Tumgik
#like it's been an Age since i've read the novels but like. they were so good
arretoskore · 2 years
Text
.
4 notes · View notes
shadowtriovibes · 10 months
Text
pt. iii: sweat it out
Tumblr media
pt. i: break a sweat || pt. ii: blood, sweat and tears || pt. iv: never let 'em see you sweat
Pairing: Sebastian Sallow x f!MC
Rating: E
Word Count: 3.3K
Warnings: 18+, aged-up characters, explicit sexual content, unprotected PIV sex, fluff and smut, quidditch jersey porn, sexy massages, dirty talk, romanticizing doggy style
Summary: born of two requests: "what about sebastian fucking the reader while she's wearing his quidditch jersey. i can see him going feral when he sees his last name on her back" and "Maybe for Part 3, MC is giving Bash a much needed massage after all of his HARD quidditch practices and games… in nothing but his jersey."
Sebastian reluctantly turns over onto his stomach so that you can sit astride his hips. As soon as you rest your weight on top of him, he exhales tiredly as if he’s just set down a towering stack of books at the librarian’s desk – like he’s let go of a weight he hadn’t realized had slowly become so burdensome in his arms. "Relax," you murmur. "I've got you." Then he tilts his head to rest on his folded hands. You know he can’t quite see you at an angle this, but you still catch just a glimpse of his warm brown eyes before they flutter shut.
Climbing all the way up to the Room of Requirement after one of his weekend Quidditch practices must be excruciating for Sebastian, you think.
After practice, he’s usually sore just about everywhere – from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet he positively aches. Having seen him in action you know that he’ll often race upwards of a hundred kilometers on his broom simply doing laps around the pitch and tracking down the school’s enchanted practice Snitches.
To make matters worse, he’s forced to skip breakfast to be at the pitch by sun-up on strict orders from his captain, who goes on to keep the team well past eleven. Now he must be starving, but if you know your love, he’ll steadfastly ignore the temptation to go straight to the Great Hall for lunch and instead make the trek up to the seventh-floor corridor.
That’s precisely why you’re waiting for him there.
In the mornings when he has practice, you like to treat yourself to a bit of a lie-in and lazily wait around for his return so you can have lunch together. You would be happy to meet him downstairs when he returns to the castle, but lately, Anne and Ominis have protested whenever Sebastian joins the lunch table straight from practice still flushed, sweating, and covered in mud from the waist down.
(Those two have become exponentially more autocratic since they started courting.)
Thus, Sebastian usually decides to be a gentleman and change first.
In the months since the start of Quidditch season and Sebastian’s first overnight stay in the Room of Requirement, he’s slowly started bringing in his belongings until he’d effectively moved out of the dormitories and into a shared nest with you. Most of his clothes were there by now, along with his endless piles of library books and his cherished personal collection of secondhand novels from Tomes and Scrolls.
You assume he’ll probably want to quickly strip off his mucked-up robes and find something clean to change into so he can escort you downstairs for lunch. But despite the exhausting morning he must have already had, you don’t feel quite enough pity for your Sebastian to take it easy on him when he finally arrives.
When he enters the room, he finds you lounging on the bed reading one of his beloved Muggle novels – wearing nothing but one of his Quidditch jerseys.
“Sebastian!” you call out happily when you look up.
“Morning, love,” he answers as he shoves the heavy door closed.
“You’re finally free,” you joke, closing your book. “I thought I’d have to come down to the pitch soon and challenge Imelda to a duel to get her to set you loose.”
“I won’t mind seeing that,” he laughs. “That would have been quite chivalrous of you.”
He shrugs out of his Quidditch robes and pulls his own soaking-wet shirt up over his head. You watch longingly as his core flexes – all those hours on a broom have made him exceptionally well-defined, and you wish you could simply get on your knees right then and there to spend your morning tracing your tongue over every delineated band of muscle.
“You know,” he teases, pulling you from your reverie. “I had planned to just put on a clean shirt to go down to lunch, but it seems you’ve nicked my spare.”
“Did I?” you say, feigning innocence. “I just grabbed the first thing I could find, I swear.”
Sebastian glances at you skeptically before sitting down at what has become “his” desk to take off his boots. You frown when you catch him wincing while he bends at the waist.
“Are you hurt?” you ask him softly.
“No,” he insists. “Just sore all over.”
“Bash,” you croon. “Poor babe.”
“Come off it, I’m fine,” he laughs. “I just need some food and a nice long bath and I’ll be grand.”
You climb off the bed and saunter over to him in his chair, appreciating the way his eyes skim across the hem of his pilfered jersey. With every step, your hips sway and tease him with quick glimpses of the tops of your bare legs.
“Are you sure?” you ask sweetly. “Because if you’re feeling poorly, I can take care of you.”
Not even the promise of dry clothes and a warm meal could pull Sebastian’s attention from such a tempting offer, especially not while you’re wearing his clothes.
He sits back in his chair while you kneel in front of him to carefully unlace his Quidditch boots. After you take off his pads as well, it’s just too easy to climb onto his lap and wind your arms around his shoulders.
Sebastian’s gaze dips down to the space between your legs. He lays one palm flat against your thigh and uses his thumb to ruck up the hem of the jersey just a bit.
“You haven’t got anything on under this, do you?” he asks knowingly.
“Not a stitch,” you breathe.
Sebastian groans quietly and wraps an arm around your waist to hold you tightly against him.
“Leave it on,” he says in a low voice. “I want to see you in my jersey the entire time I’m taking you apart.”
“Not so fast, Sallow,” you counter. “Let me give you a massage first, it will help with the soreness.”
“A ‘massage?’” he asks hopefully.
When you merely raise an eyebrow at him, he looks simply crushed.
“You’re joking,” he says flatly. “You… you actually mean to ‘take care’ of me? In an actual ‘nurse-me-back-to-health’ sort of way?”
“I mean both the regular way and the devious way,” you laugh. “But if you’re aching right now, it’s not going to be much fun for you.”
“You are sincerely wrong about that,” he argues, but you’re undeterred.
“Let me do this first,” you bargain. “I promise you’ll feel better afterward.”
There’s a bit more whining and attempts to seduce you as you wriggle free of Sebastian’s lap and tug on his arm so he’ll walk over to the bed. He strips down to the garment layer he wears beneath his uniform pants and kindly allows you to shove him onto the bed.
He’s peering up at you expectantly, obviously hoping you’ll cave and climb onto his lap once again.
“Turn over, Sebastian,” you say with a fond eye roll. “On your stomach.”
“You’re malicious,” he gripes. “An evil, wicked sorceress.”
Sebastian reluctantly turns over onto his stomach so that you can sit astride his hips. As soon as you rest your weight on top of him, he exhales tiredly as if he’s just set down a towering stack of books at the librarian’s desk – like he’s let go of a weight he hadn’t realized had slowly become so burdensome in his arms.
“Relax,” you murmur. “I’ve got you.”
Then he tilts his head to rest on his folded hands. You know he can’t quite see you at an angle this, but you still catch just a glimpse of his warm brown eyes before they flutter shut.
Go on, he says without words. Touch me. I trust you.
You think you could just stay here all day with your hands on his slightly-chilly skin. Warming him up to your touch, you skim your hands across his firm shoulder blades, along the tops of his sun-kissed shoulders, and then down the solid expanse of aching muscle in his back. He’s so broad beneath you, you think, even on his stomach. Without his height to add to the imposing figure he usually cuts, he nevertheless looks perfectly capable of rolling you off of him should he desire.
Knowing that there’s very little he could desire less sends an excited shiver through you. It’s a privilege, getting to be gentle with a man like Sebastian.
After all, except for when his hands are on your body, Sebastian is anything but gentle. He’s headstrong, impulsive, and obstinately ungovernable when he knows he’s in the right. Physically, he’s grown into a body that matches.
You shouldn’t be surprised that despite playing as a Seeker, Sebastian is not the kind of athlete who relies on being lithe and quick on his broom. Whenever he finds himself in a dead heat for the Snitch, he routinely throws his whole body into a maneuver and hurdles himself into his opposing Seeker to knock them off their path.
He’s brutish on the pitch and offers no apologies for it, though he will extend a gentlemanly hand whenever he bests the other Seeker to their prize.
Worst of all is that he has no fear of mutually assured destruction. He wants to win, sure; but more importantly, he wants the other team to lose. If that means both he and his opponent must crash into the ground in a pile of torn sports robes and grass stains before being hauled up to the Hospital Wing by an exasperated Nurse Blainey, so be it.
(Needless to say, you aren’t the only one who calls him “Bash” anymore.)
You consider all this while you quietly work through some of the larger knots that have built up in the muscles of his back. His body has kept hold of a momentous amount of trauma over the years, and if you can help dissolve even a fraction of it with your hands, you’ll be overjoyed.
Carefully you splay the palms of your hands against his bare skin and concentrate hard on spreading warmth and relaxation through the striations of Sebastian’s muscles. You visualize your magic wrapping through the infinitely small tears and bruises he’s endured to diffuse a relief that emanates a warm, pinkish glow you can genuinely see.
“What’s happening?” Sebastian asks, his voice slurred.
“How do you feel?” you whisper.
“Incredible,” he breathes. “Are you…? Is this magic that you’re doing? Ancient magic?”
“I’m not exactly sure,” you admit softly. “Regular magic, ancient magic… It’s probably a bit of both.”
“How did you–?” Sebastian asks before trailing off in a lazy, satisfied moan. “Merlin, it feels good.”
“Anne’s been showing me some of the healing magic she’s been studying with Nurse Blainey,” you say softly. “It’s actually quite interesting, Anne is quite talented with–”
“No more talking about Anne for a little while, love,” Sebastian grits out. “Just – just keep doing whatever it is you’re doing. Please.”
You giggle softly while you slide your hands down further to the base of his spine, where you know for a fact he carries an unjust amount of tension. It’s precisely there that he stores his worries about upcoming N.E.W.T. exams, his all-important role on the Quidditch team, and the pressure he puts on himself to succeed so he can take care of Anne once you all graduate – you too, now, even though you insist you’ll be equals in every way possible.
“Feeling a bit better?” you ask him hopefully.
“Can’t remember the last time I felt this good,” he mumbles. “You should be a Healer.”
“I don’t know about that,” you demur. “I rather like the idea of only doing this for you.”
Sebastian’s soft groan sounds like one of assent.
You channel magic through him for a few more moments until you notice that he finally feels less inflamed beneath your fingertips. Then you let the glow fade away until it’s just you and Sebastian, no more magic thrumming between where your bodies touch.
He’s quiet for several long moments and you wonder whether you might have simply magicked him to sleep.
“Bash?” you whisper. “Are you alright?”
All of a sudden, he’s remarkably alive beneath you. He cants one hip to tip you off of his back and onto the bed beside him, earning an annoyed huff out of you when you land on your rear. But before you can put the words together to protest, he’s parting your legs with his hands so he can settle between them and rucking up the jersey until he can see your bare core.
“You’re incredible,” he tells you earnestly. “I feel better than I have in months, love.”
“Th-that’s good,” you stutter, a bit bewildered.
He continues, “And I’m going to return the favor right this minute.”
You barely have time to blink before he’s kissing you breathless and rocking his hips against yours. You gasp sharply into his mouth and he swallows the sound, pressing his tongue against yours in that filthy way that he knows gets you soaking for him every single time he does it.
“Bash,” you whine. “Slow down a little.”
“Not a chance,” he says against your neck. “I want you, you made me need you.”
…Merlin, did you?
You try to focus while Sebastian stretches out the collar of his own jersey to suck claiming bruises along your collarbone. Did you overdo it on the healing spell? Possibly imbue him with a little too much “love?”
But then he confesses, “You’re irresistible in my clothes like this, d’you know that?”
You breathe a sigh of relief when you realize that that’s what’s got him so worked up. It’s you in his colors, his rumpled clothing with his damn name emblazoned on your back.
That quickly gives you an idea.
“Let me turn over,” you grunt as you try to squirm out from underneath him. “Sebastian, please.”
He looks thoroughly displeased when you sit up, so you placate him with one more filthy kiss before he won’t have access to your mouth for a while. Then you settle on your elbows and knees, jersey shoved up to the middle of your waist.
Sebastian says some foul words under his breath when he sees you arch and present yourself for him. You wish he’d just bury himself in you, patience and preparation be damned. Together the two of you have discovered that there’s a time and a place for slow, intimate lovemaking just as much as there is for desperate, urgent, feral fucking.
You know which one Sebastian is craving.
“Take me like this, Bash,” you say breathlessly. “So you can see whose name I carry.”
He leans over you and drags his hand across the “SALLOW” stitched in thick, white letters across the broadest part of the jersey’s shoulders. Then he lets out a noise that sounds suspiciously like a growl as he grinds his hips against yours.
“I need to be inside you,” he grunts. Behind you, you can hear him shoving his base layer down his thighs before he drags two fingertips along your slit and uses your wetness to stroke his cock. “I can’t be patient.”
“Don’t be,” you insist. You sway your hips invitingly and arch your back. “I’m ready.”
“You need my fingers,” he tells you. “I’ll give you enough, I won’t hurt you.”
You stun him by reaching a hand back and showing him how you can press two fingers against your entrance that easily sink inside. You moan softly at how different the angle is from how you usually touch yourself, but it works to get the point across to Sebastian.
“I’m ready,” you repeat. “I was waiting for you.”
Sebastian traces a thumb along your slit beside your fingers, pulling you open a bit to let himself look his fill as you spread your wetness around wantonly.
“Is this what you were doing while I was at practice?” he asks. “Laying in this bed in my clothes, playing with your pussy, and thinking of what I’d do to you when I got back?”
Now that’s a word he most certainly picked up from those Muggle books he likes to read, but it makes you squirm desperately nonetheless.
“Yes,” you whimper. “B-but I waited for you to finish.”
“That’s a shame,” he murmurs. “I suppose I’ll have to make sure you’re properly seen to, since you’ve been waiting so long.”
He presses his thumb against your entrance with your two fingers and when you can easily take it inside as well, he decides you’re indeed plenty ready for his cock instead. His gentle hand on your wrist coaxes you into pulling out, and then he lines himself up and starts to press inside.
You whimper his name as you collapse onto your elbows. He feels impossibly big like this, and despite your insistence that you were ready for him, it’s a toe-curling kind of stretch that has you panting and trembling beneath him while your body alternates between its animal instincts to rear back or submit.
“Good, you take me so well, love,” he groans. “How do you feel?”
In answer, you loudly groan into the pillow you’ve bunched up beneath you.
“Sounds like you’re enjoying yourself,” he says smugly. “Hold on tight for me, alright?”
After a few easy thrusts to ensure you’re properly braced for the full weight of him, Sebastian starts to relentlessly pound you down into the mattress. He supports you with his forearm wrapped beneath your hips and one broad hand pressing into your back – right below where his name is inscribed.
You’re fiercely loud in bed with him, but even when you’re whining and nearly sobbing for him, you can’t drown out the sound of his foul mouth.
“Take this cock,” he grunts. “Take it all, it’s what you wanted, right? For me to fill you up?”
“Yes!” you wail, knowing he expects an answer.
“That’s right,” he growls. “You want it all, I’ll give it all to you, always.”
He leans over your back and grinds in deep and you feel a twinge that isn’t entirely pleasure, but you wouldn’t dare ask him to stop – it’s too good, especially when it’s straddling the line of being too much.
“I’m gonna give you everything,” he confesses into your ear. “My seed, my name on your back, I’ll give you anything you want.”
“Give it to me,” you slur. “Go on, Bash.”
“I will love, I will,” he grunts. “But I’m finishing you first.”
He keeps murmuring filth into your ear while he works a hand underneath you to rub quick, firm circles against your clit the way he knows you like. He talks about how sweet you are for him, how you’re the best thing he has, how he wants to keep you right here for as long as you’ll let him, but whether he means in this bed or in his arms you can’t possibly know.
He deftly works you to a breathtaking climax – quite literally you lose your breath, and he just keeps drawing it out with his eager fingers and his cock buried deep in you for so long that you wonder when it will ever stop. When it finally relents, you rest your cheek against the pillow and lie boneless, content to let Sebastian hold your hips up so he can work himself toward his finish.
“Want you to keep it all inside,” he says mindlessly. “Keep it in, keep my jersey on too, fuck–”
When he spills in you, he grinds his sensitive cock against your hips for as long as he can take it to make sure you stay full of his spend. Then when he pulls out, he tucks that damn jersey back down over your ass as if to make the claim, Our work here is done.
You lay exhausted on your stomach while Sebastian cozies up behind you. Within minutes of catching your breaths his stomach growls, so you know you won’t be there for much longer, but neither of you seems to be in any hurry to untangle yourself from the other.
Eventually, you have to ask him, “...So, ‘my name on your back,’ hmm?”
You expect him to blush and stammer, or start talking about how maybe, someday, when he feels like he’s satisfied some sort of redemptive goal that will make him feel like he deserves it, that could be a reality.
Instead, he kisses behind the hinge of your jaw and murmurs, “I meant it. Whenever you want it, it’s yours. Just say the word.”
“Fine, but if I get the name, I get to keep the jersey,” you sigh.
He buries his nose in your hair and happily mumbles, “I think we’ll have to negotiate that one.”
411 notes · View notes
ticklygiggles · 1 month
Text
A bored King and a poor ticklish servant | Mobei-Jun x Shang Qinghua 
Tumblr media
A/N: A little gift for a very dear friend's birthday! I hope this fics reaches you! Happy birthday! 🎂 This is a fandom I haber never written for, and it's been sooo long since I read the novel, but I hope you enjoy it! We miss you! ❤️
Summary: What's a servant use but entertain his King? At what extend though?
This is not N$FW but there are mild mentions of things
Tumblr media
“M-My King,” Shang Qinghua stuttered, shifting his position for the umpteenth time and groaning when he was forced back in place by a cold, firm hand on his hip. “My King… I've been sitting here for a while now, and with all due respect, you're not the most comfortable piece of furniture out there and something has been poking at me, maybe we could please move- 
“Shut it,” Mobei-Jun said against his ear and Shang Qinghua shivered, feeling the freezing breathing swirling into his ear canal. “I am working.”
“That I can see, My King,” he answered, his head nodding softly as he eyed the bunch of reports scattered across the desk. At first, he was willing to help Mobei-Jun, but when the Clan Leader simply sat him down onto his lap, silently ordering him to stay put. 
Shang Qinghua didn't put up a fight, after all it was useless, and it wasn't like he hated being there… but it had been ages. His butt was hurting and the blush spread across his cheeks everytime he moved and felt Mobei-Jun’s… ahem... He was a very gifted man, that was all he could say. 
There was nothing left but to resign himself, so letting out a long sigh, he leaned against Mobei-Jun's strong and muscular chest. It really was like leaning against a wall, but a little softer, just a little, but he was happy. No matter how much he looked at him, Mobei-Jun was definitely his best creation. A beautiful and handsome face chiseled in cold marble. A body that made his mouth water every time they were intimate. He has always been his favorite character and his ideal person, so being in his arms like that, well, maybe he was thankful that he accidentally electrocuted himself to death. 
Now they were even husbands! Destiny does have a million things prepared that one would not even-
“Haah! My King!” Shang Qinghua gasped heavily, squirming in Mobei-Jun's lap. “M-My K-King! We've talked about this before! You need to warn me before touching my bare skin with your hands! You are always so c-cohohold ahahand- ahahahaha!” 
Sudden, embarrassing giggles sputtered out as he felt a soft squeeze on his left side. Shang Qinghua squirmed, but Mobei-Jun's hand was latched to him. He didn't noticed until it was too late, one of Mobei-Jun’s had slipped one hand under his clothes and was now tickling him silly. 
“My Kihihing! Oh! Yohohou knohohow I'm teheherribly tihihihicklish! Y-You cahahahannot– 
“I said I'm working.” 
“Ihihi apohohilogihihize profuhuhusely, b-but yohohou reheheally- ahahahack, my Kihihing plehehehease!” 
This was terrible. Shang Qinghua never thought that Mobei-Jun would be so attracted to tickling him after two nights ago he discovered that Shang Qinghua's body was horribly sensitive to gentle, playful touches. Since that day, there wasn't a moment where Shang Qinghua wasn't laughing like an idiot if he was within a meter of Mobei-Jun's reach. He was grateful that at least Mobei-Jun kept his little games to himself when the two of them were alone, but still! His laugh sounded so silly and embarrassing. If Shang Qinghua could, his head would be buried inside the earth like an ostrich. 
Erratic and silly giggles filled the studio as one of Mobei-Jun's icy hands squeezed Shang Qinghua's side, skittered his fingers against his ribs, clawed at his tummy, pinched at his hip and also wiggled his fingers under his arm. His hand was so fast that Shang Qinghua didn't even try to stop him and simply wriggled like a fish out of water while laughing his head off. 
“Plehehehease, my Kihihing!” He begged again, feeling tears in his eyes as Mobei-Jun decided to settle under his arm, his whole body leaning to the opposite side. “Thihihis pohohoor sehehervahahant cahahan't tahake thihihis anymohohore! I'm vehehery tihihicklish thehehere!” 
Mobei-Jun simply hummed, but no matter what he said, he seemed deaf to his words. Shang Qinghua’s clothes were in disarray, his tunic open and falling off one of his shoulders. His face was definitely red and his laugh- no, he didn't even want to talk about it. 
Also... why was Mobei-Jun tickling him right at that moment?! Hadn't he said that he was busy with the silly reports of him? Ah, he probably had grown bored, right? And instead of giving Shang Qinghua a sweet, heated kiss, he decided to torment him with his biggest weakness. How was that fair?
“I need you to stop moving right now,” Mobei-Jun said, but his fingers kept wiggling under Shang Qinghua's arm, driving him up the wall. 
Shang Qinghua shook his head. “I cahahan't! I cahahahannohot! It tickles so bahahahd!” 
Mobei-Jun growled and Shang Qinghua squealed when he was suddenly manhandled into the wooden floor. Mobei-Jun straddled him as he gathered both Shang Qinghua's wrists in one of his hands. Shang Qinghua opened his mouth to ask what was going on, but only laughter came out. 
“NOHOHO, PLEHEHEASE!” He shrieked as Mobei-Jun used his free hand to wreak havoc in both his armpits. Shang Qinghua was in hysterics in just two seconds; he cackled and kicked, squirmed and pulled at his arms, but they barely flinched in Mobei-Jun’s grasp. “MY KIHIHING! I'm gohohonna dihihie!” 
Above him Mobei-Jun was smiling faintly, tender eyes tracing Shang Qinghua's features. Shang Qinghua was simply dying, laughing and jumping every time Mobei-Jun jumped from one underarm to the other. 
“HAHAVE MEHEHERCY PLEHEHEASE!” Tears of laughter clinged to his lashes and rolled down the sides of his face. He was definitely going to die again. And by tickling this time! Would his third death be also embarrassingly pathetic too? What a disgrace, he- 
“Ohohoho, gohohoodnehehess, thahahank you!” He said breathlessly as the tickling stopped. He went limp as his arms were released and gently moved down. “M-My Kihing,” he chuckled softly as Mobei-Jun gently touched his cheek. Shang Qinghua leaned against the cold hand. “If yohou w-wanted my attention so much, you c-could have a-asked.”
Mobei-Jun’s face remained neutral as he looked down at his husband, but Shang Qinghua had learned to read his expression and he clearly saw he was sulking. Shang Qinghua smiled, oh that was adorable. 
“Let this servant help you relax for a while, My King,” he said, wrapping his arms around Mobei-Jun's neck and bringing him closer to his face for a kiss. “This servant knows exactly what his King needs, leave everything to me- w-wahait! Watch your hands, please, if you tickle me I- ahahaha!” 
Ah, so he was feeling playful, huh? Well… it was alright, Shang Qinghua thought he could probably stand another tickle attack if Mobei-Jun wanted to torture him so much. It was the last thing he could do after being blessed with his perfect side character!
118 notes · View notes
Text
chaotic book ramble so I can stop spiraling into the abyss: dark academia books you've heard of and probably already read edition
I need to talk about books I love to stay sane please stand by <3
Bunny by Mona Awad. I love this book SO MUCH. it's beautifully written, the characters are all unhinged women, there's murder, there's creation, there's a creative writing class. it drips with insanity and eroticism. reading it is like living a fever dream. you can picture the events of the book perfectly, but could never hope to explain it to anyone.
The Secret History by Donna Tartt. this book is the entire world to me. I love the characters [they're all terrible and irredeemable people], I love the story [they kill a man then they kill their friend and also worship Dionysus], and I absolutely want a friend group just like the Greek class [to reiterate: they are all walking red flags]. it's a book you have to read once, then again, and again, just to notice more and more so you can analyze it and make deductions. at the end of the day, it goes beyond the age-old "moral implications of murder" and delves into "moral implications of love". don't ask me how many times I've read it. that's my red flag.
If We Were Villains by ML Rio. it was only recently that I read this over the course of twenty four hours, and I honesty have yet to recover. I'm not a Shakespeare girlie, but I still loved the way his work was so inherently and intricately woven into the story of the iwwv characters. it was transcendent. it was a tragedy, it was a love story, it was a comedy. it depends on your perception of it, I suppose. but I digress - it's a really good bloody book. expect the ending to make you cry.
The Picture of Dorian Gray, by our lord and savior Oscar Wilde. this, technically, can't really be classified under the textbook definition of "dark academia" since there's not exactly any academia (can Harry even read let's be honest here), but it goes in this list because VIBES. this is one of my favorite novels of all time, and another one I've read one too many times for it to not be a red flag. I mean, the name of my damn blog is my red flag. I love it so much. it's got everything, from art to obsession to murder to gay people to the most heartachingly profound lines you've ever read. I mean, why wouldn't you read it if you haven't already?
These Violent Delights by Micah Nemerever. this one snuck up on me. towards the beginning, I wasn't sure if I'd like it, but by the middle, I was hooked. by the ending, I was shooketh. reading the author note, I was sitting silently in abject horror. more gay people, more obsession, more murder - what else do I have to say?
this has been a chaotic book ramble. thank you for being here <3
377 notes · View notes
guyfieriii · 1 year
Text
New Person, Same Old Mistakes
After multiple rewatches of The Bear over the last month, I've been sucked back in and couldn't think of anything else but Carmen Berzatto.
Here's part one of four of a little something about our favourite depressed chef's years in NYC.
Part II, Part III and Part IV
Tumblr media
He looks like he doesn’t really want to be here. At this date. If you could even call it that. 
A drink tomorrow night. How does that sound?
I can’t meet up at nights. Work. 
Oh.
I can meet you in the morning.
For breakfast?
Why not?
Why the fuck not?
A non-date you hauled ass all the way from Brooklyn at the crack of dawn. 
An over-exaggeration, but it’s one you feel entitled to. You’ve taken a 46-minute train ride for breakfast with a man who looks like he just crawled out of bed. Which is a miracle since he looks as though he’s been up for days. It’s not just the exhaustion that rolls off him, there’s something else you can’t quite find the word for. You wanted to turn back the moment you saw him standing outside the bodega. 
But for some reason, you kept walking. Equal parts curiosity and obligation. You made it this far, might as well see it through.
Also—
He was by no means unattractive. Looked a lot like a coked-up Gene Wilder, if you were being honest. Clad in a tight, albeit wrinkled white t-shirt and a pair of vintage jeans. Redline Selvedge. You concede to the fact that he somehow managed to pull off the ‘I got ready in under two minutes’ look quite well. Messy. Understated. Kind of hot. It was his hair that really brought it all together, sandy locks that stuck out in different directions like he’d run his hand through them over and over. 
Your hand twinged at the thought.
Every time he lifted his arm to take a drag of his cigarette, you distinctly noticed the way his bicep bulged under his sleeve. 
Christ, that’s…something.
He noticed you walk over and offered you a sort of smile with the raise of a brow, and fuck if it wasn’t endearing. 
You finally took proper notice of his eyes. Blue. Crystalline. Ocean strong waves of azure in the warmth of sun-lit currents. They were strangely emotive, despite his face remaining fairly impassive. Despondency echoed through them quietly. They were a far cry from what you saw online. 
You still admired them when you were scrolling through Tinder and came upon his profile. He had one photo - he wore a white coat in it, the ones that the guys on MasterChef wear. Like it was a professional headshot. He stood, leaning against a metal worktable with his arms crossed. Hair slicked back, with a ruminative look on his face. But his eyes—
They were hollow. A sepulchral for all sentiments buried deep within. 
His bio read:
Carmen, 29
Chicagoan. CDC at Eleven Madison Park.
That’s all it said. His name, age, and profession. Like it was a fucking resume. You scoffed at the bare effort he put in. As if a picture and a brief description of his occupation were enough to lure the ladies in. Just as you were going to move on to the next man in a series of disappointments, you accidentally swiped right and matched with him. 
Hours of scrolling and a bottle of Pinot later, it seemed like he was your best and only option. So you messaged him. He was good-looking enough if only a tad underwhelming in what he put forth. What was the harm in trying him out? 
What indeed?
Seeing him in the harsh light of day, he looked entirely different from the put together guy you saw on his profile. Still good looking, just—
Tragic.
That was the word you were looking for. 
“Carmen?” 
“Uh, yeah.” He flicked off his half-smoked cigarette to the side and wiped his hands down his jeans before offering you one for a shake. It feels rough but warm. Calloused. A worker’s hands. Hands that could tell chronicle a novel’s worth of stories, you’re sure. You can feel bits of raised skin across his palm, around his fingers. Little scars littered all over. You want to examine them all. 
You turn your wrist underneath to see a tattoo on the back of his, a knife piercing the hand. 
Christ. 
A few seconds pass as you examine the rest of his tattoos. He has a pair of cherubs holding up a Sun on his upper arm, and a snail with the words ‘Live Fast’ underneath. 
Your gaze drifts over to his other arm—
You’re interrupted by an awkward clearing of his throat and you realize you’ve been holding on to him, shaking his hand for the better part of a minute. You let go immediately, your palm still tingling from the feeling of his. The air kisses your skin, it’s light, empty, remiss of the character you found in his touch. 
“Sorry, I was just—“ Your eyes meet his once again and you’re lost. 
“It’s cool.” He mutters. “I, uh—“
“So what’s the — Sorry, you—“
“No you go—“
“I—“
“Sorry, I don’t—“
The two of you stammer over each other in constant apology before you finally put it to a halt with an uncomfortable laugh.
“I was just asking what the plan was.” You look around the block, nothing but the bodega seems to be open this early. “Where are we going to eat?”
“Right…here?” He looks at you with mild hesitance, pointing towards the bodega. 
“We’re eating breakfast here?” He has to be joking in an oddly genuine way because he looks like he-
Oh God. It’s not a joke. 
You woke up at 7 am, got onto the subway, and switched three trains for a fucking BEC.
He looks at you in deepening discomfort, a little sheepish, only just realizing that this may not be the ideal date most women have in mind. His eyes brimmed with repentance. 
Those eyes.
“It’s, uh- it’s fine!” You say with an overstated tone of cheerfulness. “I’m starving, anyway.”
“Right.” He looks unconvinced but opens the door for you, nonetheless. 
“‘Uarda, Carmy!” A woman, probably in her late 60s, seated behind the counter broke into a smile as the two of you entered. “The fuck ya been, huh?”
“Work, Lucia.” His tone conveys ire, but his face betrays him. 
He looks at the woman with softened fondness as she fusses over him. She’s loud and over-exaggerated in her mannerisms, hands animatedly gesticulating every word. All the while, Carmen — Carmy, stands there indulging her every word with the occasional apologetic glance spared your way. 
It’s a charming sight, watching the two of them talk. Lucia is loud and mothering and Carmen is reserved.
“Didn’cha mother teach ya any manners, boy? Who’s the darlin’ behind ya?” She finally ends her tirade of ‘the fuck you been?’, ‘never show ya face ‘round no more’, ‘eat a lil’ somethin’ f’fuck’s sake’ and notices you. “Don’t mind him, sweetheart. The fuck’s been mezzamort ever since he moved here.”
“I’m, uh—.” His date? To a fucking bodega?
“She’s a friend.” Carmen interjects quickly. 
“Since when do you have—“ Lucia scoffs, incredulous.
“A friend who’d love some breakfast, actually.” You cut in, wanting to spare him the end of that sentence. 
He wouldn’t have friends, would he? Doesn’t seem like the kind to. 
Maybe you could—
“Should’a said — yo Gino! Get two BECs going on a — ya’ll have it on a bagel or a roll, doll?” She snaps into action immediately.
“Uh, a bagel. Thank y—“ 
“Hear that? A bagel for her, roll for Carmy.” She yells across the other end of the small bodega to the teenage boy sitting over two milk crates, scrolling on his phone. “Get off ya fuckin’ ass, Gino! Gotta feed these kids.”
The boy gets up with an exaggerated eye roll and strolls over to the flattop to get your breakfast started. “SPK?” He questions in a monotone over his shoulder.
“‘Course she’ll have it, ya moron.” Lucia answers for you.
“She’s a bit much.” Carmen is back at your side whispering in a low voice, apologetic. “But she means well.”
“No, she’s great.” 
The two of you stand in silence, watching your sandwiches being made. With Lucia now occupied, it’s awkward once again. You’re not usually at a loss for words, but Carmen isn’t a man who oozes approachability. Not that you’ve known him longer than a few minutes. Maybe, eventually—
Maybe, you could—
“Coffee?” He asks, walking to the self-serve station behind you. 
“Hmm?” You shake your head, snapping back to reality. “Oh. Yeah, sure. Cream and two sugars, please.”
What is it about him that makes think of any kind of eventuality? You’ve only just met. It’s been awkward and stilted, and he looks like a mess. The only things know about him are summed up in a one-line bio. Maybe it’s your desperation. Your sheer need to be coupled up regardless of the clear red flags you see.
Maybe it’s his eyes. Maybe it’s the sense you get from him, this veiled potential. Maybe you’re just a fool looking to fix a man you don’t even know. 
You’re both back out on the sidewalk, coffee in hand, sandwiches packed in a little bag that hangs off his wrist. “Are we—“ You’re unsure of how to phrase your question without sounding like an idiot, but there’s no way around it. “Are we eating on the sidewalk?”
That earns you a disbelieving laugh and a smile you’ll remember. Only because it just seems so out of place. His lips curl up just the slightest in a barely there, you’ll miss it if you don’t really look kind of way. It’s all in his eyes. They lighten. The pensive wistfulness that floats in those pools of glacial blue volatilizes. What takes place in its stead is just a hint of ease and good-natured humour. It makes him look his age, just for that brief moment. 
“The park? Yeah? Thought it’d be a good spot.” It’s jarring just how his consternation inches back in as quickly as it had disappeared. 
“The park’s great, Carmy.” You say it, his nickname, without thinking. Your tone is soft with the intention to mollify. 
He looks at you in surprise and you’re worried you got too familiar too quickly. But then it comes back — that ease. His brows dip slightly, and that faint wisp of a smile returns. The fact that you were able to bring it forth fills you with this warmth. It imbibes itself in your bones, coursing through your body, settling around your heart. It beats faster. 
Faster still, as you watch him run his fingers through his hair, once, twice, thrice. You’re enthralled. 
If you could just reach out and—
“Let’s go?” He takes a step forward and turns to look back at you when you don’t move. Your gaze falls down to his hand, the one he ran through his hair with. More tattoos. A flower on the back and the letters ‘S O U’ on his fingers. Your own fingers itch to intertwine themselves with his. Feel the warmth of his palm, pass by the ridges of his scars like they’re milestones on a road not taken. At any rate, isn’t that what people do, when they go for a walk on a date? Hold hands?
Jesus Christ, listen to you. One look underneath his lugubrious nature, and you’re fucking smitten. 
“Sorry—“ You blink twice, pushing out from behind your thoughts. “Yeah, let’s go.”
You walk side by side, hands apart.
It’s a short walk, just a couple blocks. You enter the park through the side gate and pick the first empty bench you find and take a seat. You unwrap your breakfast in silence, setting your sandwiches down on paper napkins between you. 
It’s still not what you’d have had in mind for a first date and yet, you’re content. It’s a warm morning for an early spring day in New York. Lightness flickers through your hair with the Eastertide breeze — it carries with it the scent of blossoming ephemerals, the hyacinths, and magnolias that grow at your feet. It’s a cool zephyr enveloped in the warmth of the sun, almost quixotic for a morning spent in the park. The best of both worlds, really. Refreshing the air in your lungs with each breath, just as springtime offers the start of something anew. Yet, the apricity that lingers under the sunlight shining from the east brings about this effortless comfort out there in the open. 
It’s all so ideal, it pushes you to be brave. 
“Can I ask you something?” You turn sideways, now sitting cross-legged on the bench. 
“Yeah, sure.” Carmy follows suit, facing toward you, feet still planted on the ground. 
“You don’t go on many dates, do you?” You blurt the words out in a straightforward tone, it might as well have been a statement and not an inquiry. 
“That obvious?” He traces this bottom lip with his fingers in nervousness.
“Well—“ You shrug, noncommittal, with a sly smile. 
“Yeah. I don’t date. I don’t really have the time.” He sounds almost defeated like he’s settled into what his circumstances are. 
You don’t like it. 
“So what made you come out with me?” You press on and hope his answer isn’t as resigned as he looks. 
“I—“ He looks away from you, lips curling into a frown and you can see his mind churning behind his eyes for an acceptable response. 
Oh.
You’re not special. He didn’t make time. His interest in you was just as much of happenstance as you accidentally swiping right on him. 
“It’s alright, I kinda put you on the spot with that question.” You try not to sound too sullen. It’s silly. In a span of a few minutes, you’ve gone from apprehension to being so taken with him all because—
His eyes flash back to yours and he looks so fucking apologetic, it hurts. 
You’re desperate to change the subject. “Tell me about your work. You’re a chef at Eleven Madison, right?”
“Yeah.” One word. That’s all he offers. 
“It’s like the best restaurant in the country. That must be…cool.”
It breaks through the ambiguity caused by your previous question and you’re relieved. 
“Yeah. It's…cool.” His jaw tightens just by a fraction and you wonder why. But that’s a thread best left alone. 
“I know fuck all about food, forget all that fancy stuff you probably make—” Flattery is the safest bet for you at this point. So you decide to play to his ego a touch. “—So you’ll have to help me out here.”
“What do you want to know?”
“I’ll start simple. What’s your favourite thing to cook?”
That makes him pause. “At work?”
“Yeah. At work. What’s your favourite thing to make?” You offer him an encouraging smile. 
“I—“ Why is this so hard for him? He fidgets with the lid of his coffee cup.
“Can’t be that hard to think of something, Carmy.” 
“It’s not, I just — I’m CDC now. Spend more time on the pass than anything so—“
“What does that mean?”
“CDC. Chef de Cuisine. Kinda like-“
“Okay so you’re the head bitch in charge?”
“Kinda, yeah.” He scoffs. “So I’m at the pass — the part of the line where all chits are called out the plated dishes are put up.”
“So you don’t cook much anymore?”
“I used to before—“
“Okay, so before, what was the thing you loved to make?”
He actually seems to give it some thought. You watch him silently mull over, as you take a bite of your sandwich.
“Wild boar with celeriac, lingonberry, and hazelnuts.” He finally answers, definitively. 
“That sounds…simple.”
“The wild boar was dry-aged for 21 days. The celeriac was in the form of a yolk. The hazelnut oil was compressed in-house. The peels were used to smoke the lingonberry gelée.” He says with a challenging raise of a brow. 
Oh, he’s showing off.
“What the fuck?” You exclaim in utter disbelief. “A yolk?”
“Yeah, I spherified the purée with sodium alginate in a calcium gluconate bath.” He says it like it’s the most obvious thing. 
“I failed 8th-grade chemistry, so you really fucked me up just now.” 
He snorts at that. “Didn’t do so hot in school, either. But when it comes to food I—“
“Finding your passion in something just makes shit you thought was hard a whole lot easier, doesn’t it?” If only the same held true for you. All you had to account for was a series of failed starts, an apartment you could barely afford in a city where you knew no one, and a directionless future ahead.
“What’s yours?” He asks, his eyes bore into you and you shy away from their intensity. 
You walked right into that.
“I…don’t know yet.” You frown self-consciously. 
“Kinda seems like you do.”
You don’t. All you know is how to say the right thing at the right moment. A skill cultivated out of your sheer dread of not being what others need. You have no experiences to share, you’ve done nothing but fail. School. Jobs. Relationships. You’re a fuck-up. So you’ve resigned yourself to the next best thing you can be — you can be something for someone else, if not yourself.
“I—“ You keep your eyes downcast, not wanting to give yourself away. “I really don’t.”
“Heard.” You glance back up at him and are only met with recognition. It eases the tightness in your chest. 
“What’s that?” 
“It’s what you say in the kitchen when you acknowledge what you’re being told.” 
“Oh, that’s cool. I’m stealing that.” 
“You’d have to follow it up with ‘Chef’ for it to really stick, though.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Heard, Chef.” 
“That’s perfect.” It’s back, that smile. A mere tendril of one at his lips, but it bleeds from his eyes. 
Fuck, it feels good.
Maybe, eventually.
Maybe, you could—
You finish your breakfast in idle chatter. You ask him about the rest of his tattoos.
“It kinda looks like an ‘E 22’ from one angle and ‘733’ from another.” Your fingers trace the ink decorating his arm.
“Yeah. 733 is the area code for Chicago and  E22 is a dishwasher code for when the filter’s blocked.” You feel the muscles rippling under flex under your touch.
“I kinda want a tattoo.” You don’t draw your hand away. 
“What would you get?” He doesn’t seem to mind. 
“How many other dishwasher codes are there? Do I have some to pick from or just the one?”
He tells you more about things he likes to cook. You meet him in the middle with your one-pan pasta recipe and slowly watch the horror creep into his face. 
“Don’t knock it till you try it, Carmy.”
“Worked with food long enough to know what doesn’t work. And pasta cooked in canned tomatoes and half and half doesn’t work.”
He tells you some things about his life in Chicago. He mentions his siblings but the look on his face tells you it’s not a topic you ought to probe at. It’s repentant in some parts and reminiscent in others. But there’s also this resonant anger beneath it. You see the tick in his jaw, the way his fingers tap against the lid of his cup a bit faster, and the way he adjusts his position to sit a bit straighter. All to distract from the hurt. You recognize it because it’s something you do yourself. 
“My family’s not come to see me. I’ve — uh been too busy.”
“Neither has mine.” But you have all the time in the world. You don’t say that, though. 
You try and lighten the mood by telling him about your life as a gig worker. Ever since you moved to the city, you’ve barely managed to hold down a job for longer than 6 months at the time. So you wised up and made sure to have back-ups. Whenever you’ve brought that up on dates, you’ve only been met with thinly veiled judgment. But Carmy- 
“It’s kinda like working in the kitchen. No two days are the same. Keeps shit interesting.”
That’s a good way to look at it, you decide. 
In under the span of a couple hours, you leave his company feeling better. The breakfast was pretty decent. Carmy assured you it’s the best of what you’d find in the neighbourhood. 
“I don’t fuck with brunch.” He’d said. You’d laughed, but he was serious. “It’s a hell shift, and I can’t eat without picturing how fucked they are back of house.”
You part ways with a hug and a promise of a text from him for whenever he’s free next. 
“I’m going back to Chicago for a couple days in a few weeks. But when I’m back—“
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I’d like to see you again.”
The weeks passed, and you waited. 
The text never came. 
774 notes · View notes
greenerteacups · 2 months
Note
Hi! Just wanted to say the latest chapter is lovely & amazing & sweet & had me smiling the whole time! I absolutely love your characterisation of everyone, especially Draco, so it was so so lovely to return to this world & to his thoughts!! with his best friend and crush at malfoy manor no less! All the yearning is already off to a great start hehe I am so excited for the rest of book 5!
Wanted to ask you how has it been for you to write this new book and volume? Has your writing process changed since when you’d first begun taking on a long form project like this?
& also are there any moments or surprises in this book that you’re especially excited about?
sending so much love & gratitude for you and your incredible works 💓
Thank you so much! This is really encouraging, I so appreciate it.
Inasmuch as I can use this metaphor without having kids myself, I sort of see each of the books as a different child. The first one flew out in basically a few weeks of very intensive writing, and it was a total dream — plot, pacing, symbolism, major beats, all fell into place basically without effort. The character stuff was the hardest, as I've written about before, but even then, the glorious part of writing beginnings is it's the most energy you'll ever have for a project, so the lows were pretty soft lows. Book 2, in contrast, I had to drag kicking and screaming by its ankle from under the bottommost mattress of my brain. It's one of my least favorite books (tone problem; COS has killer plot/setting/ingredients for a YA novel, but it's stuck in the doldrums of Harry Potter's well-documented Early-Installment Weirdness, before Cedric Diggory slams the gas and upshifts the whole series into its correct age bracket). More specifically, once I'd gone through and picked out everything in the book that happened because of Lucius, I didn't have a plot — hey alexa how do you rewrite Chamber of Secrets when We Got No Fucking Chamber Of Secrets — and oh by the way, even if you want to do a moody tone/political setup book, remember that your protagonists are still twelve, so if you go too dark or too intense, you'll risk torpedoing your readers' suspension of disbelief. Good luck, Charlie.
Book 3 felt the most like its own novel, if that makes sense? It's the last truly feel-good book of the series; it's a great stand-alone mystery novel with relatively low stakes. Plus you get a bunch of the big series icons: patronuses, dementors, werewolves, Hogsmeade, the Marauders' Map, and time turners arithmancy. It just felt like a good old-fashioned motherfucking romp of a mystery/adventure story, before any of the complex character work and major stakes of the late books come in.
Book 4 was the most fun I've had writing anything maybe ever. I don't even know what it was. Maybe the tournament arc, honestly? Love me a tournament arc. But in any case, I opened every new chapter feeling a tingle of excitement for what I was gonna get to do. Oh, and the romance started, finally, Jesus God (if it feels like a slow burn reading, just imagine what it felt like writing it, when everything takes ten times as long, and you have to figure out how to word the fucker.)
Book 5, in contrast, has felt much less like that tingle of "here we go!" and more like "oh, man, this is gonna be cool." Because this is the arc of the story that composed the original idea for Lionheart, literally years ago, and to be honest, I didn't think I'd get this far! If you'd asked me "do you know that it's going to take you 500,000 words of backstory before you can start writing that concept you're thinking about, and you're going to do it anyway?" I would have said: "absolutely not, strange mind-reader!" But like... I'm here! Finally! And it's... real now? Like, this isn't just a bunch of clips of scenes in my head anymore! That's rad!
That being said, it's definitely been slower than Book 4, because I kept switching back to my outline document to make sure that certain things were set up properly, and that I hadn't lost any of the plot threads or forgotten a minor beat that was vitally important for the story three chapters later. And I had a minor crisis about three months ago when I ripped out about 8 chapters in the first third of the book — basically everything from September to December — because I'd done a readthrough to check pacing (big mistake! never edit while drafting, that's satan talking) and realized I had a missing storyline. Like, there was a whole layer of the story that was just. Missing. Not there. And the existing text really couldn't fit another thread, so instead of taking weeks to pore through and try to sift out what I could save, I needed to factory reset and start over. And I didn't want to! I vividly remember sitting there with my head in my hands, trying not to weep, because I'd decimated 90,000 words of work in a single edit. But it had to be done. Because the story wasn't going to work. And now (hopefully) it will.
And of course, there's still that sense of excitement and exhilaration from before. Always. But whereas Book 4 felt like a delicious chocolate pudding, Book 5 is a medium-rare steak.
(Book 6, so far, is four shots of espresso and a whiskey chaser. FWIW.)
65 notes · View notes
dduane · 7 months
Note
Hello Lady Duane! 😊 (I feel that if we can call Neil Sir Gaiman, you certainly deserve a title as well!)
I've wanted to tell you for ages now that you are one of my absolute favourite Trek authors, have been since I first read some of your novels over a decade ago as a teen - my parents and I have about? 4 or 5 copies of The Doctor's Orders between us, German and English alike (my dad even bought a copy to keep at the office for reading during his lunch breaks). The Wounded Sky is another one of my favourite Trek novels ❤️
My sister and I also occasionally watch old Barbie movies for the nostalgia. So when we watched Fairytopia a few months ago, we found out that you had written the script for the movie! I literally let out a happy yell when I saw you show up in the opening credits and went "omg, it's Diane Duane!!" That was so unexpected but also very delightful! 😊
And now, thanks to you being on tumblr as well, I found out about your other novels and bought your ebook bundle the other day. :D I'm currently a bit over halfway through So You Want to Be a Wizard and I just wanted to let you know that I'm enjoying it so very much!! ❤️
Thank you for all the wonderful words over the years! It continues to be a joy! 😊💜
Hi there!
Regarding titles: Well, okay... as long as everybody's clear that as a US citizen, titles are usually off the menu for me. (As an Irish one, not so much—the government can approve the use of them if it likes—though the neighbors'd snicker at me down the pub.) Anyway: I accept gratefully.* Though yelling "Yo, Trekkie!" might well be just as effective. :)
I'm glad you've enjoyed my Trek work! It's always been very satisfying to do. The chance to actually write professionally in what was my main fandom (after Holmes) during my late teen years has been a most unexpected—when I got started—and extraordinary thing.
And as for Fairytopia: That was a lot of fun too, and also unexpected. My agent just called me up one morning and said "How are you about Barbie...?" and I said, "Well, okay I guess, I had the usual number of them!" —and we were off. The Mattel people were fabulous to work with, and I look back on that whole project with affection.
Meanwhile, I'm delighted you're having fun with the first of the Young Wizards books! There are plenty more of them in that package (still discounted) that conform to the new timeline, which now launches in 2008 rather than the mid 1980s. (Book 10 of the series didn't need that treatment, and so isn't available in a revised edition.)
Anyway: thanks for letting me know. It's always nice to find out that I'm getting the job done. :)
*But also: according to the usual protocols, Neil—when they finally get around to knighting him, probably when a more literature- and intelligence-friendly government takes over—will properly be "Sir Neil": as UK knighthood's an acknowledgement of the person, not the family, and knights are therefore addressed by their first names. (Not to fret: people from both sides of the Water sometimes get this detail backwards.)
(...Be fun if they stuck him straight into the Lords, though. Usually, if you don't want to use your last name in your lordship's title, you can select the name of someplace in the UK that has personal meaning for you. Seeing Neil ennobled as Lord Neverwhere would be a trip.) :)
120 notes · View notes
copperbadge · 5 months
Note
If its not too personal could you talk about what was the inspiration for Michaelis? He's got a lot of depth to him, especially for what could have been a one off character in the background after Fete. Also the way he mourns but carries on really resonates with me in Jes.
Oh sure! I mean, on the one hand it is quite personal but it's a kind of personal I really enjoy sharing. :D Michaelis began life as the Standard Hallmark Parent -- you see them a lot in the movies, the parent who is
1. Kinda grouchy
2. Usually pushing their kid slightly too hard in slightly the wrong direction (with the best of intentions)
3. Often a widow/er
4. Practically a cameo designed to stress out the lead, but easily attractive enough that they could be romantic lead themselves in the sequel.
There are actually several Hallmark films where the over-sixty characters are either the supporting romance in a one-off film or the main romance of a sequel film. (The Wedding Veil films, which despite their flaws are actually very enjoyable, have a Michaelis-like character for the mother of the male lead in the first movie, and she then becomes the major supporting romantic lead in the fourth movie.)
By the time I got to Michaelis talking to Eddie at the end of the script for Fete, I'd grown to really like him. When I adapted the script to a novel, I liked him even more. I thought that I could do a sequel with him getting jolted out of himself a bit -- and I was encouraged by how many people liked him in the initial read through. The main inspirations for the actual plot of Infinite Jes were, one, Gregory jokingly suggesting he do a podcast, and two, Michaelis's defensive dismissal of Gregory's question about what he's done for companionship since Miranda passed.
Over the course of writing Infinite Jes, he came to be a collection of themes I've explored or wanted to explore, sometimes themes I knew I wasn't skilled enough to handle yet. The core of him is based on a professor I worked with as a student; the confidence that occasionally tips into arrogance, the keen intellect that likes to take things apart, the ability to look at some toxic family traits and decide "RIP but I'm different" and be a present, nurturing masculine figure, all come from that professor, who had a huge impact on me.
But I have also been fascinated for decades now by a certain kind of character in fiction, someone who has had a devastating loss and keeps going, even if they aren't driven by something like revenge. Profound grief is difficult and fascinating for me, and I finally felt capable of exploring that fully, perhaps because the pressure on romance novels is a bit lower at times.
And honestly, a lot of him is me, processing the fact that I am aging in fandom. I'm older (44) than the oldest person I knew in fandom (38) when I joined it at the age of 14. I have, for lack of a better word, a position in fandom, a status, that affords me certain perks and requires of me certain obligations. Not to call myself elected king of fandom ("I didn't vote for him!") but the duty I feel to fandom, both as a culture that raised me and a found family, is very similar.
Most of my characters contain some of me, but Michaelis and Jerry contain far more of me than most, perhaps because I'm in a place to do some reflection. Michaelis -- intelligent, experienced, hopefully a mentor, but also lonely and detached at times -- is who I'm coming to grips with being; Jerry, the charming fuckup with power but no real clue how to use it, who is doing his best to grow up a little later than a lot of his peers and figure out how disability fits into his identity, is who I still see myself as.
So yeah -- I find Michaelis incredibly fun and compelling to write for, and I think that's because I had hit a skill level in my work where I could combine a lot of tropes and themes into one character and use him to explore why I enjoy them so much. But he definitely began life as the Hallmark Widowed Dad. :D Well, there are worse origin stories.
99 notes · View notes
elbiotipo · 2 months
Note
Workbuilding Fundamentalist question: when it comes to dates, times and calendars in a fantasy setting where do you stand? I'm always conflicted as a writer just because changing the length of a year or what all the months are called all makes sense given that most fantasy worlds aren't earth and because every month is named after a person or deity and our calendar has been changed like 7 times in the real world. And yet I don't want to throw all this extra work at the reader.
Example I have a gas dwarf planet with like, winderwaker islands poking out above the gaseous ocean what people live on. And there's only 4 months in a year there so a 64 year old is still a teenager and it just seems like a lot to make someone keep track of.
First of all, very cool setting, I love islands among the clouds! Now, this is actually something I've given a lot of thought into, and might become a real concern if humanity goes to other planets.
There's, for example, an opening line of a Heinlein novel (IIRC) where a girl says she's 10 years old and thus old enough to marry, which is true, on Mars (the year is 687 days there). There is no reason, if one is designing a new planet, or even finding one IRL, to expect it to have the same day and year lenght to Earth, not even close. Mars with 21 hours is pretty close, but the length of our year and day is really just a cosmic coincidence. You could easily have an reasonably earth-like planet with shorter years (because it's closer to its star, or just revolves faster), or longer days or years.
However, very few fictional settings bother with this, and it's not hard to see why, you can have all sorts of exotic additions to your setting, but to wrap our head through different lenghts of the year or the day is a bit too much. Even different week lenghts, which did exist on history, sound strange. There are all sorts of different fantasy and sci-fi calendars, but at the root, most authors operate with "Earth-time". I don't blame them, it is 'extra work' for some readers, and it's not easy to wrap our head around, it's easier to say "this is sort of an alternate Earth" and be done with it. Also, to lenghten or shortern the year or day might bring all sorts of consequences from ecology to climate that should be considered, otherwise it's just a lame gimmick in my opinion.
HOWEVER, it's still an interesting piece of worldbuilding to consider!
Calendars of a sort have existed since humans started to count seasons and days, but our current society where there are calendars and clocks everywhere is quite recent, actually. I'm sure you are aware of the different calendars besides the BCE-CE one was imposed as the standard, many cultures . But there are also different ways of counting years;. The classic one is seasons, farming societies of course need it the most but hunter-gatherers also follow and know the seasons. There is no reason at all for them to correspond to the "temperate" seasons (summer, fall, winter, spring). Dry and wet seasons, cold and summer, and other options are not only possible, but have actually been widespread on human history. I recommend reading on Wikipedia about seasons, especially the section about non-calendar based seasons.
Of course the above applies to pre-industrial civilizations where timekeeping isn't as widespread. But even in those, counting years and ages is treated differently. Birthdays, for example, don't exist in all cultures. Koreans still count age based on the Korean new year, not your birthday. Some medieval Christian celebrated on the feast of the saint they were named after (and there are lots of them) or IIRC, their baptism. And so, a culture as yours might use different ways of counting the age of a person, perhaps by more "qualitative" rituals than just counting the years (though I have a feeling they would quickly adapt to their own calendar). Much like I told you about different kinds of seasons for different climates, I imagine that in worlds where the years are too short (or too long) to really make sense for the average person, some other ways of counting time will prevail. For example, are there predictable climate cycles in your planet? Moons (lunar calendars are always fun)? I can assume your planet has shorter years because it's closer to your star (by any chance, did you base it on red-dwarf orbiting planets?), so perhaps you could use something regarding the very visible star to count time?
Like I said at the beginning, this will be a real concern when humanity expands through space, and there's even a bit of debate if the human body can adapt to such heavy changes on its circadian rhytm. In any case, my prediction is that there would be a "Earth time", that is, 24-hours day and 365 day year, that is kept as standard out of convenience and in spaceships and space habitats (in my own setting Campoestela, it's called "ship time" because human spaceships use it as standard) and lots of "local times" on different planets with all the quirks I mentioned above, with everyone going into space learning how to convert their own time to "Earth time". Or maybe, to make things even more fun and, admittedly, complicated to the reader, the time of another time is taken as a standard. There's lots to play with here.
DON'T even ask me about relativistic time (like in Interstellar) because it makes my head hurt, even if I did use it a couple times on my stories. But "ship time" might be a real thing. Some cultures might have completely different 'times', not calendars, actually *times*, depending on relativistic time delation.
BTW anon, sorry for using this to promote myself, but if anyone loved this rant and would like to see more, I would appreciate some tips on my ko-fi (given the situation down here, now more than ever) and suggestions for other topics to talk about!
49 notes · View notes
adoroborosgoth · 3 months
Text
Crowley dying in s3
I wasn't sure how to start this meta. I've had this theory with possible (big possible) evidence sitting around for ages and I just didn't know what to do with the information.
After I'd already had this information, I only seen a hand full of others talk about it, but none have touched on it in the same way as the things I've found in my research.
So let's get on with it. For reference I'm going to tag @nightingalecottage and their lovely post here. I really recommend reading it. This theory only saw the light of day because of their post and I told them I would tag them with my meta since it lends a lot to it. And I promised myself that I would finish this for them.
Now for the meat and potatoes. I'll break it all down about how I found this information and how it might lend some theory about possible plot to s3.
This got really long so I put a cut.
-Silly narrator voice-
The facts were these.
To start I was doing research for a fic I'm working on and the details don't matter much but I'd planned to make my 'human' crowley a barrister. I was googling famous barristers for inspiration.
This lead me to wikipedia naturally as you do. And as I was looking over the list I saw this.
Tumblr media
After seeing this name on the list of barristers in popular culture I had a mini freakout. Mainly because two things NG is a huge fan of Charles Dickens and A Tale of Two Cities is on the bookclub reading list. And I kept thinking why did this seem familiar and this is why.
Tumblr media
A Tale of Two Cities is on the list of books that they recommend we read or were found in s2. So after I stopped freaking out I immediately went to the wiki page for this character. I wasn't too familiar with this book so I wanted to know more. As I was now super invested and intrigued. And found this.
Sydney Carton
Tumblr media
I couldn't help be blown away by the similarities here between Sydney Carton and a certain depressed snake demon from s2. Morosely asking Shax on a bench in the first episode "What's the point of it all?"
For some context, in the novel Sydney Carton and his later best friend Charles Darnay share a striking semblance and are easily mistaken for each other. This is how Sydney is then able to make the switch with Darnay in the end saving his life.
This brings to mind of the lore that we know that Crowley and Aziraphale were once long ago one character and split into two. Also with the ideal casting choice that Terry Pratchett wanted one actor to play both roles. That would have been really interesting and funny. Also this plays into our favorite duo MS and DT having not worked together before because they were up for the same roles.
Let's move on to
Charles Darnay
Tumblr media
Darnay resents his uncle's views much how Aziraphale resents certain aspects of heaven, but is never able to act on very much.
The note about Darnay being tutor of French made me chuckle considering what we know about Aziraphale being terrible at French. With that whole scene centered around it in s2.
Tumblr media
Ok so we all are well versed and familiar with the famous Bastille scene. We all know the one and its clear the inspiration here for it comes from A Tale of Two Cities possibly.
Side note Darnay and Carton are both in love with Lucie here, but I posit that in the case of Good omens, Aziraphale is possibly both Darnay and Lucie. Making him the best friend and love intrest.
Lucie Manette
Tumblr media
And finally why does any of this matter and what does this have to do with Crowley maybe dying in s3 you ask?
The one important detail in all of this is that at the end of the novel Carton heroically sacrificed himself to save his best friend and for the women he loves. He feels it gave him purpose and felt as if his life finally had meaning.
Two things here. The scene in which Carton swaps places with Darnay being able to pass as him well enough to save his life. Is very reminiscent of our Body Swap from s1. As well as the idea that in s3 this could also happen, but in the sense that Crowley does it to save Aziraphale's life. I clearly have no idea how s3 will play out.
Now I'm not saying that s3 will be as dramatic as all of this. It is still a comedy at its core. As others have touched on in meta and in nightingalecottage's post there are many little hints that point to the similarities and the idea that Crowley maybe doomed by the narrative. In a way, I personally don't think that Crowley's hypothetical death will be permanent. I just do not see that happening at all. A temporary death I could definitely see and it could also serve to show how much Crowley truly means to Aziraphale. The shock of it would maybe be similar to how Crowley thought he lost Aziraphale in s1 and could be a parallel.
In the end this is all speculation and theory. Either way the idea of it all makes me vibrate and I needed to finally share this with someone else. They wouldn't have recommended this book if there wasn't some sort of meaning here right? And its entirely possible I'm looking in the wrong direction.
Overall there are many parallels and similarities here between A Tale of Two Cities and certain parts of Good Omens, I'm sure I may have missed some and I just wanted to end this now before it gets too long. If you made it this far and have any other theories or something you want to add on to this please feel free to tag me. I release this into the void.
70 notes · View notes
karmiya · 8 months
Text
I actually do a lot of research and am collecting what may one day be an entire bookshelf's worth of reference books, so I thought I'd share one. This is my pride and joy, at least as far as research goes:
Tumblr media
To Live as Long as Heaven and Earth is a translation of the Shenxian Zhuan, a series of biographies of Daoist immortals by Ge Hong. The (extensive) introduction by Professor Campany also includes a lot of the translator's own research, drawing on various sources in order to provide a good overview of practices attributed to Daoists in common folklore. If you're interested in the Xianxia and Wuxia genres and their origins, I think this is an invaluable English-language text. Its focus is entirely on traditional beliefs, but through it you can see just how much of the modern fantasy genre in China is based entirely on traditional folklore.
Tumblr media
The images of talismans, for example, are extremely familiar to any viewers of modern fantasy dramas or donghua. These look very similar to the talismans we see in the Modao Zushi donghua, don't they?
Tumblr media
This is a really interesting little section describing levels of ascendance. It's a lot simpler than modern novels with their million stages of core formation, isn't it? (Though, to be fair, most novels I read are by authors who don't care to get into that level of detail and focus on characters and storytelling, thank goodness!) The 'tianxian' sound a bit like heavenly officials in more recent stories, don't they, whereas the dixian are regular immortal cultivators who still live on earth. The use of shijie (corpse simulacrums) meanwhile, seems to mainly be maintained as a means of faking one's death, not as a means of escaping the notice of the officials of the underworld!
The main paths of immortality outlined in Ge Hong's work are: internal cultivation, external cultivation (alchemy), the arts of the bedchamber, and diet. The first three are very familiar, but I've noticed that diet-based cultivation shows up much more rarely in modern stories. I can only immediately think of Ye Baiyi from Word of Honour, who begins to age again after descending from the mountains and imbibing mortal food once more.
One thing I found interesting is that most accounts of immortals flying either depict them doing so under their own power, or placing a talisman within a bamboo staff and flying on that (or sending some poor soul on a sudden trip across the country!). Flying swords seem to be a much more modern convention.
One thing that's really amusing to me is how much energy the author (Ge Hong, not the translator) dedicated to poking fun at Confucius and Confucianism. Even though the three major religions eventually became known as the Three Teachings and are in modern terms viewed as very harmonious and complementary, historically there was often a huge amount of religious tension. Confucians and Daoists bickered with each other a lot, and then Buddhists got into the fray as well as Buddhism became more and more popular in East Asia. While Buddhism was present in China in Ge Hong's time, it had yet to reach its later popularity; this is probably why Buddhism is barely mentioned in Ge Hong's writing. There are a few indirect references and borrowings from Buddhist tales, and Professor Campany posits that some were intentionally used in competition with Buddhism, while others may have been added by later compilers/transcribers of the text who were Buddhists themselves.
A lot of Cnovels depict this sort of religious tension (Thousand Autumns is a good example), and it's really interesting to see that in these translated historical texts. Even though there are plenty of texts I can't get access to and/or wouldn't be able to read in the original language, there is a huge amount of English-language and translated scholarship on Chinese history available. A lot of it is fascinating to read from a perspective of a fan of Chinese fantasy, since the genre draws so heavily on real history and folklore.
91 notes · View notes
Text
- Theory on Dazai's family -
- Why I think that Dazai is closely related to the former boss of the Port Mafia - A BSD analysis based on facts from the main manga series, the light novel "Bungo Stray Dogs: Dazai, Chuuya Age Fifteen" and the manga "Bungo Stray Dogs: Dazai, Chuuya Age Fifteen" -
Contains heavy spoilers for Dazai's backstory, the Dazai, Chuuya Age Fifteen manga and the Age Fifteen light novel
TWs: Dazai typical mentions of sewerslide, mentioned abuse, picture which shows a scene in a hospital explicitly
English isn't my first language so I apologize for any grammar mistakes.
Not completely proof read by now since I realized that I have a lot of homework while proof reading and panicked. Will be proof read in the next 24h.
---------------------------------------------------
Okay so I had this theory since I read the age 15 novel last year but I've never got around writing it down since some pieces were still missing.
In the following I will first talk about Dazai's relationship with Mori and showing parts of the age 15 novel to proof why they very popular theory that Mori is Dazai's father/a relative cannot be true. Afterwards I will talk about my theory that Dazai was already in Mafia, way before he met Mori before I will talk about my theory about why I think that Dazai is closely related to the former boss of the port mafia is either Dazai's father or a close relative like a grandfather or uncle and gonna show supporting proof from the BSD light novel "Dazai and Chuuya age 15", the BSD age 15 manga and the main BSD manga series.
1. Why Mori cannot be Dazai's father or a relative
Mori being Dazai's father or being directly related to him is a very popular opinion in the BSD fandom and which is very popular especially under anime onlys or new fans. To be honest, I had this theory too when I first started watching BSD but by now I am completely sure that this cannot be true.
Direct proof for this can be found in the BSD light novel "Dazai and Chuuya age 15" which reveals a lot about Dazai's and Chuuya's past in the Port Mafia as well as about some characters in general.
In this light novel it gets clear that Mori and Dazai are still pretty much strangers which are connected through the murder of the former boss of the Port Mafia. This also gets specifically stated in said novel on page 8 and page 7.
Tumblr media
As stated here, they've been brought together by common destiny.
On page 7 however, is a even better proof that they aren't related at all and it also gives out another very interesting information about Dazai's family.
Tumblr media
As stated here, on page seven, Dazai is "neither Mori's secret illegitimate child nor an orphan he adopted [...] ". I think that with this information, we can be pretty sure that Dazai isn't related to Mori at all. It also gets stated again that they are bound together by "common destiny" instead of any kind of relation.
Very interesting is, that it gets mentioned that Dazai isn't an orphan which Mori adopted since this information can be read in two ways. One option is, that he simply isn't adopted by Mori while the second option is, that he isn't an orphan at all. (English isn't my first language so I don't know if it can be read in only one way so feel free to correct me.)
The last proof for that Mori and Dazai aren't related to each other, can be found on page 9.
Tumblr media
The whole page makes clear, that Mori doesn't really know Dazai at all/ that he only knows him for only one year and that he only knows him on a "Coworker level". He isn't familiar with Dazai's way of thinking, speaking and acting. He simply cannot figure Dazai out and he is kind of scared of him. Dazai isn't someone he knows since a long time. If anything, he is still trying to get to know Dazai and his ways of thinking. If Mori knew Dazai since a very long time, I'm sure that he would know at least a bit about how Dazai acts and reacts to things so that he wouldn't get as uneasy as on this text page, when Dazai is showing his serious, cold and calculating side again.
This is only a speculation though since Dazai and his ways of acting and thinking are in fact nearly completely impossible to figure out for nearly everyone.
Besides this, there is a clear distance between them without any familiarity. This distance can be often found between strangers who know each other solely through working together for whatever reason, but who never hang out together in the way friends or relatives do, which creates this distance between them.
Now that I've shown some proof which supports the theory, that Dazai isn't related to Mori in any way, I'm firstly going to show proof for why I think that Dazai was already in the Mafia, way before he met Mori before I will talk about why I think that Dazai is specifically related to the former boss of the Port Mafia.
2. Why Dazai had to be in the Mafia, way before he met Mori
Now, about why Dazai had to be in the Mafia way before he met Mori.
Tumblr media
As seen in one of those panels of the first phase of the age 15 manga, Dazai is dressed on somewhat formal attire, wearing a white button up shirt and dress pants. Those clothes suit him perfectly and they look rather formal and expensive so it's unlikely that they were given to him after he got brought to the hospital. Those are his own clothes.
Now, if he would be an orphan who lived on the streets, which is another popular theroy in the fandom, he wouldn't be wearing such clothes.
Also such black and white, formal clothes/suits are commonly worn in the port mafia, often by people of a higher rank or by guards which suggests that there is some kind of a dress code among the Port Mafia. The clothes which Dazai is wearing, suit perfectly into the dress code of the port mafia.
Another point as to why he had to be in the Mafia already is the fact that he was brought to Mori, an shady underground doctor and the personal physician of the former boss of the port mafia after attempting suicide. If he would have been a normal child, no matter if orphan or not, he would have been brought to a normal official hospital in Yokohama and not to Mori.
Besides this, Mori is well aware who Dazai is, calling him by his name which suggests that Dazai isn't only already in the port mafia but also that he is known there and not just another nameless assistant.
Of course, Mori could have been informed about who this kid is by the person who brought him to him but if Dazai would really have been a random kid who wasn't involved in the Mafia, they wouldn't have any information about his name.
All of these points like the expensive and formal clothing, the fact that he seems to be involved with the Mafia already, the fact that he was brought to the underground doctor Mori (who is also the personal physician of the former boss of the port mafia) and the fact that Mori knows who Dazai is, lead me to the next point which is why I believe that Dazai is closely related to the former boss of the port mafia.
3. Why I think that Dazai is closely related to the former boss of the Port Mafia
Firstly, all the previously mentioned facts like the expensive clothes and all, are things which support my theroy in some ways but of course they aren't enough proof since alone from those facts alone, we could also think that Dazai is simply related to a executive or someone in the Mafia who has a higher rank but there are things which lead me to think that Dazai is related to the former boss of the port mafia.
Let me show you.
Tumblr media
First of all, Higuchi telling Dazai that Dazai's blood is not only "Mafia black" but also that it's more Mafia black than anyone else's in the country.
While this could also be seen as her referring to him being the feared demon prodigy, it also suggests that he is deeply connected with the port mafia. Also, talking about a connection to something through someone's blood gets often used to hint that someone is connected with something through family.
With saying that his blood is more black than anyone else's, she also says that he is deeper connected with the Mafia than Mori, Hirotsu, Chuuya or any of the other loyal members of the Mafia and besides this, she also tells him through this, that he would be more cruel than any of them.
Now the only other person about who they talk like this and who gets referred to be more cruel and deeply involved with the port mafia, who is basically anchored in the history of the port mafia, is the former boss of the port mafia himself.
Higuchi saying that his blood is mafia black, more than anyone's in the whole county, could easily be a hint that Dazai is in fact, related in some way to the only other person who's blood is mafia black, the former boss.
While this point is more based on speculation, the next point is based a lot more on the things which are actually specifically shown in the manga.
Tumblr media Tumblr media
During the flashback which shows how the former boss of the port mafia died, we can see that Dazai isn't standing next to Mori but far away from the bed next to the big window.
If Mori wanted to make Dazai pretend that he would be his new assistant, Dazai would stand next to the bed or would stand at least close to Mori to "watch and learn", to assist him or to hand him any tools or medicine he might need but this isn't the case. He is standing far away from Mori and the bed, silently watching and not assisting at all. He isn't holding any tools and he also obviously isn't looking for anything which he needs to bring Mori. Here he has the role of a bystander and is the witness.
But why would Mori bring a random child with him, only to watch him and which would later be his witness. It would make no sense and it would make him seem even more suspicious. Even if he would have waited with the murder, bringing Dazai with him a couple of times before killing the boss, it would make him look suspicious. After all, suddenly bringing a child with him which then suddenly happens to be the only witness, really is suspicious and I doubt that Mori would have made such a risky and unwell calculated plan.
If that would be the case he also could have picked any child or like any person in the Mafia. After all, there are a lot of people who wanted to see the former boss of the port mafia dead because of his brutal and cruel way of leading the Mafia and because of all the terrible crimes but again.
However, despite the large amount of people who would (most likely) happily assist Mori with getting rid of the former boss, he directly approached Dazai and he does so confidently as shown here:
Tumblr media
He seems like he knew exactly that Dazai wouldn't deny his request and he also seems as if he had picked Dazai to be his perfect assistant for this case but I genuinely don't think, that it's only because Dazai is a suicide patient.
In both, the manga and the light novel, Dazai tells Mori that of course the latter would see him as the perfect assistant because he would need to get rid of everyone who was aware of what really happened during that night and since nobody would suspect a thing if Dazai would suddenly commit suicide under unknown circumstances but while this is a good point, more on the other hand states in the light novel that he can't let him die because then the supporters of the previous boss would turn on Mori and claim that he would have killed the predecessor but I will come back to that in a second.
As previously mentioned, I don't think that Dazai being suicidial was the point which made Mori choose him as his assistant. After all, it wouldn't make anything less suspicious due to the reasons I mentioned previously.
So why did he pick Dazai if suddenly bringing a person with him, shortly before murdering the predecessor would only raise suspicions?
Well it would only raise suspicions if the person wasn't already in the room before he came to visit the boss and if they weren't in this room already since quite some time.
This is one of my main points to support the theroy and it also suits to the fact that Mori wouldn't risk seeming any more suspicious throughout bringing a random person with him and it also suits to the fact that Dazai is standing far away from the bed, obviously not pretending to be a new assistant of Mori.
Dazai stands far away from the bed, like someone who was in the room already, way before the doctor came in and he steps away from the bed to give room for the doctor so that he can do his work properly. It is a common thing to do for relatives, friends or coworkers who had been staying at the bedside of the bedridden person.
Now why would Dazai be in this room, staying with the pervious boss of the port mafia as the only person.
He is too young to be a guard and he can't be a person who was carrying out missions for the previous boss since Mori is in fact the person who gives Dazai his first mission ever which is to investigate about the rumors of the previous boss of the port mafia coming back as a ghost. It can be seen on this page of the manga where Mori specifically states that this is Dazai's first job as a official member of the Mafia.
Tumblr media
So if Dazai can't be a guard, isn't pretending to be Mori's assistant, if it's too suspicious if Mori would bring a random person with him shortly before carrying out his plan and if Dazai can't be someone who carries out missions, and especially if he isn't an official working member of the Mafia until that very moment in which Mori gives him his first mission and welcomes him as an official member of the Mafia, which, by the way, takes place around one whole year after Mori killed the predecessor, why should Dazai be staying in that room since quite some time, by the bedside of the former boss of the port mafia?
The only logical reason for this would be that he is in fact related to the boss of the port mafia in some way and due to this, stays by the side of his relative to help him in his weak, dying and bedridden state. There wouldn't be any other reason for him to keep Dazai around and if there would be, all the other points like Dazai being dressed formal and expensively and Mori knowing who Dazai is wouldn't suit into the whole situation anyways.
If Dazai only would serve as some kind of a servant, he would be someone unknown in the Mafia and they probably wouldn't have brought him to Mori after his attempt.
My last proof which supports my theroy is Dazai's reaction to having to face the former boss of the port mafia again during the fight against Arthur Rimbaud/Randou but also the bosses reaction to facing Dazai again.
On page 95 in the light novel, Dazai and Chuuya face the former boss for the first time in the whole novel and both, the reaction of Dazai and if the both is very interesting and supports my theroy a lot.
Chuuya who was never directly involved with the port mafia and the former boss and only knows about his crimes /was indirectly another victim of one of his crimes, hasn't a very specific reaction towards facing the boss and the boss also only sees him as someone he has attack without any personal connection between them.
Dazai however reacts not only chaught off guard like Chuuya upon seeing the dead body of the former boss of the port mafia standing in front of them, talking and moving but during the whole fight he doesn't say as much as he usually would and is more confused, tensed up and seemingly very uncomfortable and nervous. He does try to cover it up with sarcastic remarks and through smiling but it is very noticeable in the way he acts and talks.
Tumblr media
Upon seeing the port mafia boss, Dazai's smile becomes tense and he seems uneasy and he continues to act like this even after knowing that it's only Arthur's ability. It can't be only because he is worried about the boss telling others what really happened since they are currently in Arthur's hyperspace and the boss isn't going anywhere. The whole situation of having to see and having to talk to this person again seems to make him feel uneasy and uncomfortable which makes him turn more quiet, confused and more serious during the whole battle. It actually takes some time until he acts more relaxed and calculating like he usually does during a fight and until he stops bombarding Arthur with questions.
The former boss of the port mafia on the other hand, (and this is an incredibly interesting and overlooked part), calls Dazai "My boy" upon seeing him again, asks him Mori/ "The good doctor" has been treating him well and refrers to Dazai's face as a familiar face before he calls him my boy upon fully recognizing him. He also tells Dazai that it feel like ages since he last say him which implies that they saw each other and knew each other regularly. Him calling him my boy definitely supports that Dazai is related to him and I think it's self explanatory why. If Dazai was only some coworker, he wouldn't be referring to him as my boy.
The way Dazai talks to him also seems like he isn't talking to someone he only vaguely knows.
The distance which is present when he is communicating with Mori isn't present here and the whole way he talks to him and how he is building the sentences but also how the former boss of the port mafia is referring to him as well as how he talks to Dazai, is making clear that they know each other past the level of only coworkers as well as that they aren't just boss and normal subordinate.
The fact that Dazai refers to him as boss, the fact that Dazai assists Mori's with his plan, the way they talk to each other or better the way in which Dazai talks to the predecessor and that the fact the former boss of the port mafia isn't having any issues with killing/attempting to kill Dazai and even shows some kind of enthusiasm towards it, talking about it in a way which is implying that he already hated Dazai way before Dazai assisted Mori ("[...] I never imagined a day would come where I could behead this boy with my own two hands", the previous Mafia boss crowed hoarsely." (p.98;ll.26-28;" Bungo Stray Dogs: Dazai, Chuuya, Age Fifteen") shows the nature of the relationship between those two.
Most likely, the predecessor wasn't treating Dazai good, most likely abusing him which lead Dazai to assisting Mori and which would explain the way they talk to each other as well as Dazai's negative and almost scared reaction upon seeing the previous boss again.
Given the predecessors cruel, cold and brutal personality as well as his obsession with surpressing and killing people/people who acted against the Mafia, it isn't unlikely that he was also abusive towards Dazai.
Another quote which implies that they know each other since quite some time, can be found on page 98 in the light novel where the boss is "mourning" about the fact that his body isn't capable anymore of talking about the past before he kills Dazai. ("" If only we could chat about old times first, [...] "" (P. 98; ll.28-29)
The fact that Arthur also states that he preserved the former bosses personality and memories (P. 99; l.1) proofs that the memories of the boss as well as the way he acts isn't altered at all.
With all of these facts which suggest that Dazai is related to the former boss of the Port Mafia, it also makes sense why Mori needs Dazai to stay alive. Not only it would seem suspicious if Dazai suddenly dies, even if he would die of suicide but also because then, if Dazai would truly be related to the former boss of the Port Mafia, it would seem like Mori got rid of the person who rightfully is the next boss of the Port Mafia in order to be completely sure that he can be the next boss until he dies.
If we see it like this, it would also make even more sense as to why Mori was so scared that Dazai would kill him one day, just like how he killed the former boss in order to become the next leader of the Port Mafia because then he wouldn't just be afraid because of the "Evil expects evil from others" rule, but also because he and Dazai would both be painfully aware of the fact that Dazai is rightfully the next Boss of the Port Mafia and not Mori.
To summarize, Dazai cannot be related to Mori at all. Not only is this specifically stated in the light novel "Bungo Stray Dogs: Dazai, Chuuya, Age Fifteen" but the fact that Mori is still trying to figure out Dazai, that he isn't familiar with Dazai's way of acting and thinking and the fact that there is a constant, somewhat formal distance between them suggests that they genuinely didn't know each other before Mori asked Dazai to be his assistant/witness in his plan to murder the former boss of the port mafia.
Now despite not being related to Mori in any way, Dazai still seems to be involved with the Port Mafia already, way before he met Mori. Proof for that can mainly be found in the BSD Dazai, Chuuya, Age Fifteen manga.
There, Dazai is shown to wear formal and expensive looking clothes when he wakes up after another suicide attempt and Mori greets Dazai with his name, seemingly being well aware of who Dazai is. If Dazai would have been a random kid p.ex. from the streets, he wouldn't be wearing such clothes and Mori wouldn't know his name but he also wouldn't have been brought to the underground doctor Mori who also happens to be the personal physician of the former boss of the port mafia but to a normal and official hospital in Yokohama.
Alone due to the fact that he got brought to Mori, he had to be involved with the port mafia already otherwise he wouldn't had end up in that hospital. Now, him being well dressed, Mori knowing his name and him being brought to Mori instead of to an official hospital could also imply that he is only the son of an executive or another person in the Mafia who is of high rank but the fact that Higuchi tells Dazai years later that his blood is mafia black, more than anyone else's in the country as well as the fact that Mori chooses him to assist him in his plan of murdering the former boss of the port mafia as well as Dazai's position in the bosses room while Mori carries out his plan and his role in this plan imply that he isn't just related to a random person but rather the former boss of the port mafia himself.
Mori could have chosen anyone to be his witness, especially in regards of how many people want to see the former boss dead but he directly approaches Dazai and does so confidently as shown in the age fifteen manga. He seems to be sure that Dazai would assist him but he also seems to be sure that this won't raise any more suspicious.
If he would have started to bring a random person with him to his regular visits to the former boss, shortly before he murders him and the fact that this random person is suddenly his only witness would raise only more suspicious about him killing the boss and given Mori's character, I doubt that he would plan something so risky and uncalculated where it's sure that it would cause him more trouble than anything.
So why did he choose a seemingly random kid as his witness if suddenly bringing a person with him would only raise suspicions in the end? Because there won't be any more suspicious than there are already if the person is located in the former bosses room anyways and regularly.
The theroy that Dazai stays at the room of the former boss gets supported by the fact that Mori is specifically choosing him, seemingly being sure that this won't raise suspicions and the fact that Dazai isn't staying close to the bed or at least next to Mori while he is "treating" the former boss, not pretending to be Mori's assistant. Dazai is standing far away from Mori and the bed as a silent witness next to the window. Stepping away from the bed so that the doctor can treat the person is a common thing to do for relatives, friends or coworkers who had been staying at the bedside of the bedridden person. If Dazai would have pretended to be Mori's assistant he would be staying close to Mori, only stepping away from the bed to get something which Mori needs but this isn't the case. Also the suspicions didn't raise because of Dazai and everything went as Mori planned which is supporting the theory that Dazai was already regularly in the room.
Now why would the port mafia boss keep a child around in his room/at his bedside. Dazai is too young to be a guard, he isn't a official member of the Mafia who carries out missions since it is shown in the manga that Mori is in fact the person who gives Dazai his first mission ever and who is welcoming him as an member of the Mafia after giving him the mission, implying that Dazai wasn't an official member of the Mafia until that very moment which took place around one year after Mori successfully carried his plan out and if Dazai would have only acted as some kind of servant, he wouldn't have been dressed this well, Mori most likely wouldn't have known who Dazai is and he most likely wouldn't have been brought to Mori after his attempt. We can see how the most servants/slaves are treated in the chapter with Ace in the main manga and since the previous boss was even more cruel and brutal than Ace, he wouldn't have treated his servants any better. Given those circumstances, the only logical reason for him keeping Dazai around in his room, is that Dazai is in fact related to him in some way and is now staying at his bedside in order to help him in his weak, dying and bedridden state.
That they know each other past the levels of only boss and subordinate/ coworkers gets shown in the fight against Arthur Rimbaud/Randou where the former boss calls Dazai "My boy" and mourns about the fact that they cannot talk about the old times before he kills Dazai. They also talk to each other in a way which suggests that they know each other since a long time in a relative kind of way.
While Chuuya reacts chaught off guard towards seeing the previous boss as well but while he reacts in a way which makes clear that they never knew each other personally, Dazai tenses up and is nervous and feels uneasy through the whole fight upon having to face the boss again. It takes him a while until he acts more collected, serious and calculating like he usually does in a fight again but the uneasyness never fades fully, no matter how much he tries to cover it up.
The way they talk to each other also implies a deep rooted hate from both sides. The former boss also shows no issues with killing Dazai, implies that he already hated Dazai way before he assisted Mori and even shows some kind of enthusiasm towards killing the child.
In general, given the former bosses cruel, cold and brutal personality and given the way they interact with each other/react towards having to face each other again, it is likely that the former boss was abusive towards Dazai/that the nature of thier relationship was abusive.
During the whole fight, both talk with each other in way which suggests that they know each other personally since quite some time and the formal distance which is always present when Dazai and Mori communicate with each other isnt present between them during thier conversations, making it seem even more like they are related in some way.
All these facts, from the former boss referring to Dazai as "My boy" to Dazai's position in the room and his role in Mori's plan, lead me to think that Dazai is in fact closely related to the former boss of the port mafia. I consciously decided not to refer to the former boss as Dazai's father since I wouldn't go as far as to pinpoint the exact relation but I am almost completely sure he is closely related to him and I think it's likely that he is at least his grandfather or his uncle.
If you read all of this, I love you <3
169 notes · View notes
mosneakers · 4 months
Text
Tumblr media
Just a simple blink. And when Coraleye opens her eyes again, she and Agnes have transported to a new location.
Tumblr media
Momentarily disoriented, Coraleye gasps in awe as recognition dawns upon her. Coraleye: Oh, I've been here before! This was your home in Moonlight Falls, wasn't it? A really sweet girl named Janie lives here now; she let me stay over once.
Agnes: Oh yes, Ms. Books. I have a feeling you'll be revisiting this house again very soon, sweetheart. [Smiles]
Tumblr media Tumblr media
Agnes: [Continues] To answer your question, honey, Erik loved it here. We crafted a charming life for ourselves in this house. Our daughters thrived, we had good jobs. It was a time of contentment—a lovely chapter in our lives, really...
Coraleye: But something was missing...
Agnes: [Frowns and softly nods] Yes. And my goodness, did the guilt weigh awfully heavy on my heart! I had everything a poor widow could ask for: two darling daughters, a roof over my head, I was reunited with my beloved husband, for goodness sakes...
Coraleye frowns, offering comfort by softly grazing Agnes's back. Coraleye: [Softly] Grandma... Sometimes the heart wants what it wants, and it doesn't care about how things are "supposed" to go.
Tumblr media
Agnes: I was so young... just like you, darling. And at that age, I still yearned for the finer things in life. Though I never said it aloud, Erik knew. He'd write about it occasionally. If it were up to him, we'd have stayed put, and put our savings towards expanding our family. But for me, I was just fine with two daughters. I would've much rather put our earnings towards offering our children a more comfortable lifestyle in Sunset Valley.
Tumblr media
Coraleye: Well the difference is clear to see; you are beaming here! And it looks like those guests are really enjoying Grandpa's company. Agnes: Oh yes, that's Pauline and Hank Goddard. Erik was always the life of every party. Had almost everyone in stitches.
Tumblr media Tumblr media
Coraleye: I couldn't help but notice lots of whispering going around when you weren't looking, though... Agnes: My, my... you are quite astute, babydoll. No, truth is I knew all about the whispering. Hank Goddard's in law enforcement; he was there when Erik was pronounced dead. The story we presented them was that Erik miraculously recovered from a lengthy coma through the power of prayer. Christopher Steele has his suspicions, but kept quiet about them since that dreadful incident.
Coraleye's glowing eyes widen with intrigue. Coraleye: ...The Sunset Valley Massacre?
Agnes: [Single nod] That's the one. Come darling, our time is fleeting, and there's much more to explore. After all, we wouldn't want to leave two hearts vying for your attention alone together for too long. I've read my fair share of novels where such scenarios end disastrously. [Wink]
Tumblr media
37 notes · View notes
sincerely-sofie · 2 months
Text
Check-in for 01/28/24
It's been a while since I did one of these. Time to remedy that!
I've been doing well in my assignments, but due to some registration issues at the start of the semester I was unable to sign up for any web development or programming classes :< It's nice to take a break, but I'm really worried about getting stagnant in those skills, and maybe even losing what I've learned over time.
This is where a couple of new projects come in: A blorbo database and a tool for drawing pokemon from memory. These things are going to keep me avoid stagnancy and help me develop my web dev and Python programming skills, and I'm real excited to talk about them.
Tumblr media
First up, let's talk about that tool for drawing pokemon from memory. I love drawing pokemon from memory, but it's a bit of a struggle to find tools online that work well for a solo experience when you're doing this challenge alone. So I made a program in PyGame to solve this problem, and I've actually already completed it! It was a great learning experience when it came to getting a taste of APIs, and PokeAPI really helped me do all the heavy lifting with it. I also ended up using ChatGPT to help me understand how to phrase my questions and the things I needed to research. This is the end result:
Tumblr media
If you click "Get Random Pokemon", the program will provide a pokemon's name. The point of it is to draw the pokemon as best as you remember it, and then click "Show Pokemon Image" to see how you did. You will then have the option to get a new random pokemon, which clears the image from the window.
Tumblr media Tumblr media
There's a lot of stuff I don't understand about how the program works--- APIs evade my understanding, and Tkinter is a dark art beyond my comprehension. But I was able to make a program that solved a genuine problem for me for the first time, and that's super exciting to me!
Now, for web development--- long story short, I'm making a website dedicated to cataloguing my OCs that's very much inspired by tumblr user @snekkerdoodles's personal site on neocities, which I regularly stare at in an effort to motivate myself to make cool things like it (everyone reading this should check his page out IMMEDIATELY and tell him how cool it is). Here's the screenshots of the WIP I'm chipping away at right now:
Tumblr media Tumblr media
I don't have much to say about it, as the interesting stuff will really be the content of the pages, and I still have yet to finish the template page I'll be filling with my OCs' information. However, I can say that I'm very upset with the lack of proper teaching that took place in the first (and currently only) college web dev class I've taken. I spent an entire semester doing my own research to learn everything they were supposed to be teaching us. I'm still very peeved about that.
To summarize this very rambling post I'm too sleepy to edit properly, I'm making a digital blorbo encyclopedia, and I finished making a little desktop app thingy, which means I need to summon a new programming project. I'm tempted to make it a video game... maybe I should turn back to that visual novel idea I had ages ago and boot up RenPy!
29 notes · View notes
thepoisonroom · 2 months
Note
hello sorry if you've been asked this recently but could you recommend some good adult trans books 👉👈 no worries if you don't!!
there are lots of good ones and i've fallen out of the loop since i left my bookstore job! there's sometimes this attitude that trans writers can only be successful in some genres but there are great trans writers in lots of genres! so have tried to include a mix of genres here to highlight some of that abundance, and because i don't know what you like so want to include many things that i think might spark your curiosity.
i'm leaving a lot of classics off that i'm sure you've heard of or have been told to read, as well as some stuff i read that i didn't love and don't feel i can vouch for. there's also lots of good stuff for younger readers (have esp heard good things about sisters of dorley hall and when the angels left the old country) which is really heartening when i remember furtively reading the one trans novel for teens at my library when i was little! and i like that there are trans characters for younger readers now who don't have tragic endings. but anyway:
i really like anything by casey plett, particularly her novel little fish! i loved ivan coyote's rebent sinner for kind of autobiographical vignettes as well as gender failure which they wrote with rae spoon. gretchen felker-martin and alison rumfitt are big faves if you like horror, they're both so smart and unsparing. your body is not your body if you want a good taste of lots of different trans horror authors. the seep by chana porter for meditative sci-fi. the fifth wound by aurora mattia which is hard to describe but v gorgeous. paul takes the form of a mortal girl if you want something kind of carefree and horny and fun and not devastating or upsetting. summer fun by jeanne thornton if you've ever been like what if velvet goldmine were based on the beach boys. i like confessions of the fox by jordy rosenberg but i think the ideal audience for this book is like transmasc grad students who are horny in a neurotic way so it's not for everyone. stone fruit by lee lai was my favorite graphic novel of 2022 and it's a really beautiful examination of breakups and caring for children as a queer person and also forgiving your family. gaylord phoenix if you like your graphic novels weird.
books from my own to-read list that i've heard good things about from people i trust (have included author names only where the title alone isn't specific enough to find the right book):
wrath goddess sing (if you like mythology remixes)
a natural history of transition (magical realist short stories)
manywhere: stories (unsettling also magical realist short stories)
chromatic fantasy (graphic novel, trans guy nun has sex with the devil and has a romance with a robin hood-type trans guy bandit)
finna (gay trans multiverse travel in an IKEA)
X by davey davis (bdsm psychological thriller)
idlewild (transmasc fujoshi tumblrinas have a toxic bestieship)
girlfriends by emily zhou (slice of life short stories)
boys weekend (graphic novel, bachelorx weekend turns into a cult murder mystery)
the boy with the bird in his chest (magical realist coming of age)
the call-out (gossipy novel in verse)
nettleblack (victorian transmasc hijinks)
the story of silence (medieval n magical french trans hijinks based on the historical poem)
unfortunate elements of my anatomy (horror short stories)
bad girls by camila sosa villada (magical realist coming of age epic)
apsara engine (south asian graphic vignettes)
future feeling (funny bizarre sci-fi)
everyone on the moon is essential personnel (cyberpunk body horror weirdness)
28 notes · View notes
katerinaptrv · 3 months
Text
Dr. Chalotorn & Tharn - My Views from the Novel
So, i want to talk little about the Dr and Tharn complex relationship in the novel, like i said in previous posts i do not really see the Dr as a villain in the novel.
NOVEL SPOILERS AHEAD:
Now, to explain how I see the Dr and Tharn relationship i want to make a parallel to a BL couple we have this year AI Di & Chen Yi from Kiseki Dear To Me.
Ai Di & Chen Yi were raised together as brothers since infancy, they were orphans adopted by a mafia gang leader. AI Di is younger by a few (3 if i am not mistaken) years while Chen Yi is older.
As they grow up Ai Di develops a crush on Chen Yi while the other did not seem (at least to him) to reciprocate his feelings. The thing is Chen Yi was also in love with him but because of their difference of age it was harder for him to notice the change in his feelings. He had loved Ai Di for years since the day they met, he has a responsibility to him as his older brother. Ai Di has always been the most important person in his life and when he sees in their future he does not see this changing or a future where they are not always together.
As the series progresses they both have to be forced into a separation of 4 years, and in this time that Ai Di was away Chen Yi realizes his true feelings for him, he understands that they always being together isn't a given and how much he really loved, missed and needed him.
Now coming back to Tharn and the Dr, this is the first moment of their past that we learn from the novel:
- I've been promoted from your maid of honor to your companion.
- Aren't you satisfied? My companion isn't a position that anyone could be.
- So, what a companion must do, your Highness?
- Stand by me, accompany me, never be apart from me and obey me.
- But I've heard that being companions, their status must be alike.
- Right, right. Our status is alike now. From now on you are my companion. What I eat, you eat.
- Really?
The listener's eyes broadly widen and sparkled.
- Really. Have I ever lied to you? Chalotorn says in a tender voice while flicking his head disdanfully. See? She is so childish, he thinks to himself.
Then the scene faded to a picture of a little female Naga reading a book to Chalotorn, or she was to catch some fish and show it to him, or sometimes they teased the palace people together. These moments caused Vanvisa to let out a thin smile.
Now, i see the Dr and Tharn relationship a lot like Ai Di/Chen Yi, the Dr was the Naga King he knew and loved Tharn since Tharn started to exist, he watched him grow and played with him. When Tharn approach him with his crush he dismiss as a child admiration but promised him that no matter what they would always be together for eternity.
But as Chen Yi, the Dr took this as given, and unfortunately for him Tharn's love was a temporary crush and he truly loves Phaya. After Phaya and Tharn's death in their first life, the Dr is imprisoned because of his part in what happened by 1000 years.
After all this time separated from Tharn and watching him die in front of him he realizes how much he truly loves and misses Tharn.
He comes back into the mortal world to accompany Tharn in his reincarnations and watches Tharn fall for Phaya and sacrifice himself for countless lives dying to protect him while Phaya is still oblivious to his and Tharn real feelings. As a bonus Tharn does not remember him or any of their history together. He sees Phaya disregard and take for granted Tharn feelings like he used to do, and decides he does not deserve him.
So he starts to try to keep them apart, kills Phaya if he has to, so the Tharn could live longer and happier(in his head) with him. At some point he decides to bring Tharn again to the Underwater Castle (this is why Tharn life line is short, if there aren't all those safety measures in his infancy the Dr would have already brought him to his castle with him).
Do I think he is a perfect person? No, he is a really flawed one like everyone else, but I just can’t see him as a villain. He sure is very entitled (as all kings used to be) and decides things for Tharn without asking him.
But the moment in the end of the novel when Tharn knows everything and makes a decision to be with Phaya and tells him that he respects it and leaves him. Because he truly does love him and always did.
27 notes · View notes