#i don't know how long this will be up tbqh

[loriache]

Butch up that Elf: my Marcille manifesto

TBQH, this came into being because the Falin "dragoness" fanart rewired my brain completely. It's sillytimes, but we're going to make a serious argument: trying out being a little butch would Fix Her.

1. Marcille Gender Discomfort

Now, Marcille LOVES feminity. She loves playing dressup, she loves elaborate gowns, she spends her free time going to the spa - the absolute last thing I want is to deny that. However, there's also a definite vibe that this isn't just a preference. Specifically, the way that she pushes Falin towards femininity suggests that she isn't comfortable with gender nonconformity in the people around her.

If this was something she was 100% confident about ("I'm doing this for myself and nobody else!") surely what other people do wouldn't be a big deal? Of course, you can read this as a little bit of solipsism; "what works for me must work for you too! I think this is so cute and would suit you - wouldn't you agree?"

But for the sake of this argument, all I'm trying to suggest is that gender nonconformity (and probably sexual nonconformity... well, frankly, any kind of sexuality at all) is unlikely to be something that's on Marcille's "radar". She hasn't tried out other ways of presenting and decided she doesn't like them. I do think she'd be a very flamboyant butch - "ouji lolita" vibes, you know? It's a whole new set of wardrobe options she could play dress-up in, even.

After the story ends, she starts dressing like her mother in all black, which makes sense - her mother was also a court magician, so she's probably emulating her in order to project confidence and authority. But I can't say I think she should stick with this. Break away and be your own person, Marcille! Try a fancy waistcoat and frilled jacket!

2. Haircut

This is another potential hard sell, I'm sure. The people she loves doing her hair is a cute symbol of their care for her, and her hair is key to her magic - so there's plenty of reason for her to keep it long. But like... think practically. Having someone do your hair every morning, for the whole of her long life, while it gets messier over the day (because she can't remember to keep it neat)... That's got to be such a pain. My hair gets messy when I put a hoodie on. And I have short hair.

It would require her to go through a change of mind, and probably a little more growth in how secure she feels in her relationships, but - the hairdo's a symbol. The more important thing is the relationships themselves. Eventually I think there might be something liberating about cutting it off, even if she might eventually decide to grow it out again.

The lion, her trauma, took something away from her which was really important to her. The people around her are able to make that easier, and make up for it, and soften that loss, but... Mithrun isn't the person he was before, you know? He's a new person. The relationship he has with his brother is new, and I don't know if it's one that the person he was before could have had. If Falin hadn't died, they wouldn't have gone on that wonderful adventure! They wouldn't have met Senshi or saved Izutsumi and Laios and Marcille wouldn't have gotten so close. So I think it's totally congruent with the themes of the story that the burning away of this part of Marcille's self might eventually create the potential for new growth in a new direction, not clinging onto the parts that are gone.

This also isn't totally out of the norm for elven mages - both Otta and Flamela have short hair. Otta is canonically butch, and potentially Flamela reads that way to elves too, but the point is it clearly is possible to be an accomplished mage without long hair.

3. Desiring (to be) a chivalrous prince

Marcille's succubus is clearly General Halleus from her favourite book series, the Daltian Clan. The fact that this is her ideal man.... it certainly plays into readings of her as Not Straight. But at least, this conveys the way her conception of sex and romance is strongly idealised, dissociated from the bodily and from physical desire.

There are many ways to interpret that, including thinking about what types of desire this fixation is obstructing because she is not comfortable with it, but I am going to focus here on what this desire does signify. She likes the trappings of courtly romance, and is clearly comfortable putting herself in the role of the princess, being taken away on a white horse by a noble (but tormented; eyepatch has "death" on it lmao) prince. (Though I think he's actually the token male lead who isn't royalty; he's a General. There's always one in Romfan, lmao. IYKYK)

A kiss on the hand - this is so chaste, I think it's clear it's more about desire to play a role in a dynamic than it is about desire in a physical sense. There is undoubtedly a big part of Marcille that wants to be a beloved and chased-after princess, but I think it isn't at all impossible that she'd also enjoy being the powerful, cool, and chivalrous "prince" to someone (a pretty girl, perhaps) who needs her protection.

This is a little silly, because it's clearly just aping the shoujo artstyle that articulates basically the same idea as her succubus, that Marcille is attached to highly abstracted and idealised romantic (and Romantic) tropes and ideas. But the imaginary "successful" Marcille from chapter 4 looks quite similar to her succubus. (Another thing I noticed is that in the fantasy she has sharp ears... like full elves have. Despite what she says, I think the cultural messaging that this trait is "attractive" and hers are inferior got to her at least a bit. 😥)

Also, the way that she treats Falin, scolding her indulgently, trying to look after her and wanting to be looked up to and respected by her... that aligns more with the "masculine" role in the trope that her succubus is referencing. "What are we going to do with you...?" I can imagine her saying this to Falin, word for word. Whereas, if anyone real started talking down to her, even affectionately, I don't think she'd like it, given the negative way she reacts when people don't respect her or her skills. Especially after canon, given the way the Winged Lion was treating her.

Her attitude to Falin is partially down to her reluctance to acknowledge Falin as an adult, who is independent and can grow beyond her and leave her behind. But I think even as they move on from that unhealthy dynamic, Marcille is still going to get pleasure from feeling capable, reliable, able to look after and protect Falin. She'd like to pull the chair out for her in a restaurant on a date, you know?

4. Conclusion

Even after the growth she goes through during the story, there are parts of Marcille's character that are very much obstructed. Romance, sexuality, and gender, feel like one of those to me. The way that her discomfort with the messy origins of food betrayed a deeper, more significant discomfort with the cycles of life and death.

Much in the same way, I'd argue that the simplified, idealistic, and safely fantastical way that she views romance, as well as her very "safe" gender presentation and tendency to push it onto others as well, suggest an underlying discomfort in her own gender and sexuality. The character growth she goes through leaves her in a place where it may be possible to safely re-evaluate her relationship with Falin, as well as her choice of clothing and hairstyle, both things that go through a change at the end of the manga. Neither, I think, reach a sustainable stopping point that we see - there will be a point when it's more servants doing her hair than friends, just out of practicality, because they're all going to be so, so busy. The black clothing to copy her mum is cute, but once she gets some more self-confidence in her own skills as a court magician, I think she'll move on from it. And... who knows what direction her relationship with Falin will develop, over the years? I'm rooting for them, anyway.

In all those cases, I think moving outside of the things she's done before, into something really different from the things that are "safe" and expected, will be the most rewarding path for her. Like in the dungeon, things that she would initially reject were actually able to sustain her and broaden her tastes. She loves dressing up, looking after people, and "princely romance". So I say: Butch Marcille! It'll be good for her!!

[kindacreepy-kindaugly]

Low-key depressing how I already know no matter how well behaved I am I'll never get the same kinda Special Treatment™ Doll does

[tyrannuspitch]

how empathy is described and framed is so biased as well lol. like. i have avpd, and part of the long version of the avpd diagnostic criteria is "highly empathetic, BUT with perception of others' emotions skewed towards the negative" - so, you know, arguably pretty shit at empathy, actually, if we don't understand what other people are feeling.

but from personal experience and what i've heard from other people with the disorder, this isn't even necessarily... true? like, people with AvPD have this reputation as ~quiet, sympathetic, non-problem patients~ so of course we ~must~ have high empathy... but our whole fucking thing is avoidance and detachment.

lots of pwAvPD emotionally withdraw and feel they *cannot* connect to others. lots of pwAvPD find they can't make sense of others' emotions among all the anxious *noise* in their head, so they give up even trying. lots of pwAvPD feel like they're a prey animal and every other person in the world is a predator. lots of pwAvPD like... get paranoid, get jealous, hold grudges, and stereotype people to determine who's "safe", and so on. we're not just helpless martyrs. we have "ugly" symptoms sometimes too.

i think, most of the time, what gets called "high empathy" in pwAvPD is just high sensitivity - to guilt, to shame, to fear, to despair. but because we're apparently "the good ones", it's "empathy" when we feel it, and "highly strung", "fragile ego", "mood swings", and so on when people with "problem disorders" experience the exact same thing.

and tbqh, what this probably comes down to is that our symptoms generally suppress our ability to express rage, while these so-called problem patients' symptoms enable them to. so psychiatry takes it upon itself to suppress it for them.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for faking orgasms?

This might come as a shock given the title but I'm a man, and so is my boyfriend. However I'm much more sexually experienced than him, as in I'm his first sexual/romantic partner meanwhile I've had sex with at least 30 different guys before. I also generally have a more consistent libido, and I'm desensitized down there to a degree, AND I also often get stuck in my own head due to certain neuroses and ocd and whatnot -- all this to say, it's REALLY hard for me to reach a real climax with another person.

And my bf is aware of this. I've told him many times. I've also reassured him (truthfully!) that partially due to this, an orgasm is not the end-all-be-all of sex for me, and that I can absolutely enjoy myself without "finishing." And if he still feels bad, I will not only take a backrub or something essentially as a replacement for him making me finish, but I in fact often prefer it. I promise I've tried everything; this is not a communication issue.

But. Basically no matter what I say or do, he just doesn't believe me. Or he isn't capable of accepting it, idk. He's insistent that it makes him bad at sex and it means he couldn't please me if I don't come... all the while that he almost never actually takes initiative to do any dominant role? So tbqh he's not totally wrong about that self-assessment but it's still ridiculous bc he doesn't even know WHY? Anyway.

Telling him things that he could do to ever make it better doesn't really work either, because the moment I "criticize" him during sex, even if it's just telling him to move his legs into a different position, he often takes it incredibly personally and just stops wanting to have sex altogether bc he's suddenly not in the mood. And if it's after he's finished, he's basically conked out. He never has any energy by that point except to more or less demand that I come, as nowadays he counts my capacity to jerk off afterwards as something evident of his "ability to please me," I guess. By that point, I'm still just jerking off by myself while he plays on his phone or falls asleep next to me, which I hate and find a huge turn-off and have expressed multiple times that it's at least "weird" and "funny" to do so. But he keeps doing it.

Inb4 the most likely majority response to a lot of this: I'm aware that we're clearly not that sexually compatible. But leaving the relationship is not an option even if I wanted to. The routine of us having sex is, regardless of exactly how satisfying it is, essentially necessary to our mutual happiness.

Now that that's out of the way, here's the real meat: I've decided relatively recently to just... pretend to come. I can often get to a sort of mini-orgasm long before a real one is on the horizon and I just kind of exaggerate that. It really turns him on, and it gets rid of any of the tension that would otherwise be there once we're both done, and I'm able to either fall asleep or otherwise move on in peace.

Now obviously, this is lying, and I don't like having to lie, and also if he ever realizes that I fake them then he's gonna feel even worse than when I outright say I didn't come. But clearly it's also causing strife to be truthful, and it's also not that hard to fake it. Whatever I communicate to him is at best forgotten - and it most likely *is* genuine, innocent forgetfulness bc he has severe ADHD. I'd likely never know if it happened that he is straight up ignoring what I say. In any case it's to a level that it just seems like my only solution is to fake it.

Does he have a right to know if I haven't actually come? AITA?

What are these acronyms?

[nat-20s]

please elaborate on how Donna fundamentally changed the structure and DNA of doctor who. take no prisoners. i have to know more. I think i know how you feel but i can't articulate it. Donna was the first companion to actually have significant plot relevance. Like, series 4 depended on Donna's decisions to function as a story and no other series until series 4 relied on its companion the way Doctor Who relied on Donna (Amy Clara and Bill excluded, but you could argue that's because of Donna setting the foundation). Or how the entire bit with Clara is such a cruelly ironic thing to put 12 through because it mirrors Donna's fate so well. but there's more. Donna was a massive catalyst for so much of post-series 4 doctor who but i can't articulate it. Your point about Catherine and David hitting it off as actors with unparalleled chemistry has so much to do with it too, i think.

i know there's more.

ok ok ok so this isn't going to be even slightly cohesive because like. I don't think she changed the series in a way that I can point to and be like "Nuwho used to be this and then Donna happened and then immediately Nuwho became That" but I think she did massively influence some of the directions the show went for overall.

I mean the most obvious way she changed the show is that she changed The Doctor, so like yeah if you change the central character of the show. In a lot of ways, Nuwho is very much a war story. And I think in the first three seasons The Doctor feels more like a General- a leader of the army, the one who knows what's happening and where to direct people and how to shift the tides. He is the Central Figure of the war.

And then Donna's season happens, and to me he starts feeling like more like a foot solider, or perhaps more accurately, a floor nurse. Donna very much grounds him in the people around him, he feels less, well, alien. The message that he is not there to always be the Grand Savior of the Universe or the Grand Warrior of Time, but to be on the ground and help the people that he can. And this very much carries through the rest of Doctor Who despite Moffat's best efforts, I mean yeah 12 literally says as much in the show. So there's a big ol change.

I think the second way she changed the show was due to a:Catherine Tate's comedic background and b: Catherine and David being those two friends that cannot stop being Sillay around each other is that I think she did allow the show to take on more comedic elements/ allow The Doctor and The Companion to have more FUN on screen. That's not to say that Rose and Martha never have fun with The Doctor because that's straight up not true but I think Ten and Donna have probably the highest fun per adventure ratio of any pairing and it doesn't ever feel like. Oh why are they having this fun on screen yknow?

The third big shift that I think Donna had on the series as a whole was the role of the Companion(s). Again not that Martha or Rose had ever been like. Inferior to The Doctor but to me Donna is the companion that feels the most narratively equivalent to him. The companion has always served as audience surrogate: the one to be like hey. what?? and get things explained to them for the benefit of the viewers at home. And this also happens with Donna but sometimes she's also the one doing the explaining to The Doctor! I mean, it's the soulmatism of it all, right? While The Doctor is always The Doctor as a character, Ten and Donna swap back and forth in who is taking on The Companion and The Doctor as functional roles in the story. And this was before she Literally Became The DoctorDonna like long before that happens the best way I can describe it is like. There's a podcast i've been listening to where they talk about the most "doctory" moment of the episode and tbqh a lot of times it's like "well really the most doctory moment was done by Donna" (i think her realizing that by the ood having their brains in their hands they HAVE to trust everyone is like the Peak example of this). We see this sort of thing carry on (Especially with Clara, but fascinatingly enough it's in like. a negative way bc she's sooo like the doctor but in a way that makes both of them worse) through the series in a way I don't think would've happened if Donna's season wasn't there.

And then lastly I mean she came, she served for three episodes, and she changed the structure of the show AGAIN by doing something that no companion has ever been able to do: she was able to pull The Doctor OUT of the narrative. The Doctor is like SUCH a doomed by the narrative (and by the way the show works in general) character and she said Nope! I am going to kick the narrative in the shins until I save my best friend actually <3. And then she did!!!! Holy fuck!! I know these specials JUST came out so we haven't seen all the ripple effects yet but there's no WAY that won't result in a fundamental shift of Doctor Who overall. Like 15's personality feels so unburdened in a way that has never been possible before this point. I'm so excited.

Anyway TLDR Donna changed the show by being a friend and an equal in a way that hadn't really been part of the Companion role before and she fucks so so severely <3

[gaypolls]

Submission Guidelines/Disclaimers

First, things to keep in mind when you submit:

there is a limit of 12 answers for polls, and on this blog one of those answers will always be 'show results,' to allow for people that the poll doesn't apply to to see without skewing data. so in reality you have a maximum of 11.

there's also an 80-character limit on the options

SO, if you go over those limits, know that I will take it into my own hands to decide which answers to omit and/or how to re-word it to fit the limit.

even otherwise, expect that the wording of your submission may be slightly altered in order to be more inclusive (when it doesn't affect the data), or because i think you missed an option that you probably meant to include, or just to make it sound less clunky. if you have an issue with any changes upon posting, i'm happy to hear you out.

currently there is no wait time, but if things go as expected, soon enough it'll likely be about a 4-5 day wait between the time you submit and the time it gets posted

if your poll is addressing a very small group, don't be surprised or angry when the 'see results' poll is the biggest. that needs to be there to keep data from being skewed by anyone's curiosity.

Base Guidelines For Submitting:

poll must be related to gayness in some way. it doesn't have to be directed exclusively at gay people, but it should center same-gender attraction. if you have a poll in mind to direct specifically at bisexuals, there's @mspecpolls

it CAN be directed at a specific type of gay person, such as gay men, lesbians, specifically trans lesbians, nonbinary mlm, gay poc, disabled wlw, etc - literally you can address any specific gay group you want, just make sure to say so.

...this DOES include 'cis gay men/women/people' but tbqh you're gonna have to provide a good reason to be excluding trans people from the poll

in general if you want to explicitly exclude people who have a nonconforming relationship with gender, you better explicitly say so AND have a good reason. otherwise it'll be assumed that all sorts are included and if your options don't reflect that, i will change them or reject the poll.

it CAN relate to sex (i expect many polls here will be), just try to be tasteful about it. like, as long as it sounds like you're trying to collect data rather than arouse people lol

What would make me NOT post a submission:

as mentioned previously, if it's excluding subgroups without a good reason

if it's an opinion poll about the validity of any particular type of gay person. "validity" is a moot topic and i'm not going to encourage it, and in any case i'd like the focus of this blog to be about recording experiences (real, undeniable, forever in stone) rather than opinions (always changing, meaningless)

if it's something like "gay people: do you like pineapple on pizza?" or some other question that doesn't actually have anything to do with being gay. if you wanna send something like this, make your case for why it's relevant that the poll is directed at gay people.

if it's some other obviously offensive shit, obviously. no racism or whatnot here.

FAQ:

Who counts as gay?

Like most of these guidelines I'll continue the same sentiment from the trans polls blog: We self-define here. But I will stress answering in good faith and understanding what any given poll is asking and what definitions they're using. If you're, say, nonbinary and bisexual in a way that makes all your attraction gay, or you're gay in a very specific way (like nb4nb), or you call yourself gay bc you're mostly gay but you're technically bisexual, or you're definitely homosexual but don't actually like to call yourself gay, etc, it'll likely just depend on the poll. It's totally up to you to decide if it includes you or not, or you can always ask if you want to be sure.

Though if it's not explicitly stated that the poll excludes transmasc lesbians or transfem gays, or other trans/nonbinary gay people, you should still for sure assume it includes you.

Why isn't there an option for X?/You missed an option.

Sometimes I may genuinely miss an option, but 9 times out of 10 the lack of the option is either due to the poll limits on tumblr, or because it goes against the point of the poll. For example, if the question begins with "If you're in a relationship," then "i'm not in a relationship" isn't going to be an option. If the prerequisite of the poll doesn't apply to you, then what you click is "see results." If it's something a little less concrete, polls will usually include some kind of "other" option anyway.

Can you get rid of the 'see results' button? Or can you not include it on this particular poll? I only want X people to respond. This poll is ONLY for X people.

If a poll is on this blog, it's for everyone, questioning and simply curious people included. It's also not going to stop curious people from clicking if there's no 'see results' button. It ensures that the data doesn't get skewed, and gathering data is what polls are for. It doesn't hurt you to see a big see results bar. The data is still there. If the bar does wind up obscuring more significant data, that means the poll was addressing too small of a group to begin with. And that's NOT the end of the world. This blog is far from the only place where you can get information about other gay people's experiences.

[decepti-thots]

(I’ll preface by saying: huge JP fan who has no problem with people not liking it)

Anyways I’m actually super curious…

How are most JP fics “boring”? 🤔 I’ve always found their dynamic to be more entertaining than most, given the dichotomy of their characters.

So I’m curious as to how you’ve wound up at “boring” of all the possible reasons to dislike it. 🤣

I'm going to be a bit blunter here than I usually would be on the topic, as I was directly asked. So I'll cut the uh… negativity? I guess? For those who prefer not to see folks talk shit about a ship they like, lol.

First and foremost Jazz/Prowl is basically just… essentially made up and purely based on fanon inventions/additions, and made up fanon stuff is usually not of real interest to me without a very strong hook somewhere in the actual canon material. It is 99% fanon by volume that draws on little to no canon material of any kind but just... years of fanon, reproducing itself and mutating almost like a fanfic game of telephone, all developed in fandom echo chambers. Which renders the characters in the vast majority of fic a) largely unrelated to any canon material I like in a meaningful sense and b) tbqh, the kind of generic stuff found in a lot of typical, large dudeslash fandoms where the characters are… they're Dudeslash Fandom Archetypes with a gloss of paint on top, you know? People come in, look for which character in a fandom fits their favourite m/m trope the most, and then squish the character down to fit into that pre-existing archetype.

And the thing is, J/P has historically made a certain kind of sense for this, because the appeal was basically that… they didn't HAVE that much canon material? In the Marvel G1 comics, they have a little more specific characterisation and canon, but the G1 cartoon is not exactly a character exploration piece ANYWAY, and for Prowl especially he is a blank slate you can functionally project an OC onto. Which like, that's fine! That makes a lot of sense even if it's not what usually draws me into something.

My issue has become that if I read one more G1-fanon-soup fest mistagged "IDW" I'm gonna scream. I like IDW Prowl (and IDW Jazz too!) for the fact that these characters have specific, strongly delineated canon personalities, arcs and dynamics, and both of these characters- Prowl especially, but both of them!- have like. Things about them which are true, and which J/P fic not only tends to ignore but actively treats in a loooot of cases as somehow Inferior To Our Fanon and something to be "fixed" with idk, the power of Extremely Generic Dudeslash Tropes. I've been in many a fandom with Migratory Dudeslash Fandoms writing fic. J/P is extremely rote to me as a result, if nothing else.

It warrants mentioning that J/P fandom is where one does find a lot of examples of just undeniably racist treatment of Jazz in fic, both the truly inexcusable phonetic accent bullshit and also a lot of bad decisions around tropes. I don't think this is a function of the ship, per se, but that its specific persistence in J/P fandom (bc trust me: this has been a point of criticism for A Long Fucking Time) is in part due to it having this long entrenched fanon-to-fanon game of telephone going on? It would be better to talk about the fandom's issues there outside ship talk so I'll leave it at that, but I can't deny it has not… helped my feelings. TBH. And I know that's where a lot of the resentment you will find in the fandom obviously stems from.

IDK. It's just. It's usually fanfic of itself, you know? J/P largely feels to me, in most cases, like fanfic of fanfic of fanfic, and I come to TF fandom for fanfic of a canon. So. Yeah. Not a fan. At all.

[optiwashere]

No sleep gang!

BTS Fic ask! Was gonna do Nightsongs, but since it's still ongoing, here's a throwback.

Like I Am Safe Again: 7, 10, 26

Oooooh, now that's a fun one! It's hard for me to tell if that fic is just unpopular with people, or if folks don't have much to say about it (tbh both are reasonable) but it's one of my favorite things I've written for the fandom lol. Thanks for asking about this one 💜

7. What inspired the idea for the plot?

Other than the fact that expanding on "memory" for Shadowheart is one of my favorite things to do, it was a couple things! I was finishing up a reread of the Realm of Elderlings series, and I've always resonated with "outsider" characters in pretty much everything I read/watch/play. People that are, through their own actions or happenstance, sidelined in their own lives is very fascinating to me. That feeling of never being able to actually reach out and interact with others in a meaningful way because of what they've done, said, or because of who they think themselves to be is creative catnip for me. My love of that series and those types of (frustrating) character moments influenced the way Shadowheart in that fic continually tries to manage everything herself without once relying on people that would immediately help her. At least, at first. Shadowheart has a lot of (mostly appearance-based tbqh) benefits other outsider-types don't get, but trying to focus on the aspects of her that disconnect her from the others at that point in the timeline (namely her early secrecy, her mid-game zealotry/hesitancy) intersected really well with my canon divergence from the first part of that series. There are clear themes of repression, self-ostracization, and insecurity within her storyline that I just love. I was also obsessed with exploring her character that way after I had the thought: "how does someone who already deals with memory issues handle dissociation?"

10. Share a screenshot of the original outline.

OK, so my outlining method for that fic was kinda unhinged. I think I had an outline at one point, but it was probably a bullet point system. At some point, I either deleted it or it was never actually written down? Either way, I know the original version was actually a long one-shot like "It Is the Wound She Gave Me" but it kept getting longer and longer. Then it became three chapters/three mornings. Then I kept adding moments to expand and expand, and eventually I just had to admit that it should probably be a short multichapter lol. Some bits I know that I changed: Chapter one used to be just the "prayer at the tree" scene, Chapter two didn't have the fireside chat/episode until I was nearly done writing the whole thing, and the Epilogue didn't exist until I realized ending on Chapter four left things a little too bleakly open for me.

26. Wild Card! I'll tell you a fun fact about this fic!

Despite being named after a Cure song, I never once listened to The Cure while writing it.

[sylvaridreams]

I cut out some off topic chatter and fixed a couple typos but otherwise this is copy paste from discord, followed by some more from just me. Diving into Alba, his status as a leader and symbolic figure, his relationships with friends and lovers, and his relationship with himself.

(Long post ahead.)

Dama: tbqh i'm wondering how much longer his relationship with canach can or will last.... they love each other but the conditions keep getting more and more strained it feels like. now alba's vanished again…

Sage: I was wondering that too actually like. Wondering how strong it can last, esp since things were pretty separate for eod and haven't exactly gotten better since

Dama: canach maybe tries to find him during this... like alba was notably in the grove, giving interviews, canach tries to get ahold of him (maybe they had plans for later) and alba just never responds or shows up. stands him up and canach's like ok. well i can wait, he's probably having one of his moments.

Dama: and then weeks pass and nothing.

Dama: and then months. at some point he has to assume alba's either dead or just moved on.

Dama: letters not only being ignored but coming back return to sender. 🧍‍♂️ like "unable to locate" kind of shit

Dama: it's not like anyone else in what was once dragon's watch knows where he is either

Sage: The only one you'd be able to rely on to track him down is honestly MEISI. And..well.

Dama: my god Ivan is literally the last person who talked to him isn't he (editing note: I don't think Alba even speaks when Zojja uses his comms to call Taimi later.)

Dama: and then these demons start cropping up all over the world and its like. god. things look grim enough with just that but it appears the commander has either died or just left. and he's known for just leaving, and he's also known for doing things to put himself in danger, so. after some time canach probably just... finishes the grieving he's already started years ago, and tries to move on

Dama: i think it would hit alba hard if canach just moved on. 🧍‍♂️ a real blow to the chest.

Sage: The commnach economy is in fucking shambles

Dama: because in HIS head they're a sure thing possibly forever.... yeah i was away for a few months doing wizard shit why would you just assume i was dead?

Dama: "you didn't write me" well i. i. didn't think it would reach you.

Sage: And away for a year before that because of the tiger. And -

Dama: at some point i think canach wouldn't be willing to take him back either. at least not right now. work on yourself a bit man.

Dama: take care of yourself so you don't hurt the next person to fall in love with you.

Sage: Albas fucked up and struggling but canach is allowed to be and feel hurt because good lord.

Dama: canach has been a good sport about it for a long time but he made it clear when they started dating-dating and not just fooling around that he had his own issues and that he had boundaries and limits to what he could help with or tolerate or be around. and alba has pushed those limits almost non stop

Sage: ALBA YOU IDIOT YOU LOST THE 10/10 CACTUS

Dama: (in game screenshot reading…

Alba Moonseeker: Does what make me angry?

Peitha: The fact that everyone doesn't immediately bathe in your excellence.)

Sage: Hope how casual and informally indifferent meisi is with him now on average helps.

Dama: WHY ARENT YOU BATHING IN HIS EXCELLENCE MEISI :cry2:

Sage: Hes been there for it all it wasn't excellent

Sage: Meisis been there for it all from.a little sapling in the vigil to dragons dying to morning a charred corpse on a plateau. He respects alba, he loves alba, he had a crush on him a fuckin millenia ago. But hes never, will never deify alba.

Sage: Even among dragons watch hes a rare gaze that Just Sees a Person.

Dama: a person who can be incredibly shitty as a friend sometimes, lbr

Dama: his "I'd save the village" ass. Liar.

Sage: Probably doesn't even know one of meisis partners might die /s

Sage: Again. Meisi stays. Its more of a headache and a chore than a friendship the last few years but. If his presence does anything to help stabilize alba it is likely worth it. Even for what he has/hasn't done meisi doesn't think he deserves cutoff isolation

Dama: no but fr does he ask meisi how things are, does he take an interest in these things, or is it all take and very little give from him much of the time? you have to tell alba something's up for him to inquire about it, he won't go seeking you out to check on you.... case in point, zojja post-maguuma. his little "i would have loved to have seen her" was such bullshit to me. what stopped you buddy? never once did he Try to go find her. does he know one of meisi's partners might die... probably not, or he doesn't know the full extent of it. i don't think it's a lack of interest in people or anything, i don't think it's fully intentional, but i do think he's kind of selfish and self centered and zoomed in on his own stuff. being a hero. being THE hero.

Dama: "I'd save the village." but you don't know who any of the villagers are beyond the surface level "villager" title. you don't ask how they are. and meanwhile the dragon's champion is razing the next village over because you had to pat yourself on the back again.

Sage: Hes so focused on saving the world hes lost connection with it

Dama: i think at his base alba is a lonely person because he does things to keep himself alone. and that's why he's perfect for heroics and perfect for the pedestals that he gets lifted up onto. the commander, the hero of tyria and amnoon and cantha, the wayfinder. pinning titles to his lapels like war trophies. meanwhile he doesn't know the most base things about his closest friends. doesnt know Zeeki's dying, doesn't know almost anything about Bourbon's backstory, he only knows so much about Auruim because Auru is loud and pushy about rubbing alba's face in things. Thiiyf had to walk away from the Pact, she could have stayed by his side into Lws3 and beyond but she couldn't stand to be involved with him any longer knowing how limited her time was.

Dama: he sees his friends as not caring about him when the world doesn't need saving, well? do you care about your friends? ever?

Dama: dragon's watch is basically defunct with soo won gone -- yeah and i bet these people still make an effort to keep in contact and share things from their lives while he runs around getting hurt and being miserable and bemoaning that no one needs the commander. i love him so much god

Dama: bottom line I think that the guild and others "only reach out when the world needs saving" because. alba doesn't care unless the world needs saving.

Dama: it would be such a funny (not funny) gut punch for him to see how much everyone has moved forward in their personal lives and still stayed connected while he was. doing what? whatever. like he felt like such an outsider with the wizards and all, these guys all know each other and he's just some random from Tyria... but he doesn't know his friends either.

Dama: he's a stranger to them too.

Dama: I think he went to Rama's party primarily because he was desperate and hoping that someone would drop a big adventure on the table for the guild to go conquer as a team.

Dama: i would find it so funny if the next time he sees someone from dragon's watch they showed up with a kid and he's like haha whose baby is this then and they're like ??? commander this is my daughter....? i wrote you a letter when she was born, didn't you... read it? and everyone's quietly uncomfortable because of COURSE he didn't.

Sage: Its sad to think that *meisi* is probably more knowledgeable about what deidre means to Auru god d a m n.

Dama: of course he is, Meisi takes an actual interest in Auruim.

Alba is overall a man desperate for approval and love. He's a bad friend and lover because he only cares when the stakes are world ending, and people don't seem to care about or like him much because Alba doesn't care about or like himself. He's unable to wrap his head around a trolley problem like "would you go kill the dragon's champion on the mountain, or would you save a village from bandits" as a philosophical question because to him the "correct" answer boils down to "which one is going to make people love me?" He wouldn't save the farm, not as long as there was anything bigger and more important to do.

Being elevated to the pedestal of Commander as a sapling and then left up there for over a decade has made him incapable of seeing eye to eye with other people, even friends and lovers, not with his massive ego in the way. In a way I think that 13 years of nonstop warfare has just traumatized him to where he can't see himself as a singular small person, he has to be the face of an army, the face of heroism, and it doesn't help that he’s always going to be the Commander, hero of amnoon, dragon's champion, now wayfinder. Not a person, just a symbol.

SotO has been fascinating because not only is he treated as an outsider to a group of people so close to one another that they're family–outside looking in at healthy, real interpersonal relationships– he's also treated with revile and hatred by people within the fractals that he's "failed" – thinking specifically about the Zaishen and refugees in the Elona fractal. Their version of him failed to do the good deed, kill the big bad, win the wars, and so they hate him, and it's been a LONG time since random innocents have treated Alba that way. It took me back to the start of Lws4 when people were running from the branded attacks on Amnoon, shouting at him "You said this wouldn't happen, you said we were safe, you said you'd protect us and it was over," etc. Forcibly rubbing his face in (a version of) his failures and telling him YOU fucked this one up. The first time in a long time that people who "should" revere his symbol instead spit on it and deny him the love he needs. Maybe that *is* what he needs. To be kicked down and told he's done wrong and he can't fix it. Maybe he needs more failures under his belt, failed attempts, failed relationships, so he can finally value what he has.

I don't know right now if he and Canach will try again later on; currently the plan is that in a few months, Alba will make some sort of contact with his old guild and be told, essentially "we assumed you were dead or had left us, either way we've moved on in these ways and suggest you do too," and Canach will inform him that the same is true for their relationship; i.e. you either died or disappeared again, and I can't keep doing this either way. I've mourned you enough already. Go deal with your problems and learn to treat people who care about you like people who you care about rather than props and side characters to your A-plot.

I could definitely say more on that but I'll wait until I get some lore figured out and posted for Auru and Bourbon for SotO. :)

[freckliedan]

hi jam! recently i've taken two different autism questionnaires on two different occasions and i've scored really high on both ... but i know that i used to be super talkative when i was little ... i'm not going to get diagnosed bc it'll stay with me, but how do i Know? and what do i do with that?

hey anon! sorry for my delay on this reply, i'm at my new main @unloneliest most of the time & don't have the most spoons as of late.

i'm also self diagnosed without any desire for a professional diagnosis! what to do with it? that's up to you.

personally, just being able to understand myself as autistic, to name the things i struggle with and describe the functioning of my brain—that has made a huge difference in my life. there's a lot of parts of who i am that felt like unique failings: things Everybody could do that I just Couldn't when i tried to follow mainstream methods. when i was focused on societal metrics of success, i was doomed to failure.

i'm happier and more confident and comfortable, now that i know i'm autistic. i've given myself permission to figure out what i actually want in life, and to not expect myself to get there by the same means someone who's neuroconforming can. (i can give examples on this if anyone's interested but don't want to be too longwinded!)

how to Know For Sure you're autistic when self diagnosed? peer review. <-silly way of saying connect with community. a LOT of autistic folks are self diagnosed—diagnosis is both inaccessable to many and is something many others do not want.

i used to always preface with "probably autistic, self diagnosed" for a very long time. i also used to run multiple groups for queer youth at a nonprofit in my town. i stopped with the prefacing when a neurodivergent teen heard me doing it yet again—probably about dan and phil being a special interest tbqh—and was like "denney, you don't have to do that. you're autistic".

who needs diagnosis when u have the honesty of a teen?

no but seriously. i figured out i was autistic thanks to @asterlark (then a mutual, now my roommate) posting about autism back in our check please days, and there are a lot of autistic folks / orgs online that were super helpful resources while i was figuring things out for myself:

ASAN, the autistic self advocacy network

AWN, the autistic women and nonbinary network

@drdemonprince 's blog & writing—i've only had a chance to read its essays so far, but am seriously looking forward to reading unmasking autism

& you can find so, so many more folks when you start looking into connecting w the autistic community. if you're interested you can look thru my autism tag on my other main blog, too.

[hoardlikegoldenirises]

in an act of (???) decided to basically redo my scorpion and carnorpion design from march almost entirely. i did copy and paste some of the stuff i had already done but i redrew a lot too so this took a few days...

the new claw design (and the carnorpion helmet) is based HEAVILY off of the Scorpion armor from Superior Spider-Man (which means it was probably designed by Ramos but I donʻt actually know, might have been a different artist)

gonna put a bunch of closeups under the cut lol:

accidentally made him hot (i already thought he was hot). based his face roughly off of Vin Diesel circa the first Fast and Furious movie lol

i sliiiightly changed the design of this helmet on both the back and front. there were aspects of the previous carnorpion helmet i liked more than the previous scorpion helmet so i kind of combined the two.

BEEF

i also added a quick doc ock for comparison:

Ock's neural implants are larger and more experimental than Mac's since he made them in like... 2005 at the latest, probably earlier than that and Mac's are made in 2007 by the Tinkerer using some of Ock's existing research, so basically Phineas refined what Ock had already done.

Mac's are also inductive (i don't... know if that's actually the right way to call it but it's at least similar; wireless energy transmission essentially) and don't require strong contact to transfer and translate nerve signals, whereas Ock's plug directly into his back into the sockets like that.

one of them is gonna have more back problems later in life than the other, that's for sure.

armor front

this part changed a lot compared to the old design but it also took me a lot of fiddling to get it to where i wanted... the whole gamut of inspiration... knightly armor... halo... metroid... in the end i went with the armor bikini, obviously, but there was a version without that.

back also took some fiddling. it's very similar to the old one though. this is basically where the tail attaches (or like, a cover if he's not using it, i guess) This DOES has plugs just because... I felt like it... more secure... etc... the opposite side of the plugs (inside) is smooth discs that take the signal from his back implants (which are exposed by open eyelets on his shirt) and then that signal goes into his tail as well as all along the gold parts of his special undershirt and through his suit to where he needs it—helmet, arms/claws, torso/tail

like so:

probably more padding in there than what i drew but... eh... it's good enough. probably uses some kind of conductive fabric or something.

gave him little thumb holes to keep the sleeves straight though... hehe

and yes i decided (a while ago) that he wears a jock strap with optional cup depending on outfit (probably no cup with the metal bikini but who knows, maybe it would help keep things more secure and protected lol)

here's the tail connected. this was a bitch and a half to get the way i wanted tbqh, especially since he needs to be able to like... bend his back at all... but simplicity definitely is the way to go for this kind of thing... i like what i ended up with a lot.

maybe it's not totally fool proof but i think it looks alright

the knife is only a few inches long but that's still probably enough to stab with.

here's a little closeup of my explorations of the tail. this is based off of photo references which is why it looks the way it does lol, basically looking at things like tension-based pulley systems and animatronics and thinking about how a mechanical tail could work. i think it turned out neat.

(this is not how ock's current tentacles work fyi—ock's current set uses a pneumatic bellows system similar to Festo's bionicmotionrobot, and his previous set i'm not sure; symbiote system was hydraulic and used the symbiote as a lubricant though)

legs are almost exactly the same but i got rid of the lights cause they're just armor and not neurally linked. there's mac's face with the visor up too lol

since i put it way up top i'll put it here again—

claws and gauntlets have been pretty updated. especially the pincers though. you can see below a few pictures down i based it very heavily off of the Superior Spider-Man design. hefty, good shape, etc. i like this 500x more than the pincers i tried to do last time. and i didn't even do any of the hard work xD

here's how his arms fit into the pincers though.

they're pretty hefty.

anyway as for carnorpion

well first here's an alternate version without the thigh highs cause i couldn't choose

it just feels so... naked with the thighs bare... and not even in a slutty way. is very meaty though.

obv i also copy pasted a chunk from the old version on this but i still redrew a lot of it... TBH I'm still not sure I like it XD but it's fine. I like the claws at least. but those are just the Superior claws with teeth. turning into a crab i guess.

This Incident Is Looming btw. Next chapter (ch 4/may) if all goes well 🤘

the scar he will have after carnage is created (not before)

put the left doodle from march on the main armor pic but it would actually apply to carnorpion, not the green armor lol. plan is that i am maybe drawing more from Superior than I originally was gonna and am probably gonna have Doc Ock punch Mac's face jaw off.

AS Doc Ock though. lol.

Did I mention I based this helmet off of Superior Spider-Man's Scorpion? Cause I did. I liked the lenses... and then I was like hmm this might be good for combining organic with armor... so it's very very very similar to his helmet in Superior, but different colors:

honestly I probably should have just lifted the entire helmet wholecloth, it's so organic and weird... (and here you can see the claw inspiration as well) (arguably the torso thing on carnorpion in my drawing are also based on this...) (I know I drew a whole fucking thing but what if carnorpion was just this but red)

anyway i didn't include the uh... coin slot.

(genuinely: what IS that?????)

white base version (might actually prefer this helmet's aesthetic tbh but it's not very organic.)

the idea here is that the carnage symbiote is not (yet) bonding with mac directly but rather through/with his armor, so the Tinkerer makes like, this bonus set of armor that acts as essentially a substrate/base for the symbiote to build off of... which is why it's that weird bluish yellowish white color.

though idk maybe they'll just bond... really it's shrug city rn i'm still figuring so much shit out for this plot lol it continues to escape me

also the knife is probably bigger? idk. i can't eyeball stuff like that very well so i can't tell if it's any bigger lmao.

was also thinking this could be an opportunity for a more portable tail that doesn't require putting on an entire suit of armor (but which comes with all the pieces just in case, probably?) and so i also designed an extremely unreasonable harness to secure it to mac's bod. so of course that means: lots of straps.

slutty slutty straps

the yellow parts are just the induction/conduction stuff... gold discs, gold thread, idk.

hm i should have put some little elastic straps crossing that hole in the center. oh well, not like he'd be walking around in this without a tail strapped to it anyway

i realized in retrospect i didn't include any actual securements/connections ON the spine part underneath this but it's fine just pretend I drew those. I DID add even more straps for this under the pretense that it's being strapped onto the existing straps to keep it from wiggling.

reduce the lights to one on top and one on bottom cause the pieces of the spine are laid out kind of odd so doing lights on every one looks weird cause some are smaller and doing lights only on the one interfacing directly with his back looked weirder because they skip some rows just because of placement. looks fine like this though.

uses the same understuff as the regular suit though (the shirt with the gold bits i put up in the green suit)

all in all i think it's fair to say that mac's shit is way more of a hassle to put on and off than ock's

here's a bonus carnage. i like when carnage looks like this the best. i think the less uptight/the more bonded they get, the closer to this face carnorpion would get, but keeping some of the spikes, claws, and tail...

that's it lol

i still don't know if i like the carnorpion stuff entirely but i like this green armor muuuch more than my previous design from march.

[adracat]

So I have a feeling I'm gonna ramble on here, so tl:dr is basically I love your writing, thanks for sharing. With that out of the way:

I started by reading your G Witch myth analyses here on Tumblr. TBQH a lot of it went over my head, but I enjoyed them all (went through a mythology phase in like elementary school, so it's been a minute, but I still casually enjoy learning about myths). Then I saw you have fics on AO3. And as a millennial on the interwebs I am aware of the site, but as someone generally in the ace sphere of things I haven't actually spent any time over there. Anyway, I found your Law of Causality series and because my Sulemio brainrot is boundless I read As Above So Below. And boy howdy did I enjoy that. Like, read it a few times. The story telling is really good, and I love the little notes you stick on at the ends of the chapters. Now I am not a Prospera fan, so I didn't read Chaos and Night for a while. But eventually I decided I liked your writing enoughto give it a try. What can I say, I truly enjoy the world you concocted and wanted more of it. I'm glad I did, because I think that may be my favorite of the three stories. Still don't like Prospera as a person in general, but you wrote her so well. Like, girl, don't go making those stupid-ass choices. But obviously I see why she did, because her characterization comes through so strong in your stories, so she really had no choice in her decisions (tragically, yes). But, not to state the obvious or anything, Notrette is the one who steals the show. My favorite of your characters. The times where she is so open and honest and vulnerable in sharing her feelings with Prospera kills me every single time. She gets the best lines due to those situations. Like there are at least three times where she bluntly asks Prospera to stay in the garden, and that's not even counting the handful of times she asks for them to be a family. Damn. We all know what's gonna happen, but it doesn't make that knife's edge any less sharp. I have many favorite lines of hers, but up there is when she come back from Delling and tells Prospera she was only able to do it by thinking of her. Man, that whole interaction gets me every time and I gotta take a moment to pause and reflect. Absolutely heart wrenching. Anywho. Their toxic, tragic relationship is just so dynamic. Plus, again, all your mythology easter eggs were delightful. I thoroughly enjoyed looking up the different names and stories as I came upon/recognized them. (I'm actually naming a new character of mine in an upcoming ttrpg I'm joining after one of the gods I learned about and then did a deeper dive into late one night.) I'm sure there was quite a bit that slipped past my notice, which is a testament to your vast knowledge of a wide variety of deities across different cultures. Theophany was like a sweet afterwards/gift when it came out. Loved how it ties in the two stories, and how the two relationships mirror each other. Devastatingly so, and also in a beautiful way. I will never get over Prospera always being so firmly rooted in the past that she kills off so many healing futures she might have had. And how Suletta refuses to do the same, even without knowing her mother's tragedies, and is able to focus more on her present with a certain amount of forethought as well. Ugg, cycles indeed. I have, of course, read your other G Witch fics (the finished ones anyway, will get to the last one when it's completed). Those are great as well, but I mostly wanted to gush about your Law of Causality. I have read each story multiple times now. Just last night I finished reading all of them, in order, in their entirety. I can't get them out of my head (kinda want to go and reread my favorite parts again already) which is what lead me to reaching out to you. I'm not sure if this is poor etiquette or whatever, and I'm not an elegant writer like you, and it's certainly obnoxiously long, but I figured I've gotten so much enjoyment from your writing I ought to let you know. So. Thanks.

This made my day! Thank you so much for the gushing praise. Law of Causality possessed my soul while writing it, and I honestly think it may be the best thing I've written purely on a cohesive and thematic level. I wanted people to dive deep into everything I was doing there and think about why certain references were chosen. I'm looking for a moment to actually do a lengthy write-up on the stuff that may have been too obfuscated lmao. The two pairings are complimentary and contrasting tellings that I loved bringing to life. Prospera I knew would be a hard sell for people, but I'm glad you gave it a chance! Notrette's lines were a treat. (Ngl I reread too for them) I'm glad I wrote her saying the wildest off-the-wall shit to contrast Prospera's self-inflicted misery brainhole. It's incredible to know my work is seen and appreciated <3

[misscrawfords]

Hello, fanfic writer question, please. 1, 2, 9, 13, 40, 44, 58, 91. There were so many good ones! Thank you

I'm sorry for the delay in answering this! It was Easter and then I've been on holiday...

do you know how you want the story to end when you start, or are you just stumbling through the figurative wilderness hoping to find a road?

I never start writing unless I know the ending of the story. Like how the conclusions to essays should reflect the introduction, the ending of a story needs to be in the mind of the author from the beginning. But there might be quite a lot of wilderness in the middle I'm not sure about!

2. talk about a notable time a narrative or character has looked you dead in the eyes and said “fuck your plan, here’s what we’re actually doing.”

Actually, that doesn't really happen to me a lot. Stories unfurl and sometimes develop in cool ways when I think of a new bit of plot or development, but the characters don't really do this... I guess a kind of example was with my teenage HP next generation sequel where after writing it for quite a long time I realised one of the main characters was gay and this made so much sense! It wasn't relevant in any way to the plot but I felt I understood Xanthia so much better and it wasn't something I consciously plotted out.

9 - already answered

13. talk about a writing experience that has pleasantly surprised you.

Back when I wrote Downton fic, my collaboration with Claire (@orangeshipper) was such a lovely experience. We were just so in tune with each other in terms of what we wanted to convey about Matthew and Mary and it helped us both develop our writing skills a lot. And we became proper IRL friends too. I can't really imagine having a writing partner like that again.

40. best piece of feedback you’ve ever gotten.

Ooh, I don't know about anything specific but I always loved the comments that a fellow M/M shipper EOlivet left on my fic. We ended up kind of falling out but I was always sorry about that - she gave the best feedback! And @wah-pah also writes amazing reviews and I always feel incredibly grateful if she reads what I've written.

44. any writing advice you want to share?

Uhhhhh I'm not sure I, a person who hasn't written in ages, can give anyone any advice! But I guess I would say that writing has to be what you want to do and whatever you do is okay. I've wasted my emotions and my energy feeling competitive about my writing which is stupid when writers should support each other, and I've also felt jealous of people who seem able to write all the time on top of other lives or who are able to prioritise it or manage to write 1000 words a day or whatever. We all have different lives. Right now, my life doesn't admit of me pursuing writing seriously. It's the wrong point. I do hope at some point that will change but it's okay that I am prioritising other things at the moment. So I guess my advice would be to take it easy and not beat yourself up if you're not writing as much as you want to or how you want to - and definitely don't compare yourself to others!

58. what is the last thing that a fic made you google when you were writing it?

Golly, no idea. I'm sorry! It's been so long...

91. how has your writing style changed over the years?

Tricky. I'd like to think it's improved but honestly I'm not sure it has. I think I peaked when I was doing my masters degree, now over 10 years ago. I was so immersed in reading and the analysis of fiction I was really conscious of how I was writing. I wrote Consolation Prize and a lot of University Challenge then. I think I've got better at writing stories set in the modern era since then and perhaps developed more of a style. But tbqh I think I was a better writer ten years ago and I find that really depressing and it puts me off writing again. :(

[mikibwrites]

Hi Miki! I've been slowly working my way through your 911 Lone Star fics on ao3 and I noticed that there was a lull in 2022 where you stopped writing for the fandom and then picked it back up again in 2023, which I am very grateful for because I really enjoy your work! What made you start writing again for Lone Star??

Hi hi I know this is probably so so long ago that you sent this bb but I'm finally on a laptop so I'ma finally answer it :D

tbqh, I went thru a period (or two or three) of extreme depression over the past few years. I have always had clinical depression but these past few years I got really bad at managing it compared to before.

Naturally, the first things to suffer are the things I do for ME. Things I enjoy and do for fun bc I felt like I didn't deserve happiness. So, writing fell off a lot. I did post a few things over the years as you saw, but it took so much strength to actually finish things and post them up for people to judge (way more than it used to when I was much younger) so they were fewer and far between :(

I'm working my way out of my slump slowly but surely. There are WIPs I've had for YEARS that I'm still clunking away on (TrueBlood Tarlos, Will and Wildflowers sequel, etc.) that are still there, as well as things for other fandoms as well. I've been writing bits and pieces of about 6 different firstprince fics since I first finished the book back in 2020 but I didn't have any energy to participate in a new fandom in any real capacity. TBH what's given me some spoons to work on finishing those is the super duper overlap between the Tarlos and firstprince fandoms after the movie came out, and I'm so so grateful :)

So, tl;dr, I was depressed and didn't feel like I had anything to offer. And that's no one's fault! I also am definitely not taking this ask as like a demand or anything (which I've had problems with in past fandoms that made me stop writing) so please don't worry! I feel comfortable talking about my struggles now so thank you for asking this and giving me space to talk about it :) Also, thank you for enjoying my writing you have no idea how much it means to me that even one person gives me that kind of encouragement <3