#they're both totally making an appearance in part 4

[easy-there-leftovers]

Magnum Opus (Ch. 1)

When an MIT prodigy on their gap year is contacted by the FBI regarding her potential involvement in a series of murders in Washington D.C., she must now cooperate to uncover how her paintings are mysteriously appearing at the crime scenes.

(Written with Season 1-4 Spencer in mind, but the timeline could be anywhere pre-season 12. No mentions of past cases)

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Artist! reader|cw: Canon-typical violence|word count: 2k words

Also on Ao3!!

Series Masterlist

While Aaron Hotchner remained vigilant as he drove the black SUV, the constant flipping of Spencer’s case files seemed to be louder than the car’s air conditioning. 

He had directed Morgan and JJ to touch base at the MPDC, and had Rossi and Prentiss survey the crime scene of Jonathan Edwards; the identity of the previously unknown man in the vacant apartment.

This left him with Reid in the passenger seat to conduct an investigation on their only lead so far. 

From the update Garicia had given them, Y/n L/n was a prodigy a year younger than their very own. Having graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology a year ago, she moved to Capitol Park Plaza and Twins Apartments in Washington D.C., and is currently unemployed. Occasionally selling her paintings out of her unit under an anagram of her name.

 But something bothered him.

And it seems like Reid has picked up on it too.

“Do you think Dr. L/n is the unsub?” The unit chief asks.

Spencer hums before answering.

“While we can’t rule it out just yet, the possibility of her being the unsub is totally unlikely. The thing that’s throwing me off is that everything is too convenient. I mean, why would the unsub use something so publicly personal to them as part of their signature? It’s as if she’s overtly incriminating herself.”

Spencer checks back onto the pictures of the victims, then lifts his head up to look at Hotch to continue.

“Based on the way the victims are modeled, an immense amount of care was put into them. All for the purpose of making them look like the subjects in their paintings. Actually, the fixation on changing the bodies’ posture and keeping them clean is typically done out of remorse. But the added elements, like the placement of the paintings, creates an image of an unsub more on the narcissistic side. By creating two 'artworks,' they're prompting the viewer to decide which version of it they prefer. Mocking the original artist in the process.”

“So the paintings were done before the murder?”

“I have no reason to believe otherwise.”

His unit chief sighs and pulls over to the curb. “Well, we’re about to test that belief.” Spencer hurries to take off his seatbelt as Hotch closes the car door with a thud. 

—------

Hotchner nods at Reid as they find themselves in front of the written address Garcia gave them. He lifts his hand to knock firmly on your door, and waits for a response.

A thud from the other side causes both of them to assess each other before Hotch tells Spencer to stay behind him. Gun in hand until something, or someone, comes running at them.

But instead a muffled, “sorry” is heard right after, which causes him to lower his gun.

The door finally opens a crack to reveal a very tired twenty-something woman, some dark pigment or makeup smudged on their lower eye lines as they rubbed at it. She immediately fixed her posture however at the sight of the unexpected visitors. Eyes wide with concern.

“Dr. L/n, I’m Aaron Hotchner with Dr. Spencer Reid of the FBI.” He highlights his statement by showing his badge. “We’d like to ask you some questions.” 

“Oh, um,” The woman blinks rapidly and shakes their head before immediately saying, “Of course,” with a nod and opening the door wide to let them in.

A quirk that does not go unnoticed by Spencer, who observes how different she looks to her more formal ID photos.

—-----

You let the FBI agents into your apartment, but are now suddenly aware of the state of disarray you left it in last night. Not to mention the state you were in. 

You had just woken up and your brain wasn’t quite all there yet. If you had known you’d have guests over, you would have at least put some of your books and papers back onto their shelves rather than on your floor.

“My, uh—” You start, “Apologies! For the room and the um,”

You inhale deeply and gesture to yourself as you try to find the words before settling on an exasperated, “me.”

“No worries, miss. We don’t really call in advance.” You nod at the older man’s explanation vacantly before coming up with a response.

“Would you like anything to drink ?” You move to your fridge to get water to wake you up, and decide that it would be rude not to offer. The two decline, with the younger more busy observing your living room bookcase than the older one that sat on your couch. 

You notice that something must have interested him as he lingers on certain shelves. That section in particular had prints of dissertations you had been meaning to read, or have already read, in clear folders.

You wonder if he found his work there or something before returning with water for yourself. 

“So what can I help you with?”

“Dr. L/n, are you aware of the current string of murders that have been happening as of this year?” 

You blink rapidly again. The question catches you off guard, but you shake your head. 

“I know it’s a bad habit, and that I should, but I don’t really listen to the news.” Feeling your eyebrows quirk, you rub your hands together slowly. Making direct eye contact with Hotch, before looking at the younger man as he takes out a few papers from the folder he was holding.

“Are you familiar with these paintings then?”

 Now that piques your interest.

Dr. Spencer Reid, who sees a flicker of recognition in your eyes when it meets his own, presents various pictures of your artworks in what seems to be dimly lit areas. They’re a little dirty, but otherwise you would recognize them as your own.

 The thought instantly made something in your stomach turn.

“I–” You start, but shake your head subtly again. Unsure of what to say and how to say it next as you stare at the images. “am.” You turn your head to look back up at Spencer who nods thoughtfully.

“Recently, your paintings have been showing up at crime scenes in the D.C. area. Specifically, victims of an organized unsub that seems to be targeting people who accurately resemble the subjects in your work.” If your eyes weren’t wide enough, that bit of information had certainly opened them wider than ever before as you stared up at him.

“That, combined with the concentrated traces of 5-durastalene found in the pigments of the paint used, have led us to suspect your involvement in these murders, Dr. L/n.” You heavily feel the blink of your eyelids and rest your fingers on them to keep them closed before looking back at the two of them.

“I’m sorry,” you smile incredulously. “So you’re telling me that not only has Lunacite been identified on the paintings you’ve found, but that people who look like the personas in my private works actually exist and have since been–” You pinch the bridge of your nose. “Murdered?”

“Well that shouldn’t come as a surprise, they were your muses, weren’t they? You were commissioned?” Hotch is the one who asks and you shake your head with wide eyes.

“I didn’t even know these people existed. They were just– faces I came up with mentally with the visual library I’ve amassed over the years. I don’t really make it a habit to paint from reference. Like I said, they were private.”

“And the chemical?” You thought for a moment before your lips thinned into a line.

“I don’t know what to tell you, Agent Hotchner, but I haven’t touched anything regarding that compound in over a year. I’ve only ever worked on it in my lab on university grounds, and I don’t make a habit of bringing work home.” You scratch the hairs near the base of your hairline.

“More importantly, hundreds of students and lecturers have access to my work, my research, and my lab space. Not to mention the people who might have heard my work through academic conferences.”

You move away from your position near the living room coffee table Spencer placed the pictures on, but picked up one before you did and shook your head.

“Besides, these paintings? No one should know about them, let alone have them. I didn't sell these.” That made Spencer’s brows furrow as he looked at the other photos still on the table.

“Do you have proof?” You stay silent, but then motion for them to follow you to the door of your room.

“Well, for one, I’m sure you’d understand that most people don’t make copies of their artwork traditionally, right? Expenditure of time, work materials, effort, human error, and many other variables. It just isn’t practical nor convenient.” You ramble and look back at them to continue.

“I also don’t make the majority of my art known online. Only a good 30% makes its way to my portfolio, and the others are never to be seen by anyone else.”

“They're studies. They’re made with cheap paints, they’re subjectively not appropriate for commercial use and-–I just wouldn’t be comfortable charging anyone for them.” 

They follow you across the room, and make themselves apparent behind you.

You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

“So if my ‘commissioned paintings’ are currently on D.C. crime scenes, and possibly in MPDC evidence,” You open the door to reveal your studio to the two agents. 

Various paint tubes, books, and brushes littered the floor, table, and boxes. A lone easel was situated near your apartment window, with an unfinished painting on it. And various canvasses, not displayed, but instead kept on tall shelves. Only the differently colored edges indicated that they were ever used.

What surprised them both however, were the same paintings in the pictures staring back at them.

 Some on the walls, some on the floor, but what was most important was that they were in this room, they were clean, and there were more of them.

You turn to look back at them with shaky eyes. “So why are they still here?”

—----

Hotch and Reid stood outside of your apartment door as you cleaned yourself up. Hotch made the call to bring you to the precinct for further investigation and for your own safety, but allowed you to freshen up before leaving with them. Not that he told you about the safety part.

You were hard to read, given your erratic reactions. It unnerved him, but he supposes it comes with the territory of being gifted. You also offered to bring in your paintings and a few other materials for forensics to test, to which while he was suspicious of, was not ungrateful for.

He made a quick call to Garcia to check attendants of any academic conferences you’ve spoken at and if anyone had been more interested than the others. When he was finished, he looked to Reid who was crossing his arms and staring at the carpeted hallway before looking back at him.

“She’s uncomfortable.” He stated plainly.

“Reid, most people would be if they just found out their hobby had been getting people killed.” Hotch said as he kept looking at his phone for anything new from the others.

“There’s certainly that, but I meant her title. ‘Doctor.’” He said in quotes, and Hotch raises his eyebrow at that but allows him to continue anyway with a curt nod.

“I mean, every time we’ve addressed her with her title, she blinks faster. Did you know it’s a common attribute that’s directly related to an increase in heart rate, which is why they’re usually correlated with lying? Initially, you would think that she faked her experience to get those credentials, but given her educational background, she must have not been given an opportunity to be referred to as such for a long time. Also, the gap year she took could’ve only exacerbated any insecurities she might have about her intellectual achievements. Plus, the lack of organization in her own home, while not wildly uncommon amongst people her age, could suggest the sincerity of her belief about compartmentalizing her work and her private life.”

“And what does that tell you?”

As Spencer was supposed to answer, a thud much like the one they heard before they entered earlier was heard again, followed by a similarly muffled, ‘sorry.’

He turns to look back at Hotch again with a small, victorious smile.

“That she doesn’t fit the profile.”

——-

taglist: @littlewolfieposts

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

I’m saving up my Welsh questions so I’m not a total bother!!

1. I can broadly understand why location names in Wales are different in English (colonialism ☹️) but can you explain Castell-nedd v Neath? Maybe I haven’t gotten far enough yet but it seems to be an outlier in that they just dropped a whole part of the name?

2. Cinio v swper, I’m assuming (perhaps incorrectly hence the checking) that cinio = noon meal and swper = evening meal? Is that right or is it backwards?

3. I am deeply interested in the etymology of llun because it appears to be both a picture and (+ dydd) Monday. Are they linguistically connected??

4. Speaking of days. Am I right in inferring that dydd iau means Thursday and ddydd Iau means on Thursday? I can’t quite differentiate why the spelling changes.

5. Speaking of days part two. Nos Mercher v bore dydd Mercher. Why does nos appear to drop the dydd? Does bore ever do the same?

6. Moving away from days. There seems to be no difference between dych chi’n and wyt ti’n as far as I can tell. Are they interchangeable or are they formal/informal like vous/tu? Or is this a dialect thing like different regions??

7. I am learning about eisiau and I have a question about contractions. It appears to be dw i’n mwynhau but dw i eisiau. Why no ‘n?? I know the i’n is i yn so where’s the yn with eisiau? 🤔

Welsh my beloved you are so fun to learn but Duolingo sucks at explaining nuance.

HA okay *cracks knuckles*

1. Location names are always a bit of a wildcard between languages, because sometimes they corrupt differently and sometimes they have wildly different origins and meanings in the first place. Castell Nedd - Neath is actually a relatively mild one; it's just that people abbreviated it more in English than in Welsh. A similar thing happened to Penybont ar Ogwr - Bridgend.

By contrast, Abertawe - Swansea is totally different, with different meanings. Ditto Drefdraeth - Newport, Caergybi - Holyhead, etc. Wild shit.

2. Like a lot of languages, cinio can either mean lunch or evening meal depending on who uses it - the English equivalent is 'dinner'. Younger generations generally mean lunch. Swper is a direct transliteration of supper, though, with the same meaning (I personally use 'te' instead for evening meal). So, in short, you're broadly right, but it's a bit ambiguous.

3. Oh, you'll like this! As far as we know, it's from Proto Indo European lewk, meaning 'bright; to shine, to see' - we also get 'goleu' from it. The theory is that Dydd Llun therefore gets a similar etymology to Monday, because it refers to the moon (lleuad/luna). Llun (picture), meanwhile, is a thing you see, depicting what you see. The fact that they ultimately corrupted into the same word is coincidental.

4. There's some fun stuff here, okay.

So, you are hitting up against everyone's favourite Celtic language quirk which is MUTATIONS ┌⁠(⁠★⁠ｏ⁠☆⁠)⁠┘ These pop up in many funky ways of course. In this instance, it's not a plural but it IS trying to tell you something. So:

Dydd Iau: Thursday

Dyddiau Iau: Thursdays

Fi'n mynd i'r dre ddydd Iau: I'm going to town on Thursday

Basically, the mutation is there to indicate that there's an invisible preposition going on. If we hypercorrected it would be "Fi'n mynd i'r dre ar ddydd Iau", and that's what triggers the mutation; but in modern Welsh it's a quirk of this particular context that we do away with the preposition, because the mutation makes it clear it's there invisibly. Why do we do this? Unknown.

5. This is a slightly weird one and I suspect the answer lies somewhere in the fact that 'night' just means the dark bit while 'day' can either mean the light bit OR a 24 hour period containing both.

But, actually: you can actually drop the dydd for bore, too. It's dealer's choice. BUT, you cannot have the dydd for nos Fercher. In English, the 'day' part of 'Wednesday' is kind of invisible, and just means the 24 hour block. But in Welsh, they're still separate words, and it very much means 'the light part'. So 'nos dydd Mercher' would be like saying 'Wednesday Day Night.'

6. It's formal/plural Vs informal. Chi is formal (or plural), ti is informal.

Occasionally monoglot English Tumblrs make posts about how they reckon we should bring the you/thou divide back to English, and as a person who speaks a language that still pulls this bullshit and occasionally has to play the "How formal am I supposed to be with this person" game, every time it makes me sneer and think about how those same people complain all the livelong day about invisible social rules. You do not want this, folks. Be suitably grateful to your forebears.

7. Ah, yes, eisiau is a law unto itself.

So, the yn/'n in Welsh is normally there because the verb 'to be' gets split in half, and half gets attached to the following verb to make that verb active, right? So for example:

Rwy'n cerdded - I'm walking

Roughly, but not literally, equivalent to the English "I am walking", except if you were to split "Rwy'n" out into "Rwy yn", neither of those words means "I" or "am" - it's not a literal step by step translation.

'Yn' gets bundled in with the verb, more often than not. And again, while this is not a literal translation, it makes the verb into an '-ing' word. Welsh does not distinguish between "I walk" and "I'm walking" - it's always "I'm walking."

But eisiau is different because it's not used grammatically like that. You personally cannot actively want something in Welsh. But, there can be a want upon you. So instead of "I am wanting", you say "There is a want upon me."

So, "I want to go to town": "Mae arna'i eisiau mynd i'r dre".

Duolingo might be asking you to construct that slightly differently, though; they might want "Mae eisiau arnaf i" or something similar. But ultimately that's what it's doing.

I hope this was helpful! Let me know if anything is baffling, still.

[anyataylorjoys]

Someone asked me how I created the fade transition in this gifset which I’ll try to explain in the most comprehensive way that I can. If you've never done something like this before, I suggest reading through the full tutorial before attempting it so you know what you'll need to plan for.

To follow, you should have:

basic knowledge of how to make gifs in photoshop

some familiarity with the concept of how keyframes work

patience

Difficulty level: Moderate/advanced

Prep + overview

First and foremost, make the two gifs you'll be using. Both will need to have about the same amount of frames.

For ref the gif in my example is 540x540.

I recommend around 60-70 frames max total for a big gif, which can be pushing it if both are in color, then I would aim for 50-60. My gif has a total of 74 frames which I finessed using lossy and this will be explained in Part 4.

⚠️ IMPORTANT: when overlaying two or more gifs and when using key frames, you MUST set your frame delay to 0.03 fps for each gif, which can be changed to 0.05 fps or anything else that you want after converting the combined canvas back into frames. But both gifs have to be set to 0.03 before you convert them to timeline to avoid duplicated frames that don't match up, resulting in an unpleasantly choppy finish.

Part 1: Getting Started

Drag one of your gifs onto the other so they're both on the same canvas.

The gif that your canvas is fading FROM (Gif 1) should be on top of the gif it is fading INTO (Gif 2).

And here's a visual of the order in which your layers should appear by the end of this tutorial, so you know what you're working toward achieving:

Part 2: Creating the grid

Go to: View > Guides > New guide layout

I chose 5 columns and 5 rows to get the result of 25 squares.

The more rows and columns you choose, the more work you'll have to do, and the faster your squares will have to fade out so keep that in mind. I wouldn't recommend any more than 25 squares for this type of transition.

To save time, duplicate the line you've created 3 more times, or as many times as needed (key shortcut: CMD +J) and move each one to align with the guides both horizontally and vertically. You won't need to recreate the lines on the edges of the canvas, only the ones that will show.

After you complete this step, you will no longer need the guides so you can go back in and clear them.

Follow the same duplicating process for the squares with the rectangle tool using the lines you've created.

Align the squares inside the grid lines. The squares should not overlap the lines but fit precisely inside them.

This might take a few tries for each because although to the eye, the squares look all exactly the same size, you'll notice that if you try to use the same duplicated square for every single one without alterations, many of them will be a few pixels off and you'll have to transform the paths to fit.

To do this go to edit > transform path and hold down the command key with the control key as you move one edge to fill the space.

Once you're done, put all the squares in their separate group, which needs to be sandwiched between Gif 1 and Gif 2.

Right click Gif 1 and choose "create clipping mask" from the drop down to mask it to the squares group. This step is super important.

After this point, I also took the opacity of the line groups down to about 40% so the lines wouldn't be so bold. Doing this revealed some squares that needed fixing so even if you aren't going dim the lines, I recommend clicking off the visibility of the lines for a moment to make sure everything is covered properly.

Part 3A: Prep For Key framing

I wanted my squares to fade out in a random-like fashion and if you want the same effect, you will have to decide which squares you want to fade out first, or reversely, which parts of Gif 2 you want to be revealed first.

In order to see what's going on underneath, I made Gif 1 invisible and turned down the opacity of the squares group.

If you want text underneath to be revealed when the squares fade away, I would add that now, and place the text group above Gif 2, but under the squares group.

Make a mental note that where your text is placed and the order in which it will be revealed is also something you will have to plan for.

With the move tool, click on the first square you want to fade out. Every time you click on a square, it will reveal itself in your layers.

I chose A3 to be the first square to fade and I'm gonna move this one to the very top of all the other square layers.

So if I click on D2 next, that layer would need to be moved under the A3 layer and so on. You'll go back and forth between doing this and adding key frames to each one. As you go along, it's crucial that you put them in order from top to bottom and highly suggested that you rename the layers (numerically for example) which will make it easier to see where you've left off as your dragging the layers into place.

Part 3B: Adding the Keyframes

This is where we enter the gates of hell things become tedious.

Open up the squares group in the timeline panel so you can see all the clips.

Here is my example of the general pattern that's followed and its corresponding layers of what you want to achieve when you're finished:

So let’s try it!

Expand the control time magnification all the way to the right so you can see every frame per second.

As shown in Part 3A, select your first chosen square.

Where you place the time-indicator on the panel will indicate the placement of the keyframe. Click on the clock next to opacity to place your first keyframe.

Move the time-indicator over 3 frames and place the next key frame.

Things to consider before moving forward:

Where you place your very first keyframe will be detrimental. If you're using a lot of squares like I did, you may have to start the transition sooner than preferred.

If you're doing 25 squares, the key frames will have to be more condensed which means more overlapping because more frames are required to finish the transition, verses if you're only using a 9-squared grid. See Part 4 for more detailed examples of this.

The opacity will remain at 100% for every initial key frame, and the second one will be at 0%.

Instead of creating two keyframes like this and changing the opacities for every single clip, you can copy the keyframes and paste them onto the other clips by click-dragging your mouse over both of them and they'll both turn yellow. Then right click one of the keyframes and hit copy.

Now drop down to your next clip, move your time-indicator if necessary to the spot where the first keyframe will start and click the clock to create one. Then right click it and hit "paste".

Tip: When you have both keyframes selected, you can also move them side to side by click-dragging one of them while both are highlighted.

Your full repetitive process in steps will go as follows:

click on square of choice on the canvas

drag that square layer to the top under the last renamed

in timeline panel: drop down to next clip, move time-indicator tick to your chosen spot for the next keyframe

create new keyframe

right click new keyframe & paste copied keyframes

repeat until you've done this with every square in the group

Now you can change the opacity of your squares layer group back to 100% and turn on the visibility of Gif 1. Then hit play to see the magic happen.

PART 4: Finished examples

Example 1

the transition starts too soon Cause: initial keyframe was placed at frame 0

the squares fade away too quickly Cause: overlapping keyframes, seen below. (this may be the ideal way to go with more squares, but for only 9, it's too fast)

Example 2

more frame time for first gif

transition wraps up at a good point Cause: in this instance, the first keyframe was placed 9 frames in, and the keyframes are not overlapping. The sequential pair starts where the last pair ended, creating a slower fade of each square.

Part 5: Final Tips and Saving

You can dl my save action here which will convert everything back into frames, change the frame rate to 0.05 and open the export window so you can see the size of the gif immediately.

If it's over 10gb, one way to finesse this is by use of lossy. By definition, lossy “compresses by removing background data” and therefore quality can be lost when pushed too far. But for most gifs, I have not noticed a deterioration in quality at all when saving with lossy until you start getting into 15-20 or higher, then it will start eating away at your gif so keep it minimal.

If you've done this and your gif is losing a noticeable amount of quality and you still haven’t gotten it below 10gb, you will have no choice but to start deleting frames.

When it comes to transitions like this one, sometimes you can't spare a single frame and if this is the case, you will have to return to the timeline state in your history and condense the key frames to fade out quicker so you can shorten the gif. You should always save a history point before converting so you have a bookmark to go back to in case this happens.

That's pretty much it, free to shoot me an ask on here or on @jugheadjones with any questions.

[the-case-book-of-fanfiction]

Love Bites {Masterlist}

With your memory spotty, you gravitate toward the first person you see—an old friend from a very old past. But Astarion is keeping plenty of secrets...and he's never been the best liar. How long will it take before his deceptions unravel? And what will you do when you realize just how much damage he's done?

Ship: Astarion Ancunin x fem!vampire spawn!elf!Tav/reader

Warnings: 18+ MDNI, vampire spawn!Tav, fem!Tav, manipulative but guilty/regretful Astarion, Astarion's sexual trauma, Cazador, vampire bite, reader is turned into a spawn, reader is technically one of Astarion's victims

18+ Warnings: vaginal sex, consensual sex, mirror sex, riding, fingering, oral, blood kink, bite kink, loving sex, non-descriptive noncon/dubcon (Astarion’s trauma), Astarion experimenting with his boundaries

Total Word Count: 47,397 words (87 pages)

Notes: The title of this fic (and some of its chapter titles) is heavily inspired by Def Leppard's song Love Bites.

Posting Schedule can be found on my {Updates Page}

CONTENT NOTE: Where Astarion's perspective comes into this fic, I tried writing his experience with his hurt that he has been treated this way along with his "this is what I do" mentality; he's very back and forth about the abuse he's endured and some of my writing reflects that. If that upsets you or makes you uncomfortable in anyway, I completely understand and I encourage you to leave the fic at any point. However, I do believe writing this perspective is necessary, as his blasé take on his sexual trauma is one that I myself have struggled with, as I am sure other survivors have as well.

☟ story parts linked below ☟

Best Unremembered {Chapter 1} Waking up with a spotty memory and the only person you do remember is jarring enough—but it only gets worse when the people who remember you are monsters and strangers.

Walking Corpses {Chapter 2} Astarion's night spent searching for prey is interrupted by an unwelcome feeling of familiarity. Your life is derailed by recognizing a long-dead friend.

Little Love {Chapter 3} Appearances can be deceiving, but they can also tell you everything you need to know. A second look at the elf you once called a friend is all you need to fill in the two-hundred year gap.

The Golden Elf {Chapter 4} Sometimes, vampires choose their spawn specifically. Sometimes, they're in the wrong place at the wrong time and are lost to their loved ones for centuries. These days, that's all you can think about.

Little Star, Little Sun {Chapter 5} A long-awaited reunion that doesn't go quite as planned can lead to many things, especially when two manipulators both lay their traps for one another. Though is it really a trap when all you want to do is spare your lover from yet another night of torment?

Love Bites {Chapter 6} Astarion remembers you, but it's already too late. He's bedded you and remembered the love and life you had together, two hundred years ago, and now he has to make a choice. Does he sacrifice himself, or does he sacrifice you?

Love Bleeds {Chapter 7} Fangs gleam in the shadows and a coffin lies open nearby. Vampire lords are nasty creatures; even a changed heart can do very little when there are claws around it.

On My Knees {Chapter 8} A betrayal so severe even centuries of love threaten to break beneath its weight. Yet you offer forgiveness, even if Astarion has not felt its kindness in two hundred years.

Second Chances {Epilogue} Home is a place and home is people. You have quite the large family now, and it's time to provide for them, however you may.

Love Bites Soundtrack — 3h50min

Chapter 1: tracks 1 - 6 Chapter 2: tracks 7 - 13 Chapter 3: tracks 14 - 19 Chapter 4: tracks 20 - 26 Chapter 5: tracks 27 - 32 Chapter 6: tracks 33 - 40 Chapter 7: tracks 41 - 46 Chapter 8: tracks 47 - 53 Epilogue: tracks 54 - 60

[Image Caption: I do not give permission to repost, translate, or publish my work on any other site or app by anyone except myself. I do not give permission for my work to be fed into AI (for audio, art, or writing).]

Baldur's Gate 3 // Astarion Ancunin

Taglist: {comment and let me know if you'd like to be added to the Astarion taglist!} @wayward-hel @cheeslyy @ofmyth-andmagicart @neetheslayer @whispering-depths @freesidexjunkie @lightsinmycity @the0ldmann @gobbodoggo @oooof-ifellforyou @beeblisss @fangboner @aquaarietes @fiercest-eigengrau-skies @niqhtfell @call-me-nyxx @lueji-m @ceres-xiv @tricksy-trinity @graynstairs @rosa-rubus @ynisthatyou @thegoodwitchs-blog @catching-fire-in-the-wind @kiyastrf94 @vincemachina @silverfangmarks @ravenswritingroom @hinata7346 @hellethil @caramel-hufflepuff @beemiilk @mypainischronicbutmyassisiconic @starwatch77 @julianmarie @sadexistentialism @supernaturallover15 @writinghound @frankie-mercury @kindadolly @infernalrusalka

[olderthannetfic]

I know the response to this will be "WRITE FOR YOURSELF!!!1!" but when I look at things I worked really hard to write that have zero comments and the things I threw out there on a whim that actually appear to have made people happy, I feel so much less motivated to write the former. I know I'm supposed to be "doing it for myself" but I don't know what that means. It feels like those 90's movies saying "be yourself" or my therapist saying "be authentic". It's a nice enough sounding thing, but what does it mean? Does it mean writing in obscurity is more pure or more artsy? Is it supposed to be more moral and demonstrate integrity?

There's an agreement in fandom that writing for others is bad. It's impure. It's selfish. But no one has really ever explained why. Nor am I getting much out of writing a story that means a lot to me and getting dead silence in response. I like entertaining others and making them smile.

I can practically feel the, "uh, back in my day fic was hosted on a server and we didn't see hit counts let alone get comments and we were happy with it because we weren't whiny and in need of validation like Gen Z!!!1!" people gearing up to yell in the replies that they're good writers who don't care about comments. That's great for them, and I mean that sincerely. But equally sincerely, how are you supposed to maintain passion for something no one else is interested in? I've been told it's better to get validation via hit counts or bookmarks but numbers don't really do anything for me. Someone saying, "I loved this! Can't wait to see what happens next." can make not just my day but my week.

I know what people say. Fandom isn't a popularity context. It's not social media. You're not supposed to like talking to people about fandom things. But... I do. And the utter silence that is modern fandom - of the 100 last published fics in my fandom, only 10 have comments, and only 4 have regular commenters - is just really not fun to me.

--

Yes, lots of people do think it ~demonstrates integrity~. People who never finish anything.

People who actually succeed at making art will say superficially similar things, but what they mean is "If you write things you aren't actually interested in, you will either burn out or the art won't actually be satisfying to the audience or both".

--

The thing about back in the day is that we only got comments. You're dead wrong about that part. Yes, people whined that there wasn't enough feedback, and they will continue to whine about this until the end of time, but your description misses the most important part about the rose-colored glasses and what people are trying to explain about the past in most of those posts:

We couldn't see the lurkers (hit counts) but we did see some actual interactions. This allowed us to imagine that the comment rate was way higher than it actually was and to see fandom as a close-knit community (which was maybe somewhat more accurate than now but never as true as people believed).

--

You have fundamentally misunderstood what the (saner) posts about this are saying.

You shouldn't care about overall numbers. You should care about meaningful social interactions. Obviously, people like connecting with others via art.

Fandom is not a popularity contest. That's why you should enjoy talking to actual peers about things. Genuine connection is not about being a celebrity with fans: it's about making friends.

--

Some fandoms do have interactions. Maybe if you start interacting with others' works, that will help. Maybe you need a different fandom. "Modern fandom" isn't this total wasteland with no interaction, nor do most people find a total lack of it fun.

[ladyazurith]

You mentioned in one post that you think one problem with the game is that it twists itself into pretzels to fit the various different narratives, even when it doesn't make sense for the characters. Can you talk more about that? (Because I totally agree.)

Very much so! It's really bothersome. The first thing is in the individual chapters they tend to act like the students don't know each other well outside their own dorms, almost like they're practical strangers who have never interacted before. When everything else points to the opposite. Take Chapter 5 for example. They try to act like Ace and Deuce have no idea who Epel is, yet in Ace's CR story, he clearly meets Epel during their sorting. Never mind how they behave during events. And in chapter 2 when Cater is with Yuu and the others scoping out possible targets, it's presented like he doesn't know most of them well, when he clearly knows *everyone*.

Then from there, it's how the characters act in their individual chapters. Chapter 1 is mostly okay in this regard. Events with Riddle happen quickly enough that him having a major change of heart and acting "normal" in material from then on isn't too jarring.

But moving on from there it's a trainwreck. The chapter's overblot victims/ antagonists can get a little bit of a pass, but even then it stretches things.

Like Ruggie for instance, he is very shrewd and isn't above taking advantage of a situation. But he's not evil, he very clearly cares a lot about his home, his grandmother, and the other kids who live in the area with him. The idea that the character we see in every other situation would cause serious harm to someone else over a game is kind of ludicrous. He could have very easily risked expulsion if things had gone too far, and then he wouldn't be in a position to help *anyone*. Leona is even kind of iffy to me. While Leona tends to go out of his way to appear uncaring/unmotivated/lazy, he's actually an incredibly good dorm leader who cares about his students. Most of his real issues are internal, and harming innocent people who aren't even part of his beef with Malleus just seems out of character to me. Never mind what he does to Ruggie. Some of it can be explained by the build up of blot but not all of it.

And then Chapter 3, Azul, Jade, and Floyd. For the most part, I can see the tweels going along with everything because they both thrive on chaos. But Azul's plan is just...stupid coming from someone who's a professional businessman. First off he has no shortage of workers for the lounge. Ruggie frequently takes shifts there, and Cater while not a waiter also does a lot of work with them. But the whole sea anemone thing was just gross. And apparently, there was nothing in the contract about not disparaging their employer. It might have caused a spike in business at first just because people want to see what's going on for themselves, but overall, he'd ultimately hurt his business and drive customers *away*. Never mind the whole bullying backstory comes out of NOWHERE. Like I do have sympathy for Azul and what he went through and he is one of my favorite characters, but Ch 3 suffered from poor writing in my opinion. Narratively the whole thing was a mess.

Chapter 4 is handled better in my opinion. For the most part, I have the least amount of complaints about what goes on here. My biggest one though is what I mentioned before, Characters tend to exist in a bubble during their chapter events. You can not tell me that Cater nor Lilia wouldn't have tried to figure out what the hell was going on with Kalim. Or Silver for that matter. Never mind how Kalim had the authority to keep his entire dorm at school over a holiday when it's shut down?!!? I get his family is rich and powerful but, that still seems like a stretch idk.

Jamil I think was a least handled well otherwise, his actions and motivations seemed consistent with his character. In the end, he didn't really want to harm anyone, he just wanted his freedom and was desperate. The only real question is what did he think was going to happen next? Even if Kalim got kicked out of NRC then he would have only had about a year and a half of 'freedom' it wouldn't have solved any of his problems. And if Kalim had turned up dead, there would have still been severe repercussions for him and his family. IDK for someone who is supposed to be good at planning and scheming there definitely were parts that weren't well thought-out.

Chapter 5 and Rook is where this conversation started I think but I'll touch on it again. His actions at the end of chapter 5 are COMPLETELY out of character for what we know about him otherwise. Hiding his obsession with Neige from Vil, and then revealing it IN FRONT OF him while he's still licking his wounds from his overblot is just...if this was the only context we had for Rook, no one would be calling them friends. He had no real reason to reveal he was the one that cost them the competition.

The reception to this was so bad that's why we have the start of chapter 6 where Vil gives his speech about professionalism and why he's okay with Rook and what he did. I don't believe the narrative that Vil wasn't hurt at all, not with how he's shown to be so insecure especially where Neige is concerned. Sure I might buy the part about Rook voting for NRC not hurting him, but not the rest of it.

Never mind otherwise Rook isn't cruel. Especially not to Vil, and his actions were just that.

This is also biased, but the fact that Cater was cut from the team, and the reasons why rub me the wrong way. I know that they just wanted Jamil and Kalim because they were the previous chapter's focal point and Ace and Deuce because they're tied to pretty much everything because of Yuu and the story. But Vil keeps talking about being a professional, admitted straight up that Cater's audition was *perfect* but brushed him off and passed him over anyway. (Also Ironic because Cater's VA actually is a musician/singer/ensemble group member and not a traditional VA) but that's off course of the question lol

Also, I will never not be salty that RSA won with their song/performance. All for the narrative. And THEN they gave us a shot at seeing some kind of revenge or at least a win over them after the VDC with Epel's hometown event and yet again WE STILL LOST. I don't understand that one either. It's just frustrating for the players to be put in that situation again needlessly. There was no real narrative/story reason we had to lose.

Chapter 6 we finally get away from the narrative that the characters can't know who each other are in the main story at least -_-;. overall I don't have too many issues with Chapter 6. (other than the mini games -_-) Idia's character is kept consistent. We get some fun moments from the cast, and for the most part its in line with what we know of them and their characters. Azul and Riddle are gold, Jamil needed to hear what Leona told them. (tho it was a little pot kettle but then again that meant that Leona knew what he was talking about). And over all things don't seem AS forced. Had hoped things were gonna get better.

Then Chapter 7 rolled around and they murdered Lilia's character. The character we knew would NEVER treat his family like that. He even gives Malleus a speech in Cater's Halloween SSR about how he'll always be there when he needs him. He's consistently been shown to value his family and connections. It was just such a drastic change I am still baffled. I understand why he would be leaving, but to not really talk to those around him or explain what's going on and make an effort to keep in touch and stay in their lives? It's absurd. Of course Silver and Malleus broke down, if in high school my dad basically told me he was dying and that he was going far away and I'd never see him again, I'd have lost it too, and I'm not nearly as close to my dad as they were to Lilia.

I know they needed something to trigger Malleus's overblot but again this just seems like poor writing to me. The idea of Lilia loosing his powers and possibly dying I think would have been enough if they'd framed it right to push Malleus over the edge. That's difficult /emotional enough and they wouldn't have had to completely destroy Lilia's characterization to make it work. They could have even had the scene with Silver and Malleus when SIlver breaks down crying in front of him after trying to stay strong in front of Lilia so as not to worry him.

I'm trying to reserve too much judgment until we see the entirety of chapter 7 but unless there is some unknown reason for Lilia to have chosen this method of leaving, I don't know how to really justify it.

I get sometimes characters have to make difficult choices it is what helps make a story interesting, but if those choices arise from conflict that's not framed well or meaningful, it loses its potency. It comes across like us as the players and the characters themselves being cheated.

[rainbowsky]

Hello Rainbowsky,

I know, hiking CPN can be washed by saying WYB went to Inner Mongolia to see the shooting location for his upcoming movie and may be went on hiking when he had free time.

But, WYB who never posts more than 1 personal picture in an entire year, decided to post his hiking pictures even when the picture location matches with the shooting location of XZ and there were heavy rumours of him visiting XZ.

Also, he went to Japan and other places for seeing shooting location but he did not post pictures from there. People are also saying that if it was for movie he will not spoil the location before movie releases.

Rainbowsky, what do you think?

Hi Anon,

It's true that there are people trying to wash this whole Inner Mongolia thing. It just goes with the territory. In fact, the bigger and stronger the CPN, the harder people work to wash it.

However.

Fake, fan fiction, CPN.

It's not really washable. In part because there's not enough information available to independently verify or debunk anything, sure, but also for all the reasons everyone's been discussing lately.

The location

DD's filming locations are not known at this point. Somehow (and I can't possibly express how thoroughly impressed I am by this) the film set has been so totally locked down that nothing has leaked from it, to the degree that no one even knows for sure that the project is currently filming, or where. So people claiming he was there for filming... that's speculation.

The film synopsis solos are relying on to wash this CPN talks about the character we'd presume to be DD's (it's the only young man mentioned) being from "the heart of" the Great Khinogan Mountains.

The Wulanhada volcano park that DD was photographed by is not anywhere near that area.

We don't know exactly where GG is filming so we can't get too carried away about it, but it's pretty disingenuous for people to claim DD was there for filming when it's not anywhere near where his character is supposed to be from, and the terrain around the volcano park is totally different from the terrain where DD's character is from (would probably not make a good stand-in location for that region).

Wulanhada volcano park, left - Great Khinogan Mountains, right

Of course it's not impossible that he was there for filming, but given what little we know (the same information solos are trying to use to wash this), it seems unlikely.

It's also possible he went there directly from Beijing, but that's a 5 hour drive at minimum, so wouldn't likely have been a day trip. And DD isn't going to post a photo of himself at GG's filming location, he's going to post one that says what he wants to say while still maintaining plausible deniability. This volcano park is perfectly situated to provide all of that.

Aside from that - as turtles have already pointed out - why would DD share photos from the area where he's filming, when this film has been so very locked down until now? It doesn't make any sense at all. Keeping locations secret is what's been protecting this film from leaks and stalkers.

The content

It's pretty interesting that we've seen enormously popular photos from GG (his birthday post has over 33.7 million likes, while the Xiao Zhan Studio birthday photos post is at 4 million likes), featuring him hiking in the wilds and hanging out in campground areas, and then we get something similar from DD who, as you said, rarely shares personal photos anymore.

They both seem to be very outdoorsy lately!

For two people who - according to solos - are 'trying desperately to get out from under the tyranny of this delusional CP', they sure are making some big mistakes about how to appear to be very different people living very different lives...

His and his B&W Leicas

His and his credit card iPhone cases

His and his Gucci lion head necklaces

Yeah, they're really putting in every effort to shake this 'reputation destroying', 'horribly toxic' ship! 🙄

More on that here.

The timing

This is the biggest thing, and in my opinion what we should be focusing on the most. Because as far as I'm concerned, this post is a statement - a very loud and clear one.

DD is being (yet again) attacked with these horrible, laughably false (like, seriously - the photos are clearly of a woman who is much shorter and smaller than DD) rumors about him attending a concert with a particular actress, and suddenly the supertopic for that 'CP' is shut down and we get photos from DD that point to a totally different CP. One that he's supposedly trying to 'shake off'.

Then we see him partying it up openly, publicly, at a concert for his dear friend Da Zhangwei. Not even wearing a mask, so everyone is free to fully identify and photograph him.

It seems to me that DD is sending a pretty clear message:

I'm not dating an actress, I'm with GG

I don't need to disguise myself as a woman to go see a concert

And this is exactly what happened last time these kinds of inflammatory rumors were circulating about him with that same actress. People were claiming that the actress was wearing the same bone necklace as him (with a blurry photo where the necklace couldn't even be seen), so GG released footage wearing a Gucci lion head necklace that DD had previously worn for a race.

GG and DD don't fuck around.

So while I'll tag this with my regular "the mysteries of yizhan" tag that I use for all candy/CPN, there really is no mystery here at all. DD is fed up with this bullshit and won't stand for it.

In fact I was just saying to a friend the other day that the biggest mystery I have about GGDD these days is, how do solos manage to remain solos? They have access to the same information we do. 😅

[venaue]

[ 1 ] OC INTROS - MY TWST AU

first up : both of my yuu ocs! They co-exist in ramshackle and both play an important part in the story :D

Yuuto & Kiyuu !

more info abt them under the cut :3 [ totally not a shameless plug but i have a rp blog for them @ramshackle-snowyruins id be very happy if u checked it out :D]

REBLOGS WLD BE VERY VERY MUCH APPRECIATED !!!!!!!! <33

______________________________________________________________

first up is yuuto ! a bit of extra basic info about him :

yuuto goes by he/it , and is afab & transmasc (this however is not public knowledge)

introverted extrovert

he's an adrenaline junkie , and he enjoys getting into fights , and playing sports . (if you see him with a grin on his face during an overblot… you're not hallucinating unfortunatly... ;p)

he is easily irritable , and is often fighting with ace (as ace also does with deuce)

he also has insomnia. he finds it hard to fall asleep until around 3-4 in the morning, and wakes up at around 7-8, unless having to earlier for school.

he often hangs out with crimson and aros (2nd yr ocs) in the pop music club (with kiyuu) before the club starts, sometimes they plays music with them, and sometimes they just hang out

enjoys games, both online and board/card-esc, likes using strategy, though most of the time his temper hinders his ability to actually perform well...

one of the things he enjoys most about being at NRC is broom riding, he absolutely loves it. he often pesters anchor or mace to use their magic to get his broom started in flight class, even though he hardly ever goes out of his way to interact with anybody, even them.

if yuuto had a choice to go back to their world, he wouldn't take it, even if he was forced. he never wants to go back, and nothing would ever make him change his mind.

relationship status with canon: bffs (he's in denial tho): ace , deuce , epel , jack , ortho , sebek clubmates: azul , idia a different kind of clubmates category: leona "oh thats a close friend of [an oc/canon char they're connected to in some way]": lilia , floyd , jade , rook , silver , ruggie acquaintances: jamil , cater , trey , kalim , malleus they dislike him a tad (read: maybe a bit more than a tad): vil , riddle (^^ very brief categories just as a basis ... maybe if u ask (either here or on the rp acc) i might go into more depth ;3)

(anonymously online (under the pseudonym @/infinitelygray), he's also good friends with gloomurai and muscle_red) ;)

O-KAY TIME FOR KIYUU !!! u know the drill nooww <3

they go by they/she/he and are amab non-binary!! (again , not public knowledge tho,,)

extroverted introvert

kiyuu appears to be a confident and cheerful person, taking efforts to resolve conflicts and make sassy jokes

but they're also a chronic overthinker, always acting before they can think and then immediately regretting it afterwards , even if it had no consequence at all, always second guessing herself

she absolutely adores makeup and feminine clothing and stuff and feels most confident when theyr presenting fem and when theyve taken care of their appearance, its one of the only ways she can really feel a little more confident in herself

kiyuu has enochlophobia , the phobia of crowds , and such often grows quiet and fidgety whenever in large groups of individuals

kiyuu also has a form of insomnia , but rather a polar opposite of yuuto's in which he can fall asleep easily quite early on at around 10-11pm usually , but wakes up at really early hours of the morning usually around 2-3am in the morning and can't fall back asleep ,,

they joined the basketball club because they wanted to do something that was familiar to them in this unfamiliar world

they do feel homesick, but if ever faced with a choice to go back to her world or not, kiyuu would stay. because of yuuto, and the rest of the friends she's made, and also because of the freedom of expression she has here as opposed to back home.

relationship status with canon: bffs: ace , deuce , epel , jack , ortho , sebek good friends : lilia , kalim admires (and is decently close to): vil , rook clubmates: jamil , floyd friends: cater , malleus , silver "oh thats a close friend of [an oc/canon char they're connected to in some way]": jade , idia , riddle , azul , leona , ruggie acquaintances: trey (^^ these r pretty in order btw , so the further down the list , both vertical and horizontal , the less close they r 2 the oc) :3 (^ except the first years they're just listed in order cz im lazy)

[ddwcaph-game]

The F6E Parents as Sims!

Sooo this is what I've been busy with the past week. 😅

I've wanted to do this for a while now, both to recover from the update, and to get a better idea of what I want their character art to look like.

I used some height/fitness mods, but I tried to use as few CC as possible (mostly because it's annoying trying to hunt for the perfect ones). Some of the colors/styles aren't accurate of course, but I'm happy with the results for the most part. If anyone's interested, I might upload all the families to the gallery later (I need to remove the spoilery elements), along with links to the CCs.

Nestor and Mary

I gotta be honest, I was kinda lazy when I made the photo of Mary in Chapter 4, so this is a more accurate image of what Mary looks like in that photo (just imagine her with much longer hair). I mostly picked that outfit for Nestor because it has a lil chicken on it (it's the closest I can get to The NeStore logo), but it seems appropriate for his work anyway.

Josephine and Mariano

I didn't want to make Josy and Mario elders, but I honestly think they look better that way, hehe. They're wearing their everyday outfit since I'm still not sure what they're wearing during Rosie's party. Although... I might actually change Mario from bald to semi-bald like he is here.

Danica and Ma'am Bianes

Okay, Ma'am Bianes isn't Lily's police-mom, but I don't really have a clear idea on what Rickie looks like yet. 😅 Both of their outfits here are pretty close to their respective appearances so far, but just imagine that Dani's arm tattoo is WAY more elaborate.

Stephanie and JM Sr.

I found an outfit that's totally accurate to Tita Steph's current description in the story, but it made me remember that she's a feng shui expert and I think red suits her more than plain black in this case. I'll see if I can find a cane mod/cc for her later.

You don't really meet JM's dad in the story, but here he is anyway, hehe. He's much more grumpy looking in the close up.

Yaya Connie and Kuya Popoy

Not much to say here, but I like how both of them turned out since I didn't have a clear idea of what they both looked like before this. I wasn't planning on giving Connie short hair, but I think it fits her a lot. Just make the trim and ribbon in her outfit black and it's perfect.

Julie and Robert

Out of everyone, I think I'm satisfied with Julie and Robert the most. I can't find a good LT uniform-looking outfit for Robert without CC, so here he is with Julie's favorite shawl instead. Well, it doesn't have any patterns, but even with CC it's annoying to look for scarves/shawls separate from the outfits that aren't tightly wrapped around the neck.

***

Maggie and MC's Dad aren't here for obvious reasons, but I might make Maggie's original version later.

Anyway, I made the characters in IAC too! You can find the post here. Major spoiler warning, of course.

If you're curious, I showed F6E here too a while back, but that one's old and outdated. I kinda want to make them as teens/young adults now though.

[mecachrome]

What is the hype around jendo? I am trying to do research but I feel like they barely had any interactions?? Especially recently? Is there a primer or something cause I totally want to try to get into them!

OMGGGG well i wouldn't call myself a jendo expert or anything but i can briefly tell you why i like them!!! also soz for late reply 😭

tbh the very first thing that converted me was watching this interview forever ago because i remember being deeply intrigued by lando's demeanor + relative shyness + how hard he tried overall to appear Respectable and Mature in front of jense while answering his questions??? like the way jenson smiles at him during "are you happy?" "UMMM... kind of" wtheck T__T

jendo honestly have a lot of lore though! again i am not an expert but @cuthechicane has so many fantastic clips and gifsets if you're looking for interax that will rewire your brain chemistry ☝️ (the sheer giddinesssss of their miami interview 😭 also this is a classic moment). part of their thing is that they're both "somerset boys" (lando grew up in glastonbury / jenson is from frome) so that connection also kind of adds an extra layer to jenson having raced for mclaren / lando looking up to him and the general hero worship or cyclical nature of f1 that is palpable in their dynamic and a lot of other f1 agediff ships. ofc rossi was lando's real hero but... you know jenson is jenson

really though i think what i like most about jendo is how much jenson genuinely ADORES lando lmfao like their dynamic is so ridiculous but in a really absurdly sincere way!!! ofc it's super fun to go all in on the rancid age gap power imbalance vibes etc. and the way they flirt in public and fluster each other but jenson 100% RATES lando and hypes him up constantly to the point that it's almost embarrassing negl. lichr him going all in on lando like 4 hours ago... what's craziest to me is that he sincerely believes everyone else loves lando too like his brain can't comprehend the mere concept of someone not being obsessed with his favorite little british twink 😭 he's those innocent guys on reddit who still post comments like "lando is so nice it's impossible to hate him!!!" as if we're still in 2019 or something...... i want to live in that world

imo there's also an aspect to jendo where it's like...? jenson sees so much of himself in lando to the point of having preconceptions about lando's mentality that he projects onto him a bit which i think adds dimension to jenson's vulnerability but that goes into way more my own Meta and isn't really relevant to this post. but part of jenson's personality is that he is very charismatic and a natural speaker and also Usually Right so he loves to SAY shit and although he's not quite a nico-level professional shit stirrer he does kind of um... always speak like he knows something you don't. as evidenced by his time as lewis's teammate wherein he won the idgaf war by not acknowledging it going on in the first place. this is also why he and oscar should banter more because i feel like the comparisons between oscar and jenson are honestly so apt HLSDFH i have a jenson/oscar/lando post if that is of any interest

ok sorry i'm getting off-track but >>>all of that to me is why jendo is fun... jenson presents as very self-assured but if you do a psyche deep dive you realize he was quite sensitive growing up and Personally Victimized by briatore and has been quite open about his anxiety and the way f1 culture functioned at the time, and he's always been quite emotionally regulated but obviously there was... also a lot of glamour that accompanied that until later in his career LOL. so getting to explore those sides of him with a 20-something lando who very much mirrors him (self-reflective and sometimes overly critical and learning to live the "highly committed and industrious playboy" life) but also makes his façade crack in ways you don't often see is so fun & fascinating...!!! imo you can take them in a lot of different directions as a ship :3c

^ bonus bits i like from his book

[morn-yvri-winters]

Fun CogDis Fact [+ Some Theory Crafting & Regards to Lore itself] (STORY SPOILERS... for a 15 year old fan-game)

So i was doing some data mining (as in looking inside of the game files for fun to see how the game ticks and works, and boy howdy let me tell you, RPG Maker 2003's UI scares me, props to Otherhand for navigating through these... many variables, numbers, & symbols going on, because it honestly overwhelms me) I had learned that:

Cerue appears in the Maria & George Magicant Flashback as one of the background Gieegs behind the windows. While this most likely is just a matter of reusing sprites, it should also be noted that not all Gieegs in the "allthegoogs" sprite sheet actually get used. Like, i want to say around 3/4ths of them actually ever get used (there are a total of 4 Gieegs in "allthegoogs".

(UPDATE 1: She's actually present for one more scene, i think? For whatever reason, her event handler has two pages but she appears for both pages, from what i can guess, she is meant to be the Gieeg that appears during the sequence where Maria & George are walking down the hallway [i think i want to say when George wants to show off the mental amps to Maria, since they share similar variables "0049: maction", which is meant to be the activation of an event via some number inputted by some handler)

(UPDATE 2: Yep, she is present for the scene when George & Maria head to the giant vault door to then breach using the Mental Amplifier Device, yet she doesnt seem to look, which could mean Otherhand forgor to make her turn or she wasnt meant to be there)

Another fun fact, the two Gieegs (referred to as goog 1 & goog 2 internally) that appear when Giegue has his overstimulation moment by Maria's Melody are actually using Giegue's Sprite Sheet (referred to as "Newgiegue")

(a part of me wanted to say its probably due to Giegue being the only "stock-standard" looking gieeg to have a moving sprite, but that isnt even remotely true since the gieegs from "allthegoogs" ALSO have walk sprites as well)

...the fact that the misc googs dont get used here either really feels like there was some manner of implication there by the dev. Personally i feel like its meant to imply that this is Giegue's actual parents but that would be a MONSTROUS conclusion to jump to, especially when there is ZERO mention about the BG Gieegs other than them appearing in scenes and the "(They're watching)" interaction.

Actually, the only real plausible theory to make here would be that Cerue was around for the Human Caretaker Experiment/Goog's Arrival to the Solar System. I mean, the fact that she knows about Giegue and refers to him as an anomaly, seems to imply she knows a LOT more about Giegue (as in a majority of his history/biography) than what the player already knows (who he is, what he is, what he becomes, etc.), in addition, she has a Starman in a chamber and seems to know about their origin/capabilities, even calling their transformation into Starmen a mistake yet compliments the design itself.

Which reminds me of something else, the timeline of events in CogDis which are awfully questionable in terms of order (at least for 1 to 4):

"QUESTIONABLE" TIME OF EVENTS

(190X) - The Gieegs arrive to the Solar System and successfully neutralize the Martian's Space Station's Inhabitants to ensure they have the element of Surprise on their hand.

(190X) - The Gieegs arrive to Mars and engage in war against the Martians. They are successful in doing so and assimilate the Martians into their Army/Empire as the "Starmen" (?).

(190X) - Maria & George find Giegue out in the wild, they are then kidnapped and Maria is supposedly in a mini coma for over a week??? Regardless, George & Maria take care of Googie (also George works out some arrangements with the Gieegs to make sure that everything is comfortable to their liking).

(190X) - 2 or so years later, the event occurs, Maria gets Magicant'd and George runs away with the Mental Amplifiers.

(190X -> 198X) - Mother 1's Back Story involving George's Return to Earth occurs and eventually leads to the events of Mother 1 itself (also apparently PSI spreads out across Earth itself?).

I refer to this as being "questionable" as I am highly unsure as to whether or not the Gieegs were the only ones present on the Mothership OR if the Gieegs had done Mars dirty, assimilated the Martians into their Army as the Starmen and then went to Earth.

Personally a part of me wants to believe its potentially the former, as them getting pissed off at Humanity and taking it out on the Martians seems fitting in terms of MOTHER/Earthbound Logic (problem is that this wouldnt really align too well with the Mars' Data Log).

However it might actually be the latter considering that the Gieegs come from outside the Solar System, and by this time the Martians are the only one with a Space Station/Satellite, them getting neutralized by the Gieegs feels fitting, as the Gieegs themselves REALLY dont like it when another race has PSI (or at least, if they do, they dont like them being a potential threat to their goals, whatever THAT may be).

[tl;dr version of this paragraph, either they got super pissy and took out their hate on Mars or they are the equivalent to the Viltrumite Empire from INVINCIBLE and neutralized Mars so nobody would know and potentially warn others who about their arrival]

(now im thinking of the "THINK MARK! THINK!" meme in my head but with Giegue & [insert fitting character role here])

(Also if you're wondering why i've come to such a strong assumption about the Gieegs, it mainly has to do with a friend of mine bringing up a really good point when i was discussing lore stuff about my sona's world (aka the one in my pfp and which i have a ref sheet to), that being "Why would a race that seems peaceful, need weapons of mass destruction to defend themselves? That would imply that they aren't peaceful in the slightest or have blood on their hands." and it sorta stuck with me. Like, the best example I can currently think of is: An alien race comes down to Earth and says "we come in peace" and then pulled out a nuke and vaporized an entire forest after one deer spooked them; thats sorta what the Gieegs feel like to me whenever i think about them now, CogDis obviously doesnt make them peaceful and afr kind of 'shifty' but Official Mother (Game) Lore never actually quite describes what their intentions even were in the first place, only that they were afraid of Humanity having access to PSI and that Giegue needed to stop them)

Actually, i find it even more weird as to what could have possibly had occurred to the other Gieegs. So if we were to go by the theory of "Cerue being around", then there was probably at least... Three to Four unique Gieegs total?

(Hell, maybe there could of been even more aboard the Mothership for all we know, considering that when Maria is running through the halls, she mentions that the aliens on board all sorta just looked at them without stopping them, never brings up if they were just other Gieegs or what, just that they were being observed)

We know Cerue could have potentially disembarked at some random point (maybe potentially after the Human Caretaker Experiment OR after the Mars Invasion, depending upon which happens first) and goes into hiding on Mercury, basically collecting various creatures from around the Solar System (some either being alive or dead).

We do not know what happens to the other 2 to 3 Gieegs except that they were present for the Human Caretaker Experiment & The Invasion of Mars, as they were most likely responsible for the majority of opposition & were described as being all-powerful by the Mars Super Computer's City Records, so I imagine only a few were needed to take over.

Giegue is the only one around on the Mothership (excluding Niiue) but doesn't know where Cerue went.

(...potentially, Niiue's dialogue about him knowing that she doesn't want to meet him could imply that he's referring to his true identity as Giegue & knows that Cerue possibly sensed him but as Giegue and not his own unique being, which is why she said she only trusted the Applechasers [the main 4] and doesnt try to erase their memory).

(WARNING LINKS LEAD TO FANDOM WIKI, CARRY A BLOCKER) Oddly enough, the fandom wiki for Earthbound has a really interesting tidbit of a theory regarding as to what Giegue's Race even was or what may have happened to them (since after Mother 1, Giegue's People gets ZERO mention), mentioning that after he returned to the ship, he may have ended up killing his people in a fit of distress & deterioration before eventually transforming into Giygas, but its fandom wiki so take it with a tablespoon of salt.

(if youre wondering "why not use WikiBound?", it mainly tends to be game information rather than like, external media information..? Idk, i personally feel like i found more substance to Giegue's Fandom Page than compared to his WikiBound Page)

something i will mention however, is that the fandom wiki uses a lot of information from the novel for Mother 1 (apparently?) as a means to sorta fill in information regarding events that occur between the games. Also its the only wiki with a page regarding Giegue's Race, also this really cool illustration of the Mothership:

Anyhoot, I'm done rambling now, i just sorta wanted to share this because it was on my mind. Gonna stop now before my brain overheats and combusts from thinking too much, also i am hungry, its lunch.

(UPDATE, 12/23/202X, I've realized Cerue's Sprite has different opacities, which might mean that she's been sticking around quite a bit when George makes his discoveries & when the two escape)

[bengiyo]

Hi ~ can I ask your Top 5 good surprises in BL this year? (From shows to moments or characters that just. Pleasantly surprised you.) -☆

Hello!

La Pluie Episode 4

La Pluie episode 4 was so different from what I'm used to in BL that I wrote a whole post about the displays of emotional intelligence in the episode. So often BL characters do not act like normal people. Part of why I love La Pluie so much is that every character makes sense all the time, especially when they're being so, so wrong about something.

Nawin (Laws of Attraction)

This insane man was totally unexpected, but made immediate sense as Charn's ex as soon as he appeared.

I Cannot Reach You Ep 6

I've talked about growing up in the closet around here. It was really refreshing for me to see a smart, talented, deeply-closeted boy who was trying to be open about his feelings with his friend absolutely lose the tenuous control he had and cross that line. The last time we saw this acknowledged in any way was the kitchen scene in Until We Meet Again where Dean crosses the line with Pharm and then Pharm reasserts their boundaries. In both cases it isn't about the other party not wanting that, but just not being ready in that moment.

This might be one of the best episodes of BL ever.

"Have you been well? Without me? (Our Dating Sim)

I'm a melancholy boy! I love this show about a melancholy boy that hurt the boy he loved and their journey back to each other. Korean screenwriters are so good at delivering their core thesis in a single line. I love this show so much.

Kim Ji Hyun (The Eighth Sense)

I love this Country Twink so much!!! He is not timid or demure. He's just inexperienced. He was in it to win it the entire time. This boy did not know how to swim but still joined a surfing club to be with a man. He almost died and came back bitchier. He WON. He ain't have to compromise or nothing. I love him with my entire heart.

Ask my Top 5 BL 2023 Anything

[rainberry-stardust]

inspired by that post asking the plural community to share their personal experiences, here's a bunch of questions inspired by various system ask games that i'll be answering!

do you have a system name?

technically yes. i use rainberry, the name of a zayn malik song, as a system name online. i also have a personal system name i've been attached to for years, but i won't be sharing it here. i don't go by my system name typically, and i use it more as an online username than anything else.

irl i have 2 names people typically know me by, both the names of frequent fronters. i eventually plan to legally change my name to those 2 names as a first and middle name.

what is your alter headcount?

i have around 8 DID parts, and 4 endogenic alters. so 12-ish in total.

what are your system's origins?

traumagenic first and foremost, as i have DID. i also have some endogenic alters i specifically coined the term reveromantigenic for. my reveromantigenic alters formed unintentionally as thoughtforms, specifically from me daydreaming about fictional ships to fall asleep.

my DID parts are ever-present whether i want them to be or not, and i can somewhat-clearly trace them back to traumas in my past and i can see what trauma responses they are made of. my endogenic alters on the other hand, they're purely positive and don't have any negative or harmful aspects to them. they don't relate to my trauma in any way, and act as sentient comfort characters more than anything.

what terms do you use to describe yourself?

i gravitate towards 'parts' for my DID parts, and 'alters' for my endogenic alters. i do refer to myself as a system sometimes, but typically i call myself a person with DID or a person with parts. i rarely call myself plural, the word icks me for purely syllabic reasons.

i tend to use i/me language as well, unless i feel like clarifying we/us is necessary to make sense.

how did you discover your system?

i was 15 and somebody in a fandom discord i ran asked me to add pluralkit to the server for systems. i didn't know what a system was, so they explained to me what DID is in basic terms. i wanted to support them, so i started looking into DID and systems, and i noticed a lot of links leading to tumblr.

i made a tumblr account so i could read all the posts google was linking me, and discovered i was a system too. i originally thought i was traumaendo i believe, before i got sucked into sysmedicalism and considered myself an OSDD system for i think a year, eventually landing on DID, and now as of recent labelling myself mixed origins due to my thoughtforms.

have your views on plurality changed over time?

yes! as i said, i started off as pro-endo, but i got sucked into sysmedicalism for quite a few years. i had endogenic thoughtform alters while i was anti-endo, ironically enough, i just mislabelled them and tried to force them into traumagenic boxes.

do you have an innerworld?

nope. i have aphantasia, so i don't visualize at all. i have a strong internal monologue and i tend to think in audible words more than anything else. my parts/alters pick faceclaims based on the vague vibes they have of their appearances, and via a lot of trial and error.

how do your levels of distinction range?

my DID parts are covert, as i have the typical covert version of DID. they're distinct enough that i can sometimes tell what part is fronting, and some close friends can occasionally guess accurately, but most of the distinction isn't in personality or outward characteristics.

most of my part distinction, for the traumagenic ones, is in trauma responses, behaviors, and views on the world. those trauma-influenced traits are what show through the strongest.

meanwhile my endogenic alters are mainly distinct in personality, and strongly identifying as their sources. that, and they're all british for some reason except for one. coincidences lol.

what are your fronting patterns like?

my DID parts are situationally triggered out. they're each suited for different types of situations, be it potential traumatization, physical hardship, a work environment, a safe environment, ect. their roles reflect this a lot, too. if i feel threatened, physically or emotionally, i know my primary protector is going to be triggered out. if i feel safe and comfortable, there's a good chance my unethical caretaker is going to front.

my endogenic alters are more intentionally positive triggered out, either by focusing on their sources and unintentionally daydreaming about them (as is my habit to help me fall asleep), or by choosing to act like them until they front (my attempt at willogenesis lol, they may have gained sentience by accident but i intend to purposefully keep them around)

in general i tend to switch multiple times a day, if i had to guess probably 3-6 times a day. my situational needs vary frequently throughout my average day, triggering out various parts for various reasons.

do you experience amnesia? how so?

i do. i'm monoconcious, but i experience what i consider to be blackout amnesia in the sense i lose entire chunks of recent time. my amnesia isn't really tied to switching, though. my parts/alters don't have their own individual memories, like you might see in the movies.

my amnesia is collective; i lose the majority of every single day, conversations and situations, everything unless i write it down or recite it until memorized. i tend to only retain vague outlines of my most recent day, such as "i know i went to work yesterday and i worked on my fanfic, but i cant remember anything specific beyond that."

and that's only for my most recent day. the day before yesterday is a mystery to me. unless it's written down or i'm somehow reminded of a specific notable event by an outside party, i don't retain it.

what are your thoughts on fusion?

i want final fusion, at least for my DID parts. i'm not sure what my end goals are for my endogenic alters, as they don't really cause me distress. i want to final fuse all of my DID parts because i want to stop relying on dissociation as my primary coping mechanism, i want to fully get rid of my dissociative amnesia, and i want to have a cohesive sense of identity that isn't split up by various reactions to trauma.

fusion at all, and especially final fusion, are longterm goals for me though. right now i'm focused on symptom management, building communication, and overall integration in whatever small ways i can manage it.

do you have any in-system couples?

yes, particularly my endogenic parts. because they are all reveromantigenic (formed from daydreaming about my favourite fictional ships), they are all inherently paired into relationships. because i have 4 of them right now, that means i have 2 in-sys couples.

do you have any in-system families?

yes, but this time with my DID parts. 3 of my DID parts see themselves as siblings; my primary protector being the elder brother to 2 parts that identify with being younger ages than i am physically.

my primary protector is also very similar to another part who you've probably seen here, his name is zain, he runs our sideblog @zain-syscourse. my primary protector and zain have been in some sort of strange qpr/situationship for years, i'm not sure if they've even labelled it.

how does your gender vary across the system?

i'm bigender (male/agender) overall, and i use he/they pronouns overall. many of my DID parts identify as fully male and use he/him pronouns or as nonbinary/agender with he/they pronouns, while my endogenic alters have less reality-grounded concepts of their gender such as one identifying as a cis male and another as transfemmasc despite us overall being NOWHERE near feminine- or female-aligned.

how does your sexuality vary across the system?

it honestly doesn't vary much, surprisingly. overall i identify as demiromantic demisexual and gay (boys), and that seems to ring true system-wide. none of us are attracted to girls as far as i can tell. the demi part varies, but all of us are some level of gay.

do you tend to have collective or individual hobbies/interests?

all of my interests and hobbies are collective. that's mainly comprised of writing fanfiction, syscoursing, learning about DID, and listening to music. as far as interests, right now it's just One Direction. i have ADHD, and right now 1D is my sole hyperfixation.

does anybody irl know you're a system?

yes, two people. i live with my found family slash adoptive parents, and they know i have DID. one of them can tell some of my parts apart and has clocked the current fronter multiple times before.

do you know any other systems irl?

the same person who can clock some of my parts is also a DID system. he's very supportive of me and my problems in general, and i love him.

this was really fun to do! i went for mainly collective-aimed questions, since i didn't want to get into specific parts/alters too much. at least not on this post, maybe in the future on others! if you read all this, it's your sign to go find a bunch of plurality questions to answer! share your experiences!

[shychick-52]

Cedric's role in season 4 - Part 2

So, this is the second part in a series of posts I'm doing about what episodes in season 4 I think Cedric would have easily fit into, but they totally excluded him from. Because let's face it, he was only in four episodes there (including the finale), and it made no sense after his big redemption in the start of the season!

In Part 1 and Part 1.5, I talked about how Cedric could have been a part of the Mystic Isles arc and Sofia's Protector training.

Another episode he could have appeared in is 'Too Cute To Spook' (s4, episode 12), since both Calista and Cordelia are in it! It takes place after 'Through the Looking-Back Glass' (s4, episode 9).

The episode is all about Calista going trick-or-treating on Halloween with Sofia and her witch friends, and Calista struggles to fit in and make friends with the witches because they think she's too young to join them, and poor Calista's attempts to fit in result in her making mistakes and things going wrong for everyone.

Even tho Calista is a main character in this episode, with Cordelia only making a brief appearance in the beginning, there's no reason why Cedric couldn't have also made a cameo appearance there!

The episode opens with Sofia about to leave the castle to go trick-or-treating with her witch friends when she meets Cordelia and Calista also on their way out, only they're going to a party of a sorceress friend of Cordelia's.

Calista shows off her costume of the Giggling Goblin, which she is so proud of (her knowledge and fascination with the legend of the Giggling Goblin is so freaking adorable), then Sofia invites her to come trick-or-treating with her after Calista laments that she loves Halloween and would rather be doing something fun instead of going to a boring grown-up party.

Why wasn't Cedric even MENTIONED once throughout this whole scene?? They could have expressed disappointment that Cedric maybe couldn't go out with them because he had to work (maybe helping decorate the castle for Halloween) or maybe because he hates parties and big social gatherings (which is my hc for why he didn't go with Cordelia). And/or Calista should have told Sofia that she showed Uncle Ceddy her costume and that he praised how scary it was (maybe even said he helped her with it)!

There's no reason Cedric couldn't have been given a cameo appearance in that beginning scene, tho! It REALLY would have completed the scene! His absence really stood out.

Since this was after 'The Looking-Back Glass', and that episode ended with the siblings reconciling after Cordelia realized she'd been horribly wrong about Cedric all along (and Cedric fixed her hair, much to her gratitude), I'm sure the siblings spent the weeks or months she and Calista were staying with the royal family (while their own place underwent renovations) getting closer! The beginning of this episode would have been a perfect opportunity to give an example of that, whether by giving Cedric a cameo or even a mention!

The majority of the episode was about Calista's eagerness to fit in with Sofia and her witch friends, and her making a ton of mistakes as she tried to make their trick-or-treating adventure a fun one. @mushroomsie224 made a post talking about how similar the witches' treatment of Calista was to how everyone always treated Cedric- how angry/judgemental they got with her for ruining everything, her desperation to try to fix things/prove herself just like Cedric (which only ended up making things worse, like with Cedric), her refusal to give up like Cedric, etc. And that would have been a perfect opportunity for the writers to make that comparison! Calista could have sadly said something like "This is what Uncle Ceddy always felt like!" She or Sofia could have brought up how Cedric knows what it's like for people to treat him poorly for making mistakes, but that "he never stopped trying, and neither will I!" (Calista) or "but we know he's still a great sorcerer" (Sofia) as a means of encouragement.

@bettathanyou @fantadym @cedric-my-beloved @majoresca @sweetmariihs2 @the-gayest-show @moonypears-blog

[itsbenedict]

From the beginning | Previously | Coin standings | 60/70 | 37/37

Once again, some kind strangers have left you some supplies. You get another WIFI ACCESS POINT, to replace the one you're about to use, plus another NOBLE BELT TUT BOTNET BULLET (bringing you back up to 4) and a spare SOFTWARE PATCH (bringing you to 2). Wait, 2? Walter says yeah, I've had this one lying around since before I fell down in the sparkling abyss. Adea says well why didn't you SAY so?!

You're both distracted by the priciest purchase yet, though: a BIONIC MINTER BIT COIN MINER. This device- although someone appears to have briefly gnawed on its casing- can be installed anywhere you can find a power outlet, and it'll just spit out free money! Five Coin in the amount of time it takes for you to lose 1 hunger! Or... free minus the electricity it consumes, but it's not like it's your electricity you'd be using in this otherworld. Just leave it to run, then come back later, and you've got a massive pile of cash to spend! And there's power outlets all over this tower, so setting it up should be no problem.

Yep, there's definitely no downsides to using this machine!

So that's very convenient. Satisfied, you dig into ACCESS QUEENLIEST JUICE ION, PRONTO! "JOCQUES NINELITE PROSECUTION CASE".

Jocques Ninelite, apparently, is a local entrepreneur, who recently quit his government job as a HAZARD WICK to found the Ninelite RECEDING NEST, a technology startup. His new company has developed and is distributing EDEN SNAKE, and this has Governor Thinrar extremely mad at him for some reason. This document details dozens of attempts to come up with charges that'll stick to him so he can be arrested and his DECADE'S CHOICES confiscated, but most of them have run aground on insufficient evidence.

There's reams of legal jargon attempting to find obscure laws and bylaws under which selling EDEN SNAKE is illegal, but he apparently knew the law and meticulously avoided any of the various traps- Thinrar's legal advisors don't think they can make any of these stick in court.

Ninelite was found snooping around the scene of an apparent terrorist bombing in the MR. SQUEAK TABLEWARE 15 years ago, and is suspected of having tampered with the crime scene- but no physical evidence exists.

There's a half-finished case for an antitrust suit in here, alleging anticompetitive hiring practices where he attempts to poach talent from other companies. Nothing he's done has technically been illegal, though, but they're working on drafting new legislation that might be able to get him retroactively.

The RECEDING NEST's R&D experiments are under investigation for workplace safety violations, but they haven't been able to get an inspector on-site without alerting them ahead of time- everything they've done under surveillance has been free of occupational safety hazards.

They're even trying to get the corporate campus written up for landscaping code violations. This city has a landscaping code?! What kind of HOA nonsense is this?

You'd think a rich tech CEO would have mountains of dirty laundry, but a concerted effort by the local government has been totally unable to pin anything on him, which is odd. No one's record is this clean unless someone's put effort into cleaning it. How has he been covering his tracks?

The NEXT TO MOLASSES SACRAMENT CORONAMELT TAX ASSESSMENT reveals a similar battle involving Thinrar's legal team trying to pin something on a local business owner. This time, though, it's looking a lot less flimsy. RANDOM SEED, owner of the mountainside casino-resort MONTE CARLO, is very plainly guilty of dozens of counts of felony tax evasion, and HAZARD WICK specialist ONE-TIME PAD has volunteered to go retrieve the last pieces of evidence needed to bring him down.

...The emails between Thinrar and his legal team, though, reveal there's more going on here. Apparently, none of this tax evasion is new- rather, it's been tolerated for decades as part of some kind of under-the-table deal with the casino. Not even tolerated, exactly- it'd just be redundant to pay taxes when RANDOM SEED has been paying such humongous bribes to Thinrar in exchange for exemption from the city's gambling laws.

Somehow, MONTE CARLO has been producing more Coin than it could possibly be extracting from the pockets of desperate gamblers, and it's been keeping the city's municipal budget (and Thinrar's gubernatorial campaign) afloat for years. They're only prosecuting him now because the money is starting to dry up, and they think they can finally get better election odds by making a show of rooting out corruption. (Y'know, rather than by taking kickbacks from that same corruption.) Most of these emails are discussing how to prevent retaliation, and prosecute the case without exposing their own illegal dealings.

These files are like something out of an Ayn Rand novel- corrupt bureaucracy trying to keep down poor innocent captains of industry. The naked corruption on display is pretty flabbergasting- is it all like this?

You've been at this a while- do you want to keep digging, or has your governorship's REIGN PEAKED and you'd like to go somewhere else?

Continued | 60/70 | 36/36

[pluckyredhead]

Time for more Fourth World posting that no one asked for! I've previously written about the Fourth World comics of the 1970s and the 1980s, so here are the 1990s:

New Gods (1995): I FOUND IT! I FOUND A GOOD NEW GODS COMIC THAT ISN'T BY JACK KIRBY!!!

Okay, so the art is 1995 in the worst way, but the first 11 issues (written by Rachel Pollack) are actually excellent? The problem with previous New Gods runs was that it's hard to write about a utopian world at any length, but writers tried to introduce conflict by having the people of New Genesis be shitty, which undercuts the whole...utopia thing. Pollack has the corruption come from outside, which makes all the difference.

Basically, Darkseid manages to invade the Source (God, essentially, but more of a place than an entity) in an attempt to conquer it, but Orion follows him, and, desperate to stop him, kills him. However, committing patricide within the heart of the Source corrupts it, causing natural disasters on Earth and making everyone on New Genesis go evil or crazy or both. Which was all part of Darkseid's plan (he regenerates himself out of Orion's flesh, which is both very gross and a total mic drop moment) but now the cosmos are in upheaval and that's bad for everyone.

The other thing this book does that most post-Kirby New Gods books don't manage to do is treat Orion like an actual goddamn hero. Yes, he is angry and violent and makes bad decisions driven by destructive impulses. But he also loves Highfather and Lightray and New Genesis deeply, and this book allows those things to be stronger in him than his rage, and I'm crying about it. HE IS ACTUALLY A GOOD PERSON HE'S JUST ALSO A VERY CRANKY ONE.

The last few issues are by John Byrne and the plot and tone diverge pretty sharply but that's a lead-in to a different series so I'll talk about that in a bit.

Mister Miracle (1996): The universe tends towards balance and so because New Gods (1995) was good, this comic sucks. It sort of fits into the same continuity (it takes place after Darkseid dies), and so everyone on New Genesis is kind of being an asshole. But a lot of it just doesn't make sense and isn't explained? Like, they want Scott to be the new Highfather, even though Highfather is totally around in the concurrent New Gods series, and also this is presented as just a thing that everyone knew would inevitably happen, which...no? Honestly, the things that happen in this comic are so bizarre and arbitrary - characters appearing out of nowhere, continuity errors, random and baffling changes to the lore - that I kept thinking they were going to reveal it was all a dream. Bad.

Jack Kirby's Fourth World: So in the last 4 issues of New Gods (1995), Bryne takes over and long story short, Apokalips and New Genesis are smooshed together into one planet split down the middle (and also Orion dies). This series picks up from there and also ties into the Genesis miniseries. Byrne's art is always great, but the stakes are so exhaustingly high (the planets are smooshed together! now they're separated! Orion's dead! now he's back! now Highfather's dead!) that I started feeling numb pretty quickly.

It also relies heavily on the whole "god" thing, which means way more religious themes than I'm particularly comfortable with. (And yes, Kirby also drew very heavily one biblical themes but more for worldbuilding. He didn't have everyone on Earth "lose faith" because of issues with Source, as if atheists are just fooling themselves.) I just don't need that much Thor and Odin in my Fourth World comics, and the two of them repeatedly saying that they are "the closest to the Old Gods" is way too literal. (A commonly accepted version of events is that one of Kirby's biggest frustrations with Marvel was not being able to write a Ragnarok story and kill off Thor and his supporting cast, which is why he came to DC...where he immediately opened his book about NEW gods with the words "There came a time when the old gods died!" and a clear depiction of Ragnarok. This fan theory has several holes in it, not least of which is that Kirby did draw a Ragnarok story for Marvel, but the aggressively obvious allusion here just feels like Byrne is elbowing me in the ribs going "Get it? GET IT?")

Also, there are weird changes to the lore. I've mentioned before that in Mister Miracle #1, Scott is clearly already familiar with Earth, meaning some time has passed between his escape from Apokalips and our first sight of him...but Kirby has him living on Earth for two hundred years before Mister Miracle #1, including marrying a woman who isn't Barda - as if the idea that Scott and Barda had spent that long apart or that it took Barda that long to decide to leave Apokalips makes any sense at all. Tigra, Orion's mom, spends issues and issues claiming Orion is the result of a one night stand she had with some guy and thus not Darkseid's kid, and nobody really believes her but it's never actually resolved. Also, Infinity Man turns out to be Darkseid's brother??? What the hell.

This series also has a lot of Takion, a real Original Character Do Not Steal of a guy if ever there was one. He's Paul Kupperberg's OC, not Byrne's, but he shows up and is sparkly and more powerful than everyone and can talk to the Source and all the other characters ask him for advice all the time even though he literally just showed up and Beautiful Dreamer is in love with him and then he becomes the new Highfather. Big Mary Sue energy. Also he looks like a ripoff of Waverider, who is already firmly in Original Character Do Not Steal territory.

Anyway the series ends with Apokalips and New Genesis gearing up for a final, major clash...and then the last issue is literally just Byrne retelling a mashup of Forever People #1 and Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #147, but setting them in the post-Crisis universe instead of their original pre-Crisis framework. And then it's over. What? What???

Anyway on to the 2000s and the series I've been looking forward to since I started this project, Walt Simonson's Orion! See you in the next post!