#but also somehow i've stuck with another character for almost a year now so like?? yeah :)

[the10thdoctor]

//one of these days i’ll write here again lol

[a-dragons-journal]

Singlet+

I've been meaning to write this one for a while, so let's see how this goes.

~1k words; essay on the experience of one person who sits right on the funny little edge between "normal roleplay experience" and "actual plurality".

So, let's start with this: I am not plural. But. I do seem to live in a weird space juuuuust on the edge of plurality (and no, I do not mean that I'm a median or blurry system - I mean on the edge of that).

For one thing, I'm a daemian - that is, I practice daemonism; that is, I have personified and given faux autonomy (fauxtonomy, if you will) to my "internal narrator" of sorts and he now lives in my brain with me as a thoughtform, a brain companion, in the shape of an animal. Strictly speaking, that does qualify us for plurality, but we personally don't view our daemonism through that framework and consider ourselves a singlet (as hilarious as the plural grammar makes that sentence, I know). Many daemons don't consider themselves plural; this isn't particularly unusual - in muir case, Locke is a part of me before he is anything else, and while yes there are forms of plurality that look like that, for us personally it makes more sense to view him as "part of me, therefore, still one person".

For another, I had... basically plural experiences when I was younger. I don't want to talk about the details publicly, but suffice to say that for many years I had what I would now call headmates, and I suspect that if I had been exposed to plural spaces during that time period, they may well have stuck around permanently, instead of "fading out" and eventually disappearing as is what actually happened. To this day I don't know how "real" or "imaginary" they were, and I doubt I ever will - they were certainly real to me at the time, but I have also always been very good at suspension of disbelief. Trying to analyze it in any great level of detail is made basically impossible by my piss-poor episodic memory rendering the memories of that time so fuzzy that I can't rely on them for details.

For another, my experiences with OCs are often... soulbond-adjacent? Recently in particular I've had a lot of funny experiences with an OC of mine, a character in a Vampire: The Masquerade campaign I'm a part of (Viridian Caldwell, for my own future self's reference), which led me to do some research on soulbonding because of how fictive-adjacent the experience of her is.

And yet. The answer is a definite no. I get very strong impressions and echoes from her; she "gives" me facts about her and her life that simply Are and that I feel as strongly about being true and unchangeable as I do about my own noemata; she's almost a separate person living in my brain sometimes; I somehow come up with near-prophetic knowledge about her world (as confirmed by my Storyteller, who happens to be part of a system alongside a number of fictives from the world in question, including several who know Viridian personally) with zero explanation on a semi-regular basis.

And yet. The answer is no. Because while I seem to have all the effects a soulbond proper would produce on my end - she is not aware of me, not really. She is not conscious of my world and my life. When I really quiet my own brain and reach out to call out and see if someone's there, there's only silence. It's as though I have a one-way soulbond somehow - which, of course, puts me in the fun gray space between "soulbond" and "normal roleplay/writing experience".

And she's not a unique instance of this. This just happens to me with OCs, although it's been a bit more dramatic with her because of the presence of fictives from her world to converse with (and, realistically, because of the real-time roleplay aspect that a TTRPG has that a video game or the writing of a fanfiction doesn't).

It's as though my brain has the capacity for plurality, but it just... doesn't manifest fully.

And, truth be told, I kind of prefer it this way. I like being a singlet; I would kind of hate having to share headspace with other people. Especially since, if my childhood pseudo-plurality experiences are anything to go by, we would not have good separation of thoughts and memories and true privacy would be very difficult if not impossible. Plus, because of that, I would... probably never get over the doubt of Is It Real Or Not, and I don't need that stress in my life. (For this reason, while I'm 99.9% sure that if I intentionally tried to bring her over as a fictive, it would work, I will not be testing the theory just out of curiosity.)

I wonder if I didn't train myself out of the ability to be Plural Proper, to be honest. Not intentionally, but - I may have mentioned that my power of suspension of disbelief is very strong, and as a child this came with me being extremely easy to manipulate because it was very easy for me to fall into believing things that I wanted to believe. (Again, I don't really want to talk about the details, but suffice to say I had a pretty bad case of Protagonist Syndrome, as it were, for a while.) I had to learn to combat that natural tendency of my brain for my own protection (especially as someone active in witchcraft spaces) - and I wonder if it didn't come with the side effect of immunizing me to developing true plurality (at least without actively trying) by shutting down any attempt by my brain to form a true headmate in the process.

I don't know. I might never. All I know is that while I am, after careful consideration, definitely a singlet, I do seem to live right on the edge of plurality, and it comes with some weird experiences. (And I would like an explanation for why I keep spitting out nigh-prophetic knowledge of this campaign's world; if I find out Viridian is a fictotype of mine or something I'm going to flip my fucking lid.) I've started half-jokingly calling myself "singlet+", half as a joke on cis+ (ie, someone who's questioned their gender and come to the conclusion that they are indeed cis but has a better understanding of their experience of cisness for it) and half as an "unless" "unlesss...?" acknowledgement of the weird border area some of my experiences sit in. It's... not really a serious label, but also isn't entirely a joke.

So... yeah. Singlet+, I guess. Another victim of the "if you only have two words for fear in your language, one for mild test jitters and one for life-threatening terror, you're going to have a lot of trouble describing a lot of normal human experiences" problem of how our language around plurality often works.

[eywamygoddesswrites]

— 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓻𝓮𝓪𝓹𝓮𝓻 — (neteyam x fem!reader)

pairing: neteyam x fem!omatikaya!reader

tags: some fluff, mostly angst, long time pinning for one another

warnings: lowercase intended, crying, losing parents, character death

a/n: characters are aged up. this is my first fic and i hope you guys enjoy it!

word count: 3.8k

+ gif not mine. ctto.

neteyam had always had a bright mind. of course, it came with him as he is the golden child of the family. also being the next olo'eyktan of omatikaya. neteyam was everything a parent could wish for and more. a good bow user and nurturing like his mother, strong-willed and ready to lead the people like his father, a good brother, and figure to lo'ak, kiri, spider, and tuk, and to the rest a good na'vi who was ready to fight for his people.

a bright mind like his comes with many quirks or trinkets if one believes. such as having to come up with new ways of weaving with tuk (a little hang-out trope of the two) or a new spot that he, lo'ak, and kiri found during one of their walks. although there was one spot he decided to keep for himself.

a spot just beyond the fourth stream, under the falls where a small but spacious cave can be located if stumbled upon by accident, when the sunset hits just right, a small rainbow can be seen. 'why is this spot a secret to begin with?' that's where neteyam and his little na'vi friend meet up of course! the sweet and kind na'vi friend that he loves to be with and can always be himself. away from his duties, away from his parents, away from everyone. just a little place where he can be himself.

as he grew up, a boy slowly became a man. his features became sharper, grew taller, and learned and understood so many curiosities that his little mind couldn't comprehend back then. he became busier as his duties of being the next olo'eyktan came closer. his time with his siblings lessen as his lessons and practice took most of his time. but one thing that always stayed the same was his meet-up with y/n. 

neteyam saw her grow up into a fine woman herself. despite such changes, he never saw her as anything less. in fact, he grew to like y/n more as the years flew by. that once small crush that he had on her at 7 turned into love as he nears his 18th birthday. like a seed planted and with enough care, water, and sunshine, it grew into a beautiful flower with the sweetest scent na'vi kind could think of.

as their laughter died down after neteyam had told a story about lo'ak falling off a branch after seeing a cute na'vi pass by. after a few seconds of silence, neteyam decided to ask a question he's been pushing back in the backburner of his mind.

"hey y/n, i've been meaning to ask you this for a long time," neteyam starts, causing the na'vi to blush slightly and her mind to race with whatever the young man was going to say. "shoot!" y/n says, waiting for his question. "i never really see you around back home. it's always here or somewhere besides home," his tail waves in small, flowy waves as curiosity peaks him.

y/n was silent for a moment, only for a moment before she answered his question. "well... i'm somewhere else with my parents for one." curious. that's what neteyam felt. "why?" a simple, innocent question to a lot. "we just do." y/n sent him a smile before standing up and dusting away the dirt that had stuck to her legs.

"c'mon now you blue baby. it's time to go home!" she held out her hand to him and he gladly accepted it. they left their hideout and began walking home. somehow, his curiosity about her never left. it never really did since then but neteyam just needs to know more.

"how about i bring you to your home tonight? i've never really been there since "he exclaimed happily with a hint of excitement. after almost 11 years of friendship, he never really got to see her home nor had y/n had saw his. maybe this time, he might be able to meet the people that created such beauty of a na'vi. after all, he must get to know his future in-laws one way or another.

this sudden question got y/n sweating a bit. she began spewing some excuses just to keep neteyam from visiting her home because there was no home, to begin with. neteyam tried to coax her by doing 'puppy eyes' or whatever his dad says, saying 'please' a lot more, holding her hand, and pulling her close to him.

"maybe next time?? the house is not clean at the moment and mom might've not started cooking," she says, covering her lie with a disappointed tone. neteyam sighs in defeat, falling for her lie yet again. "next time, i promise you. i'm really sorry, nete." she brings his hands close to her and nuzzles them, causing neteyam's heart to go weak.

he lets out a soft chuckle and pulls her into a hug. "okay, fine, next time. but you better keep that promise, okay?" he holds up his pinky finger (the 4th finger) as a sign of sealing the deal. y/n wraps her pinky on his and gives a small nod. once they reached the point where they usually disperse, they both let go of each other's hands before waving goodbye to one another.

when neteyam came back home, he was greeted by jake at the front of their home. "you're late." jake says as his lips pursed into a thin line. neteyam lets out a soft 'sorry, sir.' before going past his dad, only to be pulled back before he can go into their home.

"where were you tonight? you've been coming home later and later as the eclipse passes." jake asks sternly with a hint of concern in his voice. of course, being the father he is, despite his firstborn coming close to adulthood, he can't help but still see him as the baby he used to hold. "your mother and I are just worried. we just wanna know where you were."

neteyam answered with a short reply saying 'with a friend' and proceeded to go past his dad before jake could ask him more questions. jake lets out a heavy sigh before following behind his firstborn. neteyam, once again, skipped dinner and went straight to bed. neytiri's gaze followed her son's back before looking to her mate, concern lacing in her eyes.

jake could only sigh before sitting down next to neytiri, an arm wrapping around her shoulders as she lay on his chest.

when they were attacked once again by the sky people, jake had to move fast. he needed to keep his family safe alongside the omatikaya people. but to do both, he must leave his toruk makto title behind and bring his family elsewhere. anywhere as long as they were alive.

neteyam on the other hand immediately went to his and y/n's spot. she may have taken shelter there while her parents were out fighting alongside his.

once he was there, he saw her crumpled into a ball, making herself as small as possible. when he came closer, y/n looked up with tears streaming down her face. "nete..." she says softly before throwing herself at him and breaking down into tears. "they're gone! nete, my parents-" he listened to her cries as he ran his fingers down her hair. soft 'shh's' left his mouth as he softly rocked her in his arms. despite the tears that covered her face, she looked beautiful to him.

when her cries subsided, they were in a comfortable silence once again, just in each others' arms as if when they let go of each other, the world would end.

neteyam will eventually have to tell her soon. he will leave with his family soon. he wanted to bring her with them but they weren't mated nor does his family even know her existence. how is he supposed to bring her with them?

"nete, don't leave me. please..." y/n says softly, so soft that if he didn't have his attention on her, the words would've left with the wind. he couldn't answer her. not when he was going to leave for eywa knows when. neteyam just pulls her closer to him, so close that their breaths could touch each other's skin.

hours passed by the two. just before the eclipse fell before them, they began walking to their homes. 'it's now or never.' neteyam says to himself before holding y/n's hand. "y/n, i need to tell you this." his voice was laced with sadness but also nervousness. "i have to leave soon. dad said that it's the only way to keep the omatikaya safe. to keep YOU safe."

y/n held back her sob. she understood why he had to. it was inevitable, especially after the disaster that happened. she just nodded, slowly pulling away from neteyam's grasp. his heart broke from this act alone. just like that? "please, i want to bring you with me. i want you by my side wherever i am. i want you to come with me." he tried grabbing her hands once again but she moved away.

"please… y/n, don't do this." neteyam pleaded, eyes slowly fogging with tears threatening to fall. he couldn't. he didn't want to leave y/n here while he has to go someplace else. “neteyam, don’t make this harder than it’s supposed to be. save yourselves.” y/n says before walking ahead. neteyam was left standing on his own, thoughts ran through his head but one thing that is apparent is he was never going to see her again.

when he leaves, y/n might find her mate and move on. he doesn’t know when he can come back to the forest, or if he will ever return, to begin with. people eventually move on. despite the pains it brings, people will move on and forget.

neteyam walked back home, readying himself for when he and his family will leave their current home, one where he grew up and one where he finds his worth in.

upon arriving at the border of the reef, the metkayina people took notice of their differences. how lo’ak and kiri had 5 fingers, how they had demon blood, how they looked different with their blue skin, and their thin tails.

after being accepted and told that they have to learn how to become one of the metkayina, days bled into months. from spearing a fish for dinner to holding their breaths for a long period underwater, to learning how to weave to have a bond with an ilu. although everything was hard to learn, it was something new and to achieve something despite being a different kind of na'vi, was amazing to see.

despite the hardships the sully’s went through, they persevered. although, for neteyam, something was missing. of course, there was. y/n was nowhere in sight and despite how long it has been since he had seen her, he was scared for her. neteyam missed her so much, it hurts. he didn’t know if she was okay, if she was eating well, or had been sleeping well.

maybe she had met his grandmother and mo’at had seen her potential as the next tsahik. maybe, if eywa has given them a chance. he could have her as his tsahik.

during his walk along the shore, he spots a na’vi by the rocks. it wasn’t his business in any way, but this na’vi had the same shade as he was and not like the teal color of the metkayina. he goes closer and a familiar figure starts to form.

“...y/n?” he asks, loud enough for the figure to hear. they turned around and funnily enough, it was y/n! neteyam immediately took her in his arms, their peals of laughter mixing in together as y/n nuzzles against his chest. neteyam pulls back and moves back her hair that covered her face and cups her cheeks. “what are you doing here? how did you get here?” he asks as he studies her features. eywa, she may as well be eywa’s daughter reincarnated.

y/n’s looks at neteyam, seeing his confusion but happiness in his eyes. “i couldn’t just stay back home. i needed to know if you were okay.” she cups his face and rubs her thumbs across his cheeks.

neteyam could just smile as he takes in her being. y/n was here. he was with her now. she could finally meet his family. she has to meet them. he begins to guide her back to the mauri the sully’s were occupying in when y/n stops. “i- where are we going?” she asks, her eyebrows furrowing slightly.

“i’ve been wanting to introduce you to my family. i’ve told them about you but lo’ak doesn’t want to believe me. he said ‘i never saw her so she’s not real’ but i keep telling them you are! i’ve even shown them the gifts you’ve given me.” he says happily, not noticing that y/n started to pull back away from his grasp. it’s not like she didn’t want to meet the sully’s. she would love to, she thinks they're great na'vi's, but it's just complicated.

neteyam noticed that she shook her head slightly as if disagreeing on seeing his family. "i would love to, nete, but i'm tired and i still need to find a place-" "i will take care of you, okay? i can get you food in the mauri and you can stay with me." neteyam reassures y/n but she just shook her head no.

"i appreciate it, neteyam, but i wouldn't want to intrude on your family so suddenly." he lets go of her hand and his lips pursed into a thin line. he just nods his head to finish the conversation and not make them feel more awkward than it was.

"can i at least go and help you find a place to stay?" neteyam offers, wanting to spend more time with his crush. y/n shook her head once more before giving him a hug once more. he returns her hug, inhaling her scent before they let go of each other.

"we can meet up again tomorrow, okay? we can explore new places together. just the two of us." she offers him a smile, which he gladly returns before she walks away.

ao'nung in the distance saw what just happened with the omatikaya and snickered. "just when i thought he's not as bad, he's just so fucking weird. a whole skxawng." he mumbles to himself before walking away, going to tell tsireya what he had just witnessed.

after that day, neteyam and y/n hung out more and more. they had found a place where they would meet up, just like back home. their real home.

they told stories of what they did during the months of being apart from one another. how neteyam and lo'ak defended kiri when ao'nung called kiri a freak, to his learning and the fun he had while learning on becoming one of the metkayina.

y/n on the other hand, told him what had happened back at home, how mo'at still taught some na'vi on learning to become a tsahik, how the people are doing well, and how his friends missed him. she had given him a bracelet that she had made back at the forest before leaving to go find him.

wrapping the bracelet on neteyam's wrist, his eyes wandered to y/n, memorizing everything about her. it was as if she's just so out of this world.

"what're you staring at?? do i have something on my face?" she moved her hand up to her face, causing neteyam to shake his head as soft chuckles left his mouth. "i was just wondering how eywa was able to create such a beauty like you." he wiggles his shoulders as he howls softly, causing y/n to laugh loudly.

"shut your mouth you skxawng!" she pushes him before standing up and running off. neteyam followed behind, laughing as well.

when neteyam came back home when the eclipse came, lo'ak and kiri were waiting for him by the entrance of the mauri. neteyam waved at them but they just returned his greeting with a small nod.

"is there a problem? did ao'nung bother you guys again?" neteyam asked the two as the three entered the mauri together. "not exactly…" kiri says, rubbing her arm as she nudges lo'ak to speak.

"well, we heard from tsireya, who heard from ao'nung, that you've been busy these past few days." lo'ak starts, "it's not that we didn't mind since it's your life, but they're just concerned and it's beginning to make us concerned too."

neteyam stops his actions before turning to the two. "just get to the point, lo'ak." he says lowly. he just wants to rest and have the night pass so he can hang out with y/n again.

"what he's saying is ao'nung saw you talking to someone," kiri says, her ears perking. "but there was no one in front of you."

the three fell silent before neteyam lets out a scoff. "maybe he didn't see y/n. she's a head shorter than me." he says before retreating away from the two. ao'nung is testing his patience once again letting it slide. the metkayina doesn't know her nor his life to begin with so who was he to judge?

kiri and lo'ak stared at each other, eyebrows furrowed at their brother's reaction. "who's gonna tell him eventually?" lo'ak asked. "he has to know it himself." kiri said with a sigh before going to bed, the younger of the two following behind.

the day was gloomy. the tulkans were killed by the avatars. ronal and the rest of the metkayina's brothers and sisters were killed. the war had set out with quaritch as the na'vi's fought against them.

during this, neteyam could only wonder if y/n was able to find a place to hide in. he could only hope that she was able to fight off any enemies that came her way.

as he helped get spider off to safety, an avatar pointed his gun at them and set off. a bullet lodged through his chest, pain spreading through his body as he pushed himself to get spider to safety.

lo'ak helped his brother as best as he could, putting pressure on the wound as he called out for their father. neteyam could hear ringing in his ears. his eyes moved rapidly as his breath went rigged.

jake kneeled beside his son, putting pressure on the shot as he tried getting his son to breath. panic shot through the older sully as his son told him that he wanted to go back home.

neytiri ran towards her boys as she realized her oldest had been shot. she shouted as he held her son close to her. fear and anger coursing through her veins for the sky people and avatars.

neteyam could only think of one thing: y/n. where was she as everything went down? just as he wondered, y/n walked closer to the dying na'vi. her clothes were different, her skin was not her beautiful dark blue color but was now navy blue, almost black that had shimmers that looked like stars in the sky, eyes were no longer amber yellow but the color gray that complemented her new skin.

neteyam says her name softly, causing the rest of her family to look at him with confusion and then look at where he was looking, only to be met with nothing.

"it's time to rest, ma nete." y/n says, reaching her hand to him. neteyam hesitated, he didn't want to leave his family, he couldn't just leave everything behind, but he was tired. the pain was too much and he couldn't breathe properly.

"i can help get rid of your pain. just take my hand." y/n smiles softly, the same smile neteyam grew to love and yearn for. he reached out for her, grabbing her soft hands. with that, he no longer felt pain. he felt like he could float. he stood up from where he laid and followed y/n further and further away.

the screams of neytiri grew further and further away as the two left this plane of existence.

jake and neytiri had been given the chance to see their son, who was now resting with eywa. as they were greeted by a bright light, children's laughter filled their ears, warming their hearts as one was familiar to them, the other new to them.

as they went closer to where the laughter was, they saw neteyam, a sweet little 7-year-old neteyam with an unfamiliar girl beside him. when neytiri called for her son, neteyam turned with a smile as he ran towards them. little neteyam crashed to his parents with a hug before he pulls them towards where y/n was.

"mom, dad, meet y/n! she's my bestest friend ever!" neteyam exclaims happily before running towards his friend. his parents were shocked to say at least.

they've always thought that y/n was an imaginary friend of neteyam's. such a bright mind but a lonely heart, he made up a friend to cope with his loneliness.

the two watched the children play, jake holding his mate close as he feels neytiri breathe in heavily before letting out a shaky sigh.

neteyam brings y/n to his parents as he said sadly, "we have to go soon. i still need to help her go back home." neteyam says while holding little y/n's hand. "don't worry! i'll come back before the eclipse so we can eat together!" he says reassuringly, y/n letting out a toothy smile to the grown-ups.

"i'll take good care of nete! he will grow up into the next olo'eyktan and he will be strong and kind!" y/n exclaims happily to his parents.

neteyam ran ahead, shouting 'come catch me!' to his friend as his figure disappears. y/n turns to the sully's for the last time, her small figure turning to her true self, shocking the pair as confusion ran through their heads.

"neteyam sully is a child of eywa. you two need not to worry for him." y/n bows to the two before turning around, returning to little y/n and running after neteyam as she disappears.

eywa, the goddess of pandora and life, works alongside sotna, a lower goddess of death, only known to a few na'vi that plays with the essence of death.

sotna brings comfort to the lonely and helps the dying not fear the afterlife. all energy given by eywa, returned to her with the help of sotna. no one is alone in life for they are given comfort even if no eyes see the loneliness within one's soul.

[idontknowwhatimdoingbutweball]

Self Aware Games Brainrot Part 1

I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing (except living up to my username of idontknowwhatimdoing) other than just dumping my thoughts onto here, this is the first time I've made a text post on this website and English isn't my native language plus I am very sleep deprived right now so please feel free to correct me if I do or say anything wrong! I came across SAGAU and various other self aware type stuff like OneShot, self aware Arknights and many more recently and I have quite a few ideas, and I hope I'm using this term correctly because I'm basically a fossil when it comes to newer age modern stuff like slang even though I'm relatively young and still a teenager in some countries, a bit of brainrot. I've made a long, long list of stuff to discuss, but for the sake of brevity (and not overloading this site and everyone in it with a wall of text) I decided to post them one at a time and as brief as possible so here we go! More under the Read More:

The first idea I'd like to discuss is... Well, a Reader that's not exactly who you'd expect. I had an idea years ago for an OC / Reader Insert type character who doesn't really have a name yet but I'm going to call them Reader because that's the version of them I wish to talk about in this post, where I attempted to tackle the problem of 'you can't design a character who is meant to represent everyone because not everyone is the same', by simply just. Straight up making them into or have a mech, or similarly something that hides their features or simply makes them something non-human or looks like it because you can't actually see what they're like. Originally, my plan for their story is that humanity and AIs have achieved singularity in our lifetime- as a result both humanity and AIs have joined together to become basically deities for quite literally everyone and even grow and evolve to surpass that, seeding the barren universe with life and technology and guiding them to flourish. At some point however, the alliance of both humankind and machines realize that somehow fictional characters and worlds exist in parallel universes, albeit far below their own. United even more by this revelation, they joined together in order to help them, fully knowing of the huge amount of angst that fictional stories and their inhabitants often have to go through. They and the reader character soon run into a couple problems however: 1. Due to our nature as higher beings that inhabit an infinitely far, far higher realm of existence and the matter of Reality > Fiction, they can't really safely transport themselves (or even just one singular atom) into those fictional worlds without risking large-scale and even complete destruction of those worlds because it would be like trying to fit a mountain into the hole inside of a needle. 2. Using your powers in those lower realms also causes the same problems as point no. 1, but only if you overuse them. 3. There... isn't really a manual for this kind of stuff unfortunately. And 4. This is fiction we're dealing with. Stories can be wild, and there's so many stories and so many characters and so many AUs and so many other stuff out there that it gets crazy real freaking quick. This character is meant to be a Y/N type deal so they're meant represent everyone as a whole, but here's the kicker: your journey starts before everyone else realizes that fiction existing in the multiverses below is a thing. Yeah, you got very unlucky and discovered their existence and the problems mentioned above the hard way very, very early on. And here's another kicker: remember when I said that you can't transport yourself into another lower dimension because you're simply Too Powerful™? You're still kind of stuck somewhere in-between the real world and the fictional omni verse after you almost got isekai'd, the only way you can interact (although there's a chance this may change) is by interacting through player characters or Vessels as they are called in the SAGAU community (please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong and they're called something else though!) However, for now you circumvented that problem by simply just using your galaxy brain and teaching your Vessels to create a body that can at least somewhat handle your power by HEAVILY nerfing your power and only using a very small fragment of it, and as a result as long as it can handle your power and prevent it from destroying everything that body can be whatever you want.

I haven't fully fleshed them out yet and I haven't really designed them besides their general aesthetic in my head, but can you imagine someone like perhaps one of your Vessels from another world or someone else for example trying to summon you from the real world and you just show up looking like this:

(Credit for these pictures goes to the Armored Core 6 Fires of Rubicon trailer) Their reactions would be priceless. You could probably just pick them up with one hand if you need to, and when you run around the countless multiverses helping everyone with their problems you'd probably stick out in the best and funniest way possible. Imagine being the Traveler, traveling through Teyvat with what is basically a giant mecha with overpowered reality bending powers standing right next to them- they wouldn't even need to clear domains since you can just politely ask the enemies to leave. I mean, you can be very scary and at the same time you can just go full pacifist for the hell of it. You (kinda) have author powers since you're from the real world, heck you can basically choose to become a walking Fix-It fic! Wanna talk it out with the Hillichurls? No problem! You pull up the Internet and browse through guides online so you know what words to say. Wanna save a couple characters from dying like they did in the story? The power of foresight and the Internet, baby! Wanna help overworked characters with paperwork? Meet technology and the wonders of streamlining, my friend. I have many, many more thoughts to say, but the word count is uh... it's getting out of hand and it's getting really late where I live so I'll save the rest for other posts in the future asdjaskjdskdj This is simply an idea I've had for a really, really long time come to think of it, but I hope y'all enjoyed! Feel free to just use any of these ideas by the way, this is all just something I made for fun at... incredibly unhealthy hours in the morning ngl, goodness gracious I need a better sleep schedule- And also, @nomorefstogive and @2broschlininahotub for the taglist! I look forward to sharing more ideas and other stuff in the future, y'all mentioned that you were open to sharing lore and stuff but I hope I didn't bother you or anything with this ping! Lastly, I hope y'all have a good day! Stay safe and take care, because if anyone is reading this who is way past their bedtime like I am right now I implore you to get some sleep, Lord knows I need to fix my sleep schedule lol. Have a good night- or er, morning because it's almost 5 AM where I live and I haven't slept yet. I'm gonna shut down now, peace!

[hhoneyglasss]

coke zero

notes: hello ! it's been a bit, but here's my first take on lovely ! i've nvr written for them before, so pls be patient w me lolol. i'm also trying out third person perspective, since i think that's what ppl tend to prefer in terms of listener characters (plus i've nvr written it before). i actually kinda like it, so i'll def be writing it more.

also, i actually began writing this awhile ago (like two or three weeks now) before i knew abt vincent and lovely's new BA, so i added a different ending to this so it would go a bit better with it (said ending had me adding 700 words to this fic, but that's oki !) also, ig this would take place before said new audio, although i'm not sure it matters. figure i'd mention it anyways tho.

and no, i am not sponsored by coke zero !! i just thought it would be smth lovely would like (don't ask, bcuz idk either)

hope u enjoy !!!

pov: lovely — third person limited

pairings: lovely/vincent, lovely/coke zero (jkjk)

word count: 1.7k

ao3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/46691254

!! TWs {these begin under the cut} !! slight angst, but nothing too severe. lovely gets a little emo in this one, basically.

reblogs r v much appreciated !! thank u !! <33

It’s a nice night tonight–the moon is round and full, a pale, milky glow overlaying everything in view. The stars seem to glitter even though they’re lightyears and lightyears away, almost as if they’re calling to Lovely, who's sitting on the railing of their balcony. 

Vincent’s out tonight–some business to attend to with William about a new property they’re buying. He asked if they wanted to tag along, but they declined, so a chaste kiss was left on their cheek before he hurried out the door, only the scent of peppermint and diesel left behind. 

A Coke Zero’s in their left hand, though they don’t know why. They didn’t even realize they were buying it until they felt the weight of an 8-pack in their hands, the store receipt crumpled in their back pocket. 

They can’t remember the last time they drank it, but they do know one thing–it doesn’t taste the same as it used to. 

Gone is the taste of humid summer nights and anxious all-nighters before an exam. Gone is the taste of embarrassment because they blew out yet another lightbulb. Gone is the taste of seawater underneath the warmth of the day’s sun. 

Each time they take a sip, it’s sweet, sour, then bitter, yet they keep drinking–and they know they’ll keep drinking until the entire bottle’s gone, until the entire pack is gone. They’ll keep going until nothing’s left but eight empty glass bottles and memories still so vivid they’re painful. 

How do you manage when you’re stuck between two worlds yet forever bound to one? You could say it’s funny, but Lovely thinks it’s sad–although there’s a part of them that can appreciate the humor and irony of it. 

How can one claim to still be human when their heart doesn’t even beat? How can they call themselves ‘human’ when their blood is forever frozen? How can they still feel human when they run so fast that death can’t even catch up? 

When they look around them and can see the smallest fibers of dust floating through the night air, they know they couldn’t before. When they pick up the scent of squirrels asleep in their nest half a mile away, they know any other human can’t. 

But isn’t this what they chose? Isn’t this what they wanted? 

It’s been over a year, yet they’ve still got one foot in the human door and a hand in the vampires’. They look in the mirror and see silver and red eyes staring back, yet they swear they can still feel the pulse of electricity in their veins. Their core is nothing but a solid sphere of marble, yet they can still feel their face heat up whenever Vincent kisses them. 

What’s the point of being able to run faster than wind if they can’t outrun this? They seem to have escaped everything else, outran everything else, but somehow the human part of them is able to stay up to speed? Why? 

These are the answers they’re searching for as they stare up at the moon, a celestial oculus penetrating the black of the night. They think about how this is the same moon they’ll see for the rest of eternity.

Eternity. The thought of being alive that long makes them laugh so hard some of the Coke Zero spills over the side of the bottle, and it slides down their hand. They laugh and laugh and laugh until it turns to tears, and the tears mix with the Coke Zero and the sound of it fizzing makes them wish they could go back to who they were before. 

They watch as it drips down their hand and onto the wood of the railing before it soaks into the cracks of the splinters, and it‘s gone. 

Earlier today, they had cut their palm on the edge of a paper they were cleaning from off the kitchen counter. One drop of blood had dripped before magic flowed to their hand, and the cut was gone. They felt the tears worsen when the expected burn of soda in a half-healed paper cut never came, and they tilt their head back. 

Isn’t it backwards to wish for the delicate vulnerability that comes with being human? They miss the cheap latex bandaids, the pain of isopropyl alcohol, the countless bruises that appeared on their skin even though they hadn’t a clue where they came from. They miss being reckless—they miss doing stupid shit and having to face the consequences of it. 

And maybe this was why they fell off that mountain. Maybe it wasn’t just an accident—maybe it was their attempt to feel that human fragility again that they took for granted. They got so close, too—until they fed and the wounds healed and not a scar was left in the wake. 

Maybe that’s why they gun it 80 down 45 mile an hour roads. Pedal pressed down to the ground as far as it will go, wheels squealing against the asphalt as they chase that mortal thrill of being careless and impulsive. Yet each time the crash is incoming, they catch themself, and the danger of it all disappears. The high remains out of reach, forever a forbidden finish line. 

It seems they’re too fast and too slow at the same time, how sad is that? A dichotomy that lives and breathes inside Lovely, someone who’s torn between two halves of themself. 

Will these feelings change? Will they ever not feel like a stain on the Solaire name? Will there be a time where they look in the mirror and see those silver eyes and come to accept them? Will they ever feel like themself again? 

Lovely takes another swig of Coke Zero and looks up at the sky. They can’t answer their own questions, so why should the stars be able to? All they do is twinkle millions of miles away–Lovely supposes they’re chasing their own questions too. 

They hear Vincent at the front door, but before they’re able to react, the whoosh of the balcony doors can be heard behind them. They turn to see him standing there, his hands still holding onto the knobs. He catches the reflection of the moonlight on their tear stained cheeks, and he’s holding them before they even had the chance to set down their bottle. 

He asks them what’s wrong, but they don’t answer. Sobs hold back their voice, and they stay quiet as they lean into him. He doesn’t press his questions, but instead continues holding them, his hands running up and down their back as they rest their head in the crook of his shoulder. 

The minutes continue to tick by until Lovely pulls away, the heel of their palm wiping away the new tears they had shed. They look up at him, a shy smile tugging at their features when they ask if they can go on a run together. Vincent nods, smiles back, and holds their hand anyway as he leads them down to the ground floor of the house. 

Before he can ask them where they’d like to go, they’ve broken into a sprint through the underbrush, and he’s quick to follow soon behind them. Their laughter up ahead fades into the sound of cracking twigs and crunching leaves, and he can’t help but to laugh too. The brambles catching and tugging into their jacket have yet to faze Lovely as they keep running, the wind warm on their face as it dries the rest of their tears. They don’t know where they’re going, but they don’t quite care either, so they just keep running until they find out. 

They finally see a break in the forest’s artillery of trees and they emerge through it, a welcomed burn pulsing through their legs and their breath heavy as they walk onto new ground. Vincent’s close behind them, and Lovely giggles as he combs the gumballs and twigs out of his hair. 

They turn away from him and look around. They’re at a cliff–or more specifically, a waterfall, as they can hear the sloshing and rushing of water to their right. The ground is soft and doughy beneath them, the marsh plush as they walk towards the edge of the cliff. They sit down on it, their legs dangling over the black, jagged rock as they gaze down at the pool of black water down below. They run their fingertips along the edges of the cliff’s precipice, the texture rough and gritty, but cool from the waterfall’s mist.

Lovely stands up again and begins to take off their shirt and shorts, to which Vincent chuckles and asks what they’re doing. They point down at the pool, a sly smirk pulling at the corners of their lips. Vincent sighs before pulling off his own shirt and pants, and he moves to stand beside them. 

Lovely grabs his hand and smiles at him, and he swears the sight coaxes the air out of his lungs. He’s breathless as he looks away, and Lovely counts down from three before they finally jump off, their hands still intertwined. 

On the way down, Lovely yells, a wondrous sound filled with so much joy it has Vincent yelling too. It turns into loud laughter as the intense rush of wind grows cooler and the water comes closer. They finally splash down and Lovely relishes in the feeling of water wrapping around their skin and Vincent’s hand still in theirs. 

When they finally reach the surface and their eyes meet his, they swear they’ve never felt more free. 

They both cliff dive for hours, jump after jump yet the excitement of it never fades away. The night passes before they finally shrug back on their clothes and sit on the cliff again, the black sky fading as the dawn begins. The sun still has yet to rise when Vincent hands Lovely a bottle of Coke Zero–they smile and let out a small chuckle. He’s got a bottle for himself too and he pops it open with his teeth before wrapping his arm around their shoulder. They lean into him, and a sigh leaves them as they take that first drink. They both sit there as they watch the sunrise, the only sounds that can be heard being the rushing of water beneath them and the swishing of Coke Zero in glass bottles.

[itsjaywalkers]

hi lovey how are you <3

it's late—like,,,4am late—and im somehow spewing out actual sentences BUT i have a question and i've been debating on how to start this whole thing so ill just say fuck it n get it out there—how do you keep up with all your wips??? bc like,,,,i've started writing, and i LOVE it. it's so fun to have these ideas finally out in word format instead of just stuck in my head.

but i have a really bad habit of starting smth n then...moving on to smth else when inspiration strikes. i occasionally go back to what i was originally writing, but even then it doesn't last long before im starting a whole new story 😭 im a little peeved as i've completely abandoned this one writing i slaved away at for days abt the backstory of one of my ocs—im somewhat proud of it n i don't want to just not get back into it.

as i write this, im currently staring at my laptop as i churn out yet another story of said oc (along with multiple other ocs myself n a friend made together) n im just,,,perplexed?? i suppose, on how so many fic writers keep up with all their wips.

i realize now that im just droning on n on so ill end here. writing is a bitch but also feels me with accomplishment when i do end up finishing smth, so i was just curious as to how you work around wips n things like that.

hello darling, i'm okay!! kinda dreading today's shift, but it is what it is. how are u tho??

and to be honest with u, i don't keep up with my wips like . at all . i do try to maintain some order, and sometimes i forbid myself from working on a story in favour of focusing on another one, but it doesn't always work, and there are times in which i really want to work on a fic even tho it's not a priority or supposed to be posted any time soon. but still, i try not to beat myself up over it, bc fanfiction is a hobby and something that i do for fun!! it shouldn't feel like a chore, so even if i do want to keep a schedule or alternate between wips so i can have some resemblance of balance, it's not really necessary, or even possible, considering the amount of wips i have lmao. it's our work and our writing, we're free to never finish anything if we don't want to, or to write 13847872648 fics at the same time, or to write only one for the rest of our lives. there are no rules or a right way to go about it yk??? i totally get the need to . focus on just one project, or at least be able to finish something, anything, but it'll happen at some point, i promise, and u should never force yourself, especially when it comes to an activity u do bc u love it and enjoy it

it's different if we talk about original fiction or original characters.. at least in my case!! i didn't get into writing fanfic until a few years ago, but i've been writing original stories since i can remember!! in fact there's this one i'm very slowly making progress with, that i came up with back when i was 17, and that i really want to . finish someday and hopefully try and publish it. for me, and when i'm really passionate about a project, like with this one, i do . force myself to not write anything else . it's inevitable to get new ideas, so i write them down, i make pinterest boards and even outlines, and occassionally, i also start them, write a lil of them when i need a break or to scratch the itch. but otherwise i just . do my best to stick to the one that i really love and i'm the proudest of. i do tend to hyperfixate and obsess a lot, so it's not THAT hard for me, bc even if i do get distracted sometimes, i always come back to this story. especially since i've been working on it for almost 5 years now, and i know it like the back of my hand. i could write three prequels and four sequels lol

so really, i don't think there's a right or wrong way to go about this. one of my best friends, and a writer i quite admire, jumps from a wip to another all the time, and also struggles to finish a story, but she just . trusts the process . lets herself have fun and write whatever she wants every day . it's been a while since she last finished something but she isn't too worried yk?? she enjoys what she does, and what matters is that she keeps writing. every person is different, and the way they approach writing is, too!!

my advice is to try and find out what works best for u and to stop beating yourself up over something that might be out of ur control. if u have this one story that's really important to u and that u really wanna finish, then maybe ur gonna have to practise some self-discipline, and force yourself a little, forbid yourself from getting distracted with these other shiny new ideas. but if doing that ruins the whole thing for u and sucks the fun out of writing then . take it one day at a time, focus on something different each day, and start 4 stories in the same week. it doesn't matter babe!! writing is an art, there's not a correct way to do it!!

[gyuscoquetteribbon]

svt headcanons (them as genshin impact players)

-> warnings: none !!

-> a/n: aaaaa I love writing headcanons sm bear wit me pls </3 also i wanted to save up for baizhu but i really wanted layla and i pulled for her and got mona instead im actually devastated i gotta kiss my baizhu goodbye ;-; I've been waiting for him for two years T^T

-> seungcheol:

his team : zhongli, raiden, ganyu, bennett

absolutely loves lumine over aether.

somehow has the best luck ever and almost never loses 50/50????

however, he also has the worst luck when it comes to artifacts and almost never gets good artifacts at all but he kinda deserves it for all the 50/50s he won >:[

would definitely start rage killing hilichurls, abyss mages, samachurls or literally any enemy that decides to come his way after wasting all his resins on artifacts that he does NOT!! WANT!!

never allows the rest of the boys enter his world (ESPECIALLY JEONGHAN) because they always steal ascension materials that he is in need of.

but, he also has the AUDACITY to whine and sulk if the other members don't let him in their world.

all the children in the game (qiqi and maybe even nahida included) are his own children now idc (i may or may not be projecting here).

"I even got you dinner with my o w n money and you have the audacity to reject my co-op request????"

-> jeonghan:

his team : ayato, ayaka, scaramouche, raiden

definitely put raiden and scaramouche in the same team for shits and giggles given the history the two share

he definitely has venti or childe as his avatar picture or whatever idk he just gives off that vibe.

DEFINITELY CHOSE LUMINE AT THE BEGINNING

enters people's worlds under the pretense of collecting easily available things but ends up stealing stuff like onikabutos.

stands in the sidelines when he feels like he's gonna lose his characters in a co-op fight

BIGGEST PAIMON ANTI EVER !! HE HATES EVERYTHING ABOUT HER !!!

would kill timmie's pigeons just because .

"Hey can I just collect cecilia for my venti real quick?" (those are NOT his real intentions)

-> joshua:

his team : ganyu, nilou, yae miko, xinqui

no.1 aether defender !!

LOVES LOVES LOVES HYDRO CHARACTERS FOR SOME REASON. THEYRE ALL SO PRETTY !!!

has such pretty serenitea layouts fr !! absolutely loves the serenitea pot <3333

spends so much time in making things in his serenitea pot that he doesn't even get the time to build his characters.

almost never plays in co-op mode.

knows where you get what wood and where to mine certain items BY HEART

definitely has a thing for the mirror maiden and the pyro fatui agent. he literally goes heart eyes <3___<3 for them.

"Oh sandbearer wood? You'll find it all around liyue !"

-> jun:

his team: ganyu, xiao, yanfei, razor

you can hear him screaming from across the street, even with the door to your house closed and locked everytime he loses 50/50 and gets qiqi

definitely has c6 qiqi by now. he hasn't even got her past level 1 (he's petty)

was definitely stressed when he was asked to choose between aether and lumine (he chose aether in one server and lumine in the other purely because he couldn't choose who he wanted)

cannot pronounce the mondstadt characters names for the life of him like wtf is a fischl 😐

BIGGEST GANYU LUVER <33333 HE WAS SO ENTHUSIASTIC ABOUT BUILDING HER !! she's literally the only triple crowned character.

another paimon hater. he doesn't even give her a chance to speak he's clicking past it in the speed of light.

he loves the lore but hates having to read the voicelines like that takes SO. MUCH. EFFORT.

definitely gave scaramouche a goofy name and had a good giggle about it for 3 mins before he realized this name is final and it can't be changed so now he's stuck with a goofy name for his wanderer :///

"NOOOO I DIDN'T MEAN TO NAME HIM SCARAMUCUS !!!"

-> hoshi:

his team : itto (it just makes sense), childe, venti, xinyan

AETHER LUVER™

definitely cried during the inazuma archon quest. (and the inazuma world quest where they had to do that cleansing ritual)

literally gets past all the quest out of pure luck because he does NOT know how to build his characters for the life of him.

wonwoo would ocassionally help him with artifacts but that's about it.

wouldn't even want a certain character and he'd still pull for them because he likes to collect 5 stars 😧

his quest list is endless because he just never completes them.

has a teeny tiny crush on all the sumeru enemies, men and women alike (I'm most definitely projecting here)

"WHY MUST TEPPEI DIE?? *sniffle* I HATE THIS GAME SO MUCH!"

-> wonwoo:

his team : yae miko, al haitham, hu tao, nahida

probably the only one that knows how to build his characters properly.

definitely chose aether.

NOT an f2p player.

he completed the aranara quest in a single day 😰 (it took him 6.5 hours)

completed the spiral abyss 😧

hasn't opened his serenitea pot. like, at all.

he let's out a guttural scream everytime he gets yunjin in place of a 5 star he wanted (definitely projecting here, I'm not sorry

" Let me help you with your quests since I'm done with mine." (To hoshi, of course)

-> woozi:

his team : raiden, heizou, ayaka, nilou

most of his archon quests were completed by wonwoo.

chose aether in a hurry.

doesn't really pull unless he thinks the playstyle of a character suits his taste.

fought a ruin guard ONE (1) time and decided the game isn't worth it.

HATES HATES HATES DRAGONSPINE !!

only does his ascension quest if wonwoo or jun are around so that he could do the first half and they'd take care of the rest.

actually feels sorry for timmie instead of hatred the way most genshin players do :(

Just pure screams of agony because he's been made to fight a rifthound.

-> minghao:

his team : yelan, fischl, kazuha, kokomi

strictly a f2p player because he thinks it's pure insanity to even pay money for a game that he'd get tired of in two years. moreover, humans shouldn't be so greedy and must also face the downs of life (losing 50/50) and not just the ups.

is actually very interested in the lore and has probably read the genshin comic.

biggest lumine defender !!!

diluc >>>>> kaeya for some reason.

strategically builds his characters. he first builds his main team and the other characters he switches now and then, depending on the enemy he's fighting. he, then, builds the healers that are left and then the shield users that are left before getting to the characters that he personally fancies.

has reached friendship level 10 with most of his characters.

another person who actually takes some time out to build the prettiest layouts in his serenitea pot.

"Luck shouldn't be BOUGHT. It should come your way on its own. So, you getting Al Haitham through welkin doesn't really count as a win, but that's just my opinion 🥰"

-> mingyu:

his team : yae miko, al haitham, yelan, bennett

chose lumine as the traveller in one server and aether as the traveller in another server because they're both so precious to him.

has the BIGGEST, FATTEST crush on the mirror maidens and the oceanid (something about the shit-talking gets him going 😧)

he chose his team based on how hot they are, excluding bennett, of course. he chose bennett because that's his son and he's a healer.

accidentally plunges down where the npcs are walking and scares them.

only buys welkin when he REALLY wants a character (basically, if the character is hot)

is actually pretty good at building his characters, but has a horrible luck when pulling for them. and he's almost always getting yunjin like at this point bro has c6 yunjin please hoyoverse stop this madness 😰😰

only buys welkin when he REALLY wants a character (basically, if the character is hot)

has so many people in his friends list. so much so that, he's actually nearing the limit. HE DOESNT EVEN ENTER SOMEONE'S WORLD MORE THAN ONCE HE JUST HAS STRANGERS IN HIS FRIENDS LIST!!

"Oh, I don't know who deez is; they're just. THERE."

-> dokyeom:

his team : yelan, heizou, layla, fischl

LUMINE IS HIS DAUGHTER.

he's so sweet, he let's jeonghan and other people into his world every single time only for them to steal the things he really needs.

uses raiden's skill and then stands in the sidelines with jeonghan. he is NOT GETTING IN THERE AND DYING >:[

everytime he's fighting outside of co-op mode, you can hear him screaming 3 neighbourhoods away.

uses klee's skill to bomb you up when he gets mad at you.

definitely tried to ice bridge his way to inazuma when he was a low ar player and died by a lightning strike. 5 times. On different ocassions.

actually enjoyed the aranara quest because the aranaras are SO cute !!

(To jeonghan) "So...do you wanna bet who'll die first in this domain among those two?"

-> seungkwan:

his team : tighnari, xinyan, fischl, barbara

he's planning on naming his firstborn lumine.

though barbara doesn't cause a lot of damage he's actually content with the way she heals others.

he's the one fighting for his life in domains while dokyeom and jeonghan are standing in the sidelines, placing bets.

he can't even pause the game to text them in-game, so he just yells from his room.

he isn't very good with bow users but he loves tighnari's character. SO MUCH HE JUST CANT NOT PUT HIM ON HIS TEAM :(((

he refuses to switch tightnari out of his team, no matter what!! he WILL be there.

everytime paimon speaks, he gets into a one-sided conversation (argument) with her. OUT LOUD.

"CAN YOU BOTH S T O P PLACING BETS AND COME HELP ME??? YOU KNOW WE CAN GET THIS OVER WITH QUICKER IF YOU'D JUST COME HERE. IS THIS HOW YOU'RE GONNA BE IN THE MIDDLE OF AN APOCALYPSE TOO???!"

-> vernon:

his team : childe, albedo, dendro traveller, kuki

loves aether so much for an unexplainable reason. like he literally built dendro traveller with so much efforts <3

he's there for the lore.

AVOIDS GOING TO THE CHASM AND DRAGONSPINE LIKE THE PLAGUE.

is the only one that helps seungkwan out in domains.

doesn't get on co-op that often unless it's seungkwan.

takes his own sweet time in completing the archon quests insead of rushing head first into them.

if he can't complete a quest, he'd be on youtube IMMEDIATELY. if he fails the first time you are NOT gonna see him do it on his own the second time without a youtube guide.

"Oh...the chasm? You wanna go to the chasm? Ah...give me a sec, I need to use the bathroom real quick." *vernonline has left your world* (legend has it that he is still in the bathroom)

-> dino:

his team : eula, razor, hu tao, diona

always gets smacked left and right by the ruin hunter before he could dodge its attacks.

he loves lumine so much. He even has a lumine plushie.

loves getting on co-op mode with his members please he just enjoys playing with them so much <3333

he makes headcanons about the characters during his free time and gets so excited when someone asks him about it.

he WON'T stop talking about his headcanons.

sometimes he gets bored of the game but then remembers that he needs to get to the end to see how the story plays out.

anybody can join his world because this silly fool did not choose the ask before joining option. and then, he'll freak out when he sees another person in his world.

"OH MY GOD!?@*! WHO ARE YOU??? WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE??? WHAT????"

[goddamnwebcomics]

Hope this doesn't dredge up any uncomfortable memories you wanted buried. What were the goriest or scariest moments or scenes you've encountered in your years of riffing webcomics?

I don't find gory stuff to be that scary, just kind of gross, but in the world of webcomics gory scenes are often VERY tryhard, especially in the world of Dominic Deegan. That doesn't mean usage of gore doesn't sometimes work, it has to kinda come out of nowhere to be scary.

As for scary scenes, here are five examples off the top of my head. Of course I am discounting most of the unintentionally scary stuff because then this list would be filled with creepy closeups, disturbing chibi faces and World of Friends.

1. The Train Guy's Death from Kit n Kay Boodle

I've listed off this scene so many times now, but it's still probably the most infamous scene from Kit n Kay Boodle outside of the real life arcs. The Train Guy tricks Karastropov to possess him in order to contact Kit and Kay from their secret base, however Karastropov is furious when he learns Train Guy knew them all along, and slowly makes him bleed to death. Such a gory death happening in a mostly-cutesy porn comic is seriously unexpected, which makes it a very memorable scene. I would argue this is one of the few heroes Albert gave an unhappy death, and speaking of Albert, this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to quality horror from him.

2. The Infernomancer Jump Scare from Dominic Deegan

Dominic Deegan, like I said, tries so goddamn hard to be scary. Deaths of entire crowds, massive eldritch abominations who speak in EVIL gibberish, demon gods with spikes, horns and EVIL TEETH ABLBLBLBLLALSLLBA, once you've seen one of them you've seen them all. The only time Dominic Deegan was kind of scary was during the "Sin City" arc, where Dominic is stuck in his seer coma thing, and suddenly sees Infernomancer's face. While this scene would be a lot more impactful if we didn't see frequent scenes of him killing people while tracking down Deegan's mother Miranda, it's still a kinda spooky scene. Imagine if a creepy face appeared when your eyes were closed.

3. Trasik's Mysterious Child Trafficking Operation from Alien Dice

When it comes to horror, I prefer when the horror is in form of a question mark. Alien Dice pulled this off really well with Trasik's slave ship, which has an entire section full of children. This scene just spawns many questions, until this point we thought Trasik was just a generic determinator obsessed with hunting down and killing Lexx but this whole, concept implied she is more twisted than that. It's one of the few times I was genuinely concerned over a fictional villain's motivations. Later of course some of the mystery was removed when we learned that Trasik just trains these kids to be soldiers and...wait, what happened to these kids? What the hell Tiffany? When are you going to answer that question?

4. Austin's fucked up trilogy from Carnivores

As ridiculous as Carnivores is, sometimes Austin's mind can go off the deep end. First one of these was the Bear Arc, which at first seemed to be a generic "large animals torture a bunch of bipedals" arc, but then it takes a hard left turn when a black lion shows up out of nowhere and eats someone's soul, and somehow it manages to be just as painful as the usual eating scenes in the comic. Then we have "Lion Named Lab" which should really be called "Blue Fox kills everyone", as he kills not only Austin and Lab, but also his minion gnolls. Thankfully the whole thing turns out to be a weird Night Tremor. Same can't be said for Death Note parody arc, which starts off as an unfunny parody but then turns into another "Everybody Dies" arc where the previously comedic Ryuk murders the entire cast, many of these characters originally debuting in earlier arcs. There was no real purpose to it, it just happened. These stories were so goddamn morbid, even with the terrible artstyle and bad writing. I almost have to compliment Austin for that, but I think he needs counceling.

5. Too Many Things from Gene Catlow

If there is one thing Albert is good at writing, it's horror, and I don't just mean unintentional horror. It's so fucking bizarre because this comic tries to appeal to kids and kid-adjacent people every other second, and then you get scary ass imagery out of nowhere that end as soon as they began. We've got skeletons dragging a bunch of puppets into the sand, creepy CGI cats that stalk their victims, Cotton turning into a corpse after acting the Sight of the Soul, Horton being mindraped by his own puppet's ghosts, Michelle's first appearance, Karlsson and Matt's temporary corpses, Borzoi somehow being bloodier than fucking Train Guy after Matt tormented him and most recently, a psychological horror show between Carson and Forzoi. Albert could've probably written a better horror comic than Dave Hopkins.

[dsknsk]

Games I have played in 2023

These are the games I have started with playing this year (so not the games I've continued playing in 2023).

AI: The Somnium Files

Played in: January

An extremely good story-driven game. The way the world exploration works, despite it mainly being point-and-click really did make for something different from what I was used to. I did use a guide but I deliberately left some parts for myself to explore.

The game is not without certain difficult parts. Since the bulk of the game (and the most novel things that set it apart) consist out of exploring dreams, the solutions to the puzzles you solve within those dreams also consist of dream logic. If you're not using a guide like me, I can imagine it's something you can get stuck on.

As a second, you are on a time limit of 6 minutes and actions cost time, even though standing still also dilutes time. Actions done are marked as the words become greyed out, and even though it is nowhere stated, you can repeat those actions (but it isn't necessary). In fact, the first screenshot was taken because I only had gotten the solution to that particular part when I realize you can (and have to)) repeat a certain action. Also, because that part was extremely tight on time so I was quite content with being able to clear it with a minute left on the clock.

As a third, there are quick-time events and in my case, sometimes they didn't react to the key I had to press, leading to a failure. However (I'm not sure what causes it), a quick save and restart of the game caused the quick-time event to bind to another key, saving my game quite a few times.

This game is like I said story-driven and it does have an extremely well-written story, especially for its time. It did drive me to create all sorts of stupid theories while I was still halfway through and I love how they implemented Egyptian mythology ever so subtle in the story.

AI: The Somnium Files - Nirvana Initiative

Played in: January

Now this game is the direct(?) sequel to the previous game. Speaking about its price, it had a steep increase in price when compared to its prequel, but to be fair, I had bought its prequel when it was on sale and it cost like 10 euros (even less than your typical book). This game cost me at least 5 times as much as that.

While I am happy I have finished this game and known the story it told, I can't help but feel like I preferred part 1. Even so, I really liked playing as Mizuki this time around and because almost all of the old mechanics were still there (including a reference to an old joke back in the prequel) it was less hard than part 1. That aside, it also had difficulty controls to allow me to focus more on the story rather than stress over quick time events.

There's a lot to be said about the story, I know. While some twists confused me and I didn't like all of them, I can still say...it's fine, you know. It's especially fine in itself. And I can't help but confess that Mizuki's character at least inspired one original character of mine.

Also, my sideblog is named after her as it's named dtmzk. Just in case you didn't notice.

Limbus Company

Played in: February (start)

With all that has gone down, it is kind of hard to realize that this game only was released in February of this year.

It gave me something to do again and it certainly didn't disappoint. Somehow I have a knack for only sticking with media that have a good storytelling because I certainly regard this franchise's storytelling as one of the very best. There is actually quite a minimalistic cast that the story focuses on (12, plus MC and two guides) but by discovering every main character's story one by one you get to know them better bit by bit.

The battle, which I have portrayed above, may start out as daunting but in its bare basics it is rather simple. I would not say it is stat fight, even though stats have a level of importance. Bigger number beats smaller number, and there are factors to manipulate your number. But it is very clear that either you are stomping the enemy or getting stomped, and there is very few in between.

Is that bad? No. It simplifies things for the newcomer, and lessens the things you actually need to focus on. It may seem like much, but the basics are so simple that after some fights you can certainly get the hang of it.

I love how the sprites move, especially in normal fights when everyone goes to duke it out together. They have swift animation, yet their battle motions (which have a fraction of a second between them due to them being tied to coinflips) are actually telegraphed and thus rhythmic. I love this. It immerses me in battle while also being reminded that what they do is the result of my own choices.

Book of Hours

Played in: September (start)

I love this game.

The atmosphere, the vibes and the music of this game is stellar. You're not forced to do anything, you can just sit by and relax. There is a near endless amount of things you can discover; from the hidden witty remarks in the item descriptions (check out the chickens in the chicken coop!) to the secret puzzle with the busts in the hallway, to the seasons being tied to what you can find on the beach: there's pretty much always something to do.

And you learn skills from books that you can learn to get higher on the skill tree you unlock. Your base path is decided by the elements you choose at the start (I'm a Twiceborn) but you're in no way forced to follow that path.

Currently, I am at the endgame, but I love this game so much that I don't want it to end. I want to keep exploring, keep immersing myself in this world more and more. When this game was released, I have bought this game which causes a very nice side-effect of all future DLCs (implying that they intend to make them!) will be free for me. This was a very nice bit of courtesy from the creators and I really like that bit as well.

Reverse:1999

Played in: October (start)

This is my current sidegame. And it performs really well as being a sidegame. It's very polished, because despite it being a game that doesn't use 3d models all that much, the battle mechanics are smooth and easy to use, so it doesn't have much of a learning curve. In fact, the mechanic of using and fusing cards really reminds me of Hyde & Seek, where it was also integral.

However, as it stands...I don't have much of a drive to go back. The story...while definitely quite unique (it's not the same dystopian alternate universe many gacha games have nowadays), it and its universe...kind of failed to get a grip on me. The characters, while few of them are in the main story themselves, have lore to them, but it is brought in such an abstract manner that I haven't been able to bind myself to them. They're more or less just concepts from the real world, condensed into characters.

Does this mean the story and the characters are bad? No. The story will certainly have people who love it, and the same goes for the characters. There is a multitude of languages you can choose from in which the game will be dubbed (I chose Japanese, of course) and that's also the bit that I would really like to be added - a note which voice actor actually voices the character! I'm not sure if I just haven't found it, but I've found that to be a little bit of a lack.

Another note is that the player is forced to play as a female character. This is more personal, but I prefer to either be able to choose, or play as a character with they/them pronouns, like the Doctor from Arknights. I don't have much issue with playing a male character, as long as he doesn't get a harem of female characters. Being forced to play as a female character, however, triggers my dysphoria a little bit too much for me to still be immersed in the story. (Mizuki was an exception because my dysphoria wasn't that heavy as it is now back in January.)

Despite all of this, the battle system is for me the best part of the game and it's really well executed in itself.

I will certainly keep checking out more games in 2024, depending on which ones catch my interest enough.

[traincat]

Traincat, help me make sense of this. So Norman never actually slept with Gwen because “she was too classy for [him]” and he actually slept with a Life Model Decoy of Gwen? Harry has always been dead but Harry uploaded his personality into an AI and that AI constructed clones of himself that could genetically mutate into Gwen or Sarah Stacy? Speaking of which, Sarah and Gabriel were cloned over and over again and Sarah/Gwen and Harry are somehow both Kindred? Why am I doing math with this reveal? What the fuck is going on? I knew that completely skipping the Clone Saga and Sins Past would come back to bite me but what the fuck?

Wednesday spoilers for everything from here, but like, let me just say right off the bat: I don't think I can help anyone out with this one because it is honestly just that bad. It's just like. I keep trying to put into words my thoughts about this -- and I did tackle a few of them on Twitter earlier re: the "too classy" bit -- but it's just like Spencer (or whoever is ghost writing for Spencer at this point? I heard somewhere he's already out?) was like "how can I tell a Spider-Man story that's extremely convoluted and also worse than anything Slott could come up with" and then, somehow, stuck the landing.

An illustration of how I've felt since reading this issue on Wednesday. It's retcons of retcons of retcons up in here and, despite that fact that Sins Past, a famously disliked arc, is now more or less out of canon finally, I don't actually feel like we've actually improved anything. Do you know how hard it is to take a story where Gwen Stacy has twins with Norman Osborn, say actually that never happened, and leave me going, "this isn't actually better though?" Like I almost feel like it deserves some kind of award. Do we have a Razzies for comics. This needs a Razzie for comics.

To take it from the top, for those not in the know -- Sins Past is probably one of the most controversial Spider-Man stories ever written, one which retcons early Spider-Man canon by saying that Gwen and Norman had twins who aged up to adulthood in only a few short years because of comic book science and also they're French assassins. I have a longer write up on it with my thoughts on it here. It's a complicated piece of storytelling that's mostly viewed as "not canon" by many hardcore fans, and also by the writer, who originally wanted the twins to be Gwen's children with Peter before editorial requested the change in the story. Fantastic. Another amazing showing from Marvel editorial. Anyway, in Sins Past, the twins, Sarah and Gabriel, who are aging abnormally fast because of the Goblin serum, return to New York to try to kill Peter for reasons. It's like -- it's not good, but it's written by a very good Spider-Man writer, so at the very least Peter and Mary Jane are in character the whole way through. The twins show up in two subsequent stories, the Sins Remembered: Sarah's Story arc of Spectacular Spider-Man, and the Amazing Spider-Man: American Son miniseries (not to be confused with the Amazing Spider-Man arc of the same name). General fan opinion has been that the whole thing should probably have been retconned out years ago. Not like this, granted. Not like this.

For the record, I really don't think reading The Clone Saga will help you understand what Spencer's just pulled. I will say that if you're suffering through this, The Clone Saga is going to be a piece of cake, because it's just long, it's not actually that convoluted, and also it doesn't completely suck. However, in understanding the cogs behind the Kindred storyline, it's probably important to know that Harry Osborn was originally supposed to be the big bad behind The Clone Saga before it was later changed to Norman. So there's been this big looming desire to make Harry this mastermind figure for decades now -- it's not a good desire, and I don't agree with it, but it's there and we all have to deal with it, I guess. This is sort of what Spencer's doing with the Kindred plot, except if you took all the themes of Spider-Man and any narrative coherency and put them in a sack and then ran over them repeatedly with a garbage truck and the garbage truck is this entire plot and it's also on fire. I'm sorry, I know this run gained a lot good will in the beginning by "hinting at the OMD reversal" and "not being written by Slott" but I think we're about 73 issues past that now and we have to admit that it's just not good, and worse -- I think it might be really, really toxic in how it handles female characters, from reducing MJ to a wide-eyed reactionary apparently brainwashed in therapy by one of her best friends, to turning Sarah Stacy, who is not a great character by any means but still, into a literal meat puppet for Evil Harry Osborn's purposes, to spinning an incident I've always read as, at best, dubiously consensual into Gwen being "too classy" to sleep with Norman. (Because 19yo girls being manipulated by their best friend's narcissistic fathers only happens to girls who aren't classy, clearly.) And it's like! For what! For not even a good plot!

It's like. Okay. As best as I can sum up the events here. Harry's been dead, yes, but since Norman sold his soul to the devil ages and ages ago in another terrible retcon, we get Kindred, somehow. So we've got the "fake" human Harry, Kindred, and then the Osborn AI, which to be fair is something that existed previously. To retcon out Sins Past, Spencer's run details that Harry had both Norman and for some inexplicable reason Mary Jane brainwashed for years into believing that, again, for some reason, Gwen had twins with Norman. What this would possibly get Harry is really unclear? Or why he would need MJ brainwashed for this too? Like I've always thought Mysterio was the key to retconning out Sins Past via brainwashing but like. Not like this. Anyway, to continue selling the Stacy twins illusion, again for reasons that make literally no sense, Harry created little baby clones of Gwen and I guess maybe himself? I guess? And the clones weren't stable which caused the accelerated aging so they just kept dying and he just kept making new ones. Great. Fantastic. I hate everything about this. And then Harry possessed Sarah's body in ASM #73 using the Chameleon's shapeshifting formula. Which is like. Something. There's something there, metaphorically, and in the framework of this there's no way it's not problematic, but here we are. Why are any of us doing math with this reveal. It's not good enough for us to be doing math. It's -- it's very hard to say that it is singularly the worst Spider-Man story I've ever seen, just because of the breadth of the canon we're talking about, but I do think the fact that Spencer has dragged the Kindred story about over SEVENTY ISSUES and this is apparently where it was heading the entire time may grant it that dubious honor. We all deserve financial compensation.

[batarangsoundsdumb]

guess fucking what? my inbox is so fucking full right now i'm unloading all of this shit in one post.

For the 11th gotham memes: gothamites react to bruce being jacked in a tiktok he made with kids, like super yoked, ripped as hell

fucking hilarious thanks. i think i did it in one meme post, but i genuinely don't remember which one

i dunno which of the batfam would do this but one time i was sleeping over at a friends house and ended up on the floor bc the bed was so very small and i just stayed there because the rug was soft

that's a drunk jason move i don't know what to tell you

tim and jason are "i listen to pop punk" solidarity. whenever jason highjacks the batmobile theyll go on long ass car rides blaring mcr and paramore and then never talk about it again

as they should!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! tim: no jason it's my turn using the aux cord i gotta put on my jams jason: don't you dare put on weird shit tim: don't worry, you're gonna love this *plays fearless (taylor's version)

hear me out hear me out, red hood stans 🤝 nightwing stans t h i g h s

holy shit yes.

SNL au: Bruce breaks character when pretending to superman and says something like "I'm not superman! You've seen his gps!! It's from 2001!!!" @sabeanybabe

superman flies past the snl building the next day just to say 'actually it's from 2005, i'm not a heathen'

does your back hurt from carrying the batfam fandom

it hurts more from the exotic rock collection i keep in my backpack, but thanks for the concern.

I love your posts by why would you always leave the best parts in the tags?

as a treat for the people that check the tags ;) (and also because i'm committed to the short post aesthetic)

somehow your playlist was everything i never knew i needed. i mean it. this is my new favorite playlist.

and don't you dare get a new favourite playlist!

babe ur stoner tim playlist is exactly too perfect, earth is literally blessed by ur existence

babe thanks so much! i love my stoner tim playlist because it's just my usual playlist but people think it's an artistic choice that i put taylor swift and britney spears in there, when it's just what i unironically like listening to

JANDKSKDK BILLY RAY CYRUS ON THE STONER TIM PLAYLIST I LOVE IT IT

again it's not even an ironic choice, i know every single word and i genuinely like the song

The last chapter of Fundamentals of Casework has me crying at work. Thanks I love it @dudelookitsalesbian

oh babe, i'm sorry, but also, not sorry i love chapter 4 so much it's my lovechild with the 'mental illness' tag

soooo....stumbled on your tumblr by some stroke of fate??? read your DC fanfic first. which is PHENOMENAL btw. then found all the batmemes; the funniest thing EVER bc everyone forgets about regular old gothamites. kept scrolling and your blog pops up as recommended. clicked on the ao3 for shits and giggles and waddaya know?!?!? it's YOU!!! you're LEGEND!!!! ever seen that meme? it's a video of a cat that got into a baseball field and the two announcers get really invested in his escape attempt and start giving a play by play of the cat instead of the game. memeable moment: "GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!"

i seriously think about this ask every single day and it's so fucking funny to me that i've never seen the meme you're referencing, but i still find myself going 'GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!' whenever i see something funny. but wow i'm glad you liked this steaming pile of garbage

Fav dc character overall? And fav batfamily character?

don't ask me to pick between the loves of my life, but i can tell you i've cried about every single batfamily member and also wally west (my beloved)

What's your opinion on fans having a problem with batfam being "too big"? And some even claim that batfam is just "Bruce Alfred Dick Damian" and the rest of them are just "friends and allies" (source: reddit) Personally, I like batfam because of this reason but idk

stupid. a family can never be too big. i'm not that big a fan of like huge batfam stuff with everybody from every single universe, because as much as it's funny for bruce to have like 30 kids, it just feels a little too OOC for me.

This is the best tag I've seen involving the batfam, thanks for thinking of it

This is canon now @nctxrejects

lmao yeah i think at that point alfred has had to sit through like at least a dozen coming out talks and just has a pride flag collection in the attic that he pulls out whenever a kid comes out

idk why batfam hits different as compared to any other superhero family

bc it's found family and usually the other superhero families are almost all genetically related in one way or another

I don't know if you watch the umbrella academy but I saw your last post about batcest and saw the similarities. But the thing is (although I think it's weird) in TUA, they addressed it by saying "they were raised as weapons, not siblings" or something along those lines, which is simply not the case with batfam.

yeah i watched tua but i also thought it was ridiculous and they still treated each other as siblings so i didn't like the luthor/allison thing, and am glad they stopped doing that shit bc it fucking sucked.

Hot take: Batcest shippers are the same people who believe adopted siblings are not actual siblings

smoking hot take: batcest shippers are the people who watch 'my sister got stuck in the washing machine' porn

Duke was adopted by Bruce?

not technically no, but do i, tumblr user batarangsoundsdumb, look like i care?

True story but I had to change my freaking name because it used to be "Damien" and most people would go "OH LIKE DAMIAN WAYNE" like please I'm just tryna live

true story, but i don't actually think of damian when i hear the name damian, literally the first thing that pops up is damian darkh like bruh what?

apparently dc comics company supported comic stores by giving out new titles and stuff during the beginning of the pandemic to help them run and I just think that's wholesome

ah yeah that's so fucking cool, still don't like dc, the company, because this world is a capitalist hellhole and we're all owned by warner brothers or disney with no in between.

ayo looking at tumblr head canons and finding out bruce is actually a terrible father is a punch in the gut

lmao yes, in like 50% of comics bruce is a terrible father and it gives me whiplash

oooh I just saw the jason todd vs winter soldier post and the real question is: batman vs iron man

while iron man has like hundreds of cases of armor, batman could throw out an emp and have the guy dropping out of the sky in 2 seconds.

dickfast = fastdick = quickdick = quickie

magnum hot take

hey bata(?) just thought I'd let you know I have copied the obnoxious emoji and Billy Ray post for use on simping men going forth

thank you 😘🌷 (@spacebarsidecar)

why would you do that to your followers???? i get why i did it, but why would you???

what is scarecrow made the nightwing funko pop himself, like those diy-ers that paint over other ones

oh god no, horrible take, horrible take, that's a disgusting thought oh no

I see your HC that Bruce and Oliver fucked and raise you this: Dick and Roy ALSO fucked

yes they did and it was a horrible moment for jason to find out dick has fucked both of his best friends

"at this rate bruce adds like 1 child to his family every decade or so" Duke is introduced in 2013, Damian as Damian, not as an unnamed child, in 2006. And he is already 14 years old, Robins rarely remain Robins after 16 😬 It looks like a new Robin and Batkid will appear in a couple of years

i mean i can't wait? but somebody will probably die first tho, we're due for another major character death. my money's on either cass or duke this time.

BRO you're so right all of your Bruce's ex headcanons are amazing but they aren't ships, that's kinda wild. Like I don't want any peeks into how their relationship was I just want to see everyone make fun of them

lmao YES it's just i love bruce being a slut, like good for him.

I am in love with your posts your honour thank you

omg thanks are we like,, gonna kiss now?

The justice league needs to have a meeting to discuss how many of their members/partners have slept with bruce. Because through a combination of cannon & fannon (if DC wasn’t homophobic) we have AT LEAST: 1) clark 2) lois 3) oliver 4) dinah 5) john

Thats not counting villains or random civilians @dudelookitsalesbian

yes yes yes, they'll have a yearly meeting about how many of their collective exes could be out for revenge and batman's list just keeps getting longer.

tim was like "i'm drake now" and everyone was like ahh so your fursona is a dragon and tim was like pffffft no. ducks.

and what about it?

when steph's fighting livewire and she zaps her with lighting and nothing happens and then they both just. stand there awkwardly for a second and talk. yeah i couldn't stop laughing at that batgirl steph is the BEST

oh yeah that was fucking hilarious and i think it would be so cool and sexy of dc to give steph a little comic series,,, as a treat

Hi I absolutely adore all of yours "Bruce and Oliver very badly pretending they didn't fuck each other" memes

lmao i do too

I need you to know that “Bruce Wayne had frosted tips” is one of my favorite Bruce takes of all time it’s so galaxy brained. you’re right and you should say it

he also painted his hair blonde once when he was travelling and in conclusion, this is why he's being blackmailed by the gotham gazette.

you know my thing about gordon being branded as the only good cop in gotham is its a load of shit like arguably he's a good person and not working to screw people over or anything but the fact that he also works w. batman makes him a shit cop. like yea batman is better than the mob but its still illegal its still an abuse of power he just not making bank

babe, all cops are bad cops. (but yeah youre absolutely right, working with vigilantes makes you a shit cop, but also working against vigilantes just makes you an asshole cop yanno?)

ruh roh i think i’m about to add “so not yeehaw” every time i don’t like something

that's a very good vocabulary upgrade

somehow i feel like steph already knew. like babs obviously knew but i feel like bruce got high/drunk in front of steph and started telling his boarding school stories and steph was just like “oh you fucked up i’m never gonna forget this”

steph and bruce have weird uncle/rebellious niece dynamic and they just hang out sometimes and bruce will be like 'i once broke my arm when i tripped over a hedge when i was drunk so oliver drove me to the hospital on an electric scooter' and steph will just have to sit there with that knowledge in her head.

Hello I just wanted to tell you you are So right in all your steph opinions bc she is, in fact amazing and I think that's very sexy of you. Ps. Your Bruce/Oliver fic is hilarious

babe, thank you so much and yes steph is amazing and i love her and she deserves the world and she's the best member of the batfam hands down. also thanks

In Supersons we see a couple of kids that are implied to be Damian and Jon's children and the boy has laser eyes and can fly, so I asume he's not adopted. The girl, who calls Bruce grandpa, can also fly, btw. So it's canon (probably by accident) that Jon can have kids and he must have married one of Bruce's kids. (I'm hoping for Damian, mostly because any other of his children would be waaaaaaaaaaaaay too old.) @artemisa97

lmao that was probably an accident seeing as jon is a 17 year old superhero in the year 3000 (by the jonas brothers)

You know, I'm a die hard fan of your memes, but I gotta say one thing: if Gothamites actually took gas mask everywhere with them, then the Scarecrow would just be a weird dude in a weird costume, and not a villain oh so scary. DC really should just takes notes from you.

bold of you to assume there's no gothamite anti-maskers

How does it feel being the funniest person on this app?

horrible, next question.

I can't listen to Green Day or Billy Joel without thinking of your post about how Bruce got arrested at a Billy Joel concert @nightwings-kid

yeah that's your mistake, i on the other hand can't enjoy billy joel without thinking about the glee rendition of 'uptown girl'

I've FINALLY been watching the Batman animated series and I gotta say, after watching "the gray ghost" I am CONVINCED that Batman is a closeted super hero geek who was 100% freaking out the first time he met Superman and is just REALLY good at hiding it.

superman: so what do you do in your free time? batman, thinking about the superman fanfiction he's writing on the batcomputer: i have no free time

bruce and oliver be like boyfriends to co-workers 401k (do the justice leagues get 401ks??? not that bruce and ollie would need them, but-)

lmao yes just 400 thousand words of bruce realising 'oh dip oliver is such a fucking dumbass' (also i don't know what a 401 k is but i assume they don't?)

Gothamites would totally boo superman as he saves Gotham while batman is out. @meenje

he's like 'okay think about that next time you want to be saved from an alien octopus'

I just took long break from dc comics and I come back to see ric grayson ??

i think it's very cool and sexy of dc to see dick and just think 'you know what? let's just give him a traumatic brain injury' and then didn't develop his character in any real way

SPEAKING OF RIC GRAYSON, gothamites making confused memes out of ric grayson is much needed

'dick grayson is my taxi driver? can anyone explain what the fuck happened he looks like an italian plumber?'

i hate to say it but batfam are def "marvel characters" in that sense they are characters who are human but become superheroes unlike most dc characters who are gods trying to be human maybe this is why I like batfam

fair enough

[sk1fanfiction]

the many faces of tom riddle, part 4

-attachment, orphanages, and yet more child psych: time to add yet another voice to the void-

FULL DISCLAIMER THAT THIS IS JUST MY OPINION OF A CHARACTER WHO DOESN’T HAVE THE STRONGEST CANON CHARACTERIZATION, AND THUS ALL THIS IS BASED ON MY CONCEPTUALIZATION.

I'm going to be super biased, because my favorite portrayal of Tom Riddle is actually Hero Fiennes-Tiffin as eleven-year-old Tom Riddle, in HBP and I get to chat about child psych in this one, sooo here we go.

First of all, I’m just so impressed that a kid could bring that much depth to such a complex character.

This is the portrayal, I feel, that brings us closest to Tom’s character. Yes, Coulson’s brought us pretty close, but by fifth year, the mask was on.

We don't really get to see Tom looking afraid very often, but it's fear that rules his life, so it's really poignant in our first (chronologically) introduction, he looks absolutely terrified.

The void being the fandom's loud opinions on a certain headmaster. I wouldn't call myself pro-Dumbledore, but I'm certainly not anti-Dumbledore, either. (Agnostic-Dumbledore??)

Since I'm not of the anti-Dumbledore persuasion, I decided to poke around in the tags and see what the arguments were, so I don't make comments out of ignorance.

Most of the tag seems to be more directed towards his treatment of Harry and Sirius, but a few people mentioned that Dumbledore should have treated Tom with ‘exceptional kindness’ and tried to ‘rehabilitate’ him.

As I said in Parts 2 and 3, I am 100% in favor of helping a traumatized kid learn to cope, and I don’t think Tom Riddle was solidly on the Path to Evil (TM) at birth, or even at eleven. Not even at fifteen.

Could unconditional love and kindness have helped Tom Riddle enough for the rise of Lord Voldemort to never happen? Possibly, but...

Yes, I'm about to drag up that Carl Jung quote, again.

“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.”

The problem with this is that if you’re going to blame Dumbledore for this, you also have to blame every other adult in Tom’s life: his headmaster, Dippet, his Head of House, Slughorn, his ‘caretakers’ at the orphanage, Mrs. Cole and Martha, and possibly more. In fact, if we're going to blame any adult, let's blame Merope for r*ping and abusing Tom Riddle Senior, and having a kid she wasn't intending to take care of.

Furthermore, you cannot possibly hold anyone but Tom accountable for the murders he committed. (I should not have to sit here and explain why cold-blooded murder is wrong.) And if you like Tom Riddle's character, insinuating that his actions are completely at the whim of others is just a bit condescending towards him. He's not an automaton or a marionette, he's a very intelligent human being with a functioning brain, and at sixteen is fully capable of moral reasoning and critical analysis.

I've heard the theories about Dumbledore setting the Potters up to die, and I'm not going to discuss their validity right now; but he didn't put a wand in Tom's hand and force him to kill anyone. Tom did it all of his own accord.

And while yes, I have enormous sympathy for what happened to Tom as a child, at some point, he decided to murder Myrtle Warren, and that is where I lose my sympathy. Experiencing trauma does not give you the right to inflict harm on others. Yes, Tom was failed, but then, he spectacularly failed himself.

We also have no idea how Dumbledore treated Tom as a student.

In the movies, it’s Dumbledore who tells Tom he has to go back to the orphanage, but in the books, it’s Dippet. We know that Slughorn spent a lot of time around Tom at Slug Club and such, yet I don’t really see people clamoring for his head.

I regard the sentiment that Dumbledore turned Tom Riddle into Lord Voldemort with a lot of skepticism.

But let's hear from the character himself -- his impression of eleven-year-old Tom Riddle.

“Did I know that I had just met the most dangerous Dark wizard of all time?” said Dumbledore. “No, I had no idea that he was to grow up to be what he is. However, I was certainly intrigued by him. I returned to Hogwarts intending to keep an eye upon him, something I should have done in any case, given that he was alone and friendless, but which, already, I felt I ought to do for others’ sake as much as his."

Now, assuming that Dumbledore's telling the truth, I'm not seeing something glaringly wrong with this. No, he hasn't pigeonholed Tom as evil, yes, I'd be intrigued, too, and it's a very good idea to keep an eye on Tom, for his own sake.

“At Hogwarts,” Dumbledore went on, “we teach you not only to use magic, but to control it. You have — inadvertently, I am sure — been using your powers in a way that is neither taught nor tolerated at our school."

Again, it seems like he's at least somewhat sympathetic towards Tom, and is willing to at least give him a chance.

More evidence (again, assuming Dumbledore is a reliable narrator):

Harry: “Didn’t you tell them [the other professors], sir, what he’d been like when you met him at the orphanage?” Dumbledore: “No, I did not. Though he had shown no hint of remorse, it was possible that he felt sorry for how he had behaved before and was resolved to turn over a fresh leaf. I chose to give him that chance.”

Now, I think Dumbledore is pretty awful with kids, but I don't think that's malicious. Yeah, it's a flaw, but perfect people don't exist, and perfect characters are dead boring. I am not saying that he definitely handled Tom's case well, I'm just saying that there's little evidence that Dumbledore, however shaken and scandalized, wrote him off as 'evil snake boy.'

It's also worth taking into account that it's 1938, and the attitudes towards mental health back then.

Why is Tom looking at Dumbledore like that, anyway? Why is he so scared? What has he possibly been threatened with or heard whispers of?

"'Professor'?" repeated Riddle. He looked wary. "Is that like 'doctor'? What are you here for? Did she get you in to have a look at me?"

"I don't believe you," said Riddle. "She wants me looked at, doesn't she? Tell the truth!"

"You can't kid me! The asylum, that's where you're from, isn't it? 'Professor,' yes, of course -- well, I'm not going, see? That old cat's the one who should be in the asylum. I never did anything to little Amy Benson or Dennis Bishop, and you can ask them, they'll tell you!

Tom keeps insisting he's not mad until Dumbledore finally manages to calm him down.

I'm really upset this wasn't in the movie, because it's important context. Instead we got these throwaway cutscenes of some knick-knacks relating to the Cave he's got lying around, but I just would have preferred to see him freaking out like he does in the book.

There was extreme stigma and prejudice towards mental illness.

'Lunatic asylums,' as they were called in Tom's time, were terrible places. In the 1930s and 40s, he could look forward to being 'treated' with induced convulsions, via metrazol, insulin, electroshock, and malaria injections. And if he stuck around long enough, he could even look forward to a lobotomy!

So, if you think Dumbledore was judgmental towards Tom, imagine how flat-out prejudiced whatever doctors or 'experts' Mrs. Cole might have gotten in to 'look at him' must have been!

Moving on to the next few shots, he is sitting down and hunched over as if expecting punishment or at least some kind of bad news, Dumbledore is mostly out of the frame. He’s trapped visually, by Dumbledore on one side, and a wall on the other, because he’s still very much afraid. uncomfortable, as he tells Dumbledore a secret that he fears could get him committed to an asylum (which were fucking horrible places, as I said).

It brings to the scene that miserable sense of isolation and loneliness to that has defined Tom’s entire life up to that point (and, partially due to his own bad choices, continues to define it).

And, when Dumbledore accepts it, his posture changes. he becomes more confident and more at ease, as he describes the... utilities of his magical abilities. 

"All sorts," breathed Riddle. A flush of excitement was rising up his neck into his hollow cheeks; he looked fevered. "I can make things move without touching them. I can make animals do what I want them to do, without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who annoy me. I can make them hurt if I want to."

Riddle lifted his head. His face was transfigured: There was a wild happiness upon it, yet for some reason it did not make him better looking; on the contrary, his finely carved features seemed somehow rougher, his expression almost bestial.

I do think Harry, our narrator, is being a tad bit judgmental here. Magic is probably the only thing that brings Tom happiness in his grey, lonely world, and when I was Tom's age and being bullied, if I had magic powers, you'd better believe that I'd (a) be bloody ecstatic about it (b) use them. And, like Tom, I can't honestly say that I can't imagine getting a bit carried-away with it. Unfortunately, we can't all be as inherently good and kindhearted as Harry.

Reading HBP again, as a 'mature' person, it almost seems like the reader is being prompted to see Tom as evil just because he's got 'weird' facial expressions.

So... uh...

Nope, let's judge Tom on his actions, not looks of 'wild happiness.'

To his great surprise, however, Dumbledore drew his wand from an inside pocket of his suit jacket, pointed it at the shabby wardrobe in the corner, and gave the wand a casual flick. The wardrobe burst into flames. Riddle jumped to his feet; Harry could hardly blame him for howling in shock and rage; all his worldly possessions must be in there. But even as Riddle rounded on Dumbledore, the flames vanished, leaving the wardrobe completely undamaged.

Okay, one thing I dislike is Tom's lack of emotional affect when Dumbledore burned the wardrobe, in the books, he jumped up and started screaming, instead of looking passively (in shock, perhaps?) at the fire. Incidentally, I can't really tell if he's impressed or in shock, to be honest. I think they really tried to make Tom 'creepier' in the movie.

This is one of the incidents where Dumbledore's inability to deal with children crops up.

I think he was trying to teach Tom that magic can be dangerous, and he wouldn't like it to be used against him, but burning the wardrobe that contains everything he owns was a terrible move on Dumbledore's part. Tom already has very limited trust in other people, and now, he's not going to trust Dumbledore at all -- now, he's put Tom on the defensive/offensive for the rest of their interaction, and perhaps for the rest of their teacher-student relationship.

Riddle stared from the wardrobe to Dumbledore; then, his expression greedy, he pointed at the wand. "Where can I get one of them?"

"Where do you buy spellbooks?" interrupted Riddle, who had taken the heavy money bag without thanking Dumbledore, and was now examining a fat gold Galleon.

But I'm not surprised Tom is 'greedy.' He's grown up in an environment where if he wants something, whether that's affection, food, money, toys, he's got to take it. There's no one looking after his needs specifically. I'm not surprised that he's a thief and a hoarder, and I don't think that counts as a moral failing necessarily, and more of a maladaptive way of seeking comfort. It would be bizarre if he came out of Wool's Orphanage a complete saint.

Additionally, I think given that the Gaunt family has a history of 'mental instability,' Tom is a sensitive child, and the trauma of growing up institutionalized and possibly being treated badly due to his magical abilities or personality disorder deeply affected him.

And there are points where it seems that Dumbledore is quick to judge Tom.

"He was already using magic against other people, to frighten, to punish, to control."

"Yes, indeed; a rare ability, and one supposedly connected with the Dark Arts, although as we know, there are Parselmouths among the great and the good too. In fact, his ability to speak to serpents did not make me nearly as uneasy as his obvious instincts for cruelty, secrecy, and domination."

"I trust that you also noticed that Tom Riddle was already highly self-sufficient, secretive, and, apparently, friendless?..."

And while this is all empirically true, these are (a) a product of Tom's harsh environment, and (b) do not necessarily make him evil. But the point remains that child psych didn't exist as a field of its own, and psychology as a proper science was in its infancy, so I'd be shocked if Dumbledore was insightful about Tom's situation.

But I've gone a ton of paragraphs without citing anything, so I've got to rectify that.

Let's talk about Harry Harlow's monkey experiments in the 1950-70s.

If you're not a fan of animal research, since I know some people are uncomfortable with it, feel free to scroll past.

Here's the TL;DR: Children need to be hugged and shown affection too, not just fed and clothed, please don't leave babies to 'cry out' and ignore their needs because it's backwards and fucking inhumane. HUG AND COMFORT AND CODDLE CHILDREN AND SPOIL THEM WITH AFFECTION!

I will put more red writing when the section is over.

This is still an interesting experiment to have in mind while we explore the whole 'no one taught Tom Riddle how to love' thing and whether or not it's actually a good argument.

Andddd let's go all the way back to the initial 1958 experiment, featured in Harlow's paper, the Nature of Love. (If you're familiar with Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, him and Harlow actually collaborated for a time).

To give you an idea of our starting point, until Harlow's experiment, which happened twenty years after Dumbledore meets Tom for the first time, no one in science had really been interested in studying love and affection.

"Psychologists, at least psychologists who write textbooks, not only show no interest in the origin and development of love or affection, but they seem to be unaware of its very existence."

I'm going to link some videos of Harry Harlow showing the actual experiment, which animal rights activists would probably consider 'horrifying.' It's nothing gory or anything, but if you are particularly soft-hearted (and I do not mean that as an insult), be warned. It's mostly just baby monkeys being very upset and Harlow discussing it in a callous manner. Yes, today it would be considered unethical, but it's still incredibly important work and if you think you can handle it, I would recommend watching at least the first one to get an idea of how dramatic this effect is.

Dependency when frightened

The full experiment

The TL;DW:

This experiment was conducted with rhesus macaques; they're still used in psychology/neuroscience research when you want very human-like subjects, because they are very intelligent (unnervingly so, actually). I'd say that adult ones remind me of a three-year old child.

Harlow separated newborn monkeys from their mothers, and cared for their physical needs. They had ample nutrition, bedding, warmth, et cetera. However, the researchers noticed that the monkeys:

(a) were absolutely miserable. And not just that, but although all their physical needs were taken care of, they weren't surviving well past the first few days of life. (This has also been documented in human babies, and it's called failure to thrive and I'll talk about it a bit later).

(b) showed a strong attachment to the gauze pads used to cover the floor, and decided to investigate.

So, they decided to provide a surrogate 'mother.' Two, actually. Mother #1 was basically a heated fuzzy doll that was nice for the monkeys to cuddle with. Mother #2 was the same, but not fuzzy and made of wire. Both provided milk. The result? The monkeys spent all their time cuddling and feeding from the fuzzy 'mother.' Perhaps not surprising.

What Harlow decided next, is that one of the hallmarks being attached to your caregiver is seeking hugs and reassurance from them when frightened. So, when the monkeys were presented with something scary, they'd go straight to the cloth mother and ignore the wire one. Not only that, but when placed in an unfamiliar environment, if the cloth mother was present, the monkeys would be much calmer.

In a follow-up experiment, Harlow decided to see if there was some sort of sensitive period by introducing both 'mothers' to monkeys who had been raised in isolation for 250 days. Guess what?

The initial reaction of the monkeys to the alterations was one of extreme disturbance. All the infants screamed violently and made repeated attempts to escape the cage whenever the door was opened. They kept a maximum distance from the mother surrogates and exhibited a considerable amount of rocking and crouching behavior, indicative of emotionality.

Yikes. So, at first Harlow thought that they'd passed some kind of sensitive period for socialization. But after a day or two they calmed down and started chilling out with the cloth mother like the other monkeys did. But here's a weird thing:

That the control monkeys develop affection or love for the cloth mother when she is introduced into the cage at 250 days of age cannot be questioned. There is every reason to believe, however, that this interval of delay depresses the intensity of the affectional response below that of the infant monkeys that were surrogate-mothered from birth onward

All these things... attachment, affection, love, seeking comfort ... are mostly learned behaviours.

Over.

Orphanages, institutionalized childcare, and why affection is a need, not an extra.

His face is lit the exact same was as Coulson’s was in COS (half-light, half-dark), and I said I was going to talk about this in Part 3. I think perhaps it's intended to make Fiennes-Tiffin look more evil or menacing, but I'm going to quite deliberately misinterpret it.

Now, for some context, Dumbledore has just (kind of) burned his wardrobe, ratted out his stealing habit, and (in the books only, they really took a pair of scissors to this scene) told him he needs to go apologize and return everything and Dumbledore will know if he doesn't, and, well, Tom's not exactly a happy bugger about it.

But interestingly, in the books, this is when we start to see Tom's 'persona,' aka his mask, start to come into play. Whereas before, he was screaming, howling, and generally freaking out, here, he starts to hide his emotions -- in essence, obscure his true self under a shadow. So this scene is really the reverse of Coulson's in COS.

And perhaps I'm reading wayyy too much into this, but I can't help but notice that Coulson's hair is parted opposite to Fiennes-Tiffin's, and the opposite sides of their faces are shadowed, too.

Riddle threw Dumbledore a long, clear, calculating look. "Yes, I suppose so, sir," he said finally, in an expressionless voice.

Riddle did not look remotely abashed; he was still staring coldly and appraisingly at Dumbledore. At last he said in a colorless voice, "Yes, sir."

Here's an article from The Atlantic on Romanian orphanages in the 1980s, when the dictator, Ceausescu, basically forced people to have as many children as possible and funnel them into institutionalized 'childcare', and it's absolutely heartbreaking.

There's not a whole lot of information out there on British orphanages in the 30s' and 40s', but given that people back then thought you just had to keep children on a strict schedule and feed them, it wouldn't have a whole lot better.

The only thing I've found is this, and it's not super promising.

The most important study informing the criteria for contemporary nosologies, was a study by Barbara Tizard and her colleagues of young children being raised in residential nurseries in London (Tizard, 1977). These nurseries had lower child to caregiver ratios than many previous studies of institutionalized children. Also, the children were raised in mixed aged groups and had adequate books and toys available. Nevertheless, caregivers were explicitly discouraged from forming attachments to the children in their care.

Here's a fairly recent paper that I think gives a good summary: Link

Here, they describe the responses to the Strange Situation test (which tests a child's attachment to their caregiver).

We found that 100% of the community sample received a score of “5,” indicating fully formed attachments, whereas only 3% of the infants living in institutions demonstrated fully formed attachments. The remaining 97% showed absent, incomplete, or odd and abnormal attachment behaviors.

Bowlby and Ainsworth, who did the initial study, thought that children would always attach to their caregivers, regardless of neglect or abuse. But some infants don't attach (discussed along with RAD in Part 2).

Here's a really good review paper on attachment disorders in currently or formerly institutionalized children : Link

Core features of RAD in young children include the absence of focused attachment behaviors directed towards a preferred caregiver, failure to seek and respond to comforting when distressed, reduced social and emotional reciprocity, and disturbances of emotion regulation, including reduced positive affect and unexplained fearfulness or irritability.

Which all sounds a lot like Tom in this scene. The paper also discusses neurological effects, like atypical EEG power distribution (aka brain waves), which can correlate with 'indiscriminate' behavior and poor inhibitory control; which makes sense for a kid who, oh, I don't know, hung another kid's rabbit because they were angry.

Furthermore...

...those children with more prolonged institutional rearing showed reduced amygdala discrimination and more indiscriminate behavior.

This again, makes a ton of sense for Tom's psychological profile, because the amygdala (which is part of the limbic system, which regulates emotions) plays a major role in fear, anger, anxiety, and aggression, especially with respect to learning, motivation and memory.

So, I agree completely that Tom needed a lot of help, especially given the fact that he spent eleven years in an orphanage (longer than the Bucharest study I was referring to), and Dumbledore wasn't exactly understanding of his situation, and probably didn't realise what a dramatic effect the orphanage had on Tom, and given the way he talks to Tom, probably treated him as if he were a kid who grew up in a healthy environment.

In case you are still unconvinced that hugging is that important, there's a famous 1944 study conducted on 40 newborn human infants to see what would happen if their physical needs (fed, bathed, diapers changed) were provided for with no affection. The study had to be stopped because half the babies died after four months. Affection leads to the production of hormones and boosts the immune system, which increases survival, and that is why we hug children and babies should not be in orphanages. They are supposed to be hugged, all the time. I can't find the citation right now, I'll add it later if I find it.

But I think it's vastly unrealistic to say that Dumbledore, who grew up during the Victorian Era, would have any grasp of this and I don't think he was actively malicious towards Tom.

Was Tom Riddle failed by institutional childcare? Absolutely.

Were the adults in his life oblivious to his situation? Probably.

Do the shitty things that happened to Tom excuse the murders he committed, and are they anyone's fault but his own? No. At the end of the day, Tom made all the wrong choices.

And, for what it's worth, I think (film) Dumbledore (although he expresses the same sentiment in more words in the books) wishes he could go back in time and have helped Tom.

"Draco. Years ago, I knew a boy, who made all the wrong choices. Please, let me help you."

[tyunniverse]

FRIENDS FOR A DAY (2)

pair: yeonjun x reader

genre: fluff

word count: 2654

parts: 1 | 2

· · ───────────── ·.☆.· ───────────── · ·

It had been a long time since Yeonjun felt like this. Sometimes life in general had become too much to bear and the things that used to make him happy weren't working for him anymore. Times spent alone slowly became more frequent for him than times he'd spent with his friends.

He'd skipped the first day, not wanting to go back to that routine life just yet. And towards the start of the day, he would never have imagined meeting you and getting to spend the day doing things that strayed far from any of the schedules he'd previously planned. A breath of fresh air was what he liked to call it, and he had you to thank for that.

Unlike him, everything was new to you; a new city, a new school, new people, and a whole new life ahead. Yeonjun felt a little envious after realizing it when you'd talked more about yourselves during lunch, but after seeing how you seemed to enjoy every single second of your little sight seeing endeavor, he thought that maybe he could also be a part of something new in your life.

Best friends.

You had agreed to be his best friend from today onwards; the pendant around your neck serving as proof. Yeonjun finds his hand wandering over to his pocket, holding on to his old necklace.

Half of a star. He'd bought it a few years back. The necklace had a similar purpose with the one he was wearing now— meant to be worn separately by two different people. In his case, he had bought it as a whole and had decided to keep one half of it still in its case, stashed inside his closet. His reasons for purchasing it never really felt clear even to him but he also wouldn't call it an impulsive decision. Yeonjun liked to think that he'd be able to find a use for it in the future.

"Yeonjun." You call for his attention, pointing at the posters plastered on a random shop's wall. "It says that the annual carnival will be opening tonight. Wanna go?"

Yeonjun grins. Opportunities somehow kept showing up right in front of his doorstep. "Yeah, only if you want to though. Afterall, I'm only the tour guide for today."

"Shut up." You hold back a smile. "Have you been there before?"

Yeonjun repeats the question in his mind. As someone one would consider pretty popular, you'd expect him to be no stranger in hanging out at fun places like an annual carnival, but that's just it. Yeonjun had never visited that Carnival once ever since it opened. His friends had asked him to tag along but something about it just never seemed to make him want to.

"No." Yeonjun answers, scratching the back of his head. "If we end up going then this would be my first time too." The first time he'd actually wanted to go.

"I guess we're going then." You grin and Yeonjun finds himself smiling back. "It says here that the Carnival's just around the corner so it'd probably be okay if we just walked there."

"Yeah."

The two of you make your way to the Carnival. You still had a good amount of time left before it opened so a few quick stops at some stalls along the way didn't do any harm.

· · ───────────── ·.☆.· ───────────── · ·

In all honesty, Yeonjun didn't even know when and how he'd ended up holding your hand, laughing his heart off by the time you arrived at the entrance but it all just happened somehow. Was it the when your ice cream cone almost landed straight on his shoe earlier? Or when his hand nearly hit you square in the face when he noticed a bug flying towards you? It could've even been when a group of old ladies started hitting on him at the handbag boutique and all you did was stand there shaking, wanting to laugh your ass off.

No matter what the reason was, he liked this. Somehow, it just felt right.

The two of you pay for the tickets before heading inside. The place was larger than any of you had ever expected, cleaner too. People of all ages were enjoying their carnival experience to the fullest. Children were running around with their guardians following closely behind, couples and groups of friends chatting along and taking pictures— Yeonjun could swear he saw two old men arguing over who gets to take a picture with the mascot first.

"So, which ride do you wanna go on first?" You ask, turning to him.

"Well, how about that one." Yeonjun points at the viking and you feel yourself getting more and more excited.

"NICE—" Before Yeonjun knew it, you were dragging him around to every single ride at the carnival.

You liked to keep count of everytime Yeonjun freaked out while you went on the rides, and Yeonjun liked to do the same. Despite the thrill of being at a carnival keeping you hyped up, there were a few times when you had overestimated your tolerance with being thrown around. Yeonjun nearly puked twice: once at the twister, and a second time on the rollercoaster. Even you were almost a victim by the rollercoaster's loops.

Yeonjun had claimed he was an expert at navigating haunted house attractions, stating, "I've been watching horror movies all my life. Nothing scares me at this point, tbh." True enough, nothing scared Yeonjun except every single ominous decoration and jump scares the haunted house threw at him. You weren't too fond of horror yourself, but you ended up trying to be the brave one after Yeonjun basically clung to you half of the time. It didn't help whenever you freaked out since you ended up losing Yeonjun after he not so subtly abandons you at the slightest suspicious sound. It was a miracle you made it out in one piece.

"Yeah, so, uh, sorry about that." Yeonjun laughs it off the moment you two got out.

"Sure but you should know that I'm never gonna let you live it down." You tell him, smiling widely as you hold up the photos you received from one of the staff. "I got evidence."

Yeonjun snatches the photos from your hands. "Bold of you to assume these'll affect me— oh." It definitely did.

You watch as he slips the photos inside his jacket as if it wasn't obvious enough that he was trying to hide it from you. "Nice try but," You take out another batch of photos and wave it around. "Boom. Two copies."

"Wow, okay."

The two of you ended up laughing at each other before you suggest in trying out the stalls. They say time flies by fast when you're having fun and they couldn't be more right. There had been an unspoken competition between you and Yeonjun of who can win the most prizes and let's just say you weren't about to let yourself lose. By the time you got tired, you had a total of three plushies and a bunch of candy bars stuffed in your pockets and well, Yeonjun had the exact amount of prizes you had.

"Fine. It's a draw for now but only because I'm tired." Yeonjun holds the plushies tighter. "We should really get a bag for this. I wonder if we can get a huge plastic bag somewhere."

"Nah, we can just put em in here." You take off your back pack, opening it wide. "I'm sure it can fit all six of them. They're small enough." You were lucky that they did, finally leaving your hands free.

"Wait." Yeonjun pauses after putting the last of his plushies inside. "How can I be sure you won't just take my plushies for yourself after we leave? I'm pretty easy to distract so—"

"If you forget to get them back then I'll just hand them to you tomorrow at school. You go to HSU too, right?" You tell him.

"Yeah, but how will you contact me?"

"Obviously, we exchange numbers."

Yeonjun blinks. Of course that'd be the simplest solution but still. He'd been talking about staying as friends even after all this but the thought of exchanging numbers hadn't really crossed his mind. He takes out his phone and the two of you quickly added each other as contacts, somehow feeling a bit closer after the exchange.

"While we're at it—" Yeonjun pulls you in closer as he bends down. Only now that you've felt Yeonjun's warmth close to you have you noticed how cold it actually was outside . It takes you a few seconds to register that he wants to take a few selfies.

You bust out a smile and tried to go along with whatever weird faces and poses he did. "Send them to me later." You say after examining the photos. There's one where Yeonjun mimicked a kissing motion near your cheek, making you smile. Who would've expected you two were total strangers up until a few hours ago.

"Got room for one last ride?" Yeonjun asks as you return his phone.

"Yeah, sure. Which one?"

"Don't ask as if you don't know. I'm pretty sure you left this one out on purpose."

Perhaps unconsciously, you did. In every single movie that involved the two characters going to a carnival, for some reason, they always left the Ferris Wheel for last. It's not like you wanted something grand to happen when you ride it, but more like you just wanted to get a good view of the entire carnival before leaving. It seemed like the perfect final attraction.

Yeonjun notices how you've gone quiet and decided to hold your hand, pulling you along. "Let's go before the place closes."

"Okay." You look up at him, nodding.

· · ───────────── ·.☆.· ───────────── · ·

The Ferris Wheel ride wasn't all you had expected it to be. It looked pretty slow in the movies but right now? You were about to puke.

"Yeonjun, wait." You hold on to Yeonjun who was sitting opposite to you.

The Ferris Wheel was going too fast to your liking and you started feeling dizzy. Getting a good view of the carnival seemed impossible at this point and looking at your partner made you even more miserable.

Yeonjun was having the time of his life. He loved the feeling in his stomach whenever the ride went down, and the fact that you were lowkey suffering right in front of him made him laugh even harder.

The speed went on for a few more rounds until it finally slows down. Your heart and probably everything else stilled once the ride came to a complete stop just as your car reached the top. "Thank God. I felt like I was going to die."

"Well, you're safe for now." Yeonjun grins, leaning back in his heat. "You wanted to enjoy the view, right? We'll be stuck here for probably about a minute or two so enjoy it while it lasts."

"Yeah." You smile back, looking outside the window.

The winds were colder up there, reminding you of how warm it felt when you stood close to Yeonjun earlier. Yeonjun catches you warming yourself up with your hands and chuckles. He takes off his jacket and hands it over to you. "Here, put this on."

"Thanks." You quickly put his jacket on. Usually you'd go for the polite route and turn him down but if you were going to continue this friendship business then you weren't about to suffer in the cold when the dude's practically handing you a solution.

Yeonjun gives you a little smile before you continue to admire the view. Down there, the lights almost looked like a sea of stars. The music around the place didn't really help set the mood but somehow, the mixture of it along with the laughter and delightful screams of the other visitors made it feel right. After everything that happened today, you felt like it was the right decision to end the day with this breathtaking sight.

And Yeonjun couldn't agree more. The lights below reflected in your eyes in a way that made the atmosphere lighter. He could tell you were happy and right now, that seemed to be enough for him.

The Ferris Wheel began moving. Yeonjun snickers as he felt you grab for his hand, worried that the ride might throw you off once more, but it didn't. The way down was slow, allowing you to enjoy the ride in peace. Your pendant started to shine, reflecting the lights. It reminded him of everything that happened, from the moment you two met and agreed on a friendship that would last for only a day, up until now where he held your hand on the Ferris Wheel after deciding to be friends for real this time. The pendant became the sole proof of that friendship and Yeonjun couldn't help but wonder if the ones he bought a few years back would truly be of any use in the future. But what would it symbolize for? Who knows, he might just give you the other half.

Your car comes to a stop and the doors open. The realization that the day has officially come to an end left you feeling disappointed. Yeonjun squeezes your hand, bringing your attention to him. He gestures for the two of you to get up and you do, finally stepping back on the ground.

Both you and Yeonjun felt that the way back to the entrance was too fast. It really did seem like the two of you wouldn't see each other again despite the fact you went to the same university. The thought felt silly but that's just how the carnival experience gets to you.

"I guess this is it." Yeonjun speaks up first. "You live pretty far from here, right? I can take you home if you want."

"It's okay. My cousin lives nearby and I texted her earlier that I'd be staying over." You tell him, not wanting him to worry. "How about you? Will you be alright on your own?"

"Yeah, definitely." Yeonjun reassures, holding up his hands. "Oh, and by the way. Is it okay if I leave the plushies on your bag for now? I can't exactly carry them on the way back. If it's ok with you."

"Don't worry. You can just take them back tomorrow." You grin and Yeonjun smiles back. "Also, I'm keeping your jacket for now. I'll return it after I clean it up."

"I can work with that." He shouldn't feel this happy but he did. In a way, he was able to find an excuse to meet up with you tomorrow without things getting awkward. Maybe this friendship could work out afterall.

"Thanks for today. Honestly, this was the most fun I've had ever since I got here." You say, taking one last look at him.

I should be the one to thank you. "You know, I have a lot of things I wanna say to you right now but I think I'm gonna wait until I feel like it."

"Huh?"

"Nothing. I'll text you later." Yeonjun gives you a quick pat on the shoulder before running off to the opposite direction. "See you at school! And don't forget to bring the kids!"

You raise a brow. Did he just refer to the plushies as his kids?

He felt dumb, running away from you. The longer he stayed, the more he had trouble leaving, which was new for him. It's been a while since he actually found someone he'd like to hang out with and he was having trouble controlling his excitement. Soon, you'd be able to visit each other's houses, hang out more freely, talk about your days as if it were nothing, and get to know each other more. Honestly speaking, Yeonjun couldn't wait for that day to come but I guess he'll just have to start with tomorrow.

[mercurygray]

You've already done an Eileen/Lewis thing, so feel free to save this one. Was hoping for another side to their relationship -- maybe a softer or quieter moment? Or maybe an uncharacteristic response that needs to be addressed?

This prompt is from such a long while ago, but I was stuck at work tonight and really not feeling anything else in my box and just, like...sometimes you gotta let the characters play a little dress up, right? 

She was a vision in red.

He knew in an instant he'd be the envy of the entire bar when she walked into the restaurant, all five foot six of her, stunning in scarlet and with a fur stole dripping off her shoulders like the stuff of Hollywood stardom, diamante clips in her ears and her hair in dark, shining waves on her shoulders. She gave her name to the maitre'd, who smiled and bowed like he knew her, and pointed Nixon out across the room, everyone's eyes following her as he stood up to take her hand, feeling completely unworthy of the smile she threw at him, and the kiss, fleeting and polite, that she brushed above his cheek.

"Wasn't sure you'd show," he admitted. "You must have a lot of invitations, these days - big USO star and all. And I hear there's a movie deal on the table? Paramount?"

She nodded, adjusting the fall of the fur stole around her shoulders. "I didn't throw over anyone too important for you tonight, if that's got you worried."

"Oh, thank goodness. About half of army command's here and I'd hate to have to get into it with someone on your behalf. Not that I couldn't do it, mind you, I'm pretty handy in a..." He trailed off, realizing from her smile that his mouth was running away from him a little, and cleared his throat. "Should we...should we order?"

She gave an almost regal nod, quietly smiling into the drinks menu as Lewis fumbled with his cigarette case and lit up, waiting for the waiter. "You know, we made a lot of jokes about you at boot camp," she observed, looking up with doe-like eyes over the top of the folded card.

"Did you now?"

She nodded, her smile wry. "Your big brown eyes, the fit on your PT shorts -  how your family had money."

He ignored the comment about the shorts, fully intending to come back to it at a later time. "Is that why you took this date with me? My money?" She gave a silent shrug, setting down the menu card, pretending indifference. "You can say it - I won't be offended by it. It's the way the world works, isn't it?"

Eileen took a breath, collecting herself, the red bow of her lips poised and perfect. "A year ago I might have said yes to that question. But I've been many things in my life, Captain Nixon, and I hope mercenary isn't always going to be one of them." He couldn't help but stare a little. "No," she said, playing with the clasp on her evening clutch, a small decorative box of a thing with a knot of jewels in the corner. "I'm here because... Joan talks about you a lot, in her letters, when she's trying to avoid talking about Dick, and you come off looking... pretty good. You're a good freind to her, and I believe in doing things for my friends. Including chaperoning their fake husbands on trips to London, if necessary."

He had to laugh. "She told you about that?"

"Oh, she's told me about everything," Eileen said with another wry smile. "And that's another reason why I took this date, Captain - you and I have things to discuss."

"We do?"

"About Joan. And ...other interested parties." Her gaze was calm and somehow also full of fire, the same mischief that he remembered, vaguely, from Toccoa, when she was off limits and he could not act on it. "I believe in doing good things for my friends, remember? And I think you do, too."

He couldn't help but smile, feeling that he was going to enjoy this far more than he'd anticipated. "If that's where tonight's is going, Miss Hammond, I have a feeling you'd better start calling me Lewis."

[fictionalrambles]

Shadowhunters Fandom Story - Part Six

Submitted by @lightwormsiblings​

Five Favourite Fics

Rosemary for the Soul by @poemsfromthealley​

Why I love this fic: Quiet conversations and storytelling are things that work very well for malec as a couple and this fic does both of them beautifully. I just love the way the past was brought up in this quiet moment and the way Alec listened to Magnus. The way Magnus is written is also phenomenal because it really shows how long he’s been around and how memory is a little bit different for him because of it. Basically, there’s not enough fic about Magnus telling Alec stories from his past, so I cherish this one.

Favorite quote: “I remember the sense of the moment. Not her face, only that she had dark hair, burned red by the sun here and there. Not her voice, though some of the things we talked about. Only the dry heat, and the feeling how sometimes you know, right away after meeting a person, that they're a good place to linger. That there's something there."

Break The Dark by @glorious-spoon​

Why I love this fic: There’s plenty of Maryse fic out there featuring her redemption arc but this one stuck with me in particular. It has honestly become canon in my mind about why exactly Maryse had her change of heart and realized she hadn’t been being the best mother to her children. It’s also an outside pov fic of malec which is also something I really adore. 

Favorite quote: How did Alec turn from that little boy to the stone-faced young man who’s standing in front of her like he’s braced for a blow?

How did Maryse turn into a woman whose children need to steel themselves to speak to her? (This realization KILLS me) 

i cannot touch because they are too near by @faejilly​ 

Why I love this fic: The parabatai bond is endlessly fascinating and this fic does a fantastic job at giving an in depth look into how it works. Plus there’s some wonderfully sweet malec moments and Magnus wanting to know about the parabatai bond because it’s a part of Alec and he loves Alec. I just love that concept in general. 

Favorite quote: It starts like this:

The ceremony ends with a flash of light, of power, and you have another heartbeat.

It's almost the same as yours, settles in your chest right where a heart should be, and it mostly beats the same, strong and steady, but not quite. It's not yours, and it never will be, but you guard it just the same, just as hard.

Harder, even. It's so much more precious than your own.

recesses of a lonely heart by @ralfstrashcan​

Why I love this fic: it’s an absolutely wonderful character study of Jace and the way he views love. Specifically his view of Alec and Izzy and the way he fits into the Lightwood family. This fic made me fall in love with Jace, and the lovey broken mess of a boy he is. 

Favorite quote: Jace blinks and feels hope take root in his heart, in his soul, that he might have found a security he can trust after all, a certainty he can fully rely on to be there for him, always.

It shatters a moment later when Alec turns to him with fear in his eyes and betrayal written all over his face. “No, it's not true! The demon deceived me!” he yells, agitated beyond reason, and Jace feels like he's been slapped across the heart with a seraph blade.

Of course. It was too good to be true. (Whoops that one’s kind of long but the whole quote kind of just shatters my heart into a million pieces)

If You've Got The Money, I've Got The Time by j__writes 

Why I love this fic: The best comfort fic in the world. I have no shame when I say I’ve reread this fic more times than I can count. A lovely and unique take on the fake relationship trope but one that hits all those amazing high school au tropes that make you nostalgic. It’s just overall so well written with great romance as well as friendship moments and just makes you smile through every chapter. 

Favorite quote: Perhaps it’s the alcohol drowning out all logical thought and causing his body to feel every echo of Magnus’ joy. Or maybe it’s the sparkling moonlight shining on Magnus’ wet lips when he smiles back at him, or the stars glimmering around them. Maybe it’s everything all together and all at once. Perhaps he will regret this in the morning, but right now, Alec is happy. (From my favorite scene of the entire fic)

Author story: 

Wow, well Shadowhunters has done so much for my writing. As a kid I always liked writing stories and planned out several novel length stories that I planned but never ended up finishing. I never wanted to become a professional writer but creating stories brought me a lot of joy. By the time I was in high school though, that love of writing had somehow disappeared. Watching Shadowhunters as an 18 year old fresh out of high school and falling for the characters suddenly lit that fire back up in me. I’m not sure how, to be honest. One minute I was staying up till dawn binging the show and the next I had somehow written an entire fic. Writing for this fandom for 3 years now has developed me so much as a writer in understanding how characters work and crafting stories that make people feel things. I like to think I’ve come a long way from that first fic I wrote. I’m so thankful for the show and the fandom for bringing me such amazing friends and reigniting my love for writing!

[manikas-whims]

Messing with Her

Pairing: Shouto Todoroki X Momo Yaoyorozu

Words: 1711

Rating: T

Read on: AO3 | FFnet

One. They are supposed to share just one lesson with the students of class B every week and yet somehow it has become the least bearable thing for Shouto. Although he isn’t much of an extrovert, he can bear with a few new faces but this doesn’t mean he’s ready to share seats with said new faces. And as if this isn’t enough, fate decides to play a dirty trick on him by giving him the worst possible seatmate for this particular class— Neito Monoma.

Not only does the blond hold some kind of personal grudge against class A but he is also nearly deranged. His obsession with annoying people is seriously worrisome. Negativity is known to eat away one’s inner conscience, deprive the person of liveliness and joy yet this boy thrives in chaos. Disaster fuels him like no drug can ever. And Shouto is extremely disgruntled to have to share a seat with him for a whole year.

He doesn’t pay heed to the crazy boy’s taunts and focuses on Sir Cementos, who is explaining something about strategizing which they’ll have to apply later on in test missions. His eyes glance ahead, stopping upon the back of a girl with silky, black locks next to an orange haired girl from class B. He sighs. It was his lovely, dark haired, seatmate herself who had suggested this new seat arrangement by drawing lots so as to help the two sections become more accustomed to one another and to make some new friends. Well he certainly does not need new friends. He is content with having her, Midoriya and Iida.

“Ohh so Mr. Cool Guy here is now ignoring me.” Monoma speaks, feigning a hurt expression.

Shouto finds the nickname funny, considering how hot-headed he gets when having to deal with idiots like these. But just like the rest of his classmates, he’s promised his class representatives that he’ll try to learn from this experience, not pick fights. And so, he tries to concentrate on what is being taught right in front of him.

“Is it your class rep, you’re thinking about?” Monoma says, his eyes now fixated on Yaoyorozu.

“Oh I know..” Monoma clicks his fingers, as if he’s discovered Shouto’s deepest, darkest secrets. “You’re thinking you’d rather sit with her than having to face a genius like me.”

Shouto huffs, cracking his neck to diffuse the annoyance building up within him. He has to! He promised Iida and Yaoyorozu.

“You think she’s better than me?” Monoma asks haughtily. This guy doesn’t know when to give up, does he?

Shouto ignores him.

“She is intelligent, I’ll give her that. But isn’t her kindness off-putting? I dunno, she almost seems too good to be true. Hey! Maybe she’s faking being nice to-”

“Fuck Off” The words escape Shouto’s lips before his rational mind can stop him.

It is only when the whole class turns towards him, some gasping in shock whilst several others hooting in approval of the possible incoming argument that he realizes he’s said the curse words loud enough for everyone to hear. He looks away, unfazed by everyone’s undivided attention on him. He only swears if it is to humiliate his bastard of a father. But people like Monoma press the right buttons, pushing him to lose his composure. It would’ve been fine if the arrogant boy had kept his snarky comments limited to him but he tried to insult Yaoyorozu, someone whom Shouto holds very important in his life, just like his other friends. He assures himself with that thought but wonders if he’d actually reacted the same way had it been Midoriya or Iida. Anyways, he couldn’t have just sat there and let the guy say whatever.

Sir Cementos puts down the chalk in his hand and opens his mouth to berate him for his language but Yaoyorozu beats their teacher to it.

“Todoroki-san! How could you?” she stands up, disappointment clear in her voice.

How could he? Normally, he would’ve simply told her that this stuck-up class B student just badmouthed her. But with an audience around, he can’t. He just knows that’ll hurt Yaoyorozu more than Monoma’s false remarks. So instead of stating the truth, he decides to lie. “Because he deserves.”

From the corner of his eyes, he can see Iida itching to chide him but is stopped by Midoriya.

“Swearing is wrong!” Yaoyorozu emphasizes, her hands resting on her hips. “Whether or not a person deserves it, is not as important as you spoiling your tongue by using such foul words.”

Here it is, her ‘good girl’ speech. Although she’s right, she can’t force everyone to stop swearing. And he’s already not the most ideal boy in his class. He is kind of a brooding, no-nonsense, cool sort of guy but that doesn’t mean he’s not bad. It may not be apparent but he’s just as handful as any other teenager. He doesn’t answer much to his sister and he treats his father like trash (which the man actually is). Oh! And not long ago, before the sports festival, he used to be pretty rude and uncaring about others. Its surprising that she and the rest of his classmates collectively decided to forget all of it as soon as he started opening up. So yeah, he doesn’t really care if swearing is wrong.

“It’s my tongue I’m spoiling, so you don’t need to worry.” He says with a shrug, earning some collective ‘oohs’ from the other students.

Her expression darkens at the nonchalance in his words. “I’m not worried. I just want you to apologize.”

Shouto’s eyes widen for the fraction of a second before returning to his stoic demeanor. Apologize? Him? To this jerk? And that too for cursing at Monoma because the blond was mocking her kind character? Not in a million years. If asked, he can share his soba with her but he will definitely not ask for this obnoxious boy’s forgiveness. He cocks his head to the side as he responds, “Or what?”

His words ensue a set of gasps, hoots and snickers. Even Bakugou quirks a brow in amusement. The sassy intonation in his words, makes Shouto question himself too. Crude words are one thing. But where is this coming from? He doesn’t remember ever speaking like this to anyone. Especially, since he had only meant to decline her request. Somehow he ended up saying these..challenging words!? He’s not in the position to challenge her for correcting him. So then, how did he let such words slip out of his mouth? Must be due to his time spent in the company of Bakugou and others at the provisional training.

Or is it because he enjoys messing with her? He knows she’s genuinely too sweet to scream at him for his words. Plus, he has noticed her always blushing cutely when he says something unpredictable. He isn’t sure why she reacts the way she does towards some of his actions but he likes it. He likes getting under her skin. He wants to witness how much she can take until she finally snaps back at him and takes action.

“Or..” she begins through gritted teeth, “I’ll never talk to you.”

His brows furrow immediately. The last time she stopped speaking to him was a disaster. Yes, he had talked it out with her. But he doesn’t have the energy to repeat that because he knows most of class A will be eavesdropping on them like the other time. He balls his palms into fists, the temperature rising on his left side whilst decreasing equally at his right. This isn’t fair. He didn’t expect her to be this strict on him. He isn’t saying that he’s special but she always does make him feel so. Wishing him good luck during tests, lending him spare stationary material by actually using her quirk to create it for him, offering him her expensive variety of tea and so much more. It’s just that her little gestures make him feel warm and happy..make him feel special and loved.. So now that she’s the one reprimanding him, it’s disheartening. Still, he cannot apologize to Monoma. He just can’t.

“It’s okay, Yaoyorozu-san.” Fortunately, the orange haired girl from class B intervenes. Kendo right? She’s the one who keeps her classmates in line. “I know Monoma is a bit provoking in nature.” She says sheepishly. “So there’s no need to say sorry to him. I think a written apology to your homeroom teacher will be better.” She suggests, looking awkwardly between Todoroki and Yaoyorozu.

Yaoyorozu bites her lip as if contemplating if she should agree or not but then relaxes visibly. “Fine then. Todoroki-san, please write an apology to Aizawa sensei.” With that said, she turns around, a frown still etched on her face to express her disappointment in him.

He watches the others turn back to Cementos, assuming the matter is over. But not for him. For some inexplicable reason, Shouto can’t get enough of this. He knows this isn’t a competition and that she wasn’t serious when she said what she did. He knows. Yet..

“Or what?”

“Or..I’ll never talk to you.”

The statement echoes in his head. He can’t believe that she shot back to his pugnacious words.

Shouto knows that it’s unnecessary and he’s being childish. But he can’t help himself from wanting to have the last word in this silly, one-sided argument with her. Maybe it’s his adolescent hormones kicking in but he wants to spite her, test her some more..

“Well then you better keep an eye on me or I won’t be writing that apology letter.” He drawls out but he doesn’t get to wait long. He sees Yaoyorozu instantly push her chair back with a noisy screech. In a few quick steps, she stomps towards him, glaring Monoma to get her message across. The blond boy immediately vacates the chair for her and she sits down next to Shouto, passing him a fiercer glare. He smirks, relishing in the hooting that follows anew as a result of his playful words.

Seriously, if all it takes is a few swear words and silly comebacks to make her sit by his side, then he’ll gladly do it all over again.

A/N: Amongst class A students, i think Shouto is the most badly behaved one. He's rude to people he doesn't like or doesn't respect, regardless of their age. There's so much I've noticed about him that I feel like he is the Bad Boy type right next to Bakugou 🤭

Well, I hope you guys enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing..

OH, I'M OPEN FOR REQUESTS NOW

If you have a scenario, AU or just sn idea about todomomo and you want me to write it, please comment about it here ☺