#about something that actually occured as an important canonical plot point...

[waitingforsecretsouls]

Fëanor and succession

"High princes were Fëanor and Fingolfin, the elder sons of Finwë, honoured by all in Aman; but now they grew proud and jealous each of his rights and his possessions. Then Melkor set new lies abroad in Eldamar, and whispers came to Fëanor that Fingolfin and his sons were plotting to usurp the leadership of Finwë and of the elder line of Fëanor, and to supplant them by the leave of the Valar; for the Valar were ill-pleased that the Silmarils lay in Tirion and were not committed to their keeping." - The Silmarillion, Chapter 07: Of the Silmarils and the Unrest of the Noldor

„Though after the rule of the Noldor was committed to him [Fingolfin] by Manwë (in place of his elder brother and father) he took the name of Finwë.“ -Morgoth’s Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion (II)

"He [Fëanor] claimed now the kingship of all the Noldor, since Finwë was dead, and he scorned the decrees of the Valar." -The Silmarillion, Chapter 09: Of the Flight of the Noldor

"As he [Fëanor] said with some justice: ‘My brother’s claim rests only upon a decree of the Valar; but of what force is that for those who have rejected them and seek to escape from their prison-land?’" -The Peoples of Middle - Earth, Chapter 11: The Shibboleth of Fëanor

"Therefore even as Mandos foretold the House of Fëanor were called the Dispossessed, because the overlordship passed from it, the elder, to the house of Fingolfin, both in Elendë and in Beleriand, and because also of the loss of the Silmarils." -The Silmarillion, Chapter 13: Of the Return of the Noldor

"With him into banishment went his seven sons, and northward in Valinor they made a strong place and treasury in the hills; and there at Formenos a multitude of gems were laid in hoard, and weapons also, and the Silmarils were shut in a chamber of iron. Thither also came Finwë the King, because of the love that he bore to Fëanor; and Fingolfin ruled the Noldor in Tirion. Thus the lies of Melkor were made true in seeming, though Fëanor by his own deeds had brought this thing to pass; and the bitterness that Melkor had sown endured, and lived still long afterwards between the sons of Fingolfin and Fëanor." -The Silmarillion, Chapter 07: Of the Silmarils and the Unrest of the Noldor

"One thing only marred the design of Manwë. Fëanor came indeed, for him alone Manwë had commanded to come; but Finwë came not, nor any others of the Noldor of Formenos. For said Finwë: ‘While the ban lasts upon Fëanor my son, that he may not go to Tirion, I hold myself unkinged, and I will not meet my people.’" -The Silmarillion, Chapter 08: Of the Darkening of Valinor

"Fingolfin had prefixed the name Finwë to Ñolofinwë before the Exiles reached Middle-earth. This was in pursuance of his claim to be the chieftain of all the Ñoldor after the death of Finwë, and so enraged Fëanor that it was no doubt one of the reasons for his treachery in abandoning Fingolfin and stealing away with all the ships." -The Peoples of Middle - Earth, Chapter 11: The Shibboleth of Fëanor

"So it came about that to Fëanor the rejection of þ became a symbol of the rejection of Míriel, and of himself, as her son, as the chief of the Noldor next to Finwë: […] So Fëanor would call himself 'Son of the þerindë', and when his sons in their chilhood asked why their kin in the house of Finwë used s for þ he answered: 'Take no heed! We speak as is right, and as King Finwë himself did before he was led astray. We are his heirs by right and the elder house. Let them sá – sí, if they can speak no better.'" -The Peoples of Middle – Earth, Chapter 11: The Shibboleth of Fëanor

"To his sons Finwë gave his own name as he had done to Fëanor. This maybe was done to assert their claim to be his legitimate sons, equal in that respect to his eldest child Kurufinwë Fayanáro, but there was no intention of arousing discord among the brothers, since nothing in the judgement of the Valar in any way impaired Fëanor’s position and rights as his eldest son. Nothing indeed was ever done to impair them, except by Fëanor himself; and in spite of all that later happened his eldest son remained nearest to Finwë’s heart." -The Peoples of Middle- Earth, Chapter 11: The Shibboleth of Fëanor

[the-crooked-library]

I noticed something near the end of Dracula when Jonathan and Mina separate for a final time (so she can go to Dracula's castle), that a difference between Harker and Hutter is also near the end.

For context, several chapters earlier Jonathan gets two weapons “put these flowers round your neck”—here he handed to me a wreath of withered garlic blossoms—“for other enemies more mundane, this revolver and this knife;.

Then when Mina and Van Helsing are about to depart for their ride to the castle, Jonathan keeps the knife and gives the revolver to Mina. Even for me a large-bore revolver; Jonathan would not be happy unless I was armed like the rest.

I know the phallic analysis of the weapons in the book are overstated in scholarship but I think it's telling that Jonathan insists Mina to be armed with a big gun while he lets her go do what she wants without him. Thomas didn't arm her and likely wouldn't even it were suggested imo.

omg yes! That is definitely another detail that really stood out to me during my watch, and yet another reason I genuinely start getting annoyed whenever people conflate Thomas with Jonathan - because frankly, that is allowing Thomas to reap what Jonathan sowed, so to speak. I've seen a lot of people absolutely in love with him, and yet the traits they list as the reasons are none that he possesses; in fact, the great majority of them are in exact opposition to his canon personality, and this is one of them.

Don't get me wrong, I love Thomas as a character. I think he is quite sympathetic - and, on the Watsonian level, really trying his best; but at the same time, I think it is essential to acknowledge that he is deeply flawed, if only because on the Doylist level, these flaws are fundamental to his arc in the story. It is purely a question of structure and function; because, at the end of the day, he is a fictional character, and thus, a narrative component, rather than a person.

In this case, his choices prior to the vampire hunt provide the viewer with further evidence -> of an aspect of his characterization -> that acts as one of the driving forces behind the plot of Nosferatu. Specifically, he does not notice that Ellen is lying to him; he leaves her at home as he goes off to "fight"; he doesn't even consider arming her; and he does all these things because, even though he does care for Ellen, he never really thinks of her as a person.

Thomas doesn't notice that Ellen is lying, even though she is clearly nervous when she does it, because he doesn't know what she looks like when she's hiding something (I personally think it is because she masks around him, at least to some degree - throughout the film, he is uncomfortable every time she's honest). He doesn't bring her to the hunt because it doesn't occur to him that she could help with tracking down Orlok - despite him being aware now of her immense psychic abilities, despite Von Franz describing her as a native in a world he is only visiting. And, exactly as you said, he doesn't even think to leave her a weapon; because, even as he sets out on his "quest," even after she's told him of Orlok's obsession, even though the point of the hunt is apparently to "save" her, he doesn't consider the possibility of Orlok going after her.

Contrast that with Jonathan - who knows Mina so well that they can get concerned over three lines of writing, who works with Mina's brief psychic connection to Dracula in order to track him, and who arms Mina before the final fight, because he is not satisfied unless he can do everything in his power to ensure her safety. When it comes to their relationship, Mina's revolver, while not exactly phallic (seriously, why is that topic so overwrought?..), becomes a narrative symbol of his thoughtfulness.

The difference here is that, while Ellen is important to Thomas, this importance only extends insofar as she is his wife. He sees her as a responsibility, but never as herself; and, ultimately, he never actually considers her a factor that could conceivably affect his - or anyone's - decision-making. He plans their life without even asking what she wants from it, he neglects her emotional needs, and he leaves her like a sitting duck during the hunt, without a weapon or anyone to guard her. She continuously slips his mind, utterly inconsequential beyond whatever their surrounding society defines as her role and value; and Thomas, tragically, is unable to overcome this ingrained, rigid set of rules.

This is an essential aspect of his character - because, as stated previously, the plot wouldn't happen without it. If Thomas took Ellen's wants into consideration, he wouldn't have been so hell-bent on chasing a promotion, and he wouldn't have left her right after their honeymoon to go to another country, especially if she begged him to stay. If he knew her better, he would've picked up on the plan she made with Von Franz - or she would've told him!.. Most certainly, if he saw any real personhood in her, he wouldn't have dreamed of leaving her unarmed and undefended.

Nosferatu is about Ellen's continued systemic dehumanization. The point of the story is that every single human character contributes to it on some level, despite whatever love and best intentions they might have for her. It's about the inherent monstrousness of being othered by humanity, and Thomas is - inherently, narratively, crucially - human.

[demonictumble]

fic rec list (1/??? )

this is a fic recommendation list for whomever wants a good read. All of these are on AO3. I have not provided links, so just search them up!

If you do end up reading any of these, or really any fic in general, remember to leave the author comments!! They deserve them, esp because they do this for free and they deserve to know how beautiful their writing is and how appreciated they are.

My PSA: COMMENT ON FICS AND DONT TAKE AUTHORS FOR GRANTED

DC..

IMPORTANT NOTE I am not a religious fan where I only like a fic when it adheres to canon characterization or texts. I can enjoy fics even when they completely throw off what's actually canon and that's okay for me, but it might not be for you. So just keep this in mind and the back button exists for a reason if you don't like something.

Buy Back the Secrets by Sundiscus (incomplete)

Tim Drake and Kon El centered!! OH MY GODS. I could rave on and on about this fic all day but I'll have to keep it brief. I've reread at LEAST 5 times. It's brilliant. The writing, the plot, the characterizations!! They are incredible. If I had to use a phrase to describe it, it would be "identity shenanigans and timkon" but that simplifies the absolute masterpiece that it is SO MUCH

Executive Assistant to the Batman by heartslogos (complete)

Tim is basically Bruce Wayne's assistant and is desperately trying to avoid letting them know that he knows. This is complete crack, but it is hilarious. The writing is so funny and It's what I need after a bad day or anything tbh. It may not be completely true to characters or whatever, but it makes up for it a thousand times over in spirit and the laughs it's produced from me.

anything (not the title because literally ANYTHING) by IzzyMRDB

I can rave about them all day because the dc/batfam fics I have seen them right are all so delicious and I devoured them far too fast and momggg its just so good. and I love their writing style <3

Reverse Robin AU by yellow_cabellero (complete)

I CANNOT DO THIS SERIES JUSTICE WITH MY WORDS. IT is a must read for me. The writer writes spectacularly and the characterization, even though its a reverse robin, feels on point, especially considering the circumstances (Im a huge believer in circumstances shape a person's personality, which is what I think occurs beautifully in all of these fics). They're just so GOOD.

Also this author has a STEPH FIC that is stunning. 10/10. Steph is a character that doesn't get the appreciation she deserves, so this fic was especially more touching for me. It was terrific seeing her girl bossing in the 90s (IT ALSO FELT SO PERIOD ACCURATE CAN WE TALK ABOUT THAT). Not to mention, the author shows off character flaws in a believable manner and nobody is a Mary Sue and it's just EVERYUTHING IS JUST *chefs kiss* by them.

The Fishbowl by LordLuxury (complete)

This is Dick Grayson centered. THEY HAVE MADE A MASTERPIECE. I genuinely mean it. Dick is constantly trying to pull the family together, he is trying to be the glue as everything tries to go the opposite. LET THIS MAN HAVE HIS FAMILY. This had me in shambles. Bad Dad Bruce hurt me, but it was just so realistic. That's what gets me. The whole dynamics portrayed in The Fishbowl are so goddamn realistic and it feels so real. Everyone is flawed in their own way and its just... PLEASE READ IT I BEG OF YOU.

Love and Bruises by Acin_Grayson and Hoebiwan (complete)

Despite what the title may suggest, this is actually funny! Jason thinks Batman is abusing Bruce. And I just remember dying of laughter as I read this. Terrific! Would read and Will read again

Marvel (I am a movies fan so most if not all fics I recommend from here on out will be probably based on movies!)

Tennessee Outreach for Spider-Man and Friends by ciaconna

GREAT FIC. Harley (potato gun kid in one of the iron man movies for those who don't remember) gets an internship with Tony stark for college application reasons and its to help Spiderman. Peter Parker and Harley whateverhislastname is such a funny duo and they made the fic spectacular. Terrific writing omg.

Peter and the Jailbirds by beautifullights

I THINK THIS FIC HURT ME. I don't really remember much bc its been a year and a half, but I think my emotions remember because I feel mildly sad when I think about it. Peter is on the raft and bonds with the ex-avengers also on the raft. The premise of a teenager possibly spending the rest of his life in prison is terrible, but I swear this fic has funny moments and the conversations that occur are to die for because the WRITING. WHEW.

O Brother, Where Art Thou? by theskeptileptic

Tony survives and it's set after No Way Home. Where I'm pretty sure the only people dead are May and Pepper. Morgan saves the day by remembering her big brother (Im a sucker for big brother Peter arc). Peter is kind of a mini Tony in this one I think, which is such an interesting take. And it's such a coming home story and its just so beautiful.

Cross Overs:

Even Heroes Have the Right To Dream by Bounemr (complete)

mlb/dc crossover!! where marinate and Jon are retired superhero and go to college together! Great writing and plot with a good ending. Fluffy for the most part as far I as I can remember (it's been a year since I've read it so you know it's good if I can still remember)

Hired Hands by neighborhood_yogurt (incomplete)

Percy Jackson/ DC crossover!! It's been a while since I've read this one too but It's stuck with me. It's hilarious and I need to reread it but Percy is accidentally on Penguin's payroll because he's just a dumb blonde at heart, but it's okay we all love him. And Shenanigans occur. I don't remember exactly what happens so reminder to read this again for myself as well!

(IDK if any of these authors have tumblrs, if they do, someone please tag them and I will forever be in your debt)

[bendersmind]

From '69 to Release (Giggity)

Is "giggity" still funny? Did I mention I'm fucking ancient? Because I am. I saw the premiers of South Park AND Family Guy my dudes. That's how old.

Speaking of cartoons, I've been watching "Scooby Doo, Where Are You?" for the past 2 days. You should too. It's on Tubi, my favorite source for both garbage films and weird cult shit that only I (and a small amount of freaks) watch. It's great. This has NOTHING to do with my Ghost post, I just thought you should know.

Well, not nothing. The relationship is that Scooby Doo premiered the night of the Ghost show where Nihil fucked everything up. Behind the cut you'll find some potential spoilers for "Sister Imperator #2" based on the released preview pages. If you don't want to read it come back to this post after it's released. It releases on April 16th and will make the following post ENTIERLY meaningless and wrong. So let me waste a bit of your time . . . under the cut.

Alright, so information from the preview is kinda iffy. The biggest thing, which isn't probably related to the plot of the issue itself (something about some suspicious dude following the circus Imperator is in) but it's important for lore purposes.

There are a few things we learn.

A man we presume is Nihil has been touring away from the main circus on and off for 2 years.

At this point in the story, Imperator has been with said circus for those 2 years.

The man we assume is Nihil has at least 1 brother.

Said brother has a bunch of kids already

Okay. So lets look at number 3 and 4 as being the "point" of this post. 1 and 2 set up Imperator and (probably) Nihil's relationship.

Nihil tells us that his brother has several "pups" when Imperator accuses Nihil of leaving a bunch of French maidens sad after he left. The implication is 2 fold, Nihil's brother is a ho (and I say that with love; nothing wrong with being a ho) and he doesn't wrap it before he taps it.

The last frame of our preview shows us a dinner table with circus folk and 3 women each with young children. 2 with babies and 1 with a toddler. This occurs sometime between '53 (the start of Imperator #1) and '69. It's not super clear how old Imperator is when the comic starts but she is probably 10-13. She leaves home after her stepfather murders her sisters and presumably when she was a teenager. It's hard to say when, but I'd say 15/16ish. This means she's somewhere around 20 when Nihil comes back from France. Per my timeline this would be around '60. Nihil would be around 20 then as well(based on his death being in 2020 at 80). Let's assume that they are close in age(and Imperator aged gracefully, Nihil . . . not so much).

The toddler looked to be around 3ish (I legit know shit all about kids so please correct me if I'm wrong) and is potentially Papa I (or maybe my favorite pre canon theory, Mystery Papa); the babies are likely Papa II and III. I'd like to correct my already partially incorrect post from a while back; Papa I, II, and III are confirmed to be brothers; and based on the current information we have, Nihil is probably their uncle. It'd make more sense as to why he was cool with just murdering them.

Sister Imperator #2 will probably give us more of an idea of the family structure for the Emeritus bloodline and exactly how many brothers Nihil has. Based on what I'm thinking both Nihil's father and Nihil's older brother are dead by '69. This would open the line for the next oldest son (or daughter; we actually don't know anything about female descendants in the church). That would be Nihil.

When Nihil's bid for fame failed miserably after the show at Whiskey A Go-Go he was clearly replaced. By who? Probably the next in his father's line. And so on up until the last son of his father and then on to the oldest son of the oldest brother of the last generation of Papas.

Lord in hell that's a clusterfuck of a sentence. Basically, it'd go to Nihil's older brother's oldest son. This could be either Papa I or Mystery Papa (2008 - 2011). We just don't know yet.

I think the most interesting part of this whole thing is the "old world circus" that the church comes from. The biggest question for me is where does the circus "end" and the church "begin". That is to say, how do you go from circus performer to clergy? Is everyone in the troupe an agent of Satan? Or were the Emeritus line stashed into traveling shows to hide them from potential assassins?

That would actually give us an explanation as to why Copia and Perpetua were split up and raised apart. The current theory is that Mrs. Psalterian is Marika from the comic and thus the person who raised Copia. But where was Perpetua? Someone suggested with all of his Venice carnival schtick he was raised somewhere near Venice. I think that's a fair assessment. While the Ministry is (in canon) located in Linköping, Sweden, Italy is REALTIVELY close. Also Europe has the fucking trains that get you goddamn anywhere so it isn't even like living on different coasts of the US. (Fucking Europe and your . . . excellence)

Anyway, the raising of the twins is neither here nor there; until we get some more about Perpetua we'll be lost in the surf. I really look forward to seeing how he works with the crowd. Whatever we get it will certainly be interesting.

Points of interest: What is the structure of the Clergy exactly? Why has Marika always called Copia "Cardi"? Was his name when he walked into the story we are seeing "Cardinal Cardinal Copia"? Is the circus "Cooger and Dark’s Pandemonium Shadow Show" from "Something Wicked This Way Comes"? Does Nihil already know the nature of his family? Has the church always been hidden in a traveling circus or was it in other itinerant entertainer groups(bards, theater, fakirs, etc)? Was there a magician Papa? Please tell me there are puppets! I fucking love puppets.

[divineerdrick]

Homestuck: Beyond Canon Upd8 for August 25, 2024

I'm pretty sure this upd8'd yesterday, seeing as how I got a surprise spoiler in my YouTube feed. Looks like my prediction was off for this upd8. I'm wondering if I'll ever have a chance of getting one right. With that said though, I'm gonna do things differently. Before I get into the upd8, let's talk about Vriska's relationship with Doc Scratch.

So Scratch, by his own admission, used Vriska. He did so quite coldly, brutally, and all while constantly demeaning her (as all of Caliborn's iterations are want to do to women they encounter).

All of that said, we don't actually see much interaction between Doc Scratch and Vriska. Most of it occurred via backstory. Our first interaction between them, and our introduction to Scratch himself, occurs shortly after she's introduced. This is the last time he speaks to her, and is possibly his most harmless conversation in the story. If anything, despite repeatedly insulting her, Scratch's motivation here seems almost like a pep talk. Vriska is ignoring Kanaya prior to speaking with Scratch, and is lamenting her horrible luck. But Scratch not only puts Vriska in a better mood to receive Kanaya's attention, but opens up the possibility to her that she could potentially control her luck (something Kanaya echoes). This is of course by no means benevolent. Scratch needs Vriska to fulfill her role in the session. How much his interaction affects this is hard to say, but he's depicted as a villain that manipulates through carefully timed and placed nudges. It's the reasons he's my favorite villain in Homestuck proper, and the greatest rebuke to any claim of Homestuck having shit writing.

The second conversation is much more meaningful. This one takes place via flashback as part of the cycle of revenge. Here, Scratch provokes Vriska into killing Aradia. This is probably going to be the plot point that is important for this upd8. As I said above, Scratch is depicted as a mastermind of subtle manipulation. This leaves a very real question for this conversation. If the reason Scratch is acting is to ensure that Caliborn's entry is as smooth as possible, does this mean there's a chance that Vriska wouldn't have killed Aradia without his interference? She certainly wouldn't have had such a clean shot at Tavros without his help. But even with the dominoes falling, is there a chance that Vriska might have done something different? Is there a chance, that as Aradia hoped, she might lament everything she'd done when faced by those she killed? How would things have changed? And, most importantly . . .

Does Vriska think there's a chance things might have gone differently?

The problem here is the same as before. Even if she could have done things differently, she didn't. Faced with a blatant, arrogant, and upfront manipulation, she still did what Scratch wanted her to do. She knew he wanted her to do it, and still did it. While the reason he contacted her might have been to erase any chance of her making a different decision, she still ultimately made the decision. She was young, emotionally vulnerable, distracted from potentially better outcomes, and in a culture where she'd probably be considered justified.

But she still killed Aradia.

She even had to go to great lengths to do it, and ended up doing so in an extremely cruel way. Then she did her best to put it out of her mind, often successfully, as we see with her confession to John.

Vriska needs to come to terms with this and forgive herself. Tavros and Aradia already have. She needs to accept that Scratch abused and manipulated her, just as Spidermom did, and forgive herself for the things she did because of it. Just as before, she owes him nothing. Their relationship was entirely one-sided, with her getting nothing of benefit and him getting everything he needed. The idea she ever "wronged" him by using the cue ball is ridiculous. The idea she owes any of her development as a hero to him is equally preposterous.

I feel she needs to find a way to walk away again.

Phew! That was a lot! With all that out of the way, let's actually get to this upd8!

We seem to be picking up just after our last session. No time reference of anything like that.

Oh wow! This is turning to quite the spite role-call! At least poor Gcatavrosprite doesn't seem to be sneezing as much. Gotta say, he looks quite silly though.

And here is our grumpiest of trolls, looking absolutely, fabulously, awesome! I hope as much as Erisolsprite laments their existence, they can at least take comfort in how amazing they look.

Vriska's still gonna rag on them, but we all know she's completely wrong there.

Oh! Much like how Karkat and Sollux could riff off each other, this dynamic seems to be working! Wonder if this has anything to do with Vriska's previous relationship with Eridan possibly synergizing with Sollux's penchant for demeaning himself.

Looks like Vriska has been trying to power through this, possibly only relaxing when she physically can't keep going. That definitely tracks. Hopefully she's learning to examine her habits and determine if they're actually good for her. There doesn't seem to be a pressing time limit, so she probably can just take a break and recoup.

Woops. There's the sneezing.

It seems like everyone's response to Tavros somehow having allergies while being both dead and a sprite was to just keep yelling, "Sprites don't get allergies!" until he started sneezing less. Also "VAST WILLPOWER" has echoes of Tavros boasting about his leg powered self-esteem.

And yeah, Vriska's not ready to cut herself some slack. She'll use any excuse to keep going and try to keep powering on.

Uh oh . . . Ominous Sprite is ominous. Looks like Scratch might be the next boss encounter, possibly as a followup to Momfang. Hope Vriska's build can stack bleed and rot.

Snrk. More human expressions not landing.

Uh oh . . . I sense a humbling on it's way . . .

Here we go . . .

Look at this smooth bastard. In a universe defined by the destruction of the Green Sun, he can't possibly have any real power here can he?

Also this piano refrain is genuinely creepy and haunting.

God he still offers candy!

His attempts at platitudes would almost feel genuine . . . if we didn't know they weren't made with full knowledge of the outcome and serve only to create an air of superiority.

Vriska's recovered well though. Hopefully everything will have paid off enough that she can stay on her game. I'm worried about our Sprite pair's appraisal of her readiness though.

Huh. Interesting goad here.

Oh . . . No point in posting it here as a still image, but Vriska is literally shaking. Her bravado seems to be falling apart, and I'm not sure why yet.

Shit just got next level. Regardless if this is the Plot Point doing it, or if Scratch is somehow here, he can still exert some genuinely threatening power.

And of course he wants to play a game . . .

And he just altered ours. Well shit. That certainly seems like some genuine power.

Ew.

FUCKING EW!!!

There's a reason I gave respect to the trigger warnings in the Epilogues!

With Momfang, I talked about how sometime a human victim of abuse can confront their abuser and find closure. The keyword there is "sometimes."

There is nothing Vriska can gain from a confrontation with Scratch, it just provides more opportunity for him to abuse her. He will never be sorry. Even if she had the power, she can't even make him sorry. He's dead and gone. His master is dead and gone. The only vengeance she can take has been taken. All that left is the revenge of the victor. She gets to live on, possibly even longer than he did, while he is a tattered puppet.

The question now is, how does she escape his power and abuse in this session?

She seems to logically know that she's won, that he shouldn't be able to hurt her. But there's a different between recognizing the nightmare and being able to wake up.

There's the shoe! This isn't even about Scratch. This is about backsliding, or rather the fear of it. This about working so hard only to have it all come tumbling down because you made a mistake in a moment of carelessness or weakness. I'm guessing this is also about the fear this redemption is fake, no more real than Gamzee's cult. That no matter how hard she tries, how much she does, even with seemingly all of eternity ahead of her, she will always be just a scared little kid that does awful things. That's a hard fear to overcome.

There's that notion about controlling her fortune. Man, Terezi could be a lot of help here. This version of Vriska might even be able to truly listen to her.

And here it is! I think this is another false dichotomy. As I said above, Scratch did manipulate and abuse her. But Vriska still did all those horrible things. Both things are true. Taking ownership of her deeds doesn't change what Scratch did. But she has to accept them as hers before she can move past them.

Acknowledging Vriska's ability is simply a fact. Her abilities are also part of the problem. She has done and could continue to do some real good if she mastered them. She could also wreak incredible havoc. And that's part of what she's afraid of.

Oh! That's a good question. Maybe that's something else Vriska has to figure out.

Vriska Serket completes her redemption arc! Then what? How does this change life for the people of the Candy Timeline? Does she just overthrow Jane and then try to help rebuild? Even after all of this, would she be capable of helping everyone make a better society? Does she push to have this side of the Universe escape the event horizon and return to the greater whole? Dirk is becoming every bit the manipulator Scratch was.

'Cause, you know, a part of him always was.

He's already taken victory from her once. Even after this, would she be able to face a fully ascended Dirk?

More and more I'm beginning to think that this really is just a humbling. While Vriska can't allow herself to give into all these fears I've mentioned, she also can't ignore them. She needs to acknowledge them and start preparing for them.

The sad truth is, Vriska Serket will fuck up again. Maybe not in the course of this narrative, but backslides are a part of life. And she could live for a very long time. She has to be ready for it.

Ouch. Yeah, I was afraid of this. No poignant epiphany. No triumphant last words. Just cold, harsh reality.

Next time bring a broom.

May not look like it, but there are eight A's in "AAAAAAMYGDALA."

Also, Scratch ended this session by moving her to ∞108. I'm not sure if 108 has any special meaning here. There's a Homestuck track from Toby Fox called 108 Stars of Destiny, which is a reference to Suikoden and Chinese literature. It's possible it marks the end of this arc. If we get two more chapters in September, 10/8 could be the next post after we finish this.

Have to wait and see. I'm still predicting Terezi for next chapter, and (Vriska) for the final chapter.

[this-is-gonna-hurt-me-inside]

Codywan POTC AU ideas

Ok so people seemed to like the idea (and my lack of experience in actually making posts that reach people showed when I tried to make this post through reblogging and it didn't appear anywhere :') ) so here's what I currently have with some rough drawings!

Here's the original post I made about it

Ideas and drawings for AU below, please feel free to use!! No idea if I'll actually write something for it, the creature in charge of driving my brain will decide I guess.

Ok so, Obi-Wan fills the role of Elizabeth and Cody is Will in terms of who’s the governor’s child (or grandchild/ward here) and who is found floating at sea with a mysterious medallion and becomes a blacksmith. Going to deviate from the story a lot but needed Cody to have that blood importance link - you will see why later.

Dooku is governor who takes in his grandson Obi Wan as his ward after Qui-Gon’s death, then brings him with him to port royal (feel like Dooku is a good fit for all the colonisation/sugar plantations/definitely not the good guy the films presented him as considering Caribbean in the 1770s.) Obi-wan and Cody grow up keeping in contact and obliviously infatuated with each other as per films.

Not sure if there’s a Norrington equivalent here. Satine would probably be the easiest fit in terms of romantic triangle but couldn’t be an exact match as she’d never be a soldier even if we ignored period accuracy (no idea if I will or not) and a lot of his actions would be an insult to her as a character. Think it would probably be that Satine and Obi-Wan are dear friends who aren’t interested in each other romantically but are being pressured to marry because advantageous match etc. (Possibility of both getting into Methodism and abolitionism through that and that being their points of discussion, and the clash occurs when from start of events of second film Obi-Wan goes and begins to take a much more active route to abolition eg. Killing slavers and boarding their ships to liberate those inside. Satine being against the killing and violence etc but thats later on!)

For Captain Jack Sparrow, who better than the greatest space pirate of them all, Hondo Ohnaka! (Was considering having Quinlan Vos for it but feel like his moral compass is too strong honestly)

As in the films, black pearl (possibly renamed) attacks the port and Obi-Wan is taken aboard with medallion when he invokes parley and, when he gives his surname as Fett, is taken away as they leave. Barbossa I’m currently thinking is Maul (which ties in beautifully and absolutely not completely accidentally with the clone wars episode where Hondo’s crew mutiny him to join Maul) who is going to manage to get singularly obsessed with Obi-Wan by the end of the events of the first film where he is not actually dead/possibly reincarnated like Barbossa in the films but blames Obi-Wan for everything (which would honestly be more justified than the root of Mauls obsession in canon).

Cody breaks Hondo out to help him rescue Obi Wan, they assemble a crew on Tortuga. Various Jedi characters will be appearing as part of a large network of escaped slaves and outlaws (for various reasons) who want to help people in similarly difficult and/or dangerous situations. The Jedi have had dealings with Hondo before and essentially have a similar reaction to him as ghost crew in rebels - don’t trust him as far as they can throw him but often forced to work with him against their better judgement.

Plot progresses as first film but more oh the real villains are the colonisers (though Maul and his crew are giving them a run for their money). Find out that not only is Fett blood needed to break the curse since Jango was involved with initial treasure taking, but there’s a mysterious extra reason why people are wanting to get their hands on a son of Fett. Murmurs of gaining favours with others saying it’s bad luck to have one on the same ship as them. Jedi and Hondo who have known Fett are also reluctant to give their opinion when Cody asks what Jango was like.

Movie accurate romantic and sexual tension between obi-wan and cody, gonna say period accurate homophobia also playing its part in stopping them acting on it.

After being rescued from being marooned Obi-Wan promises Dooku he will marry Satine if they rescue Cody, then sneaks out of ship to help take the Pearl and then on to rescue Cody. If it is Jedi in the crew they may well go with him but otherwise same as film. Hondo persuades Maul that he should become a commodore and Mauls crew “take a walk”. Then events as film but Obi wan kills Maul.

When they’re back at port royal, Cody saves Hondo from execution and Obi Wan saves them both either through really banking on his power as Dooku’s ward/heir or sneaking them away with distraction (possibly even before execution date). I quite like the second option as there’s an opportunity for using smugglers tunnels and a first, desperate kiss as Cody escapes with Hondo to join the crew on the Pearl.

So ends first film as it were. Here’s some more rough drawings of Cody and Obi-Wan start of first film vs third film. I absolutely used a reference for that first drawing of Cody and I nabbed the obi wan base for the drawings from another piece I’m working on so sorry about style discrepancies!

Second film! Satine and Obi-Wan’s wedding is taking place the next day and Cody, who has been writing letters back and forth with Obi-Wan , is waiting in the smugglers cave for him so they can run away together. But Obi-Wan never shows. Cody either hears at port or through Satine directly (who knew the plan to run away and was banking on the scandal meaning she could avoid marriage for a good while afterwards) that Obi-Wan has been taken into captivity by a Lord Palpatine/Sidious working for the interests of the East India Trading Company. The charges are for aiding and abetting pirates, his role in helping Hondo and Cody escape has been discovered apparently (maybe yes maybe no, Palpatine doesn’t give a fuck he just wants the compass). Cody somehow finds out about the compass being the wanted trade (Satine as a go between perhaps? Saying she’ll send hired men to get the thing that will save her fiancé?) and heads off in search of Hondo.

Hondo’s meanwhile been visited by an old friend to tell him it’s time to pay his debt, and the black spot appears in his hand. Surprise it’s not Jango! It’s Either Fox or Rex! Hondo scared shitless and runs ship aground on an island which is where Cody finds him and his crew at that time. (Do the Jedi help him get there??) Anyway think the island scenes will be more OFMD vibes than actual events of dead man’s chest.

Hondo tricks Cody into going onto shipwreck to search for key he’ll trade in return for compass. Flying Dutchman arrives and with it it’s captain, Darth Vader.

Another very rough drawing I added extremely rough shading to! Vader is combined Davy jones style with a vampire squid because 1) on brand 2) the membrane sections reminded me of the his mask. He’s wearing a bicorn hat which wouldn’t actually be the trend for another couple of decades but let’s just pretend Vader is incredibly fashion forward.

Cody is alive and so not of interest to Vader, until Hondo, who Vader has sensed and has appeared in front of on the Pearl, tells Vader that he’s a Fett and so part of his payment of 100 souls. Vader scoffs that a Fett son is payment of another’s debt and can’t be used by Hondo, but Hondo replies that Jango Fett died on land and so has no need to settle his debt anymore. Vader finally accepts when Hondo tells him Cody is in love, giving him a fortnight to find the other 99 souls.

Cody hasn’t heard this on the other ship so first he hears of it is Vader basically telling him and welcoming him as another son of Fett. Cody is confused when Vader tells him he can join his brothers on deck, figures he means crew mates, but instead comes face to face with dozens of men who look near identical to him in various states of ‘fishification’.

More rough drawings! I spent too much time on these but they’re still rough so heck it. Only did Alpha 17, Rex and Fox for these ones.

Alpha has been part of the crew for the longest time, as the first son that Jango Fett ‘paid his debt’ with. Torn between hair styles, but he’s turning into a great white shark. Alpha hasn’t known any life outside of the ship as he was barely walking when Jango took him to Vader. Jango essentially decided to settle his debt with Vader by making the souls to give himself because he’s a full out bastard. Mostly this meant one night stands and then showing up a few years down the line and promising to the mother he’d take care of the child.

Fox actually managed to live his life without Jango taking him as a child but it was still a hard life and he’s actually encountered Lord Palpatine/Sidious before. He doesn’t talk of that time but he has the brand on his neck from it (the pirate P). Either Palpatine killed him or eventually he either ran into Jango or those who knew of sons of Fett and believed that sending one to Vader would grant you favour from him/gain you a wish or something. It doesn’t, Vader just subtracts one from Fett’s debt. (Possibility of Palpatine killing Fox hoping to gain communication/favour with Vader?)

Rex is the most recent addition to the brothers in the crew aside from Cody. He’s only a couple of years younger and only a bit of fishification has started. He’s the most hopeful still of the brothers. He’s the one Cody trusts most and has as a confidant for his plan to steal the key.

Meanwhile Obi-Wan has escaped and disguised himself as a pirate. Manages to find Hondo and various Jedi. They may their way to island with the chest on it and Cody, who has managed to escape the Dutchman (name change pending) appears and fights Hondo.

Feel it would be kind of funny if Maul were to appear at this point and go all KENOBI, just to add to the chaos.

Vader is Anakin and fulfils the role of Davy Jones with Calypso being Padme (fun bit when they go to see her in her human form and they’re met by the handmaidens). Not a perfect fit as padme isn’t flighty and wild like the sea but hey ho. So Vader locked away his heart and trapped Padme in human form.

I honestly have no idea if the twins are running around somewhere or not and what they’re doing. Ashoka is definitely around somewhere as is Ezra and other rebels.

Had an idea of reincarnation or believed to be of Obi-Wan as someone Vader viewed as his in some way. Can either actually be reincarnation of just that they look similar/obi-wan is a descendant but Vader ends up obsessed with him which helps add validity when they pretend he’s Calypso/Padme.

Satine has been facing off with Palpatine and his cronies from a legal stand point but Palpatine isn’t playing fair or legal (particularly when he gets Vader’s heart (possibly delivered by Maul?)). Bo Katan would be sick to turn up and fight anyone and everyone.

Not sure if Jango is actually dead or not, but he had Boba and since he stuck around and loved his mother he thinks of him as his true child and has amazing cognitive dissonance to not be horrified and trying to rescue the others. But think he’s probably dead and boba’s running around somewhere not even aware how much danger he’s in (but possibly told by Jango not to tell people his real surname).

Oh also! Note on initial drawing - so I imagine that occurring with Mace Windu filling the role of Barbossa in the wedding scene!

Anyway hope there’s something in here that intrigues people!

[idciminlove]

some tips/opinions I have on x reader inserts - especially when following the plot of a TV show/movie!!

Avoid the "And Bumblebee!" affect - It's okay to include scenes from the media you're writing about to provide accuracy to the characters and the events occurring, but if it has little significance to your character or the plot, then there's no point of having it there. One of my biggest pet peeves is when people have scenes word for word with what the characters are saying, and has their character do little to nothing to contribute. It makes the writing seem lazy and if we wanted to have that scene we can just watch the scene ourselves in the original content.

Build character relationships and show dynamics - most writers know the rule - show, don't tell - which can be applied to almost any form of storytelling, including fanfic. Don't just say "A is B's best friend!" show their friendship and how much they care about each other. Do they have inside jokes? Do they make fun of each other? What's something they love about each other? What's something they could change about one another? etc. 2.A - Especially when having the main character being related to one of the characters, make sure to show the sibling bond! If you're going to have the characters related that's an important part. Don't just say they're related to the character as a way to force them into interactions with other characters. Show it! Show the sibling dynamic and how the two interact, especially when it is important to the plot.

Make your character an actual character - while "reader" is supposed to be a representation of the person reading, they will never be 100% accurate to those reading. You won't be able to satisfy everyone, and that's okay. The reader/main character is still a character, give them distinct traits, give them a personality. Are they strong willed and ambitious, or shy and soft spoken? Are they optimistic or a realist? What are their goals in life, dreams, plans for the future? Do they have a path set for them? Or do they have no idea what they want to do? Do they have any nervous ticks? Do they have a preferred taste or style? Of course, most of the time, we want our main characters to be someone we can sympathize with and understand, someone relatable, but it doesn't always have to be. The reader is your character, so make them your character!

Feel free to move away from the canon plot - While the canon plot may be a great set up for your fic, and can offer structure, feel free to move away from it and explore. You don't have to follow every episode of a tv show, or the whole plot of a movie. While many writers can and have managed writing along with the canon plot, I myself prefer divergence, since it makes it much easier than watching the media over and over again to make sure everything is accurate and knowing exactly what's going to happen next. (Ex: I'm working on a plot for a stranger things x reader..am I going to directly follow the plot after season 2? no, probably not lmao) It also makes things a lot less predictable, since your audience doesn't know what's going to happen next.

[lovemyromance]

Idk why this is a hard concept to grasp:

Anything that would move the plot or character development forward.. is included in the book.

Major developments that move the plot forward - included in the book.

Character interactions that are important to the integral plot - included in the book.

Plot points to set up for future overarching plot - included in the book.

Therefore it makes absolutely no sense to have an entire couple that has been foreshadowed for 3 books now to break up in a bonus chapter.

That would leave readers confused. They will ask "oh, weren't Az & Elain a thing?" They will wonder about all the moments they read between the pairing in the last book.

It also makes no sense to include a new love interest in a bonus chapter.

I know people love to bring up "Have you read the bonus chapter?" any time someone says they don't know where Gwynriel came from. I think it's funny, because if Gwynriel was foreshadowed in the actual book, don't you think they'd be asking "Well, did you read the book?" Why is the first question "did you read the bonus chapter?"

That's what Elriels ask, btw, if someone even says they don't know where Elriel came from (very rare occurrence). They don't point to a BC where Azriel is explicitly showing desire for Elain (though that would be too easy), they point to the 3 books of canon text.

Gwynriel doesn't have anything outside the bonus chapter. And that bonus chapter is also heavily skewed based on their interpretation of the text. Most people still do not see romance between the two even after reading the gwynriel's beloved 2nd half of the BC.

My point is, if someone opened the next ACOTAR book and it was Azriel suddenly head over heels for Gwyn of all characters, people would be confused. Yes the bonus chapter is available, but most people haven't read it, and even then, it's not a very solid foundation for a whole BOOK of their romance.

SJM is not going to write something to cause more confusion with the plot in a bonus chapter. She's not going to suddenly break up the couple she's been foreshadowing for 3 books and insert a new love interest in a limited edition version of the book only found from one bookstore in the US.

And I know there are people that are like "Oh well SJM has written full marriages in the BC."

I assume they are referring to singular occurrence of that in the HOFAS BC.

*SPOILER ALERT*

Ruhn & Lidia get married in a BC. That's true. But their marriage and that BC occurs at the end of the book. After the main conflict has been solved, and it is essentially a happily ever after epilogue type bonus. It is not a major development of the plot nor a shock or twist to anyone. They were already mates and together. Them getting married in the bonus chapter was just a fun wholesome way to add to the series. In fact, the entire event was so lowkey Ruhns mom wasn't even mentioned as being there.

There were no questions raised after that BC. SJM could write a 4th CC book, and their marriage would likely not have any relevance to the overall plot of that novel. She could have never published it, and it wouldn't have changed a thing.

Thats the difference. BC do not cover major plot development, they sow seeds for the future and are sometimes just for fun. They are often not needed or relevant for the plot in the book at that time. So they are not included in the book. That's it. She doesn't write bonus chapters to cause even more confusion.

But I thought it was obvious 🤷🏻‍♀️

[aboutiroh]

I'm not sure if this is something that has been discussed before, but the pacing of book 3 has always bothered me a little (not enough to consider the writing as less than phenomenal, but still). There's actually a few things that I think could have been handled better and I just grouped them under 'pacing issues' as an umbrella term, even though it's not always the most fitting term. Most of these aren't even really issues, but just my personal preference.

For instance, I always thought it's a pity we didn't get more episodes with the Gaang after Zuko joined the team. I love the fieldtrip episodes, but we barely got to see team avatar travelling together (and Toph didn't even get a fieldtrip!). There's a lot of untapped potential there and we're free to explore that ourselves of course, but having more canon storylines would've been nice and I think it wasn't impossible. (This is a segue into issue nr. 1):

Book 3 spends too much time preparing for the invasion.

The Gaang spends half a season to prepare for the invasion (they mostly just travel to the meeting point). This makes no sense to me as we, the viewers, know that Azula knows all about it (as King Kuei so nicely tells her about those plans in 2x19 "The Guru"). (Which btw, he could have mentioned to the Gaang after learning that Azula was not a Kyoshi warrior, but I'll let that slide as Kuei is canonically a useless person).

They build up towards a fight that we know is doomed to fail and that on itself is okay, but that moment could've happened earlier in the season (not so early that Zuko doesn't have the time to finally understand what his destiny truly is). If the invasion failed earlier in the season, Zuko (and Suki) would have joined earlier. Many episodes in early book 3 could easily take place after the invasion (thinking of "The painted lady" or "The puppetmaster", maybe(?) "Sokka's master" and "The runaway", though some elements would have needed altering, e.g. the Sparky Sparky Boom Man subplot (I say we get rid of it entirely)).

Conversely, there's one episode, or rather conflict, that should have occurred before the invasion. (Segue to issue nr. 2!):

2. What even was the invasion plan, really?

After the invasion fails, we learn during a beach party that the Fire Lord is planning to literally burn the entire world when the comet arrives, so the Gaang's new plan of discretely hiding and training until the comet passes turns out to be pretty pointless. Aang suddenly has to face the Fire Lord much earlier and more importantly, when Ozai's at his most powerful, which is less than ideal. So the combat training recommences. It is at this point that Aang suddenly realizes he's not willing to kill Ozai. He's of course right to feel conflicted about it, and it's understandable that his friends don't completely understand just how important this is for him. It's a necessary and significant moment in the show, but it's just strange that they haven't had the discussion before.

Aang knows he has to defeat the Fire Lord pretty early on. Throughout book 1 and book 2 he's preoccupied with learning to bend the elements (when he's not riding animals or escaping imprisonment or facing whatever other problem the plot throws his way). It's too early to think about the technicalities of what that defeat exactly entails because priorities, I totally get it. But by book 3, they have a pretty elaborate plan to invade the Royal Palace. It's just never explained how they will defeat the Fire Lord. Hakoda explains the plan as follows:

The eclipse only lasts eight minutes, not enough time for the whole invasion. And the Royal Palace is heavily guarded by firebenders. So that's where we'll need the eclipse's advantage the most. When this is finished, the Avatar will have defeated the Fire Lord. We will have control of the Fire Nation capital, and this war will be over!

Assuming the plan was not to kill Ozai (because Aang would have felt conflicted about that), how exactly would Aang defeat the Fire Lord in those eight minutes? Was he just supposed to knock him unconscious and then immediately put him in a cooler cell? If that's the case, I didn't see them carry one around. Aang had thought about the possibility of not coming back from the battle (as he tells Katara just before leaving), so it would only make sense for him to consider the possibility that it could be Ozai who would not make it out alive because of him.

[antisatiric]

it's occurred to me i've never really gone through design notes for twain's design; i have nothing else i can do right now so i'll do that under the cut!

post-writing me adding this bit on: it ended up becoming a sort of chronology about the evolution of twain's design. it's really very long, but i'm happy with the way things turned out.

this is where we started compared to my current design for twain! it's important to acknowledge where he started; my version of twain very much did come initially from bungou stray dogs, and especially on my older blog you can see a long, long stretch of time where i still used his face for icons. there's a marked difference between these two designs, though.

first of all, bungou stray dogs has a habit of just dressing the foreign authors in whatever suits the time period their real life author counterpart was from. this isn't always bad, but in twain's case it wasn't particularly accurate, so i aimed to fix that by removing the aspect of period accuracy from the lore's equation. this is where my first ever redesign comes in;

this was my first ever go at redesigning twain's character to fit the more serious storyline i had in mind for him! there are a lot of aspects changed here and a couple aspects i kept the same so i'll go through them.

the shape and color of his hair remained consistent, save for the addition of a ponytail at the back---at this time, i wasn't confident enough in my portrayal and its deviations to change standout parts of his design, and moreover i wanted to be able to continue using icons of the canon design without too much of an issue. i also kept his giant belt because i found it funny.

i wanted to incorporate a lot more color into this design, though; his initial design is almost entirely black and white except for the belt and his hair, and twain had always seemed to me the type to enjpy vibrant colors. because i tended to base him off the characters featured in his works---usually huck and tom---i wanted a very earth-toned palette, and eventually settled on the green, brown, and black because i liked the way they looked with his red hair.

you might also note that i kept the button up shirt for this design! that will inevitably change later, but for now it's staying, although i had him button it up partway. i considered it an iconic part of his design at the time to have it unbuttoned but i secretly resented the unbuttoned shirt coming up as often as it did in my writing, so i changed it.

as for his shoes, i gave him something a lot more practical while still being a little unnecessarily complicated because i had always had a gripe with his sandals. he was meant to be a rough-and-tumble traveler and the shoes never seemed to be practical for that, so i fixed them.

then we get to my next iteration of the design!

this one is actually quite close to my current design, but it suffers from a few elements i wasn't quite sure how to commit to.

by this time, his official change in ability from aimbot to what it is now had already taken place, and i had also conceptualized no. 44 thanks to the help of a long-dead server for the plot point of humanized abilities, although he was initially quite a different figure in twain's life---originally, before settling into the tense and unwilling mentor-mentee relationship, i had intended 44 to be a sort of de-facto love interest for twain who gave him power out of a sense of fascination, rather than inevitable necessity. the plot of twain being his inheritor came later.

this is the first real appearance of twain's white eye, discolored skin, and white hair, though you'll notice i was hesitant to fully commit to sapping ALL of the color from his skin and his hair retains a lot more orange in a lot wider of a span.

the buttoned up shirt is finally gone, too! i figured since i was already taking dramatic liberties with his character i could just go ahead and change whatever i liked, so i decided it would make more sense to just put him in a non-buttoned shirt and be done with the button debacle that seemed to haunt him all the time. then i gave him a jacket to make up for the loss of green in his shirt!

and now we're finally onto my current iteration of the design.

i've committed fully since then to the color sap on his face. i also brought back the belt (it wouldn't have been visible, but he lost it for a few pictures after the previous one) and decided on a more consistent volume or his hair. this is, for now, what i'm considering his final design, though i imagine it will continue to recieve slight tweaks in the future as i draw him more.

then i of course have my redesigns of him that suit a specific purpose in a couple of his aus...

... but these each honestly deserve their own posts, and i've gone on enough here. thank you for reading if you've gotten this far. i love talking about things like this when it comes to twain. hehe.

[lesboygamzee]

ACT ONE - PART ONE

in reading homestuck again im going to try my best to analyse it to my fullest potential ; while i definitely like to enjoy homestuck Casually i think that doesnt necessarily mean i need to abandon fullblown analysis . i can acknowledge Hard Canon and The Implications in the same way i can acknowledge silly stuff + how im usually going to write characters . something something you have to know the rules to break them . thisll be half rambling half ( poor ) attempts at analysis and a bit of me going Hehe joke funny also i will use the characterses canon names and pronouns for simplicity + i feel its most suited . the exception is tavros because i have tried to not she/her tavros before and it was difficult and Painful i would never do that to her ... anyway .

[…] My intent was always to make the start date a very significant number in the story, recurring frequently. Consequently, I decided to make him thirteen years old, thus making the story about four thirteen-year-old kids. There are more references to this number than can be mentioned casually, some of which are serendipitous. Playing cards, which have a good deal of relevance later, are comprised of four suits of thirteen cards each, for instance.

(page 1 author commentary)

i wont point out every case of 413 occurring but i will point out cases i find particularly interesting or fun :o) the suit of cards thing isnt something i picked up on at first but thats interesting to know ! on page two john is incorrectly named ' zoosmell pooplord ' . zoosmell being a reference to an older comic ( series of comics ? ) of hussies . i read it to see if theres anything of value i can find in there ; even in the silliest and least plot driven media you can find some sort of significance to an authors later work . maybe an idea , a character archetype , or just the plot structure . zoosmells holds no value at all and is stupid though so

im not sure if i talk about it much but i do really like how each main characterses room is in homestuck . not only are they typically really good at getting across a characters basic interests but early on with the beta kids they really sold the whole ' webcomic pretending to be a game ( that is actually a game pretending to be a webcomic ) ' thing . the simplicity of it all , the items of interest scattered around in sometimes nonsensical places , even shit like how the walls are drawn just gives the impression of a guy who you can walk around and play as . and you can ! eventually .

Your name is JOHN. As was previously mentioned it is your BIRTHDAY. A number of CAKES are scattered about your room. You have a variety of INTERESTS. You have a passion for REALLY TERRIBLE MOVIES. You like to program computers but you are NOT VERY GOOD AT IT. You have a fondness for PARANORMAL LORE, and are an aspiring AMATEUR MAGICIAN. You also like to play GAMES sometimes. What will you do?

(page 4) time for analysing interests . while characterses interests definitely dont mean NOTHING in the greater scheme of things theyre probably not as important as most other shit . i find them fun to look into , though :o3

really terrible movies - i need to actually watch these , and i plan to ! im not much of a movie guy unfortunately . i dont think theyll be the end all be all of john analysis but i doubt theyll hold NO value . apparently theyre quite shit but i willing watch the big bang theory so i think ill be fine programming computers - john is the ' player character ' in a story that is currently quite programming-joke-heavy . the fact that hes kind of dogshit at it adds to this . guy doesnt know what hes doing yet and neither do you ! simple enough . paranormal lore - johns interest in ghosts is relatively significant but id consider it more ' iconic ' . the guy likes ghostbusters , his tshirt is a knockoff slimer , etc. i think all of the kids have one of these . it doesnt matter much in the greater scheme of things but i think its cool to see what interest a character is sort of built off of even if it gets overshadowed by other shit quickly ameteur magician - im a little lost on this one honestly . it can kind of go hand in hand with pranks i guess ? maybe theres something worth looking into with regards to characters and their relationship with magic . john seems to specifically focus on magic tricks which is opposed to roses interest in Real Fucking Magic . probably not though thats stupid

on page six is a rare appearence of the cursor . its a remnant from the homestuck beta where every panel was going to be a flash panel . it was ditched for good reason

its also one of the most blatant parts of the video game feel of early homestuck . thats a reader input interacting with a fictional world ! thats all there really is to say on it though i just thought it was neat

biggest plot twist in fucking history

You stow the SMOKE PELLETS on one of your CAPTCHALOGUE CARDS in your SYLLADEX.

(page 9)

i love sylladexes . johns is obviously based off a stack data structure . john rose and dave all have data structure inspsired moduses which i appreciate but i kind of like the silly ones that come into play later on too !!! like all of jades . unfortunate that they get dropped almost entirely eventually :o(

i should give characters that dont get one them . theyre pretty awesome i think

John: Examine Problem Sleuth Poster.

PROBLEM SLEUTH MENTION !!!!!!!!!!!

John: Read note on drawer. This note is rich with the aromas of FATHERLY AFTERSHAVES AND COLOGNES.

(page 12)

i made a seperate post awhile back on how dadbert is a sort of symbol of masculinity of fatherhood of manhood etc etc and more specifically how this interacts with reading jeggbert as transfem or otherwise Not A Dude . i still think that holds some decent value

In any case, you now feel like you have gathered enough things to get down to business and do some really important stuff. The next thing you do will probably be exceptionally meaningful. John: Squawk like an imbecile and shit on your desk.

(page 15)

snrk . anyway , since it reminded me : regarding analysis that strongly take timelines into consideration when i look at a lot of homestuck character analysis i see a lot of people try and make a point of ' oh the homestuck characters dont actually HAVE these specific character traits because in ANOTHER TIMELINE they did so and so ' and while i get that , timelines are interesting as a concept and its fun to think about , it doesnt exactly have a place in character analysis . homestuck is ultimately a story and the characters are less like people and moreso tools to tell that story . this is simple shit i am well aware i am not acting like what i am saying is revolutionary but it does lead to people losing the plot a little ( literally lol ) but like .. character a doing something instead of character b or character c sparing character d or whatever blah blah blah . did these all happen ? yeah sure probably . hell you can explore that in an au and ill probably go ' woah , cool ! ' because again its fun to think about . but it doesnt matter .. homestuck tells a story and while it focuses on multiple timelines . just because john took a shit on his desk in one timeline doesnt mean i need to be factoring in ' probably took a shit on his desk at least once ' to how i write him as a character . he would not fucking do that because he does not do that in homestuck . go and write your shit-on-desk-taker!john au but it has no place in canon analysis and you dont really need to think about it all that much

typheus is a wind god etc etc basic observation . i would really like to read more on the denizens and what gods theyre inspired by but the sources i find are really long and hard to parse .. ill have to look at other peopleses analysis if i want to understand anything i will be honest

on page 25 is the first pesterlog to appear in homestuck , between john and some loser nobody cares about . in a post i unfortunately dont have the link to , said loser is compared to a sort of tutorial character for early homestuck , similarly to johns status as the player character . obviously as homestuck goes on more characters become ' playable ' , as in you see the story through their perspective . but its a pretty neat observation for the early comic !

TG: but who cares about this lets stop talking about it TG: did you get the beta yet EB: no. EB: did you? TG: man i got two copies already [...] TG: why dont you go check your mail maybe its there now EB: alright.

(page 26)

^ classic tutorial conversation . go do your objective !!! your first quest !!!!

[...] The red flippy-lever thing means you have new mail. And that means the beta might be here!

(page 28)

FACT CHECK : this is false === SHITTY ASCII 'BANNER' THAT OF WE ARE DONE HERE ===

anyway it is day two of me working on twenty eight fucking pages and it just hit midnight which means i am going to play miitopia . this is likely going to be one of the shorter posts but i hope i get less rambly as i go on so i can read more than an average of fourteen pages a day jesus fucking christ . Anyway

[drippingheart]

howdy, worms and germs. this is an indie rp blog dedicated to Getō Suguru and Fushiguro Megumi from Jujutsu Kaisen. my portrayal is both anime and manga based. manga events will not be spoiled.

! ! ! themes present but are not limited to: violence, gore, abandonment issues, childhood trauma, depression, mass murder, child soldiers. this is not to say all my threads and headcanons will be violent or solemn. I do enjoy the light hearted side of friendship and bonding, but the trauma of being a jujutsu sorcerer is very important in my portrayals.

also important : I do not condone Suguru's actions. this is fiction. I love delving into his psychology and motivation. I try to understand it to a point, but his actions and mentality are not a reflection of mine. I am pro villains; their accurate portrayals are interesting.

𝟎𝟎 details on megumi. 𝟎𝟎 details on suguru. 𝟎𝟏 promo. 𝟎𝟐 megumi visuals. 𝟎𝟐 suguru visuals. 𝟎𝟑 plotting call. 𝟎𝟒 memes. 𝟎𝟒 meme call. 𝟎𝟓 character study. 𝟎𝟔 alternate verses. 𝟎𝟕 introspection.

Rules are below the cut.

I’ll spare you anything long winded though these are definitely subject to change and certainly up for lengthening in the future!

—   𝟎𝟏   I run a mutuals only blog. If I follow you, I want to WRITE with you. I don’t collect followers and like to keep a tidy blog of people who interact with me. Since you’re reading this, that means you care enough to do so. I won’t bite your head off; please feel free to send memes or hit me up for a thread idea. I often clean up my follow list through soft blocks.

—  𝟎𝟐   I don’t write one liners or semis. The more you write, the more I’m inclined to reply rapidly. Quality and quantity fuel my motivation! I truly enjoy world building and scene progression, so novella length threads are sought. Plotting and winging things are equally enjoyed, however for lengthy and detailed threads ( esp crossovers ), plotting is preferred. I have a plotting call linked above.

—   𝟎𝟑  This is an 18+ blog as I am nearing my thirties. I don’t foresee posting NSFW images, but I write heavily graphic scenes thus don’t feel comfortable writing with minors. Any suggestive aesthetics or sinday memes will be tagged as " after dark .".  I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, and I don’t want to make any of my followers uncomfortable. More regarding potential smut is below.

—  𝟎𝟒  I don’t have any triggers and don’t tag any triggers. Threads are generally rated M, but I can go PG-13 depending on who I am writing with. I do not shy away from violent and graphic scenes fyi; I really enjoy writing them actually! I encourage you to message me if you would like to write out something extremely graphic. Violence aside, smut may make an appearance. It is not the goal of my writing. If there's chemistry in the thread and between the writers, well ... who am I to say no. In the case of potential smut, aging up characters is fine; I know some people are sensitive about this. Smut will only occur with male characters as I am gay in real life and choose to depict Suguru and Megumi as gay, albeit not openly.

—   𝟎𝟓  When it comes to ages, I think it's vital to keep character ages canon. Yeah, JJk is great with all the lore and action, but the ages of the characters and the soul crushing and life threatening lives they live is the heart of the series. What everyone goes through as a child and as a teenager is incredibly vital. The only time I think aging up is alright is in terms of smut. Having said that, I'm not opposed to writing crushes or romances during their teens. 

—  𝟎𝟔  I do moderate edits and formatting. Formatting isn’t a deal breaker with me honestly. I prefer length over pretty aesthetics. I do ask that you cut posts; I won’t be following if you don’t cut your posts or fail to tag your posts — all of your posts especially your ooc and negativity posts.

—  𝟎𝟕 Crossovers are loooooved to other animes/mangas, video games, to shows and movies. Do not be afraid to reach out with crossover ideas. I am also very much interested in AU threads especially involving Suguru since there is a lot of potential with him. So far, I have FFVII verses written up for both of the dudes. Provided interest, I will write up verses for Bleach, Castlevania, and the Witcher among other things. 

—  𝟎𝟖   As stated earlier, currently I am all caught up with the manga. For those who are only watching the anime, I will not incorporate any manga elements in our threads. I do not openly discuss spoilers for the sake of other people. If I do discuss anything that may be considered a spoiler, it will be tagged as "jjk spoilers ." Headcanons and drabbles including the events of the manga will be tagged with the aforementioned tag.

—  𝟎𝟗   Regarding Suguru, it is my preference to write him just as Suguru not as Kenjaku, however I am not opposed to it for the sake of an interesting thread. On that similar note, I am happy to write Suguru as a teenager and Megumi as a little kid for any relevant threads.

—  𝟏𝟎   I encourage you to like the content you see. If you like the images, headcanons, songs I post, you are more than welcome to like them. Do not reblog my personal edits, headcanons, and even images I find and post ( still tag with art credit ) unless I have tagged you in the post. You are also welcome to tag me in posts; that would make me very happy! When it comes to memes, please reblog from the source. PLEASE.

—  𝟏𝟏   When it comes to asks/memes, I treat them as independent little snippets. Sort of like insights with some or no background information. Sometimes I write them intentionally vague because it's what comes to me at the moment. I do not treat ask responses as starters, however you are more than welcome to continue a response of mine if you like it enough! Also, I have an ask box call linked above, and you are always welcome to like and comment it whenever you want to be sent things. Seriously. You'll never pester me. You can like request ask box things 24/7.

—  𝟏𝟐   IMPORTANT — I am a firm supporter of people being able to write whatever the fuck they want. This is all fiction; people tend to forget that. I will never judge someone nor post anything to harm/bash someone for their choices. Let people write what they want just as famous writers do. There's really no difference except famous writers get paid to do so. This is a creative journey, bruh. Images used in my banner were found on an ai image website. Don't like that? Do not interact.

[xaeyrnofnbe]

here’s the general plot i have in mind for my ZTHAB (Zeros To Heroes And Beyond) au. (so far. think of this as a first draft)

because i’ve been meaning to get around to it. i’m organizing it by arcs bc that’s the best word i can think of off the top of my head for this. you could also think of them as chapters. or episodes. yeah 👍. also i do not intend to write this as an actual fanfic because every time i try to do something like that i lose so much steam and excitement for my idea.

characters will be prefixed with mana! or prime! at the beginning of a paragraph, so assume i am talking about that version until i explicitly mention the alternate version of them.

oh and important detail: albatrio are basically platonic soulmates. so keep that in mind.

this au is based on a single just roll what-if. i have had too much fun with this. well, me and @theblacktiecacti who has suggested SO many good ideas that i have since incorporated.

(also, even though this is an alternate universe where things play out wildly different, there are still a LOT of spoilers for the riptide campaign, so i wouldn’t recommend getting into this idea if you aren’t caught up. not really any spoilers for prime defenders though.)

anyway

ARC ONE

mana!gillion, after attacking mr. ferin, is hauled off by guards. but instead of being banished from the undersea no forced to swim to the surface, (like in canon riptide,) he is brought to a room with a portal, which activates, and he is pulled through. he then falls from the sky in the world of prime.

previously on the prime side of things, prime!chip and prime!jay meet for the first time. this happens in a police station in a very tall building. flying cars are present. chip has been arrested, jay works at the station but isn’t officially an officer yet. she just kinda gets to hang around and do the jobs bc of who her dad is. she questions chip, who is having none of it and highly suspects her of having powers, much like himself. she denies this. but when he teleports out of the building while she isn’t looking, to sit on a narrow ledge, jay impulsively flies out the window to go grab him, blah blah, “so you DO have powers,” he invites her to join his new team of superheroes. she accepts begrudgingly. it’s basically like their first meeting oneshot, just in a different context.

back on mana again, mana!chip and mana!jay are blowing up the navy tower on zero, but things don’t go exactly to plan. they barely make it to the big chipper before they’re captured by marshal john, and taken to a holding cell until jay’s dad arrives, and takes her away. this solidifies in her mind that her undercover pirate thing never would have worked out anyway. she decides her best option is to climb navy ranks until she can find and kill her sister’s murderer herself. and chip? he’s left for days, stewing in irritation and building up a heavy grudge in response to jay’s betrayal, and he escapes before he can be taken anywhere worse, and sets off on a stolen ship looking for some real pirates.

ARC TWO

mana!gillion wakes up on a kitchen counter in prime!chip’s little apartment. prime!jay is also there. gillion, at first, is disoriented and lashes out, but he’s quickly calmed down by his new companions, who are incredibly curious about whatever the hell this fish guy’s got going on. the two wannabe heroes catch their new friend up on where he is and what’s happening, (at least, as far as what they’re aware of; they won’t find out about his banishment for a long time.) at some point, it turns out chip’s been training some kid who also has powers, (ollie,) and thus, the oneshot what-if this is based off of, occurs. nothing comes of that, they still aren’t prime defenders.

mana!jay is, indeed, rising in the ranks. she’s becoming a formidable soldier. and mana!chip finds mana!lizzie, and joins her crew, the grandberry pirates, with the end goal of getting back at the navy and by extension, jay.

ARC THREE

in both dimensions, something isn’t right.

mana!gillion finds himself at home and at peace with his hero friends, but something isn’t quiet right. he’s like a puzzle piece that fits perfectly, and yet is from the wrong set entirely. additionally, there’s an individual, labeled a supervillain by the news, that’s been stirring up trouble in the very city the three friends live in, and gillion can’t help but find the mechsuit of this villain incredibly familiar. gill also gets some new clothes, and some more futuristic armor. pretzel keeps her hero mask.

mana!chip is falling into old patterns from his time with reuben price, and is becoming nearly as ruthless as his captain.

mana!jay talks to her friend, kira, who voices some concerns. jay brushes these off and continues training and barking orders at the people around her. but when she is faced with a portrait of her sister, she starts to wonder if this is worth it. she spends a lot of her time alone crying.

ARC FOUR

mana!chip and mana!jay meet for the first time since zero in a tavern on neutral soil. jay doesn’t think of her leaving chip as a betrayal, but he does. she talks to him like an old friend, even tries to invite him to join her in her cause. but chip is angry. his hurt bubbles and boils under his skin, manifesting in an off putting display of lava cracking between his skin around the edges of his face, and he attacks her. the two fight, and when jay inevitably beats chip, she spares him, but leaves knowing exactly what they have become*, and exactly what she needs to do about it**. (*arch enemies) (**kill or throw every single pirate in the deepest darkest prisons, including chip.)

mana!gillion and prime!chip and prime!jay attempt to stop the new villain that has finally become enough of a threat for heroes to be an adequate force of retaliation. the robotic figure is about fifteen feet tall, and greatly resembles gillion, with black, turquoise, and pink plates and pieces, like a full suit of armor. it is called The T1d3str1d3r, or The Tidstrider, or just The Strider. the names it is given are varied. it also has a pink, octopus-like robot that breaks free of it’s surface in order to join in on the fight.

at a certain point during the fight, the heroes are split up, and mana!gillion goes searching for his enemy in an alley, only to be met with a single glowing blue eye in the darkness, and a voice not unlike his own. this is where he properly meets the prime version of himself. when his foe steps out of the shadows, prime!gillian introduces himself. he’s working with a group of vigilantes, with the goal of doing good for the city, even if they have to do bad things to get there. but that’s not the whole of it, as prime!gillian is onto him. he knows that mana!gill isn’t meant to be on prime, he knows he’s from another world. and he’s barely able to finish his monologue before mana!gillion slams into him and they fight, now with prime!gill at much more of a disadvantage, having sent his mech off to fight prime!chip and jay.

ARC FIVE

after a few more, uh, incidents, the two gills come to a truce of sorts. they’re both the same person, kind of, so they’re kind of the only ones who Get It. and eventually, mana!gill takes prime!gill to meet with his friends properly, who much to his surprise, (and kind of disappointingly,) they really hit it off. mana!gillion isn’t sure why exactly he’s upset at this, but he suddenly feels like a fourth wheel to a friendship he had helped happen. and it doesn’t feel good.

eventually, though, prime!gillian takes his new allies to his secret base. (i have not decided what the secret base is yet.) they meet the prime versions of lizzie, (who keeps everyone on task,) caspian, (lizzie’s #1 supporter and enabler,) marshal john, (the muscle,) edyn, (here called eden, she’s an inventor and mechanic,) and finn, (resident weird old guy who’s really into biology, zoology, writing romance novels, helping his granddaughter with her tech, and, finally, the multiverse.) chip is incredibly excited to see lizzie, since they were really good childhood friends, and he hadn’t seen her since the black rose heroes all split up and retired. mana!gillion talks to prime!gillian and finn, and learns about what they’ve been doing (studying the multiverse and trying to steal the tech they need to travel between dimensions, without success,) why he shouldn’t be here, and why his home dimension needs him.

over on mana, mana!chip and mana!jay have gotten to the point where they command great numbers of their respective people, and have been sending letters back and forth in an attempt to negotiate territory and resources, to no avail. they’ve also both had some pretty wild makeovers.

ARC SIX

tensions are rising.

mana!gillion is feeling more and more distanced from his prime friends. he realizes just how alone he truly is. at the same time, prime!chip and prime!gillian are having a fight on a high rooftop, (mirroring riptide episode #15 but with a more angry-looking gill,) but they do work things out eventually, and the two have a tender moment looking out over the city lights. mana!gillion starts helping prime!finn seek out facilities to rob that might have the stuff they need to send gillion home. gillion doesn’t know where his morals and beliefs lie in a world so alien to him.

mana!chip and mana!jay are at war. at this point, they’ve had some sailing scuffles. but now they’re planning the big thing, a huge battle. jay is an admiral of the navy, and chip has command over all the pirates lizzie, his captain, has recruited to their cause. both have had family and friends feeding into their drives of vengeance, both, at this point, want the other dead. the location for the final battle between pirates and navy is set: a large island that used to be home to a bustling civilization, now mostly abandoned and overgrown. all that’s to be done now is to prepare the armies for the fight.

ARC SEVEN

prime!finn has warned mana!gillion of how dangerous it is to be away from who should have been his friends. neither have any idea of what’s actually happening on mana, but they have clues that it can’t be good. all gillion knows is that the people he’s SUPPOSED to be with, are in grave danger. and his friends on prime? they have their own gillian. they don’t need him. he feels unwanted. so he, accompanied by the grandberries as well as prime!chip and prime!jay, break into the place with the parts, beat up some guards or something, steal the things, and return to base so eden and finn can begin building the portal to mana.

unfortunately, the battle is beginning. pirate and navy ships gather on opposite sides of the island, countless people waiting for their leaders to send them out onto the soon-to-be battlefield.

ARC EIGHT

with the portal built and tested, (tested at least according to finn, when a lot of water came out,) mana!gillion steps through, and falls from the sky once more, this time into his homeworld.

it takes him a great deal of time, but eventually he finds out what’s happening, and realizes he has to move quick, or else he’d lose the two people he’s never met, and yet matter more to him than either of his whole worlds.

don’t ask how he gets there, idk, but when he arrives to the battlefield, the fight has gone on all day. the sun is setting, blood is seeping through the grass and dirt, and he lunges forth into the fray, parrying some blows and dodging others, in search of HIS chip and jay.

he finds them and uhhhh. stops them from killing eachother? yeah the ending is something i’m still very much unsure about. group healing arc is required though. yeah

again, this is a very rough first draft. in a more realized version of the story, there would be a villain, some actual subplots, a big conflict that is actually properly resolved on prime, and more stuff going on on mana. yeah 👍

[an-inky-fingered-lass]

New game: Share your three best fanworks. No thinking, just the three that instinctively occur to you. Then copy-paste this ask to anonymously share with as many people as you want.

Delayed response, I'm sorry! But my first ask, how exciting. Thank you so much!

(btw @ussjellyfish I'm such a huge fan of your writing. I keep meaning to leave some comments (I'm always terrible about getting to that!) and I promise I will eventually but I just had to take the opportunity to mention it. I'm just in love with the way you do dialogue and I reread a bunch of your stories literally all the time <3)

Okay! Hmm, favorites.

First one is definitely whistling static when the young learn to fly (Agents of SHIELD, part of what I call the peaceful retirement post-season 5 AU, philindaisy family feels, 5,898 words). I've written a lot this past... year-ish, maybe like 20% percent of which is posted (oops), and whistling static is maybe my favorite thing I've done so far. It makes me so happy every time I reread it, which says a lot -- I love my own work, most of the time, but I'm also relentlessly critical of everything I do and am very good at convincing myself it's all terrible -- but whistling static does so many things I really really wanted it to do and covers a lot of themes that are super important to me. The repercussions of spending decades of your life as a spy, finding your own kind of peace (when you believed you never would) and whole messy process of it, building your life into what you what it to be and believing that that matters, because it does. It's warm and introspective and bittersweet and ultimately hopeful, which is maybe my favorite combination of all time. There are a lot of things about it I'm really proud of. It was also such a joy to write.

The second one that comes to mind... there's another AoS AU I've been building on and off, that is very, very canon divergent and essentially explores a drastically different path May's life could have taken. There is still a mission that goes terribly wrong, a traumatic event that affects her deeply and changes the course of her life, but everything is different -- so the aftermath is, too. It's currently at 7000ish words, very sparsely plotted and self-indulgent but it's very important to me. It's... also unpublished, which might make this cheating? Oops. But it's a story about building and rebuilding your life, about how love is something you work on, something you choose over and over, and how maybe sometimes doing the brave thing means choosing your own happiness. Through the course of it May and Andrew eventually adopt a little girl together (and her name is Elaine! Lainey Garner-May. I may be unreasonably proud of that name. And it maaaaaay ring a bell to one or two of you? 👀). It's unconventional family feels, STRIKE Team Delta fun and just. Feels heavy. It's really special to me for a lot of reasons. I have...three? pieces I'm hoping to wrangle into completion and maaaaybe post soon. We will see. In the meantime... here's a sneak peak? (I couldn't resist!) _

“I’m fine,” May said, a little too deliberately. Laura hummed. 

“Mm. Something’s bugging you, though.” 

May paused. Her hands didn’t stop moving -- the glasses didn’t so much as clink -- but something in the air did, as though an atmosphere could hold its breath. 

Laura didn’t. Propping her hip lazily against the counter, she was complacently aware that she’d likely prove a right menace in the interrogation room at this point, by dint of sheer, tired immunity to all her agents’ unconscious intimidation and elicitation tactics. On either side of the table. 

May rolled her eyes tiredly. “Ever think about joining up, Laur?”

“Nope,” said Laura cheerfully. It was an old exchange. “Happy where I am, thank you. Nice dodge, by the way.” 

When May relaxed it was easier to remember that she couldn’t be trusted with seasoning of any kind, that she almost always pulled dishwashing duty because she actually liked doing it. Laura thought about the legend this woman had been turned into in her absence, the way the soft sweater she was wearing still permitted a full range of motion and hero sat so awkwardly on her, heavy and cumbersome like nothing she had chosen ever was.  _

(This AU is also how I found out that Laura Barton is one of my absolute favorite povs to write. She's so much fun.)

And the third one that comes to mind, weirdly, is this character study I wrote for Tonks and Lupin from Harry Potter ages ago, that is actually complete (rare for me) but that I never posted because it was heavily, heavily inspired by the incredible dirgewithoutmusic's scar tissue boys and patchwork kids. And also a really a huge mess. But it was my first venture into this sort of... fling-ideas-at-characters-to-see-what-sticks stream of consciousness writing style, and also the beginning of my, really sort of figuring out a writing style that's mine, rather than just whatever sounds vaguely okay. It also contains what's actually still one of my favorite bits I've ever written:

Tonks wove their fingers carefully together, and didn’t think of never letting go.  (Theirs was a spot of light in a time when such things were not to be taken for granted; if a moment was all they would have, she was not going to spend it wishing for more.)

But since that's not published either, I'm going to poke tentatively at be the stillness of the moon. (Also Agents of SHIELD, and an early, alternate draft of whistling static, 3,773 words.) This one was HARD to write (the doc got to around 13k words with scrapped drafts...) but I have a thing with writing rambling conversations, the kind that whisk over like three different topics and aren't quite linear but make sense, ring true and have a point to them, a destination -- I write a lot of that and I think this is one of the times I did it best. I'm also really proud of all the little details, the way I can sort of see it playing out. This was one of those stories I really watched like a movie in my head while I was trying to write it (or *cough* trying to sleep). It was an early draft of whistling static that I got so frustrated with I started again from scratch with the same themes and a different approach and pov, but I came back to it after months and actually liked it and so... it ended up getting posted. I was amazed by the response it got, too, it got some really, really lovely comments. I stressed over it a lot but I'm really glad I ended up sharing this one.

so that's... four... (oh dear) and WOW, this got long winded. I'm sorry, I get overexcited! And I think I may have defeated the purpose here a little. Whoops. I really need to actually share more stuff. I'm working on it! This was so much fun, though. Thanks so much for asking!! <3 <3

[deadcityhq]

CHARACTER NAME: lestat de lioncourt CHARACTER FACECLAIM: sam reid CHARACTER AGE/DOB (if relevant/they're not old af): november 7th, 1760. changed in 1781 at almost 21 years old. 263 years old now technically. CHARACTER PRONOUNS/GENDER IDENTITY/SEXUALITY ETC: he/they, genderfluid, bisexual/biromantic/polyam CHARACTER FANDOM (if relevant): the vampire chronicles, admittedly with a few twists and inspo based on the new show too OC OR CANON: canon CHARACTER TYPE (for example: werewolf, shadowhunter, warlock, demon etc): vampire brat HOW LONG HAVE THEY BEEN IN NEW YORK/WHY ARE THEY THERE ETC: about three months IMPORTANT CHARACTER INFORMATION TO NOTE AND SHARE (this could be important headcanons for initial plotting, mini bios etc, supporting docs): born in france, lestat was the youngest of three sons-- five other children having not survived childhood. as the youngest child, lestat stood to inherit no lands or fortunes. as such, lestat set about forging his own path in life. from 12, he began education in a monastery and decided he would enter the order as a brother when the time came. however, this was opposed to his father and brother's ideas, and they proceeded to pull him from his education.

another attempt at building his own life came around the age of 16, when lestat disappeared with a travelling group of italian actors. he fell in love with performing. however, it didn't last long. as days later he woke up to the actors gone and his brothers to take him home.

it isn't until his twentieth year that lestat finally finds true freedom. he meets and befriends and violinist named nicholas, and upon his mother's insistence that lestat know freedom, he travels to paris with nicolas.

here, he gains a job as a backstage assistant in a theatre, while later being offered a shot at going on stage and becoming a professional actor. however, it is not long into this that something drastic happens. a change lestat was wholly unprepared for, when a man named magnus enters his life.

magnus kidnaps lestat and very soon after, he is made into a vampire. however, his maker quickly commits suicide and lestat is left to grapple with eternity on his own, adapting to his new life. however, as magnus' only fledgling, he inherits all his wealth. and so, lestat buys the theatre he used to perform at, but tends to avoid contact with the human world he was once a part of, including nicholas.

it isn't until a while later that lestat's mother, gabrielle, arrives in paris, dying, that a further change occurs in lestat: he forges his own first fledgling, changing his mother into a vampire to save her.

for months, they travel and live together, eventually taking in nicki and changing him too. many different events occur over this time, including lestat meeting and coming to know of armand and then by extension, marius. inevitably, this leads to lestat being fed some of marius' ancient blood to regain his strength after burying himself in the ground for a time after his mother leaves him.

shortly after meeting marius, he takes him to see those who must be kept -- akasha and enkil, the first vampires and rulers of their kind who appear as living statues. marius explains then how vampires came to being, and the next night, when lestat is alone, he visits akasha and enkil to try and wake them inspite of marius' warnings against this.

his plan actually works, and akasha allows lestat to drink her blood as she drinks his. that is until enkil awakens in a jealous rage and attacks lestat. thankfully, lestat is saved by marius. marius then tells lestat to leave the island and although reluctant, lestat agrees. and this… is where he comes to new orleans. and meets louis de pointe de lac.

from here, the events unfold as is known: lestat, louis and later claudia spend some 60 years together, before going their separate ways. their time together is beautiful, but clouded with tragedy and pain. it ends rather messily, with lestat thinking louis dead for some time. but then, then--

lestat comes back to the world. a longing to reconnect, and, well, he's heard all the talk. the stories floating around of so many different disasters occurring over the years. maybe he wants to take a look, maybe he wants to even contribute to the chaos. so in the end, he decides what better way to dip into the world, than with theatrics. and so, in mid/late 2023, his band is formed. and now, lestat resides in new york city, the place that seems to be becoming quite the centre for shenanigans right now. hopefully, he'll be able to make his own waves too.

THREE AESTHETICS THAT REMIND YOU OF YOUR CHARACTER:

the feel of vibrant red rose petals against skin

sounds of a lively party, with music coming from a few doors down

the fear of never being able to keep a hold of what you love most

admin andy app.

[ruins-and-rewritez]

Ok let's straighten up some things while o have my mind on it

I'm not the biggest fan of Shadow and Bone (Netflix) unpopular opinion? probably but it feels like I need to reiterate for the reason that I keep seeing posts about show fans not having read the books

I have a whole slew of reasons for this so buckle up buttercup cause this could take a while

I absolutely love Six of Crows, absolutely stellar book, best one in the Grishaverse by far (in my opinion, mind I haven't read KoS duology yet, I'm getting there) diverse, inclusive cast, incredible plot, Kaz, you know really, job well done Leigh

Shadow and Bone, also good, but I didn't fall in love with Kaz characters half as much, still addictive read, 10/10

So having the Crows in the show was a real high point for me, mostly excited to eventually watch their interactions and watch relationships develop, and knowing that the best was yet to come, and of course just the facts that my favorite characters were being brought to life on screen even if they had a much more limited screen time then their more prominent Shadow and Bone counterparts

Honestly, Season 1, I don't have the biggest problem with

It's pretty well scripted, fairly accurate toward the books minus a few things that from a movie/tv standpoint probably weren't as seemingly integral to the plot as they didn't pack as big a punch as something like Alina being the Sun Summoner

I was kinda annoyed when they outed Kirigan as evil so early on when they probably could have waited toward the end so you could find out how Alina did because reading that line I remember thinking "fcking plottwisttt" but it's pretty normal show wise to point out the villain early on to you have a better grip on the good vs. evil of it all so I can forgive that

The original Crow trio having a plot line intersecting Alina's own was actually brilliant in its own way and was totally something that I could see as canon (the whole Alina climbing into the carriage was completely accurate on the Crows luck meter)

From a Crow lover standpoint I was pretty satisfied with the whole combination of the two and didn't really have a lot to complain about so I was really hyped for what new shenanigans they'd get into in Season 2 (and for my bby Wy but that's a whole nother ballgame)

So I impatiently what for the second season expecting it to meet my ridiculously high expectations, surely it was going to be on par with the previous one

Not

The Shadow and Bone side of the show was fine, pats on the back all around, perfecting casting for Nikolai, not much to irritate my desire for perfection

But I was fairly pissed off at the Crow half of things, it felt to me that the creators decided that they no longer cared about developing the characters like they were cast-off characters that didn't deserve anymore then what they got

I hated how Wy and Jes were immediately shoved into a relationship instead of their book-canon slow burn which I find much more appealing to their dynamic like it defeats the whole point the Wylan as Kiwi arc because Jesper just throws himself into it instead of the natural progression we get in the books (Jesper's self doubt of the whole situation being so important to his character and it just being ignored to fast track their relationship was unnecessary and honestly unfair)

I hated that the entire plot line of the second book (CK) was made into the parallel of the siege and storm arc when in the series it occurs later in the timeline

This of course destroyed any hope of the proper developments (character and relationship wise) between the crows, destroying their original foundations of trust and understanding

Having Kaz fight the Dregs wasn't as impactful as it should have been

And the progression of the (CK) plot wasn't as smooth and important without the Ice Court arc why the fuck would Kaz need control of the Dregs if he wasn't going up full force against Van Eck I mean he demolishes Pekkas entire dynasty in like two scenes what does he need more bodies for

The trama and experiences of their past are largely ignored save Kaz whose trama is an enormous part of his character. That's what made the books so addicting and intriguing to the whole audience

Usually people side with the underdog relating their own troubles and problems to whatever trama or deficiency they themselves find the characters going through as the story progresses

They beauty of Six of Crows is that each one of them is so faulted and struggling with their own set of problems that it's almost impossible to not relate to at least one of them

Fast tracking the journeys of beloved characters is painful especially when you know how they truly grew into themselves and their lives

I mean I'm probably being hyper-critical over one show when plenty of shows have their own set of flaws ands issues but it's like

They put all this effort into creating a brand new storyline for the Crows in the first season, a mission to accomplish that gave the audience a nice way to see they're dynamic and questionably moral choices and then in season 2 they just went and skipped ahead, over everything that makes Six of Crows soooo good and skipped to the end where Kaz finally gets his revenge on Pekka because it was more action packed then a bunch of trama-riddled teenagers breaking into an actual high security prison in the middle of that country's biggest celebration of the year but okay I'm just some nerd that happens to appreciate literary accuracy in show/movie development so forget me

I'm not a total monster there's plenty of things about the show I appreciate but I'm still angry that my Crow babies went done justice

Show pros here