#seriously i'm not joking

[swiftiecrow]

If I spend hours explaining to you the soc duology then you're REALLY special to me.

[jichanxo]

actually am intrigued by your writing process! writing ficlets just for the exploration and all that. can you tell me more about how this works for you/how have you come up with this/all that? and do you plan on publishing the senseific ficlets somewhere in one place?

wrote a description of the entirety of how I’ve been working on sensei fic and it’s very very long, so. under the cut. (excuse my self indulgence, i absolutely could have answered this more succinctly, but i thought it would be fun (to me) to talk about my process with senseific as a whole)

I mentioned it before, but I am not a planner when it comes to writing, so I just do whatever the hell I want. and this works great since almost all my writing is short one-shots! just start on something as vague as a feeling or as detailed as a fleshed out idea and just start rolling. see how it goes. and then I go over and edit, add and cut or refine. nice and easy.

unfortunately, sensei fic doc (or rather, “yagamikuwana school au.docx” as my literal document naming goes) currently looks like this:

this includes me writing down ideas and some half formed snippets/exchanges that i’m not sure will make the cut, so it’s not an entirely accurate word count, but the point stands. it’s hardly the longest fic in the world by a long shot obviously, but for me this is uncharted territory. I just… don’t write… anything this long. ever. so sensei fic has been kind of odd because I am still very much a “just do whatever you feel like” writer, except that process has been stretched over months and months. I jump around doing different things without necessarily a coherent order, deciding depending both on what I feel like and what needs to be done

I’ll try to outline the progress behind senseific as best I remember it: well I first had the idea during my first stint with kuwagami after LJ in 2023… I can’t say I remember much from then. I started as I always do. with an idea and a dream. I wanted mundane romance kuwagami. I one day thought about if he’d somehow stay as kitakata and still met yagami. I pushed together as many pieces together as necessary to make it work (and tried to use what was already there because it would be too difficult to make stuff up on my own) – reuse seiryo high, put it in tokyo (it would be difficult to justify having yagami regularly go to the mrc if it was in another city and he didn’t have the main case of LJ to keep him around ijincho). amasawa and the club are a natural addition and an easy way to keep kitakata and yagami around each other despite an initial distaste for each other. I had a few ideas as to some of the exchanges I wanted them to have… some ideas as to fleshing out the new setting… and I did what I usually do and just riffed.

now here’s the main part of the process that I’m sure is already obvious by my saying I’m not a planner: I try to think through the internal logic of the au setting or come up with a fun idea I want to include -> I make a note of it or start writing it immediately (regardless of its spot in the fic) -> I see where it takes me -> review, add, cut, refine, consider it in the context of the wider fic. see if anything else comes up. use my best judgment and do whatever.

some of the earliest things I remember writing for this fic is the intro, a scene with kitakata being an annoying flirt (kitakata taking yagami's cigarette was an image that stuck in my head hard), and one of the first scenes with the mrc. since I wrote quite a bit out of order, eventually I ended up focusing on bridging, following the natural logic between the scenes I wanted to write, trying to connect things. the scene after the intro. whatever makes sense after that. go over everything, edit some more, make sure everything feels as cohesive as I can make it. (I think somewhere in the middle of this I dropped off until I got my second wind on kuwagami, where I picked it up again)

I have something like: intro (setting up the au and making it all clear to the reader as quickly as possible. probably inelegantly but it was a start), which naturally progressed to elaboration on kitakata and yagami’s relationship, a school club scene, me trying to think of another way to get kitakata and yagami in a room together, kaito and kitakata meeting, whatever progressed naturally as a result from that, etc. go back over, adding more things as I thought of them, fleshing stuff out (hello sawa sensei!) and all that. Though I’m working out of order, eventually a sequence starts to form. The beginning is the most fully formed rn, since I have the clearest idea as to how things should be when they start, and what should logically follow. I also like starting my editing from the top unless I have a specific scene in mind to look at, so I’ve read over the beginning the most times of anything else.

obviously I always had vague ideas as to progression, but now that I was starting to fill in more gaps, I had to think about it more seriously to ensure consistency between older scenes and new scenes. I rewrite a bunch of things for senseific not just as editing, but to add new context that wasn’t there previously, and in some cases totally overhaul them to better fit the tone, to adjust the overall progression. one of the scenes in the middle, which I mentally call “are you seeing anyone", is one I really enjoy, so I worked hard to adjust that to better suit the new context so I didn’t have to scrap it outright. on the other hand, kitakata’s phonecall scene is one that got the total overhaul treatment, because the tone no longer matched – kitakata was originally more… hm… disagreeable there, and it wouldn’t have worked with the way the yagami-kitakata relationship development was panning out, so I kept the bones but wrote it in a different direction. since nothing is really planned, most of this fic is in a state of perpetual flux. everything is subject to tinkering if need be.

it’s probably pointless for me to refer to specific scenes since they’re not posted publicly but. well. I guess it’ll make sense later if/when I post senseific. at least I know what I mean for now.

anyway, since a lot of my initial writing in the “do whatever you want” phase was about kuwagami and the development of their relationship, my first attempts at planning and organising are also about that (though I did try to keep the school stories plot in mind at the same time). I had to try and take what I already had and marry them together, make some kind of logical order.

around this time I was already on tumblr and posting some other kuwagamis and just generally feeling great about writing. I ended up showing four-white-trees (excuse my favouritism) some of my starting scenes on sensei fic since it had mostly settled down by then, and it was certainly by this point that I was feeling More Serious about making sensei fic not only Real (and genuinely trying to make it complete), but hopefully good, LMAO. not just some “if it happens it happens" venture. But yeah I was thinking more seriously about my details and getting some feedback on it for the first time and just. Man. Shit got real for me. I want to finish sensei fic even though I started it not knowing if I could commit.

ANYWAY. I was trying to lock in a sequence of events for the kuwagami relationship progression, ended up making a spreadsheet for my fic so I had a more digestible timeline to look at and understand what beats happen where, how I can smooth out any inconsistencies, where my gaps were. I’ll probably be coming back to that sheet to sort out school stories plot… but yeah. not just pure improvisation anymore.

more details started to creep out of the woodworks. I originally wrote something incredibly stupid that I ended up trying to twist into something serious lmao, and that is the um. Maturity/immaturity throughline.

Fuck. God this is embarrassing. But. I once, half asleep, wrote Yagami comparing Kitakata’s insensitive/rude flirting with him as being like a kid picking on his crush. and um. I read back over that later and. My god. You can’t just mention bullying with Kitakata around and not have it mean something. So, well, I tried to talk myself through it and arrived at something with meaning. Kitakata has to learn to not be an asshole with his flirting. To be mature about it and be a little sincere and honest and maybe not mock Yagami to his face. Yagami also learns that he’s being immature towards Kitakata in some ways and has to grow past that. They both have to grow up and talk like some fucking adults, and that’s how they can move on from the conflict that defines their early relationship. Yeah. And of course the school setting and bringing in Sawa and the students as other comparison points will help develop the theme some more. anyhow, it's not something I’ve fully sorted out, but my point is that I stumbled on this totally by accident. unplanned. I hope I can tease it out in an interesting way because it’s not quite there yet, but it’s funny how it went from a thoughtless line to something that I think is… surprisingly defining… just gotta stick the landing...

but yeah, the big picture kitakata-yagami relationship stuff was coming together. right now I’m at the stage where that plotting is as planned out as it can be without the school stories side being completed. the next big step is getting my notes so I can figure out a proper school story progression that I can line up with my kitakata-yagami plot, see how they fit together.

with regards to exploration writing – while writing/thinking about the main plot, a bunch of details have come up in passing. and while I can be vague and try to write around it, it feels so fake? It feels so obvious to me when I’m writing around something because I haven’t thought hard enough about it.

I was writing a scene where… hm… how much do I say here… Yagami has to come to understand that it’s personally important to Kitakata to make sure his students are okay, and with that is Sawa alluding to what happened with Mitsuru. and to be clear, she’s not so tactless to say it outright, but I knew, deep in my heart, that I was writing some non-committal bullshit. I was writing about her talking about what happened without enough knowledge myself as to how I think it changed Kitakata. So I forced myself to understand how Mitsuru changed Kitakata by writing about what happened between them. That’s the ficlet. And then I could look over what I wrote with Sawa with full perspective and decide if it really did sound the way I thought it should sound. I really enjoyed writing that as a personal piece of art, but it was very much a tool for my own understanding.

It’s something similar for Itokura and Kitakata now. Because my focus is shifting towards the school story plot, it raises an obvious question: If Kitakata was changed by the Mitsuru incident, then shouldn’t he have tried to do something about what happened to Itokura? (I am once again thanking four-white-trees for poking me) I can’t write about the relationship between these two in the main plot without a proper understanding of this. And I prefer to write than to plan, hence the sunday six wip. I start with a vague idea and write and see where it gets me. when I do that I’ll have a better understanding of how I want these two to operate, in a way that’s more detailed that my initial vague ideas.

That’s basically it. It doesn’t need to go in main fic but I have to write it so I feel I can make the right judgment calls. I’ll probably do this as much as I feel necessary, and yeah, I don’t see any reason not to post them since, unlike the main sensei fic which always has things changing around, these explorations should be locked in. I did make sensei fic stuff into a series on ao3, so I’ll keep putting them there as they come up.

[jessekestrel]

I'm convinced being loved and snuggled and kissed and accepted fully as I am by love of my life Sekon would solve my raw existential dread and every single other problem in my life

[lazylittledragon]

can't believe we're all adults being forced into the club penguin level of censorship in 2024

[corgiteatime]

I love seeing people call whatever is going on between Astarion and Gale as "toxic old man yaoi."

Because if you told them about it, Gale would look sad and say, "Toxic is a bit of a strong word. Everyone in this group has their own issues and-"

Meanwhile, the 200+ year old vampire shaking with rage behind him would shriek, "OLD?!?!?!"

[totallynotsloughjykk]

I think it's so funny that hua cheng held an intense, long, 800-year-old grudge against mu qing for not letting him die in the army for his celebrity crush while mu qing had no fucking idea who he was until like book 4

[theroseempress]

🍓 and ☁️ for the summer ask things!

Thank you for the ask!

🍓 worst thing you've done to your characters

Hm. Given them trauma, probably. Everyone has trauma, though the amount does vary.

☁️ wip you want to write but haven't started yet

The Fourth Wall, mainly. (Technically I haven't started writing The Golden City either, but since it's in scripting stage instead of Rotisserie Chicken stage I'm not counting it)

The worldbuilding's basically me leaning on the fourth wall (get it) in a creative manner, and I've been rotating the characters a lot recently. S'basically my secondary WIP at this point. I will absolutely ramble more about this if given the opportunity, so if you're interested please do ask!

[impactrueno]

some uncharacteristically serious juices

[egophiliac]

so on the subject of the "Crowley is secretly Revaan/Laverne/Levin/please Twst give us his name" theory, I think my feelings are best summed up as "I don't really buy it, but it's funny". like, in all seriousness, I'm not opposed to it; I have enjoyed the writing in Twst so far and I'm willing to trust that whatever happens will, you know, make sense and not be terrible. but I'm just not really convinced by the current evidence! maybe that'll change once we learn more, we'll see!

with that said, may I propose a few alternate theories about the possible Crowley/Revaan connection:

[i-am-trans-gwender]

Due to a mixture of Disney advertising the Book of Bill as being 18+ and also Billford shippers flourishing, I was very disappointed when I read it and it was more of a 13+ book and didn't contain a 60 page long graphic sex scene with Bill and Ford. (Joking. The book was good)

[solarmorrigan]

Silly idea I talked about ages ago with @azure7539arts, inspired by a similar event my workplace hosts every year. Would minors be allowed to participate in such an event? Probably not! But then again, it was the 80s, who can say for sure. Anyway, it's my birthday and I'll post nonsense if I want to <3

-

“I need you to buy me.”

Eddie looks up from his notebook, effectively jarred from his campaign-plotting fugue state by Steve’s declaration.

Steve is standing at the other end of the dining table, staring at him expectantly.

“Y’know, this is the part where someone usually follows up their completely bonkers demand with an explanation,” Eddie says slowly.

“At the charity auction,” Steve clarifies. “I need you to bid on me, and I need you to win.”

Ah, yes, that weird Rent-an-Athlete charity auction the school runs every year; anyone on any Hawkins High sports team could volunteer to be “auctioned” off in order to raise money for said sports team, to spend a day at the beck and call of the highest bidder (within reason, supposedly). It’s generally restricted to students, but occasionally, prominent alumni are invited to participate – and Steve certainly fits the bill, especially after the story the government spun about his heroism in the face of “serial killer” Henry Creel last spring.

“And what, deny all those pretty girls a chance to get at you?” Eddie asks drily (he’d never turned up at previous auctions himself, but you could hardly avoid gossip in a school their size; it had usually been some cheerleader bidding with daddy’s money who won a date– that is, a day with Steve Harrington).

“It wasn’t always a girl who won,” Steve says, crossing his arms over his chest. “One time it was Mrs. Dalton – you know, the lady on the school board who lives on my block? I just spent the day doing yard work for her. She gave me lemonade. That was pretty cool.”

“Right,” Eddie drawls. “And I’m sure she definitely didn’t sit outside and stare at your ass while you were working.”

“She did not– she– I mean she was on the porch, but, like– she wouldn’t have– she’s, like, seventy, Eddie,” Steve splutters, and it’s all Eddie can do not to laugh.

“Older gals have needs, too, Steve,” Eddie says, giving in to a smirk. “So she was checking you out from the porch, huh?”

Steve goes red. “Shut up, that isn’t the point. I’m trying to ask for your help.”

“Right, right, your absolutely reasonable request for me to buy you at market. Why, again?” Eddie asks.

“The kids are planning to bid on me,” Steve says gravely.

Eddie blinks at him. “Okay?” he says, when no further explanation is forthcoming. “You basically do most of what they ask, anyway, so…?”

“Okay, believe it or not, I actually say no to at least half of what they ask me to do. I would literally never get anything done if I gave in to all their demands.” Steve jabs a finger at Eddie, who holds up his hands in mock surrender. “Anyway, this is all Henderson’s fault.”

“It usually is,” Eddie agrees, nodding sagely.

“He decided that he was going to bid on me and then use that day to finally make me play your nerd game with you–” Eddie snorts, and Steve shoots him a look, “but Wheeler doesn’t want me to play, so he said he was going to bid against Dustin and make me do anything but sit in on a session with you guys.”

“So let Wheeler win.” Eddie shrugs.

“No! I can’t let fuckin’ Mike win, he’ll probably make me do something even more ridiculous!” Steve exclaims. "He’ll make me play chauffeur for him and El on a date, or something, and he’ll probably include the stupid hat.”

“Wait, I thought El broke up with him,” Eddie breaks in.

“No, they’re on again,” Steve says absently, shaking his head. “Which is why Max has been in a bad mood lately.”

Eddie bites back the reflexive need to ask “How can you tell?”, going instead with, “I thought she and Sinclair were on again.”

“No, they are. That’s why no one’s been actively murdered,” Steve says.

“How do you keep track of all of this?” Eddie asks, squinting at Steve.

“It’s a natural skill. And we’re getting off track,” Steve says quickly. “Normally, I wouldn’t be that worried, because Dustin regularly blows his savings on weird science gadgets or whatever, but then Lucas and Will started taking sides.”

“This is getting very involved,” Eddie says.

“So you see why I’m stressed!” Steve insists, smacking a hand to his forehead (personally, Eddie thinks Steve is stressed for many other reasons, but he figures pointing that out just now won’t be appreciated). “Lucas is on Dustin’s side, and that kid does odd jobs like nobody’s goddamn business; he actually has shit saved up. And usually I’d have faith in him being more, like, sensible than to spend it all on this, but the little shit is really fucking competitive.”

“Wonder who he got that from?” Eddie mutters.

“Okay, we do remember that I’m not actually biologically related to any of these idiots, right?” Steve snaps.

“Well now we’re just getting into nature versus nurture–”

“Eddie.”

“Right, sorry, continue.”

“Well, Will took Mike’s side–”

“Shocking.”

“Right? But anyway, I don’t know if the kid has much saved up, but between him and Wheeler, they might be able to win.” Steve sighs, looking far more world-weary than Eddie feels the situation really warrants.

“You know you don’t actually have to do what they ask you to, right?” Eddie points out.

Steve rolls his eyes. “If an auction winner complains to the school that the person they bid on didn’t fulfill their end of the bargain, they can get their money back. It’s a whole…” he waves his hand vaguely, “thing. Happened once when I was a sophomore; Deacon McNab. Lost a good chunk of change for the football team, and they vandalized the shit out of his car.”

“Ah, right. Forgot we went to school with literal psychopaths,” Eddie hums.

“So, I just need you to bid on me and win, so I’m not stuck wasting a Saturday on whatever the hell the kids are going to try to make me do. Or not do. Or– whatever,” Steve says.

“Okay, not that I don’t understand your predicament here, but I think you’re forgetting something kind of important, Steve,” Eddie drawls.

Steve’s brows draw together in question. “What?”

“I’m fucking poor.”

“Oh.” Steve shakes his head. “I didn’t mean– no, I will give you the money, you don’t have to spend a dime, man, I just need you to get me out of this.”

“Why not have Buckley do it?” Eddie asks.

“That was Plan A, but she actually has a date that night, and it’s kind of a big deal, so I don’t want her to cancel,” Steve says. “But I assumed you wouldn’t be busy.”

“Wow, rude,” Eddie scoffs, and Steve sighs.

“Fine, sorry, I just really hoped you wouldn’t be busy.” Steve gives him the most lethal set of puppy dog eyes Eddie has ever seen, as if there had been any chance from the beginning that he’d be able to say no. “Please?”

Just for show, Eddie lets out a long sigh, falling against his chair and letting his head flop over the backrest like he’s deflating.

“Fine.”

“Thank you,” Steve groans, sounding so genuinely relieved that Eddie almost feels bad about how quickly his thoughts dip into the realms of the inappropriate. “Oh my god, I owe you.”

Eddie glances back up at Steve, tongue darting out to wet his lips almost unconsciously. “You know I’m not as easy to appease as a couple of fifteen-year-olds, right?”

Steve’s eyes drop for just a second—maybe down to Eddie’s lips, maybe not; who can say?—before he looks back up, cocking an eyebrow at Eddie. “I think I can handle it.”

Slowly, Eddie grins. “We’ll see.”

[scintillatingshortgirl19]

fucking wild when the show just. goes out and says the thing out loud

[therulerofallpotatos]

Seen plenty of posts ribbing Wilson for being the repressed one but tbh multiple times we see Wilson question if House is sincerely flirting with him and every time House shuts him down so are we sure Wilson is the repressed one here?

[shy-raccoon]

The damsel in distress slowly starts getting more and more unstable from the unaddressed trauma of being frequently kidnapped. One day they completely snap and the villains start being found mysteriously murdered with increasing brutality.

[nebuladreamz]

A little different than last year's, but here we are again. To say that this past year hasn't been absolutely wild would be a lie, cause HOLY SHIT MAN

This year's birthday is. A little different for me, but you already have the silly comic to show that so I won't make like a broken record oops

But, despite the changes and hills that life's decided I should climb or throw at, it hasn't changed the fact that I'm so genuinely fucking thankful to the people that I've known since joining this fandom. I'm not even kidding when I say that being here has actually changed my life for the better. I know I said something similar last year, but this time, hoo boy it sure turned up the AMP and test how far I could go.

So, to everyone, both new and old; thank you for being here :D

@garbagechocolate @darkxsoulzyx @smoljeanius @bunmuffin @skizabaa

@tuzesdays @sleepykas @fernzwing @kandidandi @starsketchez

@just-a-drawing-bean @notdysfunk @ilsole @amberluvsbugs @cloudyvoid

@nomsthecat @alfinefalf @nosleepygay @theblog-with-thestuff

@cacaocheri

(Edit: ty kibbits for informing me of the. Fuck ass tagging system)

AND TAGGING OTHERS BECAUSE. POINTS. BONKS WITH HEAD. GETTING TO EITHER INTERACT OR TALK OR WHATEVER IS ALWAYS A DELIGHT

@ohno-the-sun @kibbits @ink-yy @saltyfryz @kaprisvn

@hierba-picante @sunny-sophies-garden @cookiiemancer @sneeblbop @justaduckarts

@pepethehumanz @crystalmagpie447 @woolysstuff @mocha-illustrates @duhsty1

@sanchensky @pillowspace @victarin @witherfide

[I DEFINITELY GOT SONAS WRONG AND THESE AREN'T ALL THE SILLY PEOPLE I KNOW BUT IM SITTING HERE AT 2:30 IN THE MORNING JUST KNOW YOU'RE THERE IN SPIRIT HANDING YOU ALL POPTARTS WAUGH]

[thegreatgremlingang]

broke: Jiang fengmian thirsted after cangse sanren and took in wei ying bc he was cangse sanren's child

woke: Jiang fengmian was literally just good friends with cangse sanren

BESPOKE: Jiang fengmian and cangse sanren formed the Wei Changze simp club so they could collectively thirst after wei changze and jiang fengmian took in wei ying bc he was WEI CHANGZE (and his homie cangse sanren)'s child