#can you spot all the characters

[amerrierworld]

brain.

I chewed the end of my pencil’s eraser, the flavour off-putting but not unwelcome. Looking at my pile of drafts and blurb prompts, the brief inkling of my motivation that I had earlier seemed to be slipping away.

“You know, this would be a lot easier if I became obsessed with something new again, quickly,” I grumbled, abusing the delete button on my keyboard as I rewrote a sentence again.

“What’s wrong with the things you’re currently obsessed with?” A low chuckle came from the other side of the room. Lou stepped through the doorway and to the side of my desk, planting reassuring hands on my shoulders. “Just write another steamy fic about me... You’ve got plenty already.”

“Yeah but I don’t want to just write about you, no matter how much I love writing about you,” I look up at her and she tuts, stealing the pencil from my mouth. “I have to keep up with different things!”

“Well, you keep promising them you’ll write more about us,” Hela grumbled from the couch in the back of the room, pointing between her and Alcina, who was hunched over uncomfortably in the small office space. “How many parts does Babysitter still need to finish the story, hm?”

“Don’t start,” I groaned, hiding my face with my hands.

“And Songbird was supposed to be just three parts, right? Now what, you’ve given yourself about ten total? You think you’ll have the stamina for that?” The Countess added.

“You’re not helping! Any of you!” I snapped, closing my laptop and getting up. “I need a drink.”

“I hope it’s one of my brands,” Alcina commented. “You know they’re the best.”

“I don’t drink blood-wine, Alci.” 

Lou, trusty Lou, followed me around the elaborate palace of writing I had constructed for myself, flicking through a notebook of drafts and characters from my recent writings. 

“You really stuck around with this, didn’t you?” She gestured to the pages of scribbles.

“What?” I asked, grabbing a glass from the cabinet in the kitchen. 

“Me, Debs, Hela, Carol, Alci, basically everything Cate Blanchett played and then some.”

“Oh, shut up,” I growled. “I wrote about some other characters too you know!”

“Yeah, years ago,” Thorin muttered, sitting at the kitchen island next to Obi-Wan. “We both barely got any mention. Fili’s story took years to finish, didn't it?”

“Boys, I promise I still love all of you. It’s just that the women characters have been more on my mind recently.”

“Well, you haven’t written about all of Cate’s characters,” Valka muttered, and Bernadette nodded. “When are you gonna invite Lydia in?”

“When I have the stamina to even begin thinking about such a complex character! I could barely write one fic about Lilith as it is!”

“Oh, sorry, we’re not complex enough for ya!” Karl snarled, chugging back my entire last bottle of wine. “This is shit, by the way.”

“Hey! That was my last bottle.”

“This is your dream, just think up another,” he scoffed, chucking the bottle into the sink.

“Just pick something! Anything will work, and to be honest, I’m surprised you haven’t written about me yet,” Legolas sat perched on one of the tables, fiddling with the ends of one of his arrows. “There’s loads in Fellowship you could write on.”

“Jesus Christ, where’d you come from? And no, I can’t just pick something! I need a good explanation for my insane hiatus... again!”

“Ah, you’ll be fine,” Bernadette replied. “The loyal fans will understand.”

“Don’t call them fans,” I muttered. “I feel weird thinking that people out there actually enjoy my writing.”

“Besides,” she kept going, “You’ve been coming and going as you please anyways since the start! Isn’t that indicative enough that you can take all the time you need if you need it?”

“Doesn’t stop me from feeling guilty though!” I sighed. “I feel like I owe my writing another piece. Something good. But that’s scary, because what the hell is supposed to be good? And what if no one reads it? It’s not even a ground-breaking novel, it’s just silly little paragraphs about characters that aren’t even mine.”

“So what?” Lou crossed her arms, leaning against the doorway -- her best place to pose. “You like writing it, so write it. Doesn’t matter if people read it. You don’t even have to post it, if you don’t want.”

Galadriel walked in beside her, hands deftly clasped in front of her. “There’s plenty to write about, meleth-nin. You’ll find something. If it’s not a fic like this, maybe something else. And if something is unfinished, let it be. That’s what the process is for.”

I opened the kitchen cabinet, and sure enough, there was another bottle of wine. But, instead, I reached for the apple juice next to it. It was nice and cold, despite not being in the fridge. God, I loved imagining things. 

“I could write more smut -- people like reading it, and it’s fun to write,” I shrugged after chugging half a glass. “But what if I should try something more? Maybe a couple parts to a story, like in dreams, but just stop it after a few, and not force myself to think of it as a massive novel with endless chapters? That’s what happened with Babysitter... I had a fantastic idea and now I’m scared to take it somewhere.”

“Maybe one day you’ll finish the big ones,” Obi-Wan mused, stroking his beard from the table. “You could always try a different series that you’ve already seen, watched, and loved. Maybe that’ll get the ball rolling. There’s lots more to Star Wars than just me.”

“I know, but I love you,” I pouted. “And Star Wars is massive!”

“So is Tolkien,” Thorin shrugged. “You’ve written about us plenty.”

“Could’ve written about me,” Loki grinned. “You basically did, of course, but you made me more the side-character. I think I would do really well as the protagonist--”

“Maybe take the time to watch new stuff, you know, the things you keep saying you’ll get into, but then don't?” Debbie suggested, pulling out a massive list of my to-be-watched and to-be-read. I pouted again, I wanted to, but had no idea where to start.

They had all entered the dining room now, Alci sitting on the floor to make room for her head. And they all looked at me expectantly. There was a typewriter on the table.

“Oh, no, absolutely not. I’m not writing something while you’re all sitting here watching me.”

“Well, what’ll it be then?” Hela countered. “You’re gonna finish this fic and be done for the day -- or should I say, year?”

“I don’t know what to write about!”

“Write about this,” Bernadette said, gesturing wildly around the room. “And then maybe something new will happen after.”

“You know, this is definitely a fever dream,” I grumbled. “I could never look a so many of Cate Blanchett’s characters at once and be able to form complete sentences.”

Three peculiar flies landed around the typewriter, buzzing haphazardly. Alcina shooed them away and the three daughters materialized, hanging from the chandelier.

“If you break that, you’ll pay for it!” I warned.

“If we break it, that means you made us break it!” Cassandra cackled. “Can’t win, sweetie. Not even in your own daydreams.”

“No, I suppose not,” I slumped in the chair and looked at the blank page. “Writing fic isn’t meant to feel like a chore, right?”

“Don’t ask us, we’re not writers,” Karl grumbled, sitting at a plate of hot food piled high. 

“Where did that come from?” I gaped. He wagged a finger in the air in thought while chewing a massive piece of steak.

“Hmn, I think... you might be hungry. Best get some fuel when you wake up.”

“But first,” Carol said softly, resting her hand on my shoulder. “Write something. Anything. Any word.”

I thought for a moment, the clock in the hall ticking loudly. Fuck it.

brain.

[tarnussy]

Elden Ring 2nd Anniversary

[another-clayres]

Bearer of Skies, Keeper of Stars

It is time to post my art entry for MC4.0!

Don't let your obligations weigh you down and HAPPY MARCH CAPRICE!!! <3

...can you feel infinity...?

[nananarc]

Ashtray . 2023

(Yeah no don't worry she's a 120kg cyborg that can crush his skull with a squeeze of her hands if she wants)

PopArt Colorful Alt Versions on my Patreon:

[oceanwithouthermoon]

ive come to realise that i dont actually hate kubokai, i just hate the way people write them

[itsfrenchfornothankyou]

The thing about Trafalgar is that he is determined to be the angsty emo in a series which is, unfortunately, a found family comedy

[superloves4]

Something that compels me so much about Maglor/Luthien is that if you change Beren with Maglor, the quest for the silmaril becomes so much more juicy

Because, yeah, on one hand it's still a suicide quest designated to either make Maglor give up Luthien or die in the process of the quest, thus freeing Luthien.

But on the other hand, this is Maglor's family treasure he is asking as bride price (which also makes it an actually accurate as a bride price is supposed to be something the groom's family already has yk), Thingol is asking Maglor to give him the whole reason the Feanorians even left Aman in the first place, the thing Feanor died trying to re-take, the reason he has been fighting for years.

Not to mention that depending on how you decide to read the oath, Thingol is asking him to not only curse himself but his entire family for Luthien, asking him if a life with Luthien is worth eternal damnation.

[supertaliart]

Claudia Kishi - role model to little artistic Asian girls since 1986.

[writeouswriter]

Reading a fic that's so well written I wish I could close my eyes and just let the descriptions and atmosphere wash over me, but the dilemma with closing my eyes is, well, I then would not be able to continue reading this fic, now would I.

[psqqa]

babe, could you phrase this literally any other way??

[singingcicadas]

The way it's depicted, Cybertron's pre-war societal issues had a lot less to do with Functionism and more to do with unchecked government corruption, massive wealth disparity, high layoff/unemployment rates, and disenfranchisement.

People were starving, they needed work, they weren’t getting any. Those that were fortunate enough to have work didn’t get paid living wages, much less have anything to spare for health contingencies. Even then stability’s still the luxury of the top few tiers; they live one cut away from layoff. The government cared only enough to exacerbate these issues by coming up with new ways for exploitation. Any attempts to protest or lobby were shut down through political persecution. As a result the masses turned increasingly to crime, drug abuse, thuggery, and violence. Extreme acts of terrorism gets lauded as long as the collateral damage's suffered by someone else. Morality and caution are eroded in the face of desperation.

Meanwhile the many alleged restrictions of Functionism are just lip service complaints made by the characters which doesn’t match up to most of the stuff we’re shown. Like if Rung could become a psychologist, a specialized job that requires higher education, despite having zero background on top of such a weird alt that he had to be classified as an ornament, then wow the functionists must be open-minded. If Dominus Ambus could be a scientist/doctor/explorer/author/successful social rights advocator during the height of functionist control with a minesweeper military-use alt (assuming that his secondary alt's the same as Minimus'), then wow the functionists must be accommodating. If Tyrest could become chief engineer under Nova and later go into law, a complete change of profession, while being a jet, then wow functionism's flexible. If Ratbat and Momus could become senators in a society that discriminates heavily against beastformers and labor frames, then wow that’s progressive. If every Prime from Nova to Zeta (with the exception of Sentinel, his alt’s a tank, he only has wings in Megatron Origin as part of his Apex armour upgrade), every single named pre-war senator other than Proteus and Momus, and four out of five of Nova Prime’s buddy club (only Galvatron's a grounder) were wingframes in a society that supposedly discriminates against wingframes, then wow that’s… inconsistent worldbuilding.

Megatron didn’t get into bloodsports or start a war because he didn’t get to pursue his dream job. He got driven into the pits and down the slippery slope of moral degeneration because his only source of income was cut off by the mine closure incident. People wanted livelihoods above anything else, it's the failure to provide that that made the miners go off the deep end and resulted in the death of a guard. If Functionism actually ensured that everyone could be guaranteed a job or at least minimized the unemployment rates, then stratified castes or not, there would have been no war. People, or societies, are generally capable of tolerating an incredible amount of injustice as long as the majority still have a chance at scraping by at the end of the day. But the government, and later Megatron, kept yanking the rug out from under everyone over and over until they no longer even had a chance at that; there's no other choice left but fight or die.

[m-for-now]

I love it so so so so much when a character is like the Smart One in the group, who is always the one who remembers the details, analyzes every piece of informationen, makes the plans and is always the first one to understand or notice something. And then I love it when that same character is so incredibly oblivious to one thing. (Especially people being nice in any way.)

[smilesrobotlover]

Suki is such an underrated character I love her sm

[befuddled-calico-whump]

This is a genuine question: I know you enjoy lady whump as you have some characters that are female and are whumpees. I enjoy it too, sorta. Truth is that I feel guilty.

I know it’s kinda problematic to see lady whump as taboo and immoral but I can’t help but feel like it’s wrong, I come from a country that HATES women (shocker all countries hate women but I mean mine has a huge femicide problem) and I know how stupid I sound “I can’t feel but it’s wrong” like duh it’s whump! But I honestly don’t know how to get over those feelings, it hits too close home.

My question here is did you ever got those feelings of guilt and if you did, how did you get over those?

It's understandable to feel guilty at times, especially when creating or enjoying dark content (and especially if it's something that hits close to home)

Initially, I had some reservations about lady whump, since in mainstream media, violence against women tends to be a sensationalized thing that exists for shock value or to motivate the male lead in some way

(it's worth noting that the media has a history of doing this to trans, gay, and otherwise queer characters and non-white characters as well)

Initially I was squicked out by the idea of lady whump because I was so used to seeing it through that lens (not to mention, as you've said, the real-life examples)

However, I've seen again and again that whump as a genre tends to handle that material well (with all genders, not just females). Instead of the shock value, whump focuses a lot on the emotions, how the harm affects the character being harmed, and more often than not gives that character a fulfilling recovery arc

Personally, that's what shifted my opinion on it

Even then, if it's something you're uncomfortable with, you're not at fault for avoiding or disliking it. It all comes down to personal preference, and whether you'd like to explore it more or just stay away, it's your choice, and you shouldn't need to explain yourself (/gen)

[sarahjacobs]

punk spot and goth sarah stuff 🫰

i also made playlists of the kind of music i think they'd listen to :') you can listen to spot's here. most tracks fall under the hardcore subgenre, but there's also a good amount of ska and pop. generally has a chaotic, garage, and/or dated kind of sound, really wanted the kind of stuff that scratches my brain in a specific, rough way

there's also sarah's playlist, which i'm less confident about because i'm wayyy more immersed in punk subculture and music. but. i tried! some gothic rock, mostly punkabilly and gothabilly. i feel like she'd be into music that has that campy slasher feel, so that's the overall mood i was gunning for

[moeblob]

So uh. Eventually I'll stop drawing these guys so obsessively but not today I guess.

(DND AU where it's just these two, Brent, and Paul on a life mission to annoy Chris the GM by having the pact of "we're only here for Karen's benefit")

Karen is a warlock, Right is a cleric, Paul is a paladin, and Brent is a bard (so he can use bardic inspiration on Karen).