn’t for the other.

So, eventually I came to the magic system in the fic. Three classes of magicks (body, soul, environment), and differing levels of innate ability and trained skill. Ironically, the three antagonist Unsundered all fit into three out of four extremes of that latter scale…

Then there was the question of what was considered “dark arts” before the Sundering. It wasn’t necessary, none of the main characters would be students of the dark arts, but it was a fun thought experiment. Eventually I came up with the idea to animate something inanimate with malicious intent. Living weapons, defensive automatons, sentient traps, and so on and so forth.

I started applying that to all of the relevant Ancients, and it was a lot more fun than I want to admit here.

Essentially what the concept crystals thing came down to in the end was a certain level of intricate casting and preservation. Lahabrea can create a flock of his birds effortlessly because he knows the concept inside out with all its details and intricacies, while someone trying to summon it themselves would have to use a crystal to get the details right. That’s also why most of the time the Ascians don’t seem to be using concept crystals—they aren’t creating much, and when they are it’s things they already know how to make.

Actually, I dug out the notes on the innate/trained scale. There’s a lot of things that are irrelevant for the fic on that, but let me write down the most relevant ones:

Emet-Selch: soul; high innate/low trained

Lahabrea: body; high innate/high trained

Elidibus: environment; low innate/high trained

Hythlodaeus: soul; high innate/not trained

Alexis (Meteor’s ancient): environment/dark arts; low innate/medium trained

Igeyorhm: body; medium innate/high trained

Minfilia: body; low innate/low trained

Venat: environment; medium innate/high trained

Rafael (previous Elidibus): soul; low innate/high trained

There was also the question of what to do with Ancients in general. True, we had the shades in Amaurot as a general idea, but just like with Azem above, I wasn’t a fan of the featureless or just “human” thing. I still am not, for the record. I think it’s goofy to have everyone be proto-Hyurs and then post-Sundering we suddenly have Hydaelyn give some people a goddess-assigned fursona. And that’s coming from someone who previously played a Hyur, for the record!

But just like how magic focused on the elements specifically instead of the broader strokes, I decided that in ancient times there would be one term for the different tribes. I tried to handwave the shades away with making the region around Amaurot the ancestral home of proto-Hyurs… and then only had one of them in the party. Oops!

Overall, my thought process was to address the weird lore bit that apparently interracial relationships are frowned upon in Eorzea. I mostly wanted to… not… have that apply for ancient times because it’s fucking weird. Not gonna call it anything other than that.

From there, it was as simple as… naming everything and everyone, giving them a place they come from, and… oh god I wrote so much stuff that never came up just so it stayed internally consistent y’all, I almost don’t want to talk about it.

The main notes on that are in Astral Scions, Umbral Sinners I, but to recap:

Hyurs were Amaurotines

Elezen were Atlanteans

Miqo’te were Children of Sirius

Lalafell were Saronian Marchers (Saro)

Roegadyn were the Galg

Viera were Lunarians

Hrothgar were the Watchers

Au Ra were white-scaled Steelhearts and black-scaled Flareseekers; formerly the Volcana

Specifically the Au Ra have a lot of background history that gets mentioned due to Lahabrea being a Flareseeker. Long story. Too long for this already long post.

Speaking of Lahabrea, though; there was rhyme and reason behind why the Ascians were what they were.

Lahabrea (Flareseeker+Amaurotine) is a renowned scholar who also is something of a social outcast both in Amaurot due to his Flareseeker heritage and in Bodhum due to his Amaurotine heritage, which leads to him being quite hard to deal with thanks to bad experiences way in the past

Elidibus (Child of Sirius+Saronian Marcher) is both very quiet and observant and still relies on company if not community and is rather lost without the support of those he deems his family

Emet-Selch (Amaurotine) is the one who misses home the fiercest out of all of them because that’s where his family and he always belonged, that’s where everyone he ever loved was

Hythlodaeus (Atlantean+Amaurotine-Lunarian) feels all over the place and cuts out his paternal home under the waves and his maternal home high above ground to find his own home

Venat (Amaurotine+Lunarian) grew up on her father’s stories about how the star looks from the Floating City of Babil and wanted the more grounded people of her home to see that as well

Another fun thing about ancient times was the fact that I could do whatever I want. It’s not that glaringly obvious with their names, but when it comes to their cities and settlements in general, I got to go a bit wild with it.

And with “wild” I mean I had some fun picking settlement names across the Final Fantasy series. I hope people who know the series a bit outside of XIV itself had some fun with the interludes; I know I had a lot of fun with it. I think if I had to pick a favourite it’d be the Floating City of Babil, the underground city Insomnia, and Archades on the mountains by the sea.

Again, I think having everything, apparently, be Ancient Greek Mythology is… stifling. I admit that even in my more canon-compliant other works I struggle with it. There’s a lot of myths to draw inspiration from; I for one would’ve loved Hermes to deal with a mfing Wolpertinger. Creature of all time.

But… at that point I was writing two different drafts. One where Unukalhai joined shortly before Hythlodaeus as POV character (which also was a joke about the darkness-aligned character joining before the light-aligned one because darkness is active), and one where he remained a non-POV but important character. Kind of similar to what Minfilia became after she was saved! It was the same for both of them up until he joined the party for good.

If I had gone with 7 POV characters instead of my full party set-up, there was a bit of an act dedicated to unravelling his feelings on this nonsense. Specifically a non-POV Unukalhai wouldn’t have spent as much time with everyone else and would have gone down a different mental rabbit hole of eventually struggling with not being able to get his revenge on Igeyorhm while also starting to feel like a replacement heist from an alternate timeline self is extremely creepy considering how the “heroes” of the Void all changed until they were effectively replaced by alternate versions of themselves. He’d have tagged along for Meteor’s Regula mission and would have gotten to hear their version of the replacement heist after they escape from Garlemald together. (Meteor taking over this timeline’s version of themself grew much less important overall as the drafting continued, so it never really came up again beyond Titan where the alternate self died during Living Dead).

After that Unukalhai would have mellowed out a bit until he would join the Ascians and Cylva on the First to deal with the Flood of Light. That would’ve been the last of him until the part where Meteor and G’raha come to the Empty.

Overall, a non-POV Unukalhai would have been less gloomy but also would have been a completely different beast. He remains fairly introspective and reclusive across both drafts, but the reclusion gets the better of him as non-POV character.

The setting itself was also becoming rather rigid—part of having so many things set in stone while adding more and more. It would be extraordinarily hard to integrate whatever canon proceeded with. I couldn’t add or remove characters because that led to a ripple effect throughout the whole plot, and the ending was admittedly the first thing I decided on after I got the idea for the premise. It was the only thing I couldn’t negotiate myself out of.

I can work with that! I’ve worked with that before!

But unlike previous longfics, something about TTAU felt daunting in ways I couldn’t articulate at any point. Still can’t. I guess I just really wanted it to be everything I’d want to read at any given time, and I really am my own harshest critic. Great going, Ms aethercurrent née vanitaslaughing, now you’ve made yourself anxious about disappointing the target audience (yourself).

I also struggled with not only making it fun for me but also for readers; I wouldn’t have posted it if I didn’t want to share it with people. I hope I did a good job in the end, but really I can only speak for myself here. If you read it, even partially, I hope you at least had some measure of fun before you dropped that absolute behemoth of a fic, and if you finished it entirely there are no words in either language I speak to convey how happy I am that my silly big baby entertained you to stick through with it until the end.

I eventually reached a point where more and more details were starting to form that were needed to keep things straight while probably never coming up.

Every member of the Convocation before the Sundering has a name and was assigned a race. Most of them are mentioned in an Interlude, but in most cases there’s some sort of underlying joke to them. Similarly all of them received titles similar to Speaker, Emissary, Architect, Seer; I attempted to keep it somewhat balanced and/or in line with a fantasy government. Messenger Mitron and Listener Loghrif sound a bit redundant with the Emissary Elidibus around, but those two specifically mostly stick to Amaurot and the more immediate surrounding settlements—specifically calling back to that one city mentioned in the sidequests in Amaurot where you deal with the debating shades. Something akin to a national relations minister, an international relations minister, and one specifically for the neighbouring countries.

At around that time the Twelve were also decided to be actual genuine deities of the star. A bit of inspiration comes from Sailor Moon (nothing concretely 100% similar, but the Twelve are effectively the star’s Sailor Scouts who also have the ability to become a new small system if they decide to leave), but I mostly just wanted them to be, y’know. Gods. Coming back to the issue I have with canon going “everything’s Amaurot”, I can’t say I love how the Twelve are in canon but I do adore them as characters. It made me choosing Menphina as the one to speak with the group all the more sweeter since I think out of all of them she’s my favourite design-wise.

There was also the thing with the Seer position that needed to be tackled at this point. I’m morbidly fascinated by characters who know the story they’re in but can’t do much to influence it because they can only tell what path they’re on depending on the ending.

I think the biggest struggle especially towards the end was the fact that I often drafted at least two possible POVs for a chapter. I often went in expecting to write one POV, got stuck irreversibly on it somehow, steamrolled the whole thing, and wrote out the other draft. I’ve cannibalised previous drafts into complete rewrites of the same POV a lot more than you’d think I have. And I only save a copy of a chapter that reached a certain word threshold or if there’s something integral written to a degree I like.

One of the worst offenders of the bunch was Chapter 78… which became Chapter 79 when I posted it. Yeah. It got so bad and frustrating that I had to make dealing with Hythlodaeus future me’s problem. Thankfully it didn’t cut too much into the pacing thanks to Act XI being extremely slow due to how introspective it was.

In the earlier days one of the other struggles was formatting. Something about my documents went haywire when pasted, leading to endless strings of completely superfluous <spans> that added strange spacing issues between all that mess. It was something that my older works struggled with too, which became a non-issue over the years (thankfully. I shudder thinking about possibly having to deal with that issue while already spending 48 hours formatting Eden Rewrite correctly).

The documents just eventually started to bug out because they were so damned long. I never expected them to be in one, but I have five documents holding all of this fic. It’s rather funny to see four chilling and the fifth on top with a 00 as its first characters in the document title so I see it first.

It's... really bittersweet to remove that 00 and seeing them all together now.

That's... about it for the fic as it was posted there. Whether you read the fic or just read this post, once again: thank you.

Thank you for sticking with me for six years, or for reading about the earliest of these six years!

For those who remember at a certain point I was considering overhauling the fic and implementing canon from Endwalker at that time, there's a bit more post to go specifically relating to that idea!

You’d think I’d struggle with keeping the canon characters and the fanfiction versions apart as someone who prefers staying canon compliant, but over the years those guys became their own beasts. Ophion could never have been Themis, but why would I want them to be the same? I needed Ophion for this fic to work, after all.

A lot, and I mean a metric shitton of stuff, breaks and changes there. It’s been a fun thought experiment at the very least. I’ll be the first one to admit that I don’t like the Warrior of Light being a reincarnation of Azem’s sundered soul; I just like them being a nobody with no preconceived notion that they’re bound to adventure no matter what because that’s what their soul always did… but Hythlodaeus likewise can’t replace them in that case.

The solution to that first massive hurdle? I suck up the Azem thing, and instead of an Unsundered Hythlodaeus, the one that joins the party is the Shade. His plot stays surprisingly intact through all of that, but instead of dealing with forced indecisiveness it becomes more of a plot about identity and what to do when you’re a creation on the path to freeing the real deal you were based on.

Out of all of them, Lahabrea changes surprisingly little—I wrote him like a stern father to Igeyorhm in this, and you can mostly mix and match a lot of that onto Erichthonios. Instead of dealing with her ascensions and the fact that she needed to be taken out, Lahabrea gets to see his son reincarnate and die over and over again.

Honestly? I could even keep the dual Elidibus approach. Instead of Ophion (the previous one’s student) and Rafael (the Zodiark sacrifice), it would be Elidibus (the Heart of Zodiark) and Themis (the rest of the Heart still remaining with Zodiark). There would be a lot of overlap with the Shade here but in the end the Shade and Hythlodaeus would exist independently from one another while the Heart of Zodiark reunites and becomes Themis again.

I think the parts where I would have to genuinely start rewriting it entirely is where to integrate canon Venat over TTAU Venat and the Endsinger. TTAU Venat is a lot more mellow than canon Venat—a shitty mother but an excellent politician versus canon’s all-loving hero with an understanding of but no love lost for politics. The Meteia as a villain are a lot less vague and distant than the Star Itself. Instead of a journey to the innermost reaches it’s to the edge of the universe. Doable, yes, but marginally harder to do. Honestly, thinking about it as I’m writing this, I think I would have to do an arc where at least Meteor if not all Sundered go to Elpis in the past to learn something while the Unsundered+Shade remain in the present to deal with the Final Days…?

Actually, let’s tackle the characters one by one in a canon-adjusted remake.

This would be assuming that there is inter-shard travel so the starting group would still be Meteor, Ryne, and G’raha. The one major major change would be that instead of Elidibus the “Ancient” to go with them would be the Shade.

Meteor would change the least. They don’t care about being Alexis, they don’t care about being Azem either. They’re one of a handful children of a farmer family in La Noscea, not some sort of government freak from ancient times long before they were ever born. They didn’t start travelling because their soul told them to after they got the Echo, they started travelling because they damn well wanted to after seeing the Calamity, get outta here with that “Azem” nonsense.

In an Elpis episode they would do the opening section for the most part. Not much else to say here.

G’raha would be a lot more cheerful once the initial horror stage of travelling through time to prevent the end of the world again faded. He’d still have his struggles with the idea of possibly letting down the future Ironworks and being arguably the least experienced in the adventuring department.

In an Elpis episode, G’raha would likely be the one to deal with Venat overall. She’d be the perfect foil to him; an experienced traveller to his inexperienced adventurer. They’re both old but he’s barely a blip on her lifespan. They’re both incredibly determined to find the reason for why this is happening.

Ryne would feel a bit more resentment towards Ascians in general at that point. Other than that, her struggle was always being the odd one out amongst the Sundered, about being face to face with the woman she was named after and seeing why that woman was so beloved. About finding her own niche and staying there, no matter the people she loses.

I think out of all of the Sundered in a possible back-in-time-again Elpis episode, she would be the one to sympathise the most with Hermes despite also possibly interacting with him the least; she would likely lead the charge right before Ktisis Hyperboreia and her plot in Elpis would mostly be about travelling treacherous foreign terrain just the way Thancred taught her.

Unukalhai’s a bit of an odd case. After all there’s still two drafts, one where he joins the party as main POV character, and one where he becomes something along the lines of TTAU Minfilia. In a rework of that, I’d have to apply a lot of the Void lore since revealed to him, which makes him go from an odd case to an even odder case. He’d… either possibly involuntarily make Azdaja’s predicament worse, or free her before Endwalker happens but she loses her memories and becomes his cool new partner in crime until a completely flabbergasted Vrtra has to drop the facade immediately because no one told him a thrice-damned Warrior of Light had his sister tagging along what the fuck.

The hypothetical Elpis Episode would have a POV Unukalhai likely be the one to help Meteion get a gift for Hermes. His already intense internal hatred coming to the surface to turn a flower from bright white to darkest shadow, mirroring what happened with Hermes and the flowers in the past? Yeah. That’s the good shit.

In a non-POV case he’d stick with the Scions to help deal with the Final Days and his section of the story most likely would have gone to Ryne.

Ophion would likely still be a soul in Zodiark. Other than that, he’s not relevant.

Themis or the Heart of Zodiark… wouldn’t necessarily be the first one to join them. Actually, I think he’d be the last one. Immovable object without memories meets unstoppable force that draws in his allies. Overall he would be a lot colder on account of having no memories, and be rather fiercely protective of the other Unsundered for reasons he cannot recall. He’d make for an excellent diplomat, but it would likewise lead straight into his greatest vice: vague, foggy memories of something other other that might float up to the surface on occasion. Claudien would be an extremely weak spot for him, except unlike Lahabrea in the same position, Themis cannot tell how or why he’s reacting like that.

While the Sundered are off for their Episode Elpis, Themis would likely scour through the Crystal Tower to find a way to interact with the him from the timeline the others came from.

Emet-Selch would be the first legitimate Ascian to “join” their cause.

Mostly out of morbid curiosity, partially because he wants to figure out how in the name of all good graces a recreation of Hythlodaeus with sentience so advanced it can be deadpan sarcastic and have an identity crisis is with there, and it’s driving him just a bit insane. He’d actually be a lot more antagonistic as a result, and he’d be the one mostly bemoaning the Sundered and how Meteor is a disgrace to Azem early on until they have enough of his nonsense and beat him up. That would serve the purpose of actually confirming that they have the strength to kill an alternate timeline version of Emet-Selch and he mellows out a bit. Not much. Just a bit.

Overall he’d be a lot more prickly—which makes for an interesting switch when during the Final Days on the Source he very swiftly drops the antagonism. It’s a bit of a “been there, done that” attitude but since the star itself is in danger he has surprisingly few qualms about saving a few Sundered while he’s at it.

Lahabrea wouldn’t change much like I said, though there would be a lot more ruthlessness behind anything and everything he does. He’s willing to walk over corpses no matter what instead of calming down a little on that once he’s been thoroughly humbled (and untempered).

He’d also be a bit more strangely sentimental internally around Minfilia specifically; he already compares her to Igeyorhm a few times in TTAU proper but in a canon-compliant rewrite the comparison point would be Erichthonios. No matter how ruthless he is, at the end of Pandæmonium he and Erichthonios started the long journey of making up, and Minfilia reminds him of Erichthonios’s best qualities in a quite haunting way. They’re both tenacious and care about everything and everyone from the bystander to the one causing the mess… except Minfilia is a bit more spicy and willing to speak her mind. He wouldn’t be as fond of her by the end, but he’d still accept her terms and teach her.

Lahabrea during the Final Days would likely be recruited by Urianger and the Loporrits as additional quality control.

I’ve gone over the Hyth Shade, but the endgame there would be essentially affirming that he is as much a person as the Sundered are. Sure, he may have been someone else’s creation but that doesn’t make him any less a person on this star, not to mention he was one of the time travellers.

The real Hythlodaeus also would’ve been rather delighted to have an identical twin, and one who’s fighting against the Final Days no less.

Can’t go into too much detail otherwise, since this canon compliant version never quite left the drafting phases for obvious reasons. He’s the one character who more reacted to the plot than being the one to move it along, and without the plot there isn’t much to say.

He’d have stayed behind to deal with the Final Days, and he’d likely have been one of the first to go to Garlemald when news of the skies changing there broke.

The one major departure from canon would be that Zodiark and Hydaelyn aren’t fully slain—Zodiark specifically it put under a complete stasis spell in the middle of unravelling, but that breaks the protective shroud He has over Etheirys and the Final Days start happening again. Hydaelyn created meticulous seals and mechanisms to ensure that despite being bound the protective shroud remains, but under full stasis and while the whole thing is falling apart…

(Hyth Shade was the one to suggest it to the Watcher, Elidibus, and Emet-Selch as an absolute last resort. None of them really wanted Zodiark to suffer; the main goal still remains to bring back those Ancients should it prove possible).

All issues with how wonky and not finished that is aside, I’d also get a lot of extremely fun things to explore. Jullus already is one of my favourite characters introduced in Endwalker, but having him tell his story to Emet-Selch would be super interesting. There’s knowing what you’re doing, and there’s coming face to face with it, and that would genuinely be super cool to do.

Then there’d be the whole Heart of Sabik business—I’d unironically love for that whole mess to unfold with the real Lahabrea and Elidibus there while there’s memory-creations Erichthonios and Themis there as well. That would be absolutely chaotic on top of Athena also being there. Atrocious vibes, ten out of ten.

Likewise, Ryne and Vrtra would also be an interesting pair of characters to interact; they’re both the youngest siblings (of a sort in Ryne’s case), they’re both intensely protective of the people they care about, and they couldn’t bring themselves to hurt those they love even if it were absolutely necessary until someone else confirmed that this was the only way. There’s also that loss of family (Azdaja missing, Ratatoskr/Bahamut/Nidhogg dead; the whole abandoned timeline) that would have them interact in a neat way too, they’re quite similar to each other.

Unukalhai and Zero. She’s effectively everything he was said to be and they both failed. There’d be an interesting dynamic between them because of that—even if getting Zero in on the plot would be rather hard. Unukalhai would definitely try and sympathise with Zenos’s voidsent and maybe try to get them to abandon their master, and through that realise that she might not be there entirely willingly.

But overall, the hardest character to implement would be the Meteia. There’s eight main characters and there’s eight different opinions on this mess, ranging from intensely sympathetic and willing to rebuild burnt bridges (Ryne, Meteor, Hyth Shade, Elidibus if he regains his memories before Ultima Thule), apathetic despite how high the stakes are (Unukalhai, Elidibus if he doesn’t regain his memories), different levels of less sympathetic (Lahabrea, Emet-Selch), and the option where G’raha has such intense issues with being not overly sympathetic and having no sympathy at all that his understanding of the situation is wildly out of control until the very end.

Having worked with them as both individuals and as a hivemind in a couple writing exercises, I honestly would have had a Meteion for every main character, and give all eight of them a proper story on top of what’s already going on there. Narrative foils that lead both parties to Ultima Thule.

Putting that one lightly: that would’ve been a goddamn motherfucking nightmare to write. Fun, but a nightmare.

And that's a lot coming out of Ms Almost Half a Million Words Across Six Years.

#long post #really fucking long post #if that read more doesnt work im. literally so goddamn sorry

14 notes · View notes

pumpkin-spike18 · 4 months ago

Text

✨Weekly Progress #31✨

Oh, hey~ I actually managed to post this 1 week in and on a Monday! :D

Weekly Progress #31

Posted devlogs

Finished 2 SYVNH TY art

Finished fan project BG sketches, got them approved

Answered comments/asks

Finished + sent proposals

Drafted SYVNH survey

Yaoi Day posts

Worked on Comms

Bug BL VN concepting

Reviewed next steps (as dev, and for specific projects)

Doodled chara ref sheet

Doujinshi planning

Stuck in a Yandere Visual Novel...HELP!!

I think my last post summarizes my work on SYVNH this week pretty well! But in case you missed it, we're working on bringing some merch to life for SYVNH! And to start that, we'll need your help in filling out our Interest Check survey!

You'll be able to get some wallpapers at the end of the survey so be sure to check it out! 😉

Future Projects

I spent a portion of this week re-evaluating my next steps as a VN/game developer and planning for future projects. I know I want to finish my current projects (BWBOK and SFB), but I was quite disorganized for the timing of when that will happen. So I did the only thing I knew how to do: schedule, schedule, and more scheduling! 😤

Goals:

BWBOK: finish for SuNoFes (9/3); admittedly the schedule for this one is a little out of my hands currently. But I will aim to finish my portions by 8/15 (hopefully).

SFB: Demo 2.0 for YuriJam (12/1); I haven't fully planned out how much of the story I'll release for 2.0 yet, but I am to finish all the sprite art this month. Afterwards, I intend to focus on finishing the last part of the story.

A long term BL project. This was what has been bouncing around my head for the past week. There are a few contenders and they're all currently untitled. The plan is to make a commercial BL game for steam in the 50k+ wordcount size. I have 3 projects within various stages the concepting to outlining phase and hopefully, I finish the outlines for at least 2 of them before the end of the month.

Fan Stuff

I've joined a few vtuber fan projects! ...Which I'm not allowed to talk about, so that's about all I can say. It's been fun so far, though!

I originally challenged myself this year to make a 20 page comic. Recently I've been reading and looking at a lot of doujinshis so... here's the outcome of my challenge: plan a small doujin. idk how much of it I'll discuss here, though...

🎃 and that's all I've got for this week! See everyone next week!

#visual novel #vnlink #devlog #indiedev #vndev #syvnh

9 notes · View notes

drabbles-mc · 2 years ago

Text

Catching the Red-Eye

Juice Ortiz x F!Reader

Request by Anon: I just saw a funny post that gave me a fic idea: Friend says “Our flight is at 3am so we could go drinking and then straight to the airport.” Y/N: “Sound like a great idea!” Narrator: “It was not a great idea.” Can I request a Juice x reader where she & her gf (maybe Tara or someone?) are coming back from a girls trip and Juice(&Jax or whoever) have to deal w/ whatever state they find their girls in? 😂😂

Warnings: language, alcohol

Word Count: 1.9k

A/N: I started a draft for this months ago when you first sent it in and then my computer deleted it. But I got back to it tonight because apparently my muse is only awake between 11pm and 1am these days 😂 I did tweak a couple little things from the original request but the idea of writing reader an Tara as friends just made my heart way too happy. I love them so much and I hope they have many adventures together going forward. I've missed writing slice of life stuff like this. 🥰 (Also I can't lie this made me want to write more fic for Jax and Tara. It's such a small glimpse of them here but god I mourn the missed opportunities of them just having normal relationship moments man idkidk)

A/N 2: My requests are closed this is an old one that's been sitting in my inbox for literal months. Unedited and unbetad as always lmao

SOA Taglist: @espieviolet99 @littlekittymeow @chibsytelford @juicyortiz @meadowofsinfulthoughts @i-just-read-stuff @bport76 @withmyteeth @buckybarneshairpullingkink @paintballkid711 @jitterbugs927 @fanfic-n-tabulous @mijagif @frattsparty @winchestershiresauce @beardburnsupersoldiers @choochoo284 @artemiseamoon @yourwinchesterbros @nessamc @garbinge @narcolini (If you want to be added to any of my taglists, please let me know!)

It was the first time that you’d ever actually been drunk on a plane. For all the times you heard people talk about airport bars, and all the times that flight attendants had offered you cocktails, you had never really thought much about it. You were always on the go through the airport, always had a book or something to keep you company on the flights. You had never even been buzzed near a plane, let alone drunk and on one.

Apparently the missing ingredient had been traveling with Tara. You had no idea what you had been missing out on until you had it. All because of a trip for a hospital conference. The two of you had spent the better part of your week sitting through lectures and seminars. Sure, the information was interesting, and sure, you were both thankful for the opportunity. But after an entire week in a swanky resort it felt like the two of you had nothing to show for it.

Then to top it all off, your flight got delayed. So you and Tara were stuck at the airport with a few extra hours to kill. It wasn’t long enough to justify leaving just to have to go back through security, but it was too long to just sit there doing nothing. You had no interest in the book in your backpack, and the way that Tara was looking around the airport had you thinking she was in the same predicament.

Then she turned and looked at you, eyebrows raised and a little bit of a glint in her eyes. “You know,” she leaned on the armrest between your two chairs at the terminal, “since our flight isn’t until three now, we could just…” she shrugged casually, “hit one of the bars here and head straight to our flight afterwards.”

You chuckled, trying to gage just how serious she was. “R-really?”

She shrugged, “Why not? The plane has a designated driver. Plus,” she stood up from her seat, “I think we deserve something besides pamphlets and lecture notes for the week we’ve had.” She held her hand out for you to take. “Come on. Closest bar is just a few gates down.”

Despite knowing that it was most likely going to end in a hangover on a plane, you slapped your hand into hers and let her pull you up from your seat and down the hallway. The amount of laughter erupting from the two of you were the sure sign of an impending good time.

It was such a good time, in fact, that it was a just before midnight when your phone started buzzing in your pocket. You pulled it out to see who was calling at such a late hour. You half-stifled a giggle as you showed Tara the name flashing across your screen.

“I forgot to tell him the flight got delayed.”

Her eyes widened as she laughed, taking a sip of her drink before saying, “Oh. When you tell him, make sure he tells Jax.” She let out another laugh. “I forgot to tell him, too.”

You were laughing as you answered the phone. “Hey, baby.”

“Hey,” Juice had been confused the second he dialed your number, but the drunken lilt to your voice only made him more confused. “Are you good? We're at the airport and—”

“Promise me you won’t get mad?” you asked, still giggling.

“He better not!” Tara chimed in with a laugh before ordering the two of you another round of drinks.

Juice couldn’t help but to laugh at the fact that Tara was also drunk. After getting it together, he said, “I promise I won’t get mad. What’s up?”

“Our flight got delayed.” You laughed. “Until 3AM. We aren’t,” you took a sip of the drink that Tara handed you, “we aren’t gonna be home until morning.”

Juice sighed but he wasn’t mad. All the shit that you went through because of him being in the club, all the changed and canceled plans for a myriad of reasons, you more than earned this one. Tara too.

“You’re mad,” you said.

He laughed. “I’m not mad. Just, you know, don’t get carried away and miss your flight.”

You smiled even though he couldn’t see it. “We won’t.”

“Text me later with an ETA?”

“As soon as we board the plane.”

“Alright. I love you.”

You were beaming. “I love you too.” He was halfway through saying goodbye when you remembered, “Oh! Shit. Make sure you tell Jax! Tara forgot too.”

Juice laughed. “Yea, I think he might have figured it out by now.”

You heard Jax's muffled hello on the other end of the line, laughing before finally getting around to saying one more I love you to Juice and saying goodbye.

The rest of the night into the tiny hours of the morning flew by in a bit of a blur. There was a lot of laughing, a lot of drinks. If your memory served right there were a decent number of them that you and Tara didn’t have to pay for yourselves which always seemed to make a drink taste better. It was a great time, and despite the amount of alcohol in your systems you still made it to your flight on time. You even remembered to update Juice.

The two of you managed to get your laughter somewhat under control for the sake of the other passengers on the plane. You didn’t want to keep them up with fits of giggles so you dialed it down. It didn’t take long for Tara to drift off to sleep, but you knew that wasn’t going to be happening for you until you home and in your own bed. And, with any luck, curled up with Juice.

Not sleeping had the unique upside of allowing you to nurse another drink or two on the flight. Just enough to keep you buzzed, to stop you from getting slammed with a brutal hangover. You kept yourself perfectly amused on the relatively short flight home. A few hours on a plane seemed to go by faster than in the car. Being able to watch the sun come up while still having a buzz certainly didn’t hurt.

Tara woke with a groan when you nudged her shoulder after the plane landed. She shook her head at you, not opening her eyes all the way as she felt around on the floor for her purse. “This is why I don’t drink,” she grumbled.

You laughed as you stood up, slipping your backpack on your shoulders. “No, you don’t drink because we always have to be grownups.”

“If we’re both grownups, why am I the only one who’s dying?” she asked as she reached over and snatched your sunglasses off the top of your head and put them on.

“I stayed up,” you laughed as you walked through the airport towards baggage claim, “and I stayed drunk.”

She had to laugh at that. “Smart. I’ll have to remember that next time.”

“Next time?” you said with a grin as you pulled your suitcase and then hers from the carousel. “Hell yea.”

When the two of you stepped outside, Tara immediately let out another groan at the bright morning sunlight. You couldn’t help your laughter as you continued walking, looking for either your car or Tara's. She followed along behind you, trusting you to do the real scouting on her behalf.

It wasn’t long until you saw both Jax and Juice standing on the sidewalk, leaning back against the side your car. You waved to get their attention, picking up your pace, not caring about the suitcase rolling and bouncing along behind you. The second you were close enough, you let go of the suitcase and ditched it on the sidewalk in favor of running up and hugging Juice. You hopped up, wrapping both your arms and legs around him as you buried your face into the crook of his neck.

He laughed, the impact of your jump making him stumble a step but he still caught and held onto you. He hooked his arms underneath you, holding you as your legs wrapped around his waist. He hooked his chin over your shoulder, holding you tight for a moment before you let your feet hit the ground again. Pulling back, you kissed him hard on the lips, leaving the both of you breathless and somehow still laughing.

“I missed you too,” he said with a chuckle. He leaned into it as you cupped his face in your hands. “The trip was good, then?”

“It was great!” you beamed. “Missed you, though.”

“Looks like you two did just fine without us.” He paused, looking over at Tara who was leaning into Jax as he chuckled at her hungover state. “Well, one of you did just fine.”

Jax kissed the side of Tara's head. “Rough trip, babe?”

She shook her head. “The trip was great. I’m still dying, though.” She hugged him and kissed him on the lips. “Take me home so I can die in peace.”

He laughed. “Is this how I am when I’m hungover?”

“You’re worse,” all three of you replied in unison, laughing when you realized.

Jax rolled his eyes but he was laughing too as he picked up both your suitcase and Tara's to toss them into the trunk of your car. “Let’s get you party animals home.”

You immediately ran towards the front of the car. “I call shotgun!”

You were comfortably slouched in your seat with your feet on the dash before Jax and Tara finished settling themselves in the back seat. Jax had his arm draped around her shoulders, keeping her tucked snug against his side as she got ready to lightly doze for the duration of the ride home.

Juice reached over, resting his hand on your thigh as he drove. You interlocked your fingers with his, watching the scenery through the windshield and the passenger window.

Juice squeezed your hand. “How the hell are you not, you know, super fucking hungover?”

You were too busy laughing to answer the question, so Tara piped up from the back seat for you. “Hair of the dog,” she mumbled.

You laughed as you nodded. “Something like that. I just didn’t let myself sober up all the way.” You saw the way Juice peeled his eyes off the road to look at you for a moment and shrugged. “What? The flight attendant offered! Who was I to say no? Don’t worry,” you patted his hand, “when I wake up from my nap in a few hours I will be plenty hungover. By then Tara will be doing better than I’m doing now.”

Juice dropped the two of them off at Jax's. You said a lazy goodbye from the passenger seat, the exhaustion of the week and the all-nighter finally catching up to you. You were starting to close your eyes when Juice got back into the driver's seat. He looked over at you before he put the car back in drive, unable to stop smiling at the sight of you.

You didn’t have to open your eyes to know that he was looking at you. “Yea?”

He laughed quietly. “Nothing. I love you.” He leaned over the center console so he could kiss the side of your head. “I’m glad you two had fun. I’m even more glad that you’re home.”

You opened your eyes and looked at him with a smile. “You’re a sap, Juan Carlos.”

He chuckled as he backed out of their driveway. “You love me, though.”

You couldn’t deny that. “I do. But remember that you love me in a few hours when I’m cranky and hungover.”

“When you’re trying to bury yourself in all of our pillows and blankets?”

“And trap you there with me.”

“And all of your crankiness.”

You laughed, resting your hand on top of his on the console between you. “Exactly.”

#soa #sons of anarchy #soa imagine #sons of anarchy fanfiction #juice ortiz #juice ortiz fanfiction #juice ortiz imagine #juice ortiz x you #juice ortiz x reader

196 notes · View notes

alexanderwales · 5 months ago

Text

The Current WIP List

Inspired by this post by @a-memory-a-distant-echo, this is a list of ongoing works-in-progress, where "in progress" I will define as "I have added at least one sentence in the last year as an indicator of actual mental load being used". This does not include worldbuilding or planning documents, which spring up like weeds. I am also including the ones that I get paid for via Patreon or publication deals or whatever.

Thresholder is my currently ongoing web serial, publishing two chapters a week (in theory ...). It's about a guy who travels between worlds and fights other people who travel between worlds, with each world being a relatively contained book. Currently about 750K words.

Doomsday Pivot! is, in theory, the follow-up to Thresholder, about a start-up that has to make a sudden change in plans when the end of the world gives everyone a character class. First book is rough draft complete but needs some responses to developmental editing, sitting at 104K words. (You can read a noncanonical first chapter here, which I had previously made public on my discord.)

Millennial Scarlet is a webcomic I write about a gig-economy demon hunter. Writing comics is awesome, mostly because I get to see my words come to life. In word count ... I'm not sure right now, but probably not all that much. In the middle of writing the fourth issue right now.

Glimwarden was a web serial that I abandoned, a black mark on my record. I intend to go back to it at some point, because it was my wife's favorite. You can read it up to the point where it was abandoned here. There are currently ~3 unreleased chapters, but most of the effort put into it has been rewriting it and bringing it up to snuff, as well as fixing some problems with it. Will get a relaunch at some point, probably, when I'm ready to commit to that. No idea on the word count.

Untitled Dance Magic story is probably a short story, currently ~5K words. It's based around a magic system where people do ballroom dance to create architecture, and is a somewhat traditional romance and/or coming of age story. I started writing it on a whim after a conversation with @etirabys at LessOnline, and hopefully they haven't started their own story, and hopefully if they have, hopefully their story doesn't overlap mine. I'll check before posting, hoping to get this one finished and out there.

Kensuke Fucks the World is an existentialist horror erotic novel, which I describe as being "like the Erogamer, but sad". Currently 75K words, and might never see the light of day. I think I can wrap it up in another 25K words, but I think it needs a lot of work.

Long Stairs will probably be novella length in its finished form, and will probably not be finished. It's an old story, which predates Worth the Candle by a few months, and is about a military fireteam making a routine delve into an endless shifting dungeon that the US military has already pulled a lot of magic out of. Medics with clerical healing, wands and firearms, high fantasy and military. There's unfortunately some stuff in there that I cannibalized for WtC that needs to be changed so it's not a repeat, but nothing structural, and there are a lot of plot beats that I enjoy in both the 15K words that are already written and what's in the notes. I did not put a bunch of work into this one, but it was one of those cases where I was reading through old stuff and got enough of a head of steam that it latched onto me again. (I also don't know enough about the military or how to write that kind of stuff, which is one of the reasons that this fic never got my full attention.)

The Lot is a story that's basically just "the backrooms, but with cars". It think it was inspired by a tumblr post, but probably won't be finished, since it's probably novella length. Currently 9K words, more a character study than it is about people stuck in an infinite parking lot and scrounging off what they can find in glove compartments.

Kitchen Sink is a bureauporn/bureaupunk novel about the agency created to deal with the rise of mutants circa 1977. Currently a mere 9K words, but the plan was for each successive part of the book to focus on another genre being discovered by the department, so you'd get a book with wizards, with vampires, with aliens, etc., mostly with a focus on how these are handled on an administrative level. No way I would ever be able to sell it, unfortunately.

Robot Team Isekai (not its real title) is about a van full of kids on their way to a robotics team meet that get transported to another world where their individual specialties grant them awesome abilities in a "your hyperfixation makes you perfectly adapted to the fantasy world" kind of way, but for five people with different hyperfixations. 2K words, probably will never see the light of day.

Full Meta vol. 2 is a novel about a group of high school students who get metafiction powers, so like ... one girl gets the ability to read the text of the novel they're in whenever someone is engaging in exposition, one guy can read the flashbacks, someone can read all the romance scenes or whatever, and they have a dysfunctional time dealing with each other through college and into adulthood. I fully recognize that calling it "Full Meta vol. 2" when no first volume exists is a gimmick title and would be confusing enough to immediately turn people away.

Dark Wizard of Donkerk was an old NaNo novel, but got halfway dev edited before my dev editor on that one flaked. I think it's a good story, just a matter of getting into the guts of it and making it great, but that takes time. 173K words, but this is old old. If you like rough, unpolished creative output, you can read it on my website.

Untitled Hermione/Draco fanfic is, uh ... I guess according to the logs was something that I put effort into in late 2023. I have read vanishingly little HP fanfic, and I'm sure there's a ton of this stuff, and that some of it is even good. This one doesn't adhere too much to canon or fanon, and is mostly about trying to write a realistic racist who falls in love with someone he's racist against. 14K words, I cannot believe I added anything to this recently, but apparently I have.

Technically by the criteria set out, I should count all seven of the NaNo test chapters I wrote. Of those, the only ones that have retained any brain space are "The Inevitable Return of Nathaniel Greene" and "Dungeon Core".

There are a few more that are technically outside the arbitrary time limit of one year, but I'm going to include them because I have thought about them in the last year (and will not include the ones that I have not thought about).

Of Witches and Wizards is what I thought was a romance but was told does not fit the apparently pretty exacting mold of a "romance novel". It's about a widowed witch whose two sons have left for college and a wizard who travels the world writing about places for a travel guide. They fall in love. Tons of worldbuilding stuff as they visit different cities and see the breadth and beauty of magic in the world. 15K words right now, was going to be a nice and slender novel.

Eager Readers in Your Area was a short story I wrote a year and a half ago. The WIP is a novel-length version of that about ... art, artists, AI art, dealing with people online, and a bunch of other stuff. I wrote an outline I thought was quite good, but if the short story is the first chapter, then I want an equally good and tight second chapter, and that's hard to do.

Slaver Slayer (not final title) was about a slave who assassinates a high-ranking member of the kingdom and through an oversight gets a magical artifact that might possibly let her kill her way through the monarchy in an attempt to end the institution of slavery. The other protagonist is a detective who's grappling with his complicity in the system and is trying to stop her. Made it to 13K words. Another one of those that was outlined to be a nice tight novel.

#my wips #creative writing #thresholder #doomsday pivot

16 notes · View notes

yandere-sins · 2 years ago

Text

So I thought I’d give a little life-update as there’s a lot going on at the moment and I think it’s visible on my blog as well. Maybe the positives first:

I do really like my new work, I like that I have set hours (even if I do overtime here and there) and though it got incredible stressful the last few weeks, I think the four people that work in my office space are the coolest in the whole company and I love the support I am getting, it’s something I always wanted for my work-life tbh! My dog is also doing very fine, she’s really a total sweetheart and I wouldn’t know what to do without her, and at least I, myself, am doing pretty okay-ish physically, so nothing to complain there.

Now to the negatives.

Unfortunately, my mom’s cancer returned but is quite hard to pinpoint. She went back to an even more aggressive chemotherapy and we’re hoping for the best. Honestly, I don’t wish cancer on anyone, it’s such a tough battle and even just as the primary caretaker it’s been really hard to deal with for me, luckily I have grandparents and a brother who all deal with it and help and support, so that’s good! My mental health though is suffering. It’s biting my own butt now, but I cancelled therapy to focus on work at the beginning of this year and now my therapist is fully booked, so I will have to sit out this month probably. I am telling that because that’s the reason I am struggling with concentrating on one thing for a long time, which includes writing, which explains the fluctuation of posts you are seeing, since I try to get requests and drafts done on the weekend when there’s less stress. Sadly only works like 30% of the time...

Going forward I have decided to indefinitely pause commissions. I have noticed that they put too much pressure with the deadline and expectancy on me when I am already struggling and sometimes need a day to myself. I can’t say when they’ll come back, but thank you all so much for your interest and support, it’s always a pleasure to write your ideas and I never had a bad experience with commission ♥

Good news for Mermay: it’s still happening! ... buuuut I am shortening the story I came up with. I think I was too ambitious with the three routes I teased, so I am trying to figure out how to ensure that it won’t drag out as much as Atreo’s story last year. Unfortunately, the start will be delayed some more, but we were going to celebrate Mer-June anyway, so at this point it probably doesn’t make as much difference (’:

Because the question arose a few times already, I will not be playing Honkai Star Rail. It has a few reasons, but the main one is I don’t have the time. Sorry to everyone who asked about it, but it’s just not the right time for me at the moment! ): I’ll probably be miserable again later when everyone has moved on to it and I am stuck behind but I have to make cuts somewhere ;;

I actually have some commissions and requests that I haven’t released yet, so I will try to schedule some of these in the meantime while I work out how to go about stuff. If you’ve been around for a while you probably know I like routines that’s why it’s always important for me to build them and keep them up. Other than that, I’ll probably focus on Mermay and my own writing projects which will happen rather irregularly. No guarantees on posting, sadly ):

I do realize tho that it just isn’t always possible to keep up frequency of posts and interactions I had when I started this blog, as much as it saddens me. I have to prioritze my real life before my internet presence (and I really need to not feel guilty about taking breaks from everything ever so often ;;), so if you see me vanishing for a few days, it’s just that really.

Thank you everyone who stuck around and supports this blog ♥ There’s another big milestone coming up veeery soon and I am always in awe that so many people would stay to read my silly little stories!! If you have some time and don’t mind waiting for a response, I’m always happy to chat and answer questions, so please don’t hesitate to hit me up!

Thanks everyone ♥

#Admin #Also I found a new editing program that I want to try out soon-ish #if something changes about my writing... it could be my editing ^^'#But Grammarly also now has an AI thingy and bleh #Don't really want to keep supporting it since it's also not really made for non-professional writing stuff

38 notes · View notes

red-riding-wood · 2 years ago

Text

Back from Hiatus

Trigger warning? I think? Brief mentions of medical stuff, nothing graphic. Oh, and death (but none occurred).

TLDR if you don't want to read seven paragraphs: Physical health bad, mental health bad, now hospitalised, fucked up when transferring my story files, hospital bad, home soon?, regardless you will be seeing me back in your feed probably more than you'd like

Rambling below cut

So, about a month ago I had to take a step back from Tumblr... and then an even bigger step back from Tumblr, because I had taken a step back from writing and I found that I just pressured myself too much to write and post when I did use the app. (I did my best to save your guys' stories in my drafts to read later but... I may have missed some and I definitely have some catching up to do.)

Why did I take a hiatus from writing? Well, that was due to my physical health declining in a real bad way. I won't get into it too much here, because I would end up telling a dramatic yet probably honestly boring story of the last four years of my life, but I'm willing to answer any questions if anyone's curious.

Anyway, that sent my head into a state of just utter... fear, I suppose. It's very difficult to care or focus on anything else when death is literally on your mind, and I was also in this weird state of limbo because I wasn't sure if I would be going to hospital or dying or what... so I didn't write, or really do anything except try to take care of myself the best I could. And I pretty much just isolated.

I've been in hospital a couple days now. The fear of death has lessened, and I think I'm gonna be okay, though I'm straight up not having a good time. I had this idea that what would get me through it was writing, so I sent myself all of my docs for my WIPs. Thing is, I keep shortcuts to them on my desktop, and apparently they don't save changes to the root file?? A lesson I learned after I showed up and found that massive chunks of my writing, notes, and storyboards were missing. Yeah, I fucked up.

But now there is talk of outpatient care as soon as this Friday which means I can maybe go home with my TPN (feeding through a vein tube which is the best way I can describe it since I am not a medical professional; it's basically a hardcore IV and I assure you it's badass and exactly like Cyberpunk 2077 -- that was sarcasm but seriously, props to anyone who lives with these because these are terrifying). If that's the case, I'll be able to carry on with White Ribbon and the fics I had started for Darjeeling and Budapest, and it will probably be a lot easier for me to write in general. I haven't tried writing yet, but hospital is a really uncomfortable environment for me (I mean, I'm sure it is for most people but I have a lovely lifetime dose of trauma on top of the usual) and I'm not managing as well as I thought I would so I have my doubts on how well I will be able to focus. (Don't worry about requests, guys... I haven't forgotten about any of them and I still fully intend to fulfill them, even if it means writing your smutty fantasies in hospital.)

If that's not the case, and I'm stuck here until surgery, well, I am willing it into the damn universe that I'm gonna write again regardless. So if you don't see me post something in the next week you have my blessing to send copious amounts of hate mail.

Thank you for reading my long-winded explanation. Oh, and, don't hesitate to message/reach out or tag me in anything! I'm feeling more social again now that I'm not, you know, dying and stuff.

#updates #i think i should be diagnosed with a rambling disorder this was meant to be like two paragraphs

8 notes · View notes

kayzig · 2 years ago

Text

Would you guys like to see what around 3 months of progress on a project looks like, for me?

I found my original post for the first image for when I started organizing my thoughts into an Obsidian flow-chart back on February 10th, and just took the newest screenshot below to give some perspective to what each column of stuff is!

So here it goes:

the column of red squares are "daily" notes, of what I changed or added to the "canvas" document. There's only 15 of them, because I really only make notes of days I "complete" something, so drafting or sketching, etc, doesn't count.

the column for Shadowmurk characters, highlighted in purple!

the column for Crimsonheart & Friends, AKA the Vermillion Kingdom characters, highlighted in orange! ...because I already used red on my "daily" notes, before I really put a lot of thought into the realization of how red and pink are really that place's COLORS.

finished comic pages! I may add another column for art and pin-ups when I get more of them drawn, too, but for now I am happy with this.

sometimes it's hard to feel like you aren't making progress as quickly as you like, but for me personally, getting to see the slowly-filled-in progress on this and how it came together after a few projects where I really burnt out fast or got stuck early on, has been validating.

And this doesn't even reflect the fact that it's spread out amongst sketches, drafts and WiPs that spanned from January to May, amongst weeks when I also had Adult Life / anime&video game fixations / a 25-ish hr-a-week job getting in the way.

it may not be for everyone but consider: getting yourself a fun little "accomplishments" flow-chart, it doesn't have to be for anything - I originally got the concept in-habit from a book I read on positive thinking where you just write down good things that happened to you from a day, and just applied it here to give myself a validating little boost.

#don't mind me #project flow chart #obsidian #obsidian canvas

4 notes · View notes

em-dashes · 2 years ago

Text

04.30.2023 - April Update Again

Total Word Count: 37407 (+3009 since last update)

I already made an April update a few weeks ago, but since it’s the end of the month (aka when I’m supposed to be posting these updates) and I got at least for a few thousand words in, I might as well do a quick update!

I was quite stuck for a while. As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, I’ve reached a point in the draft that’s new grounds, and I’ve been struggling with ye olde “everything I type down Must be perfect on the first go” mindset. I had to remind myself that this is an early draft, so I’m allowed to experiment. I’m allowed to write something and then decide I don’t like it because even if I end up deleting it, at least I’ll know what direction NOT to go. That’s valuable insight!

But it’s still gonna take a while to get through this new section, so today I decided to write some stuff from later in the book. In a rant post from wayyyyy way back, I said that I didn’t want Suddence to have a boom wham action climax because it defeats the Point™ of the book, which is an exploration of grief and loss and what it means to survive instead of an action piece. I moved away from the original ending, which had Dany facing down a bunch of cops and government agents and whatever, and made the climax a lot more emotion based.

HOWEVER, as I’m writing this today, I realized it’s actually BOTH action AND emotional. Because remember, this is a book that features TWO storylines. The main storyline has the emotional climax, but the flashback storyline--wowee, there sure is some action going on there. And it ties both timelines up perfectly because the entire book is ABOUT Dany’s reaction to the specific incident in the flashback storyline.

A lot of what I wrote is spoilery, so here are some very small tidbits.

And this one is from one of Dany’s mental diary entries:

Dany takes promises very seriously, btw.

In other news: I managed to snag a set of The Grisha Trilogy at the thrift store! I’ve been apprehensive about buying them new from book stores, not because of anti-consumerism or whatever, but because the new editions all have “Now A Netflix Series!” printed straight onto the covers, and I hated it. So for the past few weeks I’ve been keeping an eye out for the books when I visit thrift stores, and you CANNOT believe my elation when I spotted all three WHILE the store was having a 50% off sale AND they were old editions without Netflix printed on them.

So anyway, that’s what I’m reading right now. I know this series is generally considered weaker than Six of Crows (I agree, BUT) but there’s still a lot to like about it, even if I AM starting to grow out of the YA genre. It’s kind of sad that none of the stuff that I thought goes super hard made it into the show though :^(

Kk that’s it for now! I might write a bit more today if I’m feeling like it, but honestly writing the climax was a lot more emotionally draining than I thought. Toodles!!

#em dashes #suddence #suddence update #writeblr

2 notes · View notes

amtrak12 · 4 months ago

Text

I crossposted the Elemental Writer Asks to my Lucifer Twitter so this question is from over there.

Summer: How do you know when you need a break from writing?

THIS IS SUCH A GOOD QUESTION! Because it can be hard to tell the difference between needing a break and just needing to push through with a bunch of crappy writing to get through a block.

So, I guess to start, here are some reasons I, personally, might need a break from writing.

I'm sleepy

I'm distracted by a different fixation

My day job has been too demanding/busy/etc

Other real life stuff is going on

I've been writing too much

Now with outside stress, it is what it is. I either write what I can or I just let myself relax with video games or a TV marathon or whatever. And being sleepy only really has one solution too: go to bed lol

For being distracted: Unless I have an external deadline (like I signed up for a fic exchange), I just give into the distraction now. Sure, go play Sims for a couple of days because I can't stop thinking about raising horses. Yeah burn through the entire Shadow and Bone series in a week. It's fine. Even if I don't need a break from writing at that moment, the break is still a good mental refresh.

And now for the difficult-to-define problem of 'writing too much'. What is too much and how can you tell if you're at that limit?

For me, too much is anything at NanoWrimo pace (1667 words/day or 50,000 words in 30 days) or greater. That's total writing, not just how many words I publish. Now, I can handle 20-40k words per month for months on end with the occasional 50k spike. But that's only after writing the same WIP for a year and a half which has given me a lot of practice at writing consistently.

Factors that will decrease how much I writing I can do:

Editing

Brainstorming new story ideas

Free-writing and basic rough drafts are the easiest and fastest things for me to write because quality doesn't matter. But generating new ideas or editing existing writing both take a lot more brain power. At any point in time, I'm doing a mix of brainstorming, drafting, and editing. But I'm (slowly) learning I need to pay attention to which I'm doing more of in any given week, because that will influence how soon I'll need a break.

This week, for example, I posted a new Can We Keep Her chapter last Friday and a one shot on Monday. I've also written and submitted 3 drabbles for a fic exchange that won't get revealed until this coming weekend. Now, I've gotten better this year about forcing myself to take a day off of writing when I publish a new WIP chapter. Partly to celebrate and partly because I've learned I WILL burnout if I immediately jump into the next chapter. This WIP is monstrously long, and no amount of 'pushing it' is going to get it done faster.

But I definitely haven't been taking breaks after my shorter one-shots. 😬 And here I am on Thursday when I've scheduled myself to resume Chapter 20's draft and I just… don't want to. I'm feeling super unmotivated today even though I know exactly what I need to write. I thought I was disappointed by getting no comments on my one-shot -- and I am, sure -- but uh… after typing all of this out, I'm going to guess that I've expended more brain power writing and editing those drabbles than I thought. And that uh, maybe just maybe, I might need to spend tonight reading or playing video games instead of writing.

LOL I have no idea why that wasn't clear to me before. I just published FIVE different fics in a week. Seems pretty obvious that I should take a break 😜

So, I guess my advice for how to tell if you also need a break or are simply stuck on a writing problem that you need to push through:

Take note of how much you've written lately (this week/this month)

Compare that to how much you typically write in the same time period

Remember what else is going on in your life that's been demanding your energy.

If your response to any of those categories equals A Lot, you probably need a break from writing. Find the method that refreshes you, and go do that instead for a day or two (or longer, even) 💜 My favorites are fiber crafts, scripted television, and reading.

#ask #about me #writing meta #my meta #long post

0 notes

parm4carm · 1 year ago

Note

Love you, Jade ❤️ And though I know it's not the most important thing right now, speaking out and often is more important, I do hope you are okay ❤️

hiii oh my god has it forreal been weeks since you sent me this?? i swear i just saved this to my drafts three days ago .. the passage of time truly fries my brain

first, this is so sweet of you to send to me and i'm so grateful that people still check in on me when i'm quiet online <3 i know i am a veryyyyy unreliable presence here but i really do appreciate all the love and i'm sending it right back to you <3

you've kind of given me the perfect jumping off point to just throw a lot of updates and ramblings in one spot bc truthfully i do not feel right posting normal posts and taking up space with things that are trivial in the grand scheme of things. i genuinely don't have the brain capacity for much else these days besides keeping up with palestine/congo/sudan etc related updates + the occasional few hours where i can watch a movie or a show without feeling guilty

(general life update dump below so beware bc i talk a lot)

brief mental state check in but i am not doing well! not just with the weight of the world but with everything else in my life lmao. pretty much everyone who knows me knows that the holidays/the winter are the roughest months for me so i'm usually radio silent :/ this year has been... so rough and i don't know why every year feels worse than the last but it really truly does! i'm particularly lonelier this year and it's honestly my fault. idk how to reach out to people when i'm so isolated tbh i feel like a burden at all times especially now that most of the people i used to talk to daily online and irl are doing way better than me and i'm just. always stuck here in this really shitty space i can't seem to get out of no matter how hard i try

i don't talk about my problems a lot online but like. after losing my childhood pet and then getting accepted to two different programs in one year (grad school and community college) and having to drop out of both AND dealing with a decline in my mother's health AND my grandmother's cancer scare AND my own financial issues AND unemployment i'm just exhausted. because of all of this i truly don't know how to function like a normal person or make friends or keep friends anymore i'm just miserable tbh

okay i know this is a hard pivot, but i thought i could just compile things that have brought me a little bit of happiness that i haven't talked about here! it's all on me to feel like this, but i have intense guilt about posting anything not related to current events, so this is my way around that! so.. enjoy i guess <3

personal stuff (you can send me asks to explain more if you want)

i beat my new years' resolution of watching 365 things this year – i'm up to 500 logs!

a lot of new tv (28 total, entire shows, rewatches, new seasons, miniseries, and documentaries included)

fixated on kpop this year and listened to 30 groups whole discography! i actually counted and it was exactly 30 lmao ask me ab my fav groups and biases if you dare

started drinking tea every day :)

redecorating my apartment and it's so much cozier now

i've become more of a snoopy/peanuts fanatic :)

to build on the new years resolution, i've added quite a few horror franchises under my belt :) my horror tag on letterboxd is roughly 250 now!

i think i'm finally breaking my lifelong nail biting habit??? fingers crossed!

buying more things secondhand and feeling way better about it! mostly clothes and dvds but me and my partner are huge fans of knick knacks

have tried a lot of new food this year :) and am cooking new recipes a lot more too!

went to the beach for vacation for the first time in ten years <3 went to this cool little record store and got a band recommendation from the owner that's now one of my underground favs!

celebrated ten years with my partner this year and although it's been such a rough year for the both of us and we're not nearly where we ever thought we'd be, we're more solid now than we've ever been!!! i really would not have made it through this year without them

honestly this year has been a blur 90% of the time so there's obviously been more little things that make me happy but! it's been a big year for consuming media bc i don't have much energy for creating anymore unfortunately

#asks #if you read this wow ily but do not feel obligated to ever read my ramblings LMAO

1 note · View note

redheadarcher · 1 year ago

Text

so the time has come—it’s time for me to organize myself here bc i’ve been a mess. since my real life has been a mess, it’s only natural that it’d end up reflecting here. but since things are settleting, it’s time to do the same here. so here's what i figured out:

i’ve noticed that i’m a lot faster/have more muse writing things that are new/fresh so between today & tomorrow i’ll go thru my drafts and i’ll reply to whatever i have muse for. what’s stuck or what’s too old i’ll be dropping. if you do have a thread with me that you really want to continue, you can tell me & i’ll totally work on it but if you’d like to start new things too, i’ll be more than happy ! once i finish what i owe here i'll be posting new sc & memes so there's gonna be plenty opportunity for us to start new things.

the starters i already owe ( i have one around the avengers era & one for short & random stuff ). will be done & posting between today - tomorrow so stay tuned !

people i owing replies on the chat to plotting - i’m not ignoring you i’m just not a multitasking person as i thought i was so i need to focus on one thing at time. as soon as my drafts are controlled, i’ll get to you ( probably tomorrow night or saturday ).

& i guess that’s it. a lot happened on my real life these past weeks/months & i ended up hoarding a lot & letting a lot get out of control here & now i feel bad/overwhelmed with everything i owe but can't seem to finish. a sort of “fresh start ” will truly help me, i hope you guys understand.

#it's just a heads up #also today i have dnd later so naturally #it's also a day where i wanna do everything here #ut have limited time so…i won’t finish everything today.#❅ wιтнoυт arrowѕ ( ooc ) ❅

1 note · View note

druidx · 2 years ago

Text

WIP Whenever/ March Round-up

What was on the Task List for Feb?

✅️ Posting drafts. I realised I had got @/druidx up again to unacceptable levels so I went on a tag-game spree, so now @/druidx is down again to 150 (from 177 in Feb). I also managed to bring @/dru-reads-writeblr down to 46 (from 183 in Feb). (Not that it's writing related but @/nine-blessed-hero is now also down from ~250 to 35!)

✅️ Starbound Character Intros. Yes! 14 crew are now posted, with 1 left to post. If you're interested you can find them over at @/dru-plays-starbound, #mio's crew.

❌️ Posting 'For Posterity' items. I straight up forgot about this again.

✅️ Edit The Ruby Falls. Yes! I re-read the stuff I added last Nov, and had an epiphany about something I was stuck on, which was preventing me moving forward with the story re-write. I just need to go back and add that bit, ensuring it flows in correctly with the rest of the story around it, then I can continue from where I was.

❌️ Finish some of the 78 WIPs. Narp. I went to DK in the first week of March, and then felt really crap the whole rest of the month, so I haven't felt like writing or editing anything.

✅️ Record Podfics. Yes! 7 more were released this month, and 7 more have been recorded ready for release. I'm now into fics that are 1500+ words, and it's getting harder not to stumble near the end. I may have to look into getting Audacity so that I can take breaks and then stitch the two parts together. I mean, I knew this would happen eventually, but I thought I could last a little longer 😅️

What's Next for April?

➼ Do Backups! I had a reminder on my calendar to do these the weekend before I went to DK. I did all the prelim work of getting a Google Takeout, tidying my files etc & et al... then never did the actual backup 🤦️ This has to be done either a Friday or a Saturday because it takes a full 8 hours, and it has to be done soon, because I'm a whole month overdue and it makes me anxious.

➼ Starbound Character Intros. I still have 2 main characters, 1 crew, and a dozen side characters left to do. But you know, I'll be happy if I get the last crewmember done.

➼ Edit The Ruby Falls. I'm going to dedicate Week 14 to doing this. It's the first full week of April, and also includes Good Friday bank holiday, so lots of writing time 🤞️

➼ Record Podfics. Only 100 to go...

➼ Finish some of the 80 78 WIPs. As long as this number keeps going down, I'll be happy.

➼ Posting 'For Posterity' items. Or, at the very least, look at sorting my messy Stories folder out.

➼ Posting drafts. We're now at 150 in @/druidx and 46 in @/dru-reads-writeblr. I'd like to get Reads-Writeblr down to 25, and Main down to 100.

#meta writing #wip update #wip whenever #wip wednesday #progress update #writing roundup #writing progress #meta wandering words

1 note · View note

loumauve · 2 years ago

Text

dashboard page 3 is still stuck in 2022 for me. thanks for that

but sure. give us the reblog pop-up that does nothing except confuse people and take just as long if not longer to use than the post editor itself

dashboard has been messed up for me ever since you first implemented the pop-up, and it makes it impossible to look at recent posts past the first what.. 20? that the two pages I can access give me.

can y'all please at least acknowledge this and do something to fix it?

and I'm on the regular web-browser. slim window size therefore the lil burger menu appears which is still better than the regular messy one of the standard size windows.

what's also still messed up for me, this has been going on for at least a week and a half now tho, is that I get the blue notification button above the menu signifying that there's new SOMETHING be it messages or activity but this is what the actual menu looks like:

it used to show the blue notification symbol over new messages and activity up top but now there's no symbol unless I get a new ask. and the activity is invisible unless I open the submenu of my blog which would be fine if I could make that submenu remain open but you have it set so that it always reverts back to being closed when I check back in.

all in all the tumblr user experience has turned to absolute incomprehensible garbage within the past few months and honestly I don't see what y'all are doing to improve it.

all I see is new features almost nobody asked for with no toggle options to opt out (like the anon asks no longer being allowed from non-registered folks - just let us choose if we want to have it on or off) (or the reblog pop-up which does nothing for me bc I always tag posts or add them to drafts and both those options require an additional tap now) and it can't be down to just wanting more money bc then y'all would actually consider more payment options than just credit card. but tbh I'm starting to get tired of asking and sending in support tickets and TRYING bc y'all just don't care. and y'all don't listen to what we're saying. about live. about pop-ups. about most stuff actually

Tuesday, March 21st, 2023

🌟 New

We’ve launched a new tabbed version of Explore in the Android app!

We’ve removed the Fast Queue experiment from Tumblr Labs if you’re using Tumblr in a mobile browser on your phone. The “Add to queue” option is now in the new reblog popup when tapping the reblog button on a post.

When scheduling a post on web, the editor will now warn you if you don’t provide a valid time along with the date.

🛠 Fixed

Fixed an issue where GIFs with attribution could fail to display on some blog themes.

Fixed a bug on web that was causing the “Follow” button in post headers to jump to the next line when there are too many rainbow checkmarks in the header.

🚧 Ongoing

Nothing to report here today.

🌱 Upcoming

Nothing to report here today.

Experiencing an issue? File a Support Request and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can!

Want to share your feedback about something? Check out our Work in Progress blog and start a discussion with the community.

#im so tired fuck this shit

317 notes · View notes

explosivenebula · 3 years ago

Note

Hi! I saw where did the " I'll always protect you" so I was wondering if you could do that but this time with a s/o who was physically attacked by their family along with mentally and emotionally (since unfortunately my parents used to that when I was young)hides their emotions, and has a hard time expressing themselves along with they don't really cry a lot since they used to get themselves to sleep as a child. (Also with the same bakugo, midoriya and kirishima please!)

Ahh I feel like this is confusing!!! Sorry this is my first time asking for stuff like these! You do amazing writing btw ♡

Of course, thanks for your request! First I’d just like to say abuse is something no one on earth deserves to be put through. It’s horrible, and often makes a lot of people regret many decisions. I’m so proud of you for getting through that! If anyone reading this is going through abuse, don’t be afraid to speak up and help defend yourself and those around you. There will always be people willing to help!

I got a little stuck with Kirishima, so I skipped over him for now, but this headcanon idea with him has been added to the draft list for me to complete a little later. Hopefully I can get back on track with him! I’ll be doing things a little different to the first as well as the request you’ve asked, so hopefully you enjoy this!

MASTERLIST

‘Emotionally Absent’ Bakugou and Midoriya x reader Headcanons {REQUEST}

PAIRINGS: Bakugou x reader, Midoriya x reader

WARNINGS: Mentions and descriptions of emotional, mental and physical abuse, mentions of depressive actions and thoughts

GENRE: Slight Angst, fluff comfort

POST TYPE: Headcanons

*̩̩̥͙　-•̩̩͙-ˏˋ⋆ 　　⋆ˊˎ-•̩̩͙-　*̩̩̥͙

If you’d like to request a similar headcanon or something entirely different with the same or different MHA/BNHA characters, feel free do to so! Note: Most of my work will be a gender-neutral reader/perspective unless you specifically request something different. You may also request a headcanon for any size, ethnicity, religion etc of person, everything here is welcome! (As long as it is not offensive, and follows the guidelines.)

🌸Explosive Nebula 爆発性星雲🌸

- 07.21.2021 -

MIDORIYA IZUKU

╰☆╮Midoriya isn’t the most observant of the class, but becoming closer to you and being able to call you his s/o leaves many opportunities for him to notice the small actions or mannerisms you may take on. Before you became close to the green haired male, it was becoming increasingly obvious to him with each passing day, you held the same emotional line as Todoroki, if not more in depth than the half and half boy. You weren’t as excited as he was when heroes or training was announced, and rarely showed any reaction to anything happening around you. He’s naturally drawn to this behaviour, and attempts to become much more inclusive around you, hoping to treat you in ways he can attempt to pull any reaction from you. Angry, annoyed, excited, enthusiastic or happy, he simply wants to see something glimmering in those eyes. As time goes on, he manages to come closer and closer with each passing day, until he finds you’ve developed feelings. He’s ecstatic, since he feels the same way.

╰☆╮Barely even weeks into a relationship with him, and he’s already becoming increasingly bothered by your lack in emotional comprehension. He loves how your smile lights up around him, but the second your flourished into a public environment, it’s as if all memories and feeling are stripped from your form. It bothers him much more than he may initially state, and decides to sit you down in a quiet area and mention what’s been gnawing at the back of his mind for months. And, knowing that you can trust him, he finds out through small implications and backstory what’s been happening to you outside of life with him.

╰☆╮He breaks down, crying and shaking, hitting himself physically and mentally over and over again for not realising sooner. Part of him believes he could have moved quicker, made a bigger mark and helped you much sooner. But battling with his own mindset becomes last on his list of worries. He’ll push everything crowding his mind aside to help and comfort you, almost immediately enveloping you in a tight hug. His comfort widely consists off muttering small arguments under his breath about how heroes don’t deserve that and only villains would do that to someone, and keeping a supporting hand on your form every time you’re around.

╰☆╮His next goal, once he feels he feels he’s drilled to you how much he loves you and how safe you are in his arms, is to get you to feel something other than the ice cold blanket draping your shoulders. His way to do this? Pure kindness. He does everything and anything to go out of his way, doing anything he can to draw a smile from your face. Putting every ounce of effort into cooking your favourite meals, making sure your getting enough sleep and drinking water, keeping an eye on your health, watching your medication (if you take any), drawing you beautiful baths, buying your favourite clothes, watching your favourite movies and anything else he can think of. No day with him is bland or lonely. And if he can see that smile on your lips, he watches and takes it in, before kissing you as soft and sweetly as he’s ever done.

╰☆╮Around other people, he’ll help articulate things for you if you have trouble getting your point across. He knows that lack of emotion often causes a barrier between you and others, so if anyone takes anything the wrong way or doesn’t understand the meaning behind your speech, he’ll help get that to them. He’s great at reading your language and the story your eyes tell with each flutter, so its easy for him to understand your intentions. But, he also leaves you alone at times, offering his silent support while he watched and wills you to do it yourself, often encouraging you to be the first to engage the conversation. Overall, he becomes much more protective over you, eyeing everyone to decide whether or not he can pace an ounce of trust on them to treat you safely.

BAKUGOU KATSUKI

╰☆╮Bakugou, despite his rudeness and abrupt way of handling situations, is knowingly extremely observant and careful. It takes a lot to get even the smallest of details to go unnoticed by Katsuki, so he understandably singles you out in his own agenda the second he sees you. He notices the soft gleams in your eye and how the dull with each passing moment of mentioning home life around the days end, or how you would completely avoid any interaction to do with the subject at all. But most predominately, that he doesn’t necessarily try hard to discover, is your near emotionless state. He’ll watch you completely deadpan while your classmates are sprawling with happiness, or simply brush off what looks to be an extremely painful injury. Sure, he’s tough, and he brushes things off more than anyone. But still, there should be something pooling in your eyes. And, at first, he takes it as a challenge, regarding you as someone dangerous, strong, and definitely a worthy opponent.

╰☆╮But of course, your relationship with him sparks and grows. You stand as his s/o, someone he trusts dearly and keeps close by him at all times. He would never date anyone he didn’t respect or care for, but e doesn’t expect you to be grateful or feel privileged. He simply wants you to understand how much he cares for you, and shows how you’re the single only person who can get as close to him as you have. And even being his s/o, he never takes his curious eyes of your mannerisms. He doesn’t mention it but drops a few hints he’s aware, until finally, he decides to confront you. He hates holding secrets about others against them. He sees it as a ‘cowards move’. He’ll ask a few questions, slowly trying to rip every piece of information out of you he can. Until he comes to the touchy subject of your family, and when he sees your normally absent minded state nearly break down, pouring your heart out to retell your stories, he’s more understanding than he ever was before.

╰☆╮After he get’s over the initial shock and rage of wanting to murder your ‘asshole extra’ parents, he’ll focus as much as possible in the near future, careful not to make any sharp movements around you that could cause you to jump or spook. As time passes, he becomes more accustomed and treat it as second nature, going as far as to cover your ears at unnecessary loud noises like his yelling or others screaming, and keep some part of himself connected to you in extremely crowded areas, hoping to remind you of his supportive presence. He makes it clear that every passing second spent with him are the safest moments you’ll ever have in your life, and every moment away from him, he’s working tirelessly to make the cities, streets, and suburbs a safer place for you. You become his motivation for fighting villains, but he notices he’s become more willing to help less ‘fighting’ missions pass. He’s more than happy to help calm abuse victims down, or partake in investigations to bring down abusive parents, siblings, relationships, strangers etc.

╰☆╮When it comes to trying to emerge your emotions, he rarely uses his words. He’s terrible at them, so uses his love language, acts of service. These aren’t major or constant like Midoriya, but considering Bakugou’s mannerisms what he does is truly an act of love. These tend to be majorly caring for you during an injury recovery, sickness, or anything that has you bed or hospital bound. One of his more unenviable ways is pushing your emotions, sometimes going as far as to purposely anger or annoy you slightly. He doesn't do it to be rude or annoying, but he sees getting angry as healthy for someone who doesn’t often show emotions. He want's you more comfortable with them, so he can begin to understand what your feeling without reading your eyes and posture.

╰☆╮He knows you have a hard time expressing yourself at times, and he’s extremely protective over you. Sometimes it makes for an explosive mix of raw emotions from the ash blonde, but when it comes to defending you, nothing he does he sees as over the top or unnecessary. They insulted his s/o, it’s only fitting they pay the price at the extent of their own discomfort. Whenever you’re in public needed to express something to someone, talking to a friend, or talking to anyone he believes is important to be sharing a conversation with, he listens closely. He makes sure you try your best to show as much enthusiasm, understanding, happiness etc. as you can to whoever you may be talking to. Not because of their benefit, but because he want’s you to be able to grow. He want’s you evolving in your emotions, to be that person to help you do so. And if anyone makes it more difficult or he feels you freezing up, he’s more than happy to take over. If you’re ever uncomfortable, he’ll do everything in his power to get you feeling safe as quickly as possible.

🌸Explosive Nebula 爆発性星雲🌸

Posted 07.22.2021

Written and Published by: explosivenebula

264 notes · View notes