#the reverse falls rewrite that lives in my brain

[brrdhouse]

i may have forgotten to post this. it did really well on twitter so i'm hoping people like it here ^^

[mischief----managed]

Great is human we know this (of course)

And going by ep 1 - 5, and how his dying brain rewrites everything, it's safe to say he doesn't ever truly express his true feelings about anything.

1) the accident- in the episode 1 he gets to call the ambulance after the time reversal. He even mentally makes up a whole story where she intentionally jumps in front of the car and everything, so its not his fault because it was a suicide attempt. But in ep 6, he just outwardly seems not to care at all.

2) Tyme - even in his "dream state" he maintains the fact that Tyme approach him for less that honest reasons. But here his tyme falls in love with him and cares about him like no one has before. In this world, they don't just fuck, they make love and its awkward and cute but most importantly, its private. His ideal tyme isn't sleeping with him for revenge porn but because he has feelings for him. When the whole reveal happens in reality, he laughs and makes jokes because yes, he enjoys watching his dad suffer. But you can't honestly believe he didn't have a moment to himself to accept he's nothing but a means to an end to tyme. He got to tell tyme how lonely and sad he has lived his life in his mind but because of the revenge porn and tyme never actually softening up to him in reality, he never gets to be vulnerable.

He seems shameless, but honestly I would be too if I have spent most of life alone and someone gives me the slightest bit of attention even if its for all the wrong reasons. He's desperate and will take any bit of affection he can get even if he has to beg, he has nothing to lose.

3) Assisted murder - In his dream state he betrays his friend and gets tonkla's brother (I can't remember his name) to the hospital which saves his life. In real life, not so much. I'm not saying he isn't morally fucked up for not doing the right thing but have you ever had a dying body presented to you like that? No. Chances are most people would make shitty decisions because they feel like they already have blood on their hands. So yes he should have made a different choice (he knows this too) but he didn't and so he does the right thing in the one place he has the power to. Also, isn't Title his only actual friend? Why wouldn't the starved for love and affection young man help the only person that puts up with him and shows him even a sliver of care and attention?

There are other things but these are the main events for me that makes my heart break for Great. He is at the end of the day a sad, lonely, overly privileged and love deprived child that needs attention and is willing to look in all the wrong places at the expense of his life and safety.

[da-millerrrrr]

Reverse Falls Gideon but he is still that little weird 9 year old in the beginning. After the failed crush on Mabel though he’s going through character development and overall cools his temper and makes him a better person. Helps that during that equivalent of an episode Mabel asked for Will’s help and briefly gained psychic powers.

Gideon is going to move on from his crush, grow as a person, and still be a very unhinged 9 year old who wants to find the rest of the Journals for his own gain and to find out what kind of ultimate power the Author was trying to hide. He’ll chill out but he will still be unhinged.

Reverse Falls Pacifica meanwhile is in that stage where she slowly is trying to become her own person outside her parents. I like to think she at first would try and use the journal to make herself look better but as time goes on she breaks away from that and becomes more genuine. Eventually we even get her defying her parents and have her spend more time away from the manor.

The Northwest Party thing still happens but with the change being Pacifica asking Dipper for help in trying to break out of her room and getting the townsfolk in. By then Dipper probably swore off from talking to Will ever and now it’s just him trying to navigate the fact that his parents might actually divorce and he has to deal.

reverse falls rewrite is gonna be living in my brain for a WHILE now

[comehomeducklings]

Present [Part 4] (Obsession)

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6

Tom Riddle's Moodboard

Main Character's Moodboard

~////////////////𓆙////////////////~

1943 ~ 6th year

“What would be the purpose of a wizard or witch to prepare a Polyjuice potion?” Slughorn asks. “Yes, Mr. Riddle?”

Tom drops his hand from the air, “The potion grants the drinker to take the form of another.”

“Yes! And what would happen if said drinker tried to transform into an animal?”

I know this one so I lift my hand.

“Go ahead.”

I clear my throat, “When the human drinker tries to transform into an animal they would not take its complete form. Only sections of said animal.”

Slughorn nods his head, “Can they reverse after a bit of time like normally?”

“No,” I answered. “It takes an extremely long time to wear off, and you might even have to go to the hospital wing.”

He grins and continues to write on the chalkboard. Even though he can enchant the writer's tool to note down itself, I’m guessing he prefers the old-fashioned way.

Tom and I are even on points. When he answers correctly, I also do right after him. I can see him noting down both our points on the corner of his parchment. The black tally marks standing out. Our points are on my paper as well, just in case he decides to cheat. No chances are being taken today, or tomorrow.

“How long does the potion wear off if made correctly?”

Riddle and I both shoot our hands up. His demeanor is calm and collected while I'm sitting on my feet to have my arm raised higher than his. It’s not very fair that his arms are the length of mine to the third power.

“Mr. Nott, what do you know?”

“A single dose could last from 10 minutes to 12 hours.”

Another question wasted by not getting called on. I don’t mind that much since it doesn't keep me behind. Riddle seems to care a little bit too much. His competitive side is showing and I guess his pal is ruining the race.

Professor stole our textbooks for this pop quiz. The rapid-fire questions should “already be memorized and known,” down to the molecular detail. My knowledge only goes so far.

I trust myself, to a point. There’s definitely going to be a question I get wrong and I’m already dreading it. Every answer that falls out of my mouth is examined and thought over ten times before the action of answering arises.

“For something a little different, Mr. Riddle come to the front of the classroom and write four ingredients that are needed for the potion.”

He stands up and pushes his chair in. His eyes as cold as The Black Lake. While he makes his way toward the board I cross my fingers, hoping he forgets one. I know that’s not the kindest, but nothing with him is necessarily “kind.”

There he goes, writing all four ingredients with ease. His handwriting is beautiful. How does he honestly do that? Does he practice every single day to get it that precise?

Maybe I should practice to improve as well. Honestly embarrassing how bad my handwriting seems next to his. We compared essays once, never again. That was the most embarrassing moment of my life. He just laughed at me and kept pointing out how weird my f’s looked.

I swear my letters weren’t that bad. It’s just that he overachieves everything. Now I rewrite every “f” letter that appears on my homework. Thank you for the new insecurity, Riddle.

“Very good! Very good, your turn,” he points towards me. “Three more ingredients this time.”

While I stand in front of the board, I check out what he has already put down. Lacewig flies, leeches, okay not bad. Knotgrass and the hair of the person the drinker will transform into.

He numbered them so I continued on from that.

5) Boomslang skin

6) Fluxweed

Last one, let's see. We already put Lacewig flies, Knotgrass, hair, the skin, and Fluxweed. I hesitate for a little bit, my brain working at high speed. Anxiety levels are higher than Mount Everest.

7) Powdered Bicorn Horn

There we go, I smile to myself proudly. When I turn back around my eyes meet his. He smirks and nods while he writes down a point for both of us. I’m not sure that it counts for four points, just one.

The questions go on for quite a bit. Our tally marks are piling higher and higher. Each of our count's neck and neck for the top spot.

“What is the brewing time?”

“About a month.”

“How does the potion look before the addition of the final ingredient?”

“Thick like the mud after it pours.”

“It also is bubbling.”

“How does it look after adding the final ingredient?”

“Depends on who the witch or wizard made the potion to look like.”

“Varies in taste and color.”

He seems to be done with questions so Tom and I start counting the marks. On my paper, I seem to be .5 points ahead of him. I quickly look his way to see him come to the same conclusion. He takes a deep breath and casts his eyes to the side. Tom then tilts his quill my way signaling that I did indeed win.

I’m about to squeal quite highly but then I recollect I’m in a classroom. Full of people who are terrified to be anywhere in this castle. That would be quite inappropriate of me so I keep my excitement to myself.

Professor Slughorn wipes the whole board away. Clearing all the information we were learning and reviewing about.

“When I pair you up, each of you will grab the right ingredients for this potion and lay it near the front of your desk,” he says. “It should be laid in the order you would normally use when making the concoction.”

“First up, Miss Horn and Miss Yellowbo.”

The classroom starts to move with life as students pair with one another. Some cheerful noises and annoyed ones from who they ended up with. Most of us here know each other. I don’t think I would mind having anyone in this room as my partner.

“Mr. Riddle and-”

Of course, it’s me. Starting to think the pairings’ on purpose. His face shines too brightly for it not to be well planned out. I make my way to the shelves to start out picking the ingredients.

There’s always a moment where my mind decides to give up on me. Most of the elements are obtained. A few are missing.

I’m going over the variety of bottles containing different substances when I feel a looming pressure on my back. An arm slightly grazes past my ear and picks up Fluxweed.

“How do you manage to forget the very ingredient you wrote down on the board?” Toms whispers right by my ear.

I shift my eyesight to the side to see him already looking at me, “Sorry, I blanked out a little.”

He starts seizing half of the ingredients into his hold. I don’t really mind carrying a couple, but I’m just left with one bottle after he takes most of my possessions.

“Taking all the credit now I see,” I tilt my head as I raise my chin to meet his tall build.

“You were about to spill everything. I’m saving you from embarrassment,” he responds cockily.

I started to argue but he already made his way back to the desk, “Everything was perfectly stable in my arms.”

He continues to ignore me and sets down everything. Including the one bottled ingredient in my hand that he snatched just a few moments ago.

“Nothing is ever perfectly stable with you.”

I’m about to whisper a word no children should hear before Slughorn makes his way to our table. Saving Riddle from my rising annoyance.

“Wonderful! You too got all of them perfectly,” he starts. “I would expect no less from my star students.”

All I do is smile brightly in respect. Trying not to drive any more attention to the outburst of pride he has for us.

“Thank you, professor,” Tom says. He starts picking the ingredients off of the table, still barely letting me take any.

Riddle just walks off while our proffesor continues around the room. When he comes back I just about finish wiping the desk of any accidental spills.

“I won our little game this time,” I nudged his shoulder with my own.

Tom slightly rolls his eyes with a small smile, “I see that you have. Just this one though.”

“And many more to come,” I exclaim.

Our attention seeks back to our teacher, “You’ll all be writing an essay about an imaginary way this potion could go wrong. I expect it to be turned in before class tomorrow.”

I hurry to get my textbook off of my area and head towards the back of the classroom near the doorway.

“Everyone split into two groups. This half will go with Riddle while the other is with me.”

I turn my head once more to look at Tom, he’s reassuring one of the students that they are going to be okay.

I only look for a couple of seconds before leading my half of the group out first. A few stops along the way to make sure perfects are keeping order. Most of my group of students have been dropped off. A couple still lures behind me, I picked them up as I worked my way through the castle halls.

They were also dropped off and now I scatter along the hallway to make sure everyone is where they are supposed to be. Like every other period, the routine stays the same mostly.

My robes have a few wet spots on them still from the tears of younger students attending this school. I fully believe it won’t be too long until the headmaster and the ministry deal with whoever is making our lives miserable here. The murders will surely not go unjustly.

As I am turning a new hallway I happen to meet up with Riddle.

“All good?”

“Of course,” he responds. “Nothing out of the ordinary.”

He seems to look around quite a bit. Like he’s searching for something.

“Head back to your class, I will look around once more.”

That’s the last thing he says before moving around me with his hand on my shoulder. Quickly slipping past me.

~////////////////𓆙////////////////~

“No, no no,” I whisper to myself as I crumple yet another paper in my hand. I throw it on the ground next to me and huff out a breath.

Writing this bloody essay is taking more time than I predicted. It usually comes naturally to me but I can’t seem to write correctly. Every time I make a mistake I have to start over again. My handwriting failing to write neatly for once.

My whole structure and information is already figured out. Writing is what’s taking me the longest. No matter how hard I try, the letters never seem to come out correctly from my quill.

Especially the f’s.

F

f

Infuriating really. I only have an hour left until the library closes. It already technically shut down but the librarian gave me an extra three hours as long as I lock up.

Perks of being Head Girl I suppose.

My head is in my hands as I compose myself. It’s late and I’m tired, it’s not even safe to be out at this time. At least if I happen to die I wouldn’t have to write this essay.

“How long have you been trying at this-” a low voice asks behind me.

I jump in my seat, “Oh it’s just you. Well, it’s been-”

“And failing?” Tom finishes as he takes the seat next to me. The chair turned slightly to me.

I roll my eyes and fall further back into my seat. My head turned upwards, admiring the flying books in the ceiling. Finding their place, their way home.

“Probably an hour and a half,” I sigh. “You’re completely right about how bad my calligraphy is.”

He just nods his head and takes a fresh new sheet from the middle of the table. His quill magically appears from inside his robe. All the papers that have the plans for my essay start to float around his head and workspace. Occasionally glancing up at them from time to time and then going back to writing.

His lips are pursed in concentration, “I write my F’s like this. It’s easier that way and extremely easy to practice and write quickly.”

My head peers over his shoulder as I watch him effortlessly indite.

“You try,” he opens up my fingers that were closing my hand and places a quill in them.

I furrow my eyebrows and start to practice my letters on a separate piece of paper that I originally scrapped. I don’t want to waste paper and there’s no reason to get a fresh new one.

We both work quietly in the night until the last few minutes of opening time. Before I left the room I saw him quickly go far back into the library. I never got to ask him why he arrived here so late.

Never saw the need to.

~////////////////𓆙////////////////~ Taglist:

@empath-bunny

@jinxqsu

[faejilly]

I was tagged by @la-muerta​ & @facialteeth​ & @thedivinemissema​ for the WIP/Title Game

rules: post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. send me an ask with the title that most intrigues you and interests you and i’ll post a little snippet of it or tell you something about it!

AND THEN  by @shadoedseptmbr​ @msviolacea​ & @ravenclawnerd​ for the “stories you want to write... but for some reason haven’t yet”

so this will be a mish-mash of both? The WIPs will mostly have blurbs in this case (to fit the second meme) but you are still welcome to ask follow-up questions, if you’d like ;) Assuming you make it through the list, it is uh. Not Short.

Anyone who would like to play with their WIPs, please consider yourself tagged in either or both of these. :D

Misc Fic Folder:

“untitled document” - where I’m working on fictober fills so I have word-counts for my GYWO tracker. I am not working on these because Brains Are Dumb and also Going Back To Work Is Exhausting

I made a file called “YULETIDE!” which has nothing in it but I’m determined to finish this year so that is definitely technically a thing in the Unending WIP List of Doom worth mentioning. (Tho obviously that’s all I could say even if I had started, because anonymous.)

“coda-fics, rewatch!” -yes, that exclamation mark is important! it’s to keep me motivated! (it didn’t work). Much like untitled, this is for putting stuff so I can do word count tracking even if I don’t know what I’m doing. Currently I think it just says “MARYSE” because I was working on my SH 1x6 coda-fic and then got distracted and haven’t typed anything up yet. (Yay notebooks? Boo notebooks? Not even sure at this point.)

WNIP (works not in progress) Folder:

“TOG” - I had one vivid mental image of how Nicky & Joe met (blood-stained evil smiles?) but then no idea for a follow-up story and also the fandom is insane and I’m not sure I want to deal with all of *gestures vaguely* all that

“Shan Xia Notes” -for a TTRPG that never quite got off the ground; she was a semi-tragic selkie who was still in love with the evil queen/lady who stole her skin and I got to play her for like one session and she was surprisingly chaotic neutral, which wasn’t at all what I’d been expecting. But the game never really got off the ground, so I never had enough info to really delve into writing backstory fic

“post-Kruschev” -Kruschev’s List was the last episode of Scarecrow & Mrs King, and I was debating writing an epilogue in place of the s5 we never got, to try and tie up some loose ends, but the fandom’s three old-ladies in trench coats and I never quite worked up the gumption to get it anywhere

“Code Realize warm as silk sequel” -there is literally nothing in this file except “SEX! Only a little angst” because I wanted to write some “we can’t actually touch each other” smut but never actually did. 🤷‍♀️

BioWare (also all Not-In-Progress Anymore)

“seb/adelaide”, “Theia” & “DAI Erana” -these WIP folders were cannibalized for ficlets for the last few times I did fictober, and while originally I had ideas for longer epilogues for all three of them, at this point I don’t think any of the remaining bits could support a story any longer.

”whispers in the dark” -Maia Ryder never really got much fic at all; the cancellation of any further Andromeda stuff was really disheartening, and at this point I’d have to play the game again, and I don’t think I’m gonna manage that any time soon

”TSP” -a Mass Effect 3 Shepard AU collab project that kind of went off the rails, and our mutual brains/lives never quite seem to line up so we can try and rebuild it ”Ngaio & Tane” -my one truly ruthless Shepard (Alliance background, who romanced Traynor) whose father Tane Shepard was, I think, in PsyOps, and I wanted to figure out their complicated relationship but never really did know where I was going with it

”JE Zu & Yaling” -so I’ve rambled about my Tragic Sagacious Zu Romance Thoughts regarding Jade Empire more than once (#Icy Yaling should have most of it) but apparently I want to yell about it more than I want to actually write it? Whoops.

”CI sequel: 5 times fic?” -Cruel Intentions is a kinkmeme fill that I started and then it sat for like five years before I actually finished it, and I liked the ending, but it does leave a giant fucking question mark in terms of how those people got from there to where they are after the game, and I kind of wanted to write a proper h/c fic rather than just... leaving them wallowing in all that trauma?

But I didn’t. I don’t even remember for sure how I wanted to frame the 5/1 of it all, besides it being something sad about allowing people to see you or touch you in some way. (Prayers maybe, since I think there was definitely some Sebastian & Fenris & faith stuff going on in there.)

“candles” -Merribela prompt fill that I never was happy with? Not sure what I might do with it at this point, so it’s just sitting there all sad and lonely and neglected-like.

Shadowhunters

pt1: WIP LIST ONLY

“Persuasion” -so I keep trying to write Persuasion AUs in many fandoms because it’s my favorite Austen, but I think I like it too much, I have no real solid concept of how I’d transform it, and if I don’t have anything else to say about different characters within that framework, I have no push to actually write anything? Also this SH version of it suffered from MASSIVE scope creep when I started outlining and it got too big for me to handle so I like, killed it twice? Whoops. This one is really probably never gonna happen.

“oosdt sequel” -I wanted to write more about the Forest That Eats People and Magnus & Alec as Guardians Between Worlds, and also some background Magnus’ Found Family & Lightwood Family Feels (maybe some clizzy?) and I left a Madzie plot-thread dangling from the first one on purpose even but I think this one had too many ideas and not enough focus so it’s sort of sprawling all over a doc with a lot of “???” in it

“procedural-ish” -this was originally going to be a sex-farce. and then it turned more serious. and then maybe kind of copaganda which was uncomfortable in terms of the Everything That Is The News in 2020, and then maybe it was more a Mafia AU and at that point I had self-inflicted tone whiplash and I wished the voices in my head were a little more forthcoming about their plans so I stopped before I brained myself on my computer monitor in frustration.

“I had rather a rose than live forever” -I started a reverse!verse Malec (Shadowhunter!Magnus, High Warlock!Alec) for bingo last year, and I couldn’t quite get it together in time, so I made a moodboard inspired by the bits I’d started instead. I may see if one of my prompts from Bingo this year help me finish it?

“fall fright fest (practical magic  au)” -exactly what it says on the tin! almost exactly a year old & neglected! IDEK ANYMORE (I talked about this one with the WIP meme last time tho: here)

“priest!kink theology?” -I thought it was gonna be smut? I like priest!kink. I have made other people like it and yell at me even! But then I kept diverging into demon!Magnus thinking about Priest!Alec’s faith and as usual, IDEK ANYMORE *laughs*

(If they’re remotely canon-adjacent or divergent, a bunch of these are in here because I need to rewatch the show to get the pacing/timing/tone right and I haven’t, and I don’t know why, because I enjoy the show, but BRAINS! Are Dumb! So I guess that’s it?)

“I do” -I have tried to write this damnable Malec arranged marriage fic like six different times. I have signed up for fic exchanges and bangs with it, I have rewritten massive sections, trying to change tone or structure or POV or whatever, and it basically comes down to they like each other too fast and I keep not gutting it enough to get back to a useful pace, but by the time I realized that I was on take six and kind of sick of it. I may get back to it eventually

“wing!fic” -canon divergent in early s1, trying to deal with the consequences of Simon’s kidnapping as the Truly Serious Event that it should have been. It uh. Got heavier than I expected with those consequences (considering it was originally just supposed to be Alec’s wings flirting with Magnus) and also see above re: rewatching for pacing.

“2x20 aftermath/date night/pandemonium porn“ -yes that is the actual wip title. It used to be “spite fic” because I was originally inspired by fighting against a lot of fic!Alec characterization that was clearly based more on the books and ATG syndrome than the Alec in the show, which is the Alec I know and like and want to read about. BUT, pacing and etc. again, I think. Also I have somehow entirely lost my knack for writing porn, which makes it difficult to finish something originally intended to be smut!fic. Or even teasing almost!smut.

“rubbish heap” -so this is about three different fics that I realized complemented each other really well so they’re now all in the same file as I try to turn them into the sequel of “with an if in its soul”. It includes amnesia, parabatai lore shenanigans, a s3 rewrite, and some truly awful Owl adjustments that make me wince in horrified authorly delight and pain. BUT, as with the other ones in this file, the scope is large and I normally write short-fic and I kind of just threw up my hands in exasperation. I may have to break it back up into the three different fics instead, if I ever actually want to write it. Them? But also I need to take better notes on s3 to make sure I have what I need in here.

SH Pt 2: Started posting or not yet in hiatus because it’s actually almost ready to be a thing in the real world! maybe!?

“kisses (firsts)” -I actually started publishing this one, a “series of firsts” that was supposed to be kind of relationship milestones and kind of an excuse for smut, and then there wasn’t that much smut and I lost momentum and also dear lords & ladies the timeline is stupid, wtf. I may not ever add to this one, tbqh. It doesn’t stop in a terrible place, and they’re all ficlets so they stand alone all right.

“clizzy epilogue” -this is blank atm, it’s more a reminder for me to keep poking away at my “girls who can’t breathe air, only fire” collection BECAUSE I WOULD LIKE TO ACTUALLY GET TO THE CLIZZY AT SOME POINT

"mer!alec" -pts 2-4 of a series, but apparently having an actual plan gets in the way of me *writing* the thing, and I haven't managed to throw the half an outline far enough away from my brain to be able to write again. Or something like that.

"ibhww" -if broken hearts were whole is a soulmate fic I started a million years ago, and purposefully set aside to finish some other WIPs because I thought they'd be quick, and now it's just buried under two and a half years of regret and shame so it's hard to get back to it

"iafy" -i am for you is a delightful & frothy semi-epistolary fluff piece that also just lost momentum because Life & 2020 & etc. It's far and away the most popular thing I've ever posted on AO3, which also makes me feel weird sometimes, and I feel like the fact that there's no grand conclusion planned, just a bit more fluff and settling in, might end up being disappointing? Basically, it's the first time I think I've psyched myself out about reader expectations, and until I get over that I'm going to have trouble finishing the last couple chapters. (There really are probably only two more chapters though. IT’S SO CLOSE, I wish I could just... write it. And yet?)

“fake-hating” -I do not like fake dating as a trope that much, I just do not get it, but I love outside POVs and arranged marriages and there’s this delighful tumblr post about how they wished there was more fic about people who were together but had to pretend they werent’, and uh. This may be that? Eventually? I’m not exhausted by my failure to finish it yet, so it’s still in the regular folder rather than the hiatus folder, even though nothing’s been posted for it.

AND I THINK THAT’S IT?

Not as terrible as it could be, but still. MANY WORDS THAT MAY NEVER SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY. Posting the equivalent of one’s old ratty sketchbook is always a weird feeling. :D

[veliseraptor]

tagged by @why-this-kolaveri-machi in this one - thanks! nice and short and since my brain is struggling to focus on anything why not

AO3 Name: Lise

Fandoms: I have cruised through many fandoms over the years and am probably more properly multifandom now than I’ve been in a long time. I think the MCU remains far and away the thing I’ve written the most fic for, though now I’m sticking my legs in The Untamed and I’ve written a lot for a few other fandoms (notably Supernatural, Wheel of Time, Black Jewels Trilogy, Doctrine of Labyrinths, A Song of Ice and Fire, and The Silmarillion).

Fic you spent the most time on: If we count Remember This Cold as a single fic (I don’t, really) I’m closing in on eight years on that one, but the runner-up is Life In Reverse which took six years to write. I’m pretty sure that’s still true, though I know there are WIPs on my hard drive that have technically been in progress longer at that point.

But that’s the one that’s actually finished that took longest.

Fic you spent the least amount of time on: Oh, Jesus. I don’t know. I have a number of oneshots that were very ‘I wrote this in about three hours over the course of an afternoon, no idea how’ but I don’t remember which ones. I think my body’s made of shell might have been one of those? More recently the martyr, the victim also happened like this.

Longest fic: Single fic (so, not by verse), easily it’s Life in Reverse at 228,217 words. 

Shortest fic: There’s a lot of short (including literal drabble) works on my Tumblr and I have no idea which of them is shortest, and there are a lot of things there, so I’m just going to go with the shortest posted on AO3, which is After the War (349 words).

Most hits: .I tend to rule out multichapter fic for these questions because they’re always going to get artificial inflation by virtue of having more chapters to get hits on, so skipping down past Life in Reverse and Halfway House it is actually I heard you killed your only friend last year.

Most kudos: Once again (unsurprisingly) Life in Reverse - the next most is Steve Rogers’ Halfway House for Notorious Supervillains, though it is a substantial gap.

Most comment threads: If I skip over multichapter fic again (because, again, artificial inflation), it is the ship at the end of the universe.

Fave fic you wrote: Lord, I don’t know. Depends on the day (and time of day, and mood at the time, and who’s asking). Right now I am deeply proud of everyone else is spring bound - might be my favorite thing I’ve written in a while.

Fic you want to rewrite/expand on: If I let myself think about this too much the list would be a mile long, and also the list of “fics I could write sequels to and am actively trying not to” is as long as my arm. I feel like there’s a number of Silmarillion fics I’d rewrite if I felt like I could go back to them without wanting to crawl into a hole and die. Some older Maeglin fic, maybe. 

Or I could write another Celegorm’s Death fic, I’ve only written four of them so far and it’s been a few years, surely I’ve gotten better in that time. Would be fun to have, like, a Celegorm’s Death Fic for every five years. 

I want to write more in the Maeglin-lives AU, which is one of those nice AUs that’s so open-door for me I can just kind of wander back into it when I feel like being sad about my terrible son. (No, the other one. No, the other other one.)

But yeah, ask me how many of my WIPs are actually sequels to things I’ve written before.

Share a bit of your WIP or share a story idea that you’re planning: The fic I’m currently trying to finish is a post-Untamed terrible road trip fic between Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji full of passive aggression and some aggression aggression and the continuing adventures in Jiang Cheng’s attempts to deal with his emotions and not being very good at it. 

Excerpt:

“How could you let him leave,” he said, his voice thick.

He was aware of Lan Wangji falling still. Stiller than usual. “I told you. Wei Ying said he wanted to go. I was respecting his wishes.”

“Fuck his wishes,” Jiang Cheng said with feeling. “When have Wei Wuxian’s wishes gotten him anywhere good?”

Lan Wangji somehow got even stiller. His eyes were in shadow, and he said nothing. 

“I’m right,” Jiang Cheng said fiercely. “You know I’m right. If you’d asked, he’d’ve stayed.”

The other one is also Untamed fic and is fondly known as the worst found family fic, or else “this is going to be the most fucked up happy ending ever.”

I tag - @orodrethsgeek, @paradife-loft, @thelightofthingshopedfor, @loxxxlay, @midnight-mismanagement, @mostfacinorous and @cigaretteburnslikefairylights...I don’t remember how many people I was supposed to tag here, let’s go with that?

[psyga315]

Rewriting a Mykan fanfic: Hate of the Sea

I don’t have a hatred towards Dakari King Mykan and I don’t think he’d want any pity. When he isn’t guided by biases or how he wanted something to end, he can write decent stories. No blockbusters but definitely not bad.

However, that’s the problem with Mykan. He views life in a way that’s so cynical, that even I, a guy who has quite a lot of cynical fanfics up his sleeve (including some rewrites that are darker than the shows they try to fix), reel in disgust. Mykan is a guy who goes out of his way to make a character from My Little Pony have a miscarriage because he didn’t like how she represents love. And that was just the one of two options people got to vote for. The other was killing off her husband for that exact same reason. The lightest story he wrote that I read was about a down-on-his-luck character-of-the-week from Inuyasha ends up getting together with the woman he loved.

So, I decided to use my slightly optimistic approach to stories to write up an alternate take on Mykan’s story: Hate of the Sea, a Little Mermaid fanfic where Mykan’s intent was to give Ariel and Melody a lesson about the real world, that not everything has a happy ever after ending… And I’m not sure if he’s read up on how the original Little Mermaid ended.

First off, let’s change that theme. We’ll still teach Ariel and Melody a lesson about the real world, but a lot less cynical: the cycle of revenge. Yes, yes, roll your eyes, but before Neil Druckmann destroyed that message to hell and back (along with some unpaid employees), the tale of someone wanting revenge and the pain of actually going through with it is an interesting tale that has multiple outcomes depending on your outlook. Do you want to be a cynic and show how revenge can make someone as ugly as the person who wronged them in the first place? An optimist who wants to show a more peace filled solution to the conflict? Someone who just wants someone to say “payback is a bitch” and leave it at that? Or are you a middle-of-the-road guy who observes the theme and stretches it out to its logical conclusion?

And, best part is, the ground work is already laid out for us. If you can, read Hate of the Sea to see what I’m talking about. You’ll get a better idea of where I’m going with this. For now, though, let’s start at the beginning. Things stay relatively the same, with a throwaway line about how Tip and Dash, Melody’s sidekicks in Little Mermaid 2, returned to the arctic because it’s summer time. The immediate change will be Count Aquis’s minions: Electricon and Angelicon.

A slight change though, making them more mystical than the sudden technological shift, to better tie in with the mythos of the Little Mermaid, so no piranha missiles. Also, I’d probably rename them because they’re honestly generic (and would be better for Transformer faction names anyways) but the best I can think of is Eelektross for Electricon and I think that’s already taken. Think I’ll go with Uma for the Angel monster and Leech for the Eel.

The biggest change, though, comes in Count Aquis. I’ll give more details later, but the long story short of it is that he’s looking for Melody. We don’t know this at first, instead having him vaguely saying “where is she” and giving the wrong memo that he meant Ariel. The group is successful in sacking a town and capturing mermaids. They leave the mermen and other sea creatures be. Upon seeing Triton, he has it out for him and tries to kill him, only for Flounder to take the blow.

Flounder retreats to the surface to warn Ariel of her impending danger while Triton faces Aquis off, leaving his fate unknown. Melody’s interactions with Samuel stays the same. Scuttle comes by later that night to deliver an injured Flounder who warns that there’s a terrible threat in the ocean that’s looking for Ariel. The first conclusion they reach is that it’s someone with a connection to Ursula, given the last person who gave them trouble was her sister, but Flounder gives them a description of the man and even says how his hate seems to know no bounds… He then passes away, signifying that this is serious business. Ariel mourns for her closest friend as Eric and Melody comfort her.

Cut to Aquis, where I don’t change a lot of what happens. I think increase the bickering between Leech and Uma and showcase their characteristics a bit more. I kinda see a Sidorak and Roodaka (from Bionicle) relationship between them where Leech is the brawn who thinks he’s top of the world and Uma is the brains who seeks Aquis’s sole approval, though that’s probably because I recently seen a review of Web of Shadows and thought Roodaka was a cool villain. That or increase the Jindrax/Toxica relation and have them bicker, yes, but still show how much of good friends they are.

Either way, Aquis cares not. He wants Melody no matter what. We also see his sea-mutants, horrific mishmashes of sea creatures (If you played Impossible Creatures, you’ll have some idea of what I mean), and how little he cares of them, as he eats a shrimp-jellyfish hybrid right in front of Leech and Uma to emphasize what kind of punishment they would receive should they fail him. They go on their way as Aquis looks at the amulet he has… and cries.

As before, Melody’s interactions with Samuel are the same, but Samuel’s discussion about his master is changed. Instead, he reveals that he was adopted by a person and is considered to be a father to him. Basically, he doesn’t have the “used to be a street rat until Aquis found me and paid me to do his dirty work”. This adds a little more mystery to who the “Surface Agent” is. Another thing to note is that Samuel was orphaned as a baby in a shipwreck and, eerily enough, he’s about a year or so older than Melody, which causes the people who’ve seen the Little Mermaid to go “ooooooooh nooooo…”

Instead of coming across Leech and Uma, Samuel comes across a new person: Professor Aquarius, his adoptive father. At first, Samuel is excited about the new girl he met and how he’s in love. Aquarius seems to be proud of him until he says that her name is Melody. Aquarius then scowls, but doesn’t say anything. Last thing he wants is to invoke Romeo and Juliet on his son. Instead, he encourages him to keep hanging out with Melody, even giving him a pat on the back, which turns out to be a leech-dolphin hybrid that latches onto the nape of his neck and emits sonar for him to sense.

To confirm who he is, Aquarius feels his skin drying up as he gasps for air. He then runs to an already filled tub and slams his head into it, his face shedding any human features in trade for the more ferocious looking face of Count Aquis. The next chapter opens with Aquis returning to his lair, with Uma asking if he managed to find the girl. He says yes, but they need to wait for the right time. Uma asks if Aquis loves the surface so much that he would abandon his mission. She sings a song to the tune of the Reversed Song of Healing (The notes will be reversed, meaning it’d be preformed without the song actually going backwards, if that makes sense) that reminds him of years gone by.

At this same time, this is where we get the info dump on who Professor Aquarius was from Eric, who learned of him when he was a kid. While Aquarius was denounced as a madman for concluding his research in intelligent life in the sea with “there’s mermaids!”, he managed to hook up with an idealist whose mind was wide open and they went sailing in search for the mermaids, vowing to find a way to live underwater so that drowning wouldn’t be a fate.

However, as Eric says how they disappeared off the face of the earth, the song becomes a harsh, oceanic operetta where we see a flashback to Aquarius and his wife, who is holding a newly born baby, braving through a storm. Flashes of lightning shows a silhouette of a figure emerging from the water with a strong glow. Then, lightning hits the ship, destroying it and separating Aquarius from his wife and daughter. We see the wife land, only to see the mast fall on top of her (with that traditional Disney cut away to show Aquarius’s reaction). The baby ends up being swept in the sea as Aquarius falls ever deeper in the midnight sea…

It then cuts to Aquis’s crying face as he wipes his tears. Uma lets Aquis mourn in peace and solidify his feelings for revenge. She then goes to Leech, who is annoyed and asks “how much longer do we need to put up with that crybaby?” To which she responds: “patience, he’ll get what we need soon enough and then…”, and, as a cruel call back, she too eats a shrimp-jellyfish to show what she means. They then hear metal break and they go to investigate it.

Eric decides to break the tension by asking Melody how the date went, much to her embarrassment. However, before they could discuss any further, they hear a cry for help and immediately go despite the clear warning against going into the sea. There, they see a woman trying to escape the clutches of Leech and Uma. Ariel and Melody manage to get them away, with Sebastian having in on the action.

“Dat one’z for Flounda, ye beeches!” as he snips on Leech’s tail.

They rescue the woman and bring her to safety. They find out her name is Atta and that she was imprisoned with members of a resistance force who had been fighting Aquis for twenty years. She explains more about who Aquis is and why he didn’t intervene during Little Mermaids 1, 2, 3, and the show (long story short, the resistance kept Aquis busy and his goals would conflict with the Octo-sisters and Marina anyways), and also tells Ariel that Triton’s alive and is recovering at her place. Ariel wants to go, but Eric tries to stop her, saying that they barely made it out of fighting Leech and Uma alive and that it would be safer if they remained on dry land.

Melody, however, insists. Samuel gets involved as well, and he joins the party. Instead of a pill that turns Eric and Samuel into the N64 Zora, it’d be a magic amulet that Triton had been crafting ever since Melody destroyed the wall and reunited humanity with mermanity. Atta leads them to the resistance HQ known as Sanctuary and red flags blare up when she insists no one tell anyone where it is.

Triton and Ariel reunite, though not without bringing up how Flounder died. Triton is a bit remorseful, but we don’t know why. Likewise, Samuel looks to be intimidated by Triton’s presence, something that Melody notices. She just assumes it’s because Triton has a six pack or some other silly reason. Triton then explains what he knows of Aquis, or rather, his master, Oceanus.

Oceanus was a Titan who dueled with Triton’s father, Poseidon and the battle rendered the seas blood red (hence the Red Sea) and they had no means to defeat Oceanus. So, they used a planetary alignment of every planet up to Saturn to open up a gate to Tartarus and seal Oceanus up. Keen-eyed viewers will note that the bars have been broken and they had to fix it, reflecting how this took place after Hercules.

As far as Triton’s concerned, Oceanus is still sealed up, but he has an idea on who Aquis is… He says that he might be Oceanus’s prophet. Someone who lives only to serve Oceanus. Later on, Melody and Samuel chat and while Samuel doesn’t say much, what he does say solidifies their love for each other. As Melody goes to talk with her parents, Uma and Leech tell him that he needs to break the barrier. As Samuel refuses, the leech begins to dig deep into his neck and the blood begins to attract sharks. Uma reveals through this that she’s the one who is able to mutate the creatures to be hybrids. Leech wraps himself around Samuel and tells him flat out that if he doesn’t do as they say, he’s dead.

Samuel is forced to go to his chagrin. Meanwhile, Atta talks with Ariel about the struggles of being a mother, to which Atta replies that she has no family, or any memory of one. All she does is serve the resistance. Up to the betrayal, it plays out normally. The only change would be Samuel trying to say why he was afraid of Triton, only for Aquis emerges to capture Melody. She begs Samuel to help her, but Samuel frowns.

“You did well, son.” Aquis pats Samuel on the back and tells Melody that he was the one who rescued him from the storm. When Melody asks if he’s lying, Samuel confirms, then grips his fists.

“This was all… for what your grandfather took from me that night!” Samuel said as Melody is knocked unconscious. She then wakes up in a cell where Samuel sees her as they have a rather sad duet about how Samuel could never be part of any world, not because he backstabs people, but because he does it out of the hatred in his heart. Out of spite. The sad thing is, he’s painfully aware of it and knows that what he has to do next will destroy his bond with Melody: avenge his parents by killing Triton.

Back at the Sanctuary, it gets invaded by Leech and Uma in an attempt to crush them. They succeed and take them prisoner, including Ariel and co. Samuel awaits in a chamber with Aquis and asks why they must harm Melody. Aquis then explains how Melody is a product of true love and that destroying it would cause even the cosmos to despair and lend its energy to Oceanus. Samuel frowns before Aquis reminds him that Triton brought this onto himself.

Because Eric is captured too, we cut a large chunk out that I felt was unneeded. So, Eric wakes up with the rest as Aquis comes in. This is the first time he sees Aquis. He also sees Melody on an altar and puts two and two together, demanding that Aquis lets her go and even offering to take her place. Aquis wants none of this and seaweeds his mouth shut. He then explains that he’ll sacrifice Melody to Oceanus and destroy the entire sea level. Eric bites through the seaweed and demands to know who Aquis is.

Aquis takes off his mask as we see a gillman version of Aquarius with pointed teeth. They all retch at his form, even Samuel, as he explains that he would have died during the storm if it wasn’t for Oceanus offering a helping hand. In trade for servitude, Oceanus would give him the means to conduct revenge. He then forces Triton to confess. Triton frowns and we get another view of that operetta where we see the man with the glowing power was actually Triton.

Ariel wonders why he would do such a thing, to which Triton confessed that he was grieving for Athena, his wife, and wanted revenge and so killed any humans who would dare swim over Alantica. He mellowed out when Ariel met Eric, obviously, but that’s when Samuel calls him out. This is the first time Eric and Ariel see Samuel on the villain’s side, but as soon as he brings up his pain, they understand.

“ADMIT IT! YOU KILLED MY PARENTS TOO! YOUR XENOPHOBIC FERVOR RUINED MY LIFE!” Samuel cries out.

“… Yes… I did it. It’s all my fault. I’m the reason your parents are killed… Please, if it satisfies you… Kill me instead. Oceanus would be pleased to know the blood of Poseidon’s only son will sate his thirst than a granddaughter.” He accepts his fate…

But Aquis wants none of it. He tells Samuel to kill Melody and let her blood attract Oceanus out of prison while the eclipse is about to begin. Samuel looks over Melody, who defiantly stares at him, as though goading him to do it. Samuel cries and says “I’m sorry”…

Before impaling Aquis with his dagger. He says that he’ll take up Triton’s offer and frees Melody. Melody, however, attacks Samuel and the two struggle over the dagger. Ariel is moved to tears at seeing what would have been lovers driven to try and kill each other. We’re not gonna make it too violent, just grabbing each other and tussling around.

Uma and Leech come in to Aquis’s aid, or rather, to kill the mermen (and Eric), but as soon as Uma sees Ariel, she takes the time to gloat about how her happily ever after will be a happily never after. Melody warns Ariel of her mutant controlling powers and Eric manages to deck her in the face. Triton recognizes Uma’s witchery and calls her out for learning under Ursula. Uma laughs… Ursula isn’t her teacher. She’s her mother.

Eric’s like “let me guess, you want revenge too?”, but then she laughs. She never knew her mother personally and in order to have hate, you would need to know what love is. She only wants to bring Oceanus back so that she can do what her family failed to do long ago: rule the ocean. While this is going on, Melody gets the upper hand and holds the dagger over Samuel’s neck… She struggles… then drops the dagger and cries. She doesn’t want to kill her first love. She lets Samuel go after tossing the dagger away and Samuel has no idea what to do…

He then sees Uma approach the trident that had been locked up and takes it for herself, smiling at the fact that she’ll be the third member of her family to wield the power to shape the oceans as she sees fit… As she uses it to cause lightning storms, Samuel has flashbacks to when he was a baby. His family was caught in a rough storm and one thing he remembers was a large silhouette of a creature with many tendrils holding the Trident.

Those same tendrils emerge from Uma as she uses the Trident. He began to draw his conclusion and, in a rage, tackles Uma to the ground, knocking her and causing the Trident to hit Leech. Leech has a dumb muscle moment where he goes “I don’t feel so good…” before fading away. Uma sees Leech disappear and is distraught. She then glares at Samuel and tries to kill him, only for his fist to punch her face.

“YOU DID IT?! DIDN’T YOU!? YOU KILLED MY PARENTS!” Samuel shouted. Melody pulls him away as Uma gets up. Now she’s lusting for revenge. Aquis, however, gets up and is armed with the Trident. Samuel quickly breaks the group out and now we get a free-for-all, but, without the trident, they can’t win. Atta gets close to killing him… But then notices something familiar. She remembers a man over her crib, singing a lullaby version of Under The Sea. The man? Aquarius.

“Dad?” She asks. Aquarius is confused… She then recites the song. Sebastian just gives the dude the stink eye and goes “dood, ya reep aff mah sheet, mon?” Aquarius remembers his own daughter and holds her tightly. Atta then remembers what happened that night. As she sank to the ocean, Triton managed to save her life and, believing her life would be better off as a mermaid, turned her into one.

Aquarius is both mad and glad at Triton for saving his daughter. He had no idea how to react… Nor will he have the chance as Uma claws into Aquarius.

“You took away the one thing I cherished in this cesspool of an ocean… Now… I take away your lives!” She then causes him to bleed profusely, the blood being used to summon Oceanus. Oceanus takes over the body of Aquis and he has a tentaclelike aura kinda like Ashitaka’s arm from Princess Mononoke, just to emphasize the theme of hate. And, like before, Oceanus eats Uma to boost his powers.

The final battle commences like normal, except that Aquarius’s actions are “be a monster”. Samuel and Melody manage to impale the possessed Aquis and, as Oceanus began to retreat, Triton zaps him with the Trident, rendering the weakened Titan into nothing but sea foam. The oceans are returned to normal.

The final chapter is where things are completely different. Aquarius lays dying from his wound. Triton approaches Aquarius and apologizes for his crimes. Aquarius smiles and says how he managed to do good in his xenophobic rage… He then pleads to Triton to take care of Atta for him before he dies. Atta grieves for her father, but doesn’t let it turn into rage. She instead asks Triton to make her a human so that she could live where her father once lived, to be a part of his world.

He complies, makes her human, and then goes to Samuel, who feels conflicted with the whole ordeal, asking Triton what actually happened that night. Triton mentions Uma’s mother, Ursula, and how she terrorized the ocean for a brief while. As far as he was concerned, the ship he was on was completely wrecked and there were no survivors. When he said it was his fault, he refers to how she managed to get the Trident in the first place: through manipulating Ariel who had been criminally neglected. Samuel looks over to Aquarius and mourns him, saying how he was a father when he had none and now that he’s gone, there’s nothing left to look forward to.

Atta offers a home with her, saying they’ll pick up the pieces together. Samuel jumps on the offer, then goes to Melody, apologizing for the betrayal and nearly killing her grandfather. She does the one thing he has no idea how to react to: She forgives him. She forgives Aquis. And like that, the cycle of revenge ends… But… For someone who all their life had knew nothing but hate of the sea… That’s not enough.

He apologizes to Melody, but even though he’s forgiven by her, he still can’t forgive himself, especially with his feelings towards Triton not going away any time soon. So, he departs with Atta, much to Melody’s sadness, but the overall note is that, once he’s gotten over himself, he’ll reunite with her, as we see a year later where he return to Melody, a better man now.

We end with the two sharing a kiss as we zoom out to the ocean, ending the Little Mermaid 4: Hate of the Sea and the overall moral being that revenge is a painful cycle and it only ends with forgiveness.

[cutiegrumpycerym]

New boy ! You know what that means ? New comic ! The comic will be very short, it will just tell his full story. Here is now a full reference for him !

Name : Aion

Age : ?

AU : He comes from a dead AU, but its name was Aiontale.

Role : Gardian of Time in the multiverse. His role is to protect timelines and worldlines of the AUs, preventing useless resets done by the humans, and restoring corrupted timelines when he can.

He is NEUTRAL, so he doesn’t save anybody from they fatality. He is also not interested in making people happy. He just does his job, and wants to “pass time” by finding entertainments for himself. So he is more exactly CHAOTIC NEUTRAL.

His role is also to help the Creators to find the time they need to create AUs. And the time they need to rest, because it’s also important. His point of view on this will be explained in the comic.

Backstory : For some reasons that will be explained in the comic, his AU died, consumed. Every inhabitants was “falling down” one by one. To avoid this fatality, Aion had to destroy his own SOUL before it consumed by itself, letting him “fall down” too to die. It also erased him from the existence of every timeline and worldline possible, separating his Fate from the Fate of his world. Also, everyone would have forgot him, like he never existed. They wouldn’t even see him, as it was like if he was non-existent. He lost his ability to feel, and his memories. When he woke up, his world was just gone.

The first person he met in the multiverse was Error, who obviously tried to erase him from existence. But he couldn’t do what was already done in a certain way, so he simply tried to kill him. But Aion abilities made his magic useless, so Error gave up, upset. But the fight exhausted Aion and drained all his magic which couldn’t re-new.

Ink found him after a time, inconscious. He was interested by his story which looked similar to his own. For this only reason, he helped Aion to leanr many things like his abilities, how the multiverse worked, and the role he should have. Only because Ink was curious and fascinated.

Fresh was the third person Aion met, but they didn’t talked for a long time. But Aion has a better feeling with Fresh, because he is more similar to him than Ink is.

He also met Lust and found him particularly interesting, but I’ll keep this story for later~

Abilities :

- Two swords swordsmen. His swords are clockwise. The minute-hand, Kairos, can “slash time”. The hour-hand, Chronos, can “block time”. The second-hand, Aion, is not a weapon but a tool which allows him to “rewrite time”. He can change the past, the future and even the Fate of a person or a timeline. But as he is neutral and is not able to care about people, he just uses it to restore damaged timelines. He also doesn’t sees the point in fighting, especially with Error. So he never fights seriously.

- He can see Past, and all Futures possible of any living creatures thanks to the red belt around his coat. The problem is he can’t predict which future can occur. The only future he can see with perfection are only the next few seconds or minutes. He also oftenly confuses Past and Future with the Present time he is actually in, so he can say very confusing things to people.

- He is also aware of every alternate realities that exists thanks to Creators. So he knows about Sanscest, Fontcest, ship childs, and even fusions like AccidentVerse. But he can’t access them. He can just have a glimpse during his “dreaming sessions”.

- As a SOULLESS being, he can’t dream. He actually sees Past, Futures and Alternate Realities during his sleeps. It just confuses him a lot because he can’t distinguish what’s real or which “time” it corresponds to.

- He can feel. He actually knows two spells.

- “Chrono Stasis” allows him to “kill the time”. Basically, he can stop time. But he can do it only on living beings. Not on an entire timeline. That kinda useful in fights !

- “Chrono Anastasis” is the reversed spell, which means “Resurrection of Time”. This spell allows him to do a lot of things like healing people or cancel magic attacks, but it especially allows him to “steal and consume time” of living beings or timelines to “go back in time” for himself, bringing him back the feelings he had when he still had a SOUL. But the thing is that he’ll remain soulless, so he doesn’t know HOW to feel. Nor when, nor why. It’s just kinda confusing to him.

- This spell also allows him to re-new his lost magic. It’s the only way for him to use magic.

- This spell basically converts the time of other living things to Aion’s own benefit. But it has its risks. Each universe and person has its own resistance. Its own limit of time before being destroyed. If Aion passes this limit of time for a timeline, it will shatter and disappear like it didn’t existed. That’s why each time he enters a universe or see someone he want to use “Chrono Anastasis” on, his internal clock (located in his left eye) tells him how much time he can use it.

- If for example he uses “Chrono Anastasis” during 6 hours on a timeline, he will hace to restore those 6 hours to the timeline, losing his ability to feel and re-new his magic, and he will have to wait 6 hours before using it again, repeating the cycle. Everything’s proportional !

- His internal clock indicates him what time it is in each AU he enters, as notion of time is messed up in the multiverse.

Trivia :

- If he is too much disturbed and loses his focus, he will lose track of time and his internal clock won’t be able to update again. That’s why to prevent that, he also thinks to put his watches on the right hour. But if he forgot, and lost track of time, he will have a huge panic attack.

- When he looses track of time, his left eye will show a red hourglass instead of a green clock.

- When he is thinking, the hourglass will also show up !

- The color of the clock / hourglass depends on his “emotions”. Green if he feels okay, red if he doesn’t.

- He has a huge phobia of not being able to know the time and measure it. So he basically hates voids because time doesn’t exist there, so his internal clock can’t do anything for him.

- When he doesn’t feel, he quickly loses track of time in an AU as he is not able to “feel the time” anymore. So he will rely on his watches. If he forgot to put them on the right hour, he will just stay immobile until he compketely blacks-out, like a broken clock.

- He hates to wait.

- He hates wastes of time.

- He has also a huge phobia of “being inexistant”, or just not living. That’s why he entertains himself in any ways possible to feel alive. That’s why he feels so alike with Fresh.

- He met many people, outcodes like Paper Crane, and even Template and Pale. He likes Pale a lot while he can’t understand Template.

- He really likes most of the Floweys.

- He developped sadistic tendancies, so he will purposely say scary things to people just to see how they will react.

- Or mainly because he can’t realize when he does something bad. Heh. He can’t feel. That’s pretty hard for him to figure this out, or understand others or even feel empathy for them !

- He can purposely act annoying. Just for fun. He is the kind of guy to SLUUUURP intensely what he is drinking right next to somebody just to watch they reaction. Cuz dat’s funny lol.

- He finds Lust very fascinating. Because he doesn’t understand him and is curious. And because WOW. “HIS DIFFERENT PASTS, FUTURES AND EVEN SELFS IN ALTERNATE REALITIES ARE COMPLETELY WACC ! GOOD JOB CREATORS !”

- Laughs at everything.

- Doesn’t understand metaphors. And many things about people.

- Tells time-related puns. Of course.

- HE LOVES ALL OBJECTS RELATED TO TIME. OH MY. WATCHES AND HOURGLASSES ARE SO GOOD.

- His favorite food are niku-pan. Also called bobuns (I believe ?) You know ? Those soft breads with meat inside ? Delicious~ “He could kill for it~”

- He enjoys to do scary smiles like Flowey, just to scare people. That’s funny too.

- When he feels, his emotions are very random unlike Ink. This spell is based on his Memories. And the freshest and most traumatizing memory he has is the feeling of terror and despair he felt as the idea of dying while seeing his own world shatter.

- So yes. When he feels, he is very anguished. Most of the time. That why he does anything to feel better and amused.

- He anguishes a lot when someone points out his bad or inappropriate behaviors whereas he can’t even understand what he did wrong. Then he will feel frustrated of not being able to understand.

- He can’t give a proper definition to feelings. He knows what are basic emotions such as joy, sadness, anger or fear. But that’s all. He doesn’t even know what Disgust or Disappointment are.

- He acts like a jerk without knowing it. And when he knows, he doesn’t care. He is Neutral !

- When he doesn’t feel, he can feel fear in very critical or dangerous moments, because our brains are programmed to create a reaction similar to this feeling that doesn’t depend on SOULs. Like with Flowey. That’s called “Survival Instinct”. Something very present within Aion.

- Aion is the metaphysical time. The time we can’t measure, such as generations, age, fate, ETERNITY. This is one of the three types of time with Chronos and Kairos.

- No one knows if he can use magic in the same way as other Sanses, like bones or Gaster Blasters. Even him. He haven’t found yet any memory about magic from his world.

- “To find the Time, we need a lot of Patience, and Perseverance !”

“Well, see you in the comic, Creators !”

————– Aion!Sans and Aiontale by me Art by me

PLEASE DON’T REPOST, COPY, TRACE NOR USE MY ART ! REBLOGS ARE HIGHLY APPRECIATED ! ^^

(Click for better resolution !)

[plainviewed]

Hi! I’ve been following you for a lil lil bit, but already you seem super smart and knowledgeable so.. what are some books or other pieces of writing you think everyone should read? Have a lovely day!

B’aww, thank you! <3 You too nonnie! <3

Just off the top of my head at three o’clock in the morning, and the qualification that you provided that its something that ‘everyone should read,’ I’m going to go for more books that I found changed me fundamentally, as a person, after reading them. That may be a self-help book; that might be a societal critique, that might be a work of classic literature. I tried to give a bit of everything. <3

 I’ll put a little copy-and-paste synopsis here for you for each book, and will elaborate if necessary in brackets. 

BEHOLD: LAUREN’S LIST OF LITERARY RECOMMENDATIONS:

From My (Non-Law) Bookcase (But still are about political issues):

Rage Becomes Her: The Power of Women’s Anger by Soraya Chemaly: 

‘As women, we’ve been urged for so long to bottle up our anger, letting it corrode our bodies and minds in ways we don’t even realize. Yet there are so, so many legitimate reasons for us to feel angry, ranging from blatant, horrifying acts of misogyny to the subtle drip, drip drip of daily sexism that reinforces the absurdly damaging gender norms of our society. In Rage Becomes Her, Soraya Chemaly argues that our anger is not only justified, it is also an active part of the solution. We are so often encouraged to resist our rage or punished for justifiably expressing it, yet how many remarkable achievements would never have gotten off the ground without the kernel of anger that fueled them? Approached with conscious intention, anger is a vital instrument, a radar for injustice and a catalyst for change. On the flip side, the societal and cultural belittlement of our anger is a cunning way of limiting and controlling our power—one we can no longer abide.’

Academic Ableism: Disability and Higher Education by Jay T. Dolmage:

‘Academic Ableism brings together disability studies and institutional critique to recognize the ways that disability is composed in and by higher education, and rewrites the spaces, times, and economies of disability in higher education to place disability front and center. For too long, argues Jay Timothy Dolmage, disability has been constructed as the antithesis of higher education, often positioned as a distraction, a drain, a problem to be solved. The ethic of higher education encourages students and teachers alike to accentuate ability, valorize perfection, and stigmatize anything that hints at intellectual, mental, or physical weakness, even as we gesture toward the value of diversity and innovation. Examining everything from campus accommodation processes, to architecture, to popular films about college life, Dolmage argues that disability is central to higher education, and that building more inclusive schools allows better education for all.’

(This book strays into more academic categories, but it’s still really great that this sort of book is being written. I personally recognise its value as someone with mental health struggles and who has had to fight ironically in the legal sphere for myself in terms of finding support within my own career moving forward as a lawyer/legal academic. I think the fact that the narrative that disabilities are seen as the antithesis of secondary education despite claims of diversity is something that all university students need to guard themselves against, or at least educate themselves on, in order to work against some systems that even though they espouse equality, might not have their best interests at heart. 

I’ve ironically found this especially terrible in law, where my first term of law school I was told ‘girls like you don’t go to law school,’ followed by constant questioning by the community at large after graduate that any hint of mental weakness equates to being unfit to practice law. This is despite the majority of lawyers having mental health problems, if not full blown addictions. It’s honestly why I’m pivoting back to academia (law prof), or moving to practice for the government (which enforces union restrictions on how long a lawyer can actually work, where firms just actually work them to death without union protections ironically; ugh. My whole point is, I’m not ashamed of having mental health problems in a field largely categorised by achievements in secondary education. I feel no reason to hide it, even though people tell me to. If someone is ashamed of me over something I had no control over developing, then I probably don’t want to be involved with them, do I? (A good method I recommend; it may cut off some superficial ‘friends’/’opportunities,’ but it leads to those who truly understand what a mental health disability may entail, and how strong you are for overcoming it).

White Fragility: Why It’s so Hard to for White People to Talk about Racism by Robin DiAngelo:

The New York Times best-selling book exploring the counterproductive reactions white people have when their assumptions about race are challenged, and how these reactions maintain racial inequality.

In this “vital, necessary, and beautiful book” (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility and “allows us to understand racism as a practice not restricted to ‘bad people’ (Claudia Rankine). Referring to the defensive moves that white people make when challenged racially, white fragility is characterized by emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and by behaviors including argumentation and silence. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium and prevent any meaningful cross-racial dialogue. In this in-depth exploration, DiAngelo examines how white fragility develops, how it protects racial inequality, and what we can do to engage more constructively.

Two Mental Health-Related Books:

Do Nothing: How to Break Away from Overworking, Overdoing, and Underliving by Celeste Headlee:

‘We work feverishly to make ourselves happy. So why are we so miserable?

Despite our constant search for new ways to optimize our bodies and minds for peak performance, human beings are working more instead of less, living harder not smarter, and becoming more lonely and anxious. We strive for the absolute best in every aspect of our lives, ignoring what we do well naturally and reaching for a bar that keeps rising higher and higher. Why do we measure our time in terms of efficiency instead of meaning? Why can’t we just take a break?

In Do Nothing, award-winning journalist Celeste Headlee illuminates a new path ahead, seeking to institute a global shift in our thinking so we can stop sabotaging our well-being, put work aside, and start living instead of doing. As it turns out, we’re searching for external solutions to an internal problem. We won’t find what we’re searching for in punishing diets, productivity apps, or the latest self-improvement schemes. Yet all is not lost - we just need to learn how to take time for ourselves, without agenda or profit, and redefine what is truly worthwhile.

Pulling together threads from history, neuroscience, social science, and even paleontology, Headlee examines long-held assumptions about time use, idleness, hard work, and even our ultimate goals. Her research reveals that the habits we cling to are doing us harm; they developed recently in human history, which means they are habits that can, and must, be broken. It’s time to reverse the trend that’s making us all sadder, sicker, and less productive, and return to a way of life that allows us to thrive.’

(I just read this book lately and I love it; it’s really follows the history of how we’ve come to this point where we can’t shut off our brains, and we see ourselves in this really puritanical, commercialist manner: How we define ourselves by how much we produce, and if we fall short of this goal by being (ironically) human, we berate ourselves for it. This really has let me shift my mentality towards a much healthier, less ‘workaholic’ mode in my COVID downtime, and really helped me move towards a healthier lifestyle in the jobs I’m searching for now that I’ve left school. Recommended for anyone taking the big leap into the full time work world).

Chained to the Desk by Bryan Robinson:

‘Americans love a hard worker. The worker who toils eighteen-hour days and eats meals on the run between appointments is usually viewed with a combination of respect and awe. But for many, this lifestyle leads to family problems, a decline in work productivity, and ultimately to physical and mental collapse. Intended for anyone touched by what Robinson calls “the best-dressed problem of the twenty-first century,” Chained to the Desk provides an inside look at workaholism’s impact on those who live and work with work addicts—partners, spouses, children, and colleagues—as well as the appropriate techniques for clinicians who treat them. Originally published in 1998, this groundbreaking book from best-selling author and widely respected family therapist Bryan E. Robinson was the first comprehensive portrait of the workaholic. In this new and fully updated third edition, Robinson draws on hundreds of case reports from his own original research and years of clinical practice. The agonies of workaholism have grown all the more challenging in a world where the computer, cell phone, and iPhone allow twenty-four-hour access to the office, even on weekends and from vacation spots. Adult children of workaholics describe their childhood pain and the lifelong legacies they still carry, and the spouses or partners of workaholics reveal the isolation and loneliness of their vacant relationships. Employers and business colleagues discuss the cost to the company when workaholism dominates the workplace. Chained to the Desk both counsels and consoles. It provides a step-by-step guide to help readers spot workaholism, understand it, and recover.’

(I also just read this one, and it’s an older book edited to a third edition, and it shows. However, it also does the important work of demonstrating how workaholics should be treated in the same category as anyone else who gets any sort of ‘high’ from something, like drugs or alcoholism. It opens with the quote (and I’m paraphrasing here), “Workaholicism is the best dressed addiction.” It’s the one we’re rewarded for constantly, not matter what mental toll it takes on us. While I’m not exactly ready to sign up for a twelve-step plan (and some of the chapters are specifically for spouses and children), it still dishes out some really good advice about feeding other areas of our lives and how to not simply focus on work.)

From My Undergraduate Degree (Classics and Double Minor in English and German Literature, with a little World Literature thrown in for good measure):

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe: 

THINGS FALL APART tells two overlapping, intertwining stories, both of which center around Okonkwo, a “strong man” of an Ibo village in Nigeria. The first of these stories traces Okonkwo's fall from grace with the tribal world in which he lives, and in its classical purity of line and economical beauty it provides us with a powerful fable about the immemorial conflict between the individual and society. The second story, which is as modern as the first is ancient, and which elevates the book to a tragic plane, concerns the clash of cultures and the destruction of Okonkwo's world through the arrival of aggressive, proselytizing European missionaries. These twin dramas are perfectly harmonized, and they are modulated by an awareness capable of encompassing at once the life of nature, human history, and the mysterious compulsions of the soul. THINGS FALL APART is the most illuminating and permanent monument we have to the modern African experience as seen from within.

(This is a classic of African Literature, and what I wrote my world literature paper on in first year. It really is a story about the affect of a fall of one culture, where Okonkwo is the prime example of what a ‘man’ may be in this society, to how this society (and African societies as a whole) are affected by European colonialism. How one man can be seen as a paradigm of perfection at one point in time, and the scourge of the earth at another, when he stubbornly holds to his ideals, no matter how flawed they may be. It’s a book I remember reading the ending of, and it’s a theme for all three of these books, and just looking down and literally letting out an, “Ooooooooh~~~~” xD That’s really my ‘tell’ of a good book. I haven’t reread it since then, but it’s always stuck with me). 

Animal Farm by George Orwell:

‘Perhaps one of the most influential allegories of the 20th century, George Orwell's Animal Farm has made its way into countless schoolrooms and libraries, and has been the inspiration of several films. Written in 1945, before Orwell's conceptually similar 1984, Animal Farm's world consists of anthropomorphized farm animals as they attempt to create an ideal society--it becomes dystopian as the flaws of the ideology seep out. Like 1984, Orwell meant for Animal Farm to represent a Communist state, and to depict its downfalls. With a message that is not soon to be forgotten, Animal Farm reminds us that "all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."’

(It’s stereotypical and you’ve probably read it, but I still love this book to pieces and literally have an Animal Farm pin on my bag xD If you haven’t read it, read it: It also has the OhhhOOohhh~ effect xD)

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury:

‘Ray Bradbury's internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 is a masterwork of 20th-century literature set in a bleak, dystopian future.

Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television "family". But then he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn’t live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television. When Mildred attempts suicide and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, the fireman has to run for his life.’

(What do I have to say by this point? Another Ooooh~ effect book xD)

[thatboomerkid]

Twist of Deadly Wishes

Twist of Deadly Wishes -- Pathfinder Feat

... Glancing away, the mage visibly struggled with his emotions. “Any wish, then. Is mine.”

“Yes.”

“Mine to make as I see fit.”

The demon smiled. “Oh, indeed. Most certainly and truly, master.”

“Any ... any wish at all?”

Shadibriri shrugged. “Within ... ah, limited guidelines. Barring a wish for more wishes, there is little of which I am not capable. As I have said before, to other men in other places: I can call forth any spell, I can resurrect the dead, I can rewrite time and space. I can create from nothing, and make you wealthy beyond your wildest dreams; I can open doors to other worlds, and cast you across the infinite pleasures of the planes as you desire. I can turn lead to gold, pig-farmers to pigs, and day to night. With but a word, I can unmake mountains, reshape flesh and topple kings ...”            

“Very well.”            

The demon smirked. “I was not done, master, and am still bound to speak the truth. The whole truth. I can also rewire your brain so that you think you’re a hummingbird, or set your bones on fire, or turn you into a pillar of salt and throw you into the ocean to dissolve, as a certain nameless sorceress once discovered. My abilities are not much limited; you drink from the very waterfall of creation’s torrent when you unleash my gifts. Be careful, I suppose they say, what you wish for.”            

“It is to you, then, to interpret the meaning of my wish?”

The demon shrugged again. “My powers are great, and call on majesties older that your species can fathom; even I do not truly comprehend the full scope of what I do, any more than you understand the mysteries of digesting a glass of warm milk and turning it into blood and flesh, nor how it is that you fall to sleep, and dream, and then wake again. I would be careful, were I you, to know exactly what you want, and to make it clear to me what you want, and to phrase what you want as precisely as possible. Barring that, you should also hope that I’m in a good mood, and that my values coincide rather perfectly with your own.”

The mage swallowed, hard. He then allowed himself a thin smile, but it was wry, and without much humor. “Heh. Yes.”

-- from Twisting Amongst Mages

You command the very waterfall of creation’s torrent.

Brought to you absolutely free to enjoy, to test & to share – as always – by the fine folks of my Patreon.

original image from here

Prerequisite: Ability to use spells, spell-like abilities or supernatural abilities of any kind; non-good alignment; see Special, below

Benefit: When you gain this feat, roll three ten-sided dice and arrange them in order from highest to lowest; you will generate a three-digit or four-digit number from your result (somewhere between 111 and 1099). If your highest score is a ten, it represents 1,000; otherwise, tens always represent zero.

For Example: Mike rolls a 3, a 9 and a 10. His final result is 1093. Amber rolls two 3s and a 7. Her final result is 733. Kelsey rolls two 10s and a 1. Her final result is 1,001.

This is the total Twist Score you much reach to Cash-Out your wish. Each time you Cash-Out, you re-roll this 1d100 and once again begin the long climb to your new target score.

If any magical attack you make – or supernatural ability you use – would ever kill a living intelligent creature outright, you may choose to reduce your damage by any amount and thus leave the creature alive; if you choose to do so, you may demand that your victim make a wish.

If your target hears and understands you, and freely chooses to make this wish, you gain the ability to grant this wish (caster level 21st), much like an efreeti or glabrezu.

A wish made in this way must be a statement that can be uttered, in full, in six seconds or less.

Demanding that your target make a wish in this way ends your turn. On your opponent’s next turn, she may speak her wish as a free action. On your next turn, you may then grant this wish as a full-round action.

You may not grant more than three wishes per day. If you are a PC, you may not grant the wish of a fellow PC. Whether you are a PC or NPC, you may not grant a wish to an ally of any kind; if you attempt to do so, your attack’s damage is not reduced in any way and your ally is instead slain.

You may always freely choose to fulfill a wish of this type in a destructive or even deadly manner, although you must TECHNICALLY fulfill a mortal’s stated desires by use of this magic: if a target states that she wishes she could see in black-&-white, rather than in color, you could not, for example, just summon a horde of baboons to beat her to death and then say “your wish is granted.”

If your target says “I wish for limitless riches,” however, you are 100% percent within your rights to crush them beneath a tide of gold coins Plutokinesis-style or banish them to a section of the Elemental Plane of Earth composed entirely of diamonds ... but without a breathable atmosphere.

Your GM is the final arbiter of what are and are not legal responses to the granting of a wish; strong, open and above-all honest communication with your GM is not simply encouraged for this feat but is instead required.

If your GM cannot decide what a specific character would wish for, she may choose to roll 3d6 on the chart below (ignoring any result and rounding down if that option has already been used too many times) to determine the character’s wish; possible responses from you are also listed after each choice:

I wish I wasn’t here! / I wish I was somewhere else! [You may plane shift your target to the Abyss, to the City of Brass or to another location of your choice]

I wish I could escape / I wish there was something I could do to get away safely! [You may baleful polymorph your target into a rabbit or a frog]

I wish you weren’t here! / I wish you would just go away! [You may use greater teleport, moving to any location that is outside of your target’s immediate visual field]

I wish I was home! / back home! / at home! [You may teleport your target back to their home, bringing along yourself and your party or other combatants if you desire]

I wish this hadn’t happened! [Your target is teleported, unharmed and healed of all conditions & wounds, back to where they last awoke or to wherever they were 12 hours ago, whichever is greater]

I wish you would just let me go! [You and your target are both teleported 100 feet into the air, with you grappling your target. At the end of your action, you are teleported back to your previous location]

I wish you were on fire! [You gain the benefits of fire shield]

I wish you would leave me alone! [Your target is subject to a maze effect]

I wish I could kill you! [Your target is given one round to kill you. All other creatures in the area benefit from a sanctuary spell. If you are not dead at the end of the round, your target dies]

I wish you couldn’t see me! [Your target gains permanent natural invisibility, as per an invisible stalker. She also gains a permanent overwhelming scent of rot, death and the grave (or some other scent, as you choose); all opponents within 30 feet may freely detect her purely by sense of smell. If she is upwind, the range increases to 60 feet; if downwind, it drops to 15 feet. Her exact location is not revealed, only her presence within range and the general direction toward her. When she is within 5 feet of any creature with a sense of smell, that creature automatically pinpoints her location even if otherwise blinded to her. She may also be tracked by her smell: any creature may attempt to follow from where she has been by making a Wisdom (or Survival) check to trace her movements and current whereabouts, even if she possesses the trackless step ability. The typical DC for smelling her out is 10; this DC increases by 2 for each hour since she departed the area. This otherwise follows the rules for the Survival skill.

I wish I was immortal! / I wish I was undefeatable! [Your target gains the benefits of the Immortal Creature template and is subject to a baleful polymorph effect]

I wish I was invincible! [Your target is transformed to adamantine, as per a special flesh to stone spell]

I wish your magic would fail! [You may gain the benefits of transformation]

I wish there was another way we could settle this! [You and your target are both teleported to another location, as per a maze spell. You may challenge your opponent to any test of skill -- that is NOT combat! -- that you desire; if you opponent fails against you, she dies]

I wish you would face me alone! [You and your target are both teleported to a location of your choice]

I wish you were dead! [You instantly split yourself into a pair of creatures: your spectral true self and your corporeal false self. Your true self becomes both invisible and incorporeal, and must remain directly adjacent to your false self until this effect ends. You may take no actions while you are so disjointed, nor interact with your environment in any way except to observe. Your false self dies for one hour per character level you possess or until you choose to end the effect. At any time while this effect is active, you may choose to end the effect as a free action: thereby collapsing yourself back into a single creature under your full control. All reversible effects related to your death are undone instantly at this time, just as though you had not died; this includes any damage and/or all secondary effects that would have been avoided if your false self had not died. You are the beneficiary of a true resurrection effect.

I wish ... I wish ... uh ... (stuttering) [your target is forced to answer the following round]

I refuse! [you may not force the creature to make a wish]

You are not required to grant a wish made of you in this way. For example, if a victim says “I wish your bones were all broken,” you could offer to your GM the option “Very well ... I gain all the benefits of an elemental body (or fluid form) spell, and all of my ‘bones’ are ‘broken’”; if your GM doesn’t like that, however, you are within your rights to simply say “I will not grant such a wish.”

If you choose not to grant a wish, you lose one Twist Point from your current Twist Score. This does not count against the total number of wishes you can grant each day.

Each time that you grant a wish by use of this feat, you add a number of Twist Points to your Twist Score equal to your target’s Hit Dice. Once you have reached your goal, you may Cash-Out all of your Twist Points as a full-round action and immediately gain the benefits of a wish spell.

Special: This feat assumes that your GM will establish additional specific, in-universe backgrounds and requirements for gaining this ability; the prerequisites (above) for this feat are thus left intentionally vague, entirely up to the storyteller. In a traditional fantasy game, this power might be limited only to elves or to other creatures with ties to the First World, only to demons and their mortal kin, only to wishcrafters or witches with specific Patrons, only to members of a certain lineage or arcane tradition, only to mad chaos-gods and their spawn, to the seventh son of a seventh son, or to certain “chosen ones” who are born to fulfill a dark destiny.

—

NOTE:

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[brrdhouse]

i am once again not dead!! just working on something big lol

oh how i love you, the reverse falls rewrite that lives in my brain.. sigh

[newhologram]

Glorious purpose, sacrifice, and the god who started it all

Send a heartbeat to The void that cries through you Relive the pictures that have come to pass For now we stand alone The world is lost and blown And we are flesh and blood disintegrate With no more to hate

- The Beginning Is the End Is the Beginning by Smashing Pumpkins (because this song is 100% about Avengers)

Been on an MCU binge to put everything under a microscope, so here’s what’s been rolling around in my brain. 

Infinity War spoilers below with speculation/theories for Avengers 4 that includes A4 spoilery set leak stuff. 

**SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT**

* * *

There’s a lot to talk about as far as theories as we were given some hopeful leads in IW and other films. Just to take inventory on some other speculations and fun ideas: 

Shuri may have backed Vision up

Soul World: is that where Gamora is? Is that where everyone who was dusted went?

Nebula may get a meaningful role in helping to take Thanos down

Captain Marvel’s role in all this??

The possibility of Adam Warlock coming out of his cocoon

The Eternals maybe

Hawkeye/Ronin

Thor’s Stormbreaker handle being made of Groot somehow solving something

Thanos being overcome with grief in his isolation

The possibility of a major time jump in A4 to see how Earth has moved on after the snap, which may include Tony’s future with Pepper and their child. Everyone will have lived so many years with the consequences of the snap.

It also feels like each character might have to go on their own hunt for the stones, which might lead to an interesting reversal of the loss and sacrifice they faced in IW. I wonder who gets assigned to each stone and how that’ll play out for their individual character arc? There’s one stone for each original Avenger, so that’s cool to think about 

Erasing versus dying. If you’ve heard anything about “the Event” that a lot of astrologers have been talking about lately, basically our reality is due for a cosmic event which splits us—leaving people behind and taking the rest into a prosperous new universe. Some will be “erased” from this existence. It’s been called the Rapture. Which is uh. Pretty interesting considering IW premiered on the actual date of the rapture prediction and how the Snap is absolutely a kind of sad superhero bad ending rapture. 

Rewriting everything that we’ve seen in the past 6 years in canon

I’ve also seen some talk of theories such as “Loki is Bruce Banner in disguise”. I can see why this theory is popular because Bruce acts really weird the whole movie and seems to know things he shouldn’t. But I’m not too into it because it feels like there’s a big payoff coming with the Hulk (as in, we better get a cool shot of him bursting out of the Hulkbuster armor, like the toy).

There’s also some talk about spotting Quicksilver and even Wolverine on the set but I have nooo idea what those would even mean, not just in regards to the plot but with the whole joint custody thing Sony, Fox and Disney have been working out. 

All of that said, I’ve been thinking about a few other threads in particular though, so that’s what I’ll be exploring here. Just speculation for fun. Let’s see where it leads.

☀ Undying Fidelity

The opening scene was really suspicious to me for many reasons. These directors are sharp and I believe there is purpose to everything we see as well as what we don’t see.

Let’s talk about my boy Loki.

He starts out pretty scared. The guy is sweating bullets. 

After the Hulk engages Thanos, Loki isn’t on screen for several minutes. We don’t see him reacting or hiding or anything. I don’t trust that, especially not with the Russo bros directing it. I feel as though something is being hidden from us in this moment, distracted by the Hulk just as much as the bad guys are.

When he reappears to offer himself as a guide to Thanos, suddenly his demeanor is totally different. He seems calm, resolved even. 

His choice of words is very important. The most suspicious to me are: “rightful heir to Jotunheim”, “God of Mischief”, “do hereby pledge my undying fidelity”. Loki does not want us to forget that he’s not only a Jotunn, not Asgardian by blood, but he’s a God, and a very, very cunning one. To be honest, it doesn’t feel like that last line was for Thanos at all. It honestly feels like he’s saying it to someone else—maybe himself. To his own duty in this moment. Which brings me to the next bullet point:

After that last line, dagger forming, his eyes quickly dart down. There’s a pause. A small beat there. He looks as though he’s steeling himself. That, to me, is the face of a man who very much knows he’s about to die. It’s a very Obi-Wan moment, right in front of Thor. It’s somehow even more heartbreaking if he knew it was coming, and was still so scared and small when Thanos wrapped his fist around his neck. 

Loki’s a smart cookie. He may be relatively young for a god/alien but this isn’t his first rodeo. He already knows how deadly and terrifying Thanos is without the Gauntlet/stones, so what does he think he can do right now? He knows a little dagger isn’t going to win this for them and that’s precisely the point. He isn’t dumb enough to try that sincerely, which makes me believe even more that it was strategic. I have a feeling Thanos chiding him about his choice in words (”undying”) is going to come back to bite him in the ass.

Back to Loki’s words being important. When he’s first about to surrender the Tesseract earlier in the scene, he says to Thor, "I promise you, brother, the sun will shine on us again."  He says it with so much purpose.

And his final words to Thanos: “You will never be a god.” Another reminder: Loki is a god. He’s survived a black hole, stabbing, Hulk-smashing, Grandmaster’s orgies, and likely more in his years. We’ve come to expect him to fake his own death by this point, though I’m still on the fence about whether this one was fake, or a necessary one he knew needed to happen, or somehow a bit of both. I wonder, only a little, where did Loki’s body go, is it just floating around with the rest of the dead? 

For that matter, where the hell is Valkyrie? Is there any meaningful payoff rather than just humor for Korg calling Loki a ghost in Ragnarok? I’m not too hopeful for something like that, but it’s a thought. 

Later on in the film we see Thor, another god, (barely) survive the concentrated full force of a dying star. I’m supposed to believe Loki, an incredibly gifted frost giant child trained in the arts of magic, Loki Ha Ha Duplicates of Me Everywhere Odinson, Loki I’m Right Where I Need to Be Laufeyson just has a sudden brain fart, tries to stab the Mad Titan, gets his neck snapped in front of his brother, and it’s not on purpose? 

BITCH. DID. NOT. TURN. BACK. TO. BLUE. 

Do I really think Loki is still alive? I don’t know. Loki is very, very dear to me but like I said, I’m on the fence. Because it seems like the deaths that happened before the snap, save for Gamora, might be permanent because we needed to feel that the stakes were high. On the other hand, again, Loki is very gifted. We’ve seen him “die” before and I still have a very hard time believing he’s fully dead and not god-level deep coma smacked down needing time to regenerate if he doesn’t just turn blue right after since his iconic look is an illusion too. His line about the sun shining on them again uses the word “us”, which could indicate a revival and reunion somehow. 

But I’m cry because you know he and Thor got into a lot of trouble growing up, and big brother was always there for him. But then little brother goes through some hard stuff, falls into a black hole, gets picked up by a cult, and it all comes down to this moment now: no home to return safely to, no mother to console him after Odin’s discipline, Thor unable to save him. 

♥ We Don’t Trade Lives

Before I go into A4 speculation, let’s look at how each character deals with sacrifice, just for fun: 

Loki is given a choice: his brother’s life, or the Space Stone → Loki surrenders and sacrifices himself 

Quill is given a choice: the love of his life, or Thanos getting closer to winning → Quill is hesitates and is unable to keep his promise of sacrificing Gamora

Gamora is given a choice: her sister, or the location of the Soul Stone  → Gamora surrenders to spare Nebula 

Thanos is given a choice: his favorite daughter, or the Soul Stone → Thanos sacrifices Gamora for the stone

Dr. Strange is given a choice: Tony Stark, or the Time Stone → Despite earlier warning Tony he wouldn’t hesitate to sacrifice either him or Peter if it means keeping the Time Stone safe, he surrenders the stone → He sacrifices his duty, his life, and the lives of everyone else who gets dusted in order to put them on the one right path he saw out of over 14 million

Wanda is given a choice: Vision, or the Mind Stone → Her struggle with this choice starts earlier on when Vision offers to sacrifice himself to destroy the Mind Stone → Cap tells him “we don’t trade lives”  → Wanda is also not willing to immediately kill him when asked → They run out of time and options, Wanda finally sacrifices Vision, which as we saw didn’t really work out the way they wanted

Our characters struggle with sacrificing something important to them in order to save the universe (remember, in the eyes of Thanos, he’s saving the universe too). Many of the characters value their loved ones above everything else and don’t want to have to make that choice. They don’t want to face the pain of a life without that person, or they don’t want another person to suffer or die painfully because of them.

Alright. Let’s talk bidness. 

♛   Reframe the Future

Yeah—remember B.A.R.F.? Binarily Augmented Retro-Framing. 

This has to be what Tony will use to look back at things. I see him replaying the events of the first Avengers over and over, trying to figure out how it all could’ve gone so wrong, what clues they missed, and how to fix it. 

Which brings us to the question of time travel. Is this where the idea of Infinite Avengers will come in, if the multiverse is explored? I don’t have too much of a lead on that, but it’s interesting to think about. If that ends up being the title of A4 it would certainly point to that.

(Note Tony’s greying hair which supports the idea that A4 will start 5-10 years after Infinity War)

Many have speculated about the devices on their wrists in these photos, as well as the fact that while Tony and Ant-Man seem to be their present selves, others are in their old costumes from the first Avengers. Doesn’t quite answer why Cap is wearing a device, unless they recruit lots of multiversal Avengers from various timelines/realities/points in history to help? (Wouldn’t it be crazy to find out that Ant-Man has been a secret tiny time traveling Avenger the whole time?) 

It’s hard to know exactly what kind of time travel shenanigans we’re dealing with. Maybe we’ll learn more when we see Ant-Man and the Wasp, since they’re going to be dealing with the quantum realm, where time doesn’t really exist. In the quantum realm, every possibility exists at the same time. 

We do have some clues though. 

Exhibit A: Loki in all his muzzled glory, as seen at the end of Avengers.

We know that this time travel plot would involve going back to where it all started. But what could be done, what is Tony’s play? 

Exhibit B: Tony Stark in S.H.I.E.L.D. gear. More specifically—

As one of Loki’s escorts.

What we don’t see in Avengers is how everything goes down when they take Loki back into custody (after grubbing on shawarma). We don’t see the discussion about what to do with him and Thor’s decision to take Loki and the Tesseract back to Asgard. 

So, again, what the hell is Tony’s game plan? 

If he’s disguised as a guard, there could be a chance to get alone with Loki and talk to him. Tell him everything that goes down. Get him to help. Get info from him, and make sure he knows how things need to play out in order for this all to work.

I’m not sure how yet though. It seems this could somehow involve Stark making his own Infinity Gauntlet, but that’s later down the line. Where does Loki fit into the plan beyond the time travel scene? That may be all we get of him. 

I’m so excited for the possibility of my two favorite characters working together or even having just once more scene together, however it plays out. Tony and Loki both smiled at each others’ jokes in A1 and I loved it. I feel like their dynamic would be so interesting to explore more. Tony totally clocked that Loki is a diva, because they’re both like that lol.

☮ Glorious Purpose

But what’s most interesting to me right now is the implication that if this is the closed loop kind of time travel, it would mean Loki has known about all this since the end of Avengers. 

When the Hulk was distracting everyone, was Loki hiding behind a wall, readying himself for what he knew he needed to do next? I’ve heard talk of the possibility of a duplicate since that’s what Loki does, but would Thanos have been able to tell he was killing an illusion? He didn’t have the Soul Stone then which likely helped him tell which Strange was real later. I’ve also heard talk of a Loki switchout, but I’m not too convinced because it would involve somehow transporting another Loki there. Not so sure there would be a stealthy way to do any of that. 

Did Loki die in the beginning of Infinity War fully knowing all those years that it was going to happen, that it needed to happen, in order for the sun to shine again?

Did Loki die to help save the universe?

...

If Loki knew those few weeks on Sakaar were going to be his last, do you think he was like, “Guess I better live my best life and spend my final days sipping cocktails on Grandmaster’s lap.”

My final speculation prediction REQUIREMENT from Marvel Studios is to have Avengers 4 end with a beautiful Pepperony wedding filled with superheroes. Whoever’s left, that is. 

(This also means if there’s a time jump, Tony will possibly erase the present he has with Pepper and their child in order to save everyone... Should be interesting.)

In conclusion, have this whiteboard drawing I did for @spazzeon as I tried to explain all of this

[jamesgierach]

CATEGORIZING HOMICIDES FOR PREVENTION

by James E. Gierach

As a former Cook County assistant state’s attorney who put homicide cases before the Cook County grand jury daily, I always wanted to know the motivation for a killing. Why was this killing committed? This is important, because knowing the motivation for a set of killings better enables authorities to learn “whodunit” and, importantly, how to better strategize to prevent potential future homicides.

Generally, in my experience, the “why” of homicide perpetration can be classified into one of three broad categories: (a) homicides committed for financial gain, (b) homicides committed out of hate, and (c) homicides committed by “crazies” for no sensible reason.

Homicides motivated by hate are very difficult to predict and, therefore, are very difficult to prevent.

HATE HOMICIDES

Falling into the “hate category” of killing are homicides committed by estranged domestic partners, feuding family members and in-laws. More commonly falling into the “hate classification” of homicides are those committed by “haters,” persons who hate others, often strangers, simply because of the other’s identification with a particular race, creed, color, religion, sexual preference, political affiliation, nationality, immigration status (the “foreigners and aliens”), or gang affiliation.

Hate, like love, knows no bounds.

HOMICIDES BY “CRAZIES”

Homicides committed by persons “out of their minds” are also difficult to prediction.

Lucidity can come and go for some, and the question is: how out-of-touch is Tom, Dick or Sally. It’s not always easy to identify who’s “nuts” and who is not, or who “would never do that,” and who would.

Persons suffering from delusions, paranoia, schizophrenia or other mental disease or defect can allow a human brain to depart from rationality so far as to constitute a deadly condition endangering the lives of others and themselves. But even a relatively “normal” “healthy” human brain can be taxed by the environment, chemistry, relationships, predicament, pressure, hate, deficiency, genealogy, and many other factors, making it difficult to diagnose “mental illness”, or predict future behavior.

Mental illness-triggered homicides, like hate-motivated homicides, are difficult to predict and, therefore, again, difficult to prevent.

HOMICIDES FOR PROFIT

The most preventable type of homicides are those committed for economic advantage. “Homicides for profit” are commonly committed in conjunction with other crimes, like carjackings, armed robberies, burglaries or drug-dealing. Chicago gangs gravitate to these crimes and are encouraged and enabled by governmental laws and societal endorsement of drug prohibition, otherwise known as “the War on Drugs.”

Drug-prohibition policy is the Rumpelstiltskin magic that spins straw into gold, ditch-weed into an Illinois $1 billion recreational marijuana market, and substance addiction into a global $500 billion dollar enterprise.

Chicago police superintendent after superintendent have asserted that most Chicago homicides are caused by gang members fighting over drug turf, the drug trade, and gang retaliatory killings.

Every police superintendent, every mayor, every governor, and every U.S. president since 1971 (when Pres. Richard Nixon declared his drug war) has tried every treatment, education, prevention and law enforcement program, policy and initiative to stop drug-war killing, “the most prevalent homicides,” to no avail.

STOP THE KILLING

Yet, the answer to stopping the most preventable homicides — gang homicides and drug-related homicides — is there for the taking. Call it a “silver bullet.”

Take the exorbitant profit out of drug-dealing by legalizing drug markets, drug sales, drug production and drug possession. Put the “Failed War on Drugs” into reverse and “save the kids,” save our neighborhoods, and restore hope. Stop making good, well-intended, well-reasoned plans for stopping violence but always, leaving out the only essential ingredient to peace — End Drug Prohibition, Repeal the Controlled Substances Act, and Amend U.N. drug-prohibition conventions.

GUN-CONTROL AND THE SECOND AMENDMENT REWRITE

Guns are the most efficacious and commonly used instruments to commit homicides. Regardless of homicide motivation, guns are the weapon of choice for all categories of homicides — hate, insanity and greed.

Therefore, it should be obvious to everyone that the U.S. Congress should enact laws that better control guns, an objective that inevitably collides with Americans’ Second Amendment trust and confidence in guns. Congress must — by constitutional amendment and general law — revisit our national preoccupation with guns.

None of the suggestions made in this article are easy; certainly, the drug-legalization ideas are not intuitive. Nevertheless, these ideas must be put into action. And they must be put into action now.

Palos Park, Illinois

April 19, 2021

[porcupine-girl]

Fic I will write someday

Uh, the first version of this contained weird shit at the bottom, and Tumblr wouldn’t let me edit the post (maybe because of said weird shit?), so sorry for the repost...

I’m not allowed to really write any fic until my dissertation is done (so, September). After that I am going to write ALL THE FIC. However, even if I can’t write any of it down my brain is still churning it out.

Right now I’m taking a break from trying to understand how to interpret the results of multiple logistic regression (if anyone here knows, HELP PLEASE edit: I think I’m figuring it out), so I’m going to tell you guys about some of the fics I have either partially finished or like in outline/brainstorm form. Feel free to tell me which ones you think I should work on first!

Zimbits:

My second FTH fic, the prompt was “social media witch Bitty.” I’ve taken that and combined it with the plot of the musical She Loves Me. The 45K first draft is done, but I’ve got a LOT of editing/rewriting to do. It currently sits around 48K. My top priority once I can focus on fic again.

A couple more stories for Oh., the compilation of alternate Jack/Bitty getting together scenes.

Random compilation of canon missing scenes (right after the kiss, in Madison, etc).

ABO: Jack and Bitty are both omegas and accidentally mate. Oops!

More in the A Lot Like Life ‘verse: some Bitty coming out to his parents stuff, some Bitty in Montreal stuff, plus lots of smut. We’ve got some sensory deprivation, some Bitty making Jack watch him dance with other guys at a club, some role reversal, and one doc titled “underwear” that just contains a text conversation of Bitty having a surprise for Jack and refusing to share details, which I’m guessing was going to involve Jack in panties? IDK, at some point there will be Jack in panties.

Academia AU: Jack is a first year Assistant Prof in the history department, Bitty is a 3rd(?maybe?) year grad student who is his TA for the fall. Bitty winds up dropping out of grad school, because I was working through my issues when I conceived this plot. Not because he had bad grades or anything, just because fuck academia. Anyhow, then they can date.

Woke up married in Vegas AU: What it says on the tin. Jack went to Samwell for two years then joined the Falconers, so didn’t meet Bitty there, but Shitty has been trying to get them together for years. So when Bitty is in Vegas for some kind of youtube awards or something, and Jack is there for a game against the Aces, they meet and hey, Shitty was right, they get along really well. Oops!

Jack hooks up with Camilla once at the start of his senior year. Three months later, he finds out she’s pregnant. She doesn’t want to have an abortion; she plans to give the baby up for adoption. Jack decides he wants to keep the baby, because his rookie year in the NHL needs to be more complicated. But his parents will help and he’ll get a nanny and stuff. Bitty, being Bitty, talks Jack into hiring him as his nanny for the summer. Because covering Jack with baking ingredients wasn’t enough, now he needs to see Jack taking care of a newborn

SPN:

Okay I swear I’m going to finish Museum of Broken Relationships and The Breath Before the Phrase. Breath is… hm. I should have ended it where it is, but I thought I had one more chapter, but I’m not sure I actually do. There might be one more short chapter, or I might rewrite Ch 10 to tie it up. Either way, I actually have later stuff in the series written so I would really like to be able to move forward there.

ABO: Alternate S9, Kevin and Human!Cas are living in the bunker. Dean has to go off his suppressants to have a heat because he hasn’t had one in years and that’s not healthy. Surprise! Truemates! Who’dathunkit.

ABO Dean/Cas/Bela, Bela POV: Dean is an alpha, Cas is a beta, they’re mated. Cas can’t really handle Dean’s ruts, so they go to a sex club to find an omega when they need to. Bela has helped them out several times now. Although, this time she finds out that they aren’t quite who she thought they were.

Cas is a lecturer in religious studies at the University of Nebraska. He has a run-in with a crazy guy who tries to kill him. Two FBI agents show up to investigate; Cas discovers that their suspect, who definitely looks like the guy, is dead and they’re not FBI agents. He forces them to take him along to the grave desecration stuff, finds out it really was a ghost and the supernatural is real. Sam and Dean try to keep him from getting involved, but he’s a little shit and keeps popping up anyhow, at some point hooking up with Dean in the process. But Dean keeps pushing him away, won’t do it again. They finally give in and have their friend Charlie move in with him because at least he’ll have a babysitter if he insists on getting involved in all this shit. Then Rowena shows up, and things get really weird.

And Yet ‘verse (canon divergent D/s stuff): I actually have a story for this written, sitting there for like two years in need of editing. And an outline for a whole big series.

Academia AU: Yeah, another one. hahaha. Anyhow, I conceived of this like three years ago, then got stuck a few chapters in, I think because I just wasn’t a good enough writer to do the things I wanted. Maybe now I could finish it. Dean is a MechE PhD student, Cas is a first year Psychology Assistant Prof who needs a housemate.

Dean and Cas are MIT students who meet at a particular event. I’m not going to say more because I don’t want this post showing up on searches for particular terms (this fic would also be locked to AO3 members for that reason).

I just got my SPN ABO bingo card, so in addition to the two ABOs here you can count on a bunch more coming! I doubt I’ll get a blackout, but there will be at least 4-5 for a bingo.

Other:

I really wanna write Two/Nyx for Dark Matter.

Sherlock/Anthea pre-canon PWP that tried to grow a casefic plot so I gave up.

Sherlock/Sally pre-canon PWP, they meet at a college party and hook up

Started before S3 - John and Sherlock confess their feelings the morning of John and Mary’s wedding, which gets cancelled. They’re such assholes.

[the-doctors-strays-blog]

Regeneration

with travelxhopefully, from ryanxsinclair - dropped

“Right, so you used to be a bloke. That I get. What I don’t get is why you were glowin’. It was right freaky.“

Oh, she had been glowing? Makes sense, she supposes. It tended to linger for several hours, keeping on changing in the ‘background’ so to speak.

❝ Residual regeneration energy. See, when we’re mortally wounded or jus’ get too old, we regenerate. Create a whole new body and keep on keepin’ on. It releases a massive amount of hormones called lindos, burning every cell in me body and rewritting my DNA, my brain and my personality. S’why I was a bit confused when we first met. My brain was still cookin’, rewrittin’ itself and changin’. ❞

Lots of information. Slow down a bit.

❝ It ain’t the first time I’ve done it either. First time bein’ a woman, though. ❞

Oh my stars! M’travelin’ through the universe with a video game character, Ryan thought. It was like when you ran your character off a cliff, but the game didn’t save right and you ended up at the bottom, with one less life than before. Nice, easy short cut. Or like reincarnation.

As always, the Doctor was speaking like she was on fast forward, but he caught most of it, even the nonsense words like ‘lindos’. After what he’d seen of the Doctor before, he decided to just take her word on it. She died an old Scottish bloke and turned into a pretty blonde. Okay. She was alien, after all, so why not? “Wait, your whole species does it? Doesn’t that get confusin’, everyone changin’ their face? And do you have a choice, or is it a sort of random avatar sort of thing? And the glowin’ light, if it was healin’ you, then why’d it float away like that?”

❝ Yep! At first, yeah, but we’ve got a way of just… knowin’ who’s who. Can’t really explain it. ❞

For a second, she paused, trying to come up with a good way of putting it. Oh! She’s thought of what to liken it to.

❝ S’like when y’get your hair cut. Or change your clothes. Y’look a bit different but it’s still you. It’s a gamble really. Though I ‘ave seen a few choose what they wanna look like. I never really bothered t’ try. ❞

She gave a shrug at that. Why bother? Let it happen and what she got, was what she’d stick with. It didn’t matter to her what she looked like, so long as she kept on being the Doctor and helping those who needed it. That was all that mattered.

❝ Dispersing, I guess. Eventually it just fades. Very handy though. Helped me survive crashin’ through the train roof. Never wanna do that again. Y’think that crane was high? Should’ve seen how far I fell. Still, can’t blame her. I’d toss me out too if I got wrecked. ❞

“Getting a haircut doesn’t normally involve dyin’. That would be a really, really bad haircut.” Ryan leaned against one of the golden, crystalline columns that lined the TARDIS’ console, trying and failing to picture the Doctor as anyone else than she was now. He believed her, entirely, he accepted it, but it was hard to imagine. She was the Doctor. “Sort of a big change, whole new body.”

An entire world where people just grew a new body when they died, lived their lives over again. That had to be incredible - your loved ones never actually being gone, just changing a bit, and knowing that if you messed up being young you could try again eventually.

“Doctor,” he began, with a weighty pause after, for it felt a bit strange asking - maybe she didn’t have a world, maybe her whole race just went bouncing about in space in blue boxes, “maybe before you take us home, could we stop off on your world? Planet of the Face-Changin’ Time Ladies, that has t’be cool.“

❝ True. ❞

Was her only response to the hair cut comment. It sure would be a bad hair cut. Going in to get it done and bam! You’re dead. Awful business. Anyway. Moving on. She simply nodded as Ryan spoke again, silently agreeing. A very big change indeed, over and over again. It never got any less painful but it was better than alternative.

❝ Yeah? ❞

She answered, resting back on the console as she waited. Something in his pause had her a little concerned. Was he going to ask a heavy question? It sure felt like it. Annnnd he did.

Any traces of happiness drained from her face at the question he asked; Gallifrey. He wanted to visit Gallifrey. Of course. She should’ve seen that one coming. Talk highly of your species and they’ll wanna visit your home for tea and biscuits. Her tongue darted out, wetting dry lips and lowered her head, turning her attention to her boots.

❝ ‘fraid not. I mean, it is cool. It used to be cool. But… ❞

She shook her head; she couldn’t, for multiple reasons.

❝ I can’t go back. I won’t go back. Sorry. ❞

Ryan looked at her in concern - he hadn’t imagined that she’d react like that, drawing into herself. He’d always gotten the impression that she didn’t tend to head home very often, but he’d just figured she was like the people who’d left Sheffield after school and now only ever came home for Christmas, and sometimes not even then.

“M’sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you. I just figured, we go to all these places, and your world…” This ship… Her ability to cheat death and survive a fall through a train… All the beautiful insanity of this life, on the TARDIS… How could her world not be cool? “It was just an idea, s’fine,”he shrugged, trying to play it off as nothing, and not missing the way she looked down at her boot, which wasn’t nothing, “Are you, you know, fine?”

Oh. She didn’t mean to make Ryan feel bad. It just brought up bad memories she’d rather not think about but… maybe she could give the vaguest of explanations so that the other could understand why she didn’t want to return.

Her head lifted, forcing a smile back on her face.

❝ S’okay, you didn’t upset me. I just… ❞

Another pause, struggling to find the right words to say. Funny, that. The Doctor struggling with words when she’s always so bubbly and talkative. But talking about Gallifrey is something she needs careful words with.

❝ It was beautiful. The second sun would rise in the east and it’d make the forest glow like it was on fire. And one of the moons shone so bright you’d see it up there with the sun. At night, the sky would turn a warm orange, and you’d see all the stars the universe had to offer. All the stars we were only allowed to watch. Oh, but the golden fields, and the slopes of red grass I used to run through when I was a kid. ❞

A pained but adoring smile on her lips. It was beautiful, and they were good memories. But it also hurt. She spoke lovingly of it, even if there was sadness in her eyes. She’d love to return, but there was a reason she left in the first place.

❝ I’d love to take you back there but they won’t welcome me back with open arms. Why would they? I stole a TARDIS and ran away. Broke their rules. But who needs ‘em, am I right? I’ve got you guys ‘n’ the whole universe out there to explore. ❞

That wasn’t all but it was all she was willing to say right now. A grin was back on her face, wiping away any sadness she had displayed. Focus on the good things. Her fam. The TARDIS. And their adventures. It was all she needed.

“You stole the TARDIS?“ Ryan blurted, almost more surprised that he wasn’t surprised than he was surprised about that particular revelation. Why did that fit so well? He’d never been quite able to imagine the Doctor picking the TARDIS out of a line of blue boxes like a car lot, and her confusion over the controls had dissuaded a theory that she’d built the ship herself. But stole it? It suited, somehow, her way of approaching life, breaking the rules and putting them back together for the better. “So what,“ he joked, “you afraid you’ll go back and get her repoed? Sounds really amazin’ though, your world. You know, sometimes I think Graham still half-believes you’re joshin’ on the whole alien thing.“

He strolled around the console. Flying around the universe in a stolen time machine with a blonde alien who sounded like she was from Yorkshire. He’d never get used to this, he never wanted to get used to this. “What d’you mean though, only allowed to watch? Why’d they go and build a bunch of time machines if they weren’t goin’ to use them? S’like those people who buy action figures only to stick the boxes on a shelf.” He’d once made his mate Mike livid when he was about ten and he’d pulled one of his ‘collector items’ off a shelf to play with it. Mike had only ever come round his place after that - Ryan was half sure Mike, or Mike’s dad, had secretly banned him from their house.

There was a simple ‘yep’ and a nod in reply to his question, a smile on her face that showed that she didn’t regret it for a second. The TARDIS was her ship, her home, and she wouldn’t trade it for anything. It gave her a chance to explore everything she had dreamt of visiting, to take part in traditions and meet new species. Who wouldn’t love a ship that can give you everything you’ve ever wanted?

❝ After everythin’ we’ve seen, it’s hard to deny that I am. ❞

She shrugged a shoulder. It’ll sink in eventually. Sometimes it takes a while, and sometimes they get into it immediately. She’s pretty sure that Graham is on board with it all, even if he still questions her choices of running into danger sometimes. Less so now, thankfully.

❝ ‘Cos of the damage the Time Lords did. They changed events, took part in wars, messed with things they shouldn’t have ‘n’ it caused the Eternal War. Minyans almost went extinct after we gave ‘em technology that couldn’t use responsibly and the Time Lord’s meddlin’ on Klist accidentally reversed evolution for the inhabitants there. Drove ‘em all mad.  After that… Rassilon issued the non-interference policy. Only allowed to observe ‘n’ not get involved. ❞

A rule which the Doctor breaks frequently despite saying they weren’t going to interfere. Sometimes she just can’t sit back and do nothing when there is injustice happening to the people in front of her. Especially when it takes lives. The only times when she can’t do that is when it’s an event that is a fixed point in time. An event that she can’t interfere in no matter how much she wants to.

❝ You can guess how much they must’ve loved me, eh? They forced me t’regenerate and exiled me to Earth when I broke the policy. So, y’know. Try t’avoid ‘em. ❞

Non-interference. That was so not the Doctor, no matter how much she might insist that they not interfere on different planets or different times they nearly always ended up fixing something, changing someone’s life, saving someone. He could see why she didn’t get on with her people and beyond that… they’d executed her. And for what? Saving people. Although it wasn’t the same as it was on Earth, being executed when she could just take on a new body, all of his desire to see her world flickered to nothing in a moment.

“That’s horrible,“ he said. “That wasn’t when you fell through the train though, yeah? ‘Cos you said the TARDIS was explodin’. How long ago was that then, the whole exile thing?“ She’d gone through a few regenerations, he knew; there was the grey haired Scotsman, and a few she’d mentioned before that one in her various stories.

“I mean it could be worse though, Earth. All the worlds in the universe and you seem t’come here a lot.“ Other than mistaking a hotel tycoon for Ed Sheeran, she almost got more pop culture references that he did. And they ended up on Earth nearly every other trip - although maybe that was for their sake. He almost wondered if she’d spent more time on Earth than on her own world - maybe Graham was right, maybe she wasn’t as alien as she liked to claim.

[ironheart-stony]

Novel Length | Stony Fic Recs

Long chaptered fics with delicious slow burn and world building. 

Last updated 4/2/2017. THERE’S MORE LONG FIC RECS - Part 2 IS HERE 

Fics over 50k words.

My Son, My Sun by Wordsplat | T | 70k | superfamily

Just before the events of Iron Man, a baby is left on Tony's doorstep. He wants nothing to do with it at first, but his time in Afghanistan changes his mind and Tony vows to become a better man for his son's sake.

I (created from fantasies) exist solely for you by Mizzy | T | 62k | comicbook office!au

Six years ago, without the Avengers Initiative there to save the day, scientist Dr. Eric Selvig sacrificed himself to save the world, the almighty demi-god Thor was lost to a terrible storm, and vigilante Iron Man – spotted with a nuclear weapon trying to take advantage of the situation – was forever labelled an enemy of SHIELD.

This is a comic book office AU, where Steve is defrosted a year too late, Thor has forgotten who he is, and no one knows Tony is Iron Man.

Also includes: office pranks, inappropriate post-it notes, and superheroes who like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain

The Ghosts of War by scifigrl47 | M | 60k | historical!AU

Steven Rogers never wanted to be king, but he knows his duty, and he does it well. Lord Tony Stark, the king's appointed consort, does his duty as well, even though he'd enjoy his duty more if it actually involved sleeping with the king. As it doesn't, he's just resigned. The war that made Steve king and cost him nearly everything may be over, but a meeting of old enemies might stir up some ghosts none of them are prepared for.

Truth Behind Masks by scifigrl47 | M | 98k | identity porn

Steve Rogers has plenty of friends. He just doesn't know two of them are the same man.

That's just how Tony Stark/Iron Man likes it. Until he comes to regret it.

One More Troubled Soul ♥ by sara_holmes | various | 61k | wintersoldier!steve

And Tony realizes that working out who the Winter Soldier used to be and who he is now are two entirely different things.

Slipping off the Page into Your Hands by Sineala | E | 68k | soulmates!au

Soulmates have their first words to each other written on their wrists. This should make it easy. For Steve and Tony, it is anything but. Steve's problem is that the future he has awoken into is nothing he was ever expecting: he has a soulmate now. Who might be a robot. And if his soulmate is Iron Man, how can he be so attracted to Tony Stark? It should be impossible. Tony's problem is that he is Iron Man, his soulmate is a man whom he in no way deserves, and he is going to fight everything in his heart and do his best to make sure Steve never, ever finds out the whole truth.

I wanted to fix this (but couldn't stop from tearing it down) by missbecky | E | 50K

A visit from a Reed Richards from a parallel world convinces Tony and Steve that they must do whatever they can to prevent their world from falling into Civil War. They can save the world…but at what cost to themselves?

Like Coming Home by missbecky | M | 75K | universe crossover, 616

After a tragic accident, Steve is given a chance to go back in time and deliver a warning to Tony in the hope of avoiding their fate. Something's gone wrong, though, because this is not his world he's ended up in. And that is definitely not his Tony who's planning to delete his own brain.

Sometimes your second chance isn't at all what you were expecting.

Stay With Me (home is where your mind is.) ♥ by sara_holmes | M | 67k | multiverse

Where Steve doesn’t quite die, ends up stranded in the multiverse and would quite like to know how the hell so many versions of himself ended up sleeping with Tony Stark. Well, that’s going to make things a tad awkward when he gets home.

Relativistic Heat Conduction ♥ by BlossomsintheMist | E | 69k | AOU, H/C

Age of Ultron-based, but not entirely canon compliant. Written for the 2013 Cap-Iron Man Reverse Big Bang. Ultron has attacked, obliterating most of the world's superheroes and resistance in a matter of hours. The remaining heroes band together and share what strength they have to get through it, to survive, and defeat Ultron once and for all. Steve Rogers grieves in the wake of the disaster and the heroes' defeat, and no one knows if he will be able to provide the leadership they need--but Tony Stark isn't about to let him slip away that easily.

If We Never Got This Second Chance ♥ by Pookaseraph | M | 50k | time travel, superfamily

When Tony and Steve’s son from the future, Jake Jensen, arrives at Avenger’s Tower, the two of them are forced to confront some hard truths: Tony that he might not actually become a horrible father, and Steve that he might not be able to set aside his discomfort with sharing a child with another man. When they both get a second chance at a first try at fatherhood, it’s up to the two of them to learn from their own future's past.

His Fate Will Be Unlearned by scifigrl47 | M | 94k | canon divergence

Tony Stark spent his childhood making weapons, filling the hole his father left in the world when he succumbed to alcohol, grief, and his own demons. At the age of fifteen, he ran away from home, and made it as far as MIT before all of his responsibilities caught up to him. Now seventeen, he just wants to finish his degree and escape from everything connected to the Stark name.

Steve Rogers crashed into the icy North Atlantic in the 1940's, sacrificing himself to save the world. He never expected to wake up, and now that he has, he's not sure he's glad. The US Army has other plans for him, but for now, Steve is slowly learning to live life in the 21st century, and taking classes at Boston College. He's beginning to suspect that there is no escape.

Boston College is on the T's Green Line. MIT is on the Red. The two lines meet at the Park Street Station, and so will Steve and Tony.

This time tomorrow (where were we?) by dorcas_gustine | E | 85k | Marvel 616

Tony goes to see Wanda, and suddenly Steve is alive and there are Skrulls! Or maybe Tony is just going crazy. Nothing happens in this fic, until the very end. Seriously. There's a lot of talking, mostly at inopportune moments, Tony's views on the acceptable gifts to give people are slightly different from everyone else's and he spends more time than would seem necessary being (half-)naked. What else is new?

And We Are Giants by CapsicleRogers | M | 68k | pacificrim!au

When Captain Steve Rogers wakes from an injury-induced coma, a lot has changed in the battle against the Kaiju. There are new Jaegers with new pilots, new advances in the study of the beasts, even new rules in the Shatterdome. It’s starting to seem like they’re finally ready to defeat the monsters once and for all, but first Steve must learn to get along with his new team of pilots. Especially the troublesome Tony Stark, who’s proving to be harder to deal with than the Kaiju problem itself.

Upon Waking by Winterstar  | E | 80k | serious injury, PTSD, angst

A story of recovery. In a world without superheroes, Tony Stark, the disinherited son of a billionaire, goes to Afghanistan as an embedded media star, only to be held hostage for months until he’s rescued. During his recovery, his therapist Doctor Bruce Banner prescribes an unusual treatment; volunteer work at a rehab center. He meets an eclectic assembled group including a vet who thinks he’s Thor, a physical therapist who might be a spy, and an all American hero, Steve Rogers. It is Steve Rogers, the soldier in a coma, who captures his interest and, eventually, his heart.

Fics over 100k words

Say When Verse ♥ series (9 works) by ann2who | E | 328k | MCU

A series rewriting MCU verse, beginning with an alternate version of Iron Man 2, in which, instead of Natasha, Steve got assigned to help Tony while the genius was slowly dying of Palladium poisoning. Continues there in unfolding Steve's and Tony's journey through acceptance, trust, and eventually love.

In Which Tony Stark Builds Himself Some Friends (But His Family Was Assigned by Nick Fury)  ♥ series (7 works) by scifigrl47 | various | 343k | MCU

Steve takes things like personal responsibility and respect seriously. Tony's got people he pays to take care of that kind of thing, and anyway, he's pretty sure that he's going to die of some exotic disease in his workshop, because Dummy's still a little spotty about what is 'clean' enough to put on an open wound. The rest of the Avengers are in this for personal gain, except for Clint, he just enjoys being a dick.And some things shouldn't be a chore.

Blue Lips, Blue Veins by romanoff | E | 300k | growing up, friends to lovers, slowburn

Tony Stark is Iron Man.

Before that, he was an man with bigger heart than brain. Before that, he was an asshole with a bigger mouth than sense. And before that, he was was a scared little boy. Not that it matters. Stark's always have had iron in their backbone.

Will of Iron, Heart of Glass ♥  series (3 works) | M | 104k | AI!tony

Tony has been held by Stane since his escape from Afghani terrorists, marked dead in the eyes of the world while Stane is free to use his mind, inventions, and company as he sees fit. Tony feels there's nothing he can do and has resigned himself to death to save those he loves. That would be when JARVIS lets Captain America stumble into his old lab.

Steve has been wandering Avengers Mansion in the steps of a ghost, seeing empty spaces, and recurring oddities that mean nothing to anyone but him. He doesn't know who left them, or why the ghost lingers. It isn't even until he enters a dusty lab that things start to fall into place as he meets Anthony, a computer program named for its creator Anthony Stark.

Deep in the Heart of Me ♥ by Finely Honed (jaqen_hgar) | E | 257k | modern/non-power!au, ptsd, parent!steve

There were days when the realization that he was someone’s father made Steve's head hurt, but mostly he was grateful that he could trust his instincts, because apparently Peter was what had been missing from his life. Yes, he still had lingering, unresolved issues from his time in the Army, and sure, he had what Bucky annoyingly referred to as a criminally untapped ass, and no life outside of work and Peter, but Steve was okay with how his life had turned out because of trusting his instincts.

Unfortunately, those same instincts had straight up betrayed him by going absolutely haywire upon being exposed to Tony Stark.

A Higher Form of War ♥ by sabrecmc | M | 292k | historical/royalty!au

Tony is a King with a surprising number of people out to kill him. Steve and the rest of the Avengers are fighting for Pierce's rebellion and end up with Tony as their prisoner. Oops.

Basically one of those bodice-ripping romance novels I don't read (ahem) but with far more gay.

The Captain and His Courtesan by Winterstar | E | 189k | space au

A story of revolution.Captain Steve Rogers is just trying to pay off his debt to SHIELD, carting cargo from the Rim worlds to the Inner Belts in his bucket of bolts ship, the Howling Commando. He keeps a low profile and makes sure his crew is safe and happy. But the universe has a different plan for the once highly decorated Captain of the Honor Guard. The universe drops a Courtesan by the name of Tony Stark into his life. The Captain doesn't like it, but Bucky convinces him that providing transport to the most elusive Courtesan in the Guild could be their ticket to freedom. His crew from the engineer with anger management issues to the pilot who may be a beautiful but deadly assassin wants him to take the commission. What ends up being a simple commission puts his crew in jeopardy and could change all of humanity, because the Courtesan is not really just a pretty face and the Captain of the Honor Guard can fall in love far too easily with a man of conviction - and Tony Stark is a man of conviction.

Newborn series by Ilerre | M | 109k | infidelity, body modification, read all warnings

It all started when they stopped trusting each other.

Power and Paradox by The_Kinky_Pet | E | 221k - WIP | MCU set in BDSM verse

“Billionaire, genius, engineer, philanthropist, submissive.  Yeah, submissive.  Any questions?”

OR

Yet another BDSM-AU.  

The Limitations of Wax ♥ by RayShippouUchiha | M | 175k - WIP | MCU with fem!toni

So Jarvis is the one who pulls her up onto her feet, presses a tool into one hand and a book into the other and tells her to create. Tells her that if the numbers and the shapes and images in her mind hurt so bad then she should build them, should give them form so that they can finally leave her alone.

Jarvis is the one who finally teaches her how to breathe.

Or

Toni Stark grows up with the tale of Icarus swirling in the back of her mind. Instead of taking it as a precautionary tale about hubris and overreaching she decides it's more about the limitations of wax.

Years later when she builds herself wings of her own she makes sure to build them out of better material.

Go Ugly Early by just_another_tinker | E | 156k - WIP | mob!au

He’s The Captain?

This was not good. This was so not good.

There were theories of course, of what The Captain would look like. Most followed the typical Hollywoodesque belief that he was some version of the Godfather, sitting in a dark room with a cigar, commanding his forces with a flick of his wrist. There were even some that even thought that The Captain was not one person, but a whole network of people with eyes and ears everywhere.

The blonde Adonis in front of him was definitely not what Tony was expecting.

Of course, in the end it didn’t matter.

There was a reason no one knew what The Captain looked like.

Because anyone who saw his face never lived to tell the tale.

Sins of Omission by Kiyaar | E | 155k - WIP | dark, torture, skrulls (be warned: this hasn’t been updated since 2013)

A Post-Civil War, Pre-Secret Invasion AU where Steve is dead, Tony's a mess, and everything sucks.

In which Tony deals poorly with Steve's death, falls off the wagon, sees ghosts, and misses a lot.

Oh, and the Skrulls are about to invade.

Indelible ♥ by Penumbren | various | 104k | dimension travel - marvel noir/616

When an experiment goes awry, Tony thinks he may have found an answer to his problems and Steve faces something he's been avoiding for a very long time.

Pulse, Beat, and Measure ♥ by Sineala | E | 134k | hero worship, marvel noir/616

Two men. Two worlds. Life during wartime. 

Holding Out for a Hero ♥ by Wordsplat | T | 100k | medieval au

When Tony was a prince and Steve was his manservant, they were young and reckless and hopelessly in love. But an attack on Tony's life convinces Steve that he can't protect Tony, so he leaves in the dead of night to train until he can. Ten years later, Steve returns to the kingdom a strong and able knight, but his king is both furious and broken-hearted. 

Proof Positive by MegaraNoelle | T | 362k | superfamily, getting together

Tony is no stranger to paternity claims from his female conquests, there's a system in place for them. But when one of the tests actually comes back positive, he makes a rash decision to not tell anyone about it, not even Pepper Potts. All Mary Parker wants is for Tony to spend a little time with their son. Tony has a lot to think about in his life now, how he wants to run his company, how his life is going to change with the arc reactor, and what he's going to do about his son, Peter. Then, the Avengers Initiative pops up, and in waltzes his childhood hero, and enemy, Captain America.

It's All in the Mind (14 works) by inukagome15 | T | 332k | MCU verse mutant!tony

The adventures of Tony as a mutant; how he learned to accept himself and his subsequent growth into his own. Hijinks ensue.