#literally just today and looking at the difference between the way my bio family and my chosen family reacted to my hair | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

daisybeewrites · 3 years

Text

Academy Blues — Prologue

word count: 1.8k

warnings: not any for this chapter

ship: Dousy, background Fitzsimmons and Philinda

okay y’all.. here it is. the first installment of my first LONG TERM SERIES!!!!!! ahhhh i’m so excited. literally i cant wait to continue this and see where it takes me. i have an idea and a few different planning sheets, but honestly i have no idea where exactly this will end up. i love each and single one of you <3 thank you for reading!! this is also posted on Ao3, and linked in the masterlist.

Daisy hated the sound of the bells at The Academy. Screeching, awful, way too loud, the bells were the bane of her existence. They all wore standard-issue watches from the lab that monitored vitals and gave them reminders, and also told the time, for god’s sake! Fitz had even modified hers so that she could play snake on the tiny watch face! There was no need for the bells to be so excruciatingly disruptive. Though, Daisy guessed, there were many things more tortuous than bells ringing every hour and fifteen minutes.

Daisy slowed to a jog, cutting her morning run short. The bright side to being a third-year was that you chose your schedule, for the most part, and that meant Daisy had a free first period for four out of five days of classes. She usually spent this free period getting an extra hour in at the gym, boxing or sparring with Mack or Bobbi, two fourth years that had reluctantly taken her under their wings, or sleeping in. She reserved sleeping in for especially rough nights where visions of ashes and earthquakes and lightning returned time and time again, no matter how many deep breaths she took or sheep she counted.

But this morning was not one of those mornings. She had been up before sunrise, a little before her usual alarm and silently headed out of her dorm for a run. It was humid this time of year on most Virginia mornings, but never so hot that it made Daisy feel as if she was being smothered. The cooler air chilled her sweaty skin, her chest rising and falling as she jogged up the three flights of steps to the second years’ dorms. Down one long hallway, and she arrived at her room.

Daisy had been given her own room at the start of last year, complete with poly-adaptic-proto-whatever panels, which she had painted a pastel shade of purple, to compliment the greens of her cacti and the dark purples and blacks of everything else in her room. Even May had agreed that the stark white was too ”psych wing” for a bedroom. Daisy was grateful for the space, but considering the panels and the private room were only necessary since...

She shuddered. Grabbing her shower caddy, Daisy set off to the bathroom at the opposite end of the hall, hoping no one else was spending a free first period at the dorms.

Her shoulder-length waves were wet from bouncing against her neck, and starting to become annoying now that the sweat had dried and was starting to itch. Picking the white tiled shower furthest away from the door, Daisy quickly turned the water on, checked the temperature, pulled her sports bra and shorts off and hopped into the shower. Shampoo, condition, soap body, rinse. Checking her watch, Daisy found that she had showered in record time, less than three minutes. After spending another five just enjoying the hot water, she hopped out and changed into her class clothes.

Dark purple leggings, Coulson’s grey vintage SHIELD tee and a pair of white running sneakers she had “borrowed” from Jemma completed her look. Passing the mirrors, Daisy tried not to glance at herself. If her hair was messy or her undereye bags a bit too dark, she didn’t want to know. Instead, she headed back to her room to pack her bag for the day.

SHIELD-issued laptop, extra hard drives and a charger, Advanced CS 3: Ethical Hacking: Theory and Application, Advanced CS 4: Secrets of The Coding Languages, Physics notebook, an essay that was three days late on some boring book about international laws, and her sparring gear were all thrown into the black bag. She gave a second glance at the Russian notebooks Bobbi had loaned to her, promising that she’d learn without taking the class. Oh well, she still had all of this term to start. Plus, would she ever really need more than the dirty words?

One look at the alarm clock that sat on her dark hardwood night table showed that she still had almost forty-five minutes before she had to be in the computer lab. Sitting down on her bed, Daisy ran a hand over the grey blanket May had given her.

Daisy’s relationship with May and Coulson had been something of a problem with other students when she first got here. Some had been okay with the obvious paternal love Coulson showed for Daisy, showing her around and checking up on her, scheduling lunch dates and reminding her of tests. May was more subtle, texting her links to tai chi videos when she noticed Daisy getting too stressed or letting Daisy do her own thing if she saw that she was overwhelmed. Of course, none of the other students knew her family history, what she had gone through just to realize that May and Coulson were more her parents than her biological father and mother could ever be. She would see them later today—May during field training and Coulson in between lectures in the canteen.

Daisy walked over to her window to open her blinds, staring out at the campus she had grown to love. The large brick buildings scattered around acres of the Virginia countryside; green fields meant for physical activities like sparring or obstacle courses, or simply basking in the weather to study or chat; the dorms—red brick and concrete melded together to upgrade and expand the charming style of previously-built homes.

Grabbing a protein bar, Daisy headed to the canteen to make a green smoothie (and maybe snatch a cup of joe before she had to listen to an hour-long lecture on the reason SHIELD must cooperate with the UN’s stupid rules at 7:30 in the morning). Smelling the pines and morning dew surrounding her, she smiled slightly. Maybe this term wouldn’t be so bad.

———————————————————————

Daniel Sousa was a man of honor. He was a man of great strength. Agent Daniel Sousa, previously Officer Daniel Sousa in the US Army, was a man who could fix his damn alarm clock on his own.

Just, not today. Or the day before.

So, Agent Daniel Sousa was now hurrying his way to class at The SHIELD Academy, books in hand and gym bag slung over his shoulders. Catching a glance at himself in the shiny glass doors of the bio-chem building, he groaned. He hadn’t even brushed his hair. And, looking down, he discovered he was wearing two different shoes.

This is the college experience everyone raves about, he thought bitterly. You see, Daniel Sousa had enlisted to the army straight out of high school, forgoing university. He climbed the ranks impressively quickly, earning his place as second-in-command and reconnaissance scout in the 28th Infantry Regiment. Unfortunately, after only four years in the army, Sousa was injured in the field, losing his leg and almost his life.

He came back to the US a war hero, and yet, he felt he wasn't finished. So, when a recruiter named Peggy Carter knocked on his door claiming to be from SHIELD (“Wow, you guys are still a thing?”), he leapt at the chance to continue fighti-...doing good. The Academy wasn’t exactly what he had bargained for, though. Trying to earn his B.A. and training to be an agent at the same time was grueling, but nothing he couldn’t deal with.

No, six different one hour and fifteen minute long classes plus mandatory physical therapy every day wasn’t going to break him. Learning how to be a communications agent and re-starting field training and catching up on general college education was no problem. Pressuring himself to be the best, to break the limits, to get past all his weaknesses was just another miniscule feather to add to the pile.

Unless his stupid alarm clock broke. Then yes, Agent Daniel Sousa would fail, buckle under the weight and be left on the floor to die.

Maybe he was being a bit dramatic.

One bunny-slippered right foot and a sneakered left leg carried him forward, propelled by a quickly chugged orange Celsius and his sheer will not to be late.

Daniel heard the late bell ring out, understanding that, on his first day of class, he would be counted late. It wasn’t like him, not at all. Especially when his first class was a refresher course on field tactics and covert strategy, something in which he was already aces.

He let out a sigh, slowing as he rounded the corner into the comms building. At the Academy, most buildings were grouped into categories: the cafeteria, gym and pool, and student resource building all to the south; the gun range, obstacle course, and specialized gym to the east; bio-chem labs, tech labs, and smaller rooms for lectures to the west; the computer labs and comms buildings right smack in the middle; and dorms to the north.

He swiped a key card with his driver’s license picture and student ID, unlocking the sliding doors that led to the computer labs. It was quicker to short cut through them than to walk around the building to the entrance closest to communications classrooms.

It wasn’t because he knew a certain broody brunette spent her mornings in the lab.

No, it wasn’t, because she wasn’t in her usual seat in the corner, typing away.

He slowly walked through the rows of computers, searching for a familiar black backpack. Nothing was there.

“Hey, Sousa,” an accented female voice called behind him. He whipped around to see who it was, feeling just a twinge of disappointment when Elena, or, as most people knew her, Yo-Yo, was leaning against the door frame. Yo-Yo, a fourth year operations trainee, who was very close with Daisy.

“Hey, Yo-Yo. Good morning,” he called, “I’m running a bit late.”

Elena checked her nails casually, “Way to state the obvious. You were running faster than I could trying to get here before the bell.”

Daniel rubbed the back of his neck and blushed. “Yeah…”

“Daisy’s running late today, too.”

Daniel looked around, pretending that hearing Daisy’s name didn’t make him want to smile. “Oh, of course. She’s usually here early.”

Elena nodded, chuckling a little at his response. She couldn’t tell if he was oblivious or just a bad liar. It was charming, really. “Right. See ya ‘round, Sousa!”

“See ya,” He replied. He thought he heard a quiet ‘Lovable nerds’ coming from the direction she left, but he couldn’t be sure.

And so, with a last look around the computer lab, Daniel set off to arrive late to May’s lecture.

———————————————————————

okay okay,,, what do y’all think?? like/reblog and let me know! it’s the best way to support writers and it only takes a second! stay tuned for more chapters!!

#academy blues #daisy johnson #agents of s.h.i.e.l.d.#dousy #daisy johnson x daniel sousa #timequake #daniel sousa #jemma simmons #leo fitz #fitzsimmons #philinda #philindaisy #ashby’s fics #marvels aos #au!

20 notes · View notes

musicfeedsmysoul12 · 4 years

Text

Princess of Atlantis

Marinette has always been fully aware her father wasn’t fully human- or Tom. Her mom had met Arthur- her bio dad- on a trip to Hawaii. They’d had a whirlwind summer fling that ended with Sabine going back to China for her move to France unaware she was pregnant.

When she discovered she was pregnant she’d contacted Arthur who had gone right to France to explain some things. Learning about the fact there was an entire world underwater? Was… interesting. Learning her daughter may be in danger because of her heritage?

She was not happy.

Marinette was five when her uncle Orm attacked the surface and her father became King of Atlantis. When they’d learned he had a daughter on land they had all decided that she could not be heir given her only Atlantean abilities were breathing underwater.

Marinette, even at age five, had no issue with that. She did not want to rule Atlantis. She wanted to be a fashion designer. She said that to her dad when he’d broken the news.

“I’m going to also redesign your suit.”

“It’s not-“

“It’s ugly daddy.”

She still was a princess though and had to sit in on lessons given to her by Mera, her father’s betrothed/girlfriend. Mera at least was fun.

She learned Atlantean design and etiquette. It was fun and enjoyable and she got to design her new step-mother’s wedding dress and her daddy’s suit for their wedding at age ten which she was thrilled about.

Marinette grew up learning about her heritage from all sides of her family, her dad fIrm on the idea. She spent time in Hawaii with her grandfather, and later her grandmother, and time in Atlantis. She learned her Hawaiian heritage, her Chinese heritage and her Atlantean heritage from a young age.

Children though can be cruel. Especially when afraid. A little girl with crazy wavy hair and the ability to swap between multiple languages is fun, but when a girl whose daddy has power and has taught her she can do no wrong decides she doesn’t like you… no one does.

Marinette grew up being taunted for her differences. She saw how some people side-eyed her and her mother while walking around, how some Atlanteans sneered at her for her mostly human heritage, saw how some of the people on the islands seemed to hesitate around her. She tried to smile through it but…

Well, in the end, it was easier to pretend. She was white-passing enough that all she needed to do was straighten her hair and stop speaking other languages.

Her mother hated it. Her papa- Tom- did too. Her daddy did, her step-momma did. Her grandfather and grandmothers did. Kaldur, the boy who became her daddy’s apprentice and a big brother figure to her, hated it too.

But she couldn’t keep going, couldn’t keep being taunted. So she plastered a smile on her face and pretended. And it worked- Chloe, the bully, backed off and she made some sort of friends. She even became a hero like her daddy and slowly gained actual friends. She got to make her own team like Kaldur, she got a partner she could count on, a mentor to help her out. She was happy.

Or so she thought.

A liar came to school and things went all to hell. She lost everything. Her friends, her comfort she felt in her hero partner being there to help. Her team, her mentor…

She was left holding a box full of power, tears in her eyes and a scream in her throat. She took off to Atlantis where she collapsed and sobbed into her step-momma’s dress and her daddy raged.

It was Kaldur who helped her.

“Fuck them,” Kaldur told her. “They don’t deserve your tears.” He sat with her and wrapped his arms around her. “They weren’t friends. Friends don’t betray you like this. Friends stick with you even when things go to hell.” He kissed her forehead and promised to be there.

And he was. He was there when she herself decided fuck it when she stopped straightening her hair and cut it into an undercut with one side framing her face. When she started wearing eyeliner- he even went and got some help from Nightwing for learning some dramatic ways to make her eyes pop.

Kaldur helped her figure out how to find good people to fight with. Kagami, Luka- they were good fighters, good friends. They had her back. Luka got into fights with his sister about her and never back down. Kagami punched Adrien and told him how little she cared for him seeing how he never backed up his friend.

Marinette started smiling again soon enough.

-0-

“I hope Marinette doesn’t make this difficult,” Lila told Alya, pouting. “I know she has Italian heritage too but I’m fully Italian…”

“Don’t worry girl, we’ll make sure Marinette doesn’t start anything,” Alya promised as they all sat in the classroom about to give their reports on their cultural heritage. The others nodded and all turned to the front just as Marinette walked in. She’d changed- everyone knew it. Gone was the kind girl… sort of. She was still kind, but she stopped looking like she used to her. Her hair was short, she wore dark make-up, and she dressed in loose and comfortable clothing that made her look badass honestly. She also apparently had tattoos but no one had believed it- until today when she came in with no sleeves and showing off her tattoos on her arms.

“Oh god, where did she get those?” asked Juleka in shock. “They’re badass.”

“Maybe they’re gang signs,” Lila said slyly, smirking as everyone began whispering about this new rumour.

“Class,” Ms. Bustier- the woman had moved with them to lycee because Chloe had demanded her favourite teacher be moved with her- began. “Marinette will be going first on her report as she needs to leave for a family thing.”

“What?” Alya asked. “But Lila’s the full Italian! Shouldn’t we learn about the culture from her?” everyone nodded. Marinette stared at them, face blank.

“...Nino, you’ve known me since we were kids. You know Tom’s not my bio dad.” Marinette said and the class froze.

“... Shit, I forgot.” Nino admitted while Marinette rolled her eyes hard.

“I figured. So no, I’m not doing Italian anyway.” She turned and began setting up her powerpoint, ignoring the class. Lila was angry. She had hoped to whine and cry that Marinette had stolen some of her points about her heritage or make some comment about Marinette obviously having stolen her report. Now she had to actually do it. “As everyone knows- and I did do a previous report on it- my mother is Chinese. What few others know is that my bio father is kānaka ʻōiwi, or Native Hawaiian as some know them as.” Marinette continued her report, showing off interesting legends about her father’s people and even speaking of her tattoos. “They were done in the traditional way and it really hurt but I think they’re pretty amazing. I don’t have much- just a few that my dad thought fit me.” Marinette grinned and everyone looked at each other feeling uncomfortable. When her report was done she left with a wave and a very awkward class.

Not that she cared, she was busy focusing on the fact uncle fucking Orm wanted to see her. Orm- as in her weedy uncle who still hated all land walkers. And who looked like a dork and still wouldn’t take her advice about his hair.

Walking up to the living room, she wanted to whine upon seeing him. He was looking annoyed while sitting on the couch.

“What’s going on that I needed to ditch school?” she asked, feeling annoyed at seeing him. She had stopped wanting to do everything for everyone. She’d stopped trying to be a people pleaser. It was annoying and frustrating. Kaldur had taken her to meet Red Robin who was similar to her in that way and they’d both had a nice long bitch out about everything before they’d both decided to stop it. Stop trying to help people who never said thanks, stop trying to please everyone.

She enjoyed the chaos the class had become and loved hearing about how much of a shit show Gotham’s Batfam had become themselves before they actually started trying again.

“We need someone to run Atlantis,” Orm said darkly. She stared at him.

“Oh fuck no. No- nope. Nuh-uh. Aʻole, Méiyǒu. NO.” She shook her head, holding her hands up. “I am literally as far from the throne as I can be given I’m the King’s only kid so far? I mean Kaldur doesn’t count.”

“This is true but your father is needed in space while Mera is still on bedrest as her pregnancy is most difficult currently and Kaldur has no actual relation to the throne.”

“And you can’t rule because technically you were dishonoured,” Marinette added in, gaining a dirty look from her uncle. “Damn… I’m just the face of this, right? Step-momma is still the one giving orders?”

“Of course. Though there is a ball with land walkers you need to attend.” Marinette stopped.

“...Everyone will know who I am then.” Orm shrugged, uncaring.

“Weren’t you planning on revealing yourself anyway?” Marinette frowned but sighed, her shoulders slumping.

“...At least I have a dress already designed and half made for this.”

-0-

Telling Bustier she wouldn’t be in for two weeks was simple enough. Ruling Atlantis- or really acting as a mouthpiece for her step-mother? Simple to. Jumping back to Paris when an Akuma happened? Easy. All of Atlantis knew she was Ladybug- they felt the magic. They knew she was the Guardian as well and mostly ignored that as long as Plagg never came near them. Given she was still hesitating on claiming the ring she was okay.

She didn’t want to take his ring, she wanted her partner back, her best friend. She wanted him to stop flirting and stop not taking things seriously.

“It’s annoying,” she told Kaldur while signing some papers. She and Kaldur were in the room Mera was in, the woman annoyed at the bed rest condition she’d been given for her pregnancy and demanding Marinette sign the papers in her room at least. “I mean- it’s wrong and gross and I should take it back but it feels… wrong. Gross to consider it, you know?”

“That’s the bond of a Ladybug and Chat Noir I believe according to our records,” Mera told her step-daughter.

“Yeah- magic makes things tricky. But he’s really pushing the boundaries.” Kaldur told Marinette who sighed.

“I don’t know what to do.”

“Tell him you’re dating someone,” Mera said. “If he’s a dick still then take the ring.”

Maybe she would. Maybe.

But first, she had the damn ball to deal with.

-0-

“I look terrible in gold Uncle Orm.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Uncle.” Orm glared at his niece as she glared at the gold fabric he’d thrust into her arms to add to her dress. It needed an extra layer, and gold was one of the colours of Atlantis. “I look better in silver.”

“I don’t care. You need to have the colours of Atlantis on you.” Orm told her. She glared at him and then at the fabric.

“At least you got the sheer stuff. It’ll look nice over it hopefully.” She added the cloth and did admit it looked nice.

She still hated gold cloth.

But it went with her tiara as she waited for the announcer to call her, a hand on Kaldur’s arm.

“Relax Marinette- everything is okay,” he told her softly.

“I’m about to reveal to the whole world I’m the Princess of Atlantis.”

“Imagine the looks on your classmates’ faces?”

“...Okay yeah, I feel better now.” Marinette flashed a smile and waited.

“Her Royal Highness, Princess Marinette Curry-Dupain-Cheng of Atlantis, current regent while her father is in space and Lord Kaldur of Atlantis.” the Announcer read out loud. Marinette and Kaldur walked into the room with their heads high.

Cameras flashed and Marinette kept her eyes focused. Her dress showed off her tattoos and muscular arms, the entire thing designed to be able to fight in if needed. She was every inch the warrior princess that Atlantis could boast of.

“Princess!” a man shouted. “Who designed your dress.”

“I did myself,” she told him. “I enjoy fashion design and sewing.”

“Are you the heir?”

“No,” she told that reporter. “Due to the fact I only have a quarter of Atlantean blood I am not the heir but as said I stepped in as regent while my father fights for our galaxy,”

“Are you and Kaldur dating?”

“Definitely not- he’s my elder brother in everything but blood and legality.” She told that one before she was led away by Kaldur and had to play nice for a few hours with politicians.

There was one face she recognized.

“Prince Ali,” she said, curtseying like she’d been taught by Mera.

“Princess Marinette,” the Prince of Achu said, bowing. He looked a bit sad. “I see you aren’t in rehab like Rose is saying Lila is claiming.” Marinette stopped as did Kaldur.

“...What?”

“Apparently that’s the new rumour that Lila Rossi is spreading.”

“...I believe I need to make some calls to various lawyers we have on land,” Kaldur said darkly and strode off to do so. Marinette had her eyes closed and took a deep breath.

“I hate that girl will all my soul,” she finally said after a moment.

“I do as well,” Ali admitted. Marinette looked at him in surprise. “I meet many people, your highness. Sometimes- unless they had made an impression- I forget them. When Rose asked if I knew Lila, I said possibly I’d met her. I did not know the extent of her lies until Rose referenced them and then… it was to late.”

“Not really your highness, you could have said something.” Ali winced.

“I have few friends, Princess Marinette, Rose is one of the few. And like others she expects me to be a perfect Prince which means not… rocking the boat so to speak.” He looked pained saying so, and Marinette frowned.

“Then she’d not a friend Prince Ali. Real friends wouldn’t hold you to expectations and ideals. That’s why I stopped being friends with a fair amount of my class. I think only Juleka and I could be called friendly- and that’s because her brother is one of my best friends.” Ali frowned but looked thoughtful.

After the ball, Marinette went back to Atlantis with a satisfied smile. She had a nice time, and she even swapped numbers with Ali.

Maybe she had a new friend.

-0-

The rest of the time spent in Atlantis was spent texting Ali when bored and ignoring the emails from her classmates who’d realized she’d changed her number. Most were basically begs for her to talk to them, a few saying they were sorry, or asking for an interview. Some accused her of lying or brainwashing Ali (Alya there) while Rose sent a sorry email. Apparently, she’d taken Ali’s message to heart and even Juleka felt bad.

Marinette didn’t give a damn.

When her dad came back and she got to hug him and hit him for leaving the planet- idiot- he had a laugh over the emails.

“Your classmates are ridiculous,” he told her. “What, do they think you’ll dramatically run back to each other, arms wide open?”

“Probably,” she told him. “I just don’t give a damn.”

“Nice.” he ruffled her hair and they chatted about seeing grandma and grandpa in Hawaii over the summer again before Marinette headed back to Paris where some of the Atlanteans who could walk on land were guarding the bakery. And where a lawyer was waiting, plus a personal assistant.

“No,” Marinette whined as her father patted her shoulder. He’d gone with her to explain some things.

“Sorry kid. You’re in the spotlight now- and that means you do need to go to a few galas and balls.” Marinette playfully gagged. Arthur laughed at his daughter again. He was happy she was doing better, that things were okay for her again. He’d worried when she was a shell of herself. Worried when she became Ladybug and worried when that Rossi girl came to the class.

He was happy she was okay.

-0-

Marinette’s new personal assistant was named Stephanie Brown and she was, in fact, Spoiler from Gotham who had agreed to move to Paris to help Marinette out and to be part of her new team of heroes she was putting together. Stephanie was still in school but she was killing it already as a personal assistant.

“Alright, so school, homework, design time then patrol. Maybe steal the ring today?” Stephanie asked as she checked the tablet.

“Maybe. I want to give him one more chance…” Marinette sighed. “But that could be the bond…”

“Hey, up to you but I will follow as the lovely Buzzer to keep an eye on things.” Stephanie grinned as Pollen giggled from the depths of her hair. Marinette nodded as they continued their walk to school, the lawyer following.

Marinette ignored the majority of the students staring at her as she walked to class, only saying hi to Kagami who waved her down to playfully scold her for not telling.

When she got to class, Stephanie broke off and the lawyer was the only one with her as they entered the room.

“GIRL!” Alya stood up. “Why the hell didn’t you ever tell me?” she was insulted her friend had never said anything to Alya.

“Because we’re not friends anymore and I wasn’t sure if I could trust you when we first met. Guess I was right.” she shrugged at Alya who flushed red at that. Lila was staring at Marinette with wide eyes as the girl turned to her. “I heard someone was claiming I was in rehab these past two weeks, plus that my tattoos were gang signs and oh so much more.” The lawyer stepped forward then.

“You’ve been served,” she told Lila who stared at the lawsuit in horror. Marinette ignored the class’s exclamations and demands she not go through with it, instead going to sit at the back again, uncaring of their words.

Adrien was giving her a look but she ignored it, pulling her phone out to text Ali, who’d texted her asking if she wanted to go for lunch. Checking with Stephanie, she agreed.

Still ignoring the class- now with Bustier giving her disappointed looks- she rushed out of the school to where Ali was waiting at lunch. The class followed and stopped, seeing who she was with.

“Ah, Princess Marinette.” Ali bowed and Marinette bowed as well, given she was wearing jeans and not a skirt.

“Prince Ali, it is a pleasure to see you again.” They smiled at each other before both blushed, feeling awkward when they realized they’d been staring.

“You look like a queen,” Ali remarked before his face went even redder and Marinette’s cheeks flamed before she grinned.

“Well I am a princess…” Ali stuttered but then laughed, offering his arm and opening the door to all of the possibilities of the two, while the class watched.

No one really realized the fall out that would occur, with Lila’s mother fired, her lies exposed and her dealings with Hawkmoth revealed. No one knew that a new cat would stalk the night one day, calling himself Prince Noir. No one knew how their lives would change.

Especially not Marinette or Ali.

tagged:

@vixen-uchiha @persephonebutkore @magicalfirebird @starwindmaden @liawinchester67 @doriebell @animegirlweeb @unmaskedagain

#miraculous ladybug #ml au #miraculous ladby x dc #aquaman #prince ali/marinette #salt

2K notes · View notes

woulddieforperrytheplatypus · 4 years

Text

Dan Povenmire, co-creator of Phineas and Ferb and the voice of Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz, just did a zoom call for fans, and this is a link to it on Google Drive and a link to it on YouTube.

Here’s a brief overlay brought to you by my incessant live blogging, and because I was speed typing on my phone, I can guarantee not everything made the cut. If you’re interested in hearing Dan talk about growing up an artist and becoming an animator and trying to pitch Phineas and Ferb and working on the show and movies, I would definitely suggest checking out the full 75 minute video. The highlights from the call are below the cut.

They added Doof and Perry because they liked chase scenes. They realized fairly quickly that more than not, the pair led to good comedy, and found it much more interesting to see how their relationship developed. He also says that they are "the most important person to each other” and “they’re really good friends.”

They wrote the Perry theme song in an hour between meetings with Disney

They decided during the pilot that they weren't going to try to get comedy from the characters saying mean things to each other. Even Doofenshmirtz wasn't motivated by evil, he just wanted to get the attention he didn't get at home.

Doof’s backstories were not Dan and Swampy's idea. They were from Jon Barry and Chris Hendrick, who [itched the lawn gnome backstory. It was long and compliated and Dan and Swampy couldn’t stop laughing. They also provided the "it all started on the day of my birth” one the next day.

making the 2D movie while making the movie was the busiest Dan says he has ever been, and that's not even counting the PnF Take Two and Doof's web show and all the interviews. Basically, 2010ish was a very busy time in the Dwampyverse.

They decided to give each pair of writers their own section of an outline to work on, and each pair got to make up the dialogue and jokes based on it. it works well for the show, but writers kept going on their own tangents and the movie ended up like 6 hours long. Dan and Kyle Menke had to redraw 80% of the show because they had to cut gags out and rewrite it so it was still funny. Note: in the new movie, they did the opposite — they wrote a script and told the board artists that they could put brief gags in but nothing too long

He thinks the show became one of the most beloved shows bc it was innocent and the adult humor wasn't dirty so the whole family could watch it together. He also said the songs at the closest thing you get to immortality in a show. Those combined made the show as big of a hit as it was, and hopefully those things will get older people to watch the movie.

His advice if you want to follow in his footsteps are to draw (and suggest you check out Cartoon Animation by Preston Blaire and How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way by Stan Lee) and to know that these jobs are out there

One of his favorite gags in PnF are the silent moments where something big happens and no one reacts (like something big fell in an early episode and crashed next to Phineas and co and at first they were all shocked but Dan changed it to them just kinda looking at it for a moment with no emotion)

Q: Did you ever want to quit what you were going?

A: "I don't really... do... anything else..."

He finished his new pilot today (July 2nd, 2020) and the movie is due tomorrow.

He would love to do more PnF and there's been talks of another PnF movie

He would love to do more Milo Murphy's Law, but it never got huge ratings and Disney's not too big on it but if people start watching it on Disney+ they might get to keep doing it. They did that with Family Guy, and it could happen to MML too.

The movie feels like old Phineas and Ferb and there are a lot of great songs!

And now, the Q&A (in which he draws random characters are he talks)

How was the process of kicking the voices?

It was sometime easy but sometimes very difficult. For Phineas, they listened to maybe a thousand people. they actually recorded someone but they put it to animation and it didn't really work. He knew as soon as he heard Vincent that he loved him. They literally recasted the lead (Vincent) the day before they had to deliver the pilot.

He knew immediately that he liked Alison Stoner. She was the second Isabella he heard, and he listened to maybe 50 others afterwards, but he knew he wanted Alison Stoner

They decided on a different Candace and they sent it to the head of the channel and the guy asked if he heard Ashley Tisdale. He told Dan to have her come in and give her direction and Dan was hesitant bc he had one that he liked but he was lowkey forced to bring her in. It was his only audition that day, and after his big block of text Dan gave her like 20 notes and she wrote the notes on the big block of text and she did it again and it was perfect and obviously Candace (but he feels bad for the actress that was almost Candace bc she'll never know how close she was)

What was the most impactful episode you worked on?

Either the last (hard to watch w/o crying) or three moments that made himcey while doing them: the end of Summer Belongs To You when Phineas gives up trying to get off the island and decides to watch the sunset with Isabella which was what she always wanted and she exploded and talked him back up onto being the person he is even tho it's a sacrifice on her behalf. He later says he started crying while pitching to his wife the AYA scene of Phinabella getting together.

Do you regret any episodes?

There are some he likes more and some he likes less but he doesn't regret any of them. He was a little disappointed in an early episode without a sing but he watched it alter and decided it was actually pretty decent. None of them make him cringe or wonder why they did that.

How has social media impacted PnF?

He recently got on TikTok and found out that's where all the PnF fans are. He was thrilled to see the response everything was getting and it made him feel good about everything he accomplished. The fact that this generation knows what an aglet is is his biggest accomplishment in pop culture.

Favorite part of working on the show/movie

He likes editing, but writing the songs is the most fun bc it feels the least like work

Who is Ferb's mom?

Never established or really thought about Ferb's mom or Phineas's dad AND IT'S NOT DOOFENSHMIRTZ THEY MADE IT IMPOSSIBLE FOR THAT TO BE TRUE STOP ASKING and Phineas and Candace are full brother and sister. The bio parents aren't interesting to them bc the family already has a mom and dad and the other ones are just out of the picture and not important.

Will there be a new character in the movie?

Super Super Big Doctor (and Disney keeps telling him what he can and can't talk about)

Are there any secrets or theories that he can tell them?

The freaking creepy pasta about schitzophrenic Candace IS NOT TRUE Phineas and Ferb do exist and are alive. There's also a theory that Candace is not based on the diary of a teen girl in Russia who killed herself, and that's not true either. He genuinely thinks they are really freaking stupid theories and they make no sense at all.

Who is your favorite guest star?

Writing a song with Slash from Guns n Roses was really cool. He also liked working with Ben Stiller, Christian Slater the delivery guy (he called and said he'd do any part in MML so they wrote him a role), Jack McBrayer (Irving/Fix It Felix), Wayne Brady (co-wrote In The Empire)

What is the motivation of Candace to bust the boys?

He's not trying to hurt them. She doesn't dislike them. She gets irritated but she's really just looking for fairness. If she built a rollercoaster in the backyard, she'd get in trouble, so they should get in trouble, too.

How did you think about hot to end the show?

Disney was starting to cool off on PnF. The merch wave had plateaued. Dan and Swampy had the next two years in the show already made, but Disney wouldn't pick up another season until they finished airing that season. They'd have to restaff for a new season and they didn't like that idea, so they turned one of their hour long specials into the finale. He wanted to be able to say goodbye and thank the fans.

#phineas and ferb #dan povenmire #candance against the universe #catu #PnF #I'm working on getting the zoom call on youtube but it's taking forever

182 notes · View notes

ethanramseyyy · 4 years

Text

OPEN HEART SECOND YEAR: CHAPTER 18

Edenbrook!!! I was skeptical in the last chapter as to if Edenbrook would actually close but now it seems so real. Like in the last scene we were literally preparing for our last day and everyone was discussing their options for new jobs. Like what is even happening. Something better happen because I can’t handle leaving this hospital behind, unless me and Ethan move out together. But still I don’t want to say goodbye to our friends.

Ethan’s advice was so good. ‘It means you fight until your last breath.’ I honestly think a lot of people should take that advice. Look at my husband being all inspirational, you’re doing amazing sweetie ;)

Having the meeting with the lawyers about Levi’s death was so upsetting. I hated that they were talking about him like he was property. And then Esme’s response broke me when she said he was priceless. I honestly believe that she had feelings for Levi and it pains me to think that she believes she killed him. I hope that we get to see Esme grow and try to move past this without blaming herself, but in I miss Levi too. He was so kind-hearted.

AURORA REALLY IS THAT BITCH!!! She quit Kenmore to come back to Edenbrook even though the hospital is falling apart. That is what having respect is June. Not that I am bitter about her leaving or anything 😒. The way she gave up a permanent job just to do right by Edenbrook just shows her true character. I am so glad that we have gotten to see her character development because I believe she has had one of the biggest developments between the books. The way she is finally doing something for herself and not doing it because of her Aunt is so inspiring, especially since she spent all that time living her Aunts shadow. We love you Aurora!

The part with MC treating all the patients was so nice. I feel like recently the book has been very storyline based so I thought it was good to see some actual work. And Gary Garrison making an appearance. God this man is so adorable and his relationship with Jackie is so funny to me. She acts like she hates him when realistically we all know she loves his company. How can you not, it’s Gary Garrison for goodness sake. Raf making an appearance is always nice, especially because of the trauma Rafael stans have been through in this book. I’m still undecided on Mitch, but I think him coming back in todays chapter showed that he was truly sorry for how he treated the angel that is Sienna Trinh. I mean no one can be as bad as her ex.

I didn’t pick the option to go on the roadtrip with Bryce and her sister but I have seen some screenshots on Tumblr and it looked so cute. I am glad that people romancing Bryce have had the chance to get to know his family and actually form a bond with his sister.

‘You’re up late’. If you have been around since I started my blog, you will know that Ethan's quote ‘you kept me up very late last night’ was my bio for so long. And this was a reminder of that which made me smile. Ugh, the development in his character has to be up there with Aurora. He is truly a completely different person compared to book 1 Ethan. This man started MASSAGING OUR SHOULDERS. When I tell you I cried (like usual). This is some of the cutest sh*t ever. And then the way they looked into each other eyes and then kissed. Literally so magical. We all say we are ready for the wedding but we really aren’t are we?!

Everyone explaining what hospitals they’ve applied for made my heart ache. Listen, I’m still holding out hope that Edenbrook will survive but it is looking less and less likely each chapter. MC’s outfit was so freaking beautiful. I thought that we would get Ethan in a matching suit but that didn’t happen unfortunately. I’m praying that we get to see their first proper date before this book ends.

Did I order 21 shots? Yes. Do I regret it? No. I couldn’t not. If this was their last outing as Edenbrook doctors they have to go out with a bang. Seeing everyone drunk was so funny. Aurora was a very affectionate drunk which I found funny because she doesn’t really open much. Elijah was quite emotional which I expected because that man is the sweetest thing. And then Jackie was also quite emotional which is funny because she seems quite cold hearted, even though we all know she isn’t deep down.

The toast to Danny and Bobby was heartbreaking. I miss them!! I think that someone in this chapter said that Bobby used to bring them a coffee during the week. Like can that guy get any cuter. I love that everyone has so much respect for them and I’m glad that @playchoices hasn’t just forgotten about them.

Ethan finding us on the roof and then joining us just goes to show how much he loves MC. Okay maybe I am being dramatic but I have never seen him turn so soft and I can’t deal.

Leland Bloom returning was not what I expected to end the chapter. I am excited to see MC and Ethan work on one last case before the hospital closes. I am dreading it but I can’t help but be excited for more chapters.

I know I always say this but I am like 3 followers away from 600 followers which is insane to me!!!! Thank you for all my new and old followers who continue to show me love. If anyone ever wants to talk, my DMs are always open, I love making new friends. Let me know what you thought of this chapter and what you think will happen to Edenbrook!

@fanficnewbie @openheartconfessions @choicescommunity @openheartincorrect @zeniamiii @lovebubblechoices @drethanramslay @ethanramseyposts @ethanplaysfavorites

18 notes · View notes

purplesurveys · 3 years

Text

1195

survey by n0b0dysp3rf3ct

—:: Who ::—

... was the last person you saw face to face? I passed by my brother last night when I had to go to the kitchen to fill up my tumbler.

... was the last person you texted or messaged online? Angela; I was just asking her for the difference among A4/A5/A6 since I’m now planning to buy a binder and sleeves for my rapidly increasing collection of photocards and postcards. It really frustrates me that A4 is the biggest one and A6 the smallest :((((

... was the last person who asked you for a favour? Kata, my manager. She filed a half-day leave last Friday to get herself and her family vaccinated in her town, so she had sent me over a very long to-do list of deliverables that she asked me to fulfill while she was out. Eventually she ended up filing a whole-day leave since she felt feverish after being under the sun all day, and also possibly from side effects of the vaccine, so I ended up carrying the entire workload for the day. I like Kata and she’s a very easy person and superior to work with, so I honestly couldn’t complain about it.

... was the last person you lent something to? Ooh, I don’t remember. I don’t really lend people things.

... was the last person who told you a secret/confided in you? Andi was just sharing to me their worries about taking the LAE (scheduled for today) and how they’ll be okay if they don’t pass.

... is the tallest person you know? Jo is like 5′7″ and we all look like beans when standing next to her. One of my uncles is also very tall; around 5′10″ or 5′11″ if I’m not mistaken.

... the shortest person you know? I think Aya? That’s just a smart guess, though; I haven’t seen most of my friends in more than a year.

... your oldest (in years) friend? Mik is turning 28 this year. Sometimes I forget just how much older he is than me since we vibe really well together during the rare times we did get to hang out. I’m still bummed we never got that smoke break we wanted to have.

... is the oldest (in length of time) friend? Angela.

... is your youngest friend? Hannah was born in 2000. Peter was born in 2001 but we aren’t that close yet.

... is your newest friend? I haven’t made any new friends recently. Stan Twitter is lonelier than I thought it would be; everyone is already friends with everyone so it’s hard to break that space. Not to mention everyone is also grossly younger than I am – I keep seeing profiles with ‘2004′ on their bio :/ I should start making an effort to look for older ARMYs lol, I definitely feel like I’d have more fun that way.

... is your closest relative? My eldest cousin on my mom’s side, my Kuya.

... was your favourite teacher? My music teacher from high school. I neeeeeever liked music as a subject and it was never a priority of mine, but she always kept our classes something for me to look forward with her advice and the way she was always able to make lessons interesting.

... was your least favourite teacher? Those who made it clear they didn’t like me, even though I didn’t do anything to deserve such hostility.

... did you spend the most time with when growing up? My siblings and cousins since we all lived together at one point.

... knows you the best? My two best friends.

... always beats you in games or sports? Andi would probably be able to beat me in any game. They just let me win because they know I can be a sore loser.

... who is the most creative of the people you know? My family is pretty artistic and I have a lot of talented relatives - my sister and my cousin Maggie paint and draw; my mom can make any kind of craft she wants, with her hnds; and one of my grand-aunts regularly does paintings. I think all of them are amazingly creative in their own way.

... is the funniest person you know? Probably Andi. Hans makes me crack up too.

... is the most organised that you know? My mom.

... that you know has travelled the most? My dad. Both our fridge doors are filled from top to bottom with magnets from places he’s travelled in due to his line of work. He’s toned down quite a bit in the last few years and has taken to staying within Asia, but back then his traveling history was super expansive – Germany, Jamaica, Italy, Belize, Aruba, Italy, France, Monaco, Denmark, Norway, the UK, US, Estonia, Portugal, etc.

... has always been there for you? Angela never left my side.

... has given you the most personal gift? I can’t possibly pick, my friends are pretty good at giving me gifts...like Andi getting me a Petals For Armor CD and a Punk shirt that hasn’t been produced in a while, and Angela giving me a personalized Friends mug because she knows I like my coffee and she knows I like Friends.

... has an annoying laugh? I don’t think anyone I know has an annoying laugh.

... never forgets a birthday? That would be me.

... do you live with? My parents, my two siblings, and our two dogs.

...,do you have the most in common with? I’m not so sure about this one, actually. I share bits of my personality with a lot of people - like me and Jo liking BTS, me and Andi liking wrestling, Blanch and I having similar personalities, me and Laurice being super meticulous when it comes to our work, etc. - but I haven’t met anyone who’s virtually a duplicate of mine when it comes to my traits and interests.

...is the sportiest person you know? I’m also not sure. Most people I know are into watching a bunch of sports, but none of them actually play.

...was your last missed call? It was an unknown number that I kept ignoring because THEY WOULDN’T TEXT WHO THEY WERE. If you have enough load credits to call me multiple times, then surely you can text me and introduce yourself first, and maybe then I can pick up the phone.

...did you last open your door for? My sister knocked last Friday because someone wanted to talk to me via landline. It was weird since no one calls via the phone anymore, but I have a gut feeling it was that ^ same person who had been trying to call me through my phone but never texted me. Eventually I learned it was one of the bloggers I’m talking to for work who just wanted to ask a few questions about our ongoing engagement.

... has your heart? Kim Taehyung. Expect the same answer for this type of question moving forward.

... has your respect? I gotta hand it to Tina for consistently doing well in her studies and excelling in every subject while doing photo and video editing for two orgs, working on her thesis, and being a board member in our mutual org, all while living alone. She does so well I wish I can tell her to give herself the occasional break to avoid burnout.

...do you share a special song with? I don’t think I have that with anyone.

...do you miss right now? Literally allllllll my friends.

...last made you angry? It’s been a while since I’ve directed my anger towards another person. When I get pissed off these days it’s usually over a situation that goes awry or out of my control.

...did you last buy a gift for? So this was not technically meant to be a gift, but what happened was I accidentally secured two orders of the same poster set, which was a part of this new BTS photobook coming out later this month, from two different shops. One of the shops merely posted an ‘interest check’ for the poster set so I signed up for it thinking it was harmless, but when they got back to me they already attached an invoice :/ I ended up having to pay for it just so things won’t get complicated between myself and the shop anymore; and I told Angela she can just keep the extra set I bought and that she can consider it a gift.

...did you celebrate your last birthday with? My family and technically my workmates since I didn’t file a leave that day. I also had food delivered to their house so I guess that can count as my ‘celebration’ with them.

...have you gone to a concert with? I went with Angela for my first Paramore show.

...can make you laugh? Anyone can tbh. It’s not very hard to make me laugh.

...has taught you how to do something? Nina taught me how to embroider and do basic needle/thread skills back when I was still getting into the hobby.

...has lost something of yours? I am almost certain my ex never kept the handwritten letters I used to write her. She never seemed to remember or bring up the things I wrote.

...has broke your heart? Gabie but I’m over it.

...has stood you up? Hasn’t happened to me before.

:: What ::

Is your favourite colour? Pastel pink.

Can you do that most your friends can’t? Type fast, apparently.

Is your birthday? April 21.

Colour eyes do you have? Dark brown/black.

Form of transport do you take to work/school? I work from home. But under normal circumstances I would drive my car.

Music do you like to listen to in the car? I connect my Spotify to the car’s Bluetooth and listen to whatever artist or playlist I’m into at the moment. The music I put on could also depend on my current mood for the day.

Languages can you speak? Filipino and English. I’ve also been able to pick up looooots of Korean phrases and expressions because of the amount of content I watch. I’m nowhere near fluent, of course, but I’m increasingly able to pick up what people say based off a few Korean words I’ll hear in a sentence.

Was the last thing you drank? Continued from idk. I finished off my glass of water from dinner.

Was the last thing you ate? My mom made pasta.

Time did you wake up this morning? Depends on how late I slept the night before and how tired I was, but it usually ranges between 5:45–7:30 AM.

Colour are your bedroom walls? They’re white.

Drink do you usually order when eating out? I never order drinks unless I’m at La Creperie, in which case I always get their San Gines hot chocolate; for everywhere else that isn’t a bar, I just get water.

Food can you cook well? ...I can’t cook.

Animals have you had for a pet? Dogs, rabbit, lovebirds, goldfish, and technically a cat but she was mostly Nina’s.

Are your initials? RC.

Kind of activities do you like to do on the weekends? I’m still kind of stuck at home during the weekends :/ so I can’t do much, but I’m not complaining since I actually prefer staying in these days. Anyway, most recently I’ve taken to catching up on BTS content I’ve missed over the last 8 years, so I like watching shows they’ve done like Bon Voyage, Run BTS, etc.

Movie do you know line by line? Two for the Road, TITANIC, and probably most of White Chicks.

Band(s) have you seen in concert? Paramore, One Direction, a bunch of local bands.

Do you buy/get to treat yourself? It’s usually food - I like giving myself a feast every Friday night - but I’m putting that in the backseat for now as I’ve realigned my money to be spent on BTS merch. My big purchases are saved for the albums for now, but every now and then I’ll see a postcard or photocard I like and buy them. Once I complete the albums I’ll be moving on to the concert DVDs, then the special packages, then probably BT21 plushies. Needless to say I have a longggggg way to go haha.

Colours your phone cover? I have a clear case.

Part of the world would you love to visit? Another continent would be nice.

Question do you dislike being asked? Even though I know people mean well, I don’t like being asked “How are you?” but tbh it’s more of a me thing because I just never really know what to say.

Subject were you good at in school? History.

Careers do your parents have? They both work in the hospitality industry.

Brand of clothing do you buy most often? For clothes clothes I’m not really loyal to a particular brand; I buy from different brands and shops all the time. But for shoes, I like sticking to Nikes.

Chocolate bar is your favourite? Not a big fan of chocolate bars. I love Reese’s Cups, though.

TV show have you watched every series of? Friends, Perfect Strangers, Breaking Bad.

Radio station do you listen to the most? It’s a little hard to tell at this point considering I haven’t driven regularly in over a year. But back when I used to do it, I usually flipped among 93.1, 99.5, and 87.5.

Podcasts are you subscribed to? I’m not the biggest fan of podcasts. Find them a tad bit boring.

Is your favourite dessert? Macarons or cheesecake.

Can’t you do that most around you seem to? Ride a bike.

Are 5 qualities you value in a friend? Loyalty, thoughtfulness, honest, sensitive to my needs and those of others, and intelligent.

Are 5 qualities you value in a partner? ^ Pretty much the same thing.

Size pizza do you usually order? Family size usually.

Cuisine do you like to order or cook? I’ve been getting Japanese so many times recently. I rarely go outside sushi.

Colour(s) dominate your wardrobe? Black and white, and colors that were in at one point like mustard yellow and pastel pink.

Toothpaste brand do you use? Colgate.

Sounds can you hear right now? My insanely loud aircon.

Is the weather like today? Like hell. I believe we’re reaching a heat index of over 50ºC every day now, so...that’s fun. It gets absolutely difficult to work in the afternoon when the temperature is at its most brutal, and its times like this I wish I got to work in the office so that there’s aircon and I could at least work comfortably :/

Are your plans for tomorrow? Just work and have tons of meetings, the usual.

:: Where ::

Do you keep your phone when not using it? I keep my phone near me even when I’m not using it since I could always get an important notification.

Were you born? Manila.

Do you go to unwind? Most days it would be the rooftop, but under normal circumstances I like staying at a coffee shop somewhere to escape life and my responsibilities for a short while.

Is your best friend right now? I believe they’re both at home since they have no reason to be out anyway.

Can you go nearby to have a good time? Personally, I would just go to the Starbucks near our village lol. If I’m feeling a bit more adventurous I’d head to Katip, which is prrrretty close by but not quite.

Is the nearest restaurant? We have a McDonald’s literally right beside the village. Then besides that is a Shakey’s, and right across that is a Burger King, then the aforementioned neaby Starbucks. Just makes me realize how urbanized my town has gotten in the last few years.

Is the nearest beach? If I had to guess, the nearest beaches would be in Batangas which is 2-3 hours away, but it really depends on how fast you can drive lol. I’m not too good with long car rides so in both times I’ve driven there I had always taken 4 hours.

Did you meet your closest friend? I met Angela in grade school, and I met Andi at a local rally in my university.

Did you go for your last vacation? Tagaytay, though it was a staycation more than anything else.

Is the nearest mall or superstore? It’s like a 3-minute drive away from the village.

Did you last get an injury? I have loadsssssss of new scratches and gashes all around my wrists from playing with Cooper.

Is the most extravagant place you’ve stayed at? It’s a toss-up between Aids’ or Gian’s house. Gian would probably win since I never actually got to go inside Aids’ place, and his was the first house I’ve been to that was able to literally take my breath away. OH and Shaun’s house was pretty fucking swanky as well.

Do most the local kids play? I would have no idea since I’m neither a kid nor a parent.

Have you been with your family? This is a very vague question lol...what do you mean where have we been? We’ve been to different towns around the country and several countries together, if that’s what you’ve been asking.

Did you spend Christmas last year? We visited a couple of relatives, and we also spent it at home.

Did your parents grow up? My mom grew up within Metro Manila; my dad in a city a little outside of it.

Did you buy the shoes you’re wearing? I’m barefoot at the moment and always am at home.

Would you like to go right now if you could? If life had still been normal I would probably be having after-work drinks at a bar near the office.

Do you miss the most from your childhood? I’m not sure how to answer this with where.

Is the best restaurant you know? I’m still searching for it.

Will you never go again as it was so bad? It’s not that it was bad, but I’d probably never dine at 8Cuts again because their burgers are not worth the hype and are very overpriced for their size.

:: When ::

...was your last vacation? My family’s last legit vacation was in August 2019; but we did have a quick escape to Tagaytay in January of this year.

...did you graduate? I officially ‘graduated’ from college in August, if you could even call it that.

...did you decide what career you wanted? Somewhere between my 2nd and 3rd year of college. That was when I decided I hated journalism and preferred PR, but since PR is under journalism’s umbrella there was no need for me to shift courses.

...did you have your first kiss? Continued. Like WHEN when or how old was I when? In any case, it was in January 2015 and I ws 16.

...did you learn how to swim? Idk, pretty early on. My parents liked taking us to water parks when we were younger, so we had a lot of exposure. I’m not sure if there was ever a time where something just clicked and I learned how to swim; I believe it had just come naturally.

...did you have your first relationship? By the end of 2014.

...did you meet your best friend? I met both of them in school, but at different points.

...do you feel the most at peace? Probably when I’m able to stay at the rooftop all alone.

...do you usually fall asleep? I’ve readjusted my body clock now (I used to want to be in bed by 9 or 10 PM, lmao) and I stay up until anywhere between 12-2 AM on weekdays.

...do you usually wake up? Ranges between 6-7:30 AM.

...did you last watch a movie? September.

...did you last go to a party? Around Februaryish, 2020.

...did you last cry? I can’t really recall. The last moment I can remember was crying over Life Goes On sometime last month, when I heard it for the first time. I’m just not sure if that’s accurate or when exactly in April that happened.

...did you laugh really hard? I always have a good laugh at least once a day.

...did you buy something pricey last? Idk what you would count as pricey but I bought the new BTS photobook set when it dropped back in April. Cost me around ₱3750. I wasn’t able to buy from the first press (it sold out in like 7 minutes lol) which included an exclusive poster set, so I had to look for a local shop that was already offering the poster set separately, and ended up shelling out another ₱2200 for it...which means all in all I spent around ₱5950 for it or roughly $125.

...did you have an argument last? Earlier this evening but I don’t want to get into it as it made me cry from sadness and frustration for the first time in months.

...did you last have a sick day? May last year.

...did you last recieve a hug? I have no idea. February, I think? when I hung out with my friends.

...when is your best friend’s birthday? July 22 or September 15, depends on which best friend.

...did you learn how to drive? I started getting lessons when I was 17, but I didn’t start feeling comfortable with it until I turned 18.

...did you last receive a surprise? Around a couple of weeks ago when my dad came home with Jollibee for us.

:: How ::

Many pets do you have? Two.

Many houses have you lived in? Three that I can remember, but I know my parents moved around a bit when I was a newborn.

Often do you shower? Every morning before my shift. I hate feeling sweaty and icky when I report for work.

Well can you cook? I can’t at all.

Many close friends do you have? I have two people I count as my absolute best friends, but I have a handful of close friends as well.

Many Brothers or sisters do you have? One of each.

Often do you go swimming? I don’t swim much at all, really...I haven’t done it since 2019, so that should say enough. As relaxing as it is, I feel like the clean-up afterwards can be such a challenge lol. Like if you swim in a pool you have to rigorously wash the chlorine off of you; and if you swim in the sea you have to also be thorough about making sure you’ve removed all the sand from your body.

Many times have you texted today? I don’t think I texted today but I did spend my whole day on chat platforms.

Do you like your toast (colour, topping)? I don’t have super particular preferences; I just like mine on the burnt side.

Do you like your tea and/or coffee? My coffee has to be sweet for me to enjoy it. I can take black coffee/Americano; I’ll just wince a lot with every sip. No tea for me thanks.

Do you like to celebrate your birthdays? With a lot of food.

Are you feeling today? A little frustrated because of an argument incident this evening. But I’m shaking it off and just focusing on the release of Butter tomorrow. My first BTS comeback!!!

Serious are you about your career goals? Very.

Many rooms are in your house? In total, 9.

Many bedrooms in your house? 4.

Did you do in your school exams? I was never consistent. I slacked off a looooooot in grade school; couldn’t give less of a shit about my classes then. I got a bit more hardworking in high school, but I still was a bit lax and I allowed myself to not put a lot of effort in subjects I didn’t care a lot for and that I know I would never have to use in real life, like chemistry or accounting, so there were exams I really excelled in and others that I would fail. It was only in college I started taking my studies incredibly seriously and I believe that showed in the grades I eventually got.

Close do you live to your parents? They’re like, five steps away.

Close do you live to your siblings? My sister’s literally in the room next to mine.

Sensitive to criticism are you? I know it’s something that can never be avoided, so I’m always open to hearing them, especially if it’s meant to help me. It doesn’t mean I enjoy it as it is being given.

Motivated to make changes are you? Depends on my mood and mindset.

Creative are you (1-10): -0.5.

Hard working are you (1-10): Probably a 22 if I really put my head into a task.

Sporty are you (1-10): I dunno, maybe a 6? I do like playing table tennis, but I’m pretty meh at any other sport.

Musical are you (1-10): 0.

Do you prefer your eggs? Runny yolk; scrambled; or a really packed omelette.

Often do you go out to eat? Before the pandemic, I liked eating out 2-3 times a week.

Would your best friend describe you? Not sure, I never tried asking them this. I hope it’s all nice things, though.

Can someone cheer you up if you’re sad? Send me photos of V. Hahahaha

Often do you meet up with your friends? ...What do you think? D:

Important is religion to you? It is not a part of my life whatsoever.

Old were you when you first stayed overnight from home? 15 or 16, I can’t really remember.

Old were you when you got your first pet? I was maybe 6.

Tech savvy are you? I know enough to survive my own, but I obviously can’t hack into other computers or things like that.

Do you show you appreciate those you care for? Buying them food.

Often do you cut your hair? I only take a trip to the salon once a year.

Often do you paint your nails? Never.

Many countries have you visited? Six.

Boyfriends/girlfriends have you had? Just one.

:: Why ::

... did you choose your username? Because it was straightforward.

... did you take this survey? I like surveys made in categories, and this seemed interesting and varied enough.

... did you choose the career you did? I found that I enjoyed it MILES more than journalism.

...did you last leave the house? I had to go to a local LBC for a work errand.

...did you last give up on something? She wasn’t worth the effort anymore. She hadn’t been for a while, but it took me forever to realize.

...did you search the last thing you searched? I wanted to sing along to the song but it was in Japanese, so I had to look up its lyrics.

...would you give up on someone completely? Oof, I guess you can refer to one of the previous questions. ^

:: If...::

You could live in any country which would you choose? Canada.

You could choose any animal as a pet which one? I’m perfectly content with dogs.

You could be famous for something what would you like? Being known for a funny tweet would probably be enough lol. I have no desire to be famous.

You are sad, how do you combat it? I don’t really get sad anymore these days, so I can’t super remember the go-to tactics I depend on...I guess I like listening to sad songs and allowing myself to wallow in the sadness, because I know I have to accept and process my feelings first before I can be able to calm down.

You can drive when did you learn? I learned shortly before I started college, when I was 18, because no one was going to be able to take me to university when the school year started.

You could have any job what would it be? Idk, I like the one I have now.

You could go anywhere for a vacation where would you go? Somewhere with a completely different feel and atmosphere, like Norway, Sweden, Finland...that part of Europe, basically.

You could eat anything right now what would it be? Samgak gimbap :/

You wrote a book what genre/topic would it be? It would be a book of essays or maybe a memoir.

You had a theme song what would it be? Idk I don’t really think about this.

You could meet any band/singer in person which one? Billie Eilish seems awesome and easy and fun to talk to.

You could act in any movie which would it be? No thanks.

You get married what venue would you like? Hotel.

If you have kids do you have names picked out? I have one name picked out for a girl but that’s it.

Could describe your dream home what would it be like? Brutalist and minimalist, with large windows, cove lights, and a lot of white space.

You could go back in time what would you change? Break up with Gab earlier.

Could use 3 words to describe your childhood which ones? Could’ve been better.

Could get the answer to any question which question would you choose? When I would die and how, just so I can have peace of mind.

You could have an endless supply of something what would it be? Money, because of course.

Meet anyone who no longer lives who’d you choose? My great-grandfather, mom’s side.

:: Can ::

... you ride a bike? No, never learned.

... you ski? I’ve never even seen snow, so no.

... you bake a cake? I can try but it will probably be very clumsily made as I don’t bake.

... you sing well? I wouldn’t say that. I like singing when I’m alone, but it doesn’t mean I’m any good.

... you do your own taxes? I’ve never tried haha so I guess not.

... you remain calm in a crisis? Depends on how serious it is.

... you do first aid? Let’s just say I wouldn’t volunteer if it comes down to it because I feel like I’d commit one fatal mistake that would make the situation graver.

... remember your best friend’s family members’ names? Both of their families, yes.

... you fire a gun? I’ve never tried so I doubt it.

... your parents drive? Yep.

...your best friend dance well? They’re not ‘dancers’ per se but sure, they can bust out a move or two.

...you make people laugh easily? Not everyone, but sure.

...stand up for yourself? That’s what I’m trying to learn these days.

...you do a martial art? No.

:: Would ::

You like to learn a new language? That’s always a welcome opportunity.

Save the life of a stray animal? Absolutely.

Know what to do if there was a hurricane? We have several ones come in the country every year so yeah, I can definitely say we’ve long been well-prepared for them.

Try a new cuisine? I do this as often as I can.

Risk your life for anyone? Yes.

You like to get back in touch with someone? No, I’m good now.

You drive in the middle of the night to get a stuck friend? Ina heartbeat.

You Know how to perform CPR? In relation to the first aid question, I wouldn’t volunteer myself in case I make a wrong move.

You likely win in a game of chess? I don’t even know how it works, so no.

You stop talking for a day for $100? Easily.

#survey #surveys

5 notes · View notes

kaypeace21 · 5 years

Note

i LOVE your analysis especially byler ones so please don't take this as hate, it's the last thing i want to do. but while i love the byler theories do you actually think the duffers are smart enough to realize the potential/brave enough to follow through on the relationship. bc tbh i think our viewpoint is skewed i don't think anyone but byler shippers see the canon possibility. and also it really seems like m/leven is going to be endgame? just wanted to know more of your thought process

Even if byler never happens- I’m 100% sure mileven won’t be endgame XD. Regardless of byler, Mike and El are just not going to happen. (Even if they’re ‘dating’ in s4). I could try to explain the reasons why I think byler will be endgame though. I’ll give the cliffnotes version. This will probably be a mess- because focusing on all the reasons isn’t as good as analyzing , each reason as it’s own separate post, in depth).

Why mileven isn’t endgame

- The duffers said, while filming ST, El was supposed to die in s1 (glad that didn’t happen). And this was also their plan when pitching their show ‘Montauk’ (later retitled ST), saying that the hypothetical s2 sequel would be about the boys returning to their town 10 years later. Mileven was never ‘planned end-game’. They also describe mileven kissing but never mention the word ‘love’ like how Jancy was described in the Montauk pitch. Nancy’s bio says “ she will experience love for the first time.” But when they describe mileven, they say, “If Mike is the Elliot of our show, Eleven is our “E.T.” Like that’s … not romantic, Duffers. And if it was supposed to be … WTF did you guys watch the same film? 0-O

- In the byler centric s2, the Duffers kept mileven separated. And the mileven kiss wasn’t written in the show. Millie pretty much said “they had to do it.” Much to Matt’s confusion but then the Duffers agreed. And used ‘every breath you take’ (a song about divorce), and just by coincidence their 2nd back-up song was also a song about a divorce? Nah, they were trolling.

- Most of the women (Nancy & Max) in the show critique Mileven saying Mike treats her as if she’s stupid, can’t take care of herself, or as she is a possession.

-in the first ep of s3 almost all the guys (who had/have gfs) Hopper, Lucas, and Dustin all criticize the mileven relationship and think it’s unhealthy.

Hopper says “ They’re spending entirely too much time together… It is constant.It is constant! Okay? That is not normal, that is not healthy! ”

Lucas mocks Mike, saying “ Oh El, I wish we could make out forever and never hang out with any of our friends.”

Dustin says when they flake on him, “It’s bullshit, I just got home!” (insert Nancy calling Stancy ‘bullshit’)

and before this Dustin talks about Romeo & Juliet (while mileven is out of frame). R&J is all about the dangers of not knowing the difference between love and infatuation. Juliet after Romeo is banished just complains about how in love/sad she is but never pursues looking for him (sound familiar)? R&J claimed that they were in love with each other after knowing each for a few days and deciding to get married-sabotaging the closest relationships they had with their friends/family (all in the name of ‘true love’) . Similarly Mileven thought they were in love after only a week of knowing each other, and the second they are reunited they start dating and spend all their time with each other. El is allowed out of the house (and her friends are allowed to visit), but El hasn’t interacted with Max nor Will? They spend almost everyday in her room just making out. Mike puts very little effort into integrating her into his life or as part of the group. The only time they go out- is for Mike to show off El to Dustin like a possession- then before El can even do the boding activity with the group (with the radio tower)- Mike convinces her to leave to make out. They are both complicit in this and they both bring out the worst in each other and they make each other blinded to their loved ones’ feelings.

- El literally asks Max “How do I know what I like?” Do I have to explain why this could be problematic? She even says “I don’t know”, when Max asks if Mike is a good kisser.You can call me ‘ableist’ my abused-autistic ass will disagree. But El is not ready for a romantic relationship! it makes perfect sense for El to be confused by the distinctions of romantic, platonic, and familial love- when the first 12 years of her life she didn’t receive any form of love , PERIOD! And she is not like normal abuse victims (she has never had proper socialization with peers her own age or even adults).All she had was television. She latches herself on to anyone who is kind to her (something I used to do). Without Mike she used Max as a replacement almost immediately, and even starts repeating/mirroring the things she says (specifically coping phrases from her …over 6 times!). She’s also susceptible to doing what others say or want her to do, “dumping his ass” (with Max’s validation and encouragement). El might love Mike but I don’t think it’s romantic, she latched on to the first person that was kind to her. Before their first kiss she asked Mike “Will you be like my brother?” And she’s hurt when he says “no”, asking “Why not?”. He then kisses her (she watches a lot of soap operas and she assumes it must be ‘romantic love’). You’re telling me that if she was ‘in love’ with Mike she would have been that happy over dumping him? I’m not saying El is dumb for not being able to discern these things (I think people without such backgrounds may still struggle with this concept). But it makes perfect sense for El to be confused by the distinctions of various loves or even the differences between ‘crushes’ , ‘physical attraction’ and ‘romantic love’

- In the last ep El asks about what he said at the cabin to Max, specifying “you talked about your feelings?”. He says and I QUOTE “Oh! Oh, yeah that.Man, that was so long ago. Um…” and starts to scratch his head. Then he excuses what he said at the cabin, saying it was “in the heat of the moment stuff and we were arguing… I don’t actually remember. What did I say exactly?”

Now either he legitimately forgot! Or he lied! You know the thing that broke them up in the first place! The one thing that El holds as her most important value in life- honesty. And he lied- about something as important as his romantic feelings?! Make up any excuse (about being shy/character flaws all you want), but this isn’t real life- it’s fiction (everything is done for a narrative purpose). That wasn’t an accident ( mileven wasn’t “written out of character”- like milevens claim, the duffers were criticizing the ship on purpose) .And the fact he lied again! Wouldn’t bode well for a long term relation with each other. The whole season, criticized their romantic relationship ! That wasn’t a coincidence neither was the fact he looked confused by her confession, and kept his eyes open the whole time and didn’t kiss her back .

And as she smiled and walked away, he looked confused. That wasn’t a directing mistake, like so many milevens are claiming! You really think they wouldn’t make sure their ‘fav ship’ didn’t have a good final kiss?

Especially since it was right after a romantic Jancy scene (which was directed amazingly)- where Nancy even mentions Mileven- to make us compare the 2 pairings romantic scenes even more.

* I know I sound like an assh*le but I’m just annoyed. I’ve always censored my byler posts trying not to offend/criticize mileven. I never cross tagged my byler meta with the hashtag mileven (never will, cause it’s rude). But (without sounding pompous) my byler posts generally gets reblogged a lot- and now the milevens have seen my posts (and are sending lots of hate my way) and worst of all they’ve invaded the byler tag. Today I saw 2 posts in the byler tag saying. “We’re delusional” and “stupid”- and also in the same posts they say they “feel attacked” by us.Um… there’s a difference between byler shippers privately criticizing a ship without bothering mileven shippers (and only tagging it byler) . Versus Mileven shippers tagging things byler (and ranting about the ship and it’s shippers). Loved the comment about how Mike can’t be bi cause “he loves El too much”.I think Mike is probably gay and in denial. But, um that’s not how being bi works- didn’t know bi people love women and men ½ as much as the gays/straights. Thanks for informing me (rolls eyes for eternity).So kid-gloves off, nothing left to lose! Time to compare the ships.

‘The breakup’ vs ‘fight’ parallel

comedic vs dramatic! The casual sunny day vs the dramatic framing of the storm (a romantic trope) . The ‘break-up’ being a scene with multiple onlookers vs the fight being with Will and Mike only (making it more personal/intimate). ‘Cold as ice’ playing after the mileven breakup vs the sad instrumentals playing during the byler fight. The comedic after-math at the mall. El and Max laughing, and another joke being made as the bus leaves.El’s happiness vs Will’s heartbreak.

Mike’s drastically different expressions after their fights. He looks regretful with Will, and almost annoyed with El dumping him. The fact Mike apologized right away more than once to Will, and ran into a storm to apologize a 2nd time. But with El he just lies to cover up the first lie, and then after the break-up he just complains/lounges on the couch (not taking any responsibility). He literally says about El “Why is she treating me this way? What did I do to deserve this? What did I do wrong?”.( He lied and made her feel “like garbage”!) Then he burps and laughs about chips- and makes sexist comments. Neither EL nor Mike are heartbroken by the breakup.

But when he angers Will (by him trying to finish the game early), he immediately tries to de-escalate saying softly “I was just joking- c’mon, let’s finish the game”. But when Will just yells back (much to Mike’s confusion) he doesn’t dismiss his feelings as irrational (like he wrongfully did to El) but chases him to the garage- and begs him to stay since it’s raining.

In the garage, Mike immediately apologizes saying “I said I was sorry, alright. It was a cool campaign.” But after this, they fight and Mike runs into a storm to apologize a second time , and says to Will’s door “ WILL! I’m sorry I was being an asshole. Can you just come outside and we’ll talk? WILL!” He immediately takes responsibility and apologizes. And he’s desperate to resolve things. And when they find him outside castle Byers he just asks (Mike’s catchphrase) “Will, Are you ok?”

Shed scene ( “best thing I’ve ever done” vs “the most important thing in the world to me”) parallel

When Mike says to El “you’re most important thing to me” in the pool shed. El doesn’t even acknowledge the comment (and neither should the audience- cause the words were empty). She completely ignores his words, and responds by asking him about his previous comments. Asking whether Hopper was right about them spending too much time together.

I didn’t edit (or delete any scene after his proclamation) this is how fast it was delivered ! The framing of this mileven scene was not cinematic or heartfelt, and neither was the delivery from Mike. He’s not crying, trying to reach her with proclamations of his genuine feelings. There’s no dramatic music, framing, lighting or shot composition. And El just responds and cuts his supposed ‘true feelings’ off- only to agree with Hopper and says “ she should spend time with her own species.” And if this ‘romantic moment’ wasn’t already undermined enough. This is when Mike realizes she was spying on him , and feels wrongfully violated (something she doesn’t apologize for, saying “I make my own rules” . He even brings this up in a later episode (this clearly bothered him)!

Juxtaposed to the MUCH longer byler scene. A literal single tear falling down his cheek as Mike , recounts the first day they met. Mike being in the back drop of darkness only his face being illuminated (having him appear like a guiding light to Will). Saying “ I felt so alone and so scared… but you were alone too” (alone together/crazy together) . He then talks about asking Will to be his friend, and then he pauses and breaks eye contact , before looking him in the eye and smiling (lost in the memory) saying softly “you said yes, you said yes.” (cough like saying yes at a wedding).

So, after he says “you said yes, you said yes.” It’s important to mention that he takes a deep breath and breaks eye contact again, (looking down and to the side) as he says this line. Subconsciously, I believe he knows this line is romantic and he’s too afraid to say it to his face. Only flicking his eyes up to look at Will after he finishes the entire sentence, and to gauge Will’s reaction.

This whole monologue is only of tight shots of just their faces (their bodies aren’t shown like in the pool shed scene). This is a personal moment between them and them alone- and the fact we zoom in on their faces (expresses this to be important emotionally) . And when we see Will’s reaction to Mike saying “it was the best thing I’ve ever done”. We just see Will’s face only- no music is playing and all we hear is Will’s whimpers and Mike crying in the background.

“ Blank makes you Crazy” vs “ Crazy Together parallel

When Mike tries to confess his “love” to El he says “Well they do say it makes you crazy”… much to El’s confusion.He has to try to explain it a second time to El- who just gets even more confused, by his ‘confession’. Saying “you never heard that expression? Like blank makes you crazy … like the word (love)?”

But when Mike says he “feels like he’s going crazy” Will immediately responds with “Me too”. Mike even smiles at the comment. So that moment in s2 means more than we think, when Mike (with tears in his eyes) smiles at Will’s comment and asks them to go “crazy together”.And when Will responds back “yeah, crazy together” (who also has tears in his eyes). They even linger on the moment as they just smile and stare at each other.

Mike is in denial, and may not even realize he loves Will, but he knows subconsciously that he does. He heard the phrase “love makes you crazy and that damn stupid”, 100′s of times and that’s why he said that phrase to Will. And why it made him so happy when Will reciprocated , by saying “ yeah. crazy together.” In addition to why we see them both go from happy, to immediately upset over the conversation.The scene was already romantically coded in s2 (but the scene in s3 re-contextualizes the whole thing) . Mike thinks “love makes you crazy” , and he asked Will to go ‘crazy together’ with him. And When Will is at castle byers looking at the Halloween pic of the 2 the day Mike said that, Will cries and calls himself “stupid” (4x). Can’t get more obvious… Like look what the duffers did!

El and Will’s opinions on Mike (Parallels)

-When asked if Mike was a good kisser, she just said “I don’t know he’s my 1st boyfriend.” (implying she’s thinking, at least subconsciously, of having other boyfriends ,who are not Mike in the future). But when Mike pretty much asks’ if Will thought they’d never get girlfriends, and spend the rest of their lives with each other’.Will just sadly responds “yeah, I guess I did. I really did!” Unlike, El, Will always saw Mike as his future, his forever.

-And when Mike says “it’s just a break” , Max says “No it’s not!”, and we see El laugh along with Max’s comment. She is not heartbroken at the idea of never getting back together with him, romantically. Right after they break up she was laughing, reading comics, and playing games with Max.

But Will is devastated over the fight! And out of all the memories in Castle Byers it’s the Ghostbusters photo from Halloween that causes Will to pick up the bat and start destroying everything. That was the night that Mike agreed to go “crazy together” with him. He tears it in ½ right in the center where Mike and Will are. He was so stupid to think it meant anything. The “crazy together” scene, that Mike initiated in s2 was always meant to be romantic. Not only because of Will’s reaction to the photo in s3, but because Mike in s3 says “They do say it makes you crazy…blank makes you crazy.” Which is exactly what happens to Will, as he has his breakdown.Castle byers was built on a rainy night , the same day Will’s dad left, when Will was 5 (the same age he met Mike). And lonnie called him a “queer” and a “f*g” and forced him to do “normal things” like baseball to have him “be more of a man”. And then on a rainy night, after Mike says “It’s not my fault you don’t like girls”… what does Will destroy castle byers with? A baseball bat! The fact Will has a baseball bat (despite in s1 saying he does not like baseball) in Castle Byers, surrounded by things he loves: drawings, d&d, art supplies, a microscope, comics- just shows what an impact Lonnie’s problematic conditioning and abandonment had on him. He used a baseball bat to destroy something he loves -castle Byers, and symbolically he was trying to reject his feelings for Mike using Lonnie’s old tactics of fixing him.

- Also, El doesn’t even seem to appreciate when Mike acts like his true self (goofy/like a kid). She laughs when Max complains he talks too much. Rolls his at his jokes with the cpr-dummy, covers his mouth and tells him to stop when he tries to joke and sing, ignores him when he gets excited about talking about dinosaurs. Which relates to my next point

The only characters who’s character bios focus on ‘escaping’ through d&d is Mike and Will.

Will in the Montauk pitch was described as having “sexual identity issues… LIKE MIKE , Will ESCAPES through fantasy gaming where he can be himself, uninhibited.” Like what is Mike escaping from… being a nerd? Because they could of said ‘like his friends’. And no it’s not because they’re best friends- they even specifIed in Lucas bio he’s “ Mike’s best friend” (which was even mentioned in s1).

.In Mike’s character description it says “ bullying and near-crippling insecurity. He has never had a first kiss, much less a girlfriend.He ESCAPES his insecurities through reading fantasy novels … retreating into his own vivid imagination. The Dungeon Master of his Dungeons and Dragons group, he writes sprawling adventures with fantastical monsters.When he finds himself on a real adventure, facing real monsters, he will discover a courage he didn’t know he had. By the end, he will even kiss a girl.”

*Interesting that Mike uses D&D to escape his insecurities about not having a gf (retreating into his imagination). While Will (who is somewhat aware of his sexuality) uses d&d to escape and be himself uninhibited. They’re foils in a sense- using d&d for opposing reasons.

So the s3 fight about d&d games has a lot more meaning

Mike equates heterosexual romance with ‘growing up’ and his feeling for Will as something childish he has to grow out of.When they fight over d&d. Mike says “It’s not my fault you don’t like girls!”, then he tries to ½ apologize only to say, “I’m not trying to be a jerk. Ok? But We’re not kids anymore.” He pretty much explains, this is just the way things are-boys fall in love with girls, get girlfriends, and that’s just a part of growing up (heteronormativity). And tells Will “I mean, what did you think, really? That we were never gonna get girlfriends? We were just gonna sit in my basement all day and play games for the rest of our lives?” And poor Will who is probably more aware of his feelings just responds. “Yeah. I guess I did. I really did.” And after this Mike rushes to Will’s house and apologizes saying he was an “asshole.”When he tries to say he loves El . It was very forced. He can’t even use the world love or explain his feelings, “A feeling … yeah, like, something… like OLD PEOPLE say it sometimes”.

He can’t even describe love and what his “feelings” entail for El , he then says “Yeah, like something , like old people say it some times. He doesn’t even say it back in the last ep, when she confesses. It’s all talk, but no feeling, it’s just a part of becoming an adult in Mike’s mind.

In the last ep before the mileven kiss, he even invites both El and Will over for Christmas saying “ And Will too… we could all have new presents to play with and… *scoffs* Sorry, that made me sound like a 7 year old... ”

And it’s implied in the last ep (before the mileven kiss), because of the 3 month breakup Mike is back to liking d &d. When Mike sees Will put his own d&d book in the donation box he stops him.

Mike: “WHOA, dude that’s the donation box.”

Will: “ I know, I’ll just use yours, when I come back. (pause) if WE still want to play?”

So then Mike asks, shyly …

Mike : “Yeah, but what if you want to join another party?” (cough- girls , the other ‘species’, or just someone else: girl, guy or otherwise)

Will: “Not possible.” (Will will always love Mike- insert Mikes immediate heart-eye reaction to this comment).

I think people don’t notice what the subtext is here- regardless of his intentions, Mike broke Will’s heart. He made him feel “stupid” for ever thinking he ever had a chance with Mike. He always saw Mike as his forever, but Mike shot any hopes of that down in the garage. Will doesn’t trust his own instincts. Mike could straight up flirt with him in s4/5- and Will would dismiss it as his imagination. He essentially said ‘he’ll always love Mike- but if something is going to happen. It’s up to Mike to initiate it’.

Mike was queer coded since ep 1 (and he’s more queer coded than Will)!

I LITERALLY thought (in s1) Mike was queer before Will!

- 3 rainbow references. Mike in s1 in his basement has a red heart being propelled by a rainbow sign. We see this again in s3 as a drawing. Mike also stands next to Will behind a rainbow apple poster in s2. Forbidden fruit + rainbow = queer forbidden romance. Also the apple poster was in the AV Club and at that time the rainbow apple-mac sign was suspected to be in reference to for Alan Turning (the gay ‘father of computers’).

In s1:

- 4 separate characters said El looked like a boy, but Mike doesn’t care! Even one of the men thought El might be the missing ‘Byers boy’. When El loses her wig , Troy said “she doesn’t even look like a girl” to the cops. But Mike just calls her “really pretty”

-Nancy says “I thought you were acting weird, but I thought it was because of Will” And Mike responds “I thought you were acting weird too I thought it was because of Steve … Do you like Jonathan now”?” Nancy: “No, do you like Eleven?”. They literally compared the explicit love triangle between Steve/Nancy/Jonathan to the Will-Mike-El dynamic!

- Mike literally uses gender inclusive pronouns when talking about crushes using the word “someone” (3 times), and embarrassing himself because he can’t articulate the difference between friendship and romance. When he could of simply given the 80s heteronormative answer of ‘when a boy likes a girl’.

Mike: “ you go to school dances with someone.

You know someone that you like”

El: “a friend?”

Mike: ‘not a friend uh … uh someone like a” (gives up and kisses her)

-Mike’s mom said “ What’s been going on with Will, I can’t imagine what it’s been like for you. I just … want you to feel like you can talk to me. I never want you to feel like you have to HIDE anything from me” (she even emphasizes the word ‘hide” (which is heavily queer coded)

- when Will ‘dies’, “we can be heroes” by David bowie (a bisexual singer) plays, “And we kiss as though nothing could fall and the shame” is the lyric that plays when Mike returns to his house and cries in his mother’s arms over the ‘death’ of Will. Do I have to explain how ‘kissing and shame’ are queer-coded . And how such a lyric is oddly romantic- if we’re supposed to see their bond as nothing but platonic XD

-his dad jokes “Absolutely not” *turns to wife* “our son with a girl?”.

- when Lucas makes fun of his crush on EL, Lucas gets down on one knee and says “ I love you so much, will you marry me?” and literally 1s later, we’re introduced to the bullies and the idea (for the first time) that Will is ‘gay’, and Mike is in the forefront of the scene and unlike his friends he is THE ONLY ONE physically assaulted as they cause him to fall face first into a rock (like a gay-bashing) . They leave Lucas and Dustin unharmed. Even though Lucas just proposed to another guy- which should have gotten him a beating by the homophobic bullies.

It’s supposed to subconsciously hint Mike is queer like Will, and likes Will. The first interaction with the bullies, they mention Will being ‘gay’ right after they mention Mike’s crush on androgynous El and have a guy propose to Mike. Mike says to “ignore them” ( the homophobic remarks) but is assaulted anyways. And when asked what happed he doesn’t want to tell El the details cause he’s ashamed .

2nd time the bullies talk about Will, Mike is once again in the forefront, unlike his straight friends who are in the background . But this time Mike initiates the confrontation), as the bullies say Will is “flying in fairyland with all the other little fairies. All happy and gay”. Mike was literally on the verge or tears at this comment (despite being happy a few moments earlier , telling the others to ‘act sad’ because they’d look suspicious other wise). But this is the comment where Mike snaps and pushes Troy back (because he took it personally/wanted to defend Will).

The framing of Mike once again being in the front and snapping at the homophobic remarks ( gifs don’t do it justice, just rewatch the scene -Mike eyes water at the remarks). Then the last time the bullies appear , Mike jumps off the cliff and “flies like a fairy” (like Troy said) thanks to El . Troy at the police station even uses the word “fly” not levitate.

-Mike sneaking out to find Will, as Steve sneaks in to Nancy’s. They both even make eye contact (and pretend not to have seen each other).

- they share dinosaur toys , in s1 and 2 they appear to be the only ones with dinosaur toys.

- The s1 mom hug scene where Mike feels he lost Will is paralleled in s3 - signifying how he lost him a 2nd time.

- Mike in the 1st ep being the one to insist on looking for Will in the rain (callback to s3). But he never went looking for El when he saw her through his window? Even when Mike saw Will’s dead body, the second he heard his voice he convinced his friends to help rescue him!

- You remember the binder (from s1) that Mike keeps, filled with 100s of Will’s drawings, and how he caresses the drawing after thinking Will was dead. That’s totes platonic.

- Mike in s1 proclaiming “I’m the only one who cares about Will!” Seems like something a kid with a crush might say ( because obviously his other friends care about Will). But he thinks he cares the most. He was even the first to worry about Will not showing up to school, the first to suggest looking for him while speaking to Hopper, and when Hopper and his parents say ‘no’ he sneaks out anyway (and is the first to suggest forming a search party). The first to believe he was alive after seeing his dead body.The only boy to have a scene dedicated solely to him mourning Will. Mike being the only boy to stay awake at the hospital, and the first boy to see and hug Will. The only one to have a private one on one talk before Will goes missing. The only one who was literally given 100s of Will’s drawings. And yet Dustin says Lucas’ is Mike’s best friend? So what does that make Mike and Will?

In s2:

- Will in all 3 seasons identifies as a wizard. But in s2 Mike (the paladin) says Will is a cleric. Meaning this reflects how Mike actually feels about Will. In d&d, they have similar moral values, powers, and generally need and depend on each other in the lore of d&d. Paladins have similar healing powers to clerics, but clerics have stronger healing abilities - which is interesting since Mike has always been viewed as the protector. But to Mike Will has helped him (maybe deal with the loss of El and other trauma) , just by being there. And if Mike says Will is a cleric,despite Will still identifying as a wizard in s3, it shows how deeply Mike actually feels about Will. It shows he views Will as one of the only people who understands him and views him as a healing presence and his moral compass.

“ strength of conviction gave many paladins a sense of common fellowship but did not always endear them to others. In many cases, paladins did not get along quite as well with other non-paladin adventurers, with the exception of clerics with similar beliefs.”

“A Paladin tries to hold to the highest standards of conduct, but even the most virtuous Paladin is fallible. Sometimes the heat of emotion causes a Paladin to transgress his or her oath (of honesty, courage, compassion, honor ,and duty). A paladin who has broken a vow typically seeks absolution from a cleric who shares his or her faith or from another paladin of the same order. After a rite of confession and forgiveness, the paladin starts fresh.”

This proves Mike knows he treats Will special/different than his other friends- and unlike a relationship with El (they are still individuals who are not dependent on each other). And Mike thinks being with Will quite literally makes him a better person. Juxtaposed with how him being in a romantic relationship with El made him blind and apathetic to those closest to him .

- All the mileven s1 parallels vs byler s2 parallels were ALL initiated by Mike. If the parallels were meant to show a one sided love triangle (on Mike’s end). They would of made Will the instigator not Mike! Parallels can be watched here , start at 6:50)

-Mike initiated the “crazy together’ line- and in s3 he said ‘blank makes you crazy’. So subconsciously he knew the line had romantic connotations.

-Mike initiating the hand hold (with a zoom in shot) and in the show this is only done for romantic pairings. Also Mike being the one to initiate the ‘arm thing’ which is generally romantic. But in s3 , Lucas also does this, saying “I am spending quality time with my girlfriend’

-Mike saying, asking him to be his friend was the “best thing I’ve ever done”

-Mike constantly following Will around, asking if he’s okay or biking to his house to check on him in s2 . In s3 running out to chase Will to the garage and apologizing, and running into a storm to apologize a 2nd time.

YOU SEE A PATTERN! Mike is whipped! And is the one constantly chasing and pursuing Will, not the other way around! Before s3, people always portrayed Will as the (stereotypical- problematic trope of a) sad-pinning-gay in a one sided love with Mike. It’s like people didn’t even watch the show (and just assigned tropes/stereotypes they wanted, that weren’t actually there). Will (probably too shy or scared to- because of homophobic taunts) never initiated a single byler moment- it was ALWAYS Mike!!! If people were actually objective, they would of thought it was Mike who was the one pinning!

- Which brings me to Mike literally pinning! Mike forcing Will to dance with a girl (who has a rainbow hairclip), but you literally see Mike’s shocked expression like ‘what,why’d I do that ?’ And after this, they show Dustin looking sad about Max/Lucas dancing and then they have Mike get into the frame (next to Dustin) and look sad when Will/girl are dancing in the same exact frame as Max/Lucas. As they switch between these last 2 shots.

the cannon Spotify playlists-called ‘Mike’s basement beats’- These are character playlists that Spotify and St worked on together after s2.

-his first song is “small town boy” an 80s LGBT anthem about living in a small town and being queer and bullied. Every band member was openly gay.

-his 11th song is ‘don’t you want me’ from a “celebrate your gay pride” album

* But queer people are “delusional” for thinking Mike isn’t straight? And are told to “open your eyes and watch the show” (that was an actual quote in the byler tag). Ok? Take your own advice, then! XD

One of the Duffers cited inspirations for ST is SUPER GAY (and what they based the byler dynamic off of).

In the Will comic, Will throws an old 1970s book called “house of stairs” at the demorgorgan. And in a later chapter Mike and Will just read together at the library (just silently reading together, enjoying each others’ company-totally not a romantic cliche).And Mike warns Will the book ‘could have spoilers’ for the d&d campaign. Also look at this byler-centric cover :)

Peter (Will) is shy, quiet ,initially a pushover, and gay-coded. And as a coping mechanism he has psychological-breaks with reality where he thinks of his best friend from the orphanage, Jasper (Mike) . Another kidnapped boy, named Oliver (who looks just like Jasper/Mike) is also queer-coded (but a violent-sociopath). And, unlike Jasper who actually wanted to protect/take care of Peter -Oliver starts to gets a sick thrill out of making Peter dependent on him (which Peter catches on to pretty quickly). Oliver was insistent on being the only one to ‘wake’ Peter from his episodes (just like how Mike did for Will, in s2), except Oliver calls him pet-names like “sweetheart, baby, etc.”

And again to prove it’s queer-coded I’ll read some of the (shortened) quotes, in the order they were written. These are quotes from Peter (Will’s) pov talking about his childhood best-friend Jasper (Mike) .

-“his room. His and jaspers room. Jasper looking up from his desk, smiling glad to see him. Jasper saying . Something very important. The most important message, the secret message. He couldn’t hear him . But jasper keeps smiling , keeps talking . What was the message, jasper? What was the message? The dream had been beautiful at the beginning, terrible at the end, but he longed to be in it again. If only he hadn’t awakened.”

-“Jasper sitting on the bed and taking off his shoes ,smiling, ‘you’re okay pete, you’re better than a hundered of those slobs put together. Tomorrow I’ll tell them so myself‘ jasper’s strong, hard body as he got into bed ,so different from peter’s. Strong, to protect him to take care of him. Jasper, who always took care of him”.

-“He wanted to think about oliver it it was like having Jasper back again. It would disturb him to see Oliver go off with Abigail… the rejection quite painful. It had never been like that with Jasper…jasper.

-The room they shared with rainbow colors, murmuring comforting words to him , enclosing and protecting him. He let himself drift into it, the rainbow hues dimness.”

-“No one ever depended on him. It was he who always depended on others, on Jasper. jasper, who had always taken care of him. Jasper…”

later he admits his feelings for Jasper to Lola/el. Lola and Pete are plantonic soulmates. The only reason why they survive and don’t succumb to their dark and violent urges/psychological brainwashing is because of each other. Lola has brown hair and eyes and has a buzzcut and is heavily implied to be a lesbian (as she is the only girl in the group who is not fooled by Oliver’s ‘nice guy act’. Which makes the other girls ‘suspicious’ and alienate her). Also this was written in the 70s… she has a buzzcut and is said to “look like a boy”. It’s not that subtle! There was a reason that the author whose first name was WILLIAM (was suspected to be gay/bi when he was alive)! XD

-Peter says “ he was my friend we were always together . Jasper his name was jasper .in the dream he’s taking care of me’. Now he was beginning to cry, his throat constricting and tears welling up in his eyes .’taking care of me … he always took care of me… taking care of me, and , and … and loving me’. ‘”It was the best time in your life’ she murmured’. ‘Yes’ “

* cough protective childhood friend, rainbows, ‘best time of your life = best thing I ever did.

S3 ending (byler centric ending)

When we first see Mike during the Hopper mologue, the moving truck leaves. “Like you’re pulling away from me or something. I miss playing board games every night (d &d)”… (the last thing they talked about was Will visiting to play d&d and their fight this season started because of a disagreement about d&d.)

Then Mike looks back at the Byers house (just lingers there and looks back as his friends leave) like how Will did seeing Mike hold hands with El and leave . “But I know you’re getting older, growing, changing. I guess, if I’m being really honest, that’s what scares me. I don’t want things to change.”Mike , like Will “doesn’t want things things to change”. He doesn’t want his his feelings of friendship to become romantic in regards to Will, it “scares” him (especially in rural 80s Indiana). Right after Will cries, it immediately switches to Mike hugging his mom- to mirror the time he thought Will died in s1 “So I think maybe that’s why I came in here, to try and maybe stop that change. To turn back the clock. To make things go back to how they were.” He goes back to his mother for comfort, like he did the 1st time he lost Will. But also to reverse back time, to s1, before he realized his feelings for Will were romantic. When things were simpler.

“But I know that’s naive. It’s just not how life works. It’s moving, always moving, whether you like it or not. And yeah, sometimes it’s painful. Sometimes it’s sad. And sometimes, it’s surprising. Happy.” (byler endgame)

Will (in s2) even says everyone treats him like ‘freak/ that something is wrong with him’ (purposely leaving out Mike from the discussion). And then when Will disparages himself as a freak,and Jonathan agrees but asks Will, ‘who would he rather be friends with- David Bowie (who was openly bi since the 70s) or Kenny Rogers’? And when Will says Bowie, Jonathan agrees saying “see, it’s no contest”.

So, it’s just another coincidence that when Will ‘dies’ (in s1) a David Bowie song (‘we can be heroes’) plays. And as Mike hugs his mom, mourning Will - a romantic lyric from the song plays during the hug?“And we kiss, as though nothing could fall. And the shame” (which is heavily queer coded)?

And then in the last ep (in s3) Mike mirrors this scene in s1, hugging his mom, since he feels like he’s losing Will all over again. And right after the hug (‘we can be heroes’) plays again!? I’m not saying byler is endgame. But- WAIT THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT I’M SAYING! XD

These men literally invented ‘hetero-baiting’ (with Robin & Steve) and you think they’re going to queer bait?!

Also, if Will was a girl named ‘Willow” no one would call byler ‘delusional’ ! Even the most casual viewer would say it’s obvious they’d end up together in the end!

If the witness said about El in s1 , “ same height… it could be the Byers girl”, instead of ‘boy’ (pointing out the resemblance). Mike only meeting El cause he was looking for Willow. Proclaiming “i’m the only one who cares about Willow!” . Mike getting into fights and getting upset (almost crying) about the bullies insulting Willow. Mike only getting angry at El when he thinks she lied about Willow being alive. Mike being the only boy who has a scene dedicated to his loss of her (with the same romantic lyrics playing). Mike having a whole binder of her drawings and caressing one of the drawings, after he thinks she died. Mike being the only one of her friends to stay awake at the hospital, waiting for her to wake up- so he can see her and hug her first. People probably would of started shipping it the second Willow stared at him and was the only one who didn’t lie to him, in the first ep! Another parallel to El!

If Will was Willow, the majority of the fandom would be byler shippers. Think about it! . Mike having s2 byler scenes that are identical to s1 mileven scenes, and then additional unique byler scenes. Mike staying by Willow’s side 24 hours a day for several days (not even changing clothes), carrying her out of the hospital, grabbing her hand (with a zoom in shot),constantly asking her if she’s okay at least 5-7 times, putting his arm around her twice, being the only one who could tell something was off with her (and it wasn’t her normal type of quiet). Calling and running all the way to her house and banging on the door to check on her, desperate. Watching her sleep cause he’s so worried. That shed scene reminiscing about how they first met in perfect detail, saying “I asked, I asked if you wanted to be my friend. You said yes, you said yes. It was the best thing I’ve ever done. (like a marriage proposal)” The “crazy together” scene. Them being close since they were 5 vs the girl he knew for a week (but is somehow in love with?). In s2 if Mike sadly watched Willow dance with another guy , while Dustin does the same to Max. Forget it- everyone would already know mileven would be doomed to fail.

And again think about s3 if Will was a girl.They parallel the (comedic) mileven breakup vs (the sad/serious) byler breakup. Then Mike just complains and burps on the couch vs apologizing to Willlow multiple times/even going into a storm to apologize a 2nd time (and to ‘talk’). Willow having a breakdown over the fight vs El laughing and high five-ing Max after.The shed vs the pool shed scene- “best thing I’ve ever done” vs “you’re the most important thing in the world to me”, “blank makes you crazy’ (as El stares confused) vs “crazy together’ (where Willow says ‘yeah, crazy together’). Mike going on ‘movie dates with Willlow all the time’ right after making out with El. The last mileven kiss where Mike has his eyes open the whole time, and doesn’t kiss back. And saying he doesn’t remember saying “I love” you to El (and doesn’t say ‘I love you’ back). Right after having a talk with Willow about playing games when she comes back (the crux of their fight). Mike getting excited that he’ll be able to visit El and Willow on Thanksgiving and them visiting him on Christmas (those are holidays where family usually introduces their S.O.) Having the last scene of Mike, be him looking back at Willow’s house, and have that whole monologue about “feelings changing”, and then he goes to hug his mom like the s1 byler scene where he thought Willow was dead, signifying he lost her again. And that’s not even all the scenes- and every time byler won by a landslide. If Will was a girl, we wouldn’t be ‘delusional’! It would be obvious writing on the wall, that Mike would eventually choose Willow over El by the end of the series.

But since they are 2 boys, we’re delusional, because queer kids don’t exist … apparently.

*S3-I’m not repeating my literal essays but they’re probably better than this post so here are the links to pretty much all my s3 byler meta. (x) (x) (x) (x) (x) (x) (x) (x)

gif credit: 1st few have the name stark in the gifs, 2nd byler gif (found on wheheart.com- user dream_daisy, not sure if they also have a Tumblr , 3rd livelovecaliforniadreams, 4th &10th Cath-avery, 5& 6th unknown, 7-9 eggogorgon . Tell me if you know the unknown one so I can give credit , please.

#byler #byeler

1K notes · View notes

colony22graphics · 4 years

Photo

❝Shine on, diamond.❞

◆ member since: nov. 22, 2013 ◆ longest character: alexander donovan ◆

@alexander-donovan, Well, here we go.

Rory, there's no way on earth I could possibly describe what you've done for this community. Aside from making it all in the first place, constructing the post-apocalyptic sandbox we all hold so dear, you also pay attention to how it's executed---from basic principles of operation and how we ought to respect each other as players, down to the smallest, weirdest headcanon. It matters to you---which I think is probably the best way to summarize your energy and wisdom, the Rory-ness of it all:

Things matter. People matter. Caring matters.

In a world where we're pretty damn used to moving from one diversion to the next at a moment's notice, you make something that's absolutely set apart by saying, resolutely and passionately, that what we do here really matters.

And you're right, to think that. If you need any further proof that you---Rory---matter, you can look at me writing this damn letter (and swearing every three sentences, sorry). But you in your extremely Ro way, said hey, six years fucking matters, and so do all the people we play with, so let’s get mushy on the main and tell them. And I can tell you to your face you're right and this was a stellar idea because... I do that now. Because of your influence, I'm a better person, one who does actually try and tell people what I think.

You challenge people to care, and to translate their caring into something others can recognize, and reciprocate. You’re never afraid to point out the importance of saying things and leaving a meaningful mark, becoming an active part of our community instead of staying in our own heads (as introverts on the internet are prone to doing).

You're also a hell of a writer, which is inspirational in itself, and I can’t leave that out of it. Your dedication to your characters, to their motivations and struggles, shines through in every post you make, and you don't let fear or insecurity take root or stop you from doing what you love. You know it's not about achieving perfection, but about collaboration and growth. The way we write is an exercise in discipline and embracing the joys of language, it's not meant to be fine art (though a lot of the stuff you come up with off the cuff blurs the line between the two on a regular basis.) It's really very rude how talented you are.

I won't talk too much more about you and me personally because you already know it pretty well, but I will mention that when I offered to help out with tech stuff, you don't even know how impossible being a full mod felt for me, at the time. I'd just come out of some rough experiences and was ready to never do that again. But over the years, you gave me steps that I could take only when I felt comfortable, and let me accept only the responsibility that I thought I could manage (though you always told me you knew I was more than capable of handling it). In a very real way, with your patience and understanding, you gave me back my confidence, and my willingness to be vulnerable. That's something I won't ever forget.

You have my respect and my friendship, always.

And dear lord, if Tumblr has managed not to self-destruct in the next five or ten years, I really hope we're still around doing this shit. No place I'd rather be.

Love you, Ro.

<3 Lottie.

(Oh, by the way, I took the liberty of adding something else, under the cut. I knew that I would never be able to cover everything, and that I’d run out of words, so I turned to others to fill in the gaps and maybe it’ll help convey it all a little more properly. Many thanks to everyone.) ❤

—- Happy Colony 6th Anniversary —-

RO, YOU ARE AN ABSOLUTE GIFT. I’m incredibly grateful all those years ago I saw that Bones bio and decided to join this crazy little family because that is exactly what you have created with the Colony: You have made a family. You have always been a pleasure to write with, a hard-working and careful admin, and now this second go-round I'm happy to call you a good friend. I wanted to mirror your sentiment on my anniversary post, it is amazing how time rewards our patience with this second meeting! I owe you a very real debt because thanks to this group when a friend let me down whilst I was on a different goddamn continent, thanks to you, I found Cassie there to help me out! The group is an extension of you: thoughtful, kind, emotional, and funny as hell. - Nicola

Rory, your dedication to the Colony (and previously Belvedere) astounds me every day. Writing with you is an absolute joy, thank you for all that you do for us!! - Cassie

RO HOLY COW!! It's insane to think of being part of something so wonderful for so long, I can't imagine how proud you must be to call this place home. I absolutely love writing with every character I've gotten to interact with, you approach your characters and this RPG with such a passion, it's always made getting to be part of it all the more special to me! To many years to come! - Molly

The things I admire most about you are your kindness, your compassion, your understanding and the way you always make the best of a situation. You've been nothing but welcoming and kind to me since I've had the privilege of joining this insanely talented and incredible group, and every day I am in awe of the love and care and detail you pour into the rpg. You have been so supportive over these past few months, every day I consider myself insanely lucky to have met you. I adore you and I'm so happy for you that you've come so far in your own personal journey, you truly do deserve all the happiness in the world. - Lou

Ro, you’re an absolutely wonderful mod and person. I’ve never met a more dedicated and creative mod in all my years on this website. You’re an astounding writer and creator who leaves me wanting to be better. You’re a wonderful person to write with and an even better friend. I love you and all the work you do for everyone in this group. Thank you for creating this fantastic place and starting this wonderful family. - Lee

Thanks for always being so open and welcoming! It's been such a blast writing with you. - Ren

Your commitment to this game and its players is absolutely next level, and it shines through in literally everything you do for us. I haven’t felt so at home and so comfortable in an RP in such a long time, possibly ever, and I know so much of that has to do with the amazing environment (both IC and OOC) you’ve spent such a long time painstakingly and lovingly cultivating. This RP wouldn't be the incredible space it is without such an incredible and dedicated team of mods. I hope you know how much I appreciate all you do, and how much I flippin' love ya! - Alex

Rory, you're a perfect admin and an amazing friend! You've always made me feel so welcome here, from day one, and my heart feels warm and fuzzy when I think of you. I utterly adore all your characters and your writing is just brilliant, it's always so much fun to brainstorm and write and plot with you. Thank you, thank you, thank you! - Ellie

When an rp has a lifespan of not just a year or two, but SIX FREAKIN YEARS, you must look to your leader. Ships don’t sail without a captain, and you have been the most loyal, loving, and adventurous captain to your crew. Congratulations on this amazing accomplishment, love. xoxo. - Amy

Rory, I just wanted to thank you for how welcome you've made me feel since I joined the group. It takes a special person to be an admin (dedicated, patient, and just a little bit weird), and the six years you've been running this group is a testament to how well you do it. You've got incredible creativity and passion, and I know I'm not the only one that feels so lucky to write with you in this world you've built. Congratulations on six years! Here's to many more. - Nick

RORUUUUU. I literally have no idea where my life would be now if I'd never met you. I've said it before and I'll say it again, you inspire me to be braver and stronger and more self-loving. Thank you for being my friend even after all these years. - Mika

I don’t think I can concisely put into words how much you mean to me, but I’ll try: we first met in 2012 and through all these years you’ve continually inspired me with your talent and hard work. You’re more than just an incredible friend, you’re an ICONIC leader that has the determination and talent to keep this group running for six amazing years (with the help of your equally talented and wonderful co-mod, naturally, wink wonk). The Colony is a family to me, and I think to all of us, even before it’s a writing group. It couldn’t be what it is today without someone as tirelessly understanding and creative at its helm. You’re an absolute gift, you’ve been there for me through thick and thin, and I’m grateful every day that I get to call you a friend. - Maddie

Ro, you have been so kind and amazing since day one! You have this astonishing energy and a kindness that honestly makes the colony feel like another home. You’re such a phenomenal writer, and have made this rp a community like no other. I can’t quite put into words how much I appreciate you, and how much effort you put into everything you do. You’re so talented and I feel incredibly lucky to say I’m a part of this community. Thank you for being you. xxx. - El

The Colony has been a living, breathing world in which to create, and the key piece - creativity - is embedded in your DNA. You aren't just an enthusiastic mod. In some aspects you are the Col. I know you want everyone to feel included and allowed to be inspired by the writing of others rather than hemmed in by rules and egos so many other groups have. Thank you for throwing all your characters at me when one of mine has some wild scheme. I've said before your writing is cinematic in its expression and it always challenges me to want to (try to) write on a higher level. I'm grateful to have you as a sounding board when I get stuck in the mud of my own self-doubt with writing. Thank you for just being a friend as well and letting me ramble too. It is impossible to sum up this wildest of rides out of all my writing adventures so, much love, as always. xx. - Cat

#col22graphics #alexander donovan #corbin ealy #teilo aisling #adrien bennett #felix turner #orson hurst #cr: lottie #cr: rory #6th year anniversary

9 notes · View notes

roguebotanist · 5 years

Text

I’ve been playing around with talk to transformer today and thought it would be fun to extend a bunch of sim bios! I think someone may have done something similar recently, but I’m not really sure. Anyway, here’s every sim in Strangetown (bolded parts are their original bios). Long post ahead:

Loki Beaker

As soon as he perfects his latest invention, Loki is sure to get the recognition he knows he deserves. In the meantime, he keeps himself busy by trying to assemble a nuclear reactor out of common household items. During one of his experiments, he accidentally melts the family dog. Realizing that his so-called tools of destruction are so harmless, Loki gladly takes his pet back home and happily adopts it. Fearing that the strange creature will cause more damage if he is ever left alone, Loki goes to great lengths to keep it, including stacking hundreds of baby chicken eggs in the backyard.

Circe Beaker

Circe knows 238 different ways to make someone scream, and none of them are nice. She enjoys taxidermy and collecting coat hangers. She has a wonderful knowledge of names and an affinity for Hallmark, which is why all her books are centered around Christmas and spring holidays. This is particularly important to her, as her whole life is completely shaped by them. The children love to ask questions about things, and they are able to make up as many of the answers as they like. Do you have a huge embarrassment problem? One of Circe's known phrases is 'Where's the finger in your back pocket?'.

Sometimes in the garden, she prances

Nervous Subject

His hobbies include twitching and blinking a lot. He's also fond of travelling and baking. Along with the broad and meaty teeth of a canine, St George the giant groundhog has a day-old beard and a partial gingivitis – which is the inflammation of a plaque inside the teeth. His beard and gingivitis don't hurt his routine; they just mean he's a bit slower and a bit more circumspect.

That's because he's aged.

Olive Specter (yes, it gave her stats)

Olive will stop at nothing to get what she wants. She spends her time collecting mushrooms, sharpening sticks, and excavating her yard. As you might expect, she has a big appetite, and eats anything that she thinks is good enough for her. She's as much of a carnivore as you are, and is able to catch fish or birds at the least opportunity. She doesn't bother with plants, and prefers to live in areas full of food.

Alignment: Neutral evil

Hit Dice: 1d8+2

Speed: 30 feet

Ophelia Nigmos (this one is unsettling and strangely coherent)

Ophelia's hobbies include hypochondria and monitoring the air quality. She worries about the future... and the past... and the present. Especially right now.

Her past memories have become like mantras, repeating over and over in her head. They are the most important thing to her. This time, she's not sure she will remember them the way she did before. She's aching to go back and erase her past.

That which is most important to her--the things she left behind--has been forgotten. And nobody can help her. Nobody.

PT9 Smith

The only thing PT9 loves more than his lawn is his family. When he is not spending time with his children, he enjoys clipping coupons and staring up at the sky. Over the years PT9 has found his place in the aquarium world. He has helped educate people on different types of fish and he has hosted various education seminars for clients who have "fish stories" to share. In his spare time, PT9 enjoys spending time with his wife and his grandchildren.

Jenny Smith

Jenny loves having a career, but she wishes she could spend more time with her family, and maybe make some new friends. She really likes green. She wishes she had more friends. She wishes her mom would talk to her more often. She wishes she had nicer hair. She wishes her nose looked like a horse's. She has a lot of sympathy for humans and hopes to see one in the future. Jenny is a cross between a cat and a dog with a medium build, no special traits, but that means she's got a lot of muscle and a huge body

Johnny Smith

Johnny dreams of being the hero that rides in on a white horse, or at least a cool sports car. He'd go on to become the worst Superhero in all of space and time, which I guess is exactly what a normal, human teenage boy would do.

Jill Smith

When Jill closes her eyes, she sees dolphins. She has her heart set on becoming a deep sea welder someday. She loves dolphins so much, she's often put one in the trunk of her car and hit the gas to cheer her up.

"I love them so much," Jill declares. "I'm a Dolphin Lover."

Pascal Curious

No matter what happens, Pascal believes there is a logical explanation for everything. In his free time, he practices home psychoanalysis and collects conspiracy theories. He's become adept at opening jars containing creepy little bones or fragments of jellyfish, an odd skill in the world of ponysaurus hunting.

"I have been extremely lucky with bone fragments and that's not even being exaggerating," Pascal said.

Vidcund Curious

Serious and exact, Vidcund strives to fit the universe into a nice tidy package. He has an unnatural fondness for African violets. He is literally covered in them, from head to toe, if not technically. This is an odd love-hate relationship, a love-love and a hate-hate; that leaves us to sit and imagine the potential war between the vine and the earth.

Lazlo (”Twilight”) Curious

Not as studious as his older brothers, Lazlo got his degree in Phrenology. He likes to call phone psychics and spends hours trying to bend forks with his mind. His middle name is "Twilight" because his father was a vampire. He hates flowers.

General Buzz Grunt

The General likes to have his clocks set to military time. He used to enjoy barbershop quartet singing, but that is classified information. It's unknown when he fell in love, but it's possible that he was one of the first humans to understand the concept of love.

Tank Grunt

Tank Grunt wants to be just like his old man. He spends his days lifting heavy things, dodging imaginary bullets, and being bigger than the other guy, but deep down inside, he wonders if anyone really knows who he is. He hates it when his grandmother wants him to call her "Mama" and his grandma is pissed, and he just wants to stay in the dark and get away from the boring world around him. If he could just learn to love himself, he'd be unstoppable.

Ripp Grunt

Ripp totally doesn't care what you think of him. He is going to do whatever he wants to do, which is mostly what everyone else is doing. He has this whimsical desire to show off his tattoos, even though they give me nightmares (sometimes it feels like these tattoos are like a big torture device). He is hyperbolic and outrageous and uncouth and rude to the point that he's almost comical.

Buck Grunt

More than anything else, Buck wants to be a pet stylist to the stars. He spends a lot of time wondering why his father never seems to notice him.

"I want to have big hands and big feet, and I'm hoping I'm going to end up a couple of feet longer than my parents are," Buck said. "My Dad tells me a lot of things like, 'My son is going to be that guy who gets attention by the funnest side of you you've ever seen.' "

Cousins' health makes him optimistic about his prospects

Ajay Loner

To pass the hours, Ajay enjoys counting the grains of sand in his backyard. He may be about to blow his last few thousand, so he worries no more. "You can always count them. You just have to keep on keeping on," he says.

Chloe Curious

The complete opposite of her sister, Chloe just wants to meet new people and to have a good time. She can often be found daydreaming or chatting on the phone. She is very positive and has a creative mind, a big help when composing mean tweets. She always makes sure she keeps her emotions under control and is not too outgoing in social situations.

Lola Curious

Intelligent and focused, Lola knows what she wants and how to get it. She enjoys politics and telling those around her what to do. She keeps her enemies close and keeps a close eye on her enemies' backbones. Her love of Doctor Who and her interest in exploration drive her to travel the galaxy.

Erin Beaker

Erin spends a lot of time working on her psychic powers. Of course, she isn't really psychic, but don't tell her that. Erin's already a pro at picking out great dates with potential future partners. Nothing beats having a psychic date.

Kristen Singles

Kristen envisions herself as a world famous sports champion. She doesn't particularly care for Strangetown, but it's only a pit stop on her track to greatness. As much as she hates to admit it, her talent has never been in question, but that's not stopping her from strutting and parading around town in a T-shirt advertising her skills. She's no longer treating her sport as a game, but instead is obsessed with her prowess as a self proclaimed "muscle mom."

#ts2 #long post #this took HOURS bc I wanted them to all be at least mildly entertaining #I think buck's is my favorite

19 notes · View notes

moonlightreal · 4 years

Text

Winx Club season 8/25

In which it all goes down.

25 The White Fox

Underwater! Subnautica Below Zero! Crystal Sirenix!

We’re searching for Sky, who is… in a cave! With air! But he’s hurt his leg and will certainly freeze before long. The water is rising! “Time to face the truth Sky, you’re in trouble!”

The girls swim, dodge some underwater falling rocks. Flora sees a passage and the girls swim down it.

Water rises! Sky is done for! But the girls are here just in time! Bloom surrounds Sky in a bubble of fire and they all blast up into the air.

On land, Bloom uses her Dragonfire to warm Sky up and he’s ok. Bloom says, “I couldn’t live without you.” “Neither could I. Literally.” heh. I wonder if these eps had a different writer or Sky’s voice actor was having a good day or something.

Oh wait, spoke too soon.

Bloom: “what are you doing here? You weren’t supposed to follow us to Dyamond.”

Sky: “I wanted to be with you, Bloom.”

Bloom; “But that is not a reason to-”

Sky: “come on Bloom, we never get to spend any time together,”

Bloom: “You’re right, Sky. But… there’s no time to talk now. Tell us what happened.”

If this season wasn’t about to end, I suspect I’d end up shouting at Bloom and Sky to discuss their relationship like adults, just like I was with Musa and Riven. Sky is passionate about being a Specialist going on missions, so he should understand Bloom has the same feelings about her missions with the Winx. They have that in common.

Sky tells them about the fox and getting attacked by Icy and then Bloom tells Sky to go stay safe and let the Winx handle the Trix. Sky is so not happy about being left behind because he’s injured. Tecna repairs his suit-- ‘Thanks Tecna! that’s the second time already! I’m starting to like it!”

Tec: “Don’t get used to it.” Heh. I wonder if any of the boys has enough magic to learn the suit-fix trick. Helia can do a little magic, can’t he? Maybe I’m misremembering.

So Sky can come along, “But you have to stay at a safe distance, all right?”

Sky: “Prince’s honor.” And he does a little salute.

Elsewhere, Icy and the fox have come to the crystal-flower tree, now frozen in a thick layer of ice. Icy puts her hand to the trunk and smiles, then sits down with the fox beside her. “Remember this place? I’m… just happy to be with you again, Sapphire.”

Return to flashback! The two girls playing under the tree. The older one says, “We could stay here forever. It’s our own special place.” The little girl in funny shorts twirls and says, ‘But why? The magic universe is full of wonderful places!”

“But on Dyamond we have everything we need. We never have to leave.”

“Don’t be so sure about that, Icy! Life is full of surprises! One moment the sun is out, the next--”

Doom approaches, but we just learned that Icy is the timid, frizzy blonde older sister. Well, I knew but the unspoilered would have assumed Icy was the silver-haired girl. So, Icy and Sapphire. So somewhere, parents named their firstborn “Heart of Ice”? That is supposed to be Icy’s real name from season one. Don’t quote me on where I read it, but it was canon at least 4kids canon which was the only one we had before canons started popping up like weeds in springtime. I think the other two are “Lady of Darkness” and “Mistress of Storms” or similar, they’re not terribly inspired.

Also: is it really a retcon when Icy had no backstory before? Hmm.

Back to doom? Back to doom. The foxes flee! Wind blows and darkness falls as purple stormclouds cover the sky! The two girls cling to each other in panic.

The lightning strikes, and there appears… well the first thing you see is the skull helmet. Red hair, purple lipstick, very pale skin. Antlered skull helmet and feathers. Necklace of claws. Staff that’s a branch with things hanging off it. Tattered dress. Four ice golems behind her. I think she looks like a hagraven from Skyrim but she’s called the “Shaman Witch.”

Little Sapphire asks what we’re all thinking: “Who are they?”

The Shaman Witch lands and thwomps the end of her staff into the ground. Ice spreads over everything. There are a whole lot more ice golems now as this person advances upon the cowering girls. Ice spreads from her feet.

Shaman Witch: “Good day little ones, I hope you can help me. I’m looking for the castle where the queen of Dyamond lives.”

Ok those words, and her posh British voice, do not match her image at all!

Icy grabs her sister, shushing her. Don’t move, don’t say a word.

Little Sapphire’s having none of it. She pops out, “What do you want with my mother? The queen doesn’t talk to witches! Because you ARE a witch! I see it!”

Icy grabs her sister, ‘Stop, Sapphire!”

Shaman Witch: “Sapphire. What a beautiful name. Strong and fierce like a wild beast! Go and join the other cubs!” And she lightnings Sapphire into a fox.

Then she comes for Icy, “What’s your name, princess?… I hope you’ll be more more obedient, Icy. Today Dyamond will have a new queen. I expect you to obey.” and she asks the way to the castle.

Icy points.

Shaman Witch and her golems go wreck the city.

Icy cries. She picks up a last crystal flower. She walks to the overlook-- the same one the Trix were watching from last episode, and the mountain the Winx were on is the remains of the royal city.

Icy: “Shaman witch, you have conquered my kingdom and transformed my sister, but I promise I’ll break that curse! Hear that, Sapphire? I’ll be as brave as you were! And I’ll become a stronger witch than she is. And when I’m the strongest witch of all I’ll come back, and I’ll save you.”

Back in the present Icy magics the fox and creates a hologram of little Sapphire. But it’s just a hologram, they can’t touch. “The truth is, I’m still not strong enough to break the spell of the Shaman witch. I didn’t want to come here, I didn’t mean to get your hopes up. Forgive me Sapphire. I was forced to come back to Dyamond but I’m not ready yet.”

The fox cries.

Icy: “But I’ll catch up with you soon. And you’ll be returned to normal, sister.”

Aaaand here’s Darcy and Stormy with the question we’re all asking: ‘I thought WE were your sisters!’

Icy: “Companions, allies, friends maybe. We call ourselves sisters, but we’re not. She’s the only real sister I have, Sapphire.”

Icy’s voice actor nails this line.

That answers something I’ve been wondering about since season one: were they biological sisters? Back when 4kids canon was the only canon there were mentions of which of them was oldest and youngest suggesting they are bio-sisters, but was that 4kids or straight from Rainbow? Who knows. I only know season one as I saw it and what i saw was suggestions that they are biological sisters but no confirmation.

Stormy: “I thought there were no secrets between us.”

Icy takes to the air for a mini tour.

Icy: “This was my kingdom a long time ago, but a merciless witch conquered it. My family, the people of Dyamond, everything has been turned into ice. These totems are the work of the witch, they’re symbols of her dark power, eternal and unbreakable. The guardians of her frigid spell!”

Darcy gets why Icy didn’t want to come, too many bad memories. Stormy: “too much pain… bleck! All this sadness is making me sick!” Heh.

Icy’s plan is to get the new powers Valtor has promised them and maybe then she’ll be strong enough to bring life back to Dyamond-- and if Valtor double crosses them they’ll defeat him. “The most important battle is here. The reason I became the witch you know, I did it for her.”

Or you could get the stars yourself and use your wish, Icy. That’d probably work.

Sapphire tugs at Icy’s cape. She knows where the prime star is! Off go the Trix! It’s down a crevasse, across a bridge into this crystal cavern with an iced over building in it. And there’s the star, floating in its hamster ball. But when Icy grabs for it, it zaps her and flies away down a small tunnel. With Icy down, Stormy sees her chance. She tries to zap the tunnel wider and ends up destabilizing the whole cavern!

Ok, what-all do we have to talk about? Icy sure changed personality fast, exactly like Tinx at the end of Wow from evil to wimp in one quick move! Also, Icy is sad about her kingdom being buried in ice but was unbothered by the same thing happening to Domino. And in eight seasons of watching the Winx help people, Icy hasn’t once thought to ask Boom—who helped reverse the exact same spell on her own planet—for help? My head’s spinning here.

I sense there will be followup posts deconstructing Icy’s brand new backstory further.

But we’ve got more episode to go! Topside the winx and Sky are flying when snow blasts up from the crevasse. Sky notices and now the girls know where the action is.

Down below Icy’s yelling at Stormy for nearly bringing the mountain down on their heads, but her zapping hasn’t widened the tunnel. Icy realizes that the building is filled with the Shaman Witch’s magic. So this is her lair? And where IS the Shaman Witch? She wanted to be queen of Dyamond but instead she wrecked the place and vanished. Maybe the people of Dyamond put up a good fight and the realm got so busted up that the Shaman Witch realized there was nothing left worth being queen of and she went off to conquer someplace else? I mean, a queen of a destroyed city and zero subjects isn’t worth much.

Also: Is the Shaman Witch the ice witch of the Three Ancestors, before she met the other two?

Sapphire runs off down the tunnel to get the star.

Winx arrive, not knowing any of this! Battle is joined! Crystal Sirenix powers are strong, but this cavern is not real stable! Rocks fall, threatening to trap Sapphire in the tunnel.

Darcy and Stormy seem to have gotten used to this “sister” thing real fast once Sapphire became useful.

Everyone else flees the crumbling cavern, leaving Icy to get her fox sister out of the tunnel. Icy calls Sapphire to come out, but Sapphire wants to get the star. Icy calls, ‘Forget the star! it’s not that important!” and uses magic to pull Sapphire back. They fly up into the air.

Stormy: ‘tell me you got the star!”

Icy: ‘No, but I saved what really matters.”

Bloom gapes.

The star rises out of the crevasse. Stella’s happy, but I think the Trix may have a better claim. The star case appears for more poetry. “Behold the seventh and final prime star revealed, holding a greater power than all the others, the star of the bond that lasts forever, the love of two sisters who stand together.” the star flies to Icy and Sapphire.

The Trix gloat. The Winx are confused. Icy gets all evil-eyes again. She and the Trix, and Sapphire and the prime star, leave through a portal.

Stella is confused! “What do those three know about sisterly love?” but Bloom says it’s not all over yet.

Team Trix appears still on Dyamond. Stormy asks why they haven’t gone back to Valtor yet. Icy tries the prime star’s magic, and it erases Valtor’s mark from their hands. Darcy and Stormy hug and chant, ‘Freedom, freedom, freedom!” heh.

Icy tries to use the prime star to change Sapphire back—and it works! They hug, but Sapphire changes back into a fox. The prime star wasn’t strong enough. Icy breaks down crying. But she promises again, her voice getting eviler as she gets her determination on, to become the most powerful witch and come back to save her sister.

Nighttime Alfea with a big moon! The star case is pontificating, the last star has been found but the winner has not yet been decided.

Stella: ‘Four to three to Valtor! The star case may be magical but it can’t do math!”

But the other girls realize Valtor only has three stars, it’s Icy who has the tiebreaker. Bloom feels that icy won’t give the star to Valtor. “It’s what I’m hoping. Because today I saw a spark of love in Icy’s heart! Winx, we’re not just going to stand here and wait. we’re going to attack Valtor’s palace and take his prime stars. I have a plan.’

Episode end! What a ride!

...hang on, they can just go to Valtor’s asteroid? Why haven’t they done that already?

Also with the whole “secret of sisters” thing it seems like Icy was the only person who COULD have gotten this star. Or Bloom, if Daphne existed in this timeline but she maybe doesn’t. So… the Wishing Star set this up. The Wishing Star wants good things for Icy/Sapphire/Dyamond’s people if they’re frozen instead of dead, and set this up. But with one episode to go I’m pretty sure Dyamond doesn’t get saved yet. Hmm.

Also, did Icy start out as a fairy? If Sapphire said “our mom the queen doesn’t talk to witches” that suggests that they’re fairies or nonmagical girls. It also suggests that Dyamond is a pretty magically bigoted place.

This sudden batch of backstory just came out of nowhere with no foreshadowing and no conclusion. My first thought was that the writers were setting up for season 9: Icy finally realizes the Winx like to help people and asks Bloom to help her save her sister. The Winx and Trix have to work together defeating the Shaman Witch and her minions while Darcy and Stormy try to mess up the alliance because they’re jerks, and in the end Icy restores her kingdom and family and settles down to be a princess. Except Icy is a jerk too, but that’s a different subject. But they never foreshadow future seasons…

No. Wait.

This isn’t setup for season nine, it’s setup for MOVIE FOUR! Just like Politea’s story kind of appeared out of nowhere in season 5. Whaddaya think, does that make sense to you? We haven’t heard anything solid about movie 4, and with how things are in Italy now who knows what the future holds for Rainbow, but maybe that was the plan.

#winx season 8 #winx club

3 notes · View notes

mutantsrisingrpg · 4 years

Photo

Congratulations CAITLIN! You’ve been accepted as EPIMETHEUS.

Tierney is a skeleton that I hold near to my heart and it’s clear from your application that he’s just a dear to you, Caitlin! The backstory that you weaved together for him not only broke my heart, but made me actively root for him. The bit about Blake and how important he was to Tierney was such a great addition to him and added another layer that pulled at my heart. “But nothing good lasts forever,” whew did that line slap me across the face. I can’t wait to see where you take Tierney on the dash!

Welcome to Mutants Rising! Please read the checklist and submit your account within 24 hours.

Out of Character Information:

NAME/ALIAS: Caitlin

PRONOUNS: she/her

AGE: 27

TIMEZONE & ACTIVITY LEVEL: CST; Due to the current pandemic I have lost my job. I’m currently under a shelter-in-place order at my parents place so I have…a great deal of time. Sure, there are days I’m not around but those days are usually cleaning and shopping days. We’re trying to get attached to a schedule with….some success. So I’ll be pretty darn active for a while. In the event the pandemic is over I’ll let you know how my activity will change but that strikes me as a ways off.

In Character Information:

DESIRED ROLE: Tierney Sinclair; Epimetheus

GENDER/PRONOUNS: Cis-Male, he/him

DETAILS & ANALYSIS:

Tierney is a lot of things. But at his heart he’s a boy reaching out for a hand to hold. He’s been denied so much in life and now that his life is in his hands he wants to grab the things he never had. Family. Friends. Purpose. He’s been adrift for so long, lost in a world he doesn’t understand and that doesn’t want him, that finding solid ground to stand on has never been easy. And now that he’s found all of those things he’s finding life isn’t as simple as reaching for your goals and taking them. He struggles with himself some days. He wants to be the boy that never got to be and the man he’s proud of being today. He’s tugged between finding out what normal might have been or could be and doing what he’s good at and known for. It’s like a game of tug of war that he can never win.

BIO:

Content Warning: child abuse, murder, death

Tierney Sinclair was born to a single mother in the slums of Las Vegas, Nevada on September 8, 1979. And that was all he ever knew of his life before the orphanages. Abandoned on the doorstep of a local orphanage with nothing more than his name and a ratty hospital blanket. The Las Vegas Home for Orphans was not a kind place to grow up, especially not for a mutant. Tierney’s powers first manifested when he was three and throwing a tantrum. The bottle of milk he wanted so badly, rather miraculously, appeared next to him because he’d willed it. Easy enough to ignore, which is exactly what everyone opted to do. Mutants were trouble and the last thing they wanted here was mutant trouble. That was, until one of his tantrums caused one of the workers to black out and wake up two hours later.

He was four when he was given to the government for testing. And they tested him for years. Tierney was thirteen when they slapped a level five rating on him and finally released him to a mutant “friendly” orphanage out in Las Vegas. Not that life in the orphanage was much easier than life in the lab. Unaccustomed to the modern world Tierney found himself behind his peers in almost everything. Lost and alone in such a strange and different world made him an easy target for some of the tougher kids in the orphanage and they bullied him relentlessly. It all stopped the day Tierney snapped, nearly killing one of his biggest tormentors. He was punished severely for his actions and Tierney found he just didn’t care. He’d had enough of being walked on and over like a door mat. He was Tierney-fucking-Sinclair and woe to the person who thought him a push over.

Between his powers and his dangerous penchant for using them when angry Tierney did a lot of orphanage hopping until he aged out of the program at eighteen. Life outside the system proved to be….difficult, at best. With a petty crimes rap sheet as long as his arm and a level five label on top of that Tierney found no forgiveness is the world of humans. He survived on odd jobs and theft. Stealing was easy enough when all you had to do was wiggle your fingers at a lock and convince the elderly security guard to look the other way. It was stealing that landed him in the Blackburn Syndicate’s lap. Over confident in his abilities he ended up stepping into the middle of one of their cons at just the wrong moment, causing the whole job to flop. Some would say it was luck that they got out alive, but everyone there knew it was Tierney’s powers and fast thinking that got them all out and in one piece. That didn’t stop the Syndicate from being angry though and they presented Tierney with an offer he couldn’t refuse. Join them or die.

It was simple enough to say yes and shake the hand that sealed his fate. He slipped into life with the Syndicate with ease, surprising even himself. He job hopped for a while, struggling to find his place in the group. It was only after Blake Ryans, the Syndicate’s hitman, took him under his wing that he found it. Killing didn’t come naturally to Tierney but Blake never let him back down. He always said that if the government deemed him as dangerous he may as well live up to it, right? And eventually, he did. Blake crafted him into the best hitman he could be, expertly passing on the wealth of knowledge he’d accrued over the years. Tierney soaked it all up like a sponge and within three years had become Blake’s second in command, trusted enough to do Syndicate jobs on his own sometimes. But nothing good lasts forever.

On a job gone wrong Blake was lost and never returned. Tierney waited, and waited, and waited; but it became increasingly clear Blake was dead. He wasn’t surprised when the Syndicate asked him to step up and take Blake’s job, citing they’d been planning on asking him to do it anyways in the next couple of years. It was an easy enough yes. Blake never returned and after a while Tierney found he’d stopped waiting for him. It’s what Blake would have wanted anyways. He’s been the Syndicate’s most trusted hitman for years now, a job he takes great pride in. The Syndicate has become the only family he’s ever known and he’s exceptionally protective of them because of it. There’s nothing he wouldn’t do to protect them. Nothing.

EXPANDED CONNECTIONS:

ABIGAIL IMANI - (The tug towards what ‘normal’ could have been.) Tierney knows…almost nothing about this woman, save for the fact she’s always getting a cup of coffee when he is. At first it was just a weird coincidence but after a while it simply became routine. It’s easy to talk with her over things that don’t really matter. She makes him feel almost normal. What it’s like to be a person rather than the scary mutant most people peg him for these days. With Abigail he’s simply Tierney, the guy who likes too much sugar in his coffee.

CIARA SAWYER - (Another chance. Living vicariously through another.) Tierney can’t explain what drew him to Ciara the first time they met. Maybe it’s because he saw a little of himself in her or maybe it was the way she looked at him and smiled despite his reputation. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t really care. Like Blake all those years ago he tucked her under his wing and has tried to help her find her place in the Syndicate. He never expected someone as soft and quiet as Ciara to wind up being his most trusted asset in the field. Sure, the first couple of jobs were…bumpy but Ciara was a fast learner now they’re like a well oiled machine. He makes their car keys dances and she robs them blind. It’s brilliant. He hasn’t told her, but he’s resoundingly proud of who she’s become. There’s no one he’d rather work with out in the than her. It’s no secret that Tierney is soft on Ciara but woe to the person that tries to exploit that. If there’s one good thing he leaves behind in this world it will be her. He tries his hardest to shelter her from the more grisly aspects of his role in the Syndicate with varying degrees of success.

GERRARD BERMUDEZ - (The tug towards who he is today. Someone to rail against who isn’t afraid to rail back.) Tierney doesn’t hate Gerrard but he certainly doesn’t like him very much. No one knows why, not ever Tierney himself. It was such an instant distaste that lingers on his tongue like bad fish. He avoids him when he can…and when he can’t he’s not afraid to push at his buttons. It’s almost entertaining to see how far he can get sometimes.

EXTRA:

Content Warning: murder. abuse, violence, guns

-> Tierney doesn’t like killing. He never has. He knows it’s an odd trait to have in a man who is literally hired to kill people, but it’s something his mentor Blake instilled in him from the minute he started training him. Tierney will never kill someone simply because they are there. If they’re not his target then they don’t matter. He goes to great lengths to avoid unnecessary bloodshed but it’s happened on the rare occasion. He regrets those deaths and only those deaths. -> Some might say Tierney has a nasty habit of over planning his hits, but Tierney would disagree. He likes having a plan, likes watching as all the little pieces fall into place. It’s a heady sense of accomplishment. And the coup-de-grace? The ending parts. Tierney might not like shedding blood unnecessarily but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t like shedding it altogether. There’s something heady in holding someone’s life in your hands and knowing exactly what you’re going to do with it. -> Tierney is trained in every aspect of killing imaginable. He’s talented with a gun, with his fists, and with his powers. It doesn’t matter how it happens so long as it happens, so Blake made sure Tierney could do the job any way imaginable. -> Outside of off hand remarks and vague references there is no one in the Syndicate who knows anything about Tierney’s life before the grand fuck up. Anyone that’s tried to ask about it has been rudely told to fuck off or out right ignored. As far as Tierney is concerned his life didn’t start until the Syndicate found him. -> Don’t touch Tierney without his permission. Years of abuse have made him a distrustful and jumpy man. Touching is prohibited to everyone except those he trusts and even then, he’s never been the kind of person who liked hugs anyways. -> Tierney never really managed to adapt to the modern life style that surrounds him. He’s hopeless when it comes to anything more complicated than the texting feature on his phone. Computers have always been a mystery to him and he’s perfectly okay with that. There are plenty of others out there that can do what he wants. If that means he has to ask or intimidate he’s flexible. -> Tierney is a staunch believer that mutants deserve more than they’ve got. Deserve more than a childhood of cruel experiments and homes. He wants mutants to be treated as equals instead of dangerous lab rats. It might not happen in his life time but he wants to pave the way for others like him. He buts heads with people who think mutants are more than humans. He wouldn’t wish his life on even them. -> Tierney doesn’t own a car. He owns a motorcycle. In fact, he owns four. He’s a grease monkey when it comes to bikes and can’t say no to a good deal. He finds something very soothing in spending a day working on one of his bikes. The Syndicate pays him well, but there’s people out there who pay him more for one of his custom bikes. -> Tierney has amazing control over his powers. But his powers have always been deeply tied to his emotions. He’s stronger when he’s feeling a powerful wash of emotions than when he isn’t. He hasn’t lost his cool in nearly twenty years but the effects of it can be damaging. He tries not to let himself get too overwhelmed. -> Tierney’s powers are tied to his hands. He can do things without them but using his hands as focus points helps him with the accuracy of his powers. There is no physical sign that Tierney is using his powers outside of someone who knows that when his hands are moving…things are moving. For Tierney manipulating his powers feels like a string of energy connecting him to his target. He can equate it to almost being like a puppeteer. -> Tierney has a fantastic amount of fortitude when it comes to using his powers for an extended period of time but after a while he will start to get tired, especially for tricks that require his full concentration. -> Power Break Down: ——> Telekinetic Choking: The ability to choke someone without physically touching them. One of the first of Tierney’s powers to manifest and one of the ones he relies heaviest on even now. He must be within sight of his target in order to achieve this power but his range can be as long as a basketball court if he concentrates. ——-> Telekinetic Homing Effect: The ability to cause an object to lock onto a target and follow them until they collide. This trick is one of Tierney’s most useful. And he’s always found it fun to grab someone’s bullet and send it back at them, even if they run. Tierney doesn’t know the full extent of his range but again, he must see the person in order to send anything with homing capabilities at them. ——-> Telekinetic Object Manipulation: The ability to move objects by focusing on them. Probably the best distraction technique ever. Nothing gets people to stop paying attention to their surroundings like their car keys dancing out of their pocket, right? It’s taken him many years but Tierney is now capable of performing this talent with a multitude of objects at the same time. The bigger the object the more concentration it takes. Also a useful skill for picking locks and one he mastered early in his petty crime days. There isn’t a lock he hasn’t been able to pop, yet. Tierney’s range for this is huge but he must be able to see the objects he’s moving if he wants any degree of success. ——-> Telekinetic Mental Manipulation: He’s not able to take over someone’s mind and turn them into his puppet but with a little meddling he’s often able to get people to do things they weren’t prone to doing before. Looking left instead of right, forgetting to check the closet doors, little things that can have a big impact on a job at any given time. Tierney isn’t afraid of his abilities but he hasn’t explored this one as much due to lack of useful targets. His range on this is fairly short and for anything bigger than a stray adjustment or two must put his full concentration on the target. ——-> Psionic Explosion: The ability to create a large mass of energy that can cause huge amounts of damage. Using this power exhausts Tierney and he rarely uses it unless it’s an emergency or a last resort. What little he knows about it comes from the tests he underwent as a child and the two times he’s been forced to use it in his adulthood. Both times leveling a building.

ANYTHING ELSE: Nope! All good on my end! Let me know if you need anything from me!! <3

#accepted: epimetheus #Accepted

2 notes · View notes

sourwolf-sterek32 · 5 years

Text

Terminus ( Daryl Dixon x Reader One-shot )

Summary: Terminus. It was not a sanctuary for all. It was far from it and little did you know today was about to turn into the worst day of your life as you sat in front of a blood stained metal tub. Your life minutes away from crashing down around you as you looked through teary eyes at your brother, Sam.

Pairings: Daryl Dixon x Reader

Word Count: 3.9k

Warnings: mentions of death, descriptions of death, mentions of blood, gore, just basic twd stuff

A/N: Yes I know those photos are Sam Winchester but the reader isn’t a Winchester, the readers brother is called Sam and I pictured him while I wrote this. Also, I was in a really sad mood when I wrote this, like I was very emotional that day and this was how I dealt with those emotions by writing a sad one-shot. Sorry not sorry.

Side note- I hate Tumblr’s new font on text posts, so if you guys do as well you can find this fic and all my others on my AO3 and Wattpad accounts, link for those in my bio at the bottom of my masterlist.

Your hands were tied behind your back, your mouth gaged with some kind of cloth or rag. You were forced onto your knees in front of a large metal tub which had blood stains painted through it. You had a really bad feeling about this and you weren't afraid to admit that you were scared. Hell, your older brother Sam seemed scared despite their best efforts to hide it. He was the bravest man you know, nothing could scare him, but right now everyone was.

You were between Sam, and Glenn, but you knew Daryl, Rick and Bob were further down the tub on your right. The men from Terminus were all wearing blood-covered aprons as you glanced around the large warehouse. Your stomach turned when you spotted a man across the room cutting a dead body's leg on top of a metal bench. What the hell is this place? What kind of sick people do that?

You turned your attention back to the Terminus men behind you guys when you noticed one of them holding a metal bat as they walked towards the end of the tub.

Before you could even try figure what they were planning the Terminus man swung the bat, slamming it into the back of the guys head who was at the end of the tub, instantly knocking him out cold. What the hell were they doing? You thought to yourself as the other Terminus man grabbed the unconscious guys head before slicing his throat and dropping his body back against the tub. His blood now flowing into the metal tub.

You stared at the man's body in shock, your body beginning to shake in fear. These guys are fucking psychos, you had to get out of here.

Without hesitation you quickly pulled down the large wooden stake you'd broken off from inside the train cart where you guys were being held earlier. You had hidden it up the sleeve of your flannel shirt, but you just hoped it was strong enough to cut through the zip ties around your wrist.

"Hey guys, what were your shot counts?" Gareth's voice suddenly questioned as you looked across the warehouse to find him walking through the door.

"38." One of the men replied before slamming the bat against the next man as you forced yourself to look away. You glanced down the row spotting Daryl who was staring at you, his expression masked, but you knew him. You knew Daryl well enough to know he was panicking and you were too.

"Hey, your shot count?" Gareth questioned turning your attention back to the men.

"Crap man, I'm sorry. This is my first round up." The man with the knife replied, his voice slightly nervous as he stared over at the leader.

"After you're done here go back to your point and count the shells." Gareth replied as he wrote something down in whatever book he was holding as he began to walk away. No he couldn't leave yet, if he did the others would continue killing you guys.

Without a second thought you tried shouting at him through the gag in your mouth, trying anything to get his attention and distract him. Rick, Daryl and Sam would have a plan, they always came up with a plan, you just had to distract the man for as long as possible.

"What's that honey? I can't hear you." Gareth responded, closing his book and putting it on the bench as he walked over to you. He crouched down on the other side of the tub opposite you as he pulled the gag out of your mouth.

"You don't have to do this. Please. You can take all our stuff and weapons, just let us go." You pleated. You hated begging for your life like this, you knew it sounded pathetic, but it was the only option you had left as you continued to try cut through the zip ties slowly, not wanting them to notice.

"We already took all your stuff, honey." He replied with a sickening grin.

"You can walk away from this, we can work it out. It doesn't have to be like this." You added, but the man shook his head as he put the gag back over your mouth.

"It does. It has to be like this." He stated as he turned his attention over to Rick, crouching down opposite him and taking his gag out.

"I saw you go in the woods with a bag and come out without it. What was in it? You hid it right? In case things went bad? Smart, we'll find it. But it's too dangerous to go out there right now." Gareth said as he pulled a knife out from his belt before grabbing Bob's head and holding the blade to it. "What was in it? I'm curious and it was a big bag."

"Let me take you out there. I'll show you." Rick replied, but it was clear by the slight shake to Gareth's head that he wasn't going to fall for that.

"Not going to happen. But this might." Gareth responded pointing the knife towards Bob's eye.

"AK-47, automatic weapons, night scope, a compound bow and a machete with a red handle. And that's what I'm gonna use to kill you." Rick stated glaring at Gareth who just chuckled before putting his knife back and placing the gag back over Ricks mouth.

"Thanks. Guys, get back to work." Gareth ordered as he walked out the room. Shit.

You watched on in panic as his men continued doing the exact same thing to the next two guys, while you hurriedly worked on moving the wooden stake up and down against your restrains trying desperately to cut them. Your heart pounding against your chest. You had to stop this, your brother was next in line.

This couldn't be happening, it had to be a dream. Your brother couldn't die like this, not after everything you guys had been through. You'd survived this long, he can't die like this. He was the only family you had left, you can't lose him too. You just lost your younger sister when the Governor attacked the prison, she got caught in the crossfire, a bullet piercing straight through her skull. Daryl and Beth had to literally drag you out of prison when walkers began filing in through the broken fences. The only closure you got was to see Daryl kill the bastard who fired the gun and the fact that she died instantly. No pain. No suffering. It was quick and hopefully painless. But this... this was entirely different. You had just found your brother again after the prison fell, you had just got him back only a few days ago. You can't lose him again, you can't lose him forever.

Tears were now tricking from your eyes as you looked over at your brother. He was staring at you with glazed over eyes from his unshed tears giving you a small nod and if it wasn't for the gag over his mouth you could have sworn he was smiling at you. Why was he smiling? This couldn't be happening... You can't lose him too.

Your eyes glanced over at the Terminus men dropping the last guy back down against the tub, his blood now mixing in with the others.

You screamed into the rag covering your mouth, trying anything to get the men away from your brother, but it was too late. The bat came swinging down against the back of Sam's skull before they slit his throat.

Tears were now pouring down your face as you somehow managed to slice through the zip ties around your hands. Without hesitation you quickly stood up pushing the man with the knife away from your brother. His lifeless body falling to the ground, blood pouring from his neck.

"You'll die for that!" You screamed slamming the wooden stake into the man's shoulder, but before you could do anything else the other man grabbed you from behind. You couldn't move, he had your arms pinned behind your back and you knew there was no way out of this. But you didn't care, you didn't care about anything anymore as you looked through teary eyes at your brothers limp, pale body laying on the cement in a pool of his blood.

You felt the barrel of a gun pressed against your temple and you closed your eyes waiting for him to end it. But before the man could pull the trigger something suddenly exploded from outside, shaking the entire warehouse.

You fell to the ground from the explosion, the Terminus man hitting the deck behind you as his finger bumped the trigger, the bullet piercing through your left thigh as you cried out in pain.

The next few minutes went by in a blur. You were vaguely aware of the gunshots in the distance and Rick somehow getting out of his restraints and killing the two Terminus men before cutting Daryl, Glenn and Bob's restraints off. But all you could do was stare at your brothers dead body by the metal tub. Your hands covering your mouth trying to muffle your sobs.

"Sammy." You whimpered not bothering to try stop the tears falling down your cheeks. He's gone. He died and you didn't do anything to stop it. What kind of sister were you?

"They got problems. We got a chance." Rick stated from somewhere to your right.

"It sounded like a bomb." Someone else added, but you weren't listening until a set of hands grabbed your shoulders.

"Y/N? Hey, look at me. Look me." Someone shouted, shaking your shoulders gently, but you couldn't take your eyes off your brother, your hand still over your mouth as you tried to hold back tears. You felt something wrapping around your bleeding thigh as you winced at the sudden pain, snapping you away from your brother as you spotted a familiar red rag being tied around your leg. "Y/N? Please girl, ya gotta look at me." The same voice said and suddenly you realised it was Daryl as you lifted your head. Your red brimmed eyes locking with his panicked blue ones as you gave him a small nod. You knew you needed to be strong, you had to be strong if you wanted to get out of this, you didn't have a choice. You could cry later, right now your friends were in danger and you weren't going to let anyone else die today.

"Y/N, I'm sorry, but we gotta go." Rick called from the other side of the room causing Daryl to quickly stand up holding his hand out for you. You took his hand, groaning at the sudden pain in your thigh as you put weight on your left leg.

"Can ya walk?" Daryl asked and you nodded, not trusting your voice at the moment before he handed you a knife from one of the benches as the two of you ran over to Rick, Glenn and Bob on the other side of the room. The bullet wound burning in pain after every step as you moved on pure adrenaline.

Daryl stayed by your side the entire time as the group of you walked through a door that lead to a different room. Dead bodies hanging off meat hooks from the ceiling, arms, legs and heads all cut off as you forced yourself to look away. Who the hell were these people?

"Cross any of these people you kill them. Don't hesitate, they won't." Rick stated and with that you all made your way outside. Walkers were roaming the courtyard, Terminus people running around either shooting at the walkers or just purely running for their lives.

It didn't take you guys long to kill most the Terminus people, although Gareth and couple others were nowhere to be seen. Rick unlocked the train cart door, letting Michonne, Carl, Maggie, Glenn, Rosita, Tara, Abraham and Eugene out and with the group of you, you managed to cut through enough walkers to get to the fence.

"Up and over!" Rosita yelled, throwing a large blanket over the top of the barbed wire fence as everyone began climbing over.

"I-I can't. Not with my leg." You began to mumble taking a step away from the fence, the pain in your leg starting to really kick in as it gave way from underneath you. Daryl quickly grabbed you from behind stopping you from hitting the ground.

"I'll help ya. I ain't lettin' ya die too." He responded as he wrapped his arm around your waist helping you walk over to the fence as him and Rick somehow managed to get you over the fence as you landed on the dirt on the other side of the fence with a thud.

"Oh my God, you're shot." Maggie suddenly said as she helped you back onto your feet before Daryl and Rick climbed the fence.

"We need to get that bag of guns, Daryl?" Rick asked looking over at his brother as Daryl glanced over to you. He clearly didn't want to leave you alone, but you gave him a reassuring nod as you leant against Maggie for support.

"It's this way." Daryl suddenly said as he began tracking back to where you guys had buried the bag. Maggie helped you walk, Glenn walking on the other side of you in case you lost your balance.

After a few minutes Daryl pointed to the ground, kicking a few leaves to expose a small shovel before handing it to Rick as he began digging up the bag.

"I got her." Daryl said walking back over to you as Maggie and Glenn nodded giving the two of you some space. "Sit down for a bit, let me see it." Daryl said gently and you nodded as he carefully helped you sit down, the others all watching you with concern as Rick continued digging for the bag.

"We don't have any bandages or medical equipment." Abraham stated from somewhere behind you and you nodded. The bullet had gone all the way through so that was good, but you didn't care. You didn't even care that you'd been shot. Your brother's dead and you were still alive. It shouldn't be like that, he was stronger, he was smarter, he was braver, it should have been you.

"We got medical supplies." A familiar voice suddenly called as you looked across the woods to find Carol walking towards the group of you with Daryl's crossbow in her hands. It was her. She caused the distraction back in Terminus.

In a split second Daryl was up and jogging over to her, wrapping her up in a tight hug and despite everything that has had happened you couldn't help the small smile on your face. You had thought she was dead after Rick kicked her out the prison.

"Did you do that?" Rick asked as Daryl pulled away from her taking a few steps back and Carol nodded before Rick pulled her into a hug.

"You have to come with me." Carol suddenly said looking over at the rest of you before her eyes landed on you, spotting the blood seeping through the rag around your thigh and down your jeans. But that wasn't what she was worried about, she was staring into your red eyes and you knew she was starting to put together what happened. Her eyes quickly scanned the rest of the group before she looked back at you with a sad expression.

"Your brother... oh my God." Carol whispered walking over to you in realisation as she dropped to her knees besides you and wrapped you up in a hug. "I'm so sorry."

You had to blink back tears as she pulled away from you before leading the group to whatever she wanted you to see. Daryl was immediately by your side, helping you up as you all reached a road and began following it until Carol veered off down a dirt path towards a small wooden cabin.

You were kinda zoned out as you all walked towards the cabin. Images of filling your mind of your brothers lifeless body and his teary eyes as he looked at you, that small smile on his face as he stared at you for the last time.

Suddenly Rick, Carl and Sasha began sprinting towards the cabin, snapping you out of your thoughts. And that's when you saw them. Tyrese holding baby Judith walking out the cabin. They were alive.

You watched as Tyrese handed Rick his daughter, him and Carl hugging her with tears of joy as Sasha ran over to her brother, pulling him into a hug. Suddenly a wave of emotion hit you as you watched the brother and sister hug. You weren't ever going to hug Sam again, he was gone and the last conversation the two of you had was a stupid argument.

"I don't need you constantly looking over me! I'm not a little girl anymore, Sam. I can take care of myself!" You yelled in frustration as the two of you walked back towards the group who were currently camped by a few broken down cars on the side of the road for the night.

"Really? Because I just had to save your life back there. You didn't even see the walker sneaking up behind you." Sam responded, crossing his arms over his chest and you knew he was right. You were stupid and let your guard down when you spotted the squirrel in the tree. You were so focused on hunting the damn animal that you forgot about the dead walking around and if it wasn't for your brother, you would have been bit.

"I had it handled!" You lied causing your brother to throw his hands in the air in defeat.

"Whatever. Daryl, she's all yours." Your brother stated as the two of you reached the group who were all watching you in a mix of confusion and amusement. You and your brother rarely fought, most siblings fought all the time, but you two rarely did. Although the last couple of weeks were really starting to take its toll on you. First Beth got taken away and then the Claimers happened and now you were all literally moving from house to house to survive. It was all just starting to get to you and you couldn't control your anger, your brother just happened to be there when you snapped.

"Ya alright?" Daryl questioned pushing himself up from the tailgate of an old beat up truck as he walked over to you.

"Yeah, just got in a stupid argument with my brother. It doesn't matter, let's cook up these squirrels." You replied holding up the three squirrels you had tied to rope around your shoulder as Daryl nodded wrapping his arm over your waist as the two of you walked back over to the group.

"We have medical supplies in the cabin. Y/N come inside, we'll get your leg fixed up." Tyrese's voice suddenly called snapping you out of your flashback as you glanced over at him. His arm wrapped over his sisters shoulder and that was all it took for the tears to come rushing back into your eyes. You couldn't do this, you couldn't be here around everyone, you just couldn't.

Shaking your head you began taking a few steps backwards away from the group. You could feel everyone watching you as you quickly turned around and began walking off into the woods.

"Was it something I said?" Tyrese asked watching as you walked off before he looked around at the rest of the group in confusion.

"She just lost her brother back there. I'll go talk to her." Daryl responded not waiting for the others to reply as he walked off in the direction you had gone. "Y/N?" He called following your tracks until he spotted you sitting down against a tree, you knees bought up to your chest as you rested your head on top. He could tell you were crying by the way your body was trembling as you tried to muffle your sobs.

You didn't even notice Daryl had followed you until he sat down beside you, resting his arm around your shoulders causing you to quickly flinch away at the unexpected contact.

"It's just me." Daryl whispered, leaning his back against the tree as you relaxed into his touch. "M'sorry, Y/N. I'm so sorry." He said gently looking down as you buried your face into the crook of his neck unable to control your sobs as he wrapped his arms around your body, holding you closely.

He didn't say anything else as he held you tightly, letting you cry into him. He knew how it felt to lose a brother, he knew you needed to let yourself feel it, but he knew how painful it was. You were there for him when Merle had died, letting him cry into you as he mourned his brothers death and he was gonna make sure he did the same for you.

You weren't sure how long you stayed curled up against Daryl's side, but you had stopped crying a while ago. Your body still shaking as you tried to get the imagines of your brothers dead body out your head.

"H-he's gone... He's really gone and the last time I talk to him, I yelled at him... we were arguing... God, he hated me..." You trailed off tears rising in your eyes again as you pulled away from Daryl, sitting yourself up straighter, wincing slightly at the pain in your thigh.

"He didn't hate ya. You're his sister, he loved ya, Y/N, which was why he got so annoyed when ya nearly got bit." Daryl replied looking over at you and you nodded slightly as he wiped a stray tear from you cheek with his thumb.

"Come back to the group with me so we can get your leg stitched up. I know it hurts and I'm not just talkin' about the gunshot wound. Ya have to let yourself feel it and ya don't have to do it alone. Ya got me and Rick and the others, alright? We're here for ya." Daryl said softly, placing a gentle kiss to your forehead.

"Thanks, Dixon." You whispered, giving him a sad smile as he stood up, holding his hand out for you. You took it letting him help you to your feet as you winced at the sudden pressure on your left leg.

"You're a tough son of a bitch, Sam would have been proud of ya." Daryl commented causing you to smile ever so slightly as he wrapped his arm around your waist helping you walk back to the others.

There were no happy endings in life. Endings were always the saddest part. There were just happy days, happy moments in life and happy memories that you'd cherish forever. You may be mourning right now but your little sister, your mother, your father, all the family and friends you had lost along the way. They were rejoicing to greet Sam in heaven and one day you will be able to see him again too. But that day was not today.

Link to my Masterlist is in my bio.

Tag List: (If you want to be added or removed from the tag list just flick me an ask or a message)

@phantomfiresidesims @jodiereedus22 @luckywobblerwombatcowboy @lonewolf471 @daringvixon @sapphire1727 @twdeadlysins @hanaissupergirl @tehfabbooty @crossbowking @mel-2a @ilkaeliseb @gabegirrl86 @mummy-woves-you @elamy17 @spaghettirogers @arthursb1tch @awittyf00l @j-a-val @feartheendlesssummer @blckbuttler

#daryl dixon #daryl dixon fanfiction #daryl dixon imagine #daryl dixon x reader #daryl x reader #twd #twd fanfiction #twd masterlist #The Walking Dead #terminus #angst #the walking dead fanfiction #the walking dead imagine

293 notes · View notes

takenbyemrys · 5 years

Link

Chapter 2/10

Main pairing: Peter Parker/Harley Keener

Chapter 1

Tony’s Monday morning was going a little differently. He understood Harley’s need for some independence, so he hadn’t sent a private jet. The kid had told him he’d be there around 9, and to ‘not leave him waiting in the lobby, old man.’ Yeah, okay, Tony was nervous. It’s not everyday that you introduce your two adopted sons that knew absolutely nothing about each other. He refused to admit to anybody but Pepper that he thought of them as his children, though. Pepper had given him a warm smile and corrected him. “Our children, you idiot.” Tony might have cried after that. A million different scenarios ran through his head. Harley was a bit rough around the edges and didn’t do well with other people, but god he hoped Peter’s literal ray of sunshine personality was enough. If it wasn’t he could only imagine the tension and arguments. He had kind of put all his eggs in this basket and couldn’t afford for them not to at least be civil. That’s really all he was shooting for, maybe over the summer they would be able to get along well enough to realize they could work together. So Tony might have shut himself in the lab all weekend to worry. It happens. When his phone buzzed on the table, he jumped sky high, not expecting it to be nearly nine already.

Harley Received 8:51am I think your ego presented itself in the lobby.

Harley Received 8:51am Like really gold inlay?

Harley Sent 8:52am Wait at the reception desk. I need to come down to approve your badge.

Tony was in the elevator a second later. Harley was leaning against the reception desk, arms crossed, a smirk on his face, and a duffel bag at his feet. Kelly, the receptionist was occasionally shooting him a smile, but Tony could see her glare pulling towards a large tour group in the lobby. He ignored it and continued. Kelly raised an eyebrow as Tony walked up to her desk. Tony could see her trying not to smile. Harley raised an eyebrow. “Wow you look like shit.” He smirked, his southern drawl falling smoothly. “Keep at it kid, I'll send you right back to Tennessee.” Tony grumbled. Harley rolled his eyes and sent Kelly a dashing smile, who was covering her laughter with a cough. “Good morning Mr.Stark.” She said sweetly. “Morning, Kelly. How’s the wife?” He asked politely. “Fabulous of course. I am a bit worried about how she’s going to do with that.” Kelly gestured to the tour group. “I can send someone?” Tony asked. Kelly shook her head. “Peter already agreed to help tomorrow.” Tony raised an eyebrow at that. “But anyway. I see we have a request for an alpha level badge printing.” Kelly sent Harley a smirk. “Another one I see.” “Another one, what?” Tony asked incredulously. Kelly just shook her head with a smile. “I knew PENIS Parker was lying about his stupid internship. Why else would he skip?” An obnoxious voice sounded from the large group. Tony froze. He watched as Kelly sent another glare toward the group. “Kelly.” He said slowly. “Mrs. Potts approved an overnight tour for a local STEM school.” Kelly said, keeping her voice even. “What school?” Tony asked, afraid he already knew the answer. “Midtown Tech.” Kelly pursed her lips. Tony’s blood ran cold. That motherfucker had called his kid what exactly. “That’s happened about four times now.” “Louder each time too,” Harley drawled. He gave off a carefree attitude, but Tony could see the underlying tension. Harley didn’t really take well to true assholes. Maybe this would be good for their relationship. “Right, Kelly please print the badge. Harley, we’re going to threaten children.” Tony smiled. Harley grinned and followed.

“I’m assuming this has something to do with the other intern you mentioned?” Harley asked. Tony nodded. When they reached the edge of the group, Tony could hear the voice of a teacher giving directions. He scanned the crowd, but didn’t find the source. He looked to the right and jumped out of his skin when his eyes met the indifferent glare of Michelle Jones. “MJ,” Tony greeted. The girl scared the crap out of him. She was a tiny angrier Pepper. She nodded and her gaze quickly found Harley. She smirked. “Another Murder!Child I see.” She snorted. Ned squeaked from his spot behind her. “I- excuse me a what?” Tony asked. Harley was smirking. “Murder. Child. The new one you ordered for Peter.” MJ enunciated. “MJ.” She jerked her chin toward Harley, who looked mildly scandalized. “Harley.” The boy drawled. At this point, they were getting the attention of the teenagers around them, but they didn’t notice. “And southern to boot.” MJ smirked again. “1. Hello Ned. Stop hiding. 2. I did not ‘order’ him for Peter, Jesus Christ. It’s long past time they should meet. 3. What in all hell is a murder child?” Tony gasped. This was not how this was supposed to be going. “Hello Mr.Stark,” Ned squeaked again and stepped out from behind MJ. “I think that by tomorrow, they’ll both agree otherwise.” MJ’s eyes dragged up and down Harley, who just raised an amused eyebrow. “And a murder child is anyone with an instant kill protocol.” MJ glared at Tony. Harley’s eyebrows shot up at that. “Peter doesn’t-” Tony sputtered. “You’re not the genius he thinks you are if you don’t believe he has one.” MJ rolled her eyes. “For the record, I don’t think i count as a ‘Murder Child,’ and I don't play well with other people.” Harley smirked again. God Tony wished he would stop doing that. MJ smirked right back. “Ever almost killed someone, hell ever actually killed someone?” Harley shrugged noncommittally. “Exactly. Murder Child with an accent?” “Don’t forget the evil smirk.” Ned stuttered. MJ nodded. “Welcome to the IronFamily. I have no doubt that the minute you set your eyes on either Peter you’ll be just smitten.” “How does fifty bucks sound?” Harley raised an eyebrow. “Wait either Peter?” Tony asked, eyes flicking between the three of them. “Yep.” MJ popped the ‘p’. “MurderChild!Peter and Soft!Peter. Either one. I won’t forget to collect.” Harley shot out his hand and they shook. Tony rubbed his temples. “Jesus christ what did I get myself into? Where the hell is he anyway? I can’t see him.” “Maybe it’s because you’re so short.” “Thin fucking ice Keener.” “He got permission from May to not come.” Ned stuttered out. MJ was smirking. She shared a knowing look with Ned. “What so he’s just home?” Tony asked. He pulled his phone out of his pocket. “FRIDAY where the fuck is Peter?” “Language. MiniBoss is in Training Room 4.” Harley snorted, but he sent MJ a look when he heard ‘MiniBoss’. She just smirked at him. “Wait he’s in the fucking tower? When did he arrive? Why didn’t you notify me?” Tony started typing quickly. “Language. MiniBoss arrived at 3:14pm on Friday. You were notified when he met you in Lab 34.” FRIDAY sassed. “He hasn’t fu-reaking left since Friday. Jesus tell me he ate.” Tony groaned. “Smooth.” Harley said. Tony glared at him. “MiniBoss and TheBoss had breakfast and dinner together every day.” Friday confirmed. Tony’s jaw dropped. “Wow, IronDad really dropping the ball. What could your kids possibly be feeling right now?” MJ asked. “I am not dad!” Tony said incredulously. “Ms.Jones Mr.Leeds, i’m sure your conversation isn’t as important as…” The teacher called, but quickly trailed off when Tony turned to him. The class collectively gasped. “Hello Midtown.” Tony said. Harley snorted next to him. Tony sent him a glare. “Sorry to interrupt, I was looking for someone, who apparently isn’t here.” A tall kid pushed through the crowd. “Wait, were looking for Penis Parker?” The kid smirked, well it was like a weird grimace, but an attempt at a smirk. It was like he believed Tony would never fucking say yes. Tony’s eyes narrowed and he stepped forward so that he was right up in this kids face. “What the fuck did you just call my kid?” Tony growled. The kid paled instantly. He heard MJ snickering behind him. “I- I uh… Your kid?” Flash stuttered. “Peter Parker. My personal intern. One of the possible future heirs to my company. Like my own fucking son. You were talking about that Parker, correct?” Flash swallowed loudly. Behind him, Ned’s jaw dropped and even Harley’s eyebrows had shot up. MJ just looked amused. “I’m sorry.” Flash stumbled backward. Tony surveyed the rest of the crowd, noting the look of incredulity on their teachers face. He turned back to MJ. “No one believed the internship?” He raised a single eyebrow. MJ nodded, a smile twitching on her lips, before she cracked. “Not a dad, my ass. FRI save recording to IRONDAD Moments.” She guffawed. “Saved.” “FRIDAY where’s the kid again?” Tony sighed. “MiniBoss is in training room 4.” Friday answered. “For what?” Tony nose scrunched in confusion. “Family day.” FRIDAY said simply. Tony threw his head back and groaned. “So it’s a murder child kind of day.” MJ smirked at Harley, who was honestly so fucking confused. “FRIDAY, please record the meeting with Peter and send it to me.” “Of course, MiniPepper.” FRIDAY said. Tony whipped around to see MJ blushing. “Right, well, welcome to Stark Industries, be nice to your guide. She’s a gem. Don’t break anything.” Tony said to the teenagers. He saw a handful of teenagers nodding. He turned to walk away and found Ellen smirking at him. “Mr.Stark. The badge you requested.” Ellen handed a red badge to Harley. “I heard you adopted another one.” Tony sent a glare towards the reception desk. Kelly just waved. “Training room 4 is on our route today. Would you mind telling the fam? Just in case they want to evacuate.” Tony nodded. “Kid, get your bag.” Tony nodded to MJ and Ned and led the way to the elevator. “You need a badge to make Happy, well not happy, but less angry at me. FRIDAY took your bio scan so she will let you in any door. You have clearance for the whole building.” Tony grumbled as he walked into the elevator. “So Peter?” Harley asked. Tony rubbed a hand on his face. “Okay, only Pepper and Bruce, and now apparently a group of fucking teenagers know this, but Peter is being trained to be part of the team to take over SI should something happen to Pepper or myself.” Tony said very carefully. “A team?” Harley asked. “Why a team?” “Because Peter is also being trained to take over the Avengers.” Tony admitted. Harley’s jaw dropped. “Jesus, don't tell him any of this. Though I have no doubt, the scary one has already texted him.” Harley nodded. Tony kept sending him looks. Should he tell him that he’s part of the team? That they are the whole fucking team? Well MJ too honestly. She’ll definitely be their Pepper. Tony shook his head and decided against it. “Training room 4 FRI.” The elevator shot up.

#Peter Parker #peter parker fanfiction #fanfic #marvel fanfic #harley keener #harleypeter #Peterharley #parley #parkener #marvel

14 notes · View notes

thedelanceybruddas · 5 years

Note

Can you teach me how to rp Morris, i’m really bad at it and it’s a problem

ok so this is super late BUT youre giving me a good excuse to put together my Morris Personality HC™ so thank u anon. i apologize that this is focused less on roleplaying him and more on writing him but. i think that’s close enough.

ok so if we’re looking at the script of the musical we know that Morris is a HUGE instigator. his lines, in order, are: “you want some of that too, ya lousy crip?” - “hey Oscar, looks like it was bum information we got about a strike happening here today. not that i’m complaining; i know my skull bustin’ arm could use a day of rest” - “hey, ya working or trespassing? what’s your pleasure?” - “shut it, ya stupid crip!” - “and now, we’ve been given discretion to handle you as we see fit. yeah, so behave.” - “you can sleep right here, on this old printing press. *SMACK SMACK* now that there is firm.”

a lot of his character is displayed through his physicality; when Race says his whole ��it would be a pleasure to tell Weasel myself” line, the camera cuts to Morris and Oscar, and Morris does a sort of pointy ‘i’m watching you’ gesture; a lot of Morris’ threats are just physical gestures not included in the script. the way the actor plays him makes him seem a little less like a goon and more like a jerk older brother; constantly taunting and provoking the newsies, but not really rising to action unless he gets a reaction. every line in the script might have a threatening gesture accompanying it, but it’s like he’s daring the newsies to do anything and doesn’t really have a plan if they do take him up on it. when jack knocks the Delanceys down with Crutchie’s crutch, Oscar is immediately for retribution (“just wait till I get my hands on you!”) but Morris doesn’t respond at all; he follows his brother in chasing Jack, of course, but for someone who keeps talking big game he has no response for when the newsies actually fight back. this rule changes for Crutchie; out of the two Delanceys, Morris verbally and physically attacks Crutchie whenever he gets the opportunity. you can have your own interpretation as to why, but it isn’t excusable.

when he and Oscar are (presumably) hired by Pulitzer to intimidate Jack, Morris takes more of a hands-on approach; when they’re in the distribution yard, Oscar is the one that handles talking to the Newsies the most with little back-and-forth quips and jeers and such, while Morris only talks to them before work starts, either at the gates or just as they’re coming through them, or when his job is to beat on them. he seems to care about seeming responsible/mature when we see him working, whether for Wiesel or Pulitzer, but especially the latter, since that’s when he takes control of the situation the most; presenting the printing press to Jack, telling him to behave — Oscar only has one line in that scene, and that’s to add on to what Morris was saying with a threat (“but just in case, I’ve been polishing my favourite brass knuckles”). when compared to when he’s working for Pulitzer, it’s seems like he’s letting Oscar be the boss of the distribution yard by deliberately keeping out of things; now, I see Morris as the older brother (I have a post saying why) so I interpret this as Morris letting his baby brother do the cool stuff like handing out the papes and talking to the newsies while he handles the dirty work. whatever interpretation you choose, the point is that Morris very rarely speaks to the newsies when he starts working (i.e. after the gate has been unlocked.)

you may notice that literally every single line in the musical is him either instigating a confrontation or him taunting the newsies. if we look at the 1992 script (minus that one scene because dear god please do not use that scene for roleplay inspiration) its a lot more detailed in stage direction + it has a few different lines so we can learn a bit more about him!

the first direction in the script for Morris is for him to push past Jack with ‘deliberate aggression’. when Oscar pushes Snipeshooter to the back of the line, 'Oscar and Morris glare at the crowd, daring anyone to do anything about it.’ – basically that whole first scene with them is showing that they’re just stupid tough goons. in the scene where the Delanceys are chasing jack, at one point, when Morris has him, the script says 'Morris lifts him high into the air to smash him onto the cobblestones.’ However, this doesn’t happen in the actual scene; the only time in Carrying the Banner that’s remotely similar to this is when the Delancey’s are fighting Jack inside the circle of newsies, where Morris pushes Jack down and tackles him, showing him as the heavy-hitter of the duo, further enforcing that he’s the brother who gets his hands dirty.

later, when Jack gets the extra paper for Davey from Wiesel, Wiesel is PISSED and the script says that he backhands Morris (who isn’t even the one who gave Davey the extra paper). This doesn’t make it into the film either (probably because it’s kind of dark, GEE DISNEY DO YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE IS DARK) but it could point to Weasel being abusive towards the brothers.

morris, compared to oscar, seems super sadistic, especially when he grins at Crutchie before he and Oscar drag him off to the cops - and later in the script Crutchie fills us in that Oscar and Morris 'worked him over’ - either before or after turning him in.

we don’t see anything special specific to Morris again until a while later, after Jack becomes a scab; script says 'The Delanceys pass by; Morris grinning at him, bouncing a club in his hand.’

however, this isn’t accurate to the movie, as Morris has a blank, almost annoyed expression. this is significant due to Oscar’s next line: “come with us, cowboy. we’re gonna fix your pal Davey today — fix 'im so’s he can’t walk no more.” Morris tells him to shut up, which, in the script seems like it’s supposed to be said in a way akin to ‘shut up dude, we’re not supposed to tell him that’ but the way the actor delivers it seems more like ‘too far, shut up.’ watching the scene, you can see how Morris slowly shakes his head as Oscar speaks, and the ‘shut up’ is delivered as he pulls Oscar away from Jack. this line is the one that I’ve noticed most fans using to interpret Morris as more sympathetic. if you do want to play Morris semi-sympathetically or try to redeem him, this line is what you want to look at.

the next Delancey scene is weirdly violent and disgusting for Disney and i know it’s a cop-out but i tend to ignore it so i will not cover it here.

one last note is that after jack beats up the Delanceys for The Previous Scene Morris yells “Ya better run, cowboy – we’re tellin’ Weas! You’ll be back in the Refuge by supper time!” haha tattletale

some extra stuff that may or may not be canon: morris’ trading card reads ‘Born in SoHo and worked on the family farm. Abandoned by his parents, believes in survival of the fittest and sticks like glue to his brother, Oscar. They work with their Uncle Wiesel, keeping order at the distribution window of “The World”.’ it’s pretty likely that Mike Faist wrote this, but it’s nice to use as a kind of baseline for Morris’ characterization. Mike also says in the Meet the Newsies video for Morris that “deep down… y’know, really deep down, he’s actually like a really nice guy.”

across both versions of Newsies, we have these consistencies: Morris and Oscar work for their uncle Wiesel (they call him Uncle Weas in the movie), they fight with the Newsies at least twice, and they fight the most with Jack.

we also have the discrepancies: first, the ableism toward Crutchie. in the musical, both of the Delanceys (but mostly Morris) single him out from the other newsies specifically to bully and harass him for being disabled. Morris calls him stupid, assaults him, and calls him a slur twice. it’s obvious that he does this because he’s disabled. for example, Morris snatches his crutch away after Racetrack and Oscar start fighting (“ain’t your father one of the strikers? “guess he didn’t take care of me”) yet does literally nothing to Racetrack who’s the one that started it in the first place, not to mention that Crutchie really didn’t do anything besides stand nearest to Morris. in contrast, the 1992 version has a scene that basically mirrors this scene, except instead of Morris making Crutchie fall over by taking his crutch, Oscar shoves one of the very smallest newsies, Snipeshooter, towards the back of the line of newsies (“in the back you lousy little shrimp.”) Morris is of course still abrasive in the 1992 version, but the only time he SPECIFICALLY picks on Crutchie is when he’s literally the only one left in the distribution yard after the chaos, and Oscar and Morris are basically working in tandem at this point. Oscar kicks away Crutchie’s crutch, then they both drag him away by his shoulders — Morris does kind of menace Crutchie with his baton, but he doesn’t hit him. Throughout the entire movie (and the bar is touching the ground), at no point do Morris or Oscar call Crutchie a slur.

the ableist slurs and behaviours by Morris in the stage musical were probably included because there are basically no other opportunities to show the Delancey’s villainy, since Sarah isn’t a character and Jack never works for Wiesel — in regards to Morris’ personality and writing him, it’s probably meant to showcase either a superiority complex, his sadism (as evident in the 1992 film), or the ‘survival of the fittest’ mentality referenced in his trading card bio.

basically, when writing Morris I’d pick and choose from every one of his showcased aspects between both iterations, and I wouldn’t fall into the trap of trying to make him so sympathetic that he’s OOC. he’s mean, confrontational, vindictive, petty, violent; he looks out for his brother, tries to be responsible, and doesn’t seem to hold a grudge (especially against Jack). of course, since he’s supposed to be a one-dimensional Disney villain, you have to add some depth by yourself. for example, I headcanon that he’s older than Oscar to add a kind of asshole older brother dynamic. honestly, you don’t have to consider every single bad thing he’s ever done in canon when writing him; imo writing Morris is harder than writing Oscar because, since Morris is more stoic and physical than Oscar, it’s much harder to try and imagine his motivations and thoughts, much less build a personality that’s redeemable. Just imagine canon Morris as the skeleton and then build on top of it; don’t take away what he is OR how he’s hurt other characters, but build on top of it. just be prepared to think up a metric fuckton of headcanons.

#c slur //#morris delancey #newsies #Anonymous

23 notes · View notes

plumbobpost · 6 years

Text

Fan(fic) Friday: Spotlight on Peni Griffin

Sul sul!

Today, I have a special treat for you guys. I had the chance to ask the very delightful @penig a few questions about Widespot and The Sims in general. For those of you who aren’t familiar with her work, she has created two widely popular hoods for The Sims 2: Land Grant University and the aforementioned Widespot. It’s longer than usual, and Peni expressed the concern that it would needed to be edited down, but in all honesty, her responses were such a wealth of information, deleting any of it seemed wrong.

I’ll stop teasing you, and let Peni speak for herself:

What inspired you to create Widespot?

“I’m always in story creation mode. This has been a large part of the appeal of The Sims 2 for me, as it allows me to tell a particular kind of story that I will never, ever be able to write for publication, and have always wanted to: the story of a community in which we see every character as the hero of her own story, and how all the stories intertwine (often without the protagonists recognizing it) and affect each other as they all go about their business.”

“At the time I started Widespot, I was in a situation in which my normal professional outlets were not available to me. You will excuse me from going into detail on the subject, which can be summed up as Health Crap. For our purposes, the important thing was that I needed a project, I couldn’t work on a book, I had been thinking for some time about the potential of my favorite game as a storytelling medium, and enough discussion of the matter had been generated over at MTS that I found/was directed to the late lamented Mootilda’s thread on creating a clean, safe, populated neighborhood for sharing. ( http://modthesims.info/t/455403)”

“I actually went into some detail about the process on my writing blog at the time.”

( https://penigriffin.blogspot.com/2013/02/so-you-want-to-share.html )

Did you take inspiration from the Maxis neighborhoods?

“To a certain extent, yes. I decided that what I wanted to create was a neighborhood that would feel and play as if it had shipped with the game, but with less mess. No dead people without full character data, no memories that outright contradict each other, no hints in the bios that can’t be fully explored in the game.”

In your neighborhood, you included different story elements for each family that interconnect. What is your process in developing this story?

“Somewhere around here, I have the notebook in which I first started working it out, but I’d have to dig to find it. I remember starting with the admonition to myself to keep it simple, as your first attempt at publishing in a medium should be simple - you have enough to do mastering the new medium without trying to make something complicated with it. I knew my genre was soap opera, and though I’ve never been much of a soap watcher, my mother and husband are, so that set my parameters. I listed the tools at my disposal - the five base game aspirations, the jealousy mechanics, and the generational play. The question I asked myself at the start of the process was: “How do I create the most Drama for the least amount of effort?”

“Probably the notion of having five aspiration-themed households came almost at once, possibly as I started making name lists. I wanted to give elders a big role, because I had noticed that a lot of people thought elders were “boring,” and I knew they were wrong! I’ve always felt that Maxis missed a big trick by not having a Scheming Matriarch in Pleasantview. I wanted to shake up some stereotypes and have sims who didn’t obviously “belong” in their aspirations - shy Romance sims, outgoing Knowledge sims, lazy Fortune sims. I wanted all the households intimately connected to each other, which meant that for simplicity’s sake the story (story being defined as “person with a problem”) should center around one particular event that triggered events in all the households, a cascade of consequence. At which point I wrote down “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a fortune must be in want of a wife,” and decided that the wealthy Mann family coming to town with a highly marriageable son and a Dark Secret was a good place to start.”

“That turned out not to be the trigger, but you have to start somewhere.”

Aside from your official captions, how did you set out to convey plot to those who play Widespot?

“I tried to take pictures of enough key moments that the players could inspect the albums for clues. By playing out the development I had ensured that some important information already existed in the memories and relationship panels, but I also went in and inserted memories that seemed to me significant. I had specific meanings in mind when I gave Mary memories of potty-training her younger siblings that extend all the way back to teenhood and manipulated some of her relationship scores with the testing cheats, but I wanted the players to be free to interpret those memories and relationships according to their own ideas, so I tried to background my own opinions as much as possible.”

“The plot, after all, is the players’ job, not mine!”

As far as literal world building goes, how did you factor in your characters’ surroundings to both their plotlines and their characterization?

“The smallness of the town, necessitated by the decision to keep things as simple as possible, gave me the starting point and the town’s name - it’s just a wide spot in the road, hardly a town at all. Rural areas have a certain vibe; certain types of people grow up there, and certain kinds of people wind up there, so this was on my mind as I designed the characters, built their homes, and decided what order they should be created in CAS and moved in. Each house has a history, not all of which is necessarily made explicit to the player, and some of which really, really made me long for something more than BG Maxis content! But I think most people get that the Land cabin was built piecemeal over time, that a lot of Skye’s house was DIY, that the Beech house is Daytona’s house and the rest of her family just lives there, etc. Skye only got educational toys for his kids, but the Lands have a teddy and a dollhouse as well. The Mann’s house is the only one with a fence, and Rich ensures his privacy with stained glass windows in certain rooms. He also has that ominous closet full of aspiration rewards. (I hate that I couldn’t get him a counterfeiting machine - he clearly needs one.)”

“Some details were dictated by the game mechanics. Penny needed a double bed to get pregnant in, but there’s no particular reason for one to exist on her lot; so the heck with it, everybody in that house gets a double bed and I don’t even try to explain it. The lowest-numbered playable in the hood is always the telescope slapper, so I had to create the Mann family first in order for the guy with the Dark Secret to be the one who was incensed at the possibility of being spied on. But who would beard Rich in his own den when he, Lana, or Junior used the telescope in the daytime? That would be the local cop, wouldn’t it? This is why the Land house (with the nubile Land daughters) is right behind the Mann house and the Mann telescope is pointed straight at it. I also used the house to train the Manns - especially Junior - into wanting to buy things by furnishing it minimally to start with, and then adding items as wants were rolled for expensive artwork, games, etc.”

“When I gave characters their starting skill points, I assigned them partly at random, partly according to the implied backstory and role, and partly according to what would be possible in the game. If logic or a random roll indicated that someone in a household had a skill, I made sure that suitable skilling items existed in that household. Woody has an easel because it’s a solitary tool for gaining creativity points; the other families have the more sociable piano. Neither family is much concerned about the impression they make on the outside world, so they are not oversupplied with mirrors, unlike the other families, where Charisma matters.”

“This all works back and forth; the character or situation requires something in the setting, and then I realize that having this thing here means that I also need this and that means I should improve the relationship between these two characters, or whatever. My first and best playtester insisted to me that Goldie needed a teddy bear, and made a good case for it based on Goldie’s characterization, both in the bios and as played; and she was right, so I added it almost at the last minute. (Which is why, so often, the first thing Rhett does it pick it up and try to talk to someone through it.)”

“One thing that I was aware of during development, but am a little reluctant to discuss, is the possible implications for the setting of the racial makeup of the neighborhood. At the time I was born, in the state where I was born, the Land and Beech marriages would have been illegal; and I had that in mind when I mentioned familial disapproval in the Land bios. Some people pick that up and run with it, most people ignore it. Most people look at the Hart’s Spanish-style house and decide (despite the name) that the family has a Mediterranean or Mexican background, but others have decided that Valentine is black/white biracial and all the Spanish influence comes from Angel. I have no desire to dictate anybody’s interpretation or play style, but I do want to enable as many interpretations and play styles as possible, and this variety is an indication of success to me.”

In a lot of ways, fans have come to regard Widespot as highly as they regard the original three Maxis neighborhoods. Did you envision the neighborhood being this popular?

“I beat my “expectations” about the reception of any particular work to death years ago. While I was building Widespot, I told myself that if the only person who liked it was Aegagropilon (my first playtester), that would be good enough and anybody else’s approval would be gravy. Well, Aegagropilon loved it; and I’ve lapped up quite a bit of gravy since then. I don’t have much of a grasp of how popular it actually is, and that’s not the important thing. The important thing is that I know some people are playing it, and enjoying it, and using it in different ways. How many there are, and how it stacks up next to the many other (and in some cases far more sophisticated) fan made hoods out there, is out of my hands. I’m better off not dwelling on that.”

How did Widespot evolve after you started? Were there any massive deviations from your original plan?

“Development was an alternating process of playing (including building, character design, and actual play) and working things out on paper in illegible notes, which is always how I work. I haven’t properly thought anything till I’ve written it down, but I’m a “pantser” rather than a “plotter” - i.e. I tend to fly by the seat of my pants when creating. Too much planning kills the story for me. So once all the preliminary work had been set up, and the broad strokes of the storyline determined, the rest was done directly in the game, with a little help from the testing cheats, Tombstone of Life and Death, and so on.”

“I knew I needed to wind up with a baby for every adult woman, but I didn’t always know who specifically would be the father of each baby until I saw how characters interacted. I knew one of the households would have a ghost, but for awhile I thought it might be Lana. I assumed Candy would have two lovers but I thought one of them would be Hamilton until she informed me otherwise. As mentioned earlier, I thought the Manns would be the central, triggering household rather than the Harts. I had no plans for the teens or children at all, and they took care of their own storylines”.

On a different note, what was your inspiration for the dynamic between the Harts and the rest of Widespot’s inhabitants? How did you develop the idea for these entanglements?

“As a family of Romance sims, their job was to wreak havoc. And boy, howdy, did they! But only after I realized Angel had to be the town ghost. The family ran much too smoothly when she was in charge - she and Valentine constantly smooching it up, Rhett being Mama’s boy, Candy being Goldie’s social support. Kill Angel, and everybody falls apart and starts making bad decisions. I designed Valentine as a Dirty Old Man; but he refused to be only that. I designed Rhett as a heartless jerk, and he can be that - but he’s also the only one of the immature Mama’s boys in the hood who has lost his Mama. I designed Candy as a golddigger, and yeah, she is - but she also made friends with Daytona and Goldie without any prompting from me, and she put herself in the middle of what turned out to be the hardest knot to untie in the whole hood, the Mann Triangle.”

“And Goldie - well, Goldie was a darling who autonomously put the rest of her family ahead of herself repeatedly, could never finish her homework, and never once brought anyone home from school or came home with anyone else.”

“TL;DR: I didn’t develop the Harts. They did.”

You’ve been very active on both Mod the Sims and Tumblr for a while now. How has The Sims community evolved since you first got involved? Why do you think there is still such a strong following of the series?

“It’s hard for me to speak to how it’s evolved, since I was never part of the Age of LJ and only started playing Sims 2 since after Sims 3 was already out. Also, having been on the fringes of a lot of subcultures in my life, I have become adept at keeping away from the stuff that stresses me out. So I’ve never hung out at SimSecret. I block tags on tumblr. I avoid anything smacking of edition wars, don’t allow anonymous communication, and back out of controversies as fast as I can - with an apology if necessary, because face it, everybody’s a jerk on the internet sometimes, and the most you can hope for is to not be one any more often than you can help.”

“So I have no idea how the Sims community as a whole is going on, and I only have a limited knowledge of the portion of the Sims 2 fandom that hangs around specifically at MTS and attracts my attention on Tumblr (often by tagging Widespot). Within this limited sphere, I have noticed a few changes. I used to see it assumed as common consensus that all Maxis premades were “ugly” and that “ugly” is a bad thing; moreover, that certain sims - Goopy Gilscarbo and Sandy Bruty in particular - are more “ugly” than most and are to be avoided at all costs. Now people are shipping Goopy and Sandy (that’s largely @holleyberry’s doing, I believe) and embracing the cartooniness of sims with enthusiasm.”

“On older websites I often see “realistic” (i.e., modeled on airbrushed photos in fashion magazines) sims that, as far as I can tell, are identical to each other and to the ones on the other old websites they link to. With current websites, however, I can not only tell the sims from each other, I can tell Person A’s versions of the premades from Person B’s at a glance. This is especially marked on tumblr, where I often know who originally posted the pics I’m looking at regardless of the attached avatar.”

“And there has been such a flowering of creativity in so many directions in the last eight years it’s overwhelming, though I don’t know how that compares to the days before I started participating. I like to think of Widespot as the vanguard of a Golden Age of hood-sharing. Nobody moans about the lack of clean fan made neighborhoods anymore; they’re agonizing over whether to play Europa or Widespot or Emerald Heights or Polgannon. And suddenly people are making new face sliders. Neighborhood deco lights up at night now. There’s mods for parking on the street, taking toddlers and pets on vacation, hunting, foraging, beekeeping, on and on and on.”

“I think the main difference between now and eight years ago is, that people were defensive about still playing Sims 2, and a general air of playing a “dying game” hung over us all. Now we are joyous and defiant and declaring that Our Game is the Best and Will Never Die.”

“Or maybe that’s just the people I self-select to see. How would I know?”

As a writer by trade, did you find many similarities between creating Widespot and writing a novel?

“My experience has always been that there’s an underlying unity among all kinds of creation, and in particular that storytelling is storytelling, whether it’s the language of text, sound, line and color, or whatever. My writing habits and skills translated seamlessly into the medium of the game. The chief difference, once you factor out technical matters, is that in most forms of storytelling, you need to provide a discrete unit of Story and give the reader the pleasures of closure and narrative structure, pruning out everything that disrupts that weakens the sense of completeness.”

“When making a sims neighborhood, though, you need to be as open-ended as possible, and you need to discern the optimum moment to turn the hood over to the player, while it’s still bristling with plot hooks and unresolved situations. You don’t need, as I did, to deliberately choose the moment at which a bunch of hard choices must be made immediately; but you need to put the player into a situation in which the choices he makes will matter and shape how the neighborhood develops from that point.”

You often play neighborhoods like Pleasantview and Strangetown. Do you prefer playing your own sims or those created by Maxis?

“That’s like asking if I prefer to read Diana Wynne Jones or Megan Whelan Turner. (And if you aren’t familiar with those authors, boy do you have some great reading ahead of you!) The answer is “both.” I enjoy playing characters I’m engaged with, regardless of who made them. Sometimes I wonder what’s going on with Vidcund and want to play Strangetown; sometimes I want to reconnect with the sims in Drama Acres, my personal custom neighborhood; sometimes I want to play with some of my own plot hooks from Widespot. It’s all good.”

If you had to pick between Widespot and Land Grant University, which would you choose?

“I’d attach LGU to Widespot and play them both. I don’t do either/or choices.”

(She just defeated the Kobayashi Maru.)

Do you intend on creating more neighborhoods?

“I actually have three on hand right now: a downtown called Bigg City (an empty version of which is available on SFS http://simfileshare.net/download/207580/ ); a Seasons/Pets neighborhood I call Knotthole County; and an AL neighborhood called Port Cochere. The populated Bigg City got real complicated, real fast and when Health Crap is in a certain state I can’t work on it. Knotthole County is almost completely built but got interrupted while I was designing the characters; and Port Cochere is an SC4 map and a bunch of illegible notes. And at the moment I can’t work on any of them because I need two disk drives in order to use AGS, and one of them has gone wonky. However, I should be able to replace that soon, and then - well, maybe I’ll finally get that last week of work done on Bigg City. Or maybe I’ll decide (again) that if I’m organized enough to work on that, I should seize the moment and get queries out instead.”

Your content is themed around The Sims 2; have you played other titles in the series?, If so, which installment in The Sims is your favorite to play? For storytelling? For building? For creating sims?

“I’m a late adopter by nature. I started with the original The Sims and played it till I felt I didn’t have anything more to discover in it, at which time I started looking into the Sims 2, assuming that I’d eventually plumb its depths, too, and move on to Sims 3 about the time Sims 4 came along. Then I discovered that Sims 2’s depths are unplumbable, and that it was the perfect vehicle for that all-community storytelling I’d always longed to do.”

“The more I learn about the later iterations, the more certain I am that I will never play them. I’m sure they’re fun in their own ways, and I certainly don’t look down on anyone who chooses to play them; but I don’t like the way they look, I don’t like the lack of a storytelling tool, and most of all, the mechanics and structure of the game don’t enable my style of neighborhood play. The Sims series consists of four distinct games with four distinct sets of strengths and weaknesses; and the first two are the only ones I feel any call to play.”

Lastly, why do you still continue to play The Sims? Do you feel that the games provide a positive creative outlet?

“It still gives me pleasure. And I still have Health Crap and need projects, and have a computer that will play it. The Sims 2 is as much a part of my life as reading and playing tabletop RPGs and board games with my friends. So why would I stop?”

“The game is a positive creative outlet - it has nothing to do with my feelings on the subject. One of the most rewarding things about having made Widespot and LGU is seeing people use them as springboards for developing and experimenting with their own creative capacities. Also, a lot of simmers are deliberately using the game to control or relieve some condition or other. Depression, OCD, chronic pain from which they need distraction - I’m not the only one with Health Crap, and I am honored whenever anyone uses something I made to deal with theirs.”

“They could have done these things without me, of course - but they didn’t. They used something I made for their own benefit, and I can feel good about that.”

Any parting comments, teasers, spoilers, public service announcements, etc.?

“One of the core concepts by which I live my life is that creativity is the quality that defines humanity best, and that it is the birthright of every single one of us. But we’ve been educated to think that it’s something special and separate, accessible only to certain special “talented” people; and brainwashed to think that personal creativity that can’t be monetized is a trivial use of time. On the contrary, creativity is to a large extent what time is for. Whether it’s a book, or a game, or a prom dress, the process of making is fulfilling and enriching, and sharing what we make is nourishing to us and to those we share with. So whatever your medium is, whatever resources are available to you, whatever ideas are quickening in your brain and hands - go for it.”

“It is not a silly waste of time.”

To those of you who haven’t played Widespot, go check it out; you won’t regret it. Thanks again to Peni Griffin for allowing me to pick her brain, and I hope you all enjoyed reading it. I certainly found a new favorite word in “pantser.”

If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, feel free to visit my ask box. If you are interested, give Plumbob Post a follow, and reblog for anyone else who you think would enjoy this blog. Stay tuned for upcoming posts!

Dag dag!

#the sims #the sims 2 #fanfic friday #widespot #peni griffin

43 notes · View notes