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quitealotofsodapop · 6 months

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Oooh, The Furnaced!Macaque AU be looking good. So many angst options!

(At least Buddha was nice enough to make the urn with the FFM top)

Spideys Brain: <Ey, let’s make this angstier.>

“What, Mac actually being dead?”

<Nope! Even better!SWK and Mac were reduced to ashes, yeah? What if they were really close in there, so the ash piles were actually one pile?>

“Go on…”

“Wait, you mean, like Mac being like an ashy symbiote inside SWKs body that comes out. Would be, him breathing out smoke and, whoa, here’s Macky!”

“So, they like fused. Can they unfuse?”

<Nope! Loss of self and identity crisis up the wazoo!>

So yeah…Lao Tzu cracking that bad boy open to see what’s up and this unholy combination of both SWK and LEM comes out screaming and hitting – confused, gotta be in a lot of pain, freaking the fuck out in general. Heaven shrieks in terror as this abomination continues the rampage that leaves nearly all of Heaven in shambles – can’t believe they are wishing for SWK to be the one to do it instead.

Dunno what else to say, but I guess there would be a lot of derealizations, disassociations and identity crises down the line. Maybe identity death? Definitely grieving over the loss of self. That Journey is gonna be FUN.

Hmm….Welded Monkey AU? It’s a synonym of fused and, get this, *married*. Guess when they work it out, they might go Garnet on all this, then? Just a Garnet that couldn’t defuse even if they wanted to…okay, bad example…

(Also, imagine the general Wukongverse reaction to this…this fused monkey that still struggles with feeling real and has no actual identity…like, they love their LEMs but that is just the purest of nightmare fuel even for them – who would’ve thought the furnace could bring forth even more fears?)

Ohohoho

"Welded Monkey!au" is delightfully devious.

Sun Wukong and the Six Eared Macaque may have technically "died" to the Furnace...

But the four-armed, firey-eyed, six-eared, and two-tailed Welded Monkey King of the Crucible was born.

And of course this is considering that the being born from the furnace is a grown fusion, and was not compressed into a fresh Diamond Stone Egg from the ashes...

Both two previous minds clashing and marrying and a whole new mind forming all at once. Not even the Buddha is sure what to make of it.

The battle in heaven is legendary, and even the strongest warrior Erlang Shen is left permanently injured - the Welded Monkey being his equal match + 1. But like with the original story, the Monkey proves far too proud to turn down a bet from the Buddha (though the Macaque part of them yells that it's a trick).

Tripitaka finds his bodyguard 500 years later chained under the Mountain, and nearly faints from the sight.

A tall, bronze-furred monkey that looks at the monk with equal fascination and disgust. Molten copper and iron still dripping from their maw. Lets just say Guanyin needs to apply the crown immediately or else the combined anger of SWK and the spite of LEM means one less Journey member.

Many demons run at the sight of them.

The Welded Monkey (aka "Alloy/Héjīn) refers to themselves only in plural pronouns, as to respect their original forms.

They wield a staff and can jump into the shadows of their foes. To the unknowing, it's like seeing an Asura fight on earth.

Their personality is one of opposites; cheeky and demure, boisterous and calculating, honest and scheming, theatric and shy. So many aspects of Sun Wukong and Macaque combined.

It gets a little awkward for them to explain what's exactly going on. Enemies think it's an interesting power-up. Former friends are the most confused.

PIF: "So are you Sun Wukong or are you Macaque?" Hejin: "Yes and no." DBK: "So their child? Being a combination of both?" Hejin: "We have their memories though." DBK: "Hmm... what's it like?" Hejin, thinking for a while: "Noisy. On the inside." PIF: "I always did think Wukong and Macaque would marry. Just not in this way."

I imagine their Journey is more one of finding their own personality and identity after their creation, and them/the world as a whole accepting the loss of who they once were.

The Wukongverse def pities/is terrified of what Hejin respresents. Hejin is not a SWK/LEM child, nor are they just them combined - they are something Else.

The different Lao Tzu/Laozi's make sure to note; "Do Not put more than one monkey in the Furnace at once."

#furnaced!macaque au #furnaced!macaque #welded monkey!au #others aus #lego monkie kid #lmk #shadowpeach #sun wukong #liu er mihou #six eared macaque #character fusion

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iriel3000 · 9 months

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2018 Friday Recs - Week 4

Happy Friday! Some reading recommendations for your enjoyment. No particular order and more to come.

So, the 2 YEAR ANNIVERSARY of Friday Recs is coming up😲! and I don't have anything planned yet😩. Thoughts? Suggestions? What trope/AU have you been in the mood to read lately that we may not have covered?

Wounds by I_llbedammned

Clint wakes up in the hospital and Natasha goes to see him for a brief moment before going to fix the problem.

Clintasha Drabbles (Clintasha Advent 2018) by warqueenfuriosa (orphan_account)

Written for Clintasha Advent 2018 on tumblr

Closest Thing To A Wife by winterfrostwidow

In which Clint is not married, Natasha never was in love with Bruce. And Clint & Natasha are two fools in love, very much on the edge of unprofessionalism.

Talk to Me by intoxiicatted

From the moment he had brought her into SHIELD, she forced titanium walls over her emotions. Continued what she had been taught before; "Love is for children." In reality, she has a heart. She just wouldn't like anyone to know about it.

Loving Can Hurt Sometimes by Randomstranger1220

The Black Widow rarely has any feelings other than the satisfaction of successfully completing a mission. But Natasha Romanoff is different

The Red Room by fabricdragon

There was a lot more going on when Hawkeye spared the Black Widow. Clint Barton was a vampire hunter, Natasha was a vampire... He should have taken the shot, but he didnt.

crucibles by zombeesknees

Budapest and the aftermath. She's the close quarters. He's the long shot. They have both been unmade and remade before. This is what being partners means

If you are one of the authors or know them on tumblr and they are not properly tagged, please let me know in comments and I'll add them. Please feel free to click the Iriel3000fridayrecs link below to browse more categories

#iriel3000fridayrecs #hawkeye #clintasha #clint barton #black widow #natasha romanov #strike team delta #clint x natasha #ao3 fanfic #clintasha fanfiction #2018

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kwockwoc · 4 months

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How do you think Nicholas used to celebrate the New Year prior to attending King’s Row?

short answer: normal teen shit 🍺🚬🤪

long answer: below the cut 👇

so anon, I tried a few different ways to answer this ask – I started a couple of different mini-fics for it, one with a teenage Nick sneaking into an abandoned warehouse with a friend in middle school, the other an adult married Nick trying to organise a new year’s eve party while Seiji is stuck at home with a cold – but neither went to the heart of your question, which sort of hinges on the importance of attending Kings Row – high school, in other words, as a transformative time in Nicholas’s life.

It's no surprise that my take on Nicholas’s homelife is heavily influenced by some stuff I’ve written that uses his life outside Kings Row as a crucible for his character – I’m thinking mainly of better this way, but also the adult Nicholas Cox of Shadow Theatre, who had nothing whatever to do with his mother (it’s not clear whether she’s alive or dead in that AU, and of course KR plays no part in that story).

But you ask how I think he celebrated the new year before attending KR. In other words, a guy in his mid-teens, coming from a home where he doesn’t appear to have access to a whole lot of entertainment or support due to various factors, a kid who doesn’t really have a lot going on in life, other than ordinary teenage drama, plus a lot of energy and a desire to make something of himself, although I think the clarity he achieves in that ambition derives largely from his disastrous 15–0 loss to Seiji, and is therefore kind of specific to that year.

I think he spends his new year’s eve from the age of about fourteen until he starts at KR, with friends – I think, in keeping with the action of better this way, that his mom starts to lose any real interest in supervising him (controlling him is another matter) at around that age –

– Nick tries to stand up, but he can’t really, because the vodka means that his legs can’t really carry him right now, or not in the expected direction. Holy shit. Hooooly shiiit – and Jasper’s laughing at him – rude –

– mucking around with alcohol someone stole from their parents, and weed, probably getting home pretty messy in the early morning, and his mom tearing into him because she can smell the marijuana on his clothes. Nicky, I swear, if you’ve –

And there’d be fireworks at midnight, because there are always fireworks, so Nick and some of his friends would probably sit up and watch those, probably huddled close, because it’s likely to be below freezing. But that would be it. 🎆

#kwoc answers #thanks anon for the ask!#this was a tricky one tbqh #but i enjoyed it <3 #pre-KR Nick is a bundle of passion and energy just looking for an outlet

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deathrooteater · 2 years

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i’m back on my bullshit and neither y’all nor tungle can stop me.

i was thinking about a sci fi au for elden ring, and my first thought would be that the greater will is some sort of supercomputer, with the elden beast as it’s robot tank body, while marika and radagon are two twins that were fused through brain uploading, put on an android body with replaceable parts (would explain the hair) and named president or something along those lines by the greater will. its golden order would be a program/virus that rewrites how the world and the minds of those connected to the “network” work

the frenzied flame and scarlet rot are corrupting viruses created by rival supercomputers, to destroy/corrupt whatever they can. the dark moon is similar to the greater will but it doesn’t really care what its viruses do, unlike the others; it also has a great probability prediction processor. the fell god straight up took the law of equivalent exchange as its prime directive, and used the giants (i don’t have a scifi equivalent for them YET) as its subjects, before being (mostly) deactivated. the dragon outer god is an old supercomputer that got deactivated, though its programs are still in the network (though as far away as possible from the greater will’s core). destined death is another supercomputer, but its viruses, rather than corrupt, straight up kill whatever systems they come into contact with. the formless mother is yet another supercomputer, that wants to supplant the greater will as the shadow ruler of the world (it is also fueled by blood, somehow). the crucible of life is just how the network works in its natural state.

the gloam eyed queen managed to form and alliance with destined death, and spreads its viruses along with her cult, the circuit-wearers (since gods are computers and androids and cyborgs, the term is the equivalent of godskin lol). maliketh is marika and radagon’s half-brother, who got upgraded into a cyber-werewolf by the greater will, and who took down the cult, trapping the most potent virus used by the gloam eyed queen into his energy sword (somehow turning it black in the process?).

malenia got corrupted by the scarlet rot as soon as she was connected to the network, and it’s been slowly affecting both her mind (twisting her thoughts) and body (overheating and corrupting her implants, causing damage to her body that necessitated removal of limbs and creation of prosthesis to replace said limbs). she became a master swordswoman to compensate for this, same as canon.

morgott and mohg were born incompatible with most implants, and with the network, so they were outcasted and thrown into the undercity (the deepest and worst part of leyndell) as “omens”. after they were brought back to the mansion of their family, morgott managed to find an old model implant that worked on him, and was connected to the network, eventually becoming the shadow president. mohg, on the other hand, got nabbed by the formless mother, and became so enamoured with it and its promises that he began a cult in its name. his deformed look is caused by prosthetics he willingly put on himself to “be closer” to the formless mother.

miquella was born with... something (still determining what) that stunted his physical growth, though his mind is far sharper than most. after the greater will and his parents failed to create a cure to malenia’s condition, he took his sister and built his own skyscraper (the erdtree is a giant golden skyscraper btw), where he planned to upload his mind to become a supercomputer himself, all while providing energy to the building and surrounding area, before mohg kidnapped him and took him to the formless mother’s core, where miquella resides under forced sleep, while mohg uses the formless mother’s blood fuel to try and make miquella into a supercomputer under the mother’s control.

rennala was the ruler of a rival state to marika’s, before she married radagon (or rather, marika/radagon using a male android body) after a war. she specialized in energy weapons and hacking, before radagon left her under the greater will’s orders later on. after the whole “ranni killing herself” thing, she lost her mind, and tried to implant an incomplete copy of ranni’s mind into her university students, who were all driven insane by the process.

ranni was chosen as a possible successor to marika, along with miquella and malenia; however, just like in canon, she wanted none of it. she stole the code to the destined death virus from maliketh, and created a knife imprinted with it, with which she killed her (implanted) body, but left her incorporeal mind existing in the network, with which she later took over an android body made by seluvis.

godwyn, after beating fortissax, one of the cyber dragons, managed to form an alliance between the greater will’s empire and the cyber dragons. he was killed with the same knife that ranni created, but it didn’t completely work: while it wiped his higher functions, it failed to wipe his most basic ones, such as bodily ones, essentially leaving him a vegetable. however, some fragments of his mind were left in the network, and spread through it, eventually arriving at the implants of dead people, who were resurrected through these fragments; among them, fia.

that’s all i got for now.

#elden ring #au #text #long post #ramblings

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dainty-baneberry · 2 years

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23. Pitch

((Picks up where Veracity ends))

…“Why’d you defect?” Ciprian figured she would ask this sooner or later. How could she not? He was a full blooded Garlean, one of advanced age. He could only have been born within the Imperial Empire and likely had at one point been loyal to it. Ciprian would not deny this. It was the truth after all and he had long made his peace with his past, and present. He did not regard himself as a good person and he did not care to excerpt the energy to be a good person. Ciprian looked at Dainty, his own dark magenta eyes reflected back at him, with the exception that she, as an au ra, possessed limbal rings that he did not. “Tis not a complicated answer. At best I’d have been stripped of my wealth and exiled to rot in some shithole corner of the occupied territories. At worst I would have been executed and my name erased from all public record.”

“Not a difficult choice then.” Dainty commented sardonically. “Not at all.” Ciprian agreed. As before he did not continue speaking upon the subject of his past. Previously Dainty had let that slide as she had had no desire to hear it until the truth of their potential familiar connection had been laid bare. Now, however, she had little patience for vague tritisms. She looked away from the obese man to watch the movements of the people who lived and worked at the Great Work

It was a nice place to sit, a little to the right of Nidhana’s crucible on a small cliff, looking over the water of the cave enclosed bay and the slowly turning Aetheryte. Outside but shaded to enjoy the breeze without suffering Thavnair’s blistering sunshine, the hustle and bustle of life all around them but private enough where they could converse without concern of being overheard.

Dainty took several quick mouthfuls of vodka from her flask before delicately dabbing her lips with the back of one hand. “Tell me everything then.” She demanded in a similar tone of voice that Ciprian had used on her earlier. It was one of a woman who was used to getting her own way and using violence to achieve it if necessary. “Why you’d have been killed, Jade, your idiot son… tell me every ugly detail of it.” If she knew the truth about whatever he was declining to speak of from the start it couldn’t be used against her later.

Ciprian grimaced but nodded slowly. This was not going to be a pleasant subject but at least he could be reconciled to the fact that she, of all people, would certainly have heard worse. Ciprian doubted there was much he could say that would shock a woman who had traveled to the far side of the Universe and returned alive. “You know the name Darnus.” Ciprian stated. It was not a question. Of course she did. Everyone knew that name. “I was the lesser son of a lesser son of a particularly poor branch of that noble tree.”

His sarcasm was palpable. Dainty’s head slowly turned away from the Aetheryte she had been idly gazing at to stare at Ciprian’s profile as it occurred to her what he had just said. He was a relative of the White Raven, Nael van Darnus, instigator of the 7th Umbral Calamity. She was a relative of the White Raven, Nael van Darnus, instigator of the 7th Umbral Calamity. “Yer kidding…” Dainty couldn’t help herself, her faint Lominsan accent betraying her in her shock.

“I was a faceless justicar in Garlemald.” Ciprian continued. He was not joking, not in the slightest. “I was disowned for marrying an Au Ra woman and frankly, good. Fuck the lot of them. Hated them all anyway, the only value they saw in me was my ability to make money. Justus, your Father, was born shortly after Jade and I wed….” “How shortly?” Dainty pressed, momentarily distracted from the revelation that she was Darnus. It took nine months to carry a child to term and his use of the phrase “shortly” naturally lent her to suspect a thing or two about the reasons for a pure blooded Garlean in the notoriously racist Imperial Empire to suddenly step outside his race lines. Ciprian gave a soft snort, noting Dainty’s perceptiveness at once not bothering to make any denials.

“4 months, perhaps 5. It has been far too long a passage of time to genuinely recall but I will say this; I’ll suffer any insult but never let it be said I did wrong by my Jade. I never did.” He heaved a great sigh, voice started to take on tones of regret, rather than simply stating facts. “She died not 8 years later after a long illness.” That explained the youthfulness of the woman in the portrait - Dainty noted to herself but commented; “Only one child begat?”

“Aye. One was more than enough.” Ciprian sneered, eyes sunken into the fatty bulk of his face but they glittered with anger nonetheless. “It is the unfortunate truth that my son was born an idiot. I did my best, and gave him anything he wanted. Hired any tutor of a subject that took his fancy. He was Jade’s son, I would have moved the world for him but he rebelled against my every attempt to shield him from the hatred and condescension he would face as a hybrid. He believed me a liar, that having the name Darnus gave him some right to be accepted by society. By the age of 17 he cut all ties with me and struck out on his own.” Dainty took an almost reflexive sip from her flask at mention of that name once again as a survivor of a war might cringe at any sudden loud noise.

“That ended poorly, for him, of course.” Ciprian added, sounding both resigned and smug at the same time. “None would hire him, none would associate with him, save the worst dregs of society. Justus took up with an Au Ra lass, a fellow hybrid like himself although one born of rape and unaknowledged by those what begat her. ” Dainty couldn’t help but feel sympathy, she had once suspected a similar origin for herself, after all but the thought quickly slipped away. The name Darnus still playing heavily in the front of her mind. Ciprian grimaced again although thef anger in his expression strengthened as pitch of his voice deepened; “I am a prideful man, I admit it but begged that fool not to marry her. I knew what would happen. The disease that claimed Jade ran in her line. If he married anyone of similar blood it would be compounded. Anyone, literally anyone with even half a degree of sense would understand that. All those tutors I paid for! He had to know I was correct! Yet all he could do was mock me for my hypocrisy. I had married an Au Ra, why shouldn't he?” Ciprian shook his head to dispel the venom in his voice a little. Even so many years later his resentment towards his son ran deep; “I do not own too many morals but I have never once seen right in the needless suffering of children. I knew Justus and Mayberry’s children would likely be cursed with that which killed Jade. There was no cure and believe me I tried. I spared no expense. In the end all that could be done was to ease her suffering. I kept her warm and tended to even as she faded. For my beloved, I could do that at least.” I offered Justus and Mayberry the same for their daughter. Jade’s granddaughter and I expected nothing in return. Just give me Bellona to raise in privilege and luxury until she shuffled unto her death instead of living in abject poverty and surrounded by filth. I was refused and accused of trying to buy their daughter as a means to control Justus.”

Dainty couldn’t help but give a ghost of a smile at that. She had a feeling Ciprian was glossing over many of his own faults with this retelling but she could not deny she had met people that behaved just as Ciprian described Justus. People who were so determined to take offense that they would doom a sick loved one rather than listen to reason.

People who could not admit they had made a poor decision and would continue on a path that ended in their destruction rather than admit that they were wrong. To Dainty it felt fitting that Ciprian spoke of Justus wanting to be part of Imperial Society when his actions seemed achingly similar to the Garlean refugees in Garlemald. Those who refused to believe that the Alliance was there to help them and spat at their every effort to give them warmth, succor and kindness.

Who took genuine offers of help as an insult and then named themselves the victim when they suffered the consequences of their own actions in refusing that help.

“How Jade and I managed to produce… regardless. For the most part I turned my back on my son entirely. There was no part of Jade in him, only my own unfortunate bloodline it seemed.. He threw heavily to the Garlean side and, save a few scales on his chest he could have passed as a pureblood. He even had the eye so it made sense.” Ciprian admitted, tapping his own Garlean third eye. This Dainty found quite interesting as it leant a measure of truth to Justus’ belief that he could have been accepted by Garlean society. Was the man truly devoid of intelligence or was much of his behavior due to being stifled by a Father who believed that only his way was the right way? “I knew not of you.” Ciprian told Dainty, his tone growing almost conversational. “You must have been born after the other one and I saw no evidence of you when I defected. The White Raven had risen in the Imperial Army. One of its most lauded General’s who would deliver Eorzea to Emperor Solus. He could not suffer the scandal of someone like the Black Wolf discovering there was a legitimized hybrid among the family tree. Once that came to light it was very clear what would become of Justus and his family.” “Executed and their names erased from all public records.” Dainty echoed words he had spoken earlier. Her tone was light as his was, despite the fact that they spoke of the murder of innocent people. “Correct. I went to my son one last time. He was an idiot but he was my idiot.” Ciprian shrugged his shoulders, he had made his peace with what happened a long, long time ago now and it did not bother him to speak of that night. “I offered the family my hand. We would leave together, board a transport that very night to take us to the Ala Mhigan fringes and from there, abandon the Empire for the relative safety of Eorzea. Justus remained steadfast in his absolute stupidity. He rejected me, called me a Traitor to my face and believed the connection to Nael being finally known would be Justus’s gateway to take his rightful place among the other Elites of the Darnus name.” Ciprian gave an ugly laugh that made his belly wobble. “I left then. Perhaps a better man might have stayed a moment longer and appealed to Mayberry, perhaps I could have rationed with her, for the life of her daughter. Daughters, apparently. But I did not. Justus was born a fool and died the same way. Despite my defection I had friends enough within the Empire to give me an update of what happened to the family. I will admit I cherished a tiny hope that Justus would come to his senses and flee the Capital of his own volition. Instead they were murdered in their beds by agents of the White Raven and the house burned to the ground.”

Dainty felt a small twinge of familiarity at his words, as she had previously when he had spoken of a girl who was sickly. Despite her amnesia some tiny fragments of a long broken memory remained. Just enough for her to have a sense of certainty that Ciprian was telling the truth. She did not remember ever seeing a burned down house, only some instinct reminded her that she knew of the events that Ciprian spoke of. Dainty also had no emotional attachment to this tiny flicker of deja vu, like one might have to an actual memory. She felt like she was recalling details of something that happened in an unfeeling scientific textbook that had been read a lifetime ago.

“How you avoided their fate, I know not. I knew only of a girl named Bellona who was born sickly and died with her parents. Perhaps you were old enough to realize your Father was a simpleton and managed to escape the genetic null achievement of your family before they doomed you too.”

#ff14 ffxiv #ffxiv rp #ffxivwrite #writeseptember #ffxiv writing challenge #ffxiv writing prompt #ffxiv write 2022 #missed the deadline #late oh so late #still trying my best #doing it anyway

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foramomentonly · 4 years

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RNM Fandom Creators’ Week, Day 3 -- AU

MY MOMENT HAS COME.

Fish Bowl by @sabrinachill

Quarantine fic, but make it beautiful and brilliant and fun to be reading about quarantine in quarantine?

Leave the Light On also by @sabrinachill

It’s a fake married fic written entirely by trope prompt HOW?!

Where They Hang the Lights by @leescoresbies

Firefly and Malex and space and adventure and all good things.

Michael Sanders series by @prouvaireafterdark

Michael deserves a family and gruff, accepting dad ok.

You Can't Jump the Track and Loathly by @aewriting

I feel like these are lesser known WIP of aewriting’s, but they are my favorites I love them SO HARD.

Crucibles by @ninswhimsy

YES I’M RECING IT AGAIN FIGHT ME

thinkin' about the way that you kiss (i want to melt with you) by @queersirius

Soft bro, adult college student Michael and a Malex reunion I. It’s perfect.

A treatise upon dueling and its merits in the field of sport: OR: a candlelit rendezvous by @haloud

Smut and Latin dirty talk?!

crawlin’ back to you by detectivemeer (on AO3) @katsofmeer (on Tumblr)

The hitman AU I never knew I needed desperately. Liz is a delight.

you lift the veil (my eyes are open wide) by @iwontbeyourmedicine

Magic and Malex and mystery and world-building and beautiful descriptions and longing.

Everywhere on Earth You Go by @leescoresbies

Musician Alex and grad student Michael meet again after ten years and it’s sweet and funny and sexy and heartbreaking and Kyle’s in it and I LOVE it.

#folks i had FUN #rnmcreate2020 #au #malex #fic recs #malex fic

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lambourngb · 4 years

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Get me out of here - places to go when canon is complicated

It’s Day 3, time to celebrate those stories that I turn to when I can’t deal with canon, or when I don’t have the emotional energy to untangle all the emotions I have for what’s going on in canon. Alternative universes, the safe harbor for us. Below are a mix of rewrites of canon, remixes of canon, or out right not even set in Roswell- to fill every type distance you want from canon- from near to far.

The first story I’m reccing is a long one,- so pardon the very long review below.

my love is a life taker by @jocarthage (267,600) So one day, Jessi popped into discord to share a dream she had about timetravel and being able to save yourself in the past basically, particularly Alex getting to give his baby-self a hug, and we all went, “holy shit that’s a cool fic idea please write it!” and really reality sucks right now with quarantine and whatnot, so what better thing to do than follow a WIP? I can’t tell you how badly I needed to something to look forward to as I was staring down a milestone birthday with all my plans in tatters, and this story filled the void.

Okay- now about the actual story itself, the world building about time travel in this is incredible but easy to absorb. Jessi dumps you straight into the action in chapter 1 with Alex, at 28, assassinating an Iraqi intelligence agent in 2009 that averts a bomb that was planned on US forces. You learn so much about both the story-universe and Alex here- one, that even dressed in mask and killing someone, Alex is kind and uses morphine as an overdose and has arranged for his victim’s family to be compensated, you learn that time agents can only visit places they themselves have visited during that time, and Jesse Manes had dragged his son, who was ‘time aware’ to every place of war and ruin on the planet before he was 18 and that, Alex’s victim, even as he’s dying, recognizes what a shit childhood Alex had but that Alex doesn’t.

The next part is where Alex’s time crystal malfunctions, instead of returning him to 2018, it takes him to 1998 where an 8 year old Michael is getting beaten by his foster dad and Alex, out of his time line mysteriously, visible to only Michael, saves him, but only temporarily. We all know with abusers, until you’re out of the house, it’s just a matter of time before the next beating. However, with one act, Alex at 28 starts putting into action (even though he doesn’t recognize it at the time) the steps to save his own life as he works to save Michael from his childhood. Each mission, each jump through time, Alex meets Michael, always a year apart and only for 1000 seconds, or almost 17 minutes. Jessi takes you through some of the darkest points of US foreign policy, only as Alex takes control of his life, he also starts to change the missions, and change the world. The details of places, people, food, etc are authentic from the author’s experience, if you don’t click on the links at the end of the chapters and disappear down google-rabbit holes about the events in history, well- you’re made of stronger stuff than I am. There are lots of heavy subjects discussed, but there’s always care and honesty behind the intent. The way Michael grows, the way Alex grows, and of course the journey to the present time when they could be together? It’s like pining on steroids but it’s so wonderful. I wish I could pull out one thing that I loved in particular in this story- but it’s impossible, only to say that I love that I could disappear completely within the confines of ‘my love is a life taker’ knowing that I would be kept safe by the author, that goodness prevails.

 when I’m oceans away by @neapeaikea (28,000) this is a post-2008 shed canon-divergent AU where Alex Manes, after the best/worst night of his life bolts from Roswell and leaves Michael behind. 10 years later, on the hunt for a child conceived at Caulfield, Michael walks into a youth home in California and finds Alex. A few things, I love that this author writes an Alex who didn’t join the Air Force but still lost a leg, I don’t really enjoy disability erasure in modern AUs (I’m better at looking past that in historical or sci fi aus) . It’s pretty clear after five minutes that the connection between the two men is still there and strong despite anger, secrets and guilt. The teasing and flirting between them is great but so is the acceptance of baring their vulnerabilities. I loved the care they take with each other, and the tie in to an alien child is just so perfect.

Crucibles (series) @ninswhimsy (9,000)- I’m cheating and naming both here, but obviously nin had her finger on the pulse of fandom, by writing crusade-set queer stories before The Old Guard ever boomed into a fandom from the movie. I was lucky enough to trade DMs over the ideas of holiness and the body, and how Alex would have treated himself, certain of his doomed soul, and how Michael would have responded in turn. It’s no secret I love everything Nin writes, but this series stuck in my mind. I will be drifting off to sleep, and think about Alex walking through the ancient city of Aleppo, ready to be done with his burden and Michael there with soft palms and scented oil, and boom! I reach for my kindle to re-read it.

no regrets if we walk this new road by @andrea-lyn (97,000) This author has written so many amazing AUs, some quite far away from canon events like her Mummy AU or her Avengers AU, but I have to say, I have a very soft-spot for this rewrite of season 1 for a lot of reasons. I mean, it’s 2020, so my appetite for Cop!Max is definitely at an all-time low, so the idea of exchanging his job with Kyle’s was extremely appealing. At least Kyle is a POC holding the badge, not a white man like our canon. Anyway, politics aside, this story is special to me for the scorching good Isobel/Kyle relationship that develops, the way Isobel sharpens herself into a lawyer (not an event planner) and how Michael rounds his own edges off in turn by becoming a teacher (and being secretly married). Each deviation from canon made complete sense once you alter the way Rosa’s death affects the pod squad, and how they covered it up ripples out toward Liz, Kyle, etc.

 Layer on layer, down on down by @dotsayers (9,440) I love sci-fi tropes, especially time-loops, but they are incredibly hard to write (I know, I abandoned mine a while ago) so this story stands out because of just how well done the execution is and also the angst. Michael in a time loop about Caulfield, like how great/agonizing is that? The plot is so good, how it ties into Caulfield and why it happens in the first place, like wow. The care, and the hurt, and the fatigue that Michael has in this story, oh you just want to wrap him in a blanket. There’s a tiny throwaway line about how one of the first things Michael learned to do in foster care was to make himself heavy and unmovable- and you instantly picture kid!Michael not wanting to be removed from a house - like my heart broke! The structure of the story, with the background of his just how much he loves Alex but how badly it hurts to see him die, really makes this study of 1x12 special. Along with all the angst, there’s tiny gallows humor lines, so am I weird, that I laughed through a couple of these scenes even as Michael kept dying?

Petty pace by @aewriting (11,600) Aewriting has a couple of stellar AUs, so trying to pick just one was difficult, but I rather feel this story is sadly underappreciated it (mind the tags). It was a remix of @iwontbeyourmedicine ‘s fantastic ‘Freaky Friday’, where the humans and aliens swap roles. Alex in the role of Michael basically was something I had never pictured until Ly wrote that story, and now feel utterly changed by it, especially with this backstory- the idea of Jesse Manes bringing a foster child home? Incredibly well done because there’s an off the charts level of menace in this story. The way Jesse watches Alex, who at first mistakes it for how a pedophile might size up a victim, but then catches on quickly that it’s so much worse in a lot of ways. And Alex is such a loner in the beginning, even as he reconnects with his pod siblings Liz and Maria, he’s still planning on keeping his head down and leaving Roswell far behind. Like freedom is literally the only thing he can conceive of for himself, no real dreams outside of that until Michael slips under his defenses. I probably could have saved this story for angst day- because the second half of the story, if you don’t sob while you read it, then I dunno. It’s helpful to read Ly’s story right afterward as a reminder that things do get better for Alex ten years later. In a lot of ways this story is sadder than canon (though there’s no murder of Rosa/4th alien), I’m comforted that at least Alex has Liz in the aftermath, alike in heartache in a way that Michael didn’t have because of the pact he and Max made about Isobel in canon.

Unexpected tidings by @bestillmyslashyheart (24,800) Another rewrite of canon, that explores a couple of very interesting questions, like what would it look like if Michael never made it back to Roswell as a kid but met Alex by chance in 2008? Imagine the cornerstone of the Lost Decade love affair revolving around the mundane questions of a long distance relationship that wasn’t built on the pain of the shed or Rosa’s death? Marlo writes an amazing take on this, that is both real and deep with the normal couple problems, before introducing that spanner in the works of oh yeah, aliens are real. With Michael on the east coast, and Alex finishing off his service in Roswell, Project Shepherd still entangles Alex with Liz bringing him in on the secret in hopes that with his hacker skills he can track down the third alien child that Max and Iz remember so they can warn him. As interesting as the current plot was, I found myself absolutely revitted the slow piecemeal reveals that Marlo doled out about Alex and Michael’s relationship over time. (I also while rereading this recently got very nostaglic for season 1 Alex who didn’t trust Jesse as far as he could toss him.)

Don’t Punish Me For What I Feel by @winged-fool (3,600) Tarsus IV AU - another wonderful author with a catalog of great AUs, both sci-fi and dark, and honestly it was difficult to narrow it down to one. This story, well in 2009 I was a hard core Trek movie fan, so when I saw a trek-fusion story appear, I knew I would love it just on that basis. The thing is, this gave me Michael as the Captain, a surprisingly rare role for these space fusions, even though genius level repeat offender Jim Kirk and genius level repeat offender Michael Guerin seems pretty married in my mind as a connection. As a Tarsus-like story, all the tags are well earned by the story that Alex finally shares with Michael. It hit on so many levels, the hurt/comfort level for sure, but also to have a story where Michael is this stalwart protector of Alex was really nice to find.

this isn’t the ‘holiday best friends championship’ by @usbournejez (6,090) alright to leave this on a lighter note, my final AU rec is this masterpiece by Kieran that was part of Malex Secret Santa gift fics- and what a gift it was to all of us! The way she writes established Malex is first-rate, because she always includes their canon-levels of snark/sharpness but it’s never directed at each other and that’s something I love. Here we have Alex, where we learn in just a few short lines, is a huge control freak but has the extremely big emotional handicap, and that’s his love/fondness/deserve to caretake Michael. Emotional cactus Alex who is soft for Michael? Love it. There are small drops of angsty backstory peppered in this, but really that just fuels just how sweet and wonderful the main theme of the story- which is Alex might hate the whole world at large, he loves, protects and worships Michael (and vice versa). As someone who can bake cookies, but that’s about it, I was still enthralled with the baking details and this story has never failed to encourage me to eat dessert before dinner basically.

#rnmcreate2020 #malex fic #roswell new mexico #malex fic rec #malex #MALEX FEELS #michael guerin #alex manes #fandom positivity #worship our great authors in this fandom #can we pretend it's Wednesday?#a day late and a dollar short #working on today's now!

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clarasimone · 4 years

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Iain Glen in the archives of the Victoria & Albert Museum

YES, found a new source of info and screening possibilities in London, in the archives of V&A. Access in free but you have to register to have the Museum create a card for you.

One can find a biographical file on IG (contents unknown to me at present) and one can screen Hedda Gabler (2005) and The Crucible (2006 - so no need to travel all the way to the RSC in Stratford-upon-Avon to see it) !

Click here for the technical info: https://nal-vam.on.worldcat.org/search?queryString=au%3DGlen%2C%20Iain&databaseList=199,269,239,638,283,197,285

I’ve often posted on The Crucible but here are pics from Hedda Gabler, a real treat given that the play won multiple Olivier Awards, including Best Revival and Best Actress for Eve Best in the title role. Also note that IG gets to co-star with this youngster below ;-)

Premiere night !

Bonus:

THE TIMES (HEDDA GABLER)SATURDAY, MARCH 5, 2005

IAIN GLEN IS EFFORTLESSLY STRIKING A POSE.

This 43-year-old actor is regularly referred to as a “Scots hunk”. Today, with his fair hair pulled back into a tiny, straggly ponytail and sporting a pointy-tipped moustache, he’s a little rough around the edges. But he has a warm, intensely masculine presence and a sharp wit. As he tilts his profile towards the light, facing the photographer the perfect angle without for one second allowing his attention to wander from our conversation, it’s not difficult to see what makes Glen one of our most magnetic performers.

We’re in the Almeida Theatre’s rehearsal rooms in North London to discuss Glen’s latest role, as Judge Brack in Richard Eyre’s new production of Hedda Gabler. Ibsen’s 1890 domestic tragedy is, as Glen puts it, “psychologically astute”, even when the characters’ behaviour is at its most extreme.

Glen is surprisingly reluctant to talk about how rehearsals are going because, he says, at this stage he genuinely doesn’t know. “This is always a vulnerable time,” he says. “Really you are clueless and searching and you don’t want to give any secrets away if you feel that you have had some kind of revelation.”

Nevertheless, he agrees to divulge what he has so far uncovered about Brack, a powerful and manipulative man who attempts to contrive a situation whereby he can conduct an affair with the newlywed Hedda and continue his friendship with her husband.

“He’s an enigma, and I was drawn to him because I feel he’s very open to interpretation,” Glen says. “He’s not untypical of a certain sort of man – he’s unable to commit to a married state, so he creates triangular relationships. There are men who can divorce, well, not exactly sex from love, but they can compartmentalise their lives. Yet Brack’s feelings for both Hedda and her husband are in earnest. It’s subtle and complex.”

Glen’s record as a classical actor is impressive. His RSC debut as Henry V won him comparisons to Olivier and McKellen, and he was a rivetingly febrile Edgar in Max Stafford Clark’s King Lear at the Royal Court.

More recently he starred in Peter Stein’s much-admired The Seagull in 2003 and blasted his way from under the shadow of Brando as a fierce wiry Stanley Kowalski opposite Glenn Close in the National Theatre’s 2002 production of A Streetcar Named Desire. The Blue Room (1998) directed by Sam Mendes in which he and Nicole Kidman played all ten roles sent the Donmar Warehouse box office into meltdown as the public clamoured to see them in David Hare’s update of Schnitzler’s La Ronde. Both actors gave scintillating performances – and the play’s huge impact had some unexpected knock on effects. According to Kidman, The Blue Room revitalized her career, it gave Glen a taste of celebrity life and a continuing close friendship with his co-star. But his relationship with Kidman came under less welcome scrutiny when their marriages broke down – hers, to Tom Cruise, in 2001, and then in 2002 Glen’s to the actress Susannah Harker, with whom he has a son, Finlay, now aged nine. There was no affair with Kidman, but that didn’t stop the speculation.

“It was difficult, but you have to handle it with good grace and move on,” says Glen whose partner now is Charlotte Emmerson, also an actress. “I mean, if I was taking my son to school and a photographer was there taking pictures, I don’t know how I’d react. Maybe I’d kick the living daylights out of him. But so far it’s never been bad enough to upset me. It’s part of the business.

Still, he clearly doesn’t relish it – one reason why he’s never likely to move to Hollywood. Besides, he says, there’s a much more satisfying variety of work here, where he can switch between film, television and theatre. “I like to spread myself quite thin. When I’m working I’m focused, but when it’s done, it’s done. I jump into the next thing.”

Right now, he’s on our screens playing the Jacobite rebel Alan Breck in the BBC’s Kidnapped. And RŽgis Warnier’s Man to Man, in which Glen stars as Victorian Scientist in search of the missing link, recently premiered at the Berlin Film Festival and is due for general release later this year.

“I’m someone who likes to get a lot done in a day,” he remarks. “I don’t think I’d have stuck with acting if I hadn’t worked pretty solidly. It’s so painful for actors who don’t work. If acting had meant I was just sitting around, I couldn’t have done it.” And with that he’s off. Let’s hope the acting profession continues to keep him busy.

#V&A Museum #Iain Glen #hedda gabler #benedict cumberbatch #eve best #the crucible

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the2020romanceproject · 4 years

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Review: The Soldier's Scoundrel by Cat Sebastian

(Or: three types of tension, and how this book fails to balance them)

You guys! I read my first romance novel! I enjoyed it in a lot of respects; there were also ways it disappointed me. More below the cut.

A few caveats before I dig in. First, this is the first full romance novel I've ever read. I’m going to try not to make too many wild conjectures about the genre as a whole, but forgive me if I leap to a few inaccurate conclusions. Second, I'll be making comparisons to fanfiction, and while I have read widely, I definitely haven’t hit all the corners of fandom. The comparisons will be biased towards the kinds of fanfiction I happen to have read (mostly slash, mostly on AO3).

Finally, I’m going to say at the outset that I feel a little weird saying critical things about an author's work in general. This is definitely an effect of fandom, where unsolicited concrit is a no-go. But this is a published novel, and there's a whole different review culture around published works, so I'm going to go ahead and be critical. If anyone feels like I'm being inappropriately harsh or cruel about any book at any point, please let me know.

So, The Soldier's Scoundrel! A quick plot summary, with spoilers: Jack grew up in the gutter and is now a roguish detective-type in Regency London, going around the law to solve problems for ladies and other people down on their luck (but never gentlemen; he hates gentlemen). Oliver is the younger son of an earl who's been in the army for a decade but got injured in battle and is back in London, living off a modest income. He goes to see Jack because he discovers that his sister paid Jack a large amount of money several years ago and wants to know why. The two men are immediately attracted to each other but adversarial. Oliver disapproves of Jack's law-breaking but gets embroiled in his current case, and the two end up traveling together, sleeping together, and falling in love. Jack eventually tells Oliver to screw off because he can’t see himself having a place in a gentleman's life; Oliver then tries to get himself ruined so that Jack will be comfortable being with him. Jack stops him from ruining himself but sees that Oliver is determined for them to be together, so they find a small house they can both live in and set up a life together.

First of all, let me say that the sexual tension in this book was TOP-NOTCH. No complaints there. There’s a scene in an alleyway early on where Oliver licks Jack’s thumb and it is delicious. Good job, Cat Sebastian, making me really want these two men to jump into bed together.

Unfortunately, that ended up being a bit of a problem, because as soon as they did jump into bed together—which happens just around the halfway point—I dramatically lost interest. They weren’t in love yet, or established as a couple, so there should have been a remaining source of tension, but I super didn’t feel it.

(Extra caveat: this was true FOR ME. YMMV.)

I have a theory as to why. I’m still thinking it through, but here’s a stab at it:

There are two primary kinds of tension in a story about two people getting together, which I’m going to call sexual tension and romantic tension. Sexual tension is X isn’t sleeping with Y but wants to be. Romantic tension is where X is in love with Y but thinks that Y isn’t in love with them. (It is NOT where X and Y are in love but can’t be together—but more on that below.) You often get the two types of tension at once: X is in love with Y and wants to sleep with them. But sometimes you just get romantic tension—where, say, they’re already sleeping together but feelings haven’t been admitted—or just sexual tension, where they’re attracted to each other but not in love.

This book starts out with just sexual tension. Jack and Oliver are immediately attracted to each other, and though they try to suppress the attraction, it only grows as they spend more time together. I was super there for all of that. But then they sleep together. Sexual tension: gone. This is where romantic tension could have stepped in and carried us through the second half of the book. But they weren’t in love yet. There WAS no romantic tension. Where they wanted to be (in bed together) and where they were (in bed together) lined up perfectly—and so I lost interest.

There are a few ingredients that contributed to this problem, I think. The period of time covered by the book was relatively short (I want to say a couple of weeks). The crucible forcing the two characters together was relatively weak, so there wasn’t a lot of excuse for them to spend time together if they weren’t sleeping together. They didn’t know each other at all before the start of the book. They were very honest, not with each other, but with themselves, about their feelings every step of the way, so there was never an indication that they might be feeling more strongly than the narration let on. We got both of their points of view so there was never any tension for the reader about what the other character was feeling—or even for the two of them about what the other was feeling, really. And they had sex relatively early in the story (for my expectations, anyway).

This is such a different combination of elements than I would have expected to find in fanfiction. Fanfiction has a definite advantage over romance when it comes to building romantic tension, because it can build on a preexisting canon relationship. It doesn’t always choose to—sometimes people write complete AUs—but even AUs get to build on a preexisting connection between the characters in the minds of the readers. So some of this difference is inherent to two the genres. But I’m going to go through a few of the things that I think contributed to the tension problem in the second half of the book, including how fanfic might have handled them differently.

Time & proximity. The timeline of this book was so short. Of course Jack and Oliver weren’t in love by the time they had sex; it had only been like a week, and they hadn’t spent that much time together. They weren’t roommates, or best friends, or colleagues, or teammates, or customers at each other’s coffee shops, or even rivals. These premises could exist in original fiction just as easily as in fanfiction. I don’t know if they do and this book is an exception, or if the premise of strangers meeting and then choosing to seek each other out is a genre standard. Either way, it made it very difficult for the characters to fall in love before falling into bed.

Honesty. I was surprised so often by the text TELLING us their feelings for each other every step of the way. Not that it’s not good to know your own emotions—it is very good! Very important!—but what’s good in people isn’t always good in protagonists. These two knew they were attracted right away, and then they knew they were falling in love, and that took some of the fun out of it for me. It also took some of the power out of their feelings. We are often bad at feelings, and we’re particularly bad at feelings when they’re important ones. In having the characters admit to themselves what they felt as soon as they started feeling it, the text made those feelings seem less significant. It also made it seem very unlikely that the characters were feeling more than they said. It deprived us of the potential tension of waiting for the characters to realize what they already felt. Withholding is a huge source of tension, and this text did not withhold.

Two POVs. The text didn’t even withhold the love interest’s point of view. One of my friends who reads more het than I do tells me that two points of view is more common in the fics she reads, but it is VERY uncommon in the ones I read. I can only think of one I’ve read recently (and in that one, both parties were desperately in love for years before they so much as kissed). In this book, there was never a possibility that the other person wouldn’t feel as strongly as the POV character, because we had seen both POVs and we knew they were in roughly the same place as each other.

There was no confession. Remember what I was saying about honesty above? They just told each other! How they felt! When they felt it! So boring!! I mean, yes, healthy and all, but a story needs conflict and this could have been a great source of it but wasn’t. I’ll grant you that misunderstanding plots and secret-keeping plots can be done very badly—sometimes you just end up yelling at the characters for not having the one simple conversation that would solve all their problems-—but they can also be done very well. There are real reasons people might be afraid to confess their desires to each other, or why they might think the other person could never return their feelings, and this didn’t present any of those. To its credit, it also didn’t give us bad or contrived reasons, which would have been much worse. But it just didn’t find any tension here. (I fully acknowledge that not every story HAS to use this as a source of tension. But it was one way this could have done it.)

The wrong kind of obstacles (for me). I discovered in reading this book that while I love external obstacles to characters getting together, I strongly prefer the kind of obstacle that is a barrier to them telling each other they’re in love rather than the kind that keeps them from finding a happy place in the world together. Once they’ve confessed and are, to all intents and purposes, together, even if not in the eyes of the world, my interest largely stops. “This person is engaged to someone else; therefore he will never love me” is a million times more interesting to me than “this person is engaged to someone else and so even though we love each other we cannot marry.” Fic has very few of the latter and a lot of the former, in my experience.

The wrong kind of internal resistance (for me). Again, I like the kind of obstacle that makes X think Y will never love them, rather than the kind that makes X not want to be with Y. I’m just...not that interested in a character that doesn’t WANT to be with the other person. If that’s what they want, they’ve already got it, and my work as a reader is done! Fanfiction does tend to feature a lot of internal resistance—I can’t fall in love with him; he’s another man!—but it usually takes the form of the POV character thinking the other person wouldn’t want them or would hate them for even feeling like this. Jack and Oliver both have reasons to not want to be with each other, and it does not make me interested in them getting together. It just makes me think, great, they’re sleeping together; they’re done.

Loss of sexual tension. So many of the problems with the tension could have been solved if the characters hadn’t had sex until the end of the novel. I suspect (and will be curious to investigate further) that this is a quasi-requirement of the romance genre: a sex scene well before the last tenth of the book, which is where I would have put it in this case. (To be fair, that would also have required a better crucible for the characters, because there was no good reason for them to spend so much time together if they weren’t having sex.) A sex scene halfway through the book can totally work, but only (for me) if there’s some other major source of tension preserved. Either they’re already in love but pretending it’s just sex, or (in a fun twist that preserves a good deal of the sexual tension) they’re pretending it’s practice, or just buddies, and that they don’t really feel the desire they do. There are probably other possibilities here, but this book didn’t really choose any of them.

This all might just be a way of saying I like pining. (It’s true; I do.) But I suspect there’s something else going on here, where romance readers might experience tension from a different source than I do. They might be reading not to see these two people who are in love get together, but to see these two people who aren’t in love fall in love. Which, I’ll admit, is often the case for all of us at the start of a story about two strangers meeting. But for me, for tension to be preserved, what the characters want needs to increase more quickly than what they get. This is very different from a healthy real-life dating situation, where what the two (or more) people want will match or be only very slightly ahead of what they get. Maybe romance, or at least this novel, is trying to mimic these healthier scenarios? I guess that’s fine, but it seems a little boring to me.

So, the novel didn’t have great romantic tension. One thing that could potentially have made up for it is a third type of tension: logistical. If sexual tension is wanting to sleep with someone but not, and romantic tension is wanting the person to be in love with you but thinking they’re not, then logistical tension is when you know the other person wants you and loves you but there’s some other force keeping you apart. It’s the external obstacle I mentioned above. There are versions of this that I find strongly compelling, but it has to be an ironclad external obstacle, and it should probably coincide with deprivation on other fronts: they’re in love but can’t see each other, definitely can’t sleep together, maybe don’t even get to talk to each other about their love. This book didn’t have any of that. They spent most of the book together, and a good half of it as lovers, and while there were societal obstacles to them being together, they were both financially solvent and relatively unattached, so the obstacles didn’t seem very strong to me.

There was also, it’s worth noting, a mystery plot. I haven’t touched on it a lot in this post. It was a fun thread, and definitely one of the things that helped me get through the post-sex middle, but it resolved fairly easily and wasn’t a big part of the story. It was mostly an excuse to have Jack and Oliver going places together. This was definitely a romance with a mystery in it rather than a mystery with a romance in it.

...Okay, this has gotten extremely long and there are still things I haven’t talked about! I should mention that there were a lot of things I did like about this book. (I mean, I liked it wholeheartedly until about halfway through.) Jack and Oliver were believable and likable characters who were very convincingly different from each other. They had opposing worldviews that made a lot of sense in light of their pasts, and their relationship with each other changed them in ways that made them both better people, which is something I really like in a romance. The sex scenes were great, and there were a lot of sweet moments that I enjoyed despite being annoyed at the general lack of romantic tension. There was some really nice hurt-comfort. It was well-written and enjoyable in general; I just wanted something to pull me more strongly through the second half.

There are a few things that came up here that I’d love to dig into more—honesty vs. dramatic irony in narration; the overlap between attraction and love—but I think I’ll save those for further reviews. Doesn’t look like I’m going to run out of material anytime soon. :) For now, I’ll just say that I fully recommend the first half of this book. And if you like watching two characters who are already sleeping together fall in love, I can go ahead and recommend the whole thing.

(P.S. If anyone has recs for romance novels that do have pining, send them my way!)

#reviews #romance novels #fanfiction #fanfic meta #cat sebastian #the soldier's scoundrel

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yourdeepestfathoms · 4 years

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The Crucible AU where Elizabeth and John aren’t married, but Mary is still the servant to John. John often sends her to the tavern in Salem (which Elizabeth owns) and orders her to not come back until it’s dark (he usually sends her to work there when he doesn’t want to see her). Mary is pretty cool with it, though, because the pretty, nice lady works at the tavern and she’s always so kind and she feels safe around her :) (even though they don’t talk much. Mary is very quiet and even shyer, so she doesn’t say a lot of things, just helps clean. but just Elizabeth’s presence is enough to calm her!)

However, John and Elizabeth end up hitting it off and John tells Mary that she better keep quiet and not ruin this for him (Elizabeth already knows that she’s in pain a lot of times because she’ll show up to work limping or even crying sometimes) and definitely not tell Elizabeth about her treatment or else.

Angst ensues!

#the crucible au #the crucible headcanons #the crucible #crucible concept #mary warren #john proctor #elizabeth proctor #tw: abuse

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blxckdamask · 5 years

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Trashcan’s Fic Rec: July ‘19

i know this is really late but i was busy so i couldnt really get this done. an yway,,, yall know the drill by now,, this has a bunch of bnha (mostly bkdk) and some rairpairs aswell as some drarry, odaat and b99.

BNHA Fics:

{bakudeku}

When Izuku's insecurities about his scarred body hit him full throttle, Katsuki is there to show Izuku just how beautiful scars can be.

Katsuki's reflection above the sink stared back. Eyes still drowsy with a hint of a shadow beneath them. Hair more of a mess than he would prefer, but he was plenty awake now.

All because of Deku.

Katsuki reflects at 4 am.

Pride has always had a special place in Midoriya Izuku's heart.

"I trusted you and you had me murdered!” Midoriya wailed, anguished. Bakugou twitched focusing on the spell that made him capture Midoriya's soul.

“Shut up! You got yourself killed!”

“I didn't! You said you had my back and I thought you had it! But you didn't! Kacchan! My body!” Midoriya cried as he watched Bakugou lug his limp body through the forest.

This is what happens when Bakugou tries to become best friends with Midoriya again.

Katsuki doesn't know what's wrong with Izuku. Is he mad? What is he mad about? What did Katsuki do!? All he knows is that he can't let Izuku break up with him. Not while they're still keeping their relationship a secret.

Izuku forces Katsuki to apologize for everything he's ever done to hurt him.

Bakugou and Midoriya have been best friends since... well, since either of them could remember. But both harbor unspoken feelings for the other, will this be an end to their friendship?

Izuku, a dog hybrid, has lived with his owner Toshinori, a retired hybrid psychologist, his whole life. He takes on some of the shelter’s most difficult cases as fosters, and so Izuku has learned to be the best foster-mate possible for scared and abused hybrids. At first, Katsuki, a cat hybrid who’s been kept in a tiny apartment nearly his whole life, seems just like any of the other awful cases they’ve seen, but somehow, Izuku and him grow a lot closer than usual over the course of his stay. Eventually, the question becomes: could he stay forever?

“Izuku knows what the Hanahaki does. He knows what his options are, and sure, they aren’t great. In fact, they’re pretty horrible. The list is short and daunting. There are still flower petals on his pillow."

In which Izuku has Hanahaki Disease, and Katsuki's furious.

And you're crushing on him, and he's just so cute, and the baby's cute, and what's a guy to do, anyway?

Ever since they were little, Izuku and Katsuki’s families have had family dinners. It’s just them and their parents, and that’s fine. Until more people get dragged in. (And try to set Izuku and Katsuki up.)

for twinstars week day four - family

{todobaku}

It started from a normal evening to a small argument that made them go on vacation that made Katsuki realize that he wanted something more from Shouto.

Bakugou, Denki, Midoriya, Momo and Todoroki all end up in a McDonald's one early morning. A suggestion of a movie and a credit card reveal later and the teens are off to spend the day together.

They all know that it's Todoroki's father's credit card, but none of them care.

Bakugo and Todoroki both find themselves living together with disabilities, helping each other get by. In doing so, they fall in love.

{rairpairs & other ships}

“You haven’t changed at all, have ya?” he observed, pinching her cheek affectionately.

Ochako batted his hand away from her cheeks for the second time that morning, wondering if he had a thing for them. “That doesn’t even make any sense, Bakugou. I’m from the past. Of course I haven’t changed.”

“Makes perfect sense,” Bakugou countered, closing his teeth around a bite of eggs. “You were doing this same shit yesterday morning.”

My entry for the day 2 prompt of Kacchako week: otherworldly.

Bakugou watches with something akin to affection when Shinsou starts playing with his dog until she jumps all around him and is barking excitedly. He has never seen the both of them so content before. The Sergeant is always so concentrated at College grounds, either that or she’s calm but still looking out for him. Bakugou has seen them during lectures, at lunch at their usual table, during their ways to Bakugou’s dorm and to Shinsou’s apartment off campus, he has seen them through their late-night-skyping sessions and in countless pictures on Sergeant Barkowitz’ Instagram. He has seen their best but not their worst, and that makes Bakugou wonder if he’ll ever be such a great companion to Shinsou like the Sergeant is.

"Shouta could have never imagined reaching this point in his life. He honestly expected to die at some point when he was younger, alone somewhere in an alleyway, killed in action during his hero work maybe."

Instead he's in a warm hospital bed and surrounded by some of the people he cares most about.

Shinsou Hitoshi had never had a family before, and he refuses to screw it up. But when a villain attacks him and his new little sister, he may have lost the only family he's ever had.

Bakugou never wanted to be mated. Especially not to a villain but it didn't look like he had any choice in the matter. The only question now was: will he ever escape?

OR,

The author loves Bakugou and loves to make him suffer so Dabi kidnaps him and forces our favourite blasty boy to become his mate. It goes from bad to good to bad and back to good.

While working together as pro heroes, Iida, Bakugou and Todoroki are taken captive. The situation is strange: none of their Quirks work, and they aren’t tortured or killed – in fact, they never see their captors. There is nothing to do but wait.

Things are tense between the three of them, but Iida finds the situation bringing him closer to Bakugou than he thought possible. But who knows how this will change things between when they get out…

Quirk: Infatuation - The user of this quirk affects two people by touching them at the same time, they then fall into a state of infatuation with each other; they could be affected by this for up to a week.

Iida and Bakugou get affected by an infatuation quirk that makes them be sweet to each other. So sweet, that it could give you cavities. Warning: This story will contain an excessive amount of pet names, hence the title.

Other Fandoms Fics:

Recently married, Harry and Draco are tasked with raising a four-year old Teddy, whose emerging gender identity brings up an array of questions, fears, and revelations for them when they realise that Teddy might be transgender.

When Draco learns he's pregnant again, he blames his husband. Harry, however, couldn't be happier.

Jake dated two guys in college, but doesn't realise until he introduces one of them to Amy.

The family learns a secret about Schneider

alex said the far scarier sentence that at the same time was more comforting than anything the teenager had ever heard before. “she,” alex mumbled under his- no, her- breath, voice beginning to choke up, “was sitting on her bed, in her room. her,” he- she, she- sighed and spoke just a little louder, just a little surer. “her name is alex, and she’s a girl.” alex smiled to herself, so small it was probably barely considered one. she didn’t care; she finally felt whole.

or: in another world, elena isn't the only alvarez daughter (but it takes alex some time to figure that out)

#monthly fic rec #fic rec #bnha #bkdk #tdbk #kacchako #bakushin #bakuiida #bakudabi #erasermic #Harry Potter #drarry #odaat #b99 #peraltiago

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jrob64 · 5 years

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CS Fic Rec Monday

My @csficrecmonday recommendations are all the stories by my sweet friend @kymbersmith-90

She’s written such a variety of stories that you’re sure to find one (or 18!) you like. A few of these are finished, most are in progress but she tries to update as often as possible when life doesn’t get in the way.

Let’s begin with the stories that got me hooked on her writing - The Royal Realities series. So far, there are 3 parts plus some outtakes. Don’t let the number of chapters put you off. They are short and very sweet! Actor Killian Jones meets/falls in love with/marries Princess Emma, next in line to the throne.

If you want more stories about the royals, she’s also started to write The Swan Scandal and At Her Majesty’s Service.

Three of my favorite AUs she’s writing are Fairytales, Ethical Conflicts and Figure it Out. All of them are completely different versions of Killian and Emma, but they are perfect couples in each one.

She’s also done a couple of supernatural stories, one actually based on the show Supernatural, Divine Intervention, and the other, titled Slayer, which was written for @cssns and is based on Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Kym wrote a lovely one-shot as a gift to me which is canon compliant to episode 4x02, Thawing Out, and she also wrote a smutty two-shot called Exposure, which is fantastic. Patience is a canon divergent piece that she plans to add to in the future.

She’s touched on her love of sports by writing a Snooker-inspired story, The Crucible Curse (including a futuretake for it) and one based on a true story about the relationship between a footballer and a child battling cancer titled Onside.

Finally, she’s writing two stories that involve spies, FBI agents and criminal activities- Look What You Made Me Do and Anonymous.

As I’ve said, she’s written a wide variety of different stories, but they are all amazing! She has many other ideas for stories and is constantly adding to her list, so if you are like me and get addicted to her writing, you should have plenty to read for the foreseeable future!

#csfrm #cs ff #cs fic #cs rec #captainswan #ouat

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onceuponaprincessworld · 5 years

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Captain Swan Complete MC p.5

Happy New Year everyone! To celebrate I made a rec list with complete fics that deseve all your love and comments! Happy reading!

If you are intrested you can find my other lists here.

To Play the Game (and win your heart), @hookedonapirate

Some people would call it a job, but to Emma and her sister, Milah, it’s a game of the heart. Play by the rules and you’ll never get hurt.Whatever you call swindling wealthy men out of their money, this con-artist duo has it down to a tee. Milah sets up an available, rich man and gets him to marry her. Emma seduces and lures the husband into having an affair so he’ll get caught in the act. He then loses his money in the ensuing divorce.The sisters wear a coat of armor around their hearts to keep them intact, but when they set their sights on their next mark, professional golfer Killian “Hook” Jones, Emma never imagined how hard the game could be and how easily her heart could be stolen—especially when she switches roles with Milah and becomes the one exchanging vows with the gorgeous multi-millionaire.

Finding The Altar, @profdanglaisstuff

The only person Killian Jones loves more than his best mate David Nolan is David's sister Emma Swan. He knows he can never act on his feelings... but what happens when she acts on hers?

On the Two, @lifeinahole27

He’s one or two solid days of drinking away from needing to check into AA, and she’s one performance interview away from being able to move closer to home. Their paths were unlikely to cross until they end up in the same place and find a way to help each other out, even if they don’t realize it. How and why they meet and intertwine is against the odds, and definitely against the rules.

Single Riders Won’t Stay Single, @let-it-raines

Emma Swan gets in the "single riders" line for a rollercoaster only to be paired with a handsome stranger for what turns out to be the ride of her life.

Alii dimidium Lunam (The Other Half of the Moon), @artistic-writer

Mongrel Killian Jones, packless and alone, finds Emma by chance in a bar, but she neglects to mention she is running away from her pack responsibilities...responsibilities that her strict father and alpha, David Nolan, expects of his only child and heir to the Misthaven pack. None of which include falling in love with a mongrel. Loosely based Lady and the Tramp AU.

Beastly, @xemmaloveskillianx

Meet Killian Jones. Attractive. Wealthy. Arrogant. He has it all… until he becomes aggressively unattractive outside as he is on the inside. Cursed to find someone that can see him better than he can see himself, he hides away, because who could ever learn to love a beast?

The Crucible Curse, @kymbersmith-90

A chance encounter on the morning of her first day at work results in Emma meeting a mysterious, heavily tattooed, pretty-eyed Irish man. But there are some secrets he's not yet willing to share with her.

Hook-Echo, @initiala

They're in a rut. That's what Deputy Emma Swan tells herself over and over again as her boyfriend, Killian Jones, grows more and more distant, and more frustrated, due to complications with his dissertation research on tornado formation. But storm season's more than halfway over and this dry spell is doing nothing to make things easier for him--or their relationship. Will everything blow over, or is there a greater storm on the horizon?

Holding On to Pieces of Us, @ilovemesomekillianjones

One year after the disappearance of the love of her life, Emma Swan is struggling. She’s losing hope, consciousness, and she might be losing her mind. After receiving life altering news, Emma will be faced with more than one difficult decision. Her choices seem bleak, until a new choice is offered, one she couldn’t have fathomed even in the crazy hallucinations she’s been having. Will she embark on a future that’s different than the one that was ripped from her just one short year ago?

The Gift Receipt, @welllpthisishappening

It genuinely makes sense in her head.

After all, Mary Margaret is being Mary Margaret and Emma just needs five seconds to herself and for her friends to get off her back and saying she can’t talk to Killian Jones because she and Killian Jones once went on a very bad date is the perfect excuse. It’s also not true, but whatever. It works.

Until Emma needs to bring someone home for Christmas. To get the entire town off her back. So, she comes up with another plan and another lie and pretending to get back together with a guy she was never actually with will make their inevitable break-up incredibly easy. It makes sense. Seriously.

That is, of course, until Killian agrees and there’s far too much pie and radio hits of the 70s and opinions on animated Christmas classics. It gets a little more complicated after that.

The Princess of White Chapel, @katie-dub

Dr Killian Jones is having a terrible day. He’s got a mission, he’s got a time machine, he’s got … drunk. What could possibly go wrong?

The Dancing Thief, @trueloveseyeroll

Pretending to be a noblewoman might be the dumbest thing Emma has ever agreed to do. And she’s not sure if meeting Lord Killian Jones made the whole thing better or worse. (Better. Definitely better.)

#cs ff #cs fic #cs au #cs rec ff #cs rec fic #cs recs #cs fanfiction #cs fanfics #cs rec list #cs recs ff #my rec list

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