#if i feel motivated i might make a oneshot out of this concept

[johnslittlespoon]

that post about bucky and all the dog metaphors actually has me shaking like i just had a panera charged lemonade dose of caffeine THE WAY IVE BEEN CONSIDERING THE EXACT SAME THINGS BUT I THOUGHT I WAS CRAZY please please write this im serious ill start writing john on his knees figurative leash is buck's hand if you do like i've already got it in my head im gonna think about it for the rest of the week anyway might as well

SJDGKK THIS HAS ME GIGGLING. I KNOW I KEEP SAYING IT BUT YES DOG CODED BUCKY IS MY FAVOURITE TROPE IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD.

i am ABSOLUTELY writing the hell out of it, the amount of ideas i have for it would eat away at what few braincells i have left otherwise, and it makes me SO happy that other people love the concept just as much, it's so motivating honestly and i'm so thrilled that i get to yap about it here <33

also i know you said figurative leash but i've thought a god awful amount about gale actually collar–and–leashing john in a worrying amount of scenarios (gale holding him close with the leash while he has john on his knees and he's buried deep in his throat, gale using his leash like a handhold while he's fucking john doggy(ha)style, gale tying john to the bed post with his leash and making him watch while he touches himself, etc etc.)

the dog thing was meant to just be a maybe 3–4k word oneshot originally, but lately i've been feeling maybe a 3–4 part thing, not a chaptered fic because as soon as i call it that i know i'll feel too intimidated to write it LOL but more so a short fic? idk. i just know there's a lot of feelings–heavy stuff i wanna get into with it, but also a lot of smut ideas, but most of them won't fit naturally into the flow of the oneshot, so i'm foreseeing at LEAST one or two pwp oneshots set in the same fic lol.

it's gonna be a lot but i just. ugh. john egan is dog coded au is everything to me okay <33 it feels like my baby and it's not even written yet! i haven't even decided on a title but it's got its own playlist and everything already lol i'm in so deep :')

[gravedigest]

Gonna answer this over here, hope you don’t mind.

Oops it’s gonna be rambling I am so sorry

A lot of my writing winds up being freestyle, and getting something going takes four or five tries to stick the opener, like pulling the cord on an engine to get it to start. I have like three 2k word versions of how I wanted Doing Something to go, and one of them actually has Sanford in Hank’s place and Sanford’s more like a refrigerator than a runaway lawnmower. It wasn’t as fun to write, so I shucked it into the “neat concept, I’ll fuck with it later” bin.

Which is fine, I can have as many half-formed ideas as I want because I have the storage space for it.

From there I kinda write out little scene chunklets that I can rearrange or swap out with eachother, I’ll be thinking about the next scene I wanna do while I’m writing a different chunk, or thinking about an old chunk while writing a new one that I can slot in between that’ll make the overall story more coherent. So like, giving Doc a motive for specifically using Deimos to pilot Hank? I didn’t have one for a really fucking long time, then I was writing I think, like, Deimos’ meltdown and was like “Okay actually Deimos is going to be Doom. You can run Doom on anything.”

Then once I get my chunklets in a row I can go back over and add in more shit, and it makes it really easy to change details. Hank in the restaurant, how did he get to the restaurant? Fuck it. He was holed up in the tower this whole time and it was right next door. I’ll mention Deimos smells something burnt up in that other scene, weeeeee~

I kinda got this whole method from just writing vignettes? HNMT is a pretty obvious example of shoving a bunch of little scenes together to make something longer. I was using the research notes in that to kind of give hard stops so I didn’t need to stitch everything together as much. Because I’m lazy. And being lazy means you come up with fun ways to cut corners like that.

Tis how the first livestreaming video was invented. People didn’t wanna go stand up to see if the coffee was done, so they just hooked up a camera to a network and forced it to stream the video. I think I remember that right, take it with a shaker of salt, I ain’t remember shit good.

I highly recommend just doing a shitload of self indulgent vignettes though, just a bunch of scenes you want to read that don’t have to be connected to each other that you don’t have to do anything with. Eventually you might wind up connecting some of them together and extrapolating on a concept, and you can snowball from there.

Or just make a fun little oneshot, Workday is from a 30k document of what amounts to practicing each character individually in a bunch of scenarios, kind of just getting a feel of how I can have people interact and differentiate them from one another. It also just has a lot of stupid dialogue.

I fucking love writing dialogue. It’s really bad. But also neat when you can figure out how to give characters enough voice to where you don’t get confused about who’s saying what without having to say “he said, they said, x explained” yadda yadda. I use that thing as a reference for how I write each character to kind of gage consistency, and I’m not the best at it but I sure am getting better.

So, yeah. I get distracted really easily and this all sort of helps direct me being distracted into getting more work done than I would’ve if I had to follow a real outline, playing with legos instead of worrying about brick and mortar.

TLDR: Mostly freestyle, then editing in the plot beats that form naturally from that.

@ya-killin-me-smalls

[cinnabundoll]

Chat is any of you interested in hearing out the concepts I made for Due's and Just's backstories

I've only explained it to only one person ��� I have the concept down but if I were to make a oneshot of it I'd evaporate

If yes, ↓

Due's Pre Escape Backstory, with a temporary name of "The day you and the stars disappeared" (the title could be interchangeable) explores his story before becoming a runaway from the institution he grew up in.

The main goal was to explain his motive as to why he ran away in the first place and what motivated him to do so. (This is his human version) His story is heavily inspired by The Promised Neverland and Chapter 3-4 from Reverse 1999

----------------------

"Justice"s Backstory, no name yet, explores his life before becoming a knight and overall protector of the kingdom. The extra I added was that there were two genocides that happened instead of one, The first involving the loss of Just's mentor and the 2nd is the one from his reference.

I gave Just and the child some dynamic, making the child one of his students, (it's like a loophole/phenomenon of the kingdom, the protector being killed by their student something something, Just is the one who breaks that samsara)

Just is a teacher pre knight as he wanted to take the role his previous mentor did after those years of teaching him. Again, Inspired by Chapter 5 of Reverse 1999

And the rest are just bits of puzzle pieces I've tried to conjoined to add more into these.

Please note these are just concepts!(well might as well call these headcanons?) These were meant to be for fun and not taken as canon, although some of my headcanons do connect with these stories ^_^ especially with Due's since i wanted to explore more of his behaviors and add more meaning to them

Feel free to send an ask for any questions regarding these concepts! Or just any headcanons I have for The Sillies in general! (⁠✷⁠‿⁠✷⁠)

"Justice" belongs to @angeutblogo

Due belongs to @dantemoths-lair

[asukaskerian]

(Cherry wine ask!)

The way you write complex political stages that have such powerful undercurrents of cultural significance is SO CAPTIVATING TO ME. The way you combine the political world building with ABO plot is awesome. How do you figure out how far in depth to go? Do you find it a struggle to balance the plot development (with such complex machinations and layers) with the ABO side?

ahhhh #^__^# thank you.

the political stuff honestly just happens, and KEEPS HAPPENING.

... hm. actually i might be conceptualizing clans and political entities (countries, villages etc) like characters in their own right? kinda sorta. wow, i never thought about it like that, but basically? characters have set parameters for behavior/range of IC moods/atmosphere-mouthfeel which vary with outside pressure and a path (or several) for evolution due to outside pressure and inner growth and conflicts with other characters, and so must political entities? huh.

anyway when i wordbuild i'm usually sitting here going :

ohhhh i had a fun anthropological idea the other day (month, year) from reading that article, wonder if i can retool it so this clan can use it

alright, WHY is it like this... let's make up a historical reason.

ok now this historical event/pressure might have caused other developments elsewhere actually and i need a contrasting habit/tradition so let's give THAT development to this other clan so we can root the conflict through their mutual history and make it feel more solid

wait shit this is giving me OTHER possibilities for ELSEWHERE

etc etc

it's basically just my brain going "what IF" and giving me five answers to every background question, and since i'm a squirrel i try to fit all of it in. :/

i've been wrestling with the ABO genre for, uh, a LONG while, desperately trying to make it make sense, which is why my tag is ABO quest in the first place. because it's hot as fuck! and i love humans with weird nonhuman mindsets! but it DOESN'T MAKE ANY EVOLUTIONARY SENSE. and like, if the betas do nothing the alpha/omega dynamic is basically "alpha male stereotype/swooning female stereotype (+ the guy who does the laundry and MAYBE gets to give sage advice). and i also love polyamory and different concepts of family/romance group worldbuildings! so when i remembered that fraternal marriage was a thing i was like "oooooohhhh" and then it was just a long game of "ok but how does THAT interact with this and that part of the warring clans clusterfuck".

if i were writing just politics it would be too dry to keep me interested but if i only wrote romance and porn i would =__= "ok the outside world exists tho, this is soooo unrealistic" all the way through. unless it's a oneshot i can't be motivated by "the fallout is that they get to fuck", and if it's just cardboard cutout characters making Important Events Happen i can't make myself care. human element plz!

... ok but the real struggle is that i always end up having a bazillion super cool ideas and forgetting to save them into a word document for later.

[colossal-red]

have some g/t fundy questions to clash with your no motivation!! answer whenever you have the time :)

do you see fundy as more of a tiny or a giant? or perhaps a mini-giant or sizeshifter? :0

what's your favorite g/t au/oneshot with fundy in it? ps. i'd be hype to find some fics if you'd like them :]

how are fundy's borrowing skills? is he more clumsy or put-together? ramble about borrower!fundy headcannons, please /nf

if fundy were to be a borrower, who's house would he live in? why?

if fundy were a giant, who would he acquire as his tiny friend?

do you have any fic/au ideas with g/t fundy??

are you pleased or offended by the g/t fundy content in this fandom?

if g!fundy were to be put into a situation where he was offered to be paid handsomely in return for using his size difference for evil, would he accept or decline, do you think? why?

and finally, have a quick lil scenario: t!fundy hitching a ride on a fox :D maybe if we're talking about a dsmp setting, he'd ride it around l'manburg & manburg in the early days >:D

i hope this has helped your oddly specific no-motivation :D

Oh wow, thanks for the questions Brick! :D

Hmmmmm

I personally see him as more of a giant, tho Sizeshifter and tiny Fundy are pretty great as well I think :D

Definitely, @blurrybunnie 's Lost Kin fic, its what brought me to this community and is just really good in general and I'd definitely recommend it. :D (Also I'd absolutely love if you were to find fic's for me @w@/nf)

I'd say that he might not be the best at borrowing XD He'd probably be the type of borrower to pull off a convoluted prank and end up getting a bit too close to a Bean and caught- xd I think that he might be the type to take a bit-too-much food from the Bean and getting noticed, and I think he'd be a bit more of a loner for the most part :D

Now this is a good question @w@ I think one of the more obvious options is putting him in Wilbur's house with the Father-Son Duo even if they wouldn't be Father and Son in the au. An alternative option could be the homes of the Las Nevadas crew, or JSchlatt's home in an AU, I feel like those would be the best although it would be interesting to try out others than those XD I do have an idea for another guy who Fundy could live with... but I dunno if they're good with Fanfiction of themselves yet so I'm holding off of it for now- xd Oh and also H-bomb, tho without the Cat Maid Sona for, fairly obvious reasons I think O_o

Who would Fundy gain as a Tiny friend-? Well, I feel like it could be similar to the previous options with who he'd borrow from, Wilbur, and the Las Nevadas crew, I also feel like H-bomb would be a good fit for this, though without the Cat Maid sona, for fairly obvious reasons- O_o

I have my AU SRBF already made, with tiny!5-up and giant!fundy, but other than that I don't have very many ideas sadly ;-; Hmmm, tho I do think something related to him imitating Wil's 100-player challenges using borrowers could make an interesting fic concept >:D

I wouldn't say I'm pleased, and I definitely wouldn't say I'm offended, I'd say I'm more, hopeful for Fundy in this community, there already is a bit of g/t Fundy out there, but it just needs to be expanded upon and explored further, I think there's potential here @w@

I think it depends, if he already has some tiny friends then he would probably decline, tho probably just barely... and if he didn't then he'd definitely accept the money I think XD After all, I heard that before it was retconned and he was made Wilbur's son in DSMP He originally joined L'manburg because they seemed wealthy xd tho this was retconned and changed to him being Wil's son.

:0 Oooooo, that is a pretty good scenario, would definitely make a good art piece XD I wish I was a good enough artist to draw that @w@

Thanks for the Ask Brick! :D

[wander-wren]

Wren’s Fanfic Masterpost

completed works or wips already posted to my ao3!! alphabetical order by fandom, post order within fandom categories. feel free to ask me about any of them but especially the wips—no guarantee i ever finish anything unposted, but showing interest might kick my motivation up. once it’s posted, it WILL eventually, someday, be finished.

everything is a oneshot unless stated otherwise. everything is a happy ending unless stated otherwise. for space, i only included archive content warnings, but all fic notes/tags should have more detailed CWs.

other posts have my current wips or concepts im kicking around.

Arcane

afterimage- post-s1 nightmare fic featuring jinx, with vi and caitlyn there to help. strong focus on jinx’s trauma and hallucinations.

transformation- sort of trans jinx (nonbinary girl) character study, including trans dad silco and some stumbling blocks on the road to healing between vi and jinx.

day off (off day)- caitvi hurt/comfort where cait gets badly hurt on the job, ft hospitals, feral protective vi, and panic attacks, hooray.

the things the war leaves behind- whumptober prompt fill for “say goodbye.” a look at what happened when ekko tried to save powder from silco.

BNHA

i’ll set the table (you can make the fire)- post canon/pro hero au with krbkdktd. izuku overuses ofa at work, causing a pain flareup, and his boyfriends take care of him

all systems red- 3-chapter todoroki-centric sickfic that spiralled out of control and turned into an “erasermic find out about endeavor and adopt todo” fic. mostly a fic about my headcanon that todoroki is dissociating half the time.

not what time steals (what it leaves behind)- whumptober fill for “caged.” old guard/immortality au where dabihawks have been psychically connected for centuries, but separated bc hawks is used as the commissions favorite torture experiment. then: rescue!

can’t believe what you see (all eyes on me)- whumptober fill for “waking up disoriented” and direct sequel to “not what time steals,” so same plot/premise.

lie still and let the lights pass by- decidedly unwhumpy whumptober fill for “tossing and turning.” platonic or pre-slash tdbk, there was only one bed, nightmare fic.

wrong place, right time- after all might crushes deku's hero dream, aizawa finds him on the edge of a rooftop, and they have a very long talk. first installment of my quirkless!deku au.

Check Please!

there’s a ringing in my head- whumptober fill for “dazed and confused” featuring concussed!bitty and pre-slash zimbits. iffy on the happy ending bc of miscommunications between jack and bitty.

The Old Guard

in the sea that’s painted black (you’re a king and i’m a lionheart)- au where only nicky was kidnapped by merrick, with much worse and very gross torture, then rescue and healing. and joenicky being in love, of course

walking heavy till the dying’s done- joenicky fic that asks “so what if you were impaled, stuck, but unable to die? wouldn’t that suck?” and yes, it would.

dry drowning- whumptober fill for “running out of air,” ft booker/nile and bonding over quynh dreams

The Raven Cycle

how to keep turning when the world goes still- non-tdt compliant post canon au where adam and ronan are accosted by the past at harvard, and adam doesn’t cope well.

how to be still when the world whirls on- same universe as above, but now facing ronan’s ghost. discussion of past rape/non-con in the usual vein of rovinsky toxicity

stealth missions (your cover’s blown)- transmasc adam has been going stealth at aglionby, terrified that if his all-very-cis friends find out he’s trans, they’ll drop him. turns out he’s wrong about…all of that. mostly platonic gangsey, bit of pynch.

this black thing inside of me (call it irrationality)- also a non-tdt compliant college au, pynch/adam-centric sickfic and emetophobic!adam. sort of a vent/projection fic for me.

hostage situation- whumptober fill for “ransom video,” where greenmantle kidnaps adam to get to the greywaren and ronan goes ballistic.

shields, surrender, shadows on shoulders- whumptober fill for “silent panic attack,” direct sequel to “hostage situation,” covering the hospital visit after the kidnapping.

this circular humanity- whumptober fill for “whipping,” set roughly around dream thieves. pynch crumbs. adam returns to the trailer to speak to his mom, and it does not go well, but his friends help.

old habits- non-tdt compliant au with established pynch, where the boys work through ronan's trauma re: past abusive rovinsky. yes i have two fics like this now, no i don't know why either

Six of Crows

the world owes me nothing (i’m taking from it still)- trans!inej character study set pre-canon, with hints of kanej and lots of Gender Feelings. tagged rape/non-con for canon-typical depictions of inej’s backstory.

without armor (or not at all)- post-ck, kanej, kaz-centric focusing on overcoming his fear of touch. very sweet imo as the author lol.

to take up swords and strike the sea- unfinished 1/3 part pirate!inej fic post-ck. not kanej, not kaz friendly but not kaz unfriendly. inej gets a gf. both of them are trans but that’s just a bg element. also discusses, not in detail, abuse and rape, bc *waves at inej and her entire mission*.

no matter how broken (come home to you)- ck au where inej’s legs are broken by van eck and she grieves, heals, and grows. lots of kanej, lots of crows friendship, lots of disabled characters still being badass.

best laid plans- whumptober fill for “ambush.” pre-canon, jesper, inej, and kaz attempting a bank robbery that goes wrong when dime lions show up. technically sad/cliffhanger ending, but no mc death or anything.

ghost of you- whumptober fill for “back from the dead” ft wesper. jesper doesn’t come back from a job when he says he will, and wylan panics. presumed death and misunderstandings cause angst trope?? my faves

Warrior Cats

swiftpaw’s chance- swiftpaw lives au with bright/swift/cloud, focusing mainly on his journey and healing from the trauma of the dog pack through the rest of tpb. 16/16 chapters.

dusk to dawn- sequel to swiftpaw’s chance, rewrite of the new prophecy focusing on whitewing and nightcloud, then squirrelflight and tawnypelt as well, with others thrown in for spice. 48/70 chapters.

Welcome to Night Vale

unsolvable calamities- carlos goes on a work binge in an attemot to solve night vale and stop so many people from dying, then collapses. cecil helps.

not quite perfect (so you say)- trans!carlos comes out to cecil, panics, and then they have a Talk about how things are different in night vale (they’re better. night vale is queertopia).

wilderness survival guide- whumptober fill for “self-done first aid/makeshift splint.” carlos nearly gets swallowed by the whispering forest and doesn’t make it out unhurt.

[thatskelebitch]

Mitsu cupping Kou's face in his hands and just admiring him go brrrr

[sorryimananti-romantic]

rant ahead:

hellooo people. it's been a while since i posted. hope you all are healthy. not that anybody cares (if you do, thank you) i've been very busy these past two to three months. my masters degree is almost halfway done- we're still wrapping up the second semester and after that, i only have to work on my thesis, practically from home, which means i get to have free time too.

but i want to use that time to explore my options, find where i fit in, and work. i'm a linguistics major and i want to explore both in and out of that field when i start working for real. i decided to try a lot of things because i can always resort to studying further, or teaching in a school or college, or writing professionally or something, but i want to do more than that. so wish me luck, pray that i find a place and skill i'm comfortable working with!

i haven't given up writing fics. i know some of you miss me and are patiently waiting for me to put out another piece. thank you for supporting me so far! i have a few work in progress actually- slowly working on them since finishing my assignments before the deadlines is my top priority these days, but gosh, am i writing fics. so here's what's happening:

a wooyoung fic bc i only have one of him so far lol. i keep changing the whole thing because i want to make it scream wooyoung. it's getting somewhere. it's royal (i keep writing royal aus i should just make it my concept) and it's gonna be funny (i hope). let's hope i can actually finish the thing and not give up.

another is a... (drum rolls) take me home spinoff! it's a san story, there's an original character, and it can be read as a stand alone too (though you might want to read take me home bc it's fun pls go read) bc i keep providing history there. i'm going to make take me home a whole fucking universe and write spinoffs for a few, if not all the members. it's going to be dark. i'm very speedily writing it. what motivated me were quite a few people both on tumblr and wattpad simping for take me home san. i have to admit, i'm also a take me home san simp. boi deserved better. he'll get the best.

so i guess it's going to be at least another half a month before i'll be able to put something out. take me home enthusiasts, sit tight and pray i finish it and don't give up lolll also i'm writing it without a limit in mind so i'm not sure if it's just going to be a lengthy oneshot or a goddamn novel again (can you belive take me home was 155k words?? i snapPED).

if yall have prompts for any members, feel free to suggest! i might be able to write something around it :)) i hope you all are doing well and best of luck with whatever's going on with you! stay safe and stay healthy <3

[katnissmellarkkk]

Hiiii, y’all! I got drabble requests — that I love and appreciate and will be writing v soon — but somehow this is the concept that my brain wanted to write tonight. I was reading a fic and I got suddenly inspired and this extremely angsty, canon compliant oneshot was born. I’ve never written in Peeta’s point of view before though so go easy on me 🥺😘😅.

Trigger Warning : As it centers around Peeta’s childhood, it contains strong mentions of maternal abuse.

Summary : Peeta confronts his regretful mother the night the Quarter Quell is announced.

“Did you ever love me at all?”

I stare at her, the woman who used to hit me with a belt, who turned my face black and blue with her open palm, who put angry red lines across my back, who chased me down the upstairs hallway until I was cornered and trapped, until I was at her mercy. The woman who singlehandedly became the motivation behind Rye’s wrestling career and subsequently mine too.

She’s a mess now. Her blonde hair tied up in a disastrous bun, the small amount of makeup she can afford — and cherishes like gold — smeared all around her eyes, her knuckles bright red, like she’d banged her fist into the wall with all the force in her body.

She’s not a big lady. She’s nowhere near as large as she seemed when I was a kid. Back when I was small and naive and all I wanted was her attention. All I wanted was for her to care about me.

I’m twice her size now. I’m as tall as Rye and barely two inches shorter than Rueben. Our father still has all three of us beat in size but I sense my eldest brother will surpass him any day now.

I’m twice her size and she can’t hurt me now even if she tried and yet, when I stand before her, one on one, I still feel like the little boy who asked her to kiss better the mark that came from inside her own fist.

“Mama,” I murmur quietly, alerting her suddenly to my presence.

Her head flies up from her desk at once, staring at me in shock. “Peeta?”

“Hi,” I whisper, my vocal cords giving out when I need them most. I try to swallow the lump building in my throat — the lump I always feel when in her presence — and instead I make it worse.

“What’re you doing here?” She asks and there’s no malice in her tone but I flinch just the same. Because I don’t know. I don’t know what to tell her. I don’t know why I came here.

Because you’re my mother and you were my first home and I miss you even though I spent every day of my life wishing to escape from you?

Because I’m headed back into an arena once again, this time for certain death of my own accord, and I feel like if I don’t do this now I never will.

Because Katniss turned to Gale in her hour of need and I can’t fault her, I can’t blame her for loving him, but it stings. It stings so bad. It stings and it hurts and it throbs to the point where I think I might explode and when I’m in pain, all I can think about is you. All I can think about is you and your rage and your rejection and my being a constant disappointment to you. All I can think about is how much pain you inflicted on me when I was only a child. What did I do to deserve that?

“Peeta?” She inquires again when I don’t reply, squinting at me through the darkness of the night. We have to be quiet or else we’ll wake my father, sleeping only twenty feet away in the next room.

I can smell her breath from here. It mildly surprises me, to sniff alcohol so blatantly on her. Typically it’s my father who drinks away his sorrows. Typically it’s him who passes out drunk and one of us boys are dispatched to bring him home and put him to bed before he can disgrace his wife beyond repair.

“Why were you drinking?” I ask, avoiding the question in her baby blue eyes. The same eyes she gave to me. I don’t even know why people claim I look like my father. I stare at my mother like I’m staring into a mirror. I have her upturned blue eyes and matching nose. I have her downturned mouth and rounded chin. I have her exact shade of white blonde hair and the barely visible eyelashes too. I have her mannerisms when upset and sometimes when I close my eyes, I swear I can hear her berating me like not a day has passed since I lived under her thumb.

She looks down at the empty glass bottle by her feet, as if her inebriation is news to even her. I see a flare of defensive anger flash across her face — she has so many different kinds of anger. I wonder if it’s normal to be able to identify them all in under a second. I wonder if it’s normal to feel a knot twist in your stomach when your mother reaches for your hand — but she composes herself. She composes herself and reaches for my hand and I pull away on instinct because the only times she ever showed me affection was after she’d hurt me real bad.

She has the good sense now to look down at the ground, at least. Finally, she is feeling a tinge of the rejection she drowned me in my whole entire life.

“How did you get in here?” She asks quietly, standing up from her chair, straightening her spine and meeting my gaze. Transforming into someone else again.

Rejection has always made her change shape.

“Dad left the backdoor unlocked. I came up through the side stairwell,” I tell her evenly, but we both know that’s not the answer she’s looking for.

“Why are you here?” Once again, there’s nothing but plain, quiet curiosity in her tone but I still feel my chest ache at the question.

And I can’t drag this out any longer. “Did you ever love me?” I murmur, feeling as pathetic as I know she thinks I am. “Even when I was little? Or when I was born? Did you ever love me at all?”

“You stupid creature!”

“Can you do just one thing right?”

“You think I wanted this life? You think I wanted to be your mother?”

“Of course I did,” she says, maybe for the first time ever, but it barely registers to me. Maybe it’s because after a lifetime of waiting to hear it, the sentiment falls short to the fantasy my mind created. Or maybe it’s because I don’t believe it. Too much has happened. You can’t wipe a chalkboard clean in one night. Especially if the writing on the board is seventeen years old.

Somehow that revelation is the most painful of all and I turn quickly to go before she can clock the liquid quickly building up behind my lids.

“I loved you,” she exclaims abruptly, catching me off-guard. Her outburst paralyzes me into place. “I loved you more than anything,” she proclaims now, and I hear the tears in her voice and the most insane urge to console her wells up deep inside my chest. But I force it down. You can’t make up for seventeen years in one night. “You were my baby. You are, Peeta. You are-“

“Don’t say that,” I hiss, but my mouth feels disconnected from my brain and my head is spinning. I’ve never heard these words before. Not from her. Not ever from her lips. Fury bubbles up inside me as I turn to face her. “Don’t you dare tell me that now. You told me you hated me. So many times.”

“I never said that.”

“You never had to actually say it. I could see it!” I have to make a conscious effort to lower my voice. The last thing I want is to have my father join in on our happy moment right here. “I could see it, Mama. In everything. Every time you looked at me, you acted like I was a disturbance to you. You could barely tolerate being around me-“

But it’s her turn to interrupt me. “It wasn’t you I couldn’t tolerate, Peeta. It was me. You reminded me so much of myself. In ways you can’t even begin to understand. You were so much like me. And I hated being me.”

Her words are earnest, there seems to be an element of truth behind her tone, her tears appear to be real. And what she’s saying tracks. Years ago, my father used to tell me the same thing.

“She doesn’t hate you, Peeta. Sometimes you just remind your mother of the parts of herself she doesn’t like so much.”

“It’s not about you, son. It’s never been about you.”

“She loves you. She loves you, she just can’t express it. She can only see the bad parts of herself. And sometimes that makes her only see the bad parts of her inside you.”

But somehow hearing over and over again that I’m just like the woman who once hit me in the face so hard I told my friends I fell off the bakery roof and they believed me doesn’t give me much comfort at all.

“That’s too bad,” I whisper, realizing we’ve stood in silence for too long. Realizing that my coming to see her tonight was pointless and to come here of all places, after seeing the person I love most in the world in the arms of the one she loves, means I’m nothing more than a glutton for punishment.

I am nothing. Just like my mother always said.

And evidently she’s not even done yet. No, for some reason she’s rambling on, twisting her hands the way she used to in the aftermath of her maltreatment. “You were stubborn. When you were young, you were the most stubborn boy there ever was. And sarcastic. And too hopeful. You believed in fantasies. You always believed you could be more than this district would let you be.”

“What?” I snap, exasperation rising up and decimating the lump in my throat. “You’re not making any sense.”

“I’m telling you all the ways you were like me. All the bad qualities I passed down to you.” She sniffles loudly and wipes her nose in the same way she smacked my hand once with a wooden spoon for doing. “I was trying, Peeta. I was trying to protect you,” she admits desperately. “I thought if I was hard on you, it would prepare you better for life in the long run. I thought that if I could rid you of all my qualities, you would end up happier than me. I was trying to give you what you needed.”

I feel my chest heave involuntarily and I have to look away, ashamed to be crying in her presence. “What I needed was a mother who loved me,” I say through gritted teeth, fighting to keep it together even a little. “If you cared about me at all, that’s what you should have given me. Not bruises and bloody noses because you thought it necessary to beat the qualities you couldn’t stand out of me.”

“I did love you,” she pleads, her eyes — the same eyes as mine — flashing to the empty liquor bottle on the ground. “I do love you, Peeta. So much. After that announcement tonight, I was beside myself. I can’t stand the idea of you heading back into that place-“

But I can’t stand the idea of letting her finish that sentence. “Is that why you told me last year that Katniss was District Twelve’s big winner? That she’s a survivor?”

And in an instant, she’s casting her gaze down towards her shoes, the remorse splayed plainly across her features. Almost inaudibly, she still attempts to explain. “I was always most motivated when trying to prove someone wrong. I didn’t mean-“

“The last time you may ever see me and you thought to give me some kind of reverse psychology?” I exclaim, still seeing bright red.

Which apparently is another quality I get from her. My ire. As evidenced by her quick tonal shift as well.

“I thought it would make it easier if you didn’t come home again!”

We both fall silent at that. There’s nothing left for me to say. I have all the answers I’ll ever get and there’s nothing she could say that’ll make me feel better. There’s nothing that can erase the past or change my childhood or alter my memory. There’s nothing that can make me forget the way she treated me growing up.

But she’s not done yet. She starts walking towards me and I’m about to leave before this scene gets any more dramatic and my father gets involved, but she grasps my arm before I reach the doorway. She grasps my arm in a gentle hold, so different from the hand that used to stain me purple without remorse.

“I’m sorry, Peeta,” she whispers, begging me to hear her. Begging me to hear her sincerity and remorse. “I’m so sorry for what I did. I’m so sorry for how I treated you. For how I hurt you.”

I shake my head though, the tears I tried so hard to repress flowing freely now. “Stop,” I rasp but she pretends not to hear me.

“You were always a good boy. It was me who was bad. I was the disappointment,” she insists, her voice considerably firm for the amount of salt water coursing down her face. “I was wrong. Not you, honey. Me. I was wrong.”

But you can’t erase seventeen years in one night and I try to break away again, but I’m just too overcome with emotion to refuse any longer.

And then she pulls out a weapon strong enough to cut me to my knees in an instant.

“It wasn’t your fault, Peeta. What I did to you and your brothers wasn’t any of your faults.”

“Stop talking,” I urge desperately, my jaw locked tight and my teeth biting into the soft flesh of my tongue. “Just stop it. Please.”

But her arms are slowly coming around me and she’s close to sobs and she begins to whisper the painful sentiment all over again. “It wasn’t your fault that I hurt you. And I’m sorry. I’m so sorry that I let you go so long without hearing that. But I don’t want you to die without knowing that I was the one in the wrong. And I would take it all back in a second if I could-“

And I can’t stand it anymore. I give into her hug, collapsing against her with such a force it knocks us both down to our knees. I’m not a little boy anymore, I’m not the child she could so easily hurt, I’m not the kid who was too afraid to stand up for himself or his brothers, but he still exists inside of me. It’s him that wants my mother’s embrace, who wants the apology for the wounds he didn’t understand, for the words that kept him awake at night, that caused him to fall asleep with a damp pillow.

And I know she may just be drunk or that she could take it all back when tomorrow comes. I know that this is merely her guilt speaking and my probable death is hanging heavy over her head. But there was a time when these words were all I ever wanted to hear and I choose to take that for what it’s worth.

It doesn’t mean to me now what it might have years ago. But it still means something.

It still means something.

[lythea-creation]

Hi, I would like to request a Clove Kentwell x Reader I don't really have anything particular so you can choose the plot.

I hope you do my request

I Will Win For Us - Clove Kentwell x fem reader (Chapter 1)

First of all thanks for the request, anon. I have never written anything for Clove before, but I hope you like what I came up with anyway.

summary: Clove and (f/n) have known each other basically their whole life. What happens when Clove wants to volunteer for the next Hunger Games?

warnings: none I think

word count: 762

Author's note: Feel free to check out my Masterlists and make requests. No reposting please! Reblogging, comments and requests are always appreciated &lt;3 If you like the story/my writing, please don't be shy to say it via comments or asks! It takes you a few seconds and might make my day. It's the best appreciation you can show to a writer you like.

Since I got several requests for more Clove content, I decided to turn this oneshot into a series. Hope you enjoy it.

----------

I had been trained to become a peacekeeper from a young age, nothing unusual in district 2.

My life had always consisted of endless training, work and discipline. Breaking out of this concept had not even crossed my mind. It was my sense of normality.

Making friends as a child or teenager was a difficult intent as we were encouraged to compete against each other, to become the greatest, make our families proud.

Therefore it was hard to trust.

Without Clove I would be a robot … simply existing to fulfill the expectations forced upon me without a second thought.

She was the one who had been keeping me alive all this time.

We had known each other basically our whole life because our parents were close friends.

Hence Clove and I had trained together and motivated each other to exceed our limits. Our friendship and rivalry had made us stronger as we had different strengths and weaknesses.

Helping each other out was not exactly a thing between children of our district. Sure, we allied during the Hunger Games, but as soon as it came down to killing to win ourselves we did not hesitate to do so.

So Cloves and my relationship set us apart from the rest.

Currently we were practicing throwing knives at targets.

Clove had always been great at it, a natural.

I preferred hand-to-hand combat. My reflexes were sharp meaning I could dodge nearly every attack, whether it was a hand, foot or even a weapon.

Suddenly a knife grazed my ear as it barely missed my head.

My hand automatically moved to the small cut.

“You should get rid of your daydreaming if you wanna survive in the arena”, Clove noted with a grin.

“You know I'm not planning to go there”, I reminded her.

“I still don't understand why. You would stand a good chance with your reflexes”, she considered.

I could not understand why she wanted to participate in the Games so desperately.

Most teenagers here wanted to make their family proud by it and could not wait to do so.

But we were only fifteen. There was still time to grow and improve our senses and skills.

“Are you seriously planning to go this year?”, I inquired anxiously.

“(f/n), you know exactly how long I already waited. And my parents want me to. I can't let them down”, she claimed, approaching me slowly.

“I just don't want to lose you, Clo”, I whispered as she was standing right in front of me now, holding my hands.

“I know. I'm not planning to die either”, she reassured me. “When I get back from the Games, we can live in my victors house together. I know we didn't plan to tell our parents about our relationship until we were eighteen. But they couldn't keep us apart then. Nobody can resist a victor. We can finally step out of line and stop hiding.”

I loved the imagination of that. Yet it was not worth the risk to lose her completely. Waiting three years was definitely better. But she would only get mad at me if I told her that and I did not want to fight her now. The reaping was only five days away.

“Then let's make sure you win”, I declared and pushed her to the ground with a surprise attack.

I was sitting on top of her now holding her wrists next to her head. “You're dead”, I announced jokingly.

“That wasn't fair”, she complained struggling to free herself.

After a few seconds she gave up. She knew best that she did not stand a chance against my fighting techniques. I had beat grown men with them.

“The fights in the arena won't be fair either”, I shot back.

“Yeah, but I won't be distracted by them or trust them like I do with you”, she uttered softly.

For a moment I could see the fear and pain in her eyes. I saw the fifteen year old girl and not the soldier they were trying to turn us into.

I let go of her hands and instead leaned onto the ground next to them to kiss her.

When we pulled away Clove quickly turned us around. So she was holding me down now. Her proud grin was pissing me off and making me love her even more at the same time.

Clove was a fighter. I was sure she would do anything required to return to me. Hopefully it would be enough.

Next Chapter

[lord-of-christmas-lights]

I swear I have normal Narnia headcanons. However, none of them are featured in this post.

So! If you've been following my series of posts about my Inhuman Narnia AU and the couple of oneshots I posted on ao3 under ASkyOfKai, you've probably noticed that in this little universe I've created, Narnia is sort of...sentient. And I've just realized that I've only actually gone into depth about this on Discord with my friends who are probably very tired of hearing about it. So I'm making y'all suffer through it instead. Welcome to Inhuman Narnia 101, please take your seats because this is going to take a while.

Warning for religious themes, theological discussion, and some dark fantasy/inhuman/body horror concepts that involve blood and physical changes.

BEFORE I SAY ANYTHING: Please keep in mind that an AU is meant to be an alternate universe that may not follow canon information. If anything in this post contradicts canon on the creation of Narnia (it undoubtedly will), pay it no mind, this is an AU. It doesn't have to follow canon.

First off, a little explanation of the Inhuman Narnia AU in general. Basically I came up with this AU after seeing some other people on tumblr post about the Pevensies being not quite human after their time in Narnia. Just eerie, cryptid, a bit of dark fantasy kinda stuff. And I was like, "I'm in love, sign me up, I have ideas." I did not sit down and develop this all at once. The worldbuilding I've done for it has come slowly over the past few weeks through posts, fanfics, and discord rambles. The idea of Narnia being a sentient earth deity of sorts is a recent one and there is already so much to it. (Also I call her Narnia because it's convenient, she has other names but I haven't bothered to like, actually make any up so Narnia is what she's called.)

The most important thing to note starting off is that Narnia is not supposed to be a replacement for Aslan, nor is she necessarily "the hero to his villain". Aslan and I have an interesting relationship, as he is literally God/Jesus/The Holy Spirit/etc and I no longer really identify as Christian. While there are times that Aslan definitely takes a more antagonistic route in my writings, I don't actually see him as a bad guy, nor as a good guy. As God, he literally removed from our concepts of good and evil (in my opinion). The same goes for Narnia being an earth deity. I am a Christian-raised pagan, and I definitely subscribe to the idea that gods and deities are not subject to humanity and our rules. Narnia is not a good goddess, she is not a bad goddess, she simply is a goddess. Plain and simple. The dichotomy that exists between Narnia and Aslan in my writing is generally that of opposing deities, but this isn't a hard and fast rule. There were and still are times when they're friends, working towards the same goals. There are times when Narnia's power is stronger than Aslan's and times when Aslan's power is stronger than hers. There is no simple 1:1 comparison between them.

So, getting into motivations and why Narnia as a deity even exists. Essentially, I asked the question, "How do the Pevensies become inhuman?" and voila earth deity Narnia was born. Now, the basic in-universe mythology I've worked out is that Narnia and Aslan are two deities from separate dimensions that came together to create a new world, the world of Narnia. Aslan is the one who oversees things, he's the one who comes up with the ideas, and he's a little less attached to the world as a whole because he's a Creator, not an earth deity. Narnia is, however, and she literally makes up the world, she sort of runs the entire thing on a physical level, and she is much more attached to it. So she's always kinda taken on this role of making the things in her world the way she wants them. For the most part, she and Aslan designed everything together and they're both happy with it blah blah blah. Well, Aslan then decides to bring a few humans from this other world he's created to Narnia. And she affects them a bit (I've got headcanons about Digory and Polly that I haven't posted anywhere yet but I might soon), but it isn't until Aslan brings the Pevensies over that she really gets to experiment. See, there are other deities in the world that kinda rule over the various lands on a surface level (patron gods for Telmar, the Archenlands, etc, they just have less power than Narnia and Aslan) so she has a little less power over the people in those places, but the country of Narnia is both her land and her so when the Pevensies become the Kings and Queens and live there for 15 years, she's very connected to them. And it's through this connection that she starts to affect them. Honestly, I'm not sure if Narnia even knows what she's doing when she starts stripping away their humanity. I think it's that she can feel they're not from her world and she doesn't like that. She wants them to be a part of her, she wants them to belong in her world just the same as everyone else. (Side note—I know Telmar and some other lands in canon are based on people finding portals and coming through and I'd like to say that she does affect them a bit, takes away a bit of their humanity, but it's not to the same extent as the Kings and Queens of her lands).

"So Kai," you might say, "You keep empathizing that she is literally the land and the land is her. What the hell do you mean by that?" Well, essentially, she is...the...land. Basically if you've read Percy Jackson Heroes of Olympus, there's this idea that Gaia and Tartarus are both physically their domains and able to take on a smaller, human shaped physical form because they're gods and not restricted by human ideas of only having one body. Narnia is the same. Her physical form is both the entire world and whatever smaller shape she might appear in to people. However, we have to acknowledge that their world is differently structurally from ours. There's magic, there's talking animals, and in my Inhuman AU, there is a literal Heart of Narnia at the center. Like a physical, beating, human-shaped heart. Except it's a lot bigger than a regular human heart. Also it's golden. And many many many miles underground. So anyways this is where she's centered. It's basically where her soul is. Probably under Cair Paravel because I just came up with that idea and I love it. And radiating out from it are veins of magic and blood, and these stretch all across the world. Now here is where we get into blood magic and some of those fun terrifying concepts I've come up with.

Narnia has her own blood, of course, but also whenever one of her Kings or Queens bleeds in battle, she kinda pulls it down through the earth into her own heart and veins. It doesn't really do anything to her or them in particular, it's just a fun side effect of them having a patron pagan god. Yes this includes Caspian after he becomes King. Also Peter's blood turns golden because he's the High King, and then later Caspian's does too because I just really like imagery of Ben Barnes bleeding gold. (Side note—when Peter returns to England, his blood goes back to red, but it does remain a brighter red than blood generally is).

Diverting for half a second here. Now, in both my regular Narnia writings and my Inhuman AU, Lucy is very very connected to magic. In my regular Narnia fanfic, she studies with the druids, who are sort of like BBC Merlin's druids. They're just like, chill dudes who run around in camps doing magic and making prophecies and shit. However, in the Inhuman AU, they are a lot darker. One of my favorite ideas with the Inhuman druids and Lucy is that they are so connected to Narnia's magic and her Heart that their hands become stained with blood. Is it their blood, is it Narnia's blood, is it someone else's blood? Idk, don't ask questions. But yea, their hands are permanently stained reddish-brown to almost black. In my regular Narnia stuff, I still like the idea of Lucy's hands being stained and go with just earth magic, dirt stuff for the reason why. But yea no, in the Inhuman AU her hands are stained with blood because of blood magic.

So getting a bit more into how Narnia affects the Pevensies now because I love talking about this lol. She doesn't consciously chose how to change them, though she does call them her creations. Generally the way her magic affects them is by connecting them to to the land in some way and bringing out certain traits they have. So for Peter it's his eyes flickering between regular blue and the amber of a lion's, feathers appearing on his back that grow into wings, having a strength greater than that of a giant's. His blood is golden and on clear nights, the Aurora Borealis in the sky is reflected across his skin. For Susan, her skin glints like glass in the sun and she can briefly glimpse the future. Her wounds are sewn shut with golden rays of light, her eyes are cracked but clear, and she seems to glow faintly in the night, a bit of the sun's radiance shining through her. Edmund has a bit of a star's power lodged in his throat, and can manipulate words, uses them to influence people and their actions. His skin is frostbitten in places, a side effect of ruling the Woods where the White Witch once held so much power, and in some spots his bones shine under the ice that spreads across his skin. Lucy has the stained skin from her stronger connection to magic, and when she speaks words from the Old Language (the one Aslan and Narnia used to shape the world itself), her voice echoes and rasps. Her teeth are too sharp, her smile too wide, and when she disappears underwater, she can stay for hours without surfacing. I want to get into Eustace and Caspian now too but this post is already extremely long and I've still got a bit to cover, so we're just sticking with the Pevensies for now. So yea, Narnia doesn't pick what she does to the Pevensies, she just connects herself to them and through that connection, they change. The magic that she is made of, that Narnia the world operates on, that's what changes them. However, as I stated already, she does call them her creations and feels extremely responsible for them.

Wrapping back around up to the beginning, this is the biggest source of conflict between her and Aslan as of the canon timeline. I like to believe that the lamppost incident was an accident, that Aslan didn't actually mean to send them back at the end of LWW and it was pure coincidence, wrong place wrong time stuff. That being said, it did happen and Narnia really didn't like it happening. The Pevensies did return to their (mostly) human selves in this AU in England, so when they came back in Prince Caspian, she felt disconnected from them again. She reacted to this by digging into them even harder on a spiritual level and essentially speedran them back to being inhuman throughout the timeline of PC, which generally takes place over a few months in my mind. I don't remember how long it was in the book, it's been quite a while since I read them, but it's only like a week in the movie and like eff that, overthrowing a kingdom takes a bit longer in my opinion. Now there are a few divergences here. 1. They all stay at the end of PC and yea that's it, they go back to being Kings and Queens and it's like a second Golden Age but with Caspian there as well. 2. Susan and Peter stay, Lucy and Edmund go back and it's a repeat of the human/inhumanity cycle for them + Eustace in VOTDT and then they stay. 3. Everything happens exactly as it does in canon and it's a constant cycle of humanity/inhumanity with the character's various trips and finally ends at The Last Battle. I like all versions and I tend to leave things a little open to the reader on what exactly happens, or I would if I could actually finish some of my drafts and post them. As you can imagine, Narnia likes 1 the best and 3 the least. She really wants her Kings and Queens to stay and rule her lands and like be awesome and stuff. However, Aslan prefers 3 the best and 1 the least. So again, neither of them is really good nor evil, they just have differing opinions on how the world should be run and what the Pevensie's fates should be. I do tend to side with Narnia, I really like exploring these concepts of inhumanity, but I also really like the concept of a cycle. That's very common in mythology.

So anyways, that's a bit of an overview on earth deity Narnia and her role in my Inhuman AU. If you made it this far, congratulations, and I give you explicit permission to use any of my ideas in your own writing/fanart/whatever, as long as you tag either my tumblr or my ao3 (lord-of-christmas-lights and ASkyOfKai) because I need more Narnia+Inhumanity content in my life. Thanks for reading all this and I'll probably be back very soon with elaboration on Eustace and Caspian's inhumanity!

- Kai

[genesisrose74]

Up Late -> S. Ishigami

Hey I physically cannot get Senku mf’ing Ishigami off my brain and it is one in the morning, so time for nighttime concepts written by ya girl :3 This is sorta a headcanon/short oneshot scenario combination that I made on the spot. Hope you enjoy it!

Good gracious I just love him and wanna give him a hug, is that too much to ask for

*****

As much as he claims to be against the thoughts of himself in a romantic relationship, Senku would sacrifice a limb for the people dear to him in situations of vulnerability and the like (ahem,,, nearly crying after hearing his friends’ voices over the phone after so long apart, making cola for Gen on multiple occasions, etc.). Therefore I reject the idea that you’d always have to be the one to initiate intimate moments between you both, and will today entertain soft Senku appearing at night time. He’s very often awake later than others in the village because he has a hard time reigning in all his thoughts and plans quickly, and if you happen to catch him at these hours it is a blessing and a half. Not that you’ve told him that.

He’s still his joking and oddly charismatic self, of course, but he’s noticeably more attentive. Things like, “you need rest if you’re gonna keep working tomorrow” and, “it’s not the smartest to be out in this colder weather, you know” fall from his mouth and into the crisper night air if he encounters you milling about without much rhyme or reason. If he’s working on something smaller in the little observatory house, you’ll get invited up to look through his telescope at all the gorgeous stars — ones that seem to twinkle that much brighter in the comfortable presence of each other.

One moment Senku’s tinkering with one of his little projects to wind himself down, and the next he’s quietly watching as you lean out of the makeshift observatory’s opening, looking up at the sky with such contentment reflecting back from your own observing gaze that it makes him unreasonably intrigued.

“Wouldn’t you rather see everything up there a bit closer with the telescope?” He inquires a bit jokingly, the subtle smirk in his tone clear as the night display above. Yet your mouth only twitches upwards at his question, and the scientist who almost always has a logical explanation for things simply grows more interested.

“It’s pretty just taking everything in at once, too,” you hum thoughtfully. “Don’t you think?”

He does. As much as he likes seeing all the pieces that make up the contents of the universe beyond, looking up at it now in one big framework seems to give him that usual feeling of exhilaration.

Maybe you contributed to the scene as well, as Senku takes note of the way you balance on your tiptoes before rocking back onto your heels, really for no good reason but entertaining him all the same. And he’s barely even thinking about it further as he places his things safely to the side and stands to his feet, wandering over to get a better look at what you’ve become so enraptured with.

Your eyes swim with the light of billions of stars that stare down at the village, glossy with something that neither you nor him can really pinpoint, and Senku offers a light nod in response to your earlier question. The little gesture in your peripheral causes you to crack a smile, and it only sticks around longer when the crimson-eyed boy slips off his winter jacket to hand over.

“If you stay out of bed any more today, the cold won’t be very forgiving,” he notes, and to his satisfaction, you take the warm article of clothing without further persuasion.

“I might stick around for a bit,” comes your reply. “The walk back does not sound all too appealing at the moment, but I’ll get the motivation eventually. Hopefully.”

He scoffs lightheartedly with a shake of his head. Stubborn, he thinks, just like how you would sometimes get before the whole petrification phenomenon. He quite liked it. Back then and right now.

“You know,” he starts, slowly turning away from the roof’s opening, “if you’re that opposed to going back, there’s room here.”

The offer is menial and simple, something Senku would offer up no matter the person to which he was speaking, but he’s truly hoping that you’ll say yes to the proposition. You shift in position to lean your jacket-covered back against the wooden wall, soft smile and warm figure the only thing running through the young scientist’s head as he tilts his head to look back at you.

“If you wouldn’t mind housing me for the evening, I’d very much like to take up that offer.”

“I wouldn’t have asked if I minded,” he points out, the faintest of grins tugging at the corners of his lips. “Come on, let’s go to bed.”

And you do - both of you. And maybe he lets you hold onto that winter coat until morning, because you melted into its warmth with so much ease that sleep overtook you in minutes, a gentle smile ever present as you nestled into the cozy fabric.

After the next few times that it happens, Senku gets a jacket made similar to his own and stores it beside the telescope, just in case you’d like to stay the night with him again.

[johannas-motivational-insults]

Jo’s Top 10 of 2020

I see lots of artists doing that thing where they post a piece from each month of the year... unfortunately my content creation isn’t necessarily consistent and it’s hard to track what month individual fic chapters were posted in, but I figured I’d do something similar and post my Top 10 pieces of content I created in 2020, what they’re about and why I love them. I actually did get a fair amount done this year thanks to the lockdown, but I’ve narrowed it down to these ten that I’d like to reflect on. (To be fair, I’m probably forgetting something huge. Feel free to leave comments if you think I passed over something important lol.)

10. Friendship in the Horde (meta): This is something I’d wanted to write for a while but finally got around to finishing in February. It’s basically a sociology paper lmao, an analysis of the social hierarchies and systems of the Horde. It was also a convenient excuse for me to gush about Catralonnie, an underrated (friend)ship. But honestly this was an important piece for me because I have always identified with the Horde characters way more than any of the rebels (other than Adora, who grew up in the Horde) and part of why is how they are in an unsafe environment and end up forming relationships that are helpful for survival but hinder them psychologically. And I think to understand the Horde characters and really evaluate their motives and choices you need to understand this first.

9. The Sting in My Eyes: On the surface this is just a run of the mill hurt/comfort oneshot, but it was a really important post-canon processing fic for me. I had a lot of feelings about Catra’s relationships with Shadow Weaver and Melog in season 5, particularly about how Catra must have felt really conflicted after Shadow Weaver told her what she wanted to hear all those years but in a way that felt unearned and out of the blue. It was really cathartic for me to write a scene where she struggles with those mixed feelings but has Adora and Melog to help her process them. And I had long associated the song the title is from with Catra and Shadow Weaver’s relationship, and the way she died trying to redeem herself really solidified that connection.

8. Hail Mary, chapter 6: This was supposed to be a short chapter mostly about the backstory between Catra and Scorpia in this au, with some Catradora yearning thrown in. It evolved into a massive, sprawling thing that is very atmospheric in terms of how the setting and vibes are described and how in the moment it feels. Hail Mary is like that sometimes but that type of narration is usually about football games rather than parties, so this chapter was a fun change of pace in many ways. It was really nostaglic for me to write too, the nerves of being a teenager at a party with your crush and how intense everything feels. And the Scorptra stuff really is delicious, it was nice seeing them have that conversation they never got to have in canon and truly make up, and the tiny sliver I added of Catra’s earlier history was heartbreaking in the best way. So this was not what I intended to write, but it turned out way better for it.

7. A Better Son or Daughter (AMV): I’ve done other Adora AMVs, but this one is really my iconic piece. The song is perfect for Adora, so perfect it’s on Noelle’s Adora playlist. The vid itself is a character study about Adora’s mental health struggles and the way she represses them, as well as a tribute to her resiliency and her eventual triumph of getting to a better place in her life. This is a song that gives me a lot of feelings and once I was making it about Adora it gave me even more, so this was a very satisfying piece to complete. I wish Noelle had gotten a chance to see it but oh well, maybe down the line.

6. Hail Mary, chapter 12: This is the chapter that much of the fic had been building to, Catra and Adora in conflict because Catra finally got the chance to be Adora’s hero and Adora shot her down. It’s painfully analogous to canon, both in terms of how (I suspect) Catra felt in Thaymor and Adora’s tendency to victim blame because she’s so pragmatic. There’s definitely some tones of Taking Control in there but Lonnie does a much better job of examining Catra’s psychology and needs than Glimmer did in canon (a writing error imo, Glimmer should have had more insight). Adora just wants to help but sometimes in her quest to do so she disenfranchises others, and this was a much needed look at that aspect of her character. It’s also an excellent illustration of what it’s like to play a peacekeeping role in an abusive household and how stressful it is trying to protect others while also protecting yourself.

5. Unstoppable (AMV): This is not my favorite Catra AMV I’ve ever done, but it might be the cleverest. The soundtrack is a song about mental illness masquerading as a song about being a bad bitch, which is basically Catra in a nutshell. The lyrics are incredibly fitting for her and her arc as it develops over seasons 1-4. The vid itself takes a hard turn in the interpretation of the lyrics, going from talking about how no one can stop Catra to how she can’t stop herself because she’s in such a terrible sunk cost fallacy spiral, and I think I got several death threats over that twist lmao. As someone who primarily deals in angst, there’s hardly a better compliment to be paid.

4. Demons, chapter 31: This one got real dark on me. The concept of this chapter was originally an examination of how comparing abuse can get really dicey but you also have to respect that other people have had different experiences from you and you have to be careful not to equate things or make it sound like you’re talking over someone else. I guess it’s also a bit of a look at how autistic people (like myself) will often explain why they can empathize so others know they understand rather than saying empty platitudes, but that can come off as insensitive or like they’re making things about them. I mean, in this case Adora kinda was making things about her, but she was provoked into it by a parade of comments insinuating she didn’t suffer at all, which was also unfair. Anyway it’s one of the more important Catradora fights in Demons and something I’d written bits of over a year prior, it was that important to the plot, but it also took a turn I was not originally planning. I finished the chapter when I was in a really bad depressive and self-loathing spiral and that bled onto the page, but it worked perfectly for Catra in this scenario... that push and pull of feeling like the world has hurt and victimized you mixed with knowing you’ve done some bad things yourself and feeling like you don’t have a leg to stand on when mourning the ways you’ve been hurt. It’s intense as all fuck but it’s excellent.

3. Hail Mary, chapter 11: Speaking of dark Catra content, this chapter... whew. It was really something else, to read and to write. I have written flashbacks in Demons that are more detailed and even include explicit violence but because those scenes are always in flashback form I never really got the chance to sit in the head of an abuse victim waiting for the other shoe to drop for an entire chapter like I did here. It’s quite different from the rest of Hail Mary stylistically and is both highly sensory and extremely internalized. It took me back to some terrifying moments in my own life so it was difficult but also extremely cathartic to write. It’s important too because it really sets up where Catra was at mentally heading into her big fight with Adora, and that chapter is in Adora POV. This chapter is ranked so high simply because it’s... polished, as @malachi-walker put it. It almost is its own story within the story and really noteworthy as a piece all its own.

2. Demons, chapter 26: This chapter is very similar thematically to Hail Mary 12, just based in the canonverse. It deals with one of the core (but highly neglected by fandom) conflicts between Catra and Adora, where they both need to feel like they can take care of and protect the other but also detest feeling weak or vulnerable themselves. It leads to Adora’s ego making Catra feel disrespected and Catra’s behavior confusing Adora and making her think she’s an ungrateful brat rather than someone who needs so badly to be needed, just like her. There’s definitely some power struggles in this chapter but finally they’re able to get to the heart of it and seeing them talk it out is so satisfying. Getting this chapter published was also important to me on a personal level because, like I said, this aspect of their conflict and relationship is rarely acknowleged for how important it is when really it’s one of the deepest conflicts between them in the series. It’s a scene I started writing pretty much as soon I knew I was extending the fic into something longer because I just needed them to have this conversation, so finishing it was so satisfying.

1. Satisfaction, chapter 3: This chapter took me a really long time to write, both in terms of time to get it published and time I actually spent working on it. It’s the crown jewel of a fic that’s really important to me and I had to get it just right, so I spent more time agonizing over every detail and rewriting things to get them absolutely perfect than I usually do (I’m a perfectionist anyway, but this took it to a whole other level). But in the end it was worth it, because this chapter is damn fine. It’s really hot, as you’d expect from a smut fic, but it’s also an excellent character study of how both Catra and Adora were affected by their abuse and trauma and the issues it raises for them in terms of sex and intimacy. Also, come on, we need more BDSM fics out there that focus on the actual point of it all (the trust involved) and promote communication and do the character work to explain why they might be into it in the first place.

BONUS (from December 31, 2019): One of my favorite pieces of 2020 technically came out in 2019, but I posted it on New Years Eve so most people first saw it in 2020. It’s an absolute banger of an AMV called I’m Not Jesus that’s all about Catra and Adora’s anger towards Shadow Weaver and their refusal to forgive their abuser. Funny enough this came out before Adora’s iconic “I will never forgive you” line, and Shadow Weaver definitely made things more complicated with how she went out, but I think the sentiment still applies.

[sevensided]

how did you get into writing fic? i'd love to start but idk even where to begin! I loved adats so I was wondering do you have any advice?

Oh my goodness! I am so flattered you’ve asked me this. Yes, I can absolutely help. I’ll throw a bunch of rambling under the cut.

I started writing fic probably when I was... sixteen years old? A lot of my early works were oneshots. I couldn’t figure out how to do anything plot heavy for the life of me, so I just stuck to AUs or whatever I felt like. I wasn’t in any particular fandom -- I really wrote whatever I had ideas for. I remember I tried once to do a plot-heavy story and I received a review absolutely ripping it to shreds. Like, it was so cruel I cried lol. I ended up deleting the fic. Years later, I get what they were trying to say (basically, more substance, less style), but at the time it cut to the quick. Really, it was only when I was in my twenties that I started writing work that was longer and/or better.

The fandom that helped me actually write plot heavy work was a historical-based fandom. As I’m a historian, it was perfect. I got to use my research skills and knowledge to create works that, above all, aimed to feel authentic. I mainly read historical fiction, so I was familiar with how that genre worked. Miraculously, people loved my work. I think I wrote about ~200k in the period of a year? These were several short stories (20-40k) and a few oneshot filler fics. While I was part of this fandom I also helped organise a Big Bang which was a lot of hard work but was extremely rewarding. Along with that, I interacted mainly with other fic writers, so I spent a lot of time chatting to people about ideas and encouraging other writers, and it just created a lovely medley where no concept was impossible or any line of dialogue too difficult. We supported each other and it was truly like a little commune. I gradually stepped away from the fandom mainly because it was just a part of my life at a very specific time, and almost as soon as that time was over, my love for that story/ship faded, but I firmly believe I figured out a lot of how/what I do now purely through that experience.

Regarding ADATS

With ADATS, it stemmed entirely from wanting to “explain” three months in canon (at the end of season three). I was interested in the idea of season four setting up Will/Mike in canon, and I wanted to test the source material to see if I could draw from what already existed to create something authentic. I began with that simple idea: what happened from July to October in 1985? Then I thought about the major themes I wanted to hit -- family, friendship, coming of age, sexuality -- and I nested them around the bigger concept: how do I get Mike from being ostensibly straight to realising he is gay? That meant thinking of two steps: Mike discovering his attraction to guys; Mike discovering his attraction to Will. Those two concepts were separate “arcs” that needed addressing in different ways. Balance was key to weaving them together and making the reader feel like they knew what was coming (and that they felt smart for putting the pieces together) without just rushing through and going “now kiss!” That’s partly why ADATS needs a sequel, lol: because it’s not finished!

Writing process

The first thing I do when I start to get an idea is I write it down. Sounds obvious. But when you have a killer line of dialogue come to you in the shower and you think “I’ll remember that” -- reader, you will not remember it. You gotta get it down ASAP! I do that the whole way through, as generally I’ll be thinking of scenes I’m stuck on and then it’ll just come to me and I’ll quickly jot it down.

The next thing -- or what I do in the meantime -- is start structuring. I plan. I try to plan a lot. Sometimes it’s okay to write “and something happens here to get them here”, because you’ll figure it out later, but for the most part I’ve discovered that planning is like gold and you can’t get enough of it. I break my work up into generally 3-4 parts/sections, and I treat each section like a mini story. So each part needs a conflict and resolution, and it needs to flow into the next section. You need to have a feeling of things evolving and maturing. Once I’ve planned those little bits, I start thinking about the bigger plot arc and how I can drop in hints along the way. I’m probably not a subtle or skilled enough writer to yet pull off that sort of gasping twist you get in really excellent books, but I’m trying to get there. It’s hard, is what I’m trying to say, but that’s okay, because we’re all learning.

Then I generally do aesthetic stuff. Sounds stupid, probably. But nothing helps me get more into a mood than doing a Pinterest board or -- most of all -- making a Spotify mix. I start thinking about the vibe and the general atmosphere, and then I almost exclusively listen to that mix when I’m working. Sort of like muscle memory? Just to get the creative juices associated with that particular selection of songs.

Another thing I’ll do along with plot structure is character structure. This is a biggie. I mean, a story is nothing without characters. So I’ll just jot down a bunch of bullet points of characters and particular aspects that I want to highlight or remember. I hate continuity errors in fiction. Like, if someone says they work on Maple Street but later in the fic they’re working on Pine Street. I hate that. So I keep note of specific things that my main character might notice at repeated points in the story (colours, places, smells, names, sounds -- so they’re all consistent even as the narrative evolves). That’s another thing -- your characters’ motivations. Not everyone is going to be a huge player, but they all do serve a purpose. The most important character is obviously your main character. I personally think it’s important to let your M.C. be an arse at times. They’re going to be mean, they’re going to misinterpret things or fly off the handle... just let ‘em. Let them be wretched humans, and then bring them back and make them realise what they’ve done. Let them learn! I love consequences in fiction, lol.

At the same time, I’ll probably start writing. We’ve already written down some snippets of neat dialogue or descriptions, but now we should start the actual process. For me, I used to start at the beginning. Usually this was the most fleshed out anyway: I’ll have a clear idea of the beginning and the end, but nothing in the middle. These days, if I have a scene in mind that I can’t forget, I’ll just write it. It will possibly get scrapped or rewritten, but that’s okay, because at least you’ve got it down and now you can devote your brain power to something useful (like figuring out what the middle is supposed to be). I’ll have half a dozen of totally out of context scenes just littered in my Word document that I’ll add to as I go along. Eventually, though, you’re going to start writing properly, and that’s when you write your opening scene.

Opening scenes: super important. Every time I write a scene I think: what is the point of this? What do I want the reader to learn or takeaway? Sometimes you do have filler scenes, but they also serve a different purpose (perhaps to establish a group dynamic or to explore/describe a character’s surroundings). Mainly, though, every scene should push something forward in some way, whether it’s character development or a plot point. So, with an opening scene, I always think you have to establish: where you are; who you are; what they are doing; where they’ve come from (in a philosophical and practical sense); and where they’re going (ditto). That doesn’t have to happen in the first paragraph -- that would be silly. But if you sprinkle that information in over time it’ll gradually build up a picture of your character and that way the reader can get an idea of who they are. You basically need to give a snapshot of what your story is about. This also goes back to the character creator stuff: where they are at the start should be different to where they end up. How that happens is, of course, because of plot, and because you’ve structured everything to the nth degree, we’ve got a very clear progression of that character’s growth (/s easier said than done lol).

General advice

Write down everything: every idea, a bit of dialogue, a description, whatever. Write it down. Doesn’t have to be neat. Just has to be on paper. You can’t remember everything, so if you’re spending time trying to hold those things in your head, it’s taking up space for new ideas to come along.

Structure, plan, structure, plan. Sometimes it’s boring and I hate it. Other times, when I’ve not written in a few days and I open the Word doc and think wtf is this supposed to be, I am very grateful for Past Me for leaving such detailed notes. Seriously, it helps so much. Oneshots don’t really need planning, in my experience. You just get those out there. But multi-chaptered stories really do, even ones that “just” focus on a relationship.

Whatever you want to write, commit to it. Space goblins invade Hawkins? Do it. Eleven and Max find themselves in a cult akin to Midsommar (2019) and must escape? Yes. Just... whatever you want to do, remember that you’re writing it for you. Write what most interests you, what makes you when you reread it go AHHHHH I LOVE THIS!! Because that makes it a thousand times easier to actually get on with the writing when you enjoy what you’re doing.

Write a lot. Every day, if you can, or at least at designated times. Occasionally I have a very specific headspace/vibe I have to be in, but sometimes it just hits me and I’ll say to my partner “I need to write now” and just disappear, lol. The more you write the more you write. It’s so, so, so true. Cannot emphasise this enough. When I wrote that ~200k in twelve months? It was because I literally wrote every. day. Or near enough. Remember that some days you’ll write 200 words, and other days you’ll write 20k (this happened to me with ADATS -- part of the reason I finished it so quickly was because I had sprints of writing 10k+ at a time that only happened because I was in the rhythm of it). Write, write, write. Who cares if it’s crap! No one will see it until you are ready. In the meantime, just write!

Probably last of all (although I could go on and on) is connect with other writers. If you’re struggling to start, sometimes just talking about it can help a huge amount. I hope it goes without saying that you can message me whenever you want, anon or not, and I will talk to you. We can talk about ideas or I can beta stuff, whatever you want! Find like-minded people and talk to them about what you want to do. Another thing this helps is in advertising your work when you do publish. I see a lot of first time fic writers get super down because they publish their magnum opus on AO3 but no one comments. Honestly, it’s because no one knows you’ve published! You don’t have to be tooting your own horn every which way, but just actively talking about your work and even collaborating with other content creators with get you hyped and other people too (and the input and encouragement other fandom members give is just... out of this world. Anon messages helped me finish ADATS when I was really worried I wouldn’t [that’s the truth]. Seriously, support is everything). When you have people excited about your work, you get excited. It’s really as simple as that.

I could go on but this is already horrendously long. I hope even a bit of this helps! If you want to chat or have any more questions, just hit me up any time.

[wander-wren]

Wren’s WIP Masterlist

all my current wips! any projects that aren’t finished that i want to finish, someday, not necessarily what i’m working on right now. all oneshots unless stated otherwise, and longfics have an estimated length given. if i decide to fully abandon a fic (which rarely happens), i’ll take it off the list. feel free to ask me about anything here, it might motivate me to finish or give me a new idea!!

other posts have my completed fics and random concepts.

Priority WIPs

these are wips i’ve worked on in the past month and/or unfinished fics currently posted to ao3. listed in rough order of priority-within-priority.

dusk to dawn- sequel to swiftpaw’s chance, rewrite of the new prophecy focusing on whitewing and nightcloud, then squirrelflight and tawnypelt as well, with others thrown in for spice. 70 chapters, 200kish.

falling feathers (i’ll follow you home)- bnha D/s au, dabihawks, your standard hawks double agent fic but with all the angst of the au. secret relationships, miscommunication, enemies to ??? to ????? to ???????? to lovers?? very VERY long, 500k+.

running- wtnv fic inspired by this fic. after being attacked in his home, carlos flees, taking a near-suicide job in night vale. what he finds is very different from the strange, hostile town he expected, and he falls in love, makes friends, nearly dies a few times, but eventually…heals. longfic, maybe 80k?

whumptober prompts- i fizzled out around day 13, but i do want to complete them eventually, even if it takes a long time

to take up swords and strike the sea- pirate!inej fic post-ck. not kanej, not kaz friendly but not kaz unfriendly. inej gets a gf. both of them are trans but that’s just a bg element. 3 parts, 35kish.

Other WIPS

sorted alphabetically by fandom, then again by rough priority within fandom. priority is completely determined by vibes and i’m hardly going to shuffle the order around regularly, so even if something is on the bottom of a long list, don’t be afraid to ask about it!

Arcane

turning out of time- t4t jinxekko, post-canon in a magical world where everything is peace and happiness on both sides. they throw an anniversary party and discover fireworks are not a great idea for not-quite-girls who used to make bombs and now have ptsd.

BNHA

sleepless- just before the hero license exams, izuku throws himself into training, determined to catch up to his classmates and never fail anyone ever again. he also stops sleeping. bakugo, clumsily, helps, and cue romance.

burn ourselves to ashes (use the rubble for the parts)- todoroki, bakugo, and deku are supposed to just be making a grocery store run. then there’s a villain attack, a collapsed building, a bleeding-out deku, and…a need for someone to cauterize a wound. todoroki has Feelings about this.

pull my feathers one by one (put ‘em in your pocket when i’m gone)- dabihawks miscommunication/getting together fic ft all of hawks’s bird traits & HPSC bashing

The Old Guard

believe you hold the answers (but your feathers are all frayed)- nile convinces booker to break his exile, sure that once the others see him they’ll realize their mistake and let him come home. joe goes ballistic.

don’t care to beg your pardon (let’s live until we die)- mortal joenicky college au where joe volunteers to be a car crash victim in nicky’s paramedic training and promptly falls in love with his competence and beauty and nicky-ness. cue romance. might kick off a oneshot series in this vein?

it’s your wound, my sutures- fairly on-the-nose title, healing works a little too well and joe ends up with a bullet buried in his shoulder. nicky and andy perform impromptu diy surgery.

The Raven Cycle

lost in what you think of me (let me be the void you fill)- i take freaky friday, give it to pynch, and rub my trans feelings all over it bc they’re both trans in different ways in this one.

one forward, one back (lost in labyrinthine spirals)- sequel to “this black thing inside of me,” in the emetophobic!adam universe. a story about recovery’s ups and downs and weird triggers. i’m still projecting/venting.

call the ravens, call the swifts- wing au getting together, where adam’s wing gets injured, ronan helps, and they have a lot of good and bad feelings.

Six of Crows

taxidermy fingerprints, taxonomize our differences- wylan comes out to the crows as nonbinary. kaz is Very interested by this. everyone talks. kaz comes out to the crows as nonbinary.

Warrior Cats

the world ends eventually (so come with me)- blossomivy fic where the two decide to abandon the clans before the great battle. they don’t quite get away in time an have to fight their way out, but it’s worth it, to be together and happy.

Welcome to Night Vale

punishment by proxy- instead of taking cecil for reeducation, the secret police decide carlos will be a much more effective deterrent. cecil picks up the pieces.

intersecting realities- takes place during that arc where the universe almost collapsed, i’m not entirely sure where past me was going with it but it seems like cecilos are wrestling with reality and which universe to live in??

[fabelyn]

Equivalent Exchange

Pairing: Childe/Zhongli (chili)

Rated: T for language Warnings: spoilers for 1.1 update story Chapter: Oneshot Chapter Word Count: 2525

Link to AO3

Summary: Some would see Zhongli’s penniless state as the most pathetic oversight.

Childe sees it as an opportunity.

And maybe that’s what Zhongli is hoping for.

“This is a pleasant surprise,” Childe lies easily, having tracked his target to this location. “May I sit with you?”

He stands beside Zhongli, and is disappointed when he shows no visible reaction to finding him so close after they’d parted with no contact.

The tea table Zhongli sits on is clearly made for one, yet that doesn’t deter him from nodding and making a welcoming motion, and Childe pulls up a chair. The table is small enough that their knees are almost touching beneath it.

“I apologize, I did not realize I would have company and only ordered for myself,” Zhongli motions the leftover tea.

“I see you’re still keeping the finest of taste.”

“Shall I order more for you?”

“Hm, no it’s fine, for now.”

Zhongli smiles. “This is nice, I don't think we’ve sat down to talk since you introduced me to the Traveller.”

So, not beating around the bush too much . “Hm. We were all so busy with the…funeral arrangements.” He chuckled, and Zhongli joined in. Childe let the levity rest between them for a moment before sobering the conversation somewhat. “And I was unaware if you wanted another meal… after.”

Zhongli raises one perfect eyebrow as if completely baffled. “Now, why would that be?”

Childe couldn’t detect sarcasm in the question so he just nods. “True, you certainly did achieve success in your endeavors, so I suppose you aren’t angry with me, at the very least.”

“You sound as if your goal wasn’t reached.”

Childe shrugged. “It was, since the Tsarista was satisfied, although there was… a surprising development along the way.” I did not think I was so stupid as to be interested in the target I was using.

“Surprising development,” Zhongli quoted slowly, then smiled. “Yes, you could say I too had some of that.”

“Indeed?”

“Yes.”

Childe waited, but no further explanation was forthcoming. He shrugged, it was only fair.

“Alright, so neither of us failed. But now we no longer have need of each other. I did not think you had further interest in keeping up a sham relationship, Rex Lapis .”

Zhongli stared at him, then smiled thinly. His mannerisms were still as gentle as Childe recalled, but the look in his eyes were much sharper than before.

“A sham? And yet, you’ve come.”

“You all but called for me. I got curious.”

“Did I? I do not recall doing such a thing, as pleasant as your current company may be.”

“You told the Traveller that you, Morax , had forgotten to plan for having mora a your disposal after your defection from your Archon duties, and they mentioned such a ridictulous thing to me. And it seems others have heard a similar tale of woe from you, I not in so many words.”

“Signaling that I find myself without monetary recourse may mean I require assistance here and there, but not that you must come assist me.”

“And maybe I did not come to offer aid, much less friendship, but to simply laugh at your predicament.”

“Did you?”

“Hm, do you really have no Mora? I find it truly hard to believe that after that amusing plot you tricked me into, and successfully making a deal with the Tsarista, that you would truly not have thought such a thing through. Not to mention, your alias as Zhongli did have a job at the Funeral Parlor. A detail I cannot simply forget given that is how you roped me into contacting you before.” Childe smiles brightly.

Zhongli remains unmoved. “Perhaps after so much time as the Archon, the concept of needing currency to live had become a detail beneath me and I did not factor it.”

“Is that so?”

They stare at each other, a standoff where neither wants to be the first to cede. Childe resists the urge to laugh: it is fun to try the patience of an Archon, yet it is also so unbearably frustrating, perhaps he will lose on-

“I am not in as dire straits as I may have…. accidentally appeared to the Traveller and others.”

Childe blinks in surprise; he had not expected Zhongli to concede so quickly. Or for it not feel like he had won. 

“As you surmised earlier,” Zhongli went on, “my employment at the Funeral Parlor could always be taken up again.”

“And yet, you haven’t done so.”

“Indeed.” Zhongli drums his long fingers on the table. “Retirement does not feel right if I am simply taken up another task. Perhaps if it were something enjoyable...”

Childe is getting impatient. “Is getting on your knees enjoyable?” He asks, wondering if the language was too crude for the likes of Rex Lapis to understand.

Zhongli raises an eyebrow, Childe decides to explain.

“The two women who helped pay for you this week, surely you have not become so old as to not understand what they were asking for as gratitude?”

Zhongli’s reply is completely out of Childe’s expectation.

“Why do you assume I would be on my knees?” He asks simply, and, before Childe can recover from that, continues. “And why does that interest you? Is that what you’d ask as payment for helping me now? Oh, pardon me, you implied you only came to laugh at my predicament, not help.”

Childe can simply agree and excuse himself. End this and leave. But if he had wanted nothing, he wouldn’t have come in the first place.

“Did I imply that? I think you misunderstood. I did come to help you after all. Although, naturally, I should have some equivalent compensation, especially since, from my understanding, this monetary aid would prolong itself as you have no interest in getting a job any time soon.”

Zhongli’s perfect poise slips a little, almost as if his shoulders have sagged in relief.

For the first time in… possibly, ever, Childe feels a twinge of what may be guilt. Spurned by Zhongli’s surprising candor, he decides it might be best, afterall, to not trick the... man... further.

“Rex Lapis, Zhongli, I’m not sure you realize who you’re after.”

“Childe, Tartaglia , a Harbinger from Snezhnaya, correct?”

Childe’s fingers twitch at the name coming from Zhongli’s lips. “Our previous camaraderie was all but manufactured so I could attain my results. Had my Tsarista not demanded subtlety and diplomacy, I wouldn’t have sought out the Funeral Parlor, and simply brought pandemonium to Liyue from the get go. I’m not the affable young lordling I acted as. Even the youngest Harbinger is still a Harbinger. I attacked the Traveller, I nearly brought destruction to Liyue, and I regret nor apologize for either. The precious friend you made before, he doesn’t exist.

“However, in acknowledgement of our good… ah… companionship thus far, I suggest you reconsider, and leave.”

It’s actually insane that, after everything, he came to Zhongli to simply allow him to leave when the man had all but tactidly said he’d sell his body to Childe. 

But from the moment he had sat so near Zhongli he realized he could no longer wear a mask, not for this. He could not see himself starting anything with the man while not being himself.

And he knows he won’t bear rejection well if their acquaintanceship goes further.

Zhongli stares at him, then begins chuckling.

“Oh, it seems I came here not to laugh at you, but to be laughed at.”

“Pardon my manners, but really, I never expected such silly words from you.”

“Silly?”

“Hm, yes. Let’s see. First of all, the cute persona-”

“...Cute?”

“-You crafted as Childe here in Liyue, while it may have been a performance sufficient enough to trick mere mortals, was hardly that convincing to me. I could see the look in your eyes even as you smiled. I never expected you to be a gentle soul. And as for what you tried to unleash, your glee towards it all, and your lack of remorse now… I see it all, I have lost my gnosis not my eyes. Childe, Tartaglia, whatever name you give yourself, I am pursuing you, not your disguise.”

Zhongli raises a hand as if to stop Childe from interrupting. Childe, however, had no such plans.

“That said, underestimating my observational skills is not enough to make me laugh. What dumbfounds me, yet touches me at the same time, is that you just said you’ll allow me to leave, and I think you mean truly meant that.”

“What about that?”

“Were you aware that I was offered a bonus for my willing compliance towards my end of the bargain?”

Childe blinks. He had not, and shakes his head, confused at the sudden turn.

“Very well. it so happened that this boon would have been to… interestingly enough… deny a request you had made, just after everything was over. I refused it, naturally, else you would not be here.”

Childe stiffens, and Zhongli’s smile widens.

“As you said, even the youngest Harbinger is still a Harbinger. It is unthinkable that they would waste one of their most precious resources staying in Liyue and not going elsewhere to further your Tsarista’s objective. It would be quite the demotion, your staying here, if not for the fact you requested it.”

Childe tries to laugh it off. “I-”

“Pardon me, but I’m not done. Of course, as strange as it is, there are maybe some reasons for it. Spying on the Qixing and the nearby Mondstat. Planning or organizing a future invasion. Certainly there are excuses that could be sufficient enough to make it seem that you truly had no other motive to stay here, other than to serve.”

“Precisely, so-”

“Still not done,” Zhongli says, voice a little deeper, stricter, and Childe finds himself shutting his mouth in too much excited obedience at the tone. Zhongli pauses, as if gauging Childe’s reaction, but then continues. “I waited to see if you would come to reacquaint ourselves, for the sake of your new task. You did not. So I may have made comments to the Traveller and others mentioning a monetary predicament, to see if you would come then. You still did not. However… two interesting things happened, do you know what they are?”

Childe just stares. Surely Zhongli doesn’t know-

“The first kind lady that offered mora in exchange for ah… in your words “me on my knees” was sadly caught in bed by her husband with another man.”

Oh Tsarista, Zhongli knows.

“The other one… a fire consumed parts of her home -a candle gone wrong, such a normal thing- and while she is fine and not in any trouble, she no longer can afford to spend money on others, at least not for a while.”

At Childe’s continued silence, Zhongli leans forward, reaches across the table and tucks an errant lock of hair behind Childe’s ear.

It takes all of Childe’s restraint not to lift his hand to where he was touched.

“Perhaps a gentler, humbler, soul than I would simply assume coincidence. But I am not that humble, and I recall the look in your eyes. So it amuses me that here and now, you offer me freedom from you, yet you’ve been quite keen to stay near and ruin any chances I may have of leaning on other people. You claim I don’t know what I want, but it seems to me you are the one unsure.”

Childe opens his mouth, closes it, then throws caution to the wind. “Being willful is my forte,” he says with a small laugh to be master of himself again. “I didn’t like where that was going, so I cut it short with those women. But I’ve concluded I don’t want to live more of a farce than I already do, so I don’t want anything with you where I have to pretend to be, well, not me.”

“You wouldn’t have to.”

And Childe truly believes it. And because he does, he says something he had never expected to.

“But you know, paying for your lifestyle for an indefinite amount of time will be too costly. Make I should demand your heart along with your body?”

It’s cheesy but it does the trick. Finally it seems he has managed to disconcert Zhongli, who clearly had not expected Childe to say something so outrageous. Childe laughs, because he hadn’t expected it either.

Zhongli recovers spectacularly fast. “Well now, I think the grace of having the former Geo Archon’s body at your command is recompense enough.”

“Oho, so now you abruptly understand the value of money?”

“No such thing, it’s just that even someone so out of tune as I can tell this transaction of yours is too one sided.”

“So, after all of…” Childe waves at the table between them, “whatever this conversation was, is that where we stop? Your body and nothing else?”

Well, not that Childe, who had been bracing for less than that, wasn’t happy , he simply wasn’t satiated.

“Hm… I never said that. I simply don’t believe mora is sufficient.”

The electricity that’s coursing through him almost feels like Childe had accidentally ignited his Delusion. He tries not to shiver and remain composed. “Fair enough. Then, oh mighty Rex Lapis, what price would you place on your heart?”

Maybe this had all been another carefully crafted ploy by the Archon, and he was planning to entice Childe into obedience, or reveal Snezhaya’s secrets-

“Hm, I believe this sort of transaction can only be done if the same thing is exchanged in return.”

Childe blinks. 

Oh. 

He really should have seen that one coming, shouldn't he?

He can simply lie. But he won’t.

Hesitant for the first time, he looks down at the empty cup between them, and reaches out to play with it. “... That would be tricky. I don’t know if my… if what I have to offer has the same value of yours.” And because he really can’t seem to stop running his mouth today, he dares add. “It might even be more than yours. Or. Or maybe less, of course.”

Zhongli’s hand reaches out lightning fast to hold his own over the table.

“I highly doubt that,” he says softly. “However, we can put that part of the deal on hold for now and discuss the, ah, terms and values at a later time. Unless this needs to be a package for you?”

Childe snorts, no longer discomfited, but finds himself turning his hand to properly hold Zhongli’s. “Oh please, what kind of fool would throw away this deal? Alright, so according to our deal, you’re mine-”

“My body, for now. Don’t try to trick the God of Contracts so brazenly.”

“I am brazen, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. But fine. And in turn I am your walking wallet.”

“Are you not going to put a limit to how much I can demand from you?”

“Are you?”

“I can handle anything.”

“So long as you can, my wallet will handle your demands. And. I don’t see my tasks here in Liyue ending anytime soon, so we can discuss the rest later.”

“We have a contract, then. Ah, could you kindly start by dealing with this meal?”

“Certainly, but you’re following me tonight.”

*

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Notes:

I did this in a feverish state after the new storyline dropped (this was posted to ao3 yesterday), so apologies if it's not that good. I did consider trying to extend it a bit so it did not feel too fast, but the last time I tried doing a "long oneshot" things, ah, backfired into a massive WIP and I did not want that again.

I hope it wasn't too bad. I've never written for this fandom before, so I don't know if I got them down correctly. My main concern was Childe, who to me comes of as slightly sadistic and I could see him being the possessive sort, if he ever came to care about anything. Plus he is unrepetant in his crimes.