#zasp bug fables

[shachihata]

i really like leifzasp i just also think both of them would be like. extremely lame about it

[waddledeeliveries]

team mothiva too :]

[hana-bobo-finch]

this is what happened after the golden festival. probably.

mothiva mothiva come quick your malewife has a tummy ache

[fandomfantasyy]

Leif: Okay, who- who's the hottest person you can think of? Zasp, not yet over his crush: Sniff... Mothiva... Leif: ...Okay. Zasp. Mothiva isn't here right now, you can be honest with me. Zasp: Mothiva is a ten. Leif: She's a six at best?! Zasp: You take that back!

[liceinmyteeth]

I should draw zasp more

[shadowthedragoncat]

Fictional men I like a lot

what does this say about me....

[brokencroww]

aspy

[uchudishe]

Thank you, spectralgecko, for template. Now I can spread the insanity.

Explanations, if you want such.

To note and to lore drop, purely my worldview you are free to disagree and ignore - I usually operate on the self-invented "presumption of affectionate friendship" - basically, "if it's not clearly stated those two are lovers, then they are just very good friends", or "they are good friends unless proven otherwise" (the "but they talked funny!" does not work, shipping someone for being on one screen is dumb). Because most people understand love very narrow-mindedly, they think you can only be close, affectionate, friendly, open and it cetera only with lovers - and thats a result of devaluing friendship. Meanwhile, friendship can be as endearing and sometimes even more wholesome than love. This presumption is also why I don't like Kabbu x Neolith, but you do you, people.

But, for the sake of funsies, I like to go sometimes silly, like it happened with Neolith and Beast. Or in this case (looks at Celia and Levi) remind that friendship also has -ship on the end (◕‿↼)

Elom and Tecki - canon, and I kinda like the dynamic of curing the depression.

Elizant x Neolith - idea by Conflicted Writer that seeing Neolith, the ray of sunshine, in her self-loathing life can be a ground for a romance.

Leif x Muse - canonical ship that has to get an AU where Muse died alongside Leif. People tend to forget the fun guy literally was married.

Hoaxe x Hornet - I won't elaborate. Yet. But for an idea, thank to Lord Terrakion on discord

Hornet x Zasp - regarding lore drop earlier, crying out loud, it is a guilty pleasure. There is not much way that could be plausible, but I love it and I perfectly understand that might be hypocritical

Scuba Ant x Aquaphobic Termite is a strange one. It was a crack idea, and while totally like to image oke helping another at some point - because its wholesome - making them a pair is a joke with a seed of possibility.

Levi x Celia - oh boy, I love when pre-established enemies find a common ground and then build a tight bond. There is so much to think about. How they got together? How Levi even managed to pull that off? What they went through together to be that close *nods to Scarlett boss fight*. Like seriously, Celia abandoned any reason or tactic when she saw the gay ant™ knocking her partner off, rushed in - and in a fashion so reckless that she also got conked down instantly. My Dice... it's a situation where I use the "presumption of affectionate friendship", but with all due honesty, it's TOO easy to make them into lovers.

Also, Levi could be a large part why Elizant agrees to get ladybugs back into the Kingdom. Its almost like noble and honest work shows you are ready to take amends and take responsibility for actions of your compatriots, which results in people seeing you in better light... and it works way better than assualt, battery, stealing and saying "you're the bad ones because you don't accept us", EH ASTOTHELES? (Pet peeve, please ignore).

(Totally adequate about Celia and Levi)

Elizant x Hoaxe - born as a what if. In Wasp Kin AU, Hoaxe with little entourage rushes to help Ant Kingdom repel the Dead Landers invasion. And he end up fighting side by side with Elizant. Good first impression makes for a rich soil for further relationship, if you play cards right. IT IS NOT CANONICAL to Wasp Kin, but an interesting thought.

Beast x Neolith - citation, "it's stupid, implausable, low key deranged, so fuck it we ball". Unlike Wasp Kin, this is a key point in Awaken the Beast AU (only the one where Beast is anthropomorphic)

Ok bye.

[rainydayzo]

gotta add wasp and Mother a

[lurrau]

[allistertheghost]

what if we called zaspleif electric current

because like ice is water and water currents

and then electric because zasp was supposed to have like. lightning powers or some shit

[artseniccatnip]

zasp :]

[waddledeeliveries]

mspaint shenanigans

[hana-bobo-finch]

I never see anyone talk about this bit of dialogue from the beginning of ch7 but i’m always spinning it around in my head

[fandomfantasyy]

i love how zasp is basically canonically trans. hes referred to as a man in the whole game, and either he just doesnt correct it, hes just a masculine woman with he/him pronouns, or hes trans. why? well, it comes down to bug anatomy

according to the bug fables wiki, (where i get all of my bug fables info ofc,) zasp is a metric paper wasp, and according to the devs, zasp is a potter wasp. no idea why the wiki isn't up to date but oh well! zasp has a stinger. heres the thing tho: if he was born a male wasp, he wouldnt have one, no matter which species he is.

in quite a few wasp species that ive noticed, only the female wasps have stingers. this includes zasps species! id comment on the antennae but i havent rlly researched enough to get a clear answer :P (ive been looking at too many wasp things help)

before i realized this, i thought it was just a popular headcanon. but now, especially with the help of scrolling the bug fables tag for hours and seeing a handful of comics about it, i realized it comes down to BASIC WASP BIOLOGY

someone get this wasp in the lgbtq wiki yall /j

[spectralgecko]

Dead Lander Hoaxe AU: Cast

If I were writing a fic for this, I'd let the info unfold, but I do not forsee myself having the time, energy, or general wherewithal to actually pull that off. Any writing will be mostly oneshots and small sub-episodes, I suspect. I'm going to upload some chapter-by-chapter information. Either way, I hope this is vaguely entertaining-

Most of the usual cast is the same as the original, but some are tweaked and I've made some new faces to fill in some ensuing plot holes.

Familiar faces:

First and foremost, blorbo the first and namesake of the AU - Hoaxe (who is never actually called Hoaxe in-world) throws the whole plot sideways by just... not being the antagonist in this. He's just A Guy trying and succeeding in surviving the dead lands (and as such just... doesn't even show up in the plot until chapter seven-). When he eventually does appear, he's an ally, though he's a wee bit too spiky to quite be friend-shaped. He's still impatient and a touch impulsive, and favors lurking in the shadows to outright confrontation. Right up until he's cornered, at least. He doesn't exactly have a name, but some of the roaches have taken to calling him Qolea, meaning“the slinger” (lit. “the one who slings/throws [things] - pulled from Hebrew). This is just their nickname for him, though, and while he does respond to it, it’s unclear whether he properly considers it a name, or if he even grasps the notion of naming things that way. They also call him the wanderer, the drifter, the roamer - really anything referring to his generally nomadic existence outside the roach village. 

Blorbo the second - Astotheles. I am blatantly biased, and also removing the wasp situation leaves some room to beef up the bandit interactions. Astotheles is much more involved this time around out of necessity. He is Tired™. He ends up as a wary and somewhat de facto ally of Team Snakemouth in the latter half of things, and the role of the bandits in the plot is bigger. The post-game territory would lend itself to maybe, just maybe, resolving things between Astotheles and co. and Queen Elizant II. I am also very much inspired by fics like The Merciful Bandit by Tangyfighter on Ao3 (I think they exist over here? scared to tag tho-), so there's some inspiration there and also a possibility of some Astotheles and Isau interactions.

There's a liiiiittle more of Mothiva and Zasp (largely Zasp because blorbo the third). Zasp also gets lowkey whumped on enough for Mothiva to have a chance to be openly concerned for him (the plot-hole fixers are antagonizing the wasp, woe is he).

New Faces:

Xera - A jewel wasp and an assassin with a particular distaste for anything roach-associated. One of the recurring antagonists. Her name is a butchering of the Greek xeraino for "to wither."

Lapido - A ground mantis and another of the core antagonists. (Name from the Latin lapidus for stone). He's the cold, silent type - not only does he not have much to say, he can't say it to begin with for... undisclosed reasons. Unlike the other antagonists, he doesn't have anything personal against any of our cast, he's just following orders.

Chari - A cricket lieutenant that, after a "foolish decision" on Astotheles' part, turned on the Bandit leader, despite formerly being a rather good friend of the bandit (once more, inspo from The Merciful Bandit. I’ve tried to avoid going too close to Tangy's plotline there, but do note that the divergent bandits are absolutely inspired by events therein.) (Name from Hebrew Chara (anger, burning, kindling) + i (1st person possessive)

The Greywings - The collective band of insurrectionists that borders on a cult of sorts. They seem to have some ties to the Plutonic guardian, but Venus mentions that they can’t truly be acolytes of Pluto - their magic is entirely wrong. It withers and decays, entirely destructive in nature. It also doesn't seem to function like most sorcery or wizardry, being more... bargained for. The scant evidence suggests this cultish group is not above trying to enslave other bugs to fuel their cause, and seems to haven cannibalism and parasitism. Many of its members are bugs that thrive on hunting and using other bugs. (e.g. their irl basis is parasitic or targeting, and I’ve opted to translate that as “fully capable of not doing that and being perfectly fine [like Maki, other wasps, etc.], but actively choose to give into and indulge the lower instinct like a lesser bug).

Esherev - A steely cricket-hunter wasp, and the apparent leader of the Greywings. (Name from the Hebrew esh + cherev, fire + sword). This one has some beef with our main protagonists, Astotheles in particular, and is overall just... a nasty piece of work.