lucsf19

[lucsf19]

I was wondering if you'd share whatever head cannons you have about Vaughn and Yulian?

this is kind of hard lol because a lot of my headcannons are just what is written in my fic haha. plus, i dont want to spoil anything in the future with certain headcannons, but these are kinda based on a future where they would be together but without giving anything away.

a lot of people think of yulian as a little 'dumb' because of his unhinged/chaotic nature, when it actuality he is very intelligent and will make a great pakhan

yulian and vaughn calm one another, but in very different ways.

even though he is bigger than vaughn, yulian loves being the little spoon.

yulian fell first, but vaughn will fall harder.

when he was young, vaughn used to love wearing fake glasses to match with his papa.

vaughn and yulian like to gossip about the others' relationships.

yulian is actually the strict parent, whereas vaughn is the chill one.

though not often, vaughn occasionally has nightmares about the basement and yulian is the only one that can comfort him (just like he was the one to comfort him in the basement.

vaughn has an extreme strict zero-tolerance policy for anyone saying a single bad word about yulian, even from his own friends/family.

they have pets together.

vaughn is a great sniper, like his mother.

yulian has stars tattooed somewhere on him, for his mother.

vaughn is better at cooking, but yulian is better at baking.

it actually isnt easy for them to work together as pakhans at first, as they grew up watching their respective bratvas being run very differently by their fathers, but, eventually, they make it work.

both vaughn and yulian have no issue 'getting rid' of anyone from their own organization who refuses to respect the authority of the other.

they bicker all the time about which city is better, chicago or new york.

yulian prefers to kiss on the forehead, whereas vaughn prefers to kiss on the cheek.

though, both's favourite is obviously the lips

they dont have any matching tattoos (vaughn thinks its corny) but they do have plenty for one another.

yulian loves watching reality tv.

vaughn doesnt, but he pretends to for yulians sake.

yulian knows this, and loves his mishka even more for it.

they are in agreement that 'i love you' is not strong enough to fully represent the way they feel about the other, but they still say it constantly, as its the closest they can get out loud.

they always sit beside one another in bratva meetings and will often rest their hand on the others thigh under the table.

they slowly manage to change the historic rule that the eldest son inherits the parents position. instead, they make it the eldest child.

both thinks the other is too good for them, but would rather be 'selfish' than let them go.

i hope you agreed with and enjoyed my headacannons! feel free to say if you agree/what your own are, i might even use them as ideas in tbbu! <3

[lucsf19]

You know how V is the youngest, about Killian's age, but Gareth still called him at the hospital to set things up. I was wondering if you think it ties into his character that he has to keep a mature personality in front of others, like growing up to fast?

vaughn is 18 almost 19 right now, he is the same age as mia and maya :). (in my fic at least)

i definitely think that vaughn feels slightly seperated from his fellow heathens because of position as future pakhan. jeremy and nikolai of course are also heirs and have important roles to fill, but they are not expected to be the leader, let alone one that needs to measure up to Kirill Mozorov. and yeah, the fact that he is the youngest of them, even though he will lead them, probably plays a factor in it. however i dont think i would say its because he feels like he has to in order to gain their respect as its been made very clear that the other heathens respect vaughn as their future pakhan and i believe vaughn knows this. i think he moreso needs to prove to himself that he is as capable a leader as everyone else thinks he is.

i also think just in general, his childhood and the basement especially made him mature quicker than most. there is one other thing that has caused him to mature/try hard to ensure he acts 'older' than he is in front of everyone, but it hasnt been revealed yet so i cant talk about it haha.

[lucsf19]

Hey sorry to bother but when are you gonna update?not trying to rush or anything

no worries i know im like so late. im like halfway done with the chapter but without giving too much away i have really struggled to write this chap because there are so many characters in it and im trying to get their characterizations/personalities right but its just giving me writers block lol.

ive been answering these asks all day trying to get myself in the vaughn/yulian headspace so i can keep writing but ill literally write like two sentences then get stuck again. im gunna try reallyyyy hard to finish and upload it tonight <3.

[lucsf19]

hey! So like you know how Gareth was kind of "alone" like how he was friends with the heathens but kept them at arms length until kaydena and V(reddit) came into his life? Do you think it's almost the same way with Vaughn as well since he was separated from them for a while?

hello!

i think to an extent, yes. his decison not to go to the island at first had nothing to do with wanting to be away from the heathens, but because he wanted to be away from yulian. it wasnt that he wanted to keep them at arms length, but he had to. however, i wouldnt say he kept them at arms length in the same way as gareth. gareth kept them at arms length to hide his true self, he wanted to keep them away so no one would find out his true nature. for vaughn, its not that he actively decides or wants to keep them away, but because he has to so he can stay away from yulian. but i definitely agree that vaughn felt a level of loneliness until he met gareth.

[lucsf19]

Hello, hope you're having a good day! I was wondering if you'd give us a sort of run down on annies character and personality?

thank you! i hope your having a great day too :)

so annie if of course one of my ocs. i know people dont tend to like/care for ocs in fics very much which is totally understandable, but to write a full-length novel like im doing its kind of inevitable for me to have a few. annie is probably my favourite oc in the book. her and mikhail are sort of the sort of jethro and simone of tbbu, if you want someone you can compare their characters with.

a large part of me creating her came from the fact that, as much as i love RK's books, there are very few female side characters in her books that are actually fleshed out/serve a purpose other than to just make the fmc or other mmc jealous. obviously, vaughn does get jealous of her with yulian, but that is just because of who vaughn is and her character serves a lot more than to just prop up yulian and vaughns relationship. often the side-female characters just exist to like/flirt with the mmcs, such as clara in GOF and morgan in KTV. i understand why rina writes them, but i wish that rina would write the women as more than just obstacles in the main characters' relationship. this isnt just a critique on rinas books but all romance books that tend to do this.

it really annoys me when female side characters in dark romance books are reduced to nothing more than 'bimbos' or 'sluts' who are written just to flirt with or sleep with the male leads. theyre often portrayed as unintelligent, shallow, and disposable, serving no purpose beyond being insulted, mocked, or tossed aside by the main characters once they meet the fmc / other mmc, usually without any real reason other than to boost the mcs superiority or create cheap drama. what bothers me most is that these women are often just trying to enjoy themselves or have fun, yet the narrative punishes them for it. theyre framed as ridiculous, irritating, or pathetic for expressing their sexuality while the male characters are never shamed for doing the same. it kinda reinforces a tired, sexist double standard. especially when the other mc ends up doing something to said side character for simply being with the mmc, even though it was the mmcs choice to be with them in the first place. there is also a habit where the women are written as there being no possibility of them not wanting to have sex with the mmc because he is just that hot, so of course she must want to sleep with him.even in a dark romance where morally grey behavior is expected, women can still be written as complex and interesting characters even if they arent the love interest. they can be smart, funny, ambitious, messy, confident, vulnerable etc, anything beyond this lazy stereotype. its possible to write sexually confident women without reducing them to a punchline or a plot device.

sorry if i went off on a bit of a rant haha, this is just one of the main critiques i usually have of rinas books. me creating the character of annie is just kind of me trying to not recreate these stereotypes in my own fic. annie is a confident woman who is sure of herself, her sexuality and what she wants. as already mentioned, she studys computer science and is more than happy to lend her skills to yulian, as she wants to prove her loyalty and ability to him in the hopes she can permanently work for him in his organization, where she can further show her skills to grow in the ranks. she does regularly have sex with men as she is a young woman who enjoys it and there is no shame in this. she is gorgeous and she knows it. while she is fine with hooking up with whomever she pleases, she wont do it with yulian or anyone else she views 'professionally' as she doesnt want to get places by using her body, but by proving herself through her loyalty and intelligence. this is something that yulian respects, hence why he has taken a liking to her.

while she is of course a little manipulative, as one usually is to want to work in the mafia, she can still be compassionate and genuine. she is extremely intelligent and good atreading people, hence why she is always so quick to recognise what mood yulian is in and, while only subtly, has always expressed her support of yulian when it comes to vaughn.

all of this is just how ive always written/pictured her character from the start. again, though, as she is my oc, i wont delve too much into her character as i know she isnt what you guys are reading for lol. but as she is of course becoming an important member of yulians inner circle, and friend (though of course mikhail is still his best friend since childhood), she will be around quite a bit.

i hope i worded this correctly lol. im not trying to insult rk's writing as she is still obviously our queen, but sometimes the way she writes women does frustrate me. annie is not overly important to the story, i just wanted to write a woman the way i wish they were written in rinas books and show that, even if it is a dark romance, a woman can exist to be more than just a plot device who has no real importance beyond being a bimbo.

i hope this answered your question even if i did go off topic quite a bit lol. once again, i hope you have a great day :).

[lucsf19]

What tropes do you think would describe your fanfic?

this is such a fun question but i struggled a lot with it haha. i wanted to think of some that were a little more unique but tbh the ones that worked best are pretty basic. id say:

enemies to lovers (duh)/enemies-friends-enemies-lovers (if you want to be more specific)

forced proximity (first in the basement and then sort of again when vaughn moves to the island)

forbidden love

misunderstandings/miscommunication

mafia

possessive/obsessive mc's

there probably are others that would work but these are all that i could come up with. there are also others that i didnt wanna say because they could be slightly spoilery

[lucsf19]

Hey so I also write on AO3 lol and I get stuck in writers block a LOT. Has it happened to you? Whatd you do to get rid of it?

yes I absolutely feel u it happens to me all the time haha. I have two main ways of trying to escape writers block and one is to write a different scene further in the chapter/the next chapter. essentially, if you are struggling with the middle scene of a chapter, but have the first done, write the last one and then come back to the middle one. this is because rather than writing in terms of just what you want to happen, you’re writing to connect two scenes which I personally find a lot easier.

the other thing i do (and this is the thing i do most) is if im struggling to write a scene in full then I’ll just word dump what I want to happen. like on a separate document I’ll just write out in detail but without proper grammar/sentences just everything I want to happen. eg:

‘Vaughn goes to X place where he finds that yulian did Y thing which makes him very mad so he flies to Z place because he knows yulian is there and he watches yulian for a while who appears oblivious but actually isn’t then Vaughn attacks yulian for what he did. yulian gets angry and shouts at him but is also clearly hurt about it and Vaughn feels guilty but finds it hard to express these emotions so they just come as anger so yulian storms away and Vaughn thinks about how unsure he is of his feelings toward yulian.’

this is just short and has nothing to do with the fic it’s just a small example and it’d be a little more detailed realistically, but it is essentially just writing out what you want to happen but without proper grammar/dialogue. I’d then just follow it by writing it out in full with internal thoughts, description, dialogue etc. obviously it might not be for everyone but it’s definitely what works best for me :)

[lucsf19]

Do you think you'd finish the blood between us before Rina uploads htv?

yes definitely. I’m hoping to get it finished before I go back to uni (so end of Septemberish) but it definitely will be done before the end of the year.

[lucsf19]

i forgot to ask this with my other question, but what was your favorite scene to write?

my fav scenes to write have always been the flashback scenes as I love exploring how they met for the first time and how their initial obsession began (which is why I’m a little sad the flashbacks are now over).

but other than that I really enjoyed writing the initiation night and the scene of them in the woods and their first kiss. the initiation has always been such an important night of all the other books so it felt so cool to write my own version of it.

[lucsf19]

What was the hardest scene to write so far? Also, dw enjoy life, have fun on Saturday!

idk if I would say a particular scene was hardest of all to write, but there are certain groups of scenes that I find difficult. one is sex scenes just because they can be a little awkward haha. scenes where other characters we know well appear (eg heathens, Vaughn’s parents) can be hard because I obviously have to try and write them in character how rina has made them. with yulian and Vaughn, I’ve made a large chunk of their personalities myself so its more up to me how they act, but with other established characters, I need to figure out how I think they would act based on what we already know about them. then finally scenes that I took from ktv can be hard as they can feel limiting in terms of what I can do as I obviously have to write with what has already happened as opposed to coming up with it myself.

[lucsf19]

Do you think V is a motorcycle or Car person, or if yulian is the car person??

I actually can’t say bc you’ll find out which of these they are in my fic in a future chap haha.

[lucsf19]

HII, Thanks for replying to my question, and yeah you answered most of it! To specify the question I was wondering plotwise how you planned it out and stuff, sorry it was confusing!!

oh no worries at all!

I actually answered a similar question in one of the comments on ao3 about how I come up with my ideas and the writing process so lemme copy and paste that here

‘so the entire story is already planned out and I have a document that has every chapter with 5-7 bullet points outlining what will happen in the chap that I follow when I write so I’m not really making it up as I go along. Obviously I do change some things here and there though.

In terms of coming up with the ideas in the first place, smaller things like dialogue and stuff I just kind of write as it comes to me, but certain lines I might have come up with while like daydreaming or earlier in the chapter/an earlier chapter so I’m kinda building up to be able to use the line. Then for the overall plot, as I said I’ve already planned the whole thing and it was a few months ago now so I don’t remember everything haha but I think I just kind of come up with certain things I want to happen at various points in the story, as well as how it ends etc and then I just kinda connect them together and figure out ways to make them fit in a storyline such as by adding other plot points in between, reasons characters may be feeling a certain way or be in a certain place. Like for example I might have gone in this chapter I want X to happen in X location and then two chapters later I need Y to happen in Y location and so I fill in the gaps of what happened in between for it to make sense to move from X to Y.

It was a very fun process but definitely a little frustrating at times when I was trying to make certain things work that I found difficult. Especially when it came to matching things up with KTV as I had to make the timeline work and it kinda blocked me having total creative freedom as I had to follow cannon stuff, but once I moved past KTV timeline and could follow my own pace it definitely made things easier.’

That was my reply to the comment. in terms of coming up with ideas for Vaughn and yulian specifically in the plot, I’d usually just come up with an idea for what I wanted to happen/needed to happen to make something else in the fic work and I’d just sit back and consider what I think Vaughn and yulian would do in that situation based on how I’ve written their personalities.

when it comes to just the major plots specifically that I want to happen, those I came up with by going ‘okay, so Vaughn and yulian are obsessed with one another but they cannot be together due to the basement, being from rival mafia, parents being against it, both being men etc’ so what has to happen to get past these problems? obviously I can’t say how I came up with the resolutions to these because they haven’t happened yet, but that’s the overall idea.

I hope that answered your question fully <3

[lucsf19]

Helloo, I was rereading your work- love it- and on the first chapter you said you'd already made up your mind about the dynamics between yulian and vaughn(dominance wise). I was wondering if you'd share your thoughts, it's fine if not by the way, have a good day!

I think by dominance wise you mean top/bottom but if not please let me know!

I have decided which way they will go in my own story and I have given hints about it but I won’t confirm which dynamic they are bc spoilers.

I don’t really want to share my thoughts too much bc I don’t want to like reveal myself as leaning one way or another bc then I might be inadvertently spoiling my plan. when I’ve fully shown what dynamic they are, I’ll definitely go into depth about why I chose what I did and what my thoughts are. but when making the decision I was just kind of looking at their personalities and how they worked together but I was also looking a lot at what others wanted/thought, as I did ask in the comments of the first chap what other readers thought/ wanted their to dynamic to be.

feel free to ask me this question again once it’s been revealed and I’ll happily answer it much better :)

I’m so happy your enjoying my work enough to reread it stuff like that makes writing so much more fun so tysm. I hope you have a great day too <3

[lucsf19]

What're your all time favorite books?

I use storygraph to track my reading and I have a little over 100 books on there and these are my only five star reads:

the song of Achilles, keeping 13, redeeming 6, fourth wing, god of fury, princes gambit and releasing 10.

however some of my 4.75 that are extremely close are binding 13, kings rising, the Graham effect, kings rising, folk of air trilogy, for the fans and saving 6

you can probably tell what my favourite series is haha. redeeming 6 is without a doubt my fav book of all time. I can’t even explain how it made me feel just that it literally changed me as a person. the song of Achilles is the hardest I’ve ever cried at a book and god of fury was the first book I ever gave 5 stars and was probably the book that truly got me back into reading after like years.

[lucsf19]

What song do you think represents Yulian family dynamics the best? And Vaughns?

oh this is such a good but hard question. once again I cannot keep it to just one song.

For yulian: family line by Conan gray is pretty perfect. (and then he’d hit / she took the punches but she never fought / my sisters when I cry / how could you hurt a little kid / cause now I’m scared that everyone I love will leave me / I truly am my parents child / we are not the same) literally so many lyrics from this song fit him perfectly.

for yulian: Fourth of July by sufjan Stevens. (Represents yulian and his mothers relationship so well. ‘my star in the sky’ if you remember that one conversation betweeen Vaughn and yulian in the basement).

For Vaughn is both easier and harder. he genuinely just comes from a happy family where both of his parents love and support him and he knows it tbh. so even though they are a little cliche I’d probably just say ‘count on me’ by Bruno mars, ‘look after you’ by the fray, ‘home’ by Edith whiskers (I know these are kinda love songs romantically but just interpret them as being about family haha). basically any song that can represent genuine love/care for family would work.

[lucsf19]

Hiii, Rina said in her story that one of the ways to describe HTV is that "Not everything is what it looks like". What do you think that might mean?? 😭

dudeeeeee I have no idea. We know that rina LOVES a plot twist I don’t think she has ever written a book without one (and they almost always have my jaw dropping) so it rlly could be anything. I think maybe it could be similar to Gareth in that Vaughn hides his true personality. (maybe he tries to be ‘stoic’ or smth as future pakhan but is actually almost as psychotic as gareth) just because in his texts he always seemed so chill and mature, but we also know he snuck in yulians room, invited him to the initiation, choked him with his chains etc, which very much suggests he is not as chill as he came acrosss.

But other than that I rlly have no idea. we know so little about his and yulians character that anything could be a surprise tbh. one thing i just realllyyyy hope she doesn’t do is have Vaughn no longer become Pakhan to be with yulian as her ‘plot twist’ as I think it would be a little offensive if you know what I mean. the only reason rai wasn’t pakhan in the end was because she was a woman and now if the only reason Vaughn isn’t pakhan is because he is dating a man i think it would just look very bad on rina tbh.

[lucsf19]

Will yulian ever have to choose between Tati (his family) and Vaughn again?

no spoilers!