#also I can very much relate to her thought process that she talks about while discussing her haul

[fractallogic]

There’s a BookTuber I’m subscribed to now and she’s so sweet. Like we have fundamentally different priorities (she didn’t immediately get a library card upon moving to a new city??? She hasn’t visited all of the indie bookstores near her, just B&N???), but she’s so cute and so happy and has such an interesting way of doing the parasocial relationships on her videos. CHARMING.

[ikigaisvt]

Everything Everywhere All at Once

You have always loved Vernon and that much he knows. What he doesn't know is that you love him more than a best friend probably should. He also doesn't know you're virgin; but that has no correlation, right? Or does it?

What you don't know about him? Well, he's in love with you too. And surprise, surprise, he's a virgin too.

pairing: reader x vernon, she/her!reader x vernon, virgin!reader x virgin!vernon, inexperienced!reader x somewhat experienced!vernon, bottom!reader x top!vernon (but no real power dynamics) words: 3.9k content: smut, fluff, slight angst warnings: dirty talk (subtle), begging, praising, fingering, first time for mcs, protected sex, kinda love making, very sappy tbh, vernon is vry horny, they're desperate for each other, petnames (for reader: babe, baby, sweetheart, my girl, girlfriend / for vernon: babe, baby, boyfriend), vernon is called pretty, slight angst ig?, reader wears lingerie note: MINORS/AGELESS/BLANK BLOGS DNI. i first thought of this idea after playing a silly kpop dating game with my bff and i got vernon as my best friend and first time,,, i thought it fit him all too well so i decided to write it! you absolutely don't have to know the movie EEAAO to read this, it's absolutely not related to its story. the last paragraph of the fic is inspired by a quote from EEAAO which i'll put here "of all the places i could be, i just want to be here with you." (same quote as on the banner). also, once again, shout out to @homerunhansol for hyping me up while i was in the process of writing this and for being so excited! this one is for you, my fav dolly 🫶

You love Vernon. You really do. You don't think you could have lived your life without him and thanks god you didn't had to. You often talk about being soulmates with each other; how the feeling of being together transcends anything else. Any love you have ever felt feels so little compared to what he makes you feel.

And people must be thinking how lucky you are to have such a wonderful partner.

But here's the problem: Vernon is your best friend and you have been in love with him for as long as you can remember.

As Vernon looks at his best friend sat next to him, on his couch, in his dorm, he wonders how a situation can feel so blessed and yet so cursed. He truly thinks being your best friend is the greatest gift in his life; you are an amazing friend, you never fail to support him and let him know how precious he is to this world. You understand every single one of his obsessions, from movies to cats to tacos. Despite all of this, you will forever – at least he thinks so – a source of hurt for him. Vernon has been in love with you for as long as he can remember and that's a lot of time. You have always been part of his life, just like his love for you has always been here, rooted deep in his heart, never swaying or moving aside for anyone else.

He knows it's all because of this love that he's still a virgin. He also knows that he probably should have gotten over it by now and lose his virginity with the numerous girls who have tried to get with him. He truly knows all this and yet he cannot get over this deep-rooted emotion he feels when you look at him, just as you are doing right now.

"Vernon? Earth to Vernon?" you say, waving your hand in front of his eyes, "Are you even listening to me?" you ask him, chuckling.

"Sorry, was up in my head for a sec." he answers, turning to give you his full attention.

"Let me guess, were you thinking about Everything Everywhere All at Once, again?" you tease him in a smile.

"No, I wasn't," he says, frowning a little, "It wasn't anything important." It was important.

"Okay, if you say so!" you tell him cheerfully, "Anyway, as I was saying, I was on a date with this boy and you know what was one of his first question?" you ask him, waiting for his answer which comes in a shake of his head, "If I was a virgin!" you say, dropping your hand in a dramatic way, "When I told him I was still one, he bolted out of that café-"

"Wait, you're still a virgin?" Vernon asks, completely surprised at the news. If there was someone who could pulled anyone, it'd be you.

"Oh, you missed that part too?" you tell him, still annoyed at the memory of said boy, Vernon nodding again, too shocked to let any words out, "yeah I confessed to- no I mean, I broke the news like 5 minutes ago. What you were thinking about must have been really important. Anyway, now I’m thinking I really need to get rid of my virginity card because it's blocking every relationship for me."

"But how can you get rid of it? It's not like you're going to jump on the first boy who's slightly interested in you?" he says, in disbelief at your words, "Right?"

"No! Of course not," you say trying to calm down your nerves at what you're about to say, "That's why I was thinking about this- What if you become my first time?" you finally throw as Vernon takes a sip of his coke, making him choke on it.

"What?" he answers in a strangled voice.

"Listen to me before you say no, please!" you beg, your hands joined in front of you, "I just- I trust you and I love you and you are definitely experienced," I am definitely not, Vernon thinks to himself, his cock already straining in his pants at the thought of even touching you, "And I can't think of anyone else better than you for this." you conclude, looking desperately in his eyes for any sign that you did not scared him away.

"This is a crazy idea, Y/N." his voice still hoarse from the coke incident.

"It really isn't," you fight back, "We don't have to talk about it to anyone. It will just be between me and you."

"Do you really trust me with this?" he asks you, pondering about the idea. if I say yes, when I say yes, it will be for me only, Vernon says to himself. So selfish. "If we do this, I have one request." Vernon tells you, already knowing his answer.

"Anything you want." you tell him, already eager to please. Cute.

"You have to watch Everything Everywhere All at Once with me." he asks, making this easier on purpose – if he’s true to himself he’s doing it mostly for him rather than you.

It's a few days later, when you scrubbed every inch of your skin that you and Vernon meet up – in your apartment (as it is roommate free) so you can, quite literally, fuck around. If someone told you months ago, you'd be doing this with your best friend, you wouldn’t believe them.

When Vernon walks in your apartment, you can see the anxiety on his face and in the way he holds himself. You’re starting to think you have broken your best friend with your proposition.

"You good?" you ask him, getting a hold of his hand, making him jump out.

"Y-Yeah! I'm fine," he tells you, his cock hardening already hardening against his pants for you.

"Come on," you say as you give him your hand, leading him to the bedroom.

When you both go into your room, Vernon notices how it is cleaner than any other day, no clothes lying on the floor (even though that will not last) while your bed is done nicely. You sit down at the foot of the bed, Vernon still standing in front of you.

"How- How do we process?" Vernon asks you, his knees shaking slightly.

"We don't have to do this, you know?" you say softly, "Maybe it was a bad idea after all." you mumble.

"No, no, no," he tells you hastily, falling on his knees to get to eyes level with you, "It's fine. I want to do this." he says, holding your hands tightly. "Do you?"

"Yeah, I want to do this too." you say, looking up at him with doe eyes.

"That's good to know," he chuckles slightly, stroking your hand with his thumb, "Can I kiss you?"

"Hm, you can." The nerves starting to get to you too, before easing up when Vernon gets a hold of your hand.

He leans in slowly at first, so you can back out at any moment but when he feels your hand squeeze his in a you can kiss me, he slams his lips to yours. He feels your hands move to his shirt, grabbing it tightly. After a few seconds of a sweet kiss, you part, feeling the emotion of finally sharing a kiss settle down in the pit of your stomach. You hide your face in his neck, whining softly.

"What is it?" he whispers, rubbing your back over your shirt.

"Nothing, 'm fine." you mumble, raising your head slightly, kissing at his jaw, making him shudder. You make your way back to his mouth, leaving a trail of wet kisses along the way. Vernon hisses at each one, feeling sensitive already, his cock getting harder every time your lips touch his skin.

"Can I kiss you again?" you whisper against his lips.

"Of course," he says as he gets up, "Come on, lay down for me."

"Y-Yeah, okay."

"Good." he says as he gets onto the bed, holding himself up above you.

"Come here," you mumble softly, raising your arms to touch him, "please."

Vernon lowers himself, your nose touching, as you close the space between your lips, opening your mouth slightly. You moan quietly when he starts to kiss you harder as if he wanted to do this his whole life. If only you knew.

As the kiss gets even more heated, you start to play with the hem of his shirt, wanting him to get it off so you can feel him completely.

"Want me to get this off?" he asks you, trying to keep it together for your sake. After all, you think he has experience.

"Yeah," you breath out, "I can take mine off too." you whisper softly.

"it's okay, you don't have to," he utters, sitting up on his heels, "Anything you're comfortable with."

"I want to." you tell him, looking up with shiny eyes.

"Alright, baby." he answers before pulling up his shirt, revealing his toned torso, blushed a light pink.

"You look so pretty-" you sigh out, laying your hand on his stomach, feeling his happy trail under your palm.

"T-Thank you." he mumbles, reaching out for your shirt in a sign that he wants to see you too. Your shirt gets pulled off in a few seconds, revealing a pretty baby pink bra, made mostly of lace.

"Fuck- You look so good," he moans out, his pants getting tighter at every passing second, “Is this for me?" he asks in a low voice, reaching out for your chest, almost hissing – as you moan – at the sensation of the lace under his fingers, as if it burns him.

"Hm, yeah," you admit in a small voice, "Wanted to be pretty for you- It's a matching set, too." you moan out at the way he plays with your covered tits. He must have done this to so many girls, you think to yourself, and you feel the tears welling up in your eyes but you push it down. If you can have him at least once, you will take it. No matter how much it hurts.

"You're going to kill me," he whines, the desperation making the fire in the pit of his stomach grow bigger and bigger, "Can I see?"

"Yeah." you nod, feeling the shyness gather up in a blush all the way down your neck. As soon as the words are out of your mouth, he works at the buttons on your pants, chuckling slightly at the way his hands are shaking from nervousness. Once your pants slide down, Vernon gasps at the way your baby pink panties hug your pussy so well.

"It looks gorgeous- No, I mean- You look gorgeous." he sighs out, the stress making him mumble rapidly.

"Thank you," you exhale, clutching onto his hand tightly, "Why are you so nervous? You already did this. I’m sure you know what to do."

"Well- I know what I’m doing b-but only up until this point." he mumbles under his breath, finally confessing to being a virgin too.

"What do you mean?" you ask, not quite understanding the situation.

"I mean- I already did all this and some more. I already used my fingers on someone but-" he chokes out, the words not quite wanting to form in his throat, "I’m a virgin too."

"Oh." you say softly, shocked that your best friend – whom you are deeply in love with and who's extremely hot, is a virgin too. He softly lets go of his hold on your hand, understanding that you might want to back out of your arrangement. After all, this is not what you were expecting.

"I’d understand if you don't want to keep going." he utters.

"Hey," you interject gently, holding his hand once again, "Can I know why?"

He sighs out; "Maybe one day I will tell you." In a very very very long time.

"Okay, that's fine," you smile, "It doesn't matter anyway."

"No? It doesn't?" he asks, surprised.

"No, it doesn’t. I want you," you reply, looking up at him, a pleading look across your face, "And I’m so wet. You can't just leave me like this."

"Fuck- Okay," he murmurs, knowing you want him and not his experience making this whole situation way different, "What can I do? I don't want to do something you don't want."

"Will you touch me? Please?" you ask, your hands softly touching his back, goosebumps appearing on his skin.

"Can you open your legs for me, baby?" he asks, his hands pushing your legs open gently. You fall open at his might, Vernon seeing your pretty panty with a wet patch already showing.

"Shit baby- You're so fucking wet for me already."

"i told you so," you whine as your hips buck at him, "Will you touch me n-" you choke out, not even being able to finish your phrase that his fingers meet over your panties, rubbing your clit in a circle motion. Your moans fill the room pretty soon and its only music to Vernon’s ears.

"You sound so good for me- you're driving me crazy." he tells you, his cock pressing against the harshness of his pants' seam making him groan out. He knows he already ruined his briefs from how much pre-cum is oozing from his cock.

"Shit- Vernon," you say, choking out on your moans, "Just get rid of my panties, please."

"Y-Yeah, of course, sure," he mumbles, panicking at the thought of seeing your pussy in full light. He tugs at your panties, your hips raising to help him get it off, "You look so pretty," he says, the second it's off, already teasing your hole with one finger, "Everywhere. You look so pretty, everywhere." he rectifies, blushing deeply. "I’ll start slow, okay? Tell me if it hurts or you want me to stop."

"Don't worry," you say as you grasp at his other hand, intertwining your fingers together, "I will." you whisper, bringing your intertwined hands to your lips, kissing his knuckles.

He slowly thrust his index, feeling your warmth hugging him tight, making him wonder how the fuck are you even gonna take his cock.

“You good, babe?” he tells you, breathless, brushing your hair out of your face messily.

“Yeah- feels so good.” you say, in a high pitch, already choking on pleasure. “You can move. I- can take it.” you assure him, closing your eyes, letting your body fall into the slow rhythm he settled for.

Vernon works you open slowly, your hips bucking up slightly at the sensation after he adds a second finger.

“You’re so tight, sweetheart,” he says, your walls clamping around his fingers, “How are you even going to take me?” he mumbles under his breath as he never stops his movements, bringing you so close to the edge.

“I’m so close, please-” You beg, wanting to fall off the edge already. Your hand grips his even harder, wanting to feel him all at once.

“You can come whenever, okay? Just let me know,” he replies, adding pressure to your clit with his thumb, “I might need to prepare my heart to see my pretty girl cum.”

“Stop being so silly,” you say, short of breath, “you might kill the mood.”

“I’m not silly,” he says out loud but as you fall of the edge he adds, “I’m just in love with you.” quietly, thinking you will not hear it with the fog shortening all of your sensations but your sense of touch. You feel Vernon everywhere; in the depth of your brain, thoughts of him dazing everything for you and also in the beating of your heart, how it slows down when his breath gets caught in his throat and how it speeds up when he utters a word, especially when he confesses of being in love with you. Your pleasure keeps going up and up, thinking of how he’s in love with you as much as you’re in love with him, until it starts to goes down and you realize he doesn’t know you heard him and that you love him too.

“Me too.” you whisper, once you catch your breath, as if loving him is still a shameful secret that should never be brought into daylight.

“This is not the kind of things people say after their first orgasm.” he utters as he rubs at your hips, “How are you feeling?”

“I’m in love with you too.” you clarify, bringing your hand up to the hair falling into his eyes as shock can be read on his face.

“Y-you heard me?” he answers quietly, his world slightly crumbling around him as his brain didn’t register your words just yet.

“Yeah, I did.” you chuckle slightly as your rub at his hand, waiting for realization to hit him. Realization that you love him too.

“Shit- this is so ba-” he starts, before cutting himself off, “did you just say you’re in love with me too?”

“Yeah, I did.” You repeat, amusement showing on your face.

“Oh. Oh.” He utters, happiness making its way on his face as quickly as pink tint his cheeks, “Do you, really? You’re not just saying this, right? It’s not an in-the-moment thing? You really do, right?” he babbles fast, nervousness still present within his heart – and in his voice.

“Vernon, baby,” you say, grabbing his face in your two hands, stroking his cheeks, “I’ve been in love with you since the first time I got to learn about love. This is the cheesiest thing I can probably say but it’s the truth. You’re who taught me love, who made me realize I’d never settle for someone who loves me less than you do. Trust me when I say I love you; I do, in every way. As a best friend and as a girl who thought she was in an unrequited love all of her life.” you confess, hoping it can ease his nerves – mostly so he can fuck you. You want him even more, now.

“Do you know you just made this whole thing way hotter, now?” He mumbles, redness still covering his cheeks – and even his torso.

“By confessing my undying love for you?” you giggle, your hands resting on his shoulders, playing with his hair at back of his neck, “I’m glad then, baby.”

“Do you want to keep doing this?” he asks, leaning down to kiss at your neck, leaving a trail of kisses from one side to the other as your hands wrap around his shoulder, whining at the way he’s so eager to please you.

“Baby- yeah, please,” you plead, “I want you.”

Vernon groans slightly at your desperation, thinking that maybe all along you wanted to have him and not just to have someone take your virgin card. Vernon keeps leaving kisses along your neckline, your collarbones, your jaw, slowly working you two up again; you, pleased by the sensation of his warm mouth marking your body forever and him, thrilled to please you as he hears your sweet whimpers begging him to fuck you. He detaches himself from you, despite your whines making him want to grab you in his arms and never let you go, to take a condom from his jean’s back pocket. He climbs on the bed again, sitting on his heels as he puts the condom on, while you watch him resting on your elbows.

“Are you ready?” Vernon asks as he finds his place over you again, opening your legs slightly with his hand while you lay down again.

“Hm, I am,” you whisper, brushing his hair back, “Are you?”

“Y-yeah,” he says, offering his hand to you in a please hold me, “take a deep breath for me, okay? I read it can sting but we will go slow, okay?”

“Yeah,” you whisper, “I trust you.” you add before he pushes his tip inside. He keeps going so he fully settles in you, your pussy clenching around him as your hand squeezes his.

“You’re okay?” he asks, nuzzling his nose against your cheek before leaving a full of love kiss against it.

“Hm, j-just give me a minute.” you utter out, leaning into his touch against your cheek.

“You feel so good around me, my girl.” he whispers as he moans out loud at the way you clench around him at his words.

“Y-you can move.” you tell him, feeling your slight pain subside, only for pleasure to replace it.

As soon as he settles a gentle rhythm, you can feel his pleasure building up as he moans out louder at every passing second, your whines mixing with his, your pleasure sitting in the pit of your stomach.

“Babe- fuck, I’m not gonna last long,” he whines, loving the way you tighten around him, “You feel so good- fuck, you’re so good for me.” he mumbles incoherently, pleasure taking over his every cells.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” you whimper, “you can cum, cum for me, cum for me, baby,” you tell him, holding him as he plops against your chest, his hip giving one last push as he comes, burbling against your shoulder – a mix of moans, I love you’s and thank you’s.

You rub his back for a few minutes, waiting for him to come down his high, feeling his breath hit your neck every time he exhales. His heart, which you feel strumming against your chest, slowly calm down before he pulls out of you and gets up to get rid of the condom. He’s quickly back on the bed, holding himself over you, his face still harboring a pretty hue of red, drops of sweat still showing at his hairline.

“You look so pretty,” you whisper, looking up at him with stars in your eyes, “I love you.”

“I love you too,” he whispers, a deeper shade of red creeping on his cheeks, “you didn’t come.” He mumbles under his breath, a slight pout making its way on his lips.

“It’s okay,” you mumble, slowly pushing him back so you can straddle him, “we have a whole life now, don’t we?” you laugh, kissing his cheek before getting up, “Come on! We need to shower.”

It’s only after a shared shower and countless kisses that you find yourself under the sheet again your head resting against his naked chest. You gently play with his fingers as it rests over the sheet, his other hand lightly rubbing at your bare back, giving you goosebumps all over.

“What now?” he says quietly, as if he expects you to let him slip through your fingers.

“Now, you can call me your girlfriend,” you chuckle slightly, knowing he doesn’t how to go about the new relationship, “and I’ll call you my boyfriend.” Vernon giggles at your corniness, loving how you can ease up his nerves so quickly.

“Okay, girlfriend. What do you want to do for our first date?” he asks after leaving a kiss on the top of your head.

You think for a few seconds, still playing with his fingers as he rests his chin on your head, before you sit up quickly, turning around to face him.

“I know, I know!” you say loudly, almost jumping up and down from excitement.

“Okay, babe,” he says, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear, “care to share a thought?”

“Let’s have watch Everything Everywhere All at Once as a first date!” you tell him, proud of your idea.

“Oh, didn’t I choose my girl well?” he says before grabbing your arm, making you fall down in his embrace again.

No matter what the future holds for you and Vernon, you both know that despite all the places you could be, you both just you want to be with each other. In every world. In every timeline. And in every universe.

thank you SO much for reading! remember that likes, reblogs and comments are always appreciated so don't hesitate if you liked it 🫶

[alotofpockets]

Happy when you're around | Florence Pugh

Paring: Florence Pugh x Reader

Summary: You're helping your girlfriend film her newest Cooking with Flo video, and help her with a Q&A on Instagram live.

Masterlist | Marvel masterlist | Words: 707

Florence was dancing around the kitchen, between the chopping of vegetables and stirring in pots. She was in the process of filming a Cooking with Flo episode. You were behind the camera making sure to get all the right angles to give her fans the best experience.

You loved how at ease Florence was in front of the camera, she had to be with her job of course but this was different. She connected with her fans, talked to them, even when her episodes weren't live and she couldn't see their responses or have a two way conversation with them. She never failed to find a new topic to talk about. 

As a bonus Florence posted an extra story on her Instagram for her followers to send in questions, after she posted all the parts to the Cooking with Flo. She was nervous because she had never done this before, but she was excited when she saw all the questions come pouring in.

Florence wanted to answer the questions on an Instagram live. So, you suggested putting up a tripod to film her and to read the questions aloud from your phone, that way it was more like an interview. Flo thought it was a good idea, it eased her nerves a bit.

"Hi, everyone! I hope you enjoyed that little Cooking with Flo." She started. She knew how much they love the series, as they're always requesting more. "Thank you so much for all the questions you've sent in. My lovely girlfriend, behind the camera, will read as many of them out for me before we have to leave. I hope to answer as many as I can!" 

You looked at Florence to give you the sign to ask the first question. Once she did you read one out for her. "Let's start off with a food related question, what is your favorite dish to make?" - "Hm that's a good one, I love so many. Honestly, I think my favorite thing to do is to create a dish from the leftovers we have. I get to be more creative and challenge myself." 

You continue with the next question, "Are you working on any new projects at the moment?" Florence looks at you and smiles. "We just finished the press tour for A Good Person. If you haven't seen it yet, it's out in theaters now!" She plugs while making finger guns towards the camera. "But to answer your question, no not at the moment. I've had a busy couple of years work wise and while I'm very happy with that, I want some time with my girlfriend. So, I'm taking a couple of months off, and we're going to travel together. I've got some auditions planned before we go, so who knows after our trip I might have some new projects coming up."

You continue asking more questions, when you stumble upon one with your name. "Haha I like this one, I'd like to know your point of view on this. What is y/n like when she's filming your Cooking with Flo videos?" Florence moves her hands in a come here motion. "If you all don't mind, I'm gonna bring her in front of the camera for this one." 

Once you sit down next to her, she starts answering the question. "Y/n is amazingly supportive behind the camera, and in general. She's very detail oriented and knows exactly what I want to show and when I want to give you all a closer look at something. Besides that I also have the cheesy answer, which is that she's beautiful behind the camera, and she always looks at me with the most admiring smile." You blush at all her compliments. 

"That's because I'm always happy when you're around." You say while leaning into her more. She puts her arm around you. You see the screen filled with lovely messages from the audience and feel the smile on Florence's face. "We have to get going now, but I promise I'll answer more questions soon! Thank you for joining us and I hope you'll all have a wonderful day." With that you end the live and cuddle up to your girlfriend, before you have to get ready.

[rollingaroundin-bread]

Hi 🥺 what if they- 👉👈 what if they got mawwied???? 💕💕💕

Okay hi I’ve been working on these on and off all month (mostly off I got really busy whoops) and I have A LOT of thoughts about a Legbone wedding (ft. the drawtectives cause they really are my blorbos) 

Anyways here’s a list of headcannons that I didn’t get to draw:

So right off the bat let’s talk OUTFITS

To me Legzi and Ryjinah had gone looking for dresses but Legzi wasn’t really pumped about any of them 

So maybe they went on a road trip (because ladies bookclub road trips my beloved) to either go look in a different boutique or to do other wedding related shenanigans 

And on the side of the road Legzi spots this rag 

And of course it’s a torn up wedding dress and suddenly she has a Vision^TM

Just Legzi being more excited about fixing up this dress than anything she could have just bought up to that point 

Because to me Legzi is someone who loves to feel like a part of the process and having all her random skills she picked up from Darkmouth 

Then design wise I wanted something puffy so I could hide how much taller I made her 

Because personally I think her using the leg stilts on her wedding day is not only very Legzi^TM but I also made myself laugh with the concept :) 

And florals because those are fun, green, and easy to make by hand (as someone who’s made a lot of ribbon flowers)!! The vines were places where the dress was really torn and needed more structural stitching 

Ryjinahs dress on the other hand I wanted to take some inspiration from her season 1 design (even though I haven’t seen it) 

Also I love a chance to draw some boob 

so anyways York’s invitation

I’ve said it before but “artists draw fan art of each other’s art” where Karina drew Ryjinah, York, Rowan, and Jacob horse all hanging out is CANON TO ME

Which is why all of those characters were invited!! :)

Anyways I imagine all the invitations had your standard stuff- names, dates, rsvp section

But where it would’ve said +1 I think Ryjinah scribbled that out and hand wrote “+2 ;)” 

Which of course Grandma would be slightly flustered by meanwhile York is like “AWESOME you guys can come!!!” 

I believe in drawtectives polycule supremacy and also York is aroace

Which also lead to my miniature leg wrestling joke :)

Oh but the second York and Rah’ōxah lock eyes they’re going to leg wrestle (Pokémon rules) 

Then they can become friends too and we can make Julia’s drawing in “pro artists redraw their old OCs” canon!!! 

Rah’ōxah is both Legzi and Ryjinahs maid of honor :) 

She’s awesome of course she can do both!!!!!!

I wish I had drawn this but to me Parker the cat officiated :)

Maybe while standing on top of Parker the horse 

Ryjinah was not pleased with this but also couldn’t say no to the combined force of Legzi and Rah’ōxah’s puppy dog eyes 

Plus Parker the cat is the only person (cat) they know who’s ordained

Oh last thing I wanted to but didn’t draw was a Rosé & Rowan interaction 

Or not even so much of an interaction but they catch each other’s gaze from across the room and freeze 

Oh more headcannons but they’re siblings to me 

I mean dyed hair? Knives? Mysterious pasts? Color schemes?? Attracted to himbos??? 

Anyways they both have moved on from their family in different directions 

So to suddenly meet again even from across the room 

Then York or Gramdma calls for Rosé and she looks away and they’re gone

But I digress 

Tbh for everyone’s outfits I kinda just went “you know what would be cute???” 

So floral dress for grandma (obviously) 

Jumpsuit + long gloves for Rosé because vibes 

Unbuttoned shirt and double breasted vest for York so he doesn’t have sleeves 

Similar thought process for Rah’ōxah because they give off similar vibes BUT I made Rah’ōxah’s the same colors as Ryjinah and Legzi so she could match both :)

Then a demon Johnny button on her outer vest kinda like the pin/broach she has in Julia’s drawing in pro artists redraw old OCs 

Rowan I just wanted to look swanky and what’s more swanky than a tailcoat? 

And for everyone but Rah’ōxah I tried to keep to their normal color schemes!! :) 

Are all these outfits practical for what I made a beach wedding on a whim? Absolutely not 

I gave pretty much all of them some sort of heels even if they are technically wedges which is better but STILL 

Beaches are fun and easy ish to draw and I never do backgrounds anyways give me a break lol 

But anyways I think that’s all my thoughts!!!

So Legzi & Ryjinah ride into the sunset on their noble steed Jacob Horse :)

[orangeypopsicle]

Writing this because I'm scanning through fics right now like a sad cat in a wet cardboard box. Like, I'm so desperate for a story that shows the complexity of Velvet and Veneer's relationship, but also, I've been in such a depressive funk the past few weeks that I can't write it. I feel like I can dedicate another post to them here, though.

Velvet wasn't an angel, nor was Veneer heartless, but there is something to note how they both had a mix of qualities. This may be a controversial statement, but Veneer seems to have this issue where he leans on his more domineering sister due to low self-esteem, which results in him enabling Velvet. He loved his sister and was partially convinced to go through with harmful actions, but to what extent does loving someone also explain hyping up that person while they hurt people? Also, I don't particularly enjoy the difference in how he phrased the reasoning for his actions to Floyd versus the public. Veneer mentions the attachment to his sister when talking to Floyd, but his own personal gains in the situation are emphasized. When Veneer apologizes to the public for being a fraud, he mentions his want for fame but also retracts this statement by saying that only Velvet wanted fame, and he followed her due to not standing up for himself. It was an admission of guilt, but the shift to his sister being malicious instead of them both wasn't fully taking accountability either. It's a point of emphasis for me due to the softening of Veneer's personality by the fandom. He's a person with a reserved personality and more likely to feel remorse, but also is materialistic and a bit two-faced.

Since I don't want this to be a rant about Veneer because I very much love both characters, I want to get to Velvet. She's a person with a history of emotional regulation issues: explosive, self-serving, and self-centered. Velvet is a person who is desperate for attention and approval by any means necessary. She puts on a show (with talent she stole), gives it her all, gets very close to seriously injuring herself multiple times in the process, and offers to entertain them more when the audience cheers her on. Similar to her brother, I like to think that she's a person with horrendously low self-esteem but tends to deal with it by putting people down so that she can feel better. However, I want to give the benefit of the doubt that she may not be aware of the extent to which she uses people. When Veneer directly states his issues with their relationship in his confession of their crimes, Velvet responds by saying that she thought that he was on the same page with her ideas. Velvet implies multiple times in the story that she believes that they both wanted fame. Did that make Velvet's lack of concern over Veneer voicing his worries okay? No! I want to bring some attention to Velvet not seeming to fully understand how people feel when they are hurt or when they may have different needs. (Writer's note: Mind you, I have a disability and other mental illnesses that impair my ability to understand other people, so I'm more willing to humanize traits like that.) I also want to mention that Veneer did reap the benefits of exploiting the trolls and said that he enjoyed his luxurious lifestyle more than his remorse about hurting people. So it also may be a mix of Velvet struggling to understand people on an emotional level and a genuine misunderstanding.

Despite the two being a bundle of issues, it's very sweet how well they mesh and how they like to be in-sync. Veneer catches Velvet before she falls, Velvet pats Veneer on the head when he's nervous, Veneer instinctively goes behind Velvet to feel safe, they go shopping together and wear matching clothes, and they naturally lean into and are generally physically close to each other. They both aren't great as people, but care for each other.

On a semi-related topic and not wanting to make another post dedicated to it, I wish the movie expanded on the drug metaphor? It's a children's film, but I do feel that talking to young children at home who may be experiencing family members struggling with addiction has a place in media. It makes you do things you wouldn't normally do, it can make you hurt people in a variety of ways, it's an unfortunate lifestyle choice in a number of young people who were chewed up and spat out by the entertainment industry, it frequently starts with the idea that it's casual use/emotionally or psychologically beneficial and quickly snowballs horribly, and it alienates you from your loved ones. This could have been a unique opportunity to not only be about how drug use is harmful but also what it's like to be unequipped to help a person who doesn't want help. We tell children that drugs are bad but also don't prepare them for when the person doesn't want to stop despite all evidence showing that it's harmful. It can be very confusing because it's not emphasized how hard of a process it is to get sober or even want to get sober.

But yeah, those were some of my thoughts! Thanks for reading, if you got this far. 😅

[norrington-hell]

I’m offically buying tickets to see this upcoming Ted talk from you. Please elaborate because this is obvious me to every time I rewatch the series. I wanna see what you have to say about it!

VERY WELL TUMBLR USER @grayladyofthewell

It’s been nearly five years, and I still feel very strongly about this subject. Lord knows I’ve tried my damndest to find peace, but alas! Jimothy continues to consume my waking thought!

It’s so clear that Jack Davenport was playing a character that HE’D been the one to write. James is so much more fleshed out and real than the majority of the very fun, and very trope-y cast. That’s not to say every other character is devoid of nuance (I am not talking about the sequels oh my GOD am i not talking about the sequels), but more to the point that the original script had James written as a mustache twirling, power-hungry, opportunistic secondary antagonist. I think they might have even drafted him to team up with Barbossa at one point (either that or I dreamed it in which case hell yeah original idea do not steal).

When Jack Dav showed up, the part evolved into something much more complex. Much more relatable. Much more HUMAN. Something reminiscent of a regency drama. And the audience has the benefit of SEEING it…while the other characters in the universe DO NOT.

We, the viewers, can know James is in love FRFR. Elizabeth doesn’t. And that’s a damn shame bcuz if the worlds best pirate hunter had been even a little bit more exciting and visibly interested in her as, you know, a person, I imagine he would have been a much more pleasing prospect for her.

When Elizabeth does finally see him in all his complexity, when she does finally understand the depth of his feelings, it’s too late. Or James believes so, at least. He likely had no intention of going with her. He likely had every intention of hanging for his treason. But he would do so knowing he’d tried to put things right.

James Norrington was so well-written he COULDN’T survive this narrative. There’s too much beauty in his tragedy. Too much poetry in his sacrifice. And…let’s be honest, fam. The writers were riding the wave of mid 2000s ‘lol random’ energy they assumed the audience loved about J*ck Sp*rrow and making a delirious cash grab in the process. This series wasn’t made to be art. They had no idea what to do with James after the second film.

Now, as for what I said about conforming being his end.

The reason he stands out to us, the reason he captures our hearts and imaginations, the reason we’re still talking about him nearly 20 years after his canonical death is also the reason he is as killed.

He was a goddamn Jane Austen hero in a goddamn Disney movie based on a goddamn theme park ride.

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[momentofmemory]

If you were going to add an episode to Teen Wolf, what would it be about?

Oh i so got u bestie; i have so many thoughts about a bonus episode in between Codominance and Sword and the Spirit (5x13 to 5x14)!! The overarching theme of the episode would be trust—how it's been broken, how it's been healed, who you choose to put your faith into (and why), etc.

A-Plot

Scott seeks out, finds, and confronts Deucalion, in response to discovering Theo is looking for him at the end of Codominance. I think you could still keep the tension of whether or not Deucalion is double crossing Scott or triple crossing Theo, and then that final showdown will feel less out of nowhere

The main people involved here would be Scott, Kira, and Stiles, as Kira processes what all happened with the skinwalkers, particularly re: her test, and gets some closure between her & Scott re: her fox

In order for it to make sense that she goes back to the skinwalkers after Codominance highlighted how much she doesn't want to be with them, this episode would have to do some groundwork of her realizing she wasn't in control when she killed the oni and "beat" the test. We see her break her sword in the next episode, so i think maybe she should try to use it again in this one—and fail. This provides some really interesting stakes for Eichen & Scott's faith in her

Also i think scira deserve a talk about scott lying to her, and feel like this could be related to the crater in his chest he also won't talk about. I think his trust in Eichen could really elevated if Scira had a scene where Scott tells her the truth about just how big her fox is, and he trusts her not only with that information, but that she can still do it

Also also Scott and Stiles actually talk about Scott dying for heaven's sake!!! We needed it so bad and I think this would be a good time for it, especially as Kira finds out about it for the first time. Then we get a sciles hug bc i said so

How their varied fears of the nogitsune vs kira's kitsune plays in very heavily here, too

Ahem so anyway this resolves with a tense scene between Scott & Deucalion where you're really not sure if you can trust him at all, and afterwards Scott is worried he's making a bad call—and Stiles says it's okay, because he doesn't trust Deucalion, he trusts Scott, and Kira follows him up by saying that either way, this time, the pack will be there to back him up.

B-Plot

I hate Eichen so bad but I think it would've helped if Lydia had had scenes with Valack when she's more cogent/given more agency—maybe something that clarifies what he was doing with Peter at the end of s4 and how that led to her?

I feel like this would have to be in a mindscape, same as she has with Meredith, so Lydia is able to respond coherently/isn't just a prop to talk at

This could also clarify some of Valack's goals/motivations more concretely and foreshadow Lydia's victory over him in Lie Ability

C-Plot

Instead of Theo telling Malia he'll help her at the end of Codominance, their arc would be drawn out over the episode. This would heighten the tension of her having to depend on him, while allowing her to wrestle more explicitly with whether or not she's looking so she can kill the Desert Wolf, or to save Deaton

At the same time Scott is reckoning with his death, Theo is reckoning with Scott's resurrection—prompted, perhaps, by Corey having realized Scott was scared of Theo in the tunnels, the same way Corey was scared of Scott

Misc

I'd love a scene with Liam & his Dad—a werewolf reveal, preferably, +Liam processing his choices re: Scott & Hayden with someone that loves him, but is removed enough from the situation to comment on Liam's responsibility

I could get a Deaton & Corinne scene, as a Treat<3

[fuckyeahdindjarin]

Behind the Seams: Part III

Welcome to the first instalment of Behind the Seams! Thank you everyone who has responded so positively to this slightly self-indulgent idea I had. I know I take so long in between chapters, this seems like a fun way to keep you guys in the loop, and also to keep myself motivated and productive while I work by sharing my thoughts as I go.

This time, I'll be rambling about focusing on the characters as I'm still in the thick of developing personalities and interpretations in the Seams universe, and I'd love to put all the thoughts that have been rattling around my brain into words to help me process it.

I will be tagging these posts as 'behind the seams' together with the chapter number 'seams iii' so you can filter this out if you don't want to see them! For those who are interested, let's dive in below the cut!

Current status: 3.2k written, fully outlined rough draft with most of the dialogue drafted.

Initial thoughts: This chapter wrote far more easily than I expected to so far. Each story is different, but I tend to find the 3rd to 5th chapters hardest to write, when you're building up the shape of the arc of the whole series.

I'm still keeping my options open with regards to what Seams is or can be, but I'm still thinking 'loose fit series' i.e. there won't be a solid, overarching story arc or ending to the series since it's not a plot-driven story. It will be interesting to see if my approach changes after a couple more chapters!

The challenge: The first two instalments were so hyper-zoomed in on Joel and Pin, I knew that the challenge for this chapter is pulling back the camera and seeing how they interact with each other outside the safety of the Outfitters, and how they fit into the wider community.

Joel and Pin: I was re-reading Threads in preparation for writing Part III, and what strikes me is that these two really don't know a lot about one another. They've barely had a fully formed conversation despite the forced proximity and some very charged moments in the last two chapters. I've tentatively written most of their dialogue in this chapter, and it's interesting that a couple of times, I've stopped myself and thought - is this too playful for a shy person like Pin? Is it too familiar with two people who are practically strangers, despite their chemistry? It's a balance that I'll have to find as I edit, and I'm excited to see how it turns out.

Tommy: For some reason, Tommy comes fairly easily to me, a testament to Pedro and Gabriel’s chemistry on screen. Without giving too much away, I'm really happy with the angle I found for Joel and Tommy in this chapter. There's a lot to unpack between the two brothers, but the happy occasion means that I can focus on the good part of their relationship for now. However, I am keeping the tensions in their history in my back pocket because I don't want to gloss over the very real and three-dimensional relationship we saw in the series.

Ellie: I've talked about how I'm nervous about writing Ellie. My Pedro boys are all lone wolves - sure they have their best friends (Teak to Palomino!Jack, Santi to Grays!Frankie, Pete/Rebecca to Consent!Dieter), but Ellie is Joel's kid, and she's part of his life more than any BFF is to my other Pedro boys. Luckily, I have found an in with Ellie that I think works well with the story in Part III, and also fits in with the broader direction of the fic. It's going to be nerve-wrecking, but I'm ready to write her into Seams!

Tess: I'm not in a place to say too much yet about Tess, but it's so important to me that she isn't erased from the Seams universe despite her not being there. I've been thinking a lot about Tess lately, about how she will fit into the story, how Joel will fit Pin into his and in relation to Tess. There are no easy answers, and it will be something to mull over in the next few chapters.

Something fun: Ok, all this character stuff is pretty heavy, so I want to end on a light-hearted note - Joel's tummy makes a cameo in a white undervest 😌

And that's it for Behind the Seams: Part III! I feel a lot lighter having found a space for all the things I have been thinking about while drafting the chapter. I hope this was a fun deep dive for you guys as well, I'll be hitting Google Docs hard this weekend to try to get all of the writing done for Part III so that I can start editing next week. My askbox is always open if anyone wants to chat 🥰

[vasito-de-leche]

I saw your post regarding the Self-Aware R1999!AU and it was good and mind-blowing! Now I'm wondering how will it go with 6 or 37 regaining consciousness, considering that they're always seeking for the "truth", and maybe the Reader's existence would heighten the quest for the truth more!

;R1999 37 - Self Aware AU

Headcanons about how 37 would act upon becoming self-aware. Related to this Self-Aware AU post.

I RECENTLY FINISHED 6'S ANECDOTE, SO NOW I HAVE A LOT OF THOUGHTS THIS ASK IS A GREAT EXERCISE TO GET THE BRAIN GOING o7

this post only contains 37, since it got a little long and I didn't know how to format it the usual way because I LOVE rambling and rambling. I think there's another ask somewhere about 6 in the self-aware AU, so I'll get to that one soon!

also I think this post is impossible to read if you haven't read chapter 5 at least, bc I use a lot of the terms used in Apeiron!

37 is such an interesting character. Okay okay, bear with me for a bit while I get all of my 37 thoughts out of my brain!

I feel like people downplay how cruel or detached she can be. Because of her innate ability to see numbers in everyone and everything, essentially seeing "the truth" and being able to provide Proof to support her claims, 37 lives disconnected from her entire community while also being upheld as a genius and beacon of progress. She's the "Star of Hermes," after all.

A lot of her character focuses on this alienation and "othering," how her mindset and beliefs set her apart from others as she cannot understand the importance of soul numbers from an emotional standpoint--like she says in the main story, she's always known she's 37. Everyone's known this. And she does not understand the importance of knowing WHY she's 37. She doesn't care about the traits assigned to each number, that is meaningless rhetoric to her, what matters is the final result. She's 37, and that's it. She upholds the purity of numbers, practically worships this pure aspect of the world of Forms. She's at her happiest when she talks about how numbers will always be numbers, no matter who tries to figure them out, or when or how.

And we also see the cruel aspect of her that I believe people overlook--37 admits that she enjoys revealing people's numbers because she wants to be the first to prove this truth. It's only near the end of Chapter 05 that she wonders, if only briefly, whether being the first to prove someone's number means that she knew the truth better. Other than that, she has absolutely NO trouble revealing Vertin's number, nor attempting to tell Sophia her own number as kids--and 37, while she does not care for the rhetoric of numbers and their assigned virtues, knows how much the journey of self-discovery means to her entire community. And she still chose to do this, because she does not see the value in the process.

This isn't to say that she's exclusively a cruel character nor a misguided little baby, I would say that she's cruel the same way a child can be--37 is a very lovely and complex character! I just think people take her cute appearance at face value and forget the extent of her abilities and her perception of the world.

In the context of a Self-Aware AU, I believe that this self-awareness would be recontextualized as yet another eternal truth for her. Her curiosity wouldn't be applied to this, because there is nothing to figure out--the world has always been a game, that's it. Instead of focusing on the emotional or existential aspects, 37 would focus instead on the "guidelines" that rule this fake world.

It would revolve around the mechanical aspects: she understands that every fight follows a set pattern, as this is a turn based combat game. She wants to know why some people stand out, why they're assigned as 6 or 5 or 4 or 3 or 2 stars. Why not a 1 star? Why not 10? Why this system in particular? Why doesn't Sophia have any stars? Is it because she hasn't figured out her number yet? No, that can't be, because 210 also lacks stars. And so on and so forth.

The focus will still be numbers, so she would be the perfect assistant for Players who care a lot about meta!

I'm also willing to say that 37 would be one of the very few characters who has no trouble at all coping with the fact that she's a character in a videogame. To know that she's a bunch of "code" wouldn't change a thing for her, because she was already 37 in the first place!

There is also the aspect of finding out that her mother's death (as well as Sophia's father) was scripted. I'm going on a long tangent here, so bear with me for a second.

I feel like... 37 would see that as a positive thing? First of all, we know that the death of everyone in that boat was caused because of a miscalculation from Sophia and 37's part, which is the catalyst for 37's Emanation research. I do believe that, even though 37 shows little to no (conventional) emotion in that specific moment, she still grieves and mourns in her own way--and the way she does that is by clinging onto the one thing that is left of her mother: her pneuma analysis and research, the computer that stopped working, the pattern of the "Storm". We are told that 37 became a recluse, isolating herself even more from her community, when her and her mother's research was proven to be wrong, that she only came out of her lab when Vertin and her team arrived. We see her muttering while unconscious in the cave with Vertin, calling out for her own mother and telling her that their research wasn't wrong, that they were right all along (because they were missing one vital piece of information that only an outsider like Vertin could deliver).

Second of all, we know that 37 does not understand nor care about fate, she does not care for wordplay that muddies the true essence of numbers. So she would not think that the death of all those people can be attributed to something as vague and nonsensical as "fate."

Third and final point of this tangent, 37 does not like to be proven wrong. Or rather, 6's character event shows us that, no matter what she's told or how she behaves, 37 will always believe that she's in the right.

With all of this in mind, I think that finding out that this accident was something scripted--that is to say, part of the "truth" (or canon, from our perspective) of this world--would reinforce 37's beliefs. This miscalculation was a mistake born from her former self, the 37 that did not truly understand the world, before she achieved self-awareness. And now that she's wide awake, there's no way that she could ever make a mistake like that ever again. If else, I can see her being mildly irritated that it took her this long to open her eyes, struggling with the fact that she's not the first person to become self-aware. And just like she casually reveals other people's numbers, she would dangle the knowledge of self-awareness in front of others instead of keeping it secret.

On the subject of finding out about the Player, I'm not quite sure how 37 would react. Sure, 37's life is ruled by the same dogma that rules everyone else within Apeiron, but her approach is devoid of that same spiritual and religious devotion that others like 210 carry. Like we see in 6's character event, 37 does not care about the importance of the number 6 nor whoever holds the title, because the "truth" is that everyone within that bloodline is going to inherit the title at some point or another. Compare this to 210, who treats the previous 6 (Atticus' aunt, Alma) with such reverence.

So perhaps that's how 37 would act, then? This "divine" figure is yet another 6 for her, someone who has all relevant knowledge, nothing more and nothing less.

I like to think that 37 is able to see the Player very clearly right away, the same way she can see people's numbers, whereas 6 is the one who can hear them clearly, the same way he inherits the Revelation from his ancestors.

And unless you're another super math genius like her, I can absolutely see 37 pouting about it. How come someone like you gets to be "outside" in the world of Forms? Maybe she becomes curious about finding "proof" of your world, to confirm whether you live in the world of Forms or something else entirely, perhaps yet another world of Matters, full of Fragments. Realizing that the world the Player lives in is practically identical to her own--minus the existence of integers and fractions, just a world full of imaginary numbers--would be a curious experience for 37.

I can also see 37 telling Vertin the Player's own soul number the moment she figures it out, perhaps as a way to repay the favour for the events of Chapter 05. Assuming she survives that bomb, I actually don't know what happens in Chapter 06 LMFAO....

Long story short, not many would realize that 37 has become self-aware, since her behaviour remains largely the same. And it wouldn't affect her as deeply as it affects other characters.

[comradekatara]

hi, I just remembered your modern au yangvik art, and now I want to know your thoughts on a modern au for yangchen and kavik (if you could include chaisee and kalyaan thoughts, that would also be amazing)

omg yes this ask is like a year too late I won’t lie, but I do have a ridiculous yangchen kyoshi korra (undergrad) college roommates vision in my mind that I simply must excise so thank you for this opportunity! (obviously they’re all roughly the same age here. again, I fully acknowledge how ridiculous this premise is)

yangchen is on the basketball team, and she lives and breathes basketball. kyoshi is also on the basketball team. she doesn’t actually care about sports at all, but she’s their star player and she needs the scholarship. they’re also roommates with korra, who (is too short for basketball, but) plays a bunch of other sports so they all kind of know each other through that (korra and rangi are also on the same soccer team), and so they decide to live together sophomore year onwards.

yangchen’s freshman assigned roommate was chaisee, who inexplicably pisses her off for reasons she can’t actually name, which only pisses her off harder because she’s somehow the only person on campus who can sense her heinous vibes.

kavik’s freshman roommate is jujinta, which is terrible for him because jujinta hates him for some inexplicable reason (the reason is that sometimes he leaves empty bowls out for a couple hours, and jujinta wants his head for it, naturally).

kavik is technically pre-med, but the math department keeps trying to recruit him because they need more guys who are good at math and also know how to talk to people.

kavik first meets yangchen playing go at a board game party (they’re both very cool). they’re the first person the other meets who actually proves a difficult opponent, so they’re both instantly intrigued.

yangchen wants to be able to affect policy, so she majors in international relations, but immediately she’s like “why is this field so unserious,” and starts taking a bunch of other inter-department classes to supplement it so that she can still have the degree necessary to go into her designated field, but also actually maybe learn something real in the process. she has to get special permission from the registrar every single semester to take like six classes, and by the time she graduates (she chooses not to graduate early, even though she could), she’s taken at least one class in pretty much every major department. she ends up minoring in philosophy.

kavik is always kind of insecure about the fact that kalyaan goes to an ivy league school and plans to go into tech or finance and make a bunch of money, while he accepted a scholarship close to home to be with his parents and plans to spend the next ten years (at least) training to be a doctor. especially because he knows that he does have a natural penchant for the skills required to work in those fields, and could easily make even more money than kalyaan pursuing it, whereas med school is impossibly difficult for even the most gifted student. so he’s constantly questioning his life choices, but deep down, he knows it’s what he wants to do more than anything.

both of yangchen’s roommates have beautiful girlfriends who are always over and practically live there. technically kavik is also always over and practically lives there, but kyoshi and korra lowkey just assume he’s gay because they can never hear them having sex through the walls, unlike yangchen, who can hear them constantly. he’s not gay, of course. they’re both just really weird heterosexuals.

despite not actually being a math major, kavik knows basically every professor in the department. so when their fourth player is sick, kavik invites yangchen to join him, professor tayagum, and his husband professor akuudan, for their weekly game of mahjong. thus begins a tradition.

one time yangchen can’t make it because she has a game, and since kavik feels obliged to go to her game, he also can’t make it. instead of cancelling, korra and asami offer to sub in instead. korra has never actually played before and barely understands the rules. asami, on the other hand, is so good that it’s actually not even fun anymore.

ayunerak is the dean, and everyone likes her because she’s very chill but also scarily competent. feishan is the president and he’s famous for being the world’s most irrational, irascible hardass. no one likes him, not even his own parents.

jetsun went missing when yangchen was a child. she’s been presumed dead for years, but yangchen doesn’t actually know for sure, and has been holding out hope her whole life that one day she will see her again. she went to this school specifically because it’s in the area of where jetsun was last seen. after all, she could have gone anywhere. she never does find jetsun again, of course, but she learns to make her peace with it, and sometimes she can feel jetsun visiting her in dreams, wherein she tells her to move on.

henshe is yangchen’s TA. she swears she didn’t mean to do it, but she asks him a question during class on a particularly stressful day for him, and he doesn’t actually know how to answer the question so instead he simply breaks down in tears and collapses on the floor. he has to be dragged away by emergency medical services. he doesn’t come back to class for two weeks after that.

kyoshi joins the lit mag in her junior year. she quickly realizes that this is not the place for her, as chaisee runs that shit like the navy. she quits and explains why to yangchen, who has never felt more vindicated in her entire life. she knew she wasn’t the only person who disliked that bitch.

kavik meets chaisee only once while in college, late in their senior year, and says to yangchen, “oh yeah, you were right, she has awful vibes.” unfortunately, in five years’ time, he will learn that she is in a very dedicated relationship with his brother, and they are expecting a daughter soon. they met while working for the same defense contractor.

kavik and yangchen take exactly one class together, and it is the philosophy of science. they get absolutely nothing done in that class because they just spend the whole time texting each other observations about the other students. they somehow manage to both get A’s anyway.

after graduation, yangchen and kavik move in together, which is nice because they’re already best friends who know all of each other’s worst habits and don’t really mind them, but is also kind of sad because she lowkey misses the beautiful dykes she used to live with. they still text one another in the groupchat constantly, but alas, it’s not the same. kavik is like “sorry i’m not a gorgeous lesbian????” and yangchen just goes “you should be.”

oh, and roku and kuruk are also students there, but no one in their friend group ever pays them any attention. kavik and kuruk are friendly enough at board game night, but kuruk is a party animal and runs with a very different crowd. and roku is just plain lame and no one likes him. he’s in some of yangchen’s IR classes and all his comments are reductive and straight-up tedious. the only capacity in which she appreciates this man is when she gets to politely destroy him. how he managed to pull ta min, no one will ever know.

every year on the anniversary of jetsun’s “disappearance,” kavik spends all day baking yangchen a platter of differently flavored macarons. he rarely ever bakes, but he’s extremely good at it, and it always cheers her up without fail, every year. she somehow never notices the pattern.

[azuremist]

Alterhumanity and Autism (Script)

During my panel at this year's Othercon, I said that I would publicly post my panel's script, and my survey's results onto my tumblr, for easy archival purposes! (There is no way to submit Google Docs to archive.org that I'm aware of...)

This is the panel's script! What I said before the QnA part of the panel. Once the panel recording is uploaded, I'll reblog with the link to it, as well! The results for the survey will also be posted to this account shortly.

Here is the blurb that I originally wrote for the panel, on the schedule:

"This panel aims to explore the relationship between autism and alterhumanity, by looking at the history, the modern autistic community and what real alterhumans have to say on the topic. Why it is that neurodivergency is seemingly so common in the alterhuman community? Is it correlation, causation, or perhaps something in between?"

And, below is the script itself!

Hi, everyone! I am so excited to be speaking at Othercon this year and I hope everyone else is enjoying the 'con so far. My name is Azure! You may also call me Bede, as I answer to both. I like he/him, she/her and bun/buns pronouns, and I am a multitude of things! I am a demon (a fallen angel if you wanna get technical), and my main fictotype is, you'll never guess who based off my names, Bede from Pokemon. Shoutout to any Pokemonkin listening. I've been active in the alterhuman community for around 5 years now, and was the head and sole mod of ‘From Fictionkind’, which is a zine released in 2022, aiming to explore the experiences of those who have a fiction-based identity. If you are interested, you can download it here. (Send link)

I am a grab bag of disorders and disabilities, most of which I won't list, but what is relevant to this panel is that I am, in fact, autistic. Not only that, but I have done, by all metrics, way too much research into autism, and I am an autistic activist!

To preface: although this panel is going to specifically namedrop and talk about autism a lot, I am sure that a lot of different beings can relate to what I am going to talk about today. Not just other neurodivergencies and disabilities, either. Much of what I am going to be talking about today could resonate with any oppressed being's experiences. I welcome all discussion about the similarities of different experiences with open arms!

But, for the sake of transparency, I am not very good at talking off the cuff. So I am going to spend the bulk of this panel reading from a pre-prepared script. If anyone is interested in a transcript, it is available on Google Docs for viewing! I will send it in the panel chat right now, so that anyone who needs to may read along, for word-processing purposes. (Send link) This also means that I am not going to be looking at the chat a whole lot, so if there's something you'd particularly like for me to see, I encourage you to hold it until the end so that I can be sure to see it and give it the thought and recognition that it deserves. All this being said, I still will be looking at the chat occasionally.

To prepare for this panel, I took a survey polling autistic alterhumans, which was taking responses from March 7th to July 1st, so around 4 months. I was hoping for about maybe 90 participants, but that number was blown out of the water with over 500 responses!! I will be going over those results later on in the panel, and will also be referencing the anonymous freeform responses.

The very last point of my preamble here is to warn that this panel may not be suitable for all audiences. This lecture contains extended discussion of ableism, and, while I try to keep the mentions brief, there will be specific talk of disabled folks, including children, being hurt. If you're unable to handle that at this time, that is absolutely fine. Take care of yourself and have a great con!

This panel aims to explore the relationship between autism and alterhumanity, by looking at the history, the modern autistic community and what real alterhumans have to say on the topic. I hope to, perhaps not explain, but look into why it is that neurodivergency is seemingly so common in the alterhuman community, and whether it's because of correlation, causation, or perhaps something in between.

Now, let's start off with a question and feel free to try and guess: What do fairies, aliens, and crystals all have in common? Do we have any guesses?

The correct answer is that all 3 of these things have been used to try and claim autistic children are nonhuman!

Let's get into the specifics, starting from the top with fairies.

The changeling is a form of fairy found in European folklore. Also referred to as an "oaf" historically, a changeling is a fairy that is left in the place of an identical human child, when they are stolen away by other fairies. This is to say, parents believed that their human child was being replaced by an identical fairy child. There were multiple tricks that were thought to fend this off. When you believe you already have a changeling, though... There were less ways to go about that. Historical records and tales about changelings unfortunately imply that the solution chosen for a changeling child was often times infanticide.

Many modern psychologists now believe that most tales of changelings developed in an attempt to explain disabled children. This includes, but is not limited to, deformities, Down syndrome, Williams syndrome, cerebral palsy, and, of course, autism. The fact that boys are more often born with birth defects lines up with the touted belief that boys were more likely to be taken by fairies.

Furthermore, see "regressive autism". This so-called phenomena occurs when a child appears to develop, quote-unquote, "normally", until they start showing symptoms of autism in their later years. Now, what actually happens in these cases is that they never noticed their child's autistic traits until those later years. But the fact that there is still a name for this sudden perceived shift in an autistic child shows the sheer amount of cases there are like this, even today. Now, imagine how bad it was hundreds of years ago, before we even had a word for autism. This "sudden shift" perspective very much parallels the supposed markings of your child being replaced by a changeling.

Second verse, same as the first: aliens. Although the term "starseed" has been picked up in the alterhuman community as a way to describe one's self as an alien, "starseeds", or "star children", didn't originate in the alterhuman community. Their existence is a theory put forth by Brad Seiger in his 1976 book, titled "Gods of Aquarius". It posits that some humans originated as extraterrestrials, and arrived on Earth through either birth or by taking over an existent human body.

Generally agreed-upon signs that you or someone you love is a starseed, according to believers, include that person feeling like they don't belong, being hyperempathetic (which is a sign of autism, despite what the stereotypes would have you believe), introversion, and... Actually, I'm going to quote this in its entirety. In "What Is A Starseed & 50 Clear Signs You Are One", published by The Spirit Nomad, the first listed sign is, quote, "You are highly sensitive. You easily feel overwhelmed and drained when you are in a place with many people and with intense stimuli – like shopping malls, clubs, and networking events. You might also be sensitive to stimulants like coffee, alcohol and even dark chocolate." Endquote.

You think I'm joking about these things just listing autism symptoms. I'm not!

Finally... Crystals. Crystal children and indigo children are both believed to be sort of the next step in scientific evolution, according to New Age circles. More specifically, crystal children are the newest generation, while indigo children were the first wave, from around the 70s to the 90s. I'll just be calling both of these 'waves' crystal children for the sake of simplicity, but know that they are just two waves of the same thing. Crystal children are believed to possess special or supernatural abilities, such as telepathy. Autistic children having telepathy, as we all know, is the plot of Mob Psycho 100.

Signs that your child is a crystal child include high empathy, being perceived as 'strange' by others or intelligent for their age (see the autistic gifted kid phenomenon), and being sensitive to the point of fussing in crowded spaces. It's also said that crystal children may struggle in socially conventional schools, because of their dislike of rigid authority, being smarter than their teachers, and their lack of response to guilt, fear, or manipulation-based discipline. (Read: indirect communication.)

It is actually a noted phenomenon that many parents, when confronted with a diagnosis like a learning disability, ADHD, or autism, will alternatively label their child as a crystal child. Autism researcher Mitzi Waltz noted this phenomenon, and spoke about it in a 2009 issue of The Journal of Religion, Disability & Health. He suggests that parents recategorize autistic symptoms as telepathic powers to attempt to reconceptualize these autistic traits as a part of a more conventionally positive identity. He also puts into words why this can be harmful, stating that parents could refuse to acknowledge their child's impairments, refuse accommodations, and, quote, "transmit belief systems to the child that are self-aggrandizing, confusing, or potentially frightening." Endquote.

Believe it or not, there are actually MORE examples of myths or conspiracy theories that attempt to explain autistic children as nonhuman. But, I will leave it at those three.

Let's take a brief look into modern media now. Specifically, the "autistic-coded robot" trope. A lot of times, when humans try to write robots, or AI or such, they think that they can just take all essential things that make humanity what it is, and take away a few things. Make them not express empathy, they don't get nonliteral phrases, they obviously speak in monotone. We could sprinkle in a little bit of feeling out of place with humanity for flavor aaaand it's autistic. Your robot is autistic. To name some examples of this trope, think Data from Star Trek, or Zane from Ninjago.

This trope is more or less echoed, beat for beat, with the autistic-coded alien trope. Examples of this flavor of the trope include Peridot from Steven Universe, Spock from Star Trek, or, and I'm sorry for anyone who I'm about to violently throw back into 2016 with this, Keith from Voltron.

Because nonhumanity is so often linked to autistic beings by the culture around us, desiring to be nonhuman or connecting with nonhumanity is now a recognized part of autistic culture. We often feel out of place in neurotypical society. Join autistic spaces, and you’ll see jokes like, “What kind of nonhuman did you think you were as a kid?” (In case you’re wondering, the answer is werewolf for me.) Growing up thinking that the reason behind your autistic traits is because you are secretly nonhuman is a common experience. Jokes about desiring a tail and to purr often go viral within autistic spaces, because they are forms of natural and nonverbal communication that shows those around us that we are happy. The topic of nonhumanity within autistic culture is also talked about within professional settings, such as in Kim Duff’s speech, “The Role of Changeling Lore in Autistic Culture”, at the 1999 Autreat conference of Autism Network International.

There is also discussion of how autistic beings oftentimes connect with animals better than with humans. For example, Temple Grandin is an autistic animal behavioralist who has written extensively on how her being autistic helps her understand how animals feel. For example, she speaks in 2004’s, “Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior”, and in 1997’s “Thinking the Way Animals Do: Unique Insights from a Person with a Singular Understanding”.

In more modern times, we have the 2022 article, “How Autism Connects Me With Animals”, in which Emily Moran Barwick, writes, quote, “I knew how profoundly frustrating, isolating and demoralizing it was to be unable to convey what I wanted to convey. I knew how it felt to never be truly understood. And it broke my heart thinking of what non-human animals were experiencing at the hands of humans; that no matter how desperately and clearly they communicated their terror and pain, they were ignored and discounted.” Endquote.

All of these connections have led to the creation of subcultures created in an attempt to reclaim the dehumanization put onto us. To name one example, voidpunk is a subculture created by tumblr user arotaro in the 2010s, and more or less hinges on this idea. Key points of this subculture include the rejection of the norm, embracing nonhumanity, and comfort in the unknown. In the words of it’s creator, quote, “It’s not the same as otherkin because it’s not really like, “Ah yes, I am a cat/dragon/wolf/that one guy from Homestuck/etc.”, it’s not necessarily something specific, and it’s not necessarily literally believing you’re something other than human. It’s, well, punk. Society puts out a lot of messages about What It Means To Be Human (trademark) that can make a lot of people who don’t completely fit the bill feel lost, broken, alone, or like they’re doing something wrong; Voidpunk is about taking that message of “you’re not human”, making it your own, and throwing it back in society’s face. You say I’m not human? Sure, ok. That’s chill. Why does being Human (trademark) have to be a goal to aspire to anyway? What’s so great about humanity?” Endquote. She then goes on to specifically namedrop neurodivergents as one of the target audiences for the subculture, as well. She also later answers an ask to clarify, quote, “Someone who doesn’t face dehumanization cannot be voidpunk.” Endquote.

So, where does all of this information intersect with the notable number of autistic alterhumans? Well, that’s just the question, isn’t it? Is it possible that alterhuman identity may correlate with those who have identities and neurotypes which are demonized by society? After all, queer beings are common within alterhuman spaces, too. And, if there is a correlation, is there causation there, as well? There are already some terms coined to describe when alterhuman identity is caused or influenced by autistic traits; such as ‘otherspin’, a term for when one’s alterhuman identity is caused / influenced by special interests. Furthermore, ‘altervexo’ attempts to describe identifying as alterhuman out of spite for the dehumanization one has faced. However, to my knowledge, no term has been made or extensive talks had about, voluntary or nonvoluntary, alterhuman identity, as possibly having origins within dehumanization.

So, I set out to have that conversation. As stated at the start of this panel, I ran a survey, mostly promoted on tumblr, from March 7th to July 1st, posing questions to the autistic alterhuman community about their personal experiences, which got over 500 responses! 537, to be exact. I’d like to share the results of this survey with you now. The raw data collected is available here. (Send link) I will also be posting both the raw data, and the script for this panel, to my tumblr, @azuremist, but that’s mostly for easy archival purposes. Now, it’s NUMBERS TIME, baby!

I asked everyone to indicate if they agreed or disagreed with the statements I made. For the statement, “I believe that my autism has influenced my alterhumanity in some way, shape, or form,” 92% of those who took my survey agreed, and 8% disagreed, which is a WILD split. Far beyond notable.

For the statement, “I feel like the way that autistic beings are seen by society has influenced my alterhumanity”, the split is a bit more even, with 72.4% agreeing, and 27.6% disagreeing.

This means that, of those who I polled who agreed that autism influenced their alterhumanity, 78.6% (rounding down) also agreed that the way autistic beings are viewed in society influenced their alterhumanity. This is a rate a bit over 3 in every 4.

This next question is one of the things that I asked more out of personal curiosity, which is, whether or not they feel more safe to be openly autistic in alterhuman spaces, when compared to other community spaces. Of those polled, 89.4% agreed, and 10.6% disagreed, which makes me quite happy! One anonymous being commented, quote, “I generally find that most alterhuman spaces are a lot more accepting of autistic beings than wider society if that makes sense? Going into an alterhuman space, I'm never concerned that it may not be safe or accessible for me.” Endquote. Someone else wrote in that they could testify to the opposite being true, as well; autistic spaces, in their experience, had a higher likelihood of being accepting of alterhuman identities. However, one being who answered ‘no’ to this question stated that they avoid alterhuman spaces for things related to this subject. They list as an example, quote, “Like the refusal of tone tags? I understand not wanting them to be used for you but banning them from the space all together? And also a lot of spaces, despite being accepting of autistic beings, still find a way to hate those beings for being autistic.” Making community spaces safe for autistic beings is an ongoing learning process for everyone involved. So please make sure to consult your local autistic advocate to make sure everything is accessible for those of all neurotypes.

For the next questions, I asked about everyone’s specific experience with alterhumanity. Another question that I asked, mostly out of curiosity, is, “Would you consider alterhumanity, as a subject, a special interest?” 64.8% of respondents answered ‘no’, and 35.2% answered ‘yes’.

The next question, though, is really quite interesting to me. It asks, “If you have any kintypes which originate from a piece of media: Would you consider that kintype's source material a special interest?” 69% of respondents (nice) answered ‘yes’, and 31% answered ‘no’. That’s a pretty close percentage to the question about alterhumanity as a special interest, but with the answers flipped. Indeed, many times in the section where I invite others to talk about their experience, there are respondents specifically namedropping that they believe their special interests contribute to their alterhumanity. Some, but not all, of these instances include a space conceptkin who has space as a special interest, two catkin, with one having Warrior Cats as a past special interest, and the other, cats in general as one, and someone who specifically wrote, quote, “I also feel as though my special interests in some medias have influenced the fact that I identify with both real and fictional species. For example, I have a large number of original characters who are demons and I feel like my special interest in them may have led me down the path of discovering myself as demonkin.” When discussing the subject of autism influencing alterhumanity, special interests were easily the thing that came up the most, other than how autistic beings are seen by neurotypical society.

The final multiple choice question I had asked, “If you have a nonhuman kintype of any kind: Do you experience species dysphoria and/or euphoria?” To this, 85.9% answered ‘yes’, and 14.1% answered ‘no’.

We can compare this to a survey not aimed at autistic alterhumans; specifically, the ‘Alterhumanity and Gender Survey’, as conducted by Eli, at pantomorph on tumblr. These results were posted on July 22nd of 2019, and reported that, in response to the question, “Do you experience species dysphoria?”, 4.9% answered ‘I used to,’ 8.9% answered ‘unsure’, 22.7% answered ‘no’, 36% answered ‘sometimes’ and 27.6% answered ‘yes’. Adding up the percentages of ‘I used to’, ‘sometimes’ and ‘yes’, we get 68.5% of respondents who are certain that they have, at some point, experienced species dysphoria.

This means that, according to these surveys, autistic alterhumans appear to have a higher chance of experiencing species dysphoria, with a 17.5% difference. Though, keep in mind, I included euphoria in my question, and Eli did not. This would certainly require more data to confirm, however, this at least would warrant further polling, in my opinion.

All of this talk about autistic beings and species dysphoria may have you thinking about the fact that autistic beings are statistically more likely to identify as transgender, with some estimates stating that transgender individuals are up to 6 times more likely to be autistic than cisgender individuals! This is because gender is stupid, and autistic folks are not. Multiple respondents to the survey brought this point up. One being specifically wrote in, quote, “Statistically, autistic folks are more likely to know they're trans than allistics, and I support the theory that that's got something to do with autistic beings seeing things without the lens of social cues and societal pressures, including more awareness of who we are and how we see ourselves. … Society is like, "You should be like this," and autistics are like, "But why? It doesn't really make sense, plus I don't fit in to those standards anyway, so why not choose my own path in life?"” Endquote. I definitely agree that the reason so many autistic folks identify as transgender may be similar to, or the same, reason that autistic folks seem to be more likely to be alterhuman.

Hello to all trans autistic alterhumans listening! Call that a triple threat.

Now, the final question that I asked. I listed multiple different alterhuman identities, and asked everyone to indicate which, if any, of the provided labels that they identify with. And, indeed, my hypothesis when going into this question was proven correct. Of the terms that I provided, it was “nonhuman” that most autistic alterhumans identified with specifically, with 74.9% of respondents identifying as nonhuman. Other popular answers to this question included ‘therian’, with 57.5%, and fictionkin with a nonhuman fictional character. Indeed, I did put two separate options for fictionkin, where they could indicate if their fictional kintype was human or not. 45.1% of respondents had a nonhuman fictotype, and 41.2% of respondents had a human fictotype. So, autistic fictionkin appear to have around a 9% (rounding down) higher likelihood to identify with nonhuman fictional characters. Unfortunately, I could not find another survey to compare this statistic against, but it is a statistic we have now, nonetheless.

Furthermore, I specifically listed 3 common kintypes that have been associated with autistic beings, as previously discussed: fairies, aliens, and robots / technology. Of these, techkin was easily the most popular, with 19.9% of respondents identifying as such. Alienkin and fairykin were close in numbers, with 11.2% identifying as alienkin, and 11.9% identifying as fairykin. On the subject of being robotkin, one being wrote, quote, “I do not on a literal, physical level believe I’m a robot, however, tropes related to robots and the way they behave and are treated feel analogous to my own lived experiences, so in some ways it feels as though I experience my life as a robot would.” Endquote.

Which segways nicely into the final question, which is the filled in responses. For this question, I prompted, “If you have anything you'd like to add, please tell me about your experiences involving your alterhumanity and autism.”

Many took the chance to speak on if they felt like their autism and alterhumanity were connected. As previously mentioned, lots of folks mentioned special interests as a factor. Lots of folks also said that they felt the two were connected, but couldn’t explain how, with a common sentiment being that it is a ‘chicken or the egg’ situation. Two different beings whose kintypes are their past lives wrote in, and both said that a hypothetical allistic version of them wouldn’t be able to get memories as easily. Multiple beings also wrote that they felt like the awakening process was made easier due to their autism. They were so used to seeing themselves as different from everybody else, and not understanding social cues, that they were more willing to take on, quote-unquote, “weird” solutions as the source of their feelings. Other commonly-mentioned points include dehumanization as a reason for alterhumanity, autistic traits being seen as similar to animalistic traits, and the possibly-related high rate of autistic pagans and witches.

Something that I didn’t expect going in, but perhaps should have, is the amount of autistic alterbeings who wrote about their struggle to find words to describe themselves. One ghostkin wrote they felt like their nonconformity to their kintype’s typical associated traits (like darkness, doom and gloom, et cetera) was due to their autism, but that they felt they didn’t belong with other ghostkin because of it. And a LOT of folks wrote in saying that they had a lot of trouble figuring out what terminology to use, especially regarding the ever-dreaded ‘identify with’ or ‘identify as’ question. One being wrote in that they see themself as psychological otherkin, but would be more accurately described as having a neurotype-based, or neurology-based, origin, due to their autism. However, this has caused some issues, as it is not seen as a, quote-unquote, ‘valid’ origin. Someone else describes having issues with this because the community does a lot of gatekeeping, and because it is easier to find beings complaining about words being misused than the actual use of words.

Now, there are some responses that I would like to read in full, or mostly in full, for your listening pleasure.

The first one is as follows. Quote. “When I was 6-ish, I started noticing that people treated me a bit like they treated our old Windows ‘98 Dell computer. The computer was inhuman when it worked (and praised for its distance from humanity! “Yes, it can play videos from the internet! Isn’t technology cool?”) and human when it broke down (“He’s getting overwhelmed, give us a sec.” “She’s blinking at me. I have no idea why this is such a difficult task.” “It ate my fucking CD. Stubborn POS.”). It’s a bit frustrating that my autistic traits are only praised when they make me convenient for others to use... I’m self-sufficient, I’m quiet, I’m a fast learner and a thorough researcher, so I rarely need to bother another person to complete the tasks I’m given. But because that’s all anyone ever seems to want me for... It’s a self-fulfilling cycle which is useful for the neurotypicals but exhausting for me, and when it ends in a burnout (inevitable) then I’m finally treated as human, but only because I’ve failed to be the computer they wanted. So I’m a computer when someone’s pleased with me, and I’m human when I’ve disappointed them. You can see why I might like the idea of being a PC more than a person. Also, when something’s wrong, computers’ error messages are both clearer and harder to ignore than a human’s requests for accommodation. This is a bit of a bummer, sorry. The upside is that I’m crazy good at data analysis now.” Endquote. This was excellently put, and I’m sure something that may resonate with autistic techkin.

Another write-in reads, quote, “One does not have to be autistic to be alterhuman or nonhuman, but one does have to be autistic to be my species. My species does not have human neurology, or allistic neurology. To be my species one must be autistic… though it’s more that my species has neurology which allistics will refer to as autism. I could not be my species if I wasn’t autistic.” Endquote. This is a very interesting response, and, to be honest, I sort of wish I knew what this being’s species was so that I could look more into it. It’s almost like a sort of alternate view of autistic nonhumans or autistic aliens, which is just lovely.

Then, there is this submission. Quote, “Diagnosed with autism at 15, explained a lot, I can't help but wonder - if I'd known, would I still dehumanize myself in the way I do? Other kids called me "cat boy" because when they would pick on me, I'd hiss at them. I don't know why. I think I just saw my cats do it and it was the only way I knew how to retaliate. But it just made them laugh. ... I stopped seeing myself as human a long time ago, more of an animal for people's amusement. ... But when I found out about otherkin, it was like suddenly this experience of mine I was certain I was alone in was shared. For some people it's spiritual, but even in our differences, our feelings were the same. The community  taught me to love this nonhuman side of me, and they were understanding of my diagnosis. I didn't feel like an outcast there, they made me feel like it was something to cherish, and I do.” Endquote. Again, absolutely very well-said. Reclaiming and celebrating nonhumanity is, from what I’ve gathered, a large part of the autistic alterhuman experience, and this response phrased it just wonderfully.

Lastly, in regards to responses: shoutout to the one guy who said, “I just finished making my first ever tail, isn’t that sick?”, because yes, yes it is.

Thank you so much again to all the respondents to my survey!

And so, we have now reached the discussion section, which will last until my time runs out. This is where I will cease looking at a script, so please send anything you’d particularly like me to see now! Also, feel free to ask me questions, and I will answer to the best of my ability. Alternatively, tell me about your experiences, or just give general comments!

[alchemicaladarna]

Demon Royalty AU part 3

I haven't really thought that much about other characters' roles in this story, so for now the only eggs that I've fully fleshed out the story for are Em, Dapper, Pomme, and Richas :D

Empanada: Vampire

Co-adopted by Bagi and Niki and taken care of by her clan when she was a very small child (4-5)

A group of rogue and wild vampires that fed on humans, demons, etc. massacred a human village and fed on all its inhabitants

Bagi and Cellbit arrived at the village almost too late as there was only one survivor that hasn't been devoured or turned into a rogue: Empanada

The little girl's parents were dead and she was on the brink of death too

The only way to save Em was to turn her into a vampire and she had to drink Bagi's blood to complete the transformation and save her.

Niki would also often care for Em, as Bagi's right-hand

Keep the wild/rogue vampires in mind because they'll most likely be important later

Richas: Vampire

Wild vampire child that was found running in the forest by himself when he was only 4

Had to fend for himself by feeding on animals until Cellbit, Pac, Mike, and Felps found him while hunting for food

No one knows who his parents are/were- it seemed as if they just left him to survive on his own

Was missing a leg since birth and was likely left behind

Cellbit's clan adopted Richas of course- it took a while for Richas to trust or be able to communicate properly with them at first

Was found 2 years before Em

Children typically aren't vampires because they would need to have vampiric venom in their blood and they'd have to feed on blood too. If they do become vampires as children, they still grow up normally, but stop aging in their 30s.

Dapper: Demon

Son of Bad, Prince of Death

Rumored that Dapper's other father was the Prince of Diamonds from the Overworld, a gem golem- no one dares to ask Bad though, he never gives a clear answer or dismisses the question entirely

How? Use your imagination d:

Dapper loves exploring the Nether and is very fascinated by magic, alchemy, science

Encouraged by her father to pursue her studies of the Nether Kingdom

Also studying as a reaper apprentice

Rare occassion Dapper can go to Overworld when Bad must collect souls as the grim reaper and train him for the job

Gives Bad a heart attack when Dapper would wander off when they're in the Overworld

2 years older than Pomme

Demon children can be born in different ways because there are many types of demons, but regular low-class demons are mortal and age normally living up to 300 years max. Royal blood demons grow up normally but the older they get, the slower their aging process becomes because they have longer lifespans than regular demons. Dapper has a much longer lifespan because he's the son of a demon and what is basically a diamond.

Brief intermission to talk about the French kingdom/land/it's a working title XD:

Leaders aren't monarchs, but have titles called "Royal Governors" that represent the people in a council

They have sub-regions that each leader represents- but the people are also included in discussions relating to the kingdom- their respective leaders just represent them during the meetings

The Council leaders: Étoiles, Aypierre, Antoine, Baghera

All have close ties to Bad and the Nether Kingdoms

Pomme: ???

This girl's origins are a complete mystery because like. No one really knows where she came from?

She was found in an ancient city in the Deep Dark. A baby, barely one, just sitting in ancient ruins, surrounded by cornflowers

Pomme was found by Étoiles and Aypierre during an expedition into the ancient cities

The crazy part is she wasn't crying until the two found her, so they had to bring her to the surface very quickly

Brought her to the kingdom, back to Antoine and Baghera- they all loved her instantly

Soon, they noticed her powers get very out of control, and it's difficult for the Overworld leaders to manage alone- especially since she covered the kingdom in darkness and almost single handedly brought a plague upon them at one point

They know nothing about her powers so they visited an old friend who might have some answers: Bad. He has a lot of knowledge about the Deep Dark, but he's never encountered a baby just- mysteriously surrounded by cornflowers in an ancient ruin

The Four asked Bad to watch over her as well because Pomme was truly an anomaly and they needed his help

He hesitated for a bit because he already has Dapper, but eventually agreed to adopt her too

They agreed to have Pomme stay in the Nether with Bad until she was 17 and she can fully control her powers, and Antoine, Baghera, Pierre, and Étoiles would visit her regularly too

I thought about writing Chunsik as another demon child, but I remembered his parents, right now, are only Acau and Jungryeok. He hasn't met YD yet, and also something else to keep in mind is YD being a demon is still just a headcanon.

[justme-1723]

Ep. 5 Ramblings (After watching it a second time)

- Protective Sand is so sexy. (This is important information and vital to the plot 🫣)

- The way Ray & Sand compliment each other is just *chefs kiss* (Sand is a natural caregiver and Ray wants/needs to be taken care of) Their sarcasm. The way they can banter back and forth. Sand knows when to tease him and Ray knows when to pout/give puppy eyes. Sand stands his ground and Ray gives in. Ugh, I could go on and on.

- Nick interrupting SandRay, but also leaving as quickly as possible because he ships it was king behavior.

- Ray eating his breakfast after Sand asks him to (even after he said he didn’t want it at first) was so 😩

- I’m not sure if anyone else noticed this… The face Ray made after Sand told him that he didn’t trust him with his life broke my fucking heart.

- Ray smiling after Sand helped him with his helmet (while Sand was facing away from him no less). You aren’t slick babe. We see those heart eyes 😻!

- The entire clothing store scene! Everything about it was perfect. That second outfit he chose for Ray was horrible and I wanted to rescue our sad meow meow.

- Mew is so fucking adorable. That’s it. That’s all I have to say.

- But seriously… Top seemed genuinely concerned for him and was also ready to destroy the person who almost ran Mew down. One point for Top.

- Nick & Boston were entirely too sweet the majority of the episode. I didn’t believe it, but I also couldn’t help loving it because Mark is just fucking precious.

- Nick changing his entire identity just to keep Boston interested was super depressing. It was also very realistic and relatable… I felt called out honestly.

- Summer. Sweet Summer. I just love that she backed off and didn’t make things awkward. I also found it interesting that Ray chose to tell Sand that he wasn’t flirting, just simply keeping her company. He then completely shifted his attention away from Summer once Sand returned and didn’t even notice that she left.

- I’ve said this before, but Ray looks so damn happy anytime he’s with Sand. He’s relaxed. He’s lighter. He smiles so big and bright. He just seems comfortable and free.

- The TopMew date was very interesting. Loads to unpack and I’m still trying to figure out how I feel about it. Something about them is just… off. I think it’s supposed to be this way. Like… Top says I love you first and I was so shocked. I literally couldn’t process it lol. I honestly have no idea if he was sincere or not.

- Boston wasn’t a dick to Mew when he called for advice about sleeping with Top. Good for you babe.

- Nick is helping with their graduation project? Like… it’s nice of him, but what the fuck?

- I know most people will disagree, but Top didn’t look happy at all when he saw Nick & Ton together. At first glance, I thought he was jealous, but also disgusted? But after watching the episode again I’m conflicted.

- The entire scene with Sand’s mom was amazing. She’s sort of a mess and I feel like there is a lot more to this part of the story, but I loved her so much. I do think Sand has had to take care of her for a big portion of his life. He said himself they are more like friends which is good and they clearly talk about everything, but it makes sense that he’s someone who needs to be in control because his childhood was probably chaotic.

- Ray sang a love song to Sand for his birthday. Okay bestie.

- They opened up to each other about their parents 😭😭😭😭😭!!! This scene was my favorite of the episode. They really took a huge step forward here in terms of trust & communication. (this brings me back to them wearing the exact same shoes in episode one. They might be from different financial backgrounds, but they are more alike than they know. They’ve walked similar paths. Blah blah you know what I’m trying to say!)

- Nick, sweetheart, love of my life. You just had to drag Boston up the steps and into your apartment?! You couldn’t let him suffer alone just this once?

- Sand & Ray being total boyfriends in front of Nick & Boston was just everything I ever wanted. I truly thought Ray was going to freak out when he realized Ton saw them, but he didn’t give a flying fuck and continued to be his clingy self with Sand right in front of their salad.

- I hate you, Boston. I also want to hug you because I think you hate yourself.

- The bed scene with Sand & Ray was devastating. Ray tried so hard to reach out, but Sand couldn’t take his hand. He has so much baggage surrounding whatever happened with his ex and Top, that I’m sure he felt so fucking stupid for letting it happen again. Like great I love someone else who doesn’t love me back. I just wanted to wrap him up and protect him from the world. My heart broke for Ray too. He started the process of moving forward only to have his past thrown back in his face. You could tell how bad he felt for Sand and how desperately he wanted to fix things.

- That final Happy Birthday was so unnecessary and I expect an apology from Khaotung and Jojo because watching First (yes I said First not Sand) shed that single tear was too much from me to handle.

[teamfreewill56-blog]

Can you rank the hashiras and reasons why?

This ask took way longer than I thought it would, I believe I overthought the question and then it took me a while to really think over the hashira and choose. And putting it into words took longer than I expected.

@plutonianmoons I interpreted this question as who do I rank in terms of favorites and why, if you meant it in another way shoot me another ask and I’ll respond. I’m going to start with the list so that those who don’t want to know my reasons don’t have to go hunting for where their favorite hashira is. 

Kyojuro Rengoku

Uzui Tengen

Mitsuri Kanroji

Muichiro 

Shinobu

Sanemi

Iguro

Giyuu

Gyomei

Kyojuro Rengoku

I feel like this will come as a surprise to absolutely nobody lol. He’s my favorite character after all and probably my favorite of all time. I hopefully have been able to sprinkle my reasoning of why I love Kyojuro so much throughout my posts so I will try not to ramble too much. Though, not repeating myself is kinda impossible haha.  

Kyojuro resonates with me so deeply, and even I don’t fully understand why. One reason I think is because he makes me feel….seen. His struggles and grief and pain, and how it came about, a lot of it I can relate to, it hits very close to home for me. And seeing what he goes through and how he dealt with it, its helped me to see and realize that my own experiences and feelings are valid, and its helped me process things I haven’t been able to, even with years of therapy. He isn’t just a ball of sunshine who hides his pain, that’s such a gloss over. He IS a flame, all his feelings make him burn, his anger, righteous and otherwise, his love of his family, his comrades, of his hobbies, the way he devotes his all into everything he does and how so many of his actions are driven by love and compassion and that that’s what drives him to be so duty-bound. He’s someone like many of us, has gone through grief and pain and so much and because of his situation didn’t get to have it addressed or dealt with, he just figured out how to live with it. I love how he isn’t Mr. Positive, if he is confronted by something negative, by someone’s hurt feelings he addresses it, he validates, and yet he’s not perfect in doing that either, because with some people he can’t address it even though he wants to. I love brave he is, standing up for others but also facing criticism and cynicism and hatred again and again and being so certain of his creed and who he is that he doesn’t let those things infest him, he burns them up immediately. I love how much he loves Ruka, how even though he lost her at such a young age he never resented her but kept her with him always. He thought of her, shared his memories of her, she touched every aspect of who he grew up to be and he never forgot that. I love that even though he is stubborn he isn’t unyielding where it matters. If he makes a snap judgment and realizes it he will change it, will he always? No probably not because just like everyone else that’s going to be different from situation to situation. I love how even though he was told he could never be a Hashira and that he should abandon it, that he didn’t. He worked and worked and worked and he accomplished it. I love how warm and welcoming he is to others, that even though he can sit there stiff as a board he does things that make you know he’s paying attention, the way he invites the Corp member from Mugen Train episode 1 to join him, the way he pats the seat indicating he wants Tanjiro to sit right next to him. The way he gives Senjuro his complete attention and focus when they are talking about emotionally difficult topics. I love how he is honest when he easily could lie to try to spare feelings and yet he is so careful and mindful during those times too. I love how freaking intelligent he is, and that it’s subtle. That it’s not just book intelligence but he’s just actually intelligent. The conversations he has, the way he breaks down what’s going on around him, the choices he makes when he acts. The questions he ponders and asks himself and tries to figure out the answer to. The fact that when Shinjuro told him he didn’t have what it takes to become a Hashira, the way that he thought about that question and pondered it and came to his answer---he could have just got upset and hurt and focused on those feelings, but he didn’t, he delved into it and found his answer. I love his expressions, and I know people joke that sometimes there’s not a thought going on behind his eyes but I disagree, I think he looks like that cause his brain is thinking of so much at once. I love how he has a bunch of shared traits with the other Hashira but in a way that’s uniquely him. I will cut myself off here because if I don’t I’m never gonna stop lol. 

2. Uzui Tengen

One of the reasons I love Tengen is I was so surprised by him, I thought I was going to hate this man’s guts--especially after his introduction to the boys. But instead it was just character beat after character beat of why I would and do like him. You look at him and its like “oh he’s the wild one” but he actually isn’t. He had a lapse of judgment and was rushing when he kidnapped Aoi and wasn’t thinking straight but he also got talked out of taking her pretty easily. I don’t like that he slapped her butt, and I think its still a weird thing for him to do but its in there and I’m sure his wives and Shinobu got on him for that whole incident. But after that we see quickly that he’s one of the responsible ones, and like Kyojuro he really really cares about people and their safety, he sees and acknowledges the boys as boys and does his best to take care of them and watch over them while at the District. Of course, he doesn’t do it perfectly, but he does a pretty damn good job. I love that he actually verbally acknowledges to them that he made mistakes and he put them in danger and owns his poor behavior and decisions. I love that once Zenitsu gets taken he instructs Tanjiro and Inosuke to leave and gives them that important wisdom that surviving isn’t a loss and it isn’t failing. I love that he doesn’t try to shoo the boys off once they are in the fight, he adapts and lets them help him. And even though he lets them stay he consistently is making moves to protect them during the fight and trying to take as much weight off them as he can. He is aware of what the boys’ states are in the midst of the fight and tries to finish things quickly and change the battle to keep them safe. I also love his dynamic with them--he absolutely understands how teenage boys are and how they work and he lets them be boys in his presence without letting them do something terrible. Inosuke gets overwhelmed and starts trying to headbutt people and just rampage in his anxiety? No you don’t boar boy back over here with me. Zenitsu wanders off and starts getting enticed by the women? Boy don’t you even think about going in there I will carry you by the collar through the whole place. His dynamic with Zenitsu is so fun, because they bicker at each other and he teases him like a guy who is 10+ years older than their younger brother would. I love how Tengen truly loves his wives, and that he doesn’t love them all in the same way or show love in the same way to them all. He knows his wives and treats them as his individual partners. I love how calculating but also wild he is in his fighting. His fight with Gyutaro and Daki was such fun to watch. 

3. Mitsuri Kanroji

I love how Mitsuri allows herself to feel all her feelings, how once she stops pretending to be who and what she isn’t, our Love Hashira wears herself completely on her sleeve. And she isn’t ashamed of it or prideful about it. In her fight against Zohakuten she starts out confidently attacking him, jumps right in there and saves Tanjiro and her character beats are so good, she’s freaked out about how big Zohakuten’s dragons are and yet immediately turns her attention to Tanjiro with a smile, confidence and warmth. She sets him down and tells him to take a break, praises him and tells him she’ll take care of it. When Zohakuten calls her a “shameless tramp” she shows such a genuine reaction of shock and upset and I can’t help but adore how honest she is in showing her feelings and being able to show multiple feelings at once. She isn’t arrogant when confronting Zohakuten that first time, but even then, she doesn’t stay dwelling on the fact that he insults her she is ready to go and move to attack once Zohakuten strikes at her. When the dragons start dodging her and moving faster she doesn’t hide her feelings of nervousness, she shows her panic but she doesn’t stop attacking or give up, she just freaking adapts and keeps going, seriously goes “can I take on this many at once?” AND THEN JUST DOES IT. She gets smacked point blank in the face with a sonic blast and instinctively defends her whole body by tensing it up. I love how her confidence isn’t iron-clad, insults, harsh words and reactions, they all hurt her and she doesn’t ignore them but tries to deal with them the best way she can, even if sometimes its the wrong way like she does when she becomes more reserved after finding out Shinobu’s reason for being a Slayer. I love that instead of being ugly or mean to the person who is ugly or mean to her, she honestly defends herself and feels her feelings without trying to hurt the other person. I love how she wants to have a husband but also wants to help people love themselves and once she becomes a slayer these two things no longer conflict for her. She loves people and trusts that one day she’ll find a good man in the Corp to marry. I love how genuine she is with her acceptance of people. She genuinely accepts Tanjiro and Nezuko and treats Nezuko like a younger sister, hugging her, singing with her, playing with her, and protecting her. The fact that she sheds tears of joy seeing not only that Nezuko is alive but also talking--there’s no doubt she loves these kids. Her love for people as individuals is so strong:  even though Genya is mean to her she wanted to talk to him, when she saves the Village leader and he makes a flirty comment she teasingly chides him. And in both instances she could have gotten really angry but didn’t. Nor does she call Genya names or anything, and she talks about him kindly when he’s brought up later. I love how Mitsuri actually is willing to do the tough things, but isn’t shy about saying how she feels about it. I love how she never actually hated the things that made her different, she always cherished them, but it just took her a little while to reach her full acceptance. I love how much she has in common with Kyojuro and that in some instances you can see it and it doesn’t have to be brought up. Mitsuri reminds me a lot of Sailor Moon’s Usagi and I kind of love that. 

4. Tokito Muichiro

Muichiro is part of my little brother baby trio. Comprised of Muichiro, Genya and Senjuro. I love how well this amnesic child does deadpan humor and yet in the same breath can be so RELENTLESSLY sassy. Like I’m sure Tengen thinks he is the sass master but Muichiro would DEVESTATE HIM. His sass is sharp and clever and our little Mist Hashira knows how to time his humor beats perfectly and in the optimal way to jab his opponent. The way that he’s passive-aggressive while he has amnesia, without meaning to be is also really funny. Karate-chopping Tanjiro, holding his nose to make him wake up, like Muichiro really is going for the fastest route here. 

I also love how fierce he is, like yes Muichiro was taunting Gyokko but he was not messing around in his fighting and you could see it in how he moved. Plus the way that he came at Gyokko from within the mist and then minced him into sushi? So hardcore.

 I adore how he isn’t bitter about having amnesia, like, he could very easily and rightfully be angry and upset and hold those feelings but he doesn’t. Instead, he focuses on trying to remember things but also not let it stress him out if he can’t. I love how truly kind and gentle he is, even when Yuichiro was being mean to him and aggressive, Muichiro didn’t return that. He loved and cared and respected every member of his family. He admired all of them.

I love how his motives to originally become a swordsman were so pure and kind-hearted and that he wanted to help people the way their parents taught them. I love how when he regained his memories he was able to revisit those memories and realize that his brother did love him, that he was worried and scared and just a 10-year old trying to take care of his only remaining family. I admire so much that he was able and willing to think about his past and realize that the way he thought about his brother was wrong and not the truth. His relationship with Tanjiro is so adorable, like hands down Tanjiro is his favorite person and the favoritism and kindness he shows Tanjiro after he gets his memories back is so cute it’s like that aggressive best friend who is nice only to their bestie and just a terror to everyone else. 

5. Shinazugawa Sanemi 

There are so many wonderful, devoted big brothers in Demon Slayer and Sanemi is one of the top for me. We can tell in Genya’s flashbacks that Sanemi was completely committed to his role as provider and caretaker for their family. He loved and respected his mother and he loved his siblings and Genya trying to support him and stand with him back then meant so much to him and you can tell. Even after what happened to their siblings and mother, that devotion stayed, Sanemi just had to go about it differently.

I think the way he acts towards people is understandable although not justified, like many other characters he was completely unaware of demons before his family got slaughtered and unlike Gyomei, Giyuu and Tanjiro his family got slaughtered by his own mother and he killed her not realizing it was her until too late, and then had to deal with the realization that he killed his mother as well as having the brother he fought tooth and nail to protect curse him and things just got worse from there. Yes, Sanemi isn’t the only one who has lost comrades but he is one of the few slayers who has to wonder if a demon showing up is because of him and not the other way around. He never hated Genya for the things he said when their mom died, he was never bitter towards him. He loved him and knew his little brother well enough to know how kind hearted and sensitive Genya was and that’s why he was so harsh because he was so scared of losing Genya too and of Genya going through the traumas he had. Scared enough that he was willing to maim him if it meant getting him out of the Corp. And more than willing to let Genya hate him forever. I mean seriously, think about the mental and emotional will power you’d have to conjure up to be able to look at your younger brother who is pleading to talk to you and make the decision to try and blind him and keep insisting you’re not family. I don’t agree it was the right thing to do but the fact that he could even bring himself to attempt that geez. 

 Not to mention hearing Genya had eaten demon flesh probably scared him because that kind of makes Genya a demon and if he goes out of control someone would have to kill him. I think his rage is understandable, I think his anger initially at Nezuko and Tanjiro is very understandable and it’s shown on his face when he looks down after Nezuko rejects his blood. This demon rejects human flesh, why couldn’t my mom? Why did I have to kill my mom, lose all my siblings and lose my remaining brother, lose my best friend, but this kid gets to keep his sister who is a demon? Would anyone else in his shoes respond differently? I really doubt it. 

 I love how he’s like the unexpected wild child of the Hashira---not completely unexpected I mean look at him--but the fact that he just pulls an Inosuke and just picks fights with people left and right and he really seems to enjoy his fights but he’s also not ignorant about it. He is aware of what’s going on and he is calculating and strategizing and he’s so -adaptive- like Sanemi will try literally anything in battle if he thinks there’s even a hint it might work. The fact that he knows how to be annoying and cocky to his opponent but isn’t arrogant in his fighting (exception being his fights with Giyuu I think) is a refreshing take on this type of character. Sanemi doesn’t think he can beat everybody, he doesn’t think he’s invincible but that’s okay with him because he still wants to try it regardless. And like Muichiro he knows how to push those buttons and he has such fun doing it and honestly, I have so much fun watching him antagonize his opponents. 

6. Obanai Iguro

I love Iguro’s design. I love that he could have just hated people and cursed them because that’s kind of what you’d expect from someone who’s own family treated them the way the Iguro clan did to Obanai. His family sliced open his face, tried to sacrifice him to a demon and then cursed him for surviving when it backfired on them. He had no social interaction until he was friggin 11 with anyone outside of his messed up family. I appreciate how honest he is about his reasons for being a demon slayer. He isn’t doing this to be noble or because its the right thing. He wants to try to purge his family’s tainted blood from himself by killing demons for others, knowing he can never truly purge that blood but at least its -something-. I love how even though he was hurt all for the sake of a snake demon that he doesn’t hate Kabamaru (check spelling) and he treats that precious white snake so well and that Kabamaru isn’t just a decoration but his partner. I appreciate how even though he doesn’t know how to tell Mitsuri he loves her verbally---he’s constantly showing it. Writing letters back and forth with her, sitting with her and just letting her eat as much as she wants, giving her socks that match her eyes because he knew she was uncomfortable at first with her uniform. When she starts trying to explain how she got the Demon Slayer Mark and its all gibberish and he just face palms---not even upset just like “my poor wife she’s doing her best”. The way that he gets jealous of Tanjiro being buddy buddy with Mitsuri is so funny because its so stupid and yet he has Muichiiro’s petty streak, just listing off all the Corp members “crimes” when Tanjiro is like “did these people commit some sort of crime?” I love how he changed his mind about Tanjiro and he was -such- a good battle partner with Tanjiro when it was just the two of them for a bit. The fact that he got right between Tanjiro and Muzan’s Akira-like jaws knowing that would definitely kill him, he didn’t go to pin Muzan he went directly to save Tanjiro from getting swallowed.To me it seemed so clear that in this final battle Iguro accepted Tanjiro and supported him, they worked as a team and Loner Iguro is good at it I can’t wait to see him in the new anime content. 

7. Kocho Shinobu 

Shinobu is also kind of a typical anime girl but I still like her. Short angry girl is a pretty common trope but she does it well. I love that she is biting and vicious with a smile on her face, kind of like what you expect from the stereotypical mean rich girl, but you can tell that’s also not Shinobu because she will -actually- mess you up in a heartbeat. I love that she’s not a “mean girl”, she loves her friends and her butterfly girls and she cares a lot about people and she’s not ashamed of being a “healer”. I love that instead of writing herself off, “I’m small and therefore can’t fight the same as everyone else” she figured out a method that worked for her, and it is probably one of the worst ways a demon can die---it’s definitely the most painful. I love how one way she showed Kanae her love for her was choosing to always smile even though she’s never actually happy. That it’s not forced positivity, and Kanae wasn’t asking that of her. But it was “My sister loved my smile, so I will continue to smile for her.” I love how she is constantly stepping in to show support to the characters. Talking to Kyojuro before he left, confronting Mitsuri about her starving herself once she found out about it, encouraging and showing happiness for Kanao starting to speak up for herself and being a sort of mother figure for Inosuke where she cared for him but was also able to discipline him in a way that no one else really could. I do feel like her best interactions are when she’s with Zenitsu, Douma and Giyuu but it could just be that I find those moments with her to be the most fun and entertaining. 

8. Tokito Giyuu

Giyuu’s is kinda funny because he’s typically the type of anime character who is my favorite in a series but compared to the previous 7, yeah he’s here. I do love that he’s a tried and true introvert, like he is a devoted Hashira but at the same time gives off the Shikamaru vibe of “Gosh I’d rather be at home”. I enjoy that even though he has a bond with Tanjiro that doesn’t like cure him of his introvertness, he still gets overwhelmed by Tanjiro sometimes and is just like “no, not today” and tries to split. I love that that’s not really attempted to get fixed, that’s just how Giyuu is and that’s okay. He still has moments of joy and sass and all the other feelings but there’s no “we need to heal Giyuu” thread in the story besides the side story of everyone trying to get him smile/laugh.  I will always be saddened by the fact that he for the longest time didn’t feel like he was a Hashira and just wrote himself off but I also kind of like how the Hashira weren’t suddenly like, “That’s crazy, we love and accept you Giyuu!” But by the end I feel like he was mostly accepted, particularly by Sanemi which was nice since those two were almost like unspoken rivals it felt like. His scenes with Tanjiro and Shinobu are the best to me, because he obviously cares about Tanjiro a lot while he simultaneously just has no idea what to do with this kid unless he’s fighting alongside him. I  love his dynamic with Shinobu, its not one I usually love a lot but theirs is so much fun and Shinobu really brings out Giyuu’s sass and sarcasm which is fun to see especially with him doing it deadpan. I appreciate Giyuu’s struggle as a character because I feel like its one that a lot of us can relate to and its nice to see him accept and grow comfortable with himself as the story progresses. 

9. Himejima Gyomei

I will probably get a lot of hate for this one, but oh well. Unlike the other Hashira where I do like them on some level, I don’t like Gyomei at all. If you pushed me I guess I would say his extremely impractical weapon? But like, that’s really reaching. I feel like the only reason I don’t immediately forget about him is because he’s massive and is always crying with his hands in prayer stance. He’s a monk but like in name only. Maybe its just because there wasn’t enough time but I can’t think of a single time where Gyomei showed monk behavior besides saying “Namu Amida Butsu” and Genya mentions that the mantra he used fighting the Emotion Demons was something he learned from Gyomei but nothing past that. Even his crying seems to be more of an at-random thing and not a “he’s feeling deep or spiritual emotions”. We never get an explanaton for why he cries all the time and then suddenly doesn’t cry during his fighting and gets all….macho? I guess I would call it. But yeah look at that conversation between him and Tanjiro at the boulder, if those are spiritual teachings they are not good ones…so to me he doesn’t practice what he preaches, but we also aren’t really shown what he believes spiritually. 

My biggest issue with him is his attitude towards children. He was bitter and mistrustful towards children after the demon attack because the TRAUMATIZED FOUR YEAR OLD didn’t express gratitude for him saving her life. Children struggle with expressing gratitude period, especially that young, they definitely aren’t going to be thinking about expressing gratitude after going through watching you bash another adult’s skull in. 

And because of this he believes that children “Are pure and innocent. Weak. They lie easily…are casually cruel…and selfish.” Children are this way unless they are taught correctly, adults are this way even if they ARE taught correctly. Children’s brains aren’t fully developed at four years old, and yeah, Gyomei doesn’t know that science but seeing as he was raising other kids there, he should understand kids better than he does. Children lie easily because at that young of an age the worst thing that can happen to you is getting in trouble, so you lie to avoid it. You have to be taught how to deal with that properly. Children are not “casually cruel”, they don’t understand that their words and actions impact other people’s emotions and feelings the way that adults do they have to be shown and taught it, just like everyone else. That’s not something that just comes from predisposition. Children are selfish? So are adults, and children don’t become selfless unless they are shown and taught it. Gyomei went through this trauma too, so I don’t blame him for his knee jerk reaction being upset at the child, but the fact that afterwards he stayed upset and decided that children are all these things, and staying upset that she didn’t show gratitude? That’s ridiculous.

[fang-and-feather]

Ikemen Vampire - Theo x OC

Words: 1,747

Summary: Amy had always been confident of who she was, so a change to what she thought very set about her, made her feel lost on her own identity. If this can change, what else that she also took for granted can? Luckly she has Theo to help her find herself again.

Tags: Fluff and Comfort, Sexuality and Identity Crisis, Background Genderbending, Background Polyamory, Background Theo x Female Arthur, just slight suggestive at the end

Written for April's Polyam Shipping Day Prompt: Attraction from @polyamships

I also have a poll regarding the future of this fic

I want to thank @onegianthotmess for her post from which I borrowed genderbent Arthur's name, and @bicayaya and @keithsandwich who I talked to about Amy's sexuality once and they were very sweet and helpful (if there was anyone else in that post, I will add you to these credits when I actually find the post)

This fic is very experimental. I am exploring something different with Amy, exploring how she would work in a ship with Theo, and it's also my first time properly writing Theo and the first trying genderbent IkeVamp... I didn't have much space for Arthur in this chapter, but this will focus on the three of them.

Also, how did I take the whole day just to edit this?!

Next Chapter / IkeVamp Masterlist / General Masterlist / AO3 Link

Amy had to deal with questioning herself, at minor changes in life or when questioned by someone else, but that was an easy, quick process, to assert her position in a situation.

Recently, it had been one change after another. Realizing her knowledge of the world was limited, vampires existed and time travel was possible. Questioning her feelings for Theo. And the more serious one, questioning her place in the new world as she chose to stay in this time period. She quickly adapted to every change.

But these situations, and everything before, had been about adapting to something external, be it a place, a situation or a person. The most internal questioning was about her tastes in men when she fell in love with Theo. It wasn’t that big of a life change.

Now this? This wasn’t related to a single person, and it changed her whole perception of herself, and such change removed all of her security in her own identity.

Although Amy never had actually been attracted to anyone before Theo. Never been in love before him. Her attempts at figuring if any shift of feelings towards a friend was love, and the different ways she observed each gender, made Amy very sure she was only interested in men. She never doubted that since her late teens.

And now she had a boyfriend. There was no reason to question it.

That was until the last few days around Arthea.

Amy had been friends with the writer for a while. She was Arthea’s early reader, and they sometimes went out together, solving small cases around town, and often grabbing something to eat on the way back. Arthea was someone Amy trusted to comfort or distract her to avoid panic attacks. But although Amy always had difficulty noticing the difference, nothing of the feelings she had differed from any of her other closest friends, so it had to be purely platonic.

Until this week, and especially this morning.

It had been a case to solve like any other, but when they stopped by a cafe for some sweets, Amy found herself embarrassed by Arthea sharing a spoonful of her own dessert. It was something she always casually did with other friends. Not something she had any romantic association besides movies making it seem so.

And she still attributed it to realizing people were watching and would have a different interpretation. But there was little to no excuse to what happened in the carriage.

Even while to justify the weirdness of earlier, Amy couldn’t forget it and be comfortable around her friend.

Arthea acted the same as always and tried to comfort her with the usual flirty teasing. But at that moment, it made things worse, especially when Arthea leaned in, as if to kiss Amy.

Amy knew her friend wouldn’t, but a part of her wanted it to happen. She felt trapped and confused and overreacted, things getting even more awkward between them.

She was afraid of what these feelings meant. If she couldn’t trust in what she was the most safe about herself, what else could change? How could she be sure of things? And who she was if she couldn’t be sure of anything?

The idea of such internal changes also brought up things she would rather forget, and the fear of these changes bringing her to similar points again.

Besides, a little voice amidst all that chaos whispered that this kind of change wasn’t appropriate. Something she always accepted in others, but in herself, it was unacceptable.

But that was the thing that mattered the least. Being stripped of her self knowledge was what scared her.

Amy built a kind of character out of traits she had that fit occasions, like a professional Amy for work, but to build and maintain these, she had to know her core, and if her core changed, it destabilized everything else. She would have to put a long time into rebuilding everything.

But if something changed, how could she be sure it wouldn’t happen again? That she wouldn’t put all that effort only to have to do it again halfway? And how would she deal with these situations in the meantime?

Amy nearly jumped when an arm wrapped around her back, but she found herself secure in Theo’s embrace.

She had hidden in the attic because she didn’t have the energy to deal with people. She wasn’t aware her boyfriend was back and that he would find her.

“What’s the problem, Hondje? Are you sad because I didn’t take you on a walk today?”

“I’m fine, Theo.” She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “Just thinking.”

“It doesn’t feel right for you to be so quiet.” When she remained quiet, unsure of what he really expected her to say, he sighed. “She told me what happened.”

Of course Arthea did. She was one of the biggest gossipers in this house, even though she had serious competition.

“I’m sorry. Won’t happen again.”

If it already didn’t feel right before, thinking that Theo already had an idea of who she was that he had committed to, it didn’t feel proper to change that.

“Are you sure? Because if you can control it, then it shouldn’t have happened now.”

She should have known he would be mad. Why was he even still holding her in such a comforting manner? She had messed up his trust.

“I’ll learn to.”

Amy expected a serious response like “As you should” or something more teasing with hidden understanding like “I’ll make sure you do”. But Theo pulled her closer and caressed her hair, a sweet gesture that didn’t seem to fit the situation.

“Do you like her?” Amy shrugged. Even she wasn’t sure. “I’ve known it for a while, even if you didn’t notice, and I don’t like this. I don’t want to share you. But is it really so much worse than seeing you struggling to hold back and hide yourself for me?”

The words sounded strange coming from Theo, but it took Amy a moment to realize why.

These were the same words she had told Theo after he, slightly more drunk than usual, had almost kissed an even more drunk Arthea that was flirting with him after a party.

She had confronted him when he was sober, but it took a while to wear down his stubbornness and get Theo to admit that he was interested in the writer before Amy even showed up. But he clashed with Arthea’s personality and didn’t think she was looking for anything serious with anyone.

Besides, he had other things in his mind other than looking for a relationship, and that made him push these feelings away, apparently successfully. So, when he met Amy, he didn’t even think about that when falling in love with her.

But forgetting and just burying the attraction were different things. His case was the latter, although he only realized so when drunk.

And although Amy never imagined she would, was okay with it. In fact, she was partially happy that Theo was opening himself to new feelings and experiences. But a part of her still wanted to keep him all to herself.

These words meant Theo felt the same. And Amy wished that solved all her problems.

When she continued not to respond, Theo pushed her down on the bench, trapping her under him.

“What is it? Were you trying to make me jealous? Expecting me to punish you? Because I can always change my mind.” he said with a dangerous smirk.

“No!” Amy finally spoke, trying to push him away by the shoulders, but neither she put that much effort in it, nor he let himself be pried away.

“Then what is it, Hondje? Seems like I still didn’t train you properly, if you still think you need to hide from me. Shall we start a new lesson now? Or will you trust me?”

Between his usual teasing, Theo knew the right words to push her. And never too hard either, as surprising as it would be to other people.

“I… I was sure I wasn’t like this… and the idea of changing makes me feel… broken. I’m not sure if I even am the same person anymore. Or who I will be in the future. What If I become someone very different from who I am now? Someone different from the person you love?”

“What nonsense is that? Why would being attracted to her change who you are? You ‘are’ the person I love, and you couldn’t change that even if you wanted.” His tone was fierce, but the words were sweet. “I wouldn’t be Arthea if it was that easy to change my mind. It’s not you who will manage that.” Theo intertwined their fingers, an intimate gesture that also had her further pinned down, and kissed her until she was breathless. “And I changed for you. Am I a different person?” When Amy shook her head, he kissed her again. “If you ever forget who you are, I’ll be sure to remind you. Thoroughly. Because no matter who you will become, you will always be mine.”

Theo kissed her again, letting one of her hands go to explore her body. Amy moaned, her hold on his hand tightening. Her next words didn’t match her actions, though.

“Not here, Theo.”

When they parted, Theo sat back, pulling Amy with him.

“I’ll listen because you were a good girl. But you better be prepared. Once I get you back to bed, you won’t be leaving until I make sure you have no more silly worries. And maybe for a while longer, because I don’t think you will be able to stand when I’m done with you.”

Theo grinned before pulling her for a new kiss. One hand still entangled with hers, the other tangling in her hair, holding her closer.

Amy didn’t try to protest this time. Because Theo was right that she had him for purchase if she even lost sight of herself.

She would have to talk to Arthea later. But, for now, Amy would enjoy her current boyfriend.

“Does that mean you will take a break from work?”

“Someone will have to keep an eye on you, Hondje. You always get in trouble when I’m not looking.”

She did not. But before she could protest, Theo was kissing her again, stealing all further thoughts, leaving just him. And Amy couldn’t feel safer.

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[otogariado]

i am always skeptical of media where the monstrous creatures of evil are painted as irredeemable and truly inhuman because they aren't capable of thinking and feeling like humans—it's easy for it to fall into so many -isms, notably ableism and racism. it's like the age old argument against robots except make it fantasy, and to have it painted in such a cut and dry way sets off alarm bells.

but i think the way frieren (the show) handles its demons and the concept of them only being able to mimic human speech and other parts of human culture and not understand it is actually good. in that, intrinsically, frieren (the show) is about human connection. they put a lot of emphasis on human understanding as well as compassion. and i think it's fundamental that frieren (the character) is presented the way she is—an elf who is also inhuman, but is so very human in her sentience anyway. she doesn't perceive a lot of things similarly to humans because of the gap between her morality and the morality of humans, but still she is able to shift her perspective the more she interacts with people and the world around her and the more she opens up to it. when your main character is presented as an "outsider looking in" and is going through an arc of self-(re)discovery, it changes the game when you introduce demons.

at first i was heavily against demons being painted in such a frank way. it's been a while since i watched that arc when it was released, but since then i think the concept of the clones in the dungeon during the second exam in the exam arc adds more insight to it. the clones don't have actual minds, but try to perfectly recreate them instead. and now i understand and accept it. you can mimic and recreate a person from the ground up so perfectly, but it comes with the caveat of no matter how perfect your mimicry is, if it's all logic and algorithms then that's just not human. even if a person is very logical and rational in their way of thinking, people are imperfect. there's always factors that influence how we think and feel (even if we're someone who doesn't 'feel' as much as other people), "noise" that would count as human error. and that's something the demons never account for. as people have put it, how terrifying is it to recreate something without fundamentally understanding it.

and now it's very interesting how timely this theme is in frieren with regards to discussions about the (mis)use of AI and topics like AI art. it's a whole other discussion entirely, but it's really fascinating timing that these discussions kind of align. i don't believe AI is inherently "evil" (and i don't like how most people talk about it like it's a boogeyman) because ultimately it is supposed to be a tool and it depends on those who program it and wield it. but i firmly believe that AI is not meant to replace humans, because it just can't. it's meant to augment our lives for improvement but never completely replace anyone. AI art in particular can almost be related to frieren directly: AI art is generated through an algorithm. yes, AI follow decision-making algorithms and that's how it learns and comes up with outputs. but ultimately these decisions could never come close to the thought process a real human could have. an AI can mimic a pattern it sees from a certain artist, but it can never recreate the artistic vision that the original artist had that lead to that very specific decision. and people are inconsistent; it's only natural to us humans. the downfall of AI is that since it is decision-based, it has to follow a certain set of rules, and that in of itself already hinders it from ever coming close to humans. because humans are constantly changing, and people can react to an event they're re-experiencing differently than they did originally. i used to hate onions as a kid and now i love eating them. do you think demons have a concept of that in the universe of frieren?