#still feel like an imposter in the fanfic world but doing this helped

[lavendelhummel]

20 Questions about writing - another tag-game!

Now that I spend my Sunday doing the music game, why not do it again? Because  as I said before but want to say again: thank you for *all* the tags @lilolilyr ! I appreciate all of them a whole lot! But especially the ones about writing!! Because I love writing and talking about it and because I still struggle a bit to call myself writer with my cute little 125k words on ao3 and especially with so rarely finding the time to write recently :( Aaand looks like I just answered one of the questions: 

2. What’s your total ao3 word count?

It’s 125418 at the moment (hoping that I’ll finally come around editing the 10k chapter next weekend, that sits on my computer for months now, that would change it quite drastically but we’ll see).

But back to the beginning: 

1. How many works do you have on ao3?

Not that many, 7. Most of my ideas still live in my head, mostly out of lack of time to write. It's a very varied mix of length though, my first work are 15 chapters of single one shots, that I posted as one story because I didn't want to take up to much space. Then I have the WiP, that is almost 80k now and not at all finished, I have most of the next chapter finished and it's again quite long. But in between being able to finish that I suddenly started posting shorter works too, one two-shot and one one-shot. And now there is also two new one shots that are a different fandom and the first thing I was able to write since I had to stop for real life stress reasons for a few months, one of them was written together with @lilolilyr, another first experience, writing together, such fun! And then there is also another oneshot collection about pregnancy, that I almost forgot, that I have plans for but tbh they are not very high on the priority list.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Mostly The Wheel of Time (well, Siuaraine aka the fishwives) so far, but those two newer ones are Warehouse 13 (Bering&Wells) and so are many of my unwritten ideas. And I wrote about Marla and Fran from I care a lot.

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Well, since there aren't that many, it's all of them expect for those two Warehouse ones.

But to be more precise: for some reason, by far, very far that one-shot collection for I care a lot with 176 kudos. I don't understand this at all, because I wouldn't rec them nor do them this way again, they are quite weird and my first fanfic steps. I definitely see that I have gotten better since then, even though it hasn't been terribly long! Still, I am very happy if people had fun reading this!! Second is the long fic with so far 7 chapters and I think, this can be explained by it having more chapters than the others but also I put a lot of work in it, so it's nice. And then the 4 chapter one shot collection with 48 kudos, then the one shot I wrote as a birthday present for @ginnyjyng and fifth the short mermaid two shot - still planning on writing a longer Mermaid AU! - with 18 kudos.

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

Yes, every single one, always so far. Even this one, though it confused me a lot:

And why? Because if someone says something to me, I answer, I react? Because comments make me over the moon happy and I want to show it? Because I love to talk to people and when someone comes to me to talk, yes I will talk! And I think I would feel impolite not to as well, if someone goes out of their way to tell me something about my writing, then I can answer that. And also! I am unfortunately still working on overcoming my shyness in commenting other peoples fics and if I do that and get a reply it makes me a) happy and b) makes it so much easier to comment again because it means I hopefully didn't annoy the person (rationally I know that other people are as happy about comments as I am but... it's not fully rational).

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I don't think I have any fic with an angsty ending! Life is hard enough, I want happy endings and also happy beginnings and middle parts! So no angsty endings at all, but you could call the fix-it chapter/one shot of the I care a lot- collection angsty because it deals with the not-so-happy ending of the otherwise great movie (I don't like it anymore, if anyone wants to read about it, better try the follow up chapter, that one is better). And maybe also my new warehouse13 fic, because it deals with Helenas grief and pain, but it's about healing through poetry and both have happy endings!

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Well, all of them then? Happ-iest though... I mean both of the above mentioned because they have a happy resolve? Or rather the ones that are pure fluff, like the birthday one? Or the mermaid one, because sapphic mermaids are the happy ending I am still waiting for for my own life? Btw., even every chapter of the long WiP has its own happy ending. Oh, and I guess chapter7 was a bit angstier too and has a very happy ending! And so chapter8 starts very happy, but unfortunately still unedited in a word document...

8. Do you get hate on fic?

I wouldn't say "hate". But the very first comment I ever got wasn't very positive and I have to admit, it stung for a good while. I am mostly over it now. Well, and the one from above from "weird ass" (why?) calling me "tea snob" (weird ass is right on this one, so I guess its just truth and no hate).

9. Do you write smut?

No, but not because I don't want to or think it's bad. I enjoy reading it from other writers! But I can't do it (yet). I will allude to it though and feel more confident in that the longer I write fic in general, so maybe one day, I will. Right now, I can't.

10. Do you write crossovers?

No, it's not something that interests me. Not even in the little head-scenarios, it just doesn't happen.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

I don't think so. But again, my fics aren't very plentiful or popular and most very specific, so I don't think they'd be first choice to steal.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, and I can repeat it here again, my fics aren't very plentiful or popular and most very specific, so I don't think they'd be first choice to x (steal, translate, anything).

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

Woooohpppp, yes, as I mentioned already, now I have! @lilolilyr and I had fun mentally teasing poor Helena here! It was definitely very different from writing alone, different mindset, atmosphere and feeling afterwards but fun! Different kind of fun than sitting alone at my desk ;) (which is also fun if it's for fanfic). And it was quite spontaneous, we were both actually working on other fics and then interrupted those to do this. Aaand now maybe this new thing that we just thought of? What is going on?

14. What’s your all-time favourite ship?

I have to say Moiraine and Siuan here! I can't say yet Bering&Wells because I have only been obsessed with them for months, but it feels like an obsession that is going to stick.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but probably won’t?

I only have one WIP that is more than an outline and a few sentences but actual posted chapters, it's Yellow. I do still plan on finishing that, the reason it hasn't been updated is that I couldn't write anything at all for a few months and am easing back into writing slowly (still dont have huge amounts of time). But I am thinking about cutting it a bit shorter than originally planned. It would still fully work in the plot and as I said each chapter has a happy end, so it would just not follow their lives as long but have a finished ending. I have 85% of the new chapter written but haven't touched it since mid-july. It is coming!

In my head I have so many and the thought of giving some of them up hurts but realistically I won't write them all. I'll have to see which ones I'll be able to pursue.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I can bring a flow into the emotions I try to describe, that they feel kind of natural? And I can't be too trope-y or fake, same as I can't lie in real life, so I'd think my writing should be rather authentic? This is a difficult question, but what I can definitely say is that writing makes me feel very good. It's a very special mindset and calmness that it brings, like a little candle that gets lit inside of me.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Dialogue, I'd say. Not that my dialogue is particularly bad, but initiating it instead of describing the protagonists inner world is sometimes a problem. But I am working on it and I feel like my writing is only getting better. I mean after the involuntary break I am a bit rigid and have to get back into practice but in general there is progress.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

The thing is that there are some things I am used to saying in one language and others in another. Before I committed to fanfic I mostly wrote melodramatic poems in Frallemand (because let’s be honest, Freutsch klingt scheiße), maybe 80% French (because that’s what I mostly use in my head for some reason) and 20% German (because that is after all what I grew up with and spent the bigger part of my life with). So, yes, I love using that! But it had to fit the character and the story, have a reason. And I often find it doesn‘t go very naturally in some fics. In my head it makes sense to use multiple languages but in my head lots of things make sense that could be hard to follow on page. The question is what is the character‘s relationship with this language and words in general? Who are they talking to, do they understand? What about the POV is it in the mixed languages too? 

Are it words or whole sections? I don’t like just using cliché words in that language and the whole rest in English, no one (me?) talks like that. 

So far when I have used another language than English, it was in a way that it got explained during the next few sentences by the characters anyway, so it felt like a flow and not interrupted by translation.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

It was I care a lot. I had been trough a bad few months mentally and was starting to do better, and when I watched that film (and loved it) suddendly I started having ideas and it felt like a fog had finally be lifted. I hadn’t been able to access my creative side for a few years at that point because of stress, and it felt so good. So I tried to never give it up again (obviously I had to take breaks again but I didn’t forget about it like before).

And when I read more interviews with Rosamund Pike because of I care a lot I found out about The Wheel of Time and read the books and got into that. 

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

My favorite is the least popular. It is a bit of nonsense but so fun and I like the ambiance. Dreaming of waves. The first chapter is serious and actually canon compliant and the second a bit cracky. A bit of siuaraine mermaid fic when I couldn’t write a whole long AU (which I still want to do but we will see when). And now I also like the most recent one I posted, it’s about Helena discovering my favorite poet and so probably as self indulgent as the mermaid one. I got very little feedback on both, especially the last one, so if someone has thoughts, I’d love to discuss them! 

Thank you again, so much for tagging me @lilolilyr! I am tagging @lakeofsilverpike and @trollocks-in-my-bollocks. Sorry to both of you, if this feels spammy, I think it is kind of fun and you said you didn't mind spamming. I am curious to know about your feelings on writing, but only do it if you want to! I will stop doing these again now, this took me three days and will spent my time rather on actual fic writing and not writing about writing ;)

[beneathsilverstars]

very possible youve done this before but…. can u come up with some hcs about how the party connects with nille? in a post canon hypothetical

(youve probably talked a lot about nille before but just!! general ideas. maybe silly ideas. anything u wanna share you havent talked about before. etc :])

Ok this is all minor spoilers for my currently unposted Nille fanfic and major spoilers for my currently unwritten post-canon fanfic but I don't care if you don't, let's go.

People usually write Nille as quite overprotective of Bonnie, and I do too, but I also write her as unsure that she's good enough to protect them! So her big reaction to meeting the party is "I failed to keep Bonnie safe, of course I failed, I was always doomed to fail. And these people succeeded!! Who am I next to the Saviors of Vaugarde??"

So she kinda feels like shit, personally. And she has no idea how to act around the party, because there's the way she acts around strangers, and there's the way she acts around people she trusts, and it is understandably bizarre for those circles to overlap. Since she can't be suspicious or friendly, and she's feeling somewhat useless, I think her instinct is to kinda just... fade back..? Which is upsetting to her in itself, which feeds back into the problems. But! Everyone is very determined to connect with her, and "we love the same kid" is a great way to bond, and Nille still has her usual Bambouche support system to help her sort out her feelings, and the party have been working on their communication skills. So they figure it out!

Her exact first impression of Siffrin probably depends a lot on how he's coping at that point post-canon, which isn't something I've decided yet... But it's some sort of strange mix of "I owe you my life" and "Wowww do you need my therapist's number" and "#Relatable /neg /pos". Siffrin meanwhile is anxious as fuck because he's not just meeting the most important person in Bonnie's life, she also has the power to break apart the family he nearly destroyed the world to keep together! So it's a little awkwardly intense on both sides.

Then once they get to know each other better, there's some emotional difficulty in how similar they are; it's hard not to compare what's worse, remembering shitty parents or not remembering any family, being alone or having to take care of a young child. So there's some pity and guilty jealousy on both sides. But also commiseration and understanding! But also they're liable to trigger each other's issues occasionally, what with Siffrin still having a rather poor handle on their own emotions and Nille disrupting the party dynamics. But they don't really hold it against each other; it would be hypocritical, and none of that matters compared to the fact that they've both nearly died for Bonnie. They like to go fishing together, sometimes Nille helps explain things that Siffrin only knows through muscle memory. And Nille does end up passing on some therapy tips!

Nille is a little star-struck by Mirabelle, who is the Chosen Savior of Vaugarde and only a couple years older than her and so heroic and nice and well-adjusted! Mirabelle is on a similar but less extreme wavelength, excited to meet Bonnie's sister who she's heard so intriguingly little about, but who must be so brave and cool! Once they get to know each other more it's kind of a confidence boost for Nille to realize that even Mirabelle has anxiety and imposter syndrome and is just some girl who found herself in the position to do something and she did her best to do it. And Mirabelle thinks Nille is just as cool as she imagined!

They end up taking some small classes together for fun at various Houses while they travel. When Mirabelle figures out that Nille isn't very good at reading, she reads books to her sometimes, and recommends her books that aren't too hard but also aren't too kiddie. One more for the girl's night book club! They have some good convos too about the balance of protecting and caring for a child vs giving them space to grow confident and independent, since Mira's parents were quite stifling; it's easier to find the acceptable middle range when you know what both failure modes look like, instead of just the one horrible extreme.

Isabeau is very friendly, and used to working with strangers and projecting an aura of safety, so he's got the chillest dynamic with Nille to start. He's the one who notices that her easy acceptance of the group was a little too easy and actually has some difficult feelings behind it. And he's been working on being braver, so he consults with his friends and then talks to Nille about it! I think it's a scary conversation but helpful in the long run, it's the start of establishing actual personal trust rather than just assumptions and idealization.

Since that precedent has been set, Isabeau becomes Nille's first choice if she needs to bring something up to the group. Doesn't hurt that he reminds her of one of the first people she met in Bambouche, too! On Isabeau's side, he likes having the opportunity to get to know someone new while he's figuring out his new self. And he's so delighted when she joins the war on puns as a whole new front: dad jokes. She wasn't even particularly into them before, she just wanted to shake up the battlefield. Nille and Isabeau also spar sometimes, because she hates how poorly she did at defending Bonnie, and Isabeau has the most formal/practical training in self-defense to pass on. (And he's the most willing to do physically-demanding activities for fun after already walking all day.)

Nille finds Odile intimidating. She's not sweet like Mira, or exuberant like Isa, or, uh, whatever the fuck Siffrin has going on. She's a full generation older than Nille and hard to read! Scary! But Bonnie adores her, and she's been making an effort to be more reassuring to Siffrin lately which shows, and Isabeau starts being more teasing-rude to Odile (the way she is to him) to prove that he can annoy her without repercussion which is really funny. So it doesn't take all too long for Nille to come down from high alert for the most part! And Odile respects Nille hardcore for raising Bonnie and takes her very seriously, which she appreciates.

Odile takes point on tutoring Bonnie, because she has some formal teaching experience and they're most likely to sit and listen for her anyway, but the others will give lessons on this or that. But Odile soon realizes from the way Nille hovers but doesn't help that she is actually further behind in schooling than Bonnie, and makes it her mission to rectify that. It's kinda rocky at first because Nille is both self-conscious of and resigned to her lack of education, but once she starts getting into it she really gets into it! This brings Odile and Nille a lot closer and Nille ends up admiring her a lot, especially as she catches hints of wild Odile lore.

Loop really likes getting to know Nille, since she never knew pre-loops Siffrin but she's still connected to their family. Not a stranger, not a copy, best of both worlds! Nille also appreciates having another person there who feels out of place in the party dynamics. She thinks Loop is funny, but also worrying, but they have enough people worried about them that she decides to goof off with them and enable them instead. Like yes it's probably bad for their mental health to make this kind of joke but it's worse to have everyone constantly analyzing their jokes' healthiness, yknow? Ironically, this (along with her newcomer status) means that Loop takes her worry more seriously and is more likely to listen to her than anyone else (except maybe Siffrin but only maybe).

Sometimes Loop gets a little too frantically irrational and it freaks Nille out because it reminds her of her and her mom's manic episodes. But she can disengage and tag someone else in, and see from afar that it all turns out okay! Loop gets some therapy tips from her too, but not necessarily the same ones as Siffrin. And they give her super shitty advice in return, in that way where it makes you realize how shitty it is and commit yourself to doing the opposite. They like to do silly things together that Nille never got the chance to do as a child and Loop doesn't remember doing, like rolling around in mud puddles and staying up all night just to watch the sunrise. Nille doesn't feel as self-conscious about acting juvenile because Loop is like a billion years old, but she also doesn't have to be in charge the way she is when playing with Bonnie! And Loop gets to make brand new memories with someone who has no old ones to compare them to!

Bonnie is super happy to see Nille for like, a day, and then they get really mad at her more often than not for like a week (because now that they're home with her it's safe to be distraught and uncooperative), and then they settle back into a more consistent dynamic. But it takes a while longer for them to be able to comfortably get any farther away from each other than maybe a room over; Bonnie confidently heads off and then suddenly comes running back, and Nille is so brave about separating and bravely panics the entire time. Oh well! The first time around it only took her a couple years to get to be okay with Bonnie being away from her, she'll figure it out again eventually!

There's no rush.

[mc-cos-charm]

This one will be a short thing so don't expect much.

GENSHIN AU: SAGAU (a cult in later chap?)

"THE ONE WHO WOKE UP IN A DREAM"

Pronunciation of you: You, them/their, neutral.

Characters; 'you' for now , Klee , Amber . ???

Warning : self-harm , blood (please if you are not comfortable do not read) gore

3rd p.o.v

It isn't really that much of a big deal when it comes to doing your work and finishing it quickly. It just naturally happened that your phone was near you and is begging for you to play and entertain yourself rather than do lousy work.

Your p.o.v

I picked up my phone that is near me , the wallpaper showed my favorite things. Apps I downloaded out of sheer boredom , swiping before seeing the GENSHIN app. It's like a daily thing to do , open GENSHIN . Log in . Do the dailies . Burn every raisin. Rage on artifacts that are not even half decent . Admire the characters I love, and or co-op with other players who will sometimes kick me out after they are done... Wait the last one is actually sad..

Just that , before pulling on the latest banner, though I got qiqi while pulling on the event banner.

I yawn for a moment before looking at my work that is clearly not even half done.

'I'll do that later , just a few more seconds..'

3rd p.o.v

That is what you thought after falling asleep and seeing yourself in a rather....

peaceful place?

The warm sun , the smooth grass , the air that isn't polluted , well that is certainly new after being immune to industrial air but anyway , this is rather...

PANICKING SITUATION— I mean , you didn't do your work who knows when that'll be due...

Looking left and then right. Only the wind knows where you are.

Your p.o.v

'should there be a character that will say imposter like any other SAGAU right?'

I thought to myself before wandering off. The sky is cloudless and the sounds that surround me are only birds , nature and the nearby body of water.

"what does every imposter slash creator always do here again?" I mumbled out, grasping any fanfics and stories I had read over Tumblr, AO3 , quotav and Wattpad..

"right... What am I even wearing?",

it's not really an armor or anything that could save me if ever a character suddenly came and attacked me. It's just simple clothes.

I sat on a nearby tree , a huge one at that with the tree comes the anemo statue.

'Monsdadt'

"it would really help if I could have clue on what I'm supposed to do..but right now , I'm just very confused"

I said before looking up . I could see how the leaves sway in a gentle manner , it creates some small gaps letting small lights in..

it's pretty, if you think about it .

it looks like the gaps create stars that you could only watch in daylight.

"ah wait , in things like this blood is important!"

before pricking my finger with a sharp dried stick I found on the ground, the blood was red and then it turned white? And then shimmer lightly before it became gold.

"yeah.. ill be hunted , bad." ,

it isn't much but , it's not like I have any energy to run, I mean.. I'm too tired..

If they want to kilL me then just do it so that there won't be any problem or if they want I'll gladly do it myself.

That was what I was thinking before seeing a shadow loom and stare at me

"hello? Are you lost?" A blond haired little girl said.

"I guess..." I answered reluctantly.

It's not that I'm lost , it's just that I'm quite tired for some reason. It's the feeling that the world itself is eating every ounce of my energy and forces me to sleep and be tired.

"well you're in luck! Because the best knight is right in front of you! My name is klee , nice to meet you" Klee said gleefully , looking at me with curiosity.

"I'm glad to fina– I'm glad to meet you klee , my name is '—————' ..." I said as I smiled at klee . The feeling of being sucked in an unknown reason is still making itself known to me. Does that even make sense? To me.. no , definitely not. What kind of monologue is that even?

"uhm... Sorry? May I know your name again?" Klee said , she somehow didn't recognize what you looked like but you are not a local from what you're wearing right now.

"oh , it's alright.. no need to apologize. My name is '————±±' , is it hard to pronounce?" I asked Klee who is looking more confused at me

"are you saying your name? Because all klee hears are just long tiiiinggg , like that and nothing more..." Klee said as she begins to look even more confused and troubled .

Will this be a problem in the future? Maybe ? But who knows?

"ah... I don't know.." I answered truthfully, even I don't know what's going on .

"KLEE!!" A lady came in red , with a bow in her hand.

"come here! Right now Klee , quick!" The lady said before grabbing klee's arm gently yet firmly.

"excuse me.. but may I know—" , before realizing what's going on there was a painful throb in my head causing me to silence myself.

BLOOD ...

Pitter , patter , blood dripping into the ground.

There was someone else who aimed the arrow in my direction and cruelly shot me in the head.

It hurts ... IT HURTS ... MAKE IT STOP.

a low glow around me , surrounding me like a warm blanket before disappearing In front of everyone.

Much to the ladies horror. Who would have thought that someone would aim and shoot at a stranger In front of them no less.

It was fast.

Everything happened too quickly and amber could only thank barbatos that she put her hand on klee's eyes before everything happened.

Alright .

That's a wrap up everyone , go to sleep now. It's 11:37 pm.

Though let me know if you guys want to continue this..

And could I have a favor with you , reader.

What will be your fake name or an alias ? You guys need a certain nickname to continue on this.

Let me know in the comments (⁠.⁠ ⁠❛⁠ ⁠ᴗ⁠ ⁠❛⁠.⁠)

, thank you for reading .

[princesscolumbia]

And now for something different from my usual!

Normally, I write some variety of fanfiction, and I'm 100% proud of nearly everything I've ever written. (Yes, even THAT one.) If I could, without any sort of IP complications, write just for fanfic I'd streamline my process and chunk out words for fanfics all day long, get a book contract, and quit my day job. In a friggin' heartbeat.

Unfortunately, fanfic has all sorts of complications if you want to make a living as an author. This, unfortunately, results in fanfic authors either quitting because the whole thing is a time sink and they have a life a job and things to get done, or they become "grown up" authors with a publishing deal and (in many cases) wind up deleting their fanworks in bulk "because they're Srs Riters™️now!"

When I wrapped up My Empire of Dirt, I took a look at the finished product and said, "...you know, I think I might just be good at this writing thing." But I had in my head the little monster that wasn't quite Imposter Syndrome (more like an ugly cousin of Imposter Syndrome) that said that no matter how good I was, nobody would ever like what I wrote, especially if it was original work.

(This was my stepmother's horrible, abusive language that she hammered into me viciously during my teenage years. Knowing the source helps, but it's still something I have to work to overcome on occasion.)

I had some ideas that I started jotting down (and yes, they're still on the 'to write' pile), but nothing really 'clicked' as a, "OMG, I've got to write this thing!"

Then I read Trouble with Horns. And I needed more, so I read Witch of Chains...and Illegal Alien in an MMO World, and Lieforged Gale, and Digital Galaxies, and Esmie the Calamity, and Coven's Rebellion, and Digital Exodus. And even as early as Witch of Chains I knew I had a story to tell that the setting of a post-WW3 Earth in the middle of The Singularity would let me tell it in.

And I realized...wait, this is it! This is my "training wheels" for writing original fics! Because QuietValerie won't do collabs with other authors anymore (long story involving the Kammiverse and RoyalRoad), but does let people play in her sandbox with carte blanch (and, best of all, no lawyers involved), I can write a fic that's got only a few connection points to Troubleverse to prop it up and draw an audience, and if AuthorBun ever disavows Code of Ethics entirely, it'll take some work but I'll be able to de-couple it entirely! It's, from the outset, 95% original work. If I have to re-jigger that last 5%...well, published authors often have to rework a LOT more of their original works than that, so...let's do this!

And it's worked for me! ALL the hesitance I used to have for writing original fics is gone. I've created interesting, dynamic characters, built out entire story worlds, constructed a complex and interwoven plot that has my readers guessing and thirsty for clues, and the only reason I haven't finished is because there's just so much story to tell!

So for this November (and no, I'm not digging into the whole NaNoWriMo corporate BS right now), I decided to take an idea that, just like Code of Ethics, seized me by the throat and said, "This story is one that needs to be told and you're the only one who can."

George lives in a world that feels gray. In spite of superheroes based in the city he lives in with his mom, the clubs he's in at school, and the handful of friends he's managed to pick up, at ripe old age of 15 years old he feels disconnected from it all. Then one day a Quantum Storm hits. These storms are how superheroes (and villains) get their powers, and George is right in the middle of it, suddenly granting him super powers…along with a brand new GIRL body! Fortunately for HER, she stumbles onto a mentor at the same time. …that all happened six months ago. Now she's in a hospital on the West coast, super-cuffed to a bed, and about to answer for her crimes…including murder. How did this happen?!

Preview, as always, below the cut:

Georgie woke up.

She was somewhat surprised to discover that she was even alive, let alone awake. After what she’d done, she was surprised that anyone had let her live at all.

After what she’d done, she probably deserved it.

It wasn’t fair, of course. It never was, but complaining about whether life was fair or not only led down the path of the supervillain, heroes accepted that life wasn’t fair and participated in the Sisyphean task of making it more fair.

She’d learned the word ‘Sisyphean’ in English class a few weeks ago. She’d never quite understood why the former-hero-turned-villain Sisyphus had gone black-cape until recently, nor had she understood how his chosen name connected to the work he had been doing. Now that she had some experience being a superhero, she thought she understood better than anyone not blessed with superpowers could.

No matter what good you did, at some point it all came crashing down.

She looked around a bit, noticing the room she was in was dark, but there was a counter with a sink across from her, a lightbox mounted to the wall, a television mounted to the ceiling, and some translucent curtains over some windows showing it was about mid-afternoon…wherever she was. What little she could make out of the landscape through the curtains didn’t look anything like the city she lived in. I was running for a long time, she mused, And for me that’s saying something.

She turned her attention back to the room and noted there was an I.V. pole next to the bed she was in and a tube snaking down to what she presumed was the pinching sensation in the back of her hand. She couldn’t follow the tube all the way down to look at her hand, not yet. Had anyone else been in her spot, they might have been overjoyed to be alive after what she’d been through. Not her, though.

For her, there was a fate worse than death, and she wasn’t ready to face that yet.

On the other side of the bed was what appeared to be a heartrate monitor, but she was no expert on medical equipment. The bit that was supposed to be showing the two-peak bumping line that represented a human heartbeat was an almost solid bar of white, though the flickering of the screen told her that it was desperately trying to record a heartrate that was far faster than the machine was capable of registering.

There was no getting around it, she was in a hospital room, and a fairly high-end one, if she could rely on what she’d seen of such things on TV as an indication.

As for the part that came next, well, she had to muster her courage…and after everything she’d been through, ‘courage’ was a word she wasn’t sure she had any claim to.

It was surprisingly hard, knowing what was coming and knowing she had to face it. Just a little longer, a voice was whispering in the back of her mind, Just let yourself imagine nothing has changed just a little bit longer, it’s not like you’re not going to find out soon enough anyway.

Available exclusively to my supporters on Patreon.

[heathtrash]

When you're working on TWW fanfic, how do you get like new inspiration or even just the motivation to keep going?

(p.s. thank you for keeping the fandom alive!!)

inspiration/ideas are something i almost never have a problem with. i come up with new scenarios for these gays almost constantly and it's everything in me to not just constantly begin new wips and crossovers and aus that have never been explored! and there's so much media to draw from with tww with all eight books, the shows, the movie, the spinoffs - idk but even like vanilla 2017 or 1998 stuff is always giving me life, maybe because i'm an insatiable multishipper with no chill and an adoration of rarepairs.

i also make sure i "read around" tww. i watch things or listen to audiobooks with a related genre or vibe, especially if i'm exploring au or want to go for a specific tone. keeping your brain active and making connections like this helps so much with inspiration and plot. it's like going on a silly little mental health walk, but instead of nature or whatever, you're opening your brain up to new possibilities. even something completely unrelated can spark something! it makes the worlds you write feel a bit richer as you're writing them.

motivation is something different, because i struggle with a lot of self-confidence in my own writing (lol, cptsd. i'm in therapy). comments on my works do really help with that. but these days people seem to feel weird about leaving comments on works that aren't like a week old??? bruh people still talk about books that are decades or centuries old. and we have some lovely people still in the fandom who are willing to read some of my work, and that is amazing to me!!

but of course, there are fics i've started that i am not sure will ever see the light of day because i feel like they're not good enough, or works that i've put up that very few people were interested in (rip to pippa university years my beloved. never escaped single digits on the kudos for 10k of fic). those embarrassments and failures hold me back so much because they confirm my own negative thoughts about my writing and make me not want to put my energy into this. i have a full plan of chapter 13 of a clock with no hands, but i keep giving myself imposter syndrome over my ability to write it well enough. idk. rationally, i know that the types of story i write are sometimes not what people want to read. i think it's important to talk about (please i am NOT fishing) because i'm sure there are many people who feel the same way. some people even look up to me as a writer?? but i cannot emphasise enough that it's a miracle that anything goes online with my mental health being how it is.

anyway, enough about me! mostly i try to think primarily of the fandom and what's best for us right now. that's why i'm running the drabble exchange, which i think will be a really fun way to get little sparks of inspiration going for everyone, as well as hopefully providing a chance for new writers to dip their toe into whatever ship they like! please sign up to join in - this is the last weekend before i close sign-ups!

i'm certainly not solely responsible for keeping the fandom alive though!!! there are some incredible artists who are doing a much better job of that than me with the recent influx of art - as well as all those who are writing new fics that are providing after the slump we had with the conclusion of the 2017 series. it was really hard to recover the fandom after s3, and i know i've had a small part to play in that with the twitter group chat evolving into reviving the discord. but i couldn't have done any of that if no one else was around to join in!

(also side note - general invitation extended to anyone who wants to join the discord!)

[nagichi-boop]

I'm Not an Idiot (ROTTMNT fanfic)

I was held at gunpoint and told to write this because I was being mean to myself. /j

Jk, I actually had this idea and was given an excuse to write it. So without further ado...

— x —

April scowled at her homework, impatiently tapping her pen against her head. Leo, who was sat reading a comic nearby, looked up to see his friend struggling.

“You good over there, April?” he asked curiously.

“Yeah, I’m dandy,” April answered sarcastically. She stared at her work for a few moments before before sighing loudly and leaning back in her seat. “This homework is impossible! Why did teach give us this during our holiday week? It’s not fair.” She took a deep breath. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be this ridiculous over this.” “Nothing ridiculous about it,” Leo replied sincerely. “Do you need help?” “I might need it,” April admitted. Leo stood up and had just made his way to April before she continued speaking. “Do you think you can get Donnie for me? It seems like something he is best able to help me with.” Leo tensed up a little.

“Sure thing,” Leo smiled through gritted teeth, then began to walk away. He stopped. “By the way, you need to divide by 4 to isolate x.” April looked up in surprise, but before she had the chance to say anything, Leo had already left the room.

After briefly visiting Donnie in his lab to deliver April’s message, Leo went to his room and flopped on his bed face first, burying his head in his pillow. He grumbled into it frustratedly for a while.

“Leo, are you okay?” Mikey asked as he peered around into Leo’s room, startling Leo.

“How long have you been there?” Leo responded, turning his head to the side. “I didn’t hear you walk up to the room.”

“Not too long,” Mikey answered, then smiled proudly. “I have been practicing my sneaking.”

Leo frowned, then turned his head to face the wall. “I’m not in the mood for jokes right now, Mikey.” Mikey paused for a moment before speaking again.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not really,” Leo huffed in annoyance. After the room fell silent, Leo began to feel guilty. “But…I guess I wouldn’t mind some company.”

“You sure? I can leave you be if that would be better for you.” “It’s fine,” Leo insisted, speaking more softly than he had before. Mikey walked into Leo’s room, sitting down and leaning beside his bed. They remained quiet for a bit before Leo began to feel restless. “If I tell you what’s wrong, you won’t snitch to anyone?” “Of course not,” Mikey assured. “Dr Feelings doesn’t share information about his patients.” “I don’t want to talk to Dr Feelings,” Leo bemoaned. “I want to speak to Mikey.” “Oh,” Mikey responded, a little surprised. He smiled again. “I can do that, too.”

Leo remained silent for a while, trying to compose his thoughts. “I guess…I’m just a bit annoyed that people seem to underestimate me all the time.”

“What do you mean?”

“April was doing her homework earlier and didn’t even ask if I could help before she told me to get Donnie for me,” Leo clarified. “I mean, I know I’m not very smart and Donnie is definitely in a better position to help April, but for some reason it still annoyed me.”

Mikey hummed thoughtfully. “It sounds a little like imposter syndrome to me,” Mikey commented. “Which…is a poor name for it.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, it’s more of a narrative that someone has rather than a syndrome, which suggest it’s an affliction that-”

“No no,” Leo interrupted. “I mean what is imposter syndrome?”

“Oh, my bad,” Mikey apologised, playfully poking his tongue out. “It’s a term people use to describe someone who believes they’re not qualified for something, even if there is plenty of proof to support the opposite. Everyone in the world could tell that person they are great at something, but they won’t believe it themselves. So in your case, you believe you’re not smart despite the opposite being true.” “Oh yeah?” Leo spoke, forcing an insincere smile. “What proof do you have of that?” “How many times have me, Donnie and Raph rushed into a situation that you insisted wasn’t safe? Who was is that accurately guessed what his brothers did when we fought against Shredder? Heck, who was it that tricked Big Mama in order to get the mystic collar?”

“I did,” Leo reluctantly acknowledged. “But you all still treat me like an irresponsible kid.” “That has less to do with you than it does us,” Mikey confessed. “Sometimes being aloof makes people make assumptions. They assume you’re irresponsible, stupid, immature; those kinds of things.” Leo spun his head around and looked down at Mikey. “That doesn’t mean that’s the truth, it’s just how others see it.”

“That was…awfully accurate and specific,” Leo remarked. He then paused and thought about it, then his eyes widened in realisation. “Wait, are you talking from personal experience?”

“See, you are smart!” Mikey chimed playfully.

“I’m sorry we’ve made you feel that way, Mikey,” Leo apologised remorsefully.

“It’s alright,” Mikey spoke half-heartedly. “I guess we are both a bit guilty of it, huh?” Leo sat up and began to pat beside himself, inviting Mikey to sit with him. His younger brother jumped at the opportunity, quickly standing and then taking a seat beside Leo. To his surprise, Leo placed his hand on Mikey’s head and gently guided it to his shoulder, then moved his hand to Mikey’s shoulder for a side hug. Mikey’s happy façade slipped a little and he closed his eyes to take in the moment.

“So you really don’t think I’m dumb?” Leo croaked insecurely.  

“Far from it,” Mikey replied without hesitation. “I know you insist you’re just the face man of the group, but I think we would all be genuinely lost without you.” They went quiet as Leo rested his head atop Mikey’s.

“I’m sorry for treating you like a kid sometimes,” Leo softly spoke.

“I mean, it’s not always a bad thing,” Mikey admitted. “I can go a bit off the walls sometimes. And you cut me a lot more slack than Raph does,” Mikey pouted.

“Yeah, I know what you mean,” Leo sighed. “But he’s not doing it maliciously. Raph just feels a heavy weight as the eldest sibling because he feels responsible for our safety.”

“But that’s not his problem,” Mikey spoke up, unaware of his volume, to which covered his mouth in shock.

“I know, but what we do and think isn’t always rational,” Leo noted. He then tensed up a little. “And, well…being put in the position of responsibility, I sort of understand how he feels.” Mikey looked up at him sadly. Leo took a deep breath, then smirked at Mikey. “I guess I’m glad I have such competent brothers.”

“And we are lucky to have such a smart leader,” Mikey grinned back. The two of them leaned closer into each other, smiling contently.

“Alright,” Leo suddenly spoke up, interrupting the silence. “Enough of this mushy stuff. What’s say we raid the arcade while Donnie is busy helping April?” “Are you sure you’re okay?” Mikey questioned out of concern. “I am here to listen if you have anything else on your mind.” “You’ve helped me plenty,” Leo confirmed. “But maybe I’ll take you up on that offer another day if that’s okay?” “I’m always down to listen to you,” Mikey assured.

“Thanks, little bro,” Leo spoke as he pet Mikey’s head. He then shot up off the bed, stretching his arms above his head before smirking smugly at Mikey. “Okay, enough stalling. Let’s race to the arcade. Last one there has to give up a slice of his pizza at dinner.” “Oh, you are so on,” Mikey contested. The two brothers grinned at each other knowingly, then immediately sprinted out of room on their way to the arcade.

— x —

I haven’t proof read this btw lol

[skyloftian-nutcase]

For the fanfic writer ask meme: A & M

A: Of the fanfic you’ve written, which is your favorite and why?

Paradox is another big favorite of mine! I still love the premise of it, and the rush of just having the idea slam into me and I ran to the computer and wrote it while Van Medoh music played over and over was just so much fun. I cranked that sucker out in like forty-five minutes and I still think it’s one of my best stories. The scene where Time’s willing to hold the Master Sword just to help Sky brings me a lot of joy too haha.

M: What’s the weirdest AU scenario you’ve come up with? Did it turn into a story?

Haha I was wondering if someone was gonna ask this!

So currently, the weirdest AU playing through my head is from my idea of TotK: Hero’s Shadow. Essentially it’s “what if Ganondorf won?”

TotK talk below the cut because I know some lovelies don’t want spoilers.

So the idea is that Shadow escaped Gan’s clutches, ran into Wild, and the two were traveling together. Gan recaptures Shadow and takes total control over him (beforehand he’d only take control when he thought Shadow needed to be reeled in). Shadow fights it tooth and nail as best he can, but Gan uses him to help fight Wild and they defeat him. Shadow finally breaks under all the pressure and the strain on his mind, like full on mental breakdown - age regression, can’t function, is totally dependent on Gan.

Ganondorf is now faced with the dilemma that he has his kingdom but his family is kind of a disaster and, by his standards, weak. And it’s his own doing. He reshapes Hyrule in his image, kills the majority of the people in Central Hyrule when he creates the Gloom Field. The rest flee the kingdom. He brings the Gerudo to heel. He captures most of the sages and corrupts them to be his soldiers (Turin escapes, rescuing Wild and helping him flee because Turin is awesome and I love him). Many refugees go to Yona’s Domain, where she’s trying to guide and help the survivors and very much feeling survivor’s guilt and imposter syndrome as queen to a people who aren’t hers and a widow (she doesn’t know Sidon survived) right after marriage.

With the world as his oyster, Gan could just let the power corrupt him entirely and toss Shadow aside, but he chooses to try and help the broken kid. He hides him from the world, though, trying to protect him. At some point Shadow is aware enough that seeing Gan’s secret stone just triggers full on meltdowns, and Ganondorf actually takes it off and leaves it hidden so he can take care of him. Eventually, Shadow’s in bad enough shape that Gan summons Yona, who has to figure out how to heal this kid’s mind while also trying not to die while also realizing Sidon is alive and has to be rescued - and if Sidon’s alive, who else could be?

Shadow eventually recovers and he and Yona bust out while rescuing the sages. Meanwhile, Wild and Tulin are gathering a resistance (after Wild has his own meltdown over losing, that is). They all meet up and fight Gan, I guess… idk if Gan actually decides to be a decent person or not.

This AU is likely never going to get written, but it’s been lurking in my brain for weeks and I can’t say why lol.

[inevitably-johnlocked]

Hi!

How do I stop being insecure about my fanfic writing? I can probably say that I do a fairly decent job at it, but it's just that when my work doesn't get any attention, I can't help but cringe at my own work; thinking about where I went wrong with that particular story. I hate that feeling.

Could you give me some insights on that?

Hey Nonny *HUGS*

Oooooof I wish I honestly knew 100% how to stop the imposter syndrome, as I do it EVERY single day with not just my blog, but also in my day job and in my artwork and my own writing projects as well. It's a tough thing to combat, but inevitably, I've found just... learning to let go, learn from your perceived mistake, and improve on it next time has always worked for me. AND writing the story (or in my case, doing the project) for my own self, and stop caring about what someone else might think helps a lot to.

As creatives, we are our own worst critics, and unfortunately feeling like you're never good enough is a side-effect of that... but you know what else is a side effect? Self-improvement and learning to love the thing you wrote. I found a PILE of my old fanfics I wrote as a teenager, and WOW, yeah, some of the writing is bad, but when I read it, I see the stories I created all over again in my head, and it inspires me to want to do fanart for that story I wrote, or helps me see how much my writing has improved. My storytelling now is far more superior, but I don't hate younger-me's work. I thank Young Steph for writing that world I wanted to see, because I re-read them with some laughter, but also with fondness and love. AND I remember back in my Sonic days that my stories WERE well loved and enjoyed, and I still hold onto those memories.

And it also inspires me to "do better" in a sense. "Practice makes...", well, not "perfect" as there is no one definition of perfection that isn't subjective, but practice DOES make for honing your craft, for inspiring yourself and others, and for making people happy.

I think that has helped me, anyway. Just doing something to make myself feel happy. There's so few things in this world anymore we can truly enjoy, so discard this concept of "cringe" and embrace the fact that you LOVED writing that story, right? Embrace the joy that you brought just ONE other person with your story. And embrace the fact that one more story done means another step on your "writing improvement" journey.

Writing makes you happy, and I don't think there's any "cringe" in that <3

[jurrasicworldcc]

Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous Fanfic

Title: [REDACTED]

Setting: Alternate scenario if Sammy died from the venom in “The Long Run”

Warning: Language and intense scenes

I do not own anything!!!

————————————————————————

Yaz held Sammy’s hand as Brooklynn injected the antidote into the cowgirl’s arm. Sammy’s skin was still green and Yaz uttered, “C’mon, Sammy. Wake up. Please wake up. Forget what I said, we’ll always be friends, no matter how far apart we are…It may not be easy or perfect but…Please…I love you…Like love love you…”

But…Sammy didn’t wake up. Brooklynn leaned in closer she didn’t feel Sammy’s heartbeat. The star shuddered and uttered, “We’re too late.”

Ben gasped and then Kenji clenched his head. Darius hugged Brooklynn and Yaz cradled Sammy in her arms. The athlete sobbed in her failure and screamed a blood-curling wail.

The rain boomed and went pouring. Darius and Yaz agreed to bury Sammy somewhere while the others got the supplies for the boat.

At a random part of the jungle, Yaz dug into the burial point for Sammy’s “funeral” and sobbed with the tears still running. She dug some more and then said, “I lost my best friend…and do you know the worst part? I had feelings for her…I had a chance of us being together and a chance at happiness…I blew it because I was scared of what my mom would think and also ruining my friendship!”

She wiped some of her tears and then heard Darius’s laughter. It wasn’t laughter that came from a bad joke about dinosaurs, it was one of a maniacs. Yaz was confused and asked, “Darius…Are you….laughing? How could you laugh at a fucking shitty time like this?!?”

“HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHA!!!” Darius finally calmed down. “Because it’s all so damn funny! Of COURSE, you could’ve been together!” He smiled. “Sammy loved you since the day you’ve met her. She even considered that moment where she confessed her whole spy thing “your breakup”. And she was nervous too! She told all of us!!”

Camp Cretaceous - February, 2016

Sammy went to Darius and said, “You’ve gotta help me, Darius! I’m gay for Yaz! She’s strong, smart, fast, and a really great artist! She gives me this strong feeling like if a cow kicked me in the stomach!”

“I…I’m not great at this but if I were you, I would do things for her while her ankle is healing, and she’ll like you.” Darius replied.

Weeks later

“Sorry it didn’t work out, Sammy…” Darius uttered.

“What’s this now?” Brooklynn asked.

“Sammy has feelings for Yaz.”

“Oh, my…GOD!! I have the BEST advice for you! Say, have you ever heard of “Flirting?”

April

“Yaz?” Kenji asked.

“Oh, sorry…” Brooklynn uttered. “She, Darius, and Ben went out for a couple of days looking for more food…Me and Kenji can help you when she comes back.”

“Oh, thanks, Brooklynn.” Sammy said.

May

“Why are confessing feelings so hard?” Sammy asked.

Present Day - June

Yaz shuddered and uttered, “Sammy loved me? You knew all along…She loved me and you…YOU RUINED IT?!?!?!? But why, Darius? You could’ve told me at any time!”

“Simple, she doesn’t deserve you, Yaz.” Darius chuckled.

“Deserve? But I loved her! I’m her Yasmina, and she’s my Sam-“

“SHE IS NOT SAMMY!!!” Darius screamed. “She’s an imposter! A filthy imposter!!”

“What do you mean-?” Yaz suddenly bumped her shovel into something metal sounding.

“Excellent timing…”

Yaz faintly heard the sound of Darius putting something on like a clicking sound but she ignored it and moved the dirt of where she banged her shovel at and then saw what appeared to be Darius’s decaying corpse and screamed. “IMPOSSIBLE!! How can you be Darius unless…”

You’re not Darius… Yaz looked at the other Darius who was now smiling evilly like something from a horror movie that Yaz and her mom watched before. “W-Who…are you?”

“I told you…” Darius then came out of the shade wearing what appeared to be decaying forms of the other camper’s items like Brooklynn’s jacket, Kenji’s watch, Ben’s fanny pack, Sammy’s headband, and also what appeared to be Yaz’s shoe tied to the fanny pack. “I’M YOUR BEST FRIEND!!”

That was the breaking point for Yaz. She laughed insanely and said, “My be-be-be-be-be-No, no, no, no! You’re a fake version of my friend and you’re crazy! I should know! You kept me and Sammy apart, you’ve lied to me, AND YOU’VE LET HER DIE! And now, you need to PAY!!!”

Darius laughed maniacally and then Yaz tackled him and began to strangle him. Darius choked and uttered, “If…you kill me…then you’ll never…URK-meet her…”

“MEET WHO???”

“SAMMY!”

Yaz then stopped and let go of Darius. He chuckled and she said, “You’re LYING! She’s gone and you know it…”

“Not this sack of shit and blood!” Darius kicked Sammy’s body aside. “The REAL Sammy! The one who will love and appreciate you for who you are and never let you go! The Sammy who will Iove you…You can be together…”

“Be together…How?”

“I’m creating a perfect universe and Sammy is in it! I can take you to her!”

“Oh, please! Please take me!”

“Why, of course, I will!”

The Genetics Lab

Darius finally activated his universal portal and Yaz took off her jacket and let her hair down. Darius held out his hand and Yaz took it. The two prepared to step into the portal and Darius asked sadistically, “What lengths will you go to so you can have the perfect life?”

Corrupt Darius Bowman found

Universe Coordinates received

Current Coordinates: UNIVERSE-69

Dimensional Trace initiated

Threat Level High

Universe Protection Protocol Activated



[the-teddy-bear-butch]

@candle-lion the stupid fanfic asks part 1/3, “all divisible by 3” 🫡

3: on a scale of 1-10 how much do you enjoy incorporating romance into the average story?

A solid 8! I’m a hopeless romantic at heart. I like fluffy romantic shit

6: do you have any kind of consistent writing schedule or just hoping for the best?

I write about the same times when I do write, but I’m pretty spontaneous about it. I like to write at night, but I don’t set aside specific time’s necessarily

9: in an ideal world where you’re already super successful and published, would you want to see a tv or movie adaptation of your work? why or why not?

YES. That would be COOL AS FUCK. I will say, I would be incredibly disappointed if it was a bad adaptation, but it would be cool to see the characters I’ve created on screen anyway. Plus I can bitch with the fans about what they got wrong and I think it would be fun

12: do you ever have trouble focusing on writing? how do you get around that? 

Yes, constantly. Usually I will just power through, some good music and a sprint usually helps. However, sometimes I find that stepping back, having a snack, some water, and/or a nap and then trying again helps.

15: where do you share your writing?

Here, AO3, occasionally Discord. My irls can see my og stuff but they don’t see my fics.

18: what is your most and least favorite part of writing?

Favorite is when the plot clicks into place and when I get to reread That Scene in a fic that I’ve been SO excited for. Lead favorite is when the plot ISN’T clicking or I feel like I’ve written myself into a corner. Also the imposter syndrome!

21: pick a writer to co-write a book with and tell us what you’d write about.

You. Monsterfucking. Next question. /j Uuuuuuh Idk really. I am ashamed of how little I’ve read recently and not a lot of Authors come to mind. Suzanne Collins would be fun but she’s too Big Brain for me. Realistically if any of the mutuals asked me to collab, I’d probably be down tho

24: on average, how much writing do you get done in a day?

I’m all in or nothing. I’ll do 3-4k in a night or nothing for 3 days.

27: do you share rough drafts or do you wait until it’s all polished? And who do you share them with?

I share rough drafts with other writer friends (you’ve seen snippets of course). Never the whole bit really, but parts I like or I’m excited about or want advice on.

30: most inspirational quote you’ve ever read or heard that’s still important to you.

Not a specific quote, but that queering the map project? I think about that a lot. The way it’s people trying to give inspiration, trying to survive, trying to make each other laugh. It’s very showing of the kindness of humanity, I think. I want to make a journal of inspirational quotes and bits of writing that I’ve read, I’ve actually already got the empty journal, so I’ll probably be obnoxious about that!!

33: do you start with the characters or the plot when writing?

With fic, characters. It’s easier for me to begin kind of sorting through the roles and figuring out how characters fit, and work on the plot from there. With original stories, I’ll generally get a basic plot > a main character or two > the rest of the plot > then the rest of the cast

[spitfire-of-the-sea]

Holding on

Another little Ace x reader scenario. I SHOULD work. Instead, I'd rather contemplate dumb scenarios because they make me giggle. :D Mostly spittballing ideas here, of scenes I might like to put into a fanfic. This one is a mess, since I literally just typed it down and it's not beta-ed... but I hope you still find it amusing. =) Somewhat at least. No beta. We die like pirates.

Ace x reader; SFW

Napping during the daytime didn’t pay off.

Well, at least it didn’t anymore since one Portgas D. Ace had joined your crew. For one, there was a chance that somehow you’d end up in the middle of one of his I-will-murder-Pops-challenges. The chance was slim – usually, in some way, he tried his best to make sure to not cause collateral damage – but it was never zero. You’d know. Pretty early on after he’d been brought on board you’d taken a nap on deck and the next thing you knew your hair was singed and your little deck chair had broken down with you and Ace on top of it in a mess of flailing limbs and breathless curses.

A couple of months had gone by since then and things had changed – at least at this point the challenges were officially announced ahead of time and you had time to scramble off before you or your hair were in any real danger. You’d also started to notice that Ace was, in fact, damn attractive when he wasn’t spitting hissed insults like a feral cat backed into a corner. His freckles were damn cute and he was actually quite polite and nice, at least when he wasn’t talking to Pops.

Not that you’d ever admit it. You butted heads with him often enough, tired of his completely insane quest to defeat Pops and Ace’s complete inability to realize that it wasn’t going to happen anytime soon, if ever.

Hence, you’d done the sensible thing. You’d taken all those nauseating little feelings unfolding somewhere deep in your chest, fluttering up in your belly, tugging on the corners of your lips, and had stuffed them into a drawer labeled “Hard Nope” somewhere deep in the back of your head. Sure, sometimes they slipped out and you couldn’t help but watch him a tad too long or take it upon yourself to clean his wounds and bandage them even if there were so many other people around who could have easily done an even better job… but mostly, you managed. Distance helped.

However, all this had made you somewhat careless. You had gone back to your habit of taking naps on deck whenever you had an hour of time in between. As Marco’s assistant, you were used to long evenings and sometimes hectic days. The naps helped. You liked your naps.

They had gotten you into this situation, though: the situation being that you had been asleep when there had been a vote on who would be on Ace-duty today. Without the ability to protest, you had ended up being volunteered and so… here you were.

Ace-duty meant you’d have to keep an eye on him while you were on the island and that was a full-time job that allowed no mistakes. You’d have to keep him in sight at all times and make sure he didn’t accidentally light anything on fire, eat somebody out of a living without paying, blurt out his plan to kill Pops to the whole world (it was unlikely the pirate world would react with only mild amusement; most likely, they’d sense a sign of weakness and send tons of challengers and that would be annoying). Plus, you had to keep him from drowning in his food and starting a small-scale war.

Thatch had lost him sometime during a late evening only weeks ago and mere hours later you’d somehow ended up in the middle of a civil war between two villages. It had something to do with a shrine of some sun deity and half of the people started to worship Ace while the other half tried to kill him as an imposter.

The time before that Izou had simply not given enough fucks to take his duty seriously and from what you’d heard, Ace had eaten a whole restaurant empty, then fainted in his last plate and almost been buried alive by a very panicked middle-aged couple who were afraid they had somehow killed one of Pops’ sons and tried to get rid of the evidence.

So, long story short… it was your turn to watch Ace tonight and you would not let him escape your sight and cause mayhem. Spotting his bright orange hat in the distance, he was already making his way off the Moby Dick. You narrowed your eyes and cracked first your knuckles and then your neck. After a few stretches, you set off to catch up with him, simply vaulting over the railing and landing right in front of him.

He came to a halt abruptly, almost bumping into you and you saw his eyes widen for a moment. In the next one, a bright smile appeared on his lips as he regarded you.

“Oh, hey!” he said easily and watched you straighten yourself up in front of him. Your height wasn’t very impressive, you were smaller than almost everybody else on the Moby Dick. You were cursing yourself for miscalculating and jumping down too close in front of him, now you had to look up to him. You glared.

He cocked his head to the side, watching you. “Oh, well,” he said then, his smile growing as he reached out a hand and patted your head. “I’ll be off then.”

Patted. Your. Head.

Caught between the urgent feeling of your cheeks suddenly being on fire and the urge to slap his hand away because you were not a dog, you froze for a precious second. Words were piling up on top of your tongue, nonsensical and undecided and locked away behind clenched teeth. By the time you’d formulated a sentence, his warm hand had already slipped off your head as he moved past you and moved into the crowd. It was more reflex than conscious thought that made your hand snap out and catch him by his shirt, barely catching it by the hem.

He stopped again when he felt the tug, throwing you a confused glance over his shoulder and his warm brown eyes on you only made matters worse if possible. You stared at him like a damn idiot, unable to put together even the most rudimentary word combination. Something that vexed you to no uncertain extent, you were not usually so tongue-tied and that left only one conclusion:

It was clearly his fault. He made you look dumb. Or perhaps he made you dumb. Whichever it was, you didn’t like it. Perhaps it was the magic power of the physique he was displaying so generously, shirt open all the time and now even within reach. Damn his magic abs.

“Do you need something?” Ace asked finally and cocked an eyebrow at you, his eyes searching you before they dropped to your hand on his shirt.

Finally, finally, something came out of your mouth: “You have to stay close.”

His second eyebrow joined the first one, both now almost touching his hairline before he chuckled, hunching down to be on eye-level with you. Which made things so much worse. So. Much. Worse. You could basically have bumped your nose against his with only one step forward.

“Are you scared?” he asked gently and reached out again, patting you again. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep you safe.”

That did it.

You used your free hand to slap his away from your head, huffing and puffing. “I’m not scared!” you snapped. Despite your size, you were, in fact, not completely helpless! Sure, you were not exactly a top-tier fighter but you could hold your own well enough.

His smile softened and he nodded, dropping his hand. “Of course not.”

Oh, that guy ticked you off on so many levels. Like, why couldn’t he just fucking close his shirt?!

“I’m not!” you repeated and were very aware that you sounded like a petulant four-year-old. You took a deep breath, willing at least a few of your brain cells to stop registering the outline of his abdominal muscles and the V you could see trailing down into his…-

Damnit it! Again!

“I’m not scared!” you said for the third time and would have slapped yourself if it hadn’t made you look even weirder. “What I mean,” you continued immediately when he opened his mouth, “is that you need to stay close to me so you’re safe!”

Ace laughed at that. The bastard.

“I think I’ll be fine,” he finally said, mirth still making his eyes twinkle as he straightened again. “I think I’ll go off on my own tonight. I’ll see you later!”

You stared at him. He stared right back, then looked down at your hand on his shirt, and then back at you.

“No you won’t,” you said and tried to do so calmly. “Go off on your own, that is.”

“Why?” he asked.

“Because this island is not Pops’ territory, per se. It’s right at the border with Kaido and we don’t want to lure him out of Wano. It will be annoying to explain to the commanders why I let you bring a dormant volcano back to life just for shits and giggles...-“

“There’s a dormant volcano here?” Ace interrupted you, interest lighting up his face and you cursed yourself.

“No?” you tried and tightened your fingers on his shirt.

“So yes?” he asked with a grin and already looked up toward the forest-covered mountain not too far in the distance.

“Listen, we won’t go there,” you told him and quickly considered your options. “There’s a BBQ place just down the road, I’m sure you’re hungry. Let’s go there…!” You started walking in that direction and only realized after a few steps that you were holding his shirt in your hand. Only his shirt. Without him in it.

Pivoting on the balls of your feet you quickly spotted his broad back as he made his way through the crowd heading for the mountain. He’d simply slipped out of his shirt. Panic rose in you before anger quickly pushed it back down. Dropping the shirt you quickly sprinted after him, catching up just before he turned into a side-street and could slip out of your sight. Reaching out you curled two fingers around a belt-hoop on his trousers, jerking him back.

Still fully focused on catching up with him, you had not thought it fully through, and were not prepared for your motion making Ace stumble back a step and bump into you. Embarrassingly, you bounced off of him like a ping-pong-ball bounced against a wall and would have gone down if not for your reflexes.

“I said no!,” you told him firmly, your voice muffled by the hand you had brought up to tenderly feel your nose – you’d smashed into his shoulder with it and since the damn man apparently had the consistency of a brick wall, it was throbbing now.

“Ach, come on!” he whined. “I am just going to take a look, I’ve never seen one. I’ll behave!”

Which was a lie if you’d ever heard one. You doubted Ace knew the meaning of ‘behave’. Your fingers tightened around the belt hoop as you stared up at him. There was little doubt in your head that you’d not be able to contain whatever he could start at that volcano and you weren’t willing to give it a try.

“No! We’ll go and eat! You like food!” you told him and tugged. To no avail, he didn’t budge. Instead, his eyes went to your hand and you could see the cogs in his head turn.

“You want to strip out of those, too?” you snapped.

He lifted his head to meet your eyes and you didn’t like the grin on his face. You liked even less that you couldn’t help but drop your gaze to your hand and thereby his waistline and thereby the V-shape and thereby the thoughts of what if he actually stripped out of those…

“Why not?” Ace asked, the ever-present grin making pretty good progress in driving you up the wall. “Freedom might be worth it.”

Clenching your teeth you snapped your eyes back up to his. He wouldn’t. Right? Right?!

Deciding to call his bluff you leaned closer. “If you do,” you told him succinctly, “I’ll still have something to hold onto.”

For once it seemed as though you had succeeded in wiping that grin off his face.

[madametrashbin]

Like Glass

In which I gloriously gave up resisting after reading the nth OC-included pieces from the many that have come to fruition in the SAGAU world and had decided to quietly slide my son into this (andaquicktagtoacertainsomeonehere=> @nicebonescomrade).

My son has been around for the longest time since I started writing fanfics (which has been a decade now since I took up the pen- and later on the keyboard, almost to my 11th year at this point). I love him very much and wanted to finally release him into the wilds- skjsksjksjkjs 

This is a short Imposter!AU of the Villain!SAGAU verse, feat my boi... lemme know if it’s fine like this because I rarely bring out my OCs into stories publicly (and if you wanna ask about them, feel free).  

This is so bad because it’s so late and I cannot sleep because insomnia is a bitch as always.  ∠( ᐛ 」∠)＿

So fragile, this light...

Such were his thoughts when he gazed down at the existence the world had revered, yet mistook quite easily. The ichor that spilled onto the snow, the gold that stained the pure white beneath his feet... He feels Teyvat’s unrestricted rage, just as he too felt the burn that threatened to boil over his entire existence with the desire to slaughter.

You have become weak... so very weak.

He loves them, the one who gave him a Reason to be something rather than an existence formed purely by the concept of Destruction. He loves them with everything that he is, with what little he could truly offer aside from unrestrained Destruction that he could only do.

He would give up everything for them, and whatever they asked, he would do it. To be a weapon to deliver their justice, to be a friend that is there to give comfort... to be a protector that grants safety to the body and soul. 

Everything is theirs.

But you are not awake to hear these prayers and vows... for you in all your love have been mistaken by the blind heathens who follow a monster wearing your skin.

He exhales softly and watches the wisp of white fly out from his lips before he gazed back into the figure soaked in gold, the divine ichor dripping upon the snow as the winds whisper to him with urgency to move.

There was no more time to think, for the heathens blinded by the embodiment of greed were on their way.

I will protect you... I will give you everything and more. 

I will be better than them... even if I am worthless as a mere thought that should not be alive.

The person who saved you, Polaris, was an odd person.

You weren’t even sure if  he was supposed to exist since you found nothing of the sorts about him in the game... granted, a lot of things that happened to you were already confusing enough.

This made you rather glad that he was willing to answer all your questions while he had “mended” you from the horrid state you were in before. The pain was undeniably gone, and any traces of the attacks done to you weren’t present either.

Is this another aspect of Destruction he was talking about?

You cannot help but wonder just what rules he could twist with that unique ability of his that put the Archons and Celestia to shame. 

As much as you want to know more about that power of his, you were still fairly exhausted from the week before... you barely survived, after all and you weren’t sure whether to be thankful to live another day with someone by your side at last or be angry that you are alive in this hellhole of a world.

But when the hand as pale as snow gently take your own like glass, you quickly dismiss the feelings of anger as the man who gave you everything he could give quietly settles by your side.

With this small space filled with only comfort and silence, the safety you feel knowing Teyvat itself was protecting you alongside him... it fills you with warmth that makes you forget the cruel world outside.

(And you know the length they are willing to go for your sake, as you ignore the noises that sometimes became too loud outside during the darkest hours of the night. You ignore them, if only because it is no longer your problem.)

[bywhatilove]

Somewhere Only We Know

This fanfic is based upon Keane’s song “Somewhere Only We Know.” It has always reminded me of the sibuna clearing so I wanted to incorporate it into a fanfiction.

Fair warning: I am the CEO of writing sappy sibuna fanfic. I absolutely love the found family aspect of sibuna and will die on that hill.

“I walked across an empty land

I knew the pathway like the back of my hand

I felt the earth beneath my feet

Sat by the river, and it made me complete”

Amber’s freshly cut, shoulder length blonde hair gently flew behind her as she walked down the hill. Even though she was in the woods, she still wore her favorite pair of wedges. Such a monumental occasion like this called for such measures. Today was the first time sibuna was going to be in the same place together, at once, in two years- there if you counted the year since they had last seen Nina. It was a very special day. Of course it had been Amber who had planned the whole thing and of course she had been the first to arrive. Even after all these years, she still knew the pathway to the Sibuna Clearing like the back of her hand. How could she not? This was the place where it all began. This was the place where the club, she had named and founded, mind you, was born that crisp autumn afternoon with Nina and Fabian. Everything led back to here. So, she sat on one of the logs and waited. She waited to see the raven hair of her favorite geek; the red hair of the only girl she knew who could pull off such a goth pixie look; the silly outfit of the boy who she loved first; the boyish grin of the boy who saved Sibuna; the not so well-known, but trusted, perfect curls of the newbie; and perhaps the one she was most excited to see, the extremely missed smile of her best friend.

For the first time since she had left Anubis all those years ago, Amber felt complete. Sitting in this beloved spot, she couldn’t help but reminisce on the feelings that sibuna brought her. Sure, it was scary as hell being haunted by egyptain spirits and deadly curses, but being in sibuna had taught her what it felt like to belong. She had found a family through the scared eyes of the six other teenagers who were in well over their heads. For the first time in her life, she had felt loved.

“Oh, simple thing, where have you gone?

I'm getting old, and I need something to rely on

So tell me when you're gonna let me in

I'm getting tired, and I need somewhere to begin”

Fabin ran his fingers through his hair- a sure sign that he was nervous. It was his tale-tale sign that he was struggling with some deep inner turnmoil. Even after spending years of building up confidence from his once previous state of being that nerdy push over in high school….even after spending three years of his high school career fighting egyptian spirits, curses and saving the world...the idea of seeing her for the first time in three years was enough to send him right back over the edge. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to see her. No, it wasn’t that at. He had spent the past three years wanting nothing more than to see Nina Martin again. But now that he finally had the chance? Well, he just didn’t know where to begin.

He had spent the last two years since graduation desperately trying to escape the feeling that, at the mere age of 18, he had already fulfilled his life’s purpose. Since leaving sibuna, nothing had ever measured up. He had never felt that feeling of belonging again. He was so young, yet he felt like he was already 100 years old and had done everything in life he was meant to do. Solving ancient egyptian curses? Check. Escaping Egyptian ghosts whose purpose was to kill you? Check. Saving the world multiple times from utter destruction? Check. He was so tired of feeling like he had nothing left for him anymore. And all he wanted was to feel like he belonged again- like he was more than a pushover nerd like the boy he spent so long proving to others he wasn’t anymore. What Fabian never truly realized was that he didn’t need to prove himself to others anymore. He was constantly trying to prove himself to, well, himself.

“I came across a fallen tree

I felt the branches of it looking at me

Is this the place we used to love?

Is this the place that I've been dreaming of?”

Patrica and Eddie walked down the hill in silence. Of course they had come together- back to the spot where, even if they hadn’t been there for the founding of the club, the couple owed everything to. Sibuna may have been a hindrance to their relationship in the beginning, with Patricia having to constantly hide her real reasons for disappearing so suddenly and so often. And that time she even had to go as far as using Eddie as a Sibuna swing temp for one of their tunnel tasks (something they could laugh at now). But, for Eddie and Patrica separately….it was what gave them a home and something to hold on to. Before sibuna and before each other, neither Eddie or Patrica had ever felt like they had a purpose. Both of them had spent so long feeling forgotten by their respective parents, like they were disposable in their own family hierarchies. Sibuna had taught each of them that they had a purpose. But, more than that, it taught them each that they were deserving of unconditional love and friendship.

“So,” Patrica broke the silence, “you’re sure that she is going to be here?”

There was no question about the she in question.

Eddie shrugged his shoulders. “I mean I think so. She responded to Amber’s SOS message about the urgent need for a sibuna reunion.”

Eddie and Nina hadn’t kept total silence between the two of them since she had practically fallen off the face of the earth. They did share a godly connection between the two of them after all. A connection that no one, no even their fellow sibunas, would understand. So, when Eddie lost his osirian powers, Nina received a frantic text a few days later. Since then, they touched base a couple times. Nina had made Eddie swear that he would keep her up to date on her friends she had to leave behind. He told her everything, from what universities everyone had gotten into to who everyone was dating. Even if that meant that he had to break the news about Mara and Fabian not so long lasting relationship (she wasn’t as quick to reply to that message).

Patrica was silent for a beat before finally responding. “I’m glad. I’ve really missed her.”

And Eddie could tell she was being sincere. Nina had left so suddenly and so unexpected. Seeing her again? It was all they had wanted for the past three years. No matter how far she tried to stay away or how much time had passed, Nina would always be apart of their family.

“Oh simple thing, where have you gone?

I'm getting old and I need something to rely on

So tell me when you're gonna let me in

I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin”

Alfie slid down the hill that led him to the familiar fire pit with the logs surrounding it. He couldn’t help but remember the time when he had (more like was forced) to burn his favorite joker hat in order to really be considered a sibuna. But, if he was being honest, it took him a long time to really feel like he belonged in sibuna. He couldn’t help but feel like his unfortunate time being locked in the cellar was the only reason he was allowed to be a sibuna. If it hadn’t been for that, well he probably would have stayed in the dark about what was really going on in Anubis House for his entire time there. Alfie never said anything, but he could always hear the unwillingness in Nina’s voice when she finally told him about the secrets of Anubis House. Now, after being a sibuna for three years, he knew that Nina was just a very stubborn person who was just trying to protect him by keeping him in the dark. But it had stung, to think that he wasn't wanted in the club that he loved being a part of. It was nice to finally feel like he was more than the stupid, class clown. Sibuna gave him the chance to prove himself. To prove that he was brave, smart and, well, needed. He would never forget that.

So, when had received a text from his ex-girlfriend saying that she was planning a sibuna reunion and that it was absolutely mandatory they all be there, he was the first to respond. He needed to feel like he belonged again. He needed something to rely on again.

“And if you have a minute, why don't we go

Talk about it somewhere only we know?

This could be the end of everything

So why don't we go somewhere only we know?

Somewhere only we know”

Sometimes, K.T couldn’t help but feel like an imposter. Like she was just a replacement. She couldn’t help but remember that she had only been a member of sibuna for one year. She wasn’t there for its founding or for the first two years its members spent fighting for their lives. So, sometimes, she looked at Fabina, Patrica, Alfie (and Amber for that short while she was there) with envy. There was an invisible string that held the four of them together based on shared past trauma, unconditional friendship and a kind of trust K.T never knew was possible to be shared. Even Eddie, with all of his Osirian and leader of sibuna glory, wasn’t a part of this bond the four of them shared. The four of them shared a bond that K.T would never truly be able to nudge her way into. And she was okay with that. It wasn’t that she felt unwanted or anything. No, it wasn’t that at all. She knew her fellow sibuna members loved her and wanted her there. But she wasn’t an original and that was something that made her feel very insecure about her position in sibuna. Even if such feelings were unwarranted by the actions of her fellow sibunas.

So, K.T couldn’t help but feel nervous about this reunion. She didn’t want to be. At all. This was her family for crying out loud. But...the infamous Nina Martin was going to be there today and K.T didn’t know what to expect. Would Nina welcome her with open arms into the club she had founded? Or would she view K.T as nothing more than her replacement and give her the cold shoulder? She had never met Nina, but she felt like she had. This was the chosen one. The girl who founded sibuna and served as leader for two years. The girl who was Amber’s best friend and roommate. The girl who broke Fabian’s heart with a simple letter. She had never met Nina, but she was already intimidated by her.

“Oh simple thing, where have you gone?

I'm getting old and I need something to rely on

So tell me when you're gonna let me in

I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin”

Nina Martin was scared. Ever since she was little, Nina had a reputation for being fearless. She was the little girl who got into trouble for jumping off of high platforms on the playground at recess. Then, when her parents died, everyone looked at Nina with admiration. They looked at her with pity, sure, but also with wonder. Even being so young, Nina had held herself together so well. What everyone didn’t realize was that Nina held her tears for the pillow at night when no one else was around. That was when she allowed herself to be weak. To be scared. Even when she came to Anubis House and began her lead over sibuna, her fellow sibuna members looked at her with the same admiration. Yet they too (not even Amber despite being her roommate) didn’t realize that she allowed herself to be weak when no one was around. Nina prided herself on being brave-on being fearless. Allowing others to see her break? That just wasn’t acceptable.

So maybe that was why Nina didn’t come back to England for her final year. Maybe that was why, when everything started to crumple, when her Gran’s health took such a drastic decrease, when the ancient Egyptian Gods started taunting her even when she was home in America with worse nightmares than ever before, that Nina chose to spare her friends. She didn’t want them to see her at her lowest. She didn’t want to bring the hopelessness she felt about her gran’s health, or how haunting the Gods tasks were getting. About how the Gods were demanding more of her than ever, with much more higher stakes. So...Nina did what may have either been the bravest or cowardice thing of her life (she still couldn't decide). She ran and hid in America. She ignored her friends’ desperate pleas for any contact. And, quite frankly, it was the worst year of her life. She had to say goodbye to the boy who was her first love...a boy she still loved. She had to say goodbye to her best friend and roommate. She had to say goodbye to the only people, who besides her gran, she knew loved her. But she was about to see them all again for the first time in three years and, despite all of the egyptian gods she fought off, this was the scariest thing she had ever done. At this moment, Nina Martin wasn’t fearless. She felt like the biggest coward ever.

“And if you have a minute, why don't we go

Talk about it somewhere only we know?

This could be the end of everything

So why don't we go? So why don't we go?”

Perhaps it was sheer fate or a coincidence but, ironically ceremonially, Nina was the last to arrive at the sibuna clearing. She stopped a couple tracks away from where the group had gathered- just far enough away where she was hidden from eye sight by the tree line but close enough where she could hear what they were saying. Through the trees, Nina could see them. She heard her best friend’s laugh echo through the forest as she hugged Alfie (who was no doubt telling some stupid joke). She saw how Patrica and Eddie’s hands were intertwined so tightly, like they afraid what would happened if they let go. Looked like Nina wasn’t the only one still plagued by the ghosts and nightmares of what happened here. She saw an unfamiliar face, but noted how much it looked like she just clicked with the others (which made Nina’s heart happy). Finally, she allowed her eyes to land on Fabian. She could quite literally feel her heart sink to the ground when she saw his familiar raven black hair and boyish grin. Of everyone, he was the one who was the hardest to let go. He was the first boy to ever hold her heart, and that was something time nor distance would ever change.

Suddenly, Nina became fearless again. She looked around at these five people who she trusted with her life and she knew she was home. Almost as if just being around them was enough to make her feel strong and brave again, Nina knew everything would work out. This place...this simple clearing in the woods on the grounds of their old boarding school was where everything changed for Nina. For all of them. What looked like a simple clearing in the woods to outsiders, was a lifeline to the six souls who gathered there today. It was where they, as lost and confused teenagers, were found by a force much bigger than themselves. It was somewhere only they knew.

Nina took a deep breath and fed off the courage sheerly being in this spot gave off. She stepped out of the lining of trees and into the eyesight of her fellow sibunas. Five pairs of eyes turned to her. Yet, Nina was no longer scared of what came next

She was finally home.

“Oh, this could be the end of everything

So why don't we go somewhere only we know?

Somewhere only we know

Somewhere only we know”

[inkabelledesigns]

So anyone that’s been chatting with me in the past week knows that I’m on a bit of a kick for Balan Wonderworld. A friend of mine has been livestreaming it, and I finally got my hands on it!...Only for my brother to kind of monopolize my Switch and play it for himself. ^^’’’ I don’t mind too much, but he’s probably gonna beat it before I do, the kid’s almost made it to World 7, just needs a few more statues for the train. Meanwhile I’ve only gotten to touch the game for the second time tonight, which has landed me searching for statues and beating the World 3 boss. But I’m glad he’s having fun, it’s awesome to share this game with him. He dances along to all the little celebration sequences, it’s adorable. 

Today he went back and beat the boss for World 4, and he told me it had the same music for that dance sequence as World 2 did. I double checked just to be sure, and he’s right, it does! That strikes me as pretty interesting. I knew they reused the dance tracks for different bosses, but I never paid much mind to the order in which they’re repeated. Because it’s not a straight “123,” it jumps around a little more. It makes me wonder about the ties between the game and the novel. (This is where we get into spoiler territory.)

So I haven’t finished the novel yet (I get the sense I’m right before the final boss, much like my friend is for her game playthrough), but in it, every character has a different name. So our World 2 stage master, Fiona, is called Seagazer, and our World 4 stage master, Haoyu, is Skygazer. It’s established that these two have a close friendship since coming to Wonderworld, and they’ve got a lot in common. So the fact that their sequences share music makes me wonder if the others do too. So now I need to check. If you guys want to look too, here’s the other friendships:

Watcher and Sentinel (World 5 and World 8)

Clocktower Kid and Pensive Pierrot (World 6 and World 9)

Madam of the Mansion and Checkered King (World 10 and World 7)

If they have the same dance music, I’m gonna chuckle, that’s a really clever note game developers. I’d also like to say, dammit devs, some of the stories of these characters are so much darker in the book. Like, we find out Checkered King, the chess guy, lost his wife to sickness while he was too focused on trying to keep his title. Like oh my god, way to make me cry! Not all of them get fleshed out like that, but a lot of them do. Skygazer over there? He almost gets paralyzed in an airplane accident. Scarecrow, our good buddy Farmer Jose? He’s got a family, his home and crops are destroyed in that storm, and he’s afraid he’ll never be able to send his son to college. Madam of the Mansion has some serious issues with imposter syndrome as an artist (that hit me). Bugsy, our sweet little bug loving girl? I already loved her in the game, I identified with her as someone who had weird interests growing up, but when they go into detail about her laboring over these bugs for a class project, and everyone making fun of her for it, oh it hurt, it hurt a lot. And Lady of the Midnight Sun? Oh my gosh I cried the most over her. Her parents loved her dearly, and while going out to get her a Christmas present, they died in a car crash. She feels responsible for their death, and that hurts, that hurts so much. While I still have both of my parents, I can’t help but empathize a little with her and Clocktower Kid on the subject on death. I’ve been afraid of losing my dad since my 17th birthday, and I’m now 24. I know that even when his death does come, while I’ve been expecting it, it’s going to hit me harder and a lot worse than I think it will, and mind you, my imagination is scarily vivid. It all hits very close to home, all of the things they go through are very human problems.

That’s the thing I really love about Balan Wonderworld, but it’s also the biggest contrast between the game and the book: It’s a story about healing. In the game, everything starts out bad but ends up happy, but in the book, it starts off happy and turns out really sad. Honestly, you read the book for the angst and then play the game for the good vibes, ‘cause like, you can’t NOT smile at least a little bit while seeing these characters! In the book, everyone is so upset when you snap them out of their monstrous forms, angry and grieving now that they have the memories of their human, Earthly lives back, because they didn’t want to have to go through any of the pain and trauma again. Lance locked it all away, let them be happy, but it wasn’t real happiness. And it’s the moments where Balan pops in and tries to comfort some of these characters that really hit me. (Y’know, besides the lore point of him taking off his hat.) He sounds like he feels bad that this has to be done, but he knows that if he, Leo, and Emma continue to let Lance manipulate things, Wonderworld won’t be alright, and neither will any of the people who live there. Balan makes it very clear that Wonderworld isn’t about being happy all the time, it’s about finding balance within your life, within yourself. Even though we go through difficult times, we have to keep going, we have to believe that there’s something better on the horizon, that we can move forward and make things better for ourselves, be it by charting our own path or working together with our friends. That’s a really positive message. We have to balance the positive and the negative, otherwise we won’t know joy for what it really is. While I may not know how this whole thing ends, I have to say, I haven’t had this much fun with a game in a long time. 3D platformers are usually not my jam, I’m really bad at being precise (which has been a problem a few times so far), but this game goes at a slower pace, which is exactly what I needed. It’s so cheery and bright, super colorful too. Not gonna lie, I have a fanfic in the works already. ^^’’’’ Hope to share a lot of love for the maestro with all of you!

[transbian-uprising]

Some of my own Danganronpa non-despair AU headcanons/imagines this time! (THH edition)

I was inspired, so I decided why not write down some headcanons/imagines/character adjustments for my Danganronpa non-despair AU! I’m gonna be doing this as a series, starting with the THH characters, then the SDR2 characters, then the V3 characters (although I will mention characters from other games in my headcanons). Enjoy!

Makoto Naegi | 苗木誠

He’d definitely lend a listening ear to whoever wanted to vent to him.

When he first comes to Hope’s Peak, he’s such a fanboy over everyone

He has an inferiority complex and self worth issues because he’s surrounded by insanely talented students, but Sayaka and Kyoko quickly help him get over that

He’s pretty good at keyboard, and plays alongside Sayaka a lot

He actually got noticed by Kaede, who offered to teach him, which obviously he was ecstatic about

He’s the only one in Class 78th, and possibly all of Hope’s Peak, who is neurotypical

Sayaka Maizono | 舞園さやか

Her and Makoto are basically best friends

She’s still a total cinnamon roll, but she loves to play little pranks on the rest of Class 78th and have a good laugh over it

She, Ibuki, Leon and Kaede tried to form a music group together but they fell apart really quickly due to their different styles

She has a huge crush on Makoto, but she’s afraid to admit it

Leon Kuwata | 桑田怜恩

He’s almost always the only one in class, just so he can avoid playing baseball

Ibuki taught him guitar and he’s been playing nonstop ever since

He *tries* to get along with Sayaka, but prefers hanging out with Ibuki since they almost always end up playing together

Everyone in Class 78 calls him the Ultimate Guitarist because... reasons

Toko Fukawa | 腐川冬子

She doesn’t have the weird thing for Byakuya in this au

She doesn’t slut shame the girls either

She’s still really shy tho

She initially dislikes Hifumi for writing fanfic, but they eventually bond over their mutual love for writing

She’s also close with Tsumugi, and the two of them collaborated to write a book that was loosely based on Tsumugi’s favorite anime

Genocider Syo is friends with Sonia, but she’s a bit put off by Sonia’s obsession with her and other serial killers

Kiyotaka Ishimaru | 石丸清多夏

Initially, the rest of the class shys away from him because he has a stick up his ass about the rules, but Mondo and Chihiro quickly befriend him

After a while, he loosens up a bit, but he never stops being the Ultimate Moral Compass

He tries to bond with the class by telling jokes, but he’s always super awkward with it and is usually unsuccessful

He’s SUPER gullible — he’ll believe anything anyone tells him, and you better believe Class 78 uses that to their advantage

Once, he dyed his hair white on a dare, and ended up liking it and kept it that way

He also tries to do impressions of his classmates (mostly Mondo) but, again, is painfully bad at it

Everyone actually finds these funny tho

Mondo Oowada | 大和田紋土

He, surprisingly, likes to play card games, which everyone was shocked to find out

Except Celeste, who is fascinated by his interest

He’s very protective of his friends, and will do anything for them

Especially Taka and Chihiro, his two best friends

He’s an amazing hairstylist, and secretly loves to play with and style people’s hair

Everyone in all of Hope’s peak knows to go to him for hair care tips and tricks

He also taught Chihiro how to ride a motorcycle the two of them rode around together a lot, until Taka ratted them out

He still hasn’t forgiven Taka for that

Chihiro Fujisaki | 不二咲千尋

In this au, he’s a bit more open about his gender, but still has loads of insecurities

At first, he’s completely in the closet, but after rumors spread online about him being a boy, he decides to live as himself and goes to Mondo for help

Mondo became his first real friend to him because of this, and him (and eventually Sakura too) helped him become strong

Eventually, he became an honorary member of Mondo’s gang and would often hang out with them in his free time

His hidden talent is being a voice actor, but he’s super embarrassed to talk about it since he’s the Ultimate Programmer

His first voice role was in a video game he developed himself, which led some talent scouts to notice him

He eventually voiced in several anime and video games, some of which he also helped develop

He’s almost as passionate about acting as he is about programming, but the only people he feels comfortable talking about it to are Hifumi and Tsumugi, who both become huge fans of his, and Mondo and Taka

When he found out Junko had created Monokuma, he was fascinated and offered to help her with ironing out all his kinks

He, Chiaki, Mukuro and Miu also created the Exisals in this au, for the sole reason of fooling around

Although, Chihiro himself was a bit intimidated by his creation at first, but after Tsumugi and Junko pressured him to try one out for himself, he fell in love

Yasuhiro Hagakure | 葉隠康比呂

He’s less of a dumbass in this AU, although he still has a tendency to get himself in sticky situations

Celeste and Hifumi played a prank on him by getting him to dress up in the Robo Justice suit and go around scaring people, but it backfired after Hiro fell down the stairs and broke his leg

Being the only one in the class who can, he often buys wine for Celeste and Mondo (and whoever asks, but only those two ever do)

He and Mondo use the same hair gel, so sometimes he’d take Mondo’s without knowing, which would lead to some awkward misunderstandings

Interestingly, he once predicted the world would end and they’d all end up dead, but that never ended up happening

That’s where the “30% accurate” thing came from— before that he was almost always right

He constantly makes jokes about being an old man (even though he’s only in his early twenties)

Hifumi Yamada | 山田一二三

He’s no longer solely attracted to anime characters, but he still loves them very much

He’s also nicer in this au

He’s besties with Tsumugi, and they bond over their love of anime and fiction

He’s also a huge fan of Chihiro’s, after he found out Chihiro was on the development team for his favorite game AND voiced two of his favorite anime characters

Low key has a crush on Celeste

Angie constantly makes jokes about how his first name is just “one two three” in Japanese

Whenever he’s watching an anime Chihiro was in, he’ll hound him with questions about what it was like recording, which Chihiro doesn’t mind because he doesn’t get to talk about his voice work a lot

Someday he wants to write and direct his own anime, and Tsumugi and Toko give him a lot of writing tips

He formed a LARP group with Gundham, Tsumugi, Chihiro, Junko, and Kaito

Celestia Ludenberg

She doesn’t treat Hifumi like a servant in this AU, but she’s still mean af and has a superiority complex

She eventually revealed her true identity to the class after she got inspired by Chihiro, but it didn’t change anything with her classmates

Except Hiro, who constantly made jokes about them having the same name, much to Celeste’s annoyance

She occasionally brings Grand Bois Chéri Ludenberg to school with her, but she doesn’t let anyone except Hifumi, Sonia and Gundham pet him

She high-key has a crush on Sonia

She doesn’t actually know how to do her own hair, so she has to get Mondo to do it for her

Sakura Oogami | 大神さくら

She and Tenko become friends SO QUICKLY because of their shared passion for martial arts

She’s still friends with Aoi tho

The three of them hang out together a lot

She and Tenko developed a new form of martial arts combining Neo-Aikido and Sakura’s own style, which they named the Oogami Method

Junko bullied her because of her ripped uniform, but after she explained that nothing would fit her, Junko offered to have one made for her

Kyoko Kirigiri | 霧切響子

She and Shuichi are very close, obviously

She gives Shuichi a lot of pointers on improving his investigative skills, and they work together often to solve cases

She and Makoto still become close, but their friendship is overshadowed by her and Shuichi’s

She notices this after a while, and makes a concerted effort to spend more time with Makoto

She’s less distant in this AU, but she still tries not to show her emotions

Her hair is naturally black in this AU, she dyed it purple after she lost a bet (with Celeste)

Aoi Asahina | 朝日奈葵

In this AU, she doesn’t just love donuts, but she loves all sweets

She was a fan of Junko’s before coming to Hope’s Peak, and the two of them became friends quickly

She and Akane are also close, and everyone jokes that they’re sisters, though in reality they aren’t

She once got recruited by Kaito to be in a play his class was putting on, but she’s such a terrible actor that they gave her part to Junko

She once walked in on Junko and Mukuro testing out Monokuma for the first time, and they were super freaked out, but Aoi was fascinated and wanted to try controlling him

Mukuro was against it, but Junko was cool with it, so she got to in the end

Byakuya Togami | 十神白夜

He and Makoto are both obsessed with true crime, and the two of them actually become friends because of that

They both love digging into Hope’s Peak’s files and his family’s files to find mysteries they could try and solve

Sonia joins them a lot too

He unofficially became the class’s French teacher after they found out he was fluent

He’s nicer in this au, and he’s kind of the dad of the class

When the Imposter was impersonating him, the two of them got into a little mini-war over who was the superior Togami (Twogami surprisingly won that war, albeit barely)

Mukuro Ikusaba | 戦刃むくろ

She’s away from Hope’s Peak A LOT, usually doing soldier things

When she is at Hope’s Peak, she spends most of her time either developing new weapons or looking after Junko

She’s usually the one who has to clean up after Junko’s shenanigans, even though she partakes in them herself

She helps Junko with a lot of her projects, but usually she ends up working on her own things while Junko does her thing

Despite this, she loves working with her sister when she gets the chance

Her proudest achievement is the Exisals, even though she collaborated with Chihiro, Chiaki and Miu to create them

Junko Enoshima | 江ノ島盾子

While she’s obviously not Ultimate Despair in this au, she’s still very chaotic and loves causing shenanigans and playing (mostly) harmless pranks

She’s friends with Sayaka and Kokichi because of this (both she and Sayaka are members of D.I.C.E. too)

She still puts on different personas, but she does it as a joke

She’s actually a very good actress, and she loves to act, but just like Chihiro, that gets overshadowed by her Ultimate talent

She loves to build and create things, just like her sister, which is why she created Monokuma

She uses Monokuma for her pranks a lot

Sometimes she goes through severe depressive episodes where she doesn’t have the energy to leave her home, but she usually uses Monokuma as a sort of telepresence unit so she can still talk to her friends

At first, no one knew that Monokuma was her, but Aoi ended up spilling the beans

She also learned animation from Ryota, and wants to make an anime starring her, Kaito, Tsumugi, Chihiro, Mukuro and Hajime

She loves to share her projects with her friends, and often lets other people control Monokuma or model for her

She gets hurt a LOT, and usually Mikan has to care for her

Her proudest achievement is replacing the Exisals’ weapons with water guns (even though Mukuro did most of the work)

They actually decided to leave them like that afterwards, since the Exisals were only ever used by her friends to mess around in

She suffers from PTSD, and part of that is recurring nightmares that the world ended and all her friends were forced to kill each other

[cupcakesnomnomnom123]

Durarara!! x The Outsider

Crossover

*note* AHHH this cross over is my new thing I swear lol. I don’t usually write fics because I can’t hold my attention down long enough to think about a whole story. I usually like to draw because I love it and it gets my ideas out quicker. But I can’t stop thinking about this scenario and the dialogues between the characters that I have to let it out! This is my first fanfic so please be gentle but still love some criticism to my writing. ☺️ also THANK YOU for the support for the other post. I’m glad y’all like it. Also! Not going to be too much Shizaya yet. I wanted to be more Tom and Shizuo friendship centric here.

<TW> mentions of murder, child rape, cannabilisim

(Scenario: News has spread all over Japan of a brutal sexual assault and murder case of 10 year old Misaki Suzuki in Ikebukoro. Details of the murder was leaked to the public early leading to Tom Tanaka arrest while the public and social media are pushing for his death sentence. Tom is waiting to be put on trial. Shizuo visits his accused friend in jail )

Seeing Tom after a week since the… incident.. it looked like Tom aged 10 years. Shizuo sits down and picks up the phone on the left side of the wall and sees Tom so the same. They wait till security leaves and they were alone.

“Hey Tom.. are you okay?…. Wait, shit uhh sorry…that’s a dumb ass question to ask. How are you holding up?”

“…Not very good honestly… who knew being hunged over, fired and being put to jail on the same day really wears a person out haha…”

Tom laughs to lighten the situation but Shizuo can tell it’s fake and self depreciating. Shizuo raises his right arm and tries to rub the exhaustion from his eyes. He looks earnestly at Tom.

“You didn’t do it.”

Tom drops the small smile he had and his eyes showed what he truly felt inside. Completely hopeless.

“Why do you think that? You even said you saw me. Everyone thinks I did it. Even my family. I know they do…my mother refuses to answer the phone. And she always answers the phone. Hell I’m even starting to believe it too. “

“No”, Shizuo says sternly,”it doesn’t add up. I told the police I was with you most of that night. All those fucked up things that happened to the kid. It doesn’t even make sense….you couldn’t of been the one to do it. I’m sure there were cameras at the bar we were at. You couldn’t be at two places at once Tom. That’s impossible”

“A lot of impossible things happen in this city Shizuo. I’m staring at a guy who can lift trucks with no problem”

“This isn’t the same thing.”

Shizuo hates that Tom is feeling this way. He’s upset and pissed at the whole situation. He was pissed the whole time the police was questioning him. He doesn’t have a problem with them per se, even with his bad history with them. It was the repetitive way they were asking the same.damn.questions. Over and over just said differently. It was to see if he would change his story and it was getting on his last nerves. They were betting on Shizuo to give up Tom because they got DNA evidence and even bite mark evidence. All matching down to the very last tooth. But he hold his ground and kept telling them the truth. The police were obviously getting annoyed but he didn’t give a damn. They were trying to get justice for Misaki. They wanted to blame the person all the signs who is pointed at. It made sense. He still would of beaten their asses. But would not helped his or Toms case at all.

He first thought was Izaya since he’s always the cause of all Shizuos problems. This time, it didn’t have izaya’s stink and it didn’t sit right with Shizuo. Izaya usually makes himself known that Shizuo is the bane of Izaya’s existence. The flea is a coward and ruin people’s lives, however…. this… even he thinks izaya doesn’t cross a certain line.

After dealing with the police for hours he went home but he couldn’t get much sleep. The image of Tom running away covered in Misaki’s blood burned in his mind. When he did sleep he wake up having nightmares of finding Misaki body in that dark alley over and over. At the time, he didn’t knew what he saw being he was buzzed from the night of drinking .He didn’t know it was the little girl till he saw the face. The body itself was almost unrecognizable. The body was mangled and ripped apart like a huge animal had gotten her. She was close to Akanes age and sometimes in his dreams both their faces will merge together staring at Shizuo with those same cold dead eyes. That wasn’t the worst part of his nightmares. The absolute worst part was imagination giving him vivid images what the Tom imposter did before Misaki’s murder. He wished he didn’t know..

“Didn’t you also hear from the police shizuo.?,” Tom avoids his eyes.”They also found my DNA all over the scene. They found dna in the building, the van, clothes, inside-

Toms stopped when his voiced hitched a little.

“…the cops showed me pictures…..They were trying to get me to confess but I really don’t remember after I was drinking. I shouldn’t kept drinking. You were right I should of stopped after drink three I should-“

“Hey”. Shizuo says in a harsher manner than he intended.

While Tom tries not to completely break down in front of Shizuo, Shizuo looks at the situation with pure anger and frustration. He can feel the familiar burning feeling simmering beneath his skin. He’s used of being feared like a inhuman beast he is. People feared, and held animosity towards Shizuo. He’s used to that. But Tom wasn’t. Tom literally has the whole world against him right now.

“You don’t deserve to be here..” he almost whispers in the receiver. “ you’re not the monster everyone says you are. I know this not because I was with you most of that night. I know you. We wouldn’t be friends if you pissed me off.”

Their was silence between them. The pause went on too long for Shizuos liking. Toms smile was tired, a little shaky when he sighed but grateful. It was a sigh of relief someone was there at their lowest.

“I think this is the first time you called me one. I was wondering if you ever referred me besides being your boss.” Tom closes his eyes while slightly leans back in his chair with his arms crossed and one side of his mouth perked up. “It feels weird getting the side of being pepped talked at but….” He looks at shizuo with thankful eyes

“Thanks…for getting angry that night. Well, for my behalf. Honestly, that’s the most nicest thing someone has done for me so far since I’ve been in this cage. I’m glad I still have you as a friend. Though I’m not your boss anymore.”

Shizuo doesn’t let too many people in his life in because of the fear of him accidentally hurting them. But this is Tom. Who was their for him at his lowest. He helped him to get most of the thugs off him during middle school. Gave him the suggestion to dye his hair blonde. Given him a job where everything else has failed. Even with izaya interfering with most of them, he knew his temper alone is the first cause of them. Tom helped him so much more than Shizuo deserved. Tom was the last person to be in this fucked up position. Even with the limited pool of relationships he has, he knew when a friend needed him. So he said what he knew he can do best.

“I’ll kill the asshole who put you in this mess. You didn’t kill the girl. I will prove your innocence one way or another. No matter what. I’ll be honest, I’m not sure where to start but I will find them.”

He can’t ask Tom to trust him. He’s afraid to ask. It would be too much faith to ask he had on him when he didn’t had that much faith in himself. Back of his mind, he’s afraid to fail. The voice nagging him, telling him he’s a fuck up. He’s nothing more than a beast destroying everything in his wake. But he’s gotta try. He’s too scared of the alternative option. Tom dying alone believing he’s not worth saving. So he squashes, pushes, kickes and punches that voice back as far it can go. Tom needed to see he’s trying. Tom just smiled at him.

“I trust you on that shizuo. I don’t usually go for violence but this is a special case. I wish I can be there to witness you do it. You still owe me a drink.”

“You still want to drink after this?” Shizuo jokes. Tom smiles a little wider and puts his left hand on his chin in contemplation.

“Hmmm You right. I’m done with drinking for a while. I’ll just settle with trying not to get killed in prison.”

*Aannnd that’s it! Im not sure how much I can do writing before I burn out but the dialogue is the fun part. Doing backgrounds will forever be a fun and the bane of my existence. I hope I stayed IC. I want to do a scenario where shizuo and izaya will work together but my brain will go straight to fluffy moments lol. *