catreginae

[catreginae]

Not fun fact: technical writing (such as writing clear instructions) is not for everybody. If people can't follow your instructions, your instructions are useless.

[catreginae]

I guess Vampire Warriors bring sleepy as fuck all the time is his Defining Trait.

[catreginae]

Kids in fandom are funny because they don't have enough life experience to realize that they don't have a lot of life experience.

[catreginae]

It's fucking hot and fucking humid.

[catreginae]

TUMBLR LINKS ARE WORKING AGAIN LETS GO!!!

Thou Shall Find Thyself - Chapter 3

Warriors pulled his scarf tighter around himself, tucking his chin under where he’d bunched up some of the fabric near his face so he could protect as much of his skin as possible from the biting cold. It was bad enough he’d ended up separated from the others and dumped on a mountain in the snow, he didn’t need to end up getting frostbite too. The tips of his ears burned and his toes felt miserably frozen in his boots but there wasn’t much he could do to protect them, other than maybe clamp his hands around the sides of his head but that’d make it difficult to hear and he didn’t want to hinder that. He could barely see, it was so dark out, he didn’t want to make himself even more vulnerable.

This a collaboration fic between @catreginae and I that @writerpyre requested! It features catreginae’s Warriors from Thou Shalt Not Fall and my Warriors largely from my series "You're a Part of Me".

[catreginae]

so im working on going through my ask box and i stumbled across someone i KNOW to be homophobic (because ive seen them say homophobic things with my own two eyeballs) complimenting a fic i wrote in which Warriors was written to be undeniably gay and in said fic referenced dates with men and experiencing homophobia, and i am SO confused. like… glad you liked the fic…? but if you’re so homophobic did you just. ignore the explicit queerness of said fic…?

they said they really enjoy a Lot of my fics and. thanks, but also hi i am a gay man and i do not tolerate homophobia and if YOU cant tolerate queerness how are you enjoying my fics because i write Warriors to be a gay man…? And i dont hide that…? im just SO confused 😭 like theyre homophobic but enjoy my fics about gay people that are OBVIOUSLY about gay people??

[catreginae]

thanks for the sane and normal takes on what’s going on in LU right now. every time i see a post you’re in the notes fighting the good fight and that’s so real.

Me? Normal? What a fun time!

I guess it's because I've watched this happen over and over again. The fundamental issue is that people don't know the difference between fanon and canon, but still act like they have some authority to speak on it when they leave the yard and engage with non-LU creators.

This happens every year, sometimes more than once!

At the end of the day, this is a festering wound. We keep having the same conversations but ultimately, we're probably going to keep having it because we're not having productive conversations. People see negativity and don't want anything to do with it. I understand wanting to protect your peace. At the same time though, it also means we're stuck in the same place.

This is will happen again.

[catreginae]

I am probably really unpopular right now, but you win some and you lose some, I guess.

[catreginae]

This Ring is a Shield: Part 2

Warriors comes home to find that there are unexpected visitors, and one of them gets under his skin.

No longer a one-shot! Read chapter one here! This is for the @queering-the-chain.

-

It wasn’t often that they were close enough to home for Warriors to take the group to his house to rest but when they close enough, the mood was almost celebratory. They all got along with Vivienne, they all loved Penelope, and since Warriors married into a rich family, there was more than enough room for everybody. It wasn’t as cozy as the ranch was, since there were reminders of nobility everywhere, but it was still a lot better and cheaper for them to use than an inn was.

As soon as he stepped through the front door though, he could tell something was wrong. The atmosphere felt cold and Penelope didn’t come to greet him with a meow at the door like she usually did. “Everybody stay by the door,” he mumbled as he took off his boots and went looking for Vivienne. He found her in what Warriors called the “hosting room”, a room with a fireplace, a low table, and a few sofas. Sometimes, the other utilized the room to relax and get a little bit of alone time, but Warriors saw it get used the most when the in-laws were over. In fact, it was being used for that right now.

“Vivienne, the cat is lovely but she isn’t a child.”

“To me, she is. She might not be a human child but she’s fills the same roll in our lives.”

Warriors recognized his mother-in-law. She always dressed well, keeping her grey-streaked blonde hair pinned up into the perfect bun, wearing jewellery with the large, embedded gemstones, and long dresses with lace. Today, she was wearing ruby earrings and a maroon coloured dress. At best, they just tolerated each other. They exchanged pleasantries and didn’t insult each other but Warriors didn’t feel as though she actually liked him. There wasn’t any warmth in any of their interactions. Whenever she was around, he just let Vivienne do all the talking.

He didn’t know the other person though. She was looked to be just a bit older than his mother-in-law and dressed just as well, though she wore her grey hair loose and she was wearing a navy coloured dress.

“Don’t you want more grandchildren, Marlene?” the other woman asked.

“I have plenty from my other children to enjoy. The Arlett family is still strong. If Vivienne and her husband can’t have a child of their own, I will enjoy the cat. Speaking of her husband, I see that he’s back for now. Hello, Link.”

“...hello,” he said, once he realized that he was being addressed. The other woman turned away from him to look at Vivienne.

“You and that man would have beautiful children.” Vivienne rolled her eyes.

“Oh, leave them alone, Cynthia. They’ve tried,” her mother said.

“They could try more often. He’s really good looking, Vivienne.”

“Stop,” Warriors said, rolling his eyes. Cynthia didn’t even look at him.

“Who is inherit your estate if you don’t have children, Vivienne? The cat? There are lot of reasons to have children, so you two should keep trying,” she continued, either unaware of the fact that they wanted her to shut up, or she just didn’t care. Warriors had no idea who she even was – probably some sort of noble too, knowing Vivienne’s family – but who came into somebody’s house and kept talking over them? Irritation bubbled up in his chest but he took a deep breath, trying to get his emotions under control.

“Look,” Warriors started, looking at Vivienne and then looking at Cynthia. “I’m not actually attracted to her, romantically or otherwise, so we’re not having children. We got married for politic reasons.”

“Perhaps you’re interested in men? I’ve got a son I have suspicions about.”

Warriors threw his hands up. “I’m not attracted anybody!”

He knew he should be more careful with his attitude around nobles but his patience was beginning to wear quite thin. He was used to dancing around the topic but Cynthia, whoever she was, was a stranger and also insufferable. He felt bad for her poor son who may or may not interested in men but either way, Warriors had the feeling that he didn’t trust her enough to say one way or another. She could only speculate because her son wasn't telling her anything.

“Truly? How do you even know? Perhaps Vivienne wasn’t the right person for you but regardless-”

“Cynthia, leave them alone. It’s none of your business, at any rate,” his mother-in-law stated.

“Hi, couldn’t help but to overhear,” Legend said suddenly, squeezing between Warriors and the door frame. “War- Link already explained himself. You don’t have to understand his feelings, but you need to shut the fuck up and leave him alone. It’s really fucking strange to be so invested somebody else’s sex life, especially when it has nothing to do with you. You’re not his partner.”

“Legend,” Warriors hissed through clenched teeth as his cheeks burned. He wasn’t wrong but it wasn’t Legend who had to deal with the nobility when they all went home for real. It was him and Vivienne! Legend glared at him, then glared at Cynthia. Cynthia’s face turned red, Vivienne was hiding her smirk behind her hand, and his mother-in-law looked... surprisingly unbothered. She stood up.

“Vivienne, I’ll talk to you later tonight. Cynthia, I suggest we leave. I think you’ve caused enough damage today,” she said simply, motion for Cynthia to follow her out. Legend and Warriors moved to let the two of them through.

“All clear!” Twilight called out after a couple of minutes.

Vivienne relaxed instantly. “Thank you, Legend. You have quite the way with words.”

“But what about-”

“Warriors, don’t worry about it. If Vivienne doesn’t look that bothered about the potential consequences, then I think you can afford to relax a little,” Legend said. “Besides, I wasn’t going to standby while that woman just walked all over you and your feelings. You might be good at standing up for us, but you don’t really stand up for yourself. Let us help you sometimes.”

Warriors couldn’t really argue against that. His mother-in-law seemed sympathetic to them too, or at least she didn’t seem upset or angry. Also, Legend was right about the fact that he tried to avoid discussion about his asexuality and lack of romantic interest, so he had a hard time shutting it down when the conversation went somewhere he didn’t want it to go. Granted, he kind of turned the direction of the conversation that way, but that was because he was tired of being questioned on why they only had Penelope. He knew he didn’t have to say anything but for some reason, people always felt the need to push. They needed a specific reason when there was none and they couldn’t just leave it be.

Suddenly, Vivienne stood up.

“Let’s all relax and get some tea, alright?”

-

Warriors was more relaxed after having something warm to drink and being in the company of the others, who were busy talking about animals. It was mostly Twilight leading the conversation, the man who talk anybody’s ear off when it came to animals, but the others were able to jump in too. Vivienne also explained who the other woman was – her aunt from her father’s side. That also made him a feel a bit better because that meant it was mostly a family matter, so Legend telling her to fuck off could be dealt with internally. Penelope must have been aware that he was upset because she was sticking to him, which made Twilight stick to him so he can stay with her. Wild managed to squeeze in a quick dinner as well.

When her mother did come back, Link sent them all to their rooms while the three of them went to the living room.

“Vivienne, Link, I’m sorry that Cynthia acted the way she did. I should have stepped in sooner. Your father is talking to her right now because he isn’t happy with her behaviour either.”

Warriors wasn’t exactly shocked by that. His father-in-law asked about children more in the beginning of their marriage and then seemed have to stopped caring about it. He didn’t bring it up the last couple of times when he dragged him to some event or another.

“Do you have the similar feelings as Link?”

She nodded. “Truthfully, I was happy to marry Link because he made it clear when we first met that he wasn’t going to pressure me to anything I didn’t want to do. Neither one of us are interested in sex or romance, so our marriage works for us. We became really good friends, so we’re happy.”

Warriors nodded.

“Your father and I figured out that you weren’t going to have children when you introduced Penelope to us. We hoped you might change your mind but we also made peace with it.”

Vivienne shook her head. “This would have been nice to know earlier.”

“I just didn’t know how to bring it up.”

Warriors understood, at least a little bit. On his part, he knew he wasn’t exactly open to conversation about his asexuality. It took a lot for him to speak up and he usually only spoke about it because something bothered him. Warriors knew it was probably not healthy, but that wasn’t something he had the time to address. The best he had were the others, who were always willing to lend an ear, and Vivienne, for obvious reasons.

He honestly wasn’t sure if that was the case for Vivienne. She didn’t tell her parents, so maybe she would have only said something if there was an indication that they were indifferent to it.

“I guess I can’t really blame you... And about what Cynthia said, who is getting this villa?” Vivienne asked. “Link and I were going to suggest that we put Penelope in our will.”

“I thought you weren’t going to tell your parents about that.”

Nonetheless, his mother in law laughed.

“If you died before Penelope, we would take her in, but she’s not getting the villa. Either you can adopt children, or it will simply stay in the family and one your nieces or nephews can have it. I wouldn’t worry about the villa,” her mother said gently. “However... I think this place is too big for a single cat. Perhaps you should get consider getting Penelope a friend, especially since Link has been gone so often lately.”

Vivienne lit up.

“Do I get to pick the cat this time?” Link asked.

“We could have three cats, we can both pick one.”

Link nodded. “Three cats sound good.”

This fills the aro, ace, standing up to hate, and coming out prompts.

[catreginae]

I hc that Wild can sing really good.

Like most of the others have instruments but Wild has his voice, which is cute to think about bc he hums while he cooks.

(Also in totk he learns to hum different songs, he could’ve learned them from the rest of the chain!)

[catreginae]

Wait, people think that it's weird for adults to start drama? Like, drama is only a thing kids start? Wish half of the people I work with got that memo!

We have adults at work that unplug a fridge and then don't plug it back in, like we want to the stuff that we put into a fridge to be warm instead of cold.

There isn't a magical age where adults cut off all things childish, for better or for worse. There are teens who think it's weird that adults are in fandom spaces like there's an age where you stop being fans of things (also adults run cons and stuff, not kids!). There isn't a magical age where logic and common sense kicks in either.

[catreginae]

[catreginae]

If I may add, people should really learn how to emulate videogames. I played minish cap for the first time by emulating it on my phone, *over 10 years ago*. Do not pay Nintendo to use their dogshit proprietary emulator to play 30 year old games. Besides, mods, randomizers and romhacks are fun! In conclusion, corporations are not your friends.

I completely forgot that I was playing ALTTP on an emulator and I didn't finish it yet. Another funny thing is that I have thousands of ROMs on my computer because a coworker lent me a USB stick full of them. He was offering so I copied everything.

But yes, emulation is always an option too if you want to look into it! I have the cartridge for ALTTP but I also don't feel like setting up the Super Nintendo, so I emulated it. Sometimes I booted it up quickly to check something since I knew exactly where I wanted to go. It can be really useful! You can also buy USB controllers that are not Nintendo brand but do the same thing.

I will never judge anybody for turning to the high seas since the used games market gets ridiculous sometimes and it took Nintendo so fucking long to jump onto it.

[catreginae]

I am miserable right now and the LU fandom has nothing to do with it.

[catreginae]

I promise that I'm not a bitch or a gatekeeper.

My issue is that people don't take the time to learn the difference between canon and fanon, and then they try to enforce fanon into people who are probably following canon more closely (or aren't even in the LU fandom). You can't know the difference if you don't know canon to begin with.

Do I care if you played all the games? No.

Do I care if you decide to not use canon after all? No.

I care about people being good fanon neighbours and I care about people learning more about a series I love because it has a lot to offer.

Knowing canon means you have more toys to play with, more scenarios to pit the blorbos against, and appreciate Jojo's attention to detail. Canon is enrichment for your habitat. Just because it's in your habitat doesn't mean it's the only thing you're allowed to play with but it's nice to know it's there for inspiration when you need it.

We're not asking you to play all the games. We're asking that you know the difference between canon and fanon. We're asking you to be open to learning new things because I think a bunch of us would be open to teaching more if we knew there was an audience for it. We're asking you to maybe watch a YouTube video, or scroll through Zelda Dungeon. That's what broke adults do - we watch other people play the games we wish had.

In the very least, maybe just stay in your own lane. Don't try teaching or enforcing something you don't know about.

[catreginae]

I get not being able to play the games but I still don't think it's an excuse when there are synopsis and whole gamewalk throughs available on Youtube.

I'm collaborating with someone right now who wasn't familiar with one of the monsters I wanted to use. When it came time to write them in, I sent them a couple of YouTube videos so they could understand how these monsters operated. I look up YouTube videos all the time when my memory is fuzzy.

People go "I can't play the games!" and just stop there. That's the annoying part. That's what feels like learned helplessness. They don't look up YouTube videos, or look up a plot synopsis, or walkthroughs - all which are free and have been there for a long time. They aren't the game but they still give you a lot of information, people just have to be willing to use them and it doesn't feel like people are.

As far as other Link Meets creators, they also have a learned helplessness. It's easier for them to yell us in the tags and the people incorrectly tagging things probably don't hang out in the tags. They're off in their own corner off the internet and only kind of heard of LU, so that's the tag they used. Either they need to correct people individually or block them, don't yell at the rest of the fandom for it.

Finally, people have headcanoning Link queer for a long fucking time. Link, for a long time, was a stand in. He was "your link to the game". You can change his name in most games because of this. I remember having debates about this on Deviantart after Skyward Sword came out! If you want him to be gay, he was gay. Simple as that. People have been queering that boy long before LU, haha. I used to read a lot of Pipit x Link fics because that's where a lot of hurt/comfort fics were.

I've been into Zelda since the late 2000s. At least 2008! There's a lot of context missing when you are a newer fan, I get that. However, newer fans also just don't want to put in effort into finding things themselves and it's frustrating. We also have a limited time in our day to teach people and I don't want to write a whole thing about a monster to get like 5 notes.

i don't have money or time to play video games

i do want to play all the zelda games eventually for my own sake and my own writing but my friend gifted me totk two years ago (i think) and i still haven't played it because i know if i played it i wouldn't have time to create art or write because i'd be sucked in (which i can't risk because i need to focus on studying too). i've only played botw, again cause my friend bought it for me. games are expensive first and foremost and also they take a long time for me to finish and require me to set aside time. i really wish i had gotten into it when i was younger, when i had more time, but well, i got into it in grad school.

if i were to wait until i played all the games to create anything for the fandom, i wouldn't be able to create anything until at least 5 years later.

so i tend to be discouraged by people who say things like "they haven't even played the games".

it's odd, because this really reminds me of the fans in the batfam fandom who insist that the fans who haven't read the comics are dumb and really talk down on anything they make. i think i saw most of them on twitter when i used to use twitter. i'm glad i don't really see stuff like that on ao3. but again, the problem is, a lot of the fans don't have the time or money to read comics. (also for DC in general, it's a pick-your-canon situation because there are so many comic writers that have their own version of the characters too so i don't understand people who say that comics should be where you get all your information when the characters vary from writer to writer, just like in fanfiction, it's about finding a writer you like) AND ALSO DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY GENERATIONS AND ITERATIONS AND COMIC RUNS EXIST IN BATFAM ALONE??? ITS NOT LIKE MANGA WHERE IT'S A CONTINUOUS STORY BY ONE WRITER, IMAGINE IF NARUTO WAS WRITTEN BY OTHER WRITERS MULTIPLE TIMES ACROSS ALMOST A CENTURY. YOUNG JUSTICE AND TEEN TITANS THE ANIMATED SHOWS ARE FANFICTIONS IN THEIR OWN RIGHT.

anyway

i don't think its reasonable to say i should play all the games before i create something. i want to create. i want to be happy. this is supposed to be fun.

i think i'd agree that those who insist that an interpretation of a character is wrong/right when they haven't seen the source material or try to do an analysis of the character in the context of the source material shouldn't do that, if you want to do analysis posts about canon, that's when you should know the source material, but a lot of the time it's the fanon version of the character they're talking about through headcanons. and also a lot of the time, these types of fans that only know the characters through fanon are children and/or are new to the concept of fandom. i would assume the version of a character that i've seen first or that everybody is talking about was the only way to think about it too if i was new and young.

in fact at my grown age, i was one of those people who tagged a non-LU art as LU, because a lot of the links across link-meets look pretty similar, because people are designing their links based on canon so they're going to share similarities. i saw another au creator state that they were scared of giving twilight a fur detail bc it would look too much like LU but did it anyway bc they wanted to (as they should) but also i feel like that proves how easy it is to mistake the designs. after the creator of the art i tagged incorrectly corrected me, i was more alert about it going forward (honestly i've just been sticking to LU creators to be safe at this point).

and people are right, LU is very popular. it's the ONLY links-meet i knew about when i emerged from botw and my friend told me about it. i honestly wasn't aware there were other versions until way later. especially because the names are pretty similar across links-meets and again the designs are too so i don't think it's all that surprising people get confused and just tag it LU. now imagine you're new to even the concept of fandom AND still in junior high. (side note, i have a couple of cis-straight male friends who are zelda fans and they don't use twilight or time or wild to call the characters, which i think is crazy because it'd be much easier than "twilight princess link" or "ocarina of time link". actually, speaking of cis-straight male fans, a lot of them say the same thing people hating on the LU fandom say, that we (transformative fandom) as a whole haven't played the games, especially when we say we headcanon the characters as queer or if they have autism or if they act differently than the "cool, masculine character" they think the links are.) this (different links-meet aus) is a very unique situation in fandom i think, from my go-around fandoms, naruto, one piece, batfam, haikyuu, the hobbit, etc haven't had different au beef to this extent or at all. it's honestly so fascinating. it's like everybody wants to be separated from each other in a way. (edit: i GOT IT! IT'S BC THE LINKS HAVE BECOME PERSONAL OCs MORE THAN SHARED CHARACTERS, THEY'RE NOT FIGHTING OVER SHARED CHARACTERS, NOT EVEN THE INTERPRETATION OF SAID CHARACTERS LIKE MOST OTHER FANDOMS, BUT SINCE THEY MADE THEIR OWN STORY, THEIR LINKS ARE MORE THEIR OCS THAN ANYTHING THEREFORE SOME PEOPLE FEEL MORE DEFENSIVE THAN FANS IN OTHER FANDOMS WOULD, IN THIS ESSAY I WILL—also most aus are shared between fans in other fandoms, like in batfam they have talon!dick or reverse robins, in the zelda fandom it's more a personal project, also in the microcosm that is LU the LU fandom have aus within the au which are exactly how other fandoms usually do aus, it's all so fascinating!) also i think the fact that LU is so much more popular than any other au adds to it. i've never seen such a phenomenon in other fandoms where one iteration is so much more well known.

LU is popular, i think the most popular links-meet au, at least on tumblr. (jhoca and ovega-karts works are getting more attention as a result of the comic dubs voice actors have done on YouTube) it's what one of my friends called "the gateway links meet au" which means a lot of the new zelda fans are getting funneled through LU first, which means a lot of them are young, new to fandom, new to zelda, or a combination of those. (also, especially for the first two, young and/or new to fandom, means they are susceptible to purity fandom culture, watch out for that). i'm not trying to excuse if people have done harmful things on purpose in the past or in the present but i feel like ignoring this context is doing more harm than good: the context being that because LU is popular it's where all the newest fans end up, and new fans are still learning.

and i really sympathize with creators who keep having their art tagged wrong, whether it was an accident by the tagger or not, because after a while i can understand for some people it can get annoying. but like this recent situation i feel like this pent up frustration is causing people to get too eager to jump on any perceived slight and honestly come off as a bit of an asshole.

i saw someone say they should just block every LU fan at this point, (meaning for it to be a punishment i'm assuming), but honestly yes, please do if it will give you peace. we don't want to be in places we're not wanted either. but it'll be hard, because again, LU is the gateway new zelda fans will come through and they will keep making the same mistake.

[catreginae]

A couple of days ago, I made a post that basically said there are not enough monsters being used by the Fandom. There are so many of them yet, we all use moblins, bokoblins, and Lynels - all monsters that appear about of BOTW/TOTK.

And there are variations of those that are different! Did you know that Lynels also appear in OG Zelda and ALTTP/ALBW too? Legend would know Lynels that only breathe fire, imagine his surprise when he sees one armed to the teeth!

It is so much fucking fun to compare and contrast the monsters that the boys would know! But you have to know a lot of monsters!

I was going to make posts about what type of monsters the Zelda games has but then I thought, why should I be the one doing research for you? The Zelda community has been compiling information for decades! You just have to use google or Youtube to watch Let's Plays. It's not like any of it is hard to find! Fuck, Nintendo has been making the games more and more accessible. There's just no excuse these days.

I feel like I would just be wasting my time because the LU is fucking allergic to research that requires doing more than reading a fanfic.

Do any of you want to actual want to learn or this fandom just going to be the horse that fucking refuses to drink water after we led you to it?