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pinksilvace · 10 months

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A few weeks back, I made a comment to the effect of, "Belos views himself as the single human character in a muppets production." It has since then spiraled into an entire AU in my head that refuses to leave me alone. A few weeks back, I made a comment to the effect of, "Belos views himself as the single human character in a muppets production." It has since then spiraled into an entire AU in my head that refuses to leave me alone.

The basic premise:

Caleb and Evelyn found a weekly children's program ("The Boiling Isles") that features puppets; little Philip is featured as the one human, and since the episodes with him do much better than the ones without, he grows up into the role and eventually becomes a big part of the production staff as well

When Caleb and Evelyn die in an accident, Philip inherits the show

Some of the main (puppet) characters are named Luzura, Willow, Amity, and Augustus (you can see where I'm going with this). Philip would be able to stand these puppets on their own BUT

In promotional materials and interviews, he is ALWAYS asked what it's like to "work with" Luzura/Willow/Amity/Gus. Philip is absolutely INFURIATED by this because they're PUPPETS why can't anybody see that they're PUPPETS don't you care about the STAFF or the ARTISTS or the LIGHTING MANAGERS why does everybody pretend that the PUPPETS are REAL PEOPLE and why does HE have to pretend that the PUPPETS are when he responds??? He's convinced that some of the interviewers genuinely believe that the puppets are alive and tries to patiently explain that, no, they are just puppets. The interviewers always refuse to break the immersion.

Expanded AU thoughts are under the cut.

Caleb and Evelyn meet at an arts college. Evelyn is a film student, and the show's prototype is her capstone project. Caleb offers to bring Philip in as an actor and it sticks. Caleb also helps make some of the first puppets.

Little Philip's identity is protected by 1) the presence of a mask, and 2) the stage name "Belos". The name sticks around for his on-screen appearances.

While sticking around the set, Philip learns a lot about the different areas of production. He especially likes building sets, backdrops, props, and puppets, though he finds the writing process interesting as well. When he's old enough to help out with paperwork, he takes over the logistical side of things because tbh both Caleb and Evelyn are helpless when it comes to that

By the time Philip takes over, he's basically the head supervisor of every single department. His management makes the show's popularity explode

Philip is definitely the best at building and controlling puppets. Every now and then, he makes an extra-large "final boss" sort of puppet that only he is physically capable of controlling, and some of them end up in museums

Philip raises Hunter, but he's sort of the neglectful sort. He's ultra-focused on keeping the show his brother put so much thought, effort, and love into alive, and it makes literally any semblance of life he might have had outside of the show suffer

Similarly to Philip, Hunter grows up on set, but not as an actor. The production staff looks after him. When he's old enough, he also becomes a part of the test audience

The production staff is composed of the Emperor's Coven members in canon; i.e. Darius is in charge of lighting and wires, Raine is the sound director, Eberwolf is the lead puppet master, Hettie is the on-site medic, etc.

Luz and Camila are also a part of the test audience. I'm going to pretend that Philip and Camila are good buds in this AU. Philip inserts Luzura into the show as a character based on Luz

Basically most of the ire that Philip has in this AU is directed toward the puppets because they're not REAL why are THEY getting the GLORY can we PLEASE not pretend that these PUPPETS have thoughts and feelings and personalities???

He also doesn't leave because 1) the aforementioned attachment to something Caleb loved so much, and 2) he's put too much effort into this show already and he knows that no replacement could ever be so proficient at his job

Let's be real, Philip's work ethic is super unsustainable, and it DEFINITELY keeps him from grieving properly

When Hunter reveals that he does not, in fact, want to inherit the company that Philip has built, it's CRUSHING to Philip, who feels like giving it up would be disrespecting Caleb's legacy, unaware that he's staring Caleb's legacy in the face

Ideally Philip's arc (which I have hardly described here) would end with wealthy retirement and him being able to say "goodbye Boiling Isles" and never having to appear alongside those godforsaken puppets ever again

#my art #belmup au #mullet caleb mullet caleb mullet caleb #I'll be honest the art was just an excuse to talk about this au but mullet caleb will forever live in my heart #the owl house #toh fanart #caleb wittebane #philip wittebane #emperor belos #toh au #evelyn clawthorne #also yes all of the puppets are left handed :) that was very important to Evelyn #fernart

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pochapal · 10 months

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32! Do you like HS^2?

i...genuinely do! i think sometimes there's a half-conception that based on the mere premise of my fics that i don't like postcanon all that much (omelette route was misconstrued as an epilogues fix-it fic in certain circles and pickle route is still sometimes seen as a "better version" of hs^2) even though everything i write is in direct conversation with and comes from a place of admiration for hs^2/the epilogues.

with hs^2 in particular i think it had some really electric ideas that we only got to see the very first brushstrokes of (thinking most pertinently here about whatever was going to go down on deltritus that we never saw) that, if they'd been able to get off the ground, probably would have eclipsed the epilogues as the most interesting part of homestuck. from the bits we saw the meat timeline stuff was definitely the weakest. outside of the jade/altcallie possession chapter a lot of that half of the story was fairly unsurprising character-driven extrapolation of the same angst we departed the epilogues with - and i largely agree with @hms-no-fun that some kind of timeskip here would have helped it feel a little less repetitive (although arguably there might have been? three years definitely passed with dirk et al but it was very up in the air as to how long it had been for the pursuit spaceship crew). i get why that never happened - both meat and candy were being told in tandem and candy ended on a buildup to an immediate conflict that needed to be followed in real time versus meat's meandering slingshot towards something more nebulous, so for the sake of structural symmetry that limited things a little.

i think i'm more amenable to a lot of hs^2's storytelling decisions because i wholly and entirely loved the epilogues from the getgo and it was so good to see that theme/tone be carried through to a more "traditional" mspa space, even if i wonder if the comic form damaged the story more than it helped it. i remember a lot of people getting weirdly mad whenever we'd get an extended prose scene instead of visual panels despite hs^2 being a continuation of the text-based epilogues. then again, the mainstream hs fandom as a whole fucking sucked when it came to postcanon and that's even more evident in how they've collectively memoryholed the whole thing so talking about audience reception is maybe not the most useful thing to talk about here lmao. idk i think people forget that homestuck is largely a story about people who suck and then who get better from sucking. it's just that nobody really likes it when that lens is turned inward onto the alphas/betas who outside of a small handful of exceptions in canon never really had any ethical issues that caused problems for them and others so i personally think it was very interesting and refreshing to explore how the kids' complacency wrt their baggage and trauma allowed them and their world to backslide so disastrously! roxy lalonde enabling jane's fascist ascension is fascinating storytelling actually! (side note: read through shadowed eyes)

hs^2's original characterwork is probably where the story shines the most. the fucked up dynamics between the theseus crew was super fun to read because there's honestly nothing more enjoyable than Supremely Divorced people deciding that makes them irredeemably evil now. the egbert gender stuff was really nice! i particularly enjoyed how, even though it came after the june egbert renaissance, it still managed to be its own unique take on egbert's gender arc that i think really encapsulated the originality driving the project. also forever shoutout to the candy kids my beloved candy kids my children who i will die for - for me in particular hs^2 was a fun time because i was developing my own versions of harry/vrissy/tav for pickle route in parallel to hs^2 and it was so enjoyable seeing all the overlaps and divergences with each upd8. also yiffy fucking rules on every level and even though she never got to be more than a promise she sure was one hell of a promise.

that said i do not think it's that surprising that hs^2 ultimately died before its time. the conditions of the story paired with the most demoralising and vicious iteration of the fandom meant the odds were stacked against it in a big way. you can particularly see the strain of that starting to manifest in the final ~6 months worth of upd8s where people were leaving/being pushed out of the project and every part of hs^2 was a completely hostile environment and the quality of the art and storytelling began to get a little shaky - which i can't really blame them for all things considered! it's hard to want to make the best version of a story possible when the overwhelming reception is a bunch of sanctimonious redditbrained weirdos screaming that you're evil and foul for making characters in a piece of fiction do unexpected and surprising things and also being sympathetic to trans women. there were of course issues with the production conditions of hs^2 that would have probably led to some sort of reckoning at some point, but it's very obvious that the traumatic pressure cooker of a fanbase that wanted nothing more than the death of this project and the ruination of everyone that worked on it threw this whole thing off the rails much faster. despite that, you still have to infinitely admire the team for daring to make something challenging and original in a sphere dominated by people who are content to regurgitate the same babybrained 2013 content ad infinitum - for just a brief moment, homestuck was truly allowed to be the literary masterpiece it's been all along. now people just treat it as more fandomslop to consume and that's perhaps the biggest shame of all.

in the end i think hs^2's legacy is best felt in the places haunted by its premature absence. i'm talking about the comic itself of course but also other spaces and people and projects. stuff that really engaged with the meaty thematic frameworks being thrown up in postcanon that now no longer have a mirror to talk back to - stuff like pesterquest and godfeels and the aforementioned through shadowed eyes that all massively are in conversation with the deeper artistic and philosophical principles underpinning this era of homestuck. if anything else hs^2 will continue to serve as a useful prerequisite for getting into some of the best stuff homestuck fans have ever made. we might never see what could have been, but at least the torch is still being carried by people who care.

#spaceengineerjulia #homestuck asks #homestuck^2 #long post #i had more opinions on this than i'd previously thought lmao

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agaraugur · 1 year

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I started Dungeon23 a little early. Dungeon23 is a room-a-day ttrpg megadungeon writing project. The premise so far is that there’s a floating chunk of mountain I’m calling “the Clod” that houses the megadungeon. I’m not attached to the name, but the etymology of “cloud” is related to “clod,” as anglo myth imagines clouds as floating rocks where you might, for example, encounter a giant after climbing a beanstalk.

Room 1 28Dec2022 A dozen mythril braids anchored the Clod to the valley. One mythril braid anchors it today. Most are either scavenged (mythril is valuable) or their anchors in the valley have broken in the intervening years. One way to get to The Clod is to climb 600 feet on the surviving cable and then to scramble from there to the vines and odd perches. This involves at least one reasonably difficult check, whose primary dangers can be avoided with a climbing kit.

Room 2 29Dec2022 When the wind catches it, the Clod collides with the side of a mountain. Where it connects, both the Clod and the mountain are worn smooth. This has exposed a mining tunnel in the base of the Clod. Entrepeneurial sorts have dug foxholes into the side of the mountain, which offer an element of safety (being in one during a collision does modest thunder damage, preferable to instant death.) From the highest foxhole, one can leap into the mine tunnel. The darkness, tendency of moisture to freeze, smoothness of the contact surfaces, and angle of the slope renders the space between foxholes difficult terrain.

Room 3 30Dec2022 On the north face of the Clod, a conspicuously large hallway large enough for a gargantuan creature is visible. This is accessible to flying creatures, or to characters making the lengthy climb from the western cable to the hallway. Inside is a thick basalt door, and a series of levers and a button set in the wall, and the long-ruined remains of a camp site. The wall containing the levers has been partially opened, exposing the mechanism which has itself fallen into decay. Repairing the mechanism or finding a bypass requires an appropriate skill check. Blood inside the mechanism indicates the previous party attempted such a thing before being fatally attacked, though no bodies are visible.

Room 4 31Dec2022 The top of the Clod has copses of evergreen trees growing in irregular spots upon an eroded slab brick surface, and a gilded obelisk covered in draconic boasts. A dozen perytons exist up here, living off the wild goats, bears, deer, and other wildlife. Perytons, by their nature, take a special interest in humanoid travelers, and attack at night. At dusk they will harass humanoids with dropped stones, pulls and shoves with hooked sticks, and occasional attacks. They maintain smaller nests on nearby peaks and ridges, out to two days out, but return to the Clod regularly. Their continued harassment prevents restful sleep, and locals know to avoid this valley. Once a prey is deemed suitably vulnerable, they will commit to a fight to the death.

The golden obelisk proclaims the Clod as the property of Gozpoditakel, a dragon that boasts of their most valued hoard: the chiefs and nobles they hold for literal kings' ransoms. A history check against the names, or the obvious age of the space, indicates that the dragon seems to be gone. There is probably a direct way from this perch to the "hoard" itself, but it's not obvious.

Room 5 01Dec2023 Mt. Dlagan is to the southwest of the Clod, and it's peak sits about 400 feet higher than the apex of the Clod. 200 feet below the apex, observing the Clod, is a carefully obscured shelter. It houses two fraternal twin dwarven adventurers - Grake and Yurrow Ironboot. They are the hired guides of the party that failed to repair the door in the north hallway. They have a spell scroll of Fly which neither can use. Their deftness with mountaincraft is how they survive, but they don't have a clear plan out of the valley entirely. They have the skill to lasso a peryton, but they don't have the nerve or people to try the gambit. They may attempt to sign their location to players with a hand mirror at a distance.

Room 6 02Dec2023 A now closed entrance, covered in snow and moss, appear on the south side of the Clod. Once used as an exit for detritus from the mine, it has been closed with a round copper plug that has tarnished green over the years. A reasonably high passive perception score will notice a roughly circular patch of green-stained snow against the moss and rock. Climbing from the western cable, flying, or gliding from a higher point can access the spot, and clearing the snow reveals a five-foot threshold safe for standing. The plug has a fist-sized hole in the center and numerous matching holes near its circumference. Inset in the leftmost hole is a pin. Removing the pin and setting it into the center allows the plug to roll sideways, opening the space.

Room 7 04Dec2023 Sitting a bit north of the Clod's current location in the Ka'ahli Valley is an abandoned dwarven mining camp. What remains of it would require an organized excavation, but some features are visible and potentially useful. An earth and stonework ridge, once used for water diversion, surrounds the camp and sits three and a half feet tall. A large freestanding domed furnace can provide emergency shelter from the elements. Inside the furnace are lead pellets (suitable for use as sling bullets), bronze molds, bowls made from crushed bonemeal, and a short flat adamantine bar with a bifurcated hook on one end, and a hole in the other. Once used to fish material out of the furnace, the bar can now be used as an improvised grappling hook or as an adamantine sickle that does piercing damage.

#dungeon23 #zero people are going to be interested in this #ttrpg #d&d #worldbuilding

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privatewinters · 1 year

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I posted 130 times in 2022

That's 11 more posts than 2021!

36 posts created (28%)

94 posts reblogged (72%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@icedfairy

@bridgyrose

@gakugaku-blog

@privatewinters

@rwbylesbianism

I tagged 129 of my posts in 2022

Only 1% of my posts had no tags

#rwby - 41 posts

#updates - 38 posts

#the clockwork angel - 24 posts

#cursed gunner - 24 posts

#immigrant realms - 24 posts

#icedfairy - 23 posts

#ruby rose - 23 posts

#story updates - 23 posts

#little witch academia - 20 posts

#touhou - 20 posts

Longest Tag: 96 characters

#ryumi and juri are basically just alice and marisa from touhou with the serial numbers filed off

My Top Posts in 2022:

Regarding the recent Rooster Teeth controversy

Yes, I’m aware of what Kdin Jenzen said about RT on Twitter...

But no, that is not going to stop me from liking RWBY as a whole, and it especially isn’t going to stop me from writing The Rose Thorn of Earth.

Because to me, the art is distinct from the artist and I’m not going to shit on the art just because of the artist’s bullshit, unless the art is a direct product of the artist’s bullshits, which RWBY isn’t.

2 notes - Posted October 16, 2022

Yep, it's a Nuts and Dolts Wandavision AU based on this post by @roses-like-red on Tumblr, which I got permission to write this fic for. With Ruby as Wanda and Penny as Vision.

However, you might have noticed that it is tagged as both Post-Canon and an AU, when these two tags are usually mutually exclusive. So why is this the case?

You see, for the entire premise of a Nuts and Dolts Wandavision AU to work, there needs to be A) the death of Penny, and B) Ruby being able to warp reality like Wanda did in Wandavision. Penny's death is obviously already covered by the Fall of Atlas. But as for Ruby being able to warp reality? Well, I have to change how Maiden powers work to accommodate that. Hence this fic being both Post-Canon and an AU.

Though how did Ruby come to be in possession of Maiden powers in this case?

Well, that's what we're going to find out...

3 notes - Posted January 30, 2022

More regarding the Rooster Teeth controversy

I usually don’t take sides when controversies are involved. But as the RT controversy has escalated to what it is right now, I felt like I should stop being neutral and take a side for once.

That side being anyone who opposes RT’s top management.

I just wanted to say that if I have the ability to do so, I’d buy RT from Warner-Discovery, sack every single rotten egg in RT, gives all the good eggs the salary and break time they deserved, hire more good eggs to replace the rotten ones that got sacked, and then restructure RT to make sure this controversy can never happen again.

Not since Donald Trump had I decided that I have to side against anyone specifically in a controversy...

3 notes - Posted October 19, 2022

Yep, I went around and made another Minecraft custom map. This time it’s a puzzle map centered around the crafting mechanic.

You can give it a try if you want!

This map can also be downloaded from Mediafire.

4 notes - Posted March 13, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

A “Holy S**t!” moment on AO3

68 (as of this posting) one-shots of “Yandere LWA character x OC” by the SAME GUY, within ONE WEEK!!!

Seriously, this guy has taken “quantity over quality” to a whole new level by spamming basically the same thing over and over again, so much so that he has basically drowned out all other stories in the Little Witch Academia section on AO3 with his boatload of one-shots of Yandere LWA girls and OCs. I had to use the search function to exclude everything with the “Yandere” tag just so I could see anything else.

JackNTrade, if you’re seeing this, please stop spamming so many one-shots with the same premise. Not everyone wants to have their AO3 log be nothing but Yandere stories. Maybe you should consider writing something else or slow down a bit. Either one of those, or step away from your computer/ put down your smart device and go touch real, physical grass. Seriously, I have literally never seen such a thing happening anywhere on the Internet.

9 notes - Posted December 3, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#tumblr2022 #year in review #my 2022 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

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mithrilwren · 3 years

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I really, really wanted to contribute something to Essek Week, but unfortunately with two essays and a novel chapter due by Monday, I didn’t have the time or mental energy to write anything new. Cue me remembering that I’d actually started working on an Essek-centric shadowgast Pirate!AU last summer, that never saw the light of day! Though I did a whole bunch of research for it, summer ended before I could get farther than the first couple chapters. Still, I’m very fond of the premise, and I’d like to finish it one day. I can’t guarantee I will (life’s too busy to commit myself to another Big Fic Project atm) but in the meantime, here’s a little taste in the form of the first chapter.

-------------------

For @essek-week Day 7: AU

Courts of Silk (Chapter 1)

Essek startled from his trance to the crackle of blistering thunder overhead.

Mind bled of all drowsiness in an instant, he unfolded his legs and slid off the berth, drifting to the center of the room and tilting his ear towards the boards above.

A storm… but the skies were meant to be clear for days, and he trusted Avus to know it. Could the weather have turned so–

Boom.

Essek’s eyebrows flew up as the deck visibly lurched below his feet.

Not thunder.

Cannon fire.

More sounds now, hurried ones – an erratic tempo of feet pounding through the corridor outside his little room, the floorboards creaking dully under the weight of the crew scrambling over the deck above. He flinched as a louder noise pierced through the commotion: the rattling of a heavy fist falling against the door of his cabin, hard enough to shake the wooden frame.

“We’ve been boarded!” Zel’ra’s guttural shout startled him out of his confused stupor, and he flew to the door and flung it open. The quartermaster stood outside, her snarling jaw dripping with whitish battle foam, the kind that bugbears of Rosohna so seldom have occasion to sport within city walls. “Come on, magic boy, time for you to earn your– Shit!”

Then she was gone, and Essek was left staring dumbly at the empty corridor, as Zel’ra raced back the way she came. A moment later, there was a yelp, and the grisly crack of metal hitting bone. Then there was no sound at all, save the rocking of the ocean’s pulse against the hull, and the thump of confident, unfamiliar footsteps, coming closer and closer to his open door.

He had only a few moments to make his decision. The fight might still be going on above deck, but if intruders had already made it below, there was little hope of a favorable outcome for the crew of the Barren Bow. He hadn’t thought the Empire would be brazen enough to attack a diplomatic ship in open waters, but there were soldiers of all ilks on the open sea, and no government to hold them to account so far from land. He would not put it past a Dwendalian crew to sight a Dynasty flag on the horizon and decide to take the matter of revenge in their own hands. If so, there was no telling what treatment they might expect at the hands of their attackers. Rage was rarely tamed by abstract rules of engagement, and he doubted anyone would care to ask what the nature of their mission was, once the killing began.

But perhaps…

Quickly, Essek drew aside his sleeve and materialized the leather–bound contents of his wristpocket into his hands. His spellbook lay beside precious components in their embroidered fold, and there, at the bottom of the pile: the folio. He whispered a quiet word and the paper folded apart, revealing its damning – and perhaps, in the right hands, lifesaving – contents.

The letters.

If the tides were so unfavorable that he could not fight, perhaps that might be enough to–

He vanished the whole affair back into the ether as two shadows fell across the door.

From the darkness of the hallway, two figures stepped over the threshold. In front was a young woman: human, with swarthy skin made darker still by the weathering burn of long days at sea. Her hands were tucked beneath bare arms and her hip turned out to an unconcerned jaunt, adorned by a sash of deep blue. Behind her, and looming so tall that she had to hunch to fit through the frame of the door, was a giant of a woman. Taller even than Zel’ra, her bare shoulders glistening with rippling muscles and sweat, pale as moonlight – or as the steely glint of the broadsword at her back. The younger woman swept him over with piercing eyes, her confident grin not quite masking the focused gaze beneath. Though she bore no weapons, Essek could feel the stain of threat in every taut sinew of her body. He held still, waiting to see who would make the first move.

Her eyes finally paused, centered on the floor beneath his feet, and her grin dropped into something more like a startled ‘oh’. Too late, he realized his mistake – that his levitation, as natural and instinctive as standing on his own two feet, had just given him away.

“Mage!” she sputtered, and her hand was gripping his arm and twisting it behind his back before he even realized she’d moved. Essek dropped the levitation spell, hoping to get enough leverage from the sudden height difference to slip out of her grasp, but before he could so much as shuffle to the left, the taller woman was at his right, clutching his other arm with a grip strong enough to break bone.

“Shit,” the first woman spat as she stepped back, allowing the second to take both of his arms into custody. “Who the fuck did we just board?”

Essek kept silent, staring at her, searching for any sign of weakness and finding less than nothing. If he had just had his hands free for a moment longer… but that didn’t matter now. There weren’t many spells without a somatic component at his disposal, and cantrips wouldn’t save his neck, should the giantess move quicker to snap it than he could speak.

Without a means of immediate escape, he looked next for any way to identify his captors. They were human, but their loose, subdued dress – for the younger woman, a vest of blue cotton, the other, a braided grey tunic, and frayed ribbons in both their hair – was nothing like the silver and crimson finery of the Righteous Brand.

If not from the Empire, who were these people? Hired thugs? Mercenaries?

“Are there more of you skulking down here?”

He didn’t ask the woman to clarify, though he wasn’t sure exactly what she was asking. More drow? Yes, but he was not about to reveal the nature of the delegation travelling under his protection to her. More mages? No. As always, he had convinced the Bright Queen that his effort alone would be sufficient. For the first time in a very long time, he wished he’d been a little more conservative in estimating his own skills. Given the current situation, someone else’s power at his back might actually be welcome, rather than distracting.

Her burning gaze made it clear that he had to say something, and soon, but for once, the right words did not come. The truth did not matter: he knew that any unfavorable answer would be taken as a lie.

Still, Essek would not panic. The only way to regain control of the situation was by carefully gathering information, finding something that he could use to shift the balance of power at a more advantageous moment. That was his particular specialty.

“I do not know,” he answered coolly. “For I do not know who is above and below deck at all hours of the day. I can only speak for myself.”

“Beau! Fjor– fuck– Captain Tusktooth wants you on deck!” A new voice, its timbre high and grating, like glass against cold iron, echoed from around the corner. The woman – Beau, he filed away – turned her head and shouted back out the door.

“Just a second, we’ve got one more!” Then, “Tell him to get Caleb over here, we’ve got a goddamn mage to deal with!”

The giantess at his back leaned down, so close that her dreaded locks nestled amidst the silver chains that hung from tip to base of his pointed ear. “You aren’t going to give us any trouble, are you?” she murmured, and despite every ounce of training he’d undergone for exactly this sort of intimidation, he still couldn’t help the way he shivered at her dark tone. There was a deep quality to her voice that sung of violence, for violence’s sake, and though he wasn’t yet truly afraid, he had no wish to provoke her.

“How could I?” Essek gently flexed his arms in her grasp: not enough to challenge, but enough to reassure her of his helplessness.

Her lips curled back, and… yes. There was a little fear gathering there, in the back of his throat. A good kind of fear – the prudent kind. It would keep him alert, and focused, and ready to strike back when the moment was right.

When she started pushing him forward, he followed her lead willingly, and the two of them shadowed Beau into the corridor and up the steps that led back above deck. Essek winced as the bright noonday sun slipped into view, already anticipating the stinging burn that was sure to follow. He’d managed to avoid the deck for most of the voyage, much to the chagrin of the Assarian crew. He was not born into a body made for manning rigging, and certainly not under an unrepentant sky determined to scorch his face and hands and neck and leave him itching and miserable for days without relief. His better use was below deck, planning for the engagement ahead, and his hours of fresh air better taken in the evening, when the gentler light of the moons was merely a prickle beneath his skin, rather than a flame.

Everywhere he looked, he saw mismatched bodies. Though Essek hadn’t met the entire complement of the Barren Bow’s crew, he had to assume most of the scattered orcs, goblins, and bugbears belonged to their side. Most of the ones on their feet were being held in the shallow recess at the centre of the deck, where great cannons might have been lodged on a more modern ship. A handful of unremarkable humans, each equipped with a rapier – or, in one man’s case, a salt-encrusted retort – stood above them, keeping watch. Amidst all that humanity stood a wild–eyed goblin in a blaring yellow dress, hefting a crossbow composed of whirring gears and levers of an intricate make that rivaled Waccoh’s own craftsmanship. She was currently in the process of shouting threats down across the heads of his cowed compatriots. Some were clutching broken arms or wiping blood from contusions and burnt welts. Lying at the center of the group was an unconscious Zel’ra, the goose egg at the back of her skull already angry and red.

Finally, he spied the remainder of the drow contingent clustered by the ship’s rail. Diplomats, all of them, bound for a parley at sea and not trained for conflict beyond what it took to hold a dagger right-way up. He was the only one among them battle-tested, and even then, his means leaned more towards subterfuge than outright combat. Theoretically, the Assarian crew was meant to be their main line of defence in case of attack. Clearly they had not proven up to the task.

Essek would be filing a very unfavorable report with their commanders upon his return, if any of them survived the day.

“Captain!” Beau shouted, and a tall half-orc stepped away from the railing, his wide-brimmed hat only partially disguising the many scars that littered his face.

“Weather’s turning,” he said, casting his eyes towards the – as far as Essek could tell – clear horizon. Those same yellow eyes flickered up, above Essek’s head, and for a moment seemed to narrow before turning back to Beau. “You finished clearing the hold yet?”

“Didn’t make it that far.” Beau jerked her head, and Essek was thrust into the sunlight all at once. The glare was blinding, and apparently not just to him. The giantess’s hands jerked around his arms, like they wanted to fly up and shield her eyes as well. That was all the opportunity he needed.

With one quick motion, he jerked his arms from her grasp and drew his hands together, tracing familiar glyphs out of nothing but muscle memory as his mouth uttered an incantation, and the world exploded around him. The giantess was flung back against the doorframe, wood splintering beneath her weight, and both Beau and the half-orc slammed into the deck and began to hurtle towards the side of the boat. Forcing his eyes to stay focused amidst the chaos and the harsh light, Essek caught the glitter of a cutlass skittering along the boards as he took stock of his position on the newly reborn battlefield.

Nearly all of the boarders were in a concentrated area in front of him, and the rest of the Assarian crew were protected by the lip of the recess in the deck. The terrain could not be more advantageous. Essek allowed himself a small smirk as he raised his hand and prepared a vacuum blast that would level the whole of the upper deck, and deliver them all to safety in one swift stroke.

How arrogant, that this petty group of mercenaries thought they could capture–

“Counterspell.”

The magic sizzled and died in his hand, and Essek whirled, searching for whoever had spoken behind him. Thugs he could handle, but it was always best to deal with a mage first, when they could do such infuriating things as what had just occurred. But once he turned, he found himself facing an empty doorway, and an empty deck above that. No trace of whoever had cast the counterspell.

The giantess was gone as well.

He heard the click before he could parse what cold and heavy thing was tugging on his wrist, but he was horribly aware of what was happening by the time his other wrist was wrenched behind his back and small hands clasped the second iron band shut. A stomach-churning wave of exhaustion passed through him from scalp to toe, and he staggered, only barely holding on to consciousness. Head lolling towards the floor, he saw two soft-soled boots landing lightly on the deck in front of him.

With great effort, he managed to drag his head up from his chest, and found himself staring into blue eyes and dusty freckles, lips pressed into a thin line, all framed by tangles of copper-red hair.

“Good work, Nott,” the man said. His accent was one Essek had only heard once before, though through the mire of exhaustion he could not remember where.

Behind Essek, the half-orc groaned and pushed himself up off the deck. “Next time you have a brilliant plan for subduing the prisoner, maybe let’s try not putting us all in the line of fire, hm?”

The man ignored the sarcasm, still looking all too carefully at Essek.

“Are you finished?” he murmured, and though his body was lithe, his soft voice sung of as much violence as the giantess’s darker growl.

With a sigh, Essek let his shoulders drop. He could still feel the pulses of magic coursing through the iron bands around his wrists. Even if he got his arms free again, the cuffs would not be easily slipped, or broken. These people, whoever they were, came equipped to handle wizards like himself. Was that what they were, then? Assassins in disguise? Privateers? The blunt instrument of some government or another?

Not that it made much difference now. Whoever they were, he was at their mercy.

“Spin him around.”

Essek felt himself being maneuvered away from the man’s incisive gaze. Through bleary eyes he caught the looks of frustrated disbelief from the four drow delegates, lamenting their crushed hope in silent, huddled unity. He was meant to be their protection. Now that Essek was taken, what else could save them? Not one of them was brave enough to attempt it themselves. A shiver of disgust ran through Essek, as heady as the self-recrimination it concealed at having allowed himself to be captured so easily.

The half-orc strode up to Essek, the sword in his hand now replaced, though Essek hadn’t seen the man move to retrieve it. It was a silver cutlass, fine enough to cleave a person clean through and leave one half still propped up on the other. Too rich a prize by far for a simple mercenary – he must have come by it dishonestly, or been given it as boon or bribe. Neither prospect boded well.

The hand that gripped the sword told an equally foreboding story, for only the thumb was composed of green flesh. The rest of the fingers were severed at the third knuckle, and replaced by metal imitations fixed to the wrist by a harness of leather cords. Still, he held the hilt with all the confidence of a trained fighter, and the surety of his grasp left Essek little doubt as to its effectiveness, mechanical augmentation or no.

“My name,” said the half-orc, “is Captain Tusktooth.” A hint of bright teeth flashed from below the wide brim of the hat. “And this ship is mine now. Its cargo, mine too.”

The answer about the identity of his captors, at last, became clear, for what little good it did him.

Pirates.

“By whose authority?” Essek shot a harsh look at the foolish dignitary who had chosen this moment to find their courage, but Tusktooth only grinned harder.

“By my own.” Behind Essek’s back, Nott and Beau slipped back through the splintered doorframe and down into the depths of the ship once more. “Now, my crew is going to finish taking a look through your cargo. I trust that your captain has been honest about the contents of your hold. Are there any other surprises I should be warning my people of? Anybody else looking to make trouble?”

Would that there were. “You will find little of value to take. We travelled light.” He spoke the truth, having no more useful lie at his disposal. His tongue felt heavy in his mouth, and another wave of exhaustion teased at the edges of his mind. He fought it with all the strength he had – which was growing less and less by the minute.

“So your captain told me. But that wasn’t my question.” Tusktooth’s voice grew as keen as the blade in his hand as he lifted it and placed the edge to the shallow of Essek’s throat. “Are there others like you aboard?”

He did not flinch. Torment and torture were old friends: his own cherished instruments. He did not fear what this man would do to him, any more than he feared death itself. At least, that is what he told his errant heart, as sweat began to bead at the nape of his neck.

“No.”

Tusktooth stared him down for a minute longer, and Essek held his gaze as best he could with the sun still searing his eyes. But at last, the sword withdrew, and Essek’s breath came a little easier. “Then let’s call this an exercise in… mutual trust.” He smiled once more, and Essek returned the expression with a vague twitch of lips.

The tense exchange was followed by ten excruciating minutes of silence, during which Essek did his best not to fidget in his heavy robes, even when his exposed skin grew so heated he felt liable to burst into flames. As they waited, the redheaded man pulled Tusktooth aside for a private conversation, and Essek sweated, and watched, and tried to formulate a plan.

The pirates would find nothing of value to steal. The Barren Bow had provisions for the voyage, but anything else aboard was the purview of the Assarian crew, who had planned to head back towards the shores of Igrathad as soon as the parley concluded. There were no scheduled stops for trade, and thus, no trade goods in their hold. There weren’t even guns to offer. Essek would never dare to admit it aloud, but the Dynasty lagged sorely behind the rest of Wildemount in outfitting its fleet with the relatively new technology of cannonry, at least of the type that lacked a magical component. Firearms had only entered the sphere of weaponmaking some thirty years prior, and with Xhorhas primarily landlocked, the navy hadn’t been high on the priority list for refurbishment.

His best hope was that some of the crew had hidden stashes of coin in their quarters. Otherwise, there would be nothing for the pirates to take, and without anything to satisfy them, well… he did not want to be in manacles when that news was delivered to a man who’d already put a sword to his throat.

If only to convince himself he was not totally beaten yet, Essek watched Tusktooth and the redhead carefully, seeing what he could glean from body language alone. Their conversation was hushed but tense, and every few moments the redhead would turn his eyes towards the drow delegation, and then to Essek himself. He made sure to drop his own eyes before they could meet again, not wanting to spark another confrontation by appearing insolent. As for the pirate captain… there was confidence, yes, but the unwavering edge of confidence seemed to drop away from his shoulders as he spoke to the other man. His arms moved more wildly; his words were more rapid, and at a higher pitch. Perhaps his earlier confidence was not so unshakeable as it at first appeared.

At last, Beau and the goblin re-emerged from the staircase. “We got shit all,” Beau said, tossing down a half-empty sack by Essek’s feet. He winced as a few bruised tubers rolled out across the warped deck.

“...Shit.” Tusktooth ran a hand over his mouth. “Shit. Nothing?”

“Nott and I checked every inch of that hold, the crew quarters, everything. No money, no timber, no – fuck, I don’t know – fine silks or–”

“No cannons,” Nott added mournfully. “No black powder.”

“We went through all this for nothing?”

“Maybe someone’s holding out on us,” Nott said, brandishing her crossbow. “I could make ‘em talk for you, Captain. Make them squeal–”

“Oh–kay, Nott,” Tusktooth said, “let’s take it down a notch.” But despite his placating tone, his look was thoughtful. Again, he turned to Essek. “You never never did say what you all were doing out here, so far from home. You don’t look like a sailor to me.”

“Yes, friend,” said the redhead, stepping up to Essek from Tusktooth’s other side, alarmingly calm, and placing altogether too much emphasis on the second word to be trusted, “what is it you do here?” Essek took a half-step back, not liking the feeling of being pressed in from all angles, and walked himself straight into the chest of the giantess.

Nowhere to hide. And with his hands bound behind his back, no way to levitate up to a level where he didn’t feel every inch of height his captors had over him. Which, at his firmly average height for a drow, was many.

Focus, Thelyss. Focus.

“Why should I answer your questions,” he sneered, “when you have not done me the same courtesy? Who are you, to board a vessel commissioned lawfully by the Bright Queen herself?” It was a dangerous ploy, but a considered one – a hastily calculated risk. If the pirates could not be convinced there was nothing of value to be found, they might decide to punish the crew for concealing their rightful prize, and when even a beating couldn’t drive his compatriots to forfeit non-existent gold, the pirates might well scuttle the ship and leave them all to drown at sea. He doubted simple brigands would care much for the particulars of a diplomatic mission if there was no treasure involved, so there was little harm in broaching a subject that might be far more dangerous to discuss with more educated captors.

But apparently, some aspect of Essek’s logic had failed him again, because the redhead immediately shot a wide-eyed look at Tusktooth, before looking back to Essek. “The Bright Queen?”

Essek gave a little bow. His head swam as he dipped back up – the handcuffs, no doubt, though it could just as easily be the beginnings of heatstroke – and he had to swallow twice to find the fortitude to speak without slurring. “Essek Thelyss, Shadowhand of the Kryn Dynasty and ambassador of the realm.” The last part was an… embellishment, and if he chanced a glance over at the true ambassadors, he imagined there would be many offended looks. But thankfully, all attention was solely focused on him. “I assure you, you won’t find the prize you’re looking for on a diplomatic vessel, gentleman. Your friends have already given you proof – we carry nothing beyond our own provision. Unless you have a particular taste for the delicacies of Xhorhasian fashion, I’m afraid we have little to offer you.”

Nott snarled, but the redhead put up a hand. “Captain,” he said slowly, looking at Tusktooth. “Might I… make a suggestion?”

“You may.”

“It’s not something I’d usually propose, but times being what they are…” Tusktooth nodded grimly.

“We haven’t got many options left.”

“Precisely. I believe that our friend Mr. Thelyss here has lied to us.” He could laugh for the irony of it all; this was the most truthful Essek had been in years. “There is indeed something very valuable aboard this ship.” His blue eyes pierced through Essek, and it was only his determination to keep the – now violently pitching – contents of his stomach where they belonged, that stopped him from speaking up in his own defense.

“And that is...?”

“Himself.”

#critical role #essek thelyss #shadowgast #essek week #my writing #also since plank king essek is a... thing??? now #the timing seems appropriate lol #this fic is not that but it is still (eventual) pirate!Essek #and who doesn't love that

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jinterlude · 3 years

Text

Grow a Pear

—Requested by @shadowsremedy: Seokjin + Kuroko’s Basketball + School Gym as part of @bangtan-headquarters Bangtan Anime Club Drabble Event!

—Pairing: Seokjin x Reader (Female OC) [feat. Seungcheol from SVT]

—Genre(s): Humor, Slight-Angst, & Slight-Fluff

—AUs/Tropes: Anime-verse, Kuroko’s Basketball!AU, High School!AU, Basketball Player!Seokjin, Basketball Club Manager!Reader, Opposites Attract Trope

—Warning(s) & Rating: Swearing, Reader threatening bodily harm onto Seokjin, Shameless flirting, & Jealousy from an old middle school rival / PG-15

—Word Count: 1.6K

—Summary: In which news of playing against a certain team sparks a rather interesting memory...

—A/N: This drabble is based on episodes 52 & 53 of KnB, but you do not have to watch the series to understand this story’s overall premise! It is also inspired by Kesha’s song “Grow a Pear” (hence the title LOL) because I immediately think of Kise’s character. Since Seokjin reminds me of that 2D pretty boy, I decided to write a fun story!

“Hey, ___!”

A faint hum exits your lips as your eyes remain fixated on your player statistics book. You flip between a few pages with the gears in your brain working in overdrive, almost forgetting for a split moment that Kaijo’s basketball captain asked for your attention.

“Yes, Sungwon?” You reply, closing the book and tucking it underneath your arm.

Pursing his lips, Sungwon strides over to you, leaning against the stage inside the gym. Don’t you love playing inside an auditorium?

“So…” He begins but grows silent. How on Earth is he supposed to ask you to be the sacrificial lamb? How will he tell you that you’ve been chosen to say the team’s resident narcissist yet talented prodigy that Kaijo will play against Fukuda Sugo? Specifically, they’re playing against a certain someone with a rather colorful history with yourself and said prodigy.

Tiny creases form on your forehead as your brows knit together. You know that carefree look anywhere. More often than not, you become chosen to do a specific task that no other teammate wants to do—talking to Kim Seokjin.

“Now, before you say no—”

“Nope.”

“You didn’t even hear what I have to say.”

“Doesn’t matter. My answer is still the same. No.”

With that, you turn on your heel, and not even a few steps in, you bump into the one person you don’t want to see.

“Princess!”

And to think…

You were having such a fantastic day…

“What do you want, Seokjin?” You question, grabbing the statistics book from your underarm and flipping it open to some random page. You already have the data mesmerized like the back of your hand. You just want to appear busy in front of the arrogant pretty boy.

“Well, besides you finally acknowledging that you’re my girlfriend? A little bird told me that we’re playing against his team in the Quarterfinals,” Seokjin replies, his tone dropping near the end. This serious expression slowly takes over his handsome features, almost sending shivers down your spine.

If looks can kill, then Seokjin is guilty of murder in the first degree...

Thank God he chose to attend a different school. Who knows what will happen if two people who absolutely despise each other play on the same team.

“Remind me to thank Namjoon for that…” You mutter, slightly shaking your head as you slowly draw in your breath. Then, a force, light chuckle escapes your lips, personally finding it rather humorous of the current situation.

“Anyway, so how are you feeling about playing against the dude who has a thing for your sloppy seconds?” You tease, attempting to lighten up the situation.

Seokjin’s brow perks up, “Sloppy seconds?” he repeats, a tiny grin form on his handsome face.

You nod, “Well yeah...I mean, he did steal your ex-girlfriend from you.”

In response, the arrogant basketball player hums. However, this exciting gleam enters the corners of his eyes.

What is he thinking now?

Suddenly, he turns to you, his gaze piercing into yours with this unexplainable emotion glazing over his eyes.

“Oh? I mean, he did come close to stealing you away from me that one day.” He states as this bright smile dances across his gorgeous face.

For a split second, your cheeks become hot. Your heart practically drums against your chest. Shit. Even your palms clam up, sticking to the cover of the player statistics book.

What is this feeling?

Then, it dawns on you. This nervousness is the same emotion you felt when you comforted Seokjin that fateful day—well, supported him in your own unique way…

Tapping your pencil against your chin, a soft growl emits from your lips as you try to figure out the best course of action. The Captain, Kim Namjoon, previously asked you to develop a plan to preserve the Generation of Miracle’s stamina, specifically when using their rather unique talents. At first, you thought Namjoon was flat out insane for asking such a request. Like, you’d have to take into account their height and weight difference. Oh! You couldn’t forget that you also keep in mind their current talent levels. All while these calculations occur during an official game with another team.

Yeah...

Namjoon might as well tell you to put on a fucking jersey while he’s at it.

Rubbing the sides of your forehead, you can’t help but let out a long, harsh breath as this throbbing sensation enters the left side of your head.

“Hey, manager ___.” You hear a familiar voice, interrupting your rather irritating calculations. You look up from the tiny pile of scattered papers containing player statistics. However, you don’t bother spouting words towards the overly cocky player. Instead, you merely hum in response, unknowingly irking the basketball player.

Plastering on a smug grin, the person leans against the stage, quickly glancing at what you’re doing.

“So, is that the special project Namjoon asked you to do for him?” The arrogant male student asks.

“Yep, and shouldn’t you be practicing Seungcheol?” You question back, raising a brow.

Seungcheol scoffs lightly, “Why? I mean, I already earned a permanent spot on the regular team, so…” He trails on, chuckling to himself. He finds the mere thought of his spot being taken away quite humorous.

You mentally roll your eyes. God, you don’t know who’s the bigger arrogant fool. Him or—

“Yo, Seokjin!” shouts Jungkook, running up to the new recruit.

Ah, Kim Seokjin. He recently joined the basketball club just a few months ago. He’s already showing promise despite being a second-year student. Shit. Seokjin’s talents have rapidly progressed to the point that Namjoon took notice of him and was promoted to first-string just last week.

Yet, you can’t quite put your finger on it, but something is holding Seokjin back.

But what?

Before you become entirely lost in your thoughts, you hear Seungcheol’s arrogant voice taunt Seokjin.

Oh, great…

You swiftly stand up from your seat and rush over to the argumentative duo. But as you draw near to the quarrelsome pair, you instantly halt. What is this intense atmosphere lingering in the air?

And why do you suddenly feel something other than agitation towards Seokjin?

“W-what did you say?”

“You heard me, Kim Seokjin. Whoever wins our 1v1 match earns the right to call ___ his girlfriend.”

“Hold on. You can’t just call dibs on ___!” shouts Jungkook in complete and utter shock.

Instantly slapping yourself back, in reality, you snatch a basketball from an innocent player and roughly throw it at Seungcheol, anger visible all over your face.

Sadly for you, the annoying prick catches it with ease, smirking at you.

“What’s the matter, babe? You don’t believe that I can put Seokjin in his place?” He coos, further taunting Seokjin. What sets the handsome prodigy over the edge is when Seungcheol abruptly pulls you against his chest, dropping the basketball in the process. His cheek brushes against yours, making you want to gag.

Just as you’re about to violently elbow him in the stomach, Seokjin shoves Seungcheol away before forcefully throwing the discarded ball at him.

“You start.”

“This should be fun.”

But it was just the opposite...

It was a complete slaughter with Seokjin on his hands and knees, panting and sweating profusely. His eyes widened from the shock of his defeat.

Not only has he lost horribly against Seungcheol, but he also lost you—or so he believes.

“So, how about that date, baby girl? After all, you’re now my girlfriend.” Seungcheol asks, making sure that Seokjin can hear him.

“Yeah, I don’t date dudes who have a thing for other fellas’ sloppy seconds.” You bluntly state, turning towards Yoongi and Jungkook, “I mean, first it was Yerin, right? The one that was going around the entire fucking school saying that she was Seokjin’s girlfriend. Oh, I feel sorry for her since it was just last week, you were chasing after her, and now you’re after me.” You say, clicking your tongue in fake disappointment.

Seungcheol’s arrogant smile vanishes and is now replaced with a scowl.

“Let me ask you this, why are you obsessed with Seokjin’s sloppy seconds? Like there are a million girls in this damn school who, oddly enough, would love to be your arm candy. Yet you go after the ones that either show interest in Seokjin or who Seokjin’s interested in. Like, dude. Stop. It’s honestly creepy to the point that I firmly believe you have a weird obsession with him.” You finish as you walk over to Seokjin, offering him a helping hand.

Seokjin faintly smiles, grabbing your hand, as he pulls himself up. Soon, his smile becomes bright. His sweet smile almost blinds you—and makes your heart skip a beat.

“I knew you had a soft spot for me, ___.”

“Don’t push it, Jinnie boy.”

Softly shaking your head, you playfully shove Seokjin, snapping him out of his thoughts. You then jump down from the stage, having popped yourself up there moments earlier.

“Well, all I have to say is that Seungcheol better watch out. He hasn’t seen your ‘Perfect Copy’ in action yet.” You warmly smile as you make your way towards the exit but soon halt. You glance over your shoulder, maintaining that sweet smile, and say,

“Besides, he’s no match for you with your girlfriend cheering you on from the bench.”

“Right…” He mumbles, totally ignoring your words. Then, it hits him as if someone doused him with cold water.

“Wait! Did you just call yourself my girlfriend?!!” Seokjin hollers, chasing after you.

“I don’t know. Win tomorrow’s match, and I’ll let you know.”

“Oh, that’s cruel, princess…”

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twiststreet · 3 years

Photo

New favorite purchase in a while: my copy of OffGrid magazine (or “recoil offgrid...?”) that I bought at the Sacramento airport because I missed what magazines used to be: little short opportunities on the most casual possible basis to find out about a world not your own, paid attention to with scrutiny but some editorial distance, I guess is how I’d put it. The last days of magazines were a while ago (and the heyday was before I was alive, the heyday was the 60′s)-- and the internet’s attempts to do magazines all seem to have failed, RIP Grantland or whatever. But it was an hour long plane flight and I didn’t want to read the novel I brought with me, so.

OffGrid seemed like it’d be a fun one-- I mean, that jacket. What’s going on with that guy’s life that he was like “I need to wear this jacket?” How much time got spent posing that collar. Why is he in using a laptop in the woods...? You can’t see what’s on the bag to his left but it’s the words “Mystery Ranch.” I wanted to solve that mystery!!!

Plus: for a good solid moment, I was like, “Man, what if I had a DIY Junkyard Knife Project. What if that’d be good for me, like, as a new thing? What if immersing myself into high-end artisnal shivs could become a fun side hustle? I could sell my bespoke shanks at Guns and Knives Shows.” My whole thing lately has been trying to pivot and all, so. You know: dreams; aspirations; etc. (Bladeshow West is on October 8-9 in Long Beach and has the “West Coast Flipping Championship”, but I’m out of town).

So I open it up on the plane-- inside front cover is a photograph of a socom 16 cqb, opposite a photo of a man holding the rifle. The man’s beard is exactly what you’re imagining. Most of the ads are for guns or night vision shit (one ad is for Gatorz sunglasses, though-- “the world’s best eyewear for mission driven people”). Besides that, it’s a normal-looking magazine, albeit not a particularly inspired one on the design side, but. There’s a gear section like men’s magazines always have, but for the “ultimate go bag”, bikes, “urban use” hiking boots, dinner sausages, thermal optics, knives, and a book called “The Ninja Wilderness Survival Guide.” Ninjas were big outdoorsmen. You know: so far so good-- exactly what I wanted. It’s a magazine for MEN in all caps so everything being sold is exclusively black or grey or grey-brown.

And it’s got that sort of “we’re a magazine” tone to the prose, like there’s a certain style of writing that magazines always have-- it’s such a narrow band of style that people are okay with reading... but like from the survivalist sausage review:

“As much as we fancy ourselves survivalists, not all of us are going to take down a buck, field dress it, and haul it back to home base during a weekend camping trip with the family. Sometimes we just ilke to chill and and make s’mores.”

That sort of performance of humility that magazines have. “We’re all just people here. Now here’s our review of a $90 hatchet” (‘perfect for batoning wood.’). Part of me wants to live in the world of magazines...

But then you get to the Good Part-- the article “What If Your Privacy has Been Compromised by Internet Doxing” by ... “Recoil Offgrid Staff.” Ohhhh, I see what they did there. You’re not going to dox the person who wrote this article, folks. (Except the names of staff are all listed in the magazine credits, so not the tightest op-sec I’ve ever seen, but okay).

This article kind of catches the eye because of the extremely specific hypotheticals.

Because it’s an article about what to do about internet doxing but it begins with a section called “The Setup”, laying out a scenario that YOU, the READER, might have to worry about, a situation where you might very well get doxed and then what??? Here’s that part of the article:

The Setup: imagine you attended a city council meeting to express your concern about the side effect of a growing homeless population in your area. You plan to voice your concern for your famliy’s safety after witnessing an increase in drug sales, sexual assaults and public defecation. [...] Some activists who attended this meeting did so in an effort to retaliate against residents who were speaking out against the homeless problem. [..] An online petition appearing to solicit residents to push for legislation that imposes tougher penalties against homelessness had recently been started. [...] Everyone who’d signed up had been catfished. [...] Now, hostile notes are being left in your mailbox, harassing calls and texts from blocked numbers are coming in and you genuinely fear that the reprisals will become physical.”

The entire premise of the article is that you say something so hateful at a city council meeting about “how we need to punish the homeless” that the internet causes you to fear for your safety!! Your A+ plan to **have the same decrepit bureaucracy that’s allowed a homeless crisis to just terrorize people because they can’t pay for basic survival** is so despised that you need to read a magazine article urging you to (and this is a quote) “decide whether to stay at my residence, leave my house temporarily, or permanently move.”

(The worst doxing I ever saw was because women went near video games, but).

Just this ultra-specific hypothetical! There’s a real “office staff” 10000% got made fun of on twitter for yelling some dumb shit stink to the proceedings from, ike, paragraph 3 on. And if you were wondering whether the article would complain about vaccines later, you betcha. In a later section, the article warns you to obtain situational awareness and not engage with internet crackpots, but the hypothetical example they give is “Did that person actually say they believe that anyone who’s hesitant to be vaccinated should be compelled to do so or be banned from participating in any social activity?” Use your situational awareness! Stay away from that person online but insist on coughing around them socially! They can dox you just for trying to negligently murder their immuno-compromised grandpa!! Here’s an ad for a gun.

Here’s a drawing that comes with the article:

The reader is being asked to relate to the person looking at the phone! “That’s probably what you look like.” I mean... seems fair?

The next article is with a veteran of the IDF. There’s an article about hiding secret messages in memes (the example is a meme of a dog that say “love is in the air or is that bacon?”), which suggests you hide images in “raunchy images” since casual onlookers may click away from those faster... on the internet... where raunchy images are frowned upon?? There’s an article about how to escape if you’re ever tied up with duct tape (i’m going to live forever). There’s an article about the kinds of reptiles you want to hunt when you’re trying to survive that tells readers not to hunt crocodiles, and stick to snakes and lizards-- there goes my weekend.

But I just love that at the very core of this, that they say the quiet part out loud, that the reason you need all this survivalist knowledge and tactical gear is... because quote “self-proclaimed social justice” people out there don’t want to hear your A+ super-good ideas about society. A young person called me a Mayonnaise-Turd for refusing to be vaccinated and coughing on all the produce at Krogers. What’s the best tactical knife I can buy? Waaaah. Just the constant fear that drips off of these morons, because they live in a world where they get called stupid finally with the regularity they’ve long deserved. Just the most scared fucking cowards-- they need night vision goggles to fucking go to Dave & Busters, because these stay-puft marshmallow men think that AntiFa is going to bumrush the Dave & Busters for their skeeball tickets.

I love anytime you scratch away at Real Masculinity and find the throbbing, wet Hyperemotional Pussy underneath that’s there like at least 7 out of 10 times. That was basically the premise of the entire early 00′s in comedy, and I had a really good time, but then woke comedy-scolds made them stop and then ended comedy and replaced comedy with Bo Burnham filming himself crying while waiting for Door Dash in his mansion. I don’t understand the world anymore! I wish I’d owned a PFC9 Compact pistol with aggressive slide serrations when children killed bromance comedies!!!! Jason Segal and Paul Rudd haven’t made a movie together in years-- time to go off the grid!

#Civilization is Doomed.

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readingaccountability · 3 years

Text

snow crash - neal stephenson

my playlist (because of The Way That I Am)

final thoughts:

okay, im going to be honest right out of the gate- i cant decide whether this is a book id recommend or not. it was really fun for the most part, but personally there was a lot more exposition than id like. the early portions of the novel have exposition which feels completely fair, mostly things relating to worldbuilding. stephenson creates his own vision of future america, and some places online referred to it as cyberpunk, and some as post-cyberpunk. id be more in the latter camp, mostly due to the way he plays with tropes, leaving the reader unsure of which will be subverted and which wont.

the use of language was really fun, and i enjoyed the worldbuilding a lot. his vision of a futuristic capitalistic earth feels surreal in its immediacy and recognizability. the back jacket blurb ends with "a future america so bizarre, so outrageous, you'll recognize it immediately." which, yeah. a texan info-tech magnate? two competing corporations owning the highway system? suburban city-states? this was another enjoyable thing- everything was colorfully named, and names treated totally normally, which kind of poked fun at how we have everyday things named very ludicrously and for the most part we are totally blind to it.

one aspect i really enjoyed was that the author often doesn't make certain things clear to the audience, until he does, and then it becomes necessary to reassess the entire story and setting. this goes to underscore the theme of the importance of information and the ways we take it in and perceive the world based upon it. for example, we don't learn that y.t. is fifteen until maybe 75 pages in, at which point a lot makes sense in retrospect. the same thing occurs in the worldbuilding, as suddenly a detail is given in passing and the reader must incorporate it into the setting, which by default we assume to be similar in many ways to our idea of america. it keeps the reader on their toes as well as furthering the worldbuilding. for the most part, the tech stuff didnt feel outdated to me, despite being a future projected out from '92.

however, aspects of the book are definitely very 1992. id put these into two camps: the first, being that the book does at different times use slurs. the main character is black and asian, the n word is used a few times by racist side-character/antagonist types, as are a few other racial slurs. there was also the occasional usage of the r slur, within the narrative prose itself, rather than usage as an insult within dialogue.

the protagonist, who is named, unfortunately, hiro protagonist, is a great character and felt very fleshed out to me, though at times he reminded me more of dirk strider than normally would be ideal. (its obvious that stephenson and andrew hussie are of a similar type of writer, and play with similar tropes, lmao.) hiro is a man of many worlds. he seems to shift between them easily, though never fully existing in any of them. this is reflected in his background, both in his biracial identity and in having been raised on a myriad of army bases. this is layered further in his fluidity in interacting with both reality and the metaverse, yet remaining slightly, consistently aloof. fascinatingly the first moment i sensed this drop was when we meet juanita- aka where his real and meta realities coincide. the description of them as the adam and eve of the metaverse is both insanely romantic and thematically key (good god i wish we had more than like, two conversations between them). juanita designed the facial component to metaverse avatars, doing the majority of this work when the two were together, and hiro can see echoes of both their facial tics in the face of every avatar in the metaverse. in a way, by having done this work juanita is positioned by the narrative as one of the gods of this digital realm. she is also hiro's call to action, being aware of the coming trouble and alerting him to it, as well as connecting him to the informational database he needs to prepare.

y.t., the secondary protagonist, fucking ruled. i loved that she was just a fifteen year old punkass kid whose mom doesnt know how crazy this part time job is. y.t. being worried about her mom was a great thread throughout, and a really good balance to how obviously independent y.t. is. i do wish there had been a chance to explain more about her background (she has a dad who left who is mentioned in a throwaway sentence, and a boyfriend who is mentioned near the beginning but never again.) i really enjoyed how obviously hyperaware y.t. was at all times about her own place within the insanities of the setting, while also consistently writing her as a teen maybe in way too deep who thinks about things in typically teenage ways. but like, that wasn't ever held against her? the narrative meets her where she is. it was honestly awesome. HOWEVER,

i absolutely hated the raven and y.t. scenes. how creepy!!! he basically statutory rapes her!!! we know hes at least late 20s early 30s, because hes the same age as hiro. if this sort of content is upsetting to read for you, i definitely do NOT recommend this book. (if you want to avoid reading these bits: ch 47 y.t. meets raven, ch 50 they are in a bar eating, ch 52 things happen that result in y.t.'s anti-assault device activating- she did not activate it on purpose, but forgot it was there- and raven is knocked out.)

please PLEASE dont take any of the following analysis as like, trying to be apologetic towards this scenes. because again they were awful and hard to get through and really gross. but im also cognizant that the author was obviously trying to convey something by making the choice, like the way it was written is obviously not condoning this sort of thing.

i think maybe what stephenson was trying to get at with that, was that we see hiro internally negate any potential for anything untoward with y.t. basically immediately, since he kind of senses that she might have a small crush on him (though this doesnt last more than a fleeting moment, especially from her perspective). vs raven, whose 'poor impulse control' warning tattoo eventually elicits a sarcastic remark from hiro after he finds out raven and y.t. were "a thing". i really dont think hiro knew how far it went? like it was just suuuper weird, but i figured it was meant narratively to 1. execute the chekovs gun of y.t.'s anti-assault device, 2. contrast hiro and raven (especially considering the bike-racing argument where theyre telling the story together, which is supposed to parallel them, while contrasting the differences in how they ended up?), and 3. just to get raven unconscious, i guess. but good god it was weird and i hated every second of it, why couldnt the device have like, activated way earlier?? gah. fucking upsetting. moving past that!

honestly i was really frustrated by how little screentime juanita got, because the way she was introduced was so fucking interesting and then shes mostly off doing her own thing. the bits of explanation she gives at the end about what she was up to on the raft are so sparse and im like damn, can we get a little bit of her pov in here? please? that would have ruled. additionally, shes supposed to be hiros love interest, but we see so little of them interacting outside her intro scenes. a huge portion of why hiro is getting into the sumerian mythology is literally framed as something that will help him understand juanita, but we dont get to see him talk to her about it barely at all.

the supporting characters were quite fun, i particularly liked the librarian. big surprise, i liked the overly literal ai information-dispensor, lmfao. watching him and hiro interact reminded me SO hard of geordi laforge having honest to god conversations with the computer where he tries to coax information out of it, aka one of my favorite little aspects of tng.

and lastly, the major plot themes themselves. i adore the way stephenson approached action, it was very entertaining. usually i cant really visualize action scenes written out, but his use of language was really really effective and engaging. the plot itself was absolutely fascinating, though i found the premise pretty contrived. which isnt bad in itself, i was fully suspending my disbelief until the last hundred pages or so. which for a 550+ page book, isnt too bad.

i did like the approach of linking the ancient to the modern, that is always really neat. and i think ultimately stephenson did it in an interesting way, not how i would have done it, but definitely interesting! creating these ideas about information infrastructures, and there being words that can access those and be used to control people, was wild. not sure if i agree about the equating of religion to a virus, though he did specifically establish that it was more the approach to religion, than religion itself. (maybe if juanita had been more goddamn present in the narrative that could have been elaborated on a little more. literally her perspective would have been perfect in balancing that out!!)

ultimately what did me in was the very very very long winded MONOLOGUE where hiro re-explained the whole premise, in ways that didnt really neatly organize into a cohesive argument. a lot of the scenes where hiro talks to the librarian, which are interspersed throughout the book, are really exposition heavy, because stephenson is rooting his ideas in historical concepts that need to be explained to both hiro and the audience. and i thought all that was fine, because it was a conversation where hiro was grappling with the information, and he was figuring it out along with the reader, and most importantly it was a conversation between him and the librarian computer program.

howeverrr later on we get a full rehash of all that, where hiro makes clear some stuff that was just implied for the reader, and hes literally just telling these important men whats up in this big long monologue. utterly worthless. i kept reading it and going YEAH, we KNOW, we know this we know this. and the important men barely interjected. it added basically nothing to our understanding of the situation, other than reframing it. but everything added was already an implicit thing, and didnt really need to be said again.

the resolution to the book was stellar, the last 30-40 pages, once hiro is onto the raft, were great. ultimately after reading and giving some time to digest it, i think it was a solidly great book with a few big drawbacks near the end, but which dont carry through and sully the ending.

#bookblr #book tag #snow crash #neal stephenson #reading progress update #book review #cyberpunk #post-cyberpunk #god this is long #kind of ended up being book report esque... elementary school vibes. i fucking love it ngl #original post #playlist series

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black-streak · 4 years

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Hey I love your writing!! For a prompt how about a Timmari story where they keep meeting at a coffee shop and start dating. Then Mari gets a job at WE and finds out that Tim is a Wayne.

Oh! I love seeing your comments on my works! (and your username is 👌) this prompt was extremely fun and I ended up with a really cool premise imo considering it's only around 1000 words. If I didn't already have a long wip, I'd probably expand this a ton, so thank you so much for sending it in. Hope you enjoy!

~---~

Marinette never meant to become employed at Wayne Enterprises. Honestly, she's not sure anyone ever did, based on the stories her new coworkers shared with her upon her revealing that working there had been an accident.

They'd welcome her and ask how she came to find herself working in the office. From the moment she opened her mouth, nods of understanding and small knowing smiles came flooding her way.

So many saying they were down on their luck, taking odd jobs, even working for criminals when times were tough, just to put food on the table. Suddenly, like an angel of good omens, a business card passed by steady promising hands and a call later, they were working a stable job in a reputable company without fear of being laid off.

That… Was not quite how she came to be here, but they never let her get past the, "Completely by accident, I'm still not sure what's happening," so apparently surprise jobs were common in Gotham.

They were, however, taken off guard and even applauded her upon finding out exactly where she was stationed. How did someone like her end up with this position? Good question. She wishes she knew.

Sighing softly, she took her time heading up towards the up most floors, on a mission from her new boss.

Waiting on the elevator, she reminisced on her time in this wretched city thus far, trying to figure out how she ended up here of all places. She moved from Paris out of sheer need for change, sick of the overly safe, villainless streets. How does one act as a hero when there is nothing to be heroic about? Add on the money Fu passed along to her in accordance with her gaining guardianship of the miracle box plus selling the massage parlor he no longer had need for and it left her… well enough.

Setting up shop, she settled in quickly before reopening her commissions page and began working once more. It was around this time she met Tim, her now boyfriend.

The two had bumped into each other in the coffee shop down the way from her place, her newest haunt for sketching. Well rather, they bumped into each other numerous times on multiple days always at the same time and murmured soft, embarrassed apologies with light blushes and avoided eye contact. The usual barista began setting their coffee orders on a little table off to the side before their arrival instead of waiting for them to order and handing it off to them separately. Something about "shipping it" and needing the two to just "get on with it already".

This led to having regular conversations over their preferred beverages until eventually one had to leave, usually Tim. After three months of this dance, Cathryn, their barista, took the steering wheel once again and wrote a little message on his cup to just ask her out already. Three weeks in and she could not thank the barista enough. Her boyfriend was amazing.

It was around the time she first visited that particular coffee shop that she picked up a new love for creating fabrics and materials to incorporate into clothing. She began to look further into organic chemistry, using the information to help formulate new fabrics that were more durable, yet light and flexible. They quickly became a feature amongst her commission prices, allowing the truly daring to strike out and debut her newest materials in her stead.

Finally reaching the office she needed, she spoke briefly to a nice woman named Tam, who promptly walked over to the CEO's door.

"Miss DC is here with files for review and sign off."

"Now?" A familiar voice spoke up.

"Considering she is behind me, I would presume so."

"Did she mention which department?"

"She didn't."

A soft sigh, "Let her in."

Tam gestured her in with an amused, "good luck," closing the door behind.

"One moment please," he spoke, eyes glued to the screen in front of him. She stared in surprise for a moment, not entirely processing the situation. Finally she just shook her head and accepted her reality.

This might as well happen. Adult life was already so god damn weird.

"Take your time," she shrugged, taking a seat in the chair across from him.

His eyebrow scrunched up for a second in concentration only for him to snap to attention, surprise splashed across his features, "Marinette?"

"Morning Tim!"

"What are you doing here?"

"Same as you, I suppose. Working. Guess this is a bit of a conflict of interest, huh?"

With a blink, he turned back to his computer and clicked through a few files, eyes scrolling the pages only to come to realization.

"R&D division. Direct assistant and secretary to Mr. Lucius Fox. Hired one week ago."

"Yup," she popped, completely unsure how else to react.

"I thought you were a fashion designer?"

"I am. Have my own business and everything. You're as confused as I am."

"Did you apply?"

"Nope."

"Then how- nevermind. I know how. Same way everyone ends up here. By surprise and random happenstance."

"Well yes, though I was under the impression I was being asked to create a suit for someone considering the email came through my site and not my personals."

His eyes seemed to twitch just barely. She got the distinct feeling he knew something she didn't. That was fine. He didn't even know her designer pseudonym yet. Speaking of them not knowing things about each other.

"I thought you said you were in the family business?"

"I am. Bruce Wayne is my adoptive father."

"Well okay then. On that note, Mr. Fox has requested your immediate attention on these files. He expects them to be returned to his office within the hour. The project will be underway in the meantime." She stated, falling back into work mode and dropping the stack onto the desk in front of him with great pleasure as his eyes glared at the paperwork.

"Not going to wait approval?" Tim asked.

"I've been assured that will be unnecessary. I may be new, but it's been made very clear to me. I only answer to Mr. Fox. You're more of a formality in this instance and will have no effect on my work."

He gaped at her before shaking it off with a laugh, "I assume Lucius himself told you as much."

"Pretty much."

"Of course he did."

"Still on for tonight?"

"If I get through the mess you just left me."

"You will. Only have an hour, remember?"

"I suppose we are then."

"Wonderful! We have so many new things to talk about," she stated, leaning in with a sly look before turning on her heel and sashaying out of the room, "See you later, Boss!" She called cheerfully on her way, cackling at his choked off response and violently red face.

Closing the door behind her, she met Tam's unimpressed, yet curious look, "What was that about?"

"Just found out my boyfriend works here!" She grinned, heading back to her own division to the sound of the Tam's gleeful laugh.

#timari #timinette #maribat #ml x dc #working on prompts sent in before the cut off #last two? i think will be put up tomorrow #what are timelines?#screw it Mr Fox and Tim as CEO can coexist

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what-breaks-my-heart · 4 years

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Episode 10: Misunderstanding from Understanding (이해라는 오해) - Episode Thoughts

It is safe to assume many viewers are ENRAGED at Woo Yeon’s behaviour in this episode, particularly when she agreed to have dinner with Joon Soo just a minute after Lee Soo introduced her to his parents as the person he likes, and when she showed up in front of Lee Soo’s door afterward.

I was enraged myself that I went to several posts made by other people and shared my displeasure by her actions. No matter how I tried to find the reason behind Woo Yeon’s actions, I found nothing. It seemed to me that her actions were not only unjustified, but also unbecoming of her character.

Buuuuuut, and that’s a big but here (no pun intended), after sittting with my thoughts (more like tossing in bed) and going through all of the over 1,000 screencaps I took during the episode (oh god I am becoming more like my tumblr mutual with 50 GB of screencaps), I realised the writer pulled a grand scheme of shifting the viewers’ rooting from Woo Yeon to Lee Soo, while also laying down another piece of the puzzle in Woo Yeon’s and Lee Soo’s eventful relationship. I promise this will make at least some sense further down

This is going to be a long post so more under the break!

A quick recap: episode 9 ended with Lee Soo walking past Woo Yeon with a straight face at the exhibition, with Woo Yeon feeling upset about it.

At the beginning of episode 10, we were shown the conversation between Woo Yeon and Young Hee about her attending this exhibition. This conversation which took place before the exhibition, seemed to be out place (more on that later), because it could have been cut short to just Woo Yon telling Young Hee why she’s not worried about attending the exhibition. Heck, it could have been done with the three girlfriends having a drink and them teasing each other. But no, this conversation only took place between the two of them. Apparently Young Hee is acting like a big sister to Woo Yeon with her sage advice too.

Young Hee: Will you be okay? Both Mr. CEO and Soo will be there.

Woo Yeon: Why wouldn’t I? It’s all over anyway.

Young Hee: With whom?

Woo Yeon: With both.

Young Hee: When?

Woo Yeon: Well, it ended a while ago for me. And I haven’t heard from Mr. CEO or Soo since. It’s over.

Young Hee: Mr. CEO is one thing, but Soo said he’d wait.

Woo Yeon: He’s selfish. If he wanted to, he would’ve called long ago.

Young Hee: Who are you to conclude that?

Woo Yeon: Because I understand. Because I was like that. When someone I thought would like only me started seeing someone else, and when I saw him saying and doing things that I thought were only for me to someone else, I got jealous. How ridiculous is that?

Young Hee: You don’t want him, but you don’t want anyone else to have him. Something like that?

Woo Yeon: Something like that.

Young Hee: And so, that’s how it is for Soo.

Woo Yeon: Correct.

Young Hee: Are you sure about yourself?

Cue the episode title in calligraphy writing.

At first, I really thought this conversation was out of place and didn’t deserve to be followed by the episode title calligraphy. Some of you would notice that these episode title calligraphy would only appear after some heavy conversations in the middle of the episode. Putting this conversation and the episode title calligraphy right at the beginning of the episode was way too heavy.

However, by putting the title this early in the episode, the tone for the entire episode has been set, and everything that is bound to happen will follow this theme. Earlier this morning, I was mad at myself for not noticing how this ties back to Woo Yeon’s outrageous behaviour at the end of the episode.

You see, what this episode is trying to tell us is how the characters thought they have understood the others, and acted based on that perceived understanding.

Why Woo Yeon acted that way, you ask? Because she thought she understood Lee Soo. She thought she had seen it all, being the closest person to Lee Soo during their last year in high school together.

Woo Yeon knew how she has a moment of burning jealousy everytime someone she thought would like only her, suddenly acted in a similar way they were to her, to other people.

Woo Yeon also interpreted Lee Soo’s sudden act of clinging onto her when she was in a relationship with Joon Soo as Lee Soo being jealous and frustrated that Woo Yeon, whom he thought would only like Lee Soo, suddenly showed any sign of interest to someone else.

Premised on the above, Woo Yeon concluded that she and Lee Soo are similar in that sense, easily becoming jealous.

Now, let’s jump ahead to the night when the incident took place.

What we know:

Woo Yeon wanted to leave upon learning that Joon Soo had tricked her into having a dinner with him by pulling some strings with his friend who told her it would be a business meeting with the said friend on the future project.

Joon Soo guilt tripped her into staying, saying her leaving would embarrass him in front of Lee Soo’s family who noticed them at the restaurant.

Woo Yeon reluctantly stayed, and rejected Joon Soo’s proposal to be in a relationship. AGAIN. Girl, you could have finished early and left right away yet you didn’t

Lee Soo, who was only a moment ago, lit up after running into Woo Yeon at the restaurant and introduced her as the person he likes to his parents, turned sour, and the entire family had an awkward birthday dinner.

The thing that made me furious about this is how Woo Yeon felt obliged to stay to save Joon Soo’s face, while ignoring how the entire fiasco would HUMILIATE Lee Soo in front of his own parents. Not just Lee Soo. In front of Lee Soo’s PARENTS. I was fuming mad.

Both groups finished dinner, and all of them were leaving the place. Unlike Joon Soo the creepy stalker, Lee Soo waited for her in front of the building, just to speed off in his car when Woo Yeon tried to approach him.

Never stop being a drama queen, Lee Soo

And now what? Woo Yeon actually took a taxi to Lee Soo’s apartment? Just to explain to him what had happened?

*flips table*

“No matter how hard I try to understand you, there’s only one conclusion. Kyung Woo Yeon thinks I’m a joke.”

“What?”

“It looks like you still don’t believe me, but I really like you. So don’t trample on my feeling.”

Set it straight to her, Lee Soo!

“But I just snapped right out of it. I’ve regained my balance.”

Let me reiterate how this made me outraged. If Woo Yeon was planning on getting pay back for his mistreatment of her over the years, she really has gone overboard this time. Lee Soo might have been a selfish jerk, but everything that he ever told her was his understanding of his feelings during the moment. Never once has he tried to hurt her on purpose. He did hurt her nonetheless, and that’s why I gave her a one-time pass when she quoted his own words to him at the cafe. But repeatedly hurting him on purpose? I started to feel like Lee Soo deserved better.

Okay, here’s what I promised.

“When someone I thought would like only me started seeing someone else, and when I saw him saying and doing things that I thought were only for me to someone else, I got jealous.”

“It’s like a moment of burning jelaousy. Something like that.”

Remember I said earlier how Woo Yeon concluded that Lee Soo became jealous at her once she dated Joon Soo. Their fateful (I keep repeating this wordplay but it’s funnier in Korean) encounter at the restaurant was their second time seeing each other since Lee Soo took that long trip, and Lee Soo was being treated to the sight of Woo Yeon having a dinner date with Joon Soo.

Based on her own conclusion of how Lee Soo would react to this, she tried to explain what happened to stop him from getting jealous. Why? Because she needed him to continue worshipping her. She needed to keep him by her side, close enough that she could feel herself being chased by Lee Soo who was madly in an unrequited love, but not too close, because she didn’t want him. Woo Yeon must really like tuning into the home shopping channel huh

“You don’t want him, but you don’t want anyone else to have him. Something like that?”

It was a eureka moment when I joined all of these dots together. I could finally understand why Woo Yeon did what she did. She basically acted in the way that she understood her own feelings, and the way she understood Lee Soo. But no, it still does NOT justify her actions.

“Are you sure about yourself? Do you never misunderstood yourself in any way? I just wonder if the emotion that you say you’re sure about really is what you feel. It’s human nature to misunderstand yourself at times. Is it possible to understand someone else? I just wonder if it’s right when you think you understand someone is when misunderstandings form.”

I now believe that Woo Yeon is still confused about her own feelings and misunderstood herself (and Lee Soo). It may be some time before she can finally clear all of that misunderstanding, but I believe just like how Lee Soo finally understood his own feelings, Woo Yeon would soon understand hers too.

In conclusion, I would say that this episode integrated the episode title, Misunderstanding from Understanding really well. Perhaps a little too well.

#woah this felt like writing an entire literature analysis for my exam ages ago #excuse the long post but as you can tell I am possessed by this drama #all I can think of is this drama and this drama alone #more than friends #kdrama #kdrama opinion

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dillydedalus · 3 years

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january reading

why does january always feel like it’s 3 months long. anyway here’s what i read in january, feat. poison experts with ocd, ants in your brain, old bolsheviks getting purged, and mountweazels.

city of lies, sam hawke (poison wars #1) this is a perfectly nice fantasy novel about jovan, who serves as essentially a secret guard against poisoning for his city state’s heir and is forced to step up when his uncle (also a secret poison guard) and the ruler are both killed by an unknown poison AND also the city is suddenly under a very creepy siege (are these events related? who knows!) this is all very fine & entertaining & there are some fun ideas, but also... the main character has ocd and SAME HAT SAME HAT. also like the idea of having a very important, secret and potentially fatal job that requires you to painstakingly test everything the ruler/heir is consuming WHILE HAVING OCD is like... such a deliciously sadistic concept. amazing. 3/5

my heart hemmed in, marie ndiaye (translated from french by jordan stump) a strange horror-ish tale in which two married teachers, bastions of upper-middle-class respectability and taste, suddenly find themselves utterly despised by everyone around them, escalating until the husband is seriously injured. through several very unexpected twists, it becomes clear that the couple’s own contempt for anyone not fitting into their world and especially nadia’s hostility and shame about her (implied to be northern african) ancestry is the reason for their pariah status. disturbing, surprising, FUCKED UP IF TRUE (looking back, i no longer really know what i mean by that). 4/5

xenogenesis trilogy (dawn/adulthood rites/imago), octavia e. butler octavia butler is incapable of writing anything uninteresting and while i don’t always completely vibe with her stuff, it’s always fascinating & thought-provoking. this series combines some of her favourite topics (genetic manipulation, alien/human reproduction, what is humanity) into a tale of an alien species, the oankali, saving some human survivors from the apocalypse and beginning a gene-trading project with them, integrating them into their reproductive system and creating mixed/’construct’ generations with traits from both species. and like, to me, this was uncomfortably into the biology = destiny thing & didn’t really question the oankali assertion that humans were genetically doomed to hierarchical behaviour & aggression (& also weirdly straight for a book about an alien species with 3 genders that engages in 5-partner-reproduction with humans), so that angle fell flat for me for the most part, altho i suppose i do agree that embracing change, even change that comes at a cost, is better than clinging to an unsustainable (& potentially destructive) purity. where i think the series is most interesting is in its exploration of consent and in how far consent is possible in extremely one-sided power dynamics (curiously, while the oankali condemn and seem to lack the human drive for hierarchy, they find it very easy to abuse their position of power & violate boundaries & never question the morality of this. in this, the first book, focusing on a human survivor first encountering the oankali and learning of their project, is the most interesting, as lilith as a human most explicitly struggles with her position - would her consent be meaningful? can she even consent when there is a kind of biochemical dependence between humans and their alien mates? the other two books, told from the perspectives of lilith’s constructed/mixed children, continue discussing themes of consent, autonomy and power dynamics, but i found them less interesting the further they moved from human perspectives. on the whole: 2.5/5

love & other thought experiments, sophie ward man, we love a pierre menard reference. anyway. this is a novel in stories, each based (loosely) on a thought experiment, about (loosely) a lesbian couple and their son arthur, illness and grief, parenthood, love, consciousness and perception, alternative universes, and having an ant in your brain. it is thoroughly delightful & clever, but goes for warmth and humanity (or ant-ity) over intellectual games (surprising given that it is all about thought experiments - but while they are a nice structuring device i don’t think they add all that much). i haven’t entirely worked out my feelings about the ending and it’s hard to discuss anyway given the twists and turns this takes, but it's a whole lot of fun. 4/5

a general theory of oblivion, josé eduardo agualusa (tr. from portuguese by daniel hahn) interesting little novel(la) set in angola during and after the struggle for independence, in which a portuguese woman, ludo, with extreme agoraphobia walls herself into her apartment to avoid the violence and chaos (but also just... bc she has agoraphobia) with a involving a bunch of much more active characters and how they are connected to her to various degrees. i didn’t like the sideplot quite as much as ludo’s isolation in her walled-in flat with her dog, catching pigeons on the balcony and writing on the walls. 3/5

cassandra at the wedding, dorothy baker phd student cassandra returns home attend (sabotage) her twin sister judith’s wedding to a young doctor whose name she refuses to remember, believing that her sister secretly wants out. cass is a mess, and as a shift to judith’s perspective reveals, definitely wrong about what judith wants and maybe a little delusional, but also a ridiculously compelling narrator, the brilliant but troubled contrast to judith’s safer conventionality. on the whole, cassandra’s narrative voice is the strongest feature of a book i otherwise found a bit slow & a bit heavy on the quirky family. fav line is when cass, post-character-development, plans to “take a quick look at [her] dumb thesis and see if it might lead to something less smooth and more revolting, or at least satisfying more than the requirements of the University”. 3/5

the office of historical corrections, danielle evans a very solid collection of realist short stories (+ the titular novella), mainly dealing with racism, (black) womanhood, relationships between women, and anticolonial/antiracist historiography. while i thought all the stories were well-done and none stood out as weak or an unnecessary inclusion, there also weren’t any that really stood out to me. 3/5

sonnenfinsternis, arthur koestler (english title: darkness at noon) (audio) you know what’s cool about this book? when i added it to my goodreads tbr in 2012, i would have had to read it in translation as the german original was lost during koestler’s escape from the nazis, but since then, the original has been rediscovered and republished. yet another proof that leaving books on your tbr for ages is a good thing actually. anyway. this is a story about the stalinist purges, told thru old bolshevik rubashov, who, after serving the Party loyally for years & doing his fair share of selling people out for the Party, is arrested for ~oppositional activities. in jail and during his interrogations, rubashov reflects on the course the Party has taken and his own part (and guilt) in that, and the way totalitarianism has eaten up and poisoned even the most commendable ideals the Party once held (and still holds?), the course of history and at what point the end no longer justifies the means. it’s brilliant, rubashov is brilliant and despicable, i’m very happy it was rediscovered. 5/5

heads of the colored people, nafissa thompson-spires another really solid short story collection, also focused on the experiences of black people in america (particularly the black upper-middle class), black womanhood and black relationships, altho with a somewhat more satirical tone than danielle evans’s collection. standouts for me were the story in letters between the mothers of the only black girls at a private school, a story about a family of fruitarians, and a story about a girl who fetishises her disabled boyfriend(s). 3.5/5

pedro páramo, juan rulfo (gernan transl. by dagmar ploetz) mexican classic about a rich and abusive landowner (the titular pedro paramo) and the ghost town he leaves behind - quite literally, as, when his son tries to find his father, the town is full of people, quite ready to talk shit about pedro, but they are all dead. it’s an interesting setting with occasionally vivid writing, but the skips in time and character were kind of confusing and i lost my place a lot. i’d be interested in reading rulfo’s other major work, el llano en llamas. 2.5/5

verse für zeitgenossen, mascha kaléko short collection of the poems kaléko, a jewish german poet, wrote while in exile in the united states in the 30-40s, as well as some poems written after the end of ww2. kaléko’s voice is witty, but at turns also melancholy or satirical. as expected i preferred the pieces that directly addressed the experience of exile (”sozusagen ein mailied” is one of my favourite exillyrik pieces). 3/5

the harpy, megan hunter yeah this was boooooooring. the cover is really cool & the premise sounded intriguing (women gets cheated on, makes deal with husband that she is allowed to hurt him three times in revenge, women is also obsessed with harpies: female revenge & female monsters is my jam) but it’s literally so dull & trying so hard to be deep. 1.5/5

the liar’s dictionary, eley williams this is such a delightful book, from the design (those marbled endpapers? yes) to the preface (all about what a dictionary is/could be), to the chapter headings (A-Z words, mostly relating to lies, dishonesty, etc in some way or another, containing at least one fictitious entry), to the dual plots (intern at new edition of a dictionary in contemporary england checking the incomplete old dictionary for mountweazels vs 1899 london with the guy putting the mountweazels in), to williams’s clear joy about words and playing with them. there were so many lines that made me think about how to translate them, which is always a fun exercise. 3.5/5

catherine the great & the small, olja knežević (tr. from montenegrin by ellen elias-bursać, paula gordon) coming-of-age-ish novel about katarina from montenegro, who grows up in titograd/podgorica and belgrad in the 70s/80s, eventually moving to london as an adult. to be honest while there are some interesting aspects in how this portrays yugoslavia and conflicts between the different parts of yugoslavia, i mostly found this a pretty sloggy slog of misery without much to emotionally connect to, which is sad bc i was p excited for it :(. 2/5

the decameron project: 29 new stories from the pandemic, anthology a collection of short stories written during covid lockdown (and mostly about covid/lockdown in some way). they got a bunch of cool authors, including margaret atwood, edwidge danticat, rachel kushner ... it’s an interesting project and the stories are mostly pretty good, but there wasn’t one that really stood out to me as amazing. i also kinda wish more of the stories had diverged more from covid/lockdown thematically bc it got a lil repetitive tbh. 2/5

#the books i read #long post #sonnenfinsternis is so good the audiobook nearly made me cry in the supermarket

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tsarisfanfiction · 4 years

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Fic Rec Bingo

Okie dokie, this is the Fan Rec Bingo - idea courtesy of lightvials on twitter, but I don’t have a twitter that I ever use, so I’m filling it out here instead. Let’s see if I can fill it all out!

I did, and then some. To save poor dashboards, it’s all under the cut! If I know author tumblrs they’ve been mentioned - I know pitifully few so if anyone knows the ones I don’t, let me know so I can mention them, too!

A fic you love without knowing the source material: The Dragon-King’s Temple by Kyral (Stargate SG-1/Avatar the Last Airbender)

Through the spite of the spirits or plain rotten chance, a door that would have been better left untouched has opened. On the other hand, with Fire and Earth as one's allies, sometimes escaping is the easy part. Rated: Gen. AO3 Archive Warning for Graphic Descriptions of Violence. Characters: Zuko, Toph Beifong, Janet Fraiser, Sam Carter, Jack O’Neill, and more Words: 196311. Status: Complete

I very rarely read fics without already knowing the canon, but one that I think counts would be a Stargate/ATLA crossover, because I know nothing about Stargate and I have yet to finish ATLA! This was recommended to me due to the creativity of the author regarding a language barrier (something I always enjoy, and my friend knows that).

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A fic series with a premise that shouldn’t work but it does: Crazy=Genius by blackkat (Bleach/Harry Potter)

Minerva McGonagall isn't about to let Harry go back to the Dursleys after his first year. She finds an alternative, and along the way, Bazzard Black finds that he might have more family left than he'd ever thought. Rated: Teen. AO3 No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Bazz-B, Harry Potter, and more Words: 21682. Status: Incomplete

Okay, I cheated and picked a series. Not my fault blackkat decided to make this universe a series of oneshots rather than a single entity and you’re certainly not getting me to only pick one of the five already published ones. Bazz-B being a Black and also kinda a wizard is a brilliant concept, and having him adopting Harry is pure gold. Not sure how crazy Quincy adopting poor, neglected Boy Who Lives works, but it does!

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A fic you’ve reread several times: The Guardian (Director’s Cut) by SGTBrowncoat (Naruto)

Itachi Uchiha receives his first mission in ANBU: protecting a certain trouble making Jinchuriki. He bonds quickly with the boy, but dark forces rise to threaten Itachi, Naruto, and those they care for most. Rated: T. Canon-typical violence Characters: Uchiha Itachi, Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Shisui and more (includes Uchiha Itachi/Inuzuka Hana background pairing) Words: 35945. Status: Complete

Back to my first ever fandom, here, and a really fun non-massacre AU fic, with lots of Itachi and Shisui goodness. There are a fair few ANBU-looking-after-kid-Naruto fics but this is by far my favourite of them! There is a sequel, but unfortunately it’s not finished and hasn’t been updated in a long time (I live in hope!)

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A fic you still remember many years later: While The Ring Went South by Thundera Tiger (Lord of the Rings)

What happened after the Fellowship left Rivendell but before they came down off Caradhras? Behold the missing scenes. Rated: K+. Canon-typical violence Characters: Legolas, Gimli, Aragon, Gandalf, the whole Fellowship Words: 149624. Status: Complete

I refound this fic completely by accident the other week, after first reading it (according to when I favourited it on FFN) in 2011! It was just as amazing as I remembered, and is really the standard I hold all other LotR fics to, especially ones that involve the entire, pre-Moria, Fellowship. It has a sequel but sadly that’s not been updated in some time (but again, I live in hope!)

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A comfort fic: There May Be Some Collateral Damage by metisket (Bleach/Harry Potter)

Ichigo’s been ordered to go undercover at a magic school to bodyguard a kid named Harry Potter, and this would be fine, except that he’s about as good at bodyguarding as he is at magic. And he considers it a good day, magic-wise, if he hasn’t set anything on fire. Rated: Gen. AO3 No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Kurosaki Ichigo, Harry Potter, Weasley Twins, and more. Words: 61209. Status: Complete

I have no idea what this means by ‘Comfort Fic’ but if I want a laugh and Umbridge getting a pile of comeuppance, this is definitely the fic I’ll turn to. As the A/N says: ‘sending Ichigo to Hogwarts is basically the same as swinging a wrecking ball directly into the side of the castle’. Beautiful chaos is what we get. Beautiful, beautiful chaos.

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A cathartic fic: See You Again by cookietosser (One Piece)

Rocinante has been through a lot in his life. Adding uncontrollable time travel into the mix? That's just the icing on the cake. Rated: Teen. AO3 Violence and (canon) Character Death Warnings Characters: Donquioxte Rocinante|Cora-san, Trafalgar Law, Heart Pirates Words: 15755. Status: Complete

You want to rip my heart out and trample it into lots of little pieces while still making it all better because Law and Rocinante? Well, this little time-traveller’s wife AU fic is just the one for all that. Sad moments, frustrating moments, happy moments, all wrapped up in this oneshot!

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A fic you’d print and put on your bookshelf: Thrower of the Dart by Vathara (Artemis Fowl/The Avengers)

What might have happened instead of Artemis Fowl book 6, if it'd happened in the Marvel Universe. Megalomaniacs ahoy! Rated: Teen. AO3 No Archive Warnings Characters: Artemis Fowl II, Tony Stark, and more Words: 101272. Status: Complete

It’s long, it’s epic, and it would nestle in perfectly at home alongside my Artemis Fowl books on the bookshelf! It’s not so much a rewrite of book 6 as a complete replacement of it, with a new plot and an all too familiar villain!

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A fic you associate with a song: Goodbye, Brother by Serena Estelle (Bleach)

Ilforte's final moments as I like to picture them-with his brother. Rated: T. Canonical character death Characters: Szayelaporro Granz, Yylfordt Granz Words: 3073. Status: Complete

Might be cheating, because the author actually names a song in their starting A/N, but this definitely brings to mind Exile Vilify by The National, and I fully recommend listening to that (on loop - there is a 10-hour loop version on youtube) as you watch this for maximum tear-jerking effect.

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A fic that inspires you: Magic of the Rose Cross by Awensweth (Harry Potter/D.Gray-Man)

In Harry's 4th year the Triwizard Tournament is brought back to live, but the appearance of a fourth mysterious school about which only Dumbledore seems to know brings new secrets with it for everyone. Who are the students of Rose Cross? Rated: Mature. AO3 Chose Not To Use Warnings Characters: Harry Potter, Allen Walker, and more Words: 66632. Status: Incomplete

I have been inspired by many, many fics, but I chose this one in particular because it was the main one that inspired me to join the HP/DGM Triwizard Tournament wave of the early 2010s - indeed, The Combat School is one of my most popular fics, but without this and other fics of the trope, I probably would never have written it! That’s not to say I’ve copied this fic - aside from the base trope I tried my best to make my own work unique against the others, and hope that I succeeded! Sadly, this fic is incomplete and hasn’t been updated for some time, but it’s still worth a read.

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A fic that brought you on board a new ship: Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell by MsChunks (Boku no Hero Academia)

Uraraka and Bakugo have a secret. It’s not what their classmates think it is. Rated: Teen. AO3 Chose Not To Use Warnings Characters: Bakugo Katsuki, Uraraka Ochako Words: 182478. Status: Complete

Putting Bakugo and Uraraka together was something I’d never considered, and I started this fic with some trepidation after a friend recommended it to me, but said friend has never steered me wrong with fics and didn’t start now! Fake dating, Uraraka actually being badass, the most terrifying couple in class 1-A? That’s this fic.

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A fic you wish could be a movie: Mission Impossible by Loopstagirl (Thunderbirds)

Being selected for his first solo mission should have been exciting for Captain Scott Tracy of the Air Force. But there was something else at play. Something dangerous and deadly. Something that could cost him more than his life. Rating: T. Warnings: Violence Characters: Scott Tracy, Gordon Tracy Words: 55048. Status: Complete

Air Force!Scott? W.A.S.P.!Gordon? On a joint mission together? Yes, gimme, gimme, gimme. Gimme Scott’s awkwardness alone on a boat of WASP personnel, gimme Gordon’s horror when he realises the suicide mission pilot is his older brother, and now give that all to me on screen! And we can’t forget the Hood, of course! Might be a bit higher rating than the current Thunderbirds stuff, but hey, I’m old enough. Gimme.

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A fic that led to you becoming friends with the author: The Gabriel Project by Aceidia (Bleach) - @thetwelvecaesars

When Szayelaporro knew Aizen's reign in Heuco Mundo was coming to a close, he took matters into his own brilliant hands. He reincarnates himself and the other nine Espadas into a new life full of surprising turns and irony. Yet, the harmony and ignorance is not forever as they begin to remember. Rating: M (violence) Characters: Szayelaporro Granz, the Espada Words: 116030. Status: Complete

Well, this fic sparked off a friendship that’s still very much there, even if neither of us write much for Bleach any more! What started off as a challenge to identify who the Espada were turned into essay-length PMs about anything and everything, and then RP groups and now random emails about whatever at random times of the day (different timezones don’t help)!

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A fic you’ve gushed about irl: Living Like Kings by CLynnB (Thunderbirds)

The world wants to know more about the Tracy brothers. So Lady Penelope takes it upon herself to show the world just who they are. Through YouTube. Rating: Gen. AO3 Author Chose Not To Use Warnings Characters: Lady Penelope-Creighton-Ward, Tracy Family (background Pen/Ink, Scayo, Virg/Brains) Words: 35348. Status: Complete

I love social media fics like this one, and my poor boyfriend got the brunt of it while we were on holiday... he knows basically nothing about Thunderbirds except for what he’s heard from me (which is a lot because he’s amazing and lets me gush). I mean, Tracy boys playing “The Floor Is Lava?” and tackling each other to the ground? Gimme.

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A fic you associate with a place: Thunderbirds Meet Thunderbirds - Alan trip in to the movie verse by ak47stylegirl (Thunderbirds) @ak47stylegirl

Crazy stuff always happens to Tracys, don't they? Add felling into a different world to the list. Rating: Gen. AO3 No Archive Warnings Characters: Alan Tracy, Tracy Family times two Words: 25599. Status: Incomplete

This might be a little random, but this fic was one that I found while I was ill on holiday to the Lake District last autumn. Sadly, it’s the only trip there I’ve ever done where I couldn’t climb a single fell (and my car’s clutch burnt out after having to reverse up a pass... thanks bus coming the other way), and this fic’s updates while I was there kept me sane! This has actually very loosely inspired a fic of my own which is in the making - which might get posted in the next year if I’m lucky... Still waiting eagerly for this fic’s next update :D

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A fic that made you gasp out loud: The Colours Of The World by MaiKusakabe (Fullmetal Alchemist/Harry Potter)

When Roy Mustang went to retrieve his eyesight from Truth, he wasn’t expecting to end up doing a job in exchange. It couldn’t even be an easy job, of course, because Edward’s assessment of Truth was a pretty accurate one. Rating: Mature. AO3 No Archive Warnings (but watch for canon-typical violence) Characters: Roy Mustang, Albus Dumbledore, Sirius Black, and more Words: 120578. Status: Incomplete

Badass Roy yesss. Twists and turns and Truth is a pretentious you-know-what but Voldemort’s even worse so where does that leave poor Roy except caught in the middle and very much a war veteran at this point... much to the horror of a few wizards!

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A fic you found at the right time: Seafaring Heartless: Exit North Blue by Avian Swallow (One Piece)

Pirates may be considered evil by the majority, but Law had met quite a few of the world's navy who were corrupt to the core and putting up a very thick facade. He reasoned that if he was going to manipulate and scheme his way into that goal, at least he was going to be honest enough to admit it. Rating: T. Canon-typical situations Characters: Trafalgar Law, Bepo, Penguin, Shachi, Heart Pirate OCs Words: 159644. Status: Complete

Is there ever a ‘wrong time’ to find a fic? (a 100k+ at 4am debatable, but shh). When I craved Heart Pirate content, this fic (and its sequel, still in progress but updating) appeared! Only loosely clings to canon at the moment, thanks to some SBS revelations, but with well developed OCs to fill the faces we have no names or personalities for at the moment!

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A fic that you would read fic of: Only a Boy by Riddle Lee (Harry Potter/Merlin)

Merlin has changed Camelot forever but while that part of his life is complete, destiny has a new task for him. Now he has to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, hide the fact that he's the Merlin, and defeat a Dark Lord that's messing with magic he knows nothing about. Rating: T. Canon-typical situations Characters: Merlin, Draco Malfoy, Hermione Granger, and more Words: 340998. Status: Incomplete

An amazing universe with Slytherin!Merlin, no Harry Potter/Boy Who Lived, and the good old ‘hiding real identity’ trope to underpin the whole series. Currently just into the start of Merlin’s third year at Hogwarts, aka “The Prisoner of Azkaban”. This universe has so much to give, although Riddle Lee is doing a fantastic job at it. It’s incomplete and slow to update but does update!

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A fic that made you laugh out loud: HOW’S THE COMA GOING by ossicle (One Piece)

Kidd and Penguin keep trying to murder each other and Law is done with their shit. He assigns them to take care of each other’s injuries so they’ll learn to get along. It doesn’t work. Rating: Teen. AO3 No Archive Warnings Characters: Eustass Kid, Penguin, Trafalgar Law (background KidLaw) Words: 2062. Status: Complete

Oh this one had me in stitches basically the whole time. Kid’s bedside manner should not be mimicked in the slightest, but a beautiful bonding fic in typical pirate fashion - beat ‘em up ‘til they have your approval. Poor, poor, Law.

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A fic with a line (or two) that you’ve memorised by heart: On Their Side by Gumnut (Thunderbirds) - @gumnut-logic

She trusted these boys with a great deal. Rating: Teen. AO3 No Warnings Apply Characters: Colonel Casey, Virgil Tracy, Gordon Tracy Words: 1116. Status: Complete

I think I have basically the entire thing memorised. This one also falls into several other categories, most notably ones that made me laugh and ones that I’ve reread several times, but it really belongs here on this list.

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A fic that gave you butterflies: it’s a long way forward so trust in me by aloneintherain (Miraculous Ladybug)

Six times Marinette carried Adrien (plus one time he carried her). Rating: Teen. AO3 No Archive Warnings Characters: Adrien Agreste|Chat Noir, Marinette Dupain-Cheng|Ladybug (all sides of the love square) Words: 5611. Status: Complete

Aaah I have a weak spot for strong!Marinette and this fic ticks that box time and time again, with a side of blushing!Adrien and general love-struck Adrien/Chat. I mean, what more could a girl need?

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A fic that embodies something you value in life: Team Itachi by Killer of thy Cookies (Naruto)

What if the Third Hokage stopped the council before they could order Itachi to commit the Uchiha Clan Massacre? Itachi is one of the village's strongest ninja, and has now been given the task of being a Jonin sensei, assigned to Team 7 with his little brother Sasuke, the 'dead last' Naruto Uzumaki, and fangirl Sakura Haruno. This is Team Itachi. Rating: T. Canon-typical situations Characters: Uchiha Itachi, Uchiha Sasuke, Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura, and more Words: 155092. Status: Complete

(Yup, another non-massacre AU.) Loyalty. Honestly, there are so many fics that have loyalty in them, especially in fandoms like Naruto, where loyalty is a pretty big thing anyway (alongside friendship, of course), but this one is Itachi staying openly loyal to the village because Sarutobi actually saved the clan, and of course lovely bonds between the team!

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A favourite AU: A Son By Any Other Name by carryonstarkid (Thunderbirds)

Cursed as a child, Scott Tracy lives a life in which everyone he encounters must follow all of his given commands. Rating: Teen. AO3 Chose Not To Use Warnings Characters: Scott Tracy, Tracy Brothers, Kayo Kyrano, and more Words: 83429. Status: Complete

I rarely read AU fics - my preferred sandbox is the canon one, or a nice slice of canon diversion, rather than completely taking characters out of their home and dumping them somewhere entirely new. This fairytale AU, however - reminding me very much of Sleeping Beauty except instead of sleeping it’s, well, what the summary says - is fantastically well done and addresses the strain such a thing would put on even the closest of family relationships.

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A fic you stayed up too late to finish reading: As N Approaches Infinity by Corisanna (Bleach/Puella Magi Madoka Magica)

Despairing as yet another timeline goes horribly wrong, Homura wanders into Karakura. There she discovers that while the spiritually-aware people of Karakura were distracted by Ichigo Kurosaki and Xcution, Kyubey had managed to contract the Kurosaki sisters as magical girls. Drawing the attention of the shinigami could be just the advantage Homura needs. Rating: Teen. AO3 No Archive Warnings but watch out for canon-typical situations for both fandoms (especially Madoka) Characters: Akemi Homura, Kurosaki Karin, Kurosaki Yuzu, Urahara Kisuke, and many more Words: 465297. Status: Incomplete

There are many fanfictions that have kept me up til dawn. Many. This one, however, has literally robbed me of all my sleep and I’ve still been unable to finish it in one sitting. It’s good, the pacing is fantastic, and with Homura as our leading lady, that means those time resets really hit hard when they happen (and they happen. They really, really, happen). Might be incomplete, but is still updating - and there’s plenty to keep you occupied in the meantime!

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A fic that made you feel seen: A Seed Once Grown by Darkestwolfx (Thunderbirds) - @darkestwolfx

Believe it or not, they did have a garden on Tracy Island. It looked a little like a… tip. And that was being kind. Rating: Teen. AO3 No Archive Warnings Characters: Ned Tedford, Tracy Family Words: 4785. Status: Complete

Okay, so I’m taking this literally because I spend a lot of time feeling invisible on the internet so having a fic written for me from someone I’d barely spoken to before was a whole pile of screaming. Not that it’s the first time someone’s written a fic for me, but the other ones have been done by friends I’d already known for some time, and not someone in a fandom I’m just starting to find my feet in.

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Free space: whoo boy, fun time! There are a few fics on the top of my head that didn’t fill any of the above prompts (or got beaten to the punch by another), so my wildcard space is going to be a few fic links without the extra detail because I’ve already spent about 12 hours on this to get to this point (did I get sidetracked and re-read a bunch? You bet) and I’d quite like to also get some fic written today, too!

Eight-Day Week (JoJo Spotting) by TrufflestheMushroom (JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure)

The Trouble With Eastern by teaandtumblr (One Piece)

Remembrance by ClioSelene (One Piece)

Legacy by MaiKusakabe (One Piece)

A Fleeting Smile by AnonymousTwit (Boku no Hero Academia)

Too Loud For Comfort by vaporeon_ninja (Boku no Hero Academia)

A Dragon’s Hoard by Chezka (Boku no Hero Academia)

Nine Lives by P_Artsypants (Miraculous Ladybug)

Chat’s Eye View (Love Letters To Paris) by Icka M Chif (Miraculous Ladybug)

Gabriel’s Lament by Chaotic Neutral (Miraculous Ladybug)

What The Cat Dragged In by Kyral (Avengers/Miraculous Ladybug)

Weekend Warrior by BlackDog_66 (Avengers)

Fitting In (Tiny Spaces) by aloneintherain (Avengers)

Autonomy by beetlebee (Naruto)

Great Minds by ScreamingViking (Final Fantasy VII)

Dear Kunsel by Sinnatious (Final Fantasy VII)

Cracks in the knight by authorettejasmin (Magic Kaito)

To Wrap An Elvish Princeling by Jael (Lord of the Rings)

There are more, many more, and I’ll probably post a few more recs around - you can also find some on my blog and I’ll try and get that updated with a few more at some point because there are many more than that!

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hellzyeahwebwielingessays · 4 years

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The Not-So-Amazing Mary Jane Part 7: MJ blindly trusts Beck (even though she wouldn’t!)

Previous Part

Next Part

Master Post

This post will be the first of maaaaaaany where I’ll be unpacking the problems prevalent in the status quo presented to us in at the end of AMJ #1.

My intent is to thoroughly explore these problems in this and consequent posts before moving onto issue #2. By doing this I (and others so inclined) can try to bear them in mind as prevailing problems with every issue until such as a time as they are addressed.

In future posts like this (at least until we get to AMJ #2) I will try to dispense with the preamble and get right down to business.

But for now I should start by clearly defining what exactly the premise presented in AMJ #1 even is.

The premise as I see it is as follows:

Mary Jane, out of sympathy for him and interest in the project, is making a movie with Mysterio. A Mysterio who has disguised himself as a respected film director and hired former felons and current super villains as part of his crew. He and MJ maintain Beck’s secret from everyone (which includes Peter but we’ll get there in another post).

In this instalment I will be addressing why MJ’s trust of Beck and failure to verify his claims is nonsensical.

As touched on in our coverage of AMJ #1, Mary Jane believes Beck’s sob story and ultimately agrees to work with him in spite of his crimes and the presence of active villains. Williams writes her genuinely sympathetic and interested in the film project, buying what Beck is saying and lacking any suspicion beyond that.

The most we get is MJ (arguably) noticing Beck’s abuse of one his staff and presumably bearing it in mind for future dealings with him.

Now, MJ is great at reading people and is very aware she possesses that skill. Between her upbringing moving around the country, her profession in acting and modelling (which puts many people, in particular young women, in potentially vulnerable positions) and her experience dating and living with a superhero, it’s an essential skill and one she’s honed. You could call it her personal brand of spider-sense.

If MJ’s Spidey sense were registering honesty from someone then it’d be crucial in her decision to ultimately believe them and judge their threat level.

These pages though get muddy because Beck is mixing the truth and deception. Technically everything he is saying is true so MJ would likely be picking that up. But he didn’t actually need MJ to be in the movie so he was lying about that and more poignantly he is omitting the fact this movie plays into Kindred’s wider schemes.

Is MJ’s failure to register deception from Beck a mistake? Is Williams dropping the ball here?

Actually no.

Mary Jane is a good read of people, but she is absolutely not flawless in this regard. There have been times she’s misread Peter and indeed been fooled by other people. Five key examples come to mind and we’re going to be starting with the most debatable ones.

Firstly there was Jason Jerome a fellow actor who offered friendship and support when MJ began working on the soap opera Secret Hospital. Jason was a harassing creep intent upon seducing Mary Jane, regarding her marital status as challenge that’d make his ‘conquest’ all the sweeter. I go into much more detail about Jason’s encounters with MJ in this post.

I will concede that it can definitely be argued that MJ was out of character or emotionally vulnerable during the course of this subplot so it doesn’t necessarily prove anything. Nevertheless, in MJ’s canonical history she was fooled by a fellow (and more experienced) actor than herself.

Secondly there was Aunt May’s death in ASM #400. Aunt May was impersonated by a dying actress who’d been genetically altered to look like and register as her. For around a year everyone (including MJ) believed their beloved May to be dead once more proving how MJ’s ability to read people isn’t flawless. Again though there is a lot of stuff that can be contested with this example, the most significant being that as originally written the intent was that this was the actual Aunt May, not an imposter.

However even accepting the retcon one could argue that due to her pregnancy, May’s miraculous recovery from a coma and the general stress of the Clone Saga up until that point Mary Jane’s ‘Spidey sense’ was not going to be working properly. However, canonically this is once again an example of a fellow (and likely more experienced) actress deceiving MJ.

My other examples don’t have nearly as much leeway.

Perhaps the most significant is Jonathan Caesar, the Parkers’ landlord who was obsessed with ‘owning’ Mary Jane. You can imagine what that would’ve entailed. He abducted MJ and held her prisoner for a little while. The thing is initially MJ found the guy charming and the idea he was a threat never crossed her mind.

Unlike the above two examples there weren’t any obvious extenuating circumstances that I can recall to excuse MJ’s faux pas. She was just genuinely fooled by him.

Then we have her friend Lorraine whom you might recall from part 4 of this essay series. As mentioned there, Lorraine was an old friend of MJ’s who’d developed a cocaine problem. MJ sought to help her and Lorraine seemed willing to be helped. But when MJ left her alone for a little while Lorraine almost immediately snuck out to find her next hit.

Models are not actresses strictly speaking. But to my limited knowledge their profession must involve some degree of adopting a false persona. Even if we were to say otherwise, Lorraine was clearly capable of duping Mary Jane.

Finally, for an extended period of time the Chameleon fooled MJ and most everyone else when he impersonated J. Jonah Jameson in Web #52.

Like Beck, Chameleon made a whole career out of fooling people and Beck could be argued to be even better at it than Chammy.

So the idea that someone could fool MJ is definitely possible in a lot of stories.

But we shouldn’t take MJ’s trust as a sign that she is in the right. It’s so often tempting to side with the protagonist’s POV precisely because they are the protagonist. If MJ trusts Mysterio she must feel he isn’t dangerous and isn’t that bad really right?

But the possibility that she can be wrong is on the table based upon her history and (whilst I personally doubt Williams intended it this way) that is what is happening here big time.

Now I am not suggesting that MJ should second-guess every read of people she makes nor that the above examples should be sore spots in her mind. But collectively they would enshrine to Mary Jane herself that she shouldn’t just presume her immediate reads of people are accurate, and that would go even more so for professional actors.

In this issue MJ hasn’t got any extenuating circumstances to compromise her judgement. She isn’t in the midst of an emotionally turbulent time in her life. She isn’t being blinded my friendship, loneliness or familial love. She also hasn’t had much time to observe or get to know Beck up close and personal, this exchange being the longest amount of time they’ve ever spoken to one another.

But as I spent far too much time pointing out in parts 3-5, MJ is very aware of Mysterio’s skills, his typical tactics and the horrible things he has done. She knows he is a career criminal and a dangerous/nasty one at that. And she knows that he is an incredibly accomplished and experienced manipulator/deceiver/actor, almost definitely more experienced than her self. And this is to say nothing of the times he’s personally hurt her or the people she cares about.

Realistically upon learning of Beck’s involvement she should somehow start to work against him and most definitely not trust him!

Even exempting the personal pain he’s been complicit in visiting upon Mary Jane and/or her loved ones, she knows enough about him to be suspicious.

In knowing his skillset and M.O. Mary Jane should either not trust him at all or at the very least not simply not take everything he says at face value. She would be savvy enough to recognize whatever her ‘radar’ is reading. At best the odds are 50/50 that her radar is off. And those odds exist precisely because making you believe things that aren’t real is the entire conceit of Beck’s alter ego.

But wait, there’s more!

Beck basically admitted to:

Stealing a man’s identity

Wasting over a year of his life working on a project that doesn’t actually exist (in a location notorious for unaccounted for landmines btw)

Using that to con people into giving him their money

Using that money to make a movie which means he’s gambling with their money without their consent and potentially gambling with the public image of the film studio, the crew and the man he’s impersonating if the film gets a bad reception or financially flops

He’s doing all this off the back of what an extremely risky movie to make in the first place. Imagine if an empathetic and unapologetic movie about the life of George Zimmerman came out?

Said movie is a vanity project explicitly about himself

He’s using current super villains on the crew. If you are a current super villain then by definition you are not out on parole, you aren’t reformed and you are still wanted by the law.

And Mary Jane…goes along with this. Lampshading the fact that it’s insane for her to do that doesn’t excuse the extreme mischaracterization of doing that in the first place.

At the very least she should run a check online or with her various contacts in the super hero community to see if he’s actually dying. Remember from MJ’s POV Beck has full on faked his own death at least twice. She has no hard evidence for this whatsoever beyond the word of a man who is notoriously duplicitous.

Now to play Devil’s advocate we could argue that MJ believes Beck is out of jail legally. He might’ve served his time, been let out early for good behaviour or precisely because he is dying. Or perhaps he had legal help that weaselled him out of being locked up.

However this angle of interpretation just doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.

For starters given his very long history of very serious crimes (even excluding the ones MJ is unaware of) it’d be common sense to presume that Beck would be serving time barring extenuating circumstances. Common sense would then lead anybody to try and confirm if any extenuating circumstances exist. This could prove impossible because how accessible records on costumed criminals are to the public is unclear. But anyone with a phone or internet access could at least try.

MJ has far more than mere common sense and she’s got far more than a phone and internet access. And yet there isn’t even a hint that she makes even a lazy attempt at confirming Beck’s story.

Now let’s pretend MJ forgot every single encounter with Mysterio she knows about before Nick Spencer’s run. No faking Aunt May’s death. No helping Doc Ock in ‘Ends of the Earth’. Nothing from ‘Guardian Devil’. None of the stuff we covered in parts 3-5.

Mary Jane would still realistically be fully aware Beck committed a HUGE crime mere months ago that involved the Avengers (plus other heroes) that was also the inciting incident that reconciled her with the love of her life.

This alone should be enough for her to not so quickly or blindly trust Beck! Even if she was unaware of the legal fallout of that event it was still an event that endangered lots of innocent people and heroes. Chiefly it endangered the love of her life! MJ trusts the guy whose actions nearly killed the man she loves most in the world!

Speaking of Peter by the way, he’s a super hero who’s regularly tangled with this guy.*

She has also worked for, is an acquaintance of or personal friends with:

Tony Stark/Iron Man

Riri Williams/Ironheart

The main roster of the Fantastic Four

Several big name members of the Avengers (including Captain America and Jessica Drew)

The Avengers faithful butler Jarvis

Members of a support group comprised of the loved ones of super heroes (see ASM v5 #8-10)

Carlie Cooper, a forensics scientist who has worked for the police

She has also encountered shape shifters, impersonators, clones and body swaps in the last 10 years of her life, so a certain degree of safety precautions would be requisite for her.

Collectively this means MJ would not simply presume Beck is walking free legally and more importantly could and would check up on that. It wouldn’t be hard. She wouldn’t even have to tell Peter if for some reason she was worried about him knowing; we’ll dive a lot more into this in a much later instalment.

Her research would then naturally turn up the fact that Beck clearly escaped from prison. Even if the details of Beck’s trial or consequent legal proceedings (like being paroled or cutting a deal) weren’t public knowledge Mary Jane’s contacts would be able to inform her of what would’ve happened. Thus she’d know Beck was legally declared insane and sent to Ravencroft but not legally released.

Similarly even if the details of Mysterio’s ‘death’ in Ravencroft weren’t publically known MJ would have the means of learning that and thus confirm that Beck had faked his death once again; (see ASM v5 #24-25). This would then open up the possibility to MJ that the body the authorities have belongs to someone else.

From MJ’s point of view, at best that’s macabre and unethical. At worst it could mean Beck caused someone’s death. MJ is clearly aware that Mysterio might be capable of such a thing because she is almost immediately concerned Beck has done something bad to the real Cage McKnight!

Now I’m not saying MJ is going along with Beck even knowing he probably killed his psychiatrist. But what I am saying is that it’s utterly out of character for MJ (or pretty much any character) to not check this stuff!

Maybe Williams will address all this, but reading AMJ #1 it seems far more likely she’s not bothered to consider the implications of the direction she has taken. Or worse, she has but is ignoring them because she wants to tell the story she wants no matter what.

The point is moot though because MJ wouldn’t give Beck the benefit of the doubt in the first place.

There is more to be said regarding MJ’s trust issues in the story, but I think I’ll save that for next time.

*And typically won through a highly unique danger sense that MJ lacks, a sense that mitigates Beck’s abilities.

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#Amazing Mary Jane #mjwatsonedit #Mary Jane Watson Parker #mary jane watson #MJ Watson #Mysterio #Quentin Beck #Peter Parker #spider-man #Leah Williams

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faintblueivy · 5 years

Note

"Those cherry blossoms show your real beauty." and "Cherry blossoms line is so overrated, please say something more original or pick another flower." BoruSara request if you willing to accept it, you can pick any setting you want. BTW I don't see the reason why I should make herself anon, so here I am! Your clumsy fan Kirumi ;)

Hi everyone! I’m finally done with this sequel of Starting Again and can’t wait to share it with you all! Thanks to @karinrumi for this amazing prompt and also to @mirachaann for beta reading it! My submission for Borusaraweek 2019! Day 3!

Prompt: Flowers

Word Count: 4k

Genre: Fluff

It’s Your Flower

“I’m late! Damn!”

Boruto hisses under his breath as his feet pound against the floor loudly. As he races through the stairs and then the corridors, he sees that barely a few people pass by him, noting how the school was almost empty now. As soon as the plank of 2 A comes into sight, his speed slows down and he pushes the door open immediately. There she was, sitting on her seat calmly in an empty classroom. The curtain of her dark hair was blocking her face from his gaze.

“Sarada!” He calls out and she immediately whirls around to look at him.

“Oh, you’re here,” she says nonchalantly.

“It’s late! You shouldn’t have waited for me!”

He crosses the distance between them, plopping on the seat in front of her, still slightly out of breath.

“You asked me to, didn’t you?” She laughs.

“Err…I didn’t think I’d be this late. You should have gone home.” He insists again, peeking over the notes sprawled on her desk.

“Hmm, but you still came to check.” She gives him a knowing smile, “And you did run!”

Boruto immediately averts his gaze, “I didn’t! I just did exercise!”

“Sure. Exercise.” she says with a smug smirk.

They immediately lock down on a glaring contest which - Boruto notes – was becoming quite a norm nowadays. And to be honest, he didn’t mind…peering into her eyes – which were so beautifully expressive, capable of projecting her delicate feelings. He is the one to blink away first, unable to handle the heat creeping up his neck.

“Come on. Let’s not stay here.”

He doesn’t even give her the time to respond as he slings her bag over his shoulder and proceeds to exit the classroom. He chuckles at her protests as she scrambles up, gathering her notes and running after him.

“Give me my bag!” She pouts, still trying to balance the notebooks and sheets in her arms.

“Nah. You carry that troublesome package.” His hand waves at the mess she’s carrying. “And leave this to me.” He points to her bag hanging on his shoulder. She narrows her eyes but doesn’t argue anymore.

They trudge down the same stairs that he had raced up a few minutes ago when Sarada asks, “Where are we going exactly?”

“Our secret base, of course,” he exclaims gleefully and Sarada suppresses the incessant urge to roll her eyes. Despite it all, a tiny smile curls upon her lips helplessly.

The ‘secret base’ he was referring to was their bench. Yes, that particular bench where she had treated his injuries and well, the place where they became friends, so it was theirs.

It was some distance away from their school, in a deserted park and barely any people passed by. It was a place where they could sit and relax together, without a worry in the world and know a lot more about each other. A safe haven, and a place to go to for them.

As they walk through the school premises, Boruto waves to those who greet them and Sarada gives them all nods of acknowledgement and polite smiles.

Only eight minutes later, they are at the park. Boruto deposits both of their bags on the side and plops down. Sarada immediately follows after, placing the notes in between them. She rummages through some of them before pulling out a few sheets of paper stapled together and shoves them to him. At his questioning brow, she commands simply. “Read.”

“Tanabata is celebrated to commemorate the romantic story of two lovers represented by the stars Vega and Altair who are only allowed to meet each other once a year as long as the skies are clear.

It is celebrated on the 7th day of the 7th lunar month, which is July 7th in the modern calendar. Some places in Japan celebrate Tanabata on August 7th in accordance with the older Chinese calendar, which is where the legend originated.

The most famous of all the Tanabata festivals is celebrated in Sendai on August 7th, but most of Japan recognizes July 7th.”

Boruto stops, taking a breath before reading further everything on her notes with wide eyes.

“Tanabata originated from a Chinese legend called Qixi and was brought to Japan in the 8th century. This is the story of two lovers. Princess Orihime, the seamstress, wove beautiful clothes by the heavenly river, represented by the Milky Way. Because Orihime worked so hard weaving beautiful clothes, she became sad and despaired of ever finding love. Her father, who was God of the heavens, loved her dearly and arranged for her to meet Hikoboshi, the cow herder who lived on the other side of the Milky Way. The two fell in love instantly and married. Their love and devotion was so deep that Orihime stopped weaving and Hikoboshi allowed his cows to wander the heavens.

Orihime’s father became angry and forbade the lovers to be together, but Orihime pleaded with him to allow them to stay. He loved his daughter, so he decreed that the two star-crossed lovers could meet once a year–on the 7th day of the 7th month if Orihime returned to her weaving. On the first day they were to be reunited, they found the river (Milky Way) to be too difficult to cross. Orihime became so despondent that a flock of magpies came and made a bridge for her. It is said that if it rains on Tanabata-”

Boruto halts reading out-loud, his eyes sweeping over the page. All it said was more about the story and rituals related to the festival.

“…Sarada?” He questions, vaguely gesturing toward the sheaf of papers in his hand, “We’re supposed to write a play here…not an essay.”

“I know that!” Sarada glares, half hissing and half yelling. “Read the next page idiot!”

He nods and turns the page over, eyes skimming through the material and then widening with each next page.

“You wrote the entire play all by yourself?!” He asks, feeling both in-credulousness and – if he were to be honest - quite impressed.

“Most of it,” she says nonchalantly. “A few girls helped me through.” She admits, and Boruto has an inkling as to how much the girls might have ‘helped’ her. He shakes his head at her fondly and then pays attention to the rest of the reading left to be done. And he has to admit, every new line is nothing short of excellence.

“This is going to be a blast!” He exclaims excitedly. “We just need to execute it properly.”

Sarada nods in agreement, but when he questions, “Who’s going to be Hikoboshi?,” she can’t help but raise up her brows, a smirk dancing upon her lips.

“Class decided,” she shrugs. “You’ll be.”

“Oh– wait? What?! Why me?!” He wails, angry that he was chosen again.

“Everyone said that they wanted their hero to be the Hero of the drama.” Sarada snickers.

“But I don’t have enough time!” He yells, frantic.

“Everyone said that they were willing to wait after classes,” she says quietly, as if prepared for any excuses he had.

“Arghhh! Now I can’t even have fun! I am overburdened. Thanks to a certain someone’s decisive vote to make me class representative for the festival.” He glares at her.

“Now, now, Boruto! Be a man!” She taps him on the shoulder patronizingly. “It will suit you, I’m sure.”

“Why-” he leans closer to her, blue eyes narrowing, “-do I feel like there was definitely some meddling done by a certain someone?”

“Oh? Are you trying to accuse me of this now?” She smirks, a playful look overcoming her features.

“I never said it was you,” he says as a matter-of-fact. “You admitted yourself!” He finishes, waving his arm with flair of triumph.

“You insinuated it.” She stood up from her seat, slightly turning her head to look at him. “But what if I do admit that it was me?”

The question hangs in the air for several moments before Boruto yells, “I trusted you! But…you! You betrayed me! Why Sarada? How can you do something like that to me?”

“Well, I just figured… the more busy you got the less trouble you’d cause? Hehe!” She laughs a little, feeling a bit proud of herself for the small game she had played.

“Hehe.” He mimics her and she knows that she has to instantly run or it’ll be trouble for her.

“You! Come back here, now!” He shouts, hot on her tail as he chases her through the entire park. Their notes, books, and bags left behind on the bench, the empty park filled with their yelling and the shrieks of laughter. The vibrant orange sunset and their happiness together beautifully meld into a fond memory that deserves to be cherished forever.

…

“I was thinking…” He appears beside her out of nowhere on her walk to school the next morning.

“A very dangerous pastime,” she comments, hiding a smirk. He glares at her but she ignores it like a pro who has mastered the said art.

“About the script,” he continues, successfully catching her attention.

“What about it?” Her head tilts towards him in curiousity.

“Maybe we should change it? Slightly? The scene where Hikoboshi first meets Orihime,” he suggests.

“Hmm? What do you want to change about it?”

“I was thinking about the cherry blossoms scene,” he says. “As well as that one line where he compares her beauty to the cherry blossoms around them.”

Sarada hums in understanding as they reach the classroom. She slides into her seat and retrieves the bundle of papers from her bag. Flipping through the pages she finally finds the part he was talking about.

“'Those cherry blossoms show your real beauty.’ this one?”

Boruto peeks over her shoulder and nods immediately.

“Yup! Cherry blossoms line is so overrated. Please say something more original or pick another flower.” He remarks.

Anyway, before she could say anything, the school bell chimes, echoing through the classroom.

“Hey, come on! The assembly won’t begin without us! Boruto grins, helping her stuff the papers into her bag again and then proceeding to grab her arm to drag her out of the class.

…

The entire day passes by and Sarada still does not understand why Boruto doesn’t want cherry blossoms in the play. They were beautiful and delicate flowers, symbolizing spring and beauty, as well as fleetingness of happiness for Orihime and Hikoboshi. And she cannot think of anything better to express their tragic love story.

Cherry blossoms also meant renewal which felt like a gracious nod to the promise of meeting each other again every year for the star-crossed lovers. Cherry blossoms were perfect for the play, no doubt. But he probably had his reasons for not wanting them.

When school was over, she waits for him in the class like she normally does. He is by her side in a few minutes and both of them climb down the stairs. He is whistling nonchalantly but Sarada has her mind shooting questions.

“Why don’t you want the cherry blossoms?” She whispers, and then looks up at him, trying to observe any minute detail that might show his discomfort, “Is there a reason you don’t like them?”

He blinks twice before muttering, “It's… not that I don’t like them. It’s just that… they are not your flowers.” He explains as if she was supposed to know that.

“Oh,” she frowns a little before realization hits her “Wait. Wait, Boruto? Are you…under the impression that I’m the one playing Orihime?”

“You’re… not?” He questions, brows pinched in confusion.

“No, I’m not. I forgot to mention, didn’t I? Sorry about that.” She shakes her head.

“It’s alright,” he says, flustered. “But who is Orihime then?”

“Sumire-san.”

“Ehhhh??? The class rep? Why?”

“Um, we thought she fits the image of a beautiful, delicate and sad princess better than anyone. And traditionally, the Princess had long hair and Sumire-san definitely is the one with the longest hair among all of us. And well… a bunch of other factors as well.”

“I-it makes sense now… I guess. But I-I really thought that you were playing Orihime.” He nods enthusiastically, eyes never staying in one place, his cheeks still a little pink, and his arm comes up to rub the back of his neck.

“Anyway, I do not have that princess beauty to be honest.” She confesses, startling him for a second before he hums gently.

“Yeah, now that I think about it…you don’t.” Boruto agrees, and for some reason, Sarada feels a sting of pain shooting through her heart. But then he gives her a look, blue eyes softening.

“Your beauty is more like that of a warrior.”

That faint admiration in his eyes makes a blush bloom on her cheeks.

“Well, if it’s class rep then cherry blossoms are fine,” he says with utter nonchalance before giving her a curt nod.

She nods in agreement before what he said finally registers in her mind. She halts in her steps.

“What do you mean by that? Oy, Boruto, where are you going? Why are cherry blossoms fine for class rep but not for me?“ She yells at him but he’s already running down the corridor, shouting rambunctiously and roughhousing people like he ordinarily does.

…

The next morning when they meet, she voices out her questions.

“Why… why did you think cherry blossoms suit class rep and not me?” She does not want to admit it, but it felt unnerving for some reason.

“Wait… did I offend you or something?” He exclaims, slightly panicking, bending down to look at her.

“No! No! It’s nothing like that!” Sarada waves her arms defensively. “It’s just…I thought cherry blossoms are beautiful. I think…I was surprised?”

He straightens back, looking thoughtful, as if taking time to arrange his words carefully.

“It’s not that I don’t find them beautiful…well, it’s more like, the delicate beauty of cherry blossoms, when I see it, it doesn’t remind me of you. You need something bolder, more vibrant. I don’t know why I think like this, but I do.”

“So, you mean, flowers remind you of certain people?” She questions, her head tilted to a side.

“Definitely! Like, when I see lavender, it reminds me of my Mom.” He says gently before bursting out loudly,“And then, the sunflowers! They are so bright and colorful that they scream Himawari to me!” He grins like a happy kid and Sarada is unable to hold back a smile.

“So, you suppose that there must be a flower for me too? Something that reminds you solely of…me?” she asks, with slight hesitation and slight hope.

“I don’t know…which it is yet.” He admits. “The flower that reminds me of you…but I promise I’ll find it! Your flower!”

…

Sarada watches from the sidelines, speaking up her part when needed otherwise. Boruto was playing his part stunningly. She hadn’t imagined that he would be such a stellar actor. But then again, he’s always been unpredictable.

And Sumire was no less. Her gentle demeanor and gracefulness fit well with Orihime’s soft and woefully tragic longing. The two of them together were absolutely captivating! The audience seemed to think that as well, with their wide eyes and jaws hanging.

There was a stirring caused up in audience when the Emperor of the heavens - Orihime’s father unleashed his anger towards the young couple separating them, and Sarada had to admit that Inojin played the role perfectly. He looked beautiful in his elegant clothes, and wrathful in his disposition.

The scene of separation was a painful one, but Orihime’s pining for her loved one was even worse. Sarada grabs the mike again and speaks her part.

“Months passed, but the princess could not return back to her weaving. The designs she made looked soulless now, her eyes dull with sadness. She would not speak, nor smile. So was her longing and love for Hikoboshi. Her father, the Emperor, could not bear seeing his precious child like that anymore. All his attempts to entice her with exquisite jewels, fine silks and lavish gardens failed. So, he finally made a decision~”

The next parts of the play went smoothly and all of the hard work they’ve put together in the making of this play seemed to work. The spectators clapped like crazy in the final scene where the two lovers were finally able to reunite.

As all the cast collects on the stage to present their gratitude to the viewers for their patience and cooperation, Boruto darts down the stage, grabbing Sarada’s wrist and drags her back to the main stage, a big wide grin on his face. When a lot of spectators immediately recognize her as the narrator of the play, she feels her heart thrum into her ears in resonance with the lovely cacophony.

And when Sumire, who was standing on the other side of Boruto gives her an encouraging smile which Sarada immediately returns and together, holding hands, they bow down to the audience and receive another heavy round of applause making Sarada feel as if all her efforts had received justice.

…

She walks through the decorated hallways of the school. The play was in for an immense success and every person they encountered seemed to praise their work. Sarada is elated. After working for continuous hours, at the end, they felt relieved now to finally be able to enjoy the cultural festival. Getting Sumire out of her elegant Kimono was a strenuous task but they had finally managed it without any serious mishaps.

Different classes had different scheduled stuff and Sarada could not wait to take a look around. The bag on her shoulders was heavy since it was loaded with hamburgers that class 1 C’s stall was selling. As she arrives near the classroom that had been given as the boys’ dress-room, almost all of them exit at once whining about how hungry they were. Her eyes flick around to catch a glimpse of a mop of golden hair but to no avail. Instead, she is noticed by someone else.

“Sarada?” Shikadai calls her out, gaining the attention of every boy in the group. She slides the bag off her shoulder and tosses it to him.

“Burgers.” It’s the only word she utters out before they attack the bag like rabid dogs, and she’s glad for a second that she’s not the one holding it anymore.

And in less than a minute, the bag is emptied.

“You guys didn’t save any for Boruto!” She complains to Shikadai and he smirks knowingly, jerking his chin to the small paper bag she had in her right hand.

“I would have saved him one if I hadn’t known that you’d already kept some for him away.”

Caught red-handed, Sarada flushes instantly and Shikadai laughs before gesturing to the room, tossing her bag back to her.

“He’s inside,” he says and leaves, waving a hand back at her.

…

When Sarada slides the door open, Boruto is in the middle of changing. His pants ride low on his hips and his back is turned towards her as he pulls his shirt up. Sarada feels color bloom upon her cheeks, biting her lower lip to ignore how his well defined muscles contour and move with his actions.

That’s when he notices her.

“Sa-Sarada?!” He squeaks and she yelps, jumping out of the room and slamming the door back into the place.

In merely thirty seconds, the sound of the door opening reaches her ears and Boruto comes to stand beside her. She is averting her gaze in shame from him.

“You know,” he taunts, “girls peeping on boys is as shameful as boys peeping on girls.”

“I wasn’t peeping,” she snaps, eyes flicking over his face and feels a weird happy rush in her stomach seeing how red his cheeks were.

“Sure you weren’t.” Even while blushing, his sass wasn’t going anywhere.

She pushes him inside the classroom in fake anger and shuts the door behind them.

…

They’re sitting together comfortably, him on the desk and Sarada on the bench, both of them having a burger in their hands as they calmly chew, eyes appreciating the beauty of the sun that was about to set.

“Thanks!” He raises his burger and talks with his mouth full, but Sarada does not have the energy to chide him.

“You did well, in the play,” she compliments, smiling gently. “Never messed up a single line and conducted your part very smoothly. I am impressed.”

He smirks and bows, “I aim for nothing else but to please, Ma’am.”

The silence stretches between them, devoid of any specific conversations but she feels content. Being with him was… like living with a box of surprises. Sometimes he’d be a whirlwind of activity and other times he’d be a quiet thinker. Whimsical, she’d say.

It is him who breaks the silence. “Hey, the other day, I visited Inojin’s mom’s flower shop,” he says, softly, as if not wanting to ruin the peace between them.

“Hmm?” She was not sure where he was going with this.

“I found it. Your flower, I mean.”

She whips her head around fast, eyes wide, and he just grins before jumping off the desk he was sitting on. He crosses the distance of a few seats to reach his own desk and starts rummaging through his backpack.

She watches him with curious eyes, feeling her heart beating rapidly. She wondered what kind of flower made him think of her. She was so engrossed in her thoughts that she didn’t realise when he came to stand beside her, his arm wound around his back to hide whatever he was hiding.

She peers up at him through her lashes, excitement barely hidden in her eyes. And then he finally extends his arm in her direction. There, sitting on the top of his palm was…

A red camellia.

She feels her breath hitch in her throat, overwhelmed for a few moments before looking up at him again.

“Camellia is a spring flower, isn’t it? And the red color shows how spirited and passionate you are about your goals and also your bonds! The moment I saw this,” he smiled nostalgically, “I thought of you.”

Sarada feels a deep red blush painting her cheeks, her mind running mile a minute. She was no stranger to camellias. They were gorgeous flowers that always somehow soothed her heart. Especially, the red camellias… she knew what they meant. These red flowers had meaning - an amalgam of passion, desire and… Oh!

Oh!

Did he know?

“Y-you know,” she stutters, her onyx eyes fixing themselves on the beautiful red flower in her cupped palms “Red camellias…mean one more thing.”

It takes him only a fraction of second to curl his arm around her waist to pull her in. Sarada yelps loudly and he blurts out a ‘sorry’ before smashing their lips together. It takes her a moment to register what had happened but he’s already pulling away.

He never averts his gaze away from her, even as he is embarrassed like hell. His blue eyes, shimmering with warmth and affection make her lean into him even more. And the flower is still clutched in her hand.

“I know the meaning,” he tells her, still peering down at her. “Do you?”

Sarada does not hesitate to fist his shirt and drag him down to meet her lips again. This time, they are both prepared. Their lips move in perfect synchronization, tasting each other and melting into each other’s embrace. But the lack of oxygen makes them pull away soon after.

Sarada giggles, huffing for air.

“Do I?”

A moment of stunning quietness follows before they both burst out laughing, unable to hold it together. Sarada is deliriously happy, because how can she not be. This idiot was hers now.

He surprises her though, grabbing her slender wrist which held the flower and bringing it up to him. His lips gently brush her soft fingers, eyes still intently on her and she feels a tingling sensation rush all through her bones.

He smiles.

“It’s your flower.”

“Yes.” She smiles too.

It is mine.

…

Well? I’m super excited to know about your thoughts for this fic. I wrote this in parts with a lot going on in my real life and honestly, I felt as if I had lost touch in. writing BoruSara. I hope this story was enjoyable enough to you all!

Btw, everything I mentioned about Camellias was true! Red camellias do symbolise passion or desire and of course, romantic love as well. They are even coupled with pink camellias to present romantic love.

And all the stuff about Tanabata? I got it from here!

This story was fun for me to write, I hope it was for fun for you all to read as well! A cookie for for thoughts!!!

#borusara #bsaweek19 #borusaraweek19 #boruto x sarada #boruto and sarada #boruto uzumaki #boruto #sarada uchiha #sarada #boruto naruto next generations #adi writes #day 3 #borusara fanfiction #borusarafics

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delicatelyoptimistictimetravel1 · 4 years

Text

Masters Project Update

It has been a long time since I have posted on here. Unfortunately due to the current worldwide pandemic that has been going on for the last 3-4 months and the fact that I am a key worker working in the healthcare sector I have been unable to devote much time to my university work and have made very little progress since the university closed and lockdown began.

Having this time away from my project has given me time to reflect on what I was trying to achieve with my series and what I wanted to have as a final product. Due to the nature of the job that I do (many repetitive tasks that don’t require much thinking) I was able to devote a lot of time to fleshing out the story of my series and do a deep dive into my characters pasts and personalities.

I arrived at a place with my main characters for my series which I was really happy with and began writing out the main points for each episode, explaining what each character would do where they would begin, where they would end up and whether they would change or develop along the way.

It was during this time that I began noticing issues with my story, I would write an arc for one character that felt right but wouldn’t allow other characters stories to shine.I found myself constantly rewriting my side characters stories trying to contort them to find into my main characters story.

After many failed attempt to rewrite the side characters stories I opted to remove one of the main characters and put him aside to be used in another series that I was planning to develop after I have finished university. I then sat down and rewrote the main characters story, making the series completely about his journey.

But again I began to hit road blocks, character choices didn’t seem to make sense, things appeared to happen just because the story needed them to to move forward. I began spiraling and spiraling trying to make this story work when in the back of my mind I already knew that it just wasn’t going to come together, and if it did, it wouldn’t be a series that anyone other than me would be interested in watching.

So I tried to take my mind off of my series for a few days, hoping that if I did, some inspiration might present itself. During this time I began coming up with other small ideas for animations I would like to produce when I have free time in the future. Small skits, animating various funny scenarios that have occurred either in my life or someone I knows. I even made a plan of starting to animate 1 second a day for an entire year, similar the bothers McLoed who created 365, a short video based around the same premise of animating 1 second a day.

While taking this break from my series I began looking through old notes I have written and scrips that I had started and never finished. Most of what I found was so incomplete it threatened to send me into another spiral. But there was one script that stuck out from all of the others. It was a short film I had written one night while I was walking home from a night at one of my friends from work house, The wak took me around 45-50 minutes so I had a lot of time to think and something had sparked an idea in my head. Something I saw or something I had heard had set this idea in motion and I had managed to write a huge amount down by the time I had gotten home.

After I found this script I began rewriting it trying to picture how I wanted it to look, the art style and the way I would go about animating it. It didn’t take me long before I had written a 12 page script that I knew I could add to if needed or would be fine the way it was. I save the document and put it to one side thinking that now I had completed a project it might allow me to figure out the issues with my series. So I began working my way through my series story again trying to figure out where it was going and how to make it flow without it feeling as if it was being pushed along to reach a certain goal, I wanted it to feel organic.

But the more I worked on my series, the more my short film idea would crop up in the back of my mind. I would sit down on a night when I had an hour to do some work and would find myself looking up different art styles or ways to frame shots for this short film that I wasn’t even making.

I finally gave in and with one of the few days I have had off work since lockdown began, I devoted a full day to researching and doing a script breakdown, began storyboarding and coming up with how the story would flow and how I would inter-cut the present day scenes with flashbacks and nightmare that the character would be having (This might seem confusing but I will be doing a post soon explaining the story). I found that I was enjoying working on the project infinitely more that I was enjoying working on my series. Every time I though of a new shot or a new layer to the story it was exciting, unlike working on my series where every time I had a new idea I dreaded having to go back and rewrite huge sections of the story to fit it in.

Long story shot I have decided to change my project Idea from creating a pitch bible for a series, along with an animated title sequence, a couple of animated scenes and possible a short trailer. To my new idea and produce a short film of around 5-7 minutes and an art book to show to process of the making of the film, including the research and the inspiration.

#update #development #short film

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