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leclarifies · 3 months ago

Text

birthday boy

✰ max verstappen x !bestfriend reader ✰

summary: max doesn't like it when it's race week and you're not there. he's been trying to convince you to quit your job and just come to his races full-time, offering to pay for the expenses but you've refused every single time. you end up surprising him in the singapore gp for his surprise birthday party the grid had arranged for him.

wc: 3.5k

a/n: hi there! this is my FIRST ever published fic and i'm super nervous about posting hjawdhbawjhbdbhawd i've had this idea since maxie's birthday in september but kept it in the drafts and re-edited some things around just to make it cohesive. i have requests open and my masterlist is currently an ongoing wip. thank you for reading!

edit: hello, here's my complete masterlist for anyone who wants to view my other work. thank you for 350 notes btw! i really appreciate it <3

a ding rings through your phone and at first, you ignore it.

it’s usually a work text which is why you’re not more alert. it’s a weekend and you genuinely just want to enjoy yourself while watching the race that your best friend is participating in and starting from pole position.

then another ding, two more follow after that.

your furrow your brows confused, if it was a work text then they wouldn’t be spamming unless it was an emergency.

you open your phone and you’ve realized you’ve been added to a group chat.

lily m: hi guys! i’ve created this gc bc some of the boys wanted to surprise max for his birthday!!!!! so i’ve invited most of the drivers and their wags here in case you guys wanted in as well charles: Yes, hello everyone :) kika: yes! we’re so excited <33 all of the wags and respective drivers should be in this groupchat :D

seeing this groupchat made you confused, yes you were max’s best friend but you were certainly not a wag and very certain that you weren’t a driver. so, you sent a text.

you: hi guys, i appreciate the gesture but i am not a wag and certainly not a driver HAHA

lily m: oh yeah! alex told me to add you bc we thought that you would want to surprise max considering you guys are best friends HAHAHAH my bad i should’ve clarified

alexandra: welcome y/n! it’s great to have u here :]

you: no worries guys, but max’s birthday isn’t until almost two weeks from now were you guys planning a big party?

charles: I’m not sure what we want to do but considering it’s Autumn break when it’s his actual birthday, we wanted to start early.

lily z: we *could* plan a big party, but what do u think y/n? u know him best

you: i think a big party could suit him best lots of gin & tonic must i add

carlos: HAHA Of course.

the chats continued to flow in as all of the wags and some of their drivers tried to plan what felt best for max’s birthday party. it was a few hours before the race and you had assumed not all of the drivers had their phones on them which explained the lack of texts coming from them, it wasn’t abnormal. they were usually busy with their last minute content for their social media platforms or doing pre-race interviews.

then your phone rang, it was an incoming call.

“hello?” you spoke softly into the phone after picking up, knowing exactly who called.

“hi,” max breathed out softly, you could hear the hustle and bustle of the paddock in the background. max always made it a habit to call you a few hours before the race start, and it warmed your heart to think that he always thought of you before the races.

you didn’t know when the feelings started, was it his seventeenth birthday where he kissed you before his race? was it the promise that he would always be by your side and support you when you got your first job? was it when he convinced you to move to monaco and helped you move in with your sister? was it the soft glances he would shoot your way when you were at the paddock? or was it the small touches he would give when you guys were watching a movie? you didn’t know. all you knew that he was your best friend and you didn’t want to fuck this friendship up.

“hey, how are you?” you replied, “the pre-race nerves getting to you maxie?”

“never. how’s it in monaco? how are jimmy and sassy?” max had asked, he had asked you to babysit his cats for you and you accepted. you loved nothing more than to watch over his cats while tending to your work.

“s’good. the cats are well-behaved, and i’m lounging in your sim racing gear about to turn it on and experience the race myself,” you joked, knowing that you were nowhere near the sim racing setup that he had for himself.

“i told you not to touch that,” max warned, you could tell he was walking around just by the sound of him talking and being slightly out of breath, “i miss you being here on the weekends, when are you off work?”

“i’m kidding,” you laughed as you got into a more comfortable position on his couch, “i dunno when i’m scheduled for time off again. i also do not have the money to continue to travel around the world to watch your races, max. i am comfortable with watching your races from monaco.” “how many times do i have to tell you that you can fly with me and stay with me while you’re out?” max reprimanded you for even thinking about the expenses, “you could even quit your job and do nothing and i could still have money leftover.”

you hated when he brought that up, he had always brought up the idea of you quitting your job and him helping you through your family’s struggles. you didn’t want to feel like a leech, you knew that his job was stressful enough, you didn’t want to be a stress on him and affect his job. “i am not a leech–”

“you are not leeching if i’m telling you to quit your job and come accompany me through my race schedule. it’s nice to have a support system around…” max’s voice trailed off, “seeing the other drivers with their girlfriends– friends makes me jealous.”

you were quiet for a bit, you’ve had this conversation one too many times with him before. he had told you to just live life and be with him, to stop thinking about the expenses and just be there for him but something about having your entire life being paid for by an extremely rich dutchman just didn’t sit right with you.

“i told you i’d think about it, plus you can invite all of the friends you want. it doesn’t have to be specifically me,” you sighed, rubbing your temples, “it’s not a nice feeling having to rely on someone 24/7 you know. you should understand how i feel as well.”

“i understand,” max sighed as well through the line, then you could hear him a bit farther away talking to one of the staff walking with him, you were assuming that they were on the way to the motorhome, “anyways, i’m on my way to film some content and i just wanted to see how you’re holding up at home."

you hummed back a response, listening intently to what he had to say, knowing that he would want to talk to you more before having to begrudgingly film content for the red bull racing’s social media platforms, “can you at least promise me that you will give me an answer after autumn break?”

you knew that autumn break was after the race he was at right now, which was in singapore.

“max…” your voice trailed off, you didn’t know if you could make that decision in less than a month, “look, i said i’d think about it–” “but you’ve been thinking about it for three months, isn’t three months enough to make up your mind?” max cut you off, he hated it when you were stalling even though he knew that deep in your heart you would never come and just live off his expenses.

“we’re not having this conversation now,” you huffed, almost feeling frustrated now from max’s persistence, “how about you focus on the race and we can talk about this when you’re back?” “you always shut me out when it comes to hard decisions,” max replied back with the same attitude, “it’s such a bad habit, it pisses me off and it’s not like i’m asking you for a hard thing–” “just focus on the race. it’s your job. let me focus and enjoy mine, please. we can talk about this later when you’re back and you’ll have your answer then,” you almost begged him, you heard him say his goodbyes before shutting off the line. it was too early in the morning for him to be bargaining with you about your job– it wasn’t even bargaining anymore. he was practically begging you to quit your job to come to races with him full-time.

you didn’t necessarily have a hard job, sometimes you would attend the grand prix because you were working under a marketing firm in monaco and that would enable you to come to the races but it wasn’t all the time. your marketing firm worked closely with formula 1, but they had their main focuses and it didn’t allow you to attend and take time off work all of the time.

you estimated that it would be around 3 pm at singapore, which meant it was 5 hours to go before the main race.

rubbing on your temples was a habit you had when you got stressed and it made you stressed even thinking about quitting your job. you liked your job and your co-workers and the pay wasn’t bad.

you had basically promised him that you would give him an answer after he got home in monaco which made you make a decision under pressure. a ding from your phone distracted you from the problem at hand.

lily z: @/you how long would it take you to come to singapore? you: woah so suddenly?

kika: we thought we would just celebrate his birthday after the race, since we all can’t be in monaco at his exact birthday date what do u think y/n?

you: i dunno… okay kinda tmi but max has been bugging me about quitting my job to come and accompany him to the races fulltime but i told him i would give him a decision after the race i don’t think i’m ready to make a decision that quickly

alex: damn… we thought that it would be easier to celebrate in singapore instead of planning the party in monaco

you: it would certainly be easier all around but idk if i can face him so soon

lily m: i mean… is quitting ur job to hang out with us 24/7 rlly a bad idea HAHAH

you: honestly i would love to just hang out with u guys and just make it my job but i don’t wanna make it seem like i’m leeching off of max yk…

carmen: hi! i just caught up w everything but honestly, do what u feel comfortable with doing x if u don’t feel comfortable w cmg to singapore, then we’ll make ourselves available at an agreed date in monaco <3

alexandra: yeah, i agree ^^

lily z: honestly it all comes down to u y/n we all want everyone to b comfortable!

you: i don’t wanna be a nuisance, so i’ll take u guys up on that offer

alexandra: yay! so… book ur flight now..?

carmen: u better be ready bbg HAHAHAH

rebecca: wait what’s happening i just checked my phone

you stifled a laugh at rebecca’s late response but sighed, you guessed it was now or never.

you booked the first earliest flight from monaco to singapore, not forgetting about max’s cats and leaving them to your sister who lived together with you a few doors down.

but being on a flight to singapore meant that you had to miss watching the singapore gp altogether, only arriving in singapore at 8 am the next day.

you yawned and stretched as you got off the airplane, not forgetting to turn your phone back on to see a barrage of texts from max and from the group chat.

maxie <3: P2 Y/n :) Were u watching? Wish u were here :(

maxie <3: Hello? Is ur phone off? Why are my texts green?

maxie <3: I’m starting to get worried I texted your sister and she said she had no idea where u are

maxie <3: Can u please answer me, I’m really worried.

you giggled a bit from max’s flood of texts, but you and the girls had discussed that it would be a good idea to surprise him with your arrival in singapore. you told your boss that you were taking paid time off for the week as you knew that you would be traveling with the wags and drivers for the week to celebrate the autumn break.

alexandra and rebecca were the ones to pick you up from the airport, all three of you catching up and gossiping about what happened at the track while you were in the air.

“honestly, it was crazy to see mclaren finally starting to dominate the track this time of the year. usually we would see ferrari and red bull fighting but i guess they had the better car,” alexandra mumbled as you all sat together in the car.

“i expected max to win, but that’s a bit biased isn’t it?” you laughed, “he complained about the car a couple of times throughout the free practices but i wouldn’t know shit about the car. i’ve never driven one.” “yeah, carlos does it to me all the time and i’m sitting there pretending i know everything about the cars,” rebecca added onto that thought, “like yes babe, i know exactly what you’re talking about because being an f1 wag dictates that you know everything about the car you’re driving.” the three of you laughed.

it wasn’t long before you guys reached the club that you guys planned to have the big surprise party, lily z and m were there with kika and carmen. the boys were keeping max busy for the day.

it wasn’t long before the club was decorated and fit for the surprise party, you had booked out the entire club for the night to celebrate. it was nearing the time that max would arrive with the party of drivers.

“okay, so lando told max that they were celebrating his win again tonight so max shouldn’t be suspicious about what’s going on. considering lando’s quite the party animal,” lily z had told the group as they were sitting around the booth, you nodded and listened along well while guests from the teams were shuffling into the club.

honestly, you were a bit nervous facing max. you didn’t know if you were ready to completely quit your job, but you told yourself that you would talk about it later once the time comes. there wasn’t a point to stress about it now when max was nowhere in sight.

maxie <3: Y/n? Are my texts going through? Where are you?? I’m gonna call your phone flashed to see max was calling you. you picked it up and the first thing you hear was max panicking, “hello? where the hell have you been the past day? why haven’t you returned any of my calls or texts?” “well hello to you too,” you laughed, “i’m sorry about not responding to you, i’ve been busy with work. i’m currently at a work event. congrats on p2 by the way, i couldn’t watch the race because i was at the office.” “don’t ever do that again, you scared the shit out of me,” max breathed out, you could faintly hear the chatter of the drivers behind him.

“what are you doing right now?” you asked, feigning innocence, acting as if you didn’t know exactly where he was and what he was doing right now.

“lando wanted to celebrate his win again tonight so we’re going to a club to party,” max explained, “we’re arriving now, i’ll talk to you again later but you better respond straight away or i’m flying straight home.” “okay, okay. stay safe max,” you clicked the phone off before you signaled everyone to turn off the lights and get into positions to surprise max.

the doors of the club opened to reveal the drivers of the grid.

“why are the lights off–” “surprise!” everyone had shouted as max was front and center, the lights switched on to reveal the birthday balloons and you were there in front of the boys with the wags behind you. his face was priceless, the shock and the realization all hitting him at once. the realization that you were there and you weren’t at a work event but here, in the flesh, in front of him. it made him ecstatic.

you flashed a bright smile to max as he ran and hugged you almost instantly.

“you’re so sneaky,” max breathed out, you could feel his hot breath next to your ear, making goosebumps rise in its wake, “you made me so worried to only show up here…” you could only laugh and hugged him back tightly, his hug, his touch, it made you feel alive. his touch was electrifying– in a good way. his touches, whether light or full blown hand holding or his arm around your shoulder always lit you up like a lightbulb.

“i wanted to surprise you– well, everyone did. they thought it would be more convenient for me to come here and surprise you,” you laughed, “so, are you surprised?”

“hell yeah, let’s get this fucking party started!”

“so, about you quitting your job,” max tried to sneak the conversation in as the both of you were walking to his hotel, you couldn’t help but roll your eyes. they just had a really good fucking party and both of you were quite tipsy but sober enough to navigate your way through the streets of singapore (with the help of google maps).

“you’re a very persistent man,” you laughed as you walked alongside max, shoulders brushing against each other. it was almost 4 am, but you didn’t feel unsafe or scared at all. spending the night with max was what you really enjoyed. he made you feel things that you were scared of addressing, so for now you were going to enjoy the moment.

“seriously, you told me after the race and this is definitely after the race. so tell me, did you decide what you’re going to do?” max grabbed your wrist to stop the both of you from walking, you guys could see the hotel from this distance but he wanted to sincerely talk to you, “are you going to slave your life away, working from paycheck to paycheck and only coming to my races when you have the time? or are you going to agree with me and just ‘leech’ off of me?”

you sighed and turned to look at max, you couldn’t lie that the life he offered was enticing. not having to work a day in your life and still coming to these flashy grand prix and partying almost every week was a dream for most people and you were most people. “i dunno max, i told you i would give it a thought but you know how i feel about me living off of your money,” you locked eyes with max’s bright blue ones and he stepped closer to you, landing a hand on your cheek endearingly. the way he looked at you full of unconditional love, you couldn’t tell whether it was romantic or platonic anymore. you knew max and you knew that max would do anything for the people you loved and you were included in that list.

“if you’re thinking about family back at home, you know i can always send over some as well right? i know that’s your biggest concern,” max looked deep into your eyes and you could almost feel like he was looking into your soul, “i know you’re scared of leaving your work behind because you still need to support your family back home and you wanna know something? they’re my family too, i would send them money even if you didn’t ask.” max’s other hand found its way to hold yours, “please… just do this one thing for me. i always see the other drivers with their significant others and it pains me to see that you’re the only one not there and breaking your back to work. i just want you to support me and have fun while doing it…”

“max…”

“i’m serious,” max’s face grew ever so close to your own, you couldn’t tell whether the heat on your cheeks was from the proximity of the both of you or from the lingering alcohol, “you know i’d do anything for you and i don’t do that for a lot of people– you’re not a lot of people.”

“if i say okay, will that make you happy?” “the happiest man in the world.”

“consider this a birthday gift then birthday boy,” you breathed out and as you finished you sentence, you felt his lips on your own.

the kiss was electrifying– he was electrifying. his other hand that was clasping your hand softly was now on your other cheek, deepening the kiss. your hands found their way wrapped around his neck, pulling him closer.

to a rare passerby, the two of you were just a sweet couple sharing a kiss at 4 am and maybe, that’s what you were.

“you don’t know how long i’ve been wanting to do that for.” “ditto.”

#max verstappen fic #max verstappen x reader #max verstappen x yn #max verstappen oneshot #max verstappen fanfic #leclarifies fics

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corviiids · 23 days ago

Note

If i ask nicely, would you consider writing the core of Light and L character like you did for Shuake? (IT'S BRILLIANT BTW!! You're so galazy brain. I love reading any meta or just silly posts you posted here <3) because you mention Light a couple time in Akechi's part and now i need to know your thought on him and L.

(Also, about the death note wip you're cooking right now, is it a oneshot or multiple chapters fic? Im super excited for it!)

i ABSOLUTELY would thank you so much for asking and for your lovely kind words. and im sorry this took me seven years to get to i just kept psyching myself out.

here's the ren & goro post this ask refers to for anyone wondering. the 'core' refers to my answer to a writing meme:

26. What would you describe as OOC? [...] it's the same approach i take to language tbh particularly in pronunciation. once you understand how a language forms its sounds at a base level, you dont struggle with the accent on particular words, and you can encounter words you've never seen before and understand how they're likely to be said/spelled/etc. so once i learn to 'speak' a character they come more naturally. idk if that comparison makes sense to anyone else but it does to meeeee all this to say i think a character is ooc if they do or say something i cant reconcile with that core!

the death note wip is a multichap!! thank you for your interest!!! ill talk about it more once i've stopped tying myself in knots plotting it!! broadly it's a what-if type au which has led me to replot an entire series from scratch dont look at me

anyway lawlight below. i will say ive been really desperately wanting to do like a video essay or something about death note which would be a lot about L and light specifically and how i interpret their characters so ill try and not go toooooo insane in this post but maybe ill go more insane later. in a video. with my human voice.

(edit: i failed i went insane)

light - one-way road to the sky

ok let's talk about one of my favourite scenes of the entire series, which i think is widely not super well understood but honestly to me holds the key to light's entire character. it's right there in volume 1

sorry, the only digital copy ive got on hand is the scanlation. for comparison the official print copy reads:

bubble 1: hey, maki, wanna party tomorrow with some guys from s. college? ten o'clock. bubble 2: yeah, totally! bubble 3: hey, can i go too? bubble 4: my mom isn't here yet? what's that nag doing, geez! light (thinking): damn... light (thinking): start looking around you... light (thinking): and all you see are people the world would be better off without.

this happens within the first 40 pages of the first volume. and it's like. haha hey light what the fuck? this is a totally normal scene in everyday life. people are talking about living their lives. nobody's done anything remotely reprehensible in this scene. and light's just walking through the streets experiencing apparently unprompted and quite extreme misanthropy. what's wrong with him

ok let's have a quick look at the first time we meet light in the anime.

[...]

cool cool cool im gonna pivot again let's look at the first song (besides the overture) in the musical.

ok rook! we get it! light yagami is out here like damn we live in a society time to kill people about it. this is news to nobody! we all know this!! that's what the series is about! why are we rehashing all of this

great. cool. awesome. let's look at all those scenes one more time. but this time don't look at light. instead let's look at the people around him

in the opening shots of the anime (after the shinigami world, which actually is much the same theme): news of brutal murder is narrated over establishing shots of tokyo. light is shown dead-eyed, going about his ordinary life, surrounded by random other civilians doing the same thing.

in the musical, light isn't angry that murders happen. he's angry about the inaction and complicity of the ordinary people around him.

these scenes aren't highlighting that light thinks crime is bad. we all know crime is bad. the point of these scenes is to contrast light's frustration and fury against the reactions of the people around him. here's what light yagami is seeing: we're surrounded with rot. but nobody's reacting. and then life just goes on. so suddenly all those completely normal scenes of people being concerned with the superficial details of their life aren't just normality, they're complicity. day in, day out. so the world is rotting, and to light, it seems that everyone is completely ok with that. that's just the way things are. and that disgusts and depresses him. on top of than that, it isolates him: he feels like he's the only one who sees or cares about this, that everyone dismisses him as naive, that no one else can be trusted, that everyone else is able to ignore something he sees as inexcusable. this is a sentiment he repeats again and again. it reads as arrogance, and it is, but it's also isolation - after all it's lonely at the top and just as lonely to feel like you're at the top even if you arent

can i talk about the iliad again? is that ok with everyone. im gonna talk about the iliad again

in book 1 of the iliad, the commander of the greek army insults achilles by publicly and unlawfully taking a prize (the girl briseis) who rightfully belonged to achilles. achilles reacts by withdrawing his troops from the army, dooming the greeks' campaign. achilles had a lot of friends in the army, so why would he essentially sentence them all to death for something that only agamemnon did? well, (because agamemnon did something publicly that everyone knew was wrong, and yet nobody was willing (or at least able) to stand up for achilles and stop it from happening. achilles, disgusted by the inaction of the bystanders, turned his back on all of them. fun fact i nearly wrote a mini thesis (an academic one not just a long post on tumblr) about the intersection btwn this book of the iliad and legal theory but law+classics is such a niche interdisciplinary field my professor couldnt find anyone who could supervise me so i couldnt do it. anyway that's not the point

is this right or fair? who cares, not the point. what im interested in is what that kind of behaviour says about the individual. light, like achilles, is a highly idealistic person. we all know that in the abstract, but take a second to really really dig into it, because it's actually quite an interesting fact about a character who is popularly understood as being cold and unfeeling or flatly psychotic and on a power trip. idealism isn't naivety, it's not optimism, it's not even really a happy thing. idealism is simply a firm belief in the way things should be at the cost of refusing or being unable to accept what is.

this is the core of light yagami to me. light doesn't become kira because he's cold or destructive or crazy. he doesn't actually even do it because he's spiteful or misanthropic. it's very much the opposite. he's misanthropic because he believes in the world so much. isn't that a great contradiction! ok here i'll show you some proof.

in an early scene (also in volume 1), light describes himself as an optimist and ryuk finds that interesting.

so light is an optimist. he believes in a bright future for humanity. he wants to protect humanity. he likes humanity. no, he doesn't believe that people are inherently good, but he does believe in some goodness as a part of humanity and wants to protect the best of people, in an egotistical way:

how do we reconcile that with a young man who walks through the streets listening to completely ordinary conversations by ordinary people and reacts by wishing death on everyone talking?

let's split out what's going on here. remember what's happening in light's head. light yagami is 17 years old. he grew up with a police chief for a father (in a fictional world where the police are the literary stand-in for law as justice so just pretend for a second that police are good im sorry), watching his father work tirelessly to fight crime - but crime continues, making this an endless, thankless task. and while crime continues, so does the world around him. every day light sees atrocities on the news, and he sees atrocities brought home, and then he lives his ordinary life and watches the people around him apparently not give a shit, only concerned with the petty details of their own little lives. bystanders watching wrong happen, selfishly unaffected. day in, day out. that idealism is getting colder the longer this unendurable injustice goes on. so achilles condemns his friends to death.

what human trait is being exhibited? realistically it's helplessness. would being miserable about crime help to end crime? of course not. people have to go on with their lives, that's a fact, it's even a strength. even light begins the series completely unable to do a thing about the rot he sees around him, which is part of why he's so depressed. but that's not what light is seeing. light is seeing ordinary people appear to choose not to give a fuck about injustice. the thing that's sparking his disgust is apathy, real or apparent. light yagami is an idealist. he wants a better future - a utopia that only he can imagine - something that can only happen if either everyone becomes as good as he is, or he takes control.

if you leave an idealist in an unwinnable situation for too long, their pure belief will start to curdle. it will not turn to realism. they will not accept what is. they will only become more and more bitter that what should be, isn't. they will become a cynicist. this is really the heart of my argument and ive made it a million times and ill make it again. idealism and cynicism are not opposites, they're not even two sides of a coin. they are two points on the same line which moves very quickly in only one direction. this is where i start when im writing him: how do i make someone who believes so hard that it's killing him? someone who believes so hard it makes him believe in nothing?

then we find the third point on that line, which someone can reach by gaining sudden power - for example, a magic notebook that kills people: radicalisation.

how do we reconcile his desire to protect humanity with the fact that what he's trying to protect against is also humanity? how can i say light loves humanity when he has such disdain for them? easy peasy: light sees himself as the messiah. my bumper sticker that says ask me about light's martyr complex PLEASE ask me about light's martyr complex i wrote a song about it ask me about light seeing himself as the sacrificial lamb on the (and then the bumper sticker cuts off)

light loves humanity the way a twisted shepherd might love his sheep. something to be protected, but something beneath you that can't be trusted to know what's best for them. humanity is something he loves because it's endearingly pathetic, something to pity and save. repeatedly he refers to becoming kira as a personal sacrifice, something that costs him his soul but that he has to do. it's a delusion of grandeur driven by dual purposes of ego and some desperate wish to change a status quo he's been despairing about for years.

tl;dr: light believes with all his soul in something he thinks is impossible, and it's killing him slowly, and then a chance to change the world just falls out of the sky

L - isolate yourself until you can make believe it's just a game

steeples fingers. i have Things to Say about L Lawliet.

ok listen. listen. Listen. listen. are you listening? listen. in general i think people kind of misunderstand characters who are hyper-intellectual and/or behave unconventionally in social settings. you're all going to fucking kill me for this but i think there's a tendency to like... accidentally turn any character who falls vaguely in this broad category into sheldon cooper. god im sorry i feel like i just shot everyone's collective dog

specifically what i mean by that is that 'awkward' gets flanderised in a way that eventually becomes a caricature of itself, because there is so much nuance to actual social awkwardness that it's very easy to kind of pick a template and stick to it without really thinking about what makes that character 'awkward' and what the root and type of awkwardness is, unique to them. so instead we just get, like... generic big word user. generic driven by logic and logic alone guy. generic guy who doesn't Do Well with other people, for Smart Reasons.

here's a list of true things about L which i think are safe to say are uncontroversial

intuitive

logical, master of deductive reasoning

competitive

behaves in an odd way that draws attention

is aware of that fact

focuses extremely hard on his cases and only cares about being a detective not anything else

isolates himself and doesn't like talking to people partly for his own safety partly because it's boring to him

here are things i have seen in characterisation of L which i would like to dispute

makes decisions and draws conclusions based solely on logic and evidence

doesn't understand social cues

here's a list of alternate interpretations which i would like to propose and that i am willing to back up with evidence and/or by physically fighting over them

is driven primarily not by logic or evidence, but by incredible intuition which is supported by logic and evidence when it suits him

has a keen understanding of people, interpersonal relationships, and social norms

leverages that understanding frequently to his benefit

feels that he is not capable of / not a part of emotions that he sees as being typically human (see his speech about being a monster)

and yet in an abstract and self-contradictory and low-priority way still kind of desires connection, leaving him emotionally isolated

chooses to behave oddly on purpose, not because he doesn't realise he's behaving oddly, but because it is not a priority for him

those might seem like fine distinctions at some points, but stray slightly off the mark and his characterisation begins to vary wildly. for example, interpret L as being bemused or unaware of social cues, and one possible characterisation that may stem from that understanding (which i have seen) is that L doesn't understand sarcasm or jokes - which is demonstrably untrue. L demonstrates weak social skills because social skills aren't a priority for him, not because he doesn't understand social norms. after all he does a reasonably convincing 'i am a normal dudeguy' voice on at least two occasions (suzuki the information line guy and asahi the calling matsuda for drinks guy). even with the taskforce, when his behaviour is more of his usual bizarre self, he still makes the effort to treat them respectfully and meet them where they are, explaining himself when they ask, chatting with them, holding ordinary conversations. you can read this any number of ways but my point is that he can do all of this with relatively little struggle

it's also very much not the case that L doesn't have feelings or care about other people. he's ruthless and he's cool with causing people to die if he has to, but he reacts with visible distress to the deaths of the FBI agents, to ukita's death, to the prospect of other members of the taskforce dying. he does care, he's just not morally driven as a priority.

ok but if he can cosplay as Normal Dudeguy with no trouble then why doesn't he. why does he conduct all his business in dark rooms apart from the entire world forever. is it gauche to use a section of my own fic to explain my point? im going to do it anyway

It is easy to identify in Light what he has long known in himself. That little pearl of disruption, grown around an irritating grain of something just unique and tremendous enough to be uncomfortable to the more ordinary around them. L has hidden it by hiding himself. Light has hidden it by hiding within himself. L's black letter is to Light’s vapid smile is to Kira's invisible bullet.

(honestly a lot of what i have discussed here is also covered in this fic so in case this fucking three thousand word essay is not enough for you you can go read that.)

something L and light significantly have in common is that their intellect and unique way of thinking really set them apart from everyone in the world, which is incredibly isolating. but while L has the 'benefit' (arguably could be a detriment but i think he sees it as a benefit) of a unique upbringing which allows him to use his skills to their full extent without worrying about really anything else, light is very much trapped by social convention. while light's life is privileged and materially perfect, he's stuck inside what society expects of him, while L is able to exist completely outside that paradigm. the result is that light has retreated within himself and spends all day playing a part, barely tolerating the monotony and apathy of the world around him by mechanically performing as expected while smothering the part of him that never has an opportunity to truly come out until kira. L, on the other hand, has no reason to put up with a society that is, for lack of a better term, really just beneath him. so he retreats. remember that the first volume/chapter of the manga is called 'boredom'.

you can see that even in his comparatively limited interactions with the task force, he is having to exercise a level of patience to explain to them what he's thinking at every stage, to have to defend his methods, his instincts, his decisions, etc, needing to step through every stage of his reasoning so that the others can follow and won't object. this is NOT just about masking his odd behaviour, it's also very much about having to step through his morals and his process, which is second nature to him but is new to everyone else and needs explaining. it is visibly exhausting to him, and this is with people he actually seems to like well enough. eg during yotsuba arc when light and soichiro keep raising moral concerns, and he has those little "here we go again" moments (which i love SO much and are so telling of him to me) even though he doesn't let his frustration show. which is why he usually does not bother with it and prefers to work alone. he sits the way he does even though he knows it's odd, because he feels he need to sit that way. when light calls it out, he doesn't question that people will think he's strange, so he's clearly aware. he just explains himself.

but if he were out with people on the regular, he'd need to defend himself constantly. the things L does are not conventional. yes the sitting is just an oddity of his so it's a good example, but it's not just the things that are odd that cause a problem: he frequently makes decisions which seem to make massive leaps of logic nobody else (except light) can follow, and often his actions are morally questionable or even reprehensible. all that is because L is extremely pragmatic and results-focused. it kind of doesn't matter to him how he gets from A to B as long as he gets to B. but the way his mind works is that he makes big jumps that make perfect sense to him but would draw curiosity or objection from anyone who doesn't think the way he does. it would be absolutely exhausting to have to constantly defend every strange or questionable thing he did, so he just retreats.

when he works with other people, i think it's worth noting that the team dynamic never actually struggles for L's awkwardness. this is something i really like about death note honestly - L is quirky and strange, but the series doesn't do that thing where it's like He's A Genius Of Course He's Rude To Everyone. he's actually not. for the most part, L is courteous, patient, and polite. he's sometimes blunt or abrupt, but he very rarely does the thing where he's obliviously cruel or brushes people off. he's considerate of people's needs, he's visibly compassionate of other people's emotional difficulties, and he very rarely loses his patience. when matsuda tries to tell the locked-up light about kira resuming activity, L snaps "Matsuda!" to stop him, and then immediately corrects himself to go "I mean, Matsuda-san." it would have been really easy for the series to do that tropey shit where he's so smart that he doesn't bother with politeness, but he factually does. he makes the effort to treat people politely even when he's not actually being kind. when he's asked to explain himself, the reader can see he's tired and annoyed, but he doesn't take it out on people. on the odd occasion he does make fun of someone for being slow, he does so in mostly light-hearted ways. so he is very capable of dealing with other people directly. his lack of social skills aren't for lack of understanding. he just can't be bothered. it's a waste of energy to try and behave 'normally' or to do things that other people find acceptable, whether that's due to social norm or common morality. it is so, so much easier for L to do things alone. without the need to explain or defend his behaviour to anyone, his isolation turns real world problems into something almost purely theoretical. so it really is like a game for him, at least at first.

whatever

i think it's really important for a character like L to not be fooled by the surface-level categorisation of 'smart awkward character'. we really need to find what's driving his awkwardness. it's not ignorance, it's not even really disdain, it's exasperation. he's tired of being surrounded by people who just can't keep up with him, and he does not have enough energy or interest to spend his time handholding everyone through his process, so he just does whatever the hell he wants and avoids people as much as possible so he doesn't have to deal with it.

look i know this is a really long way to say stuff that people mostly already know, but i think L is one of the most finely nuanced characters in the series because he looks like such a simple expression of a known archetype and the ways in which he subverts expectations are so granular that it's easy to completely miss them even while appreciating how interesting he is. the way this translates into how i write him is that he's polite and has a lot of patience until he simply doesn't, at which point he'll inwardly or subtly express that he wishes he didn't have to bother with this shit, that he picks up on fine social and emotional details that other people will totally miss, but that he'll always put his own whims and plans before anything else.

tl;dr: L behaves like someone who is constantly moving at his own pace and for whom dealing with people is rarely worth the effort, but this does not make him inept or unkind.

#i also wanna say i have my own personal headcanons regarding like #l and light's experience with neurodivergence etc #but that doesn't play into my analysis here so much. this is just about how i read their behaviour and motivations #diagnosing fictional characters is not really something i feel comfortable doing out loud #because i dont feel it's my place to do that. ill just keep those thoughts in my head #rookthots #death note #long post #i got this ask in like september #im so sorry #i got stressed about sharing my opinions on the internet so i just sat on it for months #IT'S MY OPINIONS. MY OPINIONS ONLY. only my personal thoughts and opinions #only my personal approach to writing these characters #only my personal fucking doctorate on lightology that im presenting on tumblr

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zzoomacroom · 10 months ago

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Retired amnesia Dream + coma Hob for WIP ask game please 🥺🥺🥺

Thank you for the ask! @linzod asked about this one too, and I'm super excited about it! I only have it outlined so far, but I'm hoping to write it once I'm done with the mpreg fic.

So Murphy is just some guy, as far as he knows. He's an artist, and he's kind of a shut-in with no friends and no life to speak of. He starts having really vivid dreams that, unbeknownst to him, are showing him memories of his past life. He also keeps having these recurring dreams where he meets with this guy named Hob who seems really familiar and keeps telling Murphy that he's real, he's been looking for him, he's trapped in the Dreaming and he needs Murphy to find him in the waking world. Murphy doesn't believe any of it, thinks his unconscious mind made the whole thing up, and he's like, "great, I'm so lonely that my sleeping mind made me an imaginary friend." But then he keeps finding clues suggesting that Hob is telling the truth. He goes to the White Horse and, even though it's abandoned and boarded up, he recognizes it from his dreams. He also maybe finds mentions of Hob in historical texts, the drawing of them from the 1789 meeting, etc. So now he understands that it's all true, and he has to find Hob and hopefully regain his memories in the process.

Now I'm going to put what's happening from Hob's perspective under the cut, because it's a plot twist that would be revealed later in the story.

So how did they end up in this situation? Well, after the Wake, Hob became more unhinged than ever and couldn't accept that Dream was dead. So he planned to do a whole "Dream of a Thousand Cats" style thing and have a thousand people dream that Morpheus is alive again. But in order to organize and orchestrate this whole plan, Hob puts himself into a magically induced coma so he can stay in the Dreaming and make sure the plan works. But once it does, he finds himself stuck there. The mysterious and sketchy person he hired to put him into this coma has disappeared, and now he's trapped with no way to wake up. Morpheus keeps finding him when he dreams, so Hob is overjoyed about that but heartbroken that Morpheus doesn't remember him and doesn't believe any of his dreams are real. Eventually, Morpheus finds Hob in the waking world, wakes him up, gets his memories back, and they live happily ever after.

I don't want to give too much away, but I will say that this fic will also feature Death, Delirium, Daniel, Lucienne, Matthew, Johanna Constantine and Mad Hettie.

Hopefully I'll actually be able to get it written before too long 😭

#ask game #wip title game #the sandman #dreamling #dreamling fic #sort of #retired dream #zoom writes #zoom says stuff

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dustyblinds · 9 days ago

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happy rpf monday! what are you cooking? 😁

hi again Carers of Ezzie's WIPs! i did a separate ask where i talked about underrated ships i'm writing about that can be found here

and so on this ask (thank u btw i love to yap 😭🙏🏾) let's talk about the head ship in charge joe'marr!! i'm currently writing 3 fics but one is kinda... so i'll talk about the two i like 😛

okay first is this silly fic that i dont have any snippets from just a description lol:

Tee asks to meet Joe’s girlfriend while they’re away in Louisiana.

so essentially i wanted this to be a super short fic told from Tee's perspective where he's been asking Joe since their rookie year about a girlfriend that he's always going to see on their byes and like offseason and Joe always indulges in his questions. but the silly part is that there is no girlfriend and Joe never told Tee the whole truth abt who he was seeing all those years 😭 so they have a game out in Louisiana and on the plane ride there Tee is like can I finally meet your gf and he figures it out when he sees how Joe is around Ja'Marr pregame.

some stuff im still figuring out abt this one is if i want Ja'Marr to play for the saints in this universe (shivers...) or if he's just living out in NOLA being a wag you know 🙏🏾 it'll come to me

the other fic that i'll share is abt them in college actually & in true ezzie joemarr fashion (that you just learned a few sentences ago) only joe plays football in this one & ja'marr hoops 😛

here's the description (mind you, the descriptions are just for me to write around so if it sounds corny... idk what to tell you but trust the process 😭)

Uno is playing March Madness basketball and Joe is preparing for the draft. Joe is falling (fast).

OKAY: so it takes place at LSU, mostly after the college football championship, between late January and March Madness. it's told from Joe's POV & they know each other previously, but get closer after Joe's season ends and he has time to start going to Ja'Marr's games.

i want it to be introspective of Joe trying to figure out what's going on between him and Ja'Marr but lowkey not realizing that even though Uno is entertaining him March Madness is a big deal for him and it gets really stressful and tense and yeah 🙏🏾

here are some snippets of this!!

when they meet:

“I’m Ja’Marr, by the way,” Justin’s company– Ja’Marr’s– voice cut into the sound of the tape (and registered later than Joe would like to admit). The room had previously been swamped with a tangible silence, so heavy that Joe had nearly omitted the reality of someone else being in the room from his memory.

“Joe,” he said plainly. He turned up the volume slightly so that Ja’Marr would get the idea that he was busy. The game was less than a week away and Joe was adamant on analyzing all of Florida’s games this season so that he would have a solid plan for practice in a few days.

“Justin told me you don’t talk much,” Ja’Marr moved to the couch and sat on the opposite end of Joe, “you watching Florida?”

Joe paused the film, the second time he’d done so this morning for interruption instead of study, at the realization of two things: he was not going to be able to get anything done with Ja’Marr chatting at him, and he liked the way Ja’Marr pronounced it Flo'da just then.

next excerpt is the first time Uno asks Joe to come to a game (after the cfb championship):

“Make sure you come to one of my games before you leave.”

As much as Joe liked Ja’Marr, and appreciated his company at the moment, he didn’t like basketball. At all. Generally, the regular season games were anticlimactic and pretty much identical. There were about three things you could do in basketball: pass, catch, and shoot. None of which excited Joe very much. When it came to basketball, his stance was that if he’s seen one game, he’s seen them all.

“I don’t know, I’m not really a basketball guy,” he trailed.

“That’s ‘cause you ain’t ever seen me play,” Ja’Marr stuck his pinky out, “I promise, it’ll be the best game you’ve been to.”

Hesitantly, Joe reached across the table and wrapped his pinky in Ja’Marr’s.

“Bet,” he smiled and bounced their laced fingers before letting go, “Our next home game is against Florida. I’ll send you my schedule.”

And, well, that would be unnecessary. Joe could easily access their schedule from the school’s athletic website. But, Ja’Marr was a little too enthusiastic at the thought of him coming to a game, and he got to hear him say Flo'da for the first time in a while, so he didn’t mention it. Instead, he said, “I’ll look out for it.”

(peep the handshake lol...)

random excerpt i like:

It’s hard to tell from the stands just how bad a foul is, and shit, if Joe were out there he would flop too. He couldn’t imagine getting physical on the court, bruises, scratches, the whole nine yards, and not getting any calls.

He reaches out and examines Ja’Marr’s arm up close. His fingers lightly brush over the scratches on his bicep, wincing at their severity. Ja’Marr all but flinched at the contact but kept himself steady under Joe’s touch. And to think he almost got a tech for pleading his case. Bullshit.

His eyes dragged further down to where Ja’Marr’s sleeve was earlier, tattoos on display without it now. His fingers followed his eyes, tracing over all the ink he didn’t understand. Ja’Marr was so placid under Joe’s touch, his skin too soft, too inviting.

“Looks like it hurts.” Scratches, tattoos, none of his teammates defending him. It all looks like it hurts. Joe contained himself.

Ja’Marr tilts his head slightly, angling his arm for a better look, “it do?”

“They foul you a lot.”

He smiles, “they do that when you good.”

Despite the on-court protests, he relished the way other teams guarded him in a way Joe didn’t understand. As a spectator, the fouls were a little hard to watch. He found himself holding his breath more than once when Ja’Marr drew contact.

“You think I played good, Burrow?”

“I don’t understand a lot of the rules,” Joe started, “but you had a lot of points.”

“Do you think,” Ja’Marr lowers his voice as if the place is occupied by anyone other than them, “did I look good?”

There weren’t too many things that could fluster Joe or cause him to lose his composure, and it was apparent that Ja’Marr Chase would constantly be the one to find new ways to accomplish just that. The question was miles away from what Joe was expecting, lightyears even. It left his brain scrambling to form a group of coherent words, let alone a full, thoughtful response.

Honestly, the answer was yes. Hell yes. His ball handling skills, no look passes, fast-break shots in transition, how vocal he was directing his teammates while bringing the ball down the court. There was something very attractive about it.

OKAY YAY!!! thanks for reading lmk if you want more heh.. i have a lot from the second fic but i want it to be kinda long so dont expect it soon... as for the first one like i said it's practically just an idea in my head rn LMAO but if you have any thoughts or qs lmk!!! :)

thank you so much for the ask 🤍

#nfl rpf #joemarr #joe'marr #i didnt plan on publishing these lol but why the hell not!!#my wips

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wildlife4life · 10 months ago

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Seven (+) Sentence Sunday

Tagged by the super lovely @prosperdemeter2 @gayedmundodiaz @lemonzestywrites @rainbow-nerdss @devirnis @cal-daisies-and-briars @buddierights @disasterbuckdiaz @exhuastedpigeon @dangerpronebuddie @daffi-990 @tizniz @try-set-me-on-fire and @rogerzsteven Thank so much! Go check out all their snippets and works!

Well would ya'll look at that... I'm actually participating in a tag day with an actual wip and not a coda. Whoa. And even better... Its an NFL Buck snippet! WOOOOO! Want to see more NFL Buck? Please check it all out here!

"So." Karen begins, pulling Hen's attention from the book she's been trying to read for the past week. She quirks an eyebrow at her wife, "So?" "So my boss's son's, partner broke their leg Tuesday after tripping over their 15 year old terrier." Karen explains and Hen can't help but look back towards where Paisley is lounging on the arm chair (Hen's favorite seat that she has lost to that sassy fur ball) with worry. Her wife chuckles reading Hen's internal concern, "Babe, Paisley is as pure bred as they come. We'll be lucky if she makes it to 10." "That pure bred survived an earthquake and a collapsed building. I wouldn't put it past her to make it way past 10 out of spite alone.” Hen remarks, turning back to Karen. Karen rolls her eyes, but gets back on topic, "Anyway. Harris, that's the partner, got their hands on some passes to that super exclusive gay club, The Green Carnation for this Friday." "You mean the place that runs a background check rivaling the FBI, makes every patron sign NDA's, and will blacklist a person from every gay bar from here to Vegas if they break said NDA? The place that is rumored to host not only out celebrities, but also the deeply closeted, tilt the world on it's axis if they ever came out, big names? That gay club?" Hen questions, her excitement starting to rise. Her very sexy and somehow very connected wife smirks, "The very one. And poor Harris just can't fathom trying to hop around on one leg and not drink thanks to their newly acquired pain meds. So they had their partner-" "Your boss's son." Hen remembers, leaning towards Karen, who instinctually gets closer as well. "Karson, with a K, starts to asks around his dads work because you know, we're literal rocket scientist working on very classified information." "Who better to invite to a secret club than those who work on secret projects." "Exactly." Karen's smirk becomes wicked (and very sinful), "And wouldn't you know, the only non-straight and married person around is yours truly." Hen honest to go squeals, loud and bubbling with elation, "You got us passes to The Green Carnation?!" "With a pre-paid drink package. All we have to do is agree to the background check and sign the NDA." Karen replies with a broad grin. Hen can no longer hold herself back and practically tackles her wife with a teeth clattering kiss. Karen, as always, catches her and kisses back 110%. ("So, my 48 off falls on the weekend." Eddie states and he takes notice of Buck's sly grin forming, his boyfriend most likely on the same train of thought, "And since it's still your bye week..." "You want to dance the night away with other secret gays." Evan finishes. Eddie smirks, "And get a private room blow job." The quarterback's smile is almost feral like, "I'll make the reservation." And Eddie watches Buck tap on the contact Florists with the green clover next to it. The phone rings twice before a deep voice comes through the speaker, "State your member id." "Buckley, 201-09-18." "Diaz, 201-09-19." A quick moment of silence, then, "What can The Green Carnation do for you today Mr. Buckley and Mr. Diaz?")

Hmm... Is a certain run in going to happen???? We'll see!!! Hope you all enjoyed!

Tagging (no pressure): @hippolotamus @theotherbuckley @watchyourbuck @perfectlysunny02 @aroeddiediaz @loserdiaz @diazsdimples @jesuisici33 @fortheloveofbuddie @evanbegins @buck-coded @glorious-spoon @thekristen999 @spotsandsocks @sunshinediaz @lover-of-mine @hoodie-buck @elvensorceress @gayedmundodiaz @giddyupbuck @goforkinard @bekkachaos @thewolvesof1998 @eddiebabygirldiaz @spaceprincessem @eddiiediaz @honestlydarkprincess @doublecheekeddiaz @transboybuckley @nmcggg @monsterrae1 @missmagooglie @thebloomingheather @bigfootsmom

#seven sentence sunday #tag game #my wip #911 abc #911 fic #buddie #buddie fic #evan buckley #eddie diaz #hen wilson #karen wilson #henren #quarterback buck #firefighter eddie #nfl #secret relationship #secret club #gay club #green carnation symbol

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littlecrittereli · 9 months ago

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hiii noticed ur asks were open and wanted to say i adore ur work, it's super fluid and dynamic and it makes my day to see it! both writing and artwork!

i wanted to share a doodle i made of diego when reading Reprogrammed for the first time, before i realized there was an official design by you (i read the fic before finding ur tumblr) ^_^

+ a wip of something i drew while reading Reprogrammed, (i did start tearing up and this was while i was listening to your playlist for it,) that i don't know if i'll ever finish, but since I made it with your fic in mind, i thought it would be nice to share:

once more, thank you so much for your work in general, you're a great artist and author and not only am i excited to see more of your work, but i'm also excited to just generally see how you're doing and wish you the best in life :)

THESE ARE SO COOL I LOVE THEM WHAT THE HELL!!!!! oughh I love how similar your Diego drawing is to his actual design despite not having seen it yet and thank you so much oAHDASDH YOU'RE SO NICE!!!!! RAHHH!!!! PUTTING YOU IN A SNOW GLOBE AND SHAKING VIGOROUSLY!!!!!! /AFF

#wild kratts #littlecrittereli #wk reprogrammed au #reprogrammed au #asks #wild kratts au #REPROGRAMMED FANART FEEDS ME #I JUST OUGRRRR R R R R R R R R BARK BARK BARK BARK #it makes me so happy #thank you *incoherent sobbing noises*

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writingquestionsanswered · 1 year ago

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I've had ideas for stories I want to write, I write down a bullet point outline, but then I struggle with the actual writing bit. I can think and imagine a full scale plot with hooks, twists, etc but there's a block.

I've always struggled with getting my thoughts put into words that make sense for how I see it. Or just putting thoughts into words in general.

Do you have any advice that may help?

Plot Fleshed Out, Can't Write

When you understand plot and story structure, have the plot fleshed out and outlined, but still can't write, it's almost certainly because you're lacking one or more of the following:

1 - Inspiration - Your story's outline is sort of like the wooden studs, struts, joists, and beams that serve as the underlying structure of a house. You can have detailed instructions for how to build the actual house, but if you don't have ideas for what materials to use to build the walls, the kind of roof to put up, what type of floors to put in, what color to paint the walls, and how to decorate everything, you'll only ever have a structure. That's why one of the most important things you can do as a writer is make sure you have a full creative well at all times. If you're struggling to take a detailed outline and turn it into an actual story, it's probably because your creative well is dry. You have the structure, you just don't have ideas for what to do with it. So, spend some time Filling Your Creative Well and you'll find that ideas for what to actually write come pouring in.

2 - Motivation - Believe it or not, you can have a detailed outline and a full creative well providing you with lots of ideas for what to write, and you can still be unable to actually write anything. All kinds of things can hamper our motivation to write, from self-doubt and distraction to not feeling well or life getting in the way. My posts: Feeling Unmotivated with WIP, Worried About Writing Style, Delaying Writing Out of Fear, Writing and Depression, Would Rather Be Doing Other Things can help with some of the common motivation zappers.

3 - Excitement - Even with a detailed outline, a great story idea, tons of great ideas, and plenty of motivation to write, if you're not excited about your idea--about the characters, setting, plot details, all of it--you may find yourself struggling to actually write. My posts: Guide: How to Rekindle Your Motivation to Write, Getting Excited About Your Story Again, and

4 - Practice - Knowing how stories work and being able to actually write one are two completely different things. Kind of like you can know how to read sheet music and understand how to play a piano, but that doesn't mean you can just sit down and play a beautiful, flawless concerto. Writing requires practice, and practice means you have to spend a lot of time writing not-so-great stuff before you can write great stuff. But if you never take the time to write the not-so-great stuff, or if you never start writing because you feel like what you write has to be immediately perfect, you'll never get the practice you need. So, just start writing. Do writing prompts. Write fan-fiction. Journal. Any kind of writing will exercise your writing muscles and get them into shape.

5- Energy - Having the physical and mental energy to write is just as important as everything above. If you're lacking in energy, you're not going to feel like writing when you sit down and try to write. So, self-care is super important when you're going to be writing. Make sure you're getting enough sleep, exercising, and eating right. Try to avoid doing things that sap your physical and mental energy if you know you're planning to write later. Take some time to figure out the time of day that works best for you energy-wise and try to schedule your writing time then.

Happy writing!

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joelalorian · 3 months ago

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WIP wednesday thursday friday

Imma bout to just call it WIP day. Thank you so much for the tag, my dear @burntheedges!

Being the phasical (is that even a word? idek) person that I am, I've been struggling to write much and my attention turned to playing Tom Clancy's The Division 2 for way too many hours. I'm finally getting bored with that game (again), so it's back to writing :) I have two things - one is a story that I'm 5 chapters into already and the other is just an idea so far:

Untitled stepdad!Dave York x f!reader - still rough draft form, so forgive any glaring mistakes, please. This one will likely launch around the new year.

“Sure, honey. You can come stay for a while,” your mom assured you. She sounded excited even though it wasn’t a call you wanted to make, not at this point in your life, but what other options did you have? “You can see the house and meet your new stepdad!”

Dead air. It took you a moment to process her words. “My new WHAT?” your voice rose toward the end in utter confusion. You didn’t even know your mom was dating anyone, let alone someone serious enough to fucking marry! “Oh, honey, his name is Dave and you’re just gonna love him,” she replied with a lovesick simper. You’d never heard her voice do that. She must be really into the guy. Enough to marry him without even inviting you to the god damn wedding? She’s still chatting away, explaining how they met – at work – and how it was such a whirlwind romance that they got carried away on a work trip to Vegas and decided to just tie the knot without telling anyone. Okay. That, actually, didn’t surprise you. Your mom was super smart but could be a total a flake sometimes, leaving you to wonder who the adult was on more than one occasion while growing up. She had you really young and never quite matured. “That’s great, Mom. I can’t wait to meet him,” you finally replied after twenty minutes of listening to her gush over this Dave guy. “But I’m not calling him Dad.” She laughed. “Of course not, honey. He’s too young to really be your dad anyway.”

2. Suddenly Snowbound - Joel Miller x f!reader holiday fic inspired by the Hallmark movie Love You Like Christmas. Coming December 2024.

Joel owns a ranch and sells the finest Christmas trees in the state during the holiday season. On a road trip to find a fresh start on the west coast, a blizzard leaves you stranded in the small town near Joel's ranch. Calamity and, dare I say, love ensue.

NPTs - always late to the party, apologies to anyone who's already been tagged/done this and i missed it - @baronessvonglitter @kyberblade @sirowsky-stories

@grogusmum @thundermartini @pedges-world @thesummerpetrichor @aurorawritestoescape

#wip tag game #it's wip day #whatever day this is #dave york equalizer 2 #dave york x f!reader #joel miller tlou #joel miller x f!reader

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klm-zoflorr · 4 months ago

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Fanon Lukas family tree!! Well, it's for my AU, but I'm sure we can make it work for canon as well ahah

& dark mode... it looks cool okay

I've been working on it for a month lowkey, ever since I started on that Evan/Naomi wip, just... Slowly building up lore and a story and characters and rough estimates of ages and tidbits of brainstorming and a timeline and daddy issues and coming up with names and in this case, well, superpowers too because that's what the AU is about. But anyways, I'm super excited to dig in further, because YES all of these characters pretty much have some amount of personality and interesting details about them so far. Woohoo!! It's also interesting for the same reasons Gerry is interesting; because powers pass down genetically!! Yeehaw!! I get to give them all slightly different versions of the same powers and see how it informs their relationships!

You can see here what was basically my very first version of it. How underdeveloped! It grew a lot, damn. Also some minor changes I made along the way, as for the reasons why... Well they're pretty interesting if I do say so myself, I'll talk about those later. Have fun spotting the differences if you'd like lol

Still, a few general notes so far:

I believe the only Lukases mentionned in canon are Peter, Mordechai (in the 1800's), Nathaniel (owner of their cargo company so presumably some sort of patriarch), Conrad (the guy who talked to the astronauts before shooting them into space) and Evan Lukas. To that I added Virginia, an OC but like come on we need some women represent around here. I've always interpreted Nathaniel as being Peter's uncle, so i put him there. Nathaniel should be the one in charge in my mind too, so I made him the grandfather of the main line/evan's line (because evan is sort of the main character here). I also wanted to keep peter away from the main branch because... Well i don't know. I just didn't want him to be Evan's dad I guess. Or else, you've got that specific branch of the family that gets all the spotlight and important canon characters, and everybody else kinda sucks. It's not ideal!

I originally planned on leaving Peter's branch of the family pretty blank to be honest just because I wasn't super invested into him. I thought he had a sibling and a few nephews and that was it. But then I relistened to mag159, realised he had 5 (wait, 4? Oh shit, did i fuck up. Uhhhhhh) A FEW siblings and that two of them were named, Judith and Aaron. So that was interesting!

Mostly the beginning of it was just figuring out the ages to get an idea of how they should behave and how it all fit in and how far down the line they should be, and then building around it.

Oh, yeah, and based on the few canon names we got, I tried to find names that fit in. The style was... Well. The lukases' names sound to me like they're very basic. Kinda trendy, kinda... What I thought about was "cute" actually. So i tried to keep the same vibe for the rest of my made up guys. Wee-woo. Annnnd ive been rambling again.

Oh, oh right, wait no don't leave yet there were still thing I had to talk about. Few important details I knew about at the beginning stages:

-Evan's mother is a Lukas, and she's very opinionated but kind

-I wanted Nathaniel's eldest son, the one who became Graham (no, not notebook eating graham) to have a son who resents him very much. So i did that

-Adeline! She's old as balls. And very nice. Iwant her to be my grandmawmaw

-oh, right, Mordechai 2!!! For him I thought of the power first, basically he can show you things that happened in the past without having witnessed them. It's a pretty great ability imo.

-Oh, yeah, uh, every Lukas passes down their family name no matter their gender lol.

#peter lukas #evan lukas #the lukas family #tma au #tma #the magnus archives #klm-zoflorr #magpod

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thistleraven · 15 days ago

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Sing the Body Electric Mass Effect wip

I stumbled across this in my wips and you know what, one day I will come back to sing but until then, the people should have this excerpt I wrote for ME3:

—*—

When they get to her cabin, Shepard goes directly to the bed and flops heavily on top of it, her legs wide but her arms crossed over her face to block out the light. Her raised arms pull up her sweatshirt, and Garrus is captivated by the slice of her revealed belly and the jut of her hip bones that get cut off by the waist line of her pants.

Garrus moves across the room to get in between her legs. He makes it to the edge of the bed when Shepard’s next words, said in such a sullen, annoyed tone, startle him.

“Harbinger can suck my dick.”

Garrus pauses, then chuckles. He kneels on the bed, pulling her legs over his knees so her pelvis rests in his lap. He smooths his hands over the soft, exposed skin of her belly, and watches her shiver.

“I know for a fact you don’t have one of those,” Garrus says, snapping at her waist band to punctuate his point.

“I can get one,” Shepard says mulishly. “Fuckin—call Miranda, she’ll make me one.”

“Oh yeah, that’s a call I’d be thrilled to make.” Garrus rolls his eyes. “Hey Miranda, super urgent: can you make Shepard a dick? She needs it so she can tell The Vanguard Of Our Destruction to suck it.”

She peeks out from under her arm and waggles her eyebrows at him. “I mean, I could use it for other things too.”

“Shepard, I’ve just started feeling like I’m getting the hang of sex with your body now, don’t go and complicate it for me again,” Garrus complains.

“Ugh, fine,” Shepard says, and covers her eyes again. “EDI, find me the biggest dildo on the extranet and send it to Harbinger with the note that Commander Shepard says it can assume control of this and go fuck itself.”

EDI’s dry voice comes from the ceiling. ”I’ll get right on that, Commander.”

Garrus pokes her. She grunts in response.

“You know, Harbinger might actually enjoy that. Then where would we be?”

Shepard’s mouth twitches, and Garrus watches her belly shake, feels her muscles ripple as she tries to hold in her laugh. Shepard moves her arms to look at him, her eyes bright and mischievous, and Garrus knows he’s going to hate what she says next, but Spirits, he loves her, he loves her.

“Well, who knows, G,” she says, and Garrus can hear in her voice how bad this is, how thrilled she is with knowing he’s going to hate it. He’s already resigned to it. “Maybe the Reapers just need a good nut.”

Garrus sputters, “That’s horrible,” but he can’t help but laugh with her when she finally breaks and lets loose a honking belly laugh, rare and precious these days.

“God,” Shepard wheezes finally, after their giggles subside. “What a headline: “Reaper War Averted: Not With A Bang, But With A Bust,” and that sets them off again until EDI’s voice comes over the intercom.

“Shepard,” EDI says, and Garrus never knew a computer could sound so deeply amused. “I have located the biggest dildo on the extranet. It is 45 feet tall, and 15 feet in diameter. It is worth 1.3 million credits, and was created as an homage to Krogan General Jorgal Thruk.”

There's a long moment where Garrus and Shepard digest that information.

“Wow,” Garrus says faintly. “That should do it.”

“Good for him?” Shepard offers.

EDI continues, her robotic voice devious, “It is also mechanized.”

Shepard gasps, delighted, and shoves Garrus in excitement.

“Oh my god Garrus, with a bang and a bust!”

Garrus leans forward to rest his head on her shoulder and desperately tries not to think of reapers and giant mechanized krogan dildos.

“Shepard, please, I want to achieve an erection sometime in the next year,” he pleads.

Shepard snickers against his neck, and then shimmies down so she can pull at his tunic, her bad mood clearly forgotten as she skates her fingers up his waist. Garrus shivers, and she leverages herself up to kiss his face.

“Well, Officer Vakarian, let me see what I can do,” she murmurs against his mandibles, then, “Get lost, EDI.”

The lights dim as Garrus lets himself get pulled in by her.

“Getting lost, Commander,” EDI says, her voice soft and affectionate.

—*—

To her left, the destroy panel glows a hellish red, ominous and foreboding. To her right, the glowing blue and green lights of control and synthesis chambers flicker at her, calm and soothing. Either one would be a peaceful solution, either one would save countless lives, end this war forever.

She takes a step to the right, and the world shifts, reels, fuck, her leg is so fucked up, it hurts so goddamn much, she sobs as the pain lances clean and clear like a knife—

All she has to do is get to those lights, and she can rest. All she has to do is throw her broken body into one of the those chambers, one of those tubes—

—into

Tubes. Throw her body into a tube.

meat and tubes, a little voice whispers in the back of her mind, and Shepard starts to laugh.

The Catalyst’s face flickers and god. God, it’s all so fucking funny.

She wipes the tears of grief and agony and mirth from her face, and points at him.

“Harbinger,” she says. “You stupid bitch, you almost fucking got me.”

And then she points her gun at the glowing red box and pulls the trigger.

“Shepard!” and there it is, that stupid little boy image gone and Harbinger’s voice crashing through the room. The panic in its voice is all she needs to take another step forward, pull the trigger. The box begins to spark.

“You will destroy all synthetics! The geth, your AI, the Relays, they will all be destroyed!” Harbinger warns, but every step brings a sharp new wave of pain: cleansing fire that burns away the fog of indoctrination. She can hear the desperation now, the lie in its voice, and she begins to laugh.

“I know how much this hurts you,” she mocks, and pulls the trigger. For Anderson. For her mother.

“Shepard!” Harbinger shrieks, and she pulls the trigger: for Garrus, god, honey, she’s so fucking sorry, she wishes they had more time.

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” she says conversationally, as Harbinger screams and screams around her. The floor shakes ominously, the walls start to collapse.

She pulls the trigger again and again: for humanity, for the turians. For the asari, the krogan, salarians. For the batarians, the volus, the elcor, the hanar. For the quarians. For the geth. For the protheans, and for all who came before.

For herself.

“Suck my dick,” Shepard says. She pulls the trigger one last time, and the world shatters apart.

—*—

She floats, easy, waves crashing and gulls cawing overhead. She imagines the sky is a bright, perfect blue—she can’t seem to open her eyes but it feels like it would be. She feels like she’s close to the shore, drifting in the sun-warm shallows. She feels drowsy, melatonin-sweet. She’s been floating for a long while.

“Siha,” Thane says.

She wants to say something, but she can’t get her mouth to work; her tongue is heavy, her jaw and teeth locked. She wants to look at him, but her eyes stay stubbornly closed.

“Siha,” Thane’s voice is so full of warmth and pride that her eyes prick, and she feels tears track down the sides of her face. “You did it. You can rest now.”

and god. Rest. What a concept. She wants to so bad, it’d be so nice, all she has to do is drift to shore, then she can let go, then she can sleep, but—

But.

“Not ready,” Mordin says, and he sounds—amused. Like she’s a lab sample that did something precocious. Affectionate. “Come back when ready. Tell Vakarian,” he sniffs, “Take care of you.”

And then they shove her back out to sea, down into the deep.

—*—

“‘…suck my dick?’”

The Council stenographer stares at her, mouth open in a horrified little ‘o’. In the corner of the hospital room, Shepard watches Garrus put his hands over his face and silently shake with mirth. Asshole.

“In my defense,” she says mulishly, “I didn’t think anyone was gonna know about it.”

The stenographer gives a nervous look to the new human Councillor, a ‘can-I-even-write-this-down?’ look, but Weir hasn’t taken their head out of their hands since Shepard told them about calling Harbinger a bitch.

“Look,” Shepard says, feeling very put upon, “I thought I was going to die!”

She waves the stumps of her right leg and her left arm at them to enforce her point. “I wasn’t thinking about adding to humanity’s list of dignified quotes!”

Weir lifts their head and rubs at their temples, like Shepard’s the unreasonable one here. They look at her. “You said you thought about Admiral Anderson, Mr. Vakarian, and all of the galactic races as you took the shots, correct?”

Shepard looks at Garrus. He’s watching her with such an expression—love and gratitude and pride—that it chokes her. He holds her gaze, and nods, validating. On your six, the expression says. I’ve got you.

“Yeah,” she manages finally.

“Well, then,” The Councillor stands up, and the awful scrape of their chair against the floor lets her tear her eyes from Garrus.

Weir gestures at the stenographer to get their things. “We’ll just make it work from that. We’ll say that you said you were doing it for the galaxy, something heroic. Expect a memo with the wording once it’s approved— you should memorize it for the press.”

With that, Weir and the stenographer leave in a swish of expensive fabric. Shepard gapes after them, then gestures to the door at Garrus.

“Can you believe that?” she complains. He laughs and makes his way to her side. He laces their hands together, and Shepard thrills at it, the feel of him. Garrus shakes his head sadly.

“These fucking people,” Garrus says, mock-serious, his voice a smile. She can’t help it, she beams at him, so wide and strong it hurts her face.

“That’s what I’m saying,” she says, and leans in for his kiss.

#mass effect #me3 #sing the body electric #my fic #wip #destroy ending #shakarian

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