#this is what i get for only reading and writing about specific characters

[mawlbone]

not on theme but what if......

pregnant ghost, pregnant nikto? pregnant krueger?????????

(i need them pregante)

WADDLE - GHOST, NIKTO, KREGUER

SNIPPET: A little peek into the domestic lives of these soldiers and their partners learning to adapt with a little one on the way.

[CW: amab reader, afab characters, and afab terminology usage, no reader’s pronouns mentioned, trans pregnancy, anxiety attacks, vomiting, cramps, slight rutting, and implied sex, and physical and mental health issues mention.]

[COMMENT: Thank you for the request! Sorry about writing this so late, I wish to do the shorter asks to clean up my drafts because I am mentally exhausted everyone. Also since I already wrote about pregnant Nikto in “Cracked Cradles”, I advise new readers to read that to get some context for his part. And special thanks to fish for giving me more brainrot for everyone. And there is angst because unfortunately these men are so miserable.]

Before the deep dive, there will be a lot of personal headcanons and thoughts given to each character that I will discuss before divulging into the ask to give more context as to how they will act during pregnancy in the order above. But I will TRY to keep it short and do a whole post about it later to save you the trouble! ٩(๑❛ᴗ❛๑)۶

For all what is considered “Simon” or “Ghost”, I wholeheartedly believe at the end of the day, he’s the kindest character in COD because of his upbringing and how he treats people he feels personally responsible for.

If you look back in the Modern Warfare 2: Ghost “Dead Life”, a lot of details are dropped of his childhood such as his father’s abuse, Tommy’s bullying and drug addiction later in life, and how it was only really having his mother defending him from everyone else. In this type of environment, it’s quite easy, hell even understandable for someone to become resentful and lash out. I won’t blame him if one of his main reasons to joining the Air Force was to escape the house once he was old enough.

But despite having to come home to his mother’s distress after his service to the news of Tommy’s newfound drug addiction and stealing to further fund it… He decides to take a long break and still decide to take care of the boy, now man that once too contributed to his troubles along with his father and get Tommy help and kick his father out of the house and declare he’ll be the one taking responsibility for them now as simply Simon.

He’s rational, he understands that his father is the root of everyone’s troubles such as introducing Tommy to drugs in the first place and constantly distressing his mother with his infidelity. And people may think this show of selflessness is only in 09’ Ghost but even 22’ Ghost, he is quite caring such as constantly joking with Soap with his dry ass humor to lighten up the tension during operations. Even dropping his professionalism when worrying about his sergeant during that specific scene when Soap collapses and didn’t hear a response from him with such a soft tone. All of that as if the nickname, “Johnny” wasn’t enough haha as Ghost too. Simon’s kindness never left him even after all his trauma.

He’s such a sweet boy.

Nikto and Krueger, while there is not a lot of detail for both of them canonically, I cry miserably at this, I do imagine both of them led quite lonely childhoods and joined armed service to find some purpose in their life. If not, possibly having some passive suicidal behaviors that never got really checked for their psych evaluation because the higher ups just need bodies at the end of the day to train, not humans.

Look, Nikto is considered still so useful and effective that the bosses declare him too valuable to waste which is scary to think about, so I won’t be surprised if Kreuger has some issues of his own that he keeps covered underneath that mask of his. I’ll write a whole analysis for them later too like Simon’s because I love them too! But this is already getting too long, so hope you enjoy domestic life with them.

Ghost

Being with Ghost means that you will have to deal with death constantly at the steps of your door with the life he leads. So he will be the type of person who absolutely will refuse to get pregnant unless he’s retired or has some 30 step plan in place to keep himself safe during it. Listen, he’s older and more experienced now, therefore that means he made a lot of new enemies and he already lost his family once, please don’t make him go through it again with you.

Though it doesn’t stop him from contemplating the family life with you still whenever he sees a family on the streets while you’re out on a walk together, it makes not exactly bitter, but somber if more so than anything wondering if he’s depriving you of that type of joy. He really likes his job, it practically defines him but staying at home and having a family again sounds a bit too good for now.

When he does get pregnant eventually after years of reassurance from you and preparation with the help of Price and Laswell to help him conceal his identity even further and moving somewhere quiet, Ghost will desperately try to be at peace throughout the duration of his pregnancy because he doesn’t want the baby to suffer from all his mood swings, and have issues because of all his hormones screwing with him.

Alongside this point, I do think the Rileys has a history of mental troubles and the last thing Ghost will want is to carry it down further to his baby. It’s not exactly that he’ll hate his child or his late family if they do inherit it but he will rather they led a much more happier life than he did without feeling like a burden all because he was greedy to have a family again.

He’ll heavily latch himself onto you whenever a nasty thought keeps cracking against his head. Getting all insecure and dealing with horrible intrusive thoughts wondering if he’ll repeat his father’s cycle of abuse onto his baby, it doesn’t help that he already looks so much like him. He will probably beg the baby to look more like you than him because the thought of seeing a resemblance to younger him makes him ill enough to lose any appetite for the rest of the day.

But months of watching you kissing and talking to the bump all while praising him for practically just existing makes his heart feel lighter about the matter when you stroke over his stretched skin and tell him how gorgeous he is still. His favorite however, that makes his heart unbearably warm is when he wakes up in the morning to see your sleepy head pressed against his tummy cuddling into the baby unconscious every time without fail. He doesn’t tell you about the countless photos he took of that moment with the golden light bathing you in warmth and illuminating that shiny ring on your finger.

During the pregnancy phase, you’ll have to move your shared bed to the corner of the room so he can feel safe while sleeping with the wall and you pressed again him, protecting and keeping the baby and him warm from the outside world. One of the many little things you had prepared for him to sooth his worries and insomnia, and when it gets so bad due to your husband’s anxiety, you’ll resort to taking Ghost into the car and driving endlessly throughout the night on long roads and around neighborhoods until the ride lulls him back to the gentle embrace of sleep fogs over his eyes once more. A large helping of sticky toffee pudding also gets him at ease enough to rest happily with how much he been craving sweets lately to end off dinner.

He becomes much more relaxed as he gets further along his pregnancy after his mind becomes more secure, just ditching the pants and wearing loose shorts and shirts around the house because he had enough dealing with soiled clothes due to his leaky chest and numerous bathroom runs because the child keeps kicking onto his bladder to annoy him for not giving her enough attention or when they just miss you too.

So you’ll have to deal with grumpy Ghost who become more needy and squirming to fit underneath your shirt to feel you skin to skin with him, badgering you to help him with his aches because it’s too uncomfortable and he’s tired! He becomes much more playful and all smiles when you decide to work from home so you can watch over him during the last few weeks until his due date. Long slow days where you get to see him sleep more and become louder, already preparing dad jokes and all that jazz.

But it’ll only be his misfortune one day when he laughed too hard at his own lame joke, leading his water to suddenly burst like a broken dam as you watched in pure dismay, as you lead him out the door with the bags to the base’s hospital with your now sheepish husband.

Nikto

Personally, Nikto in my interpretation has endometriosis and therefore has much more issues with getting pregnant in the first place with the additional pain onto him. So in “Crackled Cradles”, it was basically luck that he was able to get his daughter in the first place with more than enough affection to heal his pain away with the amount of pampering he gotten while pregnant.

With the newest addition in the family now, he’s perfectly content with you being out of his sight while he’s bonding with his baby and doing some housekeeping when you’re stuck in your home office for hours on end, just crying to yourself silently that you cannot be with Nikto despite only being a few rooms away because you have deadlines to meet. But hearing the happy cries and the warm raspy voice of your precious family just outside your door motivates you enough to continue on, even if you have to endure the droning old instructions that your superiors have to repeat continuously.

Days where he peeks into your office to drop off lunch and for some kisses or hearing your daughter crashing in on her walker babbling for some attention from you too, only for her to be dragged back outside as her protests fade away by Nikto’s hand dragging her car back outside.

Even with the abundance of affection, that doesn’t stop him from constantly pawing at your pants though as he whines and demands for another baby from you. You’ll find him begging, all teary eyed for one during his birthdays, anniversaries and even during the holidays because he wants more little you’s running around the cottage. It makes you sigh at his baby fever, especially when it gets the worst during his periods as he drag his bottom against your thigh to relieve his aches, trying to tempt you into knocking him up again, praying for hopefully more than one this time. He became so greedy and it’s your fault that he became like this after keeping him all sweet and warm, so take responsibility why don’t you?

If you wish to be mean to him, you can put on a condom on last minute to ease his aches and watch him sob when he feels rubber instead of you as he curses you for being to horrible to him. Thrashing and scratching up your back because while you’re relieving all of his bad aches, he truly wants another baby so he doesn’t get lonely too once you two grow old, he doesn’t like the idea of an empty nest in the next few decades.

So you shouldn’t be surprised the next night after tucking your daughter to sleep when you have to face your dear husband sitting atop of your bed, glaring at you to kill you twice before you turn your head to see his knife embedded into the empty box of condoms besides him. “Do it properly this time”, you’ll hear him growl as you feel cold sweat begin to drip down your back. It’s not exactly that you wanted to be mean to him, it’s that you will rather save him from the heartache since he’s already at a high risk during pregnancy. But you feel that’s too late to say as you watch Nikto begin to stalk towards you.

It’ll only be a few months later when you are met with a positive pregnancy test in your hand with Nikto with a smile so smug, he practically looks like the cat that ate the canary. You should had already learned to never mess with a dedicated soldier, especially if you are married to one. You don’t exactly have the heart to scold him gently that day for risking his health once again when he’s beaming so brightly at his bump once again.

You decide to hold it in and now just enjoy watching your daughter sleep in between her father’s legs for nap time, trying her best to lay her head as light as possible on her sibling when you came out of your office to check up on them, worried about the long silence for too long before joining their cuddle pile. You’ll take any chance for them to rest, as you gathered more cushions surround them as you continuously had to guide Nikto to go nap as well after spending too much time making matching clothes for the baby already.

Though his skin is already marred with heavy scars from the torture he had experienced, it’s not exactly he’s insecure of them much anymore with the new stretch marks littering about his arms and thighs after his first pregnancy when you made no shame in showing your appreciating by smoothing over the leftover flap of his stomach and helping him bathe and taking over his scarred skin. It makes him feel satisfied with this new life, even if he’s reduced to be more “harmless” now.

He doesn’t get what you mean when you say he looks “beautiful” when he feels all sweaty and disgusting from the labors of pain, but all that matters is the opinions of his children and you in his life, so he’s quite content even if it gets a bit busy and you have to work overtime sometimes to free your weekends to spend time with them, but life is good. He’ll have to get a bigger bed soon to fit everyone later and perhaps do some renovations on the cottage later.

Kreuger

For all what is known and isn’t known about the ever changing operator, under cold lights and the sturdiness of his form, he’s ever so reflective in the way those tiny green toy soldiers. You’ll watch dark beady eyes gaze upon you when he comes crashing into your clinic. And there you’ll become fascinated with the way his back muscles fold under your hands like cheap plastic. There’s no label for this, that’s just how it works between you, him, and the silence that envelopes you all into nothingness in the long quiet. So as long as no one knows what happens behind the closed doors of your office, this standstill will continue between you and him. Even when the heat becomes unbearably nauseating when teeth meet flesh.

It’s a familiar tango, there’s no rush for you to evade the cloak he surrounds himself with. Always rummaging through your file cabinets to help himself to your snacks, you had since learned to order more of his favorites for him. Greedy bastard… He’s cute enough to get away with it when he sleeps so soundly atop of you, with his head buried within your neck or in one of the clinic’s bed while you work. But you had been getting a bit worried with how he’ll been more sleepier nowadays. You’ll get an answer a few days later when you hear the familiar sounds of boots hitting tiles, only to be jolted at your disgruntled partner staring at you before sliding the positive test onto your desk.

There’s very little things that Kreuger can keep himself attached to. Constantly switching jobs and names entirely, except for skin and bones. It’s a shame that he keeps resting from his loneliness, he rather not open himself up for a knife to be rammed inside his chest. So forgive him if he’s a bit awkward, foolish at worst with how he tries to talk without sounding like an automated machine. He rather not leave himself all exposed but years of exposure under your hands left him trusting enough to tell you. If he wasn’t, he would’ve ran away long ago.

Arrangements had to be made immediately for him as he heavily insisted on keeping his career and the baby, but it’s fine, you had already understood this long ago when he first begin crashing into your life. Kreuger had always been adamant on having the freedom to move around, so if anything, it’s quite nice to see him more standstill if anything, all curled up and hogging the sheets. You’ll deal with the earful from your superiors later for taking him off the field for a bit.

And with how elusive Krueger is, it shouldn’t be a surprise that his pregnancy is too a mystery as you held his practically nonexistent bump. Feeling over the alabaster skin, you’ll move your hands to his newly formed love handles instead and squish the side of your hips as he complains about how much your child had been squeezing itself into the back of his stomach and them giving him back pains. You’ll laugh though when you gently poke the child to feel them and watch as they push against your hand all annoyed for bothering them. Before Kreuger deciding to grab your own to hold instead.

He’ll heavily complain about how clumsy he feels nowadays, unlike his agileness before, he more or less been could be taken as a penguin on olive oil with how much he has to hold himself onto you now. It makes him unbearably angry sometimes with how bad his legs cramp up and you’re not there to hold him. He doesn’t like anyone else touching him and he already shuns away from most of the base anyways, thankfully his silence is enough to scare most people off anyways. So you’ll try your best to massage his aches away and help him tidy up his scruff when he becomes too tired to do anything.

Eventually when he reaches his third trimester, you relocated him back to your home with him to be more comfortably situated. No longer is he confined to the cafeteria’s slop or your cabinet to fulfill his strange addictions. Here in your kitchen, he can thrive on making his fancy little sandwiches with all types of breads, cheeses, and jams filling up your cabinets now. And other small finger foods like hard pretzels to eat throughout the day. He would rather not deal with the nausea from a full stomach nowadays. But the child seems to be delighted by the taste of apple juice nowadays as Kreuger bemoans about how they are the most active whenever he’s drunk some to satisfy his cravings and kicking him excitedly before resorting back to his spine out of all places.

Desperately needs some quiet or ambient music playing whenever he goes because he doesn’t look the fogginess of his brain screwing with him and despises vomiting, so often you’ll have some gum of smelling salts for him to cool down. It leaves him a little too raw for him to deal on a regular basis. You regularly go on your knees to massage his swollen feet and put socks on for him when he cannot anymore.

While Kreuger huffs and puffs all he wants about the pain, you’ll hear him speak little endearments to the child and catch him sleeping outside with a blanket over his stomach in a porch’s chair, letting the cool evening breeze rock him to sleep. You decide to make yourself cozy and settle beside him in another chair, watching how soften his face had become without the harsh lines of anger and that net casting his face into obscurity. His face become more rounded now, sharp lines turned puffy from sleep and more weight holding onto him. He’s more human than he ever been, no longer that statuesque toy soldier you once knew before. The moment would had been endearing if it wasn’t for Kreuger’s noisy snoring scaring away the birds.

Even with a few rough patches here and there, you’ll watch Kreuger pace around the house carefully as he holds his bump and asking you to rearrange the nursery around to fit his preference. With full drawers and the sight of your sleepy husband partaking in this joy of picking out what he wishes is peaceful. You’ll have to hire someone to help you both for the birth later with how Kreuger’s lack of identity will cause trouble for the baby later, but in the present moment, you’ll simply partake in watching your man trying to choose between the two different floral sheets to align the crib with.

[greenerteacups]

7 and 8 for Narcissa (or really, any member of the Black family - dealers choice)

7. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you like?

I love talking about Narcissa, I'll take the chance all day!

I love that fanon Narcissa absolutely runs Draco's shit. He's portrayed as an über mama's boy, with I really jive with (obviously), since it opens up the chance to explore a relationship we basically never see in the actual books. Leaning into that also explains how Draco got so spoiled, when by all evidence Lucius isn't the most cuddly parent — he's scolding Draco in a lot of the interactions we read of them (granted, usually because Draco's doing some dumb shit). Canon Draco is always nattering about his dad, so I think he idolizes Lucius a lot more, but he's actually closer to Narcissa. As an only child in a family where his mother doesn't work, that interpretation makes a lot of sense to me, as does the idea that Narcissa would play more of an influential role in his adult life, once he'd become disillusioned with Lucius (especially in a postwar context).

8. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?

Narcissa gets woobified in the fandom like you wouldn't believe. Especially postwar fics. No blood prejudice, no bias, no hateful language, and striking civility to all muggle-born characters, Hermione especially. A change which, in most cases, seems to occur spontaneously and apropos of nothing except the end of the war. I think people do this for two reasons: (1) prejudice not a sexy flaw for your villain to have, hence why many postwar Dracos don't seem to retain virtually anything of the ideology he has in canon, and extend that blanching to Narcissa in order to avoid conflict with him and his mother; and (2) Narcissa and Lucius are both extremely scary antagonistic characters in any Dramione story if you take them seriously, and sometimes people aren't trying to write serious scary antagonists. Sometimes people just wanna write slice-of-life low-stakes stuff. That's fine! People should read and write whatever makes them happy. It just drives me up the wall to read that specific characterization of Narcissa, because I think it's totally unrealistic. Narcissa married a Death Eater! Her sister was a Death Eater! She raised a Death Eater! She lived with Death Eaters for months, if not years! Yeah, she obviously doesn't give a fuck about the Cause if it threatens her family — cf. the "is Draco in the castle?" moment — but she would not have run in these circles if she hadn't drunk the Kool-Aid and kept it down. And plus, like: if losing the first war wasn't enough to create Woke Narcissa, why would the second one be?

The obvious reading of a postwar heel-face turn, if you take canon seriously, is that Narcissa is at best a morally agnostic opportunist who adopts whatever philosophy happens to be profitable at the moment. Which is a pretty dark character. And I wouldn't mind at all if that's how she was actually written, because I think there's a real foundation for that in the text. But in fanon, it usually scans like she's a fundamentally loving and charitable person who never really believed in blood purity, she just decided to marry into a eugenecist death cult for — y'know — tax benefits or something.

[rei-ismyname]

Who do you think has been the best at writing Kurt and what is your favorite stage of the character? Personally, Kurt from Excalibur is my big favorite.

Hey! I don't think I've actually talked about Kurt much, aside from complaining about his NPC status and bizarre priest coding (that was quickly reversed) in From The Ashes

It's hard to argue with Excalibur as a defining run for Kurt's character and his themes. He got to buckle his swash and I really enjoy the relationships built during Excalibur (except Brian. Dude sucks IMO) - even if those relationships and shared experiences have been backgrounded of late. I wasn't aware of different authors when I first read it but looking back Alan Davis if I have to pick.

My favourite stage of the character though is Krakoan Age Kurt. I enjoyed him under Hickman's pen (even if the third law was a mistake.) Si Spurrier made some pretty massive missteps in Way of X but I'm glad that his reaction to Krakoa generally and The Crucible specifically was explored. There's a lot of ways to approach 'I need to start a mutant religion' and zooming in on his personal crisis of faith and allying him with Legion really worked for me.

Focusing on people and examining the laws with the background threat of Onslaught was clever, and he reached the only conclusions that makes sense. I do wish it was longer and a deeper dive into the laws, but it'd break the premise a little if The Onslaught Revelation ended and Kurt said out loud that the Krakoan government is corrupt and we need to start from scratch. Everyone nearly died permanently because Xavier has too much power with no means of accountability.

I'd have hated it if he really did start a religion; The Spark was a secular philosophy that addressed his personal crisis and resonated with a certain kind of person. I've seen people call it a religion and it makes me wonder if they read the book. The foray into justice reform in Legion of X is something I loved on a conceptual level - yes he was using his QC position for legitimacy but at its core the Altar and Legionaries was about the little people, the younger folks, those working for redemption. Kurt's pointed and specific refusal to co-operate with Charles Xavier on his authoritarian bs was a great character beat, as was defending Juggernaut's agency and the chance to be better. I do wish the original sin of Sabertooth in the hole was touched on, but Victor LaValle nailed it elsewhere so I can't complain.

Combined with the Quiet Council dissolution in Immortal X-Men I think we'd have seen an upswell of younger, politically engaged mutants eager to reform their home. I digress.

I loved Kurt's time as Spider-Man (or spinnenmann lol) as a kind of back to basics during the worst time for mutants. It's relatable that he'd be overwhelmed by trauma and grief and just want to be 'a whole Kurt Wagner' for a while. Fight some bad guys, have a romance, eat pizza with Spider-Man. I definitely liked the retcons in X-Men Blue: Origins, the follow up in X-Men Forever, but most of all that he was allowed to be angry about it in Uncanny #700. Trust is earned and neither of his bio parents have done that.

As I mentioned, I'm unimpressed with how he's been used in From The Ashes. He's wasted as a background character and I think putting him on the Uncanny team was a mistake. If it was my decision I'd have him as a peacemaker, flitting from team to team and book to book. I especially feel like he'd visit Katschen himself and not be a party to Iceman spying on her. Kurt and Kitty have a much closer relationship. Tom Brevoort has been outspoken about the X-Men killing people in Fall of X - Kurt and Kitty are the perfect lens to explore that through.

I get that he was already taken by Uncanny, but focusing on Logan and Rogue (where their familial relationship 'upgrade' is recent and barely established) to the detriment of other longstanding relationships feels like a waste to me.

It seems I had more thoughts on Kurt than I thought. Thanks for the ask!

[cheapshrimpysheep]

Okay so this is like- super specific- but can you write Jamil with a gender neutral reader who was going into entomology before getting 'transported' the the twst world? I think it would be so funny if he saw a bug in his room and was freaking out meanwhile reader is just going 'awwh look at the lil guy he's so friendly and cute!!' If not though, that's completely okay! Have a great day/night :)

COMMENTS: I also think it would be funny, but in these cases I can't think of a specific scenario, I can only think of headcanons. Another problem is that I'm on Jamil's side on this one. 😅 I don't hate insects like he does, but if I see a spider on the wall I won't think twice about killing it with my shoe.

CHARACTERS: Jamil Viper

TAGS: Funny; GN Reader; Headcanons; Bullet Points

WORD COUNT: 310 words

NOP! NOP! NOP! You're crazy, that's it! If there was the ultimate way to lose points with Jamil, this is it!

He still hates bugs, not you. But you know, friend of my enemy, my enemy is.

However, you don't know that. He hides it too well. But he also doesn't pretend to like you that much.

Despite your clear lack of taste and reprehensible- I mean, questionable career choice, having you around might be useful for him. AKA: You're the one who gets rid of the bugs.

Whenever an insect appears and you are nearby it will immediately come to you and tell you, as calmly as he can, about that insect he found. Why? Because if the insect has your attention, that means that wherever the insect is, you will be too, right? So just stay as far away from you as possible until the insect is no longer a problem.

If he asks you to get rid of an insect, what he wants most is for someone to kill it. But you'll just want to pick it up and release it somewhere else. He'll always prefer to simply annihilate the thing, but as long as you keep it away from him, that's fine.

He will NOT visit you at Ramshackle Dorm. What if you've started some kind of ant far? Or are collecting insects to keep as pets like Jade has the terrariums? Jamil shivers just thinking about it.

Whenever you have a 'what a cute little bug' moment, he will hide as much as possible the extreme disgust he is actully feeling.

If you try to show him the intention, like picking it up and getting close to him... WHAT IN THE NAMES OF THE GREAT SEVEN ARE YOU EVEN THINKING?! DO YOU WANT TO DIE BURNED?! Because you are finally getting him to at least hate you.

If you dropped in here out of the blue and want to read more from me, you can find it in my pinned post: INDEX

[teddywesworl]

ok elaborating on this. trying to explain what i mean by a cipher. because it's about tone and genre expectations, but it's also more than that.

your first paragraph (or two) is the framework through which the rest of the work is interpreted. consider:

these four lines of text provide the following information:

this is an "Illario forgiven" fic

Lucanis and Spite have been arguing about this decision, but

"pieces are moving into place," i.e. there is a plan afoot which Spite is allowing to proceed without resistance out of respect, but

other Crows are causing trouble in a way that tells Lucanis they don't respect him.

the scene is set. however, this information leaves us with the following questions:

why did this version of Lucanis forgive Illario?

what plan is afoot? what pieces are moving into place?

which Crows are causing trouble? and how?

and these questions are the basis for the rest of the fic. if you are reading at all closely, you will have them in the back of your mind from the very start. you will be waiting for answers. you will, hopefully, be looking for answers before they are explicitly revealed. you may even clue in to the idea that each question may be answered in more than one way, and some answers may only be implied. the important thing is that a skilled reader is primed to look.

the 'cipher' here, the key that you are being asked to use to decode the rest of the story, is the very presence of unanswered questions about action and plot.

this is an appropriate cipher for this fic, which is structured like a heist or an intrigue. think of the way heists are often intercut in ways that withhold information in a way that is immensely satisfying to watch when the information is eventually revealed.

consider:

this opener presents, in some ways, a much simpler cipher. the first sentence is a classic "hook," a snappy little one-liner which is then expounded upon in the following paragraph. questions are left unanswered (who was that guy? and what exactly did he do to 17 year old ashur?), but they are questions about character beats, and they land differently.

the point of this opener is less to ask questions and more to provide an emotional foundation for everything that follows. this is the story of a man who has been hurt in a very specific way. this wound will affect the way he acts and the emotional catharsis he achieves for the rest of the story. this single paragraph is the key to understanding this specific character. you will get more out of the story if you hold this paragraph in your mind throughout.

this is an appropriate cipher for a slow-paced character study with less focus on plot and more on emotional beats. think of a prestige drama that starts with a prologue that might feel disconnected from the main storyline, until the story progresses and characters reveal more of themselves.

consider:

this is a heavy worldbuilding opener, which can be appropriate for dense high fantasy if there's a good enough reason to provide that information from the jump. do we need this info right now? is this info useful context to interpret what follows?

without spoiling my entire novel, the most important sentence in this paragraph is the last one: "There was no written record to corroborate such a claim, only the oral tradition of the local grandmothers."

that's the cipher; that's the key to understanding everything that follows. i want you reading this novel with the knowledge in the back of your mind that a conquered people has an oral tradition which is in conflict with written records.

these are obviously just three examples, and there are uncountable ways to effectively begin a story. But: that first paragraph establishes much more than you may realize, and it colors your reader's interpretation of everything after it. Take advantage of that opportunity to say something about the story you're writing and put up some damn set dressing. peace and love

honestly the most life changing bit of writing technique i've applied to my work in the last few years is: first paragraph as thesis statement. or maybe first paragraph as cipher? or lens? in any case, the very first paragraph (or page, or chapter) has the power to prime the reader to interpret the rest of the work in a certain way, with an eye out for certain elements.

likewise, if you are a skilled reader, you can pull a lot of information out of a well-crafted first paragraph, and you can take that information with you as you engage with the rest of the story.

this is why it drives me sort of insane now when a story starts with dialogue or a character waking up in the morning or similar. experienced writers harp on about the importance of the first sentence as a hook to get the reader invested, but it's just as much about (hello sorry im obsessed with the psychology of storytelling) influencing the way the reader engages with everything that comes after it

anyway happy wip wednesday here's the beginning of first talon lucanis fic

and the beginning of the ashur pov companion to other masks

and the first paragraph of the novel (im not fully 100% sold on this one but it sure does provide the cipher)

call this an invitation to post first paragraphs for wip wednesday, if you wannaaaa

[crystallizsch]

Hi Hi! how about 💬 for yuusha and anyone from octavinelle?

HI HI anon!! thank you for the ask 💕 (ask game here!)

also this is so evil if you knew how i was spiraling from realizing that octavinelle was starting to grow on me ghdkjsflsd i don't mean this to be bad in any way though! it's really funny thank you 😤💖

and i couldnt choose so i did a random generator and it gave me azul. *shakes my fist* of course it’s azul.

Yuusha & Azul ━━━━━━✦

🐙: How would you like to work in Mostro Lounge? You will be paid handsomely.

💜: .....What’s the catch?

🐙: You wound me, Prefect. There is none. I am doing this out of my own benevolence.

💜: Uh-huh.

The word of the Ramshackle Prefect looking for a side job seemed to have reached the Octavinelle Housewarden's ears.

Because of course it did.

Yuusha looked at Azul with grave suspicion while he looked back at her with a similar look he gave everyone else every time he was bargaining a deal.

As far as she could tell, there didn't seem to be any malicious intent behind those eyes. But there didn't seem to be any sincerity either.

It was hard to tell his intentions.

But Yuu really had no other choice. She just has to take this opportunity at face value.

She needs the tuna can money for her cat.

In any case, if she managed to break Leona by sabotaging his sleep to the point where she was able to force him to do something for her, she could also break Azul if he tried anything to exploit her further.

🐙: I would like you to sleep on it, at least. It's not every day an opportunity like this lands on your feet.

💜: *sigh* No, there's no need. You have a point... I'll take the job.

🐙: Wonderful!

[hplonesomeart]

Would

(go to one of his theatrical broadway-wannabe concerts or perhaps a late night gameshow comedy hour sketch performance. I’m not too picky I’d be willing to pay money just to see him perform anything period)

Yea I felt like doing something silly in order to break away from the dread of finals week coming up. What can I say? I’m a professional procrastinator. But man oh man it was a good call this time around—I mean just look as this scrumptious masterpiece right here. Time well spent for sure. Genuinely I believe to have cooked with it chat /j

This is a version without the added stars by the way. And the second one is obviously just raw image reference/the original “bereal concert meme” source. I was very tempted to put Puzzles in that same exact outfit—however I decided it would be overly time consuming to make two separate versions. Maybe once finals are over I’ll be able to do that :)

[fiapple]

i'm getting towards the end of the skypeia arc, & i'd like to say just how much i adore the way the female strawhats have been treated.

just... every aspect of how the way their characters have been previously contextualized influences the story-line is treated with a masterful amount of consideration. we're given so many layers to both of them that enrich not only their characters specifically, but the arc, and the one piece world as a whole. without nami & robin having their specific skills, and their specific values, without those being built upon, the story would have come to a halt.

you could not have skypeia without nami & robin being who they are as individuals. not just because they never would've gotten there without nami, but also because the way these women think is itself foundational to the machinations of the arc as a whole.

to be totally upfront, if you think any other strawhats were more central to the skypeia arc than nami & robin were you are full-on fucking lying to yourself.

[ceasarslegion]

Oh, boy! @general-luce @justfortalkingtofriends @onwardsandfourwords

So i should underline that I don't know exactly where this started, but I have a few personal theories based on what I've read of his and his online presence.

For those who don't know, years and years ago, when Twitter was still Twitter, SK had made a public statement regarding the then-new wave of book banning in the US where he said that if your school bans a book, to go to the nearest public library or book store and find out exactly what it is they don't want you to see and make your own conclusions. In this he included a graph of all the usual suspects of alt right Christian eye lasers: the hunger games, to kill a mockingbird, 1984, Harry potter, etc. JKR responded to this by saying that SK was one of her allies and said something to the effect of "im so glad that someone in our circles still has common sense" because she had equated his statement about how banning books is always bad regardless of what that book is to mean he was supporting her personal views. SK responded with a short and sweet "trans women are women" and then posted a screenshot showing she had blocked him. Objectively funny interaction

My personal theory is that this is where it all started. Because you don't exactly see the whole interaction if you follow someone and they never reply to the last thing someone said to them. If radfems had only seen the one sided view of SKs words through JKR, then they would naturally assume he was on their side.

But ever since then, there's been a weird... spike of radfems in the tags for SK works. Most notably, I've seen them hanging around the tags for The Shining, Carrie, and most often, Misery.

For those who don't know the book plots of these works, The Shining and Carrie focus a lot more on the systemic misogyny aspect of the abuse that Wendy and Carrie White face than their film adaptations do. Wendy is lulled into learned helplessness by being totally financially dependent on Jack after he saved her from an abusive family life, essentially meaning that she traded one abusive situation for another. In Carrie White's case, she's described explicitly as fat and unconventionally attractive for a young woman, which is portrayed as the main reason that she is abused by the other girls in school, and why pig's blood specifically was chosen to dunk her with at the prom. And a HUGE difference between book and movie in these ones is that in the books, SK's women have a lot more personal agency over their actions and are a lot less passive than they seem in their movies. Wendy is way more gung-ho about self-defense against Jack and Carrie White owns her psychic powers more; they drive their own story and actions rather than being people those actions happen to.

In the case of Misery, you can take that and multiply it by 100. A brief plot summary for those who don't know is that Paul Sheldon is an internationally famous author who made millions off of his victorian period romance/drama novels featuring the character Misery Chastain. He kills her off in his recent book because he's tired of being defined by what he terms as trashy romance books and wants to be a Serious Author. He gets in a car wreck and breaks both his legs, and a former nurse named Annie Wilkes drags him out and nurses him back to health. She claims to be his biggest fan and worships the ground he walks on, until the last Misery book releases and she reads her death. She keeps him locked up and tortures him into writing one last Misery novel just for her where she gets resurrected and they all live happily ever after. That's a very basic version of it, but just know that at one point she chops his foot off with a rusty axe for trying to escape and runs a rookie cop's head over with a lawn mower for trying to rescue him, and the only reason she doesnt shoot Paul in between the eyes and then herself is because he hasnt finished her book yet.

Annie Wilkes is also not described as the most attractive person in the world. This is not for any physical features beyond what you would expect from a book written in 1987, this is a combination of how Paul is a bit of misogynist with mommy issues that he ascribes to women as a group himself (heavily implied that his mother used to emasculate and beat him as a child), and how Annie doesn't take care of herself. She's described as gross more than ugly, like she doesn't bother to shower and leaves greasy dishes behind for weeks to grow mold and rot and Paul can smell it on her breath, or hear the rats scuttling in the basement. She was once also on trial for murder in Denver after a strange amount of NICU infants died under her care as a nurse, but was let off for lack of evidence. She's also very religious but in the way racist republicans are religious, so she essentially kills people and thinks it's justified because they were wicked and deserving of damnation. Many things can be read into there with the earlier things I mentioned.

Anyway, Annie has been... I don't know if "reclaimed" is the best word to use? She's been somethinged by radfems. I think most of us with basic reading comprehension can grasp why Paul's character would not exactly describe Annie in the most respectful or best of lights, considering she kidnapped and tortured him, kept him drugged up, killed a bunch of babies, forced him to write a book for her, chopped off his foot, locked him in a cellar with rats, and horrifically murdered the man who tried to rescue him. The TERFs do not grasp this very well. A common theme you'll see among them in the SK book fandom is that Annie Wilkes did nothing wrong and Paul deserved his torture and should've been murdered at the end of the book for his pretty run of the mill milquetoast 1980s misogyny. And that the way King describes Annie is in itself misogynist for describing a kidnapper and torturer in a negative light. There's many who have voiced that they actually felt bad for Annie by the end of the book and described King as "verbally battering" her. As if a few mean words towards again, a kidnapper and torturer as described from the POV of the guy she is kidnapping and torturing, are worse than the kidnapping and torturing.

There's also a few slurs within the book. I want to heavily underline here that these were dropped within the context of showing the flaws of the characters who said them in a horror novel, they weren't just thrown around for the sake of it. For example, Paul introduces a new black character in the book he writes for Annie because his characters go to Africa looking for an experimental cure for Misery's condition and most people tend to not be white in Africa. Annie actually likes this character a lot, and still very casually and without hesitation refers to him as the N word, which in the context of an otherwise relatively relaxed scene, is meant to make the reader flinch and feel uncomfortable, which draws attention to how Annie's poisonous worldviews infect the way she thinks of even the people she likes, reducing them down to inherently inferior even when they hold positive positions in her head. Also, someone like her is not exactly going to realistically use PC language. The discomfort is the point and it's additive to the novel at large. This is of course taken as though King himself approves of the use of these terms despite being vocally anti-racist and portraying racism as an element of HORROR, ie, something to be HORRIFIED by.

So here's some examples I found after 5 minutes of scrolling the Misery tags to prove I'm not fucking with you:

Why are the Stephen King tags so full of terfs when the man himself has been vocally pro trans and told JKR to fuck off

[prince-liest]

I’m reading Witch King by Martha Wells, and now that I have read more than one (1) series by this author, I have been suddenly brained with a two-by-four sharpied over with “realizing that I really enjoy novels by Martha Wells because they live in the specific niche created by the intersection of casually and thoroughly queer casts and non-romance storylines”

I am as ever a sucker for non-human main characters struggling with their very human feelings, which is why I jumped on Witch King the moment I saw “the author of Murderbot wrote another book with a main character that’s non-human,” but I live in this dichotomy where I can really enjoy reading queer romances but I don’t really identify with non-ace characters (which is not actually something I figured out how to differentiate until I was Last Week Years Old). so there are lots of books out there that I enjoy reading but it’s comparatively rare for me to read something that feels like it was written For Me and Martha Wells does that very well

anyway, give me more ace it-pronouns human-spliced robot main characters and people-eating demons who consider rank over gender when finding new bodies to inhabit

[kasper7489]

I kinda hopped into the dc fandom by reading fics (I know I know lmao)

But as I've read more comics and looked into different characterization and analysis I now have a more developed idea as to how I view a lot of the characters and have preferences to how their written. I'm def the type to click out a fic if I find myself thinking 'he would not fucking say that'

Anyway this is just to say it's very funny to me when I go thru some of the fics I bookmarked at the begining of my interest and find myself going Uh Oh! I don't think I can read this anymore!

[crystalkitty1220]

Man I wonder where the leader of the fear realm could've gone, it's alMOST LIKE NEVIN HAS AN

[mantisgodsdomain]

We ought to write more Pokemon fic some time. We want to recreate the Pokemon Manners/Human Manners cheat sheet that we made a few years ago we think that this site would like the Sliding Scale Of Politeness When Greeting A New Pokemon You've Never Met Before.

[sskk-manifesto]

Ep 5!!!

[corrupteddoodles]

me checking out the tlou tag hoping to see cool fanart and new people to make friends with:

smut. literally so much smut. like 3 fanarts/text posts/anything for the 15 smuts:

[feral-aether]

I've been doing some bits of writing recently in small, few page spurts for practice. Here's one I did for Blurr in the au I'm working on!