apphiarothowrites

[apphiarothowrites]

They beat a hasty retreat home, the child-that-is-Marco carried quietly on Ace's hip. He says little and all of them are tense with the implication of what their eldest blonde has experienced.

They don't push. When they get home, Marco simply wraps himself up in a towel and opts to sit on the bed while Ace and Sabo cobble together clothing for themselves. He smiles at certain points, at their clumsy and coltish attempts to dress that result in them tripping over or bumping into things as they struggle with under-sized bodies, but remains quiet. Quieter than usual.

When they finally deem themselves presentable (both in boxers and oversized shirts) they pilfer a shirt for Marco (that sits more like a dress on his child shape) and collapse into bed in a tangled heap.

They don't push.

They do nap, off and on. By nightfall, with rumbling stomachs, they drag themselves upright to make dinner (Ace makes dinner, the only one still tall enough to reach the cupboard shelves without help). They eat, they bathe, then fall right back into their pile.

They don't push.

The next morning they all wake back in their normal bodies and Marco-still sans pants-gets up first to make breakfast. He finds a pair of shorts somewhere in between waking up the other two and starting coffee. They sit down together, they eat, and they don't push.

Marco finally breaks the odd silence as they're putting the dishes away.

"Pops took care of him." He says quietly. "It's how we met-the place my mother sold me to. The man in charge tried offering me to Pops a year after I was left there and Pops took care of him. Then he brought me onto the Moby and that was that-yoi."

Ace did always hear that Marco had been picked up young, the youngest ever to join the crew. He'd never known how young. Sabo had always heard that Marco was the longest-serving member of Whitebeard's many pirates, he'd never known how long.

The time before lunch passes in bed again, a tangled heap of warm arms and comforting snores around a bundled down blue bird.

Dumb idea I'm pulling from a fcucking Star Trek fic of all things but: (trigger warning for implied sexual abuse of a child)

MAS, post-marineford on sphinx (ace lives, sabo finds them early, the whole usual shebang of them getting together during the 2 year time skip) get whammied by a devil fruit that regresses their physical bodies back to the age at which they first had sex. Minds in tact, bodies changed, they all three take stock of themselves and each other after a flash of light--

Ace barely looks any younger, his first real sexual experience was after he left Dawn Island (17-and-a-half, with masked deuce, after they got off that island together). Gangly limbs, skinnier face and body, still growing into his muscle mass. His shorts somehow are looser than before the fruit hit him and he has to tighten the belt-his shoes are also a size too big now and he thinks that's the funniest part of the whole deal

Sabo looks somewhat younger, a daring 15-year-old who snuck off from the Revolutionary base to chat up a local boy with dark hair and steely eyes who struck his fancy. It was an awkward experience for them both. He's drowning his his coat and shirt, his pants punched up around his ankles (he hit a growth spurt at 18 that shot him up 7 inches in a year). He squawks at the indignity of being so short again. His hat also drops over his eyes and he has to keep pushing it up-adorable.

When the two of them finish poking fun at each other, they turn to look for Marco-

Marco, all of 7 years old, barely tall enough to reach Sabo's stomach, drowning in his purple shirt and trying to get his sandals off. He doesn't seem the slightest bit phased by the dramatic change and he steadfastly ignores the shock radiating off his lovers from one side. When Ace and Sabo get over their shock enough to help him he huffs a sigh and lets Ace pick him up.

"Shit pretty bird-" Sabo tries to say something, anything but-

"We're not talking about it here-yoi." Comes Marco's disgustingly youthful voice, tone full of an adult's hard warning.

#ar writes #the tragic de aging au #that got sappier than I intended whoops

[apphiarothowrites]

Dumb idea I'm pulling from a fcucking Star Trek fic of all things but: (trigger warning for implied sexual abuse of a child)

MAS, post-marineford on sphinx (ace lives, sabo finds them early, the whole usual shebang of them getting together during the 2 year time skip) get whammied by a devil fruit that regresses their physical bodies back to the age at which they first had sex. Minds in tact, bodies changed, they all three take stock of themselves and each other after a flash of light--

Ace barely looks any younger, his first real sexual experience was after he left Dawn Island (17-and-a-half, with masked deuce, after they got off that island together). Gangly limbs, skinnier face and body, still growing into his muscle mass. His shorts somehow are looser than before the fruit hit him and he has to tighten the belt-his shoes are also a size too big now and he thinks that's the funniest part of the whole deal

Sabo looks somewhat younger, a daring 15-year-old who snuck off from the Revolutionary base to chat up a local boy with dark hair and steely eyes who struck his fancy. It was an awkward experience for them both. He's drowning his his coat and shirt, his pants punched up around his ankles (he hit a growth spurt at 18 that shot him up 7 inches in a year). He squawks at the indignity of being so short again. His hat also drops over his eyes and he has to keep pushing it up-adorable.

When the two of them finish poking fun at each other, they turn to look for Marco-

Marco, all of 7 years old, barely tall enough to reach Sabo's stomach, drowning in his purple shirt and trying to get his sandals off. He doesn't seem the slightest bit phased by the dramatic change and he steadfastly ignores the shock radiating off his lovers from one side. When Ace and Sabo get over their shock enough to help him he huffs a sigh and lets Ace pick him up.

"Shit pretty bird-" Sabo tries to say something, anything but-

"We're not talking about it here-yoi." Comes Marco's disgustingly youthful voice, tone full of an adult's hard warning.

#AR writes #the tragic de-aging au

[apphiarothowrites]

@ fic authors what do you personally consider a successful fic? What’s the bar?

#yeah with how HBTB has been treating me just getting shit written down is a victory

[apphiarothowrites]

*SIGHS*

Another AO3 app that's pretending to be official when it's not (or at least isn't making it clear its unofficial.) They're using AO3's name and logo, and embedding ads.

There is no official AO3 app

Someone else is gathering your data, potentially your log in information etc and making use of it how they please. (They say they're not but their privacy policy says otherwise)

They are making money from the ads without the fic writer's consent.

They've also rated it Pegi 3 (which is ludicrous)

Please, even if you care about nothing else, for the safety of your data, please don't use this app. Certainly don't give it your AO3 log in details.

I've told AO3 that it's infringing on its copyright. I will be requesting they remove access of my work as I do not consent to my creative content being used to generate ad revenue for them.

I will be reporting it as incorrectly rated.

The only email address I can find is [email protected] which is included in their privacy policy, and [email protected] as their developer.

[apphiarothowrites]

Alright, to ao3's soon to be arriving Wattpad Refugees, a basic guide to general user culture:

1.) Unlike Wattpads vote system that let's you like each chapter, the ao3 equivalent kudos only allows one per work. Everyone is generally quietly annoyed about this. To engage with each chapter, you're heavily encouraged to comment. Trust me, it makes people's day.

2.) Ao3 has no algorithm. By default it's latest updated work first. You can find things to your taste through searches, filters and tags.

3.) 'No archive warnings apply' and 'user has chosen not to use archive warnings' mean two very different things. No archives warnings means the work is free from any content that could require a warning tag (character death, graphic depictions of violence, non-con, etc). User has chosen not to use archive warnings means it could contain any of the warning content, be it hasn't been explicitly tagged. Treat it like an allergen. No archive warnings apply is allergen free. User has chosen not to use archive warnings, may contain traces or whole chunks of the allergen. If you're likely to have a bad reaction, maybe don't take the risk.

4.) Speaking of warnings, ao3 has very few restrictions on the type of work that's allowed. Whatever your personal thoughts or feelings on that are, thats how the site is. You're likely to run across some dark subject matters and a lot of people are uncomfortable with reading that. You're well within your rights not like these works and have your opinion on whether they should be allowed, but harassing the authors of such works (or any works) is more likely to come back on you than them. Ao3 operates on a strong policy of 'don't like, don't read'. Use the tagging system to your full advantage to only engage with the kind of works you want to see.

We look forward to welcoming you all and seeing the fantastic works you create. Happy writing!

#should note because apparently people can't understand the phrase #“don't like don't read” means that if you do not like a thing then do not read the thing #you are not being forced at gunpoint to read anything on AO3 #so if you do not like it then hit the back button and don't read it

[apphiarothowrites]

A second sneak peek

this whole fuckin' fic man, it's kicking my ass so hard. The schedule is defo slipping and I can't even get mad about it because of how hard this whole thing is kicking me.

anyway, here have a sneak peek at the one part of chapter 3 that I'm actually satisfied with

He doesn’t even have to dodge. Sand and strings flying around him, eventually descending to the base of the execution stand, and he doesn’t have to dodge a single move. It wasn’t about him. It was never about him.

None of this was, truly, about him. No one is listening to him-not Pops nor Marco, not Garp, not Luffy. He wonders, as the despondence and isolation of a fight that ignores his existence begins to really settle into his rib cage, if he’s worth listening to. If he was ever worth listening to.

If he was ever worth anything at all. 

There’s nothing you can do. A voice echoes at him, the context missing but the tone warm.

He lifts his head, straining and trying to remember who could have said something so horrible but so happily. The voice is familiar but so distant-everything in his head scrambled as despair eats his hollow chest. The fight, the weakness from the seastone, being cut off from his element-cut off from himself… He can’t fight it, and it’s getting harder and harder to keep trying to fight it.

There’s nothing you can be. It echoes again, contextless and comfortable.

Gods above and below, who could have said that?? What the hell could they have meant? No, he knows what they meant. He could even take a fair guess at why they would have said it. He is nothing-worse than nothing he is cursed. Born to die, born to destroy the lives of others as he dies. He’s worse than nothing-

There’s nothing that you can say- It echoes forward, a faceless memory that makes his heart pound for reasons beyond his understanding. It’s reassuring, somehow, like a valve beginning to turn and release pressure held back. But for what remains of the life of him he can’t remember why that is nor who said it.

Tears build up, liquid fire burning his eyelids and dripping. He can’t figure any of this shit out-just like always, the answers just out of reach and awaiting a more experienced hand to guide him towards them-

That I won’t forgive. “I’m coming Ace!”

Marco.

Of course it’s Marco.

A blue flash rises from below the wall, brilliant and golden and hungry for success-

Garp’s fist, crashing down and sending that beautiful bird to the ground. He can’t see where Marco’s landed, but he can feel the man’s gaze upon him. Something flickers to life in his chest. A warmth in the cold and hopelessness.

Something is trying to build, to grow, to spur action and Ace-

Ace feels…so strange…

He almost feels-

“I…I want…”

The words come almost unbidden.

There’s nothing you can do, nothing you can be, nothing that you can say–

He realizes he lied before. For a moment, he feels the echo of Luffy’s laughter pressed to his back where his little brother has been carried before. For a moment he feels Marco’s arms and wings and strange wailing birdsong inside his chest where he’s buried him before. For a moment the ground shakes under him as Pops tosses his head back to laugh. For a bare brief moment, he feels another hand in his as he goes running and laughing from an irate town guard and Sabo’s laughing with him.

He realizes that he’s lied before-to the world and to himself. 

That I won’t forgive.

He lied to Marco. He lied to Pops. He lied to Luffy and Sabo and and the world and most importantly he lied to himself. He’s been lying to himself, for almost his entire existence. And Marco-Marco was the first to forgive him for it.

His heart feels like it’s bursting in his chest, the truth laid bare before his mind’s eye. He feels so strange, so–

“I want to live!”

Free.

#AR talks #AR writes #hbtb stuff and notes

[apphiarothowrites]

Full offense and pun fully intended, but I genuinely think the very existence of "dead dove, do not eat" was a fucking canary in the mines, and no one really paid attention.

Because the tag itself was created as a response to a fandom-wide tendency to disregard warnings and assume tagging was exaggerated. And then the same fucking idiots reading those tags describing things they found upsetting or disturbing or just not to their taste would STILL click into the stories and give the writer's grief about it.

And as a response writers began using the tag to signal "no, really, I MEAN the tags!"

But like.

If you really think about it, that's a solution to a different problem. The solution to "I know you tagged your story appropriately but I chose to disregard the tags and warnings by reading it anyway, even though I knew it would upset me, so now I'm upset and making it your problem" is frankly a block, a ban and wide-spread blacklisting. But fandom as a whole is fucking awful at handling bad faith, insidious arguments that appeal to community inclusion and weaponize the fact most people participating in fandom want to share the space with others, as opposed to hurting people.

So instead of upfront ridiculing this kind of maladaptive attempt to foster one's own emotional self-regulation onto random strangers on the internet, fandom compromised and came up with a redundant tag in a good faith attempt to address an imaginary nuance.

There is no nuance to this.

A writer's job is to tag their work correctly. It's not to tag it exhaustively. It's not even to tag it extensively. A writer's sole obligation, as far as AO3 and arguably fandom spaces are concerned, is to make damn sure that the tags they put on their story actually match whatever is going on in that story.

That's it.

That's all.

"But what if I don't want to read X?" Well, you don't read fic that's tagged X.

"But what if I read something that wasn't tagged X?" Well, that's very unfortunate for you, but if it is genuinely that upsetting, you have a responsibility to yourself to only browse things explicitly tagged to not include X.

"But that's not a lot of fic!" Hi, you must be new here, yes, welcome to fandom. Most of our spaces are built explicitly as a reaction to There's Not Enough Of The Thing I Want, both in canon and fandom.

"But there are things on the internet that I don't like!" Yeah, and they are also out there, offline. And, here's the thing, things existing even though we personally dislike or even hate or even flat out find offensive/gross/immoral/unspeakable existing is the price we pay to secure our right to exist as individuals and creators, regardless of who finds US personally unpleasant, hateful or flat out offensive/gross/immoral/unspeakable.

"But what about [illegal thing]?!" So the thing itself is illegal, because the thing itself has been deemed harmful. But your goddamn cop-poisoned authoritarian little heart needs to learn that sometimes things are illegal that aren't harmful, and defaulting to "but illegal!" is a surefire way to end up on the wrong side of the fascism pop quiz. You're not a figure of authority and the more you demand to control and exercise authority by command, rather than leadership, the less impressive you seem. You know how you make actual, genuine change in a community? You center harm and argue in good faith to find accommodations and spread awareness of real, actual problems.

But let's play your game. Let's pretend we're all brainwashed cop-abiding little cogs that do not own a single working brain cell to exercise critical thinking with. 99% of the time, when you cry about any given thing "being illegal!!!" you're correct only so far as the THING itself being illegal. The act or object is illegal. Depiction of it is not. You know why, dipshit? Because if depiction of the thing were illegal, you wouldn't be able to talk about it. You wouldn't be able to educate about it. You wouldn't be able to reexamine and discuss and understand the thing, how and why and where it happens and how to prevent it. And yeah, depiction being legal opens the door for people to make depictions that are in bad taste or probably not appropriate. Sure. But that's the price we pay, creating tools to demystify some of the most horrific things in the world and support the people who've survived them. The net good of those tools existing outweighs the harm of people misusing them.

"You're defending the indefensible!" No, you're clumsily stumbling into a conversation that's been going on for centuries, with your elementary school understanding of morality and your bone-deep police state rot filtering your perception of reality, and insisting you figured it out and everyone else at the table is an idiot for not agreeing with you. Shut the fuck up, sit the fuck down and read a goddamn book.

[apphiarothowrites]

I know a lot of people accept that Ace was Sanji’s bi awakening but forget the extra element of already-out Zoro getting to witness Sanji’s bi panic firsthand

[apphiarothowrites]

you, reading this. you're a creature now. reblog to creature your followers

[apphiarothowrites]

Saturday night Bird

[apphiarothowrites]

I THREATENED AND NOW IM DELIVERING 😈

IN CELEBERATION OF MY BANISHMENT HAVING COME TO AN END!

A PICREW!

AND A QUIZ!!!

DOUBLE WHAMMY!

REJOICE!

To my dear dear mutuals, to those who stayed with me during these trying times (you know you are), know that I love you people in my phone💖

@hyperbolicgrinch @castiels-destiny @cerulean-s3rpent @riverrunscold @captain-icicle @ratgandalf @piratetheon @buckyeagan @anaid-queen

#yeah that tracks I guess

[apphiarothowrites]

Melancholy. Just a good word for thoughtful and sad, and also like the perfect word to describe my state of being a lot.

Quick ! Think of a word you like ! 

Not necessarily your favorite word, it doesn’t even have to be a word you usually like ! Just a word that right now, at this moment, you look at and think “ooh what about this one”.

It can be a word you find funny, pretty, strange, scary, anything really ! You don’t need to tell me why you choose that word (though I’d love to know if you want to tell me), just give me a word ! 

(It’d be lovely if we made this into a chain but there’s no pressure <3)

uhhhhh sanguine? (literally the only word that popped up into my head rn but it’s prettyyy and sounds like summer to me in some inexplicable way 😌✨)

oh sure! Tagging @daydream-of-a-wallflower @silence-between-seconds @re-is-back-in-black @jaaklops @annotated-catastrophe @vintagetee13 @cherryswift13 @dandelions-fly-in-summer-skies @lost-in-reveriie @moonlightt444 @art-of-fools @good-oldfashioned-lover-girl @addsalwayssick @miseryoforpheus @justafanbutcurious + anyone else who’d like to join in :)

(but no pressure ofc <3)

[apphiarothowrites]

Would you consider your story "A Study in Emerald" Lovecraft / Sherlock fanfic?

Yes.

[apphiarothowrites]

hot artists don't gatekeep

I've been resource gathering for YEARS so now I am going to share my dragons hoard

Floorplanner. Design and furnish a house for you to use for having a consistent background in your comic or anything! Free, you need an account, easy to use, and you can save multiple houses.

Comparing Heights. Input the heights of characters to see what the different is between them. Great for keeping consistency. Free.

Magma. Draw online with friends in real time. Great for practice or hanging out. Free, paid plan available, account preferred.

Smithsonian Open Access. Loads of free images. Free.

SketchDaily. Lots of pose references, massive library, is set on a timer so you can practice quick figure drawing. Free.

SculptGL. A sculpting tool which I am yet to master, but you should be able to make whatever 3d object you like with it. free.

Pexels. Free stock images. And the search engine is actually pretty good at pulling up what you want.

Figurosity. Great pose references, diverse body types, lots of "how to draw" videos directly on the site, the models are 3d and you can rotate the angle, but you can't make custom poses or edit body proportions. Free, account option, paid plans available.

Line of Action. More drawing references, this one also has a focus on expressions, hands/feet, animals, landscapes. Free.

Animal Photo. You pose a 3d skull model and select an animal species, and they give you a bunch of photo references for that animal at that angle. Super handy. Free.

Height Weight Chart. You ever see an OC listed as having a certain weight but then they look Wildly different than the number suggests? Well here's a site to avoid that! It shows real people at different weights and heights to give you a better idea of what these abstract numbers all look like. Free to use.

[apphiarothowrites]

everyone: what's your goal in life?

me: to write a story so soul snatching, so gut wrenching and so devastatingly beautiful that it leaves you crying at 3am when you have a 8am lecture/shift and it inspires people to write entire essays, to write entire fanfics, mood boards and playlists based on it.

#me with hbtb #I have grand aspirations and I'm falling flat on like half of them #but at least marco's pretty when he gets hurt lmfao

[apphiarothowrites]

my biggest pet peeve wiht the english language is that you don’t have sin/sina

in swedish if u have two people who use the same pronoun u can always tell whos doing what bc its like ‘han tog sin väska’ (he took his[own] bag) and ‘han tog hans väska’ would be that he took the other persons bag

but in english its like if u have 2 ppl w/ the same pronoun:

“she took her bag” whose bag????WHose BAG was it her OWN bag or the other her’s bag??????????????

“he ate his donuts” were the donuts his own???? did he fucking eat someone elses donuts??? YIU DONT KNOW bc english is a bullshit language 

#end up defaulting to use “his own” and “the other's [thing]" as a solution to this problem #it's unfortunately a huge problem in my many fic series ugh

[apphiarothowrites]

Random shit I’m clearing out of my wip folder, listen no one has capitalized on teeth looking top surgery scars and that is a crime