#wips are fun easy and valid to post

[snackugaki]

chewing through my feelings about #150 and my baby girl

[snackugaki-jestsjapesjokes]

wip li si hard mode vs easy mode

[bookish-bogwitch]

2024 Fandom in Review

Look I know it's been 2025 for five days now but has it, really? In the few days before NYD I saw all your wonderful retrospective posts while feverishly finishing the last chapter of Basil Pitch's Diary and thinking "wow that looks so fun must keep writing," so here we are. Also, are the earth's rotations not a construct of capitalism? Think about it.

I'm not sure how to calculate words written, because I posted a lot of stuff that I wrote before 2024. If you include everything I *posted* in 2024, it's 4 fics, totaling 56k:

Simon Snow and the Selkies Four (3k, T, for the Carry On Picture Book, featuring gorgeous art by @ionlydrinkhotwater and @technetiumai)

Basil Pitch's Diary (WIP, 11/14, 56k, T).

The Stag Party (WIP, 1/4, 1k, T, for @facewithoutheart's birthday.)

Into Her Arms (7k, T, for @ivelovedhimthroughworse's birthday, co-written with the fabulous @cutestkilla)

The entire picture book fic was written in 2022, though, and the first seven chapters of BPD were written in 2022-2023, so if you look only at what I wrote this year, it's more like 3 fics totaling 33k.

I feel like these numbers are very low compared with most people who posted these kinds of roundups--I see you out there beating yourselves with "only" 100k--but I'm honestly feeling pretty chuffed about it. And chuffed about feeling chuffed, if that makes any sense, because historically, going easy on myself has not been a strong suit.

It would be a lie to pretend I'm any less thirsty for external validation than ever. Part of why I'm feeling content about my word count is because I've been showered in love and support, by readers in general and especially in the form of Bunbaz art by Skee, Ashton, Dalia, Monica (and Monica, and Monica). Oh, and there was also @rimeswithpurple getting him tattooed on her fuckin' body. (He now has gray fur and black ears, btw, but I don't think that version is on tumblr dot com yet.) Whenever I feel imposter syndrome creeping up I look at and/or squeeze the Bunbazzes, and feel better. Thank you all for being such a supportive, steadfast, loving community.

In other ways it's been a bumper year for fandom. I got to meet many of you at SSCONe, and otherwise visited with fandom friends in four cities and two countries. I brought Tiny Baz to Sicily to learn about his roots (and to keep me company when I got COVID and had to cross a lot off my itinerary). I also got my hands on a full-size Baz standee who is still folded up in my closet (I KNOW) but who I vow will be out and proud by this time next year.

Anyway, 2024 was pretty good for me personally even though American democracy, such as it is, is in free-fall, and no matter what 2025 brings, you'll be the best part of it.

A tardy thank you to for tagging me to @emeryhall @monbons @forabeatofadrum @rimeswithpurple @nausikaaa

@ileadacharmedlife @prettygoododds @artsyunderstudy @alexalexinii @best--dress

@j-nipper-95 @stitchyqueer @roomwithanopenfire @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @skeedelvee

@mooncello @whatevertheweather @aristocratic-otter @thewholelemon

It's so not New Years anymore so I'm not like, tagging tagging you, but if @cutestkilla @facewithoutheart @shrekgogurt @ebbpettier or @ic3que3n, or you reading this would like to toot your own 2024 horn, I beg you to toot away.

[diodellet]

*slides in*

How about 3, 16, 17 and 29 for the fic writer asks?

omg i didnt think id ramble this much (thank u for enabling me ner 🤧💕💕)

3. how you feel about your current WIP

tbh i'm not super confident about my writing any time i come out from from a long long hiatus of not posting anything. also like… i'm not super confident writing other charas aside from jamil since i don't really think ab them as much… (sorry leona-natics* whenever this drabble gets posted, but like fingers crossed the sitch will hopefully be exciting enough)

*i think it might have to do with the fact that i kinda hc leona on the grayspec++have more vv specific hc characterizations i like of him, but ig i do see his appeal (one of m'oomfs is a leona-natic and well ahu her propaganda might've been subconsciously assimilated)

but ahaha i tend to write things that i'm very personally interested in so i'll find a way to have fun with it, i'll be gucci i just get too into my head, it's a vicious cycle as a writer.

16. favorite place to write

uhhh im a very sedentary person, probably a result from the pandemic, and being a thorough homebody even after that

hmm i would say id like a nice ambient public place with coffeeeee my blood my life force Some amount of people engrossed in their own work, but like in the ph, esp in a place populated by a lot of uni students, cafes end up being hella cold (im skin and bones the cold is Evil)++noisy (which i don't see as a big bad thing esp since i like socializing with my friends...at the cost of putting off my own writing oops HAHAHA)

17. talk about your writing and editing process

oh boy. here we go. one thing to note throughout all this: my only consistent practice as a writer is inconsistency. (and ig, if i try hard enough, i can usually put out a passable 200-300 words in one sitting)

sometimes i can outline a fic and take forever chipping away at it

^^(case in point: that sebek x vampire!reader x silver fic... i joked abt waiting until book 7 would drop on EN but it has been Stuck. i wanna write bi-disaster sebek so bad though 🤧🤧)

other times my actual writing veers waaaaay into a diff plotpoint instead of what i have plotted out

^^(there're these 2 now-removed bullet points in wcidfy's outline for ch 3 that went: "do i have the balls to write a fever scene… gaguhan anhirap nito pag walang ob [tl: fuck this is hard (to write) without overblots]" and "i also keep thinking of a scene in the (scarabia) gardens…and lying about bees…weird")

and sometimes i can just shit out 1k-ish words unprompted.

^^though this last example leads to my most rough writing++editing ('ily but leave me tf alone' and 'no id rather pretend'), i only look over for immediate errors, but keep iffy-phrasings and repeated words, but sometimes i still miss incomplete sentences that i jus quickly fix after posting ahahaha.

in terms of my more "polished" writing, i edit as i write (<- i do Not recommend this style. it's very unsustainable if ur planning to do more conventional writing/publishing and it's very easy to get trapped in your writer's block)

and after finishing 80% of it, i try to get a second pair of eyes on it (thanks @jessamine-rose mwaps) because validation of works in progress feels good it also helps to have a trusted outside person look at the work with fresher eyes. also smtimes we get into bouncing ideas back nd forth that we spawn new brainrot lmao like this👇

i like to call my writing a "semi-polished first draft" partly out of self-defense and self-criticism. but really, i think i'd rather have "good enough" writing posted than "my best" because i could spend forever hoarding my wips. i think i'll always have regrets over not fleshing out certain beats/using certain phrasings and references, but i also enjoy looking back on my writing and seeing the incremental, microscopic progress. it makes the process more enjoyable than self-flagellating.

on a personal note, the writing workshop scene can be brutal. with some criticism being needlessly harsh, sure it produced some of my "best" writing but the process was Not Fun. while i get that being able to revise meaningfully is an important thing, i think the endgoal of feedback (from my short exp of betaing for friends) shud always be aimed towards uplifting the writer's aim to create/improving the writer's vision of what they wanna achieve, especially in a craft that is as solitary as writing. wait ill rb a post about making ur shitty pots, very in-line with making art in general

29. how easy is it for you to come up with titles?

very hard. i hate thinking of titles, thats why i yoink lines from songs (who cares if the vibe doesnt fit im adding layers of interpretation or sumn🥴🥴). ACTUALLY wcidfy had like 3 other possible names (it was either *rolls out list* hairtie, nonequivalent exchange, or ben franklin effect* wcidfy was the most bearable one.) *i tried to look up how to distill the psychological phenomenon of someone probably liking u more after u do a small favor for them into 2-3 words, but it had to be a WHITE MAN'S NAME 🤢🤢NAW!!!!

for few other examples:

'say what you mean' was initially titled 'oh how the tables turn'

'roommates? more like roomfoes' was first titled 'pet peeves'

'hypothermia' was first titled 'frigid' but then i thought of paradoxical undressing nd stuff and da pseudo-warmth

i've also moved a bunch of other plot beats from wcidfy's main document into a file called "part 45678 of wcidfy"

as u can see i prioritize making myself laugh wid my wip titles. i wanna put the illusion that my writing's not that serious. unless it is? idk i'm not sure how to describe my writing in terms of its vibes.

(list of fic writer asks, ahaha bug me ab my wips)

[if-confessions]

Hey :) aspiring author here… or hopefully some day. So i posted a demoless intro before i really started writing and the reception has been really nonexistent. I don’t get any asks and i’m sadly a person that needs at least a little validation for motivation. But i have been writing even though there’s not much encouragement but it’s been a slog to get through. I just wanted to ask, do you think once my demo is out i’ll be able to get more people interested or excited? Kind of like a catapult? I’ve been really annoyed at myself for posting this intro cause maybe more people would have been interested if i structured it differently. I hope this doesn’t sound conceited or anything but it’s really affecting me seeing all these other demoless intros blow up with 1000< likes and constant interaction and asks. I’m getting sad just thinking about it right now… I know i can’t force anyone to like my stuff and maybe my story is just bad i don’t know… It just feels like everyone is starting their wip at a massive advantage with an audience that’s already there and excited and i’m right at the bottom looking up. Was this how it used to be a few years ago? Did everyone start at the bottom? I’m trying to tell myself once people see my world they’ll fall in love with it just like me but seeing new intros come out left right and centre, all achieving things within days that i’ve been trying to do for many months makes me want to cry.

Hey Anon,

I don't want to give you any false hope or promise you that when you do publish your demo your blog will be catapulted into stardom. It could, but it also might not... Honestly, I really don't know what combo of action makes a popular project (see demo/no demo debate). Maybe your intro post is the issue, maybe it is not. Maybe your story is bad, or maybe it's just fine and the people who would click with it just hasn't seen it yet. I tried listing things that could affect a project becoming popular (and it's not even an exhaustive list), but even then it doesn't ensure results. There really are a lot of factors at play... and luck and timing.

I'm not even sure whether it was easier a few years ago or if everyone started at the bottom. There were less people working on/starting massive/epic IF projects, so it was easier to stand out from the crowd. But there were also less people in the community, so less readers, which might mean less interaction overall compared to now. But maybe it was the same as now, with a few project blowing up overnight and many staying at the bottoms for a while, and the difference is much striking than it used to be. Also, the IF Tumblr Scene in the early 2010s looked very different to now... But to get a clear answer on that, it would be easier to ask long-term IF creators whether they've seen stark differences. I wonder if COG creators opening Tumblr blogs had an effect on this too...

So what now?

Well, you really are not alone feeling this way (author tag).

But I don't also have a magic answer either to wash away those worries (if I did, I would probably be also in the super popular group of author). Here are some options?

Join a writer's group or an IF author one

Interact with other authors outside of those groups (asks, comments, regular conversation...)

Post your project on directory blogs and IF communities (discorgs, forums, other social media)

Join jams and competitions to get your name out there and receive some feedbacks

Or my favourite one that's been working for me personally:

Write for yourself, because it's fun as a hobby by itself; find the reason why you are doing this (it was learning new stuff for me); stop putting the numbers centre stage (because they are meaningless); take breaks from the internet...

That one is not easy. You are kind of forced to look inward for motivation and pushing yourself to continue. Do I slip up sometimes? Yeah, I get a but envious of other creators getting more attention that me, and I still check my stats often. I still get frustrated when only one person react to an update I worked so hard on, or even get absolutely nothing about the stuff I really enjoyed doing (sorry Detective Rye...).

But it's been less frustrating and stressful overall. I get to share the stuff I want to share when I want, and have grown a lot more over the past 6-8months than I did since I started working on it*. I feel like I've done my best writing because I'm just having fun. *I did start with an I don't care attitude when I got into IF, but when CRWL got some momentum, that didn't last...

Sidenote: the massive advantage of getting a lot of notes/followers also often comes with a lot of expectations and pressure.

[forabeatofadrum]

writey writey askie askies for youuu: 🌈🎉

🌈is there a fic that you worked *really fucking hard on* that no one would ever know? maybe a scene/theme you struggled with?

I admit I try to answer these asks/tag games with fics of the fandom we share (Glee, in this case), but my baby when it comes to this is my CO fic Call Me Maybe, that I co-wrote with @captain-aralias. I am no stranger to using my own life and experiences for fic but oh my GOD Call Me Maybe not only lifted from my own life, but it also felt like a way to express my struggle with one specific thing in fiction writing: ROMANCE!

Romance. Yeah. Weird. I write fics about romantic ships and I love doing it, but I have talked several times on this blog about how my aroace ass does struggle with it, because I have no idea what the fuck I am doing. I had a huge convo about it with @thnxforknowingme, which I should find again, and there is a post that's been in my drafts for almost a year, I think, which is a reply to something @quizasvivamos said about this (fun fact, that draft has been on my mind lately).

What is romance? Bro. That's the million dollar question. What is attraction? Who knows! So Call Me Maybe was kind of my way to express that. It started out as a shippy fic, but Aralias let me change it into a friendship fic (thanks!) after I tried to turn it into a shippy fic as well, but it just wasn't working. And then I realised that this not working is the story. Agatha tries to make it work. Agatha wants to have feelings for Ginger, and she is confused and somewhat angry at herself when she doesn't have them. She loves Ginger so much, but she also doesn't love her like that and what is wrong with her? Shouldn't she be in love with someone? Writing wise, it wasn't the hardest to write (that's Ebb & Flow, lol), but if I focus on the second part of the question: it really was a way to express my struggle with the theme of romance.

Now I don't think I am bad at writing romance. If I did, people probably didn't read all my versions of Kurt and Blaine or Simon and Baz or Jack and Bitty falling in love. But it's always a bit anxious to do, since I really have no clue what I am doing.

🎉how often do you celebrate completing & posting a work? how often do you give yourself the credit/validation that you seek from others when you post? (if you don’t, you should!)

I celebrate posting my work by obsessively reading my work. I love reading my work, mostly because it is easy to read. I already know what is going to happen, ya know? And there are some parts that make me go "hot damn I wrote that". Re: validation, I actually don't really seek that after I post, but mostly before I post. I love the feedback I get during Wip Wednesday or Six Sentence Sunday. Not saying that comments etc. after I completed it don't make me feel happy 😊, but I notice that I love that people are there during the process.

[thetantiger]

doing this 'cause I'm already experiencing art withdrawal from my hiatus I've forced onto myself with light encouragement from my friends so here we go

also I realize "game" likely implies some schmo is supposed to be like "please answer #69!" but fuck you I go by my own rules and have fun with it too

LMAO so this computer is only about a year old, a while ago my other computer literally shit itself and died so I used to have paint tool SAI on there but now on this one I legit only have the one I actually use which is FireAlpaca

Forward, but left is easier than right

I used to have this warriors self-insert OC when I was REAL YOUNG named Moonfeather that I still hold near and dear to my heart but haven't made art of in literal years and don't have a concrete design for. yes she was special, yes she could turn into a dragon (???) But if you mean ideas I currently use, Ray's been around since I was 10 so

EDITH LOL drawing little kid her is easy as fuck 'cause she looks almost exactly like kid-Gray but current/teen her is so aids 'cause she has all that dragon shit going on + her hair is complicated

literally I post everything online (that I can ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)) because I need validation there is not a single piece of digital art that I've made that hasn't been posted on the internet (for the most part ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°))

my own goddamn trauma. literally half the time I look at an arc a character just had and went "yo the way snarky like came back in a new form with blue reminds me of how my current cat acts exactly like the one I lost" and then I mental boom

gouache (spelling?), that shit's so pretty

literally just made a video about this lmao, the Animals PMV. RIP

if it's a finished piece in the form of a png I name it the piece's title, if it's a WIP art program file I name the file something like "ass" and move on

hoodies.. or scarves. belts are fun too

music or podcasts. sometimes vcs

face/expressions, I fucking LOVE drawing expressions SO MUCH

lotta them undertale/deltarune fanartists are fucking amazing but I've never been into that fandom. Also my husband is super into FNF mods and those are neat too

the little fucking ocean wiggles on fantasy maps y'know the ones

my house/desk lol

fuck idk. the shit I've trained myself to get good at is the shit I've really cared about, however my least favorite part of a piece is lineart

dear god no I HAVE to separate food from that shit, I have enough food anxiety as it is. I watch videos while I eat

not a whole lot actually, I don't distinctly remember doing so pretty much ever

literally fucking none actually. like I legit scoured my art and animation for this shit and couldn't find ANYTTHING. I adore drawing characters so much and anytime I have to draw something inanimate that's not directly clothing -on- the character or weapons it makes me want to kick a baby. broken glass is fun tho I guess???

hands. not that it's easier for me but I like how expressive I can be with em

tybaxel is so fucking amazing but that's like my only answer, not that I don't like other people's art that doesn't look like mine either but that's literally the only example I could think of because I don't keep track of this sorta thing, if it looks pretty I follow. that's my philosophy

lol

not sure what this means actually so no

only rarely for like purposes of poses or perspective. almost all the time my reference window is just a wow screenshot

nothing is coming to me off the top of my head but I have noticed characters or concepts I thought of before I found certain media crops up in said media anyway. like Detective looks very Lackadaisy and I'm not tryna say I'm salty about it I think it's neat actually

any piece with amab characters whose design includes being shirtless. like bro, tree is just chillin'

sometimes I scribble cool/dramatic expressions before drawing but only occasionally

i helped paint a mural in my hometown :D

vivzie's creations, a lot of the character designs are too spiky/thin for me but I understand the stylistic choice

LITERALLY the one I JUST posted based off the song Mama by My Chemical Romance I'm literally in love with it and I don't think anybody saw it fucking rip

anyway yeah fuck it I just felt like doing that lmfao

Weirdly Specific Artist Ask Game

Didn't see a lot of artist ask games, wanted to make a silly one.

(I wrote this while sick out of my mind last year and it's been collecting dust in my drafts, I might as well let it run free) 1. Art programs you have but don't use

2. Is it easier to draw someone facing left or right (or forward even)

3. What ideas come from when you were little

4. Fav character/subject that's a bitch to draw

5. Estimate of how much of your art you post online vs. the art you keep for yourself

6. Anything that might inspire you subconsciously (i.e. this horse wasn't supposed to look like the Last Unicorn but I see it)

7. A medium of art you don't work in but appreciate

8. What's an old project idea that you've lost interest in

9. What are your file name conventions

10. Favorite piece of clothing to draw

11. Do you listen to anything while drawing? If so, what

12. Easiest part of body to draw

13. A creator who you admire but whose work isn't your thing

14. Any favorite motifs

15. *Where* do you draw (don't drop your ip address this just means do you doodle at a park or smth)

16. Something you are good at but don't really have fun doing

17. Do you eat/drink when drawing? if so, what

18. An estimate of how much art supplies you've broken

19. Favorite inanimate objects to draw (food, nature, etc.)

20. Something everyone else finds hard to draw but you enjoy

21. Art styles nothing like your own but you like anyways

22. What physical exercises do you do before drawing, if any

23. Do you use different layer modes

24. Do your references include stock images

25. Something your art has been compared to that you were NOT inspired by

26. What's a piece that got a wildly different interpretation from what you intended

27. Do you warm up before getting to the good stuff? If so, what is it you draw to warm up with

28. Any art events you have participated in the past (like zines)

29. Media you love, but doesn't inspire you artistically

30. What piece of yours do you think is underrated

[karlachismylife]

Dont feel bad about making content you like! I love your x readers sure and I can't wait for some of the X Reader stuff you've been working on to be updated. But you should also enjoy yourself, I personally am iffy on fandom mingling but not because I think it's bad. I think the hate rare pairs get these days or cross-fandom shipping hate stems from people who had never participated in fandom joining the fandom spaces in 2020 who now have made all these rules around everything including stuff like rare pairs and cross-fandom shipping. Like everywhere but Tumblr absolutely rags on stuff like that now because we can't have fun anymore. Keep shipping and making content you enjoy :D

Hello, darling, this is such a nice message, thank you a lot! Kinda feel a little awkward that I have so many people reassuring me when for me it was just another mood swing and no big deal in the grand scheme of things, but I won't lie, this is very comforting.

I guess I just feel bad that I "abandoned" something that was more personal in favour of the thing that gives me more feedback/validation? Luckily I don't get any hate on my rarepair, but I don't get nowhere nearly as much feedback on it wither, even if we compare like a Karlach x Soap work that's fully fleshed out and some x reader headcanons that I literally pulled out of my ass in 40 minutes because adhd go brr. Of course it feels good to know that I'm capable of making someting enjoyable for people even at rapid speed (and I certainly put love in the quick thingies too, I cannot write without love), but then I sit and think like. Yeah I guess I am incapable of making anyone interested in something really personal like Karlach x Soap? Cuz what? Cuz I suck? Cuz I'm not good enough? Cuz I can't convey how much love I feel for the rarepair and infect people with it?

It's all bullshit in my head, honestly, cuz I know there are people that enjoy them, and that there are other crossfandom shipping freaks (what's up rise of the brave tangled frozen dragons), but I'm just sometimes real self-conscious about everything I do cuz like. Boohoo you feedback slut, abandoning your passion project/rarepair for the easy shiny thing. And it's dumb, because I love what I do for x reader, you love what I do for x reader, why can't I just have fun with you? I dunno. I just hate fun I guess /jk

Anyway, sorry for rambling and going off topic, I want to thank you again from the bottom of my silly heart for enjoying whatever you enjoy that I do. Be it one work, one series, some other random bullshit or my four am polls about stabbing people with forks - I am so happy I have you to share them. I just need to stop ruining my own happiness.

Also side note, I have a fuckton of ideas/wips (that list I posted recently? only got bigger), so if you're waiting for something particular, it's okay to reach out to me and ask (ofc if you're being polite, but you're clearly very kind and nice to me already, so I trust you'll be the sweetest). I basically jump from one thing to another with no system at all, so having a slight direction will be nice. I feel good when I know I make other people feel good, so requests are welcome ^^

[lavender-lotion]

11 12 & 17

Love your fics btw ♡♡

thank you!!

11. Link your three favorite fics right now

three favourite to this year

the look in your eye (darling, you set my heart aflutter)

that you trust your lips against mine (as our hearts beat a third echo)

one fire quenched with another

12. how does receiving or not receiving feedback/support impact you?

oooooh boy I am SO motivated by external validation it’s not even funny. a lack of comments/interaction will really kill any inspiration I have and burn me out really fast. I wrote about 30k of glee fic earlier this year and was in the process of writing more when I started posting some of it, and the fact that glee is just an old, quiet fandom really wore me down and killed me inspiration.

more than just that, though, feedback/lack of feedback can really change how I perceive a fic. say there’s something I really like and had a fun time writing that does really bad… it’s pretty inevitable that I’ll start wondering if the work itself is any good. this happens mostly with kink fic lol. I VERY rarely write smut and I’ve posted one lil smutty fic this year that did NOT do good, and now im pretty sure it’s cause it’s trash, not cause it’s kinky so. shrug.

then there is the flip side of that where I’ve had a few fic s preform really well and build up a bit of a following and that makes it really hard to get back into the work. I feel like there’s a lot of pressure with certain wips I have and getting back into them is super hard bc I don’t want to let anyone down!

17. What do you do when writing becomes difficult? (maybe a lack of inspiration or writers block)

there are two answers to this and they are VASTLY different lol. back when I was writing some 500k words a year, if I was ever struggling with writing, I just pushed through. I wrote daily (usually 1k+) for a couple of years, and doing that is no easy feat lol. you absolutely will NOT be constantly inspired, and a lot of writing (in that vein) is just forcing words out and editing them into better shape after the fact.

this was fun ‘cause I was super prolific, but I was also terrified of not writing and constantly thought that if I took a break it would mean that I was done writing forever

I am currently approaching writing and fandom in a much more casual manner, not really adhering to any specific goals or trying to get any sort of quantifiable output. nowadays if I’m not feeling it, I just don’t write lol. I know that I’ll come back to the craft when im ready!

it’s a much better way to approach a hobby lol

ask me something from this ask meme!

[snackugaki]

idk

[lunarheslwt]

I saw a couple of people doing this, (only @daggerandrose comes to mind) so I wanted to set out some goals for this year too, with regards to writing!

Write and post at least one work per month: I did this for the last 8 months consistently and I wanna try and continue it this year even if it'll be challenging with some of my planned wips likely to be longer

Finish my works for fests on time: also a challenge bc I truly suck with time management but I hate stressing out at the last minute so let's see if I learn from my past lol

Take part in more fests: easy enough. I've signed up for two, and so many more I'm looking forward to that I'm actually worried I'll end up signing up for too many

Surpass my 2022 overall word count: this is a fun one, not necessarily one I'll be upset over if I don't meet. I managed 80k last year so I feel like this should be somewhat doable.

Actually write my feral alpha au: ideally I wanna do this for the abo fest. I'm worried I won't make it in the time frame though. But I really love this idea, it'll push me a lot as a writer which is scary but I wanna do it.

Works to eventually be properly betaed: I'm still working up to this. I'm still finding my confidence in my work and until I do I'll struggle to let others pick my work apart but I'm hoping I get to a place where I feel comfortable in my work enough to let others help! I'd also kill for cheerleader betas tbh I do be needing external validation.

Do my monthly fic recs: I've already done this for two months but I hope I keep doing it!

Read more: self explanatory. With how much I'm writing, I don't get to read as much as I'd like so I hope I find a balance.

That's all I can think of. If anyone else wanna do this, do it and tag me! You can say I tagged you! Meanwhile I'm just gonna tag a few of y'all anyways (if you wanna do it): @huggieshalo @alwaysxlarrie @larrysballetslippers @onlythebravest @hellolovers13

Happy writing year ahead 💗

[silvershorthair]

Log cabin (WIP)

EMOTIONAL JUNK! SKIP IF YOU WANT

So, I've been feeling very discouraged about 3D artwork and my future and myself and all that fun stuff, and I think that I personally just want to lay down in bed and sleep until things just magically change to be better. At the start of the month I was planning on doing a really big animation for the end of the year with a script and whatnot, but I gave up on the second day of the month. I think yesterday or the day before or whatever, I decided I just wanted to make a cute little Christmas-y animation for the end of the month. And so I started working on it.

POSTING THE IMAGES NOW

So I decided that I wanted to make this animation take place in a cute log cabin in the forest.

So as you may have noticed, this doesn't look a lot like a log cabin. You might also be asking what's wrong with that snowman. Well, to explain, what I'm doing here is making a general layout using basic shapes and whatnot so that I can try and figure out exactly what I want. When I've figured out exactly what I want for this, then I'll start making it look actually decent. But while we're here, I might as well give you a little tour.

You aren't allowed to be mad about the lack of things to see, I said I'd give you a LITTLE tour. But wait, this cabin isn't the only thing that I've worked on.

THE TREE

Wouldn't be a forest without trees, right? Well, good news is we have trees. And look at how highly-detailed it is!!! Great tree, right? WRONG. Take a closer look at this tree.

Dear god. How low poly and horrid, right? Well, there is a valid reason for this. Polygons are expensive and we're going to be making a LOT of these trees. I tried following a CG Geek tutorial on easy low poly trees to get the branches right. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of great photos out there on pine tree branches covered in snow. I tried my best, but it just didn't look great.

Yeah, I bet you're appreciating the new tree now. Either that or you wish I kept the old tree in which case um

Point is now what I'm doing is using these little branch things as particles on the bigger branch things. Here's a photo of what the little branches look like by themselves, and what the big branches look like by themselves

The actual poly count of the big branches should be lowered because by themselves they're 33,840 polygons, which is probably not what I want for a low-poly mesh there'll be a lot of, but I'll deal with doing that later. For now, I'm going to rest.

OH WAIT I ALMOST FORGOT

THE SNOW TEXTURE

You might've noticed the snowman and the snowy tree, but there's more. I tried to mimic the way that snow is sparkly, and the way I did that was by throwing a static image I made in Gimp into the roughness slot of the material

This got me a very nice sparkly texture which I think looks close enough to snow (I haven't seen snow up close in like 2 years so cut me some slack). I'll be using this material on all the snow-related things, and I'm hoping it'll work well. I'm going to ramble a bit at the end of the post, so I just wanted to say thank you for reading this mess, and I hope you like the stuff I make.

CONCLUSION (yes I did just now look up Christmas light colors also the emotional junk is back)

I'm going to keep working on this over the next couple days, and hopefully by the end of it I'll have a cute little animation. 2022 has probably been a better year for me than 2021 in terms of good things that have happened to me. A lot of great things have happened this year which I should be happy about, but unfortunately I don't think I've fully been able to take advantage of that because of some personal problems. Joining Twitter probably didn't help that very much, but it led to me joining this site, which I do like a lot so far. I think I'm certainly going to enjoy being on here a lot more than Twitter. Anyways, that's all from me, I'm going to go lay down and be on my phone instead of going to bed like a normal person (bit of a lie, I think a normal person would've gone to bed about 6 hours ago). Bye!

[writingintheafterglow]

a guide to preparing for nanowrimo

@writingintheafterglow on ig | reposts not allowed!

1. Intro - what is NaNoWriMo?

NaNoWriMo (Nano for short!) stands for "National Novel Writing Month", and it's also the name of the website that hosts this challenge. Basically, every November, the participants of Nano try to write 50,000 words in one month, aka the length of a standard novel. This challenge isn't as easy as it may sound - you need to write at least 1667 words every day of the month in order to complete it on time!! But, if you power through, you'll be able to write a full length novel in just 30 days, which is quite a feat!

2. Know what you're writing

This might seem obvious, but if you're going to write a novel, you need to know what novel you're going to write! Some people choose to start a new novel idea, or to write a second/third/etc draft of their current novel. Whatever you choose, make sure you're clear on it before you start planning.

Right now, it's only July, so you might not know for sure what you want to write, and that's okay!! It's still pretty early to start prepping :)

3. Plot. Plot. PLOT.

Look, I get it. I'm a plantser. Plotting can be boring and time consuming and hard. But if you really want to write a novel in thirty days, you can't really afford to not know what's happening next. I would encourage you to plot out your chapters in detail, with at least three or four bullet points for each chapter's events. This is what I've found works best for me.

Make sure you really flesh out the plot and the events, so you know exactly how the story goes!!

4. Get to know your characters

While you might not enjoy plotting, you have to admit that planning your characters is really fun. They're literally the backbone of the story, and it's important that you get to know all your main characters before you start writing. So, you can fill out character profiles, write backstories, or even use other methods to flesh them out (interview, etc). I have a whole post on this in my blue theme, so take a look if you need inspiration!

5. Practice writing!!

If you want, you can start writing before Nano even starts. For example, if you're writing a fantasy novel, your target word count is probably more than 50k. So you might try to write 30k before Nano and then finish the novel during the month, it's up to you.

But whether you're planning to start your wip before Nano or not, at least practice writing it so you get a feel for the vibe of your story. You can write whatever you want, random short stories, random scenes of your characters, self indulgent scenes of your main ship- it's up to you!! But this will help you get into the mindset of the story, so you're not struggling come November!

Outro

Thank you so much for reading! I appreciate your support more than you know :)

If you'd like to show some support for my account, consider sparing a like, follow, share or save. If not, that's totally fine and i understand!

Reminder: you are loved, valid and beautiful, and dms are open!!

Again, thanks for reading and have a wonderful day!!

[shadowdianne]

Fic writer review [Or a fic writer tag game if you prefer]

I was tagged by @naralanis and I can already see her grin all the way from where I am xd Thank you, dear, for the tag, let’s see what are my answers, shall we.

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

*bursts out laughing* Adding both pseuds I have… 535 according to the account info but by counting them all I’m reaching 541 so I’m guessing it’s counting some drafts I need to re-find.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

I seriously hated you for this one xd I was going to do it by hand by I decided one-third there that I value my mental stability a little bit more xd according to the stats page back at a03 that number would be 1257884. It may be wrong. I think there should be a few more numbers up there but the majority of my works are one-shots so *shrugs* There’s also the fact that counting my ao3 things only is shaving off like half of it Xd Anyway, can we laugh at the fact that I’m a pain in the ass and that I’ve written a lot? More than I should have, that’s for sure

3. How many fandoms have you written for?

Trick question because I haven’t crossposted everything I wrote back in ffnet and I actually erased some fics from my account back there so the numbers are a little blurry there.

When I had the entirety of my work posted both in ffnet and a03 I had written for: Twilight (Bella/Alice) Glee (Faberry and there were a couple Pezberry and I don’t fucking remember the pairing name for Santana and Quinn), Harry Potter (Hermione/Ginny, Hermione/Narcissa, Hermione/Bellatrix) OUAT (SwanQueen and several oneshots focusing on the mad hatter and the blue fairy solely back at ffnet that were written in Spanish and never translated), I actually had a veeeery old au prompt of Frozen (Elsanna in where I wrote them as non sibilings), Rizzoli and Isles (Rizzles), Dishonored 2 (Emily Kaldwin/Alexi Mayhew), Lara Croft and Wonder Woman, Supergirl (SuperCorp/Supercat) I had a 100 one -or maybe two??- (Clexa), The Shannara Chronicles (Amberle/Eretreia [Or Princess Rover], Rwby [Blake Belladona/Yang], The Worst Witch (Hecate Hardbroom and Pippa Pentangle), The Half of it, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (Madam Satan/Zelda Spellman) and… I think that’s it(?) I may be forgetting some but probably nothing important if I’m not remembering it lol.

4. Top 5 fics by kudos?

Ah, we are going to go there, uh? Xd My works are not the kudos and comment getting type Xd So I was quite surprised when I went to check this.

1: Cracked it I wrote this one back in 2017, it was a prompt done by an anon: Lena is nerding with one of her projects at home, mumbling mostly to herself because she’s stuck and Kara casually mentions how to solve the problem like it’s nothing. I really had some fun with this. It was back when some us, SQeeners were fully doing the jump between OUAT and SuperGirl (I mean, there had already been some crossover as for fandom is related but this when the girls were actually getting their conjoined voice within the fandom)

2: Dateless I honestly needed to check what this one was about but I think I can see why this one shot has the amount of kudos it has. It’s a short and sweet idea and responds to the Teachers Au that went SO well with SQ. Everyone thinks they hate each other and try to set them up with other people whilst they, in truth, are dating. I don’t remember if I wrote them as married rather than dating but despite being from 2017 as well is one cheeky enough to be cool Xd I probably would edit some lines now *shudders*

3: After you I truly didn’t expect this one to be top 3. Makes me think of a lot of things, if I’m being honest Xd. After you was a one shot written almost feverishly as an answer to the fabulous drawings that Sejic did of both Lara Croft and Wonder Woman back at 2018 or something. It’s just Lara and Diana being himbos but not at all with each other.

4: How about… How about is one I remember perfectly, it was my answer to the ending of the Half of it film. I had SOME thoughts about it, let’s just stop there Xd I really liked the film itself but I think and I thought at the time that my response to wishing for a final scene at the very end of the credits responds to me being in a different personal moment than the characters. I really wanted to explore my feelings about it and so I wrote about them finding each other again after some time passes. It was also something I wrote after quite the hiatus so I took it as something I could write about without focusing too much on the why.

5: Come to me

Ahh, SuperCorp Xd I remember this one actually. A friend of mine and I were talking about descriptions, and she mentioned quite off-handedly how she wanted a fic in where Kara’s back was described. I complied… more or less.

Fun tidbit, despite the big volume of my work is obviously set in ouat there’s only 1 SQ fic there as you can see, the others are either SuperCorp or the random one shots I created for Wonderwoman/Lara Croft and The half of it. *sighs in deep thought* I’m also not going to look too much into how almost all of the fics were posted and written back in 2017. Nope, not at all.

*Small voice screaming you peaked in 2017 and everything else is garbage jumps back and forth*

5. Do you respond to comments? Why/why not?

I tend to always respond, yup. I truly value comments. I might have gone for spells of time in where I didn’t have the mental capacity to check in old fics because I truly didn’t know what to answer but I treasure every single comment and you all who comment know that I can start to ramble in the answers xd -sorry about that- I really really REALLY love interaction.

6. A fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending:

Ok, Nara, come on, this one is a catch for me. I’ve written angst in far too many fics to remember the angstiest one :P I have the most recent one, though, that is the easy one to think about: Goodbye.Written for @delirious-comfort. I’m just going to say “Kisses with their last dying breath” as an idea of what awaits inside but I’ve written about death and loss and angst quite a lot. There were some I wrote back to SQ with Regina needing to kill Emma during the Dark Swan arc that, to this day, I still love and some others in where Regina is the one that dies, again and again, trapped by magic while Emma watches. I have the loss in mental destruction form and… I REALLY like my angst y’know xd

7. Do you write crossovers?

Not counting Lara and Wonder Woman not really! I think it comes from the fact that I loooove worldbuilding as a whole and some pairings would require all my focus into making the world perfect which in turn would make me self conscious on the OOCness of it all.

8. Ever received hate on a fic?

*snorts* I’ve received hate due to the pairing I’ve written about, how I’ve written about it, the amount I’ve written, how slow or quick I can be, the usage of some tropes, the lack of usage of those same tropes… Let’s just go with: yuuuup.

9. Do you write smut?

I’ve written smut, yeah! But I can already see the pointed looks of some so let’s elaborate Xd I write smut when asked and sometimes when not asked but there’s a part of me I like to call a terrible tease that prefers writing the beginning of a scene, taunt it, focus on what happens before the sex scene per se as I find it more enjoyable to write. The process of escalation is always the best for me to see what can I do it by using both dialogue and descriptors tbh, so I tend to tease more than show.

9. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

A few weeks ago I’d have said: Maybe(?) But trying to follow the trail of some other fics that had been stolen from some friends -I think it was me trying to find more about the page that stole something from your Nara!- I found some pages in where my fics had been reposted. In some it was stated that the person posting the fic wasn’t the author but I had never been contacted in order to see if I’d say yes to such a thing and in some others the page was locked up but I could still see someone was pretending to be the author. I did the thing and got some of those down.

Pointed note: Ask me if you want to post or translate or anything. I will look into you and answer you if you seem honest about the thing. But despite every joke and self-deprecating comment those 500 and then some fics represent MY time so very kindly I say fuck off to those who wish to steal from me and if I catch you… you don’t really want to see me angry, trust me.

10. Ever had a fic translated?

I’ve given permission to some, yeah, but never heard it back from them so I’m guessing it didn’t stick.

12. Have you ever co-written a fic?

I’ve written series alongside other authors as @stregaomega for example. And some others that are unpublished -looking at you @carsonnieve - I’ve also done collabs… but fics co-written in the sense of two authors same chapters I don’t have anything posted I’m afraid :P

13. All-time favourite ship?

*snorts*, I guess the obvious answer is SQ uh? And I do think they were the ones that allowed me to read and write SO much. The one I feel more strongly about, however, is Bering and Wells from Warehouse 13.

14. WIP you want to finish, but don’t think you ever will?

All of them counts as a valid answer? But if I only could finish one that would be Arcadia. With A forgotten Promise second and the one I did as an Assassins Creed AU third. (I don’t remember the name so there’s no link, sorry xd)

15. Writing strengths?

Uhhhh, you REALLY want me to say that? I don’t fucking know!! To me everything I write is garbage. I always try to go for the feelings so I guess. Dunno xd I’ve been told I’m good at worldbuilding and to be honest is what I enjoy the most.

16. Writing weaknesses?

Everything Xd Pacing? What I hate the most sometimes is dialogue, I would count it as a weakness but I’m always far too focused on description rather than dialogue. I don’t think it’s a bad thing per se but it’s something that I don’t do as much.

17. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in a fic?

I’m conflicted. Always. Majorly because I think that having bilingual characters in fanfiction is portrayed and expected in a way that I don’t feel it’s honest with how bilingual people -us- talk. So if I go by what I know I do I think it’s not what readers hope to see when it comes to that and if I go for how canonically is hoped to be found I don’t think it’s logical. But that’s me and my overthinking Xd If I have the option I like to do it.

18. First fandom you ever wrote for?

Belice! Or Bella/Alice. Worst first fic ever but oh, well, I’m always saying that :P

19. What’s your fav fic you’ve written so far?

Uhh… Don’t make me do this XD Agh, I don’t know. I’ve always been very vocal about Metallic Ink because I let myself enjoy the process of creating a magic system almost out of zero and that was fun. Despite hating some of the writing process and that I’d do it differently now I think I’m going to stick with that answer. Or anything that had any steampunk-based undertone. To be honest I like more thinking of concepts, I had one in where Emma was a thief and it involved the robbery of a ring that was Regina’s one way ticket to freedom I then later repurposed that I adored thinking about so let’s go with…. Yeah, I love having the option of changing things up a little and focus on how characters would fit in different aesthetics for this one Xd

Annnd… these are four pages, gods. I’m just going to tag @waknatious @carsonnieve @stregaomega here and see what they do- Enjoy the questionnaire ladies :P

[seriouslyhooked]

The Best Bad Idea

Three-part CS AU where Emma and Killian are doctors working at the same hospital (world without pandemic). They’ve yet to meet, but Emma has definitely seen the sexy Dr. Jones in her travels at Mist Haven Medical. It’s generally a bad idea to get involved with a colleague, but a little fantasizing never hurt… right? Inspired by the song ‘Bad Idea’ by Ariana Grande and a TV couple who set the bar for true love stories. 

Available on FF Here and AO3 Here. 

A/N: Hey all! Here is a little something I made instead of being a responsible writer and finishing my other projects. I’ll be back to my other WIPs soon (God willing), but in the meantime here’s my 1000th attempt at writing a Captain Swan meet cute. I needed to get some words on the page, and this is the result. Hope you all enjoy, and thanks for reading!

Thump, thump. Thump, thump. Thump, thump. Thump, Thump. Steady, sure, and even. A solid pulsing sound with no inconsistencies and no delays or false starts.

In this particular patient, that fourth set of beats was the most important. Prior to his recent operation, Earl MacDonald’s heart had been weak and skipping needed pulses, then constricting far too harshly on every fourth measure. That type of arrhythmia had potentially disastrous consequences, but those worrying beats were seemingly behind them. The rhythm Emma heard through the stethoscope was a regularly circulating drumline, the tell-tale song of a heart that was working, and working well. Her surgical intervention had been successful.

She gently released the breath she was holding, a sign of the stress that she carried while waiting for patients to recuperate. Emma never let the patients see her sweat, but she had been worried on multiple levels in this case. Earl was going on 80, and not a logical contender for intensive cardiac mediation, but Emma’s gut had told her he could handle it, and she was rarely ever wrong. Earl forged through the surgery like a much younger man, and his outputs post-operation had all been extremely encouraging. It was shaping up to be another win, another life saved thanks to the power of medicine, and that filled Emma with real joy. She always did her absolute best to create good outcomes, and this time there was so much more on the line than one life. This was a man who was loved and cherished by the people closest to him, and who would be sorely missed if something were to happen.

��Anything you want me to note for the chart, Doctor Swan?” 

Emma bit back a witty retort at the pointed use of the word ‘Doctor.’ She was one of the few surgeons in this hospital who didn’t care what people called her, as long as they called on her early enough to actually save the patient’s life. But with Belle, a person Emma considered a dear and true friend, there was an added lilt of sass when using her title. Her friend was one of the nurse practitioners that Emma had been working with for years, since the day she landed here as a medical intern, but despite their differences in degrees, Belle was easily the most well-read and brilliant resource when it came to medical literature in this hospital.

“Just that Mr. MacDonald is healing nicely.”

“Did you hear that Lorraine?” Earl asked, with a Cheshire cat smile on his face, and the glint of true pride in his eyes. “Doctor Emma says I’m healing nicely.”

“Hard not to hear, seeing as I’m right beside you,” Loraine quipped, but she squeezed his hand affectionately, and offered a warm smile to her husband all the same.

“You know, usually being dubbed ‘nice’ is the kiss of death for a man.”

“Earl!” Loraine chastised, clearly not liking his word choice. Earl smiled wider, looking almost boyish in his delight.

“Well, so to speak. But I was going to say that I think we can make an exception this time. I’ve never been so happy to be referred to as ‘nice’ in my life.”

“Technically Doctor Swan was referring to your vital signs, Earl,” Belle taunted from across the room, holding back a smile Emma knew she was bound to let loose soon enough.

“Aw come on, you both know I am your favorite patient. I mean I’m not exactly pressed for competition. Have you seen the people on this floor? Good grief.”

“Ignore him, ladies. He’s all talk. He hasn’t left this room since we got here,” Loraine said, rolling her eyes, as if these antics were a constant occurrence. Based on her small window of experience with Earl, Emma would believe it. “Every meal, every visit, every moment has been within these four walls. Even his PT has been in here.”

“His PT has been here?” Emma asked, surprised that Mary Margaret, their head Occupational Therapist, had allowed for that. She was normally a by-the-book professional, and Emma never knew her friend to provide rehab consults outside of her studio.

“Yup. I told Miss Mary Margaret that I had a wife to keep an eye on and she relented.”

“No, actually what you said was, ‘Excuse me, Ms. Blanchard? You probably heard I just had heart surgery. Well, the thing is, my heart is sitting in this room. I’d like to be with her. Doesn’t seem right to be separated so soon, given what we’ve been through.’ Then you pointed at me, and used your puppy dog eyes on her. Next thing I knew, she had lugged enough equipment to fill the room here. No questions, just action.”

“I bet she ate that right up,” Belle said with a wink. “Mary Margaret loves nothing more than love itself.”

Belle and Mrs. MacDonald discussed Mary Margaret’s love of love, and Earl’s improved mobility, for a few more minutes while Emma continued checking his stats, but ultimately Earl’s patience was wearing thin. He really only had one thing on his mind, and he was now determined to ask about it. Emma was honestly shocked that he managed to wait this long. She knew it was only a matter of time and she was ready for the showdown.

“So, what do you think, Doc? Am I making it home in time for the party?”

“The one for your grandson on Sunday?” she asked, noting the three-day window between now and then. She had heard about this party non-stop, since the moment Earl woke up from the procedure. It was a central fixation for the old man, a celebration that would host his entire family, and a goal he had been carrying for over a week. Earl nodded and Emma hesitated for a few seconds, before smiling and giving the good news away. “Yes, I am confident that Jayden’s ‘Pop Pops’ will be in attendance when he turns four. But you know the rules…”

“I know, I know: no good food, no strenuous exercise, no having fun.”

“Earl.” Just the utterance of the old man’s name from his wife was enough to have him looking like a kid with his hand caught in the candy jar. Emma and Belle both chuckled at that child-like expression. It was hard not to; the old married couple was just too sweet.

“I’m sorry. I know this is serious, but what is life if you can’t have a little fun?”

“Fun comes in all shapes and sizes, Mr. MacDonald, and despite what you may think about your prescribed lifestyle changes, you’re forgetting two things. First, most of these less-alluring prescriptions will be temporary, and second, you’re a man who clearly loves a challenge.”

“Oh yeah? And how do you know that, Doc?” 

“Well for one thing, you somehow landed a lady as remarkable as Loraine. There’s no way she came easy with these corny jokes of yours. You must have worked harder than you ever worked in your life to persuade her to give you a chance.”

The laughter from the older couple was boisterous and heartwarming, and Emma knew she was right on the money. At this point, she had the ability to sniff out true affection, and these two had it in spades. Many couples she saw facing emergency room disasters together didn’t have the same good luck.

“You got that right, Doc. You know the first time we met was at the -,”

Earl’s story was unceremoniously interrupted by the crackling of the PA system specific to this room. It buzzed for a few moments before a message was delivered in a saccharine sweet voice that sounded nothing like the announcer’s normal tone.

“Paging Doctor Swan to the Nurse’s station. Doctor Swan to the Nurse’s station, code 741.”

Emma waited for the feed to cut off and began to tell Earl to please go on with the story, but the call came out again.

“Paging Doctor Swan to the Nurse’s station. Doctor Swan, code 741.”

“You know she’s just going to keep doing that until she gets her way,” Belle murmured. Emma nodded. It was no use. What Ruby Lucas wanted, Ruby Lucas got. That just seemed to be the way of the world.

“Belle, would you mind telling Ruby I’m with a patient at the moment? I will be there when I can. She can always proceed without me.”

Belle snorted out a laugh, knowing that last part would never happen, but gave a swift affirmation that she would relay the message before waving goodbye to the MacDonald’s and promising to see them soon. As her friend headed out, Emma sighed, knowing there was no way Ruby was going to give things up that easily. She had a matter of moments before some new tactic would be deployed.

“I’m sorry about that. You were saying?”

“Eh it’s kind of a long story, and you’ve got places to be, Doc. Just know, true love won out in the end with me and my Loraine. It always does.”

Emma couldn’t deny that their love appeared true even after their fifty plus years together. She personally had never experienced a love like that, but she was wondering more and more if maybe it was out there, somewhere in the later chapters of her story. For years she thought herself above that kind of need. She found validation in herself and in her work. She dedicated herself to helping others, and that had always been enough. But the loneliness that became a constant when she was growing up in foster care still lingered, and she wondered if someone might ever come along who could inspire her to take a chance and risk her heart.

“You know, I actually worked as a nurse before my kids were born,” Loraine commented easily. Emma nodded and smiled as she checked the last of Mr. MacDonald’s IV drips. Emma was aware of the older woman’s solid medical understanding. Loraine had continued to demonstrate it the entire time her husband was admitted in this ward. “I’m trying to remember if I ever ran into a code 741.”

“Oh, uh, I think – well, erm, I mean you probably didn’t,” Emma said, hoping she didn’t turn beet red at the passing comment from the older woman. She was already stuttering, which was completely out of character and eighty shades of embarrassing. Loraine’s words feigned ignorance, but her eyes told a different story. Still Emma tried to play it off. “It’s really not a big deal. Just a non-emergent protocol.”

Another alert sounded, but this time it came through the ceiling unit reserved for announcements to the wider reaches of the hospital. “Attention to all surgical ward personnel. We are paging Doctor Swan to the nurse’s station. Doctor Swan, you are needed at the nurse’s station immediately for a code 741.” The talking stopped, but the air crackled signaling that the line was still live. “Immediately.”

“Sounds pretty urgent to me,” Loraine replied. The curiosity in her gaze told Emma that the older woman was onto them, but it was Earl’s comment that cut too close for comfort.

“When I was in the war, all of our numeric codes corresponded to letters. So 7 was H, 4 was D, 1 was A. H – D – A. HDA, now what could that be….?” Uh oh. Now Emma really had to get out of here before she accidentally admitted Ruby’s code’s meaning – Hot Doctor Alert. That would be the cherry on top of a full-blown mortification sundae.

“All righty, well like I told Belle, all your scans look good. Doctor Whale is on shift this evening during the next series of rounds, so I’ll make sure your file is ready for him.”

“Of course, dear, and good luck with your doctor, er – I mean – code.”

Emma stammered out something like an ‘okay thanks,’ while leaving. She tried to get her bearings once she was out of sight of the room, but she had nowhere to go. Everyone on this floor had just heard her page, and there were bound to be at least a few who understood the meaning. She was so embarrassed, and more than a little ticked at Ruby. She was supposed to be her best friend, but she was always pulling these crazy stunts. They were mostly harmless, but for Emma, who hated being the subject of hospital gossip, it was anxiety inducing to say the least.

“Please tell me that you did not just broadcast that to the entire hospital,” Emma said, arriving at the nurse’s station with a sense of urgency, and watching some of the other nurses scurry off to avoid the confrontation. Ruby, however, was unfazed. Actually, the nurse manager just rolled her eyes, grabbing her bag and phone from her cubby, as if Emma was the one who was annoying and not the other way around.

“And here I was thinking we were the best of friends. Soul sisters, kindred spirits, friends for life. But no, ye of little faith, you actually believe I would broadcast the hot doc alert to all of Mist Haven? What kind of friend would do that?”

“But if you didn’t… then how did you…?” Emma’s questions trailed off, but her arms flailed towards the ceiling and the look on her face spoke for itself – how had Ruby used the hospital wide PA system without actually broadcasting to the entire hospital?

“You know Tink up in nuero?” Emma nodded, well acquainted with the nurse manager who had Ruby’s job on the fifth floor but with a specialization of the brain and nervous system. She was a tiny woman, but she ruled that ward with more than capable hands. “She and I bribed the IT guys to make the nurse managers an override. Now we can circumvent the PA software whenever we want. Bring some of you more stubborn Doctors to heal when it comes to answering our pages.”

“That’s… well, actually that’s genius,” Emma admitted.

“I like to think so,” Ruby teased, offering a genuine smile. The two friends laughed at all of this, and Emma felt so much better knowing that their secret was still relatively secure. The last thing she wanted was everyone knowing how she was spending her lunch breaks these days.  

“Gus, you’re holding down the fort while I’m gone, right?” Ruby asked, her smile turning slightly wicked with the purposeful jest aimed at the new nursing aid sitting behind the desk.

“Me?” The new hire replied, suddenly white as a sheet. Emma had never seen the man so stricken, and as a new nurse he had plenty of high-stress moments to look alarmed during. “I – uh – well – I -,”

“It’s called comedic relief, Gus. Commonly referred to as joking. Do me a favor, learn about it by the end of shift, kay?” Ruby pivoted to the person she actually trusted to man the fort. “Thirty minutes work for you, Belle?”

“I’ve got it handled.”

“Excellent. We’ll return with a full report,” Ruby said, grabbing Emma’s arm and moving them down the hallway before Emma could even say goodbye. “Newbies – can’t live with them, can’t pawn off scut work without them.”

“You are terrible. And yet… the look on his face just now…? Priceless,” Emma acquiesced. “But seriously, Ruby, can we PLEASE find another way to page me for this? My patients are not stupid, and the code isn’t exactly original. It’s kind of…” Ruby’s grin was so big that it stopped Emma in her tracks. She was currently trying to hold her friend to account, but Ruby looked like she’d won the lottery. “What?”

“You are so totally into him! I mean listen to you right now.”

“I didn’t say anything!” Emma said, feeling her cheeks flush against her will. 

“Exactly,” Ruby said. “You’re telling me to be more discreet when I send the bat signal, but you still want me to send it. Do you realize how unlike you that is?”

“Despite what you may think, Ruby. I’m a doctor, I’m not dead. I can appreciate a hot guy now and again.”

“Doubtful. Remember last month when all those pro hockey players were here after Ocheski collapsed on the ice? You had a room full of crazy sexy men. Like virile, hot, muscled men who get paid big money to beat each other up on the ice. Most women would die for that chance, and to make it even better, most of them were hitting on you. And what did you do? Nothing. You didn’t even blink.”

“They were not hitting on me,” Emma affirmed, but the words were hollow. They had been trying to flirt with her. A few had even attempted to get her number.

“They were hitting on you,” Ruby said adamantly.  

“He was a patient, and the rest of them were essentially his family. You know I’d never cross that line. Doesn’t count.”

“Fine, then what about Dr. King? When he came for that conjoined twins case last year, you had no interest. Zero. Zilch.”

“King was an asshole, you know that,” Emma said, belatedly catching her use of profanity and checking that no patients were around. Luckily the coast was clear.

“So? You didn’t have to marry the guy. Hot is hot, honey. That’s just how things are.” 

Emma barked out a laugh at even the thought of marrying someone like that. Arthur King was just about the worst person she could fathom to spend a life with. He was narcissistic and carrying around one of the biggest god-complexes she’d ever seen, and she was a surgeon, so she was an expert on god-complexes. 

“Your face really says it all, Emma. I mean honestly, poker would be a terrible game for you to take up. Your contempt for King is obvious, but, meanwhile, as soon as I mention Doctor Jones… aha! See, totally shifted.”

Emma didn’t know what to say to that. She could try and protest, but her friend knew her too well for that. The best thing to do was say nothing, and she was saved by their arrival at their destination. The coffee cart in the center of the action, near the entrance of Mist Haven. Here was where the wards crossed paths. Her surgical wing met up with the specialties departments, the ER, the community clinic, and more. It was also swarmed with both hospital workers and visitors. Typically, this was the last place she wanted to be, but recently it had become a highlight of her day.

“Emma? Ruby? What’s brought you out here?” a voice asked. It was Mary Margaret, and given her street clothes and jacket, Emma would guess she was just starting her shift.

“Haven’t you heard? There’s fresh meat from the ER. Two showings a day, but we favor the afternoon delight.”

“Oh right,” Mary Margaret said, nodding, like Ruby’s words were totally normal, and for Ruby they were. “I heard about the new ER Chief. Doctor Nolan? I meant to get down there and bring him something to welcome him, but I’ve been so swamped this week. My caseload is crazy at the moment. I hope he won’t think too badly of me for being a bit late.”

“Mary Margaret, literally no one in a hospital brings people cupcakes as a welcome gift, especially not new guys in other departments.” Ruby was not wrong. Hospitals were hardly the most happy-go-lucky of places. At least not usually. “Believe me, the man will be grateful whenever they come. If he even eats them. He’s fit – like fit, fit. Keto diet and a personal trainer fit. The kind of fit that makes you -,”

“Careful, Ruby,” Emma teased. “What if Graham heard you saying that?”

“God, I wish. You know how worked up he gets, and how he works out his frustrations.” Ruby’s tone was dripping in suggestion. “It’s one of the many reasons I live to drive him crazy.”

Emma and Mary Margaret laughed at Ruby’s apt assessment of her relationship with her boyfriend. Ruby had been dating the fireman for almost a year now, since he came in on one of the ambulance bays with a victim he’d rescued from a fire, but Ruby was hardly the predictable type, and Graham seemed to love that about her. They were still going strong despite her willful, wild child nature, and Emma suspected they may be built to last.

“Doctor Nolan must really be something to get you out here, Emma,” Mary Margaret said, moving forward in the line, inching ever closer to the mediocre coffee the cart promised.  

“Ha! Hardly. Emma’s not here for Nolan. She’s here for Jones.”

“Jones?” Mary Margaret asked.

“Girl, where have you been? Doctor Killian Jones, trauma surgeon extraordinaire. Chief Mills brought him here for a ‘collaboration’ with the ER, but she’s totally trying to recruit him for head of his own department. Turns out he and David Nolan are old friends. Same medical school maybe? I don’t know, no one’s gotten me those details yet. Anyway, Regina hardly leaves him alone. She only misses this little window because she’s hooking up with Doctor Locksley in the supply room on the 2nd floor.”

“She’s WHAT?!” Emma and Mary Margaret yelled at the same time and Ruby looked aghast for the first time today. Some other hospital staff in the area glanced over, but no one paid much mind beyond a head nod. Everyone was absorbed in their own need for caffeine, and no one was the wiser of the bombshell Ruby had just dropped.

“Oh shoot, I wasn’t supposed to say that. I promised Ella, damn it!”

“Ella, her assistant? I thought she quit,” Mary Margaret stage whispered.

“Oh she did. Made it a whole two months, which, you know, makes sense given the fact that Regina is a nightmare. But the last week she was here, she learned a crucial secret regarding her Majesty. She spilled last week at The White Rabbit, but I promised her I wouldn’t tell until she’s settled at her new job at GMH. So you did not hear this from me, and I did not hear this from her, capische?”

“I can’t believe the Evil Queen is dating someone,” Mary Margaret said, deeply disturbed by the idea. She shuddered at the thought, and this was someone who loved love. But love and Regina Mills didn’t really feel like concepts that belonged in the same sentence. Scratch that, they didn’t really even belong in the same book. “She’s just so…”

“Evil?” Emma responded. The nickname worked for a reason, after all. The hospital Chief was downright tyrannical.

“Exactly.”

“Well dating is a stretch. She’s screwing someone. But then again, who knows. Ella said she actually saw her smiling in those final days. And not that evil one she’s famous for. Like a real, genuine, I have a heart, smile.”

“No way,” Emma said at the same time Mary Margaret murmured, “Well would you look at that.”

“Don’t worry. I’m on the case. The temp is a totally easy mark – Sydney something. I’m buying him lunch tomorrow. I’ll have the whole story before you know it.”

“Won’t Graham be proud,” Emma chuckled, but her joke fell on deaf ears as something caught Ruby’s attention across the way. Her friend’s countenance changed immediately, putting Emma on alert.

“Ooh, they’re coming! Act normal.”

Normally, Emma would have laughed at that command, but she was too busy feeling the spike of adrenaline at the impending arrival of one Doctor Killian Jones. He really was a world-renowned trauma surgeon, who was working on a number of cutting-edge techniques that saved lives and gave critical care patients better chances to recover. She had actually heard of him a few years ago when reading about a new procedure to treat arrhythmia in patients with traumatic injury. He engineered it in the field, while serving in the British naval forces, and his paper had been circulating in cardiac wings around the country, but she never saw the man before last week when he arrived in Boston.  Suffice it to say she could not have imagined that this marvel of modern medicine would also be so roguishly handsome.

Spotting him today across the great hall, Emma was struck again by just how attractive this man was. She couldn’t even comprehend it really. All she knew was that she had yet to find a fault in him. Every day she’d stolen secret glances, and every time he proved better than her memory. It was crazy, and very reminiscent of schoolgirl crushes and teenage day dreams, but she couldn’t help the way she felt. It was intoxicating, and despite her best efforts, she was powerless to turn Ruby’s invites to the show down when she could witness this each and every day.

The first thing that she’d noticed about him was his general presence. His posture was strong and straight and assured. He looked ready for anything, but somehow laid back, like he was totally in control. People naturally parted when he walked by, as if he silently willed the flow of the hospital traffic. Ruby called it swagger. Emma called it… well something not quite safe for work. Couple that general aura of authority with the classically gorgeous features of his face, and Emma was lost. On that first day (and okay, maybe on the others as well), she actually felt her knees get weak. She always thought that was a bogus cliché, but nope, it was real, and she was the proof of it. From there she was hooked, and over time she’d chronicled more and more things to like about him.

Yesterday it had been his hair. As she watched him across the atrium, she noticed that the shade shone bright in the sun, but that it was nearer to midnight than any color brown. It was slightly longer than most of the other male doctors wore theirs, but not so long that it looked unkempt or unprofessional, at least not yet. She knew for a fact that the military never would allow for such a style, and it felt like a bit of rebellion, or maybe a lack of care for what others thought. Both sent a delicious thrill through Emma, even though she had no real confirmation one way or another. Maybe he was just lazy, but that wasn’t how she imagined him…

And oh boy did she imagine him. At first she hadn’t meant to. She just had these flashbacks to seeing him that she carried through the day. These visceral visions always started the same: he would walk by, looking downright delicious and impossible to resist, then he would turn his eyes her way here in the middle of the hospital hustle and bustle. She’d feel caught in his stare, sense the hunger even from the distance, and her heart would quicken to a maddening crescendo as he walked her way. The rest of the world would fade from view, and it would feel like they were the only two people alive. Her gaze would stay transfixed on his almost cocky composure and the hard line of his bearded jaw. The attraction in his blue eyes would light a fire in her, and then, without so much as a word like ‘hello’ or ‘nice to meet you,’ he’d pull her into his embrace and kiss her senseless. She could practically taste him on her tongue, and yet she’d never even heard him speak. People who had, who were later interrogated by Ruby, mentioned that he had an accent. British or Irish, or something along those lines. That tidbit had played oh so sweetly in Emma’s mind this week. God, she’d love to hear him say her name -,

“Emma,” a voice beside her said, but it didn’t pull her out of the fog. “Oh my God, Emma, he’s looking right at you.”

“He’s what?” Emma said, blinking back to reality before finding that Doctor Jones was looking this way. She’d been so busy fantasizing, she stopped paying attention to what was right in front of her.

In the middle of the room, the man who had intrigued her for over a week was standing totally still, disregarding the swarm of people on all sides. His entire attention had shifted from the task ahead of him, and he was looking at her, staring with a blend of intrigue and something Emma couldn’t describe. Doctor Nolan had stopped as well, but he was clearly confused as to the delay. He seemed to ask his friend what was wrong, and Emma watched spell bound, as the lips she’d envisioned kissing her moved in some kind of unheard reply. She couldn’t make out his words, but she shivered at the passion and determination etched across his being. David then looked their way, and Emma knew that Doctor Jones – Killian - had asked about them. No, forget that, he had asked about her. He was looking right at her, and that spark of heat and desire she’d always imagined was nowhere near as tantalizing as the real thing. He was looking at her with the same hunger she’d reserved for her wildest imaginings. Holy crap, what was she going to do?

“Ruby?” she asked, her voice squeaked out in alarm. She tore her gaze from the approaching object of her desire and looked to her best friend with overt confusion and mild panic.

“Took him long enough to spot you. It’s been almost a week. I thought I was going to have to hire a marching band or one of those giant arrow guys they have at outlet malls.”

Emma didn’t understand, and then it dawned on her – her friend had planned this. Emma looked at Mary Margaret, but she was still staring in the distance. Only when Emma followed her gaze did she realize that Mary Margaret wasn’t looking at Killian. She was looking at David.

“Hey, ladies, you looking to order, or what? I ain’t got all day!”

The three of them jumped at the barista’s interruption and Mary Margaret surged ahead to the line. She rattled off an order, giving way too much money to the attendant while grabbing her cup with shaky hands. Then she looked at David and back to Emma with an expression that said Mary Margaret may just bolt. Ok, what the actual hell was going on?

Before she could begin to answer that internal question, Doctor Jones and Doctor Nolan were within ear shot. Emma wracked her brain for something to say when they finally got here, but was spared when David broke the ice.

“Doctor Swan,” he said with a head nod and a polite smile. They knew each other peripherally at this point. Emma had consulted on numerous ER cases since Doctor Nolan started his new position. But she wouldn’t call them friends. They were very much acquaintances. “I heard Earl MacDonald is recovering nicely. He most definitely has you to thank for that.”

“And you too,” she said, offering credit where it was due. “A quick diagnosis makes all the difference. I’ve noticed the ER is filled with them since you started.”

“That’s kind of you. I don’t believe you’ve met my friend, Doctor Jones.”

“Killian,” Doctor Jones said immediately, before offering a heart stopping smile of his own. Emma had yet to see the man smile, and her heart skipped a beat, the rhythm of her pulse skittering in an almost blissful way. “A pleasure to meet you, Swan.”

He offered his hand to her, and Emma took it, shaking in greeting even though it was uncommon for doctors or nursing staff to do so. Chief Mills stressed that germ management was a top priority at Mist Haven, and she’d come as close to banning the practice as was legal in the state of Massachusetts. Usually Emma didn’t mind, but germs were the farthest thing from her radar when their fingers touched. Instead, Emma was filled with the zapping sense of promise and a thrill of warmth that made her head swim.

“Emma,” she whispered. A beat passed between them, and Emma lost herself for too long. Only the clearing of a throat beside them brought her back to the moment. She let go of his hand, but tracked the slight disappointment on his face when she did. It filled her with a rush of something long forgotten. A sense of peace and elation she hadn’t tasted in years. “Um these are my friends, Ruby Lucas and Mary Margaret Blanchard. Ruby’s the head nurse in the cardiac unit. And Mary Margaret runs OT for the surgical division.”

Emma tore her gaze from Killian, watching her friends make their greetings. Ruby handled her own completely, and Mary Margaret seemed to have gathered her courage, but now it was David who looked shocked and spell bound. Everyone appeared to be thrown off kilter, and it was only Ruby in control of herself. To say her friend was positively delighted with these new developments would be an understatement. That glee rang out clear as day in her invite to both the attending doctors.

“So… Doctor Nolan, Doctor Jones, any way we could convince you to join us? The coffee’s just all right, but the company’s not half bad.”

Both men agreed immediately, and Emma fought her hardest not to blush. It was hard though, and her pulse was racing in the face of this development. Killian came to stand by her, the space between them so small but still too much to bear. She tried to get her bearings as the cranky barista handed her a latte. She struggled to think of something – anything – to say, but she was tongue tied. Instead, she looked at Killian, finding an openness in his expression that said he felt the same exact way. That gave her comfort and removed some of the tension from the moment.

“The hospital’s been buzzing since you got here,” Emma offered, waiting with him while he ordered a no nonsense coffee of his own. “A lot of people are hoping you’ll stay on past the month.”

“And you, love? Have you such hopes?” his words were earnest but laced with an almost cocky easiness that sent Emma’s mind humming in delight. Still, she played it cool. At least she hoped she did.

“Jury’s still out,” she replied, smiling when he looked a little crestfallen. “Well can you blame me? I hardly even know you. Still haven’t seen what you’re capable of.”

“Only a matter of time, Swan. You can trust in that.”

His words may seem benign, but they were loaded with hidden meaning, and Emma knew he meant each one. She swallowed harshly, thinking of the things he might be capable of. Damn, was it hot in here? Or was it just the devil on her shoulder spinning another one of those dirty dreams of hers?

When they’d all gotten a coffee, the five of them moved off to the patio just outside, reserved for hospital staff. The grounds were manicured beautifully, maintaining an oasis that seemed totally disconnected from the hectic nature of the hospital. This was one of Emma’s favorite places here, and she was surprised to hear that neither David nor Killian had been here yet. They all spent a few minutes making non-threatening small talk, with mostly Ruby moving the conversations along. But despite the fluttering feeling she was grappling with, Emma couldn’t say she hated this building anticipation. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she had enjoyed herself so much. She was seated next to Killian, fully aware that all of his attention was devoted to her, and she reveled in it. At one point, while the others were talking about something with the OT department, Killian whispered to her and her alone.

“This might be presumptuous of me, love, but I find I’m helpless to resist. I was wondering – that is, I was hoping that perhaps, you and I, we could…” His eyes looked from hers down to her lips, and Emma wet them absentmindedly. She heard a low growl, and realized it was coming from him. She shifted in her seat, turned on in a way she had never been before. Instinctively she moved closer, sensing the sinfully sweet current between them, like lightning just before it cracked across the summer sky.

“We could…” she continued, hoping he would elaborate and put into words what she herself was wishing for.

“That we could -,”

“Paging all staff to the ER. All staff to the ER for an incoming trauma, category 4.”

This time the PA was most definitely broadcasting a hospital wide announcement, and the irony wasn’t lost on Emma. Ruby looked positively forlorn at the interruption, but it was somewhat poetic after how they’d gotten here.

“Category four,” David repeated, standing immediately, prompting all of them to do the same. “We haven’t had a four since I started. We’re gonna need all hands on deck. Killian?”

“Aye, mate. I’m with you.” He looked back to Emma, and only had time for the swiftest goodbye. “Until next time, love.”

Emma and her friends watched them go, running towards the ER. Belatedly, they realized that if a trauma of that magnitude was coming into the hospital, there were bound to be surgical cases flooding their ward soon enough. They hustled back to their wing, focused once more on their jobs and the lives on the line that they were sworn to help heal and make better. But Emma still carried that moment with her for the rest of the day, and when the shift was over and done, and she’d done all she could to help the people in her care, she was left wondering what exactly Doctor Jones was hoping to ask, and when, oh when, he may try to do so again.

Post-Note: So there we have it. This was originally going to be a oneshot for my CS mixtape series, but alas, the muse wants what she wants, and this time that’s a three part mini-story for all of us to share. Hope that you guys have enjoyed so far and I would love to hear what you think! As always, thanks so much for reading, and I hope you are all staying well in this crazy time! xE

[shrinkthisviolet]

For the title tag game, reaching up to touch the sky, just like a tornado (taking us by storm), Stay Gold, and Amelia Parker au

reaching up to touch the sky

Ooh well I’ve talked so much about this one (see “oc: morgan wells” and “morgan wells au”) 😂 but I have some updates since then! I’m currently working on the 2x11 oneshot, and making headway on some of the s1 stuff, so that’s exciting! Jesse and Morgan are officially going to be at odds now, since they have to be before Jesse is rescued…and Jesse, in her anger at Morgan, may have figured out a way to (temporarily) block off their link 👀 (this is gonna be important for when they’re on the same Earth and need to do it to avoid debilitating migraines. Jesse and Morgan vibrate at different frequencies, so their link isn’t stable/compatible unless they’re on their own Earths)

Oh also, Barry and Morgan may become stepsiblings in the future 👀 that’ll be fun! Especially with the Savitar arc incoming (the stepsibling thing will happen after that, but since my reimagining of Savitar is Future Barry, he already knows that this will happen)

Yeah, you’re right. Something does need to be done.

Jesse…?

Don’t worry, I won’t tell him I know. I’ll make sure he never suspects. I’m not suicidal, after all.

Morgan froze. Why do you sound like you’re saying goodbye?

Because I am.

just like a tornado (taking us by storm)

This is the WIP that’s been in my folder for a year now 😂 I’ve talked about it here, but basically, Iris takes a calmer approach to Barry in 5x18, empathizing with him and validating his feelings but also reminding him that Thawne is manipulative and Nora probably doesn’t know everything. Which…I hope is what she was trying to say in canon, instead of “maybe he’s not that bad” and dismissing Barry’s trauma along with her own for nothing more than cheap drama 💀

It also uses this post to attempt to explain some of Iris’s reasoning for dampening Nora’s powers. Grief is one reason, but…it occurs to me that metas being illegal could be another. Because…where is Team Flash? Where are their meta allies? Their biggest threat in the future is still Cicada, someone who steals metas’ powers…a villain like that would have an easy time finding a foothold in the wake of anti-meta laws, wouldn’t they?

(Also Nora is 18, as she will always be when I write about her, because I reject her being in her late 20s)

Iris opens her mouth to argue in Nora’s defense…but then reason sinks in. Nora’s a teenage girl, newly independent, and already on strained terms with her mother. There’s a very real possibility that she doesn’t know everything about her mother’s decision—or at least, that she doesn’t understand it. God knows I was never the most perceptive at 18.

stay gold

the CK time travel AU!! If you’ve read the series, you know the gist: Sam, Tory, and Aisha stuck in the past after being transported from 2x4. So far, we’ve had them winning Daniel and his mom’s trust, antagonizing the Cobras, befriending Ali (Sam did, at least), saving Dali’s relationship from briefly exploding by forcing the explanation conversation to happen earlier, and Sam winning the AVT.

In the next installment…well, it’ll have an enemies to friends arc for Sam and Johnny, who are undoubtedly one of the cornerstone relationships of this series, Samguel will be hinted at more than a few times, the trio + Daniel will befriend the Cobras…and Sam will meet some familiar faces in the past!

Sam sighed, hopping around on her left foot as she slipped on jeans and a shirt. She’d gone shopping with Ali, Susan, and Barbara a few days before the tournament, but she’d only had a little pocket change from her own time, so she’d had to rely on the girls buying stuff for her.

It had felt a lot like charity, and it stung. Especially since she vaguely remembered that exact discomfort mirrored on Miguel’s face a few times, in the short time they’d dated.

Amelia Parker AU

Ooh well basically, Amelia (fc Millie Bobby Brown) is Peter’s 4-5-years-younger little sister who doesn’t get Blipped. She gets put into foster care and bounces between a few families before finding a home that she grows to love.

She’s friends with Gwen Stacy (fc Lana Condor) in her childhood, who moves away during the Blip after one of her parents gets Blipped. However, she comes back for college!

She is close friends with Norman Osborn (fc Xolo Maridueña), they meet in high school. Norman’s twin brother, Harry, was Blipped (possibly his mom too, I haven’t decided), so now his dad’s pressuring him to take up business as a career, which Harry has been primed to do, which Norman had not until now. Norman and Amelia bond, and presumably become something more eventually 👀

There’s going to be some Tension between Amelia and Peter in NWH, because Amelia finds out about Peter being Spidey…not from Peter himself, but from Mysterio’s video. Understandably, she’s hurt by it. Peter, meanwhile, still sees her as his baby sister, instead of who she is now, which is a few months older than him. It’s a trip 😂

“Uh-huh.” Her brother, as usual, couldn’t keep a single thing from her. “Well, May says you must like MJ, because she’s over all the time, and sometimes you get flustered when you talk to her, and your cheeks go all red—yeah, like that!” She pointed at him with a grin, as his blush grew by the second.

“It-it’s not—she’s really—stop laughing!” Peter protested, but Amelia’s laughter persisted in earnest.

ask me about my wips!