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nebbyy · 1 month

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Hi! I'm not sure if you are currently taking requests, so feel free to ignore mine if you aren't! If you are taking them, however, would you please write something for King Baldwin IV overhearing reader sing and falling further in love with her because of her soft and sweet voice? Upon realizing that he's there, she becomes extremely flustered and apologizes for disrupting his peace and quiet. Thank you!

King Baldwin IV x reader - Sweetest of melodies

A/N: omg it’s been so long since I’ve received a request! I can’t lie, Baldwin is my supreme comfort character, I think I’ll never stop writing fro him because it gives me sooo much joy😩😩😩 I personally like to think of this piece as taking place a few months after Baldwin’s and reader’s wedding, so it could be considered a sequel for my first fic ever. Also, the song mentioned in this piece is a real song from the 12th century called "Can vei la lauzeta" (in English,"When I see the lark") by Bernart de Ventadorn, and the painting is "Lovers in a garden" by Charles Edward Perugini!!

Oh btw!! I’m working on a long ass series about him, based off of a prompt by @phantomsghoulette which I absolutely LOVED. Sooo all the KoH fans stay tuned for future updates🤭

Warning: nothing really, just pure fluff. Maybe you could say that religious innuendos could be something triggering for some people but I don’t know. There might be ONE, SLIGHTLY spicy mention but only if you squint really really hard. Also, keep in mind that the historical accuracy in my fics is rather relative, I try to add some details here and there but I don’t have the knowledge (nor the skills) to write a piece 100% accurate to the real history. Also, reader’s gender is female and uses she/her pronouns!!

Word count: 2918

Someone would say Baldwin's patience could already be put to test by only his illness, which she ruthlessly does not grant him a moment's respite, the eternal enemy of his body and his spirit. But no, to this perpetual torment of his had to be added the perilous duties of a king. And it was certainly not governing his people and lands that sucked what little energy he had left; this duty of his, given by his father and willed by divine design, he had long since embraced.

It was the nobles, the leeches who had drained him of his lifeblood lately. It was their endless demands, the insidious words that hissed behind his back, the languid bows and sleazy gifts designed only to gain some favor from him. Looking around him, he seemed to see only vices and sinners, power-hungry beasts just waiting for his moment of weakness so they could feed on what Baldwin had under his power.

In fact, not without reason in the past the young monarch had attempted to abdicate the throne and leave it in the hands of one of his sisters, rid himself of this burden and devote the rest of his short life taking care of his declining health and to nurture his mind away from so much corruption. At times he dreamed of retiring to France, experiencing for the first time that cold climate and verdant landscape of which his preceptors and advisors told him so much.

In fact, not without reason in the past the young monarch had attempted to abdicate the throne and leave it in the hands of one of his sisters, rid himself of this burden and devote the rest of his short life taking care of his declining health and to nurture his mind away from so much corruption. At times he dreamed of retiring to France, to experience for the first time that cold climate and verdant landscape of which his preceptors and advisors told him so much.

And he dreamed of taking you with him, imagined how sweet his life would be if his only concerns were taking care of his health and you, faithful wife, sole blessing in his life battered by such burdens. How he would wish that his days would revolve around you, that his first thought in the morning would be riding by your side through the flourishing meadows, and his last thought in the evening would be caressing your face as you lie slumbering in his arms.

It would have been a blissful fate his, if only Sybilla's husband had not died at the very moment when he would have needed him most. If only his mother had not convinced him that Guido de Lusignan was a good fit for his sister and had continued to seek a new consort for her, perhaps that fate would not have been snatched from him so early. Too late to repent now, for Baldwin would have preferred to die agonizingly on his throne rather than leave power in the hands of that bumptious and arrogant lord, who was noble only in title.

And so he found himself in this sort of hellish limbo, forced into a position that should never be required of a man in his condition, but prevented by his morality from abandoning his reign, impelled by faith in God's greater plan, that his suffering should not be in vain.

And his faith always seemed to strengthen when he had a way to escape the stifling air that characterized the throne room, always packed with knights and crusaders and nobles, when he had a way to retreat to the palace gardens, one of the few verdant places in all of Jerusalem.

With slow, swaying steps, Baldwin strolled slowly among the local palm trees and flower beds from the faraway lands, those where men speak Italian and the more distant ones, those from which his fathers came. Exotic fruits mingled with those more congenial to the French, who out of nostalgia for their lands and fields did what they could to bring the seeds of these plants with them to overseas.

His mind seemed to go out, shifting his attention from the constant buzz of court demands and duties to the chirping of birds perched on the roof, to the eviction of the soft branches that shielded him from the scorching sun. He enjoyed the refreshing air that reigned in that small oasis of greens, which was able to infiltrate the fabric of his white robes, crossing the bandages that covered much of his body and finally reaching his skin, numbed by leprosy.

To tell the truth, of that refreshing sensation little reached his damaged nerves, if not for those few points that had been spared by the merciless disease, from which departed that unusual shiver that caused him a delicate smile of relief, enjoying the refreshing breeze. Then he closed his eyes and breathed in, discovering with satisfied surprise that that light gust was also a harbinger of an intoxicating perfume, a mixture of exotic and familiar.

How funny to think of the concept of "exotic", for an Angevin born and raised in the unknown lands of the east. For him it was exotic French fruit, exotic were the green plains and heavy clothing that brought his allies from the northwest, and equally alien to the snowy mountains and forest beasts that he saw drawn in detail in his childhood books. It was these changes of perspective that stimulated his mind in a myriad of thoughts and reflections, but in a pleasurable way for him, not as exhausting as his daily duties.

His reflections on exotic and local made his mind travel, wandering until he came to a subject very close to him: Muslims and Jews, reflecting well on the landscape in front of him, recognized that he could share with them the same concepts of what is foreign and what they can claim the original belonging. And he could not but reflect on how it must have been for the first inhabitants of Jerusalem to observe the Franks who came as conquerors, and filled their gardens with such foreign plants as those pale warriors who had taken possession of their dwelling... But after all, the French soldiers who were emissaries of God’s will needed something familiar to stabilize them as they fought to reclaim the Promised Land, ut Deus voluit.

But all his brooding over these matters of conquest and submission ended up in the background in his mind, when a colorful scarlet sphere caught his attention. An exquisitely red apple seemed to tempt him from a branch just above his head, beckoning him to be picked and savored by the king, that he might lose himself in the juicy sweetness of that fruit with origins so far removed from the Holy Land. But the king's modesty prevented him from yielding to that temptation, wanting to avoid exposing the advanced state of deterioration in which his mouth was.

And in fact if that temptation had been alive it would have pale in front of something much more captivating, a sound that echoed in the most melodious distance of the song of any nightingale. Baldwin was surprised to think that he had not realized before the melody that inibriated the atmosphere around him, so taken by the tribulations of his mind that he almost missed such an intoxicating song. He did not know what he felt once he arrived in Heaven, if he had ever arrived in spite of the unjust fate in Hell that the evil Saracens wished him. He didn’t know it, but if one ever had to imagine what Heaven sounded like, that song would come to mind.

When I see the lark beating

Its wings in joy against the rays of the sun

That it forgets itself and lets itself fall

Because of the sweetness that comes to its heart

She sang in Occitan, the beautiful one in the distance. The voice of his people, of his lineage, that few in the palace can pronounce after so many years of distance from their homeland in Provence. Paying more attention to the echoing song, he would not even have had to approach it to give a face to that melodic voice: he knew how to recognize his wife’s voice.

Yet it was a new context in which he saw you, new facets of you that he had not yet had a chance to observe. Your voice, sweet as honey, venerable like all your other traits, he had never heard it except in speech, when you were proclaiming orders before your subjects with the authority fit for a queen, or when you laughed at the poems and performances of the court singers, or when you whispered in Baldwin’s ears sweet words, while you lay with bodies merged between the soft silk sheets. Always spoken, but never sung.

Alas! Such great envy then overwhelms me

Of all those whom I see rejoicing,

But though he didn’t need to approach you to recognize you, the desire to see your face exceeded any of his other needs. As if mesmerized by the sound of a siren, Baldwin was advancing towards you, with steps so slow that it seemed a hunter about to catch a deer in the woods. He wanted nothing more than to hear you sing again, that you continue to bless him with that angelic melody. What worse sin would there be than to interrupt your song, more sacred than a prayer?

His stomach filled with butterflies and turned upside down like the beasts' jugglers, his breath seemed to stop in his throat, depriving him of the breath he no longer needed, as long as he could hear you sing a moment more. And her cheeks warmed, when finally she saw you among the white lilies, more beautiful than divine salvation.

I wonder that my heart, at that moment,

Does not melt from desire.

Baldwin wondered if you sang with him in mind, if those words of love reflected your own emotional turmoil.

Oh, if only it were so, and your singing equalled his own words inscribed in the sonnets and poems he composed in your honor, which he himself commissioned from your favorite singers to perform at banquets, only to steal an embarrassed smile and to see the blush of your cheeks, along with the glint in your eyes.

Whether it was or not, the outcome remained the same since he was at that moment in your proximity, in the same state mixed with adoration, love and wonder at the bold gesture. But if only he had confirmation from your words...

Alas! How much I thought I knew

About love, and how little I know,

Because I cannot keep myself from loving

The one from whom I will gain nothing.

"My angel, your voice sounds like heaven but your words are false." Baldwin practically saw you blow up from your session, completely taken aback by his sudden appearance, unaware that your husband has been acting as a secret public all this time. Your initial surprise quickly turns into a laugh to mask your embarrassment for being caught in a moment like this, when you thought you were alone to be able to run the streets of music with your voice.

"I beg your pardon, I thought I was alone in the gardens," your eyes met his own only for a moment, before you turned your face to try and hide the blush of your face, "it was just a silly song I heard singing to the Provençal knights. I hope I did not disrupt your walk, my love..”

He laughed softly, trying to hide his amusement from having caught you off guard. He approached you more quickly than when he did just a few moments before, but with the same phlegm that managed to inspire a feeling of safeness in you. Sitting by your side on the bare rock, he raised his bandaged hand to gently cup your face and make you turn your eyes towards him. It was only then, when you had no choice but to look at Baldwin in the face that you noticed how his eyes, the only part of his face exposed to the outside world, formed two half-moons, and you came to find that it was because of how widely he was smiling, as you lowered the veil from his face.

He was making fun of you, you realized. With that swagger in his manner, you understood that his amusement came from your embarrassment at that silly misunderstanding. Laughing softly, he gently shook his head before bringing both hands to your face, holding it as if it were the most sacred of relics. "As much as I would love to hear you sing of your affection for me, just to hear your voice echoing in the air is the sweetest of gifts. How could you deprive me of this blessing thus far, my dear?"

You could do nothing but giggle at his sweet words, bringing your hands to his wrists to feel him closer to you. "You flatter me, my king. My voice boasts nothing more than those sweet melodies that the singers in the palace sing. Mine is only a dabble."

His gaze softened, his playful spirit addicted to your presence. He took the floor again, in a tone as soft as cotton, "At least this once, my queen, allow me to disagree with your words. My life may be short and my reality small, but never have I heard such an angelic voice, singing such sweet melodies. And God may not yet have granted me the ability to predict the future, but in my heart I know well that never will any singer be able to hold a candle to your beautiful voice, never will any song be able to express the same feeling of ecstasy.

"You, my angel, have managed to make a simple ballad an absolute work of art through your voice. I think I should take you with me into battle next time, for with your mere voice you could addict Saladin and his entire army.

"And seeing you here, angelic and perfect like the lilies that surround you, singing so softly that it would make any bird jealous, that I realize that whatever toil, whatever challenges God has stored up for me, and all those that still await me in my life, are worth it, if at the end of each of them there is you, voice of an angel, to hold a place for me in your arms of heaven."

You were sure you were on the verge of crying a flood of tears, the result of pure emotion at his sweet words. It was not new to you that Baldwin worshipped you as much as the God to whom his kingdom was consecrated, from the first moment he got to hear your voice and admire your face, and you knew at once that he had become yours, body and soul. But it was new to you to see him like that, completely entranced by your simple being-it was something new. A wonderful newness that made you feel like the most desired of women on this earth.

Taken by a rush of boldness, you practically jumped into his arms, wrapping your arms around his neck; you ended up on top of him, with his hands around your hips. You both laughed, like two little boys frolicking in the gardens. And you left a kiss on his left cheek, then on the bridge of his nose. A kiss again on his forehead, and then down on the side of his lips. When you were about to give him another kiss, just where he most yearned for your lips, against his, you stopped a few inches away, with a wide smile, before speaking again, "If so little is enough to make your happiness, then I will sing to you every day, whenever you ask. Let me be your nightingale, your morning song and your lullaby all at once!"

"I couldn't wish for anything else, my dear. Now, however, I beg you, sing one more melody for me, before my duties drag me back to the palace, and I shall consider myself a blessed man."

"With great pleasure, my love." Your voice was now little more than a whisper. With a languid movement, Baldwin moved his body to rest his head on your lap, and you eagerly greeted him. After slightly moving the hood that veiled his head, so that you could play with his golden locks, you began to sing a new melody, one that this time spoke of reciprocated love, of the joy of being able to hold your loved one in your arms. But the words you sang barely reached Baldwin before his sky-colored eyes closed softly, his mind giving him at least a moment's despite from his perilous life. You continued to sing, caressing his face, which from day to day appeared more and more mutilated by his disease, singing the sweetest of melodies so as to prolong this idyll in which you and your husband found yourselves in.

For with you Baldwin had a way of putting the crown aside, and being nothing more than a foolish young man in love, whose only duty was to love you, to love you with all the love that an angel like you deserved.

@sweetworkoffiction hope you like it <3

#fluff #writers on tumblr #f!reader #kingdom of heaven #king baldwin iv #king baldwin x reader #king baldwin x you #koh #medieval fiction #historical fiction #writing requests #requests open #anon ask #anon request

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grincubus · 2 years

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could we get nsfw/kink hcs for nami and nico robin with a male s/o? preferably dom but you can make it more neutral if you want. please and thank you!!!

this one was fun to write b/c ive never thought of either of them as subs before lmao. ask and you shall receive <(￣︶￣)>

headcanons for nami / nico robin x dom male s/o.

N/S/F/W CONTENT ; MINORS DO NOT READ / INTERACT, YOU WILL BE BLOCKED.

cw: restraints (both), light voyeurism (nami), light free use (robin), sensory deprivation (robin), groping? (robin), light public sex (robin)

NAMI

being watched. not by anyone other than you, though! she loves touching herself while you watch, especially if it's some sort of roleplay where you're a neighbor passing by and happen to catch her spread on the bed masturbating before coming in to "finish the job". if you sit back and make her finger her cunt in front of you, she'll cum so hard she'll see stars. loves the reverse of it too, watching you work your cock for her.

when you cum on her. she thinks you cumming inside her feels really gross, so you'd better pull out in time and not expect her to swallow, but she secretly likes it when you cum on her body. feeling your hot cum on her back, chest, and especially face really gets her going for another round.

roleplaying. gets really into it LMAO. her favorite one at the moment is her as a newly minted marine trying to climb up the ranks who captures you, a notoriously dangerous pirate, only to escape your restraints and puts her in her place by fucking her stupid. ♡

hates quickies. she spends enough of her day worried about lost time! why would want to deal with that during sex, too? loves it when you devote your time to pulling her apart bit by bit and spoil her. it makes her feel so good. ♡

clothed sex, but is too embarrassed to admit it. the desperation behind it is what really gets her going. she especially likes being felt while she's wearing her clothes, but only in the right moments. if you've been working her up throughout the day and sidle up behind her to slide your hand up her shirt and rub her pussy through her shorts, her knees will be buckling in no time. (she also likes thigh riding, but specifically while she's clothed.)

praise kink. nami likes being complimented. if you don't do so first, she'll initiate it, asking if she's being good for you, if she's the prettiest woman you've touched, if her pussy feels so good you'd want to fuck her forever. it turns her on like crazy! a good way to tease her is by praising her, but be specific; she hates generic compliments.

being restrained. finds it really hot when you tie her up and push her down into the mattress to go to town on her, but it's actually quite hard to do. as a pirate, it's not very difficult for her to break out of her hold. she always ends up coming loose and often does so to annoy you, so you'll have to get creative in your punishments. ♡

NICO ROBIN

unsurprisingly, using hands. she'll secretly fondle you in public using her devil fruit abilities. she gets off on making you cum without actually being with you. she does this often to incite your annoyance to punish her later. has a thing for your hands as well - she loves when you finger her, especially during quick & dirty moments when you're both needed elsewhere.

being restrained. unlike nami, it's more of an amusement for her lmao. she can always get out whenever she wants. likes when you force her hands behind her back and bully your cock down her throat ; the idea of being unable to move is arousing to her.

getting it on in dangerous places. not so much into weapon play, but she's something of a mild adrenaline junkie. she loves being bent over the rim of the crow's nest and fucked when she could fall at any moment, or getting plowed in the alley next to a busy market where marines could catch her at any moment.

sleepy sex. not into somnophilia, but she looooves when you fuck her early in the mornings or late at night, when she's drowsy and can feel the heat of your cock spearing her cunt open. ♡ it's a good way to clear her mind and just feel good, but it can be tiring.

slight free use. she won't drop her pants during any circumstance, ofc, but she finds being fucked whenever and wherever you want exciting. being desired by you at all times gets her hot, so when you tug her aside from a meeting or in a street and tell her what you want, she won't refuse. if you approach her when alone and feel her up, she'll reciprocate.

loves cockwarming. with how busy she is she doesn't get to do it often, but it shuts her brain off immediately and fills her with hot tingles from head to toe. at night she'd much rather warm you while you sleep than have you pull out, but she especially likes warming you with her mouth, sat under your desk while you work and nursing your cock in her throat. loves to work you through multiple orgasms as well.

sensory deprivation. she's always so aware of everything all the time, so she loves handing that burden over to you! loves not being able to tell or control what's happening to her and having that decided by you. when you tie her up and blindfold her, even gag her or plug her nose while you do as your please or punish her, she'll lose composure in minutes. ♡

#one piece smut #one piece x reader #male reader #nami x reader #nico robin x reader #mine

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gingkos-eldritch-secret · 8 months

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Fanfiction commentary and recommendations: Lex Luthor´s ascend from supervillainy to fatherhood Part VII (chapters 31 to 35)

The Original story by @halfagone can be found here.

The previous parts of the commentaries can be found here:

Part I

Part II

Part III

Part IV

Part V

Part VI

I´m very sorry that this part is so late - this is what happens when you´re on vacation and decide to do two long-term projects at once. At least they´re going well?

Anyways. What awaits us in these five chapters is a sneak peek into the minds of some Amity Park residents, a foray into social media´s stance on our favourite ghost as well as said ghost´s birth- and death days. Quite the packed program if you ask me! Without further ado - here we go :)

○○○••○○•••○○••○○○

We begin, as is quite unusual in this fic, with Sam. And the first thing we see is her frustration about her parents, combined with all the pent-up worry and rage about Danny´s disappearance as well as all her arguments with Tucker and wow - Danny sure seems to have been the glue keeping the both of them together.

I think what fuels all that rage annoyance is the guilt she feels at 'not having been there' for Danny before he fled into the realms and the portal got him. And it´s unreasonable for sure, but in the end I´d do the same. Regardless of how senseless it seems.

And Sam can´t even absolve herself of her guilt because life had gone on. The school year has gone on and people had started asking questions, with Dash and Valerie being the most persistent. And wow, Dash must really have been having a kiddie crush on Danny for him to worry so much. If only he´d shown that sooner and to Danny though… but we always only get such apologies too late in the end. And they also don´t make any inflicted pain easier …

Sam also finds this weird, especially since Dash, after years of not even being friends anymore, can still remember what Danny had wanted to become when he was older and that Danny could do the same.

How weird it was to know that Danny and Tucker and a bunch of the A-listers had gone to the same schools since elementary and some of them had even been friends? It certainly rubs Sam the wrong way.

What doesn´t is Valerie´s behaviour. Because, yes, Val and Danny had broken up long ago but neither had seemed all too ready to let it all go. There had always been LOOKS if you know what I mean.

And yeah, Sam had been jealous at the whole affair, she´d also never really thought about getting together with him instead. Despite all the comments from the people around them. And I think that´s good. God only knows how annoying it can get when people try to set you up with your friends. It can get really awkward really fast.

But … the whole difference is that Sam at some point has begun to wonder 'what if'. And if that question comes up? Buddy, you know how it goes. There´s never any good when it comes to 'what if'. Because it is an inherently human quality to prevent those 'what if’s. Because they can hurt. Regardless of if these what if´s can really come to fruition or not.

In this case it would have probably been worse because she still feels such crushing guilt about the portal incident … it wouldn´t have been healthy. Couldn´t have been, but … yeah. Sam basically:

But she´d seen him at his worst. She´s seen how he works alone and with others, how he fights and protects and was to the town like Atlas was to the sky: always the one to take the burden. Without anyone knowing. And to know that such a devoted person? Such an ardent protector? Can love oneself? It sure is a beautiful thought.

While, yes, those are by naught the most important reasons she seems to like him, but …. They seem important, don´t they? Because if one can´t even understand that Danny, at his core, needs to protect those he loves? That he´ll even endanger himself if it means that those he loves can be save and that he´s also still just plain old Danny? The pun-loving weirdo he is? Those do seem like rather nice qualities to have, don´t they?

He´s just so kind. When Sam is … not. Sure, she´d help, but she doubts that she´d have been able to come out of the whole ordeal as strong as Danny. As free of resentment. But that´s not true, is it? He´s not free of resentment or hatred. He just chose to bury it all so deep, that you´ll need a submarine to find it. Doesn´t make it any less destructive though. And just how destructive it had gotten … we´ll see that in the latter chapters. Let´s just say: there are regrets from all the people around.

And with those thoughts we´re onto Dash. Who watches Sam and Tucker dance around each other without Danny able to defuse their arguments. And apparently the last big one was such a shitshow, that the majority of the class watched the whole thing like onlookers like to watch trainwrecks.

But as surprised as everyone was about these fights, he knows it´s because Danny´s gone. But. Why. What had happened? Danny was suddenly just not there anymore. And no, Dash´s definitely not simping for Danny. Naaaah, just imagination I guess ~

But. The trio always had attention. They each had their role and so everyone knew who Danny Fenton was, which makes it even stranger that no one seemed to know anything.

And after hearing the teachers talking about CPS because the Fenton parents’ had seemed to know something? Well … I think Dash has serious regrets. He never thought they could be abusive. Whack jobs, sure. But abusive? Hindsight is always 20/20 in the end. Regardless of how much regret we have.

It all just makes so much sense to Dash. All the bruises and injuries even long after he´d stopped getting physical. Now, we all know that his parents weren´t (the sole) reason. Sure, their chases may have contributed a bit, but in the end the ghost fights were the reason. Dash does not know that though. And he probably never will.

Apparently, Dash once thought that Danny was out there fighting ghosts after the whole debacle with Ember and Youngblood, but had stopped after not seeing him do so for years. His next thought that he was ferrying weapons to Phantom. And. That´s certainly not WRONG per se. But also, that he got roughed up trying to prevent his parents from chasing Phantom. Which is also true in a certain sense, but not really the truth.

That whole train of thought leads to him a whole thing about the Fenton parents and their bigotry and how the city had changed their thoughts on ghosts, but those two had just gotten worse. That they just continually choose to think the worst of ghosts when there had been enough evidence that pointed towards that not being the case.

Dash also thinks about Danny´s perceived fear of ghosts and how that, in the end can´t really be all that true in the end. Because Ember and Youngblood? His fights with the Box ghost? The one time he fist-fought skulker? Were all counter arguments. And very good ones at that. Also, ones that Dash kind of admired, but that´s beside the point for now.

And all of that leads to Dash noticing how the city looked at the moment. Decrepit. Because the ghosts had been more violent after Phantom disappeared, even though he´d seen him once in between (we all know that was Dani anyways). And the major had stopped caring about the town as much. And doesn´t that say many things about Vlad? That he basically abandoned the town as soon as Danny vanished?

So. Dash is wondering about Phantom and Danny and all of the change that has been happening. Understandable. Change … happens. Most of the time it´s nothing bad or nefarious, but sometimes … sometimes change is scary.

The only thing Dash was even sure of was that je missed Danny Fenton - not that he´d ever tell anyone. But it says many things about him, doesn´t it?

And then we get to Vlad, obsessive Vampire wannabe that he is, his first thought is 'where is Danny'. Quite on point, really. And to know that he´d spied on the Fentons with multiple cameras and bugs? Well. It´s Vlad.

Vlad, being who he is, had to gaslight himself into thinking that 'no, the Fenton parents would never do something to their child'. Vlad, if you know that you´re basically gaslighting yourself that´s not going to WORK.

What he also noticed was the damaged and shut down portal in the Fenton lab. And of course, he tried to redirect that to his own feelings about the proto-portal that blew up in his face. Just when is he ever gonna let go of his weird obsession of 'he´s for SURE like ME. ONLY I can understand him'? Someday, I hope. I want to say never, but the things happening in the later chapters gave me some hope in that regard.

And of course, Vlad just continues his search. Not that it´s ever fruitful, because no one will tell him anything. Deserved tbh. Especially since he apparently let the ghosts out himself to lure out Danny. And in doing so basically destroyed the town… Wow, disregarding human life like that? Really? Again? I’m not even disappointed. Just resigned. VLAD BE NORMAL FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE.

And of course, the only reason he cares about Danny is, that he´s losing his chance to steal him from under Jack´s nose. Because he´ll be an adult soon …. Whyyyy is he like this … and even if he says that he feels fear for him deep down. HOW deep down are we talking? Deeper than your moral compass, that´s for sure.

He apparently needs to find Danny before Vlad basically kills himself via haywire powers. That sounds incredibly fucked up if you ask me … and unhealthy. GO SEE A THERAPIST YOU LOON.

And then we have a little cameo of Clockwork who´s just like 'Be well my child. Just wait a little longer, your old home world is not yet ready for you to come back'. Which. Okay. Weird and slightly ominous, but okay.

Now, one of my favourite parts: social media.

Social media welcomes Danny back into metropolis (after a somewhat ominous sentence that 'If you´d like to leave anonymous tip, you can go to our website at ….' - not ominous at all, nope). Good news: PR is working hard and has announced that Danny´s in good health AND the Joker’s death was rules as self-defence! Whoop!

But even though so many people are celebrating and Gotham City is planning a party for the occasion and Bruce has done some PR resulting in a memorial for Joker´s victims, People on Twitter are split into two camps. The camp that is just happy that Danny´s save and sound and the camp that hates Danny even more now, that he inadvertently killed the Joker.

And that gets even worse when the audio recording of the questioning gets leaked, because of course it does. Danny can never catch a break, can he?

I do feel vindicated that so many people love Danny for chewing out batman though. Because that, indeed, was an awesome moment :3

But now the discussions have started up again. People are calling him a killer, suddenly he´s not a 'hero' anymore? And the recording was very obviously cut, making it seem as if Danny had wanted to kill the Joker from the beginning. And people …. Don´t like that. The two camps are basically going at each other´s throats and it´s not pretty.

One of the users has a very good response to that:

There are literally places where Danny starts talking mid-sentence after a cut. They weren’t trying very hard to hide their edits #I pity whoever fell for this shit #actually wait #no I don’t

Of course, the papers are already going at it. Typical. I swear they´re like sharks. Or piranhas. Or wasps when you´re having a barbeque. Or ants when you´re having a picnic.

Danny´s also on the Later night how! His first interview there, I´m so proud of him. He handled it so well!

And the two are interacting so sweetly? Like, they´re laughing and talking about silly things even though a big topic is how Danny´s still healing. I get the impression that he, too, would like to wrap Danny into bubble wrap so that he´d be save.

He´s also impressed that Danny´s able to take his injuries so well and is … quite alarmed at the answer being his family. And his godfather and his FREAKING BEARTRAP. Fuck Vlad. Have I said this already? Anyways. Fuck him. And not in a sexy way.

We get early birthday wishes and a discussion on the logistics of being a newly adopted billionaire son. How some things are not as different as they seem at first glance.

Danny talks about how actually living with Lex has been the biggest adjustment since Lex is now a new single parent. But also, a single parent to a fucking teenager of all things. But Lex is also trying to be there and to do things better - all things that Danny´s parents never did and honestly? The more I read about how they treated Danny and how they caused him so many issues via neglect the more homicidal I get.

And that´s just cute:

Luthor: He treats me very well for a man that has no experience with children or teenagers. I can’t speak for everyone my age, but one of the hardest parts about this age period is that most people still treat you like a child but expect you to act like an adult. [Nuñez nods] But Lex- I definitely think he has expectations, or at least standards, but I’ve never felt worried about what he would do if I didn’t meet those standards. He’s surprisingly good at… just- balancing my need for independence with his own concerns- especially with more recent events- while also trying to let me… be a kid, really.

Lex just genuinely being a good parent has my heart melting as if it´s ice cream and this story is a hot summer day.

And at the question on how it´s going with so much money to spend he just goes 'well, not that different. Kinda a billionaire magnet, but still a bit different living that lifestyle' Which, yeah. Both Sam and Vlad are filthy rich after all.

And then Danny complains about Vlad on live television and makes fun of is obsession with the Green Bay Packers and his awful taste in interior design and yes, he´s a gremlin and I love him xD

The internet adores the interview. As they should. Danny showed off his adorableness (is that even a word?) and many hearts were melted. Also: he´s just a funny little dude xD

Ah yes, we also have another anecdote about Kool-Aid man jack Fenton. And how much Danny had loved it that his father did that because Danny’s been sick and he´d called for them and it´s just AWWWWWWWWWW

Of course, the interviewer is a bit confused about the parents because he´d mainly heard bad things about them. And Danny, sweetheart that he is, tells him he certainly has good ones and gives examples but also kind of realizes that:

it’s been a long time since they were parents to me. And… maybe once upon a time they had been good parents, but I don’t think they were ever good people

And OOOOOF. My baby boi :')

Then we get to the birthday! Whoop! And Lex would really, really like to know who dared to upload the questioning to twitter please.

And because he´s not even sure why good old Jim is keeping all of those corrupt officers he´s just going to sew the GCPD and throw them all out. As a treat.

We also get more introspection on Lex´ thoughts on Harley and how he´s been preparing for Danny´s first therapy session with the woman. He also says that he can´t deal with her constantly running her mouth, but that Danny likes it and it´s Ivy who has to live with her (which is lowkey a burn)

Lex also knows that Danny´s hiding something from him, but that he´s been keeping under wraps.

When Lex gets a surprise call from his PA, he did not expect that it was because people just fricking love Danny and decided he needed birthday presents. It´s a whole room full of presents and oh boy. If we take the Mac´n´cheese aside, his favourite present is this HUGE Teddy bear as well as a galaxy night light and yeah. I understand xD

Danny´s delighted so suffice to say Lex isn´t all too mad about the whole affair. Of course, the PA films Lex´ and Danny´s reaction at the whole thing. Lex gets a copy and twitter does as well.

At Danny´s question how these people even know of his birthday the dry answer to that is 'It´s in your Twitter bio'. Ah yes, we love the dry humor in this house.

Twitter also adores the part of the interview on the Late-Night show where Danny´s asked about his favourite hero and his honest to God answer is Jazz. I cried - he´s so adorable.

Also: Spiderman is his favourite comic book hero. And with how similar these two are I´m not surprised xD

Everyone dies a little inside when Danny just casually says that he and his sister had to do all the chores, because their parents just WOULDN´T. And how his sister always took care of him. But also, how she always needed to be right, even if she wasn´t and for however adult she behaved, she´d still been a kid taking care of another kid. And how he´d kept forgetting that.

After that Lex is thinking about Danny and how his powers can both be a boon and a curse. He can do SO MUCH with them. Do so much good for himself or others, but he also can´t achieve his biggest dream because of them. And that´s just heartbreaking ...

But right now. They´re in the animal shelter to choose a cat. To say that Danny´s delighted would be an understatement if I ever heard one. And of course, Danny chooses the one cat that just hates the attention and the shelter. An after learning of her story? And how she´s slow to warm up and quick to nip? Well Reminds me and probably also Danny of a certain someone and so here we go. Cat acquired! A new achievement has been unlocked!

When Lex asks Danny why he´s even wanted to go to a shelter instead of a breeder the answer is so cute. 'I wanted to give one of them a second chance for a better life. Kind of like you did to me' Gosh my HEART. I´ll die of sugar overdose. Mercy also sends a video of the tail end of the conversation on her twitter account. Which beautifully shows how amazed and soft that makes Lex.

Of course Mercy and Lex annoy each other under that video and when Lena jumps into the conversation all hope is lost lmao. Danny learns of his aunt and well. Can´t hold the boy from family if you tried - Lex has regrets.

Next Kon brings Danny´s presents like a punk Santa Claus and is surprised that Lex left a window open for him. Well, joke´s on him because Lex sees him as a son now. He has no say in it. Not that he knows that as of yet. Or that Lex knows as of yet. But they´ll get there.

Danny lets Kon meet Pepper and even though it´s a bit awkward: it´s family.

Cass also gives him her wishes and Tucker, on a tear-stained pillow, does as well. God this boy needs something happy happening to him...

Sadly that´s when Death Day happens. It happens during a press conference where Lex gives a speech and Danny´s on the podium with him, even though he hadn´t really needed to be there.

Danny’s been rubbing his chest as if in pain and his expression has slowly gotten more and more pained and paniced. Lex has gotten worried.

And then Danny collapsed, started convulsing and … while the press loved getting that footage with camera shutters going off non-stop, Lex did certainly not. Sharks.

And that´s when Danny realized what day it is and oh boy. It´s not pretty. Danny´s just miserable when Lex tells him that it´s September 30th. Lex may not understand why, but still urges Mercy to remove everyone from the facility. Just. It´s too late for that already.

Danny screamed. He screamed as if dying. Loud and drawn out, with terror and agony on his face. And everyone´s just … frozen. Because that ... That was a death scream.

Mercy recovers first, telling Lex that they´d have to move him and Lex just … numbly nods.

The scene changes. We´re now with Clark and Lois and suffice to say that Clark is not well. He says that he will be fine, but … well. He still has the scream ringing in his ears. And Lois is also still processing the whole thing. Even when Clark was the only who´d heard Danny´s heart flatlining.

When Danny wakes up Lex is immediately in caretaker mode. Instantly asking Danny how he was feeling, giving him water, the works.

Danny´s just feeling awful and Lex wants to know why things happened as they did. When Danny just raises his shirt up to show Lex his scars, Lex is quietly but quite evidently horrified. The scars are glowing an angry green. Poor boy. The scars are showing up quite horridly to be honest.

While Lex is trying not to fall into alcoholism to deal with the situation and the revelations connecting to it, he gets a visitor. Let´s just say he´s not stoked about superman visiting him.

He´s flat out glaring at the man. And everything superman maybe wants to say comes out wrong. Not surprising with all the antagonism, even while superman wants to lend help.

Lex just flat out screams at him to get out and chucks the empty glass at him. Not that him being alone again makes Lex feel any better. But why did superman think this was a good idea? They´d never had a good talk. So why? He´d had to have known that this would´ve ended badly to begin with.

And now onto the last chapter for today. And when the notes say 'Hm, how can I make this hurt more?' then you know it will rip your heart out and trample on them.

So, the press has been having a blast with Danny´s collapse. They even out the scream into the media they published. Which is more than just bad taste if you ask me.

Clark is uneasy with the whole situation being as it is. The culprit mainly being the scream. It must have sounded horrid to have such an impact. I mean. It WAS a death scream, so of course he´d be worried, but … well. Danny´s heart had stopped.

And Clark also … doesn´t really know how to break the news to Kon or Jon. And when he wants to its already too late since the news have been talking about it on and off since the day had started.

Kon seems to feel guilty because he hadn´t heard anything, especially since he´d been on babysitting duty that day. But before he falls into a hole of self-deprecation, he asks Clark just what happened. Clark is entirely unhelpful at first. 'Just what the press has released'. As if that was all that he´d heard. But after a bit of wheedling, he elaborates: The heart rate speeding up as soon as Danny had shown discomfort, how quickly it happened. How he screamed immediately after he flatlined. How the heart had restarted without assistance but had been … slower after that. How Clark visited the penthouse the previous night and heard Danny´s heartbeat being the same as usual. He doesn´t mention Lex and his reaction though.

He also doesn’t share more about his thoughts on the relationship between Danny and his parents and how they were nearly criminally neglectful. How Danny had been afraid to live under the same roof as them and all of that in addition to Danny´s health problems? Well. He´s just happy that Lex had been able to give him a better home.

Of course, Kon immediately wants to go visit his brother, as is his right. Clark just doesn´t think it´s a good idea. You know what though? Fuck Clark. Let the boys spend time together. If something like this happened to me I´d also like some visits from my family.

Of course, Clark and Kon have a quarrel about it shortly before Kon storms off. And when Jon asks 'Did you two have a fight again?' Clark realizes that maybe he should consider this problem. Another time though. For now, though he´d have to talk about Danny with his son. What I really dislike is how he uses 'Kon´s friend Danny' instead of 'Kon´s brother' because honestly? The man should have realized their relationship by now.

Kon gets to the penthouse and deliberates how he should get in when Lex just straight up opens a window for him. Kon is prepared for a fight and Lex is just too tired to care.

I mean how done must the man be if he showed himself in SHORTS? And a polo shirt? For Lex that´s downright blasphemous to be honest. Doesn´t help that he looks exhausted.

Kon takes all of this in and realizes that for the longest time he hadn´t thought of the man as human. Or at least not as the sort of person to need rest and/or food.

While he still ruminates about all of that, Lex tells him that Danny would be waking up in a few minutes since he´d been sleeping in strange 57-minute increments. Always waking up screaming. God that must hit Lex hard.

But in the meantime, instead of just standing around they talk. About the noise isolation of the penthouse, Lex´ willingness to let Kon see his other son, Lex even offers Kon self-made food and that´s the point that surprises Kon the most. That Lex can cook. Lex being the way he is I’m not surprised about that though.

I mean, should he really be surprised? It´s Lex. The man doesn´t want to depend on someone for his livelihood so of course he can cook.

And in the deceptive calm that follows Kon asks if Danny´s going to be okay. Lex … doesn´t answer for some time, but when he does it´s for the bad news that this wasn´t the first and won´t be the last time. Of course, Kon wants to know how to make it stop … and Lex seems forlorn at the question. At the implication that Lex would be capable of doing it.

While Lex desperately wants to do that, to heal his son of something that causes him such a pain, it´s impossible. And that´s just another punch to the gut.

Lex, again, asks if Kon would like food. Upon the question of cereal being available Lex just tells Kon to 'pick his poison'. Kon sees the fruit loops and is even more confused at the titbit that Danny likes to crush them before he eats them (and isn´t that just a fun thought? I imagine it being quite therapeutic). Kon takes the lucky charms instead. To which I have to say no clue if it´s a good choice or not, I don´t know all of your fancy American cereals.

When Danny wakes with a scream Kon straight up zips upstairs to his bedroom, while Lex takes a bit more time, cleaning the dining area and being despondent because no medication will make the pain go away. Therefore, cursing his own uselessness. And Amity Park´s ignoring of Danny and his problems.

As Kon and Danny talk Lex lets us see deeper into his feelings by mentioning, that he´d not wanted anyone to talk to Danny, but that the emotions would help Danny heal. They´d amass and bring ectoplasm with them, which is what Danny needed to heal.

Therefore, in theory, Danny can sense any and all emotions. He´d have to focus on them though, to know what they actually mean.

So Kon and Danny talk and banter and pet Pepper and Lex is just there, basically thinking about a great many things, including both of his sons and how he may have fucked up his relationship with one of them. He´s also surprised about Kon going to school. Which. Lex. LEX. Why did you think otherwise??

When Kon is gone, they talk about therapy again and how much Danny probably needs it. How Lex would probably need it as well, but can´t considering that his board of directors as well as the public would see it as a sign of instability and therefore boot him out of the company. Yeah, he really did not make many friends, did he?

And on the question why Danny doesn´t want it despite Jazz wanting to become a therapist? Danny tells Lex about Spectra. I hate that woman, so, so much tbh. She deserves the WORST.

When Danny calls himself a freak of nature, Lex calmly explains to him that no, he´s not. He overcame nature, he lived despite the odds. He may be rare, whichever species he identifies as, but is still a person like any other. Perhaps even stronger, since Danny just keeps on fighting against the odds.

And Danny admits that he´s just afraid of being right. Lex admits that he´s afraid of many things - losing everything he built for example. But also, that we can´t be afraid forever and can I just say? Preach.

Fear is a very, very powerful thing. It can consume us until we are but a husk of ourselves in our daily lives. It can take our light and our joy and our love and leave us with nothing but itself for company. And fighting against it is hard. So, so very hard. Maybe one of the hardest things to do even. But that does not mean we should stop fighting, does it? Regardless of how hard it gets; life can still be worth living for.

And Danny does promise to at least try. I´m incredibly proud of him for that. Because it´s a hard step to take and one that takes courage. Courage that a great many people do not have.

Then we come to Lena and Lex who have a sibling talk to last the ages. That Fatherhood suits Lex, even though he has the feeling it makes him age twice as fast. But that he also looks so much happier nowadays.

And then Lena destroys the good mood by asking Lex if he´d talked to their father recently. That he´s been asking about Lex. Who would rather jump into a vat of acid than talk to the man. And in the light of what will happen later? Yeah, that´s a good choice. That man is just pure malice incarnated, but we´re not there yet. This is just the foreshadowing.

The man apparently also wants to meet Danny and Lex would rather that not happen. When Lena just looks puzzled about that, he elaborates that none of them had a good relationship with their father. So why would she even ask? For hope of a happy family? She´s known them her whole life, shouldn´t she know better? But I guess that´s the hopeful optimist that´s speaking out of her.

And in the end, Lex does admit that fatherhood, that the content feeling he has by taking care of Danny, that that is happiness. And that´s just cute. He´s a father peeps. He´s a happy father :3

The end comes upon us with Harley hugging the living daylights out of Danny and talking with him. Danny goes right for the heavy stuff with the sentence "

“When I was fourteen, I died,” Danny told her suddenly, giving her reason to pause. “I don’t think I ever really came back.”

And just ouch. True, but ouch.

And with that this part comes to its end.

A great many things happened in just five chapter. So many words, so much and yet so little time going by. Things are starting to fall into place, don´t they?

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thingintheroad · 1 month

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trans!nigel, less murderous, w/ loving parents mention.

trans nigel inspired by/credit to @gali-in-distress and @laurelwen

might write a canon-adjacent one when i feel more sane so keep ur eyes peeled :3

／(˃ᆺ˂)＼

it had been a particularly strange week. nigel had been acting off for a few days, and had stopped bringing in animals like he usually did.

yes, alex almost preferred the lack of carcasses being split open in the room he slept in, but he knew it was something nigel enjoyed.

one night, nearing midnight, alex woke to nigels bed empty and the door to their room open. this was strange, but alex thought his roommate had simply gone for a weirdly late walk. it made sense with the whole...everything about him.

he got up and headed to the bathroom, cup in hand, to get some water. he had fallen asleep far too early and forgotten to get one like he usually did, so his mouth felt like it was full of dust.

as he approached, he heard a low voice reciting hail marys - in latin.

"Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum."

that was definitely nigel. he had seen nigel's extensive collection of rosaries. it had been unexpected, but the boy definitely seemed the sort to collect.

alex had heard nigel praying the rosary, and had been dragged along to a rosary service when nigel insisted alex and susan at least join him once. not in latin, though, but this didnt come as a surprise either.

"Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus."

he could hear running water behind nigel's voice, and saw steam rolling out from under the door. he might have thought to knock, had he not been transfixed by the hum of his outward devotions.

"Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen."

without thinking, alex grasped the door handle.

very, very thankfully, nigel was stood in front of the sink in his pyjamas. the rosary he had been gifted when he first started at the boarding school was wrapped around his hands, wooden beads clacking softly. as moved closer, alex realised there were a pair of blood-covered gloves on the sink. he froze in place.

"nigel-"

the boy at the sink turned, eyes wide.

"nigel why are those gloves covered in blood"

he took a second, turning to look at the gloves then back at alex.

"period, sorry, i ran out of what i take to avoid it."

alex felt the biggest wave of relief wash over him. he would have collapsed right on the floor were it not for the fact it would have resulted in a cracked-open skull.

"dont be sorry, do you need anything from the room?"

he attempted to not let the relief seep too far into his voice, but the grin that overtook nigel's face told him immediately that he had failed.

"you thought i'd killed someone!"

the tone was playful, unaccusatory, but still made alex cringe at himself.

"an animal, not a person, i dont think youd have it in you to take down a whole human."

the two went back and forth on this for a little while, before nigel banished alex, as the bath had filled.

back in the dorm, alex considered what he would have done if it had turned out that nigel had killed someone, and came to the conclusion that he would have helped him bury the body.

when nigel came in, hair damp, alex felt at ease again.

"would i be able to ask a question?"

"no. joking, go ahead"

alex pondered the phrasing. he didnt want to come off as invasive, but was genuinely curious.

"so, why do you pray rosary in latin during your period?"

a grin similar to the one earlier split the boys face again. he hung the beads on the pegboard above his bed, and sat facing alex.

"i dont like thinking about it too much, obviously, but i feel a sort of duty to take extra steps in my faith during the week. its a distraction i guess, my period is a physical reminder that ive got a while to go in terms of transition. i learnt to use the rosary as a distraction when i first got my period, i thought i was being punished for not being enough of a boy and began praying and advocating that Mary would ask God to forgive me for it. obviously i know it isnt, now, my parents had to sit me down with a priest to explain that i was fine."

settling down to sleep, alex thought about how he might have reacted in the same situation. would he have also assumed he was being punished by God, or was that a nigel-specific attribute?

he never got the water.

#coping #projecting #authors feelings adapted into canon-typical assumptions #alex version coming soon #like minds 2006 #like minds #nigel colbie #trans nigel #susan mueller #susan is alive #nigel's parents love and care for him

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furymint · 6 months

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2023 Creator Reflection

ffxiv.

1. dance me to the end of love

this one was fun! i always like merging a character's outfit with the bg so i liked doing that again. picking the colors for elliots outfit was also enjoyable. ive wanted to make smth w that cover for a while

2. shame was still the tyrant of his life

i only wrote two nol and eli things this year and neither of them are finished. the first was a continuation of a scene where nol kisses elliot against the blue stained glass in his room--i once posted it but then i deleted it bc it made me feel woozy for its allusions to sex. i wanted to rebuild it and take a shot at it now that im comfortable writing n reading sex, but i never got very far. theres actually lots of nice parts! i just like nols dumb angsting the best!

3. valentine

i really wanted to focus on nol's eye here, but also not make it too obvious lol. i used a ps filter like a schmuck but i wanted it to be darker without making it even more difficult to see, so i took away their bodies and limited the colors to make it what it is.

4. amateur cracksmen

the second nol n eli wip, which doesnt have many interesting lines rn, was a raffles-inspired story where eli drags nol as his valet to a rival artist's house and tries to steal back the brooch that he bought from an underground dealer feat. much babbling abt the state of societal responsibility that war is supposed to bring

ffxvi.

1. herz an herz dir

i wrote some reflections about this one already here. i honestly was very (distressed voice) cant believe im writing pure fanfic for the first time in over ten years and lacked a lot of direction when i started bc uhhhhh terence has 8 and a half mins of screen time. i tried to convince myself that it's not much different than me stealing brucemont for my own evil devices, but the unique perspective of seeing quite so much fan content def influenced my interpretation. i wanted their relationship to be much more imbalanced from the get-go initially--dion using his power unintentionally and terence barely passing a thought abt it until later bc he's just so accustomed to obeying--but i ended up giving terence a lot more sway & ammunition in their argument. the breakfast bed thing is also smth im rly fond of.

2. mund an mund

there's also additional meta for this one here. i made a silly doodle abt it also. dion kept picking fights here! it honestly turned out how i expected. when i first started this fic, i was gonna have dion start out right in oriflamme and meet ter and kihel there, but i booted them to northreach so i could have this stretch of conflict. i think it's like. Bad Pacing. technically. if i still believe the conflict introduced in the next chapter is the core one, that is. which i sorrrrta do. but i dont care bc i rly like the visual of kihel laying in dion's lap and getting to put a gun on the wall w ahmed.

3. eines atems

its been two months since the last chapter and this chapter is humiliatingly not written. i have all my scrambled notes and scenes that i jotted down in between the first two chapters, so i have a full direction, but it's been really difficult to write lately. ive been devoting all my time to trying to recoup my mental health and work on my teredio secret santa. ill start next year with this wip as a priority, so for now i only have the photoshop edit for it. kihel is holding terence's hand--it's his pov turn.

overall i didnt like this year very much. i didn't read, create, research or do a lot even though i tried to. i became really disconnected from all of my friends bc im too tired to stay for rp or hold online conversations. at this point, i dont play ffxiv at all except the few times i managed to rp a little. i moved into nanny's house and have my own space, but don't have the presence of mind to do anything about my pc, books, and so on, although i did make a lot of progress rewrapping my books w fresh wraps and some other things. my plans for next year are to reach out to a couple of my friends, build my pc, relearn + rebuild + relaunch my queer lit blog on open source code, survive school, and rediscover the productivity ive lost the past few years.

teredio has helped me a LOT to find community, inspiration, and art in my loneliest year yet. im very proud of my fic and grateful every day to the ppl who have reached out to me about liking it. even if im sorry about my productivity rate in comparison to how many extraordinary writers there are in the ship's fandom, i know i have to be easy on myself to relearn how to write, create a writing schedule that works for me, and stop punishing myself when i cant get the words out.

past reflections: 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022

#ngl writing this out made me feel like #i reopened a lot of grief about my ability to work and create #and i need to walk away from it before i cry even more lol #thank u to my fc for still being the place #i love to visit when i wake up #even though all of us a struggling a lot #with life and ingame motivation #brianna babbles

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13thsinnr · 11 months

Note

Hey! Here’s an OC-based ask; you could use it for Toothpaste too though I’m not sure who that is but I’m assuming they’re not an OC, but! I’d like to know a little more about whichever OC(s) you have the most on your mind right now.

Oh, and use this ask as a reminder to hydrate and stretch.

THANK YOU!! just now i was thinking about vino and a couple other mayhem ocs i might just take this as a chance to ramble on about them tbh but mainly vino

i know vin is the character i talk about the most but good lord i love him so much and lately ive been thinking so much more about his character and how he plays a role in the overarching world of mayhem cause like. i know ive never actually written the story out (cause its a big too complex i think to be just one devoted storyline) but vino's character to me has always been one that is like.. highly contradictory.

to anyone who doesnt know about mayhem/vino: mayhem is (or used to be? i dont know anymore) a cookie run au which is hardly even one at this point cause of how insanely detached it is from canon but it explores the alternate world of twizzly and her gang, and vino is a character who is sort of a mercenary-type worker under a company known as SCI (societal change institute)

im not gonna fully explain vino's backstory in this post but long story short he was taken from his family (who he remembers very little of due to his memory being wiped) and put into this program for SCI where they used reactivated (vampiric) blood with supernatural properties to engineer human weapons, eventually this program was snuffed out after he had a blowup and killed a ton of the scientists working on it (and in turn his fellow subjects, leaving him the sole survivor of the project). vino was kept in the care of SCI and, as a non-human in a world where inhumans aren't actually known to exist, he had essentially no choice but to stay with them to keep some place in society. vino, being essentially the strongest living thing alive, was trained secretly by SCI and kept with them as a 'hidden asset' to use when necessary.

now, SCI's goal is to repair a broken world, and in some ways i guess theyre the good guys? but they do a lot of unsavory things (such as the experimentation, which was actually hidden from the media) and their actual values are... a little fucked, one might say (they seek to eradicate crime and criminals yet put little effort into actually finding the root of the issues which cause people to resort to these lives), and although vino appears to be a cold-blooded killer, he actually has a strong sense of morality. he genuinely wants to help people, but for one, he can't really do anything about the situation he's in, therefore he pushes his own feelings of guilt to the side in order to try to help in the long term (essentially "the ends justify the means", in a way?), and two, he's a character that represents naïveté. he's easily manipulated by those around him, and honestly becomes comfortable being controlled by an authority figure, despite how contradictory it may seem for such a powerful being to be controlled at all.

now, vino slowly unlearns some of these things throughout his character arc. as his relationship to toothpaste develops, he begins to allow himself to doubt his actions, and the actions of his organization. he gains back his sense of morals, and begins to rebel more and more against authority. i like to think as a character that vino represents adolescence in a way: although physically, vino is a grown man, he hasn't been able to live his own life without the orders of another person... since he can remember, literally. he gets the chance to taste freedom and finally begins to become more than just the mold that others placed around him, gets to try new things and learn what he as an individual likes and believes in.

when i first created this character, the symbol i wanted to use to represent him was wings: broken wing earrings which represented the way he was shackled down by authority ("clipped wings"), intentional wing imagery in my art to portray different stages of him coming into his own, etc. and ive been thinking about bringing that back a lot lately.

i actually have like two other things i meant to talk about but i got carried away and this is running really long LMAO thank you so much for asking and if anyone wants to hear about 1. the link between vino's past selves and/or 2. the relationships vino has with others please let me know and ill make another post!!

#vino #oc tag #mayhem au

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tothedarkdarkseas · 1 year

Note

Hello i have read your entire collection of fics and i gotta say. Wow . what a Talent for the Grime. im not a 2doc girlie unfortunately but I've been softened. won over. I can now see 2doc and go "well that's very interesting. I wanna see where this author goes w it" instead of the general feeling of he would Not fucking say that. bc the truth isthat maybe he would . say those things he says in your fics etc. You understand. Most of all i have an appetite for grime and i have had it Saciated. i saved the plastic beach fics for the end bc i knew they'd be the ones id be more predisposed 2wards and while i was right i will say -> paula fic sweep. i love ms cracker she's such a cunt. as a dyke well all i can say is come 2 bed sweetheart your horrible mean gross standoffish attitude is wasted on a rockstar like stuart. I haven't read a hotter woman in a while Congrats. um but yeah also the plastic beach fics i left some comments bc oysters got to me Bad i never fully felt the impact of plastic beach from a murdoc perspective w such INCISIVENESS and POWER just the fucking spiraling horror of putting yourself in that position out of desperation and PRIDE??? god. GOD. and then the fic you have pinned. the fic that.made me check out your ao3. god . ive been in bad relationships that hurt me greatly and i had to keep seeing the.person. It was So cathartic. the mixing of 2ds identity w murdocs the enmeshment the. The

sorry 4.the.long ask im a little drunk but you HAVE to know you have got a NEW BIG FAN

i wanna see.more of your noodle and cyborg noodle :( noodlez mean so much 2me and 2d and noodle in seething coast got to me so fucking bad. russ' small role also got me weeping but not as much as 2d and bday girl noodle ending did. your 2d is perhaps the most interesting read ive seen on the character so far .

This message brought so much joy to my night, as did your comments on AO3! I apologize for my lateness; I absolutely intend to respond to them over there (as far as my intentions go for the foreseeable future I will always respond to comments or asks, so long as anyone is kind enough to stop by! It just takes a few days sometimes, whoops) but I'm so enchanted by the ephemeral nature of the drunk message, I've got to let you know I've seen it, haha.

I love the sentence "unfortunately, I am not a 2Doc girlie" as it feels quite backwards from the other side of it. I would say, being someone who has written exclusively 2Doc stories for their fanfiction career and runs a bizarrely devoted 2Doc blog years longer than they ought to have, being a 2Doc girlie is an unfortunate thing to be. I wouldn't blame you having apprehensions! If you can believe it, when I got into Gorillaz I would avoid the shipping element altogether and skip past any 2Doc that popped up along my way; I also felt a sense of... neutrality to profound disinterest toward it, and had things gone differently after I may have bowed out without any lasting words exchanged and moved forward along the fandom line, as so many do. I felt some sense of shame, I think, to admit I was reshaping the characters by my own wants, but I accept now that this is what Gorillaz fandom is; the nearer to canon one can go in tone, the better, but there's a point where the road forks (splinters into four forks, and four more further down, really) and for the sake of your own stability and consistency, you have to make a decision about that character's path. Anyway, sorry, I'm rambling! Hopefully that doesn't bore you to tears, but your message made me think about it all again, and I enjoy doing so!

Thank you for reading everything, good gravy, it's a tall order and I'm just-- I am beyond flattered. I am beyond humbled. I am moderately embarrassed by some of the early writing, but I'm incredibly touched nonetheless. I am especially grateful for Paula to make her way into a loving home, biting and spitting all the way. Stuart is not and will never be equipped for the job. ("It's rotten work, especially if it's you," only Paula's not asking him to do it and she's sure as shit not offering it in return. God, I love that woman.)

Thank you. I don't know if it's too sappy and too sincere to say, but I think we grow in sincerity, I think we are emotionally and mentally fed by honesty even to a degree of discomfort, and so I swallow that embarrassment and say... you naming those stories, sharing your thoughts, sharing with me a connection and a sense of caring for Oysters, Ampersands, Seething Coast-- the stories that I cared most for, stories that drew the most from myself even when I tried to obscure it, stories that still sit close to the breast-- that is special. That really means more to me than a comical reply can express. I'm really glad that these scenes meant something to you and that they get to live in another person. That's the horror and the prize of writing, it's the thing you dread doing wrong and losing in the void; but to hear months or years later that it's found someone, and they felt something for it, and they're not embarrassed for you that you've stumbled through making something like this from these characters, that's all you can dream of. That's everything. It matters very much. I can't say I have anything new on the horizon for Noodle (...and I can't say what I have done in the past few months is anywhere near cresting the horizon) but this message gets my heart thu-thumping and has me mulling her over. Maybe one day we can revisit the mess again. If you'd like to listen, this song always makes me think of Stu and Noodle, specifically on that illusion of solid ground in the years after Plastic Beach. I listened to it sometimes to get in the mood to write them.

youtube

#<3

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nullified-kiss · 2 years

Text

🖇 THE PERFECT KISS | ATSUSHI NAKAJIMA (DRABBLE)

☆ authors note : ik its been a long time since I’ve been here but things have been happening (good things thank goodness) and I haven’t been able to think about bsd, tr, or even anime for that matter. Lately my free time has been devoted to other hobbies I’ve been picking up, but this does not mean I am going to stop writing, expect more coming your way if everything goes as I planned :))

HIS LIPS ARE so, so cold. It was like kissing a snowman. You smiled at your own silly thought as your wrapped your arms around his neck. You tasted the hot chocolate on his lips, stealing the sweetness that’s left on the smile of your lover.

Atsushi pulls back, the happiness on his face like a contagious warmth that spreads to your smile. Even as you scold at him to pull up his winter scarf, his radiating joy fails to stay hidden underneath the warm wool. “You’re so cold, Atsushi. Why didn’t you wear your scarf properly?”

He doesn’t answer for a moment, taking your hand into his. “I wanted to give you this first kiss into the new year. The perfect kiss. Right when the clock struck twelve.” He laughs to himself. “I wouldn’t want to embarrass myself and kiss you a second late because of a scarf, now do I?”

“Why-“ you stopped yourself, following his glance as he watches other couples around you in the moment, with laughter, and arms around each other, and smiles and whispers of what you could only guess could be sweet nothings to the other’s ear. Why on earth would a timed kiss matter, Atsushi?

He turns to you shyly, as he says, “I wanted to give you an important kiss at the start of the year, as everyone does every new year.”

You cup both of his cheeks in your hands, looking into his eyes. “Atsushi. Every one of your kiss is a perfect kiss. Every single one. It’s a kiss without you that’s imperfect, darling.”

He seems unconvinced. Hesitant, even, to believe your words.

“So this is a perfect kiss,” you mumble, kissing the corner of his lips, off to the side of his face. It felt awkward, like an arrow narrowly missing it’s target. Unbothered by this, you sense his stillness.

“And this is a perfect kiss.” You kiss his nose, leaving your lips to his skin a little longer than normal, before pulling away.

“Love, that’s not what I-“ You silence him with your lips on his, and he kisses back.

His lips leave yours as he pulls back. “What were you about to say, handsome?”

“God, I love you so much.”

i finished this at like september 10 end me ;-;

edit: GUYS IVE HAD ENOUGH ITS NOT GETTING POSTED NEAR CHRISTMAS I WONT BE ABLE TO WAIT THAT LONG

edit edit: I just realized I completely skipped Christmas and straight to New Years whoops

taglist : @nameless-shrimp @finniesblog @duckiichan @kazubxnii @n1kolaiz @weebumochi ! please feel free to join my taglist here ! (ahhh yes I use my taglist for the 1st time >.<)

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warmau · 3 years

Text

not knowing what to say isn't a foreign feeling to you, yet when you come face to face with ten outside his apartment on this summer morning, you are almost too petrified to even string a sentence together

he's really just........leaving

ten shines a big smile and from the open door you hear kun's exasperated voice asking why in the world ten is packing up his entire existence for a program that's going to last two months

"you look nervous"

ten jokes first, running a hand through his dark hair which he's spent the colder months growing out

"im the one going to a different country and yet you look like you might turn green"

his laughter tickles you and you force yourself out of the weird, frozen feeling, for his sake

"im not nervous - it's just this is our first summer apart since what, highschool?"

ten leans against the frame of his door and lets kun scuttle past him with a scowl

yangyang and hendery bounce after him with ten's insane amount of luggage

"yeah but it's two months, not two decades. plus....you know how much ive always wanted to do this."

right. and here you are being selfish.

"of course, i mean it's literally the birthplace of ballet."

"technically that's italy, but france is a close second."

"i hate you"

ten pulls you into his arms before you register that this is your goodbye hug

"i'll miss you too."

kun drives everyone to the airport, he complains and cries the most.

sicheng gives you a knowing look when ten takes your wrist in his hand and tucks your arm between his.

you ignore the look, and focus on ten. on him. and then - when the switchboard pops up his flight info - he gives a bubbly and excited

"ive gotta go!"

and then summer starts, just as he's gone

"so when are you going to tell him you're in love with him."

sicheng brings the big gulp he stole from hendery up to his lips and you keep your eyes closed behind your sunglasses

"sorry, yukhei's not my type."

"you know im not talking about yukhei."

you dig your fingers into the sand beside your towel, the beach is already so noisy so you pretend you don't hear sicheng, but you still feel him looking.

you guess a part of it is true, you love ten. who doesn't?

is that the core of the issue then, that ten is so available and loveable and charming, that it makes him also unattainable?

or at least, unattainable to you.

you hear your phone buzz inside your bag and sicheng is being dragged into the water by the rowdy rest of your friend group

it could be a text from ten?

your mind excites, but you put out that fire

it's probably just spam.

ten does text and even video call the first two or so weeks while he's away

you get blurry photos of food at cafes and the eiffel tower, random fancy looking dogs being walked on the small, cramped streets

ten's connection is kind of bad - but he still gleams through the fuzzy facetime camera as he shows you around the room the dance academy has provided

pangs of his happiness and excitement seep into you

and then there's the first sign of worry comes knocking and twirling through his door

a group of other dancers, all beautiful and strong, asking ten - from the limited amount of french you catch - if he's done, they're waiting for him to go to a show with them

ten gives you a scattered, quick goodbye. he says he'll video call again.

all you get is an update text almost five days later that has no pictures attached just a;

im ok - by the way i totally miss eating hot chips with you at midnight. ive had like a banana smoothie and that's it.

sicheng and kun are the first to pick up on the shift, you are quietly withdrawing to yourself

nothing makes you laugh

ten doesn't reply to your question about what the paris metro looks like, actually he doesn't even read it

kun nearly tugs hendery's ear red when he shares a snap story of ten pressed cheek to cheek with his new dancer friends in front of the louvre when you're in the same room

the thing is you are not jealous of any of them.

you don't go around trying to find their facebooks, clicking on their instagram profiles, comparing you and them.

you are just sad to your bones that they will understand ten in such a way that no matter how long you two have been friends

you will never, truly know

"you're his best friend"

sicheng reasons on the phone as you stare up at the wall above your desk, littered in old pictures and clippings and your gaze catches on the ticket stub from ten's first-ever solo dance performance

it had been a talent show in highschool.

it had been the first time you saw ten perform outside the corner of his cramped bedroom or the glimpse you caught meeting up with him outside the dance academy

he's in paris, he's with people who love it so much more than i do - they love dancing like he loves dancing.

i cannot understand that.

"i think you were right sicheng."

"im always right."

i do love him. when am i going to tell him?

you hang up after sicheng has his i told you so moment and stare at your screen

a notification flashes across the screen and it's a text from ten

the trains here are blue. i miss you.

you want to reply right away, so you open the message and start typing

i miss you too. actually, i think i finally understand why people who are in love are so hurt when they're suddenly left without their other half and ten you are my o-

you delete the sentence and make a face

nice. i miss you too.

you don't send it - or at least you forget to because your fingers are shaking and you exit out of the messaging app before checking

abandoning your phone, you turn on your side and stretch your hand out to reach the edge of the bed

there's enough space between you and it for someone to fit, so you remember the countless times ten has laid there

smiling and laughing and tickling your face with his sleeping breath

you can't even recall a conversation because there have been hundreds

suddenly you feel a warmth creep up your skin

hundreds of opportunities to tell him - and each time i chose to be a coward.

"you should write him a letter."

"this isn't a movie, what - you think im going to write a letter and he'll jump on the first plane from france to come to my side?"

sicheng cocks an eyebrow as if to say it is a possibility

"no. im not writing a letter. i'll suck it up and confess when he comes back."

you somehow end up writing a letter.

maybe because you really do want to just send a long text spilling your mushy, soft, pink feelings

but you know that's just not what ten deserves

he deserves (and you do too, but you won't admit this) a face to face confession

so you start retelling the moments that flutter up in your heart whenever you think about him

how he makes the room brighter when he's in it, how he dances with every bone, joint, muscle in his body - how he approaches it with no inhibition and true devotion that paints its way across his face when he practices, how he fits perfectly into the hole that grows more massive every day you don't see him

standing there across the hall - coffee in hand, gym bag with his scuffed dance shoes

by the time you're finished - the letter is longer than you imagine. there are parts crossed and scribbled out, repetitive thoughts, and stupid little comments and metaphors that compare ten to flowers or clouds or anything else pretty in nature

you cringe at yourself, but you do feel better

it could be your outline for when the time to actually tell him comes.

you shove the papers into an envelope, write ten's name and the address of his parisian dance academy just for the irony

and then make the mistake of letting it sit on your desk

in a matter of days, it has been swallowed by a bunch of other papers and trinkets

and when you're rushing around your room trying to get ready for another adventure to the beach - sicheng clinks the lollipop against his teeth and fishes it out - curious at the stamp

"do you want me to mail this?"

he asks and you're trying to find those sunglasses you literally just bought and grumble that sure, whatever - you'll meet him out by kun's car.

halfway to the beach, you turn in horror from the passenger seat to look at sicheng in the back

your eyes like saucers and a tremor in a voice

"wait. what did you ask me back in my room?"

sicheng's big smile is red from the candy, "your letter to ten."

and there comes the second pang of dread and worry that takes the overwhelming shape of your summer

oh my god - oh my god - maybe the letter won't even make it. i mean it's a letter to france....it'll take at least a month to get there. wait - it probably didn't even have a stamp on it. oh god maybe the address was totally off and some poor stranger is about to be subjected to my very incoherent feelings.....

every day you look at your phone and there's no texts or emails or anything from ten

his social media has gone quiet too

you throw your dignity down a well and ask all your friends if they've heard from him and they all scratch their heads and say no, it's been maybe a week since they did

your stress then turns from your love letter to a possibility that ten is in trouble

he kind of thrives from attention so it is very weird that he's so off-grid

you decide finally, on the day that it's been exactly a month and one day since he was gone, to call

you hover over the facetime button - should i text him first?

with a yelp, you nearly drop and crack your screen when ten's name flashes across the screen

you settle your breathing and tell yourself he hasn't gotten the letter, there's no way - since when has snail mail been efficient?

you answer and are about to ask what's up when ten waves something into the camera

"i got your letter."

maybe you go into rigor. because ten's eyebrows knit and he asks if your connection is ok, you aren't saying anything

you don't know if it's just because you miss him so much that you're able to drag yourself back into consciousness or because you are curious, in the depths of your mind, what his reaction will be

"o-oh. right- i-"

ten frowns and you think it's coming. the rejection is coming.

"is that why you didn't answer my text? you sent the letter instead?"

"your text?"

"yeah, i said i missed you and you read it and never responded."

a peek of a smile stretches on his pretty, bare face

"i never thought you were so romantic to send a letter."

something burns on your skin but you just try to make sure your hand holding the phone doesn't shake

"im not - i just, it was dumb sicheng said i should write it because - i don't know. he's the romantic, blame him."

"you're the one that said i could make a shy tulip open its petals with my laughter."

"oh god"

that smile turns into a grin

"and that my dancing manages to cast a spell on you."

you hide your expression by turning your face

"are you going to re-read the whole thing to me?"

"should i, you're so poetic."

"don't make fun of me."

your voice is serious this time, small and huddled, because you mean it

worse than being told he doesn't feel the same is to be ridiculed for holding him in your heart like this for so long

"im not making fun of you, the letter is beautiful."

you still can't look at him, it's so ten to be kind before he's cruel

"i could never write something like that - so i thought i would just call you and say it."

you don't need to love song yourself into telling me you just see me as a friend

"i love you."

your head whips back so fast your phone drops and you curse and ten can't help but laugh

"sorry, sorry -what did you say?"

he runs a hand through his dark hair, the lighting in his room is dim and illuminates him perfectly

a large white t-shirt engulfs his slender shoulders as he sits up against the wall

"i love you. i know it's corny to confess over facetime, but im guessing it's more forgivable than text?"

a bubble bursts in your stomach and it makes you feel lightheaded and inhumanely blissful all at once

"i love you too."

"more then friends right, because your letter had this part about kissing im very interested in."

you bite back your lip and nod, both embarrassed that he'd bring that part up too but also seeing ten - your close friend, your secret love - talk about kissing you

makes some of the neurons in your body go haywire

"good, i seriously was scared you might have been pranking me with thi-"

"i would never. im not hendery."

"oh how are they, ive been super busy with the practice for a review so i haven't talked to anyone."

another thing you love about him, he keeps everyone in. he leaves none of his friends behind. he pretends like he couldn't have a care in the world, but he cares more than anyone else.

"he's ok, he almost crashed kun's car yesterday."

ten shrugs, "expected."

and like that - everything is still somehow the same. there is no awkward phase after you've talked about your feelings for each other at all.

because your love doesn't come as a one hit punch because ten is beautiful, although he is to an unfair degree

it comes from the experience of being around him. having so much of him. maybe even getting a little addicted.

you do talk more on the phone, no more long pauses even though ten's practices get more grueling and you tell him to take his time to rest

but he's sweaty on the practice room floor - texting you - telling you everything is sore but the thought of seeing you soon makes it all better

it's three days before ten is scheduled to fly back that he has his review and you are biting your fingernails waiting for him to tell you about it

when you get a youtube link at like three in the morning - you click it and someone has recorded ten's performance

somehow, he looks more graceful than you've ever seen him

a new text comes in when it's almost done

'i think i did well - can i get a reward?'

'you'll get a really good one when you're home'

he sends a winking emoji and you can't fall asleep after because you wonder what he's expecting, you'd meant a kiss - had he meant more?

you wouldn't mind that at all.

xiaojun is being pulled away from the conveyer belt by kun and hendery is asking sicheng for a sip of his starbucks as you all wait for ten's plane to land in the airport lobby

you two have not told anyone - mostly because you know there will be endless questions you won't have answers too and sicheng might literally never let you live it down

so you wait for ten to be here so you can suffer together

you see the gates from his flight open and sicheng mutters that you look like you're going to pop like a goddamn balloon

for once in your life, you don't snide back at him, folding your hands in front of you and tippy-toeing to see over the crowd

and then, like seeing him for the first time all the years ago when you first met, ten comes out

hendery and xiaojun try to go for a running jump, but the older members hold them back because everyone can sense whats coming

you dash toward him and ten doesn't stay still either - you two collide so hard it almost hurts, but you don't care at all

ten's duffel bag falls over his shoulder and your hands are wrapped around his neck before he can even say your name

it's a first kiss that couldn't be more characteristically fit for you

sweet, big smiles tasted on lips, and interrupted by none other than your group of friends gasping in a symphony of shock

except for sicheng - he knew

ten tastes like you imagine he would taste, maybe because in smaller ways you've already had doses of the sunshine that radiates off him before

he keeps his hands wrapped around your waist as he looks down into your eyes

"mon amour"

"is that really all you learned in france?"

"ummm yeah, i don't know how to say let's get out of here and back to my place even though im pretty sure someone said that to me at some point."

you pout, "don't try to make me jealous."

"never!"

ten chuckles as you press your face into his neck and hug him close

the only way you get pulled apart is because someone (kun) reminds you all you're still at the PUBLIC airport

the drive back is a frenzy and everyone wants to know everything and not about just you two - because you're "two" now - but about france and traveling and ten's dancing

like you'd sensed - nothing has really changed

just this time, your fingers are locked in tens. and the warmth you longed for in silence is suddenly all out in the open.

funnily enough, you and ten don't ever write letters to each other again.

ten just doesn't like writing - it takes too much sitting down

and you are horrified everytime he fishes your love confession out of the memory box and dangles it above your head as leverage

it's how he convinced you into adopting the first cat. now you two have three.

so when you and him are deciding the best way to let all your friends know about your upcoming event you cross out mailed invitations

"we can make an email list."

your legs are thrown over his thighs on the sofa and he's resting the laptop on you them

"let's just make an instagram post: wedding in our backyard on thursday - you're invited."

ten pinches his nose

"we are not having a backyard wedding. we could not fit everyone in my dance company into it anyway."

you play with your engagement band and sigh

"fine, fine. what about.....we just call everyone and tell them. if we call kun right now he'll let all of the world know by the end of the week."

ten agrees with a hum, but then starts typing and you lean over to see

"bulk wedding invites? you're giving in?"

he closes the laptop and tosses it to the side, easily and gently pushing you down onto your back to hover over you with a small content sound

"i am. but we don't even have to write the letters - some company will do it for us."

his lips are inches from yours and all of a sudden you're young again - waiting to kiss him for the first time at that airport

"you know we'll still have to write vows right."

he is about to kiss you, he's so close and your eyes are closing

"i'll just read your letter outl-"

"TEN NO!"

he laughs, laughs until he finally does kiss you and then laughs again when he pulls back - the overflowing amount of love that exists in that moment is potent

you tell him to get over that old thing, but he shakes his head

"never, when again in all the lives i live is someone going to say i could make a shy tulip open its petals with my laughter?"

#i know his bday was in february please im still working through them cries #ten au #ten imagines #ten scenarios #nct au #nct imagines #nct scenarios #wayv imagines #wayv au #wayv scenarios #sfw #nostolgic!au #ten #member: ten #im sicheng through all this

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heartofstanding · 2 years

Note

thoughts on margaret of anjou? or alternatively, could you tell us a bit more about 'the henry vi experiment'? x

Going to answer this in two separate posts so not to cross streams too much and because I have a lot to say!

My thoughts on Margaret of Anjou are that I love her. I actually have this post going around in my head as I write this:

The "real" Margaret is largely lost. The images of her that have come down to us have been filtered through misogyny, anti-French rhetoric, Yorkist propaganda and slander that were then adopted by the Tudor-era writers who found plenty of material in a transgressive women, and, of course, culminates in Shakespeare's depiction. She appears to have absorbed the blame for Henry VI's policies and behaviours, becoming the person people held responsible for the loss of territories in France, the failure of peace efforts, the ruin and "murder" of "Good Duke Humphrey", the purported unscrupulous favourites like Suffolk and Somerset, for the increasingly isolation of Henry's court, for "forcing" York to rebel, for the failing to produce an heir in a "timely" fashion, for leading resistances against Edward IV and causing a disturbance to the peace, etc, etc.

It's impossible to tell just how much Margaret was actually responsible for the "bad government" of Henry VI's reign. In some cases, she probably wasn't responsible at all: Suffolk rose to prominence several years before she married Henry, she was only 15 when she married Henry and shouldn't be held more responsible than the older men at court, and it was a common tactic to criticise a queen or a favourite rather than criticising the king directly, which would be treason.

The interesting thing is that had Margaret actually succeeded in restoring Henry VI and the Lancastrian to the throne, she would be remembered in very different terms. Instead of the devouring, destructive she-wolf, she would be seen as a loyal wife and devoted mother who did what was necessary to protect her family. It is really interesting reading Helen Maurer's Margaret of Anjou: Queenship and Power in Late Medieval England and seeing how much evidence of Margaret's tenure as queen shows her to have acted within the traditional roles for queens, only stepping out of that accepted role when necessity forced her to take on a more obviously active role.

In terms of redemptive takes on Margaret, I'm not very interested in the type that presents her as this innocent victim, never did anything wrong, really nice woman, unfairly smeared. I'm not interested in any type of redemptive takes for any person along those lines. I want to shake them violently in a Pringles can ;) I like to think that the "she-wolf" legend had a kernel of truth in it because I don't like the declawed, bland versions of Margaret I find. I feel like Margaret was an incredibly strong woman to keep going (as many issues as I have with Susan Higginbotham's novel about Margaret, I really love how she connected Margaret with hope) and I like takes that allow Margaret to be strong and sympathetic without flattening her down or declawing her into the acceptable historical heroine mode.

#margaret of anjou #asks #feuillesmortes #text posts #i could keep going on and on #i was gonna talk about margaret's relationship with henry vi and the trope of her having an affair with someone else #but this is very long #so feel free to ask me about that so i can ramble some more in a different post

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richmond-rex · 3 years

Note

Henry VII for the love meme? (I don’t think he’s been requested but if not then Anne Boleyn because I am Predictable ;)) <3

Oh my, I'm sorry I completely forgot about this ask! Ok, let's go:

love meme: put something in my inbox and i’ll tell you something i love about it

Henry VII: I suppose I really admire his strength of vision. Henry committed his whole self to his idea of uniting England under the crown and he made that happen not only by imposing his authority and driving royal policy but also by applying himself wholeheartedly to his work. He was quite an industrious man, and one could think that after a lifetime of having his inheritance denied and living like a hostage or a prisoner, he would dedicate himself solely to pleasure and pastimes after becoming the most powerful man in England. He had the political acumen to know that wouldn't last him long, though. Perhaps a survivor's mindset also factored into that. He never let himself feel too comfortable or safe. His story is extraordinary exactly because he had been the underdog for so long, and I think his success has got less to do with winning than with not giving up.

Pollard when talking about Edward IV said that the latter could really have united England under his rule but unfortunately, his reign was almost as much marked by factionalism as his predecessor (Henry VI)'s had been. 'Fundamentally,' Pollard says, 'Edward’s regime had remained to the very end the narrow rule of a victorious faction in civil war.' I think that perhaps it was necessary for someone that had stayed away from it all to read the country's situation with an unbiased mind and listen to both sides to heal old wounds. He integrated both Yorkists and Lancastrians into his regime and he reverted attainders that had injured both parties. This is the king that took men that had born arms against him like the Earl of Lincoln and welcomed them into his council, the very heart of his administration. He valued service and good counsel and a man could rise high in his regime by talent alone. Like Steven Gunn once said, there could never have been a Thomas Cromwell without the tradition of service to the crown initiated under Henry VII.

This 'direct line of civil servants administering the realm in the interests of the crown irrespective of the person of the king' can actually be traced back to Edward IV's reign. Those were men like John Fortescue and John Morton, but Henry VII made more use of them. I don't remember now who said that Henry VII had a real administrator's mind — I think that factor (an administrator's mind instead of a bubbling personality for example), coupled with a certain natural disposition made him smart enough to try to unite the whole kingdom not necessarily under himself, but under his heir. His son, aptly named Arthur, would be the 'once and future king', and that was all the message that was required. Though Henry is not particularly remarked as charismatic nowadays, he had a true talent for PR. A whole life having to live off appearances alone must have made him very attuned to that kind of thing.

The joining of the red and white roses was just brilliant as a PR stunt. Some people think it was just a cheap rip-off of the Yorkist white rose but setting aside the fact that Welsh poets were calling him the red rose before he had even landed in Britain (and his use of Welsh prophecy is a whole other brilliant thing), I think people just don't know the strong Marian connotations that white and red roses possessed in the late middle ages. We know Henry VII was particularly devoted to the Virgin Mary, and Mary was said to be a rose both white and red. The way I see it, the joining of the roses was not just the union of two factions at war, it involved a deeper religious meaning where Mary's white qualities (such as her purity) could be reunited with her red qualities (such as her charity). Before his children were even born Henry was already advertising that value. Henry VII understood the emphasis he needed to put on his heir, he knew how to create a commitment to his dynasty under his son so that the crown could be passed down peacefully.

Henry VII succeeded in that regard, but it wasn't an easy process. As far as 1504 there were people who weren't planning on crowning his son after his death. He didn't give up until his family and heir were safe, even though this man was literally ill with tuberculosis during the last years of his reign. Saying that is not the same as claiming Henry VII had some moral high ground, for that was just his tenacity and stubbornness — the same tenacity that made him escape so many attempts against his life by the skin of his teeth when he was young. Pollard mentions how Henry VII hung on until his heir was old enough to succeed him even though he had been at death's door so many times, and I think his herculean effort deserves some credit. He was very obstinate, and I can't help but admire that. He was also very lucky in a lot of ways, and he knew how to grasp that opportunity/luck when it presented itself to him.

Henry never vacillated in a moment of crisis, and I think that strong grip, combined with a more open mind acquired after a lifetime living on the Continent understanding the politics of Europe and away from the factionalism in England — I think that very combination in a monarch was just what the kingdom needed at the time. He wasn't flamboyant but it is his very seriousness and commitment that I admire in him. I hope I didn't ramble too much, though! Thank you for sending this ask, darling! 🌹x

P.S.: This answer was already sufficiently long but I think that Henry VII's patronage of the arts should be brought up more. Despite popular belief that he was a miser, Henry VII spent liberally on his court and Tudor patronage as we know it was very much shaped by his own. Henry VII founded a royal school of Flemish illuminations in England, he created the offices of royal librarian, royal portraitist and royal 'arras maker' (for tapestries), as well as transforming the office of king's glazier into a year-round job. He was a patron of the printing press at Westminster and of Mary of Burgundy's school of painting in Flanders. He supported poets and scholars at his court (called 'laureates'), men like Bernard André and Polydore Vergil but also Skelton, Hawes, Cornish and Pietro Carmeliano whom he provided with annuities. Henry also supported not just one but three troupes of actors, and two minstrel companies. He virtually institutionalised the patronage of arts in England through offices in the royal household, and that's something I admire about him too.

#ask #henry vii #love meme #historian: a. j. pollard #historian: steven gunn

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wri0thesley · 3 years

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hii would j like to say that ive been reading your works since ive got into jjba (around last june) and i absolutely adore your works ♡ you are also incredibly friendly n interactive w all your readers and i rly love how approachable you are! anyway ive been having dio brainrot as of late (ehe) especially sdc dio~ i just want to cockwarm and be spoiled by him, because he absolutely seems like the type to treat his favorite pet with such love and care.. and thinking about my squishy body against his toned and muscular one really gets my gears grinding LMAOOO thank you so much for allowing people to brainrot in your ask box!! i hope you have a good day~

cooling solution - reader x dio (1.7k)

nsfw! afab reader, neutral pronouns. cock-warming, reader is dio’s pet. slight belly bulge. dub-con if you squint but reader is implied to be into it/a willing participant in their status as dio’s pet.

your lord presents a solution to the humid night-time air of egypt.

Lord Dio’s big hand rests gently on the top of your head, fingers petting your hair. You’re kneeling by him, your cheek pressed to his knee, relishing in where he’s all over cool skin in the sticky heat of Cairo. You are wearing very little, by his choice – but still, in a place like this, with someone (something?) like him beside you, even those are too close and uncomfortable.

You sigh, shifting, leaning more into the touch – and Dio chuckles, very low.

“Is something wrong, little morsel?”

Is something wrong? The answer is both yes and no; it’s wrong that you’re not on your Lord’s lap, that you’re not pleasing him, that it’s so hot and sticky and that you’re uncomfortable where you are. But on the other hand . . . nothing is wrong. Not when your Lord Dio is beside you, gifting you with his presence, touching you even in the smallest amount.

“N-no,” you say, after a moment, your voice very soft. “Only--”

“Hmm?” The hand on your head moves, stroking over the soft curve of your cheek to prick his nail into your chin and tip your face up. Your eyes meet his, golden and indulgent – he is always indulgent of you. You are his pampered little pet, and whilst some other occupants of the mansion may rush about and twist their faces into grimace and do all kinds of little chores and odd jobs, your only purpose is to please and amuse Lord Dio.

It is a purpose that you fulfil with great relish.

“You can tell me,” he says, voice soft velvet, comforting like an embrace. “I’ll do anything I can to make you more comfortable, pet.”

The caress of his voice on the soft, fond name makes you press your thighs together in need, reminding you of all of the other times he’s whispered sweet things to you when his fingers or cock have been buried to the hilt inside of you and he’s brought you past your peak over and over again, benevolent in giving you pleasure for he knows that at the end of the night it will be him who has the final gratification.

“It’s just . . . warm,” you say, your cheeks flushing even hotter.

Dio’s golden eyes stay locked on you, but you see the corners crinkle with mirth, the lightest tilt of his carefully painted lips. You are permitted to do that for him, sometimes – your face close to his, your teeth biting into your bottom lip in concentration as you coat every contour of his mouth.

“Oh,” he says. His fingertips move from your chin to brush over your neck, your collarbone – you lean into the touch instinctually again, both because of who it is before you and to chase the coldness of his undead, alabaster skin. “I can help with that, can’t I?”

“I-I would never dream of asking you, my Lord,” you whisper, your eyes widening in case he takes your carefully worded complaint against the air of Egypt as a complaint against him. He’s amused by your attempt; the hand jangling with thick golden bangles moves to grip your upper arm.

“You need not be afraid to make requests of me when I have so much I can give you,” he says, and the words send another bolt of heat through you as he uses his strength to tug you up. “I know that you’re aware my devotion to you comes at the price of your obedience – and I know, too, that you’re a well-trained little pet, hmm?”

“Y-yes, my Lord.”

Your feet are warm on the stone beneath them. The candlelight plays tricks on your body and coverings, showing the curves of your form beneath the sheer, expensive fabrics. Dio’s eyes drink in every inch of you with pleasure that he does not even attempt to hide.

That’s what you are there for, after all – not just a pretty, obedient little pet, but a treasure and an ornament he can enjoy looking at in whichever ways he pleases. If he asked you to rip out your own heart and hold it for him so he may see it, you would stand stock-still as a statue until your last breath forced you to the ground.

“Good,” he’s amused, still. “I see how you bend into my touch. Is my skin a comfort to you, little morsel?”

You nod, biting your lip again. You know what Dio is – you know his skin is marble-cool and chiselled because he is not alive. You ought to be afraid of him, perhaps – but you are hypnotised by his pretty words and the his power, the flex of his muscle when he holds you against him, the whispers of what kind of world he will make for himself and how he wants to have you by his side on your knees always.

“Cool?” He asks, humming, as they brush again over your heated cheeks. “Do you think, perhaps, you would be contented to nestle against me on my lap?”

You sigh at the thought of it – cheek against his chest, big arms and hands holding you in place, the coldness of his skin like a soothing balm.

“I would be honoured, my Lord.”

“Good pet,” He says, and he brushes his thumb over your lips. You open your mouth without thinking, and are rewarded with an emerald-tinted smirk. “Just one condition, yes? I know you’ll be anxious to please me.”

“Of course,” you say, wide-eyed.

Lazily, he reaches for his lower half, fingers expertly undoing the buttons and catches of his complicated outfit. Your mouth goes dry as he pulls out his cock without fanfare, and you see he is already hard. Your body gives another full-length throb that you feel pounding inside you like a heartbeat – you are intimately familiar with this part of Dio’s anatomy. You know what he likes, how he feels, the twitch of it inside you – all by heart.

“You say you’re hot, hmm? The air . . . oppressive. Skin sticky.” Those eyes rake all over you again, and you know he must see the beading of sweat on your forehead, the way your hands dig into palms – the glaze of your eyes as you watch him languidly wrap his big fingers around his cock, pumping the shaft. The slick noise makes your toes curl and your heart skip a beat. “I, however . . . I find myself rather cold, tonight.”

“I’m sorry, my Lord,” you say, through the dryness in your throat. You can barely think. Lord Dio has trained you to see his cock and want nothing more than to have it inside you by any means necessary. “M-may I be of any assistance?”

“Oh, good pet,” he breathes, rubbing his thumb over the tip, where his slit is beading shining pre-come. Your servile devotion, the deferential compliance . . . nothing quite hits him in the same way. “I rather think you might be. Come here.”

He crooks his finger to you, petting his knee with the hand not currently wrapped around his leaking cock. You are smaller than him – as anybody is – and it takes you a moment to manage to perch there. You can already feel the coolness of his thigh leaking through, comforting the warmth of your flesh.

“You won’t need these, hmm?” He hooks a finger into one piece of the fabric that’s covering your body, and lets it flutter to the floor, baring your form to his hungry eyes. You feel radiant under his gaze – at once unworthy, and worshipped. It’s a heady rush, knowing that he’s looking at you and wanting you. There is nothing that quite compares to knowing you are wanted by a God.

You eagerly bend into how he wants you, spreading your thighs wide, straddling him as best you can though the muscle that clings to every line of his body means your legs are stretched in a ‘v’ that is almost painful.

Dio chuckles at you, bringing a hand up to cup your sex. You start at the cool fingers on the very hottest part of you, where you are all slickness and fire. His thumb and forefinger open the plump lips of your labia so he can drink in the sight of you – the swollen nub of your clit, nestled like a pearl in an oyster. The pulsating ring of your entrance, so hungry for something inside of it – and so small that every time Dio looks at it, he wonders how you manage to take him so well.

“You want me too,” he says, and it is not a question but you nod your head frantically even so. The way that he is studying you like a beautiful piece of art is serving to do nothing but make you feel needier to press your body against him in its entirety. How could anyone not want him?

“You’re sweet,” he tells you – and then, he moves his hips just so and the tip of his cock catches against your entrance. Your fingers flex onto his shoulders immediately, by instinct – the ache and stretch of yourself around him momentarily all-consuming. He lets out a soft laugh. “You can hold on,” he murmurs, all soft, as he continues inexorably sheathing himself inside of you, inch by glorious inch. You’re slick from both sweat and desire (Dio could say your name across a crowded room and your body, you know, would react) – but that does not stop the fact that his cock could break you in half, if he wanted it to.

“M-my Lord,” you say, breathlessly, syllables forming and breaking in your throat. “S-so big--”

“Mm,” he says, another torturous inch sinking inside you. “And you, so small and soft . . .”

Your cheeks heat up under the way he says ‘soft’, the rub of his thumb over the plush of your thighs. You are all softness against him indeed – his own stiff body, all cold strength and sinew, in direct opposition to you. Dio never seems to be able to get enough of your body even so; claws and mouth and cock brushing against you, murmuring sweet things, holding and squeezing and enjoying the sight of fingers sinking into flesh.

He hilts his cock inside you, the hand on your thigh once more moving to gently push on your stomach, where his cock is distending the flesh slightly. There’s a smug undercurrent to the way he does it – reacting with unhidden amusement at the little jerk of pleasure you give, to feel him so fully buried inside you.

“You may rest against me,” he tells you – and you do not need to be told again. You shift awkwardly, the feel of his cock inside you not exactly alien, but uncomfortable when you wish to press your cheek against his chest and wrap your arms about his neck in order to feel his cool flesh give you some relief. Dio sighs as you do so, relaxing back into the chair. “There. Now . . . hmm. I have other things to attend to. Pretty thing, You’ll be good and stay here keeping my cock warm, won’t you?”

He does not need to wait for the whisper of assent that you breathe against the scar on his neck. He knows exactly what your answer will be.

#jjba #not sfw #writing #dio x reader #dio brando x reader #jjba x reader #afab reader #neutral pronouns #Anonymous #dio brando

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sevenkittensinatrenchcoat · 3 years

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Cats 1986 (and Others) vs. 2016

A post I made a few months ago comparing information gathered from interviews with different Cats casts has come up again recently and I’ve heard even more interviews since, so I want to add on to that a little and elaborate on the things I’ve already said.

CW: Some of the language regarding Demeter’s backstory is a bit darker than I’ve previously mentioned

So, I’ve now heard interviews from US Tours III, IV, and V, spanning from 1986 to 2012. They’re all Broadway-based, and the Broadway Revival went in a very different direction, but the three tours were all very similar to each other.

In both the tours and in 2016, the cast was sat down before rehearsals to hear the “story of Cats”. However, this meant two completely different things. The Tour casts were told the plot of the show, who their characters were and what they were meant to be doing. The 2016 was told the story of how the show Cats was created, how ALW had the idea and made a show out of it. No mention of the story and characters. This means that the Tour casts were given useful information for building their characters, while the 2016 cast got something that was interesting but did nothing to help them do their jobs in the present. More emphasis was put on the show’s legacy than on how to actually perform it. Trevor Nunn did the 2016 explaining, I believe, and it sounds like he was on an ego trip, talking about what he did instead of what the cast was supposed to do. Trevor Nunn is one of the few people who knows how the show works, so this is quite frustrating.

Though the Tour cast was given a whole story, most of them only remembered the perspectives of their own characters. The point of learning the plot was so that they knew what they were doing. It wasn’t supposed to matter to the audience. So, everyone mainly focused on their own jobs. But, everyone knew Demeter’s backstory, because it was the first thing they were told and it caught their attention. It almost became a meme that the first sentence of the plot was “Demeter was raped by Macavity”.

The story begins with Demeter having just escaped from Macavity. He kidnapped and raped her. Though she didn’t want it, she kind of enjoyed the sex, which messed with her head quite a bit. Bomba went through the exact same thing, but because she enjoyed it, she acts like the whole thing was nothing more than an annoyance. The two react to the same situation in different ways.

Jacob Brent was either given a toned down version of the story (he mentions kidnapping, but not rape), or he chose to give a toned down version to avoid the uncomfortable subject.

The 2016 knew that Macavity and Demeter had some sort of backstory, but they weren’t very clear on exactly what happened. They decided that they’d had an abusive relationship, but that the whole thing was consensual and there was no kidnapping, because the only element of this story that the audience can pick up without context is that there was some sort of sexual relationship between Macavity and Demeter, but she’s now afraid of him.

At least one cast member said that Macavity was a rapist, but she didn’t elaborate.

This messed with Demeter’s character far more than anyone expected. The rape element honestly isn’t necessary. Demeter and Macavity had some sort of sex, but it could’ve been consensual, with Demeter enjoying the sex but hating the man. That’s actually what Gillian Lynne seemed to have implied in interviews. However, the kidnapping part of the backstory is important, because it establishes the connection between Demeter and Grizabella. While hiding from Macavity, right before the story begins, Demeter sees Grizabella on the Bad Side of Town. Due to not being a Jellicle before this night, she doesn’t know who she is, and therefore has no bias against her. She just sees this woman living on the streets, humans wondering aloud why she isn’t dead, and felt sympathy for her.

So, when Grizabella appears at the ball and everyone hates her, Demeter wants to intervene, but she doesn’t want to upset her new friends. She came to the Jellicles for protection and is afraid of them rejecting her for siding with their enemy. Still, she tells the tribe what she knows about Griz, possibly trying to convince them to be nicer to her, but it doesn’t work and Demeter just starts following the crowd.

The lyrics Demeter sings, by themselves, are musical exposition that doesn’t imply sympathy. A line like “You’d really have thought she’d ought to be dead” sounds like it could be played as an insult. The words can either mean “I’m surprising the poor thing’s still alive in her condition” or “Why can’t the bitch fuck off and die already?”. Without the context of Demeter’s backstory, Kim Faure picked the latter, when with the context, it’s clearly meant to be the former. So, Demeter’s delivery of her lines in Glamour Cat in 2016 is venomous, almost sadistic.

Later on, towards the end of act one, 2016 Demeter reaches out to Grizabella like she does in most other versions, despite the earlier delivery. What made her change gears? I have no idea.

So, there was a lot of insight on Demeter. She’s the character with the most detailed backstory, making her the closest thing the show has to a protagonist.

Another character that gets a lot of attention, as he demands, is Tugger. Many Tugger actors were interviewed. I think he’s the favorite character of the host of the podcast. Different Tuggers from different eras responded to certain topics differently. Tuggers from the 1980s were unaware that Tugger was commonly interpreted as Not Straight and that Tuggoffelees is a thing. But, the more recent the show their from, the more they’re aware of and interested in the topic. The Tour V Tugger joined very late, during the last few years of the tour. He had access to the internet and could see what the fandom was up to. He played Tugger as ambiguously bi and, though he hadn’t thought of it at the time, liked the idea of the Tuggoffelees pairing. Tyler Hanes, 2016 Tugger, was the only one interviewed who played Tuggoffelees on purpose.

Tyler Hanes was very interesting. He watched the 1998 film while preparing for the role and didn’t seem to like it very much. He wanted his version of Tugger to be his own and avoided taking inspiration from any other version. John Partridge’s Tugger and Hanes’ Tugger being so different from each other might’ve been deliberate.

But, the choreography is what really messed with Tugger’s character. The host of the podcast mentioned Tugger’s pelvic thrusts and Hanes said that he wanted to do that sort of thing, but the new choreography removed all of it. He couldn’t make Tugger as horny or sexy as he wanted to. It was a key part of the character, but the choreography just wouldn’t let it happen. The result is that a bunch of queens fangirl over Tugger, but because Tugger’s defining trait in his number is being vain and obnoxious, the reason why he, of all toms, is considering the sexiest is completely lost. He’s just a dick to everyone (except Misto) and they love him anyway.

Other Tuggers do act like assholes during the number, but it’s not the focus. The lyrics are about Tugger being difficult, but the choreography, often to a comedic degree, isn’t about that. The message of Lynne’s choreography is that DESPITE Tugger being obnoxious, he’s a sex god and that’s what matters to his fans. Blankenbuehlers’s choreography mainly focuses on Tugger being obnoxious, which is a better match to the lyrics, but it makes the character less likable.

Also, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The two most sexualized numbers are Tugger’s and Macavity’s. Tugger’s number is about a man being sexy. Macavity’s number has two women being sexy. Blankenbuehler redid Tugger’s number, toning down the sexuality, but he left Macavity alone completely, so it’s as sexual as it always is. Male sexuality needs to be toned down, but female sexuality is fine. This is what happens when a woman is replaced with a straight dude. I doubt it was done on purpose, but there was definitely some subconscious bias going on there.

The way the casts talk about the two choreographers is also different. Both of them are treated as the experts on the show, more like how a director is normally treated. But, how well they filled that role varied. Lynne could explain what every single move meant. Those who worked with her knew exactly what they were doing. Nobody has ever described any of Blankenbuehler’s choreography with the same detail. In numbers in 2016 that Blankenbuehler left alone, even without Lynne present at all, everything was clearly explained. Skimble actors, since Skimble’s number wasn’t altered much, describe people who’d worked with Lynne talking them through the choreography. No one talked about Blankenbuehler’s work like that. Every move of Lynne’s Jellicle Ball apparently represented something. Blankenbuehler’s Jellicle Ball looks fine, but there isn’t that level of detail.

The rehearsals of the the choreography were paced differently as well. 2016 was apparently put together in something of a hurry. Most Cats rehearsals begin with several days of the cast studying cats and learning how to move like them. 2016 devoted only a few hours to this. Gillian Lynne reportedly visited a rehearsal and was upset the none of the dancers knew how to move like cats. Cats has unique choreography in a unique cat-like style, but the 2016 team had no time to practice it, so they often come across as a bit too human. They’re talented human dancers, but they’re not very cat-like. Blankenbuehler’s choreography is often in a different, more modern urban style, that doesn’t seem like it was done with cat-like movement in mind.

I don’t hate Blankenbuehler. In behind the scenes stuff, he seems like a nice guy that the team liked working with. But, I don’t think he really understood what his role was. He was a choreographer and he did choreography. This would’ve been fine, even great for any other show, but not Cats.

Most modern musical theatre is based on opera. Characters sing about their feelings and that tells the story. The added element of dance takes the feelings of the song and amplifies them. The actors are emoting with their entire bodies in a larger-than-life way that creates an emotional intensity that audiences can empathize with. The music makes the audience feel what the characters are feeling in a way nothing else really can. Music is kind of magical. You hear a certain melody with certain instruments, and suddenly you’re happy, or sad, or angry.

This, by the way, is why going for realism in musicals is a terrible idea. Musicals don’t exist in physical reality. They exist on an emotional level that realism takes away from.

Cats rarely works like opera. The lyrics are mainly just adaptations of whimsical poems, so they don’t tell you much of anything. Memory, which features original lyrics and no dancing is an exception to this rule. In general, because they’re not dance roles, Grizabella and Old Deuteronomy have to use music and song lyrics to play their parts in the story. Jemima also does this whenever she does something connected to either one of them.

But, Cats is normally more of a ballet than an opera. Ballet tells a story purely through dance. Because the lyrics in Cats matter so rarely, it ends up working like a ballet, because the dance, unrelated to the poems, means something. It’s still a heightened reality where music invokes emotions and actors emote with their whole bodies, like in other musicals, but instead of the dance being an amplifier, it’s the storyteller.

ALW really liked a bunch of poems and wanted to put them to music. The result was a bunch of songs with a similar them but no real connection to each other. That works as a concept album, but Webber wanted a musical, an actual show where people danced to his concept album. He didn’t care about the story and didn’t expect anyone else to.

But, other people cared about the story. No one knew how to make a musical that’s not about something. Trevor Nunn added Memory and the storyline with Grizabella as an emotional centerpiece. There wasn’t a clear plot, but, on an emotional level, it now felt like something was actually happening. Gillian Lynne had no idea how to choreograph a musical about nothing, so she didn’t. She came up with her own interpretations of things and made the show about something. Several somethings, in fact. Victoria is going through puberty and discovering her sexuality. Demeter is recovering from an abusive sexual experience, with Bomba having a different attitude towards being in the same situation. The women in the story were given detailed story arcs that often revolved around their sexuality.

How sexuality is portrayed in Cats could be its own essay.

Anyway, Cats tells its story with a unique style of choreography. Because the choreographer is the story teller, Lynne had a lot of influence over the show. She was the one who knew all the details. Blankenbuehler was brought in to choreograph a show, like a normal job for him, not knowing what that would actually mean. He came in to have dance amplify the emotions in the song lyrics like in any other musical, not knowing that that’s impossible to do with Cats. The role of choreographer meant a level of knowledge and control that would normally belong to the director, composer, and lyricist. He didn’t realize that the show having any story at all depended on him.

So, he did stuff that looked cool, but didn’t tell the story, or that took the story in a direction that it wasn’t supposed to go. Tugger dancing in front of a giant mirror is funny in the moment, but that sort of narcissism, though funny, isn’t likable, and Tugger needs to be likable. He’s a major character and he helps save the day at the end by hyping up Misto. But, 2016 Tugger hypes up Misto because if feels like Misto is the only cat he truly respects. He has the same respect for Old Deuteronomy that the others have, but he doesn’t sound quite as sincere when he sings about him. He spends so much of his number antagonizing Munkustrap in particular that it’s hard to believe that he has any respect for him.

What can be learned from these interviews is that Blankenbuehler didn’t know what his job truly was and was there because someone important thought Cats would be more popular in 2016 if it was more like Hamilton and got the Hamilton guy to give it a make-over. Nunn was so proud of the show’s success that he neglected what made it successful in the first place, and the 2016 cast was rushed through rehearsals without proper instructions. Everyone tried their best, but they were all stuck.

For the most part, I blame whoever decided to have Blankenbuehler rechoreograph the show. Blankenbuehler did what he thought his job was and the cast did their jobs to the best of their ability. What really ruined Cats 2016 was an executive decision to fix something that wasn’t broken, believing if they made the Old Big Show more like the New Big Show, that would make people love it again. But Hamilton is no more like Cats than a cat is like a dog.

#cats 2016 #lots of cats tours #really long post #andy blankenbuehler is bad at cats #but it's not his fault #a cat is not a hamilton #gillian lynne #don't let her legacy die with her

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morkofday · 3 years

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#10YearPromise - pingxie blabberings

bc i wasn’t able to answer these questions throughout the week (as i’ve been traveling around while being extremely busy), i decided to just collect all of my answers under one post! i never tire talking about pingxie so this was extremely enjoyable ♥ am also practicing some very shameless self promo in this so be prepared!

thank you for @laireshi for organizing this event (i take it’s you alone? am not sure, sorry for my laziness) and being amazing in general ^^ i won’t be able to join as i am still very busy and summer is always pure chaos for me, so i can only hope that other ppl have fun! if you are not aware of 10 Year Promise Pingxie Exchange, you can find the original announcement post here. join in if you have the time and inspiration ^^

and then to my answers which i will be placing under the cut bc i don’t want to flood anyone’s dash with me going bonkers over these two idiots. enjoy tho if you decide to read this :’D ♥

I. What made you ship pingxie?

Back when I got into Reboot bc of ZYL (as has happened to many ppl probably) and then saw stuff about pingxie once I started going through that drama’s tag on tumblr, my first thought about them was that they had to be a crack ship. The way Reboot portrays them as well as their actors and their huuuge age difference affected this a lot, and I was actually cackling at them bc all their moments in Reboot made me just go “oh, socialist brotherhood at its best” in my head. But then I finished watching Reboot’s 1st season (as the 2nd one wasn’t out yet) and started reading some fics. I learned more about them and the canon storyline. I learned how damn devoted they are to each other, and after that, many moments in Reboot gained new meaning in my eyes. So, I think what made me ship pingxie was a mix of Reboot (especially the hallucination moment where Xiaoge dies and Wu Xie loses it bc that’s my jam as I later on became to notice) and then the amazing fics I dug out during that time. After that the love grew stronger as I watched the other dramas, and these days I’m a lost cause. I feel like I spend most of my awake time thinking about these two and their love. They are amazing. I cry rivers for them.

II. Which pingxie version is your favorite?

After finding pingxie, I fell in love with them properly during TLT2. There is just something about that stage of their relationship for me, the stage where both of them are still very tentative about everything but they have deep down accepted that they’re tied now. Wu Xie is figuring out so many things, coming to terms with being betrayed by his uncle and slowly realizing that something bigger is going on behind the scenes. Meanwhile, Xiaoge is learning how to trust Wu Xie and how to accept that he cannot leave this naïve boy behind. It feels very fragile, and I have so many emotions about TLT2 bc of this. Xiaoge is so soft and feels very multilayered. Wu Xie is still his naïve self but is slowly gaining some sharper edges as he comes to face the cruel world. I like how Cheng Yi and Hou Minghao have portrayed this dynamic. Also, TLT2 is just very extra with all the pingxie scenes, who would be able to resist loving them? So, I have to admit that my favorite pingxie is these two, tho Ultimate Note comes very, very close.

III. What’s your favorite pingxie headcanon?

Headcanons are a bit hard for me as I don’t know enough of the canon. I have not read the novels so most of the story I’ve just patched together from all the bits I’ve read from somewhere (here, on twt, in fics) and through the scenes the dramas have shown me. I feel like the whole world is lowkey made of headcanons for me :’D But hmm, my favorite pingxie headcanon… I’d say there are two and then one bonus bc it’s more a Wu Xie related headcanon than just pingxie. The first one is that the pingxie confession happens after the Bronze Gate. It feels like the only moment when they’re both ready for such a thing. I’d say Xiaoge comes to realize his own feelings a lot earlier and he might tell something to unconscious Wu Xie before leaving for ten years, but he will not actually leave Wu Xie with such a burden. He doesn’t want to ask anything when it sounds like he doesn’t even believe that Wu Xie will be willing to wait for him, and I’d say that for him, his feelings are going to be fine even if Wu Xie never learns about them. He might even wish that Wu Xie never learns about them bc he’s not able to promise much as an immortal and amnesiac being (he outlives Wu Xie, most likely forgets him). For Wu Xie however, I’d say he needs time. He really is way too naïve and I’d say that he needs those ten years to realize that he’s in love with his best friend. I dunno who confesses first after Xiaoge returns but I think that only after that decade their relationship is “mature” enough to hold the weight of a confession (even if I also love to play around with the thought of them getting together during the events of Ultimate Note bc that drama offered many good chances for that). Another headcanon for me is that Xiaoge will find a way to die when Wu Xie does. After learning about them more, I feel like Reboot implies this too. Xiaoge is very accepting of Wu Xie’s death but in the last moments, when he really thinks that this is going to be it for Wu Xie, he hesitates. We see a spark of desperation there, and I’ve come to think that his initial plan, the plan he came up with once he got that call from Wu Xie and knew he would join Wu Xie on his last adventure, was to see this through for Wu Xie’s sake and then leave and die alone. I don’t know how much there would be left for Zhang Qiling after Wu Xie is gone. I feel like this is also what Wu Xie fears. But would he really resent Xiaoge for joining him in death after living such a long and hard life? I’d say no and I’d say that even Pangzi accepts this as one of the most likely outcomes. The bonus one then feels very personal to me. I don’t usually talk about this bc I feel so unsure of even mentioning this but I’ve seen others with similar thoughts so am sharing! I’ve never before gotten any vibes about a character’s sexuality in a drama I’ve watched but Reboot Wu Xie looked at me once in the eye and all I could hear was my brain yelling “asexual”. So, that is just my personal headcanon for Wu Xie. He’s ace and proud of it. He can flirt etc. but sex makes him go naah. He doesn’t need it or want it. He can appreciate beauty and hot ppl without wanting to sleep with them and I think his relationship with Xiaoge fits very well into this. I don’t have any personal experiences with being ace but I feel like Wu Xie has read the name once, shrugged and gone, “guess that’s me” and continued on with his life. He’s badass like that and I love him for it. (take a very relevant meme lol from this post)

IV. What’s the ideal pingxie date?

Ah, christ. I dunno if I’ve ever thought about them going on a date? In the middle of tomb raiding, hospital trips and fighting against powers bigger than themselves, I’ve rarely seen any time for them to do something like that lol. But after Ultimate Note, I’ve thought about star gazing a lot. Just them, the infinite night sky and some lonely hilltop. They would probably take a blanket with them, huddle together and talk about things in hushed voices. Wu Xie would go on a ramble about all the constellations and their meanings and mythology behind them and Xiaoge would just nod at him and watch Wu Xie talking. Maybe he would offer some tidbits in the middle of the rambling, making Wu Xie smile brightly. It would be relaxing and comfortable and loving. They would make out a lil bit. Would maybe lie down and play with each other’s hair. All their worries would feel insignificant. Wu Xie would fall asleep for a moment and Xiaoge would wake him up with a kiss to get him moving again so that they don’t need to sleep on the cold ground. They would return home and drink something warm and then go to sleep, cuddled together and happy. relevant edit x

V. What’s your favorite pingxie getting together scenario?

I guess I already talked about this a bit but let me elaborate then! As said, I’d see it happening after the Bronze Gate. I am not sure if it would be right away (they’re both going through so much trauma at that point) or if it would happen after Reboot (maybe we would still need Wu Xie almost dying for them to get their shit together), but I’d say it happens in a rush either way. It’s one of those “I have to tell you something before it’s too late” -type of moments. Or one of those “Bc I love you, you idiot!” -type of moments. I feel like I keep thinking that maybe Wu Xie would have to confess first bc as said, Xiaoge wouldn’t like to burden Wu Xie with his feelings when there’s so little he can give in the sense of normalcy. But then again, I have written a oneshot where Xiaoge is the first one to confess and that always feels better for me. That at some point Xiaoge feels secure enough to tell Wu Xie about his own feelings. That he feels confident and comfortable enough to say it out loud while still expecting nothing in return bc he knows that Wu Xie won’t abandon him either way. But no matter how that happens, I always see it as this dam breaking. The emotions finally become too strong. Something happens that reminds them that life is too short. Something happens that makes them finally talk it out and ah, Pangzi can finally take a break, what a joy

VI. What’s your favorite pingxie moment?

Every adaptation has its own good moments so let me make a list (like I saw someone else do too):

The Lost Tomb:

Xiaoge rescues Wu Xie from the shibie

Wu Xie worrying over unconscious Xiaoge plus taking care of him in the hotel room

The Pingxie MomentTM aka Xiaoge saving Wu Xie from falling and then cradling the boy to his chest while thumb rubbing his shoulder

The Lost Tomb 2:

Xiaoge revealed to be Baldie and Wu Xie yelling at him about it

Lowkey the whole underwater tomb arc bc holy shit that’s gay

Wu Xie losing it when Xiaoge doesn’t come up from the underwater tomb, diving after him and then almost dying himself + Pangzi getting angry at him for being stupid

pingxie ft. magical skype in the bronze tree cave (and Xiaoge being emo about the 1000yo warrior guy right before that)

Xiaoge rescuing Wu Xie from drowning (they shared air, you cannot convince me otherwise) + Wu Xie giving Xiaoge his watch in the hospital (relevant edits x x)

Wu Xie’s face when he sees Zhang Buxun in the coffin bc I love pain :)

Xiaoge not shooting Wu Xie despite not remembering him in the mountain village

Wu Xie grabbing Xiaoge’s jacket after being kidnapped and the Iron Triangle reunites in that old Chen guy’s cabin, asking, “Is that you?” from Xiaoge to make sure that he remembers again while looking like the biggest puppy (relevant edit x)

also some relevant memes x

Ultimate Note:

The hand over mouth reunion in the Golmud Sanatorium

“Xiaoge will ignore anyone else but you”

Xiaoge pretending he isn’t Losing ItTM throughout the whole time Wu Xie is in the Devil’s City with A-Ning

more hand over mouth with the gigantic snake

“The goddess has ascended”

Wu Xie protecting Xiaoge after he returns from the jade meteorite

“Do you remember me?” “Wu Xie.”

Wu Xie promising to help Xiaoge find his memories no matter what bc Xiaoge’s business is Wu Xie’s business

“Maybe you can return home with a wife today.” Wu Xie: proceeds to stare at Xiaoge, horrified

“Take me home.”

The sword gifting scene (especially Xiaoge denying the possibility of him killing Wu Xie or them harming each other, relevant edits x x)

other relevant edits for ultimate note x x

Reboot:

Wu Xie telling Xiaoge about his sickness and then Xiaoge coming back and promising to join Wu Xie on his trip (relevant edit x)

the death hallucination bc am a masochist

Wu Xie’s death dream where Xiaoge calls to him but then accepts his choice to move forward bc am a masochist pt. 2

pingxie reunion in the Thunder City forest where Xiaoge saves Wu Xie & co. from the poisonous gas

the moment in Thunder City where Wu Xie sits outside at night, eating the peanuts Pangzi gave him and then notices Xiaoge, offering him the peanuts and smiling

when Xiaoge leaves for the last time and then gets reunited with healed Wu Xie against all odds

the train scene and their softest smiles to each other

Time Raiders:

Wu Xie being the best bean and just wanting to befriend this mysterious man while seeing right under his skin and making Xiaoge baffled and fall in love in approximately 0.5 seconds

Xiaoge, catch! *proceeds to save only Wu Xie when they fall into that shibie horror chamber*

Xiaoge’s desperation to save Wu Xie from the crumbling ground

their death waltz at the end of the movie plus Xiaoge’s sacrifice

+ Sand Sea:

“Don’t you dare call him Xiaoge!”

Wu Xie offering his friends and then himself as comfort to Li Cu when he’s scared while smiling very softly at the memory of Xiaoge

“But isn’t his surname Wu?” Hei Xiazi: You have seen nothing yet, you sweet summer child

Wu Xie talking about Xiaoge’s past in the temple (aka the Tibetan Sea Flower story bc I just adore how pretty they’ve made those scenes)

VII. What is the best gift Wu Xie and Xiaoge could give each other?

I haven’t really thought about this type of stuff either bc we have already seen a ton of gifts being exchanged! I love the watch Wu Xie gives to Xiaoge in TLT2 as mentioned (it’s so silly but also so sweet) and I love it that Wu Xie gifts Xiaoge with a new sword in Ultimate Note. Also, I feel like I can count the food Wu Xie leaves for Xiaoge in Ultimate Note and that one moment where Xiaoge offers his knife for Wu Xie as a “pen”. They would give anything for each other as long as the other asked (which they never do) so I dunno what type of gift would matter the most. As it’s so hard to say, let me talk about one more headcanon that I’ve been thinking about ever since the infamous Bazaar photoshoot for Ultimate Note/XYL & ZSX. So, we see them having matching rings and necklaces in that photoshoot. I think jewelry would be kind of difficult for Xiaoge to wear when he needs to fight, as jewelry could be a hindrance in that type of situation But my brain won’t shut up about “pingxie married!!!” when I ask this question from it. To be honest, I do not see pingxie getting married in the traditional sense. They don’t need something like that after everything they’ve gone through. But I like to play around with the thought of promise rings. Just them exchanging rings for fun, for their own sakes, to have something concrete that reminds them of their promise to each other and of their feelings. Maybe even Xiaoge could wear that ring under his gloves idk. But am a sucker for that thought so my answer to this is then simply: a ring. relevant edits x x

if you read this far, thank you so much! I hope this gave you something and thank you once more for organizing this and allowing everyone to share their love for pingxie ^^ ♥

#10yearpromise #pingxie #dmbj #yes i ramble without any purpose #yes i love them a normal amount :)#thank you for organizing this!!#and sorry for coming at you like this #i hope you don't mind #am wishing you luck with the event!!#and hoping everyone has fun #i hope everything in this post #works like it's supposed to #bc oh boy did i struggle

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