thecinderninja

[thecinderninja]

You’ve heard of “don’t monetize your hobbies”; get ready for "don’t master your hobbies".

Your hobbies are here to help you decompress and have fun. They do not have to be disciplines you toil over for expertise, unless that is something you genuinely enjoy doing.

It’s okay to enjoy language-learning without ever becoming fluent, or even conversational. It’s okay to like playing guitar even if you only know a few clumsy songs. You can read books and never finish them, bowl without ever scoring even halfway to perfect. We’re here to explore and play, and we cannot do that if we’re chasing perfection in everything we do.

[thecinderninja]

REBLOG THIS IF YOU WANT FANFIC / ONESHOT IDEAS IN YOUR ASK BOX

[thecinderninja]

Stardust

On Ao3 as The_Cinderninja

Holiday Truce gift for @astatia-ghast

The house is quiet now. Quieter than I can remember it ever being. There’s the hum of the refrigerator, the creak of the foundation shifting as the house breathes, the muffled sounds of life outside the old window panes and the even older, thinner glass. But the spaces between these sounds stretch long now. They ache in a way they never did when I was alive.  

At night, when they sleep, I drift through empty rooms. The kitchen where I’d steal snacks and argue with Jazz over the last slice of pizza. The living room where I’d sit, my legs thrown over the arm of the couch while Mom tried to make me sit properly. My room, where the silence is comforting and suffocating all the same.

I drift down the hallway where my sister used to chase me, red faced, shrieking my name and threatening violent retribution for whatever crimes I had committed against her books, her dolls, her hair. Now she shuffles to her room, her shoulders rounded, her face pale and hollowed. She doesn’t slam her door the way she used to. 

I wish she would.

My room is the same, but it isn’t. They haven’t touched much - my books still lean haphazardly on the shelf, my posters still cling to the walls, curling at the corners. My glow stars remain in the places they were glued ten years ago when we first moved in, when we first painted the walls robin’s egg blue, when my four year old self stood perched on the headboard dictating the placement of each star, in each constellation, until my ceiling was - to me - a perfect mimicry of the night sky. But it smells wrong now. Stale. Like absence.  

Mom walks by sometimes and pauses at the doorway, her hand brushing the frame as though she wants to step in but can’t. Sometimes I think she’s trying to conjure the courage to push the door open. Other times I think she feels me there, and is trying to tell herself she does not.

Dad hasn’t set foot in my room since the day he cleared out my laundry. He keeps busy fixing things around the house - things that don’t need fixing. I watch him through the window as he tends the garden he never used to care about. Our yard was nothing but half-yellowed grass for as long as I could remember. A storage space for spillover junk, spare parts, odds and ends that didn’t have a home in the house or garage. 

Now the old kiddie pool is gone, and in its place are neat rows of pepper, cucumber, and tomato.

I’ve never seen Dad spend so much time outside before. Now I know where Jazz and I get our freckles from.

It’s Jazz I follow the most. She’s the one I worry about. She stays locked in her room, staring at the ceiling. She doesn’t read anymore. Sometimes, she talks to me. Her voice cracks when she says my name, but she talks.  

“I miss you, you know,” she whispered yesterday. “Even if you were annoying.”  

I wanted to tell her I miss her too. I wanted to tell her I wasn’t gone, but I didn’t. (I couldn’t).

Would it help?  

Mom and Dad have always been firm: Ghosts don’t rest. Ghosts are what’s left when you cling too tightly to a life already ended. “They suffer,” Mom said once, years ago, when Jazz asked if Grandma had become a ghost. “It’s not a fate you should wish on your loved ones. It’s a hollow, selfish comfort to wish for.”

Would knowing I’m still here bring comfort? Or would it break something already fragile?  

I don’t know.  

Today, Jazz sits on her carpeted floor, her back to the door, her shoulders shaking. I reach out, knowing I can’t touch her, but wishing I could.  

“Please…” she says, so softly I almost miss it. “I feel crazy, but… I swear…” She trails off. “Please, don’t be gone.”

I shouldn’t. I know I shouldn’t.  

What good could it do her? Knowing I’m still here? Mom’s words play on a loop in my mind: Ghosts don’t rest. They suffer. 

But I’m so tired of being alone. Tired of watching them grieve while I’m still here. My fingers curl around the nothingness that’s left of my life, and something inside of me feels angry at the unfairness, of how wrong it all is.

How none of this should have happened in the first place if our parents had paid more attention to their own children than to ghost stories. In a way, they’d always loved ghosts more than me, hadn’t they?

I… don’t know where that thought came from. I know it isn’t correct, but… it feels true in a way I can’t shake.

I stretch out, and it takes every ounce of will I have to brush my hand against the photo frame on her bookshelf. A photo of her and me - her and I? - from some family trip I was too young to still remember. It is a candid photo, neither one of us are smiling. I don’t know what was so special about that day that she chose to frame it and keep it all these years. Now, I’ll never be able to ask.

The photo frame shifts. Not enough to topple over, not enough to fall from the shelf. But it shifts.

Jazz freezes.

Her voice trembles. “It’s just the wind,” she murmurs. Her eyes dart to her closed window.

I watch her try to convince herself as her heart thunders in her chest. But then she swallows hard, her jaw setting with fragile determination.  

“If you’re here,” she says, louder this time, “do it again.”  

I hesitate, but only for a moment. I nudge it again, anger forgotten but this time fuelled by adrenaline - or whatever the ghostly equivalent is in my non-existent endocrine system - tipping it forward until it clatters softly against the wood.  

Her breath hitches and stops.. “Oh my god,” she whispers. “Oh my god, oh my god.” She stands up, backing away until her knees hit the edge of the bed.  

She’s afraid. My chest tightens with the wrongness of it, but I can’t stop now.  

“It’s not real,” she mutters to herself. “Coincidence. It’s just - coincidence.” Her voice cracks. “Do it again.”  

I flick her lamp off, plunging us into darkness. She gasps, stumbling back onto the bed.  

For a moment, silence. And then -

“I knew it.” Her voice is soft, shaking.

She sinks onto the mattress, her face in her hands. Her breath comes fast, ragged, and then the dam breaks and emotions spill out, flooding the room.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I’m so, so sorry. For everything. For every stupid fight. Every time I yelled at you. Every time I wasn’t fair, or kind, or-” Her voice shatters. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there when you needed me.”  

Her sobs shake me, filling the room, and the air, and my soul like wine overfilling a cup, liquid starlight, and I feel like I’ve been hollowed out and refilled with luminiferous aether. I reach toward her, instinctively wanting to offer comfort, but my hand falls short of her shoulder. The space between us is immeasurable. Her room is small but the quintessence contained between its four corners is vast.

How do I tell her she has nothing to apologize for? That she was everything a sister was supposed to be? We bickered because we cared. We fought because we trusted each other to survive the fallout. It was always us against everything else. Her and me against the world.

And now she’s crying, and it sounds like a sky of stardust.

“I miss you,” she whispers into the darkness. “I miss you so much.”  

I want to tell her I’m sorry too. Sorry I can’t be the brother she needs anymore. Sorry I can’t protect her from this hollow grief.  

I thought I could comfort her. Thought I could soothe my own loneliness by showing here I’m still here. Instead, I’ve torn open wounds that were barely beginning to scab over.  

I want to reach out, to tell her that none of this was her fault. That there’s nothing to apologize for. That every fight, every shout, every frustrated sigh was just a part of us. Part of what it meant to be her little brother.  

But I have no voice. 

Instead, I watch as my silence - the only answer I can give - drags her deeper into the shallow grave of grief that’s already swallowing her whole.  

Mom and Dad’s voices echo in my mind. Ghosts suffer. They make others suffer.

I didn’t believe it then. I didn’t think about it much at all, really. Ghosts were just another bedtime story, another way to make sense of the unknown. My parents’ weird obsession. But now...  

The house is hollow, and I’m the thing rattling around inside it. This place is too big for the people left inside it, but too small for me. I can’t move without brushing against memories.

Jazz is still crying in her room. Every instinct I have screams to stay, to do something, but what’s the point? I’ve already hurt her more than I ever did in life. Mom and Dad were right - ghosts are no comfort.

I leave her there and drift into the kitchen. It’s empty, dark but for the faint green glow from the stove clock. The hum of the refrigerator fills the space, steady and indifferent, the sound of life continuing without me, underscored by the air conditioner kicking on.

There’s no hum of electricity coursing through the walls like blood through veins. No blinking red light from the primed security system. The crash of metal-on-metal, of tools and machinery, of hands and minds at work behind the basement door - those sounds are gone.  

All of it buried behind the heavy steel door. Locked away, dismantled, abandoned.

This house was a living thing once, but now it feels almost as dead as I am.

Mom and Dad sit in silence at every meal. They don’t say anything, don’t even look at each other. The long pauses between words have become whole dinners, their work abandoned like old habits. Dad’s hands no longer twitch toward his tools. Mom’s gaze no longer lingers on the basement door. They’ve boarded up the pieces of themselves that once defined them.

Mom and Dad have lost so much. Not just me - they’ve lost their purpose, the drive that once filled this house with noise and light and endless activity.

They don’t speak of ghosts anymore. 

I wonder if they sense me pacing the rooms I used to fill. Haunting them. Do they know I’m still here? Do they hope I’m still here? Or do they pray to all of the gods they’ve never believed in that I’m not? Maybe they sit across from each other at night, heads bowed, praying that I’ve found peace.

I don’t know.  

The silence is loud.  

They were right all along about ghosts. Ghosts carry their unfinished lives like anchors. Ghosts suffer. And they make the living suffer with them.  

I don’t want to be that. I don’t want to be the reason my family fractures any further than they already have.  

But here I am.  

I know that it’s selfish to stay, but I don’t want to leave.

The hum of the refrigerator. The creak of brick and beam. Their mercurial grief flooding the house with quicksilver.

I don’t want to leave.

[thecinderninja]

There is zero demand for Albeven but that is not going to stop me.

[thecinderninja]

[thecinderninja]

[thecinderninja]

maybe if that united healthcare shooter knocks out 33 more CEOs he'll be up to 34 felonies and he can run for president...

[thecinderninja]

When you kill a healthcare ceo, it’s terrorism. When someone shoots your kid in elementary school, it’s thoughts and prayers for like a week and then they move on. It truly shows the fact that terrorism is whatever the american government wants it to mean.

[thecinderninja]

[thecinderninja]

How to Write Vivid Descriptions WITHOUT Overloading

Are you the type of person who describes a setting by using an intimidatingly huge paragraph that just rambles on and on and on because you're told to be specific but don't quite know how to do it correctly? If you've been struggling to detail settings, you've come to the right place! I'll reveal how to effectively describe a setting without having to use one big chunk of text and shoving it at your reader!

~ LINK IDEAS TOGETHER

As writers, we hear "show, don't tell" quite often, and the same applies when writing settings. But for some people this tip does little to help because, well, it's a bit of a vague concept.

With that being said, "linking ideas together" is a great way to describe the setting without having to explain the location! What do I mean?

Let's say there's a green field and I'm trying to depict it. This method is to find another subject that could connect with the setting to further describe it. What else is green? What reminds the character of the field? What's something similar?

Ex: The field in front of him reminded him of a photo he once saw long ago as a boy. His parents were standing in a lush, grassy area void of people, hugging each other tightly and smiling brightly at the camera under the bright blue sky.

In that example, I linked the field to a picture the character found, and by using his memories, I was able to paint a rough image of the location while setting the tone!

Ex: She'd been there before. She was there when the building still stood tall. When the streets were filled with people bustling about and the air smelled like cigarettes. Now, there is no tall building, but instead a pile of debris. She hasn't seen anyone in thirty minutes, and any smell of cigarettes would've surely been washed away by the rain.

This time, I connected the present location with the past one. But instead of showing the similarities, I contrasted them to emphasize the changes and abandoned state of the area!

~ LITERARY DEVICES

The most common literary devices I see regarding setting are similes, metaphors, and personifications!

It's similar my previous tip, where you connect two ideas together, but more general. The similes and metaphors don't have to be based on a specific experience of the character, but instead something more universal so everyone can connect with it!

Personification, on the other hand, can be used to substitute verbs.

Examples:

The stars shone like glittering jewels.

The road carved into the mountain.

The flowers waltzed along the music of the wind.

These devices allow you to describe something quickly and elegantly!

~ USE ACTIONS

Arguably, the most common tip provided when describing a setting is to use the five senses: sight, smell, touch, hearing, and taste. If you're like me, though, and have NO clue on how that's supposed to help, let me break it down!

Instead of thinking about the senses directly, use ACTIONS that correlate with the senses.

Instead of saying "the wood felt tough", say "he touched the wood, marveling at the toughness of the material".

Instead of saying "the air smelled like candies", say "she sniffed the air, inhaling the aroma of candies".

Instead of saying "the city was bright", say "they stare at the city, admiring how the lights illuminate the buildings and roads.

Do you see how your description suddenly blends in with the text now that there's an action and separate subject involved? You're still effectively describing the scene, but you're not pushing it at your reader. This also makes it far easier to build onto the depiction of the moment because you're not limited to adjectives!

By utilizing these three concepts, you can build an evocative description of the setting that won't overwhelm nor bore the readers!

Happy writing~

3hks :D

[thecinderninja]

when i was a homeless 20-year-old i was rejected from multiple housing opportunities because i had 5k in medical debt from going to the ER after getting roofied and sexually assaulted (i was unconscious so calling 911 was not my decision) and UHC denied my insurance claim. so yeah, i'm actually deriving an enormous amount of pleasure from watching health insurance CEOs snivel and hide like the heartless cowards they are. may those who profit from our suffering live in fear of those they seek to deny.

[thecinderninja]

This week, I read a fic that was around 20 years old, which had originally been posted on the author's personal website and which she added to AO3 a few years ago. She listed her email address with the fic, so after I finished reading, I sent her an email saying how much I enjoyed the story, how much I appreciated the work and effort she obviously put into it, and thanked her for uploading it to AO3. She responded the next day and thanked me for my message, then said she had a few more stories in the same series that she hadn't gotten around to uploading. I checked this morning--she added a 35,000 word novella and thanked me in the summary.

👏 comment 👏 on 👏 old 👏 fics 👏

[thecinderninja]

Nameless Bard ISaT AU battle sprites because why not

[thecinderninja]

what he means: my first girlfriend sacrificed herself for the good of her people, and she didn't think twice about it. i saw firsthand what it meant to truly protect those you love, and in that moment i also experienced what it meant to be loved enough to be protected. but i wasn't ready. i didn't have enough time to say goodbye. she was gone before she fell back to me, and i knew it even before i looked for a pulse that wasn't there. she was heavy, until she wasn't, because i saw death happen in a way i never thought it could when her body vanished from my arms. i now know what it feels like to kiss a spirit, and it's the last touch i have of her. she sacrificed herself because she believed it was her duty, an expectation she felt she needed to face, and it should never have happened. but she got dragged into a war that we brought to her home. there was nothing i could do to protect her from its devastation, and i blame myself for her death.

what he says: my first girlfriend turned into the moon

[thecinderninja]

parents got a new cat they named lord montague and this morning i heard my dad in the other room say "i would have to advise against that decision, my lord" followed by a crashing sound

[thecinderninja]

all i want to do is write that one fic that takes people’s breath away and kinda lingers in the back of their minds. i want to write something that makes people want to make art and play with my versions of characters or in the universe i created. i want to be able to create worlds that feel real enough to walk into and write lines that stick with people until they forget where exactly they heard it because it lives in their bones now.

[thecinderninja]

i’m so glad earth only has one moon, if there were more i’d have to pick a favorite and that sounds too emotionally taxing to even fathom