#world's fair was about getting completely lost in fiction

[canislupusangelus]

ISTTVG could not have come at a better point in my life tbh...... like very beginning of summer break, right before my 17th birthday, after a year of (more severe than it had been for a while) depression. And I watched it with two of the people I love most. It was insane.

[transmasc-tabris]

.

[guardians-ofthe-lastyoungkilljoy]

three coffees please - verstappen / ricciardo

(gif not mine @maxgovroom)

pairing: max x fem driver!reader x daniel

summary: Max, Daniel, and you. Inseparable. Their bond from childhood rivals to best friends to lovers.

themes/warnings: alcohol, no smut, domestic, fluff, some angst, hint of daniel being possessive, daniel's tattoos, no use of y/n THIS IS FICTION

wc: 1.8k

a/n: craving maxiel x reader that isn't straight up smut so enjoy this completely self indulgent fic. also trying to get back into writing so if you have request pls put them through <3

read on ao3 https://archiveofourown.org/works/59444749

You and Max grew up racing together in karting. Your families weren’t friends but you two gravitated towards each other after a few years of hard racing and a fair share of head butting. Your shared love of cats really began your relationship. 

You were usually the only girl at the track so you were subject to endless teasing from the other boys about many things, including your close friendship with Max. It didn’t really matter though, you or Max ran them off track eventually and the comments and snide remarks stopped. 

Your relationship with Max never grew from more than a friendship, except for that one time when you were thirteen and you shared each other’s first kiss behind a building behind a building before a race, for good luck of course. You and Max ended up sharing a 1-2. 

Max ended up joining the Red Bull Driver Academy whilst you joined the Mercedes Driver Academy. The rival academies were of no concern to either of you and had long ago figured out how to manage your relationship on and off track. 

Max ended up making his Formula 1 debut a year earlier than you. This was when he properly made Daniel’s acquaintance. 

Daniel. Charming. Loud. Handsome. Cheerful. The Australian had the motorsport world wrapped around his tattooed fingers, including Max. Many of your phone calls with Max that year involved a funny anecdote about Daniel’s antics that week. 

You joined the grid a year later, driving for Williams and wanting to prove yourself for the Mercedes seat. No one was more excited than Max, eager to have his childhood best friend and now F1 best friend in the same place for twenty something weekends a year. 

You finally met Daniel that year. He was everything you thought and more. His kindness and genuine nature surprised you, having pulled you aside for coffee and a quick chat during pre-season testing. After all, it wasn’t long ago that he was a young, nervous rookie. 

You were sucked into the shiny whirlpool of Daniel Ricciardo soon after. Hangouts with Max in his Monaco apartment on off weeks turned into the three of you spending hours on each other’s living room floors. On the days where distance separated the three of you, Facetime calls and gaming sessions were the norm. 

You and Daniel started seeing each other three years into your F1 career. At this point, you had lost the last of your baby fat and had grown into a beautiful young woman. Daniel had always thought you were beautiful, but recently, you had become something otherworldly. 

It started after someone’s birthday celebration in some Monaco nightclub. You and Daniel danced together as you always had, but Daniel’s grip on your hips was tighter and the way he leaned down on your neck was closer than he had ever been. He eyed off other men, daring them to try and take a piece, knowing he’d come out on top. 

Max was oblivious to the entire situation, too blind drunk to notice the lingering touches as you and Daniel helped him into bed at the end of the night.

A light hand on your hip, a longing glance in the dim light of the kitchen ended with you in the guest room, wrapped in Daniel’s arms as he worshiped you until the early hours of the morning. 

Daniel greeted you with a cup of coffee, an old Red Bull shirt he kept at Max’s, and a joke that you looked good in the red and dark blue. 

You two started up a breakfast in the kitchen, bringing out a hungover and bleary eyed Max from his room. Max didn’t catch the look shared between yourself and Daniel, a silent agreement to not tell Max about the night before. Max ignored the Red Bull shirt with the giant 3 on the back, chalking it up to not wanting to wear alcohol ridden clothes, rather than a sign of Daniel’s claim on you. 

You and Daniel continued seeing each other for the next year. Well, “seeing” each other in loose terms. You kept it casual, aware of the challenges of romance as an F1 driver, more so between two drivers and even more so when you’re the first female F1 driver in what felt like forever. Still, for what it’s worth, both of you never saw another person. 

Max began catching on soon enough. A flash of pink fabric behind a closing door of Daniel’s room, much too small for one of Daniel’s loud shirts. Fading bruises on your chest, only noticeable up close on yacht days in the summer. Max seeing Daniel going into your room late Saturday night and seeing you two walk into the paddock together the next morning. 

Safe to say, Max was confused. He wasn’t upset that you and Daniel were hanging out without him. It would be more weird if you two weren’t. But the nature of your relationship was confusing to him, enough for him to begin digging. 

Now, Max wasn’t one to snoop, but he’s known you long enough for you not to care. You were in the shower after some shared training which was good enough an opportunity for him. Your password remained the same, but Max scrolled past the games he’d play on your phone to your photo album. Nothing out of the ordinary, some dumb selfies and pictures from the paddock and Monaco.

Two photos caught his eye. The first, a dark room illuminated by the flash from your phone. You were lying against your sheets, hair messy on the pillow behind you. You were smiling, eyes tired, but there was an unmistakable hand with a rose tattoo around your neck - Daniel. The second, less obvious but still recognisable to Max. The morning light was streaming through your window and a man sat on the edge of your bed, his back to the camera. The defining curls were definitely Daniels and the muscles on his back were the same ones Max had been admiring for years. 

Max put the phone back where he found it. He had the confirmation he wanted but it didn’t settle the heavy pit in his stomach. Both you and Daniel were attractive people, there was no denying that. He’d even caught himself looking at you both several times throughout the years. Sometimes he was delusional enough to think the looks were reciprocated, but that would be in his wildest dreams. 

The feeling was no longer confusion. It was a strange myriad of emotions he’d only felt in fleeting moments, quickly shut down by his brain. The dam is open now. A feeling longing for his best friends, the people he loved most and could never define his relationship with. Jealousy, not directed at a single person, but perhaps at both of you in a way Max could not understand yet. Betrayal, for not being told or trusted enough with this information, when Max could tell the both of you anything. 

You could tell something was bothering Max, but you never pushed. He’d come to you when he was ready. Years of knowing Max has taught you enough of his emotional processing. Still, you brought it up to Daniel one night in bed. He assumed it was stress at Red Bull, but you thought otherwise. 

It came to a boil at Daniel’s apartment one night. The three of you organised a casual homemade dinner. You answered the door with dishevelled hair, blaming it on training earlier in the day but if anything, it was from certain activities prior to Max’s arrival. 

All three of you had a few drinks that night. Max was sober enough to know what was happening but had enough alcohol to count as liquid courage. 

Max sat on a beanbag on the floor, eyeing you and Daniel on the couch. You sat on the end with a glass of wine, Daniel right next to you, thighs touching yours despite the spacious couch. 

I know you two have been hooking up. 

Shock. Panic. Backs against a corner. Words stuck in a clogged throat. 

Apologies streamed out, from you and Daniel. Your hand ended up in Max’s hair, your other holding his hand. Daniel on Max’s other side, holding his hand and arm. Tears came from all three of you. 

Max sat there, almost numb and resigned. He was hurt, but he also hated seeing you and Daniel like this. Maybe it was the alcohol, maybe the heightened emotions or the unholy combination of both. 

Consequences be damned. The three of you will emerge from the aftermath later, like always. Max just needed his people. 

Max leaned in to you and cut you off mid sentence with a hard kiss. Another round of shock, then confusion from which emerged a feeling of familiarity. These were the same lips that touched yours all those years ago. This was Max, who always had your back. Your Maxie. You kissed him back and the grip he had on your hand tightened. 

Max pulled away, breathless and eyes wide. But breathing was you, and breathing was Daniel so he pulled Daniel in by the curls on the back of his head. Daniel pressed in as much as he could because this was Max. His Max, and when he had no one, he always had Max. 

They had each other that night, making up for emotions and lost time, where nothing else mattered but the three of you. 

Max lay in between you and Daniel in the sobering dawn light. You leaned on your forearm, running your fingers through Max’s hair. Daniel lay half asleep, cuddled into Max’s side. 

I need you. Both. 

Max spoke those words into the ceiling. A crossroads, that would forever change the trajectory of your lives. 

Daniel blinked sleepily at you. Another silent communication, that perhaps Max was the missing piece between the both of you; the catalyst for the next step. 

We’ll have you.

Always. 

You layed back down, tucking yourself into Max’s side. Daniel tightened his grip around Max’s waist and drifted off into sleep. 

Life became a little simpler after. You all kept your own apartments, but every night was a sleepover with your best friends. Things eventually started migrating between places; toothbrushes in mugs, each other’s hobbies and crafts and everyone’s favourite snacks having a permanent stash in each other’s apartments. 

Daniel liked to begin mornings by bringing in coffee for the three of you. He blamed the Italian in him when Max protested one early morning and tried to bury himself further into the sheets and you. 

He was an extrovert and a lover at heart, so it wasn’t a surprise when Daniel’s personal team found out about the relationship first. The public would never know, they were long ago used to seeing the three of you out and about, even when the catch ups turned into dinner dates. 

Daniel was a giver, proven to him on the night Max won his first championship. A quiet moment on the balcony of his hotel room, watching you and Max slow dance, the lights of the city reflecting on your slinky black dress. He realised he would give anything for you and Max. 

[avelera]

Maintaining Scope of Violence in Your Story's World

I saw an interesting discussion in the Baldur's Gate 3 subreddit, commenting how a player's immersion was broken when a version of the player character, known as "The Dark Urge", is apparently to blame for a particularly brutal murder and yet the companion characters don't turn on him/her/them immediately. The commenter was baffled given the brutality of the killing. Yet many replies pointed out that other members of the party are also murderers or tapdancing on the edge of committing atrocities, not to mention other mitigating circumstances that it would be spoilers to go into.

This got me thinking about scope of violence in genre fiction and how, on top of all the other difficult jobs the writer has before them, establishing what level of violence is "commonplace" vs "shocking" can be a surprisingly delicate process.

(Cut for length. Includes references to Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon, John Wick, and NBC's Hannibal in an exploration of how to establish the scope and scale of on-screen violence. TW for discussions of violence against children in shows like GoT and HotD, though it is largely in abstract terms.)

I'm reminded of "House of the Dragon" (HotD) which, I must confess, I found to have rather patchy and uneven writing.

One moment in HotD that I found rather dissonant, shall we say, was when a child of the nobility loses his eye in a brawl with other children. His mother, an aristocrat, is understandably horrified and enraged. However, some of the threats she makes to equally powerful Houses over the incident feel, dare I say, disproportionate to the event, given that her threats could lead to the world as she knows it being plunged into civil war, all over what amounts to a tussle between children, albeit one that ends in a particularly gruesome manner.

On the one hand, any modern mother likely would completely freak out at such an appalling injury as a lost eye from a knife fight between children. That would be a major shock to a modern community, where such violence is quite rare. And in fairness, the aristocrats of the world of "Game of Thrones" and HotD by extension are largely insulated by their privilege from the day to day violence we see portrayed in the series. If anyone was realistically going to have a modern response to a child's maiming, it would be the sheltered daughter of a noble house with regards to her beloved child.

However, as understandable as her reaction might be to modern viewers and to those who take into account her sheltered upbringing, in my mind, the show's narrative wobbled there in terms of establishing the level of violence that is considered commonplace in the world of HotD/GoT. In the first season of Game of Thrones, we famously saw a child pushed out of a window, permanently disabled and left in a coma for months, and while this is a major event that creates a great deal of tension and conflict, ultimately the family after their attempts at individual revenge the fact is they can't start a civil war over this single event. So in a way we're sort of left with: this is just a thing that happens that we have to suck up and deal with, even if certain individuals might wish to and continue to pursue a personal vendetta. Couple that with commoner children being murdered and the deaths going completely unremarked upon by wider society, we're left with the impression of a world in which brutality, even brutality against children which would grind a modern community to a halt, is simply an ugly and relatively common part of life. A life with so much ugliness and personal violence that it really almost gets lost amidst all the other horrors.

Which makes the HotD mother's reaction feel... disproportionate. Not in relation to her child's suffering, which is entirely understandable, but her view of what retaliation constitutes a proportional response comes across as hysterical. Too modern. Children are horrifically injured in the GoT/HotD world all the time. Frankly, by comparison, a lost eye is almost minor compared to a loss of mobility in a rigorously martial world, access to which Bran lost with his fall. We don't get as good of a set up of what the conflicting morals of this world are, we don't get the comparison between commoner and noble children as clearly as in GoT, we don't really get all the conflicting views of "When is it normal to start a civil war over a child's injury?" - the sense of scope and scale of violence and how we and the characters are supposed to react to it... wobbles.

Along these lines, I've also pointed out that in shows like NBC's Hannibal, the show is scrupulously careful about not really referencing global events like wars. In my mind, there's a simple reason for that. Your average drone attack on civilians in the Middle East kills more innocent people by accident than Hannibal Lecter has ever killed in his entire murderous career. Compared to weapons of war, one murderous serial killer is barely a rounding error in terms of death and human suffering. So the show has to remain almost claustrophobically intimate so we never get confronted with the "So what?" of the individual death and human suffering Hannibal and the other serial killers bring about on a very close, personal basis. The horror style is meant to force us to imagine ourselves if we were the victims (or the killer) in these incredibly intimate murders. If our suffering was writ large. If every individual death was massively significant. But this is in contrast with real world mass casualty events which would dwarf many times all of the deaths in the Hannibal show combined.

As a final example, the moment the first season of "True Detective" lost me was when the value of a single life also wobbled dramatically. The conceit of the show is that a single murder, or a half dozen at most, murders of young white women is worthy of a major, multi-year investigation. Yet when the investigation inadvertently leads to an outbreak of violence in a predominantly black community, shown almost immediately to kill more people (in front of their children, even) than were lost in the entire murder spree of white women that's being investigated, the show didn't seem to care at all. Individual white female victims were worthy of a breathless investigation into their untimely loss, but twice that number of black people killed in an outbreak of violence directly linked to the investigation didn't even seem worthy of commentary or reflection at all. The value of a single human life was no longer consistent. If these deaths aren't worthy of justice, then why should I care about the few individual deaths being investigated?

As with any measuring of scope in fiction, it's very hard for the author to do alone. It really is an instance where an outside pair of eyes is incredibly valuable.

But things to keep in mind while crafting a narrative around violence is just how much are readers or viewers supposed to be alarmed by individual acts of violence. It's common and indeed necessary for modern media to establish the rules of its world. Even stories nominally set in "our" world actually do almost as much worldbuilding as any fantasy tale in this respect. In a cop drama where each episode is built around a single murder, we need to inhabit a world where a single murder is worthy of dozens of people spending time and resources bringing the killer to justice. In such a world, a mass casualty event of several deaths should be shocking. To this end, like in NBC's Hannibal, it's probably best to avoid mentions of mass casualty events caused by war or natural disasters.

By contrast, an action film like John Wick might place less value on individual deaths (beyond the motivating deaths of a single dog, which is thoroughly commented on within the story as feeling disproportionate and therein lies much of what makes the plot so unique. I'd argue it is also the cutest dog ever born, but I digress). We're not going to see a lurid headline, "John Wick murders 26 local men in cold blood, read about this tragic loss along with quotes by their devastated wives and children on page 6". To a certain extent, the violence there is meant to be just shocking enough to thrill, but we're not meant to get too invested in the details of the actual body count.

And, to go even more extreme, in war or disaster movies, we see or have narrated that thousands have died at a time. Again, to go back to Game of Thrones/House of the Dragon, one reason it's hard to see the mother's reaction to her child's maiming as anything but a bit disproportionate is because we see with such brutality hundreds if not thousands of men, women, and children dying directly or indirectly as a result of war. While it's understandable that a mother would burn the world down for an injury to her child, we're not well placed to agree with or sympathize with her reactions on the broader scale, in terms of retribution that would lead to war, against a backdrop of brutal mass casualty events in the thousands where even more families are devastated and more children injured or killed.

As a final, positive word on the Game of Thrones universe, the early seasons of the GoT were actually very good at controlling the audience's reaction to the scope of violence. Namely, the Battle of the Blackwater sticks out in my mind. The world of GoT is so grounded in the mud, in ugly, personal but intimate violence done with hands or blades, otherwise rudimentary weapons, that the first time we see an explosion on a near-modern scale feels as genuinely breathtaking to modern eyes as it might have to the Medieval-eseque eyes of that world. Yet there are movies chock-full of explosions where the explosions lose impact and importance, become background noise, because they're simply one of many. By rigorously tamping down and limiting the scope and type of violence to largely hand to hand combat, Game of Thrones set up a moment where modern warfare-style explosions are awe-inspiring. Against that backdrop, the appearance of fire-breathing dragons on the battlefield is also arresting, though their capabilities would likely be dwarfed by a modern fighter jet and many viewers of GoT would be familiar with films where the scope and scale of violence is much bigger and more explosive. It feels big in GoT because the scope and scale has been so small to that point.

Once you as a writer have established the modernity of your violence, the scope and scale of it, the average body count, the importance of a single human life, it's important to stick to it. If a character has a differing view, then they should be noted as having it by the narrative. A grizzled war veteran might shrug at a small town murder investigation of a single individual, but a sleepy town might lose its mind over it. In the modern world, the lives of children are put on the highest pedestal, but once you establish in your world that some children's lives are of lower value, then showing a mother act with an understandable modern sensibility of horror and outrage still needs to be commented on so we understand where her reaction falls within her society, especially if it's in contrast. That is what teaches us how to watch and appreciate the narrative choices as they're meant to be appreciated.

[scribbleseas]

an indignant pawn story: the door

Description: Taking place hours after the events of The Indignant Pawn, Ciel Phantomhive anxiously awaits an update from the room in front of him.

Warnings: extreme grief, violence, mentions of blood, crying, regrets, laughing at really inappropriate times, just really really sad, angst & no comfort.

Author’s Note: Hi, Everyone!

For those of you who might be seeing my work for the first time, this is a spinoff short from my first complete fan fiction: The Indignant Pawn! I suggest checking it out if you are interested in a hitwoman/runaway royalty!reader x Ciel Phantomhive, a lot of deception, fierce enemies to lovers, and a couple that will fight the world for each other. If that sounds cool to you, I highly suggest heading over to the masterlist linked below before you read this.

Anyway, I hope you like this! Even though it’s a little depressing, lol. In all fairness, an explanation was asked of me. I work for ya’ll.

Happy Reading!

Stay Alive,

Dan

THE INDIGNANT PAWN MASTERLIST

MAY 13TH, 1895

SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN, GERMANY

For the first time in eight years, tears ran down Ciel Phantomhive’s cheeks. His throat was raw. His nose was running. A tumultuous combination of rage and grief tore at his heart as it beat in his chest. It worked overtime. His lungs worked overtime as his breaths came in ragged inhales, forcing air in, forcing air out. A forming headache throbbed in his temples.

Crying changes nothing, he reminded himself. Crying wouldn’t repair the damage in Y/n’s chest. Crying wouldn’t have stopped the bullet that was meant for him— it was meant for him. There was no denying it.

And that’s what made his guilt gnaw at him. He should have been bleeding. Dying. It was his adversary, his bullet, and his inaction that allowed Y/n to get shot.

“My Lord,” Sebastian started, only for Ciel to silence him with a glance before fixating his stare on the door. Don’t you dare speak to me, you traitor.

“At the very least, you should change, sir,” Sebastian was the only one to speak in the waiting room. Everyone else sat in silence, save for Lizzie’s sniffling. The room smelled of antiseptic and it was cold, but nobody complained. Nobody moved.

Ciel ignored the suggestion. He stared ahead at the door separating him from the operating room. From Y/n. If he could trade his place for hers, he would. It should have been him. It should have been. What was Y/n thinking?

She wasn’t thinking. She was selfless, protecting him on instinct.

She was selfless….And the world was cruel.

She didn’t deserve this.

He did. He should have protected her on instinct— but his weren’t nearly as swift as hers. It hurt to admit, but there was no other explanation.

“Ciel, he’s right,” Lizzie tried. “Your clothes are…” she said weekly, unsure of how to remind Ciel that he was covered in Y/n’s blood; and that his wedding suit was soiled with the bride’s blood. There was even a red tint on his hands, the sick smell of iron on them, no matter how Lizzie tried to clean them off for him. He didn’t care about his hands or his clothing.

Y/n was likely dying. How could he think to change when he could lose her?

After she lost consciousness, the medic arrived and did all he could to stabilize her before there was no choice but to transfer her to the nearest hospital for emergency surgery. As the medical field expanded (especially in Germany), surgeons liked to make teaching lectures out of every surgery. However given the high-profile victim and near-impossible condition Marie was in, the hospital ensured her procedure was private.

To them, it would be Princess Marie of Schleswig-Holstein dying. Only the real Marie had already been dead for months before then!

The irony made the corner of his mouth twitch, and a heartbroken cackle threatened to rip out of his sore throat before Lizzie said his name again, sobering him

“…Ciel?”

“Elizabeth. Honestly,” Ciel warned flatly. The oak door separating the waiting room from the sterile operating room was beginning to antagonize him. By now, Ciel committed most of its knots, age lines, indents— even the tarnish on the brass knob. He detested that door. He wanted to kick it off its hinges…almost as much as he wanted to kick his demon’s head off his shoulders. Stomp on the severed head. That. Deceitful. Bastard.

He needed to punish that wretch for utterly disobeying his order. They had a bloody contract for a bloody reason, did they not?

“I’m sorry, Ciel,” Lizzie took a sharp inhale, chastened. She pursed her lips and released them. Her wary eyes lingered on him for a beat longer, concerned for him. She watched him strike Sebastian so hard that his knuckles started bleeding. And then, Ciel spent half the carriage ride laughing hysterically at her side. He’d laughed until his sides hurt and his cheeks pinched. He was laughing at the situational irony while his tears grieved its fallout. After all, Y/n only came into his life because she was tasked with killing him! And she was on a surgery table because she wanted to save his life!

Not to mention, she was sure Mariana would sabotage them. She was convinced. Ciel had reassured her in vain.

Herr intuition was perfect. Diego even warned them. They should have called off the wedding. The princess should never have to save the Earl— it was an affront to those childish tales she loved so much. It was a torture to be saved. It hurt less to be the martyr because they aren’t responsible for toiling in the changed world without them.

Ciel looked back to the door. Nothing lasts forever.

Someone you love is someone you can lose, Ciel recalled.“Someone I love could be someone I lost…” he mumbled in extension of the thought, tensing when he realized he spoke the latter aloud.

“I know, Ciel, but you should have something to eat, at least. Or have some water, or tea. You’ve been standing there for hours. Sit,” Ciel’s cousin reminded him, but he didn’t dignify it with a response. He couldn’t sit and eat. He wouldn’t.

“My Lord, I have an update…” the lead surgeon shouldered through the operating room’s door and into the waiting room. His face was marred with exhaustion, having performed a surgery so late into the night and without a break.

Ciel held his breath.

Please be alive, Y/n. I need you.

[i-myeoni-blogs]

From (2022- Ongoing) – TV series Review

Creator – John Griffin

Genre – Science fiction, Horror, Supernatural

First episode Release Date – 20 Feb 2022

Introduction –

Imagine getting trapped in an unknown place with unknown creatures lurking in the dark and no way to escape! Sounds terrifying, right? John Griffin’s creation, From, perfectly exemplifies a spine-chilling experience. It is a series that will leave you with suspense and a cliffhanger. Started in 2022, From is an ongoing series that has completed three seasons. The latest season aired in September 2024 and had a total of 10 episodes. This gripping TV series leaves the audiences curious with many questions yet to be answered.

Plot Analysis –

From begins with a family of four driving to their new home in “The Township” but getting trapped in a strange and unfamiliar place. By the day, the place remains normal and peaceful, but as the night falls it becomes a terrifying nightmare to live in.

The town that remains unknown to the outer world, is in the middle of somewhere. No matter where the characters were driving to, they all ended up in the town suggests there’s more eerie than just the creatures.

Where unknown creatures that look human lurk with sinister smiles ready for some blood and flesh. Their manipulative words to lure people out of their houses that were protected by Talismans. The people in the town were all traveling somewhere but somehow ended up in this town trying their best to see another daylight. Boyd Stevens played by Harold Perrineau; a veteran who takes up the position of sheriff to keep everyone safe.

But the place had some other plans, as the show advances many questions arise about ‘the boy in white’, ‘the faraway tree’, and of course ‘the creatures’.  The town itself has become a place that feeds on fear, with all the supernatural things. That messes up with people’s minds, making them do things they’d regret later. The series explores the mystery, fragility of the events, confusion, dilemma, and pure horror as the people try their best to unravel the mystery and find a way out. Making it different from any other evil-spirited horrors.

Characters and acting –

The more I say the less it is, every character in the series owns their role perfectly. But Boyd Stevens played by Harold Perrineau is one of the main characters who shines with the main character's energy. He stole the show with his great acting as his portrayal of a leader with flaws adds naturality and depth to his character. Especially with the tough decisions he had to take, making him stand out.

Julie Matthews played by Hannah Cheramy; by the end of season 3 becomes the center of the story with more mystery for the upcoming season.

Victor Kavanaugh played by Scott McCord who survived in the town for longer than anyone else holds an important part since the beginning of the series.

Characters like Tabitha (Catalina Sandino Moreno), Jade (David Alpay), and Sara (Avery Konard) also delivered commendable performances making them an important part of the series. The whole cast, the supporting characters, and the team bring the supernatural world of ‘From’ to life. Making it a successful and intriguing series besides ‘Lost’, ‘Stranger Things’ and ‘Riverdale’.

Miss –

While From has its fair share of captivating moments, it’s not without flaws. The pacing can feel sluggish, especially for viewers who prefer a faster narrative. Major revelations are withheld until the later seasons, which may test the patience of some. With only 10 episodes per season, the series occasionally feels stretched, leaving audiences craving more progress.

Verdict –

With its different story and fear-gripping concept, the series hooks viewers from the start. The introduction episodes in season 1, slowly take flow in season 2 and get a few things answered in season 3. The series makes the viewer keep coming back for more with an interesting plot and essential cliffhangers. If you are a fan of horror and mystery, this series is for you because it’ll keep you guessing ‘what’ll be next?’

Rating – 8.5/10

Recommendation – Highly Recommended.

[manonamora-if]

February Check-In

From here on out, we should be back on track - IRL be damned (crossing fingers with that). Unless someone throws another wrench...

Anyway, let's not think about the bummer stuff...

Here's to a hopefully "normal" month with stuff actually being checked off a list!

Onto the usual index:

Recap of last month’s progress

IF Events in the Next Month

Plan for the next month

Still long post under the break. If you want a mini version, head over to itch.io!

January Progress

Welp... there wasn't much of a list in the January Check-in, since it was the retrospective, which included the yearly plan. Still, I did make a mini one on itch. Put together we'd get:

Still play more IF and maybe review. ✅

Finish the edits of Harcourt Ch5 ✅ and coding ❌

Fix one of the semi-completed games: ❌either the Egg parser or TRNT (and make it a proper parser)

Complete the Seed/Shuffle-Comp entry✅

Honestly, not bad... The first one, obviously is done and dusted. IFDB says I posted 60+ reviews in January - covering the Short Game Showcase, the ShuffleComp, and the Recipe Jam helped quite a bit. And that also meant... I'm 3rd in the Reviewer ranking! Only 100 more to second place...

MelS and I finally stopped playing ping-pong with the editing of Harcourt (later than we wanted...), and I'm currently sitting down to edit the whole maze. I had hoped to be done by the end of this month, but it wasn't feasible... It was close - I only have half a dozen passages to code, to check it works, and do the formatting. I used to laugh at his complaining of working all the rooms for this maze (because he chose to do that many), but now I'm the one suffering... Don't do mazes... Or don't do 30+-room mazes... (I'm not joking here) Also: If all goes well, March/April should be editing of Chapter 6, June/July coding of Chapter 6 (+ re-edits of previous chapters), August/September beta/edits, October? completed game.

As for the ShuffleComp, I made it realllll close to the deadline. But (not so) strangers in the night was completed just in time! Aaaannnddd, got 1st place in the Use of Songs category! Yay me :D Also submitted to the SeedComp! and the Zach Jam.

As for fixing the parsers.... whomp whomp, didn't manage that.

Buuuutt:

I made another parser! Not Another Sad Meal is a slice-of-life cooking sim of easy difficulty (and clickable elements for help!)

Also made a Zine! CTRL+SHIFT+ZUT+ALORS Lost content meets weird technology. I probably will never make this game, but you can use it as inspiration if you want!

And spent a few days working on a collaborative virtual card for a friend. While that will never be made public (for obvious reasons), You can find the basic interface [here].

Also won kuddos of best puzzle for An Eggcellent Preparation (even though it kinda broken)!

So yeah... not huge updates for projects, but some good progress and a few mini-new games. I'm not expecting people to check those out... But it would be neat if you did!

What’s happening in February?

There's always something happening in the IF world. I don't think I ever find all that happens anyway... but. Here's the ones I know!

The Queer Vampire Game Jam ends in about three weeks. Got a vampire/human story with a LGBT+ cast? Then this is the event for you! (unranked) Also they are doing a fundraising/matching donation with submissions!

Obviously @neointeractives got you covered for Valentine’s with the Smoochie Jam: it’s all about kisses, love and romance (unranked) - Be also on the look out for the next Neo-Interactives mini-jam which is happening mid-March.

The SeedComp! (Sprouting) ends at the end of February. Come transform someone’s idea or asset into a new IF game! See @seedcomp-if for more info ;) (ranked)

Concours de Fiction Interactive Francophone 2024 se termine dans un mois! Viendez faire des histoires en français!! <3 (ranked, duh)

The Spring Thing is waiting for your intent to participate until March 1st! After that, the submissions are due in April (also ranked)

Got a cool talk idea regarding Interactive Fiction, narration, or gameplay? Consider submitting a proposal for this year’s Narrascope! They are still looking for people!!!!

Note: @neointeractives will have jams all year long. One a month/or so. And the next Planting Round of @seedcomp-if will start as soon as the results are dropped.

The PLANtm for February

Shortest month, and one busy months in events (I'm at the head of two... what am I DOING WITH MY LIFE....)... So much to do, so little time. But also, ONE EXTRA DAY THIS MONTH! :D

What are we hoping to do this month?

Play more games! Because there are a bunch of jams happening and a backlog of games I'm trying to clear. Also I want to get to that second IFDB spot! (1st won't ever be attainable...)

Finish the Code Ch5 of Harcourt. This is attainable. This is doable. I will finish... because I am already 80% done. MelS is working on Chapter 6 for this month - hoping to have a rough draft for me to check too by the end of the month...

Finish fixing The Roads Not Taken. This is your month. I swear I am manifesting it hard. This is happening. I will finish you. I'm sorry I've been avoiding you....

Jam Entry number 685470w8698... probably. Maybe do a Queer Vampire/Smoochie Combo. Maybe even a French Comp game?

ALSO: I will probably do an another AMA mid-Feb.

~

The 2024 To-Do List:

New year, new list. A more feasible one, according to January-Me.

The hopefully maybe easy to handle To-Do:

fix the bugs in EDOC + overall the French version to match

fix the bugs of TRNT + find a way to add the missing pieces (giving up on the translation)

fixing the interface of LPM and the popups + check animal interactions

figure out the One-Button JavaScrip/jQuery issue...

edit the loading screens of the completed tiny games to include the program/format logo at least.

The 'Need a Bunch of Content to update but it's planned!' To-Do:

Update my website (bunch new title - also I don't think the logo clicky thing work...) + redo my itch page

Finish TTATEH (MelS dependent - this year should be it - for real)

Finish Exquisite Cadaver (half-way mark by this summer - manif)

Finish P-Rix - Space Trucker (main path at least)

Update CRWL (it's been almost two years... I'm getting ashamed)

The Unlikely But it Would be Dope To-Do

Finish The Dinner as it was planned (and translate)

Finish In the Blink of an Eye as it was planned (and retranslate)

Finish The Rye in the Dark City

Fixing TTTT (at least fixing, maybe try adding some storylets)

And finally The 'It's impossible, but one can wish' TO-DO:

Remaster SPS IH (if I managed to start this after completing the rest... I'm going to eat a whole sheet cake).

Start the IFComp project (2025? Might end up being a ST?)

[mirror-to-the-past]

More (Apparently) KH3:Remind and Melody of Memory Stuff

Spiritually pounding on the windows of the Square Enix building- what do you MEAN I find out via YouTube that there's story cutscenes locked behind those egregious Data fights?? (That I'll personally beat... someday...)

(I also just went ahead and watched all the cutscenes for Melody of Memory, because I didn't want to play through a $60 rhythm game, sorryyy)

But first, Re:Mind and its sneaky, sneaky cutscenes...

Everything with Yozora has me Bonkers. I can't believe they've done this. Echoing Sora's first line in the series "I've been having these weird thoughts lately" through his own side of the story, him saying that he doesn't look like how he appears, the 'why do you know that name,' the "save Sora" while immediately drawing a gun on the man in question?? I'm just... *screaming noises* They're bringing everything together with the fiction versus reality stuff they have going on, and guys, I get SO excited when some games go meta. I'm squealing like a little girl; I'm ecstatic. Despite Sora being in (what I now know as Quadratum) and the background of the Yozora fight reflecting that, I can't help but wonder if it was another internal fight due to the arena switching to Sora's Heart Station for a second, akin to Roxas' fight in KH2.

And the music was so pretty... Yozora has a gorgeous theme. The prettier the battle theme, the more insane the KH fight, I say.

Also Riku was dreaming of Sora for a year. Lmao. He just... didn't say anything about it, while everyone was busting their asses. I'll be honest, literally the only way I could take that is that he dismissed his dreams as irrelevant- ah yes, dreaming of Sora? Nothing crazy to see here. Oh, Riku.

Also more importantly than Riku's angst deal- KAIRI WAS LAUNCHED INTO SPACE WHEN SHE WAS A PRESCHOOLER TO ACT AS A KEYBLADE WIELDER HOMING DEVICE, JESUS CHRIST. Kairi 🤝 Megamind 🤝 potentially Superman (I'm not a comics guy):

Getting launched out of their home planets into space in order to escape the destruction of their worlds, given vague and confusing scenarios and instructions to adapt to once they find a new planet, but they really just wanna chill and be loved and keep people safe.

And she's gonna train with Aqua! :D Another professional at getting launched into other worlds (realms). I hope she bonds with Ventus, as I've recently been made aware of their similarities in disposition, and how they are treated by others (hearts of pure light, designated by their groups as "the one who should stay home/be protected", wavering self confidence in their own abilities and self worth). Additionally, the hilarious potential scenarios of Kairi being like "yeah, and my favorite color's actually-" and Ventus interrupts with "Purple. I know," because the man essentially vicariously lived Sora's childhood. I'm super stoked for future Kairi screentime! Loved when she saw Xehanort in her memories and was like 'I don't care if you're a memory, data, manifestation of my heart or any other thing- I hate you, get out of my life forever. Hugs and kisses, die.' Like, 10/10, girl. Fair. Kairi's a volcano wrapped in a sweet package ready to snap at someone.

Riku's like "Y'know Ansem, I'm gonna miss you... 🥺"

And Sora's like "Xemnas, stooop all the violence. How can you take advantage of people with hearts? You should feel your feelings. You're valid, bestie. ☺️"

Kairi's no bleeding heart for baddies, she just wants everyone to get off her damn case, lol!

Also LOL at the fairy godmother of all people being the one to ship Riku off to Quadratum after Sora. My Cinderiku jokes (as well as my previous KH3 post's blurb about Riku determinedly walking into the ocean to find Sora) may not be completely unwarranted, now. Like, Miss 'specialty in dreams?' Miss "If you'd lost all your faith, I couldn't be here. And here I am." Not even to mention "a dream is a wish your heart makes," a very relevant lyric for this set of circumstances, if I do say so myself. I guess that's just gonna be another song I love and sing to myself that now makes me think of KH. 🤷 There's worse things I suppose, for example, like Buddy Holly being stuck in my head for three days straight and making me feel like I'm trapped listening to my uncle's records (thanks, Good Omens).

I ended up re-watching "Cinderella" for the first time in a while because of that part of Re:Mind and MoM. The KH association of the part with Fairy Godmother's appearance is now semi-heartwrenching, given the context of her appearance in "Cinderella," as well:

You have the vocalizing chorus throughout the opening of the scene acting as a callback to Cinderella's "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes" song as well as reflecting her inner thoughts, and she has a dialogue with it while she sobs alone in the garden:

Chorus: Whatever you wish for, you keep...

Cinderella: "Oh, no... no, it isn't true."

Chorus: Have faith in your dreams and someday... your rainbow will come smiling through!

Cinderella: "It's just no use. No use at all."

Chorus: No matter how your heart is grieving, if you keep on believing...

Cinderella: "I can't believe! Not anymore..."

Chorus: The dream that you wish... *lyric trails off, unfinished*

Cinderella: "There's nothing left to believe in... nothing..."

[Fairy Godmother materializes next to her]

FG: "Nothing my dear? Oh, now you don't really mean that."

Cinderella: "Oh, but I do-"

FG: "Nonsense, child! If you lost all your faith, I couldn't be here, and here I am!"

[the violin and cello come in to finish the last part of the lyric] "...will come true."

Beautiful scene, really. The chorus assisting the animation is delightful... I watched Bambi and Lady and the Tramp (Bella Notte <3) a lot growing up because I loved that old-timey choral work. So dreamy...

Additional funny/sweet bit: I like how Mickey was freaking out to the point of being pinned down over Riku being unceremoniously dropped into Quadratum via Fairy Godmother's spontaneity and enabling.

'You sent my son to the big city ALONE?! He could get mugged, he could get lost, he could get hate-crimed, he could-'

*jump cut to Riku, and he's trying to gauge the value of Earth Money by spying on hot dog stands. He sheds his first known tear of the series by trying to figure out public transit routes*

Anyway, in the words of Cid:

"But what happens next?!"

[writingquestionsanswered]

Would it be a major turn off if a character, in a world where almost everyone has magic, only had a few chances before they have to cause like actual bodily harm in order to continue using it?

Some additional context I have to justify it are that 1. It's almost OP and I need some things to balance it out. Like, it's literally immortality that's kinda like save points, just done so it isn't completely videogame style (since that world isn't a video game) 2. Most people's powers do have side effects. However, to be fair, they're supposed to make sense (e.g. former protagonist has fire powers, so she's also heat resistant but is naturally very hot, so cold hurts more before it heats up and she can't touch things that need cold because she can't just switch off the heat, or one that's probably more cliche but they've got super strength and don't know how much force they're actually applying, gentle to them still is pretty rough a lot of the time, etc), and I'm not sure if having to actually injure yourself is a good side effect to near-immortality 3. She also has a sort of healing ability doubled with it, where no matter how awful the injury it heals in 24 hours (like from light paper cut to the loss of a limb, it is always 24 hours, it just made more sense to me that way), so as long as she stops the bleeding she'll be fine the next day But then I feel like it's a bit too much since 1. She would lose any motive to use it - she doesn't worry about death, so with the injury and pain it'd likely just be like adding 0+-1 when you're trying to get 2 (if that makes sense), 2. She's in single-digits still, so it'd be a child harming themself because they don't want to die, which while the tone is definitely supposed to get dark at some point I feel like that might just be a bit much both to read and to write, and 3. There's already another balance in place - if she dies, she'll appear back at the last "save" (considering it's inspired by video games that's the quickest way to describe it), and will lose any memory or development that happened in-between. It also only lasts ~a month so that she won't be completely immortal, she has to keep redoing it if she wants to be. So she'd physically and mentally revert back to up to a month ago, in the exact place she was no matter what happened there in-between, no matter where she's been or what she's learned in-between. Still debating whether or not there should be a way to regain the memories or not.

I'm also not sure if I actually want to give her another reason to hesitate to use it, or if it's just because I like letting characters suffer in my head, but the story isn't going to just be in my head so I want it to be actually fun instead of just agony lol. I don't want my story to be too affected by my sadism exclusively reserved for fictional characters.

Sorry it's long and probably awkward, and that it probably has way too much info when I just needed a little bit, I just want to write my story (and current protagonist) decently and not be TOO harsh on the characters. While the way I wrote probably made it kinda clear which way I'm thinking of going, I just wanted an outsider opinion that I trust before choosing one way or the other. Sorry if it's too uncomfortable or morbid or anything, idk where else to ask and I'm embarrassed to ask people I know irl (personal issues 💀)

Thank you for reading this whole ask, sorry again about how long it is!

Bodily Harm as Consequence of Magic Use

I feel like "bodily harm" is really broad and random consequence of using magic. So... after a few uses, if the character uses magic again, their arm or leg just randomly breaks? Or a huge gash opens up on their back? It doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Typically, the consequences of magic are more logical:

-- Physical fatigue (lots of energy coursing through your body) -- Mental fatigue (extreme focus, quick thinking, mental stress) -- Loss of source (source of magic is limited so lost once used up) -- Harm to other (someone/something related is harmed by use)

You would typically choose one of these consequences (though physical and mental fatigue often go hand-in-hand), then the extent of the consequence is greater with the power/amount of magic used. In other words, a smaller spell has a smaller consequence. A bigger spell has a bigger consequence. A small spell would cause a little bit of physical exhaustion. A big spell would cause the person to pass out for a little while.

If you can find some way for the injuries to make sense, then you could still do that. But I would also add the consequence that injuries incurred via magic use don't heal in 24 hours. And while injured, no magic can be used. That way there's an actual cost to using magic too often. It's not just a superficial cost like an injury. They're putting themselves in the position of being powerless until the injury heals naturally.

I hope that helps!

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

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[comraderomeo]

Where Skin Ends Ch. 1

Updated Every Other Thursday (hopefully)

Foreword:

Hello and welcome. This is the first piece of fiction I'm posting anywhere public since grade school, and I'm pretty excited and nervous about it. It's about a lot of things, many unsettling and esoteric, and is set in the BattleTech universe. However, I'm trying to not get too overbearing on the lore, for everyone's sake (including my own). Also, fair warning: these characters are stolen from my other, more central projects, so don't be surprised if they show up in a completely different setting. All in all, thank you for having a look!

links: ao3 masterpost

cw: alcohol abuse, vague mental illness, vomit mention

"I had just one quick glimpse out the porthole, to see the frosted dot in the distance becoming slowly massive, before the alarm went off. Sirens and red lights flashing all around put me and my lance into a run toward the 'mech bay. We stripped to reveal our um... coolant vests, and scrambled up the ladders into the cockpits of our veritable killing machines. The 'techs sped through the startup checks and then my Hatchetman, Jester, came alive. I felt Her warming me in livid spite of my wellbeing. Then, the commander came in over the comms, 'get those asses in gear, Alpha Lance! We've got Marik ‘mechs at the drop zone, so break a leg!' Jester spun around in her bay, and the world went silent."

You spent two months running patrols on some planetoid so devoid of life it couldn't even be considered backwater. Though, the mining company operating there was scared to shit of the inter-House war that had just broken out, even when it had just been rumors and speculation, so it was good money that got better daily. The patrols were so desolate. You only had the massive snow drifts and whoever was on comms to keep you company the whole time. Being so alone was perfect.

"The bottom of the bay dropped out and sent me into the fray. I came in right on top of an Atlas (you know what that is right?), and embedded my axe directly in his cockpit. Those fuckers are tough though, so it threw me off, and I got a torso-full of lasers at close range. It wasn't enough to take me down, though, and I got another chop in with a blast from my own weapons. That's when the rest of my lance got a good shot, and the ‘mech was lost in a barrage of shells and missiles and lasers. But, shrouded in the smoke coming off his melting armor, he kept coming. I used my other arm to get up close and push the weapons in his torso off angle, pulling the Atlas into a grapple. That sent his autocannon shots wildly off, but his missiles still got a bad hit on one of my lancemates. I knew at that point it was do or die, so I shoved my torso cannon right up against his viewport, and boom!!"

House Marik had arrived in just one dropship and launched an assault on the mining complex. It must’ve been producing something important, because they sent a lot of firepower at you. You had been out on patrol at the time they first popped up on sensors, and while the rest of the crew scrambled, you made the right choice to beat a hasty retreat. The truth is, you never stood a chance. In the following skirmish, it took all the skill your lance could muster and losing your hatchet arm to take down a single assault ‘mech, and the engagement had just let the other enemies slip by and annihilate the target. You probably could have taken at least two more, but not without losses.

"The blast almost tore my arm clean off, but the Atlas went tumbling into the ground, quiet as the void. Then, we turned our sights to 'mech two, a slightly smaller one that was trying to flank us. It was a bitch to hit, but we adapted-"

You ran and left them to burn. Another city to ashes.

"Mat! What the hell are you on about!?"

Your surroundings come flooding back into focus. You're at a bar somewhere you can't quite remember right now. How many drinks has it been? Last count says two, but that's beyond doubtful now, making your ability to rattle off that story coherently a feat in itself. There's a woman opposite you at the table. She's picking at a scratch in the finish and is almost certainly checked out of the conversation. You're sure there was a reason you were telling her about this encounter, and that it's extremely important that you make it impressive. However, the lack of oxygen in your brain had lost that reason paragraphs ago. Ashe, the lancemate who interrupted your flow, is certainly less far gone than you and looks bemused. She continues, "If you're going to be spinning tall tales about our exploits, at least make them believable. Who the hell’s going to think you actually chopped an Atlas in half like death from above?"

You feel the heat of embarrassment overtake that of inebriation. She could have just stayed quiet, because you have a good ending planned out and everything. What's her problem anyway? She has enough friends to go bother in the company, and her boyfriend is like right over there… somewhere. The woman across from you, who you'd neglected to get the name of like a prick, looks up with a bit of surprise and chimes in, "Oh! Sorry, I was listening, promise. It's a nice story and all. I mean, nothing like what it's actually like on the front, from what I know, but it would make a good story for one of those pulpy war novels or something."

This makes you indignant. You huff and say something stupid, "And, how would you know?"

She smiles back at you, barely wounded, and replies in practiced rhythm, "Corporal Hannelore Geelen, 57th Lyran Armored. A pleasure to meet you, MechWarrior."

Ashe laughs her head off in the background, while you- Wait are you crying? Why are you crying!? Ashe and Hannelore both look at you in different flavors of mortification. You didn’t even do anything that bad, but now you're saying sorry over and over again, while insisting you were a complete asshole. Be thankful your spontaneous bout of sorrow is quiet enough to avoid the attention of the whole damned bar. Some fear of predatoriness has clearly flitted into your mind and been amplified by alcohol, since you keep apologizing for being a dick, and a bastard, and a whore and really any bad word you can think of, without a care for relevance. The pair of voices in the background started to sound like a chorus,

"Hey hey, it's ok. The story wasn't that bad."

"Mat, what the fuck? Are you ok?"

Et cetera.

Et cetera.

Then, after some quick consideration, Ashe says something akin to "fuck it" under her breath and scoops you up into a fireman's carry to whisk you out of the public eye. That's quite the blow to the barely smoldering embers of your self esteem, and as if to spite you a fifteenth time over, the corporal you had accidentally been trying to have sex with gets up and follows along with you. A brief conversation occurs in the twilight of your perception. It's just mumbling to you really.

"I'm very sorry for this, Corporal. I can take care of them from here."

"It's no problem. I was bored anyway. Plus, I'm sure they'll be better company sober."

You pass out after that, which is likely for the best.

The air flees your lungs, as if they were cursed. You cough and writhe on the grassy hill you had been dropped upon not too softly.

“…and you didn’t have to drop them.”

“Didn’t mean to, but they’ll live.”

They’re talking about you, probably. You still feel the embarrassment lingering from the bar, but there that anger, still present and bubbling to the top. Being manhandled out of a public breakdown is a disgrace, but despite your clouded take on things, it’s clearly your fault to begin with. The figures towering over you are out of focus and haloed in blinding artificial light. Your brain cobbles together a pretty, angelic simile, which just makes you more angry. 

“Are they always like this?”

“Only in port, usually. They're a normal amount of feckless in a ‘mech.”

A mumbling starts to burble out from your lips, growing louder as you focus control into your fricatives and plosives and whatnot. It gets to a point where one of the angels stops mid-sentence to address you, “Care to share with the class, Mat?”

You think very hard about the words you want to say next. They have to be finely crafted and powerful enough to win you a quiet evening to recover from whatever this was. You take a deep breath, steel your gaze, open your mouth and rasp just barely audibly, “Fuck you. I am prestige. I outrank everyone here.”

Why do you keep claiming honor that's not yours? It's insulting.

The blindingly bright angel snickers, and its duller yet equally holy counterpart cocks its head in curiosity. 

“Is that true, Ashe? I took you for lance commander.”

“Maybe it was, but sure as fuck hasn't been for a while now.”

“Really? How's that?”

“Well, back in the Third Succession War…”

You feel their insolence radiating into you. It's unthinkable that you, the champion but inches away from nobility, the company commander with so many medals you jangled like a children's toy, the only mechwarrior with more than half a brain cell in this whole system, could be so debased. But, who are you to argue with heaven? Because, despite their angelicness being only a ruse, they can see you for what you really are in this moment.

“Wait a second, do you know if they've been drinking anything other than shots?”

“Wouldn't know. I was doing my best to avoid babysitting this time.”

“I see. But, in that case, I'll be back in a second.”

Once the other had left earshot, the remaining harbinger turns to you and speaks, “I swear to fuck, Mat. You're lucky she's nice. Otherwise, I would've dropped you in a drainage ditch and called you in M.I.A. Between the shit you and Ed pull, they wouldn't even question it.”

You say sorry.

“I don't really care about apologies. We have drills tomorrow, and you better be on point or I’ll make you as armless as your damned ‘mech.”

You say sorry again.

“I don't know what your problem is, but you really have to start thinking about how you're not the only one with them. I try to help, but I'm reaching my limit. We all are.”

You say sorry again. And, again, and again, and again, and again. You're curled into a ball now, trying to block out as much sensation as you can. A fleeting thought hits you, letting you know you'd make a good physics test question right now. It was kind of funny, but you find the idea insulting. You ask yourself where you're going from here, as if you could even stand in your state. You wonder what catastrophe will play out tomorrow, assuming tomorrow ever comes. You ponder if the ground could just swallow you here and now. A hand lightly taps you on the shoulder.

“Hey, Mat right? I got you some water. I suggest you drink now, before you regret it later.”

She set a bag of water next to you with a crinkle. It's probably one of the three litre ones they have in the stores here, the ones with the scenic river on the label. You should be thankful for this. You agree and say thank you as audibly as you can. She probably hears you. You take the water as an opportunity to distract yourself from the noise of thinking for a second and take a series of greedy sips from the plastic pouring tip. 

“Hey. Hey! Slow down! I'm not helping you back to housing if you piss yourself.”

You comply, and that's probably for the best because in your haste, you upset your stomach. You vomit about a third of the bag of water and a year’s worth of alcohol onto the grass. God knows how you were able to hold it back until now. 

“Eugh…”

“They haven't eaten, looks like.”

“Corporal, with all due respect, gross.”

Hannelore shrugs. You don't remember not eating, but you don't remember eating either. That's probably not a good sign. You try to push yourself up off the ground, so you don't have to sit next to the mess you made anymore. You do a decent job of putting your feet on the ground. The balance is harder, and you start to careen just as Ashe catches you by the shoulder.

“Alright, Sergeant [that’s you], that's enough embarrassing yourself for one night. I think it's time to get you home.”

“That's probably best for the both of you. It's a big day tomorrow.”

“Seems like it. I'll see you then, Corporal.”

“Stay safe, you two.”

You take a second to process the detail left so casually in that farewell. When you finally get it, you look at Ashe with a panic and say, “Wait, what!?” She laughs back at you and just says, “Tomorrow's going to be a weird one for you, that's a given.”

You think of all the different ways to get out of drills tomorrow. There's plenty, many of which involve some fairly unnecessary self mutilation, but you won't act on any of them. It's clear the thought of being in your warm bed all alone is too tantalizing to be interrupted by even the strongest self hatred. Outside your head, the walk home is quiet. Ashe seems to soften toward you along the way, but probably from fatigue over anything else. She leaves you alone, and you just try your best to focus on the path ahead of you.

Before you know it, you're back in your dormitory room, double locking your door behind you. You hold a heavy debate over whether you can handle a shower, but something distracts you, another stray thought. This is a bad idea, but you won’t be dissuaded. Now, you’re digging through your duffle that had been tossed into a corner and lived out of for the past couple days. Toward the bottom, there's a slightly crumpled piece of photo paper. You almost instantly notice a few creases that had appeared since the last time you saw it. That hurts you. It reminds you that this fragile memory will be gone one day. You cry again. It's ok to this time; it won't hurt anyone. I silently accompany you because, despite the fact I never held a name that wasn't yours, it’s impossible to not miss how I looked in those royal guard dress whites. It was commissioning day. She was there too, looking happy for the both of us, but like me, She also lost her name somewhere down the line. I feel bad now. I wish I could apologize for being judgemental and cruel, but you didn't hear me say it at first so can't hear me repent. I wish I could hold you and you me, so we could mourn together and maybe you would hear me say, “it's ok.” Then, things might get better, even slightly. However, that's not possible, so you suffer drunk and alone. I’m sorry. 

Thankfully, sleep catches you at some point, despite you being fully dressed and leaving your lamp on. I hope beyond hope that you have a better day tomorrow.

[daikhenkhi]

It does involve Submas and Ingo but there is a fic on a fictional scenario where Ingo once reunited a small Dawn with her mother when Dawn got lost when they were visiting Nimbasa once, in the second half it's about Johanna being once again reunited with her daugther and Ingo bringing her too her. I know it's definitely not something you are looking for but I really see your frustrations a lot. It really isn't fair to really all the PLA characters and the possibility of stories that can be told

(also agreeing that everyone there does Kamado dirty. They turn him into a almost pathetic villain just for the sake of having a villain while I think he's complex and it's understandable given his past trauma to react the way he does. His apology in the game also feels genuine. And I feel his growth in character is one of the best.)

BUT

I think aside the Submas Twins another one that takes away way too much from the majority of PLA characters is also Volo. Everyone is simping this guy who literally tried to murder the protagonist to get a hold of the plates and get to Arceus.

He's either used as a one dimensional villain or an innocent mew-mew because of the implied bad time he had... still doesn't excuse him to try and DESTROY THE WORLD. (not to mention shoving him onto the twins as well)

Sometimes it feels like I’m yelling into the void when I talk about the submas brainrot that’s consumed this fandom, so I’m glad other people feel the same way.

The fandom’s obsession with Volo is at least somewhat understandable considering he’s a genderbent Cynthia and the main antagonist of the post-game, but the submas craze is genuinely inexplicable. Two completely optional side characters from Gen V with around 3 lines of dialogue in total, one of which makes a short cameo LA. There was really no reason for them to blow up the way they did

[sweetthingshavesharpteeth]

apparently today is webcomic day (who decides these things?) so i thought i'd highlight some under-appreciated webcomics that i love (they're all queer, because that's always high on the list of what i look for in fiction)

no links, because i want it to show up in the tags, but these are very easy to find with a quick web search

Buuza! by Shazleen Khan is set in an alternate history world with a blend of modern tech and fantasy elements, in an empire based in the arabian peninsula. genre-wise it's slice of life, but several of the characters are also tied up in politics, so it certainly touches on wider drama in the world. the characters are complex and rich, and the worldbuilding is fascinating without detracting from the character-driven narrative.

@twelvefifteencomic by Zelazny, an amazing urban fantasy adventure story set over the course of a single night. this is a fanwork of a music video, of all things, and zelazny has done an amazing job of taking a 3 minute video and expanding it into an engaging and fun story. tw for mentions of (past) suicide. this is complete, but there is apparently a sequel in the works.

Finding Home by @haridraws is a beautiful and at times heartrending slow burn fantasy romance. themes of depression and (past) abusive relationships are an important part of the story, just as fair warning. it is very close to finishing (i've actually read the end because i have the books, and the ending does not disappoint).

White Noise by @thephooka is one of those stories that makes me want to devour every bit of information about the world it is set in (and @tape-hiss does fulfil some of that desire). don't get me wrong, the characters and story are incredibly engaging, but it's rare to see a world so richly imagined. the story itself is about losing everything and finding new things (as well as old things you thought you'd lost), and about liminality, and about making change. the primary antagonists are slavers, so the story does engage repeatedly with the violence of slavery. arc one has just finished, with an epilogue in progress, and a second and final arc is planned.

[assholepants]

One thing that keeps coming up on the homestuck made this world podcast that I'd like to reflect on (I'm on E5P3 btw, so apologies if something like this gets discussed later and I'm junking the gun) is this idea that characters are puppets that Hussie can guide, or shine a camera on, or influence, but they are ultimately their own things, that are somewhat separate from their full control as an author. And the hmtw guys, quite rightly, point out that this really isn't how fiction works in a broad sense. And yes they are 100% correct that this explanation is often used in contexts where Hussie wants to absolve herself from responsibility for choices they have made, and this is important when parsing how sincere Hussie is being with this idea.

But I do think this theory of fiction weirdly reflective of a form of storytelling that I have a fair amount of experience with, and that is TTRPGs. Where you have, what could be considered as a sort of central author who creates the world, the key plot points, all of the NPCs and basically does most of the legwork for guiding and shaping the story. Essentially what the Black text narrative voice does in homestuck. But the PLAYER characters in that story do exist as a separate entity, which the GM can guide and influence and attempt to push in certain directions, but who ultimately exist outside of the realm of direct control of the 'cental author'. And as a GM, you have to plan around these things, and consider how these characters work, the types of decisions they might make, and how you can tell a coherent story whilst still allowing these characters to act somewhat independantly from you.

I do think at some points, homestuck feels like it is written by a GM who has sort of lost control of the table a little bit. Character motivations seem to take precedent over story beats that the author really wants to hit, and copious amounts of time are spent pulling the train back on the tracks, only for another character to derail in another way. But what's odd, is obviously if this is the model of fiction we are using, Hussie is ALSO the person piloting the player characters. GMing a game, played solely by himself. And in this way I can see where this worldview comes from right? If as the author of a work you are considering what characters would do, as separate from and sometimes antithetical to where you want the story to go, then it makes sense that you might erroneously start to view them as distinct entities that exist by themselves and have lives outside of the narrative that you are explicitly writing. And when you write like 6 different characters that intentionally have elements of authorial, or GM power, it become very easy for these characters to derail what you, as the primary author, want to do.

Obviously we can never actually know Hussie's actual writing process and this is pure speculation, and also again the fact that Hussie has control over all of the 'player' characters makes it distinct from a ttrpg. It also means that this theory actually does not absolve it from responsibility for character actions at all. But as someone who has GMed ttrpgs and has this same issue of trying to balance story with character development and motivation coming from forces outside of my complete control, it's something interesting to think about, with regards to the way that Hussie constructs this theory of how fiction is made.

[seewetter]

"but I think some people with cries of "normalizing incest" are moreso talking about fetishism as an action unto itself being normalized, and that's just true, right?"

It seems you are thinking of a very specific argument?

There's no lack of people saying that incest writers are causing real incest at scale.

"The comparison to game of thrones is disingenuous too, like it's just a completely different situation. Responding to arguments about small scale personal community dynamics with an appeal to pop culture and the entire population of earth is just obfuscation, things can be normalized in a community without being normalized by broader society, your friend can be a jerk at bowling night without it influencing the country's policies."

The GoT comparison was made on April 15, 2021. When I saw (and reblogged) the GoT comparison post (Sep 2024), there were discussions with users that felt incest IRL was being normalized by fanfic.

Can I link to these discussions, months later? No -- I searched my liked posts and wasn't able to find anything. At the time, I wasn't impressed by the argument and just shared the rebuttal without the original argument.

It's not ideal. Now the rebuttal is decoupled from the thing it is a rebuttal to.

But in that (lost) context, I don't find the comparison so disingenuous. If someone says "incest will become popular in society if you keep writing fanfic" and someone else replies "that would have happened long ago, if so" then that seems like an appropriate response.

"I am growing very tired of the traumaqueer tendency to deny their role in the world as artists, like, "you say we are influencing society, but have you considered that we're really bad at that?" isn't an argument"

In the context of "jerk at bowling alley" influence, I won't argue with you, but in the context of "incest spreads as a mind virus" I would beg to differ.

Journalists have attributed murders to Frank Sinatra's song "My Way" for example, and I think those attributions were overstated. Even if true, the song did not have the same effect outside the Philippines or on Filipinas, if true it had a specific effect on some men in the Philippines in a specific time period. It's a really narrow effect.

I agree that "you say we are influencing society, but have you considered that we're really bad at that?" is not an argument. But applied to the My Way murders, we might say:

"They say the music caused murders, but have we considered how unlikely that is? To argue this, you need to argue that an ultra-specific demographic under specific conditions in a specific country for a short span of time was motivated to murder when hearing the music...and that the effect couldn't be replicated."

And I feel the same way about people warning against fiction causing real incest. Why would fiction do that? When does fiction get people excited enough to imitate something that is prohibited?

------------------------------------------------------------------------

But to address your concern Patricia, I think that's very fair. There's something really de-contextualized about arguing against opponents of incest without actually quoting their ideas and being sort of un-systematic about it.

If we take your example into consideration, I would wholeheartedly agree with your adjusted response: "that influencing society would be a good thing if it were to happen". If people write incest fic and other people want to read that and it gets more widespread, that's fun, actually.

"x ship is normalizing incest-"

Buddy

If game of thrones hasn't normalized incest by now (pulling over 10 million views in the 7th season alone) then a small fandom ship most certainly won't

[spacecadetspe]

A snippet from last year...

Aug. 14, 2023

It's been a fairly good week without many incidents.  The exception was in dealing with a text from X.

W lost a set of Fortitude's car keys, and so to teach him a lesson, we're requiring him to "pay back" the value of the key fob in exercises.  The key fob would be $375 to replace, so we rounded down to 300 exercises.  Well, W told X, and X came at me, demanding that I find some other way to punish W.

I felt my hackles rise as soon as I saw the long-ass text he'd sent me.  How dare he suddenly claim to care!

But I took a breath and waited for the trigger to pass.  I told X about the keys, and that I'd been trying to get W to eat healthier and exercise more.  I also refused to take the money out of his allowance or give him more chores, because I don't believe in free labor or putting a child into debt.  And spanking him won't solve anything at all, so either he can join a sports team, or we can do a few short workouts per week, which is what W was freaking out about.

W doesn't want to join a sports team for some reason that he hasn't made clear yet.  I think he's scared of what his peers think, and is worried that they'll be mean to him.  He threw a tantrum with X, who caved, of course.

So... all this to say that I'm still livid at this sorry excuse for male flesh that is pretending to care only when his child is throwing a tantrum.

That being said, the weekend went pretty smoothly, with W only really showing resistance a single time.  I think he's learning pretty quickly that I don't tolerate bullshit, or being treated as if I'm stupid.  He's learning that exercise gives him more energy, and being without his phone allows him to learn communication skills and bond.

It was only after W had returned to his father Sunday evening that I got a summons from Vassilios.  This was unusual, after an uneventful week (which I needed; my wounds are still healing), so I was stunned to see him so worried.  He came in and offered me a black obsidian mati, and told me that it had been found during the last rounds.

"It belongs to Epiales," he explained solemnly.  "Sometimes he goes by the moniker 'the Black Dream.'"

"A nightmare," I mused.  "And what's his specialty?"

Vassilios' expression grew grave.  "The worst nightmares imaginable."

I felt myself grow serious, and I made the attempt to translate his name.  The best I could come up with was "the proud one."  Hypnos had named him after a sin.  "Oh my."

He nodded.  "He's indiscriminate, sociopathic; even violent.  He's been known to attack or kill dreamers.  It's been said he's half demon."

I'd never heard of a demonic half-breed outside of literary fiction.  I was surprised they actually exist.  Maybe I shouldn't have been.  "Which one?" I asked.

Vassilios didn't know, so I advised him to go find Flauros, who is living among Rath's troops in the Dream World as a human.  "He's a sort of family historian for demon-kind," I said.  "That could help us."

Vassilios left, and almost immediately after, Phantasos popped in.  He didn't know much about Epiales, namely because Hypnos had been the only one who was ever able to keep him in line.  I shudder at the thought.

It's nice to have someone looking in on me.  Lately I've felt like someone has been watching my every move, and to be fair, that probably was the Black Dream, himself.  And at the time, it felt better to think it might be Phantasos, rather something as baneful as Epiales.

But, without warning, the mati began to tremble, and Epiales appeared and demanded that I hand over the Dream Staff.

I tried to make small talk, even let him try his hand at wielding the staff and the great book of spells.  His reaction was to accuse me of stalling.

"Stalling?" I scoffed.  "I just handed you the book and staff.  How exactly does that look like stalling?"

He didn't answer; he only made it clear that the only thing that would satisfy him was the complete subjugation of the Dream World.  His demonic heritage allowed him to wield the dream staff in a way that no other oneiros could.

Phantasos' reaction was to draw his bow.

"You missed something," I said.  "You're so proud and so hasty that you forgot some crucial information."

"And what's that?" he growled.

"One, the oneiroi didn't choose me for the role; I was assigned.  You weren't.  Two, I built this place.  It responds to my whim.  I have the high ground.  Three: there are eight Virtues holding the title of Dream Lord, and you chose to pick on the strongest one.  And baby, you aren't even on my radar.  That should tell you how close you are to fucking up right now."

As expected, he didn't listen.  He began corrupting the nexus, freezing the oneiroi mid-transit and poisoning them with demonic energy.  So I took his powers.  I cursed him to human form, laden with painful empathy, broke his signet ring, and beheaded him.  Using the power of the primordials, I purified the nexus, and then called Thanatos to take Epiales' body away.

The nexus will recover... but so must I.  I've channeled too much energy, and my wounds are still far too fresh to overexert myself again.  As much as I'd rather keep company with Phobetor, Morpheus, or Phantasos... I'm just not sure I have the energy.

[witchoftrinity]

3, 8, 19

Mun Questions Regarding Muse

3. If you could change one event in your muse’s life (in their main or canon verse), what would you change?

oh god where do I begin with this girl

The obvious answer is...changing how impulsive she is at the start of the arc she was involved. The glaring problem with changing that and putting a cork in the all out war she considered is then she doesn't really get that development from jumping down the rabbit hole. Even if it would've solved a LOT of problems.

But yeah if she just chilled tf out and kept the idea of rebuilding the bridges in her mind I think she'd be a bit better off.

19. If you had to judge your muse and sentence them to a “fair” fate, what would your judgement be? Would you punish them? Reward them? How?

I go into detail more in the next question because I ranted WAY too much but honestly I agree with everyone that says she should've gotten a worse punishment. Not that I'm a decision maker in a "school anime world student council" but being expelled & forced to do community service is getting it off light for what she did in the grand scheme of things. Still as I explain next I'm (completely biased) feel she deserved a second chance rather then subjected to whatever whims of fate would've happened naturally (In this series considering the "bad end visions" probably nothing good and worse then just "dying")

8. Do you genuinely want your muse to be happy? What do you think would make them most happy in life?

To preface all of this I am a sucker for cute shit. I also can't emotionally stand when kids or anyone in media goes through it. If there's someone in a book, movie, or show that's having a rough time and they've not given me any reason to like hate them to the bone I'm about to cry my heart out. It's one of the top 3 ways you can get me invested by just playing with my heartstrings involving characters who are, to say the least, not having the best time.

And deep down considering the people I had to deal with in my own life I should hate her and say "god no she doesn't deserve to be happy". She's the most stuck up person alive and if I really did ever met a "Mika" IRL I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be friends with her esp if she was around my age group. Thankfully this is fiction and I think I'm safe from meeting those kinds of people. But I can safely say holy shit yes I want her to be happy.

Did she commit actions not limited to treason, acts of terror, and plenty of other war crimes? Yes. However when this CG hit I pretty much lost my shit.

The game does a good job at basically conveying my thoughts to her. Mika, at her core, is really a no good troublemaker. She's basically lied and betrayed you (their teacher) twice by the time she breaks down in front of you. On top of that she basically has solidified the idea she is nothing but a no good Witch who only causes problems.

Forgiving her is a no-go. However at the end of it all seeing he rsmile and being the one to extend a helping hand to learn from her mistakes is IMO the best course.

also I mean look at her she's just a goober (ignore the war crimes)