#but like in darklina fics. i just want it to be about them. they are the only 2 characters i recognize

[no-mercy-bby]

I think that Shadow and Bone is unnecessarily complex btw

#I do get that the show is based off the book series #but like in darklina fics. i just want it to be about them. they are the only 2 characters i recognize #basically im not a real fan #if you think about it.. its just star wars but sillier #to me 'the fold took my parents' is the same as 'singing killed by grandma' #shadow and bone #also im only one episode 4 of season 1 and i already know everything that happend with them #anywaysss i love ben barnes #hes my lil meow meow

[olderthannetfic]

https://www.tumblr.com/olderthannetfic/746123891380027392/httpswwwtumblrcomolderthannetfic746100114129

Darklina is an interesting case because there's plenty you could say about the fucked up elements of the ship (and those are what make it so hot so I don't understand glossing over them), but antis insist on labeling it pedophilia (Alina is very clearly an adult in-universe, it's fantasy 19th century Russia and she's a conscript in the army, not a child) and grooming (none of the key elements of grooming are present in their relationship, either in the books or in the show; words mean things!) and then claiming that anyone who ships it is a moral degenerate for supporting those things.

Which makes it even funnier that a couple years ago on darklinatwt, there was a big dust up over the fact that several prominent darklina authors wrote dead dove fics featuring actual pedophilia, grooming, and rape. There was a lot of 'you're just proving them right for what they accuse us of!' thrown around and it's like. Sorry, but when antis promise me a ship that has grooming in it, then I look and don't find any, all that makes me want to do is write a fic that has it. Even better when it makes antis scream themselves into an embolism.

Funnier still, something similar happened in the Daemyra fandom, only this time the split was between the side of the fandom that preferred pre-timeskip Daemyra and the side that insisted we only like them when the age difference isn't as obvious, don't lump us in with those freaks (despite the fact that in both cases, Rhaenyra is played by an adult actress and in both cases they are still uncle and niece and the sexiest scene between them happened when Daemon took his 19-year-old niece to a brothel and fingerbanged her). The holier-than-thou side of the fandom also flipped their nut over dead dove enthusiasts on the other side enjoying noncon and explicit grooming fics and it's like ??????? THAT'S STILL AN UNCLE AND HIS NIECE HE KNEW SINCE SHE WAS AN INFANT. Forgive the fuck out of us if we want to play with the darker aspects that aren't actually given on screen--that's what fanfiction is for!

--

[iamstartraveller776]

Writing Patterns

Tagged by @more-better-words! Thank you! 💜

Rules: list the first line of your last 10 (posted) fics and see if there's a pattern!

(I'm only doing stories that are longer than 1k words. I've written a lot of baby ficlets lately, lol.)

Alina’s attendants are silent as they dress her. [The Truth in Our Hearts, SAB, Darklina]

"Listen, listen," Jane said, her words a tad elastic at the edges. "I don't like you." [Fun Surprises, MCU, Lokane]

coming home this wknd u free? [Lies, TROP, Haladriel]

Mud squelched beneath Killian’s boots as he trudged up a path overgrown with thick foliage. [To Cleave Destiny, OUAT, Captain Swan]

Your turn for groceries. Pick them up before 6 pm. [Crossing Boundaries, TROP, Haladriel]

His gaze has substance, she’s learned. [Alike But Not, MCU, Lokane]

Alina hadn't meant to fall asleep. [Involuntary, SAB, Darklina]

"And that is why I will never be at your side." [no peace in truth, TROP, Haladriel]

The queen announces a fete for the eve of their departure from Númenor. [Reprieve, TROP, Haladriel]

Killian stumbles across her late at night in a secluded glade. [In the Quiet Moonlight, OUAT, Captain Swan]

I guess my pattern is that I like shorter first lines? LOL

Bonus first lines of some of my favorite Trip/T'Pol stories just for @more-better-words (I didn't include any of my Mirror Universe stories; these are sweet and/or funny stories):

On the scale of one to disastrous for first encounters, this was shaping up to be the worst one yet—at least for Trip. [Mission Gone Awry]

Sometimes a man just had to assert his manhood, and usually in the stupidest way possible. [Connubial Negotiations]

Now this is the kind of "work" I'm talking about! [Unexpected Too]

Note to self: When offered a spot in an exchange program on a desert planet, think twice before accepting. [Three Months on Vulcan]

She's kneeling before her meditation candles late at night when he enters her quarters. [Indelible]

Tagging: @jhalya, @kmomof4, @searchingwardrobes, @scriberated, @coraleethroughthelookingglass, @somebirdortheother, @talshiargirlfriend, @snowbellewells, @hollyethecurious, @demonscantgothere, @bywayofmemory, @jomiddlemarch, @curator-on-ao3, @thecoziestbean, @nenyabusiness, and ANYONE WHO WANTS TO PLAY! (Just tag me back so I can see your first lines!)

#tag games #first lines #darklina #haladriel #saurondriel #lokane #captain swan #trip x t'pol

[thereisnolumos]

darklina thoughts: I wanted to get into the shadow and bone Fandom(books and show) because of the amazing gif set of the darklina kiss I saw

Like who are these two that are sharing such a beautiful kiss. And look so aesthically pleasing together with the darkness and light vibes. I was so excited to find out who these two were because these kind of ships are my everything. Than I find out and 😨😱😤😠🤬!!!!! It was like running full steam a head with tons of excitement and crashing face first into a wall when I find out everything about this Fandom. Both about the books and show. The author and this beautiful ship. And I'm like God why do authors do this ship. Tease us with everything we want and the full potential. But than do a completely one 80 and waste are time on things we don't care about, or find insulting or toxic, and tells us are tastes are dumb and toxic. So now I just read fics and look at beautiful art of Darklina and the potential they could have been. It's just so annoying because this stuff happens all the time!!! And don't get me started on what I heard about the author. I don't know if their true. And wish I could find out real stuff about her. But if it is. God she is so messed up for doing this to us.

I only got in the fandom bcs I randomly saw a teaser for the first season and Ben Barnes was there in all his dark glory. I knew nothing about the books, but the way that show was promoted I was expecting the epic dark romance, villain who’s not really a villain gets the girl all the vibe. Plus cool world build and complicated detailed story overall.

I got none of that.

That show was interesting and hopeful for the first 5 episodes (we will always have 1x05🖤). It wasn’t as detailed and complex as I expected, but it had potential and the main pair - the one they based THE ENTIRE promotion on by the way - was having one of the most fiery and spark inducing chemistry I’ve ever seen on the screen, so I kept my hopes up for the overall plot and focused on them. And then… then they backpedaled SO HARD on everything that made that show interesting for the broad audience, I wonder how they didn’t give themselves a whiplash… though considering the horrible quality of s2 they probably did

Though I didn’t like the way s1 ended, I still thought there is hope, and “we need a conflict for our main pair, I guess”. I truly, wholeheartedly believed that creators and writers of the show are not complete idiots and know how to read the room and what the most of their audience is there for, so that’s what they’ll deliver. But oh my, how wrong I was.

The second season is downright unwatchable with how horrifyingly terrible it is. I only suffered through the entire thing for Ben, who, bless his heart, tried his hardest to deliver the complexity and depth of his character, who he only agreed to play if they “won’t make him a cardboard villain”. And they did exactly that in s2, or tried to, bcs Ben Barnes and his talent didn’t let them, despite all their efforts. The rest of the cast I guess didn’t have enough experience to fix the worst writing imaginable with their acting, so most of the characters became absolutely bland and uninteresting and SO IDIOTICALLY STUPUD, I yelled at them constantly, scaring my cat the entire time.

Also, as much as I understand it from exploring the fandom, the creators and writers of the show are die hard fans of the Crows, and they don’t actually like Alina’s trilogy at all. So… why didn’t they just do the books they wanted I’ll never know. Instead, they forced the Crows in the plot they were never a part of (making all of them okay with selling a girl to slavery in the process. Despite one of them being the former slave and the other one being the one who got her out of it… make it make sense, I beg of you), in the second season they wasted SO MUCH time on their plot lines that 1)didn’t matter one bit for the overall story, 2)were absolutely uninteresting to everyone who isn’t the Crows fan beforehand. In the end we got half-assed Alina and Aleksander’s story with half-assed Crows’ story. They should’ve just made the Crows show, without touching Alina and Aleksander

I haven’t read the books, but from what I gathered in the fandom, though still committing the same sin of putting all the promotion and marketing into the Dark romance trope without actually delivering on it, and force feeding the fans one of the worst and most toxic pairings ever with Malina, at least Alina and Aleksander’s characters weren’t made so cardboard and stupid, and there was tragedy in their story, not the shit that they gave us in s2. Though I absolutely DESPISE the fact that Alina looses her powers in the end and goes on to live Mal’s dream life… Like WHAT THE FUCK?? What levels of internalized misogyny do you need to have as a woman, to write this plot line for your female protagonist???? I can’t.

On Mal’s toxicity: at least that made him a fleshed out character in the books. Absolutely horrible one, how could the author make him “get the girl” is beyond me. But at least he had a personality, however terrible one. In the show, I guess understanding, that no one would root for that asshole, they removed his toxicity almost completely, but that made him as bland as stale porridge. There wasn’t ANYTHING left on his character. At all. How anyone could’ve rooted for him I absolutely refuse to understand. Any woman deserved better than Blade😈

I don’t know anything about Leigh Bardugo, except for the fact that she butcher my native language and makes me furious. If you don’t know the language at least on a medium level, perhaps don’t use it in your books. Or at least hire someone who does. The way she butchered it, I’m not sure she even used Google translate…

So yeah, I’m with you on only reading Darklina fanfics and admiring fan art. I’m not at all sad that they cancelled the show, and I’m even giddy that those creators and writers didn’t get their wet dream of the Crows spin off. They didn’t deserve it after the shit they pulled in the second season. I do hope that they won’t ruin any other shows in the future. I am sad for the actors, who deserved much better and who were actually good at their parts, while the writing was okay. Poor Archie Renaux suffered the most, his character didn’t have good writing at all, not for a single scene. I hope we’ll see more of all of them.

And we need Ben and Jessie to do a film together. Preferably a rom com, but I’m not picky. Just that their characters are together. Such chemistry can’t be wasted

#shadow and bone critical #anti shadow and bone #anti shadow and bone writers #anti s&b #anti s&b writers #anti leigh bardugo #darklina #the darkling #pro the darkling #pro aleksander morozova #pro darklina #anti malina #alina starkov #aleksander morozova #ben barnes #jessie mei li

[tirkdi]

I don't know why but I've been imagining this a lot for some weird reason. If somehow darklina do end up together just SOMEHOW do you think at one point they'll get bored of each other? Will darkling's obsession with Alina eventually wear out? maybe Alina will want to try something else with someone else. How would darkling react to that? He's possessive as fuck but sometimes I wonder he would understand that unlike him, Alina never really got to be truly free and explore things for herself. I mean I don't think he'll let Alina go lol but do you think aat some point in centuries they might open their relationship?

This is such a hard question because when we're talking about immortals, I tend to believe that almost everything is possible, so this is where metas trying to answer the question (as opposed to fics) get tricky. Is it possible? Totally. Is it likely? Hard to say. I think the question we're getting at is – what are the conditions under which it might happen?

I'm taking the premise of this question to be that somehow, probably during R&R, they get together and rule Ravka (why not?). So we're dealing with not-quite-end-of-R&R Darkling & Alina. It will take them a while to work themselves into a relationship in the first place, and there are a lot of ways that could shake out. But assuming they get there, to a place that is respectful and reciprocal (if not gentle and loving), how long would that feel like 'enough' for Alina, and in what ways?

There are a few things going on here that I'll call out. One thing, to your point of he wouldn't let Alina go, is that we have an example of what an extremely long-lived relationship looks like for him already: Baghra. When the trilogy starts, he's like 800 years old and still living with his mom! Whenever we see them together they're fighting, but they don't leave each other, and right up until the second before she did it, he couldn't fathom that Baghra would jump off a mountain rather than just coming home with him. Similarly, I think it's unlikely that he'd stop needing Alina at any point. At the same time, Alina is different than him – but I do think it's reasonable/probably correct to envision an Alina who never needs him as much as he needs her, even a gazillion years later.

Another question then would be, at what point will Alina feel like she wants (and, importantly, deserves) happiness/something more? There's some character work that has to shake out there, because I'm having a hard time envisioning an Alina that ended up with Aleks at the end of R&R doing anything but being really hard on both of them for many, many years. How does she develop from there? Depending on the setup, I could see his and Alina's relationship getting to a point where they fight like he did with Baghra, but also similarly neither of them has any intention of ever leaving the other. Balance sounds nice in theory, but can be tricky to implement! Their relationship might end up less like a balance and more like a seesaw.

So then, there's the question of – is Alina looking for someone other than him to make her happy or to piss him off? The pissing him off seems pretty straightforward (and I think we have some fics like that that I've seen?). Assuming she isn't doing it to upset him, that she genuinely wants more than him, then I think there's the question of are we talking about sex or are we talking about a relationship with someone else? I do think you could come up with a setup where eventually he'd come to terms with sex, reassuring himself about how the Zoya lookalikes he sees leaving Alina's room in the morning are going to die in like a minute anyway, he doesn't even have to do anything.

I could also see a setup where you could make a power dynamic like that that he'd even enjoy, if he let himself. I think a lot about the Oscar Wilde quote: "Everything in the world is about sex, except sex. Sex is about power." If he allowed himself to acknowledge that he liked the ... humiliation? one area of his life where he was not in control? ... then I could also see him being into it, as long as he felt secure enough in the relationship between the two of them. And that right there is the whole reason we (or at least I) love this ship – their power dynamic is endlessly fascinating and there are so many different ways it could go

#i almost never say never for our tgt immortals #darklina #grishaverse #an ask #aleksander morozova #alina starkov #this was a fun ask to think through!

[wetcatspellcaster]

very kindly tagged by @cursedhaglette, thank you for giving me a chance to talk about my writing :)

1) How many works do you have on AO3?

11! :)

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

lmfao. 985,659. That's nearly ten thesises (theses?) in the time of my PhD programme, so I'm going to just go quickly walk into the sea.

3) What fandoms do you write for?

the majority of my fic is for videogames with love interests and OC potential (BG3, Dragon Age) but I did briefly fall prey to the darklina disease, which I have to admit to here in order to answer some of the other questions

4) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1- Pieces Still Stuck in Your Teeth (bg3)

2- Party Favours (bg3)

3- A Bleeding Heart (bg3)

4- The Stars Don't Shine, They Burn (shadow and bone)

5- An Honest Lie (bg3)

5) Do you respond to comments?

as best as I can, I typically clear out a previous chapter just before I post something new (so that's one way to monitor or predict my posting activity lmfao)

6) What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Lmao. Sunblindness (shadow and bone) which takes an 'eye for an eye' approach to an amnesia AU. I actually wanted to end on a major character death but my pal's response was "jesus Emma, this is something people read for fun" so I watered it down :')))))

7) What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Party Favours currently!! Happier endings incoming, IMO.

8) Do you get hate on fics?

yes, occasionally, I'm still in single digits thankfully. i always find it so funny bc nobody is more critical of my fic than me. you think you can hurt me? babygirl, we're in the 5th dimension of insults in my brain, your surface level comment barely touches the sides.

9) Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

nope! call me the Astarion!spawn ending, the way I fade-to-black :')))))

10) Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I crossovered Stardust and Shadow and Bone, but it was not a straight crossover it was more a chewed up, swallowed, and digested version of both premises. I similarly wrote a Wintersmith/Shadow and Bone crossover that I never posted bc the sickness left me.

11) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

lol. lmfao, even. :)))))

12) Have you ever had a fic translated?

I have had requests made of me and given permission for that to happen, but I do not know if it was ever posted!

13) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

no, it's not for me unfortunately, I was that horrible kid in group projects who just wished she could work alone :')))))))))))

14) What’s your all time favorite ship?

honestly there are many but the two that are indelibly written on my soul are Howl/Sophie and Spike/Buffy like the simple bitch I am.

In terms of things I've written? zevran/surana, hands down.

15) What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Anything I post I will eventually finish, out of social anxiety alone. At the moment I'm worried about the stuff sitting unposted in gdocs.

16) What are your writing strengths?

hahahahahahaha i don't fucking know i think i can make character voices distinct so you can usually tell which POV I'm writing from once the perspectives are established?

I have been complimented on my dialogue.

I think I'm usually brave enough to take a risky decision, even if it doesn't pay off. These decisions also land more than they used to so it's a skill I've built with time and one I am proud of.

My jokes don't seem to just be for me anymore, I like it when other people say I made them laugh.

17) What are your writing weaknesses?

If there's something that can be said straightforwardly in a sentence, you know I'll say it in three paragraphs instead. I wouldn't be surprised if people think I'm a purple-prosed motherfucker.

Smut and lack thereof

the repeat of 'conversation, stage direction, eye contact, expression, repeat' is not a weakness but it is something I become intermittently self conscious of.

18) Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I am a fan of it and I appreciate it when its done well (pour one out for Naomi Novik's fic/writing where the language work is cringingly poor), but not something I can personally do. Admirer in others, of the skills I lack.

19) First fandom you wrote for?

*dabs* Dragon Age, the OG. It was the pandemic, and I didn't want to replay Wicked Eyes Wicked Hearts bc I hate timed sections, so I wrote a fic instead.

20) Favorite fic you’ve written?

I feel bad writing this on the blog that's currently 99% BG3, but The Stars Don't Shine They Burn. It was my first time plotting something that diverged greatly from source material, and I was going through some stuff at the time that I can feel viscerally when I return to it and read the words. It is a work of personalised comfort. There's one scene in it that still gets me, every single time.

I don't know, it's funny to see Pieces get attention and I'm very, very proud of Pieces, but some of what I'm thinking through in that was in its proto-form in the other fic, which is finished and I'm really proud of it... so let's see if anything comes along to bop it off the top spot once I have a critical distance and am not in the writing trenches lol.

Tagging wise, I actually want to do an open call on this one!! this was a really pleasant exercise, so anyone seeing this who wants to talk about their writing or celebrate their achievements can take this as my personal invitation :)

scared? do it anyway x

#tags #tag games #my writing #personal tag

[qqueenofhades]

in the land of snow and shadow is SUCH a lovely title, which ship is it for? I have a bet with myself over which it is. XD

Aha, this is the sequel to my Shadow and Bone season 2 Fivan fic, we could stay like this forever [lost in wonderland]. I wrote it after we learned by Word of God that Fedyor and Ivan were both alive and supposed to be in SAB s2, but foiled by scheduling conflicts for their actors. Anyway, now that Netflix has been its usual terrible self and cancelled SAB (everyone throw poo at them), in the land of snow and shadow is both the sequel to LIW and the exploration of things I would have liked to see in season 3. As such, the ships are Fivan, Darklina (he's dead but since when does that stop him), some Nikolina, and my dearest need, which is Ivan/Jesper foetp, or rather Ivan hating Jesper's guts for all eternity while Jesper is like AH YES I KNEW WE WERE BESTIES!!!! I am excite.

I actually just finished chapter 2 of that earlier today, and have about 15k words written overall. I'm trying to decide when I want to start posting it, but yes, it is at least in production. Ahem.

#letmetellyouaboutmyfeels #ask #fivan #fivan ff #in the land of snow and shadow #wip tag game #so was your guess correct lol

[hawthorneandheartstrings]

Okay so I saw some stuff, and I just wanna clarify, so here comes another ramble. Under the cut bc this is probably gonna be an essay or something.

I ship people, and most often it's enemies to lovers. Think Reylo, Dramione, Darklina, etc. Why do I ship them? It depends on each pairing, and each dynamic and I won't get into all of that right here, right now.

I just wanted to talk about Dramione. I know that there may be people who like it bc they like Tom Felton or whatever, and that's fine. But there are also those of us who actually love the ship because we love Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger. And people definitely have different opinions, which they are allowed to have. My opinion? I was really surprised by this ship at first. Like I didn't realize it was a thing, bc well, he bullied her in school.

But then I got to thinking and reading some fics in which there was character growth, there were apologies, there was repentance, etc. As in, I really love those fics in which Draco is very much bit of an asshole, arrogant Draco but then he does some reflection, realizes he maybe shouldn't have treated Hermione that way, and wants to make amends. That's how I write my Draco in Tenebrae and other fics you'll see. I personally like a Draco who is redeemed, not just from his being a Death Eater, but redeemed in the eyes of Hermione. And that redemption requires working for it.

So basically, I'm saying I like Dramione because it's definitely a real enemies to lovers ship. Like there was animosity and then something happened and they discovered love (either one was in love first and then the other fell or both have feelings and deny them etc) I like those fics like Remain Nameless, DMATMOOBIL, Heavy Lies the Crown, in which Draco is still himself, but he's developing or already has these feelings for her, and because of that, he wants to show her that he's not the boy he once was.

There is depth there, not just smut. Don't get me wrong, smut is a thing, and if it's not my thing, it's not. But what I'm saying, is I like relationships in fics to have this depth of growth between the characters, and not an abrupt sudden change from "Filthy little Mudblood!" To "I adore you, my love". No, there needs to be build, and I personally believe between Draco and Hermione, there needs to be some action, some gesture, some things talked about before they can just be a thing.

I don't know if this made any sense, but it's a rough idea of how I feel about Dramione.

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk haha, and if you want to keep up with my Dramione thoughts and fics, stick around and follow me here.

If by chance, you are interested in the Fantastic Beasts fandom or Eddie Redmayne, you can follow me here -> inastarlesssky

#Dramione #Draco Malfoy #Hermione granger #Ella is rambling again #My ramblings #This is just how I feel about them

[folklauerate]

20 questions for fic writers

thanks for the tag @bad-surprise and @ladykettlechips

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

71 under my name and a few on anon!

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

796,982 which is kind of insane to think about. I started writing creatively for the first time in years in January of 2022. To have published this much is kind of crazy to think about. I'm likely going to hit 800k this year which is... Just wild. Lol.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

The vast majority of my fic Bridgerton! I've written a two for The Rings of Power (Haladriel), one for Shadow and Bone (Darklina), and one for The Hunger Games (Everlark). I have plans for a few more Haladriel and Darklina :)

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

(NOTE: I actually have never looked at my fics by kudos, I only know the set up is the most kudos'd one because well it's over 1k and none of my other fics are. So going through this was interesting!)

The Set Up — My Kathony royals au where Anthony is the King of England and Kate is a world famous actress. This is my most popular fic by far, I'm not sure how it ended up that way! It's a mind boggling amount of kudos (1,769 as of right now) and I know a lot of folks have much larger kudos counts, and it's hardly the most kudos'd in the fandom lol, but it's pretty big for me and I'm not sure if I'll write something else that'll get more lol. I do love this fic a lot, it feels like they're my own characters and that's likely because I've taken plenty of liberties and whatnot. Anyway. I could do talk about it for ages so I'll move on!

Hold Onto You -- A oneshot of Anthony holding babies--his own and his siblings. It was one of the first things I ever wrote for the fandom! Looking back it's a bit of foreshadowing for how I started to write lol--it was a pretty long oneshot written in less than a day which I've done multiple times since then. I haven't revisited this one in a while and don't even know if I can--writing regency is not my strong suit and my earlier writing is still hard for me to read these days lol.

leave the light on — A twoshot where Kate and Anthony are roommates and fall in love. It's set in NYC and is very rom-com-y! It has some of my favorite things to write; domesticity, people growing with one another and around one another, descriptions of the sky, descriptions of the subway, descriptions of NYC, a big wedding, a love confession. I recently finished it lol! I'm actually surprised this is up there!

Office Hours — I wrote this in September of last year in an attempt to get better at writing smut! I actually posted this on anon first because it felt too revealing to post this lol. I was actually really uncomfortable writing smut back then and I think I've improved a lot since then. The response was wild, I really was just so in the weeds with this fic that I couldn't even tell if it was hot or not lol.

lost in your current like a priceless wine— this is my prof au! And an age gap au :) writing this was wild and special. It was a lot of texting Kara and being so very thoroughly enveloped and possessed with this idea that was taking shape. I wrote this over countries and continents and on planes. I wrote all 40k of it in far less than a month and just! I dunno! It was so immersive. It's one of my favorite things I've written. It's crazy it was just this year.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I do! Lol that being said--I have quite a backlog right now. Responding to comments takes a lot of energy and time from me and I usually figure that people want me to write fic as opposed to responding to comments. I do want to say that I honestly sincerely appreciate every comment. I think all fic writers do. We love hearing what you loved and love hearing your thoughts! I'm sure my not responding to them is likely not encouraging so I'm sorry. Know that I want to respond to them and I am quite literally in the process of doing so right now lol. If you commented on Bridgerton, Actually (my Love, Actually AU from last year) then I've been responding to you lol!

6. What’s the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

This fic isn't finished but my daddy warned me about men like you lol!

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

I'm a sucker for a happy ending! I'm not sure what my happiest ending is, but the vast majority of fics have a happy ending :) Feel free to lmk what you think the happiest ending is.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Yes. I've gotten some really inane hate comments that are just... dumb and easy to brush off. I've also gotten really intense hate comments that are so long they've required multiple comments, with people reposting exactly what they wrote after I deleted it. It's been really tough to deal with and I think I have some mild anxiety around comments in general as a result. Anyway, it's tough! I think hate comments tend to stick around the most in my brain and so I do appreciate all the nice comments because the gut clench from negative ones never really goes away :,)

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I do indeed write smut! I'm not really sure if I can describe what "kind" or how you can tell what your kind of smut is? I write plenty of dirty talk and smut with and without feelings. In general, I think that smut does need to do something for the story if it's in a fic with plot--if it's a fic that's just smut then it doesn't really matter. If it's a fic with plot, I like to make sure the smut actually helps the plot along and works to carry the reader through what the characters are feeling and their journeys.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I haven't but I will enjoy adding celebs or pop culture things in fics!

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yeah.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope but if anyone ever wants to, lmk! Translation is an art form and tricky and time consuming and I'm happy to work with anyone who wants to :)

13. Have you ever cowritten a fic before?

I have and I have LOVED doing it!!!!! I was so thrilled to write the West Wing AU with Rama, whose Tumblr @ I simply cannot find, and @grantairesbottle and I wrote in our perfect park together! Both AUs will be getting follow-up fics :) I truly adore both of their work and getting to write with two dear friends and incredible writers was just so lovely. Even more fun than that was just getting to freak out over this shared idea together! It was just such a lovely joint venture.

14. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

I could not pick one! I love James/Lily from Harry Potter, Katniss/Peeta from The Hunger Games, and Kate/Anthony from Bridgerton. I'd honestly say they're my OTPs! I love them so, so much. I've read so many Everlark and Jily fics growing up, too, those I've had for so long. It's kind of hilarious how those three have so much in common, like it's not like I went around looking for ships like that but it just happens. You like what you like, I suppose :)

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

I honestly do want to finish all of them but I don't think I'll finish my Gilmore Girls AU, simply because the characterization is so far off from what I think or how I understand those characters now.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Creating really immersive worlds through specific details. Doing research to make worlds lived in. I write a LOT of modern AUs for a book/show that takes place in regency England so I think world-building is one of my biggest strengths. Being able to transport characters into new worlds and understanding how they'd respond to that specific world and situation of the fic is another strength. I think my banter is pretty good? I also like to think I have a pretty good pulse on what my audience will like and what seems to be the thing du jour in the fandom. I usually don't end up writing to it lol but this is a strength as a reader, I'd say, not as a writer.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

PATIENCE lol! If I spent more time perfecting, editing, and letting things percolate, I think my works would all be better for it. Instead, I largely write and write and write and then hit publish the moment I'm done. With a few fics (specifically the royals au) I will have someone beta for me and then I at least have another level of editing and another pair of eyes for a vibe/gut check before I publish. I do think, however, that if I was brave enough to actually face my work and sit and edit, it would all be better in general. I'd also then be able to finish a fic before posting, which I've simply never done.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I do plenty of this for Bridgerton fic because I usually try and include Marathi or Hindi for Kate and her family. Idk if i'd count it as another language but it is another language in the sense that it's not English!

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Harry Potter lol! I wish I still had my old HPFF fics :,,) that website sadly went down and I don't know how to use the wayback machine to find that. But yeah!

20. Favorite fic you’ve ever written?

Oh, I couldn't pick just one! The Set Up is def one. I've done a lot of work with world building and research for that one. Sweet Like Honey is another favorite fic. I wouldn't even say that it's really a great example of those characters because I did a lot of work to bend things to make stuff work for this particular situation. I maintain that it's true to the characters for this specific situation which is a p bonkers one. I mean, I wanted a step-father fic so I wrote one! It turned into something a bit more involved. lost in your current like a priceless wine is another fav. This one is just... it's special to me. It was really different from the other fics being written at the time and I hadn't seen or read an age gap like that for these two or a fic where they don't have that initial bickering/fighting vibes, which was a result ofc of Anthony being a bit older and the characterization I gave him for the AU, so it felt really scary putting it up for people to read. The response was really overwhelming and wonderful and so kind. That fic also marks a sort of turning point in my own writing, for me at least. I think I got braver after that one.

Thanks for the tag! I hope this is fun or interesting to read :) tagging @grantairesbottle @amalinwrites @somethingclearandtrue @tinacentury and Rama whose @ is not coming up !! Also tagging anyone who would like to do this :)

#fanfic #writing #ask a fic writer #some questions and thoughts on my own fic

[esssteee]

wip meme: the cabin au !!

snowed in / inclement weather / "oh no we're stuck in this confirmed space because [reasonswhocares] and have to deal with our emotional shit" is my jAAAAAAMMMMM

there really is smth about the weather being the perfect representation of inner conflict, isn't it? and if it enforces an enclosed situation for the characters in question, damn, what's better?

tagging @mercutiotakethewheel and @iamstartraveller776 cause they ask for that one too, but you guys chose the one fic i have the least info/work on but fuck it, maybe one of the purposes of that wip game is to also force the writer to come up with their shit!

the primary thing is that alina and aleksander are separated from the rest of the grisha (and mal, just imagine him stuck with ivan and the others, that deserves a fic of its own) and aleksander sports a more or less terrible head injury cause the man may wear kefta and corecloth but when your horse decides to rear and bolt thanks to fjerdans firing their heavy artillery, well, even your head may take a hit. so we have alina tugging a bleeding, consciousness-deficient aleksander, and, wonders of wonders, who stumbles upon a tiny shack in the middle of the woods right as the snowstorm turns into a fucking real blizzard. luck in the middle of bad luck, that's her thing, yeah.

her survival depends on her keeping her head on her shoulders and not fall prey to the panic of having to take care of aleksander and maybe not really wishing him the best but also still having those pesky feelings that continue to resist the battering force of baghra's half-truths, but also, maybe this could be the best time to get that full picture even if she isn't sure she wants it at this point. so she needs to deal with their basic needs, with her own feelings, with HIS own (cause he will be conscious at one point and won't that be awkward uh), but mostly, this is a doylist situation made for them to get their freaking shit together at a point in the book/show i really wished for more adult communication and less teen-orientated drama.

so expect lots of tension, rised hackles, turning around the pot, of grumbling avowals even, and, mostly, of sudden realisations that life cannot be considered only in a black and white angle. maybe some smut too but maybe not cause the point is to have them understand each other, or reaching the beginning of it, and smut would maybe diminish that. anyway, this fic is very much in its genesis, but it would make my darklina heart quite happy to put these two in a very deserved situation like this one.

#shadow and bone #grishaverse #my fic #darklina

[takaraphoenix]

Ok so I just finished watching Shadow and Bone for the first time and I knew you had watched it before so I came to see what your opinions on some of it was. Didn't really see anything for what what is probably my favorite ship is but I don't really care about that right now. I think I'm more interested in knowing what you're Top 5 favorite ships are (Top 10 if you feel like you're having a hard time narrowing it down to just 5 but from what I saw, I don't think that would be a problem???). Also, if you feel up to it, any favorite headcanons for the various characters or ships you might want to include. Much love to you Phoe!!! Now I'm off to go consume for content because I need my pretty men... gods, why are there so many pretty men in this show 😭😭😭 a lot of pretty women too, though I'm gay so it's just aesthetically pretty on their part, lol

oooh you watched ot for the first time! I hope you liked it! And well now I'm cirious what your favorite ship was.

Since I only have exactly 10 ships in this fandom, I will give you a top 10! lol Though since these are all the ships, they actually do span the entire spectrum of "I am obsessed with this", "I've written for this" to "it's a nice sidepairing! I liked when they were on screen but don't really think about them when they're not".

Aleksander/Alina

Inej/Alina

Kaz/Jesper

Genya/Alina

Tamar/Inej

Nikolai/Mal

Nikolai/Alina

Tamar/Nadia

Jesper/Wylan

David/Genya

+ bonus: Tolya/poetry

because I definitely came out of this headcanoning Tolya as aroace and I want this softest of boys to find someone who will platonically share his love of poetry with him. Please. He deserves it.

Not a secret that Darklina is my OTP. I'm not exactly quiet about it. They make me feel all shades of unhinged. I gotta get onto writing about them, honestly, can't believe that hasn't happened yet, but I guess that s1 left me too satisfied with canon overall to want to write just yet. Currently nose-deep in fics about them.

Alina and Inej is a solid second. They didn't have much interaction but what they had was gold. The blade protecting her saint. The worship and awe. These two badasses. I love them. And, much like Alinej, both Kaz/Jesper and Genya/Alina were also ships I came out of s1 with and wrote for after that.

Honestly, Tamar/Nadia would rank higher if the show had dedicated more time to them, but they happened so much in the background and I'm genuinely mad about that. I had to sit through so so so much straight drama especially in this season, but the only wlw ship in this entire show and they barely got screentime. They were cute together, visually, but... I didn't get enough of what made them click, or of Nadia's personality in general to be quite honest, to be as invested as I wanted to be (because I did. I knew that Nadia was a wlw and I knew that Tamar would be introduced this season and I was looking forward to this). So, with what the show gave me? I was like "daw, cute" when they were on screen, yeah.

On the other hand, I love both Tamar and Inej, and the potential of Inej now on the ship makes me think of the potential of those two together. Now, I am a lover of poly so I would not be opposed to just mashing these two ships together either. But I'm really intrigued by Tamar/Inej primarily here.

Nikolai and Alina worked surprisingly well. Didn't think I'd end up with another guy for Alina aside from Aleksander. But I really liked their chemistry and the fake marriage plotline absolutely ended me. He could be her trophy husband, I wouldn't mind.

Jesper and Wylan were honestly a positive surprise to me! You know me, you know my track-record with canon mlm ships! I usually do not like them. So that they made the list at all is great. I'm not super invested, but I thought they were adorable.

And Genya and David were cute too. I don't get why they killed David off? From what I gather, they don't in the books, so that was weird. But I thought they were nice.

Headcanons? Mostly sexuality wise.

Ace Kaz. Ace Kaz was the first once I had. I know his touch aversion roots in trauma but I recognize a lot of my own sex-repulsion in his behavior and am projecting hard so ace Kaz. Also definitely dom Kaz, have you seen that man rule his club, or bring Pekka to his knees (not that I want Pekka to sub for him, ew, but the power Kaz radiated in that moment was *chef's kiss*).

Nikolai the pan pirate who definitely should never have been a prince, like, I would love him so much more if he had just been a pirate but thoughts on the monarchy and how that plotline was handled are too much for this post. ANYWAY yeah I think Nikolai should go back onto his ship and pirate away with his boyfriend. Also, just, can you believe the Enemies to Lovers arc Mal and Nikolai had? I mean, they literally went from "I refuse to know your name" to "take my name", like that is explicitly something that happened in canon. Wild.

Lesbian Inej, which I know, not a popular headcanon in the fandom since the fandom seems to unanimously ship her and her endgame romance. I just... don't really get romantic vibes there at all, even after season 2. I like them as friends, a lot. But I'm getting huge lesbian vibes from Inej and will be clinging onto that, even more so after how little wlw love s2 gave me.

Mal as a suppressed gay would be fun. Like, his thing with Alina was annoying. He didn't give a damn about her romantic feelings for him until she had a boyfriend and suddenly he got jealous. I don't like these types of writings. So I'd love to see that more as Mal never having been romantically interested in her at all, just friend!Mal afraid to be abandoned. The cheeky pirate is his gay awakening. All the girls - and apparently book!Mal was kind of a slut - were just him trying really hard to be straight.

Alina is just a bi queen. And queen literal. That's where the "Niko should go sail with his bf" part comes into play, because... the monarchy needs to go down. She should rule, she should have never supported the damn royal family that's been enslaving and oppressing Grisha for centuries, I just. I don't like that part. I really don't. Ship to rule beside her is optional (Aleksander, Genya, okay fine Nikolai but like she rules, he's just her trophy husband), but queen!Alina is a must. Though gotta admit for my Alinej I still love her as a part of the Crows - post s1, I wrote some where Alina and Mal just... stayed with the Crows after they left Ravka and I'm still fond of that. I still think that would be a fun take.

#Shadow and Bone #Shipping #Headcanons #Darklina #Malkolai #Alinej #Nikolina #Tamadia #Taminej #??? I am guessing?? #Genyavid #Wesper #Genyalina #Kazper #tagging all the ships just to be on the blacklistable safe side #though I am unsure about Tamar/Inej and their ship name

[greensaplinggrace]

Hey love how are you? Do you have any darklina fanfic recs where they're both equally obsessed/in love with each other, I read a lot of the ship's fanfic and it's always Aleksander who's more in love who seems more invested even if most of them are in Alina's pov and it's very confusing to me tbh,I read fics for a lot of different ships but this is the only fandom where this is to be a ln almost constant thing even in modern aus which?? I like my ships and my fanfic to be ride or die where there's a balance, I'm reading about Alina and Aleksander I'm not self inserting myself and imagining it's me in her place ( not that there's anything wrong with that it's just not how I consume fiction) especially when canon is so unsatisfactory where the writing on the show/books are very lacking and I want to read about these people falling madly in love with each other in endless different universes.

I got this ask a while back and never got around to answering it, plus since I have been writing darklina fic I have not been reading it as much lately.

so I'm tossing this out there for anybody to answer: if anybody wants to make a list please do! I'd love to know about any fics like this as well honestly.

#shadow and bone #sab #grishaverse #asks and answers #myramblings #darklina #alina starkov #aleksander morozova #the darkling #anon #sorry for not answering this nonny #good luck on your hunt if you're still searching

[atjsgf]

📔

So I have this idea for a Grishaverse/Marvel crossover, in which the grishaverse over time eventually evolves into something that looks a lot like the Marvel Universe but with different countries and continents that map more closely onto the grishaverse. (Not identical to it; borders change and new places are discovered. I still think there’s a whole other side to the grishaverse we don’t know about, like literally the map only covers half of the earth.)

In this AU, TGT ended with the Darkling alive and Darklina endgame. They had a pair of twins, one was a human and the other was a grisha who had both sun summoning and shadow summoning powers. Something went super wrong though with the grisha twin–I’m still figuring out what, but it involved them not being able to manage their powers, and ended in the grisha twin dying. (The twins were adults when this happened.) Darklina broke up after this and haven’t seen each other in centuries and have basically receded into the shadows. They both exist in history textbooks, but it’s assumed they both must’ve died by now, like sure, grisha are long-lived, but they aren’t immortal. 

Anyway, the human twin didn’t want to choose between his parents and ultimately just wanted a fresh start, he was grieving, too, so he went to Kerch and changed his name to Stark (from Starkov), and eventually this led to Tony Stark being born. 

Tony has a kid–I’m still deciding which one (I have a couple different Tony kid OC ideas and I’m still deciding which one to use, but I’m leaning towards Petra, so I’ll use her name here. When Tony gets kidnapped in Shu Han (basically the same plot as getting kidnapped in Afghanistan in canon), the stress causes Petra’s powers to emerge–she has sun summoning and shadow summoning powers, just like Alina and the Darkling’s kid. 

As soon as this becomes public knowledge, darklina come out of the shadows and have to reunite to stop history from repeating itself, which means Tony and Petra now have to deal with the knowledge of their ancestry including Sankta Alina and the Black Heretic, who are alive, on top of dealing with Petra’s powers and Tony’s trauma. 

Some other stuff that exists:

Petra’s mom is Isabella Ferreira, an OC played by Lais Ribeiro. She and Tony are endgame

Leila exists because I’m incapable of imagining a Marvel world without her, lmao. I’m thinking of combining this with an AU idea I had where Leila is adoptive siblings with Grant Ward (in that they were both in the foster system in the same area, so they shared a few foster homes/group homes and decided they were family. Grant changed his name to Whittaker when he turned 18.)

Grisha generally fill the niche in this universe that mutants fill in Marvel canon. (I stand by my assertion that the Darkling is just Grisha Magneto.)

In Marvel canon, Magick and Collosus are descended from Rasputin, like THE Rasputin. In this fic, they’re descended from the Apparat since he’s basically Grishaverse Rasputin. 

Also in Marvel canon, Natasha is descended from the Romanov family (sometimes, they go back and forth on it.) In this fic, she and Alex (my Alex, not the Darkling) are descended from the Lantsovs. I think Natasha’s surname is still Romanov (just bc her name is iconic 2 me and I can’t imagine changing it), but since they’re half-siblings, Alex might go by Lantsov or Lantsova. 

I always had this headcanon that gendered surnames DO exist in Ravka, but are kind of an old-fashioned tradition that is only really practiced by the royal family by the time TGT takes place. 

Ulla is from Atlantis

Wenwu crossed paths with the Darkling and Alina at one point pre-story. 

Thor and Loki are Fjerdan gods, not Norse ones (obvs.)

#thank u for asking!!! <3 #isa #qna #ask meme: unwritten fics

[mermaidsirennikita]

I mean yeah it all comes back to her being a reylo, the way people still talk about them shocks me. Idk if i've ever seen shippers from such a mainstream popular ship get treated this way when honestly....reylo isn't even that problematic. I would argue something like darklina is more problematic and those shippers don't get 1/3 of the shit reylos get. Hell I could name you other more problematic ships where the shippers don't get nearly as much hate as reylos.

Well, to be very fair a lot of reylos said a lot of out of pocket, racist (and specifically antiblack) shit about John Boyega and Finn. I don't want to downplay the shit John Boyega went through making those movies.

And in turn, a lot of finnreys said some really fucked up, racist (specifically anti-Asian) shit about Kelly Marie Tran and Rose... and I do think that gets downplayed a LOT. Like, if we're going to talk about racist fandom antics in SW, and there are a lot of them, then let's talk about all of it. Obviously, all of this goes beyond shipping, but the interesting phenomenon that did happen with the reylo stuff is that because they didn't want Rey with Finn, many of them did support Finnrose (and by the way, lol--I'm not into Finnrey because in general I don't like Rey outside of TLJ and I frankly though Finn deserved better on every level, and I wouldn't consider myself a Reylo, but I AM into Finnrose, and to a lesser extent Finnpoe). For some, I do think that was a "get Finn out of Rey's path" thing, for sure--but also, setting Finn up with a cool pretty girl to get him away from Rey is... not the worst thing lol. And I would also say that many did seem to genuinely like that ship, and a lot of the reylo fic authors I saw back in the day used to write some good Finnrose shit.

(Also: Roselo? Let's get into it. I would kill for Rian to cast Adam and Kelly in a Benoit Blanc movie, the chances that Adam would do it are MIDDLING but still.)

I think the main reason why the reylo thing got much bigger, tbh, is that it's Star Wars. Darklina is in theory more problematic (though to me it's very much a draw because while I personally do not find Kylo Ren as like, threatening as the Darkling, he's still a prominent cog in a dictatorial fascist-aligned regime and he did kill a lot of innocent people, so, you know, fair) but S&B is NOTHING compared to SW. I think in general shippers are loathed by a lot of old school SW die-hards because Shipping = Kissing and Kissing is Gross, and Bad People Bad, except for Vader because Vader Cool. They make exceptions for Han and Leia because they still jerk it to Leia to this day and it's a part of the old lore, and a lot of them just want to be Han Solo in a way I don't think a lot of them wanted to be Kylo Ren.

And then you combine that with the morality police who really just like. Didn't like reylo for whatever reason, but decided to take on the idea that it's HORRRRRIIIIIBLEEEE to ship a bad guy with someone (when like--I personally cannot STAND Anidala, but you would have no SW if a bad guy hadn't fucked someone back in the day... tepidly, I imagine, but it happened). The idea of using moral righteousness to justify your ship has always been a thing, right? (If we're keeping it real here: while I do think that a lot of reylo antis were genuinely concerned about racism with that ship, I also think that many of the white antis.... were only concerned with racism when it suited them. I mean, where were they when Kelly was getting death threats? Care about it for everyone, you know?) But I think it became a much bigger thing when it was reylo.

Then in turn, the reylos reacted by becoming more cultlike, because that's what happens when you vilify people for wanting to ship something. And they became wackier, and the lore became more kNOWN. Like, again--I don't personally ship reylo. I find the dynamic compelling in TLJ; I think Adam and Daisy have great chemistry in that movie; I think that he and Rian pulled her best work in the trilogy out of her; and I think that that movie is the only one where Rey feels like an actual human being, versus a girlboss cypher. She's human, she idolizes Luke and then realizes he's only human, she experiences disappointment, she experiences DOUBT about morality, she is, I believe, genuinely pretty horny for Kylo Ren in that movie (imo, Rey probably has like, zero sexual experience lol, but I also doubt that he has much either), and the idea of her wanting to be SOMETHING only to find out she's NOT THAT is really interesting. I find the idea of her being tempted to become his Dark Empress or whatever, and the idea of him being both an incredibly weird, dark, amoral person who's all about assuaging his own Feelings because mommy and daddy didn't love him the way he wanted them to... and someone who else wants this girl to bounce on it as his Dark Empress.... really interests me.

I didn't want to see them have babies. I didn't want to see them be happily ever after. I wanted to see her kill him while kissing him or something. Which I don't think was what a lot of reylos wanted, right? So it kind of made that ship inaccessible to me, and I imagine a lot of people who might've otherwise been into it. And I think things like "grey force babies" or whatever naturally made it seem more ridic, which of course happens with any ship (BOATBABY.......) but the size of the fandom and the ship made it seem bigger.

But because that ship was so archetypal (big bad man, girl onto which you could project whatever you wanted because she has like zero personality in 2/3 movies) it was easier for allll of these fic writers to do whatever they wanted with the dynamic, to pass the fic around, to do weird shit with it. And I think that tends to happen with bad/good ships. The fic writers have something very iconic to cling to, and they can do more with it, and therefore the fic is better, and that makes the ship bigger. The ship evolves into the fanon version, and then everyone who hates it hates it more because that ship is getting what they want. It reminds me of Darklina, Dramione (and for the record Dramione is something like... Go with God, but I do nOT. GET. THE DRAMIONE RENAISSANCE LOL.), Haladriel. Because reylo was again, so big though, there were more writers and more types of fic and it just got More More More.

So yeah, I think it's all kind of a snake eating its own tail thing. And now everyone who hated reylo anyway hates it even more because of all these reylo authors getting book deals, and often having solid success (or better). You can make a lot of critiques about why that's happening with a white ship versus a ship featuring poc, but that's beyond reylo and gets into fandom racism and racism in publishing AT LARGE. It's a bigger thing than just "the reylos did this".

But yeah, I personally don't really find Reylo all that shocking or perverse a ship. I've shipped worse lol. I just think there are a lot of really complicated things that have less to do with the SHIP than the shipping culture. Some of those things are super valid. However, I also think that this narrative occurred wherein it was like "the only toxic ones are the reylos" and... Yeah dude, there were plenty of toxic reylos. However... The Kelly Marie Tran of it all is where I really start getting bugged, because what happened to her and her character was one of the grossest things that happened in that franchise, and LET US BE REAL, the driving force behind that was not the reylos. (Nor do I want to imply that it was all finnreys--a lot of the SW fandom in general is super fucked re: basically any people of color in prominent roles.)

#anywaaaaay #i also just think that

[part-timewonders]

↻ pick a fic and a different ship and I’ll tell you how I’d rewrite it

“a matter of time” as Darklina? 👀

I PROMISE I DIDN'T FORGET ABOUT THIS, I JUST WANTED TO GIVE IT THE PROPER ATTENTION IT DESERVED.

In 2020 and 2021, I wrote a kylux role reversal fic called "a matter of time." It was basically a retelling of The Last Jedi, which leaves us with 2 options to go here. Are we putting Alina and Sasha in the Star Wars universe, like in my prequel-era AU? Are we doing role reversal in the Grishaverse?

...why not both.

(All questions are here!!)

SCENARIO 1: TLJ-VERSE DARKLINA

This isn't really TLJ-verse, but what about Sith Lord Aleksander and his little apprentice Alina, who is spying on the Resistance for him? She's feeding him all this information about the rebels through their Force bond, and planting fake information within the Resistance. To them, she's just a Force-sensitive rebel, still in need of training, but ultimately on their side. They won't know what hit them when Aleksander arrives to take his favorite girl back...

SCENARIO 2: ROLE REVERSAL IN GRISHAVERSE

Alina Starkov, legendary Sun Summoner, creates The Fold, a stretch of land where you'll basically burn to death in blistering light and heat, centuries before she finds Aleksander Morozova, the first Shadow Summoner in centuries, enlisted with the First Army, totally unaware of his power to eclipse the sun. She needs to keep him close to her side, because once she can control his power, she can control the Fold and use it to destroy all the other countries surrounding Ravka.

#darklina #ask box #sternfleck

[tirkdi]

no i will get you started on that kiss. speak your mind.

haha oh no, anon! (re my comment at the end of this ask)

look. I try not to be too down on things on main because I think we are all just here to have a good time, so for anyone who loves the darklina kiss scenes in the show, this ask is not for you! I'm not trying to make people enjoy them less, but since you asked I will share the ways in which I wish they were done differently

so first – the kisses/sexual consent in the books are terrible, and I think we all know that. In my modern au/occasional-retelling of the series, I initially tried writing their first kiss the way it was in the books and it felt soooooo gross. we all expected they'd do better in the show with consent, and they did! but to me a lot of it was still not done as well as it could have been

alina takes the initiative in kissing aleks in the show, which, given the power dynamics between them, is great. love that, it gets rid of some of the problems. (their power dynamics are also very different in the show vs books to begin with, which gets rid of some other problems.) but she kisses him and then he says: 'not that many people surprise me, miss starkov.'

(we are going to leave aside that I hate when men in romances call the women 'miss,' because I realize that is a personal problem, but I really, really do hate it. rip me reading or watching literally anything these days)

but the fact is: she kissed him, for the first time, and he was surprised about it. and that doesn't feel good to me! he's smiling when he says it, and it's pretty clear from his reaction that he was into it, but what if he hadn't been? women don't get to go around surprising people with kisses just because they're women (and, in this particular scenario, not running the army the other person is in)

rather than the show writers being like 'oh it was problematic when he surprised her with a kiss – let's have her surprise him instead!' I would have loved to see some ... I don't know ... actual conversation about it? they're adults! they can ask a question about whether or not the other person is into kissing in a way that is still sexy! they have both done much, much harder things

and I believe I am in the extreme minority here (I certainly am amongst my friends) but I also disliked the 'are you sure' that aleks says mid-make out on the war room table. 'are you sure' – of what???? I definitely expected him, after he collared her and she's like 'what are you doing??', to retort 'well you said you were sure.' I recently read a fic where he said something along the lines of 'you said you were sure – I thought you understood that that meant you were willing to risk getting pregnant' which like ... the fact that it is so vague is what makes it not a good question! (also what a random time to ask, she literally just kissed you?)

and, now I am on a full tangent, but it was interesting how, though they clearly cared more about sexual consent in the show than in the books, the scene where he collars her and then uses her power felt much more physically violating in the show than it ever did when I read it. I wondered if that was the tradeoff they made – they wanted to show some of that violation and lack of consent but they didn't want it to be around kissing

so. anyway. I am thrilled for much of the fandom (and many of my friends!) that those scenes did it for them. while certainly miles better than the books, I still think it could have – pretty easily – been done a lot better. especially since it seemed like they were trying to make it not problematic, I'm surprised it was done the way it was

#an ask #anonymous #you wanted it you got it haha #grishaverse #aleksander morozova #alina starkov