#sometimes i can't even believe how much i myself have written. like i think i am not a writer. i am not doing enough. i do not write enough | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

inkskinned · 3 months

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crows use tools and like to slide down snowy hills. today we saw a goose with a hurt foot who was kept safe by his flock - before taking off, they waited for him to catch up. there are colors only butterflies see. reindeer are matriarchical. cows have best friends and 4 stomachs and like jazz music. i watched a video recently of an octopus making himself a door out of a coconut shell.

i am a little soft, okay. but sometimes i can't talk either. the world is like fractal light to me, and passes through my skin in tendrils. i feel certain small things like a catapult; i skirt around the big things and somehow arrive in crisis without ever realizing i'm in pain.

in 5th grade we read The Curious Incident of the Dog In The Night-time, which is about a young autistic boy. it is how they introduced us to empathy about neurotypes, which was well-timed: around 10 years old was when i started having my life fully ruined by symptoms. people started noticing.

i wonder if birds can tell if another bird is odd. like the phrase odd duck. i have to believe that all odd ducks are still very much loved by the other normal ducks. i have to believe that, or i will cry.

i remember my 5th grade teacher holding the curious incident up, dazzled by the language written by someone who is neurotypical. my teacher said: "sometimes i want to cut open their mind to know exactly how autistics are thinking. it's just so different! they must see the world so strangely!" later, at 22, in my education classes, we were taught to say a person with autism or a person on the spectrum or neurodivergent. i actually personally kind of like person-first language - it implies the other person is trying to protect me from myself. i know they had to teach themselves that pattern of speech, is all, and it shows they're at least trying. and i was a person first, even if i wasn't good at it.

plants learn information. they must encode data somehow, but where would they store it? when you cut open a sapling, you cannot find the how they think - if they "think" at all. they learn, but do not think. i want to paint that process - i think it would be mostly purple and blue.

the book was not about me, it was about a young boy. his life was patterned into a different set of categories. he did not cry about the tag on his shirt. i remember reading it and saying to myself: i am wrong, and broken, but it isn't in this way. something else is wrong with me instead. later, in that same person-first education class, my teacher would bring up the curious incident and mention that it is now widely panned as being inaccurate and stereotypical. she frowned and said we might not know how a person with autism thinks, but it is unlikely to be expressed in that way. this book was written with the best intentions by a special-ed teacher, but there's some debate as to if somebody who was on the spectrum would be even able to write something like this.

we might not understand it, but crows and ravens have developed their own language. this is also true of whales, dolphins, and many other species. i do not know how a crow thinks, but we do know they can problem solve. (is "thinking" equal to "problem solving"? or is "thinking" data processing? data management?) i do not know how my dog thinks, either, but we "talk" all the same - i know what he is asking for, even if he only asks once.

i am not a dolphin or reindeer or a dog in the nighttime, but i am an odd duck. in the ugly duckling, she grows up and comes home and is beautiful and finds her soulmate. all that ugliness she experienced lives in downy feathers inside of her, staining everything a muted grey. she is beautiful eventually, though, so she is loved. they do not want to cut her open to see how she thinks.

a while ago i got into an argument with a classmate about that weird sia music video about autism. my classmate said she thought it was good to raise awareness. i told her they should have just hired someone else to do it. she said it's not fair to an autistic person to expect them to be able to handle that kind of a thing.

today i saw a goose, and he was limping. i want to be loved like a flock loves a wounded creature: the phrase taken under a wing. which is to say i have always known i am not normal. desperate, mewling - i want to be loved beyond words.

loved beyond thinking.

#spilled ink #writeblr #personal #please don't ask me to talk on my experience on the spectrum lol. i hate how ppl talk to me about it #i really try not to write so specifically about it #bc inevitably someone talks to me like im a child #i think this is the first time i've ever openly identified with it but i've been hinting for years #i might delete this. feels big.#the thing is that being on the spectrum actually IS a spectrum #and if u say ur autistic #inevitably someone makes an assumption about ur needs/symptoms #please do not treat me differently than u usually would. like.... we can tell when you do #and like i mention. i do appreciate the effort. i do truly appreciate the effort.#but it still feels like...#when i was blind. sometimes people kind of did the same-ish thing.#they'd find out i was blind and start talking really loudly?#and while i KNOW they're just trying to help. it would be like. i'd be trying to find #the right way into a building (sometimes only 1 door is unlocked and i couldn't see the signs posted about where to go)#and ppl would be like ''OH UR BLIND? YES SO THIS IS A DOOR. IT OPENS INTO THE BUILDING. IT IS LOCKED NOW."#''A DOOR CAN BE FOUND IN MANY LOCATIONS.''#and it feels like. when i admit to being autistic #someone comes screeching into my life being like THIS IS A DOOR.

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ao3commentoftheday · 5 months

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I've always found it hard to find the right words for comments, but I used to try and put down something on all the fics I liked but after seeing what some of my writer friends, who are fairy popular in their fandoms, say privately in the groupchat about some of the comments they get, I can't bring myself to leave any comments at all any more.

I know it's a form or unloading where they can salt without hurting anyone and I generally think that's a good thing, saltmates are needed so you can talk about all the crappy annoying things in fandom in a private space and not spread shit on tumblr or ao3 etc.

But It's so so disheartening to me as a comment shy reader because it's never good enough. If it's just emoji hearts or someone saying "second kudos" it's too short and worthless. If it's epicly long well-written, funny, sweet, and clever love bombing, then it's too much and annoying.

I just don't understand, I don't write myself, I draw, badly, and I never get the kind of praise they sometimes get, but I would LOVE to have some of those things said about my work.

I love my friends a lot and I'm a firm believer in saltmates, but it makes me a little crazy and very paranoid to see the difference between what they say in private and what they actually answer to the comments in public on their fics.

I've read a lot here on tumblr about how fic writers love ALL comments etc etc and a lot of tips and tricks for people who have problems leaving comments, but I dont trust that now and I never comment anymore because I do not want a writer of a fic I love to think such things about me, even if it's just in their minds in private.

Do I have extra salty friends or is this a common thing among writers that no one wants to admits out loud?

From my experience, as a writer in fandom on and off for 20-ish years and as the mod of a comment-positive fandom ask blog, your friends are extra salty.

Have I heard people get frustrated with "I liked this!" comments? Sure. But for every one of those, I hear at least 10 people who are giddy and bouncing and just over the moon that someone liked their fic. I've never heard anyone complain about "epicly long well-written, funny, sweet, and clever love bombing." Most fic writers I know would probably pass out from happiness if they received one of those.

I don't know your friends, of course, but it sounds like someone in the group got a little toxic at some point and the rest of them went along, for whatever reason. Maybe burnout was a factor. Maybe they had a specific thing they wanted to get from their comments section that they weren't able to receive. Whatever the cause, the effect on you is bad.

I know you didn't ask for what to do about this, but I'm going to lay it out for you anyway:

stay in the group chat and feel worse and worse about every comment you've ever left on a fic

say something to your friends and ask that they have those conversations when you're not around (your choice if you include the part about it being because they make you feel bad)

leave the group chat and maybe also lose those friends

None of those options are great, but your current situation already sucks so it might be time to try something new.

I'm so so sorry that they made you feel like your comments weren't enough, anon. You don't deserve that. No one does. I hope if those authors see this ask that they pause and reflect and realize the audience they were speaking in front of.

I agree that people need a place to be salty, and I appreciate them doing it in a private space - but it wasn't private enough. ❤️

#asks and answers #long post

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waldau · 3 months

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hello!! big fan here! i think you’re super talented and cool 🫶🏼 can i perhaps request a friends to lovers thing for vernon? do you think he’d be the first one to break and confess or would it be you? if it’s the latter, how does he react? any thoughts on this would be fine really, even if you don’t want to make it into a full fledged story. just love talking about and thinking about vernon.

darling anon i think you broke my brain because i've never written so much in a single day (also thank you so much!!! <3). i love vernon and i've kind of been in a vernon spiral myself recently. i hope you like this :)

chroma — chwe hansol | 2,520 words | fluff

chroma (noun) — the purity of a colour, or its freedom from white or grey. reader and vernon are best friends who SCREAM become lovers. briefly ft dokyeom.

gender neutral reader. warnings: none.

at first glance, you and vernon are opposites.

not exactly grumpy and sunshine opposites, but if you're both the same colour, you're a shade or two brighter than him. which means that you're similar with different energy levels, and honestly? you love your dynamic.

your friends notice that outside of the group, you're the one he's the closest to — so it only makes sense that he's also the one you're the closest to.

he's always near you whenever you're hanging out with your friends — whether you're sitting right next to each other or across the room, he meets your eyes from time to time, if only to check in on you, or to allude to an inside joke when someone speaks.

(you have way too many inside jokes; an unhealthy amount, even.)

he always makes it a point to drop you home. always. unless your other friends are around, in which case he won't rest till you send him a text saying you got home safely. or you crash at each other's places for the night if you're too tired.

you always look forward to whenever he gets random bursts of energy and proceeds to tell you about stuff he finds interesting. but you also use him as a pillow when he becomes extremely quiet, and honestly? it's pretty easy to co-exist with vernon regardless of the silence or the lack of it, because you always match his energy.

he sends you pictures of whatever he thinks you'll like, whether it's a meme or a sunset, but sometimes he sends you stuff he likes — like a cool monument he saw in new york or his cat or a picture of two snails on the side of the road with the caption "us?"

seriously, opening his texts is like a wild card (in a good way).

he always makes it a point to drop you home. always. unless your other friends are around, in which case he won't rest till you send him a text saying you got home safely.

you're slightly more affectionate than him, which is something he doesn't mind.

he's not the first to initiate hugs, but you can trust that he's always going to find your hand for a high five or a fist bump or a quick side hug.

if you're sitting together on the couch listening to music or watching something on the television, he lets you loop your arm through his like it's something you do every day (which it most definitely is).

vernon wasn't very physical in the beginning of your friendship, but now you're used to a light brush of his hand against yours, your shoulders bumping for a second or two, a poke to your cheek — just your things.

now the thing is this: you have a crush on vernon. a huge crush that doesn't seem to be going away any time soon.

"i knew it!" dokyeom says shrilly, and you wince. you love him, but you're not sure if he's capable of keeping your secret.

"was it that obvious?"

"of course it was! i've seen the way you look at him. like he's the funniest guy in the room, even if he's not. or like he's the hottest guy in the room. which he—"

"—is," you finish, and bite your tongue. dokyeom doesn't need to know exactly how in deep you are.

dokyeom shakes his head. "i can't believe he doesn't know."

"kyeom, if you tell him, i swear—"

"i won't! i kind of want to see how long it takes for him to realize."

"i don't think he will," you say, looking over to where vernon is sitting on the couch and arguing with seungkwan and seungcheol about the best movie from 2008.

"how do you know that?"

you shrug. "i've tried dropping subtle hints. he's just...oblivious."

dokyeom follows your gaze and sighs. "he really is. but if you ask me," he says, turning to raise an eyebrow. "this really could go somewhere."

every year, you spend valentine's day together.

it started as a joke the first time — vernon's date somehow cancelled on him at the last moment, and he showed up to your place with a bouquet of flowers and a box of chocolates.

you thought your heart was going to fall out of your body, but he sheepishly explained he didn't know where else to go, or who else to give them to.

it turned into a rant about how he didn't believe in or care about the holiday anymore.

but now it's your tradition to enjoy each other's company rolling your eyes and booing at cheesy movies.

(you wish they'd come to life, specifically with vernon, but he doesn't have to know.)

he isn't the best at comforting you with words. you learned that a long time ago and know it well even now. yet he's the first person you turn to when something's wrong.

you're wrapped in a blanket on vernon's sofa, a hot mug of cocoa in front of you next to a bowl of snacks, but your mind isn't on any of them. why, you think. why, why, why me. you feel terrible for the space you're occupying, even though you've curled up into a ball.

"hey," vernon says from above you, and the next thing you know, you're pulled into him. "i don't know what to say to make it better, and...i don't know what else i can do, but tell me, okay?"

you nod.

"i'm sorry."

you stop crying at that, trying to blink away your tears but failing. "why?"

"he was a dick, and you never deserved someone so shitty."

you try to inhale, but it's shaky. "i'm just...so tired," you say, resting your head on his shoulder. "i don't know why i keep attracting idiots like him. and i hate that you always have to see me like this."

"like this?"

"in pieces. crying. whatever."

"you're not in pieces," vernon says, running his hand over your back. "you're sad. it happens. and i don't mind being here, okay? i'm always here. sorry."

you snort. "you've apologized more to me than he's ever done at this point."

"now you know who to keep around longer," vernon smiles.

you wonder if vernon's aware of the things he does. he talks to you like there's no one else he'd rather be with at the moment. he bends down to meet your eyes when you're talking about something, and you're amazed he hasn't noticed you short-circuiting in the middle of your sentences more than a few times now. he finds the most random things to give you every now and then.

"huh?"

"pebble. reminded me of pou."

"pou? vernon, that was so long ago!"

"do you want me to skip this rock?"

"no, wait—"

fights with him aren't really fights, because one of you always caves in and has to make up.

"your neck's going to hurt," you hear vernon say softly, probably trying not to wake you up. but you weren't really asleep in the first place.

"why do you care?" you grumble, sitting up straight and wincing when your neck does, in fact, hurt.

"i don't hate you just because we had a fight," he says, pulling you down to rest your head on his chest. "sore necks suck."

you chew on your cheek for a while, not wanting to say the words you know are inevitable. "fighting with you sucks, too."

he says nothing; just hugs you tighter.

you're surprised at how well you've adapted to vernon going out on dates.

it wasn't easy, you'll admit. at first it felt like your heart was being ripped out of your chest while also being crushed, but now it's okay (maybe because he hasn't been dating as much recently — you can't remember the last one he even went on).

you're nothing if not a supportive best friend, so you're okay with the few times his dates go well enough to tell you about.

you teasingly tell him not to give you too many details, but you wonder if he knows why you really ask that of him.

both of you act like a married couple, according to your friends. it made you blush at first, but there's no point reacting to it anymore because it's just not true. vernon doesn't like you the way you like him, and the way you're affectionate with each other is...hard to explain. just friends, you say, even though you wish you were more.

"you're dishgushting," dokyeom says, mouth stuffed full of pizza while he pours himself some coke.

you give him a look. "you or me?"

dokyeom nods, chewing aggressively before swallowing his bite. "you. and vernon. can't stop giving each other those eyes all the time. makes me sick."

"...eyes?"

"like you need a room or something. like there's no one else in here with you guys."

"we don't do that, kyeom."

he snorts inelegantly. "ask anyone. you're lucky jeonghan hasn't snitched on you yet."

and maybe, just maybe, vernon treats you somewhat differently than he treats his friends.

you always get the first bite of his food, always listen to new vinyls he gets on the weekends, sprawled out on the floor and letting the music seep into your skin, always get to steal his hoodies whenever you're cold — you can't think of any other friend of his who gets the same treatment.

but that's just best friend privilege.

at least that's what you tell yourself.

after vernon comes back from his latest tour, he becomes more touchy with you — resting a hand on your thigh, tracing the shell of your ear, linking pinkies with you.

maybe it's just his way of reconnecting with you after being away for so long.

but doesn't he realize what he's doing to your heart?

probably not, you think, when he wraps his arms around your waist one morning when you're in front of his vinyl collection, trying to pick something you think you'll like.

"sol?" you ask, patting his hands before resuming browsing through his shelf.

"hey."

"what's up?"

"tired."

"shouldn't you be in bed, then?"

"you weren't there."

you pause, the magdalene vinyl in your hand threatening to fall before you place it back. "i'm never there."

"wanna change that?"

"what?"

"what."

you think it's some silly pick-up line he's trying to test on you, so you gently push him back to his bedroom, threatening to leave his home if he doesn't sleep for a few more hours.

but it doesn't end there.

those pick-up lines pop up in the most unexpected places, with the most unexpected company. you shake your head and laugh them off, but you wonder why he's behaving like this.

there's one possible explanation for it, but you're not going to let yourself walk down that path. not unless he does it first.

vernon's quiet on the walk back to your car from the supermarket, half your groceries with you and the other half with him. he doesn't say anything when you point out his shoelace is untied, or his hair is sticking up a bit weirdly for his liking, or even the fact that there's a cat sitting right next to your car before it skitters away a few seconds later.

you're not worried. vernon does have those moments where he zones out so hard no one can get him back for a while, and this seems to be one of them.

"i love you," he finally says.

your hand fumbles with the grip of your bag. not cool, not when there's a couple of glass jars in there. there's going to be nothing cute to put the cookies in if you break them now.

"i love you too?" you offer, because it's not uncommon for you to say it to each other. it's just that vernon's never brought it up unprompted before.

"no. not how you think."

not how you think? how...

oh.

you can only stare at vernon, mind running a million miles an hour while he refuses to look at you, suddenly finding interest in that untied shoelace.

"love me love me?"

he nods, almost imperceptible if you weren't looking for it. it gives you a sudden boost of courage, of happiness, of everything good. you weren't wrong, after all. you put the rest of the groceries in the trunk and turn to face him.

you've seen this sight hundreds of times before — vernon with his messy hair, in this very hoodie with jam stains on the left sleeve, and those brown eyes that light up from the inside when the sun hits them just the right way and make him look like the most handsome man in the world — but it's like you've been seeing the world, even vernon, in monochrome till he said those words.

chroma.

"oi," you say, grabbing his face in your hands. "sol."

he just blinks.

"are you sure? absolutely sure?"

"yeah," he says, voice a bit rougher than usual, and you see yourself in his eyes for a moment. "i am. but i'm sor—"

you shut him up with a quick peck to his lips, uncaring of who might be seeing you right now. you know you're going to be embarrassed about it, squeal about it to dokyeom, bury your face in your pillow and question if any of it was real, but right now, it doesn't matter.

you've shocked vernon, for once. it feels good. he's staring at you with his mouth open, hands clutching your wrists like there's no tomorrow.

"you're not the only one," you explain, all bravado fizzling out when his full focus lands only on you.

"oh? yeah?" he asks, pulling you closer.

"mm."

he rubs his thumb across one of your wrists. "do you have eggs?"

"...what?" back to regularly scheduled programming, then. trust vernon not to make it weird.

"eggs. or ice cream. anything that needs the fridge. because i want to take you out on a date right now."

some things change: vernon becomes your boyfriend. you move in together a few months later. it's not the first time you've met his mother, but you're still nervous.

but the best thing of all is that he's yours now.

he even tells you how he realized he loved you back.

"i just...remembered you arguing with me about whether penne or fusilli was better, and my only thought was, i want this with you. for however long i could have it. i think i just loved you for so long, but...i didn't realize it was that love. i finally understood why kyeom-hyung kept telling me to get my shit together."

"sol—"

"no one knows me like you do and i don't want anyone else to. yeah."

"sol, babe, i was just asking if you want me to take out the trash."

"you...oh," he says, grinning in that shy way he does. "thought you asked me if i wanted you. but hey, if i'm trash for you, you're legally obligated to take me out, right?"

i've never put pictures before but he's SO boyfriend material, look at him

taglist: @bookyeom @wootify @strnsvt @cloudycaramel @thepoopdokyeomtouched @minnieminshi

#yo i didn't ramble i just threw up a large volume of words i REALLY hope you like this #like WHAT is this. even i'm shocked #BUT i love writing 'oh' moments. peak writing idc idc #also there are two wolves inside you: WOULD he fucking say that and he would NOT fucking say that #guess i just love him too much :)#chwe hansol #chwe hansol fluff #vernon #vernon fluff #fluff #seventeen #seventeen fluff #svt #svt fluff #waldau writes #req

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flowerandblood · 1 month

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ONE YEAR OF FLOWER&BLOOD

✨🎉🌙✨🎉🌙✨🎉🌙✨🎉🌙✨🎉🌙✨🎉🌙

Exactly one year ago I posted my first chapter of the My Best Friend series. Nowadays I think it's something awful and I don't even try to edit it because I'd have to write everything from scratch, but I've left it for people who feel attached to the story. I remember getting about six likes and one comment on the first day and that huuuuge interest made me eager to create chapter 2 and then all the others.

I remember the excitement with which I waited and then replied to comments, not believing that people were actually waiting for the next chapter. At the time I was literally not following anyone, which was good because I wasn't comparing myself to anyone.

Eventually I felt I was ready to try writing other series and a few were successful enough that I decided to stay here permanently and create because it made me happy. Up to that point, everyone had been very kind to me and I started following more and more blogs, wanting to feel part of the fandom, to make friends with everyone. Now I know that was the biggest mistake I made.

Seeing things that didn't interest me, fanfic's whose way of writing couldn't draw me in, I felt frustrated, while at the same time fearing that if I stopped following someone, that person would see it as an affront. At the same time, The Impossible Choice, my biggest project until The Fall from the Heavens (which I'm currently editing and re-editing, while inserting on AO3), began to be written.

Just when I thought I had reached the pinnacle of my abilities (which wasn't true), I also started to clash with anonymous hate messages, probably the worst of which were those vilifying me and my husband, and those regarding my one-shot with Micheal Gavey. I know now that taking it personally and getting involved was my big mistake, and the fandom was shaken by drama that got out of hand.

I was a few steps away from deleting my blog at the time, but my husband talked me out of the idea (thankfully, as my stories aren't saved anywhere else − I'm only now moving them to AO3).

That's when I first realised that some people here I don't even like, and they probably don't like me. I wondered, why are we following each other then? Why are we pretending to have any courtesy? It was only later that I realised that to be considered someone's friend, you have to reblog their work and preferably agree with them even when they write hurtful things.

Since I've depleted my circle of those I follow to about 20 people, since I've blocked dozens of people and tags, there's been blissful silence (with the exceptions of when I write about behaviour in the fandom that I find toxic and someone accuses me of causing drama, but I'm used to it now). I've also never written happier than I do now.

Ideas come to me on their own, I don't feel uptight about what other big people will think of me, whether they reblog it, approve of it or not. I don't give a shit and life is beautiful! Although I can be emotionally unstable, I'm only 70 people short of crossing the next milestone of 3,000 followers, and that's BIG for me. It amuses me that I keep getting messages that someone is going to block me or stop following me, and you guys keep coming. It's gratifying.

I'm going to keep writing for you guys, and I'm sure during season two you'll also see my posts describing my impressions after the episodes in which I hope to involve my husband. I'll also keep you updated here on how I'm doing with my book I'm creating in my private life.

Apreciation

@ewanmitchellcrumbs

Ange. I know that sometimes I'm fucked up, but I want you to know that you've made this place so much more bearable for me that I can't imagine it without you. What I appreciate most about you is that you can talk and discuss, that you always try to understand the other side, that you are empathetic, warm and kind. I feel that, like friends in everyday life, we can also tell each other about things we disagree about, and there are not many people like that here.

On top of that, you are very talented and your stories are always a pleasure to read, even when they are short, you are able to build the plot and atmosphere perfectly, something I have always admired. Thank you for every kind word and understanding.

I still remember your first message to me via ask, referring to the fact that I didn't want to write a pairing with a mermaid because someone else was writing about it at the same time. My heart melted then, it was so nice!

@targaryenrealnessdarling

Liz, Queen of Angst! Your calmness and composure puts me in awe. You're disgustingly talented when it comes to writing and you have a super-sweet personality. When you started following me I began to squirm with delight, and when you started reblogging my stuff? My goodness!!!

@persephonerinyes

You've been engaging and reblogging my stories for as long as I can remember. Always involved, your thoughts make me smile. Thank you for being with me for so long!

@zenka96

You've been here with me since the dawn of time. You know that I love you. Your support from the very beginning really makes me feel like I have a friend here.

@huramuna

I am so proud of you! I remember your asks when I wrote Glass Cuts Deepest, your illustrations for me and your uncertainty about whether you should start writing yourself. I'm so happy for you and that you are so successful! You deserved it.

@black-dread & @aegonx

You are my favourite gif makers. Your work always leaves me in awe, you are amazing! I know how much work you put into it and somehow you make even the worst lit scenes look wonderful!

@summerposie; @0eessirk8; @melsunshine; @immyowndefender; @bellaisasleep; @kckt88; @thedamewithabook; @happinessinthebeing; @queenofshinigamis; @travelingmypassion; @mefools; @fan-goddess; @toodlesxcuddles; @ammo23; @troublesomesnitch; @mariahossain; @out-of-life; @apothe-roses; @heavenhatesme; @whitearemydarkestnight; @liv-cole; @blackswxnn; @echos-muses; @watercolorskyy; @at-a-rax-ia; @tssf-imagines; @snh96; @hiatuswhore; @exitpursuedbyavulcan; @darylandbethfanforever9; @the-dendrophile-bookdragon; @opheliaas-stuff @zaldritzosrose

Your comments and reblogs make me want to keep writing. You make me laugh, you comfort me and you support me. I know I'm definitely forgetting someone, but I want you to know that I love everyone who comments on my stories and there is nothing better for me than responding to your reactions and questions! I have known some of you for so many months that I truly consider you my good friends!

lottie-blue-star; aveatquevale-; aemondtargaryenwifey marvelescvpe; alphard-hydraes-blog; herejusttostan; li0nn3stuff; alexandrawho; vilmakamunen; angelinap09; theloveablestargirl; rose-blue-19; xxxkat3xxx; flosaureum; mandiiblanche; librawh0re; jasminecosmic99; ivvypg; rojocarnation; killmanduh; tokkiiidoll; wolfdressedinlace; angelofvivianne; nina2697; starwarsgirlsimmer1; katsucker; ipostwhtifeel; aemondsdelight; ilswemoon; tigrigri; pasta-rask; roselibrary; lystargs; gemini-mama; nikstrange; tempo-rary-fix; coffeeobsessedtrencher; gwuinivyre; dreamerbythewayx; diiickbrainn; mothmankit

And everyone else I missed and whose icons I would recognize from afar. I know that you have been with me for many months, often in silence or communicating anonymously. Your silent support and presence is something wonderful for me, knowing that you have been with me for so long and read all my posts!

Thankyouthankyouthankyou!!!!

#one year anniversary #celebration

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harmless-pest · 3 months

Text

((HEY TURNS OUT I LIED AGAIN

I thought i didn't write down any of my plans for this blog, but it seems like I did? so here's some character bios I wrote and the synopsis of what was gonna happen in epilogue (unfortunately without visual direction)

The following content was written in 2017, only meant to be read by myself and is mostly unedited

LORE

The underground is going empty. Slowly. Mostly he stays at charas grave, bc he's a fukkin flower and would die without sunlight. The only other place with light is the palace and there's too much traffic there in and out of the underground. He wants to avoid people after what he did. Not that anyone remembers any of it, resets or the god thing (it was kinda cool he doesn't super regret that. More later) but he feels like. Bad about it and doesn't know how to deal with THAT baloney. he'll still go out every now and then though to see the state of the UG, explore abandoned places, hear word of the surface from locals who decided it wasn't for them or just came back to visit. None of them know who he is, but some are familiar with a weird flower they've seen popping out of the ground and suddenly disappearing. He absolutely idolizes frisk for saving the underground, doing what he and chara never could. But after a while alone with himself he realizes that frisk just coincidentally came at the right time. First he idolized chara, then frisk, and then he realized HE was the one who became a GOD and broke the barrier himself and sure frisk helped but he could have done it on his own! He's charismatic enough! Who needs frisk, they aren't even that great or cool! They had the power to reset and didn't even do anything cool with it! They went around one whole time and that was it, they weren't even interested in the experimentation and mind games... He gets very lonely without frisk. He only knew them for a day but they were kind and forgiving to him unlike anyone else has ever been. He misses them. Sometimes frisk will come back to visit but he'll hide in the other buttercups, ashamed he's a flower again and afraid to talk to them. He's fuckin constantly monologuing he's so lonely. Without someone to cut him off he just keeeeeeps gooooooing He kidnaps absolutely everyones mannerisms and gets so mad if you point it out He's been around for 2-3 months in reality, which is a fuckton of time for resetting esp compared to frisks single day. He had to get real bored to stop for so long and let it all play out. He's just glad he chose to stop on a timeline where everyone was relatively happy so they could all be saved. Where is chara? He doesn't know. He still misses them but he doesn't care much to see them again anymore. Chara wasn't that great, but they also weren't that bad. They were his best friend and he idolized them. Chara was sure they were the angel sent to free the underground and he believed them. He hates what happened but he doesn't blame chara for it. For a minute when he 180s on them he does! But he's just angry and the more he thinks about it he can't stay mad. They were just kids. They didn't know. this is what they get. He doesn't care for humans one bit. He's only met 2 and the rest tried to kill him on sight. As a whole he doesn't hate all humans, but he certainly doesn't trust any of them. He was once obsessed with humans, its kind of like having your favorite celebrity be a jerk but worse. Part of the reason he stays underground is to avoid them, but touristy humans go down there sometimes so it doesn't always work. Many times when he goes to ask how the surface is, its to affirm his beliefs about humans. And often the bias in the underground is on his side. Grillbys is still open down there so he mostly goes there for Intel.

The vague amount of time it’s been since chara and asriel died is fairly short. Short enough for chara to know snowdrake, short enough for chara to have instigated the gyftrot thing and introduced the underground to christmas

THE GREAT ANALYSIS OF FLOWEY

Primary motivations: fear of death, fear of loneliness. Fear of death trumps all, as being with friends puts him on the surface where theres too many people and things that have killed him before.

He’s dependent, picks a favorite person and latches on. Personality is largely a construct of traits he pulled from others.

He’s self-obsessed in that he’s constantly analyzing his own behavior and thinking about what he’s doing. May be an asriel trait refined by ages of carefully shaping himself to behave in certain ways at certain times. He’s not actually that snappy and quick to anger? At least not normally. He’s in a bad mood lately but when he wants to, he can stay perfectly composed. The threats are just a mechanism to get others to fuck off.

He’s an open book who will keep going on about himself if prompted, and if he’s not trying to hide something from a specific person. Exacerbated by the fact that he’s been talking to himself for so long.

Nasty cognitive dissonance. He will carefully look at all potential issues and outcomes but will find excuses and land on the one that benefits himself/his desires. (ie, he wont admit it but he knows theres nothing really keeping him away from frisk)

He’s been living a long time “without consequences” yeah but he’s extremely critically aware of all consequences. Every action he takes is calculated, he’s just roleplaying 100% of the time. Now that he can’t reset, there are consequences, so he’s very afraid of doing things and fucking up. Part of the reason why he doesnt want to see frisk is because he can’t believe they like him and he thinks that if they learn more about him, they’ll stop. He doesnt know they know everything about him. Frisk is his special person, he cant stand to lose them.

A lot of this is devoted to him figuring out who he is as a person

Doesn’t care for life but fears death because he doesn’t know what’s going to happen without a soul: he fears the unknown

Has the patience of a god but he doesn’t like puzzles that much? He wants the story not the challenge, whereas chara and frisk enjoy the challenge (puzzle enjoyment goes chara>frisk>flowey). Like me, he’ll do the same thing over and over again for hours until it works, but if he gets stuck at a puzzle for more than 30 minutes he’s gotta leave for a while out of frustration. That isn’t to say he’s bad at puzzles, in fact spending so much time with papyrus has made him pretty good at them! At least in theory.

On the surface he has fucking AWFUL crippling panic attacks and he finds it hard to do anything or go anywhere, at least without frisk. 100% dependency and he hates it

First reaction when people do things for him is “no this is bad and I hate it” even if he likes it actually. He doesn't realize he does it until its too late and he's too stubborn to admit anything after the fact. Its a defense mechanism after being taken advantage of, developed because he's so complacent and fine with anything

Unrealistically high and vague expectations placed on him all his life (ur gonna do something big, ur gonna change the world, etc)

His feelings toward Frisk

Theyre his favorite person right now, he’s obsessed with them and loves everything they do. This will wear off and he’ll resent them for a while until he manages to get over it and stop idolizing them. The spite could come out of them having “moral highground” and gently scolding him over little things that add up over time, out of them taking care of themselves poorly because they prioritize others, and by the fact that they’re just as bad as he is as it turns out. He’s afraid theyll stop loving him since he can’t love them. Hes fairly candid about how he cant love them, even asking them if theyre aware he’s just using them for attention and being a leech. What he doesnt know is that frisk is using him as well to stop chara, so once he finds out about that there will probably be some kind of relief.

His feelings toward Chara

They were always the right one, the smart one, as much as he loved them and was fascinated by them and loved to learn things from them, he really hated that part of them deep down though he never snapped and shared it. In the future he will since he’s less tolerant.

His feelings towards the relationship those two have

He’s jealous that they’re so close and know so much about each other. They’re really closer than any two people ever could be since they’ve shared a body for so long. There’s also such a strange mix of love and hate between them that he really can’t read their relationship. He resents the idea of being the third wheel so deeply and he’s particularly spiteful of chara for this since he loves frisk.

His FEELINGS

He super do have them, eh?? He super is actually just very traumatized and lonely and confused eh?? Almost as if he absolutely can and does still love everyone, he’s just detached himself from it. Something very easy to do.

HOW THE FRISK BE

They’re kind of a little bitch and a goth. Rebellious teen days now!! They’re hard to read which can either work for or against them. They don’t really give a shit in a large part about much of anything, especially not now when they’re very concerned with themselves and their problems. They don’t get along with humans or much of anyone their own age for this reason.

Resetting was largely on their hands and they got pretty fucked up by it. Chara did encourage them to do some shit, it wasnt helped that flowey who had forgotten about them was encouraging them too. It was just a bunch of irresponsible kids playing games with peoples lives. There’s also a touch of frisk getting to points on the surface where things are new and changing which scares them into resetting for fear of the unknown future.

Frisk thought everything was fine until they got to the end of all the genocide stuff, that’s when chara lost it. In the whole “you think theres no consequences for this shit u pulled” manner and tried to hold frisk to it. It was a 2 souls one body case where they shared equal control, this was the first time neither cooperated. Frisk wasnt immediately freaked out by chara, they’re both friends and frisk knew they were a weirdo. Frisk gave in and “sold their soul” so chara would let them do anything other than sit around in an empty void. Chara played the next game like their regular old friend. Then they killed everyone. That’s when frisk freaked out and realized their friend had lost it. When frisk learned to regret what they did. They reset to a world where their friends could be alive again and fought their hardest, but Chara still had their way. This timeline, Frisk went out of their way immediately to get any kind of protection from chara. All kinds of supernatural charms and tricks to keep ghosts at bay. As a result, it’s been a while since they saw chara. And they miss chara a lot. But they know that chara watches them and is waiting for the moment when frisk lets their guard down.

Frisk pushes so hard to get flowey to come home with them because they know he’s asriel and they know he knows chara. Maybe he’ll know a way to talk some sense into them. And after everything they did, frisk feels betrayed by chara and can’t call them their best friend. Floweys the only person they know wouldn’t do that, he’s faithful to the end.

Frisk is a fixer though, they still love everyone despite what they did and feel genuinely sorry for the way they fucked up. Including chara after all theyve done. It breaks their heart that they can’t play with chara anymore

When frisk finally explains all of this to flowey, chara’s sitting there busting in loudly at every chance and every disagreement like the fucker they are and flowey’s doing everything in his power to tune them out and just watch frisk’s hands

Backstory and reasons why they climbed the mountain are unknown. They will not under any circumstances talk about their old life, which concerns some people, but prying accomplishes nothing. They try to act as though nothing bad ever happened to them to make them want to climb a mountain no one ever returns from, because life is good now and they’ve got loving friends and family. Even other humans who knew Frisk before don’t know much about them since they never really spoke. For Frisk, pretending it never happened is as good as it never happening, at least so they try to think. But they’ll have some triggers, just need to figure out what.

Frisk talks in their sleep, however it’s only very quiet nonsense gibberish. This shocks flowey, as he didn’t think they were capable of talking at all. It makes him more curious about their past too.

THE CHARA SITUATION

Are they soulless? It’s hard to say since really theyre nothing but a soul, just fractured all to hell and lingering long after they should. I still like the idea of their soul being a little infused with bits form asriels soul too

Before the underground, they were the youngest of a large family that mistreated them. They went underground after the death of their mother. In the underground they were best friends and great siblings with asriel. They hung out with kids they shouldnt have though. They werent treated super great underground either, as a human. They and asriel both got up to shit they shouldnt have.

HOW MUCH DOES EVERYONE KNOW ABOUT FRISK AND FLOWEY

Sans: Frisk assumed he knew everything already so they told him that they and flowey could reset. Didn’t tell him that they’ve killed everyone multiple times

Papyrus, Undyne, toriel, asgore: Doesn’t know

Alphys: let in a little on the reset business

The next section of the document covers the meetings, which were all made into finished comics, and therefore will be skipped.

SURFACE

(note from present Stem: this is all way more uncooked and hard to read than i thought it might be)

Flowey has nightmares that charas coming to kill him. Notably one comic where chara in shadow approaches and then it’s revealed as frisk

The inciting action

Kids make fun of Frisk for being “dumb” and flowey for being a flower and never wanting to be outside (he needs a roof over his head). At one point he snaps back a little too much and loses it a little. Frisk, as a result, tries to stuff him in their bag but this doesn’t calm him down. He blows up the backpack with magic and hurts a bunch of kids in the crossfire, including frisk

Toriel

She walks into the room where flowey is. They say hi to each other. Then she asks if he's feeling well. He's confused, but says he's fine. She says that's good. Then she says he's been behaving strangely lately. Floweys upset by this. “Did my acting get worse or can you see straight through me?” she giggles, “I think its your acting, dear.” she asks him what's wrong, if he's not happy on the surface. He says no, he's happy and he never wants to go away again. He decides that he’s comfortable enough with toriel to tell her this, she was once his mom after all, and in a way she is again. He's confused. He doesnt know what to do while frisk is away at school, since he can't join them after he had a weird episode and threatened other kids. He can play with papyrus and that's fun, but he doesnt really want to do that. He doesnt want to leave or go anywhere without frisk really. Toriel asks if that's why he's confined himself to this little pot. He doesn't really know, and he doesn't want to admit being scared. Toriel catches on though. She sees that he really is just a regular kid in there, and a kid at that since its hard to tell with him being a flower, and hes scared of this big world. The underground has always been the same, small and hardly changing even after all the years since they were trapped down there. By contrast the surface is huge and full of new people and everything changes all the time, and it’s scary. By now she's caught on that he has issues with humans. She says that he can trust anyone in this house, but she understands if frisk is the only one he can really count on. He finally cracks. He admits that hes afraid of frisk getting sick of him since he's such a pathetic mess like this and can't do anything about it. Toriel tells him that frisk never would. They love him too much. But if he's still that afraid, then he needs to try and be better eventually. Sitting around in that pot all day waiting for frisk to come back won't do it.

Alphys

Frisk finally breaks because flowey is being so insufferable and snaps at him. They both feel extremely bad, so toriel says that flowey needs to stay somewhere else for a while (because he won’t get along with anyone else in the house lately so sending frisk away is silly). Flowey hesitantly agrees to it and requests to stay with alphys and undyne. Which means i finally have to try writing for undyne lol. He probably hung out with undyne during frisk’s gym classes since he can’t exactly exercise as a flower. But he can’t go to work with her because he isn’t allowed at the school, so if he goes to work with anyone, it’s with alphys. She might take some time off for his sake too because she wants to get to know him and while she doesn’t fully understand why he’d go out of his way to choose her to stay with, she appreciates it. They watch some anime and al finally gets a chance to pry at him scientifically with a lot of question asking. He holds back on life questions except for ones that pertain only to this timeline and are least incriminating. Watching anime on netflix one night while the autoplay is loading he suddenly says he’s asriel. Alphys chokes on her popcorn or something and jumps to stop the autoplay like “what did you just say?!” “Don’t tell toriel. Or asgore. Please. don’t tell anyone.” ‘i won’t! I promise i won’t say anything to anyone!b-b-but did you really say youre--” “prince asriel. The one who absorbed the soul of the first human to fall underground and got killed on the surface” “b-b-b-b-b-but h-how is that possible?? Y-y-y-you don’t… you d-don’t have a s-soul, i-if you were--” “the flowers in asgore’s garden were growing out of my dust. That determination brought me back to consciousness.” “o-o-oh my g-g-god, I-i…” he finally looks up at her in the eye “alphys, you’re going to take this really badly. I’m gonna tell you everything. If you’re ready. I’m warning you now because this is going to get…. Really… really dark. And it’s going to make you feel awful. But you at least deserve to know. If you aren’t ready, I’ll stop. But there’s no promise I’ll ever be willing to say this all again.” alphys centers herself and turns to face him “i’m ready”

CHARA the first time they see chara again is shortly after frisk takes him home when chara possesses frisk and stumbles out of bed in the middle of the night.

he catches them and theyre like “so at long last you caught on to me”

f: “get out of frisk’s body”

c: “what makes you think I’m not frisk?”

f: “they don’t talk like that. no one’s as bad at roleplaying as you are, chara.”

c*leaves frisk’s body*: “Why that tone, asriel? Are you not surprised to see me? I will admit, I did not think you would take this long to figure it out.”

f: “I had my suspicions the whole time but you were always pretty well hidden.”

c:”hm,,, that doesn’t sound right… oh… Oh! You let yourself forget!”

f:”What are you talking about? why are you possessing frisk’s body”

c:”Frisk never told you? Our sweet savior of monsterkind has been bad. they reset and reset and reset until they destroyed the entire world and I was happy to let them live in the void they created, the hard earned fruits of their labor, but they would not accept it. So they sold their soul to me in order to reset once again. They tried to fix all their mistakes and make the world as if they had never done any wrong. They have forgotten that their actions have consequences, so I am here to remind them.”

f: “chara- chara. Chara. They sold their SOUL to you?”

c: “yes they-”

f:”did they sign a contract for it?”

c:”A contract? What? No, of course not. I am a ghost, I don’t have paper-”

f:”then it’s not legally binding”

c: “what?” f:”it’s not legally binding! You can’t just take people’s souls, chara!”

c:” Yes I can! I can? And I did.”

f:”you’re being ridiculous! Give frisk their soul back and leave them alone!!”

c:”no! ugh… we will continue this later” and then they leave

--- c: frisk has taken to wearing special charms and making all kinds of wards to keep me away. I don’t think they trust me anymore f: i wonder why

--- f: frisk taught me that anyone can be a better person if they just try, so I’m trying. They want to try too! c: frisk also went about systematically murdering every last one of their friends immediately after that f: chara. ohmygod.

--- c: I’m not going to swear. it’s rude and unintelligent f: it’s more fun tho

Chara makes mention of things they and flowey did in past timelines that were so fun and he can’t remember them, it makes him feel left out

Frisk’s room is covered head to toe in objects and symbols that ward off ghosts and evil spirits. They wear crosses and gemstone rings, they have objects scattered around their room and steal spices from the kitchen that supposedly help, and a circle of salt around their bed. Chara comments later that a lot of the things are meant to keep evil spirits away and therefore don’t actually do anything to them. No one really knows what to say to that

Flowey to frisk after he discovers they were just using him: so i guess… we’re even? You were no better than me all along?

Frisk shrugs

“But um… i was using you because you loved me. So.. do you really…?”

Frisk frantically shakes their hands and waves their arms to tell him no, then scoops him up in a tight hug

Frisk laying in bed after a bad day

“Aw, is someone grumpy because they have too many friends?”

Frisk pushes his pot off the bed to crash down onto the floor while flowey snickers

Frisk has gotten in trouble for texting flowey during class so they have to put their phone away now

*insert some kind of normal convo. Then: frisk. Frisk reply. Reply. Reply. Reply. Reply. (cont.) all with very close together timestamps*

Frisk hours later: <3

*conversation continues as normal*

TO GET BODIES BACK

chara keeps possessing frisk and it drives flowey and frisk up a wall bc they can barely do anything about it other than by being constantly vigilant. theyre both exhausted and sick of it since charas spectral and doesnt run out of energy. and theyre so obnoxious. they go to alphys for help since she knows how to bond souls to things. she asks them why they dont like call an exorcist or something and flowey and frisk both hesitate before admitting they both love chara too much despite how shitty they are. alphys tells them that chara has to accept the body in order to bond to it, and everyone agrees it’s unlikely that they’ll go for anything unlike their actual human body. alphys says she may know something they can do, she just has to call a friend first. she gets on the phone with a mysterious human who they can’t hear on the other side. actually she might give her opener over text and then immediately get a phonecall in response. she opens by bringing up their interest in necromancy, says that she has a ghost, no not a monster ghost, a human ghost, then has to hold the phone back bc they’re screaming on the other side. she calms them down and starts asking about any ways they can think of making a body for someone. she might just tell the two to take off and give them a thumbs up, she’ll text them later. alphys finally gets back to them and tells them they might be able to build a type of hybrid human-monster body for chara, but they need their buried remains and powerful magic in order to do so, and it only makes sense that it be the magic of their parents used to resurrect them. she might sprinkle in that if this works, flowey might be able to get his asriel body back too. of course, nothing is possible if they can’t get chara to agree to all of it. and of course they don’t. their lack of body is punishment, appropriately earned. for them and flowey both. they can’t go back to their bodies just as they cannot undo the wrongs they have done. they cannot escape the consequences of their actions. it would be great if chara said “thats a funny trick to play on god!” flowey tells them that this isn’t some kind of fucked up divine punishment. what they did wasn’t so bad to warrant this. if anything, taking these forms has made them both WORSE. if it were supposed to be punishment they wouldn’t have these chances to get out. he was punishing himself for so long and it didn’t make any difference, but accepting everyone’s help and trying to do better with them DID help him. doesn’t chara want a body back? don’t they miss the ability to feel… anything? don’t they want to live the life they never got a chance to have? chara goes quiet for the first time in their life and undeath. then they agree to it. after that, the three of them go to asgore and toriel to finally break the news that their dead kids are still here. chara doesn’t show themselves, but the point still gets across. they agree to it wholeheartedly and without hesitation the next step is to prepare chara’s body. alphys has a small team of humans helping her out, or maybe just one very enthusiastic one. chara’s body is dug up and there are complements to how well preserved it is, this could be easier than anticipated. a mixture of science and magic is used to heal it and make its human processes function again. just before chara’s to go in frisk tells them that they can’t wait to finally hug them and they’re like “i take it back?? i can’t do this” once in their body chara’s just a clumsy weak little fuck and so very grouchy about having to feel things again.

When asriel gets his body back, the first thing he does is stomp out the old flower. Only frisk notices, it worries them. They try to ask him later but he gets offended like, “what you wanted me to keep it to remind me of my horrible life or something?! You think i need it in case something happens and i have to live in it again? I’d rather die!” the reality is that he thinks he’s cured and better and brand new now that he isnt a flower anymore, but that couldnt be farther from the truth. He’s now convinced hes perfect and can do no wrong which makes him do a lot of wrong

#ooc post

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amethystina · 25 days

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Can I just say I legit dropped my tea cup when I saw the news about a new fic from you!!! I'm so very bumped for it you cannot imagine!!! Please is there something else you can tell us about it? This is better than anything for Easter and birthday and Christmas!

Be careful and don't burn yourself!

And, well, it's a 5+1 from Ga On's POV that spans across the drama with the concept "five times Ga On touched Yo Han without thinking and one time he did it intentionally." It started with me wondering what would happen if Ga On actually had reached out to touch Yo Han when he first showed Ga On the scar on his back, and then it evolved from there.

And by "evolved" I mean that the touches snowball and cause some slight changes to canon events and their developing relationship. Things escalate a bit quicker than the original, I guess you could say?

And then there will be a bonus chapter (or a +2, if you will) just because I realised I wanted to make the story come full circle with Ga On touching Yo Han's back again and that, in turn, devolved into a sex scene. And, like, the downside of me never having written one with this pairing before is that my brain just went "OH SHINY NEW TOY, GOTTA EXPLORE THIS." So the sex scene is getting really long even if that definitely wasn't my intention, because some part of me can't help but want to explore the dynamic and intricate details of these two having sex x'D

I'm really proud of myself for keeping the rest short, though! (She says about a fic that's 13k, unedited, not counting the, so far, 7k long bonus chapter) Like, you wouldn't believe how tricky it is when I'm used to exploring every tiny nuance and, in this one, I couldn't. There simply was no time. So I had to completely skip any discussions about Isaac, Elijah isn't even in it (which I'm sure is illegal), and a lot of the emotional development happens off-screen.

It's a much quicker, contained story told in a different format than my other fics, but will hopefully still be enjoyable? There will be lots of touching and A LOT of tension, if nothing else. Especially since this is during the time when Yo Han and Ga On are still getting to know each other and Yo Han has more of his Abyss tendencies. And Ga On is more bold since he doesn't have quite as much baggage. So closer to Gravitational Pull than Who Holds the Devil.

But yeah. The thought hit me and even if I "should" maybe be writing on Who Holds the Devil instead, I decided to let myself write this because the concept sounded really intriguing and I knew it would be pretty short (for being me). The bonus chapter isn't quite finished yet and I also have to edit all of it so I don't know when I'll be able to post it, though. But hopefully sometime soon?

And I hope you will enjoy it once I do! Thank you so much for sharing your enthusiasm — it's really encouraging. Like, I still can't believe that people are this excited about my writing. I'm very grateful 💜

#Amethystina Replies #Anonymous #Amethystina Writes #Each Touch (Brings Us One Step Closer)#Is what it's called #One step closer to what you ask?#Well #Read and find out ;)#For real though #I go HAM on the Dangerous Yo Han imagery #Because I admit that's a weakness of mine #I just love how dramatic I can be with him #It brings me so much joy #So look forward to that I guess?

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shavynel · 8 months

Text

Writing comments for fanfic

tl;dr -- Write one thing you liked about the fic (a phrase or moment) and how you reacted or made you feel! Also, keep it fun! Make no demands of fic authors who write out of love and Owe Us Nothing.

It took me a while to figure out how to write comments. I went through an evolution. There's lots of stuff on how to write stories, probably even giving crit and feedback, but commenting? Not nearly as much. So here's my not so short ramble on writing comments for fic. Includes my Ways of commenting and Tenets of commenting.

Examples here will be T-rated (by AO3 standards) and most are taken from or newly written with specific fics in mind. They are, ahem, almost all Genshin Impact.

Commenting is, I believe, a personal thing. I've been told I have a bit of an enthusiastic presence, so what feels true to you may vary. I also like to write words (can you tell?). And smash keyboards.

Leaving comments is, in fact, effort! But it's also a skill that can be learned and honed. And honestly, I think my fic experience is improved by it. I don't always leave a comment. But, I don't know... that random internet person authored a Whole Thing. For Free (likely). And I just get to read it?? Yeah, I'm going to leave a little appreciation. Just a little snack in return for this fulfilling meal you have fed me.

I also find writing a comment is also a way for me to just bask in a fic a little bit longer, linger in that feeling of oh, wow, this was so good, and I don't want to leave yet. (And then sometimes there's a response, and then I get a bonus dose of nostalgia!)

Ways of commenting

These are roughly ordered by amount of effort required. I would say the comments I leave are a mash up of these, really. There aren't actual hard lines between them.

1. An extra kudos.

Kudos are nice. Knowing the kudos button isn't enough is one layer deeper! Comments like

"Thanks for writing!" "<3" "i mash kudos button but no more kudos come out what's wronnnnggg????" "yay an update!" "this is so good"

Level of effort: slightly more than a kudos.

Honestly, copy-pasteable. Personally, I would always write these out. Somehow, to me, as a commenter, feels more real if I tippy tappy the letters myself even if Author can't tell. It's a nice way to let an author know you're coming back chapter after chapter when we can only kudos once on a fic. I like to leave a little something more, but I still often start or end with this.

2. Fic reaction.

Sometimes a fic just leaves me a certain way. Invoked a particular mood or visceral reaction. So, I let the author know!

"Awww, my heart is warm!" "Jaw on ground. WTF!" "Literal chills." "My eyes are wet. How did that happen?" "This fic is pure comfort." "AHHHHHHHHHHH!" "Heart on floor, smashed." "WHOLESOME!" "This has left me completely feral and ready to punch something."

Level of effort: you need some emotional intelligence or other awareness of you reactions.

As a starting point, was the fic -- wholesome, sweet, chaotic (in a good way), funny, heartwrenching, sad, delightful, shocking, calm, peaceful, I just want a hug now, terrifying, creepy, comedic?

How do you then turn this into a comment? "This was so ___!!"

Honestly, my crutch here is to just keyboard smash. What does it mean? Your guess as good as mine. I'm speechless, and I cannot words properly, but please participate in these Feels I'm having.

3. One detail I like. (My default comment style)

This one covers a lot of scope. If I read to the end of the fic, there's probably something I liked. Maybe

a turn of phrase. "Diluc drinking grape juice like a man chained to an interrogation table. sfjfskkdz" "Bedsheets twisted up like cooked spinach is SO accurate." "Itto-to is such a cute mashup name!" "We have years ahead of us. That was just one day in the past. The feeeeeelllssss" ":) as punctuation" "Barbatos and Nobles as a bookstore. Sdjjsfjdw I love it"

a particular character moment, action, interaction, or dialogue. quote or paraphrase it! "Diluc kicking Childe into the water was hilarious." "Childe is such an adrenaline junkie. I can't believe he would lean out the window while he was driving." "I'm so proud of Zhongli for actually admitting his feelings!"

some specific moment you emotionally reacted to. I've only recently trained myself out of stoic facing through fic. I mean, it's a useful skill, don't get me wrong (especially in public), but it's less useful when it's just me by myself. I now laugh at 3am reading fic, and my life is brighter for it. Comedy fic writers, you are my fave. "Can't get over when Diluc walks in on Kaeya and Childe. AHHHHH!" "Qiqi drying Childe's hair was so sweet!"

Level of effort: you have to actually remember something you liked or reacted to.

The number of movies I watch and number of times someone asks how's my week, and I just stare blankly because I know it was good but don't know anything else? High. So yeah, this isn't trivial.

I've gotten to the point where usually while reading I notice a moment of "wow I love this!" I don't go looking for them (because I want to stay in fic headspace not comment material hunting headspace), and I don't spend much effort trying to remember. If I forget, that's fine. Not like I'm not writing a book review for a grade or anything.

Just, what's a moment you just got to call out? (And bonus, what's your reaction?) Authors out there seem to like to make us feel things. Show them we're just dangling from their puppet strings!

I usually leave comments like this. Just popcorn style, as many things as I remember, whatever comes up as I recall it. I'm aware that sometimes I end up basically quoting a fic back to its author completely out of order interspersed with commentary or keyboard smashes. I'm occasionally embarrassed by how much I'm smashing into their comments, but the reception seems overall positive.

4. Between the lines and spin off thoughts.

Sometimes fic make me think. I mean, canon makes me think, and then people go and make fanworks off of that, so of course I'm bound to run into fic that makes me think. Sometimes the things I notice or think about aren't directly in the text, but implied or spin out thoughts. An interpretation, a mini analysis, or a reflection. Like,

a new thought or take on a character. "Aro-ace Venti! I like this take!" "Please don't break Klee. She's just trying her best to hold all the adults together. Oh no. You've already broken Klee. T_T" "I bet Jean is the only person who could have kicked Diluc's ass, and he really needed it." "Kaeya what are you doooinggg?? Why is he like this???" (An extra note, it's cool to disagree with a character, but not the author. Character did that makes you want to scream? Go for it. Author wrote the character in a way you disagree with? Don't comment. Leave the fic if it bothers you that much.)

noticing foreshadowing or a detail that isn't fully explained / only alluded to. "Is that Scara working at Scarabucks???" "Wait, something about what Venti said makes me think this isn't just a modern day AU ..." "Did that count as a geo construct for the purposes of the contract?"

some sentence or moment somewhere that just hits you in the brain. This one I don't actually know if author's like. On the one hand, I can imagine it being flattering. On the other, maybe it's too personal? I'll usually center these on the characters, kind of like character analysis. "Diluc sharing his anxiety with Kaeya, and that being what made Kaeya look at his own anxiety... really hits. Like, I don't even think Diluc could have said something sooner without Kaeya running, which says so much about how Diluc loves Kaeya. And the fact Kaeya can see this as a mirror of what he's doing and learns something from it. Just. Oof. Wow." "The conversation between Zhongli and Childe is just so real. Like Zhongli is trying so hard but his ass just can't understand Childe just wants him to tell them things and his not telling things is Not Helping even though he just wants to protect the boy!"

Level of effort: some amount of analytical thinking, reflection, or willingness to share when you get sucker punched by words.

This one I absolutely never go looking for, so I don't leave many such comments. When it does come up, it usually smacks me in the face, and I let it (roll with the hit and into the comments). On occasion I am wailing in the comment box when the revelation (like having broken Klee) just dawns on me. Am I Feelings Processing in comment boxes? Uuuhhhhhh, no comment. (Don't mind the lack of delivery on the pun.)

I'd like to think authors appreciate when we reflect back to them we get their interpretation, but I can also imagine it might be a little too much for authors if we get too personal. In which case, sorry. Your work is great! Please take it as my intention to flatter you since you've touched my heart or brain or soul with your words.

5. Craft appreciation.

This one, *head scratches* yeah, I don't often end up here. But sometimes it's not one moment, but something about all the moments, something underlying, or something in the way it was all put together. If I do end up here and write a general statement, I like to point to specific bits that made me think that (which is where I lean back on One Detail I Like). Actually, yeah, usually I use this as flavor to One Detail I Like, but I think it's sufficiently different to pull out separately. It's a writerly meta layer. What falls here?

dialogue. "Your dialogue is so good. I can hear it in in the VA's voice." "I love the contrast between how Zhongli talks and Childe talks."

imagery. "Can't get over the imagery of Childe releasing dandelion scenes. Such a kid!" "Childe sleeping with Tranquil Statlight is just so peaceful."

characterization. "The little nuggets you give characters like Rosaria doing community service at the church for Crimes just gives me life." "I love the way you write Childe. He's so aggressive!"

setting, world building (more for AUs but wow there are some authors good at expanding on canon lore). "Your world building is so cool. Like the abyssal graffiti on the walls?? HNNG!"

writing style. "Your style is very dreamy. <3" "This is genuinely so heartwarming, and yet at the same time what is this underlying feeling of something is wrong????" "I feel like people appreciate the art of comedic one liners but you've got angst one liners. AND THEY SLAY."

pacing, timing. "This fic reads like a high speed express train. It just never stops or slows down!!" "What is this cRaFT! Like. Para 1, comedic. Para 2, thoughtful. Para 3, WHY DO MY HEARTSTRINGS HURT."

use of language. "Using he for POV character and they for the other is LINGUISTICALLY MIND BLOWING." (Please, I want this to catch on more. I do absolutely respect people's pronouns. These fictional characters (and people who have pronoun flexibility)? She and they instead of she and she?? THE CLARITY WE COULD HAVE??!? I'm incredibly greedy for it.)

premise. "Pierro Dad gives me so much life." "The Bachelor but it's Diluc?? Let's go!!"

plot twist, or cliff hanger. "The reveal!!! *screaming*" "I can't believe you would do me like this." (No, I can't in good conscience leave a specific example and give a fic away. Yes, I am thinking of specific fics still.)

Level of effort: be able to map details you like to writer's craft.

Let's not pretend we're here to do crit. Even if we're using writerly words, we are not here to do crit. Well, I am not because I don't believe the comments box is the right time or place for it, but I am happy to lay on the praise and point out the things that worked for me.

Usually, I think it's harder to look across a fic and be like, yeah, the dialogue hit, or this writing style or pacing really does it for me. It's more nebulous. And sometimes it kicks you out of fic reading headspace and into a writerly meta land to notice, so I don't, and I just let the fic wash over me. And if something here strikes me, I will offer my praises. Again, I think it helps to think of this more as an additional kind of One Detail I Like.

Tenets of commenting (and a little of reading)

Okay, so those were some do's, but I also have don't's. These are my boundaries that I keep. Maybe yours are different. I suspect most of these stem from the place, Author did this for free and Owes Me Nothing, so that's the one real tenet. I keep these in mind so that I can keep fic a nice, fun, safe place for me (and hopefully the authors too).

1. I will never ask for updates. I never expect a next chapter.

I've seen enough content creators stressed out and burnt out about putting something out over and over again. I feel for them. That sucks. They probably just started doing it for fun, and now ... The demand and expectation they continue to perform for free? Yeah, it's not going to come from me.

Once upon a time, because of this and a desire to have complete stories, I wouldn't read incomplete fics. I now am The Biggest Fan of incomplete fics. Yes, hang me off the side of a cliff. I will scream at you. And if you don't haul me back up? Well, fine. I'll live. Some other author's got my back. Probably. There's still so much to love between world building, characterization, good moments, jokes -- and you sometimes get the experience of seeing familiar faces screaming at the fic with you update after update. It's precious. It's fleeting. I could go on, but maybe a different day. Back to commenting!

Flip side, as an author, I will say the desire for more is, in one case, why I plan to continue a fic from years ago. I was very firm at the time I would not be extending the one shot, but I guess time changes things, and the fact people were like, I would read more story contributes to that.

So this one is very much a personal tenet. There's some line between I love this so much I want it to continue, and expecting there to be more. Where is it? I don't know. So I just stay away. Surely Author will get I want more if I just say how much I love everything and have commented on their latest chapter. Rather than leave snacks that taste like burn out to some authors, I will focus on other flavors of comments!

2. I will not say what I dislike.

Not my ship? I probably won't read. Not my preferred ship dynamic? Tropes I don't like? Characterization not hitting it for me? Paragraph formatting not doing it for me? I just x out of there, find something I do like. People be writing things for free! Let them have their fun!

If I did read it, snd I stayed, something else must have grabbed my attention. I'll focus on that. Writing style not quite doing it for me but I love the details added to the world? "Wow, the world you flesh out is so complex." No mention about how much of a drag it is to read, because hey, I still read it, and I had reason to not put it down!

3. I will not give corrections.

Authors (and maybe a beta) have put in tremendous effort and time, and to be like, "you missed a typo" or "actually, the canon lore says X" often detracts from the beauty of the shared fic experience. I interpret random grammar and misspeaks and typos in daily conversation and texts all the time. Surely I know enough to employ this skill. And if I figured it out, other readers probably will figure it out too. If I can't, I usually assume the author was too big brain for me and skip merrily along to the next sentence. (And if it's too much for me to handle, I click out.)

Yeah I get it! I get the urge to want to be helpful and contribute to other people's experience! I know that feel! Because, well, I learned this one from experience. I tried once. Watched an author wilt a little when what I wanted was to be helpful. Yeeeaaah, not doing that again.

So, I suspect this often comes off as a little entitled that just by that bit of you say something and kinda underlyingly expect the author to do something about it, and again, Author Owes Me Nothing! Even if the author is asking for a beta, I'd reach out first and make sure they are now in a headspace to be expecting beta thoughts from me.

Wrapping it up

I love fic, the world is rich with it, and I am full of love for authors and their craft. It fills my heart with joy to know I can return a little smile to someone who has let me hop on their ride for free.

It does take effort. Writing comments, turns out, is writing. Writing is a skill, therefore writing comments is a skill. And writing takes practice to improve, so, guess what, writing comments takes practice to improve. Who would've thunk. (Not me, I assure you.)

I've wanted to write this for me for a while, capture what I've learned because I noticed my ability to write comments change over time. Then recently, I was rec'd a fic and told to definitely leave a comment because the author deserves it and I write good comments. Dispatched because I write good comments! Now my commenter feathers are fluffed up, and so I have actually written this. But I definitely didn't start out the comment writer I am today, so I wanted to share that, surprisingly there is a progression path! (Maybe this is only surprising to me.)

I do find commenting adds to my fic reading experience. And I love reading other people's comments. Sometimes other people notice things I didn't or have very cool interpretations, and that is an extra wow right there. (And look at all these other people who like the thing I like!)

And if I leave a comment, sometimes I get a reply! Author noticed my little comment! Extra dose of happy for everyone!

And sometimes, sometimes, (and again I would never expect it, but it is a gift much like fic itself is) an author will write back full of their notes and what they were thinking about writing those moments, and I treasure that so, so much. It's both a delight because of the usual Author saw my effort commenting and I get an extra behind the scenes! The craft behind the craft! (Now how do authors leave good replies? That is still a mystery to me.)

Sometimes I write a lot and then it goes into a black hole, and that's sad. Hmm. I'm pretty sure this is what authors feel when we don't leave comments. Hmm. Guess it's time to write more comments! (Sometimes, like fic updates, replies show up months later, and that's honestly <3)

So, let's go leave some comments and show those authors love and tell them how much they delighted us! Or ... how they smashed our hearts into the ground with angst/no comfort because sometimes that's just what one wants to read.

#fanfiction #ao3 #fic commenting #fandom #fandom meta #a few too many genshin references #shavynel scribbles

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goodluckclove · 10 days

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Various "Failures" From My Google Docs

Good morning! I'm at my usual coffee shop and got inspired by the troubles of a few friends to embarrass myself.

Sit down with me. I'm enjoying my usual blended chai. There's room on the couch if you'd like to join me.

So I've written thirteen novels. I think thirteen, I've actually lost count. Let's say, like, five full-length plays and twelve to fourteen finished novels. Impressive, right? Maybe. I'm realizing that I consider that not much of a brag, if only because I know the amount of trips and stumbles it took to get to one completed project.

I've ditched a lot of ideas. A lot. If I need to I can dig into my old hard drives to find all the doc files from my youth, but I also have the same Google Docs I've had since middle school.

It's mostly plays and ghostwriting assignments, but if you did you'll find some snippets from my constant attempts at growth.

Some stuff like this is okay. The line "hair slicked back/suit black silk" is pretty good, but a little too the writer thinks they're clever for me now. I don't really remember where I planned to go with this. I think the narrator was somehow going to be given the identity of Roy Fontaine. I was really fixated on the surname Fontaine at the time. I don't know why.

But then there's also a lot of stuff like this:

Hey look it's Fontaine again! I guess he's a doctor, too! Also I am astounded by how casually the main character just pulls out the Necronomicon. He pulls it out? From where? His pocket? Is it a zine?

I don't know why, but something about how suddenly this jumps in terms of dropping specifics makes me think that Sonic the Hedgehog is about to show up. I can't explain it.

This is the only thing in a Doc titled "Psychosis". I have zero memory of what I was planning on doing with this. What's kind of crazy though is that I wrote this in 2014, and six years later I'll use essentially this exact bit in a finished novel without even realizing it.

Another bit from 2014. No clue what I planned to do with this. It's hilarious to me that something stopped me from finishing the sentence. What am I, Franz Kafka writing The Tower? I didn't die. I wasn't raptured. I just apparently tried to think of something a large oak door would do and immediately gave up. It was 2014 I had finished, like, four novels. And this idea was fully stalled by what had to be a fucking huge oak door.

My favorite part of this radio play I tried to write is that somehow, believe it or not - when I wrote this I did not fully understand the Quantum Suicide thought experiment. And for along time I still kind of thought that this could be salvaged into a good idea, until last night when I asked my wife to put on a video describing the experiment and I immediately found it so dumb. Just ridiculously stupid. The only good thing about Quantum Mickey is that the title kicks ass and I'm definitely keeping it for something.

I've written a lot. A lot. I've earned the severity of carpal tunnel I currently have. If I had to put it into a statistic, I'd say maybe seventy percent ends up finished. fifty percent ends up polished to be read or published. Thirty percent actually ends up being read or published. I'm okay with this, because I enjoy the work. But for me, part of enjoying the work is not panicking when a project doing work.

If I need to end a project in the middle of a sentence, I do. I've clearly proven that I do. Sometimes I write for thirty pages and lose interest, other times I get a paragraph in and get distracted forever. That's okay.

That's okay. As long as you're doing something.

I could've included segments of Carnation, my first novella that was supposed to be a novel but I never finished it. But I fucking guess that's getting it's own post when I hit 150 followers so I hope you're prepared for what the type of stuff I enjoyed in middle school.

There's an Irish child that speaks exclusively in slang. You aren't ready.

#writeblr #writing community #on writing #writers on tumblr #authors of tumblr #writing #writing advice #writing tips #writing inspo #writing inspiration

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reflections-in-a-critical-eye · 7 months

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I've asked myself many times over the course of three years about how would I react to information that comes to contradict a specific image I have about people. And the answer would differ, more or less, depending on a myriad of factors, such as my mental wellbeing, my attitude toward the fandom, the group, the members, etc. The truth is, I only knew how I would respond the moment it happens and I was pleasantly surprised in a way. I see it as a sign that I'm doing better or at least I'm on the path of doing better.

These are things that I didn't want to allow to come to surface in the way I used to handle the BTM blog. Perhaps because the point was to create a platform in which I could offer the rational, researched perspective which I considered to be the correct one. I'm not retracting any of that. I still believe that it is possible to offer a more complex perspective if I can back it up with knowledge from various fields, but it was also one of my defense mechanisms.

Without expanding on the personal reasons, it has become very easy for me to separate my rational and emotional side. So much, that even when I should be staying in the moment and let my emotions take space, I can't really do it, I need to come up with a rational explanation so it can make sense. I then applied this to BTS as well. I couldn't just say I like this group when someone would ask, I would have to tell them about all the studies I read and how my fascination is mostly intelectual, when in truth it was both. I used to talk about jikook only in the context of analysis, be it GCF through semiotics or various types of interpretations when it came to their performances or fandom reception in terms of their dynamics. It had to be in the context of rational fascination and curiosity because I was merely trying to justify myself on why I care that much about two strangers that I look at on my phone. Again, my intellectual curiosity is real, but that has always been only one side if the coin, but it was one that I pushed.

It's about shame actually. I can't actually accept that I have such an interest. It doesn't fit with the idea I have of myself. And sometimes I don't like it because it makes me question my intellect, my critical thinking. How can I be so good academically and at the same time I fear that I've fallen into a fandom trap? I'm smart, right? Right?

I'm sure a lot of people have dealt with or ar going through this process of cognitive dissonance. How does one deal with the mere idea that something they believe in based on their understanding of the world, their ability of decoding (not in a conspiracy sense, but in a Saussurean way) can turn out to be wrong? We see something that resembles a specific behavior that we are surrounded with our entire lives, sometimes we ourselves engage with, but we've identified it wrong on others? Of course, it's through the visual medium, one that is edited. It's a puzzle with large chunks missing, but we're getting a general idea of it. But we can be wrong. So how do we deal with that? Well, I don't have a correct answer.

Me in 2020/2021 would have been more affected because my mental health was not good. I was functionally depressed and I clinged so much onto BTS, Jikook and the small community that I found myself in at that time, that I would have felt a lot more torn than I am now.

A couple of years later and having to actually go through a situation in which my understanding of people's relationship might not be accurate, I realized I'm fine. And I think it's because it made me really register just now that I finally learned how to have fun with it. It took me three years. By having fun, I mean genuinely being able to simply enjoy the little things. I'm still on the path of not being ashamed for liking kpop or spending time talking about the dynamic/relationship of two people.

What prompted this post was reading what is currently being written in the jikook tag. Yes, I had this big introductory chunk that perhaps people won't bother reading, but I'm doing it for myself. If I can't be honest while writing stuff into the void for strangers to read, then what is the point?

I get frustrated very easily. I like debates and contradictory points of view, but not always. And that's because I like to be right. Almost all the time. So when I see something that I believe it lacks logic or I find it absurd, then my fingers are itching. I don't comment or DM people, I can control myself. I'd rather get out of the app and do something else.

What I want to say is I was surprised at how much fanfiction is being written. More that usual. Shipping contains a big deal of fanfiction by its nature. Gestures and events taking place at different times are interpreted and having information added that fills the gaps. People do that because they have to make sense of what they see.

They like to make relationship timelines. They speculate on first kisses and first sexual experiences. That's their imagination. None of us has any way of knowing. The element of fiction is heighted when people feel like they are losing control of the narrative. When they are unsure of what they are seeing. Which is what usually happens in the shipping community on a yearly basis. Anons flooding the bloggers' inboxes because they need confirmation or they didn't get any ship content in a month or two which means something is wrong.

There's this understanding that the shipper/supporter is delusional while the one who stops shipping is the rational one. From what I've observed throughout time and mostly now, that is a false distinction. The so-called rational fan makes use of fiction just as the shipper. The difference is in purpose. One talks about why the supposed romantic relationship is real and the other tries to refute that. But both categories seem to need fiction in order to build their arguments. That is because none of them have access to someone's private life and relationship, so the gaps need to be filled with speculation. There is no right or wrong version here, despite how much the idea is being pushed. And me writing about this won't make a difference. It's simply how the fandom works. The one who position themselves on the side of anti-delulu will always be seen as the less crazy one. The similarities will fade for the collective consciousness of the fandom.

I think it's difficult for a lot of people, regardless on which side they find themselves on, to accept that the option of simply not knowing is enough as well. Or knowing, but without getting anal about it. But it's hard and they write posts after posts, anons are sending asks over asks because there has to be a firm answer. Only a few allow themselves to be in between lines.

I'll bring back something that I always used to say. Shipping and involvement in the fandom is a lot more about us and less about the people we're talking about. It's about fullfiling some needs, of needing a community, of focusing on the idea of love. Those things can still be done in a way that still makes the experience enjoyable. But not everyone can and I'm not blaming it.

There's a way to just like how people behave with each other and imagine things without adding so much weight to it. Regardless of the true nature. It's our imagination, there's no need for a moral inquisition to tell anyone how to think or that they should stop thinking a certain way. Touching some grass is a cliche and an expression I ended up hating, but I do believe that being connected to discourse on a daily basis can really alter our sense of reality and what we consider to be real issues. We really should pay more attention to that and take some distance if necessary.

#m thoughts #jikook #kpop shipping #bts shipping #fandom discourse

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thewildsophia · 3 months

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OK KO, Let's be Heroes!//KO x Older Sibling!Reader

A/N: I can't believe this hasn't been written before omg. I had the thought of an older sibling reader to KO rolling around in my head while watching the series and was shocked to find no fanfics with the premise. So I did it myself.

NOTE: The Reader's powers are basically Portgas D. Ace's from One Piece. If you aren't familiar, I've attached a few gifs to give you an idea of what it's like.

Word Count: 2026

"Read More Link" placed due to length.

So I can’t think of a realistic way for Reader to be a biological older sibling to KO considering the timeline of what happened.

Soooooooo…You took on the role of KO’s older sibling, even though you’re not related by blood.

[Insert tragic backstory here] and Carol had found you when you were a young teenager wandering about without a home to go to. When she found that out about you, she couldn’t in good conscience leave you alone, so she…adopted you basically. There wasn’t any paperwork involved so you just unofficially become her second child.

Carol was SHOOK when she found out about your superpower (and that’s putting it lightly, she was freaking out--).

It happened when she failed to light the fire underneath her stove a few days after you came to live with her and KO. Not thinking much about it, you held your finger up and lit the fire yourself. When she turned and saw the small fire burning on the tip of your finger she freaked tf out thinking you were hurt.

A one-hour explanation later, she was now on board as to what power you have: You’re made out of fire and can set other things on fire just by looking at them. You even showed her some of your moves the next day faaaaar away from anything flammable.

Carol encouraged you to become a hero and with her help you eventually did. You became a decently high-ranking hero at a young age, clocking in at level 6.

There were a LOT of companies trying and failing to recruit you, but you chose to stay home with Carol and KO (no Carol is NOT crying-).

KO was quite young when you were “adopted,” being around 3 or 4 at the time. Because of that, he always assumed that you were his older sibling by blood and it wasn’t until one day between ages 6 to 11 that Carol told him the truth.

My boy was shocked, but it didn’t change anything between your dynamic.

In fact, you became even more of an inspiration to him on his path to becoming a hero!

You helped Carol a lot at the fitness dojo until Carol got KO a job at Gar’s, to which Carol also had you hired to keep an eye on KO. Not that she didn’t trust him, she just knew that he could get in over his head sometimes and wanted to have someone be there to protect him.

Talking about Gar’s, Rad and Enid absolutely ADORE you. You’re the unofficial manager appointed by them truly because you are a few levels higher than them.

At first, when they heard they were getting two new coworkers, they didn’t think much of it. You and KO seemed nice enough so they didn’t mind having you around.

It’s not until the Darell robot for the day comes busting into the plaza that their opinion changes.

Just ask KO is about to get absolutely decked by Darell, you zoomed onto the scene in a blaze of fire and punched the bot, setting it on fire while also hitting it with enough force to send it back to Boxmore with KO nestled into your other arm.

“Nobody ever touched my little brother.” You muttered under your breath while wrapping KO into your arms further to soothe him. You walk past a stunned Rad and Enid as you enter the store and get back to work.

That day, Rad and Enid also became your younger siblings. Pestering you with questions like “How did you get so strong?” and “Where did you get that power from?” Considering you’re a year or two older and much stronger you embraced the title with honor.

You actually became a little bit of a local celebrity after working at Gar’s for a while. People, locals really, would occasionally come in a ask to take a picture with you. Abashed, you said yes every time because you really couldn’t say no. Real Magic Skeleton even has a picture of you on his site with a small bio (You blushed so hard when you found out you thought you were gonna explode).

Speaking of which, KO LOVES to flaunt you around and hype you up, much to your embarrassment. He says stuff like, “Look at my cool amazingly strong older sibling!” and “My older sibling could beat up your older sibling!”

KO means well, but he embarrasses the shit out of you.

MAD PROTECTIVE. If Carol is protective then you are on another level entirely. If someone even says something mean about KO it’s on sight. People learned very quickly that you are KO’s older sibling and that you will not hesitate to DIE to protect him (KO prays that it never comes to that).

I could see a rude customer coming in and harassing KO about Cob knows what and you just come up behind them and punch them out of the store. When Mr. Gar confronted you about it, you held your ground and stated proudly what you had done. He was honestly surprised at your resolve and didn’t punish you at all, saying “You should stick up for yourself and the ones you love.”

Lord Boxman even became a little weary about attacking the plaza knowing that you worked there and you are a pretty strong defender. That doesn’t stop him, of course, but he does strategize to combat you better.

Professor Venomous encourages Boxman to capture you and “convert” you to villainy since your power is something that could be very useful to them. You’ve heard people throughout your life make comments about how “villainous” your power is, but you never let it get to your head since you know who you are and that’s all that matters.

Taking. Naps. Together. Seriously, if KO ever doses off during one of his shifts, you’re quick to follow him. You’ll scoop him up into your arms and sit down somewhere in the corner and fall asleep with him. Rad and Enid think it’s absolutely adorable and have several pictures of you two.

Rad and Enid will even join your cuddle pile in the break room when time permits (or when they make the time themselves).

KO will even occasionally crawl into your bed at home and sleep with you there. He says that your bed is more comfortable than his, but you really know he gets lonely sometimes.

Piggyback rides! KO loves to lounge on your shoulders and back and will often hang off of you as he does with Rad.

You’re also just used to the feeling of holding/carrying KO that it sometimes feels weird when you haven’t for a while.

When you met TKO for the first time you kinda panicked like many of the other plaza members. It was an especially stressful time in your life (and probably much more for Carol).

TKO wasn’t that fond of you either which made everything 10x harder to deal with. He didn’t actively dislike you, it was more like he wanted nothing to do with you.

Once KO came out of that initial swap between himself and TKO, you didn’t really think much about it.

When he mentioned some “Shadowy Figure” though you immediately began to do as much research as you could on the guy, you were determined to beat the crap out of this guy (if not kill him-).

Listening to KO cry into your and Carol’s arms blabbering about, “I’m so sorry!” and “I don’t know what he did to me!” You honestly thought this man had touched KO (I know I’m not the only one…right??). It took a lot of coaxing, but you eventually managed to understand what happened when KO told you the full story.

It’s not until Dendy begins to monitor KO and TKO that you start to give his alter much thought. You encourage KO to pursue research into his darker ego, assuming he’s okay with it of course, and offer to be someone he can talk to about it if he isn’t comfortable talking to anyone else about it.

During some of these talks, you open up about yourself a bit to KO to make him feel better and let him know that the negative emotions he feels are normal.

During some of the more intimate conversations, you tell him how you used to hurt people and even kill at times before Carol took you in.

KO doesn’t believe you at first. How could someone so kind and loving have killed in their life? You use that to help you explain that good people do bad things sometimes, but that doesn’t make them a bad person.

You teach him that TKO isn’t something that he should be ashamed of and cage up in the back of his mind, but could instead be someone to rely on in times of need.

He feels a lot better after you tell him all of this.

Hugging and holding KO close to you during nights when he feels really bad about himself. Where he doubts his ability to become a good hero and to be able to harness TKO’s powers.

You’d rock him back in forth in his bed while quietly soothing him over his crying. He asked you not to tell Mommy and you promised him that he had your word.

I could honestly see Reader lying to cover up KO’s tracks. Like KO is caught doing something he absolutely should not be doing and instead of immediately admitting fault, you would come up with some realistic yet unfeasible lie that only works about 50% of the time.

KO loves to spar with you! He learned most of his physical skills from you, stuff like punching, jumping, kicking, and all that fun stuff. You’ve never used your fire powers against him though.

There was one incident where Boxmore accidentally found out what your weakness is, that being water. A Shannon bot had thrown you into the little kiddie pool Rad and Enid had set up before the attack started.

When you jumped out of the pool soaking wet and unable to start a fire, the stupid sibling trio laughed and mocked you. Enid was quick to come in with a kick to Raymond’s head and you soon found your footing.

Boxmore learned that day not to underestimate you as even without your powers you’re still a physically strong hero.

However, it would seem that Boxman and Professor Venomous stored that data about you since some of the bots they send are equipped with water guns. You’ve gotten pretty good at dodging them, so that’s kinda cool.

You do remember one time after KO had gotten a handle over TKO where you had been drenched with a bucket of water and right as you were about to get socked by Raymond, KO had pushed you out of the way and dodged the punch himself.

You had never been more proud of KO than in that moment and you made that known to him after the fight. You ran up to him and cradled him in your arms talking about how proud you were and that he was becoming such a fine hero (that last one got him to blush a little).

Rad and Enid definitely took a picture of this and then proceeded to print out a copy and put it in the break room.

When you and KO found out that your mom was dating Mr. Gar, you both were a little unsure about how you felt. When Rad and Enid asked about it, they asked the two of you together and then asked you separately.

Seeing as you’re the older sibling they thought that you would have had a better idea of how you feel about the whole arrangement and were bummed out when they realized that you really didn’t know how you felt.

After the date you four hosted for Carol and Mr. Gar, both you and KO see how happy Mr. Gar makes your mom and decide that if she’s happy then you’re happy as well.

KO is honestly one of the best younger brothers you could ever ask for. He’s kind and selfless and wants to help others when he can. And in return, you are the best older sibling that KO could ever ask for.

Sorry the format looks off in some places, Tumblr just makes booty juice decisions like limiting the character limit per block to 4096 words...

#ok ko #ok ko let's be heroes #ok ko x reader #ok ko let's be heroes x reader #KO x reader #Enid x reader #Rad x reader #Radicles x reader #carol x reader #sibling reader #thewildsophia writes

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kneelingshadowsalome · 9 months

Note

Hey 🥺 I'm finally coming here 😩 I've read Just friends so many times it marked a before and after in my life LETMME tell you that you're the greatest writer ever ?? This Yandere Konig just will live with me forever and I will cherish him forever😩 I'm literally the lyric ,"my old man is a thief and I'm gonna stay with him till the end" (I'm sorry I'm a Lana del Rey enthusiastic)

Girl I can't STOP stressing the fact that that fanfic is life-changing hell, even now that I'm talking bout it I want to read it again (I wish I could read it for the first time again 😩) like just thank you thank you for making so many incredible written masterpieces caUSE IM READING also the ghost bodyguard and im LIVING for it ok?? My ass was shaking with the las update fucking mind-blowing and PERFECT.

So returning to my man König, you know I'm Hispanic (you didn't know but hey I'm Hispanic) and I would like really want to know how would König react or behave having a darling that is Hispanic (? (This is pure self indulgence, like I want to fucking put myself there) I mean, I don't want to appropriate any stereotypes but when sometimes can be a lot and we donate pretty different from everyone else(? So idk I just like would like to know kajsosib

Thank you again for making so many good content I told you before and I tell you know you're my cult leader 🙏

Hey babe you're too sweet! I can't believe my crazy story and crazy interpretation of König has had such an impact 🩷💕😭 Thank you for telling me, I'm just so glad that we can all buzz about this hot, insane man! And cult leader!? Haha omg this sounds dangerous (I love it, let's gather the whole toxic König crew and go to Austria together and build a shrine for this man, we can share headcanons thrice a day, dinner is served right after the compulsory fanfic writing workshop)

As for your ask, I'm sorry, I don't think I know enough about Hispanic culture to go too deep into detail & I wish to tread very carefully with stereotypes too, I hope this take is ok 🩷😘

The way I see it, there's two ways this thing would go….

An emotional, lively, feminine woman who has strong family values would be a dream come true for König. If you identify with the concept of marianismo at all, if you're loving and loyal and want to support your husband-to-be (König won't settle being just your 'boyfriend'), want to get married too and embrace your femininity while he gets to be The Man, your provider and protector, well, damn. This guy is on his knees! König will worship you, return your support and love tenfold, hundredfold. It will be the love story of a lifetime (and a story of traditional gender roles too but König would only view it as romantic 🩷)

But if you're "a lot", perhaps more outgoing than König thinks is appropriate, if you don't give a shit about his Ordnung muss sein-mentality and laugh at his attempts to cage you…? Sorry but you'll drive the poor man crazy!

He needs to possess protect you, which means your "temper" is a weed in the garden of your love. It needs to be pulled out, and you need to be tamed. König will go out of his mind as he tries to both please your every wish and try to put you on a leash. Lots of arguments ensue as you try to explain to this man that he's overreacting (and König is like Was?? He's not overreacting or hysterical, you're hysterical), lots of passionate reconciliation sex follows as he tries to prove you that you're his and his alone and no other man is allowed to even look at you.

So please don't torture him too much ❤️, he's not used to women's company and has a lot of suppressed energy and emotion, he just wants to take care of you and be the head of the house (and that you two worship each other 24/7 and carry each other's blood in small little vials or something omg)

#answered #yandere könig #könig headcanons

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geralts-yenn · 4 months

Text

2023 character wrapped

@deandoesthingstome knows too well I get a little obsessive over some characters - let's see if I can make it to nine (or if I can stop at nine 😁 a look onto my masterlist that's barely a year old tells me we will get there)

Here we go...

My no 1: No surprise here - Mikey

He's my precious silly boy and I will never stop loving him. As part of a family of lunatics here or here, as our best friend, or as the cute neighbor who steals the heart of Nina and Mel

2. Melot

I blame @raccoon-eyed-rebel for introducing me to the slutty lil' braid boy. Just look at that grumpy, miserable little guy. I can't help but thinking about how to make him feel better. That's why he gets the love from not only one but two lovely persons in my Hearts Too Big universe. He's still not quite happy as a vampire in Believe in Me, but I swear we'll get to it.

3. Syverson

Not much of a surprise - how could I not love him? He's the character I read the most this year, for sure. But I also loved to write him into my bonfire story and it's follow up. I was yearning for him and I imagined him as a daddy 🥰

4. Evan

Oh, he was a surprise for me. Even though I liked his character in the movie, I didn't intend to write for him. Until a lovely nonnie put him into my brain and started to fuel my obsession with him here, here and here.

5. Walter

The grumpy bear was always a favorite of me when it came to reading but I was a little scared to write him by myself. In the end, I'm quite happy with the outcome when I finally dared.

6. August Walker

Another one that I love but didn't dare to write. Until it was too tempting to add him as the vampire king in Believe in Me. And then those little pieces of smut here and here with the vampire king were surprisingly easy to write.

7. Napoleon Solo

I love the smooth spy. I had so much fun to pair him up with the lovely Amina and I totally plan to get back to Leon sometime in the future

8. Charles

I wish I had more time to explore his character. I love him so much - especially when he's put into a modern AU. I kinda did this to him as my sidekick for Melot. And I have a wip in my folders, sleeping for way too long, where he's the most annoying and yet adorable duke. I really hope I get to the point where I can introduce him to you.

That's everyone I have written for this year. But I surely don't stop here with obsessing

I won't count Geralt, Will and all the other characters of Henry Cavill because this post is already too long for anyone to read, lol.

But I surely have to count the man himself

9. Henry Cavill

Yes, I am obsessed with this man and I am not sorry! I guess I won't ever get back to the unfinished RPF that got me into writing at all but I will not stop loving the adorkable man that he is.

And then there are still some guys that don't look like Henry:

9. Dean Winchester

I had almost forgotten how much I loved him. Until I introduced the teenager to Supernatural and spent a lot of evenings this year watching that stupid little shit 😍

10. Billy Russo

One of my favorite roles for Ben. And so many good fics out there that I need to explore at some point.

11. Jack Reacher

Very recent addition to the hunks in my head. I love the new season and I'm definitely not immune to that man's visual charms.

I think I will stop here, even if I could name probably another 12...

@ellethespaceunicorn @peyton--warren @gummydummy19 @jvanilly @ronearoundblindly @ylva-syverson want to talk about your favorite characters?

#tag game #2023 character wrapped #Sorry #I know this is unhealty #but I love them all

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gelidponies · 5 months

Text

"I can't believe the shopkeeper gave us this blind buy completely free!"

Sunburst whinnied with enthusiasm, practically skipping behind his wife like a foal.

"I'll make sure to have Spike remind me, we have to send them a donation! I guess it's what we get for spending every weekend there!"

"Maybe this was their donation to get us out of their manes for a while!"

He mused in response to his wife, making Twilight chortle and giggle.

Twilight placed the barrel on the tile of their bedroom, splayed out just like they did when the couple played their favorite board games. The top of the barrel opened with ease...albeit covered them in some dust.

In seconds flat there was a war of magic beams as Sunburst and Twilight ravaged the barrel of its sweet sweet antique and vintage books.

Normally, the lack of variety would be disappointing but not for these two. The next half hour was spent passing each book back and forth until they came to a realization. Every single book was one neither had read before! Some even Twilight of all ponies had not heard of before.

"Sunburst look! The Brain Chemistry of Friendship!"

When she went to continue Sunburst joined her, the two exclaiming in unison.

"Like dopamine and serotonin!"

Even princesses and royal advisors needed lazy days sometimes. With Twilight's abilitiy to speed read they could get through all the books in no time.

So they began.

Only, a few minutes into reading when Twilight went to reach for a highlighter she clumsily bumped her leg into the barrel.

It made a strange noise as though there was something still inside.

"Strange."

Sunburst's magic aura rummaged around for a moment before picking up a long slender box.

His wife's eyes lit up as she saw it. He should have known something strange was up when something was able to tear Twilight from a book.

"It sounds like...a game?"

He mused as he shook the box. Loose pieces rattled against the inside, small and many but not fragile.

Upon opening all the tiles scattered in front of them with a loud clattering sound. All that was left was a folded piece of paper.

"It is a game! It's fascinating! There's old ponish on some of these tiles but the instructions are written in modern english!"

"And theres gemstones on some of the others! It's fate if I do say so myself!"

"Although it's more likely statistical coincidence."

Sunburst playfully cleared his throat, urging her to move on.

"There aren't many instructions here, how curious.

The pieces are split in to two, one side has questions the answers to which will have a matching gemstone piece.

When all the questions are correctly answered and the pieces connected, flip them over to reveal a secret message!"

Putting the instructions down she began to fumble with the pieces. The old ponish text was so small they had to squish their faces together to read it.

"There are only 6 pieces all together, I can't imagine this game has much replayability."

Sunburst chuckled nervously, fearful he would dampen the excitement.

"Oh! Perhaps it's a prototype!"

He perked up with his realization.

"That would explain why it ended up at an antique shop. The old and new ponish present together leads me to believe it's vintage and made to look much older! Isn't that so cool!"

She said, clapping the ground with her hooves.

"Ok ok, the first question, get your gemstones ready!"

Twilight winked.

"This gem was featured as the most expensive ingridient in Cleotrotra's cocktail."

This of course was Twilight's wheelhouse so she quickly connected that question to the piece that displayed a freshwater pearl.

"Long ago, ponies believed this story was true, but now most experts think it is just made up. Stallions who wrote about Cleotrotra would make up all kinds of stories to smear her reputation."

Sunburst nodded knowingly, gemology wasn't Twilight's forte but he was always amazed by the ways their skills intersecting.

Not to mention, seeing her be so right and elucidate on said fact was quite attractive if he did say so himself.

"Let's see if you'll get this one Twi! This gems rarest and most valuable variant is colored black."

Twilight scanned the selection of gemstones in front of her, biting her lip as she wracked her brain for the knowledge.

"Well consider me stumped!"

She beamed from ear to ear.

There was nopony it was safer to make a mistake around than her love.

"Well I know how much you love a chance to learn something new! The answer is Opal."

"Doy! I should have known that one! Rarity would kill me if she was here."

Twilight's sentence trailed off into a nerdy chortle.

"Aw, don't be so hard on yourself! This is one I know you’ll get!"

Sunburst lovingly stroked Twilight's hoof, making her wings flutter like a hummingbirds.

"Let's see, ancient ponies believed this gemstone kept you from becoming intoxi-"

"AMETHYST!-"

She yelped, her cheeks turning a deep magenta.

"-ahem. The answer is amethyst."

The puzzle was almost done with only one more question to go.

This day had turned out to be so much more eventuful than either of them could have hoped. Some magic in the air made it feel like things could only get better.

"Well I know, one amethyst that absolutely intoxicates me so perhaps we've stumbled on another apocryphal tale."~

Sunburst mused, to anypony else it would be a little...cringeworthy but to Twilight...well...

"W-what? I...I, my coat is heather! I have no idea what you're talking about! LETSJUSTREADTHELASTQUESTIONTOGETHERPLEASE!"

With the paper placed on the ground between them Twilight bumped heads with Sunburst in her stupor. When her vision cleared they could both see the last question.

Not a gem but a rock, this brightly colored stone is mottled with white calcite and brassy pyrite.

A short knowing glance saw the purple alicorn pushing the old ponish piece to the final remaining gemstone. Lapis Lazuli.

They took turns flipping over the puzzle pieces until the message they had been waiting for was revealed.

"Foal?"

The word lingered on the air for a second, Twilight silently watched the gears turn in his head.

"Oh! We never considered that this might not just be a prototype but a translated version from another language. If I had to guess it was meant to say fool! A practical joke on the overthinker?”

“Quasi-homophones are easily to fumble for an equish-as-a-second-language speaker….however.”

Twilight stepped away for a moment and pulled out something black and laminated.

“I think it has something to do with something I shared with our close friend, the antique store owner.”

Sunburst didn't understand the convoluted nature of Twilight's theory until he laid eyes on what she handed him.

An ultrasound.

“F….Twilight I don't understand do you mean….?”

She nodded, blushing profusely and hiding her face in her wing.

Sunburst couldn't stop himself from jumping for joy. He was married to the smartest, most beautiful mare he had ever known and they were going to have a foal together. He had to have been dreaming!

“The girls helped come up with the puzzle, Pinkie even had her sisters chip in. It ended up being harder AND simpler than I could have guessed.”

She looked down at the scattered pieces and the image of the unborn foal inside her.

“I suppose the rest of our lives will be like that now.”

“You know what the old ponish ponies say Twi!”

Twilight joined him, answering in unison.

“Reward prefers risk!” For @kindheart525 's https://www.deviantart.com/kindheart525/journal/Thirdverse-Ships-Contest-OPEN-988129888

Twilight's CM by https://www.deviantart.com/blackgryph0n/art/Twilight-Sparkle-Cutie-Mark-204983087

Background by https://www.deviantart.com/rhythms7

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ceterisparibus116 · 1 year

Note

Hey! As far as I understand, in the US you guys have to do an undergraduate degree before doing law school. Do you have any opinion on what Matt would’ve taken at undergrad?

Also I just want to say that I really love your writing and your posts are genuinely making me consider a career path that I’d never thought about before! I’d always sort of dismissed being a lawyer because I’m quite shy about public speaking, so I never really thought about how much I like the law in itself. It’s so interesting!

EEEEEEEEE this is exciting! The world needs more lawyers - especially more lawyers going into it for the right reasons. So many lawyers just care about the money or the power (or their parents' approval), which means there's a dire need for lawyers who want to help people.

And I just wanna say: law doesn't require public speaking. Criminal law kinda does (you're pretty much always showing up for hearings and trials in criminal law), but civil law...not so much. Civil law has some hearings and depositions, but very few civil cases go to trial. The vast majority of it is sitting at a desk, writing and researching. Although you do have to be able to meet with victims and witnesses, and that makes some people nervous. (That still makes me nervous, actually.) But it's not public speaking, I think?

You could also try to be a full-time law clerk. Most judges hire clerks for only a year or two, but some take on clerks permanently. As a clerk, your job is 100% research and writing and preparing documents. You get all the fun of making brilliant legal points, but you can make those points safely on paper without having to stand up and present them.

However, I also do believe that public speaking is a skill, not just some natural talent. So I think it's always possible to get better. Here are my two absolute favorite resources on public speaking:

This amazing youtube channel (which isn't specifically for public speaking, but does address public speaking sometimes, and has a ton of general tips for building confidence, overcoming nervousness, turning awkwardness into charisma, etc.); and

This lifesaving book (which is the best book I've read on public speaking, hands-down, and I highly recommend it even for people who aren't lawyers because although it's written for lawyers, the content is overall about how you approach public speaking [how to both feel and appear more confident, etc.] rather than the content of what you're saying. I literally love this book so much!)

Oh, you also asked about Matt. XD

My undergrad was political science, so I like the idea of Matt doing the same just because #relatable. But I don't actually think of him as a poli-sci guy. Like, Karen is the one who's more concerned with broad social structures. Matt seems more interested with figuring out what he's supposed to do than he is with figuring out what society is supposed to do. Matt seems to say: "The system is broken, but I can help as a lawyer, and where I can't help as a lawyer, I can help as a vigilante." He's not the one invested in uncovering corruption or dismantling oppressive systems.

I think of him as more like a history guy. Partly because of the Thurgood Marshall thing. But I imagine him digging into the history books, finding people who inspire him, and modeling his life after them (when he's not angsting about whether he could live up to them).

That said, I secretly ADORE the idea of Matt as a math major. My mock trial coach in high school tried to convince me to be a math major myself, and although I didn't go that route (I'm more like Karen; I wanted to research social and political issues), there's a lot of wisdom to it. Math is logic, after all. And it's pure logic.

If I say "a + b = c," there's no emotion there. But if I say something like "police + poverty = ____" ...y'all already are having an emotional reaction, right? And you're filling in the blank with something. You're likely filling the blanks in based on emotion and anecdotes, since I think most of us have a strong opinion about this, but most of us probably haven't done a deep statistical study into the issues.

As a lawyer, if you care about truth, it's absolutely vital to be able to use logic both to make your arguments and to figure out which arguments you should be making in the first place. We can't completely ditch our personal biases, but I do believe studying math helps work those parts of your brain that can analyze a problem with logic and without using emotion and anecdotes as a shortcut.

So yeah, I love the idea of Matt being good at math.

#legal #matt murdock #daredevil #meta #asks #ask me things i'm friendly

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ironborealis · 1 year

Text

So this post appeared on my feed because I was dumb and said I was interested in things tagged "Severus Snape" because I forget how things work sometimes.

I gave them a long response but I think it's a banger so I've cleaned it up to share.

To preface, I'll say that I was still in school when the books were starting to come out, and so I was in school during the period the books are set. I wasn't in the UK and can't speak to specifics there, but my own.

Your question feels really disingenuous when you tag it #james potter supremacy but I am a fool and going to answer you honestly anyway.

I liked Snape the moment it was revealed in the first book that he wasn't the villain -- because it showed him as someone who gave no fucks about how others saw him. I had been violently bullied for years at that point, but was told that I needed to stop letting it hurt me or to stop acting in ways to invite the abuse. All I internalized was that it was my fault and I needed to change myself so that they'd like me. So meeting a character who just stopped giving a fuck about other people's opinions was fascinating.

The text doesn't, I think, intend for you to read Snape's behavior as incredibly abusive. A lot of his behavior to the students wouldn't have been seen as abnormal when I was in school. Unkind but within tolerance. He was a prick and the assumption with teachers like that was that A) don't take it personally B) If you can't do A then stay off their radar and count the minutes until class is over. I'm hoping that the sudden uproar about how abusive Snape is now is a sign that school culture has changed. Because you're right, it's awful, and shouldn't happen. But that's now, and not then. Then it was acceptable if not exactly encouraged behavior.

For me, Snape's teaching style would have been within normal limits and at least it wasn't false advertising. I saw popular "kind" teachers bully disabled students, throw coffee mugs, and choke slam 9 year olds. Those teachers were never punished. I preferred the hard asses who didn't pretend, but would restrain themselves to only demoralizing you with words. They never went half so far as those much beloved teachers. These were in schools that had long banned corporal punishment by teachers, by the way.

Plus, Snape's bullying is written in such a way that is so over the top and dramatic it's hard for me to believe that there's any real intent as he never follows through with most of his threats. He's amusing himself, which is fucked up, yes, but so is his situation being forced to teach children (a job he hates) by daylight and fighting a war as a spy by moonlight (a job he also hates).

When book 5 revealed his own history of being bullied the kinship I felt for him just kinda clicked. Game knew game, even if I didn't know it then.

What impressed me about Snape is that he made a terrible decision of joining the DE, he knows it, he regrets it, and most importantly he does something about it. He sabotages them and when he can't do that he tries to reduce harm as much as possible.

He joins a side lead by people who are responsible for his own traumas, who are unrepentant about their roles in it but still expect him to get over it. Snape isn't interested in pretending everything is fine with his allies when everything isn't fine and that's such a challenging and brave stance to take.

Because if I were in his shoes, my first instinct would be to swallow all my anger and stuff it in well inside me and pretend it doesn't exist so that I could be seen as agreeable and the bigger person. I know I'm not alone in that. However, that instinct has caused me so much damage that I will spend the rest of my life fighting that instinct tooth and nail.m, because what it means is that you are minimizing yourself and your safety in order to make other people comfortable.

Snape might have the right idea (but poor execution) when it comes to some people, but he falters when it comes to Lily. I was so disappointed with the reveal that Lily was his primary motivation, even if it's grown on me. He's so damned loyal to someone who wasn't even a great friend to him by the end. Lily smiles before she intercedes in SWM, which to me signaled that the whole scene was just a way for James to pull Lily's metaphorical pigtail (Snape) in their courtship and if I were the pigtail I'd be pissed too. It doesn't justify but it adds context for why he might want to hurt her then.

And Snape spends the rest of his life regretting his moments of weakness and giving his life to prevent Voldemort from winning, for a friend who failed him pretty spectacularly.

Most people don't do that -- they regret and then they try to get on with their lives. They don't want to talk about it. We're STILL finding guards from WWII concentration camps hiding out in suburbs after all. Snape doesn't choose that and that's brave as hell.

Snape's "redemption" is a hot debate, but I don't know that redemption is even his goal. He's just trying to do what's right. If he were really searching for redemption then certainly I think he'd have sought a more friendly relationship with Harry, if only on the side.

Which brings me back to how can you claim "James Potter Supremacy" when he's only seen in SWM, where he's a cruel bully to someone minding their own business (SWM takes place after the Shack per canon), and we only have the testimony of Sirius and Remus, a decade after his death, to say that he "got better" -- which meant not publicly tormenting Snape, but doing it in private. We never get to see this better version of James.

Sirius and Remus are highly motivated to put James in the best light possible to his orphaned son, which is natural, but it doesn't make it gospel truth. I think he may have become a better person with time, because that typically happens, and certainly he had the capacity for great kindness (befriending Remus) which makes his decisions to be so cruel even more painful. But he died and we never get to see any of him in canon except him being a complete asshole.

So why would you question how people can like Snape when there is so much more canonical evidence that Snape was a good person with serious faults than there is for James being anything other than a school bully who died young?

#severus snape #pro snape #professor severus snape #pro severus snape #The irony of All the Young Dudes written by #David Bowie #A perennial outsider to that point #Who's gender non-conformity was threatening to the establishment #Becoming so strongly associated with a set of characters who are emblematic OF the establishment #To the point that the Google tells me about the BOOK (their word) before the song #When the FANFIC demonizes the canonically gender nonconforming character.#Awful #flames on the side of my face #i don't want to live on this planet anymore

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