#in all seriousness the last time i saw this was in the theater - yes i've been a dan craig stan near forever lol -

[mobius-m-mobius]

DANIEL CRAIG as JAKE LONERGAN in COWBOYS & ALIENS (2011)

[frodo-with-glasses]

25 Questions with Phil Dragash: YES, SERIOUSLY!

So y'all know how I was reviewing Phil Dragash's audiobook of LotR last year, but kinda fell off somewhere in the middle of Rohan?? Well, guess what! A couple weeks ago, I received a tumblr message from the man himself, saying he'd read through all my reviews, had really enjoyed the little blast from the past, and was open to answering questions if I had any!

So of course, I had LOTS of questions.

The first one being: "Are you actually the real Phil Dragash??"

But I'm delighted to say that after exchanging emails with the work email listed on his website, I can confidently say that it is the real dude, and I've had a blast chatting with him! So for those of you who urged I listen to this audiobook—especially @laurelindorenan for her glowing recommendation—and for everyone else who likes the audiobook and/or enjoyed my reviews: I am delighted to present, ladies and gentlehobbits, this peek behind the curtain!

But of course I'm putting it all below the cut, because this man rambles like I do 🤣

Obligatory disclaimer: All opinions presented by Mr. Dragash are his own, I am not necessarily condoning any of them; please do not come after me for his opinions regarding pineapple on pizza.

25 QUESTIONS, LET'S GO!

1. Tell me how you got into Lord of the Rings!

I was ten years old when my dad took me to the library, and found a VHS copy of Ralph Bakshi’s 1978 animated Lord of the Rings film. I was already a fan of the “Chronicles of Narnia” and my dad just handed the tape to me and said “Look, C.S. Lewis’s friend made this”. I watched it, and had no idea what was going on. It was so hard to understand.

Fast forward to the year 2002 when “Fellowship” was out on DVD, and we had a movie night at my older cousin’s place, and watched the film for the first time. My 13 year old self was enraptured by it. Dad bought the DVD first thing the next day, and I’ve been a fan ever since! I, my brother, and our dad watched “Return of the King” in theaters four times, which was saying something, considering we only ever saw a movie once in cinemas. Between “The Return of the King” opening in December ‘03, I picked up the books and read (as well as I could) through them. A lot of friends kept joking “tell us how the damn story ends!”, good times.

2. When and how did you decide to make this audiobook? What’s the story behind the entire project? 

I was a very ambitious lad, and my first and biggest interest was filmmaking. I used to direct short films with my friends ever since my 11th birthday, and was the youngest in class at the filmschool I attended a few years later. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that I had massive ambitions to direct “the Hobbit”, which is silly in retrospect considering I was 16 years old at the time. I even sent my portfolio and DVDs of my films to Peter Jackson’s manager (who actually got back to me with a wonderful response, despite not being able to accept my ‘completely reasonable’ offer) When I was heartbroken and torn to pieces knowing I wouldn’t be directing the movie, a few more years went by, and I decided to reread some chapters of the “Lord of the Rings” books. I remember really well that this was late at night, laying in bed, and going through “King of the Golden Hall” and seeing how close to the movies it was, but also far more expanded. I thought “my extensive home-made short movies experience with sound design and sound mixing could work here, and I could just read a few chapters and try to make the soundscape as realistic as possible. Why not try it?” 

So, the next day I tried. The first two chapters I tried were “King of the Golden Hall” and “A Journey in the Dark” (which partly answers your other question about that chapter). I was so absolutely surprised by how well it was going, that I decided to upload them onto YouTube in March 2010 I think. I got a fairly good response, and I was planning on doing a few more random chapters. I never intended to do the whole thing. But this one comment on YouTube I’ll always remember, it said: “I think you should go from start to finish, because you’ll probably get used to the characters and sounds and people can also follow along in the story gradually”.

Taking that suggestion to heart, in August 2010 I went from Chapter 1 onward. 

3. Were you inspired by any other audiobook versions of LotR (such as the BBC radio drama)?

I was not, I actually haven’t listened to the BBC Radio drama until far ahead into the project I was doing. I did some research on what other audio productions anyone did with LOTR, from The Mind’s Eye edition, to the ‘60s Hobbit Radio Play; so I felt pretty confident. I just fell in love with the way the films brought Middle-Earth to life and seeing their incredible dedication for authenticity (from the props department, to the music), you really couldn’t do any better than that visually or audibly - at least in my opinion. I just wanted to hear Tolkien’s text but with the realisation of the films. 

However, if you listen to Chapter 1 of TTT, and hear how Legolas laments their absence from not being there to help Boromir at Amon Hen, you can clearly hear the inflection from the BBC Radio play’s version. I just lifted that because I thought it was a fantastic way to deliver the line.

4. Did you have any rituals for “getting into character” before recording?

If I were to show you the raw unedited recording sessions, you’d probably be surprised at how underdeveloped it is! I had no real rituals or warmups, I just went for it. Usually went in cold, and tried reading the entire chapter and doing all the voices at once. Then I’d be exhausted, and afterwards start cutting all the mistakes, and separating each character into different tracks – and then re-recording 50%-70% of it, as I was laying in the sounds. 

I think any character just needs a few words for me to say in their voice, and that helps for the rest of their dialogue. For Aragorn it was usually: “You cannot wield it! None of us can.” for Pippin it was: “Sometimes”, just random things that make things ‘click’ in my head. If I got lost or didn’t feel like the performances were working, I’d simply just watch scenes from the films to hear the real actors again!

5. Who was your favorite character to voice? Who was your least favorite? And why?

People who know me, know I love doing the villains. Sauron, the orcs, the Nazgûl, etc. I just love the idea of personifying things that scare you. Something completely the opposite of who you are. Always a fun time! Any character I can nail extremely accurately always makes me happy, but I’m always very critical of my own work, so it’s a rare thing.

My least favorite characters to voice are: Imrahil, Denethor, Arwen, Celeborn, Galadriel, Erestor, Lindir, Haldir, Goldberry, Gildor… I think the pattern is pretty obvious if you realize that I am incapable of providing a satisfactory voice that feels unique enough. They just sound to me like “I wish I had a broader range. They weren’t done justice.” I have feelings for most of the characters in this situation, but I’m a mere mortal. I can’t do all of them as well as I wish I could. I wish Aragorn was more like Viggo Mortensen’s voice (I tried with the nasally yells you mentioned!), I wish Gandalf had a richer tone, I wish Saruman sounded more majestic, and I wish Frodo was - in retrospect- more older sounding, too. There’s so much I wish I could do better, but to hell with it, I tried.

Fun fact: my least-favorite to voice are also Orcs because they destroy my throat after a while. Which is ironic, because of my first statement.

6. I noticed that you gave the men of Rohan and Gondor slightly different dialects! Are you pulling from any real-world accents to make that happen?

I did try to listen to Anglo-Saxon, and ancient norse but I just tried to make Rohan and Gondor slightly distinct in any way I could. I never really tried to make things too obvious, but admittedly, I think I just used my intuition (smoothing the R’s for the Rohirrim, making the Gondorians more ‘proper’, etc.). I do want to emphasize that this was a one-person project and keeping things together or consistent is definitely an extraneous exercise when you’re just trying to get something finished by yourself! 

7. Some characters (like Beregond and Quickbeam, to name a couple of my favorites) aren’t in the movies, so they don’t have an actor for you to imitate. How did you decide what they would sound like?

Well, in the case of Beregond, I realized he was just “your ordinary guy”, and seeing Minas Tirith through his eyes (and Pippin’s)  is such an amazing and interesting opportunity. It made the city feel so real, and I wanted to take advantage of that. I think I started with a ‘generic’ voice, but when I re-recorded him knowing more and more of the context and what he was saying to Pippin, and as a result who he is, made me adjust what I felt were more his personality. But still that ‘ordinary guy’ idea was the bedrock, and it’s been years since I heard that chapter, but I hope it holds up! (I just remembered Bergil is in that too, another voice I wish I could have done better) 

Another fun fact: when Pippin scares the kids in Minas Tirith, the audio was from something I videotaped when I was 10 years old with my friends, it had the perfect “kids-going-aaah!” sound.

If I had it my way, I’d have a cast of dozens in this Audiobook, so a lot of times I never felt like my voice was enough to truly capture the “We’re in Middle-Earth, we just have microphones to record it” idea. So I have to make compromises since I was the only one doing the voices. That being said, Quickbeam was a fun surprise because he felt like, as you said “young treebeard”, and these things just worked out through experimentation! I think Quickbeam turned out pretty nice. I like Quickbeam.

8. HOW—I ask with great enthusiasm—DID YOU DO TREEBEARD’S VOICE? How did you get that resonance and woody sound? Did you send your voice through a wooden box and re-record it on the other side like they did in the movies?

It’s really great that you know all the behind the scenes stories from the films! Especially what Ethan Van der Ryn, David Farmer, and the late Michael Hopkins have done with their incredible creativity. I had no such resources to produce Treebeard’s sound. What I did was a digital facsimile: a special ‘room’ reverb, with some other equalizing effects to boost the bass and (maybe, I can’t remember) another higher pitched track of the same voice faintly in there. 

You won’t believe this, but I was not going to do The Two Towers audiobook unless I could do a good Treebeard voice. In 2011 after finishing “Fellowship”, I was on the fence about continuing, and only committed once I knew I could do Treebeard right. Treebeard was the key to all this. This should come to no surprise to the ones who played the game, but I used a lot of sound effects from ‘Battle for Middle-Earth’ which contained a lot of clean sounds for ents, trolls, the balrog, the ringwraiths, and other monsters from the films. I used the ent’s footsteps from the games, and recorded my own foley for some of the trees snapping and leaves rustling as well. The “fart” sounds were the low creaking of tree branches, and - as they stated in the making-of for the films - very pitched down cow moos. 

9. Tell me about the foley work! Ever since I was a kid, I’ve always been that nerd who watched the Behind The Scenes featurettes for fun, so I’m very interested to hear how you made the sound effects for footsteps and whistling arrows and jangling horse harnesses and such. 

I’m glad you are! I’ve collected sound libraries (ripped from video games, and finding and buying sound packs) for a literal decade, because I always needed sounds for the short films I made when I was younger. I just kept learning about how to mix sounds together, and it’s very creative and very enjoyable! That being said, the foley work itself is mostly recorded by me. If I can’t find a sound in the library I have, I will record it. Clothing rustles, and touch are all recorded while I listen to the audiobook playback and ‘perform’ each character. It’s a really arduous process, but I think it adds so much life into the sound. 

I went out into the woods (or backyard) with my mic to record footsteps, sometimes I would listen to the audiobook with headphones while performing the footsteps. When I would have traveled somewhere with different terrain I would be sure to record more foley (rocks being moved, or pebbles being stepped on) knowing I’ll use it for certain chapters. I do not want to reveal a huge secret about the predominant foley for the character's clothes, but an old backpack I used were 90% of the characters’ ‘movements’. Some wingflaps of the fell beasts were just my jeans. It’s a really creative process trying to find things that ‘sound’ right for an environment or action. The magic is putting them all together and hearing the result. Also, yes Sam’s pan is my grandma’s frying pan, and I know it’s sometimes annoying, but - look - Sam has a lot of stuff to carry.

I start with the background sounds (wind, tree rustles, water if there is any, etc.) lots of layers of them just to make them sound unique and not the same. Then I move to selective and nearer environmental background sounds. Then, the ‘hero’ sounds, the effects that are integral to the story (if it’s sword clashes, or an explosion, or who knows what), and finally the foley (footsteps, clothing rustles, breaths, etc.) - I had a friend record her own horses breathing and moving for a lot of closeups of the horses in the audiobooks. I think even if you can’t really hear some of their low breaths, their presence is still ‘there’. I personally think I got a lot better by the end of LOTR than when I started! 

I wanted to add, the sounds for little Elanor in the very last scene of “The Return of the King” (the baby sounds), I was not happy with the stock baby sounds I had, and asked my older cousin (an audio person too!) to send me recordings he made of his then-1-year-old daughter in a studio. So, my first-cousin-once-removed is Elanor! She’s 22 now. I feel old.

10. Do you have a favorite sound effect from this project? Mine is the “pat-pat” against cloth that’s used to denote a hug.

Absolutely, do you remember the two “watchers” before the tower of Cirith Ungol? The vulture-like statues that block the hobbit’s path out? The alarm sound is a wholly original sound design I did, and I’m really happy with it. It’s just ugly sounding, and that’s the point. I always wished I had more Nazgul, and I think the worst moments I had with mixing were the battle scenes. There’s just too much to handle and make it sound good. But I really tried.

I’m very glad you heard the ‘pat-pat’s. I try my best to perform every character when recording foley, and want even some of the sounds to convey something in the telling of the story.

11. What's the thought process behind your use of the various musical motifs from Howard Shore's score? (Read: Why do you use the Shire theme so often, and why does it get me in the heart every single time?)

I want everyone to know that this is a really important and valuable question, and one I never really get to talk about: To me, Howard Shore’s music is one of the very best things to come out of the films. He truly made an opera out of the story, and all his leitmotifs and orchestrations are a stroke of genius. They work on their own, and when reading the books as well, and as a nerd for films and all that stuff, I wanted to put a lot of care into how I’m placing the score, and for what scene, emotionally and leitmotivically, if that’s a word.

The Audiobook I did is obviously a ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’ situation, so I can’t credit myself for the majority of the Audiobook I did, but I wanted to use all my filmmaking intuition to properly use the music to enhance the telling of the story. So, just like the filmmakers had to change and mix lines from the book, or make changes to make it work as a film, I felt like a lot of instances happened with the music for the audiobook. Obviously, I used the score when applicable to the intended scenes, but there are very often cases where they won’t work. I read as much as I could in the past about what the motifs were and where Shore used them in the movies, so I followed that trajectory for the most part. Gondor is Gondor, Rohan is Rohan, Mordor is Mordor, etc. 

Changes happen when I feel the emotions for a scene in the books do not match up to the ones in the films, and then there are brand new scenes and characters not in the movies at all, that I have to figure out! Take the pause from music between Gandalf falling into the chasm with the Balrog, and the fellowship successfully escaping. It’s perfect in the film, but I knew I couldn’t put the lamenting heartbreaking music in there yet, since the descriptions all drive the idea that escape is paramount. So I treated it as a ‘shock’ moment. No music until they’re completely out of the mountain, then the grief comes in. Things like that, a lot of fun creative thinking to get those emotions working!

I recall you mentioning the ‘Gimli / Legolas drinking game’ statement and how I used the hell out of it throughout the Audiobook, which is a good example. I pitched it up and down, for different moments, and it just has that hobbit mundane and jolly quality to it. So, in it goes to fill moments from the books. 

I also edited and modified existing motifs for completely different scenes and ideas. One of my favorites is when Treebeard talks about the Entwives. I needed this melancholy yearning sound that was really essential, and found it by reversing Eowyn’s theme, and pitching it down so the violin sounds like a cello/bass. To me it just felt extremely appropriate for the sound of a long-lost relationship while portraying a larger-than-life creature. 

Let’s also say Bombadil. I made up the idea that the last statement in the credits for “Return of the King”, was Bombadil’s theme. It’s actually just a reference to Der Ring des Nibelungen by Wagner, a very verbose beautiful crescendo, but I thought “I’ll pretend like it’s Bombadil, he’s last in the score even though he’s the first in Arda”. So I used that musical progression in his songs, that’s his leitmotif now (to me, anyway) He sings in that wavy up-and-down melody. Which is why you hear a lot of that in those chapters.

I also try to use recordings not from the original score: I looked far and wide for alternative recordings, predominantly the album by the Royal Prague Philharmonic, and the “LOTR Symphony”, just to make the Audiobooks feel different. I pitched down and moved and reassembled a lot of different cues for different scenes as well.

There are not a lot of instances of music from other movies, however, they do exist! I used music from “Battle for Middle-Earth”, the game “War in the North”, and for the last few chapters, “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” since it just came out at the time. I used a lot of music from Howard Shore’s “Seven” and “The Game” during Shelob (I think), and for the Barrow-Downs. I used a tiny bit of underscore from the brilliant Don Davis’s “The Matrix Reloaded”, it had a really eerie choir which made me feel like it would be perfect for the fatigue and dizzying unreality of Mordor when Sam and Frodo were on their last leg, trying to get to Mt. Doom. Lastly, I used a little bit of music from Howard Shore’s “Twilight: Eclipse” for some dialogue scenes during Return of the King! And music from the independent film “Mongol” by Tuomas Kantelinen for the Woses when Theoden has to get help from Ghan-Buri-Ghan. Also the ending of ROTK has a few cues from “The Lord of the Rings musical”, lovely stuff.

It may surprise you that there is a small amount of score I actually ‘wrote’ with help from my brother (he’s a musician). It’s in the coronation of Elessar. It’s not very good but I needed something. There is also a cello version of “to the edge of night”, which I kindly asked permission to use by YouTube celloist, but I sadly don't think that video is up anymore.

Lastly, I use the Shire music so much because - just like Howard Shore said - it becomes a ‘hymn’ or an ‘anthem’ for the hobbits as they leave their comforts behind and are in a wide and unfamiliar world. Every little bit that reminds them of home, or relates to each of them, usually deserves a little ‘shire’ statement here and there. I feel if it’s in the characters’ hearts and minds, it has to be expressed in the music!

12. Out of all the chapters I’ve listened to so far on the Internet Archive, “A Journey in the Dark” is the one most plagued with editing issues; Sam’s temper tantrum over leaving Bill the Pony is cut out entirely. Which is a shame, because I was really looking forward to hearing your take on that. (Is it strange to say that I wanted to hear you break down into blubbering tears? Probably. Let’s ignore that and move on.) Is there any chance that you have a cleaner edit of that chapter somewhere?

I think you’ll be very unsurprised to know that “A Journey in the Dark” is the first chapter I ever recorded. I think you’ll also need to know that I did FOTR when I was 21 years old, and my grasp on doing better sound mixing or even getting the characters right was still a work in progress. I learned so much going chapter-by-chapter and felt that each succeeding one improves from the former. As a demo-run, I did “King of the Golden Hall '' and “Journey in the Dark” in early 2010 (in fact, I did only the first half of “JITD” back then. Stopping right after they are barred inside the mines, as the Watcher destroys the gate. I did the second half once I caught up with the story going chapter-by-chapter.)

There are so many issues with it, and I haven’t listened to it since. If you have headphones you’ll also notice that none of the voices really pan from left to right, or feel like they’re ever anywhere else except the dead-center. I was lazy back then. 

When I read the chapters, at the time, I was sharing an ‘office room’ with my younger brother, and as a teenaged younger brother does - continues strumming his guitar no matter what the other brother is doing. It was really fun, and funny and I was extremely sloppy with editing things out, and taking it too seriously. So, for sure you can hear ‘someone’ in the background during the early parts of FOTR, and I was too lazy to re-record or edit out the noises that weren’t supposed to be there.

Forgive me if this part is a lot longer, but now that you mention it, I want to get on my soap-box and rant about how many things I agree with about the Audiobook’s shortcomings and how many things have changed since the wee days of 2010: 

I didn’t really get a grasp on the characters, and I had no idea I was going to do the entire book. I did not take enough care with sound mixing (it’s a highly technical and rigorous practice, I’ve discovered. Even now, ten plus years later - it’s too technical for me to fully understand yet), and I did not thoroughly re-listen to the chapter when I was done with an edit or a sound-effects pass. Therefore there’s always been mistakes still in there, and just unpleasantly careless placement of sounds and music. I have often thought about re-recording it to get it up to scratch, but it’s been over a decade and I haven’t properly preserved all the sound stems without having to re-sound-mix the whole chapter again, and there is that little thing called ‘burnout’ which is hard to ignore. So, I apologize to everyone who has to suffer through that huge drop in quality with “A Journey in the Dark”. It quite literally was my first attempt, and it definitely shows. 

The good news is that a fan asked me the same thing about the missing piece in that chapter (the one you mentioned! With Sam and Bill!), and I’ve heard the same comments about it throughout the years. Why is it missing? I don’t know why! I recorded it, but in my loose run-and-gun past when I was a wee lad, I was careless, and just had the mp3 with that part missing. A rendering error, perhaps! Stupid 21 year old Phil just hodgepoging everything.

A Few months ago, I did get another email about that missing piece. I thought “okay, once and for all, I’m going to find that missing part.” - and I searched my old harddrives for some kind of archival copy with that part in it. Amazingly, it was a lot harder to find than I thought. Every rendered version of JITD either stopped right before that scene, or had it omitted. I actually found one half of it as a ‘demo’ piece I rendered years ago for a ‘sound trailer’, and then I finally found the original YouTube video I made - which had it intact! Now the hardest part was stitching it together with the rest. Took longer than I thought, but I finally amended this horrible incompetence. And yes, I will share the link to you! And be prepared to be disappointed at the 2010-era quality!

I don’t know if anyone knows this, but with the mp3s circling around, I have taken the liberty of re-recording and re-working some chapters from their original versions. I try my best to preserve the originals, but I also wish people to listen to the re-records. I have actually re-recorded and re-mastered “A Long-Expected Party” three times. 2011, 2013, and 2014. I re-recorded “King of the Golden Hall” in 2013, and “Shadow of the Past” in 2014. I usually try labelling the dates on the mp3 files themselves. The one I’m most proud of re-recording bits of, is “The Pyre of Denethor” as the first time I had Denethor say his last words he was mildly raising his voice, but I listened to it again one day and went “this man should be at the edge of sanity.” - so he absolutely yells now, and it’s such a night-and-day comparison.

Another addendum: I completely understand the complaints about ‘the sound/music drowning out the dialogue’. It’s been the #1 complaint over the decade. I completely understand. I never had professional sound mixing gear, nor did I have proper mixing headphones or speakers or a proper studio (most of the audiobook was recorded at my grandmother’s house!). The balance of the audio making it sound immersive, (like you are there!) and having clear dialogue to hear is - like I said - an extremely technical and complex process that I’ve never had the ability or tech to master. Let alone for a book that’s 48 hours long, and has so much sound and music to it. Nothing would bring me more joy than to work with an experienced sound mixer, and find all my audio stems, and for us to work together to clear up any and all issues. But as this project was a simple fan-made work, and I haven’t distributed it myself for a decade, who knows?

This is also why I never went on to do “The Hobbit”. Burnout is real, and I’ve never recovered from LOTR. The burnout… “it’s never really healed, Sam.”

13. What was your favorite scene to record and mix?

Mount Doom. Can’t get better than trying to make the climax as horrible and eucatastrophic as that. It all led up to this, and it was such a rush to work on. I remember how I was at the edge of my seat watching ROTK in cinemas for the first time, and how amazingly they pulled it off, and I wanted to definitely imitate that, but using Tolkien’s own writing. Just so cool.

I have two favorite chapters: The first one is “The Scouring of the Shire”. I remember well, when I was working on it, I realized this has never been ‘dramatized’ before. At least not in full. I felt so special being the first one (probably) to do it. I could imagine the entire chapter in my head like a film, and I could bring it to life with very little outside influence. Such a poignant and shocking chapter. 

I don’t think I would have done it as well without the experience I gained doing the rest of the Audiobook. Showing the strength of the four hobbits, portraying the dignity and resolve of their kind, giving that pathetic yet dangerous authenticity to Sharkey, and the ruffians, illustrating the battle of bywater with sound… this was done in 2013, so we all were able to listen to new music by Howard Shore (for The Hobbit), and I would be able to transpose motifs from that, into “Scouring”, and honestly I wouldn’t know how it would have worked out if the Hobbit films didn’t come out just at the right time. I think the score fits so well with the events of “Scouring”, there is a ‘mordor’ theme but it feels ‘unfinished’, like the remnant of an old defeated foe; there’s that wily progression for Radagast in the films, that I used for the hobbit’s rebellion and the conflict, and there’s a new ‘hobbit/shire’ motif that worked so perfectly for a ‘wounded, but recovering’ Shire. I feel so silly talking about decisions I made for this, but I always wanted to share some thoughts I had! 

Fun fact: I had a wonderful person ask if she would be able to play Rosie Cotton back in 2013, and I asked her to perform her lines. She was great, but I realized a very strange thing: when I put her in the audio mix, it would actually break the immersion, because you can hear a voice that wasn’t mine, and as a result - I couldn’t help but keep thinking - my voice for Rosie’s mother sounded like a Monty Python skit in comparison! And thus her lines had to be unused. It kind of just opened the fourth wall, breaking the illusion. Which is a shame, because I always dream of having a fully-cast LOTR Audiobook, maybe someday officially.

The other favorite is “The Tower of Cirith Ungol” just because I listened to it one day in 2014, and heard no errors. I was so proud. I couldn’t think of anything I wanted to change substantially. No one dislikes all the errors more than I do!

14. What’s your best memory from this entire project?

My late dad drove me and my brother out into a clearing at midnight in the forest. The sky was so clear and starry. And we were here simply to just yell at the top of our lungs to record material for “Helm’s Deep”. All the clear yells: “Elendil!!!” “Gúthwinë! Gúthwinë For the Mark!”etc. Etc. - I lost my voice, it was a fun time. He held the microphone for me as I splashed around a stream (for Gollum), once again at midnight since there were fewer background sounds.

I also tell this story a lot: A friend of mine who was listening to the chapters as I finished them - she hated the sound of knuckles cracking. And hated spiders. So, obviously, Shelob would have to have knuckle-cracking sounds for her limbs. So I recorded my own knuckles cracking and tried using it as much as I could for Shelob’s legs moving about. My friend was soooo ecstatic to know this fact.

15. If you could do it all again today, what would you change?

I would consider doing a ground-up re-recording of everything. With a budget, with a cast, with a lot more understanding of the story and intentions behind them. With VR sound options. With extra original music. That’s the dream. 

If we’re back to reality, I guess I’d just re-record a bunch of chapters since they could always be better, and tighten all the technical errors. But that would require a lot of assembling of the raw archived files, and re-building of sounds, and re-recording of lines. Also, as I stated before, I do not want to distribute my unofficial fan work just because I know that it’s a copyright nightmare. And burnout… “it’s never really healed, Sam.”

I like taking other people’s opinions to heart, such as the issues with Frodo’s youth or inflections and intonations for certain scenes that I didn’t quite fully grasp the first time. I would love to adjust things and make it closer to the book now.

- - - - -

And now! The Silly Questions Lightning Round!

(With thoughts from Lady Glasses in parentheses and italics!)

1. In Fellowship, long stretches of dialogue would often have someone randomly cough in the background. Tell me about the Cough. Why is the Cough there?

No one hates the coughs more than me. That’s either my brother minding his own business in the other end of our ‘office room’. I think you now know I was 21, I didn’t care, so these things are just left in because I was careless. However, sometimes there are intentional coughs to make it feel more realistic. It’s been years since I listened to it, so unless I somehow do a massive commentary stream someday (thinking about it), your guess will be as good as mine! The coughs heavily subsided once I did Two Towers, since I was by myself.

2. During the dinner scene with Farmer Cotton, someone burps. Who was that?

Mine. I have no regrets with that one. Or Pippin. I guess it could be Pippin.

(Darn! And here I thought it was Farmer Cotton, LOL)

3. How did you manage to make Bill Ferny’s voice so perfectly obnoxious?

I imagined Bill as an obnoxious guy. The image in my head gives me a good idea of what he’d sound like, and I’m so glad he’s so obnoxious that you had to mention it.

(He sounds perfectly punchable. Thanks, I hate it.)

4. Did you crack yourself up at any point in the recording?

Oh yes, in fact I have a whole outtake reel just for you!

(Warning to anyone who clicks the link: the April Fool's audio had me ON THE FLOOR)

5. Voice acting aside, who is your favorite character in LotR and why?

If you asked me in 2002 it would be the Balrog, if you asked me now it would be difficult because so many of them mean so much to me, and each of their aspects have something to aspire to. Gandalf, Aragorn, Sam, Frodo, Galadriel, the list goes on and on.

(That's beautiful, and so true. The story really grows with us, doesn't it?)

6. What’s your favorite color?

Blue. Always has been.

(Blue is a good color! 💙)

7. Political question: Pineapples on pizza, yes or no?

Yes, I still don’t get what the fuss is about

(Oooh, controversial)

8. Is a hotdog a sandwich?

No, it’s a hotdog!

(Counterpoint: A hotdog is a taco.)

9. What’s your opinion on geese?

They’re racist

(Racist against the entire human race, apparently)

10. How much would I have to pay you to say “I love boats!” in Merry’s voice? (It’s an inside joke with my friends.)

Nothing, it’s on the house!

(HOLY CRAP I LOVE YOU)

- - - - -

Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us! What are you working on nowadays?

I’ve actually had a few people ask me if I’ll ever do more audiobooks like this, and I seem to have tapped something. Yes, in fact! I’m working with a few creative collaborators on a small company to do the exact same sonic experience with other books! Since we’re very small, we are starting with stories in the Public Domain, and have successfully kickstarted (and finished) “The Jungle Book” by Rudyard Kipling. Which will be out (hopefully, officially) by early September! I’m really excited and hope this will lead to more projects, and - hopefully- back to Tolkien someday, in an official manner. Please follow my Instagram or Facebook for more info about it. (I also have a Twitter and Tumblr and more, but they’re all completely unrelated to LOTR and are just me drawing doodles and being a nerd, very unlike the Audiobooks I did, which is a bit confusing, I admit.)

- - - - -

And that concludes our interview! As I told Phil, it was so much fun to discuss a fellow fan's passion project like this. The more I read about it, the more I realized just how similar it was to my own experiences as a fan creator. We all start out as just a noob with a few unpolished skills, making something because we love it, and we learn and grow and hone our talents along the way. It's legitimately inspiring.

Needless to say, I am stoked to finish listening to the rest of this audiobook! Is it a bit weird knowing the creator of the thing might drop in and read my reviews?? Yes. Yes it is. But I'm gonna do it anyway. No holds barred! If I hear another cough, you're gonna know about it, Phil!

Also I may or may not do something with that audio of Merry because I'M STILL DYING OF LAUGHTER HELP

Anyway! If you made it to the end of this, you deserve a cookie! Everybody say thank you to Mr. Dragash, and go check out the other stuff he's doing nowadays! Namárië!

[melis-writes]

what's your take on michael and kay's relationship in the films? do you think michael actually loved her?

Absolutely, I do!! I've done so much research and analysis on them both in film and the book because I'm obsessed with them as a couple LMAO. I've written straight up essays on here. You can find them here, here, here, and here.

To sum up the most important parts from all of them to prove my point:

Michael also makes this clear to Kay after he becomes Don too. Michael reminded Kay countless times throughout the book that he wanted to marry her, that he wanted to slowly be transparent to her about the nature of his family first. He really worked on building the love and trust in his relationship with Kay because he believed in having a future and a family with her, with or without the family business.

Michael even thought about changing his last name (seriously) for the sake of Kay’s reputation.

Michael said gently, “Will your parents approve of me?” Kay shrugged, “I don’t care,” she said. Michael said, “I even thought of changing my name, legally.”

Kay came in after him and put her arms around his waist from behind. “When are we going to get married?” She asked. “Whenever you say.” Michael said.

Mind you, Michael is not in any way desperate to marry Kay or in an urgent need to. This is all solely built on the trust, affection, and bond they have in their relationship together. He mentions marriage a lot more to her than she does to him.

When Michael had returned home from Sicily, he told Kay that she was the only one he was ever “in love” with:

[Kay:] “Why do you want me to marry you after never calling me all these months?” [Michael:] “You are the only person I felt any affection for, that I care about. I didn’t call you because it never occurred to me that you’d still be interested in me after everything that’s happened. […] I want you and I want a family.” “You know, when I came home I wasn’t that glad when I saw my family, my father, my mother, my sister Connie, and Tom. It was nice but I didn’t really give a damn. Then I came home tonight and saw you in the kitchen and I was glad. Is that what you mean by love?”

He put his arms around her and kissed her gently on the lips. Her mouth was sweet and he gently pulled her down on the bed. She closed her eyes, waiting for him to make love to her and Michael felt an enormous happiness. He had spent the war years fighting in the Pacific, and on those bloody islands he had dreamed of a girl like Kay Adams. Of a beauty like hers. She opened her eyes and hen pulled his head down to kiss him. They made love until it was time for dinner and the theater.

Michael refused to listen to anyone else asked/told Michael he should get surgery done for the bits of broken bone in his face due to McClusky breaking his jaw, even 2 years after the injury healed on the outside of his cheek. Kay was the exception to this of course! Michael wanted Kay’s opinion, and subsequently “got his face fixed”:

She knew that Michael had done it against all his own inclinations. Had done it because she has asked him to, and that she was the only person in the world who could make him act against his own nature.

And lets not forget when he said...

“You were all that I loved and valued most in the world and now I’m losing you…I’ve lost you anyway; You’re gone and it was all for nothing. You need to understand that I had a whole different destiny planned for us.”

And keeping in mind these following points:

Michael could have remarried any time after his divorce from Kay and had more children/a second son.

Michael wore his wedding ring for another 10+ years.

Michael was still trying to win Kay, apologize to her, get close to her in TGF3.

Michael moved onto Kay barely a year after Apollonia’s death.

Michael referred to Kay as “his wife” even after she remarried.

Yes, in full truth I do believe Michael loved Kay. I believe he cared for her deeply and was in love with her to the fullest extent. Their relationship and romance as a whole is so much better fleshed out in the book than the film but of course Michael is also essentially two different people when you compare him to how he was in the novel versus the film. I get why he's portrayed differently, but it's so easy to gloss over the truth of him and Kay if you don't actually sit to think about what they had and what Michael held together for their future together. ❤️

[cdmagic1408]

So I’ve just thought of some stuff I wanted to say during my time in hiatus…

Oh my god. OH MY GOD NO WAY. BOB CHAPEK HAS BEEN FIRED?!?! THIS IS AMAZING!!! I didn't think they'd actually do that but seriously tho GOOD RIDDANCE to that man I hate him so much....so here’s to hoping things will turn around at Disney finally 🎊🤞

I love this Pixar Thanksgiving art SO MUCH!! Like…Ian and Barley…they’re so adorable here 🥺

HAPPY 5 YEARS TO COCO! Arguably my second favorite Pixar film of all time! I can’t believe it's 5...like that’s crazy…I’ll never forget the first time I went to see it in theaters with my sister, my mom, my grandparents, my aunt and her best friend in Chicago, the whole thing was so amazing! And then like two weeks later I saw it for a second time in my childhood hometown…to this day I still love it so so much, the story, the characters, and the animation are all so beautiful...I really should rewatch it again sometime...

AHHHHHHH YOSHIS ARE IN THE MARIO MOVIE!!! YESSSSSSSS!!! They look just like I hoped they would be! I’m so much more excited for this movie now than I was back in October! Not only because my favorite adorable green dino could potentially be here, but the animation looks really awesome, and I'm genuinely curious to see where this story is going to take us...plus I've always loved Mario games and the world of Mario as a whole. I'm like Leonardo DiCaprio pointing at all the references there are so far!

Oooooh yes!! Spotify Wrapped! I’ve been looking forward to this! What's my number one? Ah yes, The Police is my top artist and their song "Spirits in the Material World" is my top song as it should be 🎶 🎶 🎶 I listened to their music so much this summer...they’re one of my favorite bands! Also Bebe Rexha and Taylor Swift made the cut, two more of my favorites and two more greats! Yay! And OMG I did it. I listened to "Anti-Hero" enough times for it to be my third most played song this year! YES!!! 🤘 😄

New Mario movie clip gets released during the 2022 Game Awards: OMG this score is sooooooo good! 😲 like I can hear the all the different recognizable themes from the mario games here but it also sounds like animated movie score! It’s such a perfect combo! And oh yeah, I see the way you’re running Mario…that IS your run cycle and I love it! That right there is from the games! 😏 Is it bad that I want more after this clip? I mean the more I see, the more I want it if you know what I mean... 👀

Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio released on Netflix just last week on the 9th, and just last week on the 9th is when I watched it! I've heard so many great things about it and I'd never seen a del Toro film before so I thought I'd give it a try! Very charming but also quite dark, it's a really fascinating take on the Pinocchio story that's unlike what I've seen of it before! I think my favorite character ended up being Sebastian the Cricket, he was so fun to watch (and for the record, Ewan McGregor has such charisma in all the roles I've seen him play from Robots to Big Fish. He's great! And this was no exception!) All the voice-acting was very well done and the animation too! I have a huge soft spot for stop motion! I thought every movement made was really amazing. Anyway yeah, check it out if you can cause animation distributed by Netflix always deserves more recognition!

(cue Merrie Melodies closing theme)

That's all, Folks!

[francesderwent]

Troy and Gabriella, also reylo

TROY AND GABRIELLA

first of all screaaaaaaming because I adore the crap out of them and firmly believe that they are extraordinarily valid!!!

my FAVORITE moment? has GOT to be "Can I Have This Dance", because it's all about the fact that what they have is a MIRACLE, and it's worth fighting for!! but they're not trying to stay in the same moment forever, they're gonna lead and follow through life, they're gonna keep on getting better.

WHOLESOME, all caps!! more wholesome than anybody else, maybe!!!!!

I'm legit going to fully seriously say "Love Story" because they absolutely epitomize the Fearless kind of pure, sincere teenage love, and they are kind of the Romeo and Juliet of jocks and nerds. and also! I believe in my heart that those crazy kids made it, and they got married and had the white dress and everything!! "Romeo, save me, they're trying to tell me how to feel / this love is difficult, but it's real / don't be afraid, we'll make it out of this mess / it's a love story, baby, just say yes"

ship: it's crazy how few teenage ships from the gajillion teenage shows I've seen even come close to the sheer perfection of their energy. closest would be Scott and Allison from Teen Wolf, probably! EDIT: I am an idiot and the correct answer was obviously Scott and Kira.

a childhood friends AU! we'll make it so they only see each other in the summers so starting school together DOES change everything, but I love the "just like kindergarten" line so much that I think it would be fun to make it true. that singing together feels like when you met a kid and started playing together and suddenly were best friends, because that's what happened for them! and they're growing all the time but they never leave that behind.

I'm gonna throw them in the honorable mentions because they deserve it!!!!!

REY AND BEN

they are a ship of MOMENTS, aren't they?? I think my favorite, the one that took my breath away in theaters, is when their eyes meet in that last battle in tros and she sees him and she knows it's really him, knows that he's shed every mask he's ever worn and is looking at her with his own eyes!! both younger and older than he's ever been!!!! and he nods at her and that gives her the courage she needs! this connection that has been like a haunting is now a lifeline!!

I have absolutely no idea what to say here because there is a part of my brain that is absolutely refusing to give any ground in the reylo battles of late 2019 by even thinking the phrase fucked up when it comes to them, but also I feel like calling them wholesome might be a stretch? too bad, I'm going to!! because they've both got their issues and they hurt each other in deep ways but in the end they're honest with each other and they save each other!!!!!!! and isn't that what counts?

"Only Love" by Mumford and Sons!! "I didn't fool you but I failed you / in short, made a fool out of you and a younger heart / and I rage and I rage / but perhaps I will come of age and be ready for you / and you saw me low, alone again / didn't they say that only love will win in the end?"

I already connected them with Zutara, so now I'm gonna draw a line between them and Jude and Cardan. I think my reasoning basically boils down to "big snake paradoxically and symbolically healed by violence" but I don't think that means I'm wrong, necessarily

I love the idea of a Ben never goes dark AU in a million different ways, but especially when he's just not especially force-sensitive, not especially good at it, except that he has this deep force connection to this random scavenger out in the middle of nowhere who's really good with the force. despite this, Ben is Leia's favorite child and Rey is Han's favorite not-child.

they did not make the list!

[elizmanderson]

2022 wrap-up, part 4

part 1 is here

part 2 is here

part 3 is here

istg this is the last part. it just turns out I did more stuff this year than I thought, which is exactly why I do these wrap-ups for myself every year. otherwise I fixate on the bad parts or the parts where I did nothing yet somehow also failed to rest.

travel

new york

I went to NYC for the first time ever for my friend chelsea's book launch! the officially unofficial one that we had for her in central park, since during her official book launch I was at phantom of the opera with another one of our friends who was kind enough to treat me to a broadway show

I saw and did a lot and went many places, but lowkey the highlight of my trip (aside from meeting all my long-time twitter writing peeps <3) was my last evening in the city. I had a drink at the stonewall inn and then wandered around the village, taking pictures of buildings because I was in love with the light on the fire escapes. I turned down jane street without even thinking about it.

after about a block, I was like, "wait, which street did I just turn down," and I went back to the nearest intersection to check. but nope, I'd turned down the right street without looking at my map, without paying strict attention to street signs and landmarks, without even thinking about it. I realize actual new yorkers will 100% disagree with this, but in that moment new york became a little bit mine and I became a little bit hers.

it took me months to recover financially from this trip, even with staying in a sketchy hostel and without paying for my own broadway tickets, but I loved it. a lot more than I thought I would, actually, since I grew up in the country and I'm probably three trees in a trench coat rather than an actual human person.

admittedly when I got back and saw how green the trails on our campus were, I was like "how did I even THINK I liked it there?? they kept all their nature in one place and it wasn't half this green!!" but I seriously did fall in love with the city, and yes I obnoxiously point at the screen when watching media set in manhattan like "I've been there!!" I am That Bitch.

georgia

I mean okay fine I go to georgia every year because my parents live here now. but still. I love savannah and coastal georgia in general, and this year I also visited jekyll island for the first time. I didn't stay long at jekyll, and unfortunately savannah was so cold I might as well have been back home (jk, it was sub-zero at home and a balmy 15 in savannah on the coldest night), but I always love going, I got to see my beloved atlantic, and I once again took a thousand pictures of live oaks just because.

other things

non-book media

movies: cyrano (yes it says 2021 but it wasn't at my theater until february of this year, so we're calling it 2022), bros, thor: love & thunder, ticket to paradise, see how they run, and actually encanto played at our second-run theater so I saw that in theaters again <3

tv: ofmd and only murders in the building, both new comfort shows despite one involving piracy and the other involving murder

musicals: groundhog day: the musical and come from away, and also I'm listing cyrano here in addition to above bc I love the soundtrack and have it in my car along with the other two

personal tomfoolery

we're about to go full-on diary here, but whatever bc that's how I used this blog before I got 500 new followers and ofmd ruined all other uses of said blog, so that's how I'm finishing this post

queer feels

I've both thought about and avoided about thinking about my sexuality and gender even more than I already have in the past 10 or 12 years. I like "queer" for this reason: it covers any non-allocishet identity I might ever need. it indicates that I'm part of the community while giving me space and time to figure out the particulars on my own (and reduces the need for me to come out repeatedly to the same people as I decide on new identities, which is good bc I viscerally hate coming out at all and dream of a world where I wouldn't have to). I like more particular labels for helping me figure out my experience, validating my experience, and finding other people whose experiences are similar.

I'm still thinking through they, although I admit when I asked folks to use it in a pronoun testing room I got warm fuzzies. I've avoided thinking through my gender in detail, but I bought a genderqueer sticker and enamel pin to add to my existing pride stickers and pins. it's just that it's like I have to come out to myself.

I did actually come out to my dad as queer this year. which made me feel feelings even though it shouldn't have been a big deal bc my parents are allies. my dad's literally in his law school's gsa, much to the confusion of the younger folks. I came out via email, in the spur of the moment, which is both a very me and a very internet-dad way to come out. and he basically said, "thanks for trusting me with that, but I already vibed it from your writing."

(I'm paraphrasing. my sixty-year-old, deeply uncool white-guy father didn't use the word "vibed.")

I'm quietly queer, for the most part, but every year I get a little louder. this year, with fascism on the rise and so many anti-queer and specifically anti-trans bills brought forth in so many states and me only just out of the closet to my parents (albeit less deeply in the closet in the first place than I thought I was), I talked more about my queerness than usual. I put "queer" in every single author bio for every single thing for which I needed a bio. I stickered my laptop in pride flags. I put up pride flags outside my office and pride pins inside it and joined the dei committee at work. I'm not a fighter. but I got just a little bit louder.

friend feels

I kinda started thinking some time within the last few years, how many friendships have I maybe missed out on because both of us were too insecure to take the first real step and be friends?

which has highkey always been my approach to romance. I'll get my heart broke a thousand times and still go after every new person I fall for. but when it comes to friendship, I'm like do not.

but I've been thinking this lately.

so with an existing maybe-friend, when an opportunity came along to write him a letter for a retreat he went on, I basically just wrote him a letter like "hey I care about you and I'm glad we're friends." and boom, lo and behold, he came back like "oh my goodness thank you so much for that wonderful letter," and things have been much more comfortable since then. which was a nice lil validation of my theory that sometimes people Do Not Dislike Me, In Fact, but are just as insecure in friendship as I am.

I also made a whole new friend with this new girl at work. the rsd has hit me fucking hard this year, which I do not appreciate. but I keep pushing past it and making an effort, and now I have a nice stash of good encounters stored up for when the rsd tries to bamboozle me once more. she's so welcoming and lovely and kind, so I hope things are also settled there even if sometimes I feel like they aren't because that's just how I am.

anyway, that's my year. there was a lot of weird and terrible bullshit going on locally, nationally, globally, and in the background, but there was some good shit in there, too.

here's to more friends, more books, more birds, more plants, more falling-in-love-with-cities, more kindness and good and little warm gestures in 2023.

[shield-maiden-of-sherwood]

A Dream Deferred - PT 5

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5

The Unexpected

My eyes burned as I sat before my laptop. I reread the last couple of pages I wrote over and over but couldn't for the life of me figure out what came next. The dreaded writer's block.

I felt like I was trying to drive uphill on a snowbank and I could feel the traction slipping as I slowly started to slide backward. Why couldn't I do this?

I checked my phone for about the 10th time, trying to refrain from getting stuck in a social media loop and feeding my self-hatred. It was pathetic. The last time I scrolled through my feeds, I saw old friends and colleagues posed in front of random locales with other friends or loved ones as they announced how much fun they were having in Cancun or posting their newborn giggling while it gets sniffed by their dog with the catchy caption that says "Big brother meeting the new baby!" It's a dog, Susan.

Sitting back in my chair, I groan. Reaching for my coffee cup, I subconsciously take a sip, only to wince and spit it out a moment later. I look at the cup, seeing the suspicious-looking contents inside. Shit... when did I last do dishes?

I contemplate getting up to wash my cup and brew a fresh pot when there's a knock on my door. My eyes widen before narrowing but I don't move. I wait a moment to see if there's another knock but when there isn't, I slowly rise and head to my kitchen. Then they knock again. For fuck's sake.

Setting my cup down, I stride over as there's another knock. Throwing the door open, I frown seeing Pete. He smiles for a moment before it falters as he glances behind me and then back to me. "You look like shit."

I shoot him a glare. "Do you need something? I'm busy."

"Yeah? Like what? Sleeping during the day?" He asks, raising a brow. "Don't tell me you've become a vampire in the past week since I've seen you."

As he says this, my brows draw together. Has it really been a week since the play? Quite honestly, it felt like only a couple of days ago. Then again, I have gone to work a couple of times...

Feeling his gaze on me, I'm snapped out of wandering thoughts as I realize he's expecting an answer.

"Maybe. Feel free to wear garlic at all times, just to be sure."

"Noted." He chuckles. "But seriously, are you busy?"

"Now? Yes."

"Doing what?"

"Writing."

He raises a brow. "How's that going?"

Maybe it was the sleep deprivation or because he was just annoying but I cross my arms over my chest. "Fine." I shrug. Terrible. I'm stuck and hate my life.

"Then how about tonight around 8? Are you free?"

"No."

He raises a brow. "Working?"

"No. Writing."

"For the next four hours?"

"Yes."

His eyes narrow. "You haven't left your apartment much, have you?"

"I don't see how it's your business." I shoot back.

"It could do you some good to  maybe take a nap and get out and about for a short time."

Admittedly, a nap sounded amazing but like hell was I going to tell him that. "No."

I start to close the door but he places a hand on the door to stop it. "Wait..."

With a deep sigh, I open it once more. "What?"

"How about this? I'll leave you alone for now so you can go take a nap since you're clearly in need of sleep. And then at around 8:00 I'll come back and we'll go see a movie. Deal?"

"No deal," I say trying to close the door once more. Much to my annoyance foot is in the door. I glare at him. "Move your foot."

"Will you accept my movie offer?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I don't watch movies."

He pauses a moment as if to think. He smirks.

"What if I said I'm afraid of the dark? I need somebody to go with me to the dark movie theater and hold my hand."

I grimace. "No. Get one of your groupies to do it. You seem to have a knack for finding them." He chuckles. "Come on. It's one movie. Please?"

I groan. "For fucks sake... If I say Yes, will you leave me alone?"

He nods. "Until I come to pick you up at 8:00, yes. "

I roll my eyes. "Fine."

His grin widens. "See you at 8."

As soon as he removes his foot in the doorway I quickly push the door shut and groan.

* * *

As soon as the door is shut, I lock it and lean against it. What the hell did I just agree to? Rubbing my tired eyes, I quickly pull out my phone and dial Yuri's number. "Come on, come on...," I'm mutter as it continues to ring. Finally, she picks up. "Hey, Abby!" She greets. "I just got on my lunch break. What's up?" "Are you free at 8:00?" Exhausted, I sit down with my back against the door, awaiting her reply as she says something quietly to somebody on her end. "Uh... No, I have an appointment for a gig around 7:30." I grimace. "Seriously? Who needs their makeup done at 7:30 in the evening?" "Apparently some local author is doing a book signing later tonight and her publicist hired me to do her makeup. Why?" Despite her not being able to see it, I frown. "Pete invited me to go see a movie." "Oh really?" She says and I can just tell from the way her voice sounds that she's got a shit-eating grin on her face. "Like a date?" "Ugh. No." I Say wrinkling my nose. "I was trying to write but he came to bother me and wouldn't leave me alone until I agreed to go. It's more of a hostage situation." She chuckles. "Well hostage situation or not, do you need help figuring out what to wear? I can send some links for some simple makeup tutorials?" "No need. It's not like I'm going to impress anybody, let alone Pete." I can't help but wrinkle my nose at the thought. "What are you going to wear?" I sigh, picking at the random pieces of lint on my unwashed pajama pants. "I don't know. T-shirt and jeans, I guess?" There's a pause and for a moment I worry that I lost the signal. I look at my phone to see that she's still on the line. "Yuri?" "You're seriously going to just wear a t-shirt and jeans?" "Yeah? What's wrong with that?" "Nothing..." "I'm not going to dress up for him." She sighs. "What about shoes?" I tell her my normal sneakers and it sounds like she's about to have a mental breakdown. "Abby!" "What?" "The same sneakers that are worn with holes and look like you worked on a construction site?" My brows drew together. Did she think I owned another pair? "Yeah?" She muttered something in Russian I don't understand under her breath." "Just do me one favor and at least swap out the t-shirt for that dark blue blouse that you got at the mall a couple of months ago. It looked cute on you." "Yuri..." "Please? Do it for me." I sigh. "Fine."

After we eventually hung up, I set my phone down and leave my head back against the cool door. Maybe a nap wasn't a bad idea.

*  *  *

I'm not usually one to have very memorable dreams. In fact, most of my dreams tend to be stressful ones about my writing or something that had happened at the bar. Yet for some reason, I had a dream that I was a famous author and was signing autographs for various celebrities. Or at least I was until I was woken up by a loud knock on my door. I groan and rise from my bed before slinking over to the door. I pull it open in, wash to my dismay, Pete stands before me dressed in a clean, light gray Henley, dark jeans and his hair combed and styled. I blink at him as the remnants of sleep cling to my eyes. He smirks. "Glad to see you finally got some sleep as suggested." I yawn and rub my eyes. "You're early." "Actually, I'm about 15 minutes late because I had to go pick up something. I texted you." My brows draw together as I hold up a finger and walk back over to my bed to grab my phone. Sure enough, I had a text from an unknown number saying that he would be running a bit late and to make sure I was ready. Shit.

"If you hurry and get ready, we'll be able to still grab some snacks before the movie starts." "I'm not even dressed." "I'll wait." He grins. Rolling my eyes with a sigh, I shut the door. As I dig through my closet to find the blouse that I promised Yuri that I would wear, I started wondering what I was even doing. Did he see this as a date? Or was he truly just trying to get me out of the house and give me a distraction? I wasn't sure which was worse.

As I quickly dress, put on deodorant, and stare at myself for a couple of moments in the mirror, I sigh and quickly brush out my hair and put it up into an unwashed ponytail. I looked like shit and I knew it but I didn't really have time to shower. I quickly hunted down my keys and grab my phone, there was another knock at the door and I rushed to open it. As soon as the door opens, Pete looks me over and nods. "Perfect. Ready to go?" I shrug and he tells me to follow him as he starts back toward the staircase. I let out a sigh and lock up at the apartment and follow him out. * * *

"So did you have a specific movie in mind? " I ask as I follow him down the stairs. He opens the door for me and motions me through. "Not really. I took a gander at some of the movies that were playing and most of them started around 8:45 and 9:00." He shrugs. "I figured we would just go, find out what was playing soon and go from there."

I follow him out the front door and down the street. His legs are a bit longer than mine so I was almost running just to keep up with him. Luckily he seemed to notice as he slowed down so we can walk beside each other. "Well, you seem to be the movie buff so I imagine you probably saw a couple that you would like to see." He shrugs. "I did but I was hoping you would pick." "Why me? You already know I'm not a big movie person. You can just pick and go from there." Grinning, he shakes his head. "I can go see whatever movie I want whenever I want. Since I'm going with you, I'm letting you pick. I'm curious to see what type of movie you choose." I stop in my tracks and it takes him a moment to notice and stop as well. He turns to me, frowning. "Is this like some weird test?" I asked, the heat rising to my cheeks as I feel people staring at us. His brows furrow. "No. I just want to see what kind of movies you're into. That way in the future--" I quickly cut him off. "This is a one-time deal. There's not going to be a future movie happening." He shrugs, grinning as he turns to start walking again. "We'll see." I roll my eyes and jog to catch back up with him.

We head down a couple of blocks before Pete stops beside a silver car. He takes out his keys and unlocks it before opening the passenger side door and motioning inside. "Shall we?"

I look between him and the car but don't move. "You have a car? Don't you literally make practically nothing between jobs and acting?" "No, I don't have a car. This is a loan from one of my castmates from the play. I asked him for a favor." I narrow my eyes. "Why?" He just shrugs. "I figured it would be easier and quicker this way." He once more motions for me to get in and, after hesitating for a moment, I get in and he shuts the door.

As we arrive at the movie theater, the place is pretty full with other moviegoers excitedly buying their tickets and snacks as they talk about the movie they're about to see. We stop a little ways from the ticket counter as Pete looks up to see which movies are playing soon or have just started. "Any strike your fancy?" He asks, his eyes still moving over the title cards. I shrug. Honestly, as I was looking around at the other moviegoers, I couldn't help but feel out of place, especially around Pete. While I definitely wasn't there to impress him, my unwashed hair and frumpy clothing that I pulled on at the last minute made me stand out among the nicely dressed girls who had fully painted faces and hair done as they went with their girlfriends or with girls and guys alike. Honestly, I just wanted to hide. "Abby?" I look up at him and see him frowning as he watches me. "You okay?" I can feel my cheeks burning from embarrassment as I shrug. "Pete, what are we doing here?" His brows crease. "What do you mean?" My gaze burns into his as I feel my embarrassment fueling my anger. "I mean why did you invite me here? Was it to embarrass me? I told you I'm not a movie person." "Honestly? I invited you because we're neighbors and you said at the bar that you do enjoy having fun. When you said that you didn't really grow up watching movies I figured it would be a fun opportunity to see one together and maybe discuss it." As he said this, I could have sworn that his cheeks started to redden a little bit. Could he really be blushing? Or was it anger because I seem so ungrateful? He shrugs again. "Sometimes I hear you come in early in the morning or have seen you look exhausted. You seem to only work and right so I figured maybe you could use a break and we get to know each other a little bit. I mean you've lived in the building for little over 6 months now and I think aside from you yelling at me and talking to me after the play and bar, we haven't really spoken to one another." That's because I don't like you. "Also, being a writer, I figured that with The Great Gatsby playing, it would be fun to see the movie and then discuss it with you since I'm pretty sure you might have an opinion on it." He smiles.

For a moment, I just stood there. In all my anger, I didn't even notice that The Great Gatsby was playing. In all honesty, it was actually one of my favorite books growing up but I wasn't about to tell him that. Instead, I just exhale. "So is that what we're going to see?" I ask quietly. "If that's what you wish to see. As I said, I'm letting you pick." I nod, walking up to the ticket counter with Pete in tow. The bored teenager behind the counter looks at me and straightens before plastering on a fake smile as she asked me what movie we were there to see. "Two tickets for The Great Gatsby please." As she prints out the tickets, Pete steps up to pay before ushering me over to the concession area. He gives me my ticket. "All right let's talk about snacks. What would you like?" I shrug. "I'm not really hungry." "It's a movie theater you never get snacks because you're hungry. You get them because it's part of the experience." I roll my eyes and he just chuckles. As we wait in line to get our snacks, I look around at the movie posters hung up around the space advertising current movies playing and also ones coming up. I grimace as I look at The Great Gatsby poster. "Is that Leonardo DiCaprio?" I ask aloud more to myself than to Pete. He turns his head and nods. "He's the guy from Titanic right?" "Among other things. I take it you weren't a fan?" He asks, seeing my expression. I shrug."I wouldn't know. I never saw it." His eyes widen. "You're kidding? You never watch it on Netflix or any of the other streaming sites?" I shrug and shake my head. "I usually watch television shows and documentaries more than movies." "I'll add it to the list then." I look at him questioningly. "What list?" He smiles. "The list of movies that you need to watch. Mostly I was thinking of classics like An American Werewolf in London or Die Hard." "Die Hard? The Bruce Willis movie?" "Yeah! Seen it?" "No." He smiles. "Then that's going on the list." The people in front of us get their food and move off to the side. As we step up, the person behind the counter looks between us, asking what we would like. Pete orders two small popcorns, a box of Mike and Ikes, and a soda for himself before asking if I would like anything to drink. I hesitantly order a small drink for myself before quickly heading over to our theater and finding our seats. Surprisingly, the movie Wasn't very packed with only a few groups near the front and one couple off in the back corner. As we took our seats, Pete hands me my popcorn and opens his Mike and Ikes. He offered me some but I decline He simply shrugs and empties it into his own popcorn, muttering something about how much he likes sweet popcorn as the final trailer ends and the show begins.

* * *

After the movie, I left the theater in a good mood. There was just something about The Great Gatsby that always made me so thoughtful about the future. I was actually in a good enough mood that even something that Pete said made me laugh which made him smile. "So I guess I can take it you liked the movie?" He asks as we walk out to his castmate's car. "I did, surprisingly." Once more he holds open the door for me and this time I thank him as I get inside and he closes the door behind me. As we ride back to the apartment, we discuss various moments of the movie and compare them with the book. In all honesty, even though he said that he was a reader I never thought that The Great Gatsby would have been one of them. Much to my surprise, he seemed to have quite a bit of insight from when he was in college. He parks the car in a space that was surprisingly open closer to the apartment than it originally had been and we continue to walk and talk on the way back. "You know I think my favorite part was the quote from Jordan." He says as we climb the stairs to the front door of our apartment building. He opens the door for me and motions me inside which once more I surprisingly accept and thank him. "And which quote is that?" "The one she said about how much she loves large parties because they're so intimate and how small parties have no privacy." We climb the stairs to our floor and he walks me back to my door which we stop in front of. "Why is that your favorite?" I ask, genuinely curious. Smiling, he shrugs. "Well it rings true, doesn't it?" "What do you mean?" He leans against my door frame, shrugging. "Maybe it was not the intended purpose of the quote but think about it. In a large party versus a small party, when do you have the most opportunity to have one-on-one time with people? Think about all those high school parties." "I never went to high school parties." I frown. "Then think about the high school parties that were portrayed in movies, I'm sure you've seen those. In those movies when it's a small get-together of a handful of friends, they're usually all together hanging out, right?" "For the most part, yeah."

"Yet it was the bigger parties where people are usually grouped off and making out in bedrooms and having sex and enjoying more intimate experiences." I don't know why but I suddenly feel myself blushing slightly as he mentioned all of it. Not like I was a nun or anything but It wasn't exactly a topic I expected to be brought up. You did have a point though. "Or maybe it was hinting at the illusion of wealth." He raises a brow and cocks his head. "What do you mean?" "I mean in a small setting when people don't really have a personality or interests, they're kind of exposed while in a large party, they're able to mask themselves and become sort of anonymous and play up this persona to make them seem interesting and make people believe that they know them more  than they actually do." Even as the words leave my mouth, I curse myself inwardly wondering if that made any sense at all as Pete just stood there looking at me. I was about to apologize when his face lit up with a smile. "I never thought about it like that but I think you're right. I guess maybe writers like yourself are able to dig a little deeper into the more abstract meanings that we others can't fully comprehend." Feeling the heat rise to my cheeks, I look away. I pull out my keys and fumble with the lock on my door to give me something to do as I waited for the blushing to go away. When I turn back to him, he smiles. "If you're not too busy, I would love to continue talking about this whole book versus movie thing. Would it be okay for me to come in so we can have some coffee and talk?" I feel the heat in my cheeks once more and feel the need to say no and quickly run into my apartment to hide. Instead, I only get out a half-muttered excuse about my apartment being messy. He shrugs. "I don't really mind. Or if you're not comfortable with that we could always go to my apartment. I also have coffee." Honestly, the thought of going into Pete's apartment made me feel awkward and self-conscious. I try to think quickly before muttering to him to give me a moment. He nods and I quickly disappear into my apartment.

Running around I quickly turn on the lights and open a window to air out the space while I cursed at myself under my breath as I cleaned up all the dirty dishes and order out containers that were all over my living area. Throwing most of my dishes into the sink, I poured water and soap into the sink and let them soak while I quickly washed out a couple of cups and started to brew a fresh pot of coffee.

Slightly out of breath, I look out around my space and nod.  Best I can do, I guess. I rush over to my door, pausing to take a few deep breaths to hide the fact that I'm already out of breath before opening the door. Pete, who was leaning against the railing across from my door, looks down from where he was staring and smiles. "Come on in," I muttered, holding the door open and motioning him inside. "I have a new pot brewing as we speak."

[ashdoesntlikejkrowling]

i came up with a theory last night while at glory days (if you don't know what that is, it's like a sports themed restaurant on the east coast)

context: yesterday, my friend and i decided to go to glory days late at night cuz why not. we saw a bunch of the popular sporty kids there, including our old driver's ed teacher.

i then started to think about silver diner and how it kinda has a similar menu, and then, it hit me. glory days and silver diner are on the opposite ends of the school team event after party spectrum. how? well, you see, glory days, like i mentioned earlier, is more sports-themed and is geared more towards athletes n stuff and is usually where school sports teams in my area go after a big game or competition of some sort. meanwhile, silver diner is where most theater kids in the area go for after parties. now, like i mentioned earlier, silver diner and glory days both have similar menus, but how is it different? well, silver diner has more of a jukebox, old-timey theme to it. they even have little jukeboxes on each table so you can play music while you're eating. thus, this restaurant is geared more towards theater/music kids and is a reliable place for after parties.

so what does all of this mean? well, there's a spectrum formed here. on one side, there's the athletic kids hangout end, which is where we put glory days. on the other side, there's the theater kid hangout end, which is where we put silver diner. thus, glory days and silver diner both have some sort of connection with one another, while being targeted towards completely different parties. they both have similar menu items and are chain restaurants specifically found on the east coast, being more prevalent in the dmv area. they both also close at around midnight. thus, i made a visual representation of this below, if you want to add any other restaurants:

quick notes: yes, i am aware that some theater kids go to glory days and some athletic kids go to silver diner. i've seen it happen. also, yes, i am aware that denny's is the #1 theater after party place, but there isn't a denny's in my city and i've never eaten there before, so i didn't put it on the spectrum. once again, feel free to add restaurants you see fit into this graph thing. don't take this post seriously, it's just another one of my shower thoughts i get from time to time. have a great day.

[sing-sideblog]

Aftermath (Part 1)

This story takes place immediately after the events of the gala. The previous story is on my alt account and on my archiveofourown.org account, another place to see my stories. Btw, happy valentine's day everyone! Sorry this isn't exactly what I wanted to post but as long as I post something today, I'm good.

"...Wow..."

"Yeah..."

Ryan stood beside Johnny, his face was coated in shock after being told everything that had happened that night.

It was supposed to be a normal night, one where Buster moon and his crew would mingle with the best of the best in show business. Unfortunately, many things went wrong in that one night. Jimmy crystal returned, an assassin attempted to kill Buster, only to get severely injured. And to top it all off, it was revealed that Nooshy had a hand to play in the events that led up to this.

The gorilla was so shocked to hear this that he and the snow lynx ended up getting into an argument about it, Resulting in what Johnny feared to be the end of their friendship.

"Johnny, I've only known you and Nooshy for a few months. But I know from watching you two that a little argument won't get in the way of your friendship."

Johnny glanced at the tiger, a small smile on his face, "that's kinda cheesy, ain't it?"

Ryan smiled softly, "I got you to smile, didn't i?"

Johnny chuckled, "Alright, you got me."

The two laughed a bit before Ryan focused on Johnny. "But in all seriousness, you weren't wrong to worry. And while yes, she did it in the wrong way, Nooshy wasn't wrong to try and protect you." He paused, staring off at the chaos in front of them. Reporters, paramedics, cops were all over the place.

'I know I would've done the same if I were in her shoes' he thought to himself, the very idea of a sweet guy like Johnny getting hurt sent a chill down his spine.

The two stood there in silence for a moment before something caught Ryan's eye. Several paramedics a cops were rushing to the back of the crystal tower hotel, Johnny soon noticed as well and walked over to a cop, who stayed behind with a few cops to keep the reporters from following the group that left.

"What's going on?"

"There was a stabbing behind the hotel. Now stay back before you get trampled!" The cop said harshly, struggling to help keep reporters back as the group of paramedics returned with a body on the stretcher.

Johnny tried to see who was on the stretcher but due to the large crowd, it was hard to see. Ryan, however, got a glimpse of who it was. The tiger gasped in shock as he stumbled back in disbelief. Johnny noticed this and immediately went to check on his friend.

"Ryan?! What's wrong?"

"J-Johnny..." Ryan looked at Johnny, his eyes filled with sorrow as he looked at the gorilla.

"..It was Nooshy."

----------

A few minutes earlier...

Alfonso had just closed for the night, his friend having already left an hour ago. It had been a slow day due to the preparations for the gala, but they managed to make some money selling their frozen treats.

As he prepared to leave for the night, he did a last minute check on the items that would be needed for the next day. He wanted to leave around the time the gala ended so he could surprise Meena, who had texted him earlier in the day that she was in redshore city for the gala. He was excited to see her again, the last time they saw each other was when the theater group performed at the majestic theater. Ever since then, the two have kept in contact by texts, phone calls, and video chats, though the two longed to meet each other in person once again.

He was just finishing up when he heard a noise outside. Curiosity getting the better of him, Alfonso opened the back of the truck and looked outside. Though it was dark, the street lights were enough to allow him to see the silhouettes of two animals. one of them fell to the ground while the other stood there staring down at the one who fell.

Immediately, Alfonso got the suspicious feeling that something wasn't right.

"Hey!" He called out, catching the attention of the animal who stood over the other. Without hesitation, the animal ran off, leaving animal on the floor behind, only sending more fear into Alfonso. The elephant pulled out his phone as he approached the animal on the floor, just in case.

The closer he got, the more he started to recognize the clothing the animal wore. His heart started to race when he also noticed the small drips of blood on the concrete. Once he was close enough to the body, he froze in horror.

Nooshy was lying unconscious, bleeding out from her side. Alfonso immediately rushed back to his truck, grabbing a clean rag and rushing back to the lynx, pressing the rag against her wound to stop the bleeding and calling 911.

"911, what's your emergency?" The operator asked on the other side of the line.

"I-I need help! I...A friend of mine has been stabbed! I'm at the crystal tower hotel around the back!"

"Okay sir, we have an ambulance in the area, I'll inform them right away of your location."

When the call was done, Alfonso focused on trying to stop the bleeding until the paramedics arrived.

----------

Eddie stared at the TV in shock, the screen showing the news that was covering what had recently happened in redshore city. Buster was almost killed! The very thought of it made him want to faint, but he forced himself to stand up and continue watching.

"While the renowned showman was not severely injured, he has been rushed to the hospital for further inspection after two officers claim that the koala went "savage" during the attack." The reporter said, a picture of Buster beside him, The picture had been taken a while back, when the crew performed at the majestic theater.

What had worried Eddie the most, however, was the fact that they had said that Buster had apparently gone savage. He had only heard of it once, back when there had been reports of savage incidents in the city of zootopia. Many had feared that it was predators slowly reverting back to their savage ways. But then it was revealed that a plant known as 'Night Howlers' was causing these incidents, many even saying the plants can cause prey to go savage as well.

And though the animals affected by the plant were eventually cured, it didn't stop major crime bosses from selling the hazardous plant on the black market.

Eddie shook his head, trying to rid himself of a horrifying thought. Did Buster have night howlers on him? Was he drugged? The many possibilities flooded his mind, none of them made any sense to the sheep.

He was snapped back to reality when the sound of his phones ring tone went off. He grabbed it off the sofa and checked the caller ID before answering.

"Garry?"

"Are you watching the news?!" The dachshund dog's panicked voice asked on the other side of the line.

"Yeah, I'm watching it right now..." he replied.

"It's insane!" Garry exclaimed. On the other side of the line, Garry was in his mother's house, the large television was set on the news just like Eddie's was. He paced back and forth in the room as he spoke. "There hasn't been a savage attack in two years and now this happens?!"

"They haven't confirmed it was a savage attack yet! They've just said-"

Garry interrupted Eddie, "People talk, Eddie. From what I heard, some think crystal drugged him sometime during the night."

"Why would he do that?"

There was silence on Garry's side. "You don't know, do you?" He finally asked.

"Know what?"

"Okay," Garry sat down on the sofa in the room. "How much do you know about Jimmy crystal and that night Moon performed that show of his?"

Eddie shrugged. "Not much. I did hear crystal was arrested but that's really it."

"So...you don't know that Jimmy almost killed Moon, right?"

Eddie nearly dropped his phone, "W-What?"

"I'm surprised you didn't know. I thought he told you when you went to see him the other day."

"He didn't say anything!" Eddie shouted suddenly. He then looked back to when the last time he saw Buster, realizing just how exhausted he had looked. "Damn it...!" He uttered to himself. He should've known something was wrong the moment he saw Buster.

"Okay okay, look. What's done is done. All we can do is hope Moon will be okay." Garry said, and though Eddie opened his mouth to argue, he knew Garry was right. What good would arguing do? It wouldn't help the situation at hand.

"Okay...look, I got to go, Garry. I'll see you soon, okay?"

"Okay. See you later, Eddie..."

As Eddie ended the call, he turned his attention back to the TV. The reporter was talking, when suddenly, paramedics and cops were rushing around in the background, catching the attention of the reporter. At first, Eddie thought it was nothing, considering how much had happened already. But it wasn't until he heard a familiar voice yelling in the background, a voice that stood out amongst the officers screaming at everyone to stand back, it caused Eddie's heart to start racing again.

"Please!" The voice begged. "She's my friend, I-"

"Sir, I'm sorry. But we can't allow you to get in."

"Johnny! I'll give you a ride, hurry!" Another voice called out. The camera focused for a moment on the gorilla, his face filled with worry as the doors to the ambulance closed. He stood there for a second before the voice called out to him again. The camera then moved to focus on the reporter again, but Eddie couldn't bare to watch anymore.

He grabbed the remote and shut off the TV, his entire body was shaking from what he just saw and heard. He buried in face in his hands, wanting to forget everything he just heard.

----------

Not long after arriving at the hospital, Johnny and Ryan had watched as Nooshy was rushed inside. The two had been stopped by a nurse and told to wait in the waiting room. The two were soon joined by the rest of the group, who were given a ride by Alfonso.

Upon seeing him, Ash rushed over to Johnny, who was sitting in a chair. The saddened expression on his face raised an alarm within ash. "Johnny..?" She spoke quietly, as to not catch the attention of the other animals waiting in the room.

"....it's my fault..."

"What?"

"It's my fault....I shouldn't have let her go..." he said quietly, tears escaping his eyes as he stared at the doors leading to the rooms where patients were taken. He remembered the fear he felt when Ryan told him that Nooshy was being rushed to the hospital after being stabbed. As he and Ryan drove the hospital, his fear for his friend was replaced with rage during the drive. He had wanted nothing more than to find the perpetrator and teach them a lesson they'd never forget.

But when they had finally reached the hospital, the fear and guilt he had felt before returned.

"This isn't your fault, Johnny." Ash said as she took a seat next to him, placing a paw on his arm. The porcupine was close to tears herself. Weeks before the gala began, Ash had believed that attending the event was a bad idea, considering all that's happened in redshore before.

But despite that, she still went with Buster and the others. Mainly to make sure Buster would be okay in case something went wrong. And now with everything that had happened, she wished that Buster had listened to her.

"None of us could've known this would happen, especially to Nooshy! All of this is just...b-bad luck!"

"Bad luck?" Johnny turned down face Ash, tears running down his face. "This is more than bad luck, this was an attempted murder! Buster almost died and Nooshy-"

"Sir!" Johnny flinched at the sudden sound from the nurse behind him, a calico cat. "The other patients can hear you." It was at this moment when Johnny noticed the other animals in the waiting room, along with the cast. All of them were looking at him with concern and discomfort.

Rosita went over to Johnny as the nurse cleared her throat. "Now then, you're here to see..." she checked the clipboard she held in his paws, "...Ms. Nicole Wright and Buster moon, yes?"

Johnny nodded, Ryan sat up in his seat, The others went over to stand with the two as the nurse continued, "Well, we have good news about Ms. Wright. She's stable, the wound wasn't deep enough to cause serious injuries but she did loose a lot of blood from the stab wound. As long as she rests, in time, she should make a full recovery."

Johnny was relieved to hear that Nooshy was going to okay, he wiped away a few tears as Ryan put a paw on his shoulder. "Now as for Mr. Moon, he woke up not too long ago."

"He did?"

"Can we see him?" Meena asked.

"And Nooshy as well?" Johnny added.

The nurse thought about it for a moment before sighing, "Alright, but not too many at once and only for a little while. We aren't really supposed allow visitors at this hour..."

Rosita turned to Johnny, "you go on and check on her. We'll try to explain everything to Buster." she said, referring to Nooshy. Johnny thanked Rosita as the group of animals followed the nurse to the rooms where their friends were now resting.

More of this story is on the way! If you have any questions, headcanons, or even story prompts you want to see, feel free to ask! I hope you enjoyed this first part of The Aftermath!

Until the next post, have a great day!

[piepeloe]

Spider-man: No Way Home

I just came back from the new Spider-man, because we get our new releases on Wednesdays.

I'm not sure what my expectations were, since I was never big on any of the Spidey movies. MCU or what came before. And this time I was hesitant about all the stuff they seemed to be cramming in there, but...

OMG, this was so much fun! The rest of the audience agreed. In my country reactions tend to be pretty muted, but we got several cheers and rounds of applause.

I'll put the more spoilery stuff behind a cut, but in summary

All the characters get a chance to shine, every person that shows up has great moments.

Wong. That's all I'm going to say.

It's quieter than I expected? Still has the required action scenes, but also again, also scenes that let the characters shine.

The action scenes are pretty amazing though.

It's very much a Spider-man movie, and not partly a Dr.Strange one, like I was worried about. He's in it, and there's the multiverse and whatnot, but definitely Peter's show.

Lovely nods to Tony Stark and other Avengers here and there.

I hope you're watching Hawkeye, because there's definitely shout-outs (tiny ones in the background!) for that one.

Read on for spoilery stuff

Whatever you've heard about possible appearances, YES.

Charlie Cox does appear as DareDevil. For one scene, but it's an awesome one. People in my theater freaked. Downside: the whole thing with Mysterio pretty much gets wrapped up off-screen? At least the legal stuff. It's just public opinion after that.

Andrew Garfield appears as Peter/Spider-man. He got a round of applause when he appeared. He's awesome. I've never even seen those movies, but I'm thinking I should because he was brilliant. I've seen the actor in other stuff and love him.

Tobey Maguire also appears as Peter/Spidey, and he's fantastic. Second round of applause when he showed up.

We don't get much about what happened to both of them after we last saw them, but enough. Mostly they're there to help Tom's Peter work through things. And banter and bonding. Their scenes with all 3 of them are the best.

Seriously, I can watch hours just the 3 of them. I keep thinking of favorite moments, but this thing is already too long.

From the trailers it was clear MCU Peter would want to save the villains and I had a hard time buying that, but the movie really tries to make you like all of them. and it works, they're all sympathetic by the end.

One of the best things is that I hadn't seen Garfield's Spidey and it had been years since I'd seen Maguire's, but I could totally follow along and feel for these people.

Oh, and no Miles Morales, but a shout-out/nod that was well done IMO and went over great with the audience I saw it with.

I was a bit iffy about the final solution to the spell gone wrong, but then I saw how it led to a more classic take on Spider-man, kind of a reboot again, and I think it has great potential. I do wonder how it well affect people who know Spider-man, who have fought with him.

There's a mid-credit scene:

Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock/Venom. Which is hilarious, as he's apparently spent all that time figuring out where he is and how there are superheroes and an 'alien obsessed with rocks'. And then he gets sent home. But: a little bit of symbiote stays behind, so YES, Venom is technically in the MCU now.

The post-credit scene is somewhat disappointing as it's a trailer for Dr.Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Which will have Wanda and apparently not as an antagonist like I was expecting.

[pacificwaternymph]

Hello i come to ramble about last life uninvited in your inbox.

I have many thoughts about all of them. So i am writing about each of them. Yes.

Scar - oh many thoughts here. how he now has the most lives on the server when he was the first red in 3rd life. also that he is definitely evil aligned. much more. funky evil wizard.

Grian - oh you wanna murder someone so badly don’t you? seriously so far 3/4 he was involved with the boogy kill, he was veey eager to warch joel set up his trap and see said trap in action.

Mumbo - died to lava 2/2 times. Burn scars yes. Also i was very surprised to see how easily he would have betrayed the ahallience for a life. One of two people to have killed a boogyman.

Joel - absolutely feral. i love his talks with scar on the cobblestone bridge. He is trying so hard to be evil and everyone is so scared of him.

Lizzie - absolute girlboss. Nothing more to say currently. Oh! And her boogy kill. [chef‘s kiss]

Martyn - So far, rather drawn to ren. i am bot crying. not at all.

Ren - Speaking of: theatre kid (affectionate) he is so dramatic, but i am also very invested in the fact that he is sworn to lizzie to protect her while he made scar swear to him to not kill him

Etho - his thing in the last episode is either going to help him or bite him in the butt immensely in the near future. The boy who cried wolf too many times, but who is to say that this can’t come as a help.

I also recently saw a multiple headcanons for (boogy) kills. My favourites are that the victim gets a scar that won’t heal. Grian with a line around his neck when he was killed by bdubs. Mumbo with burn scars from getting a lava bath curtesy of scar. Pearl and Scott with wounds from being attacked by lizzie and joel respectively. But also the boogyman getting a constant reminder of their victim(‘s fate) in the form of a tattoo/mark.

Also i love how different people described the feeling of being the boogyman. thinking about the feeling being something that consumes your mind until you no longer can think of anything other than to kill someone. Which would also tie into the fact that if you don’t kill as the boogyman you automatically go red.

This is getting so long. I am so sorry.

- Bear

Excuse you, the fuck do you mean uninvited? Come ramble whenever you like, I don't mind!! I enjoy seeing other peoples' thoughts :D

Scar- I don't know that much about him but he seems like a really interesting character. Also I love how he just goes around absolutely scamming the heck out of people.

Grian - He's so feral and I adore him. He seems so ready to kill someone and I love him for it.

Mumbo - Absolutely burn scars, I love head canons about scars if you let me I will go on for hours (please for the love of god do not let me). Yeah that's a bit surprising, but then again considering he isn't very loyal to his faction on Hermitcraft either (from what I've seen), should it be?

Joel - Also feral. Also I love the whole thing he has going on with Lizzie right now. I am very soft for the couple because they're very sweet, but also there is so much potential for angst in there.

Lizzie - Lizzie and Cleo are both girlbosses and should be feared by everyone on the server. Those two together are going to take the server by storm. Her kill was so clean, and then she turned around and went "Still up for an alliance?" It was so funny

Martyn - Oh my GOD. Martyn's claim to fame on Tumblr so far seems to be that he still has a connection to Ren? Idk, I haven't seen much of him. But yeah no he and Ren are a pair a could easily see myself falling down a rabbit hole for.

Ren - REN. I didn't watch him before Last Life but my GOD. I'm a bit of a theater kid myself so I immediately latched on to his energy. I love how Lizzie responds to his dramatics. From his POV he's swearing his allegiance to a dark faerie queen. From anyone else's he's a dramatic, overenthusiastic puppy.

Etho - Yeah it could go either way to be honest. Fear will make people less likely to attack him, but also less likely to ally with him, which would leave him vulnerable SHOULD someone decide to attack him. Especially later on with red-lives running around.

YES the scar head canons! It kind of reminds me of the whole scars thing from Dream SMP that is widely accepted to be canon despite no actual evidence of that (to my knowledge. I think one or two may have canonized it). And I saw the tattoo one too, I really liked that one as well, it was a cool concept!

Yeah! Between itches and hazes and frustration it's amazing. I feel like Lizzie's is the most similar to actual bloodlust people get when they're red? That may have something to do with the fact that she's new to the server, and so hasn't experienced proper bloodlust yet.

NEVER APOLOGIZE FOR LEAVING A LONG ASK.

I. LOVE. RECEIVING THEM.

Thank you for your thoughts, they are greatly appreciated :D

[deleteddewewted]

Incel!Shinsou Oneshot: "Why are you acting like that?”

To keep busy I just thought that a oneshot of Shinsou getting self conscious/needy would be cute since we already have his redemption arc rolling in. The next part of the Incel!Shinsou series (Part 3) will have him proving his worth at the Sports Festival. So in thinking of how he will prove himself to you I thought of how will all of those people affect him, especially you. ( This oneshot takes place pre changes, so Shinsou is still his disgusting self but he's figuring out how to woo a woman, especially of your caliber.)

Incel!Shinsou Series:

Part 1: Incel! Shinsou x F!Reader

Part 2: Incel! Shinsou x F!Reader

Incel!Shinsou Headcanons

"I know what you're doin' here. Made your intentions clear. Oh you, you terrible thing, you. Terrible thing, you. Terrible thing, you. Beautiful thing"

TW: Strong Language, Mild Sexism

People were never an obstacle when it came to the things Shinsou wanted. He’s aware that others would do anything for him if he played his cards right. The right words with the right question did wonders for him. So why the fuck couldn’t he have what he wanted when it came to you? You drove him up the wall with the kindness you showed him. He didn’t deserve it and you’re existence almost felt like a punishment from whatever deity that existed out there to make him suffer. You guys were suppose to be studying for your upcoming project that required a poster, a slide show, and one influential person that would help prove your projects point. You left him running circles within his own mind as to how you were so willing to challenge him. He wanted you to obey him not see through his bullshit. It wasn’t like you didn’t listen to him vent, or didn't give him attention, but he wanted to hold you under his control. To be the person you listened to.

In class you where both seated on the extreme ends of the room on opposite sides. You never realized this (you do), but his head would periodically turn towards your direction to look at you, to figure you out (liar). This time, you managed to catch him do it.

“What are you doing?” You asked plainly. You honestly didn’t care that he was staring, everyone does when you dress like you're attending an MCR concert in the middle of autumn.

“You look different....today.”

“Nice.” It was difficult to care. Shinsou was just some guy in your class that you had to deal with. Nothing special really....ok, maybe it wasn’t fully true. You didn’t really know him all that well or anything (Unless it was mocking and belittling everything you did, that was normal behavior for him so it wasn’t surprising to find out he was like that outside of campus.) but he wasn’t all that bad? If he cared for himself a bit more, hygiene wise he would be considered handsome or at least a competent human being (you weren't going to call him a man, men don't act this childish. At least the ones you knew.) Maybe then you would take his opinion seriously, but for now you’ll ignore his...interesting comments he's been throwing towards you today.

“It’s rude to ignore someone when their talking to you, you know?” The neutral face he had now possessed a frown and a furrow to his brows. You still couldn’t process how he took the time to make sure his hair stayed purple but didn’t care for his body odor. (This man dyes his hair purple yet cant bother to shower or use deodorant for once in his life.)

“I’m not ignoring you, I’m just not interested in anything you have to say.” With that you get up and take your things and leave. There was no point in wasting time on someone who couldn’t even look at you directly and had to also sneak glances at you. "Do I really look that unbearable?" you thought to yourself. In the end you didn’t care anymore, everyone was entitled to an opinion and the last thing you need is feeling self conscious because of your out of place classmate.

Shinsou was fuming. How the fuck did you just get up and leave his ass while he was trying to complement you. You should have been more appreciative that he was giving you his attention for once. A bitch like you wasn't even worth it so he doesn't understand why he even tried with you.

He never goes directly home after school but instead to the local theater. It was one of the few places where he could be around others and could genuinely be himself. It was weird, he didn't feel like himself when he was speaking with his "friends", friends that he's never spoken to verbally, never seen, and never would meet. He knew that he didn't deserve this, to have a safe haven when he acts like an ass, yet here he was.

"Good morning Shinsou! How are you? Are you ready for rehearsals? You did remember to read your lines, right?" Shinsou rolls his eyes at his theater mates antics. Monoma never seems to stop but he does know when to tone it down and when it comes to Shinsou he tones it down a bit. (Because Monoma is canonically considerate of others, look back the Sports Festival and the Joint Training Arc.)

"Im good man, yes i did read and memorized the script, dont worry about it." What an odd friendship, the most chaotic gentleman like man out the bunch with the quietist incel in the group. Shinsou should have seen it coming when he was adopted by Monoma but he's running on 2 to 4 hours of sleep so he doesn't really care.

Believe it or not Shinsou does take showers (only for theater) but very quickly and with no care (no shampoo or soap, fucking why man.) Theater means more to him and so making his character look the best they possible can was his first and foremost priority. He puts on his costume, gets to makeup (the minimum, because it's "gay" for him to wear makeup and since the world is unfair and cruel he has perfect skin for a greasy headed asshole.)

"Everyone get a move on! Kodai, Tsuburaba, and Awase! Go to stage left! Light techs, how's it up there?" One of the tech heads shouted out. Shinsou and Monoma got to their positions on the stage and the rehearsals began.

Love, the play was about love. Love that wasn't rejected but also not accepted. He didn't understand the concept fully. Was it romantic? Platonic? Familiar? Admiration? He loved his dad, but he mostly admired him. He worked long hours and middle resents him for not being there for him, yet he realizes that his dad works to give him the world, a home with all the things he wanted. He never had a mother so he never had parental or familiar, again his dad was there but he wanted a parent that would hold him when he came back from school everyday. He didn't have a girlfriend, so he doesn't know romantic. So far all of his characters where villains, or evil in some way. He was starting to get sick of them. Shinsou wanted something more, wanted to play a character that wasn't how everyone saw him as on his day to day life. He wanted a challenge, he wanted....affection. Just to show it. He wanted attraction. Just to abuse it. He wanted...love. To just...maybe...feel...enjoy...understand it.

"You terrible thing you. My love, you're so cold. You've left me hanging on every one of your words. You've made me loose my self, lose my self-control because of you!" He pours everything into his performance, his loneliness, his regrets, his experience. He's been told by his co-performers and directors that he has a great future in the arts, in theater. If he just took care of himself more he would be an amazing actor, not only incredibly talented but also attractive. He would have the world kneeling, bowing to him just from his words alone. He could have anything he wanted just because of his existence.

" You've made me do things i don't want to do...for you." Kodai stands there looking horrified. He's covered in blood, the blood of her lover, the one she left him for.

"No, i-i didn't-"

"YOU MADE ME-MADE DO THIS FOR YOU! You terrible, terrible, terrible thing! You beautiful thing, I've done this for you!...and you still cant and won't love me." He doesn't see Kodai anymore. It's not her face he sees, nor her voice that he hears.

Its you...its your voice. You. You looking back at him while he slowly lowered himself to kneel and crawl towards you. It's you who backs away from him as he starts to cry and hiccup.

"You wreck me, you made me. You leave me in your wake, please let me go!" He sees you and feels you grabbing his wrists back, pushing him into himself.

"Don't you ever let me go...."

You terrible beautiful thing, you.

And here we are again. This was a lot fun to write since it feels more concrete when it comes towards his personality and his full thought process. In many cases people like Shinsou just want attention or some sense of validation, which there is nothing wrong with wanting those things but it's more about the manner you go about it. You shouldn't pressure or force others to spend time with you, but there is always someone out there that will like to give you those things.

Tag list: @blossominglark

[gracefulweather]

hello ! it's been quite a long time since i last sent an ask 😅 sorry fam !

once i pull an eric pc it'll b over for me :") but i got my friend a maverick album and she pulled the sunric pc lmao ! i also got a nice collection of sunwoo photos from a friend and i ordered a sunric photo strip 😳😳😳

hyunjae 😅😅😅😅😅😅😅 stay away !!! jk i love him

UR SUNWOO FIC !!! IS SO GOOD !!!! IM OBSESSED WITH IT FR 😭😭😭 the way u write is so beautiful and how everything connects, it's so effortless and detailed ! i love it sm, seriously 🥺 the plot and the characterization is so amazing !! u did so well, truly one of the best fics i've ever read

hahahaha lovesick ..... . its a journey tbh, it always takes me a while to decide...so we'll see ! i've changed the plot so many times too lol but hopefully it'll stay interesting and i'll actually find the inspo to write it haha !

YES YES YES i was hoping for atz to release the kingdom ver. of the songs i'm so glad they did ! i wish all the groups would make official releases and hopefully tbz will give us that spicy monster cover 👀 AND THE ROCK VER. OF THE STEALER WE NEED IT !

i started watching 'our beloved summer' ! rn its like enemies to lovers to enemies and i like it !! PLS i thought we were promised goedam in like august :"( wait hyunjae's drama was cancelled??? i watched the first episode i thought it was fun :")

THE WAY THEY ALL GANGED UP ON ERIC LMAO IT WAS SO FUNNY

oohh i see ! i find that i am v uncreative in letting my mind wander :( and i rewrite and recycle the same plotlines a lot lol but it def helps for me to go out and like.. do stuff to get inspo ahaha 👀 omg the hj etl !!! i am excited

DRINK IT THE AUDIENCE WANTS DRINK IT ICE TEA ENTERTAINMENT ARE U LISTENING

yesss i feel like hoon's hair color has changed a lot recently ! but its so cute !! HYUNJAE >:( why does he looks so good all the time

what if !! we get hypnotized at the GDAs ?

WORLD. TOUR [!(#*#)! O H MAN .... i cannot do that, hopefully they come to somewhere near me 😭

hyunjae is literally unhinged lmao his sense of humor is amazing i love it

also we finally got the milsun live 🤩🤩🤩 the fucking part when sunwoo said he likes hotdogs at the movie theater and hyunjae was like those r for kids and sunwoo made those fucking faces PLEEEASE a comedic duo 😭😭😭 and also sunwoo going tf off abt loud chewers in movie theaters hahHa

today i saw sunwoo promising to do some sort of ab reveal and then i closed twitter i can feel my eye twitching as i type this rip my sanity

my exams ended and i surprisingly didn't fuck em up too much ☺☺☺ all i've been doing is working so far and dealing w my uh 😅 kinda rude boss lol anyway !

HOW IS 2022 SO CLOSE LIKE WHAT WHERE DID THE YEAR GO????

i hope u are thriving and doing well and resting !! what else have u been up to???

HII BESTIE HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! 🎉🍾🎆✨ did you do anything fun? any resolutions? anything you're looking forward to this year?

oooh rooting for an eric pc for ur next pull hehe but that sounds like a nice collection of sunwoo!!! do you have like a shelf in ur room that's just for ur kpop stuff? HAHA i did the pc in clear phone case thing for a bit but then got a new phone case so put sangyeon back on my shelf :')

adklfjk ty for ur comments really 🥺🥺🥺 i spent most of the writing process hating it so i was pleasantly surprised to have it turn out well in the end!! wrote way too many versions of it too LMAO but ahHHH thank u for ur support 🥺💖

ohhh how much of ur smaus do you plan before you start posting? i've tried writing series a few times in the past but i always need to like.... get the whole thing done before posting otherwise it'd never get done 🤡 i hope u find ur inspo soooon ahh i'm excited for whatever u decide to do with lovesick!!

omg yes the tbz monster cover and now ROCK VERSION OF MAVERICK TOO!!! are they rlly never gonna release them tho 😭 but omg did you hear about how the person who arranged their upcoming ost is the one who arranged the reveal/checkmate mama 2020 stage and stealer rock ver??? is this who we go talk to... (ง'̀-'́)ง

ohhh is that the drama where exes have to film a documentary or something? i've seen it around and it looks like fic inspo 👀 is it good? but omg enemies to lovers to enemies LOL. ikr what happened to goedam :(( and i guess hyunjae's webdrama didn't do well enough to be continued? although.... it's supposedly.... the most popular thing on that youtube channel LMAOOO

i am also very uncreative omg sometimes i read other people's fics esp if it's a fantasy or magical realism kind of world or has a cool concept and i'm like.... how do you come up with this??? nothing wrong with cliches tho!! but yeahh going out and doing stuff deffs helps with inspo haha

oooh do you like hoon's long hair? kinda miss his black hair now LOL. hyunjae..... we don't speak of him 😶 WAIT GDA that's this weekend..... they're performing?? i've lost track of all the award shows already but hypnotized would be amazing (drink it... would be too... BIG SIGH 😔). i'm gonna rely on jacob and kevin to pull some strings and get them to canada for the world tour hehe

SUNWOO'S FACE AT THAT PART WAS SO FUNNY AKDFJKFL i laughed every time i saw it on my tl!! and yeah i also read about that ab reveal thing 😶 sangyeon once made that promise but never kept it... so maybeeeee you'll be safe 👀

oooh that's so good go get that 4.0!! i believe in u!! but ur rude boss :(( props to u for handling school and work and everything tho!! and ikr the year went by so fast... i saw a post that said '2021 is proof that time flies whether you had fun or not' HAHA think it's accurate 🤡 the holidays felt way too short tbh, i was stressing over this fic exchange and gifts the entire time so not much rest but that's ok!! LOL

[anthropologicalhands]

r/n - i've been working on my backwards walk / there's nowhere else for me to go / except back to you just one last time / say yes before i change my mind

As Rebecca tries to be sanguine about nearing forty, seeing it as a peak rather than a slide into decay (a Naomi-fostered distortion that has proven remarkably difficult to shake), one thing that has comforted Rebecca over the last decade is that with experience, she’s learned how to handle all matter of situations with grace, simply because she’s seen them before.

Revisiting this particular situation, however, is not what she expected.

It starts with an invitation delivered to Rebecca’s house to Hebby’s fifth grade graduation. There wouldn’t be anything strange about such a thing, even after she gets over the orange-and-turquoise astronaut theme (Hebby was going through a bit of a NASA phase), were it not for the fact the invitation was also addressed to Nathaniel.

Rebecca and Nathaniel, specifically.

Still frowning and trying to ignore the weird ringing that just went through her head at the jolt of seeing hers and Nathaniel’s names juxtaposed across a piece of lurid cardstock—like they’re a unit, or something—Rebecca credits herself with just pulling her phone out and calling Darryl directly instead of diving headfirst into a panic spiral.

“Rebecca!” Darryl’s voice booms from the other end of the line, and Rebecca can’t help the reflexive grin—Darryl’s unflagging enthusiasm while raising four daughters remains nothing short than a scientific marvel. “What a surprise. How is my favorite pretzel singer?”

“Hey, Darryl. Quick question for you. I got your card—”

“Isn’t it great? Hebby picked out the colors specially.”

“I’ll bet she did. But that’s not why I was calling, actually. I was wondering if, perchance, you might have had a shortage of such eye-popping invitations?”

“What do you mean?”

“My invitation was addressed to me and Nathaniel, which, I can definitely send him the deets, no problem, but wouldn’t an email be easier?”

“Oh?” She can hear Darryl’s mustache frown from the other end of the phone. “You mean you and Nathaniel aren’t…”

“Well, he doesn’t live here,” snaps Rebecca, a little flustered. “Why would you think that? Why did you think—did he—”

“Hang on,” says Darryl, and she can hear him calling for April, leaving her stuttered rejection hanging.

Are her and Nathaniel—

How is that even a question anymore?

It’s been a decade, and everyone involved with that event has definitively moved forward with their lives. Her and Josh were a definitive ‘no’ from that fateful Valentine’s Day onwards, remaining dear friends instead, and she was very much the ‘cool aunt’ among his own children. Her and Greg had wavered briefly for a bit afterwards, ran into some seriously uncomfortable friction, and it took them the better part of two years to find a good balance. It probably helped that she accidentally connected him to the woman who would become his wife, but that was a story for another day.

And it was a similar story with Nathaniel. He went to Guatemala for two years, came back and split his time between helping at MountainTop and working with some volunteer legal capacity with the local zoos and her and him—

Ah. Well.

Okay, so it wasn’t quite as clearly defined with Nathaniel, beyond the general fact that she wanted him to be happy, and he wanted her to be happy, and generally their relationship since his return had been checking in on each other, making fun of their weird hobbies and still showing up to events that were important to each other. It was all very adult and friendly and open. Their friendship had appropriate limits and boundaries and they supported each other in the respective relationships they had tried over the years, and it was very platonic…

Well. Except when it wasn’t. There hadn’t been a repeat of the Mona incident ever, and Rebecca could honestly say that she really liked a couple of the long-term girlfriends he’d introduced to them since then, and was genuinely regretful when those relationships ended. Especially for Sylvia, the LA Zoo curator who had to move for her career. Not that the regret wasn’t complicated by other factors, like when Nathaniel had admitted privately to Rebecca later that as much as he liked Sylvia, he just couldn’t see himself leaving California again.

She didn’t get butterflies at that, exactly, because but there had been a comfort in knowing that Nathaniel was content to remain in her orbit.

Again, not entirely uncomplicated. But it was nothing beyond the usual messy spectrum of human emotion internally, and never acted on externally.

She’s dated on and off as suited her libido and her schedule and her desire to find a life partner. She’s had relationships that got serious enough to talk about the future on and off, but they’ve all ended too for reasons inherent to those dynamics themselves. Nathaniel had been a good friend while they were going on, and a shoulder to cry on after, and well, okay, they might have fallen back into bed together a few times over the years, but they never pretended that it was either more than it was or that it was some forbidden thing that wouldn’t happen again. It was what it was.

Well. And they hung out, sometimes. And occasionally were each other’s plus-ones to public events. And friends’ weddings. And quite possibly—

Hm.

It really, really doesn’t help her case that she’s going to see him tonight, either.

“Rebecca?” Darryl tears her out of her thoughts. “Sorry about that! I think there was just a mistake at the stationary shop and they put your cards in together. What are the odds? I might need to call the other parents on the list, just to make sure that they got theirs all right. Could you take that one to Nathaniel? I don’t know if it’s out of your way—”

“Not at all!” says Rebecca, smiling with all of her teeth even though Darryl can’t see her, her cheeks aching. “Not even remotely.”

“Good,” says Darryl, and she can hear him beaming from the other side of the line.

~

“So, a funny thing happened on the way to your apartment…”

“That’s ominous,” comments Nathaniel, taking the bag of groceries she shoves at him without complaint as he closes the door behind her. Rebecca kicks off her shoes and toes them out of the walkway, abiding by Nathaniel’s still oft-repeated entreaties to not leave her personal belongings strewn entirely across his apartment.

“It’s not ominous so much as luminous,” says Rebecca, reaching into her purse and withdrawing Hebby’s invitation with a little flourish of the wrist. “Well, fluorescent.”

“Oh my god.”

Nathaniel accepts the card and flicks it open, scanning through the cheerful, only slightly grammatically incorrect message, and cannot quite suppress an amused huff of laughter. Rebecca hides her own smile as she turns away to set her purse on the very useful hook Nathaniel installed for her own use. Like herself, Nathaniel has a soft spot for Hebby, despite his continued awkwardness around children.

“Right? She gets that from Darryl for sure.”

“I don’t know, I remember someone showing up in some pink and purple eyesore into a law firm the very first day I met her.”

“You just didn’t know fun when you saw it,” says Rebecca instead, perching on the edge of the couch. “But it was funny. I was worried for a second that he thought that we were a couple or something. How weird is that?”

She is completely, totally casual in her delivery of that line, she knows. A decade in community theater and singing gigs have certainly finetuned her ability to turn a phrase, if nothing else. But something must be slightly offkey, because Nathaniel snaps up from marveling at the card to eye her suspiciously.

“Very weird,” he says, after a slightly-too-long pause. “Do we seem like a couple? Why would we seem like a couple when we aren’t a couple?”

“That’s exactly what I thought!” She punches him companionably on the arm; apparently too hard, if the way he winces and rubs at his bicep is any consideration.

(She’s been taking workout classes with Valencia—she deserves something for all that pain.)

“But it’s probably nothing,” she adds, determined to address this weird little misstep directly, because they are both too old to be having any kinds of weird misunderstandings anymore. “We’re close. We have our own rhythm, our own special two step. No wonder Darryl got confused.”

“He’s getting old,” says Nathaniel.

“Dude, c’mon.”

“What? It’s true.”

“What about you, Mister Gray?” Rebecca challenges. Nathaniel pulls a face in response, clearly fighting the urge to brush his hand through the aforementioned silvering at his temples.

(He wasn’t quite vain enough to dye his hair yet, though Rebecca credits his restraint to the fact that she would never let him hear the end of it.)

“It’s just a couple of hairs,” he says inconsequentially, as though it hasn’t been long established that between the two of them, he’s the one with the greater fear of aging, and therefore in far more danger of aging gracelessly.

“Keep telling yourself that.” Rebecca hops off the couch and grabs him by the elbow. “Now c’mon, let’s make sure make these sweet potatoes are not oh-sweet-pies-don’t!”

~

Heading over to Nathaniel’s place had left Rebecca feeling on edge, not quite sure how to process the idea of someone, anyone, considering her and Nathaniel as a potential couple this late in the game.

Nothing is more grounding, however, than seeing Nathaniel being clearly so off kilter, missing steps in what should be a well-worn dance of theirs by now. Dancing has always been their thing—where they once threw each other off at every possible moment, shaking up their convictions about life and happiness and how that concept could exist within their previously compartmentalized existences. Now, they were familiar with each other. Comfortable. Predictable.

They knew each other’s moves now, which means that she could see Nathaniel’s as clear as water.

He’s unfocused during dinner, a little erratic in his answers, jittery, as if he’s had too much coffee. It’s putting her off her rhythm, and while she knows that not everything in life needs to be a big song and dance production, there does need to be some kind of continuity.

This evening was supposed to be easygoing and relaxing. And, yes, probably beneficial in that very particular friends-with-benefits way. But since that clearly wasn’t going to happen, they needed to execute a sharp left turn and get this all settled.

“Nathaniel?” she repeats, for the third time.

“Hm?”

“Are you getting hard of hearing in your old age?” He scowls deeply at her in response. “Yeah, yeah, I had to ask. So, what’s bugging you?”

He’s silent for a long minute. “Just something ridiculous.”

“Yeah?”

He shakes his head. “We don’t need to go through it again. It’s just spinning in circles around the same old subject.”

“Try a jazz square then.”

That startles a laugh out of him, much to Rebecca’s satisfaction. Good to know that she still has some capacity for surprise with him. She continues, “You know that move, right? Don’t tell me you forgot about Connie.”

“Are you kidding? I still have nightmares about her scarf strangling me to death.”

“Dark.”

“She was terrifying.”

“Yeah.” They sit in companionable silence. Then Nathaniel sighs.

“Sorry I’m being weird. I just…hearing that from you, I always thought it would just be a good laugh. You know, ridiculous to even think about romance again. But it made me feel weird instead, so now I’m acting slightly weird.”

“I wouldn’t say slightly,” teases Rebecca, unable to resist. Nathaniel doesn’t return her smile.

“Rebecca, I like where we are. I like that our relationship isn’t a big production anymore.”

“Don’t get me wrong—I love drama on the stage, but that’s definitely where it should stay.” She drums her fingers on her thigh, subconsciously tapping out a tune that’s been giving her trouble these last few weeks. “We can learn new steps, you know. Old dogs, new tricks? That doesn’t only apply to the bedroom.”

Nathaniel (again, predictably) groans.

“Aren’t you getting too old to have such a dirty mind?” But he’s smiling, now.

“Nah. I fully intend to be a filthy old woman. But seriously,” she adds, moving to sit besides him on the couch. “If just the thought of other people thinking that we’re a couple again is enough to send us both off balance, we need to center ourselves. Maybe it’s something worth talking about. What do you say?”

She reaches out and grabs his hand, and starts to tap a rhythm against his large palm—one of the first she ever composed, the first one her friends ever danced to. After a moment, he taps back, completing it.

“Yes.”

[aprilyuki]

Jumin x MC x Zen fanfic

Photo and characters belong to cheritz

You put your phone by your ear, excited to hear his voice only to be disappointed. He had been busy for weeks now and you barely saw each other. Whenever he came back home, it's was really late and he was exhausted, not giving you any chance to catch up. You just understood. It's the consequences of dating a busy man but you just want a minute to check how he was doing.

"What are we gonna do with him, Elly? ." you caressed the cat's soft white fur.

Your phone suddenly rang and you quickly answered it. "Jumin?"

"Oh..um sorry to disappoint you, MC. It's Zen" he laughed awkwardly.

"Oh my gosh. I am so sorry. It's just that- nevermind. How have you been?" you asked Zen.

"I'm fine. And looks like Jumin has been ignoring his princess."

"No. He's just busy. Con of dating a CEO."

"Seriously. That guy." he exasperated. You knew it was going to be another long line of his complaints against Jumin so you cut him off.

"Why did you call by the way?"

"Oh yeah! Uhmm are you free today? I really need help with something."

"Yeah. Sure. For an old friend, why not."

"Awesome. I'll pick you up."

You entered his house and dropped your bag on the sofa. "Are you sure? I'm not really great at acting. I'm sure you have lots of friends in the theater that can help you." You asked. You were always ready to help, of course, but you didn't know it was to help him practice script reading. You thought you'll just watch. You were not that confident with your acting skills.

"Yes. I really want to get this role. And I really need you to practice with me and act as my leading lady. I really need it to be you." he looked deeply into your eyes longingly. It's been a while since you last saw each other. But as usual, all of his affection always missed your notice.

You sighed. "Okay. But don't blame me if I'm gonna be really bad at this."

"I'll try not to laugh at you." he joked. You lightly smacked his arm.

"What a bully." you laughed

He was sitting beside you on the sofa, reading his script until it was your turn.

"I don't get him." you read. "I don't know anymore." you tried your best,really. But you couldn't help but sound awkward. "He always says he loves me but he felt so distant. We barely have time for each other. He doesnt confide in me anymore. I feel useless while I watch him carry all of his burden alone. I want to be there for him." the more you read the lines, the more it hit you until you felt like you were not reading it anymore. Its as if you were saying it now.

Tears threatened to form in your eyes so you snap out of it."Uhmm" you slid your finger through the paper while you were searching for the next line. "I wish I just fell for someone like you, Zen." 'oh crap' you thought. You called him by his real name. You looked up at Zen to apologize but he suddenly looked so sad, pained. 'Is he in character?'

"Can't you just choose me? I've always been waiting for you." he raised his hand and caressed your cheek. You flinched at the sudden touch. "I've always been here waiting for you. Why can't you see that? I love you. I've always loved you, MC" He moved his face closer to yours as he stared at your lips.

"Zen?" he snapped out and looked at you. "I don't think that's on the script."

Realizing he was so close, he immediately jumped away. "I-it's improvising.." he stuttered. "We do that a lot."

"I see. You're really a great actor, Zen. I almost believed you."

"Yeah. Acting. It's just my lines. Scripted." he looked down.

"You even called me by my real name so be careful next time. Don't disappoint us fans." You smiled. "I'm looking forward to your play. And Jaehee too, of course."

"Thanks." he smiled, bitterly. He didnt know if he was trying to steal a little happiness from Jumin by calling you over or just torturing himself knowing you will never look at him the way you look at your lover.

You guys continued practicing. You were so intent on helping him out that you forgot about the time and fell asleep on the couch. Zen kneeled in front of you. He swept the hair on your face.

"I meant those words. Why can't you see me?" he whispered. Suddenly, someone held his hand and pushed him away. "J-Jumin?!"

"huh?" you slowly opened your eyes, waking up. "Jumin!" you exclaimed, happily. He returned the big smile on your face with a cold stare. He grabbed your wrist and pulled you out of Zen's house. "Jumin slow down. You're hurting me." you can feel his grip tightening.

"Hey! What are you doing?!" Zen yelled. He caught up and grab Jumin's wrist. He couldn't hide his anger anymore.

Jumin annoyingly pulled his hand off.

"Mind your own business. This is between me and my GIRLFRIEND." He emphasized. The words stabbed Zen that he could only watch you leaving.

While in the car, Jumin was not talking. He was just looking out of the window with a grave expression.

"Jumin, What's wrong?"

You tried to hold his hand but he just flicked it off. You were hurt but you couldnt help but feel worried. You noticed he doesn't look good. "Are you okay?" you touch his forehead to check his temperature. "Jumin! Your fever is really high. I think we should go to the hospital"

He pushed your hand off. "Be quiet." he coldly hissed.

When you got to the condo he just pulled you back into your room.

"Jumin!" you called. "whats wrong? Tell me"

He just ignored you and pushed you into the bed. He brought his head close to your neck.

"Ow!" you felt a sharp pain. "what are you doing?" you tried to push him away but he's too strong for you. You were just pinned down on the bed.

"Marking my territory." He bit again and you flinched. "So that they'll know your mine. So that Zen will know you really are mine." he swiftly undressed you and loosed his necktie.

"Is this about him? I was just helping him." You sat down and cupped his face and looked at him. "Talk to me. Tell me what's wrong" you pleaded. Expressoinless, his face grew closer and you felt his lips on yours. His tounge slid in. Your breathing grew erratic.

He pulled out, giving you a chance you catch your breathe. "You want to know whats wrong?" he rested his head on your shoulder. You felt how hot he is and realized he was breathing heavily. "You're too nice to everybody. If I leave you alone, you will be stolen away."

"I won't."

"You're too innocent. I've been thinking of what should I do to you. I want to lock you in a cage or tie you up. I can't lose you." he mumbled. He couldn't look at you, feeling embarrassed of how he just acted. You never saw Jumin be so insecure.

"Jumin" you kissed him. "I Love you. I really love you. I am yours. I'll keep on saying this until you're sick of it." you promised.

"I highly doubt it." reassured, he felt weak and fell asleep.

You just watched him sleep for a while thinking how he could be so insecure. You never saw anybody other than him. If someone should be scared, you thought it should be you. He could do anything, he is smart and handsome. You thought he was too good to be true.

Your phone rang, disrupting your thought. It was Jaehee.

"Jaehee? It's late. Why are you calling?"

"Sorry for bothering you MC. I just want to check how Mr. Han is doing. He doesn't look good earlier."

"He has a fever but it went down now. He's resting. But I don't think he can come to work tomorrow."

"Oh it's okay. It's his off anyway. He has been working non-stop for weeks to finish all of his works and have a day off with you."

"He did that?" you asked. You never knew he hasn't been coming home right away because of you.

"I think I said too much. Take care of him, MC. Goodnight."

"Goodnight." you ended the call

You looked at Jumin sleeping peacefully and sat beside him on the bed.

"Thank you. I love you." you whispered as you kissed his forehead.

[geek-gem]

Transformers Dark Of The Moon

I've finally seen the movie again after these years. Let me warn you, spoilers and I have a lot to say.

Their is really a lot to say about this movie. But I'm glad I finally got my to do list of watching the first three Bayformers now.

Another thing I'll be honest about I was gonna play the Dark Of The Moon game on PS3 but it requires more MB's to clear out but I decided fuck it I don't care. Especially it's a short game but I'm not doing that shit. I just wanna watch this film especially remembering this is a long film.

But back to the movie. I'll be honest and I'm not critic and my opinion may be invalid because lots of people hate Bayformers. We have a new continuity with the Bumblebee movie which I think is the best decision this franchise has done.

To me this movie while I like the first film from 2007.

After watching this and I'm still having some feelings after being it. But I feel this is my favorite out of the Bayformers saga. This is basically where it should of ended and should of let the Bayformers end with dignity. Or at least until a new director came along like Travis Knight or others.

Especially like I remember a movie guy named Cure4 on DeviantArt but he's gone from that shit. I agree with him and I'm thinking this is the sequel the 2007 film should of had.

I'm pissed and I hate that Age Of Extinction was the follow up to this film. Despite how people feel about this film, my God Bay tried to redeem himself after Revenge Of The Fallen a film that is like some sort of weird parody there the video game tie in's I see as the best version especially the PS3/Xbox 360/PC versions and even the Wii/PS2 versions.

Another thing I wanna reveal when I saw this film for the first time in theaters I actually used this.

I seriously wore that and it worked and it was awesome. It was a experience despite I felt nervous. I was young but what the hell it's gonna be 8 years since the movie was released. Especially the 3D was awesome when I saw it in theaters.

But back to the movie again I'm sorry. I'm not gonna make this a full review I don't wanna waste anyone's time.

When I think about it Sam is a lot better in this film. While I do feel some moments could be worked on. He should of apologized to Bee after he meets him I know Sam's angry. Especially this development of Sam wants to matter. This is much better then what we had in Revenge Of The Fallen.

Carly I honestly find more likable then Mikaela. Seriously I do especially that moment where she literally tells Megatron that he will basically be Sentinel's bitch if he doesn't do anything. She basically treats Sam with a bit more respect and well I like the relationship more then what Sam and Mikaela had.

Lennox and Epps were always great. Especially Epps during the scenes in Chicago. Simmons is seriously entertaining in this and Dutch is a blessing.

Let me just talk about Dylan Gould. This guy he's been on my mind. I made two joke posts him deleted the first one of he's been waiting for that betrayal towards Sam.

Patrick Dempsey honestly and his portrayal of Dylan is a performance that left an impression on me. Because I was actually surprised by his reveal of who he actually was. But seriously this man is a dick and in a way I like him. Despite seeing in the film him talking about making tough choices and him being on the winning side. Yet over the course of the film he starts to take it a bit personal.

While I kept thinking before seeing the film he was enjoying it maybe. But my view on it changed. I just think Patrick Dempsey kind of owns the role.

Yes we should talk about the robots and let me be honest. What I love about this film it's basically the Decepticons strike back. They are basically winning in this film. I love the Chicago invasion scene.

I do feel like the entire Bayformers series yes their should of been more Transformers screen time. Especially the Decepticons in this case. While I feel in Revenge Of The Fallen I can tell Starscream feels like he's a little snarky in some parts. While I know he's kissing up to Megatron to cover his ass. I would of liked some what....I don't know more snarky shit or something Starscream would say or do. Maybe even during his confrontation with Sam he mentioning after the Decepticons win that he would overthrow Megatron and become the winner.

I remember when I was young when I saw this for the first time. For Starscream I had hoped he would betray Megatron yet that would be so much for one film. Because that's Starscream from G1, Animated, and other continuities. At least one last hurrah before he dies.

Especially I remember when I was young I wanted Skids and Mudflap, along with Leo to come back....I was young and I enjoyed Revenge Of The Fallen a lot more okay. Wouldn't mind Leo but their seems to be a bit much but what the hell I wanted Dinobots in this film.(well it's said Skids and Mudflap are shown as cars but they were supposed to die....they did die by Sentinel in the movie comic)

I dig Soundwave in this film. Even Laserbeak these guys are douches but would of liked to seen more Soundwave. Especially I like this little dynamic between Dylan and Soundwave I know that's weird of me to say. Would of liked to seen more.

Shockwave in this film seriously I was hyped for him when I was young and playing the prequel game. I feel it's stupid he's not as important. He should of had more lines and more interactions. I even agree with a comment on YouTube he should of been in the Africa scene.

While he is badass it's stupid how he goes out but give him a better send off and a fight with Optimus Prime. I wanted to see more Shockwave and I think it would of been better if he was voiced by Mark Ryan. Frank Welker didn't do a bad job and he actually had two lines spoken in English.

At least his driller creature is cool. But seriously after all the hype and I want to just put some promotional stuff.

Whatever if this one is official or not. It's just in Shockwave's own words......logical. Or my own words fucking logical.

The reason I'm saying Mark Ryan because of his English accent and I want to be reminded of Corey Burton. Sorry for sounding weird.

Let me say I feel Sentinel Prime is probably the best antagonist actually we've had in a Transformers live action film especially in the Bayformers. Characters like Shatter and Dropkick are great. Even Lockdown was nice. But I liked Sentinel. I'll be honest I was actually surprised when I witnessed his betrayal when I was young. I thought the Decepticons were gonna force him to use the Pillars maybe even Shockwave but what we got was something else.

Also I really liked the scenes with Optimus and Sentinel. I do feel we should of gotten more and had them be longer. Especially I like Optimus in this. I do see their was this father and son or brother like relationship that Bay talked about. But would of liked to seen more.

The other Autobots are alright cool. I do feel the whole Que/Wheeljack thing was just seriously stupid. Especially now before Bumblebee a Wheeljack design that was more accurate. Tragic about the way he died.

Looking back at the film theirs not a lot of Cybertronian scenes but they leave an impact.

Also I really wanna talk about the ending with Optimus, Sentinel, and Megatron. We should of gotten more Megatron I agree.

But the scene where leading up to Optimus killing Sentinel seeing it in action after going through the movie. It is awkward in a way.

Yet I'll be honest Sentinel basically deserved it. In fact of the Decepticons, and Dylan fucking deserved what they got. Because after everything they did their to me was not a way shit would end peacefully or something. Including your hearing this from a Steven Universe fan a show that deals with pacifism and other shit.

I do feel and I've talked about this before but I might delete it now because I'm gonna mention it here. But I feel if the scene went like it was Megatron who kills Sentinel or this dark idea of Sentinel killing himself or even himself dying from wounds. Especially giving Megatron and Optimus more of a fight even with Optimus haven't one arm.

Or hell seriously Bay should of gone with the original that was kept in the novel that Megatron teamed up with Optimus to kill Sentinel and Megatron would stop what he's doing. Also hearing that it would of explored Megatron more. That ending would have his look in The Last Knight make sense that he went to Cybertron after Dark Of The Moon and over time he decided to go back leading the Decepticons. Instead they had to kill him off and the whole Galvatron thing. Even though Megatron got what was coming to him.

Gonna be honest the Starscream death while I like the idea of Sam having the courage to take on Starscream and even killing him. But I do feel Starscream should of died a more I guess epic death.

Especially I weirdly wanted Sam to be all Cade Yeager shooting Decepticons and some how killing them. I mean you Sam jumping on cars and even sliding under them.

Gonna say before seeing the movie I kept thinking Dylan in his fight with Sam should of died a more brutal death. Such as Sam telling him to shut up after the messager comment and beating him to death. But Dylan's death is perfect. Seriously he gets hit in the face with some sort of pole thing and dies by the pillar.

Listen I'm sorry for rambling a lot. This became more of some review or reaction. The action was seriously nice and the special effects, score was always excellent.

Gonna be honest while I wasn't emotional much throughout the movie. Did feel emotional over the, "The fight will be your own" scene and felt a little at the, "No Prisoners Only Trophies" scene....that should of had more weight. I'll be honest when I was young I was expecting Sam for some reason come out of hiding yelling no in slow motion, surprising everyone then the Decepticon drop ship gets hijacked.

Gonna say did enjoy Wheelie and Brains I like them. Glad they we're still around in later films.

I think I've talked too much. Basically I think this is the best Bayformers sequel, this is what we should got gotten as a sequel to the 2007 film. It's better then Revenge Of The Fallen, Age Of Extinction, and The Last Knight.

My only weird complaint that isn't towards the movie.....Dinobots could of been in this some how.....during the battle of Chicago. We should of gotten Dinobots vs the Driller. Grimlock voiced by Vin Diesel or whatever I've had that weird casting idea I think for years. Or even Devastator in this because it's a huge open battle with so many opportunities. While I understand Michael Bay didn't wanna go larger like he did with Revenge Of The Fallen. I'm just disappointed that the next film we got after this was Age Of Extinction.

Tags dealt with sorry that got wrong, their was a lot to talk about. Glad I could talk about this and again I finished my to do list of rewatching the original trilogy. Bring on the new cinematic universe in the Knightverse that started out with Travis Knight's Bumblebee I'm ready for more excellent films.