#How tf did I do this without guidelines

[chazchaschad]

sketch of lieutenant worf

[genericpuff]

Hey so I have a question-

Is Rachel even contributing to LO's art anymore? Like, at all?

CAUTION: MILD FASTPASS SPOILERS AHEAD !!!

I've talked at length about the 'tells' of each assistant and artist, and while it doesn't guarantee that I can tell exactly who drew each panel, there's one thing there's been a lot less of in the most recent episodes that have caught my attention - things that I know Rachel would typically contribute.

And most of it comes down to her lineart.

The shading was always her, no doubt about that, you could tell with how consistently awful it is, how she would take actual decent flats from her assistants and proceed to butcher them with muddied shading.

AmyKim89's flats vs. after Rachel's gotten her hands on them:

(seriously Rachel why tf did you darken Persephone's legs here, it looked so much better before ??)

But there was also her lineart which, at first, I didn't realize who was drawing it. It didn't show up super often in LO but it was always very noticeable when it did so I knew it had to be someone on the team doing it:

The thickness of the lines and the extra little strokes added in along the knuckles and bends, that wasn't something that was really common in LO at this point... at least it hasn't been since S1:

And when comparing it to the lineart she used to do in The Doctor Pepper/Foxglove Show:

(look at the mouth in The Doctor Foxglove Show vs. Hera in the pilot version of LO, they're literally the same)

So yeah, it was certainly the revelation to discover that that one instance of "weirdly detailed lineart" wasn't one of her assistants having a little extra fun, it was Rachel herself. It was already so uncommon for her to contribute all the way back in S2 that her contributions seemed to be more of the exception rather than the norm.

And since seeing the art that's been in the newest FP episodes following the return of the series... is Rachel even drawing at all anymore? Because lately the lineart has felt very thin, in a way that I can't tell if it's her assistants just doing all the lineart now or if she's trying to emulate S1 LO more by using less lineart. But S1 didn't have thin lineart, it had very thick lineart, BUT only being used where necessary to emphasis shadows and depth.

Now the lineart feels very... dinky? Especially when you look at the eyelashes.

That said, there are moments from S1 that had similarly 'dinky' lineart, so take this with grains of salt. It still didn't feel as dinky though as it does today where the lines are practically non-existent in how thin they are.

There are also times when you can tell they're really trying to emulate that S1 look, the pieces are there but they aren't being put together very well:

So yeah at this point I wouldn't even be shocked if all Rachel's doing at this point is scripting and roughs. And considering there are definitely times where she'll just draw without knowing what to write, the 'scripting' is also practically non-existent. It's just her leaving her roughs off to the last second for her assistants to whip out with very little time to pay attention to what's being submitted.

Once again it's Rachel fundamentally missing the point of the criticism that's being made of her work. She's trying to forcefully emulate something that she didn't even have a process behind. I can attest as someone who's been trying to do studies of her past work to recreate it as faithfully as possible through Rekindled, it's very difficult to achieve the 'old LO' look because 'old LO' was literally just Rachel slapping down brush strokes until they looked good, there was no specific process or guidelines that she followed, she just made things look textured and colorful. Everything else was basically up to her figuring out what actually looked good, with panels often having their own vibes separate from others in isolation of one another.

Now she's trying to replicate that look while missing the point entirely that it's not something she can really replicate anymore. Though we do get the odd panel that's way closer to the point, those panels have one thing that she's clearly not putting into the comic as a whole anymore - love and effort.

(fr this panel is so gorgeous but I feel like at this point it was more sheer luck because of how rare it is to see panels like these nowadays, this feels like an accident LOL)

Case in point, this honorable mention towards Persephone's outfit which is literally just a color-swapped version of the sketch that Rachel posted to Blue Sky that got meme'd to death in the ULO sub:

Did you catch that though? The weird dark patch over her boob and the gap in the lineart of her cleavage?

That's because they copy pasted the first panel and then erased out the hands, but missed the part of the hand shading that was overlapping the breast and the gap in the lineart.

I shit you not, Rachel coming up with memes on Blue Sky that she's scraped out of shows she watched 20 years ago is basically the full extent of her writing at this point.

Haha take a thing and make it bigger! So funnyyyy!

(seriously Rachel's 'humor' feels like it's stuck in 2010)

Yep, you're really earning that #1 NYT Bestseller label that you haven't even gotten since Volume 3, Rachel. Put your hand down, there are no high fives for you here.

[the-canine-king]

not to be hater on main (and also it's going here since i think i'm gonna end up rambling too long on twt lol) but i really hate a lot of artist youtube content. honestly if you're looking for basic fundamentals, look for the professional artists that has worked in the industry for years and has a book published (loomis and hampton) rather than a random 18yr old student.

i mean, at least some videos are titled "how **I** draw _____" rather than "how to draw _____" and it's a bigger bonus if they mention which artist/ resource they studied rather than throw the method's name off hand.

i'm gonna be a super hater and art snobby here but i watched a video where it was really.... wrong? and also their fundamentals are pretty bad. i have a lot i wanna say here. (idk what got over me but i get really snarky here lol, there's extra notes at the end)

their use of the loomis method. i mean, idk if this is a modification of the loomis method that i've never seen but i've seen TWO artist mention the horizontal line in the classic set up is the EYE line. if we're following the book, it's the BROW line. and then they say "oh drop the horizontal line down halfway *and a little bit under*" tf you mean "a little bit"? just drop it half way for the brow?? GAH, looking at their basic structure from drawing from references really annoy me. like. YOU'RE NOT... DOING IT RIGHT...

them and 90% of videos bashing on loomis method for "not allowing different characterization. am i insane?? did we read the same book?? he LITERALLY DRAWS examples of varied head shapes?? literally mentions how you imagine the skull like clay and you disform it into a specific shape?? i can't find the exact line but i'm pretty sure he mentions how everyone had a similar basic head structure but it's up to the artist to figure out how it varies for the specific person. while yes it doesn't show better examples of different features in terms of race, but that doesn't mean he doesn't guide you on trying to understand the basic echos of the form across everyone that lets you use it to artistically form it for the specific model/ character. like it's so weird to see everyone parroting the same "issue" w/ the loomis method when loomis' book literally acknowledges it and says to know follow the measurements for every head

the lack of understanding/ shaping of form and the planes of the head. i mean idk if it's bc they didn't know the asaro head but them tracing a portrait to fit such arbitrary lines implying the planes was so AUGH. like it's so clear they don't have a good understanding of the lips and jaw/ planes of the cheek. how do you trace the photo (AND STUDIED HAMPTON'S BOOK) but not understand the lips and chin like cmon. i get it if it was more of a gestural approach but you're literally tracing so i mean lol.

their flat ass basic forms. lol. idk, like at least be capable of drawing a circle. and then drawing their guidelines following the form of a sphere. idk i started laughing when "this is how you draw the head in different angles" and it's incredibly flat. no form. no "space". you're just arbitrarily doing the motions without considering the shape you want to draw. if you want to draw a convincing head you have to draw a convincing shape

idk like. their art is genuinely not bad at all, way better than what i can make. and i understand that everyone has a different approach and etc etc like if this is how THEY do it then it's whatever. but at the same time it's really hard to look past as this is the most popular video over 1mil views and many taking this to heart in the comments. it's also probably a stylistic choice but style should not excuse poor foundations lol. i think it's heavy handed on the fact that the artist intuitively knows what looks better and can adjust it themselves but it's terrible advice for a beginner since the beginner wouldn't know what to adjust (they wouldn't have to learn to adjust if they learned how to draw the foundation better but whatever) lol

the way that **I** want my art to look and art that appeals to me is to have a big emphasis on 3d space and form. if the construction phase (foundation) is too flat your whole drawing would look flat. i'm still studying artist that manage to make a drawing feel like it's 3d on paper but i'm slowly getting the forms down.

i think i'm also just really irritated at this new wave of artists (at least on toyhouse) so adamant on NOT learning the fundamentals. like one one hand i get it if you don't care about improving, bc you're still improving if you're drawing for fun. however if you want to draw better quickly and more effectively then yes you have to learn the basic foundation. it's even more irritating when their excuse is "i don't want to learn realism" LIKE?? where do you think art comes from, JUST your imagination? it comes from life and your experiences. your memories, you clown. you live life and then draw out what you SEE and experience in the world. how do you draw a horse if you've never properly studied one. how do you draw a convincing person if you never understand how we actually look. you're not doing "realism" you're building your understanding of the world to make a world in your art. you're building your understanding of proportions and measuring. you're building your understanding of light and shadow. you're building so many foundational stuff that's found in every single art field and art style but you're too close minded you brush it off as "just realism"

i would end it off with "how **I** draw the head" but that's pretty hypocritical lol. if you read all this and wanna know what i looked at that's actually very helpful, literally just read hampton's "Figure Drawing and Design" and loomis' "Drawing the Head and Figure" that's literally all you need. (hampton also has a youtube channel where he goes over the head in a little series of videos, worth checking out if you don't know where to get the book or you just want the head chapters explicitly drawn in real time)

loomis helps a lot w/ figuring out the basics of basic, but hampton helps a lot more w/ more clear examples and an extra guideline to help place the eyes

[dylawa]

Elf Tav-haver here: before I start, I just want to point out that half elf lifespan is only about half a century more than human lifespans, so there isn't too much time difference that complicates things there. It probably also wouldn't be terribly hard to extend a human's lifespan by twenty-ish years. Volo is over a hundred years old, and he's a bumbling idiot, but Volo is also kind of an outlier, and Elminster has had an in with Mystra since his youth over a thousand years ago-- so it's really up to you how easy extending Gale's life by just a few years would be.

With the half-elf difference out of the way; elves, obviously, live much longer. As in many can naturally reach a thousand years old without any additional help, though the usual lifespan is around 750 years. I'm not sure what angle you're asking your question from (is it about ethics of the age difference? The tragedy of Gale growing old and dying sooner?) so I'll address the main three things I keep in mind with my Tav playing fast and loose with Forgotten Realms "canon":

1: From a "moral" standpoint (which, honestly, this one is all over the place, WOTC has changed elf biology often enough that at this point I say "the elf maturation age is whatever TF you want it to be"), elves are not considered "mature" until they experience their first reverie that involves their current life experiences, not a past life. That's a whole other basket of eggs I'm not going to delve too deeply into, that'll just make this explanation more complicated than it needs to be. I highly suggest looking into the Elf wiki for the Forgotten Realms if you haven't. All you need to know is this "matured" reverie typically happens at around age 30 for elves, even though they physically and mentally mature at the same rate as humans.

I personally played a little loose with this reverie timeline, and it gets more complicated when one considers I shoved my Tav in the Astral Plane (where one does not age) at around twenty five/twenty seven. She was there for a hundred years in the Material Plane, which would normally translate to, quite literally, billions of years in the Astral Plane, but I fiddled with canon there too so that there are different "pockets" where time (and aging) runs differently in the Astral, and my Tav went to live in a settlement where time runs as closely to the Material Plane as possible. I only did this to capitalize on both an inexperienced Tav, and having the tiniest age gap possible while still making the elf "mature" in forgotten realms lore (so give or take ~100 years-- but this is so absolutely not important in the larger picture honestly. Again, do whatever TF you want with your elven biology, as far as I'm concerned the lore is a guideline not a scripture.)

2: It's actually canon elves find the shortness of human lifespans attractive. Commitment is HUGE for elves, and they are very serious about finding "the one" if they intend to settle down and have children with someone for the rest of their very long lives. With humans, they can dedicate themself to a relationship for the duration of the human's lifespan, have a pleasant and loving fifty or so years, then move on to the next thing when the human passes away. It's a win-win for both parties. Again, this is a guideline, not a scripture, but when you delve really deep into elven lore, their origins and what they believe in, it makes sense.

That being said, different races of elves believe in slightly different things, and you can apply that to your own canon. There are also some sub races of elves that don't have extensive lore written yet, like astral elves-- which my Tav happens to be. Meaning the world is my oyster, and astral elves mostly live in-- well, the astral plane. So their concept of both time, lifespans, and relationships is probably very different from their Material Plane counterparts. Even then, different individuals can have different ideas on the value of a relationship, and right and wrong ways to approach one, just like real life. Some astral elves may only view a committed relationship as a hindrance to enjoying the full offerings of life ("Freedom of nature's gifts," anyone?). Some might think it as merely a means of achieving reproduction. Other astral elves, like my Tav, might have been raised to believe that a relationship is a crucial continuation of a bloodline as close to divine as a mortal might achieve, while secretly longing for something more...

3. Finally, the point that you probably meant for this whole question: the emotions connected to a Tav and Gale's differing lifespan. My Tav, by the end of the story, is of course going to be wholly dedicated and devoted to Gale, community and elven beliefs on human relationships aside. If anything, they're more than codependent, and I'm slurping that juice like godly nectar, so of course they're going to want as much time together as possible. The thing about Gale I feel some people forget is that he was an archmage (or so he claims) before his abduction and infection, before the orb, probably even before he became Mystra's Chosen. To make a long story short, this man was, if not a level 20 wizard, very close to it. So, with the tadpole gone by the end game, it would stand to reason that he would either return to full power immediately, or extremely quickly, and only continue to grow from there.

Where am I going with this? Elminster is a wizard. Volo is a wizard (which, not knowing much about volo before I started researching, shocked and enraged me, what do you MEAN he isn't a bard--). Even Karsus lived some three centuries before his folly and the fall of Netheril. While some of Volo's longevity can be attributed to a few decades frozen in stone, clearly wizards have something going on that increases their lifespan, and undoubtedly the higher level the wizard, the easier an extended lifespan would be to achieve. Even if they don't, even if Elminster and Volo and the Netheril residents are exceptions and not rules, there's a few ways one can extend their lifespan-- and a few you can easily make up, because that's the delightful point of DND. TL;DR, my Tav and Gale can't live without each other, Gale either extends his life on his own, or they go through either a spell or ritual, or find an artifact, to split their lifespans between them. She gives him some of her life to extend his.

Is this what Gale would normally do, particularly the splitting of lifespans? Perhaps not. A healthier, saner Gale wouldn't want his love to miss out on what life can offer them, all the things they can see, all the amazing things they can be a part of. But I plan on profoundly fucking up this couple mentally over the course of my fic. And it's going to be a blast.

hey bg3 people with elf/half elf tavs romancing gale

how are you dealing with the… lifespan thing story wise?

[drawlfoy]

detention, retention, and draco malfoy being a little shit

masterlist request guidelines

pairing: draco x reader

request: no not really

summary: golden trio friend y/n y/l/n tries to extract information out of draco malfoy after being placed in detention together.

warnings: swearing, panic attack kinda stuff, just the dark war things that would come w having the task that draco does

a/n: ayo so i started this as a fic i was originally planning on writing in a week. i discontinued it bc i didn’t think anyone was that interested, but i’ve written for it on and off. it’s about 16k words right now standing, but i’m reposting this as a 2 part series. here are the first ~12k words....enjoy :) IMPORTANT: if you’re like “hey i started reading this in october why tf are you reposting the first two parts” just keep reading ok lmao i promise there’s more there’s about through part 6 in here hehe. i just wanted new readers to be able to pick up on it without being turned off by the fact that it was part 3. this will b e 2 parts and at least 20k words

word count: 11.6k

taglist: @gruffle1 @missmultifandommess @cleopatera @hahaboop @accio-rogers @geeksareunique @eltanin-malfoy @war-sword @cams-lynn @itsivyberry @ayo-cowbelly @nerd-domland @yesnerdsblog @shizarianathania @evanstanfanatic @strawberriesonsummer @hariosborn @night-ving @straightzoinked @imintoodeeptostop @naiomimoonshard @jejegu @ophelia-enthusiast @alwaysbeanunknownfan @nearly-memories @litty-dumb @callieclearwater @malfoy-wife15 @charlenasaxen @belladaises @fiantomartell

happy reading y’all

For legal purposes, the york pudding she lobbed at Pansy Parkinson’s head on Monday evening was simply meant to be a joke. She didn’t know that her aim was bad enough that it was going to get in Snape’s hair instead--honestly, it wasn’t even supposed to get past the Ravenclaw table, much less veer to the left to make a beeline for the professors--but no matter how much she tried to explain this to McGonagall, her sentence remained the same: detention every Friday. For two months.

Her life was ending for sure.

“I honestly don’t know what you were expecting,” Hermione told her as she gently wiped off the nib of her quill later that night in the common room. “Even if you had hit your mark, that’s still technically assault.”

“Did you even hear what she said to me? She told me that I looked like the type of kid that bit people in primary school,” complained Y/N. “I didn’t even think she knew what primary school was!”

Hermione snorted. “How long ago?”

“Two days. I’ve been waiting until there was something throwable on the dinner table.”

“How very analytic of you.”

“I’m going to hit you.”

“And you wonder why you’ve got detention.” Hermione tsk-ed at her, her face stone serious but her tone light hearted. “Maybe take this as an opportunity to, I don’t know, do your homework for once? So you won’t have to have a breakdown over the next Potion’s essay and beg me to write it for you?”

“I’m going to go to sleep and think terribly mean thoughts about you.”

“Have fun.”

~ 

Detention.

Something that Y/N wasn’t completely unfamiliar with--she’d done her time organizing Snape’s cabinets, just like every other Gryffindor--but it was different when it came to McGonagall. An impressive old lady, she thought that McGonagall saw something in her. She was always the first to chuckle at Y/N’s jokes and hesitated to reprimand her stupid behavior. And she never gave Y/N detention.

Until now, she supposed. 6th year was changing a lot of things--even their Potions professor--so McGonagall turning a new stone shouldn’t have been anything shocking.

At least, not as shocking as the first thing Y/N saw as she walked into her house head’s office.

“Malfoy?” she spat.

The platinum blonde didn’t even bother to look up from his desk.

“Miss Y/L/N,” Professor McGonagall chided. “I think we would all prefer if you restrained yourself from getting into any more physical altercations with Slytherins.”

She huffed, plopping down in the chair furthest away from that foul git and reaching for her satchel.

“I’ll be back in two hours,” said the elderly professor. “If I hear anything, and I mean anything, other than the sound of studying, consider your sentence doubled.”

With a swish of her robes, McGonagall was gone, leaving her with Malfoy. 

“So what’d you do to get in here, huh? Did the administration finally get a hold of that video of you licking Voldemort’s toes?”

“What the fuck does that mean?!” he snapped, whipping around to glare at her.

“‘s just a joke,” said Y/N. “Like--how everyone says your family houses him and everything--but whatever. I can tell it’s a sore spot.”

His gaze, never withering in intensity, remained trained on her face. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Apparently so. What’re you here for?”

He exhaled sharply. “If I tell you, will you shut up and let me think?”

“No promises, but maybe.”

“Late work. I forgot to turn in the Transfiguration exam last week.”

She made a tutting sound as she lazily shuffled through the crumpled parchment in her satchel. “I expected more from you. Aren’t you gonna ask me how I wound up here?”

“No. I am going to ask you to stop talking now, though.”

~

“That’s terribly unfortunate,” Hermione said over breakfast the next morning. Ron and Harry were nervously chit chatting at the other side of the table over the Saturday Quidditch game against Hufflepuff--supposedly it was supposed to be quite a high stakes match. Not like Y/N cared much, though.

“Yeah! And the worst part was that he won’t even tease anymore. Like, he just sits there all broody and woe is me. We’re all witnessing our nation’s descent into war--he’s not special!”

“Who are you talking about?” asked Harry.

“Oh, just Malfoy,” said Y/N. “We have detention together with McGonagall. He’s such a nasty little greaseball, don’t you think? I mean, look at him right now, glowering over his cereal.”

“Wait! That’s it!”

“What’s it, Harry?” Hermione asked.

“It’s genius, really,” he said. “Y/N has to spend time with him alone every week, and we know that something is up with him. Malfoy is absolutely a Death Eater and has connections to You-Know-Who, but I just need to find a way to prove it.”

“I vaguely forecast where this is going, and I hate it already.”

“Listen, Y/N. It’s not for that long, and it’s for the health of the wizarding world. If you just get to know him--”

“Ick!”

“If you just get to know him, maybe get him to trust you and find out his secrets...we’d finally have enough to turn him in and throw him out of Hogwarts for good.”

“Is that really necessary, Harry?” Ginny butted in from her seat further down next to Dean. “Malfoy’s probably just exhausted like the rest of you. 6th year is difficult, and we have no solid evidence that he’s a Death Eater. I’m sure being stuck in a room with him for 2 hours is hard enough without pretending to be nice to him.”

“But what if Harry’s right?” said Y/N. “What if he is actually a Death Eater? What if he’s an active danger to the student body?”

“Exactly!” The joy written across Harry’s face at the prospect of someone else finally agreeing was infectious. “So will you?”

“Er…” She dragged her spoon across the top layer of her porridge. “In theory, sure. In actuality, I’m not sure how I could do it. Malfoy doesn’t want anything to do with me, either.”

“Love potion?” offered Ron.

“I don’t care how much of a prat he is, I’m not roofying him.”

“I rarely agree with you, Y/N, but I think you’re right. If you want to do this, you need to get him to trust you for real.”

“Your back-handed compliment skills never disappoint, Hermione. Do you think you could help me out with a plan?”

A slow smile spread across the girl’s face as she nodded. “That’s my strong suit.”

The plan they laid out over the remainder of the day was ambitious but at least do-able. Each week was split into different subtasks, the end goal being a somewhat tentative friendship between the two. 

“If you can flirt with him and get him to have a crush on you without scaring him off, you’d be in the best possible position,” Hermione told her as they walked back from the Quidditch pitch among the screaming Gryffindor fans. They’d won--yet again. “Obviously I don’t foresee that being likely, but if you pull it off somehow he’d probably be willing to tell you anything. The fact that you’re a pureblood is going to carry you through this whole ordeal. He’ll at least be accepting of your existence in the wizarding community.”

The bitter edge in Hermione’s tone made Y/N’s blood boil. There was no reason for Malfoy to be as prejudiced as he was--he’d spent his adolescence in Hermione’s academic dust. She was obviously smarter than him. 

“You got it, ‘Mione,” she said. Her voice barely carried over the cheers of her peers as they ascended the steps to the common room. “We’ll take this little ferret down. I can’t wait.”

“Don’t get too cocky, now.”

The Gryffindor after-party was crazy...per usual. The charmed self-filling goblets, the blasted playlist of Wizpop pumping through the air, and the buzzing energy of the room was giving Y/N a giant headache. She stood with Hermione and Harry by the edge of the crowd, watching Ron get hoisted up on the shoulders of the chasers. 

“No wonder the Slytherins think we’re Neanderthals,” Y/N mused. For once, Hermione didn’t respond. “Hermione? Is everything okay?”

The second she turned away to look at her best friend, gasps and whistles filled the room. She whipped back just in time to see Lavender Brown, a sweet but slightly ditzy girl in their year, pull away from a kiss with Ron.

“Oh shi--Hermione!”

Harry and Y/N shared a glance before darting after the witch--who had impressively already made it to the door. 

“Hermione, wait!” Y/N called as they jogged after her, throwing open the common room entrance and finding her sat by the tapestry on the other side of the hall, knees to her chest.

“‘Mione, what’s wrong?” asked Harry.

“Don’t be daft, Harry,” said Y/N. “You saw exactly what the rest of us did.”

“I don’t understa--”

“Harry.” Her voice was taut. “I know you’re just trying to help, but I think that it might be best if you let us be. Go back and enjoy the party.”

He gave her a tight, grateful smile before darting back through the door. Y/N wasted no more time in walking over to Hermione and throwing her arms around her shoulders.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, hugging her tight. Hermione made no move to detach them, so she continued. “Ron is an idiot. You deserve so much better--your first kiss was Viktor fucking Krum, after all. You’re hot stuff and this place is just unfortunately running dry of men who are impressive enough for you. Once you’re out of here and working in the Ministry, you’re gonna have the time of your life with men actually in your league.”

Hermione managed a sniffly laugh as she wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “It’s just so fucking embarrassing, you know. Like, I have a crush on him because I think he understands me and I smelled him in my Amortentia and I thought he’d like me back, but…” She hiccuped. “Then he goes off and kisses Lavender Brown, of all people. There’s nothing particularly wrong with her or anything, but she’s so different...I’m so bookish, and she’s so girly and everything I’m not…”

Y/N took the opportunity to tuck a lock of Hermione’s hair behind her ear as she listened.

“And it can’t help but make me think--was I ever anything to him but a friend? If the girl he ends up choosing is the opposite of me?”

“Girly, don’t think like that,” murmured Y/N. “He’s a teenage boy. They don’t think of love the way that we do--to them it’s a game of availability, not of choice. At least for Ronald. You intimidate him, and by extension, you’re not available.”

“That shouldn’t matter!”

“You’re right. It shouldn’t.” Y/N drew a long breath. “So you should find someone who always has you as their first choice--someone who isn’t intimidated by your intellect. They’re out there. I promise.”

Hermione managed a shaky smile. “Thanks, Y/N. I mean it. Do you mind if I have some alone time? I don’t think I’m ready to go back to the party but I just want some quiet.”

“Of course. Let me know if you need me,” she said, brushing herself off and making to walk down the hall.

“You’re not going back to the party?”

“Nah. It hurts my head and I want fresh air. If I’m not back here in a half hour, assume that I’ve been kidnapped.”

With that, she started her walk. She wasn’t planning on going on a long stroll--there was a small balcony that she often went to when she needed to clear her head. It was beautiful, especially on a snowy night like this.

But the walk was creepy.

There was only one way in and out--a narrow, damp hallway that had absolutely no light fixtures. If Y/N really wanted to, she could cast a quick lumos, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to see what lived on the walls. The stairs were steep, too, but she managed to bound up all 40 of them in record time. 

“Who’s there?”

The sudden voice ripped a scream out of Y/N’s throat as she reached the top, catching a glimpse of the shadowy figure at the edge of the balcony that spoke. She clasped her hand over her mouth and she crept forward to the opening, getting a better look at the person that was in her secret spot.

The clouds shifted in the sky to allow more moonlight to cast a soft glow on Malfoy’s face, hardened with irritation.

“Malfoy?” Y/N asked, rather dumbly.

“What stellar observational skills,” he drawled. 

She felt her cheeks grow hot. “What are you doing here? This is part of the Gryffindor tower. Shouldn’t you be...I don’t know...playing hide and seek with the sewer rats in the dungeons?”

“Very funny.” His flat tone exposed the fact that he did not, in fact, find it very funny. “There’s no rule barring me from coming up here.”

“But why? This is my spot!”

“Because I wanted to get out. Now, I was here first, so unless you want your detention extended, I suggest you leave.”

Y/N bit the fiery comebacks on the tip of her tongue as the memories of her plan with Hermione began floating back to her. 

Week 1 -- Hold one neutral, civil conversation with Malfoy.

“I’ll be quiet. You won’t even know I’m here,” Y/N decided upon. leaning up against the balcony. The rogue snowflakes that made it past the overhanging roof melted on her cheeks. 

“That isn’t a suggestion,” said Malfoy. “I’m demanding you leave.”

“Beautiful night, isn’t it?” Y/N asked, pointedly ignoring his words. “I’ve always loved the snow. It’s so quiet.”

“And it would be even quieter if you left.”

“Aren’t you the conversationalist?” said Y/N.

“If you don’t leave, I will hex you,” Malfoy told her through gritted teeth. 

“I just love how the moonlight reflects off of the snow,” continued Y/N. “It’s so...pure.”

“Please leave.”

On her walk back down the dank stairwell, she allowed herself a little smile. 

Task 1? Technically done.

~ 

The first week went largely as planned. Malfoy was cold and certainly suspicious of her, but he wasn’t completely venomous when Y/N asked where he got his quill from in Potions. It was silver, charmed to shimmer with flecks of forest green. He told her Barnaby’s in France, and that was that. She walked away from his table with all of her limbs attached. Perhaps that was all the progress she was going to make in the next few weeks, but the task at hand certainly made the prospect of her lost Friday afternoons more bearable. 

Harry was going completely batty, rambling on about how Malfoy was behind the mysterious cursed objects that had been floating about the castle without explanation. 

“And why would Malfoy bring cursed objects to Hogwarts if he has aspirations other than being expelled?” Hermione would ask over their books.

“You don’t understand, Hermione! You girls need to be careful walking around at night--especially you, Y/N. I don’t want you going missing after detention because of that slimeball.”

Y/N always gave him a laugh, berating him for his slight misogynistic commentary and turning back to whatever her task was, but the truth was that she was worried for him. The mental weight of the impending war and the fact that he couldn’t do anything about it was certainly getting too difficult for him to bear. It was heartbreaking to see the vivacious boy she’d grown up with crumble under the responsibilities of something he should never have to worry about in the first place.

Friday came much sooner than expected, and Y/N reluctantly left her friends in the common room to trek to McGonagall’s office. The walk was frigid and the wind bit at her cheeks as she rounded the last outdoor hall.

Why was this castle so dark?

A thump behind her made her jump, and Harry’s words came floating back to her. 

Remember all those cursed objects? What if there’s someone just...stalking the school grounds, waiting for someone like me to snatch?

She shivered, throwing herself at the office door and slamming it behind her.

“Miss Y/L/N,” Professor McGonagall greeted, her eyebrows raised in amusement. “Something giving you trouble?”

“No, Professor,” she answered, setting her bag down on the desk next to Malfoy. He sent her a curious look as well. “It’s just cold outside.”

She chuckled. “I need to go speak to Headmaster Dumbledore. I expect that, upon my return, you both are in one piece and alive.”

“I’m not sure if I’m the one who needs to be given that speech,” said Y/N, bored and testing the waters.

“She’s right, Professor,” added Malfoy. “There’s no projectiles here.”

McGonagall exhaled a long, shaky breath before brushing herself off. “Please. Behave yourselves.”

“You got it, boss,” she said as she watched her Professor walk out the door. “So, Malfoy. How was your week?”

“I don’t know what you’re up to, but I’d way prefer if you didn’t speak to me,” he said, refusing to make eye contact.

“I’m not up to anything! We’re in detention together and, I dunno, since I see you sometimes at balls, I thought it’d be nice to be on good terms.”

“Good terms?” He scoffed. “You’re a Gryffindor. I’d rather you be a bloody Hufflepuff.”

“How about neutral terms?”

Even though he wasn’t looking at her, she could catch a glimpse of him rolling his eyes. “If neutral terms mean you being quiet, then, yes. Please.”

“I’ll be plenty quiet. After I hear about your opinion on what happened in Potions today with Brown and Weasley. When Snape yelled at them for holding hands.”

He let out a sharp sigh. “Believe it or not, I actually have better things to do than keep up with whatever stuff your house does.”

“But…?” Y/N pressed. She may not’ve spent her time at Hogwarts as Malfoy’s best friend, but she had grown up with the boy, and she could tell when he was holding back.

He stared blankly at her.

“Come on. I’m literally the only person in my house who’ll openly admit that they’re disgusted by that dynamic. I’m begging you.”

She wasn’t sure if she was imagining it, but she thought she saw a flicker of amusement dance across his face for a moment. “Your house sounds more like a cult than a student group.”

“Oh, says the one from Slytherin,” said Y/N. 

“We only act like that because our families are close. What’s your excuse? Hormones and Quidditch culture?”

“Touché.” As much as she wanted to fight back, she bit her tongue. Whatever she was doing was making progress, and quicker progress than she was expecting. Her next task was to make him laugh, and she was emboldened by the fact that she could potentially be able to kill two birds with one stone. 

They sat in silence for a little bit, but this time, it was a comfortable silence. Malfoy wasn’t staring at the clock on the wall or rolling his eyes at her every move, so she had time to plot.

On one hand, she could make a fool of herself--drop her inkwell, say something stupid in class, fall down the stairs--but she had a sneaking suspicion that her sorry attempts at slapstick humor wouldn’t land well with Draco anymore. He’d become so serious lately, so solemn. This was the most light hearted she’d seen him, even compared with how he acted with the rest of his Slytherin lackeys. 

On the other, she could try to sell out her friends. She could confide in him how “big” Hermione’s teeth were (they weren’t even big) or tell him that Ron smelled of eggs (true, but that was a low blow). Something told her that this would be much more successful, but she wasn’t willing to turn to that so quickly--she was already a week ahead as it was. 

“What is it?” 

Malfoy’s bored drawl cut through her flurried thoughts. Her cheeks turned pink as she blinked, noticing that she’d been staring at him for far too long. “Nothing. Sorry. I just spaced out.”

“Sure,” he mumbled, giving her another suspicious look before turning back to his work. “Can you maybe space out somewhere other than my face?”

“Where’s your vanity, Malfoy?” she pressed as she leaned back in her chair, hair swinging over the back. 

“Shut up,” he snapped. She could tell that whatever connection they’d had in the fleeting moments beforehand was being burnt by the second, but her embarrassment and pride drove her forward.

“Merlin, what’s got you so wound up?” she prompted, noting how deliciously unraveled he looked at this. “Where’s my cool, collected Slytherin?”

He slammed hands on his desk at this, whipping around to glare at her. “What’s your angle, Y/L/N?”

“What?”

“Why are you bothering me?”

“Because I want to.” She beamed.

Malfoy ran his fingers through his hair, mussing up the usual neat manner in which it normally laid on his head. “Compelling. What do you want from me?”

“What do I want…?” She tilted her head at him, narrowing her eyes. “What?”

“You never talk to me,” he explained. “Obviously, I prefer it like that. I can’t help but wonder why suddenly you want to be making small talk. So, what is it you want from me?”

“Malfoy,” she said. “I think you’re a spoiled prick who thinks far too highly of himself and drives me insane. But I also think that you’re funnier than what my friends give you credit for. Granted, you’ve always been annoying, but I don’t want anything from you. I just want to, I dunno, make these next few months less insufferable.” Somehow the lie slipped through her teeth easier than any of her previous bluffs. 

He frowned, his mouth opening once before firmly screwing shut into a scowl. “Oh.”

“No offense, Malfoy, but what else can you offer me other than your dazzling personality?” she teased. “You know my family. I don’t need to blackmail you to pay for jewelry I’ve had my eye on or anything.”

He scoffed. “As if I’d say yes.”

“Exactly my point. It’d be fucking weird. Merlin, I’m not trying to butter you up to buy out Borgin & Burkes for me. Do I give off gold-digger vibes? Is that what this is about?”

“Fucking hell.” Malfoy turned to her in disbelief. “Do you ever shut up?”

“Answer my question. Or better yet, pull out your wallet. Wait, did I say that out loud?” She mimed surprise and covered her mouth. “Oh no! What will my mother say now that I’ve squandered my last chance of hitching you? There’s no way I can go home for Christmas break now.”

He rolled his eyes so hard she found herself worried for a moment that they were going to just permanently get stuck in the back of his head. “Hate to break it to you, but you didn’t really have a shot to begin with.”

Ouch.

She huffed and dramatically flopped over the back of her chair, hoping he couldn’t see that she’d flinched. “So you don’t think I’m pretty??” 

“Y/L/N,” he snapped, his voice a low warning. “Can I please just work? What is with you today?”

Y/N sent him a sour look before giving her Charms work another look. Malfoy was awfully quiet, and when she snuck any glances at him later on, he was angled to face away from her. 

Why did she feel like such shit all of a sudden? She cataloged the past events, trying to pinpoint the exact moment that her stomach dropped. It all made sense when the words “You didn’t really have a shot to begin with” echoed around her head once again. She’d failed Harry. She’d failed Hermione. There was no way that she was going to be able to get him to reveal his secrets now--it’s not like he was confiding in even his closest friends as Harry made apparent when he explained how vague his statements were to his fellow Slytherins on the train. Her only chance would’ve been to somehow get him to fall for her, and that wasn’t going...great. And it had been a pipedream to begin with.

When McGonagall swished back into the classroom to dismiss them, Y/N shot out of there without even looking at Malfoy again. It felt like something was lodged in her throat and she was not going to cry in front of him. No, no. She had to make it to Hermione to tell her what was going on. 

“Y/L/N?” 

Malfoy’s voice made her pause in her flee as she nearly rounded the corner in front of her, but she refused to look back. It was far enough away that it was possible she didn’t hear him.

“Wait!”

She was up the stairs and speed walking as fast as her legs could carry her to the Gryffindor tower before he even saw which way she went.

~

“I don’t think you understand,” Y/N wailed by the fire as Hermione rubbed her shoulders and Harry sat awkwardly perched on the couch. “I can’t do this. The only way this was going to work was if he had a crush on me, and I don’t think he ever will. I fucked it up! The one time you guys need me, I fuck it up! I let you down!”

Hermione’s left hand stopped its rubbing to rest firmly on her shoulder. “Please don’t be upset. You didn’t let us down. Plus, you’re only, what...two weeks in? You don’t need him to like you to make it work. Just getting him to trust you will be enough, and you’re good at that.”

“I don’t think so,” continued Y/N. “Harry said that he wasn’t even that open on the train when he overheard him talking to all of his friends. And those are purebloods that he likes! That he’s trusted and known for years and years! I’m a friend of you guys, and he knows it. I think he’d figure it out quick.”

“We should take every chance we can get,” said Harry from his spot a few feet away, his eyes lazy and unfocused on the fire crackling in front of them. “You won’t let us down if you can’t get anything, Y/N, you know that! But if you got anything from him, it’d be incredible. It’s a win-win. I don’t understand why you’re so upset.”

“I’m not upset,” she said, her tone becoming defensive. “I just...don’t want to mess this up. I know how much it’d mean if I succeeded.”

“So just try!” Hermione said. “There’s nothing wrong with it. I’m sorry he was kind of mean to you today, but I don’t think that should bother you too much. He should be more afraid of what you’d say if you didn’t care about being a good person.”

“Fucking right on there,” she said, wiping away the frustrated tears. “If I was honest with him, he’d leave crying. He should be grateful that I’m taking this bet so I actually have to be nice to him.”

“That’s the spirit.” Harry leaned over to smack her back like he did his Quidditch teammates after a winning match. 

After they’d parted their ways with Harry, Hermione and Y/N made their way slowly up the stairwell to the girls’ dorms. 

“Y/N?” Hermione asked, breaking the silence. 

“Yeah?”

“Do you think, er…” She paused. “Do you think you were really upset about failing us today? Or was it something else?”

“What do you mean?” Y/N furrowed her eyebrows. “I don’t see what else it would be.”

“I’m sorry,” responded the bright witch. “Forget I ever asked. It was a stupid thing to wonder about.”

“Weirdo,” she teased as she waved her a goodnight and made her way to her dorm.

The next morning, Y/N busied herself with revising her Charms essay over her breakfast--a cup of tea and a half-buttered piece of toast--while Hermione leaned over her shoulder, nodding or grimacing at the corrections she made. 

“Did you work during detention? Like, at all?”

“‘Mione,” moaned Y/N. “It’s too early for this. I don’t want a lecture. I just couldn’t focus.”

Her warm brown eyes narrowed as they bore into Y/N’s face. “Why were you distracted?”

“Oh, I, uh…” She stumbled over her words as Hermione drew closer. “Merlin, Hermione. I told you last night. I just felt like I was letting you all down.”

“Mhm,” was all she got in response before her best friend tilted her head back down to the parchment in front of her. 

Y/N sat, completely puzzled. What was Hermione on about? She’d been straightforward with what was hurting her--she didn’t want to mess up the only task the Golden Trio had ever given her--and, even if she hadn’t been, Hermione was smart enough to deduce things for herself. So what was she thinking about?

Her eyes drifted over to the Slytherin table where the usual 6th year pureblood gang loitered about, drinking black coffee and sulking--but Malfoy was not to be seen. She jumped when her eyes met Parkinson, her dark eyes burning into her soul as a deep scowl was written across her face.

“Malfoy, what the fuck do you want?” Ron’s voice pulled her back to reality to see him glaring somewhere behind her.

“I wasn’t here to talk to you,” a familiar voice drawled. 

She turned to see Malfoy standing behind her, a sneer written all across his stupidly pretty face.

“Miss me already?” asked Y/N as she raised an eyebrow and cocked her head to the side. 

“For fuck’s sake, stop doing that,” he mumbled, reaching into his pocket and throwing a box at her. “You forgot your quill. I took the liberty of properly storing it, because it seems like you lot like to just throw them in your bag. Makes me physically ill to watch.”

“Oh.” Y/N studied the intricate box in her hands before tucking it away in her knapsack. “Thanks? I guess?”

He nodded curtly, contorting his face into one last scowl to send to Ron before turning and leaving,

“So,” Hermione began, cutting her omelet at a much brisker pace, “I think we need to have a little chat. About...all of this.” 

“Why?” 

“Not right now,” she said, her voice low and her eyes flicking at Ron and Harry sitting across from them. “I don’t think it’d benefit us for them to hear.” 

“Ok?” She cautiously took a bite out of her toast and continued staring Hermione down. “You’re scaring me.”

“It’s...I don’t know. I thought I was crazy for thinking this, but it seems like we need to talk about it anyways. For this little mission of yours to work, we need to be totally open and honest with each other.”

“Sure.” Y/N took another bite. “I honestly have no clue what’s got you so on edge, though.”

“Who’s on edge?” Harry asked, leaning over the table and stealing the croissant on Y/N’s plate. 

“Hey!” she exclaimed. “Do you not see the entire plate of them over there?”

He laughed, sending her an easy grin and dunking a piece into the hot chocolate in his mug. “Finders keepers. Say, Y/N, are you busy next weekend? Ron and Lavender are going to Madame Puddingfoot’s together, and I know Hermione isn’t going to want to take a weekend off studying to go to Hogsmeade, so I thought that maybe we could go cause some trouble at the Cauldron.”

“If you stop stealing my food we can talk about it,” replied Y/N, the corners of her lips tugging up into a grin. 

“Deal.”

Hermione tugged at her arm. “I just realized I need to get something out of my room before we watch the Quidditch game. Will you come with me, Y/N?”

“Sure!” said Y/N. “Gee, I’m rolling in invitations today.”

Once they exited the dining hall, though, it immediately became evident that they were not actually heading up to the dorms. Hermione dragged her into the nearest bathroom before casting a quick silencing charm.

“Myrtle! Are you in here?” Only when she was sure silence was the only response to her question, she seemed satisfied to turn to Y/N and begin talking. “When were you going to tell me that you have a thing for Malfoy?”

“I’m sorry, what?” Y/N felt the heat that had risen to her cheeks from the last quill-encounter re-emerge.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” said Hermione. “Are you seriously going to expect me to believe that you nearly sobbed over some random pureblood git telling you you never had a chance with him because it might slow down your progress with helping us? Actually? I’ve seen you look more ecstatic about hearing that your dear granny passed away.”

“To be fair, she had really good life insurance,” Y/N cut in. “And she was an old hag. Never had a nice thing to say to me.”

“Life insurance or no life insurance...you can’t seriously expect me to believe that you were just upset about not being able to help us as much. That was ridiculous. I don’t buy it. And the way you blushed like crazy when he came over to talk to you--the way you try and pretend like you can flirt...please. Y/N, it’s clear as day. I know you, and I know you have a crush on him.”

“Hermione!” hissed Y/N. “You have no clue what you’re talking about!”

“Yes, I think I do,” she pushed. “And you need to be honest with me if you want to be of any help right now.”

Her bossiness lit a fire of rage in Y/N’s chest, but she sucked in a deep breath, shutting her eyes before releasing it. “Believe me when I say I haven’t ever acknowledged any feelings I may or may not have towards him.”

“Ok.” Her face softened. “I know it might take time, but I honestly do think I’m right. Please just...be careful. This is a really odd situation to get caught up in if you actually have feelings for the other person. You’re trying to manipulate him, for Merlin’s sake.”

“And if I have these feelings for him, I’ve done a pretty damn good job of suppressing them for however long they’ve been here.” 

Hermione sighed. “That’s true. I’m just saying that spending this much time with him is probably only going to make things worse. Will you please tell me if anything changes between the two of you?”

“Anything changes?” Y/N’s voice was dripping in disbelief. “You’re joking. Even if I was obsessed with him I don’t think there’s ever a chance of hell in anything ‘changing’ between us. He said it himself.”

“You know what I mean, Y/N,” responded Hermione. “Just promise me, ok?”

“Ok,” said Y/N. “I promise.”

That seemed to satiate Hermione as she nodded approvingly at her friend. “I think it goes without saying that Ron and Harry shouldn’t hear about this.”

“There’s nothing to hear about, but yes.” She shuffled her feet before meeting Hermione’s eyes again. “Er, I’m sorry for this being a weird question, but would you mind coming along with me and Harry to Hogsmeade? I don’t really see him like...that...and I don’t want to read into it too much and reject him if he is doing it just platonically, but just in case. Y’know.”

“Sure,” said Hermione, even though her face took on that curious expression yet again. “Anyways, you actually did forget something--you’re not wearing a single piece of Gryffindor colors for our game today. You should probably run back to your dorm before Harry and Ron notice.”

After they said their goodbyes, Y/N found herself turning over the things Hermione had said to her in her head. Did she like Malfoy? No, no fucking way. But a part of her really did think he was funny. And of course it was natural to feel rejected when anyone insinuates that they’d never consider you as a romantic interest without jest. 

Once she’d made it up to her room and grabbed a few scarves, Y/N made to put her red cloak into her satchel. Her fingers ghosted over the box that Malfoy had given her and scoffed once she saw the Malfoy crest engraved into the rich wood. 

Narcissistic snot.

Her curiosity got the better of her as she reached over to open up the elaborately decorated box. What met her was not just one quill but two--one of which was most certainly not her own. 

She took them both out, tossing the old one in a pile with her other trusty familiar white feather quills and picked up the other one. It looked familiar--identical to the quill that she’d complimented Malfoy on in Potions about a week ago. Butterflies began to flutter like crazy in her stomach as she turned it over in her hand, watching the gray and green glitter together and the magic sparkles cast a gentle light over her bed. She generally avoided dipping into her family’s pockets to get school supplies any more than she had to--it’s not like it made her friends feel good about themselves when they were reminded how rich her family was--but this might be what she could consider to be an exception. She hadn’t even liked his quill all that much when she first saw it in Potions--but it was one of those things that was so noticeable that it made sense to compliment him. 

She gave it one last look before tucking it back away into the elaborately decorated box. Perhaps she had spoken too soon when she’d told Hermione all hope was lost. 

~ 

When Monday morning Potions class with the Slytherins rolled around, Y/N wasted no time. Malfoy was alone--even his Slytherin lackeys seemed to know not to bother him. Just what she needed.

“Malfoy,” she greeted, setting her bag down on his table and looking him dead on. He raised to meet her eyes, his eyebrow raised.

“Can I help you?”

“I just wanted you to know that I also really like your immense fortune,” she said. “And your manor.”

“Well, a lot of people do,” he mumbled as he looked away to dig through something in his bag. If she didn’t know any better, she would’ve thought he was blushing.

“I’m just letting you know,” she continued. “In case you were wanting to give them away. It worked for the quill, so I thought, well, why not?”

He exhaled, a deep and annoyed sound escaping his lips as he rolled his eyes up to the ceiling. “I knew I shouldn’t have done that.”

“You really didn’t have to.”

“I was getting sick of it,” he told her. “I never can stick with one quill for too long, and I thought it’d be a shame to toss it. I thought it’d be better to be charitable--it’s not like your family could get an appointment at Barnaby’s if they tried.”

“Hey!” Y/N said indignantly. “You don’t know that!”

“I’ve heard your parents try to speak French,” he said. “If you’re anything like them, you'll be barred from ever entering the country.”

“Malfoy!” 

His lips turned up into a smile, a soft laugh escaping his lips. Y/N suppressed the urge to grin in return. Task 3? Done. “What?”

“I can’t even argue with you,” she said. “It’s tragic.”

She stared at the empty stool next to him, wondering if she should just take the leap and sit with him. Malfoy seemed unbothered by her presence as he opened up his Potions book and set it next to his cauldron. “Do you want a partner?” The words left her lips before she could stop them.

He cast her a curious look before glancing at the empty stool. “It depends. Are you going to be annoying?”

She gasped in faux-offense. “What makes you think I could ever be annoying?”

“On that note, I think you better get back to Potter.” He motioned with his head towards the side of the room where most of her Gryffindor friends were chatting. Harry was staring at her, his fists clenched by his side.

Y/N smirked and sent him a wink. 

“On that note,” she said, careful to imitate Malfoy’s drawl and sending him a smug grin, “Maybe I better sit here.”

“Hm.” He awarded her one more uninterested look before rolling up his sleeves and setting out the ingredients for the potion they were brewing--Amortentia. 

She tried not to make it too obvious that she was staring at his left arm, but there was nothing on it like Harry had told her. It was just pure, unblemished pale skin that shimmered under the light. Before he could catch her looking, she quickly sat down and started pulling out her own things. After a short pause, she decided to take out the silver quill. She’d left his box back in her room--she wouldn’t be caught dead with something that had the Malfoy crest on it--but she’d wrapped it in a pouch with her own family’s emblem on the front, shimmering in gold and red.

“Why don’t you just buy your own charmed quills?” asked Malfoy after they had chopped all of the gillweed. 

“You already know. We’re an abomination to the French. We aren’t allowed entry.”

“That’s not what I mean.” His tone was meant to read as exasperated, but his words still seemed good-natured.

“I...well.” She frowned. She’d never confessed this to anyone, but she supposed that Malfoy wasn’t going to find a way to use it against her. “I don’t like to flaunt my family wealth. I think it makes people, at least in Gryffindor, like me less. I learned that pretty early on.”

He hummed something in response before sliding all the gillweed into the cauldron, turning the clear liquid into a bubbling forest green. 

“Why are you being so nice to me all of a sudden?” she asked. 

He took his time finishing the note he was jotting down before he answered. “I’m not being nice. It’s just called being civil. You said it yourself, we see each other at balls sometimes.”

“We probably won’t anymore, though,” she mused. 

Malfoy’s eyebrows shot up, but his voice remained low and steady. “No. I suppose that we probably won’t. Is your family part of the Order?”

“Hm. Are you a Death Eater?” she asked brazenly. He had no business asking her something like that, and he knew it. Especially not with his family connections.

“What do you think?” he drawled, waving his bared left arm in front of her face.

“Bullshit. That doesn’t mean anything after we learned Glamour spells last year.”

“Guess you’ll just have to trust me, then,” he responded, focusing intently on the bubbling liquid in front of him instead of her face. 

“I guess so,” she replied. The weight of her Glamour comment began to sink in--she was right, after all. How had she not thought of it before? 

But he was right when he told her she just had to trust him. Could she? Y/N rested her chin in the palm of her propped hand as she watched him work. A piece of disobedient moonbeam blonde hair dangled over his forehead as he diced up the unicorn tail, his eyebrows furrowed in focus.

“Is this why you want to be my partner?” he finally asked after a few moments of silence. “So you can just stare at me while I do all the work?”

“There’s the vain Draco I know,” she said, grinning as she leaned over to punch his shoulder. 

He rolled his eyes again, scooting out of arm's reach before flipping back to Amortentia in his book. “You’re insufferable. And it’s Malfoy to you.”

“Fine, fine, Malfoy,” said Y/N. “What do you want me to do, then?”

He shoved his cutting board towards her, the half-diced unicorn tail staring up at her. “Finish dicing this and then stir it in. 9 times clockwise. I did almost all of the work, but it should be finished after that.”

Y/N sent him another glare before doing as he said. The glittering quill kept catching her attention from the corner of her eye, and she couldn’t help but notice that Malfoy was writing with just a plain white quill for the time being. HE really did just give it to me. 

After the final ingredients were diced, she began to stir, each rotation around the cauldron turning the potion to a different color. It began as the bubbling green, then a deep sea blue, then a royal purple, a crimson blood red, a glimmering gold--before settling into a pale silver.

“Wow. It’s beautiful,” she breathed. “It’s like...liquid starlight.”

“All thanks to me,” said Malfoy. “You didn’t even have to crush the Mandrake root.”

“You’re such a gentleman, Malfoy.” Her voice dripped in fake sincerity. “So, what do you smell?”

Y/N was expecting him to scowl at her and tell her that it wasn’t any of her business, but he actually leaned over the cauldron and shut his eyes. 

“I’ve never been good at explaining what things smell like.” 

“Fair.”

Once he leaned back, she took his place, shutting her eyes and breathing in a tendril of the beautiful potion. “Whoa.”

“What’s it for you?”

“I don’t...know,” she admitted. “It’s not something I can describe note by note. It kind of reminds me of something, though.”

“Something with Potter, I presume?” he said, casually twirling his generic white quill around his fingers.

“No,” she answered, surprised at how honest she was being. “It’s…I’m trying to think. Er, it’s very lavish. It reminds me of when I was younger and my parents would drag me to galas and balls and whatnot.” 

He stared at her in silence.

“What about you? Does it remind you of anything?”

“Yeah.” Malfoy reached forward to put a lid on the cauldron, effectively shutting out the steam from reaching either of them.

“Ooh, have you figured it out yet?” she teased, crossing her legs and turning to face him head on. “Let me guess. Is it someone like…”

She paused, a wicked smile stretching across her face. “Oh my god, is it Hermione? Or Luna? Or...help me out here!”

“No.” His voice was sour. 

“Ah, it’s Parkinson then, isn’t it? Tell her I’m sorry for throwing food at her if you ever have the chance. Make sure to add the part where I’m more sorry that I missed.” 

“Y/L/N!”

“It’s okay. I’d be a little let down, too.”

“Can you please just…” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Please just stop. I haven’t figured it out. Okay? Happy now?”

“I’ll leave you alone,” said Y/N. “Under one condition. You give me a hint. I’ve given you everything I know! This isn’t fair.”

“This doesn’t have to be fair,” he hissed.

Y/N kept the easy smile plastered on her face while she waited, her eyebrows raised in anticipation.

“You’re not going to let up until I tell you, are you?”

“You’d be right on that,” she said, sugary sweet.

“Fine. It’s something kind of floral.” 

“How descriptive,” she snorted as she slumped back in her stool, thinking hard. Where had she smelled it before? Y/N shut her eyes, leaning her head back and trying to immerse herself into the memory that had surfaced. It smelled like grandeur, like an open ballroom full of guests wearing expensive perfumes. She could feel spinning, spinning like she was with a dance partner. Who was it? She couldn’t quite remember--the last ball she’d been to had been years ago--but after she leaned forward and smelled the Amortentia once more time, she came to a conclusion.

“I had to have danced with him at a gala before,” she announced to Malfoy, who was looking quite unimpressed. “So I know it’s no one from Gryffindor.”

“Interesting,” was all he said before turning to his parchment and jotting something down.

Late that night, while Y/N was settling into bed, a strange idea struck her. Sure that the thought that was nagging her was completely fruitless, she had no trouble with reaching into her desk and pulling out the Malfoy box. She just had to check if she wanted to sleep well.

Here goes.

She closed her eyes, imagining the expensive scent of her Amortentia. Then she opened it, stuck her nose into the fabric, and breathed in.

Well, fuck. 

~

The internal debate going through Y/N the next day at the breakfast table was intense. On one hand, she really, really wanted to just tell Hermione that Malfoy had been in her Amortentia and she was completely fucked, but on the other…

She glanced at the witch next to her as she methodically sliced her toast into perfect, equivalent squares before dunking them in jam. Y/N liking Malfoy was not going to fit into her toast cubes. If she said anything, she would lose her excuse to talk to her about him. And her excuse to try and get close with him. 

Perhaps I can figure it out tomorrow. 

When tomorrow came, she still hadn’t made progress. Y/N was beginning to think that her so called “revelation” after they brewed Amortentia was truly just complete and utter bullshit. So what that his quill box smelled like it--all rich people kind of smelled the same at some points, and so did their houses. There was a reason why she couldn’t immediately pin the scent to anything--it wasn’t like she even knew what Malfoy smelled like.

But the truth remained that she was still attracted to someone who happened to be a rich Slytherin--so naturally, her mind began to wander. There’s no way it was Zabini--his mother owned a fragrance line, and she would’ve instantly recognized the cologne that she knew Mrs. Zabini made him wear--and there was absolutely no way that it was Crabbe or Goyle, so the only other Slytherin it left was...Nott? But that didn’t make sense either--she’d never spoken to him before in her life, even less than Malfoy. So perhaps it would be better if she didn’t think on it.

The next day of potion brewing came on a stormy Wednesday. Malfoy and Y/N worked silently together to brew a Draught of Dreamless Sleep. She was surprised to see how practiced his movements were--he didn’t even have to reference the book to recite the exact measurements and directions.

“Do you have bad dreams or something?” she asked, mostly as a joke. He didn’t seem to pick up on the light-heartedness and stiffened up.

“No?”

“Gee, you’re talkative today,” Y/N said, trying to ignore how her hand brushed his by accident when she added the scoop of anjelica. 

“Excuse me for not entertaining you,” he drawled. “I wasn’t expecting to have such a needy potions partner today.”

“I am not needy!” she gasped, smacking his arm. “I’ve sat in silence for a full hour!”

He rolled his eyes (he was always rolling his eyes) and gave the potion one more final stir before setting the lid on the cauldron. “Think you can do that again? It needs to simmer for that long.”

“Just because you’re so sweet to me,” crooned Y/N before pulling out a heavy book from her satchel. Her Charms exam was tomorrow, and, naturally, she had decided to save all of her revising work until the night before. The textbook stared back at her as she jotted a few notes onto a previously blank sheet of parchment. The quill in her hands was light and glided across the paper like the tears of Merlin, something that she had forgotten quills could do. All of her familiar basic quills were okay, but they were prone to skidding and breaking. This nib hadn’t worn down in the slightest, still at a smooth and defined peak.

Y/N couldn’t believe that, out of all people, the person to give her such a thoughtful gift was Draco Malfoy. She tried to sneak a glance at him then, moving her curtain of hair away from her face. It took all she had in her to not be startled at the fact that he was already looking back, a slightly concerned expression etched into his face.

“Is something wrong?” 

He snapped out of it the moment the words left her lips, his face hardening. “No.”

“Forget I ever asked,” she responded, turning away from him for good and focusing on her textbook. No, there was no way he could be what she smelled in her Amortentia. She liked to think that her subconscious wasn’t secretly a masochist.

~

Friday evening swung around again, much to Y/N’s dismay. She’d had a talk with Hermione later on in the week, confirming that no, she did not smell Malfoy in her Amortentia, and that yes, she was still abiding by the plan that Hermione had so carefully laid out for her. It did bother her a bit that she could be lying to her on both fronts--but at the end of the day, she was going to get the answers that Harry wanted, no matter what. 

She just had to get through the scary ass castle first. She’d forgotten how spooky Hogwarts was after her previous sprint to the door, and this time she was positively trembling by the time she turned another dark corner on her way to McGonagall’s office. Yet another cursed item had been found in the girl’s lavatory on the 3rd floor, right by some of the classes that she had taken earlier in the week. The fact that whoever was out there was capable of dark magic and actively wanted to hurt people terrified her, all that Gryffindor bravery be damned. 

So when she heard footsteps suddenly right beside her, it was no wonder that she jumped feet in the air.

“Fuck!” she sputtered, turning to see a very familiar blonde in Slytherin robes. He was frozen in place, curiously looking her up and down.

“Am I interrupting something?”

“Malfoy,” Y/N said, resisting the urge to melt into a puddle of relief at the sight. This wasn’t right--wasn’t he a suspected Death Eater? “You scared me.”

He scoffed, digging his hands into his pockets. “You’re supposed to be the brave ones, right?”

“Huh?”

Malfoy motioned to her Gryffindor jumper. 

“Oh.” Heat rushed to her cheeks as she realized what he meant. “I dunno. I just get jumpy around the castle at night.”

“No shit.” They’d begun to walk now, side by side. Y/N couldn’t remember ever walking with him before--she’d always been late. “Do you think I forgot the way you screamed when you saw me at the tower?”

“Shut up,” she grumbled, reaching over and giving him a healthy shove. 

They walked in silence together. Malfoy moved noticeably slower than he normally did so he wouldn’t leave Y/N’s shorter legs in tow. McGonagall seemed pleasantly surprised to see Malfoy hold the door open for her.

“I’m glad to see you two getting along,” she said, giving Y/N a hesitant nod before grabbing the stack of papers on her desk. “I’ll be back momentarily.”

After she exited the room with a swish of her deep maroon robes, Malfoy turned to her. “Are you scared of the dark or something?”

She turned, ready to send a biting retort his way, before she noticed how gray his pallor looked...and how big the circles under his eyes were. “You look like shit, Malfoy. Is everything okay?”

He rolled his eyes. “Don’t change the subject.”

“Oh. Um…” Y/N pause before deciding that the little tidbit of information she was about to reveal wasn’t that important anyways. “I’m just on edge at night at Hogwarts is all. Especially with all that weird shit going on with all the cursed objects. So I kind of hate walking to and from detention.”

Malfoy let out something that sounded like a strained laugh.

“You didn’t answer my question. Is everything okay?”

“None of your business,” he snipped. “I just had a bad night.”

“Do you have trouble sleeping?” she asked, unable to keep herself from prying.

“Something like that.”

“Have you tried lavender?”

“I’m sorry?” He frowned.

“Lavender. Like the essential oil. It’s nothing magical,” she explained. “I just like to spray it in my bed sometimes before I sleep. Or I’ll use a few drops in a diffuser. I have trouble sleeping too, all the time, actually.” She shut her mouth before she had any chance to ramble further.

“It sounds a bit too floral for my taste.”

“Here.” Y/N dug around in her satchel, searching for the tiny spray bottle she kept with her at all times. “Borrow this and spritz your pillow with it before you sleep, and then tell me it’s too floral. I promise it helps.”

He glared at her. She extended her hand with the white bottle that was covered in purple decor, raising her eyebrows expectantly. “I won’t tell anyone that you have it if that’s what you’re worried about or whatever.”

“Fine,” he snapped, snatching it from her hand and dragging his fingers over her palm for just a second. “Don’t expect me to actually try it, though.”

“Just give it a sniff.” 

He huffed, but to her surprise, he actually uncapped the top and held the spray hole up to his nose, inhaling in once.

The effect was immediate. Malfoy’s face completely drained of color, becoming even grayer than he’d been when she first saw him under the light. The briefest expression of surprise fleeted over his face before he wiped it off, replacing it with something unreadable and tossing it back at her. “I’m not using this.”

“Why not?”

“Not quite my taste,” he spat.

Y/N was shocked by the sudden outburst, watching as he continued to glower at his desk. “I don’t understand. It really does help you sleep. I know it seems stupid, but I...really think you should try it. Just once, if anything.”

“Why does it matter so much to you?”

“Because I--” Y/N stopped herself before she let her mouth run without check. “I know what it’s like is all. I feel like shit if I don’t sleep. Plus, I have to spend time with you every Friday. I imagine that you’ll be slightly more tolerable if you sleep more.”

“Hm.” He sent her a particularly venomous glare. “Thanks for your concern. Consider me uninterested, though.”

“You break my heart,” she teased, pulling back her hand and placing the bottle on the corner of her desk. An idea struck her.

“And just what are you smiling about?” Draco said. His lips were turned into a sour frown. 

“Nothing, nothing,” she responded, her voice adopting a sing-song quality. All she had to do now was wait. 

He exhaled, a deep and exasperated sound. Then he turned back to whatever was in front of him.

McGonagall entered the room a few minutes later, nodding cordially at the comfortable silence the two students were in. What she didn’t know was that Y/N was waiting, just waiting for Malfoy to dig through his satchel and stop paying attention to his quill.

She got her opportunity a few minutes later, when McGonagall called him up to look over his latest Transfiguration homework.

“Mr. Malfoy, I’m happy to see that you’re taking more initiative in getting your assignments done...I have to say that you had me a bit concerned…”

While her professor kept Malfoy occupied, Y/N darted over and grabbed his quill. 

Ha.

Malfoy frowned down at his desk when he returned, giving Y/N a suspicious look.

“What is it, Malfoy?” she said, hoping her voice conveyed nothing that might hint that she took something of his.

“Nothing.”

“Hm.”

The rest of detention passed without any more discussion. Y/N was eager to run up to her dorm and set up her plan to be carried out the next morning, but she calmed her bouncing leg and forced herself to keep a straight face when McGonagall dismissed them.

“Got somewhere to be, Y/L/N?” Malfoy’s voice called after her as she sped down the hall towards the Gryffindor tower. 

“What’s it to you?” she fired back.

He didn’t respond. Instead, he picked up his pace until he was walking next to her.

“Aren’t the Slytherin dorms the other direction?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Are they?” 

She allowed herself to be amused by the way words flowed out of his mouth when he was slightly out of breath. “Why are you walking with me?”

“You said it yourself.” He kept his eyes cast on the cobblestones below them. “You don’t like walking alone at night.”

“Uh...oh.” Against her will, her feet froze and she was glued to the ground. “You’re joking, right?”

If the lighting wasn’t so dim, Y/N would have good reason to believe he was blushing with how intently he was studying his fingernails. “By all means, I can be.”

“No! No, I didn’t mean it like that,” she said, the words tumbling out of her mouth. “Er...I’d like you to. If you want to, that is.”

He shrugged, an elfish expression spreading across his face as he took in how nervous she was. “Well, come to think of it, you didn’t ask me to. I suppose I better get back to the Slytherin dorms anyways. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near the Gryffindor Tower right now.”

“Why?” she squeaked.

“Oh, you know, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that most of the cursed things showed up on your side of the castle, yeah?”

She gulped.

“I gotta get going. Don’t want to stand around here too long. This place gives me the creeps.” With that, he turned and began walking away.

“Malfoy?” She hated how timid her voice sounded. “Consider this me asking you to walk with me.”

He slowly faced her, a sly grin plastered all over his face. “Oh? Did I hear that correctly? Do you want me to?”

“I’m only going to say this once,” she said, putting her hands on her hips and trying her best to look intimidating. “Walk with me. Please.”

“I guess I’ll take it.” Malfoy glided down the hallway to her in just a couple steps, sending her yet another smug look.

“You made up that whole ordeal about Gryffindor Tower being targeted, didn’t you?” asked Y/N as they rounded the corner to reach the staircase leading up to the common room.

“You bought it, didn’t you?” 

“Who says I didn’t just want you to walk with me?” pushed Y/N. This was as close to flirting as it would ever get for her--but it looked like, somehow, things were falling into place. The heat in her cheeks must’ve been from the excitement of making progress. 

Malfoy’s toe caught on the first stair and, if it weren’t for Y/N’s steady grip on his arm, would’ve made him go sprawling across the stone steps. 

“Merlin, Malfoy,” she said, immediately dropping her grip from his shoulder. “What’s gotten into you?”

He responded with an unceremonial snort and a withering glare. The rest of the walk was done in silence, and Y/N noted how careful his footwork became around the Gryffindor steps.

“This is me,” she finally said once they reached the tapestry for the Gryffindor dorms. He seemed surprised, and only then did it strike her that he’d probably never seen the entrance himself before. “Thanks for being such a gentleman.”

“I live to serve,” he drawled.

And just like that, he was gone.

~

Her plan was simple. She had located an extra monogrammed pouch in her cabinet, a rich mahogany color with her family crest in a vivid gold, and placed both his quill and the lavender bottle. She would corner him after breakfast or follow him out of the Great Hall and show him then.

However, it was becoming increasingly obvious that Malfoy was not coming to Saturday morning breakfast. Many people didn’t, but Y/N had never known him to miss it. His normal spot was vacant, and it certainly wasn’t a house-made decision as all of his Slytherin friends were present and accounted for. Y/N couldn’t say for sure, but she could see Parkinson turning her head to the entrance every time the doors thudded open before glancing back to Malfoy’s empty seat when it turned out to be someone else.

Where was that loser?

“Excuse me,” she said to the trio as she stood up and brushed off her skirt. “I think I’m going to go get some fresh air. I have a bitch of a headache.”

Hermione and Harry expressed their sympathies while Ron gave her a characteristic mumble through his mouthful of bread, and she was off with the pouch secured in her cloak pocket.

It was a clear November morning, clearly Mother Nature’s attempt to slowly move the world from the crisp autumn to a cold winter. The sky was clear and the sun’s rays warmed her skin at a slanted angle, casting weak shadows across the courtyard.

If I were Malfoy, where would I go to sulk?

The obvious answer was either the Slytherin common room or his own dorm, but that was without a doubt out of question for her. She wasn’t even sure if she possessed the knowledge to guess which corridor the entrance was in, much less work out the password herself. Beyond that, just getting into the common room and waiting would be...She shivered. It would be a terrible idea while she was clearly wearing a cloak in Gryffindor red and gold trim. 

As she continued her aimless wander around the castle, she heard the slightest sound from the girl’s bathroom on the second floor. It wasn’t ever really in use--no one came in there to actually use the loo unless they wanted Myrtle to materialize and tell them her supernatural troubles while they were in the middle of their personal business--but it was often the source of strange happenings. 

Like the cursed objects she thought to herself, her nails digging into her palms. But did she care about that right now? Surely cursed objects seemed somewhat...suspicious. Dark magic was difficult to hide, and to a pureblood eye that grew up around magical objects, cursed things shouldn’t be impossible to spot. 

And, plus, it was Malfoy she was looking for. None of the students had died from the curses so far, and if she was able to break through and learn something, or at the very least gain his trust, the reward to the Order would be more than worth it.

She stepped in, expecting to see an entirely empty bathroom with perhaps a ghost rattling around at the sink. Instead, a different sight awaited her.

Draco Malfoy was clutching the edge of the cracked sink basin in front of him, rocking himself back and forth and shaking. From her vantage point, she could see that he was dressed in his normal garb--a black ensemble--but his hair was unruly and messy, sticking up in the back like he’d hurriedly tugged something over his head.

A strangled gasp grounded her and halted her curious observations. Malfoy began to make these awful sobbing sounds, like he could barely manage to breathe. 

Y/N was frozen in place as she surveyed her options. If she stayed and tried to talk to him, he might react in anger or hurt her. But if she just left him, like this, all alone...She swallowed once before stepping forward.

“Malfoy? Are you okay?” Obviously he’s not, you bint said a voice deep in her brain. She pushed it aside as he swung around, his wand raised and his eyes blazing. “Whoa! I’m not going to...Put your wand down!”

He stared at her, his eyes wide with horror as he continued to shake, so much so that his wand slipped out of his hand and clattered to the floor. Without thinking, Y/N reached into her pocket and flung her wand away, holding her hands up.

“I’m not going to try anything. I promise.”

As she drew closer, she could see the remnants of tears on his wet cheeks and the way that his silver eyes were rimmed with a bloodshot red. 

“You shouldn’t be here,” he hissed, his voice weak and cracking. 

“Neither should you. This is the girl’s bathroom.”

final a/n: ok so lmk if you guys wants me to continue. i really did not edit the last half fjkdsal;f also kinda made this an au where malfoy tried to assassinate dumbledore. with more than one cursed object but dw it’ll all make sense ill clear that up 😭

[somecunttookmyurl]

Idk who donny is but I want you to know reading thru those posts made me very angry for you and @ him bc like COME TF ONNNNN WHAT AN ASSHOLE WTF

you should be glad you haven't been around for the ongoing donny saga. i posted a video he made for the mental welfare commission once and everyone wanted to murder him without about 10 seconds. everybody who has ever met him hates him, including my GP but the rundown if you want it

- i was referred to him for an adhd diagnosis by a therapist who made it VERY ABUNDANTLY CLEAR i do not suffer from anxiety

- spent 2.5 years at every appointment insisting i have anxiety, something nobody who has spoken to me for 5 seconds could ever accuse me of. including the adhd guy i just spoke to who said "you definitely do not have anxiety whatsoever that's just ludicrous"

- was so convinved i Secretly Have Anxiety Not ADHD that he once prescribed a drug that had severe interactions with 3 other things i was taking and could - this is not hyperbole - have killed me. i had the good sense to confer with a pharmacist after 3 days who panicked and told me to cease usage immediately because i was maybe a day or 2 away from suffering a seizure and as i live alone unable to call for help, that type of seizure may well have been fatal

- i left a message for donny before making that call and he did not call back to check in for 2 weeks. had i waited for his opinion i would no longer be here

- had absolutely no idea how to treat me and as such i was the one coming up with all of the treatment options. which he was extremely dismissive of every time and had to "confer with the specialist first". on every occasion, the specialist agreed with the proposal. i now learn that every time he did that, he was taking credit for the ideas and research

- repeatedly claimed that he had asked the adhd specialist to meet with me (at my rquest) and the specialist had declined because he "saw no benefit" in a direct conversation. i now learn that this, too, was a lie and no such requests were ever made

- cannot tell the difference between hypomania and adhd hyperactivity

- cannot tell the difference between external adhd presentations and anxiety even after being informed of what those are

- insisted for 2 years that the brief psychotic disorder (with stressor) i have been experiencing for 15 years and know damn fine well how to deal with was, you guessed it, anxiety. if that were the case i would have absolutely been studied by psychs for being such a rare and bizarre presentation but, surprise! no.

- expressed no concern over the rapid and severe weightloss i experienced on a different drug he prescribed that was not stopping because i was still a normal weight. i have previously had issues with disordered eating.

- has never heard of adderall, or bupropion (wellbutrin)

- willfuly ignored the Royal College of Psychiatrists (Scotland) guidelines on good practice for treatment of adult adhd. because he was not even familiar with the document. that he is supposed to read. as part of his job.

- refused to transfer my care to another consultant, constantly, until i wrote a 16-page document detailing the extent of his malpractice and negligence thus shaming him in front of the entire clinic. for which he is now under investigation

- never administered any adhd rating scales and ignored proper drug titration procedure

- even after finally arranging for a consult with the adhd guy (post "you are at best negligent and at worst actively dangerous" letter) did not transfer my care in the meantime to another consultant meaning i have been without access, and woefully insufficiently medicated, since december

i mean there's more the guy truly is a fucking stain upon this earth but that about covers the worst of it

[oonajaeadira]

Sunday Seven: August 1

In an effort to read more fic and support more fic and get through my massive to-read list, I wanted to do a post once a week to hype some stuff I’m liking.

And, because I like a theme and want to love up all my boys, each Sunday will list one fic featuring each of my favorite boys--Din, Ez, Pero, Jack, Javi, and Frankie. I know there are amazing fics out there featuring other characters, (which is why I’ll keep the seventh spot open for wild card), these are just the boys I love reading the most and occupying the most real estate on my to-read list.

🔥indicates spicy stuff

DIN: The Waterpark by @starlightmornings 🔥(for ch.5 mainly) I do not read a ton of crackfic, but when I do, I love them to be as off the wall as this one. Chapter 2: Don’t Blow It is a personal favorite, but this whole series is a howl.

EZRA: Read to Me by @mandocrasis Short, sweet, and soft, a simple moment of Ezra being comforting in a moment when he is needed most. This is a distilled moment of soft Ez, and--if you know me, you know I cannot resist Ezra and books and reading out loud. I just love love love this one.

PERO: Fiercely Gentle by @absurdthirst This. Melted me. Just a pile of fkn goo. It’s a bite-sized fic about choosing Pero as your husband because you see what others don’t and I’m just done.

JACK: Bad Decisions by @themand0lorian So I have to confess something up front, I would be mortified if anyone sang to me during karaoke. Just balls out embarrassed, and I can put up with a lot. It’s a nightmare of mine. THIS FIC THO. I don’t know how Marnie did it, but she made it into something I don’t know if I could live without. The thought of Jack belting out AC/DC kind of revvs me anyway, but the writing of this is all in the visuals and it’s glorious. I very much agreed with the reader character statements at the end. Yes.

JAVI: untitled by @just-here-for-the-moment I can’t stop thinking about this story (less a pun intended and more an homage). There’s something so soft and lovely and vulnerable about this piece, and I’m impressed that she made me gasp with the “talking at the same time” convention. Everything here is truthful and graceful and happens exactly as it needs to and doesn’t flinch from Javi being Javi for all his flaws and selective hidden softness.

FRANKIE: untitled by @radiowallet This is Frankie when he’s jealous at the beach. I love his quiet possessive side. The tiny twist at the ending is kinda my favorite thing. <3

WILD CARD -- RP ACCOUNTS I’ve been a long-time fan of the soft and lyrical @inquiries-for-ezra and recently enjoyed the daily affirmation coaching of @agent-jack-d . I’ve learned that there are a whole SLEW of PCU roleplay accounts! I’ve put together a list here and if you have any others that I’ve missed, please let me know! (I’m sure there’s more for the TF crew I’m missing....) Three new ones popped up this week alone, including a Great Wall duo of the fantastically grouchy @pero-tovar-bastard-spaniard and the disturbingly charming @very-heroic-william-garin . My favorite of the moment is definitely @morally-gray-prospector who does a really smart and amazing pre-Prospect Ezra. I believe all of these accounts are 18+ for obvious reasons--although not all of them are amorous accounts. If you choose to engage, make sure to read their individual rules and guidelines before playing along! Link to the list of PCU RP accounts

[whaleofatjme1920]

《I'm Tiana, she/her pronouns, Dr Clef and romantic *not because I'm lonely or anything*. Oh I'm 19 and I never learnt how to fucking read》

{With the letter is a flower press of a blue cornflower.}

Hey stranger

I know what you're thinking... why tf am I sending you a letter after not saying anything after I left. I'm sorry ok. I just didn't know what to say. I hope you're taking care of yourself.

Just wanted to say that everything is going good over here. Just got my results and I'm surprised that I did well. I started gardening again... this time the plants are actually growing. Yeah I'm surprised too. Nothing really exciting is going on besides me seeing a delivery man getting robbed. So he was at a stop street and they jumped out of the bushes, pushed him off his bike, took the food and ran away. I helped him... after giggling a bit. I'm sorry but it was kinda funny seeing something like that happen. All in a day in South Africa.

I miss you. I hope you know that. I miss slow dancing with you at 1 in the morning. I miss your singing. I miss your snarky comments and your mischievous smirks. I miss all your little hugs and kisses. I miss all the 'that's what she said,' jokes I miss looking into those beautiful eyes. Have I told how lovely they look? Gosh I hate to admit it but I miss your god awful jokes.

I forgot to ask, how is everyone at the foundation? What did Bright get up too? Did Kondraki get that picture I left on his desk, the clefdraki one? Gosh I miss teasing him about that. Damn I miss everyone. Hopefully I might come visit you guys, if life doesn't fuck me over. Anyways that's all for now.

I love you ... re mom. Jk jk I love ya cleffy, more than you'll ever know.

Tiana

^Hi Elsie wanna say really appreciate you doing this and I love your writing style. Have a wonderful day, eat enough food and drink plenty of water. ^

[Disclaimer: Letters To Those you Hold Dear is a special event I'm holding from December 9th - whenever I feel like closing it! The absolute deadline is December 21st. Find guidelines here so you can send a letter or two to those you hold dear <3]

Nice to "see" you too stranger,

Actually, I wish I could say that it was nice to finally hear from you, but, I gotta admit, you hurt my feelings when you up and left like that without a single word. I was worried I can't believe you left without a trace and that was rude. Y'know?

But whatever, you're writing to me now and that's all I can ask for. I'm real happy to hear that things are going alright for you. You got back into gardening that's good. I remember you brought in a tomato plant and the thing looked like it suffocated in your office space. Finally revealing you have a green thumb anyways, huh? Sounds lively over there. Are you okay? Doesn't sound like something to shrug off, or even giggle at, but, the things that are normal with you are things that aren't for me and vice versa.

Everyone here at 19 is doing just fine. It's a little monotonous as of late, but nothing we can't really handle. Bright's been terrorizing the opening level researchers, which I've been happily joining him on. Konny's looking to take up some seminars. I find that interesting and almost sad. The man hates other people, why does he want to teach them now? I assume he got your pictures because he doesn't want to be in the same hallway as me. We miss you over here too.

Especially me, I miss you a lot. You're far, far away from me, you realize that, right? I miss your laughter and the little things you'd say. I miss your touch. I miss looking at you and actually enjoying my day and the things I'd see just because I knew you were the one making me feel that way. You've always been the star lighting up my night sky.

That's enough mush.

Yours,

C.

[Attached with the letter is a pressed clump of forget me nots, along with a little note reading "saw these and though of you."]

Hi love bug,

Thank you so much, that's so incredibly sweet of you to say! Doing this kind of stuff makes me happy because I know it makes you guys happy. I hope you enjoyed this. Have a wonderful day yourself.

Lots of love, Elsie

[thebeauregardbros]

“The Ultimate Character Questionnaire”: Alus Beauregard

a fuckton of random questions abt alus ramblingly answered

questions stolen from [here]. i cut out ones that ask the same questions i accidentally answered prior, or just didn’t interest me enough to answer, so if you wanna do this for your own OC I recommend copy+pasting it from the source!

Basic Character Questions

First name? Alus (pronounced ‘Ah-Loose’)

Surname? Beauregard (taken from adoptive father)

Nicknames? Alus wants to be called “Al” but it doesn’t stick because his name is already short. Lots of people unfortunately call him Alice. he does not like that

Date of birth? unknown but he celebrates his birthday on All Saint’s Wake (aka Halloween)

Age? Funfact: Alus and Arc’s age is the age between the RPers’ real-world ages (I’m 24, Arc’s player is 25, but for a brief period Arc’s player becomes 26 while I’m still 24.) So they’re going to be 25 this year (2020)... what the fuck. stop growing. dont do that.

Physical / Appearance

Height? I... he’s tall. Despite Alus being the max height for Miqo’te characters (5′8″/173cm), other male Miqo’te RPers say their characters are taller than that anyway, so I’m like.. not sure what to answer. I don’t want to break reasonable canon of what’s possible for Miqo’te but I also don’t want him to be short or average sized in comparison to other average Miqo’te. I’m just gonna say, definitively, “Alus is tall for a Miqo’te”. If you have a tall Miqo, Alus is just as tall. Or half an inch taller. Take that as whatever you want. I’m tired.

Weight? I... don’t know? This question really doesn’t clarify anything to me; people can be the same height and weight and look totally different in body type. If you absolutely had to get an answer from me, my best guess is maybe somewhere between 170lbs-180lbs? (assuming he is 5′8″)

Build? Wide shoulders, slender hips, long legs, big wide chest and a nice strong core. He is muscular; burly and brawny; his body type feels intimidating and large. He has a healthy amount of fat over his muscles, but still has much clearly visible muscle especially while flexing.

Hair colour? Golden blonde; it’s got a subtle yellow-ish tone that reminds you of sunshine.

Hair style? Alus’ hair is naturally thick and wavy. His hair is grown out long; about armpit length. His hair is choppy, even somewhat feathered. It’s a bit badly damaged from years on the road, but the split ends and fly-aways sparkle brilliantly in the sunlight like a messy halo around his head. His hair naturally very poofy, like damaged 80s hair. Long bangs that were once pushed back fall gracefully over his face like a wild child running about in spring. Whilst resting away from work, he braids it loosely.

Eye colour? Heterochromia; A raspberry red in one pupil, and a sun-shiny yellow-orange in the other.

Eye Shape? Thin and serious, and slightly down-turned. Small double-lid.

Glasses or contact lenses? His eyes are overall pretty healthy, but he’s slightly far-sighted. He uses glasses once in awhile to read, but they’re not super necessary.

Distinguishing facial features? Heterochromia and his adult male Miqo’te markings. He tends to wear purple eyeshadow around his eyes and a subtle purple lip tint.

Which facial feature is most prominent? The facial structure of Alus more resembles an Elezen than a typical Miqo’te; he has a long slender nose, a oval face shape and noticeably high cheekbones.

Which bodily feature is most prominent? Alus’ lion-like tail is somewhat unique among other typical Miqo’te.

Other distinguishing features? His style of dress tends to stand out in a crowd; he favors pure white and soft pastels over more popular color tones among adventurers like blacks and greys. Also unlike the typical adventurer, he is more want to wear fabrics of the fancy and soft nobleman, decked out in frills and lace like a prince locked far away in a chamber more than any man on a dusty and bloody battlefield.

Skin? Uh... a... “medium tan” skintone? (again I have no idea how tf I’m supposed to figure out labels for skin tones when there’s no widely used phrases for specific tones fghdjkgh) with a “warm gold undertone”. The small amount of skin that’s ever exposed upon him is surprisingly soft, as if he never did much hard work in his life. [SPOILER]Underneath his clothes, however...The countless scars upon his torso, back, legs and upper-arms are rough and hard, like treated leather.[/SPOILER]

Birthmarks? Not that he knows of. He has lots of scars from messing around in his childhood but he can’t remember the origin of them all. Any of them could be birth marks as far as he can tell.

Tattoos? None! And he never plans to get one. He has yet to see any tattoos that match his personal aesthetics of what he’d put on his body yet and even if he did, he can’t imagine liking them enough to want to get one.

Physical handicaps? [SPOILER]Numbness in various small patches of skin throughout his body.[SPOILER]

Type of clothes? I already answered this somewhat but if you’re curious about specifics, I made [this pinterest] of stuff I’d imagine he’d wear. Pretty much just take the “aristocrat” Japanese street fashion genre and turn it white, and give it a bit of a gold trim. Lots of frills and lace; heavily inspired by fantastical shoujo manga glorified depictions of what a Prince Charming looks like in medieval setting fairy tales.

How do they wear their clothes? Some (not all) of the specific guidelines I have in my head of what his wardrobe’s like; Colors are only pastels, white, or gold - once in a blue moon he might wear a rich dark raspberry red color or bright orange or yellow. He will NEVER wear grey or black. Pants have to be long enough to reach the ankles. He prefers wearing his shirts tucked-in. Clothes MUST fully cover everything on his body excluding head, neck, and hands at all times - low neckline acceptable in off-duty time. Under special occasions only (ie beachware); lower arms, top of feet or shins can be uncovered. He wears a lot of jabot ties.

What are their feet like? (type of shoes, state of shoes, socks, feet, pristine, dirty, worn, etc) Alus takes his quality of fashion seriously. He’s the type of guy who wears expensive fancy soft white socks trimmed with gold nobody will ever see with the little suspenders on his legs to keep the socks from sagging down. He adores wearing white pointed dress shoes, especially if they have a bit of a high heel. Gold jewelry or buckles are lovely, and any shoe with lace, bows, ribbons, fancy beadwork or faux flowers are supreme. (Google image search ‘Bridal Boots’ if you wanna see his shoes. He’d seriously wear any of them.)

Race / Ethnicity? hhhhhhhhh it’s 5am man I dont have the energy to google faces until i find a reasonable faceclaim and try to figure out that person’s ethnicity... they’re Fantasy Characters... alus is a miqo’te.. maybe had some elezen or hyur in his lineage? idk

Mannerisms? Alus is like a living embodiment of a cartoon Disney prince. I don’t know how to better describe it; He’s elegant and gentle for the most part but can also so comically stiff you could mistake him for an automaton or a piece of background cardboard - then when the moment hits, he can spring into an unrealistic slapstick looney toon nightmare. He always seems to be in a constant state of floating between elegance, stiffness, and slapstick. There is never a break. There is never an in-between.

Are they in good health? For their active life circumstances of constant physical hardship, they are in amazingly good health.

Do they have any disabilities? I don’t think of ADHD as a disability (and I’m saying that as someone who has autism and most likely ADD or ADHD myself) but it’s classified by a lot of people as a disability. So yeah, uh, Alus absolutely has ADHD.

Personality

Are they more optimistic or pessimistic? Definitely more optimistic, sometimes to a fault. I think there’s a degree of choice in there but he’s kinda lost the boundary between blind trust and trying to believe in people and situations because he morally wants to. He is still a worry wart, and that is what causes him to fight so hard as he does for making things around him better as well as making himself better - but I think he makes a very active effort of not letting anyone see that part of him, maybe in an effort to convince himself as well that everything is and will be okay.

Are they introverted or extroverted? Extroverted in a lot of ways and introverted in others. Alus loves and thrives around people, and I think he’s a bit more drained than the average person when he’s alone vs. being in a crowd, but he’s still living more as an introvert - one-on-one deep talks can make him extremely anxious. He’s great at the surface niceties but can often find himself too devoted to strangers, which leads him into trouble sometimes. He’s like a really great social co-worker and a extremely awkward off-duty member of society that doesn’t really know how to function or navigate normal relationships.

Do they ever put on airs? A b s o l u t e l y. Alus’ entire persona is carefully hand-crafted over a lifetime. It’s not to say “This isn’t who he really is, he’s a liar”, but moreso “He’s not quite the person he wishes he was yet.” He makes a really large effort to put on airs of this confident and beautiful Princely type of heroic figure straight out of a fairy tale where he simultaneously knows that such a goal is impossible, since this isn’t a story book - this is real life, he is flawed and complicated, and nothing is as perfect as you wish it was. But he keeps trying no matter what.

What bad habits do they have? Low-key bullying his brother, for sure. Arc is the only person Alus just can’t really put on airs with so his perfect image just breaks down around him. While Alus appears to be a very gentle and kind individual around other people, he’ll comically slap and roast his brother without mercy. (Don’t worry; it’s mutual between them.)

What makes them laugh out loud? Almost anything. Alus is definitely a big giggler, and an even bigger loud spontaneous laugher.

How do they display affection? There’s two major levels of it. First, it’s showering you with little gifts - sweets, flowers, even money if you’re in need, with nothing asked in return. If you’re very close to him, it’s skinship; he loves spontaneously hugging others and holding hands and all that kinda platonic stuff. He’ll pretty much not let go of your arm if you’re around him. He also loves dancing with people, you bet he’ll do the whole nine yards of weaving you around him, lifting you above his head and dipping you.

Mental handicaps? Hates being touched. He has some really bad memories of being manhandled and despises any type of physical restriction on himself, especially from people he doesn’t find VERY close to him. He hates even more to be seen in casual clothes, especially clothes that expose his skin. He’s really not a fan of his exposed body and it’s gonna take a lot for him to get over it. He’s slowly getting better but it’s a long journey.  

How do they want to be seen by others? Someone to look up to; someone to rely on. He wants to be the hope for humanity, essentially. He wants to inspire others to heroism and kindness just by seeing him, and he wants to make the world a better place just by existing in it.

How do they see themselves? Someone who’s just not good enough; Someone who needs to keep working to be better; someone who’s chosen destiny is to be the hero of humanity.

How are they seen by others? Probably as a weirdo. He definitely comes off as eccentric; his strange comedic ramblings and sudden dancing mid-conversation, as well as his random gifts and bag full of pranks, magic tricks and fireworks just really feel off-the-wall. His immediate devotion to others may also come off as exceedingly suspicious. I think how he dresses and his cafe also indicate he’s kind of the ‘rich unhinged guy’ stereotype. People who know him well though know that he’s an extremely good person who would give you the clothes off his back if you needed them more. He loves humanity and would do anything for it.

Strongest character trait? His stubborn devotion to his ideals, for sure. If he wants something, he’ll work his hardest to make sure it happens.

Weakest character trait? Far too trusting of strangers; he gets taken advantage of very easily, and he’s almost always happy to come back for more. He’ll even give the biggest villain a 2nd and 3rd and 4th chance. His inability to condemn anyone as truly evil may cause far more hardship for everyone in the long run than if he just chose to kill the person or lock them up indefinitely and be done with it.

How competitive are they? Alus thrives in competitive environments due to an absolute love and adoration for sportsmanship. He does a fantastic job making his competitors have fun and feels that a competition that is too one-sided doesn’t have any fun or worth. He loves difficult competition because he feels that it helps better himself and his rival.

Do they make snap judgements or take time to consider? Oh, he’s absolutely a “strike now while the iron’s hot” type of a guy. He knows that even a second of a wait can change things for the worse. He’s also definitely a philosophical type that thinks over every possible scenario in his mind in his off-time, but ultimately, he’ll always be the one running off to get things done as soon as they’re brought to his attention. He’s the opposite of his brother, who wants to slow things down before making rash decisions. Alus just knows those decisions need to be made, so it might as well be now, so he just gets it done and worries about the outcome later.

How do they react to praise? He’s actually probably never used to it. I think he has a bit of a low self-esteem problem in how he sees himself as never quite as good as he wants himself to be, so praise can catch him off-guard pretty easily. He’ll cover that up by clumsily stating something comically over-the-top like “Of course, I am incredible! I am the best! Mwahahaha!” but not before gasping for air and stuttering like a shy schoolgirl first.

How do they react to criticism? He has a great ability to deflect toxicity into positivity; he asks what people mean and tries to understand them. I think if the criticism can be taken as constructive, he’s always happy to take it. If the criticism is just plain mean, I think he’ll ask if there’s anything he can do to help the person he’s talking to - he knows nobody would say such mean things to another unless they were having a pretty bad day.

What is their greatest fear? Oh, y’know. Losing his brother. Slugs and slimy things. If you wanna get painful and philosophical about it, I think he’s terrified of the future. He tries to live in the moment and just do the best he can at all times, but when he sees that what he does doesn’t help a lot of the world to stay safe, it freaks him out. In his mind, he’s doing a lot, but in reality - it’s not much at the grand scheme of things. He tries not to think about it too much. He tries not to think much of the past either - of all the mistakes, of what he could and couldn’t have done. It frustrates him. I guess you could say his greatest fear is his own limits. It never feels like he’s doing enough, or even if he ever could do enough.

What are their biggest secrets? [SPOILERS, OBVIOUSLY] Alus is absolutely disgusted with the military powers of the world, and the politicians. He tries to stay optimistic and bright on the outside - he stays useful and does what he can without complaint, he tries to lie to himself and say it isn’t too bad, tries to focus on the good these systems do, to be placated and trust his brother that things will work out alright in this setup - but he sincerely wishes that somehow they could be abolished entirely. He’s frustrated with the idea of any one person or power having control over the lives of others - people those single powers may never meet - will inevitably cause a lack of humanity and understanding of others. Nobody should have this power, not even him, not even the gods. As Alus’ writer, I don’t think he knows a good alternative, he just knows he’s seen enough immoral and inconsiderate shitfuckery in these systems that he can barely stand it anymore. I think many soldiers probably feel like this eventually. [/SPOILER]

What is their philosophy of life? literally just look at the [quote insp tag]

When was the last time they cried? I FEEL LIKE ALUS IS THE TYPE TO TEAR UP AT EXTREMELY COMMON SHIT TBH?? EVERYTHING IS SO BEAUTIFUL I STARTED CRYING TYPE??

What haunts them? [SPOILER]Literally just... becoming a soldier or a fighter to begin with. He wishes it never happened, he wishes the world didn’t need fighting to begin with. But he knows he can never go back now, and even if he did, he’d probably still become a soldier all over again. It’s all he can do in this violent, terrible world.[/SPOILER]

What are their political views? Notable traits would supporting equality rights for Beastmen, more funding towards helping refugees, more funding to adoption agencies and orphanages, more transparency about tax profit and spending, creating opportunities for different countries to share their culture.. etc. (Note: I like to believe that larger glaring IRL political issues like lack of LGBTQ+ rights, gender inequality, ableism, skin-color-based racism and other large current inhumane social problems aren’t problems in FFXIV’s universe. If your RP character uses bigotry in accurate line of these IRL social issues as a character trait, you are not welcome in my RP circle. Period.)

What will they stand up for? He hates violence in general, so he’ll do whatever he can to stop it. Anyone who seems to be controlling or keeping other people against their will is something he loathes. No means no!

Who do they quote? Urianger. like a lot. Probably mostly accidentally; he picks up a lot of vocal mannerisms from the guy.

Are they indoorsy or outdoorsy? Outdoorsy, for sure. He grew up under the stars and being forced indoors for a long time will probably give him feelings of anxiousness and claustrophobia, especially if the space is small. He has had some bad experiences being unable to go outside so he takes his freedom to roam outdoors very seriously.

What is their sinful little habit? He loves sweets. This guy is all about boasting a healthy diet, but his weakness shows the exact opposite. More serious answer: He tends to procrastinate bad, especially when it comes to his passive military duties.

How do they treat people better than them? If they breathe, they’re royalty. Utmost respect and courtesy. Treats them as if he’s the royal butler to their fancy ass selves, even if they’re the lowest of the low in poverty.

How do they treat people worse than them? Honestly? Pretty much the same answer as above. If he gets truly angry at someone, he’ll tell them how and why straight-up, but he’ll never stop giving them the respect and courtesy he believes every human being deserves.

What quality do they most value in a friend? Someone who is as ridiculously open-hearted and ready to confess love to the nearest person along with anything else in the world as Alus tends to do, but also someone who pays close enough attention to him that they can tell when he’s in distress. Alus has a hard time speaking up about when he feels uncomfortable, so someone who has a talent for empathy - detecting other peoples’ emotions - would be incredibly invaluable. That’s the fastest way to his heart.

What do they consider an overrated virtue? None, and all. He thinks that if anyone gets carried away with any traditional virtue to the point that they’re causing evil in the world, they’re just misguided. He understands that - or at least actively wants to understand that - so he can forgive.

If they could change one thing about themselves, what would it be? He... honestly thinks of himself as more of an Elezen than a Miqo’te. So anything that ‘gives away’ that he’s a Miqo’te, he could probably do without. He likes his ears and his tail though! But maybe if he was taller? lmao. (I don’t intend to ever Fantasia Alus FYI, MAYBE if male viera comes out and my partner agrees to it AND I have absolutely no active RP going on, but it’s very unlikely, and if it does happen it will be considered a retcon, not a character development)

What is their obsession? Definitely his aesthetics. He spends an incredibly large amount of time, effort, and money on making himself look and properly act like a “fairy tale prince charming”. It’s not only a philosophical mindset of being moral and heroic, but also being charming and supportive to everyone around himself. He honestly hopes and believes that if he succeeds in creating and upholding this image that every person who rests their eyes upon him will be filled with determination and hope that heroism and safety is real.

What are their pet peeves? He disapproves of the glorification of alcohol, smoking, or any other vices that are bad for the average person’s health. He won’t turn away the people with these vices as potential friends, but he’ll certainly be tempted to lecture them on it. He is also really not a fan of casual skinship between strangers, nor is he a fan of an aggressively pessimistic attitude, nor will he ever really be used to people who wear very little clothing (He isn’t disapproving of the sex industry or sex workers per say, he just doesn’t ‘get it’; he could never imagine himself in their shoes), nor is he a fan of other people trying to change him to be more chill about his aesthetic code (how he dresses, how he positively interacts with others, etc.) - but he tends to be more quiet about his dislike of these things. He tries to stay open minded and patient, but yeah, maybe it’ll take a bit longer to get to ‘close friend’ status with these things.

What are their idiosyncrasies? (special mannerisms?) His posture tends to be stiff as a board: too perfect, like some sort of breathing statue or mechanic humanoid, while at other times it’s as if a switch is flipped to make him become a crazy slapstick ragdoll. He tends to speak in a constant fluctuation of ‘ye olde English’ and common casual speech, and he keeps a few feet distance from people he isn’t especially close with at all times. He’s generous with money and far too trusting of strangers to the point it feels like an overblown parody of these traits. He’s painfully optimistic and takes compliments first with a moment of surprise before he adjusts his reaction with over-the-top narcissistic vigor. He’s a constantly faltering image of himself. He’s a walking symbolism of good-hearted chaos.

Friends and Family

Is their family big or small? Who does it consist of? The only people Alus regards as true family is his twin brother, Arc, and his late adoptive father, Gwenneg. There are other Beauregards in the world, and other great “found family”-esque friends yet to make, but Alus cannot imagine them ever meeting the kind of friendship and connection he has with his brother and had with his father. Perhaps he’s tried in the past, but it just never feels the same. He’s at the point he’s given up on the idea of it happening casually.

What is their perception of family? A close-knit group that is always there for eachother, practically living at eachother’s hips. The type of people you can just glance at and they can read your mind, and even if they disagree with you, they’ll go along with you and fix it later. They’re always up for improving eachother. They are essentially extensions of oneself, and like limbs, even if such is cut - it is carefully looked after and healed, the rest of the body worries and tries to better it, never blaming it’s limb for not being good enough. All part of one system.

Describe their best friend. Arc is undeniably Alus’ best friend. I feel a bit weird talking about my friend’s OC for them, but I will say this; Arc’s strengths are in his slow and strategic approach to things; his love of politics and ability to glide through them, the way he finds the best routes and setups in battle, the timing, everything down to the little tiniest details to turn a battle of either wits or blood - he thinks over all of it, something Alus lacks. And despite being much less prone to trust than the willingly naive Alus, he can find the good in just about anybody when it really comes down to it. Arc knows the dark side of this world and is constantly aware and remembering of it, but understands it’s still worth fighting for. He’s also got a pretty good fashion sense! He seems extremely shady when it comes to his bar business though... It seems to be played up as a joke, but you’re never quite sure as you’re talking to him about it.

Ideal best friend? In assumption this means ‘a best friend besides Arc’, I think Alus’ standards are low. Of course, he’d love to have someone who shares his basic interests of aesthetics and his moral philosophy that centralizes on a love for humanity, and the honor and strength of action to act on it, but he also wants to know someone who can teach him a lot. I think that type of person could be absolutely anyone, especially someone that is nothing like him. Alus doesn’t want to necessarily completely change himself through the journey of knowing anothers’ life, nor change someone else entirely either, even if it’s for the better. He just wants mutual understanding with others. He finds a joy that can be found nowhere else when he feels two people, who don’t have anything in common, can find a common ground. This kind of thing excites him. I think something in-between -- someone who is a lot like him in a lot of ways, but has a few traits he lacks completely -- is ideal for him. 

Describe their other friends / Describe their acquaintances. (combo’d) Alus doesn’t really have other people he regards true friends, I think. He kinda regards every person he meets as his friends. That’s really all there is to it for him.

Do they have any pets? No pets, just a lot of animals that follow him around for food scraps and snacks. He always has an open window for birds and butterflies, and an open door to dodos and chickens and stray cats. He enjoys the company of birds the most, though he’s a fan of the loyal doggy too. In terms of his mounts - He mainly only claims ownership over his military-issued chocobo for paperwork purposes, but regards her as a friend without a voice more than an animal under his ownership.  

Who are their natural allies? Anyone who agrees for humanitarian rights, I think. Alus just exists to be a hero, really.

Who are their surprising allies? People he once fought. He always reaches out a hand for people who’ve made mistakes and tells them that he’ll be their friend if they agree to stop their mean-spirited behavior.

Past and Future

What was your character like as a baby? As a child? Equal combination “good kid” and “absolute little shit”; On the surface, he’d always be loyal to his father and polite to strangers, but the second he and his brother got some time to themselves they’d get into all kinds of shenanigans - especially if they manage to find some way to conceal their identity. Most of those shenanigans were pranks trying to scare people with All Saint’s Wake-esque props. They were also a time they were absolutely not above purposely trying to confuse people on which brother was which whenever it was convenient or just funny.

Did they grow up rich or poor? Poor, but I think he still thought himself as lucky. He might not have had a big room to himself or a lot of possessions, but he got to travel the world and meet so many interesting people and see so many interesting things in his father’s caravan.

Did they grow up nurtured or neglected? Nurtured for sure. His family were joined at the hip.

What is the most offensive thing they ever said? I’m sure Alus used to have a potty mouth when he was a kid and young teen. He picked it up from being exposed to so many different individuals growing up. If he’s been around a lot of sailors in Lima Lominsa, I think it’s a safe bet that he probably swore like one too. After his father died that changed almost immediately though in order to honor his dad’s memory.

What is their greatest achievement? I’m sure there’s much more impressive individual achievements he has accomplished - monsters he’s fought, hostage situations he’s negotiated, villains he’s managed to persuade to become heroes, but if you asked him, he’d tell you that simply being lucky enough to be chosen to become one of the Warriors of Light or opening his cafe are the achievements he’s most proud of.

What was their first kiss like? [spoiler]Still haven’t had it![/spoiler]

What is the worst thing they did to someone they loved? I feel like even though Alus adored his father, he probably did a lot of things to make him worried or stressed out, maybe even ran away once or twice just for the fun of it. It was a lot more innocent time for Alus and I don’t think he’d do anything like that in adulthood.

What are their ambitions? Alus just wants to end all war. Full stop. It’s not that complicated. He doesn’t really know the most effective way how to, though. He just keeps doing whatever he can when people request his help - which usually ends up taking advantage of his physical combat skills.

What advice would they give their younger self? Cherish this time. Hug your father and tell him you love him more often. And maybe focus on being a medic or someone who helps the world peacefully more than someone who uses violence to solve the world’s problems. Maybe care a little more about politics.

What smells remind them of their childhood? Chamomile, road dust, seasalt,  and old fancy dusty antiques. 

What was their childhood ambition? To grow up to be a glamorous warrior that saves the world again and again and to rescue a pretty princess.

What is their best childhood memory? Dancing on the streets of Ul’dah with his brother for a little extra pocket money and becoming unexpectedly popular.

What is their worst childhood memory? Losing his father to the calamity and being passed between temporary foster homes again and again, then finally losing his brother in that mess, too.

Did they have an imaginary childhood friend? Alus left out honeyed milk for faeries all the time as a child. Post-calamity, he started to quietly make-believe that faeries and little unicorns visited him when he was particularly lonely or bored, or just wanted to escape his own mind for awhile.

When was the last time they were crushed with disappointment? [FFXIV POST-STORMBLOOD SPOILER]Hearing about Zenos’ body being revived against Zenos’ wishes for a perfect death.[/SPOILER]

What past act are they most ashamed of? Any time Alus can’t save someone from death. Sometimes, Alus must be the one to kill them himself. This is an unbearable sin to bear for him.

What past act are they most proud of? Any time he can save someone. Any time he can help the suffering of someone by giving a little coin. Every time he has made someone smile. It is all the most cherishable, wonderful memories to him. None better than the others.

Has anyone ever saved their life? His twin brother Arc probably on at least a weekly basis. I think saving eachothers’ lives is a regular thing on a battlefield, even if your ally is basically a stranger.

Strongest childhood memory? Just sitting underneath the stars, curled up under a blanket with his brother while they rest their head on their father’s lap as he reads them bedtime stories.

Love

Do they believe in love at first sight? Absolutely. Guy will trust anyone at the drop of a hat, why not fall in love, too?

Are they in a relationship? Not officially, no. I think he casually flirts a lot and has gone out on sporadic dates with many people, but he hasn’t become anyone’s “steady”.

How do they behave in a relationship? Alus is extremely inexperienced. I think he’ll end up trying so hard to show off to whoever he’s dating that he’ll become exhausted. He wants to treat his future spouse like royalty.

When did you character last have sex? [SPOILER]Never![/SPOILER]

What sort of sex do they have? Nothing kinky or out there, he’s a shy confused mess to begin with when it comes to sex - he’s probably very reserved and traditional about it. I should note that Alus is canonically asexual, even if he doesn’t fully realize it yet. He doesn’t really understand the appeal of sex but he’d want his significant other to be happy. [NSFW/18+] He’d definitely insist on being a top, though. [/SAFE!]

Has your character ever been in love? As an greyromantic writer, I have no fucking solid idea what romantic love is supposed to be defined as. If you define it as ‘fantasizing about having a certain person in mind as a future spouse’ then, yes, Alus has been in love loads of times.

Have they ever had their heart broken? Many times, but it rarely gets him down for too long - he’ll fall in love with the next person he sees, then the cycle restarts.

Conflict

How do they respond to a threat? A fake, forced smile. Explaining calmly to the enemy that what they’re doing is wrong. Explaining calmly to the enemy to drop it and go drink tea with him instead. If being calm doesn’t work, yelling at them about their hypocritical morality like some sort of shounen superhero making a speech.

Are they most likely to fight with their fists or their tongue? Tongue, for sure. Alus will be so painfully reasonable with his enemies that the only way he’s drawing his sword to fight is someone else draws first.

What is your character’s kryptonite? Like any hero, he’s a sucker for hostages. Also, math completely turns him fucking stupid. [SPOILER]Also... having his morality questioned, especially being accused of being a hypocrite.[/SPOILER]

If your character could only save one thing from their burning house, what would it be? A faerie tale storybook from his childhood his father read to him often when he was alive.

How do they perceive strangers? “A friend he doesn’t know yet.”

What do they love to hate? I don’t really imagine Alus truly ‘hates’ anything or anyone, just greatly dislikes or disapproves of them. And even then I think he doesn’t particularly enjoy disliking them. I don’t think he views negative feelings as something to be prideful over.

What are their phobias? Slugs and other slimy creatures, as well as mild situational claustrophobia.

What is their choice of weapon? His fists, for sure; there’s some sort of philosophy inside his mind that fighting with his bare hands or body without tools or weapons to aid him is the ultimate form of respect towards other human beings’ pain and livelihood - he wants them to know he shall feel pain right back if he strikes someone else, and he’s allowing himself the possibility to be hurt in return.

What living person do they most despise? I think anyone who justifies war or pain as a glorious and wonderful thing instead of a tragedy is someone he dislikes. Especially if said person has no respect for human life or the bodies of the fallen.

Have they ever been bullied or teased? Plenty. Unfortunately mostly his given name is particularly targetted. He’s also been called too soft plenty of times.

Where do they go when they’re angry? Home - his house is well soundproofed and cozy. He may go on an off-trail walk alone in the middle of Thanalan or the like.

Who are their enemies and why? The Garlean army, the Ascians.. do you really need to ask why? They wish to create death and chaos, that’s plenty of a reason enough.

Work, Education and Hobbies

What is their current job? Maelstrom military field medic, café proprietor, free paladin

What do they think about their current job? The café is seemingly always empty, but he doesn’t mind continuing to pour money into it. It’s a safe haven to him and a symbol of his independence from the violent life of military duty. Being a field medic is endlessly horrifying, but he’s glad he can help people. His status of Free Paladin makes him obligated to carry out duties to help Eorzea, which is something he’s proud of - but he is always not all that great at drawing his sword at the sign of trouble.

What are some of their past jobs? The only other “jobs” Alus has had in the past were mostly just side jobs for a little extra pocket money, mostly dancing on the street.

What are their hobbies? Dancing, capoeira martial arts, piano, tea brewing, baking, reading, writing, sketching, watercolor art, goldsmithing, fashion, bird keeping.

Educational background? Went to a school for accounting for a few years. He retained absolutely no information about accounting.

Intelligence level? Literate; can read older more complex texts easily. Good with maps. More of a “physical education” kinda guy.

Do they have any specialist training? Paladin training. Nothing else formal.

Do they have a natural talent for something? Weirdly incredibly good at parkour - stuff like navigating tightropes and climbing up buildings without any hesitation or struggle.

What is their socioeconomic status? At the moment, Alus is pretty well-off. He and his brother own their own business in the Lavender Beds, and Alus can afford high class clothes, hobbies, furniture and the like. He’s also prone to donate to charity near constantly.

Favourites

What is their favourite animal? whatever birds are ROUND

Which animal to they dislike the most? S L U G S

What place would they most like to visit? His cafe, honestly. It’s a safe haven.

What is the most beautiful thing they’ve ever seen? People.

What is their favourite song? Simply Satie

Music, art, reading preferred? Alus loves playing piano, drawing sketches and reading storybooks. I don’t think he could trade one for the other! (He’s awful at singing though.)

What is their favourite colour? Pale blue, white, yellow-gold, and pastel pink.

What is their password? “Password”. Nobody will ever get it!

Favourite food: La Noscean toast! (AKA French toast!) with lots of berries and whipped cream!

Who is their favourite artist? ??? ((OOC: if Alphonse Mucha was in FFXIV it’d be him idk))

What is their favourite day of the week? E V E R Y D A Y (but probably mostly Sunday)

Possessions

What is in their fridge: Fresh salad, fruits, fresh berries, vegetables, tofu, jackfruit, orange juice, leftover strawberry shortcake, protein shakes, leftover rice, eggs, butter, yogurt, frozen berries... and even fresh flowers?

What is on their bedside table? A dozen lighthearted fairytale and academic books on aether he recycles through reading every night as he goes to bed, a pitcher & glass of water, a vase with a flower in it, reading glasses, 3 inch tall lil stuffed dodo.

What is in their bin? Compost bin for old fruits/vegetables/egg shells/bread and a recycling bin full of paper and packaging garbage.

What is in their bag? A lot of coin, a hairbrush, a box of ice chilled flowers, travel-size beauty products, lots of fireworks and other fun little spectacle toys, a pocket-sized book of poetry, a basic armor polishing set, a miniature sewing kit, bandages, healing potions.

What is their most treasured possession? A very old and damaged book of fairy tales from his childhood.

Spirituality

Who or what is your character’s guardian angel? His adoptive father - at least, that’s what he wants to believe.

Do they believe in the afterlife? Yes! Very much so.

What are their religious views? [SPOILER]Alus has a complicated relationship with religion. For the most part of his life, he’s believed in The Twelve like every other Eorzean, but as he’s grown older he’s found himself more and more impatient and even disgusted of the cruelties that the gods allow to happen, and the ways followers of Nald’thal and Halone use their religion as a means to prey on the weak for the sake of money, classism, and racial disparity. Hearing the words of Garlean soldiers point out that proof that The Twelve exist is seemingly nonexistent has further disrupted Alus’ belief in them. Alus does, however, firmly believe in Hydaelyn.[/SPOILER]

What do they think heaven is? Alus has no true confident belief in what exactly the seven heavens are, but he likes to think heaven is a place where flowers bloom all the time, the weather is always warm and sunny, bugs don’t bother you and war and violence never happen, and relaxing tea parties are hosted all day long, clothes are comfortable and pretty and never soiled by dirt and mud no matter how much you play in the grass.

What do they think hell is? Like many Eorzeans, Alus believes in the seven hells. The seven hells are a place that one must climb out of to eventually make it to heaven, and depending on how bad of a person you were in life, the deeper in hell you start out in after you die, and the more you have to climb before you get upward into heaven. Alus finds great comfort in this ideology because it means that no matter how bad a person was in life, they may still find forgiveness and redemption in death.

Are they superstitious? I think he’s open-minded. He seems to discover so many legends of being real every day that it’s difficult for him not to believe in anything and everything he hears. He tries to be respectful of the unknown and follow their rules, but when push comes to shove it’s all about the grandest happiness for everyone - he will challenge whatever fae or ghostly apparition that wants to mess with him if he thinks what they’re doing is immoral or unfair. 

What would they like to be reincarnated as? A stream. A rosebush. A rainbow. Something that others can look at and feel at peace, something for others to enjoy. A way to give love without living a life that inevitably creates suffering through heroism. To just exist as part of the beauty in the world.

How would they like to die? He doesn’t know. Death scares him. He does not want to die in battle. He does not want to die sleeping in a bed. But he wishes he’ll be old. He wishes he’ll have lots of friends. And he wishes he did everything he could while he was alive to make the world a better place as much as he possibly could.

What animal is most like your character, spiritually speaking? .... A golden retriever. Eager to please, extremely loving and loyal, a strong body, picky about weird things, and incredibly goofy.

Values

What do they think is the worst thing that can be done to a person? Betrayal?? torture?? bullying?? rape?? what do you want from me. He hates all forms of toxic and violent behavior!!

What is their view of ‘freedom’? The ability to form your own path; the ability to be whatever you want, even if the dream seems impossible to everyone else. The ability to go anywhere you want, walk and run anywhere you want, travel anywhere you want. The ability to say no when you want. The ability to be respected as independent.

How often do they lie? NEVER!!!!!!! He might bend the truth a little bit or side-step an answer but even white lies he’s not into. He rarely needs to white lie about anything anyway; he tends to see the best in everything.

What’s their view of lying? BAD AND UNNESSESARY

How often do they make promises? Constantly.

How often do they keep or break their promises? He 100% keeps his promises unless he’s literally physically incapacitated and in which case he will apologize and try to make it up to you so much

Daily life

What are their eating habits? Vegetarian. He eats really healthy and he eats a lot. Big fan of asian food I think. Has no problems eating stuff that’s bland as hell; I feel like it’s part of his determination to better himself. Has a terrible weakness for sweets, though. Secretly hates stuff that’s slimy, like mushrooms, but he will never complain if it’s given to him.

Do they have any allergies? Nope, he’s lucky. If he does, he hasn’t discovered it yet.

Describe their home. Very white, tons of gold nouveau trim on everything, and tons of flowers everywhere. Looks like the home of royalty. [Here’s his housing aesthetic.]

Are they minimalist or a clutter hoarder? Neither, I think. Maybe leaning closer to minimalist over clutter-lover; he likes everything being clean and easy to access in his house. His design aesthetic of nouveau isn’t necessarily minimalist in inherent style though imo.

What do they do first thing on a weekday morning? Wakes up extra early, takes a quick cool shower to wake himself up, eats a quick and simple breakfast full of protein; most likely something with a lot of nuts and eggs as it’s ingredients + big salad. packs a simple lunchbox and starts his day: Every morning, he walks to the statues of Nald and Thal, viewing the warm pink sunrise in the process. he pays his respects to each; cleans and dusts with a simple cleaning kit he’s left there prior. Leaves some simple offerings. Finds somewhere nice and empty in Thanalan to do some excercises and martial arts training for the day. sits down and eats lunch afterwards. lazily walks home, takes another quick shower to get the sweat and dust off. while his hair is drying, he puts on makeup and decides a proper outfit to wear for the day. meets up with arc, goes on their obliged military-issued mission for the day.

What do they do on a Sunday afternoon? Makes an effort to drag Arc over to his place for a big fancy dinner. Tea and crumpets as an early evening appetizer. Alus cooks everything while Arc hangs out and talks, lending a bit of help when Alus demands asks for him. Arc sneaks in alcohol. Alus yells at him. repeat next week.

What do they do on a Friday night? this but like, outside, alone, in the middle of thanalan somewhere

What is the soft drink of choice? If soft drinks existed in Eorzea I can’t help but feel like Alus is one of those freaks who don’t like any of them.

What is their alcoholic drink of choice? NO

Miscellaneous

What is their character archetype? This question originally linked to some basic archetypes, but I already have TVtropes collected and they’re far more interesting as an answer imo SO: [All-Loving Hero], [Reluctant Warrior], [Cloudcuckoolander], [Warrior Poet], [Stepford Smiler], [Motor Mouth], [Large Ham], [Stupid Good], [In Touch With His Feminine Side], [The Fashionista], [Light Is Good], [Flower Motifs], [Declaration of Protection].

Who is their hero? I don’t think Alus has a specific person in mind that isn’t fictional - fact is, nobody is as perfect as the type of person he strives to be. I think he finds traits of admirable heroism everywhere in people, though. Everything from his friends who fight for the good of the world no matter what, from the villain who unexpectedly saves someone while nobody else is watching, to the single mother who works hard to raise her children, to the homeless people who just continue to fight on to live even when everything feels so hopeless around them. I think he sees traits in others he wishes he had all the time. He wants to embody all the good traits of everyone. And I should mention, if one is to have a ‘hero’, it is expected that person to be better than one, yes? I don’t think Alus believes he’s particularly better than anyone else, especially in their positive traits.

What or who would your character dress up as for Halloween? Alus goes HARD on All Saint’s Wake. He and Arc’s signature best costume always ends up being these hyper-realistic ghost costumes that they trick out with special glamours, magic, and tech to surprise the passerby. If it doesn’t genuinely scare someone, it isn’t enough!

Are they comfortable with technology? I think he’s absolutely got the boomer brain when it comes to allagan technology. He can get by fixing old mechanical clocks and the like but when it comes to allagan stuff, he’s just absolutely out of his element. He’ll certainly listen if someone wants to try explaining it to him, but it’ll take considerable time before he fully “gets it” and usually when he does, it’s more on blind faith and an ability to follow basic directions more than true understanding. I think in general it just doesn’t really interest him and if he’s going to spend the time and energy to learn about it, he’d rather use that energy on his other interests - books, physical training, baking and the like. (Modern AU: He’s absolutely the guy still using an ancient flip phone because “It still works!” Also, he capitalizes and uses perfect grammar in all his extremely-hard-to-type number code texts.)

If they could save one person, who would it be? It’s a difficult question, because of course - the first person to come to mind is Arc. But the thing is, Arc can take care of himself. And Alus knows this. Alus trusts this. So when it comes down to choosing between Arc and someone less capable.. Alus will most likely help the less capable person. If Arc is hurt, Alus knows he’ll forgive him. But if Arc were to die? And it be Alus’ fault? It would utterly crush him.

If they could call one person for help, who would it be? Arc, of course. There’s nobody Alus would rather have by his side while dealing with problems.

What is their favourite proverb? “Since it is likely that children will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and courage.” – C.S. Lewis (Personally my fav proverb in thinkin about Alus is “Because the world is so full of death and horror, I try again and again to console my heart and pick the flowers that grow in the midst of hell.” – Hermann Hesse)

What is their greatest extravagance? This is kind of a depressing and even controversial answer, but it’s honestly any time he has ducked out from military duty with or without permission when all of it has just gotten to him too much. He knows that him not being there will be more of a problem than a solution - he knows that - but any moment he can just pretend, for a moment, that he’s just a normal man running a normal little girlish cafe during a time without war.. That’s his greatest extravagance.  

What is their greatest regret? The amount of enemies he has been forced to down when talk wasn’t enough is piling higher and higher every moon cycle. It’s an absolute horror. He tries so hard to be nonlethal as possible. He’s studied so much how to avoid vital organs, how to down someone without hurting them badly, but no matter what there is always the chance of there being a prior injury he didn’t know about, or a undiagnosed medical problem that was just activated by the smallest knock.. That isn’t even to mention the people who have been hurt because the people he talked down didn’t keep their word or stood back up when he thought they’d stay asleep. No matter what, he just isn’t enough to save everyone. Why is it that no matter how hard he works to have this ideal of pacifism, it never works completely? Why is it never enough?

What is their perception of redemption? That the unwavering truth of this world is that people are fundamentally capable of change. He refuses to believe otherwise, no matter what. Perhaps it is an active choice instead of an instinctual one, nobody is certain for Alus’ mindful case. He believes the expectation for lifelong punishment for a past crime is petty and cruel, and in itself deters people from switching sides for the better. He believes anyone and everyone deserves the right to have the choice to right their wrongs at any time. Don’t misunderstand though - He understands sometimes people are far too gone for simply dropping everything they’ve done and that’s enough to erase their mistakes - he knows that some people can only find rightful redemption in the afterlife after execution, even if execution is not an ideal solution to stopping them in his eyes. But he prays for them. He’ll never give up on anyone.

What would they do if they won the lottery? Back into investments or savings to get an even bigger profit later. Alus knows how to play the smart long game. But uh... If the fates play a trick and he sees a beautiful fashion piece in a shop window, maybe that won’t last too long. He’s also notoriously overly generous with money to the needy, he spends money on service tips like pouring water out of a glass. Money is always moving, and if he starts to run low, he just works a little harder to get back to the comfort zone. He’s in a pretty good place in his life monetarily wise atm already.

What is their favourite fairytale? It’s difficult to answer this because I don’t know what sorts of stories exist in Eorzean canon! But I can say that the real-world 1986 manga “The Sword of Paros” is a huge inspiration to Alus’ character. It’s about a person born with the title of ‘Princess’ who believes to have been born the wrong gender, and does everything in their power to prove themselves worthy of the title of ‘Prince’ despite immeasurable odds against them from their family and their country. The hero also falls in love with a commoner woman who wishes nothing more to be loved by the idyllic image of a charming knight in shining armor that comes and rescues her, and their love is ultimately tragic as it’s also not recognized as valid.. but the prince never stops fighting for his title and the right of his love, and the ability for them both to be happy. Though the story ends without the ideal conclusion, the very concept of these characters fighting against all odds for something genuinely better for the whole world is something Alus is really all about. (Also, seriously, read this manga. It’s groundbreaking. It’s Utena done right.)

What fairytale do they hate? Any faerietales that have unhappy endings, or seem to focus strongly on tragedy or pessimistic ideas of realism in the world. That tends to fall into the category of ‘cautionary tales’ most the time. He’s also really not a fan of stories with body horror or gore.

Do they believe in happy endings? I think he believes that happy endings should always be the goal, but I don’t think he truly accepts that they actually exist. He understands that happiness and safety is always temporary, and this is why he should always strive to make the world a better place. If he helps someone get to a point that they’re happy, healthy, and safe - he’ll just move on to the next person who needs his help. A happy ending for himself though? I think he’s not confident in it, but he wants to live every day to the fullest as he can before he dies. He accepts this as part of his duty - he knows he’s living on ultimately borrowed time.

What is their idea of perfect happiness? Being in love, being surrounded by people you love, having the support of others you trust and having the ability to spoil the people you care about. Having a home you’ll never be kicked out of.. And no war that you have to leave to. No people you have to harm. Just the peace to drink tea with your former enemies as you gaze out onto flowers on a warm day... That’s all he ever wants.

What would they ask a fortune teller? I think he’s concerned if he’ll ever someone to truly share his life with besides his brother. He just really wants a good friend.. Ideally, someone attractive he can hold the hand of!

If your character could travel through time, where would they go? Before the Calamity. He’d just want to listen to his father tell him a few more stories again. He misses the peacefulness of his childhood, the certainty that someone out there stronger than him loved him and wanted to keep him safe, the ability to ignore his own call to war... He wouldn’t so selfish to want to try and bend fate enough to save his father, though he would if he had the chance.. But he knows it’s impossible.

What sport do they excel at? (Modern AU) He was definitely a cheerleader in highschool and/or college, I feel like. Probably into dancing! And ofc a dedicated martial artist. I feel like he’d be pretty good at football and wrestling too - games that require a bulky build to be great at - but he just doesn’t have a particular interest in either of those.

What sport do they suck at? (Modern AU) Probably stuff like archery and tennis -  not only would he’d thrive better in big team sports, he’s just not much for long-range dexterity. He’d also be absolutely incompetent as an esports competitor lmfao.

If they could have a superpower, what would they choose? Anything that was especially effective at saving peoples’ lives. Time travel to stop mistakes before they happen or say the right thing before a war breaks out, super effective healing powers... anything. Just to stop suffering and death.

[itsswimmingtragedycollection]

The Dumpster Fire that is ‘The Order’

First of all, why is his show labeled as a horror? My humble guess is that it was intended for younger audiences?? I genuinely wanna know. Because, even if it was for teens, some blood and a few dead bodies does not a horror make.  Secondly, what the fuck? And I truly mean that.  I mean, the idea itself doesn’t sound bad at all. A college student joins a secret society and finds out his supposedly evil dad is the head of it? He’s also in a werewolf club that fights that same secret society? Sign me tf up. But the execution just takes a really weird turn.  From the get go, you kinda aren’t sure if the show wants to be takes seriously or not. And that question is never answered. Literally in the opening scene the letter changes from ‘we regret to inform you’ to ‘congratulations’ in front of Jack’s eyes and he has absolutely no reaction whatsoever to that peculiar development, which kind of screams ‘not to be taken seriously’ similarly to the whole ‘My evil dad killed my mom so naturally I’m gonna join a secret society, become someone important and powerful and eventually use that power to fight him.’ Who on earth plots a revenge along those lines? But then a second later, the plot falls back in the supernatural drama category.  To top it all off there’s a whole lot of ‘woke humor’ which most of the time comes across as cringe worthy edginess we’re all happy we outgrew after HS.  But, even if you could somehow get pas the not-so-subtle jumps from complete absurdity to realism, there’s nothing else to hold on to. No character, no relationship, no plot line we’re offered is strong enough to pull us in.  In fact. one of the most annoying things about The Order is that basically no character has a personality. I am 8 episodes deep (and I don’t intend to finish it because that’s how boring it is) and I still don’t know anything substantial about anyone. And can we take a second to just look at Jake’s relationship with Alyssa? What even is that? Are they flirting are they not, does he really like her or is she a means to an end, is she into him or his dad, why are they kissing and why does it look so uncomfortable, did they just cast two people with the least chemistry on purpose or is bad writing/directing? So many questions. If we draw a parallel between Jack’s progress with her and him being on board with the wolves, it makes even less sense. He needs how many episodes to decide to try and kiss her, but when it comes to dedicating your whole life to fighting bad magic, you go from ‘no way, you’re all insane, you made me kill an innocent man’ to ‘I pledge my life to the cause’ within two seconds.   Speaking of things that make no sense, I have to mention Jack’s ‘friendship’ with Amir. Don’t get me wrong, I get that we meet people and think to ourselves how that could grow into a beautiful friendship, but acting as if someone you just met is really your friend, and that odd flashback to like one beer they shared, when Amir was found dead, is just... I don’t even know what to say.  The Order as an organization is equally puzzling. Who are they? Why are they? What’s the purpose, what’s the goal, the mission? I can’t settle for just a group of magic users who follow strict hierarchies but kinda all look out for themselves and don’t really like each other that much. And occasionally sacrifice goats. And change people’s memories.(And they can revive a golem and ask it who made it, but the fact that Jack, who found out about magic like yesterday, sabotaged their spell somehow goes right over their magical heads. ) But essentially it’s for the good of the whole wide world.????????????? And the masks are what makes me think an 8yo came up with the whole concept.  If you thought the werewolf knights are any less confusing, think again. They hear noises when ‘bad magic’ happens and solve it by killing anything that moves. Heroes. Also, how do they know what they are supposed to do if they refuse to read anything? I mean, that’s not how a secret society, since that’s more or less what they are, works. Someone has to tell you, show you, teach you. Sure, you have the wolves inside you, but if you don’t know they speak a certain language, it’s fairly certain you don’t know a whole lot. And why is there only four of you? How can four knights take down an organization as big as The Order? Especially since their preferred method is violent murder, something that is not very subtle and does not go unnoticed for long, which basically ensures the rage of the entire Order falling on their heads before they even begin their so called mission. Once again: ????????????????? And what even does ‘bad magic’ mean? The term is so vague and abstract that I have a hard time understanding how can you form an organization that fights something barely defined. All magic can potentially be bad magic. What are the guidelines here? Help me comprehend.  The show also has a very odd relationship towards death. One can sort of ‘forgive’ the wizards and the wolves for being chill about it, but if someone was targeting and butchering people on your campus, wouldn’t you be at least a bit worried? We don’t see any students panicking, we saw one police officer, there were no measures taken by the college, unless you count turning Amir’s death into a bike accident. And just when you start getting used to being casual about it, Jack has a whole meltdown over killing someone the first time he turned. And then also his professor. But even that meltdown is not very convincing, since most of what he does is just screaming ‘I KILLED AN INNOCENT MAN!!!’ into the void, without a much deeper attempt to deal with that. Which is why I don’t get why the show even made an issue out of it.  I also don’t get Jack’s grandpa. Like not even a little bit. Because if you think about it, it’s not * that * unimaginable that a little boy would come up with the idea of joining a secret society to avenge his mother’s death, but it is * very * odd to imagine an old ass grown up who not only thinks it’s a good idea to direct your whole young life towards revenge, but encourages it to a point of making a detailed plan on how to do that, and basically spends your entire childhood grooming you to become a little rage fueled bundle of psychological damage. All of this is only scratching the surface of the mess that is The fucking Order, because the show is a giant entangled coil of nonsense and I barely knew where to start. It’s fair to say that the biggest buzzkill is failure to pick a direction and stick with it. You don’t have to look that close to see some of the influences. The biggest one being, obviously, The Magicians, followed by some Teen Wolf, there’s even elements from Scream Queens, a bit of Buffy, a pinch of the Craft, etc. Almost like someone decided to look up successful shows in the supernatural/fantasy/horror genre and just smash them all up together in hopes of making something appealing to the largest audience possible. Personally, as a * very big * fan of before mentioned The Magicians, I get the feeling that Netflix wanted to make something that could rival it, but better. Because TM is, dare I say so, one of the best, if not the best, shows of the decade. I honestly have not seen anything like it, that has the same platform, in literally a decade. If you have, please let me know. 

Whit the BDE, edgy, but in a good way, humor, strong political views, strong female characters, fun twist and turns that actually do manage to mix absurd with normal life in a magical, no pun intended, way, sexuality representation, but not in a ‘we just want to please the gays so they give us the views’ way, great male characters we wish we saw more of, compelling character development and so on. Tho the most likable aspect of the series is probably the take on overdone story lines, where they twist the narrative just enough for it to become actually relatable. We all are tired of super special chosen ones who save the world because they are soo special and specially chosen by gods to save the world and all the dumb boring unspecial people with their pure hearts and strong characters. And also find true love.  You see attempts at this within The Order on every turn, except that it doesn’t work nearly as well for them, precisely because they went for that AND MORE. More wouldn’t even be a bad thing if it was’t so all over the place that it just comes off as ‘WE WANT EVERYONE TO LIKE THIS, GIVE US ALL THE VIEWS, ALL OF THEM.’ I am very much inclined to think this is what happened, considering other stuff Netflix has put out there. (Mostly referring to endlessly stupid shit like YOU, which only has the intention of being controversial and attention grabbing, for the views. Tho they do have some fun shit too, don’t get me wrong.) So I guess what I’m trying to say is,  the though of making something like TM, is not a bad one,  I’m all for it, but you actually have to put a shit ton more imagination into it if you want it to work out. But that’s just my opinion.   

[eyebeastposts]

2022 Prompt Story Poll Results

The votes have been cast and the poll has been closed so let's go over the results. Overall, I received twice as many voters this year as the previous poll. I consider this quite the improvement in not only interaction, but also shows how much I've grown over the past year. Now without further ado, let's get to the main reason the poll was made in the first place.

The winner of the 2022 Prompt Story Poll is...

Writing Prompt 418: Female Slobification (Weight Gain, Burping, and Farting)

Top 5

1st Place: Writing Prompt 418: Female Slobification (Weight Gain, Burping, and Farting)

2nd Place: Patreon Prompt 224: Persona 5 Girls Slobby Cow Girls TF

3rd Place: Writing Prompt 450: SSBBW Sumo Ryuko (Kill La Kill) Weight Gain

5th Place (Tie):

Writing Prompt 452: Hex Maniac (Pokémon) Weight Gain

Writing Prompt 499: Miia and Centorea (Monster Musume) Weight Gain via Mutual Feeding and Sexual Content

Thank you everyone who voted! I will begin writing the winning story shortly. As for the runner ups, have no fear. They may come back at sometime in the future. And speaking of the future...

Future Project Polls

Let me go over the results for each of the product interest polls I did.

Discord Server: I set up a Discord server where I can freely post my stories and my readers can interact with one another.

Approval: 63.5%

-Message received loud and clear. I'll set up a Discord server and try to have it in a semi-usable state within the next few days. Hopefully this will get me to log onto my account more frequently at least.

Writing Livestreams: I set up a Piczel or another NSFW friendly streaming account to occasionally show off the writing process.

Approval: 34.9%

-An expected response, but one I'm okay with. Saves me from the headaches of figuring out how to stream.

Ko-fi Prompts: Accept Ko-fi donations (or similar one time payments) for prompt requests that can be done at anytime.

Approval: 54%

-More than enough to justify pulling the trigger on this one. I have a Ko-fi setup, I just don't advertise it very often. I'll make an official post when I open these up along with some guidelines to avoid complete chaos.

Bounty  Commission Slots: Special commission slots for specific story themes  (fetishes, characters, etc.) that come with a discount.

Approval: 57.1%

-Also enough to go ahead with, but with the caveat that this will be highly dependent on how much time is available to me. That being said, this will probably be a good option if I really want to write about something specific, but still want a bit of payment to go with it.

Crowdfunded  Stories: Put up story ideas that would be written after people donate a  certain amount towards them. (Example: I put up the concept of a cruise ship where people become slobs with a goal of $50. If multiple people send in enough to meet the goal, I approve the story and write it.)

Approval: 50.8%

-Probably the most decisive one on the list. I'm assuming this will be highly dependent on how much the goals are for each story. Might do one or two of these just to test the waters then make an actual decision if they'll be a regular thing.

YCH  Story Auctions: Similar to Your Character Here art auctions, but replaced with story scenarios people can bid on to decide which character will be the focus. Example: I make a YCH about someone becoming a slobby pig person and people bid to decide on which character it will be.

Approval: 50.8%

-Same story as the crowdfunded stories. I'll give them a few tries and see how it goes.

Fetish Novel: Self-publish a novel length fetish story on Amazon, Gumroad, or similar site that people can purchase.

Approval: 55.6%

-This would be something I work on in the background of everything else. I have two ideas for said novel, one where I kind of make the kinks more subdued and the other where it's a bit more obvious. I'll make an update if this makes any headway.

Conclusion: Mostly positive reactions to all ideas. I'll obviously try to iron out the details on any of these I decide to try out. Look forward to these experiments in the future. Either they'll shine like stars or like piles of burning tires.

Fetish Suggestions

Next, let me address a few fetish suggestions I got from the survey.

Messing and Scat

-No. Like I've said in the past, these are things that I am not comfortable writing about. I'm sorry, but they're not something I see myself ever including in my stories.

Clown, Bimbo, Fusion, and any other Personality TF

-Transformation is something I enjoy writing, but I'm also aware is less popular than my other kinks. That being said, I won't say no to indulging in these from time to time.

Muscle Growth, Giant/Giantess, Futa, Blueberry Expansion, Inflation, Uglification, and Males

-Things I'm all for using, but also fall under kinks that aren't the most popular. Still don't mind writing about them.

Hypnosis, IQ Loss, and other Mental Changes

-Same as the transformation stories. Fun to write, but not always the most popular. That being said, I would like to try my hand at hypnosis again. Seems like a fun premise to combine with any other number of stories.

Hair Growth, Squashing, and Pussy Expansion

-Unless I have a good premise for these, I think these particular kinks will remain a secondary focus in my stories.

Any suggestions for Slob and/or Weight Gain

-That's mostly what I do already and I don't plan to stop anytime soon.

Character/Franchise Suggestions

Next, let me address a few character and franchise suggestions.

Persona

-Probably my most frequently requested series. Not exactly tired of the franchise yet, but something that should be expected to show up on a regular basis.

Danganronpa

-Same as Persona in that it shows up often, but I do feel like I could do more with certain characters. Just haven't had a chance to do anything with my favorites yet like Miu, Ibuki, or Sakura.

Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss

-Helluva Boss has been a good source, but I'm not sure I want to do a full story on Hazbin Hotel until the first season actually premieres. Still, pretty impressive how much this has shown up with only a pilot and a few preview animations.

Koboyashi's Dragon Maid, Street Fighter, Pokemon, Panty and Stocking, Fallout, and Kill La Kill

-Yes please.

Devil May Cry, Jujutsu Kaisen, and Demon Slayer

-Popular series that I'm honestly astounded I haven't done anything for yet.

Keijo, Indivisible, and Plus-Sized Elf

-Series I would love to write about, but also recognize that they're not the most popular or well known.

Futurama, Inside Job, DC, Marvel, and any other Western Franchises

-I won't deny that my interests lean more towards the East in terms of interest. Not that I don't want to write about these things, just that they'll probably come up a lot less often.

Velvet Crowe (Tails of Beseria) and Mass Effect

-These are things I've actually started, but fell off from one reason or another. Not that they're bad, just that I need to find time to get back to them.

Trails, Miraculous Ladybug, Highschool DxD, Warcraft, 40k, Starcraft, The Witcher, Bravely Default, One Piece, Edens Zero, Black Clover, Fire Force, Cyberpunk, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Naruto, and any Fire Emblem besides Awakening.

-Can't write about things I don't know. Simple as that.

Relaxation Destination

-Let me show the results of where people would like for me to relax, which was totally not a way to decide what the theme for the next prompt request session will be. WINK

A library with a few of my favorite books: 45.8%

Sitting at the food court of a dying mall, enjoying a pastry from Cinnabon: 33.3%

Beachside with an umbrella, a chair, and a cooler full of drinks: 14.6%

In an art studio wildly painting an alternative view of the world: 6.3%

Fattening Career

About 72% of the people polled don't know about it, so I'll just put a reminder here that I'm working with Bladerune9 as a writer for their in progress weight gain visual novel, Fattening Career.

Fattening Career: https://forum.weightgaming.com/t/fattening-career-3d-weight-gain-visual-novel-0-04-released-for-free/24897

Conclusion

A very insightful series of results to go along with an interesting year. Not going to lie, looking a little rough to start 2023, but I'll try to keep pushing forward. Thanks to everyone for voting, leaving words of encouragement, or just reading my stuff.

See you all in 2023!

[alexrepgh]

Freedom- Limits of Restraint

August 2018 was charged with many memories. These memories were cutting in ways that I didn’t put them in my diary because I believed their intensity would never die off….

First week of August…., I had an interview with the admission committee of the department of Theoretical and Applied Biology at KNUST for a position in their master’s program. At the interview, I met one of smartest girls I know. She was easy-going, smart and pretty. Getting along with her in such a short time marked the genesis of me moving out of my reticence. Many people had complained about my reserved nature, so I was happy to get out of it finally. Interestingly, another friend I cherish would bring out how I talk too much later. Different persons engrave their barometers, shaped mostly by their own experiences and expect you live by those brands. These individual level standardization aggregate to form the societal constraints on the macro level. These constraints may aptly be a class of factors that affect life’s ‘navigability’ as described by the American Legal Philosopher Cass Sunstein in his book ‘On Freedom’.

Can humans be absolutely free? There are always structures which limit the freedom of humanity. In my own life, I have not been free, to say the least. I have always wanted to be a researcher. After my bachelor’s degree, I began working at the University Hospital of KNUST as a lab scientist, or ‘labman’. Some of my co-workers could attest that I was almost always absent-minded because I kept thinking of ways to generate hypothesis from the results I get from each patient’s sample. I made certain mistakes due to my inattentive disposition. My job as a laboratory scientist constrained me from doing what I love to do. My job was to find what and how, not ask why I am getting the results. To be free, I applied to grad school, where I could be trained to pursue a career in academia.

In academia, I would be able (or supposed to be able) to think freely, at least. Free thought has been the bedrock for scientific innovations and discoveries. Free thought has its roots to the Socratic Dialectical method. Socrates lived from about 470 BC to 399 BC, in a highly hierarchical society. At that time, his proposition of a critical free thought involving the use of reason, mind, senses to evaluate and challenge, in order to arrive at the truth was met with hostility from society. He was imprisoned and finally put to death. Critical free thought perpetuated, as evidenced by scientific innovations today. What needs further exploration is his imprisonment and subsequent death.

Academics  are immured by structures we call laboratories. Activities in a laboratory are regulated or monitored by others in different buildings who measure the works of researchers. These people are sometimes called administrators. Administrators use metrics to rate the performance of academics to determine who needs to be tenured, deserving a raise or needs firing for being unproductive. Upon digitization of life, these metrics which measure a researcher’s output, are likely to be found in the clouds. As delineated by Justin E.H. Smith, cloud based, algorithm driven measurement of  researchers’ efficiency by social-media-like platforms like GoogleScholar, ResearchGate, Academia.edu potentially divert the researcher’s attention. In the long run, they would focus on building their profiles (e.g by faking a smile behind the camera to use as a profile picture or hiring an algorithm to boost the visibility of their article in the cloud). Academics who do not live up to these metrics, are deprecated (imprisoned) or fired (death).

I do not intend to censure structures that restrain researchers’ activities or free thought. To be clear, unrestrained free thought can be very detrimental to science and society in general. A society with absolutely free living citizens may eventually crash because no one would appreciate the limit of their freedom, engendering chaos and wars. That is why there are always freedom-limiting structures to ensure living in harmony.

Life’s restraints

Even without structures, man is inherently endowed with values that control their activities.  Some of these values include the desires( affections, love), will and conscience, as described by John Abercrombie (not the guitarist) in his book ‘The Philosophy of Moral Feeling‘. Man is a moral being and these values which constitute man’s morality can either be edified or corrupted. Corrupted values are despised and individuals with corrupted values are outcast from society. Edification of values, on the other hand is favored and usually citizens are encouraged to cultivate such values. Institutions are therefore created to either punish individuals with unworthy values or provide guidelines for edification of values. One institution that has served this latter purpose for eons is religion.

The influence of religion in modern life cannot be understated. I grew up a Pentecostal. Unlike others who were ‘forced’ into their denominations or religions, mostly by their parents, I was ‘free’ to choose which denomination, and religion for that matter. Up till now, I do not know my mother’s church, my father may be a traditionalist. Regardless of the religion, the main focus of religion as an institution is to shape man’s moral values.

Shaping man’s values has also been at the center of ethics, the branch of philosophy that deals with morality.  Many philosophers of ethics have tried to conflate ethics, religion and humanity. Descartes mind-body dualism was an attempt to bridge humanity and ethics. David Hume’s philosophy in particular, was a kind that tried to connect religion and secularism. His was the kind that we need today, as secularism is on the rise.

Living freely- The end of restraint

Secularism is worldwide, especially in the highly cosmopolitan cities such as New York, Paris, LA or Miami. Last winter break, I took the tri-rail from Boynton Beach to Miami Airport, sitting close to the window pane where I could gaze through the moving land and ponder over my pain. I was travelling to New York for the winter break. The winter break was needed after a very daunting three months of academic work (As you may not know, I accepted an offer from Biomedical Science department of FAU ahead of offer from Theoretical and Applied Biology of KNUST for obvious reasons I don’t want to get into). The first semester was very difficult for me because I was in a new environment, experienced the cultural shock, struggling to blend in with my Asante accent, and many other constraints I intend to write about in another setting.  Miami is a beautiful city. It is the first city in the US I saw. As you might be aware, the US has very nice cities which are highly adorned and painted to the outside world as heaven, but I was a bit disappointed when I first got to Miami. After all, right after getting out of the plane, I Ubered to Boca Raton, how could I see all the beauties of Miami.

Indeed, in the course of the Fall semester, I visited Miami a couple of times with new friends I made in my new environment. The first time was to South Beach, my first time being at the beach (I come from Kumasi, a very reserved and land-locked city). We went at sun set so that the girls we went with could take pictures with the sun kissing their foreheads. Approaching South Beach, I got scared because of the tall buildings that seem to have been built on water bodies. Part of the road leading to South Beach was built on water as well and I couldn’t stop imagining scary things. When we got closer to South Beach, I saw things I couldn’t imagine. The extent of hedonism was indescribable. There were two males kissing on the streets ( TF? y’all should get a room ffs). Well, I was supposed to ‘enjoy’ the fleeting moment and continue my walk. So I took pictures with my friends.

  As we were taking the pictures a couple of well-wasted Mexicans decided to join us. One of them gave me his instagram for me to follow him.I followed him and any update from him would be him displaying a new drinking bar or holding a bottle of whiskey.

Well, that’s the whole point of taking pictures now. I mean the point is to show people that we are ‘enjoying’ life to the fullest.

The next time I went to Miami was when I was travelling to New York. I was excited to be seeing NYC. When I told my friend in Hong Kong, he was so happy for me. He told me he couldn’t wait to see NYC himself (Later, he told me he visited Paris, and I told him I couldn’t wait to see Paris myself). The point of telling others about the places we’ve been is to let awaken their interest in visiting these places.

I got to LaGuardia around 9pm and I was greeted by the windy, chilling weather. This was so unlike the usual Florida weather I was accustomed to (similar to the weather I have known all my life in Ghana). I could not get out of the airport until the cab was ready to pick me. I was ushered into my new place, on the fifth floor in one apartment complex in Merriam Avenue in The Bronx.

  Exploring New York was fun, partly because I did not explore alone. I was almost always with my bestfriend, Nana Aba. She was the first person to wish me on my birthday. The first time we met in New York, she had to come all over to The Bronx because she said I would get lost if I went to see her. Well, I got lost a couple of times though. Sometimes, I got on the wrong bus or train. Trains in New York are not like South Florida trains. Trains in New York are usually congested and it’s not unusual to find people standing in them.  They can be found underground (subways) and they run 24/7,  serving as bedroom for some homeless people, I learnt. The trains in South Florida are spacious; there are even spaces for bicycles, where people (like me) who love the planet and do not want to burn fossil to kill it can place their bicycles. Also, the seats are arranged such that you can stare into the space outside and clear your thoughts. Well, the disparate transport systems in the two locations depict the lay out of the two locations.

One day, I took the subway from The Bronx to meet my best friend at Manhattan. I met her at 59th Street, Columbus Circle after. We hired a tour guide (paid 60 dollars) to take us around Central Park. He showed us all the nice places. One particular place I enjoyed was the Bow Bridge. We witnessed about 4 proposals in the space of the three or four minutes we spent on this Bridge. As expected, I took advantage of the scene and took pictures of her. So here is my best friend at the Bow Bridge….

And if you want to see the entire Bow Bridge, I got you ( I know you could google it but its more fun if you see it here)

After touring Central Park, we went to a cinema at Broadway to watch a movie. Someone had suggested the Greenbook to me so I went to watch it with her. Imagine being the only two black people in the midst of whites, in the same room, watching GreenBook!!! Well, if you have not watched the movie, you might not get the point I’m trying to convey. It’s a good movie that you should watch.

New York was fun, in every hedonistic aspect of the word fun. I remember walking the Brooklyn Bridge in the cold. I remember going to a Korean restaurant, spending 15 dollars and being forced to eat all the food by ‘madam’ (I call my best-friend madam sometimes and you don’t have to know why). Oh! I nearly forgot when we spent all the night at Times Square enjoying the bright city lights and walking from 42nd Street to 57th Street. But like they say, all good things must come to an end so on the 31st of December, as the year was ending, I booked a ticket to go back to South Florida.

Dominance- The end of Freedom.

On my way back to Florida, I opened iBooks to read Why Nations Fail. In this book, Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson argued that nations fail because of factors when the economy is less inclusive or more extractive. Botswana, for instance is prospering more than the Rhodesian countries (Zambia and Zimbabwe) because the former has built a more inclusive economy.  One particular event is apparent throughout the book: that the trans-atlantic slave trade was a critical juncture that would influence the economic growth of most countries in West Africa. Slavery, generally is a depiction of the quest of humans to dominate. The scenarios surrounding the success of the slave trade corroborates this assertion. Kings captured people from other tribes during wars and sold them as slaves, in exchange for gun and gun powder, that would be used to make them powerful. This would help such tribes in territorial dominance, the same way as dominating trade, commerce and industrialization was the motive of the Europeans who engaged in this barbaric act.

Even though Why Nations Fail make the case for how slavery has contributed to the current economic and political inequalities around the globe, it failed to outline how it has contributed to what Elizabeth Currid-Halkett termed Inconspicuous consumption.  Inconspicuous consumption are obviously the intangibles, things we cannot see. These include knowledge, culture and to some extent technology. These are the spheres that humans are fighting dominate now. Regardless of tangibles or not, dominance is a human character which restrains others freedom. Others fight for their freedom by overcoming dominance.

Overcoming Dominance- Silver Spoon and Gold Medal

Different people have different things dominating their lives. To be free, they need to overcome these dominance. Some are born into well-to do families, where they are provided with everything they can think of. For such people, they need to overcome being fortunate. Others never get what they need. To get them, they need to break great bonds. Most of the people I know start breaking them after their Silver Jubilee. Others break them later in life. As we travel through this life, whether you were born on a silver spoon or wooden ladle, there is one motive; going for the gold medal. What is your gold medal. Mine is perhaps to write this for you. Find yours.

Till I write again……

Life After Silver… Freedom- Limits of Restraint August 2018 was charged with many memories. These memories were cutting in ways that I didn’t put them in my diary because I believed their intensity would never die off….

[kirstiexrose]

Ive always been painfully aware of how not “right” I am. From a young age I did the weird things. I was that kid lifting up trashcans at recess so I could find all of my favorite bug friends. I requested liverwurst and mustard sandwiches for my lunchbox. I laughed a lot about things that someone my age was not suppose to. I was endlessly curious and selfless without a second thought. I was the kid who offered to give away her birthday cake. A weirdo for sure. From as far back as I can remember, I was scolded, berated and hurt for this. Being different. My ways broke rules and strict stereotypes. My gentle little heart gave and people took. Some took things Ill never get back. I was the perfect target. For the abusers, narcissists and hormonal teenage bitches. So I took it. All of it became my rule book. “Kirstie’s Guidelines on how to live” written by a bunch of fucking asshats. For the past 26 years I’ve been living my life within the confines of who they told me I should be. How utterly exhausting and not to mention boring it is. I’m not a good, polite member of society. The woman in the cubicle silently working her life away. I am not the dutiful wife & mother. Not the modest and meager woman of your dreams. I’m sure as hell not the exotic supermodel or cool girl you dreamed up either. I am the quirky, free, breathe of fresh air kick you in the ass and call you Suzy kind of girl. And no I don’t know what that means. It’s meant to be provocative. Orrr if could be I watch way too many southern baking shows. They have strange sayings I’ve apparently adopted. I am the off topic, random girl you’ll probably never quite understand. Don’t worry I’m right there with you. But for once, I’m proud of that fact. My favorite star is Spica. I love sporks. Crocs make me cringe. But my hate transfers seamlessly into love so I may end up starting a collection tomorrow. Pluto is by far the chillest planet. I wonder if planets are sentient. Why everything was so large in the prehistoric age compared to now. How TF time isn’t linear. If all paths are actually cycles and there is never a true end or beginning. If others have memories and stories that have been stuck in their mind since they could remember. I wonder if others wonder the way I do. If they seek losing themselves in a way to find what they don’t know they know. A way back to truth. Are there wanderers like me? I suppose there has to be. Maybe right now they’re also wondering about me

Kirstie’s guide to not giving a fuck: part 1 of many

[noctomania]

on nihilism and subjectivity

while i am ok with and actually comforted by nihilism, i recognize not everyone is! it makes me think about in class when a teacher would be telling us about a project and students askin questions about guidelines etc. in the situations where the teacher/professor let loose the reigns and didn't have much if any restrictions, there were always peers of mine who would absolutely lose it over there being no guidelines, constantly worried that because they weren't given a list of "do not do this" that they would do something wrong, while i was comforted with the freedom of understanding that even if i did do something wrong it was with the best intentions and that it was a learning experience regardless, which requires some fuck ups to learn sometimes. some people were brought up in a way or have had experience that makes them more comfortable with restrictions because they feel safe with the fences. me, im always worried about what is behind the fence, boundlessness makes me more at ease. it also makes me think of anarchist vs heirarchists. i consider myself anarchist bc of my nihilistic perspective. i don't think laws are necessary because much of it is intuitive ("i want no trouble so i won't trouble anyone else unnecessarily") and usually they are just in place not as guidelines to the general public (how many laws did you not know exist?) but for expediting trials and give easement to jury and judge in their objectives of placing blame. i feel more comfortable accepting the real lawlessness of life and working from there for peace rather than trying to use institutions that were built on corrupt principles by corrupt people for corrupt purposes to "right the wrongs". it doesn't make sense to me and in fact i argue overcomplicates things unnecessarily, because sometimes the laws can be used against victims and actually often is. For instance, who is to say one set of rights is more important than another. is my right to speech more important than someone's right to their religion or someone else's right to bare arms? one person would rate those very differently from another who would very differently from me. i will admit it's admirable the lengths at which humans have gone to attempt to make a recipe for equality, but the facts are diversity exists. diverse perspectives will never cease to be and where diversity exists so does conflict and the ways in which we have chosen to react to that conflict is poor. we have focused on placing blame and shaming certainly someone if not everyone without really coming to a conclusion. most walk away from any conflict hurt somehow, if not at the end then surely in the beginning or at some place throughout and nothing will change that back. as it is, at least here, a person is accused of a crime or turn themselves in and there is an entire process where "unbias parties" participate in determining the believability of someone's alibi and based on prescribed knowledge, which is transitional in nature, determine their future. now nihilism catches a lotta slack because it can serve as grey area for criminals to get away with shit. well guess what, so does our current system, the only thing is it's built by them for them and it benefits the most powerful. at least with nihilism and anarchy there would be no pre-existing wall for the powerful to hide behind. there would be no red tape preventing every day people from accessing others who are more revered or popular. i don't feel it is acceptable to negate the harm you can cause by claiming nothing matters anyway, it's not a justification for malfunction. doing something purely harmful is unnecessary at best, that is clear. we can clearly determine productive vs detrimental better than we can determine right vs wrong or good vs bad. As it is, we're trying to run quantitative measures in a qualitative reality and that inevitable neglects important factors, things like mental health, neurodiversity, the "invisible" identities and their experiences, etc. As a species we are built to recognize patterns and we do it fairly well. but we mistake the forest for the trees when we try to apply that theory to practice. we think if we create a cookie cutter system that all the slack we cut off will rot away and we'll be left with a perfect cookie. but that slack doesn't die out. it doesn't fade. it festers. out on the fringe. it grows stronger by one way or another. outliers are further ousted by their removal from the development of the rest of society. The people living in rural areas that aren't as accessible, the introverts who seek solitude, those pushed out by capitalism that forgets the poor need homes too; these people suffer from being disjointed from societies culture. There is rural culture, urban culture, rich culture, suburban culture, fringe culture, etcetc. these groups are removed from one another's lifestyles be it due to money, location, identity tolerance or a variety (generally a variety and none of these exist in vacuums.) They all get different exposure to different experiences on an individual basis, but also on a group basis. Life is simply too complex to have even transitional law of the land imo. i believe everything needs to be treated with the same level of uniqueness that it is composed of. I feel it would be much more efficient that way. however that's based of my own knowledge which is not based in reading about political ideology or theories. whatever assumptions you may bring to this post are likely of your own but if you have gotten this far after reading all the above and wish to talk about this id love to but don't pull out some reference to some political philosopher and assume ill know who tf you're talking about and why because i won't and you will just piss me off by coming across pretentious as i am but a dumb country boy who somehow made it through college without hardly ever reading anything beyond skimming (mostly because our education system is a joke as well) until them toodles my brain is fried