#and like i OBVIOUSLY ship them (i run a ship blog lol) BUT even from the perspective of completely platonic friendship this gives me tingles

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

ik you mentioned interest in writing out how you'd prefer homestuck ended (though obviously time and money makes that impossible lol), and you touched on it in your big eridan essay at the end, but would you ever consider maybe a more detailed outline? i really enjoy your thoughts on the characters and the abandoned plotlines, i'd love to get a little more of an in depth look at how you wish it went down.

Yeah sure!

For those who aren't sure what the hell I'm talking 'bout, please check out my blog and the various essays I've been writing.

Some of it is contingent on stuff I kind of still need to reread so I'm really sorry to the alpha kid likers but I'm still not totally 100% sure where I want to take them. I'm also going to include quite a few personal preference ships; I'm not interested in arguing what other people should ship or about arguing about the course of action for my dumb fanfic in general. I also tend to discover the plot I want while I'm writing it, which I don't have the luxury of here, so... some of it is going to be kind of sloppy. I'm also a big troll stan so unfortunately the kids are a little bit neglected (sorry!!!!). That said.

So the changes would take place directly after GAME OVER, which is personally the point at which I think the truncation/turning on the fanbase really starts - ships start to get turbo-sped at that point. I'm not even saying I dislike JohnRoxy or JohnRezi, but they just feel oddly rushed the way they're handled in the comic itself. IMO, anyway.

There's not too much I would rearrange during this interstitial segment; I think it's important for Jade to have the experience of loneliness, for Terezi to kick off the retcons by only feeling comfortable fixing her own mistakes. Moreover, there's no reason why other characters can't use her mind beacon abilities to ask John to rearrange the timeline, though their attempts, because they aren't backed by Seer of Mind abilities, are a lot sloppier and come with a lot more unforseen consequences.

But something I would change is that Roxy's deal with Nyx is not to just kind of... sit back and chill in non-space while John does all the work; instead, like Rose in Davesprite's timeline, Nyx puts her to sleep, and when the timeline ceases to be, GameOver!Roxy's memories get transferred to Past!Roxy via her dreamself (which wakes up early), fulfilling a "stealing from void for others" aspect of her abilities, and leads to some important interactions later on down the line.

Also, this timeline's ARquiussprite and Gamzee's corpse (heretofore referred to as (ARquiussprite) and (Gamzee)) need to come along for the ride somehow. Maybe they fall through the sky after LOLAR crashes into LOFAF.

This kicks off a series of retcons, as each troll that gets brought back successively asks for another troll/set of trolls to be brought back. This absolutely RIDDLES Act 5 with password pages, can't go two steps without running into a password page, there are password pages within password pages (which IMO is very funny and very Homestuck).

Meanwhile, a couple other plots are running concurrently - the GameOver!crew (heretofore referred to as (Name)) are now in the dream bubbles, completing their character arcs and preparing to defeat LE. Because time and space are weird in the Furthest Ring, every successive meteor trip that occurs as a result of John's retcons is the first time from the point of view of the meteor, but is a repeating event from the point of view of the people in the bubbles - eg those dead god tier Eridan and Feferi wind up healing the Mayor like seven times from their perspective.

(Aradia) is fluttering her ASS off to make sure everyone is in the right "place" at the right "time" for this, lmfao.

Roxy gaining future memories also means that the Alpha kids get to complete their arcs in a way they weren't able to prior to Game Over. Because what John's retcons are doing are functionally whiting out and redrawing the past, the Alpha kids are also only seeing a single linear timeline.

One last arc, which is running concurrent to the retconned!trolls and their new meteor trips, is that bringing back each successive character allows them ALL to grow a little more. So it is NOT like they bring back Vriska, and now everyone's problem are fixed and everything is fine; Vriska's still kind of awful, but she gets better after Tavros gets brought back and they have to character develop alongside each other, and same when Aradia and Sollux get brought back, so on and so on. Because it's about BEING FRIENDS and BEING A TEAM. They're all still having interpersonal problems right up until ALL of them get brought back.

But as a side effect of this and the questing done by the GameOver!crew, the Dancestors get more fully utilized as foils, and get their problems addressed. As the retcon!team goes through their character development, they start to tear the Dancestors apart, because the Dancestors represent shitty parents who force their kids to clean up after their messes, and refuting them works both literally and symbolically as rejecting their irresponsible way of being in lieu of responsibility, accountability, empathy, and compassion.

So here's the series of retcons, and the absolute bullshit that accompanies each decision:

Terezi asks John to save Vriska, and prevent herself from getting too spades with Gamzee, as these are her two greatest regrets.

Pretty much just what her canon iteration asked for; I don't see any problems with the actions she asks John to do for her.

HOWEVER, we'd get more than just a montage of Vriska's time on the meteor, because in this version of events, we're taking our time and letting plot points breathe. Neither does she magically fix everything just by being around when she's very much herself still going thru it by the time the Meteor trip pops off. In any case, she brings with her some new complications:

Karkat still winds up having to play moirail and keep Gamzee calm. This still ends up breaking down by the halfway point of the comic, because they're kind of just not good for each other, but Karkat's personal shitty relationships are going to become A Theme, so it's important to make note of it here.

Vriska and Terezi don't fully make up on this iteration of the trip, since from Terezi's point of view, she was still actively about to kill Vriska before John intervened; however, we get more hints, now that they have to spend three years together, that not only does Vriska really miss Terezi (which is pretty well-established, given how she can't seem to leave Terezi alone), but Terezi actually misses Vriska, too - she's just really bad at separating her own feelings and desires from her instinctive grasp of karma and justice, a very Mind player-type problem to have.

At least with Vriska around, Terezi's able to nip her Gamzee habit in the bud, but this kind of leads to Gamzee feeling worse and more alone.

Something Really Messy happens between Vriska, Rose, and Kanaya when Rose starts her drinking habit, and it's pretty toxic for all involved, and Karkat is kind of stuck playing auspice. Vriska already expresses not liking Rose much and develops some flushed feelings for Kanaya after being watching her murder Eridan, so "It's Really Messy" is kind of all I can say on the matter. The girls are fightiiinnnnggggg

Dave and Terezi get close again, but given the weirdo vibes he notices between her and Vriska, and the fact that he's really not down with quadrants (YET.), means they still end up not getting together.

Sorry DaveKat likers but I am not one. They do not ever get together, so if you are hoping for that, I am sorry and you don't have to keep reading if you don't want to, it's OK.

On a note about Vriska and Terezi - personally, I do think their moirallegiance is endgame; Vriska clearly misses her terribly, constantly trying to bug her into making the Scourge Sisters a Thing again, and she even expresses feeling really bad about the Team Charge Debacle to Terezi explicitly, before directly foreshadowing how awful Terezi will feel after killing Vriska:

AG: Cause even though you got all these highfalutin morals and fancy reserv8tions, you know as well as me that a killer is a killer is a killer! AG: There 8n't no ch8nging your ways for good, and one d8y you're going to flail that silly l8ttle cane of yours and not find n8thin to 8ump into, and fall f8ce first into the shit ag8in. AG: And you're going to do something t8rri8le to some8ody and wish you could t8ke it 8ack 8ut you c8n't!!!!!!!! AG: And then you'll work hard to win 8ack their trust, and you'll try and try and tr8, and you'll see how hard it is! AG: You'll seeeeeeee!

We know that she starts using 8's where they don't make sense phonetically when she gets really agitated, so it's pretty safe to say that she's displaying genuine emotional distress here. When combined with the way she tells John about feeling absolutely horri8le about killing Tavros, it's pretty clear she's genuine about feeling really bad about the Team Charge debacle, and sincere about wanting to somehow make amends and get back into Terezi's good graces, at times trying rivalry, at times trying to prove that she's trying to fix her mistakes.

Terezi also vehemently denies them having a kismesistude and directly mirrors Vriska's hesitance about all the murder:

GC: W3 4R3 SUPPOS3D TO R3V3L 1N BLOODSH3D 4S W3 GROW UP GC: 4ND SH3 S33MS TO B3 3MBR4C1NG H3R R1T3 OF P4SS4G3 W1TH R3CKL3SS 4B4NDON, 4S 1 WOULD 3XP3CT GC: GR4BB1NG TH3 BULL BY TH3 HORNS, SO TO SP34K GC: 1TS 4 L1TTL3 1NT1M1D4T1NG GC: B3C4US3 1M NOT SUR3 1F 1M R34DY FOR TH4T

AG: On my world, I would 8e completely vindic8ed for killing him! He is far lower on the hemospectrum than me. He managed to disrespect me time and time again, 8ut I kept letting him live! In fact, the amount of slack I cut him would 8e considered scandalous 8y those in my class. AG: I had every reason to kill him. And yet... AG: I feel 8ad a8out it like a lame weak fudge8lood, just like he was. AG: And the fact that I feel 8ad is why I'm sort of freaking out right now!

They're basically two toxic girls who CANNOT be honest with their real feelings, and wind up hurting each other. They need therapy badly, but given the fact that they also mirror each other positively - Terezi feels grateful to Vriska for blinding her, and Vriska mentions she ought to thank Terezi for killing her, which set her up on a date with the dead John Terezi also killed - I think they have a lot of potential to be genuinely kind to each other once they work through their individual issues.

Anyway. We're keeping the Roxy stuff under wraps for now - last we saw of her, she went to go see her denizen, and her planet exploded, and John was really bummed about it. HOWEVER, we are going to check in with our GameOver!crew, although only lightly for now:

Meenah and (Vriska) have fully disappeared, and (Tavros), (Nepeta), and (Feferi) are looking for them because they've got the FUCKING TREASURE???

Everyone else from the Game Over timeline has landed in the afterlife, to varying degrees.

Shortly after entering the afterlife, (Eridan) fucked off somewhere to be alone. Last anyone heard from him was (ghost!Sollux) and him being Erisolsprite, but neither (ghost!Sollux) nor (alive!Sollux) have seen him since Erisolsprite died in Game Over.

(Karkat) is also brooding off on his own, feeling really shitty and sorry for himself. He's always felt personally responsible for everything going wrong for his team, and now that his team is basically entirely dead, he feels extra shitty.

Mostly just setting up that these guys are still relevant to the story, despite now being (irrelevant).

That brings us to the second retcon. Vriska obviously had great regrets about killing Tavros, both pre- and post-retcon, so she asks for his death to be prevented.

Tavros is back.

Vriska's requested fix is a very simple one - after all, Karkat makes mention about how Vriska's always had a competitive streak with Terezi, admiring/being jealous of her ability to manipul8 people; I think an ultimate culmination of that is her insisting that insisting to John that he do a retcon to stop her from killing Tavros - which, as covered above, she regrets greatly - but to do a much sloppier job of it, simply having John pop into [S] Wake and knock Tavros the fuck out.

Vriska herself doesn't believe this will have any unintended side effects, because her opinion of Tavros is still really low despite her genuine desire to make amends, and she's wrong.

Tavros's stay on the meteor has a major effect on Gamzee. I'm not entirely sure how it would pan out exactly, but I think Gamzee would step in between Dave and Tavros, into a situation none of them are happy with. This starts Tavros on a path of realizing that his inability to stand up for himself not only hurts him, but people he cares about (Gamzee, whom he ghosted).

Vriska is mostly uninterested in Tavros now, as the moment has kind of passed, and Terezi keeps getting on her ass about going after him (which brings the two of them closer).

Previous Messy romantic situations are still active. Karkat is going thru it.

Dave feels bad about tormenting Tavros but he kind of can't help himself, especially because Tavros keeps going up to him for some reason. The fact that he gets trapped in an auspice with Tavros and Gamzee kind of reinforces that he does NOT vibe with troll quadrants. Dave becomes MORE xenophobic.

On a note regarding Gamzee and Tavros: while I generally try to avoid relying on Hussie's commentary too much, as he likes to play his cards close to his chest, his note about Gamzee in the Act 5 book is actually significant enough to me to include:

The best explanation for why Gamzee says he's scared of Vriska, in my opinion, is this: he's flat-out lying. It's a good way for him to maintain his cover as 'Soft Gamzee.' It also provides some ammunition for those who, against all sense of good taste and judgment, want to continue to believe and assert that Gamzee is a decent guy with sensitive emotions and vulnerabilities before he undergoes his Muderstuck awakening. He was none of those things, ever.

Hussie likes to play coy, and you can't really trust anything he says after Act 6 because he's fed up with the fandom, but I think this comment comes early enough, and is made assertively enough, that it can be taken at face value. I know that "Soft Gamzee" is actually extremely popular in the fandom, so this may be controversial, but I do think there's more evidence for him being kind of nasty and manipulative than not, and having that always be a part of him brings more cohesiveness to his character. For example, he seems to have a pale crush on Karkat, trying to assert that Karkat is his best friend and changing the topic when Sollux gets brought up and he recognizes Karkat is closer to Sollux than him, and if you read his first log with Terezi as if he's hiding being nasty under a soft veneer, then his comments do read as pretty passive-aggressive.

TC: yOu KnOw HoW iT iS wItH fAmIlY. GC: NO, NOT R34LLY! GC: 4DURRRR DURR DURP TC: Oh YeAh... ... TC: I sPaCeD oUt, DiD yOu KnOw HoW bEaTuFuL tHe SoUnD oF tHe OcEaN iS? TC: hAvE yOu EvEr EvEn SeEn ThE oCeAn? TC: oR i MeAn SmElLeD iT... TC: SoRrY. GC: >:[

Maybe most damningly, his narration calls dealing with Eridan's genuine emotional distress "indulge emotional theatrics," an implication of his true feelings. Karkat and Eridan are heavily foreshadowed to be moirails, and Gamzee seems to have a pale crush on Karkat. What does Gamzee do in this conversation? He chases Eridan away from comforting Karkat - using the same excuse as he uses to avoid dealing with Vriska.

CA: put kar on TC: UuUuH, i cAn't rEaLlY ThInK AbOuT InTeRvEnInG, tHe bLaCk fRoWnInG MoThErFuCkEr kInDa sCaReS Me

Moreover, he does NOT seem to like Jack comforting Karkat instead, either.

THIS IS NOT TO SAY I DON'T THINK GAMZEE ALSO DESERVES A SHOT AT KINDNESS AND REDEMPTION. Gamzee is clearly a very troubled youth, between his absentee lusus, his indoctrination into a fundie doomsday cult, and his sopor usage. The fact that having his faith shattered by Dave makes him snap implies that, one, he was already unstable and teetering on the edge, and having his faith fucked with was the last straw, and two, that until he lost that last shred of hope, he was still pretending to be nicer than he was for a reason, and given that his LE worship doesn't start up until after the snappage, I think it can be extrapolated that that reason is that he genuinely wants to get along with his friends.

Given that Gamzee's issues largely stem from his neglectful lusus, it's not a stretch to say that Gamzee does not take well to abandonment and isolation. So here's kind of where Tavros comes in:

Gamzee mentions that he feels "So aT ChIlL WiTh yOu" while talking to Tavros, and Tavros reciprocates the friendship and also - interestingly - acknowledges Gamzee's religion, calling it beautiful even if he doesn't necessarily believe in it. I call it interesting because Karkat's inability to do so is explicitly one of the reasons their moirallegiance broke down. Moreover, in their first conversation together, Gamzee explicitly praises Tavros for his "gumption" for stealing his clown nose, when Tavros's avoidance of his problems is one of his biggest personal issues. So yeah, personally, I'm all for moirallegiance.

But Tavros started ghosting him after Gamzee offered to make out a little, another symptom of his avoidance issues. I'm sure that, even in this meteor trip, the fact that Gamzee killed Equius and Nepeta really scares him. In his conversation with Terezi, Terezi outright says "NO WOND3R V4NT4S C4NT ST4ND YOU"; Equius is constantly yelling at him; lots of people on their team seem to genuinely just sort of dislike him.

CG: MIRACLES ARE LIKE POOP STAINS ON GOD'S UNDERWEAR. TA: eheheh makiing fun of people2 reliigiion2 i2 the be2t thiing two do.

So having one of the few people he does really like also ghost him probably did... bad things to his mental health. Especially so when said person wound up dead. But now that he isn't dead, I think they have a shot - they just need to address their personal problems. Tavros with his avoidance, and Gamzee with his resentment toward the world, and reliance on substances and religion to take the edge off. In this meteor iteration, that doesn't quite happen - their toxic auspicetism succeeds in letting them air out their dirty laundry to the audience, but doesn't bring full reconciliation.

In any case, this meteor trip is fairly short, and uneventful from the dream bubbles side, although I do think Tavros should get a talking-to from (Tavros) about real self-esteem and self-worth.

Still, being back in contact with Tavros again, even if in kind of a messed-up way, does make Gamzee start to reconsider some of his past actions. This brings us to:

Gamzee Asks for Equius and Nepeta back.

Gamzee's not as nice as he lets on, but he does genuinely care about his teammates, and for the people he really cares about, like Karkat or Tavros, I think he's willing to stick his neck out. Bringing back Nepeta and Equius is more for Tavros than himself, really, because Tavros is scared of him for doing that, and he motherfuckin' misses Tavros, okay? John mostly agrees because he's kind of scared of Gamzee.

Some really fun stuff starts happening this go around.

The Gamzee-Tavros situation becomes resolved because this time, Equius steps in as an auspice between Tavros and Dave, and this auspicetism is COMPLETELY HEALTHY (with the bonus of being extremely funny, and what is the point of a Homestuck ship if it is not deeply funny).

Gamzee and Tavros are able to enter into a totally healthy moirallegiance once the auspicetism builds up Tavros's self-confidence, much to Karkat's relief.

Being stuck in the auspicetism makes Dave go crawling back to Terezi on his hands and knees. I'm sorry, Terezi. I'll do anything if you take me back. Just don't let me die as the guy stuck in a threesome with the two worst trolls. Dave has overcome his xenophobia.

Dave and Terezi becoming official does make Karkat sad, however, so when Nepeta finally works up the courage to confess to him, he accepts the offer to date her, thus fulfilling Jaspersprite's musing that she might only be able to date him after she dies.

They also break up. We're keeping up this trend of Karkat and his disastrous relationships. He's still involved in the Rose/Kanaya/Vriska drama, too.

With GamTav and Dave/Tavros/Equius cinched, Tavros and Vriska reach a sort of truce with each other. Not really friends, since they kind of still dislike each other, but Vriska would genuinely be glad to see Tavros getting more actually confident, and muster up the energy to genuinely apologize for almost killing him, so there's a sort of mutual respect there now. Vriska and Terezi are even closer because of this, but still not fully over their problems.

On the topic of the Dave/Tavros/Equius auspicetism: Dave still can't stop bothering Tavros, but the lewdness of it sets Equius off, so he feels like he has to intervene. Dave also can't stop himself from bothering Equius, which ALWAYS BACKFIRES, and since Tavros has a weird fondness/rivalry with Dave, he'd find it within himself to ask Equius to back off (which would work, because of Equius's... Equius). And every time Equius gets too overbearing toward Tavros, Dave feels COMPELLED to intervene, because he's like, my fucking god, you are the two worst trolls, why must weirdos fight. Dave desperately wants out, but he can't stop staring at these two.

And weirdly enough, it's beneficial for all of them. With two people to yell at him for being weird, Equius becomes less weird. With a rival in Dave and more contact with Equius, Tavros becomes more confident. And Dave has two people to rap against and feel good about his art with, something he more or less had to deal with alone during previous trips.

On the topic of Karkat and Nepeta, there are quite a few implications that they wouldn't necessarily work out. For citations, let me just link my Nepeta essay, where I go over what the comic says about their relationship from a storytelling perspective; here, I'll talk about their relationship from a more interpersonal perspective.

Karkat's signals are mixed as fuuuuuuck. While I don't necessarily think this will be an issue for Nepeta, as - as a Heart player - she's preternatually gifted at understanding motivations, the thing is... I think Nepeta can do better, and deserves better, a sentiment echoed by Jasprosesprite^2. She certainly deserves better than being second to Terezi, at the very least, even if she states she likes his outbursts.

And the thing is, Karkat is pretty explicit about saying that he doesn't return her feelings; in a world where they date, there's always going to be a sense that she's his second choice. And, just... my girl deserves better, okay? Moreover, while he respects her personhood, he's also pretty nasty to her when he DOES talk to her, implying he doesn't necessarily respect her choices. And also, she's actually really bad at shipping, so there will be this extremely weird tension of like... a hobbyist vs. a professional. I don't think Karkat would be able to stop himself from mocking some of her shipping choices if she ever opened up to him about that.

But I think them getting together is important for Nepeta, developmentally - I talk about this in my essay for her, but shipping is something I think she does need to outgrow, since it's kind of a replacement she's using for her loneliness. Moreover, I say in that essay that the issues she has in her moirallegiance with Equius warrant relationship counselling - and that's what Karkat is uniquely qualified to dispense, as the team's Blood player. Although they end up not working out, Nepeta would take several valuable lessons from this relationship - that she's kind of bad at shipping, that Equius is being kind of a shithead to her, and that she needs to start making friends with other people.

Now then. We're finally getting into some drama in the bubbles.

Please imagine for me Equius and Horuss talking, and Equius being aghast at the way Horuss is so derisive towards his matesprit and moirail. Now imagine him pulling a mic out of nowhere and rapping at him about how his problem is that he does not respect his partners. Now imagine Tavros and Dave joining in, also out of nowhere, with Tavros adding bars about how the hemospectrum is, not a good thing, he thinks. And Dave adding bars about how he does not have a fucking dog in this race. He's not even a troll. He doesn't understand their hemospectrum. Let him out of here. The fine fucking art of Alternian slam poetry. I think Horuss would start crying. So would I if three people including my grandkid started rapping at me.

Nepeta's uncanny emotional acumen leads to her wanting to befriend Damara, but being unable to speak her language.

GameOver!crew is up to something, IDK, probably showing (Tavros) inspiring people and rebuilding the ghost army, to tell a parallel story to Tavros becoming more genuinely self-confident.

We check in with the Alpha kids, too, who have some group therapy sessions led by Roxy.

Vriska and Tavros confront Rufioh together, a final culmination of their no-longer-enemiesship, and together, they steal Rufioh's ones. Like, Tavros starts speak1ng w1th ones, something he always had in him, and they also roast Rufioh so badly that he stops speaking in ones. But the way it's presented to the audience, Vriska outright just says that Tavros should steal his ones. And Tavros does. This carries over to successive retcons, as it's implied that Tavros just kind of starts naturally being more confident as healthy relationships are established sooner and sooner.

Anyway, a final note about Equius - his problems are mostly due to being sheltered. Although he is probably the most casteist highblood, he's not really that casteist, as what's really going on is just that he's got a BDSM kink. But because he's sheltered, he does not realize that it's a kink. And a fetishist who does not realize that they're a fetishist has more power than God.

His protectiveness of Nepeta does come from a good place; preventing her from playing FLARP was actually in her best interest, given what happens to people who play FLARP. But he's very much going overboard with it, likely an extension of his own lack of understanding of how much sheltering is good and how much becomes detrimental. What he really needs is for someone to point it out to him, which I think he gets via Nepeta or via Karkat, and then have a reaaaaally long think about it. He's genuinely a polite and helpful soul, who doesn't WANT to make people uncomfortable. The auspicetism is very good for him in this regard, as is his moirallegiance once Karkat talks him and Nepeta through their issues.

The point is, once he's forced to reckon with the fact that the degeneracy is coming from inside the house, I think he'd have a LOT of regrets about the way he treated Aradia. Which leads us to:

Whoops That Robot Thing Was Really Inappropriate Huh

Equius approaches John to ask him to make Past!Equius reconsider the Aradiabot Thing. John's getting kind of impatient with all these trolls who keep asking him to go back through time, but given that everyone seems a little happier each time, he can't help but agree.

So he goes back to the past, before Equius can give Aradia her robot body with the love chip in it, and something really fun gets to happen here: first of all, Equius's Void status makes him really hard to place, so John winds up missing by a bit, time-wise, so Aradia's already in the body. This is the first time that retconning!John and Aradia have been in the same place together, and when she meets him and finds out that he can time travel without causing paradoxes, she demands (with her Aradiabot deathmurderkill intensity) to be taken back in time to before she died.

John's retcon powers explicitly ignore the usual rules of paradox space - he describes it as a "fresh start". Given that Breath is associated with choices and freedom, his retcon powers are kind of the ultimate culmination of his abilities as a breath player. Although doomed timelines can and will still result from paradoxes caused by players when John isn't there, anything he directly interferes with is totally a-okay.

So all Aradiabot asks him for is passage back in time, in order to sanction her interference in the past. After she dismisses him, she still more or less has to adhere to events in the original timeline, for two reasons - the first being that she doesn't want to risk a new doomed timeline, and the second so she can keep the timeline predictable.

So even though she's basically asked for passage to the time period before SGRUB, it's basically outright stated that the progression of events has to be more or less the same, up until the point where John's other retcons take place. So here are the cascading effects of Aradiabot preventing her own death:

Aradiabot takes Aradia's place in the Team Charge debacle, being blown up/"killed" (as a sprite) by Sollux's eye beams, so that she can take Aradia's place as Doc Scratch/the Handmaiden's servant and "carry out" their orders.

Meanwhile, Aradia seeks refuge with Equius, whose void powers keep her hidden from Doc Scratch's omnipotence.

Because Sollux never actually killed Aradia, and Aradia communicates with him via Equius's account, Sollux is less depressed and self-loathing. He no longer predicts a future where all of them die and he has to be blinded. It's left deliberately vague whether this future comes to pass because he's less pessimistic, so his Mage powers are calling a happier future into being, or if his future changed, so his Mage powers are prophesying something new.

Nepeta starts regaining memories of alternate timelines and past retcons, as an extension of her Rogue of Heart powers. This includes the relationship counselling she received from Karkat.

Between Nepeta and Aradia yelling at him, Equius's character development starts sooner, so he's squared away for future events, and ends up not making the creepy Aradiabot, making a non-creepy one instead.

Aradia and Equius do not strike up a relationship, and become uneasy enemies/friends.

Aradia secretly god tiers well in advance of Jack's arrival, and meets him at Derse rather than awakening on her crypt there.

Aradia and Sollux continue a loving matespritship, leading to Sollux settling into a moirallegiance with Feferi. He's devastated when she dies, which still happens along with the rest of Eridan's freakout; Aradiabot doesn't intervene because she's needed for:

Aradiabot winds up being the one to sacrifice herself piloting the meteor, allowing Sollux to stay with the rest of the team when he meets up with Aradia, (Aradia), and (Sollux) at the Green Sun. Aradiabot winds up with the GameOver!crew.

With the 1337 hackers back in commission, Sollux and Roxy are able to establish a server connection with each other, allowing them to communicate during the 3-year meteor trip.

Aradia involves herself in the Rose/Kanaya/Vriska Mess, and I kind of can't decide what I like better - a vascillatory pitch/flush threeway between Rose, Kanaya, and Vriska, now that Vriska's near the end of her character development, with Aradia serving as a stabilizing force as Kanaya's on-again off-again moirail, or Aradia stepping in as an auspice. Either way, it's out of Karkat's hands.

This has a knock-on effect of finally giving Vriska the chance to fully make amends with Aradia, which winds up cinching the Vriska/Terezi moirallegiance. The scourge sisters are back baybee. And between a healthy moirallegiance for Terezi and a healthy moirallegiance for Gamzee, I think pitch Terezi/Gamzee could work as a healthy ship this time around. I'm not married to it, but they did always seem to hate each other well before SGRUB.

Nepeta has LEARNED HER LESSON regarding dating Karkat, so that does not happen.

Karkat now has no quadrants. He winds up desperately throwing himself at Sadstuck Sollux to try and help him get over his breakup. It's not a good look. Sadkat. He also takes up talking to the alpha kids for emotional support, which puts them off, too. Still gives really good relationship advice. He's clearly one of the more unstable members of the retcon!crew at this point.

We're light on the dream bubble drama this time around because of how MUCH is happening for the retcon!crew, but there's going to be a reference in there of Nepeta learning East Beforan.

SO. NOTES TIME.

Aradia expresses outright that she hated the feeling that she was set up and that she wishes someone would have stopped her from being so reckless. And although she seems to find some satisfaction in being the stewardess of the afterlife, there's clearly some resentment there that she's been forced into that role, as she expresses that what she's really looking forward to is watching it all break apart. There's also kind of an orphaned plot thread where Aradia is spending a lot of time in the afterlife putting knowledge together, which never really directly pays off except to the audience, and I think a really good way to bring that back in would be for her to be communing with (Aradia) in the dream bubbles in order to make sure the timeline flows as smoothly as possible.

As for Aradia/Kanaya - they're actually really good friends, and Aradia expresses that she's flattered that Kanaya wants to talk to her so much. There is a tone here that matches the way Vriska thinks about Kanaya when Kanaya is still ostensibly Vriska's moirail, and Kanaya herself admits to being attracted to people who are reckless. In fact...

AA: i just wish AA: back when i was behaving recklessly AA: i had s0me0ne t0 tell me t0 st0p listening AA: even if i ended up ign0ring their advice AA: it w0uld have been nice

GA: It Must Be A Certain Madness Im Afflicted By GA: To Orbit Those More Reckless And Dangerous Than I And More Daring For It GA: I Guess I Want To Help Them But They Never Can Be Helped It Seems

So I'm just kind of saying... Aradia and Kanaya moirallegiance... is not entirely unfounded. And a moirail stabilizes a troll's other relationships; if we have a moirail for Kanaya and a moirail for Vriska, then the Mess that is whatever's going on with Kanaya, Vriska, and Rose would probably resolve itself, I think. Either way, Rose is surrounded by SUCH a girl's night of emotional support to help her with sobriety now.

As for whatever's going on between her and Equius, I tend to believe the comic when it tells me relationships don't work out, and Aradia expresses regret for kissing him during the Ministrife. I think they could be good vitriolic frenemies, though.

Okay, onto Sollux.

In the same panel where Eridan and Karkat are implied to be "hatched for each other" pale-wise, Feferi and Sollux are foreshadowed in the same way:

They also spend a LOT OF TIME curled up in a pile together talking about their feelings, which we don't see with matesprits, but we DO see with moirails. Nepeta and Equius do the same thing, and they are kind of THE moirails. So I think Sollux and Feferi were always meant to be pale, but because Aradia died, Sollux wound up taking Feferi on as a matesprit instead. Between EriFef, SolFef, and GamTav, people getting flushed and pale feelings entangled is like, a Running Thing, so it's not really surprising to me.

Now, here's the thing. We already know that Sollux likes to cope with a rebound, since he went flushed with Feferi after Aradiabot exploded and was presumed dead. And Karkat cares very fucking much about Sollux, to the point where Gamzee speculates that he's actually Karkat's best friend, and Karkat even calls him that (although Karkat also kind of just calls anyone his best friend, lol).

CG: GAMZEE WAS MY VERY GOOD FRIEND, WHO WAS THIS GOOFY LOVEABLE BULLSHIT CLOWN UNTIL HE WENT PSYCHO AND KILLED SOME PEOPLE. I LIKED HIM A LOT. CG: I DON'T KNOW, I GUESS MY BEST FRIEND IS REALLY JUST THE GUY WHO I HAPPEN TO BE FEELING MOST SENTIMENTAL TO AT THE MOMENT, IS THAT A FUCKING CRIME.

This crab's got so much love in him. In any case, I mostly just want to keep sticking Karkat in these extremely unhealthy relationships for a while. It makes it sweeter when he finally winds up with Eridan LIKE HE WAS ALWAYS MEANT TO... but yeah.

Cross-session communication is also entirely possible, as Sollux set up chat clients between the trolls and the kids in the first place, and even without that, Kanaya found Rose's old GameFAQs on a server in the Furthest Ring. With both Sollux and Roxy on the case, there's no way they can't somehow establish communications way sooner.

Regarding Nepeta regaining her memories, let me once more point you towards the Nepeta essay. She's on track to become the one who attains Ultimate Selfhood, and comforts people like Jade and John about not really knowing their friends or being lonely.

But yeah, obviously Sollux asks for Feferi to be brought back.

F-EF-ERI!!!! 38D

Mostly Sollux just asks to be prevented from provoking Eridan so harshly. Eridan still winds up blowing up the matriorb, and thus, still getting killed by Kanaya in retribution, but this means that Eridan is now the only member of the team left dead.

PITCH FEFNEP. PITCH FEFNEP. PITCH FEFNEP

Pitch FefNep leads to Feferi letting slip something casteist where Sollux can hear; he doesn't personally care because he's heard much worse, but puts them on a break while she sorts herself out. They get back together after that.

Karkat alone :'( he's mostly just talking to the alpha kids at this point, trying to hide from all the happy fucking relationships happening all around him.

If the last retcon was really heavy on the retcon!crew, then this one is much more about what's happening in the bubbles. We get most of our dancestor development this go around. Do not read if you like the dancestors! I go very in-depth about how most of them are horrible people on purpose here, so their arcs are mostly about them being pulled up on their abject awfulness.

Nepeta, who has learned East Beforan, is able to talk to Damara and have an earnest heart-to-heart with her about how awfully she was treated. They hug and cry. Damara, finally validated, gives everyone a big middle finger.

Feferi heals Mituna's brain injury, because literally why the FUCK has nobody else done that. Now once more in control of his faculties, he breaks up with Latula, pissed off that she took advantage of him all those eons to boost her own ego. He also gives everyone a big middle finger. Damara steals her skateboard and high fives Mituna.

Porrim's basically the only dancestor who grew as a person so I think she mostly escapes unscathed.

Latula gets chased around by Sollux and Aradia, who basically just bully her for being bad at games. This is a date to them.

Gamzee completely refutes Kurloz, with his newfound clarity about the real miracle being friendship and the real dark carnival being the world he and his friends will build, not that LE noise.

In a double team between Terezi and Rose, Meulin gets eviscerated for the way her own Issues have made her ships deliberately awful, that she could have simply Not, and she has a bit of a breakdown.

As Feferi is grappling with her privilege and internalized casteism, Cronus wanders up to try and hit on her, and she goes "oh my god... when people look at me, are you what they see? A friendless loser that nobody likes? A total waste of seawater who's only pretending to be cool with the lower castes? A totally fake poser? 38(" Cronus just goes "..." and starts crying and Feferi ends the convo oblivious to that, just going "wow... thanks for talking with me! really gave me a lot to think about" imagine how funny it would be -

Karkat finds and talks to (Eridan), where he fully admits to missing the guy. His mopiness is so extreme that (Eridan) takes issue with it and punches him, before basically yelling at him to get his shit together. Karkat then yells at HIM for him to get HIS shit together, and they both leave, intent on getting their shit together.

We also get an update on Vriska and Meenah at this point, where Meenah is starting to seem more into how they totally ditched their responsibilities than Vriska is.

So the thing with this update is that most of the trolls have sorted their shit out; even Karkat has had a lot of introspection about how he really just fucking loves his friends and should have been more honest about it, not worried so much about appearing weak or lame. With the double Aradias in play to kind of handwave that the timeline will be stable because they're ensuring all loops get completed and all necessary conversations happen, and with everyone's successful relationships on display, we can kind of truncate the next leg of the journey:

Karkat Fixes Everything

Karkat is the Friendship Troll. Karkat is the Romance Troll. Karkat is the Bonds troll. He is their team's Blood player, and as the Blood player, he's been shown to deeply love all of his fucking friends - yes, even the assholes. Maybe even especially them.

As such, it's vitally important for the last push - last leg of the journey - to belong to Karkat. Where would our Blood player be without his bonds? Well, we actually have the answer to that. It's knocked out and prevented from joining in any of the important boss battles. LAME!

So in the last retcon, Karkat hears from Nepeta about the retcons that have been happening, and he really starts digging through his own past. If every retcon so far has been each troll only feeling comfortable undoing their own personal mistakes, then what of the guy who feels personally responsible for everything, all the time, forever?

Look, I'm not saying that a shipping chart saves Homestuck, but... by the time this last retcon is through, every Alternian troll is alive and god tiered. And he is dating Eridan.

If you have any questions about him dating Eridan, please refer to the link above. That essay is nearly as long as this one. There's SO MUCH FUCKING FORESHADOWING.

I don't think the god tiering needs to be explained, because if we hear that Karkat basically made his past self a shipping chart, and we've seen everybody's character development as they've gone through this journey, and we have Aradias on timeline duty and Nepeta with memories of past retcons and her alternate selves, I think we can more or less gloss over exactly how they go about earning their wings while maintaining timeline integrity. The important thing is that Karkat is dating Eridan now.

Because that leads to the last few bits of dream bubble stuff, but before we get into that...

Miscellaneous Plot Things That Need To Happen But I Don't Know Where To Put Them

Yeah there's just some ideas that I have floating around that need to be placed somewhere but IDK exactly where, or exactly how they shake out.

Hal becomes a real boy. And by that I mean as part of their character development, Jake makes Hal "real" a la brain ghost Dirk, and then the rest of them have to scramble against the clock (Jake's ability to maintain Hal's realness) to god tier him and make his existence permanent. He's a Sylph of Mind, which allows him to negate Condy's mind control. And maybe a GCATboy?

(Tavros) becomes the new leader of the ghost army.

Davesprite winds up dead at some point in the bubbles and doesn't explain how he died, but he and (Dave) get to fight each other and hash out their Realness and Relevance issues, before facing their final boss fight as bros once more.

Jade and Nepeta get to talk, and Nepeta gives Jade the reassuring speech about Ultimate Selfhood and how she won't be lonely forever. Maybe it's flushed. Might leave it ambiguous.

Somebody needs to auspicetize Dirk and Jake holy shit. Dunno who. Maybe Karkat, but I kind of like him pitch with Dirk, so IDK really.

Dad needs to die. Sorry Dad. If I can find a way to kill off all of the sprites besides ARquiusprite, I will. It's explicitly stated that sprites are drawn to the battlefield during the Reckoning, presumably to die, as part of the coming-of-age themes - losing one's guardians. It's sad but it's gotta happen.

All the Godtier!Calliope stuff basically happens as-is.

Can you tell I need to do more research on the alpha kids...

Ok Back To Karkat And Eridan

I think I'm going to leave their moirallegiance fairly ambiguous, but when Eridan is brought back, he and Karkat are basically together all the time. Karkat's signals are mixed even on the best of days, so I don't know how easy it'll be to tell that these two assholes slinging death threats at each other are pale, but *I* will know, and that's what matters.

This leads to the last two dancestor takedowns:

Karkat and Eridan (mostly Eridan) round on Kankri. Eridan calls him SO MANY SLURS. The fact that Karkat not only condones this, but is DATING ERIDAN, kind of makes Kankri lose it a bit.

(Karkat) and (Eridan), who have reconciled in the bubbles, finally find (Vriska) and Meenah. (Karkat) gives the two of them the speech that retcon!Vriska gave (Vriska) in the comic's original ending, but this time around, (Vriska) actually agrees with him. This serves as a conclusion to (Karkat) and Meenah's arc, and causes Meenah to feel so bad that she walks back to the other dancestors in shame, as (Vriska) leaves with him with the treasure to finally fight LE.

When Meenah returns to the dancestors, the first one she finds is Aranea, who's really sad about her own little escapade, blaming herself for the way Game Over went. This prompts Meenah to go, no, it was probably my fault, shouldn't have let you run off like that. And this would, from all the sobbing dancestors, prompt a string of "no, I'm the reason we failed"s, eventually culminating in Meenah rallying them together to do one last good thing before everyone gets sucked into the black hole and go join the fight against LE. Everyone agrees.

(Gamzee) is revived by the life players and cursed with immortality, so he can go on to become LE and complete that time loop. He is immediately locked in the fridge. This is also why he can't fucking die no matter what you do to him.

This also leads us into the final boss fights.

VS. CONDY

The twelve trolls. The Condesce represents tyranny, the worst aspects of the trolls' old society, and as such, is most thematically taken down by them. While she did fuck up the alpha kids' lives, too, I just personally think it's so much more thematic and satisfying to watch her be beaten down by the trolls.

VS. THE THREE JACKS

The eight kids plus Hal plus Davesprite. With Bec Noir specifically, it's fucking PERSONAL, as this guy killed their parents. This is where Dave fulfils his destiny of killing an iteration of English with his sword, when he decapitates Jack English; the person in the middle of that sandwich is Davesprite, which is how he dies and winds up in the bubbles. The iteration of Jack that survives to date Ms. Paint is Spades Slick, as he's the most sympathetic out of all of them and didn't kill anybody's parents.

At some point during this fight, I like the idea that they get zapped away by Jack English, John zaps them to the Godtier!Caliborn fight where he gets sealed in the juju, and then we cut back to the fight with Jack English, where, inexplicably, they all zap right back in.

VS. THE FELT

The spares - ARquiussprite, (Gamzee) in the fridge (who has since been revived by the life players and blessed/cursed with eternal life so he can go on to fulfill his role in the timelines and become part of LE), Dad, and the other sprites (if any of them are left alive).

VS. LORD ENGLISH

The GameOver!crew, the ghost army, the dancestors (they have a Big Damn Heroes moment right near the end, buying Jake time to deploy the Weapon), Aradiabot, and Davesprite.

Jake fulfills his destiny to defeat the Lord of all Angels by being the one to deploy the weapon, which deposits the beta kids, who knock LE in to the black hole. They then zap out of there, collecting the alpha kids from after the Caliborn fight, and zap back to the fight with the Jacks.

This specific configuration of boss battles winds up leaving Lord English entirely up to dead characters, who are then implied to all eventually get sucked into the black hole - their memories to live on through the living characters via Ultimate Selfhood, which only Nepeta achieves on screen, but implies that they will all achieve eventually.

It's important to me that the GameOver!crew is the one leading the fight against Lord English, as they're the ones who were the most screwed over by LE and his machinations - manipulated into killing each other, used as servants of his will, dying ignobly in a doomed timeline filled with special stardust. Meanwhile, the retcon!kids and trolls prove what they've learned - about compassion, kindness, equality, and forgiveness - by beating the shit out of the Condesce, who represents the horrors of Alternia, and the Jacks, especially Bec Noir and Jack English - the latter of which is a shadow of what Lord English represents - immaturity, cruelty, hatred - and the former of which is a culmination of all the failures they committed to get to this point, a symptom of their universal cancer.

I wrote a little snippet of Aradia once, and I think I'll use that to end this essay:

(ARADIA): ok now that we are all done being stupid (ARADIA): im sure enough people here remember the plan that i dont need to explain it again (ARADIA): so instead i just wanted to say (ARADIA): leave your backs to us and face forward without fear (ARADIA): the dead and irrelevant will slay the demon of double death while you unmake the threats of the living (ARADIA): and personally i think it's very fitting that he will perish here as nothing more than a bad dream (ARADIA): this will be the last time we see each other (ARADIA): so on behalf of everyone that you are going to be leaving behind (ARADIA): live (ARADIA): and be happy!

[carrie-tate]

You know what?

That's what!

That's right, this blog has grown to such a significant level, can you imagine? There are 1000 of you gathered here...

People, what are you doing here xD?

God, this... This is such a significant number, I can even give a speech about everything that I have been through during this time (about two and a half years, by the way!)

And I will!

Let me start by saying that this blog has been through a lot.

Periods like my first requests, when I scored my first hundred. Or for the second time when I was taking requests, when it was a period of creating a bunch of drawings (particularly based on Percy Jackson, btw, lol)

But the times when I get carried away and create characters stand out even more clearly.

For example, to ship them with a canon character

For example, Thea and Cilan, one of the longest-running couples on this blog, and one of the most affectionate. I even drew a comic based on them, and it all ended in one chapter >x'D

Or Chris and MMK, a couple from a completely unpopular fandom like Kaitou Joker, whose dynamic I still find most lively and exciting!

Although some of my characters were not created for romance

For example, Kasumi, my beautiful girl from Mob Psycho 100, who personifies my behavior in college now, which is even funny, because when I created her, I just wanted to be like her.

And yes, obviously, there are many more characters that I showed here, and maybe you remember them. But listing them would take so much time, and I need to move on.

Here I met wonderful people!

And I still communicate with many, and everyone is extremely dear to me! I just want to say thank you to everyone!

@caelums-fate @soft--dragon @sonartf @mochirizu @candyheartedchy @kanene-yaaay-o-retorno @randommusicalfluff @rand0m-s1nner @birbliophile @fluffy-ami @aviafoil @otomiyaa and more more more!

No matter how long we communicate, you are extremely dear to me, and thank you for being here with me! You are wonderful people! And even people I haven’t talked to, but regularly like my work, I recognize your nicknames and avatars and appreciate you too! Thank you!

This blog was created in 2021 by fifteen-year-old me who was drawing at SAI and had absolutely no idea that Tumblr would be a part of her life. Just a hobby.

And I even disappeared for almost a year, and really started working on this blog by the spring of 2022.

I slowly developed, took requests, became bolder, talking about the topic of tickle and sharing my thoughts. And looking at my old posts... I feel both funny and a little ashamed of my inexperience. But I understand that this is part of the way I grew up. And this is good.

So now I'm better than before. A lot happened. I graduated from school and entered college. I cut my hair and started wearing glasses more often. Became more open and less shy. I, one might say, took a couple of useless fandoms under my wing, drawing tickle content on them. I treasure every comment with gratitude that such drawings have finally appeared for this or that fandom (mp100, pjo, Wild Kratts, etc.), I carefully keep in my heart.

I think if the young me of 2021 saw me now, she would be proud... And that's a nice thought, you know?

Just what else I want to say...

I can’t get tired of saying thank you to this place for every memory and emotion that it gave me. Thank you so much for being here with me, you are all just wonderful, bright people, whose support I value in my hectic life!

[aranarumei]

you listed gsnk as an option and my dopamine receptors lit up. What dyou think about mikorin and mayu

ask me about a ship and I’ll give my opinions + classify them as does / doesn’t make sense, does / doesn’t compel me

heyyy surprise for you. yeah i actually was cleaning up my notes app today and realized I'd answered this and never posted this lol. gonna start off with a does make sense, does compel me and continue under the cut.

okay. hear me out. for a period of time I genuinely believe mayumiko was the gsnk duo closest to being, like, romantic. in a sense. horikashi, nozachiyo, and wakaseo have sure got a lot of development since then (in ch 60, kashima avoids hori and we get a REALLY good moment out of it) but like. just one chapter before that, we have ch 59. one of my favorite chapters. and at that point, I feel like the main couples have had their setup and they're really fun and comedic, but there hasn't been much... advancement, in a sense?

and then we hit ch 59, where "mayumayu" (nozaki mayu, who's been conned into posing as a girl) and "mamiko" (mikoshiba mikoto, who's posing as a girl so that he's not a creepy guy commenting on mayumayu's blog, unwittingly using the name of the protagonist of let's love by nozaki umetarou under alias of yumeno sakiko without knowing that he's the inspiration for the character's personality) basically immediately hit it off over text. seriously, past the first couple of texts where there's a bunch of people commenting on it, all they say is that they'll instantly reply to any texts that come their way. what commences is a hell of texting, probably, but it is a LOT of texting that happens. and that's not something that can be empty! both mikoshiba and mayu seem worn out by the amount of time they spend on it, but they don't seem worn out by each other in the slightest, judging by the fact that in ch 89, not only is mikoshiba still regularly checking mayumayu's blog, he's getting texts with extra art and well-wishes for his exams! they talk to each other about their lives! and it's not something that exists only online, too... mayu and mikoshiba are genuinely and obviously good friends outside of their online identities.

I'm aware not everyone sees it that way, but like, to me, ch 59 was like the most outright romantic the series had gotten. so it's very special to me. so is mayumiko! mayumiko’s so fun because they’re both soooo cool and soooo uncool. but while the mayumiko situation is objectively hilarious, the way they're friends is like... surprisingly understated? it's just something that happens and it works for both of them, even when it seems like it shouldn't. like, let's be real, mikoshiba can be kind of annoying, and mayu can be kind of grating. despite that they end up being really comfortable with each other. like. no wonder they could keep up that texting chain. they just click in general.

so we meet mayu in ch 33, and in ch 37, mikoshiba runs into him, and they've got this fun chapter together where miyako both compares them to cats. then in ch 49, mayu gets mikoshiba to lend him his... questionable? sure. questionable manga. calls him mikoto-san. and it just kind of... happens, them being friends. since they both hang out at nozaki's place. it's neat. in ch 64, post-The Incident, mikoshiba's comfortable enough to ask mayu for help with working out. and mayu knows mikoshiba enough to shout out the specific name of the fake high school from one of the games mikoshiba likes (sure, it's a super popular galge, but that's a strange thing to know well! especially for a guy who's traditionally lazy about everything but judo)

then of course we get to the mayu chapters where he's just so. iconic. in ch 76, mikoshiba needs to bring a guy to the mixer and then after nozaki rejects him sakura's like, ask mayu, who's been on the floor this whole time. side note i think its cute that when mikoshiba asks mayu, he calls himself "mikoshiba-nii-san." and mayu rejects him at first (also using "mikoshiba-nii-san" lol), but he ends up going once he's told he doesn't have to do that much work. and then he grills a girl about her boyfriend bc she says he does judo. and then tries to get some guy's number because he's apparently strong. judo freak (affectionate). and then, of course, as mikoshiba's thinking that "ah, they totally think mayu likes guys, but i guess it's fine since he doesn't seem to care" and when he's surrounded by girls mayu jumps in and says "he's mine," just like nozaki's shoujo manga advice had told him to do. love that for them. in ch 81, though it's a pain, mayu goes along with the idea that all the stuff in the back room is his and not mikoshiba's (though maybe he thought it was more of a pain to explain) and when talking about dating sims, mayu says, "well, guys or girls, both are pretty similar." love that guy for real.

then, in one of the moments of all time that make me insane, in ch 94, seo's pinning mikoshiba, and suddenly goes, it's boring without waka (makes sense! he's normally the guy she pushes around like this) and mikoshiba's like. oh! that's right! I haven't gotten a souvenir for mayu yet! (makes... sense...? because. because he's getting PINNED??? and we KNOW that mikoshiba hasn't done judo with mayu because it happens for the first time in ch 135, where after some really nice moments, mikoshiba sheepishly asks if mayu wants to try throwing him around too. it's a weird expression of care and also the fact that they're still friends after this fact, considering the violence nozaki translates it as, is a testament to their friendship.)

also in the extras for that volume, we see mikoshiba got him a smartphone case, which sucks because mayu's got a flip phone (though it's better than the hairpin nozaki got mayu) but then when mayu figures out a use for that smartphone case, he runs to mikoshiba to give him the good news! 'cause mikoshiba was sulking before... they're fun.

i think I've already said this but they really are close. and i think mayu's kinda clingy. in ch 114 when kashima rei asks to talk to him again, he's like, "go through mikoto-san." in ch 128 we find out that mayu shows girls in his class photos of mikoshiba so they make sure he doesn't get caught napping. this begs the question: HOW did this arrangement exist in the first place? because there's no way I can think about it that doesn't involve mayu and mikoshiba being at some level of closeness. and there's no way mayu can get so many nice looking photos of mikoshiba without being close to him. and in that same fucking chapter when nozaki’s making posts for his blog and turns mikoshiba into a girl, people think that he and mayu are dating. like oh my god. even in gekkan shoujo nozaki-san, when the main cast is meant to be a bit older than the canon timeline, mikoshiba and mayu are hanging out together at nozaki's place. and when mikoshiba and nozaki are getting all chummy with miyoshi, mayu walks in and he's like. ah. a challenger emerges (because he presumably wants to be pampered instead). my point is that they're close they just hang out. it's comfortable, which says a lot for both of them.

in ch 59 mayu's friends are like. his type is 1) someone who's stronger than him at judo or 2) someone older who'd take care of him and. mikoshiba's not #1 but he is #2. those two can be pretty sweetly considerate actually. as we see mayu gets dragged into quite a bit of stuff and does it. in ch 101 he actually finishes up the chapter of let's love while everyone's fallen asleep. and in the vol 14 extras mikoshiba gifts a water plant to a guy he barely knows. just because. so I feel like they're both sweet people underneath it all. and extra fact about ch 59 i know you'll feel crazy about. kobayashi (the guy who actually runs the mayumayu blog) calls mayu maa-kun. i am not joking.

anyways to me mikoshiba and mayu are both this weird security to each other. mayu’s someone who doesn’t care abt social graces and mikoshiba’s someone who cares too much. but when they’re weird to each other it’s like they accept everything. and I just think. despite all of the mistaken identity drama it’s like. idk. they just like each other. they just get along well. and for mikoshiba who’s so awkward with girls, this works out well. also the way that in ch 144 his fav ever gacha character is this kind of gloomy and lazy girl… fascinating thing you’re being charmed by. what a taste you have.

so in the end despite all of the wild situations i think it’ll be simple. mikoshiba will think a little too much and mayu a little too little. but they've gotten along well for so long that I think this will go pretty well, too. it'll just be a feeling that grows kind of slowly until it works for the two of them.

[petruchio]

Bestie I think you’re so right about the movie altering Lucy and Coryo’s romance to better convey the themes within the limitations of the medium!

Like it’s actually a huge book! I knew they would have to cut a lot for the sake of run time so I was fully expecting them to sacrifice some of the details that do so much heavy lifting for the deeper themes.

But I was so pleasantly surprised, and I honestly think that preserving the themes must have been a central goal in the production! I was noticing small changes - but they all seemed to serve keeping the major themes in tact?

Like I saw it with my family (who all read thg but not tbosas) and I went in wondering. Like how are they going to make a meaningful, faithful, adaptation of such a large book?? Will my family understand The Themes? And they did!

I think it speaks to Suzanne’s writing ability (her themes are layered throughout every level, so a few cuts won’t gut them entirely) and smart/intentional alterations.

Like you mention with cutting the kiss, I think doing so highlights the transactionality of this moment. Coryo won’t kiss her OR give her the compact until she denounces Billy taupe! Like literally he won’t save her life (do the right thing, like Tigris says) if she’s in love with someone else! Interesting!

But like you say, if they do !finally! kiss (without that monologue) it’s easier to miss how manipulative he’s being in that moment and the importance of it!

I think they made a similar smart choice with being shipped off to 8 - I might be wrong here!! But I’m pretty sure he isn’t ordered to be a peace keeper? He CHOOSES that because he sees it as his only avenue left? (Which I thought was some military industrial complex commentary sprinkled in but now I’m afraid I imagined this whole thing LOL)

So assuming I’m not misremembering - I thought making highbottom force him to become a peace keeper also worked similarly. Like letting him choose that (without the internal monologue) makes his motivations seem genuine when they aren’t fully. So it’s just better for the movie medium perhaps?

Anyways, rambling done lol thanks for listening 🌟

ohhhh how i love all of this!! i love you for taking the time to send all this to me -- and thank you for validating my reading of the altered love story!!

and YES i was so pleasantly surprised by how well they managed to maintain a lot of the thematic content of the book, esp because we KNOW how much they gutted it in the original trilogy. i have a couple theories on why: the first is that the filmmakers are devoted readers of my tumblr blog and they understood the importance of preserving the political themes from the novels when adapting them to the screen (ok obviously i am joking.) my real theories are -- the cultural conversation has shifted a LOT since the original films got made, and i think they were more aware and more *able* to be more explicit with so many of those ideas. i also wonder if the act of adapting the story of someone from capitol was easier than adapting someone from district 12 -- there's been much ink spilled over how we, the privileged moviegoers who are watching the film in theaters, are much more like capitolites than we are like katniss herself. and i wonder if that made it easier to adapt -- because one of the big critiques of the thg films is that they really glam jlaw up even when she's in district 12, and it makes scenes like the "remake" scenes kind of lose their power and biting social commentary. whereas with snow, and the capitol, and the games themselves, we're meant to understand that they ARE a facade, and the movie can really lean into that. (side note, my least fav costume in the whole movie was lucy gray's swimsuit. pretty much for that exact reason -- it was too ~perfect~ for the setting.)

to your point about the change with snow deciding vs being ordered to become a peacekeeper -- i honestly couldn't remember either so i went to see if i could find the quote from the book and it's this:

[...] But as he approached the dean, a cold dread washed over him. There, arranged on the table like lab specimens, were three items: an Academy napkin stained with grape punch, his mother’s silver compact, and a dingy white handkerchief. The meeting could not have lasted more than five minutes. Afterward, as agreed, Coriolanus headed directly to the Recruitment Center, where he became Panem’s newest, if not shiniest, Peacekeeper.

honestly i wish i remembered what exactly is meant by "as agreed" but i do think you're right that in the book it's more implied that he doesn't have another choice -- because he didn't win the monetary prize, he has to enroll. so i think you're right that the point is that the idea that it's his choice at all is in question because it's societal pressure and his family's financial status that kind of forces him into the military industrial complex. but i think, because they made this scene so explicit in the film, that you're right that having him be ordered to do it instead of hearing him justify it in his head manages to accomplish what we need it to for the sake of the plot moving forward (if kind of weakening that angle of sc's commentary)

also, here's something to chew on -- i was thinking as i was watching the film if part of the reason some of the changes didn't irritate me so much was because i was more forgiving of the need to shift things around to account for the lack of internal monologue because the book is written in third person instead of first person. i mean, obviously i am overly attached to pretty much everything about katniss, and yes that comes down even to her internal monologue, but i did wonder if that made some of the changes feel more natural to me, because we still kind of get them explained to us in the book as an observer, instead of listening to someone explain themselves to us (i don't know if that makes any sense?) -- but i guess what i'm trying to say is that maybe reading tbosas is more like watching a film, vs reading thg which is more like you are experiencing something alongside katniss? and that's because of the pov choice?

WELL that was a ramble! i'm always amazed by how much we can say about these books and films!! they're just so layered and so fascinating -- i'm loving all the conversations i've been seeing about tbosas. i feel like a lot of it is really starting to gel for me the more i read people's thoughts and analyses. (i still think the third act is messy though. no matter how great suzanne's themes are, i do think the pacing is rough. lol!)

[ryuichirou]

Replies

One serious one and a bunch of kind of silly shorter ones.

Anonymous asked:

Hi!  I hope you don't mind me asking this but I had a question about fandom stuff since this is my first time in an active fandom.  Almost every time there's fanworks, mostly fanart, of the TWST first and seconds years in sexual positions/sexualized, there's a lot of people dramatically freaking out because they're "minors/16/17!" and "you're not allowed to do that/it's illegal so stop that!" (Sometimes in all caps too). Are these people common in fandoms with younger casts?  Sorry for sounding anxious, I just keep running into people like this and anti-shippers and they really bring my mood down...

Hi Anon! Sure, I don’t mind talking about fandom stuff.

I think it’s not a matter of titles having younger casts, but a matter of fandoms having younger people in them. There are some shows that aren’t very popular/have fandoms that mostly consist of people that are older than 25, and you’d see less of this type of attitude there. Like, drastically less. I don’t think there are a lot of people complaining about characters of Prince of Tennis being 14-16 year olds, for example.

But if a show is popular with teens or younger people in general, chances are, there are going to be quite a number of antis. For example, SK8 got a big chunk of its popularity on tiktok and boy is it obvious lol

I want to stress that this doesn’t mean that all the anti-shippers are young: this absolutely isn’t the case, and unfortunately a lot of pretty much adult people participate in harassment, write call-outs and do this type of crap in general. Also obviously, not every teenager is an anti (not that it matters to us of course, all of our blogs are 18+ so the majority of teens shouldn’t even be here).

So yeah. I think of it as a subculture, albeit a very aggressive one. There are people who are legitimately uncomfortable with this type of content, but I’m pretty sure the majority of antis just love using their non-existent high moral ground to harass and try to control people and their art. They either don’t understand the magnitude of their actions or don’t care if they hurt real people over fictional minors.

I am very sorry that you stumble upon this type of people and that they make you feel bad. I always say this, but: block everyone. Even if a person is just mildly uncomfortable to you or you don’t like their vibes, block them just so you see less of this type of stuff.

Your art and any art that you enjoy doesn’t hurt anyone as long as people are being responsible about posting and interacting with it. So absolutely don’t feel like you’re doing something wrong just because someone doesn’t understand how fiction works. I hope this type of crap disappears as soon as fandoms become less popular, like they’ve been before things got out of hand. Some people should’ve never been here in the first place – sorry for gate-keeping, but they don’t get it and don’t care about getting it or at least being respectful to others, so why should we be better people.

Anonymous asked:

Idia: Yay, crotch view!

(related to our Lilidia drawing from yesterday hehe)

Lucky boy! Got to see Heavens right before his demise…

Anonymous asked:

What do you think about Neige x Epel?

Replied! Also talked about them a bit in this reply + some other replies that I can’t find…

Anonymous asked:

thoughts on liliaxepel?

Definitely replied before, but I can’t find that reply, so: they’re cute, gotta love two short feisty cuties together; we really liked that one vignette in which Lilia shows Epel that you don’t have to be tall or big to be scary and strong. It teases a very interesting potential dynamic both in a shippy and in a platonic sense: Epel has a lot to learn from Lilia, and it would be fun if they interacted more often.

It isn’t a ship that we’re massively passionate about, but they’re fun together! Could be very hot.

[stormblessed95]

It's a topic you already discussed previously but now we got many new infos I hope you will answer this.

Even in latest vlive Jimin told he's setting up an alarm and waking up - which means he's alone.

He's ordering food from outside and it's really a mess to clean up - there's no one with his who knows to cook.

He's working full time on music and when he rarely gets out it's alone - means there's no one he spends much time with.

RM told he's going to meet jimin now multiple times- I.e they are in same apt complex and only jimin lives there.

K army having zero spotting of jikook now - it used to happen when they were living together in nineone which JK rented.

But some big jkk blogs, including you, are still spreading misinfos like Jikook live together. I think you should change that statement by now as many new armys are following you. They may have lived together in 2020 when Jimin didn't had his apt or JK haven't rented brunnen. But things obviously changed now so you still sticking to old things is not right. It's no different from Tkkrs spreading lies saying it's their opinion and their own account. Or not stopping shipping tkk when it's almost obvious Tae maybe dating another woman now.

Okay, well I don't really CARE if jikook live together or not. Which is something yall keep really wanting me to care about. If they do or don't, it changes nothing about my opinions on anything else. And in every other post about this. I've said "we DONT KNOW if they live together or not." That's not misinformation. If I said, jikook live together and it's fact, you could call that misinformation. But you know. You tried. And here is the thing. We STILL DONT KNOW IF THEY LIVE TOGETHER OR NOT. lol you don't know either. You just think they don't. And that's FINE. So, take my response to this in the good faith that I mean it with. None of your bullet points here hold up as proof of living alone. And that is not me saying it's proof or not proof that jikook live together. They might. Or they might not. But you can't pull these facts from your ass and act like it's the end all be all of the "discussion" that I keep saying I don't care about having and yall keep trying to make me have. Lol but sure, let's get into it.

1) Waking up to an alarm doesn't mean you live alone. 😅😅 literally what?? I set an alarm when I need to be up by a certain time and im not confident the other people in my house will be up by that time and therefore end up waking up me anyway. And I live with MULTIPLE other people, not just my spouse. My partner sets an alarm a lot more often than me. Anytime he needs to be up earlier than normal for work or for an event he has planned with his friends, he sets an alarm. If I'm having a particularly bad health week, he will even go sleep in his home office and set his early alarm since he wouldn't want to risk disrupting my sleep if he needed to get up early on a week where it's clear I need more rest than normal. Does this mean we don't live together? Please a poll at how many couples who live together use an alarm (either together or seperately) or even just how many roommates do too 😅

2) Ordering food for most of your meals means you are busy and don't have time to cook or sit down for a meal even. Which, we know Jimin is. And I know we all joke about JK being Jimins cook and blah blah blah. But Jimin DOES know how to cook for himself too. He manages just fine. Lol and complaining about the mess of cleaning up either from take out or cooking, again. Doesn't equate to living alone OR living with someone else. "No one there who knows how to cook" lol EXCEPT FOR JIMIN HIMSELF?! Please go run a secondary poll about how many cohabitating couples order way too much takeout on overly busy weeks. Please also ask them if this means they don't know how to cook 😅

3) how hard Jimin is working again doesn't mean he lives with someone or alone. And saying he rarely has time to go out with people, doesn't mean never nor does it mean he isn't staying IN with anyone either. Plus, it's discounting the few times we have seem him go out and about with his FRIENDS. Lol like the soccer game he went to with Jhope. Or when he went and celebrated JKs birthday with him. Or all the times RM (which you bring up next) said he went to go visit Jimin. Not going out, but staying in.... so what does visits with friends or hanging out with others in the rare bouts of free time this year have to do with who he does or doesn't live with?

4) RM said he is going to visit Jimin multiple times, ie, only he lives there and it's in the same apt complex. Thats alot of assumptions, love. Lol just a lot of assumptions. And again, saying you have plans with a friend doesn't mean that friend lives alone or lives with someone either. Nor does it mean that Jimin was at home. Jimin ALSO said he had been practically living in the studio. Various studios. Even spending long late nights in the studios. Please tell me where Namjoon said he was going to go see Jimin at Jimins house where Jimin was there alone? For all we know Jimin was at the studio with his wife actually. Thank you very much. 🙄🤣

5) K army, the good ones, tend to keep their spottings of the members to themselves ALOT. You think the members only get spotted the very few times it ends up leaking onto the timeline and shared? Wow. They must be better master's of disguises then I thought! Not to mention, I've already done a post over this! I hope you'll read it

Everyone knows for fact about if someone is spreading misinformation over things like translations or an event like a kiss backstage that never happened. That's not an opinion. Your opinions over if jikook live together are other peoples are allowed to be different. There is not fact anywhere nor is it hurting anyone or disrespectful to a language or culture for other people to disagree with your opinion. And fyi, I'm not a big jikook blog. There are many many others that are much larger and do much more in ways of content than I do. I have my little corner of the internet and i stick to it. Nor do I tend to like to associate my opinions with the opinions of the "jikooker masses." I have my own, I'm willing to share them. I don't care if you agree with me or not. I'm willing to correct myself and be corrected if and when I'm presented with facts about ANY of my opinions. I think living together discussions aren't necessary. And I'm tired of repeating myself.

Thank you.

[silvercat-s]

Thank you for responding! I think I understand what you mean by the change of your views, since I have been following you on and off since then, I have happily witnessed your evolution here. As far as memory serves, you started off on the note of seeing Henry in not so insightfully nuanced way as you do now, and that's actually something no one can blame you for, the play did make us truly connect where Jamie Campbell Bower's empathetic defense emerged from since the beginning. Deep down, I wanted him to be redeemed too (his moments with El seemed way too genuine to be overlooked haha) but just like that you, I felt I didn't have enough evidences to point towards that direction till TFS spoilers started to drop by. But I am replying to you here to make you know that the perception which we have had it now overwritten under new Henry Creel content's light was not something to be embarrassed of. That was still you and your amazing analytical skills to have drawn what you drew with whatever limited info we were given. I understand that we are constantly growing, changing and that's a great thing, but that doesn't make your earlier reviews to be entirely wrong, they rather add beauty to its complexity which I believe we all should be proud of. It also commemorates our growth as a dedicated fan of a show which has a thing for life-changing twists for 001 of its characters. (pun obviously intended lol). Besides some of your speculations hit the bull's eyes. ( George being Henry after all) So your older blogs are still "a nice walk down memory lane" memories :))) I still admire your bravery for voicing your opinions no matter how odd one out they seemed at that time. Secondly, ( yeah I have already written so much I should be at its last para by now but still xD) I also understand the discrepancy of ship you are onboard now. And it doesn't bother me at all honestly. I actually believed in Creelarke before the play had me doubting till I decided " I will first watch the play whenever it streams on Netflix and then see for myself, what seems more canon lol" I am not like one of those toxic fans who would harass you or hold a legit grudge for changing your opinions or no longer agreeing with something rarely mutual as the matter is honestly very subjective at this point, but I appreciate the warning of ' things not being the same' you put in your response :) And lastly, (yeah finally), whenever I click on those 3 dots which would open to " view archive or block user yada yada" options, it no longer contains the Archive feature. I even tried the URL trick lol, ( yup completely not that desperate) but it would come back to this page, it's honestly like Eleven running in Nina only to return to the Rainbow Room with Henry being "Well well" haha. Hence, I hope you look into it!

You're right, I was never one of those "Henry is a heartless monster who deserved all the abuse he suffered" people, he was always my favorite character after all, and I always believed his fate could've been avoided if he had got any true help and love, and that his fondness for Eleven was genuine, but I was still wrong about him in many ways, I used to think he always had those murderous tendencies even as a kid, and I just assumed that was the direction they were taking it, it never crossed my mind they would want to subvert the evil child trope, even tho the clues were always there, I just ignored them for a lot of reasons.

TFS was a very happy surprise after the initial denial stage lol it forced me to acknowledge so much, and I'm now very glad to know the duffers actually put so much thought and care into his character and that there is still so much about him left to discover!

And don't even get me started on Jcb; that poor man was defending Henry from the very beginning, and I'm sure the play made him feel so vindicated 😅

I wouldn't say I even have any analytical skills, but thank you! I'm not really embarrassed of how I used to see Henry, because, like you said, I was doing my best with the information that we had (with some wilful blindness added to the mix), and I was having fun, in the end it's just a fictional character, you know? It's not that serious, it's not a real life issue, we should be allowed to have fun and be wrong about things, and move on.

but I'm embarrassed over how I behaved toward some of the most dedicated Henry analists. I have apologized and they have forgiven me, but it still bothers me that I did that, I could've handled that so much better

And oh god YES I'm so glad I got a least one or two things right! it saved me from feeling completely humiliated 😅 and ugh, you're almost making me regret deleting some of my posts, but I think I mostly deleted the ones where I was being a mean idiot, hopefully there's still something for you

I'm just not sure what you mean with ship discrepancy. I've never really been much of a shipper, I don't really ship anyone with Henry. I did used to ship hentty in a "well, they are canon" way, but after seeing what some of the people who watched the play said about them...they are cute still, but definitely not a one true love situation, Henry deserved someone who truly loved and stood by him, and Patty apparently wasn't that person at all, but I would still love to see the play for myself to form a better opinion on it too!

And I'm not a creelarke shipper myself, but I do understand the appeal now, and I would support anything that would bring that poor guy some happiness 🥲 so don't worry! I don't really have an issue with any ship or even have a strong opinion on it, just whatever makes our boy happy

AND I fixed it! It was the "hide blog from people without an account" setting, I had no idea it did that; it's disabled now! I'm actually very honored and surprised that you liked my posts enough to do that haha, you're very nice and insightful, I hope you come off anon someday! ❤️

[spacestationstorybook]

here are some expanded thoughts i have on the discussion that's happening right now around sharing f/os and the degree to which these characters are "real" to people. since i've been seeing a lot of different takes and i wanted to share my own.

i don't think there's anything wrong with having a f/o you view as real, and treat as a real partner. for some people this is due to a mental illness, for some people this is a coping mechanism, for some it's both. i do think that if you can make the effort it is worth it to try and form some kind of connection with other people around you, because not to sound preachy but it really will help your mental health in the long run to have a solid support system. if you can, try reaching out to groups and organizations in your area that seem like something you'd be interested in. if you can't, that's also okay. i'm all for doing what helps you cope, as long as it isn't hurting real people in the process.

which is kind of the sticking point, because occasionally you'll see people (not actually thinking of tumblr here but this is something i have seen in the reddit‏‏‎ ‎waifuism community) seeing people as lesser for being attracted to multiple characters, acting like this makes them slutty or cheaters or some other awful thing. the reddit community doesn't even accept polyamorous relationships with more than one character (and also a lot of people's "waifus" are underage in that subreddit but that's an entirely different can of worms). i think both sides should understand that self ship, or being fictoromantic, or whatever your preferred term is, is something that different people experience differently and neither side deserves scorn for their coping mechanisms.

i also think, while you obviously can't help your mental health symptoms, it is your responsibility to manage them to some degree, and posting publicly about how much you hate and despise people who share your f/os and wishing ill on them is immature behavior coming from anyone. example: i have a phobia of wasps. while this is a different scenario, this is a symptom of mental illness that i manage by blocking and filtering tags and blogs that could upset me. if something makes it through, or a mutual of mine who likes bugs reblogs a picture of wasps, i don't start posting about how disgusting and awful everyone who likes wasps are and how they should all die in a pit so i can have a pure unfiltered internet experience. i feel fucked up for a while, maybe talk about how it made me feel to a private group of friends, and i move on. i'm not gonna say "it's that easy" because maybe it's not easy for everyone but i think that while mental illness can be an explanation, it shouldn't be an excuse. i'm also not saying you have to like or get along with everyone you share with--fuck it, i don't, lol. sometimes i have mean or uncharitable thoughts toward them if i end up seeing them somewhere. but also, those are my issues, and it's not fair to also make them everyone else's.

this isn't meant to start an argument with anyone since i think all of my mutuals have said good stuff about this that i can agree with! i think there's a lot of nuance to this situation and this is just my personal opinion <3

[veilder]

[20 Question Fic Writer Game]

Thanks for the tag @eomma-jpeg! This looks fun. :D

How many works do you have on AO3?

Twenty, if you can believe it, omg. Though, tbf, most of them are just little oneshots, lol. I only have a few chapter fics to my name. XD

What is your AO3 word count?

It's apparently 189,048... Which feels like far too much for what I've written, but okay. 😅

What fandoms do you write for?

As of right now, the only fics I've posted are (mostly) for Detroit: Become Human and (one singular one) for Trigun. I've also maybe started a few things for Genshin Impact and The Silmarillion, but nothing even anywhere near done, lol. But maybe one day!

What are your top five fics by kudos?

The Nearness of You (981)

A Simple Equation (847)

In a Name (604)

we're just two lost souls (swimming in a fish bowl) (501)

In a Flash (309)

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Oh yes. I love getting comments, they mean so much to me? Even if it takes me awhile, I will respond to your comment!

What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Pft, well, right now, it's a story called Reflections that I never finished writing. XD I left it off on a really uhhhhh... horrible cliffhanger... and haven't updated since... >_> But yeah, as a general rule, I don't do angsty endings. No matter what I put a character through, they're getting out in the end.

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Absolutely The Nearness of You. Lol, the entire goal of that fic was to be like... the anti-angst. XD The DBH fandom really loves going dark and I was deliberately setting out to write something happy to try and counteract it all, omg. Not that it doesn't have a few serious moments to it of course but, overall, it just a light, fluffy romcom with (I think) a pretty funny ending, so yeah. XD

Do you get hate on fics?

Not for my fics in particular, per se, but I've had some run-ins with folks who don't like the ships I write for... Which isn't fun. >_>

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Nah, no smut for me. Tbh, even writing kissing makes me squirm, I am so ace. XD I think I would implode if I even tried, wow.

Do you write crossovers?

I've... dabbled. Nothing I've ever published or anything, but I've had a lot of crossover ideas and stuff? And I've attempted to write a few, but nothing that ever got even close to finished, lol. Crossovers are fun to think about though. XD

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not a fic, no, but an idea? Uh, I used to get very elaborate with my prompts, with a lot of detail and stuff. Basically like mini outlines. (See my pinned message on my blog if you're curious, I have a whole list of them up there. XD) But yeah, one of them I shared with a former friend who I ended up having a huge falling out with. Well, they eventually wrote and published the idea awhile after we stopped being friends and like... fine, that's alright and all, but it sure would've been nice to get some credit for it... I don't care that they used it, only that any association with me is completely absent from the fic. :/

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope, not to my knowledge!

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Nothing published, lol. I've attempted one before (with that same former friend I mentioned above), but that obviously didn't pan out. However, now I am writing a much more successful attempt with my buddy, @eomma-jpeg! So finger's crossed that eventually gets posted one of these days, I love it so much.

What's your all-time favourite ship?

All-time fave?!?!?! Oh no.... How can I pick just one? Listen, you're just gonna have to deal with me listing one for each of my main fandoms rn, because I can't possible choose. For DBH, definitely Convin? (Connor/Gavin Reed) (Though damn, North60 is a close second these days. 👀) For Genshin... Ugh, I'm such a slut for Chili. (Childe/Zhongli) And for Trigun... Ugh, it's gotta be Millyons, right? (Milly Thompson/Millions Knives) I adore all these ships sm. 😭😭😭

What's a WIP you'd like to finish but doubt you ever will?

GD DBH COFFEESHOP FIC THAT I'VE HAD FIVE CHAPTERS WRITTEN FOR FOR LIKE THREE YEARS NOW BUT CAN'T FUCKIN FINISH, UGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 😡

What are your writing strengths?

Ugh, geez, I don't know? Uh... I think I'm good at... description? Or like, setting the scene? I've also gotten a few compliments on my action scenes before, too, which I was kinda blown away by cuz I didn't think they were anything special, lol! But... yeah, maybe those?

What are your writing weaknesses?

Lololololololol, how about actually writing?!?!?! 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫 It'd be grand if I could actually do it, omggggggggggg!!!!!!!!!!

No, but other than that... I think I tend to rush? I get so fatigued by the idea of stretching something out too long so I think I tend to just cut right to the chase in my fics. I don't much like to meander or get sidetracked with B plots or anything. My fics are... compact, let's say. 😅

I also feel like my characterization can really veer off sometimes. I feel like sometimes I default to idealized versions of the characters I write instead of writing them as they actually are.

I make a lot of typos and stupid grammar mistakes and, despite me obsessively editing everything I write before posting, it seems like a lot of them still make it through. 😫

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I have... used little snippets of language in some of my fics before? But the kicker is that I found someone who actually speaks that language and asked them to help me with that, so idk, is that cheating? XD

I myself and a filthy monolingual, so I couldn't write a full-on fic in a different language or anything. But some phrases thrown in here or there for color/emphasis/character building? Yeah, I could probably do that.

First fandom you wrote for?

Oh, this is a loaded question, lol! So, first fandom I ever published a fic for was DBH back in 2019. But you'd be a fool to think that was my first attempt. XD Honestly? I think my first try was like a Suikoden fic back in... Idk, '99 or 2000? I was a child and it sucked hardcore, but y'know. XD I'm so glad my anxiety didn't prompt me to publish anything I wrote thought, omggggg. The mountain of garbage I would be sitting atop now if I did... XD

Favourite fic you've ever written?

Ah, man, it's The Lark Ascending. Without a doubt. That fic... It's both the longest thing I've ever written and the most personal. I drew from a lot of my own experiences when writing it and it helped me process some of the shit I was going through at the time and I just think it turned out... really nice. I went back and reread it not too long ago and I just... I adore it.

It's also one of the most accessible fics I've written, if anyone is curious? The whole concept of it centers around the characters as elemental spirits and I use no canon names or places or anything through the entire main story. It's the only thing I've done that's tagged with both the fandom that inspired it, but also Original Work. Because yeah, it basically is a completely original novel tbh.

The downside of it being super accessible is that it didn't really catch on in the fandom it was tagged for (DBH). It is still to the day one of my sadder failures, just because I put *so much* of myself into it? And I truly believe it has my best writing out of everything I've done, too. I went super stylized and almost poetic with it and I really tried to modulate how I wrote to match the elements of the characters I was portraying. Honestly, I'm so proud of it and I just really wish it had had a better reception than it garnered, but oh well. What's done is done.

Thank you again for the tag, @eomma-jpeg, this was a lot of fun!

As for me, I will tag... @woppy42 @ewates @sharysisnhmoonshadow @connor-sent-by-cyberlife @detroitbecomeonline @titaniumpsychologist @nock-and-bolt and anyone else who wants to pile in here! XD

[thirdmagic]

ah, yes... i dont know if it is people we share on our following list and I am not even sure if i was mutuals with them or if they unfollowed at some point before this but there were a few people, from fate fandom, people that i at least have been following for years and years, who put some stuff on my dash on the day of october 7th that. well. i jumped ship pretty much instantly because it sure was something to see after being woken by sirens and spending most of my day running between my apartment door and the bomb shelter and then seeing what was happening on the news. but yeah i havent seen a lot of it, like two-three people but i also know just enough of tumblr fate fandom to know how insular it is that i can pretty much extrapolate what must be going on in other blogs and what you must have seen. so i clearly ran away right on time lol

i don't even know if they've even forgotten some of these parts so much as they never learned about them or never knew. or maybe they haven't forgotten but need their specific easy narrative and to project their own familiar political issues on it so badly that they willingly remain ignorant. i also think there's just such an issue where the only antisemitism that registers as such in many people's minds really is just the shoah and the idea of a jew as a tragic victim of the shoah is the only one they can work with, so they just compartmentalize that from any kind of currently living, breathing, existing jewish person who is not so easily perfect-victim-ized.

but honestly, i think none of us here realized how bad it was too. i had a feeling something like this would happen one day eventually inevitably but it seemed to me like the next moment of devastation had to be way more far off and also that people would obviously do at least the bare minimum of caring and acknowledging that it's bad that it happened and to at least be a little compassionate because that's normal to expect, right. again, not a high bar, surely, right. and well. you know how that worked out.

and to you both: thank you for your kind words and your compassion and understanding. i am pretty much as safe as i can be, there has been rockets and attacks in the areas around where i live and smaller individual instances within it but nowhere near the scale of what's been going on elsewhere. emotionally i've had a few very rough days and very, very low points this past week, i won't lie, especially since i've spent the first week just kinda absorbed in following the news, but i'm doing much better than i used to and figuring out ways to deal with it and to cope, i've had a lot of people willing to listen and talk to, and i managed to find community in several different places to bond around this and work through it together

and you know for all the awfulness and all the ways people have been horrible about it online and elsewhere there's also been a lot of goodness, many, many people reached out to me personally in support, and i treasure and appreciate every single bit and every single effort you can make. and honestly it's especially valuable coming from gentiles and in general everyone who isnt affected or involved, i understand the risk it carries for you all to go against the grain and how much easier it would be to just go long with the narrative that refuses to listen and understand. so again, thank you. this stuff kinda helps me get through the day, even if it's just thoughts, words, or reblogs, it is still valuable to me and others.

[chim-chim1310]

i can't be bothered to watch the live too but i lurked on another blog and what causes the stir is that jk deleted his supposed bday thirst trap video for Jimin, read a question abt tae from a tkkr acct (and giggles while answering), and teased abt hearing tae's songs. that's all i know. so yep...shippers are scrambling and being chaotic as usual. im not a jkkr but how is tkk still a ship? lol. being a non-shipper feels so good

I still wonder how many brain cells you must've lost to ship taekook. Lol the most useless and debunked ship ever and the most disgusting and vile shippers.

Anyways all shippers are being chaotic these days.

Listen one thing I don't understand is why shippers are even fighting over someone like jungkook? Like why? I mean jimin and tae are very hot people they can have literally anyone.... Why are shippers making them fight over jungkook?😂

Like that man ain't special.

Taehyung has a hot ass girlfriend. Just get over the ship already.

And jikookers......Well what can I say about jikookers. They're slowly on their way to becoming a cult just like taekookers. If there's any jikookers reading this blog please get out of the ship while you still have time and while you're still of sane mind lol....... Otherwise you're gonna be stuck there forever and cry just like taekookers are crying and grasping at every crumb they get because deep down they themselves know their ship is not real.

Again jungkook is not that special. Why make two hot people fight over that man? I mean obviously tae and jm are not actually fighting over jk out of all the people lol. But shippers make it look like jk is some special prince and jimin and tae are fighting for him like bulls.... They act as if jimin and tae can't get any person with a snap of their fingers.

Like come on guys? Fighting over jk out of all people?

Thank god I got over the shipping phase. I'm seeing everything much more clearer now. Shippers pick at the smallest of the things and make it look so big and then make theories and run with it like it's actually facts. Idiots.

[hologramcowboy]

Hi! You know what I've been thinking recently? I've been thinking about whether J & D will ever divorce and the conclusion I came up with is....no. I truly don't think they'll ever get divorced. ✋🏼 now, hear me out.... there was a story J told at a con... about D getting covid and having to quarantine in the master bedroom and how J had to bunk with JJ....now, I don't like D as much as the next person, but, if I was sick with covid and I was isolated for a week and emerged from my bedroom and saw that the house was a mess (that's basically what J said), I'd be pissed too (like D was) that I would have to be the one to clean it all up. Now, take that story and combine them with all the times J had said that D runs "a tight ship" and how she's the "boss" and how he just does as he's told. I think J is incredibly lazy (not work wise but just as a spouse/partner). To me, he seems to have been raised as if he were in the '50's....where the women took care of the house (D doesn't do that she obviously has nannies....but I'm sure she's the one in charge of them....hell, she's the one who brought them in during the lockdown) while he makes a living and pays for everything. To him, their marriage works and he's comfortable bc he doesnt have to do any work....thats all D. As much as I want him to leave that bozo looking troll, I truly, and as sad as it is, think he may never leave her. He cheats on her, she cheats on him and I feel like they have some kind of understanding bc EVERYONE knows their relationship isn't normal or loving as she tries to make it seem. Also, let's say J leaves her, who in their right mind would want to deal with D (bc of the kids) for the rest of their lives. J is damaged goods at this point and I feel terrible for him. He may want to leave but I think he's resigned himself to an unhappy life.

Sorry for the long ask. Just wanted to get your opinion on my dumbass conclusion lol.

I hope u have a wonderful day and fuck "The Winchesters" 😏

First off, what's with the negative self talk? It is not allowed on this blog, ever. There's no such thing as your conclusion being dumb as it's bases on deep thinking. It's clear from the many comments he's made over time that Jensen is extremely comfortable and delegates everything to everyone else. Elta is a control freak so I think she serves him the sense that he can go about doing his thing without being bothered while she handles everything. They both benefit from their business arangement marriage and that's undeniable. What's also undeniable, however, is the heavy contempt Elta brings to their relationshit which is bound to errode affection as well as the wellbeing of the person on the receiving end of her constant devaluing, Jensen has shown plenty of signs he is done with her bullshit. So, even though both greatly benefit from the dynamic they are in currently, their relationship is bound to crack. If it hasn't already, which is what I highly suspect. They may not divorce to save face but that doesn't mean they aren't separated.

[gg-selvish]

I only ever really Sapnap characterized as the “straight one” in dnf fic which is usually used to contrast how someone reacts to their best friend versus how someone reacts to someone they’re attracted to. That makes sense to me even if it mischaracterizes Sapnap’s relationship with dnf. I’ve read one too many fics where dnf are hitting on each other or flirting or direct it teasingly to Sapnap and have his reaction be running for the hills. Like Sapnap hasn’t leaned into every gay joke or flirtation made by his friends, but he’s got to be the “straight one” because that’s how the straights react and the whole poor Sapnap save him thing. It does serve the purpose of getting Sapnap away, which I do like because I prefer a dnf fic to be just about them and saves me the trouble of having to read people trying and write a character I like, but they don’t care for.

mmm i disagree and also agree with this so this is gonna be long-winded as i often am.

i do agree that the biggest perpetrator of super straight and like... man's man sapnap is dnfers because of this like ur so right and. as someone who reads a lot of dnf i wish they just wouldnt even mention him lmaoooooo reading whatever reason theyve made up to get him out of the house is amusing in an annoying way. i like dnf fics where theyre just alone in the house and no one asks questions why. i read dnf for dnf not for sapnap to be there especially if they're gonna characterize him the way they do. but thats dnfers and they do things their way and thats fine i just ignore it im not gonna police anyone's writing i'm just gonna talk about it on my little blog with like 12 followers and hope no one reads it...

my biggest issue with it and where i saw it a lot in the older days (late 2020 through 2021 especially but it went beyond that too) in a way that really grinded my gears was with this like. one specific breed of karlnap. i used to ship karlnap and LOVED karlnap especially during their initial meetups. im a dnkn shipper til i die there's no reason for me to dislike them. but i just couldnt stop finding myself reading these fics that were just so strange. hyper-masculine sapnap with ditsy effeminate karl in this very very binary way that i just couldn't compute. it not only disagreed with my personal opinions but it would develop into what i saw as a slightly off-putting lack of chemistry and was just really unenjoyable for me to read. it read like m/f to me which is fine but when im looking for mlm fic i want to read mlm. this goes back to wanting queer dynamics in representation of queer relationships (note: i'm using the word representation VERY loosely. im not implying fanfiction is anything close to actual representation). it was just so weird

it's kind of funny because i realized this in a very roundabout way. a friend of mine from outside the fandom wrote and gifted to me a karlnap fic based on the karlnap they had read and it was like the perfect highlight of the dynamics in the ship that bothered me... i loved the fic, still love my friend for writing it, but it really pointed out that the characterization of those two was just so set in stone in those days and i read it but i didn't like it in the long run or as inspiration for my own writing. the writing was incredible, the quality of it was great and it popped off it was amazing. my issue was with the guts of it, yknow? the internal stuff.

that's one of the main reasons i started writing karl differently than i used to (remember when i used to write karlnap? subbottom karl in MY christian minecraft server?) and focussing on kwtnf because i was mad about the sapnap characterization but didnt watch him solo enough to focus on him... then i hyperfixated onto karl and went fucking hog wild with the idea of him and his character in my head. it obviously didnt do anything i dont have any impact on other people but it made me feel better lol

[charlesemersonwinchesteriii]

charles+hawkeye, charles+margaret

I combined your first request with some others, but thank you for the additional one!! We love biodiversity <3 Ok so. CharMarg huh.

To get it clearly out of the way: Canon CharMarg Bad. Both because it was just atrociously quarter-assedly attempted in one of the most pathetic pseudo-storylines ever scraped together, an embarrassment to put into such an otherwise quality show, and more importantly because any attempt to make these two get together in canon would always be bad no matter what, because Ms. Swit and Mr. Stiers did not want to do that and if anyone tried to make either of them do something they didn't want I would kill that person and then myself.

But there is one thing worse than canon CharMarg. And that is fanon CharMarg. Because obviously basically nobody actually ships these two, but there are many people, particularly of the mainstream h*wkbeej variety (#notallh*wkbeejers and certainly none who would be in the general vicinity of my blog at this point, I don't think), who like the idea of Charles and Margaret in a lavender marriage.

I love the recent interest in lavender marriages in fandom recently. Now everyone can do the same Pair The Spares maneuver fandom has always done with characters it doesn't care much about, but now they can do it even when the idea of the spares being in love is completely laughable. And it sounds so much cooler, too!

Man I'm sorry I don't know why this irks me so, but alas! It does. The thing is, a lavender marriage would do nothing for either of them anyways, in terms of "playing at doing what society and family want them to do", which is after all the entire purpose of such marriages. Margaret already basically had a test run of marrying into a family like Charles' when she tried it with Penobscott and she HATED it and they basically rejected her for not being the perfect Aryan race anyways. And that's beside the fact that what Charles' family want from him more than anything is children, and Margaret is at the very LEAST extremely on the fence about having kids. So she'd be as miserable as ever, obviously. And with all this, it's fair to say that the Winchesters would be hardly any more satisfied with CharMarg than they would be with Charles just staying a bachelor, so what the hell would he be in it for either???

So it's a no for me on that. So why did I put down that it's "better in fanfic"? Well now we must discuss not canon CharMarg, not fanon CharMarg, but a secret third thing. Hypothetical CharMarg. Essence of CharMarg if you will. The CharMarg that exists only in slight little glimpses in scenes where I'm like you know what? If they hadn't forced it, if they hadn't tried so hard and so badly, if they'd done nothing at all, if they'd just given us all these quiet little moments of friendship and kindness and smiles and affection and never implied anything else and then I’d seen that last scene with the book.......... I’d have been like yeah. I see that. 

And then the fandom could have done Pair The Spares normally, without pretense. And the thing is, I actually always loved fandom pairing the spares, putting every set of characters in groups of two (or three or four, if we really wanted to have some fun and get silly with it) and never leaving anybody behind, making sure nobody was alone. Even if they didn’t care about the spares much, really. It was always hell on fans of those less popular characters, of course (been there!), but it seemed to come from a place of awkward, fumbling love. Nobody gets left behind.

(Aromanticism?? Characters not needing a relationship to be fulfilled?? What’s that lol this is 2014 era Tumblr. Romance shipping LOCKDOWN.)

But of course they did force it and they did ruin it and now it’s hard to even write CharMarg as friends, sometimes, trying to parse out what their friendship is really like when they’re allowed to be people instead of two barbie dolls smashed together. 

They’re still great together though. It is great whenever they’re on screen hanging out together and being narrative mirrors and trying to figure out how to have a friend for the first time in their lives. God I wish they’d gotten to talk about their fathers together, about expectations and never being good enough and having to keep themselves apart from everyone else and repressed anger and repressed love and repressed loneliness. I wish everyone would stop smashing them together like two barbie dolls and just let them be great together. 

In conclusion society would be fixed if Loretta Swit and David Ogden Stiers got everything they wanted forever

[joculatrixster]

I posted 7,601 times in 2022

That's 780 more posts than 2021!

581 posts created (8%)

7,020 posts reblogged (92%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

inkstaindusk

ace-in-the-quiver

doodlebeeberry

asavt

I tagged 7,549 of my posts in 2022

Only 1% of my posts had no tags

#mod trix - 707 posts

#reblog for l8ter - 552 posts

#loz - 517 posts

#lol - 440 posts

#cookie run - 437 posts

#pokemon - 359 posts

#link - 285 posts

#yup - 217 posts

#zephyr - 178 posts

#cookie run kingdom - 166 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#as long as they respect skintones acting like a black person cant have big eyes or tiny noses is wwell gross! especially in a stylized styl

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

The current discourse revolving around Affogato Cookie is literally just Aloe Cookie but genderbent.

YUP i said it in my reply to anon its not about HIM specifically its a FANDOM WIDE ISSUE the fact this keeps happening is the issue. as one of the only fandoms w/ MULTIPLE CANON nonbinary and gnc cookies we cant keep forcing gender roles on cookies then acting a fool when they dint align w/ our assumptions this kind of thing is what makes pll not want to explore their genders because then they'll feel like there something else to them like they have to be gay or nonbianry. like i get u guys want to express thise hcs but the problem is i NEVER see ppl say cookies like cheesecake or chocolate bonbon are nonbinary or trans women no its always sour belt or aloe. why does Affogato HAVE to be a trans man or nonbinary but not dark cacao...? think about why u guys chose the LITTERAL man in a dress for ur trans hcs but not the strong heroic kingdom leader. thats fucked up. and trans men can hc whayever the FUCK they want i dont care but cis ppl and other trans ppl are ALSO buying into it and being upset he wasn't a she/her or they/them. thats when i get the issue. because this shit never spreads in the fandom unless a cookie is gnc and yall wanted them to be the opposite gender or nonbinary. if u make trans hcs even subconsciously because u dont like the assigned gender of a character thats. fucked. up.

this is coming from a bitch w/ a mostly trans and nonbinary friend group who loves dresses, skirts, and leggings im very much fem irl but i do not use she/her online. anyone coming across this in the tags pls stop assuming if someone disagrees w/ u they r automatically an enemy to ur cause lmao just tell me if u disagree and we can have a talk about it

36 notes - Posted February 25, 2022

#4

btw if u think kumiho is a slut/whore genuinely i hate u so much if u think its ok to insult her like that i want u hunted for sport

38 notes - Posted February 5, 2022

#3

if ur harassing ppl over info that came in a brand new update ur a bad person i dont care if canonly or heavily implied the dragons r all related the devs JUST dropped this info and ships like Ananas x Pitaya have been around for years. let ppl hae time to see the new info and change their stances on stuff yall r too fucking rude and stupid to understand that sometimes ppl dont play updates or dont have all the info before u run ur mouths istg

46 notes - Posted July 14, 2022

#2

FELLAS IS IT GAY TO-

60 notes - Posted October 5, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

dear cookie run mutuals! i just got a reply on my post about how Cream Unicorn canonly did kidnap children(not even mentioning modifying 2 adults body w/out their consent) that was condescending and also woobifed cream unicorn cookie. once again fandom ppl assume when i point out the flaws of my favs it means im being malicious and misunderstand canon as if im an idiot newbie who doesnt understand what motivation is so i obviously make posts w/ouit understand that no bc ur fav was sad/lonely they get to do whatever they want

u know what that means?

war. this means war.

im gonna start Cream Unicorn cookie is a bit fucked up propaganda now. join me in my cause of being petty bc someone didnt bother to read my tags on my post for the millionth time!

Cream Unicorn cookie is a faerie who IS fucked up that DOESNT mean they r evil but it does mean they lack general human morales and will do things like *checks notes* kidnap children and keep them bc they r lonely bc they do not understand other ppl may like *check notes* not want to be trapped in a fantasy world forever! wow! look at that a valid interpretation of a character based off canon facts that doesn't woobify my fav or ignore their actions. ik its crazy to see it!

if u wish to see more of this join me in the cause!

63 notes - Posted July 28, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[wellship]

Hey so you’re like zosan gospel to me bc you are the ONLY person who’s done zosan in a way that i like. Do you have any fic rec for them?? I wanna try and Get It but i really don’t unless it’s your comics—a Lot of other zosan is either ooc or ooc and fujoshi.

Also i really really dig ur art and your writing for your comics, you grasp the characters of op (esp sanji) in such an iconic way idk its in character but also so much more mature at the same time, i respect it.

(Also also sorry if you don’t answer asks on this blog i just figured the ship fic rec ask should go to the ship blog)

Thank you so much for the kind words!! It's extremely flattering to think I can be showing people what zosan can be, HAHA. I know exactly where you're coming from. I was a young gay teen/tween when I first got into One Piece, and so I saw some potential chemistry between Zoro and Sanji, but it seemed like every other person I saw shipping them was shipping them for totally different reasons to me. It felt like a lot of them were totally ignoring what made their dynamic unique.

So I just kind of stopped trying to engage with other shippers and watched/read the whole series in a vacuum LMAO. The way I interpret the ship ended up shielded from the popular zosan vibe. I see them get forced into very strict, stereotypical roles that don't really match up with their personalities at all, like... the whole appeal of them, to me, is that they're as similar as they are different? Neither of them are going to be stoic all the time or none of the time, or bashful, or aggressive, etc... They can both easily have either of those traits depending on circumstance. A relationship where they end up stuck in the same roles forever just... isn't Zosan to me, haha. Obviously a lot of it is heteronormativity, too. A lot of preconceptions about how a relationship has to have one "wife" role and one "husband" role and then what those roles dictate... etc etc. Not only is that not really how gay couples work, full stop, it's also just totally not how zosan works LMAO

Sorry for rambling, this is kind of off-topic. I guess because you said you wanted to understand the ship I thought I'd explain a bit of why it appeals to me. At the end of the day I like their canon dynamic, I think there's a lot of love and trust behind it already, I just think it's totally possible there could be a layer of romantic love to it, too. Ultimately they both know the other person is someone they understand, and can rely on - being able to predict someone's actions, even if they're actions that are going to piss you off or which you'll disagree with, is a kind of comfort and stability, lol. They know each other inside and out. And also, it must be a load off each others' mind for them to think, "now there's a guy I don't have to look out for".

ALRIGHT ACTUALLY ONTO THE QUESTION YOU ASKED: I don't read a lot of fics, teehee! [Gets run over by a semi] BUT I can tell you right now you can't go wrong with anything by demonzoro on AO3. They have a really nuanced and beautiful comprehension of their relationship and their dynamic. They give zosan a lot of depth and emotion that's very compelling and sincere. I recommend starting off with And Then The Sun Came Out, which has been described as a "slow burn speedrun". The visuals in this fic...... they haunt me

I don't have any specific fic to link, but I also often enjoy the way 8ball (also on AO3) portrays them. It's a bit different from the dynamic I give them, but what I've read is good, well-founded, and draws you in. They also do doodles on Twitter - I've been greatly enjoying the childhood AU comics they've been posting currently.

On that note, if you like the ratbag dynamic I give zosan then you'll probably also enjoy pierogiy's stuff on Twitter, especially if, like me, you enjoy kicking Sanji around like a football

Thank you again for the kind words on my writing/characterisation of them! A lot of comic work focuses on the art but I work hard on the writing too, so this feedback means a lot!