#WOW now THOSE were a lot of tags from what I (at least) am used to | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

writeshite · 2 years

Text

Smart Cookie

Summary:

“Huh, impressive, Dr. Reid; you’re a smart cookie.” You hold a door open, and he passes through; confused, he turns back. “Smart cookie?” “Yeah, you know, clever, intelligent,” you explained, “a smart cookie.”

Pairings:

Spencer Reid x Male!Reader

Tags:

Fluff | Inaccurate Laws Probably | First Meetings | Tattooed Reader (Because I Don't See Enough Of That) |

Words: 3871

Author's Note:

Guess what I started watching 😂 but like seriously, I am loving Criminal Minds, and as you can see, Spencer has become my favorite, I just wanna wrap this man in a hug or something.

“Love is friendship that has caught fire. It is quiet understanding, mutual confidence, sharing, and forgiving. It is loyalty through good and bad times. It settles for less than perfection and makes allowances for human weaknesses.”

- Ann Landers

Spencer’s knowledge of romance could be put together in a mountain of anecdotes and books, labeled by theme, source, and moment of discovery - sexuality, unknown source, age 15, conclusion: gay panic. Practical experience, however, could be summed into a blurb on the back of a book and promptly thrown in a fire. Friendship was something far easier; he’d come to learn it later in life - with childhood peers who took pleasure in putting him through the worst of what the American high school hierarchy had to offer - and even now, in adulthood, there were times he would think that those around him much preferred his absence over his presence.

The BAU was a lot kinder than high school was. Still, there were moments when patience would run thin, tempers may flair, or the occasional reminder that now was not the time for a tangent or a pointless anecdote or ‘do you ever shut up?’ or anything else along those lines - he didn’t mind, not like he’d used to as a child, besides, more often than not, the comments came from outside the BAU. Bystanders, police, investigators - very rarely did Spencer feel the need to squeeze himself into a neat little box and present what was deemed desirable to others, at least not until now.

“Nice to meet you, Dr. Reid.”

Change was never readily accepted by the BAU; in regards to new and retiring teammates, it was met with distaste; the change came in the form of you - a recent transfer to the team - your first case with them in Seattle, Washington. An open case, the unsub would stalk their victims and gather intel on them and their lives before attacking; victims had the murder weapons clutched in their right hand and some form of personal belonging stolen by the unsub. Trophies for his collection, his victims, all graduating students from the local university - he had access to the victim’s schedules, details of their personal lives, and used tools at the scene.

“We’ll split up,” Gideon says, “ask around the university, staff, students, and the victim’s families.”

Spencer gets paired with you, questioning the university’s Faculty of Arts, the main focus of the unsub. The Faculty of Arts focuses on creative arts, writing, philosophy, and humanities - the liberal arts - with the campus’ main library in the area. “Wow, this is fancy,” you remark. Fancy’s an understatement; the faculty entrance was grand, with a pediment and columns overhead and the university emblem on a banner at the door. With the recent deaths, fewer students had been attending classes in person; the faculty head, Professor Jody Cunningham, was an older man with dark graying at the edges, a well-trimmed beard, and smoothed clothes.

“Professor Cunningham….” you called his attention, introducing yourself, “....and this is my colleague, Dr. Reid; we’re with the Behavioral Analysis Unit.”

“A pleasure; thank you for coming; we’re all devastated by the news.”

“Did you know the students?” you ask.

Professor Cunningham nods, “They’d just handed in their thesis, and I’d been making my way through before, you know….” he ran a hand down his face, “now, none of my graduates or other students are coming in.”

“The murders all connect back to one of the subjects taught here; the first was arts, the second, humanities; if he’s going by alphabetical order, then the next one should be natural sciences,” Spencer describes the first two victims, their characteristics, similarities, differences, “do you know any graduate students doing the natural sciences who fit that profile?”

“Three students I can think of, though one of them’s not in the States anymore, so it can only be the other two, Jesse Hudson and Lynn Watson. Jesse’s majoring in biology, and his thesis, I believe, was on the role of the clock gene in protection against neural and retinal degeneration; not 100% caught up on what that is yet, Lynn —”

“The clock gene is a major circadian system regulator found in mammals and fruit flies, the latter of which the transcription factors - clock and cycle - combine and stimulate the transcription of the period and timeless genes. The two proteins bind together and enter the cell nucleus, where the timeless gene then begins to degrade and the liberated period gene interacts with the clock and cycle to prevent them from activating gene expression.” His explanation comes to a stop, and he’s hoping he hasn’t managed to weird you out.

You turn to him, “What happens after?”

“What?” He’s dumbfounded, “uh…well…you want to hear me speak more?”

“It’s why I’m asking,” you reply. “If that’s ok, you don’t have to continue if you don’t want to.”

“No, no, I’d love to; I just….people usually ask me to stop talking,” he shrugs. You raise your eyebrows, and he feels giddy, beaming a little; he carries on, even after you’re finished with professor Cunningham, you don’t deter him. Head tilted to glance at him, your undivided attention. “....I read this from an old thesis in my junior year.”

“And you still remember it?”

He nods. “I don’t forget much,” he points to his head, “eidetic memory.”

“Huh, impressive, Dr. Reid; you’re a smart cookie.” You hold a door open, and he passes through; confused, he turns back.

“Smart cookie?”

“Yeah, you know, clever, intelligent,” you explained, “a smart cookie.”

Spencer’s a smart cookie.

He’s a smart cookie.

He’s your smart cookie.

Well, technically, he’s not, but you’re the only one that calls him that nickname, not all the time; of course, you still call him by his name, but you also call him smart cookie. He bounces on his feet when you call him that, a little grin on his face as he turns to you, “What’s got you all happy, cookie?”

“Nothing, just happy to see you too,” he responds earnestly.

“I’d hope so; otherwise, this coffee run would’ve been for nothing,” you remark, placing his order on his desk, a smile on your face; then you go to your desk, to the left of him, and across from Morgan - kick your legs up and lean back on your chair.

“What none for me?” Derek pouts.

“Sorry, only deliver to sweetness,” you wink at Spencer, and he grins.

Morgan fakes offense, “Oh, oh, that’s how it’s going to be, alright. Don’t expect me to play middleman with you and Nick again.”

You snort, “Doubt that’s ever going to happen again,” you tell him, “that ship has sailed.” You move your hand through the air, mimicking a wave.

“Nick?” Spencer asks.

“Morgan’s friend, we hooked up a few times, but it never went anywhere,” you reply.

“Yeah, loverboy here did a hell of a job with him, could barely walk the next day, not that he was complaining,” Derek added on, “Said you had quite the package.”

You throw a pen at Derek, tongue stuck out at him, “TMI Derek,” Elle voiced; she’s just arrived, her own coffee in hand, chuckling while she shakes her head.

“I’m just giving performance reviews,” Derek shrugs.

“Oh god,” you laugh.

Spencer feels a little hot under the collar, knocking his knees lightly to keep his imagination at bay - your voice by his ear, hands roaming his body before settling on his hips, his own arms around your shoulder - he shook his head a little, eyes slightly wide as he sipped the coffee.

“You alright there, cookie?”

“I’ve been meaning to ask, what’s with the cookie nickname?” Elle voices.

You shrug, “Spence’s a smart cookie.”

“That’s a weird name,” Derek says.

“I think it’s adorable,” Elle counters.

“Adorable name for an adorable guy,” you wink again, and Spencer looks away, flustered.

“Well, I’m not adorable….adorableness inspires great affection or delight; you use it to describe someone or something that makes you love or like them, usually because they are….” attractive, he wants to say, but that might imply something and people didn’t like it when he implied things. He’d like you to keep liking him.

“You good there, Reid?” Derek’s voice snaps him from his thoughts, and he nods, finishing off with a lesser, more implicating adjective. Attractive, there was a 50% chance you found him attractive, but he couldn’t get all that information out of a singular nickname, let alone a few interactions - you liked his rambles and tangents, that was something, right? You’d made him an origami heart - that he kept tucked away in his journals - and called it a hint.

“No facts for me today, cookie?” You’re parked just further along the street of your target - a suburban house in Atlanta, one car in the driveway, three bedrooms, and the target of your unsub - Hotch and Gideon were on the opposite end of the street, Elle, and Derek were shacked up in the house across from it. JJ and Garcia were back at base.

“Facts?”

You turn to him, “Yeah.” You tilt your head, and he feels something, the little fluttering in his stomach, his hair brushes by his cheek when he tilts his head as well, and before he can reach up to sweep it away, you beat him to it.

“Sorry.”

“No, it’s alright….” Spencer wishes he’d stopped talking right there, that his mouth just shut or Hotch’s voice filtered through earlier before he laid down his knowledge on human touch and then proceeded to end it with the words love hormone - quite the subtle move. On the plane ride back, Reid feels every muscle in his body knot and stiffen as he goes through the interaction in the car; you’re sat beside him, dozing off with your head propped by the wall. He glances over at you every once in a while, faintly touching the side of his head you’d touched, “love hormone,” he whispers to himself.

Dr. Spencer Reid was something else; when you’d joined the BAU, it took some adjusting, your first case in Seattle was a handful, and the unsub - a student advisor - had access to his victims. He’d begun with the Faculty of Arts, and chosen graduate students from each subject, starting alphabetically; he’d only managed two before you’d caught him. You’d learned that Dr. Reid was intelligent, had an impressive memory, and “....I read this from an old thesis in my junior year.” And his voice was really nice.

He seemed to like the nickname smart cookie, bouncing on his feet and grinning when he responds; he does the same when you greet him either way. “What’s got you all happy?” you ask him after a coffee run.

“Nothing,” he responds, “just happy to see you too.”

“I’d hope so. Otherwise, this coffee run would’ve been for nothing,” you remark, placing the warm drink on his desk. Granted, it’s not really a coffee run; you’d only gotten him coffee, mainly for the smile on his face. You turned to your desk across from Morgan.

“What, none for me?” he pouts.

“Sorry, only deliver to sweetness,” you wink at Spencer, who grins in response as Morgan fakes offense, mouth agape.

“Oh, oh, that’s how it’s going to be, alright. Don’t expect me to play middleman with you and Nick again.”

“Nick?” Spencer asks.

Morgan’s friend Nick had been nice; you’d had a double date with Morgan, and one of his dates, then gone on a few more dates and spent a few nights together, but it hadn’t worked out - nothing personal, but that ship had sailed.

“Yeah, loverboy here did a hell of a job with him, could barely walk the next day, not that he was complaining, said you had quite the package,” you threw a pen at Derek, groaning, as Elle regretted walking into work at this moment and hearing the tail end of that conversation. Spencer goes quiet, and his eyes dart away as he sips his drink, a blush creeping along his face.

“You alright there, cookie?” you ask him, and he turns his attention back to you with a small smile.

“I’ve been meaning to ask, what’s with the cookie nickname?” Elle asks; she looks between you and Spencer.

You shrug, “Spence’s a smart cookie.”

“That’s a weird name,” Derek says.

“I think it’s adorable,” Elle counters.

“Adorable name for an adorable guy,” you wink again, and Spencer looks away, flustered.

“Well, I’m not adorable….adorableness inspires great affection or delight; you use it to describe someone or something that makes you love or like them, usually because they are….” he doesn’t finish right away, stalling, as you assume he gathers his words. You’re not sure what he was supposed to say, but you don’t think it was “....small.” Even after, he looks deep in thought, mind wandering away from the present.

You don’t think about it much and proceed with your day; it’s a slow day at the BAU, so paperwork seems to be the main task today, though there’s not much of it, so the majority of the day is spent idling by each other’s desks. You’ve been throwing scrunched-up paper balls at each other; Spencer had started off on the discovery of paper, then its distribution globally, and was now on its more uncommon uses. “....and you could use the paper to make worthless currency.”

“Like Monopoly money?” you question.

“Probably.”

You toss back the paper, and when he catches it this time, he unfolds it and refolds it into a swan, “You can also use it to make origami, though I wouldn’t consider that an uncommon use.”

When he hands you the swan, you take another piece of paper, fold it into a heart, you drop it in his hand, “You can also use it to leave hints,” you say, and he stares down at the heart, rosy-cheeked.

Dr. Reid was also easy to fluster.

“No facts for me today, cookie?” you ask him during surveillance; the house is empty, a decoy set in place to catch the unsub, surrounded on all sides; now all you had to do was wait.

“Facts?” he asks.

“Yeah,” you turn to him, tucking his hair back, his eyes widen again, and a blush runs along his cheeks. You apologize, withdrawing your hand.

“No, it’s alright….touch builds up cooperative relationships and reinforces reciprocity, and studies show that it signifies safety and trust. Basic touch can calm cardiovascular stress and activate the body’s vagus nerve, which is involved with our compassionate response. A simple touch can trigger the release of oxytocin, the, uh, love hormone,” he pauses, “why did I say that?”

“We’ve got movement.” Hotch’s voice interjects before anything else can be said, and you’re both out of the car, guns drawn as you track up to the house. The unsub tries to run back through the back, but Morgan’s waiting for him, knocking him down before he can escape. You don’t stick around in Atlanta, exhausted; you all pile into the plane, and you’re out; you wake to Spencer tapping your shoulder.

You stretch your arms, “Thanks for waking me, cookie.”

“No problem,” he responds.

You’re out the second your head hits the pillow, and wake up uncomfortably in yesterday’s suit. The new apartment looks homier and less empty, with most of your things already set out; you toss the old clothes in the hamper and get ready - shower, teeth, breakfast, and out the door. It’s a warm morning, so you carry your jacket in your hand.

“Damn, loverboy, I didn’t know you had sleeves.” You’d bumped into Derek on the way in, and he’d been immediately drawn to the ink on your arms.

“Oh, these old things,” you quip, “they’re nothing special.”

He whistles, and you lightly smack his arm, “Oh, shut up.” Derek wasn’t the only one taken back by the tattoos; the others were either shocked or intrigued, gathering by your desk to gander at them.

“Never, ever, keep your sleeves down again,” Garcia pleads.

“I’ll try,” you chuckle.

Spencer walks in last and takes a double glance at you, “You have tattoos? Wow,” he pauses, “wow.”

The others soon dissipate, but Spencer lingers a bit, looking between you and the ink; he reaches out but then hesitates, you hold out your arm and nod, and he traces the imagery. “That's one of my favorites,” you comment on the one he’s tracing.

“It’s beautifully detailed,” he observes, “they all are.”

“Thanks, I’ve had them done over the years,” you say. He traces the lines to your fingers, and when he finishes, he moves to the other arm - he gives you facts on the origins of tattoos and asks about some of your tattoos. You get lost in your own world, carrying on with the conversation as you’re called in for a briefing.

“What about this one?”

Spencer fixates on your tattoos, tracing them over and over, eyes following his fingers as they go over the lines again, “My second tattoo, got it a few months after my first one on my birthday.”

“What was your first one?” You’re going through paperwork looking for clues and hints to lead you to the unsub, “It’s a spinal tattoo,” you tell him and his eyes widen, “I can show you if you’re curious.”

He brings a folder to his face, a nervous laugh, and he looks like he’s considering it; he shrugs a little, “Only if you want,” he murmurs.

“Oh, cookie, I could eat you up,” you reply, and he makes a sound of amusement or surprise, or maybe it’s giddiness - as he kicks his legs a bit.

“Hey Morgan, how does dating work?”

Morgan slowly lowers the paper in his hand; it lays on his desk as he leans forward and glances over at Spencer. “Come again?”

“How does dating work?” Spencer repeats, “I assume you’re the most adept at this matter, I mean, I know how it works, but I’m also not…are you alright? Your face is doing —” Spencer gestures uncertainly.

“Just….just savoring this moment, " he replies, smiling, “I know something you don’t,” he cheers.

“I don’t not know about dating, I’m aware of it from societal expectations, facets, and data, but I lack the field experience.”

“Don’t,” Morgan holds his hands up, “don’t ruin the moment,” then he’s back, a smirk on his face; he asks, “Is it loverboy?” Spencer nodded; Morgan clapped his hands, a satisfied grin on his face, “I knew it!” he whispered before returning to the matter at hand, “So,” he cleared his throat, hands together on his desk, “dating.”

“Yes.”

“We’ll start simple; what do you know about dating? Not the facts, just the practical, like have you ever been on a date?”

“No, well, there was this one time I did get asked out by this girl in my class; we decided to go to the local park, but then I overheard her tell her friends it was a prank and they were going to douse me in some concoction, so I didn’t go,” he responds, “does that count?”

Derek shakes his head, “No, it does not, and are you ok?��

“Oh, yeah, it was a long time ago,” he shrugs, “so, what do I do about —” he winds his hands in a circular motion. “Is there a set of words I should say? Are there things I’m expected to do?”

“No, no, look,” Derek replied, “just, he likes you, for you, so don’t worry, just be yourself.”

“Be myself, huh? That’s the first time someone’s said I should do that,” he remarks. “Wait, how do you know he likes me?”

Derek raised an eyebrow, “He looks at you like the sun shines out of your ass,” he responded, “trust me, he likes you.” Spencer would like to believe Derek, and he does, but the little nagging voice in the recess of his mind, he starts wringing his hands a little and runs them along his pants to calm his nerves. “Hey,” Spencer glances up; Derek’s moved from his seat to his desk to his, leaning, “he likes you, ok?”

“How can you be sure?” Spencer purses his lips, twisting the strap of his bag, “He doesn’t deviate from how he acts when he interacts with all of us, he flirts with you just as much as he does with me, and Garcia, and Elle —”

“Why don’t you just ask him,” Derek points to the brief room; you’re currently standing by the door to it in deep conversation with Garcia. Spencer turns back and shakes his head.

“I think he’s busy; I —I’ll do it later.”

Later, in layman’s terms, really meant not ever. Preferably on his deathbed if he had to, but now that he’d asked Derek, any moment he’d look over, Derek would gesture to you, head tilted towards where you’d gone or were. Sometimes he’d mimic movements with his hand - one hand you, the other him, and they’d smoosh together into a kiss - then he’d groan, running a hand down his face when Spencer would shake his head frantically.

He’d like to avoid you and give a chance for the infatuation to die, but either he can’t bring himself to or doesn’t want to. He’s been playing the potential outcomes in his mind, he could confess, get turned down, and you’d remain friends, or he’d confess, get horribly rejected and then never see you again, or he could confess, and you could return the feelings. Considering all the options, he won’t be doing anything; he’ll just let this float away.

“You’re staring, cookie.” It’s the two of you in the kitchenette, no case, just tying up loose ends. “What’s going on in that mind of yours?”

“A potential hypothesis,” he responds.

“Oh yeah, what about?”

“Uh….I’m not sure how to put it into words,” he responds.

“Well, that’s a first,” you laugh, turning away from the kettle heating, “come on, give it a go.”

He nervously rubs his hands together, “Actually….it might be easier if I–I demonstrated it.”

“In the kitchen?” You ask, and he nods, asking you to close your eyes; you raise an eyebrow.

“Just trust me,” he begs, “....please.”

You do so, and there’s a split second where you can hear him mutter to himself - you can do this, come on - there’s a soft push against your lips, and it takes you a moment to realize he’d kissed you, holding your wrist to balance and ground himself, and then it’s gone. Your eyes open, and Spencer’s pursing his lips, hands wrangling more intensely, “R–results?” He’s not just asking; he’s hoping, the subtle worry underneath his voice as he waits for an answer.

You take one of his hands and reel him back in with a slight tug, and he looks so terrified as if bracing himself for the worst, so you kiss him, hoping it displaces any of his fears - Spencer clings to you, even after, your bodies are flush as he hides away in your arms; drawing back every once in a while to look at you, before shying away, a frivolous laugh caught in his throat.

“Good?” You inquire, and he nods.

“Very good.”

End Note:

I apologize profusely for using the word cookie as a nickname for Spencer, but I named the fic and got committed so you get to suffer with me. Stay Hydrated.

#spencer reid x male reader #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds imagine #i spent an hour looking through quotes because big brain said 'start off fic with quote that foreshadows what you're gonna write about'#tattooed!reader #smart cookie universe :)

1K notes · View notes

lavendelhummel · 8 days

Note

I'll admit I haven't read your fic because I haven't actually seen Warehouse 13, but I do have the assumption that you went through a phase as a kid where you *really* (and I mean really) wanted to be a mermaid (based on your mermaid AU, of course)

Hii! Wow, you were so quick to send this! That’s so cool!

Can I use this as a chance to point out that I wrote a WoT or rather Siuairaine mermaid story as well? ;) It’s much shorter and not very logical, more vibes, but it felt so nice to write that wonderful nonsense! I think it’s my favorite fic actually? At least out of all my Siuaraine ones!

I am not sure if that phase was that strong as a kid. I always liked water and water magic and these things. Underwater wolds fascinated me a lot. And swimming, normal swim training my parents first enforced for safety, and in the ocean! I was insatiable and made everyone come swimming in the cold waves with me. My grandma only told me in recent years that she doesn’t actually like swimming and just went with me. It’s still the same for me though. Underwater it all calms down. It feels very magical.

But back to fic, the first story longer than what you could call a one-shot in fanfic terminology I ever wrote at 10 years old was about a girl discovering her magic water powers, also about some eco-activism related to that (she was connected to the ocean, in oder to fight pollution). So there was always that I guess? Unfortunately I never finished that masterpiece and have no idea where that folder ended up.

But the mermaid fic ideas are piling! The first one (dreaming of waves, the WoT one) was quickly written. The second one was an elaborate Siuaraine AU about a second breaking of the world having sunken Cairhien (like atlantis) and all the Cairhiens having become mermaids through evolution, but also distant legend no human actually believes in, least of all cynic Siuan. That is until she sees mermaid!Moiraine who swam to far to see a human and to get away from the cruelty of her people (the mermaid!Cairhiens eat human lungs to do their gas exchanges). Saidar also changed over time and those who can touch it have the ability to turn into the other human/mermaid. I had a few fun chapter ideas, the first few with lines echoing in my head for weeks, and a happy ending (them living together on a houseboat with river-garden on the Erinin), but no actual plot. And I wanted to write it so badly! But I didn’t have time and in the end this is still an idea in my little notebook. The other one is the washing machine one I am writing now, first I thought about Moiraine for that too, but then I noticed how much better that fits for Helena and then it built in my mind until I couldn’t not write it. And now yesterday I had another B&W mermaid idea (canon, artifact taht turns someone fish-y). Oh and the one I put in the tags of a picture I reblogged a few weeks ago (with pilot!Helena and mermaid!Myka). Oh and multiple Selkie-AU ideas for Siuaraine! I think I wrote sort of an essay on that metaphor in some ao3 comments last year?

We will see how much gets written before this obsession ends. It started pretty much exactly one year ago when I was alone on a weekend-trip in Maastricht, looking down to the river, and found cool gender-inclusive mermaid stickers at HEMA, and suddenly I needed to sit in a café and write that first fic while eating hummus. It was great. But: I’ll shut up now about the mermaid fics!

Thank you so much for your assumption kicking me off to think about the origins of my ideas!!!

#fanfic #mermaid #AU-ideas #moiraine damodred #siuan sanche #myka bering #bering and wells #ask meme

2 notes · View notes

blazehedgehog · 11 months

Note

Sir BlazeHedgehog, where is your nickname from?

Oh wow, somebody actually asked for once instead of me having to volunteer it.

This is probably at least the third time I've said this just on this blog alone, but since tumblr search is worthless, we'll take it from the top one more time, but I'll hide it behind a "read more" tag for those who would rather skip it.

And because I'm going to be hiding it behind a tag, I'm going to go all in and tell a story.

The short answer is I made it up.

I am from a time before the internet was everywhere, on everything. In the 5th or 6th grade, our computer lab teacher introduced us to the world wide web using the suite of Apple Macintoshes they had available.

And when I say "Macintosh" I mean the original. Black and white screens, Hypercard, the whole deal from 1984. Keeping in mind it was currently 1995.

About 25-30 of these little guys split in to two rows. In the middle of the classroom sat a lone Macintosh Performa. Good kids got to use the Performa.

The Performa was the only computer that was capable to render what we would begin to know as the modern internet. It had Netscape Navigator installed, which supported the somewhat-new technology of webpages with embedded images.

For the rest of us, we were introduced to the text-based internet. You would bring up a terminal application and have to type out commands to interface with the school's webserver in order to check things like email (using PINE). You browsed the internet using Lynx. There was no mouse, no clicking. You scrolled using the arrow keys and could highlight links with tab.

They taught us other terminal commands, like how to open a direct text chat with another student in the lab, some basic formatting and typing stuff, etc. It was slow, difficult to use, and the internet was a lot smaller back then. We had somewhat strict rules on what we could and could not do on these machines, but since they couldn't do much, it wasn't hard to enforce.

In high school, half of the lab was a mixture of older 5200 Performas and newer 6600 "Pizza Box" Performas, with the other half being more left over monochrome Macintoshes. They also had "the one really nice computer" but this one was a modern (by 1997 standards) Power Mac G3. New tech came newer rules: no installing games, no adult content (even soft stuff, like girls in bikinis), and no chat rooms.

We were teenagers, though. You tell us not to do something, and that immediately makes you want to do it. I remember catching some of the particularly geeky among us logging in and playing online MUDs (the precursor to MMOs), and others trying to get around the Foolproof Software locks to install games or look at porn.

(This is a newer photo of that same computer lab, and I'm unsurprised that, outside of kids being on more modern hardware, absolutely nothing about the setup of that room has changed.)

I wasn't really in my spiral of depression yet, so I used the computers like a good little boy and followed the rules.

Until the last few days of the semester before summer break. That's when everybody -- students, teachers -- collectively stop caring about keeping up proper appearances. I remember having big free periods and spending time in the computer lab. I was usually the only one in there. So, immediately, I began looking up chat rooms.

A few friends and I had gotten into deep trouble a few months earlier, because one wild night during a sleepover we called into a "party line", which was a service where you were hooked into what is now known as a "discord group chat." Except you didn't know who you were getting connected with. They were total strangers. That was part of the thrill. It was new and exciting. We happened to be lucky enough to get a group of girls who were near enough to our age (maybe a little older), and we spent hours talking with them via speakerphone.

The thing was, there was a precedent that doing that cost money. You were calling a 1-800 number, and there were service fees associated with that. Per-minute. So we racked up a bill of something like $70-$100+ that night. That was a big problem.

But internet chat was free. The allure was impossible to ignore. And with it being the last few days of school, who could stop me? At worst I'd be kicked out of the computer lab, but they weren't going to, like, expel me. Being in trouble was a fake idea.

I forget where I ended up the first day, it was some kind of general Yahoo chat or something, but I remember I was too shy to be myself. Being 13 or 14 at the time, I decided to roleplay as Tuxedo Mask from Sailor Moon. One of the only times I ever did anything like that. I was full-on "I send a rose to all the ladies @}---;----" and everything, it was awful.

On the final day, I started looking up Sonic fansites and ended up somewhere called "Ruby's Sonic Page." This was the homepage of Dawn Best, under the handle Ruby the Echidna. It was there she talked about a game I'd never heard of before -- Sonic Adventure -- and provided a link to the announcement trailer in glorious 160p MPEG-1 video. I was blown away. They were making new Sonic games again?

youtube

Provided was a link to discuss the game with other Sonic fans, and it lead to Missy's Sonic Chat, a Beseen Chat Room on a website called Xoom (one of the many Geocities clones). Beseen Chats weren't live chatrooms like we'd think of modern-day Discord, or even AIM or IRC. Beseen was much more comparable to Twitter, or Tumblr, in that it was a website where you could post messages and could refresh the feed to see what other people had posted. It was a bit of a hack, but it worked well enough.

The whole thing was broken down in to different frames (if you're too young to know what those are: imagine multiple separate embedded webpages, sectioned off to specific portions of the screen). So you'd have a frame on the left that was a userlist, where people had set names and even large image avatars for themselves. At the bottom you'd have a text entry field with two buttons at the end: Send and Refresh. And then taking up most of the screen real estate was the feed itself. Something sort of like this, I guess:

And a lot of people in this Beseen chat had made up their own, original characters. This was my first introduction to Sonic OCs. And Missy's chat was a veritable who's who extremely talented fanartists. Ruby, Barachan, T2, J. Axer, Rinacat, etc.

I wanted to fit in, so I felt like I needed to come up with "a character" of my own.

Literally the first name to jump to mind was "Blaze the Hedgehog." I didn't like it. It was too obvious. Surely there had to be other Blaze the Hedgehogs out there, right? And I wasn't even particularly attached to "flame" powers.

So I sat there for a few minutes, trying to think of something better. My mind went blank.

Admitting defeat, "Blaze the Hedgehog" it was.

The chat was rather dead, given it was still technically a school day, and once I went home that afternoon, that was the end of my access to the internet. The best we had at home was some sort of Hyundai thing -- amber monochrome monitor, no graphics rendering, no hard disk, basically just a glorified word processor.

That changed once my mom got her tax return a little while later. She invested in a 233mhz Packard Bell desktop computer with Windows 98 and a subscription to America Online.

When prompted to make my own AOL username, I decided to go with "Blazehgehg." BlazeHedgehog. The character I'd made up at school.There it was. For the first time, for real, it was set in stone. And from 1998 to 2023, I've never changed it. Other "Blaze the Hedgehog"s have come and gone, but I've been the constant.

Later that night, I found my way back to Missy's Sonic Chat, and I grabbed one of Axer's Sonic images, sloppily recoloring it in MSPaint. I printed it out for posterity and kept it in a folder with artwork I'd actually drawn.

Blue and green were my favorite colors. Sonic was blue, so Blaze was green. Instead of shoes, he had boots. He wore a leather vest with a black t-shirt on underneath that covered most of his body. And atop his head, a sprout of hair, colored like a flame.

Blaze's only real role as a "character" was in the first and only fanfiction I ever wrote for him; the story was a blend of Final Fantasy VII and an anime I was in love with at the time named "Green Legend Ran." It's better it was lost to time. Besides, I don't think it was ever finished.

Blaze would go through several revisions over the years. More immediately, The Matrix hit the next year, and Blaze was given a trenchcoat. Also, since I could like, actually draw, I decided to stop painting over other people's artwork and draw Blaze for myself.

Eventually, Blaze Hedgehog the character fell out of favor. I grew up. I never really used him for much more than a forum avatar anyway, and even then, I felt like people were judging me for having a Sonic OC. Especially a green hedgehog. There were a dime-a-dozen green hedgehog Sonic OCs floating around.

Once Sega introduced Blaze the Cat in 2005, that sort of became the final nail in the coffin. But by then, I'd been using "BlazeHedgehog" as an online username for seven years. I'd grown attached to it. I didn't want to change it. So... I didn't.

As I've gotten older and put some distance between myself and that time, I find myself a bit nostalgic for the character of Blaze the Hedgehog. I redesigned him a bit a few years ago to look more like a traditional Sega Sonic character, swapping in a bomber jacket and getting rid of the shirt.

And, of course, there was Sonic Forces. Options were limited there, but a brown leather jacket and the weird black bodysuit got closest. I was most surprised by the hairstyle options. While we don't get the classic yellow-to-red, we do get a green-to-red, which is good enough. And I really like these ring-strap boots.

That's about all there is to say, really. These days it's just a username for me, and I keep it so old friends can find me more easily. I'm pretty terrible at keeping up with some people, and I get the feeling I probably come off cold to others when that's never been my intention. But for those who want to keep tabs on me, they know where to find me.

#questions #Anonymous #fan character #sonic oc #original character #blaze the hedgehog #sega #sonic team #sonic the hedgehog #memories #nostalgia

11 notes · View notes

anderstrevelyan · 1 year

Text

It's WIP Wednesday time

Thanks for the tag, @midnightprelude!

I'm back to working on Force of Nature in earnest—I shared the first bit of this a while ago, but the second part needs it to come full circle on some delicious breakfast pastry and Anders' new mission to figure out if his attempts to flirt with Garrett (Amell) are doing anything at all, sooooo all together now:

He finds him in the dining hall, working his way through half a dozen small plates with a book laid flat on the table. He’s not in his uniform yet, just the tall boots with a simple pair of trousers and white shirt tucked in, legs crossed as he flips a page between bites. If Anders were anyone else, he might feel a moment of doubt at his own relative extravagance. But instead he preens the dark feathers on his new mantle’s shoulders, adjusts the skirt of his new robe, a shade between blue and green, soft fabric shimmering between his fingers, and drops himself into the chair beside Amell.

“Wow. You look…”

“Utterly ravishing?” he suggests, hands spread in a flourish. “Like exquisite taste itself?”

“Those weren’t the words on my tongue, but I’ll give you that, sure.” Anders reaches for an elaborate-looking pastry on the nearest plate, apple of some kind he thinks, but Amell knocks his hand away. “I know you’re beholden to the metabolism now, too,” he says, “but you could at least get your own.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Maker, it smells good in here. He almost stands and follows his nose to his own breakfast, but he leans forward instead. If he doesn’t ask now he might lose the nerve. “So! I have a proposition for you.”

Amell doesn’t acknowledge his words, his eyes on his book again as he marks his page and flips it shut. “You might not want to wear that today.”

“Are you trying to get me out of my robes, Amell? A bit forward of you, but maybe I’d consider it. If you let me eat breakfast first.”

“I—” He falters, just for a moment. His recovery fast enough that Anders is almost disappointed. “We have a task before us, I’m afraid. There seems to be an opening in the tunnels, a way for the darkspawn to get through. Voldrik Glavonak’s prepared to repair it, but we need to do a sweep first, kill any darkspawn that remain. Ready to face them for the first time?”

“You seem to be forgetting the ones I barbecued quite recently.”

“The first time as a Warden. On a different scale. It’s not something to take lightly.”

“I get that a lot.”

Amell raises a brow. “You wanted to ask me something?”

Well, here goes. “Things are getting bustling around here,” he starts. “The new soldiers seem pretty green—there’s already been some broken limbs in training, and don’t think I have to tell you there’ll be worse if they have to do any actual soldiering. There was a case of the coughs going around last week. Some of the families moving in have more children on the way. Amaranthine’s far.” He looks down for a moment, worrying his robe between his fingers, but forces his gaze back up. “What I’m saying is, I think I should open a clinic.”

It takes Amell a moment to finish his bite. “We already have a clinic.”

“Well, yes, but we don’t have a mage running it. And certainly not one like me. Do I have to be humble about it? I am pretty amazing.”

“You realize you’re asking to do this in your free hours? You’re a Warden first, and frankly I need you on the field.”

That’s the point, he almost says, far too fast, but holds his tongue for a beat. “I do realize that.”

Amell sits back and takes a sip from the coffee he’s never far from in the mornings, seeming to consider. It doesn’t take long. “Okay. Yes. As long as you’re not running yourself ragged, I think that’s a splendid idea, actually. Speaking of the field, though, can we talk fighting strategy?”

Anders glances over at the line for food, teeming now that it’s more than just the early risers, but before he can turn back and say anything, Amell’s nudging a plate his way. The apple pastry, after all. He bites into it with a grin. As delicious as it smelled.

“Assuming we do find any darkspawn down there,” Amell continues, ”I’ll go in close, but I’d like you to hold back. Stay away.”

“Look, I know I’m a healer, but I did study offensive magic, too—”

“I know. But you have skills that I don’t, and I’d like to use them.”

Emboldened, Anders shuffles his chair closer and reaches for the plate of bacon. Amell does, too, then freezes when their fingers brush. His hands are warm, soft, and for a heartbeat Anders lets the touch linger, until Amell snaps his hand away. Quietly clears his throat. Is he…flustered? Anders grabs the largest piece of bacon in triumph.

A no-pressure tag forward to @noire-pandora @mxanigel @potatowitch @milesmentis @effelants @cleverblackcat @mxkelsifer @noetikat @my-dumb-obsessions @glowing-blue-feathermage @delicatefade @dismalzelenka @sulky-valkyrie @dalish-rogue @pierogipie @transandersrights —I'd love to see what you're up to, if you feel like sharing.

#wip wednesday #dragon age fan fiction #anders #amell #dragon age awakening #garrett amell #there's some more context to Anders' ask here that I'll save for the chapter itself!#buuut it's probably safe to assume this is another edition of Anders Pretends to be Light and Fun and Fine

20 notes · View notes

doctorbrown · 4 months

Text

BTTF Year-End Tag Game!

This year:

How many times would you guess you watched the first back to the future movie?

At least fifteen times through, easy. Probably more than that.

Did you get any sweet bttf merch? If so, what?

I sure did! I got my really neat BTTF backpack, a Hot Wheels miniature of the DeLorean, a couple prints from CC including a metal print of the DeLorean about to time travel, and probably another thing or two I can't think of off the top of my head.

How many cans of Pepsi Free did you chug this year?

Not one. I don't really drink soda. If I do, it's probably root beer or ginger ale.

What was a favourite bttf fanfic you read this year?

Oh god, one I absolutely LOVED was Time Is A Flat Circle. I really liked the darker tone of this fic, the villainous version of Doc presented here (because he would be a terrifying villain, lbr), and all the foreshadowing done in this fic as you get closer to the end that maybe you'll miss the first time and then you'll see it all come together later—wow, fantastic. Big fan of being unable to change the present/future via the past because everything's set to play out that way.

A favourite bttf fanart you saw this year? (please give us a link, not a screencap/repost!)

Ah hmmmmm. I don't go searching for fanart on here as much as I should, tbh. I did actually catch a couple of the Doctober artworks going around and a lot of those were incredible. I'll have to get back to you on this one.

Did you create any bttf fanart or fanfic? If you did, what one(s) are you proudest of?

I'm working on a doodle of Doc atm for fun, we'll see if I ever do anything with it. But fanfics, yeah, I guess you could sort of say I did! I participated in the Doctober '23 event, and actually completed all 31 days. I'm very hard on myself so I don't know if I'd give one I'm proudest of, but I definitely got much more comfortable with my writing as the days went on.

How many times were you late for school this year?

I have long since graduated haha.

Did you watch any other movies/tv shows with BTTF actors in them?

A few (I'm not a huge film person actually), and I think they were mostly Chris Lloyd's things hmmm—Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension, Star Trek III: Search for Spock, I Am Not A Serial Killer, Doc Brown Saves the World (it counts, I guess), Million Ways to Die in the West, there were probably others I'm sure but off the top of my head, these are the ones I remember.

Was there a memorable moment you heard a Huey Lewis song this year?

A memorable moment? Hmmmm I'm not sure. I listened to enough Huey Lewis this year but I can't think of something particularly memorable about doing so.

How many times did you fall down this year?

A couple, probably. Can't say I kept count.

Did you get to see BTTF: The Musical? What was your experience like!

I sure did! I've seen it twice now and I'd see it a third time in a heartbeat. It was an amazing experience, I went in completely blind, didn't know anything about the production, the soundtrack, nothing. When it came to Broadway, my first time seeing it was in the pre-showing (or whatever they're called); like it wasn't technically open yet but wow, I was FLOORED. I came out immediately getting the soundtrack and listening to that damn thing on repeat for weeks.

How many times did your mom retell the story of how she and your father met?

I think she's only told it to me once. Twice, perhaps, for different context. But theirs is not a happy story so it's not exactly something that gets spoken about often.

If you could describe your year in a BTTF quote, which one would it be?

My year in a BTTF quote? Uhhhhh. "Yeah, I saw it on a rerun." OR "Yeah, well uh, let's keep this brain melting stuff to ourselves, okay?"

⚡️LIGHTNING ROUND⚡️

Did you get to: go on any trains, skate on a skateboard, ride a horse, drive a DeLorean, run in the rain, go to a dance, hang up a clock (maybe on this one because I may have knocked one down, can't remember), play the guitar, pull an all-nighter, read science fiction, or drive thru Burger King this year?

Your future is whatever you make it! So what are you going to make of this coming year?

Oh fuck if I know—this may be the year I quit the job that I hate that doesn't pay me what I deserve for my qualifications and figure out what I actually enjoy doing. I'll work on my confidence re: the content I put out, namely being proud of the things I create, whatever they are.

tagged by: @cheriboms (thank you! not only for the tag, but for all the support and kind things you've said about anything I've posted) tagging: i'm not sure who to tag for this but if you see it and you like it, steal it!

#&; all my computations must conform 「 d. games 」#&; there's something about that one 「 ooc 」#this was a fun game!

6 notes · View notes

lambourngb · 1 year

Text

seven sentence sunday

I was tagged by the wonderful EJ @ravens-words - I always appreciate you thinking of me.

I am writing again. I’m writing a LOT. I wrote 60,000 words last month, but I’m not writing RNM currently. I’m having a block there, I think it’s because the stories I was working on then, are tied to my dad being sick. Anyway I’m still working through it and I hope with more time, I can at least finish the Ringmaker epic and my sequel to LYW.

I am still into Top Gun. Currently, I have “survival is insufficient” which is a Last of Us/Top Gun fusion set just after Outbreak Day in 2003. It’s 55,000 words, IceMav. Currently pre-slash, lots of action, lots of pining, lots of “wow, the Iraq War was pretty fucked up, imagine if Zombies halted that 8 months in lol but then you see the US military carry out the same draconian behavior stateside as FEDRA”,

I just started “Working on Nathan Hale’s Eulogy” which is a pre-TGM, canon adjacent story, assuming established IceMav, how does Ice tell Mav he’s dying? It’s pretty heavy, drawing on alot of my own personal experience. It’s 9K now, hopefully finishes at 15K.

first off : survival is insufficient:

There was a disconcerting line of orange and pink undergrowth, trailing from the defunct ice cooler and leading toward the line of tractor-trailers. Tom nudged the vine with his toe, perplexed at why it was growing in the middle of the desert. He risked a glance toward the parked trucks, and jumped when a shadow moved behind the windshield of one of the trucks. He looked closer, and nearly every parked truck had … something, now scrabbling at the windows.

“Organic tripwire,” Mav observed dryly next to him, while Tom struggled to take in what it meant for the fungal infection. It wasn’t just isolated to just taking over a body, it had spread out, sinking into concrete and other mediums while it waited for another host. “Looks like some of the truckers were sick when they stopped for the night.”

“Doesn’t look like enough intelligence in their brains survived infection for them to understand how to operate the door locks, they’re all trapped in there.”

“No kidding, they’re not going anywhere. Truckers keep those cabs locked up like Fort Knox when they’re stopped. No one wants to get hijacked.”

“Lucky us,” Tom murmured before turning back to the closed market door. “There could be more of them in there.”

Mav shouldered his rifle with a sure grip, and nodded to him to pull the door open. “Well, we’ve come a long way since Lancaster. I’m ready this time.”

The door swung open, easily.

They both waited for something to jump out from the store aisles, but nothing happened. The overhead fluorescent lights flickered briefly before staying on, bright and welcoming. It was the result of a long, sustained campaign by corporate interests to minimize maintenance on chain operations; the lights stayed on automatically, along with the drink coolers, only the human behind the counter had to be replaced after a shift. With a glance toward the doomed truckers in the lot, Tom stepped inside with Mav to investigate the store.

The shelves were empty of certain staples, beer, cigarettes, and easy to grab snacks. It had been clearly ransacked as the area descended into chaos, but not by any true survivalist looking to make a stand. The mini mart staples of motor oil, canned goods, and batteries were largely untouched. He exchanged a meaningful look with Mav, and he nodded in agreement with him; once they were fueled up, they would be back for the food and whatever else would fit in the Yukon.

Mav moved toward the cashier register, and then inhaled sharply when he moved around the counter. “Got a body here, not infected… just looks like someone just shot him.”

“Infected don’t carry guns.”

“Well, the military would have been more efficient and dragged his body out. I think we’re looking at a run-of-the-mill human monster.” He whispered an apology under his breath, as he nudged the poor dead clerk out of the way, and then opened the panel that controlled the gas pumps. It was a matter of a few, chilling minutes of waiting, as Tom watched the door and the back hallways toward the bathroom for any signs of company, and then Mav flashed a thumbs up. “Okay, I told the pump we put a $100 in, the maximum, it should be enough to fill the Yukon and a few of our cans.”

“Great, let’s get going before the welcome wagon from that crash site arrives.” Tom stayed on high alert as he filled the Yukon, the noises from the parked trucks kept growing louder as more and more trapped infected were alerted to their presence.

and now from: “Working on Nathan Hale’s Eulogy”:

“Now I need another shower,” Pete joked in response, a smile evident in his voice.

Tom slowly collapsed down on top of him, taking care not to knee him, giving a grunt of acknowledgement as he worked to catch his breath again. His lungs were screaming for oxygen, complaining a little louder than what he thought was normal. Yet another small betrayal. He rolled over onto his back, and stretched his ribcage upward to take a deeper breath, with his eyes closed.

The bed shifted next to him, Pete moved toward the nightstand for a wet wipe. Tom flinched at the cold touch, before sighing in pleasure as Pete began to clean them up thoroughly with slow, loving swipes. Pete made a considering sound in his throat as he tracked upward, cleaning off their chests. “You haven’t been skipping lunch, have you, Ice? And dinner? You look like you’ve lost a little weight.”

“Just getting ready for the beach season,” Tom joked, even though a small wave of alarm swept through him.

Pete slapped him with the end of the wet wipe, “Asshole. I’m serious, you better be taking care of yourself while I’m in the desert.”

“I promise, I’m not skipping any meals.” He left it unsaid that he wasn’t finishing his meals either.

“I’ll make you a big omelet in the morning,” Pete promised, his voice warm and drowsy with love. “Will fix you right up.”

If only that were true.

#seven sentence sunday #so much more than that #icemav #my wips

12 notes · View notes

braxiatel · 1 year

Text

Writer’s Round-Up 2022

I made a post following this writer’s meme on New Year’s Eve last year, so I thought I would repeat it for comparison. It isn’t one you need to be tagged in to do, nor do you need to tag others if you do it.

Total Word Count:

I have published a total of 68,570 words! Compared to 2021’s 31,021 that’s 2.2x as much!

New Things This Year:

There’s three main things that come to mind.

I started writing Hermitcraft/Life series fic!

I made some new writing friends I think deserve a shoutout. First @stitchthesewords and @atherix, and more recently @sparksnevadas and @mochiwrites. I love their works and admire each of them for their craft and their style of writing, so making their acquaintance has been lovely.

Finally I have rediscovered the joy in writing. Last year is struggled so much with anxiety about writing and publishing fic, to the point that it was preventing me from writing. I think I am a lot more confident in my own ability now, and more importantly I’ve become more comfortable with my own shortcomings. All writers have room to improve, and the best way to do that is by writing. If it is too frustrating I stop, and if not I write it as well as I can and accept that my writing is best when I am enjoying the process.

Fic I spent the most time on:

Could I Be The Sky for sure. I spent about four months working on it, and I am so proud of how far I came through the process of writing it. As such I think the story gets stronger the further you read, and the third chapter + the epilogue are by far my favourites.

Favourite thing I wrote:

Hmm. See, the thing is, I like a lot of what I wrote.

Other than CIBTS, which means a lot to me for a lot of reasons, I think the answer has to be one of the Equinox AU fics. However, because they are all part of one story I struggle to pick one. Possibly the latest, In the Darkness You Reap, or maybe the one before that Harbour Me, Guide Me Home

I also really enjoyed writing "We Double as a Drama Troupe" not least for the excuse to use a little bit of the 0.5 theatre degree I earned before dropping out of university. I think it’s funny, and that I got the characters pretty spot on.

Favourite thing I read:

Oh there’s so many. Genuinely.

I read less Warcraft fanfiction now than I did last year, but I still just want to give a shoutout to that fandom for the amazingly high level of writing quality. I specifically want to list @khadgarfield’s Convergence. I love the language it uses, especially for descriptions. In fact I think of it often while writing myself.

Another favourite was @milo-hypno’s Aftershocks of Divinity. This fic… wow, this fic. I don’t think I will ever read another romance/slowburn fic and not compare it to this. The way Aftershocks of Divinity treats the subject of love, of recovery, is genuine and poetic enough that it brought my to tears even as I was reading it for the third time - and it is one of those where rereading it adds to the story.

And lastly, I would be remiss not to mention the Midnight series by @atherix. Oh Midnight. I don’t even know where to start listing all the things I love about it. Atherix, friend, you are the master of world building and foreshadowing. Midnight is fun to read because it rewards paying attention to details. Oh, and then there’s the characterisation, of course. It has that perfect mix of accurate to canon and sensible in the context of the AU it is set within. This one is a masterclass in slowburn as well, and were it a little less late I would dig out a screenshot of me messaging the group chat full of people who do not read Hermitcraft fic, letting them know that the OT3 from the fic series I keep talking about finally got together.

Writing goals for next year:

There’s projects I want to start working on and ones I want to keep working on. Equinox and Kingdom of Boatem AU are the main two, but they aren’t necessarily a goal.

I think most of all I just want to keep working towards writing being something that brings me joy and creative satisfaction. I’ve come so far in 2022, I want to keep up that good work.

Finally, something I couldn’t fit in anywhere else. I have to give a massive shoutout to @loombarrow for all of your help with writing through the year. Love you, friend!

#writing #there’s so many other writers and fics I wanted to mention #but this post is already long enough 😅#hermitshipping #long post

17 notes · View notes

jaerie · 1 year

Text

2022 Evaluation of my Fics

I was tagged by @chai-hat-tea

1. Number of stories posted to AO3 this year: 24

2. Word count posted for the year: 95,054

3. Fandoms I wrote for: One Direction

4. Pairings: Harry/Louis and then some that I wrote anon that I won’t out myself on haha

5. Story with the most:

Kudos: Mr. Tuesday

Bookmarks: Mr. Tuesday

Comments: Mr. Tuesday hahahaha wow yall loved that one

6. Work I’m most proud of (and why):

I guess probably Mr. Tuesday. I had a lot of hope for The Marm but I struggled a LOT writing this year and it ended up not being what I wanted and hoped it would be.

7. Work I’m least proud of (and why):

I think I’d probably have to say The Marm just for the reason above. I had so many good ideas for it… but I just wasn’t able to make it happen. So much potential. It’s not a BAD fic overall, I just know what it could have been.

8. Share or describe a favourite review you received:

I don’t have a specific one to pull out unfortunately… but I receive comments saying how they trust me with new topics or kinks and it makes me feel like the mom of unchartered territory. Like hold my hand and let’s dive through it kids! Those are always the best because I try to approach topics with realistic thought processes and human experience even though most situations are fictional. It’s hard to describe what I put into fics, but it’s nice to see that I really am putting across what I’m trying to.

9. A time when writing was really, really hard:

This year was really hard for me to write in general. The past couple years have been very very difficult. The trauma over the last few years specifically from everything that has happened in my professional life made it really hard to do much more than come home and disassociate on Tiktok or some mindless phone game. I also traveled to 4 countries for 12 Harry shows and 5 Louis shows which ate up a lot of time. It was the first year of my 19 years in the industry that I used my entire allotment of employee rate hotel rooms if that says anything. I also have realized that my tolerance level for things has become so very low and I have taken a lot of things to heart that I would have brushed off in past years. The main one being that everyone comments on every single story about wanting sequels and about how they can’t wait to see what happens! Not realizing that I am internalizing that as the original fic not being good enough. I understand the thoughts behind the comments and I do appreciate that people want more, but in the mental state I’m in, it has been very hard to not see it as a sign of inadequacy.

10. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:

At this point, I feel like I’ve written so many surprising things that nothing surprises me anymore! I often try to push myself to write something bizarre or dark. I guess it always surprises me when something turns out to be soft when I didn’t set out for it to be.

11. A favourite excerpt of your writing:

I really liked this setup:

The pages of the date book fluttered as Harry used his thumb to open to the current page. Everyone used the online schedule system now, but Harry always preferred paper. He copied any appointments down every morning to keep it up to date. He slid his finger across his handwriting in pink ink until he came to today.

Tuesday. Harry loved Mr. Tuesday.

It was true that most of his clients were regulars, but there was just something about Mr. Tuesday that would make him stand out amongst the others even if he hadn’t booked almost every single Tuesday with him for the past year. It was the first day of Harry’s work week and Mr. Tuesday always eased him into it in such a pleasant way. It also meant Harry didn’t have to worry about primping himself all weekend since Mr. Tuesday liked him more natural. It was one less day he had to shave his sensitive parts.

Harry still prepared like he would for any client. He spent some time in the shower washing every inch of himself and then cleaned and sanitized the bathroom behind himself. He threw on a robe and some little shorts so he wasn’t completely naked as he moved around the room. His checklist was so routine now as he checked that the bedside table was fully stocked even though it would be impossible to go through that many condoms in one session.

There was a light knock on the door and Harry glanced up at his clock. 5:30. Right on time.

Harry took the few steps around the bed to answer the door while he was still wearing his robe. It wasn’t one of his sexy silk ones, it was pink and fluffy and usually only used to snuggle into when he wasn’t on the clock. Mr. Tuesday only liked Harry’s lingerie on special occasions.

Always aware of safety, Harry checked the peephole before opening the door. Mr. Tuesday handed him the token that confirmed he’d checked in at the front just as all of his clients had to. There didn’t need to be any negotiations. They were both on the same page.

12. How did you grow as a writer this year:

That’s a difficult question. My initial response is that I didn’t grow, but that’s never entirely true. Loss of skill has been a huge concern for me with such long stretches of not writing anything. So I would say that trying to adapt to writing in new mindsets with new processes that work in said mindset was growth. I don’t know how successful it has been, but I’ve completed a few things so it isn’t entirely a failure.

13. How do you hope to grow next year:

I hope to be able to focus on one thing and get it done. My goal is to fully form ideas before just diving in as I always have in the past. We’ll see how that goes.

14. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc):

If I spoke with you about writing, you’re a positive influence. I have a couple group chats made of individuals who are usually up for indulging my ideas even if they never become much more than ideas.

15. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year:

I think a lot more themes or ideas from my real life pop up in my fics than anyone realizes. I won’t expose most of those things, but gender has been a reoccuring theme for the year.

16. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:

I don’t really feel like I’m in a place to offer much wisdom… but I will say that if you want to write it, write it. There is an audience for EVERYTHING. It may not be a large audience, but there will be an audience. Rare pairs, dark fics, controversial fics, etc etc. Someone will always read it if you are willing to write it.

17. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:

I may have made a mistake with signing up for this round of Big Bang... but I have a lot invested in the fic and I am feeling pretty good about it so far. I am really hoping I am able to do my idea and careful plotting justice. It isn’t exactly like the things I usually write, but I’m hoping that will be a refreshing jumpstart for other projects. One step at a time, though.

18. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read.

If you’re a writer, consider this your tag! Tag me when you answer!

14 notes · View notes

bedlamsbard · 2 years

Text

I went to go see Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness mostly on a whim and I...do not think I enjoyed that experience.

well, it is always kind of neat to see a film opening day at the theatre because you tend to get audience responses, which is always fun, and I haven’t had an opening day experience since...probably TROS, because I very seldom go to the movie theatre.

(Or the fact I’m having a delayed panic attack for unrelated reasons, I just had an experience at the theatre that stepped hard on one of my panic triggers that I go to a lot of trouble to avoid dealing with.)

eta: I’m happy to talk about specifics if anyone has questions or want to know if XYZ showed up in the film or anything; just send an ask and I’ll spoiler-tag the heck out of my response.

spoilers below the break -- a few specifics but the more I think about it the more unhappy I am.

The movie definitely did have moments I liked, but in general I’m feeling really unsettled and more unhappy the more I think about it -- this feels like a betrayal of the Wanda we’ve been seeing from Age of Ultron forwards, with a side of “women are batshit about kids amiright?” Any time you have an ending that makes you wonder “wow, then why did we bother having the previous thirty films/shows?” it’s uh. not ideal. to say the least.

definitely understand now why I kept seeing headlines about “WandaVision fans will HATE THIS MOVIE!” lolsob

also I’m tetchy about multiverses in general -- I love them but I actually really hate the way the MCU (and tbh comics in general) tend to do them, and this wasn’t an exception. (Also I’m weirded out by the MCU now being canonically labeled Earth-616 since there...already...is...an Earth-616 in the comics and the MCU is not it? But whatever, it probably would have been unwieldy to say “yours is Earth-199999,” which I believe is the comics designation for the MCU ‘verse.) this one did the Loki and NWH thing where characters only made sense if you had knowledge external to the MCU, which -- for years the MCU’s strength has been that the less you know about the comics (or other films, cartoons, etc.) the better off you are as a viewer and every time they veer away from that I think it weakens whatever project it happens in.

I did like (main timeline) Stephen Strange a lot in this movie -- he’s an interesting one. And I liked that Wong didn’t get sidelined, killed off, or replaced as Sorcerer Supreme, which I was worried about. America Chavez was neat.

But I was very uncomfortable with the mass slaughter of the Illuminati, especially the Captain Carter and Captain Marvel parts, which really felt the most gruesome even though they were all pretty gruesome. (How often must I see that shield dripping with blood? Also Steve never had to use a jetpack gripe gripe gripe, but that’s my Captain Carter issues talking, and those issues are for a separate post since it’s not related to this film.)

(also while Wanda was busy killing the Illuminati someone in the back of the theatre went “BUT WHY DIDN’T SHE DO THAT TO THANOS” and yeah, kid, point.)

Also at this point, tbh, the fact that none of the MCU’s multiverse shenanigans are actually interacting with each other is starting to feel like a major flaw. No, this doesn’t have a Loki tie-in (and it felt like it should have, but that might be the fact I’m a Loki fan talking). The only real WandaVision tie-in is essentially “now Wanda’s crazy, but about her kids instead of Vision,” and WandaVision was not a multiverse show anyway. There’s no What If tie-in unless you count Captain Carter, and this is clearly a Peggy Carter from a different universe than that Captain Carter. Spider-Man: No Way Home is a side note played for laughs. The nice thing about Phase One and Phase Two of the MCU -- having gone through them lately -- is that you can clearly see that they’re building to something and existing in the same universe, but Phase Four doesn’t feel like that at all and it’s really starting to hurt it. (Phase Three has other issues but is in that weird transitional point between Phase One/Two and Phase Four.)

also don’t stay for the post-credits scene, it’s not worth it; everyone in the theatre went, “wait, is that IT?” when it rolled.

I would like to stop coming out of Marvel experiences going “wow! I enjoyed AoU way more than that!” which has happened twice in the last few weeks. (not with Moon Knight, Moon Knight was great.)

anyway...it wasn’t for me and that’s fine, I’m just kind of sad because I love multiverses and the MCU keeps doing them in ways I really dislike.

#doctor strange spoilers #doctor strange 2 spoilers #multiverse of madness spoilers #bedlam watches the mcu #doctor strange in the multiverse of madness

27 notes · View notes

cogmented · 1 year

Note

hiiii i saw ur tags on my post!! i know nothing about breaking mc but i understand ur excitement completely!! i have no idea what they did but im so excited to find out!! this team is so cool they have cool abilities AND cool lore AND cool dynamics AND a cool aesthetic!! thwy make me INSANE. hope u dont mind me dropping this in ur ask box i just need to ramble about them somewhere

YOU R SO OKAY !!!! i loveeee what is going on rn

ermmm spoilers and wht not!

like WHAT !?!!? there is so much more of a crazy element to breaking da game than im used to, especially when used in the context of a pvp heavy turned lore (more so circumstance and event) based server like it ACTUALLY COMES INTO CONFLICT RAHH we r usually just a bunch of gamers sitting around in little test servers (i was more so an in-game code guy rather than an exploit guy, im basing all my inner technical knowledge on what my friends r thinking from the context ive shown them)

im SOOO interested in how the characters play out here, like with the tyrant groupchat and some of the key players in there (pangi, reddoons, planet, SPEPTICLE !?) and how THEY were the ones supposedly getting big power

i think planet knows a lot more about what's going on than what vitalasy thinks (i have a theory that planet's trust barrier was given by spoke, maybe it couldve been given by vitalasy to more so keep him quiet? but ive been brain rotting over a planet and spoke team up so im mad biased) and spoke is much more of a leaker than i thought! he is definitely one of the least secretive members about all dis and whatnot, but his ideals are geared towards fun fun for every1 (himself)

also vi is showing phase 2 rn this is going to be FUCKING INSANE ! im soo sosoooososososo exited omhgg kicking my legs laying on my stomach twirling my hair and drawing hearts and stars around the word exploit in glitter gel pen and giggling

this has been SUCH an interesting season im still stunned by stream viewers who say s3 was the best but maybe im a nerd whatavar whatavar ....

i am going to rant and you are going to listen to me >_( hahahahaha muahhahaha but s4 has been so new and interesting from the START. those two main groups forming at the village and the outpost and their outliers was the domino effect of extremes. im on red's side here when he said that that was the main catalyst for WHY duality duo went to the lengths they did, and how THAT, the moment subz stepped into the end to see the main island completely wiped was SUCH a crucial moment to the rest of s4 development

that was the known start. that's what, to everyone else, was the beginning of consequence

but now, there's the added factor of the plan before s4, but these extremes were needed to make a reason to use these exploits in an interesting way. yeah okay, leviathan is not a threat anymore. TO US THOUGH!!!! ONLY TO US!!! because we know everything, we know what's going on and leviathan has NO IDEA what they're in for, but what does terrain, leo, ANYONE ELSE think about them? Are they scared? probably !

but seeing this as a viewer.... a watcher haha of everything we KNOW a FRACTION of how much danger everyone is in. we dont know to WHAT EXTENT !!!!! HOLY MYSTERY !!!!! im so so so excited to see how they use this

we saw how jepex and mapic and spoke used it in jepex's latest video, but they have MORE INFORMATION SINCE THEN !!! AND INFORMATION THEY DIDNT REVEAL !!!! vitalasy is SO FUCKIGN AWESOME. SOOO COOL.

it has gotten so intertwined and complicated and layered i shouldve taken notes because im sure my memory has been warped and whatavar but WOW. RAHHHH. it's not JUST exploits. it's been zam's paranoia and terrain's frog plotline and anguish and medusa and the prison and and and no end and then no end^2 and all the teams and the betrayal and hate and the flowers and dandelions and the sun moon and stars and chaos and destruction and meaning and trust and love and care and and and

i go crazy on a friday evening i dont know i love lifesteal lots and lots

#long post #cogtalks #analysis #kind of

3 notes · View notes

ghcstvalleychief · 2 years

Note

Looking at all of your asks so far makes me realize now why so many people were upset with Ep 8 of KP calling it a filler ep and upset that they “wasted” a episode that could have been perfectly used on that one couple 🥴 or that could have been used to developed the story further ……?

But what surprised me was the fact that some “KP” fans were upset too. And I was like, I want more of their lovey dovey sweet scenes and I wanted more deep conversations between them, call me cliche but I wanted those moments where you get to know your partner and what they love and what they hate. Their favorite drinks, meals, places to visit & many other stuff. So I was actually so happy to see some of it on Ep 8 and I was so taken aback by the fact that a lot of people were genuinely upset. Also a lot of people on TW are very verbal and explicit about certain scenes or how they wanted more NC scenes and proceeded to detail you what they wanted and it’s 😐. Like I enjoy a good scene and I read some ao3 stuff so I’m not like completely against it and I don’t think it’s bad to write your horniest thoughts it’s just that there are other sites made to do this , what made me even more uncomfortable was the fact that sometimes they would tag MA or literally write stuff about them under their posts. There are certain lines that as fans we shouldn’t cross. The fiction to reality is the main one, add to this the whole thing where they asked that one fan that saw mile if a girl was with him, the accusations towards Po having a thing with that guy. At the end of the day what these people want is for MA to fulfill some type of fantasy, and trust and believe that even if one of them turned out to be queer but not in a relationship that satisfies their fans those same fans would be the first to turn their backs on them, which is the saddest thing of all bc you would believe that having people that ship you with another male they would be the first people to support you if you were Really in a relationship with another Man. All I know is that even tho this is fucked up it is what the Thai industry caters too ( and I’m new in this) but seeing as to how companies have their actors do so many things to sell that illusion to fans is just messed up, and on top of that I may be wrong so correct me if I am but I’ve seen some famous CP’s with at least one underaged/ slightly of age partners and those are the ones that put me off the most, but apparently are the ones that appeal to people the most and the difference is very big from 9 to 12 yrs of difference between them which I find so disturbing. Oh wow I went off tangent but yeah MA were the first ones to really grab my attention and until then I will be supporting them fully. Together or individually they have my heart.💕

The BL fandom is garbage. It's full of children who have a Peter Pan complex who somehow are incredibly obsessed with the sexual behavior and fetishization of gay men at the same time. It's a very interesting dichotomy because these two things are not alike. At this point, no one can convince me that these fans aren't contributing to and supporting the fetishization of these men. I can't be convinced. Based on what I've seen and how the people in this fandom respond when you talk about it, these people are absolutely guilty of all of this. These people are foaming at the mouth and weak in the knees at the idea that they're getting to see two men engage in softcore porn. Like, they're losing their minds at the idea that they're about to see something like that and we're supposed to believe this isn't fetishization?

Honestly, I knew this place was weird when I saw people counting down the days until Barcode turned 18 so they can ship him with Jeff. Now, that is incredibly weird and disturbing. I absolutely judge people who do things like that because that's just downright disturbing and predatory. Why are you counting down the days until a minor turns 18 anyway? Why are you so excited for them to suddenly become 'legal?' Why is that even a thing in your mind? All it tells me is that you've always had impure, inappropriate thoughts in your mind about said minor and now you can legally tell the world about them because there's no fear of backlash anymore.

All I know is that I want MA far, far away from the entire BL industry as a whole. Just move on from it and only deal with mature dramas and opportunities, because a lot of the things I've seen from this fandom in general are sick. As someone who's in the minority of LGBT+ people in this fandom, it's not a good feeling to be surrounded by cishet people fetishizing gay people. It's an icky, gross feeling because you just know they don't care about your wellbeing out there in the real world where it actually matters and when it actually counts. Plus, these actors are not here to satisfy whatever weird fantasy these fans have. This is why people look down on BL dramas as a whole. Not because they're elitist and pretentious, but because the industry itself promotes this weirdness and the fans eat it up by supporting the industry that does it in the first place. It's like I've said before - why would the BL industry stop producing this type of content when the fans have already proven they're supportive of it? Why would they stop producing this type of content when the fans have proven that they don't actually care about the story just as long as two mildly attractive men are pushing the boundaries of these sex scenes by engaging in borderline porn? They don't care about the sole female characters in these shows being villainized and demonized. They don't care about literally anything else, and the BL industry is going to keep it coming.

#anonymous #answered asks #I know some people don't like to talk about MA moving on #however; both of them are old enough & have loftier ambitions than to stay stuck in an industry that would limit their talents & vision #apo wants to do more producing and behind the scenes work #and mile doesn't mind the entertainment thing but we know he's picky about the things he will do #we know BOTH of them are networking & willing to take on projects that allow them to meet people outside of the TV industry #obviously their goals are clearly something completely different from their contemporaries #and I highly doubt either one of them are going to continue down the BL route #that's the great thing about them being on the upper end of the age spectrum in regards to the BL industry #their age allows them to know when to move on & move past the shallow depths of the BL industry #call me pretentious; it doesn't matter #it's all low brow garbage

2 notes · View notes