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afewproblems · 8 months

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Season 2 Halloween AU Part Four

Part One, Part Two, Part Three

A very big thank you to @strangersteddierthings for chatting with me today and being such a great sounding board for the next update!

Synopsis: What if Eddie had been at Tina's Halloween Party in Season Two? Featuring Steve!Whump, Stancy Breakup, and Eddie just trying to keep up with all these new revelations about who King-Steve actually is...

***

"So…I have to ask," Eddie blurts out, cutting through the awkward silence that has fallen between them, "how were you gonna pick up your car before you ran into me?"

"I don't think it counts as running into you, if you were waiting for me Munson," Steve side steps the question expertly, flashing him a strange smirk that seems out of place. It falls after a second and twists into something pained.

"I was hoping Nance would take me," Steve says eventually, his voice soft, "which was pretty stupid in hindsight, 'specially cuz she was counting on me to drive her this morning, which--"

Steve cuts himself, snapping his mouth shut with a harsh click of teeth, he shakes his head and lifts his hand to run roughly through his hair.

"Doesn't matter anymore".

Eddie holds his breath, feeling the conversation begin to shift. It's as though he's stepped onto a tightrope and any wrong move could potentially send him over the edge.

He settles for nodding once, turning the key in the ignition.

Steve sighs and lets himself fall back into his seat, "I know you know already, the whole fucking school does, Billy saw to that," Steve gestures to his face, "say what you really want to ask".

Eddie's fingers tighten around the wheel as he turns them out of the parking lot, fighting the immediate urge to say, 'why did Miss Priss throw it all away?'

"You think I believe the rumours that come out of that shithole?" Eddie lies, keeping his eyes on the road this time.

He can feel Steve's unimpressed stare as they continue down mainstreet.

"Right, so you had no clue I was in detention?"

Eddie chews the inside of his cheek to fight the sly grin that begins to creep over his face, "Alright smart ass".

He hazards another glance at Steve as they begin to hit the residential area, he looks so different from the night before.

His limbs are loose, tension free, if it weren't for the heavy bags under Steve's eyes and the nervous tap of his fingers on the passenger door, Eddie would think he was finally relaxed.

"I knew a fight definitely happened, it's Hargrove," Eddie says slowly, carefully weighing his words, "but I typically prefer to hear the whole sordid story from the source before I pass any judgements, ya know?"

Steve doesn't say anything as they continue driving through residential the houses getting progressively bigger as they go.

"Did you," Steve pauses and breathes out slowly before shaking his head and lifting his face to meet Eddie's gaze, "is that offer for something stronger still open?"

Eddie smiles, "I think that can be arranged".

***

Eddie pulls over beside Tina Cline's house, wincing as the right front tire rolls over the curb and bounces the van as it lands on the street once more, startling a snort out of Steve.

"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up Harrington," Eddie huffs as Steve shoots him a grin.

"Didn't say a word," Steve hums, unbuckling himself from the seat. Eddie watches as he opens the door and hops out. For a moment Eddie worries Steve will pull the same disappearing act from last night but he simply stops beside his car door and motions for Eddie to roll down his window.

Eddie cracks his door open instead, "window's broken, what?"

Steve rolls his eyes, "whatever Munson, you know the way? It's north on 5th and--"

"Then two more rights, yeah man," Eddie says with a laugh in his voice, "I dropped you off remember?"

"Fuck off," Steve huffs out, he's grinning though.

Steve swings the Beemer’s door open and slides in. He turns on the ignition and flinches at the loud burst of music from the stereo, the volume obviously set from the mood of the previous night.

'I want to know what love is, I want you to show me--'

Steve slams his hand against the console, cutting off the song with a harsh crack.

The van is parked just behind the Beemer so Eddie can't see Steve's face, but his head drops down onto the wheel for just the briefest moment before he slowly lifts it, turns on his signal and pulls away from the curb.

***

Steve beats him to the house.

He's getting out of the car, which is parked on the long driveway as Eddie pulls up to the street.

Eddie hops out of the van, hiking his backpack higher up on his shoulders, not bothering to lock it. Who would even want his shitty van among the BMWs and Mercedes parked down this street --hell, Eddie could have sworn he saw a Jag three houses down.

Eddie stops short of the lawn. The Harrington house is so different in the light of day, the strange emptiness that seemed to ooze out of the dark windows the night before has disappeared, leaving an ordinary house in its wake.

"Well?" Steve calls out as he pulls a pair of keys from his back pocket and spins them once on his finger, "you coming or what Munson?"

Eddie rolls his eyes and jogs to catch up to Steve who turns on his heel to stride up the walk. He stuffs the key into the deadbolt and swings one of the double doors inwards before shucking off his sneakers.

No shoes? Fucking rich people man.

Steve must notice Eddie's expression because he blushes and shrugs, "I know, I know, but my parents will be home for Thanksgiving this year so…may as well…"

He gestures around the sterile foyer with a tight smile, as though it explains everything.

If anything, Eddie has more questions.

Steve cuts off the thought by clearing his throat, "we should smoke outside, last thing I need is for you to burn a hole in the couch or something".

Eddie steps over the threshold and has to stop himself from whistling, were the ceilings always this high in this place?

He lifts his foot to unlace his left chuck, snorting at the strange little table in the middle of the foyer. A giant vase sits atop it filled with a mixture of what have to be silk flowers --no way they were real. He pulls the shoe off and tosses it to the side before lifting his right foot.

Eddie never had the greatest balance so he hops back and forth with his right foot in the air before hopping as close as he can to the wall of the foyer and leaning back against it.

He finally gets the knot in his laces undone and throws the sneaker to the floor, dropping his right foot to the hardwood.

Eddie looks up to find Steve staring with a bemused expression on his face, he ignores the wide hazel eyes and removes the backpack from his shoulders -which can't have been helping the balance issue.

Eddie unzips the top and yanks out the trusty metal lunchbox, sliding a wicked grin into place.

"You said something about outside?"

***

By the time they've settled, facing one another on a couple of pool loungers, the sun has begun to dip low, painting the patio and empty pool a warm glowing copper. It catches Steve's hair, which shines like gold in the dying sunlight, like some Autumnal Fae King--

Eddie wants to slap himself, suddenly thankful for the November wind that cuts through the backyard, forcing him to chillout.

He picks up the grinder from his lunchbox, unscrewing the cap to open it.

"You good with a joint this evening my good King?"

He pours a handful of a new strain Rick let him try the other day into the grinder and starts twisting. It's not something he would typically share with anyone other than Jeff, but Steve seemed like he could use something a little more special tonight.

Eddie looks up after a beat of silence, "yo, Major Tom, you with me?"

Steve's face is pinched, tilted towards the empty pool, "please don't call me that," he says quietly.

"Major Tom?"

Steve raises his eyes to meet Eddie's gaze, his mouth cuts a hard line across his face, the typical easy grin it usually houses is gone.

"King-Steve," he runs a hand through his hair, letting the fingers linger to grip and pull, "I just, that's not who I am anymore, I don't--"

Steve swallows harshly, "that's all anyone could talk about this morning".

He drops his voice and octave, "oh, King Steve is so pussy whipped he let his girl fuck Jonathan Byers before she dumped him".

"Is that what Hargrove said?" Eddie asks quietly as he pours out a portion of weed onto a paper.

Steve shakes his head, "that was Tommy, but that wasn't why I hit him".

Eddie nods, and lifts the joint to his mouth to run his tongue along the edge of the paper. Steve watches him from the lounger, his eyes follow the movement before he blinks and continues.

"Tommy and I had been best friends since we were five, he uh, he knows a lot about me," Steve lifts his hand to his mouth and chews the nail of his thumb briefly before dropping it back into his lap.

"Stuff I don't tell anyone, stuff he knows will hurt".

Eddie nods, twisting the joint closed, he can kind of understand that, although the only person in his life that knew him like that was Wayne.

And Wayne would never hurt him.

Did Steve really not have anyone else like that in his life, someone he could tell anything to that wouldn't look at him weird or judge him. Someone safe.

"Anyway, Hargrove started in on me after that, but he's been fucking with me for awhile so," Steve shrugs again, "he saw his big opportunity here".

"Hargrove's been messing with you?" Eddie asks sharply as he pours more weed onto another paper. He lifts it and runs his tongue along the edge of the paper before twisting it into shape. When he looks up, Steve's ears have gone slightly pink and he's sitting strangely, slightly hunched and twisted.

"Yeah," Steve says after a moment, he clears his throat and straightens his back, "yeah, it's just been at practice so far, and I thought it was just because he wanted to one up me for my spot but," he shakes his head, "it's getting worse".

"You know, I have a bit of a reputation around school," Eddie says slowly, carefully, watching as Steve freezes and looks at Eddie with wide eyes.

"The Hellfire club is more than just the game we're playing, it's also kind of a sanctuary for kids that don't have anyone to lean on, we look after each other," Eddie continues, ignoring the way Steve relaxes slightly, "you wouldn't need to play or anything but if you need somewhere to sit at lunch now…"

Steve looks at Eddie for a long time, his expression blank, guarded, "really? Just like that?"

"Yeah man, besides I get to use my 'Mean and Scary Guy' persona on these fuckers so it's a win-win for me".

Steve grins, raising one skeptical eyebrow, "mean and scary?"

Eddie bristles a little bit at the questioning tone in Steve's voice and can't quite swallow the urge to snarl, "yeah I mean you looked plenty scared of the town freak yesterday".

Steve winces and immediately starts to shake his head, inching forward in his seat so he's even closer to Eddie, their knees are almost touching.

"That's not, I wasn't," he stops and takes a deep breath, "I was upset about Nancy and it was so dark outside, the trees--"

"You afraid of the dark Harrington?" Eddie cuts him off, the lingering irritation still simmers in his voice as he coos.

Steve just looks at him, there's something strange about the haunted expression on his face that makes the hair on the back of Eddie's arms stand on end.

"Things happen in the dark, in the woods," Steve says softly, his eyes drift to the empty pool again.

Eddie opens his mouth to ask Steve what the hell he means by that, when a voice shouts across the yard.

"Steve? STEVE?!"

The sound of someone running through the grass has them both of their feet, the joints forgotten on the pool loungers.

"Dustin?"

A kid, he can't be more than twelve or thirteen, skids into the porchlight that has replaced the last copper rays of evening light, the sun fully set by now. The kid's blue eyes are wide underneath a mop of curly hair and hat, he's breathing hard.

"I need your help".

Tag List: @eriquin @luvinthefreaks @cinnamon-mushroomabomination @goodolefashionedloverboi @ellietheasexylibrarian @bambibiest @sadboislovebeans @howincrediblysapphicofyou @coleys-a-nerd @whycantiuseunderscore @airconditioning123 @xxfiction-is-my-realityxx @corrodedbisexual @starman-jpg @ilovecupcakesandtea @yoriposts @clumsiluni @pelinelin @phantomcat94 @lololol-1234 @anaibis @airconditioning123 @steveshairspray @hellfireone @sunswathe @eddielives1986 @tentativeghost @robin-not-batman @estrellami-1 @manda-panda-monium @tinyplanet95 @perseus-notjackson

Part Five

and for some peeps that I think may be interested! @steddierthings @steddie-there @steves-strapcollection @outpastthebrakers @henderdads @stevesbipanic

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gideonisms · 4 months

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eowyn should have been a lesbian. Eowyn/faramir is like, fine, but it misses the point of eowyn for all baby dyke eowyn stans which is not that she longs for glory in battle and doesn't realize war is ugly and brutal, but that she's caught between two awful options and she doesn't want to be given one based on her gender. She's not in love with aragorn, she envies him because she finds the tasks he has in life more preferable and she hero worships him. Is this the point Tolkien was trying to make? Well, no,

#look it is LESS objectionable than other similar fantasy storylines because tolkien is making a point about the brutality of war #but i do think he correctly observes a particular impulse in some women without fully understanding the underlying tensions #he's like. for reasons unknown some women would prefer to face horrible dangerous circumstances than stay at home & tend the family castle #don't you see the castle is the important thing!#the castle is more important yes that's not the POINT #anyway. it will not be until many years later that some of those baby dykes will be able to articulate the vague feeling of betrayal #guy jobs are horrible and exploitative too on this we agree. but you see some of us will die if we have to figure out how to be nurturing

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boatboysrowout · 1 year

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i am So Very Interested in the burger king vs mcdonalds au if you're willing to share more 👁️👁️

i'm so glad you asked

it's all grian's fault, of course. 'it'll be great if all my friends got a summer job around the same place!' he said. 'it'll be fun hanging out on our lunch breaks!' he said. 'this is a genius idea, nothing will go wrong!' he said.

it goes wrong in less than a day.

it all starts with scar's job application getting rejected from burger king. he takes this very personally, as the man who interviews him is grian's friend who had just been hired the day before, and scar had been assured he would get an easy in. ren, however, didn't like how many questions scar was asking about their ice cream machine and where their security cameras were placed.

so out scar goes, sulking his way through a successful interview to work at the white castle down the road, joining bdubs and cleo. the rest of grians friends end up scattered in shops around the two restaurants with varying degrees of satisfaction with their summer jobs.

grian, as he is wont to do, waffles around a bit before committing to a job. he's pretty sure he's going to join bigb at the library, but before he decides, he goes to pay scar a visit to make sure he's still not sulking about the burger king fiasco.

that, too, is a mistake.

grian doesn't know what happened. he swears he just meant to stop in and say hi. and maybe play a little prank! just a funny little joke! only he didn't realize how much hair spray bdubs uses and how flammable that made his hair, and really, how could grian have known that the second after he fled the scene of his crime, scar would walk in at the exact wrong moment holding a lighter, making him look like the guiltiest motherfucker on earth?

it's absolutely not his fault.

but.

now scar is out of a job again, and he's gotten it in his head that the only way to get his revenge on ren is to work at the mcdonalds across the street from the burger king and, to quote scar, "make him regret not taking my offer." and listen. this is the third job scar's had in two days. it kind of feels a little bit like grian's responsibility to make sure he doesn't get fired from this one too. but it'll be fine. what else could go wrong?

so much. so, so much.

scar almost immediately goes off the rails. he creates his own customer rewards program in which he refuses to serve a customer if they don't pledge their undying loyalty to the mcdonalds in exchange for scar certified McReputation points. this somehow is remarkably successful despite grain's repeated warnings that this is a scam- scar pulls some strings and grian is forced into kitchen duty after he tries to warn one too many customers. martyn and ren catch word of this and try institute a similar program, albeit to a much less successful degree. scar, however, cannot let that stand.

grian also cannot let that stand, but this is more due to martyn coming over every day during his lunch break and annoying grian by telling increasingly convoluted jokes all ending with a punchline relating to the mcdonald's broken ice cream machine.

so that afternoon grian and scar pay the burger king a visit. scar goes up to the front counter and gives ren and martyn the longest sales pitch of his life, something about cereal, and while they're distracted grain climbs through the drive through window and smashes their ice cream machine with a baseball bat.

that's the beginning of the end.

ren takes the attack way too personally. he gets naked, makes martyn crown him with a shitty cardboard crown, dubs himself the burger king, and declares war on the mcdonalds.

he and martyn set out to recruit for their army amongst the rest of their friends in the area to varying degrees of success. they first go to visit joel in his art shop, but quickly decide to leave after the first thing they hear upon walking in is a conversation in the back room in which someone appears to be blackmailing joel over something in the basement.

they decide to try impulse and tango down at the arcade, and both of them are so confused by ren's sales pitch they just agree to make him go away (they do the same thing when scar and grian visit them a few hours later).

ren and martyn's visit to the white castle is the worst yet. instead of walking in and recruiting bdubs and cleo with their impassioned speech and thirst for justice, the burger king and his hand walk into an active warzone.

there's smoke everywhere. bdubs is screaming. martyn swears he hears a gun go off. cleo is cackling. someone runs past them entirely engulfed in flames. as ren and martyn make a hasty retreat etho cheerfully greets them from his seat on a bench outside the building, tinkering with something that looks suspiciously like a pipe bomb.

they decide to take a break from recruiting after that.

meanwhile, scar and grian have been busy. they've recruited jimmy and scott from the florists down the road to launch a yelp smear campaign against the burger king, tanking them from a respectable 3.8 stars to 1 star in an afternoon. to a normal human being, this would mean nothing, but they text a screenshot of this to martyn and ren with the caption 'this u?'

martyn and ren have never once reacted to anything normally or proportionality in their life.

skizz, one of their regulars, also takes great offense to this. he insists that this is a devastating blow against the burger king's honor, and vows to get revenge.

no one's sure exactly how he does it, but within an hour he manages to trace one of the bad reviews back to jimmy and promptly doxes him, getting him fired due to the content of his surprisingly popular google+ account.

scar and grian, after laughing hysterically for an hour over the fact that jimmy was a google+ influencer, continue their reign of terror over the burger king by taking a selfie of them next to the burger king drive through menu, which they somehow have relocated to the roof of the mcdonalds.

it's the last straw for ren.

decked out in a red cape made of the burger king curtains and armed with a spatula and the fury of a thousands suns, ren marches across the street to the mcdonalds and challenges scar and grian to a winner-takes-all duel.

a crowd begins to gather, with nearly everybody grian knows save for the people involved in what has been dubbed the white castle war, forming a loose arch behind ren and martyn as they begin to chant for a fight.

grian and scar, who came outside to see what all the commotion was about, both predictably panic at the sight of two men in capes charging towards them backed by a crowd chanting for blood. grian tries to claw his way back up the roof while scar, possessed by the spirit of apollo, does the only thing he can and chucks a potato at ren's head.

that potato hits ren square in the forehead and knocks him out cold.

the crowd goes silent.

martyn, thinking ren is dead, drops to his knees and cradles his unconscious body close to his chest and dramatically confesses his everlasting love, vowing to never leave ren's side and to never stop spreading the tale of ren's 'grey long and strong' bits.

grian, upon witnessing this, realizes to his abject horror that he also has gay feelings for his manager.

he has no idea what to do with these feelings, and the crowd is still chanting fight, and he's experienced a lot of stress and unexpected emotions in the last five minutes, so he really can't be blamed when he turns on his heel and punches scar in the face.

scar, surprised but absolutely willing to go along with it, punches grian back, and they begin beating the shit out of each other in the most pathetic fist fight a mcdonalds parking lot has ever witnessed.

meanwhile, there's police cars and fire trucks with sirens on speeding down the road past them, and someone in the crowd realizes 'oh shit are those all going to the white castle?'

so the crowd immediately abandons the world's worst fight to go see what the hell has been going down in the white castle.

it takes a bit, but, with martyn still confessing his love and sobbing over ren's unconscious body, grian finally manages to land a lucky hit and knocks scar out, sending him crumpling to the ground. for the second time that day, grian realizes with horror what he's done, and frantically tries to run to get a medic only to trip over scar's unconscious body and knock himself out as well.

The headline of the local newspaper the next morning reads as follows:

...anyone wanna ask me about my last life mall au

#this is the new dumbest thing ive ever written #anyway thanks for asking. so sorry to inflict this on you #i had to cut so many scenes from this bc it was just too long so if there's any characters or scenes youre curious about hmu #more specifically: Ask Me About The White Castle Pipe Bomb C Plot #shoutout to lew for helping me plot this out. ill never forget u #third life #desert duo #renchanting #grian #gtws #renthedog #martyn inthelittlewood #cats words

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glassedplanets · 3 months

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still thinking about Worst Possible Timing Bodyswap AU

#my art #one piece fanart #one piece sanji #zosan #i guess..... it isn't NOT zosan #took some major liberties with what capone bege's castle looks like because w/e #things can be a little dungeoney with dramatic lighting. for me. as a treat #once again intended for this to be a sketch then it grew too many limbs somehow #one piece tag #bodyswap au tag #once is an accident and twice is a coincidence that necessitates its own tag I Fucking Guess #anyways. the thing is that i am terminally incapable of picking at a seam for AU purposes without following the thread ALL the goddamn way #'what happens with-' yes i have an answer #let's see if this one surprises me by staying under 10k words or not

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mar64ds · 5 months

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The tragedy of Seam losing the only other aromantic person in the card kingdom... I would reach high levels of nihilism too

#i hope some ruddins are aro too. but for the sake of this joke #lets say jevil is the only other aro person in this place #I like making posts about aro headcanons as if they were canon things in the story #its okay seam lives in castle town now there are many aros there #i've heard the prince there is aro himself #deltaruneundertale

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voidedjuice · 23 days

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Some sidecharacters from Ilta & Cecily's thing

Cecily's adoptive sibling and Ilta's uncle

#my art #artists on tumblr #oc #original character #my artwork #drawing #traditional art #als an aro ace agender guy cecily picked up when raiding the castle she now lives in #they were working there as a maid & througj various circumstances ended up helping cecily & thus got spared (& later turned)#iltas uncle (name in progress) is just some guy running a motel with a bit too many unusual clients #during his hitman days he got real good at pretending not to notice things hed be better off not knowing so he Doesnt See any of it though #might post more about them later if i feel like it #theyre sorta hanging out in the background of the loops but tbh theyve both got enough stuff going on to be the protags of their own stuff #oc lore #ah yeah feel free to send me asks abt them if they interest you ive got a lot of stuff for them thought out #even if i barely ever draw them :')

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spookywriters · 8 days

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I can't recall atm, but I THINK I set a goal of five books this year??? And if that's the case then wow, I've already met the goal which is wild actually!

#yes a few of these are books for young adults/pre teens #but they told interesting stories tbh so hey #the current book is in the adult range #both written by a person of color AND containing lgbt content #the latter being unexpected! Just reading along and suddenly whao lesbians!#the obnoxious thing for me is trying to find books that aren't part of a series #like one book was part of a series that's 9 books in its FIRST arc #and sure it was a good book but like...eugh #I'm too lazy to track down that many books lmao #that said though one book was by the same lady who wrote Howl's Moving Castle #and ngl the way its written makes me think I'll love HMC #so I've ordered that and it'll be here uh #someday hopefully haha

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antihibikase-archive · 9 months

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> [ What did you eat today? ] > [ What author is your fav? ] > [ Where do you go on weekends when you wanna get away? ]

> I didn't eat a thing. > But that's how it should be. > No matter what they ask me, > I won't tell them anything!

#Pokemon #Pokemon Black and White #Pokemon Black and White 2 #Gym Leader Cheren #My Art #((He is so so tiny. I just wanted to doodle him in his regular colors..))#((I love how his cardigan tends to look inconsistent when I draw it but. It's definitely fluffy rather than plaid or with patterns..))#((Also I intended to draw him without his fluffy outer but I LOVE his poofy sleeves but! His polo underneath has long sleeves too :] ))#((The ruffled kind probably!))#((Aspertia City's angel that gets a reputation for being a heartbreaker because he turned down every confession ever-))#((-and once got so annoyed that he sent over Nate to rain on them and use thunder.))#((Caption is Trickle's cover of Idol! Funnily enough it is a Slater song to me. Somehow.))#((It's the whole 'avoiding interviews and questions about his personal life' thing))#((Even after post-BW2 and Relic Castle he absolutely REFUSES to tell anything about himself.))#((So there are many rumors surrounding him. The best friend/beloved of The Hero of Truth. Mentor of The Hero of Ideals.))#((Confidant of Bianca Alabaster- the professor's assistant and up and coming researcher.))#((Trainee of Hilda Weiss- battle prodigy and Battle Subway's shining star.))#((Mentor of Hugh Obsidian- the Team Plasma hunter who was chosen as Grimsley's successor.))#((Mentor of Rosa Whitefield- the new Pokestar Studios starlet and Skyla's possible successor.))#((AND he's Grimsley's brother.))#((The Heart reborn! The ghost of Undella Bay! The pure vessel of Kyurem!))#((And yet he stays silly. Divorced. Live laugh love. Cringe even.))#BW/BW2 Rewrite - Blur / Blight

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lucalicatteart · 1 year

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Poll adventure (paventure? lol) Day 5: read the small story tidbit below the poll for more details, OR just vote based on initial impression

(✦ see past poll results + further information HERE (link) ✦)

The winning option of yesterday's poll was that the adventurer should choose a suspicious egg as his gift ….

"He carefully plucks the egg from the gift pile, wrapping it in spare fabric and tucking it away inside a small wooden box within his backpack for safety. Not really wanting to stick around and get accidentally pulled into scary underground tunnels or something, he shakily bids the Well Creature farewell, and continues on through the forest, just following whatever he can find that looks vaguely like a path.. He makes an occasional stop to pick up a cool rock, harvest berries, or let the cat play in the grass, but mostly just wanders aimlessly, lost in daydreams and contemplations of how his New Fun Life Of Spontaneous Adventure is going so far......

Eventually, the forest tapers off into a more open area of land, hosting what seems like a humble little village. By this point, it's nearly nightfall, which reminds him that he's actually quite afraid of the dark, so he scrambles about town for a moment until finally finding the local Inn. After nervously stumbling inside, he rents the cheapest room available, then sits alone, snacking on some free leftover food scraps and plain water. It's been a tiring day, but in the spirit of becoming an adventurer and pushing himself to have as many experiences as possible, he figures he could hang around downstairs a little longer, perhaps get one more thing done before bed -- What should he do?"

#paventure posting #polls #choose your own adventure #Sorry I have the opposite problem to people who make characters who are too overpowered and good at everything lol #Everyone has to be fumbling around in roles that are not actually suited towards them that much (like a wandering #adventurer who is also afraid of the dark . not generally all that brave. instead of a trusty steed or something useful #he has like 5 coins and a piece of bread and a little cat. etc #) but that's the point! He wants to get out and try. He doesnt' actually know much what being an adventurer entails but he still wants to #go and adventure and see the world. leave whatever his old life was behind and just let himself be led by whatever paths happen #to present themselves to him - in the hopes that at some point along the way he'll end up with something fulfilling or know #where he actually belongs. blah blah generic adventuring stuff. so on and so forth. He can't have too specific of motivations really #just by the nature of everything he does being randomly voted on lol. So just 'generally seeking to be on a journey' works.#I wonder if that's the fantasy world version of a mid-life crisis. People reach a certain age and are just like 'I'm going to leave #my village and wander around and see what happens!!' and sometimes it works out and they become a famous #cartographer or a well known knight or work their way into a job in castle or etc. etc. and then others just return home after #like a week or something with no money and a broken arm lol #ANYWAY #I wanted to have so many options since an Inn is a good place where many branching paths could come from like. there could be such a #variety of people to talk to and things you could do there. but I'm still trying to limit it to 6 or less options each time #I wanted to have a second mysterious hooded figure described as trying very hard to look much more mysterious than #the first hooded figure but there isn't room for that with the text limits lol. but I thought it would be funny with like.. the fantasy #trope of there always being some shadowy guy in a corner in a tavern or something. but then you look and there's another even more shadowy #guy. then you look in the next corner and there's an even MORE shadowy guy. and sometimes they all stare at each other from #across the room. one of them pulls their hood down a bit and the other does it and they keep doing it until their faces are so covered they #cant see anymore. etc. etc. ANYWYA Ghbjhb #yeah! day 5!

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suspendedinbush · 1 year

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hiiihihihihi hiii youuuu simmy my beloved loml you i juuust watched howl's moving castle for the first time tday (ik appalling srry) but the entire tim i was thinkinng abt you my beloved and now i want to know abt yr r/s au <33 as much details as you dont mind saying pls <333 bc i was thinking like it would actually!! work sooo well for them ike r being not that conventionally attractive , and growing old w/a big nose while s still finds him just soooo pretty and also being dramatically vian himself AND swallowing! a STAR! and having a heavy heart that belongs to remus like itys sooooo it fits sooo well, but Also howl being a welshman is making me think it could work either way too! esp w/the turning into a crow thing paralleling werewolf tranforms and sirius instead being the son of a mother who would sell him out like sophie im!!!!!! i also know yr basing the au sorta on the book so im wondering which roles ud see fit instead! but aah im just my brain is so abuzz im so excited for whatever u plan to do however u plan to do it! this got wayy too long srry love u MWAH

LAYLA OMG!! firstly hi hi hi hello love <33 SECOND YOU WATCHED IT!!! ahhh having a little party in celebration also tell me everything what did you think??? (i'm running into your inbox right now just so you know!) and you thought of me…literally handing you my heart on a silver platter!! MWAH yours forever <333

also okay the au… (under the cut because minor spoilers and also this is so fucking long)

it definitely started as like taking direct inspiration from the book with a few nods to the movie (like the walking on air scene because obviously) but it’s evolved a lot in the past months mostly because i felt that my sophie-remus wasn’t remus enough and needed a more remus-like journey and destination in the story (not sure any of this will make sense with absolutely no context about what i’ve actually written), and then adapting the story to fit r/s more in tone (i.e the war, queerness, rejection from society etc) i got carried away and things have expanded a lot. i would still say a lot more book inspiration than movie, stuff like michael's character (rather than markl) and the minor details that the movie brushed over, like sophie’s sisters & fanny & the ben sullivan+prince justin story line, i’ve kept from the book but there are definitely some things that i knew i would change that directly contradict:

firstly and the MOST crucial detail for me, remus isn’t secretly pretty all along!! like this is the thesis of the entire au actually, it’s not an ugly duckling arc! he doesn’t break the curse to be young and beautiful again but with more self-confidence, he’s just not conventionally attractive full stop. he’s plain if not ‘ugly’ and in no way particularly impressive, he’s only 18 and hasn’t even allowed himself the space to start figuring shit out. sirius falls in love with him while he’s old with no knowledge of what remus really looks like because knowing that appearance just wasn’t even a factor in s desiring and falling for him revolutionises remus’s view of himself and his assumptions about who sirius is and also…

sirius as howl is not really that vain! this might be a spoiler, but i'd say one of the big theme’s in the au is that everyone is lying and no-one is who they appear to be and/or especially who they SAY they are and it’s remus’s assumption that sirius cares a lot about looks and would only fall in love with someone equally beautiful. howl’s vanity & concern for his looks makes sense for book howl and that story, but i wanted them to be more r/s than howl and sophie so in the au sirius’s flashy clothes and hours spent in the bathroom are more about self-expression, queerness and non-conformity, the contrast of remus struggling with otherness, not fitting in and his failed masculinity (poor baby is too sickly for the draft :/ ) and sirius being so extravagant, rocking the boat, rejecting expectations for his masculinity and flourishing—as in he literally builds a moving castle and lives on the fringes doing whatever he likes and running from/against authority (also should mention the working title for the au is 'Sirius Black’s Moving Castle for Misfits and Runaway Curse Victims').

in terms of roles i do feel like sirius is the natural howl but i did consider what r as howl would be like, i think there is something to work off with howl’s insecurity and one BIG trait being a slither-outer and a coward…very r if you ask me, but at the end of the day i don't think sirius as sophie works and remus-howl would change his character and role in the story by a lot to make it fit...

like howl’s personality by itself is sort of neither r nor s, there are similar and contradicting traits, the vanity and cowardice being the most un-sirius but (maybe a spoiler here) even in the book it’s up for interpretation how much these traits are really howl or instead a symptom of lacking a heart or even a deliberate front. so it was quite an easy adjustment in terms of sirius doing the same howl actions but with slightly different more sirius-like motivations, whereas for R as howl i don’t think you could get him to act the same way.

not sure that makes sense but i think the howl-sirius parallel works because his role in the story is much much more suited to S, like you could write an R-howl playing up the insecurity and the slither-outer trait but to me there isn’t really a story there, like where would it go…because howl is already very comfortable in his position outside polite society: he breaks convention ostentatiously, relishes in mainstream disapproval for standing out and enjoys and actively encourages his terrible reputation (for heart-eating, draft-dodging and other failings in his character). once you give reason for the apparent vanity and cowardice, howl as the prodigy who couldn’t care less about living up to expectations is perfect for sirius.

the thing about sophie's step-mother is that both dwj and miyazaki refuse to write antagonists without nuance, there isn't a clear villain like you WILL empathise with everybody—and with sophie’s step-mother especially, she’s worse in the book until she’s not! despite sophie being so lonely and unhappy at home, the story is about overcoming her own fatalistic worldview and internal feelings of worthlessness & inadequacy rather than an external battle. her family especially her sisters care a lot about her and do want the best for her even if it’s sometimes misguided but sophie has to learn to stand up for herself and stop putting everyone else first (hello martyr complex). AND there's a lot of repression (which goes to remus like water to a fish), even allowing herself to want things out of life, like it literally takes her being cursed to be an old woman and being so ashamed of her predicament and having no other choice for her to finally leave her suffocating home because she is so afraid of challenging the world head on (which is sort of antithetical to sirius).

so yeah then with sophie-sirius not working… like it’s possible to write her family and the hat shop to imitate the blacks but the problem for me is the characters themselves are basically opposites so you’d have to abandon one entirely and it would either be a completely different story to hmc or a completely different character to sirius… (also talking about the characters i mean book howl and sophie but i honestly can’t remember what’s different/missing in the movie??)

and really remus was ALWAYS the perfect sophie to me like in the wip he’s certain that in failing to be a strong, healthy, beautiful perfect specimen of a young man who can fight for the country, instead being sick, unattractive + the nebulous but undeniable fact of his queerness means there’s some innate monstrosity or wrongness about him, and being rejected by his peers has confirmed it, so he represses, withering away hiding in the dark and it’s a mixture of thinking ‘there is nothing better out there nor am i capable or deserving of any better, this is my lot in life and i’ll make do’ that keeps him there. UNTIL he’s forced to leave and comes across sirius who has made a life for himself on his own terms and on the outside seems to have everything: beauty, talent, confidence, freedom but is very flamboyantly throwing people’s admiration & acceptance (everything that remus covets) back in their faces.

in the story sophie is quite resentful of howl in a similar way remus is of sirius (here and in canon i think) and like sophie, he ‘knows’ that he’s a nobody with no future and just expects to fail. also the hat shop is much more remus’s natural environment, exhibit service worker R: ‘he was little more than a puppet in grey felt—marionette strings binding him tightly to the shop, a little flimsy and worn through in places from dancing around for customers all day long. A walking, talking, hat-fetching piece of furniture.’

sooo those are my thoughts on the casting obviously just my opinion and personal thoughts on r/s. oh and the turning into the crow thing and being corrupted by magic, it wasn’t in the book but i have incorporated it only with a different character…and someone turns into a dog also not sirius...other quick points about the wip: peter has a big part in this might be obvious who as but he’s so fun in this one, petunia is also a sympathetic character, Hope is long dead (as per), Lyall dies in the first few sentences and Andromeda has more lines than James i think. i didn’t use the whole multi-verse plot line from the book, we’re in an approximate uk somewhere between 1910s and 40s but it’s more a vibe than a time period because magic and wizards are well integrated with the culture, politics and technology etc, Market Chipping & The Waste are in the Scottish highlands (so Scottish Remus and Lily), Sirius is not from Wales unfortunately but someone does live there (also if ur interested in the book i would highly recommend listening to the audiobook to get the full of effect of Howl’s accent). and the star swallowing/giving away his heart!! it's a major plot point so i won’t say too much about that but THAT SCENE….the one with howl in the field with the shooting stars!! yeah i’m so so excited about it, it’s sooo fitting for what i have planned and only another reason why sirius just couldn’t NOT be howl!

#so umm not sure if you were expecting an essay there...#did not realise i had sooo much to say but you've basically got all the details now in one long exhaustive post!#and NO WAY any message from you could be too long layla i'm literally a pomegranate-pill devotee!! obsessed with all ur thoughts #and so grateful you want to share yours+hear mine! literally ADORE you for giving me the excuse to rant about hmc like this <33 #and actually a few more things i redesigned the castle to better suit sirius’s backstory…#sooo many floorpans were drawn #and i changed the ages/birthdays a little bit but they were chosen carefully because obviously astrology reasons #so remus is 18 and sirius is just 1 year older than him (instead of 26)#(also the remus birth chart…i did completely forget about it for a few weeks but it's on it's way!!!)#AND #sbmc #<- this is the tag now!#layla tag

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