#because exclusively making sketches >>> actually finishing anything

[octuscle]

Exchange student: Athens (GA)

Benjamin was not particularly happy that he had come to Georgia as an exchange student. Athens... He had wanted something in New England. Or at least in California. But he hadn't been able to choose. Athens had taken him.

The introductory week had been a disappointment. His fellow students were almost exclusively from the neighborhood, the boys were interested in football and hunting rifles, the girls in boys. It was all so clichéd that it was hard to express. But there was actually a very good grand piano in the assembly hall and Benjamin had been given permission to use it for his daily exercises after a short audition. He had not yet met his roommate. He wasn't due to return to university until a week later because of some family business. Benjamin was hoping for someone who was also interested in classical music and expressionism. Or at least someone who was also studying literature, art history or something similar.

It was the night from Saturday to Sunday when the door opened with a huge crash at around 02:00. Someone threw a duffel bag onto the bed and turned on the light. Benjamin blinked startled at the sudden light. He couldn't see anything against the light. But it smelled of sweat and a few other things he couldn't identify. The shadow took off his shirt, threw it on the floor and sat down on the other bed. Benjamin's eyes adjusted to the light and he began to recognize something.

"Well howdy, you must be Ben. I'm Hunter, no lie, that's my name, partner. Shoo, it ain't even 2 o'clock yet. What in tarnation are ya doin' in bed?" Benjamin was disgusted. He would have to share the room with a redneck. He turned around and mumbled, “Nice to meet you. If you'll excuse me, I'd like to get back to sleep.” Hunter just said, “Well, that’s on you if ya overlook somethin’, darlin’,” rummaged in his duffel bag and disappeared again. It must have been around 04:00 when he returned. Now it also smelled of booze. Benjamin pretended to be asleep, even though Hunter was making a lot of noise. After he had finished clearing out his things, Benjamin heard him burp loudly a few more times. And soon he was snoring.

When Benjamin's alarm clock rang at 07:00, Hunter was still snoring. He was lying naked on the comforter. Benjamin had to admit with envy that he was well trained. His butt was firm. His upper body was deeply tanned and Hunter was pale below the waist. A guy who worked out in the fresh air. Benjamin's cock got hard. He quickly grabbed his scrubs and headed for the washrooms. He wanted to be at the Georgia Museum of Art early. When he returned to his room, freshly showered, Hunter was lying awake on his bed. Jerking off his morning wood. “Well, howdy there, early riser! Ain't that somethin'! You fixin' to hit the pavement for a run?” Benjamin turned around, embarrassed. Because he didn't want to disturb Hunter while he was wanking. And because his own cock was leaking precum into his boxer shorts. “No thanks, I wanted to go to the museum.” “Real neat, we got one 'round these parts? Been here a whole year and didn’t even know. Might just tag along next time, if y'know what I mean.” “That would be nice,” Benjamin replied as he hurriedly got dressed and left the room. He had to go to the washrooms again before he went to the museum. He really needed to wank. He thought about Hunter.

He wasn't really focused in the museum. At the beginning, he made sketches of the halls and the works of art on display. He was actually surprised by the quality. There were top-class works here. But when he caught himself doodling a stag in his notebook the third time, he decided that he would probably be better off getting some fresh air. He took his rucksack out of his locker and left the museum. The fresh air did him good. Benjamin walked along Campus Road. He passed the Georgia Museum of Natural History. It was still early. He went inside.

Natural history wasn't really his hobby. But Benjamin was fascinated by the dioramas of the local animal world. He enthusiastically made sketches of the deer. Why the hell had he already made them at the art museum? And why were the deer he was drawing now often hunted prey? He probably just couldn't get Hunter out of his head. He was getting a hard-on again. Benjamin made his way back to the dormitory. Hunter and he hadn't got off to a good start. But now he would like to put that right.

"Down at th’ park wit’ the boys, tossin’ sum balls ‘round. Y’all come on by if ya wanna join!" The note was on Ben's pillow. There was a lot else lying around the room. It was as if a bomb had gone off. Hunter was obviously not the tidiest of people. There was a camouflage T-shirt on the floor. Benjamin pressed it to his face. It smelled of sweat and masculinity. He couldn't help it. He had to jerk off again. This time it came with unexpected force. Shit, on the floor, on the bed, his cum was everywhere. He took one of his dirty towels from the laundry basket and tried to clean it up as best he could. And then he made his way to the park. He had to watch Hunter play football with his buddies.

Benjamin had to search a bit to find Hunter and his friends. But it was worth it. A gang of young rednecks in the prime of their youth, on their way to becoming real men. Their muscles were glistening with sweat, their mullets sticking wet to their heads. “Yo, Ben!” Hunter shouted when he saw Benjamin. Benjamin was amazed that Hunter had recognized him. Hunter ran up to him and did a fist bump, which Benjamin returned somewhat awkwardly. “Hey there, what in tarnation are ya doin’ just standin’ ‘round like a bump on a log? Get yourself changed and hit that field!” Benjamin said that he had nothing to change into. “Floyd, you knucklehead! You got your gym gear?” Hunter yelled across the pitch. He, who was presumably Floyd, yelled back “Sure thing!”. Hunter went to a bag and threw it to Benjamin. “Here ya go, this oughta fit ya, Big fella!” Benjamin was a little embarrassed to just change in the open field. But there was no turning back now. The last time he had played football was five years ago. And he had been bad. Really bad. Now he was standing on a field in sweaty, oversized clothes belonging to a guy he didn't know called Floyd and had to play football with a guy he hardly knew, but had already wanked off on twice today. The ball flew towards him. Benjamin caught it with a leap. “To me!” roared Hunter. And with a powerful and precise pass, the ball flew to Hunter. “Bloody hell!” thought Benjamin.

The sun was about to set. The boys were lying on the grass, drinking some kind of isotonic thirst quencher. They had all taken off their shirts. Hunter's head was on Benjamin's stomach. “Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit, buddy! You best be chowin' down more and hittin' them weights less. That belly of yours ain’t got no softness to cuddle up to!” “In your dreams!” replied Benjamin, tousling Hunter's wet hair. Damn, he was well on his way to becoming a jock... Benjamin and Hunter spent the evening together, when the sun went down, they went to the movies and then out for a burger. Benjamin had never spent a Sunday like this before. It felt wrong. But it felt so good!

The next morning, Hunter's alarm clock rang at 05:30. “Dude, running and gym!” he said as he shook Benjamin awake. Benjamin had done more sport yesterday than he had ever done in his life. But without argument, he put on Floyd's dirty and sweaty clothes and the two of them set off. Benjamin actually had his first lecture at 08:30. English poetry of the 19th century. But he couldn't leave Hunter to bench press on his own. And so it was 09:00 when he arrived in the lecture hall. In his sweaty gym clothes. Without his homework. His professor asked him to join her after the lecture to explain to him clearly that this was not the performance she expected. And that he would stink. Benjamin raised his arm and took a deep breath from his armpit. “You're damn right,” he said, nodding appreciatively. His cell phone vibrated. “Fucc dude, 4got my laptop.  Bring it by, bruh. Warnell school of 4estry and natural resources” Benjamin knew where that was. Behind the natural history museum. Next lecture wasn't for another hour. Benjamin sprinted home, grabbed the computer from Hunter's desk and ran into the department. “I'm at the entrance, bro,” he wrote. ‘Cum 2 the library,’ Hunter replied. Benjamin followed the signs. Floyd was waiting outside the library. “Hey y'all, thanks a million! You’re a real lifesaver for Hunter and me. And I gotta say, them clothes are lookin' sharp. And that mullet? Pure gold!” Benjamin blushed and said that he would do the washing today and Floyd would bring the clothes back clean tomorrow. Floyd laughed and said that they had only been on for a week, a bit early to wash them. Benjamin joined in the laughter and headed off to his next lecture. Bloody hell, what had Floyd said. Mullet? What mullet? He ran his fingers through his hair sweaty from running. It was sticking to the back of his neck. Benjamin searched for a window pane to look at his reflection. Shit, he had a similar hairstyle to the boys.

Tuesday morning was Hunter and Ben's first lecture, “Ecosystems and Habitat management” in Professor Castleberry's Wildlife Ecology and Management class. They both got quite a telling off for missing the first lecture the previous week. Hunter's excuse was that he couldn't leave his parents' hunting lodge because of the storm. The story of how the bridge had been washed away sounded super realistic. Ben had to bite his tongue not to laugh out loud. He knew that Hunter simply hadn't wanted to leave without killing the big stag. Ben's excuse was less original. The fact that he was wrongly enrolled in art history and literature led to great laughter in the lecture hall. A guy with “corn-fed Midwestern boy” literally tattooed on his forehead couldn't be in a worse place than in a lecture on 19th century English poetry. Luckily, the two best buddies were given two adjacent seats. They hadn't showered after the gym today either. Very few of their fellow students wanted to sit next to them. But it was their lucky day anyway. Although the registration deadline had actually already passed, they both still got a place on the excursion to the “Population biology and ecology” field trip at the weekend. They could hardly wait for Friday. Finally a chance to get some fresh air and hopefully a good piece of game. Their hunting rifles were already threatening to rust.

A few of his fellow students knew that his real name was Ben. But everyone here called him Buck. Hunter and Buck. It just went together. The two of them studied together, pumped iron together, played football together. They hunted together. And yes, they also fucked together. But only without eye contact. Otherwise it would be totally homo!

Pics by @ki-kink

[brattypagansub]

Simon Riley headcannons that help flesh out his character (exclusively Simon Riley centric)

Has a fear of a lot of animals due to his abusive father

Ironically this fear doesn’t extend to horses and his adoptive family owned a horse breeding ranch

Soap found out he can barrel race to the tune of Summertime sadness and it ended up on TikTok

Wears color changing contacts and only two people have ever seen him without them in

Has a dirty mind and even filthier mouth but lets Soap believe he’s a smol anxious bean who needs protecting

Thought about growing his hair out to Legolas’ length

Loves Lord of the Rings and will fight anyone who says the movies are bad

Resolved himself to the fact that if anything ever happened to Johnny he’d take it the darkest place he’d need to. If it’ll get justice for the chaos gremlin.

Can speak elvish and often does when he doesn’t want anyone to know what he’s saying

Can draw and paint well

Has an ultra realistic drawing of Soap as Aragorn that’s protectively sealed in his sketch book

Once ended up with a head injury so bad that he forgot a solid year of his life. He proceeded to make it his personal mission to make Soap blush as much and as often as possible.

Is very very smart but acts dumb to piss off Price

Has a bad habit of sneaking up on people then not announcing his presence. Which actually got him punched square across the jaw one on accident by Soap.

Smokes but tries to limit it around Soap because he doesn’t want him picking up such a bad habit

Collects bobbles odds and ends because crow brain then gifts them to Soap

Grew his hair out to Bucky Barnes civil war length and neither Price nor Soap will let it be.. they both like to run their hands through it.

Fucks off every now and again to his comfort place Norway and several times had kidnapped Soap to go with

Sleeps like a Victorian child with a rare disease

Soap found a picture of him as a kid where he hsd long hair blue eyes and was a tiny spec of a child

Had to relearn volume control after taking off his mask more.

Is on the spectrum but he’s high functioning

Likes to tinker and work with his hands

Has sensory issues as it relates to people touching his face only two are allowed Soap and Price

Nearly tackled Roach when the man almost revealed his fear of most animals while Soap had a raven on his hand

Likes to call Price an old man exclusively to piss him off

When shit hit the fan in Los Almas his primary goal was to keep them off Soap to allow the man to escape. He didn’t want to have to tell Price that he’d lost the kid.

Only he can tell Soap to speak English

Once hid in a pyramid for a day because he needed to wait for the heat to die down after a kill

Macgyuver’d a rad counter when he was forced to chase a target through Chernobyl

Once when startled awake his brain auto piloted finishing an explanation about an equation. Then when asked was just asleep enough reply. ‘Giving a lecture on Lagrange theory and advanced calculus to a classroom of like ten hobbits.’ And that’s how Soap found out that he’s a genius.

When half asleep will pick up Soap and move him out of the way like he weighs nothing to get to the coffee machine

Has landed in bed with Price more times than he can count in their younger days thanks to a bottle of bourbon

Used to be very different personality wise almost like Soap until he nearly lost Roach on an op.

[pomrania]

Draw Everything June (henceforth DEJ) is coming up, so here's what you need to know about it.

For the month of June, AdorkaStock will be releasing a new pose reference photo each weekday morning; there's a whole event, it's fun and you should look into it if you draw, or you're thinking about drawing, or heck if you write and you're interested in some non-traditional prompts.

Here's how I do DEJ. When I get online for days when there's a new pose, I make a quick doodle of that, then I post "hey here's what the DEJ pose is for today, does anyone have a queer D&D (or other gaming system) character that would fit this pose?" Then I work on neatening up that sketch from reference, getting increasingly obnoxious (because I'm increasing desperate) about asking for a character. Once someone gives me their character to draw in that pose, I ask them about what their character looks like, and work on drawing THAT character in the given pose. I need to know what Pride flag/s apply to the character, because I colour it in using that colour scheme; so, a lesbian character would be rendered in shades of pink and orange, for example. I need to get a piece done before the next pose comes out, and generally that means I need to get it started and finished on the same day, but if a pose releases on Friday then I can work on it over the weekend.

I can't do this without you. Literally, I can't, my brain won't let me; also I don't have any characters of my own to draw. And there's a REALLY long rant I have inside me about this, but it boils down to "just trust me when I say that a) I can only do this a certain way, b) I want to do this, and c) it's not an imposition if I specifically ask for you to make requests".

I like it when multiple different people go "hey my character would work well for this pose", because then I have the option of choice; and if I don't pick your character for THAT pose, then it's going on a list so that character WILL get draw, even if it ends up being in July.

Below the cut I'm putting some more clarification about what characters I'll draw; this hasn't changed from previous years, but if you find yourself thinking "oh they wouldn't draw MY character", please check this to make sure.

Will draw:

a character I drew for a previous year's DEJ

an NPC from your game (if you're the GM)

your queer D&D character

your queer character from a non-D&D TTRPG

your queer character from a weird indie one-shot you'd played once

multiple characters from the same person

your friend's queer TTRPG character, if you can sufficiently describe the character

a character with or without visual reference, and whether you clearly know what they look like or where you just have vague vibes of their appearance or anything in between

a character you're currently playing

a character you're no longer playing

a character you've already made up, but haven't yet gotten the chance to play

a character who has or hasn't had artwork done of them

a character who doesn't have a specific queer identity (the rainbow flag is very useful)

Won't draw:

a character I've already drawn in DEJ 2024, unless that character experienced a massive redesign

a character from an actual-play stream or podcast, because that counts as fanart and not "drawing your character"; UNLESS you're the person who plays that character

a character who isn't queer

your BG3 character, or your character from any other video game, because that's not a TTRPG no matter what its system is based on

a character who exclusively wears all black that covers most of their body (but I can work with you to come up with another outfit for them)

"oh just use my character for whatever pose you need"

your non-game RP character

[tarochimochi]

Your BFDI human designs are soo good!!! What's your process on designing them? :3 Also, what inspirations do you use for them?? Just curious!!

Okay long answer so everything is gonna be undercut! Thanks for asking btw!

One reason my humanizations take forever is because I really wanna make sure I understand that character, so I have a design that I think fits for them. It’s different from humanizing Pokemon characters because typically your making your own personality for your Pokemon humanization in the process. (Unless your humanizing your Nuzlock or Pokemon OCs, then that’s different but you get what I mean)

I’m was already pretty hardcore into humanizing, or furrify, characters prior getting into object shows so this is really nothing new! I mainly did My Little Pony humanizations for a fanseries that most likely is never seeing the light of day, and I had alot of fun doing that!

When looking at other people who have done humanizations, the ones I always remember were the ones where they dresses like normal people, like people you see on the street, and had exclusively natural haircolors. Like take BixelWixels MLP humanizations. No bright hair colors but still readable as the character! I think those are shows of super good character design.

I knew right when I got into BFDI though, the Algebraliens would be the only ones with bright colored hair. While the contestants they would have exclusively natural hair colors, with exceptions. (Ex: Puffball, Tree, etc).

I really try to understand and study the characters before I finalize a design for them! Trust me so much writing and scrapping goes on behind scenes. For some characters, I had an idea for immediately and ran with it. Others, I had to do so much research for it. Some research included reading fanfics and me annotating them so I could deem if it was in character or not and rewatching episodes a ridiculous amount of times. Once I finish that we can finally get to designing!

So first I refer back to a master sheet which has my race and age head canon for them. Usually it will stay the same as the chart but sometimes a friend can convince me to change it or I changed my mind about things on the list. I won’t show the full list but here’s where the character were using today (Clock :33) was in!

Also has a show of how much changes, I believe my original head canon for them said he was Wasian so things can always change!

Now let’s take a look at my first ever concept for Clock

At this at this point Clock was really young? I believe if my memory serves me correct in this concept Clock was 17. Also he would have worn a see threw shirt so you could see his cool arms.

I really struggled with Clock design but I had a cool idea for his arms to actually look like clock arms kinda and I ran with it so hard. Although I did get the inspiration to make him blasian after taking some inspi from the Timekeeper cookies in cookie run and I thought hey maybe locs could somehow resemble clock arms??

So we got to the sketching finalization stage and again things are going to change!

Since that concept he’s 23 now! Um my sketches are messy so sorry! I messed around with his clothing more to the point we got to the this and I must say I am quire endeared by his design and in the process I’ve grown to have a really nice fondness for Clock! I like him alot actually!

One word of advice is, don’t follow what everyone else does just because everyone does it their’s so many cool ways to interpret things. Like show don’t tell and what not! Personally I like to not look at other humanizations for inspo while concepting them usually because I wanna make sure I’m not being to heavily influenced by anything. As far as I’m aware I’ve never seen a Clock design with locs. (If you have one PLEASE DM ME I WANNA SEE) Just have fun with it at the end of the day!

I’ll ramble about clock’s design in a second when I post him

[getsketched]

FAQs

Has anyone asked you any questions yet?

No, I literally just made this blog. I'm going to try to imagine what kind of questions people might ask a blog like this, though, and answer them.

Why did you draw me/my cat/the tree I posted/etc?

I'm learning to draw, or perhaps learning to draw better, and frequent practice is helpful. Unfortunately, picking something random around my house gets boring after a while, and tumblr is full of much more exciting things to draw.

Okay but why is it so bad?

Wow. Rude. I mentioned the learning thing, right? But really, and more importantly, I'm sketching here. Doodling. I'm not going for accuracy, I'm going for "let's see how well I can capture this in [ten minutes or an hour or whatever]." It's not supposed to be a finished masterpiece. If you would like to commission a finished masterpiece, we can talk.

Will you draw [x]?

Considering I made this blog in an effort to find more inspiration, I'm not going to argue with requests! If I somehow start getting a lot of requests, though, I might move to a "I'll let y'all know when I'm taking requests" model.

I hate your sketch. Will you delete it?

Probably, if you ask.

I love your sketch. Can I buy it?

Uhhh... I'll have to think of how to handle this one if it ever actually comes up. Maybe?

Do you sketch NSFW posts?

I might! If I do, I will tag them appropriately. I probably won't sketch anything that reads as smut to me; that said, I'm not awesome at identifying where the line between "thirst trap" and "smut" is. If you feel something should be tagged differently please let me know.

Why did you tag my image as NSFW?

Because NSFW means Not Safe For Work. At some point people decided to interpret it as "not appropriate for children," and while there's overlap, it's not the same thing. If I think there's a chance someone's boss could be a dick about them looking at my sketch and/or the original picture I sketched (more so than they would just about looking at tumblr, that is) I'm going to tag it just to be safe.

What's with the "thing that's bugging me 🩶 favorite part" bit?

Back to the "learning" thing. I think acknowledging areas for improvement is important, but if I don't also acknowledge the parts I'm happy with, I'll lose all desire to do it at all. (I don't include this on figures because I don't want people to think I'm talking about them/their bodies rather than my own artistic prowess in capturing them.)

How long have you been drawing?

On and off my whole life. I'm old.

How do I get good at drawing?

You're asking ME? Wow. That's wild. If anyone ever actually asks me this maybe I'll make a post with my thoughts on the matter.

Do you post sketches that aren't of tumblr posts?

Sure! Or, well, again, just made this and haven't posted anything yet, but yes there will be random sketchbook pages and doodles from my own brain on here, too.

Do you post things that aren't sketches?

Probably (I mean, this isn't a sketch, right?) but I'll keep it art-related here.

What [pencil/sketchbook/erasers/etc] do you use?

What's that Ron Swanson quote about not endorsing a product unless it's so good he uses it exclusively? I'm with him. I use Morton's salt. Not for drawing, of course, just for, y’know, salt. I will share that I mostly sketch with a 2H 2mm lead in a lead holder (imagine if a normal pencil and a mechanical pencil had a baby) and try not to erase too much when sketching but when it's unavoidable, my mechanical eraser is a lifesaver (I use the round one).

Can I reblog your posts?

Is that not the point of Tumblr? Of course you can!

What are your pronouns/complete list of marginalized identities/politics/phobias and triggers/mother's maiden name/favorite kind of socks/whatever?

For the purposes of this blog, please think of me as a semi-sentient sketchbook. I mean, you could find all this stuff on my main, but it's not what I'm over in this corner for. If your genuine response to meeting a semi-sentient sketchbook would be a pronoun check, my semi-sentient sketchbook response is: idk have fun with it.

I have another question that you didn't answer here.

okay 🩶 yay 🩶 send me an ask!

[twinleafclover]

Feeling good

[sasukimimochi]

I decided these sketches would go up as is so here they are! i might work on the left sketch separately in the future, because that one is my favorite of the wwx sketches on his own but i don't think it looks quite right like this [and i still like the sketch alone more than with any color even if its muted, which is usually a sign it needs to be worked on lmao]

anyway, this is IMBSB WWX! aka Angel WWX for my other afterlife au, "In My Blood, Stardust Blooms". i wanted to focus more on figuring him out than drawing anything super nice for these. [these were drawn before my actual ficlet art i recently posted, so he looks better in that ficlet art than here imo lol]

more info and links to art under the read more line!

“In My Blood, Stardust Blooms” / IMBSB is a short project that not unlike COI is about the afterlife, but centered on angels pretty exclusively this time [while COI is mostly centered in hell]. It delves into the mysteries of the forbidden land of Yiling and loss, and of course a particular couple of angel’s love for each other. I have started writing, but it's of course not up yet as it's going to be either a one shot or very few chapters. [this doesn't mean i won't make more stories about this setting in the future, it's just i don't have any future plans for it yet past what i'm doing as of now]. You can find the first post on Reddit here and Tumblr here!

Previous Artwork or segments / previews!

Wen Ning first concept drawing [will be reuploaded once i finish editing/correcting it]

A gift for the second jade of Gusu IMBSB preview 3 [contains all previews & snips]

if you want to read what i said in the previews here they are one by one. preview 1 preview 2

[archduchessofnowhere]

If you were to actually write a TV show about young Sisi, how would you do it properly?

Ohhh I have SO MANY ideas, however I’m not sure how rentable they are since they all cater specifically and exclusively to me alone lol. 

First of all, I think that as a society we have to accept that young Sisi doesn’t really make for a great protagonist, at least for modern audiences who prefer a more assertive heroine; that’s why we ended up with Girl Boss Elisabeth in both RTL Sisi and The Empress. So I would make it an “ensemble” show rather than a Sisi solo show, focusing also on other people from Elisabeth’s family, because during these years there are legit moments in which she just doesn’t do anything super interesting to adapt on a screen. But if we follow a larger cast we can switch perspectives from time to time and avoid the two bigger problems of Sisi media: the heavy fictionalization, and the bad pacing (either too slow like in The Empress, or too fast like in Sisi 2009). Also this is my show, so we get all the siblings - Elisabeth’s three brothers and four sisters, and FJ’s three brothers. They’ll have their respective side plots and will be important supporting characters in many episodes. 

For a first season I think the time period RTL Sisi covers is actually pretty good, so I would follow a similar timeline, except that I would actually respect the order in which the events happen (remember that they setted the Italian War of 1859… in 1856). So my hypothetical first season would cover the years 1853-1859 in eight 50-70 minutes long episodes. And the costumes, hairstyles and manners would be period accurate.

Actually I got excited so here is a very rough sketch of what my ideal young Sisi series would be like:

EP 1 - 1853-1854: I would add some flashbacks to 1848 (their previous encounter, FJ becoming emperor, etc), but honestly there isn't any other moment better than Ischl in 1853 to start the story. This weekend is the most overdone moment in Elisabeth's life, so I don't want to focus much on this tho: half way through the episode (and one Karl Ludwig getting his heart broken later) they'll be already engaged. There will be no scheming between Ludovika and Sophie, nor any secret meeting between Sisi and FJ: they simply met during dinner and he became in love at first sight, that's it. The rest will be Elisabeth getting ready for her future role as empress, and we'll end the episode with the wedding.

EP 2 - 1854-1855: The second episode will cover Elisabeth’s first year as an empress, with the Crimean War as a background conflict. We’ll see Sisi trying to adapt to life at court, the visit she and FJ made to Bohemia (where Emperor Ferdinand and Empress Maria Anna will make a cameo), and her first pregnancy. Archduke Max visits Vienna and instantly hits it off with his new sister-in-law, much to the annoyance of FJ. We’ll also see archduchess Sophie’s clear favoritism over Max. The episode finishes with the birth of baby Sophie.

EP 3 - 1856: The episode starts with Elisabeth already entering confinement again. Then Gisela is born, and the disappointment over a second girl is obvious. Elisabeth and Sophie disagree on how to take care of the girls, and the placing of the nursery is a great conflict. This is also the first real conflict between the two women in the series. The rest of the episode will cover the imperial couple and their daughter’s visit to Lombardy-Venetia, where we will see first hand the deep hatred towards the Habsburgs in the Italian provinces. Meanwhile in the B plot, Archduke Max courts Charlotte of Belgium, and in the C plot, Duke Ludwig starts his affair with Henriette Mendel. After the visit, FJ decides that serious changes have to be made and appoints his brother as viceroy of Lombardy-Venetia. By the end of the episode, Max and Charlotte get engaged.

EP 4 - 1857: This episode will cover solely Sisi and FJ’s visit to Hungary. Elisabeth visibly falls in love with the country, and people also love her back. We’ll also dive deep into the brutal repression of Hungary after the revolution of 1848.  However, half way through the episode, Sophie and Gisela get sick, and their illness will lurk during the rest of their parents’ journey, until they’re urgently called back. The episode finishes with baby Sophie’s death. There will be no side plots, the Imperial couple and their children will be the sole focus of this episode.

EP 5 - 1857-1858: The episode starts with Max and Charlotte getting married. Then we shift to Elisabeth, who’s in deep mourning; throughout the episode we’ll follow her in her guilt and grief until she comes to terms with the loss of her daughter. Later on Charlotte gets introduced at court, and starts off with the wrong foot with her sister-in-law. After this visit, Max and Charlotte travel to Lombardy-Venetia, where they settle in their new role. Meanwhile in the side plot, Henriette Mendel tells Ludwig she is pregnant. I know it is too on the nose, but I want to make parallels between Marie Larisch and Rudolf, since they were both born in the same year but under wildly different circumstances; so the episode will finish with Elisabeth (who accepted that she isn’t guilty of baby Sophie’s death) finding out she’s pregnant for the third time, while Marie Larisch is born, and Ludwig starts to ponder about what to do with his new secret family. 

EP 6 - 1858: The opening scene of this episode is a pregnant Elisabeth who is following every order and recommendation the doctors give her: she promises she won’t do anything, so as to not endanger the child. But with this Sisi is also breaking the fourth wall, because she really won’t do (almost) anything this episode: the protagonist will now be Helene. Personally I hate how Nené is reduced to the rejected, bitter sister so I’m making her the heroine for the whole episode because fuck it this is my show. Back at Possenhofen, the imminent engagement of Marie, the third daughter, with the Crown Prince of the Two Sicilies is the main event, but this also makes it obvious that Helene is practically a spinster now. So Ludovika decides to intervene and invites prince Maximilian of Thurn und Taxis, with the hopes he might be interested in Helene. What follows is a full on fictional recreation of their meet cute and courting until Prince Maximilian proposes to Helene. But there’s a problem: King Maximilian doesn’t approve of the union giving their different ranks. So Elisabeth (who’s finally back on the screen after like forty minutes) intervenes, convincing their cousin to allow the marriage. Elisabeth then enters confinement, lamenting missing her sister’s wedding. The episode finishes with a happy Helene getting married.  

EP 7 - 1858-1859: The episode starts with Rudolf being born: all of Vienna rejoices over the birth of the heir. Marie becomes engaged to the Crown Prince of the Two Sicilies, and she and Ludwig (who’s making his mind about whether to marry Henriette or not) go to Vienna and stay there with their sister Elisabeth for two weeks, so we will see them having fun and bonding. Lots of talks about the Italian peninsula being an unstable place, the unification movement growing stronger, etc. Meanwhile at Lombardy, Max struggles more and more to push forward his policies, and the rift between his ideas and his brother’s become obvious. The episode ends in Trieste where Elisabeth and Ludwig say goodbye to Marie, who’s sailing to Naples; Ludwig reveals to his sisters his marriage plans and Sisi promises him to help him out. 

EP 8 - 1859: For the season finale, the entire episode will cover the second Italian War of Independence. I don't have a clear structure for this one tho, but it will start with Max dimiting from his job as Viceroy of Lombardy-Venetia, and it will have Elisabeth being extremely worried about her husband's well being and running a hospital for the wounded. Also Ludwig will marry Henriette Mendel in the side plot.

You can totally tell I’m the showrunner because no one would make episodes six and seven lol. This is what I meant with “cater specifically and exclusively to me alone”. Anyway, this is just a rough sketch, there are many important events/personages that I didn't mention here that I would love them to be in this hypothetical series. It's not 100% historically accurate either, I did move some things around so the narrative flows better, but nothing too drastic, and the characterizations would be as close to their historical counterparts real personalities as possible. I accept criticism and also would love to hear other people's ideas for a series!

[kashimalin-fanfiction]

All right, it's time for your fandom veteran to hop onto the IkeRev Closure Post Train. I've played since literal Day 1. Pretty sure I got it so fast I actually have an extra day compared to most Day 1 players due to when the rollover is. It's the game I have custom plush for, merch, a cosplay, etc. for. Gonna put a read more because I don't wanna clog the tag and because dang I get a lil emotional.

First things first, the hopeful statements: The game will still be active and playable, the servers still up - yeah, no new content hits very differently than replaying old content, but it means people can still come in and get inspired by the world and characters. This is a good thing compared to a game being removed entirely (PT Silent Hills, anyone?) for the preservation of the game.

Secondly: Fandoms do not die when a game closes, if the people are willing to continue it. The power of fandom is in the people, not the media. Sure, the media fuels the fandom, but it is nothing without those who engage with it.

I am able to say this with confidence, because I can tell you this is absolutely not my first encounter with a closing game. For those who have followed me a long time: I was a moderator and writer for a little known Atsume game called Notice Me Senpai. Maybe you heard of it - heck, maybe you even played it. I went through a tragic announcement of the company shuttering and closing the app with a month to spare back in 2017. You want to know something cool?

I still am part of the Discord. The blog is still up. We have people joining the Discord in 2022, who remember this game. The Wikia is something I am updating slow and steady to preserve the game's content, and at some point that will be archived too. There are other fans with me who I know if I go to and talk about this game they will know who I reference.

We probably would call ourselves dormant, as one friend suggested when I brought this up to them. That is what IkeRev may become: dormant. And that is okay.

You can still cherish something when it closes. You do not have to stop playing the game when there are no new events. Hold onto what you have. Don't let it go. I am not telling you to stop mourning or stop being sad, or angry: it's a natural state. I have vivid recollections of where I was and what I was doing when Notice Me Senpai shut down, and the aftermath. I remember being angry and upset a game that had done so much for me was going to be gone. But then, I channeled it into the preservation of Notice Me Senpai media from the blog, encouraging everyone to download it, and celebrating it with events.

So, I ask and implore you: what will you do now? Everyone will react differently. Maybe you will start that longfic you have been itching to write. Maybe you'll review your screenshots and preserve some of the lore. Maybe you will draw to celebrate the closure.

In five years, maybe that fic will be completed. Maybe the Wikia will be updated to tell others what was there when the game was alive. Maybe your favorites will appear in your warm-up sketches.

Me, personally? I vow to finish "Fenrir Godspeed, King of Spades," and in probably a few years down the line when I have a boatload more cosplay experience, I will remake my Ray cosplay more dynamic than the first. (I'll actually make a sword, this time.)

Mourn, but don't forget. If you love what you have experienced, cherish those friends. Talk about the game still. Let the natural progression of a fandom take you through the motions. Come talk to me if you have anything you want to share. Make a discord. After your sadness or anger, utilize it to do something great for the game that has touched you so.

(And, keep an eye out, maybe I'll open requests exclusively for Rev for a hurrah. Still pending the idea.)

[glitternightingale]

Weird Questions for Writers (because writers are weird)

Taken from this list

As I said, this is just me comprising the asks so that I remember which ones I've already answered!

Now, onto the mess that is my writing routine:

1. What font do you write in? Do you actually care or is that just the default setting?

2. If you had to give up your keyboard and write your stories exclusively by hand, could you do it? If you already write everything by hand, a) are you a wizard and b) pen or pencil?

3. What is your writing ritual and why is it cursed?

My writing ritual is to obsess over an idea for weeks, thinking I haven't thought it out well enough, and when I do want to write the fic/next chapter I avoid it for the majority of the day. It gets late and I get tired but feel like I haven't been productive. That's when the first word garble appears!

4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

"Apprehensive"

5. Do you have any writing superstitions? What are they and why are they 100% true?

Hmm, my superstition is (not only when it comes to writing but just about anything I create) that when I'm proud of something I've made it's probably mediocre for everyone else. Surprisingly, my "best" is usually my "Meh...", so I try to avoid feeling overly confident! (But it also helps to sketch everyone's favorite prophet before I start a new project--)

6. What is your darkest fear about writing?

7. What is your deepest joy about writing?

8. If you had to write an entire story without either action or dialogue, which would you choose and how would it go?

I would choose to write a story without dialogue. Because, and here it becomes sneaky, I could say just as much through interior monologue or describing the characters' facial expressions and body language. (Or even write 10k of exposition)

9. Do you believe in ghosts? This isn’t about writing I just wanna know

No, I do not. My opinion changes, however, when it gets dark and something's lurking behind the door, ready to fry me with lasers.

10. Has a piece of writing ever “haunted” you? Has your own writing haunted you? What does that mean to you?

WIPs haunt me. They're like incomplete circles and I can't start something new without them being finished. (That's why I don't like writing multi-chapter fics. The needed commitment is just super big.)

11. Do you believe in the old advice to “kill your darlings?” Are you a ruthless darling assassin? What happens to the darlings you murder? Do you have a darling graveyard? Do you grieve?

12. If a genie offered you three writing wishes, what would they be? Btw if you wish for more wishes the genie turns all your current WIPs into Lorem Ipsum, I don’t make the rules

Wish 1: AO3 doesn't destroy my format when I import text from Google Docs.

Wish 2: Writing comments on other people's works comes more easily to me.

Wish 3: Just... everything I write is enjoyable(?)

13. What is a subject matter that is incredibly difficult for you to write about? What is easy?

14. Do you lend your books to people? Are people scared to borrow books from you? Do you know exactly where all your “lost” books are and which specific friend from school you haven’t seen in twelve years still possesses them? Will you ever get them back?

15. Do you write in the margins of your books? Dog-ear your pages? Read in the bath? Why or why not? Do you judge people who do these things? Can we still be friends?

*cringes at the thought* Nope, I like my books clean and basically unused (so that I can make some profit if I decide to sell them later). It's a different topic if the text is digital, though. The pens that come with most tablets hafta be used!

16. What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever used as a bookmark?

I've made this Harry Potter wand out of wood, hot glue, and sparkly stones once. It served its purpose to weigh down the book pages but then it slid off and broke. Oh, well.

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.

18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end. Spicy addition: Questioner provides the passage.

"Ah-ha! Here it is!" he exclaimed, holding the mysterious object aloft between his bony fingers. 

The young girl squinted at the colorfully-striped cone, only realizing it was a party hat when Tío Bruno managed to attach it to the donkey's forehead. 

She squealed in amazement as she saw the picture-perfect mythical animal blinking at her in all its radiant glory. However, this did not erase all the dreadful thoughts she had."

Right, so, I do watch Encanto quite often and there are always new things to discover. Then, while I was standing in front of the mirror, trying to make my eyebrows look symmetrical, I connected the party hats Osvaldo gave to Mirabel (in the "Not-Special Special" Basket) with the scene where Luisa's jumping over pink clouds with her unicorn donkeys. Party hats look like cones and cones look like unicorn horns-- Dumb, I know. But know who else would have these dumb ideas? Bruno.

19. Tell me a story about your writing journey. When did you start? Why did you start? Were there bumps along the way? Where are you now and where are you going?

20. If a witch offered you the choice between eternal happiness with your one true love and the ability to finally finish, perfect, and publish your dearest, darlingest, most precious WIP in exactly the way you’ve always imagined it — which would you choose? You can’t have both sorry, life’s a bitch

21. Could you ever quit writing? Do you ever wish you could? Why or why not?

22. How organized are you with your writing? Describe to me your organization method, if it exists. What tools do you use? Notebooks? Binders? Apps? The Cloud?

23. Describe the physical environment in which you write. Be as detailed as possible. Tell me what’s around you as you work. Paint me a picture.

24. How much prep work do you put into your stories? What does that look like for you? Do you enjoy this part or do you just want to get on with it?

25. What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story?

26. How do you get into your character’s head? How do you get out? Do you ever regret going in there in the first place?

27. Who is the most stressful character you’ve ever written? Why?

Aside from the fact that writing anyone ever is pretty stressful, I'd say it's Félix (Encanto). I couldn't pin down his personality at first without it seeming ooc and picturing his role in the Madrigals' dynamics.

28. Who is the most delightful character you’ve ever written? Why?

29. Where do you draw your inspiration? What do you do when the inspiration well runs dry?

30. Talk to me about the role dreams play in your writing life. Have you ever used material from your dreams in your writing? Have you ever written in a dream? Did you remember it when you woke up?

31. Write a short love letter to your readers.

32. What is a line from a poem/novel/fanfic etc that you return to from time and time again? How did you find it? What does it mean to you?

33. Do you practice any other art besides writing? Does that art ever tie into your writing, or is it entirely separate?

34. Thoughts on the Oxford comma, Go:

35. What’s your favorite writing rule to smash into smithereens?

36. They say to Write What You Know. Setting aside for a moment the fact that this is terrible advice…what do you Know?

37. If you were to be remembered only by the words you’ve put on the page, what would future historians think of you?

38. What is something about your writing process YOU think is Really Weird? If you are comfortable, please share. If you’re not comfortable, what do you think cats say about us?

39. What keeps you writing when you feel like giving up?

40. Please share a poem with me, I need it.

(Don't judge me for this one lmao.)

The glass is dark, your reflection green

What do you feel when you fall on your spleen?

Is it pain? Is it greed?

Or are you-- freed?

[esperata]

In a little over a week my end of term exam will be done and I might actually be able to get back to some writing. With that in mind, I’m refreshing myself on what projects I wanted to do. Featuring some plot ideas for hattercrow, octogoblin and riddlebird under the cut.

HatterCrow

Pumpkin King Based on freakxwannaxbe’s post with Jervis in the role of the curious youngster and Jonathan as the supernatural creature. I have actually written this scenario but wanted to expand on it some way. My aim was to post this at Halloween, whether I’ve done more to it or not.

Quadrille A five-times fic featuring Jervis getting dosed with fear toxin. Maybe halfway done. I certainly have concepts for each part and have written out a chunk of the first three. It’d be easy enough to finish this with a few dedicated writing sessions.

Every Breath You Take An Arkhamverse project that I’d love to complete. These versions are a degree more twisted than, for example, their btas counterparts and that makes the dynamics more intricate to work with. I really want to do justice to this one. Its begun but I have no idea how long it will end up being.

Haunted House Something fun with the btas dork squad crew, and featuring some riddlebird on the side. Exactly as the title implies, the boys go to a Haunted House. Events unfold from there. This ought to be a one shot that I could wrap up quite easily.

OctoGoblin

Mermay Yes, this is not going to be posted in time for mermay (this year). Well underway but I ran out of time. Featuring Otto as an octopus-man in the laboratory of Oscorps and Norman increasingly under pressure to dissect him for science. A smattering of Harry bonding with his dad as well.

The Hands On Approach Mostly smut. Busy CEO Norman visits an exclusive club for some tactile relief. His thoughts all too fixated on the scientist working for him, Otto. Set in TSSM version although I have not finished watching that series yet. Started and will be finished without difficulty.

Suit A random idea I had while watching TSSM. With a corporate event coming up requiring Otto’s presence, Norman insists on buying him an appropriate suit to wear. That’s about as far as I got but I’d still like to conclude it somehow.

Fate Or Something Like It Because the idea of time travel and paradoxes intrigues me (even while it gives me a headache) I sketched out my own thoughts on what happens when, post NWH, Norman and Otto go back to their respective times. Quite complex but I would love to get this written up properly sometime.

RiddleBird

The Winner Takes It All Another Arkhamverse fic, set sometime after the first. Mostly smut but with an underlying power play as you’d expect from these two. Started writing this and have copious notes so its definitely on the cards to get finished. I always enjoy coming back to this version.

Batman vs Dracula I had a good chat about this idea with a friend on discord and it essentially would be reimagining the movie with Riddler instead of Joker. I do enjoy reworking canon like that and 2004 riddlebird is one of my favourites so I’d really like to try this. Plus I would have an excuse to rewatch the film XD

Living Doll Of all my half-planned ideas, this one has lingered as a constant for longest. Using the BurtonSchumacher pairing and setting Oswald in the title roll. The gothic vibe seems fit here. There is something very appealing to me about this and I would like to develop it further.

Museum Meeting Another enduring idea after seeing a few comic panels giving me ideas. What if Ed and Oswald actually met when they were kids? Both outcast oddballs with a penchant for visiting museums and art galleries. Its a cute visual to me and I’d enjoy building upon it.

These are just a few pulled together and I have other ideas floating around (including my ongoing NaNoWriMo project). I like hearing feedback on things so feel free to drop a comment if anything strikes you.

[k-llama-llama]

Canvas

TXT AU: 6th member

Sara x TXT

Sara and Hyunjin take an important step.

A/N: Please check out my PATREON (patreon.com/kllamallama) for exclusive posts you can’t get anywhere else, as well as lots of other cool benefits!

Requests are OPEN

Masterlist and other Follow Me links in bio!

Sara undid the latch on the door, opening it wide. “You’re early.” She said in greeting.

Hyunjin held up a bag. “Food was quicker than I expected.”

Sara stepped aside so he could enter, kicking off his shoes in the doorway. “I thought you went to this restaurant all of the time. How did it surprise you?”

“I don’t know. It just did.” He smiled at her, before glancing around the apartment. “Where’s everyone else?”

“Out.” Sara said simply. “Why? Did you bring food for them too? You do have a lot there.”

Hyunjin shook his head with a laugh. “Soobin gave me a lecture about making sure you eat enough, so I just ordered extra of everything.”

Sara rolled her eyes, closing the door behind him. “That guy.” She shook her head. “I just have to put my paints away.”

“Ooh, paints?” Hyunjin set the bags on the kitchen counter. “Can I see?”

Sara stiffened. It wasn’t like she actively tried to keep her paintings secret. The boys had all seen them hundreds of times, and Tori snooped more often than not. But it wasn’t a common occurrence when someone actually wanted to see them.

“Sure.” She said finally. “I’m not done it yet, though.”

“That’s cool. I just wanna see.” Hyunjin put his hands in his pockets.

Sara turned and walked towards her bedroom without another work. The door was still open, so she walked right in, and Hyunjin closed the door behind her. The canvas was set up on her easel, showing the rudimentary color blocking for the painting she was working on.

“It’s not done.” She repeated, busying herself with putting her paints back in their case. She grabbed her brushed, wrapping them in a cloth so that she could wash them later.

“No, it’s awesome though.” Hyunjin leaned close, looking genuinely interested. “It’s the ocean, right? Like…this part is the sky and this is going to be the ocean? That’s why it gets darker as you go down.”

“Ah, kinda.” Sara bit her lip. “This half is the sky, and then in the middle is the ocean’s surface….and then this really dark bit is going to be like the bottom of the ocean.”

“That’s so cool.” Hyunjin exclaimed. “You can totally tell what it is, even with this much detail. I can’t wait to see it when you’re finished.”

Sara smiled. “Well….I’ll make sure to show you then.”

Hyunjin leaned back from the painting, glancing around the room. She had a sheet down on her bed, covered in paint smears. There was a murky glass of water that she’d obviously used to rinse her brushes as she worked, and the paints were scattered everywhere.

From there, his gaze shifted to the walls. She shared the room, but the walls around her bed were covered with tacked up sketches. It was almost comical, especially when you considered how neat and orderly she was with everything else. It wasn’t messy, just a type of organized chaos.

“You really drew all these?” He pointed at one.

“Yeah.” She sighed. “Eventually I’ll paint them. But I leave them up there until the inspiration hits, you know?”

“Sure.” He laughed. “We should go eat, right? Before the others get home and eat all of it?”

“Probably,” Sara laughed, picking up the cloth that held her dirty brushes. “Let’s go.”

She turned to leave, but Hyunjin stopped her with a hand on her elbow. “You have…uh…some paint…”

“What?” Sara reached up to rub her cheek. “Did I get it?”

“No, it’s right…” He reached up, using his thumb to wipe away the little smear of dark blue paint front next to her nose. “There…” He lowered his hand awkwardly.

Since their first date, there had been a kind of unspoken tension between them. They were probably dating, but they didn’t tell people that they were, and other than a lot of dinner dates and conversations, they hadn’t done anything else. There was always the risk that someone could see them, or that they would somehow make things more awkward.

But there was no way anyone could see them now.

“You can kiss me.” Sara said quietly. “I mean…if you want to.”

Hyunjin gave her an awkward smile. “You sure? You wouldn’t rather go out there and eat-“

Sara grabbed his shirt with her right hand and pulled him down to her level, pressing her lips against his. They stayed like that a moment, and then she released her grip and let him pull away.

“Was that too weird?” She asked. “I figured I’d just…you know…take the initiative or whatever.”

“That was…” Hyunjin blinked. “Ummm…yeah, that was….”

Sara winced. “Sorry. Sorry let’s just forget that ever happened. Let’s go eat the food and then we can pretend that this whole thing was a weird dream.”

“No!” He exclaimed. “Um, I mean…that was…really awesome.”

“It was?” Sara smiled. “Oh thank goodness. Tori said I should just go for it but I wasn’t really sure so I-“

“Tori told you?”

“Yeah.” Sara smiled sheepishly. “Well…she kinda just started talking. But it was okay? I didn’t ruin anything?”

“Not at all.” Hyunjin grinned.

Sara sighed in relief. “Okay, good. We should go eat before the food gets cold.”

“Wait! Can we…uh….just try that one more time?” Hyunjin mumbled.

“Right now?” Sara tilted her head. “What about the food?”

“It can wait a minute.” Hyunjin leaned forward. “Just…ah…close your eyes.”

Sara did.

When she felt him kiss her, she leaned in, letting him wrap his arms around her waist. They were both very tentative, but they started moving their lips together, getting the hang of it.

And then their little bliss was shattered by a scream.

They jumped apart, Hyunjin knocking his head on the bed post. Sara fell back onto the mattress, staring in disbelief at Yeonjun’s horrified face.

“You were…you were….” He looked between them in shock.

“You aren’t supposed to be home for another hour!” Sara shouted.

“What? I can’t come into my own house?”

“Not without telling me.”

“Why? Because you’re here making out with your boyfriend.”

“Okay, we were not making out.” Hyunjin cut in.

“You-“ Yeonjun pointed at him with a fury in his eyes. “I will deal with you later.”

“Jun, don’t be an idiot.” Sara tried to reason with him. “We were just…uh… kissing.” She looked down, slightly embarrassed by the admission herself.

“See, she was showing me her paintings and they-“

“I don’t recall her having any paintings on her face!” Yeonjun glared at him. “How could you? In our own home?”

“It my home too.” Sara rolled her eyes, dropping the paintbrushes onto her easel. “Come on, Hyunjin. Let’s go eat in the park.”

She grabbed his hand, dragging him past an outraged Yeonjun and into the living room.

“I don’t think I can just leave.” Hyunjin whispered. “Aren’t I supposed to beg forgiveness or-“

“You’re supposed to grab the food so we can.” Sara told him. “Come on. I’m hungry.”

“Right.” He clearly was torn between keeping his sort-of girlfriend happy, and making piece with her best friend.

He made the right choice.

“We can get drinks at the corner store.” He grabbed the bag of food, heading for his shoes. “Some of this is spicy so we’ll-“

“You’re just going to leave?” Yeonjun came out of the bedroom. “After I had to look at that.”

“So sorry.” Hyunjin said quickly.

“Yeah, we’re leaving.” Sara said at the same time. “There’s pasta in the fridge. Don’t wait up.”

“CHUNG SOO-JI!” Yeonjun shouted. “We are not done talking about this.”

“I say we are.” Sara gave him a smile. “Come on, Hyunjin.”

“Um, okay.” He took her outstretched hand, and followed her into the hallway.

She kicked the door closed behind them.

“Are you going to be in trouble?” He asked worriedly as they hurried down the hall.

Sara scoffed. “Please. I’m going to kick his ass when we get home.”

“Wow. Okay.” He stepped into the elevator with her. “Are you always that aggressive?”

“Just with them.” She squeezed his hand. “Not with you, I promise.”

“Cool cool.”

[schleierkauz]

Some Highlights from the 03.05 Stream

As usual, here’s some interesting bits of the last Cornelia Funke Q&A. I tried to structure it all a bit better this time but these talks are pretty chaotic sooo... bear with me. There’s more interesting stuff under the read more, I just put it there because it was getting so long. Anything in (brackets) is my own commentary. I hope you enjoy! :)

Inkworld

Q: What's the deal with the death bond between Mo and Dustfinger and will it be relevant in the new book? A: Since Dustfinger is probably immortal now, he’s been operating on a different level than Mo who is very much still mortal. Other than that, Cornelia doesn't want to reveal too much about TCoR for now. She worked on it the day before the stream, and she shows us the notebook she uses for it.

She thought she had a pretty good idea of what the story was going to be but more and more things keep happening and the book is already looking to be a lot longer and more complex than she intended.

- She will focus on TCoR once the move to Italy is complete and she's very excited about that since the Inkworld is essentially Magical Italy. She can't wait to sit in Volterra and write about Ombra.

- The TCoR sketch book might just be published at some point as a sort of bonus making-of book since it's already full of illustrations and other fun stuff

(That looks like the witch character, doesn’t it? I wonder who the other woman is... And god, I wish I could actually read the text. :/)

- The Inkworld exists around 1360 by our understanding of time

- The Mystery Chapter I translated ages ago is still canon! More info on that in the Reckless section

Q: Will we ever get to read the "original" Inkheart by Fenoglio? A: No, never. Cornelia's writing style is too different from Fenoglio's and she wouldn't be able to pull it off. 

However! Cornelia still hopes for an Inkworld TV show that would begin long before the story of the first book. She already has a notebook all about Dustfinger's and the Black Prince's childhoods, how they met each other as well as other characters such as Roxane etc. Fenoglio didn't care much for their backstories so Cornelia feels like she can explore them without stepping on his toes.

- A long time ago, Cornelia had an editor who thought Dustfinger was a bad character (lmao. imagine being that wrong.)

Reckless

Q: Will one of the short stories Cornelia wants to write about the Mirrorworld be about Nerron's mother? A: Interesting idea! She will consider it.

Q: Will Cornelia include African and/or Indigenous stories in the Mirrorworld? A: Yes! She planned to do it in the sixth book but right now it looks like it might happen in the fifth, so she's trying to figure out how to include South-American fairytales alongside African and Indigenous ones. She wants to include those stories through characters we meet along the way, without necessarily taking the story to those places directly. Or maybe she'll write a separate book entirely to do those fairytales justice. 

- The Mirrorworld exists around 1860 by our time

- Cornelia feels like there will be a lot of Mirrorworld spin-offs because she keeps having ideas and loves writing in that world

Q: Did Spieler (Player(?)), when he was in the "real" world, know about Capricorn and Fenoglio's Inkheart book? A: The silver book that makes people into silvertongues was created by Spieler. For a while he found it very convenient to travel the worlds through books but eventually he realised that books tend to develop a will of their own, which is why he ultimately decided to travel via mirrors. He probably knows about Fenoglio but Cornelia doesn't think he'd care much about Capricorn since he's playing in an entirely different league of villainy.

- Cornelia just signed a contract for a Reckless TV show

Cornelias new Farm in Italy

Q: Will she have animals on the new farm as well? A: Probably not! Right now she's more interested in befriending wild animals. Her dogs will stay with her but otherwise she wants to focus on wild animals as well as wild flowers. She wants to share her garden with any animal that stops by - including, hopefully, the occasional feral cat.

- Cornelia is getting into animation! She will work with a friend of hers who is a teacher in that field to create a little stop motion/animation studio on the farm so artists can bring their characters to life in a new way and create short movies.

Q: How can artists apply to be invited to the farm? A: Cornelia doesn't want people to apply directly, she'd rather leave it up to chance and fate. Most of her artists were recommended to her by friends or former colleagues and this method is working very well. She encourages people to post their work on the internet or send it to her via her website or twitter or something, she just doesn't want to hold contests regularly because it would be overwhelming and she doesn't want to have to reject people. Also, it's aimed at young artists who are just starting out and it’s mainly for girls/women, although not exclusively.

Side note, she plans to have another farm in Germany (probably in Schleswig-Holstein) and there will be other projects that happen there.

Q: Will it be possible to visit the farms, will they sell tickets? A: Cornelia doesn't want to sell tickets and definitely doesn't want "Disneyland vibes". The Mirror Farm (in Germany) isn't supposed to make money but she rather wants it to be a gift to her readers. They'll have to somehow limit how many people show up at once but there will be "open days" where anyone can just show up. Cornelia also wants to offer workshops or something similar herself once or twice a year, where people would have the chance to meet her in person.

Bonus: Life Lessons with Cornelia

Q: Does Cornelia have any advice for people in their mid-twenties who are not quite sure what to do with their lives? A: Figure out what you want to do and follow your heart because being stuck doing something you don't care about at all will make you miserable. And then it comes down to discipline and hard work. You might never get rich doing what you love but someone in their 20s is still young enough to try all kinds of different things and find a path that works. The important thing is actually following through instead of just endlessly thinking about what could be. Travel the world, try different jobs. Don't be fooled into thinking you have to go to university/college, that's nonsense. Knowing how to build a sturdy table or plant a good herb garden makes someone an artist in Cornelia's eyes. Listen to advice but don't blindly follow it. Don't be afraid to change your dreams. Make mistakes and learn from them. You live in one of the richest countries in the world, you won't starve or die on the streets so be grateful and be brave.

Misc.

- The three of them spend the first eight minutes of the stream telling us to visit this website and check out the cool bridge their bookshop is built on and the blackbird that moved into the store

- Cornelia's daughter got married and it was beautiful :)

- Cornelia is looking forward to moving to Italy and being closer to "us" and European artists. She says she'll miss California but she is incredibly tired of all the wild fires.

- Cornelia is now fully vaccinated 

- Cornelia is working on a book about two girls. One used to live in Germany in the 40s-50s, was blind and collected plants from all over the world with her father. She would write letters about those plants to her sister, and those letters are found one day by a girl from Brooklyn. She starts to go looking for the plants the letters are about in the botanical garden. Cornelia has an assistant who keeps sending her pictures from that botanical garden and it's a very fun project because it's very rooted in the real world yet Cornelia still gets to tell a story about a friendship that takes place through letters. She hopes to have finished it by August

- The Wild Chicks movie might just actually happen and everyone's excited about it

- An animated Igraine Ohnefurcht movie is in the works

- So is an animated Geisterritter/Ghost Knight movie

- Cornelia keeps losing books and other important things in the mail and it is pretty infuriating

- Cornelia recommends the book "Sand Talk" and once again says white people should be careful about not speaking over marginalised groups in the name of protecting them

[clumsyclifford]

lashton prompt: luke falling asleep on skype and ashton taking the opportunity to draw him, bonus if someone else finds the sketches before ashton shows them to luke

meghna this prompt is from almost a full calendar year ago. i am proud to report that after all this time i did in fact manage to set it in spideyverse because that’s how determined i am. more info in ao3 notes but it takes place in the summer before their senior year of high school, so after the events of everything else in spideyverse so far

read here on ao3

-

Ashton will have to thank Maya later for the tip about the Fine Arts Room. He jimmies the door handle and, as promised, the door swings opens to reveal a darkened room full of half-finished projects. They must really take the decency of humanity on faith here. Anyone could come in at any time and sabotage any of this work.

Ashton has less nefarious plans.

He sits at his usual spot but doesn’t turn any lights on; the big windows shine just enough moonlight into the room that Ashton can see the silhouettes of the furniture, and his laptop will be on in a moment anyway. Careful of the scattered pages over his workspace, he opens his computer and loads up Skype. 

Just in time for an incoming call.

Ashton fumbles with his headphones and plugs them in with one hand while he accepts the call with the other. The screen fills with Luke’s brightly-lit, highly pixelated face. Chin in his hands, elbows propped on his desk, hair a ruffled mess (from the mask, Ashton knows) — the sight of him fills Ashton with warmth.

“Hey,” Luke says, smiling his usual cheeky smile. They’ve been texting sporadically, but seeing Luke’s face — hearing his voice — gives Ashton a fluttery feeling behind his sternum. Calum would call that anatomically impossible, but he’d do it with a smirk. “I can barely see you.”

“I’m sitting in the dark,” Ashton explains. His voice is a hushed whisper even though he knows it’s absurd to be paranoid. They’re supposed to be confined to their bunks by now, and the staff and counselors will all be asleep. The only reason he and Luke are calling now, past midnight, is because now is the only time they’re both available. “I’m in the Fine Arts Room.”

“Ooh, can I see?”

“I don’t want to turn on the lights,” Ashton says. “There are windows and stuff.”

“Are you not supposed to be there?” Luke raises an eyebrow and grins. “Ooh, is Ashton Irwin sneaking around?”

“Well, if we weren’t calling at the middle of the night, I wouldn’t have to.”

“Don’t they lock the buildings?” Luke suddenly looks concerned.

Ashton shrugs. “Maya told me that if I jiggle the handle, the door will open. She was right.”

“Go Maya,” Luke says. “I like Maya. Who’s Maya?”

“My new friend,” says Ashton. “She mostly paints. We’ve got a challenge going on about whether she’s better at drawing or I’m better at painting, since neither of us really use those mediums. Hannah — one of the other campers — is going to find something for us to both paint slash draw and then there’ll be an unofficial panel of judges. It’s pretty stupid.”

“You’re smiling a lot,” Luke says, and Ashton realizes he is. “Doesn’t sound stupid to me. You think you’re gonna win?”

“No,” Ashton says honestly. “I’m pretty awful at painting.”

“I’m sure you’re better than you think. How hard can it be?”

“That’s very rich coming from you, Mr. I-Can’t-Draw-A-House.”

“Hey, fuck off! I can draw a house, thank you very much.” Luke looks down at his desk and his focus shifts, and Ashton watches in bemused patience. As he waits, he draws a blank piece of paper towards him and grabs the nearest pencil lying around. His hands move almost unconsciously, drawing lines and curves and sketching the outline of something Ashton hasn’t quite decided on yet. Luke finally lifts his head up. “Here, see?” He holds up a piece of paper to the camera, where he’s drawn a box with an isosceles triangle on top for the roof, complete with a little chimney sticking out. “House,” Luke proudly declares. “Boom. Get fucked, Irwin.”

“I stand corrected,” Ashton chuckles. He hums. “They’ll probably just find us equally talented because painting is different from drawing and blah blah blah artsy hipster bullshit.”

“Stop dismissing the artsy hipster bullshit,” Luke says stubbornly. “I’ll have you know my boyfriend deals exclusively in artsy hipster bullshit.”

“You think my drawings are artsy hipster bullshit?”

“No, babe, I think you are artsy hipster bullshit.” Luke grins widely and then gets cut off by a yawn. Ashton bites back a very cheesy comment about how Luke should web himself up for being criminally cute.

“You know what, I’m gonna let you have that one,” he says instead. “Since I am at an artsy hipster bullshit summer camp.”

“I miss you.” Luke pouts. It’s a funny look on him. Ashton tries to imagine Spiderman pouting and completely fails. Sometimes it’s hard for him to reconcile Luke and Spiderman being the same person. That this adorable six-foot-and-change beanstalk who yawns on Skype is the same person who can do a double-backflip and land on his feet on the rooftop of any building. Ashton’s boyfriend stops crimes. What the fuck.

“I miss you too,” he says. “You seem tired.”

“I’m not tired.” Instant karma is a bitch. Luke immediately yawns again, this time much wider. “Okay, I’m a little tired,” he admits, smacking his lips like a child. “Summer break is deceptively boring. I…I run out of things to do all day, so I just kinda…keep patrolling. I might be wearing myself out.”

“Jesus, Luke, take it easy on yourself. Queens goes the entire school day without Spiderman’s protection during the school year. You can handle a break.”

“Yeah, but I might as well patrol,” Luke counters. “I have the time, and it’s not like I’m doing anything else.”

“I thought you and Michael were working on new specs for the suit.”

“It’s mostly Michael. Also, I think he’s kind of annoyed about the whole 24/7 patrol. He can’t work on the suit if I’m wearing it.”

“That is true.”

“But he’s been spending a lot of his time with Calum, anyway,” Luke says coolly. “So I figure he’s probably got other priorities.”

“Well, if you keep blowing him off to obsessively patrol the city, I can’t possibly imagine why he’s making other plans.” 

Luke stares through the camera. His shoulders slump. “Maybe. I hadn’t thought of that.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Ashton chirps.

Luke sighs deeply. “You’re not here, Ash.”

Ashton purses his lips and frowns. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I know, but I’m just saying. I miss you. I wish you were here.”

“Yeah,” Ashton says. He misses Luke too, more than is probably healthy. That’s what he gets, he supposes, for only having a handful of close relationships; Luke and Calum are his whole life, and not being able to hug either one of them for even a week has been pretty challenging. “But look, it’s only another week, and then I am all yours, I swear.”

“Don’t enable me,” Luke says, affronted. “You’re supposed to say things like… ‘You don’t own me’ and ‘I’m my own person’ and stuff like that.”

Ashton blinks, confused. “Uh…well, yeah, but we both already know that. I’m just saying I miss you too. But if it’s any consolation, Maya has ruthlessly mocked me for all the drawings I do of you. Like mercilessly. It’s actually kind of embarrassing.”

“That is super embarrassing,” Luke says, with a small, bashful smile. “You’re so fucking lame, Ashton.”

“Wow,” Ashton says. “You even sound like her.”

Luke giggles, which turns seamlessly into a yawn. “Hey, I came first. Maya sounds like me.”

“Luke, babe, just go to sleep,” Ashton says. “We can talk another night. Maybe one where you’re more well-rested.”

“I’m super rested,” Luke says in a monotone. “King of restedness, me.”

“Wow, I’m suddenly convinced.” Luke makes a half-hearted face at him and Ashton makes one back. The sketch under Ashton’s pencil has revealed itself to be Luke, yet again. Shocker. It really is embarrassing that Ashton defaults to drawing his boyfriend. If they ever break up, Ashton will be fucked.

“Are you drawing?” Trust Luke to notice. Although the fact that it’s taken him this long to notice means he must be slower on the uptake than usual. 

“Yeah,” Ashton says, because when is he not. 

“Drawing what?”

“Guess,” Ashton says dryly.

Luke gives a sleepy smile. “At least you’re predictable.”

“Luke, I’m begging you to get some sleep. We’ll talk tomorrow or this weekend or something, okay?”

Luke yawns yet again. “Okay,” he agrees, right hand propping up his head. His eyes flutter shut and then open again. “Okay, fine.”

“And please let Michael look at your suit,” Ashton adds. “You know he’s only going to make it better.”

“I know, I know, I just…” Luke’s eyes fall shut again. It seems more out of tiredness than distress. “If I give it to him, then I can’t use it.”

Ashton’s pretty sure if Luke’s hero complex gets any bigger he’s going to have to start renting out rooms. “It’ll be two days, tops,” he says. “Take two days off.”

“I wanna wait ‘til you’re back,” Luke mumbles. “Spend ‘em with you.”

“You spend most of your time with me,” Ashton says gently. “Spend them with Michael. Hell, spend them with Cal.”

“But I want…” Luke yawns. He lists sideways a little. “I want you.”

Ashton chews his lip. “I’ll be back before you know it,” he says. “You won’t be able to get rid of me.”

Luke hums absently. “‘Kay, g’night,” he slurs, but makes no gesture to hang up the call. He probably expects Ashton to end it. If Luke is as asleep as he looks right now, Ashton kind of has to.

The graphite on the sketch paper is smudging a little. Ashton glances down at the half-assed likeness of his boyfriend and has an idea.

Quietly, he grabs another blank page, moves his laptop back a little, and starts to draw.

-

They’re up bright and early the next day, and after breakfast Ashton follows a decidedly more lively Maya into the Fine Arts Room, where she takes her place diagonally from him at their table. They’re both mid-project; Ashton stacks and sets aside his scratch papers and pulls forth the drawing he’s currently working on.

“So? You talked to Luke?”

Ashton blinks and looks up at Maya. “Yeah,” he says. “Thanks for the tip, I meant to say.”

“Hey, don’t thank me, thank Cupid,” Maya says airily. “I’m on the side of love, baby.”

Ashton snorts and rolls his eyes. “Let Cupid know I say thanks.”

Maya hums. “Cupid says you’re welcome.”

They’re quiet while Maya gets herself set up — she has to put all her acrylics back every evening only to set them back out every morning, another reason Ashton prefers pencils over paints — and Ashton picks up his pencil and starts to draw. 

“Is this yours?” Maya asks, peering at Ashton’s discarded stack of sketches.

“Yeah,” Ashton says without looking. “Just sketches and stuff.”

“Wait, this is so cute.” She’s leaning over the drawing on the top. Ashton glances up.

It’s Luke from last night, soundly asleep over Skype.

Ashton had ended the call after about ten minutes of silence, enough time to get the rough outlines of all the important shapes. The video quality wouldn’t have lent itself to a good sketch anyway if Ashton had been chasing authenticity, but fortunately he knows Luke’s face well enough — both from drawing it and gazing at it in real life — to pretend the call had had a crystal-clear picture. None of it is colored in, but it’s as obviously Luke as all of Ashton’s other drawings. Somehow, though, this one feels more personal.

“Did you draw this last night?”

“Uh,” Ashton says, reaching for the drawing. He shuffles it between several other papers so an innocuous collection of doodles is now at the top of the stack, and Maya clicks her tongue in disapproval.

“Hey, I was looking at that. It was cute.”

“Yeah, it’s— it’s just nothing.”

“It’s not nothing, it’s adorable,” Maya says. She fixes him with puppy-dog eyes. “Pleeeease can I see it? I won’t show anyone. I’m studying so I can kick your ass in our competition.”

Ashton sighs. “It’s just Luke. You’ve seen millions of drawings of him.”

“But those were obviously from memory,” Maya points out, taking his non-answer as an affirmative and sifting through the stack. Ashton doesn’t bother trying to stop her. It’s not like he has anything to hide — or at least not anything Maya could figure out by looking at the drawing.

And in her defense, Luke does look cute as fuck in the drawing, because he’d looked cute as fuck in real life.

“For all you know, this one is also from memory.”

“You drew the screen, Ash, it’s clearly from last night.”

“Well,” Ashton says diplomatically. Then he abandons diplomacy, because Maya has located the drawing and is grinning and aww-ing. “Well do you blame me? He fell asleep on our call. It was adorable.”

Maya giggles. “You guys are so fucking cute,” she says. “Y’know, most people would be insulted if their boyfriend fell asleep on a video call with them.”

“He’s been really busy lately,” Ashton says. “And it was the end of the call anyway.”

“One day, I will have someone to draw me when I fall asleep on our Skype calls,” Maya says wistfully. “I’m putting the vibes out into the universe so it’ll happen soon.”

“Maybe you’ll be the one drawing them,” Ashton points out. 

Maya finally sets down the Luke drawing. She dips her brush in red paint, clearly intending to put it into her work, but at Ashton’s words instead brandishes it threateningly at him. “I won’t be drawing anyone, buddy.”

Ashton laughs. “But you’d date someone who drew instead of painted?”

“At this point?” Maya sighs theatrically. “I’d date just about anyone who did anything.”

Ashton laughs again. They work quietly for a few minutes. Ashton starts shading.

“Why do you only ever draw Luke?” Maya asks. “You said you’ve been together for less than a year. Who were you drawing before then?”

Ashton shrugs. “Uh, anyone, really,” he says. “People. There are a lot of pretty interesting people at my school, and besides, I’m from the city.”

Maya snorts derisively. “You’re from Queens.”

“Queens is in the city.”

Another derisive snort. “Queens is in the city the same way using ink stamps is painting.”

“That’s not even a little bit the same thing, at all.”

“You’re not a city boy.”

“I am literally a city boy!” Maya waves him off, but Ashton ignores her. She’s from Massachusetts. She has no leg to stand on. “My point is that there are lot of interesting people near where I live, too.”

“You didn’t ever, I don’t know, draw your friends? Calum, didn’t you say he’s your best friend from home?”

“Ah, yeah,” Ashton says. “Calum. Didn’t like when I drew him.”

“What, seriously? Why not?”

“I don’t know,” Ashton says, and it’s true. “He just asked me to stop drawing him one day so I did.” He hesitates. “...Mostly. Sometimes I still do. But if you knew Calum you’d understand why. He’s extremely good-looking.”

“Of course he is,” Maya says. “Any chance he’s single and/or interested in women from several states away?”

“No to both questions,” Ashton says sympathetically. “But good try.”

“Yeah, I figured,” Maya says good-naturedly, and they lapse into silence again.

It’s broken by Maya, again. “Do you show Luke the drawings you do of him?”

That’s a complicated question. No, Ashton doesn’t actively show his drawings to Luke, but Luke usually sees them anyway. Some of them are more private; Ashton keeps the one of Luke in the Spiderman suit sans mask folded up in the bottom of his socks drawer where he’s pretty certain no one ever looks. There doesn’t seem to be a point to showing it to Luke now, so long after he’d actually done it. But for the most part he’s not hiding his art from Luke; Luke sees what he sees, notwithstanding Ashton’s intention.

“Sometimes,” Ashton says.

Maya nods at the drawing of Luke asleep on Skype. “You gonna show him that one?”

“Uh, probably not.”

“What, why? It’s so cute.”

“I don’t know, maybe because it makes me seem like a ridiculous lovesick borderline creepy idiot?”

“Guys love that,” Maya assures him. “Or so I’m told. C’mon, why hold out on him when he already knows you’re basically obsessed with drawing him?” She taps the drawing. “And when he looks this adorable?”

Ashton breathes a laugh. “You have a point.”

“I always do,” Maya says, and she flips her hair dramatically.

Maybe Michael would let Ashton draw him. That would be a nice change from always drawing Luke and never drawing Calum. Maybe Ashton could just do it and then ask Michael what he thinks. It would be nice to have new muses. Ashton has spent a lot of time on Luke; maybe it’s about time he branched out again.

“Hey,” Ashton says, struck with inspiration as he watches Maya make brushstrokes across her paper. “Can I draw you?”

“Hell yeah, go for it,” Maya says. “I’m not sitting still for you, though.”

“I’ll live,” Ashton says dryly. Maya grins and laughs. A fresh page before Ashton and a new pencil in his hand, he studies Maya’s profile carefully and then brings his pencil to the page.

-

“Did you break into the Fine Arts Room again?”

“I don’t think it’s breaking in if it’s technically unlocked,” Ashton points out.

Luke squints but evidently fails to argue with this logic. “How’s artsy hipster bullshit camp?”

“Really good,” Ashton says, cracking his knuckles. His parents have told him repeatedly that doing so will give him arthritis, but Ashton suspects that’s more of a scare tactic than a fact. At this point he doubts even rehab could get him to stop. It’s the only thing Ashton can think to do with his hands when he’s not drawing. “By the way, remember the other day when you fell asleep on our call?”

I fell asleep at the end of our call,” Luke corrects him. “We were done talking.”

“Okay, weirdo,” Ashton says, shaking his head. “Well, anyway, Maya convinced me that I should show you this because maybe you’d think it was cute, or something.” He holds up the drawing of Luke.

Luke leans closer to the camera. Anyone else might have trouble discerning what’s on the page given how dim it is around Ashton, but not Luke. Luke has super-senses. His visual acuity is, like, a thousand. (Rough estimate.)

So when Luke’s face splits into a grin, Ashton knows he’s seen exactly what’s there. “Oh my fucking God, you sap,” he says. “I thought you just hung up straightaway.” 

“Nope,” Ashton says. “I’m just saving moments. One day I’ll have enough for a flip book.”

Luke’s expression goes all mushy and heart-eyed. “You’re unbelievable,” he says, fond and endeared. “I can’t believe you’re not bored of my dumb face yet.”

“Are you kidding? Have you seen your dumb face?” Ashton laughs. “It’s impossible to be bored of it.”

“Ashton,” Luke says, his eyes crinkling so much that the blue all but disappears. “I love you.”

And everything makes sense.

“I love you too,” Ashton says, struck by the realization that he does. The drawings, the midnight Skype calls, the death-defying trips around the city with only his faith in Luke to keep them afloat, the fluttery feeling — all of the colors lock into place, and Ashton can see the rainbow clear as day in front of him. He’s never been in love; of course he couldn’t tell. But there’s nothing else it could be.

“Oh, good,” Luke says timidly. “I was a little worried you wouldn’t say it back.”

Ashton glances from the drawing in his hand to the look on Luke’s face on the screen, and he cracks a crooked smile. “Then you, superhero, have not been paying attention.”

[artsninspo]

Unexpected Renaissance (Tre X Reader)

MASTERLIST

Pairing: Trevante Rhodes X Reader

Word count: 1.9K 

Summary: When Tre and the reader meet at his fraternity’s party they have no idea the kind of bond heading up to his room is bound to create. 

---

I was in my junior year of college when you met Tre. A totally different person; stuck up, condescending and exclusively committed to your artistic pursuits. I felt disconnected from my culture but connected to my ancestry unable to find beauty in the mundane everyday stuff that makes black beautiful. Guess surburbia and privilege can do that to a person. My mother decided to take a sabbatical and my father being a dean organized my special permission to have a roving semester. I was never interested in my mother’s mystification of the south or how she spoke about it with all its lore.

I was mortified to hear my cousin Toya didn’t know what to do with her life. But tapping into my inner artist you listened anyway considering it might be good inspiration for some work. While both of my parents went to survey some family land Toya painted my face.

“You ever been to a college party?” She asked.

“Of course… I’m in college” I stated obviously making Toya snicker.

“You’re a real bitch you know that. But still you my cousin - that’s what this family does they judge me. But you see, I’m a real bitch, I’m not gonna let you go out sad in whatever this shit is. Aren’t you supposed to be an artist?” She asked the real deal from then. “Is it avant garde or some shit I don’t understand?” She added making me smile.

“Some shit” I nodded.

“Yeah well you ain’t about to wear them rags around me. What size are you?” She asked.

“12”

“I’m sure my mama got something laying around that looks better than those rags. Cause I bet you’re into that classist sustainability bullshit too huh” Toya snapped.

“Yes I am, but I think it should start with the corporations and the rich. The lower classes naturally practice many sustainable methods.” I acknowledged.

“Good, then you ain’t all the way air headed” she commented pulling out a dress.

“I’m not a scholar I’m an artist” I clarified.

“They make y’all pay for that too? Any of those niggas in museums degreed up?” Toya asked smug as always.

“You’d do well in intellectual circles.” I commented putting on the dress and denim jacket.

“And you’re about to tear up this party” she smiled looking at me in disbelief.

The ride to campus was short and we could hear the music from the house once we got out the car. I’d never been to an HBCU before. I especially stayed away from fratboys. I watched as people greeted Toya with familiarity.

“Who’s your homegirl?” One of the guys asked. Clearly high ranking in the sorority by his confidence and posturing.

“Met her at the hair store, you said you want pretty girls” Toya justified omitting our familial relations, taking his hand and disappearing. It wasn’t until about an hour or so later that she returned and him and a few other guys got into line that I saw Tre. His movement in the stroll caught my eye and so did his arms.he had this elegance and the way the light his his skin was perfect. I didn’t realize I was staring until he was beside me. I got a closer look at his biceps .

“Tre, like what you see?” He introduced and I snickered wiping my eyes at his confidence.

“You crossed the room” I noted.

“I thought it was the right thing to do with you staring so hard” he commented. He kept talking but my mind was wrapped up on all the pieces I could create with him as the subject. My final project was on black version of renaissance art.

“What does your penis look like?” I asked interrupting him with a raised eyebrow.

“Wow, you came in with Toya right? That happened pretty fast” he swallowed as his air of confidence deflated slightly.

“What’s it look like, you have pictures on your phone?” I asked.

“Is it a prerequisite?” He asked and nodded.

“Actually it is” I responded truthfully. The tiny penises on the most renowned works of art never sat well with me. Appreciating the beauty of the sculptors work only so see those tiny members always was a sore point. Tre motioned for me to follow him in his room. I noticed eyes on us, even Toyas. He closed the door and I looked around a bit noting the minimal design.

“I bet that bed is filthy”

“Nah, I like clean sheets” he commented taking his shirt off leaving his gold chain. It made me smiled as I decided to add that touch.

“How tall are you?”

“Six feet” he noted as you stored the I information in my memory bank trying to consider how expensive it would be to do a life size sculpture in dark stone.

“Fuck” I muttered making him smile.

“You don’t want no foreplay or nothing, we can just get to it?” He asked dropping his pants and by far the best shaped and well endowed nude model I’d ever come across. Not to mention he was handsome. I circled him using my gift - a laser accurate photographic memory. I needed the body to be perfect. I could ask him for pictures of his face later I thought.

When I got up from looking at his member there was sheer confusion in his eyes.

“What, you want me to sit?” He asked confusing me.

“You can put your clothes back on.” I commented ecstatic.

“What the fuck?” He asked dressing. It hit me like a ton of bricks.

“I’m sorry, you just had perfect biceps. I’m an artist and I think you’d be an excellent sculpture. I’m probably gonna sketch you when I get back home” I told him as he grabbed his shirt. He was dumbfounded and annoyed.

“What kind of-“ he started about to blast me so I pulled out my phone finally coming back into reality and the evident danger.

“Look, I’m an artist - senior year I want to have a collection, enough for an exhibit. I’ve been waiting for the perfect subject to model a sculpture after. Michelangelo’s David is beautiful. He may have me in skill but you have David by at least six inches. In scale” I explained tempering the tension and complementing his manhood. The fire faded in his eyes as he looked through my digital portfolio.

“You did all this” he looked surprised and impressed.

“Yeah, I think it’s important for black people to enjoy art they can see themselves in” I admitted.

“You’re lucky you think my biceps are beautiful any other guy would have been fucked up with you getting that close and not sucking” he said frankly.

“My sincerest apologies.” I admitted and he smiled. “Think Toyas ready to go?” I asked.

“Nah” Tre said telling me she was occupied with his eyes.

“Alright thanks, thanks for being cool about my request” I nodded.

...

Tre was different than any other subject. It was like he was iridescent. I got another dimension another colour, more depth anytime I looked at him. Toya came home from her work one day saying Tre wanted me to call him. She never asked about that night so I didn’t say anything. We talked all night. Then there was another party and this time I went with my sketchbook and coals he stood with shirtless as I tried capturing his chest and shoulders having finished his rough outline.

Then he was visiting museums with me. Stopping by my makeshift studio in the sabbatical house nearly shitting himself every time pops came in to inquire about my progress. He was there when I cursed out suppliers and cried at the cost of a life sized adaptation, immortalization through art. He was there when the sabbatical and semester were over and we were heading back home. Then there was a Tre sized hole with me. I missed him, I missed our conversations and somehow all the art school politics, drama and preoccupations meant a little less. I found myself drifting away from superficial and towards real. My renaissance was happening at the same time I was preparing my exhibit. My Mona Lisa had brown skin and cornrows — it was Toya.

Tre and I didn’t cross paths again because of my travels until my graduation. He was visibly absent from the exhibit and frustrated about it. I’d never put out anything wit I’m that wasn’t perfect. I showed him my favourite places, I just got my own place afforded by my art instead of my parents wealth. We had sex that night, a fitting way to celebrate. He’d made a comment about not seeing me naked and how it wasn’t fair. I told him he wasn’t going to. Wrapped my insecurity on the moral high ground of not living for the visual satisfaction of men. Tre being Tre - a good man let me get away with it. Still we ended up in my unlit living room going at it on the couch. He used his hands to make mental notes. He took his hands feeling every curve, every roll every imperfection before showing me sex with artistic geniuses and proteges was nothing. I knew I loved him when he woke up and covered me over respecting my wishes about being seen. Somehow that night turned into every night for two weeks. Then he moved in three weeks later. We’ve been inseparable ever since.

I slide my stool back looking at the life sized sculpture of my man. I swallow a little emotional about it finally coming to an end. I swallow standing and daring to probe it for imperfections as my greatest critic. No one knows this body like I do.

“Tre!” I scream. “Tre!” I repeat with urgency like it can animate and walk out of the studio. He comes sleepily leaning in the doorway with his eyes barely open.

“What’s wrong babe?” He asks.

“Babe, it’s finished, four years later it’s finished” I squeal jumping into his arms and it’s a miracle he catches me smiling as he holds me close. I’ve never toiled at anything this long.

“So are you sick of looking at me yet?” He teases and I smile as he kisses me.

“No”

“You said once you finish we can start our family” he says with a one track mind.

“You’re not sick of me yet?” I retort.

“No” he admits.

I smile having denied him kids for the past two years since we’ve been married. The first year we were honeymooners and then the pressure for kids began. He stood with me in solidarity for the public while wearing me out behind closed doors. I stopped taking my birth control six months ago and have been neglecting my real husband for the art piece.

I step down from his hold taking off my glasses and gloves.

“Tre?” I ask putting things back in their place.

“Yeah?”

“I need you for something else” I admit and he swallows nodding despite his agitation the greatest husband ever. I can never thank Toya enough for dragging me to that party.

“What babe?”

“Let’s get started on our greatest masterpiece yet” I smile and it takes the double-entendre awhile to set in before he smiles ready and we get started.

______________

TAGLIST:

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[ravenwolfie97]

2021 Art Summary

The time old tradition continues. I’ll be honest; this year was rough. Like, I scraped the bottom of the barrel for most of these months. Very little art was accomplished (or, at least, completed), and I had felt pretty bad about that the last couple months. But, as it turns out, I wasn’t alone in that. Every other artist I’ve seen has said they’ve been in the exact same boat. So I’m glad now that I could do what I could this year. And now, as always, I’ll share my journey through this year with you!

normally i don’t hide these under a readmore but this one kinda got away from me and i wanted to spare your and my dashboards this time

HEY SO remember when i said i would work on my TOME Fan Animations every day all year? hahaha Yeah That Didn’t Happen I spent like ten days out of the month tops, and in that time I really only worked a little bit on storyboards and got almost all of my character’s talksprites redone. And I do like them! But yeah. I honestly don’t even know what will become of that project, if anything, at this point.

In addition to that, I participated yet again in Gotta Draw ‘Em All on deviantArt with Grookey as my muse. What a lil cutie. Sadly, this was the final event for that group, but I’m glad I was there to contribute to it.

I also continued my TOME server’s art challenge tradition of making a TOMERPG character from scratch, and Zeitgeist was born. I just think it’s got a cool design :>

Also! New thing I’m doing for this summary: some WIPs! because I did a lot of them and I’m upset that I didn’t ever get to finish them! So to kick it off here’s one that began in January and was last updated in June: a “six fanarts” part three exclusively for cute girls

okay let’s continue

i’ll tell you right now that this year is comprised of a lot of sketches because digital art was too hard or too time- or energy-consuming, so i tried to make them look really nice this time

This was the height of my Genshin fever, and the only prescription was playing it more and finally attempting to draw and write some stuff with it. Razor was the first actual character I drew, mainly cuz I love him lots, but also cuz I thought his design would lend well to my style. I also made myself a Genshin sona, as well as ones for Michael and Val (not shown cuz i couldn’t get a design figured out for Val at all): Raven (me) is a Hydro sword user, Michael is an Anemo bow user, and Val is a Pyro claymore user. Wanted to try my hand at making my own Genshin-esque designs after having lots of opinions on the actual characters and doing a bunch of edits on some of them.

My Pokemon 25th anniversary pic was late, so it goes in here. I had such a fun time emulating Sugimori’s modern art style... even if it took forever to do.

Also Astra (my nb genshin traveler) got a redesign and I still haven’t made a proper ref for it. But they do look a lot cooler. I drew them at work :>

I wanted to draw more genshin, so I asked for genshin to draw, and I attempted only one. but Venti was a good one. Got into Montero (Call Me By Your Name) too much and got Val vibes, and also watched Queer ✨ too much and loved the bisexual lighting in the third act too much, so. yeah. mix em together and that’s what i got And in a twist of fate, Tales of Lostclan re-entered my brain space because The Creator Found My Post and contacted me about it and we started chatting and it was great so I drew a Pepperpaw gijinka and named him Aiden.

Another WIP I wanted to share was my sketch for another TOME server art challenge, with Zetto in the Zero Escape universe. I really liked the prompt but again, digitization was my enemy this year.

moving on!

These are literally the only two things that happened this month. And they were both pretty late in. Drawing Diluc is easy to explain; I love him and wanted to try and draw him. The other one is much more interesting.

My friend @mew-cake​ started reading To Your Eternity (which later on in the year became an anime), and I enjoyed the bits and pieces she liveblogged. She posted something along the lines of “i wish i could write a story like this” and i was like Hell Yes let’s do it together. So we got to work, making a story I tentatively call Spirit of the Earth about an angel wanting to learn what life on Earth is like so it lives first as a tree, then a bird, then a cat, and then a variety of different humans. My recent fascination with philosophy and the themes Cake found within To Your Eternity inspired us to think on lots of aspects of life and love and hurt, and it was kinda beautiful. We should revisit it sometime.

i lied kind of, i really wanted to get this picture of Xiao done too. but i did not. here is the sketch tho

and even though we were working on one original story, at the very end of the month, there was another idea coming together...

SURPRISE, IT’S A DIFFERENT ORIGINAL STORY. It’s okay, we didn’t expect this either, but it happened anyway.

Cake had been saying that it would be cool for the two of us to be cast as anime rivals, and I was like yeah that would be cool. And then I had the most massive shower thought on that and it spiraled into this story premise. As much as I would love to completely gush about this new story, I wanna still keep most of it under wraps, so I’ll give a basic rundown. The two main characters, the “anime rivals” as they were initially, are Roxy (red/sketch) and Lalun (blue/full color), who have the powers of the Sun and the Moon respectively. In a world full of alchemical magic where many people control elements based on the solar system, Roxy and Lalun are two special cases and they’re being forced to fulfill a cosmic destiny for reasons largely unknown to them. Other characters here include: Alex (purple/sketch) who has the powers of Venus, which in this world corresponds with electricity; and Oliver (green/full color) who has the powers of Saturn, which are oriented with gravity control and telekinesis. These kids all go to school together and get into horrible situations against their will (and even at their will, sometimes). So all in all, it’s a time :3

One day we’ll show off all of our art for this, but for now, I’ll just give ya all the good stuff I did.

ALSO. WIP TIME BECAUSE I AM SO UPSET I NEVER REMEMBERED TO FINISH THIS. I liveblogged about SK8 The Infinity around this time too, and I loved it, and I drew parallels between the two main characters of that show with my two main OCs from The Dark Side: War on Destiny. So I drew Reki and Kyle together being cool bros

okay anyway

My Genshin brainrot has started to fade around now and it’d been replaced with Cosmic Legacy brainrot instead. I just... we loved these kids so much, man. So much cool stuff. Lots of funny filler. A whole bunch of suffering. Y’know. The usual.

I’ll just say it now too that most of August just had a few more Cosmic sketches. Not very much was happening with me creatively, and things were starting to grind me down. And, well... eventually things took a turn, and...

UH WHOOPS I GOT A GIRLFRIEND AND HER NAME IS STACEY AKA @wolf-of-hearts-den​?????

Yeah, that also happened very suddenly. And we both had a lot of feelings to work out. It was a lot, and we couldn’t handle it very well - Stacey especially... considering the fact she had Two Partners now n all... but it all worked out. And all in all, it was an awesome moment, and a great turning point for me.

WIP time helps break up this part of the summary and i’m also pissed i couldn’t get this done in time because it was actually a timely piece. i started to do a 10  year anniversary redraw i’d been planning for Years and chickened out when it came to doing the background. so have this comparison with my Animal Jam OC Ferret for now

okay back to girlfriend um

this was honestly really tough to make hkjbbjlk Since our relationship started pretty late into the last month, our feelings spilled out more into the month after. And Boy Howdy, were there feelings. If I can be a little transparent, being able to freely express sexual feelings and thoughts with someone you trust is literally one of the most wonderful things. It’s just one more thing I don’t have to completely hide, and it feels awesome to be able to tell someone. And to have someone think of you and want you in that way? Absolutely insane. It still boggles my mind that someone can love me the way Stacey does. Honestly incredible.

also it’s not like i didn’t make any non-horny art during that time. they were just the only things i put effort into jklhjkl MOTIVATION HITS WHEN IT HITS, Y’ALL

this isn’t a WIP but it is more cosmic art i can share

ok back to the program. god the art summary is off the rails this year

Among some more girlfriend-related material, Stacey and Cake and I also had an aggie.io session where I drew some of my OCs poorly. Featured here are Sierra from Legends: Children of the Dragons, Mamoru from Cat Devil, and Val... from my brain. He’s just cool.

there was actually very little else than this, and that continued into...

Yeah, barely anything happened this month. The RW ref is only half-finished, and I had meant to get that done in August. But I gave it to someone to actually use as reference here, so it counts, okay?

Here we have an actually decent picture of another Cosmic Legacy character named Mercutio, who’s the not-so-good guy. But he does good things for people. He’s a good father... right?

and then Stacey came up with a game in a dream called Everbound and I had to make at least a mock-up title screen for it. Thank you for getting me to make an art to fill the screen up, babe

Thank God I got the inspiration to finally do that TWEWY self-insert pic only a few days ago, or else this would have been very empty. Additionally we have A Cool Character That Shall Not Be Explained on the right, whom I have added mainly because they are very cool and a piece of art that I completed in this month that I am proud of, as well as another Cool Character that I would be happy to explain about. So Stacey had recently been coming up with their own original story universe thing that’s essentially a radioactive wasteland full of animal mutants and hybrids. It’s mostly an excuse to make rad furry character designs, and I was all in on all of it, so I wanted to try and join in, so I made Calista! She’s a housecat/jellyfish hybrid with the ability to poison and shock people cuz that’s what jellyfish do. Haven’t done much with her, but she was a fun little character design challenge to do if nothing else :>

ANYWAY yeah this year sucked art-wise, but it was a good time regardless. I got a steady full-time job, I got car-driving abilities, and most importantly I have a lovely partner and wonderful friends to keep me sane and feel loved. No matter what happens in this year to come, all I know is I’ll make the most of it, and still find some things to make me happy.

...and maybe i’ll finally get some of those WIPs done OK BYE