#sorry this is horrendously badly edited

[riverphoenixsgothwife]

[joltai-showa]

naruto reread third edition chapter three woohoo

welp, it was a good run, manga sucks now lmao

just kidding, of course, but Sasuke is by far my least favorite character in the entire series. He's okay in OG Naruto, but literally every arc with him in Shippuden makes me want to bash my head against the nearest wall. And no, the fight with Deidara isn't the main reason for my passionate hatred of this prick. I've never agreed with a Sasuke fan once in those almost 10 years since I read the manga for the first time, but I do agree that Sasuke's fate is justifiedly dramatic and it's not surprising that he lashes out against those near him, but acting like he's some paragon of virtue and was right in all of his unhindged endeavors, particularly after the Itachi reveal, is first degree clownery at its finest lmao

(also the Uchiha clan sucks too. Not necessary from in-world perspective, but from writing perspective, mid-Shippuden Kishimoto really lost the sauce with those assholes and starting giving them any possible powers that he could think of)

another fun fact but I never found any of the Uchiha members attractive lmao. if you're wondering how the hell did I manage to write 35k from Deidara's pov having hots for Obito, listen, it's her pov, not mine, I just locked the fuck in and did it lmao

last thing before continuing with the chapter, main Uchiha guys from least annoying to most annoying accodring to me: Itachi > Madara >>>>>> Obito >>> Sasuke. Itachi mostly never gets on my nerves, so gotta love him for that, Madara sucks at times because he happens to appear on the stretches of manga when Kishi stopped caring about the plot and started the Uchiha bootlicking 24/7, but at least he didn't get a shitty "rEdEmPTioN ArC" (i guess i should be thanking Kaguya for that, bleh), with Obito I am stuck in a perpetual cycle of "there is no way he is that bad in canon, I must have been overdramatic when reading" -> *rereads the manga* -> "oh my fucking god he is not just bad, he is simply awful", he is just the ultimate victim of Naruto being written backwards and Kishi making a cool twist but never actually properly working on his motivations, a real shame, he's got a lot of potential, but canon Obito has one of the worst character arcs in the entire series, so I can only enjoy fanon Obito and fans' work that actually utilizes many many things this character has to offer. I already said a lot about Sasuke, but at times his writing is much better than Obito's, so he's a little less annoying to me (that's generally not an achievement on his part, it's Kishi writing Obito so badly LMAO)

bish you live like this?

but also again WHY THE FUCK NARUTO LIVED HIS ENTIRE GODDAMN LIFE ALONE??? HIRUZEN WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING? IT'S A FUCKING CHILD, WHY IS HE UNSUPERVISED? DO YOU REALLY EXPECT HIM TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO MANAGE THE MONEY, COOK AND CLEAN AFTER HIMSELF? YOU SORRY PIECE OF SHIT, YOUR GRANDSON HAS A PRIVATE TUTOR, BUT THE CHILD OF KONOHA'S HEROES WHO PRETTY MUCH ENTRUSTED HIM INTO THE VILLAGE'S CARE LIVES LIKE THIS?

Kushina has a full time job of wooping Hiruzen's ass in the afterlife, I swear to god

also let's talk about the absolutely horrendous conditions orphans in Konoha live in? There are more obvious cases like the kids that Root takes in, they are raised into emotionless killing machines since the first moment they become their training (child abuse🥰), but even kids who didn't catch ANBU's eye are just... Obviously, we've got Naruto and he's a case of straight up neglect from both his supposed caretakers (literally any of his future teachers, but particularly Jiraya who is supposed to be his goddamn godfather) and Hiruzen, but this is Kishi rewriting everything there ever was and by Mid-Shippuden Naruto is suddenly a literal prophesied hero, a messiah and loved by everyone and everything and those who hate him are either irredeemibly evil or poor little babies who are waiting for a pep talk by Naruto to turn good again (c) Anyway, we've got some bigger fish to fry and it's cases of Kakashi and Sasuke in particular. I am not really worried in cases of Obito and Neji, because both of them lived somewhere near their clans (even if their clan sucked absolute ass, sorry for your loss, Neji), so we can at least assume that some of the older members of their clans could keep an eye on them and, y'know, fucking FEED them, but Sasuke's and Kakashi's living situations are... oooof. I might be misremembering stuff, but in the manga Sasuke is never shown to move from his house, he in fact is shown to return home and cry over the bloodied floor of the room where Fugaku and Mikoto were killied (Hiruzen is a cleaning service really this fucking expensive jesus christ), so what we have is an orphaned kid who lives in the same house his parents were murdered, in the same house his big brother tortured him psychologically, in the same district where piles of his relatives' corpses were lying. Also completely alone.

Do I need to say anything, Hiruzen?

Kakashi is even worse, because not only he lived alone in the same house his only other living family member aka his dad ended his life, I believe that the blade he carried later also happened to be the family relic that his dad used in his final moments. On top of all that, he continued to live alone in that house even after his teammate sacrificed his life for his sake, gave him his eye and this eye happens to be the only thing that remained of said teammate because he was crushed alive. He continued to live alone in that house even after he accidentaly killed the girl he promised to protect with his life, but ended up using the jutsu he managed to develop after aquiring a Sharingan to end her life. He continued to live alone in that house even after his only remaining team member aka his teacher died in a freak accident when half of the village got destroyed.

God damn. Like, Obito's fate is absolutely horrendous, sure, but you gotta admit at least he had a reason to continue living. The only thing I can say about Kakashi is how the fuck did you live to 27 years.

tl; dr Kakuzu should've opened a therapy service for shinobi and Akatsuki could have simply bought off all of the Beasts simply with that money LMAO

Kishi could not draw girls for the life of him at the beginning of the manga and it shows lol, she's so scrunky

honestly relatable Naruto

also Sasuke's haircut looks like a duck's ass and the resemblances only grows stronger in Shippuden

fucking hell I really am just Naruto, aren't I...

oh look it's the canon event kid :D

the following 697 chapters will be spent attempting to explain to the readers that this scene does not in fact allude to the endgame ship. unsuccessfully, of course lmao.

seriously Kishi is so terrible at writing romance, the only believable and toleralable ship he had managed to produce through the entire 700 chapter run of the manga is MinaKushi and they're fucking dead

i think I'll be mentioning extensively later what I think about Kishimoto writing women in general (spoiler: I really don't think that most of Naruto female cast is even good, most of the time they are decent at best, even if my heart is filled to the brim with love to some of the girls, they simply can not compete with women written by other mangakas), but after 10 years since my first read of Naruto I still stand by the observation that my 13 year old self made at the time: sometimes it feels like Kishimoto not only never talked with a woman, but never even seen them in the first place

"why are you so homophobic Sakura-chan����"

I swear I'm gonna have an aneurism if these 13 year old numbsticks are called "full-fledged shinobi", BRO THEY'RE GONNA DIE AFTER 5 MINUTES ON A SERIOUS MISSION

Okay, so another weird thing that I'm really not sure if is a rewrite/plothole/whatever, BUT

jonins aka the highest ranking you can be given unless your Kage happens to have a tragic untimely accident and you are chosen as the replacement are supposed to be really rare, like "you can count the number of them on your fingers" rare. Of course, Naruto's plot is constantly revolving around at least one jonin-level character, so we as readers see them in overabundance compared to what realistically should be taking place within the universe

here's a terrible illustration by yours and only on how the shinobi rankings should be spread out in general lmao.

Coming back to what Iruka says: why is it that jonins are supposed to be teaching the three-man teams of full-fledged shinobi children? Jonins are cream de la cream of the hierarchy, they are pretty much the highest ranking officers in the villages, save for the Kage, of course, I'm pretty sure they should be busy with something more important, like leading their own fully trained squads/divisions, not looking after little Timmiemaru and making sure that he doesn't accidentaly stab himself with a kunai. And come to think of it, the entire system is weirdly skewed, because Iruka is a chunin who teaches Academy kids who are below genins in the hierarchy, so at the end of the day we have Kages who (supposedly) work 24/7 on the external and interal affairs of the village and probably the country, jonins who do the missions and train genins, chunins who do the missions and train Academy kids and genins being genins. Now I am not advocating for 13 year olds to be teaching 7 year olds, but considering the fact that you need to pass a murder exam the chunin exam to get the rank, I think there should be quite the number of people who never pass/don't want to pass in the first place, so genins can be quite old and experienced enough to teach (hi Maito Dai).

Anyway, there's certainly more than 9 students in that room when Iruka announces that they are getting divided into teams. Did the remaining 18 guys got shafted? "We've only got three available jonins, so only the most talented kids/kids from important clans will be trained"? Or did the 18 guys got some sane teachers that didn't decide to send them to the murder exam after 6 months of missions? Wait, the kids are getting paid for the missions, right? I am not sure whether I should be worried about the unpaid child labor or the fact that 13 year olds (who should really be like 10 year olds judging by the amount of times Naruto flunked the Academy exam) have to enter the workforce at such an age.

(now these are the questions that should be raised by people hating on the shinobi system, Kishi, and not twenty flashbacks in a row to the girl they liked 17 years ago)

that's really awfully convinient that the new generation of InoShikaCho happened to have abilities approximately equal to the ones of other teams, huh, Iruka

(Konoha is built on Hashirama's wood and pure fucking nepotism lmaoooo)

jesus fucking chirst that's some choice of words from the translator

was the translator aware at the time that this is a 13 year old girl's monologue they are translating? i know teenagers are freaky, but this is supposed to be the official translation, why are we getting to the upper bound of PG rating

what even in the world is this dialogue

bro really be laser focused on Naruto since his first appearance huh

nevermind Sakura's bashing on Naruto's status as an orphan (which is really weird to me, because not only that 5 years before she and others in Kakashi's, Kurenai's and Asuma's teams were born there was a giant World War and realistically quite of few kids their age should've lost their parents there, but there also was this little incident with Nine-Tails running over everyone in the village the year they were born, so there should be A LOT of orphans of Sakura's age, yet she's being this... mean? I guess, I wouldn't call her cruel, to Naruto), I've got a bigger question: how the hell did you miss the news of Uchiha massacre and Sasuke's living situation? The kids were like 8 at the time, they should have heard of it, I mean, ONE OF THE FOUNDING CLANS AND A LARGE ONE AT THAT got murked in a single night, yet in the 5 following years Sakura never learned about it, being Sasuke's #1 fan? Maybe it's me misremembering stuff, buuuuut...

(anyway Kishi I've got a bigger question but where the fuck is the Senju clan? The poor repressed Uchiha clan by the time of the massacre stiil had dozens of members if not hundreds, but Senju clan, the other founding clan of similar size, just went poof?)

(my personal headcanon regarding this is that Tsunade during her 20 year long depressive episode took all of clans money and gambled it away :D so the remaining members of the Senju clan just kinda scattered through the countries trying to find the money for themselves and just distanced from the whole shinobi business)

THE MYTH THE MAN THE LEGEND!

Holy fuck I almost died laughing at his first interaction ever, like what the fuck is this.

Kakashi: his milk's expired. Hiruzen, nervously wiping away sweat: he's just clumsy! Kakashi: he's 13 and grew up without adult supervision, I'm not even sure if he can read the dates on the milk. Hiruzen: why are you being such a hater, Kakashi?🥺 Kakashi: not as much of a hater as my sensei and his wife are going to be to you in the afterlife, I guess.

also, Hiruzen, you know what is Kakashi even better choice for? VISITING FUCKING THERAPY

"You have a talent for sniffing things out", sniffing out what, the expired milk on mini-Minato? Gods Hiruzen you suckkkkk

that is a fucking threat and you know this, Hiruzen

LMAAAAAAAAAOOOOOO

you've got no idea, Kakashi

raising these dinguses is already an A rank mission bordering S, but how about accidentaly stumbling upon the guy who you assumed died over 15 years ago after being crushed into meat paste? :D

[dandunn]

Fic author interview tagged by @vampirenaomi

1 How many works do you have on AO3?

42

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

728,089

3. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Fic that annoys me so much I disabled comments (go find it yourself lmao), Marked for Death, Tiger by the Tail, What's coming through is Alive, The Sea is Getting Rough Again

my one piece fics all have way more kudos than my recent stuff basically

4. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i do sometimes, im usually tired from writing and editing so sometimes ill just say thanks lol

5. What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

i wrote a fic anonymously which is horrendously dark and doesnt have a happy ending but I think most other fics i write at least have a bittersweet or happy ending hdfgb

6. What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

uhhhhhh i dunno man I like the ending of the fic i wrote where goemon threatens to cut one of jigen's exes' dicks off and then they go hang out by the pool. that was fun :)

7. Do you write crossovers?

not really, I've had a few ideas for them but they're hard to write and wouldnt have worked out

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?

not... really? i got a really weird backhanded compliment where someone talked at length about a ship i dont like (the fic wasnt about that couple) then said the first chapter was alright apart from being painfully slow (thanks) and then accused me of virtue signalling because of the difficult topics i handled in the fic.

It was really, really strange like I genuinely think they were trying to pay me a compliment but they were incredibly shit at it lol

And then in another fic I turned off comments because a minor started bitching at me about the porn I wrote not being sexy enough and when I told them to go away they harassed me for a little while. That was fun.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yeas. I prefer it when smut is incorporated into the story because I kind of need the emotional stakes to be high enough otherwise I kind of lose interest. Smut without feelings is just kinda boring to me. Of course I have some exceptions but those are rare nowadays.

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I'm aware of.

11. Have you ever had a fic translated?

yes, though it's on wattpad apparently so I have no idea if the person doing it credited me because I dont use that site lol.

12. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

yeah and I dont recommend it. we only wrote like 2 chapters of it but i no longer speak to the co-author and the whole thing ended up feeling a bit disjointed and weird.

13. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Uhh I have a couple, zoro/luffy, ace/sanji, jigen/lupin and jigen/goemon

zolu probably wins here because i have not so far written a 200k fic about anyone else lol

14. What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

*gestures weakly at literally everything in my google docs*

I forgot how to write sorry

15. What are your writing strengths?

*tv static noise*

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

i cant speak english

17. What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I don't know whether its bad or just handled badly by a lot of writers but I don't like it. Speaking as someone whos been learning japanese for the past 2+ years I hate it when I come across a word and have to either look it up myself or scroll to the bottom of the fic for any footnotes there are to explain it. Gonna use myself as an example for how I go about this kind of thing:

Fujiko tries to smile at his robotic, overly formal speech patterns, when really it's a little off-putting. She hasn't heard anyone use the word sessha, 'my humble self', for themselves outside of a period drama.

each to their own but i prefer putting in a small aside like this rather than shoving in foreign words and expecting for the reader to go and break the flow of the writing by looking it up for themselves.

18. What was the first fandom you wrote for?

id say pokemon mystery dungeon but the first fic i wrote i instantly deleted after getting one negative comment, i think one piece is more where i cut my teeth

19. What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to?

i dont really know? ive gotten into a couple of new things recently but they havent triggered my "oh i gotta write something" reaction

20. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

i dunno man i dont like my work very much right now heres an image if u read all of this

[djgomasar]

Rant (and kinda callout???)

Ohh my God... I don’t use Tumblr in a while, I’m really sorry, sometimes I forget that I’ve one and also because the website isn’t a cup of tea for me for being a little confusing. But there’s something that I’ve been wanting to take off of my chest and it’s about the proshippers from The Umbrella Academy’s fandom.

Since I’ve been part of this fandom, my friends and I’ve witnessed a lot of pretty fucked up shit (and to make it even worse, a lot of fanarts done by proshippers are well made, it’s sad that these artists are wasting their talent in problematic matters...): from here on Tumblr, Instagram, Pinterest and etc... And it’s horrendous the amount of people in the fandom that ships and defends incest and p*dophilia with the classic arguments such as “it’s fiction, it doesn’t affect reality”, “in the comics some of the siblings were dating/had a crush on each other”, “Vanya is bisexual”... Gosh, these arguments are so annoying, repetitive and you can easily debunk them, however, these people still denies the proofs you give to them and some of them even attacks you for no reason whatsoever.

If you’re a Vissy (Vanya x Sissy) shipper, please, be careful while posting something related to the couple, especially on Instagram. Fiveya shippers will find your post/fanart/shipping edit and they will attack you and/or even steal your artwork, especially if it has the lesbian or sapphic flag on it. My best friend had their fanart of sapphic Vanya stolen and badly edited to a bisexual flag and the person even claimed to be the original artist behind it last year. Those same Fiveya stans call Vissy shippers biphobics when in reality, they only care for bisexual rights when it comes to shipping Vanya with her 14 years old looking brother, cus I never saw any of these stans actually raising awareness for the bi folks before. And oh, I can’t forget that they’re also extremely lesbiphobic towards Vanya and transphobic towards Elliot Page: several of the Fiveya stans that attacked my friends and I said awful things about lesbians to us and they also invalidate Vanya’s sexuality just because she had a relationship with Leonard in the first season, but in the series there are lots of scenes showing that Vanya is a lesbian, in the official Wikia of the show, Vanya’s profile page says that she’s a lesbian and Elliot himself told in a recent interview that Vanya fell in love for the first time in the second season, which means her first love was Sissy. Unfornately, these stans also invalidate Elliot’s gender and words, only giving a damn to what Aidan says... They know that Aidan is a problematic celebrity, but looks like they don’t care about it just because “he’s handsome”. Like beauty is a good excuse to defend someone amirite? /s

Anyways, here’s my rant. If you’re reading this, I hope you’ll have a good day, drink water, use masks and be careful with proshippers. They’re increasing in numbers (both inside and outside of the fandom) and this is really worrysome...

[robinisademon]

I posted 3,553 times in 2022

That's 2,022 more posts than 2021!

11 posts created (0%)

3,542 posts reblogged (100%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@aroacevaljean

@mcrbois

@veshille

@snowy-sniper

@wizardsisananimal

I tagged 2,060 of my posts in 2022

Only 42% of my posts had no tags

#mcr - 858 posts

#g - 705 posts

#art - 469 posts

#ofmd - 256 posts

#sandman - 87 posts

#q - 63 posts

#esc22 - 37 posts

#green dress tm art ref time - 35 posts

#jellycat - 34 posts

#les mis - 28 posts

Longest Tag: 138 characters

#but however i have been seeing the trend in university lately that when youre ill the teachers sometimes still exoect you to follow class-

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Blackbeard in art nouveau style, sad edition.

Background inspired by Mucha's "Fox-Land Jamaica Rum" (1897)

Flowers are wild rose, sweet pea, and butterfly weed. All badly drawn at 3 AM.

plus heres a horrendously coloured one! it's muddy and includes really shit bucket fill! enjoy!

See the full post

73 notes - Posted April 24, 2022

#4

quick lil draw,, im hfhsfjsfhjakfajkd so not sorry

(based on "Fruit" by Mucha, 1897)

85 notes - Posted April 16, 2022

#3

okay okay this is still a Sketch so dont scream at me i know the face is like a smiley and the arms are different lengths but shhhhhh. the vision is coming together

EDIT this now has a finished version

138 notes - Posted April 7, 2022

#2

Just gonna drop this here...

it's a silly little powerpoint with some outfit images on the slides, sorted by date. not complete, dont come for my throat. working on it though!

Edit 23/09: Completed all shows up to today. Would love feedback on any potential mistakes.

Edit 24/09: it's temporarily down bc onedrive is a bitch. hopefully will be fixed soon! more info on this in the comments of this post.

Edit 25/09: Microsoft. is a fucking. twat. Theyve blocked my account, probably because my powerpoint is seen as spam. Apparently on of their spam policies is "Don’t send content to people you don’t know or to many people at the same time" which is dumb because why do we have a fucking share function then? YeAh pLs sHaRe iT bUT LikE dOnt sHare it ToO mUCh. Bastards. cant have anything fun.

Anyway. I cant get my account back (well, i could but i dont want to give them my phone number), which means its time for the next plan:

Ill replace the link to the powerpoint with a link to a google drive, and I'll upload new versions of the powerpoint on there. Sadly all previous reblogs will keep the wrong link so i really hope they will see this message. Ill also put it in the comment section to make that a little more likely. I might also make a brand new post, additionally to this one.

Sorry for all the inconveniences and i hope we can share a little joy in a new way. fingers crossed.

317 notes - Posted September 22, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Alright. I'm just gonna quit painting and post this before I go insane. You can scream at me now.

References:

Background design and colours heavily based on "La Dame aux camélias", Mucha (1896).

Flowers in the background are lily (yellow), honeysuckle (really badly drawn), and thyme (didnt even bother to draw the shape right).

Pose based on "Médéé", Mucha (1898), especially the arms hands and knife situation.

Character is from Our Flag Means Death (2022). Obviously.

1,172 notes - Posted April 9, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[petruchio]

ugh so disappointing that the cruel prince Isn't good

i genuinely wanted it to be good because like i wanted a fun cool ya fantasy story and i was literally sitting there reading it like… what is this.

first off — what was that prose? the fact that i was literally sitting there going “huh. that’s a sentence fragment. weird” or “i think that comma should be a semicolon” LIKE WHO EDITED THIS. seriously how did this get to publication?! and it’s not like you can’t use sentence fragments in fiction — but they’re powerful stylistic choices? they shouldn’t be done so poorly that your reader is taken OUT OF THE STORY by how awkwardly deployed your sentence fragment is? WHAT?!?!?! that’s not style! that’s just bad writing and bad grammar!!!

second of all — just structurally the book was badly done basically all around. the pacing? horrendous. the beginning was so insanely slow and the ending so insanely rushed. the characters? not a single one was compelling or developed. what were their motivations? why did jude want to stay in the faerie world when all they did was bully and torture her? oh and also murder her parents? “it’s all i’ve ever known” YEAH GIRL AND IT SUCKS!! the plot? nonsensical, and half the stuff that happened didn’t even matter. all that stuff with her twin sister and the locke dude? literally WHAT was the point of that. it added *nothing* to the story or the themes. the random human girl who just like casually jumped into a lake and was then never mentioned again? WHY. and then the main character jude had essentially no discernible narrative voice, which is INSANE for a book written in first person. how do you take first person narration and STILL be such a blank character? i hated her the entire time i was reading. and then the language was all over the place?? contractions and no contractions in the SAME SENTENCE? insanely formal archaic language alongside words like “crappy” and “pissed off”?? is this a magical fantasy faerie realm or NOT? the language drove me INSANE. i was constantly being taken out of the world by the inconsistency of the language — a really BAD thing for a (fantasy!!!!) book to do!! and the descriptions of everything were so vague that i could barely form a picture of anything that was going on? which is wild because like it’s a lush fantasy faerie world? (now im realizing the spiderwick world was only as lush and beautiful as it was because of the magic of the illustrations because the descriptions here just kind of skipped around and never settled into the world they were supposed to be describing. tragic) and the love interest? or should i say the LITERAL BULLY WHO DRUGS AND HUMILIATES THE PROTAGONIST? how could we root for that?? he was awful?!! i don’t care if he has a “tortured past” he’s a horrible person! im sorry but HOW are we still doing this in ya lit and calling it “enemies to lovers” THATS JUST BULLYING! and did he develop? did their relationship develop? did they actually get to know each other? nope. he just randomly shows up on like page 300 after literally drugging her and publicly humiliating her for the first 2/3 of the book and suddenly he’s in love with her. WOW. what a ~compelling~ love story. thanks i hate it.

UGH. im SO disappointed and i can’t believe i wasted my time on that crap. time to read another classic or just read the hunger games again or whatEVER to purge that from my memory

[sapphirelass]

What family is all about - Weasley FamilyxWeasley!Sister

Hiiiiiii!!! It’s... been a while. Again. Let’s face it, I’ll never be able to post as often as I’d like. I just don’t like rushing stuff, or posting anything I’m not happy with, so...

Anyhow, I LOVED writing for the Weasley family, and I’ll most likely do it again soon. Bill and Charlie are both underrated characters in my opinion and I had a ton of fun letting them ‘shine’ (despite this being a sort of sad story, but that always seems to be where I end up... XD)

Also, I might have to edit this once more, but it’s late, I have not posted in about two weeks and I just want to go to sleep XD That being said, take it for what it is, and I’ll try to correct any grammatical errors later. Good night! <3

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Please note:

1: I don’t own any of the gifs used, nor any already established characters, so credit to the authors and original creators - You have done a phenomenal job :)

2: English is not my native language, as I was born and raised in Sweden. I have, however, studied English for almost a decade, so I don’t think it’ll be a problem, I just thought I’d let you know ;)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Word count: ≈ 2800 (they just keep getting longer, don’t they? XD)

Warnings: Light swearing, blood, angst

Enjoy! :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That’s what family is all about 

“How big did his tongue get?”

“It was four feet long before his parents would let me shrink it!”

The sound of laughter was heard from the kitchen as Elwira Weasley entered her childhood home. She worked as an arithmancer, and had been stationed at a research-facility in the northern parts of Sweden for the past few years. Her work took up most of her time, but she had just travelled home to go see the quidditch final with her dad, older brother Bill, twin brother Charlie and all their younger siblings.

“It isn’t funny”, her dad shouted. “That sort of behaviour seriously undermines wizard-muggle relations! I spend half my life campaigning against the mistreatment of muggles, and my own sons-”

“Are just a wee bit too daft to understand that!”

She walked through the door and found her entire family, plus two other people she didn’t know, all sitting or standing around the kitchen table.

“Ellie?!”

Her older brother and twin, with whom she had always been extremely close, both made their way across the room and pulled her into a hug so tight she could barely breathe.

“Blimey! ‘ello Bill, hey Charlie! Long time no see, huh?”

“Certainly!”, their mother exclaimed while pushing the two oldest sons to the side as she tried to get a good look at her grown-up daughter. “Not a single visit since Christmas, Elwira Weasley, we’ve had to do with owls for six months?!”

“Sorry, mum, there’s been a lot of work to do… I thought I’d stay for the rest of the summer though, if that’s okay with you?”

“Of course, dear! Have you eaten yet?”

“No, I’m famished!”

Mrs Weasley went off to get another plate, and Ellie, after greeting everyone and being introduced to Harry and Hermione, took a seat between her dad and youngest brother.

“So Ronald? Had a good term?”

“Err.. Sure? Nothing interesting except for the stuff I wrote to you about, though.”

“Well you’re going into your fourth year now - almost halfway through!” She paused for a moment and turned to her father. “You good dad? You seem a bit… tense?”

Arthur looked up from his plate and sent his daughter a kind smile.

“Don’t worry about it, darling. Hosting the world cup comes with a great deal of problems all with the need to be solved. Admittedly, it’s not really part of my job, but the entire ministry becomes quite chaotic when something like that is days away. I’m a bit stressed, that’s all. How are things up in Scandinavia?”

“They’re… somewhat slow to be honest. There’s so much work to do between like October and February, but in the summer it’s mostly filing and other boring bits of paperwork.”

“Elwira?”, Hermione asked. “Sorry, I’m just curious, what is it that you do? Ron’s never told us…”

“That’s probably cause Ron doesn’t understand what I’m doing”, she smirked, “but of course, I work with, and study, arithmancy which, as you might know, is part of what’s called ‘natural magic’.”

“Great!”, mumbled Ron quietly, making sure only his friends and older sister heard. “Hermione, there are four rules in this house, okay? One: Don’t ask Charlie about dragons, Two: Don’t ask Percy about anything, Three: Don’t ask dad about muggles, and Four: Don’t ask Ellie about her job. Break either and you’ll be stuck listening to a five hour lecture.”

 Hermione didn’t seem to be bored though, so Ellie ignored her brother’s comment and continued. 

“It’s the type of magic that has been studied and worshiped since ancient times and has a very strong connection with nature. The natural phenomena with the strongest affiliation with magic is, while they in themselves have what the muggles would call a ‘scientific explanation’, the northern lights. Meaning it’s only when they’re visible that we can make any significant progress.”

Ellie paused and glanced at the younger girl, trying to see whether she had caught on or not, and was happy when realizing that she had.

“And... “, questioned Hermione, “the northern lights are only visible north of the polar circle and b-”

“Between September and March, exactly… Meaning there’s sadly not that much advanced research that can be done during the rest of the year…”

“It’s still a fascinating subject though. I only started last year, but I love it.”

“I’m glad! At least some people appreciate the wonderful art that is arithmancy, Ronald!”

Ron looked up at the mention of his name and met his sister’s gaze. 

“I just don’t find it interesting”, he said.  

“Right, because you ha-”

Ellie didn’t get to finish her sentence before being interrupted by her twin brother.

“Hey, Ellie? Must have been fun watching the Nordic versus Germany, huh?”

“Oh shut up, Charlie!”, she groaned while putting her head in her hands. “Holy Merlin…” The Nordic National Quidditch team, of which she had become a huge supporter in the last few years, had suffered a HORRENDOUS loss against Germany, and it had certainly not been a fun night. 

Her brother, however, did not shut up, but instead burst out laughing.  

“Charlie, it’s not funny!! You should have been there though… You’d have done a much better job than the stand-in seeker we had.”

“What were the results again? 700-20?”

“... 520 actually”

“520 to??”, Bill said mockingly

“You’re idiots both of you… 520-0, happy now?”

Ellie hadn’t realized that everyone else around the table had been listening in on their conversation, but was made aware when Fred, George, Harry, Ron, Ginny and Arthur began laughing loudly.

“Why is this so funny to everyone? England lost badly too, and neither Romania nor Egypt even qualified to compete?!”

“Yeah...”, began Fred.

“But none of them lost with 520 points.”, finished George, earning himself a furious look from his older sister who stood up and shook her head.

“I’ll go see if mum needs any help…”

~~~~~~

Ellie loved her family, and therefore all her slightly annoying brothers, beyond everything, but being away from them for months and then meeting them all at the same time was TIRING! Having no desire to sleep through the world cup, she decided to go to bed early the night before, and she had barely closed her eyes before she fell asleep...

~~~~~~

“3, 2 ‘shhhh, quiet!”

Ellie took notice of the obnoxiously loud whispers, but it wasn’t enough to fully wake her up.

“We’ve got one more chance, 3, 2, 1, ELLIE!!!!”

She woke up instantly and sent a blast of blue sparks towards her older brother, barely missing him by an inch.

“What ‘ru doing, El? You can’t just go attacking people?!”

He tried to sound angry, but failed miserably, a heartwarming laugh escaping his mouth.

“You bloody idiots?! Why’d you scare me like that? You’re 21 and 23, not five?”

“Brings back memories, doesn’t it? Do you remember-”

“Yes, I do!”. She rubbed her eyes slowly, “‘85, look can you two please let me sleep?”

“Sorry, sis”, said Bill. “We’re leaving in half an hour. The kids and dad left ages ago.”

“Yeah, you don’t want to be late do you? Not when you can cheer for a team that might not loo-”

“Charlie, I swear!”

~~~~~~

The match was fantastic! Ellie would never admit it to her brothers, but it was nice to watch an even one for once. Watching and cheering with her family brought back fond memories of childhood games at the Burrow or Hogwarts, and she realized just how much she had missed actually playing. They stayed up late discussing players and tactics, but eventually their father ushered them all off to bed. 

~~~~~~

“Ellie?”

“Ellie??”

She stirred slightly and pulled the sleeping bag tighter around her.

“Ellie! Damn it, wake up!”

She opened her eyes slowly and saw her twin brother bent above her. The sight made her sigh.

“Charlie”, she mumbled. “We see each other once- or twice a year nowadays, do you really feel obligated to wake me up every time you get the chance?”

“Elwira, I’m serious! Get up!”

This caught her attention. Sure, the twins often used their full names when messing with each other, but it didn’t sound like Charlie was joking at all. She sat up, rubbed the sleep from her eyes and yawned loudly.

“What’s going on? Wha- Charlie? It’s still dark out? Why’d yo-”

“Ellie, c’mon. We have to help dad. Someone’s attacking the muggles.”

He threw his sister a jacket and pulled her out of the tent. Arthur, Bill and Percy were all waiting outside.

“Dad?”, she asked. “What’s happening? Charlie sai-”

“We’ve got to help the ministry!”, he said while frantically trying to count everyone and make sure they were there. “Fred, George, you make sure the others are safe. Go wait in the woods and I’ll come for you when the situation’s under control. Bill, Charlie, Percy, Ellie, let’s see if there’s something we can do.”

Nobody questioned Mr Weasley’s instructions, and immediately left in different directions. There were people everywhere though, and the two directions quickly became three, four, six. Spells and curses were fired left, right and centre and Ellie found herself disarming and stunning at least a few death eaters. There weren’t that many of them, roughly thirty or so, but the insane amount of witches and wizards fleeing the campsite made it difficult to fight back. She couldn’t risk hitting any random bloke.

While duelling a tall man in a black mask, Ellie suddenly stumbled forward, a particularly nasty curse having hit her straight in the back. Falling to the ground felt way more painful than it should have, and her wand landed well beyond her reach. She groaned as a burning pain spread through her lower back, but made an effort to get back up anyways. She did, however, not make it very far before the sharp end of a wand dug into her throat.

The death eater behind her sniggered and pulled her up by the collar of her shirt.

“Well, well, well… Why’re you trying to ruin our fun?”

He stood way too close for comfort and Ellie felt his breath on her neck. She tried to answer, but the curse that was shot at her must have hit its intended target, as all that came out when she opened her mouth was a strained cough and warm blood.

The bloke holding her let out a dark chuckle and threw her to the ground. She could barely keep her eyes open, and a thick, red liquid oozed from the wound in her back.

“Not so high-and-mighty now, are we?”

Ellie lacked the strength to fight back, and to the death eaters that seemed to take all the fun out of the situation. They set off back towards the campsite, leaving Ellie on the ground next to a few pines. She tried her very best to sit up, but ended up passing out…

~~~~~~

“Charlie?!”

Bill ran up to his younger brother and pulled him in for a quick, one-armed hug.

“Charlie, you okay? We’ve got to get back to the tent. Where’s El?”

“Wha-, I-I thought she was with you?!?”

“What? Last I saw her you were together?”

The brothers shared a lock of utter terror.

“Bill, we have to find her!”

“I know… Dad went to get the kids and Percy’s back in the tent waiting.”

“There’s no time to waste then. Let’s go”

~~~~~~

They had been running around the camping grounds for half an hour, and there was still not a trace of a living soul - let alone the special one they were searching for. At first, they had been shouting her name at the top of their lungs, but were now walking silently. That was, at least, until a shout made both of them turn around.

“Bill! Charlie! What are you doing? I told you to stay in the tent?”

Arthur Weasley came running towards them, with Harry, Ron and Hermione following close behind.

“Dad!”, Charlie shouted. “Have you seen El? We can’t find her?”

“What?”, asked Arthur. “But she was with you, wasn’t she?”

“Yes, at first, but we must have gotten separated… Dad, is that? You know?”

He threw a dark glance at the skull and snake decorating the night sky and said, “Yes. Yes it is. Look, I’ll take Ron, Hermione and Harry back to the tent, and I’ll meet you back here in ten minutes, okay? Don’t go too far. Come on kids!”

~~~~~~

Just as the brothers were about to give up, go back to the clearing, wait for their dad and hopefully find both their sisters safe and sound, Bill noticed something. A glimpse of red in the moonlight…

“Charlie? Get over here fast!”

The younger brother followed Bill’s gaze and immediately set off through the forest when his eyes found a mess of ginger hair sticking out from behind a rather large pine. Bill followed closely behind.

“ELLIE!!!?!!”

Charlie stumbled to his knees and turned his sister around, trying to get a better look at her. He pressed his hand to her wrist and breathed a sigh of relief when he found a pulse.

“She’s alive”, he mumbled. “Bill, she’s alive!”

“Good. I- Good.” Bill was lost for words too and mumbled a quick “Let me see”.

He pushed some hair out of her eyes and searched for any clues to what had hit her. He was a curse-breaker after all, but that usually meant working with curses placed on things or places, not people. 

“Charlie, I-I don’t know what that is… it’s not a curse I’m familiar with and I’m no healer… You want to carry her?”

“Of course”

Charlie brought his twin into his arms and picked her up, her bruised, limp body threatening to fall unless he held on tight enough. The brothers walked back to the clearing where they’d promised to meet their dad, but kept a close watch on their sister. They would apparate, though at the moment none of them felt like they had much time for ‘Deliberation’. It wasn’t very far anyways.

~~~~~~

“DAD!”, Bill shouted as soon as they noticed Arthur in the clearing where they were supposed to wait.

“Boys! Didn’t I tell you t-”

“We’ll take that later, Dad, you’ve got to help her!?”

Arthur Weasley was speechless, which had most likely never happened before, and Charlie felt so helpless. This was worse than his worst nightmares, and there was nothing he could do. Had it been a wounded dragon, sure, he knew loads about them, but this?

“Dad?”, asked Bill. “What can we do?”

“Right. Er… I suppose there’s no use trying to get you to wait here?”, he said while looking at Charlie who frantically shook his head. “Right, Bill could you go back to Percy and the kids? Fill them in on what happened? Then Charlie and I’ll take Ellie to St Mungos, okay?”

Bill didn’t look too happy with the idea, but nodded nonetheless.

---

“Charlie sit down!”

“Fred, he can’t”, said George. “Hey, I think you missed a spot over there, Charles”

“Shut it both of you! Honestly, why am I the only one that’s worried?”

Arthur stood up and put an arm around his son.

“Listen, we’re all worried, but walking back and forth isn’t helping anyone. Just sit for a moment, huh?”

“No, dad, you don’t understand! It’s my fault. We were supposed to stick together! I let her out of my sight...I-”

“Charlie, we all-”

“No, Bill, you don’t get it either, I should-”

“-let your sister sleep for once? That’d be greatly appreciated, thank you.”

The entire family turned at once, and found the oldest daughter struggling to sit up.

“EL!!”

Charlie stumbled over and put a hand on his sister’s back, trying to help her up, but unfortunately placing it right where the curse had hit her.

“Auch!”

She moved away from his touch and he pulled his hand back immediately.

“Blimey, Ellie I’m so s-”

“Charlie, it’s good. Don’t worry about it.”

Ellie pulled her brother into a hug, though he was now extremely careful, and she looked over his shoulder at the rest of her family. Her eyes met Bill’s and he sent her a kind smile. She gestured for him to come join them, and eventually the whole family found themselves in a loving group hug. Molly did her very best to wrap her arms around all her children, desperately trying to convince herself that they were all there - safe and sound and loved. 

Because if there was one thing the Weasleys had a lot of, it was love and that is, after all, precisely what family is all about.

~ L

Masterlist

[wannaliveattheholidayinn]

Writing Tag Game

I was tagged by @janelevy, thanks for the tag 💗💗

20 questions, Writer’s Edition:

(answers under the cut)

How many works do you have on AO3?

19!

What’s your total AO3 word count?

38,913 (holy fuck... what?)

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

on ao3 only, 10. they're marvel cinematic universe, zoey's extraordinary playlist, loki (2021), avengers - all media types, the 100 by kass morgan, knives out (2019), the 100 (tv), cloak and dagger (2018), the avengers (marvel movies), and spooksville (tv) (clearly some repeats here)

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

you were all I wanted (and what I almost didn't get) (knives out)

I Really Like You (Even If You're a Pain in My Ass) (the 100)

time, curious time (gave me no compasses, gave me no signs) (loki & mcu)

the right or a clue (I wouldn’t know if I knew) (loki & avengers & mcu)

an indentation in the shape of you (your mark on me, a golden tattoo) (loki & mcu)

(i don't understand that last one considering it's less than 105 words)

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

i try! i get overwhelmed easily and comments can feel overwhelming for me, but i do really try! it's just a nice thing, plus i like to interact with my readers. there's only one fic where i'm just... not going to touch the comments

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

oof um... probably Vivaldi, Four Seasons: Spring and Steve Rogers, but i have a few angsty ending fics

What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

probably Coffee and Cakes (But Not Coffee Cakes) or basorexia

Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

not on ao3. but back when i had fanfiction.net my friend and i were gonna collaborate on a lab rats: elite force x the big bang theory fic. basically, it was that crossover, but they were also gonna crossover with other disney channel shows (ex. kickin' it, girl meets world, etc.) it never got past the first chapter kjdhsjfkg thank g.od

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

yes actually. i don't think it was for my actual fic, just the pairing it was for (zimon), but it was under my fic (and under another person's fic bc it was the same person reviewing) so it felt like hate. either way, i just laughed at it tbh

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

no. the closest thing i got with smut was in basorexia and it was pretty vague

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

no, and i hope to god i never do. it seems like a nightmare to have happen and i feel awful for anyone who has

Have you ever had a fic translated?

nope! though i'd be super, super honored if someone ever wanted to

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

nope, but i'd be down to!

What’s your all-time favorite ship?

oh,,, probably Romanogers. That was like... the first real marvel/mcu ship i got super into and i still super adore them. should've been canon

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

um... published wip... probably You Make Me Live Now, Honey (You’re My Best Friend). it's just something i got invested in for a while, and then i kinda burned out on it. i don't think i'm gonna update it or write anything for it again, at least not for a while. as for unpublished... literally so many, i'm not gonna bother listing any of them

What are your writing strengths?

i'm sorry to be an idiot, but i legitimately have no clue

What are your writing weaknesses?

procrastination. i have several more, but procrastination is just the biggest

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

i cannot speak any languages other than english, except for a few phrases in french, spanish, hebrew, and yiddish. i've tried my hand at hebrew and yiddish in I’ve never been in those places... and Take My Hand (Wreck My Plans) is almost certainly going to have (badly google translated) irish, scottish gaelic, and hebrew appear in the future. there's already some irish in song form in it.

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

on ao3, zoey's extraordinary playlist. but my first actual fandom was girl meets world. it was some... dumb rucas fanfic that i think is actually still up... i really wanted my first fic to mighty med, but... i mean... still a disney show

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

oh my god, my absolute favorite fic i've ever written is I’ve never been in those places... it's just... such a deeply personal fic to me, there's so much of myself in, of my experiences, and my emotions. just... nothing tops it for me. it's the one fic i'm not going to respond to comments on, probably ever. if i had to choose a second, probably Coffee and Cakes (But Not Coffee Cakes) bc it's just so damn fluffy and despite the fact it's my first fic and horrendously outdated in canon, i honestly think it holds up pretty well.

tagging: @wannabe-etymologist, @nivuwrites, anyone else who potentially wants to do this! (no pressure!)

[shookethbrooketh]

seven days

day four: part two

summary: dan is stuck in the wrong timeline. one day, he kisses phil goodnight. the next morning, he’s completely alone. he doesn’t even recognize where he wakes up, and little details in the world around him have changed. he has no clue what’s happening or where to go next in an effort to fix it; all he knows is that he has to find phil.

genre: sci-fi, a lil bit of angst, happy ending

warnings: just some swearing!

fic word count: 10.4k chapter word count: 1.4k

written for the @phandomreversebang ! inspired by the awesome moodboard/edits by @maybeformepersonally ! beta’d (beginning to end) by @i-might-just-leave-soon !

dan became immediately aware of the flowers still in his hand. he held them up and made sure they were still perfect, putting on a smile. “follow the trope.”

read it on ao3

Before Dan could even think, he was inside the tattoo parlor. “Hello, I bro-” 

“Yeah, you got the flowers. You’re too late; buzz off,” Phil said, the harsh tone in his voice catching Dan off guard. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, immediately jumping into protective boyfriend mode. He could tell Phil was seriously upset, and it was almost instinctual for him to step in. “What happened?” he added, stepping up to the counter and resisting the urge to reach out and touch Phil. 

“Oh, nothing, just my boyfriend forgot our anniversary. So I don’t need your stupid flowers.” He grabbed them from Dan’s hand anyway, but he immediately threw them on the ground and stomped on them. 

“Oh…” Dan whispered. “Alright then.” He perked up, showing Phil a cautious smile. “I’m sure he didn’t really forget! He’s probably planning a surprise for you later.” 

“Nah, he forgot,” Phil grumbled. “I can always tell with him.” He rolled his eyes and walked around the counter to stand beside Dan. He planted his elbow on the counter and looked up at Dan. “That was a cute thought, though.” 

Dan raised an eyebrow at this; he’d known Phil long enough to know when Phil was flirting with him, and Phil was definitely flirting with him. “Um, thanks,” he said. Obviously he missed Phil, but this was the Phil he knew ten years ago; it was simply… odd. 

“How old are you?” Phil asked, inching a bit closer to Dan. 

“Twenty-eight,” Dan replied, scooting back a bit. He and Phil had a considerable age gap, but four years and six years were a different ballpark, especially when it came to hitting on the man you’re in love with but ten years younger. There was no definitive word to describe it other than uncomfortable. 

“That’s not too old,” Phil replied, and Dan didn’t know how to react. On one hand, he was generally creeped out; this clearly wasn’t the Phil he knew. On the other hand, he wanted Phil back so badly he was almost willing to take any Phil he could get. Besides, the trope was drawing him in, and he couldn’t help but feel as if he was supposed to let it. 

“D-don’t you have a boyfriend?” Dan stammered out, still wary of the concept of becoming involved with this morally skewed version of Phil. 

“Dumped him for bein a twat,” he said, standing up from the counter and matching up to Dan so that they were only a few inches from each other. “What’re you, straight?” 

Dan instinctively laughed. “No-” 

Before he could even finish his vowel, Phil pressed his lips up against Dan’s, and it felt as if every emotion known to man rushed through his head at once. There was the familiar relief; all logic and reason drained from him and was replaced by the love he felt every time he kissed Phil. It was love he hadn’t felt in days, and even that was far too long. There was also some fear and discomfort. Even though he technically was still kissing Phil, he still felt almost as if he was being unfaithful to the Phil he knew. Plus, this Phil was a different Phil even in his intimacy; when he kissed his Phil, it was deep and full of love. This Phil, being much younger, kissed with lust and revenge. He was sure they weren’t unlike him in their youth, but he’d matured since then, and in the moment it was really a bit gross. 

“I can’t do this!” he shouted, and it was as if he could feel everything crumbling around him. He was living in a simulation, a cheesy, fetishizing fanfiction written by some 12-year-old who didn’t know better, and he couldn’t bear to go along with it, even if he was “meant to.” He didn’t give a shit if he was “supposed” to take Phil out to dinner and fall in love; he was already in love, and he wasn’t going to sit through some horrendously predictable plot when he could just as easily explain himself to Phil and hopefully Phil would help him find a way home. This young, angry boy was apparently a scientist, after all. 

But at the same time, he felt as if pulling away gave him some sort of a game over screen. He set himself up for the bad ending by doing something good. He could feel the trope crack in half in his very heart; it was like he was nothing more than a character, and he’d just broken the fourth wall. He was Wreck It Ralph, and suddenly, because he stuck up for himself, the game wasn’t quite right anymore. 

“What do you bloody mean you can’t?” Phil replied, hostility back in his voice like when they’d first met. 

“I love you,” Dan blurted. He couldn’t think of anything else. 

Phil stood in silence for a moment before leaning forward a bit and blinking a few times, clearly unable to even process what Dan was telling him. “Alright, now I know you’ve gone mad. Get out.”

“Wait, liste-”

“Out! You’re a bloody crazy man; get out!” At this point, Phil approached him again, but rather than making a move, he simply turned him around and started pushing him towards the door.

“You’re trying to time travel!” Dan shouted out of desperation. Suddenly Phil stopped in his tracks and backed away from Dan. 

“Who told you?” he said, taking calculated steps back as if he was scared of Dan. 

“I came from the year 2019,” Dan said, and it took all his effort not to laugh because of how ridiculous it sounded; he was speaking like he’d walked straight out of a movie. “I actually am in love with you, or, well, another timeline’s version of you. I keep getting transported to different timelines, and you’re the only one who can help me get back.” 

Phil backed himself up to a door at the other side of the room. “I can’t help you do shit. It’s too early in the timelines for me to develop time travel. I’m only beginning to look into it.” 

Dan’s eyes widened in terror. “So there’s no one in this timeline who can help me get back to 2019? I’m stuck reliving the last ten years?”

“Not necessarily,” Phil replied cautiously. He still looked scared to his core, although Dan couldn’t quite identify why. “Maybe some Phil’s done it.” 

“Don’t you know these things?” Dan asked, beginning to get angry. “I thought you all had some weird sixth sense bullshit.” 

“Nope!” Phil said, all too cheery. “So sorry, but I must be going!” he said in a voice far too posh for him before turning the knob and swiftly slipping into the room behind him. Before Dan could even respond, he was gone. 

“Phil!” Dan shouted. “Phil, you little shit, what are you hiding from me?” He banged on the door with all his force, but it wouldn’t open. Finally he realized that he was taking his anger out on a piece of wood, and he gave up, sliding to his knees and softly beginning to sob. He was never going to get home. 

Dan heard a heavy sigh from the other side of the door and raised his head to see the door creaking open just a bit. “If you can find another Phil from your year, he should be able to get you home,” Phil said. “We don’t have the technology yet, but he will.” 

“Where the hell am I supposed to find a 2019 Phil in 2009?” Dan growled. He must have looked absolutely pathetic; his cheeks were coated with tears, and he could barely see Phil. It was a miracle Phil was willing to talk to him. 

“If you’re here, the Phils of the future probably are testing on various things, and a version of you was one of them. I don’t doubt that one Phil tried stepping through a portal himself.” 

“But how can I find him?” 

Phil rolled his eyes. “I don’t know, but not here. Just get out of here and go do your thing.” 

Dan clambered to his feet and made his way to the door. He walked slowly and emotionlessly back to the flower shop and into its adjacent flat, where he flopped back down onto the same couch he woke up on. He hadn’t even anything to process; he knew exactly what he had to do. He had to wait - for another day, for another trope, for another Phil.

[saitouh]

friend 1: wait, gintxxxjustaxxx made edits with ep 139 🤔

friend 2: she spazzed over a new tsukuyo art 🙄

lmao why do you do this every. single. time you are called out for your shit? why do you try so hard, aero? do you know at which point it becomes obvious that you are over-compensating? don’t you have “novels” to write? aren’t you a very, very busy author who “isn’t around much anymore” ? don’t you have “schoolwork” to do? why do you care what ppl say about you if it’s all untrue and we are all “liars” anyway? 

seriously, why do you try. so. hard. to prove that you dont hate tsukuyo each. time. you are called out? 

do you think this is going to negate all the vile shit you have spouted about her? do you think this is going to somehow justify all the heinous accusations you hurled at her fans? do you think doing this is going to make it okay that you laughed and joined in the ridicule when a disgusting anon messaged you and called someone else a whore?

You quickly make tsukuyo edits, quickly reblog gintsuki arts right after being called on your hateful bs every single time - this is so much like how you gaslight people after attacking them - “Let me know if you need any more help!” or, “If you need anything cleared up, message me again!"

Lmao why do you think such a fcking conduct is acceptable????

Should I slap you in the face and then say, “Let me know if you need anything next time! ^_^”

??????

You’ve done this shit REPEATEDLY and you keep doing it and you are STILL doing it.

i would have maybe felt a tiny bit sorry for your pitiful ass if i weren’t still so furious with you making up such a serious lie about me and other people “mocking your rape”, and you doing all those horrendous shit to my friends and other ppl like lats. how could you find it in yourself to do such a despicable thing, i’m still at a loss for words. no words could vebalize my disgust with you. i will keep repeating this for as long as you and your followers still keep up with this act, for as long as you and your followers still unrepentantly harass my friends and me.

And you have to nerve to whine about me never having spoken to you in private. You expect ME, someone you lied about “mocking your rape”, something I didn’t do, TALK TO YOU,???? CIVILLY? This shit is so hilarious I would’ve howled and cried if it weren’t so fcking disgusting.

Btw. Have you ever noticed how inconsistent you are? it is especially obvious when you blab on and on and on. Do you keep track of the lies you have told?

You were clearly desperate to chase me off like what you did to the others. You wanted people to believe you so badly, that I “mocked your rape”. I stated explicitly how you have lied about that several times and finally on Tumblr. And the only things you’re still going on with is, “saitouh is vicious, that’s how she is” facade. All of you really expected that I would run and hide like all the others you have bullied (i don’t blame them, they’re traumatised by the group-mobbing). Sucks to be you I’m not your usual victim. 

Do you have actual friends irl beyond your online persona? Oh wait. You going to jump into defensive mode later, and tell an “anon” who will conveniently message you right after my post, just like what you’ve done so many times before. They will say, ohmygod, that crazy chick saitouh is STILL at it! (Doesn’t matter that queen mother aero is still at it, trying hard to compensate by reblogging tsukuyo, gushing insincerely like a clown in a field) 

And you will passionately tell them how you have so many offline “friends”, that they’re all so amazing, and you are sooo happy you couldn’t bother with “toxic people who are worthless and just jealous of you online”, that ppl like me are sooo “vicious” they can’t get to you anyway, because you are “so successful”, you’re a “lion” on a throne who doesn’t bother with the opinions of “sheep” (i still can’t believe u actually typed and posted this deranged shit out), and then you would act like you are soo appreciative of anon’s “sweetness”, aksjhdajkhasjkah. Or are you going to turn a 180 degrees and spin out another sob story how your friends have let you down all your life? That they’re all the ones at fault, that I’m the one at fault, all the other people who have spoken up before were ALL at fault, and you are never the problematic one, ever? Hmm? Which option will it be? Choose your own adventure!

I’ve never mentioned you directly by name on tumblr before until now, until that big post. but you and your friends always seem to know each time what and who i was talking about whenever i threw out a post. all of you have always been automatically aware of your guilt and actions. all of you always, always bum-rush to “defend” yourselves on your blogs and twitter. this will always be fcking hilarious to me. why do you try so hard? 

I’m not a big blogger. Half my followers are inactive. I also have a good habit of not tagging my shit generally. i have an expansive block list. before tumblr took away the “number of blocked people” count, my block list (over 1000) was bigger than my followers’ list. that list grew over the last few years, because i block shit i do not want to see. but man, you people fcking proliferated all over the place. if i had a choice that could 100% guarantee me that i would not see your shit ever again, i would take it in a heartbeat. you however, you’re all so invested in me, you seem to know immediately if i had written or posted anything at all. that’s the level of stalking you have. And yet, your only defense after all of this is, “saitouh’s just jealous of me”

?????? 

You know what you have done. your followers know exactly what they have done. if i see any of your nasty ass comments anywhere near my friends again, if they even receive a single message on their currently hidden blogs or fanfic accounts, which you, or your followers still stalk after chasing them out of fandom (and you bitches even left nasty shit comments as recent as a few months ago), if you do it, if you harass them with even one word, if you do this shit to me again, i swear to buddha.

My friends have already hidden themselves for the past 2 years. They’ve never, EVER pushed for gintsuki other than the few times they stood up for her. The fact that you and your fucktard followers from a massive fucktard fandom can’t and won’t even let people quietly enjoy creating content for themselves, won’t even shut the fuck up about an innocent female character, the fact that you incessantly stalk and harass the fans, my friends, all the while you pretend on your blog that you welcome all contributors (does this fandom really belong to you?), you really make my blood boil, you fcking lying, batshit insane, bitches. 

this is just fandom. it doesn’t pay anyone’s salary. stick to your own ginhiji and gintae shit and don’t ever touch my friends again. you horrid bitches have taken this far enough since 2011. people like us who knew you since back then have already gone in and out of college and gotten jobs and you, little bambi, are still “19 years old″ and bitching about tsukuyo’s “down-spiral” because she loves gintoki. i’m so amazed to know you were just 11-12 years old back in 2011, and already so well-versed in things like bondage, nsfw, yaoi, anal sex, and getting so excited over them. I’m so amazed at the level of your writing skill when you were a pre-teen. 11-12 years old and already writing so fluidly about boy sex. i'm repeating. but i will repeat it for as long as you continue your fake shit. keep your manure-filled mouths closed about tsukuyo and do not touch her, too. 11-12 years old and already know how to criticize female characters for loving male characters. Alright! I BELIEVE IT! 

Being fake does not compensate for an ugly heart. Making edits and reblogging tsukuyo arts are not going to neutralize all the vile, heinous shit you have done. It’s not going to fool anyone into believing that you actually like tsukuyo, either. not after calling her a rapist, and then saying her fans who support her are rape apologists/ mocking rape victims. well, maybe you can fool the really ignorant little pimpernels, i guess.

Your little charades don’t help you the slightest bit. I would have been shook if I didn’t already know that’s how you and your whole circle are. 

[theadrogna]

I was tagged by @smilinstar, thank you!

Rules:

1. Post a quote or short excerpt from your early days of writing/ARTING.(I’m talking old fanfics/ART, slash fics/ART, original fic/ART, etc., that are barely edited and have a ton of technical errors and misspelled words.) This is the cringe part. Don’t edit anything! Let it be horrendous. Don’t Panic.

2. Post a quote or short excerpt from one of your most recent works/WIPs. Something that you’re proud of. Something that you’ve written/ARTED that makes you smile when you read it.

3. Tag a writer/artist you admire, anyone who you think is amazing, new friends, followers, writeblrs, anyone who you’d like to know more about. If you think someone is a great writer/artist and you want to see how they’ve developed their skills, tag them! Everyone started somewhere.

1. Hmm. I have been writing for a really long time, and I could pull out some of my really early original stuff, but I’ll stick to fanfic. The first fandom I ever wrote for was Airwolf, which had been off air for quite a while before I got into the fandom and so my audience was tiny. Here’s an excerpt from Wolf’s Bane, which is still up on Fanfic.net if anyone is feeling masochistic enough to want to read the rest of it.

Hawke was pulling on his shirt whilst finishing a mouthful of toast when he caught the disturbance in the air that meant he would have company. His friend, Dominic had often teased him about his sensitive hearing and his supposed sixth sense for the arrival of a helicopter at the lake, but the warning it gave him often proved useful. Hawke was not expecting any guests this morning and it would be unlikely that Dominic would visit him so early. That left only one person and when a white helicopter landed beside the lake he knew that his intuition had been correct. He moved into the kitchen area and put on a fresh pot of coffee.

Knowing that the door was always unlocked, Michael Archangel didn’t bother knocking, but breezed in followed by his shadow, Marella. Both were dressed completely in white, which was the uniform of the section that Michael headed up at the Firm. The only part of Michael’s dress that was not white was the black left lens of his glasses and it stood out starkly against his otherwise perfectly white well-tailored suit. He walked with a confident step and it was only the cane that he carried which belied the fact that his leg was badly injured. Marella wore a white flight suit and was not only Michael’s pilot but was also his closest aide.

“You’re too late for breakfast, Michael,” said Hawke.

“I didn’t come all the way up here for breakfast with you, Hawke,” replied Michael, with a slight tone of annoyance in his voice.

Wow, that’s not good. Kind of wooden and there’s so much I would change in it if I was writing it now.

2. I’m never happy with my writing, but I have definitely improved over the years. So, here’s a bit from, Gently As She Goes. Rip and Gideon have been trying to find each and suffering from memory issues after a mission gone wrong in ancient Denmark.

“I think you’ve been going for joyrides to the nearby town and pretending to be a dragon,” said Rip.

Oh dear. That doesn’t sound good.

“Well, it’s certainly not going to help the timeline,” said Rip. “Bring up your diagnostics.”

Rip scanned down the list of malfunctioning systems. His head was killing him. It was getting so bad that he was actually considering throwing up because of the pain. He could hardly read the screen. He closed his eyes for a second, trying to get them to behave enough that he could read the list.

Something caught his eye.

“Gideon, stop!” he said, sharply. The scrolling list came to a halt. He read the entries again. “Shut down all psychic systems immediately. You are not to connect with me or any other humans that come into range.”

Yes, Captain. Is there a problem?

Rip breathed out a blessed sigh of relief as the pain in his head gradually decreased.

“You’re the Grendel,” he said, with a sigh. “Your dream recording systems… they’re malfunctioning. You’ve been searching for my brainwaves. It’s one of your routines for finding me in an emergency, but it looks like you’ve been emitting psychic impulses as well as trying to connect to mine. Which has all been made worse by the fact that you’ve been tapping directly into the time drive to draw power for it.”

I am sorry. I was unaware that I was doing that. My systems are badly damaged.

“I know, Gideon, you didn’t mean to do it, but the human brain can’t take that kind of power. I got a headache just walking on board. It should be fine once we get it repaired,” said Rip. “Did you know that you’ve also been generating a hologram that’s been calling my name while walking around in the forest?”

No, Captain. I didn’t know I could do that.

“Neither did I,” said Rip. “I mean, holograms, yes, but I had no idea you had a form that was beyond this one. They thought you were a ghost.”

That’s quite unfortunate.

“If it’s any consolation, they think I’m a hero and they sent me off to kill a dragon,” said Rip. “Since the dragon turned out to be you, I think I might give that a miss.”

Much better. I actually enjoyed reading that again!

3. I would love to see what @caffeinated-and-confused, @incendiaglacies, @riphuntertimemasterlegend, @darkestsight, @singledarkshade and @quentinlances make of this challenge. Show me your early stuff, guys!

[talesfromacrip]

Parents At It Again:

———

my dad made my mom mad as fucking hell bc she apparently hasn’t been eating properly, exercising like she should more bc of me, leaving food to waste aaaand continues buying mooorrre. she had this disgusting attitude bc of it and I’m glad she fucking got the message in the end, but why unleash your demons on me and make me feel uglier than I already feel???

Shit like, why I don’t help much. I’m too much to take care off . that’s why she’s not so active even though she goes out and does random errands and yard work and shit which isn’t my fault I can’t do. that I don’t help with groceries and blaaahhh, blaah, same shit as always

Like, we all have to take care of ourselves in this family bc we’re all we fucking got.no one wants to deal with us and our problems and definitely not mine apparently which is wonderful. We have to try to be healthy and work together in the damn end, not bicker and fight like fucking children..

I despise when my mom makes me feel like shit for not being able to move and do certain tasks and every day activities in general. Even little things it seems. Its not my fucking fault in the end this happened. moms shouldn’t make their kids feel like shit, but I guess they do sometimes huh.. eughh. I feel even more worthless and useless as it is.then she tells me in Spanish with a harsher tone and then proceeds to say how she’ll get rid of me or leave me in a home by myself in the process.. just , nasty crap no one should hear or tell someone !?!?

So of course it’s gonna make me feel like absolute garbage and or pissed the fuck off. like, why didn’t you do it years ago then?? sorry I can’t be the "perfect child" I guess. Its extremely annoying. at this point, I’m over it, but how can you really be?she kept going on about who’s gonna take care of me when they’re gone and I won’t know nothing to help someone I’ll be with bc I can’t do anything much to begin. no one wants to deal with the "nightmare", same shit

That kind of attitude keeps me from engaging in any sort of relationship or ships period. she’s not wrong in some way,but is that.. really necessary??

I can’t move for shit, do anything for anyone. cant clean, cook, exercise properly, anything. I’m just here, waiting on others to do my simple human job for me bc i cannot. I can move to an extent sure, not a lot though like some think..it’s at least something than nothing. not enough though it seems. I still need help when I do anything . hell, help, help.no independence at all. an extent, but it’s stripped.makes me feel like a burden. I’m really useless in way. I know I’m not, but that’s how I feel bc of this and other problems as well

It eats at me when I talk to new friends. old ones and current.when I start to develop feelings for some.. I feel it’ll creep up or that it is.. that they’ll think/say the exact same things as her and the others. that why I’m so reserved and I shouldn’t be, but I am. I’m sorry I’m like that.. like this?? I just feel like no one wants to be with me or around me,anything. which apparently is true as I’ve been told, but you have to carry on even if it hurts so badly.. sigh

—

people probably wonder at the end of the day why I don’t wanna be here anymore or interact much or anything..

Its bc my wonderful family who makes me feel iller than I already am :)) including some others,but you understand hopefully

Family shouldn’t make you want to feel like that at all.. but they do

I just wanna get away.. everyday I have a craving to just leave this house.. to just, get the fuck out and just go somewhere, but I can’t. I’m trapped in here and in my own body essentially. hate every moment of it.

This is why I have a hard time confiding in others about my parents and anything in general tbh. It’s not something that is easy to talk about. it’s something not most even know how to deal with as well. at least some try their best..

-

I have some of these issues not only bc of others who hurt me before, but bc of my mom I feel .

My dad doesn’t give a shit much. he does to an extent, but like, he doesn’t tell me: "Don’t trust them so much." "Don’t get carried away." "Don’t say too much information." "They don’t care." Blah, blah, negativity, bad things at me ya know. when he’s been mad though a few times, he has said some, terrible things and it’s expected, but shouldn’t be

Ya know who’s like that exactly as well? the one I used to call my ‘best friend’

that bastard got along with my mom well and they agreed on how I act like a wall in conversations sometimes, how dumb I can be when it came to not knowing something simple, how I don’t do much, it’s all in my head.. it goes on. such, lovely people huh.

to hear two people you think care about you say that is horrendous and extremely hard on your heart and mind. my mom cares to an extent, but idk sometimes anymore. her moods scare me and don’t surprise me at the same time.. shes also very manipulative sometimes and acts like nothing ever happened.she then expects me to forget about it after. umm, how??

—

This is kinda why I say I’m really sorry if I ever said I didn’t trust any of y’all before..

This is a reason why.

I did and I do with my whole life.. just, not in a good state

It’s ugly to tell someone you don’t trust them when you’re close in some ways.. it’s ugly to not put that trust into someone when they did for you.

I trust y’all a lot and I’m sorry..

I’m extremely thankful everyday to have such incredible people in my life..I swear to biscuits. I’m glad i can talk and confide in folks who won’t yell at me, which is sad, or judge me harshly and all..

you don’t know how much I appreciate that. at least someone is trying to understand and all that ya know. all we have to do is try. I guess not for some though.  

(( edit: 2019, forgot the month tbh ))

[lesserfandomappreciation]

reader is a mermaid/merman as they got lost from the great sea, they end up in Zora's Domain, when they bump in to Prince Sidon, seeing as he is a shark they are scared at first but Prince Sidon are interesed in what they are, slowly they begin to trust Prince Sidon, so when Sidon ask them to meet there father, they get fluttered because they can't stand on her tail, and afther that fluff happen if you don't mind

Hey darling! I noticed you mentioned “her tail” on the request, but used mostly gender neutral pronouns elsewhere. So for now, I’m going to stick to gender neutral, but if you want me to change that, just say so and I can do some edits. Also, this is why I took so long yesterday, it wound up going for a lot longer than what I expected. if I get enough requests for it, I might consider making it a series in the future, it was a lot of fun to write! Hope you like it, I was psyched to write this!

-Mod Pinks

Mermaid/man s/o lost in the rivers (Sidon) (Warning: Mild Cursing)

No. No no no no nO NO!

Again the angry waves of the sea slammed down on them, forcing them deeper into the new territory than they had ever dared to go, all while the river tried to shove them back out to the treacherous sea.

A simple mission to find special river herbs to make some medicine, that’s all it was supposed to be. They hadn’t meant to take so long. They hadn’t seen the storm, how could they have known what was to come. 

More waves crashed heavily and they found themselves swimming harder upstream, trying to escape the dangerous waters. Suddenly, they felt themselves start to swirl. Oh no- the river joined with another, and the current propelled them uncontrollably away from the sea, and all they could do was scream and hope for the best, as the current dragged them further and further from the sea. 

That had been nearly 2 weeks ago, and ever since then, (Name) had been objectively and fully lost in these new waters. They had no idea where they were, and the last time they stuck their head out of the water, they had been attacked by the strangest green and red creatures they’d ever have the displeasure of coming across. 

Thanks the Wave-Bringer that they weren’t due back to their home for another 2 months- they had left on an expedition to get and study new medicinal herbs, and while (Name) couldn’t argue that the objective was certainly well-over completed, they longed to find the exit so as to be back in waters they knew.

Couldn’t deny that these new waters had piqued a bit of their interest. They were much sweeter, and the fish in them were as well, so starvation was far from a problem. And the sights in them-! Why, whenever they stuck their head out of the water and weren’t immediately chased away, they’d see sights they’d never imagine before. Green luscious mounds of some sort of plant, boulders so tall they looked like they could reach the sky- and beneath the river, scores of fish and plants they wished they had the time to study.

Perhaps when they managed to find their way out, they’d have to come back to map and study everything specifically in the rivers- there was so much to study and see and rUN AND AVOID IS THAT AN OCTOPUS FIRING BOULDERS AT THEM HELLS NO RETREAT RETREAT!!!! 

Time waits for no man, and right now (Name) assumed life waited for no lost merfolk who were about to possibly die, so with all their might they swam in spirals away from the horrendous creature of death, searching for a place to hid- THERE! With surprising speed, they rushed to a little hole in the side of the river, relieved they found shelter at such a time of fear- WHUMP.

Why was the Universe so vindictive? Did they unknowingly kill some orphan’s best seahorse on accident in another life to deserve this- this- HUMILIATION.

Twisting and turning, shoving and heaving, (Name) faced the terrible realization that there was no way in hell their lower half was going to fit. Coincidentally, there was no way their upper half was going to be easy to dislodge from the hole, not within their lifespan at least.

Damn it. They were going to die from getting a direct hit from a rock octopus to the ass after getting stuck in a damn hole. Maybe it was for the best that they were lost alone, goodness knows that if there were living witnesses they’d have to haunt their ass to ensure their silence.

Good bye, beautiful world. May the Wave-bringer bring their soul back to the sea-

Was that blood they smelled? Why did they smell blood? Why wasn’t it there own, did the octopus managed to hit itself oH GOODNESS WHY WERE THERE A PAIR OF HANDS ON THEIR TAIL?!

“Looks like you got yourself in a bit of a bind, friend.” Huh? “Don’t worry, I’ll have you out in a moment.” Rescue..? People?! Oh thank you Wave-bringer! Her temple was going to get a big donation of fish the second she got back for sending them a rescuer! (Name) excitedly pushed their hands against the dirt, trying to help their hero dislodge them from their badly-chosen prison, shoving and pushing with all their might as they felt as if their tail was being pulled out of existence. Just a bit more-!!!!

Whump. Freedom! Sweet glorious freedom! They heard a gasp behind them- right, the owner of the two hands still on their tail, they best turn and thank them for helping… them.

Huh. Suddenly, the rock octopus made a lot more sense. After all, could they really fault the poor creatures for having to evolve the ability to toss boulders when tHE SHARKS IN THESE WATERS SOMEHOW KEPT THEIR ORIGINAL BODY BUT ALSO GREW A TORSO WITH ARMS AND TWO EXTRA TAILS.

“H…Wha-” ARE THOSE SHARP TEETH NOPE NOPE NOPE THEY ARE NOT ABOUT TO BE DINNER TO A GODS-FORSAKEN GIANT SHARK PERSON WITH TWO TAILS NO SIR. 

“Hey! Wait-!” Nope nope they were out of there, twisting in it’s grasp quickly forcing it to let go as (Name) booked it down the river, continuing the way they were going with much more rejuvenated vigor and determination than before. A trail of bubbles was all they left behind them as they swam with everything they had, praying they lost that…that….shudder Shark-being. If they ever made it back to the ocean, they would leave that part out. No need for stupid idiots to call them a liar over this, they wouldn’t believe them anyway.

Especially the part where they kept running into the creature for days on end. Every day, at least once, or sometimes unfortunately twice, they’d spot the red and immediately start swimming until their fins couldn’t move an inch, escaping the teeth just barely. Sometimes the creature would be strange, and throw a fish at them, as if trying to feed them right before they ran off. Other times, (Name) would wake from a daydream to see it swimming alongside them, smiling and watching. Those days were particularly terrifying. 

They hated to admit it though- they had grown somewhat used to seeing the red streak, and was actually growing - dare they say it- attached to strange little being. It was at least a presence they could interact with for a few moments everyday. 

Which made today so strange. No red, no sign of it anywhere. They should have been relieved, but they couldn’t shake the feeling that it was nearby, waiting, watching, for a chance to strike. Hours passed, and finally, finally, they no longer felt the sense of dread upon them, and they stopped…somewhere in the river. At least they weren’t retracing their steps, that’s the good news. They looked around them, listened and observed for what must have been an hour at least, waiting for anything, any signal to book it.

There was none.Whew.

But it was late. The shadows of night crept upon them, and if a sharkperson and boulder octopus were scary at daylight, there was no way they were going to gamble with running into them in the dark, absolutely not. 

After some searching, a few boulders moved and some seaweed gathered for a decent bed, (Name) curled up beneath the shelter of boulders they had made, laying on the cool seaweed. Today had taken its toll, and within moments, they were asleep, dreaming of making their way home safely.

…“h…o”

Groooan…. infernal fish, with their incessant need to make so much noise in the mornings.

…“H..e..o…”

Hrmph. Dedicated lousy fish, couldn’t they see they hadn’t slept in ages?

…“..Hello..?”

….That’s not a fish, is it…?

Opening one eye, they hoped, prayed, that it was all some hoax, a late night illusion.

And saw a mouthful of grinning shark teeth.

“Ah, you’re awake, good. I was afraid you were hurt; the river bed is no place to rest-”

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!!!” Not letting its startled reaction to their scream go wasted, (Name) launched forward between its tails, swimming blindly as their bleary mind struggled to make up from down this early in the morning- resulting in slamming straight into the river bed.

Well. That wasn’t exactly graceful. 

“I’m so sorry, I-I hadn’t meant to startle you- are you injured-? Wait don’t-!” Oh Wave-bringer below what was charging at them, they couldn’t see anything, their mind was too exhausted to see anything straight- what was it?!

“PLEASEDON’TEATMEIPROMISEYOUITASTEAWFULAAAAAAH!!!!” (Name) swam back into their boulder shelter, slipping between its arms and curling as much as they could as far back into the makeshift shelter as they could fit. This is it. This is where they die. Goodbye cruel world.

“Eat- Oh, so that’s why you- I’m very sorry if I gave you that impression, but I assure you I don’t eat people. They don’t taste particularly good- no no that was a joke! A joke!” The creature seemed more distressed as (Name) pushed further back into the shelter, not comforted one bit. The creature sighed, and swam up t the entrance, extending its hand forward gently.

“Let’s start over, please. My name is Sidon, Prince of the Zora people, and you are in my home-”“People? A-as in, more of you???”“Yes, but I promise you, just like me, they don’t eat people. And honestly, I am sorry for scaring you, I just… hadn’t seen someone like you before so I was a bit tongue-tied at that time… Please, come out of the cave, I just wish to talk to you.”

Hmm… it sounded sincere… And upon closer exposure to it- his- hand, (Name) saw that whatever a ‘Zora’ was, it didn’t seem to have the skin of a shark… so maybe… maybe it wasn’t a shark.. person… And if it really did want to eat them, he could have done so so many times by now (daydreaming and swimming were going to be the death of them someday). 

“…How do I know I can trust you?”“er… If at any point I scare you again, you are free to hit me and run- I will not chase you and will never bother you again.”“…You swear this?”“Yes. On my honor as Prince.”

….It’s not like they had a whole lot of better options… If anything else, if they died, at least it would be quicker than starving in a shelter as someone circled above waiting for them to starve to death. Hesitation wrecked their body, doing little to stop them from slowly edging to the exit of the shelter and even more slowly exiting it.

Getting a good first look at the crea- man before them, (Name) finally saw him beyond the terrifying teeth and head shape. Red, brighter than more fish in the sea, danced on his skin. Deep yellow eyes, metal necklace and a strange… poofy white thing on his person. And huge. Can’t forget his huge height.

All in all though, not *quite* as terrifying as they had first seen. Still, they kept their distance as this Sidon sized them up as well. 

The man had a very nice smile, (Name) had to admit that. Even if the teeth were still making sure they stayed a nice few meters away from him. 

“Oh. Sorry, I had not meant to gawk but… I’ve never seen anyone quite like you before. Who are you, and what are you?”

“…(Name), Scholar of the North-sea merfolk clan. I’m a merfolk. A… pleasure to meet you. S-…Sorry for screaming.”

“Likewise (Name), and apology accepted.” Strange. Their name sounded… somehow warmer when they said it. Damn it, they really needed to get back, this isolation was not good for their soul at all. “If I may ask, what brings you to the Zora domain? The sea is weeks away.” 

“I assure you, I had no idea I was in anyone’s domain. I’ve been lost in these rivers for weeks trying to get back to the sea.”

“…You’ve been trying to get to the sea, and you wound up here?”“…Yes..?”“In the Zora Domain?”“…Listen, if you’re going to sass me, at least use real life stuff to do it-”“-You really are lost, the sea is in the exact opposite direction of us.”

… 

…

…aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-

“…Beg your pardon?”“The Zora domain’s stronghold is a lake, not a few hours continuing this way in the river-”

-aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa-

“The sea, by river at least, is at least 2 weeks of navigating the rivers away.”-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-“…I…I….see…” Take a deep breath, (Name), deep breath. Aaaaaand try to figure out the right thing to say now to Prince Sidon, this awkward silence really isn’t helping in the “not crazy” argument more than likely going on in his head. “Thank you, for…clarifying that Your, uh…Your High-ness, is that the right-? Okay, good.” Awkwardly drummed their fingers against the sides of their tail, really unsure as to what to say. Half a month really had done no favours to their people skills at all. “Soooooooo…., I had best be getting on then. 2 weeks of swimming and all. Again, sorry for the whole ‘screaming my head off thing,’ won’t happen again-”

“Perhaps I can help you/So see you later/Oh sorry you go first/No, you/I-”“Please. I gave you more than a difficult time earlier, and I can see this is something that distresses you. Allow me to make it up to you.”“…What exactly did you have in mind?”

….

….

…. Looking back, maybe having an actual bed to sleep on and a water-proof map of all the rivers wasn’t as worth it as they had thought. Not that being surrounded by more Zora sharkpeople (minus the fin, what had happened to the fins, were they chopped off, what-) was bad, though it certainly didn’t help out a whole lot, what with their intense staring and all. It’s just…

Most people prefer to be surrounded by stuff they can actually move in, that’s all. 

“Allow me-”“No no, I can do this, just give me a mom- A-HA! There we are!” It was wiggly, “standing”, as the prince put it, on their tail, but it was something. Even if it was faaaaaaar from dignified. “As you were saying, you said you believe your father can be of assistance to me?”

He nodded enthusiastically. “Of course! Father knows our rivers like the back of his hands. If anyone can find a fast route to the sea, he can. And he’ll no doubt want to know of our new neighbors in the sea.” 

“ ‘New”  is a strong word, but I can understand that-”Splash. 

“Surely you’ll let me help you, you can’t just move like this in these waters, they’re too shallow.” (Name) politely waved off the prince’s outstretched hand, wobbling back into an upright position. The shallow water forced them to, which was relatively demeaning, but with a bit more practice, they should be able to somewhat navigate it. 

“Help me how exactly? Don’t worry, I’m getting the hang of this “standing” stuff, it’s the uh… what’s that other word-”“Walking.”“Yes, that! Just give me a moment, I can figure this out-” Splash. “Just, one moment, so jumping didn’t work, what about” Splash “…If at first you don’t succeed, try try again.”Splash. “…About that help…” They did their best to feel no offense as the prince stifled a laugh at their clumsy attempts to walk with one tail. No doubt it did look rather silly. He knelt down towards them, his arms outstretched. 

“May I?”“…Sure.. what exactly are you doiNG?!” From demeaning to just undignified, the little squeak at the end they gave at the sudden shift of position was just not respectable in any way. Nor was the way their arms tightly gripped ‘round Prince Sidon’t neck any way close to being ‘respectable,’ they hadn’t been held like this since before they learned how to swim. “…Guess that does solve the problem, even if the solution is rather… unorthodox.”

“Have you never been held like this?”“I’ve never been fully above water, period. This is…strange, but nothing some time can’t help.”

Secure in his arms, (Name) finally had a chance to take it all in. Arcs high above, silver blending into the water and lit up by the brightly-colored people in its very inconveniently shallow waters. Were they an artist, they could argue it was objectively stunning. 

(Name) was in a whirl. Stunning sights all around, people with knowledge that back home they hadn’t even begin tapping in, incredible culture and people that were kind of terrifying but also so strange and new. And charming in the case of some particular individuals.

They looked up at their red rescuer, and couldn’t help but give a bit of a smile.

Maybe they would enjoy those extra two months after all.

[johnhardinsawyer]

Practicing Forgiveness

John Sawyer

Bedford Presbyterian Church

2 / 24 / 19

Genesis 45:3-11, 15

Luke 6:27-38

“Practicing Forgiveness”

(The Hard Work of the How-to’s)

Get out your tuxedos and ballgowns, break out your spray tans and your Spanx, because tonight – it’s the Oscars!  [Hooray for Hollywood. . . duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh Hollywood!]  That’s right! Tonight, people who love movies will be watching with bated breath to see who will be wearing whom on the red carpet, who will perform during the ceremony, and who will win best sound editing – my favorite category.  People will also be watching to see who will be in the audience, and which stars will be seated next to each other, and whether or not the stars are really just like us.  One person who won’t be at the Oscars tonight – besides yours truly, unfortunately – will be the host of the show.  That’s right, for the first time in a long time, there won’t be a host for this year’s Oscar ceremony.  The comedian Kevin Hart was asked to host but there was a controversy around something that he had said several years ago.  And even though he said he had apologized – years ago and in the years since – for a tasteless joke on Twitter that people didn’t like, apparently his multiple apologies as well as claims that he had evolved in his thinking weren’t enough.  This controversy was going to distract from Hollywood’s big night, so Kevin Hart stepped down from the hosting gig, or he was asked to step down, or something. . .  It gets a little confusing.  

Now, I’m not going to say whether or not I think Kevin Hart should or should not have been able to host the Oscars.  But I am going to say that when it comes to accusations, apologies, and forgiveness, we do live in interesting times.  The rise of social media and the #MeToo and #blacklivesmatter movements as well as the extreme political polarization of our country and world have shown that if you have ever done anything perceived as wrong by a group of people – whether you have committed an actual crime or have simply done something offensive, even long ago, there is a pretty good chance that you will be held to account for it, publicly, whether you are Kevin Hart or Ralph Northam, R. Kelly or Robert Kraft.  And, depending on how sorry you are, and the manner in which you apologize, and/or are punished, you might – just maybe – be forgiven, but not by everyone.

Just so you know, if there is any opportunity for us, as a society, to become more kind, I am all for it.  And, based on the hurtful behavior – racist, sexist, and otherwise – of so many people over the years, it is past time for a reckoning and for people to be held to account for their words and actions.  But, with all of these accusations and dark truths coming to light, is there a time and a place for forgiveness?  Is it even possible to forgive anyone, anymore?  As I said a moment ago, these are interesting times. But, forgiveness has always been interesting. . . and difficult. . .

Imagine this:  

You come from a big family and, over the years, it has become clear that you are one of the favorite children – actually, thefavorite child.  Your dad even gets you a special coat to wear, just as a sign that he thinks you are special.  Well, your older siblings don’t like this very much and they don’t like you very much, so, at an opportune moment, when you are away from home, your siblings find you, beat you up, take your coat, throw you in a pit, and then sell you – for twenty pieces of silver – to some people who are going down to Egypt.[1]  Your siblings then take your ripped up coat back to your father and tell him that you have been killed by wild animals.  

No, this is not the plot of one of tonight’s Oscar-nominated films.  This is just a little bit of the backstory to today’s reading from Genesis.  Joseph was sold, by his brothers, into slavery and was taken to Egypt.  But, over the course of the next few years, Joseph – by the grace of God – was lifted up from slavery to become second only to the king of Egypt.  And, when there was a time of famine and food was in short supply, the kingdom of Egypt had plenty of food in storage because of Joseph.  

People came from other countries in search of food, including Joseph’s older brothers, who did not realize that their little brother was still alive, much less that he was in such a powerful position.  Oh, the irony!  What a great plot twist!  Imagine Joseph’s surprise when his brothers walked into the room, hats in hand, to ask for food. His brothers didn’t recognize him, at first, not even when Joseph was stern with them.  Finally, Joseph couldn’t contain himself any longer.  He broke down and cried, so that his weeping could be heard throughout the palace.  When he was able to speak, he said – much to his brother’s shock –

“I am Joseph, your brother whom you sold into Egypt.  But don’t feel badly, don’t blame yourselves for selling me.  God was behind it.  God sent me here ahead of you to save lives.”[2]

Joseph, who had been helpless to the violent actions of his brothers now found the roles reversed.  He could have ordered to have his brothers killed or sold as slaves, themselves.  Indeed, this is what his brothers feared would happen, but Joseph invited them to come and live in the land of Egypt where they and their families would be safe, fed, and cared-for.  Joseph forgave his brothers for the years of pain and anguish they had caused him, and he meant it. . .  It should be noted that the Bible never says that Joseph forgot what his brothers had done to him.  It just says that he forgave them.  He ran to embrace his brothers and kissed them all (Genesis 45:15)  What they had meant for evil, God used for good.[3]  If this were a movie, the orchestra music would swell, the screen would fade to black, and the credits would start rolling on the Book of Genesis.  When it comes to forgiveness, this is a beautiful story.  This is a perfect, Biblical, example of how to do it.  

Now, I know that it is not likely that many of you have been sold into slavery in Egypt and then years later have been put in a position where you can forgive the people who did that to you, but all of us have opportunities in our own lives to both offer forgiveness and receive forgiveness.

Forgiveness is a powerful thing – a holy thing.  It can be incredibly healing and incredibly hard. Jesus doesn’t make it any easier for us, either.  In today’s reading from the Gospel of Luke, Jesus instructs his disciples:

Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those you curse you, pray for those who abuse you.  If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. . .  Do to others as you would have them do to you. . .  Do not judge and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.  Forgive, and you will be forgiven; give and it will be given to you.  (Luke 6:27-29, 31, 37-38)

These are challenging words, aren’t they?  For many of us, Jesus might as well be saying, “If you flap your arms hard enough, you’ll be able to fly” or just, “Here, folks:  do the impossible. . .”  “Love your enemies?”  “Do not judge?”  “Forgive, and you will be forgiven?”  “Jesus, you’re asking too much of us.”  One commentator writes that Jesus is not offering us

“a recipe for self-help. . . [but instead] it is a recipe for disaster, because the very idea of forgiveness is radical and powerful.  It runs against our thinking, our inclinations, our desires, and our will.”[4]

So, what is Jesus saying, here?  For starters, he is not asking us to be push-overs, or to accept and allow mistreatment by others.  What he is asking of us is to allow God to reframe the conflicts in our lives in holy terms.  Thomas Currie, a retired pastor and professor puts it this way:

The real threat that our enemies represent to us today is that our hatred of them will define who we are and thus give them power to define the meaning of our lives. That is something the gospel is unwilling to let happen. The meaning of our lives belongs no more to our enemies than it does to ourselves. The best thing we can do to love our enemies is to confess our faith in [Jesus,] who refuses to take their enmity as seriously as it wants to be taken, and instead absorbs its poison in the ocean of [God’s] forgiveness.  It is not as if [God] denies their enmity or smothers it with a dismissive sentiment of “love,” but rather that [Jesus] refuses to let their enmity do the one thing it wants to do, which is to claim him for itself. To love one’s enemies is, in this sense, to be set free from engaging them on their own terms. And by raising this possibility, this freedom will enable our enemies to confront, if not discover, a deeper humanity.[5]

In other words, the act of forgiveness is an act of power, in which someone relies on God’s power to overcome, and ultimately overwhelm, the power of an evil that has been done to them.  I know that there are some dark and horrible things that can happen to us and to others – things that we might believe are unforgivable.  There are those hard things that have happened to us which we will never forget, but the real power of forgiveness is not allowing those hard things to have power over us and define us forever.  

This past week, I attended a hearing on the possible repeal of the death penalty in the State of New Hampshire.  Speaker after speaker talked about seemingly unforgivable things happening to the victims of horrendous crimes.  But they also said that holding on to a mindset of vengeance was more psychologically and spiritually damaging in the long-run.  Do we want to be defined by a mindset of vengeance – filling our days and nights with grief and anger – or do we want the power to be healed?

When it came to forgiving his brothers, Joseph held literal power.  He was second only to the king.  But the power that God showed through Joseph was that there is a place – even in the most broken of relationships – for God’s grace to shine through the cracks.  This grace might not fully restore a broken relationship, but it does have the power to bring healing to our own hearts, and minds, and souls – and, in God’s own way and time, healing to those who have done us wrong.

There is a verse to a hymn that I love which speaks to this – a verse that we will often skip and not sing, by request, whenever we sing the hymn because what it asks of us is so hard:

For just and unjust, a place at the table,

abuser, abused, with need to forgive,

in anger, in hurt, a mindset of mercy,

for just and unjust, a new way to live.[6]

Jesus Christ has shown us this new way to live and how hard it is to live it.  This forgiveness stuff isn’t for the faint of heart.  It takes courage, it takes faith, and it takes practice.

There is a friend of our church named Nancy, who comes to the monthly worship services that we offer at the Birch Hill retirement community.  

This past week, Nancy told a story about how she never really got along with her daughter-in-law.  For years, Nancy’s daughter-in-law kept Nancy’s son and grandchildren away from Nancy. This was tremendously painful for Nancy. But when her daughter-in-law was diagnosed with brain cancer and slipped into a coma, it was Nancy who moved in to care for her during her final days.  Her daughter-in-law might not have even known that it was Nancy who was sitting by her bedside, but Nancy knew.  She knew that her very presence at her daughter’s bedside was an act of forgiveness.  God had given her the power to practice forgiveness and she claimed that power for her own – to not let the brokenness of a relationship define how that relationship came to an end.

Even though we live in interesting and difficult times, there is still a place for forgiveness – in our own minds and hearts, in the life of our families, in the life of our nation, and world.  The reason why I say this is that I believe in the One who came to offer forgiveness to all the world.  Even as Jesus was dying on the cross, an innocent victim of human cruelty, he prayed, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.”  (Luke 23:34)

Oh, how hard and oh, how holy. . .  May we live, and may we forgive with that kind of grace. . .

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

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[1]See Genesis 37.

[2]Eugene Peterson, The Message – Numbered Edition (Colorado Springs:  NAV Press, 2002) 73.  Genesis 45:4ff.

[3]See Genesis 50:20.

[4]David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, ed. Feasting on the Word – Year C, Vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009) 383. Homiletical Perspective, Vaughn Crowe-Tipton.

[5]https://pres-outlook.org/2018/05/what-does-jesus-mean-by-love-your-enemies/.

[6]Shirley Erena Murray, 1998. “For Everyone Born” © 1998 Hope Publishing Company.  Glory to God – The Presbyterian Hymnal(Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2013) 769.