#i am still writing some shit sometimes but i share my stories with maybe one person once a year
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The sob story with this is that I wrote this yesterday and it got deleted before I could save it. I wanted to die cry, basically. Somehow I managed to re-create most of it, after working on it all damn day. (I basically ended up writing over 6,000+ words in one day. Yowza) I still feel as though the first version was better, but…no one knows that but me, I suppose. (And my partner, who got to read it right before the horrors happened). Regardless, I am proud of this and proud of myself for not giving up when it really would have been easy to. So huzzah to the fickle hand of fate and all that stuff.
For Suptober 2023 prompt “starlight”
I tag @fellshish and @canonblastedships and @clarkenting for being super cool reblog buddies, lol (which is just a thing I made up) This is the longest destiel fic I’ve written yet and it will be my first official AO3 destiel! (As soon as I remember how to do that, oy)
Edited: Now with Spiffy AO3 Link! Here!
The Starlight
There were three types of people that visited the Starlight Lounge — drunks, people desperate to score, and the employees that made their bread and butter trying to tame the other two.
Dean Winchester, unfortunately, was a member of that third group. Oh, sure, Dean had been known to put away a fair bunch of liquor in his day, and sure, Dean had definitely been known to do the Bedroom Rodeo whenever the opportunity presented itself. Hell, back when he’d first started at the Starlight he’d often been three types at once. Work, drink, get laid. Sometimes, not even in that order.
But that was past Dean. Current and newly mature Dean (hah) just wanted to work, go home, eat and fall into his bed. Working at the Starlight wasn’t that bad – it had fairly decent pay and it was often interesting. And like everyone else, Dean had bills to pay and he gave more than his fair share to Sammy. Not that Sam really needed it anymore; he was busy working as a law clerk downtown, putting himself through school. But still, Dean wanted to help as much as he could and besides it was his brotherly duty. Heh. Duty.
Tonight, due to the cold and rainy weather, the bar was fairly empty and business had been slow. There was only one of his regulars, a writer by the name of Chuck crying into his notebooks at the back of the bar. To be honest, Dean had never seen Chuck write a damn thing but the man sure could put scotch away like a pro. There was also a young couple making out in one of the booths near the restrooms. He’d been keeping an eye on them most of the night, actually, making sure no one lost any clothing. The Starlight didn’t need a public indecency charge on the books. At least, not so soon since the last one, at any rate.
Dean yawned and finished cleaning up the bar, hoping Chuck and the couple on their way to Soft-Porn Town would soon be leaving. Maybe Dean could even push them on their way a bit early, so he could get home at a decent time, for once. As he walked over towards Chuck to perhaps lightly suggest the writer hit the road, the double doors of the bar blew open – bringing in the rain, the cold rush of the wind and a new customer in a beige trench coat with seriously fucked up hair. Great.
Dean sighed and turned back around as the new guy slumped onto the first stool at the bar. His dark brown, messed up hair looked even worse up close, and he had a scowl on his face as he glared down at the bar in front of him.
“Whiskey. Neat,” Messy-Hair said, voice low and very rumbly.
Dean pulled down a clean glass and poured some of their nicer whiskey into it. Dude looks like he could afford it, at any rate. He had a nice suit on under the coat, now that Dean could properly see it and his watch was one of those big clunky things that could probably tell the time on Jupiter or some shit like that. The man’s hand reaches for the glass before Dean has barely pushed it forward. He throws back the drink in record time and hits the bar with it so that it makes a loud thunk.
“Another one.”
Dean shrugged as the man kept glaring down at the bar as though it contained all the answers to life and everything else; Dean knew for a fact that it didn’t. It didn’t even have a ‘42’ scratched into it or anything. (RIP Douglas Adams)
This time the man just wraps his hand around the glass, his fingers clutching at it and woah, Dean thinks, dude’s got some huge fucking hands. They’re big and they’re strong looking. The fingers are nice and long and graceful and oh, oh, oh. Maybe it’s a kink, or maybe it’s a preference, but Dean loves hands. Manly looking mitts like Messy-Hair here and even smaller, more delicate hands like on most women, with pretty nail colors. But Dean’s not choosy.
He sees motion out of the corner of his eye and notices Chuck signaling that he’d like to pay up. Glancing at Messy-Hair he figures he has a few minutes before having to pour him another so he sets the bottle down and heads over to the other side.
“All right there, Chuck?”
“Yeah, yeah, thank you, Dean.”
The older man is flipping through his wallet and counting out his cash slowly. Dean wipes the bar and puts Chuck’s last glass into the bucket for later cleaning.
“Write anything tonight?” Dean always asks this question. It’s like a little game he and Chuck play because it always has the same answer.
“No,” Chuck says looking up at him. He places his finger to his temple solemnly, almost like he’s holding a gun. “But I did a lot of work up here.”
He always gives Dean this look as though Dean should know exactly what he’s talking about. But, of course, Dean never does. He likes to read but he sure as hell would never attempt to write. Personally, he thinks Chuck is sort of crazy, but hey, to each their own, right?
Chuck pushes his notebooks into his old canvas bag on the bar. It’s bulging with everything he carries with him and looks fit to burst. Dean supposes that writer’s block is heavy business.
Chucks nods goodnight as he slips his bag over his shoulders, buckling a bit under the weight. Dean watches as he wobbles away and he’s not sure if it’s from the alcohol or the bag. He’d normally be worried (hey, no bar can stay in business if all its clientele got themselves killed), but he knows Chuck lives nearby. He’ll be all right and probably in his same spot tomorrow evening. He puts Chuck’s money into the till and realizes he tipped Dean more than usual. He really did have had a good night, then.
He notices the couple trying to break the world record for smooches in a single night are getting up and putting on their jackets. Maybe Dean can get out early; he’s got the DVR set for Dr Sexy already, but he wouldn’t say no to catching it live for once.
Glancing over he sees Messy-Hair is now resting his head on the bar, but he lifts it as the doors bang shut behind Chuck, the cold burst of wind making his hair looking even more disheveled. Dean heads back over to see if he needs a refill and is suddenly struck dumb by the other man finally looking at him. Holy Mother of Blue, those are some eyes. The dude is handsome. Like old-time movie handsome. Strong jaw, with a smattering of scruff, pink soft lips and eyes that look like they can see into your soul, no, scratch that, not see, but pierce. Dean swallows roughly and picks up the whiskey bottle.
“Hey, uh, it’s getting late. One more for the road?” Dean assumes the dude doesn’t know the Starlight is technically open until midnight. Assumes, hah. More like prays.
Blue-Eyes stares at him and frowns. “I thought this establishment closed at midnight.”
“Er, yeah. I suppose it does.”
“Then I’ll take another,” Blue-Eyes pauses and holds out his glass. “And keep them coming for the next forty-five minutes, barkeep.”
Dean blinks at the old-fashioned word and pours another round. They stare at each other until he hears a giggle and a clearing of a throat. He looks over to see the couple and wonders how long they’ve been waiting. Judging from the churlish look on the guy’s face and the barely contained laughter emanating from the girl, it’s been awhile. He settles their tab and takes their money (lousy tip, of course) as the two saunter past Blue-Eyes and escape out into the night. Well, at least Dean can see it’s stopped raining.
Making up his mind, he follows them from behind the bar and locks the door after them. He flips off the sign, too. He may be stuck here with Blue-Eyes, but he’ll be damned if he’ll let someone else come meandering in to make him get home even later.
He comes back to stand in front of his customer and makes a decision. Pulling down another glass, he pours some of the whiskey into it and sighs as the warmth of it hits his system. What do they always say about good whiskey? It should warm the cockles of the heart, or something like that. Not that Dean actually knows what a cockle is, but hey, it went down smooth.
He realizes Blue-Eyes is watching him and Dean decides to bite the bullet. He’s tired, bored and probably on his way to cranky town if Blue-Eyes keeps his word about the next forty-five minutes.
“So, what brings you out on a cold and rainy night like tonight, Mr, uh…what’s your name? I can’t keep calling you what I’ve been calling you in my head.”
The other man squints and tilts his head at Dean like a tiny, confused bird. And no, Dean doesn’t find that adorable at all. Nope.
“What have you been calling me in your head?”
Dean purses his lips. Sometimes he’s really an idiot. He gives Blue-Eyes a shaky laugh.
“I said I wasn’t gonna keeping doing that.”
They stare at each other again, neither one budging until Blue-Eyes releases a breath and blinks, shoulders slumping a bit more. By the end of the night Dean expects this guy to be melted into the floor.
“Cas.”
Dean frowns. “Your name is Mr Cas?”
“No, just Cas.” Blue-Eyes, no, scratch that, Cas then holds out his hand so Dean can shake it like they’re fellow professionals meeting at a party or something. As he grips the other man’s hand in his own he realizes Cas’s hand is warm, dry, and, yep, strong. The dude is seriously ticking all of Dean’s boxes without even trying. It’s a bit unnerving, really.
“Is that short for something?” Dean asks, wondering what type of name that is.
Cas just looks at him over the rim of his glass. “Perhaps.”
Neither of them say anything else for a long moment and Dean shakes his head. “People ever tell you you talk too much?”
“Yes. All the time,” Cas says with a smirk.
Dean laughs. “Well, whatever. It’s officially nice to meet you, Cas. I’m Dean. Humble and professional barkeep at your service.”
“Hello, Dean.”
Cas’s voice is deep but there’s a warmth to it that makes Dean happy. They chit-chat for a bit, just like Dean would do with any newbie to the bar. He pours them both another round and then tries his question again.
“So, you seemed a bit upset earlier. What brought you through my doors, Cas?”
Cas sighs and glances away. He taps his fingers lightly on the polished wood of the bar. He stares at Dean as though assessing him and then looks as though he’s made up his mind.
“My…er, the person I’ve been dating, dumped me tonight. We went to an expensive restaurant and ordered far too pricey food for the serving size and drank outrageously fancy wine. Then they ordered an expensive bottle of cognac, drank it all and then told me I wasn’t worth it.”
Dean winces. “Ouch. How long were you together?”
“Six months.”
“Well, it’s not too long for a relationship, but it’s long enough to hurt.”
Cas nods, looking sullen again.
“What special occasion was it?”
Cas stares at him. “How could you possibly know that?”
“Fancy restaurant, the way you’re dressed, the cognac. Nobody orders that unless there’s been a birth or an anniversary or both.”
“It was my birthday,” Cas says, looking down again.
“Fuck,” Dean blurts out without thinking. “And they dumped you? Seriously bad juju, man.”
Cas nods and takes another drink of his whiskey, looking miserable. Dean tops off both of their glasses and hums.
“What was his name?”
Cas whips his head up, suddenly looking confused and more than a little worried. “I never said it was a he.”
“It was your distinct lack of pronouns, dude. Always the dead giveaway. Trust me, as a guy who plays for both sides, I know. Pronouns are key. Hey, relax, Cas, this is a safe space.” Dean points to the small pride flag he keeps above the bar and watches as Cas visibly relaxes.
The silence that falls between them is comfortable now. Welcoming, even. Cas clears his throat and rests his hand on his chin, peering at Dean.
“So…you’re bi, I assume or, pan, perhaps?”
“Got it in one. Just another bisexual loser ruining the world one lay at a time.”
Dean winks to show he’s only kidding. He’s proud to be bi, but it doesn’t mean he can’t make a joke at his own expense. Of course, if Sam or his friend Charlie were here they’d both tell him what they thought of that.
“His name was Bartholomew.”
Dean snorts. “It fits him. Douche-y name for a douche-canoe.”
Cas barks out a laugh and it completely changes his face into something truly beautiful. Dean suddenly feels the need to always make Cas laugh like that. He can’t imagine anyone not wanting to – his laugh is infectious. And the light it puts in his eyes is irresistible.
Cas looks serious again as he swirls the rest of the whiskey in his glass. “To be honest, Bart was just the last in a long line of failed…connections. I’m doubting my own self-worth at this point. Everyone ends up leaving or they get fed up with me. I’m too introverted…too socially awkward to deal with, I suppose.”
“I don’t know, you seem to be doing okay right now.”
“I’ve been drinking,” Cas says, deadpan. “And also I’m paying you.”
Dean chuckles. “Not really, I decided to stop charging you as soon as I poured my first one.”
“Your hospitality know no bounds. Truly.”
Dean laughs. Cas’s dry delivery and poker-faced expressions really are the limit. He feels that familiar warmth he always gets when he meets someone new. A someone new that excites him. But he pushes the feeling aside because he knows on some level that trying to get into Cas’s pants is so not what the other man needs right now. Dean shivers as he realizes how damn mature that sounds. Next he’ll be looking into 401ks and cemetery plots.
“Well, consider them birthday drinks. Of course, this stuff doesn’t cost a small fortune or anything, but I figured you’d already paid out enough tonight.”
Cas smirks and shakes his head at Dean. “Thank you, Dean. It’s actually very kind of you to…take pity on me.”
He says it jokingly but Dean gets the sense that he means it. He reaches forward and touches Cas’s hand.
“Hey, no pity here. You are ridiculously attractive and if I didn’t have a conscience, I’d definitely be throwing out my best lines here to help you relieve some tension, if you know what I mean. And you are not awkward to me, but even if you were, it wouldn’t be enough to stop me from asking for your number or seeing if you wanted to meet up sometime. I barely know you but you seem like a decent guy, Cas. And I think all of those people that don’t get you can just fuck right off. You need to keep trying, man. Don’t give up just because a few losers couldn’t see what they had.”
Cas blinks at Dean, blue eyes getting huge. “You think I’m ridiculously attractive?”
Dean thinks back. Did he say that? Yeah, he said that. Figures that would be the only thing to register with the dude.
“What sort of line would you use on me? I mean, if you were going to, that is.” Cas shyly glances away and then back, a curious look on his face.
“Oh, uh, probably something like, well you know what they say — the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else.” Dean waggles his eyebrows and smirks, faking a leer.
“I’m not sure that would work with me,” Cas says, mirth clear in his eyes.
“Yeah, yeah. You’d make me work for it, I know. But seriously, you need to regroup, clear out the douche-canoes from your life and find a new guy, man.”
Cas smiles at him in fondness, and nope, Dean is not going to do it. He will not break his rule about dating people just out of relationships. Not even for big huge blue eyes that make him feel sappy like a love song. Cas, however, clearly has other plans.
“This may be forward but, um, Dean would you allow me take you out for dinner? As a date, in case you were wondering how I meant it.”
“Oh, wow, Cas, um, I mean…”
Cas’s face takes an interesting journey in two seconds – from hopeful joy to miserable and wretched. Dean feels his heart break a little bit for him in that moment and mentally kicks his own ass for being a tool.
“Oh, I see. I…I’m sorry, Dean. Thank you for hospitality.” Cas fumbles with his wallet and places far too much money next to his glass. “I won’t keep you anymore. Go home and enjoy whatever is left of your night.”
Dean watches dumbly as Cas sits up straighter and then turns in his seat, his broad shoulders unyielding, suddenly. Dean knows he just can’t let it end like this.
“No, wait, Cas!”
Dean practically flings himself around the bar to reach Cas before he can unlock the door and leave without a backwards glance. He rests his hand on Cas’s shoulder, stopping him.
“It’s only because I have a rule about dating people that just got out of a relationship. It has nothing to do with you, I promise you. You need to focus on you, dude. Figure out what you’re looking for. If this one was just the last in a long line of guys who don’t understand you, try and see what people you’re going for. I mean, I’m no expert, and God knows I’ve had my fair share of jumping before looking moments, but I think you just need some Cas time right now, you know? If we ever start something I do not want to be rebound guy and you deserve something better than a one night stand.”
Cas stares at him, blue eyes half in shadow. Dean holds his breath, hoping he didn’t just lose something. All he can hear is the clock ticking behind him and the pounding of his own heart in his ears.
“That was quite the speech,” Cas finally says. “You sound like you know from experience.”
“Cas, man. You have no idea.”
“I have some, like I said, a long line of rejections. Still…” Cas’s eyes search his face and then nods to himself. “Maybe you’re right. I do tend to do things without thinking in this area of life despite being very practical usually. And you’re also right on anther point, Dean. You do not deserve to be “rebound guy”.”
Dean can’t help his grin as Cas makes the quotes motion with his fingers. They stare at each other for a bit longer before he unlocks the door. Cas steps out as the cold air filters in between them, causing them bother to shiver. Dean pauses, and then holds out his hand. “Let me have your phone.”
“My phone?”
“Yeah, you have one, right? Or have you moved on to something flashier like sky writing?”
Cas snorts and shakes his head. He fumbles in his pockets and then pulls out a slim, black smartphone. He unlocks it and hands it over. Of course, it’d be that kind of phone that can help you bake bread or turn off all the lights in the world with just a click or something. He finally finds what he’s looking for and puts his contact information in.
“There. There’s my number. Text me to let me know you get home, okay? And as for the rest, we’ll take it one day at a time, Cas. Let’s be friends, first.”
Cas smiles shyly as he looks down at his phone and nods. “Friends, first. I like that. Goodnight, Dean.”
“Goodnight, buddy. Be safe.”
Cas slips out and away, leaving a coldness in his wake as he takes his body heat with him. Dean watches him go, the black of the night almost swallowing him up. Cas pauses to pull his coat tighter, the glow of the streetlight lighting up his profile. To Dean he looks pure—angelic, almost, like a painting or a sculpture. With one last look at Dean, he eventually fades away, disappearing back into the world. Soon all Dean can see is his own breath in the air and the twinkling starlight from the surprisingly clear sky above. He locks up again and finishes his routine for the night. After he’s put the money in the safe and headed out back to his car, he feels happy inside. Like something good just occurred — like some new path has been cleared for him to travel. His drive home is quick and easy, there’s hardly any traffic mostly due to the earlier rain. It’s just as he’s pulling into his driveway that he feels his phone buzz in his pocket. It’s from an unknown number and his heart beats faster as he reads the message.
From unknown: I arrived home safely, Dean. Thank you, again. Would you like to get coffee tomorrow, or, perhaps I should say, later today? Oh, this is Cas, by the way. In case you didn’t know. :)
Dean saves the number and then returns to the message to reply, a grin creeping onto his face before he even realizes it.
Dean: Of course, dude. Coffee sounds great. Around 1pm?
Cas: Perfect. Do you know the Blue Java Café on Marion and Elm? It’s across from the park and one of my favorite places.
Dean: Sounds good. Can’t wait to talk to you sober, ya lush… (lol j/k hah)
Cas sends him a sticking-tongue-out emoji as a response and Dean chuckles as he locks up his car. He has a nice, happy feeling in his heart as he thinks of Cas. Like maybe this is something special. Or maybe it’s just that it could be and has the potential to be. He knows he told Cas friends first, but Dean’s willing to see where it…where they, can go.
#suptober23#destiel#prompt:starlight#dean and cas#meet-cute#my writing#biting nails here#like posting stuff is scary#wth#I am not used this anymore#castiel#dean winchester
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Hihihi
I read the request you wrote for lucifer, and it made me so happy!!!!
And, I do have one more request, could you maybe generally write for the hazbin group finding out the readers cause of death being from a roller coaster, and them not knowing who they are? (Could it maybe be a song fic using the ballad of Jane doe?)
Or
A platonic angel dust fic with the reader talking(singing) about their previous family and / or life? Along with them breaking down at the end, with a small bit of comfort from angel dust? (Dead mom from beetle juice)
You can choose either or, it doesn't really matter to me :)
With love,
-Xin 💙
Good evening my dear! So glad to have you sending in another request,
I AM A MAJOR RIDE THE CYCLONE FAN, I FORCED MY BEST FRIEND TO WATCH IT WITH ME AND GOT EM' HOOKED ON IT, I WATCHED IT AS I WROTE RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA I CRIED IT IS A GREAT MUSICAL, I GREATLY RECOMMEND IT, IT'S ALLEGEDLY ON YOUTUBE
Reader much like Jane Doe is going to be a doll, I like to call this, reader having a lil existential crisis during a trust exercise turned life stories sharing time.
Also I'll tag you like I did last time! @fuck-this-shit-xin
The fallen saint
People who live in the hazbin hotel x gn reader
Warnings!
Death, decapitation, dolls, I am still terrified of dolls why did I add them? I don't know, accidentally implied underage drinking but the reader isn't underage, reader and Angel are very loosely implied to be besties because yes
Ballad of Jane doe
You came to the hotel confused and scared, you found a flyer that advertised and you thought that it'd be better then the chaos in the other parts of hell.
You didn't remember much about your life, just that you died from a rollercoaster accident with your friends? Classmates? Family? You didn't remember,
The last thing you remember was someone clutching your hand saying something that was muffled over the screams before a sharp piece of metal sliced your throat and you saw the sky.
Sometimes you get glimpses of life before, school uniforms, arcades, lights, someone saying a muffled name, holding you, smiling at you.
Who were they? A friend? Family?
You wish you knew.
Charlie was the most sympathetic to your situation, embracing you with open arms into the hotel, imagine not knowing who you were? Well you didn't have to imagine.
You were practically a clean slate, perfect for redemption no matter what you did in the past, because you weren't that person anymore.
Charlie had organized a trust exercise that had pinwheeled into mild drunken shenanigans venting about life and how they lived before they died, Husk had revealed that he apparently had a child somewhere that caused a small commotion of "YOU HAD A WHAT-" and that turned into Sir Pentious saying he missed his son,
Niffty brought up some guy she was obsessed with while alive that may or may not have died it wasn't clear, Vaggie revealed small, very small parts about her life in heaven and being an exorcist, Angel dust brought up his family that was in hell and his twin sister Molly who was the only one to go above, and even Alastor was in the conversation talking about his mother and what a wonderful mother she was.
And then it came to you, cradling a alcoholic beverage.
"I wish I knew what my life was like, like What did I do end up down here? I mean I know I died because of a rollercoaster but I don't think that was a sin." You said your fingers circling your glass, Angel dust patting your shoulder in support.
"I'm sure it wasn't anything that bad"
"You probably set orphanages on fire, I can see you doing that" Niffty chimed in staring into your soul
"Niffty what the hell."
You took a breath as music began to play, one of the things you don't expect in death is that everything becomes a musical.
"Some might say we're release, pushing daisies, deceased,"
You place the glass you were holding onto the table in front of you before standing up from the couch you wrapped your arms around yourself.
"But we all know the worms must be fed,"
"And They're singing." Husk muttered taking a swig of his drink as he was told to hush.
"There's just one lingering fear, Oh my soul, is it here?"
It was a silly question but was it? Most Hellborn supposedly didn't have souls but they were still alive in someway, was it the same case with you? Is that why you couldn't remember? Was your soul back on earth where you perished?
You let one of your hands drift up to your neck, feeling the thread stitching that kept your head attached to your neck, it was slightly lighter then the rest of your body, reminiscent of a dolls.
"Or is it rotting somewhere with my head?"
The people you mostly considered friends [Alastor was on a thin line of friend or weird smiley guy that lived in the hotel] watched you pace around.
"Oh my soul"
Who were you?
"Oh my soul"
What did you do? What didn't you do?
''Oh my soul''
What regrets did you have? Did you live life to the fullest? Who did you love, who did you cherish? Did you have friends? Family? Who were they?
"Oh my soul''
"Ooh...Ooh...Ahh...Ahh... ah''
You missed people you didn't even remember,
Were you loved? Hated?
Did someone miss you? Who did you die with? What did you do to end up here? Did you kill someone? Did you set an orphanage on fire like Niffty suggested?
The people that appeared in your dreams, who's faces were blurred, that would disappear when you tried to reach out to them, were they real or were they just from your dreaming state?
"Oh no soul, and no name"
Everyone had come up with their own nickname for you, typically something related to dolls like doll, Dollface, Dolly, Raggedy Ann, Raggedy Andy or Chucky etc
That last one was from Husk.
you didn't mind it but you desperately wanted to know what your name was, did you get to choose it? Or was it given to you? Did you like it? Did you want to change it? Did you go by a nickname instead? Was it long? Was it short? Was it fancy or simple? Were you named after someone? Oh how you desperately wished to know.
"And no story, what a shame.."
Was your life exciting? Dull? Did you wish for something more?
"Cruel existence was only a sham?"
Dying in a rollercoaster accident was odd, insane and tragic, you showed up in hell with a uniform, were you a student? Did you attend some weird uniform requiring college? You died with others you knew them didn't you? Did you die with strangers or did you die with people you knew?
Tears swelled in your glassy, shiny doll-like eyes
"Oh Saint Peter, let me in!"
Charlie and Vaggie shared a look, recalling the whole welcome to heaven thing and him straight up moaning in song.
"You must know where I've been, Won't you tell me at last who I am?"
You could bare it, being in hell, it was horrible because it was hell but everyone else knew who they were, somewhat, they had a name that they chose or got, they had some semblemblance of an identity,
So why didn't you?
"Who I am,"
It wasn't fair, it really wasn't
"Who I am"
Everyone in the room knew who they were, they remembered their lives or in Charlie's case her life so far.
"Who I am"
You didn't ask for much, you helped out at the hotel, you gleefully participated in the exercises, you were a decent person, at least now you were if you weren't before.
"Who I am"
Would you get your memories back if you went to heaven?
"Ooh...Ooh...Ahh...Ahh... ah"
Or would you completely lose your memories again, would you have to start all over again?
You didn't want to forget the folks in the hazbin hotel, they were your friends right?
Right?
It'd be one thing if you lost your memories here but it'd be just cruel if you lost them again, you didn't want to lose them again you desperately clung to the glimpses you got of the past, you needed to keep the memories of the present.
"And from the ground, beneath my feet, I hear the anguish of the street"
You glanced outside the window, people were doing whatever they did, someone was actively getting stabbed they probably remembered who they were.
"A choir never complete"
Something flashed in your head
You died in a choir, you were apart of a choir,
You were apart of something, you sung with them, were you all close? Were you like family?
Where were they? Would they recognize you if they saw you now?
Would they? Would you recognize them? Would all your memories come rushing back in an instant like in the movies?
"And like an old forgotten tune, a song that no one knows..."
A appeared in your arms, a doll that had been gifted to you by Angel dust for a day they had dubbed your birthday, they threw you a party and everything, confetti, balloons, cake, you got a few gifts that you treasured, from Charlie, sir Pentious, hell even Alastor gave you a weird doodle of you that laid with the other gifts.
You held it close to you.
"Forgot how it goes, just John, Jane and me"
You didn't name the doll John or Jane, you didn't know a John or a Jane, or maybe you did? Anyways you carried it around with you, finding it as a source of comfort for when your friends weren't nearby
"Forever eternally, Doll Doe"
You hugged the doll tighter as a tear slipped slid down your doll-like face,
You were angry, what had you done to deserve this? You should at least know what condemned you here? What sin was so bad to warrant this?
"And I'm askin' why lord,"
The effects kicked in as the room went darker as your voice raised, desperation, confusion.
"If this is how I die, lord"
Why couldn't you have a normal death at least! Did anyone even find your head? Was it eaten by animals? Did it hit some poor person trying to have a fun day at the amusement park?
"Why be left with no family"
The hotel residents began to develop a found family relationship, and you were apart of it, you loved it but, what was your family from before like? Did you even have one?
"And no friends?"
Assuming no one you knew had fallen down below, you didn't die alone but you came alone while the others had ascended to above.
"Ooh."
Background vocals came in out of nowhere lowkey freaking out some of your friends, Vaggie had already gotten her spear ready to Incase, of something maybe if the voices decided to attack
"I've got no celebration, just this consolation,"
Did you even have a funeral? Was it closed casket? Who attended?
"Time eats all his children, In the end"
You had questions and you wanted answers.
"Ahhh..."
Freaky disembodied background vocals
"A melody floats through the air, when silence falls, does no one care?"
You were human once, you didn't care what genre your life fell into, comedy, horror, tragedy, thriller, if you played the role of a villain or a hero, a funny side character, you just wanted to know
"Does anyone care?"
Where were the background vocals coming from, they were freaky.
"Another sad, forgotten tune"
Your story laid forgotten, abandoned on some bookshelf like a book a teenager brought thinking they'd like it but they couldn't even make it past the first page so it lays, rotting away.
"Another song that no one knows"
You wanted to go back, you wanted to live your life again, you didn't know what it entailed but you would do anything, make a deal, throw whatever afterlife you had away.
"So that's how it goes!''
No, you would keep the afterlife you were given, you cherished the memories you've made here.
"Just John, Jane and me"
Your life was cut short wasn't it? What didn't you get to experience, what didn't your choir experience?
Why did you all have to die that day? Why did the rollercoaster have to derail, why didn't they check it?
"Forever eternally, Dollface Doe"
"And she's asking why, lord?"
The disembodied voices were in all honesty a nice touch to the song, still freaky though especially since was now dolls scattered around the area, is that where the voices were coming from?
"Why, oh why, oh why, oh why...?"
Why?
You were the one who convinced your choir to go on the rollercoaster, you begged them offering to buy them snacks after,
They agreed, you didn't know.
Was that the thing that condemned you here??
"This is no way to die, lord!"
At least getting decapitated by a rollercoaster made for a good conversation starter, probably.
"No one to sing, no one to sigh"
You only got glimpses, sometimes a nostalgic feeling for something you couldn't remember no matter how desperately you wanted too.
"Now that all is said and done"
Life had ended, afterlife had only begun,
You couldn't go back, no matter what you did, even if you sold your soul, a soul you weren't sure you even had anymore.
"Isn't there anyone to tell me who I am?"
You were turned away from your friends, you didn't want to see the pitying face some of them probably had.
"No singing songs of celebration''
Were you someone who liked to party? A homebody? Were you a sweetheart? Did people say you had a heart of stone,
"Just this sorry speculation"
You could try and force yourself to remember but in the best case scenario you could get a glimpse and a headache, and the worse case you'd be left clutching your doll trying to comfort yourself with a horrible headache.
"Like John and Jane I'll be eternally"
Maybe you should give up on trying to figure out who you were, try to forget that you ever lived before this.
"A forgotten name, some lost refrain"
If anything, you didn't have to have your memories back completely, if you could just remember your name.
"Just 'Doll' "
You closed your eyes, clutching the doll.
"Dolly..."
The freaky dolls that appeared sneaked close, Vaggie stabbed one like a doll kabob
"Doe!"
You twirled and landed back in your seat, you leaned to the table to grab your drink again, intending to down it as the dolls finished your lament.
"A melody floats through the air, when silence falls, does no one care?"
The room began to lighten back up again as the creepy little dolls poofed away one by one, including the kabobbed one.
"Doll Doe."
You got a hug from a tearful Charlie and a two handed headpat from Angel since he couldn't really do anything else since you were trapped in Charlie's hug.
Charlie would later note that it was a successful trust exercise since everyone including you had opened up a little bit, you felt relieved to get that lament of yours off your chest, it didn't change much but breaking out in song was oddly therapeutic, you guessed that's why others did it so often!
Would you ever regain your memories? You didn't know, but for now you would try to remember anything from your past while making new memories with your friends at the Hazbin hotel.
Good evening folks! thank you for tuning on in, this has gotta be one of my favorite songfics to write to date, AGAIN I REALLY RECOMMEND RIDE THE CYCLONE, thank you for tuning in I hope you enjoyed! Goodnight folks!
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hey dude! What's up :)) been just a little since l've said something
Initially, this is me saying thank you and goodbye
This isn't supposed to be a weird pity story, so l'm so unbelievably sorry if it comes off that way, lol.
When I began reading your work, I was enamoured with fiction because of personal issues (as many usually are, honestly, I know I'm one of god knows how many people trying to run away from life for just a second with fanfics or media in general). I don't know if I will ever be able to communicate this properly, hell, this will even be unbelievable funny or dramatic but I need to get this across because it's coming from a genuine place. Your stories and work thus far has brought me comfort, immense heaps of it, and even still when I deal with things that feel out of reach or too much to actually face head on I find myself wandering back to syg or just your blog in general
I mean this, from my entire heart, thank you and thank Bee. A million times thank you, for making that one silly silly stupid piece of fanfiction, because oh my god it got me through some major stressful hardships within my life for the past 3 years.
I am leaving tumblr, however I’m aware I have submitted asks with my actual accounts before, so you'll likely be able to see they're still gonna be up. I'm just deleting tumblr the app instead of my account, but for other social platforms they will be deleted properly (such as quotev) so I won’t be indulging in much reading anymore when it comes to fanfics and such lol
I don't know if I'll come back, if I do I likely will not be back for long or to be as active as l've been because of the toll social media’s taken. So even as ridiculous as this feels, to tell someone I’m simply a fan of and barely truly know, that their fanfic of murderers and their love story with my self insert kept me pushing through a lot of tough days, I genuinely just had to.
I needed to thank both you and your partner for the work you've both put out. I still have that smiley pin I’d made, and I will cherish what you made quotev have been for me ( I literally found out about the website during early or late 2020 I can barely remember, then later found your fic, I was DEEP DIVING into that shit LMAO )
I hope whatever happens for you and bee in the future is only good, and I only will wish nothing but the best of luck with everything man.
feel free to post this (idk what it’s called but when you publicly reply lol) or not, as long as you read this it’ll mean lots to me !! >:))
your coolest weirdest ticci toby fan whose also named toby, 🐚 annon
I always struggle to convey gratefulness for messages like this and readership- especially repeated readership. My life would be different if it were not for comments and messages egging us on to keep writing from syg to ho1c. While it's easy to say that writing is solely out of passion for the craft there is also the drive to share something with others. Hearing those others loud or quiet as a favorite- does push us forward when we have no motivation or desire to work. That drive has made us closer as a couple, better thinkers, and a halfway decent writing team. I thank you and all the others who send us stuff even if it's shit post asks I never answer because I like having them in my inbox like a personal horde of platonic Valentine's. I like keeping the pieces you give me to myself sometimes. I know it may seem like I'm ignoring you but I find genuine comfort in these messages. That there are so many. That they are so varied. That we have reached beyond our shut-in existence to touch the lives of others.
I find myself wondering where an anon has gone when I do not hear from them in awhile. I wish them well. I wish them better standards than us.
Maybe we'll meet again someday space cowboy. If you're ever back in town feel free to shoot me (a message).
Thank you for reaching out. Thank you for reading. I wish you peace and love and good books.
#though i may be inactive as of lates my thoughts have not been#abby and i talk about you#abby and i talk about a lot of you#we are happy to be present day comforts or 2020 nostalgia#🐚#anon#reply#long post
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Should Have Been Obvious
Fandom: My Hero Academia, Boku no Hero Academia
Rating: T
Genre: Humor
Summary: "How the actual fuck did I raise such a stupid brat?"
Even as the side of Katsuki's lip curled, he couldn't necessarily argue with his mother. He wanted to, he really, really did, but in this one case he had to concede that she was maybe, just slightly, kind of right.
It should have been obvious.
Words: 2,433
"How the actual fuck did I raise such a stupid brat?"
Even as the side of Katsuki's lip curled, he couldn't necessarily argue with his mother. He wanted to, he really, really did, but in this one case he had to concede that she was maybe, just slightly, kind of right. Partly because she hadn't been the first to say it - their friends, their former teachers, the others at their agency; hell, even Recovery Girl had broken her retirement and self imposed month long temporary isolation in Florida to give him a call and chew him out when she had heard the news. The doctors so far had been nicer about the whole thing, if with an air of judgment about them, reassuring him that, while rare, it could, in fact, happen. There'd been studies, tv shows, social experiments - they weren't the only ones this had happened to, though perhaps they were one of the most famous. That had only made him feel slightly better, because really, the other reason he didn't snap back at his mother was that, thinking about it, all of the signs had, if fact, been there.
It should have been obvious.
But, really, Izuku being sick at 3 am almost every single day for two months had been easy to write off. The damn nerd was constantly getting cheap crap from convenience stores for snacks on his way home from patrols, no matter how much Katsuki tried to protest. So they had both just laughed (or, rather, Katsuki had laughed, Izuku had bemoaned) it off as his stomach finally taking its revenge now that he was in his mid-20s.
The back and chest pain? Well, they were both heroes - things were constantly getting tweaked and twisted and hit, and even when they had desk duty, Izuku never sat properly. He was always hunched over his laptop, muttering under his breath instead of keeping track of his HDMI cables so he could use the nice, comfortable chairs and large monitors the agency had gotten them.
Being tired? The nerd never slept. End of story, he was always tired, and so was Katsuki, depending on whether or not Izuku had kept him awake as well. Sometimes a happy tired, if he'd gotten his dick wet at least, but more often then not a frustrated tired, his lovely, wonderful husband and mate keeping him awake half the night because they just had to talk about the new quirk theory he'd come up with. A talk that couldn't wait until their, you know, shared patrol the next day, or shared lunch hour, or dinner, where they lived together.
Crying easily? Izuku had already been flooding the city on a daily basis because a child knew his name, and if someone insulted one of their friends (especially him), they had exactly three seconds to find somewhere to hide and pray before he tried to rip them a new asshole for shits and giggles. Moodswings had always been part of Izuku, and nothing new to their lives.
Neither of them had thought much about Izuku's missed heat; he'd always been irregular, ever since he'd gotten One for All, going from the standard one every three months to sometimes six months in between a heat, or sometimes only two. Their mating and medications had helped, for the most part, but a missed one was nothing to worry about. For sure nothing to call home or run to a doctor about, but instead just a scheduled off long weekend to take advantage of.
Though, perhaps his reluctance to take apart the elaborate nest he'd established in the living room should have sent up some flags. Katsuki was glad for the small bite scar on his hand now, and the fact that the nest was still there, left alone after Izuku had made it very clear it was staying. They'd need it, even if it was ugly as fuck and in the worst place possible. It smelled like them, sure, but he still hated the fact that they owned an Icy Hot blanket, and for some reason Izuku had put that bastard's merch right where it was most visible wherever you went in the apartment.
Sure, the weird food had been weird, but none of it had been too too strange. Katsuki had gagged the first time he'd seen Izuku eat pork rinds and m&ms ("It's just like chocolate covered bacon, Kacchan!"), and more than once Katsuki had wondered why and how he'd let himself get bullied out of his own house to try and find melon pudding in the middle of the night, but again, not too weird. Or, rather, neither of them had really just thought about it.
Damn it, Denki was rubbing off on him too much. He really was a dumbass.
To be fair, in their defense, there had been some pretty obvious things that hadn't been there as well. Izuku's scent had barely changed, the slightest extra sweetness of milk barely there under the lighting and mint. He'd barely put on any extra weight, his increased appetite quickly burned off by the amount of exercise they did each day. They were both already horny fucks, so any increase in that area hadn’t been that noticeable.
It hadn't been until earlier that day that they'd begun to suspect something was maybe, just maybe, wrong. Izuku had woken up complaining of a weird pressure in his lower stomach, strange cramps that he couldn't just walk off. Katsuki had suggested he take the day off, go to the doctor, but Izuku had been insistent on doing his shift first. They had a short, early day, so they could always swing by whichever hospital was closest to them when they clocked out.
"I'm fine, Kacchan," Izuku had said, his smile tight even as he rubbed at his lower back, hissing as another cramp hit him. "It's probably just some stomach thing from all the weird things I've been eating."
He'd wanted to push, but deciding it was better to not argue and just keep a close eye on him, Katsuki had just nodded and gotten ready for the day.
He should have pushed. Throughout the day it was clear how much the cramps had been bothering Izuku, citizens giving him strange, almost panicked looks each time he stopped and pressed his hand to his stomach or his back, biting back whatever noise of pain threatened to break free. Some had even given Katsuki angry, disapproving looks, though when he had just shrugged and rubbed Izuku's back until he insisted he was fine enough for them to continue, that seemed enough for people to drop it. At least until the alerts went off for the robbery.
He wasn't even sure now what the name of the place was, whether it was a bank or some kind of store, just that one of the villains had some kind of x-ray quirk to let them figure out where the best goods to take were, while the other could pull apart the metal and bricks to fill their bags. He and Deku had been the first on the scene, making enough of an entrance that, without turning off the weird eye thing the woman had been doing, both villains had turned towards them, more than ready to fight.
Only for Creepy Eyes to take one look at Izuku and throw her hands up, hitting her partner on the way so she would do the same.
“What the actual fuck is wrong with you? You need to be in a hospital, not running around being a hero for one fucking day. We’re thieves, we’re not getting involved in this shit and possibly hurting one of you.” Her voice had been panicked, each blink causing her eyes to flicker between black and green as she lowered herself to the ground. “And you,” the snarl had taken Katsuki off guard, he’d admit - plenty of villains had growled at him before, but never with this kind of tone - “what kind of alpha are you? I know he’s the number one hero and all the shit, but really? You really care that little about him that you didn’t take him to the hospital already? Fucking shitty mate is what you are.”
Katsuki had bristled at the accusation, words he technically understood but that all together meant shit. Not that he had had time to do anything: his face dark, Izuku had taken a few steps forward, power crackling through his limbs, mouth open to speak-
Only to freeze as another one of those cramps rippled through him, this time accompanied by wetness that had stained the back of his pants, soaking through and dripping down his legs onto the dusty floor.
The next few hours had been blurry, Katsuki had to admit. Bird Brain flying in on his wave of darkness to take over for them while they waited for the ambulance; the ride as the EMTs helped Izuku out of his hero costume, asking him questions Katsuki fired off the answers to, because he knew Izuku more than well enough to respond even as his husband gritted his teeth against the strange pain, scent sharp and stressed and scared; the hospital trying to pull him to the side so he could fill out forms (he might or might not have tried to bite someone) until someone with brains had told them to do it later, this was happening now.
The room, the doctors, too many voices and not enough answers as he tried to keep Izuku calm. Calm and breathing and following the few instructions one of the smiling nurses had come by his head to give him (smiling, so that had to mean he wasn’t dying, something Katsuki had latched onto), ignoring his own pained hand as Izuku squeezed it between the waves. Waves that part of Katsuki had realized were more than some stomach bug, but he’d been proven an idiot, a complete dumbass, because it hadn’t been until the end, when Izuku had been screaming and crying and accidentally kicked someone in the face that it had gone quiet, that it had ended and whatever had been going on was over, that a small, whimpering newborn had been placed on Izuku’s chest that he’d actually realized what it all meant.
“Fucking hell,” he’d breathed, eyes wide and slightly faint as he’d watched Izuku carefully push back the dark hair on their head. Watched as, exhausted and out of it, Izuku had nuzzled the infant before trying to find a nurse, frowning as his tired gaze had fallen on Katsuki himself.
“They gave me a baby, Kacchan,” Izuku had slurred, eyes drooping, barely awake. “We’re heroes - we need to find her parents.”
“Give her here, nerd,” Katsuki had said, though it had taken a long few moments and some gentle swipes of his wrists over Izuku’s to get him to actually let go of her. “Go to sleep; I got her.”
And that was still how he was now, two hours after his daughter’s birth. He’d called his mom, given her the bare jist of it - she’d grabbed Inko on her way over, his dad out of the country for some business meeting, his green-haired mother-in-law quietly fawning over her still sleeping son. The doctor had given him something, after hearing the whole story, to help with healing and keep him calm when he woke up, though he’d sleep for a bit longer. Mitsuki sat next to him, looking between her phone and granddaughter, eyes bright even as she berated him and fielded calls. Stupid villain had leaked everything to the media the first chance she’d gotten, and Katsuki was glad he had someone to deal with the fallout of their stupidity for them.
He sure as fuck couldn’t. Besides calling the old hag, he’d barely been able to take his eyes off of her. She was so small, could fit in his arms so easily, his daughter. Perfectly healthy, if a bit small and a little bit early, nothing to be concerned about, according to the doctor that had almost had to pry her from his hands to give her her first checkover. A miracle, in Katsuki’s mind, considering there’d been nothing that he knew they should have been doing; none of the vitamins, none of the classes, none of the special exercises or appointments or anything that those shitty lifetime movies always made such a big deal out of.
They were dumbasses, as his mother so loved to remind him every few minutes as she replied to calls and texts and coordinated with PR, but even so they’d made the best kid.
“Kacchan?”
Immediately he was at Izuku’s side; he knew he was purring, brushing his cheek over and over against Izuku’s as he held their baby in his arms, scenting him excessively as Izuku just looked at him in tired confusion, but Katsuki couldn’t bring himself to stop. He’d had two whole extra hours to process this shit, and fuck, sure, brats had always been a “When we get to them” kind of thing, but she was here and perfect and he was happy.
“So it wasn’t a dream.” His voice tired and awed, Izuku just reached out for the baby, their baby, and brushed his wrist over her, scenting her, smiling as she squirmed at the sensation. “Kacchan, we have a baby. We didn’t even know I was pregnant and now we have a daughter.” He was tearing up, taking the offered tissues from Inko as Katsuki just sat there and let him process, nuzzling him while holding their child tight between them. “What are we going to tell everyone?”
“Don’t worry about that, ‘Zuku,” Katsuki quickly said, shooting Mitsuki a look they both understood. He didn’t need to know about the media circus show, about how Momo had created a key to their apartment and their friends were already swarming their home with baby shit, that the world was talking and speculating and wondering about how they’d gotten into this predicament in the first place (since a hero almost giving birth on the field was a new one). “Right now you need to rest, and we need to figure out what we’re calling this cute little brat.”
“Don’t call your kid a brat, you stupid brat. How I raised such a dumbass, I’ll never know.”
Katsuki wanted to argue, but really, she was right. He was a dumbass - a lucky as fuck, happy dumbass, and at least now he knew what to look for next time.
[END]
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#the 9 one queues it#mha#my hero academia#BkDk#BakuDeku#KatsuDeku#bakugou katsuki#izuku midoriya#Omegaverse#alpha katsuki#omega izuku#didn't know he was pregnant#mpreg#MHA fanfic#MHA fanfiction#BkDk fanfic
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Curation 2024: Flesh and Marble
Hey! You got an hour?
I love curation. I like taking the unending deluge of information, of sensations, of stuff that the world throws at us, and I just. I think one of the kindest, most gentle things you can do for another person is say "look at this. Decision paralysis is banished, information overload is dead, check out this story I've created. Look at these specific rocks out of the infinite combinations of rocks there are. Not just these rocks, but this order. See the narrative? There's a through line, if you look. Trust Me. Take my hand."
I love making playlists for that exact reason. You almost have to make them like throwing pots, with a reckless abandon that allows for a stroke of inspiration. But also, you kind of have to be allowed to let a few off the wheel lumpy and potential but not fully realized. You gotta Get Down with the concept of failure. To burn through them until you find just the right combination of songs that captures a feeling, a time, a memory. A museum of music.
I like museums because they are, more than anything, a signpost for what we find important. A landmark. The public art of city streets given form in an art museum, sometimes even through that same public art, often divorced of context, because museums don't let themselves be weird enough. To commit to the bit enough.Too few museums truly curate, truly immerse in the story. Give you a reason to follow the threads they lay. You start to almost resent it. Get in your feelings. Feel Sum Kinda Way. But once you learn to speak museum, you realize that they can only meet you halfway, and you are your own curator as you wander hallowed halls and learn about building materials, about Rothko, about postage stamps. You pick your own adventure. And you fall in love with museums all over again.
So when I find a museum or something that I enjoy, I just. Lose It. I want to share it. I want to take you along and say "LOOK AT THIS. How Does It Make You Feel." I want you to share in the wonder, and the marvel. So sometimes I even write. Sometimes I say, I can enchant you, ensnare you. I can bring you along the line, into the fold, I can capture a sunray for the length of a paragraph. Time frozen in amber, in service of you seeing just a touch of the magic.
I almost died again this year. Maybe more than once. There's Comedy in death. Even near death. We have to let ourselves laugh at it. We stay silly right? You can't greet death as an old friend if you're scared of him. But you can't chase after him either. He's coy. He's shy. He'll come when he's ready. And I'm not ready now either.
I don't think I'm as scared anymore though. I wouldn't say You're My Best Friend, Death. But you're certainly no stranger. You're not someone I would turn away, and I would share a drink with you. I would be tender, I think. You have it rough too.
I think this year of all things I'm falling in love again. I fell out of love with life, a while back. It was rough and it was scary and I didn't feel like myself. And I still don't, but we all know time pulls us forward, yadda yadda, you can't step into the same river twice, you are a construct and all constructs are ever changing, time stole my front porch; can't have shit in ship of theseus. I Want To Know Your Plans, time, but the future is that quote from Nightvale, always flinching first, leaving me only a present.
So I'm different now. In the present. In some ways worse. in some better. I think I'm gentler, at least I hope so. I want to be kinder. I want to treat people with care. And I want to share an idea to cap off this year, because I want to have curated my own experience, and maybe I can help you fall in love with life again too. Next year is going up, because I am on the Up and Up.
I can't get past the idea of choice. What makes the gardener pick flowers or weeds? The tastes of the gardener. What they cultivate, what they choose. They curate their garden and all of living is just. This same action again and again, on larger or smaller scales. When I was little I tried to get into Rollerblades. I thought they were super cool, I thought I'd be a cool kid in rollerblades. But I was drawn to biking. I still bike now. You can stand, if you dare, with the wind blowing through you, wheels turning all on their own, you king of the world on your personal palantir. You can pump your legs and get your heart singing and I can't imagine my life if I'd picked rollerblades. You know?
I started chasing an idea halfway through this, but to loop back to what I wanted to explain is- I want to curate my experience of this year. I want to be able to point to this year down the line and show just why it mattered- not for the time everyone will think, but the time that happened after. I looked at my life and said, I can Make It Better. I can rebuild it, different this time. I can be me, but a little further down the river. A few more boards replaced.
Can I do it? Can I Be Him? The me I want to be, the one who took this year and kindled something bright? I miss my surety. I miss my certainty. Everything feels like a big muddy middle right now, and I don't think I can ever reach as high or as low as I once did. But I think I can be steadily climbing up. Boot up bitch, the stairs are slippery but it turns out you have nothing but time.
My mom wants me to move home. She's scared, for me, out here "alone". She doesn't think my friends took good care of me, given what happened in March. I can't blame her. I wasn't taken good care of. I wouldn't let people, I hid it all. I was ashamed. I was embarassed. It's Hard To Live In The City, but not for the reasons my mom thinks- there's so much going on here. There's so much information and so many things to know and see and do, you can hide in plain sight. You can craft a narrative. You can shape the experience so that what you are, what you need, who you have become is hidden.
I know now that I need to be seen, to be known. I need other people to get who I am. But I'm not Fred Astaire- I can't be someone to everyone, even just a name. I have to curate (sick of me yet?) my own experience. My own image. I have to choose who my audience is now. It's tougher to decide who is worth your attention (And it is attention- that's all an audience is). It feels like gardening. Who's a flower and who's a weed. I don't like it. But you have to, to live. And I'm tired of not living.
And so I walk forward from my own Easter rebirth. Shaky legged, on stilts like Bambi, just becoming a new man. I hate it but you make yourself every day, don't you? Why would now be any different. I'm just more aware of it. It'll fade, with time. Like the scar it is. But I don't want to forget this feeling. I want to remember it. To have a story to tell that circles around it, gives it edges and definition. And so I wrote this.
It's part playlist. It's part poetry. It's prose, but it's prosaically just a list of songs as well. I sat down to write and my hands started moving, and I got here, with you. Are you still with me? I'm glad. I'm glad I'm still here, and I'm glad you're here with me. I'm even glad I'm still awake,writing this instead of sleeping. What's The Time Where You Are? Here it's late-about 1AM. And I have to finish this, I'm almost done. I wanted to leave you somewhere better than we started. This story is going up, remember?
I've picked a better audience, actually. That's a good first step. They're not the King Of My Heart, but they might be as close as it gets. I feel sweet. I feel simple. I feel at ease. But more importantly I feel like I can do. I can accomplish. I can rest. I can recover. I can just. Be.
Maybe this music isn't to your liking. But that's ok, I Don't Mind. I didn't make it for you to fall in love with. I made it to make you fall in love with the idea. I want you to curate your own life. You have to. Or you're not living. I want you to love the life that you've made. I don't love mine yet. But I want to, and I'm going to. And that's that on that.
I guess the elephant in the room is, why Flesh and Marble? Why not Clay, like old man Ozymandius? It ties better to the throwing pots above. Of getting muddy biking, of being down in the dirt before rising three days later. Even now I'm thinking that Feet of Clay is a much better title. But I like Flesh and Marble. The first song I put on here was a similar title structure. But I didn't want to give the concept air time, actually- too close to March for my liking, although the song was great. It just wasn't the vibe. But the name was close. And the artist. Armani Caesar. What a name! So I guess. The title is an oblique reference. A circumnavigation of the problem. A polite, detached nod to the impetus whilst giving it no credit.
But yeah. I hope you've listened, as you've gone. The songs matter a great deal to me this year, and they almost always do. I'm sappy and I stick to a song once I love it. I'll love it for 10 years. 20 years. 100 years. I attach so fast, and sometimes forever, if indelibly.
Curate your life. Build something of value. And by god find beauty or you'll die.
Peace.
#Yearly Curation#Deeply Personal Bullshit in here#also some writing. Most of it bad but I feel better having done it.#Curation 2024
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So, if I know my Mesa Island geography, we should be getting pretty close to Songshroom Marsh. Wonder if Yoyo's still hanging around here?
That's, uh... that's... not an ominous name or anything....
This place... doesn't seem quite as fun as Luana made it sound.
Okay, full disclosure, I was actually trying to drown myself in the mire because I want to tell Quarble about all the cool stuff I did.
But this is cool too. I guess the moral of the story is that sometimes attempted suicide comes with neat prizes. If they ever write a fable about all the things I learned on my travels, I'll be sure to include that.
Holy shit, the Magic Seashell? The one from Watcher Island that lets you breathe underwater?
Wait, no, I can already do that for some reason. Plus, it doesn't really look that cute. Luana said it was a cute pink clamshell thing. She was very excited about it. But this more resembles a slug.
That does sound like it relates to the magic Docarri shells, though. Hmm....
Yeah. Uh. What the hell happened to this place? Luana didn't like it very much but what she described pales in comparison to how tortured and gross the marsh is.
Also, she called it Songshroom but the sign at the entrance said Quillshroom. So. Obviously some changes have taken place.
Oh, is it the cool magic seashell I found? 'Cause I found it. You can't have it back. It's mine now, as laid down in the Mine Now, Fucko bylaw.
Primal Fear... fuck, I know that name. It's... somewhere. Maybe one of Teaks's stories? I don't know. I've heard it before. I know I've heard it before.
No, wait! It was one of the volumes of prophecy that Yoyo kept in her cabin. She had a book on Primal Fear. That's where I know the name from.
Is. That. Where the living mushrooms come from?
...Luana wrote about them singing. The ones I've seen have not been singing. I don't think they're enjoying their fungal lives anymore.
With gusto.
I can't believe you told me to fight it! Do you have any idea how humiliated I was!? That was the most embarrassing moment of my goddamn life.
And I once screwed up Cloudstep practice so hard I ended up dangling from a tree branch by my pants around my ankles. I met Quarble on a return trip through a challenge I'd already solved. So the competition is steep.
How many times have you sent members of my order to their graves to pick a fight with a harmless glowball minding his fucking business!?
FUCK. No wonder Luana called probably-you an assclown!
WHAT. NO. I don't really see much relevance or importance in your stories - I think the pear tree one might have been about Yoyo maybe? - but I've been enjoying them nonetheless.
I'll stop touching your cabinet if you keep sharing stories with me. ._. Pweese?
Oh, there's the singing mushrooms. Okay, so they are still here.
They. Uh. They don't look very cheerful, though. Luana said they were cheerful.
Gotta say, not a fan of the titular quillshrooms. Their quills are incredibly difficult to dodge, especially when they fire while I'm in midair. What total assholes.
As a botanophobe, I can't be surprised by this, but fungus is far more dangerous than turtles.
...how stupid do I feel like being today?
I am... passably competent at the Cloudstep. I think I could--
Okay, I want it on record that I actually made it, but was killed by a Quillshroom afterwards. After being thoroughly tenderized by spikes in the process of making it but that's beside the point. The point is I'm awesome and this is definitely going down as a W in my book.
Not important. What's important is HEY BESTIE, check out where we are? Yeah, that's right, I'm blazing trails through Quillshroom Marsh with my expert jumping and profound getting-stabbed proficiencies.
I know we were in Howling Grotto last we talked but I... found the exit of my own accord and nothing else happened. Now we're here. Trying to not be here as expediently as possible because I don't want to be a mushroom.
...
Why is this my life?
...we've found one secret path beneath the mire. I wonder... This does look very suspicious.
They thought they could hide their secrets from me. Joke's on them, I am highly skilled in observation and pattern recog--
I think I hate this place.
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Man, I really hate it when I'm reading something and the plot is incredibly good. Like so very good and then it just becomes smut. Pure smut. The amount of times this has happened to me is ridiculous. To each their own of course, I'm not hating on those writers. Everyone has their interests and if that's what they like then I'm happy they feel comfortable enough to share. It's just so difficult to find stories where characters remain platonic or where they don't just have sex a bunch to deepen their bond. Idk. Am I being a prude or an ass for thinking like this?
Are you talking about books or fics? :v
If the latter I highly suggest using the filters to blacklist. There's a guide here! Then just stick to rated G or T and avoid anything with tags that imply there's smut in it (there will still be people who don't tag their shit BUT try to avoid those). In general M or E is always gonna contain some kinda smut, or at least references to sex. Sometimes it's for violence/language but that's rare.
If it's books it's usually pretty easy to tell which books will have smut lol (at least in my experience, I avoid romance books generally)... if there's a shirtless or scantly-clad person on the cover it's prolly gonna have it. You can also check goodreads and sometimes you can tell based on comments and ratings if there will be smut, you can also just ask in the questions section.
You're not a prude or being an ass at all my friend!! Everybody's got stuff they're cool with and stuff they're not cool with. Heck, I have stretches of time where I'm super sex-repulsed and can't look at anything containing sex without wanting to gag. It's not at all unreasonable!
I'm not quite sure where to look for this BUT you may look for books/fics featuring asexual/aromantic characters. There aren't a ton but I know they exist! r/asexuality and/or r/aromantic as well as other internet forums may be helpful with locating books like this- there tends to be some overlap between the two so a lot of the time you'll find people looking for aroace stuff in one or the other. Also I have just today found out the term for romance books without smut is called "closed door" or "clean" romance so that's interesting
And remember: be the change you wanna see in the world! Maybe pick up writing and write the kind of relationship you prefer? It doesn't have to be a full-on book, maybe a fic or a short story with ocs? It can be super fun and fulfilling while also hitting that niche you crave
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Ugh so I am not happy with how my @inklings-challenge story is turning out. I like the idea, don't think it's executed the best and it's not done, but I want to publish some of it anyway. Maybe sharing some of it will help. This as been a great exercise so far for me though. Any feedback is appreciated.
I fully intend to rework this into something bigger. I've got other ideas...
Anyway. Here is part of Strange Gods.
Look, you won’t be hearing telling this story at any other time, but it’s a party and I’m a little drunk. You know how it is, after almost everyone’s gone home, it’s late August and the air’s warm but it’s almost midnight and it’s got that coolness in the air, plastic chairs are huddled around a dying fire and it’s only the friends that are closer than brothers. The heart’s nocturnal. I guess this is when it comes out.
So here we are and I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you and I don’t care what you think. Well. I guess that’s not true. I don’t know if we did the right thing. But you’re not the one we have to answer to.
Since Brad brought you in with us, I guess you know we used to be a band. Strange Gods. Ever heard of it? Well, little before your time. We were never big. Mostly local shows and Metal Fests. Opened for some bigger names a couple times. We had fun, we had hair longer than our girlfriends’ and sometimes more makeup then them too. Mostly we were just guys in jeans and T-shirts with a passion for music. We fancied ourselves artists. My wife calls music “the art most like divinity”. Like how God could just speak and His words obeyed and music is a little like that. Ours was more like a sneeze than divine speech maybe but she loved it still. I still play for her, sometimes.
Oh the best part was the fans. The girls. You know how it is. You’re kinda weird in high school, a little awkward, but then you start strumming on a guitar, you say oh yeah I play drums in a band and suddenly you’re doing ok.
The worst part? The fans. We weren’t too big, but you’d get recognized every now and again. Sometimes it was all cool, just talking about music and shit. Other times people got a little weird. They thought oh, here’s someone famous, and then you’re almost not human to them anymore. But it was usually alright. And there was one in particular that I—none of us—will ever forget.
The kid was a local. Not much younger than us, but a hell of a lot more awkward. It was alright though. He wore these glasses and those kinds of shirts with full moons and yellow-eyed wolves scattered on the front and he’d sort of talk at the ground instead of at you and he loved the fact that a lot of our songs were based on local history and legend—half-hanged witches, wolves with a thirst for human flesh in winter, earth that won’t accept the dead—a lot of what you’d expect. Well this kid’s name was…I’ll call him Louis. Louis met us at Outer Realms (you know that pub on 114th?) after a very small gig, but we hadn’t been in Strange Gods for very long, so even small gigs were celebrated. Maybe we would have been more weirded out by this kid kinda staring and shyly shuffling up to us if we were sober but you know what, it was ok. Jason even let him have one of his guitar picks and we got him a beer, which he accepted enthusiastically but didn’t drink once. He said he loved having someone write songs about all the stories his dad told him as a kid. He said if we wanted more inspiration, he could help us. He collected stories, he said, the ones you whispered at sleepovers and summer camps, the ones that changed a little bit every time you told them, the ones almost nobody really believed. And we were like, hell yeah brother. That’s how Louis became our consultant for lyrics. Winter Walker, Thy Iron Refine, and Dance at the Bottom of the Sea all had songs with lyrics by him. But he never wanted credit, never wanted his name listed on the albums. He just seemed content to hang out at our house and tell us stories. Whenever we went on tour he would ask us to collect legends of the cities we visited. Brad told him he was welcome to join us but he just smiled at the ground and shook his head. He liked it here. Why would anyone ever want to leave?
Louis was friends with us for almost two years. He even spent Thanksgiving and Christmas with us since he didn’t have anyone else since his dad had died. He worked two part-time jobs, one at Seeny’s Pizza Arcade and one at the post office sorting letters, but most evenings and weekends he would come join us, sometimes bringing over a new boardgame all the way from Europe or a home-baked apple-pie (this guy could bake). Or he’d go on long walks wandering in the woods and fields outside town.
One day in November Louis didn’t show up for our usual Saturday night jam. We were working on the song Night Rite for the album that ended up being Seven Red Seeds and he was supposed to show up and work on lyrics with me and Jason. We were supposed to be filming a music video to go along with the new release and that was pretty exciting. But the kid never showed. We shrugged it off. After all, he was a bit of a loner. Besides us he didn’t seem to have any friends. He took long walks, sometimes after midnight.
Yeah. I’ll have to answer for not looking a little harder sooner.
Brad tried calling him Sunday with no pick-up. We drove down to the house that he rented from Mrs. Ozeki, but she said he want out on one of his little tramps at around 4pm yesterday, but she hadn’t heard him come in.
No, it’s alright. I’m fine, I’m just getting a little too sober I guess. I mean it’s not alright but it has to be.
We reported his disappearance after checking in with his work and learning he didn’t show up there either. The police investigated us, briefly. We were basically the only people he hung out with and maybe all the songs about murdered kings and lost whaling ships freaked them out a bit. Ultimately they ruled us out. They ruled almost everything out.
Brad, Jason, and I were all volunteers for when they swept the woods in long lines looking for scraps of clothing, his glasses, anything. I remember us all looking at each other, thinking the same thing, but Jason was the only one who said it out loud. He said, I don’t want to be the one to find his body.
The most they found when they swept the woods was his camera. Someone else had found it and we never got to see what exactly was on the film. Someone clearly has. The newspapers speculated about if it had held any clues, but any questions for the Sheriffs department was met with a “we do not believe the photographs from the victim’s camera hold any information about what led to his disappearance.” Yeah, bullshit. We heard stories around about most of the pictures just being of the few remaining winter robins, which Louis loved. And then everyone had a different version of what was on the last three. Some said close shots of a man in a red windbreaker. Some said blurry images of a great white wolf like the legends.
But the one that we all thought sounded the most real, was that of a field. You know the one near the old Pressfield cemetery? Photos of seemingly nothing but brown grass and gray skies but in the distance what looks like an enormous black bird flying near the ground. And over the last few photographs, the thing gets closer and closer, until the last picture is a smeared mess of Louis turning around, I guess to run. I don’t know for sure though. I pray to Christ I never do.
What we saw was enough.
In the end the case ran absolutely cold. They had nothing. If some psycho got him, he left no trace. If he got hurt and died of exposure, where was the body? If an animal got him, where was the blood and torn clothing? He sure as hell didn’t just ditch town out the blue.
We took a little time off from everything. It just didn’t feel right, you know, writing about death and ghost stories when our weird little friend had just become one. I’ll always wonder. If he thought, you know, this is fitting. To become what I have always chased. God I’m still drunk. Of course not. You don’t think about all the badness you write songs about until you can’t even bury someone’s son.
His uncle and a few cousins came down to collect his things and clear everything up. The oldest cousin met with us a few times, let us know that she was glad Louis had had some people here after his dad had passed away. She invited us to the little funeral they had at Salve Regina Church. Brad almost didn’t go. He gave in eventually but he sat in the back and didn’t stay afterward. No, I’d never been until then. There were moments, you know, moments where I forgot why we were there and the strange chants and the candles and the silence dropped over you like heavy night and bright day and I remember looking at the wrinkled man in black and gold and thinking, this is crazy and I think I’m wanting to be crazy too.
The priests shook our hands as we left and spoke to us about Louis and about how he would pray for us and ask the other Fathers to pray for us too. And they nodded and smiled gravely and the taller one, Father Nicholas, said, we will be happy to see you next Sunday. And Jason said we’d think about it.
Eventually we had to get going with life again. Things felt a little more somber. I mean really somber, not this adolescent misery we’d been playing with. We stopped going to Outer Realms after every work day, Brad flushed all our weed. It just felt cheap. Jason spent more time with his little sisters during his free time, Brad flew back to Chicago for a few days during Christmas to spend it with his parents. Me? I hung around. My future wife was here and that’s where I wanted to be.
It was mid-February when our producer started kicking us to get back into finishing our songs and making the music video that had been put on hold. And you know I guess without really discussing it, we knew what we wanted to do.
Dies Irae isn’t our most famous song, but I don’t care, it’s our best. When we talked it over with our producer, we drew a hard line: Pressfield cemetery. That old one where they found that kid’s camera? Yeah, that’s the one. We want it filmed there.
That’s what we said and that’s what we did. And yeah, old natures die hard, it was still over-the-top, it still had some goth-looking girls (one of whom eventually became my wife), and when we got there it was freezing and gray and brown-iced earth. It was still us and we hoped it would still be Louis.
We had a couple of days to film. On the first day Jason went for a little walk around the perimeter of the cemetery, fingers red from the cold as he held his cigarette, and when he came back around he looked a little jumpy. He said, I don’t like it here. Them birds are talking. Talking? Yeah talking. Well, laughing.
It felt weird being there again. There was a feeling in the air even from the film crew that had never been there before. One said it was bad luck to be walking around all these bodies and the only reason he was doing this was because he needed the money.
And it was weird to think that the gravestone that had Louis’s name carved into it was just a false monument.
On the third and last day it started pouring rain. Just pounding. You couldn’t hardly see a damned thing in front of you. It was the kinda rain that hurt when it hit you it was coming down so hard.
We were packing up, almost everyone had left, when Jason comes up to our pick-up and asks if we heard a weird noise. Weird noise? Well hell yeah, those girls were wild. No, he says, I ain’t kidding. Like a growl but more human. Like a scream, but more animal. Well, we kind of laugh at him, say it’s probably a cougar. And before Brad can make a joke about that—
There it is. It’s not a scream. It’s something that slices through the tombstones and rattles the eardrums so it was a sound—but of what I don’t know. I don’t know. Everyone got this look, this dead look like the world fell out beneath our feet. Nobody said a word. It sounded like it had come from somewhere in the middle of the cemetery. And there was a smell too. You know when it rains it mixes up the dirt and the plants and it just shocks you with the scent? It was like that, but as if the dirt was freshly dug and something rotten was unearthed.
And like I said, you couldn’t hardly see. Just dark blotches where the graves were blinking in and out of sight between raindrops. We just stood there, watching, listening. My heart has never pounded harder. I saw those rumors in my mind of gray skies and something big flying towards you and those are the last pictures you ever take.
Finally nothing happens and we start looking at each other, feeling like of course it was just an animal prowling around. Gosh, you had us scared man. Let’s get the hell out, let’s get back to my place, I’m cooking alfredo and Brad’s got a couple of bottles from the producer’s vineyard. Sure it was nice of him to share. Yeah actually I did get that girl’s number, the one with the green eyes? Come on, get the heat on, I’m freezing.
And we’re driving away, the noise forgotten—except Jason keeps looking out the rear window, just quick little checks. I pretend not to notice. But he twitches a couple of times, opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something, but no. He keeps quiet. Eventually he stops looking and seems to relax.
I don’t stop though. And a couple of times through the sheets of rain and the obstruction of the trees, I wonder if I see something wet, dark, and shiny slinking along the road. But it’s impossible to tell.
I get up the next morning and find this thing slung across the back porch. The ground is still soaked from last night’s rain but it hasn’t managed to wash away the shear amount of blood that’s coating the concrete patio. And I need you to get this. It was so much blood. You could’ve splashed around it. My stomach almost couldn’t take it. My sense of smell certainly didn’t.
Brad and Jason got up because of the smell. They shuffled out like the dead awakened and found me staring at this thing on the porch. Jason started retching and I told him to puke in the sink. I wasn’t about to clean up this thing and then clean up after him. What the hell is it? Brad says. Who cares? It’s got to get off the porch. Looks like a malformed-newlyborn-mut or something. Maybe it got suckered by a car.
We dug it as deep as we could and it crossed my mind that, damn, maybe we shouldn’t have a thing that smells that bad, a thing that looks that rotted decomposing God knows what into the soil. And Brad didn’t say anything but I knew we were thinking the same thing. Something about it just feels wrong. Like we shouldn’t be touching it. Like we shouldn’t have even looked at it. It crossed my mind that maybe Father Nicholas could come over and do whatever it is priests do to make things clean.
The paws though, check those out. They kinda look like hands, thinking maybe it’s a raccoon but the bastards too big. Good lord, it looks almost rotten. Maybe something else dropped it off. On the porch? On my porch man? Get the hose too, we got to wash off the whole backyard after this. Get the shovel and help me out—of course we’re going to bury it, that’s just what you do. Something’ll dig it out of the trash if we chuck it in there. It looks sorry enough, that’s just what you do.
How big? Maybe about four feet long. It looked pathetic and disgusting and I didn’t tell Brad this but I almost was glad. Maybe that ain’t it. But it felt right that we had our shovels and we were digging a hole and we were going to lay this bloody pulp in it. Father Nicholas once told me about things being fitting. And I guess that’s what it was, fitting.
No, I didn’t, make that connection, between this thing and what we heard in Pressfield cemetery. Not yet. But you know how it is. You never think you’re going to get a story out of something while you’re in it.
The thing was buried and we scrubbed ourselves off and then moved on with our day. Jason seemed much quieter, but he’d been that way since Louis vanished. So maybe it was nothing.
During the night I drempt I was on a boat. It was a boat that my parents had taken me to once, on a family vacation to Main. It was white and blue and unlike that July day years ago, the sea was wine-red and wild with storm. The waves were flooding the deck and the red foam left behind looked like clumps of flesh. I was stumbling around, looking for my mom or my dad or anyone at all—but the deck was empty. I found the door that led down into the lower deck, and the wood was almost black. I put my hand against the icy door, about to push it open, but somehow through the crashing of the waves I heard a scratch, like a single long claw dragging from the top of the frame all the way down to the bottom. I pressed my ear to the door. I don’t think I was breathing. And I listened to the scratching go all the way back up and down, slowly, over and over again.
When I woke up, it was still dark and at first I was thinking I was still sleeping. The scratching sound was still ringing in my ears, and I sat up trying to shake it away. My stomach churned. The clock said 2:36 A.M. I turned my head to the small window that looked into the dark backyard and realized that the scratching noise was coming from that direction. A long, slow scratch from the top of the window to the bottom.
I wasn’t as scared as you’d think. Maybe I was still too asleep, maybe all my panic had been used up over the last few days but I found myself crawling over to the window and just—waiting. I couldn’t see jack. I hadn’t flicked on my lamp. I just waited until the scratching started over at the top and I followed it down the glass, trying to see something, anything. But all I could see was what looked like a glint of a knife and a clearly defined scratch down the middle of the pane. And that’s when it kicked in, me getting scared. Someone was dragging a Goddamn knife down my window.
The most sensible thing to do, or at least the most sensible thing my half-awake brain could think of to do, was go wake up Brad and get the rifles from underneath his bed. He was not happy. He told me I should quite drinking so much before bed, but eventually he got up, gun on his shoulder.
I kept the light off and nodded to my window. We held our breath listening. Brad got closer, looking out into the blackness. The scratching had stopped and I didn’t see anything outside. But Brad noticed the crack in the glass and suddenly looked very awake.
I’m going to go check outside, he said, and as he headed toward the back door, the one closest to my bedroom, there was a series of loud slams that sounded like a person jumping off the roof. At this point Jason was up, and he’s asking what the hell was going on and Brad told him there’s a wildcat clawing Steve’s window or some crap. I’m going to fire a shot up and scare it away.
But two things happened before Brad could slide open the back door. I hadn’t thought about it until now, but there was an familiar smell that had been growing steadily stronger, a rotten, turned-earth smell, and I couldn’t say anything except stop. Don’t open it, wait.
And Jason, stone still looking out the back window at the porch right behind the door, called out the same thing. Stop.
That’s not a cougar. You gotta look.
I’m telling you, we did look. And there was the slimy pink thing with long skinny limbs crouched in front of the back door. It looked like it had a fleshy cape on its back and it twitched as if in pain. We watched unmoving as one long claw flicked up, digging into the door, dragging it down slowly to the ground, and then repeating the act, slowly, slowly.
And you just knew, you just knew, this was the thing that wasn’t supposed to be here.
No, no way, Brad was saying, this is getting too weird. We buried this thing. We put it in the ground. And it crawled out. And we saw it. It was dead. We threw it in the hole and it got back up.
Jason was still watching the thing as it lay on the doorstep. We don’t know if it was actually dead, he said. He said it in a whisper. Well you didn’t bury it, says Brad.
***
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I'm curious how can you manage to write something so deranged (complementary) and it's still amazing?? Like I've been trying to write something that's out of my comfort zone but always stop halfway or chickened out because I don't know where or how to write the character. Is there a tip or notes that you can share with us? I love your stories btw and I've read all of them. Thank you so much for sharing 😘 I hope you're successful in everything that you do.
okay let me see what advice i can give!
first tip: pick a work you think does this really well and print it out. grab some highlighters. go over it like a hawk, highlighting the places you think they nailed that you struggle with. is it because they use some special verbs? are they speeding up or slowing down action? skipping over details you think you have to include or it won't make any sense? take note of what verbs they use, how they choreograph, how they set up the space and scene. this is a bit of tedious process but it teaches you so much about how others do it if you're willing to put in the time, and is just a great writing habit overall imo.
second tip: i chicken out a lot too! sometimes i have to turn that shame around. like okay, what's stopping me. i'm posting something online and no one knows who i am irl, check. sometimes i make an entirely new ao3 account just to feel safe about it. sometimes that shame can be utilized in the characters. shame when used right can be really hot, because you want to show how much a character wants something, can't stop thinking about it, even though it makes them melt from shame. and then keep upping the ante until they can't resist the desire anymore.
third tip: contrary to popular belief i think almost any kink i feasibly care about can happen with any character if you build up the setting well enough. the simplest formula is framing it as a problem character A has, and character B offers a solution. limited POV to one character means limited knowledge, so you can also play with "oh my god why are they behaving so annoying/sluttily/weird around me? ooooh oh ok they want to do [nasty kink]" and then comes a period of reflection, wrestling with it. i sometimes straight up project my own thoughts into this zone to process and be able to actually write it hahaha. it's really sexy and good tension to show the internal friction of wanting something and getting just a taste, and realizing ah shit you want it even more now.
fourth tip: if the kink is really far out of your comfort zone, write like a stepping stone guide building up to it (say, lactation might be too far out. okay. breastplay? tit bondage? sucking on nipples really intensely? nipple clamps? oiled up breasts?). and see how far you can go along it. maybe you need to stop halfway in one fic but the next time you can go a little further, and the third time you make it all the way. it is completely fine and actually really cool to explore the same kinks over and over and i promise readers won't get tired!
fifth tip: this is more something i love to read than what i usually write myself, but: character A comes across a kink in media. they begin to research it, think about it, and maybe tell character B or B finds out through accident. turns out, B is intrigued and into it. this formula works really well in building up, pouring research into it, allowing yourself to linger in doubts and details and hesitations... this whole thing, is it a trope? it should be. i love it. and it works so well with so many kinks!
okay i hope even a smidge in here was of use to you, and if you need any help with more specifics or generics my askbox is always open!
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ok maybe i’ve just been seeing way too many twitter arguments about this, arguments which i don’t think really exist on tumblr, but i guess i wanted to share my opinion here.
when i was reading atyd a few years ago, i never read the characters being misogynistic in a “oh this author must hate women” type of way and more in a “sometimes people in the 70s were misogynistic without even realizing it” way.
like… i don’t get it when that’s included as like a “problematic” feature of the fic, because i felt it was realistic and i feel strongly that writers can write bad characters/bad things without they themself agreeing with those characters and things.
i simply don’t think writing something bad = endorsing it.
idk maybe it’s been a while since i last read atyd, and i know it does have some poor representation in other areas, but i never really felt offended as a “woman” (whatever that even means for me) when the characters said some misogynistic stuff because i just accepted the fic as a period piece trying to be somewhat realistic. like i’m sorry, a lot of guys in the 70s said some weird shit about women— yes, probably even the guys you like. ofc not every author has to be realistic about that stuff, but clearly a little bit of realism was an aim for atyd, and i don’t think that’s bad.
even in my own writing, i write stuff i don’t agree with. for example: opev. regulus is very progressive in that story because of his education and blah blah blah, and yet he still treats women, namely emma, in a way that i don’t necessarily like. i would never treat someone like that, but i realize that not only is the time period’s views different from now but also regulus has his own personal reasons to be behaving the way he does. i also write stuff like murder and cannibalism… but i am very against killing people and i am vegetarian. clearly i do not practice the things i write in my personal life.
i’m just telling a story that happens to have complex behaviors that i don’t really like but wanted to explore. i think, in some instances (although not all instances; there definitely are some real issues sometimes), that’s what happened in other fics like atyd.
(side note: i also don’t get it when people say atyd was biphobic? again, maybe it’s just been a while and i’m forgetting shit, but is the biphobia supposed to be remus sleeping with women when he labels himself gay??? is that the biphobia? or is there another example? i’ve been seeing that and i’m confused.)
(additional note: atyd does have some hurtful things written in it. my brain goes to the representation of irish travelers first. the writer themself has even acknowledged that. the issue of their apology or whatever isn’t one i’m going to be arguing, neither is those real hurtful issues otherwise written in that fic— i agree those things should’ve been handled better. this is just about my take on the depictions of misogyny and writers being allowed to write bad things without it being representative of them as a person.)
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☔for the fic ask game!
☔Is there a fic concept you have that you'd like to just explain and share because you're not sure you'll ever write it? If so, what is it?
There is in my heart a canon divergence fic, maybe proper narrative maybe just bullet points, which I have functionally written out as much as I ever will below this cut, in which:
Shortly before the Fall of Númenor and more importantly the Changing of the World, Finrod has a Prophecy of what's coming
He tells Celechwes, who says, "Oh, I...am not okay with it. I didn't plan to go back, but if I can't? If the road truly, utterly only goes one way? That's- that's not okay. I can't, I won't live like that."
So Celechwes goes and talks to some people (quietly, unofficially), who talk to some other people (quietly, unofficially)...
She ends up leading a small fleet that sets out from a southern port just a few days before the Númenoreans are expected to land in the north (fully aiming to avoid the Men). it's about half veterans of Beleriand who have never felt like they fit in on Aman (45% Fëanorians but many close followers of Fingon and more non-Noldor), a quarter elves from other places who don't want to be cut off forever from what was once home, and a quarter Aman-born elves who've grown up on stories of mortal lands and who feel a little restless in the Land of Bliss.
(Finrod joins at the last moment. Amarië found him sitting on a balcony overlooking Valmar and sadly playing the song he once played as the Beorlings woke to see their first shining elf-lord, and she said, "Findaráto Ingoldo, Finrod Felagund Adanil, I will not willingly part from you again - but nor do I want to arrive in the lands across the sea only for war a second time, too late to see all their storied beauty. Also, you know Mingoneth* convinced Veryawendë* to join the fleet, right? Can you imagine how much trouble they'll get into with only Celechwes for supervision?" And he looked up, and saw that she'd packed both their long-distance travel bags.)
*OCs, see: "Of the Golden Horde"
(By then, Rawen Ectheliel, once Lieutenant Right Hand of Himring, had already apologized to her wife - who thought they were done with this sort of thing - and followed her lady aboard. She IS done with this sort of thing (ie, rebellion; the House of Fëanor...as it became). But she lost Himring; she couldn't abide herself if she let ill fate befall Celechwes as well.)
The thing about being on at sea when the world abruptly turns from flat into a globe, sailing from a continent that is no longer on said globe, is that you get EXTREMELY turned around and lost. And, frankly, split up as a fleet.
[Cue: several-decades-long montage of several hundred elves - about half hardened (relaxed, but still hardened) war veterans, a quarter friendly nature people just trying to get home, and a quarter kids (in the eyes of all the rest) who have never met a real mortal before - scattered throughout the new southern hemisphere in ones and twos and a few coherent shiploads, trying to find each other and - for most - make their way north toward the lands and people that they know best.]
(If they happen to arrive in time to help beat the ever-loving shit out of Sauron, that's not, like, a drawback for anyone.)
Adventures are had! Hardened war veterans process trauma and old grudges (and sometimes get new ones). People re-find old homes and settle down once more, or realize that either home or they have changed and continue onward with their new companions. Kids grow up.
After a number of sidequests and other delays - flooding rivers, saving an innocent forest from an encroaching swarm of giant spiders, saving a small country from a neighboring evil king influenced by fell whispers from the depths below his castle... It occurs to some of them that all these delays might not be coincidence. They haven't received any official penalties from the Valar for their, er, polite but overt defiance of if not the letter than certainly the spirit of several laws, but...
"I think we are being made Agents of Good," Amarië said thoughtfully. "I think the price of being here is that we must lend a hand where it is needed, where the Great Ones fear to tread for their touch is not...'delicate'...at the best of times."
Celechwes did not like being used without her permission. But, fallen Beleriand never forgotten, she couldn't fault Amarië's analysis.
"I think we should try leaning into it," Finrod suggested. "They'll see that we're here in good faith, and no doubt speed our journey to where our hearts most yearn to go."
(The nearby stream blooped encouragingly, because Ulmo had been explicitly forbidden from giving explicit messages again.)
A few nights later, a local Mannish hunter approached their camp. Emphasis, perhaps, on Man-ish. Her eyes were the blue of a northern wolf-dog. She asked for help scouring the nearby mountains of a dark cult.
[cue: several more decades of montaged adventures. the local folk legends will be rich for generations]
They do arrive in the north just in time to help kick Sauron's fucking ass. Though not early enough to avert the tragedy of the Battle of Dagorlad, they learn later. But before the final, would-be pyrrhic victory; when the soldiers of the Last Alliance are marching into Mordor proper.
Galadriel is the first to know - she's aiding in a healing tent on the foul northern border, ready to ride in a second wave or to hold firm any retreat, when a mind touches her which she hadn't expected to feel again ere either the remaking of the world or her own death and rebirth (for she still had no intention of Sailing.)
Alatariel! her eldest brother calls. How goes the day? I've missed you, of course! Also, do you have a recommendation for where best to land 500 assorted elves, men and cavalry mounts coming up from the south, that we may swiftly come to whatever aid you all need?
A day later, a small host stood at the crest of the path past retaken Minas Ithil, looking out over the shadowed plains of Mordor. All before them was bloodied and embattled: Men fought Men, Elves fought Orcs, eagles and other goodly birds clashed in midair with giant bats and scrawny but deadly petty firedrakes. The very earth groaned in pain beneath the enemy's chains. And far in the distance, near the foot of a fire-spitting mountain, two star-studded banners - one white on black above a white tree, one silver stars on a blue field - approached a red eye on black.
At the head of the bannerless Host of the Returned, Rawen - generally elected battle-leader - raised her blade.
Celechwes put a hand on her arm. "Do not call 'Súlaearil.' It's embarrassing. Don't do it."
"My lady," Rawen protested, with her particular intonation that made it clear she was saying 'your majesty.'
"No," Celechwes said firmly.
"'Finwë and the North'?" suggested the elf on Rawen's other side, once third in command of Fingon's Dragon-frighters.
"Can't go wrong with that," agreed Finrod, a little further down the line.
Rawen sighed. Her blade, which had sagged a little, she raised straight again, then pointed forward with that battle-cry that had long united the great Siege-line of the Noldor: "Finwë and the North!"
"FINWË AND THE NORTH!" roared the Host of the Returned - all hardened veterans by now, though less brittle in it than some had begun. The fiery-faithful of Himring and the valorous of Barad Eithel, the quick of Ossiriand and the cunning of Nargothrond and the devoted of Doriath, the bold and restless of Aman and those who loved Middle Earth so dearly that they could do naught but defend it; slayers of orcs and spiders and feller beasts, saviors of lands besieged and heroes of legend, swept down from the heights to descend upon Sauron's unsuspecting eastern flank.
Ahead of them all streaked a single swift rider, blond hair streaming in the wind of her passage. Her mount was a prong-horned antelope from the plains far to the south, faster than any cavalry horse (and not usually suited to riding, but blue-eyed Alatar had whispered it some encouragement before they'd parted).
They leapt the first line of the enemy, hastily reassembling itself to meet this unexpected new foe. They jerked and dodged and ducked through the others, as behind them the battle lines slammed together. Jagged orcish blades came at her, and the sharp iron of men enraptured or enslaved to the dark, but mostly in passing - they didn't have time for a single rider driving through with no weapons of her own, her only goal the bright silver-on-blue star in the distance.
Eventually a pair of clever firedrakes managed to herd them up one of the low, ragged cliffs that spurted up here and there on the barren land. Celechwes rolled off her antelope to avoid a stream of fire and ran the other way without hesitation - the quick, clever creature would get to safety far more ably with no heavy elf on its back. Without, slowing, she sprinted off the edge of the cliff.
She'd planned to tuck and roll to the bottom, then pick herself up and keep running. The land ahead was clear for a few miles, save for the pits. Instead, great, sharp talons grasped her gently, and (non-specifically) familiar wings beat around her, with a screech that echoed in her bones.
She laughed as one Great Eagle dropped her carefully toward another. With a sailor's grace she landed with both feet on its broad, shifting back, and returned a joyous screech of challenge into the racing wind.
Below and ahead (though less far with every wingbeat), Ereinion Gil-galad looked up. Eagles had been screaming for battle all day, all month, but for a moment he could've sworn -
Celechwes's eagle dove to avoid a vampire. She dropped her knees and gripped its feathers tightly, and thanked the stars that she wasn't trying to do this while keeping someone from bleeding out from the wrist.
As they dove toward the volcano and the forces advancing against one another there, she eagle-shrieked again, in greeting this time, and shouted, "Erein, hold your position! Re-enforcements are coming!"
Even - nay, especially the High King of the Noldor in Middle Earth knew better than to question the finest royal courier in Beleriand, much less his mother the queen. "Hold!" Gil-galad bellowed over the clash of blades.
Celechwes circled back up, looking back across the field. But Sauron, too, had heard her message, and knew a victory when it was about to slip from his grasp. Mighty and fell, he strode forward toward the banners of Gil-galad and Elendil, and the kings of Elves and Men.
In swift, vicious, terrible combat they were soon joined, Sauron with his dark, burning blade and Gil-galad with bright Aeglos and Elendil with shining Narsil. Likely, at best, all would have been slain -
But Celechwes hadn't been the only one of her host riding hard across the dark plains, dallying with no enemy save the greatest foe. She was only (as ever) the fastest.
"HEY, GORTHAUR!" yelled Finrod Felagund, with a particular intonation that made it clear he was saying, Hey, motherfucker! "I CALL REMATCH!"
And this time, as he raised his voice in a Song of trust unbroken and faith fulfilled, of Sea and sand and second chances, Amarië of the Vanyar Sang with him, their souls entwined, she who had learned to Sing from Maiar on the slope of Ezollohar where stood the Trees; and with them also Sang their daughter Veryawendë Tinúviel, named by prophecy from both parents, fated to be a bright melody in darkness and a great change in the world, and this was not her time but still the Great Music swirled thick around her; and you bet your ass Galadriel had also ridden down from the north to join as fast as she was able -
The last time Galadriel and Amarië joined their voices in powerful harmony had been the final duel between Morgoth and Finarfin, Anairë, and the last of the Host of the Noldor. With Sauron's power reflected and redoubled unto himself through his terrible Ring, this duel was no less hard-won, but it was very definitively won. They even prevented him from erupting the volcano as a final spiteful blow.
"We should destroy the Ring," Gil-galad said at the end, exhausted, bloody, and leaning on Elrond for support.
Isildur eyed it - shining golden on Sauron's cut-off black hand - with battle-fire lingering in his grey eyes. "I would rather claim it as weregild, for Anarion - "
"For the love of - " said Celechwes, dismounted now that the worst of the battle was over (though there was a great deal of mopping-up to do, of orcs, corrupted men and etc.)
"Is this still the Noldorin influence?" she demanded, of nobody in particular. "Or is it a new Edainic thing? No, I suppose Thingol fell to it in the end, too - is it being inland? Do you not spend enough time near the sea, and that's why you're constantly obsessed with cursed jewelry? Here, I'll do it - don't go anywhere, Erein; I'll be right back."
She shucked off her leather hauberk to use as a glove, picked up Sauron's still coal-hot black hand, and sprinted up the volcano slope before anyone else could say a word.
"...I'm really sorry," Elendil said into the relative quiet that followed, "I think I know who you are, my lord - " he bowed toward Finrod, as best he could while leaning bloody and exhausted on Isildur - "and Lady Galadriel, I'm so glad you caught up with us. But I'm not sure about any of these other ladies who have come to our rescue? Including that one?" He jerked his head toward the bright-haired figure already halfway up Oroduin's rocky slope, with the air of a man wondering if he should call for soldiers to chase after her.
"That's my mother," said Gil-galad.
"Ah," said Elendil and Isildur, with perfect understanding. They, too, had mothers.
The Forge of Sauron rumbled ominously, shuddered and spat out first sparks, then sprays of lava. Celechwes, briefly out of sight in the cavern near the top, sprinted back down ahead of the molten rock, empty handed.
"Everyone move!" she shouted. "Should've evacuated first! Go, go, go!"
And then everyone lived happily after - though a lot of them probably did Sail not long thereafter, including most of the Host of the Returned - including the Finrod, Amarië, and Veryawendë, though not bold-hearted Mingoneth, and Celechwes, and Gil-galad. Because they'd accomplished a Great Task and Aman is, actually, objectively more pleasant for Elves than most mortal lands (and Beleriand was still gone). The spiritual weather is just so much better. Everyone stuck around to see Elrond and Celebrian get married, though, and to meet their kids and see Gondor and the Greenwood both regain their feet.
With no Gil-galad to come and sort out several conflicting emotions about his parents, Fingon does stay in Mandos, keeping Maedhros company for longer...but not too much longer. There weren't many casualties among the Host of the Returned, but Rawen Ectheliel was among them (her last thought is that her wife is going to be really, truly, perhaps irrevocably disappointed). She manages to find them before she leaves, the memory of Thangorodrim which Maedhros has made to hang from in his self-pity, self-loathing and twisted self-aggrandizement, where Fingon sits by his feet out of loyalty, devotion, stubbornness, pride and fear; and she gives their behavior such a scathing review that Fingon actually pulls his shit together a few years later and tentatively leaves, and Maedhros pulls one of his hands out of the chains.
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What’s your thoughts on Arslan’s arc in Fixing RWBY?:
https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBYcritics/comments/13lzuwb/fixing_rwby_v6_ep_19/jlehbke/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&utm_content=1&utm_term=15&context=3
Well, normally I wouldn't even bother because I am not wasting my time on Celtic's 'Fixing' but I see that he's the one referenced here. So sure.
To defend my own writing choice there, this was what I planned to be Arslan's fate back when I retrofitted her character back during Volume 3.
Sorry Celtic, didn't you hear? Defending your writing choices is attacking your critics and rejecting criticism.
So be a good little creator, take it up the ass and ask for seconds.
It was only after that in which she appeared in.... Before the Dawn, I want to say? She may have gotten a mention in After the Fall, but that was mostly away from Shade as a locale. When I learned she was in the book I was initially irritated, because I like the arc I did for her, but if they did something with her I would be willing to detour. Unfortunately, they... really didn't do anything with her. She, along with 90% of the remaining cast in that book, was completely wasted, so I felt no anxiety in detouring.
Maybe because we have these things in the real world called 'limitations' and 'restrictions'. I know you like to pretend you could just write an outline, get some shitty sketches and pretend it's an actual product but actual creators have to deal with limitations while producing an actual product.
Considering I've already deviated by killing some characters, maiming others, and having a handful survive when they weren't supposed to, this change wasn't too big to me.
Keep this in mind. It's going to bite him in the ass soon.
As to why I did what I did with her, while the episode's story is squarely on Cinder, this is the conclusion of Arslan's arc... or should I say, her failure to arc.
... No. He didn't do that, did he?
Her life up until Vytal was defined by trying to one-up Pyrrha and earn the respect of those around her as a competent combatant. Her defeat at the tournament (and subsequent fall of Beacon) should have been the moment she self-reflected and found something else to value in her life, but what ended up happening was emotional stagnation. While she became more jaded and tired, as seen in Fixing Volume 5, she still held onto her world view back when she was trying to upstage Pyrrha. Her desire to seek revenge on Cinder may have seemed noble at first glance (partially because Cinder was also involved in Lionheart's death, at least to her knowledge), but in reality it was her way of trying to find closure to her spat with Pyrrha. She wanted to beat the person that killed Pyrrha because by transitive property, she'd be superior to Pyrrha. Unfortunately for her, Pyrrha was markedly outclassed by Cinder, so Arslan had little-to-no-hope of beating her. She let her obsession overtake her and she made several critical flaws that led to her dying as a result. Arslan should be looked at a dark tragedy.
... He did. He fucking did.
Hey Celtic, where did you get such an idea huh? Maybe from, I dunno...
A doctor breaking down a power hungry bitch?
Raymond McNeil.
You didn't GIVE Arslan her own arc. You copy/pasted CINDER'S arc then cut out half of it.
The whole idea of 'I am obsessed and I died because I failed to move on' is what CINDER is going through. That was the whole point of Watts' tearing into Cinder- to get it through her thick skull that she hadn't proven herself worthy of shit. That she was stagnating and stuck repeating her mistakes. And to cement that even if she got better as a villain- she was still a VILLAIN at the end of the day.
And it works with Cinder because this same inability to move on is shared with other villains like Adam and Salem. All of them are stuck in the past, in their own pain, while the heroes move past that and keep fighting. It's a called a 'theme', Raymond. Try analyzing it sometime.
Here, what is the point of Arslan going through this arc? Does it reinforce a theme or idea? Does it set the tone going forward? Is there any kind of parallel between her and her killer?
Going off of what you deemed important enough to mention- No. None of that is the point. Going off what you say later-
As to my overall process, Fixing RWBY is a lot more wholistic in approach than just making nips and tucks, even if I try not to stray too far from things (a solid example is the upping of the number of episodes that I've stuck too since Volume 1). I make changes to characters, lore building, world building and plot structure all the time because I feel like there's more to be squeezed out of those elements than the show even attempted to show (looking forward to actually working on Penny in Volume 7, we have almost too many ideas where to go with her).
Also gotta love the fact that Celtic is claiming he's changing things for the sake of the series while dedicating time to a character that adds nothing and indicates her arc has no real reason to exist. If it connected to the themes of the series- why didn't he mention it? Unless he doesn't think about themes in a heavily THEMATIC show.
There's also the unfortunate factor that as I move along, making even small changes will cause a ripple effect, meaning we have to account for more and more as time progresses. It's just the nature of the beast. I fully expect by the end of the series the two stories will only vaguely resemble each other. Hell, Volume 6 so far has had to account for so much that it already feels insanely different to the original, even while doing our best to keep specific plot points extant. What started as "Let's put some tournament drama in this tournament to put pressure on Pyrrha" evolved into "Arslan can't let go and this leads to her unfortunate demise."
Then you failed Raymond. Because according to you-
Really the heart of it is trying to figure out the story/stories that Miles, Kerry, Monty, (and later) Eddie and Kiersi want to tell with what they present us and then reverse engineering it to get the most mileage possible
You are writing their story.
And here's the thing- you didn't NEED to bring in Arslan. You try to just this by saying that Cinder killing mooks doesn't sell her threat-
That.... was a lot more than I intended to write, but I hope that ramble helps you understand where I'm coming from with the choice made about Arslan. As to your suggestion, I don't feel a simple mook from the Spiders would have served a purpose, plot or character-wise. Cinder is a serious threat, even at her lowest, and this is the moment that affirms that when she's in play, people's lives are on the table (looking at you, V8).
-but your own words imply Arslan has been living in Pyrrha's shadow for years. Hell,your own words about Arslan's death imply as much. If Pyrrha was better than Arslan but lost to Cinder- no shit Arslan was gonna die.
Could have gone the mook route and avoided all this shit with Arslan. But when you're more concerned with getting your dick sucked- guess basic writing skills need to go.
P.S. I find it funny that Raymond tries to take a potshots at V8 for not portraying Cinder as a serious threat when the finale absolutely did...while still emphasizing that she's stil alittle girl looking for control.
Maybe try boxing on your own level next time. I hear first time self insert harem fanfics could use a spell checker.
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me thinks, just maybe, you should totally share your fab four characters hcs (specifically ones ab their appearances) 😇 also i just rlly love headcanons
GDJGHJGDJHD THIS IS SO FUNNY I LITERALLY HAVE LIKE. WRITTEN IN MY NOTES APP ALL MY MAIN APPEARANCE HEADCANONS AND STUFF AND I WAS GONNA SEND YOU SCREENSHOTS EARLIER BUT I TOTALLY FORGOT GHGHDHGD so anyways im just gonna copy/paste my word vomit (plus added commentary as i reread this) here lmao
(also just a quick little thing, i have far too many hcs for these fucks, some of which contradict each other bc it kind of depends on what setting/story im thinking about these characters in. things like gender and pronouns change a lot too, so im not even gonna try and catalog all that shit. just know they are all Gay and Trans and only party has "consistent" pronouns bc they always use they/them, but i might add others in if im feeling spicy. the lack of canon material is absolutely wonderful for my creativity, so this is just like. a collection of the things that remain the same across the majority of my mental images of them lol)
Jet Star: no surprise here, his hair is very textured! so many curls!! i see the curls as a bit looser, not super tight or packed together but still like, well defined yknow? i envision him with fairly dark skin as well and, playing into the whole star/space association i have w/ him, i feel like he absolutely loves body glitter and, like, sparkly eyeshadows and shit (he doesn't wear it *all* the time but he'll put it on for a party or something and then just let it rub off over time. needless to say, there is glitter fucking all over his room). also, he fucking LOVES jewelry! just wears SO many bracelets and necklaces and shit (more bracelets than necklaces but there's still a lot of both). this was more of a ttid specific thing, but i think ive gotten so used to imaging him with a huge fucking scar on/around his neck, that its sort of bled into my regular interpretations of him so that's there as well! also, he wears an eyepatch PURELY as an aesthetic thing bc he thinks it makes him look cool and it switches eyes constantly but he denies that fact whenever people point it out! (that is until he actually *does* get his eye fucked up. some exterminator noticed how the patch's location would change, thought it would be funny to give it a permanet placement).
Party Poison: SO MANY FUCKING TATTOOS I'VE WRITTEN A POST ABT THIS AND I COULD HONESTLY WRITE A WHOLE FIC ABT IT I JUST- THEM. INK. COLORS. FUCK. love the idea of them with long hair, too. they usually keep it shaggy and just a *tad* bit longer than shoulder length, but i feel like they'd only cut it when they're in jusssst the right mood so it'll tend to grow out for months, get really long and start to reach their mid back, and then they'll get annoyed and finally chop a shit ton off when they're bored at like 4 am. also, this has nothing to do with appearances but they get fucking terrible and frequent migraines, purely because i get terrible and frequent migraines my only hobby is projecting my problems onto these gay fucks :D (also could so write a fic abt that and how it effected them it the city/their conflicting feelings about taking pills to help with the pain once they get out to the zones... hmmm...) the fucker also has sharp as hell teeth! canine especially! idk why they just do. kobra does to (snake siblings go brrr) but party's are noticed more often because they tend to talk a lot more/loudly and smile wider than kobra so people notice it on them more. im also a big fucking fan of android party so sometimes they are robot to me :) if they aren't robot, then they usually have some type of prosthetic limb in my brain (usually an arm idk why and idk if that's gonna be in ttid but yknow. we ball). they also really like lipstick, and they've got a large collection of practically every color imaginable
The Kobra Kid: okay so like i said before, sharp teeth! snake boy's got fangs!! he's also got heterochromia (ooo city trauma from being Different time!! there was definetly talk of surgeries to "correct" his eyes when he was younger and it was becoming more noticeable, but party always fought the adults on it, said he was too young, it would be too expensive, shit like that. worst came to worst, they'd get into some trouble to distract from the issue for a bit). anyways, i think the kid's naturally blonde, but not *that* blonde, yknow? like he gets out to the desert an the sun makes it a bit lighter and he falls in love with the idea of it being fucking BLONDE blonde, so he totally steals party's leftover bleach and just fried the absolute shit out of it. also, fuck it, i only thought of this just now but im incorporating it into everything ever; he dyes a streak in the front the same red as poison. (i like the idea that joys close to each other will dye their hair the others favorite color or the color that they have their hair as. and they're brothers!!! he loves his sibling!!!! he gets a re streak fuck you i can do what i want :]) uhhh other kobra things, oh! the world is a bright, bright place, and my man wears sunglasses constantly, even indoors, to Cope (again. projecting.) and yeah maybe he wears them too so he's harder to read/looks more badass, but really its just bc it fucking bright out man. OH AND PIERCINGS FUCK I FORGOT ABOUT THE PIERCINGS HE'S GOT SO MANY MOSTLY IN THE EARS BUT EYEBROW AND SEPTUM TOO AND OF FUCKING *COURSE* MY MAN HAS SNAKEBITES FUCK (one again might be projecting here but i love piercings and he'd look cool with them so he has them) also just thought of this but his nose is Fucked Up omg he gets punched in the face so much
Fun Ghoul: Scar :] he makes the most animated facial expressions too, and he's got these big fucking bright green eyes, and all that combines with the scar kind of freaks people out and he fucking LOVES it! he laughs at literally everything, too, especially when he's feeling nervous or super energetic. his adrenaline gets pumping and he's just cackling like a hyena. anyways, his hair is so fucking dark like *inky* black, and he's never heard of a shower a day in his life so my guy is greasy as all FUCK. his hair is just so fucking shiny and stringy and jet absolutely yells at him constantly trying to get him to WASH HIS FUCKING HAIR. it's longer than poison's, but not by a lot, and he ties it back a lot especially when he's working on projects and shit. he's cut it if he didn't hate it so much when it's short. his skin tone's also like a medium dark-ish, and i think he has a few tattoos but not nearly as many as party (his are all like super meaningful and related to like, late crew members or phoenix witch/religious things or mementos of super important moments in his life. (part of him hopes that, if the battery ever does get him and they steal his mind and memories away, the ink in his skin will help him remember who he truly is). he's got a lot of burn scars too (bombs and shit)!! not most aren't super severe, but they're visible in a lot of spots. he thinks it looks cool. fucker not only paints his nails, but he paints everyone else's too whether or not they're aware of it at them time (he gets bored and does it while they're sleeping lmao. party loves it, kobra's indifferent, jet pretends to get pissed off bc it makes ghoul laugh but really he thinks its sweet). also a fan of him with prosthetic limbs but i haven't really thought about that all too much yet.
#asks#killjoy headcanons#danger days headcanons#my headcanons#party poison#fun ghoul#kobra kid#jet star#so yeah! that's generally them!#so yeah! that's generally them! i think about them far too much and i could probably write a whole book about them- OH WAIT#lmao#i think gerard should hire me tho tbh i could write a comics run about them and it'd be so so so good please mx way just give me a chance-
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hello! a few hours from now, the epilogue of go on, claim my heart, the my fair lady sequel, is gonna be posting, so i wanted to take a minute to thank everyone who has stopped by my lil corner of the internet to read what has become my largest writing project to date. i had no idea what i was getting myself into when i first started writing mfl, especially not half a year of feverish, near-obsessive plotting and writing and rewriting this story that would not leave me alone. a lot of things fell to the wayside as i wrote mfl and gocmh, and i don't regret any of it, because i can safely say that this is the writing that i am the most proud of.
i want to thank @romeoandjulietyouwish in particular for her graciously allowing me to play in her sandbox. no one's mind works like lis's, and as i have said before, she comes up with so many fucking stellar ideas that she leaves crumbs for the rest of us, so i'm super grateful that she's so kind about letting us take those crumbs and make them our own. mfl wouldn't exist without you, lis, so thank you, thank you, thank you.
i also could not wrap this series without calling out the two best readers a girl could ask for, @ravendruid and @crispysnake. y'all are fucking unhinged, but it is the exact energy that every writer needs to keep going. i can't tell you the number of times a drabble or chapter posted that i wasn't particularly fond of that you two completely changed my opinion about. you two are the kindest, most enthusiastic, most generous readers, and i'm so lucky that you're also my friends. please continue to be absolutely batshit in my tags; it's the only thing that keeps me going.
(also @otterlycaleb made fucking ART about this shit, what the fuck what the fuck what the FUCK—)
a hopefully but probably not quick note about the future of mfl: today, like literally right now, i am in the middle of my first day of work at a brand new job, one that will require me to move my entire life halfway across the country, back to my hometown. it is big and scary and exhilarating and everything i've been hoping for, and i feel so, so lucky. this does mean that for the next little bit, while i learn a new job and pick up my shit and drive cross-country, i will probably be less able to write long or short fics, so i hope y'all don't mind me shutting up for the first time in forever. that being said, while i have absolutely no plans to write a third installment in the mfl 'verse, that doesn't mean there isn't more to say (as y'all will find out in like three and a half hours lol). i fully plan on still writing tmwiw drabbles set before, during, and after mfl/gocmh, and i will still be accepting prompts and requests for drabbles set in this 'verse until i say otherwise. mfl will always occupy an inordinate amount of my brain space, and i refuse to not share that with y'all.
additionally! starting very soon (like, maybe tomorrow? we'll see how busy i am, lol), i will be posting to ao3 the entirety of the mfl 'verse in chronological order. every chapter, one-shot, and drabble, in the order that they happened. another massive shout-out to @ravendruid for being my own personal lore-keeper on this; she read every single mfl chapter, tmwiw drabble, and one-shot to help me get this shit in order. the ao3 work will be titled i've come a long, long way (also from "my fair lady" by kaleo, are we seeing a pattern here?), and the plan is to post five chapters a day until the whole thing is up (although, again, with the moving this might get a lil wibbly wobbly). there will be some additional proofreading edits to these chapters (sometimes i can't spell!!) but nothing about the substance of these chapters will change, so this is just for people who like their stories to be told chronologically (fucking weirdos). this work will only be available on ao3, although it will be linked on my mfl masterpost.
ok, i think i am done for now. i have taken up enough of your time, in so many more ways than one. thank you again, if you read every single installment of the mfl saga or if you just read a paragraph. all of it means the world to me, and i know i never would have continued past the first chapter if i weren't part of such a wonderful, loving, generous, brilliant community. i've only been watching critical role for just over a year now, part of the fandom for even less than that, and i can't believe i haven't always had y'all in my life. please continue to love and support each other, and thank you for loving and supporting me.
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I really wanted to give satisfaction, I couldn't write a goodbye letter but I'm too tired, I couldn't do much and no one will listen to my advice so I feel like it must all be in vain, I still had many things to do on earth and I hope that someone knows so well about me that they will say them, and I hope that someone who is stronger than me will do them. I really didn't want to go out like this, and I may be being hasty but I don't want to be in my 40s and everything continues like this. I could do something drastic to get out of this nightmare but I lack the courage, Sometimes it feels like a punishment, I don't know if it's because of the person I am or was, or because of some shit that happened in my past life or what I said about certain """people"'"'. You know, I should have done this before, when I really had no hope, Saying goodbye with hope is the worst thing.. I wish I had the courage I had before, but after so many things I'm simply afraid, I know I should do it, but I don't know who is right, and I have no one to help me, I'm in such a fucked up Gaslight that I don't know if I'm right about the story anymore, And at the same time as I'm afraid it's karma, I'll be really pissed if I get to heaven and they say I didn't try hard enough. Like,I was positive, I said positive things but I'm tired, and I know that even if I fell, I have to get up because at some point it will work out, But it's so far away. I'm afraid of saying that I tried and being told that I didn't try enough.. And literally my suicide is a desperate way of asking someone superior for help, but if they exist I'm probably not being accompanied. I had so many things to do .... I really had good ideas, my actions may not be but deep down I wanted to do something good... You know, the hope I had is gone, and I know that one day I would leave this place but it takes so long, I know I can do something but is it worth it? So far it has never been worth it.
I have some things to say
If you believe in my art and make it recognized, I love you.
If my art is simply not known.. well.. if you have seen it, believe in it please.
Girls, please don't follow in my footsteps
Children listen to adults
And to my father, if I don't give up on leaving here until you return, please forgive me, don't let my departure shake you, you have to be strong.
Diana, you have an incredible future, never forget that
Caio, you will be able to move up in life and your arrogance doesn't make you bad or anything like that.
Grandma... Pray for me, You were incredible.
Grandma, I never met you, but I won't forget you
For my pets, mommy loves you, I will hug you from the other side.
Mom, I should have followed your advice, but ... Whatever, goodbye.
Cristiane, maybe I'm right but don't let that change anything.
Psychologist, well you were good, thanks for it.
Requests:
Make me remembered
Save the world for me
Share my art
Give me a nice funeral
Alex I'm just going to say goodbye to you. Malri, I would like you to come to my show.
A no thanks to: Sabrina, Isabelly and all the fucking "friends" that I have in 2019-2022 except for Maria.
Erick I missed you
Homage:
Richard Ramirez, Ted Bundy, sol pais, Sarah m, a.h, John Wayne, Jeffrey Dahmer, Robert maldsley and all the sk.
School people: You weren't nearly killed.
#hell is a teenage girl#female manipulator#girlhood#im just a girl#coquette#female rage#lana del rey aka lizzy grant#girlblogging#coquette girl#goodbye
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I need to ramble about A Plague Tale: Requiem
Man i have so many thoughts over a plague tale: requiem and i need to share them or write them down somewhere or I think i will aHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
the game is so good dude, like, holy shit. i loved innocence, i really did, but there were some aspects that were okay. ya know? like, sometimes i think there was this whole, "illusion of choice" thing present. like more than one way to get pass enemies but in truth there wasn't really.
but requiem? holy shit dude, requiem really dID give you a choice. I noticed it the MOMENT Lucas pointed out how Amicia (the player, technically) handled the situation, and the game showed 3 different like, skills that will develop depending on how you get by enemies. One for stealth, one for aggressiveness/fighting, and another that I don't really understand but I think it had to do with alchemy. And oh BOY WERE THERE CHOICES IN THIS GAME.
There's like, all kinds of different ways to get by enemies, 17 different PATHS, DUDE IT'S SO GOOD. HOLY SHIT WHAT THE FUCK
the story, oH MY GOD, THE STORY WAS SO GOOD AND TRAGIC. I LOVED the new characters. I absolutely adored Sophia, though I wish they gave Arnaud a bit more screentime. With him we just snuck around and walked around town. With Sophia we like, spent a whole fucking day with her. The game did such a good job at establishing her character. Showing her traits and her thoughts and loyalty. My favorite being after she finds out about the rats, after she finds out about the curse, after she learns EVERYTHING, she STILL choses the kids. She still picks them. Still helps them. She stays by their side until the end and even more so then. GOD, it was so good, and I loved her character. And I'm sO HAPPY SHE DIDN'T DIE.
We didn't see much of Beatrice but one scene with her keeps replaying in my head. When the rats are taking over the town, and Amicia reaches Beatrice and Hugo. Beatrice watches the rats, believing, yet also hoping Amicia's words will reach Hugo in time. And there's a moment, where, she accepts the worst. Accepts the fate of herself and her children. And rather than panicking, rather than scolding Amicia, or telling her to hurry, she hugs them. She hugs her children. She wraps her arms around them and holds them close. Because if this is truly the end, she wants to be with her children.
Beatrice, in all her being and faults, is not a perfect mother. And to me, she didn't have enough screen time to me to truly make an opinion of the type of mother she is. Yet, I think about that scene a lot. Because to me, it shows that she loved Amicia and Hugo dearly. She closed her eyes, held her children, and accepted her fate.
I loved Lucas in this game, you can truly tell that he's a bit more mature. That's he's grown from the previous game, and even the stuff that happened in between the two games (because apparently there's books that go over events between the two games and the moment they get translated I am going to buy the sHIT OUT OF THEM).
I love how he was the balance in this game. He kept Amicia and Hugo, especially Amicia grounded. He calmed them down, comforted them, supported them, held them, he was their strength when they had nothing left.
If the world was being consumed by a hurricane, Lucas was the eye of the storm.
You could tell how much he loved Amicia and Hugo, how much they meant to him. In Innocence it was obvious that he cared for them after a while. But Requiem showed that he began to love them. That they mean everything to him. Maybe it's because Lucas is my favorite character, but it was so obvious that he thought of them as family. Or at least as something as strong as family. They meant everything to him, he loved them both so much. The De Rune were his world, and it hurts to think that he almost lost it, and in some cases, practically did lose it.
Amicia, holy shit Amicia, it's so obvious the effect the 1st game had on her, the consequences, the toll. Amicia is ready for everything to go wrong, but she still holds on to hope that maybe, just maybe it won't. She acts less like a young girl trying to survive and weighing her decisions, and more like an adult who is ready to do what is necessary even if she doesn't want to. And it hurts. It hurts to see what she has become, and to see how the 1st game has changed her. It hurts to see her deal with trauma at a time where stuff like that wasn't really discovered??? At least I don't think it was all that known.
And Hugo? God, Hugo. My poor boy. You can tell how much he wants to be like other kids, how much he wants friends, and peace. How tired he is, he's 5 years old and he's already tired. He hadn't even lived yet, the choice to live was stolen from him by selfish assholes. And it hurts to see how afraid he is of dying in the beginning only to reach the end and... It's just so.. Obvious that he knows what has to be done. That he knows he's going to die. And he's okay with it. Hugo has come to terms with it and it hurts. He's 5. FIVE. FIVE YEARS OLD. When I played Innocence for the first time, all I could think about was, "Hugo has never been outside, this is his 1st time outside. This is his first impression of the outside world. A beautiful yet cruel place" And that thought is still so strong in Requiem. And it hurts.
This game hurts, and it knows it hurts. It's a beautiful yet cruel game. And I love it.
I can't stop thinking about it. It's all I can think about. God, I fucking love this game.
When people would ask me, "What's your favorite game?" I never had an actual answer. I could answer my favorite video game franchise, but I've never had a favorite game before.
Now, though? Requiem changes that.
I adore this game. Replaying it now hurts, but something is missing now. And I know what it is.
I want to experience the game for the first time again. In all it's beauty and pain.
I've never felt that way about a game before. And I love it.
I love Requiem. In all it's being.
To think none of this would have happened if I hadn't stumbled upon a random video showing Innocence's gameplay.
I wouldn't change a thing though.
#god i love this game so much#I might ramble about it more because i need to scream into the void#A plague tale#a plague tale innocence#a plague tale requiem#lucas the apprentice#amicia de rune#hugo de rune#beatrice de rune#sophia#a plague tale spoilers
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