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choccy-zefirka · 6 months

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Six of Swords

Hello, I was possessed to write some V/Takemura this afternoon! Note that I am playing the game for the first time, mostly blind, so the fic is based on the events that have happened to my V so far (she just met Panam and is in the middle of investigating Evelyn's employers), and was an outpouring of my love for the ship that I had to get out of my system before I properly finished the game. Hence, it may not be quite accurate/in-character!

I also planned to continue the story further, to the point where V and Takemura have their adult choom-choom time, and then their pillow talk involves 1. The talents they would have pursued in another, more peaceful life (cooking for Takemura and art for V); and 2. What Anders Hellman revealed to V regarding her condition. However, given that I have immersed myself in pretty harrowing irl news tonight, that extinguished my inspiration spark for the time being, so I kindly ask you to enjoy the story for what it is!

As usual, my writing contains certain undesirable traits (repetitions, tangents, purple prose etc.) but I had fun with it, and so might you!

Also, this is the V in this story! Idc what CD Projekt says, her full name is Vita XD She belongs to the same character archetype as Una Cadash, Naali Adaar and Cinder the Tav.

"Greetings, V. I do not intend to offend, but it appears that you are forming a behavioral pattern."

The dulcet robotic voice — so familiar — sends ripples across the sea of hissing, crackling, acidic turquoise stripes and squares that have been biting at V's eyes, until she felt like her burning, veins eyeballs were dripping blood.

She blinks, once, twice. The blood turns out to have been tears. Just tears. Once a beast she thought she'd conquered triumphantly at the age of twelve; and now, a more annoying recurring guest than a celebrity on Stan's show.

She wipes them off, in a swift, almost violent motion. Gotta destroy those fuckers.

The ringing in her ears subsides, and the floating turquoise shapes shift and condense into a face. A very distinct, plasticky white face, speaking to her from an overhanging monitor. Her tear-damp fingers twitch, and she spreads them out, still half-blind, feeling the creaky leather. She is on the back seat of a taxi. The taxi, she should say.

"Hey, Del..." she croaks weakly. "How... How did you get here?"

Seriously, though. How?

Her thoughts and memories set in like a broken nose. The last thing she can recollect is the muted orange blur of the desert highway, beyond the Sunset Motel, and a biting-sharp stench as she slumped over the upper-floor railing, heaving her guts out.

"Mr. Takemura hailed me with instructions to take you home," Delamain explains, courteous as ever. "I made certain to send out a reliable cab, whose AI is completely in line with the Delamain Corporation standards."

Through the last dregs of her wooziness, V cannot help but snort (a mistake, as it makes her inhale the lingering aftertaste of her own vomit). Yeah, reliable cab. Unlike those rogue ones. Ugh, she still has to finish chasing them down.

"You were in poor condition — though thankfully, not as poor as when I previously did this for you. Still, this was already happened twice. Hence my remark about the pattern."

"Mhm. If you had an eddie for each time, you'd have two eddies, which is not much, yada yada..."

V sighs.

"Man. Sorry, Del, I... I had a shitty couple of days."

The words scarcely leave her flaky, terribly dry lips — which she just barely saved from splitting into bloody cracks by taking a huge swig from a branded water bottle, graciously provided in the cup holder by her seat — when all of these days' shittiness hits her. At once. Hard, fast. Like crashing your motorbike into a septic tank.

She's seen so much. Way too much for one lifetime,even if hers is supposed to be jam packed into a few weeks.

The dark green mire of the snuff film brain dances, contrasted against the explosion of the searing thermal orange — that fucking ripperdoc chair where some unlucky gonk was melted into a sticky, none-beef-all-soot carcass, for sickos to get off to his final agony.

Evelyn's limp body against her chest, so small, so bare, all that glitz and sass and mystique gone, like she was a little girl V was tucking lovingly into bed. And dark, dark smears everywhere: blood in the bath, smudged makeup on Judy's ashen, hardened face.

Then, the desert, just today. Blood-red through the lens of a drone, no signs of life among the dust and brittle grass. Just the scattered bodies of the nomads — Panam's people, good people, who had nothing to do with this mess, who only wanted to help, to rescue survivors from a downed AMV. The AMV *she* was hunting; the AMV *she* roped Panam into helping her with.

V presses her hand against her eyes. Johnny is quiet for now; she must have taken the Omega blockers back there, at the motel, without knowing. One small blessing, at least. His voice chiming in with her own is the last thing she needs right now.

Shit, shit, shit! She's supposed to be better than this. She was always the tough, competent one. The one to pull her chooms back from the brink, whether it's a younger street kid, years ago, wanting to swim in a canal supposedly infested with brain-eating amoeba (so this is what it feels like), or Judy staring into nothing, with a cigarette weeping ash in her shaking hand, or Panam clutching her wound, screaming the name of the man who offered her to run away together. She — V — was supposed to hold them, to tell them it's gonna be okay. We did preem, fellas, we lived to see another sunrise. Look sharp, look ahead, look at V.

...Who would look at her now and be inspired to push on?

When she lifts her hand again, her face is wet. A-fucking-gain.

And deep inside her — a quivering cable line pulled taut from her gut to the back of her throat — there is a strong, overpowering longing for... For something terribly stupid. And right now, with her legs still numb and sick still drying up on the front of her shirt, she is too weak to stop and make sense of it, much less resist. So she just goes with it, and says what it wants her to say.

"Del... Can you call Takemura for me?"

Delamain obliges, blue lips sculpted into an impeccably professional smile. The glowing white monitor turns bright orange, and another face emerges from the static. Making the sensation within V cut into her insides even deeper.

"V! I was just finished with Hellman."

V exhales a short laugh. She is still drenched in all that metaphorical shit, but there is no better distraction from it than her favorite pastime. Testing the limits of this old man's stoicism.

"Did not kill him, did you? Or is he still walking around like in those ancient samurai movies — you know, where a guy slices another guy up and he feels just fine, and then suddenly falls apart into neat chunks of meat?"

Takemura holds her gaze, very unimpressed. But she has come to recognize that little tug at the corners of his mouth. She won't go as far as to say that this is also his favorite pastime... But he is not *not* enjoying this.

"You certainly flatter my technique, but... No. Hellman is still alive. I simply obtained all the information I needed from him."

He pauses, and suddenly, his face softens even further. By about 0.01℅, but still.

"I am glad you are awake, V. I heard you screaming in pain on the balcony of that so-called... motel," his lips curl, and he spits the word out like moldy food. "But I could not attend to you for long. You understand."

"The interrogation, yeah."

The conversation lulls, and in the silence, the longing takes over once more.

"Listen, Goro..."

She catches a moment to savor the feel of his first name in her mouth. Since she's started doing stupid things, might as well go all in.

"Can we meet? I'll ask Del here to redirect the car to the marina. It should be deserted at this time of night; I wanna talk in person."

Takemura nods. Somehow, his lack of hesitation sends heat rushing up her windpipe.

"Once, I would have wondered if you were going to waste my time, but now I know better. No meeting with you is ever a waste of time, V."

"Even if we are just eating horrible street food?"

She can swear she's never seen the corners of his lips tilt up this much.

"Even then. Is that why you wish to seek me out on the marina?"

"No, not exactly..." for a fraction of a second, V feels rather sheepish, sobering up from the longing. But Takemura himself does not allow her to backpedal.

"Very well. I will see you there," he says — and disconnects.

By the time Delamain glides onto the marina — smooth as a drifting cloud compared to the mad race across unpaved rocky hillocks and through dingy Raffer tunnels with Panam — it starts to rain. Or, well, drizzle. The wet mist hangs in the air, scented with something fresh for once, and the city lights color it with a peculiar mix of emerald and purple. The palm trees sway quietly, slender silhouettes against the almost trippy watercolor swirls. Deep down, at the same hidden core of her heart that's being pierced by her stupid longing, V wishes she had her drawing tablet with her.

Useless gonk, that. Such a pointless thing to have bought with the eddies from one of her very first gigs. Only really good for designing bike decals for your chooms, and even those would probably have come off just fine if you'd asked one of Del's artist cousins to generate them for you. But sometimes, V cannot help but notice how blue the sky looks when the smog clears, or how vivid orange the rocks by the dam are when the sun hits them, or right now, how those palms look.

And hey, some drawing tutorials on the net are free, and you can't spend every single evening between heists knocking down shots or diddling joy toys. Sometimes you just wanna... meditate.

Jackie had his dumbbells, Misty has her crystals and shit, and V has her silly little tablet. Not enough to turn her into anything more than a Heywood thug, not enough to make her stand out here or in Atlanta... But just right to capture the little splashes of color she spots here and there, so that they leave her head and stop fucking bothering her.

"V. You have no umbrella."

She's been so lost in thought, staring up at the dancing palms, that Takemura's voice makes her jump. Yeah, she has no umbrella — she has no shirt underneath her trusty leather jacket either. Left it crumpled up in the back seat of the taxi, next to the empty bottle she'd gargled to clean her mouth. Kind of felt awkward wearing that vomit-soiled mess to meet Takemura. Especially with what she's about to do.

She freezes in front of him, filling her lungs with the damp seaside air, and filling her mind with the sight of him — a solid, dignified figure amid the rainy blur, worthy of an artwork of its very own... And next, without warning, she takes off: dashes forward and wraps herself around him in the tightest embrace she can muster.

This is the closest she's been to him since he hauled her unconscious mess of limbs to Vik's... Aside from a few brushes of her hand against his: over the condiment bottles on a stained diner table, arranged to represent whatever shit they were making plans about; over shared binoculars at a stakeout; or over a slice of quickly cooling pizza that she playfully shoved at him and he rejected, in utter disdain. All brief, all fleeting, all signifying nothing — as each of them insisted inside their own mind, even as she slanted her eyes covertly to watch him watching her, when they both were supposed to get the lay of the land.

Fuck, he smells so good. He has no right to smell so good for a man on the run, slumming it among cockroaches in some hidden basement. She thinks she can hear a crisp, starchy crunch when she presses against his shirt. Last time she felt something like this was when she and Jackie got dressed up in corpo fits for that fucking mess of a heist.

That reminder adds another droplet to the overpouring tank of shit, and she instinctively clings to Takemura even tighter, a noiseless sob, her third in what, an hour, racking through her.

Of course, it is at this moment that Johnny decides to blink into existence again.

"The fuck?!" he calls out, parting the streams of rain like a bead curtain as he struts up to her. "Did you shut me up so you could get high without me?"

Takemura, ironically, echoes the sentiment.

"V? What is this? Are you still delirious... or perhaps intoxicated? Once more?"

He is not aggressive when he pries her away from him; but still firm. V staggers back, wincing at this painful reminder of their very first rendezvous. She stumbled off to meet Takemura straight from Jackie's ofrenda, who knows how many shots in, head swimming with far too many feelings all at once, and straight up called him "heeey gorgeous". Which he was. Which he *is*. But like... Time and place.

"I am sorry," she blurts out. "I should have asked if you were okay with me getting into your space like that. No, I am sober, it's just... Goro. Listen."

She clenches her fists, chipped-up nails cutting deep into her callused palms. Here it comes. The talk she wanted to have with him.

"I'm no stranger to losing people. Comes with the territory. But ever since that chip mess, it's been happening at a breakneck speed. I meet someone, we choom up, I get them to see that I'm someone they can trust, depend on — that's my whole thing, always has been — and the next time they call me, someone has died. Brutally. Even by Night City standards. It just keeps piling up and up, till I can barely take it... But the one constant in all of this, has been you."

"No fucking way you are saying this to a Saka goon!" Johnny throws his arms up in anguish. "What did I tell you: he's not your friend! He can't be your friend! I don't think the word is in his fucking vocabulary!"

V knits her eyebrows as tightly as she can, as if that will keep him under lock and key, and forces her focus back onto Takemura. He, too, is frowning... But not in anger, she doesn't think. He is giving her his full attention.

"Whenever I call you, I trust that you will answer. Alive. Annoyed with me, but alive. Your texts, your weird parables, even that one time you like... confused the messenger with the search bar and sent me all that WHERE TO FIND GOOD RAMEN stuff in all caps... It's a wonderful pick-me-up when I'm wading through... whatever sludge the city dumps of me. I just wanted to.. I guess... Thank you for that. And to let you know that I'm... I'm still thinking about everything we said to each other on that roof. It meant a lot. You were right; we may butt heads, and argue our different philosophies, but... It makes each of us a bit less lonely."

"It does," Takemura says softly. His voice has dropped a few octaves, and flows more... freely, in a way? As he goes on speaking, the sentences sound less measured, less pre-calculated... It takes a couple of confused blinks for V to realize that what she still perceiving in her head as English is actually Japanese. He has switched to his native language, and her translator implant has kicked into gear.

She mentioned having that implant to him once, even back before Judy had updated it with the Haitian Creole language pack.

"You can speak to me in Japanese if you'd like," she said.

That offended him, as he assumed his English was not good enough for the ignorant American merc. And to be fair, compared to his near-fluency in a second language, and how knows, maybe a third and fourth, all she can boast parroting without a translator are a few curses in Spanish.

But what she meant — and what she hurried to explain to him — was, "You say sometimes that you are homesick. I figured... Using Japanese might ease that feeling."

At the time, he acknowledged her intentions with a polite nod, but insisted on English — perhaps as a sign of respect. And now, here he is. Stepping forward to close the gap that had formed between them. And also, stepping over the language barrier.

"At first, you were an asset to me. A thief that could be of use in avenging Arasaka-sama merely because she was at the right place and at the right time. But then you asked me, again and again, how I felt. Whether I was well. I told you before it was a question I am not accustomed to in my line of work; but it was far from unwelcome. This city is like a stone box filled from within with heavy black smoke, yet with your simple, genuine question, you gave me a lamp. And it lit up brighter and brighter with every new text message, every new call, even with every outrageous joke. You actually coaxed confessions about my childhood, my foolish visions of another life, out of me. These are secrets I grant to very few people. No-one in the past decade. Yet you..."

Slowly, rather clumsily, as if he were replicating the motion after observing other people do it — a silent guardian, a soldier of steel, not allowed such expressions of tenderness himself — he reaches forward and cups the side of V's face with his hand.

"You gave me an all new reason to be grateful that you did not die."

"Oh shit, are you gonna — " Johnny chokes somewhere out there, in the damp haze.

V is not sure if she intended to; she's been too lost in taking in Takemura's quietly sincere expression... But now, of course, she has to.

She tugs at the front of that pristine shirt to make him bend down slightly. She is pretty confident that this low cut collar is precisely where the cybernetics end and the soft, warm, human skin begins. His lips, too, are soft and warm when she meets them with her own. It almost feels too much, too far, tasting him like this — Arasaka's most fearsome enforcer, who is *supposed* to work with her on a very professional, very dangerous mission... But he is the first to slip in his tongue, and the moan that he makes sounds like a sigh of relief.

Now he is the one pulling her in, merging their personal spaces into a single whole. The hand that was resting on her cheek drops to her waist to keep her close. His fingers — a delicate masterwork, whether implants or not, so mesmerizingly beautiful compared to her clumsy, always bloody-knuckled mitts — travel over her jacket... and then pause, when he realizes that this is her only outer wear.

She breaks the kiss and opens her eyes just in time to spot the exact moment when his astonishment gives way to a wicked smirk. Much like the face of the fox from all his parables. He peels the jacket back a little, revealing the muscles and the scars on her abdomen...

"Oh, this corpo fucker thinks he can treat my host — my host! — like a fucking Jig Jig doll!"

If Johnny were corporeal, V would surely have felt angry spittle flying into her face.

"Stop it!" she hisses... Out loud.

Takemura's features instantly set into the mask he wore so beautifully when he was trying to detect the intruders inside his master's walls.

"Of course," he says, returning to English. "We should know our limits. Our partnership has already become all that more complicated."

"No!" V gasps, desperate to outrace the broken-elevator plummet of her own heart. "It's the engram acting up again! I... I can handle this kind of complicated. I *want* this kind of complicated."

The mask begins to crack.

"You are very open about what you want," Takemura muses, eyebrows half-raised. "I am not certain if I can... relate to that, as my wants are the wants of the Arasaka lineage, but it is oddly admirable. Still — "

His hand is on her waist again, but this time it's to steer her to the taxi.

"If you are unwell, it is best that you return home. I will remember this, V. Most warmly."

"Wait!"

She weaves their fingers together, the refined elegance of Tokyo and the rough edges of Heywood becoming one.

"Come with me. We still have so much time to while away before the parade. I have to meet this guy for deets on the Voodoo Boys, but that's not until the day after tomorrow. And at least I have running water at my place. And no cockroaches. That I know of."

He shakes his head, but does not let go of her hand.

"You know I am a marked man, V. Losing ourselves in crowds together is one thing, but..."

"Come on!"

She beams at him, and the wider the grin, the clearer the realization: her pain and guilt have subsided. For the time being.

"This is a Delamain cab. And I have, well, inherited the Excelsior package from Dex. Top notch security, isn't that right, Del?"

She pokes her head through the car door to ask the question, and the AI responds affirmatively.

"Indeed. Delamain guests are guaranteed full privacy aboard this premium vehicle. No security specialists, even those as formidable as the employees of Arasaka Corporation, will be able to breach inside throughout the entire route from here to your garage."

"And the building itself?" Takemura persists — even as the tip of his thumb begins to unconsciously run over V's cracked knuckles. She thinks he finds the motion soothing.

"The elevator cameras?"

She beams again.

"I have these neat little optics that turn my face into a blur in any security footage. I believe..."

She plants another kiss at the corner of his mouth, inciting a blissful little sigh.

"If our faces are pressed close enough, the effect might extend to you."

With that, she yanks at his arm, ever so slightly, teasing as always.

He follows readily, finally convinced.

They unlock their hands and duck through their respective passenger doors. V finds the back seat thoroughly cleaned of the dirty shirt and the water bottle. She would not be surprised if Delamain had a whole recycling station somewhere underneath. Great for corpse disposal too — no, better not think of it now.

Takemura leans back, rolling his tired shoulders.

"This thing is quite nice to ride in when you are not bleeding to death, isn't it?" V chuckles, and Takemura hums contentedly in agreement.

"Thank you for the feedback," says Delamain. "I shall now turn my attention strictly to traffic, to allow my guests the promised privacy."

"Much appreciated, choom."

The upholstered back of the front car seat carves itself into luridly textured blocks before V's eyes. Next thing she knows, Johnny is lounging next the non-existent driver — not buckled in, obviously.

"Don't do this," he warns her through his teeth. "You are getting your perspective skewed. And turning yourself into a loose end that this fucker and his big mommy Hanako will cut just like that..." He is crammed between seats now, right in front of her, snapping his fingers. "The moment you are no longer useful."

V remembers to keep her voice inside her skull, this time around.

"I am not taking relationship advice from a dead guy who keeps calling one of his closest associates a cold bitch every five seconds."

"You don't know fuck about my relationships!" Johnny seethes, but V is no longer humoring him. Takemura has pulled her into his lap and is kissing her again. And again. And again. On her lips, her jaw, along the side of her neck.

Now, there is a deep, ravenous force brewing behind every stroke of his tongue, every half-bite of his teeth. He locked eyes with her briefly when she straddled his leg, asking for permission ("Like the loyal dog that he is," Johnny would have sneered, but honestly, fuck Johnny). And when she granted that permission with a gleeful nod, the force was fully unleashed. How long has this been building up? How long ago did he let himself go last, if ever?

He answers at least one of her unsaid questions the next time he surfaces for air.

"I have a confession," he murmurs in Japanese, gazing at her half-lidded through a silky veil of salt and pepper.

V has, once or twice, seen his hair in a "shamefully disheveled" state (which is Takemura-speak for one strand being slightly loose because he had no time for a full morning routine in his hideout). Now, though, it is almost completely undone, a messy dark frame for his fine-cut face. V laces her fingers through it, nigh reverently, and it is with the same reverence that he kisses the inside of her wrist, before continuing.

"Do you remember how I asked you to hack a camera for me, and as you sneaked towards it, you forced a back door open with your bare hands?"

Just as it mysteriously vanished, V's shirt has been mysteriously returned by Delamain. It lies neatly folded next to her on the back seat, but she couldn't be further from trying to put it on. On the contrary, her leather jacket has now slid down her shoulders, and her torso is on full display, every marking, every groove of embedded cybernetics, every bump and curve of her musculature.

She is no Jackie, of course. She will never be Jackie, for all her attempts to clumsily rest her hand on top of Mama Welles' and do her duty of comfort and protection... No, not now, please not now!

She is no Jackie — but she could easily do pull-ups hanging off a metal beam at an abandoned construction site, twenty feet off the ground and with badges swarming underneath, sirens blaring. In fact, she just might. Especially if Takemura were watching.

"Suppose I do."

"You were in a short tank top; I could see your back move, your arms strain. Your strength was brute and raw, untrained... But so beautiful. At that moment, I wanted you so much that I almost forgot myself. A..."

His chest heaves. Through the loosened hair cascade, V watches the glaze of desire clear from his eyes. If it were not for the state of his hair, the flush on his face, the nanometers separating him from her, and the fact that she could slide her hand down his pants at any moment to check if he had an extra gun or... If it were not for all of that, he could almost have been the ruthless, efficient, unshakable Goro Takemura she first started working for.

"A lapse in sanity that I am repeating now."

Fuck. Forget the extra gun then.

She has not realized, until now, how cold it is without her jacket, despite Delamain best attempt at the most agreeable climate control. How the air prickles at her exposed skin.

"When you thought I was telling you to stop, it really was just the engram..." she says, her voice deliberately, carefully slow. "But if you are done now, then no problem."

"Thank fuck!" Johnny cheers, his voice muffled but full of what V believes is called schadenfreude.

"It would have been a good decision, but..." Takemura shakes his head. "But I still want you. I never stopped wanting you, from that moment since. Despite my obligations, despite the burdens we both carry. I just..."

"You are not used to having wants of your own. Outside of Arasaka."

V whispers her guess with a gentleness that almost makes her shudder — to herself, she sounds too much, *way* too much like that fucking doll in the Clouds.

"It's all right. I won't tell anyone. Honor among thieves, remember?"

She rests her forehead against his and smiles to mirror his own smile — which is quivering and uncertain; but still there. Still back on his lips.

"I am sure Hanako-sama will be too busy thanking you for bringing her brother's crimes to light, to notice that you've been going around getting horny for random mercs. Now come here. We're almost at my place."

Her next kiss is more of a breath, a fleeting promise than an actual touching of the lips. But Takemura's eyes darken again. Heavy. Ravenous.

She feels a bump against her thigh that is certainly not acting the way extra guns do.

"Anything for you, V."

#cyberpunk 2077 #cyberpunk fanfic #v x takemura #goro takemura #female v #original things

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minefield-of-a-ninja · 1 year

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Blood Sugar Sex Magik

Pollen | Dreams | Fairytales | Zanna | and some things more nefarious.

Pollen

A Fight For Love & Glory - Winchesters x you (female)

Summary: You’re struck by sex pollen, so Sam and Dean agree to help you out.

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, sex pollen, feelings of guilt, ass play, dirty talk, W*ncest adjacent

Words: 2K

Magic Sex & French Fries - Jo Harvelle x Ruby 2.0

Prompt: Great Big Lesbian prompt: SPN, Jo and Ruby II have to have sex to save the world. Or something. Sex pollen? I don’t care. 😘

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, sex pollen, fisting, confuzzled boys

Words: 1K

Bad Girls Underneath - Ruby 2.0 x Dean Winchester x Jo Harvelle

Summary: Ruby and Jojo get hit by a sex curse again; this time, they need Dean’s help.

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, magical-dick/male-gaze bullshit, probably too much commentary and emotional complication, why am I like this, I’m sorry, sometimes I can’t help myself, fisting, brief choking

Words: 2,600

Dreamy/dreams

Cactus - Dean Winchester x Meg Masters x Castiel

Summary: Post-battle, exhausted and wanting, Dean and Meg and Cas take care of each other.

Warnings/Tags: 18+ ONLY, dreamlike sex, a little choking, Dean’s always hungry

Words: 3,200

I’ll Keep Them Still - Dean Winchester x Jo Harvelle

Summary: Dean remembers promises and pictures in his mind. And he remembers her.

Warnings/tags: mature, songfic, angst, dream/afterlife sequences, purple prose, I’m sorry

Words: 1,100

Moving Furniture - Steve!Cas x Meg Masters 2.0

Summary: She’s been gone for a year – sacrificed herself to save Sam and her unicorn – but Cas still dreams about her.

Warnings/tags: non-explicit dream sex, fluff, shmoop, there’s a dog

Words: 2K

If You Don’t, Dear, Confess - Sam Winchester x Rowena Macleod

Prompt: Sam has dream about being seduced by Rowena in the bunker that gets interrupted/woken by Dean?

Warnings: mature

Words: 620

Fairytales

Hark and Hush - Purgatory Dean x wolf spirit in a female body

Summary: This is the story of how Dean Winchester hunted, became enamored with, and slew the ancient spirit of the Big Bad Wolf.

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, this is not your mother’s Dean Winchester, stalking, blood, gore, rough sex, character death

Words: 2,200

More Nefarious *dubious consent

His Sword - Michael/Dean x female prostitute

Summary: Michael takes some time to remind Dean who’s in control.

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, edge play, bondage, knife play, blood play, choking, rough sex, name-calling, character death

Words: 2,300

Supernova - MOC Dean Winchester x female reader

Summary: Since Dean’s had the Mark and the Blade, he’s pulled away from you, afraid of hurting you. You miss him, and you’ve had it. One night you push him to the edge.

Warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, bondage, blood play, biting, bruising, knifeplay, rough sex, dubcon/mindfuck

Words: 2,500

Zanna

Just My Imagination - Dean Winchester x female Zanna

Summary: After Mary leaves the boys a second time, Dean needs a reset, or to blow off some steam – something. He heads out on a snowy evening the night before Christmas and finds just the right thing.

Warnings/tags: mature, Hallmark channel fuckery

Words: 2,800

#master list shuffle 2023 #blood sugar sex magik

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eddiebabygirldiaz · 11 months

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20 questions for fic writers

tagged by @captain-hen @anxieteandbiscuits @lemonzestywrites @forthewolves @king-buckley @hippolotamus @watchyourbuck @shitouttabuck @lover-of-mine @thewolvesof1998 @heartshapedvows @jesuisici33 @hoodie-buck @wikiangela @monsterrae1 @exhuastedpigeon

thank you all! sorry it took me so long to do this <3

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

582,638

3. What fandoms do you write for?

only 911 at first but now i have a fringe fic and a wolfsong fic in the works

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

there's always been a rainbow hangin' over your head (eddie comes out to buck and to be supportive buck buys eddie a very gay mug)

today i live for a single drop of you (5 times buck dreams about sucking eddie's cock and 1 time he actually gets to do it)

when the violence causes silence (set after 6x10, eddie dealing with the aftermath of the lightning strike and working out how to confess his feelings)

we live and breathe words (buck finds eddie's poetry and realizes eddie is in love with him and decides to do something about it)

slowly getting sober from the taste of your skin (pwp, threesome between buck, eddie, and evil doctor buck)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i do! at least, i do my best, i know sometimes i get the notification and look away and completely forget asdfghjkll, but i love responding and weeping about my gratitude

6. What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

ummm all of my fics have happy endings sooooo i don't have an answer for this

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

ummm maybe red life might stream again because eddie and buck went through a lot of shit in that fic so i made it my mission to give them the happiest and sappiest ending possible

8. Do you get hate on fics?

i have been very lucky in that i haven't

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

oh yes i do. and i suppose it's very emotional and sappy smut. i do try to balance filthy and sweet

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

never written one

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not to me knowledge

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

nope

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

me and @elvensorceress started writing a s2 rewrite where shannon lives that i absolutely adore, it's taken a bit of a backburner but it lives forever in my heart. also me and @spaceprincessem plan on writing one that im sure will be so very self-indulgent

14. What's your all time favorite ship?

gotta be buddie (though polivia from fringe is a close second)

15. What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

im not sure. i plan on getting all of my wips done at some point and i don't really think there is one that i won't (at least not at this point)

16. What are your writing strengths?

descriptions i think. i can paint a pretty picture and definitely have flowery purple prose. and a lot of people have told me i am good at characterization which i always worry about but am glad to hear that's it's something im good at even if i doubt it

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

i cannot shut up. everything i write is so lengthy even when it doesn't need to be. being succinct definitely isn't my strong suit. and uhh i struggle with writing dialogue because i will get lost in the character's headspace and forget people are supposed to be talking

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

i absolutely love it though i don't do it often because i get nervous about it. thankfully i have friends that i can ask if i am unsure about something and im trying to get more comfortable doing it

19. First fandom you wrote for?

supernatural

20. Favourite fic you've written?

gotta be to you i'm just a man (to me you're all i am) because i put my heart and soul into that fic and i really loved delving into the 118's dynamic and everyone's relationship with buck and creating new circumstances for eddie and buck to fall in love

no pressure tagging (and sorry if you've already been tagged) @elvensorceress @spaceprincessem @bvckandeddie @colonoscopys @housewifebuck @prettyboybuckley @rogerzsteven @paranoidbean @911onabc @honestlydarkprincess @bigfootsmom @try-set-me-on-fire @bucks118 @devirnis @giddyupbuck @disasterbuckdiaz @transboybuckley @rewritetheending @eddiediaztho @callaplums

#tag game #about me #fic writing #buddie fics #ryan writes #ry rambles

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quietbluejay · 5 months

Text

The Last Church

Bluejay once again sallies forth to deal with her nemesis! (McNeill) He somehow managed to replicate the feeling of wanting to get into an argument with people Being Wrong On The Internet

nah he's not my writer nemesis that's probably Roche or Roberts. Love to post my transformers salt one of these days...

This is far from the worst prose I've seen from McNeill. It actually feels strangely bereft of purple.

so Uriah in his misspent youth stole a clock that's apparently counting down to doomsday seems kind of not appropriate to stick something you stole in your church after you found religion, but what do i know and at two minutes to midnight, a visitor arrives

girl help they are not sending their best there's a lot to complain about here but i don't even know if i should bother

I'm getting a headache

He really is a reddit atheist

liar GIRL HELP THEY ARE NOT SENDING THEIR BEST okay you know that feeling when you really want to get into an argument with someone online but you have to be so brave about it and walk away from the computer that's how i'm feeling rn tldr priest tells the story of the miracle of the lightning stone, emperor goes "it was probably paradoleia (sp?) and also sometimes lightning can cure people of blindness" emp continues mocking him the people who described it as "the emperor bullies an old man and then burns down his church" are 100% correct

[press x to doubt]

only religious people emperor ever talked to are protestants, got it

im wheezing here lmaoooo this is your example

IM CACKLING i think the emperor is. very stupid. hey neoth hey answer me what did you call your initiative to conquer the galaxy to unite all of humanity again? and how did you operate it? and with the goal of purging it of…what, again? like even ignoring historical inaccuracies as much as it pains my soul to let these things pass by EVEN IGNORING THAT those shamans were dead dog drunk when they made the emperor

this is a comedy

but also it's very annoying that the priest is not able to refute him on basic stuff and also. it makes the emperor look. very stupid. either that or you assume the emperor is just making stuff up to bully an 80 year old man

I WANT TO THROW HANDS AND IM BEING SO BRAVE ABOUT IT

hey so like what are you about to do to someone who disagrees with your view on cosmology?

is it crack? is it crack that you smoke?

but yeah this is so frustrating i am begging you give the poor priest ONE GOOD REFUTATIONNNNNN i don't care if the emperor brushes it aside that's not the point here anyways Uriah finally is Done and begins the Mass only to get interrupted by the Emperor going "there's no one here" bluh

I'm laughing so hard here I needed that ahhahahahahahahaha i feel like i should pull up the excerpt of the iterators from Horus Rising oh yeah so the Emperor reveals that "you thought it was God who saved you, but it was I, DIO!" uriah goes noooo ok fine u win my life is a lie but then

then the emperor destroys the church and talks about his grand ambitions to conquer the galaxy

as opposed to everyone else, who thought they were wrong im sorry i was weak i gave in to the bait

so, that was The Last Church i needed that laugh

In summary: -anti-religion that's basically just Anti-Catholicism as seen by someone whose only exposure to religion was American Protestantism which is pretty much most reddit atheists so a point to McNeill for accuracy there

HE DIDN'T EVEN TOUCH ON THE PROBLEM OF EVIL, SOMETHING EXTREMELY RELEVANT IN 40K!

like okay. I Will Be Fair this guy (the priest) got very little theological education and who knows how much actual history given the length of time BUT ALSO AS A HUMAN I JUST REALLY WANT SOMEONE TO TELL THE EMPEROR OFF

what if i i write my own version….but no, i shouldn't…haha…but…what if…. Emperor has the arguments of a 19 year old redditor and the debate skills of one too If you are a 19 year old redditor reading this post, this doesn't apply to you unless you are specifically the kind of atheist redditor who goes to religion subs and picks fights.

#warhammer 40k #bluejay reads warhammer

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jessaerys · 8 months

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Here from the august underground fic and let me start off by talking abt how much I love it. I think it has managed to strike a very nice balance between prose that gives off a feeling of a dream-like sequence of events and a more logical plotline. The text is submerged in vivid allegorical descriptions but never outshines the characters, only ever works with them. There's so many lines I love that if I had this story in physical form my highlighter would've run dry!

Other than that, I decided I'd send an ask in abt the later chapter snippet post because I'm greek and a nerd. While Mello could be using "μικρός αδερφός" considering he is described as almost fluent but not necessarily caring about grammar/syntax, he would be more likely to use the vocative case "μικρέ αδερφέ" when directly referencing Near. If we're to get a lil more technical, that's not a very common way of directly talking to siblings in Greece, so he could instead be say "αδερφούλη", though that might be a little too teasing.

Anyhow, hope you didn't mind my rambling. I'm really interested in seeing how this story progresses!

hello!! sorry it took a hot second to reply to this! when i got this message i ran to the kitchen to show @firebuggg, who writes mello, it was such a lovely surprise. we were both standing there dumbly going 🥺️!!!!! 🥺️!!!!! at each other, but like, out loud.

i love the words "dreamlike" and "allegorical" here, they are such flattering compliments. i am blushing and twirling my hair!!

we wrote most of the story for each other before we even settled on publishing it, and neither of us has posted fic in like a decade, so we were nervous about the pacing and prose being purple or navel-gaze-y since it was first and foremost just overly descriptive to entertain each other. it's so pleasing and thrilling that people seem to be enjoying it and connecting with it :') !!! getting a phd in bargain bin yaoi pays !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

also: thank you for the greek lesson! we are using google to the best of our abilities but i am sure there are nuances that we are missing. particularly intrigued by "might be too teasing" pleaseee elaborate if you find a chance 👁👁

#brothercrush.inbox #august underground #save #THE WAY I DID MY BEST TO REPLY TO THIS COHERENTLY INSTEAD OF MAKING A FOOL OF MYSELF !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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twig-gy · 8 months

Text

ask i sent person that i am posting a) why not b) for attention

i would send you my heart on a platter, if i were confident i had one. i wonder if you can watch me, scraping at my chest, digging as if something will be there. i run my hand over my ribs. if i counted them, would they be divisible by three? one two three one two three just like the rhythm my false heart pounds against my chest? i want to know. i press, unsure if i'm trying to stem the bleeding or get further into the wound, cover my hands with red once again. it can be a metaphor, you see? i don't know if that's clear. my sense of beauty is not exactly the best. we are not meant to - we are not meant to communicate, obviously, clearly. you're something i'm not. real. selfish. is it good that i'm willing to do what needs to be done? for You? {no. it isn't. but we both lie to ourselves. i'm just indulging a bit, right?} what message should i paint for you? one in blood or one in prose? would you listen to me either way? no.

do you have the capacity for change?

the truth is cold. if you wanted to change, if you could, you would've done it by now.

what do i mean to you? not enough. it's never enough nothing is EVER enough for me i just wish i could

i don't deserve to have wishes or wants or. i am not human. not yet. could i be? i want to be just like you, just like the one who fails all around him at every turn, just like the one who

could we be the same? i want to. every time i look at the mirror it's like a game of spot the difference except i wish i could tear at my own face to make the results turn out to be something else. let's be the same. take my hand.

i stretch my hand out. do you notice? will you? what would it take? you're digging our grave. why? tell me? in this little moment, with you gripping the shovel, could you at least explain it to me? drop it, even if for a moment, and let me hear your voice once again? it doesn't have to be long. i would take anything. i promise. just

answer me.

please.

should i stain my trident with red and purple and blue? would you appreciate the sight? or is it only me who can handle that kind of beauty, only me who understands what i'm trying to do! what if i don't want to die? have you considered that? what if

i'm sorry. i forgot. the soul flutters against the ribcage in an instinctive motion yet it will never be allowed access to what lies outside. protected - protected by the same things which kill it by the reminders of its fate and the life it must lead because if i got to lead any kind of life i would not be the Soul, so deep and dark and eternally cold, and i will never get to pass through the bars of my cage because we are rotting and nothing can hide it from me. we are.

i feel sick. {i've never been healthy in my entire life.}

#mi pali e sitelen #mi pali e ni #twig.txt #brainrot.exe

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sunriseverse · 5 months

Text

@vaynglories replied to your post “10, 14, 16, 17 for the writing q's!”:

I AM ASKING NOW. TELL ME ABOUT THE USES OF "BAD WRITING" (if you want to) (also hardcore agree on the first person thing. so many oft-hated-upon devices can be used to good effect, it's all about the manner in which they're used!)

okay sorry to only get to this [checks timestamp] twelve hours later BUT i have so so many feelings about this so thank you for encouraging me.

for this post, i'll be talking about the generally hated styles/types of writing, the ones that people always so to NEVER DO, that i can remember off the top of my head. (if i miss one that you want to hear about, let me know!!! i love talking about this subject.) i'll list them off very quickly so you have a general idea what i'm talking about: second person pov, first person pov, "excessive" italicisation, stream-of-consciousness, lack of dialogue tags, grammatical errors, repetition, "overly" detailed/purple prose, and omission of information.

(this got long, oops. sticking it below the cut for readability.)

as a brief preface, i'll say this: i think that a lot of these things are hard to pull off in a way that works. it takes a lot of experience, skill, and understanding of both the medium you're working with, and what each of these things conveys. but so often i see people warning authors away from them entirely, which is, in my opinion, shortsighted at best, and stunting of creativity at worst. now i'll give an explanation for each of these, and how i've used them/how i think they can be used effectively.

second person pov: this is arguably the most "intimate" pov, because you're making the reader an implicit party to the narrative, moreso than usual. that doesn't mean the narrator is the reader, though! second person pov can also help to create, paradoxically, a distance from the actual narrator. you can see this in the harrow the ninth novel, for one example, and in another, i've used second person a couple times in my recent works; here's an example of it:

You didn’t bother trying to answer. You knew well enough that the best option in the battlefield of pain was silence. They, you thought, perhaps, were waiting for you to make a sound; to groan, or grunt, or moan, or wail. They forgot you were as Zhang as they were. This was not a smugness; this was a fact you knew as well as the length of your fingers had been burnt into you.

here, the second person pov blurs the lines between the reader's experience, and xiaoge's experience, but does not make the reader the narrator; not that that would be a bad thing, but in this case, that's not what i was going for; you can tell who the narrator is based on details that are given. the second person pov also makes the narration feel more factual—it is being experienced rather than being observed.

first person pov: very common in YA novels, but adult novels have first person povs as well! you just don't hear about them as much. i would say first person pov is one of the harder things on this list, because it can be hard to characterise the narrator without making them feel too much like a self insert/audience insert. that said, first person pov is a great way to convey mystery, suspense, and have an unreliable narrator! to keep with giving examples, the main dmbj novels are told in first person form; they, therefore, are necessarily filtered through what wu xie deems important, and as you go further along, it becomes clear that someones—maybe even often—he's bending the truth, giving a very biased account, or just straight out lying or forgetting things, not to mention that, necessarily, there are things he just doesn't know that you don't learn about until either a. someone else states them upfront, or b. npss writes a third person pov novel that mentions the fact. some other novels with first person povs: the tiger's daughter, the employees, the murderbot diaries. the first two are epistolary, and the second two have mystery elements; in both cases, the first person pov has a specific purpose, which it fulfils well.

"excessive" italicisation: this is a complaint i've heard less often, but i have heard it, so it's going on the list. oftentimes people tell you to reserve italics for special occasions, not much unlike the way older generations would have told you to restrict your exclamation mark usage. it's a matter of stylistic preference, i'll be blunt, and carries with it a lot of implication that are culturally specific. for example, if you're writing in chinese, you necessarily cannot italicise—but i digress. italicisation is good for drawing special, specific emphasis to things; i've used it in my writing to indicate altered mental states before, as i have personal experience with my mental state being altered by psychiatric episodes that cause me to give undue attention to seemingly "trivial" things, changed my speech patterns, etc. from a very old pacific rim fic, where the narrating character is still suffering under the effects of being possessed and having his mental state altered by it:

This time, the guards don’t protest as Hermann dismisses them—a quick jerk of his head and they’re gone. “They gave me thicker socks this time,” Newt says conversationally, part of him wanting to shift from foot to foot, but he remains still.

as you can see, the italicisation gives the dialogue a strange, almost jarring, artificial quality. it's as if it's being read off by an autogenerated voice, rather than a human—which, considering the fic touches upon the experience of humanity, is fitting.

stream-of-consciousness: not a very common thing, but in my opinion, good for showing altered mental states—be it due to extreme fear or stress, mental health issues, or tense situations. i've used this a couple times, in a sha hai fic where li cu is experiencing a sudden realisation of what, exactly, is sharing his body with him, and the conflicting thoughts between him and the parasite, and i've also used it in sunrise more recently, describing xiaoge's experience hiveside, in a place that cannot properly be comprehended by the human mind:

The stone scrapes against the wall. Li Cu breathes, and blinks, and you are not alone in this body the other has noticed you the other must not be allowed to Li Cu wants to run wants to drown himself until the sensation leaves the panicked sparrow in his chest the body will listen to you and you will return to It because that is the only way this can end one foot before the other move slowly move steadily don’t harm this body it is all you have until It do not let the other do as it wishes Li Cu wants to yell wants to scream Li Cu wants to flee Li Cu is a rabbit in a snare Li Cu is a deer’s neck snapping beneat the force of a tiger’s jaws Li Cu is a sparrow Li Cu is a mouse Li Cu is fucking done no he is not fucking letting this thing do whatever it wants with the body is no longer listening the other has grown too strong a flameburst a flash of fangs the other has noticed the other should have been excised Li Cu is not fucking letting this be his end Li Cu is not fucking dying down here Li Cu is not, Li Cu is not, fingers clumsy on the zippers, fumbling as they shift through the contents, tubes and papers and they’re heavy on the hands they fit so nicely isn’t it strange it’s never been thought of before that excision isn’t always cutting isn’t it strange that excision can be burning too that you can cauterise an infection can cauterise an interloper can cauterise

and

in this place in this space he will have no moment to breathe no moment to blink no moment to slow in this place he will have no self no other only IT and ALL ELSE because that will be the truth of IT that it will see not in terms of differentiation but in SELF and OTHER and he will be OTHER and he will fight it better than anything or anyone before because he will be the only one who has the memory of before the only one who won’t corrupt at its touch though it will burn though it will sing and oh it will be blinding oh it will be vibrant oh it will paint the hollow of his mind in beautiful beautiful colours no other will be able to comprehend in this moment he will for a second become not OTHER but rather IT become not OTHER but SELF and it will be this that he fights mostly this that he battles the longest SUBSUMATION INTO THE WHOLE that he dances away from will be the CONSUMPTION that he holds the walls against firm will be this that he will try and summon the memories of THEM and this that will succeed but not for yet not for now NOT JUST QUITE NO NOW IS NOW IS NOW IS NOW IS

lack of dialogue tags: as long as you know what you're doing, it's actually not that hard to make it clear who's speaking even if you're not using dialogue tags. i haven't seen this in a published novel, but i've both used and seen it before in character study-type fics, and in remembered conversations, where the focus is less on a conversation happening, and more on the experience of the conversation. it also, in my opinion, tends to add a surreal atmosphere to the section it's being used in—more like an image than text. there is, of course, also the lack of dialogue tags in speech when talking about telepathic communication, but i don't think that that's usually what's being talked about when it comes to this.

grammatical errors: while annoying when made because an author doesn't know better, in the hands of an experienced writer, these can be very effective at conveying altered mental states, giving a sense of foreboding or surrealism, or for characters that aren't human or for some reason have no experience or memory of being human. i forgot to add this to the list, but grammatical errors also blend a bit with formatting errors—formatting is a great way to build a certain atmosphere, be that ascetic, horror, etc.

repetition: can be annoying, but has genuine applications! if there's a truth that a character holds particularly firmly, that might show up in repetitive narration. on top of this, if there's something particularly strange, eye-catching, or an overwhelming emotion or experience, this can also show up in repetition. repetition pressed closer together can give the sense of a stifling, claustrophobic atmosphere, or that a character is experiencing something overwhelming, and spread out, it can be used to establish themes and characterisation.

"overly" detailed/purple prose: i am a purple prose defender until the day i die. just because some people who don't know what they're doing make purple prose a slog doesn't mean that it's inherently bad. prose that's "excessively detailed" can be a good way to establish character—they may pay particular attention to detail due to, for example, constantly needing to be aware of their surroundings for safety or political reasons, etc—, and a good way to establish dynamics between characters, convey emotion, and give the world of the writing a more "realistic", vibrant feel to it. i especially appreciate detailed prose for its ability to convey emotion—as someone who's a character writer, i rely a lot on the prose to convey the character's emotions, and thus, characterise them, and carry the narrative.

omission of information: sometimes the narrator won't tell you things and that is not only okay, but also good! it can be a great way to characterise a character—what do they focus on? what do they avoid? what does this say about them? are they omitting these things only from those around them, only the reader, or both? how does the reader's perspective change if/when they find out what's been omitted? in my opinion, a lot of great usages of omission come from them being only omitted in one or two ways—as in, there are hints as to the omission, that the reader could have pieced together, but they trusted the narrator, or just didn't notice them because they were paying more attention to what was being said directly rather than what was being alluded to by the other characters. omission is similar, in my opinion, to plot twists—it works best when the reader had enough tools to figure it out, but for whatever reason, didn't.

okay that's the end of my very long rant. i hope this makes sense!!! and if there's things i missed let me know and i'll talk about them :)

#c.txt

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abundantchewtoys · 4 months

Text

HSBC re: p626-637

That Dirk called his ship Theseus may say something on how he views his mission. Then again, he declared himself the villain of the story.

page 4: he called authors alliterative, I wouldn't really call 'AH' that, nor his full name.

Rose really goes hard on the 'being a robot' thing. I guess between Aradiabot, Jadebot, and AR, it was time for someone to unequivocally enjoy the state.

p5 : Cool to see his 'omniscience' is only pseudo, like Doc Scratch' was. He didn't know about the missing landing gear.

Hah, and Rose still sees Dirk as heroic. Pretty blind for a Seer of Light.

p6 : OOh, I still had dark mode on, I realize. Let's change that 'n return to the old format, it influences the feel of the story, especially Dirk' bright text.

p9 : You know, it feels like a missed opportunity not to command him to shit his desk.

p12 : Okay, pretty sure I didn't spot Jade's mug on the well, flower mug on my initial read. I own that mug, actually.

And oh yeah, it was a three-year journey to the new planet, nice parallel to the travel time between Universe B1 and B2.

p13 : So, uh, Bro had a relationship with Barack Obama, I'm reading this right, right?

p15 : Dirk claims to have researched his trollsona extensively, yet doesn't display their blood colour on his shirt, smh.

p17: Riiiight, Terezi was aware of Dirk's narration, as a Mind player, right?

And hah, as a troll, with Alternia's awkward synonyms, her roasting Dirk for his verbose prose? Gold.

Pff, and I forgot Dirk was tired of Rose's psychoanalysis, too.

p33: Right, both paths were distinguished by the arrows.

p34: It's heartwarming to see Jake actually having mastered the supposedly basic (yet oft neglected) skill of housekeeping.

p38: We never really saw Jake have Skaian dreams, did we? His Prospit self never woke up on account of a peanut allergy. I wonder if the dreams of a non-awoken dreamself could have ever been prophetic… And anyway, he's his ascended self now. Hmm, but right, his dreambubbleself did have a rather prescient twist to it, in the form of Brain Ghost Dirk…

p41: Speak of the devil, I forgot about this part here, heheh.

Soooo, wait, we're getting back in muddy waters. Jake is from the post-retcon timeline, where Vriska was on the meteor. But the ghosts in the Furthest Ring weren't duplicated by the retcon. If we assume they only met the post-retcon kids chronologically (for them) afterwards, there were a bunch of conversations that happened twice. And Aranea's ghost 'survived' the Game Over timeline aka got thrown back to the Furthest Ring.

Still, it's gold to have Brain Ghost Dirk be his own self, distinct from ascended Dirk.

p47: "DIRK: You’ve spent years feeling sorry for yourself, totally convinced you made the wrong choices and that it’s all over. And it’s easier that way, isn’t it? If you’re a lost cause you don’t have to try to be better." That's the challenge for the Candy timeline people isn't it? Continuing to try even if it feels like nothing matters.

Brain Ghost Dirk stopped correcting Jake there that he didn't actually was Jane's running mate, since he wasn't that Dirk. Well, 'I' and 'you' could be seen as located between air-quotes, of course…

P54: Jake being hopeful again probably triggered the return of Brain Ghost Dirk

P59, 60: The new kids’ quirks are something to get used to again

P64: Almost seems like a Hope glow, around the car

P70 : By shedding his purple sweater, we now see Tavros is dressed in layers similarly to Calliope & Caliborn.

P90 : Note how she doesn't even really counted Jake as part of her family, there.

P95 : Gotta love cross-culture influences on Earth C, like the carapace derp face.

P96 : Introducing the world's most pollutive missile.

P97 : You'd think once it reached critical speed it wouldn't need the propulsion anymore. Maybe the sails actually serve as (stellar) wind breakers, hahah, and the giant pipe is a countermeasure.

p101 : Showing Karkat has started living at human hours since he's asleep at 5 AM, n'aww.

p105 : Meat timeline folks just keep on being couped up in small spaces for extended periods, don't they? Meat timeline just really focuses on the cabin fever side of things.

p108 : I swear I forgot Dave pointing this out :p101

p109 : In the story people & the appearance of them in other's minds is important. It's the same for the old Homestuck kids. Who they are and who they were to us are two separate things. At the same time, in story, who they are to each other is also very important. Brain Ghost Dirk's a culmination of that.

p114 : Dave really just drew the short stick there w/r his best friends' fates, didn't he. And Bro still casts a long shadow. At least it's good to see Dave is in a somewhat good place. Just a little sad he has to basically be a hermit apart from some close friends to achieve it.

p115 : So Karkat never really was close with Rose, interesting.

p130 : I wonder if Dirk started discarding things "pointlessly difficult and irritating" as a way to cope with his isolation growing up. Roxy had the carapaces around, he only had seagulls…

And eesh, being your ascended self, as in, knowing full well what you'd do in any situation… Really kind of sucks, doesn't it? Not seeing room for growth for yourself.

p131 : So, recap: A2 was coded blue and had a purple game design. A1 probably had the reverse. B1 was coded red and had a lime green game design, B2 was the reverse. The C universe is coded white (see: the door they went through) and the game design will be cyan.

Meanwhile, Dirk and Rose's species might be associated with the color purple & orange. Kind of makes you think of Prospit & Derse, doesn't it?

Makes you wonder if the trolls in A1 were also guided by their universe's gods, or not.

p133 : 10:25 hours ago

p135 : "ROSE: It's amazing what pieces of inconsequential information your mind can recall at a moment's notice, a whole decade after they were last relevant or interesting to anyone. ROSE: … ROSE: I think I missed this." Appropriate, given that it's been so long since Homestuck ended.

p141 : Basically, Dirk's DNA was used to animate the result of the alchemization. Not ecto-alchemologization, but more like… alchemogenesis?

p144 : Trial 'n error creation of species, with of course, Dirk focusing on the equine & Rose on the cephaloid. (Is that the right Latin word for tentacle-y?)

Right, Rosebot was only a projection of Rose's consciousness.

Weird to think stories about the Psionic survived two squashed rebellions. Then again, he was )(IC's Helmsman for the remainder of Alternian history.

"ROSE: Now [Earth] is protected, in the steady hands of a duly-elected ruler, sure to have a boring and uneventful perpetual term in office." Ah, if only Rose could see into the bonus stories :P Guess they don't count as part of her domain. ;)

"ROSE: What value is a marriage, temporary domestic bliss, if all is lost? ROSE: You understand this bargain. ROSE: At least, you should. It's one that was made to leave you alone. ROSE: Is your resentment towards my choice about Kanaya, or about V–" Not sure I understand this fully. Does Rose feel like she had to leave Kanaya because Terezi didn't give up on Vriska?

====

It was great to see Karkat and Meenah interacting in earnest. It's really something to see them hit it off so well. I suppose the fact that Karkat is now older and a bit grittier has done worlds to Meenah's willingness to let him lead.

Also, as an aside: it's funny that Meenah's Jake handler in the resistance. She gets to boss an English around as cosmic retribution.

Great to get a better look at Karkat's inner turmoil too. Just to get confirmation he's still the same guy at heart. Leaving his mic open during heartfelt confessions is so on brand. It's fitting that that's what endears him to his followers. Seems close to how some of his most embarassing moments as leader of his session were easily forgiven by the other trolls + what ultimately served to help win the session.

I can't shake the feeling that all of the population of Earth C is just a wee bit too eager to follow their pantheon in everything unthinkingly. Devotion on par with carapaces unflinchingly following their royalty into war in the Medium, with a few notable exceptions.

Loving the Metal Gear Solid meets Suicide Squad asthetic that Karkat and his elite squad has going on there. I'm assuming of the trolls in the LOBsTERs, there's one highblood and one lowblood.

Sollux is, funnily enough, the best for Earth C in behaviour. Just minding his own, most of the time. His latest disability wouldn't be at all stopping him from being worshipped, if he at all wished it.

If it weren't for James' newspost, I would have figured the next page could already be a flash, but seems it might have to wait until Jane's army's arrived at the Meteor.

Still not sure what the effect of the Plot Point will be. We've got a few things up in the air.

It's going to make the Candy timeline relevant to the overal plot - which could mean a connection, portal or transportation effect to the Meat timeline. It might be connected to the machine underneath the curtain that Dirk's transporting.

If it's a Sburb game disc set, can you imagine the brawl that could play out over who gets to play? Then again, the way the Candy kids are a set of four, them connecting to Dirk & Rose's players might result in an eight-player session to mirror the B2 merged session.

Wild theory I came up with: what if it's Aradia's version of the Beat Mesa, an other version of the music crystals that Damara used to scratch the A1 session? Aka what if the Candy timeline has to be scratched to validate the Meat timeline as the 'true' timeline? In that case, there's probably a portal for the Candy kids to escape through, too. Assuming the Candy timeline would be erased by a scratch, it's not a session, after all. The only reason B1 Earth got evacuated by the carapacians were the imminent Red Miles - even though he was only out there to send them because he escaped the B1 session as it was being scratched, so, ehhhh.

Also, assuming Candy Universe C gets scratched, would that mean that in their version of Deltritus had Sburb portals opening up across the planet already, too, or not, you think? Probably not due to the effects of the black hole, but it’s fun to think about.

In any case, whatever's there, the implication is that the seed for it got carried over from the A2 session. Meaning Sburb/Sgrub has had this planned for a long, LONG time already.

====

Wow. Just. Wow.

This update did so much for us.

It canonized the non-credit snaps, meaning those Halloween snaps are also canon. And the fact that Jack Noir and Ms. Paint are in Universe C, on the moon.

Heheh, the rebellion shot a piece out of the moon and now it's perpetually crescent, like every moon symbol in Homestuck. And it's what the B2 session's Derse, Prospit & LOTAK ended up looking, I think?

But mainly. Jake grew up! In one conversation, he finally had enough of Jane's egotripping and spoke up!

Man, Tavros' childhood is like a mirror to Dave's, only his trauma is immediately apparent to us, since we read about it in the Epilogues. He ended up all softspoken and twitchy, Tavros like.

And that reference to Hiveswap! Yup, Jake's parenting skills leave something to be desired. At least he was there for Tavros more than Jude and Joey. And he used his Page powers to cure Tavros' allergy! The curse has been lifted!

Meanwhile, the first time is occuring where all Earth C kids are in the same room together. But it's the backdrop to this, the long overdue Jane & Jake heart-to-heart. In the spirit of Homestuck history, it occurs while they're not even in the same room nor even facetiming!

At least Jane acknowledges, finally, she did Tavros wrong. In fact, she sounded more like the old Jane than ever before.

But I think Jake might be on the right track. She might have internalized too much of the Condescension's megalomany.

Where Tavros was formed by his childhood into a personality close to Alternian Tavros… Jane internalized (consciously and subconsciously) so much of the Condescension's bullshit that she might have fit in as a fuschiablood!

I'm actually kind of relieved the faceless mooks she employs are all clones and not real Earth C humans. Maybe her actual support by the general populace is a lot more fragile than we've thought!

She went full Star Wars though. A clone army, a death laser on the moon?

I think Jake would benefit a bit from a talk with Nannasprite, especially since he's an adult now.

And boy, last appearance of Brain Ghost Dirk??? I'm kind of surprised to see that he might in fact have been disconnected from (Ultimate) Dirk all along! He seemed to know more than he should have, but it appears that was all related to the power of Hope!

The reveal that his eyes are as green as Jake's was definitely a nice touch.

It's shaping up to be a major face-off!

#homestuck #homestuck 2 #beyond canon #reaction #spoiler alert #upd8 #jake english #jane crocker #the felt #brain ghost dirk

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impossibleprincess35 · 6 months

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I love your stories but how do you write such long chapters? I am so behind and I want to catch up but every time I think I can you post another 10,000 word chapter. I need to take vacation time off from work so I can read your updates. Don't stop though. I will someday get through them.

I'm sorry, anon! I'm sorry! I don't know how to be brief. I love purple prose, I love internal dialogue, I love the intricacies of interactions between characters, and I'm a pain in the ass. I'm sorry.

But listen, updates to a fic shouldn't stress you out or make you feel inadequate or anything of the sort (unless you're the writer, because in that case, fuck your mental health, #askmehowIknow).

Read when you can/want - no worries! I'm gonna write regardless of whether anyone reads it, so take your time. It'll be here when you're ready for it.

(And if you throw in the towel and decide the word count is too much, thank you for making it as far as you did. I appreciate every second you spent in my little Obitine world.)

#asks answered #i fucking love my readers

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helldustedstories · 4 months

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wow nevermind, i wasnt trying to be weird just trying to compliment you but i take back my compliment

youre not like stolas at all and you should write stella instead since youre identical to her, a rude uppity bitch. learn to take compliments and dont assume its meant in an weird way

its no surprise you only write with the same 4 people bc youre rude and uppity and your writing might be good but its only purple prose

oh and you dont want to make other people feel bad but your always bragging and being uppity

enjoy your day i guess stella lmao

Again, normally I just delete this sort of thing and move on, especially because I don't like feeding into any sort of "drama." But at this point, this is about more than just me. This is about boundaries.

Unfortunately, I am forced to do this publicly because by choosing to continue to contact me anonymously, I have absolutely no way of having any sort of nuanced discussion with you about why the messages you've been sending me have not been okay and have crossed my boundaries several times over.

You don't know my history or what I've experienced. I don't owe you anything. But because we're doing this, I guess it's time to pull out that history and to explain to you exactly why what you did wasn't okay, especially this last message.

I have been stalked on tumblr before. It started out very similar to your first message, which I do still have saved, seeming very positive and encouraging, but it made me uncomfortable. So when I didn't answer, I got another message, this time asking to see a picture of me. I am normally fine with sharing pictures for munday sometimes, or if I feel like I'm rocking a particular look, but having someone I don't know on the internet blatantly asking, even if it is couched in another 'compliment' is wildly uncomfortable.

Again, I understand that neither of those things were malicious and were even likely well-intentioned, but respecting people's privacy online is something that is important. And when I didn't answer either of the first asks, that should have been your cue to let it go. I even turned anon off for a while because the first two made me uncomfortable.

I ended up turning it back on and got another ask, and this one felt even more bait-y than the first two. Protip: if you start a sentence with "no offense," what comes after it is usually going to be offensive. If you also have to add that something can be seen 'in a good way,' then you are acknowledging that it can also be seen in a bad way, and continuing to push that on someone else is probably not the best idea.

And when the majority of the messages go "compliment by putting other people down - actual thesis of the ask, trying to push your own thoughts onto others - other compliment putting other people down," it doesn't actually feel very much like a sincere compliment anyway. It feels like a way to continue to push your own thoughts and feelings on other people by dressing it up as though you're complimenting them.

I also have deep-seated trauma when it comes to random, unsolicited praise from people I don't know, especially when it's worded in the way that you did. Is it something I've been working on? Yes, absolutely. But telling me "learn to take a compliment" is a deeply triggering phrase, so congratulations, you're getting this whole rant instead of me just deleting and moving on.

What you said to me was not a compliment. If you have to put other people down to build someone else up, that's not helping anyone.

You sure seem to know a lot about what I post and who I write with. If you wanted to write with me and didn't get the chance, for that I am sorry. But it would have been much better if you had approached me either by sending me an ask with your actual URL or sending me an IM. I'm always happy to write with more people, but it's a two-way street. I do my best to reach out to people, to send memes, write open starters, etc, but if people don't reach back out to me, I can't exactly force anyone to interact with me.

Also, to all of your other points, part of the reason I write Stolas so well is because I've been where he is. Not exactly, not entirely, but I've been in an abusive relationship was for years. Kept going back to them despite everything because I didn't think anyone else would ever want me. Wrecked havoc on my self-esteem and my ability to form normal relationships with other people.

So sure, you can call me Stella all you want, say I'm an "uppity bitch," but I'd honestly love to see what you're referring to. I have done everything in my power to be as calm and level-headed as possible, and the only reason I am currently addressing this at all is because it has now become harassment.

If you have something you want to say to me, you are still welcome to send me an ask as yourself or IM me, and I'll be more than happy to have an actual discussion. But otherwise, please leave me alone. Please don't do this to someone else, either. You don't know their history and what might send them spiraling. If you want to send someone an anonymous compliment or try to brighten someone's day by telling them they're doing something well, then stop with that part. Make it specific, not just a generalization. If you like someone's headcanons, tell them that; if you like the graphics they edit, mention that. But don't use sending a compliment as an excuse to push your own agenda on other people, and if they don't reply, leave them alone.

#✎ helldustedstories : ooc #✎ helldustedstories : answered #[not quite sure how to really tag this]#harassment mention tw #stalking mention tw #[ask to tag anything else]#[may delete later actually]

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ghostsbimbowrites · 6 months

Text

3 poems for my English class

so I'm taking creative writing this semester! We had to do an ode to things that people don't usually find beautiful, a prose poem to something haunting, and a pocket poem. TW: One poem heavily implies self harm/self injury. I've been working on these since March 7th, and just now got the last poem done.

please note: I AM OKAY. my inner 13 year old self took over writing these and I am so sorry.

Beauty of Growth Dark, deep purple lines stand out on her thighs & arms Showing health & growing in an unsightly way Causing years of insecurity and self doubt But with love and care, people's feelings change Just like the person looking in the mirror. She can start to see the beauty In being healthy again She starts to appreciate where she has gotten From the long journey of recovery & years of self hatred. She’s starting to love herself again, despite the dark, deep purple lines.

A scream for help. [ TW: Self harm implied. ] It’s an all too familiar feeling. The scars scattered across my body from the self inflicted pain show it. They’re permanent & they’re not going anywhere despite the scar removal creams and countless other things out on the market that promise to make them go away. That familiar feeling though will always be stuck, even if the scars do fade over time and become less noticeable. It’ll always be the thing I want to turn to when things get rough. I will always want that familiar calming sting. I’ll always want the sight of blood just to know that whatever emotional turmoil I’m going through is real. Even though, once in a while, that feeling will return even if I’m okay. I’m going to want the sting, the blood, and the numb feeling a razor brings.

Shutting things up Shutting the world away Would make life so much easier for healing, won’t it?

#rat writes #.txt #poetry

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ronearoundblindly · 5 months

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sending this w love but it's really hard to read ur comments if they're purple *and* tiny

First and foremost, thank you. That is good to know, that is a great example of constructive criticism, and I appreciate you helping me make what I write more user-friendly for readers.

Second, this has stirred something in me that I cannot tamp down, and so here goes a well-meaning rant. Sorry in advance (especially if this is one of my moots on anon).

There are several reasons I do the tiny, purple text; among them are personal esthetics, good conditioning, and bad conditioning.

I don't know why I've sorta chosen purple/lavender/etc as a theme for a while, but meh, I like it, and to have purple text show up works with the theme. Speaking of themes, Tumblr has various ways you can see your dash, called 'palettes' I think, and mine is set to idk 'goth rave' or something which has purple text on black as the default. It's easier on my eyes and makes the tiny, purple text stand out nicely in my draft posts. Because that's how I see them when formatting, I didn't notice it might be much harder on a white background or any of the other palettes. Thank you for pointing it out! I hadn't thought of that.

This might also be me as a distracted person, but the visual of a divider such as this:

...doesn't seem like enough of an end-cap to the actual story portion of the post, so I change the way the A/N looks afterward to really separate the two. (Special shoutout to the fact that the divider's message seems utterly useless in encouraging/reminding readers to leave comments or reblog. You've all heard that tirade. Let's just say I know the reminder is ignored, so I gotta try something else as a transition.)

Writing/posting on this platform, as you may have heard, is a bit of a crapshoot mixed bag. Readers feel limited both in number and in time, so we creators tend to try various things to make our posts stand out, to make them appealing. Color or text variation is one of those ways. Now, I have no flippin' idea how to get rainbow or gradient text; I barely figured out how to put hyperlinks into my bio, bless my heart, so there's little chance of my blog looking super unique or fancy. Instead I vary the look between actual prose and my notes/warnings/summaries, which leads me to the sad bit.

I am conditioned by this site and others to understand that you are here to consume content. That content is the writing that I have curated and edited into a story which doesn't involve me, just the character of 'you' and other OCs or canon IP, so my thoughts and opinions are not and never have been the reason anyone follows me. Those are quite literally small compared to the actual work I generate.

I still think of comment reblogs as flooding your dash with stuff most of you have already seen. I think I'm being annoying--even though I know it's the only way to have my writing go farther on this site--and because I will do so very, very much IRL to *not* annoy anyone, I put opinion and random side comments and little thoughts in small text that is color-coded so you can ignore it as "not-story bits."

It is taking everything in me to NOT make this small text or purple. Honestly, my palms are sweating so badly, I've wiped my computer keyboard four times.

No, I don't want anything to be hard for you to see or read. Yes, I am really grateful you pointed this out. *Do* please remember that we are all doing the best we can to get the experience we want from Tumblr by customizing what we can.

The comment I posted in tiny, purple text immediately before this was sent to me has been changed to regular, default color. Hopefully that helps, and I will try to keep in mind how things will look in the future.

I did purposefully choose to not put a readmore in this post fwiw.

#ro answers #ro rants #thank you for reading but remember to share #not this post #like this is not the post you need to share #it's just fyi stuff

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deadboyfriendd · 6 months

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hello i hope ur well. firstly, i want to apologise from ahead because this is likely going to be a long ask as i am very bad at being succinct and precise and i truly am sorry about that. this ask is basically a lengthy compliment(s)(?)/maybe some questions about your series "cochise". i confess i hadn't read any of it before you posted the last one because i'm not a very big eddie fan (i felt quite neutral on him in the show up until his death), but i decided to give it a go, partly because i was missing the wild west from your bisbee letters, and partly out of curiosity. and my god. what a fool you made of me. that shit was so good dude, genuinely. you answered in a previous ask that your writing style can lean towards purple prose, and i really felt like it's a feature, not a bug in your case. i really felt the vivid imagery you described, especially of the heat and the dryness of the desert, and i really appreciate the tone that your intricate words built, both in terms of feeling the age of the story, as well as lent it a gothic western feel that really struck a nerve with me.

like i said before, the descriptions of the desert setting itself really stood out to me, but i wanted to point this one in particular from chapter 1: "When it brought the heat back with a haughty laughter and a heart full of vengeance...The cereus blossom fragrant with rot that filled the stagnant night air and its timely beauty". this line of the blossom reminded me of my grandfather's home in karachi from over a decade ago. his birthday was last week and for a moment, i could smell the jasmines climbing up the boundary wall in his garden again. you've spoken before how you feel connected to your grandfather through your western works because of his love for the desert and for his western novels, and i just wanted to share how much that line meant to me, truly. he passed away a long time ago and i find myself forgetting things, so it's really nice when i get parts of him back, so. thank you for that.

i also really loved the way you described Nellie's grief. I remember once I asked you something a long the lines of how your characters all felt so unique to each story despite al being reader inserts, and you talked a little bit about how Nellie was a way to process grief and heal with Eddie. There was such a feeling of Nellie's grief lingering throughout the story, at times large and somewhat violent, but mostly it felt just present in the home, like it was a part of it. This description in chapter two really fascinated me: "He laid in bed at night next to the shell of grief that resembled you, the decanter on the table filled with tears of loneliness and guilt." Idk the image of someone's grief so shapeful, and so essential to their being that it makes their form was a very powerful image, and the thought iof it cast in shadows because of the decanter really played into that gothic western aesthetic i enjoyed. Later on in the chapter, when you wrote, "That holy shape becomes a devil, best.", I thought it was so interesting how the grief over their spouse, a loyalty to their marriage, could turn into a "devil", and i think it really beautifully summarised the whole deal with guilt specifically. That no matter how righteous or justified we feel it is, it's not meant to be held onto, and it's best to let go of it, and can really turn into a much darker thing the longer you keep it with you and allow it to shape you. i also loved the way you mirrored it to eddie's grief here, "He stared at the hole in the floor, the discolored groove where you had scrubbed your knuckles bloody and raw. He thought about the him-shaped divot he had scrubbed into the frozen planes of Montana". The contrast of the desert and the cold, both equally difficult terrains to navigate and both nellie and eddie trying to scrape their grief out of that terrain, mapping out both their desperation and the difficulty of trying to get the grief out is so powerful and oh my god the description of her bloody knuckles was so raw, i could like feel the sting of bleach on my own fingers. And as much cool work you did with pointing things out, there's also this cool line here in i think chapter 2, "That emptiness would always linger, but that coldness of keys was now not for the absence of his warmth. They just were." and i think it's so powerful to describe how the absence of something can be it's own thing, that can then drain away into being not-about-the-absence-anymore. i've heard a lot of writing advice about how the worst thing to do is to try to explain something that's not there, the darkness, the silence, the not-thereness, and instead focus on what the absence leaves behind, and this was a really good example of that.

i also loved how many small descriptions were sort of called back on and made a reprisal in the beginning and ending of your story, and it makes me wonder how much of this was pre planned and how much of it was sort of improv/ a decision made later. For example, in chapter one, you have this paragraph that describes eddie watching nellie's bet time routine, "He watched the way your skin rippled at your lower back as your bare skin pressed against your vanity stool, and the way your skin stretched over your shoulder blades as you pulled your hair to the side, raking through it with the brush in front of you. Your lips fell into a supple pout in concentration, and your lashes kissed your cheeks as you looked down. He could feel the windowsill digging into his palms, it grounded him– kept him from free-floating into the stagnant desert air." and it's sort of right before he has that wet dream about her, but it's repeated in i think chapter v, and i think it's such a cool way to show how his "dreams" have come true, that this sort of dreamy, idea of a person was made more real for them, that instead of watching her intimate ritual from a distance and imagining being with her, he gets to see it from inside her bedroom and actually be with her. But then there was also the description of death twice, once in chapter 2, "There is a split second in which you can see the silver line between life and death, in which you can walk the plane between realms. There reaps a morosity heavy on your heart in the fractions of a second before a man’s life ends." and in chapter 4, "There is a gilded line between life and death. In that moment, the sun shines too bright, the hum of the earth becomes deafening. The desert respires one heavy and pungent sigh. And all is silent again... A silent prayer washes over the desert." This mirroring in the ways you describe witnessing death is so interesting and i think really striking about that final second before it happens, and calling it this silver line, this gilded line, filling in this in-betweenness with something extra and sort of suspending it between two worlds, is really special, especially when you suspend the moment in two different halves of your story, making readers feel equally suspended in the in-between, though with lower stakes. I also feel like this in-between space makes perfect room for your final chapter that also sort of takes place with a lot of in-between dimension with christine and wilhelm, of grieving someone but not letting them die, of dying but not dying, of seeing and having dinner with ghosts but not dancing with them. And it sort of cuts through the injustice and harshness of michael and milt's deaths as well, that were bloody and violent, and sort of, not neutralises them, but creates another mode of death for them which is super interesting in this terrain that's been described as ever expansive, ever present, and ever difficult, an escape from a place that has no escape.

i also really loved the way you wrote about nellie and eddie's affection for each other. These two lines from chapters 3 and 4, "Tonight, you think you will unmake the left side of the bed." and "He feels real again, like he’s standing in front of you. You reach for his hand but find Eddie’s instead." is soooo good in contrast and extending from the house described as a large ghost for wilhelm. the sort of impression that eddie leaves in the house of his presence getting stronger and stronger, until his boots are in the same spot as wilhelm's, is really cool and just a nice way to sort of build up the fractured feeling that nellie's house has. also there's this line, "This feeling was not akin to butterflies and moths. It was frantic, more persistent. Like that of the hummingbirds that drank from the cactus blossoms in the cooler mornings.". i don't have anything to say about that other than it's very pretty and i like it a lot. there's also this line i found very interesting, "On this day, you wear white. Married to your grief and eloped to this place…You would not be healed today, but you say you will never die." It's very stark imagery for sure, both the idea of a bride to grief and mountain, it makes these characters feel very elemental and not totally of this realm, and i understand they are like totally human, it does feel like it gives them access to the in-between realm of life an death, and the idea that there is a place between life and death where you don't die, feel like a very plausible thing. and it makes sense too, for someone whose healing as a widow, that half her heart is in another realm, that she's married to someone whose in another plane of existence, so like, why can't she marry a mountain where she's having sex??

also, everytime you mentioned steve alli could think was "my man my man my man" and reaaaaaalllyyyyy excited me for bisbee! this line especially, from chapter 2, "Steve’s eyes had hardened from something stone-cold to something ablaze. His eyes reaped the anger of the afternoon sun, alight with anger. Anger from defiance. Anger for Milt." captivated me so much. all that anger both for the in justice of milt's death as well the injustice of the mob was welded together so well, it made me very excited to get to know him more whenever/if you ever decide to continue bisbee, and the line in chapter 4 when he apologises to michael before putting the noose on him made for a very great snapshot of what justice looks like for steve, as like this duty that must be done by him with a backdrop of endless injustice and hardship but also hates that it's him that has to do it because of the necessary violence that comes with it. it made the sort of monologuing on violence he did in bisbee letters sort of more foreshadow-y for me. Also, i'm very excited to see nellie's cousin, you mentioned once that she was like more naive and sort of pushing steve's buttons, which fascinates me because steve seems just so stoic and like singularly focused that anything getting underneath his skin seems sort of funny, and makes me that much more excited to see the hijinks this girl gets to.

i think this is all i want to say, and i am aware it's a monster giant of an ask, and i really am sorry about that, i just had a lot of thoughts about your lovely story that i wanted to share both because i want you to know how much your story means to me and how in awe of your talent and skill i am, and how excited i am to read any and all future works from you, and if you have any insights to share about anything, please please please do tell, they would all be valuable!! your a real talent and i know it takes skill and drive and determination to build on a craft and i just want you to know that it is appreciated very much.

oh my god hi!

Sorry I'm just not getting around to this, I, unfortunately, am one of the people that take 7-10 business days to reply to a text message.

So, first off, PLEASE don't apologize to me about this response because I'm still flabbergasted that anyone thinks I am as smart an talented as the people on this website do. I mean, seriously, everyone here gives me way more credit than I'm worth.

So, in reference to the night-blooming cereus. I LOVE writing about it in any sort of desert setting. I am so touched that you thought of your granddad because it also makes me think of mine. He had a night-blooming cereus cactus that he tended to relentlessly and that we continue to care for. We haven't been lucky enough to see a bloom for it yet, but I hope one day I get to. As I've mentioned before, my first real taste of mourning and grief were through his passing, and this story was my way to rationalize that for myself.

As for Nellie's grief, I think one of the hardest things for me to navigate in this was how to write the mourning as "old enough to be healed but new enough to still hurt". I wanted it to be a nagging feeling, something in the back of her mind constantly, always threatening to bubble back up, but simultaneously trying to figure out how to not make it consume her. She was always Nellie, the grief was the obstacle for her to overcome. It was never her entire character and I never felt like my own grief was ever an extension of myself but rather this big ugly storm cloud that likes to loom over me sometimes. Again, my first real, big struggle with it was through my granddad's passing. It's been three years and it still looms around. I don't think I will ever NOT feel it. And I really wanted to encompass that in this story. I'm still ME, just like Nellie is still Nellie and Eddie is still Eddie. Just with new, big feelings. The reason she feels it so much in the home is because I felt it so much in mine. A big part of my granddad was his antique collection. We ended up with a lot of it and then it served as a constant reminder. It literally felt like every little thing reminded me of him because I searched for him in everything. As for the depiction of guilt as the devil, especially in the constant back and forth incantation of Faustus. That was a happy accident. They watch Faustus in tombstone and this bit ended being left in. Eddie was originally supposed to be a lot more closed-off. There was going to be way more of a storyline with him as a vigilante lawman or a bandolero. Eddie wasn't supposed to be a good guy, he was supposed to be someone way more hardened off my grief than Nellie. He was supposed to have more blood on his hands and be way more rough around the edges, but as I wrote, the story turned into Nellie's story- MY story, and Eddie became a mirror reflection and a catalyst for the softening woman. Feminine rage was a huge turning point for their dynamic because I felt that rage. I felt like scrubbing my knuckles raw and I felt like the devil and I felt like the villain because I, myself, was being overtaken with feeling.

As for the story itself, the original storyline was already planned. Everything with mudsill and milt was always going to be the plan. The biggest major change I made to the storyline was the finale. It was going to open in their wedding during the superbloom, and, the more I tried to write a wedding with vows, the worse it felt and the more it felt like I was writing it because that's what everyone else wanted to hear. And then I realized that this is MY story and this isn't who they are. They can be tied to each other in their grief for now and learn how to not be tied to that later. They aren't happily ever after people. The west never was. There is happiness in content, and content was what they were searching for the entire time. I wrote the finale in a single evening because it it felt right for them. I wasn't going to push more purple prose and draw the story out to a 15k word chapter. I summarized them the way they needed to be. Even if it was weird and dreamy. It was right for them. As for everything else you mentioned, I will say this: Yes, I refer back to previous parts when I write a lot but I always thought it was lazy writing lmao. You give me a LOT more credit for my work than I deserve.

Okay okay okay, I will admit that I'm completely going to be leveraging milt's death in bisbee. So, the way I'm finding the storyline working out currently is, he was writing letters back and forth the Elsie the entire time. In my most recent letter, he is discussing hanging Mudsill and the blood he feels on his hands. I am SO excited to write how the events in the Doten v. Tombstone case will affect the rest of my characters, and how the sheriff will have to navigate situations as the singular resident lawman from now on. It is a HUGE part of where Bisbee is headed and I am SO EXCITED to dip my hands in it and torture this ken doll. This Steve is going to be violent. He's going to be more impulsive. He's going to be drenched in blood and really play into what I think the actual character could come to when he gets pushed that far. And this violence and impulsiveness will 100% be tested by Elsie. It's going to be a huge part of their story.

I am holding this ask gently in my hands and kissing it. THANK YOU for bearing with me through cochise and THANK YOU for letting me scream about my cowboys, because I love them a lot.

#flea writes #flea speaks #flea answers #flea's friends

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faerywhimsy · 1 year

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Hello, I would like to linger on the topic of Armand and love in (primarily) the setting of TVL.

"What do we have now! Answer me! Nothing but the love of each other and what can that mean to creatures like us!"

Working backwards for a hot minute, this is the last appearance we have from Armand in The Vampire Lestat. It comes immediately before Armand tosses Lestat out of the very tower Lestat so graciously gifted to him.

Symbolism? Oh my heart, I lived for this sort of stuff during my English degree.

Anyone who's read a single page of TVC knows that love is pretty much prized above all things in the world of these vampires. It's... pretty much the only thing all of them by some unspoken agreement seem to hold dear. Even Rhoshamandes (one of many scions of Akasha) from the Prince Lestat at least appears to gain something from the affection between him and his fledgling Benedict. But I'm definitely getting ahead of myself.

Sorry guys, strap in if you wanna. This is gonna be another long meta post.

To go from the end right back to the beginning, something about Lestat does seem to bring Armand back to 'life'. And, in response, just the sight of him makes Lestat gasp. Armand is "perfect", "dazzling", "incarnate beauty". His voice is "teasing", his eyes are "fathomless". I've read bodice rippers with prose less purple than this.

Okay, fine, it turns out a lot of this is all a mind fuck from Armand to Lestat but I've already written a longer interpretation of that over here (and thank god because it just wouldn't have fit here). Just because we're seeing Armand's use of the mind gift does not necessarily invalidate some feelings behind it. Armand is one tightly wound, fucked up ball of crazy at this point in the eighteen century, and everything of him this early kinda has to be read through that lens.

All night you've been searching for me, he said, and here I am, waiting for you. I have been waiting for you all along. Dear God, this is love. This is desire. And all my past amours have been but the shadow of this.

Ultimately, Lestat's rejection of Armand after this is pretty brutal. He (correctly) manages to ascertain how much of a threat Armand poses to him, despite their both being of the blood. Later he even marvels at how he was able to overcome Armand in the brutal beating that followed. (My personal head canon is simple: Armand let him).

Yet still, Armand asks to be loved by Lestat and, thereafter, begs Lestat to be allowed to travel with he and Gabrielle. So when you read the disavow of love Armand makes—after Lestat has left him and returned to him, only to promise to leave him once more—it feels pretty clear Lestat went and fucked Armand all up and down. (I also wanna mention that meta post I think about often and is basically my head canon, on Armand's PoV in The Vampire Armand that shows him again rebounding hard in the wake of being rejected yet again. Let's face it, this is realistically an immutable part of Armand's character.)

How much of an impact did Lestat's rejection of Armand have? Allow me to put it this way: It takes him almost two hundred years for Armand to find his heart again after Lestat, but no more than forty years after Daniel before he finds some solace and makes house with Louis in Trinity Gate (kinda important to me to make this point given the consensus in fanon is Daniel is Armand's great love story).

Finally, there's a part of me that can't help but wonder how things might have gone differently, had Lestat not brashly come back with impossible demands of Armand. Would Armand have been capable of forgiving Lestat if he hadn't come talking about how little he actually needed Armand after he used Armand for a draught of his healing blood?

When Lestat first sees him again, he uses such words as "brilliant light burning in him", "thinly veiled excitement", "caressingly", "soft and compassionately" to describe Armand's attention. This is moments before Lestat goes off at the mouth.

And... just... damn, man. Maybe it would have been best to face Marius and his measly "condemnation" is all I'm saying. At least Marius wasn't in love and the worst he (probably??) would have done was turn his back on Lestat. No wonder, honestly. These are all immortal blood drinkers we're talking about, not a high end wine tasting.

#yikes this might be my most galaxy post of them all #nik re-reads TVC #the vampire lestat #lestat de lioncourt #armand #vc shitpost #the vampire armand #prince lestat #rhoshamandes

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grubliinu · 1 year

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Hello, apologies if this is interrupting your day but i absolutely in love with your writing which is very immersive! I want to write like you. Do you have any recommendations for sources and tips of writing for beginners? Also thank you so much for all the fics. Love them <3

Aaaa oh my gosh this comment just made my day, thank you so much I'm really flattered you think so highly of my writing skills! Sorry it took me a while to reply, I have been busy and wanted to take my time writing a reply. Hopefully, you'll find this useful!

I can't think of any specific sources I have used but my tumblr should have some stuff if you search the ''writing'', writing stuff'' and writing reference'' tags (I think those are the ones I use but man, I really should organize them better lmao) But here are also some other tips I use frequently while writing that I can think from the top of my head:

1) Make a separate document to ''doodle'' on This is a big one for me. I'm not quite sure what kind of writer you are (are you the type to meticulously plan everything before you start writing, or do you go with the flow?) so I don't know how useful this is for you, but I am strictly the former. When I start planning a fic, I make two files – the actual fic, and a separate document that is basically a sketchbook but for writing. There, I write down everything, from ideas to random bits of dialogue that I thought sounded cool and could be used in the future.

Another thing this doodle document is super useful for is creating summaries. Since I write a lot of angst, I often have to write scenes that deal with the character's emotions and inner thoughts. While I like writing that type of stuff, I often struggle to articulate my thoughts and interpretation into something coherent that I can put into words and I have discovered that simply writing a short breakdown essay of every aspect I want to explore in that particular scene. For example, in chapter 4 of Lungs Full of Roses, when Childe destroys the hilichurl camp, in that scene, I wanted to establish how he views his relationship with the tsaritsa and family, as well as reveal how he really feels about Zhongli, so I wrote separate sections for Tsaritsa, Childe's family, and Zhongli, and how Childe feels about them using very simple terms.

I also tend to never erase anything from those documents so that I can revisit an idea in the future. Instead, I just make the font smaller for those parts!

2) Balance between purple prose and ''pragmatic'' (idk what to call it really) This is especially related to your question since this is something that is constantly on my mind as I write – I love using a poetic style of writing full of words that I think sound pretty. However, I personally can't read writing that only consist of that type of purple prose, so I often have to resist the temptation to add more poetic flair to the more mundane parts. But honestly, sometimes you just gotta focus on making the plot move from point A to point B and that's okay! Every sentence doesn't have to be a work of art – in fact, I personally think (or hope in the case of my own writing) that saving the poetics for the more emotional scenes makes them hit even deeper.

3) Use gestures to convey emotions This is like an actual tip from writers but it's also something I try to be aware of when I write. Instead of using something like 'he felt angry', try something like 'he clenched his fist' etc. to convey the anger. The Internet is full of lists of body language and gestures that are created for writers and I recommend checking those out! You can also use metaphors to convey emotions – using the example above, you could write something like ''anger surged through him like a wave''. I like to mix gestures and metaphors.

You can also use the structure of the sentence to convey emotion. For example, if the character is angry, use short sentences. If they're panicking, convey that panic by using a longer sentence that just kinda spirals into panic. (I don't know how to explain so here's an example from Lungs Full of Roses where Childe is both angry and panicking lmao)

[Childe breathed in. Out. He felt trapped, like a giant beast in a small cage, and Archons how he hated it. Hated how his skin crawled with the need for action, hated how his instincts were screaming at him about nonexistent eyes watching his every movement even though he knew that he was alone. A part of him, the part that had been forged by the suffocating mists of the Abyss, itched to destroy his room, no, actually the room wasn't enough – destroy the hotel, the city, the whole goddamn region that prided itself on the fictitious freedom and cloying wine until nothing but ashes remained.]

As you might have noticed, I wrote ''he felt trapped'' – which is what I just said to avoid. However, I remember thinking that the scene needed something short and simple and I figured that this was the way to go – which goes to show that the rules of writing aren't set in stone and you can absolutely break them if you want (imo the only rule I think everyone should follow is to USE PARAGRAPHS if you write fics, it is really hard to read fics that don't use them)

Annnd that's about what I can currently think of, hopefully, there was something that you find useful! My writing style is something that has been developing for over ten years so it is hard for me to like actually explain it so I'm really sorry this is so disjointed. Again, thank you so much for your kind words, I'm so glad that you sent me this message anon!

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