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#for context as to what every line and colour means

mtkay13 · 10 months

Text

Wen Kexing after killing the old Ghost Valley master.

Based on this quote, by Meng Hui, in chapter 74:

When he came out, for an instant, it was unclear whether his robes were made of red fabric or if he was drenched in fresh blood; and for the first time we saw a smile appear on the wooden man's usually frozen face.

Here's the original:

这男人从里面出来的时候，身上穿着一件鲜红的袍子，那一瞬间，竟让人分辨不出，是本来颜色，还是被鲜血染就，他那张从来不动声色的木讷的脸，第一回在所有人面前露出一个笑容来。

I really wanted to try and grasp what his face could have been at that moment, considering the circumstances, what it could have meant for him to do that--killing the GVM as violently as he did. Given WKX's plans, it's safe to assume that becoming the Valley Master was a part of the plan (despite it being the most dangerous position in the Valley) to get to the key, or at least to reach the power to execute what he wanted to.

To become the Valley Master, you must kill the previous one. The way in which he did it, the violence, the brutality, can indicate many things; either a personal hatred for the man, or something more symbolic—that would be up to interpretation.

Regardless—the smile, the first smile they ever saw within Yan Wang Hall, from whom they called the "wooden man"... I wanted to explore, what did the smile mean, how could he be represented?

I think it's up to each and everyone to read something there, so I won't elaborate on my own perception and meaning of that. I just thought useful to add a bit of context. ----- I think that one of my favourite exercises is to work on nuanced expressions that can carry a lot of meaning and emotions with subtle details. The type of expression that every line and pixel can influence, where its representation comes down to the tiniest speck of colour and shadow. I'm happy with how it came out, and I feel like this ended up representing Wen Kexing quite well for me.

#wen kexing #tian ya ke #tyk #wkx

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lady-harrowhark · 1 year

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hello, can you explain to me in more clarity your “waxen” theory regarding Ianthe? I’m not picking up on what this implies but it’s making my brain itch.

Sort of! Totally fair question, I just don't have a lot of clarity myself in that I don't have a fully formed theory lol. There's definitely some links and parallels in verbiage that are pinging on my radar, so I do think something's funky, but I wouldn't say I'm fully on board with this yet. I'm just playing in the sandbox Tamsyn has provided us, tossing out ideas and thinking out loud. But I can go into some more detail, and add some more thoughts that have occurred to me since I posted that last night.

(Here's a link to the post in question, for context)

Anyway! So let's first lay out all the times we get someone described as some type of wax. At various points in HtN, we get the descriptions "a shoddy wax cast of some more beautiful sculpture," a "wax figure in a pink dolly dress," a "wax figure in pale purple chiffon," and "waxen face" for Ianthe. We also see that descriptor used a few other times for other people throughout the series. In GtN, Harrow's parents' bodies are called "waxy" and the first introduction of Protesilaus (as the beguiling corpse) says he was "waxen looking in the sunlight." In NtN, Kiriona's skin is said to have a "weird, waxy quality," then Naberius's skin is called "waxen" when they first meet up with Ianthe, and again a few pages later it again references the "waxen, handsome face". What I'm getting at here is that every time this sort of description is deployed, it's in reference to a dead body that's been preserved, manipulated, and is essentially masquerading as a living person... except for Ianthe.

We also know there are a multitude of times that she's described as looking like a poor copy of Coronabeth. There's that "shoddy wax cast of some more beautiful sculpture" line, her first introduction calls her a "starved shadow" of her sister ("or the first an illuminated reflection [of Ianthe]," and actually, off the top of my head I don't know that we ever see their descriptions framed that way again... I'd have to investigate this more later, but this might be the only time that Corona is described as a "better" version of Ianthe, rather than Ianthe being a "worse" version of Corona, which is interesting), there's a point where it says "The second twin was as though the first had been taken to pieces and put back together without any genius. She wore a robe of the same cloth and colour, but on her it was a beautiful shroud on a mummy," etc etc etc. I know there's more, but I'm too lazy to go pull the rest of the quotes and you get the picture by this point I'm sure. So nearly all of these situate her, at least visually, as a copy or approximation of Coronabeth, and one that doesn't quite live up to original at that.

So now let's pick apart this snippet of conversation we overhear between Silas and Ianthe at Magnus and Abigail's dinner party a bit. Ianthe says she was born via "surgical means," which I'm assuming is referring to a C-section delivery (or whatever the necromantic equivalent is) and notes that Corona is a few minutes older. Silas seems surprised (or perhaps concerned?) that they "risked intervention" and Ianthe says Corona had "removed [her] source of oxygen". At this point Silas says, "A wasted opportunity, I'd think." I had always taken this for him just being a dick and implying he wished she'd died in the womb, but coming back to it with this new angle... well. She says "Corona's birth put my survivability somewhere around definite nil." And I'm wondering if that doesn't tie to Harrow's comment about infant deaths generating "enough thanergy to take out the entire planet." Basically, could Silas have been implying that the Tridentarii's parents wasted an opportunity to use the thanergy from baby Ianthe's death to power up Corona?

Harrow says that twins are an ill omen, but the text hasn't come back to that as of yet. Given the difficulty necromancers experience with pregnancy, I'd imagine twins would could be especially dangerous and that in and of itself could be considered an ill omen. Ianthe's comments certainly suggest that their mother carried the pregnancy, although I don't think we know for certain whether she was a necromancer. I am so intensely curious about the Tridentarii's childhood and their parents; we get so many gestures towards some really twisted family dynamics, but very little in the way of concrete explanations. Particularly relevant here, I'd love to know more about their father wanting a "matched set" and how that came about. Did they intentionally plan for twins from the start? Was it only once they knew they were having twins that that became a factor? What's the significance there?

Outside of those "waxy" descriptors, Ianthe tends to be described as much more sickly looking than even other necromancers. We know that necromancers on the whole tend towards a phenotype of physical weakness, but even still, there's an emphasis on this with Ianthe beyond that. This might be due in part to narrator bias (coughGideoncough) or the direct juxtaposition between her and Coronabeth's vivaciousness, but what really jumps out at me as contributing to this effect is how frequently she's described as being colorless, pale, washed out, bloodless, pallid, anemic, etc etc etc. It very much makes me think of the way the color drains away from Colum (and even the rest of the room and the others in it) when Silas is siphoning. Silas himself is also often described as colorless ("mayonnaise uncle," "milk man") but not so much in a way that implies frailty as much as I read it as implying a stark coldness, in line with the very black-and-white moral authority he presumes to wield, a purported "purity", much different than Ianthe's colorlessness. With Ianthe, you get a sense that her palette ought to have been or perhaps was closer to Corona's, but the color's been drained away; where Corona's hair is described as golden, Ianthe's is "canned butter", for example. Almost like the life's been siphoned out, one might say.

So to kind of circle back around, do I actually think Ianthe is dead or a corpse like the other "wax" figures we've seen? Nah. Between Harrow and Palamedes, and especially Palamedes's medical necromancy, I think we would have heard about it by now if that were the case. But I do think it's entirely plausible that she's had a bit of a brush with death and that perhaps she's never quite fully come back from, and I do think she's being intentionally positioned as somewhat adjacent to death. If their parents were wanting twins from the outset, perhaps they used necromantic means to encourage the conception. Or if the pregnancy was as high-risk as I suspect it was, perhaps she'd died or nearly died at birth and been resuscitated. Their parents may have gone to extremes to keep her alive, to maintain their matched set. Given the themes of this series, I do feel it's necessary to draw a distinction between "resuscitation" and "resurrection" although they are curiously adjacent to one another. For all the text has grappled with dying and staying dead, dying and coming back, dying and choosing whether or not to return... we haven't touched on what something like a "near death experience" would look like. I'd imagine having that sort of experience, even at an incredibly young age, might lead one to be fascinated with, to use Ianthe's own words, "the place between death and life... the place between release and disappearance."

#it was making my brain itch also!#thank you for indulging my meandering rambles lol #I’ve got another ask sitting in my inbox that I’m working on too… I promise I’m not ignoring it!#tlt #tlt meta #ianthe tridentarius #nona the ninth spoilers #ask #mcdreary #two halves dead

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arom-antix · 8 months

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Yuri!!! On Cards collaboration!

So, I know I've been pretty inactive recently, at least in posting my own art but for good reason! In the Yuri on the Web Discord server artists and writers alike have all collaborated to illustrate a deck of cards and write stories for each of them. And as a resident artist myself, I couldn't not take the opportunity to draw for this project UuU

Oh and if anyone was wondering, yes, I am to blame for inflicting this giant project onto the server BUT I REGRET NOTHING AND NEITHER WILL YOU IF YOU CHECK OUT EVERYONE ELSE'S WORKS. Trust me, they are amazing! The masterpost can be found here!

GIANT thanks to @lines-on-ice and @yaoiconnoisseur for helping so much and being amazing co-administrators and basically making this entire thing possible! You really saved me from my own overambition XD

The guidelines for this project can be found on the Yuri!!! On Cards blog as can the masterpost with all the links to everything. All the art that gets posted to Tumblr will also be reblogged by the blog.

With all that said, here's the actual art I made! (Break for those who don't want their dash to die UuU)

Okay, I lied. First, I'd heavily recommend for you to check out the guideline posts, both the general and artists' and even the writers' if you're up to it to get a grasp of the perimeters of this project. There's also some vague lore and AU stuff about the whole thing to find which will give you context for why the art looks the way it does to a certain extent.

You can also just jump right in and take everything as I ramble about it which, I mean, I won't stop you, the guideline posts aren't short. I will not blame you. You can still just look at the art. If that's your choice, go on ahead!

First up!

Ace of the Kingdom Otabek, The Deep Shadow

Being of the Kingdom of Diamonds, he's skillful and sharp. He moves quietly as a shadow and is just as mysterious.

Okay, I can't comment much on how he actually is, you'll have find that out by reading his fic(let?). They were supposed to be ficlets but as writers tend to do, none of us could manage that so take "ficlet" with a big grain of salt for every written work.

I've, by the way, not read any of the ficlets for this project beside my own so I'll get to experience the reveal with y'all and I'm gonna perish waiting.

Anyway, about the art. The yellow of course comes from the Kingdom of Diamonds' designated colour. As for the outfit, it's based on this handsome fellow I found who's supposed to be a Kazakh archer which I thought fit Otabek's whole shadow thing perfectly (and Writingfromtheshadow's fic Equivalent Exchange has me in an iron grip and I don't want to be released).

If there are any Kazakhs in the audience, you are free to laugh at me for any inaccuracies or missteps, I am but a humble little not-Kazakh, I don't expect to have gotten it all right UuU

Next up!

King Yuuri, Wanderer of Dreams

The ruler of his realm, he is as the mind flows. Kind and benevolent yet of fickle thoughts, the spirals of the subconscious are ones he both masters and bows to.

Again, gonna be waiting for his fic with everyone else but like. It's Yuuri. Anxiety is kind of a given.

In terms of art, I don't know if you can tell but this was where I started writing my will because oh my stars, what did I get myself into. If you follow me or my art, you'll know that I don't draw lineless. Like ever. And apparently I decided this project on a deadline that others were depending on me making look nice was the place to go all out.

And the worst part is that I'm not even mad at it so I have no argument to not do it again.

Anyway, the blue is from the designated colour of spades and yes, you've guessed right as to why this colour was picked for this suit. I'm predictable, leave me alone. As for the rest, the outfit is inspired by traditional Japanese dress that the Internet told me about (again, Japanese may laugh at me all they want UuU Your culture is very cool but also there was so much info, I hope I got it at least a bit right).

Also I spent like eight hours looking at hanakotoba for this and I've never been this happy about a decision I regretted so much while I was having to draw that many flowers. And you know I had to include The Gay Flower^(TM).

The Japanese iris is now Yuuri's btw.

All the flowers used are: Japanese irises, Jasmine flowers, Forget-me-nots, cherry blossoms, white roses, green carnations and blue roses (Viktor's flower. Read: I am predictable).

And finally!

Queen Minako, Tamer of Minds

Of the Realm of Dreams, she sees your fears, the snares laid by the subconscious and, strict and blunt as she is, she clears a path for the motivated and lets no potential go to waste.

Again, haven't read a word of the fic.

This one was by far the one that I made the fastest and I would've loved to do more with it but like deadlines. I'm gracefully skipping over the fact that I set the deadline and am fully to blame for being late.

But, as with Yuuri, blue is for spades. And since I wanted her to have a leotard but still match Yuuri and make her outfit look even slightly Japanese inspired, sheer fabric to the rescue! With cherry blossoms, of course, because CSP had the pattern preinstalled UuU

And I don't know if it worked but I tried to make her hair both look like her signature style, traditional Japanese hairstyles I found on the good ol' Interwebs and then kind of a spade by having that middle stick be the stem and the hair the spade's butt.

Also this probably goes without saying but the ranks of the characters are just titles. Yuuri is not married to Minako, she is just the Queen and he the King, don't worry.

Again, a BIG thank you to everyone who also participated, it was so fun to work together on this and see everyone's progress! Nic and Lil, you're amazing, thank you so much for everything you've done for this!

And to everyone who's made it this far, thank you for sticking around and please go check out all the other art and the ficlets! I promise it's worth it!

Masterpost | AO3 collection

#AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA this project almost killed me #i am so infinitely happy about everyones contributions they are so lovely and i am gonna die happy now #but seriously what idiot decided to try a new and more detailed rendering style on a deadline #its me #i am that idiot and if i had a time machine past me would have gotten the fattest slap #idk if im ever gonna do that again but if i know myself at all itll happen because this wasnt disastrous enough a result to dissuade me #and most of it im pretty happy with #also i had so much fun with otabek #i got to play with light and texture and light and those smoke tendrils in the back and light and that fabric and light and #also rendering minako was a BLAST even if i churned her out on severe sleep deprivation my only energy being spite for my own mortality #oh and yes it was a this we decided that the aces should somehow incorporate the king of the given suit so the anger kitten is there #in otabeks i mean #now ON TO ANOTHER PROJECT #THATS... ON A DEADLINE #UH #yuri on cards #yuri on ice #yoi #yuri on ice fanart #yoi fanart #fanart #art #arom antix art #arom antix #otabek altin #katsuki yuuri #okukawa minako #collab

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marley-manson · 5 months

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Do you have any petpeaves regarding the M*A*S*H fandom?

lol sure i'll take the opportunity provided to express a few, ty for the ask!

Overall Mash fandom is pretty awesome imo, and I actually don't have many compared to a lot of fandoms I've been in, and the ones I do have tend to apply to most fandoms anyway lol, they're staples of fandom in general.

-- The biggest one is probably the common take that Hawkeye is insecure, self-loathing, emotionally repressed, thinks he doesn't deserve love, yadda yadda yadda. This isn't really Mash specific because the bad-self-esteem-ray hits every bottom in fandom at some point lol, but it's extra grating in Mash fandom for me because to me it feels more blatantly OOC than most versions of this.

Now to be fair to fandom there are a few scattered lines throughout the series you can take out of context to justify this take, and one bad episode that provably contradicts the rest of the show (Who Knew), but I feel like you have to stretch like a gymnast to justify it and ignore 99% of the rest of the show and Hawkeye's behaviour.

And it's boring and flattens Hawkeye to a caricature of someone else imho.

-- Generally, and again this applies to all fandoms lbr, I dislike the way a lot of people need to jump to accusations of bigotry to justify their personal preferences. One example I've seen a couple of times that's absolutely bizarre to me is the take that if Klinger gets dicked down and/or feminized in fic it's because of racist fetishization. That's Maxwell Q. Klinger, the dude who wears dresses throughout most of the show and canonically grows to genuinely enjoy it. And even if he was 100% masculine, that's what a lot of fandom does to every single dude they love ever lol, all it means is that Klinger has a fanbase, which is a good thing. imo attitudes like these help contribute to non-white characters getting less fanworks about them, and while I don't think it's prevalent enough in Mash fandom to have a negative effect, I've seen it destroy other ships featuring characters of colour.

Another example is the classic bad take that if you don't ship women in het or interpret a heterosexual relationship as doomed/not romantic/etc, it's because of misogyny lol. It's not hugely common in Mash fandom but I've seen it occasionally from BJ/Peg shippers and the very occasional Margaret enthusiast.

Oh and another example is that depicting Hawkeye as effeminate is homophobia. Again, this is Hawkeye, the dude who proudly calls himself unmanly in various ways every episode and makes 50 jokes about wanting to get fucked in the ass. Frankly it's a bigger stretch to me to assume he wouldn't easily and happily adopt actual effeminate body language/phrasing and tone if he's, say, at the bar and wants to pull a top. Or maybe even just if there are no straight people around, yk? Why not? The take that writing unmasculine men is offensive is a fandom classic and usually strikes me itself as homophobic, gender essentialist, and basically just someone's masc4masc kink masquerading as an issue.

Like to be clear there is certainly bigotry in the Mash fandom, as in every fandom, and it's worth discussing, and sometimes depending on context it can even apply in the above cases (eg if a fic about Klinger getting dicked down earnestly described him as idk exotic or something, or if people who 'feminize' male characters take it to silly extremes and start writing meta about how these men are woman-coded/victims of misogyny lol) but this ain't it chief, this is people repackaging their own pet peeves in social justice language to win perceived arguments, and it's a bad vibe.

-- This one IS fairly Mash specific lol, and to be clear it's 100% harmless and just something that makes me roll my eyes sometimes because I'm not into it myself and it strips away the things I do like about the ship: the way a lot of Hawk/BJ fans headcanon BJ as much more supportive and sensitive to Hawkeye than he actually is, by taking various things he does and assuming he does them for Hawkeye, like he's constantly aware of Hawkeye's unexpressed needs and catering to them.

Yk, he wears pink shirts for Hawkeye! He grew the moustache for Hawkeye (never mind that Hawkeye hates it)! He stole Hawkeye's joke to give Hawkeye enrichment because Hawkeye loves... being upset I guess. Joker Is Wild? All for Hawkeye because Hawkeye loves being paranoid and alienating people. (The reasoning I've actually seen is that Hawkeye loves having an excuse to throw a tantrum lol). He totally comforts Hawkeye when Hawkeye is upset, they just never show it. He is devoted to Hawkeye, he'd do anything for him, ignore the episodes where he calls him crazy and ditches him while he's facing adversity. He's Hawkeye's emotional support!

I've seen it in serious meta and casual headcanons and fic where BJ just falls into role of tender, emotionally intelligent emotional support like it's an assumed part of their dynamic despite not only never seeing that in canon, but Hawkeye actually pointing out multiple times that BJ is not very supportive.

It's also a misreading of Hawkeye who is actually the emotional support of their friendship, rather than vice versa, and tends to go hand in hand with my first pet peeve: Hawkeye as an emotionally insecure, repressed mess lol. BJ goes to him when he needs a shoulder to cry on, something consistent to the point of it being a way to manipulate Hawkeye in Picture This. Not vice versa. Hawkeye goes to Margaret or Mulcahy or Sidney. The only example I can think of where BJ provides emotional support (by which I mean listening to Hawkeye's emotional concerns and offering supportive input) to Hawkeye is the end of Comrades in Arms, and it's like the bare minimum of fulfilling the typical best friend on tv role.

(I like that BJ doesn't fulfill that role tbh! It's more interesting that way, it makes their dynamic feel more unique and intriguing.)

-- Also people who think Mash got more progressive in the later seasons. I think it demonstrates a shallow understanding of the political implications of the show. Getting rid of the character with a slur for a nickname doesn't automatically equal less racist, it's just an easy thing to point to that doesn't require much critical thought. And the growing feminist concerns go hand in hand with depicting republicans, patriots, and racist imperialistic military commanders as good people.

And to be fair I sympathize with this take, I've seen it everywhere from fandom to grumbling republicans complaining about mash getting preachier to professionally written retrospectives and academic analysis lol, so it's not like I hold fandom to higher standards. The ways Mash grows more regressive are more insidious, and the problems in the early seasons are much more obvious and in your face than in the later seasons. And there will always be some debate on whether eg rampant womanizing is worse than pro-imperialism messages, though I know what side I fall on there.

But imo it still sucks that it's such a popular opinion.

-- The emphasis on found family, especially in a 'the war brought them together' sense. Any hint of gratitude that the war let them meet people they love in fic, or whatever. This is something I can't completely blame on fandom because the show itself veered uncomfortably close to this a few times too in the later years, but yeah I'm not a fan. To me the most important aspect of Mash is the fact that they all hate it there, the war is worse than hell, they're virtually prisoners trapped in a nightmare, and any of the draftees would absolutely trade those relationships for an end to the war or just a ticket home. Their friendships are less a silver lining and more a painkiller that just barely takes the edge off. I think this vibe is clearer in the first half of the show, but that's yet another reason the first half is better and more progressive politically lol. And it doesn't disappear in the latter half either, just gets a bit more muddied.

-- This kind of goes hand in hand with the above points, but I feel like it's more of an older Mash fandom issue that I encounter when archive diving moreso than a thing currently (though I do occasionally still see it these days): fans who actively like the military stuff lol. I've read fic where dog tags are kinked on/romanticized, fic that depicts draft-dodging as bad, etc. These days it's more stuff in line with the worst parts of canon, like taking Potter at face value as a Good authority figure who deserves respect because of his military experience, but yeah. Don't like that.

-- Okay that's all I got off the top of my head. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to whine lol

#text post #marley on mash #under a cut for people don't don't want to see negativity #i feel like i'm pretty chill in this post but like it's still complaining

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gothhabiba · 10 months

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hello! can you explain what you mean with your tags re: the phrasing of "kill all men" and the idea that a "certain" group benefits from the oppression from another group? i'm not sure i understand what you were trying to say but i'd like to!

[regarding this post]

ftr this is just something I noticed, I'm not making any claims about whether or not it's enormously offensive or important to counter

so my point is that I feel like I've seen the same few steps occur a couple times, which go:

a certain phrase or idea is widespread on here

the idea is criticised by Black people / people of colour specifically along a racial dimension

(white) people water down & miss the historical specificity of said racial critique and think that it must have an analogue along the lines of gender or sexuality or ability status &c., and so apply it too broadly.

with the "kill all men" example, this would be:

a bunch of women express frustration with & anger at misogyny, patriarchy, & men('s role in upholding the same) using the phrase "kill all men," and maybe a few other similar phrases

some Black people point out that it is a little absurd for white women to be saying this type of thing, given the very specific and very violent relationship that white women have to Black men & 'masculinity' where certain white women could and did literally get Black men killed at will (for the most part talking about a U.S. context, tho' similar things may obtain elsewhere)

people start saying things such as "it's bad to say things like 'kill all men' because you're including gay and trans men, disabled men, and men of colour," which widens the original critique into sort of being incoherent, since none of these groups of men at large have the same relationship to the violence of white femininity that Black men do

the other example rests on my feeling that I first saw "it's not enough to say that white people aren't harmed by racism, colonialism &c.; it must be pointed out that they benefit from it"—which makes sense if by "benefit" you mean "are given some of the spoils of colonialism" rather than "are better off than if capitalism didn't exist at all"—and then, perhaps due to this influence (?), I started seeing people say that every group benefits from the oppression of every marginalised group they don't belong to, without actually arguing why that's true in each case.

#questions #bonesache

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beardisable · 11 months

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OH MY GOD OH MY GOD okay.

so i watched the 8 hour jack stream(jesus) aka watched genloss top to bottom again and listened to his theories and stuff(i really vibe with the "kidnapped as kids" angle more now) and started thinking about some theories he and chat mentioned and.

now im thinking with like. ok its probably a pretty common theory, this post was what prompted this additional idea of mine actually, but ill explain it a bit: the theory that, since sneeg and charlie can come back over and over again, and they have referenced like, refusing to do the cooking challenge in ep 1, and how charlie was playing the mouse trap but ate the cage, they have obviously done the same kind of scenes we saw ranboo do, right. and then in the Announcement video we see the same kind of "missing poster" type headshots of them, with the caption "Found them!"

i dont remember exactly where it was confirmed that showfall made the missing person posters, but like. yeah. these images are for missing posters like ranboo had. and with sneeg being caught by the security in ep 3, he had tried to escape, just like ranboo and charlie. and i feel like this wasnt the first or last time they have tried this!

also, during that screenshot the announcer says "our hero will meet a cast of crazy characters, who you may recognize", aka the audience has seen these "actors" before in other things! this is their first live show but what have they made before...?

then, with one of the Very first lines Ranboo says in the first episode, "it wasn't supposed to be like this"... showfall/hetch made it seem like this is ranboos first show and he's being tested for how well he does as The Hero.

I dont think what we saw is Ranboos first time starring in a showfall production.

its the first live thing like the announcement video said but i think hetch lied when he talked about how its a test, i think Ranboo's been here at least a few go arounds, if not tens/hundreds/thousands of times. WHICH MEANS in the end when he gets his memories back... theres an infinite amount of possibility of things they could remember for what they have been made to do in the past :) Bc remember, while this is comedy->horror, it was still relatively tame and non-explicit (at least by my personal standards?) so it is quite possible they have been in more R rated horror stuff, slashers, gore, actual saw, some kind of even worse psychological horror things, but also that they might have had incredibly good experiences like love and joy and community and anything positive too, and to remember all that in a rush... oh boy so i believe it is a circular reproduction, maybe they run through scenes repeatedly over and over while perfecting every little detail and getting different takes of genuine emotion but every time Real and a First experience... some kind of purgatory(omg christian hell reference) or endless torture or such...

ok that got really maybe unneccessarily angsty so heres my other thought:

i love me a fucking colour theory and colour symbolism! it bothered me a bit how like. in the promo game we get ranboo, then green friend/the villain(obviously charlie, tho the villain part still confuses me a Bit since its not quite true?), the blue friend/the taken(obvs sneeg) and then the red stranger/the saviour. and like it would logically follow that the red is hetch right?

jack when theorising said the titles are self descriptive, which i buy into, at least for the first episode context, charlie is the villain role, sneeg was taken(put in a cage and later snatched by the sharkciclester), and hetch was trying to help and save ranboo from this situation! but then in the second ep we also have red puzzler, and red niki? i WISH niki had. any kind of bigger role to build a Saviour type off of her but i dont think she does :( the puzzler is an option, since they make it seem like the puzzler tries to save ranboo? and thats actually a whole other thought like. since we know hetch was not actually helping ranboo, was the puzzler Genuinely helping them, and somehow showfall found out and killed him?? idk ANYWAYS that colour coding falling apart a bit made me think about how ranboo is also red!! rgb trio yknow??

if the titles are self descriptive... well i dont think Ranboo really felt like The Hero much, especcially not in the end...

I think Ranboo is actually meant to be the Saviour.

Esp with the jesus coding! I believe this kind of thing has happened many times before, with sneeg/charlie/ranboo/others realizing that shits fucked, and trying to escape, only to be caught and put back in the production. I think Ranboo(main character syndrome) was in a previous iteration the Saviour, who tried to help sneeg and charlie and others get out of there, to save them, save everyone. but they failed. got captured. once again waking up again with a "it wasn't supposed to be like this..."

and so the cycle continues, and the content wheel keeps spinning.

(ive only been in tumblr tags so feel free to link me any other ppl who arrived at the same conclusion)

#if you actually read to the end of this somehow ily take a cookie #this is giving me prologue/au ideas so i wanted to type it out to anyone who wants inspiration or smth #generation loss #genloss #ranboo #ranboolive #generation loss the social experiments #genloss meta #genloss theory #genloss au #bear.txt #i am bearpat #this post took so long bc i keep having more ideas but adding them all would make this even more incomprehensible i gotta stick to a thesis

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mintyfrostyart · 11 months

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AYO ITS THE GODS FOR DETECTIVE AU

I'll go into details about all the Gods below the cut if ur interested !!

Major props and credit to @hammerhead-art for being an ear for all this and helping me significantly crunch down on ideas for this silly lil AU RFIOEDIH Thank you for all ur help !! <3

Payment Payment (has no pronouns, only referred to by name) is both the God of hard work and of obsession. Payment represents how all deeds in life must lead to a payoff at the end. Everyone must work; everyone must always work to get what we all deserve. Maybe one day everything will be worth it; maybe it’ll all pay off. But as soon as people try to stop. They can’t. They’re stuck in this tar; this impossible barrier that can’t be broken. It sticks you to the ground; its in your hair. It’s all you can think about.

This philosophy is very common amongst Revensteed. All the Gods are invisible, but Payment seeps into every corner of the city. Through every person, since all people could ever wish for is the relief that it’ll all be worth it one day. This is also why Detective AU is presented in a black-and-white format since Payment prevents any colour from seeping through

Prejudice Prejudice (she/him) is the simplest of the Gods. She represents hate and deceit, the unwilling need to judge those around you. Prejudice is something that once it views, it eats up your mind and makes you unable to see past it. The several eyes represent the undergoing tie that prevents you from acting as you normally would to them, or strung from a single source. The torso being disembodied with only floating hands is a signifying of being "guiltless" of it, since the blood cant be on your hands if they're not attached to you.

Process Potentially one of the most interesting Gods (she/them). Progress is representative of how humans have the desire to become immortal, to always move forward (that being represented in the mechanic structure) but sacrifices the foundations of what it truly means to be human; to reproduce and to love (how the God is the shape of a bird).

“I just . in particular a thing I bounce around in m head is the relationship between the progress of mankind and technology and the natural cycle of death . and the very existence of machines which blurs this line of life and death . specifically I think making birds a symbol of both life and death , a symbol whose meaning changes depending on the context , is Fun . Life and Death and Progress in all of it , thats the way the world is . die as a bird born a human , progress mankind and die again , become a bird once more . symbol of death n life n the completion of both at once . but what happens when the symbol of death and life as we know it , both in the fact that it lives at all and that it perishes , is robotic ? when it cant die , is it even alive ? and if it cant live , could you call it a symbol of death ?” Quote from @hammerhead-art

Pleasure Pleasure (he/him) is the youngest and the most interesting case study. You see, Pleasure was not originally formed with the other 3 Gods. Pleasure is the only ‘man-made’ God, so to speak. People truly believed that there was some light at the end of the tunnel, that surely SOMETHING was waiting for them. People believed it so badly that Pleasure was able to manifest into a being of worship. People use Pleasure to excuse poor behaviour such as gambling or intense crime since life is for the living, is it not? Surely we must work so hard that we must enjoy ourselves why we are still alive.

Because of this, Payment is actually an allergy to Pleasure. He brings so much joy to an otherwise brutally working world that Payment isn’t able to seep into every crack of Revensteed. Pleasure is most common around the South of Revensteed. Because Payment can’t touch this part of town, it is the only location in the AU not portrayed in Black and White.

#tw trypophobia #trypophobia #tw many eyes #many eyes #eldrich horror?#I mean Payment's terrifying so FIOEWDH #detective au #thsc #henry stickmin #the henry stickmin collection #henry stickmin au #thsc au #people are gonna be so confused on how on earth this is henry stickmin IOHEFWDIH #reginald is kind there so that works ?? FIOEWDOH

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weirdowithaquill · 1 year

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What is the 'Engine Rulebook' and where did it come from?:

So, this really early era of railways was a bit insane, and I am not quite well-versed enough to make a case-study out of everything - but like with my Big 4 scrap post, this is more about trends than singular examples - though some do appear.

The 'Engine Rulebook' is basically the set of rules that every engine ever is taught when built. It's a series of important rules, customs and doctrine used by managers to keep engines in line. Yes, I will use a little business-management theory in here, because early management styles have a major effect. And every railway has its own rulebook that may have differences. But there are a few key things in the 'Engine Rulebook' that I see being universal:

1: The company comes first. This is basically the company ensuring loyalty by indoctrinating the engine to see its railway company as the most important aspect of their life. In the Railway Series, Donald and Douglas have very strong ties back to Scotland and the Caledonian railway - which is why they enjoy blue so much. It's the Caledonian Railway colour! And then there's Duck - who literally continues to wear his GWR colours even after joining the NWR. He's deeply connected to the GWR because of this loyalty taught to him.

2: Railway rules. This includes signalling, signage, speed limits, whistles and their uses, headcodes, flags and every other piece of railway rules. They are read the rulebook, and learn everything in it. It's vital! Percy is an industrial engine who is never taught this rulebook - because industries don't have many engines and often pilfer bits from a bigger company's - and thus Percy doesn't know much about the rules of being on a railway when he arrives on Sodor.

3: Etiquette (based on duty). Now, I don't mean bowing or curtseying or the proper fork for fish - I mean the ins and outs of the duty the engine will be expected to complete. Passenger engines learn how to handle coaches and speak politely to passengers, freight engines learn how to handle trucks and look after different cargos, shunting engines learn a new set of rules for the yards - this sort of thing. Gordon struggles with trucks because he was never taught how to handle them.

4: The managers are always right. Touched on this in a reblog of this @mean-scarlet-deceiver ramble, but its basically that the engines are taught that their managers are right in all contexts (unless breaking one of the above rules) and need to be respected and have all directions followed. The manager says to shunt - you go and shunt. They say to go get scrapped - and a good engine listens without hesitation. Doesn't work out in real life all the time - see Oliver, or the Big Engines' strike - but it definitely keeps most engines in line.

So we have these four core rules - but where did they come from? Well...

Regency Era Railways:

Straight off the bat - this is the era where every railway is figuring itself out. The L&MR was where everything was forged in fire - before it, the only railways that existed were isolated plateways in mines and the Stockton & Darlington Railway. None of these were anywhere near as complex as the L&MR, which is really the first railway 'system' in the way we might understand today. It's also where the first sentient engines begin to make a proper appearance and have an effect on people. Before, they were hidden in mines, if they existed at all - but now the public can see them!

Like, imagine this rocks up to collect you in an era when the most advanced method of transport is literally a horse. And it has a face. Remember, in this period people though that if they went over a certain speed or through a tunnel they would explode - so now the thing that might just kill them has a face?!

Managers would very quickly begin implementing ways to soothe their passengers. One way of doing that would be to dehumanise the engines - I can see many early engines being given basically no education because they are both seen as being 'working class' and because they are machines. When Rocket first ran, there were no public schools.

In this era, engines didn't know much, and they were isolated on their little systems. Yard managers are one of the few people with authority that these engines meet on a regular basis, and they use this to their advantage and cultivate this idea that the engines are entirely subservient to them. This is where that manager loyalty begins to become apparent - just not quite in its modern form.

The only education an engine would get is how to be loyal. Why should they learn signals, or passenger etiquette, or how to read? That is a driver or a guard's job. And so this really early era is characterised by dehumanisation and a lot of public-relations officers doing their best to downgrade the sentience of the engines. It's a lot of "yes they have a face, no they don't have intelligence, don't worry". This does extend into the Victorian era, as seen in Very Old Engines, as Skarloey arrives on Sodor with some principles taught at the workshop, only to be met with "you don't have rights, do your job." Which he naturally rebels at and then gets covered in a tarp for his troubles.

Of course, the Regency Era ends very soon into railway history, and just in time for a major game-changer.

The Victorian Era:

1838 is the year the first GWR train runs, and this railway in the South-west of England will have a huge impact on all railways that come after. First, the entire board of directors are very elitist and influential in parliament. This is a railway that needs to live up to its owners.

It is the GWR, not the L&MR, that writes the first book on engine learning. It's also the GWR, and not any other railway in the UK, that first develops a proper corporate culture for its engines that they actually like. The GWR does this by actually treating the engines like they have sentience.

Engines like Iron Duke are introduced to the 'Great Western Way' - this being the rulebook that Brunel and Gooch develop to best serve their wealthy owners. These engines are taught to read, understand the rules of the railway, passenger etiquette - which by now can be taught because there's less fumbling around blindly - and perhaps most importantly: they are taught a very proud mindset. The railway is the most important aspect of their lives, and they are to serve it to the best of their ability. All four of the rules appear in their first form here, except that the etiquette is not entirely based on duty, and instead all engines are taught all jobs - which horrified much of the rest of the railway companies.

But while this is going on on the GWR, the rest of the country's railways were trying to survive a crisis. Railway Mania swept Britain, and hundreds of engines and built (and destroyed) by the week. One thousand bills for new railways were submitted to parliament during this period, and while not all were built - it certainly had an impact. The LNWR was formed during this period, chunks of the Midland Railway, NER, GNR, GCR, Caledonian and basically every other major railway were all constructed in this time frame - but that didn't mean a drastic improvement in how the engines were treated in this area. Many North-western railways were influenced by the thinking from the L&MR, leading to entire fleets of early engines having zero clue how to act or even speak in some cases. When the bubble collapsed, many engines were scrapped - and this is where the other extremely important pillar stone of railway doctrine was introduced: engines are expendable, and should not want to hinder a company. The fourth rule is set into stone here, and goes unchanged and practically unchallenged all the way into the modern era.

This here, the end of steam in Britain, is able to happen because of principles introduced during Railway Mania. British Railways uses this rulebook and the laws that most likely surround it by this point to justify their actions, and also because thanks to this rulebook very few engines have the vague notion or idea to protest. Why would they, it goes against the rules!

The eradication of steam is almost directly caused by the era of Railway Mania and the principles managers introduced in the era to protect their profit margins. Without that doctrine, engines would have had a lot more rights and a lot more ability to protest being scrapped.

In other words, the 1840's was when scrapping began to appear properly, as well as the explosions, derailments and every other crash from the previous generation. Engines became unfeeling in this era - in the north at least. The GWR escaped this by being... well, not an economic bubble.

However, as the British Isles emerges from Railway Mania, two very strong railways vie for influence: the LNWR and the GWR. The LNWR has that traditional L&MR mindset - and it leads to a huge problem. The engines begin to learn how to speak from their crews, and moreover they question why their GWR counterparts are treated so much better. The LNWR also suffers from a number of easily preventable accidents caused by the engine having zero clue what to do.

Some railways land between the two, and it was the GNR that ended up formulating the four rules in their next evolution: engines were only taught their jobs. This was the GNR compromise with their board members. The board wanted a GWR approach, however the actual managers on the ground rebelled, worrying this would lead to the engines working together to demand fairer treatment. The Communist Manifesto was in major circulation at the time, and none of these companies wanted their engines getting any ideas. Instead, they implemented something of a class system, with express engines at the top and shunters at the bottom.

In the TVS, Emily is extremely abrasive towards Thomas (Seasons 8-12), and it may just have to do with the way she was raised, seeing shunters as the lowest form of engine. Gordon certainly did!

These three very distinct practices all melded and fused together on the Midland Railway - which of course ran right in between them all. The Midland Railway wrote the third proper rulebook in 1859, roughly twenty years after the GWR wrote its.

The Midland Railway's rulebook took the LNWR idea that engines needed to be taught to accept death, the GNR idea of a class system and the GWR importance of company loyalty and railway-rule-knowledge and fused them together, being able to create the rulebook that most British railways would use by 1890. The major exception to this was of course the Great Western, which slowly evolved its rulebook to use the LNWR ideas of engines being subservient to their managers while retaining the classless form of etiquette the engines were taught. The GNR would also hold out on some ideas from the GWR until it was amalgamated into the LNER, due to rising fears of Communism by the board.

Many smaller railways, such as the Furness Railway or the Highland Railway in Scotland, would use the GWR style, due to the smaller size of the workforce, and thus the potential necessity for engines to complete duties they were trained for.

Duck fits into his role at Tidmouth with such ease because he knows the theory behind every express train, every freight train, every style of shunting and branchline service. He doesn't need them, but the GWR engines were taught this just in case. Duck is excellent at his job, but he won't take any flak from the other engines because his GWR ideology makes him see them all as equal. This is of course part of the Great Western Way as explained in this post.

In direct contrast, Gordon has zero clue how to pull a freight train, and stalls on the hill because he physically doesn't know what to do.

And this brings me quite neatly to Sir Topham Hatt I. See, this is a GWR man who runs a railway that is very heavily influenced by the Midland Railway rulebook ideology. Edward knows how to do multiple tasks because the Furness Railway used GWR practice (maybe that's why he likes Edward?) while none of the other engines do. Sir Topham Hatt's management style using GWR practice is so confusing to them. Why is James - who is mixed-traffic at best - pulling the express? Why is Gordon pulling freight? Why are the big engines shunting?!

And then we have Henry. Sir Topham and Henry have such a rocky relationship, and it in many ways comes from the fact that Henry had none of the formal education that I just discussed. He's a privately-built engine from stolen plans sold cheap. He doesn't actually know the etiquette of a passenger train - no wonder he stops when he doesn't like the weather! He doesn't physically know better, and so he's acting on his first instincts. This clashes so badly with the GWR style which places etiquette almost above everything else. Hatt reacts so badly and outright insanely to this because to him, Henry is actively and deliberately breaking every rule in the book because of his paint? And Henry doesn't have a clue. Look at how horrified he is!

And don't get me wrong, this is extremely unethical and very stupid, but it has a precedence in miscommunication, differing ideologies and Henry's foolishness.

This was another massive ramble with a lot of insanity, but I do enjoy writing these. Helps organise my mind! As usual, none of the above pictures belong to me, and feel free to chuck in a comment with your opinion!

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pep-the-artemis · 1 month

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Uzi the Anarcho-Communist

A literary deep dive into the themes of Murder Drones.

(note, this took way to long to write and is far from finished and I know this is self-serving but can you please if you read this reblog it)

Although the show very much is a critique of capitalism, I don't think that's its primary theme, instead I believe the primary theme of the show is Hubris which notably emerges throughout the show but this is about communism. First lets discuss the idea that the show critiques capitalism in its plot and theming.

The opening line to the show is "we are worker drones". 'Worker' is very much a common phrase used in Marxist ideas (most famously in the quote "Workers of the land, Unite!"). Worker in this context is used to refer to a member of the working class. The word 'drone' also creates this association with dull monotony mirroring the lives of the drones.

The second shot in the show is of a group of worker drones all identical in expression, height, eye colour, clothing—very much every detail. This is the first time we really see this idea that the WDs lack individuality which is another idea discussed by Karl Marx's Gattungswesen. This lack of individuality is very much an extreme example of what Marx calls Objective Alienation, the WDs have been deprived of there right to think in the name of windex maximizing profits for those who control the means of production (in this case humans).

The third shot (authors note, can't believe we're only 19 seconds into episode 1, this is going to take forever) we finally see the face of evil, a corporation in the form of its name superimposing over the scene; its happy, outdated style juxtaposes the cold, dreary reality the WDs are living through. I would go deeper into this but if you don't know how corporations tie into Marxism theory then you need to pick up a book.

The fourth shot is so full of small details I just have to give a screenshot to appreciate its subtlety.

Top left, you can see a WD working in a precarious position working environment, not much to mention because it's doing more to play as environmental story telling for the other parts of the scene. At the highest point of the shot, JCJenson logo almost like a title basically saying this is JCJenson and also the height can be viewed as a metaphor for their position in the hierarchy. To the signs right is the control room, the only area which is kept well lit, the control room is also were the highest authority present would mingle, good lighting is a luxury of the rich (the withholding of basic rights like food, shelter and [in this case] light is again a critique Marx makes against capitalism). Bottom right, a group of humans standing around doing very little standing around the destroyed body of a worker drone not stopping the ant like WDs walking ever closer or helping the WD clinging for there life in the top right of the screen. The lives and safety of the WDs is off little consequence to the humans which is the other side of Alienation, those in power stop viewing the workers as people and more as machines to be exploited; to stop production would be the greatest sin.

The fifth, sixth, seventh and eight shots, the culmination of the humans actions. In pursuit of production, the humans led to there own downfall, being blissfully unaware until it was too late and the greatest joke, the workers survived and didn't care. This very much mirrors a lot of modern criticisms of capitalism especially around the ideas of climate change. Knowing what we know after watching the show, that the core collapse was almost certainly no coincidence, instead likely a plot by WDs (specifically the Absolute Solver) then it fits into Marxist theory specifically around Proletariat Revolution which Marx states is the inevitability of capitalism.

The ninth shot, the most important which will be made incredibly evident once I show a picture.

Its a direct parallel to the fourth shot. Firstly, the orange colour has very much been lost for a cool blue which if you note has always been the colour associated with the workers throughout all of the previous scenes, its encapsulation shows the shift in power. The JCJenson logo replaced with a graffiti doodle (somewhat similar to the anarchists symbol). And the most obvious, the workers sitting in the control room, they are now in control while the humans lay dead below them. The results of this revolution though won't be made evident until the next shot so |: moving on.

(authors note. A MINUTE IN WOOO!)

The tenth shot, the WDs now are showing unique characteristics and identities! This is the emergence of Gattungswesen, remember that one word I mentioned before but didn't really talk about well here we are now. Gattungswesen refers to what Karl Marx thinks make humans human; Marx considers the idea that identity emerges from individuals is foolish instead ones identity emerges from there social relations which is exactly what we see in this opening scene.

"They themselves begin to distinguish themselves from animals as soon as they begin to produce their means of subsistence, a step which is conditioned by their physical organisation." - Karl Marx

Marx also considers the death of personal identity one of the evil components of capitalism.

At this point, I should start talking about the disassembly drones but there's too much to talk about and I'm tired because I didn't anticipate the opening minute being so jam packed with information so I'll instead continue by talking about the Worker Drone civilisation and then Uzi (author note, ughh bite me that's a lot of writing).

In the Worker Drones civilisation, two things are very notable—both neither a hierarchy nor a market seems to exist.

The only characters seen with some hierarchical power are Kahn and Teacher but even then the Teacher doesn't have governing power, instead his power comes from his title as Teacher. Kahn on the other hand is more complicated; he does hold real power as the leader of the Worker Drone Protection Corp (Author note. to tired and lazy to verify if that's correct); at the same time the nature of his power is vague, he is never shown to have any political power nor is a political system present.

The absence of a market or capitalist constructs (a market isn't strictly capitalist but for the discussion its close enough). The only example in the WD civilisation the only time we see anything similar is in episode 2 with the vending machine (which we don't see used), the sight of all the murders by Eldritch J. Without going deep into J, its hard to go deep into this but it can be very easily read as a metaphor for how capitalism weaponises consumption.

Overall, it seems most likely beyond any other alternative (not saying an alternative is possible), but with the backing of the anti-capitalist symbolism discussed earlier, the WDs very much live in a anarcho-communist Commune.

Finally, onto the subject matter of the title, Uzi. Lets go through all the different pieces of evidence that imply that Uzi is a communist.

To begin, she's anti-authoritarian. She is very rebellious in nature, not just against Teacher but also her father. The inciting incident of the entire story is when Uzi betrays her fathers authority to go and fight the Disassembly Drones (who very much represented the police and the will of the higher authority of JCJenson).

When talking to the deluded N, she tried to convince him to rebel through using the communist argument that they are living in Subjective Alienation (more commonly refered to as 'false consciousness'), they are unaware that the humans just see them as the means to an end. Later, N starts discussing other communist ideas with J, namely there is no difference between them and the WDs, instead they are very much the same.

(author note for future reference, WDs are Lumpenproletariats)

There is more to talk about, but I'm tired.

#murder drones #murder drones spoilers #uzi murder drones #communism #anarchism #anarchocommunism #glitch productions #murder drones details #marxism

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uptoolateart · 1 year

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Plagg to Tikki: ‘We’ll see each other again. You know that you and I are one.’

I loved this line so much, for so many reasons - too many, really, to sum up in a simple Tumblr post, but I’m gonna try!

Let’s start with the ‘you know that you and I are one’ part. This is clearly a yin-yang thing. Creation and destruction are not separate; they are parts of a whole and cannot exist without each other. They define each other.

The two halves of the yin-yang symbol are often defined as masculine and feminine aspects or energies. Keep in mind this is not the same as male and female bodies; it is something much deeper and more subtle, particularly as both energies are said to be contained and expressed within each and every one of us. ‘Male’ and ‘female’ are merely words commonly used to express such concepts as the active and passive, day and night, the conscious and unconscious, and so forth.

Each half of the yin-yang contains a dot of the 'opposite' colour, to signify that the masculine contains aspects of the feminine, and vice versa. They are not opposites; they complement, contain and need each other to form a whole. The goal in life, according to so many eastern belief systems, not to mention western magical systems including alchemy, is to tap into the yin and yang within the self and achieve a perfect harmonious balance between the two sides. If you’re following my Miraculous tart card paintings, you’ll notice this is a feature of just about every card meaning.

Plagg and Tikki represent these ideas. One cannot exist without the other. How can you create if there is no prior destruction? And what is there to destroy without creation? Therefore, Plagg has this faith that he and Tikki will be reunited because he understands the nature of the universe.

As the embodiment of the power of destruction, Plagg is usually seen as a selfish, apathetic, giant stomach. This makes sense to me, because destruction is a kind of devouring process.

However, in this scene in ‘Deflagration’, he had one of his rare moments of sensitivity, highlighting that yin-yang concept once again. Remember in ‘Dearest Family’ when he said there’s a reason there’s also a kwami of destruction, after Tikki caused so much damage with unchecked creation? Creation is not good and destruction is not bad. It’s all about balance and context.

What was really interesting was that when Monarch got both miraculous in ‘Deflagration’, Plagg was the one with the instant plan. He knew the solution was self-sacrifice - again, you would go there, if you were destruction. And he’s not technically alive, so he can’t truly be annihilated. As long as there is creation, there is destruction. When he cataclysmed the ring, he must have simply returned to his energetic non-personified state.

However, his unhesitating self-sacrifice paralleled all the times Adrien has sacrificed himself. Usually, this has been as Cat Noir, although in ‘Gorizilla’ he made a major leap of faith as Adrien. Plagg’s words to Tikki could have been spoken as Adrien / Cat Noir, expressing that unwavering conviction that Ladybug will bring him back. Tikki’s worries could have been Ladybug’s.

We are often told Plagg is rubbing off on Adrien, e.g. in ‘Rocketear’. So, it’s tempting to say this is why Cat has these suicidal moments. But as already noted, he made that jump in ‘Gorizilla’ as Adrien. He was clearly chosen for his particular miraculous because he already embodies these qualities in some way. In this world or another, he will gladly go down firmly believing that he and Ladybug will be reunited in some way.

In other words...when Plagg immediately leapt to the self-sacrifice solution...was this an instance of Adrien rubbing off on him, rather than the other way round?

Also - it implies that Adrien and Marinette, or at least their souls or however you want to view this, are truly destined to be together, because they are two halves of a whole, just as their powers are. The red string of fate binds them together.

Not gonna lie - there is so much more I want to say about this, but it all feels like it’s there on the tip of my mind and I’m struggling to find the words for it because it’s so subtle. But there’s my stab in the dark at trying to pin down what I have been thinking of that scene ever since it first aired. It was a beautiful moment amid the chaos.

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capricornlevi · 1 year

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fine lines & sunflowers - bokuto koutarou x reader

summary: you really should have known better than to make a bet with kenma -- now, you have to face your worst fear: getting a tattoo. To make matters worse, the artist - bokuto, your friends inform you - is apparently renowned for being unforgiving and harsh to newcomers. you need to see for yourself if he lives up to that reputation. timeskip bokuto!tattoo artist AU x reader.

cw: explicit sexual content, reader has a phobia of needles (not discussed in detail, but mentions of the phobia in the context of getting a tattoo), alcohol consumption (all sex is sober & consensual)

NSFW, 18+ - MDNI - MINORS and AGELESS BLOGS DO NOT INTERACT!

wc: 8.2k

a/n: this is a birthday gift for my wonderful friend sofia @brainrot329 who is the world's most dedicated bokuto simp & also the most incredibly kind person i know ! happy birthday sofia !

___

The first thing you notice about the Black Jackal Tattoo Shop is how the neon sign above the entrance is so bright that it hurts your eyes.

It’s late in the evening, the sun having set fully just over an hour ago, and the pavement is bathed in a bright purple glow that outshines any of the streetlights. It’s distracting, so much so that you wonder how their neighbours haven’t complained about it – but glancing at the bustling bars and liquor stores nearby, you can’t imagine they much mind.

The second thing you notice is just how busy the place is. Even at this hour, every single one of the tables is occupied and there’s a line of people at the far end of the shop clearly awaiting their own turn. This was the last slot they had available and so you knew they were in high demand, but this goes beyond your expectations.

It’s just fifteen minutes before your appointment and so you hope that the queue will have thinned out by the time you head in. Obviously, you don’t mind waiting for a short while, but you don’t want to be here all night – more time spent queueing means more time to overthink.

More time to start panicking.

More time for you to chicken out or bolt away from the shop as though your life depended on it.

Even now, your legs threaten to buckle underneath you. Your pulse hammers in your ears, every shaky breath takes a great deal of effort. You’re terrified at what awaits you.

But a bet’s a bet, and you lost it. You need to get this tattoo in order to face your friends with your head held high.

And so it’s with a great deal of relief that the third thing you notice about Black Jackal is its obvious cleanliness. You swear you can see the floors sparkle from your vantage point on the other side of the street. The walls seem freshly painted - a nice dark blue colour, covered with golden-framed pictures of various intricate tattoo designs - and the artists are all sanitising the tables thoroughly when switching clients.

Of course, you can’t tell all that much about a place from outside their door, but they certainly present themselves very professionally – nausea-inducing neon lights aside.

You feel your phone buzz in your pocket. Reluctantly, you fish it out and check the notification despite knowing exactly what it will say.

Kenma: No backing out!

Kenma: But good luck <3

You wince and swear under your breath. Your long-time friend can be profoundly annoying at times like this, but you still type up a quick response to sate his curiosity – he’s probably waiting at his apartment with Kuroo and the others to see if you’ll actually follow through.

You: I’m waiting outside, I’ll text proof when it’s done

Three dots appear followed by a near-instantaneous response.

Kenma: Yay! Just don’t piss off Bokuto lol

You sigh as you slip your phone back into your pocket and head to the nearby chain café to kill some time.

In hindsight - perfect, glorious hindsight - you probably should have known better than to bet a professional streamer that you could beat him at Mortal Kombat. But in your defence, you’ve been playing the game since childhood and have won almost every single time - your win-to-loss ratio is somewhere in the region of ten to one - and it was far from Kenma’s favourite game, he rarely streamed it, so you figured you stood somewhat of a chance.

And then one night, after far too many homemade cocktails served by Kuroo and Kenma in their shared apartment, you issued a challenge to the latter: the long-awaited Mortal Kombat tournament, best two out of three, and the rest of your friends would act as judges to ensure all rules were being followed.

If Kenma lost, he had to shave his head live on stream. His worst nightmare.

You, on the other hand, have always had a very vocal fear of needles and so you both quickly came to the same conclusion; if you lost (and you figured it unlikely), you committed to facing your own nightmares by getting a tattoo.

To the shock of only you, Kenma won easily.

You sat in horrified silence for about a half-hour, only speaking up to accept the consolation shots of straight liquor that your friends diligently provided.

You were just about to knock back yet another tequila when Kenma softened the blow just a little.

“You can pick the design, y’know,” he pointed out with a smile that only betrayed a hint of smugness. “I won’t make you get anything embarrassing.”

You scoffed, setting the empty shot glass down on their battered old coffee table. “I don’t even know where to start.”

“Heard that Black Jackal place across town is decent,” Alisa piped up. She’d been in your corner for most of the bet, so you took her opinion to heart.

The next day, once the worst of the hangover had passed, you messaged the shop on Instagram.

“ Hey!” you’d begun, wondering if they could sense your nerves through the screen. “ Just wondering if you have any upcoming slots for a small fine line?”

You already had an idea in mind for the design, having spent the morning browsing online with Anisa; firstly, it had to be the tiniest tattoo physically possible. Secondly, in an area that didn’t hurt that much – you picked your forearm, where the websites rated it on the low-medium scale for pain (though you had your doubts).

You also had a fondness for sunflowers (as evidenced by the heavy-handed decor in your bedroom), so you spent hours perusing the “small sunflower tattoo” tab on Pinterest.

You had narrowed it down to three or four possibilities which you promptly screenshotted and forwarded along with your message to Black Jackal, receiving a reply a short while later. You partially wished they’d just ghost you so you could put it off a bit longer, but unfortunately, they were very enthusiastic to help.

“ Absolutely! We have a slot with Bokuto at 8.30 on Friday?”

Begrudgingly, you agreed.

You informed your friends of your plans the next day, announcing it over dinner with everyone in attendance as proof of your dedication.

Once you read the reply aloud, Kuroo inhaled sharply.

“ Bokuto ?” he asked, incredulous. His tone of voice concerned you deeply.

“Yes?” you answered slowly, scanning the room to see everyone’s expressions. “Why? Is there something wrong?”

Kuroo winced. “Nothing.”

Obviously, you weren’t too convinced.

“Doesn’t sound like nothing.”

Your friend started to worry his lower lip between his teeth. “It’s just …he’s … renowned for having, uh, very high standards, basically. Kinda has a scary reputation.”

“What do you mean?” you frowned, mind already conjuring up an image of this apparently terrifying Bokuto.

“I think I heard something like that … he takes the craft very seriously,” Lev piped up, sympathy written all over his face. “He’ll call you out if you’re too nervous or shaky.”

“And if you faint …” Kuroo trailed off uncomfortably and your blood ran cold in your veins. “My sister got her ankle tattoo there and nearly ran out in tears.”

You had scowled then, rolling your eyes to act as though you didn’t care, but your heart started to race at a thousand miles an hour.

“Just behave like you know what you’re doing and you’ll be fine,” Kenma interjected, at least trying to be helpful. “You’ve nothing to worry about. You’ll be in and out in like twenty minutes.”

You nodded half-heartedly, lifting your fork to your mouth and grimacing at the sudden cardboard-like texture your meal had taken on.

Half an hour. How bad could it be?

Now, standing at your original spot on the pavement with a warm latte cupped in your shivering hands, you start to think you weren’t half as scared then as you should have been.

A tattoo. A tattoo. On your body, forever , and they do it with needles.

And to top it all off, your tattoo artist is apparently a cranky perfectionist who scoffs and jeers at newbies. Wonderful.

You check the time and see you’ve about five minutes to go before you’re due inside. You knock back a large swig of your coffee, surmising that the extra shot of espresso will be of help rather than hurt.

Once the cup is empty and you feel your legs are stable enough to carry you, you cross the street.

Approaching the entrance step by step, you feel the neon light wash over you as you reach for the handle. The mahogany door is surprisingly light - or maybe your adrenaline has given you superhuman strength - and before you’re even aware of what’s happening, you’ve closed it behind you and floated across the tiled floor to reach the front desk.

The receptionist seems to be finishing up a call and so you idle by the desk, trying to force something resembling a poker face.

As she starts to take notes while speaking on the phone, you can’t help but notice the incredible sleeve of black-and-white designs all up her right arm – you’ve seen them before on Black Jackal ’s online portfolio. If memory serves, Bokuto was tagged as having done most of the work.

After about thirty more seconds she politely hangs up the phone, fixes the claw clip holding back her dark hair, and scribbles something on a piece of paper before looking up at you with a bright smile. Her enthusiasm seems so genuine that, for a moment, it takes the edge off your fear.

“Hi, I have a slot at 8.30?” you say, clearing your throat. “With Bokuto?”

Recognition dawns on her face. She says your name as a question – you nod, confirming.

“I was the one talking to you on Instagram!” she beams, gesturing for you to take the consent forms, “Bo took a look at the pictures you sent on and has a couple of stencils ready for you if you want to take a look while you’re waiting?”

You force a smile and nod again, accepting the additional papers she hands you. She asks if you need to hang up your jacket; you shrug it off, the cold air making the bare skin on your forearms prickle with goosebumps.

As if it’s necessary, she follows up by gently asking; “is this your first tattoo?”

“Yes,” comes your choked reply.

She leans in to take your jacket, giving your shoulder a quick reassuring squeeze as she does so.

“You’ll be fine, I promise! If the discomfort was that bad, I wouldn’t have gotten all these,” she holds out her arm for you to get a closer look at the gorgeous patterns. “The hardest part is getting in the chair, and you’ve pretty much done that already!”

Her smile reaches her eyes and you feel immensely grateful to have her in your corner if you do faint on Bokuto’s table.

“Thank you,” you reply sincerely, heading over to one of the benches at the end of the room to start perusing the forms.

It’s all fairly standard for a disclaimer. None of the potential complications listed on the sheet gives you any cause for concern since you’ve stocked up on all the products you’ll need for aftercare.

Plus, it’s not the after part that scares you. It’s the during part, with the buzzing and the needles and the judgmental glances you’ll get if you let out a yelp -

“Hey! How’re you doing?” a resoundingly cheery voice calls out above you. “You nearly done with the waivers?”

The unexpected greeting shocks you so much that you nearly drop the clipboard. You look up to see a very tall, very broad man grinning down at you expectantly, tattoos covering his arms except the parts obscured by his white t-shirt and black gloves, a shock of silver hair held back with a metal hairband to keep it from falling into his eyes as he works. Something on his mouth catches against the light, glistening – a silver ring on the right-hand side of his lower lip, shifting as his smile widens.

He seems … different than you expected. More animated, more enthusiastic.

“I’m Bokuto - Bo, if you prefer - and I don’t know if Kiyoko mentioned it, but I did up a few stencils … ah, you have them there, great!”

You sit there, blinking up at him and then flickering your gaze over to the door as if mapping out your exit strategy in case this interaction turns sour.

Maybe the mean part comes later. Maybe it only starts when you’re up on the table.

“Anything you want me to go through with you first?” he asks when you don’t reply, a thick brow arched in anticipation of your answer.

“Uh, nothing on here,” you reply, cool as you can manage, holding out the consent form for him to take back to Kiyoko. You hadn’t had a chance to look at his designs yet, but you don’t think you really need to; the one at the top of the pile matches your mental image perfectly. “And I think I’ll go for, uh, this one … here . If that’s okay.”

You hold out your chosen design and he takes it, somehow still smiling despite your demeanour being flighty at best.

Frosty and rude, at worst.

“Great! My favourite too. I know we’re not supposed to say that - client is always right, ‘course - but I was hoping you’d pick that one! Wanna get started?”

He gestures to one of the middle tables before snapping off the gloves.

“These are just the ones I use to clean up,” he answers your unspoken question once you’ve gotten up from your seat and glanced at his tattooed hands. “I’ll sanitise fully before we start.”

You weren’t looking at the gloves. You were looking at the intricate art covering what seem to be strong and giant hands, but you see no point in telling him that.

You slowly approach the table as Bokuto goes to deliver your forms.

Turns out, what you saw from the street didn’t even do the place justice; the area is surgically clean, not a speck of dirt of to be seen, and the plush surface of the table looks as close to comfortable as you could have hoped for. The ceiling is covered with grey tile and the overhead lighting complements it, bright enough for the artists to have visibility but not glaring to the point it gives you a headache like the street lighting did.

The framed pictures on the wall are even more beautiful up close.

The art by Bokuto’s station especially .

You hop up and sit at the edge of the table, hands clutching the side of the cushion for dear life as if falling off could kill you.

The artist at the table to your right glances over, his face impassive even through the black medical mask that he’s wearing. When you turn your head, the artist to the other side does the same, casting you a look that’s entirely neutral except for his dark brows which seem to be permanently furrowed.

Their behaviour is closer to what you expected Bokuto’s to be like; not quite rude, not quite mean, but so professional and deadpan that you can’t help but feel your inevitable breakdown would inconvenience them greatly.

“So, you decided on the placement?”

Somehow Bokuto’s voice startles you again, having been too fixated on his coworkers’ reactions, but you hide your surprise better this time. You don’t jump, just lift your head and look at him; true to his word, he’s putting the final touches on the sanitisation process before starting any other preparation.

“Hm?”

He grins, not too bothered at having to repeat himself once more. “Have you picked where it’s gonna go? Because I might have to make some changes depending on your decision.”

“Oh, the inside of my forearm” you blurt out, holding it out to show him.

Your brusque and sudden response means it’s his turn to look up in surprise, but there’s no judgment on his face when he does so. Instead, it softens, golden eyes taking on a hint of sympathy.

“You nervous?” he asks, more quietly this time.

“ No, not really, ” but your answer comes far too quickly, your face heating as the words leave you. The vice-like grip that you have on the table only further disproves your answer.

He chuckles knowingly as he pulls on a fresh pair of gloves. “You wouldn’t be the first, y’know.”

“I’m not that nervous,” you object futilely. “Really.”

Bokuto takes his seat and pulls it closer to you; partly because he seems to think eye contact will help (it does) and partly to shield you from any eavesdroppers at the tables next to you (he does so successfully).

“Seriously,” he says, quieter again. “You have absolutely nothing to worry about. If it’s too much, we stop. If you need a break, we stop. If you have any questions, I am more than happy to answer. Anything at all, no matter what. That sound okay?”

You nod instinctively but find yourself meaning it. He has a surprisingly calming presence, intimidating reputation aside.

Maybe Kuroo isn’t a great judge of character.

“I’ll walk you through it, ‘kay? Just so you know what to expect,” he starts, and another nod from you shows you’re ready to hear the rest. “Firstly, since you want it here,” he leans over and points to your inner forearm, “we’ll need to have you lying on your back with your arm held out – we could do it sitting up, but this is more comfortable for us both since it’ll minimise any shaking.”

The table is quite comfortable. You’re with him so far.

“Then,” Bokuto continues, business-like but still kind in his delivery, “we’ll sanitise your arm and make sure the skin’s ready to be tattooed - it’s only a small area, so it shouldn’t take too long - and then we pop the stencil on. If you’re happy with it, I’ll get the last of the equipment ready and you just hold still for a while – it’ll be over before you know it. Sound good?”

The way he spells it out is a lot less intimidating than some of the resources you’ve read. He’s not being condescending, either, which is a huge plus – you know what you’re getting into, you’re not a child who needs to be consoled, but you’d just prefer for someone to speak to you like a human and just lay it out so you can mentally prepare.

Which Bokuto just did. Perfectly.

So in lieu of an answer, you lay down in the position he described, and try, for the first time, to return a smile.

He seems delighted as he pushes his chair back out to double-check the supplies. “Alright! Let’s get this started!”

Staring up at the ceiling, you try to count the tiles to keep your mind occupied. Bokuto’s hands are gentle as he cleans the skin and applies the stencil but your arm still tenses under his touch.

He notices. “All okay?”

“Yep,” you murmur, starting your counting again.

One tile, two, three -

“This look okay to you?” he inquires, and you pull your eyes away from the ceiling to check the design.

To his credit, it’s perfect. A bit bigger than you expected, but you can see now that changing the size would mean losing out on some of the detailing.

It’s better than any of the ones you’d seen on Pinterest and you tell him as much. He laughs heartily, with such sincerity and energy that it’s almost contagious.

You rest your head back down and start focusing on counting the next set of tiles.

No panicking. Not now. You’re nearly there.

Four tiles, five, six, seven -

Bokuto makes a few small adjustments. Your breath quickens.

It’s so close to being over. Just grin and bear it.

Eight tiles, nine -

The needle starts to whirr.

It hits you all at once: a gut-wrenching burst of panic so strong it feels as though it could stop your heart from beating, and you bolt upright before the needle makes contact with your skin, already shaking like a leaf.

Everything’s too much now. The lights, the sounds of buzzing needles, even the low mumbling of the people conversing at the tables next to you – it all mixes into a terrifying cacophony that overloads your senses.

But contrary to what Kuroo and the others had told you, Bokuto doesn’t scold you. He doesn’t laugh, either. He doesn’t even look disappointed. He’s pulled back a little - just enough to give you some breathing space - but other than that, he’s the same. A soft smile, kind eyes, and it gives the impression that he has all the time in the world to help you.

As nice as it is, it somehow adds to your humiliation.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” you whisper, still trembling. You cover your face with your hands. “I’m sorry . I just … need a moment.”

“Why are you sorry?” he asks, genuinely puzzled. He sets the needle down in its place. “There’s nothing to be sorry for.”

What does he mean? He just saw your reaction, how is he so unbothered by it?

“Well, mostly sorry for … for that, ” you answer with a humourless laugh, finally moving your hands away from your face. “For freaking out, for losing it just there … god, I nearly jumped off the damn table .”

He huffs out a short laugh. “And? You wouldn’t be the first, that’s for sure – not the first today, even.”

You rub your eyes forlornly. “I just - it got very real all of a sudden. Too real. I’m sorry.”

He waves off your apology kindly but firmly.

“No more sorry, alright?”

Adrenaline still coursing through your veins, you find it in yourself to agree quietly. No more apologising. That much you can do.

“And just so you know,” he continues. “I’m not in the business of tattooing people against their will. If you’ve changed your mind, that is absolutely and completely fine – can’t stress enough how fine it would be. We can even try another day, I can get this stencil off you-”

“No, no,” you interrupt, your mind clearing just enough for you to object. All things considered, you actually really, really liked the look of the stencil on your skin. You want this tattoo. You want to be able to go back to your friends with your head held high. You want to do this for yourself. “I want to do it today.”

“Okay,” he notes in agreement, meeting your gaze. “Then how are we gonna make this work?”

It’s quiet for a moment as you consider your next step. You wonder if Bokuto knows just how much this eye contact is helping to keep you from dying of embarrassment.

You start to explain your fear in a way that hopefully sounds more articulate than the vague screaming that’s going on in your head.

“I don’t know if this makes sense, but it’s not the pain that bothers me so much as the needle. All my life, it was never the shot itself that freaked me out, just the sight of the needle coming towards me.”

“I get it. Pain isn’t the issue, really, but looking at this ,” he gestures to the tattoo gun, “isn’t helping you get your mind off things?”

You swallow thickly. “Yeah, pretty much.”

“Well, how about you tilt your head the other way? Akaashi’s about to clock out so you won’t be looking at his mean face for too long,” - at that, the man next to you stops cleaning the table and scowls - “and if you want, I’ll just keep talking so you’re not just staring at the wall for half an hour and you’re not focusing on the sound of the needle. If I need you to check anything - linework, shading - I’ll ask, and try and keep the needle out of the way for you. Whatcha think?”

Maybe it’s just the surge of intense emotion starting to subside, but the offer could just bring you to tears. There’s no pressure, no judgment. Just support and encouragement.

You can do it. You know you can do it.

“Sounds doable,” you answer after a slow, steadying breath. You lay down and tilt your head, seeing the tables next to you now clear. “Let’s do it.”

And this time, you don’t so much as flinch.

The tattooing itself doesn’t really hurt at all. It’s not the most comfortable sensation in the world, but it’s not painful by any measure, likely helped by the fact that you don’t catch sight of the needle for most of it.

Bokuto talks to you, and you find yourself chatting back with increasing casualness. The topics vary; work, family, how Akaashi used to be equally frightened of needles even though he vehemently denies it. It helps keep your thoughts clear.

You ask him the tattoo questions that you weren’t able to find the answers for on Google, knowing his reply will be honest.

He tells you a few college stories. One or two of them sound eerily familiar, but you don’t question it.

He asks you about your friends and about the bet that led you here. You give him the condensed version, explaining that the result was actually a lot closer than your friends had said and that if you had gone for best three out of five, you might’ve just won it.

You ask about his lip ring, if it hurt to get it done. He says it didn’t.

Your anxiety ebbs and flows throughout, but you don’t let it surface. Every time you feel panic surge through your chest you just ask Bokuto another question, letting his deep voice carry you away from the fear.

Just as you’re about to chime in with another question about his first tattoo, he interrupts first.

“ And … all … done.”

It feels as though only two or three minutes have passed, so thick shock envelops you as you ask incredulously, “ done ?”

“Done,” he confirms, setting the needle down and starting on the aftercare. “If you’re happy with it, that is?”

You glance at your arm and can’t hold back a gasp at what you see. It’s as though Bokuto reached into your mind and recreated your idea perfectly.

You spend a few minutes admiring it as he cleans up, chatting excitedly as the thrill is yet to wear off, and you feel a strange disappointment knowing it's time to part ways.

Still, you don’t let it show, thanking him and tipping generously when it's time to settle up, saying your goodbyes to Kiyoko too before collecting your jacket.

Once you’re out the door, you snap a picture of your outstretched arm with the perfect tattoo in centre frame and send it into the groupchat, riding the high of your achievement.

You: Told ya <3

Seconds pass before the replies start to flood in.

Kenma: Holy shit you actually did it, I’m impressed

Lev: And she delivers! 👏

Alisa: ^^^^^ shut UP we knew she’d follow through

Alisa: it looks amazing ahhhhh!!!!!

Kuroo: who’s “we” in this scenario

Alisa: shouldn’t u be saving this energy for twitter fights tetsuuuu

___

To commemorate you successfully facing your fears, the gang all make plans to go for drinks the next day. In fact, Kenma’s so impressed that you followed through on the bet that he agrees to pick up the tab – Kuroo is delighted with you as a result.

The table is reserved for the entire night and Alisa, Lev, and Yaku are driving separately there so you’re able to travel in one cab. Kuroo and Kenma spend the entire journey inspecting your tattoo, fully visible with the short-sleeved dress you chose for the evening since the protective wrap has been removed.

“Holy shit, it’s real, ” Kenma mutters, peering closer at the sunflower design.

You laugh a little, taken aback at the continually disbelieving attitude he has towards it. “Yeah? Lots of people have tattoos - Lev has one. Alisa has four. ”

“Yeah, but,” Kenma answers with a shake of his head. “It was your worst fear. I would have never shaved my head, y’know? Over some little bet, are you kidding?”

“Oh, you would have,” you grin, glancing over at Kuroo’s knowing expression. “We might have needed to be a bit persuasive, though . ”

Out of respect and perhaps just a bit of fear, he’s the first to leave the taxi once it’s parked and he makes a beeline to the counter to get your first drink.

The bar is busy but not too crowded, typical for this early in the night in this part of town – close enough to Black Jackal, come to think of it, and you could probably see the purple neon lighting if you peered out one of the windows.

You let yourself enjoy the buzzing atmosphere as Alisa and Yaku take you out back to go dancing. The hours trickle by without you noticing.

Once you’re teetering at the edge of being out of breath, you decide it’s best to get another drink. The others all join you, with Kenma going first to make sure the tab’s still open.

The queue by the bar counter has thinned a bit since most people have made their way to the open floor to dance and chat. It’s relatively peaceful, so you tell yourself that’s the reason why you’re able to pick out the familiar head of silver hair with such alarming quickness.

There are about six or seven people standing between you, most of whom seem to be other artists from the tattoo shop, but Bokuto’s the only one you zone in on.

It makes sense that you’d bump into him in this place. Obviously, he’d come here after finishing work since it’s so close by. You’re not sure how you didn’t expect it.

You’re also not sure why you feel a sudden and peculiar sensation brewing in your chest, radiating out in waves, intensifying every time you think you’ve caught his eye.

You grab Alisa’s arm, pulling her to the side to inform her of the sudden development.

“Bokuto’s here,” you whisper into her ear, sounding almost startled for some unknown reason. Your own tone of voice takes you by surprise.

“What?” she calls out as she leans in closer, unable to hear you over the music. “ Whatcha say? ”

“Bokuto’s here, but I need a moment before I go say hi, ” you whisper louder this time, almost at regular volume. You can only hope that nobody but Alisa understands the implications of what you’re saying.

But naturally, Kuroo picks up on your conversation with relative ease.

“Bokuto?” he asks far too loudly, glancing around in an entirely unsubtle way. “Where? Did you know he was coming?”

Heat floods your face and neck. “ Yes, Bokuto,” your scowl deepens, “and no, I didn’t know he was coming, you utter-”

Kuroo raises his hands in defence, a mischievous smirk etched on his face. “Hey, just asking! Maybe you took a shine to each other, how was I supposed to know?”

That hits a nerve for reasons you don’t quite understand. You keep your face as impassive as possible to avoid detection – you don’t really want to explore these feelings in such a public setting since you don’t even know what they are. Residual nerves, maybe?

“Why would you think that, Tetsu? You’re the one who expected I’d faint on the table.”

Kuroo has an immediate answer to your question.

“I kinda figured you’d get along, to be honest,” he admits with more than a little smugness. “So wouldn’t be too surprised if you had invited him.”

You baulk at his suggestion. “No, you didn’t! You said he’d be a dick!”

He laughs heartily, throwing his head back as he does so, and you start to piece things together.

“Do you - do you know him?”

“Yep!” Kuroo chirps. “Played volleyball with him in college.”

Your eye twitches. If you hadn’t been friends with Kuroo since your schooldays, you’d probably hurl your drink at him out of sheer frustration.

Even as it stands, the jury’s still out on the drink-throwing.

Hearing Kuroo’s howls of laughter, the others have now made their way into the conversation.

Wonderful. You’re starting to worry the loud music won’t be enough to obscure the conversation from the parties concerned.

“I was messing with you!” Kuroo clarifies, though it’s not really necessary at this point. “Bokuto’s a good guy. You probably could’ve spontaneously combusted with fear and he would’ve been the one to apologise for stressing you out.”

“You what?” Alisa gasps. She was out of the loop up until this very moment; her indignation on your behalf is quite satisfying.

“I thought you all knew!” Kuroo replies after knocking back half of his beer, cheeks flushed from the alcohol. As if his tongue needed to get any looser.

You scoff. “I didn’t! Nobody ever knows when you’re messing with them!”

“And how did Kenma and Lev know what you were talking about?” Alisa asks, throwing an accusatory look at her brother.

Kenma shrugs, answering on Lev’s behalf too. “There are a few artists down there with a reputation for being harsh, and I assumed from Tetsu’s reaction it was Bokuto … but I actually was thinking of someone else, I guess. A friend of a friend with a bad case of resting-bitch-face? A - Akaashi something?”

You glance at the surly-looking man standing next to Bokuto and it all finally falls into place.

“So I acted like a complete freak for no reason?” you ask despairingly.

With a grimace, you remember your monosyllabic answers to Bokuto’s initial questions, how you acted like a deer in headlights at every step of the process, how it took intensive intervention on his part to even get you back in the chair.

Your friends jump to your defence.

“You weren’t a freak- ”

“I’m sure you weren’t that bad-”

“Tetsu, you can be the actual worst- ”

It seems as though the rest of the group were about to settle into scolding Kuroo when you catch sight of Bokuto approaching, grinning as usual, lip ring glinting in the low lighting.

It takes a second for you to actually comprehend he’s heading towards you and not Kuroo.

Mercifully, the rest of your friends seem to realise it as soon as you do; they start to collect their drinks and get out of your way, Kuroo stopping for just a moment to greet his old friend - you still can’t believe you hadn’t figured it out earlier - before whispering something in his ear that makes Bokuto’s gaze flicker over to you.

Oh, if he’s told something embarrassing, you’ll actually kill him. Before you can react to whatever Kuroo’s said, he turns and gives you a quick wink before joining the rest of the group on the dancefloor.

“Hey!”

Bokuto’s greeting is cheery and bright, which should be encouraging were it not for the fact that it seems to be his default setting.

His hair is loose now, the metal hairband clearly only for work purposes, and the silver strands that frame his face seem so impossibly soft you have to fight back the urge to run your hand through it.

Here.

At a bar, in front of everyone.

Oh, so that’s what that feeling is.

“Hey!” you try to return his enthusiasm, ignoring the twisting in your gut from the looming realisation that you have a crush on the man you were terrified of not twenty-four hours ago.

And he knows you were terrified of him, too. Probably still thinks you are.

“So, Kuro was just telling me you know each other?” Bokuto beams. “Shoulda let me know! Could’ve told you a few embarrassing stories about him from college … and I probably did, come to think of it, but didn’t give any names yesterday. More than happy to now, though?”

A frazzled laugh slips out in spite of everything. “Yeah, we’ve been friends since we were little kids.” You pause for just a moment, considering his words. “But I’ll definitely take you up on that offer if it’s still open.”

“Oh, it absolutely is. Do you have about six hours spare to hear them all?” he hesitates for a split-second, looking more nervous than you think you’ve seen him. It passes soon, however, when he gets the words out; “... maybe over a drink?”

Oh .

Okay.

So it’s not just you who feels like this.

Relief hits you first. Then a little gleeful sensation that you haven’t felt in a long while, followed by a burst of anxiety – but you’re not going to overthink this part, you assure yourself. There’s no point. It’ll just get you as worked up as it did yesterday, and then you’ll be filled with something worse than fear or embarrassment: regret .

Besides, Bokuto seems just as he did during the session yesterday. There’s no impatience, no ‘ oh god I have to calm down this random person who’s gotten themselves stressed out for no reason’, no sign that he’s feeling anything other than enthusiasm at getting to have this conversation.

And so you happily add two more drinks to Kenma’s tab.

“By the way … Kuro never actually told me that he knew you ,” you explain finally, once Bokuto’s finished one of his college stories. You’re not drunk, barely even tipsy, but the glass of wine has definitely made it easier for you to flirt back. “If I’d known, I probably would’ve tried to put on a braver face yesterday.”

“Are you kidding? You took it like a champ.”

You roll your eyes without any malice. “ No , I didn’t.”

“You did!” he insists.

“I didn’t. ”

“Yes, you did.”

You scoff. “Well, if I did, it’s thanks to you .”

His eyes glint as they scan your face. “Whatcha mean?”

“You kept me sane. Couldn’t have done it if it weren’t for you, honestly.”

You lift a hand and rest it against his tattooed forearm, surprised at the taut muscles that flex under your touch.

Brave. You can be brave for the second day in a row.

“You up for another?”

___

After you buy two more drinks, things move so quickly that neither of you even gets to finish them.

You’re not sure who made the first move - it might have been him, with the way his eyes sought out your lips at every possible opportunity; or it might have been you, with the way your hand didn’t budge from its place resting against his arm - but all that’s important is that one of you did make it.

Or maybe both of you did.

But it doesn’t matter, because now you’re outside the bar with your back pressed up against the cool stone wall, making out like a couple of desperate teenagers.

Despite the cold air surrounding you, everything feels hot; Bokuto’s lips crushing against yours, his tongue tracing against your kiss-swollen mouth, his hands on your waist as they pull you closer.

Your skin almost burns under his touch. You get lost in it.

It’s only when he pulls away, expression torn as though it pains him to do it, that you manage to collect your thoughts into some coherent order.

You’ve long moved past the tipsy sensation you felt earlier, but your head spins for a different reason as you brace yourself against his strong shoulders, feeling light-headed in the best way possible.

“Wanna-” he begins, pausing as if worried you’ll say no. You’re already nodding before he even finishes the sentence, and he laughs before leaning in to kiss you again.

“Where do you live?” you ask, pulling back a millimetre or two, and he answers. “My place is closer,” you explain then, tugging him away towards the street to flag down a taxi.

In the cab, you check your phone as Bokuto rests a hand on your thigh, hoping to fire off a quick text to Alisa to let her know where you’ve gone.

Instead, you see that Kuroo, obviously having felt a little guilty from earlier, has sent you a couple of messages expressing his remorse.

Kuroo: You okay?

Kuroo: Sorry for messing with you. Bo’s a good guy. he won’t give you a tough time about anything

Kuroo: I think you’ll really like him

You grin. He has no idea.

You: All fine, and all is forgiven

You: Your peer pressure paid off for once

You: Just don’t do it again or I’m pretty sure Alisa will kill you :)

With that, you slip your phone back into your pocket and rest your hand over Bokuto’s.

The very moment you pass the threshold of your apartment, his mouth is on you once again; the cool metal of his lip ring contrasts with the heat of the kiss, sending pulses of desire through your core. Your flick against it with your tongue and his eyes darken delightedly, pupils blown out with desire matching your own.

It doesn’t take long for the two of you to reach the bedroom, shedding clothes down the hallway as you do so - a shirt tossed here, a pair of shoes thrown there - and soon you’re collapsing onto your bed in a messy tangle of limbs and bitten-off moans.

After a few moments, lifts his head up and grins, eyes travelling around your room. Your head rests against the pillow as you try to follow his gaze to see what exactly he’s looking at.

“Makes sense,” he mumbles fondly. “The design for your tattoo.”

Glancing at your sunflower-covered bedspread, the pressed petals framed on the wall, and the various other splashes of sunny yellow decorating your room, you accept his point with an airy laugh.

However, you’re not willing to dwell on it for too much longer – there are more pressing things at hand. Finally, you lift a trembling hand and tangle it in his hair, finding that it’s somehow softer than you even imagined.

You move your lips to this throat to kiss and suck and bite, and without you having to ask, he tips his head back to allow you more room, whispering your name in a heated and desperately low voice. He hisses as your pecks against his skin turn a little firmer, knowing there’d be a mark left were it not for the tattoos trailing up his neck. Now that he’s not wearing anything, you see the design trails down the broad expanse of his chest, over his firm pecs, further down until -

He pulls you up into his lap and you let out a startled yelp that quickly turns into an almost pitiful mewl of pleasure. You rock back and forth against one of his impossibly thick thighs, marvelling at the solid muscle of his body as he takes your hips in his hands and guides your movements.

You spend the next few minutes like this, grinding helplessly against him as tears prickle at the corners of your eyes, with him just watching you with an expression that can only be described as awe-struck. He pays no attention to bulge in his own underwear, even though it’s so hard it looks almost painful – he is fixated on you, on your reactions, on the movements that draw desperate little breaths from you and the ones that make your back arch further.

“Feel good?” he asks, almost dazed, hands running slowly up and down your thighs as you fuck yourself against him.

“Mmhmm,” you answer – redundantly, given the other sounds that flow from your lips, “need more, though, p-please.”

He doesn’t need any further instruction, flipping you to lie flat on your back and going to spread your thighs which part easily for him.

Turns out he’s more than talented with his tongue as well.

After what seems like hours of him taking you apart - of you gasping when the lip ring grazes against your sensitive flesh, of you begging for his fingers which he angles just right, of him voicing his own approval at your moans and taste and the way your thighs tighten around his face - he finally sits back on his haunches and gives you a look that you instantly recognise.

Eagerly, you roll onto your side and fetch a condom from the box in the nightstand. When you hand it to him, he finally, finally, slips out of his underwear - you can’t help how your eyes widen at the sight - then only just about manages to put on the condom before you hook your legs around his lower back and pull him on top of you.

Although he lets out a chuckle at your enthusiasm, he angles you so carefully, and you realise with a soft ache in your chest that he’s trying his best to avoid touching the still-raw skin near your tattoo.

“It’s fine,” you whisper breathily. “It doesn’t hurt anymore.”

He replies by raising your arm so it’s resting by your head on the pillow. “Still, if you need to take a break or stop, just say, ‘kay?”

You agree without hesitation.

Then, he brings his hips down until they’re flush against your own, his cock slowly and tantalisingly pushing through your folds to allow the anticipation to build (and for you to adjust to his size). But after how long he’s spent preparing you, he’s met with absolutely no resistance – on the contrary, you find yourself mumbling incoherent, slurred words that sound an awful lot like begging.

“Can - can you-”

He kisses your jawline, the sensation of the ring making you shiver once again. “Can I what, hm?”

“Can you please-” a short, shallow thrust has you gasping mid-sentence, “ please fuck me?”

You almost cry out when he starts to thrust in earnest, slowly at first and then quicker and quicker once he fully surrenders to his own desperation. The obscene sound of skin slapping against skin mixed with breathy moans and gasps start to echo around you, along with the tell-tale banging of your headboard against the wall.

His thrusts grow hard, almost punishing, but the way he cups your face tenderly in his hands shows that his intentions are not to overwhelm but to give you what you need; you hadn’t realised it, but your hips had started to cant up to meet his every stroke.

He praises you, too. Tells you how good you feel, how well you’re taking him, how he could do this forever. Every word out of his mouth makes you grip him tighter, your nails undoubtedly leaving marks against his shoulders.

It doesn’t take long for you to come for him again. He doesn’t stop or slow down his movement; he lets you whimper and cry out against his muscled chest as you come down from your high, holding you close as his thrusts turn sloppy and erratic.

He curses through gritted teeth as he comes, letting out a low moan that sends aftershocks through you. He thrusts deep and stays there; his face in that moment, so blissful and fucked-out, is one of the most gorgeous things you think you’ve ever seen.

You stay like that for a while, boneless and utterly content, before he goes to remove the condom and wash up as you catch your breath.

When he returns, there’s no awkwardness. No overthinking. You ask for him to stay the night, and he does. He sleeps soundly in your bed with his arms wrapped around you.

It’s a strange sort of comfort you don’t often find with people, let alone someone you barely know. But he makes it easy to get to know him, and you’re all too delighted to learn more.

He stays for a while the next morning. He cooks breakfast, you make the coffee.

Things are much more straightforward from that point on.

___

You get your second tattoo exactly a year later.

You’d be lying if you said you weren’t still a little nervous at the prospect of a needle so close to you, but it pales in comparison to the anxiety of your first one. This time, you find yourself looking forward to it more than you do worry.

“Ready for round two?” Bokuto asks, pressing a kiss to your forehead before starting to get the station set up. The shop is closed, the manager having let you stay late for the occasion, and the peace and quiet only add to your newfound level-headedness.

Just you and Bokuto. You can do this.

You nod without hesitation, lying back on the table as though you’re a seasoned veteran. “No freaking out this time.”

He rolls his eyes in mock annoyance but the affectionate laughter cuts through it. “Still think I’m scary, huh?”

You shrug. “Not as much anymore.”

“Well, guess I can live with that.”

When the needle starts to whirr, it doesn’t make you jump. There’s no feeling of panic or dread.

This tattoo is over quickly, like the last one, but it’s far more meaningful – you like sunflowers, sure, but you like this one better. You didn’t need to over-analyse the design since you can see exactly what it looks like on someone else.

Bokuto has an identical one freshly tattooed on his ring finger.

#bokuto x reader #bokuto kotaro x reader #bokuto koutarou x reader #timeskip bokuto #timeskip bokuto x reader #hq #haikyuu #may tries to write

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tsukiyadori · 9 months

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The Case Files of Jeweler Richard: "Tsuki no Hikari" (Clair de Lune) Web Short Story Translation

I just read the short on Nanako Tsujimura's website here that was posted in May 2023. It's called つきのひかり which directly translates to "moonlight".

And just felt compelled to make a translation immediately, because it's just such a beautiful little piece.

Timeline-wise, it's probably set somewhen after volume 10 and before volume 11.

Suggested accompanied reading prior to it is the Extra Case "Moonstone's Affection". It's included in Seven Sea's English translation of volume 4. In Japanese it can be found in the ebook version of volume 4. (In print, it appears to have been in a booklet extra handed out as shop-exclusives.)

Moonstone is all about hilariously playing the classic line "The moon is beautiful" by Natsume Souseki, something that by now is so worn out it's probably as well as become a cliché already. Moonstone has Richard giving lectures criticizing how the line gets wholly divorced from its original context and sentiment, as well as giving ab abstract roundabout what it was supposed to be about. A feeling, a peaceful mood, he says, but there isn't so much elaboration on it rather than just implication yet.

I'm kind of shocked I didn't expect it to get back to it and with what's effectively an illustrious applied example essay in prose on the subject while at it, when the whole series is all about nuanced takes on variants and expressions of "love" and beauties already. But here we are.

I tried to imitate the translation style of the official English translation.

Clair de Lune

I was sleeping amidst flowers.

When I woke up, I confusedly wondered what happened. Flowers were blooming above my head. Flowers painted in a faint colour between red and orange. Probably red puppies. It was a completely different scenery from napping on my bed or the sofa. The sky expanded itself above the flowers. It was clearly outdoors.

And.

"Good Morning."

Richard.

The sky, the flowers and Richard.

While I was thinking that something about this was rather poetic, I bewilderedly rubbed my eyes. When I raised myself, leaves fell from my head.

A garden and a pond. An arched bridge. Ah.

"This is… Henry's new residence."

"Correct."

"It feels so impressionistic, erm, this is…"

"Giverny"

"…so that means France"

"Oui"

Right, Richard answered. Reality caught up as the details gradually came back.

I and Richard, we came to Europe a week ago in order to participate in a mineral show in Munich. Munich is in Germany. That was seven days ago. Afterwards I met Shimomura who was on a little trip to Austria and learned about Henry's new residence. Somehow he bought a new real estate and restored an old building and how about we dropped by. Somehow it was amazing, somehow it left a deep impression. Somehow a lot of somehow impressions. That was five days ago. After that I joined Richard again – of course bringing a Sachertorte with me – and we headed towards our business in France. It was just a small trip by air. That was four days ago. By Japanese standards, it cost only a domestic travel fare to get from Vienna to Marseille. Somehow I wound up making Bouillabaisse at a regular customer's place, three days ago. And two days ago we got a message from Henry.

He contacted us, because we were apparently nearby, asking us if we wouldn't come over to his new residence.

Richard was a bit perplexed, but honestly I was already in Europe Mode – basically the mindset about travelling through countries in an absurd speed. It usually felt like this on the continent – it was a sort of let's go somewhere!-tension. We've even talked about taking two days off and watch some soccer or such. But honestly, I and Richard, we were a bit tired. We didn't have the spirits to watch soccer and drink beer with cheers. Our physical stamina was doubtful to last as well. To do such a thing after working a week every consecutive day, it'd be difficult unless you were in your teens or your early twenties. We have both passed that age bracket already.

That being said, the place we've been invited to, had its own set of issues. Giverny. It's somewhat in the neighbourhood of Paris. By plane, it would be just a hop away, but from Marseille it's a five hours distance with the train. Of course, it was in the same country as Marseille but, somehow, like this, the place didn't exactly feel close. It seemed about as exhausting as the soccer watching plan.

But Richard said he wanted to go.

Prefixed with a reserved 'if that was all right'.

If that was the case, things were clear for me.

Let's go. I also want to go.

And that's what we did.

We rented a car at the airport and headed towards Giverny. Right upon arriving, a bunch of security staff looking people clad in black came for us and guided us with their black car.

The place they brought us to was a house surrounded with a garden and pond and looked straight out of a fairy tale. Flowers in all sorts of colours bloomed in abundance, boats floated above the deep pond and a gracefully arched bridge hung above it. However, this version of Seigi Nakata, who recently made strides in becoming more sophisticated, understood. It was a masterpiece of impressionism, this was a residence built with the concept of Monet's paintings in mind.

Henry showed up looking like Snufkin coming out of a Moomin house – a security staff personnel was behind him like a matter of course – and welcomed us with a smile. Piano suit him, but at that moment I learned that an apron suit him as well. Not an apron for painting, but the sort for cooking. With a light brown one hanging down his head, he looked like an ordinary, a bit too skinny man.

"Recently I've been doing all sorts of things. Working, pastimes. This place is for recreation. It's very good for a change of pace."

'Work' meant the Claremont family business, an 'insurance company for an insurance company', as well as several finance-related businesses, apparently. Jeffrey handled them until now, but lining up with his vacations, Henry took them over. Richard and I were mostly kept in the dark about it, but achievements of big companies could be checked on in the daily internet and from the looks of that, they were doing pretty well. And in order for continuously doing well in any sort of work, you needed to take a breather or get a change of pace from time to time.

For this purpose this place here in France was established.

Indeed, it seemed like a very good place for a change of pace.

Henry showed up this hyper gorgeous summer house – it had a combined kitchen and dining room, as well as a reception room with a grand piano in it, a jet spa bath, a huge cabin filled with supplies neighbouring an enormous garage and all kinds of other things – he personally treated us to nice fragranced tea as well as some not wholly uniformly shaped cookies he had just baked himself. It was a perfect reception and everything tasted very well.

That's why it was a little bit exhausting.

Henry was nervous throughout the whole reception. He was his usual self. You don't have to be all that nervous, Enrique is what Shimomura would always pester on about, but that was his special privilege. Neither I nor Richard had this sort of skill.

In the end, all three of us got tired in their own way.

Henry withdrew himself to the studio to be alone for a bit, Richard departed with the car to get some snacks for the evening and I…

I said I'd take another stroll around the garden.

I was looking down at the pond from the bushes on the loosely slanted slope.

I doozed off a bit.

It was early summer. When I looked at my wristwatch it was 3pm. I probably doozed off about 30 minutes at most. It was fine now with the sun all up, but if I doozed off until evening, I would certainly have caught a cold.

"… Thanks for waking me…. Uwah, there is dirt on my shirt."

"Fortunately, it's a washable shirt."

I laughed a haha. True, if it was a dress shirt, it would have been a tragedy. That's why I only wore such wear on special occasions, like being invited to some lakeside castle party. Sometimes there are such times through.

While I rubbed my eyes, Richard looked intensely at the garden. Or at the pink and yellow flowers behind my back. Or at me. Then he suddenly started talking.

"I understand a little bit how artists feel."

"Artists?… You mean impressionist ones?"

"There is no denying that your shape with flowers nestling around you is wealthy with elegance."

"Easy mode please."

"I somehow just got the feeling of wanting to draw a picture."

"… of me?"

"Of what else?"

How weird. The owner of features that millions of artists would want to paint was, somehow, saying he felt like drawing a picture of me.

But it also made me happy.

When I playfully tried to pose as Mona Lisa, Richard sighed and politely corrected me that that was from Da Vinci. Then he started a brief commentary over Monet, the master of impressionism. Listening to it in this garden that seemed like out of a painting of his, was enjoyable and beautiful, sometimes wistfully so.

Henry, Richard and I, we enjoyed a great number of France's famous items from the supermarket and small dishes à la carte. Pâté de Campagne or cheese were the apéritif. Riding a Japanese food boom wave of recent, even Kinpira burdock was available in square packages. There was sushi as well, but Richard, who was used to Ginza's sushi in Japan, didn't seem to itch for it. Henry made a bit of a disappointed face, as salmon rolls were a secret favourite of his.

After dinner Henry played the piano for us.

France's impressionism wasn't just limited to paintings. In music there are also various artists summed up under the genre. Debussy, who is famous even in Japan, is one of them.

What he played was "Clair de Lune".

It was music filled with peace and beauty.

Outside the window, a half moon was floating about. It was reflected in the pond, and flickered as if it was drawing the picturesque design of a mosaic of light.

I wondered if that was the 'impression' that artists remembered.

Not the real moon, but something like the shadow of the moon. Something that tingled your imagination, something that allowed for an in-between.

Like how I would associate the moon or ocean to Richard's beauty whenever I remembered it.

If that was the case, I felt like I understood a bit of what Richard had called 'elegance'.

It meant to 'love' something very much.

Very much.

The sounds of the piano carried on. Tomorrow's plane would depart at noon, but we had to return to Paris and return the rental car. It was about time to go to sleep. But I wanted to stay up a bit more. I wanted to look at the shadow of the moon.

The flickering golden light somehow resembled Richard's voice, when he was right by side when I woke up.

_________________________________________________________

(TL Time 116min+40m QC/formatting)

#light novel #novel #translation #english translation #the case files of jeweler richard #housekishou richard shi no nazo kantei #tsujimura nanako

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imminentinertia · 1 month

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(I added an image description to the gif)

Now that everyone's forgotten about it it's a great time to word vomit about Last Twilight, yes? But it was only recently I finally managed to finish the last episode of Last Twilight and I have Thoughts and I needed to digest.

I also have A Very Personal Frame of Reference for how I judge media dealing with blindness. What I have read about Last Twilight has been a lot of delight, a lot of disappointment with how the story went, analysis of colours and outfits and dialogue and narrative elements, but I haven't yet seen much about the depiction of vision loss. Soooo *cracks knuckles*

(I bet I've missed some posts about it, though. I'd like to be pointed to such posts)

As for me:

I had an older relative with severe vision loss thanks to untreated glaucoma (get your eyes checked regularly once you hit 40! Glaucoma is treatable).

I grew up with two friends who had lost an eye as small children - one also had severe vision loss in the remaining eye, the other had a well functioning eye. Actually I know more people my age who have lost an eye and I did then too, but I was close with these two and I guided the near blind one often.

I have a younger relative, someone very close to me, who gradually went from perfect vision to near blind. That's the most important person from everyone with visual impairment I've known, in this context.

Let's just say I had a beady eye (sorry) on Last Twilight when I first heard of it, since I have a fair bit of experience as friend, relative, guide and activist when it comes to visual impairment. I've tried moving about with a white cane and I've learned braille (I don't remember much, though). I've provided the audio commentary when watching films with blind people, more times than I can count (and I've explained several times, with various degrees of impatience, to seeing strangers that yes, blind people can enjoy the cinema). I know a fair bit about this, I believe.

Which means I'm rarely terribly impressed with media depictions of visual impairment and it's something I tend to focus on.

As for Last Twilight:

HOLY SHIT SEA'S AMAZING ACTING

(I added an image description to the gif)

If anyone tries to claim he's not doing a fantastic job, they're objectively wrong. One may argue that artistic quality is subjective as it's invariably judged against a set of agreed upon conventions rather than true objective measures, but if you hold Sea's acting up against any agreed upon good acting and find it lacking, you need to look again.

I noticed him slipping (eyes focusing when they shouldn't) twice. Slightly. In the gif above, if a seeing character was delivering that line, the actor would focus on Jimmy when he turns his head. It's natural, there's movement and seeing people's attention is drawn to that, especially when it's this close to us.

Sea doesn't. He fucking doesn't. He looks like Day is concentrating and listening and feeling and he fucking doesn't even glance Jimmy's way even though that's what every cell in his human body wants him to. And that's just one of a million examples of how instruction, coaching and Sea's talent and effort offers up a Day that seriously seems visually impaired.

Sometimes, when a seeing actor is playing a blind character, they get instructed to - or choose - to go so unfocused that they look empty-brained. Some plaster on a vapid smile and/or Stevie Wonder head movements (you should know that Stevie Wonder turned blind very quickly after his premature birth, and he has no idea of how seeing people move. Adults who go blind are unlikely to move like him). Sea, however, looks like his brain is focusing but his eyes do not.

Day is intelligent and goofy and angry and bitter and worried and snarky-funny and sad and delighted and all of it shows on Sea's face, while his eyes look the part. It's so well done, I'm in awe.

Sea also moves exactly like my near blind younger relative and it's fucking uncanny. It's like seeing them. The often hesitant steps, the slight lean forward, the way Day uses his hands and fingers to figure out where he is and what is close to him, it gave me goosebumps. The way Day uses the remains of his sight to look at things is so like seeing my relative that I literally gasped the first time I saw it.

All the awards for Sea, please. And quite a few for Aof Noppharnach and the visually impaired acting coach. By the way, I never caught the coach's name, so if someone knows it I'd love to know.

HOLY SHIT A NEAR BLIND CHARACTER GETS TO BE COMPLEX

(I added an image description to the gif)

That doesn't happen as often as one should think. When the story is about being/going blind, the blind character is often either a super brave little ray of sunshine, or terribly tragic. Day is neither. He is all of it. He is human. He's so well written it makes me need to chew on my fists, he has all the dimensions.

Mork is arguably a bit less rounded, but Mork wears quite a few masks, and he is absolutely a human being, not a pretty cardboard cutout.

HOLY SHIT A NEAR BLIND CHARACTER GETS TO DO REAL NEAR BLIND PEOPLE STUFF

(I added an image description to the gif)

It doesn't happen as often as one might think. Fumbling somewhat, using a white cane (often in a completely meaningless way), wearing dark glasses all the fucking time - those are the staples of token blind characters, all too often. One of my favourite scenes in Last Twilight is actually when Day reads Morks contract, because it showcases a visually impaired person using his phone as a reading tool, perfectly real-looking. Well done! Kudos! Standing ovations! Now stop him there and don't let him do the stupid unnecessary breakup

Running with a seeing guide and using a phone for lots of text to speech/speech to text purposes. Going to events, libraries, bookshops, markets, parties. Going out to eat, watching a film. Day does all this with a caretaker's help for some, but not all of it. Blind people do things like this. They're not special little miracles for it, they're just people who hopefully have access to decent assistive products. Entirely too often main blind characters don't get to do many of these things. Entirely too often they're just vehicles for some inane moral of the "stay positive" variety, unless they're in a tragedy.

For the record, in the scene where Mork uses a white cane inexpertly, to put it mildly, it's quite obvious to me that Aof was aiming to show us Mork's sheer desperation. Mork's personality has extremes, and trying to put himself in a blind person's shoes and making it a lot of people's problem seems like something a distressed Mork could in fact do. The result is that he looks like a Bad Blind Character, but that's fine, just like the actors portraying those characters Mork doesn't know shit about what he's doing.

HOLY SHIT THEY DIDN'T MAKE DAY PERMANENTLY BLIND. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT

(At this point it's probably no surprise that I added an image description to the gif)

Yes. Well. Day gets his vision back in order to live properly happily ever after. I was mad as fuck about that for a while, and about the incredibly stupid breakup and time skip. I'm still mad about the most useless breakup plot fuckery ever and the time skip, and the general clunkiness of the final episode, but I'm not mad anymore about Last Twilight not showing that blind people can have true happiness.

It's about the audience, eh. To an audience of almost exclusively seeing people (I assume), losing one's sight is a frightful thing and doesn't make for the happiest of happy endings, and Day's condition is actually treatable. So production gave him his sight back. It would have been a notch braver to not do that, but a sweet romance isn't necessarily here to be all that brave. They did a lot of good work with showing how Day could manage many things on his own, with the right aids, and when the vast majority of the audience can be assumed to be seeing, showing how near blindness isn't crippling may be good enough.

After all, people are ignorant about blindness and will offer to help only to grab hold of the blind person's arm and drag them along, which is BAD, but if you've seen that guy on Last Twilight do guiding right maybe you'll do that yourself, if your assistance is needed some day. Maybe you'll listen to what the blind person is saying instead of assuming they lost their brain along with their vision.

And it's always a hell of a lot more convenient to see than to be blind, so when you have a condition that can be fixed, go ahead.

Except for that one fucking doctor making it sound like Day had three months left to live while it was just another few months until his vision would go completely, and everyone in the room (Day, mum, Night, Mork) just accepting that, I think Last Twilight did a really good job of showing that while there are great inconveniences to losing one's vision it's not being sentenced to sitting at home and feeling helpless, like Day starts out. It did a great job of dealing with an overprotective mother and a terribly guilty-feeling brother, too.

I would have liked Day to stay blind and end extremely happy, and I think it's bit of a waste of a character to heal him from the very premise of the story, but I'm not angry. Not anymore.

Although I greatly disliked the happyhappyhappy seeing ending, I was annoyed with most of the dad arc and the speedrun Night/Porjai romance, I loathed the breakup part and I hated how Day never took responsibility for his own actions leading to the accident where he got the cornea damage (although I will grudgingly admit that it's actually something that lends a whole lot of realism to Last Twilight and to Day), all in all, I honestly loved this show. No show is flawless, and Sea's gorgeous acting alone is enough to make up for a lot.

I recommend this blogger on how to write blind or visually impaired characters, if you'd like to know (a lot) more.

#last twilight the series #last twilight meta #visually impaired characters in fiction #immy mutters about things

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erstwhilesparrow · 6 months

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i've been thinking about maps and how they're inherently tricky little liars. you know that story about the emperor who wanted a 1:1 scale map of his entire kingdom, but creating that map required them to perfectly replicate the entire kingdom, at the exact same size as the kingdom? you see how that's kind of useless and how maps kind of have to leave things out for us to get any of the usual navigational help out of them? someone has to make decisions about what gets left out. what's important enough to be included. how things and places get represented. modern day maps loooove to promise objectivity and accuracy, but maps have stories and beliefs and historical contexts embedded in them no matter how hard you try to get away from those things. but this also means you can use them to tell interesting stories! how a thing is depicted on a map tells you things about the person / people responsible for its production!

due to being who i am, i think about this a lot in relation to empires smp. the kinds of maps that could be produced as the landscape of the world changes. the way that the in-game maps allow for a kind of instantaneous transfer of information over literally any distance via map copies. the extremely fixed and limited point of view provided by the in-game maps. the biases and interests of the cartographers of any given empire.

some (many) scattered thoughts in list format under the cut:

the particular idea that spurred this post: topographical maps of the regions surrounding the cod empire and mythland -- the way intensity of colour / shading and the choice of scale could be used to emphasize or gloss over the ravine separating them -- the ravine like a scar on the page, deep and dark, or the ravine like a neat line bracketed by the two other neat lines of the empires' respective walls. there are easy enough to guess reasons for who would want to create each type of map and why; tells you something about how each empire responded to the separation and war.

maps of pixandria from above -- i think a lot about how fwhip took copies of maps that the other empires had on display and put them up in his base so he would be able to see immediately if any of them start building something new. i think a lot about how when i was looking at minecraft maps of pixandria, big chunks of it just blended into the desert sand because pix was building with sandstone and i wasn't at all used to seeing pixandria from anything but ground-level. i think a lot about how this could add an extra element to how pixandria is supposed to have a bustling city under the anthill, and how fwhip's secret base is also underground, and how yeah, that's just A Cool Thing People Do Sometimes, but if it's so dangerously simple to get information about the surface of the world... how might people respond to that? consider spycraft in the empires. consider clever tricks and countermeasures. (consider s2, katherine's kingdom is falling apart, and her response, among other things, is to collect maps of her neighbours' territories. what's she worried about?)

itinerary maps -- maps have not always been bird's-eye view and carefully made to scale! itinerary maps were designed for travellers, and interested in accurately displaying the relative length of one's journey from one place to another, as well as the landmarks that one might see along the way (take a look at the Tabula Peutingeriana -- are you aware it's showing you italy?) -- in the context of empires, what types of journeys are so common that there might be demand for itinerary maps? who makes them, who uses them, what's considered a major landmark in this area and also does every mapmaker in this region consider that thing to be a major landmark? can you make something a major landmark by representing it on a map? (consider the turn of phrase about putting oneself on the map. who might want this, or not want this? the conspicuous absences in a map can also be telling. huh. i wonder how often that raid farm impulse built shows up on an empire's map in season 2.)

the usefulness of a given perspective -- kind of related to itinerary maps, i wonder how much more use you can get out of an in-game map when you have elytra? the emperors pretty much all have elytra, and the emperors often keep in-game maps of their empires. is there something there? what might it suggest about the expected use of those in-game maps?

self-aggrandizement -- another anecdote i think about all the time (and this one might be anecdotal sorry take it with a grain of salt) is the one where jesuit missionaries went to china and managed to convince some chinese nobles to trust them more after showing them a world map in the ortelian style, because chinese maps at that point mostly showed china as disproportionately large and at the center of the map, with europe (and the threat of barbarian invasion) dangerously close, and this map... didn't do that! consider how maps can create a nation or empire's sense of itself. the cod empire and mythland, always so fucking careful about the clarity of their borders. mezalea that looks massive on one map and is shoved off to the side in another. pixandrian maps that are cross-sections and not views from above. maps from the crystal cliffs that emphasize the mountain ranges like a jagged warning.

shape of the map -- hey did you know medieval european maps were often circular, with jerusalem in the center and the rest of the world split into asia, africa, and europe? you know maps can be different shapes, and this can tell you about what the creator thought was important (i don't remember exactly how circles are important to christianity but it was something about the perfection of god, maybe?) and how they understood the world? you think it could tell you something about where the map was meant to be used (a big circular map was probably meant to go on display!) and who was meant to see it? (ha, if you live in minecraft, what shape do you think the world is?)

questions and answers -- stuff like "who made this? to what end? under what influences?" are questions i have been specifically taught to ask about maps that i am presented with. in the context of empires worldbuilding, there's a really fun inversion where you do not have to work from the map to the context, but from the context to the map that might result from it. you can do cool things with this!! i am sure of it!!

#sparrowsong #please. consider maps with me.#i've seen REALLY EXCELLENT empires maps before and loved them greatly!#but sometimes i think about. well. hey. who in-universe made this map and why like this and what does it say about the creator and #the context of creation and do you see how you could manipulate the details of the map to convey or gesture at that background information #wouldn't that be so fucking cool to play with.#hm. these might also be mostly the same points multiple times. well! hope you get the gist!

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zeawesomebirdie · 2 months

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hi !!!! did NOT consider you might like to have the ask again to answer it. if you do:

seeing you post about your old west au is motivating me to at least draft my stuff out for my fic, too!!! so, firstly: good god thank you. secondly, what kind of drafting process do you normally go through? you don't have to answer this but everyone i know is pretty particular about how they write so i'm always curious!!!

Gosh okay I'm still so embarrassed about accidentally posting this before it was ready!! Lesson learned: only work on long posts on desktop (very affectionate). I'm going to copy paste what I had originally said, but there will be added stuff because it wasn't anywhere near ready to go (if you thought it was long before, honey you ain't seen nothing yet!)

Also I still am so proud of you for working on your fic, we are writing buddies now hand in lovable hand I love you thank you for enabling my rambling <33

Buckle in, here we go!

SO! My drafting process is always a moving target. I do what works best for the work in question, and things change depending on my energy and fatigue levels plus my motivation and interest levels

So that said, right now my process usually looks like:

ramble at someone in DMs, copy and paste rambles into a google doc for safekeeping and marinating

zero draft, aka word vomit until a plot forms, block out actions and the occasional dialog, determine chapter and story arcs

first draft, aka Where The Real Writing Happens

optional second draft, but only if the fic is under 10k

line edits

post :)

find a bunch of typos that I somehow missed during line editing, fix those before anyone notices

I will be showing examples because this is a bit hard to explain and Extremely Intense to a lot of people, and yeah that's because it is! I approach writing fanfic the same way I approach writing original fiction, and I find it works best for me as a plotter

If you are metaphorically inclined and familiar with oil painting: I write the way an oil painter paints. First I block in the big shapes, the gestures, and the colours. Then I come back in subsequent drafts and increase the detail until I'm done!

Further information and actual examples of my drafts will be below the cut, because this is gonna be super long and I love talking shop ^.^

And general content warning for non-graphic violence and graphic smut (and shitty early drafts); the examples are from Bruce Wayne/Dick Grayson fics

So before we get into the zero draft, I want to point out two things: first, I do full rewrites. This is why writing takes me one million years. I retype each and every word in each and every draft. Second, I'm actually trying something new with the Old West!AU, for reasons I will explain in a moment!

I started doing full rewrites in 2019 after a college writing course, in which we read Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott; she encourages the reader to embrace the shitty first draft. I ended up really benefiting from a zero draft too, something I first learned about in 2020 from someone on authortube who I no longer remember the name of. The zero draft is essentially a pre-draft, in which one gets the gist of the story out of their system before the prose clogs up the spigot

For me, zero drafts are something that need to be finished as fast as possible in order to get done at all, so due to the sheer length of the Old West!AU, I'm trying out writing little bullet points instead of my full zero drafting. Right now this fic is at 27 chapters, and this is part 1 of 3 total. I will be going back and filling in the actual blocking once I have all the scenes roughly accounted for

Context for the Old West!AU: Bruce is the Bat, a vigilante gunman who only kills when he needs to but still has the fastest draw on this side of the Mississippi. Now that he's taken care of the man who killed his parents, he's returned home to his Uncle Alfred and gone straight, meaning that he's hung up his guns and gone back to homesteading the family land. He adopts Dick and then a year later Jason as well, when small burglaries start happening in town, so he takes the Bat out of retirement and goes to investigate.

My bullet points started out like this:

Open on comparison between Bruce's first gun and the Bat's guns. Introduce Joe Chill, general drunkard. The Bat calls out Chill, shootout, Chill is killed. Chill drew first. Moment of reflection between Bruce's first gunfight at 15 to this one, at 21. Bruce goes home.

And that's the whole entire first chapter!

However, now they look more like:

The Sheriff runs up and shoots at him. The Bat has him disarmed with his own gun barrel to his throat in an instant. It doesn't take the Bat much time to get info out of him either. The burglar is only going after small change, not enough to be noticeable. That rules out the gambler, easily. The Sheriff can't do shit about it, because no one is willing to start an investigation for such small change. The Bat shoves the Sheriff to his knees and is gone before he notices. Alfred is waiting for him when he gets home, and asks. Bruce tries to deny it, but the clothes are in his hands and he can't. So he sighs and says he may have made a promise, but… there might be more to this than there seems, okay? He just… has a bad feeling about it. Alfred can't accept this, what about his sons? Bruce can't take this, and tells him he doesn't have to. Their yelling wakes up Dick and Jason, who stand in the doorway to their bedroom and look on with the door mostly closed.

Eventually both Alfred and Bruce yell each other out, and they sit down for coffee as dawn breaks. Bruce breaks the silence first, saying Alfred is right. Alfred tells him he understands. Bruce decides to let the Bat go for real now.

This is about half of the chapter, and closer to the blocking I normally do in zero drafts

So far this pre-zero draft seems to be working, given I've already finished part 1, but I also can't wait to come back and do the blocking in because that's when the fic really starts to take shape!

Usually though, I just start with a zero draft. I'm going to show you two different fics for the zero draft examples, because they were done differently, and like I said at the beginning, I try to adjust my process based on what is called for by what I'm writing

This first is from the fic I'm writing for @ful-crum. It's a 5+1, in which it is five times Dick fucks Bruce to distract him from discussing his emotions plus one time they actually discuss their emotions and then fuck about it.

Tim and Jason turn up an hour later, and they're incredibly concerned. Dick waves them off. Tim takes him at his word and heads to bed (he has a meeting with Wayne Tech at 8am tomorrow, ugh), but Jason sits down next to the bed and asks Dick what he thinks Bruce is going to say. Dick tells him he's not sure, I mean, it's B, y'know? Jason just nods, and they lapse into silence. Then Steph and Cass come in, and Bruce is most noticeably not present. Cass signs something about bed, and Steph tells Dick that she's worried about Bruce, to which Jason snorts and says they all are, but she insists that Dick talk to him. Dick doesn't even need to take more than a moment to decide that won't be happening. But Steph goes to bed, and it's nearly 04:00 when Jason heads up too, saying he'd love to help Dick lecture Bruce about staying out late but he's got stuff to do tomorrow. Dick asks if he wants to know what stuff, and Jason gives him a smirk and says ask him no questions and he'll tell him no lies. Dick can live with that.

As you can see, this is just general staging directions and vibes

This second example was supposed to be for BruDick Week 2024, but I accidentally got carried away and ended up deciding to write a longfic for it instead. The prompt was "brudick meet their AU!selves," so I did 66!brudick meets the Gotham Rogues Polycule, an AU in which Bruce, Dick, and Clark are in a very elaborate polycule with half of Gotham's villains.

Batman and Robin were on a normal mission in the middle of the day, on the trail of Catwoman, who's been stealing from the Gotham Museum of Art again. One moment they were walking into the museum, the next they were in a weird swirl of energy. Robin clings to Batman and asks what's going on, and Batman tells him steady Robin, we just have to stay calm and see what happens. The energy clears as someone calls out “incoming! Clear the floor!” and they find themselves in what is clearly the Cave, except it's even more high tech than anything they've ever seen. There's three people in suits like theirs standing in front of a massive screen, and Robin identifies the Riddler immediately, even if he doesn't recognise the other two. Before Batman can stop him, he charges the Riddler, who jumps behind the man in black and blue with a laugh. Batman does call out for him to stop, but he ignores him. The man in black and blue meets his every move, almost like he's fighting himself, and he calls out to the man in red and blue “a little help here, Supes?”

The biggest difference here is how drastically these fics changed from their zero draft to the first draft rendition, and that is entirely because of how fleshed out they ended up being (or not being, lol)

When I zero drafted the 5+1, it was with the intention of that specific part simply being a chapter, whereas my original zero draft of the 66! meeting the polycule! fic was actually intended to be a two shot at most. I unfortunately lost control of the plot during the first draft of that one, and it spiraled into a longfic, which will become more clear in a bit!

Basically though, the goal of the zero draft is to know who's where and why at all times! With longfics, there is often a restructuring that happens after the zero draft is written, where I move scenes and sometimes whole chapters to their best locations. This is where I make the most use out of a beta! Pacing is a big struggle for me and it is easier to fix at this stage, before I have all the prose and have become attached to what I've written

Next up is the first draft, and this is a whole new document. This is where I write The Actual Words. This is more or less the final version of the fic, for longfics, give or take a few paragraphs and a shit ton of line edits. Having said that though, I write in fits and bursts, because y'know disabled and stuff. So I write a paragraph or two at a time, and I am constantly adding and subtracting words and lines and sometimes whole paragraphs while I am actively working on a chapter

I'm going to show the first draft versions of both of the above fics, and due to the length these will be extremely excerpted but they should serve as examples regardless. Generally speaking, my zero drafts are about 1/3 of the length of my finished fics, however the 5+1 is currently proving to be an exception so that number may not be super accurate

First, the 5+1:

“You did take care of them, right?” Dick asked, groaning when Jason’s mouth thinned as he looked away. “Is Steph at least still with him?” “Last I heard, they were—” Jason started, cutting himself off when the Cave’s alarm signaled the arrival of newcomers. A moment later, two muddy bikes roared into the garage, leaving dark tracks behind them as they parked haphazardly together on the far side of the garage. With the return of Black Bat and Spoiler, the only empty place on the garage floor now belonged to Batman himself. Dick tried to catch Jason’s eyes as they waited in the med bay for Cass and Steph to strip off their suits and join them, but Jason turned away from him, though he didn’t rise from the bed. Something must have gone down after he’d fallen unconscious, Dick was sure of it. Why else would Bruce have sent everyone else home early on a patrol night? He could already see it in his mind’s eye, Batman doing God-knew-what out in Gotham alone, Bruce coming home with a busted lip that Dick would have to personally clean up before they went to bed, how that lip would scab over and feel under his tongue when he kissed Bruce the next morning after waking up in their bed—Bruce’s bed—on accident. How that scab would stretch when the ghost of a smile caught Bruce by surprise after one of Dick’s terrible puns. “You okay?” Steph called across the Cave as she and Cass walked toward the med bay. “Never been better,” Dick replied, trying not to be put out at Jason’s eye roll. He put up a hand for Cass to inspect when she came up to his bedside, and after she had nodded her satisfaction of his health he smiled. “I’ll be right as rain in no time.”

And the 66! meets polycule! fic:

“You!” Robin shouted, not waiting for Batman to back him up as he charged toward the Riddler. Riddler didn't move—in fact, none of the three moved—then Robin was on him, punching his face hard enough to hear a distinct crack. That startled all three into action, Riddler swearing up a storm before throwing himself behind the blue masked man, who blocked Robin's next hits without hesitation. “Robin!” Batman called from somewhere behind him, but Robin ignored him, focusing his energy on striking past the masked man's defenses to get at Riddler. “I know you're behind this, you– you scum!” Robin snarled in Riddler's direction, placing a perfectly timed jab toward the masked man's left cheek and then feinting to the right. But the man met him easily, as though they were merely sparring. “I'm not who you think I am!” Riddler exclaimed, his hands cupping his face but doing little to staunch the blood streaming from his nose. “Let's slow down for a minute, okay?” the masked man said, his voice maddeningly level as if Robin wasn't trying every trick he knew to get past him. “We can explain.” “Yeah kid, there's a good explanation here, we promise,” Riddler added. Robin growled and spun around the masked man's reach only to find him once again directly blocking him from Riddler. How in the dickens did he know exactly where Robin was going to strike before Robin himself knew? And why on earth was he protecting the Riddler? “Supes, we could use a hand here,” the masked man said, still obnoxiously calm, once again blocking Robin's fist and this time circling his hand around Robin's wrist to twist his arm behind his back. In a blink, Robin was lifted into the air by his collar, the blue and red suited man holding him at arm's length. Robin continued to struggle for a moment, but finally Batman came into view, frowning up at him. Seeing Batman's disapproval took every bit of wind from Robin's sails, and he deflated instantly. If Batman didn't think he needed to fight, then he probably didn't need to.

So as you can see, I just kinda fill in the details with each draft!

Which is where we come to the optional second draft. I try, I really do try, to do a full second draft of everything I write. I always am glad to have done one, once it's done. The problem is, I really do have very limited energy, and anything longer than a chapter or two just doesn't get finished if I try to give it a full second draft. I've instead been doing really vigorous line edits, which I don't have an examples of because those are done in the same document as the first draft!

Now, you're probably wondering why on earth I gave a smut content warning at the beginning of this post. WELL.

I am calling myself out as a newbie when it comes to the art of smut writing. My 5+1 fic, the one where literally every single part has extremely explicit smut, has the following in the zero draft:

Yes, that is not one, not two, but three "cue smuts." Clearly I was new at this (affectionate)

Shout out to past!me for this in the last part though, because at least it actually has some semblance of blocking even if it is still extremely lacking:

The kissing escalates (as it often does) to smut over the desk (though Dick does try to move the documents out of the way, even if Bruce is growling at him to leave it alone; he doesn't want to be the reason Tim has another caffeine-induced breakdown).

I didn't figure this out until I was actually writing this fic, but it turns out I not only need to block in regular action scenes, I also need to block in the smut, because otherwise I will be sitting there having no fucking clue what to write (very affectionate)

So I now present what a zero draft of smut looks like! This is from a 5+1 in which there are five times Bruce and Dick fuck because of Poison Ivy's sex pollen and it "doesn't mean anything," plus one time they fuck because they actually want to:

Dick asks if they can take off their suits, it's too hot he's too hot, and Bruce says okay, that's a good idea, and internally he's panicking because oh no. Oh no. But the moment the words are out he sees the relief in Dick's face, and realises Dick needs to be told what to do right now, so he tells him clearly to strip, it'll help. Once Dick is fully naked in the other seat, he turns to Bruce and asks if he needs help with his armor. His hand is tentatively, almost shyly stroking his cock, and Bruce is really struggling to not watch. He tells him no, he doesn't, and takes off the chest plate and arm armor, but leaves what's left of his leg armor on. He decides he can safely put his hand under his boxers, but Dick makes a little noise, and when he looks over he can clearly see Dick watching him stroke himself. Oh fuck. He's cumming before he even realises it, his boxers getting wet and sticky and his cock still so maddeningly hard and he strokes himself through it, unable to stop himself from moaning even as he tries to keep himself in a clinical mindset. Dick asks to see him, and Bruce, despite knowing what a bad, horrible idea this is, pulls down his boxers to reveal his cock. Dick shifts his hand on his own cock to mimic what Bruce is doing, and Bruce has the horrible realisation that he doesn't even really know how to jerk himself off. Dear God, hopefully Alfred stays the fuck out of the Cave tonight.

So it's really just more of the same general blocking directions and vibes!

Another thing of note for zero drafts, I try to use as few words as possible to get what I need across. These are only ever intended to be seen by myself and a beta, assuming anyone else besides me even sees them at all, so I use slang and shorthand and leave notes for myself in the text itself

This can be a bit weird for when I show it to betas (or anyone else, for that matter!) because there are some fics where the tone or the vocabulary in the zero is incredibly modern despite the fic being in a historical or pre-modern setting!

And I have yet to actually write the first draft of that one, so I'm going to give you the first draft of the "Cue more smut (but this time against the batmobile 😌)" scene so that you can see the difference between the blocking and an Actual Scene:

Bruce had turned his back to him, bracing himself against the batmobile, and Dick took hold of Bruce's hip to hold him steady when he slid a finger into his hole. A soft moan was all he got in verbal response, but Bruce pushed against Dick's finger despite Dick's best efforts to do this slowly. Chuckling under his breath, Dick slid in a second finger, relishing in the clench of Bruce's muscle as he began working him open. “Easy, B,” he said softly, leaning over him enough to move his hand from Bruce's hip to his cock. Bruce growled and arched into his touch, taking in Dick's fingers completely. “Someone's in a rush tonight, huh?” He didn't get a verbal response, not that he ever did. Bruce rarely spoke while full, relying instead on nonverbal communication to indicate his needs. It hadn't taken long for Dick to become acquainted with his movements back when they started this; after all, fucking was no different from fighting, not for them, not when they had flown side by side across Gotham for more than half of Dick's life. And Dick knew Bruce would always try to get him to rush just a little, knew he'd give in like he always did, wanting to have his cock inside Bruce as soon as physically possible just as much as Bruce did. He wasted no more time, sliding his fingers out and releasing Bruce's cock just long enough to slick up his own. The small whine from Bruce at the loss of contact ought to be ignored, ought not be acknowledged, and Dick knew that, but he couldn't resist leaning over to kiss the small of Bruce's back. Bruce huffed at him, glaring over his shoulder. Dick met his eyes with a grin. Then Dick gripped Bruce's hip again, holding him steady while Bruce leaned back to meet him, and slipped into his tight heat. There was a soft moan from Bruce the moment he bottomed out; Dick leaned forward again to kiss up his spine, keeping his cock buried deep even while Bruce began to rock back into him.

I do think the fic for @ful-crum would be easier if I had proper blocking for the smut, but also I do love a good challenge and you live and you learn, so I'm not super invested in going back and blocking in the smut at this point in time!

And honestly, once the line edits are done that's pretty much it!

I keep a little "posting info" doc for each and every fic I write, to which I add tags as I come to them in writing, so that I don't have to think about what needs to be tagged at the end after I've already forgotten what I've written. That has saved my butt so many times ngl, especially for longfics!

But really what keeps me from posting more often, despite how much I write, is that I fully finish fics before I post them, even if I'm posting them on a weekly or whatever basis. This is mostly because I can't guarantee when I'll need to randomly take several months off of writing, and I don't want to leave anything unfinished, but also because I don't want to actually end up leaving something unfinished for a few years until I cycle back into the fandom

And that's it!! Thanks for tuning in to this little master class :) If I can clarify anything please let me know; I tried to explain everything that I thought needed it but I can never tell what others will need more clarification on!!

And also, thanks again for asking this!! I don't know many people who do full drafts, or even many people who don't completely pants everything they write, and so I'm always excited to discuss my process!! I also am a firm believer in "take what helps and leave the rest," so if you find something in my process that sounds like something you'd like to do, give it a whirl!! I think it's super important to share the different kinds of processes there can be for writing, because everyone really writes so differently, you know?

Anyway, thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed my shitty early drafts (very affectionate)!!

#asks #idk what to tag this so that ill be able to find it again lmao #also shout out to whomever told you to resend it bc i was fully prepared to just have a screenshot of the ask and tag you in a post #this was very fun!!!#oh and this is for you and anyone else who sees this:#feel free to pop in my ask box and ask about what i'm working on at any time!!#i could ramble for hours about my wips #and to be able to talk about them is always a pleasure!!!

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