#wren fandom tag

[winglesswren]

oooohhhhhh my god i'm so insane about this man and his security blankie that his husband gave him before they had to divorce and both had to go their separate ways and then make it everyone else's problem and inevitably circle back around to each other and meet in the cosmos to implode their life's work and stop the world from going all fucky wucky. i love them.

I'm sure someone's already brought this up but like. Viktor is still wearing the goddamned Blanket™️ here. Look at the inner part of it. It's red. The outside is sun-bleached and covered in arcane corruption, but that interior is still the SAME COLOR AS THE BLANKET. It has a bit of corruption on it, but at least for me, this is the same blanket. He kept it.

[winglesswren]

solitude; serenity

fandom/pairing: arcane, jayvik

chapter: 1/4, 1.5k words

ao3 🔗 https://archiveofourown.org/works/61568524

(fic is currently archive locked; subject to change if i get brave and/or recieve any positive feedback but i am a coward)

posting chapter one in this format as well as on the archive; full chapter under the cut, below fic summary

edit: page break didnt work im a mobile user i will fix it tomorrow from my laptop before work

summary:

Viktor hesitates for a moment, but it seems Jayce is truly asleep. He brings one hand up, slowly, and cups Jayce’s jaw in his palm, letting his thumb swipe across his cheek affectionately.

Jayce is always so full of jittery anxious energy, buzzing around and chattering about whatever crosses his mind, never stopping for air. It’s nice to see him so relaxed like this. Something in Viktor’s chest contracts at the trust that Jayce is putting in him, to allow him to see him so unguarded.

Selfishly, Viktor wishes that he could bottle this up and live in it forever. He wishes that nothing ever had to change. Wishes that he deserved this softness that Jayce has given him, this unconditional kindness and love that he could have had seven years ago if things had been just a little different.

If he had been just a little braver.

(full chapter under the break)

A/N: boom baby chapter one of four here we go! merry christmas and happy holidays to all, and a HUGE shoutout to my friend milo @dykelizard for beta’ing this for me because i was this 🤏 close to just giving up on the whole thing and scrapping it

It’s still dark when Jayce flinches awake, the blankets wrapped around his legs and holding him immobile. His bad leg aches in protest, and he winces as he untangles himself from the cocoon and slips from the bed.

He glances over his shoulder, running a hand through his hair, and softens at the sight that greets him.

Viktor is still asleep, curled on his side with his hair falling softly over his face. He still hasn’t cut it, although he had brought it up to Jayce once, right after they had fled. Jayce had just hummed, twirling a strand around his finger and murmuring that he should do what made him feel comfortable.

It hasn’t been brought up again, but Viktor hadn’t cut his hair, and Jayce had noticed the scissors that had been on the corner of the bathroom counter were back in the cabinet.

Viktor looks younger like this, eyes closed and face relaxed. As if he carries less of the tension and grief that he holds to his heart when awake, although there is still a blip of something in his expression that refuses to let go of his guilt. Jayce wishes he could soothe it.

Instead, he just reaches out and smooths a hand over Viktor’s hair, tucking the errant strands behind his ear and brushing his thumb across his cheekbone.

His partner shifts under his touch, exhales, but doesn’t wake. His face is still lined with exhaustion, and Jayce knows that he hasn’t been sleeping well, although he refuses to talk to Jayce about what’s haunting him, keeping him awake deep into the night.

For now, though, Viktor is asleep, and Jayce pulls back his hand before he wakes him. For a moment, Viktor presses forward, chasing his hand, and his brows furrow, but almost immediately he curls back in on himself and calms.

Jayce has been staring for far too long, he realizes with a start. He turns his back and pads into the hallway, pushing the door until it’s only open a sliver. The rest of the house is quiet and cold, the lack of lights and the clouds covering the moon leaving a chill in the air. Jayce tamps down on a shudder and slips out the front door onto the porch.

There are no stars, but with the heavy fog, Jayce is unsurprised that the sky is hidden. He does miss the view, though. With winter edging closer, it’s been days of relentless cold and damp. But stars are a rare sight here anyways, wherever the arcane has spat them out. It’s quiet, and beautiful, but it’s a change. One that Jayce still isn’t sure he’ll ever fully adjust to.

He sits down hesitantly at the edge of the grass, tucking his bad leg under him and wincing as the muscles contract in a spasm at the movement. It’s been months and still the deep ache doesn’t subside. The bones had healed wrong, ever so slightly, and Jayce tells Viktor over and over when it gets bad that he just slept on it wrong, that he twisted his ankle going down the stairs, that he must have just landed wrong on his foot walking back from town.

He can tell Viktor barely believes him.

A sudden weight at his side startles him, and he jolts, but it’s just Viktor, settling down beside him and making himself comfortable on the grass without looking over at Jayce at all.

There is a brief silence, where neither of them move, and then Jayce steels himself and scoots closer, wrapping an arm around Viktor’s shoulders. He doesn’t pull away, to Jayce’s surprise, and if anything, nudges a little closer.

“I woke up and you had left. Why are you out here in the cold?” Viktor’s voice is low and raspy with sleep, and Jayce has to swallow around the sudden urge to press a kiss to his cheek and pull him closer.

He clears his throat roughly to shake the image from his mind and refocuses on Viktor’s question. “I, ah. I couldn’t sleep, so I just. I didn’t want to wake you.”

Viktor raises an eyebrow. “It’s November, Jayce. You could have stayed in the kitchen or on the couch. What is really bothering you?”

Jayce looks away, heat rising in his face, pulling back and turning towards the sky. His eyes widen. “Viktor,” he breathes, pointing.

Viktor reluctantly follows his gaze.

There are stars poking through the fog. Hundreds, thousands of tiny pinpricks of light in the sky, dim through the haze. “I haven’t seen stars since…” Viktor’s voice trailed off, and Jayce just shuffles to rest his knee against Viktor’s.

”Yeah. Me neither.”

Jayce feels Viktor’s breath puff against his neck as he shifts to look up at him. Slowly, like he thinks Jayce will take flight like a frightened animal at the wrong move, Viktor shifts closer, leaning his head against Jayce’s shoulder. He stays that way for a long moment, frozen, until Jayce finally gathers his wits enough to bring his arm back up and wrap it around Viktor’s shoulders again, this time tucking him tight against his side instead of loosely holding him.

”It’s beautiful.”

Viktor hums. “It is,” he agrees, but his eyes never leave Jayce’s face.

They sit together, silent, until the chill bites through the sweater Viktor has thrown on and a tremor ripples through his body. Jayce is immediately on alert at his side, sitting up straighter.

”Are you cold?”

Viktor considers lying, considers shaking his head and pressing into Jayce’s side and prolonging this moment a little longer, but before he can decide, a breeze rips past them and he shudders violently before he can tense up against it.

Jayce clambers to his feet, dragging Viktor up with him. “You should have told me, it’s too cold for you to be sitting out here without a jacket,” he scolds.

Viktor scoffs, but allows himself to be dragged back towards the door. “You came out here first. I just followed you.”

Jayce throws a glance over his shoulder as he tugs Viktor inside and then spins to shut and lock the front door. “You don’t have to follow me everywhere. I was going to come right back in.”

The mood shifts, just for a moment, but Jayce catches it, biting at the side of his lower lip. It’s raw from him chewing on it already, Viktor notices. A worried habit that he never managed to kick. It’s familiar. “I’m sorry,” Jayce blurts, unprompted. “I’ll stay inside, next time. I didn’t mean to… worry you or anything.”

That’s…startling? Not what Viktor expected him to say at all. He blinks. ”I just wasn’t expecting you to be gone. You can wake me up, if you need something. No sense in secrets, Jayce.” He smiles, a little more bitter than he means, but Jayce seems to understand.

”I know,” he sighs, running a hand through his hair. “I know, I just…you don’t sleep well anyways anymore, and I didn’t want to ruin what little sleep you were getting.”

Viktor raises an eyebrow, expression going just a bit cross, and Jayce automatically braces himself for the rebuke. It’s the same exasperated, fond look Viktor used to give him in the lab six years ago when he would work himself into the ground and Viktor would have to haul him back to his apartment before their combined sleep deprivation caused another explosion.

Instead of arguing back, however, Viktor just turns and starts towards their room again, barely sparing a glance back when Jayce doesn’t move. “Coming?”

”Right! We should…yes. Yeah. Coming.” He scrambles after Viktor, closing the door behind them and flicking on the lamp on the bedside table.

“You should change,” Viktor hums, already moving to slip out of his own slightly damp clothing. “You have grass stains on your knees.”

He does, Jayce is startled to find, when he pulls the fabric taut and glances down. His knees are a muted green. He’ll need to wash them tomorrow. Tomorrow? Today? He isn’t sure of the exact time.

“Are you going to stare at the floor all night, or come back to bed?” Viktor teases, and Jayce snaps out of his little trance and strips his shirt and jeans off, pulling on the soft sleepwear that Viktor chucks at his face.

”I’m coming. Don’t be impatient,” he jokes back, and Viktor huffs a small laugh.

”Have you ever known me to wait for anything?”

Jayce rolls his eyes. “You’re a fast learner.”

They lapse back into comfortable silence as they both dress and then Viktor curls up back under the blankets against the wall. Jayce awkwardly clambers in after him and draws his body up against the edge of the bed, carefully keeping a couple of inches between their shoulders.

Viktor is the first to fall back asleep, breaths evening back out as he slips back under. Jayce stays carefully on his side of the bed until he knows Viktor is asleep, and then relaxes as much as he dares, eyes closing against his will.

For as much as he was awake ten minutes ago, he’s still exhausted, and it’s catching up to him.

Viktor shifts, humming contentedly as he pushes himself against Jayce’s side and tucking himself under his arm.

Jayce doesn’t have it in himself, nor does he have the room, to pull away.

(He’s asleep before he can even really consider it anyways.)

[winglesswren]

new fic up let’s gooo! merry christmas, losers

solitude; serenity

fandom/pairing: arcane, jayvik

chapter: 1/4, 1.5k words

merry christmas apology gift for @dykelizard

ao3 🔗 https://archiveofourown.org/works/61568524

i also have the chapter posted here just for tumblr, if anyone prefers that over ao3's formatting!

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

summary:

Viktor hesitates for a moment, but it seems Jayce is truly asleep. He brings one hand up, slowly, and cups Jayce’s jaw in his palm, letting his thumb swipe across his cheek affectionately.

Jayce is always so full of jittery anxious energy, buzzing around and chattering about whatever crosses his mind, never stopping for air. It’s nice to see him so relaxed like this. Something in Viktor’s chest contracts at the trust that Jayce is putting in him, to allow him to see him so unguarded.

Selfishly, Viktor wishes that he could bottle this up and live in it forever. He wishes that nothing ever had to change. Wishes that he deserved this softness that Jayce has given him, this unconditional kindness and love that he could have had seven years ago if things had been just a little different.

If he had been just a little braver.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

(fic is currently archive locked; subject to change if i get brave and/or recieve any positive feedback but i am a coward)

ao3 🔗 https://archiveofourown.org/works/61568524

[elliwoods]

A wren for Wren @wraenata !! Ok I will admit fairy wrens are very pretty...

[winglesswren]

oh im going to be so insane about this

I might be going crazy

[wren-of-the-woods]

I've been seeing a lot of posts lately talking about how no one comments/reblogs/replies/etc anymore, and, as someone who comments regularly on a lot of fanworks, it sometimes makes me wonder if my efforts are worth anything. Then I remember how much happiness I get from comments on my own work/posts and how much the community of fandom can matter, and I remember the power that can be found in spreading joy instead of disappointment.

So -- to everyone who comments on fanfiction: thank you. You make the writing process worthwhile and so very rewarding. You make people happy every day.

To all the people who reblog art and gifsets and meta and anything else with enthusiastic tags: thank you. You make people smile and promote interesting conversations and make being on Tumblr so much more fun.

To anyone who sends people asks about their works, whether it's unprompted or part of an ask game: thank you. You give people reasons to talk about things they love and feel like a part of a community.

To the people who makes reclists: thank you. You give us more to read while showing the author how much their work is loved and appreciated, benefitting so many people.

To everyone who organizes events and groups and blogs and dedicated to fandom: thank you. You build community and love and excitement so effectively and it's wonderful.

To all the authors and artists who respond to comments and build community: thank you. You make people smile with your work and then again with your response.

To everyone who contributes to fandom and community in all the other beautiful, varied ways that I can't even begin to list: thank you. You are why we're here.

And, finally, to every writer, visual artist, gifmaker, cosplayer, maker of edits, writer of meta, or creator of art in any other form: thank you. Your work is wonderful and you make fandom what it is, regardless of who sees your art or how much response you recieve.

Keep going, everyone. You are a part of something beautiful.

[wander-wren]

sometimes i wonder about what fandom is going to look like in 5 or 10 years. i think we might have already started to see a shift.

because, look, most of the oldest, biggest fandoms are from tv shows and movies, in particular ones that go on for years and scores of episodes. star trek, star wars, stargate (is everything star?), doctor who, supernatural…even sherlock really got its biggest popularity boosts in the modern day from tv adaptations. marvel and dc were comics first, too, but movies made them more accessible; their “cinematic universe” tags are the biggest on ao3 by far.

but what tv shows are we getting now? short, 8-episode things that get canceled two or three seasons in, that are usually less-than-faithful adaptations of other media anyway.

what movies are we getting? well, marvel turns more to slop every day, and everything else is remakes and sequels no one asked for. the general populace will still go see them and find some good movies that they like, but there’s not much really for fandom to grasp onto.

the best shows for fandom that we’ve had recently, that i can think of, are stranger things, game of thrones, and maybe our flag means death. stranger things is dying off, especially since they’re looking at a 3-4 YEAR gap between s4 and s5. game of thrones’s popularity plummeted after its final season, we all know that. our flag means death is still chugging fairly okay, but after that second season a lot of the fandom dropped it, and with it now being cancelled, i don’t see it sticking around.

yes, we can chalk part of this up to a new generation to of fans having this growing idea that fandom is super temporary, to be abandoned as soon as its not on trend. but media used to be on trend for a whole lot longer than it is now. seasons were longer, we had filler episodes, things were lower quality sometimes but at least they came out on a consistent schedule. i don’t mind if supernatural isn’t an artistic masterpiece, but if i was a stranger things fan waiting until 2026 for the final season, i would be annoyed if it wasn’t damn near perfect. that’s assuming i watched it at all—we’re all so used to not getting endings and moving on, so why would i bother?

i think there are two types of shows doing sort of okay about this. one is procedurals—9-1-1 is a popular one i’ve run into, and it started in 2018, around the beginning of the decline, but it’s managed 7 seasons in those six years, most of them with 18 episodes. the other is, honestly, anime—though we can and SHOULD talk about the terrible working conditions that make the fast turnarounds there possible. look at how big some anime fandoms are.

judging by the relative fandom popularity of other procedural dramas (grey’s anatomy, law & order, criminal minds), i think that’s going to remain sort of niche. fandom likes fantasy and scifi best, and they just don’t tend to have as strong of an overarching arc to dig into. at least, that’s why i wouldn’t watch them. i think there’s also a good chance these will start to die out in the coming years as well.

anime could also die out a little bit. better working conditions would necessitate less/slower content, and it’s true that most of the popular anime fandoms have been around for years, even decades.

so, what, no new, lasting tv show or movie fandoms anymore?

what will the biggest fandoms be in 5-10 years?

podcast fandoms have a shot. the magnus archives is still going strong, and i’ve been seeing a lot about dungeons and daddies. i think we’re kind of almost past the golden age for podcasts, but i am an outsider, so maybe that will change.

book fandoms seem like a kind of obvious choice, but they just don’t get as big without, you guessed it, a movie or show adaptation. and the downsizing has hit them, too—can you think of anything from the last 5 or 10 years that rivals harry potter, percy jackson, warriors, lord of the rings, hunger games, acotar…even game of thrones (asoiaf) again? i can’t. the collapse of the publishing industry is another post entirely.

2020 is really what cemented these changes, though they were starting in the late 2010s, at least. with actual industries shutting down, there was room for indie creators making things alone in their houses to pop up, and people had more time on their hands to try new things out and get into them.

the two things that have really been on the rise since 2020 is rpf and video game fic—often both combined. we’ve got genshin impact, call of duty, minecraft of course being huge, rpf of various youtubers, and k-pop rpf. now, i think rpf is contentious enough that it won’t really become the main fandom, but video game fic…might be it.

even video blogging rpf can often be a blurred enough line that people are more comfortable with it. and the thing is…youtube creators are actually more reliable than mainstream television these days. they need to be, to maintain their platforms. they need to not cancel series and to live up to their own hype as best they can and to not abandon the channel for 3 or 4 years at a time. and again, you can talk about burnout and unrealistic expectations and all of those things, but it’s still true.

maybe i’m completely wrong. maybe in 10 years the film and publishing industries will all sort themselves out and we’ll go back to the status quo. but i think this position fandom is finding itself in is interesting, and i wouldn’t necessarily be surprised if what’s most popular (both in the specific source material sense and the medium/genre sense) is different some time down the road.

[kanerallels]

ooooh I'd love to read a sabezra/kanera/ghost crew in general christmas fic for "christmas memories"

Oh I had an immense amount of fun with this one! For @all-fandoms-christmas-festival day 5, enjoy the following!

(edit: there is also accompanying art of this by @accidental-spice that can be found here!)

Leaning against the frame of the door, Hera watched the scene in the living room unfold.

Life Day music was playing from a radio that Zeb was fiddling with. Rex and Kallus were playing holochess, while from the kitchen Hera could hear AP-5 haranguing Chopper about something.

At the far side of the room stood a Life Day tree, undecorated. Jacen was bouncing up and down next to it, his face lit up with excitement. Next to him was Sabine, who was supposed to be sorting through ornaments and lights. Instead, she was standing and grinning as she watched Ezra.

Ezra was halfway under the tree, fiddling with the stand and muttering to himself in a tone that clearly indicated that Hera didn’t want to understand what he was saying. As Hera looked on, the tree wobbled perilously to one side. “Wrong way,” Sabine said.

“Feel free to come down here and do this yourself,” Ezra said irritably.

“Oh, no, you’re doing great,” Sabine said, clearly holding back a laugh.

Hera held back one of her own. There was nothing like being with her family during Life Day. Even when there was chaos and annoyance and Force only knew what else, she loved this time of year.

It was all perfect right now, too. Snow covered the prairies of Lothal outside, the right music was playing. It was exactly the way it had been back in the precious few years she’d had with the whole crew, during the war against the Empire.

Anyone would think it was strange that she thought so fondly of such a dangerous time. But Hera treasured those Life Day memories, more than almost any others. Mainly because of who had been with them then.

She loved these Life Days too, though. Watching Jacen experience every tradition with joy and excitement filled her heart to the brim. 

A hand rested on her shoulder, and a familiar voice murmured, “Is Ezra about to take out the wall with that tree?”

Holding back a laugh, Hera glanced at Kanan, who’d just emerged from the kitchen. His dark hair, flecked with gray these days, was pulled back from his face, and he was still wearing the apron Ezra had bought him for his birthday years ago. “Hopefully not,” she told him. “But I wouldn’t bet on anything. It’s turning out to be a very precarious operation.”

“I can hear you!” Ezra called, but there was a laugh in his voice.

Kanan grinned. “Let me give you a hand, kid. Leave it to the professionals.”

“You mean the old people,” Ezra joked as Kanan knelt beside him.

“If I was old, you might respect me more,” Kanan grumbled.

As the two kept bickering good naturedly, Hera took a deep breath and released it, her heart full of joy. The memories of Life Day were good. But they were no replacement for the real thing.

[winglesswren]

i'm so insane about the fact that he hallucinated viktor WITH HIS CANE even thought 1) viktor was sitting down and wouldn't have needed it unless he was getting up and 2) it was JAYCE'S longing little fantasy vision. he loves viktor, wholly and completely. his disability doesn't even factor into jayce's awareness as being something separate from him, viktor is viktor. viktor, in all his beautiful imperfections, is not defined by his disability, by what he physically can and cannot do. he is defined by his need to help, by his ever-growing curiosity and courage and determination, by his knowledge and what he chooses to do with it. jayce has never seen viktor's disability as something that needs to be cured. he hopes to help viktor with his illness, yes, and to help make the world a better (accessible) place, but he has never once seen viktor's disability and thought him less because of it. he loves viktor, as he is. he loves viktor on purpose, in every universe.

bisexuality demons were kicking his ass

[dragonmarquise]

I was reading through some of your tags for the post and some of them caught my eye, specifically when you were talking Abt the ref and Felix thing. Why do you get angry Abt it????/gen I'm not trying to be rude, I'm generally all around New to the fandom and I wanna know why-

Okay so!! Honestly this is a fair question to ask, because anyone particularly new to the fandom or even the game in general isn’t going to know the whole context about this situation.

Short(ish) summary (also spoilers of course!): In the postgame, Red still appears at cypher spots, even though going by the story Red and Felix are the same person, and the red cyberhead was destroyed by the end of the game. Taking it at face value, some people interpret it as Red somehow coming back as a separate person from Felix. Which is a cool AU idea imo!

Unfortunately, a decent amount of people have a heavy preference towards Red over Felix, usually either because they’re too used to Red from playing as him for most of the game, or even because they see Felix as ugly/unattractive in comparison.

So then those people tend to use that AU as a way to replace Felix, basically (in my mind at least) throwing out Felix’s character development from the game in favor of Red. When from the canon story’s perspective, they’re the same damn person anyways. And like, I just find that really rude towards him, and I say this as a person who enjoys that AU too, though evidently in a different way from what other people are doing. D:

Longer rant with more details/complaints under the cut:

There are a few different variants of this AU, just to list a few scenarios:

Red is actually a somehow revived Faux, basically using the red cyberhead to hide his identity. Why he does this can vary: him wanting to actual repent for what happened and trying to start doing so by hiding his real identity, or even just hiding himself as he plots to get revenge on Felix and the rest of BRC.

Red is a copy (either complete or partial) of Felix’s mind during the time he spent stuck in the red cyberhead. Basically that converting the red cyberhead to preserve Felix’s head didn’t remove all of the systems/internals related to a normal cyberhead’s functions. The idea being maybe the Flesh Prince had to do a rush job due to needing to keep Felix’s head preserved as quickly as possible to prevent too much rotting/memory loss. Thus some systems are still there, reading Felix’s mind and later result in Red once the red cyberhead is put back together. I will admit I did talk about this scenario in a previous post of mine!

A fun one from a friend of mine: Red still existing turns out to be because a player of the actual BRC game managed to get isekai’d into the world, with them somehow getting put into a newly revived Red as his new "AI" mind. Then having to navigate the world and maybe even befriend BRC, trying to also convince them that he’s not suspicious (especially given his knowledge of the events of the game). Also dealing with how actually moving around and doing things as a writer firsthand is WAY different from just doing it in a video game, lol

Another one from a different friend: Red is “revived” by the Flesh Prince as a new lacky. Though it’s not “Red” from the game, he just found Faux’s old body and then put a completely new cyberhead on it with a basic AI, declaring it his new minion. Shenanigans ensue, probably. :P

But the one that a decent amount of people seem to prefer: Red being the one to experience most if not all of the game, connecting with the rest of BRC and becoming friends. Felix recovering his memories is still a thing here, and him basically taking the reigns once the endgame starts to defeat Faux for good. But then after that it’s revealed Felix still doesn’t have much of a friendship with the others, because it turned out that was all Red, as a separate mind/AI/etc. from Felix. So then in this version of the AU, Red is part of BRC because of the connections he made, while Felix leaves and goes back to being a solo writer because his only connection to BRC was them helping him recover his memories. It’s using Red as a complete replacement for Felix, even though canonically they’re the same person anyways.

And like… ultimately people will do whatever they want with AUs and stuff like this, I can’t force people to stop what they’re doing or agree with the criticisms I have here. And I will admit, I used to like the last point in a “WHOA that’d be a pretty cool twist!!” way, but then later thinking on it more, and realizing… no, actually, this feels like a shitty thing to do to the narrative, especially to poor Felix.

His whole thing is like!! He was friends but also rivals with DJ Cyber and Faux, until eventually going solo for All City, and even admitting he prefers to work alone. We don’t get details on why he feels that way, but we can imagine a ton of ideas for it: he has more of an ego than he lets on? He didn’t want DJ Cyber or Faux to get hurt during the path to All City, so he decides to just go for it by himself? He still genuinely thinks of them as his friends, but overall he’s generally a more aloof loner kind of person and that’s why he went solo? There’s a bunch of options!

Regardless of his reasons, he went solo for All City. He had a one night graffiti session with Faux afterwards, maybe to just check on him and catch up. But otherwise to me it implies there weren’t going to be too many more sessions like these in the future, be it with Faux or anyone else.

And then, Faux kills him. Faux’s own motivations for that are also another fascinating potential for cool fics/AUs/etc. But that’s maybe for another post. :P

Anyways! Felix is dead, but manages to get preserved and eventually revived as Red. Early on in the game, I believe right at the beginning of Chapter 2, Red decides to go up against DJ Cyber in order to find out about his own forgotten roots. And he actually starts to go off by himself, until Tryce stops him! Then Tryce tells him they’re doing this together as a crew, and the way I see it, Red is probably going, “Wait, you… want to still help me? Even if it means fighting against a guy like DJ Cyber? Really??”

Because! Again, my own interpretation, Red doesn’t have all his memories back, but I think Felix’s personality is still there, just subconsciously, y’know? “I gotta do this on my own, can’t rely on anyone else, don’t want others to get hurt because of me” etc. So this is imo one of the first big steps in Felix’s character development that I feel is going on throughout the game: learning that it’s okay to have your friends help you, and to help them out in return, sticking together until the very end and even beyond that!

I mean, just saying, Tryce and Bel join in with Vinyl and DJ Cyber to keep Mech!Faux open for a final attack during his boss fight. That’s some serious friendship right there, willing to put yourself on the line for a friend!!

So then, to basically say, “No, most/all of that was actually just Red, and Red and Felix are separate people so Felix doesn’t need to stick around with BRC anymore” is like…

Okay, pardon my language here, but it’s effectively throwing out Felix’s whole character arc, and frankly it’s fucking insulting towards him!! Guy has the power of badass friendship and hella illegal graffiti on his side, and some people wanna rip that away from him?! Come the fuck on!!

And to emphasize, I used to like this idea as like, an amazing didn’t-see-it-coming twist. But then thinking on it more, it just really isn’t fair to Felix! At all! Especially since I really do think he has an interesting character arc, going from insisting on doing things solo, to gaining new friends and going All City a second time with, in his words, “a whole crew of the best homies around”.

Literally, he says that at the hideout in the postgame! I’m kinda paraphrasing based on memories, but that’s actually what he says more or less.

Also, a lot of people in the fandom seem to really enjoy this AU specifically as a way to replace Felix with Red in their minds/headcanons/stories. Some of them just ended up very attached to Red because of playing as him for most of the game anyways. Which, y’know, that’s reasonable at least! But then for others, they latch onto this AU because of having a genuine dislike (and in some cases, outright hatred) towards Felix.

From my observations and experiences, if it’s not because they got too attached to Red, it’s mostly rooted in people not finding Felix “attractive”. That’s it, possibly the most selfish fucking reason a person could have for wanting to forcefully throw out a character’s development, like what the hell man.

imo it also reeks of a problem that some other fandoms tend to have: dissing more masculine men in the cast, in favor of the more feminine/twink men. Some people may debate on whether Red/Faux would count as a twink, especially with how the term has been watered down recently (fun fact, it was meant to be mainly used in an LGBT+ context, so specifically for LGBT+ men who fit the appearance!!). But, I hope people reading this get the idea of what I’m trying to point out here. :/

Another thing about how people are trying to use Red to replace Felix: they treat this AU like it’s canon, or that they think it should be canon. Even though it’s not, that’s the point of calling it an AU!! Like I mentioned way earlier, I’m not going to stop anyone from going into this sort of AU, even if I personally have criticism for it if it’s handled in a certain way. But what I’m not going to let slide is people trying to force an AU to be considered canon and the way it should be.

The point of an AU is to have fun with possibilities, not try to reject and replace the original canon completely!! D:

Anyways, this is uh. Pretty long as is. So I want to wrap up with at least what I personally like about the potential for a “Red comes back as a separate person” AU. Which is evidently very different from what most people enjoy about that kind of AU.

I mentioned this in my old post I linked to earlier in this post, but basically: Red is not used as a replacement for Felix, but he exists alongside him and the rest of BRC. They could even become like brothers to one another. Red being the “younger” brother who is (quite literally) new to life and wants to go out there and explore and experience all the good stuff, even in a chaotic way. And then Felix being the “older” brother, still being chill like he was before, yet also more responsible and cautious because of what he went through, thus wanting to make sure Red is safe and sort of be his mentor through these things. Felix maybe even feels like he's the main reason Red is here at all, so then he feels responsible with guiding Red and making sure he turns out alright, y'know?

… At least, that’s more or less what I would want to aim for. Them coexisting and even getting more character development for the both of them! I would take more about the specifics of how this would all work. But I do have fan fics and other stuff I want to do someday to share those ideas more. Thus I will stop here for today, hopefully I will be able to get around to those fan fics and stuff in the future! Maybe.

So yeah, that about wraps up my thoughts on this topic? I probably came off as too hostile at some points, sorry about that. It’s just, I think this particular version of the AU is especially frustrating when it’s coming from people who are clearly only using it to replace the “ugly” Felix with the more “attractive” Red. Sometimes it’s subtle, other times it’s more obvious, but either way it’s just damn annoying for me at this point. :(

[winglesswren]

uhhh arcane act 3 spoilers for anyone who still hasn’t watched it yet!!

y’all know how viktor was outwardly removed from his emotions, just a cold detached machine that no longer aligned with s1 viktor’s ideals? but inside the headspace cosmos thing we could see him being affected by things, could see him reacting and expressing emotions, that curiosity and the scientist in him craving, reaching for the promise of new knowledge, advancements?

okay good awesome.

now do you guys remember oswin from asylum of the daleks? happy and hopeful and trying to help but trapped in a shell that stopped her from truly outwardly expressing those emotions and thus repressing her ability to truly help because the ideals of her body and changed mind were vastly different from what she as a person once believed?

it’s 10pm someone please take away my internet access i’m rambling.

(thank you @dykelizard for listening to me yelling about this lmao ily)

[doodlingwren]

Hi hellooo- i saw that you started follow me and i asked my self "why and how a talented artist made brain connections to decide to follow this low quality artist", did i look funny? 🥺

Do I look talented? 🤨😳

[winglesswren]

both of these ships have me fucked UP they deserved to be happy and grow old together

"In another life I would have really liked just dancing and making inventions with you"

[xwisegirlx]

(via "Ao3 Tags Set - Wolfwren Version" Sticker for Sale by xWiseGirl)

[frederick2223]

I need to talk about the situation in the Star Wars fandom.

Anyone who knows me knows that I am VERY vocal and opinionated about the parts of Star Wars that I know to be absolutely bullshit ideas. But professionals have STANDARDS. I don't do death threats, buzzwords like "woke", slurs, or believing that Star-Wars-is-dead.

I genuinely do not give an actual fuck if I'm the last person who should be saying this but grifters and pundits no Star Wars fans of ours. Nor are their fans who we know to be perverts and borderline white nationalists.

-Frederick Drew

[aardvaark]

re: the friend who i managed to get to watch a few episodes of leverage - she’s now starting season 3 and her favourite character is eliot. my evil plan has been successful.