#do I even bother tagging all the ships mentioned here lol

[empress-of-snark]

Hey I love your fic!! I know you were thinking about including TOW the Flashback where everyone almost hooks up with someone else; if you are writing that (and don’t mind spoiling) who do you think would try to hook up? It was easy in Friends because there were 3 straight men & 3 straight women, I’m curious how would it work with Robin and Eddie in the mix.

(Ignore me this is just me brainstorming) I can def see Steve and Nancy perfectly matching the Joey and Monica story bc that just really feels like a Steve move, but idk abt the rest of them. I guess if you avoid Eddie/Chrissy it would either be Chrissy/Jonathan & Eddie/Robin or Chrissy/Robin & Jonathan/Eddie. I feel like either Eddie/Robin or Chrissy/Robin could go with the Rachel/Chandler story. I could see Robin trying to make a move on Chrissy (maybe she overhears her talking to her friends about how she regrets not experimenting in college at all bc she kinda went straight from Patrick to Jason) and I could also see Eddie trying with Robin before he knows she’s gay. I could maybe see Jonathan/Chrissy having a moment similar to Ross/Phoebe one, like maybe back in college they bumped into each other while Chrissy was upset about Patrick and Jonathan was upset about Nancy and something almost happened. I agree w you abt Jonathan/Eddie having potential: maybe when they first met Eddie thought Jon liking Bowie was a signal that’s he’s gay/bi. Or I could see a younger Jonathan potentially being interested in experimenting w Eddie when they’re high esp if he’s sad abt Nancy. Anyway this is just me rambling, I’m sure whatever you write will be amazing and be the most true to the characters. Have a great day!!

Thank you so much!!

I actually have SO MANY thoughts about the potential of this episode—you’re so right that Robin’s sexuality definitely throws a wrench into the plans (I say with love). It’s what’s kept me from being able to come up with a concrete outline.

That being said…

Totally agree that Steve/Nancy is a given (although I’ve talked plenty about the potential of Eddie/Nancy). They already have a romantic history in canon, so it makes sense. I can definitely see them having a brief infatuation when Steve first moves across the hall before realizing very quickly that they don’t make sense together.

(For context, I don’t completely hate Stancy, but I don’t like the idea of them being endgame. He wants a big family and she doesn’t—neither of them should have to compromise on that)

I absolutely adore the idea of Jonathan and Chrissy maybe finding comfort in each other when dealing with their respective romance woes. I have a soft spot for them—I think they’d actually make a really cute couple, being so similar. Chrissy kind of needs someone to look after her and Jonathan’s very good at looking after people (it’s rotten work/not to me, not if it’s you vibes honestly)

The comedic potential of Eddie hitting on Robin or Jonathan before finding out they’re not interested… amazing 😂

However, I am also into the idea of both Jonathan and Chrissy experimenting with their sexuality a bit. I can just picture Robin overhearing Chrissy’s comment and immediately tripping over herself like “hi yes, I’m Robin, I’m very gay and I’m more than happy to volunteer my services”

I also had an idea that Robin might be feeling low after getting rejected by a straight girl and thinking hell, maybe she should give men a try, after all. But after one extremely awkward, stiff kiss with Steve (think Chandler and Phoebe in ‘the one where everyone finds out’) she’s like “nope, still gay”

Ugh, there’s so many good possibilities! I wish I could write them all!

Thank you so much for the ask! Hope you have a lovely day as well!

[marybeatriceofmodena]

I'm curious, do ppl hate Love Never Dies because they think Eristine is problematic and it's made canon in it, or is it due to something else? I havent watched it yet or anything but i like the vibes, lol

Heh... Love Never Dies has always been controversial at the very least? It came out at a time where Erik/Christine was still the most popular ship in the phandom - it still is, by the way. That didn't change despite a clear shift in fandom and ""problematic content"" around 2013, so a good 3 years after the musical came out. If anything, Raoul/Christine shippers have been a minority for most of the phandom's history, and both sides of the debate at some point more or less decided to agree to disagree (I mean, the homophobic slurs Raoul would get at times were starting to REALLY be in poor taste), except on the point that without the love triangle, there wouldn't be much of a story, and there are various ways of interpreting said love triangle. So, quite frankly, I don't understand why some people on either side are trying to restart discourse in the POTO fandom but I digress. And look, if you see people in the tags saying that Erik/Christine is problematic, they're probably new, and not really representative of the phandom at large. Anything having to do with Sierra Boggess is more controversial.

I really don't think the controversy stems from it making Erik and Christine bang and have a love child - I know there are some people who are against the idea of any kind of sequel, in fanfic form or otherwise, for a variety of reasons, but most of them were being responsible adults about it and didn't actively seek fanfic. As I mentioned before, a lot of folks were Erik/Christine shippers and thought that Christine was more into the Phantom than into Raoul, that's nothing new. But a lot of them also had issues with how LND dealt with it, for several reasons. It didn't come from an "anti" sentiment, it was very much them having issues with the material that was presented to them.

Raphael/phantoonsoftheopera (who is a long time fan of POTO) goes into more detail here and I think he sums up a lot of phans' thoughts back in 2010 when LND came out (whether they shipped the Phantom and Christine or not), and I think @musicalhell is another one who was also around at the time (feel free to pop in, and hope I'm not bothering you with the tag).

As for the rest, I wish I could defend ALW's choices here in the same way I'd defend Lana Wachowski for Matrix Resurrections - i.e. you're allowed to not like it but this is this creator's baby and they're allowed to do whatever they want with it, so let's all respect art for the sake of art here. But LND is very much a vanity project, as ALW has proven multiple times, that is mean-spirited to its core in various ways. For my fellow SW fans, it's the TROS to POTO'S TLJ. The cast and crew were treated in a really shitty way back in the original London production days, same with critics of the show, and there was even a case where a journalist and long time phan who provided a critical review of LND was demeaned in an article as some sort of sad housewife who was obsessed with POTO. Mind you, ALW has tried to make LND work FOR YEARS, with various productions and tours opening here and there, but it always underperforms. And mind you, the Eristine crowd is still hanging around, and POTO is doing extremely well whereever it goes to this day. If the Eristine content was good, the crowds would follow, "problématique" posts and tweets or not. They aren't there.

[inchidentally]

Ngl little bit sad that you're becoming kinda negative on here. I miss when you used to post those super cool thoughtful discussions and analyses, without the need to trash talk or bash on other ships.

(just to say, I'd normally post something like this behind a cut and I promise I always will in future. it just feels like today in particular is a good moment to state a few of these points. I'm not normally this serious lol I just want to kind of mitigate any more drama.)

I've always posted about wanting rpf to be kept out of the drivers' and teams' public spaces and I've always said it's stupid/unnecessary drama when fans of certain fictional ships get genuinely loudly "competitive" over other fictional ships and I've really always been against people hating on the girlfriends who get caught in the crossfire of the fans who truly believe their two drivers are in a secret gay relationship. it's how I've always personally felt and apart from it being my opinion (which is fair for my blog) I also feel like having even a smidgen of traction on my posts means I can potentially prevent landoscar going down the road of certain ships that have fans who've fully crossed over into aggressive/publicly disturbing territory. and who've been doing so for years and only gotten worse.

hell, I've even always openly hated when Lando's individual content gets taken over by people bringing up Carlos or Daniel or even sometimes Oscar or Max F. the man has a life beyond all of those friendships and he very much deserves for his content to sometimes stay just about him. only people like his family or Jon/Lando's team of 10+ years deserve any significant share of credit for Lando's successes but no one's bothering to bring them up in the comments etc.

also, it's still very early days for landoscar as a ship and we have at least two more years of Lando and Oscar as teammates (fairly likely more) so if we can keep out the element of fans who take rpf into widely public spaces/directly to the people involved, then I'm going to continue to occasionally post about it. those types of fans absolutely hate reality intruding and they hate real life partners even more so I'm absolutely going to post about reality and girlfriends regularly. even apart from the fact that I'd feel weird excluding girlfriends, there's a solid reason to do so.

especially when even apart from rpf, the girlfriends always get shit from people who want the guy for themselves or who have decided they get a say in who he dates. I'm not going to pretend like all of that doesn't happen just to avoid all negativity.

as far as the tricky/controversial asks I get, I always put them fully under a cut and tag appropriately so they're incredibly easy to skip. I also batch them up so one of those posts happens maybe once every couple weeks - if that. my content has always been massively on the side of fun content vs anything drama/wank related.

the one thing I will say is that I'm getting a lot of repeat anons about ship drama that I would otherwise not hear about (I rarely look at twitter and my tumblr dash is lovely and tidy with just a few things blacklisted) so I'm going to write one sort of roundup post to cover any more of those and not answer any more. I'm just repeating myself atp.

I also went on my first ever blocking spree in this fandom today when a post I'd rb had a bunch of ragey hardcore rpf people jump onto it and I also blacklisted a few more things. so that's the last I'm personally ever going to see of that drama myself. I still casually ship carland0 and dand0 as well and a whole lot of us are nothing to do with the people publicly pushing shippy shit or doing the whole - god I cannot believe this still happens - 'my rpf ship is real and yours isn't'. they're also the people who call all girlfriends "escorts" and "beards" so they're easy to identify.

one last thing anon is that I hear you but I've got to mention I delete a LOT of borderline hate asks and I leave a fair amount of trolls frothing by refusing to respond to their asks. so I'm very much always trying to keep the content on my blog free of useless drama or negativity.

[jreads]

Unexpected Constellations (Part 06)

Rating: It's not bad, but maybe don't go reading it out loud to your mum or something. Or do, i don't know what your mum is into.

Word Count: 8.3K

Warnings: I do not want to give too many spoilers so i'll just say: Mentions of alcohol, Foul language, Canon-level violence, Slight sexual content.

A/N: My friends I feel like I apologize for being late every time I upload. But again, sorry for being late. Maybe everyone should just come to expect this. In my defence, this part is long, and I kind of almost like it? There's an OC here lol, he might show up again, he might not. Tbh the plot just needed a guy. There also may be some mistakes, but I really hope not. As per usual, check the masterlist for tags and other parts. If you reblog, I'll manifest a Din shirtless in the living waters of Mandalore scene in S3. I know we all want it. Also sidenote: I saw Brittany Broski’s post on TikTok about how she’s in her Mandalorian era…. Anyone want to take one for the team and rec this fic?🧍‍♀️❤️

He had not been joking.

Tendrils of hair stuck to your face, and you reached up for what seemed like the millionth time to pry the strands off. According to the temperature monitor on the ship, it was the hottest time of day, and the sun beat down unforgivingly on the top of your head, the varying wooden overhangs offering little reprieve.

Din was only a step ahead of you, still clothed in full armour, giving no indication that the heat was a bother to him. You didn’t understand it. He must have been under at least three layers, counting the thick plates adorning his shoulders, arms, chest, and thighs, and yet he seemed as phlegmatic as ever. You wondered how the child was faring, tucked away in a bag at your side, still wrapped in his woolly cloak. He had taken a liking to the dragonflies that buzzed around the small natural pool in the clearing where Din had landed the Crest.

The two of you had, after flying over the cove and finding no open landing platforms, decided to set up camp just outside the bustle of town, hidden behind a long stretch of waxy tropical trees. The first wave of humid air had been so pleasant, and you had savoured the fragrant smell of the planet’s flora. But now, barely half an hour into your walk, you would have begged for the cool fan in the ship, and perhaps a bucket of iced water.

As if sensing your discomfort, Din twisted toward you. “We’re almost there.”

You hummed in acknowledgement, barely having the energy to string together a sentence. You didn’t know where ‘there’ was. All he had shared with you before you left the safety of the ship was that he had an old contact in the market, someone that he had worked with long ago, someone you could trust. That remained to be seen. You trusted Din, but you wouldn’t trust a friend of Din’s simply because they were a friend of Din’s. Din had some weird friends.

Overlooking the simmering heat and the stickiness of your skin, the area was quite beautiful. It was exactly what you’d expect from a locale dubbed Raider’s Cove. Towering wood structures lined the edge of sparkling aquamarine water, framed by trees of vibrant green. The forest behind the town seemed alive with noise, buzzes and chirps coming from every direction. The force was rich on this planet, you could feel it. You knew Grogu could too. 

The market was even busier, stalls lining the street, selling all sorts of wares from food, to weapons, to jewelry. Din turned right onto a quieter, more shaded lane, and you followed suit. He hung back now to walk alongside you; he had been worried earlier about someone spotting the two of you together.

He spoke to you like a knowledgeable tour guide or a HoloNet narrator. “This market dates back to before the Old Republic. Some families have been selling here for ages, passing their business down through generations. There’s and underside to it, but it’s also home to a lot of honest and genuine people.” 

You looked up at him. “I didn’t take you for a history buff.”

“I’m not, I just had an interesting conversation with a talkative shoemaker the last time I docked here.” You grinned at him.

“It must be because you’re so approachable.” His shoulders shook lightly with silent laughter.

Since you had left Tatooine, the dynamic between you two had been… more playful. Something had shifted, just slightly, and you couldn’t quite put a finger on it. But you were content to fall into this comfortable mood with him. Honestly, it was a relief after the worry and angst of a few days prior. He hadn’t approached the subject of your almost departure during the long hours in hyperspace, choosing instead to enlist your help in the connection of a few cables in some small cavity just behind the carbonite log. Your hands were far nimbler than his, so he often got you to aid him with menial tasks like these.

After that, the two of you had put the child to bed and sat in the cockpit together, quietly conversing. Din had shared a few stories with you of his past experiences on Rishi, including the tale of a rather slippery Sullustan who had led him on a chase into the mountains, concluding with a near escape with a few of the locals. At some point you must have fallen asleep because you didn’t remember scaling the ladder back into the hull. But when you woke, hours later, you were curled on your side in the cot, a woollen blanket draped over your body and pulled up to your shoulders. It was a tender gesture, and one that made some part of you ache.

There was also the issue of that unspoken something between the two of you. 

Perhaps it was entirely one sided. Perhaps you felt that much stronger now simply because he had seen the darkest parts of you and not shied away from them. You’d be naïve to think he didn’t care for you, but you still doubted he felt the way you did. That undeniable pull, the yearning. Bursting into flames and yet shivering every time you could feel his attention on you. Maker, you wanted him. Badly. 

But you also understood the impossibility of it. His creed wasn’t the only thing that stood in between the two of you; there were many, very logical reasons as to why you would never take that step, despite so desperately wanting to.

His hand ghosted over the small of your back, stilling your thoughts. Having abandoned the thicker layers of your suit in the Crest, you wore only a light, loose-fitting undershirt, which was a blessing given the planet’s sweltering conditions. But it did mean that every touch felt like a brand, a sharp jolt of electricity that was so much harder to ignore. 

“Here.” He guided you left, into a narrowed, darker passageway. Only a few paces down, he opened a rather beaten door, ushering you inside before following. 

Descending old stone steps, the smell hit you first. It was an acrid mix of what you could only assume was piss and alcohol. You tried and failed to supress a grimace. The stairs were wet with something. You weren’t entirely keen to find out what it was.

Finally reaching the bottom, the narrow hall opened up into a dimly lit area. It was similar to some of the cantinas on Tatooine, but the usual sandy colour was replaced with grey stone and worn wood. The tables were large and circular, with strange, patterned squares in the center of each. Lining the wall to your right was a display of bottles, and a tall bar. The only light beamed down from thin windows along the top of the room’s walls. You could see the shadows cast by the feet of people as they walked down the sunny street outside. In here, it was quiet.

“It’s a gambling den.” Din’s voice travelled over your shoulder. “The contact I knew used to work here.” He moved beside you, further into the space. “It’s a long shot but I figured—”

A blaster shot rang out.

Hang circling your wrist, Din twisted you behind him in a flash, the laser bouncing harmlessly off his beskar breastplate.

“Don’t shoot! We’re looking for someone.”

 No response. He was braced, broad frame tensed, his grip on your wrist still solid. “We mean you no harm.”

“If you could just answer a few questions, we’ll be on our way.” How polite of him.

You could sense a heartbeat just to the side of a door behind the bar… human. You peered around Din’s shoulder just as—

“Maker, Mando is that you?” The voice was heavily accented, tinted with what almost sounded like humour. A man emerged from the doorway. Every muscle in Din’s body visibly relaxed. 

“I didn’t recognize you in that shiny new fit… man I could have killed you!” He came around the edge of the bar, slapping the blaster down on its surface. He approached the two of you, reaching a hand out and pulling Din in for a hug, clapping him heartily on the back. Your eyebrows just about hit the ceiling. 

Din was chuckling. “Yeah right, if it makes you feel better.”

It was then that the man noticed you, still standing somewhat awkwardly behind Mando. “Well, who have we here?” Up close, you took in more details. His skin was the richest brown you had ever seen, smooth and almost glowing, even in the near nonexistent light of the den. Dark hair was cropped close to his head, with a brutal, raised tattoo winding its way over his forehead and down the right side of his face.

He bent down and took your hand, lips meeting the back of it lightly. “It’s not often we have such beautiful ladies gracing this establishment.” You couldn’t help the giggle that escaped you. You had been called many things before, but beautiful… 

Mando answered for you, giving the man your name. Maybe you imagined the sharp edge to his voice. 

But you definitely didn’t imagine the way he stepped closer to you, before gesturing to the smiling man in front of you. “This is Castann. We met a few years back, when I came for that bounty I was telling you about.”

“My friends call me Cas.” He extended a hand, and hesitantly, you shook it. His palm was callused but warm against your own. “Apologies for the near-death experience.” He motioned to Din. “Last time I saw this bloke, he was in a much less flashy costume.” You almost choked on a laugh. “Bounty hunting must be treating you well; you’ve got new gear and a girl.”

You waited for a statement of denial from Din. It never came.

Instead, he said: “The last time I saw you, you were neck deep in debt. How’s that going?”

Cas waved his hand in dismissal. “Eh, owner died, I took over the place. You know how it goes.”

“Suspicious circumstances?” Din probed.

He placed a hand over his chest in mock indignation. “You think so little of me?” Cas turned to you again. “Honestly, how do you stand him? Is he always so—?” He put a hand up to his forehead in a salute, face devoid of emotion.

Hoping Din wasn’t looking at you, you nodded hastily. Cas laughed, a rumbling sound. “What brings you two around here anyway? Looking to sample Rishi’s wares? Couples retreat, perhaps?”

You couldn’t stop the smile that was breaking across your face. Considering you had been shot at just minutes ago, you already really liked this guy. He noticed your smile and winked at you, grinning as well.

“We’re here for information on a bounty.” Din’s answer was terse. You shifted your gaze up to him.

He didn’t mean to be curt. He wasn’t upset with anyone. Truly, it was no one’s fault but his own.

And yet, his voice came out sharper than intended, and it drew your eyes away from Castann, muting the smile that had graced your face just moments ago. He had tried not to let it get to him, but in the end, his efforts had been in vain.

It was just frustrating, the ease at which Cas was able to converse with you, connect with you so quickly, place a kiss to the back of your hand. These were small things, seemingly normal for anyone upon first meeting. 

But not to him. You had known each other for a long time now, and he had never been able to wink at you like that, to light up your face so easily, to feel the softness of your skin beneath his lips. 

He wondered, too often, what that might feel like. He wasn’t well acquainted with the feeling of jealousy, but it settled, oily and unwelcome, in his gut. Pushing his inner monologue aside for the moment, he continued.

“Have you heard anything about an auction? An anonymous source says someone’s here, in the market, trying to sell something important. We need to find them.”

Cas rolled his eyes. “Always right to business with you.” He gestured to a table behind you. “Let’s sit at least… you two make me nervous.”

You both turned, Din sliding into the booth on one side of the table. He watched you as you carefully untangled yourself from the straps of the bag. Cas claimed the booth on the opposite side.

It would make more sense for you to sit beside Castann, with Din’s bulky armour taking up most of the bench space. But for whatever reason, you claimed the spot beside him anyway, sliding the bag in so it was sandwiched between the two of you.

Cas seemed to survey the dynamic, his eyes flitting from Din to you, and back again. With a single shake of his head, he slapped his hands down on the table. 

“I’d be a terrible host if I didn’t ask if you wanted something to drink. Spotchka, maybe?” 

“Isn’t it only just past the sun’s peak?” You asked. “It’s a bit early.”

Cas waggled his eyebrows. “Ah, but time is just a construct here in Raider’s Cove.” Din leaned back, stretching his arm out and over the back of the booth. Castann eyed him suspiciously.

“Alright, no spotchka then. Ruin my fun.” He ran a hand over his scalp absentmindedly.

“Unfortunately, I’ve got nothing super juicy for you.” Din sighed lightly, hoping the sound wasn’t picked up by the modulator. Another dead end. “The port’s been pretty busy, but business usually picks up around this time of rotation.” He sees you nod in his peripheral.

“There’s not much chatter in here?” You asked Cas. 

He rested both elbows on the tabletop, grinning at you. “No little lady, there’s not much chatter at all.”

He tapped twice at a worn patch in the stone of the table and the pattered square in the middle of it came to life. 

“It’s Dejarik. Do you know how to play?” Din watched you shake your head, carefully examining the holographic creatures flickering in front of you.

“Seriously? Have you been living under a rock?” He was joking of course, but Din noticed the way you tensed at his words, curious features turning blank in a second. He didn’t stop to wonder if Cas noticed too. Instead, he lifted his hand from the back of the booth, angling it just slightly so he could brush his thumb over your shoulder. You straightened.

Cas was still talking. He hadn’t noticed then. Din continued the movement until your shoulders started to relax. 

“The patrons of this fine establishment come to watch people play. It’s all about being able to trick the opponent, or bluff, so most of the time it’s pretty quiet.” You hummed in understanding.

Castann motioned to Din. “This guy played the last time he was here. Brought the opponent to his knees. I’ve never won so much money in one night.” 

Your eyes shot to him, lips slowly breaking into a broad smile. “Really?” 

Maker, you were beautiful.

He took too long to answer—because he was gawking at you—so Cas cuts in again. “Oh yeah, it was brutal. The other guy didn’t even have a chance. He’s lucky it wasn’t a Wookie… not sure he would have left this place with all his limbs intact if it was.”

Your eyes were still fixed on him. He felt a little dizzy. 

Finally, he broke out of his daze. He said matter-of-factly: “Ithorians blink too much when they’re bluffing.“ It was the truth.

Cas pointed to Din with his thumb, as if to say: Can you believe this guy? Your laughter pealed through the room.

Seeing as Castann had no helpful information on the bounty, Din was content to let the two of you converse for a while. He had noticed the signs of fatigue as you made your trek into the village, so he thought it best to get a bit of rest in a cool, safe place. 

Frankly, he lost track of the topic of conversation, zoning out completely in favour of simply watching you. There was something different about you today, not in terms of your personality, but in the way you looked. The flimsier, oversized undershirt you wore fell low over one shoulder, exposing the hollow of your collarbone. For some reason, he couldn’t stop staring at it. He wanted to trace it. With his hands. With his lips. Your hair was windswept and a little bit wild, falling in an unfamiliar way. 

And your face. It had goldened just slightly with the sun, a small tinge of rose brushing your cheekbones and nose. You were flushed and glowing, especially when that signature smile graced your features.

He could have watched you forever.

Maker, he loved the helmet.

He wanted to kiss you.

Maker, he hated the helmet.

His impulses were getting harder and harder to control. In a strange way, it made him feel almost guilty. Like when you stumbled and he would steady you, holding on for longer than necessary, or place a hand on your shoulder or back as he passed you in the darkened hull of the Crest. He hoped it didn’t make you uncomfortable. He wondered if you would say something if it did.

Even last night, you had drifted off in the jump seat beside him, lashes dusting your cheek and lips slightly parted. He should have left you to sleep there. Part of him would argue that he knew the lower part of your spine would ache on the morning, and it was for that reason that he moved you. But the undeniable truth of the matter was that he wanted the feeling of you burned into his palms for good, like an inescapable brand. So, he had moved an arm under your knees, scooping you up from the chair. Mercifully, you hadn’t woken. Your head had lolled to the side, coming to rest on his shoulder. He had cursed the beskar pauldron. But you had sighed contentedly, and part of him had turned to putty at the sound of it. 

He had used the lightest thruster setting on the jetpack to descend into the hull, landing so lightly that even Grogu didn’t stir.

Then, he had placed you in the nook, drawing the worn blanket up around your shoulders, and he had let himself wonder, just for a moment, what it might feel like to curl up next to you.

Of course he wouldn’t have noticed the wandering green hand until it was too late.

“What in the kriffing bantha shit—” Cas was letting out a rather impressive string of expletives as he beheld the creature emerging from in between you and Din.

Noticing where his attention had gone, you laughed and scooped Grogu up from the bag. The two of you had discussed this before you departed the Crest, whether or not it was safer to leave the child aboard the ship while you ventured into the port. Ultimately, Din had trusted Castann enough to pack the kid along; it was preferrable to leaving him alone so far out of town, when there were likely other parties circling around.

You placed him on the table surface, and he became engrossed in the flickering holograms of the Dejarik game. “Meet Grogu.”

Castann’s eyes were wide as he looked at the child, and then at you. “That didn’t come out of you, did it?”

He’d never heard you laugh that loud. Trying to compose yourself, you managed to wheeze out: “Stars, no! He’s older than all of us.”

Grogu’s attention had gone from the gameboard to now rest on the stranger at the table. His head was tilted, and ears perked as he focused on Cas. Cas seemed just as engrossed with him.

While the two of them engaged in their staring contest, you turned to face Din, still leaning back casually against the bench, arm over the edge, legs spread wide, still reeling a bit from his inner thought process. He could have sworn you tried and failed to keep your eyes from travelling. You averted your gaze quickly, visibly swallowing. Something white hot shot through him.

“Do I even want to know?” Cas asked, eyes still glued to the child. He cooed in response.

Din’s voice was rough. “Trust me, you don’t.” 

Grogu broke eye contact first, turning to you instead, a pleading whine cutting the silence. 

You looked exasperated. “He’s hungry.” To the child you pointedly said: “Again.” The kid’s head tilted once more. 

“You wouldn’t mind right?” You queried. Castann interrupted you immediately.

“By all means, go right ahead. There’s a bunch of snacks behind the bar.”

Rising, you plucked an excited Grogu off the table surface, tucking him into your arm as you turned and moved to explore the area he had indicated.

Din and Cas both watched as you rummaged behind the bar, finally prying the lid off a tub of dried fruit. Grogu squealed in excitement. 

He turned back to Din. “So, what, you’re the hired muscle?”

Din’s eyes stayed on you. “If anything, she’s the hired muscle.”

He huffed a laugh, surveying you again through an awkward period of silence before saying: “Wait, you’re serious?” Din shrugged.

Cas sighed. “You’re down bad, Mando.” He said nothing.

“I’m just saying… full disclosure… I was going to make a move.” So slowly, his helmet twisted to meet Cas’ eyes. The man continued babbling. “Of course, that was after I almost shot her, I mean—” Carefully leaning forward, Mando pressed a button on his gauntlet, the blue lights of the whistling birds blinking into existence along the top of his arm.

Cas immediately started to backpedal, hands held up in surrender. “Well obviously I get it now. Put those away.”

Din hummed, pressing another button as the weapons slid back into their sheaths. 

A moment of quiet passed between the two men before Cas asked: “Since I’m so good at prying, I have to ask… Why continue the bounty hunting if you’ve got them to watch out for?” He motioned to you. Din followed his gesture, noting your body language, that which he now understood was you communicating with Grogu. Mind to mind. Half a piece of chewed fruit dangled out of the child’s mouth.

“I know you’re not strapped for credits. Wouldn’t you prefer to keep them out of harm’s way?”

“Of course I would.” His answer was instantaneous. After a breath he amended: “It’s complicated.”

“Always is with you, Mando.” He contemplated saying something else, but you were already rounding the edge of the bar, carrying the kid, who was grasping two sticks of dried fruit in his clumsy claws like a lifeline.

“We should probably get going if we want to scout out any more of the market before nightfall.” You were right. Din got up, reaching to hand you your bag. The child seemed content to clamber right back in, having achieved his goal quite easily. 

Cas walked the two of you up the stairs again, nose scrunching at the mystery liquid you had noticed on the way down. He mumbled something about getting the droid to mop it up.

Reaching the door, he swung it open, letting you and Mando pass. “Mind the curve of the main road on your way out of town. There was some action there yesterday. Two off-worlders. Both wound up dead.”

You looked to Din just as he looked to you. Castann caught on quickly.

“Oh.” The corners of his mouth turned down. “Probably should have mentioned that earlier.”

You turned to him. “Thank you… for everything.”

“Anytime, princess.” He offered you a lopsided, mischievous grin in return. “Take care of each other.” Din watched you nod, and his heart strained. “Hopefully, I’ll see you guys around. Stay safe, yeah?”

“We will.” Din replied. “Let me know if you catch any info.”

“Will do.” He clapped Din on the back once, before re-entering the stairwell.

After bidding your final farewells, you ventured back to the main stretch of road, the heat only slightly more manageable after your short reprieve.

You had walked through the curve on your way to meet Castann, but frankly, you hadn’t been paying much attention at the time, too focused on not expiring from the warmth of the day. The two of you would do some rudimentary scouting today and come back tomorrow if you had no luck.

A light breeze drifted between the wooden structures now, carrying the salted scent of the ocean. You desperately wanted to go see it, but you weren’t going to badger Din about it. The two of you were here on a mission, not a vacation.

He walked a bit closer to you than he had on the way into town, allowing you to lead through the street. More than a few people averted their eyes as the two of you walked past. 

“I don’t like this.” Din’s voice rumbled from over your shoulder. “It’s too open.”

“You’re being paranoid.” You replied over one shoulder. “We won’t linger though. Let’s give the area a once-over and then head back.”

He hummed in agreement. The curve was just up ahead, slightly less busy than the rest of the stretch. On one side was a worn wooden structure, jutting out into the street. The concave side of the cobblestone road was occupied by two merchant stands, now vacant for obvious reasons. 

You rounded the corner, coming to stop in front of the building at the point of the junction. A weathered sign swung on rusty hinges atop the door. 

Rare artifacts was engraved on the wood in messy Aurebesh.

You huffed. “Yeah, that makes sense.”

Din moved around you, approaching the darkened storefront. He ran his gloved fingers over a singed burn in the wood. “Blaster marks.” He noted. He tried the door handle. It didn’t budge. He yanked harder.

“If we’re going to try to break in, maybe we shouldn’t do it in broad daylight?” You hissed the suggestion.

A small Rodian child was watching a few paces away with interested eyes.

Din’s helmet turned toward the kid; it took off running down a side street at a startling pace.

He stalked back toward you. “Fine. We’ll come back later.”

“At least we know we’ve got the right spot.” The two of you continued down the road, taking a left fork that would lead you out of town.

“Probably.” He corrected. 

“Probably.” You echoed.

A few minutes of quiet passed as you walked. You could tell something was off with him; it had been that way since the gambling den. But you were so unsure of how to approach the subject that it forced you into silence.

You ran over the events of meeting Castann again, hoping to identify the cause of the uneasiness you sensed. But all your mind snagged on was the way he had brushed his hand over your shoulder to calm you. The way he had looked reclined against that bench, the portrait of calm. The way you had caught his helmet angled towards you, several times throughout the meeting, even when you had gotten up to find some food for Grogu. You were overanalyzing everything, but you had never really been able to think straight when it came to him.

Your thoughts stopped dead in their tracks.

He had abruptly grasped your hand in his, intertwining your fingers. His hand was so large it practically engulfed your own. You looked up in shock, bewilderment, but his focus wasn’t on you. And then he was turning, tugging on your arm to get you to follow, hastening his steps so much you had to take large strides to keep up. He must have noticed some sort of danger. You cast a glance over your shoulder.

“Don’t look behind you.” He pulled on your arm again. You stumbled to keep up. “Keep moving.” He practically growled.

“What’s going on?” His heartbeat was racing. So was your own.

“Hunters.” The two of you kept moving at a brisk pace, re-entering the busier part of the market. “They were the ones who were shooting on Nevarro. They’re part of the Guild.”

He turned a corner into another darkened side street, hauling you with him. Finding an inset in the stone wall, a residential entrance by the look of it, he pushed you up against the side, caging you in, leaning ever so slightly to look around the edge of the cavity in which you now hid. You followed his action, twisting your neck at an uncomfortable angle. You could only see a sliver of the main road. 

Swarms of people walked by. You scanned the crowd for the usual telltale signs. Weapons, weather resistant gear, advanced technology. Nothing. You waited with bated breath. And then…

A duo. You weren’t familiar with their species. The crowd parted for them as they walked, scanning their surroundings with lethal precision. The air almost seemed to cool in their presence. You were instantly thankful that Din had been so hasty in your retreat. 

It took them a few moments to pass by the street where you were hiding, the breeze slowly seeming to return to its stuffy temperature. You didn’t dare move a muscle. Still, you kept your neck craned back towards the road.

Relief flooded through you when you finally lost sight of them. That was far too close. With Grogu here as well, you had to be so careful. There was too much to lose. There could be others as well, having tracked the same information as you and Din. You would need to be extremely cautious on your way back to the ship—

A gloved finger traced the raised tendon in your neck, featherlight, painfully slow. You stopped breathing.

It swept down and across your collarbone, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake. You were frozen in place, unable to move, to talk, to focus on anything past the sensation of leather on the warmth of your skin.

It took all of your strength and bravery to twist your neck back to him. Farrik. The visor was mere inches from your face, looking down on you, so close, as if he wanted to breathe you in. This was a very real boundary between the two of you, one that had never been crossed. 

Until now. 

You weren’t going to fight a losing battle. You didn’t want to. In that moment, you knew you would have done anything he asked; you just wanted him to keep touching you.

He had always been so good at reading you.

His other hand came around your waist, hitching you up against him. A beskar-clad thigh moved to rest between your legs. You almost moaned.

Holy stars, you could feel him against you. Everywhere, all at once. It was too much. You let your head fall back against the stone. Your eyes fluttered shut.

“Din.” It was both a question and a plea.

He continued, thank the maker. The curve of your shoulder, the edge of your jaw, the flare of your hips. He mapped them all with painstaking patience, as if he had all the time in the world. You were practically melting under him, a breathless mess. 

He had you, entirely at his mercy. There was too much armour, too many layers separating you from him. You wanted to have him. Your brain was going fuzzy. If only—

The door slid open abruptly. Mando had you behind him in a millisecond, those torturous hands now resting ever so cautiously on the weapon at his belt.

A plump lady emerged and waved the two of you away, yelling something in a language you didn’t understand. He retreated slowly, keeping you behind him, palms exposed to show he meant no harm. Still, she shooed at the both of you.

Your senses were in overdrive. The sun was suddenly too bright, the sounds too loud. It was some sort of fight or flight reaction and you wondered, distantly, if the heat that pooled low in your core had something to do with the adrenaline. 

Din led you out of the side street, but not back the way you came. The main stretch was too risky now, so you’d have to take a roundabout way out of town. He didn’t say anything. Neither did you. But the tension was so thick, so ever-present, that it clouded your senses.

You were both silent the entire walk back to the Crest.

Thanks to the time spent with Castann, the sun was already beginning its descent as you made it back to the ship. The sky took on a gorgeous coral glow, offset against the azul blue of the natural pond in the clearing where you had landed. 

Din was a few steps behind you, having kept his distance the entire way back. As if he couldn’t stand to be near you. You didn’t blame him for not saying anything. You weren’t quite sure what to say either. This was one of the many reasons why the more sensible part of you had refused to get closer to him. You had wanted to avoid… this. 

The uncomfortableness, the embarrassment, the hesitation, the doubt. 

The Crest’s door opened with a hiss, the ramp descending to touch the vibrant grass. You were to first to walk up into the hull. Fine. If you were trapped in the ship together, you’d have no choice but to talk it out… Eventually.

But as you set the bag down on the bunk, the child crawling awkwardly out of it, the ramp door began closing. He hadn’t followed you in.

Only when it sealed shut did you allow your head to fall back, an exhausted sigh escaping, and tears stinging in your eyes. How silly. Why did you suddenly feel like crying?

Grogu cooed once, and you offered him a phoney smile, trying to blink back the tears before they fell. Your minds connected easily.

He was confused. He sensed the unease between yourself and Din. And he didn’t like it.

“I know little guy.” You sat on the edge of the cot with him, and he cozied up to your side. His thoughts flickered through memories of the three of you, like a photo album. You, smiling down at him, Din a looming presence just over your shoulder. Playing catch, you and him using the force to pass, and Din… the only one actually having to throw the ball. Being reunited in Mos Espa, the Mandalorian and yourself fighting side-by-side to protect him. You knew what the kid was getting at; you could feel it, clear as day, in his emotions.

“We’ll figure it out.” You weren’t sure who you were trying to convince. His ears twitched.

“Are you tired?” You already knew the answer. His restless energy was palpable, probably from having been trapped in a stuffy side bag all day.

You shifted further onto the bed, pulling him with you. “Well, let’s at least make good use of our time then.” You crossed your legs, watching him fall gracelessly into sitting position. Placing your hands on your knees, you took several deep, grounding breaths. 

Sith meditation had never really worked for you. It had always been about channeling your anger, focusing negative emotions, and forging them into weapons. Back then, it had been doable, the anguish of losing your father, the fear of the place you had lived, the rage towards those who had kept you trapped fueling your survival. But once you had escaped, once there was no one else to hate, nothing else to be afraid of, you had to find a new way to connect to the force. 

It had taken some time to learn how to quiet your mind and tune in to your surroundings instead, but the swamp planet had been as good a place as any to learn. You supposed it could be considered Jedi meditation, you had never really been able to confirm it with anyone.

Grogu was very good at it now, having learned so much from his lessons with Skywalker. A selfish part of you wished you could have met him too, asked him for guidance and advice. You had stayed on the ship with Boba that day, thanks to Din labeling you as last resort backup. But a part of you also wondered if Luke would have been distrustful of you because of who you were, or who you had been.

The child’s mind was already quiet by the time you closed your eyes. The two of you drifted together, and you thankfully let the anxiety of the day’s events fall away.

You so easily lost track of time like this, and it took the reopening of the ship’s ramp doors to jar you from your meditative state. Judging from the way the sky had faded into a deeper orange, you assumed about an hour had passed. 

The Mandalorian came striding up the incline, jetpack and weapons belts dangling from his left hand. Grogu’s eyes opened, and he let out a shrill noise, already reaching for his father.

He approached you carefully, and it took all your effort to not break eye contact with him. Memories of earlier came flooding back. You sincerely hoped your face wasn’t flushed.

“The water is nice…” He reached in to pick up the child. “…If you want to wash up.”

“Okay.” Your voice was too high pitched. Stars, you had been meditating while, mere metres away, he had shed the armour and flight suit… and probably the helmet too. You had never seen him without either.

His voice broke your treacherous train of thought. “Are you okay?” It felt like he was continuously asking you that, at least once a day.

Grogu was now tucked under his arm, staring back at you with wide eyes. “Yeah.” You replied. It was the most you could muster.

“Okay.” He exhaled, almost in… relief? An then he was moving towards the ladder. “I’ll leave you to it then.” You waited for the door of the storage room to close before you allowed yourself to get up.

He was practically stumbling over himself. He didn’t know what to do. Wasn’t sure what to say. The whole thing was a mess.

He had brought Grogu up to the storage room in the back upper level of the ship, to give you some privacy while you bathed. But unfortunately, that left him alone with his own thoughts, which wasn’t exactly preferable. 

Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.

He had been sitting on the floor for about a half an hour now, the child having climbed up on his lap, eagerly accepting ear scratches. Every second of the past 30 minutes had been spent picking apart what had transpired in that market.

It had been entirely spontaneous, about as unexpected to him as he assumed it was to you. In a dangerous situation as well, it had been so foolish of him. But it was almost as if he had relinquished the controls to his own body, the damn thing was on autopilot, and it was just aching to get caught in your orbit. But when he had felt you relax in his grip, watched you bare yourself to him, heard your breathing change, he realized he had never let himself consider it for more than a moment. 

The fact that you might want him too.

Even now it seemed absurd; you hadn’t even seen his face. And the tension afterwards, the way you wouldn’t meet his gaze, he second-guessed everything he had seen, heard, and felt in that alley.

The child was watching him quizzically. “Keep your wizard mind-reading to yourself.” He let out a string of unintelligible sounds in response. Din sighed in resignation.

He couldn’t avoid you forever; he knew that. And the embarrassment of this, it would be nothing compared to the dejection he would feel if he let you drift apart from him. The avoidance of the subject had already caused an awkwardness between the two of you; it would only get worse the longer he left it. So, it was decided.

Grabbing the child, he rose up on stiff legs. He’d wait in the hull for you, under the guise of tinkering with some mechanics and, after gauging your mood, would approach the subject.

He was conveniently forgetting to consider the fact that his brain consistently short-circuited whenever you were near. And the fact that he couldn’t seem to keep his hands to himself.

Several minutes later, you strode up the ramp. He didn’t even get a chance to breathe.

“We need to talk.”

Oh. Shit. Plan failed. Retreat.

He was crouched in front of an electric wiring panel in the hull wall, and you hoisted yourself onto a crate beside him. Your hair was wet, and you were scrunching it in a damp shirt, but your eyes were on him. Wasn’t that what he had wanted? He was so worried that you wouldn’t look at him, but now that you were… all the things he had planned to say ebbed from his mind, dripping onto the floor of the Crest like the water you had wrung from your hair.

He carefully put the tool he was using down, looking back up at you. Your features were determined.

“About what?” God kriffing damn it. He knew exactly what. He should have factored in that you would look like that. He also should have factored in what he had felt in the alleyway. Because right now it was back with a vengeance, and all he could think about was what your flushed skin—washed clean by the water of the pool—would feel like under his bare palms. He squeezed his eyes shut and reopened them, refraining from curling his hands into fists.

“You know what.” You attention hadn’t wavered, still fixed solidly on him. No turning back now. He got up slowly, steadily. You tracked him the entire way, eyes travelling the length of his body, just once.

Farrik, he was trying so hard to behave. But he was getting such vivid flashbacks, images bouncing around in his mind. The curve of your neck, tipped back against the stone wall, your body tensing and relaxing. There were other fleeting pictures too, things he had only imagined. Your legs over his shoulders, the way you sinfully moaned his name. 

He was already too far gone. 

He advanced on you, watching the look in your eyes shift. Were you scared? Of him? He stopped about a foot away, pulling at the leather on each fingertip, loosening them enough to slide the gloves off, and stacking them on the crate to the left of you. “What, exactly, did you want to say?” 

His voice was not his own. It was too rough. 

You were silent for a long moment, and he became consciously aware of the rise and fall of your chest. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale Inhale. Exhale. He was teetering over the edge. Inhale— Enough.

He stepped into your space, and you gasped sharply, angling your head slightly to keep your eyes on the visor. Another roaringly quiet moment passed. He took the damp shirt from your hands—were they trembling?—and placed it to the side. You seemed to have already forgotten it.

He spoke your name once, softly. “What was it you wanted to talk about?”

You opened your mouth to reply… and then shut it. You were just staring at him, blinking rapidly, hands fidgeting. You were nervous.

Fine. He’d have to prompt you then.

“Did you want to talk about this?” He brushed the backs of his fingers against the pulse in your neck. Your body reacted immediately. So he hadn’t imagined it. A thrill coursed through him, replacing the trepidation from earlier with something bolder. Still, you didn’t answer him.

He followed the same path, dragging his hand down your neck and across your clavicle. “Or was it this?” He had been drunk on the feel of you through the leather, but without the gloves it was torment. You were so soft,of course you would be. Your eyes had gone hooded; even under the soft light of the sunset, they were much darker. He never wanted you to stop looking at him like that.

“Maybe it was this.” He circled your waist with one arm, pulling you to the edge of the crate, until your body was flush with his. Your legs parted for him, and he stepped between them. You were pliant under his palms, your own hands coming to rest on his breastplate.

“I want to talk about this.” He dragged his thumb down your bottom lip, drinking in the way your eyes fell closed and you leaned back slightly, bringing him with you. He was enjoying this far too much. “Is that what you wanted to talk about too?”

His hands continued their ministrations, roaming and exploring, even as you remained quiet.

“Come on mesh’la.” He grasped you by the waist, putting just a sliver of distance between your two bodies. “What did you want to say?”

Finally, your eyes opened again. His knees almost buckled. Your pupils were blown wide. “What is this?” you asked. It was barely a whisper.

“What do you want it to be?” Because he would be anything for you, even if it meant not revealing the depth of his feelings. If you wanted this, only the physical aspect of it, he would give it to you willingly. Absolutely anything you wanted. All you had to do was say the words.

“I don’t…” You paused and he could see another emotion creep into your eyes. “I don’t know.” He tilted his head. In a low voice, you admitted: “I’ve never felt this before.”

Truthfully, he hadn’t either. He said as much. He hadn’t expected you to look so surprised. 

“You don’t need to figure it out right now.” Your features softened. “Take all the time you need.” He’d wait for you until the suns of Tatooine reversed their trajectory. But you didn’t need to know that yet.

You nodded and took a shaky breath. “Okay.”

“Okay.” He repeated. He removed his hands from your waist, but before he could pull them away, you grasped his left, flipping it over, studying it.

“What?” he asked, a hint of humour apparent in his voice. 

“I’m just trying to imagine what the rest of you looks like.”

Something in him fractured. He covered it up quickly, jokingly quipping: “Are you imagining certain parts more than others?”

You dropped his hand, face flushing, and smacked him on the pauldron. He chuckled and extended the hand to you once more, to help you down from the crate. Taking it, you gracefully slid off. He held on for a moment too long.

“Come on, we’ve got work to do.”

Night had long since fallen by the time you made your way back into Bootlegger’s Market. It was still busy but, as expected, the curved junction in the road was quiet. Having been the scene of a hunter’s gunfight not too long ago, people were wise to stay away. 

This time, when Din went to open the door to the rare antiques storefront, it moved easily. The squeaky hinges however, instantly put a wrench in your plan.

“There goes the element of surprise.” You hissed from behind him. He palmed at the saber hilt. 

You followed him inside, closing the door noisily behind you. A cringeworthy entrance. 

The two of you crouched behind a shelf, trying to get a feel for your surroundings. The room was dark and unbelievably cluttered. Trinkets of all shapes and sizes littered the surface of every table, shelf, and bench. Some creature’s horns were mounted on the wall, still attached to a portion of skull. You fought a shudder. 

It would be near impossible to find the crystal in this mess. But if the door had been left unlocked, that meant that someone was here.

Or someone beat you to it. You shut down the thought before it could fester.

Din looked behind him, signalling you to go left around the edge of the shelf, while he would take the right. You nodded in understanding. A voice cut through the silence.

“There’s no need for all that, you know. He’s already gone.” You heard the hiss of a match being lit and seconds later; a flickering light illuminated the store. Behind it was the face of a gorgeous, rich green Twi’lek. You stood, Din walking back around the shelf to come to your side.

“You’re too late. He left early this morning.” She placed the candle down on the table beside her. “He said I’d only need to watch the shop.” 

You and Din said nothing. She huffed and put a hand on her hip. “Can you believe I’ve been held at gunpoint four times today? You hunters have no morals.”

You were taken aback by her frankness. Din spoke for you. “Where did he go?”

“Wow, finally someone gives me the chance to tell them without threatening to kill me.” She collapses onto a stool, waving her hand in dismissal.

“He took a transport to Canto Bight. There’s an auction in the casino there in 50 hours’ time.”

“Thank you.” Din offered. She let out a humorless chuckle.

“Yeah, good luck. You’ll probably have to fight to the death just to get a landing space.”

Taglist: @that-girl-named-alex @aavengingbucky @prismaticpizza @blub-senpai

[ricanvvas]

Hello. I have noticed your very impassioned posts about shipping male friends in anime fandoms and am attempting to write a response in what I hope comes across as an understanding manner.

I am not here to attack you. I am not trying to call you homophobic. I will not be trying to convince you to ship anything you don't want to ship.

I do agree with you that fandom as a whole could benefit from more discussions about platonic relationships. Sometimes just seeing a lot of romantic shipping posts can get a bit annoying. Society as a whole could benefit from focusing less on romantic and sexual relationships. Platonic relationships are just as valid and can be just as important and deep as romantic relationships, if not more so.

However, I don't agree with how you seem to talk down to shippers. I've seen you say that people who ship characters who are best friends must not understand friendship. That is not a fair assumption to make. You don't know those people. You shouldn't make generalizations about their experiences. For example: I have 3 best friends I've known since high school who I would do anything for and be devastated to lose, and I ship Gojo and Geto. And I know full well that they will probably never be confirmed to be canonically in love, and I'm fine with that. You shouldn't be making assumptions about people based on their shipping preferences.

And again, I am NOT calling you homophobic, and that's not the point people tried to make when pointing out that the ships you are critiquing in those posts are almost entirely, if not all, mlm ships. I haven't seen you mention non-canonical wlw ships, like Nobara/Maki, or non-canonical m/f ships, like Gojo/Utahime or Yuji/Nobara. None of those are confirmed canon. I know there are only so many ships you can list or know about, but when you only ever mention mlm ships, it appears as though you are making a targeted attack. I am saying this because I want to give you the benefit of the doubt and believe that this is unintentional.

I've also seen you mention that you want to be a writer and how you would feel if people headcanoned your characters contrary to your intention. All I can say to that is that you cannot control how people will react to your writing and attempting to do so is futile. It may sound harsh, but it's true.

I can see that you have very strong opinions about this, but if you do care more about discussions about platonic male friendships than shipping discourse, then your time would be better spent making those discussions yourself and blocking the shipping tags. You aren't going to change anyone's minds with those posts. Sure, you'll attract people with similar opinions, but, as you've seen, you'll also attract the annoyance of people in related tags who didn't want to see posts like yours. For better or for worse, shipping is ingrained in the foundations of modern fandom going all the way back to the 60s with Trekkies writing fan fiction and making fan magazines to ship Spock and Kirk. It's something you'll have to either make peace with or ignore.

I'm not expecting you to reply to this. Honestly, I'll be surprised if you even bother to read the whole thing (I doubt I'd be happy getting a whole essay from some rando in my ask box lol). But if you do read the whole thing, just know that I say these things in the hopes that it will help you have a better relationship with fandom. You don't have to like all of it, and you don't even need a reason to dislike something. Fandom is about having fun, but I just can't imagine that this whole discourse is much fun for you.

Skimmed through your input, the respect is much appreciated.

But I would’ve really liked it if you didn’t bring up the being a writer part—I hope you realize that writers are writers for themselves and not for the satisfaction of others. Their imagination and their work. If somebody is twisting an author’s story and their characters, they have the right speak up and be upset because it belongs to them. Yes, it’s shared publicly, but nonetheless, they should be respected. I think it’s very ridiculous to try and create excuses for this.

A reminder of my main point; friendships should be left alone as friendships instead of being twisted.

I don’t care for headcanons or what ships one likes or whatnot. Trust me, I don’t have that much free time. You have your opinion. My problem is enforcing it onto others and this is an undeniable topic.

Saying these people probably don’t have strong friendships is an an unfair assumption from me, I’ll agree, but I’m not completely wrong for thinking so when they go berserk when I don’t agree with romantically or sexually shipping platonic friendships.

I was targeting specifics here, too. There are rarely any cases to the otherwise of this, but “MLM” has been fetishized immensely across anime fandoms, to the point that male friends are not allowed to stay male friends without being seen as a romantic or sexual partner which is where the toxicity starts. I hadn’t targeted “WLW” or regular male/female ships because they aren’t extremists in HUGE amount of numbers who will bash and shun you for not giving into their ideas. There is no dodging this fact—sure some of them are normal who accept their idea is not accepted fandom-wide and move on, but others will go as far as giving you death threats.

For example, I know an artist who ships Gojo and Utahime, and they got plenty of doxing death threats. It’s very common. When it’s a female and a male, suddenly nobody is entitled to their own opinion. This happens more often than you know.

In the same way, if you comment “they’re best friends” on a post where Gojo/Geto are shipped, they will come for you with ridiculous attacks and ridiculous claims of homophobia and I can test this any second to prove it. They have no sense of respect. They’re triggered by canon, so they should be the ones to find something to their liking. They don’t even watch for story, seriously. And I would like to kindly remind the obvious that people like me are preaching the givens from the author while people like them are preaching things they twisted in their head, so why are we the ones being attacked? We aren’t even the ones with opinions, we are the ones with factual givens.

It’s been barely two years since I became an anime fan and I thought the definition of fandom was to enjoy and speak about the show and author’s work all together—not twist it into something it isn’t and attack one another. If not, then I’m ashamed. I have never personally went up to somebody in the comments and said “fuck you” for shipping two male best friends but I’ve been told that several times for calling two male best friends, best friends.

And the thing about these animes is that they’re beautiful stories, they’re writings from an author portraying strong and emotional friendship between men, encouraging men to be more open and expressive and appreciate those they admire, because in reality they find it difficult to do so. It’s okay to feel angry if your friend left, it’s okay to cry if your friend hurt you in a way, it’s okay to grieve for years when your friend dies—but what does the “fandom” insensitively say? “They’re definitely gay and in love.” What’s the message people are sending when you only address males to romantic and sexual relationships?

Close friendships are damn strong. Stronger than one wants to believe.

What’s the point of watching something just to toss aside the story and contort characters that aren’t yours? That debunks almost any right to yell at those who don’t do what you do.

I’m not trying to change minds. It’s the other way around. They need to stop trying to change minds, and when one doesn’t buy it, they need to stop attacking childishly.

[gothmiqote]

odds for the ship game -- for WoL/Estinien or your Azem ship!

gonna do wolstinien for this one & delegate the other one for hythazemet ~

under a cut because length lol & also ig heads up for spoilers of like. the whole plot kinda fhgjj idk things get mentioned that happen up to EW & also some not-safe content lmao

Is your muse a romantic? Do they dream of love and marriage?

Yes? Maybe? Kind of? Varha has this weirdly domestic side that she's actually pretty comfortable with (likely wouldn't appreciate having this pointed out, though), so there's potential for her to wander down this route of thoughts. Realistically though I think her attachment issues would end up freaking her out too badly to seriously consider anything legally permanent. That's not to say it's off the table in the future or anything, but it's a very distant notion & she's not going to come to the conclusion that she's also able to be the one who initiates.

(Another thing to factor in here is that neither of them are the type of people to would even be thinking of the 'let's sign this for tax purposes'-type scenarios. Varha is considerably better about money & related bureaucratic life things than Estinien 'lost his company credit card privileges in record time' Varlineau, but she still lacks any foresight around planning for her future beyond next week.)

She will react favourably to the type of romantic gestures he does do, though. Like he's not subjecting her to the objective torture of having someone go 'hey I wrote this song about you :)' before they publicly serenade you acapella style, thank the fucking Twelve for that, there's not a version of her that has a strong enough poker face to take it. She melts when he remembers small likes/dislikes or takes note of something she never even bothered to verbalize in the first place. She's not a shy person, she can flick the switch into an affectionate mood pretty damn quick with the right incentive, she's just maybe not the most in-touch with her emotions all the time & sometimes needs to be coaxed.

At the end of the day, she's pretty sure that Estinien is her person. When she says she feels content with him, it's the farthest thing from 'settling' despite the connotations of the phrase. She's perfected the art of putting up a more secure & confident front, but in truth, she's gone through the bulk of her life feeling transient in her own and temporary in the lives of people around her. As the Warrior of Light, she's not only good enough--she's capable of exceeding external expectations. As herself? Not as much. She hasn't quite outgrown the deep feeling of never being anyone's favourite, of constantly being the tag along with her siblings growing up. She tries too hard to be something loud & useful & fundamentally unforgettable, and it's a knife to her side every time she falls back into acting with that desire in mind.

Estinien has been one of an exceptionally small number of people who have never added to the feeling, intentionally or not. She's not sure if it's right to be attracted to someone for the way they make you feel, if it's something that feels that selfish (in her mind). But he's obstinate enough that she knows he wouldn't have bothered to even take the chance with her if he didn't want to be there. She thinks, oddly, that part of the reason she's able to believe his motivations is the fact that he spent so long with a deliberate distance between them. It left her with less time to perform, and less time to ruminate on her hidden self-worth problems. Whatever the reason, she knows that she's never felt this way with anyone else, and no one else has cared enough to even give her that time to explore that internally. The wariness she held towards herself was more or less melted away when she was faced with how good she actually felt for once. There's a reason she didn't mind when the verbalized declarations of love started slipping out after a few months.

Is your muse good at kissing? Are they experienced?

Very good kisser.

Most people tend to assume Varha's far more experienced than she actually is for this reason--in reality, she's had a relatively small number of sexual partners, she just thinks kissing is fun & generally won't take much convincing for making out. She's particularly prone to this after a couple drinks, and sharing is caring when she's not in a serious relationship. It's hot and intimate without the full commitment of getting naked with someone & cleaning off afterwards, and it helps that she's bringing a public + outdoor sex kink to the table--even if things don't escalate to that point, the need for privacy is pretty small.

The side of her brain that makes her give in to her more mischievous bastard impulses makes kissing her #1 type of foreplay. She's able to keep herself at a pretty consistent level of arousal for a prolonged period of time while watching her partner completely come undone when she slides her tongue into their mouth in all the right ways. This is a dangerous game to play with Estinien, who is well fucking aware she's being an insufferable tease & will happily delay her own gratification at his expense. Unless he decides to haul her off to escalate things properly, she's about to spend her immediate future doing everything she possibly can to wind him up with her lips & indulgently wandering hands.

Thancred is the only other Scion to have been on the receiving end of one of her infamously white-hot kisses. It was a one-time thing, fuelled by an unholy amount of wine but was nonetheless an enjoyable encounter. (She thinks she may or may not have also done the same with Y'shtola, but that one's a far foggier memory, and she's not 100% sure it actually happened. Y'shtola doesn't help in solving the mystery, but Varha suspects this is more about Y'shtola possessing the same bastard instincts she has, and she also doesn't remember much of anything.)

Overall, she's pretty lax as long as she clicks well with someone & they're willing.

Is your muse comfortable with public displays of affection? 

To a point.

She likes touching a lot. Before now, she actually spent a fair bit of time alone. Post-Calamity, pre-Scion Varha spent her time as a travelling mercenary of sorts, taking on a string of what was essentially risky contract work and never establishing roots anywhere. She's competent when it comes to working a room, which often gives the illusion that she has more friends than she actually does. In reality, she really didn't have anyone, and predictably this led to (unconscious) touch starvation. If she's got the green light from someone she considers a friend, she's content to lean against them or sit close. One might count the physical contact from fighting as some sort of mitigation here (and as far as I remember, it actually can release some of the same chemicals in your brain as positive touch so this probably isn't too far off), but even if that was the case, it wasn't anywhere near enough. While she occasionally did engage in casual sex, the potential emotional intimacy it could lead to (or even a facsimile of the feelings) made her too uncomfortable to take care of her lack of physicality that way, which unfortunately compounded her predicament.

After spending so much time living this way, it's something she unconsciously seeks now that she's got access to it. And while his own personal history doesn't exactly match her own, there are enough similarities in the isolation to put them on fairly even ground.

Varha's caveat for pda is that it has to feel natural. She's extremely averse to anything that reads as 'fake' or trying too hard to win her attention. Something can be very obviously demonstrative, but it can't feel forced, whether the act is platonic or romantic. For most of ARR, she was actually seen as someone who could be pretty distant & cool (not an incorrect read. The walls were very, very real at the time.), and it's unfortunate that it took something drastic like the Waking Sands massacre for them to start coming down ("Wait, these people actively like me? And were concerned?"-style revelations). Over time though, it became apparent that she was actually open to hugs and kind touches, she simply wasn't a) aware that this was a something available to her and b) aware that she wanted or even needed them. She's still pretty quick to fire off a witty remark before baring her heart to anyone (talking honestly is... another beast entirely, but she readily accepts hugs & finds herself willingly sharing too-small seating areas just for the novelty of body contact.

Romantic contact operates pretty similarly. Not that she'd subject herself to seeing someone who felt the need to do a whole song & dance about how in love with her they were, she's still damn glad that's not Estinien's style in the slightest. She likes easy things--holding hands, or leaning against him if they're standing (or he's sitting; that height difference forces creativity on occasion). Hell, she's even more than happy to make herself at home on his lap in casual settings without caring who might be around. They're both incredibly blasé about this sort of thing; any attempts at friendly teasing from the Scions when they became an official 'item' fell comically flat. You definitely won't be hearing any sappy confessions of affection, but it's so obvious that they automatically gravitate toward each other regardless of most social situations.

For his part, Estinien usually likes to have his hand at least resting on her in come capacity. He's got a few draconic quirks leftover from Nidhogg, and this can manifest in some slightly possessive tendencies. Honestly, she likes it. It's nowhere near a level where it would impede her freedoms, but enough to make her feel like he's actually proud of outwardly signalling how he feels about her. She loves how casually he does it; of course she can expect him to automatically draw an arm around her shoulders if she joins him on a seat, why would he think twice about drawing attention to the fact that they're together?

It's not that he needs to be on her at all times or anything, he just... deeply prefers it, that's all. It helps that she's pretty tactile. He's been known to just sort of appear at her side at social gatherings, especially if there's any sort of crowd around her. He's not really trying to be menacing about it, and if she was irritated by it, he is capable of loosening up & finding something else to do (it doesn't happen often, but there have been times when she's needed some breathing room for whatever reason). He definitely doesn't consider himself the clingy type, and if he occasionally orchestrates it so that the Scions somehow end up short a sofa cushion & she simply has to get comfortable in his lap for a casual evening gathering with friends, no one says a word.

He's also got a habit of making small adjustments to her person if she's close enough--fixing a slightly off-center necklace, moving a piece of loose hair, that sort of thing & it's almost always done without him really realizing. This one comes with more exclusivity; she doesn't typically tolerate fussing from anyone else. She'd find it annoying if it were someone else's hand, but when he does it, it has a borderline meditative quality. Once again, pointing this out will lead to an interaction that features both of them shrugging & looking at you like you've grown a second head. They're comfortable with each other and know where the boundaries are, no, they're not concerned about holding up any type of reputation, what an odd thing to say.

They've got no problem kissing in public either, but she finds that as her name & face start becoming more recognizable, people start to get more annoying about her personal life. Plus, while she loves outdoor sex & the risk of being caught, it sort of loses the excitement when the risk factor essentially morphs into a guarantee.

This falls apart when you get liquor involved. They know how to pace themselves, but they also both like to indulge, especially among friends. After a certain amount of wine, it's not uncommon to see his arm tighten around her waist as he starts to press his face into the crook of her neck, leaving kisses that steadily amp up in intensity while she tries to carry on a conversation. Sometimes she'll play the same game, but it's more likely that she simply gets more touchy, draping herself on him in increasingly suggestive ways until one of them finally decides it's time to bid everyone a good night.

Is your muse the big spoon or the little spoon?

Small spoon, which has more to do with how ridiculous she would feel in the opposite role.

Estinien is nearly two feet taller than Varha, despite the fact that she's actually considered relatively tall herself for a Miqo'te woman & usually wears some sort of heel, even if she's dressing for combat. She's tried to be the big spoon before, and it lasted maybe a solid ten minutes before she had to re-adjust. Also, twelve forbid he rolls on her arm in the middle of the night; waking up with pins & needles would be an understatement. He's not bulky, but he's still significantly larger (& by extension, heavier) than she is. So she typically ends up the little spoon--she's an excellent size for holding. He's pretty partial to using her thighs as a pillow during the occasional afternoon nap, dozing off while she runs her fingers through his hair.

In bed, they usually prefer some variation of him on his back and she just sort of figures herself out around him, or facing each other. She likes being able to tuck into his chest, facing away from the world with their arms around each other & legs tangled up under the sheets. He's a cuddler (no surprise there), and definitely sleeps significantly better when they share a bed.

On the other hand, she finds that the quality of her sleep dropped pretty drastically during SHB. Partly because of the cold empty bed, yes (they might not have actually openly laid out what they were to each other before her trip to the First, but they'd spent the night together "by accident" enough times before that to start developing habits), but because of the events she was experiencing. She was always prone to having some vivid dreams, and they got dialled up to eleven after, morphing into something legitimately terrifying. She's at least moderately grateful that she doesn't wake up screaming, but she does jolt awake pretty violently & getting back to sleep after can be a task. It's made significantly easier if she's got a warm, solid body to curl back into & someone who wakes up to make sure she's alright.

Is your muse attracted to any features in particular?

They're both on Team Ass in the ongoing ass vs. tits debate. Varha is pretty shameless about it too. Zero effort to hide any appreciation for the way his thighs flex in his leathers. She's less inclined towards giving verbal compliments, but her thoughts read pretty clearly on her face. Estinien has more decorum by a margin, and by that I mean he doesn't really do the frequent appreciative staring she does (though, there is a certain look he gets in his eye that signals a long night is on the horizon for her), but he will dole out some lightning-quick "compliments" in her ear, sometimes paired with a sneaky ass-grab.

Outside of that, he (of course) loves the entire expanse of her body, but he's consistently drawn to the general area of her neck/collarbones/breasts, the latter becoming more of a focal point after an impulsive decision to get both nipples pierced sometime after EW. It was a more than welcome surprise after being apart for a few months. She's got a (predictable but understandable) weakness for his hands. Skilled, strong instruments calloused & scarred from years of using a lance, she's memorized every crease & scar. Speaking of scars, it's probably another obvious choice, but she can't help wanting to run her fingers, lips & tongue over his. Estinien's collection is more impressive than hers, sporting reminders of Nidhogg on each arm, and they've become natural resting places in her explorations of him.

Have their partners been mostly male, mostly female, or evenly split? 

Varha can count her partners on both hands with fingers to spare at the end of her list. She's not unfamiliar with women, but her past encounters tend to skew male. It's less to do with any real preference and more just a reflection on who was willing & who had her attention at the time. Estinien's history is likely an inverse slant with a similar ratio.

Where is your muse most sensitive? 

Feel like most Miqo'te can probably count the base of the tail as an erogenous zone. She's not super complicated beyond that, though. Biting down on her trapezius will net a pretty intense reaction, but you can probably evoke something similar just by leaving the same type of marks elsewhere on her neck.

Would your muse ever tempt their partner, e.g. flirting, wearing tight/sexy clothing?

Yes, yes & yes. She typically likes to wear things that are short & show plenty of leg even if she's not trying to be a menace. Upping the ante & hiking up her skirt a bit more isn't a problem. She knows her body well, and knows that she's objectively attractive. She's aware of all the best angles for her backside (but likes to pretend she isn't posing whatsoever). She's surprisingly pretty good about not "borrowing" clothes that don't belong to her, but loves how she looks in lingerie & one of his button-ups. But nothing really beats the pure simplicity of entering a room fresh out of the bath & dropping her towel in his line of sight. She's comfortable being nude, so the nonchalance of the act is honestly more what gets him than anything else.

Flirting, in Varha's opinion, is probably one of the most entertaining pastimes known to civilization. She's quick with double-entendres & some pretty loaded implications. She's also fond of suggestive touches or 'conveniently' brushing up against him. Basically, if she sees an opening to make it known that she's angling for something, she'll take it.

Does your muse leave hickies? Do they ask for them?

She loves to be bitten. Which is fantastic, given that he very much likes to bite. It's never really been something she's asked for with words, and the first time he suck his teeth into the side of her neck was a chance taken without asking, but there was no question that it was something that really did it for her. It's also a good thing she enjoys seeing the bruising afterwards too; Estinien isn't particularly gentle about it (surprisingly this actually doesn't have anything to do with the Dragon-like qualities he still possesses--he's just always been that way).

She can definitely get a bit bitey herself, but it's not as much of a need for her like it is for him. She's more likely to leave nail marks behind instead of hickies, though this may be at least partially a product of their positioning from the size difference.

There's definitely a part of her that likes it when you can see the marks on her neck past her shirt collar. Her favourites are always in a spot where they just peek out enough to be spotted, but she's not going to complain if they're higher or lower. She also loves it when he marks up her hips and thighs in similar ways, although those usually stay entirely hidden from public view. It's more or less a given that she's going to have some visual evidence of him on her body any time they hook up.

Has your muse reached first/second/third base? Home run? 

Well. Based on the rest of the questions. Yes.

Would your muse ever send a sexual text message? Would they send pictures?

(I have no idea if this is even possible in-universe but let's pretend it is for the sake of speculation.)

Probably. Maybe nothing in writing--she would do a passable job if she tried, but it's not really her thing. Pictures, though? I can definitely see her taking the time to set up the timer on the phone & have a mini-boudoir shoot with herself for this exact reason. Like I said, she's aware of what she looks like and knows what parts of her body he enjoys. & everyone knows a picture is worth 1000 words. To be honest, it would probably get the message across faster than any written words. I do feel like this would definitely be a 'use with caution' move, though; it's not so much a tease as it would be considered an immediate invitation.

Is your muse the type to discuss their sex life or sexual prowess with others?

If it came up, she has no problems participating in a conversation. She's also comfortable answering select questions, but there's a limit. Varha won't be sitting there offering up intense details of her latest sexual encounter without notice. She's fine if people know she has sex & know who she's with, but doesn't really want to get into it past that. Basically yes, but also, it's literally no one's business.

How interested is your muse in sex and sexual activity?

Part of the reason she was fine with not having a ton of casual sex over the years comes from being content with just getting herself off between encounters. She's got maybe a slightly above-average sex drive, but that can be taken care of solo. She's responsive, though. Estinien has a significantly higher sex drive, & it doesn't take much for her to match that

asks.

[sisterdivinium]

In good faith, I don't consider WN ships I don't follow as "spam". I simply open the fics that catch my attention and the ship tags for it, I read a bit and if I don't dig it I move to the next ones. If you do not read fics I don't understand why it seems to bother you considerably. Ok that's the part where I don't agree with your post, however it's a fair assessment of what's going on. I do follow avatrice fics, so what I'm about to say next it's from that perspective. I think avatrice is like 95-96% percent of the works on ao3 for various reasons. The show being cancelled and ava going away at the end of S2, despite it being clearly implied she's back, people feel left out to dry because we didn't get to see them reunite. So there's this almost manic drive towards fixing that thru fics. We didn't get to see them as an open explicit couple, so that's also something people have taken to fix. Another reason is that Ava silva is just such an alluring character, people went and are still nuts for her. She's so genuine, so open in her affections, so loyal and unwavering. Another reason, she happens to have been played by an actress that did an outstanding job portraying her, and I believe that the fact that Alba is so conventionally attractive plays a huge role in the pull avatrice has. And I do not mean to diminish Beatrice or Kristina's talent or acting in any way. I merely want to point out I honestly believe that if avatrice were 2 non white women, we wouldn't be seeing the amount of works that pop up daily for them, nowhere near the numbers we have currently. So in that regard it's kind of a double mortal combo that ava was written as she was and that she was played by such a pretty and charming actress. Well a triple combo, because she's white. I personally think the wlw couples that dominate fandoms have almost invariably at least one white character. Ok that's the trifecta by which I explain the popularity of avatrice (outside of them being a legitimately solid and good pairing). As for the amount of AUs I think it's due to wanting to take these 2 characters and separate them from their original universe as a way to repel/protest/take them the hell away from the universe in which they had no resolution, to cope with the feeling of severe incompleteness that canon left. Ok now that being said I join you in lamenting that we don't have more shanon/Mary and other pairings, because I feel entirely alone in shipping Ava and Camila... listen the heart wants what it wants and in my cursed unlucky case, it seems my heart wants 2 golden retrievers/gremlin energy characters together and in love. But my crack ship exists only in my fantasies 😭

I've read and found some great doctor superion works. but at least here I have found zero posts/content about my wretched crack ship, null, none, naught. At least you guys do have some content. Also I think doctor superion not having more traction is straight up ageism. Which is so sad. Anyways these are my personal opinions about it sorry for the wall of text.

Let me clarify why I called that spam, first of all, so that you understand I wasn't being malicious (or not gratuitously so, anyway, lol): every now and again, even if I don't read fic, I do take a look at the pairing tag for the one ship I write about. And, without fail, there will be at least one story posted under that tag where that very pairing is nowhere to be found. It's a fleeting mention at most. I consider it spam to post what is, say, an avatrice smut fic on the Jillian/Suzanne tag if you won't do anything with the latter ship apart from a side comment like "oh, and the two of them are together now".

A few days ago, I read an interesting post about how people posting fic and adding tags should ask themselves whether people interested in those tags would indeed find what they wanted through your story when you used them.

Let me say, then, that a Jillian/Suzanne shipper is not looking for something that can barely be called crumbs at all when she sits down to read something -- so why lead her on? At the very least tag it properly and say it's minor/implied/mentioned or something of the sort. It's annoying to me in the sense that I also use the tag, I like to know who fellow tag users are and coming across this sort of thing is disruptive. People nowadays "overtag" and I get it depending on what they have written because they want a reader to know what she's getting herself into -- and, precisely, I think it would be fair for a Jillian/Suzanne shipper to be warned of the fact that her ship isn't really featured at all in something instead of seeing that tag tacked on just because they're mentioned as a couple en passant. I'm sure that might apply to other pairings as well, as I do recall @foulbearobservation mention some phenomenon of the sort for Camila/Lilith too a few months ago.

So, to reiterate, it's less "ew, this doctor superion fic has been tainted with another ship" (which, honestly, would never bother me) and more "ugh, this other ship fic said there would be doctor superion but there is nothing and I feel duped!" The fact that I don't read it myself doesn't mean I'm not in contact with other Jillian/Suzanne shippers who do seek out fic and who do experience these feelings which we do talk about amongst ourselves.

With that out of the way, let me first thank you for getting in touch because I was very curious about hearing someone on the avatrice side of things!

It's not surprising to me, per se, that avatrice dominates and I think I mentioned it in my post that there is a reason to it. Or various reasons, really, adding to those I cited the ones you give here, being the "unfinished business" aura that the ship has acquired thanks to that damned cancellation. (I will, however, express my surprise at your passionate manifestation considering Alba as I see Kristina lovers gushing about her much more frequently -- I suppose that goes to show you how we none of us ever have the whole picture in mind, how we are always looking at things at an angle even when we try to consider them more fully! A very good reminder to keep in mind how fragmentary our understanding can be...)

What baffles me is not that avatrice is everywhere, but that there are so very little other ships around it. Historically, people in fandom have always played the "there aren't enough nice/fun/compelling/whatever female characters in canon for me to care about f/f ships" card and what's perfectly clear in WN is that this card simply cannot be played given how many wonderful female characters it has (lucky us!) And I suppose it adds to my surprise (again, this is merely me being a bit confused at the situation rather than "denouncing" it; far be it from me to tell avatrice shippers they're doing anything wrong, no, fandom is for fun after all and, as you say, it IS a solid and good pairing, I would never contest that!) that there are so many stories set in an alternate universe for what is a canon ship. It's a bit of a paradox to me, I suppose, although the idea of a "protest" against an unfinished, incomplete canon such as you mentioned might explain part of it.

On prejudice, I wouldn't want to accuse anyone of anything. There's also a predominance of white characters in a lot of media, so them being featured in a lot of pairings is a bit due to the maths of their presence as well -- going forth, as we begin to see more and more diversity (well, if the goddamn companies stop cancelling every one of our shows!) I figure the trend will begin to diminish as well. Or so I'd like to hope, unless the issue we're discussing persists, being that one ship gets all the attention and all others get zilch when the potential for others is right there staring us all in the face... Then again, it does bother me that older characters are more or less ignored by fandom at large, I won't lie, and I've seen some comments on disturbing depictions of Mary in certain corners of fandom as well. I'd like to make use of good-will towards people and not expect from them only the worse, but sometimes it can be... Challenging, let's say.

Do have my thanks for introducing me to the concept of Ava/Camila! It hadn't crossed my mind, I admit, but now I think it could be something fun to play with. I was interrupted so many times while typing up this answer that I used some of that time to write something for the pairing and I'll post it here soon-ish and maybe that can kickstart some more visibility for it! :)

Alongside my thanks, please also have my sympathies. I've always been on the rarepair side of fandom so I understand, even if your case really is a bit extreme if nobody else has ever done anything for the ship! Then again, that is the whole point of the post, the fact that it's so very hard to see anyone try something out outside of their OTP, if just for fun, just for a day, just for a drabble even!

See, my problem is not that there isn't a lot of doctor superion -- my problem is that there isn't much of anything else! I do my part, I write for my pairing that which I would like to read (and I encourage you, friendly anon, to consider doing something for Ava/Camila as well if you can! Sometimes we need to take the first step, sometimes that's what introduces people to the thing and inspires them to put their own spin on it as well. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't even have thought of maybe trying out your ship, even if it won't be a 890.000 word epic). It just strikes me as odd that the toys are all out there and there are few people who take notice of them apart from the two shiniest ones!

To end this, please don't apologise for walls of text. If ever you've been around my blog, you'll know I'm prone to them myself, as this answer attests to! Thank you for chipping in!

[xo-romiiarts]

So I've been reading opinions here and there about why there's differences in 2 shipping name for satosugu and why it seems pretty clearcut and important for this fandom and then saw your post saying the eastern fandom seems to lean more goge while western is more gego. I've read that the purpose is usually to define/tag who top/bottom if it's nsfw works and if it's not nsfw then it's to depict the dynamic (which perspectives about said dynamic vary from one fan to another). I'd even seen opinions that pointed out Mappa is prolly pushing more gego than goge just because they made Gojo lankier and prettier like ?? I'm not trying to start anything here because it all comes down to personal preferences and everyone is entitled to their opinions but to me that sounds quite traditional? Typical? Man...as someone who came from the west side then I'd say the eastern side got nicer taste! I like the top to be lankier, have pretty eyelashes, cheerful, and more childish lol. Not to mention buff, meatier bottom who is tall, dark, handsome, speaks less and has more mature personality of the two is all in the rage nowadays (more and more famous BL works recently are featuring those dynamics more). It's a bit of a bummer for me since satosugu is something we can experience fully through fanworks and as someone who only knows English, there are indeed more works for gego in English (at least from what I've seen by filtering tags for fanfics). So I really appreciate goge artists like you who made it available in English 🙏. I shud hurry up and make pixiv acc even though I would solely depend on AI translator to understand the fanfics and doujinshis there 😂

Yes I mean, I feel mappa satisfy both sides like in last episode (was the drool really needed?!?? That was made for us 😭). Even if they indeed made gojo a lanky teen I mean he kinda is in the manga too hahaa even if I like to give them both a nice built it doesn't bother me much. I do appreciate they dud make now adult Gojo look a big bigger on the shoulders specially so I just hope they deliver good post sealing Gojo when he gets out 🥹 cause that gojo is my fav version of him now.

I do still think stsg could be very versatile and it works for everyone's taste I'm just very leaning into goge now to ever go back haha but I can understand why people enjoy they other way too.

Also yes! Please pixiv has a los of logs and doujins from amazing artist and any translator will help you enjoy them and even without one it's pretty enjoyable just admiring the art in general 🥹 truly recommend you try it! And also thank you for liking my art!! 🥹🫶🏻 Happy to be here pushing the goge agenda hehe

[m00dysunflower]

Testimone di Gangster vs Purple Haze Feedback

Just came fresh off of reading the new Squatizi light novel (which I LOVED) and decided to ruminate on why I loved one and hated the other so much.

I want to preface that if anyone is nasty in replies or tags about my views and opinions of PHF, I'll block you, I don't have time to fight over a non canon Fugo centric light novel. And I think it's valid to compare the 2 stories because they're both based around part 5 and in light novel format that supposedly expands upon the part. If you find my thoughts valid and insightful, cool, if you don't, move along, you're not going to convince me to change my mind sadly.

Also this isn't going to have too bad of spoilers. I'm kinda more vague when it comes to talking about the Squatizi story.

............................................................................

Purple Haze Feedback:

I respect that people needed more Fugo content and it was a genuinely good premise. An aftermath story of Fugo returning to Passione under Giorno and Mista? Yeah I would have loved a story about that. But if you need to warp characters' personalities and throw in a bunch of forgettable stands and their users to do it... I honestly can't bother to care.

If it was much shorter then I could tolerate it, but it wasn't, so here I am. I'll be going point by point with PHF just to organize my thoughts better for such a chaotic story.

1. It warped the pre-established characters.

Mista I think was done the most dirty with that opening scene, but to insinuate that Abbacchio and Fugo killed kids behind Bruno's back felt like absolute whiplash. Also Abbacchio is bisexual obviously, he would have slept with men too, not just women lol.

I don't like that they made Trish become a pop star. Maybe she would have been better as a model, but regardless, not so soon after part 5 when she needed her time to be normal and heal, or at least be under Giorno and Mista's protection.

The whole "Fugio" moment also felt off-putting to me and is part of the reason I don't like the ship. Look, it was absolutely no rain scene or "The only time I feel at ease", let's not try to compare it.

Fugo was okay, but he was just boring and I feel that's not good... you know, considering he's the protagonist of this story. He got better near the end, sure, but by the time I got to the end I was so tired and done with the story. A better writer would have done him and the story more justice.

2. Uninteresting supporting cast and villains

Cannolo was a fine addition, but I never understood what his stand actually did, same with all of the villains' stands. I think that's just poor writing if people walk away not understanding what just happened. I had to reread scenes and I still didn't get most of what happened. Voodoo Child was a cool stand, reminded me a bit of Moody Blues, but I didn't like Sheila as a character. And I'm sorry, who let's a 14 girl in a skimpy ass outfit be the Don of Mafia's bodyguard? Sheila's whole design was so hyper-sexualized and gave me the ick, especially if she was allegedly supposed to be indigenous coded. I've only seen speculation though so I won't go into it further.

Volpe and Manic Depression are the only villain names I remember. I couldn't even tell you the names and stands of the others or what Manic Depression even did as a stand. None of them felt like an actual threat.

3. Felt like a poorly written fanfic

The random mention of Tonio from DIU as Volpe's brother was also a whiplash "where the fuck did that come from" moment, because it was so unnecessary and felt like a cheap tie in for something that was formally published in a book. It really helped give it an average fanfic feel (and I write cheesy, overly dramatic fanfiction!). I think that was also when I was nearing my breaking point.

I once had someone try to mansplain to me that PHF was a "more realistic look of the mafia"... it is not, I promise you that lol. Mafia had rules about women and children and all other kinds of shit that Passione definitely does not abide by. Real life Mafia has so much more to it. This is camp fictional media, no one should ever take it so seriously.

In short, I just think PHF had a lot of wasted potential and would have done better with an altered story. I just can't convince myself to blindly love it, no matter how much I tried to like it.

............................................................................

Testimone di Gangster

I read it last night so it's still so fresh in my mind, but this is how you expand upon a story in my humble opinion. This is also probably going to be shorter just because it was a shorter and more focused story with less characters. I also don't want to spoil it for those who haven't read it yet since it just came out in English.

First off, I think it was a such great idea to take two characters we knew so little about and expand upon them in a way that felt so much more natural. There's less room for warping characters when they didn't have such distinct personalities to begin with and also helps build the world up.

There was no overly complicated plot about drugs and stands and it gave more insight on how the crime world works in Jojo's version of Italy. It even had nods to other real life gangs and how Passione fit into this world with them. It even gave nods to the Cosa Nostra and a real life prosecutor (Falco) who dealt with a lot of gang business in Italy and I think that's just so cool. I love shit like that so much, I adore me some good worldbuilding in general that we didn't necessarily need, but it's just cool to see.

I'll admit, the story was bit hard to follow in the first chapter, but once I picked up that it was from Squalo's perspective, it was such an easy and fun read that didn't make me question what was going on every two paragraphs.

It really showed us how Tiziano is clever and calculating and can be such a useful stand user and teammate. It solidified why he and Squalo are partners (and most definitely in more than just crime for sure now ahaha). I also just love the idea of him being an attorney, especially with Talking Head as a stand, it was a fantastic concept.

The entire time I was just so entertained and caught up in the story, it was so much more engaging than I thought it was going to be. I was genuinely invested in the trial and how Tiziano was going to win the case for Passione. I'm almost sad that this story was so much shorter and would have loved more in between moments with Squalo and Tiziano, but maybe it was for the best not to drag things out.

The ending was a great nod back to their involvement in part 5 and this was in general a great insight into who they were before joining Diavolo's special guard. Plus it makes so much more sense and is amusing to know that he had a lawyer (Tiziano) apart of his elite team.

............................................................................

Now look, I don't think I necessarily have a bias because I do like Fugo just as much as I like Squalo and Tiziano. I also normally don't care for light novels when comes to anime/manga so I don't think it could be that either.

Maybe it was simply the Fugo/Fugio lovers had over-hyped and demanded that everyone read PHF that it just soured the novel before I even read it? I couldn't say for sure. All I know is I went into PHF was no expectations and was so dissatisfied where as I went into Testimone di Gangster with some expectations and was thoroughly entertained.

This is by no means a dig at Fugio shippers, like I said, PHF's ending and the hype around it made me personally more uncomfortable with the ship than I already was before reading it. Simple as that.

If I were to recommend additional Jojo content, especially for the part 5 lovers, Testimone di Gangster is the one I would urge people to read if they have an hour or two to spare. It's a short and sweet look at some great side characters and has more of part 5 spirit without getting caught up in a bunch of bland ocs.

[violetsareblue-selfships]

Worried

Ship: Urbosa x April | Word Count: 883 | Warnings/Tags: First Person POV, food mention, minor injuries (not described)

A/N: happy anniversary~ so this is really just a fluffy thing about me being worried about Urbosa (hence the title lol) I hope you enjoy it~

"Somehow I knew I'd find you in here."

I gasp softly at the sound of her voice, all fond and amused, and turn around from the cookie dough I was rolling out. "You're back." I mentally roll my eyes at how obvious that is, she wouldn't be standing in front of me if she weren't.

Still, I can't help but feel relieved at the fact that she's here now. Dealing with the Yiga Clan is always risky. At least, she's here in one piece.

Urbosa gifts me with a soft smile. It's like she can tell how worried I was before. "Yes. They won't be bothering us for a while." She says with a soft laugh.

My heart flutters at that, even as I scan her appearance. She looks a little more roughed up than usual, but that's not surprising if she came here immediately following her mission. She looks fine otherwise.

Then why do I have the feeling that something's wrong?

Urbosa raises an eyebrow at me and I smile at her, trying to cover up my uneasy feeling. I return to my task of rolling out the dough to cut cookies from, but even this task isn't enough to distract me from glancing at her occasionally.

She comes over and sits down to watch me as I work, and I shake off the idea that she's hurt long enough to get the cookies baking.

Left without anything to distract me, I'm unable to focus on anything but the idea that she's hurt and just not telling me about it. Sure, if it were bad enough, she wouldn't even be here with me right now -- she'd be at the healers. But still…

"April, I'm fine." Urbosa says softly. I walk over to her, smiling when she sets her hands on my sides and pulls me close. "Seriously, it's just a few bruises and minor scrapes. I'm fine."

"Okay." I say, nodding as I allow her words to soothe me. "Do you want me to find you a health potion anyway?" I ask quietly.

Urbosa laughs softly but not harshly. "Will it comfort you for me to take one?" She asks and I blush as she directs it over to me. That proves that she doesn't really need it, but maybe it would get rid of this anxiety I'm feeling. I nod and she smiles softly, cupping my face and rubbing her thumb over my cheek.

"Then yes. I'd like you to get me one - a low strength one." She says and I nod, checking on the cookies briefly before quickly leaving the room. It's not hard to obtain the low-grade health potion and I'm back before the cookies are even done baking.

"Here." I pass it over to her. She takes it without a word and uncaps it, drinking it in one go.

Urbosa takes a deep breath with her eyes shut and sighs softly as the potion takes effect. "Hmm. Maybe one of those bruises was worse than I thought. It feels better now that it's gone." She muses, opening her eyes and looking at me. "Thank you, darling."

I nod, a soft smile on my face as the last of my worry fades with that. I check on the cookies again and set them aside to cool when I find that they're ready.

My stomach swoops when the floor disappears from under my feet, the sensation making me giggle as she sets me on the counter. "It really is sweet how worried you were for me." Urbosa whispers, wrapping her arms around me and stepping up close to me.

My face heats up and I duck my head down, feeling flustered from the soft way her emerald eyes are looking at me. "I-- You'd do the same for me." I protest. It's merely my job as her girlfriend to worry about her.

Urbosa laughs softly and turns my face up to look at her. "While that may be true, I want you to know that I appreciate it." She starts rubbing her thumb over my cheek again and my heart skips a beat.

"I love you, Urbosa." I say softly and she smiles at me, leaning down to where she can press our foreheads together.

"I love you too, my dear." The words are whispered up against my lips and I shiver as she kisses me at the end of the sentence. My arms loop around her neck and hold her close to me as all thoughts flee from my head. How can I think when this beautiful goddess wants to kiss me?

A soft whine leaves my mouth when she pulls away and she chuckles softly, kissing the tip of my nose softly. "I know, love. Why don't we take some of those cookies back to my room? I could read to you."

It takes me a second to reboot my brain enough to have words again. "That sounds lovely. I'll agree if you promise more kisses."

Urbosa full-on laughs at that and I nearly miss her words with how elated that makes me feel. "Of course, my love. I thought that was obvious."

I giggle softly and nod, smiling as she helps me off the counter to go do just that. I love her so much.

[starsarefire824]

Heeey moot! Just woke up! Even though I'm late, I just wanted to say that you deserve to write whatever tf you want and I'm sorry some peeps were harassing you about The Pact. I don't think folks know how hard it is to not only write, but then to post it for others to see. So, for them to criticize you when it's just a fun fic that they can ignore or filter out (tags on ao3 are meant to be used geez) its wild to me. You're doing something very unique with the characters and including a lot of different subgroups of the queer community splendidly while keeping them flawed like real teens - all in 1 fic. As a demi ace myself, I was so happy to see you incorporate that in your fic respectively and a lot of my queer Sex Ed came from detailed, researched fics bc even though my parents and school system talked to me about sex, there was nothing for the queer kids, let alone ace kids to get guidance on. So, for fic readers/writers like me, using fics to explore sexuality was a godsend.

Can't help but also think it's the biphobia kicking in again, specifically for characters like Mike. No one has a problem hc Max as bi even though it seems like lumax is clearly endgame over elmax or elumax, but when it comes to Mike being bi it's like the world is ending despite it clearly being byler endgame. I personally ship all hcs of Mike's sexuality cuz only Robin and Will have been confirmed queer. Everyone else in ST to me is undisclosed until stated straight or queer. But again that's me.

Also love your poly rep cuz my sib is poly and so were some of my grandma's cousins from 1950s-now. So, again, all or most sexualities explored in fics is a must, regardless if you ship it. I've always been a polypartycule shipper and enjoy how you include all party members and mention Duzie sometimes cuz too many times I found fics/hcs excluding the fact Dustin has a stable relationship with Suzie in favor of just highlighting byler and elumax as the romantic ones of the party.

Sorry for the rant but I had to let it out. I hated scrolling through my feed and seeing that post you made of folks getting heated over fiction like you're gonna convince the Duffers to change the whole script. Anyways I hope my support is felt. This is still me typing in a sleep daze and yeah. I'll continue reading your work cuz I enjoy good writers first and foremost and omg lol you made it having some harrassers cuz the greatest books were on the banned book list. Not saying you deserve the irrational hate, but that's how I'm framing it - this is giving "banned book energy" just cuz The Pact is exploring romantic madwheeler when no one cares about byclair or henderhop or henclair (despite folks labeling El as a lesbian). Anyways, you do you moot be blessed out here

Hello deer moot!!!! <33

Thanks so much for the positive vibes!!! I truly appreciate it. I guess I was just feeling a little let down that a select few people made it so far into a fic and then were angry about the way things were going and/or felt the need for me to tell them the ending. At first it didn't bother me, but after answering the same questions 1,000 times and trying to sort of reassure everyone it got to a point of being exhausting! I want to talk about the fic, but I don't really want to have to defend my writing/story/ship choices every chapter. It's kind of exhausting and was bringing me down a little bit. But anyway, enough about that.

I am SO GLAD that you are like...really vibing with some of the choices in that story? Especially with your unique pov being demi ace and having poly family. I think that fanfiction can be a very important tool for a lot of teen when it comes to exploring sex, especially if it's not a cis het-normative type or even just....dealing with sex from a young person's pov and all of the obstacles that everyone faces in that regard. Also, I think it can just open up a conversation or make a person think about things that maybe they might not of before etc etc. Or! They can just enjoy those scenes for the writing/good time. I'm here for all of it.

I'm not sure if it's a biphobia thing? It honestly hadn't occurred to me, but you may possibly be right. I know a lot of people headcanon Mike as gay, which I fully support. I wouldn't be surprised if that is the case. I think if Byler happens in canon, he'll be unlabeled. BUT I do like to write Mike as bi, I personally think that there were feelings for El at some point. I personally headcanon him as a bi-romantic, and sexually leaning towards men. But that's just me....

But anyway, as that pertains to madwheeler, I also really enjoy the bi for bi Max and Mike dynamic, specifically because it's fun to write, and secondly it's another thing to add to their already similar personalities. And yea. I agree... unless a character's sexuality is specifically stated like El and Will's, there is room for exploration for most characters and that's what fanfic and art is for.

I do think there is this strange thought process regarding bi characters, that if they have a relationship with a person of the opposite sex it's like they're not "queer enough" for other people. Like it's somehow lesser than if Mike has a relationship with a woman, even though he already, in canon, is well, with a woman. And that people tend to forget that people are still bi, still queer, even if they are in the most outwardly straight presenting relationship, cause let's face it....you can't really help who you're attracted to and who you fall in love with. it just is.

And when it comes to the madwheeler in this fic, I am fully aware it is one of the least popular ships out there, but again, that is one of the reasons I wanted to explore it. And a a bi, poly person my self it was really interesting putting these characters in a dynamic where they were both involved with people of differing genders and orientations. It gives you a lot to work with when it comes to having things to write about! シ

And as you said, it also allows for some messy, realistic teenage angst! Which I am always a fan of! ;)

Anyway, thank you for the rant. I appreciate it so much, and am honestly still blown away by the positive responses to this story. Even if it's not everyone's cup of tea!

[avenger-hawk]

i never really understood why people ship itachi and shisui. i mean didn't shisui tell him to see him as an older brother? and we didn't see much of their relationship anyway so nothing about them seems romantic or sexual to me. and it wasn't the same as say narusasu where their whole relationship is layed out for us to see. i know shiita is not really your topic of interest but what do you think?

I’m not a big fan of Shiita cause I find it boring, but I can see why people ship them. First of all people ship characters for much less than the moments Itachi and Shisui have together in the anime (cause in the manga there’s pretty much nothing)...tbh I ship characters for interacting even less, for their potential or whatever. So I can’t judge shiita shippers, because like I wrote here and here, Shisui and Itachi share values and ideals, they spent a lot of time together and they trusted each other, even Itachi who never trusts anyone trusted Shisui, so it’s a lot.

About elements seemingly romantic or se/xual actually how many characters have se/xually charged moments? not many, and yet ppl ship them lol. Like me. Or heterosexual couples, they have no se/xually charged moment and yet...

Sometimes a good close combat fight is enough to suggest something se/xual that might happen/be imagined, sometimes a few words are. Sometimes you don’t need much to have a glimpse of how some characters’ relationships and dynamics are. Team Taka, for example, don’t have much screen time, but you can totally understand the bond between them. And if you want to see them as brotherly, ok, if you want to see more, there is space for it as well. That’s how shipping works.

What bothers me about Shiita is fanon, because some fandom headcanons became the norm, so (and I’m not referring to anyone in particular, don’t feel attacked. I just remember random things I saw online) there is kinda shy Itachi who enjoys to become a submissive bottom with Shisui (I mean there are controlling people/characters who like to be sub and this fan opinion makes sense, but now it’s the only one and I’d like to see more variety, because the opposite makes sense too), Shisui who’s a dork even tho he was one of the most feared Konoha shinobi and he was the one who influenced Itachi’s ideals, and Sasuke being the third weel, always jealous and possessive of Itachi even tho he was never like this in canon and he respected Shisui very much (in the anime he calls him Shisui-san when he was a child).

Another thing that bothers me is the ‘wholesome’ concept that now gets applied to that ship and from which a lot of ppl seem to judge those tho like different stuff in fictional pairings. Ofc wholesome is an option and it makes a lot of sense for them, but there can be more.

(also in the past I wrote a darkfic where there is shiita. needless to say it wasn’t received well in that fandom lol)

Since you mentioned NS I have the same problem with that fandom’s portrayal cause despite the many moments they have, and despite the ending, which highlighted how unhealthy and un-wholesome their relationship is, they misinterpret both characters and they reduce them in an ooc couple made of a grumpy selfish drama queen and a selfless ball of sunshine, and both are wrong because Sasuke is a selfless character who’s passive in relationships and Nar is a very assertive personality who’s not selfless at all and who’s totally dominant and possessive to Sasuke. But I have a whole tag abt how I see them.

[derangedthots]

Hiiiiiiiiii lovely writer author jacemond wife,

I hope you don’t mind me asking but I got curious about your writing process for FTF & CTF. Like you’re very much aware of where your fic is going what inspired it and already know what would be spoilers and what isn’t for us your in love readers. I hope it’s not a bother to ask and if you don’t wish to answer that completely understandable. I just wondered how you planned out the universe and plot for this ship so effectively and efficiently.

Also i can’t remember if you ever tagged it or not but was there going to be like angst in this fic? (Not asking for like tagging reasons but just because I wondered with Aemond’s personality we’d be getting dumb blond brooding and grandma Vhagar two days away from kidnapping Jace and Aemond to an island and flying away. Targaryens and their emotional constipation feelings about family)

Hope uni is treating you good and Jacemond treats you better!!!

hello my love😊🥰

it's not a bother to ask at all!! (though probably not that interesting to hear haha) i have an overactive imagination that has a tendency to make connections really quickly and if the material i'm working off of is anything based in fantasy, that ability only compounds lol. my brain will make large connections (i.e. major events i want to write/read) first while also running smaller details in the background and the longer i leave both to sit and marinate, the clearer the narrative becomes. it's all very chaotic by nature so i'll try to keep as much as i can organized on a good doc - since i can always delete certain plans later - and just keep reminding myself of where eventually i want the story to end up.

there's a lot of scene/plot planning that happens but i also try to leave myself a lot of room to play outside of stuff i KNOW needs to happen bc i don't want the fic to feel bogged down or like i'm just crossing things off a list. i mentioned in my ch2 author's endnote that i like giving my stories "room to breathe" bc i want them to feel organic rather than mechanical. hitting the right emotional beats is really important to me (what are humans if not highly-emotional beings after all, isn't that just terrible and beautiful?) so there's a lot of internal deliberation abt how characters would respond & react to certain things that i think abt every day in order to avoid the pitfalls of treating them less like complex people and more like hollow puppets on my strings. when i write, i aim to imbue my fics will life and life can lead us down unpredictable, frustrating roads haha

taking all that into account, it's pretty much why i don't have a set update schedule. i tried to do the monthly thing releasing the first ch of CTF a month after FMF but it became clear almost immediately that that wouldn't work just bc, by that point, the story had grown too large for me to tell it the way i felt it needed to be told in such a short time. plus uni responsibilities factors into it too and updates get postponed even longer than i would ever want them to (boo👎🏼👎🏼)

and research, a lot of research goes into me planning these fics lolol and often times bc i haven't read f&b i have to cross out ideas and change certain details i previously (incorrectly) believed and/or don't wanna keep

oof that was so much rambling again😂 but to answer your second question, for some reason i thought i already added the angst tag to CTF and clearly just forgot. ik you said you're not asking for tagging reasons but for me personally, it was v irresponsible of me considering jace has already had at least 2 panic attacks at this point and well...everything else. tagging my fics appropriately is important to me bc i never want to trigger anyone unnecessarily and i know we all have diff thresholds when it comes to how comfortable or uncomfortable we are with certain subjects. i'll add it here in a bit, thank you for reminding me!! it's esp. important bc yeah...there's definitely going to be more angst moving forward...no spoilers tho my mouth is sealed🤐😶‍🌫️

i hope life and jacemond treats you AMAZINGLY😚💕💕

[wolfeyedwitch]

My favorite chapter in my favorite fic of yours

Oh. Hmm. Copy and paste hasn't kept the numbers of the questions. Oh well.

I want to say it's Breakfast in Bed part 2 in WBOH, but it could be 3. Or 1, potentially. I refuse to look it up bc I'll start rereading and it's 1am AND I still have things to do. Anyway, it's just after Zera brings breakfast up and Bailey catches them with his powers and has a panic attack. I just... my heart. Bailey thinking he should be punished for using his powers. Can I kill Slipknot yet?

While writing this out though I realised that I should give special mention to the reluctant caretaker and auction of evil parts in the aus. Bc I love them so much too.

A fic I didn’t expect to like so much

The Heart and The Hunger (Hunter? Oh, idk. I read it yesterday and I've forgotten already. You know which one I mean). I love it! I wasn't sure I'd like it that much so it took me ages to get round to reading it, and then I loved it! Actually that reminds me: since I'm here, can I be added to the taglist for it (with @pigeonwhumps)?

A character/ship I didn’t enjoy/think about as much before you wrote about them

A person being used as a weapon in the way Weapon is in Weapons Don't Weep. I mean, I've thought about people being forced to fight but never in the way of like being surgically altered and talking about themself as if they're a piece of machinery and stuff.

You should know that this concept has entered my brain in the way that 'thinking about it more' means 'writing a fic about a living weapon bc I can't not now it's taken over my mind'. It's a long way off being finished and it's definitely very different from your story (I'm not copying anything, dw) but... thanks for the inspiration, I guess? Anyway, I love Weapons Don't Weep.

(ok that's more a character type than a character. But it'll do)

Thank you so much for reading, and for taking the time to comment like this!

Bailey freaking out and Zera comforting them has a special place in my heart, as does working to decondition Bailey out of all the things Slipknot trained into them. And no, you can't kill Slipknot. I have too many plot plans in place that require them being alive, unfortunately.

You are added to the taglist for The Heart and the Hunger! (You got it right the first time lol) I'm glad you enjoyed it, and that you took the time to read it even if you weren't expecting to enjoy it!

I love the idea of someone conditioned into thinking of themself as nothing more than a weapon, a piece of equipment. I think my first time reading that trope was in a Captain America fic focused on Bucky post-CATWS, called "This, You Protect". I believe it's by owlet? It's on Ao3 and it's really good. He starts off using "it" as a pronoun and internally referring to himself as "The Asset", but over the course of the fic gains insight into how to be a person again.

The other main source of inspiration was @secretwhumplair's "Royal Arms" fic, which has a similar setup with a living weapon but is set in a vaguely medieval timeframe. As such, I am 100% not worried or bothered by you getting inspired by my writing. In fact, please tag me in it when you post it! I'd love to see what you come up with!

[kaneko-junko-official]

☆Junko Kaneko☆ The young pianist prodigy!

Welcome to my blog! Some basic information about me:

Trilingual! I speak Japanese, Romanian, and English!

I go to Miya Girls Academy, and I am a second year there!

She/Her pronouns, and a cis lesbian. But I am a trans ally! All trans people are safe here regardless of your label!

Vocaloid fan! I love love love vocaloid, and my favorite voice bank is Gumi!!!

16 and a minor, so don't be weird!!!!

I play the piano and have been since I was a kid!!!

Do Not Follow If:

-You ship pedophilia and/or incest — I don't really like that content, sorry!

-You believe that depiction immediately equals glorification in media.

-MAPs/NoMAPS pedos whatever you wanna call yourselves. I'm a minor stay far away from me and my blog.

That's all!!! I hope you enjoy your stay at my blog!!!!

[OOC under cut]

LOL WE'RE DOING THIS SHIT HUH. Mod goes by Akito uses she/him [also runs @vbs-akito and a fuck ton of other blogs. Main's @shoujo--rei] Kaneko is a closeted transmasc so feel free to crack his egg, and he's my prosekai OC

Some notes:

a) This blog will have mentions of pedophilia/sa [nothing too graphic] so please censor cw pedophilia and cw sa if that bothers you. WILL NOT BE THE MAIN FOCUS OF THE BLOG BUT IS A PART OF HIS LIFE AND SO HE WILL OCASIONALLY MENTION IT EVEN IF HE DOESN'T. REALLY UNDERSTAND WHAT'S GOING ON. All trigger tags will follow the cw [trigger] format. Ask if you need something tagged!

b) Junko both has a sekai and is in a band, and is aware of both of these things, but will not talk about it unless bullied into admitting them, essentially.

Ooc statements will have \\ <- at the start. Anything without these is in character unless the post is tagged as "ooc", at which case everything in said post is ooc regardless of if it has those or not.

[cxrnxticn]

✿ da rules ✿

Activity: The activity on here will be off and on; so don’t assume I disappeared off the face of the earth if I’m gone for several days. I have a life outside of this hobby, as we all do; so please be patient with me!

NSFW-ish: This is a semi-nsfw blog (tagged #❁ — n.s.f.w. and #❁ — n.s.f.w-ish) with brief mentions of bloody fights, childhood neglect, abandonment issues, and underage exploitation. Chances for naughty stuff are pretty slim compared to my previous activity. While Mari is sexually active, Mun is ace af (and 30+); so I’ll be limiting the dirty details to vague descriptions and fade-outs if it comes to that. Also, if there are any specific tags you need me to be aware of, let me know and I'll be sure to add it! Also also, minors: do not interact!!

Shipping: This is a multi-shipping blog where each one has their own verse separated from the other. Now, when it comes to shipping, chemistry is a thing that makes both romantic and non-romantic relations worthwhile. My muse is not a pro at handling in-depth emotions; so it will take a good amount of time for her to open her heart to someone; so unless we’ve settled on a pre-established relationship, don’t expect her to throw herself onto your muse right off the bat.

Length: You’re not obligated to match my writing length but again, effort matters. For instance, if I write a paragraph, please don’t fart out a single line of dialogue. That’s just poopy.

Initiation: Never hesitate to approach me if you wanna interact! Got any ideas for our muses that tickle your fancy? I offer you consent to invade my inbox, IM me, or just send in a meme. Hell, tag me in a random starter, and I’ll leap with joy!

Discourse: I’m very anti-drama and hivemind. It’s rare for me to take things personally, or get wrapped up in public discourse; so don’t feel like you need to walk on eggshells around me. I won’t bite your head off or use any forms of violence against you for being different from me but I also refuse to put up with harmful behavior. In the end, if it comes down to that, I’ll just block you. ✌

Following Conditions

Mutuals: I only follow mutuals for the sake of seeing their posts as they do mine vice versa. Simple as that lol.

Selectivity: I’m a bit selective. I welcome pretty much all muses as long as they have the necessary details down. The things I look for are clear and concise rules and bios for muses, as well as the consideration of how our muses will interact regarding verses and dynamics. Oh and I judge the Mun’s own character as well, whether or not I see any red flags popping up that could indicate any *sussy* behavior, that will determine my decision to follow or unfollow.

TMI: I will be discouraged from following those who regularly overshare personal information not related to their muses or roleplaying in general. If your rp blog resembles your personal diary, sorry but I’ll likely unfollow. Oversharing is an unhealthy habit; especially when you publicize it to a bunch of strangers. Please be careful with what you share!

Grammar: If you make constant grammatical errors and don’t bother proofreading your posts, I might find it cringe, and be motivated to unfollow you. Sorry but I treat the art of writing with dignity, and I hope you would put in at least some effort as well. If you’re ESL, I’ll be more forgiving but come on, native English speakers, try harder!!

Interaction: If neither of us even bother to reach out to one another for a good while, I don’t see any reason to continue following. Nothing personnel, kid.

F.U.N.: Above all, have fun! Don’t beat yourself up over a late reply or for not seeming as perfect as you wish to be. It’s called roleplay for a reason! Let’s enjoy it in the same carefree manner as the children we once were! 😊