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reiniesainyo · 3 months

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IN BETWEEN. charlie bushnell x reader – 05

05 | LOGICAL previous | next | masterfile

SYNPOSIS. when a girl's co-star is good to her and now she wants it more than everything in between. (smau)

A/N. not feeling too well but... here's the episode

HOST "What's up, everyone! Welcome back to the Fangirlpedia Podcast, where we fangirls get to live out our dreams and fill out a Wikipedia for all the fangirls out there!"

HOST "I've been a fan of PJO since i was a kid, I was 15 when the first books came out and now, my daughter, who's 12 gets to watch the TV show. So it really is a dream come true and such a pleasure to be here today with the cast of Disney+'s Percy Jackson and the Olympians!"

HOST "With that, I think it's the proper time to introduce our dear guests for today."

WALKER "I'm Walker Scobell, I play Percy Jackson."

LEAH "I'm Leah Sava Jeffries and I play Annabeth Chase."

CHARLIE "I'm Charlie Bushnell and I'm the actor for Luke Castellan."

YN "And I'm YN LN and I'm the actress for Rina Velasco."

HOST "What song would you associate with your character?"

YN "For me, I Bet on Losing Dogs by Mitski"

YN "Rina is a very calculated character, she's not like Annabeth in the sense that it's just logic and facts. I think she's calculated in the fact that she's a very thoughtful person, and so I think it's interesting that her fatal flaw would be her faith and her trust— which, from face value completely contrasts her as a character. Like why does this person who thinks everything through have such childlike trust? Well, she is a child."

YN "The reason I chose this really lies in Luke, her first love, and the fact that her oblivious trust is most blatant in her relationship with him. Luke is the losing dog that all her logic tells her is losing but she still bets on him every time. He proves to her time and time again that he's put himself on this path and yet she foolishly believes every time that he can come back. I think in a way, she's aware of the fact that it's a foolish endeavor and yet pursues it anyway because she still believes there's some goodness in Luke despite him proving to her otherwise."

HOST "If YN's song for Rina is I Bet on Losing Dogs by Mitski, what would your song be, Charlie?"

CHARLIE "I think I've mentioned somewhere else that the song I used to really like use as my go-to was Swan Lake, Op. 20, Act 2? Yeah I think that's the right title. It really got me in the mood. But there's a different song that I think represents Luke."

HOST "Oh and what would that song be?"

CHARLIE "Probably.... Silver Springs yeah Silver Springs - Fleetwood Mac. It's a popular song with editors. But like, I see Luke in it because it's kind of like... that's his relationship with all the people he loves. 'Time casts it spell on you, but you won't forget me. I know I could've loved you, but you would not let me.' Those lyrics for me are really what Luke's relationship with people are like, especially post-betrayal. I think the people he love stays on his mind constantly."

CHARLIE "There's this one line 'You'll never get away from the sound of a woman that loves you'. And I think every woman in his life is the same, Annabeth, his mom, Tahlia, and Rina especially. They all love him in their own way and the fact that like you know, they love him will haunt him with every decision he makes."

HOST "Even before filming, what were the vibes from everyone?"

CHARLIE "A lot of people assume that the hardest thing is filming- which is hard but like the stuff that happens before like table reads and chemistry tests were so nerve-wracking too."

YN "You'll hear from Leah and Walker that the chemistry read was so happy and fun— Leah just got to flirt with Walker for like an hour. Good for the younger kids, meanwhile me and Charlie were out here sobbing and fighting."

WALKER "Huh? What?!"

LEAH "You never told us this."

CHARLIE "Really? We didn't"

YN "Well, for Charlie and I's chemistry read, yeah it started off with playful banter then not even two scenes later, I was arguing with Luke in a forest about him stealing the master bolt."

CHARLIE "I mean I was like begging her to stay and everything— Did I get on my knees? I remember getting on my knees."

YN "Oh my gosh yeah... he got on his knees while begging to Rina it was crazy. The chemistry they wanted from us was ... definitely passionate. It was a very specific type of chemistry."

CHARLIE "Didn't they have us— Oh spoilers if you haven't seen the last book, anyways Luke dies and they were like 'So I want you to pretend like you're dying and now you see him and you're mourning his death'"

YN "Yeah and it was like 'I'm not sure if I'll make it to Elesium...' 'I don't think anyone else would be more worthy.' and then bro just straight up died!"

WALKER "WHAT TYPE OF CHEMISTRY READ IS THIS???"

CHARLIE "Deadly chemistry. I think one of us started crying."

YN "We were giving... Shakespeare."

HOST "What were your guys' reaction after getting the role? I think most have heard about the rest of you guys but YN's casting has been a matter of secret for a little bit."

YN "Oh my god I was elated, I was finally employed!"

CHARLIE "Biggest TV show of the year and your reaction is 'I'm employed'?"

YN "Hey don't judge! I love PJO and I love the series so so so much but honestly, after doing Miss Saigon's revival and then going into first year of college in NYU I was kind of panicking because 1) I wanted to do something and 2) I had no idea what to do. Like I knew I wanted to act but I wanted to try something different and honestly, I haven't gotten any good callbacks in a long time. So I mean when I sent it in, I didn't think anything would happen but it did and I was like 'Oh my god, I'm employed, I can earn money'."

CHARLIE "A bit weird but wouldn't have it any other way."

YN "You know, Charlie, next time you can just say something nice."

CHARLIE "Then our rela- friendship wouldn't be as fun."

CHARLIE "YN at first was pretty secretive about her background so every thing she revealed herself was like a new lore drop."

YN "Lore drop???"

WALKER "Every few days on set, we'd be talking and one day you'd just drop 'Oh when I was in highschool, I was in the national debate championships and in the finals–' and you talked like it was so normal but then all of us just found out you did competitive debate."

YN "It wasn't that big of a deal–"

LEAH "You told us you won the championships?"

YN "I won best speaker but I technically-"

CHARLIE "Don't even bother."

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cassolotl · 1 year

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Results of the nonbinary name survey

Hi folks, just thought I'd throw together a quick report about nonbinary names based on the recent survey.

The survey ran from 4th until 13th May, and there were 5,179 usable responses. For this one I won't share the full spreadsheet of all responses, as it contains potentially identifying information. Having said that, you can find a spreadsheet of the information I can share with you here. Every name entered only once has been redacted.

Most popular names

Let's kick it off with the main reason I did this survey, finding the nonbinaryest name:

Alex was #1, with 1.6%, which is 1 in 62 nonbinary people.

Here's the full top 10:

Alex - 1.6% (83)

Jay - 1.2% (64)

Sam - 0.9% (49)

Charlie - 0.7% (36)

Max - 0.7% (36)

Ash - 0.6% (33)

Robin - 0.6% (33)

Rowan - 0.6% (31)

Kit - 0.6% (30)

Eli - 0.6% (29)

Name length

I'm familiar with the stereotype that nonbinary people choose names by taking 3 letters from a bag of Scrabble tiles, or that nonbinary people take letters off their given names until it's one ungenderable syllable, and I would like to take this opportunity to add that these are both excellent ways to create new names. :D

This graph takes a rolling median name length from the whole list, and it shows that generally speaking the most popular names tended to be shorter:

The average name length was 5.1 characters long.

This seems to support the stereotypes, but I feel it's worth mentioning that we can't know for sure whether it actually does, because for all we know, binary people's names might show these kinds of patterns too.

Number of names per person

Participants could enter as many names as they wanted, in a list separated by commas. That made it pretty easy to count them, and it turned out like this:

That's fairly straightforward, most people have only one name.

Problems with survey design

Overall I definitely feel that the survey had some flaws. I knew in advance that there would be some people who have more than one name that they like more or less equally, but for some reason the first question I came up with assumed that you have one name that you like most and then required a single answer from a list stating how that name happened to you - leading the respondent to a different section based on that answer.

What if you've got two or more names that you like equally, and one was given to you by your parents when you were born that you use for work, one is a nickname based on that name that evolved between you and your family and friends as you were growing up, and one is a name you chose yourself and your closest friends call you that? That's pretty much an impossible question, isn't it?

And there were several other questions in the survey that took that approach, making the data from those questions basically useless.

I didn't think it would cause problems for so many people, but it did, and I have learned my lesson there.

However, there was a question asking you to list all your names, and that's what I used to make the ranked list. I don't see how people with more than one name that they prefer completely equally (i.e. those people who would be thrown out of the survey by an impossible required first question) would prefer different names from people with one name only, so I think the ranked list is probably approximately okay, and same for the number of names per person graph and the average name length.

Implications

I haven't decided yet, but I definitely think there's scope for doing this survey annually - but separately from the identity/titles/pronouns survey, for anonymity reasons. It could be fun to track popular nonbinary names over time, similar to the popular name lists for babies that are usually split by boys'/girls' names. It might be a bit meaningless unless I collect country data as well though, which is why the list currently reads very....... American..........

Now that I've learned a lot from a big and not-so-well-designed survey run on my personal account, I'd feel more comfortable designing something a bit more fit for purpose, and running it from the @gendercensus accounts to hopefully get more participants.

~ Fin ~

#survey results #nonbinary #nonbinary names

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ruggiezz · 10 months

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soy yo de nuevo 😎😎 digamos que yo soy una persona muy apegada a su cultura y me encanta el baile y la comida tradicional de mi país: la bomba puertorriqueña y los pasteles puertorriqueños. now, it doesn't have to be puerto rican culture (puede ser de cualquier cultura de latam), that's just an example. but, how would the housewardens react to the reader's culture? maybe they see how much the latino! reader loves their culture and they ask to know more about it ((p.d. i know you don't write for some of the housewardens, so exclude those lol))

— LATINO READER THAT LOVES THEIR CULTURE : twisted wonderland

[synopsis] dormleaders with a latino! reader that loves their culture

[characters] dormleaders (except for vil)

[extra] GRACIAS TUVISTE LA MEJOR IDEA EXISTENTE, also, Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina and Peru celebrate their independence this month, so this is perfect for the occasion

★ RIDDLE ROSEHEARTS

You two had private study sessions in his room every week, where he would help you with some lessons you couldn't understand, and in return, you would buy him a slice of a strawberry dessert you found at Sam's. (He didn't really need anything in return, but he wasn't going to say no to a dessert, even if he wasn't meant to eat sweets.)

During one of the study sessions, he noticed you were in a gloomy mood and asked what was the matter.

"Today is my country's independence day, and I haven't done anything to celebrate it."

And with that, it somehow went from a study session where he was teaching you about ancient magic to a study session where you were teaching him about your country's history and how it became independent. It was very 'educational', Riddle would say. You also spoke about how they would celebrate in your country, about the festivals and parties they would hold, and most importantly, about the food. Good, now Riddle was hungry.

He offers to celebrate with you in Ramshackle; he and Trey can help you cook some national desserts if you want, and you can tell them and your friends more about your culture and how they do things where you come from. Just don't make him dance; he'll get embarrassed because he doesn't know the steps (and because Ace will make fun of him), and he is good with just watching you dance. But maybe someday you can both dance alone, together.

★ LEONA KINGSCHOLAR

"Herbivore, what pride flag is that?" He said, pointing at a pin you had of your country's flag that you had attached to your backpack.

This probably went two ways: either you almost died of laughter at his question while he looked extremely confused, or you looked at him dead in the eye with the most serious face ever. Whichever option you chose, you both ended up lying on the bed while you told him stories of your country. You told him about how people back in your world celebrated their independence every year, about the dances, the festivals, and how colorful everything was.

If you didn't know Leona well, you would have thought he was uninterested and was falling asleep, but he was listening. Everything you said was important to him; it didn't matter if it was a small thing, like the fact you found a nickel while walking to the store, or if it was a big thing, like an important achievement, he would remember it. And you talking about your culture wasn't the exception. He hummed in agreement while you talked about this one thing you did back in your country to celebrate your country's independence.

Tell him more—about the food, the celebrations, the music—it doesn't matter; he will listen. Tell him about this really popular artist who's also Latino; tell him more about this 'Chayanne' and his achievements. Even if he doesn't completely understand, he can understand the feeling of being proud of where he comes from.

★ AZUL ASHENGROTTO

Azul invited you to Mostro Lounge with the intention of getting innovative material for a new event that will attract more customers out of the kindness of his heart. He sat you down on a couch in his office and offered you a cup of tea.

"Say, prefect, could you tell me more about your country? Is there any food you particularly like? Something we can make here?"

You see, Azul was expecting this meeting to go like this: He asked. You told him about the food. He wrote it down. Everyone was happy.

What he didn't expect was sitting there two hours later and hearing you ramble about your country's food and the history of it. And he was ACTUALLY INVESTED. This wasn't part of the plan at all.

He wrote down a lot on his notepad; every detail you told him was important for him to "use in Mostro Lounge's new event", but he was just really impressed by how rich your country's culture was.

Weeks later, Azul summoned you to Mostro Lounge, surprising you with dishes you told him about. Jade brought a lot of plates with some desserts, and Floyd brought some mocktails. You were so happy, you even felt like hugging Azul, but ended up being squeezed by Floyd (affectionately), who was also happy to be able to taste new food.

The event was a success, with students praising the new dishes, and Azul decided to keep some of the popular dishes on the menu. But if your favorite one didn't make the cut, he will remember the recipe, and will make it for you from time to time, just don't tell anyone about your 'special treatment'.

"This will be our little secret, okay, prefect?"

★ KALIM AL-ASIM

Not surprisingly, Kalim got sick after taking you on a carpet ride with wet hair. Nights at Scarabia are particularly cold, and even when Jamil warned him not to forget to dry his hair when he showered at night, he ignored it that day out of excitement to see you. He just didn't have enough time to dry it, okay?

His throat ached, and he was sneezing a lot. Jamil was in a bad mood that day, and he had a lot to get done, so he left Kalim in your care on the condition that you both didn't do anything stupid.

You brought a small container to Scarabia that had ointment inside. You had it in the backpack you brought from your world; it was small enough to fit in your palm. Kalim looked in curiosity while you approached his bed and opened it to apply it to him.

"What ointment are you applying to me? It smells like mint." Kalim asked while you rubbed some of the ointment on his chest and neck.

"It's 'Vick Vaporub'; it will make you feel better; this thing can even heal a broken leg."

"FOR REAL??"

You had to explain to him what it was and how your family used it on you when you got sick. Sadly, it couldn't cure a broken leg, but it could alleviate colds. And it did work; Kalim felt better the next day, to Jamil's surprise (and relief).

Kalim ran to Ramshackle after you nursed him back to health with the help of 'Vick', asking more about how people did things back in your country. He was fascinated by your stories, and the way you described the food made him want to taste it so badly. Maybe you two could try and make the food in Scarabia's kitchen? Please teach him! If the food from your country makes you happy, then he wants to try and learn how to make it for you!

★ IDIA SHROUD

You and Idia had this routine where you both always spent the afternoon in his room, either playing videogames, doing homework, or just doing whatever in silence. But on this particular day, Idia was playing this one single-player game while you lay on his bed scrolling through your phone.

Suddenly, an idea popped into your mind. A few months ago, Idia repaired your old phone as a birthday gift, and you had a few episodes of this particular show saved on your phone. You started watching, but you had forgotten your earphones back in Ramshackle, so Idia could hear it too.

"What are you watching? It's so loud..."

"I'm watching 'Caso Cerrado'/'Caso Encerrado'. It's the English dub."

"Why is everyone yelling..? What even is that?"

You explained to Idia how it was this show where a lawyer called Ana María Polo sat in a court and heard cases, where she ended up dictating whether they were guilty or not. Idia disregarded it as a 'normie show' and continued what he was doing, but he ended up hearing the whole episode while playing. It was actually very entertaining to hear while playing.

"Wait, SHE'S PREGNANT with her boyfriend's father? WTF???"

He ended up binge-listening to the whole season while playing. Did your world always make such interesting shows? Tell him more.

Even if history was never his favorite subject, you talking about it was just like listening to a podcast—a very interesting one at least. Your routine now is to go to his room and play some video games while you talk about your country, and Idia occasionally makes a comment. And then repeat it daily.

If you couldn't come to Ignihyde, then you both could have a call, and you could talk while Idia played. Wasn't that a good relationship dynamic? You talked while Idia listened. And you were always so excited to talk to him about you where you and where you came from that he just couldn't help himself but smile (just a little) while hearing you.

★ MALLEUS DRACONIA

"This is for you, Malleus." You said as you pulled one of those blankets you used in the winter. You had found one extremely similar to the ones in your world, and you had bought two. Lately, the weather in Twisted Wonderland has been extremely cold, and Diasomnia wasn't any different.

"Thank you, Child of Man; I will treasure it."

The blanket in question:

AND HE DID TREASURE IT, using it as a blanket on his bed for a week and washing it afterwards to continue using it. It was a gift from his partner after all, much to Sebek's dismay. Silver said it looked really comfy, and he wanted one now too, while Lilia just found it amusing how attached Malleus was to a blanket.

The next day after, you gifted it to him, he appeared on your doorstep with the blanket on his hands, asking to sleep over in Ramshackle with both of your blankets. You told him more about your country and the customs over a cup of hot tea, and he listened attentively to every single thing you said. There was a dessert you liked from your country that you couldn't recreate yourself? Don't worry; he will make sure his private chef back in Briar Valley makes it for you. There's this traditional clothing from your country you want? His tailor will get it done; you don't even have to move a finger, just say the word, and he will have it done.

Hearing you talk about how proud you were of your heritage made him giddy inside over the fact that he had such a passionate partner. Tell him more; he's so invested, especially in the history. The history is the best part.

"I only have one question, child of man. Who is this 'Shakira' you talk so highly about?"

#twisted wonderland #riddle x reader #leona x reader #azul x reader #kalim x reader #idia x reader #malleus x reader #twst fluff #latino #riddle rosehearts x reader #leona kingscholar x reader #azul ashengrotto x reader #idia shroud x reader #malleus draconia x reader

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luvtonique · 3 months

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I just woke up and I chose violence let's go.

Look all I'm sayin' is

If you're gonna attack AI generative art

You should, for the same reason, attack Toby Fox.

The reason I've seen the most for people not liking AI is that it's not "Real art" and that it "Takes jobs from artists" and that it "Steals from other artists"

Well, then, let's talk about how Hopes and Dreams by Toby Fox uses fake Violins to mimic a symphony orchestra. Toby could have hired a real orchestra but he used a fake one and y'all came in your drawers over it.

Why'd nobody ever lift a finger to cover social media in how Toby Fox doesn't deserve to make money because his song "Undertale" uses a fake guitar that sounds just like a real one? He could have hired a musician to play guitar but he didn't! That cost a REAL guitar player a job, didn't it?

And how come when it was found out that Toby Fox stole entire lietmotifs from other games like Kirby n shit, y'all had like 600,000,000 excuses to defend him?

I don't dislike Toby I think he's amazing, like 100/10, one'a the brightest examples of a success story of all time and one of the nicest most pure-hearted people on earth who made two of my favorite games of all time and a ton of my favorite music. Spider Dance has been my ring tone for like 8 years.

I'm just saying, the literal same reasons I see people attacking AI gen art is shit that Toby does, all of it, and y'all worship Toby for it but attack artists.

And neither here nor there, but hear me out?

Y'all will say you're in defense of artists keeping their jobs and their livelihoods which is so very noble of you, but if an artist draws shortstacks that are just a little too short, or if an artist utilizes AI, or if an artist draws Rose Quartz skinny, or if an artist draws Sans and Frisk getting a little too Frisky, or if an artist votes for Trump, or if an artist says a dirty word you don't like, or if an artist draws a black person that looks just a little bit too stereotypical, or if an artist draws a lesbian character getting fucked, or if an artist doesn't believe in gender identities, or if an artist doesn't put trans characters in their graphic novel, or if an artist makes a sexy character with butt-jiggle the protagonist of their video game; Y'ALL ARE COMPLETELY OKAY WITH SAYING THAT ARTIST SHOULDN'T BE MAKING MONEY, AND BANDWAGONING A HATEMONGERING BRIGADE AGAINST THEM.

Or in the Sans and Frisk case: PUT SEWING NEEDLES INSIDE OF COOKIES AND GIVE THEM TO THE ARTIST WHO DREW IT, PUTTING THEM IN THE HOSPITAL.

Listen

Spare me this "We hate AI because we care about the jobs of artists" shit, you lying scoundrels. You don't care about my job! You've tried to cancel me like 500 goddamn times, got my Patreon frozen twice, got my PayPal frozen over 100 times even right in the middle of conventions, flooded my stream chat and spammed the N-word in chat trying to get my Twitch banned, flooded my Discord multiple times with links to CP trying to get my Discord banned, and you have entire Discord servers literally called things like "Jay is an asshole" and "The We Hate Jay Society" (YEAH I KNOW YOU FUCKERS EXIST, HI, HAVE FUN SCREENCAPPING THIS).

My artistic career has been under fire for the past 12 years because I draw things y'all disagree with, have opinions you don't like, and have family members who vote for politicians you think are the boogeyman that's the cause of all your problems (and haven't disowned those family members). With all due respect, when I hear "We hate AI because we believe in fair wages for artists and want to protect the jobs of artists" I just wanna strangle your lying ass.

You hate AI because it's popular to hate AI.

AI is like a prosthetic robot arm that helps you carry the groceries, and disabled people like myself (rheumatoid arthritis) benefit from its uses greatly (such as being able to draw backgrounds much easier which has greatly improved my art and INCREASED MY COMMISSION REVENUE DUE TO MY ART QUALITY IMPROVING [But y'all don't care that AI helps artists earn more money, you hate AI because you claim it's hurting artists' ability to earn money]), but you're so hung up on people using the robot arm instead of their real arms that you think you're some crusader against injustice.

You aren't.

You're just looking for reasons to attack people, it's what you do. I've been dealing with y'all looking for any goddamn reason to attack someone that you can muster for the last 12 years, hell even before that I dealt with you types. You just want to hate, you want to be prejudiced so fucking bad that you look for literally any reason you can possibly find to make some vaguepost about how much you hate an artist and post it to Reddit, and then when you get called out, get so surprised that I found your bitch ass that you start pretending you didn't mean any ill will, and start pretending that you're someone else in the most pathetic attempt to dodge blame I've ever seen.

[Context: The OP of this post accidentally revealed who they are on Tumblr, and then when I called them out on Tumblr, they pretended they were someone else because they were scared I was gonna out them on Tumblr and they tried pathetically to cover their ass, and even politely said "I never wanted to garner hate against you" when they literally posted "I hate the way he draws women" on r/mendrawingwomen and flooded the comment section (mostly now deleted) with how "disgusting of a person" I am, while I was in the comments politely giving context to the shit he was saying about me, and he started getting furious when other people were liking my art and agreeing with me instead of him. I have like 600 screencaps of all the cringe this guy spewed, but I'm not gonna post it all because it's tangential anyway. Case in point? This guy's blog is absolutely covered with how much he hates artists for drawing things he doesn't like, and he regularly posts about how AI is taking jobs from artists. Not gonna out his blog, but that's who he is. A shining example of exactly what I'm talking about. "I hate AI because it takes jobs from artists!" "THIS MAN-THING DRAWS WOMEN IN A WAY I DON'T LIKE AND HE'S A DISGUSTING PERSON, EVERYONE JOIN ME IN HATING HIM AND TRYING TO RUIN HIS REPUTATION AND THEN WE CAN CELEBRATE WHEN HE LOSES HIS JOB!!!"]

Like, y'all can sit there and act like you're defending me and artists like me all you want, you're liars. You're boldfaced fucking liars. You are disgusting. It's completely pathetic watching you attack a tool that can be used to improve our art, and claim it's in defense of the authenticity of our art and the continued financial stability of our artistic careers. Fucking give me a break.

You're looking for people who say positive things about AI art so you can attack them and feel justified because it's popular to attack them.

All while sitting there and gladly swallowing the cum of any musician who makes amazing music with synths, fake symphony instruments and autotune.

"We care about the jobs of artists."

Yeah.

Long as those artists fall in line with your opinions and only draw things that agree with said opinions, right?

Wouldn't wanna care about the jobs of "problematic" artists who draw "offensive" stuff or vote for politicians you don't like.

Final note: This isn't even an attack against any political opinions or activism or anything like that, but I'm being realistic here because these are the people I see brigading against AI art. It's not me saying those people are dumb for having their opinions or political standpoints or being activists for their beliefs, it's me saying those people are the ones who are constantly attacking AI art in "defense of artists," while in the same breath attacking artists for not sharing their political standpoints or also being activists for the same causes. If you truly, truly cared about the livelihood of artists, you'd stop attacking artists' livelihood for disagreeing with you. Or for that matter: Any reason. Stop attacking artists' livelihood, or stop pretending you care about it. Be consistent, at least.

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txttletale · 11 months

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I really agree w/ all your Hades opinions! I played that one first and then went back to all the other SG games, and was surprised at how much better the storytelling was in Transistor and Pyre. Hades is really fun and clearly high quality, but its world and characters feel so much shallower compared to its predecessors, and I really despise Hades himself, so the "reconciliation" stuff falls flat for me. Since you like Pyre, I wondered if you would maybe want to talk about your general feelings on it a little bit--what you like about it, what you don't? It's the least popular of SG's portfolio, which is so sad to me because I think it's the weirdest and most interesting one of the bunch, both story-wise and gameplay-wise (even though my personal fave is Transistor, which is still excellent, I think Pyre does more things I admire).

pyre is one of my favourite games of all time so i would love to talk about it! i mean. where to begin. i love its world. i love the very clever decision to make all the proper nouns and fantasy stuff hoverable hyperlinks so that you, the player, can be filled in on important background information about the world without the need for stilted expository dialogue:

i love the world of pyre. it's genuinely beautiful, it's my favourite of any of supergiant's worlds: the downside looks genuinely unique, it looks at once forbidding and electrically pretty.

like god damn. but what i love most about pyre is the story and characters, and how they're both not just communicated to you through the traditional methods this game employs (dialogue, flavour text) but in a way that's woven into the gameplay.

like, pyre isn't a game about fighting, it's a game about sports. it's a very high-stakes sport, but it's a sport -- for those who haven't played it, the plot of pyre is that you and your band of wacky misfits have been banished to a secret underground world. from time to time, the stars align and one person can escape this exile by winning a game of fantasy baskebtall -- and because it's a sport, the game's happy to let you lose. you can lose and that can just be part of the story. on two different occasions, i chose to throw plot-critical matches in pyre--once because an NPC on my team asked me to and once because i felt like the other guys deserved to win more than the protagonists did. and the game treats that as a valid choice, a valid thing to happen in the story! it lets the game explore opportunities and feelings and situations that a more traditional game where the player 'has' to win in the 'canonical' ending isn't capable of and it does it really well

and similarly there's something very very clever done with the character writing. getting to know characters better -- finding out why they were exiled, what's at home that they want to return to, why they want to get back to the surface -- is the same process as improving that character's stats and skills in the basketball games. the result of this is that the characters you know best, the ones you're most emotionally invested in getting to escape exile, are also the ones who you've been relying on to win your basketball games! it's by far the best iteration of the 'switch up your playstyle or else' mechanic that supergiant obsessively puts in their games because it ties directly into the emotional stakes of the story and can make it a genuinely difficult choice to liberate someone who's an essential part of your team but you've just learned has a desperate need to escape before something terrible happens to their loved ones outside.

also its got the best romance route of any supergiant game. i dont give a shit about meg or thanatos when i've got sandra the unseeing

#ask #pyre #long post

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ragingadhd · 23 days

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Will and Alyss are trans here’s my essay

We talk a lot about how funny it is that Flanagan unintentionally wrote the gayest love story between Halt and Crowley in TEY, but holy shit we don’t talk enough about how he also managed to accidentally write the two most trans characters ever.

Alyss and Will being trans is a semi-popular headcanon that’s been in the fandom for ages now, but I haven’t seen many people really dive into why this headcanon is so prevalent. I think that partially has to do with the fact that, like any lgbtq+ identity, it’s pretty difficult to clock someone as trans without relying on trans stereotypes. Really, any character in the RA series could be trans if you chose to believe it since being trans doesn’t look any certain way. That being said, I do think there are some pretty clear qualities and experiences that Will and Alyss have that feel very close to my own experience with being transgender.

Physical appearance is usually the first thing people point out/notice when talking about this headcanon. Will is short, more so than one might expect from a cis man. Alyss is taller than most men and also has a deep voice. I have mixed feelings about people pointing to this as the only reason they think they’re trans. I mean, it makes enough sense for it to be the only reason since one part of being trans is the fact that one’s body doesn’t match their gender identity. What I don’t like about that being the only reason is that there’s so much more to the trans identity and experience than “body don’t match :(“

But that’s the cool thing about Will and Alyss, their physical appearance effects their perception of themselves the same way it does for a trans person (or a cis person really, but it feels much more prevalent in trans people). In the first book, Will is clearly uncomfortable with his height; almost any time it’s brought up, he replies with “I haven’t had my growth spurt yet”, almost defensively. Then, as Will becomes more comfortable with who he is, you can see it bother him less and less. I love this bc it’s exactly what happened with my dysphoria as I transitioned. The more I got to know myself and discover myself, the less my dysphoria bothered me.

As for Alyss, she is so clearly so confident with her appearance. She never tries to hide her height or voice. Although we don’t get to see her journey with those qualities, the way she’s so confident feels like something the earned. It’s something she maybe used to feel insecure about, then decided she gets to decide what femininity means to her. Her height and voice contribute to her elegance and femininity rather than contradict them.

Another thing about Will is his name and how it relates to his identity. I know Flanagan didn’t intend for any of this to be some trans allegory, but goddamn can I relate my trans experience to it. Will grew up without a last name, and you can see how deeply that effects him. It wasn’t just that he was “Will no-name”, he was missing a part of his identity. Hell, he said verbatim “at least you know who you are” to a fucking owl because he felt so confused and unheard (which btw is the most edgy teen thing he ever did).

Though you can see this missing part of his identity bother him less as he gained a support system, it’s still clear that he felt like something was missing. If he didn’t feel like something was missing, he wouldn’t have been so incredibly happy when he became “Will Treaty”. And when he got his last name, you can tell he’s proud, not because he finally has an identity, but because he finally has a name to match the identity he’s spent so long discovering and cultivating. He no longer expresses any sadness or grief that he doesn’t have his father’s last name, because he doesn’t need it to know who he is. He’s Will Treaty, and he’s perfectly happy with being exactly that. This is the most trans-coded naming experience holy shit.

Anyway that’s all I have to say about this (for now at least). Go give your local trans friend a kiss.

#rangers apprentice #will treaty #alyss mainwaring #trans will treaty #trans alyss mainwaring #ranger's apprentice #trans

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unamusedcyclone · 16 days

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Kurama The Retired Monster: A Look at Kurama's Canon Characterization and Impact

Kurama is one of the most popular characters in the decades old Yu Yu Hakusho fandom. Published in 1992 and dubbed into English in 2002, Yu Yu Hakusho is one of the most influential battle shounen anime. References are everywhere for this wonderful story about a delinquent that surprised the heavens and saved a little boy at the cost of his own life.

The series is my favorite of the old Toonami anime with its rebuke to the strict norms of Japanese society and its message about the grey tones of life.

It's in every character in one way or another, but Kurama tackles a trope I'm personally fascinated by: the retired criminal that is dragged back into his old life by circumstance.

This doesn't seem to be a common read of the character, though all the tropes are there. Youko Kurama was a vicious criminal who, after he was taken out of commission, essentially retired due to the love of a woman. While it was not planned, Shiori showing him love and a life outside of what he knew is what canonically happened and shaped his life. He chose, after she cut up her arms to save him from broken glass, to be the son she deserved rather than leaving as he planned.

When Shiori gets sick, Kurama is contacted by Hiei to join him on a heist in Spirit World for the Three Treasures. Given Kurama's nature as the exposition fairy, he is clearly aware of what those treasures are: The Orb of Bast, the Forlorn Hope, and the Shadow Sword. So, Kurama uses his experience as a thief and gains the Forlorn Hope for himself. As we know, the Forlorn Hope has a rule: It will grant your deepest wish in exchange for your life. Kurama considers this cost fair, since he clearly still feels guilty about stealing the son Minamino Shiori was supposed to have. In the dub, he comments about how some parents are devoured by their young, hinting at blaming himself for the condition Shiori is in. It is only because Yusuke intervened that Kurama is still alive, pulled out of his suicidal guilt spiral by Yusuke offering part of his own life to the mirror after seeing his own mother mourn him.

Kurama chooses to help Yusuke defeat Hiei, cementing him as one of the good guys and beginning his friendship with and repayment of Yusuke.

The Four Saint Beasts arc can be explained as part of Hiei and Kurama's parole. I won't linger on it, but I truly believe this is part of Kurama trying to be good, serving his sentence for what is likely the least of his crimes. In his fight with Genbu, Hiei talks about how he brought Kurama on because he'd rather have him as his ally than his enemy. This is one of the first instances of what Kurama's prior life looked like to others. He is a ruthless and intelligent fighter, and he is known for it. Before Two Shots, this implies Kurama had a reputation prior to his human life, one that lasted long enough that Hiei would have heard about it. (Based on later information, Hiei is less than a hundred years old and Kurama may have left Makai a thousand years ago, making Kurama's reputation incredibly significant.)

This reputation continues to assert itself in the Dark Tournament. The audience of the tournament continue to jeer at Kurama and Hiei for being demons fighting alongside humans, implying that they are well-known enough for this to be an issue. (In the manga, we get a page that shows that demons are total gossips and I love it.) We also have Kurama's fight with Ura Urashima, where Urashima comments that he believes this Kurama, our Kurama, might have taken on the name of the scary bastard that they still tell stories about. He is mistaken.

However, it is also in the Dark Tournament where we get his fight with Touya, where he asks Touya to be better than he was. This is where we see, wholeheartedly, that Kurama regrets who he once was. He regrets being the monster that Hiei and Yomi idolize. The nature of the series is that he needs to tap into that ruthlessness to survive, which is why he connects with Suzuki before the fight with Team Toguro. It is his desire to survive Karasu that returns him to that self.

Another scene that is incredibly important is the battle with Amanuma, the Gamemaster. As we know, for Amanuma to be defeated, he must be killed, as per the rules of his territory and the video game he uses. Amanuma is also eleven years old, manipulated into joining Sensui's crusade to destroy the human world for its evils and hypocrisies. Amanuma is a child, unaware of what Sensui's plans truly mean and as much as Kurama tries to say Amanuma chose this with the full understanding of an adult, it is clear he does not really believe it. Kurama is clearly upset by his choice, but he still makes it. There is no way out, no magic solution at the time. After Amanuma dies, Hiei implies that Kurama has killed children before, in his past life, but Kurama's grief is obvious. He reacts ruthlessly to Elder Toguro. His hands are bleeding from how much he hates the fact he made that choice and how much that decision is linked to the past he's clearly trying to leave behind.

The Three Kings arc is when this really begins to show up, though due to its truncated nature, it seems to go unnoticed. Yomi is essentially the end result of what happens when someone adopts Kurama's old views. Yomi is introduced to us as untrustworthy and brutal. Kurama's patience and ruthlessness became a guide to him as he became a king in the notoriously vicious Makai, after a botched assassination attempt left him blind. To be called to serve Yomi, Kurama has to face what he once was and how it impacted someone. Yomi didn't just look up to him, but he was also Kurama's victim: Kurama is the one who paid the assassin to kill him. Kurama also has to balance facing that with his desire to keep his mother and the Human World safe. Kurama's choice to betray Yomi and go along with Yusuke's cockamamie scheme can be read as a rejection of that past self as well as reinforcing that Kurama does not want to live that old life ever again. He chooses the human world, the world where he's not a vicious bandit and has loved ones.

The anime expands this by setting Kurama up against Shigure, the demon surgeon who gave Hiei his Jagan. This fight originally felt incredibly random: Shigure and Kurama don't have anything to do with each other. However, the fight with Shigure clicked once I realized that Shigure offers to restore Kurama back into who he once was. The entire fight is Kurama choosing to fight as who he is now, not rely on that past self he hates so much. At the end, Kurama even tells Yomi he doesn't throw anything away, but what he says in his little monologue is that he'll never be that version of himself again.

Kurama spends the whole series having to depend on the reputation and ruthlessness he cultivated as a bandit. He does it in life-or-death situations, not just randomly or for shits and giggles. He doesn't seem to enjoy his reputation, especially after living as Shiori's son. He looks more contemptuous of it, his face blank when he has to tap into it. He hates that he has to be that guy, that he was that guy. With the series over, it seems like he'll choose to stay human, to stay in the Human World for as long as he can.

Kurama's canon characterization draws him more in-line with the story's theme of growing up and healing due to the power of human connection. He is mostly retired from being a brutal monster and shows regret and guilt over the past, but by the end has mostly accepted who he once was, warts and all.

#yyh #kurama #shuichi minamino #youko kurama #yu yu hakusho #meta

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evilwickedme · 1 year

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It's very frustrating to talk about fridging bc the original point of it was like a very specific criticism of how minorities are treated in comic books in particular and it's now been universalized so much people think it means "killing a woman off because she's a woman" or "killing any character to motivate another character" (the definition according to tvtropes fyi, kill it with fire kill kill kill kill). Fridging isn't bad because you're killing a character as motivation, and it's not bad because you're killing a minority off, it's bad because it's a pattern of behavior from an industry overrun by white men writing and drawing and editing those stories. You're allowed to kill a woman off if it suits your story, but the issue was that women are constantly getting hurt or depowered or raped or killed off to motivate other, non-coincidentally male characters.

The problem that stood behind the original women in refrigerators website was that the narrative that the comic book industry at large was telling was that the purpose of female characters was to get hurt in order to motivate some other guy. Kyle Rayner's girlfriend gets stuffed in a fridge, we're not sad because her life got taken from her too soon, we're sad because Kyle Rayner just lost his girlfriend. Gwen Stacy gets killed by the Green Goblin, we're not sad because she didn't get to live a full happy life, we're sad because she didn't get to live a full happy life with Peter Parker. That is not to say that the story doesn't still get told. Peter going after the Green Goblin is horrific and terrible and amazing and leads to some great plot and character development. But the choice was not to hurt Peter himself, not even to threaten his loved ones but not actually harm them, the choice - CHOICE! - the writers in the comic book industry consistently made was to hurt a character who was already part of a marginalized group, and to do that for the benefit of a (presumably) white male cishet able bodied main character's narrative.

I speak mostly in past tense because once fridging took hold in the collective popular consciousness it didn't disappear completely, but it did fall out of favor in being used so blatantly. It became isolated cases rather than the main feature of one of the best selling batman books of all time. Characters get killed off occasionally, and those characters are even sometimes members of minority groups, and biases still inform those writing choices, but I'm struggling to remember reading a comic in the last couple of years that specifically fulfills the criteria for fridging.

Anyway if you're reading this in context, you know that at the end of this month (may 2023) Marvel is planning to celebrate the most famous fridging of all time by absolutely not learning their lesson and fridging another character. They're being lazy about it, too - they've decided to do it to Kamala Khan in Peter Parker's book, two characters that mean close to nothing to each other, and being extra awful by making it a Pakistani Muslim woman being killed off during AAPI month, and so far the information we have doesn't even involve Kamala's own friends and family and superhero team mourning her at all. It's supposed to motivate Peter, because it's part of his book, and it's also supposed to parallel Gwen Stacy, and they chose to do... This. Kamala is a wildly popular and beloved character who deserves better, and frankly Peter deserves better too. If you're going to fridge, at least do it well.

But I'm also already seeing white men, who supposedly agree with me and think this is bad, saying, well it's for MCU synergy, not "because she's a female" or "because she's not a white character" (direct quotes don't @ me). And firstly, ok, way to assume the rest of us didn't also catch up to the obvious conclusion that marvel comics is doing MCU synergy, AGAIN. The thing is that those aren't separate concepts at all? Or well, they are, but they don't negate each other. They're trying to do MCU synergy and make Kamala into a mutant, but they could've done that a million other ways, just as cheap and not as offensive - a simple retcon would've sufficed, they just did that a few years ago with Franklin Richards.

They chose to do it by killing her off, and they chose to kill her off in somebody else's book to motivate him rather than tell a story about her, and they chose to do it while celebrating Gwen's fridging for some fucking reason. This is context that, when removed from the situation, makes the whole thing meaningless. And you can say a lot about Gail Simone, but that she didn't have a Goddamn point is not one of them.

#how do I even tag this #fridging #women in refrigerators #kamala khan #ms marvel #spiderman #peter parker #gwen stacy #comics #marvel comics #marvel #sexism #racism #gail speaks

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spicy-apple-pie · 6 months

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For your artists ask (if you’re still doing that) <3

7,8,9,11,15

agggh, you chose all the hard ones lol

7) Favourite works of all time excluding your own

This one is so hard because I have favourite artists, but not many favourite works. Plus, my favourite changes with every passing second but right now I would have to say this drawing of Damian with some birbies by @malenjoyer

I love this art style so much and HE'S SO CUTE

8) What do you like most about your own work

Gosh this is a hard one because I think as artists we're always thinking on whats wrong or how we can improve, but I would have to say the line art. It's my favourite part of the process and I like how much character I add to it, though I want to experiment with a more messier style.

9) What are you currently trying to improve

two things. My colour and my backgrounds. I struggle with picking out background colours that makes the foreground pop out or that just looks nice. And I think almost everyone can agree that backgrounds are hard and boring to draw. But it must be done.

11) Favourite comment you've ever received on your work

I have no idea. I love and cherish every comment on my work. Sometimes I just look through them when I'm feeling down. But my favourite right now is on my comic about Damian riding Batcow. They were basically info dumping about how riding cows isn't actually that great but I put Damian in the best spot to sit when riding. I felt so smart for that, even though I just guessed where someone would sit on a cow.

15) Biggest Art Pet Peeve

I don't have a lot of art pet peeves, more like artist pet peeves. Like those people that make those speed paint videos with the clip of markiplier going "jingle jingle" and slime videos to be like "ooooh you don't have the attention span to watch this speedpaint until the end oooooh you hate artists". I'm being hyperbolic, but I still scroll to spite them lol. But for an actual ART pet peeve, I don't like it when a character has soooo many accessories. tbf that's my personal taste, I still find the art lovely and I still admire those who put so many accessories on characters, if that makes sense??? Like that one post about the art teacher who gave a critique about a girls art telling her to make the teacher hate it? Idk I'm writing this past my bedtime so my brain is a little like mush right know. I also hate people bashing art styles. like the "calarts style" (don't get me started) or any other popular trends. Like dude, ever heard of art eras? Art goes through trends.

Thanks so much for the ask!! Hopefully this wasn't too rambley, I just like talking about stuff lol

#thanks for the ask!!#shut up spicy #ask game #anon ask #SEND ME MORE

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findafight · 1 month

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The "Robin would never date Steve's ex who broke his heart" take is FUCKING stupid for a lot of reasons.

First of off, the autonomy you're taking out of Robin with this.

Like she's not Steve's sidekick, she's not his yes man, she's an indepent girl who should be free to date any girl she wants.

She would never let her friendship with him ostacolate her love life.

Why the fuck she should do that?!

No one would.

And also, Steve is actually the one who hurt Nancy the most (slut Nancy Wheeler).

And if you think for a second that Robin would ever take Steve's side, then you're wrong.

Just stop centering everything around Steve, and stop reducing Robin to be just his sidekick, 'cause she's FUCKING not.

Hi! So. Pretty sure you found the most recent post I made (on April 6th) tagged anti rnce (and ONLY anti rnce. Not even stranger things. Just anti rnce and my personal original text post tag and a quip about choosing violence. So clearly if that’s how you got here you chose to not just send a post you disagreed with to your friends to rant about but came into my inbox and tried to start shit)And if you didn’t I truly don’t get how you, clearly a rnce fan, found me.

I’m going to be honest. Neither of us are going to change each other’s minds. I don’t like rnce for a lot of reasons, from i just don’t see a romantic spark there to a lot of the shippers being kinda shitty. I don’t care what you ship, really, just that. Claiming it’s canon or should be canon endgame etc gets annoying. And that a lot of the times the way I’ve seen the relationship portrayed (because, contrary to possibly popular belief, I have actually tried to read some fics for them. It’s also such a commonly untagged side or background pairing that I am subjected to it like that often as well) there’s so often weird terf or radfem red flags and alarm bells going off. I’ve seen someone harassed by rnce shippers for calling them out and then those shippers loudly regurgitating terf talking points like it’s fucking funny. I know all fandoms and ships have bad eggs but holy shit.

There’s been a few posts about how for some reason rnce fans try to portray people who don’t like it as making Robin Steve’s sidekick, when really we are acknowledging the facets of her characterization other than her lesbianism. Just because she likes girls doesn’t mean that’s the only thing that matters to her!

Yes, Robin liking girls is part of who she is, it influences how she acts and what she talks about, but it’s not the ONLY thing about her. She likes old movies, she enjoys pop and new wave music, she does her make up in her best friend’s car, she forgot to mention she never learned to drive because he forgot to ask if she could, she thinks combining into a super being with said best friend would possibly solve most of their problems.

Robin is a character who makes her own choices! She chooses to butt in at scoops, chooses to stay with Steve in the bunker to hold off the Russians, chooses to tell him her deepest secret, chooses to apply for jobs with Steve once they heal from the mall, chooses to spend a lot of time with him! And that’s rad. It gives us insight on who she is!

Whenever I’ve written or talked about Robin choosing not to date Nancy, I’ve always made it perfectly clear that it is Robin’s choice. Because given what we see of her in two seasons, Robin is loyal, and greatly values her friendship with Steve. Like. Regardless of how Steve feels about it, and I do think of Robin was legitimately interested in Nancy and Steve thought she had a chance, he’d encourage her to go for it. (Steve isn’t blindly encouraging Robin to hit on Vickie. He has high suspicions that Vickie is queer in some way too! She likes boobies!) I think Robin would think twice about it just because how much she encouraged stancy to get back together in s4.

Honestly, it makes me sad seeing how many times “why would robin choose her best friend’s feelings over getting a gf” is said because like. I value my friends’ feelings all the time. If I thought something I was doing was or would hurt them, I would reevaluate. Why WOULDNT Robin consider her best friend’s feelings? The first person she ever came out to? Who made her feel safe and accepted? Who made her laugh when she felt most vulnerable? Who she encouraged to get back with his ex? Romance is not a level up from friendship, it is not the endgame of life, it is not superior to any other relationship type. Treating friendships as less important to romance is something to reconsider and reevaluate.

Your last point. Anon, who is centring Steve now? Sure. He fucked up in s1. Literally no one denies that. He fucked up and he worked to make things right. He cleaned up the graffiti, he went to apologize to Jonathan, and he presumably apologized to Nancy, because she decided to date him for eleven months after that. I highly doubt there wasn’t heavy gossip about the graffiti or their breakup/makeup. I do agree that before Tina’s party Steve wasn’t helping Nancy as much as he could have, but Nancy wasn’t communicating to him either. They weren’t in the right place for each other. If we consider the alley the breakup, how is that not still breaking his heart? Yes Nancy was on a noble crusade, but it still had collateral damage. It’s something interesting about her character!

Robin wouldn’t be on board with the graffiti. But like. Steve’s changed and apologized since then. And She wasn’t there? She’s just here for the aftermath of Steve’s reignited feelings for Nancy. Idk. Both Steve and Nancy hurt each other in s1/2. It’s not a Steve v Nancy thing? It’s just an acknowledgment that of the two, Robin is closer to Steve. She’s more likely to consider him. She’s not omniscient to everything that happened or the persons feelings and reasons for doing it.

I’m sorry you don’t think friendship has an equal or greater value than some romantic relationship, it must suck. I also hope you find better things to do than to come to someone’s inbox and try to start something over a ship you like that they don’t.

#anti ronance #I censored it in my answer but anon didn’t so it might show up in the search #but not in the tag #findaanswers #listen. just get out of here #if you think I’m a stupid idiot then block and move on #but you clearly came here from somewhere looking at stuff to be mad at because I always make sure to tag #also everyone ignores that Steve has CURRENT FEELINGS for Nancy that ROBIN ENCOURAGED

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packet-of-staples · 2 months

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So I found some Rawfury videos of Yuri Lowenthal, Krizia Bajos and Cissy Jones talking about their characters and talking about the game before it was released (I was looking for clips for OC voice claims) and there was something in Cissy's Vivian video that kinda stuck out to me.

So what she says about Vivian exactly is: "Arcadia to her is- its not only where she's built her career, its where she's building her legacy, and uh, for her this is something really important. She wants to leave something of value, something that's worth a lot to people-"

Now, from a non spoiler point of view this is like, oh yeah rich Ceo lady wants to leave a mark on the world. Ceos are always talking about legacy, wanting to leave something behind, be something great yadda yadda. Added bonus if you know that she's supposed to be Elijah's '''Granddaughter''', she wants to continue her family's legacy all checks out.

But, knowing who she really is, not Elijah's granddaughter but one of the Arcadia 6, makes this sentence a lot more interesting. You could see this as her wanting to remake her legacy, because she technically already had one. Emily Garland is one of the 6 Arcadian born citizens to escape the dome, that's something pretty cool to be known for. But she threw that away, she sold out and chose to support the very company that oppressed her and many others like her. So now she has to make something more of herself to justify that choice. If she can make Arcadia greater, bring it out of its current slump like Howard Ashman did for Disney, then she's no longer the escapee who sold out because she was too weak to handle the outside world, she's the amazing woman who made American Arcadia popular again!

Cissy goes on to say: "-and so she works really really hard to make this thing, um, the best it can be with the most interesting people-" (She also goes on to call Trevor 'a bit of an L 7' or a square and I think that's really funny, like yeah, yeah he wouldn't be there, he would be square)

She does work really hard to leave something that, in her eyes, is positive to her image. She's reinventing herself to make her crawling back to the company worth it. To prove to herself that it wasn't a mistake and to leave a legacy that, hopefully, most people will look fondly on instead of in contempt or betrayal. She wants to leave something of value, because I can imagine there is a part of her that doesn't hold any value in herself, not after failing to make a difference that actually mattered and becoming part of the problem.

And I dunno I feel like that adds just an extra layer to her which is pretty cool. I could also be reading way too much into this idk.

Anyway, the other two videos are very cool too. Yuri talks about how Trevor's life isn't boring like Walton thinks it is, its just 'Exciting in the wrong way'. He also talks about how he thinks lots of people will relate to Trevor (So true) and how just because your life may be simple, it doesn't mean its boring and not worth living which I think is very sweet. Thank you Yuri. Krizia talks about how she really related to Angela because she grew up on Puerto Rico and how she got to add a couple of 'spicy words' as she put it, in her dialogue for a bit of extra authenticity. She also talked about how Walton was the job Angela always wanted, but after 'peaking behind the curtain' she realised that it wasn't the dream she thought is was, it's both kinda heart breaking but also very relatable, especially I'm sure to those in the entertainment industry. It makes me really want to know what her 'peak behind the curtain' moment was and what the steps where to get her to this point in more detail (Hey hey, Out of the Blue, hey please. please make that prologue thing you said was a good idea of mine on twitter. Hey, please? Please? It has the Regi Davis stamp of approval, please?)

The videos are very cool I'll put them under the cut if you're interested. I just wanted to have a ramble cause I haven't in a while and I've just been thinking about this.

youtube

#american arcadia #vivian walton #emily garland #trevor hills #angela solano #staples rambles #Also speaking of Regi Davis did you guys know he has Javert as his profile picture on twitter? I just thought that was really funny.#Youtube

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katethewriter · 2 years

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Meet the Fam!

Summary: Natasha and Wanda have 8 children, and they love them all 25/8. 25 hours a day/8 days a week. This is an introduction to the series and this family.

Pairing: Wanda x Natasha, parents!WandaNat x daughter!reader

Words: 5.5k~

Warnings: NON CANON AU, mentions of child abuse, child neglect, and child abandonment, a very sick baby girl, emergency birth, I get a little long winded, but what’s new?

Not really a warning, just a heads up: This series obviously has A LOT of original characters, specifically child original characters. If oc’s aren’t really your thing, this one may not be for you.

Let me know if I missed some!

A/N: I had a lot of fun brainstorming and world building for this one, so I decided to share a little bit of background information before we jump into the real fic. This one is oc heavy, so I felt the need to really introduce them, so I chose to do so in headcanon/brainstorming format 🙃 Also, this is a non canon AU, so I also felt the need to give you a tidbit of WandaNat’s back ground before all the kiddos came along. Some of these are longer than others and that’s just because I felt those needed a bit explaining for context. Tell me what you think and if you want more!

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

Meet the Maximoff-Romanoff’s!

Starting with moms:

Wanda Django Maximoff-Romanoff

daughter of Olek and Iryna Maximoff

twin sister of Pietro Maximoff

wife of Natasha

born in Sokovia

Her family moved to New York when she was a teenager because her father had a job opportunity.

Her mother decided to open a rather small restaurant to serve food from her country proudly.

and she does well.

Wanda starts off helping in the front of house with her brother

Eventually, she moves to the kitchen where she really learns to shine. She soaks up everything her mother has to teach her.

Once she has mastered everything on the current menu, she starts experimenting. Creating completely new dishes or taking her own Sokovian spin on traditional American foods.

Before long she is teaching her mother new recipes almost weekly. These are then added to the menu.

The restaurant really starts to thrive, pulling people from all of the city into their little hole in the wall, after a year or two of this.

Wanda is about to turn 18 and finish school. She makes a decision to continue her education at a culinary school.

She learns fast and quickly becomes a star pupil.

She gets her degree and returns to New York and helps her parents build the restaurant even further.

They do so well that they can move locations to a much larger venue, and they continue to grow in popularity and prestige. They offer authentic Sokovian food to a community that hasn’t really experienced before, along with Wanda’s masterful creations that blended well know dishes with Sokovian cuisine.

Eventually, her parents decide to take a step back. They still work in the restaurant when needed, but the management and ownership is passed to Wanda.

It’s hers. She owns it. She owns her own restaurant. It’s a dream come true.

The only thing she’s ever wanted more than this is a family of her own,

and soon enough she gets that too.

One night after most of the diners had left, Pietro drags Wanda to the front to introduce her to a friend of his.

Her brother tells her the man’s name, but Wanda doesn’t hear it. She’s too busy trying so hard not to embarrass herself in front of the gorgeous red haired woman sitting at the table with him.

After a short conversation, Wanda excuses herself and turns back to the kitchen mentally kicking herself the whole way.

“Stop it, Wanda. They were clearly on a date. She’s probably straight, so you have no chance.”

She only makes it halfway, and she is stopped by a smooth voice that makes her want to drop her panties.

She turns to find the red head smoothly introducing herself and asking for her number.

‘Natasha, a beautiful name for an even more a beautiful woman,’ Wanda thinks.

She accepts, and the rest is history.

They fall in love and get married in the city. Their families blend seamlessly. It’s almost too good to be true.

They live in the city. Wanda continues to run the restaurant, while Nat patrols.

Wanda always wanted a large family, not really as large of a family that she ended up with, but she wouldn’t change it for the world.

She carries and births 5 of their 8 children: Lena, PJ, Alex, Tommy and Billy.

When she is pregnant with the first set of twins, her and Nat make the decision to move out of the city. They buy a 5 bedroom up state.

Wanda decides to step back from the restaurant to focus on the babies for a while.

She still owns and manages it from afar, but she has a great staff, talented chefs, loyal managers, and a dedicated team to keep the restaurant on its feet and living up to reputation Wanda had built.

After Y/n and Alex are born and grow to the age they need to be in a daycare for most of the day, Wanda feels the need to get out and do something.

She receives an offer to teach at a local culinary school, and she jumps at the opportunity

She absolutely loves it.

Teaching other people as passionate about cooking as she is, watching their skills grow is exhilarating.

With the restaurant and teaching, Wanda feels a sense of peace that she can support her family and continue to support her family as it grows.

and grows and grows and grows

Natasha Alianovna Maximoff-Romanoff

the adopted daughter of Melina and Alexei Romanoff

older sister of Yelena

she was born in Russia

Her birth parents were killed in a car crash when she was very young, and she was sent to an orphanage for girls, The Red Room.

She was there for a few years before she met a little girl named Yelena, a girl much younger than her who just looked scared.

Natasha comforted and cared for her and continued to do so for a year.

It was then a man and woman came in looking to begin their family.

They were taken by Yelena. They spoke to her and played with her before picking her up.

The blonde girl looked frantically for the older girl with fury red hair, but she had gone to steal a snack from the kitchen for Yelena.

Natasha hears screaming and rushes to where she left Yelena.

Two strangers are walking towards the door with her little sister Yelena.

The blonde thrashes in their arms until she’s eventually released and runs straight to Natasha gripping her tightly.

The two of them had become very close, near inseparable.

and that was lowering their chances of being adopted. No one wants to take in two kids.

The strangers leave, and Natasha thinks that she just cost Yelena a good life with those two could have been parents.

but that chance was lost forever.

Until only a week later, when they return with an interest in both girls.

Natasha is 8 when she is adopted along with her official little sister.

They lived in Russia for a few years before moving all the way to Ohio. They stayed there for the rest of Natasha’s childhood.

Her mother Melina taught psychology at a local university. Her father became a police officer.

Somehow both Natasha and her sister decide to follow in his footsteps and become police officers as well.

Eventually Natasha decides to leave the suburban life to move to New York. She works and makes connections.

One day a friend of hers and fellow officer, Steve asks her to try a restaurant that is supposed to be amazing.

“A friend of mine is the owner’s brother; he can get us in.”

The food definitely lives up to the hype.

Natasha is already thinking of when she can come back next when a man approaches the table with a woman in tow.

The most breathtaking woman Natasha has ever seen.

Steve introduces the brother, Pietro, and he introduces his sister the head chef and owner of the restaurant.

Nat compliments the food and gets only a quiet thanks but a completely genuine smile in response.

As the woman, Wanda, walks back to the kitchen, Nat feels like she’s losing her chance.

She quickly chases her down and introduces herself properly and goes for it. By the grace of whatever god there is above, the chef accepts, and Natasha will be forever grateful she did.

She adores Wanda more and more with every interaction.

They get married and decide to start a family of their own.

Unlike her wife, Natasha has always wanted a family as large as they have.

She wanted carry children, to form new lives inside her and love them with every thing she had.

However, she carried and birthed only 1 of their 8 children.

Y/n is a miracle child. One they thought they had lost before she got a chance at conception, but she was there, hiding in plain sight.

The pregnancy that followed was a typical one more or less.

excluding the fact that her wife was also pregnant at the time.

Twice the cravings, twice the mood swings, twice the hormones and the sex drive to go with it.

Pregnancy sex is much harder to accomplish when both members have swollen stomachs.

All goes well until an emergency c-section was performed and Natasha was rushed into surgery.

When she wakes, the first thing she thinks is that she misses her baby. Her flat stomach evidence that her ride along is no longer riding along.

She instantly misses holding the child inside her. She’ll just have to convince Wanda to have a fifth child, so she can carry again.

Nat looks up to find Wanda with red eyes and a terrified expression. She can’t help but think the worst.

Her baby is gone.

“no no no no no no, please no”

Wanda quickly jumps up quelling her fears, Y/n ok, she’s here and healthy, but there was more.

“Nat, I had to make a decision.”

She explains what happened, the complication, the possible outcomes

“It was your uterus or your life.”

Wanda knows how much carrying children meant to her wife, and she had taken that from her.

Nat grieved for a moment.

Her only consistent dream in life was to fall in love and carry children.

That option is now gone

but if the other possibility was Natasha missing out on life with her wife and children, she knew Wanda made the right choice.

She carried Y/n.

She fulfilled that dream. Now, to love them for the rest of her life.

“She is ok?”

“She’s fine. Healthy and so beautiful, lyubov. She has your hair.”

Nat smiles, “that’s all that matters to me.”

She kisses her wife without a drop of resentment in her heart.

She eventually goes back on the job and just watches her children grow.

They all have different personalities, likes and dislikes.

Natasha’s favorite is when she watches them find their passion and chase it.

…now for the kiddos

Lena Iryna Maximoff-Romanoff

17 years old

one of “the big twins”

Natasha and Wanda’ very first born child

the biological daughter of Wanda and a male donor

born 18 mins before her twin Pietro

Named after her Aunt Yelena

At the age of two, she saw an old home video of Natasha dancing ballet in a recital and begged to dance like her.

She began lessons at the age of three and has danced till this day. She improves more and more with every year.

She’s very talented.

As a junior in high school, she has been recruited to dance in college even a professional ballet company showed interest in her.

However, she wants to be a lawyer.

specifically a family lawyer after witnessing the adoptions of two of her little siblings first hand

She has the grades for it. She’s not in the very top of her class, but she is not far below them.

In true first kid fashion, when she’s not dancing or studying? she is probably helping with the little kids.

not because her moms force her to

They would never force her to.

She just likes looking after them.

Once she and PJ are old enough to drive, she often times acts as a school bus picking up her siblings on her way home, after her ballet rehearsals of course.

When moms say “the big twins are in charge”

…what they mean is “Lena is in charge.”

and everyone knows it but PJ.

Pietro Leonid Maximoff-Romanoff

17 years old

“PJ”

one of the “big twins”

biological son of Wanda and a male donor

He was born 18 mins after his sister, and it kills him.

He’s named after his Uncle Pietro, but everyone calls him PJ.

It started as a family joke.

As soon as the twins were born, everyone got confused calling them both Pietro.

So little Pietro became Pietro Jr around family.

No one really knows when it got shortened to PJ, but it’s stuck ever since.

He’s a pretty calm child,

but he can be a rascal when he wants to be.

April fool’s day is his favorite day of the year.

He won’t admit it, but his little brother Alex is his best friend and often coconspirator.

He is currently a junior in high school. He does well in school, not as well as his twin, but still above average, and he’s ok with that.

Like his uncle Pietro he’s fast

like really fast

which is a huge help when he plays soccer. He finally got moved up to varsity his junior year,

and he is PUMPED about it.

He’s not really sure what he wants to do after graduation. Whether to go to college or a trade school.

If he goes to college, he has no idea what he would want to study?

Sifting through the options can be a little overwhelming.

but moms reassure him that he’s only a junior.

“There’s plenty of time to think about it.”

Y/n Alianovna Maximoff-Romanoff

15 years old

the only biological child of Natasha

They were fortunately able to use the same donor as the twins.

Originally, they thought the implantation didn’t take. Months later they learned that Natasha was in fact pregnant.

because it’s the same donor, she’s technically a half-sibling with her brothers and sister,

but she’s definitely a whole sibling you know what I mean?

lovingly nicknamed by her moms as their “secret agent”

due to her inexplicable ability to fly under the radar… since conception, literally.

Only four months older than her brother, Alex

technically making them “Irish twins”

but she’s a year ahead of him in school.

Her birthday falls just before the age cut off date between the grades. So she’s the youngest of her class, and he’s among the older in his.

Now a sophomore in high school, her grades are average, mostly because she dedicates so much of her time to music.

She is arguably the quietest out of all her siblings, with the exception of maybe Max.

except when she’s practicing her violin.

When Y/n was three, her moms asked her if she wanted to dance ballet like Lena. She just shrugged, and they let it go.

When Y/n is four, her sister Lena begged to go see a real ballet.

So moms took Y/n along too, thinking if she saw the dancers that might convince her.

While her moms and sister watched the dancers, Y/n was solely focused on the orchestra pit.

After that every time she got to pick music in the car, she asked for “ballet music” (of course, her moms knew exactly what she meant).

When she learned the names of all the instruments, her answer quickly changed to “violins please.”

For her 5th birthday she gets her first violin, she began lessons.

After 10 years of playing, she is good.

like really really good

not because she’s a prodigy or anything

She’s good because she wants to be, so she works hard for it.

Y/n practices all the time.

To the point that her siblings start to complain, especially when she first started.

As much as they hate to think it, it got a little frustrating for her moms too.

So they ask her to practice in the basement to cancel a bit of the noise.

She spends so much time down there, that when she’s 10, they redecorate the basement and turn it into Y/n’s new bedroom.

She absolutely loves it.

Lena is trying to convince Y/n to play for one of her ballet recital solos. Of course Y/n is gonna say yes, she looks up to her big sister too much not to.

Between how much time she spends in her room practicing and how quiet she can be and the whole “secret agent” thing she’s got going on, she’s prone to slipping through the cracks in terms of attention from her moms.

but Wanda and Natasha make a conscious effort to keep that from happening every chance they can.

Alexei Lev Maximoff-Romanoff

15 years old

“Alex”

biological son of Wanda and the same donor as his older siblings

He’s named after Natasha’s father, but he goes by Alex for similar to reasons to PJ.

Conceived at a point when everyone believed Natasha was not pregnant, he’s only four months younger than his sister.

So together they are kinda like Wanda and Nat’s second set of twins

…except also not.

The one thing to know about Alex, is that he is a class clown.

The class clown of all class clowns

The Class Clown King, if you will

Since he was very little, he’s always trying to make people laugh.

So much so, that it tended to get him in trouble at school with an ill-timed or disruptive joke.

Though now that he is in high school, he has managed to bring his number of detentions down to one a semester.

Only a freshman and he’s trying to start a comedy club at school.

His joking spirit is why he so easily agrees to many of PJ’s practical jokes. Sharing a room with his older brother makes their scheming even easier.

When he’s not in school or trying to make someone laugh, he likes to swim in the local swim league.

He’s not the fastest, but he manages to keep up.

Max Samuel Maximoff-Romanoff

12 years old

originally born Maxwell Jonathan Samuels VI (the sixth)

adopted by Wanda and Natasha when he is two years old

When they adopted him, they decided to keep the name he knew, except changing his middle name to a shortened version of his original last name.

not to honor his parents(you’ll see why in a second), but as more of an homage to all of the Samuels family line that made it possible for Max to even be alive today.

They weren’t exactly trying to add to their family at the time, but this little guy practically fell in their laps,

and then immediately into their hearts as well.

Nat first met Max when she and her partner at the time took a call to his house for a domestic dispute.

While trying to deescalate the situation with the man and woman, Natasha noticed a very young child watching the whole thing.

By his size, he couldn’t be but maybe a year or year and a half old max (pun intended).

He was a bit dirty which was a bit of a red flag, but between PJ and Alex, she knows how little boys can be. She decides to give his parents the benefit of the doubt on it.

Natasha’s partner took care of the parents, and she took care of little man.

First thing she noticed is that he was so sweet.

He smiled when she picked him up and played with her for a couple hours while the whole ordeal was settled and a next of kin came to pick him up.

She was called out to that address twice more.

Once for a suspicion of hard substance abuse which ended up being unfounded at the time, but the condition of the house had greatly deteriorated.

Natasha found Max alone in his room with a handful of bruises in multiple stages of healing. He was a little dirty and very hungry.

With not enough evidence to do anything more, they had to leave, but Nat put in a report to child services immediately.

She was called out there again only a few weeks later when a woman called in saying she found a missing child. A stranger found Max in only a diaper completely alone wandering outside in the street.

The blessed woman scooped him up out of harms way and sat with him on the sidewalk until police showed up.

When Natasha pulls up, he somehow recognizes her from the previous two times he’s seen her and immediately runs into her arms.

She scoops him up in a hug and walks him across the street to his house, where she finds both his parents passed out on the couch clearly intoxicated.

While she is happy to see sweet Max again, it’s safe to say Nat’s angry.

She’s absolutely enraged.

She arrests both parents on the spot for child neglect with a suspicion of child abuse (three strikes, am I right?)

Natasha hates to part with the little guy, but he is taken into child services until his parents situation is figured out.

A few months later, Max’s parents where also charged with several drug charges along with the child abuse and neglect charges.

They were found guilty on all and will be in prison for a very, very long time,

and Max was being put up for adoption.

The day she heard that, Natasha went home and after the kids were asleep, she all but begged Wanda to consider.

“He’s the sweetest kid.”

“His parents were screaming at each other in the other room and he was just happy to play with me.”

“He recognized me.”

“He spent all day alone in the sun, but he smiled and ran straight to me.”

“You’d love him, detka.”

It didn’t take much convincing to have her wife agreeing to consider,

and after only one visit with Max, Wanda’s decided he is theirs.

The two mothers spent a few hours playing with the boy inside the child services center.

He ended up falling asleep in Wanda’s arms. She hated the thought of him waking up without them there.

She hated the thought of leaving this building without him even more,

but the visit was over.

Nat and Wanda both kissed his head and whispered to the sleeping boy, assuring they will see him again soon, and one day they’ll be together for good.

Many visits and several weeks later, they finally take him home.

Max’s four older siblings loved him on sight. They all wanted to play with him and fought over who got to sit next to him at the dinner table.

He fits in like he was always meant to be there, because he was.

He is a total snuggle bug which his moms savor before he gets older and reaches out for them less.

However as he grows up and gets more independent, he keeps his sweet nature.

If he sees someone is sad or not feeling well, he always does something to make them smile and feel a little better.

When his little brothers were born, he was moved into the room with his older brothers.

He’s happy because that makes him one of the big kids now!

Like Alex, he likes to swim.

He is definitely the most supportive kid on the team. At swim meets he is constantly running around trying to cheer on all of his friends during their different races.

Now I know no one can know the future, but he’s gonna be a nurse when he grows up.

Trust me on this one.

He knows about his birth parents.

Where they are, why they’re there(as much as a child needs to know and as much as his moms think is appropriate), but he has no memory of them or his adoption.

If he’s asked, he’d probably tell you he’s always been a Maximoff-Romanoff.

Really he was, even before they met him, he belonged with them.

Thomas Ivan Maximoff-Romanoff

7 years old

“Tommy”

one of the “little twins”

biological son of Wanda and a male donor

older twin brother of Billy,

but he’s born only 2 minutes before his brother, so “older twin” doesn’t really mean much here.

If these two had been Natasha and Wanda’s first set of twins, there’s a high possibility they would have been their last kids.

It’s not like they are terrible trouble makers, they are just so rambunctious.

So much energy compacted into so small bodies.

They are the typical set of brothers.

They like to play rough and can be very rowdy. They run around outside and get dirty and catch bugs. Then sometimes, they are so focused on a video game, there is no getting through to them.

The moment Tommy learned to walk, he ran all. the. time.

and he runs fast.

Almost faster than PJ, but unlike his brother, he doesn’t want to really play sports, like soccer or football where speed would be a favorable tool.

No, he doesn’t like the objectives and the rules and trying to get a ball in a net or across a line.

He just likes to run really fast in one direction.

Luckily this year he’s old enough to start running track, which is the perfect extra curricular for him.

Currently he’s in grade school, and he hates when his teachers seem to pay more attention to him than some of the other kids.

“It’s because I’m not as smart as Billy. That’s why they hate me!”

but that’s not true, his moms reassure him.

“You are twins, not clones. You have different strengths, and that is perfectly fine. They just want to help you utilize yours.”

William Olek Maximoff-Romanoff

7 years old

“Billy”

one of the “little twins”

biological son of Wanda and a male donor

younger twin brother of Tommy

It was Natasha who first brought up the idea of having another baby.

The twins were 10, Y/n and Alex were 8, Max was 5,

and suddenly baby fever set in.

“just one more, detka please”

…well “just one more” turned out to be 2 more.

At the first ultrasound, Nat almost passed out much to Wanda’s amusement.

“You knew twins run in my family.”

Just like that their family of 7 became a family of 9.

The older kids, especially Lena, love to help out. “Baby duty” was the only favorable chore.

Very early, they could tell that Billy was smart.

exceptionally smart

As he went through school, this became very apparent.

his scores? highest in the class.

He does extra credit he didn’t need.

Oh, the science fair? He won that.

every year.

He even sometimes sneaks Tommy the answers to their homework when moms aren’t looking. Of course, they notice it every time.

He is one of the strongest players on the chess team.

Nat loves to sit and play chess with him.

When she was first teaching him, she would let him win every now and again. Now, sometimes she has to actually work to keep up with him.

Out of all Wanda’s children, Billy is the one who will never decline to watching sitcoms with her.

When he’s not running around with Tommy, he’s probably hiding somewhere with his nose in a book.

Anastasia Melina Maximoff-Romanoff

3 years old

sometimes referred to as Ana

adopted by Wanda and Natasha when she is only three months old.

Like before, they weren’t looking to have another child.

They were actually against it almost.

7 kids=101 kids, at least that’s what it feels like.

“No more” they agreed.

Then Bruce, a friend of theirs who works as a doctor in the local hospital, asks Wanda to cater an event at the hospital, which her restaurant doesn’t normally do, but for a friend of course she makes an exception.

When she arrives to set up for the event, she goes to find Bruce and he is clearly upset about something.

After some prompting, he begins tell Wanda about the newborn baby girl that was dropped on the steps of the hospital.

She had a cleft lip and a severe lung infection (which she shouldn’t have survived) that will probably leave her with lasting breathing difficulties.

They’ve been treating her for almost 2 months. Her condition is improving, but her lungs are too weak for her to be released.

Worse than that, she is up for adoption, and the process is not going well.

The caseworker assured the hospital that a newborn would be adopted almost immediately, but a month goes by and no one comes.

Not even a case worker has come to visit this tiny girl fighting for her life.

Bruce is so frustrated because he just got off the phone with the caseworker who told him that essentially she’s on the “unwanted list”.

Because of her health issues, she is a less desirable child for adopting parents.

They tell him, these kids usually stay in the system until they age out.

Wanda’s heart drops at the idea of an innocent child never having parents because of a condition that she has no control over.

Bruce shows her a picture of a beautiful baby girl with an oxygen mask and tubes seemingly all over her body. She wears a beanie that is stitched with the name Jane

“How did you know her name?”

Bruce looks down sheepishly, “we don’t… one of the nurses makes them for the Jane Doe’s”

That makes Wanda angry.

She doesn’t even have a name.

After the event, Wanda goes home and breaks down as she lays in bed. Nat holds her, and Wanda sobs as she tells the story.

At the end, they share a look. No words are spoken but a conversation is definitely held.

The mothers decide to think it over for a while.

Less than a week later, they call their case manager.

The process is fast, way faster than Max’s adoption.

It’s like the agency is scared to lose prospective parents for an “unwanted child.”

Nat and Wanda hate that term.

They want their daughter off that list.

She is wanted fiercely.

Two weeks later, they sign the papers.

Anastasia Melina is officially theirs.

She spends another month in the hospital. While the kids are at school, Wanda spends all day with their baby sister. Nat always stops to see Anastasia before she goes home after work. Being friends with their daughter’s doctor helps them sneak around visiting hours.

After the adoption, Anastasia’s condition improves quickly.

Like she knows she has a home and family now, and she can’t be with them until she’s better.

Finally she is strong enough to leave the hospital.

They take her home, and begin life as a family of 10.

Once home Anastasia thrives.

After a surgery for her lip and breathing treatments multiple times a day to strengthen her lungs, she looks nothing like the frail baby in the picture Bruce showed Wanda.

She grows up as the family’s little Princess. Only 3 years old, she is not letting asthma keep her down.

Her big sisters cherish her, finally not just the two of them with all those brothers.

As for all those brothers… let’s just say she has 5 built in personal body guards, and she loves them all.

She absolutely adores her big sisters.

She wants to dance ballet like Lena.

One day, she put on her tutu and little ballet slippers she got for her birthday and ran to Lena.

“I do bawet(ballet) pwease?”

Happily her big sister complies.

She teaches her positions and light warm ups that she’s seen the coaches teach the little little dancers.

Unknown to them Nat watches silently from the doorway, heart full to the brim.

Sometimes if she can hear music coming from Y/n’s door, she will sneakily open the door and dance in the living room to the music.

One day someone closes the door while she’s dancing. So she scoots down the stairs to Y/n’s room.

“Can I dance to your bawet music?”

She squeals when her sister says yes. Anastasia twists around the room while Y/n continues practicing.

Y/n was actually about to quit for the day when Ana came down, but instead she played until the toddler was worn out.

“Can you pway Ewsa?”

Not wanting to tell her no, Y/n plays Let It Go by ear giving it her best try. It’s not perfect, but apparently more than enough for her little sister.

The toddler quickly drags her upstairs to show Mommy. As Anastasia and Wanda listen to her play, she is heard playing throughout the house.

Lena looks up from the couch and asks if she can play a Taylor Swift song. Again Y/n plays by ear and memory.

This rapidly evolved into a kind of game where the family sat and just kept suggesting songs for Y/n to play at random. For the most part she kept up.

After that, the activity would pop up in family game nights every now and again. always requested for by Anastasia.

and let’s be real, no one can say no to her.

She loves all things pink, and lives up to her nickname of Princess. She loves dress up and make believe.

She is a gem the family didn’t know they were missing.

She is a total Mama and Mommy’s girl, which is perfectly fine for them.

They soak it up knowing for sure this is the very last time they will have a child this young again.

Part One: Just a Typical Morning

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

POP QUIZ! NO CHEATING!!!

(for those who’ve read this far)

Who can name all 8 kids WITHOUT checking the list again?

Bonus points if they’re in order. Extra bonus points if you get middle names too.

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