#posts that are probably still halfway incomprehensible even if you ARE in this fandom

[yardsards]

steeplechase theory that i have little backing for and is more just me throwing spaghetti at a wall:

i know we've been expecting the nanofather to also be an established/important character (such as carmine denton or clint the planeswalking janitor, etc) but what if he's not

what if he was just like. a face character/a professional caretaker that used to work in old kidadelphia (not unlike the job stimpson was supposed to do in new kidadelphia) who just got abandoned there with all the kids after the park closed

perhaps one who maybe got a little too into his role and lost his sense of reality (as some of the people who play those kinds of roles in the park seem to do at times), especially after being stuck there so long

or maybe he's just desperate for a way out. who knows.

and perhaps he figured out some sort of way to interface with the network in steeplechase as a whole, perhaps using something similar to the metalmals' energoo

related to this (and partially required for this theory to hold up): i think old kidadelphia might have originally been space themed, before being remodeled into its current more old-west and jungle adjacent vibes before eventually being closed down. perhaps as a tie-in to the sci-fi themed infinitum layer that they mentioned offhand a while back?

things that have me going down this path of thought:

-old kidadelphia is described as overall looking like a barren desert wasteland. and something like that could have easily originally been themed after, say, the surface of mars

-"the nanofather" sounds like the name of a face character, a la "sticky fingers paul pantry"

-the "big kids" believe they are on another planet other than earth. (we're going to assume that this is not true for the sake of this theory, though the possibility of it being true and the entirety of steeplechase being located off-planet is really fucking cool). this is a belief the younger kids don't seem to share.

-but the nanofather sounds like he went along with it and possibly even encouraged it, probably helping them build their rocket

-now, the belief that they're on another planet sounds like it's obviously something that they cling to in order to cope with their abandonment. but the specificity of that belief seems less like it formed organically and more like it was a story told to them by someone else that they incorporated into their worldview.

-perhaps it was a story the nanofather told them. or just kind of the general theme/lore/kayfabe of the park at the time

-also, the way everyone looks to the nanofather for guidance reminds me a lot of how children look to their caretakers

anyway this theory is definitely full of So Many holes and is almost definitely wrong but it's just a neat idea i had

[prince-everhard]

No 7. I’VE GOT YOU Support | Carrying | Enemy to Caretaker

Title: First Contact Fandom: Mass Effect Character(s): Turian OC, Human OC Rating: T Warning(s): injuries, broken bones, vomit, vehicular crash Wordcount: 1150 Summary: Decimus isn’t ready to die, but he’s especially not ready to die on a stupid scouting mission to a stupid alien colony. [set during the First Contact War; probably not canon-compliant but idgaf]

cross-posted to ao3 [eventually] @whumptober2020

Decimus isn’t ready to die.

Most people probably aren’t, when their time comes, but he was hoping to maybe be a little older than 25 cycles. He shifts away from the wreckage of the scout shuttle he’d been on, crashed into this stupid planet of this stupid alien colony. He can’t feel his legs, but his arms still work. He brings his omnitool arm up, but the thing doesn’t come on.

He curses.

Nobody else survived this crash, and now he’s gonna die alone and injured on a “simple scouting mission.” He looks over at the shuttle just in time to see it catch fire.

He curses, again.

A pack- maybe even his own pack- spilled out of the shuttle along with him. He slings it on, ignoring how much the motion hurts, and starts dragging himself away from the possibly-going-to-explode shuttle. If he’s going to die, he wants to do it in his sleep. It’s hard, pulling himself along the dusty ground with just his arms. Harder still when he catches a spur on something and it snaps and oh spirits he’d felt that! But he does eventually manage to drag himself what he thinks will be a safe distance from the explosion. The flames have totally engulfed the shuttle and he watches them dance as the adrenaline wears off and he begins losing his grip on consciousness. It’s with his last moment of wakefulness that he sees one of those strange aliens come around a nearby outcropping of rock. He’s going to die and the aliens are probably gonna dissect him.

He curses into unconsciousness.

Decimus wakes, and realizes a few strange things.

He’s not dead, which is both a good and bad thing. Good, because he really didn’t want to die on some scouting mission to an alien colony. Bad, because the last thing he remembered was seeing one of those aliens.

There’s some kind of makeshift lean-to over him. The fabric is stained and worn thin in places, but it looks fairly sturdy. If he didn’t know better, he’d say it looked military made. A little primitive, but serviceable. A few feet away, there’s a fire going- built purposefully, secured in a little ring of rocks, not the dangerous blaze of the shuttle. He’s somewhat thankful of it, because his armor is in pieces, everything hurts, and this stupid alien planet is cold. 

On the other side of the fire, there’s an alien sitting. Watching him.

Decimus curses his lack of omnitool again, though he doubted the translator would be able to help him. He tries to sit up, but his arms buckle under him. The alien is up in a second and moving toward him. Terrified, helpless- Decimus would almost rather be dead. He takes his knife from his belt instead and bares it at the alien. “Stay back!” His voice is hoarse. Everything hurts and he’s so thirsty and this forsaken alien-

The alien has stopped, posture that of pleading or submission. It surprises Decimus how recognizable the parts of the alien are. It’s bipedal, has arms and elbows and hands that look normal enough, even if they have too many digits at the end. The alien takes another step towards him, but stops when he jabs the knife in its direction. It opens its mouth and the sounds that come out are completely, totally incomprehensible. “Stay back,” he repeats, his voice trembling and cracking. What does it matter what the alien wants with him? He’s dead, or good as. The pain almost makes him close his eyes again.

The alien steps forward again, slower this time. It says something incomprehensible again. He watches, warily, as it draws near. When it is close enough for him to stab, but not for it to touch, it points down at one of its arms. Decimus looks more closely at its arm. There’s some kind of wrapping on it. The alien lifts the edge of the wrapping, making a strange, wrenched expression as it does so. Under the wrapping is a nasty-looking wound. The aliens bleed red like quarians, and Decimus is a little surprised. The alien puts the wrapping back and pulls a bundle from a pocket on their leg. It’s more wrapping. The alien points at their arm again, then the bundle, and then down at Decimus’ own leg. 

He’s almost scared to look down, and when he does- oh. One of his spurs is bent, snapped almost in half about halfway to the base. His stomach rolls and the pain hits him full force. He shifts as much as he can away from the leg, away from the shelter, and vomits. The alien stands back while he does so, making strange little cooing noises like someone might soothe an infant. 

When he’s done, Decimus pushes himself as upright as he can manage. The alien holds out some of the wrapping, nodding and miming wiping its face. He snatches the cloth away, feeling tired and vulnerable and in oh so much pain. He wipes his face and looks at the alien, who is now holding out a bottle of some kind.

He takes this with much less force than the cloth. Well, he supposes, if the alien was going to kill him it would have done so already. He takes a careful sip and almost spits it out again. It’s alcohol, pure and strong, and it tastes foul. The alien just makes what he guesses are supposed to be comforting noises. And he probably won’t hurt so much if he’s drunk. He takes a larger drink, and then another, until he doesn’t remember how many he’s had and the alien is carefully tugging the bottle from his hands. He doesn’t remember letting it get so close. It cocks its head at him and he gestures toward his bent spur. “Go ahead, be my guest,” he says, knowing it won’t understand him but feeling oddly better for having said something.

He’s glad he passes out before it starts to work what’s left of his armor off.

When Decimus wakes again, he realizes a few more strange things. His leg… well, he won’t say it doesn’t hurt, but the pain is much more manageable. He’d be willing to bet he could put weight on it, if worse came to worst.  His armor is all gone, but he’s still in his undersuit and there’s a large heavy tarp over him. The fire is still going, with some fuel stacked within his arm’s reach. His pack has been placed just by the fuel, and he can tell that it is his pack and therefore has several day’s worth of emergency rations inside. The bottle of alcohol- nearly empty- sits alongside some bottles that have a clear liquid in them. He wastes no time in cracking one open and discovering that it’s just pure sweet water.

The alien is gone.

[novantinuum]

Crack the Paragon, Chapter 7

Fandom: Steven Universe

Rating: General Audiences

Words: 3.4K~

Summary: In another world, he doesn’t have his mother’s sword or shield to hide behind when Bismuth lands her strike. The bubble pops.

Steven falls apart.

Chapter summary: In which actions are louder than words.

First | Last chapter

You can find the AO3 link in the reblogs! (I have to omit it from the original post these days to ensure this will show up in the tags.) If you enjoyed this, I’d greatly appreciate your support over there as well. 

Chapter 7: Silenced

“Are you out of your mind??”

"Pearl, please understand, I’ve been wanting this for so long,” you explain softly, the sunset illuminating the face of the pale Gem before you in shades of pink and orange as the waves crash onto shore behind her. “Human life is simply incredible! Never stagnating, always living, and loving, and learning. I want to pass on my gem, to create something new with Greg, someone who can grow! Someone… who can finally be free.”

“But- but Gems can’t have babies!” she sputters, throwing her arms out. “We don’t have the organs for it, or genetic material, o-or—“

You shake your head, enthusiastically cutting her off.

“That’s no problem, I used shapeshifting like Amethyst always does! And believe me,” you say with a conspiratorial chuckle, “you know better than anyone that I’m fully capable of holding this for the next nine months.”

“That’s not my point!”

“Then… what is?”

“My point—! You always do this, Rose!” she shouts, her pale blue eyes growing damp. “You know I try to support you, but I can’t do that if you never talk with me before leaping headfirst into whatever fanciful desire you please, and- and deciding everyone’s future for them!”

“But isn’t that… what I’m doing now?”

“No! You never even asked me how I’d feel,” she says, voice thick. “And that’s your problem.” Tears stream in rivulets down her cheeks, her lithe body quivering. Roughly, she wipes them away, and turns to escape your presence. “You never do!”

“Where did it go??”

The sound of shrill panic abruptly wakes Steven, the precise details of his peculiar dream already beginning to blur into obscurity as his eyes flutter open. A line of half-dried drool, slimy and still warm, extends from the corner of his mouth. His dad is softly snoring next to him, swaddled in his stolen covers like the very image of a sushi roll.

“No, no, no!” Pearl shouts from the kitchen. There’s a dull clap as her hand swipes across the counter. Something light (cloth?) falls to the floor. “This can’t be happening, not now, not again!!”

Yawning, he presses his fingers against the slight ache at his temple and sits up, blinking in confusion at his surroundings. “Wha—?”

For whatever reason, the beach house has devolved into absolute chaos between the time he fell asleep and now. The couch cushions are all askew, one of them flung halfway across the room. Two of the kitchen stools are overturned, and the bath towel they nestled his gem in last night lays in an abandoned heap between them. Dishes from the open cabinets are strewn everywhere on the counters. Meanwhile, the contents of the game shelf by the window— which Pearl normally keeps meticulously organized in alphabetical order— have exploded across the floor with little to no regard to the walking hazard they pose. If her intent was to blow through the place like a one person wrecking ball, then she’s clearly succeeded. No corner of the house is left untouched by her mania. The Gem roughly swings open the fridge, rattling the condiment bottles in the door. After a brief pause to scan through its contents she huffs, and slams it shut again.

Her arms shaking, she grips tufts of wispy peach hair from either side of her head. “Where is it???” she cries, her voice edging towards borderline hysteria.

“Uh, Pearl?” he asks, uneasiness churning in his gut at the sight of his guardian under so much stress. He swings his feet over the edge of his bed. “Pearl! What’s going on? What’s wrong??”

She freezes momentarily upon noticing he’s awake, her cheeks flushing blue.

“O-oh! Thank goodness you’re finally up,” she says, bounding across the room and up the stairs to him in no more than five steps. Her hands grasp his shoulders, a frantic gleam in her pale eyes. “Steven, where’s your gem?! Have you seen it??”

“My… gem?” he mutters, scrunching his nose as he peers up at her. In the fog of his exhausted, sleep deprived mind, for a second he has no idea what on Earth she’s talking about. Where’s his gem? His gem’s at his navel, inlaid flush with his skin like it’s always been, so what is she—

In a flash, snippets of recent memory eclipse everything else that’s at the forefront of his attention, reasserting their place in his psyche.

“Go ahead!” Bismuth snarls, jamming the tip of the breaking point rough against her concave gemstone. “Just do it!”

A sharp cry, his world standing still as a searing pain tears through him from the gem at his core to the very tip of his extremities.

Too damaged to sustain himself, his hard light form poofs into a cloud of smoke. He remembers this from both perspectives, now. And with the memory of the searing pain his other half was in… he wishes he doesn’t. The cracked gemstone hangs in the air for just a moment, morning sunlight glinting off its facets, before plummeting lifeless to the ground.

“—it’s Pink Diamond,” Garnet whispers in horror.

He swallows hard as the burden of the last few hours quickly rears its ugly head, weighing down once more on his shoulders. Oh, right, he thinks, resting his hand atop his stomach, over the unfamiliar facets of his newly flipped gem. Almost dying. That was a thing.

“Yes, your gem, I’ve been looking everywhere for it!” Pearl says, throwing her arms up. She leaps to the ground floor from the lofted level, and with a skip and a flourish so unbefitting of her current state of panic, jabs her pointer finger towards the kitchen counter. “I clearly remember setting it right here when we put you to bed, but now it’s nowhere to be found!”

Her words degrade to incomprehensible mumbling as she continues her fruitless search, this time localized to the space around the fireplace and the bathroom door. Finally understanding what has her in such a tizzy, Steven leaps to his feet and follows her down the stairs. Of course she’s freaking out, she thinks his gemstone disappeared entirely, or walked off, or got stolen! She has no way of knowing what happened on the beach early this morning. No one does. Someone’s gotta tell her, and that someone can only be him. Rushing to his guardian, he gently tugs at her arm.

“Pearl!”

She forces a laugh, the sound of it neurotic and unhinged, as her fumbling fingers remove a small photo of the four of them off its hook on the wall. “Well at least we can say for certain it’s not hiding behind this framed photograph!” she announces, smile stretched just a bit too wide. “Just one less infinite possibility to check…”

“Pearl, listen, you—“

“And it’s not like it could simply roll off the table without a trace, right? Am I right??”

“Please, you don’t have to freak out, ‘cause I—“

“But it’s okay Steven, there’s no need to panic! I know we’ll find it eventually, yes we will, of course we will, how could we—“

“I have it!” he blurts out, grabbing both of her shaking hands. “I have it.”

Held securely in his, her hands fall silent. The panic drains from her in but a breath as she stops to contextualize what he’s just said and what it means, her mouth slipping slightly ajar. Sensing that he’s firmly caught her attention now, he continues, heart hammering in his chest.

“Last night, the gem reformed as me, a-and… we fused back together.”

“You— you’re back to normal,” she says with glassy eyes, voice softer now.

He tugs at the collar of his pajamas. “Well, more or less. There’s a bit of a catch, and I’m pretty sure none of you are gonna like it.”

Her expression is blank with confusion. “Uhhh— a catch?”

“Y’know, it’s probably easier if I just show you,” he reasons with a nervous chuckle, and— sweat beading on his forehead— lifts his nightshirt to reveal his gem.  

Pearl kneels down to peer at it straight on, hand balled into a fist at her chin. “Oh!” she says first, brows shooting up on her face. Then, her features narrowing the more and more she looks at the newly exposed facets of his diamond: ”Ohhhh...”

“This is what her gem looked like, isn’t it?” he asks. “Pink’s?”

Her eyes shoot wide open at his query. “I—“

Immediately, her palm clamps tight over her mouth, strangling whatever words she had planned to share.

Steven cringes as he watches her struggle against her orders, a seed of guilt churning deep within. “Oh, right. You can’t… sorry, I forgot. We can talk about something else, if you want!”

She’s thankfully able to pull her hand away before too long. A distant part of him wonders how this gag order works, how it knows in advance what Pearl plans to say, if there’s any loopholes they could possibly find to skirt around it...

“I— I’d appreciate that,” she admits, suddenly looking very tired.

A lopsided smile brightening her face despite her exhaustion, she reaches up to affectionately ruffle his hair. He flashes her a boyish grin as her touch flattens some of his wild curls against his head.

“You know,” she says quietly, glancing at him with such a softness reflected in her pale irises that it almost makes him forget all the stress he’s endured, almost makes him believe nothing’s changed since yesterday, “there may be a lot I can’t talk about, but what I can say is that I’m so glad to see your beautiful smile again.”

“Pearl,” he responds, blushing with half-hearted embarrassment.

“Now let’s clean up this mess before your father wakes up, shall we?” the pale Gem chuckles nervously as she rubs her hands together, glancing between the trashed ground floor of the beach house and the middle aged man miraculously still snoozing away in the loft above.

“Nose-goes on kitchen!” he says hurriedly, tapping his finger against the tip of his nose.

She feeds him a mock gasp, already crossing behind the counter to start returning the plates and glasses to their rightful homes in the cabinet. “Oh, you rascal! How ever will I organize all this by myself?”

Steven gives a soft laugh at this, and then promptly sets himself on tidying duty. First priority is the board games strewn across the floorboards in the corner. He kneels and begins arranging the boxes into piles. From there, he stacks each pile nice and near on the shelf by the window. After straightening the stacks so the box corners line up, he moves to pull open the blinds to let more sunlight in the house. A blissful smile stretches across his face as he pauses his work to bask in the morning glow.

Already feeling a good deal more content about everything in the reminder of daybreak, he turns to Pearl. “Not gonna lie, I’m kinda surprised Dad was able to stay asleep through all our racket.”

“Greg?” she scoffs and rolls her eyes, piling a stack of plates on one of the shelves. “That man sleeps like a rock. Which,” she continues, resting her freed hand against her chin in contemplation, “as an idiom, is actually rather ironic considering that ‘rock’ is common slang for ‘Gem,’ and Gemkind as a whole doesn’t have a biological need for sleep.”

“Well, I think you can blame humans for that one,” he laughs, picking the missing couch cushion off the floor and returning it to its home. “For anyone outside Beach City, rocks don’t actually move!”

Ever so slightly, the edge of her lips turn up. “I suppose that’s true, yes…”

They fall into a fairly comfortable silence for a while after that, as they put the finishing touches on the last nooks and crannies of the beach house that needed attention. Steven makes sure the floor is spotless, every stray pillow, toy, or decorative item returned to its rightful place. Pearl finishes tidying the kitchen, re-organizing the cups on the shelves by color and type. By the end of it he can proudly say the place looks leagues cleaner than it did yesterday. For good measure, Pearl pulls a broom out of her gemstone and sweeps up any debris littering the floor. He helps out by holding the dustpan steady as she brushes the sand and dust bunnies in.

“There!” she proclaims once they’re finished, proudly surveying her roost as she solidly holds the broom with the same level of decorum with which one might hold a rebellion era rampart. “That’s much better, don’t you think?”

The ground nearly shimmers in its cleanliness. Heartily, he gives her a thumbs-up.

“Yeah, looks great!”

With a big yawn, he glances up at his father’s slumbering figure in the loft above, for a moment jealous that he’s not still snoozing away too. Four or five hours (or however long it’s been since he crawled back into bed, he hasn’t checked the clock yet) simply isn’t enough rest for a growing boy. He always tries to aim for eight or nine. Maybe he can bridge that gap now, though? Would it help, he wonders, if he falls back asleep a good twenty minutes after he woke? As he ponders this mystery, he ambles past Pearl, heading directly to the couch.

“Steven,” she says with poorly disguised concern, as she watches him abruptly flop over onto the cushions in his sheer exhaustion. “If you need to talk about what happened, then I—“

“I’m just a little tired, don’t worry about me,” he says, eyes drooping shut as he curls up tighter.

“Don’t wor—“ Pearl cuts herself off suddenly, choked up. She’s at his side in a flash, and he feels the cushion adjust for her weight as she sits herself adjacent. “How can I not worry about you? You went through something no child… no Gem should ever have to experience!”

“But I’m alive,” he points out, eyes cracking open a smidge. “I’m alive, and you guys dealt with Bismuth, a-and we fixed it like we always do, so- so there’s no point in fixating on what could’ve happened, right?”

She rests her hand on his shoulder, her fingers hesitantly shifting over the seam of his pajamas as if she’s suddenly a complete stranger to the art of comforting. Normally he lives for her shows of affection— her occasional head pats, loose side hugs, a hand clasped tight on his arm as she gently leads him through hazardous terrain on missions— but in his mounting desire to be left alone in peace to rest, he bristles under her touch. She doesn’t seem to catch onto the hint, though. Still hidden behind his neutral expression, he grits his teeth.

“I-it’s not a matter of fixation,” she continues, “it’s a matter of unpacking difficult emotions. You have to understand, the state of being cracked, it’s not one that most full Gems are easily able to bounce back from, and I just want to ensure that you’re not—“

“I’m fine, really, I am!” he snaps. “You don’t have to keep fussing about it! And anyways, it’s all over now, isn’t it? So can’t we at least try to move on from this and let things be halfway normal again?!”

Pearl reacts like she’s been physically struck. She yanks her hand back, resting her palms on her knees as she turns her head away. A cautious glance at her face (or at least the half she hasn’t intentionally obscured from his sight) shows one muddled with a blend of melancholy and that sort of silent displeasure he’s long since grown to associate with disappointed parents. He swallows hard, shame settling heavy like the diamond at the pit of his stomach. He went too far.

“Sorry,” he mumbles as he sits upright, cheeks heating up. He stares at his fingers, rhythmically flexing them.

She doesn’t vocally respond to his apology, but her form does grow visibly less tense. It’s a start.

Fully audible through the walls of the house, the tides crash onto shore, gently pulsing in and out. It doesn’t take long before the pace of his heart matches the ocean’s unwavering drumbeat. His naive young mind twitchy under the throes of the unnatural silence, he yearns for some concrete image to latch onto, anything to spirit him away from the present. Not before long, distant threads of memory from the strange dream he woke up from this morning rise to meet his pleas.

Most of the details are fuzzy, indistinct and abstract as one might expect from a dream, but nevertheless just enough specificity remains that he can’t help but wonder if this was more than your run-of-the-mill moonlight fantasy. Frowning pensively, he balls his hand against his chin. The sky was streaked with lines of pink and orange, he remembers. The tides swelled with the same unwavering prowess as they do this morning. He knows he was standing somewhere near the temple, because he clearly saw one of the stone hands half-buried on the sandy shore. A familiar ivory and peach figure stood defiant and distraught before him— no, not him!— before his…

“You always do this, Rose!”

His hands. They were wide, pale, free of the familiar calluses built up from years of plucking strings on his ukulele, they… they weren’t his. This body wasn’t his.

Mom. He was dreaming about his mom. But why, and how? He’s had dreams with her in them before, but they were always different, they were always from his perspective. They were always fluid and nonsensical. This, however… this one felt different, somehow. More tangible.

Almost… real.

“You never even asked me how I’d feel,” Pearl said, voice thick. “And that’s your problem. You never do!”

Realization dawns over him like the glow of the morning sun rising above the horizon. A sudden sickness churns in his stomach. He’s almost horrified, disgusted with his past actions in rudely brushing Pearl off like that.

She just… wants to know how I feel about all this, he thinks, throat constricting as he swallows hard. She wanted to know if I’m okay! But- is she even okay??

Is there more to this dream of his than meets the eye? Is his subconscious trying to tell him something, trying to lead him to take some sort of action? Have they really not asked her that enough?

His fingers drum against his leg as he gathers the nerve to speak again.

“Hey...”

“Yes?” Pearl says quietly, tone clipped. She’s still glancing out the window, turned away from him.

“How are you handling all this? Everything’s suddenly so different, and…” He grips the fabric of his pajama bottoms, his eyes burning hot. “I know you can’t say much about it, but I just wanna make sure you’re doin’ okay too.”

She finally meets his glance, her gaze glassy and wet. Her bottom lip quivers, so subtle he almost doesn’t pick up on it. In all the time he’s lived with her, he's not sure he’s ever seen her so vulnerable, and the sight of it drives a razor sharp point right through his heart. He takes a deep, grounding breath, and continues.

“And I want you to know I don’t blame you for this,” he reassures. “Even if you couldn’t tell us anything, that’s not your fault.”

“Thank you,” she says, her voice breaking.

“If there’s stuff I can do to make things easier, let me know?”

Her ice blue irises skate upwards as she deliberates, desperately grasping for an answer to his open ended question. Steven clasps his hands together in his lap, and simply waits in silent patience. His legs dangle back and forth over the edge of the couch.

Pearl sighs, her long suffering exhaustion evident. “If, in the future, you could avoid asking probing questions about your mother or abo- about my past on Homeworld, that would be a great help.” She presses her thumb and forefinger firm against her forehead, right under her gem. “It’s… painful, suffice it to say, when programming kicks in. And to answer your first question, I’m honestly trying not to think about any of it too much. Like you, it would seem,” she adds with a bit of a mirthful chuckle. “I can’t claim it’s good advice, but that’s where I’m at.”

“I’m sorry,” he repeats with a sniffle, leaning into her shoulder.

Tenderly, she wraps her arms around him and nestles her cheek against his mop of curly hair. It’s a blissful comfort, a wordless promise that more than anything else makes him feel safe. Secure.

“So am I,” she whispers, a tear slipping down her cheek.

__

Notes: 

I have a headcanon that Rose took ages to reform after Pearl staged her "shattering," and in the midst of that Pearl had to go into hiding with her gem so the Crystal Gems didn't learn their secret. During that, I imagine she probably lost Rose's gem at least once, and almost had the Gem equivalent of a heart attack. Which is why she's flipping out so much about it happening again, with Steven.

I also hc that Steven doesn't actually upset Pearl too often, out of the three main CGs. When she does get especially upset though, she's the type to give the icy silent treatment.

[mild-lunacy]

The Critique Investment Mismatch Problem

I was thinking about critical feedback on fics, and how generally I'm pretty firmly on the side of embracing it. You know, I always disagree with posts that stridently proclaim that people should just keep their critiques to themselves or email the author privately (... even though there's no obvious way to do that on Ao3). I'm all for honest feedback and people thinking about my fics (and other people's fics) rather than just squee. Not that I mind squee, obviously, but ultimately I don't find it as satisfying as a nice, meaty analysis. And I thought that's close enough to a critique that I don't really draw a distinction. But maybe I should.

I think what most of those posts *mean* when they say 'con-crit' is actually *ranting*. That is, the person leaves a review that doesn't have much to do with the story, and a lot to do with their (sometimes incomprehensible, other times simply entitled) wishes for or issues with the story the author chose to tell. Like I said... I'm open to that. But well, someone left me a missive saying they're 'disappointed' in the way my HP fic turned out, as if someone else wrote the last two chapters without paying attention to the first two. And like... okay, but that doesn't really help, or even tell me exactly what this person's issue was. I'm made distinctly uncomfortable, but no more enlightened as to my fic's weaknesses than I was before. It seems vaguely pointless and maybe a little mean, but that's it. The point of con-crit is theoretically to be helpful, but I don't feel... helped. Nor do I think this person ever intended their comment that way, though it was a polite and relatively respectful note compared to the unreasonable ad-hominem abuse I know some authors deal with.

I'm still not in favor of imposing any sort of limit (beyond basic politeness) on what people may say in fic comments. I've been in fandom awhile, and I've written quite a few fics, so I've seen some doozies (particularly on ff.net... ahh, those were the days). I guess I'm just saying I do understand where the distaste for con-crit comes from, simply 'cause so much of it is so underwhelming and unhelpful (to say the least). When you're in a class and are exchanging papers, you're supposed to at least try to say halfway useful or somewhat constructive things. The whole *point* of con-crit is that it's *constructive*. That's an important word choice. Meanwhile, I'm gonna have to go out on a limb and say most people don't wanna make the effort to be constructive or useful so much as they want to complain and/or explain their passions, presumably in a shorthand fully understandable only to themselves, 'cause they're the important person in the comment leaving transaction. This is not the way to make most authors take a kind view on their less-enthusiastic audience, basically. When feeling attacked, the human instinct is to retrench and retreat or lash out.

Naturally, this makes me think of Moffat and Gatiss's apparent resentful responses to Series 4 critique. Some people have been loud and unreasonable, others have clearly said unhelpful things, and overall the basic response has thus been retrenchment and half-hidden hostility among the creators and even other fans. It's certainly easy to sympathize with the person being verbally assailed or otherwise attacked. Most people don't really stop and wonder whether the critique has a point when they're feeling insulted and even fundamentally misunderstood. I realize I'm an exception here 'cause I'm fundamentally personally invested in in-depth critical discussion of fiction, even with strangers, though especially other fans-- whether it's about others or my own work. So I asked the person ranting at me to clarify, although I can almost guarantee they won't.

It's very hard to maintain that commitment, particularly in the face of commentary that, like I said, clearly misses the 'obvious', is unclear or seems to be about personal issues that have nothing to do with me as the writer (or Mofftiss, to extend the analogy). I presume most creators probably only care about in-depth critical discussions with their close friends and betas. Likewise, I guess most readers can't be bothered to really engage deeply with fics they're not enamored with to start with (no motivation, right?) This sort of phenomenon is what's probably behind the relative lack of meta on Sherlock Series 4, I would imagine. And that's with established fans of the show-- who'd bother writing a treatise on why a random fic annoyed them so that it's actually helpful to the author, right? And thus, the ever-strained relationship between creators and critics continues downhill.