#re last post i forgot i never published this

[martyrbat]

for context someone commented theyre appreciative that a youtuber has an epilepsy warning for violently flashing lights & an audio cue for when theyre over

[namikawa]

— [the perfect host]

featuring: s. geto, s. gojo

cw: smut, implied threesome, cunnulingus, implied m/m, phone sex (?), daddy kink (ofc), established relationship (reader & gojo), fingering, fem reader, chubby reader, getting “caught” masturbating, use of the word cunt (sorry lol), aftercare, not proofread fr, anything else i forgot lolz, pet names (mama, baby, pretty, sweetheart, love). wc: n/a.

notes: this is actually a fic my friend wrote (never published) & i re did it with two diff characters & finished it for her cause she never did… so if yall like it GO TO HER BLOG ILL TAG HER. this wasn’t my og idea i just wrote the smut and tweaked & added. but enjoy pls, sorry i haven’t posted in so long life has beat me up. @nvmjccnluv !!!

“so explain to me why i’m watching her again, she seems completely capable of staying in your apartment alone yknow.” suguru questions over the phone. it’s not that he hates you, but what if he was busy? he wasn’t, but gojo didn’t need to know that, he didn’t even ask to be fair. quickly dropping you off after handing the long haired man a small bag of your things.

on the other end of the phone gojo lets out a huff of laughter. “had a few things to finish up, she gets too lonely when i leave her at home so i didn’t want her getting into things. you know how it is.”

“i actually don’t, but okay man.”

“anyway, she doesn’t like many people but she didn’t seem to mind you the last time we hung out, you seemed like a safe option.” gojo continues, sounding a bit strained.

“okay, whatever, fine.”

“where’s she at anyways? if she was with you she would’ve jumped your bones to get to the phone.”

walking toward the the closed door in the hallway, geto chuckles before reassuring his friend. “relax dude, she’s in the room taking a na- holy shit.”

-

“what happened??”

the dark haired man places his ear on the door to make sure he’s not hallucinating, not saying that he’s hoping to be.

muffled moans greet his ears, but not muffled enough evidently. no, you wanted him to hear. he would have to pass by your room anyways, given that you two would be sharing a wall for the night. but him being on the phone with your boyfriend was just a coincidence, an extremely embarrassing one.

he listens to your soft whines and high pitched whimpers for what feels like days, though its hasn’t even been half a minute, paying no mind to the man yelling at him on the phone.

“SUGURU? ANSWER ME! IS SHE OKAY? I SWEAR IF SOMETHING HAPPE-” at this point geto tries to think as hard as possible to come up with a lie that won’t get him killed by his friend.

snapping out of his daze, he finally gets enough courage to respond, “yeah um i’m pretty sure, maybe i’m wrong, i think she’s uh masturbating.”

“oh, oh okay” suguru can basically hear a smirk he knows all to well forming on gojos mouth. “don’t be a rude host, go help her out man.”

what the fuck is he talking about help you out? he can’t be understanding that this is his girlfriend he’s talking about, right? on top of that, shouldn’t he be asking you for consent as well.

“are you insane man? i know you’re into all that weird shit, but her? she’d probably kill me before i even got close to the bed and throw my dead body out of my own apartment.” as nice as it sounds he didn’t know if you’d be okay with any of this. he wasn’t going to just walk straight in, right?

there’s a loud howl that comes directly from the other end of the phone. “are you really being this much of a pussy right now? i’m giving you full permission to go help my girl out, and you wanna whine about how she might kill y-”

“shut the hell up man, i didn’t say anything about being a pussy.”

“alright, then there shouldn’t be an issue with you helping her out. don’t sit up on your high horse and act like you haven’t thought about it before, i know just how those perverted thoughts of yours work, don’t you rememb-”

“okay okay shut up satoru, im going.”

pushing open the door, the first thing geto notices is your hand rubbing lightly between your soft thighs and how your wetness soaks the bed, clear evidence of how needy you were. how long have you been at it?

gojo can hear you so clearly over the phone, he might as well be in the room with you, “shit, is that her pussy i’m hearing? whats it look like?” he questions, but unfortunately for him he receives no answer.

suguru is too busy enjoying the view and listening to the pathetic little sounds coming from your cunt. his sweatpants are slowly starting to fit a little tighter than before, but he doesn’t make any movements yet, just in case you don’t wanna play this little game.

almost immediately your soft eyes flutter open and lock into his, and he swears he just came in his pants.

“sugi, please, it hurts so much,” you whine out to him, desperate for his veiny hands on you. your own hand never seems to falter though, only moving in more erratic circles around your sensitive clit; while your other hand is busy touching your nipples, trying to get the most stimulation possible.

knowing that you were just as needy for him as he was for you made the man’s confidence peak. he gives you a light smile as he walks closer to the bed, softly sitting down next to you. he leans over you a bit, close enough to where you can smell the minty, almost overpowering, scent of his shampoo. half his hair loosely tied up in a bun, the other half falling past his shoulders as he looks down at you.

“something wrong, pretty? those fingers not doing enough for you, right? don’t ‘cha wanna wait for your boyfriend to come back so he can help you out, he’s on the phone you know.”

his soft hands begin to work at your thighs, but it seems like it’ll never be any more than that. continuing for a little longer, he presses the speaker button on his phone, handing it over to you as you pull away from your core.

“can you hear me, sweetheart?” gojo asks, now finally getting some time to speak to you after being ignored for so long. “i gave sugi permission to help you out, okay? does that sound alright to you?” he utilizes the small nickname you’d given his friend, innocently coercing you to be good.

you give a small “mmm” in agreement. then, opening your legs, you grab at suguru’s hand and place it between your thighs, just barely touching your cunt.

gojo continues, smiling to himself on the other side of the device. “‘kay. i’m gonna talk you through it, just so i know you’re treating my girl right. take two of your fingers and stuff it inside of her, she’ll clench up at first but just keep working at it and she’ll open up, okay? maybe if you do good, you can have something too.”

geto lets out an annoyed breath, short, but just long enough for gojo to catch it. he knows what that means. what’s even stopping him from fucking you in first place? it’s not like gojo would know. but as he looks into your pleading eyes he realizes he’d do anything to make sure you’re content and happy.. even if that means listening to satoru’s perverted requests.

his fingers slide down to rub at your clit just a bit, before burying his pointer and ring finger deep into your cunt, you clench so tight around him, it makes him feel like he’s dreaming the way your teeth suck at your bottom lip attempting to hide your whines.

“cmon pretty, open up for me. promise i’ll make you feel good, okay?”

a throaty whimper slides from between your lips as geto’s fingers work you open. “‘s good sugi, please like that more.” you scoot down a little more, chasing his fingers to get even just a little more stimulation.

“next you’re gonna press on her clit, just a little though she’s a sensitive little thing.” gojo groans out, it’s obvious he’s taken a break from his work to focus on… other things.

“yeah yeah, i know how to use my fingers, asshole.” suguru voices, clearly annoyed. although, he still abides by the instructions and moves his thumb to press on your clit just a tiny bit. your back arches away from his fingers almost immediately, like a natural instinct, he grabs your plush hips with his other hand, pulling you back down. “nuh uh, c’mere sweet girl, you wanted my help you’re gonna get it.”

his delicate fingers curve upward into you and you feel as if you’re floating on cloud nine, the way he flicks them at just the right speed while managing to hold you down and deepen his movements. it’s all too much for him you.

the sound of gojo’s voice breaks geto out of his daze, “fuck, i gotta go suguru. i know you’ll take care of her. i’m gonna have to cut this shit short, i’ll try to come back later tonight instead of tomorrow morning. love you guys, love you baby, be good for sugi okay?” geto’s eyes immediately flicker to yours, and you see just a little bit of what you think could be fear, or excitement, in his eyes.

“bye daddy, love you too.” you whine out, hearing a quick click before the call ends.

“daddy?” he questions. “knew he was into some shit, didn’t know you were too, sweet girl. you’re too pretty and innocent, or at least you put up a good act.” his fingers slide out of you as he snickers, not ignoring the way you pout at the loss of stimuli.

“nah, not gonna leave you here all needy don’t worry mama, just gonna do it my way, that sound good to you?” geto grabs you by your hips as you choke out a small “yea”, pushing you closer to the headboard of the bed. he fully removes his hair tie and throws all of it up into a bun, swiftly grabbing your underwear and pulling it off.

you look down at him as he crawls closer to you on his stomach, wrapping his arms around your thighs and closing them around his head. you feel his fingers spread your cunt apart, licking a long stripe onto you. your body tenses up, and on instinct your hand finds its way into suguru’s hair, tugging lightly. his head perks up at you, smiling, but eventually just deciding to leave you be.

his tongue swipes over your clit, taking small breaths occasionally as he tastes your cunt. neither one of you know who this is really for at this point. he’s supposed to be ‘helping you’ but with the tent growing in his sweats he might as well be doing this for his own pleasure instead. you continue to take harsh pulls at his dark strands, so unfamiliar to you. mostly with satoru you opted for scratching at his shoulders or gripping at the sheets due to the length he kept his hair, but this, this was something you could get used to.

“sugi please, m so close, want it so bad, need you to make me cum.” you cry out, loving the way his nose rubs against your clit as he licks.

he doesn’t say anything, he can’t really, but you know he understands. he grips your thighs tighter, licking the same way as before, occasionally sucking at your clit, and before you know it you’re squirming all over his face as that familiar feeling rushes over you.

the only thing that suguru could make out of your cries were “thank you”, “so good”, and “daddy”? he wasn’t sure if you were calling him daddy or if you wanted gojo, but at this point it didn’t really matter to him. he pleased you and that’s all he needed to make him feel better.

as he lifted his head up from your pussy he could already tell how tired you were getting, he immediately grabbed you a change of clothes that gojo had packed and cleaned you up with a wet washcloth. “everything okay, mama? need anything?” your eyes strain open and you smile at the man standing above you, “i’m okay, thank you for your help. will you stay?” you could tell that he genuinely cared for you, and was worried he had done something wrong by the tone in his voice. him staying was more for him rather than yourself, not that you were complaining.

he pulled off his shirt as he crawled into bed next to you. grabbing his phone from the bedside table he saw that gojo had sent him a message.

“i’ll take care of you both when i’m back, cause i’m betting you didn’t take anything for yourself. see you both soon ;)”

suguru chuckled to himself at the message from his friend, looking down at you peacefully sleeping on his chest. maybe he could get used to something like this? but for now, he’s content.

[wings-of-ink]

First Devlog?

Hello everyone...boy, there are a lot of you already, still trying to digest that...

So, I gather that I should do these logs on occasion. I do not know how often, perhaps just when I have a few things to say. I will try not to ramble too much, but my fingies like to talk.

Anyway, I am working on chapter 3 right now. There’s some fun moments so far in it that I hope you’ll like, and we’ll get to meet Zahn, Duri'naan, and then Rundis. I’m trying not to rush because there are some exciting scenes that I’m eager to get to. I’ve outlined them to tide myself over until I get that far. There’s some quiet moments you’ll get to have as well, and right now I feel like that’s what I’m struggling with. Those areas of my story are like bridges to the next, more exciting, parts and sometimes I feel like they fall a little flat. But, I’m trying to keep in mind this is my first draft. I’ll go through it another time or two to perk things up. Those moments are still important for letting the MC get to know each RO.

My mind has been in a million directions lately too, and I’ve had a lot of ‘duh’ moments. I’ve done so much world building since I started this last year (around August/September I think), that I have pockets of important details that I kinda just forgot! So, I plan to re-read all the notes I’ve made and try to also put them into one place. I have some in my phone, in a notebook, and in no less than three folders on my laptop. It’s a wonder I have survived this many years…

What you can expect for coming updates…

-A couple fixes, of course – thank you to those who found some of those pesky buggy bois for me.

-A nicer front page, instead of being slapped with my ramblings, I’d like to actually have a nice start page. I’ll figure it out eventually, lol.

-I’ll be adding a name bank to the MC’s Nameday scene that will also show you what each name means, so if that is important to you, it’ll save you the internet search. If it tickles your fancy, the name selection will correspond in some way to the marks (names meaning "night" or "storm," etc.) so you can theme your MC a bit.

-Extra coding in case you decide to shorten MC’s given name to just “Ravi.” I did not once consider that anyone would do this, and my first play-tester – my own spouse – did….He told me about it since it made some dialog with Oswin make zero sense, and then I published the story without fixing it because I completely forgot about it.

-Different contrast color for dark mode links. I feel like I have drastically improved this with a new gold color. In retrospect, I don’t know why I didn’t use the gold before. I love it as an accent, I use it all over! The blue never felt 100% right, but my brain shut down after thinking about it too long. Here’s a sample and a (M) Zahn tease:

When can you expect an update?

I’d like to make my next update during the Amare Games Festival, ideally containing both chapters 3 and 4 since they go pretty tightly together. This will also insure that you meet the rest of the posse. It’s a tall order for both chapters to be submitted on time, and I don’t want to rush them either, but I’m going to try really really hard, lol. I will focus first on polishing chapter 3, so that no matter what, I can at least get it out in time.

Here’s a link to the post about it:

And this is the submission time frame: open from March 31st 2024 at 11:00 PM to May 1st 2024 at 12:00 AM

As a side message, should you want to read on…

I also wanted to give you all a big, like really big, heartfelt thank you. I have received so many kind messages and comments that I just can’t believe it. I am so happy (and honestly, genuinely shocked) that you’re enjoying my IF, and I’m motivated to work hard so you also enjoy each new chapter of your journey. There’s so many secrets I want to share with you about the world, and I am struggling to be patient myself, lol.

I am not usually a very open or social person, and I was scared for a long time to share anything I wrote. I reached a point in my personal life in the last few years where I just needed to embrace what I loved to do and share it with a community that shares in that love. I encourage you to do the same whether there is a story in your heart, music on your lips, or a paintbrush in your hands. Life is NOT about your 8-5. We may not be able to survive without it, but whatever moment you can, do what you actually love. Put away the those things that don’t matter, the things that stress you - including people, and make time for who you are.

Thank you all and take care!

~Lunan

[annabelle1901]

Lost Frank Castle x Karen Page fic

Hi! So I don't really interact with anyone on Tumblr but I don't really know what else to do, so here we go. I'm back on my Kastle bullshit <3 and I've been trying to find this old fan fiction on AO3 that I started reading years ago. Stopped reading after a certain point but had the tab open on my phone and I thought I'd continue reading eventually.. And then my phone got stolen, and I forgot the title & author name. Not great. I've dedicated the past few days to looking for it and so far I got nothing.

So what I'm gonna do is write down everything I remember like a mad woman in the hope that this jogs someones memory. Please help me this fic haunts me. ANY sort of reference or whatever could potentially help (Tumblr posts, links, screenshots, Google history, etc)

Fandom: Daredevil/ the Punisher obv

Pairing: Frank Castle/ Karen Page

Rating: probably explicit (canon typical violence and eventual smut)

Published: 2016-2017 (started post s2 Daredevil but pre The Punisher s1 because I don't remember any of the plot or characters from that show showing up) might have been deleted in 2020ish

Length: has to be +10 chapters (long chapters as well, don't know if it was finished)

Characters: Matt Murdock/ Daredevil, Foggy Nelson, Claire Temple, Elektra Natchios (I vividly remember them making some sort of appearance)

now let's get really unhinged...

Plot:

Pretty sure the story starts on Karen's birthday but her mood is meh.. She's on her way home or something, gets in her car and Shining Star starts playing which let's her know that Frank was recently there. Something else must have alarmed her because she goes looking for him and finds him in like an alley around her building. He's in really bad shape, bloody practically dying. She carries him to her apartment and either helps him herself or calls Claire Temple.*

*Don't think it was in this part of the story but she helps Frank and makes a joke about him not being healthy enough to be sleeping with Karen anytime soon which makes them blush. Don't think they were intimate yet but tensions were rising.

For the next couple of chapters I remember it was mainly beautifully written angst between them in this contained space while he's healing. Karen doesn't want Frank to get killed while being the Punisher, he resists her care and tries to hurt her by saying "You aren't Maria and could never be" or something.

I also vividly remember a scene where he's grieving and keeps like tugging on this necklace Karen has on while he cries in her arms. She leaves her necklace at his family's graves and the groundskeeper or something tells her not to do that because it'll get stolen but she knows that but does it anyway as a sign of respect.

They sort admit their feelings eventually but don't sleep together yet because they know they can't go back after that. For some reason Frank needs to leave the city for a little while to re-home a dog I believe he found while on a "mission" and the idea is that the time apart will help them decide whether or not they want to be together. They reunite on a sunny, lovely day in the city and go back to her apartment and lots of smut ensues. Daredevil shows up at midnight/ morning to get Frank. Something's going down he needs his help. It doesn't end well somehow Karen gets involved and they both go to the same hospital. Frank is in a coma and Karen visits him when she's allowed and urges him to live sort of mirroring when he first got shot in the head at the carousel. He wakes up but needs to go back to prison. Everything is really bad. The press somehow knows about their relationship as well. Last scene I remember is Karen and Foggy talking about all this and a newspaper printing a picture of Karen's legs with the caption Keys to the Castle? or something. Gross everything sucks and that's where I stopped reading.

So that's about all I can remember, feels like a fever dream. If anyone could help me out I'd really appreciate it. Thx!!

[girl-bateman]

I was tagged by @fre3zerbride @myheartisahouseonfire @choicesthot @godspetdog for the nine people you wanna know better thingy! Thank you guys for tagging me and sorry for taking forever to do this lmaoo. Much love xxx

There was some slight variations in the different posts I was tagged in so to make this one a single post instead of 4, I made sure all questions were included. Hope that was oki <33

Last Song: PRIDE. - Kendrick Lamar

Favourite Colour: Turquoise maybe? Like a very pale, light turquoise.

Last Movie: Happy Ending - An awful romantic comedy about a dutch couple on their thruple-journey. The guy cant communicate and the girl cant orgasm and thus she convinces her boyfriend to try out a threesome. It's the straightest movie I've watched and yet it manages to have several puss-eating scenes. Netflix never ceases to disappoint me, godbless.

Last TV Show: I'm (re)watching The Mentalist in the background as I'm writing this lmao. I'm also watching Outer Banks, Suits, Dark and Drag Race Holland.

Sweet/Spicy/Savoury: All of it, preferably in some sort of combo.

Relationship Staus: Single

Last Thing I Googled: "word for when you love inflicting pain" ; I forgot which one is sadism and which one is masochism.

Current Obsession: No idea honestly. Love and peace on planet earth? Self improvement? Accomplishing my dreams? The art of girlbossing perhaps ?

Looking Forward To: Traveling to India and (possibly) the US this spring and going to study for a semester in the Netherlands this fall !! <33 Also getting to read my own words printed !!! in a real magazine !!! Being a published author !!!

Currently reading: The God of Small Things (audiobook), The Shards (I recently got it signed <33!) and My Sister's Keeper (found it at the thrift and died of happiness)

Song stuck in head: Hey Ya! - Outcast

Favourite food: Ohhh there is too much good stuff to choose from. Maybe ramen, sushi or the vegetarian feijoada my mom makes <3

Dream trip: Solo-trip to Florence <3 I'd spend each day sitting at different cafes writing :)

Im tagging: @emmenai-kalliston, @infinite-of-sky, @matineaux, @nightmimedreams, @realbeefman, @olliecoded, @emiliosandozsequence  and anyone else who feels up for it <333

[idontwanttospoiltheparty]

Hi I’m sorry to bug you (pun intended) but do you mind explaining everything you listed in the 2023 tumblr bug poll. I’ve been here all year but I don’t think I understand all of the options. You have been really fun to follow this year I appreciate your presence in our community :)

thank you Anon 1 that is very kind of you to say!!!! :)

All right, buckle up folks:

Get Back day-by-day re-watch (January): In January some people on decided to rewatch the bits of Get Back from that specific date, some also went through the nagra tapes of that day. They'd make cool compilation posts with moments that stuck out to them. I just remembered it was actually called Get Backuary :) I didn't really participate though because January is a busy time for me, in general.

Beatles poll wars (around February-April): once the poll feature reached bug tumblr we started having a LOT of polls and it caused a not insignificant amount of discourse and accusations of "bootlicking" or whatever lol. Interestingly, we discovered that Paul and George have roughly the same amount of fans (taking ~35% each) and John and Ringo also have about the same amount of and only about half as many fans (~15% each).

McLennon Conspiracy Blogger Disappearance Event (April): I explained this here, though I forgot to mention that in mid-April this blogger went scorched earth and dropped off tumblr completely. One time they made a post insinuating that no one's ever bothered wondering why John was depressed in 65/66 (and implied it was because THEY knew McLennon had broken up for a while or something)… Sir, this is the John Lennon Psychoanalysis Website.

Eyes of the Storm (June): Paul published a book and held an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery featuring tons of never before seen pictures from late 1963 to early 1964. Very fun time though people randomly claimed the majority of the pics were John when that wasn't really true lol there was just a general bias in which pictures from the gallery got shared.

Now And Then announcement + initial discourse (June): in a radio interview to promote said gallery, Paul offhand mentioned he had used Peter Jackson's AI technology to isolate John's vocal and "the last Beatles song" would be released later this year. There was a first wave of discourse from people thinking Paul was gonna use an AI-generated John vocal, rather than use AI to isolate an existing vocal (this was so frustrating because it was so clear in context what Paul meant but online news just ran with it). Then, there was a second wave of discourse (which was revived upon the songs release) over the extent of George's involvement and how much he would have wanted this.

Beatles song tournament (July–August): A sideblog was created to do a Beatles song poll battle. It got a bit intense lol. Everyone started hatejerking about Hey Jude beating A Day In The Life in the semi-finals.

Top Worm™ (August): Literally One Of The Greatest Moments On This Site. Also, let no one tell you John wasn't Top Worm. It is law.

Now And Then song + video (November): think this one's self-explanatory but basically Now And Then came out, we all reacted to it, the video came out the next day and was kinda hilariously bad but in the funniest way possible, George Discourse Part 2 and also How Much Is Paul Allowed To Change John's Song Discourse which I found puzzling lol. Someone said him removing a verse was "Paul Rewriting History". fantastic. no notes. what a time to be alive.

[magicalmischel]

Hiiii!! For the WIP game: please tell me about Layers of Dusk and also obviously Suddenly Flames Everywhere 👀👀 And also the trans!Merlin fic if you're up for it because I know you've been working on that one lately and I'm VERY curious about it 👀👀👀😘

hiiii! 💖 thanks for asking about all of them!! 😂💖 I'll give you the summaries and snippets!

Layers of Dusk

this one is so "old" that I even made a fic cover for it to post on fanfiction.net but obviously that never happened 😂 also my draft included very bad fanart so maybe when i get back to this wip I could make better art now that I have more practice <3

summary:

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Arthur is dying and Merlin is left with no choice but to take his soul into his body and hope that they both last long enough to perform a necromancy spell. This requires sacrifices, and Merlin will have to learn that sometimes, going too far is not worth it.

I remember I stopped bc I got stuck on a scene with Gaius (or was it Gwen??) one day and I just never continued. I also wasn't sure about the fic's message, bc I felt like it should have a sad ending so that Merlin learns a lesson but also at the same time I really wanted to write a happy ending and I just didn't know what to do basically 😂

snippet:

“O drakon! E male so ftengometta! Tesd’hup’anankes!” The words echo through the silent woods and through Merlin’s mind like a steady, painful reminder of what had happened. He keeps holding onto Arthur -- both his body and his consciousness -- and he finds himself almost unaware of his surroundings, as if trapped in a daze of realization that he was indeed holding Arthur’s dead body. He didn’t dare look down at him. He couldn’t. But he took Arthur’s hand and entwined their fingers, willing himself to believe that the dragon would have a solution. Something difficult, no doubt, but very possible that would fix all this. Merlin didn’t care about the consequences. Oh god. Oh. Arthur’s hand was cold.

oh look a classic case of switching tenses halfway through a scene lmao

Suddenly Flames Everywhere

ajksfljals this fic 😭 the idea was born in summer of 2022, and I wrote the first scene then. Then it lay forgotten until I picked it up for acbb 2023 and I spent the entire summer working on it every single day, I wrote the first draft in a month, then started rewriting the whole thing and that's where I got stuck ;-; I'm "working" now on scene 18 out of 33, so I'm around in the middle of it.

summary:

It all starts with a deal. Arthur will capture the last of the dragons, and in exchange, Uther will give him more time to search for his soulmate. He won’t have to marry princess Elena when she arrives in a few days. Little does Arthur know that the dragon he shoots down is actually a young dragon-man called Merlin, and more importantly — his soulmate. It only gets more complicated from there.

and a snippet:

Only it wasn’t a dragon at all. It looked like a man. Arthur’s eyes widened, his grip on the crossbow faltering. The creature had two large, featherless, dark grey wings, and a long tail. No doubt that it wasn’t human. But it also had a human head. And human hair. Human legs, arms, even human clothes. “That’s no dragon,” he hissed. “It’s Dragonfolk,” Sir Kay whispered back, his crossbow still aimed firmly upwards. “They serve the dragons. Live like animals in small groups. Just as dangerous as the foul beasts themselves, I assure you.”

trans!merlin fic

yep this is the one I'm working on now 💖 Honestly it wasn't going to be published at first, I just had a dream where I was trans!merlin three months ago and woke up inspired and bc I was in the middle of a writer's block, I was very excited about it and wrote the whole first draft in one day. Then I forgot about it for several weeks, then I edited it, hated it, left it alone again, and I re-edited it about three weeks ago and decided I should maybe try to post it, so I reached out and found a few sensitivity readers who gave me some notes and now I'm adding scenes and editing the whole thing again 💖

it doesn't really have a big plot or anything unlike my other wips, the summary basically is just this:

In the medieval world where there are no lgbt resources or language to talk about lgbt topics, this fic depicts Merlin’s journey from realising he’s trans, to coming out to Arthur, and transitioning with the help of magic.

not gonna provide a snippet for this one just yet, but hopefully it should be posted within like . . . a month or two? Depending on how much I procrastinate lmao

thanks so much for asking again! 🥰 and sorry for replying with so much text, you know I talk a lot 😂

[illegalmushrooms]

shrooooms, the kids miss uu where art thou 😭

... hey!

(incoming yap session, beware)

This is a little awkward. I haven't touched my Tumblr in like, apparently three years. There's some questions in my inbox, but they're so old it feels a bit strange to answer them now, right? 😭

Anyway. It's nice to see you! Whoever you may be! (Are the kids OK?)

Last week, for god knows what reason, I re-donned my mushroom hat (humor me for a moment and imagine a Mario Toad-style monstrosity) and published a new (old) chapter of Don't Leave! (y'all remember that? Does anyone reading this right now remember or know who I am??).

Laying off the parentheses now--I explained in the chapter a bit of the future of the story and what was happening with me. Oh my gosh, is that a conveniently-placed link to the chapter down below?

As I mentioned somewhere in that conveniently-placed link, I'm mostly fine, and there's nothing else I have written for Don't Leave! so far.

Well...

Okay, so that's a complete and utter lie. I do have something written. But I'm afraid it's not very useful.

I actually wrote... a complete, very dramatic ending to the story. It's an interesting ending, to say the least, but of course, the story is nowhere near that point. I'd have to write another thirty-forty-who knows more chapters or something to even reach this supposed ending, and by then I might not even like the idea I have there.

I guess that's not relevant. I suppose the point I'm trying to make is that I never, ever, forgot about Don't Leave! I've thought about it a lot, even when I haven't been writing a single word. I've been reading every comment and message I received across the different platforms, and you know, smiling stupidly at my phone every time. I've totally missed the world of fanfiction! I've missed Bella, the ridiculous character I conjured up within the depths of pandemic-era isolation! I've missed sitting down at my laptop and tap-tapping away and sinking into this wonderful world Togashi made!

So here's what I'm going to say about the story. (This post just gets longer and longer, doesn't it? Sorry!)

As of right now, there is no next chapter.

I can't say when there might be a next chapter.

I can say that maybe, life-permitting, I'll post something in the fall, if I can squeeze in some time to rewatch HxH. I've just... forgotten a lot of the go story's intricacies that an author has to keep in mind to write a comprehensible fic.

That's what I have to say about Don't Leave! .

(and, to anyone who might be thinking of those other fics I wrote, which I highly doubt anyone is... I actually have a few chapters of them simmering in my docs somewhere. But I'm a bit embarrassed about it, so let's consider them dead for the moment, alright?)

Now that I've cleared that up, and some of my conscience along with it, I suppose I'll drop in a tiny life update for any curious souls. I've never disclosed much about myself and I'd like to consider myself awful cool and mysterious, but can I speed run certain vague life events from my past three years?

I... survived a car crash, travelled to new countries and places, moved, wrote a ton (fanfic and general fiction, all of it kind of ass), survived a fire, worked and toiled to the capitalist machine, had a couple mental breakdowns, conquered the mental health, lost it again, conquered again...

...and so on...

What's next for me?

I am hesitant of publishing anything else at the moment. I have a lot of fics I'd written just sitting in my files; everything from miscellaneous anime stuff to Harry Potter to this one reallllly odd story about isekai-ing into Minecraft, of all things. (I actually kind of like that one. Don't know if there's an audience for that kind of thing, though). My writing has absolutely improved since those admittedly rough early chapters of DL (I am ASTOUNDED it ever gained the little audience that it did) but there's still an anxiety I have about sharing my work. Silly, yes, but that's that.

For right now, I have the new DL chapter, I have this long-ass update post, and I have my genuine appreciation.

Much love to anyone who might still care. <3

Until next time?

Illegal Mushrooms

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

Alex Horne: How often do you think about food? Ray Peacock: Surprisingly little. Alex Horne: How often do you think about death? Ray Peacock: Surprisingly lots. Alex Horne: And how often do you look at Chortle, the website? Ray Peacock: Every other day, maybe? Alex Horne: Okay, so it’s death, then Chortle, then food. Ray Peacock: Yeah, pretty much. - Alex Horne Breaks the News podcast, quickfire quiz, June 2014

Most relatable Ray Peacock has ever been, and I've heard him be pretty fucking relatable on a lot of topics. But this might do it more than any of them. I have the exact same answers to all three questions. That is the order that those topics enter my day-to-day thoughts. And people are frequently surprised by how much I don't like turning food into a whole big thing to think about a lot. This is why I refuse to listen to Off Menu (for other reasons, I'm going to guess there's a chance I might share that with Ray Peacock as well).

Having said that, listening to this podcast episode reminded me that I used to do Chortle headline roundup posts on this blog, haven't done one of those in a while. And there are some fun ones right now. So here, have some Chortle headlines.

I am surprisingly excited for season 2 of this - surprising given that I found season 1 sort of strangely uneven and disappointing in parts. But it was uneven in a way that had potential. The good bits I liked a lot and the ideas I found intriguing. I'm pleased we get a chance to see if it can find its feet.

I watched this pilot many years ago, and then forgot about it until I saw this headline. It was fucking terrible. It took me a moment to even remember it, I briefly thought Iannucci had suddenly decided to start slagging off Veep. But nope, he's talking about this other weird American thing from far earlier.

I have had cause to think about The Thick of It a bit more in the last couple of years, possibly re-vist the stance I've held unwaveringly since I first saw it in 2009, that it's the greatest television show ever made. It seems more complicated now, as I consider the effects that many political comedy shows I love, including that one, may have had on real-life politics, some effects being not great even if the shows went in with the best intentions. On the other hand, the episode titled Spinners and Losers is an absolute masterpiece of cinematic storytelling, more righteous anger has never been committed to television than Jamie MacDonald being betrayed in the final hours. Veep is also very good. That other American pilot was very bad. This one headline has reminded me of all those things.

I clicked the link to see what the hell a cost-of-living romcom is. It's a couple who break up and can't move out due to a rental contract. Okay. Well good for Lara Ricote, anyway.

I continue to be quite pleased for Joe Lycett that he got a TV vehicle that seems utterly perfect for him, even though I could not get past the first couple of episodes when I tried to watch it myself. Good for him. Hope he wins an award.

Oh good! I'd read that he was better, but there are varying degrees of "better", and I wasn't sure which one he was. If he's traveling around to various towns for Radio 4 again, that suggests he's genuinely better. The "comedian writes a stand-up show about their recent bout of cancer" is surprisingly saturated at the moment, but I hope he gets one in next year anyway.

On the subject of the saturated market, I liked this show far more than I'd expected to, given my general aversion to hearing medical details of anything. A show with that many medical details that I still enjoyed probably deserves at least 4 stars.

I'm going to this! I'm going to this I'm going to this I'm going to this!!! I always enjoy the biannual-ish even called "Chortle publishes the contents of Daniel Kitson's mailing list." Always accompanied by the same picture. Steve Bennett definitely only has one picture of Daniel Kitson.

I used to love that show so much. But on the subject of me having re-evaluated the responsibility of various political comedies, my view on this is now that everyone should just listen to The Bugle's election special instead, get it from people who are not centrist monarchists. Actually, Last Week Tonight did quite a good UK election special this week too. I still believe in political comedy as a concept. I just have higher standards than I used to for what level of apologism and comedy washing I'll overlook in it.

He did that when I was in high school! My dad traveled to the States to see him, I couldn't go because I guess I was a kid and in school, but my dad brought me back a t-shirt that said "Eric Idle Greedy Bastard Tour" on it, that he'd got signed by Eric Idle after the show, and I wore it as a night shirt. Wore it several nights a week for nearly 10 years, until it got peed on by our mice infestation and I had to throw it away.

I watched this and quite enjoyed it! I'm not sure Comedy Blaps have a particularly high rate of getting picked up for a larger series so I don't have my hopes up for more, but I'd definitely watch it if they made this. Surely it's only a matter of time before Amy Gledhill gets some major TV role or other.

A few things going on here. That Canadian article was written by a guy my brother sort of knows, which is more crossover than I'd like there to be between my real life and Chortle (he's also kind of a dick, I wouldn't need to know anything else about him to know that, you can tell by the dig at the Kim's Convenience people as though working in shitty conditions should preclude people from speaking up about those shitty conditions). That Guardian article on political comedy is interesting, contrasting Nish Kumar and Emma Sidi with Matt Forde, I think, in terms of political comedians who can view the political situation as purely material and ones who have something more interesting to say about it. I read that stand-up round table thing, I don't follow American comedy all that much but there were several comedians whose work I know and like in there, and I had to stop reading it because it was making me like them less. Except Edelman, about whom my opinion didn't change because I've never much liked him.

[addictedtostorytelling]

Okay…that may just be one of my favorite chapters of “An Opposite of Echoes” to date - the sweet conversation between Sara & Grissom in the car, Sara’s conversation with Greg, and poor Grissom - I forgot he had the budget report to do too.

But now I’m suddenly becoming very aware that this series is just getting started as Sara mentions when her next therapy appointment is & when the ultrasound is (and the ever present hint about twins…in my mind I’ve already decided - she’s having twins).

I know you’re a busy person, but tell me that next installment in the Accidents universe isn’t going to be a year away once this story wraps to…please?

hi, @chelsshearman!

aw, shucks! i'm glad you enjoyed this week's installment so much! after putting sara through the ringer in the previous chapter, i thought it would only be fair to give her some quality time with her boys so she could recuperate a bit in this one.

though grissom definitely doesn't get the same kind of reprieve, poor guy! 😂

i'm happy to know you liked reading those conversations. i always have fun getting to "peel back the curtain" and show some of the between-the-action interpersonal moments with the team we so seldom get to see in canon.

it's wild to think there are only three updates left to go before this fic is completely posted—literally just a few more hours' worth of time within the universe of the story!

i will tease: the next chapter contains a couple of my personal favorite scenes, and i'm excited to share them with you and hear your thoughts, if you care to tell them.

as for when you might expect the next installment of the accidentsverse once "an opposite of echoes" wraps up, i honestly can't promise anything in terms of a timeline.

i have three to four more multichapter fics (tentatively) planned to span the rest of the pregnancy and the baby's or babies' birth. the first one would cover the events of christmas and its aftermath (i.e., the next few weeks in the story world immediately after "an opposite of echoes"), including the skype call with betty, sara's therapy appointment, and the 8-week ultrasound. the next one (or two, depending on how i ultimately split things) would cover some major events later in the pregnancy, and the last one would bring us through to the delivery day and the first little while postpartum.

though i know what these stories will cover content-wise, i can't tell you when to expect them.

i am a notoriously slow writer for a variety of reasons both process- and circumstance-related, and i learned long ago that whenever i try to predict when i'll be ready to publish something, i inevitably end up being wrong (and, unfortunately, never in a good "oh! i finished this story much sooner than anticipated!" kind of way).

i do intend to devote myself to "something in you i believe in" for the foreseeable future after "an opposite of echoes," and that fic will be my priority until it's completed, so i'm not likely to publish another big accidentsverse multichapter fic any time soon.

of course, since the accidentsverse is my happy place and still very much where i am currently living in my imagination, i'll say: though i can't state exactly when it might happen, since i always have little scenes and vignettes from this 'verse playing through my mind, there is a good chance i'll end up posting some fill-in-the-gaps-between-the-big-planned-multichapter-fics one-shots sometime before 2024 is out!

i just can't stay away from this geeky little family for long!

anyway, in the meantime, i hope you enjoy the end of the story. thank you so much for reading and for taking the time to share your thoughts and encouragement! 💙

p.s., re: the possibility it's twins: we'll have to see. sara will definitely be holding her breath until that ultrasound, for sure!

[again-please]

writing pattern game

Rules: Share the first line of your last ten published works or as many as you are able and see if there are any patterns! (from most recent to least recent, starting from the top)

@septemberskye tagged me in this! fun!! exposing a lot of my abandoned story shame here lol BUT we are accepting our flaws in this chili's tonight. I haven't revisited some of these older ones in a looooong time so it's kind of nice to blow the dust off of them and take a peek!

Dancing With My Demons (Baldur's Gate 3, posted, WIP)

He’d meant only to get her out of his system, at first.

A Little Further (Baldur's Gate 3, posted, complete)

It starts the next morning, after it all comes out in the light of a new day: a vampire in their midst.

survival season (Star Wars: The Last Jedi [reylo], posted, unfinished probably forever sorry the last movie really took the wind out of my sails)

Rey disembarks to find a planet in autumn.

find a thread to pull, and we can watch it unravel (Star Wars: The Force Awakens [reylo], posted, complete)

Forty-eight hours.

Ego Eris (Star Wars: The Force Awakens [reylo], posted, unfinished yeah sorry really don't bother with this one unless you want to be mad at me lmao)

As always, no day in the desert is complete without a poorly disguised scam.

and since my ao3 is just barely scraping 5, a little bonus throwback of one on ff.net that I straight up forgot existed until I resurrected this blog:

Connections (Star Wars: The Force Awakens [reylo], posted, unfinished?? I guess?? I think I intended to write more but this was more of a dual character study so it's a little less obviously unfinished than the others lol)

What most people don't realize is just how subjective memory actually is.

Patterns:

I don't know, honestly! for the most part the thing these most have in common to my eye is an attempt at a hook - lines that are meant to be like "wait WHAT is happening?" without quite being in media res. I also like starting inside a character's head since exploring the inner voice is usually mostly what gets me writing in the first place (plots?? never heard of them. we are here to brood and get slammed down big style). first lines usually kind of pop into my head fully formed out of nowhere and then once I excitedly deposit them into a document I'm like "oh shit now I have to think of some other shit to go below this"

oh gosh who to tag when you're an antisocial hermit... @howlsmovinglibrary, @novarunestone, and @eelqueen if you want! and also YOU also if you would like to!

[manonamora-if]

Retrospective 2022 (2)

See Part 1 of the retrospective and the overall graphic of 2022 here.

2021 had been a bit of a weird year for me (though it did give me the wonderful world of IF), with a lot of change. So I was glad 2022 was bit more... chill (kinda). I've dived so much deeper in IF and learned so freaking much in the past 12 months.

Long post ahead, breaking it here.

2022 Goals

Last year I only had a few goals: publish Scene 2 of CRWL, submit TTTT to the IF Comp, publish the demo of TTATEH and making Tweego my b*tch.

I am happy to say I've completed all these goals... and then some!

CRWL was updated not just once, but 3 times (with the last one including a bunch of re-writes.

I managed to submit TTTT to the IF Comp (for better for worse).

TTATEH's demo was up for Halloween (with 2 full chapters no less!)

Tweego is not a scary thing that I never managed to make work anymore (I even made an asset pack and guide to make it easy for everyone else)

So what's the extra?

I went from having essentially 3 working projects to 9-ish published ones, with the addition of: SPS Iron Hammer, The Thick Table Tavern, La Petite Mort (FR), The Trials and Tribulations of Edward Harcourt, Goncharov Escapes!, P-Rix - Space Trucker (and Le Jeu de la Dévotion - FR). All links are here.

I started getting my hands dirty with JavaScript (I know, the horror) and more customisation with CSS, and working on adding more accessibility in my projects (visual and gameplay wise).

Got more active in the community (here with Interact-IF, and on discord, and on the Forum... oh, as a note support your authors)

I've started sharing my little silly knowledge of Twine, by creating templates, and guides, and tutorials, and sharing resources.

Also organising my first Comp! (@seedcomp-if) with other peeps from the IF Forum. And we did that in 14 days! (kinda want to create more fun jams too now...)

Got into some trends, with one that resulted in the creation of the really bad idea that is @if-confessions.

And probably more that I forgot about...

Even then...

Part of me feels like it's not been enough, like I haven't been enough, like what I put out wasn't good enough. I've been struggling with insecurity and imposter syndrome for a long time, so this is not new, but it's still there, spiking once in a while, when I really don't need it to.

The slow but consistent increase of negative anons in my inbox (bound to happen with more people following/sharing my content) have made some days very hard to deal with (still, it could be much worse... even the hate from the leaks hasn't been too bad). It's hard not to feel emotional when something you are passionate about or something you do is getting egged on for not good reason. And it's not just the content of the messages (most are not even original...), but the amount of them. Honestly, it is infuriating and tiring (thank gosh for blocking...). It's also a bit hard when there is more negative than positive interactions in my inbox/replies...

Another thing that got me was the little to no progress I've made on both EC or CRWL. I had planned on releasing updates for both this semester, but I've been stuck in front of a blank page for both, or writing and re-writing the same sentence over an over again. Hadn't I distracted myself with other small projects, I would have done the same thing as last year and peaced out for months again...

And then I wrote it all down. I went through all my projects, all the posts I made and put it together that infographic, created and nice timeline... and I realised I was a bit dramatic about feeling like I haven't done enough.

At the end, there were only two months (April and May) which didn't have any publication of games, assets, guides, or update, and that was because CRWL was in re-write/beta. Even if I didn't focus my time on one project throughout the year like I maybe should have, there was on average something out there every month (almost 2x a month by the end).

Yay for unrelenting insecurities! (also, don't try to do as much as I did, I'm struggling with juggling all these projects, it's not sustainable)

2022 Achievements and Milestones

Not only did I reach last year's goals, I achieved a bunch of other stuff!

I published 6(-ish) new games/demos this year! And updated the other 3! I lost track of the count, but it wouldn't surprise me if I wrote somewhere around 100-200k words this year (maybe even more than 300k considering all I cut/re-wrote)...

I started experimenting with custom visual and macros (and editing other people's macro). Working on TTTT (and the update of EC) taught me so much about design and coding, and going much further with Twine!

With this newfound knowledge, I made my first template!

Got to learn how to use a bunch new Twine macros and tested a handful of different gameplay to incorporate in bigger projects.

Tweego. That's it.

I've seen my follower count essentially doubled this past year on both itch and Tumblr (getting close to 1k!).

All my games reached some sort of play milestone (from thousands to couple of thousands). More on that in the stats post, there's a lot.

I haven gotten more reviews and feedback on my projects than last year (the jams and comps have helped!) and in general more interactions with my posts. It's been so useful to grow as a creator and improve myself in general!

I reached 1st and 3rd place on a competition!

And participating in the IFComp was an achievement in and of itself!

And I'll add it here too: I helped organised a comp in 14 days! A proper one, not a spur of the moment jam, with an actual website and rules and stuff! (Now, I want to organise more!)

Honestly, I wouldn't have imagined at the start of the year how much I would end up doing this year, how much I would learn and grow, how much I would experience through it all. I got to climb that steep learning curve in coding, finding more about my voice in writing, designing some cool stuff, and share my love for the creative medium. Had someone shown me all I did this year back at the start of 2022, I wouldn't have believed them...

I feel very blessed to have been able to work on all these projects throughout the year and have gotten such positive reaction for each of them (and such help, to find wonderful people in this community and calling them my friends, and to interact with very passionate and helpful veterans in the genre and learn so much from them.

This year had some very high highs and quite low lows, but it has also been a very wonderful and fulfilling year overall! It makes me so excited for the new year and see what it has in store... (though I know of a few things already...)

[the-rogue-mockingjay]

Writer's end-of-year roundup, 2022! 🎉🎆

Despite the myriad hardships of the year for me - losing my old beagle, fighting doctors, a completely stupid amount of grief/loss, migraines and disability oh my! - it's actually been an amazingly productive and inspired year? I'm very proud! I completed the second draft of my first-ever longfic, which needs another round of editing or two before it's ready to be published, and I've discovered I LOVE editing. More than I love writing, actually????? Lots of people talk about the Dreaded Editing but for me, it was vastly easier than writing the first draft was LOL. I also did what I thought I would never do, which is create another Shepard, Morrigan Vesta, and I actually wrote mostly about her during NaNoWriMo this year. I'm finally getting the hang of how to give characters unique voices (or portray a canon character's voice accurately, which is something I used to be extremely hung up on). I can honestly say I've made a lot of progress both as a person and as a writer this year, and I'm finally starting to find my joy in writing again. Very exciting!

Taking a page out of @pikapeppa 's book in how to format this year's data- I love seeing your charts every year!! My own chart ended up being quite a bit messier, but that's probably because of how I tweaked it to fit my fics. I apologize deeply if the image quality gets butchered, I am not wise in the ways of battling Tumblr's nonsense

(HEY GUESS WHO FORGOT A FIC......the one I forgot is Marevera's Dream, which is a Wayfarer post-Ep 1 pre-Ep 2 WIP, and it clocks in at 1,174 words, making my actual total 60,486!!!!!)

*I forgot to note that In this darkness, on my own is a followup to A New and Dark Horizon.

60K........DUDE!!! I haven't written that much since junior high/I got my depression diagnosis in like 2016, so this is. Big!

New things I tried: For starters, I paced myself during NaNo instead of forcing myself to write every day like I did during NaNo 2020. And WOW was that a night-and-day difference! In 2020, I wrote about 20k and burned myself out so bad I couldn't write for another 6-8 months. This year, I wrote about 30k, and only sat down to write about half the days, successfully dodging burnout. I think that's a valuable lesson for me in what works for me, how to balance my desire to write with what I'm actually capable of that day, and how to work with my disability without letting it limit me.

I also wrote in first person for the first time in maaaaaany years, and while it's not as comfy as third person, it wasn't bad, and it was a good way to explore the different strengths of POVs.

And since my laptop had a fatal encounter with a cup of coffee last spring (RIP little buddy), I've gotten very comfy writing on my phone, which I had previously only done for Across the Sea and Part 1 & Part 3 of broken body built anew because I was bored/inspired during a long car ride LOL.

Fic I spent the most time on: Going Over Jordan, easy. I originally wrote it during NaNo 2020, then re-wrote it at some point during 2021 (time is a weird soup so I don't remember). And then I rewrote it AGAIN this year, edited the crap out of it, printed it, and will edit it again sometime in 2023. It's a fic that exists purely because I am at times a spiteful little goblin, and I had Opinions about the MEA main mission Hunting the Archon, i.e. I didn't agree with how Bioware wrote the companions' responses to Ryder's temporary death, and my Ryder is also an anxious neurodivergent wreck like myself, so I wanted to write how that mission would have actually gone with Brynja as Pathfinder. I wanted to highlight the relationships Brynja has with her friends (particularly Jaal), and I also just wanted her take on the mission in general, because it's not the same as what's in-game. I mean....a lot of people die gruesome deaths in that mission and you see the aftermath, you see the gutted and maimed corpses. There's a lot of horror inherent to what Bioware wrote for that mission, but they glossed over it big time. I wanted to fix that.

I'd like to have someone beta read it, but Andromeda is a niche market as it were, and I've never had anyone beta my work before, so that's honestly the biggest reason it's not published yet. It would benefit greatly from beta reading I think, but uh. I don't know how to make that happen. I'm gonna publish the dang thing in 2023 or 2024 at the latest, though, even if it kills me DGKLJDHLG.

Fic I spent the least time on: I can't say for certain, but it's probably the microfics. Those took only a couple hours. Aside from those, not counting WIPs, it'd most likely be Across the Sea, which I wrote on my phone while sitting on the kitchen floor.

Favorite thing I wrote: ALMOST ALL OF THEM. In all seriousness though, there are a few that have a special place in my heart, and the most important one is Across the Sea. I'd been wanting to explore how Marian processes/copes with Thane's death pretty much since the day I created her, but I never got around to putting any of it on paper until the time came for me to say goodbye to my dog, a 17yo beagle named Maggie we adopted in 2019, last February.

It was an absolutely hellish series of events just in those few days alone: I had a sleep study done which gave me the worst migraine of my life, I threw up in a random parking lot, went home and tried to sleep the migraine off, and was woken up a few hours later to my mom sitting on my bed and saying, quietly, "Maggie's dying". My migraine quit mattering at that point. I sat with her on the couch for hours, held her paw, petted her softly. My parents took turns sitting with her in the living room overnight.

Ultimately, she was just suffering so much for so long we had to take her to the vet. It was a weekend, so it was going to be hours before they opened. Maggie got up and stumbled to the kitchen, and she laid down in front of the door to the garage, and I just...sat with her. There was nothing I could do to help or save her, so I kept her company in her last hours. In the midst of moving and the uncertainty surrounding my health, my new disabilities, traumatizing doctor appointment after traumatizing doctor appointment, I was having to say goodbye to the greatest light and joy of my life a mere 6 months after we lost the dog we've had since I was 3 years old (a shih tzu named Reggie, who wore the pride of his breed like a royal mantle and never stopped carrying himself like a king, even when he didn't recognize us anymore).

Maybe it's silly to compare the loss of a dog to the loss of a lover, but...things just clicked in my brain. I wrote Across the Sea for and about Thane and Marian, yes, but it was for me and my beagle, too, in equal measure. Thane was terminally ill but even so he died quite unexpectedly (THANKS KAI LENG), and the same was true of Maggie. So it was....maybe it's a silly thought, but it was a vent piece. I understood my grief through the lens of Marian's, since hers was so much easier to tackle than my own in its huge overwhelming weight. I'm a very private person with big emotions, and my grief was - and is - a very personal thing. Something I needed to keep close to my chest, hidden, at the time. To write Marian's grief as I waited with Maggie for the inevitable, it was like I had a companion, a friend sitting with me in that grief. I understood Marian much better then.

So perhaps mechanically speaking, Across the Sea isn't my best piece (I'm honestly not certain where it ranks quality-wise), but it is....the writing equivalent of those pendants that carry your loved one's ashes, for me. And it's done quite well on AO3. Knowing that people have enjoyed this piece that is so precious to me and comes from a place of such deep sorrow...there is no greater honor I could ask for, I think. It's a fitting tribute to a character and franchise I love, that's gotten me through many hard times, and to the beagle that made the horrors of life worth living.

(Aside from that, my other favorites are broken body built anew (first trilogy piece), Going Over Jordan (first longfic), In this darkness on my own, Farewell to Arms, Des profondeurs dans la nuit, and the ME3 early game Morrilenko duology Never Enough/In the shadow of your heart.)

Favorite thing I read: Imma be real with you chief, I have.....not read much. Not as far as books go, anyway. But I've sure read some amazing fic and interactive fiction games!!

I reread a bunch of stuff, partly to examine the technical strengths of my fave writers and stories, and partly because hey, they're my favorite stories!! Off the top of my head, the pieces I reread were: Flotsam, Ain't Sentimental, and Loose Ends by @asaara-writes; Sorrow and Resistance by @/myrini; and while I didn't get the chance to reread/finish these like I'd hoped, A Lesson in Drowning by @theherocomplex, Where the Winds of Fortune Take Me and Lovers in a Dangerous Time by pikapeppa are bookmarked both on AO3 and in my brain for the same reasons as the shorter pieces

everything @coldshrugs has written in the past year or two. Both as a writer and as a reader, shorter form fiction is more accessible to my migraine-addled brain (I love reading long stuff but it's often migraine trigger T^T) and Azia's a MASTER of short fiction???? So much punch packed into such concise words!! Incredible clarity and emotional depth!!!! There are many writers on this site that I admire and respect greatly, and Azia is one of them

My favorite IF this year is 100% Wayfarer (@/idrellegames). I haven't been able to focus on it as much as I'd have liked, but the COMPLEXITY the DEPTH. I'm in awe of it and Idrelle. The scope of the project is so massive and the intrigue and depth of the story and characters is incredible to see, Idrelle is a one-person-army of a writer. It'd be easy to think that Wayfarer is made by a team, but nope! It's all the genius and dedication of Idrelle. Having followed Wayfarer from the beginning, the only words I can describe it is awe-inspiring

My writing goals are going in a separate post because this is about 19 times longer than I meant it to be DHFLJKDSLKJHG. If you've read this far, thank you so much!!!!!!! I know it probably got a little more personal and a little bit sadder than you were expecting, so thanks for sticking with me- and I don't blame you an ounce if you skim-read this or skipped some sections. It's a lot of words!

Happy New Year, everyone!! You guys make Tumblr great, and without the people I've met through this site, I would've missed out on not only tons of awesome media, but all y'all super cool folks and your blorbos!!! Keep on creating, everybody. Your stories, your art, your headcanons and metas and dumb jokes, you bring light into my life, and the lives of others. I want you to know that your works bring comfort and happiness to the life of one lost and drifting young woman...and I want to thank you for it, sincerely. I know for a fact I'm not the only person whose life is made better by your presence. The fact that we haven't met in-person doesn't lessen your impact by an ounce.

[tj-dragonblade]

Rules: List 10 (non-ancient) books for people to get to know you better, or that you just really like. Tagged by @wintersmitth, @lenreli, and @valeriianz - thank you! I have pretty much read fanfiction exclusively for the past couple decades, but let's see what I can dredge up from memories of my youth I have been working on this for weeks now.

D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths - I checked this out from the library dozens of times as a kid, and it is definitely the foundation of my knowledge of Greek mythology The Tower of Geburah - I don't recall the author, my apologies, but this was my first real lasting introduction to fantasy. I had no frame of reference at the time, but in hindsight it's heavily inspired by The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe (which I have never actually read). The Shannara series by Terry Brooks - I found these as a teen and caught up at about the time the sixth book was published; I distinctly remember the anticipation of waiting for book seven (at that point I'd never been reading anything that was still actively in progress and finding out at the end of book 6 that the story wasn't over yet was a tremendous surprise). I re-read those first seven books probably a dozen times; I know Brooks has gone back to that world with a few more trilogies but I haven't followed, alas. The Vampire Diaries by LJ Smith - found these post high school and this was my introduction to vampire romance. No, I haven't watched the show. The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice - read these after enjoying the movie; fell off somewhere around Blood and Gold. I remember the characters better than the stories at this point. Armand is my favorite. Saiyuki by Kazuya Minekura - okay yes it's a manga series not a book-book but I'm not gonna hit ten for this list regardless so. Based on the old Journey to the West stories; vibrant characters who gave me so many good fandom memories. Still the best fandom experience I've had. I don't know if it's still getting new chapters or when it last updated or what Minekura's present health status is; it may never be finished but I will always love what we have. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland maybe? I've definitely read it and Through the Looking Glass but I am far more attached to like. The feel of the story and all the ways it permutates through pop culture and ways it can be played with than I am in really picking it up to read again. Same with the Wizard of Oz. ?? There was this book I borrowed from my mother-in-law and I don't remember the name or author but it was both backstory for Erik and retelling of The Phantom of the Opera from his perspective with that backstory incorporated. It lined up really well with me always finding Erik the most sympathetic character in the story.

That's it, I guess that's it. I mean I did nothing but read as a kid, practically lived at the library in my teenage years, but I am absolutely drawing a blank trying to come up with two more my apologies.

Edit: whoops I forgot tagging uh. If you want to do this one please feel free to tag me when you do

[thecagedsong]

sorry for all the asks! But "Composition" caught my attention as a title. Does it involve Alan?

Oh my gosh, I forgot that one was sitting there myself. It was originally supposed to be about songs Katarina inspired Alan to write over the years, playing with bits of music Katarina remembered from her past life as the seed, but growing into being Sorerian with Alan's personal twist on it, ending with an Alan/Katarina pairing.

I didn't publish it because I only had one idea for a silly story of when they're kids and messing around in the music room while Luigi meets with the King and Geordo's stuck in a history lesson. It kinda falls apart because I've never been musically inclined. But re-reading it, it's actually an adorable, if unpolished, one shot filled with way too many head canons, but gets away with it because Katarina and Alan are like, 11, and both won't remember everything said here anyway and as a one-shot it's meant to be silly.

I think I convinced myself it was less completed than it was because the original idea was a series, so I haven't thought about it as more than a loose collection of dialog since June 2021 (when I absolutely should not have been working on fanfiction because I was one month away from my bar exam, lol, but that's when I last saved an edit in that draft).

Never apologize for sending an ask. I think I might post this one on AO3 tomorrow.

[merlions]

The mundane everyday reality that never fails to totally fucking floor me is how much the world has changed over the last ~15 years, specifically re: the bleed of (formerly) niche internet into irl culture.

Like it's so fucking weird seeing these obscure and unpopular little interests I had during middle and high school - ones I couldn't talk about to my irl friends because I was weird for even knowing they existed, much less acknowledge that they were all I interacted with during any moment I wasn't at school - become so well known in the years since that they're just thoroughly and casually embedded in everyday culture now.

Like to the point where NOW it would be weird to talk about how into them I used to be, in the same way it would come across really weird to say "I used to be obsessed with textbooks, I would spend at least 8 hours a day reading them, I met the guy who owns MacMillan, I used to be caught up with literally everything they published."

(I know that doesn't come across as THAT strange of a statement on the AuDHD website, but trust me that if I said any of this to a classmate they wouldn't even be able to respond out of fear my weird freak nerd behavior might be contagious. In retrospect that's pretty specifically ironic given the rest of this. I guess we really didn't DFTBA huh)

Anyways my old grumpy terminally-not-online bio professor posts a link on Canvas to a supplemental video on DNA and genetic inheritance in advance of our next class. I click on it, not really paying attention, expecting a boring grainy 00's video with the worst CGI youve ever seen, narrated by someone with a Jersey accent so thick you can barely understand it. Like usual. Instead, Hank fucking Green's voice (circa 2012!) starts blasting out of my computer saying, "So, I have this brother John. You may have heard of him."

Honestly it fucking jumpscared me, I forgot is Crash Course like the new Bill Nye for teachers now. Because that information won't put itself into my brain. Because "Nerdfighteria Island" still occasionally pops into my head when I'm not paying attention.

Tbh I'm just thinking about how I'm gonna sit quietly in class while he talks about this video and pretend that this is a totally neutral medium of information transfer to me, one which illicits no emotional reaction whatsoever. As if one of the top three best days of my little nerd 16yo self's life wasn't freaking it silly style to Hank playing nerd songs on his acoustic ukulele to a dance floor of like 40 people at midnight when I went to vidcon. TWICE.

Plus, like, I probably watched this video the day it was posted. And it's extra weird that THAT would be extra weird to my classmates, most of whom were around 7 years old at that time. Christ

It's not that weird but it's WEIRD to me. Like if I was saying earlier that to everyone else, telling them how crazy I was about the vlogbrothers in 2011 would be like saying I was obsessed with textbooks; then to ME, casually discussing a 2012 Crash Course video with my bio classmates is like traveling halfway across the world and running into someone who has a picture of your favorite stuffed animal from your childhood, taken from inside your personal house, as their phone background. Haha why do you have that photo? You ask. How do have that? And they're like what do you mean this is the standard phone background that comes with all phones now