#and i'm also working on a full length novel

[kingdom-creatin]

this place looks so different now what has happened

[icewindandboringhorror]

finally finished all of one character's entire quests/optional dialogue/questions/etc.... 100,000 words... .... aughhh

[merlyn-bane]

when your fun little haha fic officially passes the fault in our stars in word count with (currently) two more chapters left

[soracities]

oooh please tell us what writing rules are garbage I would love to hear more

it's not that they're garbage, which isn't what i said, just that they annoy me and even then what annoys me is not the "rules" themselves (because i do believe they can be useful depending on what you're writing) but when some of them are put out as the only way to write something as if storytelling is a one-size fits all approach, as if you can reduce the millenia-long history of literature into a fail-proof formula that will work for all writing across all cultures with no room for experimentation.

i think there are as many ways to tell a story as there are stories and how you tell something and the kind of language you use will vary depending on what language actually means to you as a writer. hemingway and faulkner both famously took digs at each other for their styles (even though i think there was a lot of admiration between them) but they are also two very different writers with two completely different approaches to language and how they use that language to say the things they want to say: neither is inherently better, or more right, than the other--their approaches were just right for them; if faulkner wanted to write using the "older, simpler, better" words hemingway loved, he would have. if james joyce wanted to depict dublin the way dickens depicted london, he would have done so. but they didn't.

someone once posted an excellent breakdown by jeff vandermeer of the different writing styles employed by different authors which i was silly enough not to save at the time, but in it he gives an overview of the structure of their sentences, and how complicated or "rich" the language is, without pitting one style against the other. and to be honest, i think writing advice that encourages you to examine and look at that relationship with language, and what it holds for you (and others) and why, is probably more helpful than blanket statements like "stay away from ambiguity" or "avoid long sentences" because neither of those actually mean anything--a sentence is a vessel but it's also a tool, like a hoghair brush or a palette knife; the value of its impact is not an essence that exists in and of itself, but entirely dependent on how you use it, otherwise all literature would just read the same way.

strict adherence to a particular form or structure within a language does not automatically make for better writing, especially not when so much literature actually consists of, and is built from, works and authors actively rebelling against those same traditional forms and structures (but which is also not to say that those forms and structures are inherently useless, either). you can say that long sentences "risk distraction" or are "ineffective" but then where does that leave someone like laszlo krasznahorkai, whose prose runs on like some kind of breathless, hypnotic incantantion for 20, 30 pages without a single full stop in sight? or a book like solar bones by mike mccormack which is made up of a single sentence going on for 200 pages? i'm not saying long sentences can't be boring or tedious, but in all honesty so can short sentences--so can any writing that follows the "rules" to the letter. if something is poorly written, the "rules" matter very little; if it's well written, they matter even less.

all that said, telling people to "avoid long sentences" is not inherently a bad thing because i think the core of it is wanting to ensure your writing remains clear, which is a fair point--but it's an issue, to me at least, when it turns into one of those dictums or pronouncements that actively narrows the potential range language can actually have. clarity is not always about length, or whether or not you cull all of your run-on lines--mihail sebastian drew a very nice distinction in one of his novels when he said "[is] there’s a single way of being clear? A notary can be clear, or a poet, but they don’t seem to me the same thing". a long sentence can be clear, but its clarity exists on different terms to a sentence that is five words long, because its relationship to its content is different. and at the end of the day, that relationship is really what it's about for me and it's distinct to each work and its author.

writers use the language and form they use that best allows them to say what they want to say. no one in their right mind is going to dismiss zadie smith for not writing like angela carter or angela carter for not writing like hemingway or hemingway for not writing like beckett or beckett for not writing like mallarmé. robert frost and sara teasdale were no more correct than the beatniks were. i love pared down, beautifully concise prose, but i also adore books that relish in language and all the various, multi-coloured layers of it, books that eschew (traditional) plot and books that question their own form and the reality of that form, and books that tell a story as straightforwardly as possible.

to be honest i think one of the most formative things i came across, years ago now, was this piece by gary provost, which really sums up the whole notion of "writing rules" for me:

this is not about do's or dont's. it even breaks the first writing rule i learnt in school ("never begin a sentence with 'And'"). but what it does is center an intimate understanding of language, where it can go and how it can get there, and what you want that to do. that's where it's at for me!

[goodluckclove]

On Not Writing

Hi! I'm back. i had a fun two days of doing absolutely nothing writing related, including scrolling this blog. Wife and I played a lot of Valheim. Took a lot of bike rides. Watched Interstellar for the first time - pretty good, kind of silly at the end. It was my first two-day weekend in probably three months, so it was much-needed, hard as it was.

And it got me thinking of some things I wanted to say to the community here. It's especially targeted towards younger writers, of which I used to be one, but I think it can apply to anyone who finds themselves despairing over how much they aren't writing.

Let's imagine you're sitting with me in this coffee shop. It's an overcast Portland morning and I just inadvertently vivisected a croissant. And as we sip our drinks (I ordered a lavender latte), you lament to me. I don't know what to do, Clove. I just haven't been writing!

You know what I say to that?

Good.

This is a new hot take of mine that I, once again, worry about upsetting people with. Because I see a lot of guides here about how to write, or how to write consistently, or how to write through writers block. But I haven't seen a single person talking about the inverse - how to not write. Or - perhaps more accurately - how to exist as a human being separate from your identity as a writer.

This is a problem for me.

Listen - I started young. I was 12 when I wrote my first novella, and 13 when I completed my first novel the next year. Adults in my life were impressed by the big-eyed child writing so many words. They encouraged me. I wrote two more novels, and they continued to encourage me. Because of the potential, right? I could be successful. I could be famous.

People stopped pushing me to try other things. I saw I was getting validation as a writer, so that only pushed me to continue fixating over something I was already enjoying and getting pretty good at. Dad had me writing two thousand words every day, because that's what Stephen King did. At 16 I finished four full-length novels, which everyone thought was really cool and interesting. I was also sporting dual hand braces every day throughout the winter to cope with the carpal tunnel I still struggle with to this day.

There is encouraging a person in their passion. There is also poisoning them with the belief that their self-worth comes from pursuing that passion. This is entirely, absolutely, even more true for younger writers and artists.

I am enraged for the young writer in my heart and in my head. Because they worried about a lot of the same things I see people worry about on here. Oh, if I don't write I'm not a writer! And to an extent they're right, as to be a writer you need to at some point write some stuff.

But here's the fucking thing, Young Clover - a child should not strive for the work ethic of a professional adult. You did not need to write 2k words a day to be a writer. You were a writer as soon as you updated that terrible Invader Zim fanfiction you wrote when you were 10.

And more than that, though, the most important thing to a person should not be their job and aspirations. If you don't write every day, you're still a writer. If you've never written anything, you aren't - and that's fine. You might write something later down the line, or you might not. Either way you are still entitled to exist on the planet and capable of living a full and passionate and wonderful life.

Hear my words: being a writer is not more important than being a human being.

If you aren't writing right now, maybe you're not supposed to be. Maybe you're meant to be nurturing your relationships, or nurturing yourself. Maybe you're supposed to be volunteering. Or meeting new people. Or gaining a new field of knowledge. Or getting really good at making focaccia bread. Or watching every Mark Wahlberg movie.

I don't like to hear this any more than you do. If I was told that I, for some reason, was not allowed to write for the rest of my life, I would be miserable for maybe a long time. After that passed it's my hope that I would move on and do other things, because my worth is not dependent on being a writer. I like doing it. I like being it, and I hope to be one for the rest of my life. But I never want it to be the first thing people see when they look at me. I don't even like bringing it up in conversation with people I don't already know.

So yeah, if you have "writer's block", maybe consider putting down the pickaxe and getting some rest. Step away entirely from the large boulder that stands between you being the next Stephen King or Brandon Sanderson or Teen Dystopia Writer no. 2321. Take a break, and I mean an ACTUAL break, not the kind where you spend the whole time sulking about work.

I am legitimately begging the writers on here to have developed lives and interests outside of writing. I am begging because I do not have that and it has consistently been one of the hardest things of my life.

You prioritize living outside your writing and it will improve the quality of your writing when you get back to it, as it'll allow you a frame of reference that extends beyond our niche industry. Or it might make you realize that, while you enjoy writing, what you really love is ceramics. Or game developing. Or mutual-aid activism. Or the movies of Mark Wahlberg.

It is not your job to treat yourself like you already have a dozen deadlines and an audience teetering on the edge of disappointment. That's ultimately not going to help you. Your job on this earth is to exist fully, for the sake of the universe that wants so desperately to live vicariously through you.

So breathe. Breathe and calm down. You aren't a failure and there's nothing you have to prove. All you have to do today is drink some water and have a nice snack while you look at a cloud.

Please be kind. All of us need to be kinder to each other and to ourselves.

That's all I want to say. I love you dearly. Please let me know if you need anything.

[gffa]

Do you have any Sith!Obi-Wan fics you can recommend? 🙏

Hi! You can do a search for Sith Obi-Wan in my bookmarks which brings up several or you can start with the novel-length ones that still live rent-free in my head even years after I've read them: Equinox by lilyconrad, obi-wan/anakin, NSFW, 95.9k During the Clone Wars, Obi-Wan and Anakin crash on a remote planet and take shelter in the ruins of a grand estate only to find they are not alone. This fic was written for me, so I'm biased, but it's genuinely my favorite for the trope because Lily put all this thought into the undercurrents going on between the characters, because it gives such care about why any version of Obi-Wan would fall to the dark and what he would be like, because each chapter had moments of foreshadowing and care given to lush, beautiful descriptions and the creeping dread of the place. It's a gorgeous fic and I think even if someone doesn't usually like Sith versions of the characters, the way this one does it (created reflections, not that our characters are falling, so it's scratching the itch of how it's an extension of our characters, but our characters are not on that exact path), I would gently suggest this one.

Lex Talionis by intermundia, obi-wan/anakin & cast, NSFW, 187.1k Or, how Obi-Wan and Anakin fell to the dark side, obtained their revenge, and saved the galaxy in the process. My other favorite Sith Obi-Wan fic, this one is about how these characters fall to the dark, and the author takes his time with how it happens step by step, but also how these massive, galaxy-spanning changes happen, how it's a combination of how sexy the dark side can be but also how awful it can be, how much pain and hurt it can cause. There's so much care and effort put into this story, it spans such a huge story, that it's one of those fics I want to physically print out in special binding because it deserves to be a pretty set on my bookshelf.

wicked thing by imaginarykat, obi-wan/anakin & cast, NSFW, 124.2k the story of how Anakin exists in a perpetual state of intense embarrassment, Kenobi is enjoying it a little too much, and everything is, generally speaking, a gigantic mess. This is an AU where Obi-Wan never trained Anakin and is already a Sith when we meet him, and there's a reason it's one of the most famous fics in the fandom, because it is the most charismatic thing I've just about ever read, the sheer amount of dark side sexy charm coming off Obi-Wan is incredible, the tension between him and Anakin is delicious, and the writing/plotting of the storyline is superb. I could not put this fic down when I read it, there's a reason this fic helped really popularize the trope, because it's just so goddamned addicting and glorious to read.

Soldier, Poet, King by Glare, obi-wan/anakin & cast, NSFW, time travel, 106.4k wip Second chances are very rarely given, but the Force smiles upon two of its favorite children and returns them to a time before their actions have met their consequences. Anakin Skywalker, also known as Darth Vader, seeks redemption while Obi-Wan “Ben” Kenobi, disillusioned with the Jedi Order and its Code, falls to the Darkness. Trapped out of time, Master and Apprentice must once again work together to stop Sideous’ plans from reaching fruition and bring Balance to the Force—all the while dodging the Jedi, the Sith, and their feelings for each other. I think this might even have been the first Sith!Obi-Wan fic that I read and I know it remains dear to me because I reread it a year or two ago and got sucked in just as hard as before. Obi-Wan is dropped back into his younger body, feels like the whole thing is a bunch of bullshit, gets sucked into dark thoughts, and just goes full dark side dom on Anakin and fixing the galaxy through machinations and foreknowledge. It's so fun and it does such great service to Anakin's level of power, that this guy is an absolute dragon in the Force, but that he also very much wants Obi-Wan's hand on the back of his neck to force him to kneel to the one person he loves. Hnngggg, it really cemented me as a fan of this trope because of how well it scratches the sexy dark side dom/sub while they're both badass dynamic, I love it so much.

I'm still making my way through a lot of Star Wars fic, so if anyone has any more recs, feel free to jump in, especially if you have some gen ones, since I mostly read pairing fic for Sith!Obi-Wan (because I'm personally after the sexy dom/sub dynamic with it)!

[renthony]

It's so funny when people genuinely ask me why I get so wrapped up in my little gay cartoons. I'm a queer making queer art, why the fuck do you think I'm invested in the way queer art is produced and received?

I have a short story available as an ebook and paperback, and there are copies of it in several libraries around the world. I'm working on a short story collection and a full-length novel right now, with the hopes that one will be ready by the end of the year.

I have to worry about censorship because it directly affects me as a queer artist. What happens if one of my sales platforms ever decides that the queers are too degenerate to monetize anymore? What happens if art by trans people starts getting rounded up and burned again? What happens to me, who creates art the conservatives despise?

And on the flip side, I also live with the very real possibility that the jackasses who scream that such-and-such queer media "didn't do enough" or was "stereotypical" or "doesn't actually represent the community well" will turn on me and decide that I need to be "held accountable" for "making The Community look bad" because they don't like the way I portray my own queer experience. I've seen it happen to my peers in the queer writing scene, and I genuinely worry that it'll happen to me or my wife (also an author) one day.

I care about the way queer media is treated because I create queer media. If y'all want to actually see more queer media, mainstream or indie, you gotta actually let queers make messy art. You gotta understand the ways queer art gets censored, and why.

And if you read that and think, "but that sounds really hard, and I don't really know how to do research," that's where I come in to say, "that is why I am doing it and trying to translate it into an accessible format for other people. That is why I care so much and study so much and talk about the queer cartoons so goddamn much."

[anticmiscellaney]

what's your favorite part of writing and drawing newoldrare?

Apart from the fact that I love writing and drawing and have fun doing it and would do it all day every day if I could, it's that I can do exactly whatever the fuck I want with it.

It's likely commercially unpublishable for a range of reasons. All the stories are designed to be printed by specific processes and assembled in ways that will probably not translate to a convenient book, and nothing about traditional publishing sounds like a good deal to me. The comments I've gotten about my other scripts relating to music have been annoying. "Young people don't know who these bands are" - okay I'm not writing YA but no problem, books are a great place to find out about new things. I'm making stories about what I'm interested in and they are an invitation for readers to join me, as I have joined many creators in their interests.

I have a few graphic novel scripts that I'd be happy to draw for traditional publication and maybe one day I'll get the chance, but I also have a full time job because I need health insurance to pay for surgery. I have rent and bills and student loans. There are only so many hours in the day, and if I'm not getting paid to do art, I will only be making art I'm insane about.

NewOldRare is what I'm insane about. The art styles and approaches are varied because I love to try different things for different stories. It'll keep growing; I have a lot of ideas noted down, a lot of scripts of various lengths written, and quite a few thumbnailed. It's small scale. It's specific. It's niche. I hide a lot of things in the backgrounds and they don't necessarily matter to the story, but they matter to me. It's probably pointless, it's just quiet snapshots of the lives of two ordinary people and it's kind of silly, but I care about it. It's partly a response to how alienating I find most queer comics/art, but it's not offering incisive commentary or judgement. It also started as a porn illustration series and I forget most people don't know that because I can't post any of it here.

I held off on posting any of it online for a pretty long time and just sent people PDFs of it because I didn't think anyone else would care - friends are obligated to at least pretend. The fact that some people I don't know like it and see value in it is strange to think about, but also very cool.

I guess that was a long way to say I love doing this work because I enjoy the process, but I also like what it represents about my development as an artist and it has helped me figure out a few things.

[magellanicclouds]

Halo - An Essay: regarding waste management systems and devices for MJOLNIR armoured Spartans It has been a hectic sort of few weeks. Between work and getting sick again (for the fourth time already this year thanks to my crewmates who can't remember it's their duty to stay home when they're ill) I've been on the outs. I haven't had the energy for much, but I'm usually a pretty active person, so this has kind of made me loopy? Which feels like as good a time as any to talk at length about the concept of catheterizing Spartans for waste management in MJOLNIR.

Let me explain.

This Silly Post crossed my dash recently and I fully understand it is meant as lighthearted fun - we have fun here. But it also dragged out some strong thoughts I've had haunting in the back of my mind about this for years because I'm super normal about Halo, and have time on my hands and the right amount of sleep deprivation and medication on board. So I wrote 3500 words about it. And about Karen Traviss, who is pretty knotted up in this conversation, since she's the one who decided to start it back in 2011.

To preface, I'm not an expert, but I have worked in emergency medicine for 25 years, and been a fan of Halo for almost as long. I've had more of a lukewarm relationship with it the last decade or so if I'm being honest, but it will always have a home in my heart; I just think letting it under my skin like that in the first place may have made me feral and prone to biting. Thankfully, I can always happily rotate Fred in my mind until the heat-death of the universe, so that's nice. Anyway, full disclosure: the essay below contains discussion about medical devices, physical trauma, and I am sharing quite a lot of personal negativity about the Kilo-5 trilogy and Karen Traviss. That said, if you'd like to sit in on the length of what I'm about to yell into the sky about all this, you can find it under the cut. I love you.

Welcome to my dissertation.

Section 1 - The Relevant Background:

Equipping Spartans with urinary catheters weeded itself into the Halo universe in the 2011 book Halo: Glasslands, during a conversation between Spartan II Naomi-010 and ODST Mal Geffen. Glasslands was the first in Karen Traviss's Kilo-5 trilogy, and she is both the originator of this, and the only official Halo author or source to have used catheters specifically since. Some context: I don't personally like these books, or their author, or even her reasoning for why she chose to add this. My personal preference doesn't make something 'bad', and I'm not out to hurt any feelings. Kilo-5 isn't a total wash for me, there are some characters and ideas that I'd of otherwise loved to have seen explored through the lens of a different author, but these books felt smothered under Traviss's habit of always injecting her very loud personal voice into the narrative fabric. I think this is something that's fine to do in an original series, but doesn't really belong in an established third party IP. She bangs on about so much of her own narrow worldview and self-assured prejudices across the trilogy that still discussing them today creates division in the fandom, and sadly did a lot of lasting damage to a couple characters. But for the topic here, the dialogue that started all this cath chat came from Naomi-010, having idle conversation with Mal who asks her about bathroom breaks. “I’m catheterized. Another reason why that machine has to be so precisely calibrated. This suit plugs into me in a lot of places.” 'The Machine' she's referring to is a Brokkr assembly, which was introduced to the lore as a large mechanical armature used to get Spartans in and out of MJOLNIR. You can see them in action in cinematics from Halo 4 (+Spartan Ops) and 5.

One single mention, and it was big news. Traviss was naturally interviewed about it because of course she was - people can't help themselves but forget an entire novel and tunnel vision on 'but how pee pee?', and her answer has always irritated me. It's not in what she says, so much as what 'what she says' means in her voice. Traviss didn't answer it directly, but instead talked about how she likes to get into character's heads by addressing the mundane necessity of things that often go overlooked to expand a sense of familiarity with the character and their world. Sounds super reasonable, I know, but don't give her too much credit - that's not a quote. It's just me paraphrasing and honestly I was pretty generous in my wording. Probably because I agree! What bugs me about it, is if you've ever read literally any interview with her, or her personal musings about her writing process, you know there's a bit of an 'honesty' issue there. She's somebody who feels perfectly comfortable ignoring established character voices, traits, or histories to satisfy whatever roles she's reinvented for them, and too many others wind up as mouthpieces. How much are you really challenging yourself in finding characters' voices when most of them are just yours? And the part about familiarity with their world? I giggled a little. She doesn't care about their world, or their aesthetics, or their technology, or their medicine. Because she didn't care about Halo while writing these, and she's not vague about admitting that. It's a matter of pride for her to purposefully refuse to research those things, in the same way she disregarded Star Wars and Gears of War - she doesn't consider the effort to be a valuable part of her process. So instead she'll skim the foundation, gather some recognizable names, pick her targets, and trusts that her personal experiences combined with an outsider perspective will generate better content to seamlessly overwrite what existed. Cool, Karen. Annoying, but why bring all that up? We're here to talk about catheters, right? Well, the fandom for the most part begin and end their assessment of the dialogue at urinary catheters, but the whole quote implies so much more than that - "This suit plugs into me in a lot of places." We're not just dealing with a cath, but apparently with multiple additional external-to-invasive connections. Reader, this dialogue is a plinth to Traviss's bizarre refusal to research not only the franchises she's contracted to write in, but also just into the basic function and hazards of existing concepts that she wants to introduce, and all because she's convinced herself she's done learning about the world. Choosing to ignore the creative freedom of limitless potential in a future of technology that would be basically magic to us today, and instead degrade 529 years of advancement is certainly a take, but it's even more ridiculous to do it with a subject (The Spartan Programme) that is considered to be the peak of advancement in that future's setting. That's clownery, just like her alleged commitment to adjusting her perspective to suit a universe's world.

I want to close out this section with a question: Why is it that writers in the Halo space - both fan and official - cling so tightly to current-day modern concepts as if they'd still be perfectly relevant in 500+ years? Music, for example, apparently suffered a multi-century stagnation in lots of published and fanmade Halo media. Though my partner made a strong counterpoint about this to be fair: we still listen to music composed by Mozart. So there's an argument to be made there. Medicine though. There is way less latitude to embrace the classics there. It's been shown across several games, novels, and films to be sufficiently advanced well beyond anything we're currently capable of or even understand, so why undermine that and choose to drag it centuries backward? For clarity, I am not talking about what might be standard in the public or private sectors, nor the enduring things that'd be used by the public and military alike, like sterile dressings, syringes, supplemental oxygen equipment. Those are the Basics and they will be relevant to us indefinitely. But I'm talking about the UNSC. I'm talking about ONI R&D. I'm talking about Section Three. Retrograding tech and failing to address a necessity that applies to every living person in the Super Soldier Wizardry department makes my mouth flatten into a tight little line.

Section Two - Caths, and why this whole thing got written:

Indwelling urinary catheters, both urethral and suprapubic. There's a laundry list of problems here, but I've distilled it down to the three biggest when suggesting they'd have any safe practical application in Spartans: Care. Activity. Damage. There is unreasonable expectations of care and maintenance for caths with regards to people who can be on operations isolated for months at a time with no support of any kind and are often limited to carrying only what can be kept on their person. The level of extreme physical activity Spartans engage in on any perfectly normal day whether deployed or not is unfit for the stability and safety of a cath. And damage; obvious enough, but with this one I'll be taking a huge emphasis on concussive forces - explosions. Something Spartans are subjected to a lot. I'll be using the height of modern-day catheter quality as a baseline for this, since that's what Traviss felt was sufficient. Regarding Urethral vs Suprapubic, Traviss doesn't specify by name, but Naomi's comment in full reads to me that she's only catheterized temporarily while armoured, hence the assembly needing to be so finely calibrated. Foley caths are temporary urethral caths that would only supplement the urinary process while a person was armoured. Suprapubic caths however are surgically placed devices. They do need routine tube replacement to keep them clean, but unlike the Foley that just serves as an aide measure for an otherwise fully functioning bladder, suprapubic caths are usually placed in people with congenital bladder disfunction, or who've suffered injury or disease that left the bladder in poor health or failure. This type of access will always require a tube in place and this would be the exclusive method of urination - in or out of armour. My Big Three Concerns fit both types similarly, though there is some additional risks associated with urethral caths that I'll cover.

Care: Caring for an invasive cath is a not insignificant effort. They're prone to blockage, kinking, and bacterial growth. They're so frequently responsible for UTIs and kidney stones that these complications are just considered the Standard Fair for having a cath. Their need to be frequently replaced because of their penchant for bacterial growth is the kicker here - whole floral colonies sprout up in caths and can eek their way out into the body through compromised tissue and wreck havoc. They have no self-cleaning mechanism, and steadily deteriorate. Changing and replacing an indwelling cath is a procedure that requires additional supplies that'd have to be carried, and needs to be done in a practiced and clean setting; preferably medical. Granted, there are people who manage the removal and insertion of their own caths at home, but they still need to ensure a clean and safe environment while they do this. A Spartan could never be guaranteed that, nor would it even be wise to consider the vulnerability of removing so much armour to handle it. Modern day caths are recommended to be replaced every 30 days or so, with some models able to be in place for a few months at a time, but that's with constant daily care and cleaning; something that'd be unreasonable for a Spartan to maintain while entrenched who knows where for who knows how long, and without access to replacement medical supplies. Those endurance times between replacements are geared for the average public person who leads an average public life and care for their cath as directed and don't get into fist fights with Sangheili. Needless to say, the endurance time for the same device in a Spartan who leads a wildly different lifestyle probably cuts those times down to a third.

Activity: Modern day caths are designed to offer people the most utility and versatility possible. Both models are available for people who are bed-bound or have extremely limited mobility, as well as for those who are mobile, independent, and live out average lives. With regards to the latter, suprapubics are somewhat more common, if for no other reason than to reduce the Foley's higher risks of induction injury, but modern urethral caths also allow for regular movement and activity with a more reduced chance of becoming dislodged or damaged than they would have had a couple decades ago. But when I say regular activity, I mean going on a walk. Shopping for groceries. Doing basic house chores. Even light exercise and sexual activity can be managed with physician advisement and the appropriate precautions taken. Anytime a Spartan was fielded they'd have to be all the more overly-cautious about Movements Outside of Their Control during confrontations, maneuvers, ambush, environmental or vehicular incidents. Even when things go well there'd be too much risk involved. That said, traumatic decatheterizations happen more frequently than anyone would like, and I'm talking about regular old Joe Everybody. I respond to no less than a dozen of these incidents a year. Both types of catheter are held in place by a bulb balloon that's inflated from a port with around 10-30ccs of saline after the tube enters the bladder (30ccs would be more appropriate for better security of the line). Before removing a cath, the saline is removed to deflate the balloon and the tube is guided out - with a Foley cath, that means being guided out of the urethra. When a Foley cath is traumatically removed, the saline filled balloon - which is like five times wider in diameter than the average 6mm urethra - does a pretty devastating amount of damage on it's way out, penis or vagina; though a penile urethra has significantly more length to damage, and the penile meatus very typically is torn. These incidents run high risk of bladder hematoma as well, which requires urgent surgical intervention. The very worst traumatic decatheterizations I've responded to were all penile and had trauma to external tissue. Ever microwaved a hotdog a little too long?

Damage: How often are Spartans subjected to explosive and other concussive forces? Silly question - answer: a lot and often and unavoidable. And we know they still feel the powerful feedback. Despite shields and dampeners and a self-moderating gel layer, strong inertial forces are still felt through the suits. Across multiple novels we're given details about near misses and blasts, accelerated or uncontrolled falls, rattling their teeth, hampering their vision, hearing, or balance; they've been rendered unconscious and suffered internal injuries. The fact that most of these events don't flat out kill them is a credit to their armour and augmentations. For reference - when a person experiences explosive or concussive force from a distance enough to avoid separation of limbs, bisection, etc, the totality of their injuries can't and won't be seen externally. How they present on the outside is just the tippy tip of the iceburg - it's what's happened to them internally that you need to be concerned about. Cracked or fractured bones, torn musculature, arterial shearing, hollow organ rupture, cardiac and brain tissue bleed, to name some common ones, and this kind of trauma extends to all implanted devices as well. For example, rods and nails and other structural aids or replacements are much more resilient than your organic tissues, and can dislodge when tissues tear or rupture, damaging anything in their way like shrapnel. The fragile little balloon of a catheter will shatter when subjected to even relatively minor explosive force, so to even consider for a moment that this would be a viable piece of equipment for people intended to routinely be involved in explosive environments is beyond willful negligence. That there wouldn't be a better solution to the question of waste management - a necessity for literally all human people who make up the entirety of the Spartan branch, with the infinite funding of ONI R&D seems so stupid to me that I… well, that I wrote this. Because, friends - participating in active warfare is not cath-safe. The kinds of physical demands and forces on Spartan bodies are not cath-safe. The risks will never outweigh the benefits to this. Even while sealed in powered armour and a skinsuit tech layer, the very thought of Section Three engineers or Halsey or anyone involved in the development of MJOLNIR dismissing the glaring obvious failure of Spartans having any kind of externalized invasive devices is so unreasonably negligent that it could only be the brainchild of an author who's convinced that these characters are all actually just psuedo-intelligent government boogiemen who aren't as capable as they claim to be. But No. They are that capable, and they are that intelligent and the fact that they have a bottomless budget and deeply flexible ethics is literally what makes them so dangerous.

So if we have to address this, how do we do it? Apparently there was always an official answer for this. Former Franchise Development Director, creator of the Master Chief**, and extremely racist asshole Frank O'Connor weighed in on this in the same interview, where he almost immediate rejected and denied Traviss's catheterization claim and says that 'this sort of stuff' was the kind of thing he and the other creative heads at Bungie/343i talked and planned about all the time. So how does this work then, because we're invested now. According to 'ol Frankie's elegant input: they just pee freely into the suit. That's it. For clarity, he's talking about the skinsuit and not the MJOLNIR interior proper. He goes on to say that connectivity between body and MJOLNIR at all levels is fully noninvasive, but precise, and that it doesn't matter what kind of body output a Spartan introduces into the suit interior, because a hygienic valve system (??) will scrub it continually and collect all matter for recycling and reintroduction via capillary action powered by movement. It's not clear in what layers or intermediaries these mechanisms occupy, he doesn't break it down more than that. But that's the answer, and it did exist back when Traviss was penning Kilo-5.

Is this answer better than haphazardly plugging extension cords from actual organ systems into MJOLNIR interior? Yes. Like, leagues better by comparison, but also I still think it sucks. To me anyway. It's flat out gross as hell, which definitely fits the personal brand of a man who proudly overfed his cat and called himself "Stinkles", but also it just doesn't strike me as the kind of design strategy ONI would pursue for any of their assets. Beside it just being 100% torn from Dune's stillsuits, it's also missing that special brand of proprietary Section Three je ne sais quoi. There's layers upon layers of too-specialized equipment installed into these people for everything else, why skip this? A body function that should have been Point 3 on a 50 point list of 'stuff to manage'. Also though? It's a lot of freedom. This is just another easy opportunity to add yet another layer of dependence. Spartans are expensive equipment. It doesn't do to give them any fewer reasons to think they can ever walk away.

So anyway, I figured I'd take a crack at it. I came up with this while editing the last two paragraphs: [Waste management] - a fully internalized collection and processing device - lets say a cybernetic implantation - that entirely replaces the bladder. It has bio-organic lumens that interconnect it to the GI and Hepatic organs. The implant assists in accelerating the processing of gathering and refining waste materials with the help of nanobots that identify and redirect waste along the lumens of each system, plus they keep the implant clean and free of bad flora. All twice-processed waste gets refined a lot quicker and any water by-product of the process is refined and redistributed back to the organs along the lumens. None of the refined water is removed from the body for drinking, because that's an unnecessary step; it's already inside. (Drinking water would be the responsibility of a suit system more likely - like, sweat leeching in the skinsuit; refine, filtrate, purify, collect into a reservoir, and jettison the excess sodium. ) There is no 'extraction of other viable nutrient' from the remainder, it's been twice identified as waste. It gets catabolized and consumed by the nanobots as a fuel source, and no externalized waste is created at all while the Spartan is geared up. The implant doesn't always run like this - it only engages this way when the Spartan is wearing MJOLNIR, and when they're not, it just works like an out-of-the-box bladder. The intermittence of usage lets the organic organs truck along as usual, preventing risk of atrophy, and the Spartan can just use a bathroom like everyone else. I'm not a bioengineer, but I do like sci fi and I think all that sounds like something that'd be possible in this sandbox. And that's the real fun of it, isn't it? There's no way anyone today can anticipate what sort of gadgetry might be available 500+ years from now, especially in a fictional universe that includes military tech hybridized with reverse engineered alien tech.

I think it's fascinating when writers and artists shake loose and really grab the reins, and I love seeing the fruit of that labour in this particular tumblr community so often. We're not a huge Halo circle, but we're a passionate one, and if this essay leaves you with nothing else, I hope it will at least remind you to Go For It when you're writing your next fic or drawing your next piece, or composing, or sewing, or printing, or anything!

In Conclusion: Rest easy, friends.

Despite Traviss's word and even books that went to print, the official canon is that Spartans are not catheterized. If that's a bummer for anyone, canon can't stop you from writing whatever you want, but I do hope maybe you'll remember my reasoning for why it might not be the best idea? At least not for armoured Spartans. A Spartan, but they're laid up in hospital? Any non-Spartan personnel? Maybe you're writing in the public sector, a colony world or vessel? Sure - I'll bet caths are still plenty widely used. Why not? They're a blissfully simple and useful effective piece of equipment. It's just all about adjusting and adapting for practicality. Medical science, like any technology, adapts and evolves infinitely as we learn and discover new things. Treatments or drug algorithms I'd of used just last year have already undergone changes, and protocols are amended constantly. It's why a person 'practices' medicine; why a scientist is always a student. If questions like this or similar really need answering in your next work, remember: Give yourself the credit you deserve, and embrace the spirit of invention. Let my Cyber Bladder, by Sparklets be the candle in the window for you!

You may all retrieve your keys from the bowl and unsilence your phones. Stay safe and please text me when you get home. Thank you. ' u ' **Addendum: Former Bungie Creative Art Director Marcus Lehto is in fact the person who is most associated with the creation of the Master Chief.**

[wovenstarlight]

I got an interesting anonymous ask on the SFS Tumblr asking about the reasoning behind a bunch of Yoohyun's decisions that had… less-than-stellar outcomes, let's say? (LMAO.) and I'd like to keep the TL blog clean so I'm answering Anon here. I'm gonna post their ask in full for reference, because the answers to each individual question overlap:

Hi, thank you very much for your time, energy and effort. What you are doing is really amazing and admirable. I know you are busy enough and I shouldn't trouble you, but after reading the manhwa, I had questions about Yoohyun's logic and sentiment, and I became more confused after reading the novel and I don't know who to ask. Please ignore my message if it's to much trouble. 1: Why doesn't Yoohyun spend the last years of his life on earth peacefully with Yoojin, even though he knows that the world will end soon? 2: What did Yoohyun accomplish by leaving and humiliating Yoojin that he was persistent to do it for so many years? 3: Why instead of using his forces and technologies to protect Yoojin, he announces to the world that it is open season on him and he is worthless? (Normaly no one dares to harm the family of an S class but Yoohyun expose Yoojin to danger by abandoning him.) 4: Why does Yoohyun stop protecting Yoojin when the most dangerous part of Yoojin's life as an F class hunter begins? (Using his influence he could easily ban Yoojin from entering dungeons. Or he could have secretly formed a group of the most powerful hunters to go with Yoojin to dungeons. This way he could have provided him with everything he needed and keep him safe. That is, if he had any intention of protecting him.) 5: Why would Yoohyun gain all that resources, power, wealth and connections and he sit around and does nothing so that Yoojin would face death every day and rot in the basement? He gain all that for what, if not for protecting Yoojin? 6: Why doesn't he ever change his procedure or provide new options for Yoojin to stop going to dungeons? (Yoojin has no chance for a peaceful life due to not having a degree and being a notorious person. And he doesn't know about that cult.) Yoojin got to see his 30 years old birthday cause the cult didn't feel like killing him and he took care of himself in dungeons and was lucky that only his legs broke. So why would Yoohyun identify as a doting brother? The more I think about it the less I understand.

(crossposted on AO3, if you'd prefer to read there)

Okay, so, I'm really prone to rambling at length and this is a subject I have strong feelings on, so I'll give you a very short version of my answer in bullet points, and then a longer version with proper chapter-specific references and full explanations of what I think was going on.

Yoohyun wants to repay Yoojin for all the care and love he's given him, but as a 17-year-old, he doesn't have much social power

Yoohyun's Awakening puts himself and anyone he loves (i.e. Yoojin) in a dangerous position, because while he has individual physical power as an S-rank, he still lacks social power and also can't singlehandedly protect Yoojin 24/7

Yoohyun, in all his rash 17-year-old glory, takes the drastic action of cutting off Yoojin, planning to build up enough power to protect Yoojin and then reunite with him. Yoojin, as just your ordinary everyday 22-year-old, faces no risks other than people targeting him in order to hurt Yoohyun (I don't agree that no one would dare to harm the family of an S-rank, for reasons I'll elaborate on later in the long answer), so if Yoohyun's not close to Yoojin, then that cuts it down to "no risks at all", right…? So tell the media, tell the world, that no, Han Yoohyun doesn't give a shit about Han Yoojin. Yoohyun assumes he'll be able to explain it all to Yoojin one day and that he'll understand. (This should answer your Question 2 and Q3.)

But it doesn't work out as expected. Yoohyun thought it'd take much less time to establish his position than it does in reality (the assumed 4-ish years ended up as 6+ years). Also, Yoojin's gone from trying to make up with Yoohyun in a way that'll let them be together again (not going to happen, because Yoohyun's still not ready to bring Yoojin back into the fold) to being in his own terrible situation, so he's started lashing out at Yoohyun. So even if Yoohyun was in a stable enough situation to try reconciling with him, Yoojin might not be open to it by this point

Somewhere along the way, Yoohyun learns from the filial duty addict Diarma the world is going to end. He doesn't drop everything and go to live with Yoojin because even now, there's still the concern that maybe Yoohyun won't be able to protect Yoojin from everything, and maybe Yoojin doesn't want Yoohyun around, anyway. There's no use in going to live with Yoojin if it'll just end up getting Yoojin killed through Yoohyun's inaction (Q1).

So Yoohyun keeps maintaining his guild and his power so he can keep protecting Yoojin from what he thinks are the Real Threats. (Because the worlds of low- and high-rank Hunters are VERY different. Yoohyun probably assumes that because Yoojin's not facing the high-rank Hunter dangers, he's facing no dangers—a stupid but understandable mistake, given that Yoojin also assumed the exact same thing in reverse about Yoohyun! It sucks, it really does, but I really do think Yoohyun just… didn't realize just how bad it was.) (Q5) And the world can end whenever it wants; if there's no challenging it, then at least Yoohyun's kept Yoojin safe in the meantime.

And the one danger they have in common, dungeons—you suggest Yoohyun banning Yoojin from entering any, but Yoohyun's cut himself off from Yoojin entirely, remember. Trying to interfere in his life would be met with (a) STRONG rejection by a deeply hurt Yoojin who doesn't understand why Yoohyun thinks he has any say in Yoojin's life anymore, and (b) interest by Yoohyun's rivals, who'd wonder why he's trying to keep his hyung away from dangers when he says he doesn't care about that hyung's wellbeing, putting Yoojin right back in their crosshairs. (Q4)

Also, the immoral people have been killing Caregivers of S-ranks. Diarma might have told Yoohyun about this. If he did, then Yoohyun's goals would definitely have gone from "stay strong and one day reconcile with hyung" to "NEVER get close to hyung, because there are beings outside this world, much more powerful than anything I can match in a reasonable timespan, who will 100% kill him". At which point, even if Yoohyun had wanted to reconcile with him, or compromise by just adjusting his plan and talking to Yoojin a little more, or literally anything past making a show of total and complete indifference, he couldn't have without knowingly risking Yoojin's life. (Q6)

You and I and all the other S-Ranks readers, removed from this situation as we are, can think of half a dozen ways Yoohyun could probably have gotten around things. But the simple fact is that in that situation, under that much pressure, with that much emotional attachment to his brother and literally everything that mattered to him at stake if he fucked up in the tiniest of ways—forget making perfect decisions, there was absolutely no way Yoohyun was going to do anything other than what seemed least risky. Because to do otherwise would be risking Yoojin’s life and therefore his own. And the choices you’ve already mades, the path you’re already on—no matter how bad it is for you, no matter how bad it is for the people you love, no matter how much it hurts—will always, always be less risky than the unknown path, because at least this way, you know what dangers to expect and brace for. At the core of the matter, it’s just that… the path that was best for Yoojin's happiness wasn't the path that was best for Yoojin's life expectancy, you see? And Yoojin can't be happy if he's dead. Yoohyun can't be alive if Yoojin's dead. That's all it came down to.

……oh my god that was so long actually. And that was supposed to be the TL;DR. The long version is going to be SO long. I hope you like reading 50-page passionate essays. There's a poll at the end, you can look forward to that!!!

(Also, okay, before we jump into the Deep End. Two disclaimers.

Anon, you said you read the manhwa and novel, but I read only the novel, so some of my chapter references might be unfamiliar. I know they shuffled events around a little in the webtoon, too, so I'll try and describe the general events so you can find any webtoon parallels.

Yoojin's a REALLY unreliable narrator and definitely doesn't know a lot of what Yoohyun's gone through. Part of that is because there's things he has no way to pick up on or deduce; part of that is because he wants to not think about Yoohyun going through bad shit; part of that is because Yoohyun doesn't want Yoojin worrying about him and has actively hidden the worse parts of his life from him. So a fair part of what I'm talking about is going to be reading between the lines and extrapolating.

Okay, disclaimers done!) Now on to the long version with references. Let's go point-by-point based on the TL;DR.

#1: Yoohyun wanting to repay Yoojin

I mean, the skill's called Last/Final Repayment! Isn't that enough? Where did you think that came from? There certainly wasn't anything Yoojin wanted to repay Yoohyun for.

Okay, no, more seriously. Yoohyun and Yoojin have grown up with only each other to depend on. Yoohyun has watched Yoojin take care of him alone their whole lives, with no outside support, keeping a roof over their head and their stomachs filled. For Yoohyun's sake, Yoojin has given up:

A complete education, with Yoojin having "dropped out of school to take care of his little brother", as mentioned in chapter 1.

A proper social life. In chapter 25, Yoojin says his friends in his early 20s were "middle-aged factory workers" instead of people his own age.

Hobbies. He says to Yerim and Myeongwoo in chapter 45 that one of his "few hobbies" is taking spam calls, but his character profile from the E-books volume 1 confirms it's his only hobby, and one that's now fading… which leaves him with zero personal interests. (The spam calling thing is almost certainly something that sprouted from loneliness in the years that the brothers were separated, by the way. After all, why would Yoojin waste time listening to some stranger on the phone talk to him about something he doesn’t care about? Most likely because there isn’t—wasn’t—really anyone else who’s willing to talk to him, anymore.)

The sole birthday present of "a 10,000 won bill to buy something tasty to have with his friends" he got from their parents, which "would be used for Han Yoohyun’s birthday. As [it was] every year", as mentioned in chapter 239, during Yoohyun’s flashback to childhood.

And Yoohyun, a helpless child, could only watch as Yoojin gave up all of that, to no real benefit of his own, just to focus all his attention and resources on supporting Yoohyun.

By the time he was in middle school, Yoohyun was already talking about becoming a doctor since it'd be "advantageous in a lot of aspects"; he says he "just wanted to make it so you [Yoojin] could live comfortably" (chapter 258). Yoojin wouldn't have to be the sole earner, and would've been able to pursue his own happiness as well as Yoohyun's. Yoohyun wants very badly for Yoojin to not have to worry about him anymore. It makes sense that that sentiment would remain even after he Awakened.

#2: Yoohyun's Awakening

And boy what an Awakening it was! Straight from a random orphaned kid with zero social life and decent grades to one of the world's most desirable and dangerous individuals, basically overnight. He has none of the social sway that the rich and well-connected Sung Hyunjae or the professional athletes Moon Hyuna and Choi Sukwon do, and he refuses to get the help of big corporations like Choi Sukwon and Bak Mingyu (and Yoon Kyeongsoo? I forget if Soodam was also a corp-backed guild). So he's got no power, but he's also declared his intent to create a guild, and that combined with his nature as a born S-rank makes people perceive him as a threat. Maybe not so much in the early days, when people think he's just an arrogant, stupid kid who's going to crash and burn, but definitely more so as time passed, which Sung Hyunjae confirms in chapter 152:

“Wasn’t [Han Yoohyun] at the age where one faces a lot of problems, starting out living alone?” […] “He wasn’t even alone, strictly speaking. I heard Team Head Seok and the others joined Haeyeon early on.” I heard that Seok Simyeong had visited Yoohyun-ie even before Haeyeon was founded. He was still annoying, but I had to give him his share of the credit for Haeyeon. Sung Hyunjae gave a small nod at my words. “Even so, it isn’t easy for a latecomer to find his place.” “That’s… You’re right.” “For the first year or so, it was easier. Since most of them said Haeyeon wouldn’t be able to properly establish itself.” Sung Hyunjae also said he hadn’t been interested in Haeyeon—in Yoohyun-ie—at the time, either. “The problem arose when it started to become a major guild.”

The second the initial "LOL, this has got to be a joke, right?" blinders come off, he's at risk. And he would've known that this would happen right from the start—Yoohyun's smart enough that he would've understood the lack of attacks was just because they didn't see him as a real threat yet.

So, again: a latecomer on the scene with no power and no experience to his name, and seen as a threat to deal with. No social connections means he has no one to rely on to help him with Yoojin's protection: it's up to him alone. And even S-ranks have to eat and sleep and use the bathroom and do half a dozen other things that would pull him away from Yoojin's side, not to mention the all-important requirement of raiding dungeons, which Yoohyun himself admits in chapter 71 was one of his main concerns:

“Once I start a raid on an S-rank dungeon, I’ll be gone for a week […]. Me… avoiding you… was also largely due to the S-rank dungeon raid time. Since, obviously, I can’t look after you once I go into the dungeon.”

So Yoohyun himself can't just stay by Yoojin's side as his bodyguard 24/7. He'd have to leave him unattended for, at minimum, whole weeks. Which means he doesn't have a reliable, sure way to keep his hyung safe.

#3: Cutting off Yoojin, and the risks to an S-rank's family

And that's not even mentioning his own safety. What happens when Yoohyun's hurt and can't help with guarding Yoojin? And he will be hurt, either by dungeon raids or other people. If you don't think that second one is a concern, as early as chapter 6, when Yoojin and Yoohyun are having their first meal together, Yoojin asks about Yoohyun's ability to cook, and he says he taught himself:

“I’ve got items for detoxification and de-cursing, now, but I didn’t have them before. So making my own food felt safer. Even now, when I enter dungeons, I bring dried rations I made myself. Since it’s most dangerous inside dungeons.” “…Detoxification? De-cursing?” What was I hearing right now? As in, there were bastards who’d poison and curse his food, so he had to make it himself… that sort of thing?

Yoohyun himself, a strong, healthy S-rank with a good constitution and one hell of a temper, was at risk of being poisoned and cursed through something as everyday as food. You said that normally, no one would dare attack the family of an S-rank—but if people are willing to attack the S-rank himself, knowing that he'll kill them for sure if it fails and he learns they're behind it, then what's stopping them from attacking the S-rank's family?

There's two points you could argue:

Yoohyun says in the chapter 6 conversation that "It’s a major crime for an Awakened person to target an Unawakened person, so I made them think it wasn’t worth it to risk going after you." But that'd only last for the 3 years up until Yoojin Awakened, and honestly, there's a real risk that anyone targeting Yoojin before that time would just be rich or socially connected enough that they could make the charges go away.

The other argument that if they attack an S-rank's beloved family and that fails, now the S-rank is coming after them with a vengeance, and he's not even suffering from the aftermath of poisoning or a curse to weaken him in the slightest, so that might scare them off. But, like… people do stupid things when they're desperate. In that kidnapping where Yoojin met the Krecke Blackie (chapters 46–49), sure, Yoojin had his own special skills that made him valuable, but he also had five major guilds and the Association all dedicated to his protection. That's several times the protection a single S-rank could offer, and some idiots who weren't even in a desperate situation still tried to go after him for benefits similar to what you'd get from having leverage over an S-rank. So I really don't think anything would stop people from threatening Yoojin. If anything, the combined facts of Yoohyun starting out from a weak position, Yoohyun obviously caring about Yoojin, and Yoojin being so much weaker than Yoohyun would make that the best option by far, if you wanted to hurt Yoohyun. After all, it’s not like Unawakened F-rank Yoojin can fight back himself, and again, Yoohyun isn’t going to fight you if it would risk Yoojin’s life.

So, Yoohyun goes "if I distance myself from hyung and make people think it WON'T hurt me for him to be hurt, then people have no reason to target him!" and follows through. I do think this was a stupid move on his part, even if he intended to explain it all to Yoojin eventually, because by not letting him in on the secret right from the start, he guaranteed that Yoojin would be hurt and upset by his sole remaining family member seemingly abandoning him for better prospects. Which leads Yoojin to start making his own stupid moves, which snowballs into a series of bad decisions on both their parts, and so on… but we'll get to that in a minute. The problem, I think, is that this plan could've worked, if only Yoohyun had told Yoojin at the start, so that Yoojin knew not to draw attention to himself. Maybe they could've done regular calls on burner phones or something, to stay in touch, and they'd have been happier that way.

Unfortunately that didn't happen. Why? Because, as Yoohyun states in that same conversation in chapter 6, he "didn’t want to burden" Yoojin. Yoohyun's desire to protect Yoojin is not just physical, but also mental/emotional—he doesn't want Yoojin to know that Yoohyun's going through all this trouble of leaving home and dealing with threats to his life and making big decisions, because he doesn't want Yoojin to worry.

[EDIT: And actually, thinking back over this, do you realize—Yoojin always talks about how Yoohyun was a delight of a child to raise, never complaining, never throwing tantrums, wonderfully behaved and always doing as he was told. Enough so that Moon Hyuna has to tell him, explicitly, in Chapter 43, that that’s not normal, in those exact words:

“He was a good younger brother who never needed to be scolded. Ever since he was little, he listened well and didn’t worry me…….” “You said you were the one to raise him, right? After you lost your parents early. That’s not normal.” She clicked her tongue and continued. “A good, obedient little brother from a poor family without parents. That sort of thing doesn’t even appear in children’s fairy tales these days. Because it’s not realistic.” “I mean, to go that far—” “Kids are kids. They get frustrated and angry if there’s something lacking, they make trouble to get attention, they compare themselves with others, and beyond begging their parents to buy them something they want, they might even resent them. Parents might still think their kids are cute, but brothers? To them, they’re just enemy bastards; I also have a younger sibling, so I know. Of course, there are brothers and sisters who get along. In peaceful households where their parents take good care of them. Even then, it’s not like they never fight. Younger brothers in particular are a type that need to be put in their place; older siblings the world across would probably agree.”

This suggests that Yoohyun and Yoojin have never, ever, EVER experienced conflict on major life decisions. Not once have they argued about Yoohyun making choices that Yoojin wouldn’t like. Which means Yoohyun approached cutting off Yoojin with a very particular mindset, and I have some guesses as to what exactly that mindset was. Do you think he hoped Yoojin would understand that his perennially well-behaved brother would have some reason for leaving home? Do you think he just… didn’t know how to approach telling Yoojin about his choice, knowing it’d upset him so much, so he simply didn’t and hoped for the best? Or was it something else entirely?

Either way: Yoohyun absolutely did not know what would come of this choice. He definitely did not expect just how hard it would be on Yoojin. At the time, he was probably just wanting to spare Yoojin the heartache of their first major argument about Yoohyun’s life choices.] And it's that very desire to not bother him with the knowledge of how much Yoohyun's suffering that eventually makes things go wrong and both of them suffer for it.

#4: Yoohyun's strategy failing

What do we know about Yoohyun's plan going wrong? We know that Yoohyun intended to wipe out his enemies before even thinking about allowing Yoojin into danger. In that conversation in chapter 6, he tells Yoojin to wait "just 1 year" and to basically live in confinement, locked up safe inside Haeyeon, until Yoohyun's done. Combined with the 3 years since the dungeons appearing and Yoohyun Awakening, that means he thought it'd take maybe 4 years in total, with hurrying at the end to accommodate Yoojin already being involved with him again. Yoojin says in narration that pre-regression, it took him 3 years instead of the 1 he's proposing, which puts us at a total of 6 years minimum before Yoohyun could even think about reuniting with Yoojin.

But, of course, a lot can and did happen in those 6 years. Within the first 3, the brothers' relationship had deteriorated enough that Yoojin blocked Yoohyun's number, as mentioned in chapter 32 by Yoohyun to Yoojin during novice Hunter training:

“You got angry and told me not to call, remember? You even blocked my number.”

Why was Yoojin angry? See chapter 158, when Yoohyun was temporarily amnesiac due to Jellyfish's fog:

“I’m certain I told you not to come near me.” …I remembered. When I’d heard that, I’d blocked Yoohyun’s number, telling him not to call me back.

Yoohyun's repeated refusal to tell Yoojin about his plans, just telling him they had to stay apart, only worsened their relationship. And while Yoohyun did attempt to reach out and help Yoojin in ways such as sending him money to cover living expenses (probably hoping to repair their rapidly deteriorating relationship), that also made it worse, with Yoojin rejecting all of those attempts. As he explains in chapter 274, during the flashbacks induced by Jellyfish in their fight:

Gritting my teeth, I sent back the money Yoohyun-ie sent me without even laying a finger on it. To the me of that time, it was horrible money that my young brother had as good as traded his life for. Yoohyun-ie wanted me to accept living expenses and stay safe, but I believed my brother was being sent to his own death and could never accept it.

It isn't like Yoohyun didn't try to reach out. He did. The problem was that all of his attempts were undercut by his continued refusal to tell Yoojin why he had distanced himself, such that all those attempts at staying in touch only rubbed salt in the wound of being abandoned. And as early as 3 years in, by his own admission in chapter 6, Yoohyun starts to think that things have gotten so bad that even if he tries to confess everything now, Yoojin might not "be understanding". He might not be willing to let go of his hurt and resentment to reconcile with him.

So should he stop reaching out, then? Surely there's still hope that they can reconcile in the future. Someday, maybe, when Yoohyun's sure he can protect Yoojin, even if Yoojin doesn't want to be with/near him.

#5: Learning about the world ending

Only, there's a deadline imposed by the end of the world, which Yoohyun learns about from filial duty addict Diarma. Part of the contract with the filial duty addicts, as Sung Hyunjae explains in chapter 102, is not interfering with said end of the world. Actually, the contractors have to give "their word that they’ll eliminate obstacles" i.e. other people fighting against the end of the world, so Yoohyun can't do anything about this deadline. This gives him a limited amount of time in which he can "eventually" reconcile with Yoojin.

So, as you ask, Anon, why not spend that limited time with his brother? Well, just because there's an end of the world approaching—which Yoohyun can't even talk about! L-rank contract, remember—doesn't mean that Yoojin is 🌟magically🌟 going to get any less mad about Yoohyun abandoning him for several years than before. Yoohyun still doesn't want to explain, so that argument is absolutely not getting resolved.

Even if he tries to explain vaguely that there's some threat and that he'd like Yoojin to live with him or at least accept his offers of protection and security, what happens if Yoojin refuses? Yoohyun clearly isn't willing to violate Yoojin's desires too far, since the most certain way to keep him safe would be to lock him up in a vault somewhere inside Haeyeon and never let anyone else see him, but that would trample all over his free will and happiness, not to mention it'd ruin Yoohyun's "live normally and happily with hyung" goals. So he'll have to let Yoojin stay out in the world, while all of Yoohyun's rivals and enemies are still out there, watching the Haeyeon Guild Leader reach out to his brother and wondering if they've reconciled. At that point, it doesn't matter if they actually have made up or not. If someone even suspects that Yoojin is close to Yoohyun, then they'll target him on the off-chance that it's true. And if Yoojin did refuse Yoohyun's offers, which he's almost certain to, then he's defenseless against whatever attacks come. And they will come. In chapter 6, Yoohyun admitted that a single visit to Haeyeon Guild by Yoojin, willing or unwilling, would be enough to get attention on him:

“But if I directly give orders for you to be brought in and allowed to live within Haeyeon Guild, my enemies will start to actively target you. Even with you just being here right now, I’m sure they’ll already have started keeping an eye on you.”

Think of it from Yoohyun's enemies' perspective. If Yoohyun cares about Yoojin, attacking Yoojin gives you leverage over Yoohyun. If Yoohyun doesn't care about Yoojin, then he won't care if you're attacking Yoojin, so you'll face no retaliation from him. Yoohyun's enemies have nothing to lose from this, while Yoohyun has everything to lose. So, in this situation, it'd be better to take the least risky path: just don't engage with Yoojin at all.

And, also, even if he'd decided to take that risk, there's a different one when it comes to actually figuring out a system to guard Yoojin. This point is more speculation, but I do think Yoohyun might have struggled with deciding when he'd done enough for Yoojin's protection. Because the reality is that Yoojin was never, ever going to be 100% safe from all dangers ever. Again, the vault method is the only way Yoohyun could achieve that. Yoohyun could've put together any amount of high-rank Hunters as Yoojin's exclusive security detail, and he'd still have to leave him alone with these potentially corruptible strangers for a full week at a time during every S-rank dungeon raid. I suspect there was a real risk of Yoohyun continuously going "I just need to get a bit stronger and a bit more established" indefinitely, without ever reaching a point where he was actually satisfied. (Which, if this was indeed a risk in canon, would be overridden in the post-regression timeline by Yoojin's keyword usage making Yoohyun's desire to live with him again and uncertainty about Yoojin's response win out over the urge to keep obsessing over safeguards.)

#6: What counts as a "real" threat

When it comes to Yoohyun's need to defend Yoojin against threats, there's also an important aspect you need to consider, which is: what threats? You see, the worlds of low-rank and high-rank Hunters are very different, to the point where Yoohyun seems to completely overlook some aspects of what Yoojin's used to dealing with, while Yoojin explicitly notes on multiple occasions that he didn't even realize Yoohyun faced certain dangers. As always, we come back to the poisoning attempts mentioned in chapter 6, the first time Yoojin realizes Yoohyun was suffering his own ordeals. This sort of sneaky threat gets reiterated in chapter 11, after Yoojin's trip to the Hunter Mall, when Yoohyun tells him he can't even take a simple drink from any public vendor because it might be poisoned (not something that'd work on Yoohyun himself, but it certainly would on those lower-ranked people around him who he cares about). No, not even in a government-sponsored location like the Association, because even these locations are filled with other guilds' spies and informants. Yoojin's internal response is essentially "what sort of underhanded bullshit is this", and out loud he questions Yoohyun about it:

“But would they do that sort of thing in none other than the Association? If they get caught, the backlash will be huge.” And if Awakened people couldn’t trust the Association, it’d end up hurting the guilds, too. “Of course they wouldn’t make trouble inside the Association. But it’s possible to have their target sent away in an ambulance or police car.” “…And then that ambulance or police car goes missing?” “You’re getting it.”

And Yoojin literally thinks, not a paragraph later, that this is maybe too much even for him:

Somehow, the further things went, the more I felt like I should stop being involved with this brat Yoohyun-ie and go off to live on my own.

Better the dangers you know than the ones you don't, but in Yoojin's words.

Everyone in the high-rank sphere is, well, high-rank. Strong and resilient even when they don't have defensive skills, to say nothing of when they do. They face threats, yes, Real Threats that pose danger to them and risk their safety and status, including threats from other people—Song Taewon mentions to Yoojin in chapter 83 that he's investigated Yoohyun for murder multiple times a year—but because they're so strong, those threats come in the form of dungeon monsters or social attacks, not actual physical harm. Especially not physical harm from other people; like, chapter 75 mentions there's laws against S-rank Hunters going into dungeons together for fear that they might hurt or kill each other, so unless they encounter each other in a dungeon break region where combat is expected (or pick fights with Chief Song, an S-rank duty-bound to fight other S-ranks), they're never really going to encounter personal threats from other Hunters.

Take all that through the lens of protecting Yoojin: he's just some guy, he's not involved in the social/political Hunter Hunger Games, so he's probably fine on that front, right? And otherwise, Yoohyun just needs to protect him from dungeons (keep Yoojin out of them when possible, prevent breaks in his area), and maybe just some general watching out for Yoojin getting himself into anything risky, since he's so weak as an F-rank. That's all the threats Yoohyun sees on a daily basis, so that's probably it, right?

Wrong. Low-rank Hunters have their own set of threats they face, and while a part of that is dungeons and monsters, a very large part of that is also just… being easy to kill, in a community of people very ready to kill. Low-rank Hunters murder each other a hell of a lot more than high-rank Hunters get to even hurt, let alone kill, each other. Think about how easily the knowledge of dungeons being good body disposal spots comes to Yoojin (chapter 19, when threatening Yerim's uncle). Think about the way Yoojin talks about being pressured into slave contracts and miner guilds, and how common it seems to be for low-rank Hunters to be maimed and disabled and left in the lurch (chapters 21 and 22, saving Yoo Myeongwoo from Hope Resources Guild). Think about chapter 49, where Yoohyun claims there's strong camaraderie among high-rank Hunters, and Yoojin responds with this:

Comradeship, huh. There was no such concept in low-rank Hunter teams. Of course, it wasn’t like there were no good people around. The problem was that they all died before long. There were fixed low-rank teams united through trust and friendship, but it was very rare that they lasted. With how strongly they banded together, if one of them died, they couldn’t endure the shock and would fall apart; and even if that didn’t happen, if they were doing well for themselves, they’d be attacked from the outside by the many Hunters who’d find them unpleasant. But a high-rank dungeon raiding team that suffered few such accidents could form a sense of comradeship and keep staying together.

Low-rank Hunters will get killed by monsters, or survive only to get killed by the loss of their teams, or find good teams only to get killed by other jealous low-ranks, or (in Yoojin's experience) survive multiple team-wide killings only to get ostracized and distrusted for being suspiciously good at surviving (almost like you're the one setting up your teams to fail! really makes you wonder, doesn't it?), or, or, or…

High-rank Hunters just… survive. That's it.

Of course Yoohyun wouldn't know to protect Yoojin from these threats. He's never faced them. To him, fighting other people is a fun, challenging pastime, where no one being allowed to kill each other is an unspoken rule that goes implicitly understood. He wouldn't realize how it was very much not fun for Yoojin; maybe he'd know it intellectually, but I don't think he'd understand, not without getting up close and personal to see Yoojin struggle with it, which he can't do himself. If he tries to send someone to spy on or just generally help out his brother, Yoojin's primed by his experiences to distrust the people around him, so spies won't get anything out of him, and any strong Hunter handpicked by Yoohyun to help his hyung might simply be unable to gain Yoojin's trust. (Picking out a whole team of strong Hunters? Even if Yoojin trusts them, they'd probably end up victimized by jealous Hunters. Rinse and repeat.) You must also take into account that Yoojin's been made enough of a target by society that he's hiding every weakness someone could potentially exploit. Hell, if he's hiding well enough, you might think he's doing just fine.

And in the time period where it would be blatantly obvious that Yoojin was not fine, that early period right when he Awakened and turned into society's scapegoat overnight? That was when Yoohyun and Haeyeon were also being targeted, and wouldn't have been able to spare the kind of attention and help Yoojin would've needed, not with all the scrutiny they were all being subjected to. Actually, when Yoojin's reminiscing about these times in chapter 59, he hypothesizes it might've been Yoohyun's rivals themselves who were behind the scapegoating:

At that time, it would’ve been hard for that guy to look out for me. Public opinion wasn’t good in many ways, and there were too many scrutinizing eyes for him to secretly look after me. Now that I thought about it, I wondered if there wasn’t some sort of operation targeting me. The response was too excessive to have simply been the work of a few trash journalists. It was a matter that could be packaged excitingly, I was an F-rank which made me easy to use, and at that time, it could drag down Haeyeon Guild in the public opinion. Whether it was the government, the Association, or rival guilds, they’d have been fools not to use me.

If it was Yoohyun's rivals behind it, then by fighting on the Haeyeon front, Yoohyun might actually have been keeping Yoojin safe, too. How do we know he didn't actually mitigate the suffering to some degree? We haven't heard from Yoohyun about his side of things during this time, so we don't have a definite answer one way or another.

Certainly, Seok Simyeong didn't help at all by making a public statement denouncing Yoojin, especially not when it was so bad Yoojin admits to almost being suicidal over it (chapter 19)! But, well, it was a busy time. We don't know whether Yoohyun was consulted on that one, or if it was something they rushed in order to get ahead of the situation. It might also be that Yoohyun was consulted and made the choice that they'd publicly denounce Yoojin but privately offer him support, only for Yoojin to reject it as he did before with the money Yoohyun sent. Yoojin's done this before, where he conveniently doesn't mention a detail about a scenario until it becomes immediately relevant!

I cannot emphasize enough that we don't have Yoohyun's perspective on this. We don't know what he was doing or not doing to help. But we know, from his love for Yoojin, from his desperate desire to keep him safe at all costs, that he must've been doing something. Was that something effective? Was it useful to Yoojin's immediate life? Who knows. But he was trying.

#7: Banning Yoojin from dungeons

…Keyword being trying. Because, uh. To be honest, how well do you think any direct attempts at "helping" went over? The very first moment that Yoojin regresses to is when Yoohyun got him out of a meeting with an Awakening broker. And Yoojin himself says that ended so badly that "after listening to Yoohyun-ie’s nagging, I’d become furious and stormed off, shouting that I could take care of myself and to quit bothering me" (chapter 5). So if Yoohyun tries to openly keep Yoojin out of danger, then Yoojin is going to have a screaming fit of anger at his life being controlled by someone who apparently isn't even interested in being in it.

And that's before Yoojin Awakened. Once he had an actual, legal, government-assigned license saying he could go into dungeons? Yoohyun had zero standing. Zero chance he was ever going to be able to stop him from going into dungeons, short of breaking down and crying and begging for him to not do it, which (to successfully convince Yoojin he wasn't just putting on a show or trying to guilt trip him) would also require Yoohyun to admit he still cared about Yoojin and reveal his 3- uh, 4- I mean, 5- 6(!!)-Year Master Plan To Keeping Hyung Safe Forever And Ever.

Yeah. Never gonna happen.

And even that one (1) attempt at keeping Yoojin away from dungeons and Hunters and everything related could've gone really badly, because as Yoohyun himself admits in their chapter 6 conversation, his enemies will "already have started keeping an eye on you [Yoojin]". Just from one single show of apparent concern for Yoojin's wellbeing! Can you imagine what would've happened if Yoohyun kept stopping Yoojin every time he tried to go into a dungeon? Setting Yoojin's own frustration and anger aside, can you picture the kind of attention that would've gotten Yoojin? No, this was one battle Yoohyun had to lose in order to win the overall war.

Anon, you mention providing "new options for Yoojin to stop going to dungeons". Okay, sure, we're starting with Yoojin being society's black sheep and probably rejected out of hand from most positions he applies to, and Yoohyun's only leverage in society being in dungeon- and Hunter-related fields. What options would he have provided for Yoojin? A dungeon- or Hunter-related job, probably at Haeyeon or one of its affiliates? That's precisely what we're trying to avoid, and also visible enough that Yoohyun might as well not have even fucking bothered with the 6-Year Master Plan etc. etc. Okay, so then something at one of Haeyeon's sponsors-? Except Haeyeon famously doesn't have backers, and any connections they have through business deals will be glaringly obvious to Yoohyun's rivals if leveraged. Oh, Han Yoojin, the man who no one wants to hire, got a job at a company whose products Han Yoohyun sponsored just a while ago! Absolutely no one is wondering how this could've happened. Also, funny how Han Yoohyun's helping Han Yoojin find work, it's almost like he cares about him… (And so the end begins.)

Remember, all of Yoohyun's efforts at separating himself from Yoojin require actually being separate from Yoojin and the choices he makes. Yoojin's life is—unfortunately enough for Yoohyun—his own to live… and his own to ruin.

#8: The transcendent threat

And all of that—every single one of these environmental factors that make it so Yoohyun has a billion and one concerns to consider before he can so much as talk to Yoojin—all of that comes before we take into account one more fact:

God Hates Caregivers Personally.

Or, in a non-joking manner, and in the fashion Yoohyun might have learned about it from Diarma, as is strongly suggested in the virtual reality dungeon arc during chapter 246:

There are beings out there, outside your world, stronger than anything you know, and this is acknowledging the fact that you are among the strongest existences humankind will ever produce. These beings rule your entire world, are the children of the very power that created the dungeons terrorizing your planet, are themselves so powerful that they can predict dungeons and manipulate the system in their favor, that they can manipulate the circumstances of individual humans as long as they're inside dungeons. In allying with any one of their number, you make an enemy out of half of the entire population of these transcendental existences. You have already made an enemy of them. And these people, these all-powerful creatures, who you've painted yourself a rival of? These same people have a known track record of killing the loved ones of people like you.

Your brother goes into dungeons every week as part of his job. He's already at immense risk. If you go near him, if you make it seem even slightly like you're interested in him personally, you make him an out-and-out target for these transcendents, and they'll smite him. He dies, and you die, and it's game over.

Option one: You can grow to their level, meet them with equal strength, certainly, but will you get the time to grow that far before they kill your brother? Is his natural lifespan even long enough that he'd survive the time it took for your growth? He dies. You die. Game over.

Option two: Don't pose a threat. It's too late for you to never get on their radar in the first place, but if you can keep from seeming any more dangerous, maybe they won't give him any attention. Secure a favor that will let you help him when he needs it, at most, but otherwise never use your transcendent connections to your own advantage.

Option two, taken to its conclusion: If you die before your brother does—if you die calling in that favor and saving his life—you never have to see him be killed.

(Option two, on the flip side: You will not expect it to be your own ally who set the stage for your loved one to be killed.)

So, basically, every single concern Yoohyun's had about protecting his brother that made him distance himself and not tell him anything so far? All of that is taken and cranked up to difficulty level Maximum. "If I show interest in hyung, one of my rivals or enemies might choose to hurt or kill him!" The transcendents WILL kill him with NO known incentive. Yoohyun might assume it's because he poses a threat to their side, but he can't be absolutely certain that's it. In fact, he doesn't know anything about this opposing transcendent faction, since he was blocked from contacting them by the very fact of having chosen a side in the first place, as Water Droplet explains when discussing the born S-ranks in chapter 106:

“We don’t know for sure either. The filial duty addicts contacted them first, so their information is obscured. We only know that there are five, and about the ones that are in contact with you.”

And while Yoohyun-as-Alpha knows the reasons behind the immoral people killing Caregivers—namely, that they want to remove distractions for S-ranks, so that they focus on combating dungeons and monsters—if Diarma had told Yoohyun about this, and if he'd thought to apply the bare minimum of intelligence to his delivery (a disclaimer that must be made, with this transcendent in particular), I really don't think he would've told him why. No, he would've wanted the immoral people to seem like a dangerous threat, so he would just have said that they might kill Yoohyun's family, without giving him their reasoning.

Which means Yoohyun knew nothing about the immoral people's motives, nothing about their goals, nothing about what they'd see as aggression. Which meant, hypothetically, that any and every action he took could trigger them to smoothly and efficiently eliminate the only person he loved in all the world. It would be so easy, too; Yoojin's entering their turf multiple times a month as part of his daily job, a fact which we've already established Yoohyun couldn't do anything about. The only thing he knew for sure is that they hadn't killed Yoojin so far.

Remember what I said before, about the known path being safer? Because you know the dangers you'll face on it? Yoohyun knows doing what he's doing right now is keeping Yoojin alive. He can't control a single other thing outside of that. And the danger posed by not doing what he's doing just got shifted to a level he is not prepared on any level to respond to. Before, he might've thought Yoojin was safe at least inside dungeons with his chosen teams; from his perspective, "dungeons with only guild members inside are actually safer than the outside world" (chapter 134), while the outside world was more of a risk because of all of Yoohyun's enemies. But now? There is danger all the time and in every location Yoojin goes, even those outside of this world, on an insane, unrivaled level. He is never, never safe, and any single unexpected action Yoohyun takes puts that at risk. If doing anything at all is dangerous, then it's better to do nothing.

So, yeah, that's the crux of it, isn't it. Yoohyun needs to protect Yoojin every day, every single time. Everything else in the whole world only needs to kill Yoojin once. In such a situation, how would Yoohyun ever dare to risk making either of them vulnerable?

…The end! I hope that this explanation, long as it is, has given you at least some additional insight into Why Yoohyun Did All That, and helped serve as a reminder of just how little we actually know about Yoohyun's perspective of the events pre-regression.

By the way, this entire post is pulling only from information we get up to chapter 272; there’s more information revealed up to chapter 350—actually, even just in the next few chapters after that, up to 275—that sheds more light on Yoohyun’s decision-making process in the pre-regression timeline. Maybe I’ll come back and post a part 2 to this analysis someday using the additional information we get as time goes on, but right now, this much will have to be enough.

In any case—thanks for reading this far. And of course, as promised, here's the poll!

[candycandy00]

Roses in the Sky - An Original Alien x Reader Story Part 5

In a future where humanity huddles in decaying domed cities controlled by alien invaders, you and your best friend Anna work as make-shift nurses in a tiny clinic run by the young doctor Terrian. The city is ruled by the aliens' violent, half-breed offspring who serve as brutal overseers. You and Anna have always tried to avoid these overseers at all cost, but your life is changed when one of those same terrifying offspring is brought into the clinic, injured and unconscious.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10

This is an original Alien (well half alien) x Fem Reader story! I hope everyone who enjoys my fanfiction will give this a shot! Any feedback whatsoever would be loved! I’ve already written this story so it’s not going to delay my fanfics. Just thought I might post chapters of this between fanfics if anyone is interested.

Slow burn, as this is a novel-length story, but there will be smut in later chapters! Also: violence, blood, rape attempts, death of side characters, etc.

“Hurry and check Terrian! He might still be alive!" you yelled to Anna as you dropped to your knees beside Vartan. He was still conscious, but curled into the fetal position, holding his stomach. Blood was pooling around him. You touched his shoulder, and he seemed to jerk slightly before he looked up at you.

"I believe my wound has reopened," he said calmly, his voice denying that he was in any pain whatsoever. But sweat rolled down his forehead as he struggled to sit up and he hissed a little as he moved his arms from his abdomen and looked down.

You helped him unbutton his jacket and slipped it off his shoulders. The bandages were still there, but they were now soaked with blood. "I have to get these off," you told him.

"Hey!" Anna cried from across the room, her voice frantic. "I found a pulse! He's still alive!"

You leapt to your feet and ran to where Anna was kneeling beside Terrian's body. Together the two of you rolled him over onto his back, getting his face out of the puddle of his own blood. His glasses fell off, and a large bruise was becoming visible on his left cheek. 

You figured one of the half-breeds must have punched him through the face with their full strength. Humans had died from less force, so Terrian was lucky to be alive.

You and Anna stood up and each grabbed one end of Terrian's body, lifting him onto the nearest cot. Anna looked desperately at you. "What do we do now? I've never treated a head injury before! Terrian always did it himself!"

You had your hands on your forehead. "I don't know! Does he have a concussion?!"

"How would I know? What if he has brain damage?! What if he's in a coma?!"

"Oh, God... I don't know what to do! I don't think there's another doctor in the whole city!"

Anna was crying again. "We can't just let him die! He's... he's all we have!"

Vartan climbed to his feet and limped over to the cot where Terrian laid motionlessly.

You were both surprised, and stepped back while he looked Terrian over. "I don't think the injury will cause permanent damage," he said.

"How do you know that?!” Anna practically screamed.

"We have been studying the human body for years. I have some basic medical knowledge."

"And you think he's going to be okay?" Anna asked, a little more calmly.

Vartan nodded. "I'm not certain, but he appears to only be unconscious. The position and color of the bruise indicate that his brain did not receive the majority of the impact. If I'm correct, he should regain consciousness soon."

"But all that blood..." you said, still staring at Terrian.

"Came from his mouth. Three of his teeth are gone," Vartan replied, pointing to Terrian's slightly gaped mouth.

Both you and Anna burst into tears, hugging each other and then laughing loudly. You were so relieved that you almost forgot Vartan was there, bleeding and on the verge of passing out. He was leaning against the wall and his hair, wet with blood and sweat, was hanging messily in his eyes. The two of you rushed to his side, allowing him to lean on you as you helped him to the back room, where the medical supplies were.

Once in the room, you sat him down on a stretcher and he carefully laid back, wincing with every move. You headed over to the counter to get alcohol and thread, when you caught Anna's eye. "Are you okay with this? Helping him?"

Anna gave you a meaningful look. "He saved us. If he hadn't gone against them, I don't even want to think about what would've happened. I hate half-breeds, but I owe him. Big time."

You nodded and then you both ran back to the stretcher to begin sewing Vartan's wound back up. It took you a little longer than it had when Terrian was helping the first time, and your work was a little more clumsy, but you managed to close the wound and stop the bleeding.

Amazingly, Vartan never screamed once, although he did occasionally grunt when the needle pierced his skin. By the time you were finished, he was exhausted and practically immobile while you bandaged him up. He fell asleep just as you looked up to tell him you were finished.

You turned out the lights and quietly left the room, returning to the main patient area to sit by Terrian's bed. You did your best to ignore the sight of the dead, scattered patients, splattered across the walls and floor. To keep yourselves distracted, you and Anna talked.

"Why did you come back?" You asked her.

Anna gave you a weak smile. "I couldn't leave you and Terrian here. I couldn't let you deal with that, not alone."

You looked down. "It must have been horrible for you, how close it came to... to what happened before."

Anna smiled very brightly then. "Yes, it was horrible at the time. But now that it's over, I'm really happy! I fought back! Look, I even have that bastard's blood under my nails where I scratched his face!"

You looked at her, surprised. "Yeah, you really did good!"

Anna laughed, then looked at you seriously. "Before, I was just a kid. I was thirteen. The minute they came in, they told me not to move a muscle. So I didn't. I was too terrified to even flinch, even when they killed my mom and brother. I didn’t even try to help them! And afterward, I felt so guilty. I kept asking myself why I didn't try to fight back. I know I couldn’t have stopped them, but I should have tried! And I promised myself, that if I was ever put in that position again, I'd fight with everything I have, even if it gets me killed. That's why I'm really proud of myself today!"

Even though she was smiling again, tears were forming in Anna's eyes. "I was so scared today, but I didn't run away! I fought back! I faced them! I... I made it right."

You stood up and wrapped your arms around Anna. You stroked your friend's hair as tears fell down your own face. "Yeah, you made it right, Anna."

Anna was crying hard again, and you held her tightly. "We're such crybabies today, aren't we?" Anna asked though her tears, laughing now.

You laughed too. "Yeah, we are.”

"Am I in heaven? I hear two angels talking.”

You both froze, then looked down at Terrian, who was looking up at you with half-open eyes. You both practically tackled him, encasing him in your arms. He laughed, then groaned. "Oh, my mouth hurts," he said, sitting up.

"One of the half-breeds knocked out a few teeth," Anna told him, sitting on the bed beside him.

Terrian groaned again, this time louder. Then he looked both you and Anna up and down. “You're both alright? What happened?"

You and Anna looked at each other for a moment, then you sat down on the cot across from Terrian's. "We came back in to help you, but the half-breeds over-powered us. They were about to kill us when Vartan came in and convinced them to let us go."

Terrian's eyes became large and wet. "You mean you almost died while trying to save me?"

The two of you nodded.

He suddenly stood up and pulled you both into his arms. "I knew it," he said, his voice cracking. "The moment I met you two, I knew you were good girls!"

You and Anna blushed a little, but smiled and laughed as Terrian cried. The family was back together. You were all alive and healthy, and that's all that mattered.

Terrian suddenly stepped back. "Wait, you said Vartan saved us? Where is he now?"

"He's in the back room, asleep," Anna said.

"Asleep?"

"They punished him instead of us," you told him, "and his wound reopened. Anna and I stitched it back up, but I think he ended up passing out."

"I'd better go check him," Terrian said, walking past them. You followed him into the back room and turned the lights on. To your shock, the stretcher Vartan had been lying on was empty, only a crumpled sheet remaining. The back door was open, and the crisp night air drifted in, sending shivers down your back.

The three of you discussed Vartan, explaining to Terrian what had happened to him but leaving out the more embarrassing details of what had occurred while he was knocked out. Neither you nor Anna wanted to worry Terrian any more than you already had.

You spent the rest of the evening cleaning up the bodies in the main patient room. You were appalled by the bloodshed, but Terrian was an absolute wreck. He loved his patients so dearly, far more so than you or Anna could comprehend. You often thought he viewed each and every patient as his own child, no matter their age. It was he who often stayed at the clinic over night, feeding the elderly soup or reading stories to the children. It was he who constantly talked to them, got to know them on a personal level. And it was he who now stood in the center of the room with tears streaming down his face as you and Anna hurried to wrap the bodies with sheets and carry them to one corner of the room.

Terrian had taken the news that the clinic had been shut down very badly. He didn't say anything, but you could tell he was deeply upset. After you moved the last body to the corner, he told you he wanted to burn the clinic. 

"But why? They just told us we can't take any more patients in," Anna said. "We don't have to destroy it! We have so many memories here!"

Terrian looked at her sadly. "I know, but it's not the place that made the memories, it's the people. The clinic serves no purpose if we can't help anyone. And besides," he said, glancing at the bodies in the corner for the first time, "we have to give them a proper funeral."

"Funeral?" you asked.

"We can't burry them all. There's not enough land for that and it would take way too long. So we should burn them."

You and Anna were quiet for a moment, then both of you finally agreed. The three of you cleaned out the back room, boxing up all of the supplies and anything that could possibly be useful later. Once it was all done, Terrian poured out a bottle of alcohol onto a sheet in the middle of the main patient room and lit it on fire with a match. You exited the clinic and stood with Anna and Terrian outside on the street, watching it burn.

Terrian turned to you and Anna. "I'll be expecting you at my house starting tomorrow. For your new jobs."

"What new jobs?" Anna asked.

Terrian grinned at her, the first time he had done so in the past few hours. "You're my new maids!"

You and Anna smiled to each other. "We'll be there, Doctor."

You parted ways once again, the last time the three of you would ever do so on that particular street, in front of that particular building. It was still burning furiously as you walked toward your apartment. It was later than usual, and the streets were fairly quiet. At least the blazing building behind you provided plenty of light, though the half-breeds would show up soon enough to put out the fire. 

You wondered about Vartan, why he had left without saying anything and where he had went and why he had really helped you. But most of all, you wondered if you would ever see him again. All but one of your meetings had taken place at the clinic, and it was where he knew to find you. Even if by chance you saw him on the street, he would no doubt be with other half-breeds and you wouldn't dare approach, no matter what had happened between you. 

You shook your head as you unlocked your door. Why did it even matter if you would see him again? He was a half-breed. He was a monster, regardless of what had happened. The female half-breed was probably right, he probably just wanted to have his way with you and then toss you aside. That's what half-breeds did.

You opened the door and stepped inside. You reached back with your right hand to shut the door behind you, but someone grabbed your wrist. You jerked yourself around to see who was there, and found yourself face to face with Vartan. His jacket was still unbuttoned from earlier, leaving his chest and bandaged abdomen exposed. His grip on your wrist was firm, but not tight or painful. He seemed tired, weak.

He looked you in the eyes and said flatly "I'm coming in."

Tag List:

@scrumptiouslampwobblercop

[celestialprincesse]

part 2 to the ex bf simon one i beg

have we had the part 2 discussion on here yet? I don't think we have but I'm feeling like getting into it today so here goes The lovely and immensely talented @cordeliawhohung phrased how these kinds of asks make writers feel far better than I ever could in one of her posts here

There also...is...a part 2 I know, shocker, right?

If you'd checked my blog, you'd see that not only is there a part 2, but also a whole host of other Simon stuff for you to read! Loads of it!

I personally believe that writers would be far more inclined to continue works if they were appreciated and complimented, as opposed to treated as some form of instant gratification to be churned out with little in the way of feedback and support.

I have 2 full length fics on the go right now, alongside dropping in to respond to the odd request and juggling life and studies and health stuff. If I wanted to update that little drabble, I would've.

I've said it once, and I'll say it again. Writers put in immense amounts of effort to create content for you to enjoy, for free. A little kindness and appreciation for the energy we put in to our work goes a long way. Demanding for more does not. If anything, it just pisses me (and others, I'm sure) off.

We are not Orwellian novel writing machines. (Thank fucking fuck)

[koukaimagines]

Hello! Could you write headcanons for the four dragons with a female s/o who is sick and how they would go about taking care of her?

Hello Anon! Thanks for sending this in when you did! I'm so sorry about the long wait. Every time I get requests about the dragons fretting about their s/o for any reason, I get so excited because they're all very cute (and maybe even cuter when they worry)

These might be reminiscent of my injured s/o HCs with Jaeha and Kija as the topic of discussion is somewhat similar! (ailed s/o with dragons caring for them)

I also happened to fall sick while working on this LMAO, but side note: using my platform to say please mask up when you go about your day! Masking is a way to protect yourself and your community members, especially those at risk/who suffer chronic conditions due to or not due to the novel COVID-19 virus— the pandemic is not over!

Pronouns for this ask will be she/her as used by anon!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kija

Kija is a member number 1 of the overprotective squad. He already wishes to treat you delicately under normal circumstances, so if ailment befalls you, you can bet that protective nature will flare up more. He makes sure you're in bed and resting no matter what you say and takes care of all of your chores for you.

Much like he would in my injured s/o HCs, Kija would want to be as knowledgable as he could be about your illness and would ask Yun questions about your condition, unusually attentive and serious while taking the info in.

He's very worried about you! It agonizes him to see you suffer headaches or sore throats— anything that your illness inflicts on you, he would take in your stead and he would often voice this to you at your bedside.

He'd help you eat and feed you without question, and maybe even force feed you before Yun tells him not to bother you too much in case you're suffering from headache/unable to stomach anything, but of course you make sure he knows his intentions are appreciated.

I don't know what to call this factor; something like this applies to all the dragons in different ways, so I'll tell you how I think they'd go about processing and expressing this: Kija is ecstatic he gets to take care of you. He thinks it ill-hearted on his part to be happy about your unfortunate state, but really, he's just happy to be at your service in any way he can. Your being sick only increases the opportunities for him to show you how much he loves you and how much he cares.

Shinah

Shinah is member number 2 of the overprotective squad. He'd go to great lengths to make sure you're well-accommodated and ask Ao to be with you at times he may have to leave your side. He gives you his fluffy coat of fur and braves the cold without it because he thinks you need it much, much, much more than he does.

He sends you glares if you try to be proactive. He really really wants you to rest because Yun advised it and said it would go away faster if you slept and ate and don't overexert yourself.

While he's out in the field and happens upon some wildflowers and thinks of you, he may hear from Yona or Zeno that he could give them to you as a get-well-soon gift. Even though it's a form of courtesy, he wants to believe that it's like a prayer for you to get well soon and thinks it will help you fight your illness.

He always keeps an eye on you. Every time you run out of water, Shinah would make sure to fetch some more for you. You don't even have to ask— if he sees that your cup is empty, he'll be right back with it full. Even at night, if he happens to be on night guard duty, he'll care for you all the same.

I don't know what to call this factor; something like this applies to all the dragons in different ways, so I'll tell you how I think they'd go about processing and expressing this: Shinah loves taking care of you. He feels like he's doing something good and that makes him feel good and worthy. He has a bit of a hard time expressing his feelings for you in words, so in some ways similar to Kija, Shinah would take this time to make sure you're well-taken care of because he wants you to know how much you mean to him. He really, really wants you to get better.

Jaeha

While you're sick, Jaeha often teases you with things like feeding you dinner and saying that you must've gotten sick so he can dote on you, or hoping that he'll catch your illness and be in bed with you, but he's actually really careful (worried) and observant of your state and wants to make sure you're comfortable.

As always, he cares much more than he lets on, and does things for you outside of the periphery of you and the group. Once he's caught, he plays it cool (like he always does) and keeps going about his day doing things for you.

While you're sleeping, he'd often sit there and watch your peaceful expression. If you have fever, he'd be there to change out the wet towel on your forehead, but he's otherwise there just watching you. When someone else walks in on him, he's unusually startled— I'll let you decipher why on your own. :) (spoiler: he's embarrassed for no reason and gets more embarrassed because he felt embarrassed but he plays it cool— it's complicated. TLDR Jaeha's silly but we already know that.)

Generally, Jaeha may tease you but his true feelings can be gleaned from how he blows on the steaming porridge in your spoon and the way he pulls the covers over you when you lay down.

I don't know how to word this factor; something like this applies to all the dragons in different ways, so I'll tell you how I think they'd go about processing and expressing this: Jaeha secretly loves the intimacy of being at your side and having you rely on him. He'd be quite open about how he's loving it (it'd come off a bit teasing and as typically non-betraying-his-feelings as Jaeha can get), but there's a deeper emotion that he's feeling while he goes through the motions of taking care of you that he wants to keep all to himself.

Zeno

When you're sick, Zeno already knows the motions of caring for you pretty well. He's his usual cheery self and his sunny disposition almost cheers your recovery on like a cheerleader.

Outside of caring for you, Zeno likes picking flowers as get-well-soon gifts. He likes to tell you all about the shenanigans of the group that you may have missed in your time resting, and his lips stretch into that heart-wrenching smile of his as he watches you giggle about how silly the group can be.

Zeno sticks by you the most out of the three dragons. Because he's immune to illness and fatigue, Yun trusts him to look after you the most while he may have his hands tied with other chores. Because of his inability to feel fatigue, Zeno also rests by you while you sleep despite your many demands for him to get some sleep. "Zeno doesn't need sleep, so you rest well, Y/N." You can hear his care in the way your name rolls off his tongue despite his infrequent use of it.

When he feeds you, he lightly brushes his lips against the spoon to make sure it's just the right temperature.

I don't know what to call this factor; something like this applies to all the dragons in different ways, so I'll tell you how I think they'd go about processing and expressing this: He finds your sick state incredibly endearing— it evokes a lot of memories for him that are bittersweet but nevertheless precious. He knows your pain will only be temporary and takes each action he takes to care for you with a profound contentedness and hope that he'll see you bounce back within a few weeks' time.

[melled42]

How do you decide on how to lay out your comic pages?

i asked my husband how he thought i planned my layout. he laughed at me and said i let god sort it out

but hes not totally wrong T0T I've been a comic fan my whole life, so i usually just sit down and sketch it out for how i want things to be lingered on or expressed. unfortunately i've got limited time to work on them. I'm fighting both the fact that I need to work on commission and my own fear of loosing my current fixation. also I have to consider how much I'm willing to push the websites I'm willing to post them on because none of them get cropped the same way

If i had full control and time I would spread things out more and probably take a full graphic novel length to tell one of my current comics lol.

otherwise, if its a big/long comic I'll actually sit down, write a script and do thumbnail compositions. I think I did that for the big sex comic, at least a little. but most of the time I'll just sit down and do what I think will get people to get the vibes/flow I want and write the dialogue later. I am really bad at incorporating text, I'm working on it and I've at least improved a little T-T

[artificial-transmutations]

An anniversary!

It's hard to believe, but this blog is around for almost a year now! In this time, I published about ~100 posts and almost 3000 of you crazy, good looking awesome people decided to follow my writing! Thank you so much for every like, reblog, follow or message during this year!

Much has happened indeed: I started a membership page for a while but decided to reduce it to a tip jar after a few months to focus on fewer, higher quality stories. I have made some great progress in the generation of AI pictures for my blog and, of course, I learned a lot about writing.

So, what's next? Well, there are two celebrations, so I have two announcements. I'll only talk about the first one now, though, since I don't quite *yet* have 3000 followers to celebrate (that might follow in a few weeks, who knows :) )

But now for the one-year-artificial-transmutations special:

I'm going to write another long story! If you liked Max' Journey or Closer Than Flesh, you might already know the concept: Single chapters of a long and intrically crafted story. However, this time I'll take it even further. The new (name yet undisclosed) story will be full novel length! And not just full novel length. I plan to actually publish it as a novel once I'm done. Of couse, you can still read the full thing here, free of charge, as always, chapter by chapter.

While it will of course be a story about transformation and gay romance, I also aim to make it an intriguing fantasy tale standing by itself. As such, there will be transformation, and there will also be man-on-man action - but not nearly as much as, for example, in Closer Than Flesh, where every chapter contained one or the other (or, sometimes, both). I recognize that this might not be what some of you are here for, but don't worry!

I will of course also continue to write my shorter stories with less plot and more... other content. In fact, the 3000-Follower special will revolve around that kind of stories.

But, if you could see yourself reading a fantasy novel from me with transformation content, be sure to watch my blog closely :) I'm happy for everyone who likes to read my stuff!

So, this is what you can expect here in the next months to come (writing a novel is a lot of work!). Tell me what you think if you like!

Let me close with another big Thank You! for being awesome for a whole year - and a picture related to the big story that is to come :)

[rosetyler42]

Hi! I'm curious to know about your Hotel Transylvania OC's 😁

Get ready for an Infodump below the cut! XD

Lucy and Simon Van Dracula, or the Van Dracula Twins, are my version of Drericka ship children. They're born 13 min apart by Cesarian, and were something of a surprise considering Ericka's advanced age.

Lucy (full name "Lucille") is the oldest, and despite her vampire powers and pride in being monstrous, she takes after her mother and Brother-in-law. She's a chaotic mischievious free-spirited laid back fun-loving charmer, a real little Terror who knows her legendary status and is proud of it. Unlike Dennis or Mavis, though, Lucy has a PRIDE in her monstrosity. She ENJOYS it. In a way, she's something like Ericka's chaotic inner child given voice, and given the monstrosity Ericka and Johnny never got. She's also has far more freedom and social interaction growing up than Mavis, having grown up around both humans and monsters when monsters no longer had to hide...and Ericka's far less uptight a parent than Drac or Mavis, as she wants her kids to have the freedom she never did and she herself was training from a young age. Drac's also relaxed a bit over the century since having Mavis, though he's still the more uptight of the two. I figured him having to deal with a bouncy crazy ball of chaos for a kid would be funny, considering he's not good with chaos XD She's into dramatics and art/drawing, is a natural at languages, and has her mother's skill in gymnastics and martial arts...augmented by her father's vampire powers, of course! Unlike Dennis, she can also hypnotize and has hypnosis resistance, and her animal transformations are fully dark brown like her hair instead of black.

If Lucy is Ericka's inner child, Simon is Drac's. He's sorta what would have happened if Dennis or Drac never got Vampire powers. Like his father, he's on she shyer, quieter, more timid side and is the pragmatic braincell to Lucy's shenanigans. That said, there's something of a "Beware the quiet ones" to him. While his family is loving and accepting, he feels like the odd one out, both due to his lack of powers and unusual chunky size, and has had to work to be scary. Ericka and Drac both went to great lengths to make sure Simon never went through feeling like the "Weak little boy" Dennis did, and since Ericka and Drac aren't as overprotective, Simon's less over-sheltered than Dennis was. Where Lucy is the "Looks like she could kill you, is actually a cinnamon roll," Simon inherited his mom's "Looks like a cinnamon roll, could actually KILL you" tendency. And like her, he'll do it either with deadly coldness or a smile. Ontop of this, the boy has a love of sailing and the ocean...especially the more scarier aspects like Pirates, electric eels, sharks, piranha, squid and octopi, and of course...krakens and other sea/water monsters. He also has his mom's love and nerd-dom of weaponry. It's part of his way of being scary. I've also drawn him and Dennis playing with the old "My First Guillotine" somewhat inspired by the scene in the HT2 novelization where Dennis uses the guillotine to chop off an action figure's head and that scene in Addams Family Values with Pubert, Pugsley, and Wednesday. Simon's more into cooking and playing the ukelele in terms of hobbies, and while he isn't as good with languages as his sister, knows a fair amount.

Dynamic-Wise, they're kinda like Ian and Barley from Onward, Wednesday and Pugsley from The Addams Family, Zack and Cody from the Suite Life, or Phineas and Ferb.

Both of them have slowed aging after 5 years old, enhanced durability, strength, agility, and speed (Though Lucy's is of course more obviously powered while Simon's more just beyond average.) They're a bit cooler than normal humans and have slower heart beats. And while they can both day walk, they can still sunburn and are allergic to both garlic and silver. (While Ericka and Drac taught them both to use weapons, they're not allowed to use wooden stakes or silver weapons just in case.) Although none of them are as deadly to them as they would be to a pure-blood vamp.

In terms of culture: James, Mavis, Dennis, and Abraham are the twins' main exposure to human things (esp. prior to school) as Drac and Ericka don't really have experience with normal human culture themselves. Since the Dracula family is Jewish coded and Ericka's family is christian coded, I decided the twins are interfaith, raised with both Christianity and Judaism so both cultures get celebrated without one overshadowing the other. Their Hebrew names are Shimown and Liorit for Simon and Lucy respectively. They're basically Russian, Romanian, possibly Hungarian going off the OG book, and Dutch. I also love the idea where... since Drac largely raised Mavis alone, and these two are twins to middle age parents...I like the idea of the pack helping raise these two. After all, Drac's apparently close enough to the pack for the Werewolf pups to call him uncle and Mavis to call Eunice "Auntie," so why not? Johnny and Mavis are even the god parents of the Twins and often the ones to help out since they live in the same building (and are the best options out of the pack.) They of course know everything about Martha and how Mom was originally trying to kill dad. Drac even made his own storybook saying how they met (The Drac-Tastic read along from the Bluray. "I saw it on a Blu-ray disc. Bonus stuff." XD) I also have a headcanon they're into Goosebumps, especially Lucy. Her favorite is Slappy. Simon also likes 2000 Leagues Under the Sea, and they both grew up with Sesame Street and Blues Clues. (I've been on a kick and hey, they're probably more tolerable than Kakie.) I also have the headcanon Lucy looks up to Johnny quite a bit, while Simon more identifies with Mavis, Dennis, and Frankenstein.

For names: Lucy is named after Lucy Westenra, the first female vamp turned on-screen in the OG book and adapations. Though in universe, Drac named her Lucille, probably from a mix of a female version of Lucifer and it meaning "Little Light." Lucy is a nickname. Liorit also means "My Light." As for Simon, I went with the in-universe idea Ericka simply had ancestor named Simon and liked the name. But in reality, I simply reused a name from an early version of Johnny (and possibly re-used into Ericka) called Simon Van Helsing, who was originally a monster hunter who fell for Mavis after finding the hotel. Simon and Shimown also means "Harkening" which is perfect considering Drac...could REALLY use a reminder to listen to others sometimes. XD

Their inspirations of course are something of a mix of Pubert Addams - both Normal and Addams-esque; Wedneday and Pugsley, Popeye and Bluto, @lovelylivelyv 's Bendy OC Jack Nephalem, Uncle Fester and Debbie, Abraham Van Helsing and the other large Van Helsing bricks + their bucktoothed overbite, Mother Gothel (kinda), Dr. Frankenfurter, Katharyn Hahn, Human!Drac, Vampirica, the HT2 Vamp Kids at Winniepecaca, "What if Drac had a humany son instead of a vampire after what happened with Dennis?", "What if he had a child like Johnny and Ericka?" The promo fakeout for Dennis being a "little terror", Martha art with brown hair, and "We've never seen a female Dhampir." They also kinda bear a resemblance to Pinky (PATB) and Young Man Rivers (Foster's Home.) Though that was unintentional.

I got alot more about these two, but I already stayed up too late and I need to go to bed. XD Will probably reblog with more pictures soon.

Tag list @lovelylivelyv @i1lyidkstupid @hotelt-resurrection @ssleeping-in-a-coffin