#i also know it's AA week and while i want to write little snippets for it

[brain-rot-central]

Who wants to bet money that I'm gonna be bawling my eyes out at my dress appointment tomorrow

[the-abdicated-flesh]

I could write something witty and vaguely shitposty, but today is about to become tomorrow and I’m tired, so yes hello, as previously mentioned, I am not dead, and I wasn’t actually gone for that long, but it’s been so long since I provided you guys with actual content, partly in due to the fact

I am writing! Like a lot now. Not a lot by some people’s standards, and it’s not that I wasn’t writing before, but I have set myself a daily quota, and am now keeping a tab for the work completed each day, because it makes me feel accomplished, to have a receipt.

And also, I am consuming a lot more content (read; fanfiction) than I have in awhile, this is not a bad thing, it just means I’ve been filling my spare time with things I like and haven’t been awarding myself pockets of nothing in which I craft tumblr posts. This conveniently segues into my next point,

I am writing fanfiction again! It’s been a few years, I mostly dropped it when I starting writing original fiction, but while reading someone else work *cough cough* it was mushrooms and magnets by starcross on ao3 I’ve posted about it before, if you like Resi8 stuff you should go read it*cough cough* I had an idea for a fic I realized I wouldn’t mind reading, and that further, I wouldn’t mind writing, which leads us to now.

I vaguely touched on this yesterday when I realized I hadn’t really spoken on here in over a week, but today you get the added bonus of music I’ve started listening to while working on said fic, and a snippet of my waxing poetic because my lesbian little heart still isn’t entirely over Lady Dimetrescu, even while I read my way through an aa hyperfixation

Some European jazz to fit the mood, the mood being Singer!Alcina au that’s not really an au since it happened in cannon, but I’m rearranging some timestamps and also mother catholic guilt choked on her toxic spores and everyone lives non-cult, human lives and maybe I throw out the timeline for some background interactions between certain characters, but it’s my canon and I’ll do what I want with it, but anyway Lady D was a jazz singer in the 1930’s, and I wanted to write about it

Yes I am aware this is French, I’m having a surprisingly hard time finding Romanian jazz from any era, much less the early twentieth century, original composer was Django Reinhardt, good vibes, v pretty, cleans the skin, waters your crops, etc

And for the sneak-preview none of you have been waiting for because I told you about this yesterday and you may not have even care about Resi8, a selection from a little something I’ve been working on, and should I hopefully publish it on ao3, you guys will be the first to know. Enjoy.

A crimson sphere of gaseous fumes dips below a sprawling horizon, bathing slowly-waking streets in red light, unobstructed by clouds. A decisive cut splits the plummeting star, leaving streaks of blood across the sky it used to inhabit, concealed by the cloak of night racing desperately after it. Rolling cars flooded streets flecked with golden streetlamps, rivaled only by seas of people washing down sidewalks, falling into and out of buildings, trams cutting through the city on electric grids. Birds shuffle across rooftops as humans shuffle through their constant lives, the sheer noise of simultaneous human existence drowning out the threads of conversation of any singular contributors. But lower still, as one picks apart glowing street signs of painful intensity, shaped light hanging low over pedestrians, there are rooms shielded from such stimulation, the lights and sounds, struggles of outside existence carefully muted, so as to not detract from the ongoing performance.

In hindsight this is literally just me waxing poetic to set tone, but I don’t have enough content yet to feel secure in giving you all the second paragraph, so here, have what is effectively just prose, that I then segue into a resi8 fanfic. I swear it becomes resi8 related you have to believe me. Alright, keep it crunchity boys, and as always, remain heretical.

[rivalsforlife]

For the fanfic ask: F, K, S, X, Y (whichever ones you feel like answering) <3 Love your work!

Alright, thank you!!

F: Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

oh no. Uhhh I’m probably going to think of something else like five seconds after posting it haha, but at the moment one of the dialogue scenes I really like is the dinner scene near the end of chapter 4 of The Catch-Up Game (linked here for easy reference). The... whole thing is pretty long and I like a lot of it, so I’ll just share a (relatively?) short snippet form it here:

“You did more than enough, Edgeworth,” Phoenix insisted. “If it weren’t for the Jurist System — founded upon your research — I would’ve never been able to clear up my scandal. If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have gotten my badge back at all.”

“The badge wasn’t all there was to it.”

“... Maybe not,” Phoenix admitted. “It’s not like we can change that. And it’s not like I would’ve wanted you to do more. It was difficult enough to accept help as it was. Besides, you’re — you’re here now, aren’t you?”

“Phoenix,” said Edgeworth.

It’s not like it was unheard of for Edgeworth to say his first name. It just… happened so rarely, Phoenix could count on one hand the times he’s heard it since grade school. Only when it was just the two of them, never when they were in some sort of public place.

But… Phoenix really liked the way Edgeworth said his name. It wasn’t like he pronounced it differently, or anything. There was just a sense of hesitance to it, like it was something precious he was holding in his mouth, and speaking it too forcefully would cause it to shatter. His name was all soft syllables, in Edgeworth’s voice which rarely softened anything, and it made Phoenix feel like he fell back into deep water after he’d just regained his footing.

“So much has changed,” said Edgeworth. “Hasn’t it?”

“Mhm, tell me about it,” said Phoenix, sinking back into his chair, trying to stay afloat. “Maya’s the Master of her village, Pearls is looking into college, Apollo’s running his own firm while Athena’s taking on more cases by herself, Trucy’s off on tour… and you, Chief Prosecutor.” He let out a faint, self-deprecating laugh. “Meanwhile it feels like I’m stuck in place. Still the same attorney I was when I started out.”

“I don’t think that’s true, but even if it were, there’s nothing wrong with that, is there?” Edgeworth asked. “I hastened towards my position, as it was the best vantage point from which to eliminate corruption. I know I’ve made great changes. I don’t regret my choices, and wouldn’t choose differently, if I had the chance to do them over. But…” He gazed at Phoenix for a long time. “There are things I missed,” he continued, barely audible. “In some ways I’m still stuck, as well, and the thought of moving forward… terrifies me.”

“... I think I know what you mean.”

“Do you?”

Phoenix didn’t answer, lowering his gaze to where Edgeworth’s hand rested almost halfway across the table. If he wanted to, he could reach out to hold it. Broad hands that he would trust the world in. But he still didn’t know what it would feel like in his, or what expression would cross Edgeworth’s face if he had the courage to take it.

Edgeworth stared at him with an unreadable expression, almost curious. “Well, you don’t have to say anything,” he said. “What matters most is that I can be here with you now.”

“... Yeah,” said Phoenix. “I agree.”

One of the major difficulties I have in writing, especially writing dialogue, is being Even Remotely Subtle at any given point, because I am an extremely unsubtle person who does not pick up on social cues! This scene though, actually most of this chapter, has to sort of subtly set up the big event at the end of chapter 5, as well as make all of Phoenix’s motivations seem sort of plausible before he actually gives the explanation a little later. Reading it over it wasn’t actually very subtle but for me I think it was a huge step in the right direction haha. 

Mainly: Phoenix fears that Miles is going to leave him again, along with everyone else he loves in his life, since everyone is starting to move on ahead without him. He’s only just gotten Miles in his life in a semi-permanent way and is terrified of losing that. Miles, meanwhile, has been so focused on his career his whole life and is just now starting to realize the other aspects of life he’d been missing out on, namely developing his relationship with Phoenix, which he’s slowly starting to work up the courage to make a move on. And they’re both aware now that they love each other (even if Phoenix can’t fully admit it to himself yet), but scared to actually take that step forward, so they tiptoe around the subject even though they both know they’re discussing it... and end up taking wildly different conclusions away from the conversation as a result, which leads to the disaster at the end of chapter 5.

Also I just kind of like how pretty some of it managed to sound, somehow. The description of how Miles says Phoenix’s name is probably one of my favourite lines in the fic haha. Overall, I feel proud of myself any time I think I can pull off a dialogue scene where people don’t say what they mean haha.

K: What’s the angstiest idea you’ve ever come up with?

Hmm prooooobably the Iris Wright Ace Attorney AU which is the one where Phoenix ends up killed by Dahlia, and to atone, Iris helps put her in jail and then takes on Phoenix’s path as an attorney... which I haven’t really written much for yet, but talked about here a little while ago. 

It’s fun and angsty because Iris has to deal with a lot of guilt of pretty much being the downfall of the two people she cared about the most, but you’ve also got Miles, who has his realization that maybe what he’s doing isn’t great so much harder and faster because the realization comes with “when you ignored the truth, it set off a chain of events that caused the death of your childhood friend.” 

Phoenix and Miles don’t end up as close in this AU by virtue of Phoenix being dead before they even meet, but Miles learns Phoenix became an attorney to save him -- and was in the courthouse when he met Dahlia because he was studying to become an attorney -- and even though Miles hadn’t spoken to Phoenix in ages, he was still Miles’ first friend and someone he held dear to his heart all those years they were separate (which I do think is true in canon too, but seeing him as an opponent made that less apparent in AA1-Miles), so news of his death indirectly because of Miles hits him pretty badly.

I did write a fic about Miles responding to Phoenix’s letters in this AU during the events of JFA as a way of trying to work through his grief. I was going to post it during the AU day for narumitsu week this year but ended up not doing that since The Catch-Up Game was stressful enough for people haha.

... I can probably come up with angstier stuff if pressed but AA isn’t one of the fandoms I crave a lot of angst for. 

OH WAIT NO I looked through my fic ideas doc and saw one that’s basically a DL-6 But Worse AU where Miles dies instead of Gregory -- kind of like The Illusion of Control, which broke me, but plot-related stuff would probably be different. A key part is them somehow managing to solve DL-6 in seven years, so that there’s the thematic parallel of Gregory then taking in Franziska (and raising her well!)

(S I already answered here!)

X: A character you enjoy making suffer.

... Apparently Miles Edgeworth? I don’t necessarily like making him suffer, I just think that you can explore many interesting aspects of his character... through his suffering... and given my fics, he’s the one I make suffer the most, so. Does it count as making him suffer if it’s canon that did it first?

Y: A character you want to protect.

Mostly the kid characters who have suffered so much more than they deserve: namely, Pearl and Trucy. Especially Trucy at the moment considering the repulsive stuff people have been writing about her in the aa ao3 tag recently.