#written: dec 5 2023

[sammy-writes-sometimes]

Word count: 558

“Your child hissed at me.” Bdubs says, voice thick with annoyance.

“They what?” Tango laughs as fae turn around, project planning abandoned the second the dryad had come into faer workshop with their three month old.

“Your child hissed at me.”

“Aaawwwwww, Nova.” fae fawn. “Did papa Bdubs upset you? Is he too cold?”

Bdubs rolls his eyes, shaking his head.

“Can I?” The netherborn held a hand out as fae offered.

Faer husband simply shrugs his shoulders before gently setting Nova into faer arms.

It doesn't go so smoothly though, Nova seeming to growl as Tango cradles them.

“See? See? They did that to me.”

“Wow.” Fae murmurs, a gentle hand running over the baby's forehead. “You okay, buddy?”

“I– I checked. Nova's fine just– just they keep growling and hissing. I didn't even know netherborn could hiss!”

“I don't do it often.” Tango jokes, swaying from one side to the other.

Fae start to purr, watching Nova carefully as they melt into the sound and start purring as well.

“Having a spicy today, buddy? Upset at everything?” Fae joke. “Don't worry, dad's here. I'm here.”

Nova doesn't settle easily, to be fair they never have. From the moment they opened their eyes, they seemed to hate everything that even simply moved. But they do settle down, falling silent against Tango’s shoulder as they purr softly, quietly.

Bdubs then presses a kiss into his cheek before starting to walk off.

“Snookums? Where–”

“I'm taking a nap, my love.”

Tango looks from him to faer workbench then back again. “Can I join?”

Bdubs smiles, kissing faer cheek again, just as gently as before. “If you put Nova to sleep for me.”

“Wow, making me do all the work?”

“I fed and changed them so don't complain.”

Tango sighs, flicking his tail as he adjusted how fae held Nova, the little netherborn’s head leaning against faer shoulder.

“Fine, but it means your next turn is longer.”

This only really makes Bdubs glare harshly. “And what if I make someone else take it?”

“As long as it isn't Zed.”

“Alright.”

Faer still purring as Bdubs leaves, trailing not far behind as they exit the building and into the wide, open meadow they made their home in.

A cherry blossom, not yet in full bloom, stands not far outside their home. Not exactly small, it had to fit a growing family of five adults and two babies, but still it felt miniscule when compared to what fae’ve grown used to on other servers.

Nova’s asleep by the time Tango gets to the house, tucked against faer shoulder as the duo purrs. There’s laughter from another room, Zedaph and Impulse talking about something as the demon cooks.

Tango sets them into a small, hand carved crib that rests on the ground of the living room, almost nest-like in design and feel.

Fae turn faer head, Bdubs already laying down on the couch with one raised, a silent invitation for faer.

The purr in Tango’s chest doesn’t grow quiet, only becoming louder as fae curl up against Bdubs’ chest and–

Dove starts wailing in the nursery.

“‘s not my turn.” Bdubs mutters, half-asleep.

“Fine, I’ll look after her..” Tango grumbles, pulling away. “Get some rest, okay?”

Faer husband doesn’t respond, simply smiling contently as fae leave the room to look after Skizz’s baby.

Our ko-fi

[toxicanonymity]

raider masterlist

dark!Joel Miller x f!reader

new one shot Jan 5, 2025: forest floor.

⚠️ this post hit the link limit, and I haven't decided what to do. I will still try to update the newest fic link above.

moodboard by @milla-frenchy 🖤 a rb will not stay up-to-date.

SUMMARY: He's a bad guy, and you're his good girl. Joel saves you from bad men, but claims you for himself. His persona starts to crack, but he gets even more possessive. You're his world, and he'll do anything to keep you. Emotional slow burn but smut the whole time. WARNINGS: 18+ canon-typical violence, noncon via implicit threat, evolving to enthusiastic dubious consent (stockholm syndrome), depraved use of praise and pet names (sweet pea, baby), unsafe P in V, exhibitionism, extreme possessiveness, dark fluff (🖤), angst, and more. NO USE of Y/N, No physical description of reader.

Spotify: raider, sweet pea (smut) Optional reference: trailer floor plan

Carter masterlist

main story

Note, non-bold links in this section were written out of order and may contain spoilers or references to future events. their placement in this list is based on timeline.

Raider: (Mar 24, 2023) - He "saves" you, then has his way with you but is kinda sweet about it. Joel POV (Oct 3, 1k)

Failed Rescue (Apr 8 - 1.9k) Your bf tries to save you. Joel makes him watch then keeps you.

Stash House (Apr 11 - 850)- Joel takes you to the stash house and shows everyone you're his. Wash Bin 🖤 (Aug 27, 1k) Shooting Practice Drabble(Jul 28, 1.6k)

Failed Escape (Apr 23, 4k)- Joel saves you from FEDRA, bathes you, amd edges you.

J. Miller (May 19, 2k) - Joel labels you with his switchblade and claims all your holes. dark. Can be skipped.

Home (May 29, 1.3k) - Joel makes dinner at home, cleans your chest, and tucks you in. 🖤

Company (Jun 9, 2.2k) - Joel brings home a girl to distract his men. dark. Extra Scene - angst.

Close (Jul 3, 2.7k) - close call with other raiders. You-almost-died sex, and later, tender sex 🖤

Gun Hug (Jul 31, 3.7k) - Joel traps 2 bad guys with some help and kills them while you. . .🖤 If you want him (1.5k) - he holds out to see🖤

Night Air (Aug 30, 3.5k) - Joel is brutal with a bad guy and his POV reveals some feelings. 🖤 Bonus blurb, wakeup pwp drabble

Hunger (Sep 29, 7k) - Joel takes you on a trek, comforts you, kills a guy, and gives you head. 🖤 He's only human (1.1k) - 👱‍♂️Carter POV, overlaps w/ hunger.

Bodies (Dec 3, 7.8k) - Strangers show up and cause a shitstorm, but Joel takes a big step. 🖤 Raider POV

No cliffhangers. Bulletin from Tox

more (drabbles, etc)

🔥 smut

Trying to use him (800) (riding) 🔥

House meeting drabble 🖤

You get sick at night drabble 🖤

He goes down on you (oral f) 🔥

If you touched his scar

if men had hurt you in the past

if you got your period 🖤

magazine and makeup 🖤

yoga pwp drabble piv 1k 🔥

boots drabble (oral f receiving) 🔥

graveyard blurb (spice)

if you bit his arm drabble (p in v) 🔥

If you snapped (emotional spice) 🖤

face sitting on sofa 🔥

being bad, looking good (2.8k, smut) 🔥

Van ride drabble (800) 🖤

sleeping beast (<1k), PWP 🔥

If Joel was sick 🖤

If you were annoying

cutting his hair 🖤

waking up on top 🔥

tired 🖤

waking up on top again 🔥

Sweet pea overhears Joel 🔥

Choking on his dick (600) 🔥

his birthday 🥺

quickie (daddy kink scenario) 🔥

✨Roly poly - comfort 🖤

Note: not all content is linked. Asks can lead to lore, snippets, and previews or hints of future plot points, etc. which are not added here.

Headcanons (not written like fic)

If another man has his way (Q&A)

dacryphilia - evolved update (Q&A)

if you had scars or tattoos (Q&A)

sweet pea by herself

If you sketched Joel and Jack

Apple picking 🖤

Responding to a Nightmare 🖤

accidentally hurting her 🖤

Analysis (#raider!analysis)

why does he keep her

why did he snap (in Company extra scene)

his eye contact

his affection / feelings, trajectory 🖤

falling for sweet pea

his self hate and her feelings

the dog and joel's concern for you

awareness of growth / why keep her

Raider Tommy

Birds of prey (2.6k)

Art, etc.

Mattress by esquire magazine

Stitches by @not-a-unique-snowflake-blog

collage by @milla-frenchy

lose control edit by @survivingandenduring

🌸 sweet pea mood boards by various

6 month collage by milla-frenchy

6 month cake by not-a-unique-snowflake-blog

🌸 sweet pea cosplay from night air

👱‍♂️carter mood board by @romana-after-dark

pts. 1-3 rb mood boards by @iamasaddie

night air gif by not-a-unique-snowflake-blog

raider/sweet pea collage by milla

sweet pea's pup by @dark-scape

want it that bad gif by dark-scape

Bodies gif by not-a-unique-snowflake-blog

👱‍♂️carter mood board by milla

Then and now drawing by romana-after-dark

Raider/sweet pea drawings by @lumoverheaven

our stars moodboard by milla

raiding edits by gasolinerainbowpuddles

under the anger by iamasaddie

🎥 Trailer (video) by @carminepoison

birthday sketch by lumoverheaven

In love w raider by milla

✨ checks that you're ok 🐺 by milla

If I've left yours off please lmk I prob tagged improperly

Back to Joel Masterlist

Fic recs: other raiders

🖤 If mine or another writer's work has inspired yours, it's always better late than never to share / shout-out 🖤

[fookinhellcurlyy]

Louis Tomlinson's Career History Pt. 1 and 2 [Post-1D] by notastrwbrysng2

Full credits to notastrwbrysng2 from X/Twitter. Reposting screenshots and texts for archiving purposes.

While I haven't done my own personal deep dive on this topic, I think this particular thread is a very informative and transparent (backed with public articles) + beginner-friendly. Not sure if this has already been shared here before but I thought I'll make this archive post anyway.

I also saw this anon of @twopoppies asking about H & L's solo careers after 1D's hiatus, so this feels like perfect timing to share it here.

I know @hoovesandfloorpaws is also doing a separate big business/industry research soon, so this introductory thread (for Louis, at least) could be a good starting point while waiting.

Note: I will copy-paste the exact texts from the tweets. The words after the cut below are from the linked thread (source). The cited articles per tweet are hyperlinked ('x'). I might replace/combine some screenshots due to Tumblr's limitations, as well as add the links from where they were originally taken.

Again, thank you so much notastrwbrysng2 (Megs) for creating this.

———

Part 1: The "missing years" not shown in AOTV

Notice how we didn't get years 2016-early 2019 in AOTV? | x

Questions I wonder about.. Louis as first signed to RCA. THEN it was announced sometime later that he switched to Epic. What happened with the label switch here? | x

"It had previously been reported that Tomlinson would end up at RCA, but when Epic Records president Sylvia Rhone heard Tomlinson’s music — in particular the song “Back To You” featuring Bebe Rexha — she campaigned for the project." Okay, okay..

It sounded at this point like Louis was on track, had songs written, had songs recorded.. Did a charity single in 2017, Just Like You cane out as a single ep.. He chatted in Nov 2017 about releasing an album and touring in 2018! Perfect, right?

....except there were crickets the first half of 2018.

January brought Louis roasting Coachellas 2018 lineup.. Towards the end of Jan, an Ask anything video.. | x

February, he teased Habit lyrics.. we have a photo of him recording All Along... And not much else..

March, The "Miss You" singer won the Best Solo Breakout award, beating out Camila Cabello, and his former One Direction bandmates, Harry Styles, Niall Horan and Liam Payne. Oh, so 4 or 5 of them were on the radio simultaneously... | x

April, another Hey, still working on the album…

And May…he left James Grant management.

Synopsis of rest of the year: (X-Factor, a couple awards, signing with WMA). Louis and Dalton Harris stuck it to cowbell and won the season.

2019 rolls around.. Two of Us promo starts and halts in March for a few weeks due to the passing of Fizzy. Louis took some time off (as to be expected) to be with family.

As of this point, Louis had released: Dec 2016: Just Hold On (not backed by an album) 2017: Back To You (no album) 2017: Miss You (no album) 2017: Just Like You (Non-album promo single) 2018: nothing! 2019: Two of Us (unattached at the time)

Yet another label change Feb 2019 now a move to Arista… STILL under S*co/S*ny.

So, 3 years in and NO completed album still? The other unattached but soon to be on the next album Walls were: KMM, We Made It, and DLIBYH with zero promotion, just a director's cut MVs that mirror much of the story Papillon.

Finally, Walls is out in 2020 with it's 4th and final single, and very little promotion.

Flash forward to concerns in 2022/2023 of the same issue: Absolutely NO airplay in his home city and surrounding areas, very little marketing in the US.

(Not much can be found about 2016.)

Coming up next: Exploring WHY Louis has hit roadblocks and how everyone is interconnected

—

Part 2: Louis' Role in 1D thru 2016

I highlighted Louis' slow moving career that started with self released singles, two label pickups (one seeming promising!), a bunch of crickets, and some movement again in 2018. To understand what was going on, we have to go back to when the band was first created. This sounds silly, yes, but it is connections that keep continuing to recur this entire time.

First, let's discuss the US market. They did not have any active boybands and record labels saw an opportunity in Brit boybands.

Leading up to January 2020, plans were put into place and discussed by Sony how to cultivate a boyband. Hottest thing in the UK was TXF. Build a boyband, sign them at their first audition in March 2010. This is a crucial link to the UK side of what will occur later on. | x

Louis & Harry both have contract dates March 26, the same day as their initial auditions. The ones on TV are their 3rd/4th. The band was set up ahead of time and played out on the cameras. During their time in the house, Lou is The Leader by week 2 (:50 in).

To reiterate AOTV, Louis has the least amount of vocals, virtually no solos until Midnight Memories. His songwriting skills were a huge asset (after "pissing off a lot of people," according to Savan Kotecha). Savan later told Rolling Stone that LOUIS led their sound forward.

Songwriting, then suddenly music management (NOTE DATE!) became Louis's role. SC began to groom Louis, who consistently fought for the boys behind the scenes, to be his "protege" of sorts and steered him away from a future solo career as early as 2014 and was "given*" an imprint

As we all know, as Louis talked about, the label did not move forward due to micromanagement by SC and S*NY. | x

At this juncture, Louis is now done with the band as of December 2015. He does not have anything lined up but is being courted by.. S*ny head Rob Str*nger. As the article in the OP explains, they wanted him for songwriting &/or music mngmt Louis at...an industry party?

Part 3 & 4 here.

[multigenderswag]

Multigender Survey Results Dec 2023: Language (part 1)

Number of pronouns 

Participants were asked “How many sets of pronouns do you use?” (single selection) and participants whose pronouns differed depending on slightly were asked to answer what they used most often. The options provided were: 

No pronouns: 2 (0.3%)

1 set of pronouns: 69 (9.3%) (nice)

2 sets of pronouns: 197 (26.5%)

3 sets of pronouns: 131 (17.6%)

4 sets of pronouns: 58 (7.8%)

5+ sets of pronouns: 98 (13.2%)

All pronouns: 72 (9.7%)

It changes regularly: 78 (10.5%)

Questioning: 38 (5.1%)

Number of pronouns vs number of genders

Participants’ answers to “How many sets of pronouns do you use?” and “How many genders do you identify as?” were compared and sorted into the following categories:

Number of pronouns is the same as the number of genders (for example, two genders and us two sets of pronouns): 109 (14.7%)

Number of pronouns is less than the number of genders (for example, all genders and one set of pronouns): 47 (6.3%)

Number of pronouns is more than the number of genders (for example, three genders and 5+ sets of pronouns): 56 (7.5%)

Number of pronouns and/or number of genders were non-numerical answers (for example, “I don’t know/I choose not to count them” for number of genders and all pronouns): 531 (71.5%)

Multiple pronouns

Participants were asked “If you use multiple pronouns, do you prefer that people use all of your pronouns interchangeably?” (single selection). The options provided were: 

Yes, and it is misgendering if they don’t: 81 (10.9% of participants overall, 11.8% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

Yes, but I don’t mind if they stick to one set: 366 (49.3% of participants overall, 53.2% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

No, I prefer that people stick to one set: 47 (6.3% of participants overall, 6.8% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

I don’t have a preference: 126 (17.0% of participants overall, 18.3% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

I don’t use multiple pronouns: 55 (7.4%)

There was also an “other” option in which participants could write in their answer. Written in answers were divided into the following categories:

It depends on context: 19 (2.6% of participants overall, 2.8% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

It depends on the pronouns (for example, using he/him and she/her interchangeably is preferred, using just he/him is okay, using just she/her is considered misgendering): 18 (2.4% of participants overall, 2.6% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

Preferences change frequently: 13 (1.7% of participants overall, 1.9% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

Yes, and I don’t like it if people stick to one set, but I don’t consider it misgendering: 11 (1.5% of participants overall, 1.6% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

Other: 7 (0.9% of participants overall, 1.0% of participants who use multiple pronouns)

Most common pronouns

Participants were asked “What pronouns do you use?” (multiple selection). For participants who only used a given set of pronouns sometimes, they were asked to select those pronouns for this question. The options provided were: 

He/him: 565 (76.0%)

She/her: 380 (51.1%)

They/them: 422 (56.8%)

It/its: 275 (37.0%)

Xe/xem: 199 (16.0%)

Fae/faer: 66 (8.9%)

Ey/em: 66 (8.9%)

Ze/hir: 52 (7.0%)

Ze/zir: 59 (7.9%)

Ae/aer: 53 (7.1%)

E/em: 53 (7.1%)

Ce/cer: 22 (3.0%)

No pronouns: 69 (9.3%)

Any/all pronouns: 135 (18.2%)

Any/all neos: 124 (16.6%)

Additionally, there was an “other” option in which participants could write in pronouns. With the given and written in pronouns combined, a total of 171 unique subject pronouns were used. 

Honorifics

Participants were asked “Which of these honorifics would you want to be referred to with?” (multiple selection). The options provided were: 

Ind.: 40 (5.4%)

Lady: 14 (1.9%)

M.: 151 (20.3%)

Masteress: 33 (4.4%)

Miss/Ms./Mrs.: 165 (22.2%)

Mistrum: 47 (6.3%)

Mr.: 339 (45.6%)

Mx.: 108 (14.5%)

Sir: 328 (44.1%)

Sirlady: 62 (8.3%)

No honorific: 311 (41.9%)

[cheeseplants]

2024 fic roundup

Can I just create an ask game? I wanted to create a snapshot for 2024 for me, and would love to hear from others, so I’m going to interview myself like a loon.

Please join in if you want 🙂 I know we’re in Dec, so feel free to answer at the end of the month if you wish!

What fandoms do you write in?

Good Omens! Aziraphale/Crowley!

And I wrote one for the tiny fandom of The House in the Cerulean Sea. Linus/Arthur 4ever.

How many words have you published in 2024?

This is a tricky one. My official total is 270,737 words but three of those were collabs. So if I count the fics that only I wrote it’s 117,911. Which is still a bit mind-blowing to me, as I only started doing this Nov 2023.

What is your greatest achievement this year?

It has to probably be my first ever longfic over 50k. I set myself a goal to write something long and follow the beats of a classic romcom. And I did it! It was really me muddling through it trying to work out what the Hell I was doing. But it exists and some people even said they liked it, so I count that as a win. 

It’s called The Apple Doesn't Fall Far and it’s about Crowley inheriting a cottage from his aunt and butting heads with Aziraphale the councillor who is in charge of knocking it down. And spoiler alert. They fall in love

What are your favourite top three fics you wrote this year?

The Apple Doesn't Fall Far - as above! 

Rating: E 

Wordcount: 58,135

It’s sugary sweet with enough light angst to create some nice drama. But it’s mainly cosy, low stakes, comfortable, contemporary British romance vibes. 

The Ecstasy of Eden

Rating: E

Wordcount: 28,303

5 times they used sex pollen, and the one time they didn't Through the Ages fic. Written for the High Sex Pollen Event. It is a fun romp through the ages with some surprising angst chapters that I absolutely love. They are silly piney fools. ALSO I got art made for it!

If we were

Rating: E

Wordcount: 3,362

In 1941 Aziraphale and Crowley imagine their life as humans.

This fic fell out of me almost fully formed. I was half asleep and began daydreaming fic (as you do) and by the time I got to my laptop, my fingers wrote it in basically a couple of hours. It is everything I love. Bittersweet, yearning, them being completely in love but unable to do anything about it, slow dancing, almost kisses and some spice!

What was your biggest pit of despair moment?

The Ecstacy of Eden was a slog at times. I had written chap one and three, but it took so long for me to get chap two into shape. I couldn’t work out what the Hell I was doing. Got beta feedback where they could tell I was clearly feeling really stuck after I wrote it because it was all a bit lacklustre. 

Almost totally gave up. I had a few: I’m never writing again, what’s the point? moments.

Somehow I pushed through and made it work. 

In a lot of ways, that was probably the moment I saw my writing improve the most. BUT IT WAS A HORRIBLE SLOG. Ugh. I wanted to say this because I know we all have them and it’s good to talk about it!

What have you learned?

Honestly, how to use commas better! I can already tell my grammar has improved a lot from when I first started. I don’t rely on epithets as much. I know what semi-colons are for (thanks @fishey-me!)

I am getting better at letting fics breathe. I feel like my background in marketing and comms makes me want to write very precisely and I am slowly learning to cast that off and take time setting scenes. I also found a few tools to help me outline better. 

Romancing the Beat by Gwen Hayes

Take Off Your Pants!: Outline Your Books for Faster, Better Writing by Libbie Hawker

They’ve been invaluable in teaching me what the Hell I’m doing. My main takeaways - work out your character's flaws and work out the theme of the story. 

I also learned what sex pollen is and then wrote a 30k fic about it.

What fic did you want to do but never made it off the ground?

Ugh, I have one in my drive called Crowley and Aziraphale go on holiday. I imagined it as a canon-compliant fic post S2 where they go on a sort of make-or-break holiday. I just liked the idea of Crowley being all grouchy in the sun and Aziraphale awkwardly trying to flirt over Sangria. ALSO only one bed! But it sort of sits in my drafts and I’ve not done much with it. 

Did you beta any fics? Any favs you want to shout out?

YES. Many fics!

But I think I’ll have to give my biggest shout-out to @kneelbeforeyourdogbabylon for Sins of Knowledge! I’ve help beta more than 100k of that (wow) and it’s a wild ride. Go check it out. 

What three fics have you read this year that you love?

Listen I have tons and tons I’d love to recommend, but I am going to whittle it down!

First up it has to be @happynachohologram who surprised me on my birthday with not only their first ever fic, but basically one of the best South Downs retirement fics ever. I still think about it. It’s under 2k and it’s absolutely beautiful. 

The Best Part by @happynachohologram

Rating: E

Wordcount: 1,702

A throwaway comment from Aziraphale sets Crowley wondering about the best parts of retirement.

-

UGH, next up @gaiaseyes451 This fic changed me. I don’t know if I’ve ever been more hooked while being emotionally devastated as this fic. Mind the tags but it’s wonderful.

A Little Life by @gaiaseyes451

Rating: E

Wordcount: 71,624

When Professor of Botany Anthony Crowley met bookshop owner Ezra Fell one November afternoon both knew their lives had irrevocably changed. From that moment forward, Anthony and Ezra’s existence was intertwined. Their story was written in the moments and memories they created as they moved through life’s chapters of coming together, building a family and facing the challenges of being human. This is a story of unconditional love and the joy and humour, obstacles and grief that inevitably come with choosing the same person, day after day, over and over and over again.

-

Gorgeous pine-scented Crowley and one of the best premises I’ve read in a while. I know most people must have read this but if you haven’t you’re in for such a treat!

Stuck on Me by @zin-lynn-c

Rating: E

Wordcount: 56,538

After a drunken handfasting ceremony goes awry, Crowley and Aziraphale find themselves magically bound to be touching at all times. In order to set the situation to rights, they must embark on a multi-day journey to seek help from the last true witch in England.

What ideas are percolating for next year?

I think my next longfic is probably going to be a road trip with college-aged Az and Crowley. The characters keep yelling at me in my head, so I think they want to be written. So far Crowley is an activist punk who needs a lift back to London after graduation and Aziraphale is a posh boy who represents everything Crowley stands against.

Animosity to lovers my beloved!

It’s probably set in the 90s so no one has a mobile phone and Crowley can be obnoxious with a box of cassettes playing Az a bunch of bebop he pretends to hate. I have a scene of Crowley taking Aziraphale to his first gay bar in my head that I can’t get rid of, so I probably need to write it. 

Who do you want to thank?

OMG all of @goodomensafterdark for giving us a platform and being a lovely bunch of pocket pals! I want to give A BIG shoutout to @happynachohologram for letting me yell all my insecurities at you and for always screeching when I send them pictures of Crowley and Aziraphale holding hands in the South Downs. 

And to @kneelbeforeyourdogbabylon for agreeing to beta my 50k longfic! Pretty sure it would never have been published if it wasn’t for you two. 

And @doonarose for organising the madness of the original CYOA!

Anyone in my tags feel free to join in or in fact anyone at all. I'll tag a few more below. Tag, answer any Qs that suit and play along!

@adverbian @isiaiowin @onedappercat @angie-words @brenna

[likeadevils]

if you had to guess purely on vibes, what order do you think the ttpd and anthology songs were written?

i know you said just based on vibes but i wanted all of my opinions to be researched and defensible so this has taken me hours to write. most of these are still opinions though!!

2022/Early 2023: i'm guessing she was mostly working with aaron on new stuff this year, while her and jack were building instrumental tracks and stems, so they could streamline writing while she was on tour if she wanted to. i'm also guessing she did 1989 tv early in 2022 and speak now tv that winter, but that's mostly based on vibes.

UNKNOWN: Clara Bow, Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus (i could see this being recorded later in spring 2023, but it just sounds so 2022 to me), I Hate It Here, I Look in People's Windows (could easily be a post mh breakup song, but this is my list), Cassandra Dec 2022: Instrumentals for Fresh Out The Slammer, Florida!!!, and Guilty As Sin are recorded in New Orleans (FOTS and Florida were confirmed to have their vocals recorded in New York) Apr 12, 2023: Taylor is photographed at Electric Lady, then Aaron shows up to all three of her eras dates in Tampa (Apr 14-16). The songs credited to both Jack and Aaron are But Daddy I Love Him. (implausible given how she and Matty were not publically dating at the time, this would be three days after her and joe announced their breakup) and thanK you aIMee (more plausible imo but still unlikely). If I had to guess I would say Taylor was recording Who's Afraid, but idk she could've not recorded anything and just have been in the studio to be in the studio, yknow

MAY: matty month. i'm guessing she was mostly working with jack, but theres nothing stopping her from working with aaron (until he leaves for tour on may 28 and is gone the rest of the month). i'm also guessing she was planning on recording a taylor's version this month, because fresh out the slammer, guilty as sin, and the alchemy all have christopher rowe credits, who is taylor's main tv collaborator.

UNKNOWN: But Daddy I Love Him, Fresh Out The Slammer (i could also see this being what i call a "wrap up song", which is a song written late in the process about emotions felt earlier in the process, in order to fill listeners in about some crucial detail(s) she hadn't covered in a song. think like, style being the last song written for 1989, or fortnight almost definitely being written in october), Guilty as Sin? (this might've been written earlier, but i doubt it was recorded before late april), Who's Afraid of Little Old Me?, The Alchemy (i'm a "it was originally about matty healy but it fit so well for travis that she decided to retroactively transform it into a travis song" truther, but that can obviously be totally wrong) May 7, 2023: The Albatross (mostly based on taylor and aaron both being in nashville and her officially getting together with matty, but i could see this also being a wrap up song) May 24, 2023: Florida!!! May 31, 2023: The Tortured Poets Department (two photos of her from this day are labeled as "the tortured poets department" and "ttpd" are on her and jacks insta)

JUNE: reports that taylor and matty broke up hit early june. jack leaves for europe in july and gets married in august, so i'm guessing he wasn't super available again until september (she also isnt photographed at electric lady between Jun 28-Sep 5). so i'm guessing the more intense jack stuff was written in june (aaron was def still around though)

UNKNOWN: My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys, I Can Do It With A Broken Heart, imgonnagetyouback (just based on when GUTS was released, i'm guessing this wasn't written after september 8) Jun 22, 2023: The Black Dog Jun 29, 2023: Down Bad

JULY: seems like aaron time! jack is seemingly in europe, aaron wasn't touring, and he showed up to two eras dates this month

UNKNOWN: So Long London, The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived, How Did It End? (this might've been written in april, but personally i would need a couple months to be able to process and express this), The Prophecy, Peter

AUGUST: a weird month! aaron is touring (though he is in nashville on the 15th), and Jack gets married on the 19th so i imagine he was busy. taylor was photgraphed in a studio in LA on the 2nd that, as far as i can tell, was not credited on TTPD (i don't have the anthology credits though).

SEPTEMBER-DECEMBER: wrap up time! i'm guessing theres probably a ton more down here, but i erred on the side of songs being written in the moment-- but i don't think she was writing multiple songs a week while on tour from may-july

UNKNOWN: I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can) (i guess it could technically have been written earlier but it feels too playful to me to have been written pre-september. also the christopher rowe credit makes me think she was recording another tv late in the year), loml (it feels like a june/july song to me but it has a christopher rowe credit and that throws me off) So High School (for obvious reasons) Early Oct, 2023: Fortnight Nov 13, 2023: Us (taylor also played bdilh for gracie that night, so we know it was written by november)

WHO KNOWS: i could see all of these being written in 2022 or 2023

UNKNOWN: thanK you aIMee, The Bolter, Robin, The Manuscript

[captainelliecomb]

2023 Fic Stats

February 2023, I decided to start tracking the amount of fic I read. I travelled a lot last year, quite a bit more than normal. I read a lot of fic when I travel.

I did a half year update at the end of June 2023. Between February and June, I read just under 13 million words.

February through December, I read just over 30 million words and 2,049 individual fic (though several are the same fic on a reread).

Some stats:

First read: Head, Hand, Heart by ddagent (@ddagent) (GOT canon divergence, Jaime/Brienne) (04 Feb 2023)

Last read: Other Brother by AlynnaStrong (ASOIAF canon divergence, Tyrion/Brienne) (31 Dec 2023)

Top 5 Most Read Authors

By number of fic. I reread frequently, so this is number of times I read a specific fic, not the author necessarily having written that number of fic.

ddagent, 78 fic (@ddagent)

Aviss, 72 fic (@aviss)

winterkill, 62 fic (@thebrimmingheart)

Lady_in_Red, 61 fic

chrkrose, 58 fic (@chrkrose)

By word count.

cardinalgirl75, 1.8 million words

winterkill, 1.3 million words (@thebrimmingheart)

sdwolfpup, 1.1 million words (@sdwolfpup)

angelowl, 1 million words (@angelowl-fics)

Aviss, 900,000 words (@aviss)

SeeThemFlying, 900,000 words (@seethemflying)

Top 5 Most Read Completed Fic

This includes number of times I read the entire fic while they were works in progress, which skews numbers. I'm doing something different in 2024.

so all the world can see by EllisJay: 12 (ASOIAF, Jaime x Brienne)

Simple by languageintostillair: 11  (GOT fix-it, Jaime x Brienne)

when the sun shine, we shine together by cardinalgirl75: 9  (Modern AU, sports, Jaime x Brienne)

Runaways by greenmtwoman: 7  (@greenmtwoman) (ASOIAF canon divergence, Jaime x Brienne)

Undisclosed Desires by Roccolinde: 7  (GOT fix-it, Addam x Jaime x Brienne)

Top 5 Longest Fic Read

The Keeper by PalyGirl, 532,733 words (GOT canon divergence, Aegon (Young Grif) x Brienne, Jaime x Brienne) (WIP)

Heart Full of Gasoline by sdwolfpup, 406,767 words (@sdwolfpup) (Modern AU, sports, Jaime x Brienne)

Diamond in the Rough by cardinalgirl75, 374,333 words (2x)  (Modern AU, sports, Jaime x Brienne)

Honor Compels Me by angel_deux, 335,399 words (@angel-deux-writes) (GOT canon divergence, Jaime x Brienne)

Truth and Measure by Telanu, 271,584 words (Devil Wears Prada, Miranda x Andrea)

Fic Over 100,000 Words Read More Than Once

Brienne-centric Kinktober 2021 by dancinginthecenteroftheworld, 101,177 words (3x)  (@dancinginthecenteroftheworld) (Brienne x all sorts of people and settings)

let's exchange the experience by cardinalgirl75, 116,080 words (3x) (Modern AU, Kimi no Na wa, Jaime x Brienne)

None But the Lonely Heart by OccasionalAvenger, 121,079 (3x) (ASOIAF, Jaime x Brienne) 

To Reach for Spring by Kadi219, 173,394 (2x)  (GOT fix-it and canon divergence, Jaime x Brienne) (WIP)

when the sun shine, we shine together by cardinalgirl75, 126,951 (2x) (Modern AU, sports, Jaime x Brienne)

Anima Dannum by motorbike_on_the_avenue, 121,021 (2x) (Modern AU, soulmates, Jaime x Brienne)

come on now, baby girl by angelowl, 119,957 (2x) (Modern AU, Veronica Mars, Jaime x Brienne)

Cubs and Gemstones by ddagent, 113,073 (2x) (Jaime x Brienne in all sorts of settings)

Brienne Pairings

I am here for Brienne of Tarth stories, and I will read her paired with almost anyone. Jaime x Brienne is my favourite, but here are several other Brienne pairings I read in 2023.

old Jaime/young Jaime/Brienne

Addam/Jaime/Brienne

Aegon (Young Griff)/Brienne

Arthur Dayne/Jaime/Brienne

Brienne & Brienne

Bronn/Brienne

Cersei/Jaime/Brienne

Cersei/Brienne

Cersei & Brienne

Dickon/Brienne

Dothraki OC/Brienne

Hyle/Jaime/Brienne

Jon/Brienne

Leonette Fossoway/Brienne

Margaery/Brienne

Melara & Brienne

Multiple people/Brienne

Oberyn/Brienne

Oberyn/Jaime/Brienne

Oberyn/Ellaria/Jaime/Brienne

Olenna & Brienne

Pevensies & Brienne

Susan/Brienne

Peter/Brienne

Podrick/Brienne

Podrick & Brienne

Renly & Brienne

Robb & Brienne

Sandor/Brienne

Sansa/Brienne

Sansa & Brienne

Thor/Brienne

Tormund/Brienne

Tyrion/Brienne

Tyrion & Brienne

Tywin/Brienne

Settings

Almost 1,000 fic were marked alternate universe. Various AUs include:

Apocalypse and dystopia

Fairy tale

Historical (including 1920s, 1940s, 1950s, 19th century, Regency, Victorian, Vikings, WWI)

Horror

Modern (including actors, artists, bikers, bodyguards, celebrities, doctors, chefs, farmers, firefighters, mafia, models, museums, photographers, politicians, reality tv, royalty, sports, students, superheroes, teachers, veterinarians, wedding planners, and writers)

Space

Western

Canons Used in Crossovers or Fusions

Belinda Blinked

Blade Runner

Dungeons & Dragons

Dragon Age II

Dune

Fight Club

Full Metal Alchemist

Frasier

Fury Road

Ghost and Mrs Muir

Inception

Kimi no Na wa

Leftovers

Leverage

Mountain Between Us

Narnia

Nutcracker

Old Guard

Only You

Pacific Rim

Persuasion

Ponyo and Dory

Romancing the Stone

Sense8

Sharknado

Ted Lasso

MCU Thor

Tortall

Veronica Mars

Westworld

When Harry Met Sally

Witcher

What We Do in the Shadows

Zombieland

Canon settings and divergence

Canon: 303 fic Canon divergence: 747 fic Fix-it: 666 fic

Most of the fic I read last year was Jaime x Brienne. For GOT, I consider canon divergence any story that diverges from Jaime returning to King's Landing in Season 8 and fix-it any story that deals with that return.

[soulofapatrick]

TAG LIST - updated 21st Dec 2023

KEY:

🌶️ = NSFW

🥹 = SFW

😡 = angsty

How I Picture Them 

𝒮𝓉𝒾𝓁𝑒𝓈 𝒮𝓉𝒾𝓁𝒾𝓃𝓈𝓀𝒾 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Not That Type of Crush 🥹

Teasing Kisses 🌶️

Scent Mark Me 🌶️

Everything To Me 🥹

𝒮𝓉𝒾𝓁𝑒𝓈 𝒮𝓉𝒾𝓁𝒾𝓃𝓈𝓀𝒾 𝓍 𝐹𝑒𝓂𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Falling Into You 🥹/tiny bit of 🌶️

Everything to Me 🥹

𝒥𝑜𝓇𝒹𝒶𝓃 𝒫𝒶𝓇𝓇𝒾𝓈𝒽 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇 

To be written...

𝒥𝑜𝓇𝒹𝒶𝓃 𝒫𝒶𝓇𝓇𝒾𝓈𝒽 𝓍 𝐹𝑒𝓂𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Make You Feel Better 🥹/🌶️

𝒫𝑒𝓉𝑒𝓇 𝐻𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Innocent Gold 🥹

Changes For The Better 🥹

𝒫𝑒𝓉𝑒𝓇 𝐻𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝓍 𝐹𝑒𝓂𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Pack Instincts 🥹

Under The Mistletoe 🥹

𝒮𝒸𝑜𝓉𝓉 𝑀𝒸𝒞𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Kiss Me Sick 🥹

𝒮𝒸𝑜𝓉𝓉 𝑀𝒸𝒞𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝓍 𝐹𝑒𝓂𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

To be written...

𝒟𝑒𝓇𝑒𝓀 𝐻𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Hypnotised 🥹

Returning to Normal 🥹

I Could Get Used to This 🥹

The Pack Realises You Love Derek - Part 1 // Part 2 //  Part 3 // Part 4 // Part 5 🥹/😡

𝒟𝑒𝓇𝑒𝓀 𝐻𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝓍 𝐹𝑒𝓂𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Accidental Admittance 🥹

Lover's Embrace 🥹

Rebuilding 🥹

𝐿𝒾𝒶𝓂 𝒟𝓊𝓃𝒷𝒶𝓇 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Dance With Me 🥹

The First I Love You 🥹/🌶️

Feigning Innocence 🥹

𝐿𝒾𝒶𝓂 𝒟𝓊𝓃𝒷𝒶𝓇 𝓍 𝐹𝑒𝓂𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Midnight Confessions 🥹

𝒯𝒽𝑒𝑜 𝑅𝒶𝑒𝓀𝑒𝓃 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Flirt Your Way Into My Heart 🥹/😡

𝒯𝒽𝑒𝑜 𝑅𝒶𝑒𝓀𝑒𝓃 𝓍 𝐹𝑒𝓂𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

To be written...

𝒥𝒶𝒸𝓀𝓈𝑜𝓃 𝒲𝒽𝒾𝓉𝓉𝑒𝓂𝑜𝓇𝑒 𝓍 𝑀𝒶𝓁𝑒 𝑅𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇

Aftermath 🥹/😡

[itwoodbeprefect]

Fic Writing Review 2024 🌈

i did this last year and tagged a bunch of people, and this year i'm going to continue the tradition but not tag anyone, i think, because i'm very late. but if you're reading this and you've posted anything to ao3 in 2024, consider yourself tagged, and please tag me if you still do it! i'd love to see other people's lists!

for me this was, uh. probably my least productive year since i really truly made the switch to english fic (2018), and it's definitely no 2019, when i posted 56 fics. but not every year can be a 2019 (or should be one, frankly), so that's okay.

-

Words and Fics (on ao3) 📚

words posted: 18,404

fics posted: 12! of which 2 were technically late crossposts from starsky & hutch fandom events in 2023 (though i also wrote a 2024 s&h advent calendar fic that is yet to make it to ao3, so if we really do the math we maybe get to 11 finished works. but i'll stick with those 12 posted within the timeframe for the rest of this, for convenience's sake, and because 1 fic per month makes a nice round average.)

first fic: With every guitar string scar on my hand, a bad buddy pat/pran fic, on jan 24th

last fic: By Heart (or: Memorization hacks for the smitten idol), a thame-po heart that skips a beat fic (which is, well. thame/po), on dec 28th

-

Ships and Fandoms ⚓

according to ao3:

Starsky & Hutch (5)

แค่เพื่อนครับเพื่อน | Bad Buddy: the Series (TV) (3)

Hawaii Five-0 (2010) (2)

เธม-โป้ Heart That Skips a Beat | Thame-Po: Heart That Skips a Beat (TV) (1)

บ้านหลอน ON SALE | Peaceful Property (TV) (1)

the most shocking thing here by far is that there are only two (2) h50 fics on this list. it doesn't even feel that way! i still spent a really good chunk of time thinking about h50 fic, it just didn't amount to much in terms of actual finished products. starsky and hutch is still going strong (relatively speaking, at least), and last year i noted that i wished i'd gotten any of my bad buddy projects posted, which clearly sort of worked out for me this year, though there's still More. the other two are two thai series that took me by surprise, which, hey, fingers crossed that will keep happening, because i really need to start writing some fic again about things i'm actually currently watching. it's good for the soul i think.

-

Top 5 Fics by Kudos 🏆

Ain’t no other that can sweep you up like a robber [h50]

Meet me at the edge (I’ve already fallen) [h50]

Sun down and I’m feeling lifted (Downtown, cherry lipstick) [bad buddy]

With every guitar string scar on my hand [bad buddy]

By Heart (or: Memorization hacks for the smitten idol) [thamepo]

h50 is easily outpacing everything else, with both of those way at the top here. what i like is that the ink/pa bad buddy fic extremely comfortably landed the third spot, with almost double the kudos of the pat/pran fic that's in fourth place. the world craves femslash i guess! along with a host of other, more likely factors (it probably has a more catchy description, it's tagged for both ships because patpran still show up, possibly more people in 2024 were looking for fic for characters played by milk and love because they're still actively working together, etc), but wouldn't it be nice.

the thamepo fic (which is thame/po. it never stops feeling a little goofy to explain the ship when it's in the title, but you could of course be writing other things anyway) taking the fifth most kudo'd spot came as a bit of a shock, but honestly, i've written for so many Smaller Fandoms in 2024 that it's not actually very odd. it's my most recent posted thing but this show is currently airing and seems to be getting a decent amount of traction, so it has the benefit of being current.

my kudos total for all 12 fics i posted this year is as of writing this at 1,235, and there's a stark contrast in this being about ~700 kudos below 2023's How to build a triangle (ted lasso, jamie/roy/keeley) all by itself. i did NOT hop into any ted-lasso-at-its-peak sized fandoms in 2024.

-

Top 5 Favorite Fics 💖

well! the upside of writing 12 fics is that i can put, like, over two-fifths of them on this list. in no particular order:

By Heart (or: Memorization hacks for the smitten idol) - i mean, i think today's episode of, uh, Thame-Po: Heart That Skips A Beat may have pushed this fic a little farther from following canon than it originally seemed (apparently thame was not aware of his own lurking romantic feelings for po, at all. oh my god) but i had a fun time writing this! it's short and not very specific and i enjoy the repeated number thing. (this kid was really rushing across the city to ask to memorize the number of a guy he apparently assumed he was just trying to be friends with. i do love him very dearly already, gosh.)

The name of the game - this is starsky/hutch and i think it's sort of sneaking in here! i was just happy this was a Complete Fic when i posted it (it had all the necessary parts, so i was sending it off), but then people were SO sweet about it in SUCH overwhelming numbers that it's probably a huge part of how i fell back in love with it myself. that's always a little magical to me. also: the sisyphus line about starsky may be my favorite thing i posted in 2024.

Rest your heart easy - also starsky/hutch! but less of a surprise. this was written for the ShareCon 2023 zine, and i don't reread it very often, but when i do it's like, yeah! i'm glad it was this fic of mine that got to participate in the zine. it's nice, it's warm, it flows.

Sun down and I’m feeling lifted (Downtown, cherry lipstick) - the bad buddy ink/pa fic! this sounds so silly when saying it about a thing that took over my life for a few months and still makes me drop to the floor when i see one (1) scene for whatever reason and am immediately attacked by the memory of how much i love it, but i'm REALLY still figuring out how to write these characters. they are my best friends and i have no idea who they are, apparently. but i like the attempt i made here, and i think i might like it more than both of the finished pat/pran focused fics, though that could be purely because i reread those far too many times in trying to Get It Right before hitting post. also. i like ink and pa! and they deserved to kiss. (and on that note, it's 2025, why is there still such a strict dividing line between GL and BL in nearly all cases? let the girls and boys hang out together, please. i won't pretend that if bad buddy could do it then everyone can (those are entirely unrealistic standards in most cases), but they could at least try.)

Home goes where the heart is - this is a peaceful property fic that is only vaguely peach/home shippy. (peaceful property being, on all levels that count, not BL.) in hindsight, i think i should have gone with one of my alternate title options and called it Pang pang! It’s a Home invasion! (because one of the characters is called pangpang and another one is called home), but hey, this slightly more serious title is fun too. i'm not even sure this is necessarily one of the best things i wrote in 2024, but it just makes me happy. there's a second peaceful property fic of which i wrote most on the night that the finale aired, but then it got longer than intended and it ended up stuck in limbo. but i still have hopes that i may give it an ending one day, because these characters in their weird kind loud ghost & cooking show that made me cry several times really deserve it (and i think there are some funny lines in the wip, and if there's one thing that makes me want to see a fic finished, it's a joke that the world should be able to read).

-

Fandom Fic Events 🤝

it's not on ao3 yet (i may do that soon-ish), but my fic for this year’s Starsky & Hutch Advent Calendar, The Simple Things! if starsky and hutch is your jam, don't forget to look at the rest of the calendar too!

-

Projects for 2025 👀

hmm, well. hmm.

2024 was an incredibly chaotic year for me, writing-wise. i'm not entirely sure what i was doing or where i was going, and i wasn't extremely motivatived to figure it out, because i was doing other things. (like figuring out how to write thai letters, for example.) i think if i want to write more, then part of my 2025 has to be to read more fiction, because it's truly just, like. words need to go in for words to come out.

i REALLY want to get a flip-flop state of mind finished up for real this year. i want to get better at/allow myself more slack to just type up something short and quick and probably not too deep, rather than feeling some need to turn every single wip idea into a months or years long project. those are great too! i love chipping away at a fic for an eternity, and the beauty of hobby writing is that there's no reason not to still do that, too! but i also need to keep things moving a little bit so i don't get stuck in a loop of looking at the same words which don't inspire me anymore and not adding anything, which also doesn't get me anything new to jump off from tomorrow.

so. write some h50 fic. write some starsky & hutch fic. write a bunch of thai series fic (and allow myself to play some jazz when it comes to character voices, because i still keep getting stuck on that too often. it's fine if they're My Version, that's what fic is). maybe something else, if i feel like it? my project for 2025 is Fun, and it would be really neat if i could get 13 fics (or more) posted (to get that yearly number moving back up again), but if not, that's also fine.

honestly maybe what i need in terms of fandoms is something in thai which is also queerbait (or queercoding), because that's where i'm at currently + what historically is best at getting me to write. i've heard a lot about high school frenemy, and i only keep dodging it because it has high school in the title, but hey, who knows! maybe watching two men who are 26 and 27 play high schoolers in some sort of feud who are obviously in love but don't kiss about it will fix me.

[asukaskerian]

Yearly word count - 2024

jan: 1 266 feb: 7 422 mar: 3 025 apr: 4 604 may: 3 026 jun: 5 163 jul: 4 652 aug: 7 143 sep: 4 557 oct: 1 247 nov: 2 839 dec: 3 284 TOTAL: 48 228 AVERAGE: 4 019/month ... slightly better than last year, i guess!

2010: 136 235, average: 11 353/month. ... :X :X :X 2011: 167 675, average: 13 973/month. :X 2012: 332 396, average: 27 700/month. eeeeeeee. 2013: 396 917, average: 33 076/month !!!!!!!! 2014: 315 332, average: 26 276/month ... :X 2015: 206 403, average: 17 200/month. 2016: 127 495, average: 10 625/month. >:( 2017: 80 828, average: 6 736/month. .__. 2018: 128 033, avergage: 10 669/month. FUCK YOU 2017. 2019: 159 609, average: 13 300/month. huh! 2020: 105 791, average: 8 816/month. ... hhghhrhhhhhhhhhhhhhh flops. 2021: 101 776, average: 8 481.33/month. =__= 2022: 73 461, average: 6 121.75/month. hhAHHJZVB WORSE THAN 2017 2023: 40 155, average: 3 346.25/month. this used to be three months' worth. hgh. 2024: 48 228, average: 4 019/month. sighflop.

FICS I POSTED THIS YEAR:

-chapters 1 to 4 of In This Economy, the bleach grimmjow/ichigo/orihime/nelliel suburban ot4. it's still not done but i'm writing chapter 21 atm so hey, i'm hoping. -chapter 1 of cosplaying in another dimension with my tamagotchi! - svsss, shen yuan adventuring in PIDW, eventual SY/luo bing-ge -Swimming With the Fishes - bleach daemon AU ficlet 8, yakuza OC POV on harribel wondering what the fuck. -You Know Better Babe - Ichigo ending/sidefic for the grimmichi pack fuckening ABO. -chapter 9 of Days on a Wire - cherry wine - madatobiizu ABO -To End a War - grimmichihime arranged marriage AU oneshot. -Foretold by the Gods - SVSSS - moshang arranged marriage oneshot.

couple new ficlets/oneshots, some super slow progress on cherry wine, finally gave in and started posting the suburban ot4... still feel like every new fic i've come up with this year has been forced out and written by rote and not inspiration. but there were a few new things even so, therefore stfu brain.

[flowerparrish]

FIC WRITING REVIEW 2024

Thank you to @42donotpanic for tagging me in this!! I am so pleased with how much fic I actually ended up writing this year, and I was only recently compiling my stats, so I've been really excited to share since you tagged me!

Rules: Feel free to show whatever stats you have. Only want to show Ao3 stats? Rock on. Want to include some qualitative info instead of stats? Please do this. Want to change how yours is presented? Absolutely do that. Would rather eat glass than do this? Please don’t eat glass but don’t feel like you have to do this either.Artists and gif makers, please also join in with any quantitative or qualitative stats or facts you want to share about your year.

Words & Fics

56,756 words posted across 51 works!

Average length written per posted fic: 1112 words!

Drabbles written: 5 drabbles, 4 double drabbles, 1 triple drabble, 1 quadruple drabble

Months I posted the most fics: October (12), Dec (10), and August (10)

Months I posted the most words: August (14,248), Dec (11,882), and Feb (9,441)

Months I didn't post any writing: June & July

Top Fandoms

Star Wars (13 works, 17,035 words)

Danny Phantom x DC (11 works, 15,258 words)

Marvel/DC (10 works, 8,858 words)

Marvel (4 works, 7,134 words)

DC (8 works, 2,968 words)

Top Ships

Danny Fenton/Jason Todd (4 works, 3365 words)

Tim Drake/Danny Fenton (3 works, 7110 words)

Bucky Barnes/Clint Barton (3 works, 6158 words)

Bucky Barnes/Clint Barton/Jason Todd (3 works, 2156 words)

Clint Barton/Roy Harper (2 works, 3675 words)

Top 3 By Comments

So I Choke On Sun (DPxDC, gen, 2.5k words) - 51 comment threads

How to Put Your ADHD Gremlin to Sleep: A Guide by Jason Todd (DC, gen, 810 words) - 25 comment threads

Can I have your autograph? (DPxDC, Tim/Danny, 5k words) - 21 comment threads

Top 5 By Kudos

So I Choke On Sun (DPxDC, gen, 2.5k words) - 1,201 kudos

Something Magical (DPxDC, Danny/Jason, 925 words) - 858 kudos

Green String of Fate (DPxDC, Danny/Jason, 1.4k words) - 773 kudos

Can I have your autograph? (DPxDC, Danny/Tim, 5k words) - 726 kudos

How to Put Your ADHD Gremlin to Sleep: A Guide By Jason Todd (Batfam gen, 810 words) - 668 kudos

Fandom Events I Wrote For in 2024:

I wrote for many Who Wrote That? games for @haunting-heroes-creative-games! Those included:

WWT - Olympics: 4 fics, 8567 words

WWT - Demon Twins: 1 fic, 2576 words

WWT - Soulmates: 3 fics, 2445 words

WWT - Lightning Round: 3 drabbles (300 words)

WWT - Ancients: 1 fic, 250 words

Likewise, for @marvel-dc-crossover-event s, I did:

WWT - Poly Pool Noodles: 1 fic, 391 words

Title Roulette: 1 fic, 2001 words

Marvel/DC 48 Hr Exchange: 5 fics, 4939 words

Holiday Elfing: 1 fic, 2868 words

Other Events Included:

@pod-together, for which I wrote 1 fic of 2,494 words

@clonebang (2023), for which I co-wrote a 10k fic, 4122 words of which were mine

@marveltrumpshate, for which I wrote 1 fic of 3,090 words

@voiceteam Mystery Box (2023) & VT 2024, for which I wrote 1 fic each, of 825 words & 466 words respectively

Yuletide, for which I wrote 3 works totaling 4075 words!

& lastly, Cozytober 2024, for which I wrote 4 fics & exactly 800 words total!

Writing Reflections:

This year, majority of the writing I finished & posted fit one of two categories: "event" or "I had this fun little idea and wrote it out real quick". I think what I can draw from that is twofold. First, I really do thrive when writing is a community activity. I like to write when it's part of a greater effort at engaging with people and building friendships and spreading joy. Second, I got way happier about writing when it began shifting from something I felt like I had to do / should be doing, to something I could just do for fun with quick little things and then toss out into the world. Majority of my fics this year were only cursorily checked over for SPAG issues or not beta'd at all, and a significant number of the short ones were written directly into the ao3 text box and posted without further thought, including "A Guide to Putting Your ADHD Gremlin to Sleep," which ended up being one of my most popular works of the year & honestly all time. This is not to say I put no thought into anything I wrote, because my other most popular work ("So I Choke on Sun") is one I spent weeks working on, despite how short it is, because I knew what I wanted to try to convey in it, and I ended up intensely proud of how it turned out. But I think I wrote so much this year because I really fell back in love with writing for fun first and foremost, and writing as an act of community involvement as a close second, and I really hope to carry that into the new year!

-

Thank you again to 42dnp for tagging me, this was so good to reflect on and such a positive way to spend my morning! <3

[sammy-writes-sometimes]

Word count: 445

---------

“So, this is it.” Impulse says lightly, leaning against a wall. There a few shulkers scattered around, filled with a mix of personal belongings and items leftover from building.

“This is it.” Bdubs adds as he looks through one of the shulkers, gently placing his art supplies inside.

The dryad sighs, shutting the last of the boxes before standing up.

“Well, this isn’t it.” The demon motions between himself and Bdubs.

“My love, you make it sound like we’re breaking up.” Bdubs points out.

Impulse chuckles, scratching at his scalp.

The dryad, his husband, easily strides up to him before placing their hand on his chin. It’s a small motion that he can’t keep himself from purring at as Bdubs starts to lightly scratch.

“I hope you don’t get rid of this.”

“Eehhh… bad texture…” Impulse says cautiously. “I might, just not this long.”

Bdubs almost pouts, but still he smiles. “Fine.”

There’s a small, swift kiss to his lips before Bdubs steps away.

“You gonna help me or what, stupid?”

“Wow, way to talk to your husband.”

“We’re not newly weds anymore, Impulse.” Bdubs laughs.

And yeah, they weren’t. It’d been a year and a half since Double Life and a year since Impulse re-proposed to Bdubs after deciding he truly did want to spend the rest of his life with the dryad.

As if Bdubs could read his mind, like they were still tied by a soulbond, he moves to play with the pocket watch Impulse had made for him.

“Hey, Bdubs?”

“Yeah?”

“A lot– a lot has happened this season… but I’m glad it led me to you.”

His husband stands there, almost dumbfounded as he stares at Impulse. But so easily, he breaks into a wide smile. “Oh you–...” He laughs awkwardly, almost backed into a corner. “Impulse?”

“Yeah?”

“I– I say– gods, this is hard.” He rubs his arm. “I– I love you so much. I love you more than the earth and sun and the moon.”

“I love you…” Bdubs’ smile turns small, soft and gentle. “And I’m– I’m more than happy that we’re together– that we’re still together.”

Impulse holds his hand, squeezing lightly as he kisses Bdubs’ cheek.

“We’re staying together, no matter what.”

“You better promise not to kill me again.”

“I, uh… I can’t do that.”

Bdubs glares before shoving him away. “Okay, alright, I see how it is.”

He can’t stop himself from giggling, and he can’t help but notice the smile that Bdubs tries to hide.

“I love you Bdubs… promise…”

Bdubs is silent for a moment, playing with the pocket watch – their wedding ring – before turning to Impulse. “I love you too.”

---------

Our ko-fi

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Ouroboros Der Siebente Ring Stefan George Illus. by Melchior Lechter Berlin: Blaetter für die Kunst, 1907.

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

December 7, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Dec 08, 2024

On Thursday, December 5, in Chicago, Illinois, former president Barack Obama gave the third in an annual series of lectures he has delivered since 2022 at his foundation’s Democracy Forum, which gathers experts, leaders, and young people to explore ways to safeguard democracy through community action.

Taken together, these lectures are a historical and philosophical exploration of the weaknesses of twenty-first century democracy as well as a road map of directions, some new and some old, for democracy’s defense. In 2022, Obama explored ways to counteract the flood of disinformation swamping a shared reality for decision making; in 2023 he discussed ways to address the extraordinary concentration of wealth that has undermined support for democracy globally.

On Thursday, Obama explored the concept of “pluralism,” a word he defined as meaning simply that “in a democracy, we all have to find a way to live alongside individuals and groups who are different than us.”

But rather than advocating what he called “holding hands and singing ‘Kumbaya’” as we all tolerate each other, Obama described modern pluralism as active work to form coalitions over shared issues. His argument echoed the concepts James Madison, a key framer of the Constitution, explained in Federalist #10 when he was trying to convince inhabitants of a big, diverse country that they should endorse the newly written document.

In 1787, many inhabitants of the fledgling nation objected to the idea of the strong national government proposed under the new constitution. They worried that such a government could fall under the control of a majority that would exercise its power to crush the rights of the minority. Madison agreed that such a calamity was likely in a small country, but argued that the very size and diversity of the people in the proposed United States would guard against such tyranny as people formed coalitions over one issue or another, then dissolved them and formed others. Such constantly shifting coalitions would serve the good of all Americans without forging a permanent powerful majority.

Obama called the Constitution “a rulebook for practicing pluralism.” The Bill of Rights gives us a series of rights that allow us to try to convince others to form coalitions to elect representatives who will “negotiate and compromise and hopefully advance our interests.”

Majority rule determines who wins, but the separation of powers and an independent judiciary are supposed to guarantee that the winners “don’t overreach to try to permanently entrench themselves or violate minority rights,” he said. The losers accept the outcome so long as they know they’ll have a chance to win the next time.

Obama noted that this system worked smoothly after World War II, largely because a booming economy meant rising standards of living that eased friction between different groups: management and labor, industry and agriculture. At the same time, the Cold War helped Americans come together against an external threat, and a limited range of popular culture reinforced a shared perspective on the world—everyone watched the sitcom Gilligan’s Island.

Most of all, though, Obama noted, American pluralism worked well because it largely excluded women and racial, gender, and religious minorities. He pointed out that as late as 2005, when he went to the Senate, he was the only African American there and only the third since Reconstruction. There were two Latinos and fourteen women.

In the 1960s, he noted drily, “things got more complicated.” “[H]istorically marginalized groups—Blacks, Latinos, Asians, Native Americans; women and gays and lesbians; and disabled Americans—demanded a seat at the table. Not only did they insist on a fair share of government-directed resources, but they brought with them new issues, born of their unique experiences that could not just be resolved by just giving them a bigger slice of the pie. So racial minorities insisted that the government intervene more deeply in the private sector and civil society to root out long-standing, systemic discrimination.”

Women wanted control over their own bodies, and gays and lesbians demanded equality before the law, challenging religious and social norms. “[P]olitics,” Obama said, “wasn’t just a fight about tax rates or roads anymore. It was about more fundamental issues that went to the core of our being and how we expected society to structure itself. Issues of identity and status and gender. Issues of family, values, and faith…. [A] lot of people…began to feel that their way of life, the American way of life, was under attack” just as increasing economic inequality made them think that other people were benefiting at their expense.

Increasingly, that economic inequality cloistered people in their own bubbles as unions, churches, and civic institutions decayed. “[W]ith the Cold War over, with generations scarred by Vietnam and Iraq and a media landscape that would shatter into a million disparate voices,” he said, Americans lost the sense of “a common national story or a common national purpose.” Media companies have played to extremes, and “[e]very election becomes an act of mortal combat.”

With that sense, there is “an increasing willingness on the part of politicians and their followers to violate democratic norms, to do anything they can to get their way, to use the power of the state to target critics and journalists and political rivals, and to even resort to violence in order to gain and hold on to power.”

For all that he was speaking in 2024, Obama could have been describing the realization of the fears of those opposed to the Constitution in 1787.

But he did not agree that those anti-Federalists had won the debate. Instead, he adapted Madison’s theory of pluralism to the modern era. Obama stood firm on the idea that the way to reclaim democracy is to build coalitions around taking action on issues that matter to the American people without regard to personal identities or political affiliations. Pluralism, Obama said, “is about recognizing that in a democracy, power comes from forging alliances, and building coalitions, and making room in those coalitions not only for the woke but also for the waking.”

And that, in many ways, identified the elephant—or rather the donkey—in the room. In the 2024 election, the Democratic Party under Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota governor Tim Walz very deliberately moved away from so-called identity politics: the idea that a person builds their political orientation around their pre-existing social identity. During the campaign, Harris rarely referred to the fact that if elected, she would be the first woman, as well as the first woman of color, to hold the presidency: when attendees at the Democratic National Convention wore white in honor of the suffragists, Harris wore black.

Instead, Harris and Walz embraced investing in the middle class and supporting small businesses. But that shift to the center did not translate into a presidential victory in 2024, and those on the political left, as well as progressive Democrats, are not convinced it was a good move.

Since the rise of Donald Trump, the MAGA party has been the one championing identity politics, rejecting American pluralism in favor of centering whiteness, a certain kind of individualist masculinity, Christianity, and misogyny. Making common cause with Republicans, even non-MAGA Republicans, in the face of such politics seems to the left and progressive Democrats self-defeating.

Obama disagrees. “[I]t’s understandable that people who have been oppressed or marginalized want to tell their stories and give voice fully to their experiences—to not have to hold back and censor themselves, especially because so many of them have been silenced in the past,” he said, “But too often, focusing on our differences leads to this notion of fixed victims and fixed villains.”

He stood firm against compromising core principles but said: “In order to build lasting majorities that support justice—not just for feeling good, not just for getting along, to deliver the goods—we have to be open to framing our issues, our causes, what we believe in in terms of ‘we’ and not just ‘us’ and ‘them.’”

And he emphasized that such cooperation works best when it’s about action, rather than just words, because action requires that people invest themselves in a common project. “It won't eradicate people's prejudices, but it will remind people that they don't have to agree on everything to at least agree on some things. And that there are some things we cannot do alone.” “It’s about agency and relationships.”

Then Obama addressed the political crisis of this moment, the one the anti-Federalists feared: “What happens when the other side has repeatedly and abundantly made clear they’re not interested in playing by the rules?” When that happens, he said, “pluralism does not call for us” to accept it. “[W]e have to stand firm and speak out and organize and mobilize as forcefully as we can.” Even then, though, “it’s important to look for allies in unlikely places,” he said, noting that “people on the other side…may share our beliefs in sticking to the rules, observing norms,” and that supporting them might help them “to exert influence on people they’ve got relationships with within the other party.”

The power of pluralism, he said, is that it can make people recognize their common experiences and common values. That, he said, is how we break the cycle of cynicism in our politics.

Obama’s argument has already drawn criticism. At MSNBC, Ben Burgis condemned Obama’s “centrist liberalism” as inadequate to address the real problems of inequality and warned that his political approach is outdated.

But it is striking how much Obama’s embrace of pluralism echoes that of James Madison, who had in his lifetime witnessed a group of wildly diverse colonists talk, write letters, argue, and organize to forge themselves into a movement that could throw off the age-old system of monarchy in favor of creating something altogether new.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[spotsandsocks]

✨ 2023 writing round-up ✨

Tagged by (and I might have missed some people sorry) @exhuastedpigeon @jamespearce9-1-1 @heartshapedvows @thekristen999 @jesuisici33 @daffi-990 @hippolotamus @wikiangela

Links to all 23 fics I’ve written which I’ve just realised coincidentally matches the year maybe I shouldn’t work on that Christmas fic after all 🤔 All under the cut cos that’s quite a few and your dash does not need to be bothered by that! 😆😆 I will forget to tag someone I know it, so if I do I didn’t really and you’re tagged too cos you’re wonderful

💕💜💕Thank you to each and everyone of you who talks to me, tags me, supports and encourages me, reblogs and likes. Sends asks and questions and prompts and love in my direction. Thank you for sharing your time, talents , your words and creative skills with us all. You make my days brighter and more fun. I adore you all and wish you all a happy kind and peaceful 2024. 💕💜💕

January

Home Wanted 6k established Buddie new pet based shenanigans 🐀🐁🐀

Could Have Should Have Would Have 3k my biggest hit this year angsty then sweet

Who You Gonna Call? 9k Eddie calls Buck and works out how he feels

February

This Must Be Love 5.7k fluffy valentines fic featuring pea puns 🫛

March

Just another minute 1.2k 6x10 spec

No Place 8.4k coma!buck spec fic with a few similarities to what we got actually

It's Such A Feeling 1.8k couldn’t remember but apparently hand appreciation fic that gets smutty 😉

April

Date Night 2k I got stuck on bus for almost 3 hours and this happened - surprisingly popular considering I had no plans to write it until traffic hit!

The Answer I Needed 2.4k Buck is always there for Eddie 5plus 1 across time till love strikes

Always There 1.6k Tía Pepa sees all at Christopher’s birthday party

May

Everything But (temptation) 4.7 5plus 1 of Eddie being a flirty tease and driving Buck crazy

Worth the wait5.7 same fic but from Buck’s perspective

July

Good Knight Sweet Prince 167,316k ahh my best beloved started in 2023 and finished this year. I adored writing and sharing this what turned out to be epic length fantasy au. Knights princes dragons thwarted love and a happy ending what can I say if that’s your thing give it a go.

Let me stay by your fire (for nothing warms me like you do)4.5k couldn’t let go of mediaeval theme so knight Buck this time coming home to his blacksmith friend Eddie. Oh and bees. 🐝

August

Something Worth Staying For 21k an enemies to lover (although not really enemies) small town newspaper au where Buck turns up and Eddie hates him until he doesn’t. Featuring my real life computer disaster 😆

Tied To You From The Start 13.4k a challenge I took on and did rather well if I say so myself 😆😆 paranormal mysterious shenanigans. Buck in peril and on the run Eddie trying to save him from his own self sacraments and hot sex.

September

The Comfort of Your Hands 2.9k inspired by an anon talking about Eddie running fingers through Bucks hair. No plans for this one it just happened and again was well received. Maybe I should stop planning fics and just see what happens.

October

The Price of Love (is high) 7.7k autumnangstfest drama. I put them both through it. All past traumas coming back to cause trouble.

Your heart or mine? Yours every time 3.6k a hungry vampire!Buck and Eddie get stuck in a lift … things occur

November

100 word fics added a short fic to this little collection i actually love doing these. It’s a great challenge

Only one answer 590 couldn’t remember.. had a look and went oh yeah that was cute. Proposal fic in under 600 words

In my defence I was left unsupervised 1.3k Buck gets bored with sissors Eddie likes the results … who could resist buzz but Buck… not Eddie it seems

Nov/Dec

The Lost and The Found wip 5/10 48k this was not meant to be this long but guess what.. got carried away and plot is plotting and demands around 100,000 at least in the end I suspect. 5 chapters out number 6and 7 before Christmas this counts as 2023 doesn’t it? Come join me for the ride

@daffi-990 @shortsighted-owl @monsterrae1 @rogerzsteven @hippolotamus @loserdiaz @the-likesofus @stagefoureddiediaz @yelenasbuddie @hoodie-buck @buddierights @bekkachaos @thekristen999 @ronordmann @caroandcats @spaceprincessem @disasterbuckdiaz @heartshapedvows @underwater-ninja-13 @wildlife4life @wikiangela @thewolvesof1998 @exhuastedpigeon @weewootruck @giddyupbuck @housewifebuck @honestlydarkprincess @pirrusstuff @elvensorceress @jesuisici33 @eddiebabygirldiaz @jamespearce9-1-1 @theplaceyoustillrememberdreaming @wh0re-behavi0r @princessfbi @jacksadventuresinwriting @ci5mates @katries @megsvstheworld @like-the-rest-of-la

[shadowthestoryteller]

Health Hiatus Announcement

This is gonna be a long post, but a necessary one that has quite a bit of important info relating to the future of my creative works concerning the Adventures!AU series. First, look at this lovely new cover art for Off to a Great Start I had done by my bud Arven92 on DA. The title has changed to The Adventure Begins, but the main story within is the same. 

The light reveals their true Alphian form (symbolic only, not a lore aspect) while their shadow shows their ultimate fate as a member of Clone Force 99/Bad Batch. The bookshelves are a key location (library), but the merge into woods represents how they're entering into a very real adventure that isn't just a fantasy they write into books. Really happy how it turned out ^^

Onto the main post! 

TLDR: Adventures!AU is being drastically shortened for my sanity and physical health into two arcs (six books each) but most likely will cease full chapter uploads after arc one as I am tired af, I don’t want to be doing this series into my 50s, and I want to turn my focus back to my originals eventually. Next year will see postings of the series prologue, Anachronism, as well as hopefully the Remaster of Off to a Great Start/The Adventure Begins. I will still be very active on my discord, where some chapters of next year's stories have already been posted. But for my other story posting sites (aka Wattpad) all new Star Wars content is on hiatus until 2026.

Been wanting to make a big post for a while for the people who aren’t a part of the discord, especially since I’ve more or less dropped off the face of tumblr after it became unhealthy due to comparison eating me alive. If you like my work, you’re welcome to join the server which is dedicated to my works. I’m active in there a few times a week, and even post bi-weekly updates as to what I’ve been working on. And I’ve posted six chapters of remastered Off to a Great Start/The Adventure Begins complete with new scenes, new povs, and even more snark! Just message me for the link, I'm still wary of a stalker finding me again.

Now, for the meat of this update. 

Y’all. I am just… dog dead tired. And stressed beyond belief. Some of it isn’t related to the Adventures!AU itself (job hunt, burnout from completing my Masters in May, ect), but a lot of it admittedly is. Considering I’ve written almost 500k words in just under 5 years, it’s no surprise. Some people don’t write that in a lifetime, and I’m out here doing that on top of college. Proud of myself for that. 

What I’m not proud of, however, is ignoring my body’s warning signals and pushing myself past my limits not once, but twice. Once in 2022, and now again in 2024. Nothing major or genuinely life-altering, but when I say my health anxiety went off the rails. Been a rough few weeks lol. 

But that leads me to now. 

Adventures!AU. My series following the adventures of my self-insert as they become a member of Clone Force 99 back when it was just four members, with the added twist of it being in an alternate universe where the Star Wars universe has crossed over with my original stories. It’s not as big as non-self insert series, but Over the River and Through the Woods (which sits at a whopping 66 chapters and 200k+ words) once got #19 out of 60k in the ocs tag. The series has been going since April 2020, seeing four completed stories of various lengths and one WIP that sits at 21 chapters and 93k words. 

Aside from the recently completed Fallen Not Forgotten, it’s been on hiatus since Dec of 2023. At least as far as chapter uploads go. It’s certainly not been collecting dust. To say it underwent some intense restructuring in July is an understatement. A big understatement. 

I originally had seventeen books planned for the series as of three months ago, sectioned into four arcs with Anachronism kinda being a “prologue” to the main Adventures!AU series. Before this timeline is banished to the dream graveyard, I’m sharing it so y’all can at least see where it was gonna go. The four arcs would have had four books each, and were structured thus:

Bonds Forged Through Fire and Storm

Off to a Great Start (25 chapters)

Over the River and Through the Woods (66 chapters)

To the Far Reaches (66 chapters)

Welcome to War Games (25 chapters)

Into the Light Through Acts in the Dark

Commander, Meet the Cat (Remastered, 20 chapters)

Fallen Not Forgotten (Remastered, 20 chapters)

Risk vs Reward (20 chapters)

Bane of My Existence (20 chapters)

Wars of the Realms

Call of the Wild (20 chapters)

Convergence Hijinks (20 chapters)

Let’s See What You’re Really Made Of (20 chapters)

Anachronistic Adventures (20 chapters)

Decaying Dreams and Deadly Dances

Shadow in the Dark (40 chapters)

Murder Uncle Mayhem (40 chapters)

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished (40 chapters)

A Legacy in Question(40 chapters)

The plans I had for this series were intricate, deep, and would push many characters to their limits. 

But turns out, it wasn’t just the characters pushed to their breaking point. 

I got sick. A rather severe case of acid reflux that landed me in the docs office for the second time in two years. That started in mid-July, and I’m still dealing with it. Will probably be dealing with the sickness afterward for another month at least. But leading up to all that, I’ve been reflecting on the series as a whole and where exactly I want it to go, how I want it to end, and all that jazz. 

Then I did a scheduling test in Excel using the above chapter load plus the 30 I had planned for Anachronism. Assuming two chapters a month with minimal breaks here and there, this series would finally end in 2050. That is by no means sustainable, and while I have had a lot of fun with this series and daydreaming about the different plotlines is a comfort activity, I can’t see myself writing these books for that long. I really want to publish my original stories some day, but I also won’t pretend that I’m not a bit tired of the series. At least, tired of pushing myself to work on stories that just don’t give the same rush of dopamine they used to. It’s almost a chore now to work on them, at least in the case of FNF. 

Full disclosure, that story has been a problem child since day one. Actually, I’m pretty sure the stress of that story is what pushed me over the edge and caused the health issues in 2022 that sent me to the doc with acid reflux the first time. Messing with canon and trying to keep the timeline continuous (with timetravel in the mix too) was nothing short of infuriating. The trajectory changed so many times as I wrote it, which I sadly feel is evident in the story. It really seems like a disjointed mess. I’m just so disappointed how it turned out, but I was determined to at least finish it and not leave everyone on a cliffhanger. And I’m proud of myself for at least finishing it, even if I cut out at least four threads from the ending. It just wasn’t healthy to keep going. 

Nor was it going to be healthy if I kept the series structured like I had it. 

So, I took the steps to fix that. 

Seventeen stories became twelve, four arcs became two. Some storylines were combined into one book (ex: Risk vs Reward and Bane of My Existence) while others (ex: Adventures!AU Batch meeting canon batch in Convergence Hijinks) were cut completely. I hated to lose some, but I’ve always been one to appreciate quality over quantity. Combining books and plotlines will help streamline things and make it more manageable. Some books also get new titles.

Arc one keeps its name, and will cover six books; Four main books then a prologue and epilogue of sorts. Anachronism, The Adventure Begins, Over the River and Through the Woods, To the Far Reaches, Welcome to War Games, and Moving Back to Look Forward. This arc covers Shadow’s initial fandom jump into the Tintin 2011 movie, their first mission with the Bad Batch, and them meeting the sailors again this time with the Batchers. Arc two will also keep its name and cover the entirety of the group’s interference of Star Wars the Clone Wars canon (rescuing Domino to taking down Palps), with a similar set up to arc one. Fallen Not Forgotten, Risk vs Reward, Level Up, Shadow in the Dark, No Good Deed Goes Unpunished, and A Legacy in Question. 

But I know that even the shortening isn’t drastic enough. I feel only dread thinking about the series now, and that won’t do. So, though it kills me, Arc One will probably be the only arc that gets an official posting. Once Moving Back to Look Forward ends in 2030 (barring any major complications), that will be it for official full length postings of Adventures!AU. I’ll still post snippets and segments from arc two on Discord (like I do now occasionally), but MBtLF will end in a way that wraps everything up nicely. I’ll be sure to craft it so it can remain open ended to their adventures, but the current trajectory will see the “main” storyline with Shadow and the Batch, plus the Tintin sailors, close in arc one. 

That’s the long term goal. So what’s short term? 

Next year I plan to at least partially post Anachronism. That story has remained in the drafts for long enough. Yes, that means To the Far Reaches is backed up another year for posting (2026). That story has a lot of emotional moments, a lot of dealing with past trauma and relationship issues, and I just don’t have the spoons for that right now. For those intense moments, I have to crack myself open a bit and let my heart bleed onto the page. I’m not in a position to do that right now. Anachronism lacked that depth, being a bit more surface level than the stories with the Batchers. It’s got its own emotional moments, but it’s not nearly as taxing. Additionally, I’m going back through what was Off to a Great Start (now The Adventure Begins) and bringing it up to the standards I try to hold OtRaTtW and TtFR to. But I learned my lesson posting stories out of order so I’m going to get Anachronism finished so there’s no continuity issues. 

That brings me to my next point; Adventures!AU canon. 

I��ve already announced that the posted C,MtC and FNF are both non-canon and should not be taken as fact. You can still enjoy them (best you can with the crack-writing) but any continuity issues should be ignored as they are from an earlier draft of the Adventures!AU. Well, that decanonization treatment is extending beyond those two. The Adventure Begins, Over the River and Through the Woods, and To the Far Reaches aren’t non-canon per se, but rather some elements of the remastered versions may contradict the original postings. Going forward, the “truest” version will be those depicted in the works posted to Adventures!AU Remastered on Wattpad. The first story (The Adventure Begins) won’t drop there until at least November 2025 but you’re free to watch it in the meantime. It’ll sit dormant for quite a bit longer though. Nothing major will change in the stories, but I plan to add some extra scenes and tweak some minor details (the Batchers time in the galaxy is one big thing I’m looking at tweaking). 

Let’s see. checks notes Yep, I think that covers everything! At least for now lol. I always have stuff to say, but this will probably be the last long update post for quite some time. 

Thanks for hanging around, and for reading this long post lol.

[hezekiahwakely]

As anticipated, here are my extensive red string notes from the pilot:

God knows how relevant any of this will turn out to be, but I'm nothing if not a collector of trivial information

Very long text beneath the cut:

Page 1

The Magnus Protocol Pilot 10/25/23

Characters (in order of appearance)

Alice Dyer -O.I.A.R. employee -Dated Sam in uni -Jokester -Training Sam -Gets along with Colin

Teddy Vaughn -Retiring from the O.I.A.R. after 4 (?) years -Going into insurance field

Colin Becher -O.I.A.R. IT Manager -Vegetarian 🥬 -On the hook of "his nibs" (boss, male) -Sensitive about FR3-d1 app development, communicates w/politicians, trying for 2 years -Only gets along w/Alice -Knows computers are listening -Jokes about being killed

Lena Kelley -O.I.A.R. Team/Department Manager -Authoritative, follows protocol -Doesn't think Gwen is qualified for management

Gwendolyn Bouchard -O.I.A.R. employee -Backlog of casework -Dislikes Lena, wants her job -Dedicated to detail -Accused of nepotism by Alice -Thinks current job is beneath her -"Not like most people." *static*

Samama Khalid (Sam) -New O.I.A.R. employee -Dated Alice in uni -Wanting to 'get back on his feet' -Familiar with TMI -Didn't know what the Incidents were before hire!!

Page 2

Pilot notes con. 10/25/23

Listening Tech - Turns on by itself 💡

Dated computers (O.I.A.R.)

"Manager's speakerphone" (Lena's)

CCTV (O.I.A.R. breakroom?)

Cell phone (Alice's)

*O.I.A.R. formed in 70s? Accor. to Alice*

*Response Department no longer exists*

Still in onboarding paperwork, "Response 121"

Sam ticked this box

Tech Specs

O.S. = Windows NT 4.0 (modified) -Extended support for this O.S. was ended Dec. 31, 2004 IRL -Runs on workstations connected by LAN -Similar GUI to 95; comes w/Internet Explorer

FR3-d1 -Custom research software circa mid-90s -Flags Incidents and creates a database -Can search private/protected sources (email) -Alice claims no one has understood its workings for 15 years -Written in German source code

*1 Year = Average Employee Stay*

Page 3

Pilot notes con. 10/25/23

Classification System

Used in FR3-d1's database

Structure: CATXRXXXXX-XXXXXXXX-XXXXXXXX

CATXRX -> From reference table (CAT = Category?) First four digits -> Main subject of Incident DPHW (?) Next eight digits -> Date of Incident Last eight digits -> Current date

Example: CAT2RC1157-12052022-13012024* -First one we hear they file. "1157" is the "DPHW" for "dolls, watching."

*Jan. 13, 2024 is the date of Sam's onboarding/training (after Teddy's going-away party)

*as listed in transcript; in-show, it's quoted as 22102023, or Oct. 22, 2023

Page 4

Pilot notes (con.) 10/25/23

FR3-d1's Voice to Text/Text to Speech

Voices (named by Alice, which Gwen dislikes):

Neil = Alex

Chester = Jonny

(those two most common)

Augustus = ?

Neil's Incident

Occurs in "Cyberspace" via the transcript

"I'm so sorry. I should have listened. I just couldn't face the thought of the rest of my life never hearing him again, I had to try." First lines 😢

Email from Harriet Winstead to Darla Winstead, May 12, 2022

Recitations *can* be paused by pressing "space"!

Chester's Incident

Also occurs in "Cyberspace"

Topic: Magnus Institute Ruins.

On forum, user RedCanary, begins April 10, 2022. Explored 4/19-20/22.

Third floor gone. No old papers.

Suspicious, occult (?) graffiti, stains (!)

Took box with strange symbols (same as ones on walls/floors)

4/30/22 Posted image of gore/eyes, possibly of themself. Banned + did not return.

Page 5

Pilot notes con. 10/25/23

Early release video Case #: CAT1RA1353-03102023-22102024(listed as 202"3" on Patreon)

Video was posted 10/22/23.

Listed as "Incident" on Patreon.

According to transcript, the O.I.A.R. offices are located in Royal Mint Court.

Johson (sic) Smirke Building

Main building.

5 storeys, Grade 2 listed.

Designed by James Johnson, but constructed between 1807-1812 by Robert Smirke after Johnson died. To be used for mint.

Entrance lodge also built by Smirke, in front of building.

Page 6

Pilot - Public Release -TMAGP#001

Changes:

Sam's first incident number - today's date

CAT2RC1157-12052022-13012024 -> CAT2RC1157-12052022-09012024

Voice (first incident)

Neil -> *Norris*

Minor word/date changes in incidents.

Minor line read differences.

Descriptions of Incidents in new transcript:

Norris': CAT1RBC5257-12052022-09012024 Reanimation (Partial) -/- Regret [Email]

Chester's: CAT23RAB2155-10042022-09012024 Transformation (Eyes) -/- Trespass [chat log]