#Definitely will do a rewrite/ longer version cause I still have many thoughts

[ray935sworld]

Alex Marquez for number 9 please 🥰🥰

Based on this

Sleep deprivation

Alex & Marc

aka Alex being too ambitious and Marc being a helpless overprotective brother

Marc once more realized the downside of being an athlete sponsored by engery drinks.

It was barely morning and he saw Alex take a red bull out of the cupboard. He watched how his younger brother let it rotate in his hold. He spun it around his fingers before opening it and pouring it down his throat. He took big sips, almost desperate for the drink.

Why did they even had those drink? They weren't healthy. Alex shouldn't drink them, especially this early in the morning.

"Everything okay?" Marc asked loudly and watched how Alex flinched. He turned to him, visibly startled to see him.

"What? Yeah. I just - I need to get some stuff done and I didn't sleep well" "Why not?" "Cause the monster under my bed kept kicking me" Alex rolled his eyes and gave his brother an annoyed look.

Marc didn't fail the notice the dark circles under his eyes that kept growing.

"What do you think? I just didn't sleep well!" "Chill, maybe you were up all night watching porn or something" he replied jokingly, hoping to ease the tension but to no avail. "Very funny" the younger one muttered before disappearing.

It was in the afternoon when Alex drank his next engery drink.

He took a deep breath, trying to get the little voice out his head that this wasn't healthy and how it messed with his training.

He knew that already. He knew all those weird chemicals messed with his diet and by the way his hands were shaking, he knew it wasn't avoidable.

The voice told him he should get some sleep. Rest. Let his body heal and then deal with everything else. That his health should be his priority. But he couldn't do that.

His eyes felt dry. They were burning like fire. Every time he blinked, there was a short moment of release, a little break, a moment of peace. But as soon as he opened them again, it kept on burning.

He sighed, giving in for a moment. He felt his shoulders heavily weighting him down. He felt the pressure building up, almost bubbling over, crushing him under it.

He felt his mind getting tired, his brain and body begging him to lay down, rest, get some sleep. But he refused. He couldn't. He didn't want to. Even the pressuring headache couldn't make him sleep.

He wanted to scream. He wanted to explode. He wanted to run as far away as he could and just disappear.

He just wanted to lay down and sleep. Sleep and not wake up. Sleep until everything went away, until no one cared about him anymore. Sleep until everything was over.

But he couldn't.

He had things to do. He had people he needed to make proud. He needed to make something out of their work, no matter how much he hated that everyone looked at him.

So instead he trained. And trained some more.

He texted his engineers to ask weird questions about the bike that didn't make sense. He looked over the data for a few million times just to try and see stuff that wasn't really there.

He needed to figure out what he was doing wrong, why he only had one win while his brother was so much better. He even snuck into Marc's office and made pictures of his data to compare them. But despite a few differences that were because of the bike, he didn't saw anything he didn't already know.

But slowly it was taking his mind away. He knew he was running out of time. He had to get a grip around the data and the different feeling on the bike.

Le Mans had been his final straw. Not just one but two crashes when he should have been on the podium.

He couldn't keep going like that. He couldn't get P2 or crash. He didn't want to be Mr P2. He wanted to be Mr P1. He wanted to be P1 in the championship and carve his name into the trophy like his brother did so many times.

He wanted to have his own trophy in their house, next to his, championship celebration helmet and his championship winning bike.

He wanted it to be the NR 73. Not 93. Not this year. Not when he was so close.

So if it took studying data and the next track till late and night just to wake up at the crack of dawn to go for a run, then by God, he would do it.

He would do it.

He would take the championship away from his own brother

For once he was okay with working in that Italian pricks favor. If it was him protecting Rossi's record, he'd be fine with if because for once he decided to be selfish. He decided to be just as much of a selfish asshole as his brother. He decided that from now on, they weren't brother on track. He decided to act the same as Marc always had.

No way back.

He felt his eyes burning, a reminder of all the work he put in and squeezed the can in his hand a little tighter.

He knew at the end of the year, a Marquez would put his name on that trophy. But this time it was up to him, which one it would be and Alex wouldn't let this chance slip away.

Not now. Not when he was so close.

Marc watched him from afar. He watched how he put on his running gear in the evening, just like he had done in the morning. He'd take the dogs out for a run, he had said.

Marc had just nodded even if he wondered how many runs their little legs could stand if Alex continued like that.

He saw how tired Alex was and he saw how Alex ignored his own needs. He didn't like that. He hated that. He wanted to wrap his baby brother up in a blanket, make him food and let him fall asleep on the couch, like they did when they were kids.

But now he couldn't because he knew Alex was working towards a goal that sometimes took inconvenience as a payment. And as hungry Marc was for success, a part of him needed to see his brother's work pay off.

As a brother, he wanted to see Alex on top. He wanted him to take care of himself and he wanted him to win.

But as a rider, he knew he'd always work against Alex ambitions so no matter what he'd say to him, the younger one wouldn't listen.

[hawkland]

Destiel fic recs (round #4) + commentary

Time for another (mostly) Destiel fic rec round-up post before my bookmarks get out of control! This one’s a mix of longer and some shorter fics (or series thereof), no particular theme except I guess a lot of angst, hurting Cas, and all the other things that tickle my Id. Several Season 9 human!Cas divergence fics, plus some later season angst-fests and rewrites.

In the Shadow of your Wings by Enochian Things (Salr323) (52k) The first of two fics by this author which I absolutely fell in love with! Canon-divergence from the end of Season 11. Cas finds himself blasted to Naples, Italy by the banishing sigil in the bunker and he stumbles — almost literally — into a sexy, delightful Italian Man of Letters, Luca. When he makes his way back to the bunker and finds Dean still alive, he tries to confess his feelings but Dean panics and shuts him down. Cas goes back in Italy soon thereafter and ends up beginning a relationship with Luca, much to Dean’s chagrin. Meanwhile Sam is still missing and it turns out there may be some dangerous individuals who are out for Cas more so than even the Winchesters. 

I loved everything about this fic so much - Luca is an amazing OC, the Naples and London locations are wonderfully evoked and took me straight back to places I’d been. The angst, the pacing, the plotting and the eventual Dean/Cas getting together are all amazing and this is definitely on my re-read in the future list.

The rest of my recs below the cut!

My heart is beating from me by Enochian Things (Salr323) (55k) The other fic by this author that I literally inhaled in one day! Season 9 Human!Cas canon divergence. It’s been months since Sam and Dean have heard from Cas, and when they do, it’s in the form of a wedding invitation. Cas is getting married to Daphne - the woman who “rescued” him and named him Emmanuel when he’d lost all his memories post-Leviathans. It seems Cas went back to her while on his own and they’ve rekindled their relationship...whatever it is. Dean just knows something isn’t right about her, so he sets out to investigate and try to figure out WTF Cas is doing before it’s too late. 

This story is so, so good! The case Dean gets Cas to come along on is unique and provides a neat investigation subplot, but what’s so especially wonderful is the explanation the author gives of who Daphne really is — and why she’d been so cool about just having a strange man with no memories move in to be her “husband” (and then want to marry him for real a couple years later, after he’d vanished from her life!) In fact it’s so brilliant I’m basically accepting it as my Daphne headcanon from now on and I don’t want to spoil it. The fic is also great in exploring Cas still struggling with understanding human emotions, customs and etiquette, Sam is A Very Good Friend, and Dean is, well, Dean. (I’m just sad this author hasn’t written more SPN fics because what they have is just brilliant.)

The wilderness. by orange_crushed (8k) Wonderful, shorter Season 9 canon divergence fic by an author who consistently makes me happy. Human!Cas leaves the bunker with a few things to get off the ground from Dean and directions to connect with Garth...but he ditches that plan to try to find his way on his own. It’s wonderfully detailed about the basic struggles of survival, finding work, making ends meet and trying to make some new friends...and why it’s important for him to prove he can make it on his own before he’s willing to welcome Dean (back) into his life.

I Through My Window See by deHavilland (26k) This is an interesting one, written well before we had canon human!Cas in Season 9. Canon-divergence in which Cas remains human after they avert the apocalypse in Season 5. Sam and Dean set him up in an apartment in Sioux Falls and then...just kind of abandon him there. He spends most of a year just barely existing before a visit from Sam finally stirs him out of his inertia and depression, to eventually get a job and also start hunting on his own. This is an interesting read, if just to see an author exploring the idea of human!Cas abandoned by Dean a few years before it actually...ended up becoming canon! I love how Cas is written in this (it’s a story much like the next one on my list that I thought does an amazing, realistic job of capturing what depression feels like), but I do have some issues with Dean. It’s never fully resolved or explained why Dean was being such an ass so I honestly wasn’t totally sold on the ending - I wanted some more out of Dean, some more explanation or apology or something. It’s a story that would have been great to have a sequel from Dean’s POV but after all this time, that will just have to exist in my brain, I suppose! Still worth a read because it’s excellently written, Cas becomes totally bad ass again by the end and it’s always fun to read early SPN fic speculating on future developments.

I Shall Not Want by domesticadventures (20k) I found myself inhaling a bunch of wonderful short ficlets by this author the other day, but this is the one I had to stop at to rec. It’s another Season 9 divergence fic, of a sort - Cas is newly human, for the sake of the story there’s no Abbadon to worry about, Sam is healed...and Sam wants to move out and get on with his own life. Cas and Dean are both struggling with adapting to their new lives and it’s a hauntingly rich and stark portrayal of depression, inertia, and the slow healing process of accepting and adapting to change. I also liked that this story gives us a Dean who is a little more aware of his feelings for Cas and they both struggle to reach out to each other - for once it’s not sexuality causing a crisis of identity but all the other shit they are coping with.

Don't Sing Love Songs by ireallydidthistomyself (17k). I’m not normally a big fan of baby/toddler!Jack fics - I like the angst that he was forced to grow up too quickly, and in general I’m not big on kid!fic in fandom. This author’s work is a big exception to that. They’ve written several stories along a similar theme: Cas raising Jack on his own/in secret for years, Dean only finding them or coming back into their lives later on. But this is the version of that idea that really packed the most punch for me and was incredibly emotionally satisfying. Dean finds Cas after 6 years, where he’s kept Jack mostly isolated and safe from the world. But with Dean allowed back into his life, Cas may be inviting grave danger upon Jack as well. This one ripped my heart out but managed to make it all better by the end.

Better Ways to Kill Our Time by always_a_birthday_girl (8k) I don’t know why I torture myself reading Dean-in-the-Ma’lak-box AUs, but I do. I think because it’s pretty much my biggest nightmare/horror and for some reason it’s cathartic while terrifying? Anyway here’s one where Dean goes through with his plan, Cas crashes and burns for most of a year, until Dean finally starts doing what he promised he wouldn’t: praying to him. Cas figures out a way to communicate back and over the distance, they manage to have certain conversations they should have years before. It’s painful but lovely and there is a happy ending, so it’s well worth the read!

Time Flows Like Water and We're Drowning by triedunture (7.9k) A little break from the later-seasons stuff I (mostly?) read, featuring a seriously hot (but angsty) Cas/Endverse!Cas/Dean threesome. When Zacariah’s plan to show Dean the future doesn’t change his mind about taking on his “responsibility”, he sends Endverse!Cas back in time to try to convince Cas instead, showing him what he’s to become. I don’t think Zac expected it to turn into a threesome, but it’s hot and beautiful and sad and wonderful all at once. 

hachikireru by vaudelin  (23k) At one point I went on a wallow-fest of reading a bunch of sad 14x20-15x03 divorce-arc fics. Just to hurt myself more, I guess. I know this fic’s been recced around a lot (at least on fail_fandomanon) and I can see why! After leaving the bunker, Cas ends up in Sioux Falls to visit Claire. She’s busy tracking down leads to find Kaia’s killer and he decides to go along with her on one such hunt. But what they find is an unexpected supernatural threat targeting those with broken hearts. Well. I think you know where that might be leading. This is a wonderful casefic with lots of character moments between Cas & Claire and then Cas & Dean, working through their pain and angst and just...it’s a very satisfying read.

Moriah Codas: A Trilogy by Toomanyfandoms99 (11k total) A series of 3 shorter fics spinning off the events of 14x20, developing a slightly divergent universe the author’s written where Cas does have his wings back and has helped resurrect a few of the angels (Balthazar, Gabriel, and Samandriel in particular). This series is absolutely heartbreaking — Cas is completely broken by Jack’s loss, has “fallen out of love” with Dean after he was ready to kill Jack, and sees no way back to what he’d had and felt before. He’s determined to just let the Empty take him...but not until he and his assembled squad of “avenging angels” clean up the mess Chuck has created, smiting zombies and taking out super-powered monsters across North America. 

Cas’s motorcycle gang/angel squad is so fucking awesome (I want a happy fic where they do this!) and this is BAMF!Cas at his finest. I just have to include a quote:

He set down the empty glass, and Gabriel said, “well, dearly beloved, we have gathered here today to kick some zombie ass. Since they have chosen to amass in Carthage, we are here to take out as many as we can without causing this town to flip the fuck out. Are we in agreement?”

“I expect,” Balthazar grinned, “a full-on bar brawl. Do not disappoint me.”

“Cassie, Driel,” Gabriel addressed the duo, “how are we with weapons?”

“I have enough machetes in a storage facility uptown to film a Jackie Chan movie,” Castiel said.

But it’s also utterly and completely heartbreaking, so don’t read this one if you need a happy ending. If you do read, check out the author’s other later-season coda fics and fic series as they are all really great.

to mend what is not broken by gothyringwald (2.6k) This last short one I’ve mentioned before, but I just have to rec it again! It was my gift for the 2021 Hurt Comfort Gift Exchange and it’s everything I wanted, and more. Sweet and caring Dean, wounded but still prideful Cas, and some lovely wing!kink/wing!care that pushes all of my button just right.

Anyway, that’s it for now as I think this is long enough. If you enjoy my recs, could you let me know? I try to not just list titles but give some commentary...as it helps me re-find stories I enjoyed the most, too!

[klutzymaiden123]

Some Tips on How I Keep Motivating Myself to Write

This post was inspired by a response I recently got from @pastelnightgale and obviously, I’m not an expert (I’m literally on year 6 of a fanfic rip), but I still wanted to type something up about this. 

I find that the hardest part about writing is finding the motivation to actually start it . . . and then keep it. You can have all of these intricate fantasies in your head, with twists and turns and even a playlist you made on spotify, but actually getting up and writing it is ridiculously hard. 

Especially if, like me, you suffer from perfectionism. 

I kinda wanted to write a post about how I personally motivate myself to write, both fanfiction and my own things. Obviously, what I write is flawed and needs a lot of improvement, but I’ve come really far and I’m proud of the progress I’ve made. 

So, here’s some tips I’ve picked up over the years. Feel free to apply this to whatever art you personally create, but this is primarily for writers.

1) Listening to Music

This is my number one. Easily. I’m someone who has a lot of attachment with the music I listen to (as most people do, I’d assume). Though I’m picky with the overall sound, I prefer music or artists who really put a lot of thought into their lyrics specifically. Or even when they use certain effects to carry across emotions or add more emphasis to specific lines. It’s why I’m such a fan of Taylor Swift; her songs are basically poetry packaged as pop music. 

It personally helps me to listen to music not just because it’s enjoyable, but it helps create scenarios in my head. We all shoot music videos in our head, why not try doing it with your characters? Plus, if the artist you’re listening to plays with words through metaphors or similies or imagery, it’s a massive bonus. I seriously recommend turning to music, whatever genre you listen to, and letting that sometimes paint the picture for you.

2) watching Movies. 

This is a massive one for me. I don’t know how high this would be on anyone else’s lists since films are obviously a completely different medium to books, but I find there’s a lot of things that can be useful about movies. For one thing, movies just have better fight sequences. Kinda obvious statement, but I don’t mean in a ‘well you can see it so therefore film is better’ no, I mean, film literally has better action sequences. 

Obviously, as a writer, you’re never going to be able to properly adapt the quick pace of fights in movies. But you can adapt the details in how they move. Fight scenes in movies are better then books because they’re choreographed. Now granted, I’m still beginning my journey in reading, but so far, I haven’t been impressed with what I’ve seen. Either the author writes a scene that describes the action, but with no focus on the strain it has on the character’s bodies, or they gloss over the fight completely. It makes me feel like I’m reading fanfiction, but written from the younger side. 

It’s just super dissapointing, so I try to challenge myself by studying how the characters moves, the impact of their movements on each other, and then how tired that can leave them. 

But also, movies can have other things that I think writers should learn to adapt. Like a character’s mannerisms. Now, I don’t just mean mannerisms as in what they do in their day to day lives, I mean facial ticks. Like, the minute sequences their features will go through as they’re processing news. Or their stances. Or what they do with their hands. Actors are very detailed about how they’re protraying their characters, and I just find myself aching to carry that over in my own portrayal of my characters.

It’s obviously important to realise that film and novels have both their benefits and disadvantages in what they can and can’t portray. But it’s even more important to realise that different mediums can also teach us things about our sense of portrayals.

3) Reading books

This may be surprising that it’s not number one, but honestly, I didn’t start reading actual books until late last year. I kinda used to read some in high school, but those were few and far between. This year I’ve actively been trying to emerge myself in more professional writing, as I do find it a little strange to want to write so badly without taking any infleunce from any other writers. 

Previously, I used to take inspiration from fanfiction and fictionpress, which I guess I still do. There’s definitely benefits in exclusively reading them (for instance, I prefer characterisation, romance and comedy in fanfiction) but I personally find books to be better in overall world building. I mean, obviously.

World building and setting are my weak spots, and I find that reading literal books actually helps me easier improve on these areas. Oh, and length. I’m a pretty detailed writer, but it’s sometimes hard to navigate what should and shouldn’t be getting so much focus. Fanfiction is pretty short (typically only a few pages), but books can be a whole lot longer, and how they use that space and length helps me translate it into my own pages. Granted, I tend to write way too much, but it’s still really helpful in navigating what should and shouldn’t be getting focus.

Oh, and bonus points for booktubers. They review a variety of different books, and for me personally, whenever they critique books, it motivates me to write something brilliant so they could maybe read it and smile. My favourites are WithCindy and Dominic Noble.

4) Tumblr—Specifically writing blogs. 

When I tell you that I did nothing in my last years of high school but secretly read fanfiction and writing blogs on tumblr in class, I--

Obviously, I’m biased, cause I’ve been reading tips on here since I was a kid, but I really recommend following some good blogs on here. They give such good advice, specifically on how to research, or portray certain emotions and, most of all, representation. Tumblr was actually where I learnt to write my fight scenes—about how to portray the feeling of a quick sequence of events, while balancing it out with your character’s limited view. They write things I haven’t even seen professionals talk about (and honestly, I think they could benefit from reading a tumblr blog). 

My personal favourite blogs are: Nimble’s Notebook, and Clevergirlhelps

5) Re-writes.

Okay, this is a massive one I should’ve mentioned in the beginning. Never compare what you have on your word doc to what others have published. Why? Because I can tell you that they did not start off like that. They went through massive amounts of editing and drafting and re-reads before coming out like this clean cut version. Trust me. No one’s that quick. And even if they are, who cares? It could take you two drafts, it could take you four, it could take you nine--we all work at our own pace.

It’s something I have to keep reminding myself when I’m on my first and second draft. Because they are shit. I always feel untalented when writing my first draft--oh, and that’s not a purposeful dig at myself to get compliments, I genuinely mean that. I will never let someone read one of my early drafts because they are literally so bad, and not only that, but those drafts are for me. They’re not there for anyone else yet. Early drafts are just so you can start to build your empire, they’re your foundation. You can reach for the sky the more you keep building. 

Don’t get on your own case if you don’t like your first draft. It’s fine. It gets so much easier the more you rewrite it. Trust me.

6) Write Things for You.

This is one of my favourite tips. Oh, and I don’t mean it in a ‘you’re not writing for an audience, you are the audience’ kinda way. No, I mean literally write things for you. And only for you.

If you have a story in your head that you don’t want to write because you know it’s just a phase, it won’t last long enough for you to make something out of, or you’re not confident in it, or whatever, fuck it—just write it. 

Open your word doc and type it out. Then don’t post it. Or share it. Keep it on your computer, stored away in a folder you won’t ever share. You might be asking, why would you waste your time on a project no one will ever see? Simple. 

It takes away the pressure.

A major hindrance to a writer actually writing is sometimes . . . not feeling good enough. You’re worried that an audience will laugh or mock what you’ve written, or that it won’t turn out just the way you planned it too, or even that the plot is too corny. Well, what I’ve found is that writing for myself stops me from judging myself so badly. I have so many documents on this computer of corny borderline wattpad stories that will never see the life of day. And it feels great. Cause I’m still actively writing and improving myself while eliminating that huge amount of anxiety that plagues me. 

This is such a massive tip, please consider it. Obviously, if the story turns out really well, go ahead and post it if you’re super proud of it. But otherwise, just write something with the intention of not sharing it. Keep it to yourself, so you can look back on it with fond memories. 

[myriadimagines]

End Of The Year Faves 2020!

Rules: it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 8 (ish) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome work!

i was tagged by the lovely @lxncelot & @musicallisto !!!

i’ve only written 10 one shots this year since i stopped taking requests rip. i only ended up picking 5 of them bc i didnt like the rest. also i love talking about the behind the scenes of writing like its just so fun. i literally went through my revision history in my google docs to see how i wrote these akjsdhasjd so literally........... if anyone wants to talk to me about a piece........... just shoot me an ask bc i will gladly tell u all about it

1. Lifetimes (Sebastien le Livre) 

this might be my number one bc it’s the most recent and i havent decided i hate it yet but wrote this as an alternative to therapy lmfaooooooo and it’s been a month but um. it still hurts. but anyway, i started off with the below paragraph:

And Booker has centuries of pain under his belt. Endless years of trauma that he cannot even begin to unpack. But you don’t have centuries. You don’t have lifetimes to reconcile with all the cruelty in the world  —  you just have one, and Booker knows he of all people should know just how much hurt one lifetime can contain.

and just worked around it, bc i was just really obsessed with the concept of having multiple lifetimes and all that, and just the fact that life has so much pain and hurt and it just sucks. i edited the first sentence for the final but otherwise it’s the same. i think i came up with some pretty good lines in this if i do say so myself, and i mentioned it in the a/n, but i intended for it to be longer but didn’t want to push it after i feel like i had written all i wanted to. i just wanted someone to hold me and comfort me clearly. 

2. Cursed Blood (Renfri)

i am obsessed with renfri as a character and her whole story, and the whole concept of her being cursed just felt like something that i really wanted to explore and write about. these were the first lines i wrote for the piece:

But every time you kiss her, you swear that it’s impossible her lips could be poison. Or perhaps you grew so used it, that the poison tasted sweet. 

i ended up editing this a lot for the final version, but a trend in my writing seems to be i always come up with how to end a piece and just work around it. i really enjoyed going into depth into renfri’s character and it kinda felt more like a character study than a reader insert? but eventually i found a way to work the reader in there and i liked where the story went, bc renfri deserves happiness and someone to be there for her.

3. Roadside (Robin Buckley)

still in shock at how many notes this one got and i am forever grateful to everyone who reblogged/left comments!!! this was for lacey’s ( @moonlit-imagines ) writing challenge, and idk why when i saw the prompt i immediately decided to use robin. for this one, i actually started with the beginning, which was the prompt, “Let’s take a walk. Just you and me.”

i mentioned this in the a/n, but i planned it to be a lot more angsty and wasn’t even planning on ending it on a happy note askjdhaksd the original plot i had in mind was that robin and the reader were into each other but were dancing around each other’s feelings. so one night, the reader drunkenly kisses steve at a party to try and make robin jealous, but it ends up just causing a rift between robin and the reader even after they confess their feelings. here is a part i wrote for the original plot before i decided to scrap it and go with the final plot.

“Look, I don’t even care if you and Steve get together.” Robin waves her hand, and you’re not used to seeing such disappointment on your best friend’s face as she lets out a shaky breath. She looks as if she’s struggling to collect herself before she asks, “I just… why did you lie to me?”

“I didn’t.” you desperately blurt, and Robin’s eyebrows furrow. Shaking your head, you take a step towards her as you explain, “I didn’t lie, Robin, I swear. I don’t like Steve. What happened at the party meant nothing—”

Robin scoffs. “Then why—”

“—because I wanted you to see.” you finally confess, and Robin stares at you. You’re shaking, tears welling in your eyes as you continue, “Because I thought I could make you jealous, because I was just too afraid to make a move and wanted you too. And I know that’s silly of me, and I never meant to hurt your feelings—”

i changed the plot because i didn’t think i could pull it off, and i didn’t know how to fully end it. i liked where it ended up going anyway after the change of direction so all good!!

4. Games (Michael Gray)

so this was inspired by a gif imagine request that @fangirlsarah16 sent me, which you can find here!! you can literally see me already plotting for the piece in the tags aksjdha i just loved how angsty the situation was, and i love michael, so i decided to just run with it. i put what i had already written into a document and just pieced everything in around it. this is definitely one of my more dramatic pieces, but i just loved how the story came together and how all the other characters were included. 

i already planned to write a part 2 while i was still writing this piece, but obviously that hasnt happened yet. also i got discouraged bc i thought it would do better in terms of notes but oh well. i wrote around 300 words of where i wanted part 2 to go, and i still have it saved, but i dont want to share it in case i end up writing it. also, i have 2 plots in mind for where i want part 2 to go, and haven’t decided which one i want to go with. we’ll have to wait and see i guess >:)

5. Off Limits (Cassian Andor)

ah yes, the first in my rewrite project that is going along very slowly. basically, im planning on rewriting my super old one shots in hopes that i’ll like them. i swear i’ve got the next one shot in my drafts but i just havent had the time to finish it yet. anyway, the original piece, which i wrote 4 years ago (!!!!), was the piece that really got my blog started and helped me get activity/attention, and it has around 500 notes, which kinda makes the new version look depressing bc it only has 97 and it’s definitely a lot better in my opinion. 

i don’t really have a detailed process for this one, seeing as i was just improving upon an old piece, but one of the main things i did want to change was cassian’s characterisation. i felt like i just made him too mean in my old piece, and i wanted to loosen him up a bit. i managed to bang this one in one day and i just think it’s some cute content and i miss the rogue one squad!!

i’m tagging @moonlit-imagines @emcon-imagines @lotsoffandomimagines @dannyboy-writes @murswrites @randomfandomimagine @sonsofeorl @spxder-mxns & all other content creators that see this!! i’m definitely missing a lot but everyone should share their favorite pieces from this year :’)

[bettsfic]

Hey! I was just wondering if you would soapbox a little about your creative process. I absolutely adore your writing advice but was wondering a bit more about how your ideas form and how you choose which to pursue and do finished products look like you want them to? What's a bad habit you're trying to break? No obligation to answer, especially cause an anon is like tell me your secrets! But thank you for all you've written, you are so helpful and kind

thanks for the great question anon! i wrote a bit about my drafting process here but that doesn’t encompass the idea building side of things (also i’ve made some changes to the process so i was thinking about writing a more cohesive, updated version at some point).

i tend to think of project ideas as piles of aesthetic, and usually i only begin writing once the pile has toppled over and i can’t not write it. that’ll make more sense in a moment. 

i’ll walk through 2 examples of my idea generating process, from how they started to where they are now. 

1. Vandal

Vandal is a novel i’m working on that i really have a lot of hope for. i’m about 60k words in right now and 75% finished. it’s about a teenage girl (sierra) who casts a spell on her hot, helpful neighbor (frank) to bind them together. the spell ends up working but backfiring when he becomes her foster father. then, in his custody, sierra gets jealous and casts a spell on his girlfriend (jenny) to break them up, but that backfires too: sierra gets taken out of frank’s custody and placed with a manipulative and abusive foster brother (leo). frank more or less kidnaps sierra and they have to Run From The Law. throughout the novel, sierra is inwardly battling Vandal, an immortal archangel that has possessed her and is trying to get her to kill herself so he can break free of the prison of her body.  

the idea for that story has a looooong breadcrumb trail and a huge aesthetic pile. since i couldn’t manage to get Baby traditionally published, i had a lot of that dynamic i could adopt into something else. i wrote at length about where that idea came from but i can no longer find that post (UPDATE: here it is). it’s somewhere in my training wheels tag. in short, i spent an entire summer watching/reading age gap stories and the male perspective in them bothered me a lot, so i wanted to write a story from the younger party’s perspective, and do the reality of those situations justice. i wrote that story, though, so i didn’t want to rewrite it. 

then, in december 2019, for reasons i don’t remember, i started reading snape/hermione fics. i really liked the dynamic, but it was a little too angsty for me, and none of the fics gave me the catharsis i was looking for, which was basically Grouchy Soft Boy Takes Care Of PTSD Weary Girl. being unable to find anything that fit the exact no-conflict, angstless dynamic i was looking for, i decided to write it myself using an A/B/O reylo idea i’d been kicking around for about 8 months but i could never land on, because i didn’t know if i wanted ben or ren. that fic turned out to be Reclaimed.  

to answer one of your questions, Reclaimed didn’t turn out the way i wanted it to at all, and i’m still kind of shocked by the traffic it has. i felt bad about writing it, because i was setting down so many other things to work on it, and it was a struggle from start to finish. at the time (and this is a major theme of my process), i thought it was a waste of energy.

but it opened a very important thematic concept to me, which is the idea of voicelessness and trauma, and recovery through finding one’s voice.

fast-forward to february, i’m headcanoning with @star-sky-earth just days before i have to head to nebraska for a writing residency. she and i are talking about a certain male celebrity who shall not be named, flirting with his younger female costar who shall not be named, and i said something along the lines of, “wouldn’t it suck to get a crush on a dude like him, only to find out he likes you back, and then you realize he’s actually kind of shallow and boring?”

i remember distinctly saying, out loud, “god fucking dammit,” because, right then, an aesthetic pile had toppled over, and an entire novel unfolded itself in my brain. i pound out an outline. it’s garbage. i play around with a vocal gauge. it’s not quite right. then, two days later, i write an opening scene that i don’t think is great but i send it to some people and they’re like, oh this is fire. 

the aesthetic pile looks like this:

lolita, where dolores is the one in control

delusions of grandeur born from a major traumatic event

obsessions with fairy tales and the escapism they provide

the consequences of extreme neglect

forced voicelessness as both a theme and a major structural constraint

a lot of wolf imagery

non-chronological timelines

i proceed to spend the next two days driving across the country brain-writing. by the time i reach nebraska, i hit the ground running, and write for basically 30-40 hours a week for 5 weeks. then, because pandemic, i decide to stay 2 more weeks, but i hit a snag. i write about 14k of really boring drivel and realize my outline has failed me. i toss the 14k and re-outline and try again. then, my attention is rattled by a crush on a composer who has no interest in me. 

i go home and fall into my annual summer depression and i lose focus. so, that’s where i’m at. i really miss vandal but it’s gotten super dark and i’m finding it difficult to manage darkness with everything going on. which brings me to my next aesthetic pile that has recently toppled over.

2. Eden

that’s not the title but it’s the project name. i’ve begun writing a YA sci fi comedy with an ensemble cast. this aesthetic pile took years to build before it toppled. it started with Elixir of Erised, hands down the best fic i’ve ever written by a huge margin. i reread it this past winter and was kind of amazed i’d written it. 

i really liked the idea of a potion showing you your deepest desires, but until recently have not had the patience to build an entire world around it. so, for the past 3.5 years, i’ve kept a document of “if i WERE to a YA SFF book with the themes of EOE, what would i want to include?” over those 3.5 years, here’s what the list became:

dark academia vibes

heist plot

soulmates

that list is not really conducive to an entire universe, and i never had the motivation to sit down and think through it. 

then i watched breaking bad, and a lot of things started clicking. at the same time, i was talking to my buddy kyle about my fallen knight archetype schematic, and i began fleshing out all the archetypes that went with it. i came up with 12. i built a database. i thought, wouldn’t it be cool to write something with ALL 12 ARCHETYPES?? haha but who would be dumb enough to do that?

me. i would. 

with breaking bad as the missing plot piece (which introduces the idea of conflict around the MANUFACTURE and DISTRIBUTION of addictive substances, with an ensemble cast of morally grey characters, which leads to a war), i had enough to get started. 

i wrote an outline. i wrote another outline. i wrote a third outline. i stopped to write some histories of this place i’d built. i wrote a fourth outline. gdocs became a mess so i downloaded scrivener and taught myself how to use it. i wrote a gauge of the first chapter and landed the voice on the first try. then i did a rough sketch of how a trilogy would go. then i outlined each book in the trilogy to make sure my character trajectories were on point. then i did a lot more worldbuilding. now i’m working on my fifth outline, which breaks the entire novel down scene by scene. 

and for Reasons, i’m tasking myself with writing the first draft in 6 days across two weekends. it’s a high-stakes adventure story with a very tight timeline, so i think it’s conducive to being written quickly.

which brings me to another question you asked, which is, what bad habits do i want to break? i always, always slow down at the halfway mark. sometimes i even give up. i have no idea why. no matter how much preparation i do, no matter how solid my endgame is, at the halfway mark i either slow to a crawl or set the whole project down and pick up something new. i do this with reading books, too. i can only ever read the first half of books. then i either skip to the end or put them down forever. it’s definitely something i have to figure out because at this rate i’ll never finish anything.

okay this took way longer than i thought it would to write but i hope it answers your question. tl;dr i follow aesthetic and thematic interests until they lead me to a point where i can’t not write the stories that develop from them. 

[docholligay]

A Little Love Story, Part One: Narrative Inconvenience

For her commission, Jetty is having me rewrite an old, old story I wrote here on the blog, that I’ve always wanted to rewrite because I thought i could do a better job of it. It’s lovely BroTP shit! And the original story was quite well liked so I hope this is too. This first part is 2,200 words, which is longer than the entire original story. Please enjoy, and remember that I love all comments, no matter how small! 

There are old magics, in this world. Power that bends and moves in the world without our being any the wiser, ones that whisper through the trees in the dark and dance on the backs of butterflies in the light. They do not always have name, or even definition, only able to be defined by the edges of what they are not, a fog or a shadow of strength.

“She let her guard down.” It was what Pluto said, and it was not incorrect, though it was not true, either, “and the enemy entranced her. A old magic.”

“She fell for it.” Rei burned with the heat a white ember as she sat around the table, arms crossed, barely looking up from the table.

“We might all, if given what we desired most.” Michiru looked out the window, gazing into an unimportant street, a note of sympathy filling her voice that was more frightening than any of Rei’s anger could have hoped to be.

Pluto nodded. “It does know each of our hearts, if I remember. If it touches you. That is its gift.”

“She turned on us.” Rei looked around at the other Senshi, mouth in a hard line. “Mina turned on us.”

“Oh, she fucking did not,” a small bead of spit burst from Haruka’s mouth and onto the table and she hammered her hand down on the chair arm, “She’s brainwashed, Rei, that’s not--it’s not her fault.”

Rei stood up, hands on the table as she leaned toward Haruka. “It doesn’t matter whose fault it is, what we have to do is the same!”

Haruka stood up to meet her, and Rei seemed utterly unimpressed by the fact that Haruka towered over her, back straight as Haruka whirled around the edge of the table, finger raised into Rei’s face.

“You’re so fucking eager to kill anyone to prove you’re,” She gave a dramatic bend and waved her hands in the air, “The best senshi of all time. We get it, you love Usagi best.” She snorted. “Fuck you, Rei, you don’t even--”

“I forgot that we only gleefully kill someone when they’re eight.” She stepped into Haruka’s face, nose to nose, “Or at least, people like you--”

“No! Stop!!” Usagi pushed herself between them, tears falling down her face, as they had been this whole time, a quiet fall of rain in between hills of sobbing. “I can fix this!”

“You can’t!” Usagi cowered to Rei’s yelling, and her voice softened, “You can’t. You’ve tried. We’ve tried. Three times, Usagi, and three times Mina’s tried to kill you.” Rei tenderly touched Usagi’s back where a raw, red line from Mina’s blade still raised. “She almost did.”

“It is a very strong magic.” Pluto said, by way of apology. “And their sense of us is keen.”

Ami nodded, looking between Rei and Usagi. “Mina would have been chosen specifically, being our commander, the strategic fighter, and she has always been a little…” She looked at Usagi’s face, and stopped herself.

“‘Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven’ one might say.” Michiru finished Ami’s thought, in a rare bit of synchronicity between them, “More so than many of us.”

“She’s selfish.” Rei crossed her arms and glanced out the window, staring at whatever nothing Michiru's eyes had moved to. “She just wants it for herself.”

“It is an old magic,” Pluto said again, smoothing over the anger and hurt dolloped like frosting across the room, “but there are some older still.”

“Love.” Usagi looked up at Pluto. “Love can break the spell, I’ve read that so many times! And I tried, but--”

As Usagi explained to Pluto a solution she already knew, Michiru moved quietly to Rei’s side, standing close to her, both eyes hitting that same odd mark in the world that no one else could see, holding her hand without ever touching her, in that strange way Rei had come to appreciate.

“Even now?” Michiru murmured, the soft wash of her voice lapping over the hot coals of Rei’s betrayal, the steam of it pricking at Rei’s eyes.

Michiru had a way of accusing Rei of everything, while saying nothing at all, in that strange way Rei had come to despise.

She said nothing, and Michiru did not press, and they both took it as a quiet assent. Yes, even now. Even if my love might save her, it would need to be carved out of me. I do not know if I have the strength to give her my heart where I might give her my bow. Yes, even now, she could not say what she might feel. If even she were sure.

“We have to find a prince, maybe!” Usagi brightened at her own suggestion, “I wonder if Mamoru could--”

“Usagi.” Pluto touched her shoulder and smiled sadly. “You have loved her so well.”

Usagi’s lip wobbled, and they all sat and stood and stared silently, knowing that it wasn’t enough. That Usagi could love all she wanted, she could believe and hope and cast a thousand attacks of healing, and it would not be enough for the sense of power and of strength that now lived in Mina’s mind. That had bent her toward a Venus allowed to be queen.

“Well what are we supposed to do?” Mako split the silence, fists balled, looking from Usagi to Rei to Pluto, as if a leader might emerge. “Capture her? We’ll bring her in?”

Ami touched Mako’s arms. “We won’t have much luck. She’s so skilled...she knows us all so well. She taught us how to fight. She knows how to get around us.”

“I’m next in line for command.” Rei walked to the front of the table and jutted her chin out as she looked around the room, shoulders back. “We have to rush her, and we have to take her out, Before she picks us off one by one. Which she can,” She looked over the edge of the raised slash that came up to Usagi’s bare shoulder, “And she will.”

“No.” Haruka stood at the other end of the table, her jaw set “‘Kill Mina’ is not the solution here.”

“This is what I’m talking about!” Rei popped and spit, a firework just blossoming, “Nobody says you have to do it yourself, Haruka! Remember your bullshit about having to do things to save the world!? Well, now’s the time to pay up for all that talk.”

Haruka slammed a fist down on the table, and Usagi winced painfully. “Are you ever gonna fucking let that--”

“Don’t ask me,” Rei crossed her arms and tossed her hair, “Why don’t you ask Hotaru? Ask her why it was okay to kill her but not someone who’s actively trying to kill Usagi. Where was your emotional crisis then?”

“Rei.” It was a rebuke, as quiet as it was, a small steel rapier at the edge of Michiru’s tongue. “Enough.”

“I--” Haruka looked down at the table, and then over to Hotaru, fist still balled tightly. “I didn’t know you.”

Hotaru said nothing, simply shrugged and placed a hand on her cheek, leaning onto the table disinterestedly. “Whatever.”

Haruka swallowed and nodded to no one. “Well.” she tapped the table and stepped back. “I’m going after her. Usagi had her shot, and I get mine. No one has to come with,” she pushed her hair back and shook her head, “In fact? You know what? Don’t.”

Rei snorted. “She’ll kill you. I give you five minutes.”

“No she won’t. I don’t think. Maybe.”

Haruka was certain in her uncertainty, and Rei remembered the taste of Mina’s chapstick in her mouth, the way her hair had looked splayed against the dark of Rei’s as they had laid together on the tatami mat Mina had pulled outside, under the stars, the grass-sweetness of it mixing with the soft peach of Mina’s scent, as she made up stories about the constellations she saw in her own mind, not caring what others had seen in the stars.

She shut her eyes a moment and let the Sight show her what she wanted to See, that Haruka would be run through in an instant by Mina’s sword, and the Sight complied, the Sight believed, the Sight thought the odds were good.

And so, “Michiru, control your wife.” was all she said, glaring as she said it.  

MIchiru had her own Sight. It worked in concert with Rei’s but never in perfect parallel. It saw further, it saw more possibility, but all of them were just a touch blurrier than Rei’s, all of them required more context and a deftness of thought. Rei was not incorrect, if it came to hand to hand combat. Mina’s skill bested Haruka’s in all weathers, and unless remarkable luck was on Haruka’s side, she would die at Mina’s hand.

And this caused Michiru a sharp pain, one that seemed to come from the inside and wormed out of her chest, leaving her heart open and bare and exposed.

But Michiru could see possibilities that Rei sometimes could not, and on this day, as she looked into the wine that she swirled around and around her glass, another possibility appeared to her in the moving bubbles. That Haruka would listen to good counsel, that Haruka would not try to save Mina, that Haruka’s life would be spared and Mina defeated.

Rei was not wrong in this, either. They were likely to win the day, if they acted at once. Mina had been wise to name her as successor.

Michiru Saw this, and she Saw Haruka, carrying Mina’s body home. She saw the two of them laughing on Michiru’s balcony, sipping back beers. Michiru Saw Haruka struggling to say anything about Mina at her funeral, crumpling the cards in her hands. She saw Haruka grinning as she planned a trip with Mina, trying not to be too excited that she had a friend who simply liked her without wanting anything. Who liked her as the tough and tender butch disaster she was. She Saw the thousand small ways that Haruka would blame herself, for not trying hard enough, for trying too hard, for not saying this, for saying that.

And she Saw Haruka’s slow decline, a whirlpool from which she could not recover, years of struggling and fighting and clawing against herself only to lose in the end. Years of pain and drink and exhaustion, in a battle Haruka could not win.

This was too cruel for Michiru. Perhaps a younger version of herself might have believed she could be all Haruka needed, that Haruka’s tenderness and tendency toward self-hatred could be pruned easily enough, that she could make Haruka into the stone wall she needed to be. But the Michiru who had loved her knew better. That what made Haruka her brilliant, beautiful, beloved girl was also her downfall. That the girl Haruka was today could not survive it, and it was only the slow bleed of a gut shot.

The girl Michiru was today loved her too much to allow it.

But even she was surprised when she opened her mouth as she walked toward Haruka. “Is this something you feel you must do?”

Haruka nodded. “I have to try. She’d do the same thing for me.”

Michiru’s mind moved to the idea of whether or not that were true, but in the end, she supposed, it only mattered that it was true to Haruka, and waved off the thought.

She held Haruka’s hands in hers, and looked up at her. “Please be careful. I love you so.” She kissed Haruka softly. “And Mina is not herself.”

“What do you think you’re going to do?” Rei shrieked in disbelief, hands on her hips, “Kiss her and break the spell, Prince Charming?”

“I don’t know, okay?” She squeezed Michiru’s hands and then softly let them drop. “If she kills me then, I guess, go ahead and do whatever. She twisted at her henshin ring, considering it a moment.  “I’m going.” She leaned in and kissed Michiru, cupping her cheek. “I love you. I’m coming back, okay?”

Michiru smiled. “One way or the other, I believe that’s so.”

She left the house, grabbing her sweater and shutting the door behind her, all the girls sitting in the silence for a moment.

“You sent her to her death.” Rei said, more as a question than an accusation.

“A less cruel one, perhaps.” Michiru barely whispered as she wandered back to her glass of wine and her window.

Usagi stood up. “We can’t let them hurt each other! Rei!”

“Usagi,” Rei drew her into her arms. “There’s no ‘let’ here, I--Haruka sent herself on a suici--well she wanted to do it, you saw, and Mina’s. Not herself.”

Usagi’s lip wobbled again, another hill of sobbing on the horizon. “What if she...hurts Haruka?”

“If she kills Haruka, hell itself will not be able to hide her from me, and so there is that consolation.” Michiru punctuated the thought with a deep drink of wine.

Usagi let out a small sob as she buried herself in Rei’s shoulder. Ami squeezed Mako’s hand, glancing up at her in a reassurance she did not feel. Pluto laid a hand on Hotaru’s head, who shrugged again, unsure of how she felt, or how she was meant to feel. But Michiru simply went out the window and stared at a sea she could not see, the rush of the waves roaring in her ears.

And Haruka clutched her ring tightly as she walked, believing in old, old magics, hoping they believed in her.

[ghostmartyr]

SnK 114 Thoughts

This is going to be done a little differently than my usual chapter posts, because I can. Or I guess a nerve got struck or something, who can say.

Attack on Titan is about humans and monsters.

It’s about the monsters humanity faces, and the monsters that humans can become.

It’s about fighting those monsters at both ends.

It depicts this fight as never-ending. You might not see the end. Your children might not see the end. Your grandchildren might not see the end. But for the generation that does see the end, for time that you’re here, you’ll play your part.

If you beat down one monster, another will take its place.

If you’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, you’ll be the monster.

There is too much wrong in this world for it to ever be right.

“I remember the pain again... Do I... have to... start all over again? This is a... cruel world. And yet... so beautiful. It was a good life.” Mikasa, 7

“They would all be happier... if I wasn’t alive.” Historia, 52

“They said just killing you would solve everything, but...” “I’m the same way. I thought it would be better if I’d never been born. The world hated me for just existing. To bring happiness to many people... I died.” Ymir, 40

“I... never needed to happen. Do it... At the very least... I want you to end it all for me.” “It’s bad for everyone if I keep on living!! Please, just hurry up and eat me!! I can’t go on living like this!!” Eren, 65, 66

“If Marley decides to exterminate all Eldians... I will accept it. That is how grave the crime of us Eldians were. They could never be atoned for. Eldians... Titans... they never should have existed in the first place.” Willy, paraphrasing Karl Fritz, 99

“Of course this danger now facing our world... can all be traced back to the existence of Eldians. I... would choose to have never been born, if it was up to me. I’ve hated my blood. More than anyone else... I wished for the extinction of all Eldians." Willy, 100

“I... can’t stand this anymore... Just... kill me, I beg of you... I want to vanish.” Reiner, 100

“You don’t really think ‘I don’t want to die.’ Youve always tried to think of a way to martyr yourself so everyone will praise you!” Ymir, 40

“I became a Warrior... because I wanted to kill myself in the grandest way I could. That’s all.” “How much better would it have all been... if I was never born into this world?” Xaver, 114

“If we’d never been born in the first place... we never would have had to suffer.” Zeke, 114

Death is nothing new to Attack on Titan. It’s everywhere. The very concept of the heroic group the protagonist wants to join is founded on the belief that their soldiers’ deaths will pave the path to a better future. It isn’t a kind future. Eren’s called a suicidal bastard for dreaming of being a Scout.

From the very start, though, that’s what the chosen protagonists are going to represent. The wings on their backs stand for freedom. Going outside the walls, even if it only leads to their deaths, is what it means to be free.

Death is a side effect.

It’s an inevitability. The world is too cruel to bypass it for the things you value, so you fight for the hollow spirit of your beliefs without seeing them ever come to fruition.

Endlessly.

Uselessly, darker thoughts start to argue.

For Eldians with a fuller history of the world, they’ve been aware of it on some level for all their lives. They have a monster waiting to be unlocked inside of them, and the longer they live, the greater the risk of that monster being exploited. They grow up hearing the horror stories of what they’re capable of.

The people of Paradis know it first-hand. Their lives for the past hundred years are forged through fear of the titans, with an entire branch of their military devoted to going out and dying in attempts to make the world less scary.

Even in the renewed version of history Willy Tybur offers, Eldia is full of tyrants until Marley becomes the tyrants. Using the same power Eldia did.

Xaver’s wife kills her son. She specifically kills her son before she kills herself. She has a man she loves, and in theory a child she loves, and the moment she understands that her child has that monstrous, tainted blood, she kills both of them.

In response, Xaver kills himself.

As slowly as possible. Learning as much as he can.

But he becomes a Warrior to die, the same way Krista Lenz joins the military to die.

A generation and a world apart, and still these things come up. Only Historia’s mother is the one who doesn’t have the courage to kill her child. Historia’s mother dies by someone else slitting her throat.

This world eats apart most of the characters we’ve seen. They’ve suffered losses and hardships, and the only release they have left becomes continuing forward. Developing their tactics, learning what they can, but living on. Killing themselves and their comrades again, and again, all for a small scrap of progress.

It’s behavior Zeke can’t stand.

“I’m sure that by the end, they’ll be sending every person inside those walls off on a suicide charge, from their elders to their children... they’ll go on saying if they’re going to die anyway, might as well make it a proud death. ...It only proves how unimaginative and set in their ways they are. ...The little fools.” Zeke, 81

All this suffering, and for what?

Titans are still going to exist.

People are still going to be terrified of them.

People still should be terrified of them.

It would be so much better if none of them existed. The memories of baseball and research can stay, but it stops there. No one will carry it on. No one’s life will be shortened so they can be someone else’s tool of destruction.

From the very beginning, there’s been a loud cry to exterminate all the titans.

Eldians are just embryo titans. All of them. For their own sake, as well as for the sake of the world around them, it’s better off if they just don’t exist anymore.

Zeke’s plan won’t cause them much pain, really. Yes, most of them will probably die in the coming war, but a few will surely live out their lives to their natural expiration date, childless, and then the threat of the titans will be a distant memory. How awful is that, really, compared to the atrocities their powers have played party to?

It’s preventing so much future pain, and the cost is what? The selfish joy of having your bloodline continued?

Zeke knows how perverse that joy becomes. Children only end up inheriting their parents’ sins and problems. He escapes them by a man he has no blood relation to coming in and saving his life.

It’s practically humane.

It’s one person deciding to rewrite the infrastructure of his entire race because the world has been so incomprehensibly cruel he can’t think of a solution that isn’t death.

Zeke’s not a character I ever expected to identify with. He’s a hypocritical jackass who’s so arrogant about his own life’s purpose that he’s turned off his ability to evolve. He isn’t responding to the world around him and seeking to change it; he’s already decided what he’s going to do.

This cycle ends. No one is coming after them. There is never going to be another Eldian Empire. There is never going to be another person who suffers from the existence of Eldians.

That fixes it, right?

If it all just stops, somehow that will make it okay again. You don’t have to fix it. It can’t be fixed. It is impossible to fix, no matter how hard you try. Trying just casts more ruin upon the world. Give up, stop, and it will all be better.

The content of what Zeke’s doing could be an interesting discussion all on its own, but that isn’t what makes this chapter hard to write about, for me. It’s that one screencap above that sea of quotes.

So now let’s make this awkward.

I’ve wanted to kill myself for months.

The thought has been present for years, but the want has mostly been since this summer. Am I out of good things that might happen? No. There are plenty of baseball games I could enjoy. There’s more to learn and experience. There are definite things I’ve lived through that brought me joy that I wouldn’t have had if I killed myself when I first had the crushing want to.

There isn’t one grand, unifying way to feel suicidal. You’ll get similar stories if you gather people into a clump, but people always insist on doing everything differently.

But since the very start of not really caring about Zeke, his conversation with Reiner and Bertolt on the wall stuck out.

He doesn’t talk about the suffering he’s experienced. Or caused. His aims are very straightforward.

“We have one goal, right? Regain the Coordinate here... and put a stop to this cursed history. Let’s just... end this. I want us... to end this.”

Three times in one page, he just talks about things stopping.

It’s something exhausting, to feel that tired. To look at the world around you and decide it’s beyond salvation. It isn’t always sadness or pain. Sometimes it’s just... being done. There’s no will left to fight, and could it please, please stop now. The ride isn’t fun, it’s not going anywhere fun, it’s not going anywhere at all, so isn’t it better if it just doesn’t exist anymore?

Living stops being the point. Cutting things off before they get even worse is the best you can hope for. Everything is just that bad. Surviving in hopes of changing it? That will only make it worse.

At some point, every avenue of thought in your head turns into thinking that everything would be so much better off if it died. Sometimes it isn’t even about you. It’s about random strangers on the news, and thinking that if whatever injury they got in some fire killed them, they won’t have to worry about finding a new place to live, and wouldn’t that be better?

Living is hard.

Stopping it all... that sounds good. It is the only thing in the world that sounds like hope after hope stops existing for you.

That makes this chapter such a pain to go over.

Because whatever the hypothetical merits of Zeke’s grand solution, all I can see is one more voice added to this series’ suicidal idiots. One more person who is so done with life, he’s decided to make sure everyone else will be done with it too.

I’ve said a few times that this is a series about genocide and how it’s bad. I still feel that is a correct statement, but in a very frustrated comment I made to a friend earlier this evening, I said this series is about suicide.

Most substantially, it’s about, fuck suicide.

Fuck it right off a cliff.

Over and over again, we see characters pushed to the brink. We see them give up, and hate themselves. We see them begging for death.

Then they get back up.

“That’s right... I still have... them...” Reiner, 97

“I’m keeping my name as I live this new life! Living this way is my way of getting revenge!! I’m going to be living proof that your fate isn’t decided at birth!!” “So what about you?! You’re going to kill yourself, the ultimate act of submission. Is that how much you want to please the people who treated you like a nuisance?! Why are you trying to hurt yourself?! If your will is that strong... then shouldn’t you be able to change your fate?!”

“...I died. But--when I did, I wished for something from the bottom of my heart. If I could be born again... I wanted to live my next life for no one but myself.” Ymir, 40

“It hit me that living was like a miracle.” “I can’t... give up. If I die now... I won’t even be able... to remember you. So--no matter what... I’m going to win! Whatever I have to do, I’m going to live!!” Mikasa, 6, 7

“When I see someone crying, saying... no one needs them... I want to tell them... It’s not true. No matter who! No matter where!” Historia, 66

“I want you to let me do it... just once. Let me believe in myself.” Eren, 66

“...But. I do not wish to die. Because... I was born into this world.” Willy, 100

“When we’re born... all of us... are free. People who reject that, no matter how strong they are... don’t matter.” “It doesn’t matter... how terrifying the world is. It doesn’t matter... how cruel the world is. Fight!! Fight!! FIGHT!!” Eren, 14

Zeke rejects that fight. He’s done with the world. He alone sees the truth, and that truth is that the only way to save Eldians from harm is for them all to die out.

Chapter 114 is called, “Sole Salvation.”

It isn’t a hard thing to fall into the belief that the only net good waiting lies in death. It’s very, very easy, and for my part, that makes reading this narrative, which this chapter specifically calls home, difficult.

Zeke is not unsympathetic in his life’s hells. The little boy who so badly wants to spend some free time with his father who only sees him as a tool--he is a child, and what he goes through at the age of seven is enough to call the tragic backstory a wrap.

He’s pretty clearly an antagonist.

The themes the story has allied itself with are that of fighting for better, even if that better can never be yours.

Zeke’s sort of there, except his entire strategy hinges on the idea that better can never exist while Eldians walk the world. Their entire presence is a blight. Zeke’s decided that the only better that can happen is one that doesn’t include Eldians.

Thematically at least, the story so far isn’t so chill with that.

Zeke is still working towards a goal, and he’ll sacrifice everything to get there, fighting his heart out, but he’s given up. He’s looked at an entire race of people and decided that there’s nothing but pain to be salvaged in them.

Part of me resents arguing against that, because yeah. Even just reading the manga, I’m looking at all of the possible happy endings I can come up with and they’re laughable in their optimism. Calling it quits and wiping your hands of the whole mess doesn’t sound like such a bad deal, really.

Only that’s not the mindset this story operates on.

If you don’t fight, you can’t win.

It isn’t about not losing.

It’s about winning.

It’s about living.

Laced through quite a few of the quotes up there is a concept that Carla puts rather nicely in the 71st chapter.

“He’s already great. Because he was born... into this world.”

Life has meaning the second it starts. Not what you do with it. Not what you contribute to the world. Those things matter--of course they matter--but that’s not the driving spirit that keeps on coming through.

So many characters talk about being born. When they look inside themselves for their reasons and beliefs, they start there. They start before they’re even cognizant.

Life has meaning because it’s life.

You don’t have to be worthy of it.

You don’t have to deserve it.

You’re allowed to have it because you are a person.

Zeke wants to deny that for Eldians. The ones who are around can stay, but the very concept of life for its own sake is one he’s given up on for his people.

I’ve never really gotten people who feel a need to have themselves continue on, but it isn’t a choice anyone else should get to make for them. Their lives should belong to them. They should be able to live them how they want.

Zeke the only way to justify the lives of Eldians is if their genetic code is altered so that more of them can never exist.

Because he wants the pain to stop.

The pain never stops.

That’s why Mikasa’s line is so iconic. There’s always pain. That doesn’t mean there can’t still be beauty. Heck, the other one she says is almost better; “It hit me that living was like a miracle.”

Zeke’s ripping out a rosebush because it’s covered in thorns. The beauty of the roses is less important to him than the cruelty of the thorns.

Relatable.

Deeply, deeply fucking relatable.

And I hope the narrative does what it’s done every single time with this kind of thinking and kicks it bloody.

Beauty means more than cruelty. If it doesn’t feel that way, that’s all the more reason to fight for it, until it feels like it matters as much as something that glorious should. The cruelty is not the end of the story.

Zeke wants it to be, because he can’t see how there will ever be a different end.

Fantastic. Good luck, Eren. Fuck knows you aren’t the gold standard for dealing with this in a healthy way, but maybe enough of your friends will be around to kick you in the head that you’ll think of something clever.

-sigh-

I guess I’m done. Even if this is more of a series post than a chapter post, but I guess technically these are just my thoughts on a chapter, and heyo, my thoughts.

Though one thing.

One thing I will mention.

Is that Zeke shouldn’t want Historia to be pregnant.

Like, he’s generally very anti-pregnancy already, but if he does his Founding mojo, he’ll still die, and the current generation will still be around, and as long as there’s someone of royal blood, said Founding mojo can be undone.

Geez I need a drink.

[aparticularbandit]

Current State of Bandit Fic:

This is long, so I apologize to everyone on mobile if that read more does not work and you have to scroll through a really long thing you don’t want to read.  Sorry!

Completed JTV Fics (by which I mean completed drafts not completed and posted):

Carla

The rough draft is completely finished.

There are fifteen chapters total.

Some of these chapters are really rough and need a lot of editing.

Okay maybe not a lot but definitely some editin.

I plan to post a chapter every other week hopefully on Mondays.

But honestly idk if I’ll keep track of which Mondays I’ve posted a chapter and which I haven’t unless I have something to alternate them with.

Luisa and the Fox

The second draft is completely finished.

It’s off with my betas.

I’ve mostly let it lie fallow for the past month-ish (or maybe only a couple of weeks idk how long it’s been friends), which means I should be able to come at it with new eyes, too.

There are five chapters total.

However, I do currently plan to have a second connected fic that’s half a direct follow-up and half I just want Luisa and the Fox fluff.

Stuff that didn’t really fit into the fic proper (like the freckles scene).

I plan to post a chapter every other week on also hopefully on Mondays.

The plan is to alternate these with Carla chapter updates, but right now I’m waiting on input from at least one of my betas before posting another chapter.

This may change in the future because I’ve been getting antsy for...a lot of reasons.

In-Progress Posted JTV Fics (by which I mean I don’t have a completed draft):

If You Lived Here, You’d Be Home Now

Now that Carla’s rough draft is finished, polls have said to focus on this one.

These chapters are harder, so hoping to do one a month.

But this really depends on how well the chapter is going - y’all probably noticed a longer wait between chapters 7 and 8 because group therapy was a barrier.

Unlike Carla and Luisa and the Fox, this fic doesn’t really have a chapter-by-chapter plan (and even Carla didn’t until those last chapters...mostly).

So I kind of know what I want to happen through the course of the fic and the order of things but sometimes more set-up is required than just jumping around (or maybe it’s not but I feel like it is).

I have no idea how many chapters are left.

At least seventeen, if my current projections are correct, and that’s dealing with stuff that I feel like needs to be in separate chapters (although I may change my mind on that later), not even necessarily including stuff that I want to sprinkle in among other things (Rose meeting with her therapist, scattered Susanna stuff, etc.), which means it might be longer, it might not be.

And like - even with those seventeen - I feel like some of them definitely warrant some cool-down time between or something like that, so guesstimates would project more than that.

Jane: The Real Story

This was second on the polls as far as things y’all wanted me to focus on.

I don’t plan to schedule updates on this one.  They may just happen when they happen.

These tend to be less intensive than the IYLHYBHN chapters, and they may fill in the every other week on Mondays slot when Carla is posted, but don’t hold me to that because I would prefer these to be unscheduled.

I also have no idea how many chapters are left.

I do plan on at least getting into s2 and s3 and potentially dealing with some of the stuff happening in s5 - like the Michael has amnesia! bit because that was part of the original post - but this is subject to change.

Mainly I have plans for that Michael bit and then dealing with Susanna and why Luisa and Rose are gone for a while.

And if this turns into Jane quit telling Mateo lies! then we...need an older Mateo.

I don’t know where/when I plan to end this.

This one is super flexible and I intend to leave it being flexible because I like having it that way.

The Adventures of Rose, the Baker’s Daughter

I like writing fairy tales don’t judge me.

This may jump into the every other week on Mondays slot when Luisa and the Fox is posted, but I may just start immediately into the other Luisa and the Fox fic that I mentioned instead.  Not sure on that yet.

I don’t know how many chapters are left.

There are at least seven, but just as with IYLHYBHN, that’s stuff I feel should be segmented into chapters and does not include other stuff that might happen between those chapters (like, for instance, I have a couple of general plot point chapters for later but don’t know all of the interconnected stuff).  In this case, I’d expect more than seven chapters.  If I finish it.  Y’all don’t seem too keen on this one.

There’s a lot of uncertains on this one, too, but I think that’s okay because y’all don’t seem too excited for it.

In-Progress Unposted JTV Fics (by which I mean I don’t have a completed draft):

Everything’s Coming Up Rose’s

90s rom-com au that no one really asked for but I’m over 17k deep into writing so you’ll probably get it anyway.

I mean.  Technically it was fourth on stuff y’all wanted me to focus on, actually ahead of The Adventures of Rose, sooooooooo.  Y’all want it but when it comes down to only getting one option on things, you don’t.

And you certainly don’t want it more than any of the other proposed aus.

Looking at maybe twelve? chapters.

Already wrote the first two and started the third, as well as having a chunk of chapter...7?? written and a bit that maybe shows up in chapter...8?? and another bit that might show up...in one of the earlier chapters maybe but I’m not sure where to put it yet.

The first two chapters are super rough but I like them, and I like this story.  A lot.  Which is why it kind of hangs out and still shows up on polls.

AND LIKE.  I ACTUALLY KNOW THE WHOLE PLOT.  DO YOU KNOW HOW RARE THAT IS.

I don’t know when I’ll start posting this one, and since y’all’ve told me y’all want me to focus on other fics in-progress and other aus, this should be lower on my totem pole but.  I like it.  So it’s not.

Luisa and the Fox: Shenanigans

Continuation of Luisa and the Fox.

No set number of chapters.

This is here for me to have more with these characters because I like them and there was more I wanted to write with them (originally just the freckles scene, but there’s starting to be some other stuff that I kind of have hanging around in my head that I might do) that didn’t really fit into the original story.

Don’t plan on posting these until after Luisa and the Fox is posted for obvious reasons, and this may fall into the every other Mondays slot once Luisa and the Fox is done.  I haven’t decided yet.

Brainstorming JTV Fics (by which I mean they’re primarily in the brainstorming stage but they may have a little bit written for them):

Harry Potter AU

The most requested AU on the poll.

Currently projected to have seven multi-chapter books.

Currently planned to be set concurrent with the original series.

Which means it may be more a crossover than an AU.  Ish.

I’ve been rereading the original series so as to get a better idea of how things fit together (and the anti-Slytherin stuff and commentary is so big and I don’t think it stops because even if you bring up Snape it’s in context of we sorted him too soon and he should’ve been in Gryffindor so like.  THOUGHTS).

This looks like it will be really long if I keep with this idea and write the whole thing.

Please don’t expect this to be finished quickly.

Please expect that I will likely take breaks to write other things.

Focus is on Clara as the viewpoint character.

I’ve made changes to birth years so that Clara and Luisa are born in the same year.

This does put Luisa a year higher in school than Clara, but since they’re in different houses anyway, this doesn’t really present a problem.

I might be overthinking this.

I’ve started outlining the first book.

I paused at chapter twelve because still figuring out the overarching series plot so the first book plot should tie into that.

I do have a general idea of character arcs for Clara/Rose and Luisa over the series and how that plays into what is discovered by the original trio over the series.

I also have a good idea of what happens in the final battle.  It’s the externals that’s causing me more problems than the character-character and internals.

I’ve started the first chapter of the first book, but it’s really rough and probably will have a lot of changes.

Hallmark Holiday Special

The second most requested AU on the poll.

Currently I have a general idea of which version I want to go with.

Those of you who were around in November/December know that there were two variations I was playing with.  A lot of aspects of those got retooled and put into Everything’s Coming Up Rose’s - and I mean a lot of aspects of both because I took the Rose from one and the Luisa from the other and meshed those together.  However, this means I can take the one that plays the Hallmark tropes straight and not worry about the complications I’d originally planned for that because they come up somewhere else, which. lets me play it more straight.

Straight, hah.

Maybe five chapters?

Off the top of my head thinking about where the chapters would break?

Maybe?

Sounds about right?

Because they’re, like, 1.5hr shows with commercial breaks every fifteen minutes, but each commercial break is like five minutes or more, so there’s like.  five segments, right?  Something like that?  My math on this is probably wrong but.  five segments?  Maybe?

I could probably jump back into writing this (I did start this somewhere in November/December) but I think I want to retool the beginning for other stuff that I think might mesh better than what I initially did.  And it needed to be edited and I should rewrite the beginning anyway, so.

This is just backburner as far as writing because do you see all of the other stuff?

Also there’s -- just because I know what needs to happen in each chapter doesn’t mean I actually have concrete plot for each chapter and I kind of want to know the complication before I jump into writing so I can make sure to get that set up properly soooooooooo we’ll see.

The hope is that I have this set and ready to post in July.

Primarily because the idea of Christmas in July makes me happy.

--and you know what.  There are five Mondays in July.  I could just have this be what I update weekly in July if there are actually five chapters.

Tentative schedule maybe????

University AU

Tied for third most requested AU with canon-compliant soulmate AU, which is below.

Since the poll for prof/prof or student/student is deadlocked at a tie, I plan to go with prof/prof.

To counterbalance the HP AU, which is a really long extended student/student AU.  With a whole bunch of other stuff.

I may do a student/student university AU later, but probably not.

My most recent ideas for the student/student university AU combines with the non-canon-compliant soulmate AU and hit some of the same points that IYLHYBHN does but in a different way with different variations.  Ish.  So because I still have general ideas for that, maybe, maybe not.  Unsure.

This is currently being brainstormed.

I have a general idea for how to start this off.

So, like, the first two chapters, maybe?  Or, like, a prologue and the first chapter?

I know how I want Rose and Luisa to meet, which would be the second chapter or...not the prologue.

I have a general idea as far as Luisa’s character.

I have less on Rose as far as concrete aspects, but I may get there.

I might jump into this one before the Hallmark Holiday Special just because it’s lingering in that place where you feel like you could be starting off on writing something and it’s there sort of thing?

Idk, it feels like less fluff than the HHS, which still needs some plot straightened out before I feel completely comfortable jumping back into it.

Canon-Compliant Soulmate AU

Tied for third most requested AU with university AU (see above).

I’m not focusing on this right now.

I know people like the one-shot and want a continuation of that, which is why this was on the poll.

I like the one-shot as a one-shot.  I think it is complete as a one-shot.  I don’t think expanding on that one will actually make it any better.

Which is why, if I revisited the soulmate timer idea, I’d planned on doing it differently and ended up combining it with the university student/student AU idea.

I do not plan on continuing the one-shot but instead want to deal with other soulmate AU tropes if I do another soulmate AU.

Given that I’d rather play with other soulmate AU tropes, I want to look through general ideas.  Once one of those stands out to me as something that could mesh better in the long form for something canon-compliant, I can start better brainstorming.

So I guess this is less in the brainstorming stage and more in the idea collecting stage.

I hang out in the RPC, so I should be able to find one of those soulmate tropes posts at some point.  And if not, you have all these other things above to look forward to that are getting more focus than this is.

This, of course, doesn’t include any one-shot ideas or the other aus I listed on that poll (I still really want to do the SG/Tick/JTV crossover because I’ve got ideas for that and how that would work), nor does it include any non-JTV fics I may or may not be writing/editing/etc.

So, basically, lots of content if I can get my butt sat down to write it.  We’ll see how it goes because, honestly, looking at all of this is intimidating, and like, I’m excited for...most of these projects but.  It’s a lot.  It’s a lot.

But I just wanted to update y’all on current projections for these.

[thearkhound]

Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake liner notes translation

The following is translation of the liner notes from the original soundtrack album to the MSX2 video game Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake released in 1991. It features a round table-style interview with the game’s development staff. While the members are addressed by nicknames, it’s pretty easy to know who is who since they still use their real surnames. Thus, it doesn’t take much of a genius to figure out who Snake Kojima is (it’s probably Joakim Mogren).

Piston Uehara: "Well, the reason we’re gathered here is because the Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake album CD being released soon, I thought so they could provide their voices into the liner notes. Moreover, it’s been a while since we last saw each other, which is another reason for the reunion."

Snake Kojima: "Has it really been nine months?"

Everyone: "How nostalgic..." "It's like a class reunion."

Piston Uehara: "I think we can expect that the recording for the CD will go quite smoothly without any incident and it’ll be a product to look forward to."

Ikachan: "Uh-huh.... We were really tired by that point."

Piston Uehara: "Today, we will talk about our personal anecdotes and such involving the development of Metal Gear 2. Shall we let our readers who we are?"

Akababa Akada: "I'm Akababa Akada (henceforth known as Akababa), who was the lead programmer. Pleased to meet you."

Monkey Oka: "I was the assistant programmer. The name is Wild Monkey Oka (henceforth known as Monkey).  My pleasure..."

Madamuyan Fukui: "I'm Madamuyan Fukui (henceforth known as Madam), who handled the characters."

Shoulder Nishio: "Uh... I'm mecha designer Red Shoulder Nishio (henceforth known as Shoulder)  and if I caused too much trouble for you guys then I’m sorry..." (everyone laughs)

Cocotte Yabu: "I'm Cocotte Yabu (henceforth known as Cocotte) and I drew the bottomless swamp."

Piston Uehara: "I did the sound effects and audio programming. The name's Piston Uehara (henceforth known as Piston)." (bows repeatedly)

Ikachan: "And I'm always here to assist you. I’m Ikachan, the composer."

Snake Kojima: "I was training at Mt. Takatori. I'm the planner, Snake Kojima (henceforth known as Snake), pleased to meet you."

Piston: "Well, let's discuss any inside stories we have about the game's development."

Akababa: "We have lots of things to talk about... Many things."

Snake: "Indeed. Many things happened during development... Like Shoulder getting lost in Tokyo."

Piston: "Shoulder went to Tokyo for the first time in his life in order to photograph the Metal Gear model figurine for the magazine ads."

Shoulder: "It was a one-man journey to Tokyo..."

Snake: "And there were bugs that became proper features..."

Monkey: "That’s right, the camouflage mat was born from a bug..."

Snake: "There was a hole data for a truck that was casually misplaced... I think someone reacted with ‘what is this?’ in a surprising and amused way and we decided to give the player an item that replicated the effect."

Akababa: "In contrast, there were also many features planned out that didn't make the cut such as wires, flying soldiers, searchlights..."

Shoulder: "Maniac Cop, piranha, and a tank.... there was even a mass-production Metal Gear model that I've designed..."

Snake: "Shoulder wasn’t paying attention to the game’s ROM size..."

Monkey: "I went through a lot of trouble trying to fit in everything thanks to him."

Shoulder: "Gulp..."

Madam: "Our ROM capacity was pretty tight and there were many characters that we had to cut out from the final version. The game’s specifications had to be changed quite a few times too since we kept exceeding our limits."

Piston: "Speaking of specification changes, we were initially told that we didn’t need to put that much music into the game ..."

Ikachan: "That's right. It was my pleasure to work on this and SD Snatcher at the same time at first, however..."

Snake: "Initially we aimed to create a heartbeat-like sound in order to bring a feeling of tension, but Piston wasn't able to creating such suitable sound effects."

Piston: (munching) "It wasn't the type of sound suitable for the SCC chip. In the end, the tune we made ended up being played only when the player infiltrates Zanzibar Building through the vent shaft."

Ikachan: "Thanks to that, I have to work in extra hours every night... My home life was on the verge of collapsing."

Piston: "If I remember correctly, I believe your infant daughter started calling her maternal uncle "papa" around this time."

(everyone else is shocked)

Piston: "After all, you did compose over 40 BGMs..."

Ikachan: "46 music tracks and 130 sound effects to be precise."

Piston: "The biggest Konami soundtrack yet!! Well, I hope you’re able to appreciate the fruits of your sacrifice with this CD." (munching)

Snake: "With all the specifications changes that happened during the development, naturally you're wondering whether the storyline was affected too. That year was pretty tumultuous for the world. The Tiananmen protests, the Romanian Revolution and the Unification of Germany.... We were taken by surprise with the real life demolition of the Berlin Wall, since in the game's storyline I've wrote that it was destroyed during the mid-90s. I had to do some last minute rewrites since Natasha Marcova's involvement and credibility in the story started having some holes."

Akababa: "But that game has so many situations that are hard to see as just fiction, so while they’re scary, they were also foreseeable. If the game was being made now, we would have to be even more careful..."

Madam: "No one could've foreseen the Gulf War back then."

Snake: "Well, war games are not really viable unless there’s peace."

Monkey: "Speaking of peace, there was this one happy person who had their last name changed during development." (everyone laughs)

Madam: "Yeah... That’s why [my] surname was different between the opening and ending credits..”

Akababa: "[So you] got married during development!!" (whistling sound)

Monkey: "There were many opportunities to fix that during debug... I'm sorry for the slip-up..."

Akababa: "I'll leave..."

Madam: "Maybe we should do a debugging tournament for the next rookie welcoming party."

Cocotte: "I probably would've brought the MSX to my home and checked for bugs there."

Snake: "Ah, the 'I don't know how to use it’ incident."

Cocotte: "That's right!" (heart pounds)

Everyone: "Ah we remember that."

Piston: "I remember going to the burger joint in my pajamas during midnight while the ROMs were being burned."

Snake: "And then on the day of the game's release, I saw nothing but  developers forming a long snakeline at the local game store. They were the faces of shrewd users."

Cocotte: "I got an SD Snatcher paper jacket for pre-ordering"

Shoulder: "Huh!! I got an ugly t-shirt." (everyone laughs)

Piston: "We still some time left before we wrap things up. Can each of you give us a few words before we end this?"

Akababa: "I'm certainly confident in the work I put into the game and I hope there's a copy in everyone’s home. Please buy our game."

Monkey: "Although this was the most difficult game I've worked on in terms of direction, gameplay system and such. I was very absorbed in my work... I did my best. If they say they're going to work on a 'Metal Gear 3', it’s going to be a bit (mumble) tiresome though."

Madam: "That’s because even though the game's theme is war, it was flowing with love underneath."

Everyone: "That’s cool!" (whistling sound)

Cocotte: "This is the first game I've ever worked on... So for me it was a memorable experience, I think." (coughing)

Shoulder: "For me... I was delighted to broaden my interests to include new hobbies such as model building and playing survival games. Let me reveal a little bit about how I made the Metal Gear D model kit. It was based on the K***e model kit by a company called N***o [note: likely referring to Ma K. Krote kit by Nitto]. Unfortunately it's been discontinued, so it’s not easy to get a hold of these days."

Ikachan: "This has felt like a one-year class reunion, but I hope I will keep on making good soundtracks, even if I'm no longer working with the same people. Please continue with your support."

Piston: "I think this game utilized the full resources of the SCC format.  The SCC usually outputs a waveform of 100P, but that’s impossible on a weak hardware unless the software allows you to adjust the timing. There's already a battle occurring against noises just before the processing time...

Akababa: "Thanks to that we had a few problems with the main programming..."

Piston: (scratching) "If you haven't bought the game yet, then please play it already. And then listen to this soundtrack."

Monkey: "That sounds like some good publicity. As expected from the sound division."

Snake: "While the subject matter of the game is definitely war, I want to transmit something in players' mind than just mere battlefield action, something to keep in mind... I hope this game will be the first step for most players in being interested in real world affairs and not just end there."

Piston: "Are you anxious to make a third Metal Gear game?"

Snake: "Well, I have several story ideas for a third game in my mind, but I haven't decided on how to make it yet.. Perhaps Metal Gear will come back when the world least expects it during a time of peace. Because when there's peace, there's also Metal Gear... Until then, I’ll await those fan letters."

Piston: "And on that note ends this rather serious liner notes. Thanks for all your good work."

[natsubeatsrock]

The Rewrite of Fairy Tail: Part 7 (History of Magic)

What is the story behind the magic of Fairy Tail?

Remember how I said the magic system is fairly solid? Well, the lore behind it and the lore of Fairy Tail in general, outside of the Dragon King Festival, isn’t very much explored. We don’t have much on an idea as to why magic is treated the way it is. 

To be honest, I’m not entirely sure that magic itself needs a definite origin per se. And, all things considered, I can imagine this kind of thing not being very important in Mashima’s mind while working on the series, when compared to the “current” events of the series. Still, there are things that need to be squared away involving how and why magic worked the way it does that involve understanding how the continent got to where it was during the series. 

So, we’re actually going to be doing the opposite of what I did in the last part. Instead of describing what, for the most part, is part of the canon series, I’ll be working with things which already are in canon to see how to best interpret them and figure out how they can be made to make sense. In doing so, I’ll start to give a rough outline of the timeline of events before the series starts.

Keep in mind that this does intersect with a few different ideas I want to get to in future posts. Even doing this singular part has taken a lot of thought and going back through the series to check through ideas and I’m afraid that I’m forgetting something. These issues are important and many deserve separate devoted attention to them as they affect the entire series.

What do we know that can be used?

Let’s start with two big dates: the aforementioned Dragon King Festival and the establishment of the first guild. 

Yes, even as this moment is from the sequel, it matters. Remember, any part of the Fairy Tail universe is fair game for this, especially the canon sequel to the original manga. Thanks to the sequel, we know that Magia Dragon, the first guild in the world started at x633. I’ve gone back and forth about if that should mean anything more specific. For now, I feel as though it should stay as is.

As for the Dragon King Festival, we don’t know when it exactly ended. According to FT Wiki, the war started at x391, but the end date was not given. A good argument could be made that it never really ended until x792 when Acnologia was beaten. That being said, it makes sense to cap the actual fighting before Acnologia starts his killing spree and technically ends the war would have to be somewhere between 150-200 years before the first guild forms.

In addition, Precht mentions that his research in magic led to the realization that magic was found in the dark arts. Of course, this led to the founding of Grimoire Heart. However, it’s not quite accurate. The One True Magic is actually Love. While Mavis and Zeref know this and that makes (some) sense, we hear this first as a possibility from Lucy. And this isn’t necessarily her own idea. It’s something that she remembers from her mother. 

So how do I explain the history of magic from these points? Again, keep in mind that this is mostly me making things in order to connect dots left by canon. I’m not describing stuff that I believe Mashima absolutely to be considered as the lore of the series. Also, some points will need a bit more explanation than I can give in this one post. That being said, here are some of the issues that I want to address, in no particular order: 

Where would Precht get his idea from the origin of magic? 

How does lost magic fit Precht’s study of magic? 

Where do Zeref’s study and research on life, death, and resurrection lead him to the concept of the origin of magic? 

How would Layla know about this origin?  

What is the reason only 10 percent of people on the continent are able to use magic?

What does the Magic Council do?

Why would they set up Etherion and Face?

And how does the Dragon King Festival affect the history of magic worldwide and specifically on the continent of Ishgar?

Here’s what I got.

Again, I don’t think we need to know exactly when the discovery of magic started. All that matters is that by the time the Dragneels get attacked, it has been known about for a while and people have started to try and understand it. People have started to get together in magic academies and universities both to teach and research the concept of magic. The only one that really matters is Mildian Academy in Ishgar, or as it was known Dragnof, where Zeref studied. This is where the origin of the One Magic as Love is originated and taught.

The entire Zeref incident involves that I haven’t entirely squared away just yet. However, an important change that I’m making is that his research leads to him getting expelled right before he would have been cursed. Which means that the Academy is allowed to exist for a while longer. Before it gets closed down, the school has two special teachers whose names would have to come in the history of magic eventually: Anna Heartfilia and Irene Belserion.

Anna’s place in the school isn’t that big of a deal. But Irene is royalty, right? Well, her status as nobility may not necessarily disqualify her from work in the school. All that really needs to happen in her case if for her to work at the school for long enough to deal with the Dragon King Festival. After she gets married, she can take up the mantle of Queen of Dragnof. The fact that she is nobility can work both as a reason for the school to want her and a source of tension for a family that marries her off to royalty. That being said, I don’t know that Irene and Anna will spend too much time as teachers together. They just have to spend a few years together so that they both know of each other.

Once the Dragon King Festival starts, the school gets roped into helping find ways to help win the war. Irene comes up with the idea Dragon Slayers just before she gets married off. The fact that she came up with it while she was a teacher, in addition to putting her in trouble, gets the school shut down. If the Zeref stuff could be brushed aside as only affecting a few, Dragon Seeds resulting in Acnologia can’t be ignored.

But before the school is shut down and Acnologia “ends” the Dragon King Festival, Anna pulls some people together to get the Eclipse Project off the ground. Of course, Anna has to get in touch with Zeref for help to make the plan work. He helps them with Eclipse, gives them Natsu and we all know the rest. Anna starts a notebook which gets passed down the Heartfilia line. One of her most important notes is that of the Origin of Magic as Love.

With the war over, the noble bloodline killed (Irene not killing people, even accidentally, while a dragon is too much of a stretch for me), and the Dragnof kingdom in ruins after the war, various different nations break off to form their own kingdoms. However, they all decide to completely ban and outlaw all forms of magic on their kingdoms as a safeguard against a similar event happening in the future. Sometime before guilds form, the continent goes by its new name, Ishgar. 

As a result of the bans, magic users leave the continent. Some end up going to the northern continent Giltena, but most go to the western continent Alakitasia, explaining their high count of mages. Of course, not all magic users leave the continent. Less than 1 percent stay. Many simply don’t use magic and do their best to remain hidden. However, some mages who stay end up trying to continue the tradition of Zeref and, by extension, the Mildian Academy. Of course, I’m referring to the followers of Zeref and, as you can imagine, they’re not welcome by the governments of Ishgar.

By virtue of being researchers, they become responsible for the creation of magic forms. While some are simply better versions of pre-existing forms of magic, others become the Lost Magic. While they still come with terrifying side effects, this origin gives two additional reasons for being lost: their existence before magic becomes legal and their connection to Zeref. The governments of Ishgar definitely wouldn’t want these abilities widely available, especially after magic becomes legal.

Speaking of which, what causes the change of tone on Ishgar? In the decades before the first guild, there start to become arguments for the legalization of magic. The arguments against boil down to a matter of precaution - not wanting another magical crisis like the Dragon King Festival. The arguments against it boil down to a matter of practicality - recognizing that banning magic hasn’t entirely stopped its use on the continent.

Obviously, the latter side wins out, due to the existence of guilds. While there have clearly been groups of wizards in the past and guilds aren’t mage-exclusive, the idea that a group of wizards would formalize themselves as a guild provides a great model to prevent future magical mistakes. If the government has regulation over the guilds and guilds keep track of their members, they can stop crazy things happening.

As an aside, if you need a reason for why Fairy Tail is specifically a large threat to the Magic Council - no doubt a necessary factor/sign as to the success of this argument - here it is. It isn’t a good sign that the top guild of Fiore doesn’t pay attention to the restrictions set up by the council. Worse still, getting into fights with other guilds, legal or otherwise, is a great way to start another magical crisis.

Obviously, this debate plays itself out on an individual country-to-country scale. But, while different countries do what they do at different speeds, they ultimately reach the same conclusion. (Grant me this as I work with a fictional series.) In addition to the existence of Magic Councils which (theoretically, in some cases) keep the guilds in check, some governments make secret extra efforts to prevent something worse. For Fiore, those things happen to be Face and Etherion.

One thing that everyone absolutely does is bury as much of the history and magic connected to the Dragon King Festival as possible. This feels like an obvious next step for them. They keep the secrets of the Festival as a close secret known only to special circles within the nobility of the government. Considering the government structure of choice seems to be a monarchy, where rulership is passed down by royal line, this kind of thing is feasible. 

Well, that’s definitely a lot of information. Even painting with a broad brush, it’s clear that this affects much of the series. This took months to get together in a way that made sense and worked with the canon of the series. In some spots, I had to make some rather interesting changes to canon.  

Thankfully, how this will be learned throughout the series is an easier issue to deal with. Obviously, I can’t just include a version of this post as an addendum to the series as required reading before I start getting to certain points. However, we learn about much of these aspects during arcs like the Grand Magic Games and Alvarez. Some of the aspects behind the history of magic are hinted as early as the Tower of Heaven or Lullaby. Heck, the manga starts with a discussion of Fairy Tail’s antics in a magic council meeting. A meeting which, as I mentioned in part 1, gets adapted into the anime’s second episode.

Will I need to tease at some of these issues? Not too much more than is already presented. I do think some attention can be given to the gap in the history and magic that would be filled by the Dragon King Festival. But, I don’t think that there is too much that needs to be hinted at within the series in regards to magic.

Introduction | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 

[akane171]

Whaaat? 28°?? Ugh, that's so warm/hot😱😱😳 But aww, animals!😍🤩😍

Nope, my ability to commit to anything for a longer period of time is restricted to READING fanfiction only, anything else my mind will get frustrated with in a few weeks at most😂 PLUS (main reason) I don't like the way it turns out whenever I actually try to write it and since that 7 year headcanon is half-made of what feels like my last remaining pieces of soul, I won't write it, I can't bring it justice😫

...LW's right, you ARE kinda evil...😫🙈 Hmm, well, concerning ideas I once had one where a villain shows up who is trying to rewrite/destroy time&fate and the Superfriends+Legion try to stop them but one of the villains turns out to be a Mon-El from even farther in the future (like, so far, no one would be able to tell how old he is anymore) who'd snapped (uhh, imagine a really really crazy version of Kai Parker?) and is intend on destroying the chains of time (and has already destroyed MANY worlds). Kara etc think they have captured him (not really, he's just bidding his time) when the Superfriends(-Kara) from the point in time when he first snapped show up. They explain how the evil!Mon snapped: Something happened that ended with Kara dying in his arms and since non of them could accept her death, they decided to send someone (which ended up Mon, cause he's the most suitable) back in time to save her, which failed, them again and again until one day he DIDN'T return to their time. His mental health was already deteriotating after Kara's death (even worse, her last words were she loved him but she never got to finish that sentence... I may have watched too much Tsubasa Chronicle when I came up with this mess🙈) and failing again and again made it worse to the point he decided that if the universe was so set on killing her, he'd just kill the universe back. And with time he just his feelings off because it hurt too much🤷🏻‍♀️ (Oh, and he may have absorbed a sun or so to grow more powerful to save her which might not have helped his mental stability either and kinda made him age even slower, etc). Soo, basically his Love for Kara and the Superfriends not caring about how he feels (...Is it obvious I'm bitter about that?) and pushing him made him snap... I hadn't really thought farther than that, but he'd definitely be deliberately cruel while the good Mon is ashamed and feels guilty...And Kara's heartbroken and angry about what they "did" to the Love of her Life... Blabla they try to get evil!Mon to see the light, keep failing, they notice he still has the necklace, Kara's all "If you no longer care about me, why are you still wearing the necklace" stuff happens and his version of the necklace gets destroyed (not sure if he does it or another villain) and the stone (which I still think has some kind of mind connecting or memory storing ability) breaks, offering one last memory of his Kara telling him she loves him no matter what which finally egts though to evil!Mon and kinda causes a mental breakdown for him and Uhhh..  Haven't thought too much about it, but it'd probably end with him helping the present and future Superfriends and Legion, manipulating time energy (that's a whole other headcanon I have, but I won't start on this now or this will get even longer than it already is) and kinda rewriting the future into one where Kara doesn't die but that destroys him and he fades away while cradling the broken pieces of his necklace in his hand as present!Kara holds him... But Hey, present Kara and Mon end up happily married with Kids Thanks to him🙈 Well, Yeah, that's about it (Lol, I'm really rubbish at keeping things short or explaining sth in a way that is NOT probably very confusing😅) NOW YOU!

Oh god...Who the heck came up with that Language and thought all of that was a good idea?😳😳

Nooo! My clones should do the cool stuff too! Like learn to play different instruments, speak all languages, drawing, writing, all kinds of stuff!🤣😍🙈

Wait, what idea?😳 What Karamel fic idea??😳😳😳😳

Ohh, right, in that universe I might like her🤔 She seemed fun in the bit you wrote and uploaded😁

HAHAHAHAHA 😂😂  #LWgoTOsleepSQUAD

XXXX

YES! And I saw most of teh animals i wanted, dolphins, lions, leopard, elephants and a lot of antelopes. Anyway, I'm super happy :D

Well, that's the pain of being a writer, I guess? You will never do the justice, but I think I know what you are talking about. That's why I'm not going to write that 243 ideas of fics I have, becasue I'm too dumb.

I am. Like, obviously.

But you are too, my friend. Holy crap, poor Mon-El. so his old, tortured, miserable self would die in the end? Like? How could you?

And... are there single km or Mon's fan that is not bitter about how he was treated? I mean, Alex treated Kara as shit and never really apologized for her shit and they are still seen as purrrfect sisters *rolls eyes* but i think we already talked about it. As for Superfriends, remember how J'onn told him to not reveal his true feelings for Kara? SpaceDad? WTF? Brainiac? WTF? Alex being a bitch? WTF? Only our son Winn understood his job, geez. I'm going to be bitter about it all forever too, so high five.

Dunno, Hungarians? xD

Gurl, have you ever seen or read stroies about people and their clones? None ends good xD

What fic idea? This of course! "(Well, I'd just kidnap Kara to the future to be happy with Mon and their bestie Winn, cause the present sucks...Well, maybe grab her parents-all three of them- as well, And send them with her, cause kids need grandparents, right?)"

So, I guess I owe you an idea, huh.

Sapce opera one, divided in 3 parts.

First called Shreds of Honour.

Daxam being the kind of autoritarian so called democratic space republic that would connect a lot of worlds (with all some horrible Security Service investigating everyone, brainwashing and horrible people at power - you know, the typical stuff). Also, Daxam being just a part of it - imagine Soviet Union in space and Daxam not being the big Brother but some satelite, known for having the best soldiers. While Krypton being dunno, probably a normal looking democracy with issues.

Daxam and Krypton being at war for years *sad violin music*

Kara, is engaged to some love of her life, but is also a fresh second in command on Kryptonian battle ship (captain - Space Dad, of course), there was a battle, they lost and were captured by Daxamites and on a vessel that was going to take them to a planet-camp.The camps being a really bad places.

But. Some pirates attack the vessels with prisoners and want to naval boarding them, to get slaves (yep, in the future things are still this bad). Pirates in general are known of being even worse than Daxamites and soldiers from The Future Soviet Union.

The Daxamite soldeirs on Kara's vessel resisted the first attack but had a lot of casualties and it was obvious that they can't survive the next attack.

So, a Daxamite officer in command (all soldiers having helmets on their heads), goes to J'onn and other Krypotonians and asks for help. He will give them guns to defend the vessel.

J'onn asks, why.

After some seconds of hesitation, the soldeir takes the helmet off and it's Mon-El. The krypotnians are surprised he is so young, but it seems all older soldiers were KIA.

He explains that the captivity in The Soviet Union is awful but still they have hope to be released one day, while if the the pirates capture them, they all will end as slaves, women sells as whores etc.

So, the Kryptonians agree, they get the guns and they defend themsleves.

But. when the FSU (Future Soviet Union) executives come they are not pleased, becasue it would be better to die than giving guns to Kryptonians aka they treat him as a traitor. Mon-El is downgraded and becasue he became Krypotnians friends, he is sent as their guard to the camp.

Some things happen, there is a lot of bias between them etc. Also, he needs to keep a face and be wary of other guards, he knows he is basically fucked and his career and probably life is over etc. but they sometimes talks, and became maybe not friends but people who respect each other.

And then i have two plots I fantasized about.

First is, some big FSU fish comes for inspection. Before, on some assembly or something, Kara does something and Mon-El hits her face with a gun and orders to shave her haid as punishment. She of course feels betrayed.

But on the inspection, the FSU dude comes (he is a typical human swine) and walks around the prisoners and chooses some females - of course all, pretty, young and blonde. He stops in front of Kara, ogles her, but when he sees her swollen face and shaved head he leaves her alone. The other women he chose are taken away.

Later, the women came back in horrible phsyical and mental shape, and you can imagine what they have done to them. And that's how Kara realizes Mon-el saved her from it.

The other plot is, that J'onn falls ill and the camp doctor refuses to give him a medicine that could save his life. The doc wants something in return but they have nothing to exchange.

So, Kara decides to go to Mon-El and well, exchanges herself for the medicne (all other guards have their prisoners partners and all people and executives know it, but keep a blind eye for it. The prisoners who decide to do it are privileged, have access to more food, some goods etc but are seen as traitors by the other prisoners). Kara knows Mon-el likes her, so she goes to his place and explains the whole situation. He just stares at her, says to stay and leaves. After some time he comes back with the medicine and orders her in harsh words to leave. J'onn is saved and other prisoners think that she became a whore and a traitor. The next time she needs soemthing she comes, he gives her but when she refuses to leave without nothing, becasue she doesn't want to be in debt, he sighs and says he wants to plays chess. She blinks and says she can't, so he teaches her and they spend some nights like that (while all people assuming other stuff is happening).

And well, after some time they seriously fall in love, sparks flly, love making happen, a lot of conversation about their lives, their societies, but not future, becasue they both know they are as good as dead.

But he starts to plot how to save her, but she refuses to leave her crew and him. So agrees and involves other people.

But a day before their plan, he is taken out of the planet by the Security Service, but the plan goes on and they are saved.

Kara is heartbroken but on the vessel that saved them, she realizes she is pregnant.

When they came back, on the first day she goes to her fiance, they have sex, so her child won't be labelled as half Daxamite. Also, she is sure Mon-El was tortured and killed.

The end of part one. Want to hear about the next one? :P

[artlessictoan]

Also, Smoke Into The Sand w/ 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15! OoO As a side-note I haven't read this yet (SHAME ON ME BC I WANNA) and i'm SUPER interested in it!

asdfjskdjskdjfsk this is gonna get long fukc

What inspired you to write the fic this way?

my main goal with sits was to make it read like an old myth or storybook, an old tale that would be passed down for generations, the majority of the fic is written in that style exactly, but the overall story definitely is (and it does come through a bit more in how the backstory is told and some of the more important scenes)

that said, the main narrative is written much more slice-of-life-y, one of my biggest inspirations for this fic is the manga monogatari (bride’s story), it’s a really nice series that explores the daily life of people in various areas along the silk road, it has that simple, everyday life feel that i love and really wanted to write into sits! that’s where the random details about desert living and the tribe’s lifestyle come in (warning for anyone who might want to check out mono though: it does have an arranged marriage between a 20 yr old woman and a 12 yr old boy, it’s being played as a more platonic/familial relationship thus far but i can totally understand why it would put people off, so just a heads-up before anyone jumps in)

What scene did you first put down?

the first scene i actually started writing was the very first scene! but the very first scene, the one that spawned this entire fic i haven’t actually gotten to yet, it’s gonna be v near the end and i’m dying to finally reveal it because it’s gonna be Big.. but i shalln’t spoil it here, just something for my readers to look forwards to <3

What’s your favorite line of narration?

ok so like i said i’m shit at remembering any of what i write and it’s a bit more than just a line but fuck it:

Gaara froze, in fact, everything did. The soft whistling ofthe wind cut off into eerie silence, the constantly shifting sand stopped witha suddenness that was entirely unnatural, Naruto glanced away for a second andsaw that some grains were being held in the air, perfectly still. He turned hisgaze back to the spirit before him, his expression hadn’t changed at all, hewas still glaring, but his eyes were unfocussed, like they weren’t reallylooking at him.

Naruto was too scared to move, to speak; hecould only stare and pray that he hadn’t just sealed his own death warrant.

What’s your favorite line of dialogue?

again, not a line, but i really love this exchange between nart and ameno so effing much:

“So mature… You’re growing up too fast, how am I ever goingto keep up?” she asked, mostly to herself judging from the distant look on herface.

He slowly drew his hand back once her face wasdry and gave her a confused look. “You won’t have to; I’ll just carry you withme.

What part was hardest to write?

well i might just be saying this cause it’s the most recent struggle i faced (among many) but the chapter six reALLY killed me. trying to find the right way to describe the exhaustion and constant fear took many, many weeks and i’m still not sure i really nailed it (hopefully something i’ll be able to fix in the next chap)

What makes this fic special or different from all your other fics?

other than being the first multi-chap fic i’ve ever written, this is actually one of my oldest fic ideas ever, seriously it’s been kicking around in my head for a good five years or so now so there’s that

it also happens to contain basically All of my Special Interests; naruto, deserts, nomadic culture, boring minutia, swords.... honestly the only thing it’s missing is cats (though i’m sure i can find some way to work them in too..)

and, honestly, this is kinda my magnum opus? or at least that’s how i’ve always thought of it, i had actually planned to not start writing it until i’d already done a few other fics because i wanted to make sure my writing skill was at its best before starting such an ambitious fic.. yeah that didn’t happen, but i think that’s actually worked out alright, jumping in with a harder fic right at the start of my writing ‘career’ has been a bit of a crash-course and taught me a heck of a lot, i still think it’s gonna be one of the best things i ever write though. it just has a very special place in my heart

Where did the title come from?

well tbh i’m kinda shit at titles, so i usually just hunt through the first chap looking for any particularly poetic-sounding line that would work (though in this case it does have a nice little easter egg, since in arab folklore jinn are made of smoke!)

Did any real people or events inspire any part of it?

hmm not really? the whole thing is meant to be very fantastical and unreal (despite all the slice-of-life stuff), the only real-world insp comes from my research into bedouin lifestyle and such

What do you like best about this fic?

gaara! i mean ofc i like him in anything but this version of gaa - silent, detached, barely human, incredibly complex - is one of my faves and he’s really fun to write, we’ll be finding out more about him as the fic goes on and when we do it’ll make his actions before now both more understandable and less at the same time (he’s quite the paradox)

What do you like least about this fic?

the inconsistency. i feel like i must’ve gone through about ten different writing styles throughout the course of it and it bothers me that i haven’t quite got that storybook feel i was always aiming for, i’ll probably do a rewrite when i’ve got more experience under my belt and try to make the whole thing a bit more cohesive

What music did you listen to, if any, to get in the mood for writing this story? Or if you didn’t listen to anything, what do you think readers should listen to to accompany us while reading?

as with btc, i mostly listen to soundtracks, since songs with lyrics really distract me when writing, since i like to try and match the music i listen to to the setting/tone of what i’m writing i try to listen to classical middle-eastern music (though i’ve had a hard time finding many albums of just instrumental stuff, if anyone has any recs i’d love you forever!)

in addition to that there’s the soundtracks of Journey, Bastion, Dreamfall Chapters and the Prince of Persia games and for instrumental artists i really like Break of Reality and Tina Guo for sits insp!

Is there anything you wanted readers to learn from reading this fic?What did you learn from writing this fic?

hmm, well i’d love it if people learned a bit more about the cultures i’m writing about (and i’d like to learn more of that too tbh, i’m still finding out new things that i actually got wrong earlier on in the fic), maybe even get interested enough to go looking for more info themselves, because there’s a lot of stuff that i simply won’t be able to go into much detail about

as for myself, well ^that and also it’s just been a rEALLY good experience in so many small ways - writing longer fics, writing in general, character interaction, introspection, action, plotting, description, suspense, mystery..... i could go on but yeah, basically it’s helped me grow as an author in Every Single Way and i’m sure it’ll help ever more before it’s done!