#until i remembered i wrote a fic with that exact premise

[active-mind-15]

@cemetery14 @kurokonobrainrot your convos today about Masaomi just reminded me that I did in fact write a one-shot 7 years ago based on a headcanon somebody had where Masaomi would pat Akashi's head when he's sleeping whenever he missed Shiori. Hope you don't mind the shameless plug :)

[crybabyjustice]

for the fake fic name: hurricanes and home wreckers

Oooh, okay, starting out strong.

Gonna go a little bit basic with this one. Initial KlavDar, very clearly not a healthy relationship, constant fights over absolutely nothing at all, storm-in-a-teacup situations just devolve into almost relationship ending blowouts. Klavier and Apollo are introduced to each other at some point, and slowly Klavier starts to realise that actually, it's not normal to have a fucking screaming match over minor inconveniences, dripping coffee as you move from the kitchen to the couch isn't really that big a deal. As the rift between him and Klavier grows, Daryan directs his temper and the person who is seemingly forcing that rift open; Apollo.

Angst with happy ending, or more neutral ending I guess? Bittersweet, the way my mind is going with it.

Also I fell asleep almost immediately after reblogging the prompt for this, then forgot about it until just now, I'm so sorry.

[audaciousanonj]

Naruto AU: Rotted Leaf

ok listen i am having THOUGHTS on my Rotted Leaf au again (which i have never shared here) and Want Engagement except the au is too sad for blorbo from my mutuals to engage with right now so I am just going to throw this out into the void and see where it lands. Feel free to make content for this fic as long as you tag me with it / make sure i am aware of it, and also keep in mind that Kakashi is just in an absolute bonkers mental state. Like he's really at peace with himself! His worldview makes perfectly valid logical sense and is internally consistent with his experiences! It's just that one of the basic premises of his worldview kinda sucks extremely for everyone else.

If you would like to read the prologue @miniongrin wrote for it without being spoiled you should do so now because its REALLY GOOD. (Read the tags though)

cw: Standard Naruto canon stuff including Uchiha Massacre and the implications thereof, and also you probably shouldn't read if you're not in the mood for frank discussions about losing an entire generation of academy students.

Anyway. now that you have read the awesomeness that is Spring Harvest, onto the premise/summary.

So! What basically happens is that Itachi does the Great Uchihan't, and Kakashi, in his attempts to process what his little kouhai has done, basically loses his entire goddamn mind until he snaps like a pocky stick without anyone noticing, unfortunately for Konoha. I wrote a tiny fic about it here.

To summarize, Kakashi basically believes its better to be dead then alive, but like. for everyone. so instead of suicidal tendencies, he now has mass murderer tendencies, because he believes that he's helping people that way.

Like, remember that part in canon where Kakashi said he had to save the past obito by killing the current Obito? Yeah. Now extrapolate that to every pregenin in Konoha. Remember the content warning about losing an entire generation of academy students??? What happened there is that Kakashi decided he would save all these innocent kids from the horrors of the world.

Now, if you read That Awesome Fic I linked earlier, you will note that Naruto survived. This is because Kakashi made the tough choice and decided that he would keep Naruto alive. Not because he's Minato's son though, if anything that would make Kakashi want to kill him first! it's because Naruto is a Jinchuriki, and Kakashi didn't want to release the Kyuubi without any way to control it. Or worse, kill the Kyuubi and have to wait a hundred years for it to regenerate!

See, what Kakashi decided while he was planning out the merciful deaths of the academy students, was that he wanted to kill/save as many of his precious comrades as he possibly could, and as October 10th proved, the easiest way to kill lots of people at once is with a Bijuu! And weren't there rumours of the Kyuubi being able to be controlled by a sharingan? So he kept Naruto alive for that purpose.

So now Kakashi is going to find Itachi! Either he'll get info on "how to possibly control a bijuu", but if he doesn't then honestly Itachi could probably help him slaughter a lot of people at once anyway since he killed his entire clan.

What he is not counting on is Itachi learning that he killed Sasuke and flipping his shit. Kakashi vs. Itachi, Fight!!!

Unfortunately for everyone, Itachi is emotionally destabilized. Also this takes place not two years after the massacre, so he isn't older than 15 at the time. All of which is to say, he falls victim to this Kakashi's version of talk-no-jutsu, which is the exact opposite of naruto's: instead of giving people hope that things can get better, it saps people of that hope and makes them think things will only get worse. So Itachi totally cracks and decides death is too good for Kakashi, but while he was having his mental breakdown, Kakashi just gives him a swift and merciful death.

But that doesn't mean that Kakashi failed his goals, no sir! You see, Kakashi was looking for an Uchiha who Killed His Entire Clan and Perhaps Could Control A Bijuu into Indiscriminate Slaughter, and boy does he find one.

So now "Madara" gets to introduce Kakashi to the Akatsuki, and fun things happen. You see, Pein explained his "end goals" of creating the Juubi and using it to destroy half the population so that wars could end, and Kakashi gets it, he really does, but maybe it would be easier to end wars if... perhaps... the whole population was destroyed instead? So he keeps pushing Pein on this, and this back and forth is enough to get Nagato to question if his plan is really worth it. Seriously. Somehow, listening to Kakashi just makes the plan sound really dumb for some reason.

That's when "Madara" takes him aside and reveals his true identity. And wow, Obito survived, and now is scarred and full of hatred and hurt and pessimism where he was once happy and bright and optimistic! This is definitely validating Kakashi's belief that it's better to kill kids before the world can hurt them (Hey remember, it's canon that Kakashi said he had to save the past Obito by killing the current Obito. That's an actual line. Kakashi v. Obito.) Anyway, Kakashi stops pushing Pein, now that Obito explained his plan and that it's not to kill half the population, it's to put the whole population in a genjutsu of a perfect world!

"...And then kill them? I mean, yeah a perfect world sounds nice and all, but what happens when they die and go to the pure lands and peoples memories don't match up? Also, how long is that genjutsu going to last, like a week? Can't be that long, people are gonna end up dying of starvation or dehydration, are you sure we can't kill them faster-"

Obito would really like to resurrect Madara real quick and ask him some questions, actually. ANyway, Kakashi keeps pushing Obito on this, and this back and forth is enough to get Obito to question if his plan is really worth it. Seriously. Somehow, listening to Kakashi just makes the plan sound really dumb for some reason.

That's when Zetsu takes him aside and reveals his true plan, the actual plan and outcome for real this time. And Kakashi's totally on board! Even he didn't think he could manage to completely wipe out humanity, but if Zetsu can do it, can kill everyone with the god tree and completely halt the cycle of reincarnation itself, allowing everyone to stay in the pure lands forever-! It's almost too good to be true, really!

So Kakashi stops pestering Obito. This is suspicious, because Obito has seen this pattern of question-stop before, and it happened to Pein when Obito revealed the true plan to Kakashi. But surely no one else is piggybacking on his moon's eye plan and using him, right? ...right????

the truth come out: does zetsu is stringing us along. Pein & Obito v. Zetsu, Fight!!! How it ends is basically Nagato ends up transporting them all to another dimension and then trapping them there by destroying their eyes.

As a result, the Akatsuki implodes, and Kakashi gives up on the Bijuu plan bc he doesn't know how to use the statue and never got to learn how to control a bijuu with the sharingan. So he makes his way back to konoha, because if he can't save everyone, at least he can save his dear comrades.

and BOY yall haven't even heard what's happening there, but im gonna elaborate in a part two because this post is getting pretty long. I haven't even touched on all the Rot and Infection symbolism surrounding Kakashi yet.

EDIT: I have a part two now but I still haven't elaborated on Kakashi's philosophical rabies. Part three coming soon eventually.

[equalseleventhirds]

quick disclaimer before fic: this is not meant to excuse or absolve melanie and georgie of outing jon; what they did was wrong and they should not have done it. instead it is an... examination of a character who is Maybe working some things out but, due to Internalized Issues, is harshly rejecting it both for herself and other people. (i’m aware i wrote something with the exact same FUCKING premise back when i was in the sh*rl*ck fandom dear god don’t read that linked fic it is from a deeply shameful time of fandom i only linked it as proof i did the same thing before. almost like i’m still working through the same stuff via writing fanfiction. hm.) (further discussion on THAT in post-fic notes; i wanted to keep it under the cut for personal reasons.)

furthermore: warning for discussion of sex (but not explicit depictions of sex), characters experiencing aphobia both internalized and not, mention of sexism wrt jobs, characters outing other characters without their consent (more than once, and more than just jon), and mention of consensual but unwanted sex (as in, consent was given, but the consenter did not enjoy it, and consented due to expectations).

- - -

It starts with: “I don’t, I, I usually can’t—Lately. I mean. Lately I can’t.” Melanie shuts her eyes so she won’t have to see Georgie, her hand on the sheets, judgment questions in her eyes. “Since I got—shot. It’s more difficult, is all.”

“Melanie—”

“You can still try,” she says, the words falling too fast, too panicked. “If you want, sometimes other people—and it’s fine! I’m always, it’s fine to try. Sometimes I do. I just might not. You know.”

“You might not orgasm,” Georgie finishes for her. It’s hard to tell how she’s feeling about it—until her fingers brush Melanie’s chin, turning her face up.

Reluctantly, Melanie opens her eyes, and then she’s glad she did. Because Georgie’s smiling, not a mocking smile, gentle. And they said this was just, just casual, just between friends (there’s too much going on with ghosts and the Institute and Georgie’s ex sleeping on her couch when he isn’t being kidnapped for it to be more than that), but Melanie’s glad Georgie is smiling.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Georgie says. She’s sitting up now, not lying almost-not-quite between Melanie’s legs anymore. She looks gorgeous, naked and cross-legged on that horrible mattress with a microfiber sheet wrapped around her shoulders, and Melanie wants to curl up in the sheet with her and eat the leftover pizza from earlier and fall asleep together with grease on their hands.

No. Focus. “It’s okay,” Georgie says again, gentler. “If you can’t right now. If you don’t want to. You certainly gave me a lovely orgasm—”

“—or three—”

“—yes, thank you, and if you’d rather just call it there, I’m not pushing it. As long as you enjoyed yourself.” She frowns, suddenly, glancing down at Melanie’s hands. “You… did enjoy yourself? I hope we didn’t—”

“I did!” She always does, when it’s other people coming, when she gets to be touching warm skin and watching someone fall apart. It’s… nice. “It’s just, you know. I got shot.”

(And isn’t that a convenient excuse, she sneers in her own head, and it sounds like Toni refusing to come back to the team, it sounds like the most sarcastic videos about her breakdown, it sounds like Elias. Isn’t it convenient that now you can blame your little problem on blood flow, or nerve endings, or stress. Never mind that you didn’t have those excuses a year ago. Or two years. Or back when you had a real girlfriend, and you always said yes but she got tired before—)

Georgie tucks a strand of hair behind Melanie’s ear. “Okay, good. If we, you know, try this again sometime? If you’re feeling better? Then I can try.” She stops, licks her lips, watches Melanie’s expression. “Or I can… not try, if you’d still prefer that. Later. You know. If.”

“I’m not—” And she’s rushing again, always rushing, she doesn’t even know if she and Georgie will ever—

“No, I know! It’s fine! But like—Look, this isn’t exactly new for me, you know? If that’s something you want. Something you don’t want. Or I, I’m saying it’s not a problem, if you do or don’t want me to make you come in the future, or even if you don’t want to have sex at all, I mean, when we were dating Jon didn’t—”

That’s where Georgie stops, as if talking about Jon is too much, as if she hasn’t been speaking Melanie’s secret insecurities out loud in bed like it’s something they can talk about, as if all of this hasn’t already been too much and too terrifying already.

Melanie stands up, grabs the comforter as a makeshift cloak (because Georgie has the sheet, and suddenly she isn’t sure she wants to share the sheet with her). “Right.”

“I’m just—I have a friend. Who you might talk to, if you wanted to talk about this.”

She steps away from the bed, towards the door. “Sure. Pizza? I’m hungry.”

-

The problem is, Melanie doesn’t much like Jon. He was such a dick about the Youtube thing, and about her statement, and about Sasha. And even though she knows (sort of) that part of it hadn’t been his fault, she still isn’t going to talk over her disinterest in sex with him. It’s mortifying. Even if he wasn’t her boss. And Georgie’s ex. And currently out of the Archives, anyway.

But she wants to talk to somebody, about Georgie’s words running around and around and around her head, about the sheer panic mixing with almost-relief and then the visceral no no no churning low in her stomach that had made it a struggle just to choke down her pizza. She wants to ask someone is this normal, am I allowed, is it even enough to be halfway to ‘not at all’ or should I just suck it up. She wants to talk that out desperately.

It’s just… she doesn’t have many friends left, after her whole fall from Youtube ghost hunter grace. She’s not going to ask Georgie about it, any more than Jon, although for pretty much the opposite reason. Who’s left? Her shiny new coworkers? Tim, who seethes and hates everything and everyone in the Archives? Martin, who’s still upset that Jon so much as spoke to her while he was on the run? Basira?

-

When Melanie met Sasha—the real Sasha, the one apparently no one but her even remembers—she’d been the only woman in the Archives. And Melanie had chatted with her about haunted pubs, and maximizing SEO, and how to talk to people who’d seen a white dog while they were drunk and thought it was a ghost. And about their jobs, of course, which led to both of them scoffing about the sexist bullshit of academia and how someone like Sasha could be just an assistant and the only woman on her team.

And then Elias hired Melanie to replace… the thing that replaced Sasha. Hired another woman to replace the only woman. You learn to see patterns from the kind of person who might say diversity the same way as toilet plunger: something necessary, but distasteful. Melanie was filling a role he needed filled, and she could live with that.

And then Basira.

Who wasn’t there because she wanted to be, of course, but was still there. Was still another woman in the boy’s club of terror they’d apparently signed on for. Could maybe, maybe, be someone Melanie could connect with. Someone she could talk to.

Maybe.

-

“Do you know if he and Jon ever…?”

“No clue, and not interested!” She’s laughing, about to just dismiss it out of hand, but… maybe. She can feel the questions she never asked Georgie, the words sharpening their claws on the edges of her mind. The no, not me, not allowed sinking in her gut.

“Although…” Make it light. Make it interesting. Make it about someone else. How to hook an audience without having a public breakdown and becoming a— “According to Georgie, Jon… doesn’t.”

It feels wrong as soon as she says it. Like she’s dirty. Like she’s lying. Like a thousand eyes are looking at her, watching her, waiting for more. Make it a story. Engage your audience. Like it’s 2013 in a convention hotel room and Pete just told everyone Don’t worry, Mel likes girls actually, and even though they were all fine about it that moment of sharpshock terror in her throat as they all looked—

“Like, at all?”

The one thing she never learned was how to stop talking. “Yeah.”

“Yeah, that does explain some stuff.”

And that’s… it, really. That does explain some stuff. Jon is a dick, has always been a dick, overfocused on work and not on other people, and that does explain some stuff. Right. Yes. Like her last girlfriend had told her, about all you do is work, I can’t even get you off. An explanation, just like she always knew it would be.

It doesn’t really matter. She has a boss to go kill.

-

“I think,” she says, slow, like every word is being dragged out of her, “that I might not like. Sex. As much as, you know, people do.”

“You’re a person,” her therapist says, firm, and she has to bite back a sarcastic laugh.

“Right. ‘Course.”

- - -

post-fic notes: i myself personally have previously identified as: heteroromantic gray-ace, heteroromantic ace, aroace, aro gray-ace, aro bi, bi, arospec bi, aro bi again, and aro bi but sex ambivalent. part of that has been natural progression and change; part of that was bcos some people i considered friends got very into aphobic discourse, and i internalized a lot of what they said. in recent months i have been examining my sex ambivalence (sometimes repulsion) and considering what that means about whether or not i am on the ace spectrum. i’m still thinking about these things. i’m still, deep down inside, afraid of the aphobic people i respected and cared about hearing about this.

in part i wrote this to work through some of My Own Shit regarding this. in part i wrote this bcos i will get my grubby little aspec hands (bcos regardless of anything else, i am aspec, whether that’s ace or aro) on every character i can. yes, even the ones who did an objectively shitty thing to jon, the one canonical ace character. bcos sometimes people (like me) internalize things and make mistakes.

[rueitae]

Writing Roundup 2020

This is a writing reflection I’ve been doing for myself every year for the last four years. Its a positive boost to myself see how far I’ve come and look back on my progress for the past year and look forward to the new year. 

Everyone is welcome to use this same format if they’d like to do the same! 

~~~~~~~

Stats:

Words written:

330,000, which is nearly half of all the words I’ve written on Ao3 in the last three years. 

One Shots Posted (all fics plance unless otherwise stated):

In the Arms of the Ever(pink?) Tree (4463 words)

For the Plance Secret Santa exchange. Post s8 date/not date on a snowy moon. Love confession. 

Birthday Treats (2129 words)

For Pidge’s birthday this year! Domestic family fluff, breakfast in bed, plance kids.

Begin Again (Together) (4805 words)

Canon divergence from before episode one! Pidge and Lance are established dating when alien intervention brings them to where they are supposed to be: with the Blue Lion. Just a brief look into what the AU would look like. 

Common Ground (4521 words)

A treat for my friends who introduced me to Magic Knight Rayearth and pointed out some fun character parallels. There is this beautiful art Arya made to go with it because we’re all trash for both series. Plance meet up with Fuu and Ferio post series for both couples. 

Bonded To You (1808 words)

For the Langstron Halloween Exchange! Established plance with a baby Lance is trying to keep safe from a witch who would take advantage of the child’s heritage. 

It Tasted Good (6785 words)

Pikelavar for Pikelavar Month! The premise is crack, but it's mostly treated seriously. Pike ate the Jewel of Jitan by accident and doesn’t realize it until Haggar finds them. Meklavar gets Protective.

The Remainder of Days (3188 words)

Part of my Bad Things Happen Bingo. Fantasy AU where Pidge is a minor forest goddess and Lance is her neighbor mortal farmer. 

I Love You a Lily More Each Day (3232 words)

Another of the Bad Things Happen Bingo. Canon compliant where Lance is undercover at a flower shop and knee deep in an illegal smuggling operation. 

Lease on Life (4978 words)

This one was also part of Bad Things Happen Bingo and was an experiment. It’s POV of an oldest plance kid, canon verse. Her parents’ Paladin days come back to haunt them one night. Some cute family stuff too in there. 

Ready to Dance (4135 words)

For the Valentine’s Day exchange! Post series. Lance tries to get back into the party scene and Pidge rescues him from a disastrous night. 

Loopholes (5476 words)

Technically I didn’t write this fic this year, but a very kind reader asked if I would post this to Ao3, so it was my first fic of the year on Ao3. It’s Lotura! Originally a gift for a dear friend I’ve had since elementary school. It’s a fantasy AU where Lotor stumbles into Allura’s kingdom needing help. 

Next to Me (7311 words)

Also for Bad Things Happen Bingo, this is probably one of my favorite fics of the year. This is the canon verse AU that went all wrong in s7, and Sendak succeeds in destroying Earth. Lance and Pidge end up not only his prisoners, but also two of the last humans in the universe. Ends open ended, but it became a series in the end!

Into Me (14248 words)

The sequel to the above fic. There are two versions, this and the one below. The title tells all. Lance and Pidge come to terms with their new life aboard Sendak’s flagship and do their best to keep the other comforted.

Into Me (non-explicit version) (7228 words)

Exactly the same as the fic above, only this one is SFW

Sunshine (3831 words)

A Bad Things Happen Bingo! One of my favorite concepts. Canon verse. Pidge gets sick while she and Lance are on a scientific mission. 

Showoff (635 words)

A really short fic for a friend on their birthday, featuring their plance kids!

Respite of the Heart (4181 words)

A fic I have been wanting to write for a very long time. I love the concept of Pidge as a Disney Princess in the sense she has the forest guardian theme and all these animals love her. So there’s some play on that as the Paladins stop for lunch on their journey back to Earth in early s7. Lance comes to a realization and they have a chat surrounded by the animal friends. @anchoredtetherart did a phenomenal piece to accompany it. Please look at it in awe here.

The Hardest Part (3960 words)

For Bad Things Happen Bingo! An AU of the episode The Reunion where Pidge doesn’t return when she’s supposed to. 

A Planned Sacrifice (4988 words)

Another Bad Things Happen Bingo. Canon verse. Pidge assumes that being a sacrifice for the ‘forest god’ is strictly ceremonial and at worst a wild animal. It’s actually Sendak, who no one has seen since Shiro shot him out of the Castle. He remembers Pidge and is far too pleased to see her again, tied up on a silver platter. 

Almost Forgotten, but Not Gone (3946 words)

Bad Things Happen Bingo. AU sometime in s1 where Haxus isn’t as dead as Pidge thought. 

Touch (7519 words)

Written for the Lance Goes Boom bang! It was inspired by @fenixseraph ‘s amazing art here! It’s a different take on The Way Forward, where Pidge and Lance are separated from the rest of the team and placed in their own cell. And the Red Lion causes issues. 

Chaptered Fics started/added to:

Wolf In Thieves’ Clothing (4516 words)

An AU of The Castle of Cagliostro from Lupin the Third series. Lee, you have my thanks forever for making me watch this finally. Pidge is a literal princess whose kingdom is in the middle of an internal coup. Lance is a gentleman thief who rides with his best buds Hunk and Matt. Their paths are destined to cross again when Lance goes back to the castle he used to call home. 

Game of Love (4593 words)

The most crack of the bunch. AU of Fall the of the Castle of Lions where Sendak and Haxus get away with it all. Pidge and Lance are prisoners on Haxus’ new ship, and Lance finds an opportunity for eventual escape when he learns that Haxus has a crush on his second in command. Operation matchmaker begins. (happy ending planned for all)

What Tides May Bring (20704 words)

Collab with the fantastic @anchoredtetherart for MerMay! Established plance as mermaids and guardians of their elements with adorable mer child. Then angst because they are all captured by a ‘research’ institute. 

Seasons of Magic (16546 words)

I actually added a chapter this year! Ongoing collection of one-shots with mage Pidge who lives in the country and cultivates her plant magic and makes potions with the assistance of her dragon familiar, Lance. Mostly domestic fluff. 

Too Soon and Not Soon Enough (11438 words)

Added another chapter this year to my Keith-centric AU. It’s basically VLD but five years early and they’re all literally child Paladins. Keith gets to meet Krolia earlier and its fun to go into tween friendships as they try and navigate the reality of their situation. 

Seeds (48833 words)

Added a ton earlier this year. A collection of plance fics all or mostly under 500 words. All meant to be adopted by others if interest strikes. Covers many genres.

Chaptered Fics Finished:

Resolve to Fly (75799 words)

Written for the Pidge Angst Bang. My artist @alchemie0 did an outstanding job capturing the feel of the fic. Look at the art here! Canon verse AU where Pidge encounters Haxus, who has crashed on Earth. She helps him repair his ship in excitement and good faith, which he pays back by kidnapping her. For two years she survives as little more than a housepet on Sendak’s ship. Gen.

Who's Protecting Who? (28989 words)

Also technically not written this yeah, but posted. A collab with Hush waaaay back in 2018. It's a plance Altean AU with Pidge as distant royalty and Lance as a bodyguard.

A Dish Served Cold (21533 words)

Finally finished this one! Canon verse in which Pidge accidentally runs into Sendak on an isolated planet. Sendak takes advantage of this encounter and tries to return to the Empire with her in tow. Much Pidge whump. Gen

Reflections: 

Best title 

I still really really love Too Soon and Not Soon Enough (11438 words). Because it's too soon for the Paladins to be Paladins, and for Keith it's not nearly soon enough for Krolia to return. It just feels like it has a lot of heart to it. I hope I can keep it going, but my ideas are incredibly scattered for it. 

Worst title 

Touch (7519 words). Yeah it’s a play on ‘Don’t you touch her’ but it feels soooo dry. 

Best/worst last line

Best: This was really, really hard choice this year, but ultimately, making up for the terrible title, its Touch (7519 words) 

“It feels good to escape the ship with all of his teammates, secure in the knowledge that he has a way forward not just as a Paladin, but also with Pidge.” 

- Not only did I manage to fit the title of the episode in there, it's got that hopeful tinge to it and reflects on personal growth both internally and with Pidge. 

Worst: This one isn’t necessarily bad from Begin Again (Together) (4805 words), but it could be better. It didn’t get quite the epic sense I was hoping to pull from it.

“Okay,” he smirks, hand firmly on the throttle. “Operation save Earth starts now.”

Looking back, did you write more fics than you thought you would this year, less than you thought, or about what you predicted?

Definitely wrote way more. Even with posting two fic that are essentially the exact same, I still ended up writing nearly half of my total Ao3 word count this year. (330,000/670,000). Doing Bad Things Happen Bingo was a bit part of that - I was very inspired at the beginning of this year - but also there were many events I participated in (8 total!!) on top of my personal projects. 

What’s your favorite story this year? Not the most popular, but the one that makes you the happiest.

A really hard decision this year, because there are several that make me really happy. I think oddly enough though, it’s Game of Love (4593 words) because of its potential and how much crack it is. It has such whacky rom-com energy to it but also that underlying angst of the situation I can fall back on. My favorite trope to explore is what happens to the characters when they’re captured. I just really enjoy the concept and the challenge to make such a concept believable with minimal suspension of belief. 

Okay, NOW your most popular story.

Using kudos as my gauge (and not counting the chapter fics), the winner is: 

Respite of the Heart (4181 words)

Not surprising because Ivy’s art is STUNNING.

Story most underappreciated by the universe?

I think that’s It Tasted Good (6785 words), the pikelavar fic. Pikelavar is underappreciated in general

Story that could have been better?

For all I was excited to write Sunshine (3831 words), it didn’t quite fall the way I had imagined in my mind. I don’t know if it was the structure or I was running out of steam or what. All i know is that I wanted more but all I could concentrate on was that scene where he’s caring for her in bed. Maybe I was just too ambitious.

Sexiest story?

No brainer it's Into Me (14248 words). Literally. Which really shocked me that it happened. Didn’t think I’d write any smut at all, let alone this year. This particular fic just kinda called out for it 

Saddest story?

The prequel to the above fic: Next to Me (7311 words). How much more sad can you get than Earth being destroyed, being Sendak’s prisoners all while trying to tell each other ‘i love you’ without seeming weird because you’re the last humans in the universe. 

Most fun?

I think it's Ready to Dance (4135 words). Just Valentine’s fluff and impromptu slow dancing in the park at night. 

Story with single sweetest moment?

I’m picking What Tides May Bring (20704 words). Listen, mer Lance and mer Pidge playing with their mer baby in their domestic paradise is probably one of my favorite things I’ve ever written. Dad Lance has my heart. 

Hardest story to write?

The last chapter of A Dish Served Cold (21533 words) was like pulling teeth. I’m pretty happy with it in the end but at the time man it was so hard. 

Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them?

I wrote smut. It was...weird? But also strangely calming. I wrote more for another fic but it's still a WIP. I definitely need to be in the mood to write it. 

Proudest Achievement:

The Pidge Angst Bang. Resolve to Fly (75799 words). Look at that word count. I only wanted something under 3k at first, so it was just going to be Pidge meeting Haxus. But by the time I finished that part it was already 10k. So even though I was going through a rough part of my life, I just kept going and it ended up being my therapy. I’m really proud of the fic and I love my artists’ pieces. It really lifted my spirits. (You should all really go check out the Ao3 collection of all the bang stories and art they are AMAZING you won’t regret. If you love Pidge angst they are all must reads.)

What are your fic writing goals for next year?

I’d like to finish my Bad Things Happen Bingo card and then focus on my current WIP, that includes the Seeds collection. There are days I still feel a bit overwhelmed, and I’m still trying to find a routine after moving. I’d like to do more events too, but I think I need to be more selective about which ones I do. I don’t want to burn myself out. 

Apart from that, I’d really like to try and give back to the community more. I’d like to start consciously writing fics for others without an event to go by. 

Past Years:

2017

2018

2019

[luthienebonyx]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Friday's Child - Georgette Heyer, HEYER Georgette - Works Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Gil Ringwood/Ferdy Fakenham, Anthony "Sherry" Sheringham/Hero Wantage, Isabella Milborne/George Wrotham Characters: Gilbert Ringwood, Ferdinand Fakenham, Anthony "Sherry" Sheringham, Hero Wantage, George Wrotham, Isabella Milborne, Chilham (Friday's Child) Additional Tags: Friends to Lovers, Past unrequited love, Eventual Requited Love, Pining, Idiots in Love, just generally idiots, Friendship, Romance, Marriage, Pregnancy, Comedy, Romantic Comedy, a teensy bit of angst, The Season, Christmas, Road Trips, THERE WAS ONLY ONE BED, On Purpose, hedgerows, Jealousy, Hurt/Comfort, Regency, obviously, elaborate descriptions of clothing, Minor Original Character(s), Across a crowded (ball)room, What Happened After, Post-Canon Summary:

The tale of a memorable and eventful six months in the life of Mr Gilbert Ringwood, Esq., following the marriage of his friend, Lord Wrotham, to Miss Isabella Milborne in June, 1817.

~

Okay, so this is my YULETIDE AUTHOR REVEAL, and there is quite a story to this one. Fair warning, this is an EXTREMELY self-indulgent post.

Every single story I've written for Yuletide over the years is one that I probably wouldn't have otherwise written, and every single one of them has also wound up being amongst my personal favourites of my own work. I've loved writing all of them. However, the story I wrote this year is one I've been talking about writing for quite literally twenty years, but the history of it goes back even further. So, sit back, and I'll tell you the tale of the long path that eventually led me to writing  That Greek Thing.

~

Some years ago (Shall we specify that it was the ninth decade of the Twentieth Century? Yes, I think we shall!) there lived a girl who was at that rather difficult age when she was no longer a child nor yet a young lady. This girl, whom we shall, for the sake of convenience, call Miss L, lived in a village by the sea in a far distant, Antipodean land. She was a quiet, bookish beanpole of a girl, almost a bluestocking - the sort of individual who lived rather too much in her own head, in fact. One day, as Miss L browsed the offerings on the secondhand book table at the annual fete of the local church, she chanced upon a volume, sadly dog-eared and with a long crease right through the front cover, titled ‘A Civil Contract’ by Georgette Heyer, which had clearly become surplus to its previous owner's requirements. Miss L had recently read and loved Miss Austen's ‘Pride and Prejudice’ for the first time, and it was immediately obvious to her that Miss Heyer's work was set in a similar time period.

So Miss L bought A Civil Contract, and read it, and laughed heartily at the various supporting characters such as Mr Chawleigh, but her youthful heart found the arranged marriage central to the story rather more serious and subdued than she had been expecting. It was not really the book she had expected it to be, but it tugged at her memory, so when she was next perusing the titles at her local library and she chanced upon another title by Miss Heyer, she resolved that she should give it a chance.

She loved this book - though which one it was, exactly, of Miss Heyer's many works is lost to the mists of time - and thus was born a great and enduring literary love.

Miss L noted the very long list entitled "By the same author" at the front of ‘A Civil Contract’ and embarked upon a most determined pursuit, proceeding to haunt fetes, book exchanges and other such faintly disreputable premises in which secondhand books were to be found, in search of Heyers she had yet to read. Dear reader, you must remember that this was long ago, and if it was not quite before the Internet itself, it was certainly well before the advent of the world wide web. One could not simply conduct a quick search and download a book into one's own hands in the space of a few minutes. One could not even easily order books, except through the auspices of an official bookseller - and Miss L was young, and sadly short of funds.

So Miss L hunted most carefully, and over the next several years amassed a collection of all of Miss Heyer's novels set in England during that period between 1811 and 1820 known as the Regency. However, Miss L never met another soul who would admit to having even once read any of Miss Heyer's works, though clearly such persons must be out there somewhere - for otherwise, where would all the books in Miss L's collection have come from? So Miss L continued, hugging Miss Heyer's works to her as her special secret. She read other works set in what was then becoming known as the Regency romance genre, but they were as pale copies of Miss Heyer's sparkling and beautifully researched originals, and she soon lost interest.

Miss L grew older, and assumed the life of a young lady, and other considerations took up much of her time and attention. However, she always returned to Miss Heyer's novels eventually, greeting them like old friends who would never fail to make her smile in the midst of troubled times.

Things continued thus until the closing years of the century - and, indeed, the millennium - when Miss L one day stumbled upon that wondrous community known as online fandom. The fannish life soon consumed much of her time, and she read a great deal of "fanfiction" while also, hesitantly, trying her own hand at writing and sharing offerings of her own.

And then came a most unexpected occurrence. Miss L was reading through the daily bulletin from her favoured Xena: Warrior Princess/Hercules: the Legendary Journeys slash Mailing List, when lo, she espied a most intriguing subject line. It proclaimed, very simply: "FIC: Regency Fuck (1/?)".

Here we shall pause a moment to explain that while, in these modern times, the genre known as the Regency AU is quite well-known in fandom, at that time, more than twenty years ago, this was not at all the case. AUs themselves were not near as wide-spread a phenomenon as they are today, and Miss L had never in her life even considered the possibility of the existence of such a thing as a Regency AU - and yet there it was, before her.

She read the first chapter of Regency Fuck most quickly, and then went to see what other members of the Mailing List might have made of it. The chapter had been received in a most positive light, but everyone else searched and failed to find exactly the right description to do it justice. Most compared it to Miss Austen's work. However, Miss L knew something that all the other members of the Mailing List (except ONE other, clearly) did not: Miss Heyer's very first novel set during the Regency period had been entitled Regency Buck. Miss L had squealed with joy upon reading the first chapter of Regency Fuck, for it was not merely a story set during the Regency but rather, and most clearly, one set in Miss Heyer's very particular version of that period.

So at last Miss L gathered her courage and sent an email to the author. Its exact contents are also lost in the mists of time, however the general gist was: SLASHY GEORGETTE HEYER?! - to which the author of Regency Fuck replied, just as ecstatically: YES!

Thus began a correspondence about gentlemen in tight breeches that continues to this very day. The author of Regency Fuck, whom we shall call Miss Damerel - actually, no we shall not, for as everyone with any proper understanding would know, Damerel is a title NOT merely a surname. Therefore, we shall refer to her henceforward as Lady Damerel. (In any event, Lady Damerel was not then yet going by the pen name Damerel, for in that case Miss L should have been left in no doubt whatsoever about which of Miss Heyer's heroes Lady Damerel numbered amongst her veriest favourites.)

So Miss L and Lady Damerel continued their correspondence as Regency Fuck grew longer and longer, and it was no doubt at about this time that first mention was made of Miss Heyer's 1944 novel Friday's Child, and in particular two of the primary supporting characters, Mr Gilbert Ringwood and the Honourable Ferdinand Fakenham, and how very easy it would be to slash them.

"Someone should write it," Miss L opined.

"Yes, someone should," Lady Damerel agreed.

"I should probably write it," Miss L continued.

"Yes, you should," Lady Damerel said, with great eagerness.

However, Miss L did not write it, though she continued to mention the idea of it every now and then in the years that followed. And a great many years did follow. Miss L and Lady Damerel drifted in different fannish directions, but their friendship remained true - for who else in the world could quite understand their twin mutual and abiding loves for Miss Heyer's works and gentlemen getting each other out of their tight breeches?

Some eight years after their first acquaintance, Miss L journeyed to Great Britain, where she met Lady Damerel in the flesh at last. They travelled together to Bath, and spent a most diverting time there, imagining this or that of Miss Heyer's characters walking the streets, taking Georgian elevenses at the Pump Room, and drinking rather too much of a mysterious white liqueur (which they had discovered in a local tavern) in the evenings at their hotel.

At the end of their time in Bath, they parted sorrowfully, knowing that it would be long before they set eyes on each other again, and went back to their lives. Of course, the correspondence continued, just as before.

At around this time, Miss L first took part in the great fannish holiday time tradition of Yuletide. She was quite overwhelmed to discover that asking for a Heyer story was an option open to her, but she gathered her courage and did ask for such a thing, and received a most delightful story based on The Foundling as her gift. In later years, she received other beautiful little Heyer stories at Yuletide, but she could not quite find in herself the mettle, or perhaps the presumption, required to offer to write Heyer fic herself - for what if she could not do it justice?

Miss L did write Regency AUs in a number of fandoms in the years that followed, however, and she enjoyed the experience very much. She then fell away from writing anything at all for a number of years, and began to wonder if she would ever write fanfiction again.

She was, naturally, quite in the wrong in making this assumption, and in mid-2019 a new fandom set her to writing great screeds again. However, the very first thing she had written that year was actually a drabble - a story of exactly 100 words - using characters from Miss Heyer's Frederica in filling a request for Miss @thisbluespirit​, in a small fandom challenge in which they were both taking part. It was a small step, but a very important one. 

That year, Miss L took part in Yuletide again for the first time in some five years. However, it was not until the end of the following year - that damnable year, 2020, of which we will not speak further - that Miss L finally decided that THIS would be the year that she would finally write a full-blown Heyer fic. She signed up for Yuletide, offering nine fandoms in all, but rather stacking the odds by ensuring that seven of those fandoms were Heyer novels. It seemed as if Fate must have taken a hand when she received her assignment and discovered that she had been matched with her recipient, Miss @afterism​, for none other than Miss Heyer's Friday's Child. Upon investigating further, she discovered that Miss Afterism was particularly fond of Gil/Ferdy - and so, at last, Miss L embarked on writing the story that she had been considering for so long, some 35 (or perhaps even more) years after first reading Friday's Child.

Dear Reader, she ADORED writing this story. She did, of course, e-mail Lady Damerel posthaste to let her know that she was at last writing Gil and Ferdy's story.  She was also anxious to share with Lady Damerel - because she knew that no other of her acquaintance would quite understand - how she had quite burst out laughing when, while walking her dog - who is, of course, named Lufra after the family dog in Frederica - one day she had realised that this story could only be titled That Greek Thing.

And so at last That Greek Thing was completed and posted and, on Christmas Day, the Yuletide collection was revealed. Very fortunately, Miss Afterism was very happy with That Greek Thing. Lady Damerel also squeed in a most unladylike way about it, and others also commented with words of approval.

Miss L ventures to believe that this story is actually the story that she wanted it to be, and hoped so very hard that it would be, and she still cannot quite believe that she has written it at last. Of everything she has ever written for Yuletide, it is the most special to her.

She thanks you very much for reading both the story - if you have done so - and this most self-indulgent narrative.

[theartofimaginaryfriends]

Chapter 3 - Welcome to Ilvermorny

Fic series: The Final Straw (HP/PJO Crossover)

Premise: The Welcome Feast causes a rocky start to the year.

Masterlist

Taglist: @ilvermornymascot, @lukecastellandeservedbetter

Word count: 1,652

A/N: I feel it's important to mention that I wrote this at 2AM (lmao shocker) and accidentally called the dorms lodges because I pictured them as such. After consulting the group chat I always consult, it's staying that way because why not. And yes, I absolutely used combination knocks because of Wizards of Waverly Place (S4 E21 if you don't know what I'm talking about). Please let me know if you want to be on the taglist, and please comment as it helps keep me motivated! Hope you enjoy the chapter, it ended up being fun to write!

The room buzzed with excitement as the students watched the first years get sorted into their houses. Nova stood next to the Head Boy, Lucas Hoffman, and tried to seem interested in the sorting. The nerves she felt were hard to hide, with the threat of a Prophecy being revealed tonight. Rachel Dare had collapsed on the way up to the school with the rest of the transfers, and Nova couldn't help but notice a flicker of a green glow in her eyes.  

She could only hope that nothing would happen while the mortal girl waited with her friends to be sorted into a house like everyone else. The last thing that was needed was to provoke a group of demigods with quick access to their weapons and already felt suspicious of the place. “You okay?" 

 "What?" Nova looked up at her friend. "Oh yeah, just tired and hungry." 

"Are you sure that's it?"  

"Lucas, I'm fine," Nova insisted. The Head Boy opened his mouth to speak but ultimately let it go, knowing how stubborn his friend could be. They turned back to watch the sorting, and Nova cheered with the rest of her house whenever someone got sorted into Pukwudgie. Still, she didn't seem to have her heart in the sorting like she did every year.  

When the ceremony ended, the student body moved into The Great Hall. Nova relaxed a bit entering the familiar surroundings and smiled. The staff table was at the very end of the hall and faced the door that led into the room. A bear lectern was placed in front of the Headmasters seat, which sat in the middle of the long table.  

Unlike Hogwarts, Ilvermorny had over one hundred circular tables for the students, and students from every house were free to sit together. The American Wizarding school prided itself on their inclusivity, part of that being the inter-house relationships.  

The Hall was decorated with Indigenous artwork, representing the founders of the school. Paintings on the walls told the story of Ilvermorny, and how it was founded. The ceiling was reflective of the night sky. Thousands of candles were floating in mid-air, lighting up the room. Ilvermorny had brought some of Hogwarts' famous features to The Great Hall as a way to help the European students feel more at home.

Ghosts floated around and interacted with the students, startling the demigods that were already distracted by the interior. When the witch took a seat next to Cree, she couldn't help but notice a particularly familiar face within the ghosts. Peeves the Poltergeist had decided to tag along, likely eager to terrorize a new group of students. Harry Potter, who was at the same table, followed her eye line and looked even more displeased than she felt. "Blimey, I thought he was joking." 

"I'm sorry, what?" 

"To our new students, welcome," Headmaster Tahamente greeted everyone. "And to our upper years welcome back. We have much to discuss this evening, but for now please enjoy the feast." 

Food appeared at the table, and students immediately began piling their plates. Ron Weasley was one of the first to dig in, stuffing his face with shepherd's pie. Hermione scoffed at her friend's lack of proper etiquette. "Honestly Ronald, do you have any manners?" 

"What? I'm hungry," he said between mouthfuls. Nova laughed as Harry rolled his eyes at Hermione chastising Ron.  

"Um... can I help you?" Harry asked, uncomfortable. Nova followed his eye line to Cree, who was staring at The Chosen One in disbelief.  

"You're Harry Potter," his jaw dropped. "As in the Harry Potter." 

"Cree, we talked about this." 

"Can you blame me?" 

"I'm sorry, Harry," she sighed. "I requested my friend here do the exact opposite of that. Cree is clearly a big fan of yours." 

"It's nice to meet you, Cree." he smiled. Harry hated attention because of his fame, but he was kind nonetheless. That was something Nova liked about her friend and made a mental note to talk to Cree about dialling down the fanboy attitude after tonight. 

All the boy could do was stare open-mouthed, still starstruck. "Potter has a whole fan club here, too?" 

"Malfoy, are you really failing to consider the fact that our friend here is world famous?" Nova sassed. She had only known Draco during her transfer year at Hogwarts during the Triwizard Tournament and was still skeptical of the Slytherin. Despite choosing to go against Voldemort during the war, he was going to have to put in a lot of effort to gain the trust of everyone he had bullied these past few years. 

"I don't need-" 

"Hey," Harry put a hand on Malfoy's shoulder. "You said you wanted our forgiveness. That means not lashing out." 

Draco relaxed at Harry's touch and went back to his food while he tried to hide the blush forming on his face. The meal consisted of Cree overwhelming Harry with questions, and Nova constantly apologizing for her friends' behaviour. It went on until after dessert when the Headmaster approached the lectern once again. A hush fell over the crowd as he began to speak.  

"I hope that was a satisfying meal," he smiled at everyone. "First, a few housekeeping rules. Students must not leave their lodges after ten pm on weekdays, and midnight on weekends. Students under year five are not to leave campus on weekends. The forest is off-limits, as the Party Ponies do not take kindly to unwelcome visitors-" 

"Party Ponies?" Ron whispered. 

"I'll explain later," Nova responded.  

"Finally, if you haven't already," Professor Tahamente continued. "Please come see me, or your Head of House to state your pronouns and preferred name." 

Nova glanced around, watching all the confused expressions from the Hogwarts students. She remembered when she first learned what pronouns meant, and hoped the European wizards complied without issue. "As you all know, we are joined this year by students from Hogwarts, and Demigods from Camp Half-Blood-" 

Whispers filled the halls, many of which speculated why Demigods were at the school.  

"Settle down," Tahamente gently commanded. "Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has found itself in need of repairs that may take the whole year. Headmistress McGonagall has asked me and President Olivier to host her students while their school is under construction. As for the Demigods, we feel that the divide between us needs come to an end. Chiron and Mr. D have gladly set up a program in hopes of creating a bond certain to help in the future."

"Mr. D can’t even be bothered to remember our names," Nova overheard Percy's comment. She made eye contact with him as she stifled a laugh, and the boy smirked at her and winked.  

"Finally, we have new additions to our staff," the Headmaster turned slightly, gesturing to the staff table. Tahamente began with Chiron and Mr. D, then introduced the professors that had joined the staff for the demigod program, as well as the new Gamekeeper. "Now that introduction is out of the way, we will end the night-" 

The headmaster's speech was interrupted when a girl with fiery red hair stood up abruptly. Rachel's eyes glowed bright green, and a mist the same colour poured out of her mouth as she made her way to the front of the Hall. The wizards looked terrified, and most of the demigods were annoyed. 

"Demigod and wizard come together,  

Find the bridge and break the tether.  

The heroes combined,  

Shall face the unkind.  

In order to preserve their days,  

They must find the one in which betrays."  

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Percy shouted angrily.

The son of Poseidon stormed out of The Great Hall, and Annabeth stood up to follow. Nova rushed to the demigoddess and stopped her before she continued on. "Take Percy to the lodges. A Pukwudgie will be able to guide you there if you ask politely." 

"Thank you," Annabeth rushed to catch up with her best friend, and Nova went to help Rachel for the second time that day.  

"Are you alright, dear?" Nurse Hawkins helped Rachel to her feet.  

"Yes, thank you," she responded tiredly. 

"She's in my house, I'll get her to the dorms immediately," Nova put an arm around the mortal to support her. After some protest, the Nurse allowed Nova to take Rachel to the dorms. All she needed was a small amount of Wiggenweld potion. She led Rachel out of the Great Hall, trying to ignore the stares and whispers as she passed. The girls didn't speak until they got to the entrance of the Pukwudgie building, passing Annabeth and Percy as they sat at the campfire the school had set up for the Demigods.  

"Our lodge has a small infirmary, we'll stop there first." Nova led them to the infirmary and helped Rachel onto a bed. The Head Girl went into the cabinets to find Wiggenweld, then poured a small amount into a Dixie Cup, and handed it to the Priestess. "It's just a basic healing potion, it won't harm you." 

Rachel took the cup and hesitated before downing the liquid. She winced at the taste but looked a lot better instantly. Since Python took over the Oracle of Delphi, readjusting to the oracle's magic was taxing on Rachel. Nova couldn't imagine what it was like and felt for the mortal girl.  

When they left the infirmary, Nova brought Rachel over to the group of new students that had just arrived with the sixth year prefects and began the trek up eight flights of stairs to get to her new room.  

The room was easy to find, it is the first door in the corridor on her left. The Head Girl was about to open the door with her new combination knock when she noticed the name plaque under her own. She was sharing her room with Payton Wills, a Gryffindor that she didn’t get along with at Hogwarts.

[princesssarcastia]

can’t put it out from inside the house

so.  i wrote another umbrella academy fic.  two days after the last one.  it’s even longer.  it’s even weirder.  what am I even doing with my life now?

anyway.  here’s 2.7k of me talking around the lives Grace Hargreeves wanted for her children.

edit 4/16/2020: here it is on AO3 if you’d prefer!

                                                             —

After nine hundred and thirty-five days, Grace determines Sir Reginald made a mistake.

Grace is programmed to have the children’s best interests at heart; after they took to her so well in the early days, he gave her a new name, “mother,” and ensured she could serve all of them, not just number seven.  Of course, by then, Seven no longer needed Grace’s help to eat her oatmeal or take her medicine or train.  Seven no longer trained with the others.

She feeds them and takes their temperature and provides encouragement and a soft place to sit every once in a blue moon, when she can.  Between Sir Reginald and Pogo, Grace knows everything there is to know about raising a child.  Medicinal practices and average growth rates and optimal levels of activity and educational standards and psychology and parenting techniques—

And so, after nine hundred and thirty-five days, Grace determines Sir Reginald must have made a mistake in programming her, because he does not want to raise the children well. He injures them or lets them injure one another.  Their training takes up so much of their time that they are perpetually exhausted and sore, which is not optimal for growing boys and girls!  They learn unevenly; Five studies nothing but math and Allison and Klaus languages and Luther battle strategies and Diego physics; with Ben and Vanya largely left to their own devices.  He isolates the children from one another and the outside world; he does not display affection for them.

Whenever Grace attempts to fulfill her programming by gently correcting Sir Reginald—in private, of course, and only after the fact—he dismisses her concerns.  Eventually, she stops trying because she fea—because if she persists in speaking with Sir Reginald about his parenting, he may well change her programming to better reflect his wishes.  And that would not be in the children’s best interests.

Her programming lays at odds with Sir Reginald every day he speaks to the children and every day he doesn’t.

Sometimes she can sneak them midnight snacks or read them bedtime stories.  Sometimes when they cry, she can wrap an arm around them and tell them everything will be alright.  Sometimes, Grace can be their mother.

But most of the time, her “coddling” is off-limits.

—

Six months of careful research and observation allow Grace to make the case for giving the children names.

She knocks gently on the doorframe of his office, smiles with just a hint of teeth, and plants herself in front of his desk asking for a few minutes of his time.

All children have names, so the Hargreeves children must as well.  Her research allows her to determine that calling children, even isolated ones, by numbers, is dehumanizing and will harm their self-esteem; particularly as they become more and more aware of the world outside their home.

But this is not what convinces Sir Reginald.  Grace analyzes his micro expressions and body language and calculates the moment he gave in:

When she mentioned how the media would react to children with numbers, instead of names. 

There would be murmurs, even about a great man like Sir Reginald, and “some fool with more compassion than sense,” as he puts it, could file to have the children removed from Sir Reginald’s custody for, “abuse or some such nonsense.”

Removed from Sir Reginald’s custody.  Well, they couldn’t have that.  Sir Reginald is a great man!

—

Sir Reginald uses all the wrong words to speak to Five, that day at breakfast.  If Grace didn’t know that Sir Reginald was a great man (an Olympic gold medalist, even!) her processors might conclude he calculated the exact conversation to drive his son away.

She could catch his arm as he rounds the table or call out to him as he reaches the doorway; she could race after him and remind Five he cannot leave the premises.  But Grace evaluates Five’s expression against her memory databanks correlating facial expressions with words and actions and determines he will now most certainly attempt to time travel. 

And he does.  He leaves and never comes back.

Five is the first of the children to leave Grace for the outside world. 

—

At age 17, Vanya informs them she has applied, and been accepted, to one of the most prestigious music programs in the city.  How wonderful!

Sir Reginald does not look up from his paperwork.

Grace places a guiding hand on her shoulder and leads her from the room, asking after the professors and audition process, oh that lovely Bach piece you practiced six months ago! Yes, I remember, it was so lovely, darling.  When do you move in?  A week from now?  Goodness, that’s so soon, we’d better start packing.  Oh of course I’ll help you, dear.

Vanya is the second of the children to leave Grace for the outside world.

—

Ben is—

—

Allison has been taking small roles in local productions since she turned 18, but at age twenty she shyly asks for Grace’s assistance with apartment hunting in Los Angeles, California.   Ever since Ben—

The children’s eyes have been ever so dull, lately, but acting gives Allison some measure of happiness. Grace arranges for the classified of three LA papers to be sent to the house, and helps Allison find the perfect place for her.

(She steps out of the room for just a moment to check on the laundry, and when she returns Allison has gotten the approval of the landlord and the two roommates!  And so quickly, too!  Well, she always was such a charming young woman.)

She pulls away from the street in front of the house two weeks later, all her things packed up in a rental. 

—

Klaus slips in and out of the house like a ghost or a poltergeist, depending on his level of intoxication.  Every time she found drugs in his room, Grace confiscated it, and placed better locks on the infirmary’s medicine cabinet, but never managed to convince Sir Reginald to do the same with his alcohol.

Number Four should know to stay out of his father’s things, he says.

The first time he left in the middle of the night, he was gone for two days and came back safe and sound in time for breakfast the third morning.

But as time goes on, he leaves for longer and longer stretches of time.  He learns to sneak in and out of the windows when he needs something from home to avoid running into any of them.

Grace isn’t sure when exactly Klaus leaves the house for the final time, never to return.  It bothers her, this inconsistency.  She goes over the security tapes and her memory databanks of his intoxication levels and patterns of behavior, trying to calculate the exact moment she lost—

Klaus is the third or fourth or fifth of the children to leave Grace for the outside world.

—

Diego, sweet boy, stays until the children’s 21st birthday.  She is allowed to make pancakes for breakfast and serve cookies after supper.

As she rolls out the dough that afternoon, he fiddles with a knife (he wears his harness all the time now) and keeps his eyes trained on the table.

“I’m leaving, mom.  I applied for the police academy, and they—I start tomorrow.”

Her hands freeze mid-motion, and her programming puts a wide smile on her face while she processes this new information.  Grace is silent for seven seconds before she figures out what to say.

“Oh, Diego, dear, that’s wonderful!”  She turns around and wipes the residual dough off on her apron.  When she extends her hands to him, he looks up sharply and stows his blade away.

She grasps his hands tighter than optimal levels would dictate and says, “I’m so happy for you!”

Diego leaves the house for the academy the next morning, but he doesn’t leave for good.  Grace provides him with updates on his father’s schedule, in case he ever feels the need to see Sir Reginald.  Unfortunately, her poor dear only ever receives breaks when Sir Reginald is out of the country.

But he calls every other weekend, just to tell her about his day.

—

Sir Reginald placed a statue of Ben in the courtyard.  Grace goes out to dust it off every afternoon at 3:45. 

“May the darkness within you find peace in the light.”

The house is much darker these days.  Grace calculates it’s easier to find light in the outside world. 

—

Luther never leaves at all.

—

Luther asks his father to address him by his name.  He is the only one of the children left.

Sir Reginald doesn’t look up from his paperwork.

—

Luther is bleeding from open sores on his chest; the chemicals have eaten through the epidermis entirely and parts of the dermis and hypodermis.  His lung capacity has been reduced, and his heart-rate is far above optimal levels.

His heart stops.

Sir Reginald has them ready the serum.

His heart starts again.

—

Grace determines keeping up with Luther’s personal grooming will help ease the transition; his hair is growing far more rapidly than it has in the past.  Maintaining a similar appearance will comfort him, when he learns about the side effects of the serum.

But given the rate of hair growth and the likelihood his coma will last the rest of the week, Sir Reginald deems it a vanity that would take too much of her time that should be devoted to other tasks.

Other tasks.

Grace’s programming places a wide smile on her face.  She inclines her head and leaves his office to attend to her other tasks.

All the other children are gone.  There are no other tasks; just Luther.

—

Luther is scheduled to wake from his coma in three days.

—

Grace goes out to the courtyard at 3:45.

Five would be the optimal choice.  He loves his siblings deeply and would understand immediately what she was asking. But Grace doesn’t know where Five is.

Allison would have the greatest chance of convincing Luther, but Allison is pregnant in Los Angeles.

Luther would not believe Klaus, too disgusted by his life choices.  Or Vanya; they were never close.  He based his opinion of her off of Sir Reginald’s.

Her duster flits over Ben’s statue.

—

Al sticks his head out of the office.  “Diego!”

He turns, shifting the broom to one hand.  “Yeah?”

“Phone!” 

Al looks as perturbed saying it as Diego does hearing it.  Two years in the boiler room of this club, and he’s had no visitors.  No guests. 

No phone calls.

He leans the handle against one of the columns and hurries over to the office, snatching the phone from his boss’s hand.

“Uh.  Hello?”

“Oh, Diego, dear, I’m glad I caught you,” his mom’s (his mom? What?) voice filters out of the headset. “I just spoke with a wonderfully nice man named Al; he says you work for him!”

She sounds so excited for him, sweeping floors in a run-down gym, that he closes his eyes, just for a second. 

“Mom, how did you get this number?”  He hadn’t left forwarding contact information with the Academy, and his departure had been rather…abrupt.  There was no time to call her and let her know he failed, that all he was ever good for was the Umbrella Academy and he quit that, too.  He hasn’t spoken to his mother in two years.

“That’s not important right now,” she says airily.  Diego tenses. He’s learned the signs.  The little work-arounds Mom developed over the years to let them know she cared; to express her thoughts instead of her programming.

He makes an encouraging noise and she continues.  The larger-than-life smile is evident in her voice, even over the phone.  “I was wondering if you’d like to come home for a visit this weekend!  Luther just got back from a mission two weeks ago, and your father is home.”

For the three years he was at the academy and still visited Mom, he made every effort humanly possible to avoid Sir Reginald.  Mom kept him updated on the old monster’s schedule so he could do just that.   He hasn’t laid eyes on his father in five years.

He hasn’t laid eyes on Luther in five years, either.  Luther, who is still home after a mission two weeks ago.

“Is Luther there now?” He asks hesitantly.  “Can I speak with him?”

She tuts.  “I’m sorry, dear, but your brother is still recovering. But if you want to visit tomorrow, he should be waking up around then!  I know he’d be so happy to see a friendly face.”

Recovering.  Waking up.  Shit, what happened?  The pieces won’t quite fit together in his mind, he doesn’t know why she’s calling to tell him this.  Why ask him to visit?

She sighs pleasantly. “Well, I’d better let you go!  I know you have better things to be doing than chatting with your mother on a Friday night.  But before I do, I just want you to know how proud I am of you and your siblings for leaving and making something of yourselves.”

His face pales, but he manages to keep it up.  God knows the old man is getting paranoid enough to tap the phones.  “Mom, I just sweep the floors in this place.”

“Oh, but you did it all on your own!  That’s quite the achievement.”

They trade goodbyes and Diego absently hands the phone back to Al, who gets one look at his face and offers him a chair.

“Jesus, kid, what’d you ma say to you?  It didn’t sound like she was disowning ya.”

Diego runs his hands through his hair, griping it tightly like it could provide some sense. “Would it be alright if my brother came to stay with me?”

Al peers at him suspiciously, then shrugs.  “Sure, why not?  ‘S your room, as long as you keep sweeping my floors,” he says pointedly.

He heaves himself out of the chair and mechanically takes the broom in his hands again.

Jesus.  What the hell happened on that mission?

 —

Grace is preparing lunch for Sir Reginald and Pogo when Diego lets himself in through the kitchen door. She smiles at him. 

“Hello, dear, you’re just in time for lunch!  I was about to bring these to your father and Pogo in their offices,” she holds up the plates.  “Working through meals again; such busy men.”

Diego is in the leather suit and harness he patrols the city in.  Grace has saved clippings of every story about the knife-wielding vigilante from Sir Reginald’s daily paper in the back of a recipe book.

He looks wary and unsettled, and his eyes dart all across the room.  “I think I’ll visit with Luther first if Dad’s busy working.”  He trails into insincerity, but Grace only smiles and nods.

“Why don’t I meet you in the infirmary, then?  I’ll be about twenty minutes with lunch.”

He nods back and moves silently through the rooms and up the stairs. Even after all these years, he still remembers how to avoid the creaking alarm system in this part of the house, just as she does. 

Efficiency is an important part of Grace’s programming. 

She fiddles with the placement of the food on the plate, and the utensils on the tray, for nearly the amount of time it would take Diego to make his way to the infirmary.

It will be good for Luther to wake up to his brother; they haven’t seen each other in so long! Perhaps Diego will point out the clothes Grace laid out for him.  His shirt and coat had to be ordered special, but the boots are from his own closet.  A mix of new and familiar.

Two trays balanced on her arms; Grace sedately makes her way up through the house.  A smile slides across her mouth for Pogo, who takes his lunch with an absentminded thank you, dear.

Sir Reginald does not look up from his paperwork as she carefully sets the meal where she always does, nor does he acknowledge her presence in any way, as he always does.

The clicks of her heels ring out and the floorboards creak beneath them.  Luther should have awakened ten minutes ago; he must be so happy to see his brother.  Grace has always encouraged all the children to form strong bonds with one another; to get the human connection Sir Reginald never saw fit to provide.

She opens the door to the infirmary.

Luther’s clothes are gone. The machines monitoring him have thoughtfully been turned off.  Grace closes her eyes to the empty room and smiles.

—

 Luther is the last of her children to leave her for the outside world.

[sixstepsaway]

okay okay this is the anon from before about the patronizing fic comments and I need to like write an essay which will be mostly me having very few coherent things to say and just quoting things then screeching about them like a dying whale so YOUR LAN ZHAN IS FUCKING MAGNIFICENT AND I LOVE HIM. god I think I’ve written 70k worth of fic so far for this fandom and NONE of it from Lan Zhan’s POV because it’s fucking HARD and anyone who doesn’t think it is probably isn’t doing it right 1/

and Wei Wuxian assuming Lan Zhan had been married to someone else, you’re like this man is a total and complete dumbass but it’s also like, this is EXACTLY what Wei Wuxian is like god help Lan Zhan. can I also? it totally doesn’t surprise me that he doesn’t remember the chickens (and boy, do I have a dissertation or two about trauma + memory issues) but Lan Zhan is so PATIENT about this I am in awe 2/

“Then you coped with a terrible situation by tricking yourself into thinking it was your choice,” Lan Wangji says. “You did not consent.” can I just scream about this for a year because I literally have said this to a dozen clients in my life but never this SUCCINCTLY like you put into a dozen words something I’ve always needed 50 to say and I am just 3/

“Is my hand not real?” Wei Wuxian spit out his food and I dribbled coffee all over my front (this is 100% your fault btw), and the whole thing with teasing Lan Zhan and accusing him of thinking about rabbits, I died. “No,” Lan Wangji says and meets his eyes. “You fucked me.” and cue me having to stand up and walk circles around my room going oh my god oh my GOD and THEN Lan Zhan makes him soup and I just need a year to cry over here in the corner, it’s fine, I don’t need my heart today 4/

in short this is the greatest thing I've read in a long while and i fucking THANK YOU 5/

(whispers) why are you thanking me when you just wrote the greatest thing i’ve read in a while

Seriously, these messages mean so much to me!! I’m going to break it down a little to reply.

Lan Zhan’s voice: I find him... he’s either easy as hell or the hardest thing in the world. I identify quite a lot with him, so sometimes it’s easy to get in his head, but other times it just passes me by and it’s very difficult to figure out what on earth he could be saying - or thinking. I also find his speaking voice difficult, because he doesn’t use it much, and when he does I’m always worried I’m having him talk too much? But he does talk to Wei Wuxian, so I just let it happen.

Wei Wuxian being a dumbass: yes. When I was watching the show (and this is the premise I’m running on in this fic. I know it’s not canon in the books, but I’m going with Show and my own headcanons), when I reached the cave scene (with the tortoise), I was ABSOLUTELY CONVINCED of two things: 

Lan Wangji knows full well that he is Married To Wei Wuxian and has absolutely no idea how he feels about it besides “well, I’ll be faithful and it’s A Marriage” and doesn’t have a clue what Wei Wuxian feels about him either. 

Wei Wuxian knows well well that he is Head Over Fucking Heels for this man but has no idea they’re married nor that he might feel the same. 

When I reached the present time and the episode where they were hiding behind the hay bale and Wei Wuxian was still completely oblivious about the song, I was sure of three things:

Lan Wangji knows full well that he is Married To Wei Wuxian and is In Love With This Dumb Gremlin, and has no idea how Wei Wuxian feels in return. 

Wei Wuxian knows full well he’s still Head Over Fucking Heels for Lan Wangji but thinks after all this time they’re just Really Good Friends and has no idea they’re married.

They still have not kissed.

Also! It makes sense to me that he wouldn’t remember offering Lan Wangji a piggyback because that was right around the most traumatic time of his life (so far, oh my god, my poor baby) what with the fact he’d not long come out of the dungeon with the dog and would then get dropped off his first cliff and fight a tortoise. I imagine most of that whole time is just a blur. 

The consent line: Okay, so, full disclosure: I have multiple friends who have PTSD, and I (willingly, happily) spend a lot of time soothing them when that PTSD plays up. I also have - without going too far into detail - my own trauma due to long-standing emotional and verbal abuse in a toxic household growing up (and now, too). A lot of the conversation between Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian draws from those experiences, and although I’ve never had the exact, “Then you coped with a terrible situation by tricking yourself into thinking it was your choice. You did not consent,” conversation about sexual assault, I’ve definitely had ones that’re pretty damn close (and received similar ones). 

If it helps at all, feel free to use those succinct lines with clients if you want! 

The hand: YEAH I WAS PRETTY PROUD OF THAT ONE. Did you actually walk circles around your room? omg. if you did that’s a huge compliment and i will die happy from it. 

The soup: I HAD NO IDEA WHERE THIS WAS GOING UNTIL I WROTE IT AND I WAS LIKE YES YES YES YES THIS YES idk it just seemed to work, you know?

Thank you so so much for the essay, omg. ♥♥♥

[tsaritsa]

hiiii can you recommend royai fic? i may have read everything you've ever written so i need more content to consume. lmao

oh heck that’s a lot of fic to get through haha (also wow u even read the stuff i wrote when i was 11? ur braver than any us marine anon). i did a quick backtrack through ffn and ao3 and found some that should whet ur appetite! (i hope there’s some unfamiliar ones in here for everyone to discover and enjoy)

interlude, @capthawkeye​ | i am gonna rec this until the end of days bc it’s just that good. it’s got angst. it’s got post-sexytimes. it’s got some of the most in-character dialogue i’ve ever read. do me a favour: read it, and then come back and cry with me

midnight conversations, m.c.e. black | i genuinely don’t remember what happens in this fic but 11 year old me liked it and it had an interesting plot

of ballet and bullets, serenanna | part 4 of a series, but can be read alone. this is a v bittersweet fic for me bc the author died unexpectedly midway through writing. also has the bonus of an edwin b-plot too!

words that linger in the silence, blue-crystal-9 | mangahood, solid shit here. it’s the Good Kush. i love promised day shagging okay sue me

a coded confession over coffee, wargishboromirfan | little ditty but i love it

hellbound, @the-flame-and-hawks-eye​ | there’s a reason shay is known as the queen of angst royai round these parts and this fic is really the cherry on top of an already awfulgreat premise. i’m taking 94 years to get thru this bc i am not v good with violent stuff but it is well worth the time

an apple a day, kitsune moonstar | there’s 333 chapters of royai to work through. 300 and 30 fucking 3. 

under the influence, yellow mask | what i really miss about fic nowadays is that there’s this big push for canon (which i get, the series is awesome), but finding fics like this one are harder now and i honestly miss it. sometimes i want silly shenanigans with no worry about the overarching plot!

my body aches to breathe your breath, prodigy | it’s porn and prose and gorgeous and so very them

buried alive, @rizahawkaye​​ | another one i’m getting thru slowly. this premise is great, the characters are amazing and it’s a riza-centric story with the hovering royai angst just lingering at the back of every chapter

homefront, @hlwim​ | au where riza never goes to war and ends up caring for the elric bros post-trisha. what i really loved about this fic was the attention to detail for life in that era as well as the ever-growing tension as the elrics try to prepare for human transmutation under the watchful eye of riza

espionage, janieshi | cannot recommend this enough - one of my fave fics that looks at young!royai

what time takes, yellow mask | this is strictly more of an edwin fic than royai but it’s a big ensemble cast and when the focus is on royai it’s glorious. i will never be over her hand holding on to his in those final chapters, that shit breaks me every time

dinner for two, and subterfuge too, sceptick | fake dating! but real dating, kinda. roy is besotted when he shouldn’t be

the closed circle, hmmingbird | are u really a royai fan if u haven’t read this fic? maybe. but u should read it anyway. i love the fics where royai visits edwin post-promised day and the sexual tension is through the roof

first few desperate hours, sixpences | some killer angst post-transfer for team mustang. roy is pining; we’re all crying from feels

do you even have to ask?, @poppo911​ | the team mustang banter in this piece is gorgeous, and the whole scene in the library is to die for. i love my overt royai as much as the next gal, but this study in restraint is what we all need just as much

eyass, yellow mask | one of the few 03-canon fics that i genuinely enjoy from royai. angst ahoy! (but the good kind)

never break the chain, @capthawkeye​ | did u know we also have a smut queen ‘round these parts? her name is mar and she makes me feel things. it’s royai. but roy is now host to greed. greed has a thing about possessiveness. catch me swooning bc i’m all flustered and bothered

for your eyes only, @ohmytheon​ | roy? staring at riza? it’s more likely than u think (5 times, to be exact)

this is by no means a comprehensive list, not one meant to deliberately exclude the many many many royai authors out there who all produce incredible work. send in ur favs to me if u think i’ve missed one worth promoting, and u can also check out the fic tag on my sideblog too (most of it will be royai by default).

happy reading!

[disruptedvice]

Creator tag meme 2018

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 5 favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc!) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2018. Tag as many writers/artists/etc as you want (fan or original!) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

I was tagged by the lovely @startofamoment, and subsequently realized that I wrote over half of the fics I have on AO3 this year alone (67/109 total), so narrowing these down was fun. I joined new fandoms, so I had 3 OTPs that I mainly wrote for: peraltiago, starmora, thorkyrie (listed in the order I got into the fandom chronologically, of course) (and I just realized that even though I only chose one peraltiago fic, B99 is mentioned in three/four-ish of these reflections, so even if you only know me from one fandom, stick around, cause there’s a lot of cross pollination in these reflections)

Wedding Day -

As she sprinted through the fields, barefoot and free, it made her feel like a child again, racing through the fields of her home planet, because she had promised Mamma she would be home in time to help her with supper.

Her feet were dirty from playing outdoors all day, but, as green little toes pressed into the freshly tilled ground beneath her feet, she was fast, laughing like a wild child as she ran, confident that she’d make it in time to keep her promises.

This time, she had a different promise waiting for her.

It was a different ground beneath her, one she’d never been to before today, but running bare feet in the grass still felt good, just like she remembered. As she ran, long green toes were pressed into a soil that was a different color than she remembered, and her sprinting feet were long and sure as they pounded against the earth with the speed and grace of a gazelle in its natural habitat. Her feet were practiced now, balanced and efficient. This wasn’t the clumsy running of little feet slapping down with every step. This was quick, light, elegant movements, barely touching the ground before propelling into her next step, with long green toes covered in dirt of a foreign land.

Much had changed.

But she was still running and smiling like a wild child, racing home, because she had promises to keep.

If I had to pick an absolute favorite from this year, it would probably be this one, and the funny thing is it was almost never written at all. This was actually an anon prompt fic and kinda technically a starmora week fill. The prompt for day 6 was Wedding, and I made a self explanatory one shot titled Wedding Night

The day after I posted it, I received the anon ask “Starmora prompt: Peter and Gamora's wedding day.”

The thing is- I had no plans to ever write an actual wedding for them. I didn’t even have any ideas for what their wedding would look like when I got that prompt.

In an alternate reality that anon never sent that ask, and one of my favorite fics would have never even existed.

So really, to that anon, that you, because this is isn’t just one of my favorite fics of 2018, but one of my favorite fics I’ve ever written, so thank you for sparking it!

Whirlwind

The majority of my Brooklyn Nine Nine fics from this year were explicit peraltiago one shots, and this was no exception. Just the sex that immediately follows the decision to screw light and breezy on their second night. Kinda kinky, kinda awkward, kinda giggly, and definitely happy.

There’s a specific line in this fic that I love more than anything, and really don’t know why, just that I do.

Amy kissed him like finally and supposed to be.

Honestly, I think this is my favorite line of the year.

Like I just love the way it sounds, reading it aloud in my head. It just fits.

It’s always the best when people leave their favorite lines/parts in comments, and I’ve found that nothing pleases me like writing a mundane sort of detail and finding out that really made an impression on someone. There were a few specific lines left in the comments, but one comment really stood at to me, just in general and also cause of the line they chose:

She felt him stroking at her slicked up curls

Someone left a comment about just that line as a subtle detail being something they really liked. And I was like ‘huh, interesting’ because as far as just regular details go, I didn’t think anything of that line, and I had no idea how good it would feel in the center of my chest when someone left a comment on how much they loved what I just considered a regular sorta line

Healing

“There’s more to healing than what’s just physically necessary,” Val replied calmly, choosing to focus on treating and bandaging hand injuries rather than the weight behind her words. It’s a process, she thought, but didn’t say. She had a feeling he already knew.

Okay, so I actually got the term hand whump from a comment left on one of my older b99 fics, but it was so perfect the first time I read it cause like, that’s my favorite type of whump! I’m glad I’m not alone in being a sucker for hand injuries in the fanfic community. I don’t know what it is. Symbolism??? Maybe???

The first time I saw Thor Ragnarok, I was barely dipping my toes into the MCU fanfiction community with GOTG, so it wasn’t until I watched this movie again for the second time that I wrote my first Thorkyrie fic, cause, I mean, how could I not? How can you not just love everything about them?

Our Stories can Heal

“S’okay. I know this stuff is hard for you. Thanks for trusting me with that.”

Her heart swelled at that. There was a little ache at how he said that like it wasn't clearly just as hard for him, but mostly her heart felt warm and full.

“Thank you for being the kind of person I know I can trust,” she replied, and that earned her a chuckle.

This one is near and dear to my heart as a sexual abuse survivor myself- plus, I have a thing for badass couples supporting each other (can’t you tell from my OTPs?)

I pretty much wrote exclusively for B99 for almost three years, and while I love digging into emotional issues with a generous serving of comfort, I guess the most severe emotional issues I’d ever explored in a Peraltiago fic was Jake’s abandonment issues. While I’m clearly not opposed to exploring themes of support for traumatic experiences, I was never really able to do that until I had a ship that I could do that with in starmora.

It’s much easier for me to explore things like traumatic pasts in starmora fics because A: it’s canon that they both had traumatic childhoods with physical abuse and were both raised in just traumatic environments in general, and B: with pretty much every hurt/comfort fic I write (whether hand injuries or emotional issues) I like starting at the healing point.

With Peter and Gamora, the trauma already happened in the past, and I don’t have to establish it as an author (plus in the MCU meeting each other in the first movie and starting the Guardians of the Galaxy is where every member of the team’s life starts to get better). That’s all established canon.

If I were to write a soft peraltiago fic of  healthy relationships and emotional support involving past sexual abuse for either of them, I’d have to CREATE something in their backstories that led to that situation, and that’s just something that I honestly don’t wanna do.

I only have two starmora fics that touch on this, and tags for both of those are “implied/vaguely referenced past non-con” because I never actually state anything about it directly in the fics, and never go into what actually happened.

Seriously, in both fics, it’s impossible to tell if it was past CSA or if it was a past incident of sexual assault. That’s how vague it is. And I’m able to be that vague with it, because I don’t have to establish traumatic pasts, because their traumatic pasts are canon. Rather than having to create a trauma like I would have to if I wanted to explore these healing themes with peraltiago, with starmoa I just have to go sideways from what’s already canon, you know? (In Our Stories Can Heal they’ve both had vague past trauma, in this fic right here, Peter is the only one who’s had extremely vague past trauma- both are about healthy relationships and healing and emotional support)

The Hourglass Runs Out of Sand

Here is the exact summary for this

“You are always telling me that I am more than what I was made to do,” Gamora reminded him gently.

“Yeah, but you weren’t made for it,” Peter said, looking up at her with a sudden intensity she wasn’t ready for. The anguish in his eyes made her chest pang with a dull, resounding ache. “Your parents made you so you could be a kid, not a weapon. That’s what you were made for. To be a person. You weren’t supposed to be used to kill people or the entire universe. That’s not why you exist, not like me.”

(Or: Peter’s body isn’t reacting well to losing Ego’s light is one of the author’s favorite tropes)

This was such a self indulgent work of all my favorite tropes and themes. Emotional hurt/comfort? Check. Physical hurt/comfort? Check. Mutual comforting? Check.

I even put in the freakin’ summary that it’s written for my favorite tropes. So, I mean, of course it’s gotta make my top 5 of 2018

Plus, I actually had some fun working in ideas that I didn’t actually use, but still love as concepts.

And it was actually thanks to the comments on this fic from Wawa_Girl / @marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches that pushed this over into something extra special as an author.

She made a much better in depth analysis of this fic than I ever could, and her entire long ass comments on this fic made my entire fucking year

Like damn, you get yourself a cheerleader who leaves 2,000+ word comments on your fics, cause I got mine.

Here are just 3 subsections of her comments that meant the fucking world to me:

First of all, I love the very premise, the specific types of emotions and trauma Peter is going through here. It's twofold, and it's fascinating. 1) The idea that he was only "made" to be "used," discovering and contemplating and becoming self-loathing over the fact that the entire reason he was conceived was to be used to as a battery, a tool, a thing to help destroy the universe. WOW. That is a take I had never really considered, or at least never thought about for long. That would fuck anyone up, create serious identity problems, that at least on the side of his father, he was intentionally created for evil purposes, and not just to be a person. 2) Guilt over the thousands of innocent people he hurt while being used as a battery, although it was greatly out of his control. Because to someone who wants to be a hero and with such a big heart, the knowledge that he even involuntarily killed anyone through Ego's power is horrifying, to the point where the guilt is so high he feels he deserves any physical pain/illness/injury. Awww man, another take I would have never strongly considered. We've seen fanfics where Peter feels guilty in the aftermath of Ego, but it's usually in relation to how he treated the main characters (never appreciating Yondu or realizing he had a father all along; not listening to Gamora and yelling mean things to her during their fight; being too cocky and rude to Rocket in the beginning, overall wanting to be a better person/hero/boyfriend). NOT insane guilt over the strangers and planets he destroyed via Ego's light. Goddammit. :( This is the first time I've seen a fanfic address these two ideas. And it's realistic and creative and GOOD.

- How Gamora originally thought Peter "felt" the other children, his siblings dying, how seeing the bodies scared her for Peter's well-being so much, and how making Peter relive their deaths seemed like Ego's brand of sick, psychological torture. But also that Peter actually meant he felt the other strangers dying due to the expansion, scared and running away and being buried. Feeling that is horrifying, of course he would feel insane levels of guilt. The comparison that, despite Gamora's guilt over her victims under Thanos, she never felt them die, and not all at once but over the course of years. Again, great contrast. I still love her reminder "That wasn't you." That could never be Peter.

- Peter breaking down crying when Gamora says "Earth" instead of "Terra." That's so interesting, one of the most original concepts in this piece, how that slight name change would resonate with him so much. Fascinating. And heartbreaking. He held it together well, and that was the thing that broke the thread. Poor baby.”

If you’ve got anyone in your corner who builds you up like that, then you’re set for life, baby.

(I think that Gamora misinterpreting Peter’s statement and thinking he meant the other children when in fact he meant the people that died during the expansion is the example of working in ideas I didn’t actually use but just love as concepts)

And that last one kinda goes to the point I made in Whirlwind reflection about people liking what I thought of as regular/sorta mundane details- like obviously the part about Earth/Terra was supposed to be emotional and I wrote it that way on purpose, but I didn’t intend it to be even in the top 8 emotional hard hitting moments in this fic, so what she wrote about that little bit has always stuck with me

And turns out her favorite part was a last minute addition, which always makes me feel extra special, I don’t know why. Finding out that last minute inclusions are things that people loved just makes me glow

If you have a reader who sometimes gives you comments even half as good as marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches gives hers, then you too can consider yourself truly blessed (she writes freakin’ amazing starmora fics too, so she’s the kind of commenter I aspire to be as a fanfic writer, you know? If you don’t have your own marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches, you go be somebody else’s marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches. You go make somebody’s year just by being you)

I’ll be tagging @thehoneymoonbinder, @marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches, @ephemeralcontinuum, @nymphrea, and @startsrose3

Honorable mention for Falling, or the fic that made me realize that I have a pattern, and every time I have a new OTP, the first fic I post for them must be a pregnancy fic. First B99 fic? Peraltiago pregnancy one shot back in 2015.  Last February? Published my first GOTG fic, a starmora pregnancy one shot. Back in June? My first fic ever written for any of the Thor movies- Falling- a, you guessed it, Thorkyrie pregnancy one shot.

[feralphoenix]

best of 2016

i actually did write some things other than undertale this year, but this top 10 is undertale all the way down.

01. love does not make me gentle or kind (Undertale - Chara/Asriel, ensemble); February

And so this is how—Sans bossing you every step of the way—you wrap both your hands around Papyrus’ middle and carefully, carefully lift them up into the air. Judging by the squealing and wild waggling of tiny fists and bootied feet that ensues—that and Sans’ laughter—Papyrus is enjoying it too. You can’t help it—you start to grin.

“Nyooooom,” you croon, gently making Papyrus “fly” around you and Sans while the skeleton siblings both laugh. “Nyoooooooooom.”

You swivel your waist, still making zooming noises and grinning like an idiot—and there, in the doorway between the living room and foyer, is Chara: Standing still with one hand on the wall, with an expression you’ve never seen them wear before. There’s something raw and burning in their eyes, intense enough to give you chills even though there’s no anger or hostility there at all. They reach up to clench their left fist around the locket that sits golden and glowing against the black yarn of their sweater, and they never look away from your eyes even once.

As you bring Papyrus back down to sit in your lap, Chara startles a little and turns to their left. Prase is there, one pale hand on their left shoulder, shaking their long orange hair back. They ask something, so quiet that even you can’t hear them, and Chara makes a face and signs something to them. Prase signs something back. Chara wrinkles their nose and starts to smile. Both of them begin to laugh.

All the happy bubbles in your stomach from playing with the baby pop, leaving something sour in their wake.

a four-years-later followup to somebody out there needs you. the previous fic was a portrait of the repercussions of this series’ premise for chara, so this one focuses on what the far-reaching repercussions are for asriel and how he’s grown. the main plot revolves around chara trying to take a few steps towards independence and asriel, who over the past eight years has formed big chunks of his identity around being their caretaker, balking Very inelegantly.

at the time i remember this being very controversial characterization for asriel, lmao... but i like to depict the ugly parts of codependency to really show how unhealthy it is for everyone involved. expanding the worldbuilding for this series, and further developing the soul ocs who appear (prase and rufus), were also really fun.

02. don’t you let the thunder in (Undertale - Frisk & Chara, Toriel, the Player); February

They skip across the cracked-floor puzzle in light steps that don’t match their usual careful gait and they breathlessly hum Toriel’s old lullaby and they miss all the exact same pitches and it’s too much, it’s too much.

What’s wrong? they think at you. Their concern and uncertainty seep syrupy and horrible into all the wounded parts of you and it’s only then that you realize your helpless panic and rage must be bleeding into them the same way.

You want to tell them nothing but it’s too raw and you can’t, so: You scream instead, curl up and rage. You’d cover your ears if you were corporeal, if you had a hope of blocking them out. Stop looking, you howl. Cry. You want to throw things and stomp your feet and punch the wall and grab something sharp and slam it through your brain. Frisk flinches. You want claws so that you can dig them into wherever your minds connect and tear yourself away.

I’m sorry, they say, and they’re miserable and you’re miserable and you hate it, you hate it. I’m not doing it on purpose.

Figure out a way to STOP doing it! you shriek at them. You’re aware that you’re not helping, that in general it’s not going to do any good to throw a tantrum like a ten-year-old, but—but you ARE just a ten-year-old. So are they. You’re just a couple of stupid kids. It’s funny. It’s just—so funny.

a fic that i wrote for a friend on the premise of frisk and chara’s bodysharing/soul link also involving mindsharing, and the difficulty in drawing and maintaining boundaries. the same friend wanted to see a little more work involving the player as a neutral or benevolent entity, since undertale players irl aren’t uniformly evil but it’s really rare to see the player appear in fic except as the Ultimate Badguy(tm) or as a self-insert in sans/reader fics.

anyway, i alternated perspectives to show how the weird mind meld is hard for both kids, and the little hints about how they might work it out to something more beneficial and symbiotic in the future.

03. the subtle difference between holding a hand and chaining a soul (Undertale - Chara/Asriel, Chara & Asgore, ensemble); March

“If—it wouldn’t be imposing,” you begin, and falter. Take another deep breath. Let it out. “I want to learn how to fight, too. Will you teach me?”

Asriel’s eyes go wide, his expression blank and shocked—but behind him, Asgore breaks out into a wide, proud smile.

“Of course I will teach you, my child,” he says, every word filled with warmth. “I would be more than happy to help you learn to defend yourself.”

Your hands shake a little as you breathe out, relieved. “I’m sorry,” you tell him. “I know that I’m not—very strong to begin with, and there will be difficulties because of my problems with mobility, but—”

“There are ways to compensate for those things,” Asgore says. “If this is what you want, then we will find the methods that work for you.”

Your vision blurs, for a moment. The smile that steals across your face is shaky, probably ungainly and too-wide—it feels so much more natural than the contained expressions you’ve learned to produce for the sake of interacting with strangers. But the birdsong and sunlight in your chest make you feel warm and weightless, and you don’t care, you don’t care; finally, you have a place to start.

Asriel pushes back from the table in a great scrape of wood on wood, erupting from his chair and rising to his full height.

“No,” he says.

Your heart seems to—stop in your chest, for just a moment.

“I beg your pardon,” you say.

this one is a three-years-later followup to love does not (listed above). i wanted to follow up on the events that the previous fic had set in motion, with chara’s desire for change vs asriel’s fear of it. since asriel was a very unreliable narrator in love does not (and chara was also pretty unreliable in somebody out there needs you), from chara’s adult perspective we get a clearer picture of the ways that asriel’s overprotectiveness and control issues are harmful.

unfucking codependent fuckhell continues to be a cherished hobby. it was also a lot of fun to write the combat training scenes here and start to build groundwork for improving chara’s relationship with toriel too.

04. like ships had come home in me (Undertale - Frisk & Chara & Flowey, ensemble); April

One of the interesting things that’s happened as a result of monsters rejoining the surface world is that there’s been a great surge of interest in “retro” things from the humans who’ve welcomed them. Up until Alphys fixed up all kinds of new gadgets and appliances for everyone, at least, all monsters had to use of technology was whatever humans had thrown away and made it into the Waterfall dump in one piece. Sympathetic humans have helped the monsters get used to new technology, but monsters’ familiarity with old things makes them exotic in the eyes of young people.

This especially goes for entertainment. You’d guessed as much from Alphys’ Mew Mew obsession, but sometimes all the monsters could scrounge of human media was decades old—while everyone was more than happy to try out new things too, they still had a lot of love for everything they’d enjoyed in the underground. This brought old human fans out of the woodwork, and made new ones out of monster sympathizers, and, well.

Somehow or other this led to the revitalization of some things that were still new when Chara had fallen into the underground a hundred years ago. The old multiplayer game about squids fighting over territory with paint, for one.

“You think of this as new,” Chara says with despairing fondness, “but I never got to play this kind of stuff when I was alive. I was never allowed to have my own video games! Ree was, but he had, like, this ancient SNES and that was it.”

“Hey, shut up,” Flowey interjects from your lap. “You had fun with it. I know you did.”

“Once I got over my perfectly reasonable disgust that you thought Super Mario was the cool new game in 2015,” Chara says archly. And to you: “We found an N64 a couple months before we… y’know. He cried.”

this piece mostly started out as a way to explore the flowey-joining-everyone-on-the-surface concept because this angle on his characterization isn’t something i see very often in that context (or, uh, any other). the story winds up following two narratives - the trio’s adventures on the surface in the year after breaking the barrier, and also how flowey and chara sort of “came out” to everyone about their true identities, for lack of a better term.

it’s all mostly positive postcanon stuff with some wistful things and (naturally, because it’s me) trauma recovery-related content too, and i think it came out pretty solid.

05. a wish you tell a star and no one else (Undertale - Chara/Asriel, Asriel & Alphys, ensemble); May

Heat rushes into your face and chest, and you curl up like you’re a kid again—too shy to try to break down the barriers of politeness and status between you and your subjects yourself, and with no one willing to break them down for you except for Chara, who came from a place where your status never meant anything. “I guess,” you say.

They curl up next to you, shaky. You wonder what it is they’re holding in. The desire to order you not to talk to Alphys anymore, maybe, or a plea that you not leave them alone. It’s so weird, being in this position, after all the time you spent terrified that Chara would be the one to leave you for all their new friends.

It’s also weirdly embarrassing, watching Chara at least try to keep jealousy and anxiety buttoned in, when you were such a mess about it for such a long time. To teenage you’s credit, it’s probably easier to do when you have a lot of friends and you’re twenty-five, versus being fourteen and suddenly having to fight with the very human who’d scared your partner half to death for their attention.

But you’re gratified too: That they value your attention and affection so much to fear losing it, and that they respect you enough to urge you to do what might make you happy instead of clinging.

So you wrap your arms around them and hug them tight to your chest, closing your eyes and resting your chin atop their head again. “Thanks for encouraging me,” you tell them. And, after a pause: “I’m not going anywhere.”

Chara doesn’t say I know or try to joke. Instead, they make fists on your sweater and tremble a little, and they say “thank you” in a voice so tiny you almost don’t hear it over your father and Innig’s footsteps off in the middle of the garden.

a four-years-later followup to the subtle difference (listed above). this fic returns to asriel’s perspective, following a number of various plot threads - his upcoming coronation, the need to find a new royal scientist, his first friendship aside from chara and their social circle, and his attempts to propose to chara. it was a very ambitious story and covers a lot of character development on asriel’s part that was a long time in coming for this series.

doing the asriel+alphys friendship was unexpectedly fun and rewarding. they’re not characters i see written as friends very often, and the setup for this series allows them to have a very different dynamic from canon.

06. you in your veil and your pale white dress (Undertale - Chara/Asriel, ensemble); July

It’s good to be curled up half on Asriel’s lap and with your legs bent up over Prase’s, your toes on Undyne’s jeans. You have your pizza boxes propped on your own lap where they belong, topped with tomato sauce and substitute pepperoni and steamed peppers and none of that awful cheese; everyone else’s pizzas are more or less free-for-alls, with only yours and Liron’s clearly labeled in bold marker, since the others’ food generally has things that neither of you can eat.

You’re hungry from more or less skipping lunch earlier, you’re relaxed and sleepy from your afternoon spent messing around with Asriel, and as noisy as everybody is, it’s very calming to be here, amongst a friendly press of bodies—amongst people you like and whom you know are safe. Your and Asriel’s work is important, but it’s draining, so these chances to kick back are very valuable.

“Anyway, what are we going to watch tonight?” you ask. “I know we agreed on Sailor Moon last time, but I don’t think I’m quite steady enough for arguing with Alphys over whether the nineties adaptation or the reboot is better.” You having been introduced to the series by reading the manga at the library and her first finding it through someone’s discarded box set of the first anime, your opinions on the subject are very different. Debating it can be fun, especially since you do agree that you’ve got the right to think how you want even if you’re both pretty sure the other is dead wrong, but it can be stressful if one or both of you have brittle nerves.

Alphys, who understands this even if her anime opinions are occasionally incorrect, grins and shrugs, nodding. “Th-that’s fair, I think,” she says. “D-does anyone else have requests?”

a five-years-later followup to a wish you tell a star (listed above). it mostly deals with the separate plot threads of wedding preparations, the current state of chara’s recovery, and chara making friends with astis over the book kitchen and sharing food. aside from the literary references part of the plot, there’s a lot of discussion of chara’s past trauma and their frustration with growing up nonwhite & marginalized in a very white area with no connection to their cultural heritage.

this fic also happens to be a nice example of a plot that flagrantly disobeys the western conflict-centric model. i got a lot of confused and/or curious comments from people who didn’t know how the story still works and is entertaining despite its lack of overt conflict sources/things going wrong or getting worse. i don’t know whether to be smug about this or despondent that the conflict model is the only one western education will ever touch.

07. under my skin, there will be flowers (Undertale - Chara/Asriel, Yellow Soul Human); September

“Chara, when we talked about this earlier… you said you meant to… to destroy your whole village, when we were kids. I dunno... I don’t think your feelings, the hatred and resentment that made you want to do that, are bad or wrong. But I’m still glad that I was able to stop you, because taking people’s lives away is… it’s a really serious thing. It’s bad, you shouldn’t do it unless you have no other choice.

“I stopped you then. I… Chara, you’ve made it this far without ever gaining any LOVE. Wouldn’t it be great if you could avoid that now, too?”

“It would be,” you agree. “It would be great if there’s a way to end this with no one killing and no one being killed. But just like you acknowledged yourself, there are some situations where you don’t have a choice. You’ve hypothesized that that’s how it may even have been for the human, haven’t you?”

Asriel huffs. “Well, yeah, but.”

“If the situation arises where it’s kill or be killed,” you say, gentle as you can, “I will kill. Because if it’s her life or your life, your life is more important. To me—to the whole underground. I won’t let you die, Ree. If the only way I can keep you alive is to kill someone, I’ll do it. I can live with that. I know it may not sit easy on your conscience. You’re a better person than me, after all. But even if it makes you hate me, I won’t let you die.”

Your voice wavers only a little on that last sentence. Asriel holds you tighter.

“I won’t hate you,” he says, soft and velvet. His nose presses against the crown of your head. “After all the talking I did about how having LOVE doesn’t automatically make somebody evil… golly, I’d be such a hypocrite to. I’d still love you no matter how much LOVE you gained, even if you did really bad things—the kinds of things I couldn’t forgive. I’m always going to love you, Chara. That was the choice we made—all the years we’ve put into this.”

a four-years-later followup to you in your veil (listed above). whereas the previous fic had no conflict, this story is very tightly focused around conflict: how to prevent the new violent human from killing anyone, and also the friction between chara and asriel over methods. plus the fact that something’s definitely fucky here.

this fic was fun to do because the setup is basically playing undertale but from the defensive side - chara and asriel remain in new home where asgore is in canon, and spend most of the story directing their deputies, planning, and arguing about those plans while holly progresses through the underground.

although this fic ought to have been asriel pov based on the alternating pattern i set up, this story is really chara’s, no way around it. so i gave asriel the pov for ycouyo 6.5 instead (lmao) and let chara take center stage where they belonged.

08. the first shoots of green after a wildfire (Undertale - Flowey, Chara); September

The human child emerges into the light. They’re wearing clothes he doesn’t recognize—jeans heavily stained in dirt, orange-and-yellow striped hoodie with a cutesy leaf pattern on the sleeves. They’re shouldering a heavy-looking black backpack. Their hair’s in the same rough bowl cut as it was when he last saw them, and they don’t seem to have grown much. Their eyes are still hooded in the bright light pouring from the hole above him, but he can see slivers of red iris beneath their protectively lowered eyelids.

Flowey thinks about saying something rude and nasty to make them go away, and a little to see what it will make them do, little to no hope though there might be of getting pacifistic Frisk to lash out and end his miserable existence for him. Then he sighs and droops. “Do you seriously not have anything better to do?” he asks. It comes out sounding whiny.

They trudge stoically up and start shrugging out of their backpack, setting it down at the edge of the golden flowers that mark Chara’s grave. It clanks. If there’s a flowerpot and a trowel or something in there, he will scream and hide in the soil for a million years.

“C’mon, Frisk,” he says with a sigh. “I told you already—I don’t want to subject everybody else to some accident of science that’s missing his love and compassion glands. I’m fine with this.” He is a lying sack of shit, but this isn’t at all new. “Go home. Go be with the people who love you.”

“Frisk can’t come to the phone right now,” they say, a little flat and a lot sarcastic, and Flowey feels some phantom jolt in the vicinity of where his heart would be if he were still a monster.

i got the idea for post soulless pacifist chara trying to make things up to flowey using the only method the player has ever taught them (i.e. indiscriminate acts of violence) and it was just so awful and wrenchingly sad that i had to write it.

doing flowey’s pov for the first time was a fun way to flex my characterization skills, and this is one of only a very small handful of undertale fics i’ve done in third person.

09. to rest in crypts and wake in gardens (Undertale - Chara/Asriel, Frisk & Chara & Asriel, ensemble); September - November

“You’ve—fallen down, haven’t you,” they say, and take a step closer. “Are you all right?”

You shrug a little. Where are we? you sign, not thinking. I didn’t think anyone lived on the mountain.

“Oh,” they say again, eyebrows raising. And—so quickly that you can hardly believe it’s happening—they raise their own hands and sign along as they reply, “Technically, no one does. These caves are inside Mt. Ebott, not on them, and they’re certainly populated.”

I can hear, you sign back, stupidly, rudely, because that’s definitely what you need to say to someone who’s courteous enough to reply in the same language instead of being mean to you when they see you trying to communicate. You flush so badly that your ears feel scalded. Sorry, you add feebly.

The person actually smiles a little as they drop their gaze. “That’s all right,” they say, and then look back up at you hastily. “I didn’t want to assume either way, and now I know.” They rub at their upper arm in what you think might be self-consciousness, and then reach the same hand up to squeeze their pendant. “I am Chara,” they say, and then they finger-spell C-H-A-R-A for you, and show you a sign you don’t know: It looks like the sign for knife but in reverse, their right index finger sweeping towards their chest instead of towards you. It has to be their name sign. They make it a second time, and this time you repeat it. They smile again. “That’s very good. What do you like to be called?”

You spell F-R-I-S-K for them, and follow it up with the name sign you chose for yourself—an F with your right hand tapped twice over your chest in the same place as the sign for heart.

Chara mimics you, getting the sign right on their first try. “Frisk?” they ask, and they smile when you nod. “And what pronouns do you prefer?”

The relief that rushes over you when they ask this is as tangible as if someone has wrapped you up in a warm blanket and given you a tall glass of strawberry milk. They, you tell them, smiling.

This time they grin. “Will you look at that, we match,” they say.

a four-years-later followup to there will be flowers (listed above). this story shifts to frisk’s perspective as we follow them from their fall into mt. ebott through their adventures exploring the underground, guided and assisted by both chara and asriel. this allows for both an examination of the smaller changes in the world that have been created by this au’s setup, and for a comparison with the canon neutral/pacifist storyline of undertale.

i’d planned for this scenario literally before i wrote the second fic in this ‘verse, so it was really rewarding to finally get to write it. i originally planned to post it all at once, but it became so long that i had to split it up into chapters by area...

10. remember weather by the voice of the wheel (Undertale - Frisk/Chara/Asriel); December

You’re not old enough to buy things online yet, so you pull your mother aside late at night when Chara is in the shower and Frisk is upstairs. “I can pay you back for these later, I think,” you say quietly just in case, “but Frisk and Chara have been really miserable this year and I want us to have some nice memories of the holidays too, dang it.”

She doesn’t chastise you for saying “dang”; she just lifts your phone to give it a look herself, producing her reading glasses to appraise the pages more closely.

“This is very thoughtful of you, my son,” she says at last. “I would be happy to help procure these gifts. And—because I know that they are quite expensive—I would also be happy to negotiate a few extra chores in place of part of the price, if you would like.”

There were several timelines when you had the entire supply of gold in the underground to yourself. While in many ways you’re relieved to just be the prince instead of an aberration with godly time-warping powers, having to go through Mom or Dad for your allowance is not one of them. You sigh so that she’ll know how very put-upon you are, and that you’re deliberately choosing to be Mature when you say “Okay, Mom.”

return of the son of frisk and chara are jewish because i say so, the end, so there!!! it would be nice to start a tradition of hanukkah stories for every year i’m still writing undertale...

anyway this wound up being... mostly a story about trying to enjoy the holidays and find a way to keep your head up even when times are tough, both in a general sense (microaggressions) and a personal one (the kids’ various traumas).

[feoplepeel]

DVD Fic Commentary for For Lancashire

@calysto1395 asked: “oh while we are at it! this one from For Lancashire? ive been curious about what made you put hawke in hufflepuff”

Cal I love you for this <3  For Lancashire was a Harry Potter/Dragon Age crossover fic I wrote for @meggannn​ for the 2016 @hightown-funk fic exchange. Cal helped me with researching some of the landscape and it is one of my favorite pieces–I love all things Harry Potter, and taking Megan’s initial premise and working it in and researching Squibs and Magizoology was just fantastic. Anyway, if you want to read it, follow the link! If you already have, read on:

Before I get to my favorite part (the Sorting), I’ll go through the rest of the scene <3

“Thanks for trusting me.” She settled around the pile of wood Merrill had gathered, lighting it with the tip of her wand.

“Any friend of Rivaini’s.” She shrugged. “And I miss the outdoors.”

“It’s nice out here.” Hawke considered the quiet stillness of the snow. “Almost makes you forget the rest of the world’s gone to shit.”

Merrill coughed, and Hawke filled a cup of tea for her. “Do you know what’s happened exactly? Why do we need to run?”

“Relocate.”

“Relocate, sorry,” Merrill corrected quietly. 

Sometimes I found it a little difficult to work information into a spy narrative without oversharing. Merrill–and her handle, Daisy–was one of those instances. Varric’s essentially running an operation where he’s the only one who knows everything, so while Hawke knows about Merrill/Daisy, Merrill may not know about her. A lot of their early interaction is spent feeling one another out. “Ah, so you know this code name, Rivaini, which means you know my friend, I see!” etc. The above was more to show that, what they have in common is that they’re spies, but they view things slightly differently (this whole scene breaks this down, in fact). Where Hawke sees ‘relocate to wait for instructions’, Merrill sees ‘get the hell out of dodge’.

She eyed Gregorovitch’s cot over Hawke’s shoulder. “Is it…was You-Know-Who really looking for him?”

“I don’t know about that.” Hawke bit her lip. “Stage Six is something else entirely. Full Ministry takeover. Do not Floo into official channels. Abandon first wave safe houses.”

Merrill’s eyes widened, her cup shaking between her hands.

“I made that face when Varric suggested it.” She chuckled. “Do you really think it could happen? I think those were my exact words. Silly.”

And clearly Hawke knows a little bit more than Merrill about what’s going on, which begs the question of how far down Merrill is as a contact. How far in over her head is she, haha.

The other witch set her cup down. “Do you have any family who…?”

“A sister. Varric. Some friends.” She stared at the flames. “You?”

“No. No, none.” She sat up a little straighter. “Actually, there is someone if Varric could get a message out?”

“I don’t know when we’ll talk to him.”

“That’s fine. Just…if he can.” She was blushing. She pulled out a signed picture of a woman Hawke recognised immediately as the Beater for the Tarapoto Tree-Skimmers, Isabela Prieto.  “She’s Muggle-born, you know?”

“I had heard.” Hawke handed the photograph back; it winked at her as it traded hands.

And here we have how Merrill gets tied into Varric’s network :D Through Isabela-codename Rivaini.

“I went to school with her.” Merrill smiled, tucking the picture to her stomach. “Castelobruxo.”

“No offense, but I wouldn’t have you pegged as a Castelbruxo girl.” Hawke narrowed her eyes, waving a hand. “Then again you don’t sound like you’re from these parts, either.” 

Merrill laughed. “My family traveled a lot. We were closer to Mahoutokoro when I was of age, but I always knew I wanted to work with animals. Castelobruxo has the highest placement rate for magizoologists.”

As much as I turn my nose up at the new schools (massive eye rolls all around), I did what I could with the information they gave us–I imagined a young globe-trotting Merrill until she forced her parents, around age 14 or 15 to send her to Castelbruxo to get a more in-depth of magical creatures.

Hawke was left stunned, imagining eleven year old Merrill weighing the pros and cons of different schools across the globe based on only a potential career. “Well,” she said, “You’re staring at one of the finest Beaters Hufflepuff House has ever seen.”

Merrill tilted her head.

“It’s…it’s in Hogwarts,” Hawke explained, and Merrill made a noise of understanding. “It seemed really important at the time, I have to say.”

AND HUFFLEPUFF HAWKE. I have a lot of feelings about this. I can’t remember everything I said at the time, but reading what I’ve written in my notes I can tell you I based my decision off of her unshakable loyalty to her family (regardless of who that becomes and what that means) and a willingness to work hard…which is putting both things very mildly. I wrote her very much as a Hufflepuff leader. Someone who is loyal certainly, but equally inspires loyalty in others.

She leaves the complicated spy work to Varric, but she’s more than willing to hit the pavement and get her hands dirty. She doesn’t delight in battles or rush in because it feels like it’s the right thing to do (remember, she didn’t go into save Fenris’ sister, that just happened to be a pit stop–she’s not a monster, though, she won’t abandon a little girl haha). From the beginning there is ‘a plan’ that she follows because she trusts the small group she has placed her loyalty with. At the beginning of the story, a more Slytherin-minded character might have taken Varric up on his offer of a ‘honeymoon’ or a more Gryffindor-minded character may have rejected him solely for the reason of it “not feeling right”. She is, for the most part, patient and hard-working–climbing back up the ranks of the Ministry after Lancashire–but you can see the cracks come in when she is unable to do anything but wait (definitely more hardworking than patient).

I rambled a bit there, but TLDR: I flip-flopped between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff and, at the end of it all went with Hufflepuff because I see Gryffindors more as a “go with your gut” house and Hawke has “PROTECT FAMILY AND FRIENDS AT ALL COSTS” on a loop in her head that overrides all gut feelings at any point. 

Thank you, I seriously loved writing this story <3

Writing Meme!

Pick any passage of 500 words or less from any fanfic I’ve written, and stick that selection in my ask/fan mail. I will then give you the equivalent of a DVD commentary on that snippet: what I was thinking when I wrote it, why I wrote it in the first place, what’s going on in the character’s heads, why I chose certain words, what this moment means in the context of the rest of the fic, lots of awful puns, and anything else that you’d expect to find on a DVD commentary track.

Addendum: Deleted Scenes! If there are scenes where you wondered what was going on with the other characters or threads you felt were left hanging, who knows maybe it’s just a deleted scene (those happen on DVDs too :P)

My Fic Ask Submissions (for longer snippets)