#but i got sucked into a new fandom literally the day after i posted the final chaptef

[renae-the-turtle]

Art for my fanfic, Charmy and the Dad Talk; I did the drawing and line art, and @alcadanon did the colours using alcohol markers!

Link to the fic here:

#sonic the hedgehog #team chaotix #vector the crocodile #espio the chameleon #charmy bee #fanart #fanfiction #i wrote and posted this fic months ago and should have posted this art here then #but i got sucked into a new fandom literally the day after i posted the final chaptef #you can even see a reference to said new fandom in the background #because i finished the art a couple days after the final chapter went up #if you spot it then good job #anyway i need to also edit the fanfic to add a link to here #cuz ao3 is terrible with pictures #so some people havent seen the art yet #charmy & the dad talk #tagging the fic title cuz idk. why not #team chaotix are family

[spacedace]

Reluctant War AU Part 3

Part 1 Part 2

More of the brain worm that has taken me over, gonna probably post it to Ao3 here before too long. Already got another part started and so many ideas for additional stuff, someone please send help I've been consumed by this thing lol

Sorry if Waller seems out of character, outside of fandom I'm mostly familiar with her through Justice League the animated show & Justice League: Unlimited and her vibe there has always struck me as "deeply incredibly unlikable character that also kind of has a point but also has done so much fucked up shit in the name of her goals that you don't really care about her point anymore." So you know, complicated lol. If she's completely unrecognizable let me know, but I'm hoping she feels at least somewhat like Waller.

Forgot to say this in the last update, but still feel free to use all this as an overly long prompt if yall want. Literally anything I throw out to the void should be treated as a prompt lol If there's anything at all interesting to you in any of this nonsense go for it <3 <3 <3

---

Amanda Waller was someone who did what needed to be done.

Ruthless, heartless, vicious, cruel.

She’d been called it all. Wore the words thrown as insults as a badges of pride and valor. Because at the end of the day, when it came to the problems she was given to face, the issues she was meant to solve, those words meant she’d done what others had been too squeamish or cowardly to do. Life was a never ending slog of trolley problems and she the only one unshakable enough to pull the levers that needed pulling.

It wasn’t so simple as a matter of greater good.

Greater good was what the weak willed muttered to themselves after having feelings over doing the bare minimum. A justification used by people on all sides to do what they wanted with fractured, faulty logic thrown around like truth was a thing immutable. To assuage their guilt when they were forced to make a call they didn’t want to.

It wasn’t a matter of greater good. It was a matter of preservation. Of protection. Of digging through the filth to find the threats skittering beneath and crush them with ruthless abandon. Of facing a god and not blinking because if you did it could cost the world.

Of doing what needed to be done, no matter how underhanded or atrocious it was.

Hands dirty.

Hands red.

Hands wrapped tight around the throat of something that could threaten to destroy it all.

When the Ghost Investigation Ward had been shoved her way with it’s sucking wound of a budget, it’s bloated incompetent staff, its asinine methods she’d seen a rotted limb in need of hacking off. It hadn’t been until she’d been conducting her inspection, digging through the trash for a few pearls of effective agents she could snatch up and put to work elsewhere, that she’d truly seen what they were working on. The potential.

Potential to better arm themselves with in the forms of the strange new weapons being created.

Potential for threats far greater than anything even she had thought possible before.

The GIW as it had been when she’d first come across it was a fetid waste of time and resources. A laughing stock agency only secret because no one took them seriously enough to look. Made stupid and useless with its own conceited delusions of importance it didn’t actually have. Yet.

She went to work on it. Hacking away as she’d originally intended, but this time with a different goal in mind. She ripped out the weeds with bare, calloused hands and planted proficiency and loyalty in their place. She took over as director herself, tossing the self-aggrandizing fool that had been running the place into the ground to the dogs as the culprit for misappropriate spendings, saving the agency by tweaking things until their ballooning budget was pinned neatly onto the former director as an embezzling charge.

Then she got to work.

The Fentons were brilliant, if entirely insane. But Amanda could work with that. She’d reigned Harley Quinn in - more or less - she could do the same to the two deranged scientists that so eagerly wanted to be apart of the fight against the dead. Especially when the benefit came in the form of the inventions they threw together so easily, especially when those inventions were weapons.

It took very little to get them on board with her plans for the GIW. Keeping their focus could be a chore, at times, but she didn’t even have to really do much in the way of pressing to get them back where she wanted them. They craved knowledge and understanding nearly as much as they craved the eradication of the entities themselves. Letting them have the first look at a new subject here, free reign over a vivisection there, it took so little to fuel their fervor and keep them busy working on the projects she set for them.

Things had been going smoothly.

For a time at least.

Until Phantom.

He’d been the main focus of the previous director’s attention, the big fish he’d so desperately wanted to catch and put up on his wall. Amanda wouldn’t lie and say it wasn’t a tempting prospect, but not one she’d put above the other projects she had set in motion since taking over. No, Phantom was powerful, enough to be a real problem one day, but she could the awkward youth in the way he held himself, the inexperience in how he handled situations. She had time to get everything else in order before focusing on getting Amity Park’s would-be hero brought to heel.

And he would be brought to heel. One way or another.

Hands dirty.

Hands red.

Hands wrapped tight around the Core of a fledgling god and bending him to her will.

An artifact, old an powerful, recovered with some effort. A means of controlling specters, of chaining them to the will of the artifact’s wielder. Dangerous in the wrong hands. Dangerous in the right hands.

It was shattered, and even whole and functional Phantom was resistant to its power. But Amanda Waller prided herself in her ability to see the potential in things. It could be repaired, be made better. Even gods could be bound, be made to kneel, with the right pieces, with the right application of force.

It was just a matter of time to gather everything needed.

Phantom didn’t know he could single handedly destroy every last member of the Justice League. The baby fat, the innocent eyes, the split-second hesitations when he fought. He knew enough to be confident in fighting the usual ghosts that haunted Amity Park, but he still very much saw himself as a little fish. Maybe it was the part of him that was still Daniel Fenton, gangly teenager not quite sure what he was truly capable of yet.

She had time before the Fenton’s son truly became an issue. Time to judge if his parents’ obsessiveness would overcome their - rather shoddy, by Amanda’s estimation - parental instincts and continue to hunt him once they knew the truth. Time to get as much out of them as she could before hand, should they falter at the idea of attacking their own son. Time for the staff to be repaired and returned to working order, to get the other items needed for the truly big fish hidden on the other side of the veil between worlds.

She had time.

Until she didn’t.

Pariah Dark had not been something she thought she’d have to account for - not yet, at least.

If he wasn’t already dead, she’d ring the Ghost King’s neck with her bare hands. His arrival had opened Phantom’s eyes to what he was capable of, of just how big of a fish he was. Worse still, Phantom’s defeat of the war mongering King changed the state of play. Phantom was no longer an impressively powerful half dead teenager.

He was King Infinite.

He was an Ancient.

He was getting on her last damn nerves.

Phantom’s rogue gallery were now firmly under the boy’s control. Still distinct nuisances around Amity Park, but no longer considered true concerns. They were loyal to their boy king, delighting in ruffling his feathers but never crossing the line into treason or attempted regicide. Which meant that the GIW was the only thing that held his attention.

Amanda took the time to send a care package to the former GIW director in his tiny, dank prison cell. As thanks for his carelessness in revealing to the entire town - both living and dead - of the agency’s existence and their intentions. Had he stuck to standard protocol, Phantom would have been none the wiser to their presence. Would have scratched his head and shrugged his shoulders at the ghost that went missing upon occasion. Would have been boredly uninterested in the people his parents had begun working with. Would have been taken by surprise when they finally came for him.

But no.

No that self-obsessed, fame chasing imbecile had to go and announce to everyone and their dead mother that the GIW existed and exactly what it was they were in Amity Park to do.

Phantom knew what they were there to do.

They could only count on his naive certainty that he could broker peace with them for so long.

Peace. As if he and his people weren’t the invading force, the monsters slipping in through the cracks between worlds, the latest threat that had to be accounted for. As if he himself hadn’t rent their world asunder himself in another world, another time. No. Peace was not something they could hash out with this baby-faced monarch with his too-big crown. Peace was the assurance of safety, security. Of control of the situation.

There could be no peace.

The higher ups were somehow surprised when Phantom took that to mean there would be war.

Amanda Waller was not.

The Fentons, as suspected, took the right side when all was revealed. Steady hands and flinty eyes as they crafted the weapons that would be needed for the coming fight. Minds even sharper in their maddened grief, hearts set on revenge for the son lost and the entity that stole his face and friends and sister in his garish pretense at humanity. They were blinded to the reality of the situation in its entirety, the potential in what their son truly was, but at the end of the day it didn’t really matter. They did what she needed them to do, they could believe whatever it was they wanted so long as they did.

By the time the boy king and his armies marched upon the Amity park facility, preparations had been put into place. The base in Amity had been stripped back to bare essentials, everything of importance moved to more secured locations.

The weapons labs.

The artifact.

The girl.

All tucked well away from the front lines where Phantom and his motley crew could not reach. Their time to be put in play would come, but not yet. First she needed to gauge what Phantom and his people were capable of, what they were willing to do in the name of what they wanted. Amity Park was a pawn well sacrificed on that front. As were the other facilities she’d left easy to find.

The problem with making children gods, with giving them crowns and calling them King and giving them armies to play with, was that they thought there should be rules. That even in the trenches tearing apart their enemies, there was a certain level of playing fair that everyone was held to. They thought there was a way the world worked, of how things should be that blinded them to more effective options even as time stretched on and desperation set in.

It was the Dead’s problem though, not hers.

She reached out to the Justice League. Sour faced, unhappy, bitterly reluctant to accept that she needed their help. Stone faced and barely containing their rage at what little they knew of the situation, they agreed to a meeting.

She didn’t let herself smile until she was well and truly alone in her office.

Greater good. A lie people told themselves. A fairytale told to children. A means of convincing the weaker willed that they had no choice, that they had a noble duty to bend to. A belief that could be wielded like a weapon if the fantasy of the idea had dug in deep enough. And there were few it had dug into so deep as the members of the Justice League.

Amanda Waller was someone who did what needed to be done.

Hands dirty.

Hands red.

Hands clenched tight on a victory long in the making.

---

Part Four

#dc x dp #dp x dc #dpxdc #danny fenton #amanda waller #GIW #ghost investigation ward #Jack Fenton #Maddie Fenton #bad parents jack & maddie fenton #cause none of this is angsty enough yet lol #tw references to vivisection #tw references to death #waller out here playing 3d chess #of course she wasn't surprised by the inevitable war she was just hoping she'd have her secret weapon ready before it actually kicked off #oh well she still has plans B - J to get through #and all the variations for each #gonna take care of her ghost problem and her justice league problem in one fell swoop if she gets her way #just throw some GIW agents into the meat grinder for a bit while she gets stuff in order & so she can see just what Danny is willing to do #anyway wonder what Elle is up to during all this #i'm sure she's fine and there's nothing to worry about #waller playing the long con yall

[m1ckeyb3rry]

── PEREGRINE // PROLOGUE

Series Synopsis: The ways that you and Seishiro Nagi fall together and fall apart over the years.

Chapter Synopsis: You are invited to the wedding of an old friend.

Series Masterlist

Pairing(s): Nagi x Reader, Kira x Reader

Chapter Word Count: 5.1k

Content Warnings: unhealthy relationships, cheating, non-linear narrative, probably ooc, angst, nagi is endgame, kira sucks, alternate universe, original characters

A/N: literally shaking as i post this because i have NOT been in the bllk fandom for long enough to be writing a fic for it but oh well #livelaughlove. some authors post new stories because they’re proud of their work. i post new stories because then when i write like shit i disappoint less people.

divider credits: @/benkeibear

Seishiro Nagi had always been beautiful when he ran, albeit atypical in his form. He lacked the fierceness that the others on his team had, his feet never pounding against the turf the way theirs did, his strides never swallowing the ground in quite that same manner. Instead, his steps were light, like he was dancing, or perhaps flying, like he was a falcon diving across the field in pursuit of his next goal.

He was the only thing that could unite your entire miserable, shitty town. Everyone was outside that day, crowding in restaurants to crane their necks at the little screen in the corner, pressing together in the square to peer up at the projection of the tied match, which only had a few minutes left to go before the end of the second half.

Nagi had the ball. You weren’t really sure how he had gotten it, who had passed it to him or what maneuver he had used to get around the other team’s defense, but it was all irrelevant. He had the ball, and as he barreled towards the other team's goalkeeper, the entire town held its breath.

Even you, who were never supposed to have much interest in soccer nor in Seishiro Nagi, found yourself worrying your lower lip between your teeth, leaning forward slightly, clenching your fists by your sides.

“Come on, Nagi,” you murmured. “We’re so close. Come on.”

A few more steps and a strategic feint, and then he had made it behind the defenders. The town swelled with anticipation as victory became all but certain, as the clock ticked nearer and nearer to the moment when Nagi would pull off one of those impossible moves of his, where he would slam the ball into the net and win the game for his team once again.

But the moment never came. For some reason, right as he drew his leg back to shoot, Nagi froze. His foot never connected with the ball; instead, it slowly came back down to rest as he stared down at his muddy cleats.

“What is he doing?” someone said. The cheers turned to whispers as Nagi proved himself to be a statue, incapable of moving, of defending his possession, of scoring, of anything. He just stood there, and as one of the defenders stole the ball off of him and passed it to the opposing team’s striker, he did not make any attempts to turn around and make up for his mistake. He just stood there, contemplating something, a cloudy dreaminess settling over his eyes. It was the most disconcerting thing you had ever seen, that complete apathy in face of an imminent loss, that resignation to an eventuality which he himself had created.

“What the hell is wrong with him?” a man screamed, and then it was a mass chaos as the people who had been praising Nagi only seconds earlier turned to baying for his blood, demanding he never play again as a punishment for his great sin.

They got their wish. The next season, and the next, Seishiro Nagi spent every match on the bench, not even afforded the role of a substitute, no matter how tired the rest of the team grew without his relentless presence, how many games they lost when they did not have him to rely on.

That first season after his disastrous loss, he was made a mockery of. Every single news article was about his downfall, every reporter charting out with glee the exact moment that he had gone from the media’s darling to their newest scapegoat. By the second season, though, he was largely forgotten. There were more exciting things, newcomers who had entered the league and dominated matches with their own unique styles, and so when it became clear that Nagi would not give them the reactions that they were hoping for, the journalists turned to talking about those players instead.

After that, he stopped going to games entirely.

There was another woman in your bed. You could hear her shuffling footsteps, the way your fiancé hushed her, her giggles as she ducked into some hiding spot or another, likely behind his neatly pressed work suits. You could picture it now — such a domestic scene it must’ve been. His arm, wrapped around her shoulders as he guided her to the closet. Her fingers, still working themselves free from his light hair. His eyes, a bright amber that would be glimmering from the thrill of the near-miss. Her cheeks, which would be flushed from the shame of your early return home.

You sighed, pursing your lips and then undoing the knot of the ribbon holding together the bouquet of flowers in your hand. Pouring a cup of water into a crystal vase, you arranged the flowers carefully in it, making sure you did not prick your fingers on the thorny stems as you waited for your fiancé to come thundering down to greet you.

“Y/N! I didn’t think you’d be home so early!” he said, leaping off the bottom stair and waltzing into the kitchen, discreetly wiping his hands against his pants.

“Hey, Ryosuke,” you said. “No worries. I was actually just about to head out again; I had thought I’d wash the sheets tonight, but I think we’re out of detergent, so I’m going to run to the store and grab some.”

“Ah, okay,” he said. “How long do you think you’ll be?”

“About an hour,” you said. “I think I’ll stop by Chigiri’s on the way back.”

“Chigiri’s?” he said, raising his eyebrows. “What do you need from him?”

It was ironic. There the two of you were, both pretending like he wasn’t hiding a third in your bedroom, and yet you were the one who was facing his accusations, who was under suspicion for no other reason than because you wanted to visit your friend.

“I lent him our blender because his broke, remember?” you said. “I was going to see if he’s gotten a replacement yet or not.”

“I see,” he said, relaxing only slightly. “Well, don’t delay on my part, I guess. See you soon?”

“See you,” you said. “I’ll text you when I’m about ten minutes away. If you could warm up the leftovers in the fridge, I’d appreciate it. I’m a little hungry.”

“Of course,” he said. “Bye!”

“Bye,” you said. Once, he would’ve pressed a kiss to your cheek, or maybe even to your lips, but now, he only waved at you before bounding back up the stairs, calling out some excuse about folding his laundry over his shoulder. You watched him go for a moment, wishing you could chase after him and demand he love you again, demand he love you the way he used to, but it would be pointless. You were unconvinced that things would ever be that way again.

One of the lights in the store near your house was broken. It would flicker back to life periodically, struggling to stay lit, but its attempts were stuttered and pitifully in vain. It worsened the migraine building behind your temples, and you narrowed your eyes as you reached the laundry aisle and picked up the cheapest, smallest bottle of detergent you could find.

“You should get that light fixed,” you said to the cashier. He didn’t even look like he was out of high school yet, and as he scanned the bottle, he muttered something about how you should’ve just used the self-checkout line instead.

“I’ll tell my manager,” he said when it became clear that you were waiting for a response. “Cash or card?”

“Card,” you said, tapping it against the screen and signing your name with the attached stylus. “I don’t need a bag.”

“Have a nice day,” he said robotically, mechanically. “Next!”

The woman behind you, who was juggling a screaming baby, a whining child, and a week’s worth of groceries, began to try and empty her cart, but her child kept tugging at her arms and her baby kept crying and she kept dropping things, so it was altogether a pointless effort. The cashier let out an aggravated sigh, barely even sparing you a nod as you tucked the detergent in your pocket.

You furrowed your brow as you watched the woman, wondering if that was to be your future. Once you married Ryosuke, once you became Mrs. Kira, then wouldn’t children be the natural next step? Certainly, that’s what your parents would say.

“Hey,” you said to the child, tapping her on the head as she pulled on her mother’s sleeve once more. Upon feeling your touch against her hair, she froze, looking up at you with wide eyes. “I really like your hairstyle. Did you do it yourself?”

Her hair had been tied into two pigtails and then messily plaited, small pink bows decorating the end of each braid and matching her shirt. She peered at you owlishly, confused enough to quiet down for a moment. Her mother shot you a grateful look as her one hand was freed so that she could start to actually deal with her groceries.

“My mommy did it,” the girl said, stumbling over her words. “For school.”

“It’s very smart,” you said. “I bet everyone in your class was jealous.”

The girl thought about this before nodding. “Yeah, they were.”

“I’m glad I finished school already,” you said, pretending to shiver. “If I hadn’t, then I wouldn’t have known what to do if you showed up looking like that!”

“Did your mommy not do your hair for you?” the girl said. You thought back to your own mother, your own days at school, and then you shook your head.

“She tried,” you said. “But no matter how elaborate the hairstyles she gave me were, they could never measure up to what you have right now.”

“Why not?” she said.

“Because,” you said. “I think your mother worked really hard on them, and that’s the most important thing. You should remember to say thank you to her when you can.”

“I always say please and thank you,” she said proudly, beaming at you, her two front teeth missing. “Mommy says it’s good manners.”

“Those are very good manners,” you agreed. “Now, it looks like your mother’s done with checking out. Let’s go to the car with her, alright?”

The girl nodded and darted ahead to grab her mother’s hand. Her mother sighed, going to free her hand from her daughter’s grip, but you stopped her.

“I’ve got it,” you said, picking up her grocery bags in both hands and nodding at the door. “Which way is your car? I’ll walk you there.”

“Oh, you — you don’t have to!” she said, fumbling in the face of the offer. “I can do it.”

“I don’t doubt you can,” you said. “But you shouldn’t have to. I’ll follow after you.”

Maybe it wasn’t the wisest decision for the woman to trust a stranger, but there was a sort of bone-deep exhaustion burrowing into her that must’ve made her accept the offer. So she only nodded at you and began to stride towards her car, unlocking it and opening the trunk so that you could put the groceries in it while she buckled her children into their respective car seats.

When she was distracted, you snuck the laundry detergent into one of the bags. It wasn’t as if you needed it; you had just gotten some the other day, and that had been the brand you preferred, too. The entire outing had just been an excuse for you to leave the house for enough time that Ryosuke’s new girl of the week could sneak out, as if she had never been there in the first place.

“Thank you so much for your help,” she said when you pressed the button to shut the trunk, stepping back and watching it slowly lower. “Er, what’s your name?”

“Y/N,” you said, offering her your hand. She accepted it, shaking it so furiously it was a wonder your arm did not fly off.

“Thank you so much, Y/N. They’re so exhausting to bring along, but I have no other choice. I know it must be so irritating to the other shoppers, but…” she trailed off in defeat, her head hanging low. “I really do have no other choice. My husband’s always busy, and we can’t quite afford a babysitter or a nanny or anything like that, so they’re always with me.”

“It’s okay,” you said. “You have the right to be there, too. I hope you can always find help when you need it.”

“Thank you,” she said again. “You, too.”

“Thanks!” you said, waving at her as you made your way to your own car, only allowing your smile to drop once you were far enough that she wouldn’t notice the way it had disappeared.

You spent the drive to Chigiri’s in silence, muting the radio and amusing yourself with watching the street lamps turn on as it grew progressively darker out, their orange glows piercing through the misty night like cheerful planets, so at odds with your glum mood.

Wouldn’t Ryosuke be like that? Because of that one chance encounter, you could envision your future so clearly. It would be exactly the life that that woman led. You would have those children that he and your parents had always wanted, and you would care for them, and all the while, he would run around and sleep with any girl he could get into his bed, his existence entirely unaffected even as yours had been wrecked.

“So,” Chigiri said, stirring a spoonful of honey into the tea he had prepared for himself, his right leg extended on the coffee table before him. “When’s your wedding with that peacock bastard, anyways?”

You took a sip of the tea he had so graciously made for you before responding, taking the moment to mull over what you’d say as the liquid scalded your tongue.

“Lately, it seems like that’s all anyone ever asks me,” you said.

“It’s a pretty typical question to ask someone who’s engaged,” he said.

“That’s true,” you said. “Well, I don’t know when it is. We haven’t picked a date or made any concrete plans yet.”

“Geez, what was the point of proposing, then?” he said.

“You’ll be the first to hear when it happens,” you said.

“Really? Not Reo?” he said. You considered this.

“The second to hear,” you amended. He pretended to scowl at you, though it was half-heartedly done.

“I can’t believe it,” he said. “Though, I guess it does kind of make sense. Nobody hates Kira as much as I do, so you’d probably want to share the news with someone a bit more supportive.”

“It’s about time you let old grudges die,” you said. Chigiri glanced at his right leg before shaking his head.

“No way,” he said. “I’ll never forgive him.”

“It wasn’t even his fault,” you said weakly, though you knew it was just another rendition of the same argument you and he had had so many times before, the same argument that the two of you would probably keep having until you both stopped being friends altogether.

It was bound to happen. There was no way that you could stay friends with Chigiri in any way that lasted. Not as you were currently. Not as who you would soon become. That kind of person didn’t deserve to be friends with someone like Chigiri, who was always so bright and gentle, who even now was frowning slightly because of you.

“Whatever,” he said. “I won’t bring it up at your wedding. That’s the best I can give you.”

You thought that you should probably smile or thank him, but the thought of your impending wedding caused a lump to form in your throat, and it was all you could do to swallow it back without tears forming in your eyes. You gulped down the tea, hissing when it burnt your mouth, glad for the tears which sprang to your eyes and disguised the moment of weakness.

“Sorry,” you said to Chigiri, who only snorted and handed you a napkin to dab at your lips with. “Speaking of which, do you think you’d be okay with wearing a dress and being one of my bridesmaids? I’m woefully lacking in the department.”

“No,” Chigiri said. “Please, make some friends. It’ll actually be embarrassing if you have no one on your side of the wedding.”

“Sorry, but some of us had better things to do in high school than socializing,” you said, tossing a pillow at him. He caught it in one hand and glared at you before chucking it back, full-force. It landed at your side, narrowly avoiding smashing into your face, and then it was your turn to glare at him.

“For your information, I also had better things to do, but somehow, I made time to get to know people,” he said.

“Oh, yeah? Name three of your friends,” you said. He opened his mouth, but you stopped him before he could speak. “Not me, not Reo, and not May.”

He closed his mouth. “Okay, you got me there. Maybe I was more focused on soccer than I realized…”

“Maybe,” you said, though your tea suddenly tasted sour at the mention of soccer.

“I’ll wear a dress if you’ll wear a suit and draw on a mustache at my wedding,” he offered.

“Um, no,” you said.

“Then I guess we’ll both be embarrassed,” he said.

“That’s even assuming you find someone you like enough to propose to, and that that person says yes,” you said.

“I will!” he said. “Just you wait. I’ll make you eat your words!”

“Whatever you say,” you said. “I still think you’re going to die alone, by the way.”

“Better than living with that excuse for a man that you plan on marrying,” he said.

Just like everything else regarding your relationship with Ryosuke, your protests were false and weak. You didn’t mean them. In fact, you even agreed with Chigiri, but if you didn’t speak up, then who would? If you didn’t say something, then all of the time you had spent with him would’ve been a waste. Everything would’ve been a waste, and that was something you could not allow.

“I’m back!” you called out as you re-entered the house, though you knew that even Ryosuke wasn’t foolish enough to risk being caught when he had had so many advance warnings and so much time to prepare for your arrival.

“There she is!” he said, grinning up at you from the dining table, not even a guilty twinge to his words as he spoke — not that you had been expecting any. “Your food’s on the counter, babe.”

“Looks good,” you said, picking up the plate and sitting across from him, picking at the pasta with a fork, pushing it around without lifting any, unable to bring yourself to actually eat it. “You didn’t have to cook, though. There was stuff in the fridge.”

“I know, but I wanted to,” he said. “Can’t I do nice things for my favorite girl every now and then?”

You knew what that clever wordplay implied. His favorite girl, but not his only. You supposed he must’ve been proud of it, of that private joke made for an audience of exactly one.

“I guess there’s no reason why you can’t,” you said. “It’s good.”

“Anytime,” he said. “Now, listen, I’ve been thinking.”

“Oh?” you said, preparing yourself for him to say that he wanted to move again or that he wanted to get rid of your cat or something equally as preposterous, as he often did when he started his sentence off with that particular phrase. “And what about?”

“We’ve been engaged for a while,” he said.

“Yes,” you said cautiously, internally cursing Chigiri, believing that he must’ve spoken this entire conversation into existence with his playful inquiries from earlier.

“So we should probably pick a date for the wedding and start preparing for it and all, don’t you think?” he said.

No, you wanted to scream at him. No, I don’t think so. I don’t want to. Nothing has to change. Don’t let it change.

You were saved from having to answer by your cell phone ringing. Without apologizing, you picked up, because there were very few people who would ever call you, and almost all of them were more important than Ryosuke.

“Y/N L/N,” a familiar voice said. Every bit of despair which had crept over you vanished in an instant at that sound, and this time when you smiled, it wasn’t forced.

“Reo!” you said. Ryosuke frowned, but you ignored him. “How late is it over there?”

“It’s early, actually, but it’s okay. I was waking up to go to the gym, anyways, and I figured I’d call you while I’m at it,” he said.

“That makes sense. What’s up?” you said.

“Can’t I just have called you because I miss you so much?” he said.

“You could have, but you wouldn’t,” you said. “What’s the real reason?”

“You’re annoying,” he said.

“Mhm,” you said.

“Fine, yes, I was calling you for a reason, but I do also miss you a lot, so don’t think I don’t!” he said.

“I wouldn’t dare,” you said.

“You know how I proposed to May a couple of years ago?” he said.

“I was there,” you reminded him. “And by the way, you’re lucky I was! The whole reason I went to college abroad was so that I had an excuse to never return to that place, so for you to go back and live there has really been inconvenient.”

“I can’t help that this is where our corporation’s headquarters are,” he said awkwardly. “I kind of have to live here.” You scoffed.

“Whatever. I’m not going to visit again, so if that’s what you’re calling about, then you might as well hang up,” you said.

“Seriously? Nothing can convince you to come?” he said, letting out a chuckle, the cocksure one he had inherited from his father. It was the one thing you hated most about him, but he had never managed to break the habit, no matter how many times you pointed it out.

“Nope,” you said. “Nothing.”

“What are you guys talking about?” Ryosuke said. You waved him off dismissively, mouthing tell you later at him when he pouted grumpily.

“Not even your own best friend’s wedding?” he pressed. You paused, taken aback by the sudden turn.

“What?” you squealed. “Like, an official wedding? You have the day picked out and all?”

“Calm down, woman, it’s not that serious,” he said. You could hear his wince through the phone, but you were too excited to care.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” you said.

“So, funny thing, that’s actually what I’m doing right now,” he said. You clicked your tongue.

“Shut up,” you said. “I can’t believe you’re actually getting married. It feels like just yesterday I was introducing the two of you.”

“I know,” he said fondly. “We’ve been arguing the whole time about whose side of the wedding party you’ll be on. At the moment, I think I’m winning, but I don’t know how long that’ll last.”

“You guys just assumed I would come?” you said.

“Will you not?” he said. You glanced at Ryosuke, who raised his eyebrows at you.

“Give me a second,” you said.

“Okay, I’ll be waiting,” he said. You put the phone on mute and set it on the table.

“Reo and May are getting married,” you said. “Soon. They want me to come.”

“Of course they would. You’re best friends with both of them,” Ryosuke said. You waited for him to reassure you, to tell you that he knew it would be hard for you to go back to your hometown but that the two of you could get through it together. However, he didn’t. You weren’t even sure why you had waited in the first place. You had known that he wasn’t that person anymore for a very long time now. Maybe it was just an old habit that you couldn’t let die quite yet. Maybe you would always be waiting for him.

“I should go, then,” you said.

“Obviously,” he said. “And I’ll come this time.”

“Naturally,” you said, because it would raise too many questions if you didn’t bring your fiancé to your best friend’s wedding. It had been bad enough when he hadn’t come with you the last time, but you had managed to soothe everyone’s concerns with stories about work being too much, how he would’ve loved to visit but had such a strict boss that he just couldn’t.

As per usual, those had all been lies. You had been the one to demand he stay back. You didn’t tell him the reason, because it hardly made sense to you, but the truth was that the thought of Ryosuke walking through the streets that had once belonged to someone else was counterintuitive. Wrong. Those steps were not his to make. That secret was not his to tarnish.

“What’s the verdict?” Reo said when you unmuted the phone and held it back up to your ear. Ryosuke leaned over and gathered your dishes, taking them with his own and turning on the sink, running them under the water, drowning out the sound of your voice.

“Don’t ask that as if you don’t know the answer, idiot,” you said. “It seems you got lucky once again. I’ll be there, and so will Ryosuke.”

Reo choked audibly. “Ryosuke? Do you mean Kira?”

“We’ve been engaged longer than you and May have. Don’t you think it would be a little weird if I still called him by his surname?” you said.

“That’s true. I was just surprised you’re still with him, but I shouldn’t have been. Sorry,” he said. “Is he going to be your plus one?”

“Again, he is my fiancé,” you said, glancing over to where he was humming to himself as he scrubbed the sauce off of the plates. Your heart panged at the sight. Sometimes, you thought that you were being unfair to him. You would hate and hate him, and then he would do something that would remind you why you had ever loved him in the first place. “Who else would I bring?”

“I don’t know, Chigiri?” he said. “You talk about him way more than you do Kira.”

“He’s my friend,” you said. “I just spend more time with him.”

“Hey, it’s not my business. If you want to have an affair, then that’s your prerogative. Although, given the history between those two, Chigiri might not be the best choice…” he said.

“You suck,” you said as he burst into laughter.

“Kidding, kidding. Anyways, May beat me to inviting Chigiri, so he couldn’t be your plus one regardless, since he’s a traitor,” he said.

“Who says I won’t decide to be on May’s side after all?” you said. “She’d probably make me her maid of honor.”

“Uh,” Reo said. “If that’s the case, then you should definitely be on my side.”

“Why is that?” you said.

“I mean, you know how the maid of honor and the best man usually spend a lot of time together?” he said nervously.

“Sure,” you said, although you really didn’t, considering you hadn’t been invited to very many weddings before, and certainly none where you had been the maid of honor.

“Well, there’s no gentle way to put this,” he said.

“Just spit it out,” you said.

“Um, just know that I really love you a lot,” he said. “But I already picked my best man.”

“How is that something you’d need to put gently? Considering my lack of ‘man’ qualifications, I wasn’t exactly expecting to get the role,” you said.

“It’s Nagi.”

Unbidden, your eyebrows shot up in surprise, but your initial burst of shock quickly settled, and you realized it made enough sense that you shouldn’t really question it. “Okay.”

“I know you guys didn’t get along in high school and all, but he was the only one I could think of,” Reo said.

“Okay,” you said.

“But you’re my best friend, too, and don’t you dare forget that!” he continued.

“Reo,” you said, but he was too busy rambling to notice.

“Just please get along with him. For my sake! And May’s, if you decide to be her maid of honor,” he said.

“Reo,” you tried again.

“You don’t even have to be friends! Just mutually ignore one another or something, it’ll go much smoother that way. Or, well, if you’re the maid of honor and he’s the best man, I guess you can’t really ignore one another, so that’s a dilemma…wait, I know! You can treat him like he’s just one of your coworkers—”

“Reo!” you said, finally growing frustrated enough to cut him off. “It’s okay. High school was years ago. Neither of us is going to let the past impact the present, I’m sure. You have more important things to be stressing out about; this shouldn’t even be on your list of worries, man. You’re getting married!”

“You promise?” he said.

“Promise,” you said.

“I’m serious. I don’t want any fights or anything. Whatever hatred you had for him, put it behind you,” he said.

“I did that already,” you said. “Many years past. I’m not a teenage girl anymore. People from back then don’t bother me.”

“Not even your parents?” he said.

“Low blow, Mr. Mikage,” you said. But of course, he didn’t even know the half of it, so how could you blame him for what he had surely believed to be a harmless joke? “I don’t know. I haven’t talked to them in a while, either.”

“Have they even met Kira yet?” he said.

“No,” you said.

“Great, then you can introduce him to them! It’ll be a double-win type of trip,” he said.

“Right,” you said. He sounded so happy that you couldn’t bear to tell him the truth, that the thought of introducing Ryosuke to your parents was actually akin to torture. Besides, what would he do if you did tell him? It was something he could never comprehend.

“Now I can’t wait!” he said.

“Me, either,” you said. “And Reo?”

“Yes?”

“Tell May I’m choosing her side,” you said.

“What? You seriously want to risk possibly being the maid of honor, even after everything I told you?” he said.

You thought about what the role might entail. Who the role might entail. And then you looked over at Ryosuke, who was putting the leftover pasta back in the fridge. He locked eyes with you and then jokingly scrunched his nose. You thought you might’ve found it endearing when you had first met him.

“Yeah,” you said. “I do.”

#nagi x reader #nagi x y/n #nagi x you #nagi seishiro #bllk x reader #bllk #blue lock #reader insert #modern au #peregrine #m1ckeyb3rry writes

[professorspork]

I hope this doesn’t come across as like a pushy “update pls” I promise that’s not how I mean it. I’m curious at what point you feel like a multi-chapter fic is ready to post? Do you write it in its entirety and then edit chapters in between updates, write and edit it in its entirety, write most of it and continue writing the rest between updates? I’m very curious about your process since you’ve been writing some monster word count fics

I really appreciate you asking!

The short version is that I've learned over time that what works best for me is completing a work in its entirety before I start posting; above all I like posting on a reliable schedule for my audience, and I simply do not write quickly enough (or coherently enough) to do that any other way. There are a lot of reasons for that and I WILL ELABORATE ON THEM AT LENGTH:

I have several multi-chapter WIPs from the Glee days-- when I was in college-- that I never finished because I'm a delicate hothouse flower when it comes to maintaining hyperfocus, and I found a new fandom to be in before I could complete them. Back then especially, I was much less disciplined about writing sequentially: I would write parts of the story wildly out of order, focusing on whatever interested me most at the time. That means my hard drive is a graveyard of unpublished content, which sucks-- not only did I never give my audience the resolutions they were looking for, but I never got to receive feedback on parts of the story I was really proud of. I found that really dispiriting.

Going to grad school for screenwriting really helped me focus on telling a story in order, because there is literally no other way to write a screenplay than one scene at a time; it's far too reliant on momentum and consistency to jump ahead to "the good bits" and come back. I also did several projects-- writing my multi-chap Frozen&Tangled polyamory epic for a friend's birthday; pre-writing all my 2015 Cartinelli Week one shots far in advance so I knew they'd be perfect come posting day-- where I had a deadline I wanted everything Done By, which got me in the habit of writing to completion before posting. It wasn't something I thought I was going to be capable of because I'm like Tinkerbell, Finn, I need applause to live feedback is incredibly motivating to me, but having the ability to go back and change things in chapter 2 if I realized they weren't adequately setting up what I wanted to do in chapter 5, or whatever, proved to be just as powerful a motivator in a different way-- it meant I could tell the stories RIGHT, if I took my time with them. I also learned to get at least one cheerleader I could leak snippets to as I went, so that I still got the dopamine hit of the feedback even though I'm ages away from posting for real.

I also found that, as a reader, I always really appreciated when authors could stick to an update schedule so I could look forward to new chapters like I would episodes of television. It's not a standard I expect from anyone, but it is something that makes me really happy-- and the two ways to do it are to either write fast enough that you're just constantly churning out new content (not an option for me, especially on the occasions when I'm actually employed and can only write on weekends) or to pre-write and then slow release. it gives me a feeling of... mastery, I guess? Like "hey everyone here's a gift I'm giving you," as opposed to writing and updating when I can, which makes me feel like I'm always chasing something (BEING chased by something?) and risking losing my audience/my own fickle concentration if I were to wait too long.

My "ONLY post after everything is done" rule is a new one, because I burned myself on rely on certain certainties, the last D/s epic I wrote (lmao can you tell this topic interests me). I worked on that for a year and was 132k in with no end in sight when I started posting, but I was part of a Kristanna discord at the time, and I wanted to seize the audience I had before it disappeared-- which is always the danger of movie fandoms, which never have as much staying power. I had hoped that because I had such a big buffer I could keep writing ahead of the updates as they came up from behind, but I tapped out at 172k when I finished the end of an arc. That kills me, because I have SO MUCH unreleased content for that story which will never see the light of day, because-- again-- I'd let temptation win and wrote ahead to The Juicy Bits instead of forcing myself to go in order.

So, two things I've learned:

Only ever outlining the juicy bits that come late in the game, instead of lovingly finessing their every word, is a great way to trick motivate myself into continuing to write in order so that I can GET to the juicy bits, full stop; if I don't exorcise them they keep haunting me and that helps me stick it out until the end

By holding stories back until they're complete, I give myself the ability to complete them because I'm able to dig myself out of holes I've written myself into. In the old days, if I got stuck because I realized the real root of my issue had come chapters earlier and that's why it's not working now, I'd just... be stuck at that wall, unable to move forward, and that would be that. The idea of going back and editing a published story for narrative content is mortifying to me and something I personally could never do, so-- this way I'm giving myself more tools and options, so that I can tell the story I want to tell and tell it right.

In terms of my actual process, I tend to work like this: my most productive time is when my ADHD meds are at full power, so in an ideal world I am writing new content from like 10am to 3pm or so, getting as far as I can in New Content. Evenings, when I'm no longer in Hyperfocus Productivity Mode, I'll go back and reread things-- sometimes chapters from much earlier-- both to entertain myself and to make edits and changes. Often, that's just moving words around here and there for cadence and flow; rarely, it's adding whole new moments or thoughts to the chapters. I try to write In Order as much as possible, getting chapters beta'd as they're completed. I'm a nitpicky perfectionist, so keeping a hold on my early chapters until everything is posted means I can change them over and over and over again without anyone knowing but me, which I love-- and those changes are getting made right down to the wire. even when the fic is "complete" and I'm "only posting" I'm still making edits; some of people's absolute favorite parts of Newsbees were added literally the night before, when it was the "get everything into AO3 and do the final pass for typos and formatting" stage. Like, Penny writing sudokus on the fly for Ruby at the hospital? Ruby thinking in Adam Font? Those were 11th hour strokes of genius.

So yeah-- that's a very long-winded way of saying that I've found writing to completion first not only makes me more likely to actually finish my WIPs, but it makes my WIPs BETTER because it gives me far, far more time with them. I know it's not something that works for everyone, but in terms of my own sense of like, duty and responsibility and goal-setting, it keeps me on track without risking Guilt completely paralyzing me-- which is what happens when I post as I go and then get interrupted.

THANK YOU FOR COMING TO MY RAMBLE.

#on writing

[recurring-polynya]

Writing/Art Update 3.5.2024

So, Polynya, did you finish the fanfic? Well...sort of? No. No, I guess the answer is actually no.

Last week, I said I had two and a half scenes left, one of which was the epilogue, and one scene I wanted to rewrite. I wrote the scene and a half that were not the epilogue, and then I tried to do that scene re-write. It came out better than it was, but I still didn't love it. I figured I would just go ahead and write the epilogue and then maybe come back and try again. 3/4 of the epilogue went great, and then I just couldn't manage to end it, and got stuck for three days. I went back and tried to re-write that scene I didn't like *again*, and barely got into before realizing that the way I was hoping to make it better did not, in fact. Yesterday, after Much Struggle, I managed to pull together an end to epilogue with is...okay...but I don't love it. So the current state of things is: 107,408 words, and it is strictly speaking, A Whole-ass Fanfic, but with two half-scenes that I hate.

It's really frustrating, because I had a bunch of productive weeks in a row, and my brain has just utterly collapsed on me in the eleventh hour. I've been trying so hard to push it over the finish line, but it's one of those things where I can't just brute force it, I need to somehow have a good idea. I am also so so tired this week. I know, logically, that probably I just need to relax and rest up for a few days and this will be easy to fix when I am feeling better, but it's hard to relax when I have this stupid almost-but-not-quite-done fanfic hanging over my head.

Here are some other stupid facts:

The scenes in question are important and I want them to be good, but they aren't exactly load-bearing, in the sense that nothing else depends on them

I don't even *need* the epilogue, and in fact, after I realized that I end all my Heart is a Muscle fics with people drinking (not on purpose, I'm just unoriginal), it made me want to drop the whole thing on principle (except that I also don't because it's sort of a thematic lead-in to the next story in the series and also Ukitake is there)

The two problem scenes are way at the end of the fanfic. When I do start posting this thing, I plan to post one chapter per week like I often do, meaning that I have literal months to fix these

Chapter 1 is beta'd and ready to go and literally nothing is stopping me from posting it this very second

BUT I don't want to post Chapter 1 until my beta has seen the whole fic because what if she notices something in Chapter 12 that needs to be fixed back in Chapter 1

AND literally nothing is stopping me from just sending my beta the last few chapters with a little note on the scenes I'm not happy with. It's highly possible she might have some ideas! Or just be like "you are insane these are fine"!

EXCEPT I don't want her to see my bad writing that I am embarrassed about

And so, here we are. I am probably going to give it another day or two, and if I can't manage to fix those two scenes, I'll just suck it up and send the rest to her.

I guess I also should re-do the banner, except I don't feel like re-doing the banner. It's....okay. I don't know. I just kind of slapped it together based on a thing we were doing at Art Club. Maybe I don't even want a banner.

Speaking of Art Club, it's March now, which meant there was a new theme at Art Club (nature) and I decided to try to get back into my daily drawing. I think this is possibly what killed my momentum on my fanfic. I am just literally only capable of having one priority at a time, even if it's a little tiny one, otherwise my brain just plays tug of war with my priorities and it's hard to manage either of them.

Anyway, I've been in kinda rough shape for the last few days, but I am sure it will pass. It's got some good bits, but I think I just never really managed to fall in love with this one, and I'm really worried about it getting a cooler reception than I'm used to, since the fandom seems to have quieted down significantly since the last time I posted one of these. On the other hand, I've worked too hard on this to not post it. Also, it's got some stuff in it that had to happen for the series to progress. And maybe other people will like it! Who knows! Not me!!

I had hoped to be able to start posting it this week, but that's not looking likely at this point, so I guess you can have another preview.

--- from Ch 3

"You really didn't have to go to all this trouble," Rukia pointed out, as she methodically piled her bowl with a heaping serving of everything on offer.

Renji grabbed a big pinch of the shirasu before passing it over to her. "It's fine. I'm not sure when I'll be up for cooking again, so I'm trying to clean out my fridge."

"Oh, so I'm helping?"

Renji grinned. "Sure."

"I love helping! If you need me to take this pickled ginger with me, I could take it off your hands."

"I think the pickles will probably keep for a bit."

"Hmmph," Rukia replied skeptically, and scooped some more into her bowl.

It was always difficult not to just sit and watch Rukia eat, in part because she truly did have an extraordinary talent for shoveling food into her mouth, but mostly because it reminded Renji of why they had come to the Seireitei in the first place, of how lucky he was these days. You have to go to work, too, this morning, he reminded himself, and dug in.

"You know, speaking of helping…" Rukia said a few minutes later, once she'd managed to eat enough to shave the edge of her morning ravenousness. "There's something I want to talk to you about."

The pleasant feelings in Renji's chest abruptly turned cold and gloppy. He frowned, and raised one eyebrow skeptically. “Yeah?”

Rukia looked up at him with her big, stupidly blue eyes. “Do you remember when we talked about how important it was for you to have a comfortable and peaceful recovery from your surgery?”

“I do. I distinctly remember asking you to drop it and not bring it up, again, actually.”

“Right, well, I never actually agreed to that. I think that you should come stay at my house.”

Renji gave her an incredulous look. “Your house? Kuchiki Manor, you mean? Your house that is actually my captain’s house?”

“It’s very nice there, as you know. The food really is very good and we have a million servants with nothing better to do--”

“I am sure they have better things to do, Rukia.”

“--and you can sit in a sunny spot in the garden and I’ll read you books and it will be so much nicer than staying in the Coordinated Relief Station!”

Renji heaved a huge, exasperated sigh. “It’s a nice idea, Rukia, but think about the look on Captain’s face if you even--”

“He said it was okay.”

Renji felt all the blood run out of his face, possibly out of his body entirely. “You asked him?”

“I know you’re only getting it done because he ordered you to. He obviously wants you to do your best to heal up well. He cares about you, too, you know, in his own way.” 

Renji stiffened, his fingers tightening on his chopsticks. “You probably told him the whole story, then? How I broke my arm in the first place?” His voice sounded like it was coming from somewhere far away.

“Not the whole thing!" Rukia shook her head vehemently. "He knows you broke it saving me, that's the only important part.”

Renji drew in a deep breath and squeezed his eyes shut. All he could focus on was the sound of his own blood pounding in his ears. “Why do you always have to do this?” he finally managed through gritted teeth. “I asked you to just leave it, but you never can.”

Rukia shoved out her lower lip. “Maybe if you took care of yourself half as well as you take care of everyone else, I would!” she protested. “Just let me spoil you for a few days, would it be so terrible?”

“Yes.”

#writing update #art update #here's hoping that posting all this will expel it from my system and i can turn around the fix my stupid bad scenes

[zoekrystall]

Anyways now for a quick important completely different thing that I saw on twt and I hope at least one post I didn't see is circulating on here but this search function sucks so quick own post plus extra stuff 🇵🇸

For today this monday (december 11) did people in gaza (motaz and bisan for example) ask for a global strike that includes no spending whatsoever and no going to school/work. No streaming for those that do that afaik. If you don't go to work say it's bc of the strike. Don't use your bank acc etc nothing that benefits the economy. Please do if you can. I heard some say to deactivate instagram and facebook for the day? Which imo not sure since ig gets used a lot to share news but if the people in gaza ask for that then I'm not one to question it. I quick searched rn and what I read was that anything meta gets deactivated for the day bc they supress palestine voices. Idk if any palestinians ask for it but some also say to give 1 star reviews to them w that in the review.

Idk if it really only got announced yesterday (I don't use ig, I am on twt daily) and if so it can be argued abt how these things should get announced way more in advance and not literally a day prior (a twt mutual got attacked purely bc they said the black friday boycott hasn't been organized well enough and talking abt strike organization in general bc it wasn't able to gain enough tractions which is completely fair and if you think saying that is somehow being against strikes like people over there please block me. this also doesn't mean ppl that don't see it somehow don't follow the right ppl or whatever) so if you only see news after you went to work or spend money or whatever then I don't blame you or if you can't bc tight money situation. Like I only saw the black friday posts quite late and while sure fandom stuff too is my timeline for the majority about palestine.

+ BDS wants you to pressure the international criminal court to issue arrest warrants for israeli leaders next to other points you can read here

+ you can email the UN at dpa-scsb3[at]un[dot]org (security council) to invoke UN article 377 to push them to circumvent the U.S. veto. You can also submit forms to both the UN website and the USA UN branch website (info from this tweet, if you don't know what to write the qrted tweet got people sharing what they wrote, this one has alt text). UN form, USA UN form.

Also idk how much here an issue of such people gaining an audience but if on twt please check who you rt reg palestine! There are many fascists posting pro palestine stuff to gain followers. If you use twt here is one thread with some of these accs with added reasons. Also the neturei karta is a far right jewish cult don't share anything from them.

#a wild lux appears #free palestine #palestine #I hope if any non follower sees this you already found a way better written post abt this but if not hello #Hope this info already circulated well enough over here

[cowboyhorsegirl]

CAP-IM Rec Week: Absolute Faves Monday

a quick & dirty reclist of all some of my absolute best beloved stevetony fic faves <3

You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real) by @kiyaar

“Why don’t you take that off,” Tony whispers back, and he tugs at the guy’s mask. He tries an arm around his waist, firm, solid, hot. Tony is hard and it’s obvious. He thinks he’d be more of a gentleman about it under normal circumstances, but in this place, it’s like a handshake. He shudders and his back muscles move beneath Tony’s hand. Tony’s pants grow tighter. He smells like Barbasol. A well-respected man. Tony wants to disrespect him. (an AU where Steve never gave up the Nomad mantle, Tony has a coke habit, and they meet on the dance floor at Studio 54.)

Podfic available from @whenasinsilks!

Please everyone go read this fic immediately and then report back so we can all go disco dancing together while screaming abt the SteveTony identity porn mutual pining drug-fueled blowjob of all time <3

Sins of Omission by @kiyaar

A Post-Civil War, Pre-Secret Invasion AU where Steve is dead, Tony's a mess, and everything sucks. In which Tony deals poorly with Steve's death, falls off the wagon, sees ghosts, and misses a lot. Oh, and the Skrulls are about to invade.

Literally a classic, this fic is the SteveTony Odyssey.

Under God by @isozyme

“Captain America represents the values of our country. The recent allegations about his sexuality are specious and designed to smear an American icon. Captain Rogers regularly attends the Church of Saint Agnes and invites the citizens of New York to attend worship with him this Sunday, April 14th. God bless America.” Nobody was ever going to know. Steve would be a good husband, a good father, and he’d never give in to sin and touch another man. But Steve makes two mistakes, one after the other: he leaves two words out of the Pledge of Allegiance, and he doesn’t notice a camera flash among the strobe lights of a dark club, because he’s dancing with his clumsy hands on Tony’s hips.

Podfic available from Cathalinaheart!

No words, only ugly beautiful emotions about being gay in the Zeroes, internalized homophobia, falling in love, and perhaps even preempting the Iraq War.

the face and the mask are mirrors, baby (the genderqueer remix) by @imaginaryelle

When Tony’s young, he thinks maybe he’s built wrong. He thinks: Maybe one day, if he gets good enough, he’ll be able to redesign Tony Stark. Cast himself in a new mold. One day, he’ll be better.

I actually think this fic was created in a secret lab specifically for me to read and be irrevocably changed and made better by it; sharing so that you all can also partake in the revolutionary experience of reading this fic and being better for it too :)

Semaphore by DevilDoll

"I’m trying to like you, Tony. You’re just making it very hard."

Podfic available from crinklysolution!

To me, this is always The 2012 Avengers-era SteveTony fic. In my eyes, it eclipses and predominates the whole of its fandom. It was I think, maybe the first MCU SteveTony fic I read back when I first got into this fandom over 10 years ago and it's stuck with me ever since, and if that isn't enough of a recommendation then I simply do not know what is!

Amor Fati by citsiurtlanu

Tony Stark has always known what the words on his wrist are supposed to lead to. What he's never known is who the words are for. 616 soulmate AU.

Honestly and truly and genuinely don't have the words to articulate how heartwrenchingly gorgeous this fic is. It has pulled real life tears from me and imprinted itself into my memory. For all the ups and downs of 616 canon, we can thank every moment of it for having existed because citsuirtlanu was able to distill it down into this incredible, incredible story. <3

Five Days a Week by @festiveferret

The day after Pepper's funeral - after Rhodey has come and gone, after Natasha has come and gone, after Tony has forcibly sent Happy away - Tony looks out of the front window, Morgan snoozing in the crook of one arm, and sees a dark, heavily-tinted car in the driveway.

The perfect, the perfect Endgame fix-it. There's a certain kind of magic in this story that I don't think I've found in any other stevetony fic to date. This fic is heartbreak and grief and guilt and friendship and romance all rolled into one indescribably lovely story.

#It's still Monday where I am so this rec list still counts! #capimrecweek #fic! #stevetony #i can't believe there's so much incredible fic in this fandom truly we are blessed with a bountiful and talented community <3

[dirtangeldean]

hi ren! i was wondering why you don't want your donation post tagged? tagging crowdfunding etc posts helps me find them again on my blog easily to rereblog in case they haven't hit their goal yet but i don't wanna make you uncomfortable

cw: weight talk/health issues

anon hiiii, i’m really glad you asked this and finally have capacity to write out fully why! so thank you 🤗

among the millions of users on this app, some things have gotten super cemented as The Way™ but that means staff knows it too.

while the 4 tags: “s***nal b***t”, c**wdf*nd”, “d**nation”, and “mu**al a*d” may seem helpful for sorting and awareness at face value, we as users have been using and overusing them for years. it’s like a sick joke to chronically poor “ebeggers” as we have been named by old reddit.

bottom line is staff hates poor people; even before they decided to take away tipping soon, they flagged posts and sh**ow ba**ed accounts, deleted users (usual poor and black/indigenous/of color) while letting gen pop think they were doing a good job. my main account has over 3k followers and i cant get any post i make over 3 notes anymore despite being a semi popular radical blog.

my messaging was taken away. i could hit post limit and still have activity of max 20 notes a day. the post itself could be randomly deleted or even hard to search all of a sudden even with a tag. it’s awful to be isolated on the internet when you’re poor. :/ call me paranoid but i barely touch my main account now.

anyway, my fandom blog doesn’t deserve a forced lack of community and i love you guys too much to not be able to see/be seen or talk to my friends. ive already been told by staff that this blog was flagged as spam once and they took away my messages, right after my last sciatic spasm. it took Weeks to get messages back.

it was awful, i was living in the dark and only eating egg cheese sandwiches or sugar rice and water bc i couldnt afford anything else. i’m not going back to that. i’ve gained weight that is making my bones hurt bc of my poverty food choices and forced sedentary lifestyle while healing my back. and i’m only just now getting back going walking and being employed sporadically. it’s super hard to not have help and not have a job bc of disability discrimination AND have deconditioned muscles. poor nutrition is horrible for muscle. it’s even harder to stomach getting 3 thousand notes on something and $17 while i owe Thousands the way it works on my main account.

if i can do anything to advocate for myself, it’s to ask this: dont use old, overused tags. get creative with tags so more people see and wont restrict me. tag comerades/mutuals in the post. tag the post with a random well wish like “good luck” or something. literally anything but the most common 4 tags. the same way people get creative with the name for their queues!

i made a post about other/different tags that can be used but it doesnt have a ton of notes, i tried looking for and i cant find it which shows 1. the tumblr tagging system still sucks 2. it will never get a ton of notes. many of the posts in the tags mention in the beginning of this post barely reach 100 notes. mathematically a post could need like 9,000 notes to be fully funded depending on the amount. there’s a post in there with 22 notes, unless that person makes a new post everyday (i know a person who does that), it’s a wasted effort and some days i barely have spoons to get up and relieve myself tbh :/

anyway, especially with things that took years to happen or months to fix, it’d just be nice if post got notes into 1k-10k territory to be effective.

i hope some or any of this answers your question, let me know if you have more! have a great day!

#da.words #anon #da.asks

[chen-chen-chen-again-chen]

For the WIP Game! (I went and updated the original post so it has links to all the answers, if folks want to check those out. Sometimes my brain good!)

@you-remind-me-of-the-babe asked me about the WIP called Will suck dick for books! 😆😆 I did not anticipate that folks would ask about works in fandoms they are not familiar with but I am LIVING FOR IT~~

I'm also going to go ahead and tag @fatalfangirl here because (methinks??) you have partaken of the Haikyuu. Going to also tag @thewesterndoor because YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DID lolol jkjk who got me into Haikyuu and whose Take/Ukai fics I ADORE.

Fandom background: Haikyuu!! is an earnest and hilarious volleyball anime where everyone is gay and chaotic and loveable. It's SO SO GOOD and like all sports anime, it is not necessarily just about sport but about FEELINGS~

Pairing background: Takeda Ittetsu/Ukai Keishin

Takeda (Take-chan): looks like a cinnamon roll but could actually kill you, English teacher, glasses nerd, his superpower is bowing at like 1000 km/h, head coach but he knows nothing about volleyball at the beginning of the series (he just stepped in to fill a void b/c he a good human), cries easily, tries to use poetry to motivate high school athletes, terrifyingly good at holding his liquor, in my headcanon he's a beast in the sack

Ukai: looks like he could kill you but is actually a cinnamon roll, Reformed Gangster Vibes, in his late 20s but his energy is always Kids Get Off My Lawn, lightweight, easily manipulated by cute English teacher into coaching a high school volleyball team even though he has full time jobs running a convenience store and helping out w/ the family farm because (in this fic) he's Weak for Dat Ass

The fic: a canon-adjacent and canon-compliant take on (some of) the events in the series, but focused on the relationship between Takeda/Ukai, these baby adults who have somehow accidentally co-adopted 14 chaotic teens.

There's fake dating, nerding out about books, soft boyfriends being super soft and domestic, dating/married even if they don't realize it, and a backstory involving writing your phone number in the back of a book, lending it to a hot stranger, and somehow running into them seven years later.

U want a snippet? here's a snippet. I has lots of snippets. (This bad boy is sitting at like 75% in my drafts folder):

"Look, are you going to buy something or not?"

"Are you going to coach the boys' volleyball team?"

"No. You should try a meat bun, they're pretty good." 

The Nice New Teacher buys a pizzaman, which is kind of adorable. "I'll come back," he says, but it's hard for him to sound threatening around a mouthful of steamed bun. 

And another, a little later on:

Keishin's gotten used to being accosted by the Nice New Teacher every few days, so he's a little weirded out by a sudden radio silence. In that time, he reviews the store inventory, decides to implement a new organization system for the frozen foods, and even washes the windows. It's a slow couple of days, okay? 

He literally just finishes throwing GunGun bars at a couple of punks from the volleyball team - the one with the shaved head catches the protein bar in his teeth, what the hell is Take-chan teaching them - when the store phone starts ringing. 

"Lo, Sakanoshita Market." 

"Ukai-kun!" Take-chan exclaims. He sounds breathless and excited, as if he's been eager to talk to Keishin all day, which is kinda adorable and - weird, Keishin corrects himself, weird, and not adorable, and definitely not a little bit charming. 

"You again," Keishin sighs, as if he's got about fifty million other things that he could be doing with his time, instead of re-reading One Piece. 

And then later, after Keishin's ass is well and truly Trapped:

"Er, thanks," Takeda says, flushing.  "I, ah, as you can see, I… I have a lot of books." 

"Do I need to stage an intervention, Sensei?" 

Takeda scratches the back of his head. "My mother was a librarian," he says, laughing a little. "So I come by it honestly." 

Keishin finds himself squinting at a silver flask resting between a bunch of cookbooks. There's writing on it in English, in fancy Gothic lettering, and he manages to just make out Will suck d- before Takeda suddenly materializes there, his smile very bright. 

"Hope you don't mind red pepper, there's a lot of it in the yakisoba!" Takeda says, his voice a bit higher than usual. "We should eat!"

THANK YOU for letting me blather about this fic in a fandom other than Carry On, LOLOLOL!!! It's so fun to come back to this and definitely makes me excited to FINALLY FINISH AT SOME POINT THIS YEAR RAWR~

#WIP Game #will suck dick for books #haikyuu!! #take/ukai #Takeda ittetsu #Ukai keishin #weak for nerds #my fic tag

[twotangledsisters]

🧠 🎞 and 📚 for the tangled ask game

Oh, all of these are so good and thanks so much for asking but I do apologize in advance because that last one may get me rambling!

🧠- Random Tangled Headcanon you have?

Oh, this reminded me that a while back I did an entire post with head canons of all the cast!

It's a bit old, may need to re-visit that sometime in the future but the first on that list is the first headcanon that came to mind for me and one I reference often in my work!

It's the idea that the flower in Rapunzel's hair are hand-picked by Eugene every morning!

It started as Eugene giving flowers to his girlfriend because that's a normal couple thing to do! But Rapunzel being new to relationships didn't think to put the flowers in a vase so she'd start adding them right into her hair, a reminder of Eugene to bring with her throughouth her day!

And Eugene, of course, got into the habit of picking her fresh flowers every morning because only the best for his love!

I just think this is something they'd do!

🎞- Movie or Series?

If I had to choose I guess I'd say series, but honestly they're inseparable in my mind!

I only got into the series because I saw the movie in cinemas as a kid and it was one of my fave Disney films since! I remember that first trailer for Before Ever After on YouTube, the excitement!

I remember the first season which I watched on Spanish television. So excited to see Eugene, Rapunzel, the new characters! Attila! Seeing these background characters get extra screen time!

But if I had to choose, I have to say series because it's what drove me into fanfics, and tumblr and back into the fandom after so many years!

📚- Favorite Tangled Fanfic?

The idea of choosing just one... I don't think it'd even be honest for me to do so because it honestly depends on what I feel like! I don't have a singular fave but I'll try to keep the list short!

If I want some cute kid, gentle, Cassandra content, literally one of @frozenwolftemplar's fics, I can't even name a specific one because she has so many one-shots that are so beautifully written, so adorable, her Young Cassandra series though is my safe space! Lots of them center around Cass' childhood which I love, I have an entire page on my kindle of her one-shots and if I'm not misremembering I was reading her fics before getting back into commenting and interacting in the community. It's possible you could credit her I came to this fandom at all? After all, I needed cute one-shots which would help feed my desire for more tts content and her fics just suck you in!

If I feel up to a longer fics, to nobody's surprise as I've talked quite a bit about it in the past I'd have to point to Tangled: Between The Kisses by @the-writer1988 and @tangledbea. It's a full series re-imagining and it just takes so much time and care in flashing out so many different characters!

Although my all time fave character isn't in it, my other faces: Eugene, Arianna, Lance, they are not just in it but perhaps some of my fave representation of them in any fanfic!

The way they do POVs is so amazing! It's just a really good read, especially if you love New Dream, or any of the characters I just listed!

And having mentioned New Dream and having mentioned One-shots how can I not mention my fave short New Dream fics:

All at Once Everything is Different and Where I'm Meant to Be by @roygbivv

Look, if you love New Dream and haven't read them just do so! They're super short but they're beautifully written and for whatever reason, maybe the prose, maybe how gentle and thoughtful they are, I don't know, they just hit me really hard!

All of these fics are ones that occupy my mind even when I'm not reading, which let me tell you isn't easy! Simply because I have really bad memory so even a fic I enjoy a lot will very soon escape my brain, but these are the ones that outdid those odds!

It took a lot for me to reduce the list down this much because there's just so many amazing Tangled fanfics out there!

I really should post recommendations more often because so many fics do not get the attention they deserve! But I'm really scared I'd end up forgetting some really important ones or something.

For now, I do have my 'fanfic fanart' tag where I post my fanart sketchbook spread (or I should if I tag correctly), and hopefully the posts under that tag will only grow! (I have a few I'm just drumming up the bravery to post while they wait in drafts!)

But I'm always looking for new fics to read! Especially ongoing ones or shorter ones, as I'm a pretty slow reader! So if anybody has recs, please send them my way! (including your own fics, of course!)

And yeah, thank you so much for the ask and I apologize for getting rambly towards the end! It's just so hard to talk about fanfics without rambling because they're so good and there are sooo many!

I hope you're having a lovely day and have a lovely week!

#ask answered

[oraclechats]

New episode opinion. First, happy new year to the Oracle, may 2024 be a good year for us all. Secondly, I was listening to this ep on my very long bus ride, and lemme tell you, I have to bite down on my lips to not laugh like a hyena in a big bus filled with people.

I literally was thinking, damn they made a new intro, the music is so snazzy and then you dropped the bomb that we almost got Ross to make it. LMAO. Shame on Ross, sucks to be you. You could have been an intro voiceline to a cool podcast that alter the course of your career, but alas, you miss your chances.

Also, I predict that drama/fandom war is definitely gonna break out in this space soon. Because of MOTA, yes. It would be these: - gatekeeping drama. It happened to every fandom that have new material after too long a period. some people will be snobbish, it's inevitable, and new fans can be annoying, inevitable as well

-current world event. well, ya know. And war shows/movies have always been under heavy scrutiny about their portrayal of wars (as it should). This will be imo the main discourse.

I have not watched the BoB symposium, I know there is a video out there of it, I need to see that hug you guys mention.

My vision for whatever fandom drama breaks out isnt to like participate but to be like Andy on WWHL, interpret that as you will.

ALSO yeah no we were trying to if anything BOOST ross’s profile and he bit the hand so trust he will start coughing in 7 days. Also yeah ill try to find the Nola Symposium link and post it bc you just reminded me i meant to do that anyways.

#the oracle files #asks #alao im goad we make you laff bc we make ourselves laff all the time!

[muyuuoffline]

I've been writing fanfics for over 4 and a half years, the first ones weren't on tumblr, but reading a lot of them from different authors,made me felt inspired, so i released my first oneshots. my writing probably sucked and was very cringey since i was still a beginner, but it had a lot of great reviews, and people reading them were very nice and heartwarming, and that kinda boosted my excitement with the whole thing being a writer. i switched sites and came here, my favorite fandom being pjsekai at the time. it was still new, and there weren't a lot of content, so i decided to try writing for my favorite characters, and little by little, my work and acc slowly received likes and followers.

but at some point (right about a year from now?or so) i became very busy with school, got my entrance exam in a few months, and i've got lots of studying waiting for me. i sometimes login to check my status, but had no time to answer my requests or messages.

I still want to continue writing, but to be honest i'm not very sure if it's gonna be for pjsekai anymore. i'm still playing it, but my insterests have been changing, and i'd be lying if i say i'm as dedicated to it now as i was before.

There is too much happening at once, so many goals to achieve, so many ideas of what i should do in the future, my communication with my family, friends. i have a lot of priority, and i thought that writing would be one of them.

I deeply apologize for literally not posting anything for a year, and i may not post anything for now, but around february or march, i might have some time to finish up my requests.

I still don't know what i'll do after that. i might stop writing overall, i might change blogs and write for a different fandom, but i probably wont be writing for pjsekai anymore due to my lack of insterest on it.

Thank you for reading, I hope you have a good day/night.

[icemankazansky]

(tw vent if that's okay if not you can just delete this, thank you <3) honestly though the hate in this fandom is... so discouraging. like ive been writing fics for top gun & tgm but the fact so many people are so set on being hateful & not respecting others, and now there's a whole burn book blog like... idk i just don't feel like i should put myself out there. which is really sad because i really want to interact. and i know the fandom wasn't like this prior to tgm, and that makes me sad too because i came in after tgm came out, and I just feel so sad that even though im not part of the problem i'm still part of like, the wave of people that flooded the fandom. which would have happened even without me being here, but idk, i just feel... sad, like it feels like tgm (even though it's a really good movie that a lot of people genuinely and innocently love) really screwed ao3 up and sorta just hurt everyone and is still hurting everyone. idk.

it just sucks that fandom is supposed to be a place that brings people together and makes happiness and instead I just feel so drained and upset when I think about posting fics and exposing them to the fandom and apparently whole discord groups to like, pick apart. it's just really sad and sucky.

anyway if you made it this far thank you very much for listening, I really appreciate it and I hope you're having an okay day even after that topgunburnbook thing and all this drama

Oh, my dear. As Saint Kesha says, "Don't let the bastards get you down. Don't let the assholes wear you out. Don't let the mean girls take your crown, don't let the scumbags screw you 'round, don't let the bastards take you down."

First of all, don't worry about the burn book people at all, because most of their posts have zero notes. It's just a couple bitter people who think being mean is edgy, and no one is even following them. So, that is a non-issue. It doesn't affect you.

And don't worry about AO3. You didn't do that. It does suck, but it's not your fault, and it's not the end of the world.

The thing that happened when Top Gun: Maverick came out and brought new fans into the fandom is that the fandom got big. And that is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, you have all these wonderful creators who are just discovering the movies and the characters, and they're bringing in great new stories and art and meta. I've met a lot of wonderful new people who are just like you: They just want to have a good time in this fandom and interact with other fans who share their passion. And honestly, most people are like that.

The problem is that big fandoms have big fandom problems. Think of it like this: Before TGM came out, the Top Gun fandom was a small town. Everyone active in fandom literally knew everyone else, either firsthand or from a, "Hey, you wrote _______; I love that story! Oh my gosh, and you're _____'s friend? That's awesome. She's the best." This creates a harmonious atmosphere, because everything is personal, it's small enough to be self-governing, and because everyone knows everyone, everyone is accountable for their actions.

After TGM came out, Top Gun fandom is no longer a small town. It's a big city. And it has the same problems that all big cities have. People generally don't know anyone except the people in their immediate circle, so that causes factions and in-grouping, and an "us versus them" mentality. This is why you get shipping wars and stuff like that. The fandom is too big to self-govern, and everyone is here to have fun, so it's not like we're going to elect a governing system, but between that and the fact that everybody doesn't know their neighbors personally, there's no accountability anymore. So for one, there's crime now. For example, there has been a lot of theft since more people joined the fandom. New fans are just straight up stealing content from other people and acting like it's their own. And what are we going to do, call the cops? No. It's just something we have to deal with because we live in a big city.

And, yes, the relative (and, on Tumblr, often literal) anonymity of being in a large fandom where no one knows you does encourage some people's terrible behavior. I talked about psychological and sociological studies of anonymity a little while ago, and the gist is: When anonymity is an option, the general chaos of the system does increase, but individuals just act like themselves, but ... moreso. Think of it like the Captain America serum or the mask from that Jim Carrey movie. Anonymity, even perceived anonymity like being just one person in a large system, just shows what you're really like inside. It dials you up to 11. And most people are kind and leave thoughtful questions or wonderful comments in ask boxes, or just go around with positive thought memes made up of happy emojis just to brighten others' days. That's most people. This small, ugly portion of the fandom that is using the fact that they cannot be held accountable as an excuse to hurt people is aberrant. They're the ones who don't belong here, and you can't let the fear of being their target keep you from enjoying all the good things a big city can afford you. Like, small towns are the bomb, but there are wonderful things that big cities can support that small towns can't. Like International Street where you can get different food from all around the world. Big art galleries. More resources for mentorship. More clubs and opportunities for you to find exactly your niche, and people who share it with you.

You didn't do anything wrong. Things grow and expand. You should be enjoying everything this city has to offer. If you feel comfortable, I would love you to come off anon and message me, and we can talk about getting you comfortable putting yourself out there in this fandom, and maybe I can connect you to some resources or some other really great people in the fandom. We want to hear from you. We want to talk to you. We want you to publish your work. We're happy you're here, truly.

#asks answered #top gun fandom #long post

[its-a-swift-kloss]

I get people are upset and everything but Taylor has been loudly telegraphing that this was something that was going to happen since the day after the VMAs with the tabloid articles that Taylor started having Tree push in response to the original rumor. It's not Taylor's fault that everyone stuck their fingers in their ears and refused to listen.

Taylor's finally got Swifties genuinely interested in 1989 TV again for longer than an hour or two by getting this new boy-toy, that's a fantastic thing after how boring and uninteresting everything else she tried to do to keep her mainstream fans interested in it since the announcement was, and as a bonus she might even end up getting sales from people who've never bought her music before.

No matter how anyone on our side of the fandom tries to pretend, this was a great business move from Taylor and could end up being just as useful for promoting her stuff for awhile down the line if she plays her cards with this beard right. And if anyone on this side of the fandom other than me bothered to read the articles about this that Taylor had Tree push, you guys would know that Taylor isn't being a bad role-model for promoting the idea that guys should ignore "No's" from women because if they try enough times they'll eventually get a "Yes", that was literally never part of the narrative for this beard at any time and is just something that some butt-hurt loser completely made up.

If Taylor wants to beard with some macho dude-bro sports guy then that's her right, and the only person who has any right to voice any objection about it is Karlie. If Karlie is fine with it then it sucks to be everyone else, Taylor has the right to live her life the way she wants and if that bothers Gaylors and some Kaylors because it not what they wanted from her then tough fucking titties.

Yes, anon, beards are beneficial. They get attention from ppl outside your fanbase. They increase numbers. They'll boost sales of whatever it is that one's selling. That's a thing, and we've seen it a million little times. We all know how it works and why celebs do it. You're preaching to the choir. I don't think ppl are all that surprised, as they are annoyed - at least as far as I've been seeing. Taylor does whatever she wants, it's her life. You won't hear me saying otherwise.

About his insistence... well, you see, he did say he tried to talk to her at the concert and was told she doesn't talk to anyone, which is a lie bc she does meet ppl and talk to them. From the top of my head, see Jessica Chastain with Taylor backstage in Mexico. So he went somewhere (I think a podcast) and complained about it a little, about how they told him she had to preserve her voice or whatever excuse they made up. Then, he went to say he threw the ball in her court and invited her to his game, implying he did reach out to her somehow after being rejected with a polite "no, sir, you can't speak to her". Honestly? I see the point of people's complaints. I myself didn't post anything about it, but, yeah, it does enforce problematic behavior a little bit. Not the worst thing her PR has ever done, sadly.

#but honestly anon why are we having this conversation?? your mind is already made up about tumblr 🤷‍♀️

[rasparagus]

the status of and my feelings about this blog

honestly i have been involved in fandom since i was way too young to be on the internet. and i took a break from being super active with fan accounts some years back bc its what was best for me. fast forward to 2021 and becoming a carat is quite literally what got me to start posting and interacting consistently again on tumblr bc the fandom seemed really chill and cool and overall just a nice way to find community, especially during a transition period of my life.

but now i realize why every other day there’s a new creator declaring they need a mental health break lmfao. its cus this shit lowkey sucks. ive barely been active in the community for two months and this is the most stress ive experienced in a fandom. i love being able to chat it up and write fics and read fics but the amount of discourse combined with so many people thinking they know every fucking thing about everything is exhausting. some of yall treat this like a job. i come here to chill but so many people use this community as a way to show how virtuous of a person they are or how witty and sassy they can be with no regard for actual human beings. i think some of yall have been on the internet so long that u have literally forgotten how to interact normally with others, even when they say something u disagree with. not every disagreement is worth some huge moral argument or name-calling session. i dont think its normal that i see a different discourse discussion occur on the timeline every day, all of them met with equal vitriol from the people involved; some things are simply not that serious. maybe if we all take a step back and remember we are people writing fake stories about people we will never meet, then the problems wont seem so big after all. hate to be a hippie but like,,,lets just vibe and treat each other like humans, man~

ofc this isnt about any of my lovely moots xoxo i love yall. but its hard to ignore the discourse that occurs within this fandom. and as someone who does a vast amount of philosophizing in my daily life for school/work/community activism and would truly just like to chill on here, the exaggeration of mild issues stresses me out. im someone who is deeply passionate about politics, social justice, and cultural criticism in day-to-day life (just like a lot of other people who tend to start discourse!). but i also am of the belief that we all need rest, and if our leisure time is plagued by the same seriousness of the “real world” then we’ll never truly get that rest. i fear that in an effort to continue my hobby of writing and interacting with other fans, i will find my mind never truly resting and will be damned to a life where i am convincing myself that i’m having fun when im not. and once again, it should never be that serious.

when i started writing for svt i saw myself being here for a while, and i still really want that. but im barely three (very short) fics in and im already exhausted (and impressed) with how much the fun has been drained out of this fandom for me. i liked it better when all i did was watch gose and gush about vernon to my non carat friends. i really cherish the mutuals ive made and bc of those connections i desire to keep this blog semi-alive. i think it’d be really sad for me to give up on the fandom this early. but this fandom has a level of toxicity that is incredibly anxiety-inducing for me. sure my mental issues are my own and it isnt anyone’s fault, but ive noticed a common trend among other creators as well, so maybe its worth considering the environment we all are fostering. who knows. maybe i need to disappear for a while so i can re-discover the spark that led me to become a svt blog in the first place. this isnt me announcing a formal hiatus or anything. i could be back tomorrow thirsting over mingyu and wanting to write and post a new fic. or it could take me weeks or months to regain the fire that made this fun in the first place. this rant is merely a tired, old (not really) soul expressing their frustrations with a fandom that quite frankly takes itself way too seriously. 

#this is ok to reblog #ro's.chats

[elmaxlys]

thoughts on utaren?

Dear anon, literally my first thought was "are you new here?" but then I realized that yeah okay fair I haven't posted about them in forever. you do need to have been there for a while to have known me during my nonstop utaren-posting phase

Short answer: there are 18 pages of posts tagged utaren on my blog, i think this speaks for itself (aka I love them, TG OTP)

Long answer: *stick figure violence* they mean so much to me

Retrospectively, this answer is not making any sense I'm just throwing thoughts around. Have fun, anon.

The thing with Utaren is that. they are so. so . They're best friends, okay. They know each other better than anyone but also they don't know each other at all and that's fucking poetic. They've been around each other for decades, they haven't seen each other in years. They can't live with the other, they can't live without him either.

If you want to know, back in. oh dear. back in the days of early :re publication (i read og around when :re was announced or something but i got "active" in fandom when :re was being published), I was Uta/Utaren posting and was arguing that Uta's tattoo talked about Renji, ya know, while anti-Utarens were arguing back that no it talked about the humans/ghouls relationship actually. Because I was so young back then with no concept of analysis, literary or not - despite the insane quantity of meta I read and my good grades in french/literature class - and also my english sucked wonderfully, I couldn't prove my point clearly. But anyways yearsss later I was proven right and this was maybe one of the best feelings I ever felt. When I say I'm always right this is what I mean.

So yeah I've been a shipper since forever.

The way I'll describe the way I see them depends on who I'm talking to, honestly, so take your pick.

With Utaren antis/deniers, they're my OTP. I ship them. They fuck on the regular. They try to kill each other before, during and after, it's part of the mating ritual. They've ruined my life enough I won't do in subtlety and won't go in deeper analysis. Leave me alone.

With Fellow Utaren Truthers, I'll say yes I ship them but I also see both of them as aspec, you know, I see Renji as arospec ace and Uta as either oriented aroace, either as alloaro, and thus this impacts the way I ship them, you know? I alternate between they're QPPs by the end of :re, they're FWB and they don't define their relationship/the way they're involved with each other (they have A Thing going on and who needs to know what that is apart from them, ya know)

With myself, they're friends. Their "we're friends" leitmotiv is. extremely important to me and that's what made me sooo involved with them in the first place, ya know? it's. so meaningful, both to them and to the story. to the fact they literally can't be together nor apart. They're friends. That's how they define what they have and who am I to tell them otherwise, you feel?

So yeah I ship them in all the ways above and probably more.

Also ya know this meta

And this fanfic

Speaking of which, I started a lot of utaren fanfics.. i never finished any because I really struggle writing relationships, especially when I'm not decided as to where I want them to go (see above the many different ways i ship them). RIP I guess

#thank you <3 #utaren #tokyo ghoul