#but i like to write dialogue as character exploration

[tvlandofficiall]

i really like seam. with a sizable amount of dialogue, a wonderfully composed theme song, some very interesting connections, and a sharp personality that lends well to thinking up interesting character interactions, they’re a character who more than deserves to be recognized in their own right. surprisingly though, i don’t see a whole lot of analysis out there when it comes to this slept-on stuffed animal, especially when compared to more recent introductions to the speculation scene like dess holiday or big plot movers like the knight. a lot of the analyses i have seen, both the kind that aligns with or has informed my own reading and the kind that does not, has either been long-deleted or lost to time. but tucked away inside seam’s seap is one of the most interesting characters in the game to me, and i want to shine a light (or perhaps, more fittingly, take a step into the darkness) on just what makes them such a fascinating addition to deltarune and its writing here, since most of the other seam analyses i’ve seen around are either long-deleted or are few and far between. 

ANALYSIS

FATE

to start talking about seam (or any darkner, for that matter) we’ve got to talk about fate. 

after all, fate and agency are all but literally the name of the game here. and seam has quite a bit to do with both of those things. right away, they tell us a couple of very important things. the lightners, they tell us, are like gods to the darkners, and they’re the ones who give the darkners their purpose.

they are actually the first to bring up the concept of a darkner’s purpose to us, and for good reason. 

purpose is a concept set up all throughout chapter one, and then paid off at the end of it – once we see that the darkners are all objects, it all comes together. 

an object’s fate is to serve and assist the person using it, much like kris’ fate is to serve and assist us as a player in using the game deltarune. (you need a player character to play, after all.) this setup lets the concept be further explored in chapter two, especially with spamton, but we’re here to talk about seam.

seam, being a darkner, is an object – a stuffed doll, to be exact. they’re actually the one ch1 darkner with a unique sprite in the light world, interestingly enough – so even if you end up missing their seap, there’s a little clue left to catch your eye and prompt you to seek them out. this is something that will come up again in later sections – they’re someone that’s made out to be quite important to a certain segment of the game.

but seam isn’t the soft and fluffy sort of personality a stuffed animal might typically be assigned as. (that honor goes first and foremost to the prince of the dark himself.) no, seam is a fairly snide old cat, and they certainly don’t have any pretense of considering you heroes when you first meet. they’re a doomy, gloomy, type of person;

and they do it all with a smile on their face to boot. they’re also quite a nihilistic personality, making no secret of the fact that nothing much here matters and that they sure aren’t too bothered about that. unlike their king, they don’t express much anger at their situation nor struggle against it in any way. they’re plenty content to stay right where they are – they don’t even come out to celebrate with everyone when the party goes to seal the fountain! 

and there’s an additional reason for that, too –

seems they not only know the kingdom’ll vanish, but they know it’s fate that our party’ll make it happen, too. (lancer, as a contrasting example, doesn’t know until it’s already happened.)

as for the fate of an object, though – well, they tell us themselves. neither light nor dark hold anything for them.

as demonstrated through the other characters; be a useful object, and you’ll be rewarded with fulfillment, love, and attention. be a useless object, and you’ll be left abandoned, unfulfilled, and desperate. but either way, every object becomes useless eventually – no matter how many times you’re patched up without a choice in the matter. either way, you’re still an object – and either way, your fate is a pretty bleak one.

so why try fighting against something as steadfast as fate? it’s fate, after all! seam’s certainly not spamton – they don’t bother themselves with any pretense of breaking strings or defying destiny. and unlike the companion that led their worldview down such a dark path in the first place, they don’t find any freedom in their nihilistic outlook or in the kingdom’s purposelessness. 

though such nihilism does, in an ironic twist, cause them to be the one who poses the question – if they’ve lost any care for the light or for its absence, could they find “purpose” in another darkner instead? could they find meaning in what little is their own? 

TELEGRAPHED IMPORTANCE (OR; GAMEPLAY AND STORY INTEGRATION) 

jevil and seam used to be quite close. before the knight arrived and all four kings ruled together, the two of them were a part of their court – seam the court mage, jevil the court jester. one day, jevil met a strange someone, and the things he’d told seam since that time have led their worldview to grow – in their own words – darker yet darker. this seems to have been the cause for the mindset described above – if the seeds of such a mindset hadn’t existed already. 

seam doesn’t exactly know if they’d consider him a friend. but he was the only one who could match them in the games they’d play together – but match up to what, exactly?

through the power of setup and payoff, we can find out. when talking to jevil before his battle, the jester mentions wanting to play one of his games with everyone once he’s out. and he’s happy to play this game with the party, too. 

the game itself is, of course, his boss battle. it’s a deadly “numbers game” where he holds most of the cards as one of the (if not the) strongest bosses in the game. and so when seam mentions playing games with jevil before he began to see the whole world as such, we can infer from this context what those games were. it’s a payoff to what jevil set up during his fight – like two people throwing a ball back and forth in narrative form. 

we get some good characterization out of this, too. seam’s not just a fan of the games they played with jevil, they’re downright ecstatic about them – even asking the party eagerly to tell them what happens when they meet with jevil, saying they almost wish they could watch! a little chaos is nothing short of thrilling to them. 

but this isn’t the only setup and payoff seam’s got going on. jevil’s fight also introduces the secret bosses’ main throughline – the shadow crystals. after the party defeats jevil, a crystal is added to our inventory, and talking to seam lets us do something with it. 

the shadow crystals are a popular point of speculation, and seam is sitting at the very center of the mystery. it’s they that collect the crystals, supposedly to stitch together something incredible for us. there’s also the added mystery of the unused purecrystal item – seemingly, seam may also have the ability to purify these crystals too – but i’ll get into that in a later section. for now, let’s talk about the crystals.

to bring seam the crystals at all, we’ve got to talk to them in their relocated shop. they’re the only shopkeeper who retains their full shop menu in castle town – spamton is absent from town altogether, rouxls and swatch do not have menus at all, and sweet cap’n cakes’ shop is remodeled into a jukebox with limited options. as such, they are the one to retain the updating, lengthier talk menu afforded to the shopkeepers. they also retain their unique shop theme – a waltz remix of the battle theme, “rude buster”. already, they’re set up to stand out. 

and when we do talk to them, they has a number of varying reactions to the crystals based on the order in which you collect them. many of these contribute to the mysterious nature of seam as a character, as the context in which they occur changes what would otherwise be quite similar dialogue. 

if you defeat jevil and bring his crystal to seam, they’re surprised to see that he had one. but, if you haven’t, seam pesters you about it – clearly implying they know you’d have gotten a crystal from him if you had. still, they’ll say the same surprised dialogue once you do bring jevil’s crystal to them – causing you to wonder if they were playing coy about it or not the first time around too. how do they know how that mechanic works? was there some strange intuition how they’d learned his defeat gave us the crystal, or did they know all along?

regardless, we know one thing’s for certain – seam knows what a shadow crystal is. they recognize the first crystal you bring them immediately, explaining what a shadow crystal is, that they’re held by powerful darkners, and later, implies they may come from special connections to the lightners. they’re obviously quite familiar with these crystals, leaving us to wonder just how they did and what the extent of their familiarity really is. what exactly do they want with these crystals? why do they know so much about them? why do they act so sketchy when we talk to them – there are quite a few moments that read like they’re trying to scare or bore us away given how often they say such things. 

(seriously, they do this a LOT.)

and there are a few more moments where they allude to knowing things they shouldn’t, too – like the power of the next foe we’ll face and the nature of the neo body.

this mystery is, as mentioned before, another way in which setup and payoff are used to keep seam within the loop of the secret bosses’ storyline. seam prompts us to discover more crystals and tells us how to do it, we go to discover more crystals and meet spamton (who has both incredibly important thematic stuff and a difficult boss fight in his arsenal), and we bring spamton’s crystal back to seam. this sets seam up as the connecting thread of the “secret boss” arc of the game. (in other words, similarly to how ralsei and susie are central characters of the main story, seam is the central character of this section of the story.)

(and if you've ever played slay the princess, these segments are another good point of comparison.)

overall, they’re telegraphed as an important character both thematically and to this storyline of the game in a more strictly mechanical sense. 

EXTRACANONICAL MATERIAL AND OTHER LOOSE THREADS

EXTRACANONICAL MATERIAL

to really get into the weeds of why seam is being telegraphed as an important character, i’d like to talk a bit about some extracanonical material as well. this information, while less immediately relevant to the game itself, is recent enough (specifically, it is all official content published after ch1’s release) that it’d like to consider it here – albeit in its own separate, much smaller section. 

there are several pieces of extracanonical material and one or two unused items that are relevant to seam. the first of those is the seam ripper, a weapon detailed in the undertale cross-stitch book.

there isn’t much to say about this that isn’t explained in and of itself.  

the second of those is this answer from the twitter qna that followed the spamton sweepstakes;

“cat/puppet” seems to match up to seam pretty accurately. plus, in addition to the obvious “puppet” status that darkners have at the whims of fate, “poppet” can be another word for “doll”.

finally, there is this unused item that draws a fair bit of speculation.

because it remains unused, it is far more dubious than the former two in terms of relevancy. it could end up remaining unused due to not making sense with the presented version of the game, or it could end up being implemented later due to it seeming like something to be introduced later as opposed to an older concept that got scrapped. however, because it is such a dubious item, i likely won’t be dwelling on it in this section as much as the former two things i’ve mentioned. still, i feel it’s worth mentioning. seam may have yet another trick up their sleeve when it comes to the crystals.

UNDERTALE

keen-eyed players may have also noticed another thing cueing seam as important – namely, their similarities to a certain character from undertale. deltarune, being a game not only about us as players but about us as players of undertale, uses symbols and signifiers of it to induce a variety of reactions in the player. although they are not identical to these characters – nor should they be, as this is a story about a new cast first and foremost – the cues still let us know these new focal characters can at times be similar to ones found in undertale. think of it a bit like how a character losing their shoe on a staircase can often be meant to make you think of cinderella.  

seam has a few of these cues. the first is their eye – a dead ringer for one of flowey’s creepy faces. it spins clockwise just like a face flowey makes before his boss fight at the end of a neutral run. this cueing makes a lot of sense, given flowey’s also a bit of a nihilist (i’d suggest going back and watching flowey’s monologue at the end of a no mercy route – the whole thing is very relevant.)

they’ve also got a face that, when flipped horizontally, looks much like the mysteryman sprite – often speculated to be gaster – as well as the aforementioned drop of the infamous “darker, yet darker” line in reference to their descent into madness. 

the secret bosses all seem to have more than a few signifiers of the man, and it makes perfect sense that the darkner standing at the center of the mystery would have them too. perhaps such a strange person is a part of what motivates them… 

CONCLUSION

overall, however, we don’t yet know much about seam. they’re keen to tell us a lot of things about a lot of people, but their own story and motivations remain unknown at this point in the story. however, that doesn’t mean they’re unimportant – i’ve detailed here why i think they’re set up to be a central character to the secret boss arc, and i think that they’re far more worth keeping an eye on than they might seem at first glance. 

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is: indelicate/@steddielations ! They have 13 fics in the Stranger Things fandom and all of them are in the Steddie tag!

lees_musings recommends the following works by @steddielations:

A Cup of Good Intentions

Trouble Looks Good On You

Wrap Me Around Your Finger

"their fics are so heartwarming and tender, i read them like comfort food"

"a cup of good intentions was the first steddie fic i read, it has a little velvet box in my heart <3" -- lees_musings

Below the cut, @steddielations answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

They’re just a really fun ship that you can do so many different things with. Just guys who need some healing and loving and I like giving it to them!! Also I see a lot of myself in both Steve and Eddie, so there’s some catharsis in writing them too.

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

Friends to lovers, hurt/comfort, angst with a happy ending, friends with benefits

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

The same as above definitely

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

These are all phenomenal and I think about them every day, they truly stick with me METAMORPHOSES by fastcardotmp3 A Certain Type by ann_anotherthing Sugar on my tongue by deadratz shake and sway me through the night by Craftnarok

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

I feel like I’ve written all the canonverse stuff that I wanted to now, so I’m excited to try out some au’s. Maybe once I finish up my current wips, I have this batman Steve and comic book writer Eddie idea that’s been in my mind forever now

What is your writing process like?

I brainstorm by writing down all the ideas I have for a particular story, then I try to organize it into a plot. Sometimes I just plan scene by scene, but I always write the dialogue first and then build around it.

Do you have any writing quirks?

Usually the best things aren’t added until I’m editing at the end, going back and doing finishing touches. Like with Trouble for instance, I didn’t add the kitchen conversation or the porch swing conversation or the joking scene with Gareth originally, it was all stuff I just decided to add when editing. Same for a lot of my fics, usually the things I get comments about the most are things I almost didn’t add.

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

I’m the worst at scheduling and posting so whenever it’s done is when it goes up

Which fic are you most proud of?

I’m most proud of Bleed Me Dry Before You Go because it’s the fic that I was really able to put the most of myself into.

How did you get the idea for Trouble Looks Good On You?

Well I knew I wanted to write a sub Eddie discovery fic, and honestly this just started as like a gag, just thinking about Steve’s jock habit of slapping asses and what would happen if he did that to Eddie, and that’s what awakens it. Then it gradually became something more serious and more thoughtful. I wanted to explore more of Eddie having this past where he’s had bad experiences with certain dynamics, and what it would mean for him to be comfortable enough to get to explore that side of himself with Steve.

When writing Trouble Looks Good On You, what was something you didn’t expect?

It started out as mostly crack so I didn’t expect it to become my longest, most character involved fic. Also I didn’t expect people to read it or like it because it was mostly for myself, so I’ve been very pleasantly surprised and grateful for the response to it.

What inspired Wrap Me Around Your Finger?

I realized I hadn’t written a virgin Eddie fic, and at the same time I wanted to explore more of what Eddie’s aftermath in Hawkins would be like, the full extent of his injuries and his reputation in the town, and maybe Steve helping him out, so it all meshed together. I worked on this for like a year so it had many phases, but adding in some Flight of Icarus lore also inspired me to make Eddie more gritty in this, very stubbornly attached to his independence, and I just love the depth it gave him in that fic in the end.

What was your favorite part to write from Wrap Me Around Your Finger?

Definitely all the banter, especially during the smut scenes, love a silly smut scene. Also can’t forget “I made sure there’s no stairs”

How do/did you feel writing A Cup of Good Intentions?

I cried so many times writing that. I just put myself in the position of Eddie and Wayne, thinking about my relationship with my dad. It was cathartic just writing that familial bond between Eddie and Wayne, and how deep that love goes through mourning and missing each other and then actually getting to reunite. It was an emotional one.

What was the most difficult part of writing A Cup of Good Intentions?

The fic had several different tones from grieving to yearning to suspense and also fluff and romance, so it was hard to blend that all together and make it flow without whiplash. Not sure if I succeeded but it was hard to do.

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

The cold open in Trouble, where it sounds like they’re hooking up but they’re actually moving an amp, probably the most clever innuendo unfolding I’ll ever make

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

I’ve got some stuff for sub Eddie week but after that I’m just focusing on finishing up Trouble finally

Outside of these questions, Is there anything YOU would like to add?

At the moment that I’m writing this, I don’t know who nominated me, so I want to say thanks so much to that person!! I’m so flattered and I appreciate it!! Also to anyone who reads my fics, thank you genuinely. And to the mods of this blog, you’re all awesome for doing this and you’re so appreciated in the fandom!!

Thank you to our author, indelicate, and our nominator, lees_musings! See more of indelicate's works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!

[ta5tier]

isat thoughts, go

[this ask is actually an excuse to ramble about whatever thing you can't get someone else to prompt you to ramble about]

i just woke up so this probably wont be too coherent but here we go!

I, like many, discovered ISAT through @jelloapocalypse’s fantastic video on the game, and by that I mean I watched the first 5 minutes of the video and immediately stopped and played the game myself.

I already liked time loops as a literary device, especially in games (outer wilds rocks, 12 minutes is interesting despite the general quality, etc) but ISAT managed to get me interested in the story and its characters before even introducing time loops as a mechanic. (Y’ALL I WAS NOT PREPARED FOR ISABEAU TO JUST COME OUT SWINGING LIKE THAT! I clocked that motherfucker before the gang even left dormont, he isnt smooth.)

ANYWAY besides the great character writing, ISAT also managed to nail its genre parody right off the bat, the literal RPS combat is so funny, Mirabelle gives off such RPG protagonist vibes, and its a neat take on the genre to center the narrative around the “edgy”rogue (HA Scissors pun). Along with the fact that Siffrin is absolutely the right amount of mentally unstable, you have all the perfect ingredients for great genre deconstruction.

Spoilers Under the Cut So be WARNED

There are tons of people talking about the story beats further so i’m not gonna spend more time here reinventing the wheel, but something I will talk about is how the game leverages ludonarrative assonance, I.e. how the game reflects the experience of the player as a part of the story.

In the case of ISAT, this manifests as the growing boredom both the player and Siffrin experience as they continue through the loops. On my first few loops I took care to avoid skipping dialogue and made sure my party was leveled up enough to succeed at any of the fights they faced. I explored thoroughly and enjoyed the process of doing so and I only reset when the game asked it of me.

But as the game continued I found myself zoning out of more and more dialogue, skipping more and more fights, and resetting whenever it would save me time. And Siffrin was with me all the way through all of it, his internal monologue growing increasingly disinterested with the affairs of his party members and the dangers they were in.

Ironically, in a game so outside my lived experience I found myself mentally aligned with Siffrin in a way that's frankly a little concerning. (im ok im not in a time loop lol)

The magic of ISAT for me was in that alignment, of feeling a shared purpose with a character, and in the breaking of that alignment in the games later acts. One of my favorite moments in any story is when I realize I can no longer fully root for the main character. Siffrin's last loop was that moment for me and I loved it. Siffrin's final trek through the House is so awful to watch but also represents the logical conclusion of his decent. The witty commentary is gone, his family is gone, the muscle memory that he and I shared in navigating the house is no longer reliable. Its all no longer necessary.

In Siffrin's mind, whats left of them isn't worth saving. And then finally, agonizingly, they are saved. Despite his best efforts to self destruct, his family come for him and they're mad and they're scared but they do it anyway, even when the world is ending around them.

Anyway yeah i love this game so much Siffrin is Stars' most mentally unwell soldier and i love them and their stupid family so much.

[sapphosdirtyhoe]

If there’s one thing about me, it’s that I’m gonna have an opinion!! I wrote about DA for my doctoral exams, and having a forum to write further about the series is super awesome.

I wish BioWare had not debuted the character trailer. The gameplay footage was beautiful, smooth, and I greatly enjoyed the return of DA2’s dialogue wheel (although I miss the robust roleplaying options afforded by Origins’ expanded choices). I am infinitely more excited for Veilguard now than I was on Sunday. However, was anyone else struck by how this prologue almost exactly mimicked the opening “Wrath of Heaven” quest in Inquisition? Pushing through demons to pick up allies, fighting a Pride Demon miniboss, and then addressing the Veil. The backdrop of Minrathous, the enhanced graphics, and the stunning music were phenomenal, but it felt ordinary and far too familiar for such an extraordinary event. I adored Neve’s character design, but she felt like a reskin of Vivienne who was softened for an audience who couldn’t handle her point-blank personality and bold opinions. I hope we fight more than demons and venatori because platinum-ing DAI gave me more of that than I’ve ever needed. That being said, the designs are stunning and I cannot wait to explore every crevice of Thedas.

I’m also a bit confused at the rehashing of Trespasser with Varric and Solas. I understand the need to make the game and its world accessible to new audiences, but it lessened the impact of your Inquisitor trying to convince Solas, thus diminishing player agency by delegating their choices with Solas to Varric who cannot be directed by the player.

Like everyone else, I’ve seen the discourse between Veilguard and earlier Dragon Age games. I’m begging folks to understand that nuance exists; just because DA2 has the line about Hawke stepping in poopy doesn’t mean that the game doesn’t also have the “All That Remains” quest (which, personally, was one of the most horrifying things I’ve ever seen). Dark stories need moments of light to be effective because that’s simply how people work. Wanting a return to the overwhelming sense of darkness and danger of Origins and the griminess of 2 doesn’t mean getting rid of all of the humor. It means not making the Darkspawn out to be a joke like the trailer did. It’s a bit weird to juxtapose the horror of Ostagar with Varric joking about killing the beasts. I think the gameplay footage did a fantastic job at capturing that vibe better, but calling folks negative and not true Dragon Age fans for expressing disappointment in the series’ direction is wild. I also need to point out how much of the discourse has fallen to “men are the worst for wanting dark gritty things again when I want my silly little dating sim.” All of these things can exist! Dragon Age is inclusive and incredibly queer (always has been), but the stories are not solely about your personal romance and shouldn’t be analyzed that way.

TLDR: the gameplay trailer for Veilguard was super cool! I’m stoked as hell to play it! However, folks expressing disappointment with certain elements of the game doesn’t diminish your personal enjoyment.

[dyrewrites]

Did I share these dumb things yet

They are dialogue fun-times for a thing I'm not writing yet, called Bloodhound (at the moment). It is a detective story starring a 345 year old vampire and his 16 year old adoptive werewolf daughter. The same two from this thing

They help monsters and things kinda like monsters.

[for those digging into tags because of Before Deluca, this is an outdated representation of Lucient. He rewrote himself. It was very rude of him, but I like him more as he is now]

“He looks so much like ol’ Darren...”

“You been around a long time, maybe he’s a descendant?”

“Would it be weird to ask him out?”

“Nah, dude’s like forty, even if he is that Darren whatever’s great great great grandkid, it’s not like he’s your kid.”

“But what if he doesn’t like men...or worse, me?”

“Use your vampire mojo, make him like you.”

“Oriana!”

“What? You can, can’t you?”

“That doesn’t mean I should. And you know that! I thought I raised you better...”

“You did, that’s why I didn’t suggest it first.”

“You shouldn’t have suggested it at all.”

“What about the ones you feed on, aren’t they under your...you know?”

“No, they...they actually ask for that.”

“That’s nasty.”

“That’s gothic romanticism, flower, and we wouldn’t live so comfortably without it.”

—

“Wait, so all vampires keep their bitemarks?”

“Correct.”

“But you don't have any marks on your neck.”

“I wasn't bitten…on my neck.”

“Then where, ew, ew, don't tell me it's—”

“It isn't, but it is in that general area. Fortunate really, it allowed me to escape detection during the trials.”

“Who was your, are they called sires?”

“No, that's an invention of romanticism. We simply refer to them as master or maker. In rare instances even father/mother.”

“And yours was…?”

“Building a family tree are we, flower?”

“I'm just curious. Was he famous?”

“How do you know it was a he?”

“Dad. C’mon. Like your gay ass is letting a woman anywhere near your downstairs.”

“...point, though I could do without the color. His name was Lucient, we'll avoid the surname lest you take to the wires for it. He was beautiful, kind and altogether horrible.”

“So bad breakup.”

“Psychotic break more like, but it's not something you need concern yourself with. He is long gone.”

--

“She said it’s a tulpa, and I feel I should know what that is...but I don’t.”

“Simplest description would be a dream made manifest. And they’ve become quite the nuisance since the advent of the internet. Do you remember last year with that especially long-necked horse creature?”

“Oh, but he was so sweet! He didn’t hurt anyone.”

“Not physically, no, but his presence sent a number to the hospital for mental distress. Regardless of danger, we are incapable of destroying them—and it isn’t in our job descriptions to do so. If it’s capable of conversation, we’ll ask it to go elsewhere, otherwise we capture and relocate. Did she offer a description?”

“’Really big moth’...wait, does she mean the moth man? The moth man...is real?”

“Remind me to explain the difference between a cryptid and a tulpa to Ms. Fairweather next she rings, would you? And fetch the lamp, no, no, the Elizabethan lamp.”

“What does it matter what lamp, he’s a moth.”

“One does not stop in on old friends without a gift, flower.”

—

“What’s the sap for?”

“Ichor, flower, it is the blood of a deity.”

“Oh, so a snack for the road?”

“Ha ha. Hardly, it is an offering to a reclusive creature born of…personal mythos.”

“Another tulpa?”

“Similar, yes.”

“Something to do with trees, I'm guessing?”

“Yes, but not living ones. I must offer it in a ghostwood.”

“I remember those, they're forests cut down or burned where it's all stumps and ash, right?”

“Impressive, flower. You do listen to this old man's rambling after all.”

“It's ghost trees, dad, who's going to ignore that.”

“You'd be surprised.”

“So what's the creature then, do you know them?”

“Oh yes…I, I do at that.”

“...you two fucked, didn't you? You fucked a tree.”

“Language, Oriana! Why must you be so crude.”

“You're not answering the question.”

“He is as much man as he is tree and it is no business of yours what we did or didn't do.”

“Just keep it in your pants when we see this tree man, I don't need that image in my head.”

“You're not coming, flower. He'll only show if I appear vulnerable.”

“Tell me this isn't an elaborate booty call…I mean I know it's been a while and you've been lonely and moping but—”

“I've been moping?”

“Well, brooding, but it's fine, it's hard for guys your age to meet people.”

“It is not hard for me to, I am doing fine, and you shouldn't be concerning yourself with my love life.”

“Dad, you're going out into the woods to summon a fuckable tree.”

“I’m not listening to this anymore. There are dryads dying by the grove and Namael is the only one I know that's close enough in species to help without falling victim to the same malady.”

“So the tree has a name…does the name have a meaning? Dryad names always have a meaning.”

“Not a dryad.”

“Not a no.”

“Bloodtongue, his name means he's extremely skilled with,”

“His tongue, yeah, I got that. Have fun on your booty call.”

“...”

[deityofhearts]

sometimes I have thoughts about my little pony,,, (please ignore that there are errors a plenty and that my writing sucks i just word vomited this in my notes app without a second thought okay?)

[styck-figure]

excluding dark, whos your favourite hollowhead?

The Chosen One. They're so fun to write and it's difficult to nail their characterization but when you DO oh it is amazing!

[rainbowresurrection]

I ended up reading The Price of the Phoenix and while it didn't make me want to bleach my eyes like Killing Time, I still didn't like it as much as I hoped I would. Don't get me wrong, the homoeroticism was intriguing to me, but the actual writing and storyline itself left me with a headache. I think I get my hopes up with these books, given all of the possibilities that the written word has for Trek, and it inevitably sets me up for disappointment lol

[deltalunaris]

Another (more recent) WIP, because I’m feeling excitable & generous tonight.

This time of Delta the Voidhearted, one of many protagonists throughout ASITV. They carry a great, cosmic responsibility, despite their reluctance to fulfill it.

[ID: A dusky purple pseudo-feline with ear tufts, spidery whiskers, fluffy cheek and mane fur, lanky legs, and a bright white, star-like marking in the middle of their chest. They gaze upon the viewer with perked eyebrows, and an attentive stare.]

[helaenahightower]

adding this to my list of things in hotd that make my brain start vibrating

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

memory is a strange thing

Monica Reyes/John Doggett | post 9x08 Hellbound | for @fortes-fortuna-iogurtum | vignette; 723 words | tagging @taleasoldastime-andspace and @cosmicmulder :)

She has done all this before.

She knows it like she knows the back of her hand or the cool tap of her ring against the balcony railing. The smoke in the back of her throat is familiar, the only thing she could think of to still the shaking of her hands. Maybe it’s just to occupy them, really, but either way, it’s comforting even though it shouldn’t be, with shaking hands and smoke in her airway and the memory playing on loop in her brain of Van Allen confirming and condemning her to failure. 

Monica has admittedly never given much thought to reincarnation. As a concept, it fascinates her — the way fate and freedom hold hands, how much will always remain the same in each individual life — but she’s never considered how it could apply to her. She thinks if she looked over her shoulder she might see a premonition of the life to come, so she just takes a long drag of her cigarette and holds it in her lungs, burning, for as long as she can. She wonders if she always has been and always will be a smoker; she’s tried to stop often enough and never fully succeeded, and that’s just this one life. 

Behind her, the door slides open and she doesn’t even turn. “You left your front door unlocked,” says John, and she huffs out a little smoky cloud into the night air.

“I know.”

“You really shouldn’t do that, you know. Crime rate here’s not as bad as New York, but still.” 

Monica shrugs. “I guess I’m still not used to being back up here,” she says. “I left it unlocked for you,” she adds.

He goes quiet, she can feel him watching her. “You knew I’d be coming over here?” He asks it, she thinks, as if he knows it’s true. “What is that, one of your premonitions?”

If the question weren’t a little too on the nose tonight, Monica might laugh at the blunt wonder in John’s voice. She just shakes her head. “I just figured you might stop by. Hoped it, maybe.” 

“You doing okay?” He asks, like she knew he would. It’s the same way she checks after him after a hard case, or after Mexico. 

Instead of answering the question, she says his name. “John, if you found out that… you’ve done all this before,” and she gestures vaguely with her cigarette, leaving a thin trail of smoke in the air encompassing them, “That everything, your life, the results of it, might be circular… would that change the choices you made?” 

She thinks of him reliving the pain of losing Luke and of the time he told her he’s afraid that he could have done more; thinks of herself trying to explain how she knew about these murders. There’s always a question of what could be changed. How much can be saved, or lost, in just one small decision. What could she have done to stop Van Allen, and what would it have meant for her? She won’t ask what could have been done to save Luke; even if John second-guesses, at least she can be sure for him.

He leans on the railing beside her, tightly-wound and silent in thought. She wonders if he’s making the same connections that she is and a part of her hopes he isn’t. It’s still a little too raw, but then, maybe it always will be. She lifts the cigarette to her mouth again, but his hand stops her and she lets go of it as easily as she’d pulled it from the box earlier. For the first time since he walked in through her unlocked front door, she meets John’s eyes. 

“There might be a few things I’d do different,” he says quietly. For a moment it’s almost like they’re holding hands. “But even if I knew where it all ended on the way, I think I have to embrace it. Only way to live with yourself, you know?” 

Monica thinks she does. She isn’t sure if he’s talking more about himself or her, or maybe both of them. There’s a fleeting moment where she feels that in some incongruously incompatible way, they understand each other.

He slips his hand from hers and tosses the cigarette three stories from her balcony. 

[illdothehotvoice]

Dimentio's entire. Thing. dshjnfdgnmdfh Makes me go crazy go stupid and it's so annoying because I don't even LIKE Dimentio that much but I'm also tired of seeing his character butchered lmfao dshjkfdg

[pettyprocrastination]

the fandomization of media means that the moment a show hits season two the villian will get their government mandated abuse-backstory-redemption-arc and immediately become boring. 

[whalehouse1]

Reading Dial H for Hero to find out more about a new character. Enjoys it for the first few chapters then MULTIVERSE!!! Then we get the villain’s backstory which did not tie together at all then I get to issue 10 and my honest reaction to reading it was, “Did I have a stroke?”

[seiwas]

thank you to everyone who’s read my simon fic so far 🥺 i see some tags mentioning that they don’t follow cod and aren’t familiar with him at all besides maybe gifsets and edits—and i am so touched!!! that you’ve chosen to continue reading despite that 🥺 thank you so much 🥺

[thomine]

44, 49, 68, 72 ovo

fanfiction writing asks (accepting!)

44. What is your favorite genre to write?

i want to say angst but i don't like angst without its layers, and that would not make it not quite angst anymore? anyways, i like things with high conflict and tension, angst comes close.

49. What fic of yours would you say is the best introduction to you as a writer?

oooh. this is a tough question... i would say ready, aim, fire (venti). it's a writing style edging on what i would consider my ideal writing style. the story has a structure (start, middle, end), and it's all delivered with poetic writing that ties the story to the larger prompt.

68. Are there any fics that influenced you to write the way you do?

no fic in particular, but my experience reading fics has formed rules that shape my writing. for example, i don't like flashback arcs so i try to avoid them in my works. i am not good with keeping up with time/dates when reading, so i tend to write without time in mind.

72. What’s your favorite writing compliment you’ve gotten?

asking to pick a favourite compliment is like asking to pick a favourite child. feels wrong but undoubtedly there will be a favourite child, haha. i think it has to be when someone shares how the fic made them feel. i know there are shortcomings in my execution, but ultimately, i am trying my best because i want my stories to leave an impact. so when people share with me how the fic made them feel, it's the biggest compliment to know my words are alive.