#the ideas make more sense in my head i just don't know how to articulate them

[halojalex]

I agree with you saying Alex wrote LYR about Jack but I feel like you could say the whole album is about Jack. LYR came out barely a year after Alex got married and if you listen to songs like LYR and Good Times I mean now that I think about it almost all the songs could be about love lost or closing a chapter in your life. I remember when this album came out I thought the album might be their last

oh for sure! tbh as with most of their albums there's a lot to unpack lyrically

honestly i often feel like lyr kind of has the same energy as tmia in a way - both of them are kind of bittersweet when you think about it (although tmia is arguably more so). i feel like nice2knou and i'd be fine kind of give the same vibe for sure, and both of those could absolutely be about jack (certainly i'd be fine at least imo). 'closing a chapter in your life' certainly describes both lyr and tmia, which is very much a jalex type vibe

[in-class-daydreams]

Imagine ex-husband Gojo doing things for his new love interests that you begged him for while you were married.

After a joint meeting between the sister schools, you overheard Suguru asking him who he was texting during the meeting.

Satoru replied, "Just letting my date know I'll be a bit late tonight since we ran long here. Todo can yap, huh?"

"Seriously!" Their voices faded as they walked down the hall.

You stood just outside the meeting room watching the corner the disappeared around. If you had to pinpoint the number one reason your marriage failed - more than clan pressure, more than the strain of being young parents, more than back to back to back missions - it would be the fact that Satoru can't communicate for shit.

Part of it wasn't his fault. His brain just didn't work like that. An inconvenient side effect of limitless is that everything makes sense in your head, but it's hard for a person with the gift to explain their thoughts to others.

So the no-call, no-shows to dinners was technically a side effect of limitless, as was his inability to articulate his feelings like an adult or the fact that he would just do things without even telling you there was a problem in the first place.

"Quit doing that with your face, brat." Sukuna emerges from the meeting room. He's out of his Ryomen form at the moment, as he usually is during meetings so that he can actually fit in his chair. "How long are you gonna let what he does affect you?"

"It doesn't!" you insist.

Sukuna rolls his eyes. "If that helps you sleep at night."

Imagine reminding yourself that you can't be mad at him.

You're seeing other people now, too. Hell, you've been divorced for over a decade, it's insanity that you care at all.

It's just. You never doubted his love for you. Not for a second, not even now that your marriage failed and you largely raised your son on your own.

"Mom?"

Maybe your divorce was his motivation to be better. You're not sure. But if he's capable of change, capable of being attentive and communicative, why couldn't he change for you all those years ago?

"Mom."

Could it be that you were his childhood companion and he loved you, but he was never in love with you? Was his love for you less than your love for him?

You hardly notice your son calling out to you until he springs into action. "Mom!" Sen nudges you away from the stove to turn of the burner. When did smoke fill the kitchen? The roux you were trying to make was burnt to a crisp, stuck to the pan and emanating an unpleasant smell.

Sen gently pries your hands off the handle and drops the ruined pan in the sink to soak. Then he makes sure the burner's off before turning to you with a conflicted expression.

He may have inherited a hybrid of both your and Satoru's personal brands of emotional stuntedness, but he could put two and two together between how distracted you've been and the rumors of Satoru dating again - What with it being huge news among jujutsu society (aka power hungry clans with eligible daughters.) Your son had his own complicated feelings regarding his father and as much as he'd prefer Satoru stay away from you, it hurt him to see you like this.

Though, watching you try to keep a stiff upper lip for his sake during the divorce is the reason he doesn't want his father anywhere near you.

"I'm sorry, sweetheart." You wipe your hands on a dish towel. "I wasn't paying attention. Hang tight while I make you something else."

He could kill Satoru right now. But you wouldn't like that, so he won't.

"Mama, I--" He shuts his mouth. You've been protecting him from the details of the divorce his whole life. What did he know about comforting you? But while he may not have been able to protect you then, he can sure as hell try now.

"Mama, why don't I take you out to dinner? My treat."

Imagine that Sen decides he needs to stop having ideas.

He brought you to a local okonomiyaki that you've been going to since he was little to the point where the owners knew you well and liked to give you little extras from the kitchen. Today's treat was a side of pickled radish.

It was your happy little hideaway. Away from jujutsu and clans and curses and your broken home.

Sen insisted on cooking the okonomiyaki for you, saying that, "My treats means I'll take care of everything!" The weak smile you gave him made his heart soar.

You giggle while he jokes around and tells you about school like how Hikari fell asleep for 45 minutes out of an hour long test and still got a better score than him. Hearing about your son and his happy school days always made you feel better.

Sen was ready to give himself a pat on the back for cheering you up when he hears the front bell jungle and a woman's laughter carries over.

"Fancy places are like that, though!" the woman laughs. "They give a bite of food per plate."

Then a familiar voice replies, "Yeah, but it was good, wasn't it? And now we get to fill up at a cute place like this."

Even though he's the one facing the door and not you, the look on your face tells Sen all he needs to know. What breaks his heart is that you've sunk lower into your seat to make yourself smaller.

Sen could kill his father right now.

Hooray, angst!

Click [here] to keep up with ex-husband Gojo and his estranged family | Ask stuff about Sen and the fam [here]

[heart-of-the-morningstar]

Alr hear me out, the service top lucifer with a very insecure reading. (Fem or GN) like he has to coax the reader to like open up (God damn I'm blushing thinking abt it-). Maybe even having to like talk them into even taking thier clothes off. Just a little idea stuck in my head.

Thank you very muchly.

Ooooooohh you’re giving me IDEAS (tbh I’d be the same boat)

~~~~

✨Opening Up✨

Lucifer x f!reader

Warnings: 18+, smut, nipple play, pet names, oral (m & f receiving), p in v, service top!Lucifer

It has become evident that I am unable to write anything concise 😅

I’M SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG I MEANT TO POST THIS DAYS AGO 😭😭

Tag list: @trashbin-nie

@yellowsubiesdance

@j-jinxee

@stevensdickrider

@airwolf92

@mrssabinecallas

@myhornybrainonlyknowsthis

@bee-sinner

@thesoccerenthusiast

@katshyperfixations

@logybearsblog

@bigfatbimbo

You sat upright on Lucifer’s king sized bed, the King of Hell straddling your lap. You don't know how you even ended up in this position, not on this bed necessarily, but how you ended up as Lucifer's beloved. You believed in your heart that you did not deserve him, but time and time again Lucifer has showered you with praise and adoration like no one ever had before. He was perfect. And you were...you. It didn't make sense.

Regardless, that didn't stop him from holding your face tenderly in his hands while he kissed you with a fiery passion. You were self conscious about being so vocal around him during intimacy, but he made it his mission to elicit as many moans and whines from you as possible. Slowly, he reached down to the hem of your sleep shirt, grabbing a fistful of fabric. Your eyes popped open, your mind racing. You pulled away from his lips and went to grab his wrist that held your clothing.

"I-I'm sorry, love," he apologized, releasing your shirt immediately. You sighed and let go of the grip you had on his hand. "I didn't mean to scare you, I should have asked. Please forgive me."

"No, no," you breathed, "it's alright. I'm not upset, I just panicked. I'm sorry."

Lucifer pressed his lips to your forehead and planted a small kiss. "Please don't ever think you need to apologize to me for how you feel, sweetheart."

"O-Ok," you stuttered.

"Do you want to stop?," Lucifer asked. You could hear the genuine concern in his voice. Hard as it was to believe, he cared about you more than anything.

You shook your head. "No."

"You're sure?," Lucifer questioned further, "because if you're uncomfortable, we can-"

You cut him of mid-sentence with a quick peck to his lips. He smiled bashfully, a cute blush spreading across his face. "Believe me, Luci, I want this. I mean I really want this, but..." you found it difficult to articulate what you wanted to say.

"Well, if that's the case darling, what if I go first then?," Lucifer proposed. You cocked your head, unsure of what he was talking about. He reached up and began to unbutton his shirt, starting from the top and working his way down. Oh...OH.

Your face instantly feels hotter and your breathing becomes staggered. You tried to say something, but the words caught in your throat. Your mouth had never felt drier. He finally reached the last button of his shirt and you finally see some of his chest. You could almost feel your brain short circuiting.

"Do you wanna do the honors, my dear?," he asked playfully. You gulped as your hands reached towards his shoulders. Gingerly, you slid his sleeves down each arm, slowly revealing more and more skin to you. Once his shirt was completely removed, you couldn’t help but stare. His chest was so smooth and toned, almost like it had been sculpted. “Like what you see?” Lucifer questioned coyly, noticing your unwavering expression of awe.

"W-Well that's hardly fair," you whispered, finally finding your voice, "you're an actual angel. Of course you're going to be gorgeous, I-" you slapped your hand over your mouth once you realized what you had said. "Please pretend you didn't hear that!," you begged through your hand.

Lucifer's face was flushed pink, he could help but smile. He chuckled as he went to remove your hand from your face. "Is that what you really think about me, sweetheart? I'm truly flattered to hear that coming from someone as exquisite as you."

"You...You really think..." you started to say but couldn't finish. Tears began to well up in your eyes, you tried to rub them away before Lucifer could see but it was too late. Lucifer cupped your face and ran his thumbs under your eyes to clear away the tears that had fallen. Your breath hitched, you tried to take in deep heavy breaths so you wouldn't start sobbing.

“Hey, hey, hey, shhhhh,” he spoke with a soothing tone. He removed himself from your lap and sat down next to you, embracing you in his arms. “It’s okay, angel, it’s ok. I upset you and I’m sorry, I never want to be the reason you cry.” He rested his head on top of yours while you clung to his chest. The scent of him hit your nostrils, it was like breathing in a warm spring day. Purely intoxicating. It calmed you down, you started to breathe normally again. You felt safe in his arms, you could have stayed there for the rest of your life.

You wrapped your arms around his torso, your tears finally drying. “Thank you, Lucifer,” you murmured. He gave you a tight squeeze before you lifted yourself back up, sitting at his hip and leaving your head on his shoulder. “You weren’t the reason I was sad, you know? You never have been.”

Lucifer turned his head to you, “Really? Then why-?”

“Because I’m afraid,” you quickly responded. “I’m afraid that I’m not good enough for you. That I never will be. You’re the all mighty Lucifer, King of Hell. You have so much strength and power and respect. And I’m…I’m just me.” You sighed and pulled your legs up to your chest to rest your head on your knees. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-”

“Darling?,” Lucifer spoke at last. He brought himself in front of you on all fours and placed his hand under your chin, forcing you to look at him in his scarlet eyes. “ “Just you” is perfect. You don’t need to be anything but yourself! I understand what you’re feeling, and it’s okay to express that. But please know that I love you just the way you are. You are my true strength.”

You chuckled softly, leaning into his hand that was now pressed against your cheek. You took his words to heart; he loved you. He loved you so much. You had to show him that you felt the same way. You drew in a few quick and deep breaths before reaching for the hem of your sleep shirt.

“Wait, wait, what are you-” Lucifer tried to say, but you were too fast. Your shirt disappeared from your body and was tossed across the room. Silence filled the space, the only thing you could hear was your heart threatening to burst through your chest.

It was at that moment you noticed you couldn’t see Lucifer’s face. His hands had flown up to block his view of you.

“Lucifer?” you called to him.

“Y-You didn’t have to do that, love,” he stuttered. “I never wanted you to feel that you had to-”

“Please look at me, Luci,” you pleaded. “I love you. And I trust you. Let me show you. Please.”

You saw Lucifer’s hands slowly fall away from his hands, his eyes still screwed shut. “Are you sure?” he asked softly.

You leaned in to plant a kiss on his soft lip. Lucifer’s eyes shot open in surprise, you pulled away before he had a chance to react. Blood rushed to your cheeks when you saw him staring at you. Your first instinct was to cover yourself and shy away, but you pushed those feelings deep down. You were going to be vulnerable, you needed to be brave. Not just for him, but for yourself. You gripped the bed sheets so hard that you felt your nails digging into your skin through the silk.

After what seemed like an eternity, Lucifer had snapped out of his trance. He started to crawl towards you on his hands and knees, only stopping when his lips were inches away from your own. You felt his hot breath on you, you were finding it more and more difficult to keep your composure.

“You…are breathtaking,” he cooed, crashing his lips into yours hungrily. His tongue begged for entrance to your mouth, and you happily allowed it. You felt yourself slowly drifting down onto your back as you and Lucifer desperately devoured each other. He pulled away from your lips, trying to catch his breath, but you noticed he wasn’t looking into your eyes. His attention had drifted a little further down. He swallowed hard.

“May I?,” Lucifer asked breathlessly. Your face felt extremely hot and you couldn’t find the power to speak, so instead you nodded your head vigorously. He gave you a cheeky grin before lowering his mouth down onto one of your nipples. The noise you made sounded more high pitched than you meant it, but God, did it feel amazing! His tongue worked one nipple as his hand played with the other. You loved the sensation of him sucking and licking at your sensitive skin, the tiny bites from his teeth driving you insane. He rolled your other nipple between his two fingers, the pinches he gave sent your brain into overdrive. You never knew how sensitive you were, but Lucifer was more than happy to service you.

All of a sudden you noticed a different sensation, you felt something press against your inner thigh, dangerously close to your clothed pussy. It took your brain a few seconds to realize what was happening.

“Uhh, Lucifer, a-are you…”, you mumbled. Lucifer looked up from your chest with a puzzled face. “I can feel umm, I-I can feel your uhh…”, you didn’t know why you couldn’t say it. Maybe you were too embarrassed, which seemed silly considering what position you found yourself in. You pointed down towards your pants where Lucifer was wedged.

“Oh…OH,” Lucifer exclaimed pushing himself from you and onto his knees. “Oh my gosh, I-I’m so sorry! I didn’t realize you could uhh, feel that…please forgive me!”

Seeing him so flustered somehow calmed some of the nerves you had before. It was cute, really. Demon overlord Lucifer getting embarrassed about unintentionally pushing his hard on against your thigh. You let out a small giggle.

"It's alright, Luci," you chuckled. "I'm flattered, really!"

Lucifer smiled, placing his hand behind him to rub the back of his neck. "I'm still sorry about that, love. I'm a little embarrassed."

“Well,” you breathed, “I guess it’s only fair that I embarrass myself too then, right?” Without warning, you grabbed the waistband of your pants and ripped them off along with your panties in one fell swoop. You laid naked in front of Lucifer, whose whole face had turned a shade of red you’ve never seen before.

“Ffffuck,” was all Lucifer could muster. You watched his Adam’s apple rise and fall, attempting to regain his thoughts. Looking at you, it was plain to see how soaked you were.

“Like what you see?,” you teased. Lucifer nodded his head eagerly, still at a loss for words. You lifted your hand and curled your finger, beckoning him to you. Obediently, Lucifer crawled on the bed towards you with no reservations. “You’re not the only one that’s worked up here. Now we’re even.”

“My love, please…” Lucifer whined, “please let me taste you.”

"Don't you...wanna get more comfortable first?," you asked him, knowing the problem in his pants had probably only gotten worse for him.

"Not until I've had my fill of you, sweetheart," he smiled before forcing his head between your legs. The moan you let out was guttural, almost feral, he lapped your folds like a starving man. He took long, drawn out licks up your slit before focusing on your clit. His lips kissed and sucked on your sensitive nub, sending waves of pleasure throughout you entire body. You couldn't pull away if you tried, he had wrapped his arms under your legs so you couldn't escape his assault on your cunt.

"Sh-shit, oh-oh my God Lucifer, FUCK," you moaned. You could feel a smile form on his face as this seemed to have made him pick up the pace. You screamed from his tongue darting in and out of you, feeling so close to snapping. Your thighs started to fold in on his head and you grabbed a fistful of his hair trying to regain some assemblance of control. “Fuckfuckfuck, mmmm…gonna c-cum, aaggghh, gonnacumgonnacum!” Lucifer’s tongue relentlessly circling your clit finally caused your body to spasm, your orgasm causing you to scream out in pleasure. Lucifer didn’t stop though, he let you ride out your orgasm and hungrily devoured your release. Once you finally came down from your high, Lucifer lifted his face from between your legs and flashed you a toothy grin, seemingly quite proud of his work.

“You alright, darling?,” he asked innocently, almost pretending like he wasn’t the cause of what you had just experienced.

“Y-yeah, I’m…I’m fine,” you breathed. “Just…Jesus, that was intense! Give me a little warning before you go all in on me like that again!”

Lucifer laughed. “I’m sorry, love, I couldn’t help myself.”

You rolled your eyes at him playfully. “Oh, I’m sure you couldn’t. Now, let’s get these off you, hmm?,” you said tugging at his pants.

Lucifer stood up from the bed quickly. He undid his belt and let his pants drop to the floor. From the outlines of his briefs, you were surprised that they could contain him at all. Before he could pull at the hem, you jumped off the bed to stop him.

“Allow me,” you offered, getting on your knees in front of him. You reached up and grabbed onto his briefs, snaking them down his legs. His cock sprang free of its cage and hung in front of your face, its tip already leaking. Without thinking, your wrapped your lips around the head of his cock. Lucifer let out a moan that you’ve never heard before, filled with absolute lust and need. You took one of your hands and grabbed the base of his shaft, slowly stroking up and down while your mouth continued to work on his head. You ran small licks against the slit, tasting and lapping all of the precum that was forming. You loved the taste of him.

“Love…f-fuck,” Lucifer panted, trying to fight through his moans, “if you don’t s-stop now, I-I’m gonna cum. I wanna…wanna feel you. P-Please…”

Reluctantly, you pulled your mouth away from his cock with a *pop*, pouting slightly. Lucifer leaned down to grab your torso and tossed you onto the bed like you were made of paper mache. That angelic strength of his always caught you off guard. Lucifer crept between your legs, planting a tender kiss on your lips.

“I promise,” he whispered against your lips, “next time you can finish what you started, but right now I need you. Need to feel you.” Lucifer brought his fingers to your needy cunt, feeling the slickness of your folds. Your breath caught in your throat at the sensation. He took his other hand and lined up the tip of his cock to your entrance. “Are you ready, my angel?,” he asked softly.

You grinned and nodded your head. With that, Lucifer closed the space between you once more with a fiery kiss as his cock entered you inch by inch. Your cries mixed with his as he finally entered you completely.

“You feel…amazing, darling, fuck…” Lucifer choked out. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” you murmured, “I-I’m okay. You can move.”

“Anything for you,” he smiled. Lucifer slowly began to rock his hips into you, his cock filling you up completely with each thrust. You could feel every inch of him ruining your pussy, hitting just the right spot every time. It didn’t take long for his pace to become erratic and uneven. He buried his cock deep inside you, both of your moans filling the room.

“Lu-Lucifer, o-oh shit, Lucifer, I-I’m so close,” you pleaded. “Please don’t stop, p-please don’t.”

“Cum for me, darling. Wanna feel you cum.” Lucifer groaned. He bit down on your should as he continued to pound into you, biting and sucking your tender skin. You were shaking, he was going too fast, you were coming undone.

“Cuminme…FUCKCUMINME,” you screamed and wrapped your legs around him as your orgasm flooded over you. You felt your walls pulsating around his cock, it was too much for Lucifer to handle. You heard him cry out and felt him twitch inside you, filling you up with his hot cum.

Coming down from your highs, you both laid there for a moment trying to catch your breath. You played with Lucifer’s hair as he laid across your chest, completely worn out. A minute or two passed before Lucifer sat up and pulled himself out of you. He laid down next to you, staring at your flushed face.

“Are you alright?,” he asked. “Did I hurt you at all?”

“No, you didn’t hurt me,” you smiled. “That felt…really good. Thank you, for everything.”

Lucifer hummed and leaned up to press a gentle kiss to your lips. “No, thank you, love.”

You chuckled returning the kiss. “Would…you mind if I held you, Luci?”

Lucifer’s eyes widened, but he smiled wide. “Of course not, I’d love nothing more.”

Lucifer rolled on his side, giving you the chance to push your body against his back and wrap your arms around him. You both didn’t move until the morning.

~~~~

Hope you enjoyed my second attempt at NSFW content lmaooooo

AND YEAH I MADE HIM THE LITTLE SPOON, IT’S WHAT HE WOULD WANT

[conditioned-to-obey]

Hi i have a question please

In day to day life i am very dominant very hard on people i dont like disrespect i dont like being told what to do even tho i love manly man and i love man who s dominant but for example i dont like giving full control to the guy to tell me what to do how to act or like when the guy be like bring me that or do that for me or you know with full subs like they cant eat with their doms or you may eat after i finish you know very acting like she s beneath you it feels very patriarchy to me

However i am very submissive in bed and i like to be spanked and roughed around but the shame afterwards is a lot like i feel like if my dom spanks me as punishment and he tells me what to do i dont really have control and cant fight you know

Idk if this makes sense and sorry for the long explanation lol but i just want to make peace with how i am in bed and in real life and how to do so

What you are describing is about 3 different things at once.

Firstly, "Full subs" doesn't label what you're describing correctly. Eating after/separate of a Dom or that level of control and protocol falls more in line with subs who practice master/slave sub dynamics. Usually seen in scenes or during events. High protocol such as this is not sustainable for most in the long run. As which, shouldn't be looked at as a base line for kink. Or seen as what it means to be a full sub. It's just one type of sub. One you don't resonate with, which is totally fine. It's not for everyone.

For example sake, the practice of eating from a bowl on the floor or separate can be done without misogynistic or patriarchal undertones. I have seen it in pet play a lot. You aren't treated as lesser, it doesn't have to be degrading or humiliation if you don't wish it to bed. It can be being taken care of, fed and pamper. A lot of subs can find it fun to play and eat out of a cute dish while someone pets their head and smiles. It depends on the angle in which it's played.

Second, yes, the themes you are uncomfortable with seems to be the idea of not being in control or feeling lesser or feeling scolded/corrected. Easily fixed by not giving him that control—outside of the bedroom or otherwise. You do not have to be a sub who gets punishments. You have control to fully take that off the table.

From what you describe your enjoyment falls under masochism and roughness. These do not have to be achieved through punishment. You can do it because you enjoy it, no scolding or framing it as corrective action. In fact it can even be a reward. This may alleviate some of that shame you feel by not being treated as lesser. Rather just as a sub who enjoys roughness in a controlled way.

There is no right or wrong way to be a sub. You can simply just be a bottom who is a masochist as well. Don't put yourself in a box. Submission is on your terms. I'm sure plenty of partners would be happy to be dominating in the bedroom and on totally equal footing outside the bedroom. People who carry a lot of responsibility in day to day life find being submissive or giving temporary control to be very freeing and a release for them. It doesn't have to be one or the other.

It's called a Power Exchange, not a Power Loss.

If it feels like you don't have a choice or are have lost your autonomy, free will or ability to speak up then you need to advocate for yourself and be an active participant in articulating why it isn't working. You have more power than you think. Your Dom either agrees and is satisfied with the arrangement of power exchange and when, or they are not. Either way it's a conversation to be had.

Best of luck.

[prima-materia-ttrpg]

The "why" behind Game Design

I've been doing a lot of thinking and talking with my friends about Prima Materia, as I often do these days. For the past few weeks there's been something itching at the back of my mind, I'm making mechanics that are starting to work well but for whatever reason they don't "feel" like Prima Materia to me. They technically fit in with the design pillars I've assigned myself; grounded, cinematic, dynamic, and fantasy, but I've felt like things are missing. Going beyond that, I don't think someone would properly grok the game if they were to read my past blog posts. If I read my past blog posts without knowing what Prima Materia is, I would think it's a game mostly focused on combat with some interesting worldbuilding.

I decided to talk with one of my friends about this, and the conversation led to me trying to properly articulate the kinds of things I want to happen in Prima Materia and compare that with the direction the design is going. In particular, how do I imagine a campaign going? What do people actually do in the game? While these are questions that can be applied to most ttrpgs, I hadn't realized how important it was to answer them concretely to make correct design decisions for my game rather than the design being driven by vague subconscious conceptions of a game that does not yet exist filtered through some core design pillars and my own limited experience in playing ttrpgs.

What do people actually do in the game?

This is a wide question, and has a wide answer.

When I think of what it would be like to actually play or GM a game of Prima Materia my mind tends towards uncovering secrets, diplomatically dealing with situations, and overcoming obstacles that require lots of preparation to pull off without getting seriously hurt. Secrets should be important to the party and world, and depending on the tier of play can be anything from uncovering new alchemical magics to metaphysical secrets of the universe that can act as MacGuffins for a longstanding party.

The more I think about it, the more I believe that uncovering secrets is one half of the beating heart of Prima Materia, and the other half is preparation for overcoming obstacles to achieve the uncovering of those secrets. Characters in the game aren't meant to be incredibly powerful but rather incredibly skilled at their area of expertise, whether that be being good with a sword, knowledgeable in certain subjects, good at diplomacy, or making useful items. That's the concept of the game that's in my head that needs to be concretely written down (and how convenient for me that I've just done that).

Going Forward

A lot of the ideas and drafts I've written or verbalized to friends make a lot more sense in this light of uncovering secrets and preparation, as lot of those ideas hinge on uncovering secrets or being prepared. There are lost manuscripts I've been itching to put in that grant skill bonuses as well as character features due to the knowledge contained within. The Alchemist profession alone is a class that takes the ideas of preparedness and uncovering secrets to 11, where you create new spells and tinctures and unlock more and more useful things to make as well as ways to make them.

There are several design decisions I've been making recently that do not spark joy for me. They will be dealt with, and going forward I will have this to keep in mind as what I want the heart of the game to be.

If you read this far, thank you very much! It means a lot. The astute among you who read my last post will notice that this is suspiciously not a post about the Sepia as I promised, and that's because I thought this post was important. I will of course try to get the Sepia post out next week, but if that fails I will bring you an update on my most recent mechanics experiment which will surely have transpired by then.

[susiecarter]

I know you wrote alot of different superbat tropes and I'm not sure if you're taking suggestions but I don't think you've covered a jealousy trope. I'd love to see Clark helplessly jealous of Bruce and all his beautiful men/ women he dates and Bruce genuinely being none the wiser of thinking maybe Clark is avoiding him all of a sudden is because he's come to his senses and realised that Bruce's friendship is a waste of time or the reason for Clark being rude ( or as rude as someone like Clark can be ) to some of his dates is because he's annoyed with brucie Wayne and his airheadedness / fakeness . And then Clark just loses it when confronted and confesses how he feels and then they have life changing sex lmao !

:D Hi, anon! You're not wrong, haha, I am ALL ABOUT the tropes—and while I have to admit that part of the reason I've never written a fic focused on jealousy is because jealousy doesn't usually tickle my id particularly well (especially with these guys, because I enjoy their delicious angst the most when they're feeling insecure and unsure of themselves emotionally = they're usually holding themselves back/deliberately trying not to put themselves forward as an option :'D) ...

... I have to admit that the way you are framing this prompt is working for me VERY MUCH INDEED. *______*! Your parenthetical is totally correct, Clark being genuinely rude to an innocent third party is kind of a hard sell :D and basically all of the rest of this, I love—the more I think about it, the more I can buy Clark feeling Some Kind of Way about all the gorgeous models (dudes, ladies, neither, Bruce Wayne is ~flexible) Bruce has on his arm all the time, one second wishing that that were him and the next second telling himself not to be so stupid (and it's not precisely that he'd LIKE having lots of people staring at him, flashes going off in his face, all of that—but it wouldn't be about Superman, it would be because he was with Bruce, because he was Bruce's and everyone was seeing him be Bruce's, and he'd have Bruce's attention, too, the headiest part of all—) ... and also feeling a certain uncharitable degree of, like, frustration, because none of these people actually know Bruce, and so it's annoying to watch them be dismissive or patronizing toward ~Bruce Wayne~; he wouldn't be like that, he respects Bruce, he cares about who Bruce actually is, he'd be grateful if Bruce gave him the time of day and he'd do whatever he could to be worthy of it ... and also being afraid he couldn't get Bruce, or if he got him, couldn't keep him, when he'd have to compete with people who look like that, people who can swan their way through upscale parties just as smoothly as Bruce can, people who are glamorous and confident and important. ;-;

And OF COURSE he'd tie himself into a huge ugly knot about it, of course he'd get himself worked up in his head over it until he can't stand to watch Bruce smile and ~bedroom eyes~ at and kiss EVEN ONE MORE OF THESE GD RANDOS, and OF COURSE Bruce would take that carefully imposed distance at least ten wrong ways at once and decide he must be the problem. :'D I will never get tired of writing Clark snapping in the face of Bruce's unwillingness to believe Clark genuinely wants him and articulating his actual feelings as forcefully as he can figure out how to, AND *clenches fists* YES, LIFE-CHANGING SEX INDEED. :DDDDD

So, yeah, as always, I can make you no promises, but if I do actually manage to write this idea, I will 100% give all credit to this ask (and/or to you directly, if you want to send me a follow-up with a username I can attribute! IF NOT NO WORRIES ♥ and seriously, thank you so much for the ask and the prompt!)

[drdemonprince]

Annual seasonal change anon:

Another thing is, and I say this as someone who approaches a lot of topics from a kind of literature-and-writing point of view, but I also think some of how I cope with change is by structuring a narrative around it so that it becomes a process, rather than an instant. I don't know if that will make sense or be useful to other people.

Like, essays have an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Stories have a beginning, middle and end. In terms of human cognition, we can form an understanding of the world around us by simplifying and structuring things so that we can interpret it more easily. And one of the common structures is schemas or maps which are kind of spatial in terms of how we relate concepts to each other and interact with them, and another is scripts which are sequential and based on multiple, linked events happening over time. And a lot of human communication can be analysed in terms of being a script with a beginning, middle and end, it's just that the amount of time and detail spent on the different stages will vary based on purposes and social contexts.

And I think it's really common in Autistic social circles to talk about how useful it is to see examples of scripts, eg for particular kinds of social interactions. But that isn't often explicitly connected to the concept of a script being a cognitive structure that humans find useful, where there's an overall structure of beginning, middle, and end, and within that, you have a more detailed outline and some things are optional and some things depend on each other etc but you can more easily fit things together and make sense of them if you have a sense of how to structure it.

I think (for me personally, at least, of course) it becomes overwhelmingly much harder to deal with change if there isn't a script. When I sit down and articulate the process, so there's the beginning before the change, the process of change in the middle, and at the end the change has more or less finished happening and we've ended up in a different situation, it becomes much easier to grasp. But if I don't consciously think about this stuff, and automatically think about change as an instantaneous moment where there's a before and after but the change itself is just BAM! without context or connections, I'm more stressed.

So the seasonality thing is about conceptualising things as repeating cycles and deliberately using past experience to increase my sense of familiarity and control - or addressing a new situation as "the first example of its type" and taking notes that I can draw upon in the future (have done that with overwhelming situations like camping and moving house, and the idea of having preparedness in the future helped me calm down the emotions around unfamiliarity of the present).

But there's also some type of time-blindness or collapsing of time that I seem to do, and if I stop and organise all the things in my head into a type of process, that expands time and structures it and it's both emotionally and cognitively easier for me to handle it and have a sense of control and actually be able to develop coping methods.

I know this is a bit abstract, I don't know if it'll either make sense or seem useful to others. But "conceptualising things as a process" is a load-bearing part of how I approach change, including very overwhelming and distressing examples of change. It really helps me.

This makes perfect sense to me, and seems useful! I think I do a lot of similar stuff with social fluctuations, too. You eventually get to learn the social behaviors and verbal patterns that suggest the party is one hour away from ending, people are finishing their last drinks, it's time to clean up, it's time for people to chat for another forty minutes in the doorway, etc. Marking these moments as expected stages of the progression helps keep me from feeling AS waylaid when the "end time" of an event extends way past what was scheduled, because people *always* take longer than they say they will and so I can just expect it instead of believing what they say. Even larger changes like a person moving out / moving away has little quiet stages you can learn to listen to, too.

[cripplecharacters]

hi! long ask up next.

I'm not sure if this is the right blog for this question, i'm really sorry if it's not. I'm part of a theatre class/group that is putting on Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream. The teacher has a very specific vision in mind that i generally vibe with. However, she's asking me to play a character in a way that might be offensive. I play two characters, one of them is Snug. There's a play within the play that an incompetent artisan theatre troupe is putting on, which snug is a part of. In our version, snug is meant to have a speech impediment (the teacher hasnt given me more specific directions on how to talk). I did a bit of research and decided that my version of snug has dysarthria (no dysphasia or aphasia) from a degenerative disease that he inherited from his dad. Im trying to play him as having distorsion and omission type articulation errors, in the initial and medial positions respectively, but it's been very hard for me to consistently play him like that becuase i dont have his disability. The only correction the teacher has given me so far is to speak slower so my dialogue is more comprehensible.

Now, i shouldn't have, but i did watch some scenes on youtube with snug in them. And none of the versions i saw give him a speech sound disorder, from what i could tell. What most versions do have in common though, is that the artisans who are putting on the play are, for lack of a better term, meant to be "dumb". Snug specifically has a line which i didn't realize was supposed to be a dig at his own intelligence until i saw a clip. The line is:

Have you the lion's part written? pray you, if it be, give it me, for I am slow of study.

In the video i saw, the actor paused briefly after saying "slow", for emphasis:

for I am slow... of study.

I'm autistic and i know what it's like for people to assume i'm "slow" because of how i talk, and i don't want to promote those stereotypical views.

What makes this whole conundrum more complicated for me is that our version is going to be (sort of?) a musical. And my teacher is adamant on me rapping an eminem song. I thought this would be fun but thinking about it more carefully i worry that the joke might be that snug is faking his disability for some reason, and that he can actually speak "normally".

sorry if some of this isnt clear, english is not my first language.

Anon S

Hello! I wanted to address this ask as a former actor and current student studying speech language pathology as well as someone with an articulation disorder.

You can give a backstory in your head as detailed as you want - and as an actor this is a good thing, and something you should do with every role no matter how complicated or simple - but the unfortunate truth is most audience members are not going to interpret it exactly the same way without the same context. You may be thinking of portraying a mixed dysarthria (and there are many types of dysarthria, from spastic to flaccid to ataxic, to mixed that will all have difference in sound quality, articulation, and rate) but unless it's written somewhere the audience, who is just noticing a slow rate and articulation errors, and who may not even be aware of what dysarthria is, may think your character has some dialect or strange difference they don't recognize.

From my knowledge of the play, the Rude Mechanicals are meant to be laughed at and this falls into the idea that people with certain speech patterns or disorders are funny or silly or even, yes, stupider than others. However, there's not much you can do about this if your director is insistent other than refuse to treat your character as a joke. I would feel better about a character with consistent errors and whose disability was thought through than one who wasn't, even with a character like a Rude Mechanical.

As for a disability disappearing during a rap, for something like stuttering that would make sense but not for an articulation disorder and certainly not for dysarthria, which causes a slower rate normally and can cause articulation issues due to coordination of the parts used to speak (not only the mouth but also the soft and hard palates and the lungs, for example). I would talk to your director about what the point of the rap is - is it to be funny? is it to show another side of him? why does this character need a speech disorder? why does this character need to rap, and why does the speech disorder need to be dropped during the rap?

If you can talk with your director and figure out what the vision is for some honestly bizarre choices it may help you figure out if you're on the right track (and if dysarthria is the right choice for a disorder for your character, as well). As always, if anyone has advice or input please feel free to add it!

[localvoidcat]

you should tell us about the character misinterpretation...

i was just thinking about. how so many character portrayals surrounding the characters in this series tend to veer towards family dynamics or extremely close friends that would do anything for each other. and im gonna go into both of these. and also the view of characters being seen as girlbosses and all that but thats been talked about a lot so ill be short with that. im putting this under the cut because its just me ranting LMAO. none of these are directed at anyone since i think most of my mutuals seem to get it but this is just in general

im gonna give a disclaimer that theres a very good chance i could be wrong about these, this is mainly based on my own view of some of the character themes/dynamics and how they're framed in-story, i haven't gone back and reviewed canon sufficently enough to be correct on this. with that said i need to be a hater for a bit 👍

i think the family thing. just does not make a lot of sense to me when it comes to like 80% of the dynamics i've seen. literally the ONLY one i understand is thatcher and adam because like. obviously an older character calling a younger character "kid" and helping them out and all that would lead to those characters being seen as having a mentor/trainee or father/son dynamic. i get that. that makes sense ALTHOUGH i will say that i don't think it's quite as simple as that but i wouldn't even know how to explain

but a lot of the time when it comes to other characters. i do not understand how they could be seen as a family dynamic with the knowledge we have of the characters now. like sarah being seen as an older sister figure to bps (which. does not make sense considering she's younger than at least one of them) or like. the mandelatech employees being seen as having any kind of family dynamic (that one just. does not make any sense to me. i feel like the only reason for that is because it's, again, an older character and a younger character that hang out but i cannot see them as uncle/niece or whatever else they are. those are coworkers to me but maybe that's just my view). there's also the idea of the remaining four survivors being seen as a general family thing and i cannot wrap my head around that at all. it makes sense for thatcher and adam as i said in the previous paragraph but it doesn't make sense for characters like sarah or evelin i cannot understand that in the slightest. again this may just be my own personal view

and then the thing with a lot of characters being close friends. this one i can kind of understand because obviously when characters are canonically friends you want to view them as being good friends. which makes sense in a lot of other things but i think with tmc in particular. a recurring theme (outside of characters like sarah and evelin or thatcher and ruth. both of those seem to be character duos that don't have issues in their relationship) is that a lot of these friendships are not good for one or both parties, whether that's a realized thing or not. again, i get how it's a lot more fun to see them as being close but i feel like viewing them as strictly close friends that only have good views on each other or as characters that would really care much about another's death in a very impactful way is kind of undermining the whole point in a lot of these dynamics.

tl;dr: while it's fun to imagine characters as having a family dynamic or as even just having a healthy friendship, as is mainly prevalent in fanon, i don't think that can be applied to canon without ignoring parts of a character/their reactions to things and their story.

final thing i'm going to touch on is something that has been talked about in SEVERAL fandoms by people that could articulate it way better than more. but i personally have a very strong vendetta about immediately labeling a female character as a girlboss or anything like that and not establishing their character beyond that. ESPECIALLY when it doesn't even line up with the character as a whole. most of the time it just feels like a binary where a girl character HAS to be labeled as a girlboss or a girlfailure or whatever other label there is regardless of whether or not they actually fit that. it's understandable to lightly joke about that (like evelin being referred to as the latter. in that case it makes sense to use that in reference to her but using that as the only defining part of her character limits her to that) but when it's used as the ONLY way those characters can be described it just becomes annoying to an extent

even for characters like ruth who we don't know a lot about, there's more to her than just. i don't know. being the singular braincell (which tends to be the view of female characters when it comes to one girl in a group of guys. which i cannot stand) or being the girlboss or being the strong one of the three and nothing else.

for the last paragraph i will admit that the majority of my talking about ruth tends to revolve around her dynamic with her friends, but there's absolutely more to her character outside of that or just being the dead character (even though her death absolutely serves as a driving factor for thatcher's character arc and other things). she does not exist solely for that group dynamic or just to be the dead character she has more depth outside of that and she has so much more depth than just being labeled as a "girlboss" and nothing else.

anyways. this was mainly just me going on a rant towards the end but i just needed to verbalize these thoughts before i exploded nothing i say is canon or the interpretation everyone else has to have this is me yelling into the void. okay goodbye 👍

[freckles-dean]

Here are some of my thoughts on Young Royals S3 ep 1-5

I’m just rambling here. This is probably going to be long, all over the place and not well articulated, so bear with me. 

And before I talk about the show, I just need to say that it never ceases to amaze me how incredibly talented all the actors are.

First of all, I don’t blame either Simon or Wilhelm. They are in an incredibly stressful situation. They are bound to make mistakes and I think their actions while being stubborn and lacking common sense are understandable.

I really loved Simon this season and i was so exited there was more of a focus on him. We finally got to some of how everything affected him. It broke my heart to notice he wasn’t the loudest in the choir anymore and then him saying he’s not enjoying music. Side note: Dude had some banger lines this season 

I find it ironic that everything that Wille found attractive in Simon’s in s1 became things that Simon has to shut down in order to be with him

If you told yesterday me that today me was actually okay with an August redemption arc, I would not have believed you. This in no way excuses his behavior, and he still has a lot to work on, but I think it was one of my favorite parts of this season. 

I am not at all surprised by the Erik thing. since s1 I kept wondering when Willie's perfect image of him would come crumbling down, but can’t imagine how devastating it would be to learn that the person who was there for you the most was not this perfect person you thought they were and might not even accept you.

I was rooting hard for Micke and Sara. I knew it was unrealistic that he wasn’t going to hurt her again, but it was still so heartbreaking that he couldn’t pull it together for her. I think there are bigger issues going on than his ADHD that needs to be handled. 

Why does the queen get space and help with her anxieties and grief, but when Wilhelm is struggling he gets no support and is seen as embarrassing and problematic???? 

Why the fuck was it Wilhelm's responsibility to teach Simon what not to do? Obviously, this kid who has never been in the public eye has no idea what he should or shouldn’t do, it almost seems like it was deliberate to get Wilmons relationship to fail idk. It would have been so easy to get something to teach him some basic media training. It's just disturbing how the court had absolutely zero regard for Simon’s safety. 

I’ve seen people talk about Wilhelm being controlling over Simon. Is it acceptable or excusable behavior? Absolutely not, but let me put things into perspective. Wilhelm was raised in an abusive and very controlling environment. His opinions and feelings didn’t matter, and he was told it was love, so it made sense that he would try to do the same for Simon and expected him to go along with it. I think expecting Wilhelm to have healthy relationship skills is unrealistic, and the show never pretended he did. It’s been pretty obvious throughout that Wilhelm consistently projects his feelings and emotions onto other people. 

I still don't know if Simon was breaking up with Wille or not, or they were just trying to frame it that way to scare us (honestly hoping it leads into a more mature conversation), but if he was… Wilhelm had it coming. He hasn’t been handling things very well and is taking it out on Simon, which is just not okay, and he doesn’t deserve that.  

Before this season, I wasn’t sure how I felt about Wille abdicating, cause i still had this fantasy in my head of him as this queer king, but after everything I’ve seen this season, it’s so obvious how much this institution is killing him. He needs to get out and heal from his traumas and find out who he really is without all those rules and pressures.

I don’t even know if I want Wilmon to be an endgame. Obviously, I do, but at this point, I don’t think that’s what’s best for either of them. It’s been very clear this season how much they don’t (at the moment) fit into each other's lives.. Either some major things have to change (Wille abdicating) or they need to split up. I just hope that both boys get a good ending, even if it’s not with each other. 

I don’t know... I’m emotionally exhausted, there are so many plot lines and I really don’t know how they are going to fix everything in one episode.

[bettsfic]

Hi Betts! <3 Can you tell us more about your craft process on how you pick a voice for a piece? I usually start plotting a story when I see or read something that makes me think, "That. That's what I want." But often I struggle to translate that feeling into a particular narration style, especially something that feels doable for more than 20k.

ah, you've touched on the most important and most difficult-to-articulate part of my writing process.

so first i want to say that you never *have* to change your voice or style. i would say most writers basically only use one voice, theirs, and they stick to it. if you're happy with the way you're writing, don't feel obligated to switch it up because you think you have to have major variation in that regard.

however, voice is pretty integral to my writing. if i can grasp the voice of a character, i know everything about them. there's minimal conscious invention in my characters. they have a voice and therefore they exist more or less fully formed, and could become the protagonist or narrator of their own story. in fact this sometimes bites me in the ass, because when i find a new character, i always want to switch into their POV. and that makes whatever i'm working on longer and more complicated, when i'm trying to keep it short and simple.

when i say "voice" i don't mean it as some fancy craft term. i mean i can actually hear their voice in my head. that's something they don't put in the welcome packet when you get diagnosed with a psychotic disorder. a lot of people assume "hearing voices" means audio hallucinations, but it can actually just mean harboring the inner monologue of other people in your head, knowing it's nothing more than cognitive ventriloquism. if you have this capability, congratulations. you have a mild positive psychotic symptom extremely conducive to creativity. if you don't, a lot of what i'm saying probably doesn't make any sense.

there's a lot of overlap between high creative output and what i call diet coke psychosis. as in, you may have all the flavor of a psychotic disorder (creativity!) and none of the calories (the agonies).

so how do i find new voices? actors.

when i binge the filmography of an actor, it's to appease an obsession, yes, but there's also a creative practicality to it, in that they can often serve as the foundation of a new voice. it usually begins with simple facecasting (which is another thing not everyone does), but often morphs a step beyond that, where you have the actor's real voice playing a character you've created. and then that, after months or years or tens of thousands of words, eventually develops into a whole-ass new person. and once you have that, you can add that voice to your roster and toss them into other stories.

in addition to filmographies, i also binge actor interviews. seasoned actors have developed a persona, so they have an ample filmography but their interviews are less useful. but actors who are fairly new and don't have many titles under their belt yet have no idea how to be famous, and that's where the gold is.

i also owe a lot to gimmick interviews like when actors have to answer questions while being attacked by puppies. no one can maintain a persona when puppies are crawling all over them.

you know how when you're around someone long enough you can pick up their mannerisms? and you know how sometimes you can daydream about being interviewed for no apparent reason? my process of finding a voice is a combination of those things. maybe i'm making it more complicated than it is. maybe it's more common than i'm giving it credit for. but it's very difficult to consciously describe unconscious processes.

a lot of writers base characters off of people they know. i actively try not to do that, not because i think it's wrong but because it's going to happen anyway, and if i push that instinct away, what bleeds in is what i can't keep out, and what i can't keep out is what needs to be there. so every voice is an actor playing the character of someone who was once very dear to me. (i almost never create characters based on people actively in my life.)

and, of course, i have to put a piece of myself in each character too. i have to find some personal connection, usually a question i have about myself and my life that i think only they can answer through the course of their journey. i have to be curious about them. what do we have in common? what don't we have in common?

as to your question about sustainability over 20k, one challenge i've given myself these past couple years is the way a character changes and develops over decades or maybe their entire life. a voice doesn't always have to be consistent, especially if your story takes place over a long time. in some cases whatever a voice turns into over the course of a story is just the way it needs to be, but sometimes you have to pull a "he wouldn't fucking say that" and go back to shuffle sentences around a bit.

i also think a lot of what i'm saying applies mostly to dialogue and first person. i consider first person basically a very long monologue, whereas i think third person i think has a lot more elasticity, and you can move around more easily in the closeness and distance of narration. i think that elasticity is what makes third person more comfortable for a lot of writers.

voice is a big thing deployed in a little way. it's the difference between "don't have" and "haven't got." it's whether they're more conducive to ending thoughts with a hard stop or connecting them with "and." but it's also in the lies they tell themselves to get by, and what they think the conflict is versus what the conflict really is, and maybe what they're trying to persuade us of. a voice is inherently rhetorical.

i hope some of this makes sense. and because this has gotten long, i've provided some examples from my novel in progress, rabbit's blood, under the cut!

i open the novel in third omniscient, which i absolutely hated because it's antithetical to everything i've described here, but it got the job done. whether i'll keep it through to later drafts remains to be seen.

On November 9, 1951, Mary Mills goes into labor. Her husband Duke is not present. She hasn’t seen him since she announced to him that she was pregnant with twins. In Duke’s stead, her oldest son Wyatt, four years old, waits at her bedside to meet his brothers. Wise beyond his years, he understood immediately that his father had abandoned them. After these past several months watching his mother’s grief and fear and anger rise as she slowly came to accept the truth, he vows now to dedicate his life to doing the right thing.

after this, the twins are born, skip and birdie. in subsequent chapters, we move into first person.

here's birdie at 60ish years old in the present. he's spent the past 10 years driving around the country robbing banks with his daughter mel.

It took us a long time to realize robbing tellers was a stupid idea. Tellers only ever have a couple thousand in their drawers. Not even worth it to go in guns blazing, get all the money from all the drawers and hold everybody hostage until the vault opens. One, that’s mean. Two, the vault might not have much either. On a bad day, you’ll walk away with ten, twenty grand, meanwhile half a dozen people are going to be traumatized for life, and if you get caught, your ass is in jail for a minimum of seven years. The government doesn’t give a fuck about banks losing money, but they get real angry when you put a gun in somebody’s face. That is, unless they’re the ones who gave it to you.

here's birdie reflecting on the past and falling in love with mel's mother, anita.

I’d gotten good at following her orders, so when she said, “Kiss me,” I said, “Yes, ma’am,” and I did. It was sweet at first, which made me think she was shy, that maybe this was her first kiss, but that didn’t last long. Passion wasn’t something I’d ever associated with myself and definitely didn’t associate with her, but we brought it out in each other alongside all the other dark and wild things.

this is birdie's son johnny reflecting on how much he hates his father. he's 30ish in the present timeline.

For my entire life my father had a goatee like the devil and blond hair that had turned mostly white by the time he was forty. He was thin, wiry, had the defensive posture of a surly teenager smoking outside of school. Mom, Mel, and I all looked alike, but Birdie looked like some guy who’d just wandered into our house.

and here's mel, also 30s, in the present. birdie has decided to part ways with her and this is the aftermath, where mel hooks up with a showgirl and takes her to breakfast the next morning.

Sara and I have breakfast at the Denny’s on the Strip which is maybe my favorite Denny’s in the country, and that’s saying something. I ask her lots of questions about microbiology, and to be polite she asks me some questions too, about my occupation and where I’m from and all that, but I evade them because she’s not really interested in my answers and I’m not interested in giving them. She’s twenty or twenty-two or something like that and that means she just wants to be the center of somebody’s attention, somebody she thinks is bigger than her, and that’s something I can offer. 

some things to note:

in the first excerpt, you'll notice a lack of contractions. that's because it's just my voice and i don't use a lot of contractions. because neurodivergence i guess, i don't know. there's also a higher register here, which you can tell by the variation of the sentences and the position of the clauses.

i based birdie off my father but birdie's voice isn't my dad's voice. that said, my dad was a habitual lecturer and so birdie is prone to Explaining Things. he also lobs off subjects of sentences sometimes and because he's spent his life running from the law, he's somewhat defensive and that comes out in a kind of aura of persuasion.

he's much more forthright when reflecting, and i think that can be found in the facts he's putting down over the opinions he offers in the present. when reflecting, he's much more vulnerable.

as far as johnny goes, i'm still working on him. i dragged him over from a different project and i'm reworking him. in the other project, he was extremely jaded and cold, and his narration style was direct and somewhat distant. some of that will carry over, but i also want to make him slightly more pathetic and immature.

mel is very reluctant to end sentences, so i try to keep them going for as long as i can. she also rambles, has a good sense of humor, and is extremely intelligent.

okay i've worked way way way too long on this, so i'm just going to hit post and hope it offers a little insight. also, happy to talk more about rabbit's blood and my process of writing it if anyone is interested.

[oodlyenough]

aa6-1 foreign turnabout

finished off DD last week and we're straight into soj.

i know the least about soj of any of the games probably, which is kind of nice because these later games really need the element of surprise they don't have a lot else lmao.

some thoughts on the tutorial case:

the good

this is a big visual upgrade from dual destinies (although i'm still unconvinced the games needed to move to 3d assets). phoenix's model looks better in ways i found hard to articulate until someone on twt pointed out SOJ gets rid of the bulky black outlines. it's so much smoother!

aside from the models, the sprite animations for the new characters are very detailed (almost too detailed... i mean do we need ninety animations per NPC? can we get some extra ones for phoenix lmao), i like how the UI has been refreshed to match khurain, overall it just looks more polished/complete than DD.

insight is new, and subject to suck more later lmao, but so far it's the best minigame since the magatama. both perceive and mood matrix suffer from being kind of nonsensical; it never stopped being goofy to me in DD that you just had interactions like "well i found the body and i was shocked" "UM ACTUALLY my robot says you were RED EMOJI FACE, so you're lying!" insight, on the other hand, is more based on logic/reason -- spot the contradiction, think through a couple different layers of info (rayfa's words vs what's on screen and what makes sense), etc. i also like the idea that the ghost witness isn't lying, you just have to interpret the memory -- it's a bit of a refreshing change from everyone just committing perjury 30000000 times.

the defense culpability act is very funny. i can't be mad at it because it is too funny. i think i should get to kill the prosecutor if i win.

also, maya having lived here for unspecified time period, surely being aware of the lawyer stuff and still inviting her best friend, ace attorney phoenix wright, is very hilarious. i hope edgeworth, academic of foreign legal systems, had a heart attack as soon as he heard where nick's vacation was

it is also funny to see supervillain payne. winston payne was just kind of an asshole and largely incompetent. gaspen is a supervillain who longs for murder. well, okay. why not i guess

the questionable

khura'in is but the latest in a long line of exciting AA countries that will have you asking "what are the geopolitics of this world?" and "...is this racist?"

it's really funny to me that the first culprit was a white guy on an eat pray love journey but that his eat pray love journey is totally incidental to the crime, apparently. khurain is apparently very welcoming to immigrants if one can become head monk guarding their sacred treasures after a mere six months, and payne is chief prosecutor after three.

it's also very funny that with his life potentially on the line, the only person phoenix is worried about is maya. i think there is an understandable in-game explanation, which is that you have to assume every game might have a new audience and that new audience has only been told of maya so far. but returning players who know he has a teenage daughter might uh. wonder.

the bad

i can sense that the more lore i learn about khurain the more racially uncomfortable i am going to become

the names are BRUTAL i wish they'd stop. i get that ace attorney always has silly goofy pun names. but i feel they're veering further and further from the... slightly more believable names into stuff that just sounds stupid, and man, trying to apply ace attorney pun name goofiness to names that are also supposed to be in a fake fictional language .... i mean it sounds like i'm reading racist jokes from the 90s. it's uncomfortable.

i also think khura'in lore is bound to upend or retcon the superior kurain village lore, which ruled in the trilogy and did not need expanding into a kingdom. isolated little village matriarchy of witch family that are constantly committing sorocide >>> whatever's about to happen here. it's great for rayfa that she does her lil dance for enrichment 2x a day to have temporary hallucinations in a pool of water, but maya crosses her fingers and shapeshifts. checkmate.

lastly, one thing i found myself thinking as i moderately enjoyed the tutorial case was that it was honestly kind of nice having a case scaled back. i can't shake the sense that three playables is just too much for these games; apollo was dead weight narratively in DD and i think athena is about to suffer that fate in SOJ. the character writing in these new games is just not strong enough to manage this many major characters and their whole entourages. the mistake of the original trilogy was accidentally setting a precedent for "new prosecutor every game, who is also our friend by the end :)". the main cast is so huge that most of them just end up stagnating or disappearing into the void or whatever; apollo and athena cannibalized each other's screentime in DD, athena usurped trucy, SOJ is introducing a whole whack of new characters to replace THOSE newbies... it's a lot. we don't need to reinvent the wheel every new game.

anyway... i know a little about 6-2 and i expect it to exacerbate a lot of these issues lmao.

[the-autistic-cat-queen]

My thoughts and feelings. 11/09/2024

I've never really been one for writing a journal or a diary. In fact I find it extremely difficult to get my thoughts and feelings out. I did used to make long Facebook posts, so I guess that's kind of the same thing. The only difference being is, they were for just people I knew and they were normally just updates on my life rather than updates on my actual feelings.

For what ever reason I've always struggled to get out my words, I mean to be fair I've always struggled with words in general because I'm dyslexic. But more recently since getting diagnosed with a neurological condition, it's made expressing myself so much harder.

No doubt as I'm typing this I'll mess up my words and say the wrong things. Growing up was never easy for me, my dad always wanted me to read things out loud, in fact he specifically wanted me and my siblings to read words from the bible. Problem was the book never made much sense, if at all. It would go on about this person was the son of this person, and it would be a list of names that most people would struggle with, let alone the 6 year old that I was at the time.

My brother and sister always seemed to manage just fine, but me, I would get stuck on each and every word before bursting into tears.

My dad would then shout at me and call me backwards. He would then make my brother and sister read my parts which would then make them feel annoyed or maybe resentful towards me. (Or at least that's how it felt at the time). It's was so long ago now that I can barely remember. But for whatever reason it's always stuck in my head that my dad thought I was stupid, that I was slow, and that I was backwards as he would word it.

I now know that it was because I'm dyslexic / autistic.

In fact it wasn't until after I left school that I learnt to read probably. My teachers at the time used to say I was lazy.

So between being called lazy and being called backwards, I honestly had low self esteem. There was many other factors to why I didn't think highly of myself, but I'll not go into them today.

I'm now almost 45 and in that time I've only ever been able to hold down one real job which only lasted just over a year from the age of 16 to 17.

I don't know what it is but I find it extremely difficult to work in social situations / environments.

Anyway for whatever reason I always seemed to struggle to get how I'm feeling across to others, as I often explain things completely different to how I want people to understand.

I don't know, sometimes I wonder if my dad was right, maybe I am backwards.

But then, just as I think these feelings, or in this case type them, I know deep down that not true, I'm actually quite an intelligent person, I just really struggle with how to articulate myself, how to get my ideas and thoughts out.

I don't know what it is, but the more I try and explain myself to people the more it seems I make the situation worse.

Take tonight for example, I have this most amazing friend in the world, she is so caring, so loving, and she always tries her best to see her friends happy, well tonight I tired to explain something to her but instead of making her understand, I think I just made her more confused / frustrated, which then lead to her feeling overwhelmed.

You see she is autistic too, in fact like myself she has also been finding things increasingly difficult. If you happen to be reading this, you know who you are and I love you with all my heart. You are amazing and I'm incredibly proud of you. I probably don't tell you that enough, but I am, I'm really proud of you.

See I'm trying to be brave by posting my feelings. It's only because of you that I'm even able to do this. You inspire me.

Anyway back to where I was, I really struggle with communication, I always have done, and I likey always will. Who knows maybe that's just something I'll need to learn to accept.

I just wish I knew what to say to make everyone happy, to make people realise they deserve happiness, that they deserve to be loved.

It was my mum's birthday the other day, yet I wasn't able to wish her happy birthday. You see long story short my parents disowned me many years ago. They did this because they were extremely religious, and, well I'm not religious at all anymore.

Anyway we can cover that some other time, I guess I'm just really struggling at the moment and I guess I wish I was able to express my feelings better.

I guess you could say in not so many words.

Being autistic is like trying to baptise a cat, you know it's never going to be easy. - NH

Edit: After reading over this about 10 times and also getting my partner (who is also dyslexic) to read it too, I think I've managed to remove / edit most of the typos out. 💜

[trillscienceofficer]

Which episode(s) would you most like b7 and/or kiradax to get together in? I'm just curious where in the timeline you would want it to happen :) hope you feel better!

Thank you!! And this is an interesting question because I have very definite thoughts for both relationships

one of my answers is ‘actually, they never do’—the first Trek fic I ever wrote dealt with exact scenario for Kira and Jadzia, and other favorite stories of mine have the same approach. I love it when feelings and attraction are left unfulfilled, living on inside both people for a much longer time because they were never expressed. This is obviously made worse by Jadzia dying and her memories still living on in Ezri. If there ever was a representation of 'what could've been', I think it's every one of the conversations that Kira and Ezri have in season 7. I think a very similar approach could be very juicy for Seven and B'Elanna as well—they live in each other's heads a lot even on the show, and if you interpret their strange rivalry as feelings neither of them can articulate, not even to themselves, and consider where Seven is twenty years later... I think they might still live in each other's heads, as the kind of rapport you'd almost forgotten about but you remember suddenly at 2am and you can't sleep any longer while you ask yourself ‘I still don't know what all that was about’ and ‘I wonder where she is now’ and the idea of meeting her again makes your heartrate spike and cringe at the same time, because what would you even say after so long, and when you weren't able to talk even when you were lost at sea? (I believe @avoicefromthestars is the biggest proponent of this approach for B7)

another answer could be ‘they get together post-canon, reconnecting after years’, which is something I'm now particularly fond of when it comes to B'Elanna and Seven. I hinted at how it could happen on “Best Left” but I definitely want to write a prequel of the fic where the circumstances in which they meet again are the main focus, I already have a plot in mind. I also used to be very fond of this approach with Kira and Ezri but an actual fic about this never really panned out.

finally, if they got together in the shows... I'm very fond of the time-skip between DS9 s3 and s4 for Kira and Jadzia to get together. Like obviously it could happen also at other times during season 4, or even earlier in the show, but to me it makes more sense if it happens after Bareil is gone but before Worf arrives on the station. I think it would be perfect also because after “Facets” Jadzia has confronted a little of her self-doubt as well as, I think, any hesitance she might've had about approaching Kira. Also I think seeing Kira embody Lela Dax might really flip a switch in Jadzia's head, in a ‘it's time to take a leap’ way. After Worf gets on the show though... I now can see them getting together only as a throuple with Worf. Obviously I won't say no to fic/headcanons that take a different route, but that's what I think now.

As for Seven and B'Elanna, pretty much all the fic I wrote for them where they get together on Voyager's timeline is set midway through season 6, for the very simple reason that I believe both 6x02 “Survival Instinct” and 6x03 “Barge of the Dead” represent watershed moments for both of them and their understanding of themselves, and that's also when their rapport thaws rather significantly and without major regressions. It's more difficult to have a precise timeline on Voyager because of the syndicated nature of the show, but I also like the idea of B'Elanna by that point (especially after “Alice”) having had enough of Tom's shenanigans and them splitting up as a consequence. I realize this stretches canon a bit—season 7 definitely contends that Seven hasn't seriously thought about a romantic partner before finding out about a relationship she apparently had with Axum but can't really remember. I am still fond of the season 6 timeline regardless.

[futureplayboibunnie]

Sexting your lover, doctor strange, who had to portal too you in the middle of the day for a quickie, because you got him so riled up.

‘Quickly’

Dr Strange x fem! reader

PROBS ONE OF MY FAVES IVE DONE SO FAR. tysm for the idea love u <33

SMUT SO MINORS SHOO x

Your fingernails tapped at the panes of your wine glass as you glanced at the clock in your apartment. Carding your fingers through your hair, you let out an exhale of boredom until your small sips of the scarlet Tempramillo turned into large obnoxious gulps.

Your day was filled with tingles.

Literally.

You found your thoughts straying away from your normal mundane everyday tasks with your very special and...talented friend, Stephen Strange. You would be doing something normal and then remind yourself of what he did to you the night before, it made your thighs tingle and your cheeks flush. You couldn't exactly explain to anybody the reason to why your head was hung low and why your teeth were knawing at your bottom lip in attempts to conceal your shit eating grin. The thrill of secrecy was what made your relationship that much more sexy.

You needed to taste him again. But he was busy.

He made hard work of letting you know never to call him or text him when he was working or on another ghastly, death dependant mission; though you never really drilled the consequences of it in your head. If he calls for you, forever you'd stay. You dabbled with the idea of sending him some naughty pictures- you'd pay good money to see his face blush in the moment of imminent danger. Maybe you'd call him, breathe and moan into the phone and whisper sweet dirty nothings as he tries to stifle his desire for you while he was out on the field. Feeling dangerous, you paced around your apartment as you grasped your phone and called him. You knew he'd be furious but isn't that what you wanted?

‘’I'm busy. I told you not to call me while I'm working.’’ Stephen clenched his teeth in annoyance at your endless disrespect. When he felt the glare of his phone screen light up, he knew he'd have to entertain you and your antics; he was spending his time disintigrating a few cosmic enemies but you wouldn't give him a choice. You were relentless.

‘’I miss you.’’ You whispered through the phone, needing to feel the richness of his voice in real time and not just through a phone line.

‘’What?’’ Stephen rasped at you and you could just sense that his eyebrows were creasing in anger, seething at your inconvenient timing but mostly startled at the fact that you called him for once.

‘’Come here.’’ You flicked your tongue from your front two teeth, exhaling out seductively. Your breath was all honeyed and rosy, you knew he wasn't going to give in that easily.

‘’I'm busy.’’ He stated all deadpan after hearing a pained grunt in the background, your thighs tingled at the thought he was literally obliterating some goon whilst being on the phone with you. You felt so important to him.

‘'I'm wet.’’

Stephen's eyebrows quirked at the statement and his mouth fell dry...or was he drooling? He couldn't figure it out let alone decide. You were getting off on saying all of this at such an inconvenient time and he wondered how wet you'd feel after he spanked the disrespect out of you, you made him look like an idiot in the middle of working and his expression was anything but kind as his muscles were tense from frowning.

‘’Get yourself off, I'm not dealing with you right now.’’ Stephen found the rest of his sentient composure to bark orders at you and stop you from distracting him from such a perilous pursuit. You pouted and he could practically hear it through the phone, you obviously didn't get the answer you were attempting to draw out of him; you paused for a moment.

‘’Why would I get myself off when you can make me feel so good all by yourself? Besides, don't you want your hands on me when I'm right here... waiting for you, wanting you more than anything?’’ You countered and Stephen felt himself melt at such articulate words, no one had ever admitted to him they wanted him so desperately and it made his heart thump through his chest. He sighed in defeat.

‘’Come on. We went at it for hours yesterday. Are you not worn out?’’ His voice was hushed, almost as if he was embarrassed and scared for anyone to hear him.

‘’I. Want. More. Stephen.’’

He hung up before he was about to get hard on the battle field, he was frustrated and aroused at the same time now and it was an undeniably toxic combination. His mind was pacing the kilometeres of multiple countries, he was being pulled to every direction but he couldn't really care because all he could think about was you. The way you sounded. The way you breathed through the phone. The way he could practically envision the array of positions he could have you in by now.

Stephen was mad at himself, mad at his lack of self control when it came to you but sometimes disorder is needed and you for one pulled him into that sphere. When he thought he had the slightest chance of getting over that little stunt of yours, you obviously had to go ahead and prove him wrong by any means. The immortal pings of your constant texts made him believe you were now trying your hand at begging which he found impossibly adorable...but that wasn't the case.

Fuck. You.

Honestly.

You sent him a multitude of pictures, completely bare in your stance and so obviously pleased with yourself. Perfect tits, perfect body, perfect face...everything about you was so perfect. Except when you try to cock tease him out of his duties and obligations. Devil disguising herself as a naive little angel. The thought of you naked had the whole world tipping on its side.

- Have I got your attention now?

Seriously. Fuck. You. He thought to himself.

Stephen couldn't say no. He was struggling against your siren like disposition.

Fuck it, he bit the dreaded bullet and conjured the portal that would lead to the demise you had been cruel enough to beg from him.

There you were, unforgiving and naked wearing nothing but a half smile as he stepped foot into your apartment. A wet dream wasn't even in the ball park of where you were right now. You made your way over to him and you were so close your bodies could barely fit a pin between you.

‘’Quickly.’’ He gritted and you responded by encompassing your lips onto his, sighing as you finally got a taste of the release you've been craving. It was as if Stephen was despairing, a moral battle between his consciousness and his rationale against his dick and heart. He felt your lips curl up into a smile against his.

He bit at your lips and chin in repose, his mouth travelling to the slender curve of your neck made you sigh in relief.

‘’You knew what you were doing.’’ He groaned before hoisting you up and carrying you to your bedroom to fuck the living daylights out of you, you were more than asking for it now.

‘’Of course I do.’’ You exhaled as Stephen threw you on the bed, unremorseful of where you landed.

‘’You know just how to do it, isn't that right baby.’’ It wasn't a question or a statement but a very unhealthy middle ground. He'd never called you baby before. Baby sounds so intimate and it made your cheeks flush crimson. '

‘’You know just how to get me this way. To make me want you this way.’’ Stephen said bitterly as he began undressing himself. Even when you've seen Stephen's body a million times you're still rendered speechless when he exposes the ripples of his chest, the bulk of his biceps and the sheer size of his cock. You were sprawled out on the bed waiting for him to wreck you into another dimension and he reckons you look like a fallen angel all for him to savour and have.

‘’I think I just know what you like.’’ You bit your lip and stared up at him through your thick fluttery lashes. Stephen fawned over you and grasped at your wrists and held them in a tight iron like grip above your pretty little head, he bent his head down and bit at your hard nipple and it made a gasp erupt out of you.

Stephen's hard glare was a response in itself. He didn't give you any forewarning or preparation as he rammed himself into you recklessly, you wanted to rough up his hair so bad but his fingernails were gripping into the skin of your wrists. The small gasp and the intense eye contact you made when he sunk into you was his favourite part of these little moments he shared with you. Your whimpers were becoming louder and louder as he moved over you in a rough, unrelenting and unceasing rhythm. He kissed your lips and it felt like you were done for.

‘’Dear God Stephen. You're so big it hurts.’’You whined against him as he stretched your insides out deliciously, he perked up at your struggle to even speak.

‘’Good.’’ He seethed. It was his turn to punish you; you risked his life by being such a cock tease but it seemed you liked being punished so brutally the way you began to whisper your own dirty little words.

Yes. Fuck me. Right there.

Though what really did him in was: ‘’You're so fucking good Stephen.’’

It was him that was making you feel like this, this good.

Although his favourite was: ‘’I don’t feel bad for any of it.’’

You just had to reinforce your bad behaviour that much more to prove a pointed that didn't need to be proven. You felt so invigorating, he couldn't remember the last time he wanted someone so bad it would make him portal his way out of his work just to be with them. Stephen's skin was on fire. His muscles were tense. His body moved in and out of you with no abandon, the heat gathering and spreading from his cock to the side of his neck, the place where you were biting at now like an animal. You called out Stephen's name in a broken whine as your hips bucked beneath him.

‘’Beautiful, horny, impatient little fuck.’’ He snapped and spat at you and it made your mind echo in thunder as your body convulsed beneath him, feeling your release come to fruition. Pleasure pulls tight in the base of your abdomen and you felt the coil begin to dissipate.

You screamed out his name, toes curling as your orgasm hit you harden than a brick. A breath shuddered from Stephen as he painted your insides with himself, he was still throbbing at your disposition. Wide eyed, tensed brow and mouth agape in an ungodly amount of pleasure. You clung to him as wild eyes met each other, exhales of arousal escaped both of your throats. It was as if you had never done this to each other before the way you were gawking at each other. Your tongue slotted against his, you bit his lip sharply and tugged it back before ultimately breathing the words Stephen would treasure for the rest of his days:

‘’I want you inside me forever.’’

—-

[commsroom]

I have DID, and a lot of my system feels very represented in Hera's character, for various reasons. Do you have any thoughts on viewing her character through this lens (or through the lens of any dissociative disorder)? (Side note but your takes on her character are always so interesting! I always get excited whenever I see one of your really long hera posts. The way you articulate things is really nice too.)

oh, interesting! i don't have DID, so i wouldn't want to make assumptions or speak for your experiences, but i would be curious to know your thoughts! and you're welcome to DM me, if you want to talk about it, but would rather not put it out there publicly.

i can talk a bit about how i feel her experiences reflect more general dissociation and depersonalization? she's had to develop a strong sense of interiority; she exists sort of 'within' her own mind, feeling separate from and like she can only observe the 'real world.' whatever tangible actions she can take are by proxy, not things she feels she's directly interacting with. there are the literal mental blocks keeping her from accessing traumatic memories, and the servers full of information that are - in a sense - part of her, directly accessible via her thoughts, but not known to her until they're accessed and processed through memory. and then there are things she can't think about, not even because they're traumatic, but because an external party decided she wasn't allowed: "do you have any idea how annoying it is to get kicked off a thought when you're halfway through having it? now i'm going to have a headache for the rest of the night." ... like, that perceived artificiality of the self and lack of autonomy and control in relation to others is something that i emotionally understand.

a lot of my fixation on the idea of hera having a body comes from a place of disconnect and desire to reconcile with that; it's cathartic, in a way, to explore what it means to have a body from the perspective of someone who has no physical history, no sense of place, or really anything that 'identity' often stems from. i think so much of just feeling like a person is in having other people respond to your presence, and when there's such a disconnect between who you are and how you're perceived - or when there's no one to perceive you at all - it's easy to feel like kind of a non-entity, and out of step with the people around you. i also find certain ways of thinking about the brain + body as a computer + machine useful in processing certain types of actions and reactions, especially in, like... the opening of persuasion; 'mindfulness' on its own doesn't do much for me, but the way hera has to adjust her thought processes to sort of re-teach herself to purposefully do one task at a time instead of everything at once - "relearning the way [she listens] to what's in [her] head" - resonates with me. i don't know if any of these experiences overlap with what you had in mind, but i'd be curious to find out! i think part of what makes her such a great character is that these are very real things that anyone with difficulty feeling present, who feels that the world is in some way uniquely inaccessible to them, who has a complicated relationship with a sense of self due to that disconnect, will understand on a very personal level, especially in relation to trauma and traumatic injury / disability.

(and thank you so much; that's kind of you!!)