#this is my first foray into writing Ace so this will be a lot of fun and i'm excited for it
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Catching Fire
Fandom: One Piece
Rating: M
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Pairings: Portgas D. Ace/Original Female Character
Characters: Portgas D. Ace, Akainu | Sakazuki, Sengoku The Buddha, Sengoku the Buddha's Goat, Shirohige | Whitebeard | Edward Newgate, Fushichou Marco | Phoenix Marco, Thatch (One Piece), Vista (One Piece), Whitebeard Pirates, Marines (One Piece)
Additional Tags: Arranged Marriage, Action/Adventure, Found Family, elizabethan/tudor style family and marriage politics, Self Indulgent Headcanons, Fluff and Humor, world building, Subterfuge, Adventure & Romance, Pre-Canon
Summary: When Aster discovers that everyone in her life values upholding a promise to her late-father over the quality of her own life, she takes matters into her own hands.
Under the mark of Whitebeard, Ace has found freedom on the seas, a freedom that extends to all under the World’s Strongest Man.
But Admiral Sakazuki is powerful in his own right and if there’s one thing he does not tolerate, it is disloyalty.
Links: AO3
Chapter 1: The Arrangement
Two masked fighters were embroiled in a sparring match, steel flashing brightly under the height of the noon sun. Block, parry, and a final thrust was the end of one fighter as the other deflected the attack with ease, disarming them.
The sword flipped end over end until the winner caught it mid-air by the handle.
The loser held their hands up beside their chest while the victor tore off their helmet to reveal a cascade of long red hair that shone with orange and the slightest hint of fuchsia. Hazel green eyes flashed with pride as the young woman breathed heavily and pink lips curled upwards in a satisfied smirk. “I think that’s 2-1, making me the victor, Alfonso.”
The other person—Alfonso—chuckled and removed his helmet, revealing an old man with graying hair and laugh lines carved deep into the corners of his eyes by the wide grin he sported. “It does indeed, Lady Aster. You’ve improved greatly.”
Aster lowered her blade and offered his sword back which he gratefully accepted.
A slow clap broke through the air in sharp staccato notes, drawing both fighters’ attention to the sidelines.
A beautiful woman with blonde hair so light it shone silver stood tall and proud. She was wreathed in a lilac dress that hugged and accentuated every curve until it fell to the floor in a dramatic arc of silk.
Alfonso bowed deep at the waist, “Lady Belmont, thank you for gracing our humble practice court. To what do we owe the honor?”
The Lady and Aster shared a glance, “It’s time for my daughter to get ready for our guests arriving this afternoon.”
Blowing out a huge sigh, the young woman trudged her way off the training field to where her mother stood looking down the straight slope of her perfect nose. Pushing past the elegant woman, Aster tromped down the stone hallway, her boots clicking loudly on the tile.
The dainty click of high heels followed hot in her path as Aster’s mother strode quickly, determined to catch up to her headstrong daughter. “Aster, that gait is not ladylike! Slow down, you should straighten your back and float gracefully across the floor.”
The young woman hunched further and walked faster just to spite her.
...Continue reading on Archive of Our Own!
#portgas_d_ace#fire fist ace#one piece#op fanfiction#whitebeard pirates#sakazuki#sengoku#sengoku's goat#i'm absolutely tagging the goat because it's an important character#this is my first foray into writing Ace so this will be a lot of fun and i'm excited for it#yonkoucrew
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AC Old Gen Headcanons (for APV)
Here're how the Old Gens work in APV. It's pretty rough since i'm writing this while dozing off from my painkillers but this is a good summary of how they work in my fic and the differences between them:
Gen One:
Since this was their first foray into augmenting humans after Gen Zero (Walter’s mother, which was the proof of concept), the survival rate was abysmally low and they were mostly fucking around and finding out. Most of the work was done on the brain and spinal cord, with a lot of invasive implants and heavy Coral injections, and they were directly connected to their C-Weapon or AC via a port connected directly to their spine. Majority of patients died from Coral poisoning or infection/rejection of implants.
Gen Two:
Implementing lessons learned from Gen One, they decided to go light on the implants and heavier on the Coral injections. They screened for suitable candidates by selecting those with natural high tolerance for Coral (coincidentally a lot of these were native Rubiconians or descendants of Rubiconians), and initially the results were very promising. Several deaths occurred from Coral poisoning, but the patients were otherwise stable and recovering well. They also focused on remote connection to C-Weapon and ACs, which remained stable so long as they were in close proximity. As they were expected to be in the cockpit when connecting, this was deemed a non-issue.
Eventually, though, many began to succumb to ‘Coral Burn’, where the Coral within their organic tissue, without the implants ‘controlling’ its desire to propagate and expand, began to crystallise within organic tissue, most notably the grey matter and along the spinal cord. While Gen Two’s enjoyed inhuman levels of mental acuity, processing and photographic memories, the Coral Burn gradually began to counteract this by causing symptoms similar to Parkinson’s disease. Inevitably, Coral Burn resulted in death.
Gen Three:
Realising that Coral in high doses was lethal without sufficient control measures in place, Gen Three was very conservative in comparison to the previous two generations. Using considerably less Coral, Gen Threes had many implants embedded along the nervous system and in the brain, creating little ‘control nodes’. While this caused death by implant rejection to spike, the overall death toll was incredibly low compared to Gen One and Gen Two. Gen Threes lacked the Coral to reliably remote connect to C-Weapons or ACs, and instead connected via the control nodes embedded along their arms, legs and spine.
However, while this generation is considered highly stable, the minimal use of Coral meant the implants only gave slight advantages compared to Gen One and Gen Two. Gen Threes enjoyed heightened mental acuity and fast reflexes, but overall were well within human limits. As a result, Gen Three was deemed a failure, as it didn’t achieving the ‘breaking human limits’ effects that the augmentations were meant to achieve.
Gen Four (Protoype):
They went back to Gen One where they did a considerable amount of work on the brain and spinal cord with far more sophisticated implants and control measures. Combining all they learned from the previous generations, the Gen Four ‘Prototypes’ had a high death rate and a mostly unstable product, but served to gradually refine the process as they learned how to balance the implants and Coral to gain the effect they want.
This was also when they introduced the ‘synchro-port’, which was a port that connected directly to the human’s cerebellum. This allowed the C-Weapon or AC to become the human’s ‘new’ nervous system, rerouting all signals emitting from the cerebellum to the C-Weapon or AC instead. This had the side effect of causing depersonalisation or proprioceptive issues.
Additionally, Gen Fours presented a new problem: a considerable amount of them began to suffer symptoms similar to Gen Zero, that being hallucinations, obsession with Coral, heavily abstracted thinking and dissociation, etc.
Gen Four (Stabilised):
After tweaking the right amount of implant and Coral, the Gen Four were ‘completed’ and deemed a resounding success. While carrying a moderate failure rate (30%), most that survived suffered from only minimal side effects that were rigorously mitigated by the Coral Cerebral Control Implant. However, these ‘stabilised’ versions still, on occasion, suffered from auditory hallucinations around heavy concentrations of Coral, which was attributed to a sympathetic response with the Coral in the Gen Four’s nervous system. It was put down as a ‘known issue, harmless’.
#apv ramblings#fanfic ramblings#armored core 6#armored core#just little headcanons and worldbuilding#about the augmentations and stuff
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Door Reviews: Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (2001)
So! The Ace Attorney series. Iconic games, known by many. So many people have recommended this game series to me already. SO MANY PEOPLE. I got the first trilogy on the PC years ago, but it sat in my library unplayed for so long. And I have finally found the time to start it. And now, reader, I am so excited to tell you all about the first game!!! Let’s go!
What’s it about?
It’s about new lawyer, Phoenix Wright, and his foray into the world of Japanese courtrooms. We meet clients and assist them in getting a Not Guilty verdict. We see him learn the ropes, investigate crime scenes, endure his own trials, and persevere against all odds.
Disclaimer: In this review, I will mostly be talking about the first four cases. The fifth case will have its own section and its own rating at the end of this review.
STYLE (Gameplay, Graphics, Music)
Gameplay feels like a visual novel with investigative elements. You navigate areas, talk to people, and take note of evidence to present to people and at trials. The gameplay isn’t really anything to write home about, but the cases themselves are interesting to unravel.
To present evidence during, you have to select the right dialogue that the witness said, then present said evidence using the assigned hotkey (E for keyboard). It becomes a game of carefully reading what the witness said and cross-referencing it with the facts of the case, catching the lie using the evidence at your disposal.
It can get grating trying to find the exact dialogue to present evidence against. The cases can get roundabout at times, so you really have to make sure you understand what the witness said. I found that I have to double, even triple-check what the witness was saying, and check the whole transcript against my stack of evidence one by one.
Outside of the trials, it’s a visual novel-esque game where you go places and interact with items, making sure to talk to NPCs as well.
The gameplay itself is simple, but the game itself uses this simplicity to good effect in terms of storytelling, which I’ll discuss more on in the next section. All in all, I think the gameplay itself passes muster for me: good enough to play with, but not bad enough that I’d get too distracted by it.
The art looks sleek and expressive. The sprites look very anime. I like their exaggerated movements at times. Makes it feel like a wacky courtroom drama. The backgrounds are nice, too.
In terms of art, I think the best part are the character designs. The characters can be so zany and distinctive! And their animations reflect this, too.
The music, I think, stands out among all of these. They set the tone for various stages of the game, giving it whimsy, an air of caution, and an intensity too. I love the Turnabout music a lot! It is very iconic.
All in all, the style of this game is something I find charming. It’s simple, but because of that simplicity the game can use it to tell better stories.
SUBSTANCE (Story, Characters, Impact)
This game’s story is fun. It has a lot of wacky hijinks in it! Even the names of characters are so wacky: Lotta Hart. Sal Manella. April May. Redd White, CEO of Bluecorp. It’s such a silly game!
It has a lot of sassiness too. The banter between Phoenix Wright and a bunch of the other characters can be so funny. He can become the butt of the joke a lot but in the courtroom he WILL sass you to hell and back if he can press the advantage!
The dialogue of this game is soooooo silly. It feels like a Saturday morning cartoon in a way! It feels cheesy at times, yet I can’t help but crack a smile.
What I like most, though, is that this game’s story has a lot of heart (heh) and earnestness! It does character relationships so well, having a good balance between lightheartedness and seriousness. It presents character struggles seriously. And most of all, it emphasizes how difficult it is to be a defense attorney in one of the countries with the highest conviction rate.
We root for Phoenix Wright not just because he’s a silly defense attorney, you root for him because he tries despite insurmountable obstacles. He tries despite a legal system that can be cartoonish but is nonetheless still based on reality, where an accusation is practically a prison sentence. He tries because it’s the right thing to do.
That’s why I like this game’s story so much. At its heart, it’s a story about doing the right thing against all odds. It tells its story with such whimsy and silliness, yet is just so earnest when it comes to things that matter.
VERDICT
Ace Attorney is a gem of a game. I enjoyed playing it after work. It became something to look forward to after my day-to-day. I was rather bemused with the story, and slowly ended up loving it. I absolutely LOVE Edgeworth as a character and he is now one of my top 5 faves of all time (maybe even top 1…… he is my blorbo of the month). With such a strong first game, I am very much excited to play the rest of the trilogy. Play this game!!!
Door Rates Game: 5/5!
REVIEW: RISE FROM THE ASHES
SO! Rise from the Ashes is the 5th case in this game. This case here is an addition to the game after it got a Nintendo DS remaster. And it makes full use of the DS capabilities, with more expressive sprites, 3D evidence, and other gameplay quirks. Too bad we’re experiencing this on the PC!! Nonetheless, we push on with this review.
Case 5 is a fresh new case with a LOT of content. It’s like… maybe two, 2.5 cases in one? There are a lot of twists and turns to the story, and the devs introduced new gameplay, chief among which is the way you can now inspect each evidence you get. You go to the court record, press Enter, and you can look at it in 3D!!! You can get to inspect engravings, blood, and most importantly, you can now look at the back of receipts! Technology…
There are other new gameplay things they introduced, but they’re mostly just small things that try to tie you better into the game and also showcase the capabilities of the DS. Well, less that and more taking advantage of the new things the DS could do. With new technology means new ways you can make your game, and new ways to tell your story.
In my opinion though, these new things introduced in gameplay feel like they were thrown in for the sake of it, as if telling the player “oh, look at me! I can do this now!” Too experimental in a way… which makes sense, since this is in a way the first AA case on the DS. I haven’t played the other DS games, but I would hope that they found a way to integrate the capabilities of the DS better and in a way that makes sense for the story.
I found the story of case 5 to be amazing!! It had a bit of a slow start for me, but when it got going I was on the edge of my seat. It was thrilling, funny, and had heart, which is what I feel is classic Ace Attorney.
I liked it!! I would give this additional content a 4/5, if only because the new gameplay stuff hassled me a bit. They tried some new things, and some of them annoyed me, but I’m sure these new things would play out better in future installments. So far, I very much enjoy the series, and I’m excited to play more of its games!
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I apologise in advance, I just need to get this itch out of my brain.
Twice I've encountered the idea that Retinz/Reus didn't kill Manov Mistree. And every time, my mind comes back to these two moments:
Retinz describes Mistree as "but a fan". This is someone he's known for years but far from familiarity, he sounds almost dismissive of the boy. He does share his secret with him and allow him to carry his mantle though...
His self-described "grand illusion". It's what tips Apollo off to the idea that the murder had been committed via trickery. Retinz even goes so far as to hang this trickery over Trucy's head when he's defeated (even calling it HIS magic). At the same time, he might just be talking about his magic forged contract... which we also have little to no evidence for that being his doing specifically...
Now don't get it twisted. I don't think he's nearly as petty or flatly evil as I perhaps painted him in my mind - the guy was likely a member of the troupe from childhood and got kicked out years later for one mistake. His foray into pyrotechnics imply that his magic had been dangerous from the get-go but we don't get the impression he messed it up more than once.
Whether he actually murdered Manov Mistree is another point though. The way it's written makes it sound like he didn't think much of a fan he's known for several years, that he's proud that he managed to fool Trucy with this stunt.
But then there's no direct evidence he tampered with the set - not the sword OR the coffin. Just that they were tampered with. We don't get a direct confession out of Retinz either, same way we would for a good chunk of other culprits.
Were the writers conscious that they had constructed a plausible argument for him not being guilty? Or were they simply writing another scumbag to put behind bars?
It's not like Ace Attorney can't be complex - Matt Engarde and Marlon Rimes are good examples of more complicated culprits - but the truth is usually made apparent by the end of it all. We KNOW Matt hired de Killer and we KNOW Rimes had accidentally killed the Captain.
Retinz? There's enough wriggle-room to say he didn't do it. But he's written as if he did.
It's honestly a little eerie... a murder with no definite culprit is a rarity - if at all common - in Ace Attorney. That part tends to be the simplest, the one that can be most definitively proven; how you get there is the hard part.
Execution counts for a lot more than intent. It's the reason why I've harped about the phantom so harshly; I LOVE the intention behind him and I LOVE the ideas behind him. But he is so clumsy in execution that he ends up more flat and confusing in a way that really bothers me.
Retinz in hindsight is kind of the opposite of that; he comes across as pretty petty on first-blush, but the way he's written ended up making him open to an interpretation that is more interesting and even tragic in the right light.
After all...
There IS the fact the footage was edited to remove the ONE part that showed Trucy's complete sword-switch. There IS the fact that he had set up the circumstances for this plot to even be possible. Hell, there really doesn't seem to be any reason for the other characters involved to kill Mistree, save for Trucy as he stole her diary.
There's this uncanny valley effect of uncertainty lingering around this trial. All evidence pointing to Retinz isn't remotely as clear-cut as things like Manfred's shoulder bullet or Ken Dingling intentionally hiding Max's bust. And it bothers me.
Given the sheer volume of signs pointing towards Retinz it's clear enough the writing wants you to think he did it, and there's good odds that he did. AA culprits are no strangers to doing whacky things to remove culpability - that's half the point of each case after all!
For all intents and purposes, Retinz is the murderer. I don't get the impression this is something the writers did intentionally to play with the ambiguity of it all. As far as the story is concerned, he's not important enough to warrant a more complicated answer.
Though the fact that there IS enough room to give a more complicated answer is interesting to me. Any excuse I have to talk about one of the 3D game's more fun antagonists is a good one, so I'm glad to have this brought to my attention at all.
#ace attorney spoilers#soj spoilers#aa6 spoilers#hang loose baby!#i mean. he IS an asshole the size of uranus.#that part doesn't dissapate just because he isn't a murder man.#but in the absence of hard evidence and a direct confession i can see why this is a point of discussion.#when THE PHANTOM leaves behind more solid evidence than you did that's a cause to pause and rethink things.#given he set up the circumstances to allow this to happen it's likely for him to be responsible...#...but i can see an argument to the contrary standing up better than most cuplrits.
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An Author's Rambling
I'm not really sure how to do this social media'ing thing. I don't use this site, or really have any desire to do so, so I feel like some hack making self-advertisements with the help of guides and AI and stuff, just throwing them into the wind where they'll be seen by no-one, because I don't have a follower base that would reblog them. It might seem self-defeatist to not want to really do the social media thing, but I'm asocial, a hermit, content to not interact with other humans for the most part, plenty neurodivergent. I guess this ramble is also me technically coming out in public pretty widely. Yeah, like Reggie, the narrator/main protag in my webnovel series, I'm an aro-ace with neurodivergencies up the wazoo, disabled in a few ways.
What am I hoping to accomplish? Just to get "An Age of Mysterious Memories" out there to people that need it, that need to be seen, to feel represented. But, like I said, posting here feels like throwing fliers into the wind, hoping that they'll land somewhere that someone picks it up and goes, "Huh, neat, maybe I'll check that out someday when I'm bored or depressed."
I'm actually surprised that a couple of my posts have been seen by at least one person that wasn't on my follower list, which, hey, shoutout to you new fam.
This social media stuff really burns me out and detracts from my writing, but between this, and some pretty-expensive google advertising, I don't know how else to offer up my story to the world.
I don't even care about "conversions" or conversion to click ratio or whatever. I have 0 patrons on Patreon, and that's fine. I've been skating by in life on the thin ice of every new day (Thank you Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson, heh.)
I guess maybe I should ask how I should even do this. Should I get more personal? Post more ramblings, with popular tags, and just hope that those bring traffic, and then hope that that traffic sees that I have a free webnovel up?
A lot of the guides suggest quantity, and a regular posting schedule for this social media stuff that's way too hard for me to keep up without burning out, because I have chapters going up every day or every other day, basically, nonstop. In the approximately two years since i started getting serious with my webnovel series, I've averaged at least a chapter every other day. Some days I write ten to twenty chapters, maybe a few days in a row, then I don't write anything for a month or two, because titling them, posting them, advertising them, burns me out. I could keep writing, forever and ever, even if that means writing chapters I can't post yet (I have so many chapters written for the next volume in my series that it's not even funny.) Or I could write side-projects, or fanfic I guess. I took my first foray into that a while back, and I kind of want to do a reread on my fanfic and plot out a conclusion to it, instead of leaving it hanging like it is. But fanfic isn't my baby, it's not what I want to get seen.
What I want seen is AAoMM, because it's... it's the representation, it's me putting myself out there, my internals, my neurodivergencies into a narrator, my Q status in the lgbtqia, having intrusive thoughts and not acting on them, and just so much more, that I know other people identify with, and honestly need. The representation matters, and I just want to provide that, because I know people who have been, or are hurting, or struggling, or are just in a funk, or depressed, or bored, or any number of things, that share so many of the traits that Reggie carries, that I carry. Several of my readers have said that it feels like the thoughts that are expressed are them in the situations Reggie is in. I don't think I've seen another adventure novel series where we get stream-of-consciousness moment-to-moment inner narration of a neurodivergent narrator that falls into the lgbtq community.
What a niche, right? Except... it's not. We're all having our own inner adventures. We all do have a stream of consciousness, whether we acknowledge it or not, and there are *Tons* of people out there who are neurodivergent in the lgbtqia community. Hell, at this point in Earth's history, I'd be surprised if anyone has survived unscathed without any neurodivergencies, trauma, or panic. We went through a global epidemic, a pandemic. That must have been rough on you peeps out there that actually leave your homes and do stuff with other humans. My sympathy to you guys. I'm a hermit, my life got a little bit easier, because things started allowing web-based doctor's visits, and delivery of groceries, and other stuff to help with social distancing. I'm rambling, but I just want to give AAoMM to everyone who needs it.
I want to nerd out about my webnovel series with people, and answer questions ranging from silly, to heart-wrenching. Why? Because I am in a good place, I've gotten somewhere in life that I feel content, despite all my comorbid things, all the depression and trauma and anxiety and social-phobia and adhd and spectrum'ness and the struggle with identity, especially my AA agendered ace identity, that I've slid around on, and worried I'd invalidated myself over the years, and everything else I've got, gone through, carry around, or deal with. Reggie's narration is that--, that beacon of, no matter how hard things get, what slams your mind with intrusive thoughts, that there's hope, that there's warm, soft times, contented times, happy times, ecstatic times, somewhere along the tunnel that is life's journey. Also that you can slide around on the scale of your agenderness or aromanticness, or your sexuality, and that that's okay, that you still are who you feel you are, or say you are, no matter what others think, that there can be romances and fluff and all kinds of things that are exceptions to rules, whether those rules are imposed by others, or yourself.
It feels like I'd look like I was shilling or pandering though if I interjected all the tags though, for every chapter, because not every chapter does it really come up that Reggie(and most of the inner circle) is at least technically agendered, or that there are several LGB relationships for side characters, or--. Well, it is always pretty evident that Reggie's brain is neurodivergent, we hear every thought that Reggie ever thinks, including the intrusive ones, almost every thought anyway.
But I also sort of want to put AAoMM in front of non-ally neurotypicals who are ablebodied and cishet, and be like:
"God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in our shoes
'Cause then you really might know what it's like to sing the blues" (Thanks Everlast, for those lyrics.)
Not in a malicious way or anything. I don't want them to suffer, I don't want anyone to suffer. Plus, I'm sure they're going through their own things, just like everyone else. I just want to try to remind people to be empathetic to each other, to think for that brief moment, before interacting with another human being, that -they are another human being-. That they deserve to be treated equally to how they're interacting with the world around them, more or less. Everyone deserves human rights, and the dignity of being acknowledged as existing with their own struggles.
I got pretty soapboxy here I guess, probably best if I shut up now and just hit post. (Could you guess that I'm an author by the verbosity of this goofy-arse post that was just supposed to be me semi-ironically whining about social media on social media?)
#aroace#representation matters#fluff#lgbt representation#disability representation#queer representation#acespec#agender#lgbtq community#lgbtq#lgbtfiction#lgbtqia#fiction#neurodivergent#asexual#aromantic#asexuality#honest thoughts#honestly#sorry for being depressing#chosenfamily#romance#depressing shit#seen#what its like#what it means to be you#intrusive thoughts#intrusive thinking#acceptance#friendship
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Top Ten Ace Attorney Games
So this seems appropriate given recent announcements. Note: I’ve never played the Professor Layton crossover so it will not be on this list. Can’t really rank something you never interacted with, you know? Also, goes without saying but all opinions expressed in this are fully subjective and should be taken with a grain of salt. Like, seriously, guys. I’ve warned you.
10) Apollo Justice - Okay, so I just want to say that AA4 is not a bad game, but good lord is it the one I have the most problems with. Good things first, however. I love the dynamic between Apollo and Trucy. Their banter is so fun. I like this version of Phoenix. Really seems like he’s grown a lot in the time between games due to circumstances. I feel his relationship with Trucy could have been explored more but what we do get is good. Ema’s back, and I’ll never say no to that. Klavier is a good rival for Apollo. All that said, man do I remember barely anything about any of the cases of this game. Outside the main cast I remember Lamoire, Kristoph, and that a couple of Gramaryes are in this one. That last case also just... gives me a headache if I think about it too long.
9) Justice For All - Oh boy. So outside of introducing my favorite Prosecutor of the OG trilogy, JFA is a bit meh overall. Don’t get me wrong, Case 2 with all the Fey Drama is very solid and the final case... Come on, do I really need to say how good the Engarde Case is? I don’t even hate the Berry Big Circus case as much as most people (except for the very uncomfortable love triangle, that I detest) but even I can’t deny it’s one of the weaker cases in the series and the first case is... the whole amnesia device is more annoying than clever. Again, I’m sure I’m not saying anything new here.
8) Ace Attorney: Phoenix Wright - Man, I wonder if this is some form of sacrilegious putting the first game this low on the list. Honestly, there’s not much to truly criticize with this one. It’s a very solid first entry into what would grow into such a beloved franchise. But I also just don’t have a ton of things to say about it in general? At least not many that haven’t already been said by more articulate people than I. It’s a good game. Solid starting point. Weakest case is the first one but... It’s the first case. So. To be expected.
7) Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth - Admittedly, this is only so low because I love the other games more and the last case is.... unbearably long. It was brilliant of Capcom to take what is likely AA’s most popular character and give him his own games, and even better to give us characters like Kay and Lang while also giving us Tiny Franziska. We did not deserve Tiny Franziska but they gave her to us anyway. A very enjoyable foray with a new game-play style.
6) Trials and Tribulations - Oh man, I am going to get so much crap for this one. Before anyone comes at me! Yes! T&T is a near flawless entry. Genuinely, the writing for this one is insane and Dahlia is such a well used antagonist. The through line for this game is masterful. Even the third case, which is indeed the weakest case, I find some charm in. So don’t get me wrong, I’m well aware that objectively this probably should have at least been in the top three. But this isn’t an objective list. This is my list. And while I do love T&T, I just adore the games in the top five more.
5) Ace Attorney Investigations 2: Prosecutor’s Path - An improvement from the first Investigations in almost every way. While I do think that the last case is still a bit too long, I think it’s overall more interesting than the first’s. More of Kay, Miles, and Gumshoe having the best dynamic. The addition of Ray, Sebastian, and Justine only making the cast all the better. Again, I’m a sucker for Justine being the best mom ever and her dynamic with John (and even Sebastian) is something I wish we’d had more of.
4) Dual Destinies - I don’t care what ya’ll say, AA5 is a fun addition and Athena is an amazing new character. I freakin love Athena. Like, I’m sorry but any character that has been through that much crap and still manages to smile and cheer up the people around her even when she’s feeling the absolute worst is a good character and I will die on this hill. Not to mention Blackquill being an equally fantastic rival for our protagonists. And that reveal in the last case while Aura is forcing them to do a retrial for her brother! “Oh but Phoenix is back to being goofy and it’s like AA4 never happened.” “Oh, but Apollo is angsty for no reason.” Sorry, doesn’t bother me. Like, I’m not even willing to call these things nitpicks because they’re just such non-issues for me. The only thing I’ll say is that the models do look a little off sometimes. This is a good game, ya’ll are just mean.
3) Spirit of Justice - So confession, SOJ was the first AA game that I saw from start to finish. I’d tried before but I’d never found the right let’s play of the AA franchise. Then I did find one, and I watched SOJ through start to finish. And I really enjoyed it. I love the setting of Khura’in, Rayfa, the final boss looking like a Power Rangers’ villain. Also, while we do get a lot of father son stuff, I’m such a freakin sucker for the mother daughter stuff between Rayfa and Gharan and Amara. Also, the Magical Turnabout is just... such a fun case? And of course, Maya can’t be in a game without getting accused of murder. But her growth as a character is great. I just really really enjoy this game, guys.
2) Great Ace Attorney: Adventures - I’m sure this comes as very little shock to anyone who knows me. The first GAA game is astounding. I love this cast of characters so much. Susato, Ryu, Sherlock, Iris, Barok, Gina, Toby, they’re all great! The new mechanics with the jury and multiple witnesses on the stand are great. The story is great. Yeah, the first case goes on for too long, but at least it feels fresh due to the new setting and characters. I feel like I can’t properly articulate how much I love this game. Which, speaking of...
1) Great Ace Attorney: Resolve - Yeah, yeah. Predictable, I’m sure. But what can I say, this took everything I loved about the first game and just made it better and expanded on it. The story takes so many twists and turns and it takes the characters and their bonds from the first game and makes me love them even more. WE LOVE THE FOUND FAMILY TROPE! Kazuma comes back and he becomes such a fascinating character. Rei, Courtney Sithe, Esmeralda Tusspells, Drebber are only some of the memorable new characters for this part 2. The fight against Stronghart (Vortex is still the cooler name) is such a triumphant moment! And playing as Susato in the first case!? That was amazing! And Ryu’s growth throughout all of this!? Like excuse me! I love this boy!
#spoilers#just in case#since the remasters will be maybe bringing in new people#ace attorney#great ace attorney#ace attorney investigations#dai gyatuken saiban#gyatuken saiban#phoenix wright#miles edgeworth#Apollo justice#athena cykes#ryuunosuke naruhodou#susato mikotoba#maya fey#kay faraday#ema skye#dick gumshoe#franziska von karma#godot#barok van zieks#klavier gavin#simon blackquill#nahyuta sahdmadhi#rayfa padma khura'in#trucy wright#mia fey#gina lestrade
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Hi Torship 💛 you have ficd for Tokoyami (mha) and Shisui, assuming they're your series favs... What other favs do you have? I don't know if you love any character like you love shisui tho? ;D hard to imagine
Have a good day/night!
Hey, Anon!
I have a lot of series that I like, fandoms that I browse over like popping your head in a gallery to admire the view and not read the labels, but only a few characters I am pretty hardcore for...!
Shisui
We been knew. I don't really know how I found myself quietly determined to dominate his character tag but life works in mysterious ways. He was a possible love interest for my SIOC back in the day and then... We spiralled, massively. I liked his character so much that I turned to my Beta one day and said 'why isn't there a Shisui time travel fic, one thats simple but impactful?' and she shrugged and told me why I didn't try my hand at it myself, and that's how In The Eye of the Beholder started. The first of...many. I think we're at around 20 Shisui-centric fics posted? And endless ideas 🤡 The OG blorbo
Obi (Akagami no Shirayuki/AnS)
Oh my god Obi. You guys don't realise everything I have bottled up inside of me, but Obi gets me almost at the same level as Shisui, I just never posted much. The AnS fandom is smaller and idk in a weird way I'd feel more out of place there because, with Naruto fics, you're kinda sheltered by the crowd? We all deal with self consciousness, I guess. Obi unlocks something in me. Like with Shisui, I can ship him with almost anyone because I'm ace and romance is nice to read but not the end of the world, you know? It's always going to be a platonic relationship that rules my fics, I can't help it. But Obi? His love for Shirayuki just turns me into this puddle of emotionally complicated goo 😵
For Bnha....
You're not wrong that there's a reason that Tokoyami ended up as my first character-centric foray into this fandom, but it's not at all the same as the previous two. I have a lot of loves in BnHa. Ochako, Momo, Kirishima, Todoroki, Dabi, Hawks, Mirko, Best Jeanist, Ingenium (Tensei), and I have a protective streak a mile wide for Tamaki (I have a lot of thoughts, on...all of it tbh) but I'm very happy to rotate across basically the whole cast from BnHA because a good fic is a damn good fic! And the artists are also extremely talented~
Narutoverse
I want to swing by Narutoverse again, just to reiterate that I may be welded to Shisui but I do love a massive number of characters, mainly the idea/potential of them than canon reality (as in most cases, I'm not a "love letter to canon" author) but it's a love all the same. Tobirama, Gai, Lee, Tsunade, Kakashi (squad 2 tbh, i picked my favs for that group), and I've grown so much fonder of other characters that I never paid much mind to (mainly Uchiha or Akatsuki etc) as just a reader!
Other fandoms
I'm... I'm a binge reader without much in the way of pickiness for a lot of fandoms. Les Mis, MCU, HP, LotR/Hobbit (I'm not even loyal to Aragorn/Arwen, this is how flexible I am in the face of good fandom content).
I have a huge preference for BAMF Din, I had to stop watching season three of the mandalorian because it was frustrating me so much lol
My favorite PJO character by a long long shot is Percy
I get annoyed when I remember that they didn't make the RDJ Sherlock Holmes movies a polytriad
I'm Merlin trash in the year 2023
I'm too scared to start One Piece 🥴
If I had the time, memory space, and energy to swallow Star Wars lore, I would write a huge fic where Finn is the protagonist. No hate to any character but I want what I want
I think I'm running out of fandoms and, therefore, character fixations 😂 you're right tho, Anon, that I don't exactly have a designated 'Shisui' level of love in each fandom!
Thank you! Have a good day/night too✨
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Fic Round Up 2022: Questions and Stats
I posted the actual list of fics in a separate post to keep things from getting too unwieldy! I produced 38 written works across 10 fandoms this year, which means that despite writing less than 2021, I actually dipped my toe into different waters!
Thank you @queenaeducan, @mxanigel & @little--abyss for the tags! 💖
Now, onto the questions.
Words posted: 68,731
Additional Words Written: Probably another 10k or so all up scattered across various half-written exchange treats...
Highest Kudos: At 69 kudos (nice) it's White Noise, my first, and so far only, foray into Hot Fuzz fic! Definitely could be tempted to write some Butterangel again. 🧈👼
Highest Kudos to Hits ratio: Possibly because of recency bias (it hasn't had time to accumulate more hits!), but it's with no place to go, the angsty Franziska ficlet I posted just before Christmas this year! (That being said, there are a few fics of mine with less hits, so I think it's doing well regardless 🥰)
Highest Hit Oneshot: two in the bush, a Cersei/Sansa fic I wrote for nonconathon this year. Never underestimate the power of porny fic in a large fandom: this work received four times as many hits as the next fic on the list (which was Kristoph/Phoenix hatesex).
New Things I Tried: I did a lot more drafting and rewriting and starting things earlier than I have in the past, and I think it's really improved the quality of my writing, and I've found that I actually quite enjoy it?
Surprise, surprise, this was the first year I tried writing after starting ADHD meds 😅 (the autism really takes over once I can actually focus, lol.)
Fic I Spent the Most Time On: All's Fair, the arranged marriage Meresino fic I wrote in an exchange for @venatohru! I kept wanting to add things to it, and then a whole actual plot evolved that I had no hope of actually completing in the time allocated, so I had to then rework the actual fic I submitted to be properly standalone and ahh. It was so much fun, though!
Still working on that sequel...
Fic I Spent the Least Time On: Funnily enough, also an exchange gift for @venatohru! This time, an Ace Attorney twincest fic, (be)longing. I literally sat down, wrote the first draft in forty minutes, and when I looked over it again a few days leter to edit, discovered it didn't really need much improvement!
Favorite Thing I Wrote: Basically anything from Orsino's POV, which is still a massive surprise to me. Here's a couple of my favourites.
From Precipice:
And Orsino was so, so tired of losing more of his own to the crushing oppression of the Gallows. It had been bad enough when he had been an apprentice, templars breathing down the necks of those who didn’t learn fast enough, or conversely, those with too much ambition. Only those who were able to adequately toe the line between these two different types of danger had successfully escaped notice.
Fortunately, Orsino’s childhood in the alienage, what little of it he remembered, had served him well when it came to knowing when to keep his head down and when to speak up. Make too much noise, or too little, and one could disappear.
It was why his parents had said nothing when the templars had come for him. Better the Gallows than the alienage, better this than dead.
He’d always held onto the hope that so long as he lived to see another day, he might one day bear witness to a better world, and perhaps even be granted the chance to help shape it himself.
Only here in the Gallows would he, an elf, a mage, an elf and a mage, be granted such an opportunity. Only in this unique set of circumstances could Orsino be the kind of man who might ascend to the ranks of First Enchanter.
It hadn't mattered that no-one else had wanted it, that the chalice was tainted, nor that he had most likely signed his own inevitable death warrant. In the absence of a silver spoon in his mouth, or indeed, any spoon at all, Orsino would always make do with whatever scraps of success he could scavenge.
But also the entire masturbation scene in end and the beginning, wherein Meredith becomes an unwilling passenger in Orsino's body after The Last Straw and nobody's truly having a great time.
A tinier snippet because I don't want to make this post too nsfw:
Meredith had known that someone like Orsino would find her actions indefensible long before the red lyrium had entrenched itself in the recesses of her mind, promising her the power to fix everything she had broken, the ability to save everyone she had failed —
I suppose, Orsino interrupted, dead is a type of safe.
Favorite Thing I Read: My reading tastes are wide and eclectic! (I've actually been working on a small project to do themed fic recs, starting with weekly DA recs, so keep an eye out for that!)
If you're really burning for recs right now, my bookmarks are pretty reliable!
Writing Goals for 2023: I'm actually hoping to write less and read more. (Both in fandom and otherwise.) 😅 I'm planning on doing less exchanges and working on more of my own fic ideas.
Tagging: @ineffableaz, @venatohru, @darethshirl, @bogunicorn, @chocochipbiscuit, @syrupwit, @fandomn00blr, and YOU!
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rules: give us the links to your fic with the most hits, second most kudos, third most comments, fourth most bookmarks, fifth most words, and finally the fic with the least words:
(nabbed from @ussjellyfish)
(turns out all but one of these are Warehouse 13 fics 😅)
Most hits: In the Warmth of Friends, a fic in which the interplay between two artifacts helps bring Christina back, and Helena and Myka both have to adapt to that. This is my most popular fic by almost any metric on AO3, and I'm super happy that it reverberates with so many people!
Second most kudos: What Goes Around Comes Around (That Halloween Story), how very timely! At Halloween, the walls between the worlds are thin, and someone from eighteen-nineties London might find themselves in twenty-tens Brooklyn. This fic was a beast to write, and I was so glad to be done with it; and now I'm so happy that people like it so much!
Third most comments: At the Heart of the Paradox, a Doctor Who crossover with lots of timey-wimey shenanigans and the most dreadful ending I ever wrote. But don't worry, there's a part two! I actually hand-drew a timeline for this fic, so that I could be sure the wibbly-wobbly-ness checked out. Really happy with how it turned out!
Fourth most bookmarks: And Now You, my behemoth (264K words!!) of a high school AU, in which Helena is an exchange student sent to Colorado Springs, and Myka the ace student who befriends her. When I had finished writing this fic, it was *just* the beginning of September, so I published it "in real time" (much like Dracula Daily), uploading each chapter on the day that the events in that chapter happened. (And yes, I had a calendar for that. In fact, I had a multi-column table (color-coded, of course) to keep track of the timeline for this fic!)
Fifth most words: Quickening, the only not-Warehouse-13 fic in this list! This is a Star Trek Voyager fic, with some TNG characters thrown in the mix. It is also part 3 in a series that itself is a continuation of an earlier series, the entirety of which was my first foray into fan fiction at the tender age of 33 😅 Still very near and dear to my heart!
Least words: A Dancing Tortoise, a double drabble set in my Chrysalis series, about one of the songs from the Carnival of Animals, and Helena's musings over it.
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Ouroboros IF - FAQ
When is the next update?
Let’s just get this one over with right off the bat -- I don’t know!
When I started writing Ouro, I saw it as a hobby project to get all that pent up creative energy out after working a soulsucking job. If I gain enough momentum and support on monetary sites such as Patreon and Ko-fi, I do have dreams of scaling back my work hours to focus on getting regular updates out. Alas, it is a lofty dream.
In writing as a hobby, there is an ebb and flow in how I work on Ouro. Some weeks my keyboard is on fire, others it’s collecting dust. I can’t force myself to write when I’m bogged down with other stuff, it just turns into mindless, boring writing. I expect that to change as I grow used to writing regularly, but I’m still learning that!
For now, I ask you to be patient with me; I love working on Ouroboros so much, but sometimes there just isn’t enough time or energy to do so. Besides being a complete novice at coding, Ouroboros is a beast of a story, and it grows exponentially with every chapter as more and more variables become relevant. Rest assured that I work on it as much as I possibly can.
Is there a discord/patreon/ko-fi?
Not yet. There will be announcements made when I launch either of the above; I just need the time and bravery to take the plunge. If you’d like to create a fan-made discord, just let me know so I can lurk it. 👀
How many parts do you expect Ouroboros to have / How long is the story?
For now, it’s planned to be a duology with part 1 being the shorter, more plot focused part, to really allow you to sink your teeth into the world and characters. Part 1 will still contain romance, but part 2 will have heavy branching depending on what character your MC romances. I might even split into 3 parts if part 2 gets too long.
I don’t have any estimates on what the wordcounts for each game will be, as this is my first foray into writing a CYOA game, but Ouroboros is an epic science-fantasy with all that implies. It will not be a short story, that’s for sure.
Where and when will the full game be released?
This is very far off still, but I plan to submit the game to hosted games when it is finished. This might change. I have a year of development for Ouroboros part 1 as a goal, but I am very lenient on that.
Are N/S/F/W questions ok to ask?
They are absolutely welcome, however until I have launched discord/patreon/ko-fi, there won’t be any explicit content on tumblr. I answer the asks that I can answer implicitly.
Will there be a love-triangle route?
No! We talk about our emotions here! The emotions explored in a love-triangle might be present.
Will there be poly-routes?
I’m thinking about it, but it is not a priority for now.
Will there be asexual/ace routes?
That is the plan! Though they will be written “last”, so to speak, as I want to write out the heavy romance first to understand how the characters would feel about it, to figure out where asexuality sits in their relationships. This is not to say that me or the characters will be reluctant to ace MC’s, quite the opposite. I’m just inexperienced in writing this and it will take lots of research and feedback to get right. I will also have to choose which part of the ace spectrum I want represented in Ouro, which is not an easy task as it is such a broad subject!
Will there be platonic routes?
Though friendships with the RO’s are entirely possible, Ouroboros is a romance at it’s core.
Your MC has the option to reject any relationships but you might find the content lacking if you do.
You will always be able to opt out of any N/S/F/W scenes, too.
Will there be RO POV’s?
Yes.
Can my MC romance L even if they were just friends?
Yes, that’s in my planning!
Can I use your art of the characters as my profile picture/avatar?
You can, and I’m honored! :> If you want to use any of the fanart, please talk to that artist first.
Can I suggest choices or scenarios for in-game Ouroboros?
Absolutely! Some might not make it into the game for one reason or another, but I cherish the suggestions you come up with; they spur my creativity. Suggestions are more than welcome.
Where do I submit bug-reports?
Either here through tumblr, or on the forum. Thank you for taking the time to locate them!
How often do you answer asks?
Whenever I can. I can go through periods where I only reblog stuff and don’t have any energy to answer anything, but they usually don’t last very long. If you see me goofing on tumblr when your ask still waits for an answer, I can promise you that I’m not ignoring it; I just need some down-time to recharge my social battery.
Can you tag the stuff you reblog that isn’t related to Ouroboros?
No. This is my personal blog, too, and was never meant to be an official site for Ouroboros. If it bothers you I would ask you to unfollow and instead keep an eye out on the forum post -- I will post all major updates there too!
You can also follow the tags found in the tag directory.
Want to see another question included here? Send it in!
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Show Recommendations Non-Thai BL:
A list of shows I’ve watched or am currently watching (Aka not including things I haven’t started yet) for @zouisalmightie
China-
The Untamed (50 Episodes, Netflix, Viki, WeTv):The series follows the adventures of two soulmate cultivators who travel to solve a series of mysteries that link to a tragic event in the past. Plot heavy story, Lots of characters, due to Chinese censorship lots of homoerotic symbolism and subtext. The leads of the show sing the OST and it's beautiful, Wang Yibo and Xiao Zhan are both members of Idol groups.
Korea-
Where Your Eyes Linger (9 Episodes, Youtube, VikiPass): The series follows a chaebol and his friend/unofficial bodyguard. This is one of Korea's first forays into BL series. It's short, but has decent pacing and plot.
Mr. Heart (9 Episode, Youtube, VikiPass): The series follows two boys, one that is training/running a marathon, and the other who is his pacemaker (helps him stay in the same pace). It's short, sweet and to the point. I'm really fond of one of the boys because he was on Produce X 101.
Philippines-
Gameboys (13 Episodes, Youtube): First Bl Drama to come from the Philippines. Follows a live-stream gamer and his fan—who found each other online during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic and the Luzon Island community quarantine. This one is a bit cheesy at first but does get better, it is however a little bit sad (TW. a death due the pandemic, not the leads.) A season 2 is in the works.
Hello Stranger (8 Episodes, Youtube): Amidst the lockdowns due to the COVID-19 pandemic, two college boys cross paths for a school project. Jock/Nerd Trope/Hate to Love. I actually enjoyed this one more than Gameboys, but I'm in the minority I think. The leads have amazing chemistry (or kilig in Tagalog). A movie is in the works.
In Between (14 Episodes, Youtube): The most important part in a relationship is not the hello or the goodbye but the In Between. This is about the boys' love (BL) story of Taurus and Otep. Friends to Lovers Trope. While the show is mean’t to be about Taurus/Otep I actually fell in love with the sidestory of Ronin and Makisig more. And I was disappointed that in the end we didn’t get really much of anything for them (unless there’s a planned season 2 that I somehow missed knowing about.)
My Day (11/14 Episodes, (Airing Currently), Youtube): A romantic comedy series about a young determined culinary intern named Sky making his way into a multi-billion-dollar food company and his boss Ace. Some of this show didn't really hit the mark ie. the writing was very lacking amongst other issues for me but I'm sticking it out because the leads have amazing chemistry and I'm glad I did because it has one of the best intimate scenes that has come from a show this year. (I'm still very much not over it)
Quaranthings (7/8 Episodes, (Airing Currently), Youtube): follows the friendship of two boys, and the love that will blossom between them while on community quarantine. Roommates to Lovers Trope. I'm really enjoying this drama even though it makes me want to bang my head on the wall, Judah's character irritates me (also in the minority here).
GAYA SA PELIKULA aka Like in the Movies (5/8 Episodes, (Airing Currently), Youtube): tells us about Karl, a 19-year-old recluse architecture student in the middle of an identity crisis and his new roommate. This just started so I don't have much thoughts about this one so far, but it's been decent.
I have other BL’s I would include but I wasn’t sure if you’ve already seen them (Skam, Yuri on Ice, american BL’s Etc.) I also plan on doing a post about Thai BL’s but there’s to many to include on this post.
#the untamed#where your eyes linger#Mr. Heart#Gameboys#Hello Stranger#In Between#My Day#Quaranthings#gaya sa pelikula
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Episodyssey: What If... Captain Carter Were The First Avenger?
[DISCLAIMER: Links provided may be unsuitable viewing for public places, if you catch my drift. Click at your own risk.]
Wow, bet you never thought you’d see this series again!
I don’t watch a lot of TV (I mostly watch movies) so this series fell by the wayside because I couldn’t really think of any episodes to talk about. I didn’t want to recount some Courage the Cowardly Dog episode I watched twenty years ago using nothing but my memories and wiki pages, because that would be boring, and I worried about my running gag of using cropped Rule 34 would cause problems, so I kind of just sat on the series. I also didn’t think I was particularly funny with the captions, so there’s that. The whole series was only just a mess.
But during my long hiatus from reviews, I came up with a lot of ideas, so this series is resurrecting! My big idea is, as you can see from the title, reviewing the episodes of the MCU’s animated anthology series, What If...? But I have even more ideas, which will come whenever the fuck I stop being lazy and write them! Episodes of Epic Rap Battles of History I didn’t cover, cases from the Ace Attorney games (which will cross over with Psycho Analysis),I finally figured out interesting things I can use Episodyssey for!
Oh, and I’m still keeping in the cropped Rule 34 joke, though I’m going to make sure to link the artist this time. So this is your warning kids, don’t click that link or you might see boobs. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Anyway, let’s get into talking about Marvel’s first foray into the multiverse! What If…? is based on the comic series of the same name, where fans would get to see alternate takes on moments in comic books, all while the omniscient narrator Uatu the Watcher sat back and, well, watched. These kind of stories could be almost anything, from showing what would happen if key moments in famous storylines played out slightly differently to gags like “What if the Fantastic Four were bananas?” It’s an interesting premise for sure, and has unlimited possibilities for storytelling, so it’s easy to see why as soon as they got the rights to Uatu back from Fox and had Loki and Girl Loki kill Kang #1 and then fuck the multiverse up they’d decide to dive in and show us what sort of crazy shenanigans would happen for want of a nail.
The first episode, What If… Captain Carter Were The First Avenger? is a far cry from crazy shenanigans, though. I’m going to be giving my own take on each episode’s title, and this one I would call What If The First Avenger… But Girl? Now don’t get me wrong here. I love Captain America: The First Avenger, and I feel like a lot of people sleep on that movie. I also love Peggy Carter, and in this episode she is just ungodly hot, with her muscles and her wholesale slaughter of Nazis. If I was Steve I’d go back in time for this woman too, goddamn.
It also helps that this whole concept came from one of my favorite games to play when I’m bored on the bus, Marvel Puzzle Quest. It’s your standard matching puzzle game with light RPG elements and all the character have powers you can use to help you out, and for the 75th anniversary of Captain America they introduced a version of Cap who was Peggy. This version was entirely their creation, and later made it into the comics, and then from there into this show.
So, on the basic conceptual, I should like this episode. But I think that’s the issue here, this episode isn’t really anything new or exciting. Yes, seeing Peggy as a buff woman who could break me over my knee is cool. Seeing skinny little bitchboy Steve become the fucking Iron Giant because they couldn’t get the rights to the Rocketeer is cool. But I don’t really think just being cool is enough to sustain a story in a series whose main conceit is showing us strange alternate takes on things we’ve seen before. Eveything here is just too samey to the movie it’s based on, with Peggy doing basically everything Steve did despite the differences that should crop up. Sure, there’s some cartoonish sexism tossed in but the episode’s length doesn’t let it get focused on too long, which is also a problem for Red Skull, who is barely in the episode and is then unceremoniously killed by a kraken he summons. Peggy even ultimately ends up in the same place Steve did in the main timeline. This episode most feels like it’s trying to ease us in to the concept, but I think it may have pulled its punches a bit too much.
As a showcase for the animation, it works very well, because the cel shaded 3D animation is mostly pretty cool. It’s also neat that they got a lot of the original actors back for their roles, with Hayley Atwell voicing Peggy, and actors like Stanley Tucci, Toby Jones, and Dominic Cooper reprising their roles as well. Chris Evans didn’t come back, but his replacement voice is former Spider-Man Josh Keaton, who does an excellent job, so can’t complain there. What I can complain about is Sebastian Stan as Bucky, who gives one of the worst performances I have ever heard in my life and is now the poster child of everything that can go wrong when you hire celebrities who can’t voice act.
Ultimately, while this isn’t the absolute worst foot forward for a series, it’s not really the best foot either. It does set up a lot of the ideas and a lot of the things you can expect to see, but it wraps them up in the MCU’s leftovers. It’s a decent episode on its own, but as an alternate take on The First Avenger, it doesn’t do enough to differentiate itself from that movie to really stand tall. Still, if you just can’t get enough Peggy Carter and want to see her beat the shit out of people with a buff Captain America bod, by god does this episode deliver.
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Well, life’s been stressful, et cetera and so on. Welcome to 2021, which will hopefully be better than 2020, but boy-oh-boy is the bar low.
I was minding my own business today when some kind person dropped a comment on one of my ‘fics (If It Takes a Lifetime). I replied to them and then read through my other replies, relived the story a bit...you know, Something Fanfic Authors Do. I was reminded of something I wanted to post here for a while, but struggled to put into concise wording: my relationship to the series.
My first foray into The Rose of Versailles was in 2008, all thanks to a certain @kippielovesyou who baited me into watching the anime because she claimed the main couple had some things in common with a pairing I was super into at the time. I got hooked. I marathoned the anime and went to work after episode 39 without having gotten any sleep at all. Shift start was at 6:30am. The assembly line started moving. One of my coworkers nudged me. “Hey,” they said. “Did something bad happen? You look miserable.”
I wasn’t miserable so much as emotionally drained. “Just tired,” I said, and focused on my work for the next 8.5 hours. I wasn’t about to tell them that my favorite characters in a television show just died.
I went home and watched the 40th episode. I felt weird afterward. Still drained. Almost...empty.
Not angry. Not betrayed. Just...this really strange sort of blankness that I had rarely felt upon reaching the ending of anything. I recalled a similar feeling at the end of the 1989 film Glory, but no other piece of media could come close to touching it. I would almost call it peace, though the unsettling kind. I’m not supposed to feel peaceful about a tragic ending, right?
But I was hooked.
I downloaded the entire series on a torrent, something I hadn’t done before OR SINCE. I burned it to discs and mailed them to Wisconsin so that my oldest internet friend (now husband) could watch it. He cried at the end. I forced my sister to sit down with me to watch the whole thing. She cried, too. I wrote fanfiction. I drew fanart (it was bad, don’t @ me). I screamed about it to countless friends on Livejournal. I recommended the series to everyone I knew and a lot of those people joined me in writing fanfiction.
What a time to be in fandom!! We flooded the fandom with regular English fanfic for the first time ever. The fandom was hopping. I met two amazing women (Kasia and Loulou) who spoiled me rotten for fanfiction reviews for the rest of my life. I bought the French manga and read the entire thing. I fell in love with one specific page (you get one guess as to which that is lol). I distinctly remember crying twice while reading the manga in a language I could only stumble through: first when Andre tried to count the stairs in the house, miscounted, and tripped, and secondly when Oscar threw herself onto her mother’s lap crying that she was a human being with feelings.
I still get emotional thinking about these scenes, particularly the latter one. The Rose of Versailles got me through so much. I honestly don’t know where I would be, or who I would be, without it. There is no way Kippie could have known that I would need RoV. For her, it was as simple as, “I enjoyed it, and I think you would, too. Because shipping.” And yeah, I’m a shipper who did enjoy it for that, but it became SO MUCH MORE THAN THAT TO ME.
I don’t want to spit the whole long tale out here, but shortly after I obsessed over RoV, I had my own identity crisis. It was a tough time for me, but it also cemented my future as an essayist who focuses primarily on the literary device known as Identity. When I went to college in 2012 that was my focus in literature, and nearly every essay I wrote I chose to explore it in some fashion. Identity. What makes a character, what shapes them, what changes or moves or motivates them. RoV motivated that love for Identity and my essays motivated the English Department chair to give me a selective scholarship (that they chose, it was never applied for). The reasoning they cited to me was that I had shown a rare passion for literature and the characters within. For the first time in my life I felt validated in my obsession with Identity.
I was in my early 20s when I first saw The Rose of Versailles, and something about the character of Oscar spoke to me, but I couldn’t quite name it. I felt that I understood her, and not just for being a woman working in a man’s field. There was something else. But what? I couldn’t figure it out.
A few years later I started seeing an uptick in romantic and sexual identities online. Demisexual. Asexual. Aromantic. Greyace. Something clicked—for me, personally, as well as my understanding of the characters. And years later, Tumblr flooded with information about ADHD presenting in women, and autism in ladies. And my brain went, OH!!!! OH!!! OH I SEE!!
I know a lot of people love Oscar for their own reason, and I think that’s probably one of my favorite things about the series: that the main character is almost universally loved by everyone, and that she receives this love no matter how the individual fans choose to view her.
Something specifically that bothered me many years ago was a certain persistent disdain for Oscar not returning André’s feelings earlier. She was blind, she was stupid, she was mean, and the worst of all: she was Bad for these reasons.
My God, when I tell you now that the scene of Oscar falling onto her mother’s lap in tears over being treated like a doll made me cry, I know why. I spent years of my life wondering why I was born the way I was. I agonized over it. I didn’t want to be “normal.” I was happy being me. But nobody else was. My sister once accused me of not having feelings. I think of that moment every time I see Oscar struggling in RoV. She’s a private person who struggles privately, but that doesn’t mean that she doesn’t feel things. And there Oscar was in the manga, having lived her life the best way she knew how, only to have her father pull the rug out from under her without deigning to even explain himself to her. Suddenly, she was not allowed to have an identity of her own. Suddenly, she was not good enough as she was.
Do you know what marriage would do to someone like Oscar, particularly at that point in her life? It would kill her. How terrifying a fate to face, no control over her own life, or feelings, or even her own body.
There’s an important scene in the manga and anime where André considers that Oscar appears “as cold as ice” to others, but personally recognizes the fire of her passionate heart and finds that endearing about her... I always felt that he liked that about her because it was a side of her only he understood, only he recognized for what it was. Like she trusted that part of her in his presence and knowing this helped that love grow. I still think that’s true.
But beyond that, I think André is on the ace spectrum himself, and understands better than anyone how Oscar’s feelings work. (There’s so much more to it than that, but I’ll leave it there for now...)
The part of the fandom that felt Oscar was selfish or uncaring for not loving André back sooner...miss the point, I think, of her character, and of the romance of the series. It’s not that Oscar is unfeeling. It’s not that she can’t love André. It’s not even that she’s choosing not to love him. In my opinion, it’s that she’s ace and the way she shows her love and care is not only different than a person might expect it to be, but also difficult to express—though whether this is due to her upbringing or her romantic identity (or both!) is up to interpretation.
More importantly, she does not owe him herself.
(And, I think beyond all this, usually people who feel this way really adore André, and while that’s great, I think they’re ignoring a key component of his character, which is: he loves Oscar and never even once so much as suggests that she owes him anything.)
Anyway, that was a long post to say: I view Oscar as ace and ADHD and I wish I could go back to 2008 me and tell myself about both of these things, because it would have saved me a lot of worry and heartache all those years ago. But it’s okay, anyway, because I still felt that connection to Oscar, even without the specific words, and I knew André loved Oscar anyway, even though he knew she was different.
If you’re reading this now, in 2021 or later, I hope you’ve been able to find a similar connection to one or several of the RoV characters. It’s not often we get to see slices of ourselves in the media, written in a sympathetic and loving way. Having that made all the difference to me when I needed it the most. ♥ And I hope it’s had a positive impact on your life, too.
#The Rose of Versailles#rov#essays from versailles#Oscar Francois de Jarjayes#tl;dr: oscar is such a good character
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Top 5 Fics of 2020
As 2020 closes and as I’m looking back on what I’ve done this year, there were five stories that stood out to me because of how I felt, what I’ve experienced, and because of what came over me as I was working on the pieces. I picked stories that many of you enjoyed, stories that I think you could discover, and stories that challenge you to think a little differently on what you already know. I felt that was a good balance for what I had in store~
Savor The Moment | 12.4k | Teen
I can say without a doubt that is the best fanfic I’ve written this year: not only is it the longest by far, not only did I draft and revise and edit and rewrite this behemoth during the entire month of August and pretty much babied this thing into the first week of my Fall Semester, not only was I focusing and fleshing out the relationships one of my favorite BSD characters, but I remember how much I struggled with this work and how much I grew after finishing it. If y’all have to know one thing about me, it’s that dialogue and writing children characters are very difficult for me. So to tackle a project that encompasses both and much more -- that’s terrific!
I love how I wrote for Oda in this and how I explored his relationship with the children, with the curry shop owner, and with Dazai. I love how I approached his backstory and bled in some of the elements I enjoyed from the Dark Era light novel into this work. I love the atmosphere, the vibes, the metaphors and all the food descriptions -- there are gorgeous quotes throughout the work and to this day, I still can’t believe that they all came from my head. This was such a good story for me: both in that it helped me grow as a writer and challenged me in my weaker areas and that it was fun to try something new and to expand on the little details I adored from the source material.
If there’s any work of mine that I think best summarizes who I am as a writer, it would have to be this one.
We Only See Each Other at Weddings & Funerals | 5.7k | Teen
There was a time in my life when angst was my bread and butter. However, as I grew older and more cynical towards life in general, I saw myself leaning towards softer and happier ideas. Mostly because they were an escape and a distraction from what was happening to me at the time, and partially because angst isn’t all that great for my heart. But during the beginning of November, something possessed me. I didn’t set out to write a character death or a heavy story; but instead, it just came out of me. And with BEAST as my backdrop and with funerals in my head, it took me about a week to finish this story from draft to end.
In terms of technicalities and skills, this work best represents much of my experience as a writer. You can see it through my syntax and flow, through the concepts and metaphors I was weaving through the plot, through how I handled the head hopping and transitions between Oda and Dazai’s POVs (making sure that they were as smooth as silk for y’all’s reading experience), through how I handled the emotional stakes and the soulmate-ish vibes going on, and through how I described the grief and mourning for what could’ve been and for what came to be.
I’m not that surprised that the response for this fic has been on the lower side compared to my other works, especially since it revolves around character death and heavy themes. But if you really enjoy BEAST and would like an in-depth scene expansion between Oda and Dazai when they met for the last at Bar Lupin, I would definitely recommend this to you.
Tender is the Light | 1.5k | General
Christmas is a polarizing holiday, depending on who you ask, because we’re celebrating the humble birth of a man and are partnering it with consumerism. So already, this day is pretty sus and I couldn’t imagine a better way to spend it this year than to write and gift myself a very cuddly, drarry fanfic. As I mentioned in the author’s notes, I don’t normally write for myself and I especially don’t gift myself a fanfic for holiday purposes. But considering how this year went and how stressed I was and the epiphany I had during this month, the old constraints I had for myself didn’t matter and I just wanted to create something that I knew I would enjoy. That probably sounds selfish and a part of me thinks it is; but honestly, it isn’t because if I wanted to work and create something, it’s got to give me joy too -- I feel.
So you could almost say I was working out some internal things while writing this and was just having fun and didn’t care that there wasn’t really a plot to this entire thing. Since it was a fic for me, I just focused on what made me feel good and happy. And as it turns out, fluffy banters of humor and cuddly introspective smacked a nerve in my heart and I felt renewed every time I came to work on this. This was such a cathartic fic for me to work, and I just had the time of my life focusing on the small things that are like nuggets of gold for me.
Hold Me A Little Closer | 2.6k | Mature
2020 was a year of many things, much of which I won’t mention and much of which we’re still living through. It was also the year I wrote my first, full-fledged smut. Or more accurately, my first genuine attempt at writing smut through my perspective as a biromantic asexual. Since 2018, I’ve been experimenting with how I wanted to portray physical intimacy and every time I scrolled through the Internet or read how others have done it, what I found was that there weren’t many resources or approaches that I felt comfortable with or with writing. Most of what you find out there is pretty much you figure it out on your own, or just looking at what others have done and copying it. Which that in itself comes with its own difficulties, depending on the approach you want to take with your own smut.
So being a discovery writer with my headlights down the path, I decided to write my first smut with an introspective approach + a tad of ace perspective because that’s who I am. I love the concept of emotional intimacy and that was the forefront for this story, accompanying the physical details. Because I knew for myself that odazai was more than just the physical aspect of it, and that both characters enjoy each other in an emotional or thoughtful setting where they can be vulnerable and be themselves and all the juicy bits about that whenever they’re together. And that might be the ace in me talking, but that’s the kind of intimacy I love between characters and the physical aspect is just one medium out of many in how they can convey that.
Personally, I would say this is the story that got me more comfortable writing for odazai. I’ve written for them beforehand in a few other fics, but this is definitely the one where I grew to know and care for them more and it comes through with the writing.
If My Eyes Were to Linger | 1.5k | General
With me talking about the top best fics that I’ve written this year, there’s no way I could conclude this without talking about the first fic I wrote for a new fandom. This story is my first foray into drarry and it comes after weeks of reading all sorts of content from them writers and I wanted to try it too. This harkens back to nine years ago when I wrote my first fanfic: I saw that others were writing stories and I wanted to do it, too. That brief childhood spark was the catalyst I needed when I considered and began jotting out this piece. You can tell through my writing that I’m figuring things out and figuring how I want to approach the individual voices of Draco and Harry.
I should also add that I was nervous as shit while writing this because I was embarking into a fandom where I knew no one in the community and I knew that no one I knew would even follow or read what I was writing. It’s been a long time since I’ve splashed into waters like that and through the help of my friends and talking with them, they helped me carry through and finish writing this piece. That meant a lot to me because for the first time in a long time, I was finally writing for me. I was finally writing a story where I didn’t care so much about how the engagement would be because I already knew there wouldn’t be much because of the circumstances I was in. So without hits or kudoses or really any expectations, I just wrote what I wanted to write and I had a damn good time with reading as I went.
And with the past few drarry fics I’ve written this month, you can feel that the adrenaline and childlike glee that came back to me is still with me. I don’t know how long this energy will last or if it’ll go away and I’ll transition into something else. But what I do know is that there are certain freedoms that come with going into the unknown and rediscovering myself again. And to know that this is for me: more than anything, that means so much.
#bungou stray dogs#bsd#oda sakunosuke#dazai osamu#odazai#draco malfoy#harry potter#drarry#fanfic writing#fanfic writer
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Fanfic Year in Review
I don’t do a lot of these types of posts, but you know what, I finished a huge project in 2020 so let’s go. Thanks so much to my fellow writers @quarantined-fics and @powerpuff-ali for the tag!
I’ll put it under a Read More for anyone who is interested in hearing about some BTM shenanigans.
1) List of fics completed this year in the order they were finished:
Beyond This Morning - My Adult AU PPGxRRB project, and my first proper foray into this fandom as an active contributor. It has a few completed one-shot sequels in the same series.
Shooketh, Not Stirred Series - The high school AU featuring Reds. These are all complete, though I may add more one-shots to it in the future!
I have other stuff on my AO3 account for PPG, including some ongoing stuff. Check it out if you like. :)
2) Number of words written: I don’t know how to figure that out for 2020 only. A lot.
3) Your most popular fic: Beyond This Morning is probably the most popular. I have some Miraculous Ladybug fics that are pretty up there too, but I’m not really active in that fandom as much anymore.
4) Your personal fav: That’s hard... I can’t decide between the original Shook one-shot and Trinity House. I loved the former because it was an homage to my favorite PPG episode, Stuck Up, Up and Away. Blossom being HBIC like she invented it is always going to be my favorite thing ever. And I’m really enjoying Trinity House because it feels different from my other work. I like the spooky aspect of the House, the mixups in the teams, getting to write the Punks, and Brick trying his best to flirt. It’s a melting pot of fun shit.
5) Your fav scene: Reds watching Frozen with Brisa in Beyond This Morning. Also the opening scene in Chapter 16 with Brick alone and grieving. Also the fight scene in Chapter 14 where Blossom is in charge of everything and winning. I reread those every now and then.
6) A fic or scene that challenged you: Trinity House in general is challenging for me. It has a combination of thriller/horror elements, comedy, and mystery that are super fun, but also very world-build-y, so it’s a constant struggle to convey information while keeping the focus on the characters’ journeys. I’m really enjoying it, but it’s been hard. The latest chapter with Brick’s team’s challenge was especially taxing, but I really like how it turned out!
7) A line of writing you’re proud of:
“Water under the bridge, that. Flooded now. Dead bodies always float to the surface no matter how lovely and dark the waters appear from the shore.” - Chapter 11 when Buttercup confronts Ace
8) A comment that touched you:
Too many to count. I think the ones that really get me are the ones where people call out things that happened in prior chapters and go, “I KNEW that meant something!” Finding foreshadowing is hugely satisfying, and I like that those people care enough about my stories to pay attention not just to the plot, but to the word choice and the allegories. I remember one person realized that the lab infiltration in the last few chapters of BTM was full of Dante’s Inferno/katabatic journey imagery. That had me yelling for joy because yeah, you’re right and you should say it loudly!
9) Something that inspired your writing:
I like superhero stories, but I often find them shallow in mainstream media. There are some exceptions, and I definitely have drawn inspiration from more mature shows like The Boys and Titans wrt the “realistic” superhero theme. But mostly, I care about women and their stories, and I wanted to write something that was centered on that. PPG has always been a beloved show since I was a little kid. I loved how the Girls are all very different, yet they are able to succeed in their own ways.
I also really wanted to read a specific type of story that I wasn’t seeing in the fandom, so I had to write it myself. I’m really glad I did.
10) Your proudest accomplishment (that one scene; finally finishing that one fic; posting your first fic; etc):
Honestly just finishing BTM and feeling super good about the quality of it feels like a big accomplishment for me. I had a pretty regular update schedule and I stuck to it, for the most part. I look back on it and I see things I could have done better or differently, but that’s the learning process. And I think the lessons learned will serve me well in the sequel...
11) Do you have any writing goals for the next year?
The BTM sequel, yes! I have not previously revealed the title I think, so here it is for those of you who bravely made it to the end of this post: The Alchemy of Us. That’s going to start posting pretty soon. I have some fun ideas for it, and I’m putting a lot of effort into it. I really want it to be good, and I think I’ve learned a lot from BTM and Trinity that will serve me well in making Alchemy the best fic I’ve written when I start posting.
Trinity House is also ongoing. I’ll be writing that concurrently with the sequel until it’s finished.
***
There are a number of good writers in this fandom! I think most of them have been tagged already, but in case you’re interested, I’m tagging @kiebs and @avesthetea
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20 first lines for the 21st year of the century...
Tagged by the FABULOUS @hyper-fixate !
Rules; post the first lines of your last 20 stories. If you don’t have 20 published stories, post them all or use your last 20 WIPs! Pick your favorite and tag some friends!
I do have 20 stories posted (I have 97 not counting my podfics) and I sorted them by date posted instead of date updated. Imma go in reverse order too!
20. “Yusuf didn’t understand why his new traveling companion caught his attention quite so often.” From Hold Fast to Me, also known as cuddle the joe fic. (The new companion, of course, being Nicky)
19. “There are, Nicky thinks, very few things he loves more in this world than Joe’s hair and beard.” From My Bounty is as Boundless As The Sea, which has too much Shakespeare and a fantastic podfic by my friend magpie
18. “One month after Booker’s exile began, he was startled out of a drunken sleep by loud knocking on his door and the blessed voice of Yusuf Al-Kaysani (Di Genova ibn ibrahim ibn muhammid etcetera etcetera) shouting “Sebastien! Open the fucking door or I’ll break it!”” From à la mémoire des pères (et frères)
17. “Sometimes, Joe wondered what he’d done in his first life to get so… lucky. Or unlucky, depending on when you asked.” From There you go pulling me right back in (warning for smut at that link)
16. “Joe exhaled deeply, raising his face to the sun as he finished his final rak’ah.” From against the assault (more smut, although no actual assault dw! It’s super fluffy malta times)
15. “Nicolo had been determined, as a child, to devote his life to god” from you love me (as i am) which is my ace joe fic and is extremely near and dear to my heart
14. “It was the first snow of the year” from one enchanted evening in which might actually be my favorite thing I’ve written in the past year. Torchwood fans should click that link.
13. “Ianto remembers being a little kid and watching his tad choke on his beer, coughing up petals” from worst you can do, the hanahaki fic that @princess-of-the-worlds forced me to write at gunpoint
12. “Joe sighed mournfully as he closed the door to his flat behind him, leaning back against the door and rubbing his temples.” From crumbs of bread which involves smut and non consensual drug use but also chubby joe being a badass undercover dude and Nicky being protective
11. “Nicky loved the sofa at the Mercer Safehouse” from and we were barely dressed, which is based off of some AMAZING art by @luminarai (although everything Cecil draws is amazing 🥺🥺🥺🥺)
10. “Owning a company worth billions of dollars was exhausting” from from the clench of a jaw which is a tiny peek into an au that @oldguardhc dared me to write (and I might revisit one day)
9. “Normally, Ianto hated being stuck at the HUB, especially on medical orders” from Haul Out The Holly (Christmas fic!!)
8. “It was on the fourth date that Joe finally said the dreaded words: “I have something that we need to talk about before this goes any further.”” From a friend to all aka stripper joe au!
7. “When Jack put the rule in the book, he was drunk” from with a Lil’ help from my friends
6. “Joe’s hair was getting long” from poetry in motion (more fluffy malta smut!)
5. “Quynh barely remembers her name sometimes” from such horrible things (exactly what it seems) aka “Alicia takes a sledgehammer to their friends’ emotions; the fic” (incidentally, written for @hyper-fixate!)
4. “Nicky had only lived in his new apartment for three days before he heard the sound of a cat meowing in his kitchen” from Kitty Mail Service aka “Alicia is very sorry about the recent sledgehammering, please forgive them; the fic”
3. “Come back to bed” from the axe forgets, the tree remembers aka amnesia fic!! My Big Bang fic with art by @sunshineandchemistry !!! Just to emphasize how many times I’ve read this damn thing, I didn’t even have to look at the first line, I just know it off the top of my head
2. “The very first time he thinks about the fact that he’s never going to play again, it’s unbidden, frenzied. Joe isn’t even aware of it.” From everywhere, at all times, which is an offshoot of the quidditch au by the invaluable mehmeh
1. “Carlos never spent a lot of time at the fire station anymore.” From fathers & sons, my latest fic and first formal foray into the 911 and 911 lone star fandoms!
So what did we learn. I like to establish settings snd character things in my first lines I guess? I like to think I have great hooks. I used to get praised for it by various teachers? Anyway, this has been fun lmao.
I tag! @princess-of-the-worlds @violetmessages @peachpitandpomegranate @shejustcalledmeafish @thirteeninafez @hesnotmy @mrsimoshen @horselover107 @yavemiel and @victorian-sexstache !
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