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turntechcatnip · 4 years

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Alright, so walking AND flying are non-negotiable. Which means you're pretty much trapped with what many people would consider the most controlling version of Dirk Strider (and that's saying something because we've got HAL) and that's worrying even if he IS trying to be better now, so umm… how you holding up, there? Need any help? *proceeds to send tons of cat toys to the apartment to satiate the boredom*

You check your phone, looking for the next message. And then the next. And the next. Your feet swing idly dozens of stories above the streets far below.

Okay fine.

You’re going to actually do this.

You’ll start tackling these ones.

It was sort of inevitable anyway, especially with you droppin’ his presence into casual conversation like that

TC: im holdin up feline

TC: additional toys would be appureciated espurrecially if you can find a durable scratching post beclaws i can file down my nails but thats no fun if ya f33l me and like none of the others ive found short of just shredding boxes comes anywhere near scratchin the itch of a good ol fashioned cave wall or a tree and im starting to eye the concrete up here like damn

TC: bro never bothered to replace the TV or the xbox so like im criminally low on non internet based activikitties though i do wonder if my claws wouldnt get in the way them controllers are made fur human hands not troll and im purrty sure i have troll hands

TC: tho i gotta clear something up here

TC: i wouldnt say he was ever really controlling???

TC: not in a you better do shit this way or else im gonna micromanage everything you do way

TC: it was more a hes gonna do whatever he wants to do and you better deal way

TC: which to be fair isnt much better for a kid who doesnt really know any better or have any agency or ability to do shit his own way and younger me kinda took it as gospel and yeah i got shit to unpack that im kinda doing my best to ignore right now but

TC: pounce was kinda worse about that t33b33aych

TC: shed grab me by the flockin neck and drag me back inside the den by force if a curious kitten got too adventurous and ive b33n pinned and growled at fur bein reckless and yes threatened with t33th but it was her job

TC: like i say he doesnt like me up here on the roof

TC: but does he stop me???

TC: no

TC: im turnin into a real life gargoyle and he does nuthin except make a passing comment about telescopes or helicopters the one time he was in the room as i headed up

TC: i could purrobably even leave if i wanted to go out walking tbh

TC: hed argue with me

TC: id likely drag the most words out of him in said argument than ive gotten in a w33k and purrobably the most f33lin out of him

TC: and if im being honest the semi-chaotic curious af kitten in me is tempted to actually pull that birdshit just to see what happawns

TC: but i sincerely believe he wouldnt stop me if i pushed back

TC: whether thats beclaws he doesnt care enough to stop me or beclaws were both avoiding the hell out of anyfang even remotely resembling confurtontation is up in the air though

TC: i dont plan on testin it beclaws i think hes right this time

TC: ...

Control huh.

TC: i dont know if bro ever wanted control of anything much less the life of another person

TC: the only thing he was remotely anal about was the training and...

TC: games done so thats a nonissue

TC: i havent s33n him draw his sword once since i got here

TC: not even when i managed to sneak up on him

In a twisted way you miss it. The training. And it isn’t something you like to think about. About how you’re pretty sure you loved him for it because that meant he’d pay attention to you you you.

Maybe some of that birdshit you spouted is the result of an internalized need to defend your brother. Maybe some of it is steeped in a cultural clash between parent and lusus. (Bro might be a shit parent but part of you wonders if he should have been a lusus instead.) Maybe some of it is just what you desperately want to believe, and you aren’t a thirteen year old anymore. You’ve died too many times. You’ve watched him die in front of you and you--

You didn’t--couldn’t think about him before. About that choice you made about the One Thing you could fix, and questions, so many questions that ate the hell out of you for three long years, kindling to your fires of self loathing.

Questions you could ask now, but don’t. And maybe that’s okay for now. You have time.

Time.

Stolen time. Locked away here in this world-that-should-be-dead.

Time.

For the longest time, you didn’t think he cared about you at all. You have some evidence to the contrary now, and that’s more than you’d ever expected to get considering in every glimpse you’d seen of that moment you always chose to leave him dead. Because it was your job.

...and yet here you both are. After.

Playing cluckbeast. Seeing how far you can push until one or both of you chicken out and dance away.

#homestuck #davepeta #davepetasprite #davepetasprite^2 #bro strider #beta dirk strider #neglect tw #these next few are aaaall bout bro lmao #this one doesn't get an art because I couldn't think of any that wasn't just yoinking the next art #but it fit between the two really well and I didn't want to try and shove it in later #so i guess its a text bonus x3 #fun fact I have literally all these written out almost as soon as I get them #it's doing the art that takes me so long #im a writer not an artist haha #junkdata

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solarianradiance · 6 years

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Zebruh: Heh, what a lovely piece of mail.

Zebruh: ♥♦ Must be from a secret admirer~ ♠♣

Amisia: youu can’t read any of that, can youu?

Zebruh: ♣…♣

Zebruh: No, I actually can’t. Its too fancy for me to understand.

Zebruh: ♦ But I take that as a good sign that I am shaking the oppressive nature of my colleagues, and am getting more in touch with the under appreciated Alternian under classes~ ♦

Amisia: OH MY GOD! WOUULD YOUU STOP BEING SO DAMN EMBARASSING AND MAKING A MOCKERY OF OUUR WHOLE CASTE?! YOUUR BIZARD DELUUSIONS AND WEIRD ASS FETISH FOR LOWBLOODS IS JUUST PLAIN FUUCKING CREEPY!!!

Zebruh: and what are you gonna do about it? Cull me over it like the classiest that you are?

Amisia: bitch, I juust might!

Zebruh: HAHAHA, nice one shorty, but we both know you cant do that without getting charged for fratricide, the worst you can do is headbutt me, and I dont think you got the shame-globes for following through.

Amisia: yeah, youu’re right, i cant cuull youu!

Amisia: buut I know someone who can!

Amisia: CHAHUUT! GET IN HERE! I NEED YOUU TO TAKE CARE OF A PROBLEM FOR ME!!!

Chahut: whaTs The impasse ThaT has earned your ire my lil darlin?

Amisia: this uugly exscuuse of a bluueblood! hes a weird creep who keeps making my caste looks bad when we already have a bad enough repuutation!

Amisia: so couuld youu do me a tiny favor and cuull him for me?

Amisia: id do it myself, buut my hands are bondaged!

Chahut: “Bondaged”? youn lady, where in the gospels name did you learn ThaT word?

Amisia: internet.

Chahut: whaT have I Told you abouT going To Those virTual sinner dens?

Amisia: hey, if it works for keeping people tied up, it works!

Amisia: also, i think we’re getting off track here, I summoned you to cuull this motherfuucker, not lectuure me abouut how I discover myself.

Chahut: and whaT have I Told you abouT preaching in vein like ThaT when you aint got a lick of sense for it?

Amisia: look, can youu cuut the suurrogate luusuus crap? are youu gonna kill this creep or not?!

Chahut: hmmm *Chahut ponder the literal fuckhead for a good long while. Like shes actually strongly considering on doing the actual favor for everyone and ending this hypocritical bugs life and ending the trouble for everybody involved*

Chahut; Nope…

Amisia: aaaahahaha, now thats a funny joke chahuut! well not really, buut i can see youure trying for some reason.

Amisia: buut this isnt the time for jokes, so couuld take your hatchet and-

Amisia: -puut the bastard ouut of my misery, PLEASE.

Chahut: no, I am noT doin iT for you, sweeT berry blue.

Amisia: …and why the hell not?! he deserves it doesent he?!

Chahut: yes, he does deserve a head full of haTcheT, ainT no doubT abouT ThaT.

Amisia: so whats the fuucking problem!?

Chahut: problem is ThaT iT wonT do you any good.

Amisia: explain youu big meanie! why wont youu take this jerkhead ouut?!

Chahut: ok, lemme have a momenT Ta sermonize my reasoning’s To yah.

Chahut: im noT gonna be here forever, im gonna gone real soon

Zebruh: ♣Are we actually doin this?♣

Chahut: now, i could put my axe Through This here moTherfuckers head and sell his horns on The sex Toy markeT like he deserves.

Amisia: the what market?

Chahut: buTT whaT would ThaT really do for The world? Theres a million more of These creeps ouT There, and for everyone you cull, Two more moTherfukers shall Take ThaT one moTherfuckers place.

Amisia: whats youur point to this sermon exactly?

Chahut: The poinT is ThaT There is none To Taking ouT every sinner you come across, even if They make you look bad. i goT fools in posse of clowns ThaT make my casTe look back Too, buT as much as I wanT To, I canT be arsed to give a shiT abouT a problem ThaT usually geTs Taken care of by someone else.

Amisia: …what?!

Chahut: im saiyan ThaT you should jusT worry abouT yourself and whaT y’all do for yourself, and learn noT Ta care bout whaT oThers Think of you for iT. he ainT eiTher of our responsibiliTies or The like.

Chahut: jusT leT iT go.

Amisia: …so youu going to kill him or…

Chahut: NO! leTs jusT go home and waTch Troll neTflix and chill TogeTher, we have beTTer Things ta To Than play unsung heroes, lil blue

Amisia: *sigh* ok chahuut, youu win. lets go home and watch game of bones or something.

Chahut: whaT have i Told you abouT shows like ThaT? Troll George R.R. MarTin does the devils work and leads us asTray

Amisia: whatever, lets juust go, im sick of this creepazoid and his shit

*Chahut takes a hold of Amisias hand, like some kind of parental big sister figure, and begins to walk away with her*

Zebruh: Glad to finally be rid of those two.

*Zebruh turns to hit on a passing lowblood butler esque redblood*

Zebruh: ♥ So… you come here often amigo?~♥

Amisia: aaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAA! *KICK*

*Amisia rushed back to kick Zebruh in the crotch with all of her tiny might and send the dickhead airborne*

Chahut: SWEET MERCILESS SAVIORS!!!

*Zebruh gets his head stuck in the cieling by his horns and is knocked out cold for it*

Amisia: that might not have done a lot of damage

Amisia: buut damn did it feel good!

Chahut: sweeT plum, you do realize ThaT you could geT in serious Trouble for doing ThaT, righT?

Amisia: what was that youu said earlier chahuut? worry abouut youurself first?

Chahut: well, iT doesenT seem like anybody here is gonna squeal on lil ole us. facT seems folks here are a tad graTeful for whaT you did…

Chahut: so long as you promise as To noT lose your Temper like ThaT again, i’ll leT iT slide for now.

Amisia: i promise to try

Chahut: i asserTain ThaTs all i could ever ask of you Then, leTs go home.

Chahut: so Tell me, was iT worTh iT?

Amisia: oh it was hella worth it! id do it again if i could!

Amisia: felt really good to give that cretin what he deserves, y’know? like i was doing the right thing in fact!

#homestuck #hiveswap #amisia erdehn #zebruh codakk #friendsim #Chahut Maenad #submission #long post

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aitian · 3 years

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5:43 am 12/29/2020

end of year.

feels right to revisit how i looked this yr on photobooth. most ppl only knew me through my webcam. i dont have many thoughts abt who i am or what im doing these days. mostly playing video games with alice. we smoked together a few days ago & i still feel like im in deadtime. like maybe i cant remember the important things im supposed to from the past. & rly existential lately. the panic is just in my throat, thinking abt how fast time is going & how there is no way back. i think there is a carceral logic behind the entrapment that all us depressed & anxious kids feel.. like the inadequacy of being alive, the failure to feel like a beautiful future is unfolding. im not sure anyone feels that way these days, & maybe thats why they r all holding on so desperately. all empires fall. im so grateful to be able to feel moms body & be her child these days. i just wanna lay my head on someones chest & feel good, warm, soft, coarse fabrics. also feeling anxious abt my classes, turning in the same essay that isnt rly an essay to all of my profs. oops. it was rly the best i could manage. vestigial body... i will finish writing smth i feel proud abt one day, & it will be written to myself. like this.

idk when the last time i wrote was, but maybe i wanna talk abt my relationships. feels like i got a hard reset on my brain by smoking with alice. oh god. anyway i havent been talking to sherry & adele recently bc i just dont feel right around them. in november remembering again what it felt like to feel so unwelcome all the time, feel that energy & those manners replicated by them toward me.. ik i should just talk to people frankly abt the things im uncomfortable with at home now that i have so much practice doing it but i just dont want to. somehow it feels like they should all just know, that they are living alongside me all this time in various ways even if i am not saying things to them, & our actions that connect us in relationship are felt by them too. & there is some part of refusal to see the relationship for what it is. im not begging for some trans pity or for commitment.. those kinds of relationship arent real. what is real is wanting to spend time with me, wanting to experience some sort of exchange between bodies, wanting to walk toward near horizons. feels like everyone who listens & agrees when i speak just does it to be amicable. there are only so many ways i can reassure myself that ppl understand me for who i am, even when they are constantly being led astray to hurt me. like alice saying its good for doctors to have objective views of their patients, outside of any other relationship. mom saying that she trusted our teachers to teach us what we needed. getting weirdly gendered messages from friends at home, & never asked in good faith about how i feel. its rly so shitty that even questions like how was the day or what ru thinking rn or whats on the horizon r things they want me to ask, then dont want to answer, & make fun of bc they feel awkward saying anything. so stupid. its this kind of shit that holds me back from letting my desires be known, these rituals of repression & shame. & i always wanna hear ppls desires & then immediately regret asking to know that our relationship is in direct conflict with their utopias. so stupid.

today after dinner, which was in the late evening, mom & alice & i did some short yoga stuff & then we did silly lion dancing. im still sore. i stretched out everything that felt sort afterward. anyway, felt good to be goofy & sweat & breathe hard.

what im feeling abt this year: - vestigial body x1000 --> dark room, heart beating fast, waiting & squeezing. theres that episode of midnight gospel when the dying dog/reindeer lady talks abt giving birth & dying, like squeezing & tensing & on no this moment will never end & then releasing & coming to rest & then all over again. & that is what i think abt every time i feel in panic now, or in a deep place of fear. there r some pains that cant be escaped, & they dont need to be. they r felt all the same. - i made a new friend through q&a who is a kid im supposed to b mentoring. it just means that all relationships are reciprocal (i dont like that word either, but they r never simply one way or transactional) & we met every thursday during the school yr. i prepared short stories for us to read & writing prompts, & we wrote abt stuff. - i just cant remember. all i remember abt this summer was going to stone valley with mom, feeling the sunlight & my tiredness (in an enveloping selse, toward my body & my spirit), playing games w sherry, playing some piano, & working on that fire emblem romhack. feels like the year went by so quickly. like i just had my birthday a few days ago, & now the new year means it is coming again soon. sometimes whole lives are vestigial. what is gruesome & magnificent abt that is that those vestigial bodies are hard to kill without clear intentions & collective effort. what sucks is the entrapment. i have been feeling this cant remember feeling in a bigger way, toward what my life was like before college, toward who i was in college now that i am so removed, & even more toward the kid whose world blossomed into smth they desperately desired & felt afraid of. middle school me would be horrified. maybe an even younger me would be proud, feel in awe or struck by the rightness of home. - i want to remember mom. the way she walks around with her hands in her pockets. 帅吗。:). how we skip/gallop sideways to avoid the wind on our walks, & she bounces when she walks like a silly kid. i love her. unruly gender, stubbornness of feelings, failure failure failure is why we r hurt but also why we r rly still allowed to be here. thinking abt moms essay, moving away from her grandma, thinking she would live together again someday. thinking abt how im home this yr, in a way i thought maybe i would never be ever again. its so cruel to leave love behind for the sake of a ritualized life i could never participate in. i wont do it. i just wont.

some feelings abt the coming year - i want to meet someone like myself & fall in love. deeply, with myself, in relationship. i wanna have sex too, & feel held in my being alive. i wanna be allowed to enjoy my body in even more regards like wearing short sleeves & feeling the sun on my arms free from dysphoria, existing in public not noticeably & feeling the evaporation of racial tension, waking up with that feeling of possibility, like i want to be alive & eat food & go outside & do those things in my body that remind me that i am a part of how the rest of this world is growing. i wanna be held in that knowing, together, of wellness & movement toward everything that means we matter to each other. - playing video games has been so important to this vestige & i dont want it to remain that way. i wanna collect stuff & grow stuff in real life, & grow myself & my relationships too. its not living when its the mourning of the freedom i should have always had & should have every moment i am continuing to life unfreely. - i wanna do some stuff to express gratitude to the ppl i have continued some sort of relationship with. feel bad abt how no one has emailed me back in more than a month now. maybe wanna do a q&a chapbook or yearbook. complex feelings bc i am so not in relationship with the ppl i wanna care abt. it sucks. part of that is letting go of guilt too, & being real with myself abt how much responsibility is on the other body to make me feel okay in our relationships. its rly not my fault that, u kno.. everyone is used to making someone like me feel like shit. sad that my most continuous relationships this yr r with professors. those dumb feelings of obligation r killer. i guess im grateful to be legible in some ways, while feeling the intensely awkward unwillingness to be real abt our positions relative to each other. i think lots more happening in this regard in the coming months w classes, blk atlantic ecologies, maybe smth w prof lee. & sometimes thinking abt what grad school would mean. - i wanna feel slow, i wanna feel like myself, i wanna feel free. some feelings r sitting in the garden on my own in the spring, planting some stuff. thinking abt what it might grow into, coming back again & again. the sun ducks behind clouds & comes back out, & the world feels so light & passing by. & time feels forever, like i have so much patience to dream & breathe & observe. this is one of my early memories, watching shadows on the concrete/sidewalks at preschool, feeling warmer then colder then warmer again. i also wanna feel the kind of collectivity that makes me know we all insist on home. i want it to branch beyond this home that i know. & also mean that i will not throw this away. im thinking abt how to exist intimately with more than one person at once. it is smth i will learn as it comes into my life.

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franruto · 7 years

Text

sasuke + the mountain goats songs

if this read more doesnt work on mobile im so sorry

so i was thinking about how many tmg songs could be applied to sasuke and i decided to make a list. tmg has an absurd number of songs and im doing this just from my fave albuns + a quick check so this list very probably isnt even complete. also, some of these songs are more sns than just sasuke but o well. if u have suggestions to add lmk

- no children: this might be the most sasuke song ever made. im going to put just the last part here but please listen to the whole song

I am drowning, there is no sign of land You are coming down with me, hand in unlovable hand And I hope you die I hope we both die

- autoclave: i lov this one and all of it is sasuke too so listen to the whole thing

When I try to open up to you, I get completely lost Houses swallowed by the earth, windows thick with frost And I reach deep down within but the pathways twist and turn And there's no light anymore and nothing left to burn I am this great, unstable mass of blood and foam And no emotion that's worth having could call my heart its home

- heel turn 2:

Get stomped like a snake Lie down in the dirt Cling to my convictions Even when I get hurt

(...)

Spend too much of my life Now trying to play fair Throw my better self overboard Shoot at him when he comes up for air Come unhinged Get revenge (...) Let all the trash rain down From way up in the rafters I’m walking out of here in one piece Don’t care what comes after Drive the wedge Torch the bridge

- game shows touch our lives: gives me sad sns feelings

Shadows crawled across the living room's length I held onto you with a desperate strength With everything With everything in me And I handed you a drink of the lovely little thing On which our survival depends People say friends don't destroy one another What do they know about friends? Thunderclouds forming, cream white moon Everything's going to be okay soon Maybe tomorrow Maybe the next day

- oceanographer’s choice: this is one so fucking sad, it makes me think about sasuke trying to break his bond with naruto

I don't know why it's gotten harder to keep myself away Thought I'd finally beat the feeling back, it all came back today And then we fell down and we locked arms, we knocked the dresser over as we rolled across the floor I don't mean it when I tell you that I don't love you anymore Look at that, would you look at that? The way the ceiling starts to swerve What will I do when I don't have you? When I finally get what I deserve

- up the wolves: i really like this one for sasuke & i love john darnielle’s comment on it too so i’m going to include it here. “Part of me wants to say look it's about revenge, but as soon as I say that... no, that's not quite it. Part of me wants to say it's about the satisfaction of not needing revenge... and I say no, thats some new age stuff. I think it's a song about the moment in your quest for revenge when you learn to embrace the futility of it. The moment when you know that the thing you want is ridiculous and pompous and a terrible thing to want anyway. The direction in which you're headed is not the direction in which you want to go, yet you're going to head that way a while longer anyway cause that's just the kind of person you are.”

There's bound to be a ghost at the back of your closet No matter where you live There'll always be a few things, maybe several things That you're going to find really difficult to forgive

(...)

I'm going to get myself in fighting trim Scope out every angle of unfair advantage I'm going to bribe the officials, I'm going to kill all the judges It's going to take you people years to recover from all of the damage

- cry for judas: listen............

Some things you do just to see How bad they'll make you feel Sometimes you try to freeze time 'Til the slots are a blur of spinning wheels But I am just a broken machine And I do things that I don't really mean Long black night, morning frost I'm still here, but all is lost

(...)

Sad and angry, can't learn how to behave Still won't know how in the darkness of the grave

- outer scorpion squadron: ok this is darnielle’s comment on it again and he says it better than i could: “This is a song (...) for people like me, who have a strong indwelling evidently permanent urge to damage themselves or cut themselves off prior to some accomplishment or arrival at a place of comfort and happiness. I didn't succeed in my goal to not bum everyone out, but... In short, this is a song about trauma, and surviving it”.

If you really want to conjure up a ghost Cultivate a space for the things that hurt you most Rake the sands until they surface Bind their tiny eyes Stake out your position, let your armor fall Stay put 'till they find you, it won't take long at all Rake the sands until they surface Up they come, gone translucent They're coming up no matter what Fools rush in and the doors slam shut Ghosts of my childhood, stay with me, if you will Find a place where there's water, hold you under 'till you're still Rake the sands until they surface Don't let anybody call them ugly

- the young thousands: ok this one makes me think of pre timeskip sasuke who continues to live in his parents house and also has a lot coming in his future

Boats ease into the harbor bearing real suspicious cargo And the sunlight on the water sets a switch off in your brain The things that you've got coming will consume you There's someone waiting out there in an alley with a chain The ghosts that haunt your building are prepared to take on substance And the dull pain that you live with isn't getting any duller There's a closet full of almost-pristine videotape Documenting sordid little scenes in living color (...) The things that you've got coming will do things that you're afraid to There is someone waiting out there with a mouthful of surprises The ghosts that haunt your building have been learning how to breathe They scan the hallways nightly vainly searching for a sign

- hebrews 11:40: this is one of my faves tmg lyrics. think sasuke w/ orochimaru period

Bright candles in the manor Where the curse takes hold Bodies reassembling down where the worms crawl Make your own friends when the world's gone cold It gets dark and then I feel certain I am going to rise again If not by faith, then by the sword I'm going to be restored Build fires to keep the beacon flashing where the earth lies flat Blood calls to blood as the hours draw down, invent my own family if it comes to that Hold them close, hold them near Tell them no one's ever going to hurt them here

- deuteronomy 2:10: this one is esp relevant bc of The Last Uchiha stuff

Feel in my bones just what the future has in store

I pace in circles So the camera will see Look hard at my stripes There'll be no more after me

I have no fear of anyone I'm dumb and wild and free I am a flightless bird And there'll be no more after me

I sang all night The moon shone on me through the trees No brothers left And there'll be no more after me

- absolute lithops effect: i like to think of this one as sasuke healing

After one long season of waiting After one long season of wanting I am breaking open My insides are pink and raw And it hurts me when I move my jaw But I am taking tiny steps forward

After one blind season alone in here After one long, sweltering summer I'm going to find the exit And I will go to the house of a friend I know And I will let myself forget With a little water and a little bit of sunlight And a little bit of tender mercy, tender mercy

- rain in soho: i might just be indulging here because i listen to this song 10 times a day and its overall feel reminds me of sasuke

No promise sweeter than a blood pact Nothing harder to go through with than a vanishing act No morning colder than the first frost No friends closer than the ones we've lost Nothing sharper than a serpent's tooth Nothing harder than the gospel truth Though you repent and don sackcloth and try to make nice You can't cross the same river twice

(...)

No town more barren than our town No haven safer than the one they tore down No greater love than to lay my life down for a friend No sweeter pleasure than to see the credits clear through to the end

ok so this is the moment where i give up because holy shit. some honorable mentions that im too lazy to go into detail (keep in mind some of those have just like one line that reminds me sasuke): this year, the house that dripped blood, old college try, choked out (i SWEAR no double meaning intended), prowl great cain, magpie, heretic pride, all up the seething coast

@yondaiime hello im tagging u here

#im so tired im going straight 2 bed now #sasuke

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photonconductor · 7 years

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i dont have an ao3 but shout out to my homeboys

once upon there was a gay on th e moon bc of a really lovng alternate au idea where elc turened BAD and klaus had a 1000 year nap and it'd take too long to fucking explain this so just roll with it ok. this gay--its elcrest btw hes also a Bad Boy now; he rly likes hot topic and thinks those t shirts with sarcastic sayings are actually rly funny but we all know they aren't--was feleing emo bc he couldn't see his bf xen o bc he betrayed him. so he stayed in his room whining abt how fgay he was until eve showed up

"hey whats wrong elc mother is here for u" even tho shes like 5000 years old and looks like shes 2 and also a rock (but im not rockist guys i promise). elc looked at her with his optics shining in the pale argentate light. good thing hes the seme here bc otherwise he'd start crying. in reality he rly wanted to fucking bone xeno bc obviously they had a lot of gay sex b4 they tried to kkill his mom once nad staring at rocks all day kinda sucks.

a;so burnign alive but hes kind of over that phase.

"im sad my bf left me for 1000 years can i pls go back to earth my raging hard on can't be satisfied bc rocks. my dicks not a jack hammer even tho im jacking it all the time (thats what guys do right bitch i dont know)" eve was so offended she put her hands on her giant rock self thats not just herself. its rly fucking complicated shut up u came here for the gay sex not instructibles on how physical forms manifest.

"we dont say ROCKS in this household young man!!!!"

"ＢＵＴＭＯＯＯＭＭＭＭＭ sorry i forgot to turn off my seme voice lemme adjust my mic it happens when my dick is hard" elcrest coughed twice "ok sounds good, BUT MOM I RLY NEED TO NUT. YOU KNOW NUT I'M SAYING... ITS ALL OR NUTTING BUT MOSTLY NUTTING IN XENO'S SWEET HOT BUNS"

"stop talking abt nuts u disgusting boy fine, god, if u leave me alone u gaylord"

and then eve punched him so hard in the dick that elcrest landed on earth in a giatn crater. how hes still alive is bc he still had some continues left like in mario even though this is a srpg game. once elc recovered he struck a pose and laughed evilly while twirling his mustache.

"finally...... I have RETURNED for xeno's hot man breasts! the world cannot stop me now!!" he cackly cackkled and quickly ripped off the fake mustache he put on just for this one scene. then elc went on a quest to find where klaus was and bc the author is too lazy to write any tansitional scenes.

elc found him chilling in his bed reading a book that was called Sweets and You: Do sweets make u inherantly Gay? elcrest made the PFFT noise. ofc they make u gay, fuckiing idiot book. he could write better than that author. in fact, elcrest was gonna do that when he got home bc obviously if this trash is published any shit elc wrote would be good.

NO! he had to focus! but he couldnt stop staring at xenos man boobs and felt his dick get hard again. elc got a nose bleed too bc thats what happens in anime right. i played persona 4 i know what im about

"damn u xeno." elc said thru his nosebleed and klaus looked up bc the author cant fucking rmemeber who is klaus and who is xeno and was surprised i remmebred his name but could not remember remember the 5th of novemember

"what"

"XENO IT IS I" since h e was caught red handed he just kickflipped through the window anyway. he did a sick flip then stood in the middle of klauses room. klaus made a gay gaspp

"alto! what are u doing hre!?" klaus said, bc in this AU that was his codename. elc wanted to be currently doing that but eve said no. fuck his mom. except please dont bc i know you sick fucks are thinking abt it.

"I HAVE COME TO BRING YOU BACK TO THE GAY SIDE, XENO WE HAVE COOKIES. bc i really miss that bammin slammin bootilicious sex we used 2 have and you are in fact bammin slammin bootilicious. also have u heard the word and gospel of our savior mother" elc said gayly

"dude no please stop preaching in my house im a changed man now" xeno pirouetted out of bed

"cmon man im ur seme u cant refuse we made like a yaoi blood oath u cant go back on ur word" elc pushed him back on thebed bc he'd have his ass yet anyway so no real use getting up. bc what is consent anyway hes Bad

"o shit really huh" klaus paused in thougt and bad elc laughed evilly. his plan was working!! all he had 2 do was the final touches! i mean besides touching xenos dick or whatever we're not yet. sorry u have to suffer for ten more paragraphs for sweat boy on boy. elc then turned around an produced a kitty keyboard from the recesses of his coat tails. xeno made the :O face and elc sat down bc playing while standing rly fuckin g sucks

"i wrote this for u on the moon so you'll be hypnotized by my sick beats" then he pulled the mic out of the keyboard and made a sick beatbox noise. No i dont know what the fuck it sounds like just google it. klaus blushued and made another gay gasp and elc made the >:3 face

then be started to play the piano keyboard. he was playing cruel angel thesis, their theme song that they had decided at 1am while xeno was drunk af. it was their theme song despite none of them speaking fucking japanese but they just felt it in their SOULS. it was rly gay. elc was going so fucking hARD that his hard on was getting 40 hard ons. and thats four tens the hard ons. and its rad.

except the ebst part was it was all in meows so it spoke 2 klaus' furry soul.

klaus nyaed softly in surprise and suddenly all his memories of being xneo were restored!!! he gave into the desire that he craved in his soul and opened his big man arms bc for some reaon everyone thinks dudes are thirsty af. dont ask me why

"elc1!1 pls take me!! but be gentle my ass hasnt been ravaged in 1000 years (sick reference to hilda and altos magical wedding night by sorunort like, comment, subscribe for more sick referneces like this one)" xeno mewled like afucking furry and elc nodded once. xeno walked up to elc an touched his man boob sensually even tho xeno is like 60 feet taller than elc just imagine it ok

elc now has sunglasses just bc i think its a funny image

"xeno...... lets do it" elc said softly

"o h elc senpai......." xeno meowed

"and i'll keep my sunglasses on bc i hate the sun #moonlifeforever" and xeno gayzed into his emotion shields sensuallyier. then elc kissed him passionately and their tongues battled for dominance but we all know klaus is a fucking bottom bitch as stated in hilda and altos magical wedding night by sorunort paragraph 17 and 18 bc it was a dialogue.

then elc ripped off his clothes bc hes fucking JACKED and jACKED OFF and xeno gay gasped forlike the third time in this fic. elc was fuckign shredded. legends told of his abs but this time it was real. almost like the fact that shaved ice flavors dont actually exists the syrup is just food coloring. his dong dangled in the breeze and xeno was turned tf on so he took off his clothes too bc hes not a god damn animal god whats wrong with u elc.

except elc didnt take off the sunglasses like he promised so those were still on dont worry readers i got you covered.

"get on ur knees dude and give me a wet willy but like on my dick" elc demanded

"wtf no"

"dude u cant say no its a smutfic"

"ok yeah i guess i kinda do like sucking dick or somethign"

"PREPARE TO EAT YOUR LAST DICK, XENO" elc cackcled and then xeno succed his dick like no tomorrow. elc practically creamed right there bc he couldnt get his rocks off on the moon for 1000 years (hahaha no im not gonna stop makign rock jokes). also xeno has no gagreflex bc he succed dick like a thousand times. once that was over elc just punched his dick in xenos hot cross buns and xeno meowed again

"why are u still a furry after 1000 years" elc asked but continued to Ravage The Promised Ass

"do u nyat like it erucu-kun???" xeno purred and elc shook his head

"no ur still banging its ok"

NUT THEN (i wanted to write but but i typoed and decided to keep it its funnier this way) xenos ass started 2 glow with a new holy light

"WHAT tHE FUCK" elc yelled

"my ass was actually the only way we could turn u good again! the more u fuck me the gooder u are!" and elc gasped gayily! no! his plan was working against him! he could alredy feel the goodness (haha get it bc fucking is hot i guess) turning him good! he had 2 pull out but found he couldnt. xeno was just too bammin slammin bootlicious

"HOW DARE YOU TRICK, I, ELCREST THE CONDICKTOR" he roared and xeno was tuned on again bc roaring is prolly a furry thign im not a furry im sorry

"it was for ur own good elc bc i love you!" xeno dokied so hard there were shoujo sparkles and even elc got shoujo sparkles. his azure optics glew like stella glow and u could almost see constellations in them. except there were sunglasses so u couldnt actually see it but the reader can. xneo was right. he was his tru love..... not the Mother..... his mom was lame anyway all she did was talk to rocks

"xeno.............." elc said wiwstfully before bangin xeno harder. their bangin was so intense everyone could hear it in the kngihts barraks. it was so loud that even ana in her coma woke up for like a second to be like The Gays are At It Again. soon enough the banging was sucessful. elc glew in a beautiful magical girl ligtht and he was become good again. xeno shed a single tear but licked it away

"im cured! xeno ur ass did it! plus that was hot" elc smiled and im pretty sure xeno cried bc look at that man. hes so beautiful. please take the $2 from my purse. they embraced in a gay way. it was cute and xeno did a thumbs up and ana's face appeared at 20% opacity in the bg and she was also winking

"elc i am so glad u are back and i love u" then they made out. for a rly long time too bc theyre so fucking GAY good lord how could stella glow keep this under wraps. then they decidd they had to punch eve in the rock bc she was a dickw hile elc was being emo and stuff. BUT FIRST, xeno got porked lke 80 more times b4 then bc 1000 years does a lot do u.

the end remember to like, comment, subscribe for more fics like this one, seeya

#choo choo motherfucker #im sorry

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adambstingus · 5 years

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Leicester City and Carolina Panthers: a friendship founded on underdog success

Cam Newton and Co play in the Super Bowl this weekend as the Foxes ride high in the Premier League. And the two teams have exchanged admiring glances

Their bandwagon has beer. Charlotte gets the swag and the bromance, but Leicester Citys true Carolina hearts actually rest two hours north and west of Bank of America Stadium, nestled in a mountain range.

If ever an official mid-south Foxes supporters group were to see the light of day, the odds are good it would probably spring from Asheville, North Carolina, dubbed Beer City USA four years in a row, a soccer-friendly burg of 83,000-plus thats home to more than a dozen craft breweries. A burg where Chris Watts has been preaching the gospel of blue for more than 15 years now.

Its like a dream, says Watts, a Leicestershire native who has called Asheville home since moving to the States almost two decades ago. My brothers a season-ticket holder and he gets to the games. I was over there in October, against Crystal Palace and Watford, and it was just unbelievable to see where we were. And you keep thinking, Is this going to keep going? Its a bit like a dream. At the same time, its brilliant.

Pinch him, he giggles. And why the hell not? Watts has been a Carolina Panthers fan for more than 10 years and a Foxes fan for pretty much the last five decades, through thick, thin, and thinner. Some eight years earlier, he had shepherded a group of US friends back to Leicestershire for his 50th birthday and a series of matches in the Midlands, including a pair at the King Power, then the Walkers Stadium.

Five minutes into the [match], one of those friends, Tim Branson, recalls of his initial Foxes experience, I saw four guys carrying out two.

But he was hooked.

The second game, they got the skybox treatment. Watts landed a program signed by the team which, as it turned out, would become the first Foxes side ever to be relegated from the Championship to the third tier of the English football pyramid.

Ive still got it, Watts chuckles. Ive got a signed program, in a frame, of Leicester at their lowest.

And look whos laughing now.

The Panthers prepping for the biggest single event in North American sport, Super Bowl 50s NFC gatecrashers. The Foxes are atop the most popular soccer league on the planet. First, they were cute. Then a curiosity. Then a fluke. Then a stubborn anamoly. They werent supposed to here, either of them.

The parallels are valid and real enough: theyd finished their previous seasons on an unexpected, almost desperate hot streak. Theyd been dismissed by the experts, were under-appreciated outside their own province, middling brand names turning in gold-caliber performances, week after week, month upon month. Leicester City looked at the Carolina Panthers, 3,924 miles and an ocean away, and saw well, themselves.

The beginning of the year, [Leicester City] didnt have great expectations and kind of the same goes for us, says Panthers kicker Graham Gano, one of four Carolina players to receive customized Leicester City shirts from the surprise Premier League leaders last month. Theyve done really well this year, and so have we. So they kind of thought their season was similar to ours and they pulled for us and thats how we got the jerseys.

Before their NFC Divisional Round test against Seattle on 17 January, Panthers players turned up at work to find that the Foxes had sent over customized blue shirts for quarterback Cam Newton, cornerback Josh Norman, linebacker Luke Kuechly and Gano.

Carolina have had an incredible season, the Leicester left-back Christian Fuchs told the teams official website. Like us, they ended last season really well and again, like us, some people didnt expect them to do what theyve done this season, even after the great start they had.

Leicester City (@LCFC) January 15, 2016

#KeepPounding, @Panthers!@vardy7 and @FuchsOfficial on #lcfc‘s pick for #SuperBowl50 https://t.co/3nAsHdpXzA pic.twitter.com/78I9uVyeE6

Before long, they shared a narrative and a hashtag: #KeepPounding. The Panthers returned the favor, and Leicester shared pictures and videos on social media of striker Jamie Vardy, centre-back Wes Morgan, Fuchs and goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel decked out in Carolina black, tossing and kicking an NFL football around.

They were natural at it, Gano says. It would be interesting to see them kicking field goals and what it would look like. Obviously, their form looks good, but I never saw the ball going through the uprights. Its a little different swing than [it takes] to keep the ball under the posts. But Id love to have an opportunity sometime to have a kick around with some of the pros over [there], and compare how I match up with those guys.

But he thinks theyd probably be thick as thieves, especially after the Foxes posted a video to YouTube of Fuchs attempting a series of keepy-uppis with the oblong American football.

I was in the airport in Chicago and Im sitting at the bar and got talking about football American and English, Watts recalls. And I pulled up [the Fuchs video] to show a few others. Its pretty neat to see an English soccer player, albeit an Austrian, keeping up an American football. They thought it was pretty cool.

In one corner, the Panthers, unloved, slapped with 22-to-1 odds to win the NFC back in May and 40-1 to win the whole shebang. In the other, Leicester, dismissed almost universal preseason favorites to be relegated this term, 2000-1 odds to win the league at the start of the campaign.

Its not quite the same, Watts says of the two franchises and their comparative roads. But nobody was expecting the Panthers to be where they are. A lot of my friends, when they saw the stuff about the shirts [coming over], and then the Panthers sent shirts back the other way, its been neat.

Carolina Panthers (@Panthers) January 15, 2016

.@LCFC pic.twitter.com/Eo8yFJuwtO

Carolina are playing in their first Super Bowl in 12 years; since 2003-04, 13 different NFL teams have qualified for the title game. Leicester are the first squad other than one of the Big Five clubs [Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea] to be leading the Premier League in the last week of January since Newcastle in 1995-96.

Being on both sides, [the more remarkable story is] Leicester City, for me, just because of what theyve had to do, the fight, where theyve had to come from, says Branson. Going down to the third division and going back into the second and having to fight their way back to the top. Ashevilles got a single-A [baseball] club. It would be like them somehow winning and if they did promotions, getting promoted to the majors. In a little city like Asheville, it doesnt happen very often.

Youve got to have respect for them, Gano says of the Foxes rise. I havent been able to catch a ton of their games weve been pretty busy over here, so I havent really had the opportunity to catch up with them.

And, full disclosure, Gano is a Bayern Munich fan, having grown up bouncing from Scotland to Germany to Scotland to Canada as a Navy brat (I used to have a thick accent, he chuckles, without a trace of brogue.) Born in Scotland, he also maintains a bit of a soft spot for Rangers.

But I didnt have a favorite English team, the kicker says. So I guess I can pull for [Leicester] now.

After all, theres plenty of room on the wagon. And in Asheville, the best beer on the continent never tasted better.

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/leicester-city-and-carolina-panthers-a-friendship-founded-on-underdog-success/ from All of Beer https://allofbeercom.tumblr.com/post/181466020937

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viralhottopics · 7 years

Text

Step Inside the YouTube-Fueled, Teenaged Extravaganza That Is Beautycon

Taylor is 14 but a young 14, with the poreless face of an American Girl doll. Her hair is sandy blond and parted down the middle. She is smart but not savvy beyond her years, with the quiet confidence that educators seek when they speak of getting girls into soccer or STEM. She talks like someone who is certain of what she knows but who hasnt yet realized the vastness of what she doesnt. For this reason, I trust Taylor entirely as she lays out the details of the online beauty scene, a teen subculture as sprawling as it is potentially valuable.

Im into singersSelena Gomez, Taylor Swiftbut YouTube is a different category. Its not something you were hired for, its not something you were born intoits something you do for a passion.

Taylors own passion, at least for now, is YouTube star Tana Mongeau. I first came into contact with Taylor on Twitter last summer when I was looking for teens who could help unpack Tanas appeal. Tana is 18, lives in Las Vegas, has produced more than 130 videos about everything from how she does her makeup in the morning to boyfriends to pumpkin spice to racismand has 2.1 million subscribers on YouTube. The only thing Taylor might love more than Tana is God. Her timeline is one half retweets from The Gospel Daily, the other half pleas for Tanas attention:

RT @The_Gospels: May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, & the love of God, & the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. -2Cor 13:14

#ISupportTanaBecause she supports us. everyday. in everything we do. we are family and always got each others back. <3

When I first talked to Taylor she was preparing to start high school near her home in Washington state, though that was hardly the biggest event in her near future. Her mom had booked a trip to Beautycon LA, an event for the online beauty scene, where Tana would soon appear alongside other beauty-scene YouTube stars. These stars respond to myriad namescreators, influencers, beauty gurus, the talenttitles that convey their indeterminate fame, as well their receptiveness to both marketing and being marketed. Most of them produce extensive and often mesmerizing makeup tutorials on YouTube, plus brand-sponsored posts across other social platforms. Taylor was looking forward to meeting Tana face-to-face after months of following her online.

On the morning of Beautycon, Taylor texts me a photo so I will know who to look for in the sea of other teens. When I find her in line for the official Tana meetup, she looks shell-shocked with joyand wears hardly any makeup.

Im going to put the pictures from today on my wall, she explains. So I want to look more like my actual self. Ive heard similar logic applied to weddings, graduations, and other milestones to be photographed for posterity. For teens like Taylor whove made it to Beautycon, it isnt a stretch to say today feels as momentous.

Slide: 1 / of 10. Caption: Caption: Beauty vlogger Alan Macias (@alannized) at Beautycon LA last year.Angie Smith

Slide: 2 / of 10. Caption: Caption: Women sample makeup at Beautycon LA in a space set up to look like a classroom.Angie Smith

Slide: 3 / of 10. Caption: Caption: YouTuber Tana Mongeau and Taylor, at Tana’s first meetup.Angie Smith

Slide: 4 / of 10. Caption: Caption: YouTube star Jenn Im backstage at Beautycon.Angie Smith

Slide: 5 / of 10. Caption: Caption: Beautycon CEO Moj Mahdara (left) with Tyra Banks (center).Angie Smith

Slide: 6 / of 10. Caption: Caption: A woman tests lipstick colors on her wrist Beautycon LA.Joshua Kolden

Slide: 7 / of 10. Caption: Caption: A make-up artist applies mascara to a Beautycon attendee. Joshua Kolden

Slide: 8 / of 10. Caption: Caption: Naturally, displays of cosmetics are everywhere at Beautycon.Joshua Kolden

Slide: 9 / of 10. Caption: Caption: A make-up artist applies eye shadow at Beautycon LA. Also, green poofs seem to be a thing.Joshua Kolden

Slide: 10 / of 10. Caption: Caption: A line of attendees waiting to enter Beautycon LA on opening day.Joshua Kolden

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Slide: 1 / of 10 Caption: Caption: Beauty vlogger Alan Macias (@alannized) at Beautycon LA last year.Angie Smith

Slide: 2 / of 10 Caption: Caption: Women sample makeup at Beautycon LA in a space set up to look like a classroom.Angie Smith

Slide: 3 / of 10 Caption: Caption: YouTuber Tana Mongeau and Taylor, at Tana’s first meetup.Angie Smith

Slide: 4 / of 10 Caption: Caption: YouTube star Jenn Im backstage at Beautycon.Angie Smith

Slide: 5 / of 10 Caption: Caption: Beautycon CEO Moj Mahdara (left) with Tyra Banks (center).Angie Smith

Slide: 6 / of 10 Caption: Caption: A woman tests lipstick colors on her wrist Beautycon LA.Joshua Kolden

Slide: 7 / of 10 Caption: Caption: A make-up artist applies mascara to a Beautycon attendee. Joshua Kolden

Slide: 8 / of 10 Caption: Caption: Naturally, displays of cosmetics are everywhere at Beautycon.Joshua Kolden

Slide: 9 / of 10 Caption: Caption: A make-up artist applies eye shadow at Beautycon LA. Also, green poofs seem to be a thing.Joshua Kolden

Slide: 10 / of 10 Caption: Caption: A line of attendees waiting to enter Beautycon LA on opening day.Joshua Kolden

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In the beginning, like 2011, Beautycon was launched as a trade show for YouTube creators, though creators back then were mostly one and the same as fans. As growth and legitimacy began separating the groups, the event caught the eye of investor Moj Mahdara, who took a stake in the company in 2013. A year later she transitioned to the role of CEO and saw potential for something bigger than a trade show. In a 2015 interview with Fast Company, she imagined a far-reaching brandVice Media for a 16- to 24-year-old girl. That target market has since stretched to include boys who can contour, gender-fluid teens, women of a certain age, and, as she puts it, anyone who loves to feel great about themselves.

Beautycon Media today is one part Coachella, one part Sephora, and one part (or more) a consulting firm for brands that are thirsty for access to this slippery generation. The enterprise now includes Beautycon Box (a cosmetics service), Beautycon Digital (a social-first editorial platform), and one-day festivals in LA, London, New York, Dallas, and Dubai.

These festivals boast pop-up shops and live tutorials but advertise the creators as the main event. Few of the YouTubers headlining Beautycon LA lay claim to their own Wikipedia page nor a single piece of coverage in a mainstream publication. The only real way to crack their biographies is by stalking their posts across social media or watching hundreds of hours of YouTube. Despite such inscrutability to even an interested adult, Beautycon LA claimed 15,000 guests this year. Thats 8,000 more than in 2015, and 10,000 more than the year before that.

All across the halls, vendors are running schemes to goad guests into online engagement.

In the morning before Beautycon opens to the public, my ride drops me off at the foot of the LA Convention Center. Through the doors, a blush-colored banner portends the tone for the day: You dont need lipstick, lipstick needs you. This years festival is taking place in West Halls A and Baround 200,000 square feet in all. Admission starts at $19.99 and scales quickly to the VIP Total Packagea $299.99 extravaganza with early-entry brunch and professional hair and makeup.

Already the premium ticketholders are milling. All across the halls vendors are running schemes to goad guests into online engagement. The simplest offers a small bribe, like a lip gloss, in exchange for a like or follow. Other brands have arranged Instagrammable backdrops in the hope that fans might pose and post. The booth for Conscious Period organic tampons is decked with pink toilet tissue, a golden toilet, and pink mock graffiti that reads: Dont go with the flow.

On a long pink carpet at the front of the hall, the talent are arriving and granting interviews to YouTube-only outlets like CelebSecretsTV. If they have anything in common, its flawless contour makeup. Diversity happened naturally at Beautycon from the start. YouTube, as a platform, has low barriers to entry, which benefits groups long shunned by old media. Success on the site doesnt demand a certain look or a vast network of well-connected friends. The day before, at Beautycon headquarters in Hollywood, Mahdara had made it clear: Im not trying to change anything. Im just trying to reflect the time in which we live. The gay daughter of Iranian immigrants, she explained, I can relate to feeling like I dont fit in. Not marketed to, written off for being a certain size, shape, gender preferencea million things.

Beautycon is not an IRL event with an incidental web presence, nor is it the offline extension of an online community; its both.

Soon after the festival opens to the public, the lines on the floor grow so knotted that I eventually lose sight of where each ends. Through periodic polling of queued-up teens, I catch wind of free lotion at QVC, free hand massages at the booth for Yes to Carrots, and a meet-and-greet event with Justin Biebers ex-girlfriend hosted by a cotton-ball brand. Bored and lost moms mill about holding skewers, licked clean of the mock chicken being proffered by Gardein.

I pause for a moment at the edge of the music stage to watch the Vine-famous Nebraskan pop-rap duo Jack & Jack. The pit is packed, but the crowd stands still, shooting steady footage with phones in the air. Beautycon plays out on a digital stage as much as it does inside the convention center. When I spoke to Taylor before the festival, she outlined her social media strategy for the daya cross-platform plan of near-professional caliber. Beautycon is not an IRL event with an incidental web presence, nor is it the offline extension of an online community; its both, though the fans seem unbothered by such distinctions.

Leaving the stage, I spot musician Courtney Love walking casually across the floor, unnoticed. Many Beautycon fans were born not only after Kurt died but after the 2002 break-up of Hole. What eludes them isnt just the context of her fame but possibly her category of celebrity in general.

Stephanie Szerlip for WIRED

YouTube creator meetups are scheduled in hour-long blocks throughout the day. Tana is one of the few with two solo meetups, and the line for her first is overflowing its corral. A girl holds a glue-sticked poster: Your superhero wears a cape, mine wears mac honey love lipstick.

Taylor is close to the front, feet from the chair where Tana will sit. As we wait, she shows me a framed poem she wroteentitled An Influencethat includes sweet (if dystopian) couplets like: An environment which provides a positive escape / Through a false world that reality shaped.The poem is signed, God Bless, Taylor.

The online beauty scene, for Taylor, is less about the makeup than following creators as one might General Hospital. Perhaps this is why she loves Tana Mongeau. Tana doesnt claim any beauty expertise (and sometimes she actively rejects it). Her videos take the form of ebullient monologues, looping from silly into serious back to crass. Taylor calls Tana a storytime YouTuber. She communicates with fans like theyre up late at a sleepover, giddy from sugar, swapping racy stories. In I Talk About Drinking and Smoking, for instance, she faces the camera in an oversize T-shirt, mocking the squeaky-clean tone of beauty YouTube, before mocking herself for a former crush on Lil Wayne. She delivers an update on I Dated a Fuckboyan earlier tale of a duplicitous suitor, which unfortunately was shared with the fuckboy himself. She reassures her fans: Im never gonna not tell raw-ass stories from my life. What comes next is an exegesis on the Kylie Jenner Lip Kit, which segues naturally into heartfelt reflection on mass shootings. (Dont you see this pattern?) Over the course of 10 and a half minutes, shes funny and rude and confused and compassionate and the hundred other feelings that tangle the teen brain. She presents herself as wise but still flawed, ever reminding viewers to Like and Subscribe. Together, day by day, theyll untangle adolescence.

Shes created such a positive environment on the internet, Taylor tells me. To the point where the amount of interaction with her following has really made it feel like more of a family.

Stephanie Szerlip for WIRED

To keep tabs on the movement of creators around the festival, Ive switched on Twitter alerts, per Taylors advice. My phone flickers constantly, annotating reality. Phone charging stations, scattered about the hall, overflow with Medusas of commonly used cords. I stop to plug in beside two older women, markedly out of place for their lack of a teen. They tell me they work in high-end cosmetics and have come to Beautycon on an espionage mission to solve their own issues reaching Generation Z.

An entry-level full-time influencer with a few million followers can expect to be paid like a low-level teacher—between $20,000 and $40,000 a year.

With a good deal of eye-rolling, they recount their brands failed attempt at a meetup with a YouTube star at a shopping center. Theyd booked the creator for a Friday afternoon, a time when parents were still at work. Without rides or cash, the teens didnt show. According to the pair of industry spies, the lesson to be learned was that creators cant sell.

In the backstage lounge, some brand reps still have hope as they dump free product on whoever will accept. Creators load up on five brands of mascara; hair extensions and blow-dryers overflow from free totes. An overwhelmed bag-check guy struggles to stow it all, wading through what must be a cool million in makeup. The hope of the reps is free exposure, though a likelier outcome is a deal for sponsored contentpaying a creator to film an endorsement. The past half decade has seen a Wild West of spon-con, with brands throwing money at anyone with followers, a desperate plea to reach the youngest consumers. As this strategy has begun to bear middling returns, the metric of choice has shifted to engagementa creators ability to move fans to interact. Whats called family on the main floor is a target market backstage.

According to Tanas manager, Jordan Worona, an entry-level full-time influencer with a few million followers can expect to be paid like a low-level teacherbetween $20,000 and $40,000 a year. Worona lost interest in managing Hollywood talent when he realized the extent to which YouTube was still in flux. The trajectory of the career is still being developed, he says. Everyone is making the rules up as they go. You could work, right now, with the top influencers in the world. If you were an acting agent, you would have to wait 10, 15, 20 years before you would have some of the top talent.

Tana isnt exactly brand-safe. She swears a lot. Her most-viewed videos have titles like Crazy Bitch in Target and I Got Banged With a Toothbrush.

On YouTube, the top is often still fleeting. Creators rise to fame under viral conditions, then fade into obscurity in the span of a year. Creators who stick around are well poised for big payouts, though hard stats are mythic and can often be misleading. Theres a rumor that PewDiePie, who had the highest number of YouTube subscribers last year, made $12million in 2015.

Thats like Tana times 100, Worona says wistfully (though he wont say specifically what she makes). He watched Tana from afar for two months, waiting for the growth of her audience to slow. It hasnt yet. As her manager, his goal is to prolong that growth and assemble a career path thats sustainable, like personalized merchandise and touring. Besides, Tana isnt exactly what he calls brand-safe. She swears a lot. Her most-viewed videos have titles like Crazy Bitch in Target and I Got Banged With a Toothbrush. She goes eagerly on record in support of Black Lives Matter and other touchy issues that make brands run in fear. In a world of vetted and sanitized teen content, she is frank and plainspoken and what fans always call real. Taylor says it isnt the edgy content that keeps her watching, but Tanas openness and willingness to speak whats on her mind. Shes a role model, for sure, but she isnt a Role Model. When Worona solicits new opportunities, he most often compares her to Chelsea Handler or Joan Rivers. When all else fails, he talks in marketing hyperbole: I mean, this is the girl who, on a monthly basis, is getting views that American Idol got.

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The fans in Tanas meetup line are peeking through the curtain, hoping to glimpse her backstage. A security guard asks me who everyone is here for, and I struggle to explain how and why she is famous. Taylor smooths and resmooths her hair in anticipation, whispering to nobody, Oh my gosh, oh my gosh. After a few beats Tana emerges, her minidress laced all the way down the front. The effect is somehow more wholesome than it soundsthink cool best friend of your older sister. Its easy to imagine her climbing out a window to go drink light beer at a party. She waves to the crowd with exuberance, and Im extra-journalistically overcome with a desire for her to like me. As the meetup begins, fans approach one by one, presenting their gifts and posing for photos. You might imagine this as stilted or formal, but Tana makes brace-faced middle schoolers seem positively carefree. She sings Happy Birthday to the camera for their friends, promises to follow them back on Twitter, and ends many of the meetups with an outright I love you. It does not sound like promo-speak when Worona tells me she could do this every day.

Taylor directs her mom on how to shoot video. When its her turn, she rushes Tana with a hug, then carefully steps back to present her with the poem. They establish the fast intimacy of two women in a bar bathroom, all drawn-out vowels and overemphatic gestures. Tana takes the framed poem in her hands, studies the text, and seems authentically touched.

Do you want to be in my vlog? she asks.

They squeeze into the frame of the camera, and Tana speaks naturally to an invisible audience.

Hi, Im here with Taylor and she came all the way from Washington.

Taylor, less practiced, compliments Tana in the third person. Shes so amazing!

The two say I love you, and Taylor exits the stall, retrieving her phone from her mom on the way out. Tana greets her next fan with a familiar Yaaaaas!

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The cheapest read on Tana Mongeaus success is that shes famous for being famous. She doesnt sing or act or dance or otherwise exhibit any nameable skill we traditionally expect to justify stardom. Shes not even all that focused on makeup. In the case of a Hollywood star, fans accumulate as the byproduct of work; fan relations necessarily come second. You and I wont likely meet Brad Pitt, and even if we do, we cant ever truly meet him. Tabloid reputation, casting, PR spin, and velvet rope all help ensure the relationship stays distant. Such distance is likely to improve Pitts career, driving up interest through scarcity of information.

By offering their lives up for constant consumption, and closing the gap between fandom and stardom, a creator attracts and earns trust from their fans.

But even if Pitt did want to get closer, its unlikely hed be able to actually pull it off. Hes busy shooting movies, getting divorced, whatever else. YouTube stars, by contrast, arent busy with anything. They have little real work outside of fan relations, which isnt to suggest that they are without talent. Famous for being famous is a constellation of soft skills not easily described by a single-word title. By offering their lives up for constant consumption, and closing the gap between fandom and stardom, a creator attracts and earns trust from their fans, who rally around them as a communal touchstone. Tanas talent is cultivating an online sense of closeness and managing the flow of interaction to sustain it. Too much interaction and she floods her market; too little and she risks seeming distant.

Stephanie Szerlip for WIRED

Before leaving the festival I visit the main stage to watch Tana appear on the #True2You panel. The YouTube creators strut onstage in a burst of confetti, filming the crowd with their phones as they walk. Taylor is sitting in the very first row, still beaming. The stars discuss everything from ignoring the haters to the importance of love and the best Snapchat filters. The message, in the end, is to always stay positive, live with love, and be true to yourself. Ive forgotten the festival was ever about makeup.

Taylor would later tell me that the best part of Beautycon was during the panel, when Tana mouthed I love you from the stage. In the week after the festival, as she waited to start high school, Taylor would tweet at Tana 570 times. She would also retweet The Gospel Daily:

RT @The_Gospels: Hear my prayer, God. Dont hide from my request. Pay attention to me and respond to me. Psalm 55:1-2

Tana, in the end, would fave two of the tweets.

Jamie Lauren Keiles (@jamiekeiles) is a freelance writer living in Los Angeles.

This article appears in the February issue. Subscribe now.