It makes me so sad when fanfiction writers come to me for writing advice, and they say something along the lines of "I write fanfic (and I'm trying to get into real writing too)", "I'm a fanfiction writer and I plan to write original fiction someday but now is just not the right time for me", or "I'm not a real writer but I write fanfic"

babes you don't have to justify writing fanfiction to me. you also don't need to tell me your plans to eventually write original fiction to be worthy of asking for writing advice.

Writing original fiction is not inherently better than writing fanfiction. Writing fanfiction is real writing. If you want to write original fiction too, great! If writing fanfiction is all you want to do, that is wonderful as well.

Do what makes you happy and be proud in the knowledge that writing isn't easy, and you're actually doing it!

OOC under the cut. Warning for some medical stuff

So... Um.... I'm finally back, I think. I've been feeling pretty crappy for a while now and just over the past week or so I was in the hospital for issues related to my lung. To keep things simple I gotta be more active and rehab my lung now because it decided to basically crap itself--I gotta take some stuff now too. Lung therapy and moving around until you feel it ain't fun. It hurts. I'm not sure when I'll be back to threads because this is still so new to me and I'm still trying to get a hold of things, recover and find my footing first. But I am back, however I'll just be more sporadic from here on out due to focusing on my health. I am extremely sorry for not letting anyone/everyone know about this sooner, but tbh I just thought it was part of my normal medical condition (the feeling cruddy/unwell part anyway, not the lung and breathing part), a long time coming until it... wasn't, I guess--there's just stuff that went on recently that's hard for me to put into words.

Sorry we've been out of commission for a wee bit - having migraines and not feeling well. Gonna try and gradually work back into things, bear with us!

It’s that time again... Send me “Top Songs” and Undine-Mun will give you one (1) randomly generated song 1-101 from her Top Songs of 2022 from Spotify. 

Calendar of Auldrant

Though I do not know if other games in the Tales series go by a similar date and day naming system, this will primarily be Tales of the Abyss. This is a long post!

Here is all the information the game gives regarding the calendar.

The Days:

This is a funny nod towards the origins behind the names of the days of the week. Rem is light and the “Sun” in Sunday is directly referencing the Sun. It's pretty neat that both reference a form of light. 

Similar situation with Lunaday and Monday (Luna- Moon, Mon- also Moon). 

Ifrit(also spelled Efreet) is Fire. Potentially in Korean the Tuesday equivalent translates to “fire day” according to Wiki about Tuesday. I don’t speak or read Korean so I also checked WordReference and found similar characters in some of the words like rage, wrath, ire, (further down that provided list) great fire. So it potentially could be a fun nod to that, can’t completely confirm. 

Undineday is water day. In Japanese and Korean Wednesday also translates to Water Day. Yes, in WordReference the Japanese character used in Wednesday is used for water so this seems fairly straightforward. In Korean I also found a bit more difficulty as the characters are widely used in many words, there are some water-related words in the sea of words the character appears in so I wouldn’t completely dismiss the possibility. 

Sylphday is wind. Thursday is a reference to Thor, the god of thunder. The wind would relate to stormy weather that thunder and lightning often appear with. 

Loreleiday- Lorelei. Friday- the greatest day of the week. In Auldrant Lorelei is considered pretty great! Just kidding, well partially. Friday comes from Freya, the goddess of marriage and love. Lorelei is a godly figure in the world of Abyss. Though Lorelei may be caring, it’s more related to sound and memory. Daath in general is fairly religious, following Lorelei, with the Order of Lorelei. In Christianity, Good Friday is a widely celebrated day. In Catholicism, all Fridays during Lent, you can’t eat meat (but it is supposed to be all Fridays to abstain from meat not just Lent). This being Friday's equivalent does make sense with the more religious aspect of the day (since Sunday was used for the more straightforward “light” connection).

The Gnomeday-Saturday connection is fairly nonexistent. Gnome is the element earth in Auldrant. Saturday is a reference to Saturn (God of Time), sabbath day (for romantic languages), and bath day (Old Norse). I will be honest, none of these fit. Sadly, it may be a case of “just put it in somewhere.”

The Months:

There are 13 months in Auldrant. As far as I can tell, there is no official count of how many days are in each month.

If we ignore Lorelei Decan for a moment, the rest of the months go forward and reverse except for Rem Decan and Luna Redecan (which is in place of the counterpart of a potential Rem Redecan). The order of Rem, Sylph Undine, Gnome, Ifrit, and Shadow are not in the order of fonon numbers. The number order of this month list is 6, 3, 4, 2, 5, 1, 1, 5, 2, 4, 3, 6, 7. I am assuming Luna and Rem are two sides of the same coin and are referencing the same fonon so they are both the 6th fonon. There was close to being a pattern of taking a number, halving it, adding one, and halving it again but they ran out of whole numbers to continue that.

The first half of the year has the postfix Decan and the latter half Redecan except for the Lorelei month. This could be because Lorelei signifies that a new year will arrive, so it has the postfix Decan. Lorelei is an important figure in Auldrant, especially Daath, so a month that stands out in the name of Lorelei would be fitting.

To think of a wild interpretation of the months, it could represent a person’s life or the year’s lifespan. The beginning starts with the sun, a new beginning. The person/year goes through the experiences of their life, experiencing all it has to bring (with fonons making up the world). The center point of the person/year’s life is the Shadow months. At this point, they are no longer young and will have to figure out what to do for the rest of their life (a very shadowy midlife crisis). They reminisce about their life and go back to relive the experiences of their youth until the sun sets and the moon rises. The end of the line. Then as all 7th Fonists do, they return to the Fonbelt, to Lorelei. Then the cycle of fonons can begin again. 

Or a more logical explanation of the months could represent the cycle the memory particles go through when traveling through the Fon Belt (The Planet Storm). Then to encompass all the Fonons Lorelei represents the final one of the 7th Fonon.

Anyway, all the months can comfortably fit 58 days in them but there is a remainder of 11 days to account for in the year. If we add a day for every other month starting with the first month, that would leave 4 days remaining. I do not know a logical placement for these days, so I will add them to Lorelei Decan. The month count would be Rem Decan- 59, Sylph Decan- 58, Undine Decan- 59, Gnome Decan- 58, Ifrit Decan- 59, Shadow Decan- 58, Shadow Redecan- 59, Ifrit Redecan- 58, Gnome Redecan- 59, Undine Redecan- 58, Sylph Redecan- 59, Luna Redecan- 58, Lorelei Decan- 63. (This will be helpful for some calculations later.)

The Year:

A year in Auldrant is 765 days. That is 2.1 times longer than our calendar year. If we compare that to our world, Jade would be 70, Guy 42, Natalia 36, Tear 32, and Anise 28. Dang does Jade look great at 70 haha! I do know the 765 days is a pun because that number sounds somewhat like Namco in Japanese. In this world, I assume people age at half the rate (My condolences to all the Auldrant parents with tantrum-throwing toddlers). Since the year is twice as long, Luke being locked in his Manor for seven years and the time skip in the story would be way longer than originally believed. Nothing like Auldrant continuing to be worse and worse, right?

Birthdays:

Can't have a ramble about a fictional calendar without talking about birthdays! From around the internet, the birthdays of the characters are listed as follows: Jade- Sylph-Redecan 22, Guy- Efreet-Decan 41, Natalia- Rem-decan 37, Luke- Lorelei-Decan 48, Tear- Lorelei-Decan 1, Anise- Shadow-Decan 46. Going along with my guess on how many days per month, the day each character is born in this: Jade- 607, Guy- 275, Natalia- 37, Luke- 750, Tear- 703, Anise- 339. (Basically, add up all the days of the months prior and add then the day of the month they were born). The birthdays I got from fan sites that supposedly got them from a QNA. I do not know the accuracy of these but for the purposes of the rest of this, these are the dates used.

I have noticed that there are assigned birthdays for the characters per our calendar year. Jade is Nov 22, and Luke is Dec 25th. I found these from fan sites and repeated them across the internet. Again with these, I do not know the accuracy, so I did my own take on the potential calculations.

There are a few ways to calculate the birthdays of these characters with our own: Divide the year by two (2.1 to be more accurate) and get an approximate answer, place our calendar year onto Abyss’, and count the days (for example there will be two Decembers).

The first option is easy. Divide the day they were born by 2.1 to get the day they would be born on Earth. It would land the characters birthdays like this: Jade- 289 (Oct 16), Guy- 130 (May 10), Natalia- 17 (Jan 17), Luke- 357 (Dec 23), Tear-  334 (Nov 30th), Anise- 161 (Jun 10). These are pretty close to the associated birthdays with Luke nearly being a Christmas Eve baby and Jade being born in fall.

The second option is also easy, for any character whose birthday is over 365, subtract 365 until it is a number below 365 and find the date associated (For example, if a character is born on the 366th day, they would be born on Jan 1st in our calendar). It would land the characters birthdays like this: Jade- 242 (Aug 30th), Guy- 275 (Oct 2nd), Natalia- 37 (Feb 6th), Luke- 20 (Jan 20), Tear- 338 (December 4th), and Anise- 339 (December 5th).

Despite the numbers not exactly lining up (there will be human error on my part with calculations and rounding), if people celebrate Jade's birthday on Nov 22 that's completely fine by me! It's a fictional birthday anyway! If it means more Tales of the Abyss art and content, Jade's birthday could be Feb 14 for all I care!

This was just something fun I've been thinking about when I learned about the calendar of Auldrant! And might as well try to put all my thoughts together for a big ramble. Hope you all enjoyed!

Ese amor tan puro que se da entre dos silencios que han aprendido a escucharse sin hablar es ése que busqué sin encontrarlo hasta que llegaste tú y escuchaste el murmullo de mi mar… Hoy navegas en mis aguas como la silente ondina que gusta de bailar sobre las olas de esos latidos que nacen de mi alma al suspirar.

That pure love that is given between two silences that have learned to listen to each other without speaking is the one I looked for without finding it until you came and listened to the murmur of my sea... Today you sail in my waters as the silent undine that likes to dance on the waves of those beats that are born from my soul when I sigh.

can you do a comprehensive list of your all-time favorite works of literature?

This came at a great time because i just bought an antique edition of L'Ingénue libertine mostly because it is bound in CANDY PINK! Colette gets it. Okay, comprehensive. Let's see.

- Any word that ever came out of Fitzgerald's pen. Not me going through his trash and reading his canceled checks to his bootlegger while copiously weeping, “THIS IS POETRY!” - La Dame aux Camelias - Eugene Onegin  - Short Stories of Katherine Mansfield - La Vita Nuova - Victoria - Leone Leoni, Sand in general - One of Cleopatra's Nights and Other Fantastic Romances - White Nights - Andersen's fairy tales - Speak, Memory - Manon Lescaut - Undine - The Red and the Black - On Tangled Paths. Or Effi Briest. Can't choose! - The Pursuit of Love - Franny and Zooey - The Pillow Book - As I Crossed a Bridge of Dreams. Forget Austen versus Bronte - are you a Lady Sarashina or a Sei Shonagon? - Sentimental Education and Madame B. - Spring Torrents, First Love, literally anything by Turgenev - A Farewell to Arms - my all-time number one forever favorite book - Le Grand Meaulnes - Aucassin and Nicolette - I Lost My Girlish Laughter - Last Summer in the City - Gentlemen Prefer Blondes - the Anne of Green Gables series, for sentimental reasons - The Portrait of a Lady - Great Expectations - Hardy in general, but especially Tess of the d’Urbervilles and The Return of the Native - Les Miserables - War and Peace - Slow Days, Fast Company - Sylvie (Nerval) - Complete Works of Shakespeare - The Dud Avocado - The Artificial Silk Girl - The Post Office Girl - Breakfast at Tiffany’s - A Doll’s House - Notre Coeur - Ariane, A Russian Girl - Claudine at School - my favorite opening line of any book, I think - Glimpses of the Moon orrrr The House of Mirth. V. tough call. - Hons and Rebels - Collected poems of Keats - Karolina Pavlova's A Double Life

i finally remembered to finish filling this out

idk if i'm gonna render it... i have a bunch of other things i also wanna work on, so. here you go. (template here)

chilchuck & laios - self explanatory, i'm The Chilaios Guy. laios is my muse when it comes to rp and i relate to him a lot but i really can't say i love him more than chilchuck, so. they're tied.

kabru - fuck man i love this dude. like he is easily one of my fave characters in the series alongside laios, chilchuck, and mithrun. his character is so fucking compelling and when people in the fandom dismiss him for being two-faced or whatever i'm like do you hate good stories? do you hate good characters? can you really not appreciate anyone but the main cast? begone. he's laios's foil and no amount of not understanding his character will change that. and he's a damn GOOD foil, the ways they interact and contrast each other are amazing.

shuro - SPEAKING OF THE FANDOM BEING SHITTY. like, the scene with him and laios that is coming up very soon in the anime is one that hit me HARD. i relate to laios in that whole debacle so hard that i cried describing the scene to my friend. but it doesn't make shuro a bad person. he and laios are so fundamentally different that they clashed because they didn't understand each other's needs or boundaries. and like, fuck, man. he still shows up for laios and the gang. also if you think he's a creep towards falin or whatever i think you need to get your eyes checked, he's so fucking respectful. and she clearly cares about him even if she doesn't return his feelings. shuro haters stay away from me

namari - godddd i love her. like idk that i have any extended analysis to give, she's just fucking awesome. i really loved all her interactions with senshi and the fact that she's chilchuck's drinking buddy delights me. she's really strong and obviously deeply caring... the moment when she bowled laios out of the way to help with the undine. god. she was so fucked over by her father's actions and she's been trying to build herself up ever since and she's just REALLY NEAT and i was always glad to see her in the manga. (can't wait to see her more in the anime too!!!)

mithrun - SON BOY. i'm obsessed with him. that post about him having a traumatic brain injury lives rent free in my head. i really, genuinely fucking love how well he and his disability are portrayed. it does exhaust me a little when the fandom is happy to make him "better" post-canon... or when they claim kabumisu is problematic bc kabru takes care of him, lmao. he's so fucking cool and the fact that he's a real threat and a driving part of the plot while also needing a caretaker and being notably handicapped by his trauma is just... awesome. neither side diminishes the other. he's disabled, but he's a badass. i love him so much.

dandan - he's a neat little guy and i love how many times he actually shows up in canon, even though he's usually a bg character when he does. i like to think he's important to the guild, like he's someone chilchuck trusts with a lot of things. obviously that wasn't the case when he first joined up, but i like the idea of him proving himself to be really good with managing things, and chilchuck leaves things in his hands when he's down in the dungeon. all headcanons but it's fun for me.

All of the spirits are overprotective of their users.

Bell is sending Death glares to any girl near Yuno, Undine is crossing her neck with her finger towards Gaja, Salamander will try to burn Mars any chance it gets, the same with anyone showing the slightest interest in Fuegoleon and Levi will murder you if you speak to Noelle.

Mermaid!Thrawn x f!reader part 5

Part 1, 2, 3, 4

"You're searching something in particular, miss?"

You turn to the Librarian, a nice short lady with round glasses that comically enlarge her eyes.

"Well, yes... In fact I'm searching several things : I would like a book on sign language, a book on the legends of the town and the gazette archives around the 50's. I don't know if you would have all that..." you explain. She seems to think for a second. "Wait at this table, I will give you what you need." she says as she walk away among the shelfs. You let your gaze travel on the covers of the books, leafing through some by curiosity, those are illustrated books for children about fairy tales. You realize you've never heard Thrawn sing like in the tales, maybe this is just folklore... You pick up an old illustrated edition of the Little Mermaid and read it again. How long since you last read it? Years, most probably. You sit at the table and let yourself carried by the tragic tale of the adolescent.

You're fully immerged in the story when she came back with the books. "The archives are on microfilms, if you want to see them we will need to take out the machine. Is it urgent?"

"No." you shake your head with a smile "No, I can come back next week.", "It would be preferable, indeed." You thank her and opens the legend book "Legends of our region" and pass everything until the aquatic creatures part. It speaks of a monster toad that haunts the swamps and a little undine that died for a pearl, you skim over the unnecessary text until you find the mermaids, and your thoroughly disapointed : The text is one page long with a childish drawing of a siren. You sigh. You choose a second one, to find out that they don't speak of it at all you take the last one with little hope but you're more lucky.

"The mermaid is an antique sea creature, existing through multiple form in multiple cultures, but the siren of our region is a bit more specific and have capacities her cousins lack." tells you the author. You install yourself comfortably and start reading. Your mermaid specie is especially sociable, helping the fisherman and the shipwrecker victims, they would have guided the fish to the shore with their songs, commanding them. They used to be nomadic tribes, following and hunting among the great whales but became sedentary as humans took the roles of the whales, providers of food. Magical creatures, they can metamorphosis in sea lion, daulphin or walrus, and even human for a brief amount of time. They say they also posess a potion to transform a human in a mermaid. The tales of the shipwrecks by singing mermaid would be a pure invention, the sailors simply choosen to take the potion and disapear into the sea forever and the desesperate partners staying on land shared the tell to mourn their relationships. Once every millenial, the tribe would get on land to enjoy a hunt party and taste what the land as to offer different than the sea and then go back into waters. They would be a second tribes that didn't help humans but eat them, drowning sailors and careless swimmers, they would be hideous creatures screetching in the night, obsess over blood and flesh. They live in the deepest layers of the ocean, where the light can't shine, in contrary of the good mermaid that higher in the layers. Today the mermaid disapeared, never to be seen again, like every mythologic creatures.

Your smartphone rings, you received an sms. It's your mother telling you that your father will sleep at a friend house tonight because they argued again.

You sigh.

You exit the library with your books, saddened. You wish you could come back in time, when you were young and your parents didn't hate each other... When they would laugh and play with you. Today they only scream and break dishes. When was the last meal you ate with them that didn't end in an argument?

What started all of this? Did they fall out of love? Did your mother cheated on your father before or after the first major argument? Before or after your father started drinking? Did he start because of that or because of his work?

You remember one night he came in the dead of night into your room, drunk, and wake you up to cry...

"Why are you crying, child?" a voice rises next to you. You raise your head to an old men in a cassock, on the front steps of the church.

"Huh... Nothing." You wipe your tears, blinking "Just bad memories."

"Would you want to tell me? To alleviate your heart." He proposes. You look at him, he looks stern, uptight, dead serious and cold. "No, i'm not really religious. It would not be-", "I didn't mean in the chapel or anyting of the sort, just have you talk would maybe ease your trouble by putting it into words." He corrects.

"Ho!" you're suprised "That is really nice of you, but I don't like talking of my problems to strangers, that is not really their cross to bearn, y'know." You try some humor, but it doesn't work, his face remains rigid and stoic. His eyes look like they could see your soul, making you feel a bit uneasy. "Then speak to a friend, maybe they would be of good advice.", "Yes sir." you nod, timidely.

"Can I see your book?" he asks politely, but his gaze is hard. You hand him the book in silence. "You try to communicate with your deaf and mute brothers and sisters? That is a good thing." You smile politely "Something of the sort." You observe the church as he leafs through it, you remember loving visiting it. Your familly isn't religious, you just like visiting old buildings, maybe you should try urbex, it could be fun! Him however, you've never seen him before

"You're new here, father...?", "Father Tarkin." he gives you back the book with a nod "In fact I came back, you must have been a infant when I was first here.", "Oh. It was a will of yours?" His hard gaze travels across the streets like he could see sin just by looking at it. "I felt a sensation of unfinished business here." You feel you won't have any more info than that so you politely thay goodbye "Well, welcome back father" and start to walk away

"One moment please." you stop dead in your tracks, turning to him with wondering eyes "Your necklace..." By instinct you grip it "What?", "It reminds me of something, is it a family heirloom?", "Yes" you lie, "Oh... curious." He seems to think, holding his chin and frowning. You feel yourself shivering. What if he knows?

"It looks like the tiara exposed at the museum.", you sigh relieved "Oh? Really?", he nods "Yes. Maybe it was inspired by the same art style?", "Probably"

He looks at it some more and shakes his head "Anyway, the night will soon fall. Go home.", "Yes father!" And you go off, you pedal to the beach and jump off your bike, run to the shore and push a bark into waters.

You paddle towards the setting sun, craddled by the waves. You paddle along the cliffs in search of one particular cavern... When you found it you enter it, when the sea will rise again, the entry will be completely hidden and you'll be stuck.

You get out of the bark and walk inside the large cavern , familiarizing yourself with the place. Then you take your flashlight and study the sign language book, waiting for him

An hour passes by when you feel a claw grazing your tighs, you raise your head from the text to see Thrawn looking at you intently. You can't help but smile. "Hi!" you wave at him surexcited, he imitates your gesture slower, like he wonders what does it mean.

You take out a fish container and he hops on the bank to seat next to you "I hope you like salmon!" you sing. You open it and give him some of the fish and you eat it together, sneakily you robbed your mother of some soy sauce and put some on your piece. He looks interested, "You want to try?" you smile. He takes the bottle and traces the text on the tag with his claw. "I doubt you can make sense of it." you mock gently. He opens the lid and inhale the scent. He frowns severely and you burst out laughing, "You're surely not used to it under water!", he looks at you like he understood you were mocking him. Nevertheless he tries it, lets a drop of it fall on his tongue and taste it. His face is indecipherable and he puts down the bottle without letting an ounce of expression twist it. He eats his salmon silently and with dignity, while you do your own cookery, slicing it and dropping it in the sauce. "Usually I eat it with sesame too." You mundanely explain, you start talking to him about your day, about every little things that happened to you. He lays down on his elbow and listen, letting his codal fin resting in water, you see his ear-fins-things wave at some moment, and his dorsal fin undulate. Once again you vent all you can, he remains still, unmoving as you both can see the sun finishing to set and the water slowly raising. You'll soon need to exit the cavern.

But you feel so good here... with him. You can't speak together, but you feel connected on an intimate level. Like you knew him for years.

You let your eyes wonders on him and you notice he's wearing your old plastic bracelet. "Ah!" you smile, you take out the necklace and show it to him, he nods slowly.

You lay beside him, letting your feet in the water, grazing his fin.

You remain silent, watching the stars through an opening in the stone of the cliff. You point at one star "Ursa minor." you indicate. He points another "Cha'fh." he murmures, "Antares." you say, "Strech" he responds, "Perseus", "Me'ro"...

You redo the wole sky like that, you giggling and him all serious. "I probably shout note everything you say, so I can remember it all my life. Oh wait!" You take out the sign language book and a mini-moodboard with markers out of your bag, " I think about ways to communicate better!" you exclaims. He raises back his torso with a raised eyebrow.

You're about to explain to him when your smartphone rings. He growls at the sudden sound. "It's okay, it's a smartphone, it won't do anything" He relaxes when he see the small machine but looks puzzled when you start speaking to it.

"Where are you?!" bawls your mother. You wince. "I'm out... with a friend.", "You didn't warn me about that! I was worried dead! Come home this instant!", "Mom, I'm an adult, I can do-", "Huh,huh, young lady! As long as you live under my roof you will abide by my rules!" and she hungs up.

You sigh, Thrawn looks at you, curious. "I have to go..." you grumble. You gather your stuff and enter the waters, you'll have to swim the sea rose. Thrawn slides next to you ready to follow you but you hesitate, you got your flashlight to look in the dark but in salted water you won't be able to open your eyes. You wince "Crap." Thrawn seems to notice your hesitation.

He gently takes your hand and pulls you gently. You take a deep breath, close your eyes and go under water. You feel him swim next to you with his powerful tail, pulling you towards the exterior. You let him guide you, swimming with your legs, he pulls you with an assured hand.

Finally you pierce the water with a gasp. Thrawn is next to you, holding your hand, waiting for you to take back your breath. You'll be drenched at home. Great...

"Thank you." You gasp, he nods and you go back to the shore together. You part with him almost reluctantly, but he let go without difficulties. You walk on the sand as he remains in shallow waters, looking at you walking away, you turn to him and wave him goodbye, he imitates you and you look at him swiming away.

Who knows when you'll see him again, he comes and goes as it pleases him

@blueninjablade3 @al-astakbar @thrawnspetgoose @readinglistfics

Look, most people don't go from hating their writing to loving it overnight. Learning how to accept it despite its flaws and coexisting with it even if it's not good is an important step in between.

//my shift key does not work... i hate this

Send me a number 1-100 in my askbox, and I'll give you the corresponding number on my Spotify Wrapped playlist!

@kcuf-ad look at this and tell me it isn't canon. You can't.

Levi took one good look at the mess that is Noelle Silva and went "Mine" picked her up and did not let go

(credit for the image @colucana thank you Lucanee )

Also fun idea, Levi as the Sea god made Undine the water spirit so now technically speaking Lolopechka who is Undine's kid (fight me) is also Leviathen's Granddaughter

WIP Snippet Game

I was tagged by @echo-bleu a while ago... and today I finally wrote something I'm pleased with. ;)

The Specters, fragment of Scene #16

“Which yearbooks do you want to see?” she asked in a tone that suggested the less the better.  “Oh, I don’t know.” Emma tried to act nonchalant, but she was terrible at this. “How about from the year five-hundred-thirty-five until five-hundred-forty? Forty-one maybe?”  Head Librarian Jalmari gave her a long look. “Six or, maybe, seven years?” she spelled it out in a way that could be interpreted as disbelieving, or mocking. Either way worked. “Wouldn’t two be enough? Thirty-seven and thirty-eight? Also known as the Apocalypse years?”  Emma gaped at the woman unsure how to respond. She scratched behind her ear and looked for help with Anaher, like she suddenly wasn’t sure.  She didn’t want to find Neve’s mother. In this moment it became painfully clear that Emma Lee used Neve as an excuse to get to those yearbooks, without revealing exactly what she wanted to look at. The years of the Apocalypse, of course. Or the Undine Crisis, as it was called outside of Undine.  “Actually.” Neve spoke, against her better judgment trying to salvage Emma’s ruse. “Thirty-six, seven and eight might be enough. Now that you mentioned it, that would explain a lot. My mother must have died during the Apocalypse, that makes so much sense. And my records--” she spread her hands, “this is why they were lost. But yes, I was born either during the Apocalypse or shortly before it, so, if we could look at thirty-six too, that would be wonderful. Do you think you can help me?”  Madam Jalmari stared at Neve like she got struck by a lightning for a few seconds of awkward silence. Neve could swear she saw in the woman’s eyes fear and disgust. The unpleasant sensation rose in her insides like a bile and with it the desire to run. She was this close to backing away and bolting out of this room, if the librarian kept staring like this, but Madam Jalmari shook herself out of her daze.  “I will be right back,” she announced and left.  The others didn’t seem to notice Jalmari’s look. Anaher moved his hands, but Neve only understood one word, “want”. Emma replied in sign as well, “tell, see”. Neve pushed her discomfort out of her thoughts and elbowed Nersan. She was trying to learn the hand speak, but it was slow-going. When Anaher signed to her, he would slow down, made his gestures easier to distinguish from one-another. With Emma or Nersan it was a flow. A dance almost. She needed Nersan to interpret for her.  “Noel asked what Emma is hoping to find, and she said she’d tell him when she finds it,” he explained in a low voice. “They’re bickering, you know.” Both Anaher and Emma gave Nersan disapproving stares, exactly the same, like they had one mind.

Thank you for reading. :)

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love 💙

Thank you and @givereadersahug for the tag, and sorry it took me 2 months to answer XD

Five fics that I've written... you torture me by making me choose!

tagging @sanctuary-angel, @renee561, @bintemuhammad, @trueliarose, @ttime42 (please don't be offended if I did / didn't tag you and you don't like it XD)

So, I decided to go for some of my less popular ones. But they're all my babies!

(list under the cut)

Snarry:

Wish not for a soul that is full of sin (4798 words incl. meta) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Harry Potter/Severus Snape Characters: Severus Snape, Harry Potter Additional Tags: Merman Severus Snape, Severus Snape Lives, Pining, Inspired by Music, Classical Music, Rusalka (Dvorak), Undine (de la Motte Fouque + Reinecke), tw: near-drowning, Art, Digital Art, Poetry, Playlist, Fairy Tale Elements, Fairy Tale Retellings, merfolk lore, Worldbuilding, Romanticism, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE Series: Part 1 of Ondine's Curse (will happen, one day.) Prologue to the merman!Snape, amnesia AU no one asked for, with gorgeous Merman!Snape art by @hereiamwithmyninjaclan.

Severitus:

Christmas in Limbo (4623 words, WIP: 3/7) Rating: Mature Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: Harry Potter & Severus Snape, implied past Lily Evans Potter/Severus Snape Characters: Harry Potter, Severus Snape, Lily Evans Potter Additional Tags: Canonical Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Torture, Temporary Character Death, quite dark at times, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Not Canon Compliant - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Severitus | Severus Snape is Harry Potter's Parent, Afterlife - sort of, Time Travel, Angst, Eventual Happy Ending, Lily meddles from beyond, Alternate Universe - A Christmas Carol Fusion, Implied Dissociation, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, We Need To Mess It Up To Fix It, Are We Sure This Ish Is For Children, Physics is Hard Series: Part 1 of Christmas in Limbo 'Verse

My (quite dark) attempt at a Severitus Christmas Carol Fusion. I hope to finish it this Christmas - I even have the ending drafted but I'm stuck for Ch. 4.

[Fic and Podfic] Ouroboros in Tribute (790 words) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Harry Potter & Severus Snape Characters: Severus Snape, Harry Potter, Lily Evans Potter (mentioned) Additional Tags: Poetry, Sonnets, Crown (Poetry form), Podfic, Podfic Length: 0-10 Minutes, Severitus | Severus Snape is Harry Potter's Parent, Sad Severitus, Past Lily Evans Potter/Severus Snape, Hidden parentage, Severus Snape is Harry Potter's biological father, Grief/Mourning, Sad, Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Emotional Hurt No Comfort, POV Severus Snape, Second Wizarding War with Voldemort (Harry Potter), Harry Potter MIA, Implied/Referenced Character Death, (telling you more would give away too much of the sequels), Series: Part 1 of Forget Me Not

This is not, strictly speaking, a fic (poem & podfic, actually), but I am really proud of what I cooked up with my words.

Be warned: it hurts.

And, from the same universe: it is time (for it to be time) (3327 words, WIP: 1/5) Rating: Mature Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Harry Potter & Severus Snape, Past Lily Evans Potter/Severus Snape - Relationship Characters: Harry Potter, Severus Snape, Lily Evans Potter Additional Tags: alternative universe, Post-War, Severitus, Sad Severitus, Angst, Emotional Hurt No Comfort, Hidden parentage, POV Severus Snape, Severus Snape Lives, Harry Potter missing in action, Presumed Dead, implied MCD, Second Wizarding War with Voldemort (Harry Potter), Grief/Mourning, Five Stages of Grief, Memories, Ritual Magic, Diary/Journal, Non-Linear Narrative Series: Part 2 of Forget Me Not

Really looking forward to finishing this - I'm a bit of a sadist and like turturing my readers and my characters with all the emotional pain.

Other HP Gen: (considering I wrote exactly one work for Doctor Who, and that's it in terms of writing fandoms for me - I am quite a bit more diverse in my audio work.)

Whoso list to hunt (2021 words) Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Aberforth Dumbledore & Severus Snape Characters: Aberforth Dumbledore, Severus Snape Additional Tags: Hog's Head Inn (Harry Potter), Unspeakables (Harry Potter), Unspeakable Aberforth Dumbledore, Job Interview, Pre-Canon, Unspeakable Recruit Severus Snape, Good Severus Snape Series: Part 4 of Unspeakable Mysteries Universe (will happen, as well, wone day)

Well, technically, this is also Snarry-adjacent, considering I wrote this as pre-prequel to the Unspeakable Mysteries Universe. This idea is my trying to say that Aberforth has massive Underesteimated Character Potential (tm).