#the more i wrote the less it made sense to separate the two parts out

[anyroads]

OK you know what, if we're gonna talk about Bake Off then fuck it, let's do this.

It used to be this wholesome, lovely show! We used to watch it for the bakers! And the learning! And the light banter and occasional bit of coy innuendo! What happened?

Channel 4 happened. When they bought the show they made a number of changes, most of them Not Good™️. Not just in the sense of them resulting in a lot of 😬 and 🫠 moments, but in the sense of how they changed the show's purpose, atmosphere, and brand.

Look, I know most people are just like, "whatever, it's just a baking show," and yeah, sure. But it's one of the UK's most successful TV exports, and where it once shifted the tone of reality competition to being wholesome and supportive of contestants, it's since moved towards creating tension at the contestants' cost. So aside from the fact that most people watching it signed up to watch a nice show, it has also shifted the goalposts of what that even means. And that, lovelies and gentlefolk, is some bullshit.

I decided to break my rant analysis into four main parts: theme weeks, the hosts, the judges, and the bakers. Let's get to it!

Theme Weeks:

If you watch Bake Off, you know the show's always had a specific theme for each week. The staples that come up in most seasons are:

cake

biscuit

bread

pudding/dessert

pastry

patisserie

Less common but consistent are things like caramel and chocolate week.

Then there are the fun episodes! When GBBO was on the BBC, this started out with things tea week, tarts, pies, tray bakes, basically little tangents still focused on emphasizing specific baking skills. In Series 6 (still on the BBC) they had their first nation-focused theme week with French week -- fairly innocuous given that a lot of patisserie is French, France and England share much more culture than either cares to admit [Norman Flag dot gif], and it was a nice change from watching Paul make the bakers do recipes that involved boiling things while talking about how wonderful boiled doughs are (are they, Paul? Are they?).

The show kept mixing it up with innocuous themes like advanced dough and alternative ingredients weeks, European cakes, Victorian week, batter week, and botanical week. And while it was frustrating to watch Paul Hollywood mispronounce things like the Hungarian Dobos Torta and lecture bakers on babka when he clearly knew nothing about it (or about Jewish baking in general, go off Past Me), the show's general attitude was that the judges had their own opinions, which were separate from the immutable facts around the chemistry of baking (more on this later) and shouldn't affect how bakers are judged.

After the show moved to Channel 4, the number of themed weeks increased and more of them focused on specific countries. In 6 seasons on the BBC, there were only two country-focused theme weeks, and in 5 seasons on Channel 4 there have been five. And while they've also had themes like vegan baking, roaring 20s, the 1980s, spice week, etc. the show has really started to go hard on exoticizing other cultures in outright disrespectful and racist ways. There's been Italian and Danish week, German, Japanese (it wasn't, it was East Asian week), and now Mexican week (which doesn't touch on interspersed Jewish bakes that didn't get a theme week, like versions of bagels and babka set as technical challenges that were borderline hate crimes and mansplained by a guy who has no idea how to make either and once wrote in a cookbook that challah was traditionally eaten during Passover). Each time the hosts played up the theme with racist bits and jokes that can be used as evidence in court if your case is "why should shows with scripted content have a professional writing staff."

Which touches on other issues the show has now...

The Hosts:

When GBBO was on the BBC, the show was hosted by ✨Mel Giedroyc✨ and ✨Sue Perkins✨. They encouraged the bakers! They'd hold stuff for them sometimes! They were interested in them! If a baker had a breakdown, they would start singing copyrighted material to render the footage unusable! When the show moved to Channel 4, they left, though I'm not unconvinced that Channel 4 offered them impossible to accept contracts to force them out so they could rebrand the show. They replaced them with Sandy Toksvig and Noel Fielding. Sandy was a lovely host in the vein of Mel and Sue, and she and Noel had a relatively sweet rapport, but she left a few seasons ago and was replaced by Matt Lucas.

Noel Fielding is mostly known for his quirky brand of comedy, a sort of British Zooey Deschanel who's goth from the neck up, an upperclass British gay divorcee from the neck down, and basically an early 60s Beatle re: trousers. Matt Lucas has almost definitely never watched a single episode of GBBO and his most redeeming quality is his thinly veiled contempt for Paul Hollywood.

The two treat the baking tent as their personal playground. Far from the supportive attitude of Mel and Sue, they tend to get in the bakers' way during the most stressful moments, especially when they try to do hilarious "comedy" bits (I can't not put that in quotes) like Noel's talking wooden spoon thing, or Matt talking over Noel to do time calls. During theme weeks like Japanese and Mexican week, they do culture-specific bits that are both racist ("just Juan joke" and "is Mexico a real place?") and unsurprising, given that both Matt and Noel did blackface on their respective sketch shows and absolutely could and should have known better because it was already the current fucking century.

All this to say, there's now a separation between the bakers and the hosts, as if they're on different shows. The hosts are doing their own thing and the bakers are doing GBBO. The show has gotten meaner to the bakers, and the hosts aren't there to support them anymore, they're just there to be comic relief. Because when you refocus your show on stressing the bakers the fuck out, you need a forced laugh I guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

The Judges:

First of all, a sincere congratulations to Paul Hollywood who managed to squeeze I jUsT cAmE bAcK fRoM mExIcO aNd YeT sTiLL pRoNoUnCe PiCo De GaLLo As 'PiKa De KaLLa' and I aM aN eXpErT oN s'MoReS wHiCh aRe MaDe WiTh DiGeStiVe BiScUiTs AcCoRdiNg tO mE, aN eXpErT oN s'MoReS, just two in a giant pile of astoundingly wrong hot takes, into a short enough time span that they all aired within Liz Truss's term as Prime Minister. A true man of accomplishments.

In the interest of fairness, I need to preface this with a disclaimer that, due to the fact that I've been watching Bake Off for most of its run, I'm biased. Specifically, I can't stand Paul Hollywood's smarmy, classist, egomaniac ass because he's proven time and again he's more interested in looking smart than actually knowing what he's talking about. Since the show moved to Channel 4, they've changed the occasional handshake Paul would give bakers to the HoLlYwOoD hAnDsHaKe™️. It's gone from being an emphasis of someone's skill to a goal, a reward, and one that emphasizes the judges' place above the bakers.

The judges used to function as teachers, imparting their skills and insights to the bakers. When the show was on the BBC, the voiceover leading to a judging would focus on the bakers' work being finished, saying how it will now be evaluated based on their skill and how well they met the brief. The voiceovers now, on Channel 4, focus on the judging (literally saying something along the lines of, "the bakers will now be judged by Prue and Paul"). There is a clear distinction Channel 4's producers have made, to mark that the show is now about whether or not the judges approve, not whether the brief was understood and executed well. On the BBC, it was irrelevant whether the judges liked a particular flavor, as long as the bake was well-made. Now, the bakers are expected to know the judges tastes and cater to them, which is frankly bullshit. A judge doesn't have to like a flavor to know whether or not it was executed well, ie. is it carrying a bake and was it meant to etc.

The judges have been turned into a brand. Cynically, Channel 4 knows that by building them up and focusing the show more on them, they can exploit their image more for profit. In the process, they've become much more biased and their own biases have come out as well. Most recently in the flaming dumpster fire that was Mexican Week, Paul Hollywood tried to intimidate a baker by telling them he had just gotten back from Mexico (which must have been a fruitful learning trip if he couldn't even learn how to pronounce pico de gallo correctly). Where do I even start with this? Here's an amateur baker from England (the show specifically casts middle and lower middle class bakers for the most part??) who likely can't afford trips to Mexico, who lives in a country with incredibly limited access to Mexican cuisine, who is expected not only to understand the cooking and baking traditions of a completely different culture but to do so well enough to play with it and do something creative with it. On top of which, one of the judges is now using his privilege of traveling halfway around the world as some kind of leverage, as if this were a bar that any amateur British baker could clear.

Prue, meanwhile, has openly asserted her biases against cultural flavors and textures, prioritizing her own personal preferences over them, as if they were in any way relevant to the skills and knowledge necessary to execute the tasks she sets to the bakers. She has also been consistently elitist, criticizing bakers for choices they made that were clearly informed by their experiences within income brackets that are too low and foreign for Prue to comprehend. She once had a go at a baker on a Christmas special because his Christmas dinner themed bake didn't have a turkey, even though it was clear from the stories he shared of his own Christmases that his family likely couldn't afford one. "It's not really Christmas dinner without a turkey," Prue said into the camera angrily while sitting on a chair made of live orphans and telling the ghost of Christmas Future to come back when he had another museum gift shop necklace for her to round out her collection.

The show is no longer about which baker has the best skills. It's become about which mortal can appease the gods of Mount Olympus, ie. the judges.

The Bakers:

Remember when the show was about them? Channel 4 doesn't! Because this is a reality competition show, the bakers are chosen both based on their skills, as well as cast-ability. They're cast as characters, distinct from each other, from different areas, age groups, ethnicities. All of them are amateurs. All of them are middle or lower middle class. They've ranged from college students to supermarket cashiers to prison wardens to scientists.

Something I noticed when the show moved to Channel 4 is that the baker who goes home in the first week is always wildly behind the rest in skills. I have no proof of this other than my eyeballs and deductive reasoning skills, but I think that Channel 4 deliberately casts a ringer each season who they think will be an easy send-off in the first week, just to get the audience's feet wet.

Anyway, like I said, this show used to be about the bakers - about them building skills and learning, and having walked into the tent with a self-taught foundation and understanding of the processes and chemical reactions involved in baking. When the show was on the BBC, the end of each round had some (often brief) moments of tension - will they finish in time? Will they get their bakes on the plate before time is up? Did they forget to add sugar to their batter and only remember at the last minute? In the end, they usually managed to finish and we'd all breathe a sigh of relief and think, yeah! You go, Bakers Who I'm Rooting For!

Now, on Channel 4, the end of round drama has been stretched to be so much longer that they've composed extra music for it. The bakers often seem out of their depth, whether because the instructions for the technical challenge are too vague (bake a lemon meringue pie??? As if anyone in the UK under the age of 60 has had one in the last decade???), or because they were expected to bake something that required a more than a basic foundation they weren't told of. Often it seems like they just aren't given enough time, a tactic used by reality competition shows to manipulate contestants into giving the cameras more dramatic content. On top of all this, the hosts get in their way, instead of helping them plate their bakes. As has been pointed out before, when everyone fails the challenge, the real failure lies with whoever set it.

In conclusion:

The show no longer exists to teach the bakers - and the audience - skills or knowledge. It now manipulates contestants for dramatic effect and prioritizes showing conflict over wholesome content. Channel 4 sees the bakers as social media content they can churn out season after season, and don't care about them because in a few months there'll be a new batch to exploit. Meanwhile, the judges are also out of their depth, co-opting recipes from other cultures and butchering them horrendously, while the camera gives them nothing but status as they hold bakers to the expectation that they learn how to make things very much the wrong way. If you saw any of the tweets about Mexican or Japanese week, or read my post on how Paul Hollywood isn't allowed to go near babka ever again, you'll understand.

So what would fix all this? Scrap the current judges and the hosts altogether. Bring back Mel and Sue, and replace the judges with expert bakers who have a love of their craft and want to share it with others. The draw of GBBO used to be its warmth and comfort - if Channel 4 isn't going to start its own version of Master Chef For Bakers, then it needs to stop trying to find a balance of how it can insert that vibe into GBBO. It can't. That's not a thing. Stop trying.

[mythserene]

A BEATLE DIDN’T SAY THAT! Lewisohn’s lab-created quotes

“One of the things about this book that is a strength is it’s not me saying anything, it’s them or other people. I shape the text, I plot where it goes, I weave it, but the quotes are theirs. And so when I’ve got Paul McCartney behaving in a way some readers might think, ‘Whatever, oh dear,’ it’s actually him saying it. So you end up thinking that to his own credit he said that. It’s not me saying it.” (Mark Lewisohn, ‘Noted,’ (October 7, 2013) Somerset, Guy.)

This is hella long, and that's because it's actually a full blog post. (In case you want it in a less monstrous form.)

A lot of people for a long time have put a lot of trust in Mark Lewisohn’s footnotes. Or at least in the fact of those footnotes. Because once you dig through them for any length of time you quickly discover that Mark Lewisohn’s footnotes hold secrets that would get him expelled from any undergraduate program. They reveal a “history” often contrived through a mass of Frankenquotes, ala carte creations, Lewisohn rephrased ‘paraphrases,’ and worse. For some parts of the narrative things aren’t too bad, yet in others monsters lurk around every corner. But this is not the sort of thing that’s graded on a curve, and it is past time to have a conversation about what standards should be accepted in Beatles’ scholarship.

Lewisohn lists his sources unlike most others. And his footnotes alone are more insightful than some other writers’ books. (Reddit, r/beatles)

I do not judge footnotes based on their insightfulness, nor do I want to single out a redditor, but I grabbed the comment because it’s an opinion that is widely shared and even accepted as canon. At least by people who have not combed those freakish footnotes. And while the pages of piled up sources do look fearsome en masse, a closer inspection reveals an offense to the truth, a threat to the record, and a blight on Beatles’ historiography.

“The rules for writing history are obvious. Who does not perceive that its chief law is never to dare say anything false, and never dare withhold anything true? The slightest suspicion of hatred or favor must be avoided. That such should be the foundations is known to all; the materials with which the building will be raised consist of facts and words.” –Cicero

A Look at Lewisohn’s Lab-created Frankenquotes

FIRST, WHAT ARE QUOTES? AND WHY ARE QUOTES?

Quotes are the soul and center of recorded—and recording— history.

And the rules around quotes and quotation marks are pretty simple. Most people, even if they’ve never written anything beyond a term paper, understand what quotation marks represent.

A set of quotation marks means, “This person said or wrote ‘these exact words’ at some given time.” You can smash a quote from two hours before or two years before right up against a separate quote to make your point—although it might get your grade lowered—but what you cannot do is take two different statements from two different times and make them seem like they are one statement.

When you put words inside one set of quotation marks you are stating, in black and white, that the identified person made this statement. That they said all those words together—or if you want to excise a reasonable part and use ellipses to represent that— as part of the same statement.

Look, combining two separate quotes that are not part of the same thought or topic is not a subjective issue. It is not an issue of controversy. Quotes are the bone marrow of written history. Quotes are the alpha and omega. In academic work or journalism they have to be, which makes sense as soon as you think about it. If it was cool for me to take a transcript and grab half a sentence from page 2 and half a sentence from page 17, push them together as if those words were spoken one after the other in a single thought, I bet I can manage to get those words to say almost anything I want.

Separate thoughts must be in two separate quotation marks. Separate. Somewhere between four sentences and a paragraph is widely accepted as the “two separate quotes” line, and there can be some ethical and technical wiggle room in a long rant by a person, but what makes all that subjective nonsense go out the window is if the quotes come from two separate questions. Or two separate days. That’s two quotes. Not hard.

Which again, makes sense if the point is conveying information to the reader and lessening the chance of a writer manipulating someone else’s words to express something that the person didn’t mean.

This is the contract inherent in a quote. These are the rules we all agree to and understand, and these are the reasons why. And there’s no reason to break them.

Why do you want me to believe that John said these two things at one time? What was wrong with what he did say?

THE FOUR MOST COMMON WAYS MARK LEWISOHN MAULS THE MEANING OF THE QUOTE:

The Basic Lewisohn Frankenquote 🧟‍♂️

(“CONCLUDING FIVE WORDS FROM—” – I cannot even see the point of this THREE PART monster. Full footnote reads: 9) Author interview with Tony Meehan, September 6, 1995. (“I met George again in 1968 and for some reason he was harboring a grudge against me. He was very, very uptight about it—’You blocked us getting a recording contract …’ ”) First part of George quote from interview by Terry David Mulligan, The Great Canadian Gold Rush, CBC radio, May 30 and June 6, 1977; concluding five words from interview for The Beatles Anthology)

This three-headed monster attributed to George Harrison is a very dull little guy. Not particularly venomous. Just convenient, I guess. For whatever reason, Mark Lewisohn decided it was worth rummaging through the quote buffet until he collected enough pieces for George Harrison to say this thing. “…concluding five words from…” What are we even doing here? No, really. Please tell me.

And like a lot of the footnotes for these bespoke quotations, there are further problems. “[F]rom interview for Beatles Anthology”? An interview that aired? In one of the episodes? Can you narrow it down? I guess I’ll just have to listen very closely to them all and hope I don’t miss the five words.

But if we got bogged down in the sorts of trivial details that would immediately lose a college student a letter grade off a History 101 paper we would never get anywhere. We have to stick to the violent felonies.

*Love the "George would say——" Uh, would he? Well, I guess after all that trouble you went to, he would now. It's really incredible how cavalier Lewisohn is about a Beatle's words.

These sorts of reconstituted, lab-engineered, made up “quotes” are shot throughout Tune In. “Quotes” made up of words from two, three, and even four sources, spoken months or often years apart.

Ala Carte Creations 🍱

It really is a buffet, and these ala carte creations come in all shapes and sizes. They might just be words that have been plucked up and glued back together to make something more useful to a particular narrative. (Ellipses or dash optional.)

TUNE IN: “John saw a bigger picture, and it would be surprising if it wasn’t equally obvious, or made obvious, to Brian and George. He likened Paul’s enduring snag with Brian to his other long-standing difficulty: ‘[Brian] and Paul didn’t get along—it was a bit like [Stuart and Paul] between the two of them.’” (Footnote 37: Interview by Peter McCabe and Robert D. Schonfeld, September 1971)

Bonus 🍒 Phoebe's dramatic reading of John's original quote:

The Donut 🍩

Then there are a seemingly uncountable number of “quotes” with a sentence or three ripped out from the middle, but with zero representation that more words were ever there. (And in most of these particular deceptions, the simple representation of something excised (. . .) would make the quote fine. There are a lot of these, but they are also the easiest to fix.)

Chapter 10: “I was in a sort of blind rage for two years. [I was e]ither drunk or fighting. **It had been the same with other girlfriends I’d had.** There was something the matter with me.”

And then there are the true buffet bonanzas, words lifted and twisted beyond recognition until they say something brand spanking new. 

However, John remembered Paul’s attitude to Brian being very different. John was always emphatic that Paul didn’t want Brian as the Beatles’ manager and presented obstacles to destabilize him, to make his job difficult … like turning up late for meetings. “Three of us chose Epstein. Paul used to sulk and God knows what … [Paul] wasn’t that keen [on Brian]—he’s more conservative, the way he approaches things. He even says that: it’s nothing he denies.”

The Lewisohn Remixes 🍸

And then there are the “paraphrases.” I couldn’t even begin to guess how many of these there are, and often they aren’t even paraphrases, but whole new Mark Lewisohn re-interpretations with quotation marks slapped around them. But if you don’t check, you probably won’t know, because like this Lewisohn rewrite of a well-known Mrs. Harrison quote, there’s a good chance you’ll recognize the bulk of it, making it less likely that you’ll catch the scalpel work excising Paul. And while I don’t want to get caught in the nooks and crannies of intent in an example like this one I have to say, just this once, that what has to be a purposeful excising of Paul to create a slightly new quote on one side, combined with a badly acted, bad faith—(or bad scholar)—“Where was Paul when John’s mom died?” on the other, is par for the course. 

George Harrison’s mom’s made up Lewisohn rephrase which coincidentally removes Paul from the imagery.]  ❦  LEWISOHN:“ Asked some years later to describe how he’d been able to help John cope with the loss of Julia, Paul could remember nothing of the period at all. It could be they didn’t see much of each other in the summer of 1958. John was working at the airport, and Paul and George went on holiday together—adventurous for boys of 16 and 15. But Louise Harrison would recall how she encouraged George to visit John at Mendips, “so he wouldn’t be alone with his thoughts.”  ❦  DAVIES: “They were still practicing a lot at George’s house, the only house where they got endless hospitality and encouragement. . . . I forced George to go round and see him, to make sure he still went off playing in their group and just didn’t sit and brood. They all went through a lot together, even in those early days, and they always helped each other.”

Why do you have to slice and dice and reconstitute people’s words? No writer, and certainly no historian, should ever feel empowered to take words from a historical figure from two or three different places and topics and times, splice them together, and tell us, “Winston Churchill said this.” No he didn’t! Why are you so intent on changing the words of the people you’re writing about? What’s wrong with just using two different quotes? 

You cannot take two or three quotes from two or three or even four separate statements, stick them between one set of quotation marks and say John or Paul or George or Joe Smith said this. 

No they didn’t. They never said that. Why do you want me to think they did?? 

All these words are Abraham Lincoln’s, but this is not a Lincoln quote:

“Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say for one that I have no other so great as that of — making a most discreditable exhibition of myself.” 

(I kept it ridiculous, although I didn’t have to.)

But I want you, the reader, to be saying to yourself, “Okay, enough already. I get it!” Because in the last few days I have wandered too far into the weeds too many times and written far too many words detailing the multiplicity of ways Mr. Lewisohn does violence to each and every law of reporting historical facts, and could write many more. And I will post a more detailed list of the crimes against the quote that I am charging Mark Lewisohn with as we go forward, but I don’t think we need that now. The fact is that every fair-minded person knows what quotation marks represent, and there is no more fair-minded group of people than serious Beatles fans and scholars. And it is those fair-minded scholars who I want most to hear me. Whether you’ve written books or host a podcast or just know that you know a whole lot of stuff and take seriously your part of the trust in preserving the truth about The Beatles for us and future generations, it is you I am really talking to. My Cicero quoting-freaks. The ones who care about getting it right.

“The chief, the only, aim of style is to put facts in a clear light, with no concealment.” - Lucian of Samosata

⁠What footnotes can do, and what footnotes can’t.

You can list multiple sources in a single footnote. That’s not only fine, it’s correct. If I want to tell part of a story based on several sources, that often means several sources in a footnote. But not for one, single quote. 

The problem isn’t the footnote, it’s the bioengineered quote on the page that you swept under a footnote hoping I wouldn’t notice. 

Which leads us to what a footnote is not. A footnote is not a post-hoc fixative for your textual sins. You cannot do whatever you want as long as you confess it in a footnote. A footnote is not a magic spell. A footnote is not the universally understood symbol for “I have my fingers crossed behind my back.” You cannot fix lies and misrepresentations in the footnotes. Footnotes aren’t for trying to chase down three different sources to match up which part of a manufactured “quote” someone said on which date. Footnotes are not the picture on the front of a puzzle box. I should not need to find corner pieces to figure out which of these George Harrison words were actually spoken together. 

Footnotes are a truthful and independently verifiable record of primary sources. It’s that simple.

And taking Mark Lewisohn completely out of the picture for a moment, I feel sure we can all agree that neither John Lennon nor Paul McCartney nor George Harrison nor Ritchie Starkey would want anyone rearranging their words as if they were guitar chords. You wouldn’t take three-quarters of Penny Lane and one-quarter of Across the Universe, put them together and call it a Beatles‘ song. So don’t take three quarters of John to Jann Wenner and one-quarter of John to Lisa Robinson, put them together and call it a Beatle’s quote.

MY PERSONAL STANDARD IS THAT IF SOMEONE REPRESENTS, “A BEATLE SAID THIS,” IT BETTER DAMN WELL BE SOMETHING A BEATLE SAID.

None of the Beatles, dead or alive, would be cool with their words being taken out of context at all, let alone two or three different statements on god knows what being combined into one. This isn’t hard, though. Use two or three separate quotation marks, and don’t take statements out of context. Don’t mix and match their words, but don’t twist them, either. If a person said something, it is the historian’s duty to represent those words to the best of your ability, and then use them to tell a factual story focused on what you feel is important. Staying true to the original words and true to their meaning. If you can’t use those words without twisting them, then change your story to fit their words, not the other way around. If their statement helps tell the story your way, use it! For goodness sake, John Lennon said at least two opposing things about almost every topic on earth, so there should be enough to choose from without being deceptive. I actually want the truth. Don’t you?

Biography is story based around accurately represented, trustworthy and verifiable facts. And look, Beatles fans, whoever your favorite is: we are not going to get the truth about his history if we don’t learn to take these things seriously. Let’s have—if not high standards—at least the lowest generally accepted standards. In the mid-term we need a lot more Beatles scholars with a lot more points of view, and now—right now—we need experienced Beatles scholars to prioritize searching out and finding smart, interested people to mentor. And we simply must ensure that we aren’t allowing to solidify into stone “facts” that are not facts and statements no one ever made. I don’t think any honest Beatles fan—(which rounds up to all of them)—wants any question around that issue.

The record is the most important thing. Now, and always. This is not about John versus Paul. John versus Paul may live on always in our hearts, but for Beatles history, it’s the wrong question. I’d rather someone be up front about their loves, but in the end the focus should be on representing the primary facts in their most pristine form. Love who you love most, but place truth above all. Pristine facts. Pristine quotes. Nothing hidden. Nothing misrepresented. 

Let the historical actors speak for themselves. That is their right.

And the historian’s duty.

NEXT, WE DISSECT A MONSTER.

Final note: I became frustrated and (maybe strangely) offended by Lewisohn's obscene pretenses in 2020, but my frustrations were nebulous and unfocused until this incredible AKOM series. I feel much better now. Angrier. But better. They worked their asses off. 🥂

[waitmyturtles]

THE MORNING AFTER: ONLY FRIENDS, EPISODE 10 EDITION -- WHEN THE HOES CAN'T CATCH A BREAK

I wrote about the hoes yesterday in response to my reaction to the Atom/Boston scandal. But really, my thoughts on hoes not being able to catch breaks in Only Friends, I think, extends to.... maybe to this entire show itself.

I thought yesterday's episode was fantastic. The acting was SPARKLING. I finally felt like I appreciated having both First and Khaotung acting together. Good LORD, Khaotung. The scene in Sand's apartment, the wailing meditation in the rehab triage. Khaotung out-Gaipa'ed himself. Utterly amazing, and First rose to the occasion as well. I also thought Book carried himself more strongly than I had seen in previous episodes -- him and Force carried their tension well in this episode.

But I wrote to @lurkingshan yesterday -- maybe typifying myself as an international fan -- that I feel a little unsettled about the direction of where this show is either going, and/or where I thought this show was going to go.

In my ask to Shan, I indicated that through ALL of the preliminary material we had available to us about OF, from the initial promos, to Jojo and team interacting on social media, the actors and the entire artistic team dropping hints -- that I had a relatively strong sense of where this show was going.

I will be honest and selfish! I was particularly excited about a potential vision from Jojo et al that having lots of sex on the part of an individual would be a decision that would possibly NOT be judged by others. I was damn excited about potentially seeing a meditation on that. It was certainly a vibe that had been easily reached in Jojo's early work in Gay OK Bangkok.

Shan wrote in her answer to me (thank you, dear friend!) that so much has shaped and likely changed the trajectory of Only Friends from its original gestation to the current editing process. This includes observations made by Jojo et al about how the fandoms have spoken about the show on social media.

Our amazing mutual, @bengiyo Sensei, went even further in separate conversation with Shan, noting even more of the various factors that have likely impacted the original vision of this show as had been proposed to us in the fandom last fall. Ben notes that the process of a show changing trajectory within its airing time is common practice. Both Shan and Ben did not hesitate to note that the presence of the shipped pairs of FirstKhao and ForceBook -- and the influence of the large fandoms surrounding these two pairs -- has very likely impacted the Only Friends storylines, to the extent of possibly demanding that the show have more linear, monogamous, and romantic stories and conclusions than were originally expected (at least, as expected from fans like myself, who were already familiar with the boundaries that Jojo usually likes to push).

While MewTop and SandRay continue to flirt with, to toe the line of more traditionally romantic conclusions (okay, maybe not MewTop as much, I'll get there in a bit) -- I feel like I've been caught by a bit of surprise that BostonNick have also been bitten by this current romance bug.

While I really did love this episode (and I'll explain why down below in a bit, besides Khao's stellar acting), I'm just feeling.... a little saddened and bogged down that Boston's ass was handed to him like that. So, Atom lies. Cheum stands up for Atom. I cannot expect Cheum to do less in that moment as a big sis, although I have very much questioned her judgment in the past (like inviting Mew's ex to their hostel Halloween party, what the fuck).

I'm sighing with a bit of regret, because in this episode, the framing of a resolution for Boston is that Nick comes back to Boston. Boston admits to Nick he's acted like an asshole, as I screenshot above, and we know that -- filming RayMew, sleeping with Top.

But I don't know, in the summation of his saying that he's done "awful things," if he's also lumping his life of engaging in casual sex, as he unwinds to Nick. I just -- I don't want Boston judging himself for having casual sex. (To @respectthepetty's point! Let the sluts slut. Why judge?)

Don't do shitty things to your friends, for sure, but if I were your mom, Boston? Have the sex. If someone's gonna judge you, it ain't me.

Are we getting an indirect judgement against Boston’s casual sex with a resolution that Nick will come back to Boston’s life? Is the show telling us that, vis à vis Nick's return, that Boston will be redeemed by.... monogamy? Is that what Cheum's and Mew's presence at the confrontation telling us? Is Boston’s ultimate resolution that he’ll have either a relationship or an LDR with Nick?

If that’s what works for the narrative device of Boston, then — okay. I will have to trust Jojo and team with that. I do NOT want to question Boston’s reaching a point of queer joy by finding love in a relationship with Nick. If Jojo and team are telling us a story that people-judged-as-sluts can find love in a relationship, then... I wasn't expecting Only Friends to go in that somewhat puritanical direction, but I'll go with it, because I trust Jojo.

But I think I am feeling a little bummed about how we may have gotten there. Because, goddamn: for once, give me a world in which casual sex is NOT judged. For heavens' sake, Cheum and Mew. Khai and I’ll sit in the corner with tears in our eyes.

My ho heart is pining for what could have been (chaos leading to a summation judgement AGAINST monogamous purity). But, anyway. None of this is ACTUALLY resolved, I need to tell my damn self; we still have two episodes left, and I’ll stop being so mewdy about it.

The other question I have floating about this episode is: what’s Mew’s motivation to get revenge against Top NOW? If he wanted to team up with Boeing to get back at Top — narratively, that may have made more sense two or three episodes ago, no? During the last episode, we saw Mew very much teetering on the edge of what he should do. His moms LOVED Top, and they missed all of Mew’s confused signals. We ended episode 9 with Mew stating to Cheum that he thought he was still in love with Top.

I appreciate a good state of confusion. Mew might still love Top. Mew might still be damn angry at Top, too. As I’ve written before, the wise Daniel Tiger has taught my kids, and so many more, that having two or more feelings is okay.

But I’m wondering about the timing of this arc. Mew plans something out with Boeing seemingly AFTER he's chosen to resolve his issues with Top. What was it about Boeing’s presence that triggered another revenge reaction in Mew? Mew’s….already been there with revenge. With Ray. And that’s done now. I don’t think I’m clear on Mew’s motivation on revenge AGAIN. Unless? Unless... I'm rubbing my hands together....

.....unless it’s to actually just SLEEP with Boeing, because come AWN, let me get to what I actually, really LOVED about this episode.

Shan indicated in her answer to me yesterday that OF was originally supposed to be constructed with GMMTV’s stable of supporting actors — your Neos, your Marks, your Papangs, your Monds.

For me? Man, Papang’s and Mond’s ENERGY was fresh to watch. I totally squealed at the possibility of BookMond. Mond is just so…..THERE, in a “why yes, look at my manly muscular shoulders, why yes, my gym membership comes with towels and high-end shower products” kinda way.

I liked Mond’s THERE-ness. I like that plants are the new Netflix.

I liked the spice of newness and curiosity in this episode. I liked seeing supporting faces, people that we know and love in Papang and Mond, doing something bold and totally different, and I love the ideas that they bring with their characters -- that Daddy Dan is very obviously in "like" with Nick; and that Boeing is truly around to fuck some damn shit up with Top, and maybe Mew.

Am I demanding this show BE ABOUT curiosity and newness? Unfortunately, that's what turned me on in this episode, and I admittedly would loooove to see more of it as this series winds down.

No, I do not have the right to DEMAND where this show goes. Westerners demanding things of queer Asian artists is an absolute NO for me.

But I think, as I look back at the trajectory of the last few episodes, that I had hoped the show would be less about the branded pairs. I honestly didn't think Only Friends was gonna be about the shipping. I thought loose lips were gonna sink the ships, and I was standing on the beach, cheering my ass off. To see SandRay approaching change and commitment in a romantic and positive way -- the acting was PHENOMENAL, but the outcome was a little to-be-expected-for-a-BL-in-a-non-BL-show kind of way.

And as for MewTop -- while I'm confused about the timeline of Mew's vengeful waffling, should I just go ahead and expect them to get together AGAIN? I'd like to ask for contextual clarification. But, at this point, that's how I know Mew to be, so I think my answer is yes -- I will be expecting Mew and Top to get together after all of this.

As I wonder how the ships kinda took over this whole joint, I think the answer is obviously in front of my face. FirstKhao and ForceBook are the first two GMMTV ships to travel out of the continent for fan meets, with FK going to Brazil, and FB going to Italy. If storylines in a fictional drama upset the fantasies of ship fandoms that these couples may not get together in their drama commodities, GMMTV's wallets, and the fanbases, may not like that very much. If FB’s and FK’s characters don’t get together — and that has a demonstrable economic impact? Jojo and team may have no choice but to hand over some happy endings to some shipped dudes for Jojo's future at GMMTV. Jojo's had to toe lines before. We KNEW what he was indicating by putting Joss, Mild, and Tay together in certain ways in 3 Will Be Free. But he couldn't go so far as to actually show a throuple in intimacy. That would have been too much for GMMTV in 2019.

To Shan’s very apt and accurate point at the end of her answer to my ask — my hope for purely uncommodified art from the Only Friends team, art that doesn’t leverage a judgement against sex in its potentially romantic conclusions, may very well be a pipe dream. If Jojo and his team were pushed to keep the ships together -- and to create happy-ish endings for as many characters in this show as possible, AND to be forced to leverage monogamy IN those storylines -- then how can I judge the artists for needing to toe an economic line? I can't. We are damn lucky enough that Jojo makes art as progressive as Only Friends, as 3 Will Be Free, as Gay OK Bangkok. Only Friends is still a great show.

But.... there was a moment where I think more than a few of us thought that we'd see something truly experimental with the ships sinking. There may still be time to see something nuts happen. But in the end, if Jojo and team have to keep the ships sailing, I won't begrudge the artists. But I will hope that GMMTV can keep allowing for more progressively progressive art over time, maybe even for the sake of letting a ship sink every once in a while.

(Ephemerality…my hope that we’d see intrigue beyond the ships was perhaps ephemeral. But we still have two episodes left! Let’s see! @ranchthoughts @twig-tea @chickenstrangers @lurkingshan @neuroticbookworm @distant-screaming @clara-maybe-ontheroad @thatgirl4815 @slayerkitty)

[mingtinys]

Stained Glass

pairing : choi san x gn!reader

mafia!au , soulmate!au , angst , hurt/no comfort

warnings : language (like a lot) , depictions of blood and open wounds , mentions of guns (not fired) and general violence

word count : 4.4 k

requested ? no

a/n : this was a fic i originally wrote for an entirely different person back when i was in my star wars phase and just never published. but i liked the general plot and changed up a few things to ateezify it . brownie points if u can guess what character it was originally for 

[ part 2 ]

"You know, glaring at the clock isn't gonna make him get back any faster."

"Fuck off, Mingi." You mumble half-heartedly, eyes still glued to the analog clock mounted on the wall above Mingi, taunting you from across the room. Each second that ticks by twists knot after uncomfortable knot in your stomach, the feeling climbing up into your throat and nearly making you choke. It's been too long.

"Someone's snippy today."

You cut your eyes at the boy in one last warning, "I don't like being sidelined."

Mingi, long immune to your threats and sour attitude, stares back with an amused expression. "And I don't like babysitting, yet here we are– ah!" He shrieks as the blunt toe of your boot connects with his shin under the pristine mahogany table. The resounding groan followed by Mingi cradling his shin spreads a satisfied smirk across your lips.

"Why would you do that?"

"You know why."

"I'm never helping you and San out on another mission again." It's his pout that finally makes you feel a smidge guilty about kicking him. It wasn't his — or his poor shin for that matter's — fault you were in a bad mood. He was just the one unfortunate enough to be left with you and your anxiety-driven frustration.

"Sorry, Min." He seems decently pleased with your half-assed apology, a soft and empathetic expression returning to his otherwise sharp features. "I'm just worried, he should have been back by now."

"He's fine, Y/N." Mingi's eyes meet yours, genuine and comforting. "You guys have been partners for what? Two years now. You know he's more than capable of handling himself.

He's right and you hate it. Logically, it made more sense for only San to go while you and Mingi stayed back at the safe house and infiltrated their security to make sure he went undetected. Logically, San was the best choice between the two of you, he's been to this specific enemy base before and knows the layout like the back of his hand. Logically, the plan was sound and easy. "I'll be in and out in thirty, no sweat." He'd said when you tried to argue your case for tagging along.

But despite the mission being "so easy even a golden retriever could do it," — San's words — an uneasy feeling still settled into your gut the second he drove off. You don't like being too far from your partner, unable to provide backup or know his status. When you've been by his side every second of every mission for so long, it feels foreign being separated. Hongjoong had also drilled into everyone's heads the golden rule of always sticking in pairs, no matter how useless it may seem. It's a rule you and San have always followed; if not for the sake of saving yourselves from one of Hongjoong's lengthy, and terrifying, lectures, then because the two of you genuinely work well together.

You trust him to get it done, you really do. But his thirty-minute mission has long since turned into well over an hour with minimal communication and you can't help the gnawing feeling in your stomach. You shouldn't have let him go alone, this whole thing was stupid.

You huff, arms folded tightly across your chest and foot rapidly tapping the floor. "He's got twenty minutes before I go there and find out what's taking so long myself."  Mingi, who you expected to immediately shut down that idea and call you dramatic, doesn't respond, much less acknowledge the fact you spoke at all. You glance up, only to find he's gone from nursing his shin to smiling down at his phone, fingers happily tapping away at the screen.

A frown spreads to your lips, you weren't quite done complaining about the situation at hand. "Mingi," you deadpan. "Stop texting your stupid soulmate, we're in the middle of a mission."

He rolls his eyes and releases an exaggerated groan, but does as you ask regardless, setting his phone face down on the table. "No. You're in the middle of complaining about the mission. There's nothing for us to do anyways until San gets back." He takes a beat, dragging his hands down his face then jabs a finger in your direction. "And soulmates aren't stupid, you're just chronically miserable and hate love."

"I don't hate love," you defend. "I just don't see how you can justify bringing someone into this kind of life, much less have time for them."

Mingi stares blankly back at you as if he's calling your bluff. "Not everyone is as cynical as you. Now, Yeosang? He comes close, but you definitely take the fuckin' cake."

Cynical. You much prefer the term realistic. Because in your line of work, the chances of loved ones getting caught in the crossfire are near certain. You've witnessed it first-hand multiple times; soulmates used as leverage and bargaining chips between rivals, lovers left lifeless and brutalized in the name of revenge, their partners soaked in blood and begging for them to just wake up. The thought haunts you more than you'd like it to. Realistically, it's irresponsible and selfish to expect someone to just be okay with that risk. Even if the universe itself begged to differ.

Of course, you'd be lying if you said you'd never at least entertained the idea of a soulmate. In fact, when you were little, it was all you thought about. Constantly fantasizing about the moment you first touched them, skin to skin. Your black-and-white toned vision exploding into a beautiful array of vibrant colors. Everything about it just seemed so magical back then. But now, meeting your cosmically selected partner fills your entire being with nothing but dread.

You've gone through indescribable lengths to ensure you never trigger the whirlwind of colors waiting to be released, avidly avoiding skin-to-skin contact with everyone possible. You refused to even shake San's hand when Hongjoong first introduced the two of you as partners. The way you saw it, if you never knew who your soulmate was, they could never get hurt because of you. You would never have to lose anything dear to yourself ever again.

"Still," you finally respond to Mingi. "It just doesn't feel right to put someone through that. Make them deal with our shit lives, constantly in danger. I can't do it, especially not after what happened to Seonghwa's poor soulmate—"

"Stop." Mingi abruptly cuts you off, eyes wide as if Seonghwa himself would somehow hear your words from miles away. "You know not to talk about that." You sink further in your seat at his scolding, like a child who knows they're in the wrong but is too stubborn to admit it.

Mingi draws in a deep breath and releases it in a long and worn-out sigh. "You seriously never wanna find your soulmate? Like ever?" There's a certain undertone of pity in his voice that you've grown to resent whenever he brings up the topic of soulmates. Like he can't possibly fathom how one could be so content without one when his entire life revolves around his. Like you're some sad charity case he needs to heal so you can finally be "happy."

You refuse to meet his eyes as you speak. "Why would I want something else to lose?"

Mingi shrugs, "I don't know. To give our shitty lives even the tiniest bit of meaning? To have something worth coming home to. I can't really explain it, life just feels ... complete now."

"Sounds overrated."

"There's a bright, colorful, loving world out there, Y/N. You deserve to see it with someone by your side, even if you don't think so."

"I much prefer the grey tones. Thanks." With that, Mingi finally relents, allowing you the silence to descend back into your worrisome thoughts.

You don't get to dwell on them for long. No more than a few moments pass when a loud series of crashes and thuds startle you and Mingi alert. You lunge for the spare gun holstered on the underside of the table, knuckles white as your fingers wrap around the grip. Mingi has his own in hand and you signal for him to follow behind, he nods without protest

"Y/N!" A voice yells out. It's strained, yet unmistakably San's. Your heart stops, but only for a split second, then begins to slam aggressively against your chest, like it's catching up with your racing mind. It takes less than a second for you to discard your pistol and bolt for the living room, Mingi hot on your heels.

The room is a mess compared to just a few minutes ago. Picture frames shattered and face down on the floor, furniture recklessly shoved out of the way, and a shelf's contents spilled about. At the center of it all is San, stumbling around and grasping at anything and everything to keep his balance as he treks through the room. He's clutching at his left side with his other hand, small dark droplets of an unknown liquid on the floor outline his path. The same liquid coats his paled hand and the all too familiar scent of iron stings your nostrils.

You allow yourself half a second. Only half a second to reign in your frantic thoughts, shove your emotions to the furthest corner of your mind, and put on a calm and collected face, just as you've been trained to do. Just as everyone in Hongjoong’s organization has been trained to do.

"Help him to that chair." Mingi follows your command instantly, ducking under San's arm to let him lean all his weight on Mingi's shoulders.

"I need a med kit," San instructs, teeth gritted in pain but surprisingly calm.

You nod to Mingi, allowing him to handle getting san into the nearest armchair so you can retrieve the med kit from below the kitchen sink. When you return, San is slumped in the chair, head thrown back against the headrest and sucking in deep breaths.

You kneel beside him, on his left side where he's still clutching at the space between his hip and where his ribs end. You talk as you open the med kit and sift through the supplies. "Mingi, take the car and get Yunho, he can do a better job fixing whatever this is than I can. Fast."

Mingi doesn't nod or even acknowledge you spoke. He just grabs the keys from the kitchen counter and bolts for the front door.

San groans and attempts to reposition himself in the chair to grant you better access to his wound. "There's a piece of shrapnel in my side, you need to get it out. We can't wait for Yunho."

"I'm sorry, what?" You ask, whipping your head to look at him with wild eyes and a bewildered look of confusion. "Why the hell is there shrapnel in you?"

"Because something blew up," he says it like it's the most obvious thing in the world. Good to know he hasn't bled out enough to dull his charming attitude. "Now get it out."

"Because something blew—? Shit, San." It's ticking you off just how nonchalant he is about the whole ordeal. As if he didn't just come crashing into the safe house, dripping blood all over the freshly varnished hardwood. As if he's not in the worst pain imaginable while trying his hardest to act unfazed.

You pick up a pair of long tweezers and a miniature flashlight from the now ransacked med kit. Shooing San's hand away from his wound, you click the light on and start inspecting the jagged wound in his side. More blood oozes from the wound at the loss of pressure, staining the light-colored chair. Hongjoong isn't going to be too happy about it, but the aesthetics of the safehouse aren't exactly a top priority at the moment.

"It's an easy mission, oh I can just go alone. In and out in thirty," you mock. San shoots you a glare.

"Okay, okay I get it. You wanna get this thing the fuck out of me? Feels like it's ripping my insides apart."

"Just stay still and don't bitch out on me." Rather ungracefully, you slot the tweezers into his wound and start digging around. The method isn't the most effective, but then again you weren't exactly as talented as Yunho when it came to treating injuries. Sure, you've roughly fixed up a couple of wounds when out on a mission, but nothing anywhere near this bad.

"Ow . . . ow . . . OW!" San writhes in his seat, making his displeasure with your technique known loud and clear. " You wanna be a little more gentle with that?"

"Oh, I'm sorry. Does me digging around in your fucking shrapnel wound hurt?" You snip at him. You really were trying to make this as painless as possible, but your hands are shaking and his incessant complaining isn't exactly a morality boost. "I'm not a medic, San, I don't know what I'm doing."  

"Literally anything else! Please!" His voice cracks, an indication of how unbearable the pain must be. You sympathize with him, you really do. But there isn't exactly a better option, so you continue digging, just a little less rushed this time, and San tries everything he can to stifle his groans. After a few more hopeless minutes of searching, you still can't find the shard.

"I can't see it. This flashlight isn't doing any good and I can't feel it with the tweezers." It's just one big dark mess in your vision. Perhaps Yunho or Mingi would be able to see some distinction in the colors with their soulmate-induced retinas, but this whole feat is growing useless with your lack of experience and poor vision.

"Then try again. You need to get it out before it goes any deeper." San's voice is slightly calmer this time, tone less abrasive and snarky, even bordering on comforting.

"I'm sorry but everything is kind of the same fucking color. It just looks like a dark mess."

"Then stick your fingers in there and try to feel where it is." He says it with such blunt confidence that the phrase catches you so off guard. You pause your actions and stare at San's face, eyebrows raised and waiting for him to say something like "just kidding." But he doesn't. He just stares back at you like you're stupid for not jumping into action without question.

"What?" You hadn't even chanced getting his blood on your fingers while using the tweezers, and now he wants you to just shove your hand in there?

"Do it."

"I'm not fucking–"

"Y/N, please!" There's an urgency in his voice and it strikes a cord in your heart. Against everything he's tried to convey from the moment he stumbled in — the brave face, the tough, arrogant act — he sounds scared. Underneath everything, Choi San is scared and that scares you.

"Okay, okay" you whisper, more so to yourself. "You can do this."

You grab the bottle of alcohol from the med kit and douse your hands in it, rubbing the cool liquid in. You should really be doing this with gloves, but they're conveniently m.i.a., so you do the best you can. With the flashlight gripped tightly in your non-dominant hand, you flex your fingers on the other, mentally preparing yourself. Just do it. Suck it up and do it. As every nerve in your fingers screams and begs for you to stop, you take a deep breath and—

In the split second between when your finger hovers just over his wound to when it just barely touches his skin, a chill shoots up your spine. The world goes from black and white to bursting with hundreds— no thousands, of vivid colors. Horrifyingly enough, the main color your brain registers is red. Dark, glistening red. You recoil, yanking your hand away like San's skin is made of hot embers.

So many different emotions and thoughts rush through your brain at once. It's overwhelming, and all you can do is match San's unbelieving expression. You've spent years avoiding this exact moment, and now it's happening at the worst time imaginable.

This can't be happening. This can't be possible. Choi San cannot be your soulmate.

San is the first to speak.

"Y/N— ah, fuck." He doubles over, hand flying back to hold his side, and squeezes his eyes shut. It snaps you back to reality like a bucket of ice water over your head. San's still injured. He's your soulmate but he's injured and oh God everything is so fucked right now. There are more pressing matters than sorting through your complicated feelings. So you compartmentalize the part of you that wants to run far, far away. The part that's filled with fear and panic.

The part of you that's always, in the deepest confines of yourself, seen San as a little bit more than just a partner. You bury all of it for the time being so you can revisit it once San is out of immediate danger.

"Come on," you coax, helping him to sit back up. "Don't forget this was your idea."

"Y/N—" He tries again.

"I know, San. Let's not worry about that right now, okay?"

He weakly nods. "Just get it over with."

You try not to think about it too much this time. Hesitation hasn't gotten you anywhere and you're not sure how much longer San can last.

San screams as you plunge your finger deep into his wound. It's warm and squishy as you fish around, the feeling so nauseating and vile you have to suppress a gag. Strings of curses and meaningless threats fall from San's lips as he squirms. Though you ignore them completely, too focused on keeping your lunch down as the urge to throw up surfaces for the fourth time.

What is likely just a few seconds of searching feels like hours. But your finger eventually comes into contact with something sharp and hard, it budges slightly when you knock against it. San jerks upward with a gasp, and you have to drop your flashlight so you can use your free hand to press against his chest and pin him down to the chair. On any other occasion, San could easily overpower you if he wanted. But the blood loss has made him weaker and there isn't much energy left in him to fight back.

"It's almost over, I promise. Hold on just a little bit longer."

Much to San's displeasure, you have to dig around again to relocate the piece of shrapnel. While your knowledge of the human blood vessel system is limited, you don't think it's deep enough to have cut an artery. The flow of blood is much more consistent with a knicked vein. Not fatal, but definitely painful and concerning with the sheer amount of blood leaking from his body.

"Okay, now stay very still." You instruct once you've found the shard again. Very carefully you take your hand off San's broad chest and reach back for the tweezers. You slip them back into the wound with surgical-like care and use your finger to guide them to the piece of shrapnel. It's easier this time to grasp the metal shard and once you have a hold of it you're able to slip your finger out. The resounding sucking noise is pure nightmare fuel when combined with the whimpers coming from San.

"Okay, I got it. Are you ready? This is gonna hurt a lot."

San nods, "I can handle it." It's very unconvincing.

You wipe the blood from your hand on your pants and extend it towards San. You aren't sure if he'll take it, and you're even more unsure of why you felt the need to offer it. Because he'll need something to hold on to while you rip a piece of metal from his side? Because he's your partner and you've never enjoyed seeing him in pain? Because he's your soulmate and it's the least you could do to comfort him? Whatever the reason, he takes it without hesitation, and you're happy for it.

"On three."

San takes a deep breath.

"One—"

Something halfway between a gasp and a curse breaks past San's lips as you swiftly, and not so gently, pull the shrapnel from his side. The sudden extraction has him crushing your hand in his grasp, though you don't have much time to process the pain as you drop the offending object and grab a wad of gauze to press against the profusely bleeding cut.

"What happened to two and three!?" He barks between short and heavy breaths.

"Would you have stayed relaxed by the time I got there?"

"Fuck you," he groans, words meaningless. You slip your hand from San's iron-like grasp and guide him down to the gauze you've placed. Another gasp involuntarily escapes him the more he presses down on the wound to slow the bleeding.

An awkward silence hangs in the air and casts a heavy blanket across the room. It's suffocating in and of itself, but the way San's eyes burn a hole into your skull is so much worse. You can't even bring yourself to lift your gaze from the bloody shrapnel on the floor to face him. The offending object doesn't feel so threatening now as it lays jagged and tinted red on the hardwood. It reminds you of how stained glass looks when shattered into pieces. Dull, delicate, haunting. A small distraction from the man you refuse to face, the man who is most definitely expecting something from you, but you aren't sure you can give him the answer he wants right now. But his heavy and labored breathing is making him hard to ignore.

"Um . . . Yunho should be here soon, I'm sure he can patch—"

"Don't do that."

"Do what?" You feign innocence.

"Change the subject."

You rise from your kneeling position but keep your eyes trained on your shoes and arms wrapped protectively around your waist. Every neuron in your brain is screaming and pleading for him to just drop it. You're not sure any time will ever be a good time to have a conversation on the obvious, but they still sound a hell of a lot better than right now while he's still not completely out of danger.

"Now isn't a good time, San. We can talk about it once you're healed and—"

"No." He's firm in his stance. "Look, I understand if you need time to process everything, but this isn't something you can just ignore and make go away. We're gonna have to talk about it sooner or later."

You feel horrible. Because for every time you've made it known you have absolutely no intention of ever being involved with your soulmate, San has been right there on the opposing side. He's confided in you and Wooyoung countless times about just how much he desires to meet his soulmate. How he adores the idea of finding that perfect person to share a life with. It's truly unfortunate that person had to be you.

You're pretty sure you love San, that you've always loved San. But you just can't. The thought of him getting even closer along with the danger he puts himself in every day? You'd never truly be able to find peace or comfort in that type of relationship. So you take in a deep breath, hold back a flurry of tears, and prepare yourself for what will possibly be the cruelest thing to ever come from your lips. You prepare to absolutely and utterly crush San's heart and dreams into a billion pieces. You try to convince yourself it's for the best, but the guilt outweighs that feeling.

"There's nothing to talk about. I don't–" there's really no kind way to say this. "I don't want you as a soulmate. I don't feel that way toward you–"

"Liar." His voice is shaky, and the image of stray tears streaming down his face invades your mind. You've never seen him cry before, and you definitely don't want to now.

"What, did you think you'd be some sort of exception? Just because we're partners? You know my opinion on soulmates. I can't– I won't. . . I'm sorry it had to be me, you deserve better."

The universe must take some form of pity on you because before San can articulate his next thought Yunho and Mingi burst through the safe house door. "What happened?" Yunho commands, already dropping his duffle bag of medical supplies to the floor and kneeling beside San.

"He got hit by shrapnel, I dug it out and did the best I could but you'll probably need to disinfect and stitch it up." You rattle off everything you did almost robotically before making a beeline for the front door, and though Yunho is too zeroed into treating San, Mingi picks up almost instantly on the quake in your voice and tension that suffocates the entire house.

His hand shoots out to grab your arm. "Woah, what's wron—"

"Not now, Mingi." You bite at him, ripping your arms from his grasp before he even really had a hold of it. Shouts from San and Yunho arguing with each other fill the living room, trying to use it as a distraction, you attempt your escape again.

"San, stop being difficult."

"Don't fucking touch me! So you're just gonna leave—?" His words stop you dead in your tracks, frozen in place with your fingers ghosting the doorknob. "—You're not even gonna fucking look at me?" The room goes silent once more. Your skin itches from the number of eyes staring you down.

"You're a coward if you run now."

His words sting, though you're sure it's nothing compared to what you've done to him. Ripping a piece of metal from his side only to moment later rip his heart from his chest. You truly deserve every insult he throws your way.

"I'm sorry," You repeat. "It's for the best."

Your body feels numb like it's operating on autopilot as you hastily slip into the cool fall air and let the wooden door slam shut with a blunt bang.

It's for the best. He'll understand it one day.

[ part 2 ]

[sunflower-chai]

Hi!! This is a really dumb question, and you 100% don't have to answer it, but I keep seeing your reblogs of dsmp - what is it? What's it about? How had it taken a hold of your soul and what do you take from it?

oh mouse. you have opened the floodgates.

so basically dsmp (aka dream smp but i don’t call it that anymore bc the content creator dream, who the server is named after, is a terrible person. which is a whole other can of worms i won’t get into) is a survival multiplayer (hence SMP) minecraft server that tells a story via improvised roleplay. it ran from april 2020 - april 2023 and grew from 4 members on the first day to 39 members by the end. it also featured a handful of guests including, i kid you not, michael clifford from 5 seconds of summer and lil nas x. the story was primarily distributed via livestreams on youtube and twitch, though some members and fans created highlight videos on youtube.

how do i explain what dsmp is about? overall, it’s a heavily character-driven story with many different factions, wars, and eras. each member essentially wrote their own story, and fans could pick whose POV they were most interested in and follow along with whatever lore was created. (at one point there was a head writer who, surprise surprise, also turned out to be a terrible person. are you sensing the pattern here?) so honestly the answer to “what is the dsmp about?” is different depending on which members/characters you choose to pay attention to.

i got interested in the server in early 2021 when someone i followed on tumblr for a completely unrelated fandom started posting about it (which is how i get into most new interests these days lol). i looked up some clips on youtube and discovered the content creator tommyinnit via an among us gameplay video. i thought he was really funny and checked out his channel. the first video of his i watched was “the funniest minecraft video ever,” which was edited from one of his dsmp streams where he and two other members created a religion based on twitch prime subscriptions. it’s ridiculous and still makes me laugh to this day. so after that i decided i wanted to know what this minecraft server was all about. i found VODs (archived livestream recordings) of the big events on the server and watched as many as i could. honestly i had to skip around a lot because there was simply too much content to catch up on, and a lot of members didn’t save their VODs. that was another reason i tended to follow tommy’s POV, he uploaded all of his twitch VODs to a separate youtube channel. he also streamed less frequently and for shorter time periods than most of the members so it was a more manageable amount of stuff to watch. after i got decently caught up, i started tuning in for the dsmp streams live. and boy oh boy did i become obsessed. spring of 2021 i was a junior in college and i hardly left my apartment because of covid restrictions. i was incredibly bored and developing depression (which i would not realize until i went to therapy that summer and got referred to a psychiatrist for diagnosis. but i digress). dsmp was genuinely the only thing that got me excited anymore.

spring-summer 2021 was honestly a golden age for dsmp fans because so much lore was happening at such a rapid pace and it was EXHILIRATING. the fandom would churn out analysis, fanfics, art, animatics, and even original songs at the speed of light. everyone would liveblog during big lore events and it was just such a fun community to be a part of, even though i mainly lurked on tumblr back then. the source material was nothing but minecraft blocks and webcams, so i think it really allowed the fans’ creativity to flow. the fans truly carried that server, particularly SAD-ist’s animatics on youtube and derivakat’s fan songs, though my favorite song was beetlebug’s “an ode to l’manburg.”

so you’re probably wondering: what the heck is l’manburg? so this gets into what i think truly made the server worth investing in, which was the storytelling. “l’manburg” was a fictional country created on the dsmp server. it actually started out as a van used to sell “drugs” (aka minecraft potions), created by c!tommy and c!wilbur (c! = character, to differentiate between roleplay and the actual content creators). basically wilbur wanted to roleplay breaking bad lol. a bunch of the other server members cracked down on this “illegal” business, so c!wilbur decided to form his own country on the land surrounding the van (now a hot dog van), declaring independence from the greater SMP so citizens would be free to do what they want. he called it l’manburg because it “sounded european,” and all of the citizens at the time were european while those still loyal to the greater SMP were mostly american. the citizens of l’manburg at the time were c!wilbur, c!tommy, c!tubbo, c!fundy, and c!eret. the greater SMP didn’t take kindly to this new country’s existence, so c!dream issued a declaration of war, and thus began the l’manburg war for independence, which was really an excuse to do hamilton roleplay (yes, it’s all very silly but i love it. it gets much more serious later on). anyway i don’t want to say much more in case you decide to give it a watch, but if you do good luck. i would recommend blueberry tv on youtube, who does a great job condensing the most important moments into 20ish minute episodes. they have a playlist called “dream smp plot playlist” which is a good place to start.

okay now i’m taking this opportunity to gush a little about c!tommy, one of my favorite characters in anything ever. he starts out as a loud, funny, slightly annoying, mean-to-your-face but kind-at-heart sixteen year old kid, and by the end he’s eighteen, he’s literally been to hell and back, he’s a little quieter, a bit jaded, and doesn’t easily trust others or even his own mind. but even after everything he goes through, he still tries to believe the best in people and stubbornly holds onto hope that things will get better. he’s incredibly loyal to his friends. he loves things that most people would overlook and he loves them hard. he communicates his feelings in convoluted metaphors that are accidentally poetic. he constantly listens to music, probably has an unhealthy attachment to it, but he’s willing to give it up if it means freedom and happiness for his friends. he deals with so much unfair treatment and abuse and trauma and he could so easily give into despair or allow those experiences to darken his morals but nothing is ever able to completely dull his spark. it would honestly be easier to give up or become the villain, but it’s just not in his nature. i just love him so much man 😭

[alvfr]

The Ex from Hell - Part 2

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3]

I think this is related the demonic ex prompt I wrote here. I’m not sure if this goes before or after, but I’ll figure it out and link accordingly. I'd love to hear your thoughts if you take the time to read and feel free to reblog if you want <3

WIP: The Ex from Hell Excerpt rating: T Word count: 1.74k

It was a dull Sunday in March when Cousin Kathy knocked on my door. The sleet of a poor man’s winter clung to the black felt of her wide-brimmed hat, and she huddled in her fashionably oversized coat, also black, where she stood on the steps of the sober living house I currently called home. She looked like the singular inked character in a pencil sketch, all sleek black lines separating her from the muted gray background that made up the neighborhood. The deep, rich black of her clothes clashed with the vivid red of her hair, toning into her pale skin that tinted pink from the nippy weather.

“I would say it’s good to see you,” she said after being ushered inside, her voice thin and girlish. Just like her face was seventy percent eyes and two percent nose. So pretty, she almost looked fake. A doll. “But that would be a lie, so I’ll abstain. I would also say that you look good, but alas, another lie. You’ve gained weight.”

“You know, for a second, I was actually happy to see you, Kath.” I left her standing in the hallway that was under constant maintenance and always smelled of paint, and I trudged up the stairs. All too aware of how my steps made the old wood creak with discomfort and remained mum when Cousin Kathy flittered up to follow me. “Not surprised, though. Figured it was only a matter of time before one of you showed up to gloat.”

“I wish I was here to gloat.” Like the rest of her, Kathy’s voice felt foreign in the somber house. Too thin and too sharp, like a stiletto dagger piercing the delicate ecosystem within the walls. Disrupting the relative peace of people like me just existing. Shuffling around and doing their chores, trying to get one day to turn into the next. Kathy kept her hands inside her coat pockets and gave the impression that if she’d had a handkerchief, she would have held it over her nose and mouth. Like she had entered a phthisis ward and not a sober living facility. “Alas, I have come for more serious business.”

If the house was a sanitorium, my room was the plague pit. Kathy visibly recoiled when entering, the bare landlord-white walls and naked linoleum floors apparently too much for her sensitive disposition. I would be the first to admit that it was not much to look at — a bed, a nightstand, a desk, and a chair — but it was clean and organized, all of my meager belongings safely tucked away in the closet. Orange floral curtains, probably donated by a previous resident, covered the windows, and I could picture someone adding the pop of color as an afterthought. Maybe hoping it would help brighten the place up and instead only emphasized the dreariness of the room.

I kicked off the soft slippers I wore indoors, sat cross-legged on the bed, which I made every morning before inspection, and gestured for Kathy to have the chair. It was the polite thing to do, after all. Seeing her squirm, caught between gentility and repulsion, was just an added bonus. She ended up perching on the very tip of the chair, trying to sit on it and not touch it at the same time, and folded her hands neatly in her lap.

It had been years since I last saw Kathy, and I knew those years had been less kind to me than her. Both in our early thirties, we looked roughly two decades apart. Some due to genetics, and the rest probably due to makeup and other kinds of camouflage.

It would be a tough sell to convince anyone about both our shared age and our relation, so opposite in every sense of the word. Kathy’s red hair swept around her face, so perfectly blown out it belonged on the cover of a magazine. In contrast, my curly locks hung limp around my face, scrubbed of all volume and shine from the industrial-strength shampoo provided in the communal showers. And while Kathy’s skin could be described as porcelain, white, and smooth, I was more like an old tablecloth, pale and riddled with mysterious spots. Only our eyes were alike, light gray and unblinking, with one pupil slightly bigger than the other.

“So, what’s new?” I leaned back on the bed where my gray sweatpants blended in with the bed sheets that had probably been white a couple of hundred washes ago. “What serious business brings you all the way across town?”

“We think it’s time you come home.”

Once, those words would have slapped me right into sobriety. Pity I had taken the hard way there instead. It cost every iota of self-control to keep still, to avoid bursting into laughter or tears or hysteria at those senseless, reckless words she had just uttered like she was commenting on the weather. That was Kathy for you, she did not beat around the bush.

“I am home.”

Kathy narrowed her eyes slightly, squinting in hopes of seeing me more clearly. As if her dear old grandmother suddenly had grown pointed ears and a mouth full of fangs. I did not move from my spot, biting my teeth together as hard as possible and hoping she did not see how my jaw tightened. It was not a lie, I reminded myself. Technically and legally, this was my home.

“You know what I mean,” Kathy eventually said as if daring me to contradict her. “We feel that now that you have served your sentence, you are ready to return to the Manor.”

“Which one?”

“There is only one Manor, Cousin.”

“No, no, I mean, which sentence are you referring to? My two-year stint in Pollwood or my lifetime banishment from our family?”

She stared at me while I stared back, neither of us blinking for an unnaturally long time. A game we had played as children and brought with us into adulthood. A game I had always excelled at, and sure enough, it did not take too long before a hint of a nervous smile played upon her doll-like lips. “Both.”

“Lifetimes sure aren’t what they used to be,” I said and kept staring unblinkingly at her to look for any clues. “What’s changed?”

Kathy’s little mouth pursed into a pin-prick before she answered, clearly choosing every syllable with care. “We need you back.”

“Need is not the same as want.”

“I never said it was.“ She rose from her chair, smoothed her hands over her coat, and nodded to herself. “A taxi will come around tomorrow at eight. That should give you plenty of time to pack and settle whatever affairs you might have.”

“Yeah, uhm, I’m not leaving.” I settled further in the bed, subconsciously emphasizing my words. “No matter when the taxi comes around, really. So you just run back to the Manor and let them know that, as far as I’m concerned, my lifetime is still rolling. I’d thank you for stopping by, but I won’t.”

Kathy paused, looking like a magazine clipping pasted into the trepid room. “You are aware that your accommodation is sponsored by our funding.”

Not a question, did not beget an answer and yet I failed to keep quiet. “My inheritance after Granny pays for my accommodation.”

“An inheritance that is managed by the family, as stipulated quite clearly in Grandmother’s will. A copy was sent your way, but I suppose you were too busy to bother reading it. Like you were too busy to attend her funeral.”

“Funerals are for the living,” I said, a mockery of the whole truth, but an acceptable substitute ever the same. “But I managed without your cash for about ten years. I think I’ll be okay.”

“Managed.” Kathy smiled, showing off teeth that seemed too large for her head. “I suppose you can call it that. But I don’t suppose you have a plan. Except maybe taking your ex-husband back to court, see if there’s a chance of reinstating the alimony? I would suggest hiring a proper attorney this time. He did get out of your previous deal quite fast. Just as the marriage itself.”

“So you have been keeping tabs on me all these years. Good to know. I don’t recall seeing your name on the registry for our wedding though. Not that you were invited, of course, but when has that ever stopped Katherine the Great?”

“Never.”

“Yeah. If you must know, I’d rather cut off my own arm than accept any kind of help from him again. And I would cut off my other arm rather than return to the Manor. You can quote me on that when you go back to kiss Hester’s ass.” As predicted, Kathy recoiled at my crude word choice. “Close the door on your way out, please.”

She remained immobile where she stood on the floor. “This is non-negotiable, I’m afraid.”

With a shrug, I picked up my phone and swiped through non-existing notifications to feign disinterest. “It often is with you guys.”

“You guys,” Kathy parroted and my neck prickled from the power of her stare. My phone screen flickered and went black, forcing me to look up at Kathy’s pinched face. “You guys. How many days do you have now?”

“Ninety-one.”

“Not those days.” Kathy swivelled back to face me, feet and hands together, like a ballerina. “Don’t give me that look, you know what I mean. Don’t make me ask you outright.”

“Like I said, it’s been about ten years now.” I tried to shrug, to give of the impression of ease, to distract from the way my teeth ground together. “So three thousand days, maybe, give or take.”

“Three thousand days since you practiced,” Kathy’s head tilted to the side, like a predator catching the distant pattering of prey, “or three thousand days since you tried?”

The strain from my jaw planted up to my temples, setting off thumps of a brewing migraine. “Yes.” We stared at each other, waiting for the other to blink, but now Kathy had the upper hand and she knew it. I swallowed the sharp edge in my throat. “No.”

Instead of the victorious smirk I expected, Cousin Kathy’s eyebrows softened and she gave a sad nod. “Come home, Harmony. We need you to come home now.”

“Why?”

“Because people are dying and we need your help to stop it.”

[nicsnort]

Trial by Fire (part 5)

A Nightcrawler/Fem!OC romance, drama, and mystery fanfic, with lots of Quicksilver thrown in for fun and even more drama.

Intro (with link to full Ao3 story) First Previous

If there was one thing about the human, Quicksilver thought, it was that she was determined. All of these qualities were things he admired -- bravery, foolish risk, determination -- except for the overarching, glaring error: she was human. He still wasn’t sure if she was to be trusted. After all, she painted herself as doing such a grand gesture as subjecting herself to possibly years of slavery and death, all for the purpose of mutant rights...or so she said. Was it for her fame? Her name? 

Quicksilver didn’t sleep much that night. He kept waking to look over at her, the one thing that was out of place in his room. He wondered again why he had drawn the short straw. Perhaps if the woman Azazel had could be placed back in camp, he could take this one. Although...when he woke in the morning to hear the typing, he found that he was interested in studying her. She was different and she’d be useful in the article about the Brotherhood. And she was... very different. Maybe that was what kept his attention rather than doing the bare minimum to be sure she was fed, clothed, and alive.

Speaking of… 

“Can I have food,” Bedelia asked Quicksilver, “and perhaps a change of clothes?” 

“Hm? Oh, yeah, sure.” He stood and made sure he looked presentable. When he left the room, there was only the sound of the door clicking to show he had left. Given that she wasn’t in the same state as the others, he picked up a plate of bread, cheese, and fruit big enough for two. He paused though before placing his portion on a separate plate. No need to share from the same plate. 

He picked up some clothes that he suspected would be her size, blue jeans, and a light green top. When Quicksilver returned, there was a breeze that entered with him. He left the door open this time, deciding it was better to limit the talk. He knew Toad and Blob would still be laughing at him -- the bruises on his face were fresh and the cut, though not bleeding, was still vivid. Maybe he could set her up in the kitchen. Yes, that way he had his room back for a while.

He placed the plate before her on the bed and tossed her the stack of clothes before picking up the computer. His facial expression was bored as he read what she wrote so far, but inwardly he was impressed. “Hm. You know how to write a sentence.” That was all the compliment he gave her before placing the computer back down and reaching to get a grape from his plate. “Get dressed, and you can set up in the kitchen.” With more people walking in, less need for him to stay glued to her side. After all, he had some things to do. Most of it was stealing, but it was fun and he was good at it.

To be alone, if only for a few moments, made some of the stress that Bedelia had been feeling melt away. But the return of Quicksilver with food and clothing was just as welcome. His words made her a bit wary, he was moving her, but then again she supposed he couldn’t watch her all day. Putting her in a public-ish place would make sense.

She slid on the jeans, slightly too big but better than too small, and the shirt was loose enough that the bandages on her ribs weren’t bothered. Picking up her plate of food and the laptop she followed him to the kitchen. There was a small table that she was directed to and grateful to be in a proper chair she quickly got back to work. When she had the chance today, perhaps after he returned from doing whatever, she would ask if she could inquire about interviewing some of the mutants.

A few hours passed, and Azazel entered the kitchen. He was filling up a glass of water when he spotted the green-haired woman at the table. Nary a Quicksilver in sight. He stepped up behind her and peered over her shoulder at her words.

“‘...the uprising was miraculously aligned with the arrival of the Brotherhood of Mutants. They had come to save their brethren from their chains - indeed a show of deepest brotherhood’...that is rather poetic journalism,” he breathed in her ear.

Bedelia jumped, nearly falling to the floor. While she worked, she often drowned out all outside noise and had not registered the presence of someone else. Azazel smirked with amusement at her surprise. “Where is Quicksilver,” he asked once she had gotten her bearings.

“Out, I think. He told me to set up here and went off, saying he had work to do.” Bedelia eyed the red mutant. He was one that people did not know much about. Rarely was he caught in photos or video. And no information could be found on him. Russian given his accent, though, which was an interesting thought.

“I see. Then I am sure he will not mind if you take a break. The little sestra , Trance, would like to see you. She is very concerned for her fellow mutant.” There was cruel humor in his eyes as he said that.

“I should--” Bedelia stopped, knowing that the red mutant was threatening her. If she didn’t come, something told her that rumors about her true nature would spread quickly. “Of course, I could stretch my legs. And it will be nice to see how she is recovering.”

Azazel’s smirk widened, and he led the journalist out of the kitchen and to the private room where Trance was recovering.

“Sarah!” Trance greeted with a smile from her position sitting in the bed. However, her smile slowly fell. Behind Sarah, who wore new clothes as well, was Azazel. The red mutant was smirking as he remained in the doorway. “How are you feeling?” She asked Sarah, her tone hesitant. Something looked different about her.

Bedelia smiled at Trance, but she noticed how her smile fell at the sight of her. Had she been told she was a human? She thought Magneto had warned her against saying she was, so none of the Brotherhood would say either.

Still, Trance was friendly enough. Bedelia entered the room and sat on the edge of the bed. “I’m doing alright. I think the real question is, how are you doing? You were shot.”

“I’m doing much better, thanks to my nurse over there.” She said lightly, nodding towards Azazel, whose anticipatory smirk was setting off all her alarms. “He has a charming bedside manner. I was just about to go out and socialize with the others. I can introduce you to a few of them since we left before you could.”

“That’s great to hear,” Bedelia said with a kind smile. “And I would love to meet some of the others.”

Trance looked closely at the mutant before her. “Sarah, your...your eyes aren’t...green.” Not that she knew the woman for more than a few hours. After all, she had just arrived when everything went down. Still, Trance was certain that her eyes had been green as they brought one another to the plane. 

At her comment, Bedelia froze just a bit. But it was best, to tell the truth. “Well, I was wearing colored contacts when we first met. I’ve removed them since then...do you need help getting outside? I could do with a bit of a walk.”

Bedelia looked to Azazel, half asking for permission. Azazel gave a nod of his head. “Da, of course, but I will be nearby just in case.”

While Azazel was looking at Trance when he spoke, Bedelia knew that was pointed towards her.

“Why did you wear contacts?” She asked the woman as they started to walk, mindful of her arm not bumping into anything. Her tone poorly hid the suspicion that something was off. Bedelia could sense it, but she had to keep up appearances.

“To match my hair,” Bedelia said with a bit of a chuckle. “And need, I can’t see anything more than 30 feet away right now. Luckily they aren’t necessary for everyday function.”

With Azazel's guidance out of the place, once they were outside, Trance paused and took a deep breath, in awe once more that they were free. Her hand went up to her neck to ensure there was no collar. It was all real, which boosted her pleasure and beat down the suspicion...a bit. Bedelia watched Trance closely as they walked over to where a few mutants had gathered around a small fire, but her gaze was one of care, making sure that Trance was alright. Azazel watched them both with slight amusement.

As they approached the mutants, a heavily scarred one noticed them, and a large grin split his face. “Trance,” he said with excitement, “you’re alright.”

Trance smiled wide and threw her good arm out, calling out with joy, “Skinwalker!” The man stood and walked over. He hugged Trance, mindful of her bandaged arm, and laughed. Trance laughed as well though hers was thick with emotion. “Skinwalker, we’re out. I’m just fine.”

“Yes,” the man’s voice was deep and filled the space, “we’re free, Trance, it worked.” He looked up and gave a small smile to the green-haired woman and the red mutant. “Our doctor…it’s good to see you again. And this is…?”

Trance cleared her throat, looking over at the two. “This,” she nodded to the green-haired woman, “is Sarah. She was one of the new mutants to arrive. Sarah, this is Skinwalker. He’s an old soul.”

“Old souls are made of wisdom and fantastic songs,” Skinwalker half-teased before nodding. “It is a pleasure to meet you, Sarah. I am glad you did not have to live on that island for long.”

“Speaking of,” Trance’s voice lowered, “did Skitters…?”

Skinwalker’s smile dropped. Trance’s shoulders lowered. “We knew the numbers weren’t good.”

“Yeah, no, of course. Anyway, let’s…we’ll talk in private later.” Trance was keenly aware of the woman next to her and the demon whose bed she had slept in behind her. Now wasn’t the time to get depressed. That would happen at night around a fire, perhaps with some booze.

At the fire sat a few familiar faces, some distant, and not too far off was someone who seemed rather young. Skinwalker nodded understandingly and turned back to the green-haired mutant. “What are your powers, Sarah?” 

Ah, the problems with false names. Perhaps she should have told Trance her actual name in the bunker before they came out. But that would have only caused more questions. She saw the moment of mourning they shared for their fellow, and for a brief moment, she truly did feel like an intruder.

As they sat down around the fire, Bedelia smiled. “Hypercognition,” she said and explained it the same as she did with Trance. “And yours?”

The circle went around and introduced themselves and their powers briefly. When Bedelia glanced at Trance, she saw that the other woman had a sick look on her face and was looking at Bedelia with a bit of anger. “Are you alright? It isn’t your wound, is it?” There was nothing but honest concern in her voice.

“No, my wounds are fine.” Trance stated calmly. Bedelia knew something was bothering the woman, though. The difference in the way she looked at her compared to the others…Bedelia wondered what the woman’s powers entailed. Illusions, yes, falsehoods, so did that mean she could sense when people weren’t being honest?

“What were your powers again,” Trance asked as the others talked amongst themselves.

“Hypercognition,” Bedelia replied, worry growing on her face. That worry was justified as she saw the realization in Trance’s eyes.

Trance opened her mouth, about to ask something drastic and damning, “Are you…”

Azazel would have let her ask if it were not for Magneto’s orders to keep the journalist safe. Reaching out, Azazel grabbed Trance’s uninjured shoulder and squeezed slightly. “Are you going to ask, Sarah? We should head inside soon. Trance still is not fully recovered.” The human was lucky that Magneto said the journalist would ask for volunteers to interview.

“Oh, right.” Of course, she wasn’t going to be allowed too much time outside, and she was grateful for his intervention. This was twice that he had saved her if the first was inadvertent.

The mutants around her were looking at her curiously but a bit warily. Bedelia blushed just a bit. “Well, I am a bit chagrined; you see, I am a freelance journalist. I went to Genosha to investigate the rumors and reveal the truth to the world. As my time was, luckily, short, I was wondering if some of you would be willing to share what you experienced with me.”

Bedelia waited for their responses with a hint of nervousness on her face.

The mutants tensed and looked at one another. Skinwalker was the one who spoke first. “You are asking us to retell our worse experiences for the world.” He and Trance shared a look, to which Trance reached up to touch Azazel’s arm as she walked around the log, using him as a guide so she wouldn’t fall again. “We will discuss it,” Skinwalker settled, “but return in a few hours. I am sure some are willing.”

“Of course, I understand,” Bedelia told the group. “I thank you for the consideration. I think the world needs to know what is happening in Genosha, and any accounts you can give me, or just information, will help to make people listen and understand the inhumanity of what is happening.”

“I need to get inside. Now.” Trance said, encouraging Sarah to join by adding, “Sarah, mind helping me? I don’t want to rely on Azazel too much.” As if she hadn’t just fallen against him and used him to collect her balance just then. 

At Trance’s words, Bedelia smiled and stood. “Certainly, I need to get back to work as well. Thank you again,” she told the mutants. 

Bedelia helped the other woman towards the base. Azazel followed closely behind, a devilish glint in his eyes. This was going to be good, he could tell. He shut the heavy steel door behind them, and each step inwards brought a bit more glee to his eyes. The devil could tell what would happen, and he was here for every moment of drama.

When the door was out of sight, Trance turned to face the green-haired woman, her expression grim and cold. “What are you?”

____

Next

Fanfic Masterlist

[youredreamingofroo]

📩 Simblr question of the day: Choose as many sims/ocs as you'd like for this question, What's something INCREDIBLY obscure and/or out-of-pocket about your sim/oc? Something that nobody (fellow sims and/or your followers and mutuals) knows 👀 (This could be things about their social skills, physicality and/or birth defects, or it could be something they vaguely remember, a dream they had that actually predicted the future, etc etc... whatever you come up with)

( p.s I'm [the SQOTD anon] planning on starting a separate SQOTD blog for these asks/questions, and I'm open for input on this :) ) ( p.p.s freely share this SQOTD around, anon or not, and use the # SQOTD ~ 💛 )

HI SQOTD ANON!! I hope you are so well, you are amazing

I'm gonna sorta blast out obscure facts for multiple OCs/Sims, when I say obscure facts, I'm gonna prolly do more behind the scenes facts and less actual character facts 😭 I'll try to squeeze some in tho

Under the cut cuz this gets LONGGG (I have so many behind the scenes facts LMAO)

For Roo: Here's a couple Behind-The-Scenes facts, I have SOO many of these for early-days roo so get ready:

[ Prior to a settled design for Roo, Roo was gonna be a Succubus woman with white fading to black hair! I still have the only drawing I made of her, but it's bad and embarrassing (mind you its like 6 years old so) LMFAOO [ Adding onto the last one, I used to go by "The Unfortunate Roo" before Roo was a separate character and when I used to call myself Roo, I also went by "The UnRootunate" which you can imagine 12 year old me was SOO proud of that... 💀 (it is clever tho so 🤷‍♂️) [ After making Roo's first design, I intended Roo to be trans! FtM- This ended up changing because I designed his younger versions and they weren't pre-transition, and instead ended up making his gender be very apparently open-ended (which you can see through his different eras where his hair progressively gets longer :P) [ I never really shared what Roo's middle name is! But to be honest, I completely forgot about the existence of his middle name LMAO Initially his middle names were "Ivory-Roland" and the idea of "Roo" for a name came from "Roland"! [ This will come as a shock... but a while ago (~1 year ago), I was actually gonna give Roo a child 👀👀 Not biological, but just a kid he adopted or something, I don't remember anything about the kid cuz I never wrote anything down

And Here's a couple "other people/sims don't know/notice this" facts:

[ This is INCREDIBLY unnoticeable, but Roo's freckles would very faintly change through the years alongside his hair and eyes changing due to Piametia!

For Virginia (Roo's mother): I've only got one Behind-The-Scenes fact for her:

[ My first name choice for her was gonna be Persephone! But I felt that it didn't fit her <:)

Putting these together but here's two name facts for Virginia (besides the persephone part) and Reese:

[ Virginia's last name was supposed to be Keith-Norman when I first made her, but have since realized it wouldn't make sense for one reason that you'll see in the next fact- Her middle name was supposed to be Jillian and... it stuck! (Virginia Jillian Norman) [ Reese's name was COMPLETELY different when I made him... "Stephen-Elijah [Eli] Jackle Florence"... Yea LMAO, this is why Keith for Virginia wouldn't make sense, and overall his name was just a chaotic mess... I decided to actually make him have no middle name! And his birth last name is Arnett, but he changed it to Norman :) (Reese Arnett -> Reese Norman)

For Jordynn (Roo's oldest sister): Once again, behind-the-scene fact :):

[ One of the first iterations of Jordynn was that she looked nothing like her parents (Virginia and Reese) and because of this, Reese got upset with Virginia and almost divorced her bec he assumed the kid wasn't his! They had a much more toxic relationship when they were being baked in the OC oven

and here's an in-universe fact:

[ She doesn't tell a lot of people this because it's not necessarily an issue, but she's deathly allergic to lavender, one whiff could put her out of commission for a LONGGG while

For Devan (Roo's only brother): behind-the-scenes fact:

[ Devan used to have british origins, and would have a very confusing accent crossed with heavy Swedish and a heavy British accent, making it very difficult for people to understand him no matter what language he spoke, I ended up changing this simply cuz I forgot :)

in-universe fact:

[ He has pierced ears! But he tends to forget to put earrings in and has had to re-pierce his ears once before

For Deliahna (Roo's second youngest sister): in-universe fact:

[ Her birthday is on Valentines Day!! <:)

And finally, Juniper (Roo's youngest sister): in-universe fact:

[ Juni is mixed! She's Hispanic and Scandinavian, and has an accent that actually ping-pongs in terms of which half is stronger, which depends on which parent she's with, if she's with Virginia, her light Swedish accent comes out, but if she's with Mateo (Her Father and Roo's step/half(?) father), her thick hispanic accent comes out, she's also fluent in Spanish and English, and knows little-to-no Swedish

- -

And here's a random fact about an OC that never really saw the light of day (keep in mind I was like 12-14 when I made this OC LMAO):

[ This oc's name is "Bashful", is a clown and is a quintuplet! (The other names are just [insert verb] - ful 💀)

AND last fact (sorry I keep saying and LMAO) about an OC that I plan to... eventually share 😭:

[ I have an OC named 1504 and she's made of Clay! She's one of my oldest OCs that has actually survived the OC-purge (by OC purge I just mean completely dropping all my old OCs for new ones)

[chanis-banani]

First night together - part 2

Read part 1 here (1.2k words)

Pairing: Seungsik x female reader

Genre: gentle smut

Word count: 1.7k

Contains: fingering, oral (f receiving), protected sex, aftercare

The long awaited part 2 of this fic is finally here! This one delves right into the smut, so I recommend reading part 1 first for context. Or enjoy the smut on its own ~

Note: I wrote this for the lovely @jongside ~ happy birthday <3

“Please tell me if I’m moving too fast okay?” You nodded at him and smirked. “Can I also tell you if you’re going too slow?”

Seungsik gave you a surprised look and chuckled against your lips. “Oh, is that so?” he replied and you felt his hand slowly creeping further up your thigh. Almost naturally, you spread your legs a little more to give room to his hand. He greedily accepted the offer and began to stroke his index finger along the edge of your panties.

A delighted little gasp escaped your lips as you felt his fingertip stroke its way along your pussy, through the fabric of your underwear. His tongue slid between your lips as he deepened the kiss. He still had one hand on your chin, which he now moved up to cup your cheek.

You felt how he caressed two fingers up and down your pussy and at this point you were very well-aware of how incredibly wet you were. By the way Seungsik’s lips were curled up into a little smirk, you could tell that he was aware of it too. Slowly, he brought those two fingers up towards your clit and started dragging circles along it, making you let out a little gasp.

“Y/n?” he suddenly mumbled. His voice sounded husky and almost a bit hungry in a way. He pulled his lips away from yours and when you looked at him, you could see a sense of craving in his eyes.

“Can I eat you out?”

You didn’t know how to react. On one hand you were incredibly turned on and wanted nothing more than him going down on you. His lips and tongue already felt so good against your own lips, you couldn’t even imagine how amazing it would feel to have him sucking on your clit. But it was hard not to feel self-conscious about it. What if he would hate it?

He could tell that you were worried and comfortingly stroked your cheek with his thumb. “Don’t worry, I know I’ll like it,” he said with a little smirk, “and I think you’ll like it too. Can I?”

Despite your nerves, you could not resist his offer when he looked at you with those big, beautiful eyes. Besides, you really wanted his tongue inside of you.

You both took off all of your clothes and you took a minute to appreciate his dazzling features. This wasn’t the first time you saw him without a shirt, yet every time the sight of his body just took your breath away.

However, this was the first time you saw him without any sort of pants or underwear on. The sight of his private parts, all exposed just for you, gave you butterflies in your stomach. A sense of vulnerability and intimacy came over you and in this moment you felt so grateful to have him all for yourself like this.

Seungsik gently laid you down onto your back and separated your legs to lay down between them. At this point you were so excited that being exposed like this barely made you feel nervous anymore. He continued to stroke your thighs a little bit while he inched his face closer and closer to your pussy. The distance was now so small that you could feel his breath on your skin, which sent a slight shiver down your spine.

First, he pressed a gentle kiss on your clit, followed by a second, less gentle kiss and then you felt his tongue. He wrapped his lips around your clit, carefully sucking on it while continuing to massage it with his tongue.

You threw your head back into the pillow, letting out a soft “oh Seungsik,” under your breath. Somehow you’d always had a feeling that he would be good at giving head. But you hadn’t expected him to be this good.

Suddenly you felt how he brought his index finger to your wet cunt and started to tease around your opening, slowly stroking up and down between your folds. You couldn’t help but whimper, but Seungsik calmly continued to toy with you while you squirmed around for him.

He sucked on your clit a little more roughly, moaning softly against your skin, and inserted his middle finger into you. Stars danced before your eyes as you indulged in this pleasurable sensation. Before you knew it, Seungsik added his index finger and carefully began pumping them into you, while he continued to let his mouth work its magic on your clit. It only took a short moment until you were a moaning mess beneath him, gripping into the sheets for any kind of support. 

After a little while, he pulled his lips away and began to trail kisses on your inner thigh instead, while continuing to fuck you with his fingers. “Baby…” he murmured in between kisses. God, had his voice always sounded this sexy? “Would you like me to fuck you properly now?”

You didn’t even have to think about his question. Never in your life had you been this turned on. Just the thought of Seungsik’s cock deep inside of you drove you absolutely mad already.

When he pulled his fingers out of you, you could feel your own wetness dripping onto the sheets below you. He got up from the bed and walked over to the nightstand to grab a condom. It would be awkward to stare at him while he put it on, yet you couldn’t help but have a little glimpse. It wasn’t until now that you realized how hard he was.

He made his way back to the bed and gave you a warm, reassuring smile. “Are you nervous?” he asked while he got on top of you and you shook your head. “No, I’m not nervous anymore. Just extremely horny.”

He grinned at your response and you wrapped your arms around his neck, pulling him closer to you. “I want you so badly Seungsik…” There was still a big smile on his lips, making them look so inviting. You pressed a long, lustful kiss on them and then pulled away again so you could talk to him. “I need you inside of me.” He stroked your cheek with his thumb and pressed another quick kiss on your lips, before saying “So do I.”

The room became filled with soft moans and heavy breathing as he slid his tip into you. Your arms were clenched around his neck and once he was properly inside of you, you pulled him more closely against your body. “Are you still feeling okay?” he asked kindly. You nodded and returned the same question to him, to which he replied with “I feel fantastic.”

With a happy smile on his face, he brought his face down to press kisses on your neck and simultaneously started to thrust himself into you at a gentle pace. Getting filled up by him like this felt even better than you had imagined. You had been so worried about all the things that could go wrong when having sex with him for the first time, that you had pretty much forgotten to imagine how nice it could be.

Seungsik made love to you in the most caring, intimate way. He covered your neck with loving kisses while carefully pumping himself into you. Every now and then he looked up at your face to make sure you were enjoying it and each time he saw the look of bliss on your face, he smiled happily.

Even though having your neck kissed by him like this felt amazing, you wanted a little more, so you hooked your finger under his chin and brought his mouth to your own. He contently accepted your lips, deepening both the kiss and his thrusts at once.

You let out a little gasp when you suddenly felt him hit your sweet spot perfectly. It was clear that he noticed what was going on, because he started to focus on hitting you from that exact same angle again and again. At this rate, your climax was approaching rapidly and your moans grew louder while you clung on to him even more tightly. 

“Do you think you can cum for me?” he whispered against your lips and you nodded in response, unable to form any coherent sentences.

He picked up the pace a bit more and pushed himself a little deeper into you, applying even more pressure to your sweet spot. Your moans became more desperate and just when you whined his name, you were hit by your orgasm. But Seungsik continued to thrust himself into you with the same intensity. He was so close as well that he couldn’t afford to slow down. While you moaned and cried out in pleasure, he thrusted into you a few more times before he ultimately reached his climax as well.

After you both washed up, neither of you even bothered to put on any pajamas before getting back into the bed. Once you laid comfortably under the covers and turned off the lights, Seungsik pulled you against his chest and pressed a long kiss on the top of your head. “So, how was it?” he asked with a slightly nervous tone in his voice. You giggled softly and kissed his cheek. “It was everything I hoped for. But you could’ve warned me about your talent for giving head…” The both of you chuckled and you could tell that he felt relieved to hear that.

He took your hand in his own and intertwined your fingers together while you snuggled your face into his chest. “You know…” he mumbled, “even though I was really looking forward to making love to you, the thing I was most excited for was this…” You looked up at him, a little bit confused about what exactly he meant and he stroked your head with his free hand. “This. Finally holding you in my arms while we sleep.” You could feel your cheeks getting hot at this sweet remark and you nestled your face back into his chest. “That’s what I was most excited about too.”

[honey-minded-hivemind]

My favorite character from the Owl House is Hunter because his character arc is so good and his relationship with Willow is adorable. (He literally fell for her at first sight)

And my favorite character from X Men is Kitty (I hate her relationship with Cyclops because she was a CHILD AND HE WAS A GROWN ASS MAN WHEN THEY MEET IN THE COMICS. Also can I just say that I hate that they make Bobby (the guy who does the ice thing) gay because that came out of nowhere and it only happened because an alternative version Jean Gray and her version of Bobby is gay so she decides that all versions of Bobby is gay and she needs to help them be their true self and Bobby who keep in mind has shown sexual and romantic interest in women up to this point 'realizes' he's gay and the rest of the comic is just him coming out to everyone one by one and hardly anything else happens. I wouldn't have minded so much if it wasn't for the fact that most media still treats sexuality like there's only two options gay or straight which completely erases Bisexual, Pansexual, Demisexual, Asexual, to name a few. It just grinds my gears you know anyway sorry for the rant. Kitty deserves a good love interest hopefully she gets one)

I feel like if reader had magic I feel like it would be similar to ether to Luz's or Eda's.

Hunter was so awesome, and he felt relatable, too. He and Willow are cute together, let them have plant and palisman babies!

I like Kitty, and I haven't read the comics (except a handful) so I didn't even know that relationship was thing. (Who the f*ck wrote that?!) I use my favorite X-Men medias as canon, along with head and heart canons, because let's face it: There are so many separate comics with different writers, different movies and timelines, even three (now going to be four) separate X-Men cartoons, whatever books and games they have for the various media, and even the anime and other Marvel shows where the characters show up from time to time. It is SO confusing. So, I just pick my favorite out of the bunch and roll with those (and usually it makes enough sense. Except the timeline changes in the movies. That STILL confuses me. Who is alive? Who is dead? Hopefully Deadpool fixes things).

And yeah, for Bobby, only one version of him was gay. It would have made more senses if they built that into a story arc, took it slowly, instead of being so abrupt. Let the guy be gay or bisexual, but at least make it make sense and not just be considered a quirk or passing fancy. Give it some development. Some thought. Make it mean something. Let it happen like how The Owl House portrays romance and self-discovery. (I myself am part of the asexual community, and that took awhile to figure out, and to this day I'm still finding out more about how I view relationships, platonic or romantic or otherwise. I'm not sure if I truly am interested in romance or not, but in the past I had a crush on a guy and girl, and later found out I just thought they were really great friends). This stuff can take time, it can get messy and feel gut-wrenching, but it doesn't make a person less for being bisexual or gay or lesbian or asexual or straight or trans. None are better than the others, and none are less than the others. It does help to realize all of this isn't back and white. It's a big, mixed canvas of grays in every shade of cloud and ash and silver and stone and eggshell and storm and smoke. (Point is, LGBTQA+ isn't back and white, neither is being straight, but these things are not just quirks. They shouldn't be treated that way, as those are valid beliefs and emotions that don't go away). (I hope I said this right, I'm not always great explaining my thoughts on this kind of thing).

Reader having a power similar to Luz or Eda would be so wild! Surprise, they have glyphs! Surprise, they're part owl beast! They have wild magic, they're blessed by the last Titans, they kicked an evil old emperor/hypocrite into dust! The series finale might have been a little rushed (thanks a LOT, Disney. You should have given them extra time! Extra episodes! A whole lot more episodes than just three for the third season!) but I thought it was still good for the constraints put on Dana and her team. They did good.

[abcleverun]

A Leg to Stand On

I want to start by saying the art and essay were non-malicious; even this isn't meant to be aggressive, and I took no offense to A Rebuttal of a Rebuttal. I’ll get more into why I wrote Criticizing the Attorney at the end of this, but I drew the art because Kat looked fun to draw, and I’ve had that meme with her and Ben in my head for almost a year. Since you released your latest youtube video, it reminded me of the idea, and I had to finally get it out. As I said in the tags of that post, you (Cat) are free to do whatever you want with the image.

Now—my essay wasn't about me arguing what should and should not have happened, it was about critiquing the defense. "The right thing to do" and "what I would like to see happen" are two separate things. I don't feel bad for Harangue, and I thought that moment where Ben, turned human, continued hitting Vilgax was a great scene, for all the reasons Cat pointed out in her section.

I will concede:

In Ultimate Alien, Ben is a deputized agent of the Plumbers. By OV, it seems he's no longer fully affiliated with the Plumbers. Ben being a special agent absolutely makes sense.

I wrote my essay entirely by American standards. I don't know how Plumber law works; we only have scraps and hints laid out throughout the franchise. From what I could see of it, it's pretty heavily based on US law, but I can't claim for sure that it's all 1 to 1.

It's true, I made assumptions too, but the "he might've had a breakdown" part felt a bit... odd? To me, like that was a little too specific. But at the same time, even writing about that in the original response, I did feel like I was being a bit of a hypocrite.

By the standards I laid out, Rook absolutely has committed police brutality in the past. I've talked about that with friends privately before; I strongly dislike and disagree with Rook's tactics and beliefs. I actually have a shelved essay on how I dislike the plumbers as a whole, and I might pick it back up again.

I disagree/will stand by my original points:

“Do you really think the galactic courts would side with Vilgax over Ben on a debate about excessive use of force?”

No, but I think if Vilgax had some decent lawyers, they would absolutely make that argument. (That actually sounds like a normal UA episode plot...)

They were indeed too lenient, but they were following procedure, unlike Ben. Procedure sucks, but it's there for a reason. It's not the best reason, but it's better than having no procedure. That's kind of part of the limitation of science fiction; it's always written from the perspective of someone living in current time, with current technology, and their current laws. It's hard to think of anything better if you're a liberal if you only know all you've ever known, hence why space cop procedure still sucks, despite being set up by super advanced and hyper intelligent aliens. The writers seemed to be less interested in “what would the most ideal legal system look like?” and were more focused on portraying “Cops… in SPACE!”

Moving on: even if Haragnue went unpunished, Ben still wouldn't have been in the right to punish him; Harangue should've gone through the system. Harangue being rich and powerful makes that harder, but not impossible. Harangue was supposed to be a sort of Alex Jones type parody, and Alex Jones had his day in court and lost. I honestly think it'd've been interesting to see him get processed, if written by someone capable of pulling off a plot like that. It all depends on what kind of fantasy you want to go for; UA might've taken that up, but it was only natural that OV took the path it took.

I don't think Harangue was really hurt by being turned into an alien, but if Harangue decided to sue, he would absolutely have a leg to stand on. That was my main point: both Vilgax and Haragnue have cases.

Ben has MUCH STRONGER cases against them, but that's another story—one I hope to dive into in the future.

Now, "Why did you respond to something I wrote four years ago?”

It was the first essay in your blog directory.

“Why respond to any of the essays at all?”

I always felt like your arguments could’ve been more objective. I wanted to try my hand at scratching this itch that was kind of bugging me about these takedowns, almost like stress-testing it. I could've added more "here's a better defense for Ben," but hindsight is 20/20 and all that.

I was intending to do more, but the flame kind of fizzled out after writing the one. It actually helped the juices flowing for general essays on Ben 10; a few I’m working on now are Diagnosing Benjamin Kirby Tennyson, Ben is Unintentionally a Queer Icon, and (Possibly) Why Ben Tried to Murder Kevin—the last one being my attempt to answer that without using the “Ben’s just evil” argument.

Lastly, I understand why Lunany called me AB, but I enjoy going by Suzie.

@xcatxgirlx (Not tagging Lunany because she said she's not interested in interacting with the fandom), I'm very open to discussion on this and other topics regarding Ben 10. Looking forward to your video.

[myristicisms]

@valour-bound sent;;

🖋 for Chris and Squall for Zacks RE verse 👏👌

for plot ideas! Still accepting!

SOL,,, u do not know what you've done today bestie!!! Basically lemme just,, hehe okay!!

For Chris

So basically because I'm such a gene ass with my foresight or whatever I have multiple RE verses for Chris and Zack to interact in or whatever, so we'll go chronological!!! Kinda!! More or less I do have a revelations verse where Zack works with the B.S.A.A (just made sense) and so there's the possibility of Zack being in contact with Chris and Jessica (shit talking Jessica in his mind because something's off abt her to him and he does not trust her), possibly giving more details or even exchanging information with one another some time between the sinking of the Queen Semiramis and Queen Zenobia and the exploration of the last ship that I cannot remember the name of, ofc that'd be around the point where Zack has to kill Angeal.

THEN there's the in between of the prequel DLC to re5 and re5 itself where Zack briefly ends up paired up with Chris on the occasional mission, both of which sort of help each other grasp that they're not responsible for their partner's deaths (or ig death for Angeal and Jill's going MIA bc we know she ain't dead LMFAO)

Ofc there's also re6, where Zack could briefly cross paths with Chris and Piers (me when I bust out my Piers knowledge and hcs bc I wrote him for like two years) or Zack communicating updates to Chris as captain of the team beta or whateva, also possibly helping Chris cope with the loss of Piers or being the one to help with getting Chris out of the ocean and chatting about the after math in the "haha that didn't happen" kind of way or whatever, maybe dinner together like in Chris's ending scene because two dudes having steak hehe

And finally there's also the re8 verse!!! Zack is No Longer affiliated with the B.S.A.A and is now a mercenary that takes on jobs he feels people need his assistance or whatever and so he's chilling in the village trying to protect the villagers or whateva, this one is Not Developed Much but I could see some odd little "hey I know you 🤨" shenanigans going on, possible reminiscing before they blOW UP THE VILLAGE LFMWJDBS idk idk

Anyways for Squall 🥰

This one could def be a little bit on the harder side since it heavily depends on which part of the timeline you're wanting him in but??? What if after revelations (where Zack kills Angeal bc gotta fuck up his life somehow) Squall ends up being assigned Zack's new partner on missions or whatever, be it for basic recon or straight up clean up of B.O.W shenanigans or whatever, something something opening up to a new partner + working with someone who I imagine prefers to work solo being new (me when they'll probably end up kissing on the mouth idk/j) or we could def have them bump into each other in raccoon city, establish them kinda already knowing each other (Zack getting separated from Angeal??? Crazy but so very likely LMFAOOO) and then going from there? Or they could be mercenary pals for 7/8 too, lots to do for them and it's very flexible which is why I'm struggle bussing!!!

But those are my main ideas for them!!!

[normal-with-adhd-is-a-joke]

Ok I wrote something to talk to my therapist about but I also wanted to hear if the Tumblr dissociative disorder community had any idea what the fuck I experienced.

TW for dissociation, unknown and concerning mental health event, trauma.

So I went into withdrawal from my meds because I lost the bottle under my bed. On of the things that happened to me was that I had a severe episode of dissociation. usually my episodes are like a one or two but this one was more like a six or seven. I got so dissociated that I actually felt like my past self was a different person than my current self was and I started to panic about maybe supressing my past self and keeping her from being expressed. I even talk to her at one point and she responded. it was the first time that I've left my body during an dissociation episode and felt like somebody else took over. It was incredibly weird and disturbing and it's been bothering me since. I know that I'm not a system I've taken great care in considering that because I know a lot of people who are systems and I do dissociate, but I'm confident that's not what's happening here. A small part of me is still panicked over the idea that I might be an alter and not the host personality and that I've somehow been suppressing the host for the past few years, but again, I haven't shown any signs of being a system prior to this and I've thoroughly scoured my past for signs. I remember learning at one point that sometimes people can become dissociated from their own memories or believe that their memories were made by someone else. I think that's what happened here. I've changed a lot in the past 3 years but I'm trying to comfort myself by identifying traits I've had since before COVID like personality quirks and interests that prove that I'm still the same person. It was just really scary, it shook up my entire sense of self, and I'm now having somewhat of a trauma response whenever something makes me think about it. I feel the same panic and separation from myself that I felt during the episode and I avoid mentions of it because it stresses me out. I think maybe understanding what happened better and processing it will help me feel less afraid.

[caramariafilm]

The Man Who Fell in Love with the Sky - Production Design

30th March - FILMING DAY THREE

Continuing on from my last post, here is an update on what the schedule would look like! For today’s filming, myself and Saskia would join for the morning shoot and help set up the flashback scene. Since we were working with a child actor we couldn’t have them on set for more than four hours anyway so this gave us a time limit on this. After the morning was done, Saskia and I would leave to pick up our set design props, then head to the interior location and set up for the entire afternoon and evening if we needed. While this was going on, the crew would go to Braidburn Valley and get the pickup of the titlecard sequence.

There would be no wing shots today, the driver was also unable to do the evening shoot as he was working and there was an issue with scheduling so they agreed to move the skeleton crew to the 1st. Something else, we agreed it made less sense for me to be part of the skeleton crew as this would mean there would be no sound recordist in the car (driver, director, actor, and DOP). So, I instead said I would show the actor the wings on the interior shoots as I’d be bringing them in thenm show him how he can move them around and get comfortable with them, as well as write out a DETAILED document explaining how to care for the wings.

While this wasn’t an indeal scheduling - missing the titlecard sequence and not being able to handle the wings - I understood it was what was best for us all with the time frame we had. 

For the morning shoot, I brought the matching costume for Young Arthur as well as the wire and switch for the rocket! Saskia brought the rocket :)

I also brought options for the love letter that Young Arthur wrote that was going to get taped to the side of the rocket. I had sent the director photos of the different options however thought it would be best for him to see them in person. 

Before the child actor arrived, Saskia and I set up the rocket and did everything we could to prepare for the shoot as we knew we didn’t have much time. The director and DOP mentioned Young Arthur ducking behind some kind of garden object, however in the script it read that Arthur hid behind himself, so Saskia and I were a bit confused.

We realised this prop must’ve come from the storyboarding process and wasn’t communicated with us properly. This was totally fine! These things happen, it just meant Saskia and I had to find something on set that would work. So, we went around the garden and found what we could! This was lots of fun. We found a metal planting structure that actually matched the rocketshape which was great, and then used an upside down plant pot with some wooden planks lent against it to create a shelter like structure. This worked really really well and I’m so happy with it. Although it looks homemade, I feel like it looks like something a small child would make, which is ideal.

The morning shoot went by really smoothly. It rained for ten minutes or so but it just meant everyone could take breaks.

After Saskia and I were finished setting up, we spoke about the interior plan to make most of the time - we needed to stay til the end of the shoot to reset the handmade structure we made.

When the morning wrapped, we ended up being a bit pushed for time and had to cut a couple shots. This was a shame as it meant there was no time for the children’s love letter I wrote for Young Arthur, as well as the little toggle switch I purchased for the rocket. These things happen though, and the child’s safety is most important.

After this, Saskia and I went our separate ways to get all of our props together. The child wrangler - Cate RIding - is a close friend of mine and offered to help me pick up my props as it was definitely a two person job. I am so grateful for this, I wouldn’t have been able to manage by myself and she is also just so kind and was a lovely energy to have around. 

So we both went back and got all my props and started to bring them to the interior location. We had to take lots of breaks, as everything was super heavy, but once we made it, I was really excited!

Cate and I waited for Saskia before we started moving anything big, and I went around the space and just took lots of photos for resets after the shoot.

When Saskia arrived, we set off on moving around all the big furniture as described by the floor plan the DOP laid out for us. Once this was done, we worked on getting the photos of clouds in the frames and sticking the letters on walls. Smaller details such as items on desk could be figured out the morning of the shoot, while the camera department were setting up. 

Here is what it looked like before…

And here it is after the first day of setting up!

[skelezomperman]

Revising A Tale of Star-Crossed Knights - Chapter 8

Link to Chapter 8: https://archiveofourown.org/works/39015690/chapters/100327227

This chapter is the end of Part I, and it marks the point where Erinys and Finn separate forever. When I first thinking of this piece, this was the first scene I thought of: a tearful goodbye where Finn gives his Brave Lance to Erinys as something to remember him by. In fact, it was the first scene I wrote, and it was published under the title So this is goodbye in October 2021.

This chapter is the best-written one in Part I, in my opinion. There wasn't too much that had to be changed in this one. The only thing was that I did end up changing Finn's mannerisms a little bit over Part I to make him sound less awkward and more natural sounding. In the original A/N, I said that I was concerned that I made Erinys too emotional, but I think looking back it does make sense - Erinys has a right to be emotional because she's getting pushed around by Finn, in a way.

One thing I do want to note is that I'm cutting out most of the "and then it turned out bad" things that I ended chapters on. I feel most of these are cringy and don't really add much when the reader is expecting tragedy. However, I left this cliffhanger in at the end of Chapter 8 because it's the end of an entire part - it's supposed to signal that the fleeting hope at the end of this chapter was, in fact, fleeting.

Oh, and of course I cut out language stuff. So Ced's childhood nickname for Finn is Dada, not Tata. It's for the better to not get cringy with that.

--- Original Author's Notes

We've made it to the end of Part I. This is the last time that Finn and Erinys will ever actually be together. Their married life arc is over. The last scene by the way is adapted from "So this is goodbye," which is the first sketch of the couple that I wrote back in October 2021. I think it's the most pivotal scene that these two have together. It's powerful especially since we as the reader have knowledge that the characters don't - that they're going to go on to never see each other again (barring an afterlife).

Looking over this chapter after I finished it, I think my main concern is that it may have portrayed Erinys as a bit too emotional compared to Finn - that Finn doesn't really show his anxieties while Erinys becomes outright violent at one point. But I think it fits the characters. Finn (unfortunately) keeps his emotions bottled up for the most part, and he will keep his anxiety about his wife within himself in Part II. And Finn is really the one who made the "bad" choice here, not Erinys, because he *chose* to go to Leonster despite Quan offering to allow him to stay in Silesse. That will become more self-evident over Part II.

I might take the next week off from this fic before starting on Chapter 9, which is the first part of Part II. I'm impressed because this entire story was supposed to only have eight chapters. Part I alone has lasted longer than I imagined this story going. Feel free to give kudos and comment what you think of the story - I really do appreciate comments.

Miscellaneous notes: Amore is Italian, I mean Leonstrian for love (which I would assume that most readers would know), kohanie/kochanie is Polish, I mean Silessian for beloved. I realized upon proofreading that the scene where Erinys screams at Finn has a lot more...conjugal tension than I thought. I did not intend it at all, but I kept it because it's dramatic. Tata is Silessian for Dad and Mama is obviously Silessian for Mom. Erinys will probably try to teach Ced what little she knows of Leonstrian in the future. Yes the fade to black when Finn comes home to Erinys for the last time is meant to be an indication that those two did The Funny that night. You can probably guess who got conceived as a result of that. Erinys gives Finn a few strands of her hair - I haven't decided what to do with that in the future. Finn will probably keep the lock of hair but he might get it sewn onto his sleeve so he "wears his heart on his sleeve" so to speak. Maybe, as unrealistic as that sounds. In the original sketch "So this is goodbye," Finn was already promoted when he left. Here, Finn will promote after he arrives in Silesse. Ced was also completely not present in that sketch, but I also originally envisioned the timespan from Sigurd's arrival in Silesse to Quan and Co.'s departure to be around two months, not a full year. So I saw Ced as a very young infant still, not a one year old who is old enough to stand. Ced has heterochromia because I said so. Some people say his FE4 sprite has that. I don't personally see it but I'm writing it in anyways. The Brave Lance of course will figure as a symbol later in the story. It lampshades that a common strategy in-game is for Finn to give his Brave Lance to Erinys so she and Fee can use it during the three-ish chapters that Finn is gone, especially since Finn does fine enough without it when he joins in Chapter 7. We'll see how it goes because I haven't decided how I'm going to reconcile the FE5 timeline with this.

Hope you enjoyed and I'll see you guys in a couple week with Chapter 9 :)

[idleglowingpixels]

XXY -- July 7th. 2023 - Launch Update (Author's Note)

AO3 was glitching on me, so for whatever reason, it wouldn't post my full note, cutting me off about halfway through. I decided I'd just post the full note on here in a separate post to the update so anyone who wants to read it can.

Hello, everyone! After all this time, we've finally reached the conclusion to the first batch of chapters (I consider 7 an extra chapter, for reasons I'll get into when it releases lol). It feels like yesterday I had officially rebooted the fic by uploading Chapter 1 back in February. If you told me then that the job I started wasn't gonna work out, I think I'd cry haha. But if you also told me XXY would have the sheer amount of support it's gained over the last six months, I'd cry too (but happy tears <3).

Before I let myself get too sappy, let me talk about the happenings of this chapter. Butch closes out the first round of POVs, and we get a bit more insight into how he views things. This version of Butch is a lot more reserved than the Butch I've read in others' stories, as I interpreted his canon self to be less talkative than the others and more focused on the battles ahead. Don't get me wrong, I think I've taken that interpretation a lot harder than I anticipated, but I think having the parallel to Buttercup's outspoken nature is nice. He's also (albeit closeted) femme to foil Buttercup's tomboyish personality, which admittedly wouldn't make sense in canon, but it was a change that I felt worked well.

Speaking of Buttercup, while she's still harsh and snappy with his brothers, she's got a bit of a soft spot for Butch. But unlike the blues, who have openly expressed feelings for each other in front of everybody, they've kept the story between them hidden. And for the most part, it's still hidden… (Sorry guys :'D XD)

Also, XXY has its name officially! Roll credits! Yeah it's a mitosis motif, looks like middle school science class ingraining that stuff into my head was worth something haha. Their logo would look more like X><Y. It represents how though they're a full team now, they started as two separate teams (PPG & RRB). Science isn't even my favorite subject, I just thought of the name somewhere along the way and it stuck. XXY actually came from me merging XX and XY for the teams' acronym pattern (AAB), as well as the whole Chemical X and Y thing referring back to their genetic codes, but finding out XXY is an intersex variation was pretty cool too!

Now to the sappy part, sorry in advance lol. I know I say this a lot, but being able to share my work has been keeping me going during this near-drought period I've had with writing over the last few months. It's been so hard not feeling guilty for my lacking progress, but I know there's been people who have kept up with this fic since its original run in 2020-2021 who waited over an entire year through 2022 to see it reboot this year, and their patience made writing these new chapters all the more worth it.

Before the re-launch, the last chapter I wrote of the original (Chapter 4) was uploaded in September of 2021, and I had made numerous updates throughout the in-between period on that last chapter so everyone knew I was still working on it. I'm so very grateful for everyone who waited through that time frame for the soft-reset.

Truly, from the bottom of my heart, thank you, all of you, for your support. Whether you've been here from the beginning, just finished your first read through the whole thing at 3am, or you stumbled upon this fic anywhere in between, I'm so grateful you're a part of this journey with me and appreciate the time you've taken to read through this. I hope you've enjoyed it so far.

As always, thanks so much for all the things, including hits, bookmarks, comments and kudos! Stay hydrated, and have an absolutely wonderful day or night!!! <3