#also important that by this point he had decided that wilde's deal was that he was supposed to invert original expectations of him

[just-an-enby-lemon]

Sometimes I just think about how Alexander made the party try to defend Oscar Wilde from kidnnappers and named the negociator Dorian. So everyone was like "this is clearly a Dorian Gray reference this has to be a very strong and powerfull man" and were all on edge only for Hamid to very easily kill him and Alex just go "he was just a guy named Dorian, there is actual soldiers outside, he was just a negotiator, completly normal guy, nothing especial."

[ef-1]

WHERE is the AD18 post you liar 🤕 jk ilysm pls take your time I'm just curious

sorRY I FORGOT OKAY

let me preface this by saying that there really wasn't anything notable about AD18 (Fernando was "retiring" but we knew that for months in advance, Charles was replacing Kimi at Ferrari but we knew that for months in advance, it was Daniel's last race at RB but we also knew that for months in advance etc) most of what I feel about that weekend is probably nostalgia but. It was the ✨️vibe✨️ the vibe was so immaculate. Drivers used to say that the last race of the season feels like the last day of school but 2018 really just captured that sentiment, no one wanted to be there but in the best way possible you know?

Formative event for me personally was Sebastian and Lewis trading helmets. I think what makes #sewis compelling now is how far they've come. But how far they've come also has the added disadvantage of neutering and sanitising what Seb and Lewis were back in the day. I mean 2018 literally started in Aus with Lewis telling Seb he wanted to wipe the smile off his face. At the beginning of 2018 Lewis was a 4 time champion, tied with Seb. Seb said again and again and again that he had a vested interest in Lewis not winning anymore championships, for his sake and for the sake of protecting Michael Schumacher's record. Anyway it was like. WILD and heart-warming and a very big deal

Re: Fernando retiring. So like. At that point, his last race of his career*, Fernando had already shat on McLaren in literally every fucking conceivable way, calling the engine an f2 engine (gp2), when asked about the very expensive updates on his car he replied "feels good. Much slower than before. Amazing". And ofc in AD18 he couldn't leave without one last jab, his race engineer was trying to gas him up to fight for p10 and he's like "you can fight for that 1 point ☝️ Fernando🔥🔥 1 point is on the table💯" to which he replied "👹I HAVE 1 THOUSAND AND 8 HUNDRED POINTS⁉️👹"

Re: re Alonso retiring, they painted him an ugly ass mural (support artists pls but it looked funny) in the driver's meeting room and during the important drivers debrief while Carlos was giving a lecture about safety or something Daniel lost it and Fernando filmed him losing it

nothing will ever go harder than this im afraid + obvi it was the champions sending Fernando off with 🍩 but fate is a fan of aesthetics so Kimi who was supposed to do donuts with them retired from the race (I think it would have thrown off the composition of the photo with 2 red cars so I'm glad)

Lewis offering Seb a Monster and Seb replying "I prefer Red Bull" (<-I Died that day)

During the last Team Principal conference of the year, of course they sat Christian and Cyril next to eachother. And of course they asked him about losing Daniel and the renault engine, to which Christian decided the best way to answer that question is to remind Cyril that while they're both basically the same age, when Christian was the youngest TP in F1, Cyril was working in the kitchen 😭

In conclusion it was chaos and I loved it so much and it will forever hold a v special place in my heart

[demigoddessqueens]

rooftop

A/n - writing prompt for August codexmonthly

Summary: Ezio has something urgently important to tell you.

Masterlist 11

It was one of those rare sleepless nights for Ezio. Be it his nerves, his thoughts on his past, the lingering traces of a nightmare he’s had for loved ones, or whatever budding feelings he was starting to feel for you.

Nights like these, he was grateful for the Assassin hideouts that let him be with his thoughts. Even though it was lonesome for the young man, the one he wanted to talk to most was you right now. The shadows worked in his favor tonight, trying not to wake the others sleeping in their rooms. As he knocked at your door, he lingered for a good while until there was no response. Figuring something was out of the ordinary, he turned the knob to enter.

“Mia bella, are you here?”

Seeing the covers overturned on your bed, and the cool breeze from the opened window, Ezio deduced where you might have been.

It was a starry night that reminded you of back home. Ever since you were little, you admired nights like these because it let your imagination run wild of fantasy worlds that inhabited each star. You would climb up to the top of the family house roof and just admire the stars and give them their own names. Each with their own story and history that let your mind run until it lulled you to sleep. Ever since you had joined the Brotherhood to bring justice for your family, you still kept this habit up especially after the tougher missions, imagining they were there with you.

It also provided a solace of realizing that you may or may not have feelings for one of your best friends. It was a lot to process, but for once this was something in your control that gave you a semblance of fleeting happiness. You were snapped out of your revelry as you heard the roof creak with another presence. Soon, you saw Ezio’s hand reach up towards the roof as the rogue pulled himself up to where you sat.

“I figured you might be here, bella, I couldn’t hear you in your room.”

You smiled softly as he scooted closer to sit right by you.

“Figured you would come around. Could never resist an audience, now could you?”

Stars, a cool night, you letting your walls down around him. Was this a sign? Should he take that chance right now. Ezio swallowed before he decided his next words.

“It is a nice night, but even nicer with you here.”

You laughed as you slightly bumped into his shoulder.

“Careful Ezio, your sweet words to me might ruffle feathers of your line of suitors.”

“And I will be there to defend you, just as you always do when a Templar attacks.”

Your laugh rung through the clear night, not making matters any easier on for the young man’s heart. He inched closer to where your shoulders were practically glued to each other. You turned your head to face him, heart hammering in your own chest and eyes searching for any indication of what you always assumed.

“Ezio, how long have you had feelings for me? And don’t try to hide it, it’s glaringly obvious at this point.”

It was so sudden that you practically felt time freeze for you both. You could see the brown eyes widen in anticipation and the blush creep up on his face. He tried to turn away for a while, but you could hear him muttering something under his breath.

Feeling cheeky, you nudged your shoulder into his as you tried to stifle your laugh

“What was that, couldn’t hear you.”

“I said, is it really that obvious? How could I have kept it away for so long?”

He laughed nervously, trying to play it off before jumping farther into the abyss of his heart.

“You know I’m in love with you, but it’s not a big deal if you don’t feel the same, it’s not—!”

You leaned closer to him and placed a soft kiss on his cheek.

“That’s what I wanted to hear. I’ve felt the same way too, Ezio.”

Ezio smiled at you in such a sweet manner that it squeezed your heart. He returned your kisses, whispering his confessions to only your ears in between them.

“I’ve always cared for you for a while now. And truth be told, being with you makes it harder NOT act on those feelings right now.”

Leaning over, you placed a kiss on his lips again. Ezio’s hands wrapped around your waist as you threaded your hands through his hair.

[olderthannetfic]

https://olderthannetfic.tumblr.com/post/735990124795543552/some-of-the-cringiest-writing-in-a-novel-i-read#notes Re: first commenter. No, actually, but it's weird that it happened twice. (Not gonna mention I've read books with a similar issues, but these books were the first ones where all of the values felt so condensed and clashing when it happened.)

Latter commenter though buckle up this is long, so that you actually get the full picture: The main character, who in this story is part of the majority, is herself is shown to have very progressive values almost from the start, and is aware of the racism experienced by others and also the sexism and queerphobia and ableism that exists in the setting. She herself has been a victim of sexism, is questioning her queer identity and deals with having to hide her ND condition. It's not just shown that she has awareness of this, she knows that what these things are and that being racist, sexist, queerphobic and ableist is bigoted and wrong. She's even shown multiple times standing up against racism/sexism/queerphobia/ableism. It's clear she understands these concepts and why they're wrong. Even at a point confronting her own family about their racism towards a different character for being of a mixed background. But then suddenly there's this one part where she does a complete 180 and does the exact thing she condemned throughout the book(s) without fanfare towards exactly one singular character and his ethnic background. It clashes extremely with how she acted the entire way throughout with other characters of minority ethnicities, or other marginalized people. And no, she never reflects on her weird view on this one guy, nor does it ever change. Nothing about this guy even justifies it either, he's just a guy. The books just keep up her view of him as a "civilized barbarian" for the entire run. I also got the impression that the ethnicity seemed to be based on a real ethnicity while reading. If the book was at least self-aware, or she reflected on why she thinks the people of that ethnicity being "beastly" and "barbaric" and why she views him as the one specific exception with actual good reason beyond "he doesn't behave like a wild animal". The only person of that ethnic group whom she considers to be civilized, it could have maybe fit with her growing and realizing that even she still has things to learn. But it never happens. It's a big flaw in the books that her values never grow, her values are almost completely the same from the start until the end. Vague description, but there's a scene where she fights to save a slave girl who's part of a minority from being publicly abused. She saves the girl and tells her nobodies worth is determined by their birth. Then a few chapters later, she's turning right around gaping open mouthed at the "civilized barbarian" guy for being able to read. Read. Not doing biochemistry or knowing rocket science, something that could be impressive if someone does it casually, no, the guy's just able to read in his spare time. That part had a heavy undertone of viewing that ethnicity as inherently inferior and less intellectually capable. That is the issue. Not that the author is a marginalized person writing a #problematic character. That's actually honestly interesting, and engaging. Reccs in the comments, thanks. The "problem" is the author wrote a character who's incredibly staunchly progressive and also frequently shows the character acting in a way that is very in-line with these values, but then decided that the fetishism of this one ethnicity as "barbaric and exotic", and telling us how this one guy is basically a noble and civilized savage who can read! was more important than keeping her character consistent in her values -which were clearly written and shown throughout the story- while not reflecting on this specific flaw in her worldview. I read the books specifically because the author mentioned that she'd "show you how it's done" stating her main character would tackle racism/sexism/queerphobia/ableism in the books and fight against them. To give it to the author, the main characters isn't completely on the nose, but in some parts it does feel like a lecture.

--

Well, we can't judge for ourselves without reading whatever this is, but I do find that authors who are very vocal about ~showing you how it's done~ are often not the ones who are actually best at that.

Also, for this or any other topic, an author should beware of being too self-aggrandizing: if you promise nothing, people will be pleasantly surprised and praise you. If you say you're better than others, they'll go in looking for an excuse to shoot you down. Doesn't matter whether it's anti-racism or writing skill: we tend to find it annoying when people blow their own horn too hard.

[encrucijada]

PÍA RAMBLES #8

you might have seen this post or this wip intro. i'm here to talk about this book because i think it's really cool @teddywriting and i wrote almost 40k words by simply playing dolls with our ocs.

(yes i will be using screencaps of before sunrise, 1995 for any and all subsequent updates regarding this project thank you very much)

what's weird about this book in particular is that, despite maripaz and theo taking up way too much space in my brain, it's also incredibly hard to talk about them?? i know every single detail about them down to what they might order to eat at a mcdonald's, and yet i feel no one outside from teddy and i really knows these characters. their lore is weird and a bit convoluted and explaining it feels like i'm trying to explain the plot of a television show with like 18 seasons of character development you just had to be there to witness to understand even a fraction of it.

but first some basics about the actual book

title: babylon boy (book 1 of the home habitat duology)

genre: literary fiction

category: i say adult because there will be no censoring of topics but in this first installment our protagonists are around eighteen years old. you might consider that ya but i wouldn't

a small summary: having independently run away from home for their own reasons, theo and maripaz meet while homeless on the streets and form an alliance of convenience to survive. while theo vehemently denies the drug addiction he’s nursing, maripaz tries to deal with the way both want and revulsion seem to exist in her at the same time. falling in love is probably the easiest thing they do.

teddy and i are co-authoring, as in we both write the words. they will be primarily working on theo's chapters and i will be primarily working on maripaz's chapters but we'll both be involved in fully crafting this story.

talking about your book is hard when all that happens in it is character work so even whether someone gets sick at one point feels like a spoiler you want people to be surprised by.

we created mari and theo in 2020 on a whim. i can't even remember what prompted it exactly. we wanted a new pair of characters to play with and we decided to make two assholes to bicker and be mean to each other. this iteration saw three reincarnations before we put the characters on the shelf and almost resigned ourselves to them being a miss... if not for one important detail... i really, really believed they should have kissed. this first version of them would eventually be known as the homeless au.

looking back it's Wild thinking about how different mari and theo used to be. we moved onto new aus to play around with, landing on a superhero-type beat that became their new canon for a while. we had fantasy and sci-fi and musicians and hadestown and the raven cycle (that last one did so much for us it's insane). every new thing we tried shaped them more and more until they were unrecognisable from their original versions. one day i really want to go through their threads from start to finish and look at that change in real time.

there was a new thesis to their characters and it was no longer "what if two awful guys with issues were forced together and tried to bite each other's heads off". instead we were looking at two characters that through every new incarnation became more sincere and gentle. they had meta-narrative character development.

(every new au also gave us more characters to populate the world including but not limited to theo's twin sister, maripaz's seven siblings, alex, philip, a whole lot of parental figures, a quirky cast of friends... but i'll talk about them some other time)

then i did it again. in the 2.0 version of the homeless au there was one scene i loved beyond words where an argument between our two protagonists resulted in maripaz punching theo right on the mouth. when she tried to swing a second time he stopped her hand and warned her that if she wanted to hit him he would hit back. they fought and the scene ended. i said to teddy: they should have kissed. we laughed and imagined how homeless au would go now that their characters had changed so much. we started thinking about it more and more until we were moving the pieces of their cinematic universe around to fit this new idea... and suddenly we had plot for a book that would revamp that original homeless au... and a sequel too! (but more on that second one another time)

teddy started a rp thread of what came right after the opening scene of babylon boy, where theo and maripaz would shoplift and he would steal the angel necklace she wore (<- this is important)... and we just kept going... and going. we'd already had a few keys scenes to work towards, one those being that punching scene that started it all, as well as the ending. teddy added two new scenes we began calling the halo scene and the church scene, and we moved something we called the pool scene into this book from another au. we just had to fill in the blanks... fill in the blanks we did.

these right here are the names i gave each individual thread of the roleplay-ification of babylon boy. their purpose is not so much to be chapter titles but to make specific scenes easy to find for future reference. though obviously i had to be a bit artistic about it.

i don't know if babylon boy will have chapter titles, and if they will have some sort of theme going on (usually i like just putting two words together to create some imagery). "angel face" is probably what i would title chapter 1, but i also hesitate on that decision because i think i would like to save angel for later.

these threads are less of a draft and more the skeleton of a draft, that's why i called it a draft 0. its purpose is to give teddy and i direction and reading through them i already know how i want to shift the timeline and how i'd rewrite some of the scenes to make them a lot better, but it did give us a great cause and effect look of things. the way teddy and i approach our roleplay threads is more loose than what i do with @on-the-river-lethe (with whom i'm currently roleplaying draft 1 of our book lupine trail and also a giant hunger games au). fluffy and i write responses between 1k-4k words, they are basically chapters. teddy and i instead do a quick call and response, mostly focused on dialogue, we build on top of each other and neither of us really knows where a thread will go when we start.

there are no actual non-roleplay words written for babylon boy thus far. teddy is in charge of chapter 1 as we open with theo's pov but we are both busy or focused on other things. right now we're enjoying the playing around stage of the process (which i don't see going away even once we start seriously writing, i know for a fact we'll probably do various roleplay-type passes to babylon boy).

you've probably noticed the christian imagery is rampant here. it happened kind of by accident and the already mentioned halo scene is entirely to blame for it. like i said, teddy and i have this very "yes, and," approach to storytelling together where we kinda build on top of what the other puts down. teddy gave me the description of one (1) scene where theo sees a halo of light around maripaz's head and i decided "well, this is now i thing that is here to stay". church scene really brought it all together and there is a scene in book 2 adeptly nicknamed the angel scene that is kind of the culmination of this.

the imagery is almost exclusive to theo's pov as mari is more the subject of the imagery than the one pushing it forward. teddy and i will be doing our most to fill this book with visuals: characters lined with stained glass windows, lights shaped like hearts, signs and graffiti that say meaningful stuff.

babylon boy, as the title suggests, is more theo's book. both he and maripaz have meaningful arcs but theo's is really at the core of it, mari takes centre stage in book 2 (titled gossamer girl). i think i talked about this somewhere before but the titles just kind of... happened. gossamer was relevant for that superhero au and it's just a word i really adore so i wanted to use it on the title. you can't go wrong with alliteration so gossamer girl it is. and because i love when books in a series match i had to do something with boy. like gossamer i adore babylon for some reason, and so we got babylon boy. i wasn't sure about that one because while gossamer girl made sense with the theme, what did "babylon boy" even mean, exactly? teddy came in clutch and analysed the title for me. they connected it to theo's drug addiction and now i can't think of any two titles that are more perfect for this series.

like i said, there are no actual words written for this book so sadly i cannot share any excerpts. but i will share

Festival was very much the result of teddy and i having just watched before sunrise, 1995

we watched before sunrise, 1995 because the mannerisms of the two leads reek of maripaz and theo

"until a miracle happens" became a recurring thing said in the draft and it wrecked me

Our Fears is probably my favourite thread both thematically and visually. followed closely by Church Angels, though that one is mostly visually

The Pool is the longest thread with about 90 responses and all of it is beautiful. i would probably consider it the companion to Our Fears

"mutual pining they're both just idiots"

the closing image is probably my favourite one of the book

the core themes are very much trust, love, and communal help. we've got such an array of npcs who simply... help. i love the human race.

i'll probably do another update before we start properly writing talking about maripaz and theo as characters specifically. a bit of a crash course on who they are, really.

anyway. i'm giving you a golden star if you read all of that ⭐ do ask me or teddy about this story!! we'd be happy to talk about it. or even just about the characters.

cheers, pía

[myimaginarywonderland]

Imagine this:

Evan/Tommy have been out on like 2 dates since the fifth episode what with their crazy schedule and Buck having to help his sister with her wedding which Tommy obviously understands.

Tommy also learns that Chim is getting married and that Evan will be there for the Bachelor party. But Evan, sweet disaster, has not told him that Chim and Maddie, his sister, are marrying each other. So yeah, Tommy is a bit confused how Evan wants to do a Bachelor party the day before his sisters wedding with a friend but he doesn't question it because he is starting to learn how big Evans's heart is and it's kind of cute.

Cute to Evab obviously sending picks in his drunk state sometime during the Bachelor party, Tommy chuckling to himself and just ignoring it because we'll, he has to work before leaving tomorrow.

While Tommy is getting ready after shift, he looks at the messages again Evan sent, especially the pictures (because drunk Buck is cute) and he notices something which just for some weird reason catches his attention. After a certain point Chim just isn't in the pictures anymore. And Tommy feels weird but pushes that away and chooses to just ease his worry by shooting Chim a text how he is happy for him and that the party kind of seems wild.

He then is in the car later on the way and something just feels off. He checks for a reply but nothing. Chim had joked before that he will send a picture but silence since they last exchanged a text about two days ago. So then Tommy kind of just stops, thinks about and just decides to call Chim.

Nothing.

It shouldn't be surprising but it is. So then he sort of looks at the pictures again and maybe zooms in, sees Chim hurt or something and now he feels the knot tighten in his stomach.

He texts Evan and Eddie if they heard anything and there is just as much silence which makes him uneasy. Maybe he tries calling again, still nothing and now he is anxious because this is Chim who saved his life.

When he notices the time after maybe his calls he curses because he will probably be late for the time he set up with Evan to meet.

It is then, that he is clued in om Chim missing (by Evan or Eddie) turns around, on autopilot to get back to the Hanger.

A few minutes later once he is back, maybe a call comes through about a missing groom and you know him being hurt (I am assuming with Maddie being at dispatch they know/have proof something is wrong.)

Tommy just jumps in action, listening to the details, acting on autopilot and completely forgetting Evans and his date.

When he finds Chim he obviously lifts him to the hospital and it's only when he drops him off to be examined that he realizes what he did. He curses and wants to call Buck but he has to deal with Chim who insists he is fine (only minor injuries) and wants to get married. And well, after a long argument and everything Chim did for him, he can't say no so he agrees to fly Chim to his wedding while Chim uses his phone to calm down his soon-to-be wife.

Dopped up Chim continues to talk about how great Maddie is and how glad he is that Buck introduced them etc.

And suddenly Tommy feels the guilt rush in because shit he just stood Evan up. He didn't mean to.

But Chim is more important so he pushes it down even if he feels terrible.

They land, and he can already so the bride with a pack of the people besides her. When the doors open and Tommy helps Chim out he notices someone very close by the bride and it's...

Buck?

And then Maddie is overwhelmed, hugging Chim and scolding her brother for losing her husband and says something along the lines of "I swear to God Evan, do not ever do that again."

And she only notices Tommy maybe after calming down and when Chimney points out that Tommy here wouldn't let him miss his wedding.

Maddie freezes. Turns to Buck who probably is torn between looking sheepish and heart eyes, turns to Tommy, back to Buck again and goes "Wait, Tommy like Eddie's friend Tommy?" And Chim says something like "Hey, he was my friend first."

Maddie just laughs, hugs Tommy who is still trying to process all of this and whispers how he already has her approval but if he hurts her baby brother they will have problems.

Maddie leaves with Chim to see if they can salvage the wedding, Tommy and Evan staying behind a bit and Tommy finally comes back and is like "You're Howie's brother in law?" And dumb, sweet, head over heels buck (who has definitely not been checking out how hot Tommy looks on the job) says something along the lines off "Not yet" and Tommy just laughs because wow, he really is crushing on probably the sweetest and most ridiculous fire fighter in all of LA.

[scales-claws-and-thorns]

(Count)Down to Dawntrail Free Day :V

Look at me, actually doing all seven days, woo!

Considering one of the options for the free day was "talk about how the game and the people you have met have made an impact on your life", I'm going to go with that.

This is going to be a long one

I started playing FFXIV back in the ARR open beta. At the time, I didn't have a good gaming PC but I did have a PS3 and I saw XIV as an opportunity to play a game with my then-GF and roommate. I picked lancer because it would become dragoon and I really dug the armor. The character was a male keeper because fangs. I even dug up a picture.

Look at him. Obviously this is not lancer but of the few pictures I do have at the time this is probably the clearest one haha.

I had also picked Adamantoise as the world to be on :V

At some point, I joined an FC called .. I think it was Order of the Wild Rose? And I followed some of the people who were members of that FC on tumblr. This is important.

Anyway, I played off and on (I was terrible looking back lol), sometimes I would talk with other FC people, sometimes I would just .. do quests and try to figure out what I should be doing. But, my then-partner quit and so did my roommate and I just.

Okay, so, to try to get myself more attached to the game, I decided to try RP. I made a character on Balmung :) I joined a new FC :) and I even had my first ever RP with them!! And then I deleted the character.

:D

I don't know, I had this problem of becoming suddenly self conscious and afraid that I was doing things wrong and I would rapidly pull out of whatever I had tried to do. This was definitely not the first time I'd done this.

At that point, I had decided I might quit FFXIV. I didn't feel as connected as I wanted to and so maybe I would just let the sub lapse and move on. But! I did transfer that moon cat up there onto Balmung first because there was a brief thought of maybe trying RP on him. Which I didn't do. But now he lived on Balmung.

Fast forward ... I don't know how many months later and HW was releasing. I was still following some people I had followed back in that old FC and knew they had also ended up on Balmung. And I saw all of them be rather excited about the new expac coming out (you know, kind of like right now).

At the time, I was dealing with what would become my diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis and couldn't work. I desperately needed something to do and people to talk to because otherwise I would just be kind of alone sitting at home.

I decided I had three options: Elder Scrolls Online, FFXIV, or return to Destiny with a vengeance (I had played a ton of it and even was in a clan, I'd just quit by this point).

I ended up landing on FFXIV because... well, I was following people who played it! Technically, I had an in! Maybe I could even join that new FC of theirs! They seemed to be having a lot of fun!

So I get myself a sub, boot up the game, and fantasia that moon cat into a Xaela. And this is when Tai arrived!

It wasn't until I had gotten into Ishgard and then leveled Dark Knight that I started RPing. And it wasn't until a couple months after that where I did end up joining The Riskbreakers. But I did, in fact, end up joining that new FC of theirs. It turns out, they remembered my old character's name!

I met a lot of cool people through that FC. And many of them helped me out a ton a couple years later when I ended up becoming homeless for a time. I am forever grateful for all of their help.

But that isn't all of the cool people I met.

At the end that same year I joined the Riskbreakers, I joined another RP group called Rendezvous of the Stars. And it is through this group that I would meet my current girlfriend of .. it'll be eight years in July.

Several years after that during Shadowbringers, I would end up (through more connections) meeting my boyfriend as well! Along with one of two awesome roommates.

The other roommate was technically also through the Riskbreakers later down the line.

Man Risk has done a lot for me haha

I need you all to understand that if not for this game, my life would look so much different. I like to say that it saved my life, in fact. Maybe not directly, but through all the wonderful people I met who made such an impact on my life.

I can imagine that I will be continuing to play this game until they stop updating it entirely and then even then I'll probably still pop in from time to time until they shut down the servers.

It is just extremely important to me, in all sorts of ways. From the two best partners a guy could ask for, to every single fantastic friend along the way, and even to all the brief connections with strangers..

I don't think I could ever really put into words just how much this game means to me.

I hope to see you all in Dawntrail!

[dark-and-kinky-hetalia-scenarios]

Hello :) Could you write a scenario for a mochi reader x mochi 1p Ancient Rome in which Ancient Rome tries to woo the reader by applying Ovid's dating tips from his Ars Amatoria, the reader thinking Ancient Rome's approaches are silly but he finally wins them over because they're so knowledgeable of the classics?

And can you go nsfw when the mochis get steamy and smush together and fuse into a single mochi, and give a headcanon as to what happens as their consciousnesses merge into one?

Thankss :**

Why must you torture me with this kind of ask?

The politeness in the ask is greatly appreciated tho

This is going to be shit btw because I really don't wanna do it but here you go

If anyone gets horny from this I will die of terror, please don't okay, I'm not trying to make it hot, I'm just trying to survive

Okay so a little background knowledge before we start

Ancient Rome is like 50 years old body wise and has the mind of a 20 year old, so his mochi form is a little bit weird, not like old old looking but mature looking, a very strong mate for any lonely mochi

Also have I mentioned that I hate you for making me look up Ovid outside of university?

Okay I don't, but Ovid is a dick

This takes place in Ancient Rome times because I do not want to deal with Ovids fucked up ideas in the modern world!

I know that it isn't logical but that's what I'm going with

There is going to be a weird sex scene, don't like mochi sex then please don't read it, I already feel weird enough writing it

If you only want the sfw part then scroll down until you find the second pair of ---- line

Have fun

Also I respect that you requested this off anon, but like wow that's wild

POV what POV????? It's everyone's point of view because I hate myself

-----

It was a hot day in the ancient Roman capital, Mochi Rome was doing his best trying to get his owner to help him with a specialised mochi bath. It was one of Ovid's most important teachings, keeping good hygiene.

Rome had read the Ars Amatoria out loud for this dear mochi pet, and Mochi Rome was determined to sway you with his new found dating and literary knowledge, because his normal approach had not worked, which frustrated him beyond measure. You were simply too cute to be without a mate.

Luckily Rome was already ready with a Mochi bath and mochi Rome became very clean

Mochi Rome was anxious for his owner to bring him to the play area where his and your owner had arranged a play date for the two of you

Mochi Rome had a plan though on how to seduce you, it involved a theatre, well a home made one with sticks but that had to be close enough. He just needed to convince his owner to go earlier. A feat in itself since Rome was not good at showing up on time anywhere

So mochi Rome was going to start very early with bugging his owner into actually taking them both to the meeting place

He jumped around, made mochi noises as loud as he could, nibbled on Rome's fingers, overall he went nuts. it took a while but eventually Rome got the hint and brought him to the area with his sticks

Mochi Rome spent an hour preparing the stick theatre and was very proud of the result

In reality it was wobbly and did not even resemble a theatre. It was a pile of sticks.

Mochi Rome also decided to make a circus with sticks, actually everything was made with sticks

He was very proud of himself.

Rome thought his mochi was acting very odd recently, but did not pay much notice to it.

Finally mochi you and your owner arrived, (y/n) put down mochi you and walked over to Rome to let the two mochis have their play time

Mochi (y/n) went over to mochi Rome and greeted him happily. Then your mochi eyes caught sight of the theatre, the Circus and all the other whack things he built out of sticks, and built terribly as well.

Mochi you laughed at him because you thought it was silly and you were jumping away to do something else.

Mochi Rome however did not let this deter him from winning you over

He followed you and started reciting the Ars Amatoria. You looked at him, positively surprised he could remember anything from that very interesting book. Your human had also read it to you. Of course it was a silly book, but it was still cute he thought he could use it to woo you. Okay it was really cute, you looked at him and winked. Thus began the chase around. Mochi Rome ended up catching you.

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Nsfw starts here, be warned it's just uh, it's weird okay, I don't like it either

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Mochi Rome caught up to you and started nibbling on you, it was very nice and you made happy mochi noises, which soon turned to horny mochi noises.

You rubbed up against mochi Rome to excite him, and yourself.

Mochi Rome started to get very excited and he nibbled more intensely on you to make you show your entrance. Not after long he succeeded and he pushed his mochi appendage into your entrance. He started to hop back and forth to make friction. It felt very nice for you and opened up more for him

Mochi Rome made rather loud happy mochi noises. Surprisingly none of the humans heard it.

As you were both getting close your mochi flesh started to move oddly and you started to absorb each other. You both welcomed this, this meant your were true mochi mates. It was meant to be!

Mochi you and Mochi Rome became one mochi, of bigger size and with a mix of your features.

You were happy and so was he.

--------

Sfw again

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Rome and your human self were too busy talking to notice what was going on with the mochis, it wasn't until Rome out of the corner of his eye saw that there was only one mochi that did not look familiar that he snapped out of the conversation he was having with the very attractive human.

Shit

That was not a good outcome for two dotting mochi owners, your mochis had become one, not something that happened at a normal rate.

(y/n) looked over to see what Rome was staring at and when they realised what was going on they looked horrified. Not a good way to get to know you more personally and up close. He should've known his mochi would fall for the mochi of the human who was the target of his affection.

Rome got cockblocked by his own mochi, and now neither of you had your own mochi.

You looked at him for an awkward amount of time before finally speaking

"uhm... Can this be undone or?"

"... Not by anyone but them"

More awkward silence.

Or maybe it didn't have to be bad

"well one of us can't just take the mochi, they'll be sad regardless of who has it, it'll miss the other owner"

"....what are you suggesting?"

"well the house next to mine is empty, you could move in there and we could share a garden and have that as it's home and then it can be close to us both!"

You looked at the cheerful older man who had definitely been trying to seduce you for a while now. You were certain now, he was an idiot.

"... Fine, temporarily"

"Of course!"

This was like going to the theatre and watching a drama that was poorly written, but it seemed you had no other choice, for now at least.

------

The end. I am not continuing this.

------

I hate myself for writing the worst scenario ever, I don't know what's going on, I'm too sick for this, anyways that was your cursed request and now I re-evaluate my life choices

Have a cursed day.

This is definitely my curse

Fucking Tumblr wouldn't let me edit this shit on the app, I hate this fucking place

All I have left to say is this:

fy fy skamme skamme

[herrlindemann]

Metal Hammer - March 1999

Rammstein has recently been the subject of ever-higher jets of flame. Shoes off and put the position of the band.

The last few months have left a lot of room for wild thoughts (irrational) journeys about an allegedly right-wing image of the band. In the conversation, Richard Kruspe and manager Emu were open to discussion and also self-critical. Manager Emu didn't have a controlling function in this case, but reflects the band, and thus he became part of this interview. Since there are certainly fans among you who are interested in topics other than the discussion about the clip for 'Stripped', the following pages also deal with the experiences of the recently completed Family Values tour with Korn, Orga, Ice Cube , Limp Bizkit and a preview of the new record.

Richard: The two months in the US felt like half a year. In order to be able to eat properly during the tour, we took a cook with us this time. As a result, all the bands sat in our catering area.

Were you able to expand your newcomer bonus and become the surprise act of the festival?

Richard: In the beginning there was a problem with the order, because we were supposed to appear second after Orgy. In America, concerts start relatively early, but people come relatively late, and we didn't want to play in front of 300 people.

Emu: There were alternatives up for debate: We could have expected 3,000 people on our own headlining tour.

Richard: Ultimately, the request came because they wanted an exciting festival, not because they like us particularly well. Anyway, they offered us the post-Korn position as co-headliners. As a result, the other bands were pissed off and distant too. We ended up playing by Korn and within a week the response from the musicians was that it was okay and we deserved the spot. Except for the couple of Korn fans chained in the front row, we had the feeling that we had convinced the audience at every concert.

How important is the Grammy nomination for ‘Du hast’ to you?

Richard: I was emotionally touched like in a few moments. It's a real recognition because producers, musicians and radio stations are interviewed for this. We're also pleased that bands like Rage Against The Machine, Marilyn Manson, Rob Halford or Dave Groll generally admit to being Rammstein fans.

Do you see yourself in a league with the nominated bands, including Metallica?

Richard: Yes. But I only know Metallica, Judas Priest and Rage Against The Machine.

Now there were tears that our most successful piece of music is hanging around in America.

Richard: I understand a certain jealousy, but if you want to please everyone, you need copies. It's like when you have five wives, the one you date first is the most jealous. But we're staying in Germany, and I was happy to be back here after two months.

Do you personally like the 'Stripped' video with Leni Riefenstahl's recordings?

Richard: Yes. When we spoke to our director back then, the basic idea was 'sport'. At the second meeting he brought a demo with these same recordings to show us what he has in mind. We spontaneously decided to do it.

Wasn't there an internal discussion?

Emu: We were expecting the record company to say it wasn't possible. Our only turning point was one day when we looked at Russian footage from the same period to see if it would work. It hasn't. There are a few plays by other directors in there, but otherwise we left it with Leni Riefenstahl.

Richard: Maybe we reacted so spontaneously because it's a piece of memory from our childhood.

Can you understand that people react sensitively?

Richard: Yes, but what I don't understand is that on the one hand they are enthusiastic about it, but on the other hand they are influenced by the opinion that is made in the media. That means the first reaction is "Oh, nice ", and when they hear that it's Leni Reifenstahl, they make a face. We used images from a sports film, not Triumph of the Will.

Emu: People asked me where we got the thousand gymnasts from. When they found out about Riefenstahl and were told who she was, they said " You can't do that ".

But you knew her before.

Richard: As an artist yes, but she wasn't in my life like she is today. I'm reading her biography right now.

Emu: In Denmark, art students look at her works as a lesson. Then we don't have to stand there and explain what attraction that has.

Witt says that someone with talent had to come to terms with the Third Reich.

Richard: It's not about good or bad, it's about their art. But of course I can't condone the fact that she let Hitler blind her.

Emu: After the Wall came down, friends with whom you made music told you that they were Stasi agents.

Richard: One also forgives…

Emu: Many from the West mobilized against former SED people. There's a willingness in me to defend when people arrive who haven't seen it. I've heard a lot of speculation about Leni Riefenstahl, especially the question of whether she slept with Hitler, far more often than the statement "that's the seduction of power ". There's only one artist I've heard more speculation about, and that's Rammstein. For example that the 'Stripped' clip was produced for the American market. It wasn't even released in the US.

If I were you, I would be less bothered by the articles by Spiegel or Rolling Stone, but more by the meanwhile negative reactions of the fans.

Richard: That's not true.

But we get corresponding letters from the editor. People want to sell their Rammstein collection.

Richard: Really? Rammstein is a phenomenon, discussions about it have already broken friendships, but that can only mean that you know a little more afterwards.

Emu: A friend of ours has a small independent cinema. When he came to a joint meeting of the cinema operators with the Rammstein hat, they wanted to exclude him. So it can also go to the existential. The 'Stripped' video is being used as evidence to prove what has been floating around in the media for a long time.

You are blamed for providing the image of German that America wants to see.

Richard: What picture do we deliver? We often had to answer the question of whether we were gay there; but none came about “German” and “Nazi”. ‘Du hast’, the video that ran in the US, is a gangster story. They like the music. But I can now understand the attitude of people who say you should be more sensitive, although I still think the video is beautiful and aesthetic. Art has something to do with spontaneity, emotion and naivety. If you always weigh everything, only boring things come out.

Do you make sure in the future that you don't give this image any additional nourishment?

Richard: We want to continue to choose quality.

And when art and sensitivity face each other again?

Richard: That's when you start circumcising yourself. But of course there is a moral limit that runs right there that I would have rejected making 'Triumph des Willens', no question. But 'Olympia' has to do with sports aesthetics.

If you can understand it, does that also weigh on your conscience?

Richard: Yes, yes. Till, our singer, also has problems with it and is really depressed. When you keep hearing accusations that aren't true, it hurts too. I used to have blonde rastas and made funky music, now I'm thinking about situations that are completely unfamiliar to me: What if I want to go to a club and the bouncer says to me: "You can't come in here, you right pig! ».

Where do you want to start?

Richard: By showing people that you can also make art with other means. We want to let people know that Rammstein will always innovate...

If you don't want to be deterred, you have to make yourself independent of the opinions of others, right?

Richard: It really takes self-confidence and a thick skin.

At least you seem to have the former.

Richard: It seems that way, doesn't it?

Absolutely. So are you the speaker?

Richard: That's not true. It's actually very well divided apart from Till. We didn't want to follow the record company line that singers have to do interviews. The musicians know a lot more about sound, while the singer is limited to writing lyrics and can't talk about some musical things at all.

Are you a bit afraid of the next record yourself?

Richard: It's like Christmas when you have a gift and you don't know if you like it. On the one hand I notice that I'm repeating myself and I'm enthusiastic about it because I realize that this is Rammstein. On the other hand, of course, something new has to be added. I approach it conservatively, a riff, a rhythm, a melody, and when it then harmonizes with the text, freshness should be brought in, like the modern electronics in Sehnsucht. Since I wrote the second record more or less by myself, I would also like the others to contribute more musically. It's never good trying to please someone. I recently spoke to a producer who said you have to keep your instincts and follow them. Then all you have to do is concentrate. I write two to three hours every day and confidence is related to how successful I am, whether I had a good idea and wrote something good. If nothing happens for two or three days, I'm also very, very small.

Is Till now thinking twice about his texts, or is there even a reappraisal of things?

Richard: I find his lyrics so apolitical that he doesn't have to think about it. It's poetry. I hope he tries to stay away from it. If Till would work that out, people wouldn't understand it at all. Kraftwerk were partly condemned too, but if this band had made an anti-fascist song, it wouldn't have fitted. Just as little as with Rammstein.

Emu: We cannot justify what never happened. In order to keep the influence within limits, we have now canceled the clipping service so that all the articles are no longer lying around in the office and you read everything all the time. That's enough.

Richard: We're not closing ourselves off to information. According to the saying "Resist the beginnings " we think about it. In America I even made a wrong decision because I'm so insecure and sensitized. I had a fan kicked out who was always throwing his right arm forward. He didn't do anything, just went along with the music.

Hasn't something broken for you lately from the magic, the dream of being successful?

Richard: The better known you are, the lonelier you get. But I can't do something completely different right now. As long as I can take it, I'll keep going. You can tell that you can compensate for all these stories and your personal sacrifices with music. Maybe our situation can be compared to when you play a song in the rehearsal room. You like it, go out, play it in front of people fifty times until you realize there's no response. But you have to get to that point first. The reactions to 'Stripped' are similar. You have to admit that you may have made a mistake. You haven't managed to get it understood. A communication difficulty between bathroom and fan. Maybe it's a piece of history that we live out, others don't see it that way. It was also a cover version, I'm not sure if we would have put it on our own song.

Is there anything new for your fans?

Richard: We are working on a new stage show. It's hard to separate from fire. Water would be great, but that is very difficult to achieve.

Emu: We're thinking of a combination with neon.

In the beginning every hard German band had to be measured against you musically, now everyone justifies that they are not Nazis...

Richard: Yes, soon they won't be able to hear the name Rammstein anymore.

[esther-dot]

It's just weird that how many times it occurs in Brienne chapters about how Sansa will no longer remain maid or being raped. I just hope that Grrm spared Sansa from getting involved in any kind of unwanted sexual encounters. I mean if he can save Brienne from getting raped at last moment he could have Sansa spared from it. I am actually wary of how he will deal with Sansa sexuality considering time gap he scrapped.

I think that Martin has had Sansa endure these assaults not as a prelude to her getting raped, but rather, to make her escape from them all the more remarkable. If a horrible fate doesn’t seem possible or imminent, the fact that it doesn’t happen wont hit with the same weight. To me, when the Hound holds the knife to her throat and nearly rapes her, the idea isn’t that he never would, but that he was this close to following through, and Sansa’s compassion was the only thing that stopped him.

I mentioned to someone in the comments on a recent post that the Hound brags he’s a butcher and women and children only meat, but Sansa’s kindness to him, her compassion for his suffering, prevents him from seeing her that way, changes how he views himself. It’s an awful moment, I don’t like reading about Sansa getting perved on and assaulted, but I can understand why Martin included some of it, to show the power of something other than brute force, to show her power over villains. That’s not to deny that the accumulative affect of it all by now is a lot. It is. We pretty routinely bemoan it!

I’ve been pretty confident that book Sansa will not be raped or killed for some time. Before I’ve pointed to the “virgin” trope in medieval lit (I know) as a potential reason why it never seemed like part of her story:

Telling the hero what God has in store for them is The Virgin’s primary job. She tires to keep the hero on their quest. She is often described as beautiful, graceful. Though still generally a secondary or even tertiary character in Medieval literature, The Virgin is still important to the plot. She is respected and protected in some way throughout the story. Even when she is in trouble, the author doesn’t do any physical damage to her, often just putting her to sleep or locking her somewhere until the hero can save her. (link)

(talked about this some more over here)

and I also think, as much as Martin writes a lot of sexual violence/threats of sexual violence, this isn’t something he’d do to Sansa thoughtlessly. I found this quote on his old blog some time ago, and it is reassuring to me that he takes the threat of rape against his characters seriously (poor guy wrote this before GoT premiered--I can only imagine what he thought after s5):

I have sometimes allowed other writers to play with my children.  In Wild Cards, for instance, which is a shared world.  Lohengrin, Hoodoo Mama, Popinjay, the Turtle, and all my other WC creations have been written by other writers, and I have written their characters.  But I submit, this is NOT at all the same thing.  A shared world is a tightly controlled environment.  In the case of Wild Cards, it's controlled by me.  I decide who gets to borrow my creations, and I review their stories, and approve or disapproval what is done with them.  "No, Popinjay would say it this way," I say, or "Sorry, the Turtle would never do that," or, more importantly (this has never come up in Wild Cards, but it did in some other shared worlds), "No, absolutely not, your character may not rape my character, I don't give a fuck how powerful you think it would be." And that's Wild Cards.  A world and characters created to be shared.  It's not at all the same with Ice & Fire.  No one gets to abuse the people of Westeros but me. (link)

Rape, even though he includes far more sexual violence than we may want, is something he takes seriously. He isn't going to have Sansa raped so that it trends on twitter/sparks countless articles, ups viewership, unlike how GoT used it. It would only happen in ASOIAF if Sansa's story demanded it, and since we have a prophecy of Sansa killing a giant in Winterfell rather than being harmed by one, I believe that Sansa will go North and be empowered, not further victimized.

As for a general wariness about how he is going to handle Sansa's sexuality, it depends on how you read the foreshadowing, but I do tend to think she will have a romantic relationship on the page, so I guess it isn't all good news for you, anon! 😅

[theimaginatrix27]

Coming Soon to AO3: the Sisko'Brien Salamanders AU!

I could not go another day without making this post. Because I intend to start posting this fic as soon as it's no longer November in Australia.

A few months ago, I was on my friend @kintatsujo's Discord server, telling her and my other friends on there, quite earnestly, that I believed I was incapable of writing Sci-fi, and was particularly nervous about writing for any Star Trek series, because the fandom was big and old and intimidating, and I was a Fantasy writer! I couldn't possibly get all the technical stuff right!

And then I started nattering on about my ideas for a Star Trek series that I'd had floating in my head for about thirteen years, and as I was doing so, I started looking stuff up on the wiki, made a couple posts, absolutely trawled the blog of someone who reblogged one of those posts, found a Deep Space 9-themed Discord server (and about a dozen new friends!), and started having plot tribbles populate my brain, all squealing excitedly at being allowed to run wild.

And one of those ideas was sparked by this post, which I found on that days-long blog trawl I mentioned, and which delighted me so much that I started imagining some of the scenes. And then imagining the fallout. And then having my own ideas about how it would all pan out, and I knew this story was a keeper.

The important points from the post that set my brain off, in case you don't wanna click through:

Benjamin Sisko wouldn't abandon his salamander babies if he ever went through a Threshold scenario (as in the episode of Star Trek: Voyager for the uninitiated).

Since this is a human-specific mutation, the other parent would have to be one of the other human cast

DS9's Threshold is clearly an O'Brien-must-suffer episode.

The very idea of this happening was hilarious to me, so in hindsight I shouldn't have been all that surprised the plot tribble moved in and started breeding like mad.

I let the idea stew throughout October, and have been writing for the AU all month. And I've written about 30k for it so far! Not all of it's for the main/initial fic laying a great deal of the groundwork/surrounding the events within the post (but with my own twists on some of the ideas because I was imagining the characters' reactions as I saw them and they flowed better than the comments in the post), but I do have six chapters almost ready to go, and will probably keep writing stuff after NaNo because I wanna tell this story! The rest of what I've written is for the pre/conquel I started when I decided we needed to explore Sisko and O'Brien's experiences while mutated (and that is going to be a fun fic!), and the sequel! Because once I established some stuff about the babies (like their names and personalities), they wanted to be doing things! And those things might have widespread impacts, but I will not go into details because that's for when the sequel fic goes up! Which it isn't until I finish posting the Main/original fic!

Milestone will be coming to AO3 on the 1st of December Australian time, and I wanted to let people know it was gonna happen. I'm so excited to start sharing this with the fandom!

@reginaldbroccoli @laurelhach @vermin-disciple @apolesen I am tagging you specifically to thank you for combining your efforts to create the post that made this story possible, and also to let you know someone is writing the thing. And I hope at least some of you will be interested in reading it and won't mind that I couldn't wait until next Threshold Day to begin posting said thing.

[fuckyeah-jessicabiel]

Jessica Biel for CosmoGirl October/November 1999 by Jodi Bryson 

Find out why this 7th Heaven star is the coolest friend a girl could have!  

"I'm definitely weird," Jessica Biel confesses as she digs  through the knick-knacks in her bedroom.   "I have some really wild  stuff."  She points out her collection of vintage sunglasses, a bunch of  so-bright-they're-blinding wigs, dozens of phone numbers taped to the  wall, and her favorite Abercrombie & Fitch ad.  "He is the hottest  Abercrombie model ever," she says.  

The 17 year old star of 7th Heaven just finished her third season  on the show and aced her junior year of high school.  Now she's  flinging clothes around her bedroom to prep for a European vacation with  two of her closest friends.  "I want to go someplace I've never been  with people I really love hanging out with," she says.  "I want to see  some amazing things."  

Jessie has that I'll-try-anything-once outlook down pat.  She  started her career as a model, but at 14 decided to give acting a whirl.   Like in a Hollywood fairy tale, she flew to L.A. and had just a few  auditions before scoring the primo role of Mary Camden.  

Jessie works on 7th Heaven six days a week, nine months a year.   But as soon as she steps off the set, straight-arrow Mary vanishes and  the real Jessie charms everyone around her with warp-speed chitchat  about her big plans for the future (a backpacking trip with her best  friend, college, and maybe a second career as a photographer).  Clearly,  Jessie is ready to take on the world.  First stop, Europe!  

The Big Trip 

"I have no idea what to expect," Jessie says of her European  vacation, "but I just can't wait to eat that good food!"  Is she worried  about travelling to strange countries where she doesn't know a soul?   "No, I'm very excited.  My mom has a checklist of things for me to do  before I go:  Make copies of my passport, driver's license, and credit  cards; pack these things close to my body but separate from my wallet.   My mother has planed it all out -- I just gotta do it."  

Jessie makes a surprisingly small pile of clothes at the bottom  of her bed, then crams it into a backpack.  "I'm honestly taking one  pair of pants, a T-shirt, a couple pairs of shorts, a few tank tops, a  sweatshirt, a bathing suit, and two pairs of underwear that I'll keep  throwing in the sink.  My camera is the most important thing."  

In addition to taking tons of snaps, Jessie has dreamed up the  coolest way to keep track of her European adventures.  "Instead of a  private diary, I'm going to take a big book, like a communal journal,  and anyone can write in it," she says.  "If someone says, 'Can I see  your journal and write a little entry?' that's cool.  It will be nice to  look back and read what we all did and what we felt together."  Bon  voyage!  

Best Friends  

Her travelling companions are her friends Shane Nelson and Light  Dreamer Eternity.  "Light rocks so hard," Jessie says.  And even though  she lives in L.A. now, Jessie is still supertight with her best friend  from her hometown of Boulder, Colorado, who's also named Jessie.  "I  have pictures of Jessie and me stuck all over my room," she says.   What's her secret for maintaining such strong friendships?  "There's  never the silent treatment," Jessie explains. "If I was in a fight with a  friend, I would just call and be like, What is the deal?  What did I  do?  What do we need to talk about?  How can we get it over with?"   Jessie's the kind of friend who wouldn't let you stay mad at her.  

A Special Guy  

Will her absence make anyone's heart grow fonder?  Jessie let it  slip that she has a long-distance boyfriend, but then she wouldn't spill  a single detail! (And believe us, we begged!)   But she did share her  sure-fire hook-up advice.  "I'm pretty forward with guys," she says.   "I'll just walk up to somebody and I'll be really blunt and say, 'What a  great-looking person you are!  Have an awesome day.'"   Does that  really work?  "Well, I don't say that to a guy because I want him to be  my boyfriend," she says.  "I just want to tell him."   What guy could  resist?  

Prom Night  

Unfortunately, Jessie didn't get to take her secret boyfriend to  her junior prom.  "I promised Beverley Mitchell [who plays her younger  sister Lucy on 7th Heaven] that I'd go to her friend's prom.  And she  made me promise that I wouldn't back out.  I found out a week later that  my prom was the exact same day!  So I missed my prom to go to another  prom with this kid who didn't have a date," she says.  She didn't skimp  on glamour for her first prom experience: She wore an elegant white  cami-and-skirt combo with superhigh-heeled sandals.  "It turned out that  we had a good time, but Bev totally owes me!"  

Bad Behavior  

Jessie doesn't always play it so straight and narrow.  There's a  sneaky story about the pink flamingo hanging from her bedroom ceiling.  

"We had just sold our house in Boulder, Colorado, and I loved  that house," she says.  "I wanted to see it one more time.   When my  best friend Jessie and I drove up to it, my eyes welled up -- there was a  pink flamingo sticking out of my front yard!  It was the chessiest  thing I'd ever seen.  I was not happy with that flamingo.  I thought,  This has to go.  So I ran and ripped it out of the ground.  I busted to  the car and yelled, 'Go, Jessie, go!' and we just took off.  I pulled  out the stick and put the flamingo in my suitcase, and took it home with  me," she says.  "I don't think the family even knew it was missing."  Um, Jessie...they do now.  

BRIGHT FUTURE  

Even though Jessie's a totally fearless adventurer, she still  gets homesick for Boulder.  "I miss the people, I miss the mountains.   It is so laid-back there," she explains.   Does she ever see herself  going back to settle down in the Rocky Mountain foothills?  "I have one  more year of high school, which seems like it's going to take forever --  and then I'm on my own!  I can be wherever I want to be!"   Look out  world -- here she comes!"  

[ofpineapplesanddawns]

While I am still thinking about DT and vampire stuff, my mind drifted to werewolves (because of course), and I remembered I do technically have fics where Ten and Lucian interact and are dating, and then I thought of... this.

Warning: absolutely ridiculous commentary from Ten based on something David talked about at a con when filming Tooth and Claw

Takes place while Lucian and his pack have control over the castle, so before all the shit with Kraven and Lucian faking his death.

On with the fic!

--

"Did you know," The Doctor said as he peeled a banana he had just pulled out of the inside pocket of his duster, "that I've met a werewolf once?"

"I wouldn't be surprised, you tend to usually land your strange box machine in their territory. Please stop doing that, it makes them more aggressive because the sounds frighten them." Lucian huffed, before putting hot metal into water, steam erupting immediately.

"Ah, yeah, true. But not those werewolves!" The Doctor grinned and bit into his treat. "A 'iffer'n kin'!" He said, his mouth full of fruit.

Lucian removed the metal from the water and set it aside, the Doctor realizing it was a horseshoe. He wondered if Lucian would let him use his sonic to attach to a horse, he had always wanted to use that setting, never got the chance yet.

"What do you mean?" Lucian asked, removing his gloves.

"Well," the Doctor swallowed, "when me and Rose, you know her, told you all about her, yes?"

"Yes, you have."

"Right, well, me and her were trying to travel to the 1970s, I think it was the 1970s, anyway. I miscalculated and sent us back to the 1800s! Wild, eh? Well, there, we ran into the lady herself, Queen Victoria! She'll be queen of the United Kingdom in a few centuries. So, we ran into her in Scotland, lovely place, do visit one day, and we decided to go with her to a manor."

So, as he sat on a seat in Lucian's blacksmith station, the Doctor told the lycan about the events of his time with Queen Victoria. He talked about the strange guards who turned out to be dangerous monks, set to handle and deal with a caged man.

Lucian wasn't exactly thrilled about a wolfman being locked in a cage, but understood that for safety reasons, it was necessary. The Doctor also spoke about the telescope, excited about explaining why that was important later.

But then he got to the part about the transformation he had witnessed. "It was... it was brilliant, in a way! I had never seen anything like it before, ah, just... just gorgeous, you know? Though, I personally like yours better."

"Thank you?"

"You're welcome!" The Doctor beamed. "Anyway, the lad escaped the cage once he changed into a wolf, and... well... I hate to say this, but this boy, was a boy, mind. Like, I know movies and artwork try to avoid it, but he was..."

The Doctor felt warm, and not just from the fire that Lucian was throwing a few dry logs into. He coughed, tugging at his collar.

Lucian glanced at him, tilting his head. "He was what, Doctor?"

"Ah, well... I mean, it's quite rude to point things out, especially for someone who is naked, and really, I didn't mean to look, but he was certainly, uhh..."

The lycan chuckled and shook his head. "Was he very well endowed, Doctor? Is that what you're trying to get at?"

"I didn't mean to look!" The Doctor exclaimed, wringing the banana peel in his hands, looking at some of the finished metal works rather than at the amused man before him. "We were being chased and I kept wanting to get a good look, but my eyes kept seeing- and then there's what happened later, and it's just...! I mean, it was so bright and yet you could still-!"

Lucian was laughing louder now and the Doctor tossed the banana peel at him.

"ANYWAY!" He loudly announced. "We got chased into a library and it turns out that was the right idea cause the room was protected-!" He tried to continue his story, but Lucian was still smiling as he worked and it made it hard to concentrate.

He probably shouldn't have brought this up, him and his big gob.

--

I'm sorry, but I will never get over David and how impressed he was about the guy doing the motion capture for the werewolf and how the suit he wore left NOTHING to the imagination. David is just in total awe over it, and it's like, why are you telling a room full of people this???

Also, the horseshoe thing is just a silly reference to one of the Big Finish stories and how Ten got very excited about using that setting. The man is a dork.

[valiantvillain]

Also please just give me more about Bei - I know she is incredibly beautiful and romanced The Best Man in Faerun.

What is her background? What makes her tick? What drew her to Wyll? Is it plain sailing for them or is there any tension along the way?

Beitris is a wild magic sorcerer born to a rather dysfunctional family that was the result of an arranged marriage for business reasons, a union that basically put all of her alchemist mother's ambitions to pasture to support her husband's ambitions and take care of a growing family (though not entirely willingly as dear dad preferred business to family). Bei grew up the youngest of five siblings and the only girl in the family, and of the various members of her family it was her mother who was the most patient when it came to Bei's wild surges and taught her alchemy. She also liked to entertain Bei with fairytales and stories. When she died, however, dad decided to saddle Beitris with all the household labor (*cough*servitude*cough*) that had once been relegated to her mother, ever making the consistent comment that at least her prettiness might let any potential marriage prospects overlook her wild magic. When he did manage to find a husband for her in one of his more unscrupulous business partners, Bei ran away with the help of a friend of her mother's to escape being in the exact same position her mother once was.

Her mother's friend, whose shape the Guardian took on in the visions, helped Bei get a job working in a fairly successful alchemist's workshop. Things were good for a bit. Bei was actually able to start putting money towards her future, get used to having independence, she liked the work, and the occasional flash of a smile and batting of her eyes had a good success rate of getting customers to purchase more than they intended. But then a wild surge happened at a most inopportune time while the owner was showing an important client around the shop and Beitris sent half the store up in flames with a fireball. Despite having been caught in the blast herself, she was fired and had to find another way to get by on her own.

Unfortunately, the incident seemed to get her blacklisted and she struggled to find a job. So she turned to swindling and eventually became quite the effective charlatan, no doubt helped along by having a pretty face. People will believe almost anything if the words come from a pretty face, don't they? She did have some scruples though. She would only target rich people and those who deserved it. After all, how much of that wealth was ever gained entirely honestly to begin with. For a time she even somewhat liked it, got a thrill out of how easy it was. Although Beitris was never exactly proud of it, but she wasn't going hungry and she kept telling herself that once she had enough to live a cushy life she'd go on the straight and narrow. Just a rich woman who would open her own alchemy shop, live in a nice house, occasionally donate to charitable causes, and enjoy her own company since the idea of love and romance had long lost its luster as unrealistic childish fantasies. At that point, she'd heard "i love you" from enough marks and criminal rivals to know how cheap a sentiment it was. Though she does still love a good romance novel.

Bei was so close to her goal when the mindflayers abducted her after her latest succession of scams in Neverwinter. And suddenly her nearly-realized dream went up in smoke and she had a tadpole in her head and a bunch of people apparently looking to her to help deal with it. But hey, she's charming and she has magic, surely that will get them somewhere even if Gale's presence is starting up the good old wizard vs sorcerer rivalry among the group, Lae'zel and Shadowheart give her charm a workout in keeping the peace, and Astarion is being...well, himself. And then Wyll joins up with them.

She's heard of the Blade of Frontiers, even had a passing admiration for the tales if they were as true as people claimed. They reminded her of the stories of heroes and handsome princes her mother used to tell her. Yet surely no one's that selflessly heroic, no one's that nice, not in her experience. But then he turns out to be the exact person the stories made him out to be. He is charming. He is selfless. He is heroic. And it's no more clear to her than when he becomes a devil all for refusing to kill Karlach. He is the Blade of Frontiers and he deserves so much better than what fate has given him. Because unlike her, he saw the cards he was dealt and didn't let it sour and turn him bitter like she did. She envied yet admired that about him.

I think Wyll might have perceived it as much more smooth-sailing than she did as romantically and emotionally, Beitris just went in with more hang-ups. Her parents were a rotten example, she'd manipulated people using her looks for years, and the few serious relationships she'd had did not end well. In addition to that, she didn't feel she deserved someone like Wyll. I like to think she was very open about her past, perhaps especially in his presence in this attempt to warn him away from being interested in her. "You hear this? You hear about the things I've done? The chaos I've caused? You sure you this is the mess you want?" Only for him to judge her by the actions he actually saw her take: times she used her charm to save someone's life, to talk them out of dangerous situations, how she doesn't shy away from after his transformation, and how even if she visibly wars with herself a bit she does do the right thing (in particular, helping the tieflings and animals). And perhaps he can't help but appreciate the broad smile on her face when a wild surge actually works in their favor. The excitement and the relief that just dance in her eyes.

And he's so genuine that he just slowly and so easily breaks down her defenses. Internally, Bei finds herself cursing him for making her believe in fairytale romances and Prince Charmings again like a little girl. Someone who makes her like the butterflies in her stomach and find joy in flirtation again. Someone who remains in good humor after a wild surge turned them both into cats in the midst of a boss fight (that did actually happen). He makes her think she's deserving of a great love, and by his act 2 dance scene, she was in love with him. And she'll be damned if she's not gonna get him the happy storybook ending he deserves.

[noddytheornithopod]

So I have seen through to the end of Master Detective Archives: Rain Code, so time to post random spoilery thoughts

First of all... I quickly figured out the Homunculi twist. Especially when I saw the meat buns being made. I did jokingly suggest weeks ago maybe they’re made of Homunculi or something... I just got who is eating who wrong. Now if you’ll excuse me, if I see anywhere offering meat buns, it’s gonna be a while before I feel okay trying them.

I also had a feeling Makoto was running this totalitarian city to protect the Homunculi. Interesting that even while many of the cases don’t have more sympathetic culprits, we actually have our central antagonist be someone with sympathetic motives.

This is of course a spiritual successor to Danganronpa, but it especially follows up on V3′s themes, so it’s even more a spiritual successor to that game specifically. V3 ended on a more ambiguous and existential note, but probably because the stuff they were dealing with in that climax was more abstract and well less applicable to real life. I do kind of prefer that still, but I do like what Rain Code ended up doing even if comes to a somewhat different conclusion to V3 (truth being more subjective/the idea of emotional truth vs there’s one truth even if it sucks and we just have to choose how to face it, again I think the difference comes down to V3 exploring the idea of fiction itself and why we tell and care about stories, so different scenarios). Still, wonder if this is Kodaka just exploring different ideas, or if there’s an evolution in his thinking going on here.

Oh yeah, speaking of Danganronpa, the pink blood aesthetic choice becomes an actual plot point cuz that’s now Homunculi blood. I have a feeling there’s already lots of wild crack theories about how the Danganronpa universe is now populated with Homunculi or something, lol. That being said, it could be a fancy way for Team Danganronpa to keep making a cast for more seasons... okay okay stop Noddy

When the other Master Detectives died, I thought it was pretty anticlimactic. It was a relief to see they were alive not just because I wanted them to be (even resident fuckboy Desuhiko), but because if they just unceremoniously died offscreen like that, it would’ve been extremely underwhelming (seriously, at least Halara would’ve made it out, there weren’t THAT many Homunculi in one place, Makoto :v).

I’m really happy we ended with a nonviolent solution - reaping the souls of murderers was no fun and clearly took a toll on Yuma. I’m sure some people are gonna be rolling their eyes because IDK Steven Universe made them allergic to villain redemption stories (also Steven Universe is one of the best cartoons in recent memory and its unique take on justice is a positive, shut up don’t @ me). I’ll still need to think about how this progressed overall and if Yuma could’ve been challenged even more, but I like that it ends with Yuma deciding “no I’m going to spare you because you helping everyone will benefit more”, and IDK he probably also empathises with Makoto cuz y’know he’s basically a clone of him so he understands how he thinks.

Not surprised Makoto was a Homunculus, nor was I at the Yuma connection, but I didn’t quite expect Yuma being Number One. Like, it’s not THAT surprising when you think about it, but it’s not something I was actively thinking about, especially since well... look at him! He’s a fucking baby! How is HE in charge of the world’s most important detective organisation??? Look I know he’s actually like 19 or some shit and character design means fuck all for ages in these Spike Chunsoft/Too Kyo games but you certainly could’ve fooled me.

I felt more with Shinigami than I expected, especially when they said goodbye. Like, it actually makes me see their previous interactions differently. Was Shinigami this rough and rude all the time just so that she wouldn’t let Yuma be attached to her, and thus making vice versa unlikely? Was she TRYING to be unlikeable just so that when the time came for their pact to end (and well it has to, he was using her to solve the big mystery), saying goodbye would be easier? Also to actually see some growth from her too surprised me, always insisting he should learn to be self reliant and stuff (obviously not noticing the hypocrisy lol) but then realising Yuma’s strength was that he could trust others and work with them (and like, that’s the whole point of the coalescence Forte, it’s that trait manifested into an actual ability). I had a feeling the game was going here along with its truth vs lies thing, but it’s nice to be vindicated.

I think there’s certainly stuff to analyse from a socio-political aspect too. I will say that it is kinda bullshit to say there’s objectively a smartest human, and all the weird eugenics-y stuff that came from that (though let’s be real, the Unified Government and Amaterasu might as well be doing eugenics, trying to find “ideal” specimens to grow Homunculi from). Okay, that aside, so the idea for creating immortal humanoids was... for military purposes. Yeah, seeing how much governments would rather invest in the military industrial complex than helping people, that tracks. I do wonder if there’s any influence from Japanese issues too, because I am aware that the Japanese government has been militarising more over the past years despite appearing “pacifist”. I also am sure one could find allegories with Homunculi, like they definitely feel like they would’ve just been eliminated in whatever way they could if Makoto didn’t intervene and blackmail the government. But the idea of a bunch of what might as well be sick/diseased people waking up after a massive disaster... part of me wonders if there’s any Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombing parallels that could be drawn. I don’t know enough about what happened to make any solid comments, but I do wonder if there’s something here, or allegories one could draw to anything else. Also yes yes of course we still technically have Amaterasu Corp in charge and yes okay Makoto did change but the anarchist in me is still kind of shaking my fist that they’re still run by a corporation lol. At least there’s referendums now so maybe they’re slowly trying to break it down and decentralise it? That’s just wishful thinking though, I have no clue what the politics of the people at Too Kyo and Spike Chunsoft are, lol.

So there’s probably gonna be more in this series, I wonder if we’ll follow a different detective in each entry? I think it would be tiring for Yuma to keep making pacts with Shinigami and then forgetting her after each game, lol.

This might be recency bias but I got serious Star Wars Rebels vibes from the end. Yuma fucking disappearing on everyone, and the girl close to him going “I’m gonna find him someday” and going on a big journey to do that? Yeah. All we need is IDK a Danganronpa character popping up to fill in the Ahsoka role (though honestly I’d prefer the universes be separate for now, I’m just joking around). :P

Okay so we’ve figured out stuff like how Homunculi can eat without needing to consume human flesh (yay for not just excessively executing criminals), but what about all the “dead” ones? Are we going to figure out a solution for them so they don’t stay in that zombie state forever? They’re basically immortal because even after “dying” the artificial cells regenerate into something technically alive. Look, if they’ve made skin cream to protect them from that deadly UV radiation, they might eventually find something too.

Also are they functionally immortal? Like, I think they said they don’t age because they look as when the DNA was taken, but what about all the kids and stuff? Do they ever grow up? Do those girls in that cutthroat all girls high school (which is now hopefully less cutthroat now they’re not isolated and don’t need to carry the entertainment industry in Kanai Ward lol) have to go there forever? I guess they can graduate, but what if you’re eternally a teenager? Do they just stop growing once they reach maturity like humans? I have too many questions.

Can Homunculi reproduce? What happens when they get busy? What if say Kurumi and Yuma decide to settle down one day assuming all goes well, what happens if a human and a homunculi want kids? Can half-homunculi exist? I’m asking too many questions, lol.

Anyway, had a blast checking this out. I don’t think it will ever be what Danganronpa was for me, those games got into a really unique part of me, but overall I did like most of what we got here. Now if only they’d release it on more than the goddamn Switch...

More thoughts post OP:

So the humanoid race who fears the Sun and risks going berserk reminds me of what I’ve heard about I am Legend/The Omega Man, especially the idea of treating the supposed monsters as sympathetic and having humanity too? Would track for Kodaka and all his pop culture references.

I also like the implicit commentary on the prison systems. Like taking criminals and turning them into food? Yeah, I bet the prison industrial complex would try that if they could get away with it. :V Resident fascist Yomi is of course the embodiment of the Law and Order criminal punishment ideas. But yeah, stuff like Yuma deciding not to just reap Makoto’s soul, the guilt of reaping the murderer’s souls in general, etc does track because I think even Danganronpa has themes like this when you think about it, with Monokuma’s eye for an eye mentality. But yeah, even with endings where people seem to be more cooperative with society, and are trying to rehabilitate or redeem people seems to be a thing here, not just with Makoto but Martina too. Granted, it seems the Peacekeepers still exist from what I can tell, but whatever, you can’t win them all. :v

Once again gotta love how in the end despite all the crude humour and edginess, Kodaka at his heart is a sentimental softie in his work, lol.

There’s a lot of angst you could do with Homunculi killing their human counterparts, eg Kurumi killing her grandfather. On a similar note, sequel idea if they go there: survivors of The Blank Week Incident who escaped Kanai Ward who are convinced Homunculi are dangerous and want to eliminate them, even thinking they “stole” their lives? Maybe even reveal Kurumi’s grandfather survived, he wouldn’t have to face his duplicate so that dilemma would be gone, but the dilemma of facing his granddaughter who thinks and feels exactly as she did her human progenitor but also isn’t and possibly killed her?

So Makoto taking over Amaterasu... good intentions to try and save everyone, but even if it focuses more on the whole creating mysteries aspect at least in the dialogue, there’s something to be said in what a monster he became in the name of these good things. Almost like you can’t just elect the right people to fix what is already a system designed to screw us over, hmm... yeah, see this is why I wish something more radical happened to Amaterasu at the end, lol. The seeds for it are there! Also him saying he’d be fine with Yomi’s totalitarianism as long as he didn’t try to expose Homunculi to other researchers and thus the outside world? I didn’t think about it much initially because I was more focused on how despite everything he did it all started from a good place, but damn, he really did get fucked up. Being afraid and alone is one massive bitch.

[utilitycaster]

Top 10 (or five or however many you wanna do) hopes/dreams/things-you-wanna-see happen during the two shot? What do you want the most. Also for a bonus point however many things you’d hate to see, or like things the fandom wants that you’d disagree with (coughs in inexplicable fjorjester hate)

So, on some level, it's like. It's Mighty Nein. They are dealing with Uk'otoa. I don't really think they can go wrong, per se. With that said, here's the stuff I'd like to see:

Sabian. Travis always excels at providing a certain weight to his character backstories and in having people who are both immensely important and also largely unseen (Vandran; the Claret Orders/Oltgar/Chet's past lovers; Wrayne Agrupnin; Kevdak felt this way prior to him showing up) so it's like. Let us see Sabian, he's at the center of Fjord's backstory, we narrowly missed him bc the Nein decided to go mad hard on Avantika right away and then it made sense to part ways post-Aeor (this is valid of them but still) and he's DEFINITELY caught up in this.

I will be happy if they reseal Uk'otoa, but I will be ECSTATIC if they just fucking kill him. Fuck off, snea snake.

Similarly, I'd like to see Caduceus and Essek cameos. We know Cad's not coming (and why would he, tbh, he's got a garden and he does not have any love for the sea and [long derailing meta about Cad and Fjord's friendship redacted]). I highly doubt Essek is joining them for the full two-shot either for mechanical and narrative reasons. However, a brief send-off scene or a Sending to those guys would be a nice touch.

TBH on that note I'd love for it to open with a like, call to action with scenes from each of the groups, so like, Jester, with Fjord and Kingsley, calling up Beau and Yasha; Caleb (and possibly Essek); Veth; and Caduceus, and each of them getting a scene of what they're currently up to and then joining everyone on the ship, or not, as the case may be. (Cad: I'm well! Absolutely not! But if any of you die and it's not Caleb tell him you can teleport here for resurrection or burial, whatever.)

Veth has 6 first level wizard spells now (possibly more if they leveled up further?) and I want her to go fucking wild.

Taliesin gets carte blanche - even when I don't vibe with his characters (which has only happened once) I trust his builds will be at minimum interesting - so I would love to see something absolutely bananas for Kingsley.

I want Marius LePual to finally kill something. Like, a small thing, like a sea spawn dude.

Fjord was considering getting a tattoo, vaguely, from Orly, and he's had the time, and I think that would be very fun. I feel like dexterity is the obvious choice but who knows. Maybe he picks cold resistance.

torn tbh between "somehow, Avantika returned" for comedy and making Vandran very unhappy, and the fact that her zombie death was a significant moment and the moment of the Star Razor's exultation.

My ridiculous long-shot wish is a Beauyasha engagement thus setting up another one shot set at their wedding. This offers an opportunity for Caduceus and Essek content that would make more sense than in this two-shot, it would be very fun, and probably Isharnai interrupts it.

Things I don't want to see are under a cut so that people who want to be in a pure state of bliss can continue. Rock on; as established, I am, as Brian Murphy once said of himself, made almost entirely of salt, but I admire those who are not.

So here's the thing. Do I care, particularly, about the opinions of people who keep calling for two characters who have been dating for like four months and have never once been stated to be married, to get divorced? Do I care, particularly, about the opinions of people whose social skills are so utterly lacking that they genuinely think that the way to achieving closure for unrequited feelings for one of your closest friends, who is dating another one of your closest friends, when you are also either in a relationship, or at least involved in Serious Wizard Flirting, is to confess this love to them, instead of quietly moving on? Like, realistically, it goes like this:

Do I care, particularly, about the opinions of people, who I believe with unshakeable certainty, would 100% be the biggest Fjord stans of all time if he were played exactly the same, beat for beat, word for word, except by either Marisha or Liam (depending on their personal preference), instead of by Travis?

The answer is, of course, yes. I do. The devil on my shoulder constantly whispers to me "but M, someone is WRONG on the INTERNET." Fortunately, the angel on my shoulder has a boombox blasting "Welcome to Wildemount" at top volume and is doing a pretty good job of drowning it out right now.

Anyway, is it Thursday yet?