#let's call it fandom year in review for outsiders

[cloudyfacewithjam]

+ bonus

SAS: Rogue Heroes + textposts

[violetmuses]

Tough Days - A. Aretas ❤️‍🩹

Title: Tough Days - A. Aretas ❤️‍🩹

Fandom: “Bad Boys” Film Universe

Character: Armando Aretas

Main Storyline: Former criminal Armando Aretas and Detective Marcus Burnett try to build their unexpected relationship. 🏷 @adoresmiles

====

2024

Though facing many questions or encountering different secrets over time, famous detective Mike Lowrey would now stand up as the biological father of previous criminal Armando Aretas.

Because the Miami Police Department handled operations, even Mike's longtime partner and best friend Marcus Burnett crossed Aretas as well.

After hiding overseas and safely returning to Miami, Florida, Armando would stay at home with Mike, but continued helping the known precinct.

_____

“Are you still mad at me about the campfire thing?” Marcus leaned toward Armando from his desk.

“No, but you talk too much.” Aretas took Skittles from Marcus without looking and veiled the candy

“Hey!” Upon realization, Marcus glanced around for sweets. “Can't let me enjoy shit, just like your father.”

Tossing the candy to Mike, Armando jutted his chin and headed to the briefing room.

“Catch up with your nephew right now before I call Theresa over the junk food.” Mike arched his brow toward Marcus and even mentioned Burnett's wife Theresa.

“Really, man?” Marcus immediately defends himself while trailing everyone inside.

“Go.” Mike clenched his teeth. “You survived the heart attack, but you're still my brother.”

“I know.” Sitting down, Marcus and Mike prepared themselves for work as usual. “How's Armando doing?”

“Ask him yourself. Are you scared?” Mike nearly chuckled.

“Hell no. He just doesn't express himself.” Marcus told the truth.

Armando's still learning.” Lowrey responded back this time around, sipping coffee. “Let's focus.”

“Fine.” Marcus stopped playing around while looking forward. Captain Rita Secada stands behind the podium and heads this meeting.

Another hustle is coming up. Burnett thought.

____

“Why do y'all always put Armando near the clubs?” Marcus reviewed files of their next case.

“Even I can't go anymore.” Mike answered Marcus. “Times have changed, man.”

“So we're old now?” Marcus squinted toward his best friend.

“To be honest, yeah.” Mike shrugged. “And let's just say that Armando has a better chance of catching these fools.”

“How can Armando work better than us? We've been in the game for years, Mike.” Marcus glanced between Lowrey and Aretas, curious.

“No suspicion.” Mike cleared his throat. “If you and I step foot anywhere, folks start running before we can even question people.”

“But I still don't like what's happening.” Marcus vented. “Every time we go out like that, Armando pulls some charm and he ends up getting phone numbers.”

“Networks.” Mike nodded. “It's a distraction to reach the criminals before we swarm everything.”

“Yeah, right.” Marcus casted both eyes toward the ceiling. “You're just putting Armando outside for no reason at this point.”

“I won't leave. It's still work.”Aretas finally spoke up and chime in.

“You don't even talk to the ladies, man.” Marcus judged Aretas.

“Hey, that's none of your business” Mike warned Marcus over boundaries as usual.

“It is. We haven't met anyone.” Marcus shook his head. “I want another case. Talk to Rita.”

“Shut up, man.” Mike planned to keep going, but radio signals buzzed around the precinct.

“There's a chase, let's go.” Armando revealed slightly accented English and stood up, grabbing car keys.

Given no other option, Mike and Marcus hustled to follow Aretas.

_____

“I know damn-well that Mike never taught you how to drive!” Marcus worried from the passenger seat. “Slow down, Armando.”

“Not now. Please!” Aretas punched the gas while speeding regardless. Sirens wailed in all directions this afternoon.

“Shit!” Marcus just kept yelling. “Is this motherfucker driving the Batmobile?”

“Lamborghini.” Armando name-dropped the vehicle in pursuit.

When the Lambo turned, Armando caught this chance right away and immediately stopped driving.

“Freeze!” Marcus and Armando yelled together while the AMMO squad gathered near this big-time car.

“Don't touch me, pig!” This criminal shouted once Mike handcuffed him, but Armando lowered his gun.

“Zway?” Armando then narrowed his eyes past the Florida sun.

“Hey, help me out, man! I can hook you up right now.” Zway Rodriguez lived.

“Nah, you still get on my nerves, Zway. Take him to the station.” Armando nodded to Mike once more.

“How the hell is Zway still breathing?” Marcus stood flabbergasted. “We torched his ass!”

“No.” Armando corrected. “Zway dropped from my helicopter like Mike, but I didn't know what happened afterwards until now.”

“Damn.” Marcus returned to their car. “Do you think Zway connects our new case here?”

“We'll see.” This time, Armando started driving without trouble and headed back to the precinct.

_____

By nightfall, bright lights painted almost every corner of South Beach once more.

“All jokes aside, how are you doing?” Marcus and Armando joined the back of this limousine.

“Better, I guess.” Aretas tried. “I'm not running anymore.”

“Of course not.” Marcus then revealed more truth here. “Shit might be difficult for a while, but we got your back now.”

“Thanks.” Armando nodded, ready to handle business.

“We look good, but don't act up tonight. I'm still around.” Marcus glanced near Armando before entering the club.

Ignoring Marcus, Armando recognized security first.

“Sup, man?” One guard dapped up Aretas while standing between overhead neon lights. “What are you doing with Burnett?”

“It's another case.” Armando whispered. Even Marcus nodded, impressed.

“Damn.” That guard shook his head. “Who's the culprit now?”

“Where's Spark? I need to catch him before the drop hits.” This large-scale supply of drugs would funnel Miami soon.

“VIP waiting on our second floor. Get his ass, all right?” The guard pointed, leading directions for Armando and Marcus.

“Got it.” Aretas took charge and Marcus followed, ready.

______

“That's Spark? He's not special.” Marcus chuckled near Armando.

Spark wore this knockoff designer outfit as people gathered around the VIP section.

“The Aretas legacy is thriving. Hello…” Spark barely introduced himself before yelling woke up this venue.

“Hands up!” The AMMO squad pulled up once more, led by Mike and Rita.

_______

Sooner than later, red and blue overcasts brightened Miami.

At long last, Spark met the patrol vehicles for his crimes and another righteous bust threw down.

“Good job, Armando, but I still have a question for you.” Marcus asked.

“Yeah?” Aretas looked toward Burnett.

“Are you ever coming by the house? We don't bite.” Marcus invited Armando to see his family.

“Maybe.” Aretas shrugged and left the scene with Mike as Marcus returned home.

Progress is better than nothing.

[sumiink]

Sumi's Fic Recs

I've been saving a list of fan fiction I like for years now and thought I should share it!

Fandoms include Danny Phantom, DPxDC, Batman, DCMK, BNHA, and Miraculous Ladybug, Legend of Zelda (Linked Universe), Mob Psycho 100, and Genshin Impact. Links, summaries, and comments under the cut.

Danny Phantom

Phantom of Truth by Haiju

NOTE: An edited/updated version of the sequel (Shadow of a Doubt) is also on AO3, but not finished. The finished, unedited version can be found on FF.net here.

Summary: Locked away in a secret government lab with Phantom as her sole object of study, nothing stands between Maddie and the truth... except, perhaps, herself.

Review: You can’t talk about Danny Phantom fanfic without bringing up Phantom of Truth. This one defines the vivisection genre. It’s written in Maddie’s perspective and you can see her character in every little detail of the writing.

Treading Water by TheFullCatastrophe

Summary: "This is the story of why we had to start calling Danny Fenton, Danny FINton. Get it, Danny? 'Cause you have FINS? Oh, I kill me." - a summary by Tucker Foley.

Review: Mermaid AU! Another classic fandom fic, this one with great worldbuilding and some dark, realistic vibes that make the ghosts (well, mermaids) really feel dangerous.

Modern Day Ghost Girl by MemoryWriter

Summary: Wendy Manson, 14-year old freshman in Casper High. Recently she's been able to sense ghosts, and on the day Wendy's paranormal curiosity gets the best of her, her project partner and ex-best friend Shane happens to follow her. When she meets a mysterious ghost in the abandoned apartment, what of her identity will she be discovering?

Review: One of the first fics I ever read, so it holds a special place in my heart.

Outside Looking In by Ellen_Brand

Summary: Casper High's new psychiatrist has some interesting interviews ahead of him.

Review: A great outside perspective into Danny. Also I just like Cade!

Phantom’s Sketchbook by AkoyaMizuno

Summary: Mr. Lancer finds himself in an unparalleled situation, he has access to something which can give him incredible insight into the personal workings of Amity Park's local ghost teen hero, Danny Phantom.

Review: Another fandom classic! A must read for the student/teacher relationship between Mr. Lancer and Danny.

You Should Be Dead by SapphireDragon11

Summary: Dash and Kwan are horrified to discover they've accidentally killed their classmate, but perhaps even more so when he shows up at school the next day. With his secret on the line, Danny soon discovers Dash and Kwan are the least of his worries.

Review: An epic story of Danny going up against incredible odds! One of my absolute favorites!

DPxDC

But I Want to Be Let In, Not Out by TheWritingOwl

NOTE: Actually a series of one-shots!

Summary: Growing up with the Fentons, Danny resigned himself to the fact that he would never see Damian again. However, when he gets summoned to Gotham after becoming the Ghost King, he finds himself reuniting with his long lost twin.

Review: Some nice demon twins au with batfam elements- all the stuff I like in a DPxDC fic.

close enough to be whole again by hailsatanacab

Summary: “If you ever find yourself in danger, go to Bruce Wayne. He will help you.”     His mother had loved him, in her own way. If she hadn’t, she wouldn’t have helped him escape. If she hadn’t, she would have dragged him back to the League of Assassins, to Grandfather. If she hadn’t, he’d be dead.     She loved him, but she loved the League more.     Jack and Maddie Fenton loved him too, they did, but they loved their work more.     They loved their work more.     --     After his parents react poorly to his reveal, Danny escapes to the only person he thinks can help him - Bruce Wayne. He doesn't know what to expect when he gets there, but it has to be better than where he is, surely? He certainly doesn't expect to be reunited with his long lost twin brother Damian. It's funny how things work out that way.     Danny is 16 years old, not Phantom Planet compliant

Review: More angsty demon twins AU with secret identity shenanigans, what’s no to love?

Recognized by AgentIanLegend

Summary: When they heard the fateful words "Recognized: Robin - B01," nothing could have prepared them for the web of secrets which would unravel as Daniel Fenton and Richard Grayson search for answers.

Review: An epic story will all kinds of twists and turns. Very will written with great pacing and tight storytelling!

Batman

hand in unloveable hand (a chokehold) by britishparty

Summary: Tim Drake is eleven years old when he’s grabbed off the streets of Bristol while he’s on his way home. It will be okay, he tells himself: they’ll call his parents, and they’ll pay the ransom, and he’ll get to go home.

There are pictures of Batman and Robin on the camera he was carrying. A lot of pictures.

They don’t call his parents. They call Black Mask.

- or: the one where Black Mask kidnaps Tim and tries to groom him into a ruthless heir, and Tim tries to figure out how to destroy him from the inside out.

Review: Tim is great in this. This one is full of scheming and mind games and all that good stuff.

From When He Sprang by WereDog15

Summary: January 2012. For the last four years, Jason Todd has been living on the streets of Gotham, doing whatever he can in order to survive on his own. But one night, as he emerges from his dwelling in Gotham’s underground tunnels, he encounters the legendary dynamic duo of Batman and Robin.A little bit of help can go a long way, but Jason's world is ripped apart as he is unintentionally put in the path of one of the deadliest secret societies that the world has ever known.Discover the story of the event that changed their lives forever, and put Jason on the path to becoming the second Robin.

Review: THIS FIC. It’s creative, it’s dark, it’s gory - this one makes me feel like I’m back in middle school reading The Hunger Games for the first time. This fic does not pull any punches.

Liminal Spaces by Calamityjim

NOTE: A multi-part series with some extra one-shots too

Summary: Bruce's habit of collecting strays is not limited by dimension. Or When Young Justice Batman comes across an angsty, seemingly abandoned by his Batman Tim Drake, he decides to step up to the plate and parent the crap out of him.

Review: Oh this one is a long, epic story with all kinds of twists and turns. And lots and lots of emotional batfam moments.

A Gentlekid Thief by Blazonix

Summary: Tim didn't mean to become the notorious thief Red X; it just sort of happened. Just like how he somehow wound up being Batman’s greatest nemesis - his therapist. He would like to remind whatever higher forces are out there that he is still only 12.

Review: Funny and clever!

From the Shadows by Wolfsbanesparks

NOTE: Shazam crossover

Summary: All Billy Batson wanted was to survive a particularly rough week living on the streets of Fawcett City. The last thing he was looking for was a new family. All Bruce Wayne wanted was to learn a bit more about his upbeat teammate under the guise of official Wayne Enterprises business. But he could never turn his back on a child in need. Especially one as surrounded by mystery as Billy. OR   Billy gets adopted by the Batfamily while trying to deal with a strong magical enemy.

Review: I’m always a fan of gen fic that also has an overarching story and great villain!

Shutterbye by katiesparks

Summary: The more I research it, the more I know it has to be true. Dick Grayson is Robin. And that means Bruce Wayne is Batman. All the pieces fit. I move my Dick and Bruce Wayne things into the Batman and Robin box and buy an extra lock for it.

Review: One-shot written from a young Tim’s perspective. The writing style really brings his character to life.

Surveillance by smilebackwards

NOTE: A multi part series

Summary: Tim knows antagonizing Lex Luthor wasn’t exactly his safest move but the point is really driven home by the bullet to the shoulder. Or: The AU where Jason never died and Tim is a civilian who contributes to crime fighting by taking surveillance photos and leaving them on the desktop of the Batcomputer.

Review: Gotta love some ‘stalker Tim gets involved in hero stuff without actually wearing a cape’ stuff.

Detective Conan & Magic Kaito

(Don’t) Believe What You Know by discordiansamba

NOTE: This fic is actually a rewrite, buuuuuut I saved the older, longer version if you want to read that one instead. Available here (I just copy and pasted it, so formatting may be a little weird)

Summary: For as long as he's known him, Hattori Heiji has always seemed to gotten mixed up in cases with a sort of... supernatural touch. Honestly, Conan's never thought much of it- it's not as if the things that go bump in the night are actually real, and they've got countless cases behind them to prove just that.But after getting mixed up in a strange case in Osaka and learning a disturbing secret from Heiji's past, its left Conan wondering if there's more his friend isn't telling him. So he does what any good detective would- investigate.He's just... not sure he was ready for the answers.

Review: I am a huge of discordiansamba’s writing! It very descriptive and the stories tend to have a lot of interesting moving parts. This fic in particular is great for its worldbuilding and the magical, dangerous adventures Heiji gets involved in. And Heiji trying to hide stuff from Conan always makes for some good tension.

Blood and Snow by discordiansamba

Summary: Heiji Hattori has never believed in the supernatural. Things like vampires have always been a bunch of nonsense to him. But the supernatural is about to prove itself very real.

Review: If you like the last one, you’ll like this one too – another supernatural adventure focusing on Heiji!

Unprofessional Opinion by Ellen_Brand

Summary: A series of psychologicalpersonality profiles of our boys... with guest shrink Cade Maboroshi!

Review: I just like Cade! And an outsider’s perspective is always fun, especially in this writing style.

The Case of the Magic Bullet Murder by MirrorandImage

NOTE: Technically a sequel, but I didn’t read the first one and wasn’t lost. There’s also a third fic that’s good too!

Summary: As always Conan stumbles across another body; and this time the prime suspect is this high school kid named Kuroba Kaito. Sequel to The Case of the Hidden Epidemic.

Review: We get to see Conan interact with Kaito, and that always makes for fun secret identity shenanigans. And we even get to see Kaito get involved in solving a case!

Insanity, Apparently by Taliya

NOTE: A series of one shots

Summary: Takagi Wataru would like to register a complaint to whichever deity thought it would be hilarious to toss him into odd situations with Kaitou KID. Repeatedly. Because this was far beyond his pay grade.

Review: A fun story with a mix of characters you don’t see very often.

Be a Better Me by Lisa_Telramor

Summary: Kaito thought that the Robot Incident ended with the destruction of his copycat robot. He couldn't have guessed how wrong that assumption was when he is injured months later.

Review: Wonderfully angsty and doesn’t shy away from the horror of Kaito’s new reality.

Guide you home by Tobina

NOTE: Uses Guide & Sentinel tropes, which I’d never heard of before but I guess it used to be popular in fanfic in the 90’s? Basically Sentinels have superpowers and Guides help them control it. The two tend to be lifelong partners, but it can be romantic or familial or platonic.

Summary: As a Level 5s Sentinel and skillful detective, Kudou Shinichi helps the Tokyo Police Department whenever they get stuck with a case, his Guide Ran at his side to ground him when needed. After a KID heist, it becomes clear that Guides are dissapearing and Shinichi and his western counterpart Hattori Heiji are knee-deep into the case, especially because this one hits far too close to home for comfort. When then even phantom thief Kaitou KID gets involved, things are bound to get... interesting.

Review: A GREAT story that does a good job with worldbuilding and characters’ relationships. While it focuses on Conan, my favorite part of this fic is the arc the Kaito goes through and the way this story takes a look at his motivations and moral compass.

It's Raining Men, Hallelujah by Asuka Kureru

Summary: Conan already has some kind of corpse magnet power, but when Heiji is in his orbit the corpses actively come to them. From above. Witness.

Review: A fandom classic! Short and hilarious.

Inconceivable by joisbishmyoga

Summary: In the face of a DNA analysis Kaito can't deny, he begins uncovering the rest of his family's secrets. Too bad he's not the only one looking.

Review: An epic story that has a takedown of the Black Org AND twin AU, what’s not to love?

Secrets in Indigo by Sinnatious

Summary: A throwaway comment about Kaitou KID’s eye colour sets Kaito on an uncomfortable path of discovery.

Review: I can’t give too many spoilers! An overall great story with great writing as Kaito discovers secrets and also tries to keep them hidden.

The Young Royals of Deduction by joisbishmyoga

NOTE: One shot

Summary: The Exclusive Interview with Four Children Taking the Investigative World by Storm

Review: Short but fun!

My Hero Academia

The Thin Gray Line by A_ToastToTheOutcasts

Summary: The beauty of the era of quirks wasn't the amazing abilities; it was that nobody sane would even entertain the thought that Kuroko, the most wanted vigilante in all of Japan, was Quirkless.

Review: A vigilante AU with a badass Deku (or, in this case, Kuroko) who puts the whole Hero Commisison to shame. The rivalry between Deku and Bakugou is so intense in this fic, I love it.

Yesterday Upon the Stair by PitViperOfDoom

Notes: When you’re done with this, there’s also a fun related one-shot by another author called U.A. Unsolved by kabukichou (ameliafromafairytale)

Summary: Midoriya Izuku has always been written off as weird. As if it's not bad enough to be the quirkless weakling, he has to be the weird quirkless weakling on top of it. But truthfully, the "weird" part is the only part that's accurate. He's determined not to be a weakling, and in spite of what it says on paper, he's not actually quirkless. Even before meeting All-Might and taking on the power of One For All, Izuku isn't quirkless. Not that anyone would believe it if he told them.

Review: An epic story full of secrets and ghosts!

Hero Class Civil Warfare by RogueDruid (Icarius51)

Summary: Heroes lead by Bakugo. Villains lead by Midoriya. Seven days prep time. Three days for Izuku Midoriya to show why they should be glad he's not a real villain.

Review: Badass Deku going all out and scaring his classmates. This one uses nearly every character from class 1-A and 1-B and manages to make everyone have an impact on the story!

Tales of the Jade Mantis by Chess_Blackfyre

NOTE: A multi-part series

Summary: The adventures of Inko Midoriya, Number One Vigilante in all of Japan, and her complicated relationship with the Number One Hero, All Might. However, it's not all about kicking butt and taking names, watch as the telekinetic in the leather jacket struggles with things like brutal mentors, working in customer service, and trying to be a good single parent.

Review: The only fic I’ve found with Inko as a vigilante! Quite the journey, this one goes over her career as a vigilante and what comes after when Izuku suddenly has a quirk. I love the weird adventures Inko gets up to and the interesting people she meets. One of my all time favorites!

Monochrome Skies by QuantumPoint

Summary: Midoriya Izuku died four years ago. Midoriya Izuku dead in a housefire when his mother didn’t notice him come home early. Midoriya Izuku dead because heroes failed to hear the screams of a scared child. Midoriya Izuku dead alone and scared.His mother mourned him but went on with her life. The heroes swore to be better, but still made the same mistakes. And for four years, everyone believed he was until Aizawa caught sight of a well-known vigilante and decided to investigate. Everyone believed it until Yagi bumped into a kind child on the street and tried to give him hope.

Review: I can’t say much because spoilers, but if you’re an artist, read this.

brilliant lights will cease to burn (by my hands i’ll reignite them) by novalotypo

NOTE: It’s a Card Captor Sakura crossover, but honestly I’ve never seen that and as far as I can tell this doesn’t have much to so with that show. It’s BNHA characters and world with some Card Captor magic elements.

Summary: Midoriya Izuku is quirkless. This, he knows very well.This is also what he knows:Weekends and vacations are reserved for walking neighborhood dogs. The elderly are the most powerful people on Earth. Local gods are picky eaters. Trust is a feeble, feeble thing. Magic cards are incredibly difficult to seal, especially when the world thinks you're a vigilante. Heroes are not magicians, but magicians can be heroes.Becoming a cardcaptor wasn't on Izuku's bucket list, but he'll be damned if he doesn't make the best out of it.

Review: Deku doesn’t have a quirk, so he gets sucked up into some magical card captor responsibilities and goes all out, as he does. This one has an analytical Deku, otherworldly magic, creepy villains, and some tension between a vigilante Deku and hero society as a whole. One of my absolute favorites!

Quirk: Knife! by brightredwings

Summary: Izuku Midoriya is unlucky, to say the least and life hasn't exactly been kind. Things weren't so bad in the beginning, but once he was diagnosed quirkless, well, it all went to shit. Everyone grew to hate him, even his best friend and own father.Was it really that impossible to become a hero without a quirk? It doesn't really matter because to Izuku, the term hero is flexible. He'll be his own hero because he's learnt from his own experience, people are selfish and the only one he can rely on is himself.Left alone to fend for himself in the world, Izuku goes out to change things on his own terms, despite his methods being slightly illegal. Keyword, slightly. It's only illegal if he gets caught, right?

Review: A long story with great arcs for a lot of League of Villains character, and a beautiful ending. Some pretty intense angst with happy endings for everyone.

Roses are red and they taste like shit by Unbreakable_Red_Riot

Summary: Katsuki was really fucking sick of the smell of flowers.

Review: Ah, yes, KiriBaku with hanhaki disease. Mostly from Bakugou’s point of view, so you get to see all his frustration and a ton of drama. Also looks into some other characters like Midoriya and Todoroki, which is a nice touch.

The Beauty of a Beast by starofgems

Summary: Once upon a time a lonely beast lived in a manor deep in the forest. He dreamed of the day his true love appeared to break his curse... When a beauty finally appears in his life, it is not quite as he imagined. For who could have thought a beauty would be more of a beast. Or The beauty and the beast AU nobody asked for but here it is.

Review: A very sweet love story. (KiriBaku)

The Deaf Hero: Deku by BeyondTheClouds777

Summary: His whole life, Izuku was told that he couldn’t do it. That he should give up while he still had the chance. That someone like him—Deaf, Quirkless—could never become a hero.But Izuku wasn’t going to give up. Not now and not ever. (OR, the one where nearly everything's the same, but Izuku is Deaf.)

Review: Right what it says on the tin. Deku’s added deafness creates more tension between Deku and Bakugou, his classmates, and even other heroes. Things get angsty but Deku always stays determined, which I love.

Miraculous Ladybug

Where Have All The Heroes Gone and Where Are All The Gods? by Anthemyst

NOTE: This is actually part 5 of a series, but I just started with this one and didn’t feel lost. Just know that in this story, Gabirel isn’t Hawkmoth. Most of this was written before Season 1 ended, I think.

Summary: On their fourteenth birthday, the Agreste triplets' world is turned upside down. Their government has been overthrown, their city taken, and superheroes all over Europe have suddenly and mysteriously vanished-including, to their shock, their parents. They'll need to work together, and become the heroes Paris needs, if they're going to save both their parents and their country.

Review: A next-gen fic that got me into ML fanfic in general! It’s got a fun dystopian vibe and the Agreste kids are all fleshed out very nicely. One of my absolute favorites!

Not A Bit by CaptainOzone

Summary: "Sometimes, being a brother is even better than being a superhero," says author Marc Brown. Félix Agreste has been both, and he can't have said it better himself. (AKA The Brothers AU I wanted to read but had to write myself when I realized this AU has a depressing lack of fic to its name)

Review: I’m always a fan of fic that has Marinette and Adrien AND Felix and Bridgette.

Legend of Zelda (Linked Universe)

Looking for Group by Tashilover

Summary: People want to be a Hero so badly, they're willing to bribe, lie, cheat, and beg. Twilight knows there's a Hero amongst the people in this college town. It's just a matter of finding them.

Review: The modern setting keeps things fresh, yet this story is still full of legends, danger, and a fight of good vs evil!

Mob Psycho 100

tomorrow isn’t always another day by suitablyskippy

NOTE: One shot

Summary: It’s like Reigen’s been waiting for the question. He stops dead on the pavement, grips Mob by the shoulders, and stares down into his eyes with an expression as haunted as though every ghost the pair of them has ever exorcised has taken up residence behind it. “Mob,” he says. “Mob,” he says again. “Tell me, Mob. Look at me and tell me. Tell me truthfully. Do I look cursed to you?”Mob looks at him, and tells him truthfully. “No.”“Well, you didn’t look very long,” says Reigen. “Let’s just stand here for a moment, like so, and you can have another look, a nice long look, and really think about it...” (There's nothing strange about being called back to exorcise the same haunted photocopier six days in a row. It must just be a very haunted photocopier.)

Review: THIS WHOLE CONEPT IS HILARIOUS

Genshin Impact

Traveler’s search for Scaramouche by Scuriel

NOTE: A choose your own adventure story!

Summary: Ei wants Traveler to search for Scaramouche and get back her gnosis. They have many decisions to make along the way.

Review: Don’t see something like this very often! There are actually a lot of different outcomes.

[rainbow-nerdss]

Fic Writing review 2023!

I was tagged by: @just-my-latest-hyperfixation @aidaronan @exhuastedpigeon @jamespearce9-1-1 @theotherbuckley @aspecbuddie @thewolvesof1998 @daffi-990 (And possibly others, i may have missed one or two, sorry if i did!)

I can't believe 2023 is over, honestly. This year has had some ups and downs for sure but overall I'm so proud of what I've achieved. I started the year mainly writing Stranger Things fics, and while I still love that fandom and all of the wonderful people I met there, my inspiration for writing it was beginning to fade.

And along came 9-1-1. I am so happy with where I've ended up, and for all the new friends I've made since I found this show back in April!

Here's an overview of my year in fic:

Words posted to ao3: 235,060

Words written: 250,465

Works posted: 38

Fandoms posted for: 3 (Stranger Things, 9-1-1, MCU/Captain America)

Specifics and tags are under the cut!

Longest fic:

Crawling on Back to You 109k words, 30 chapters Stranger Things, Steve/Eddie, Rated E

Shortest fic:

Keep on Walkin' and don't look back 521 words Stranger Things, Steve/Eddie, Rated T

Top 5 by kudos:

1. Right in front of your eyes

9-1-1, Buddie, 15k

He and Chris, and Buck. They work, they’re a unit. Why should it matter that he’s single? Buck is watching him, like he’s reading every thought on his face. “You’re already planning to lie about the date. Why don’t you just tell her you met someone yourself?” Eddie shrugs and tilts his head to the side, squinting in thought. “She won’t set me up on dates if she thinks I’ve got someone,” he muses. “But she’ll want to meet whoever it is.” “So... Introduce them?” Or: Buck offers to fake-date Eddie so Pepa will stop setting him up on dates.

2. Pinky Promise

9-1-1, Buddie, 1k

Christopher Diaz doesn't mind that his dad's dating someone new. He's not dumb, he knows there's someone. The way his dad has been smiling lately, the way Chris catches him staring at his coffee, daydreaming like he isn't a grown man. The sleepovers Chris is suddenly allowed to go to on almost a weekly basis. Chris is happy for him, really he is. He’s just not planning to let himself get attached to whoever it turns out to be, just in case. He doesn't need a step-parent, because he has Dad, and he has Buck, and that’s enough. Whoever his dad dates, well. They'll probably leave, eventually. Chris doesn’t need to worry about them. Or: Eddie and Buck come to Chris with some news, and he doesn't take it very well at all.

3. Peek-A-Boo

Stranger Things, Steddie, 1k

Eddie tried not to stare. He really tried. He didn't notice at first, too preoccupied with the tub of pringles he'd been making his way through while talking about Corroded Coffin's last gig. Sure, he'd noticed the shorts. The ridiculous amount of leg Steve was showing, the way they hugged his ass, but it wasn't until Steve moved, lifted one foot to rest on the cushion, knees spread, that Eddie noticed another feature of the shorts. Or: Steve puts on a bit of an accidental show.

4. Definition

9-1-1, Buddie, 2k

It keeps happening, time and time again. People get it wrong. Whatever people say, it feels wrong and they don't know how to set the record straight, until Chris takes it into his own hands. or: 5 times people get Buck's role in Chris's life wrong, and 1 time they set the record straight

5. take my hand (knot your fingers through mine)

9-1-1, Buddie, 4k, written with @pock-o-pea

At least Buck’s okay. He’s outside, safe, doing his job. Buck’s okay, which means no matter what happens inside this van, If the crushing weight of the fridge takes him before Buck can get to him, if the van pancakes or flips or any number of likely disasters occur, if Eddie dies in here, alone, and in pain, then… He thinks of Mallory, of Jo. How they’d called out for each other. His eyes shut briefly as Mallory’s words echo in his head. “She’s not my daughter. Jo’s mother was my best friend… she saved me so many times.” Or: what 6x18 could've been

2023 Events I've participated in: AUgust, Fandom Trumps Hate

Current works in progress:

The bodyguard fic (somebody to someone) -One chapter posted, 3 more written and (almost) ready to post!

Steve time travelling in the upside down (of moments and unmoments (of time lost)) -One posted, two more in the drafts 😁

The break-up fic (you were my town) - Two posted, the third almost ready to post

Season 7 fic: 10 chapters, currently being edited to post

and then a bunch of isolated oneshots I've yet to figure out an ending for: 5+1 times Eddie sees buck with kids that aren't his, friends with benefits, secret relationship, Teacher!Buck, Buckley siblings kiss of death, Buck in the stairs (just started this one last night!)

Goals for 2024:

I want to finish posting all of the WIPs which are already on ao3, post my s7 fic before March 14, keep working on all the WIPs I have in my docs and of course write more and keep sharing!

Most of all I want to keep participating in this wonderful fandom I've found on here, I have had *such* a good time over the past year in fandom 🥰🥰

No pressure tags (sorry if you've already done this and I missed it!)

@hellwrites @the-emdash @wildlife4life @disasterbuckdiaz @loserdiaz @jeeyuns @callmenewbie @911-on-abc @bittersweet-in-boston @kwills91 @trenchcoatsandtimetravel @spotsandsocks @devirnis @housewifebuck @lover-of-mine @gayhoediaz @mojowitchcraft @wikiangela @steadfastsaturnsrings @sunflowerdiaiz @cardamomsage @velvetjinx

Also tagging anyone else who might want to look back at the year and I've accidentally missed!

Rules: Feel free to show whatever stats you have. Only want to show Ao3 stats? Rock on. Want to include some quantitative info instead of stats? Please do this. Want to change how yours is presented? Absolutely do that. Would rather eat glass than do this? Please don’t eat glass but don’t feel like you have to do this either.

[thumperdaetime]

A Gentle Reminder:

if you feel like you're spinning your wheels, and stuck doom scrolling this week -due to the current political landscape. I highly recommend logging off for a bit and seeing if you have the stomach to call a loved one who has political veiws that clash with your own.

social media and news coverage is fantastic for getting info out to people who want to listen, but it is an ineffective tool for actually communicating with people you disagree with.

I'm not a people-scientist but every time i see "yelling at each other online doesn't actually help" and have the energy to look into What does actually help, experts always say that it's empathetic, long term relationships between people that disagree.

so if you have a bunch of nervous political energy and no clearly helpful place to put it right now:

go call your grandmother. talk about the weather, and the way you miss her cooking. give her a real living person to picture The next time a newscaster talks about the radical-left-mob. if you talk to her regularly consider asking what she thinks about the recent political thing. you're not there to debate or prove her wrong or even change her mind. just listen to someone you love confess their fears, and then share your own fears. you are probably actually on the same side when you get down to it. you both want a safe place to live and the people you love to be happy, (most people do) its just you dont agree about how to go about that.

text your little cousin a random meme, when they send back a thing about how voting is a scam, let it go. share a vine to find out if they know the deep lore. make plans to meet up and play whatever video game they're obsessed with right now. and if the vibe is right and its not going to become an argument, try talking a bit about why the whole not voting movement scares you. don't talk down to them, talk like your two friends who respect each other's opinion (Thats The whole goal actually) ask them why they think its a good strategy, collaborate on other activist things you can do together. included them in your politics instead of dismissing their points.

and its not easy, as wild as it is to think about having a deep but pleasant conversation with your worst Uncle. the fact remains that Your Problematic & Uncle is much more likely to speak up for gay rights. if you can get to a place where you enjoy each others company, and you feel safe talking to him about your struggles as a queer person. and to be fair, you are more likely to take into account the effects of a gun ban on the local wildlife balance, if you sit through your Problematic Uncle complaining about how local restrictions made deer season hard to do last year, and now the tic population is up and the food banks are empty.

divide and conquer is a long standing tactical strategy. and we have seen that fascist in particular like to divide people into a hierarchy of ""real people""" and an ""inhuman enemy"" . when we let their rhetoric turn our peers and neighbors into an inhuman enemy, we can loose sight of what we should actually be fighting for and against.

and if you spend all your time yelling at Doug Nobody who was taking an angry shit when you were typing out that essay, you take energy away from the real fight (the systems and actual active oppressors). the best way to stop that tactic is by standing together with people outside of the box you've been assigned (as much as ethically possible). and refusing to let the system make you perpetuate usless infighting.

When we let the political fandom (yes i mean the media made around politics and not actual political action) act as a wedge between us and people who could have been in our lives, we end up with weaker support groups and less per review for political ideas. it is easy to believe Q-anon if the only people you talk to believe in Q-anon. the same way it is easy to believe that Taylor Swift is a lesbian if everyone you talk to believes Taylor Swift is a lesbian. sometimes we need a person to stop and say "wait, can you run that idea by me again? it doesn't fit my perception of reality"

and Yes. it is probably unlikely at this point to convince someone who has voted one way their whole life to change their political views before November. but that doesn't mean we dont reach-out ever. there will still be politics in September and October, you will still need a diverse support group, and people you trust to bounce political ideas off of. and if you are as worried as i am about this upcoming election, it is very possible that having a community of people who are okay with working together despite political differences will be very helpful in the coming years. (and holding a meaningful, satisfying conversation with someone you disagree with on a fundamental issue is a huge skill to have if you want to take part in alot of activism, community building, or family gatherings)

a quick list of things Op is NOT Saying in this post:

it is your duty and responsibility to do this thing and you're a bad person for not doing it.

this is really easy and everyone should be able (and willing) to take on the emotional energy needed to do this for everyone they know who doesn't agree with them.

watching news or being on social media doesn't help anything.

this is the best way to help and there are no other things you should be doing with your time/energy.

the conversations will be pleasant and/or will always have a positive outcome.

any beliefs i listed together are some how morally equivalent.

you should compromise your beliefs for the sake of getting along with others.

the best answer is most likely centrist because both sides are extremists.

voting this one time will fix all of the things and you're evil if you are conflicted about it.

voting is the best way for a single individual to enact change in their country.

i love the president, and the candidates, and the voting system, and the two parties, and the electoral college, and the bombs, and the genocide and all the death and corruption and violence its all holding up and being held up by.

we should listen to "both sides" to get a fair and balanced picture of the issue

we should let nazis, and bigots, and fascist talk openly about their ideas openly as if its not hate speech calling for violence against marginalized people.

you Have to go reconnect with your abusers and toxic relationships from your past in the hopes you can convince them to vote correctly.

the current political thing that made me make this post is The Most Important Thing!!! that has ever happened in the whole world over all of written history, and we should all be talking about it for forever, otherwise you're helping the inhuman enemy!!!

things are already fucked so theirs no point in trying to get enough votes.

things will be fine and ok if nothing changes and we just keep on this projected path forward.

i know so much and am so smart and I've solved political discourse and if only everyone listened to me we would have world peace already.

Taylor Swift is a wlw

things I am saying. now. here. at the end of the post:

be kind. go look at the sky. i love you <3

[marengogo]

if said content was from someone whose account name was related to thinking my best friend and i were romantically involved, i'd check out the account before reposting (even if the content i was planning on reposting didn't have anything to do with said shipping thoughts)

i don't blame th, but i do wish he checked the account 😞

TW: mention of triggering words/actions such as “rape” but not the actual action.

Hi Anon,I hope you can forgive me for using your post to address a topic I've been meaning to discuss. The following has absolutely nothing like for real 💜🙏🏾 against you, but it kinda sets the perfect scenario, so imma take advantage it. BUT imma offer you a jikook hug in exchange, hope you can accept this for your very honest and not blaming frustration 🥹🫰🏾💜

So the topic is: SHIPPING.

Remember that chapter 2 blog which I promised, but NEVER delivered? 🤡🤡🤡 Yeah, so,shipping was going to be one of the many subsections of that blog, which to be honest with you, is sitting unfinished in my draft, and most likely will stay like that … BUT, luckily for me not sure for y’all 😬😬 today serves itself as a perfect day to actually give it an applicable context. Through today's familiar mayhem, I read a post which I think will give the perfect context to the topic of shipping. It is a post from @akookminsupporter, the following one:

I actually happen to agree with this 100%, because I do agree that we don’t want the people we stan to directly, or indirectly, endorse problematic situations, particularly those that are recognised as such universally. For example:

GENOCIDE a UNIVERSALLY KNOWN ISSUE and NOT DEBATABLE PROBLEM

RAPE a UNIVERSALLY KNOWN ISSUE and NOT DEBATABLE PROBLEM 

RACIAL SLURS a UNIVERSALLY KNOWN ISSUE and NOT DEBATABLE PROBLEM 

You get my point.

Now when it comes to shipping, it is WITHOUT A DOUBT one of the greatest plights within our fandom in particular, but in reality it is an issue in kpop and other music genres as a whole. Yet, the reality is that shipping is indeed a traditional tool REALLY HATE CALLING IT THAT BUT … that is almost always used as a means to a common and popular end. So the questions are: 

Do fans within the kpop fandom consider it an issue? Yes and No. 

Do people outside the kpop fandom consider it an issue? … Do they even know about it, or about it being a serious issue, within its perimeter?

Do the idols consider it an issue? … Yes? and No?

In its entirety, as all the questions don’t actually have a universally unanimous answer, SHIPPING in general, as of 17 January 2024, can’t be considered a universally known and agreeable issue. BUT, in the case of kpop, the situation is much worse. To begin with, we are unable to definitively agree on whether, or not, shipping is actually an issue to begin with, or not; be it the idol or the shipper. Nobody, in their right mind, is out there making jokes about, for example, genocide. If they are, they will righteously face big ass consequences by almost ANYONE who stumbles upon said comment/s. Shipping, on the other hand, the only people who would care, are the people within said field/environment. But, as I am a very integral part of this fandom, I know that, for us, it has become quite a nerve wracking issue, so let’s go a bit deeper.

Let’s go with the generally known concept within kpop that a debuting band is very likely to engage in fanservice and, consequently, form ships. The idols know, the fans know. Then, let’s give it 4 years? More or less many bands decided that “you know what? I don’t need to do this anymore” and as a consequence, some have tried to address this subject, and some just pretend to not know anymore. No matter the choice, the fact still remains that their related shippers were created, toxic or not, and 9 out of 10 cases; they ain’t going nowhere.

In the case of BTS, it is actually very funny because the only person who has allegedly tried to address this, is the one person who is constantly under fire for “feeding his shippers”. What is even funnier, to me at least, is that none of his 6 members actually came out to back him up, the day he challenged his viewers regarding shipping, at least not that I recall, if you know of any members that was actually supporting Tae, please let me know. So, if none of my bandmates seem to find it an imminent problem because let’s be honest, they had to deal with far bigger shit, apparently, and the company seems to not find it a panic-worth problem, apparently, then, if I were Tae, I’d be initially hella frustrated, but eventually I’d be like: FUCK IT. Which is the mentality I honestly think they all end up applying, in the kpop world.

So, what EXACTLY IS considered shipping? 

Repeatedly mentioning the name of a shipped/rival member? Posting pictures with a shipped/rival member? Touching a shipped/rival member? Spending time with shipped/rival member? Standing next to a shipped/rival member? Etc. Just so you know, If any, or all, of these qualify with shipping, then maknae line is UNIVERSALLY within our fandom FUCKED, and yes, only them, because, let’s be real, not many care about the shipping involving the hyung line, even though they do engage in the same type of behaviour … except for Yoongi, he is kinda in the middle, like some sort of collateral damage. 

So then what should we do? Should we completely ban shipping? Should shipping be banned maybe 4 years after the debut of all groups? Or should shipping have regulations, some kind of universal judge that presides and guides shipping behaviour? Should shipping fanfictions be abolished? Should unit names be restricted to the sole use of members? Should members cut out time in their life to make sure that they are aware of shipping and their consequences? Soooooo many questions, and probably tooooooo many answers, but the one fact still remains that MOST LIKELY these are all issues for those consuming the provided “shipping content” but not for those providing said “shipping content”, because for example:

And here I will be applying the parent/guardian/teacher/authority figure test, as in , for the next set of examples would any of the aforementioned figures be alarmed? Following are my test results  on whose problem it is, between the fandom and its idol.

A JM fan-dedicated birthday party, being crashed by rival shippers: Shippers problems. JM’s mail being stolen: Park Jimin problem, because tbh it could have been anyone, not necessarily a shipper.

JK having to look at a poster saying that he is in love with Tae at the airport: Shippers problems. JK having an actual stalker: Jeon Jungkook problem, because tbh it could have been anyone, not necessarily a shipper.

Tae posting a picture with an shipped/rival member: Shippers problems. Tae finding a girl in his private lift with a marriage certificate: Kim Taehuing problem, because tbh it could have been anyone, not necessarily a shipper.

And don’t get me wrong: name dragging, defaming, lying,character bashing, graphic obscenity, etc, they are all very painful issues to witness, and endure, but it always mainly occurs within the kpop environment. When articles write about perhaps a lazy member, when other fandoms drag our favs to pieces, in the end, when the global announcements are made, none of those descriptive, obscene qualities follow. Grammy nominated BTS, is just Grammy nominated BTS, not paving crew Grammy nominated BTS, or “worst fandom” fuck y’all possessing Grammy nominated BTS. ‘Namean?

Furthermore, the truth probably is that, at the level of BTS, the artist DOESN’T HAVE TO SEE ANY OF THAT BULLSHIT, which is why it ultimately ends up being an “US” issue. Even when toxic shippers reach higher entities, like the company, government offices etc, the second these entities see that it is about a ship, after I am hoping due diligence, they are dismissed, pronto. And so, reiterating, we are left with the bulk of it all 🤡🤡🤡.

So if, taking today as an example, Tae sees a post ABOUT HIMSELF not even his ship, just himself, by one of his shippers, we can assume that he has a pretty good idea about what might be on their page, which to be very honest, I won’t blame him for not wanting to check, but obviously, given all that we’ve been discussing, the idol themself is probably made to not have to think about it at all, as it is considered accepted, not acceptable, behaviour.  ALSO they would leave any related, and/or possible issues, to a designated team, which will assess if there is or not a real threat. Because historically, thus far at least, if there were any life-threatening hazards the company seems to take it VERY SERIOUSLY and any other threat is also dealt with accordingly. 

But what if, for example, by not checking the shipper’s page, Tae had allowed a human trafficking account to prolifer?! … let’s not 🧢:

TODAY, nobody was angry because of the fact that him not checking the page meant that he could have missed a potential infringement of human rights.

AND If they were a  human trafficking page, why is IG allowing them a platform and not quickly doing something about it?

In addition to the fact that, it is a real thing that, CURRENTLY, the accounts that are most likely to post about Tae aren't OT7s nor his biased fans (they may not be that fast or have the numbers) not even tae solos (for lack of numbers or different immediate priorities, such as streaming) but, you guessed it, taekook shippers. Hence, his algorithm will reflect accordingly. 

I mean, are we to tell JM to stop affectionately hug his members? Do we dare telling jk to stop liking shipping tiktoks or mention members' names? ….

All that just to say that @ejassy, in reality and effectively, by reposting said story, Tae wasn't actually endorsing shipping, because shipping in SK, differently from smoking or doing drugs, is generally not frowned upon. It is not an action or message that needs any kind of endorings, because within the kpop world, those who use it as a tool do not consider it a problem, hence, it is very openly accepted as a part of the culture they willingly, or not, help create. 

“But so-and-so gets dragged viciously, and disgustingly, everyday” I know. They probably know as well, but I’ve already discussed their responsible personnel. As for us, we know what to do, report report report! . I mean, I’m sure that they have a PR team that tells them about the good trends or good SM news, achievements, etc. “So what? .. we fans are stuck with toxic shippers and our favs not acknowledging or doing anything about it?” … 🤡🤡🤡

I don’t know.

We mostly all know about shipping culture’s systematic past, we know about its problematic present. In all honesty, it feels a bit like a lost battle but recently Kpop fans were able to make it known that, for example, for good reasons, they are against Starbucks. And it very effectively got to their idols, because said fans were united and in agreement. But within the shipping world, they all hate the other shipper and at the same time they kinda don't want to stop their own shipping, because they are really not against it, in fact, perhaps, they’d like some boundaries set, but who is to decide said boundaries? OR should shipping be considered a universal issue? … I think shipping has actually become an issue, particularly when regarding the queer community, BUT, what do I know, right? So, what's the solution ....

Y’all tell me.

Always respectfully yours,

Marengo.

PS - Once again, thank you Anon, now I'm off to bed 😴😴😴

[dollsome-does-tumblr]

I rediscovered my fandom predictions for 2023 from last year's fandom year in review post! Let's see how we did!

I currently have four story-still-in-progress ships over which I am simply suffering and feral: Ted/Rebecca, Ed/Stede, Guillermo/Nandor, and Roman/Gerri. I am going to predict here, boldly and in the interest of wishing my dreams into reality, that at least 3 of the 4 are gonna kiss onscreen next year. WHY NOT! 💋 Why not want good things for me, for us all??

I'd like to thank Ed and Stede for kissing enough to almost make up for none of my other ships kissing!!!!! (Sidenote: boooo, other ships!)

I predict that Phoebe Waller Bridge and/or Emerald Fennell will create a Killing Eve one-last-ride movie to fix the terrible ending and bring peace to the Villaneve enthusiasts of the world. (lol, WHY NOT)

Still waiting on this one. *taps watch* (But also, thank you for Saltburn, Emerald Fennell. Now give PWB a call and get to work on ya Killing Eve fix-it!)

I predict that if the Community movie comes out next year, I’m gonna be in a right effin’ state over Jeff and Annie. It’s gonna be a problem. It’s gonna get gnarly.

The Community movie did not come out, obvi, but I am currently in s5 of a rewatch and indeed in a right effin' state over Jeff and Annie, as I have been constantly on some level since November 12, 2009. I love them SO much it makes me feel like my heart lives outside my body!!!!!!! And it's held in Dan Harmon's very stress-inducing hands!!!!

I also predict, purely from the feral depths of my soul, that Bret and Jemaine will show up on OFMD. Manifesting it!!!

Season three, you know you need to exist, and this -- among other reasons -- is why.

[emotionalcadaver]

Part 13: Dance of Darkness

Fandom: Peaky Blinders

Pairing: Tommy Shelby x Grace Burgess x OC

Summary: Disaster leads to an explosive confrontation between Lucy and one of the Shelbys.

Word Count: 3,568

Notes: Warnings for depictions of slut shaming (sort of) and references to violence and sexual assault. Apologies to Polly fans in advance for this one.

Previous Chapter • Series • Fic • Next Chapter

Chapter 10: Ride or Die

“Where did Lucy get to?” May asked as they walked the rest of the way back to the house from visiting the horse, stepping into the entryway. “I thought that she would come meet us at the stables after she was finished with those calls.”

Lucy had been informed by the maids that there was a call for her or Tommy just before they were about to leave for the stables. She’d told them to go on ahead and that she’d catch up with them. But she’d never turned up.

“Probably yelling at someone on the other line. Sometimes it happens. Drink?” he asked.

“Why not?”

He went to the alcohol shelf to pour them both glasses while May sat down to remove her boots. 

“Madam, there is a telephone call,” one of the maids reported.

“I’ll take it in the drawing room,” May said, taking the glass Tommy offered her.

“It’s for Mr. Shelby,” the maid said. There was a boom as a door slammed, and then the clatter of shoes running along the floor, and Lucy appeared behind the maid, hair messy and eyes huge, face pale.

“Tommy. You need to come hear what’s happened. Now.”

∗ ∗ ∗ 

She had to jog to keep up with Tommy as he stormed towards the church.

“Shall I wait for you outside?” she asked. Campbell had ordered that he and Tommy have their meetings in private. He likely wouldn’t respond well to her presence when he had expressly forbid it.

“No,” Tommy said, already half up the stairs, though he paused until she climbed them to be back at his side. The look in his eyes told her enough. He wouldn’t be letting her out of his sight for a while. Not when his entire family was being targeted. 

“We had a deal,” he shouted as he entered the church, stalking to where Campbell was sitting the pews. When Campbell didn’t respond, his voice rose. “Hey! We had a fucking deal!”

“I would thank you to moderate your language in a place of worship,” Campbell said. Tommy seized the paper out of his hands and threw it to the ground, getting directly into his face.

“Fuck your house of worship,” Lucy said. Campbell glanced back at where she was standing.

“She isn’t supposed to be here.”

Tommy leaned closer. “We had a fucking deal.”

Tommy paced back and forth as he and Campbell argued. The smug, patronizing tone in Campbell’s voice was almost enough to make Lucy lunge forward and mash his head into the wooden pew in front of him. 

“So…let us review the new situation. I have your brother in a prison cell, charged with the murder of Billy Kitchen. The case against him is strong, and I have no doubt that his destiny is to hang. And then there is Polly’s son, Michael. He has already admitted to helping Arthur burn down the Marquis pub. Oh. He was a tough nut to crack, that boy, but crack he did. So, I have your brother facing the noose, I have your cousin facing five years for arson, and I have your entire organization in disarray in Birmingham and in London,” Campbell said, eyes shimmering with glee.

What a fucking disaster. 

Tommy was trying to bargain with him. Even though he had already agreed to do the killing. But Campbell just smiled, and shook his head. It had never been about trying to strong arm them into doing more for him. It was about showing Tommy that, even if he himself was not afraid to die, Campbell could have his entire family killed, should he fail to follow through. 

“I’ve been ahead of you every step of the way,” Campbell said. “And, as my father used to say…to make sure your dog obeys you, you have to show it the stick once in a while,” he raised his cane for emphasis. It clanged as he brought it back down to the floor, the sound turning rhythmic as he began to head towards the doors. 

Lucy watched as Tommy’s hands flexed into fists, waiting until the doors had slammed shut behind Campbell.

“We’ll see how much he likes that stick when I shove it up his arse,” Lucy mumbled, crossing her arms over her chest, shaking her hair out of her face. “What do you want to do?”

“We need to get to the office,” he began to walk towards the doors. Lucy rushed to remain at his side. “Now.” 

∗ ∗ ∗ 

When he came into the office, the phone on his desk was ringing.

“Tommy, Arthur’s in solitary confinement. Michael’s in the remand wing–” Lizzie started frantically.

“Yeah. I already know. Get out, shut the doors,” he stalked into his office with Lucy still right behind him. Lizzie stopped speaking and did as she was told, the double doors to his office closing with a click. The phone continued to ring, even as he sank into his seat. With a great amount of foreboding, Tommy lifted it from its cradle and held it to his ear.

“Tommy?” he swore that his heart stopped, everything going still. “It’s me,” her voice was the same low, soothing Irish lilt that he remembered, that haunted him in his dreams. “Tommy, can you hear me?”

“Yes, Grace.”

Lucy nearly dropped the gloves she’d been tugging off, half running around the desk. He tilted the phone so that she could also hear.

“I think you called. I…I haven’t slept,” she sucked in a deep breath. “Is Lucy there?”

“Yes, she’s right here.”

“Hi, Grace,” Lucy whispered into the phone when he turned it to her.

“Hi, Lucy,” Grace’s voice was soft and longing.

“Grace, this is not a good time,” it physically hurt him to say it. 

“I can call you back.”

“No, it’s fine. It’s all right,” the last thing he wanted was to stop hearing her voice.

“Can we meet?” Grace asked. Lucy looked at him with wide, hopeful, pleading eyes.

“Yes. We’ll meet.”

“When?”

He hesitated. “Grace, there are some things I have to do first.”

“That’s alright. That’s alright, just…whenever those things are done.”

“I’ll call you.”

“I’ll make sure that I’m the one who gets to the phone first, this time.”

“Good bye, Grace.”

“Bye, Tommy. Bye, Lucy.”

“Bye, Grace,” Lucy said, voice very quiet.

He took a deep breath, and hung up the phone. Lucy stared at it for a long moment, chin slightly trembling as she tried not to cry. 

“Come here,” he pulled her gently into the circle of his arms, squeezing her to him as tight as he could without having to worry about hurting her, tucking his face into her neck and breathing in the scent and comfort of her perfume. 

∗ ∗ ∗ 

When they entered the betting shop, John, Esme, Finn, and Polly were already gathered, waiting for them. 

John began to report to Tommy. It wasn’t good.

“They’ve taken Michael,” Finn said, desperately.

“Business first,” Tommy ordered. Polly leapt from her seat, physically shoving Lucy out of the way in her haste to get at Tommy. Lucy caught herself against the wall with a yelp, head whirling to stare at her in shock.

“They took Michael.”

Tommy held up a hand. “I said business first. And don’t push Lucy, Polly.”

Polly continued to try to talk, but Tommy shouted over her. 

“Polly, business first!” he barked. She went silent, glowering. Lucy moved so that she was on the other side of Tommy from her, putting him between them, just in case. A movement that wasn’t lost on Tommy, if the way that his eyes tracked her were any indication. He turned back to his brother. “John?” he said, encouraging him to continue with his report. All of their whiskey had been taken, vans impounded and warehouses locked. They’d lost the Eden Club back to Sabini. Alfie had framed Arthur for Billy Kitchen’s death, so their truce with the Black Country boys was over.  

“I don’t give a fuck about whiskey,” Polly interrupted. “I don’t give a fuck about Billy Kitchen. I want my son out of prison, now!” she slammed her hand on a desk.

“Thomas, I spoke to Johnny Dogs–” Esme began.

“This meeting should just be family!” Polly raged.

“I can help–” Esme tried.

“Let her talk!” Lucy said.

“It’s family only, she’s not blood, Tommy!” Polly practically screeched. 

“Let her speak,” Tommy ordered.

“Or is this a business–have you forgotten our family–” her eyes locked on Lucy, like she’d just realized that she was there, and her face turned bright red, all the hatred that she’d kept locked up towards her spilling out in one sudden, demented roar. “Get your soulless, disgusting, bitch of a slut out of here, now!”

Lucy recoiled like she’d been slapped, sinking into herself, her back hitting the wall behind her.

“Enough!” Tommy shouted. 

But Polly wasn’t done. “We all know that you just keep her around as a hole to shove your cock into–” 

“Enough!” Tommy roared, in a voice Lucy had never heard him use before. He sounded monstrous, terrifying in a way that wasn’t wholly human. Polly went silent, eyes widening, taking a step back, like she’d actually realized that she’d gone too far. Lucy stared at the floor, eyes blinking hard, feeling the rise of warmth in her cheeks from humiliation, unable to look at any of the other people in the room, though she could feel all of their eyes on her.

 “Enough, Polly,” his voice was lower, but the dangerous growl was still there. “Esme?” he turned back to her, voice more gentle.

“I spoke to Johnny Dogs. The Lees are kin.”

“The bloody Lees!” Polly shouted.

“They can give us men,” Esme argued.

“We don’t need more fucking men! It’s men that have done the damage. It’s…it…” Polly stammered. “It is men fighting like cockerels that have put us here in the first place.”

“Esme, we’ll take up their offer. We need men,” Tommy said. Polly looked at him with the most hateful expression Lucy had ever seen.

“If Michael ever gets out of prison, I am taking him away from this family. For good. This life is bad,” she stalked around the table and grabbed Finn by the arm. “This life is all bad.”

“Aunt Pol, what are you doing?” Finn asked.

“Shut up and walk,” she half shoved him toward the door.

“Polly,” Tommy called after her, his voice a low and dangerous growl. She hesitated. “If you ever speak about Lucy like that again, I’ll have you thrown out onto the streets.”

Polly’s face twisted, and for a moment Lucy thought that she might actually lunge at him, but instead she just spat on the ground near his feet, and shoved Finn the rest of the way out the door.

Tommy leaned against a table with a sigh, convening with Esme and John for a few more minutes, sinking into a chair. Esme sent John away to get the car, and then leaned against the other side of the table from Tommy, face close. She began to mumble to him, about riding away. About getting lost.

Tommy moved slowly, leaning forward to tell her in a quiet voice to go with John. Then he reached out, and grabbed her by the face with one large hand, holding so tightly her cheeks squished. “If you ever talk about getting lost again, I’ll cut you from this family,” the threat was spoken in a soft whisper, and then he let her face go. Esme looked around, at the empty room, save for Lucy still leaned up against the wall watching them.

“What family?”

And then she walked out the door. 

Lucy let her head fall back to thump against the wall, staring tearily up at the ceiling, swallowing hard. Polly’s furious outbursts regarding her presence really shouldn’t have bothered her, by now. She ought to be used to them at this point.

She had always figured that Polly knew about her and Tommy, at least in some fashion. Polly was observant. And she wasn’t stupid. Of course, she knew that the other family members all probably also had their suspicions, but…she had never expected Polly to just out them like that. Certainly not in such a horribly demeaning and humiliating way.

“Lucy,” Tommy cleared his throat, voice surprisingly close. She coughed, once, and opened eyes she hadn’t even realized that she’d closed. He was standing right in front of her. Tucking a curl behind her ear, she tried–and horribly failed–to give him a shaky smile. “Come here.”

He pulled her into his arms, hand cradling the back of her head, pressing it to his chest. She locked her arms around his ribs, leaning into him heavily as he began to carefully stroke her hair, the other arm wrapped around her, anchoring her to him.

“Sorry,” she whispered, sniffling. He shook his head, cheek resting against the top of her head. He smelled of smoke and whiskey and his cologne, his body impossibly warm as she cuddled closer into him. He kissed her forehead, and she relaxed.

“Don’t listen to a word she fucking says,” he said, sternly. “Eh?”

She nodded, movements still shaky, against him. 

“And Lucy…hey,” he pulled back, tilting her chin up to look into his eyes. “It’s not true. None of it. I love you,” he kissed her between her brows. “You’re perfect.”

Sniffing, she nodded, squeezing him back to her with her cheek squished against his chest. “I love you too,” she sighed. “They all officially know, now.”

“Yeah. It’ll be alright,” he assured. He pulled back just enough to kiss her, making it slow and deep, hand cradling the back of her head while the other kept her close. When they broke apart, he rested his forehead against hers. “Listen, I’m going to go call Grace. I’m going to set up a time and place for us to meet her, yeah?”

She sniffed, nodding, knowing that he was trying to distract her with the idea of something hopeful and exciting. “Yeah.”

He smiled gently, kissing her again before letting her settle back against his chest. 

He let her hold onto him for as long as she needed, stroking her hair and pressing kisses to her head the entire time.

∗ ∗ ∗ 

She put down the phone, after listening silently to what Ada had just told her, resting her fingers against her lips, tapping them once, then buried her face in her hands, feeling as the muscles in her cheeks contracted, leaving her to shudder.

Even after all this time, the alleyway remained.

Not just the alleyway, narrow and terrible, as the men grinned gleefully down at her, but the hole. The hole that came after. Once she’d regained consciousness after she inevitably passed out. Probably from a combination of blood loss, pain, and shock.

It had been so dark, so cold…the soil dug deep under her fingernails when she clawed at it, lungs heaving for breath, frantic as she fought her way up, out from under the ground and back to the surface.

Back to life.

Raising her head up, away from the darkness of her palms, she breathed deeply, forcing down the memories of her own trauma that the report of the new one had drawn forth. 

Poor Polly. Much as she and Polly may have hated each other, she never would have wished that upon her.

She was going to have to tell Tommy. That was why Ada had phoned her, after all. Probably because she knew that Lucy was the only one of them who would be able to have a chance at preventing Tommy from marching to Campbell’s lodgings and slaughtering the man then and there. 

She made a second call, to a man that they had inside the prison, asking him a few pointed, careful questions, listening silently and unmoving to the responses, then hung up the phone.

Standing, she went to double doors to Tommy’s office, stepping out into the space that Lizzie occupied, where Tommy was giving her instructions for the next couple of days.

“Tommy,” she said, quietly. He looked up, saw the look on her face, and immediately hastened towards her. “We need to talk,” she half whispered, and he nodded, going into the office. 

“Everything alright?” Lizzie asked, eyeing her curiously from her desk.

“Mhm. Everything’s fine, Lizzie, thank you,” Lucy went back into Tommy’s office, closing the door behind her. “Tommy,” she said, very quietly. He looked up from his desk.

“Yes?”

She sat down, the leather in the seat beneath her squeaking in complaint as she eased her weight into it. Reaching across the desk, she took his hands in hers. “I need you to listen to what I have to tell you, and I need you to promise me not to go flying off the handle.”

“What’s happened?”

“Tommy, promise me,” he never broke his promises to her. Not ever. He sighed, icy eyes narrowed.

“Fine. I promise. Now what’s wrong?”

“Ada called. She said that Polly…Polly went to the prison, to…I guess to try to get Michael out. She didn’t trust us to get it done, probably. Anyway, she went in, she saw Campbell, and,” Lucy gulped around the words. “Something happened. I talked with one of our men inside. He says that Polly made a trade of sorts, for Michael’s release. He’s been released, by the way. Ada says that night, after Polly went to the prison, she found her in the bath back at the house, drunk out of her mind, scrubbing harshly at her skin.”

As she’d spoken, Tommy’s face had gradually drained of all color, until he was so white Lucy was afraid that he would pass out. At that particular final detail, a muscle in his cheek twitched. It was a habit that Lucy had also developed, that still she sometimes found herself doing; scrubbing at her skin until it was red and raw. As if she could somehow scrub away the memory of their hands on her. 

“Tommy?” she asked, hoarsely, unsure of what he was going to do. “Tommy?”

He wiped a hand over his face, grunting, brows pinching as if in pain.

“I know you would like to kill him,” she said. “I would like to kill him too,” she looked into those eyes, blue and whirling and furious. Though she knew not at her. “But I think that doing so now would do more harm than good.”

Tommy’s jaw twitched, lips pursing. And then, without a word, he rose up out of his seat, walked around the desk, and picked up his coat and hat.

“Tommy? Tommy!” Lucy jumped up, half running after him, barely having enough time to snag her own coat and hat from the hooks they were hanging on before following him out the door, and down the street. But he wasn’t headed in the direction of Campbell’s lodgings. “Tommy, where are you going?” 

She grew quiet, as Charlie’s yard came into view, allowing the silence to just settle around them. Tommy pushed open the door to the stables, going to his black stallion, running a hand along his muscular flank, eyes tortured.

“Hullo, Sin,” Lucy said to her chestnut mare, stroking her nose, feeding her a few sugar cubes from her palm. “Good girl,” she pressed a kiss to the horse’s nose, closing her tired eyes and resting her forehead against her. When she opened her eyes, Tommy was no longer there. “Tommy?”

She found him with Curly, having shed his coat and hat, helping to shovel shit with sharp, quick movements. Curly was staring at him in bafflement.

“Why are you doing that, Tommy?”

“To remind myself of what I’d be if I wasn’t who I am.”

Leaning against the entrance to the shed, Lucy watched with a flutter of pride in her chest. He’d never allowed himself to forget where he had come from; the kinds of troubles which he’d used to suffer. That many more still suffered each and every day.

Curly began to help Tommy shovel, grinning to himself, clearly taking joy out of Tommy’s sudden decision to assist him. Lucy continued to just watch them work, eyeing the way that the muscles flexed in Tommy’s arms and back, his face creased with concentration.

Charlie came over to stand beside her, took one look at Tommy still shoveling and Curly beaming, and removed his cigarette from his mouth. “Tommy? What’s going on?”

“I think Tommy’s lost his mind, Charlie,” Curly said, ecstatic. Tommy ceased his movements, clearing his throat.

“Well, it’s honest work, Curly, but I don’t want to get used to it,” he stooped to scoop back up his hat and jacket. “So I’ll need six cans of petrol. Bring them to the garage, put them in the back of the car.”

“Six cans?” Charlie asked. Tommy just nodded, heading to the door, taking Lucy’s arm as he walked by, guiding her with him. “Tommy? If you ever want a job, I’ll get you your own shovel,” he shouted after them.

“Did shoveling shit make you feel better?” Lucy asked. Tommy washed a hand down his face, groaning.

“Not really.”

She rubbed at his arm. Then he looked at her, something almost like excitement entering his eyes.

“But I know of something that will.”

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[daisymakesstuff]

Prologue

| Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 |

Fandom: The Wayhaven Chronicles

Relationships: Morgan x Female Detective (Neveah Desanto)

Rating: Chapter is T (for violence, surprisingly); Series is M but might get bumped up to E.

Chapter Word Count: 1,600

Description: A devastating tragedy leaves detective Neveah Desanto as the best caretaker for an orphaned infant, putting Unit Bravo in an interesting situation and a strain on her and Morgan's relationship.

Read on AO3

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

Morgan sparks up her cigarette, glad to find her lighter still works after so long without use. The gravel of the warehouse roof shifts underneath her as she looks over the edge. There’s a moving truck parked out front and Agency employees are bringing furniture into the warehouse with their usual efficiency.

She recognizes the crib when she sees it, and a rocking chair, but she has no idea what most of it is. Do babies really need this much stuff?  Probably not. Nat was helping.  

 In hindsight, she should’ve known something like this would be coming one day. Maybe not a baby specifically, but the first known magical beast from the Echo World? A stray werewolf? Those are absolutely the kind of things her girlfriend would bring home. Neveah is a bleeding heart, and she’s always taking care of everyone.  There was a mission a few years back that should’ve been a dead giveaway…if Morgan had looked past her own interests when it happened. That’s never really been her strong suit, though.  

Deep in the Forest Outside of Wayhaven, Several Years Ago

With Ava and Farah having already downed the Trappers patrolling this area, Neveah and Morgan are hopeful they’ll be able to locate the supernatural they kidnapped. Nat, who stayed behind to look over the area maps, determined this was the most likely location given the routes the patrols followed. 

A sudden, shrill sound grates on Morgan’s ears. Grimacing, Morgan activates her radio to communicate with the team. “The target is northeast a few hundred feet…sounds like it might be a cave of some sort. It’s too loud to get a read on how many Trappers there are, though.”  

“Understood. I’m reviewing the area maps now. I’ll let you know when I’ve found a good entry point,” Nat’s voice comes over the radio. “Farah and I will circle back to act as additional support. Stand by until we arrive,” Ava orders. 

Neveah stops, frowning when she cannot sense whatever Morgan has.  “Wait, how do you know that?” She asks. 

“Because the baby crying is making my ears bleed,” Morgan gripes. The youngest Neveah had ever seen the Trappers take were usually 12 or 13, and she had made the mistake of assuming that is what they would find here. 

“A baby ?” Neveah’s whole demeanor shifts, a sudden determination taking over her face. She takes off, moving with impressive speed for a human, especially when she is in a dress and navigating a heavily-forested area. 

“Neveah!” Morgan barks, but it’s too late. There is no talking her down when she’s like this. Morgan lets out a long-suffering groan and follows close behind her. 

“I know the cave you’re talking about!” Neveah calls back. 

“That’s not what I’m worried about, sweetheart,” Morgan drawls. She runs a hand through her dark waves, as though that might soothe the twinge in her chest that happens every time Neveah throws herself head-first into danger. “We’re approaching the location now,” Morgan mutters reluctantly into the radio. 

“I told you to stand by, Neveah,” Ava scolds over the radio. She doesn’t need to be told to know whose plan this is. “There are supernaturals who rely on voice mimicry to lure their prey. This could be a trap.”

“You sent me because I’d probably be immune.” Neveah reminds her,  breathing heavily as she continues to make her way through the trees. 

“The ability could be physical—” 

“And what if it's not? What if they’re actually in there?” Neveah cuts Ava off. There is no snark to her question, just the deep genuine worry that can play just about anyone or anything’s heartstrings like a fiddle. 

Ava never answers, and Neveah falls quiet as she approaches the entrance to the cave. Neveah can finally hear the baby’s cries, their screaming echoes through the cave, faintly filtering out into the surrounding wilderness. 

“Will you shut it up already!?” snaps a Trapper from inside. 

“What does it look like I’m trying to do!?” A more feminine voice shouts back. They are both barely audible over the baby screaming. Morgan doesn’t think a creature with such small lungs should be able to make such a loud sustained noise.

 It does provide a good distraction though, allowing Neveah and Morgan to peer in and get an idea of the situation. The cave looks to go much deeper and become a much tighter squeeze, but the cavern the Trappers are in is open and fairly flat. 

There are four of them in total. One is off to the left digging through his backpack. Two are to the right, and one paces roughly in the center of the cavern bouncing the baby with an irritated scowl on her face. The kid is probably some sort of fae from the magic surrounding it. The aura isn’t particularly strong, but it’s way more than Morgan would expect from a kid so small.

Neveah nods toward the trapper to the left. She then looks at Morgan and tilts her head toward the two on the right. Morgan nods back to show she understands the assignment, and Neveah charges into the cave. At first, the fight is going well. There is a scream from one of the Trappers as Neveah no doubt gets the upper hand on him. Someone’s Volt clatters to the ground behind her, but there’s no scream or thump of a body hitting the ground. 

Morgan is almost caught by the prongs on the Trapper’s Volt, but manages to dodge just in time, using the opportunity to counterattack. The woman goes down with a groan. Usually, the hardest part of combat with Trappers is not being allowed to kill them, but she’s distracted right now. 

“Okay! Okay,” Neveah pleads, her voice tense with urgency and panic. Morgan stabs the Volt into her final trapper’s side absent-mindedly, all of her attention drawn to the scene behind her. “I’ll come with you. Just…please don’t hurt the baby.” 

The final Trapper has the baby in one arm and is holding their modified Volt to Neveah’s back with the other. Neveah raises her hands immediately in surrender, her Volt clattering to the ground. It rolls a few feet away from her…and closer to Morgan. Morgan growls at the Trapper, drawing her attention. 

“Stop right there, vampire! Come any closer and I’ll kill it!” Morgan hesitates, and it's not quite as fake as she wants it to be. This may be a ploy, but she knows Neveah really would sacrifice herself for someone else in a heartbeat, which means Morgan has to make sure it doesn’t actually come to that. 

Neveah chooses that moment to act, biting down as hard as she can on the arm the Trapper is using to hold the baby. It works as intended, the pain startling her into loosening her grip so Neveah can take the baby away from her. Holding the infant tightly to her chest, Neveah throws herself backward to get away from the blue sparking end of the Volt the Trapper tries to lash out at her with, making sure to land on her back so she takes the brunt of the impact and all of the scrapes. 

Not exactly graceful, but it gives Morgan the space she needs to pick up Neveah’s prod and jam it into the Trapper’s ribs. Morgan finds herself turning around before her enemy even hits the floor again, needing to make sure the detective is alright.

For just a moment, Morgan gets to drink in the sight of Neveah with her mouth coated in blood and a sharp feral look in her eyes. That image is going to keep Morgan warm for the next few days. 

It fades quickly back into her usual soft, worried expression as she has the chance to regain her bearings from the fall. Neveah shifts her grip to support the infant with one arm so she can use the other to push herself up off the ground. She’s bleeding from a variety of cuts and scrapes, dress and cardigan ruined from the fall. Despite that, all of her attention is directed to the baby, who is entirely unharmed but still crying. 

“Shh,” Neveah speaks softly to the infant, bouncing gently and patting its back to try and soothe it. “It’s alright now. We’re going to get you home to your parents.”

Morgan has to shut her eyes and hold her breath for a moment. The adrenaline fading, the kid’s screaming, the scent of Neveah’s blood, and the intense, confusing feelings the situation has inspired are all way too much in combination. She forces herself to concentrate on the sound of Neveah’s gentle cooing, ignoring everything else. The pain fades away almost instantly. 

“Are you alright, sweetheart?” Morgan crosses to Neveah in a couple of quick strides, her hand gently grabbing Neveah’s jaw to draw her attention away. Warm brown eyes lock onto her almost immediately, and Morgan uses the opportunity to inspect her closely, looking for any distress Neveah might try to hide from her. 

“I’m okay,” Neveah smiles reassuringly, “just scrapes and bruises.” Morgan is pleased to find it’s genuine and lets her go with a nod. 

The baby’s screaming gradually peters out to hiccuping gasps, resting its head on Neveah’s shoulder and grabbing little fistfuls of her cardigan to soothe itself. The detective continues to rub the baby’s back with gentle motions, looking down at it with open care and affection. 

As they trudge back toward the rendezvous point, Morgan is just grateful that she’s not the one having to handle the baby. 

[lycorogue]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Originally started by @izanae. **EDIT: Seems izanae was also tagged by someone, but didn't state who. So I'm not sure who truly originated this questionnaire... Thanks for the tag @tree-reads

The "original" Fic Writers Ask thread (that izanae started) was getting lengthy (by nature of the game), and I was about to double its size (by nature of my writing style). But please go and check that thread out to see how other wriblrs answered. You might find a new favorite that way!

Alright, let's get to it.

1. How many works do you have on ao3?

49 (really? It feels like I have so many more...) You can also find me over on FFN and DA still, and I do post my stories here too... just... FYI.

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

357,107* *I feel like I should clarify that the 49 stories and 357k words is since I started publishing fanfic in 2010. I feel like this doesn't seem all that impressive now... (also... holy hecken! I've been publishing fanfic for 13 years!?)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Mostly Miraculous Ladybug (31), but I originated in the "Hey, Arnold!" fandom (7*). I've also written for Fruits Basket (4). I have a couple of D&D fanfics - 1 each for 2 of my D&D characters, and I have written one story each for the following fandoms: - Left 4 Dead/Jonathan Coulton's song "Re: Your Brains" - Graceling Realm series by Kristin Cashore (specifically, the novel Bitterblue) [Rated: Explicit] - Ender Series by Orson Scott Card (specifically, the novel Speaker for the Dead) - Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (the LoZ franchise is one of my main fandoms... I'm shocked I haven't written more for it...) [Told in 1st person] - An all-OCs fic set in the X-Men: Evolution universe *I have more HA fics over on FFN that I didn't port over because they aren't completed works.

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Woven Heartstrings Summary: Chat Noir needs a Christmas gift for Ladybug. Marinette is a very crafty and creative person, so Chat Noir asks her for some help in making a gift for his lady. While hesitant in aiding Chat Noir's attempts to woo her superhero self, Marinette reluctantly agrees. Although, after a week of working side-by-side with Marinette, Chat Noir's not so sure he wants to gift the scarf he's making to Ladybug after all. Could Your Paradise Also Be Your Hell? Summary: Marinette is not coping very well when she's magically transported into her older-self's body, and discovers she's now married to Adrien Agreste. [Unofficial companion piece to Remember That Time When... by @mostlovedgirl-writes ] Peeping Tomcat Summary: Something called to Adrien, and before he knew it, he was addicted to sitting outside Marinette's window as Chat Noir; just watching her. His voyeuristic habit needs to stop, but things have gotten far too complicated now that he realizes he's growing a crush on her. [Story told in 1st person; non-sexual voyeurism] I Was Thinking of You Summary: Girls' Day derails when Marinette realizes the male lead of a romance movie reminds her of someone other than Adrien. [Lukanette story] Is it True? Summary: Marinette instantly regrets confessing her feelings for Adrien. He decides it might be time for a confession of his own.

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

Always. I may run out of spoons and miss a comment for a little while, but I make a point of going back and still replying eventually. Even if it's months later. EDIT: I neglected to copy/paste the whole question originally. So, here's the answer to the why/why not question. I make sure to respond to all comments because people put in the effort to read my story and then tell me how they felt about it. I NEED to send the love right back to them. I need them to know that their words matter and warmed my heart. (That said, even if you don't leave a review, I do love you, Reader)

6. What’s the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Despite my friends teasing that I'm "the queen of angst", I actually don't have too many stories that don't end on a hopeful note. So, if we're going "pure angst ending" I only have two: Unsent Letter for the Fruits Basket fandom and True Husband for Speaker for the Dead (Enderverse). Both are shorter stories of people believing they are unworthy of love, pity those who do love them, and believe they have sinned and are deserving of being miserable. If you want to stick within the Miraculous fandom, I'd say I'm Not Allowed to Love You [contains s4 finale spoilers]. That was angsty enough that I had to end on a hopeful note via an epilogue that I added to the closing author's notes.

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

Oh goodness! As mentioned, I try to end just about all of my stories on a high note. I was able to narrow the 49 stories down to 8 with a fluffy, happy ending. Out of those 8? I think Woven Heartstrings has the most optimistic, love-filled ending? Everybody is just showing their love and appreciation for everyone else (even Adrien and Gabriel... written pre-Chat Blanc, I believe???). It's just a lovefest story. Runners Up categories: - Favorite LoveSquare Fluff winner: I Just Wanted to Kiss You - Happiest Lukanette content winner: I Was Thinking of You - Happiest Family Unit winner: Build Your Own Luck - Happiest Platonic Love winner*: The Truest of Friends *excluding Woven Heartstrings - Happiest "I'm probably going to rework this as original fiction" winner: I Don't Care [a Gabriemilie story written before s5 lore drops]

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I have been so so SO lucky that I have not. My heart goes out to you writers who do. :'(

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

I have written smut 3x (working on a 4th). I published 1. I am cishet, so I am vanilla and write cishet. Smut is also a rare genre of writing for me to venture into. So rare that my current "smut" story is more "plot with eventual porn" than it is "porn with(out) plot". The sex is a significant character development moment in 3 out of the 4 stories I wrote. The 4th was more of a character study for a pair of OCs. No shade on the "porn without plot" folks. Those stories are so fun and indulgent and I appreciate them so much. My brain just won't let me pare down to that style no matter how much I try. It's like "Nope. Must have character growth. Throw emotions into this mess!"

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one?

I think I've only attempted to write a crossover once... and it was not a very successful result. It was Arnold Shortman and Helga Pataki from "Hey, Arnold!" in the world of Familiar of Zero. Helga was Louise and Arnold was her familiar Saito.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Uh... I don't think so???

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Not to my knowledge (although I'd be down if someone wanted to translate any of my works). That said, Woven Heartstrings does have the only non-English review I've received (it's in French). So.... maybe someone translated it into French without letting me know??? I just assumed the reader knew enough English to understand what I wrote or otherwise used a translating service....

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

Three different times. One was partially published. Prior to the Hey Arnold Jungle Movie officially being made, @chibisunnie and I attempted to write up a fanscript (is that how we met? I can't recall....). My friend Ronoxym and I have also attempted to write two different X-Men OC stories centered around his OC Devon. Although, in both cases, it was more he wrote the story and then I kind of unintentionally hijacked it???? The incomplete co-written fic that I actually attempted to publish* was one of the two I wrote with Rono: Please, Let Me Explain. *not published on AO3; on FFN and DA only

14. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

That I've written for? Love Square. Specifically anything where Marinette is herself instead of Ladybug: MariChat or Adrienette. They just remind me so much of myself and my husband. Fave in general? My OTP of OTPs is probably Gambit and Rogue from X-Men. I tend to refer to my husband as Gambit to my Rogue. (Are you sensing a theme as per my relationship vs my shipping tendencies?)

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

My poor unintentionally abandoned "Hey, Arnold!" epic What is Truly Meant to Be. It is on FFN and DA only.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I am frequently told that I keep the characters and world so in-character/canon-accurate that my stories read like "lost episodes" of a show. I'm also fairly good at dialogue and conveying emotions.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

- Naming things. Titles. Naming a McGuffin. Coming up with superhero/villain names. etc. - Anything with a LOT of action in it. Be that fight scenes, chase scenes, or sex scenes. I'm someone who can picture things in my head as clear as if I were watching a movie, and I try to convey what I'm seeing to the reader as if I were writing visual media such as a show/movie or comic. This usually leads me to micromanage the movement of the characters and the action ends up feeling clunky and repetitive. - Allowing the characters to get physically hurt in a way that professional medical treatment is needed. Broken limb? Stab wound? Concussion? Injured eye? Poisoned? Nope. Can't do it. Mental block tells me "no". - Write short, sweet, concise stories/drabbles/ficlets (can't you tell?)

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

Huh. With the exception of proper nouns (such as Chat Noir), I'm not sure if I've used non-English words that aren't just borrowed words within English or words most English speakers would know anyway (such as enchanté, cómo estás, or dōmo arigatō). I know I italicize thoughts, so I don't know if I'd italicize a non-English word to signal that it's a foreign word??? I'd assume the readers would know that already. I think, if I were to ever use a foreign word within dialogue it would have to depend on the circumstance. If the foreign word or phrase is important for the POV character to learn, I may include it along with a translation. Otherwise, I may just state that the characters are speaking in this other language and then write it in English so my readers have a better chance at understanding what is being said. Also, I am far from multilingual, so that would help me avoid translation errors.

19. What’s the first fandom you wrote for?

Technically, I think it would be X-Men???? I think I came up with X-Men OCs and storylines for those OCs back when I was in, like, 5th grade????? Then I did some Batman fanfics in middle and early high school. Mostly solo roleplay/dressup in my basement because I was that nerd still playing pretend by myself when I was 16. First fandom I published a fic for? If you don't count play-by-post RPGs*, then my first published-online fanfic fandom was "Hey, Arnold!" *the play-by-post game was for Batman.

20. Favorite fic you’ve ever written?

YOU'RE ASKING ME TO PICK MY FAVORITE CHILD!? Unlike parenthood, I GUESS I could put effort into actually answering this.... I've got it narrowed down to 4. These are the 4 I have probably reread the most. Two of them are the stories I wrote as kind of fanfics of @mostlovedgirl-writes 's fanfics. Take what you want from that, but, basically, I guess I love living in the worlds MLG creates??? The other two finalists are my personal headcanons for Miraculous Ladybug. Headcanon stories: Build Your Own Luck - cute little Dupain-Cheng family bonding story about the origins of the lucky charm bracelet that Marinette gave to Adrien. Forever in Darkness - What Plagg's life was like with his previous holders, and why he thinks Adrien is the best one he's had. Inspired by MLG: Could Your Paradise Also Be Your Hell? - How Marinette spent the night before heading off to NYC. Unofficial companion story for Remember That Time When... Rolling Thunder - Adult Marinette and Adrien stumbling their way into a romantic relationship, finally! Based off of Finding Yourself in the Details Honorable Mention to my longest story and first completed chaptered story: Peeping Tomcat

Phew! That... was a LOT! Thanks for sticking around until the end! It was fun going back through my portfolio.

All that wish to answer this, consider yourself tagged!

Official no-pressure tags for: @mostlovedgirl-writes, @captaintoomanybattles, @thetauruspixie, @livrever, and @cyhyr

[totalleeawesome]

Develop Blog: Market Yourself, Not Just Your Game

How many of you love marketing? I'm near-sighted, but I'm sure I wouldn't see many hands raised. From my experience trying and failing to get my game known, I've asked endless questions, perused multiple marketing discords, and even got a question answered by Chris Z. himself. Yet I can never shake this anxiety I feel whenever I make a twitter post. I have no blue check mark so I already know that me going viral is unlikely. I've accepted that my my page will take years to bear followers. But sticking to it isn't a matter of discipline, it's a matter of overcoming my fears of rejection.

Unfortunately, I made the mistake of making my first game the magnum opus. I don't have experience releasing anything outside of jam projects, nor do I know what it's like to get review-bombed on Steam. I have never learned how to deal with fans telling me how to write, I've never encountered trolls telling me to off myself, all I've encountered is a lack of notifications after a post went live. Part of me is grateful that I get minimal feedback. It means that I don't need to worry about growing a fandom that rivals the toxicity of Undertale. I don't need to worry about disappointing people because I skipped out on my blog this weekend. It's as if a lack of progress rewards me more than progress. Or more likely, it's my anxiety keeping me locked in a gilded birdcage.

How many of you look forward to posting on Reddit, making a tiktok video, or updating your discord? Tell me your secrets, because I'd much rather be writing my game's script than researching strategies on TikTok. Dopamine is one hell of a drug, and I get more of it by writing than appeasing consumers. I know a lot of people that'd prefer to pass it off to a PR agent and let them play with it. After all, they're the ones reading the bad reviews. Now if only most of them didn't cost an arm and a leg for us indies.

Sadly I don't have the silver bullet to get me or you all out of this rut. As much as marketing is research oriented, it's mostly doing. I call it a progressive craft, where you'll get better at it the more you throw yourself to the mercy of Reddit mods. Not only that, the best marketers will share their content to the point where it might annoy people. Think about all of those Youtube ads. I can recall Shick Hydra, the Lending Club, Old Spice, and all those brands marketed by corny actors four years ago. We all know what Genshin Impact is due to its pension for shoving anime girls in our faces. Chris Z. himself will tell you that the more you talk about your product, the more people will learn about it. Love it or hate it, it'll improve your odds of having someone visit your steam page. It sounds manipulative and underhanded, and that's because it is. Why do you think so many communities lose their minds at the slightest hint of self-promotion? Because everyone has a product to exhibit.

But how the hell could you, let alone myself, go through with doing something so corporate? Do we have to become those guys who get routinely banned by mods? Of course not, and I wouldn't advocate for you spamming your brand. Marketing isn't just promoting your brand, it's also about promoting YOU! Something interesting about being a respected member of a community is that you can get away with self-promotion a lot more than someone who isn't. It's almost as if people have come to like you, so they check out your page and wish list your game. And the craziest part about this is that you don't need a rigid schedule to market yourself unlike your game. You can be like me when I go into a Visual Novel discord, gush about my favorite waifu for ten minutes, then bounce. This helps me stay motivated with playing visual novels, and the mods see me as active so they're more likely to allow me to self-promote. Of course this is based on social media with forum mods and communities, but being active on Twitter, Tiktok, and Itch goes a long way as well. Because when you comment on someone's video, that person might be tempted to look at your profile out of appreciation. And if your steam page is listed in the bio, they just got hit with a call to action. People, especially newer profiles, adore any form of feedback. I'd know, I do a happy dance every time I get a comment on my post. Yes you read right, a sincere comment on a tiktok video indirectly markets your game. Your character can be just as profound as a flashy trailer. So is marketing still as scary?

Dale Carnegie, author of How To Win Friends And Influence People, refers to this as marketing for other people. Mods want an active community, so being an active member might make them more interested in working with you. Indie developers love feedback, so giving them what they want might encourage them to reciprocate what you want. One example from my past experiences is when I offered to be a beta tester for one of my colleagues. I had been following her for seven years. We were the same, both new developers struggling to make their big debut. So I played her demos, interacted on her twitter posts, and gave honest and constructive feedback from my beta tests. Was I working in the mindset of what I want? I'd be lying if I said no, but my priority was to help this indie developer release her first game. Later on, I ran into a conundrum where I needed to commission someone to help with capsule art for my steam page. Now pause and take a guess at what this developer told me when I asked her for some tips. If you guessed, "I'll help you arrange the capsules free of charge", then pat yourself on the back. But this transaction went both ways. Now, I'm a fan and will purchase future games out of appreciation. And the cycle MIGHT come around and she reciprocates. I capitalized the word "might" to emphasize something I want everyone to be aware of; to be sincere from start to end, whether or not you like the results. I'm not looking to train manipulators, and people can sense flattery through a computer screen.

Since that last example wasn't directly marketing related, another example involves these blogs. When I first started posting them to Reddit, I got a mixture of downvotes, no activity, and my post deleted by the mods. It made me want to hide and never blog again, but it also showed me that posting a small summary followed by a link probably rubs people the wrong way. My goal with these blogs, aside from keeping my demons at bay, is to spread awareness of my itch page. So what did I do? I included the entire blog in the initial post, with an optional call-to-action at the bottom to follow my itch. Then my next post got a lot of feedback. None got banned, people commented with thanks or criticisms, and I got to learn some valuable insights about how to make my blogs better. I wasn't seen as some other spammer, I was perceived as engaging the community. Well I hope I was…

I hope that this blog post inspired you as much as it inspired me. If you're as introverted as me, you'd much rather live under a rock and only come out when your masterpiece is complete. It's almost as if the difficult hobby that's game design teaches us bad habits. But in the end, it's a necessary part of the process. Baldur's Gate 3 would've been a flash in the pan had it not been for the devs not shutting up about it. However those developers did more than just post pictures of the women you could romance. They interacted with consumers and other developers, so much so that their game got fully funded on Kickstarter. Imagine someone willing to pay for your game's development for you! Us indie developers are underdogs by default up against the hill that is finishing our products. Be thoughtful and compassionate with others, and you just might have a helping hand up the slope.

If you enjoyed this blog, please leave a comment down below and tell me how awesome I am. If you'd like to support me, follow my itch.io OR play my prototype here https://totalleeaweaomw.itch.io/philistine. Let's become better developers together!

[dsudis]

2022 Fic Year in Review

Scope note: I am including the WIP I completed this year, which will also appear in the previous year during which chapters were posted, if I ever get around to making a fic year in review post for that year. Stories posted for 2022 Christmas fic exchanges are included in this post.

In 2022 I posted 17 stories, including the concluding chapters of one WIP begun in 2021, for a total of over 104,000 words of fic posted in four fandoms. This was a pretty average number of stories for the past several years (since 2017, I've posted 12-18 stories per year) and a bit of a bounce back from last year's total of less than 82,000 words of fic posted. Weirdly, my word count total for 2022 was within a hundred words of my total from 2007, when I was, uh… working full time, in grad school, and shoveling most of my writing into a story I wouldn't post until the following year. 2022… also had its challenges, but I continue to regard it as The Year My Writing Came Back From The War, so I am pretty pleased all in all.

I actually wrote over 155,000 words of fic this year, with most of the unposted word count going to the Sandman Nightmare Apocalypse AU I started as a Nanowrimo project which… only needs another 80K or so, so… it could get finished in 2023? Maybe??

Story titles this year quoted The Mountain Goats, Taylor Swift, Rainier Maria Rilke, Beck, Swedish synth-pop duo The Knife, U2, T.S. Eliot and Sammy Cahn, who I have just this moment learned was the lyricist responsible for "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!"

Under the cut: fic list and year in review questions answered!

Critical Role

Whomever You Call Out to in the Night (Critical Role: Mighty Nein, Caduceus & Caleb, platonic rope bondage) Just One More Thing (Critical Role: Bells Hells, Orym & Ashton, Ashton's touch aversion) Dangerous Company (Critical Role: Bells Hells, Orym & Fearne, Teen, discussion of the PvP powder keg that is this party) Live Along Some Distant Day (Critical Role: Mighty Nein, Caleb/Essek, Teen, bonding over childhood religious trauma) One Hit, One Kiss (Critical Role: Mighty Nein, Molly/Caleb, Explicit, semi-public sex & spanking)

The Witcher

If I Could Never Give You Peace Emhyr var Emreis + Wolf Witchers, Teen, Emhyr is very confused by why all these people want him alive but inclined to go with it) The End Is Where We Start (Duny/Pavetta, VERY minor Geralt/Jaskier, implications of Many Complex Future Pairings, Explicit, time-travel fixit AU)

The Sandman

Licking the Spoon (Dreamling, Explicit, touch-starved Dream does some sensation-seeking with Hob) Lying in Wait (one-sided Dreamling, Mature, Dream in captivity fantasizes about Hob Gadling) An Endless End (Dream & Death, Teen, thoughts on what happens to Our Hero post-The Kindly Ones, Softer than you might think) A Dream of Unusual Size (Dreamling, Teen, Dream is Smol instead of Big for once) Introduction to Goncharov Studies (Dreamling + That Whole Goncharov Phenomenon, Explicit, Dream just gets Really Excited about story-making okay) The Weather Outside Is Frightful (Dreamling, Teen, Hurt/Comfort) Held Now by This Love (Dreamling, Explicit, kink/bondage/shibari)

Rock Bottom of a Hallowed Ground (Never Refuse You #1, Dreamling, Explicit, Dream decides that the Hob Gadling of 1689 needs some looking after and takes him on a visit to the Dreaming) A Symbol of Your Exegesis (Never Refuse You #2, Dreamling, Explicit, Hob is wandering around the Dreaming and encounters Big Dream)

The Cabots - Cat Sebastian

Caleb Murphy Gets a Hug

My best story this year: Probably "Rock Bottom of a Hallowed Ground", I think?

My favorite story this year: "Licking the Spoon"

My most popular story this year: Also "Licking the Spoon" by a fair margin but I swear I would love it even if it weren't!

Most fun story to write: Probably "Introduction to Goncharov Studies"!

Story with the single sexiest moment: (So I am cutting and pasting these questions from a previous year and the answer to this question from 2018 began with "I guess it depends on how you feel about tentacles?" which technically is not a relevant answer this year because I haven't posted any of that kind of Dreamling fic yet, but it feels very apt anyway.) "One Hit, One Kiss"

Story with the single sweetest moment: "The Weather Outside Is Frightful" almost in its entirety.

Story with the single saddest moment: Logic compels me to at least consider that it's "An Endless End" but I don't think of that as a sad story? I think it's probably "Live Along Some Distant Day" or possibly one of the other ones with Caleb in them because I mean: Caleb.

My weirdest/kinkiest story as demonstrated by reader response: "One Hit One Kiss" wins the private bookmarks quotient with 54% private, edging out "Held Now by This Love" with 48% and "Whomever You Call Out to in the Night" with 45%. "Whomever" did win the highest ratio of kudos to comments (which I fondly interpret as the "I liked this but I don't want to talk about it" quotient) with 21.4 kudos per comment, just edging out "A Dream of Unusual Size" (21.3) and "A Symbol of Your Exegesis" (20).

My most startlingly wholesome story as demonstrated by reader response: "Caleb Murphy Gets a Hug" has just one private bookmark!

Hardest story to write: [2018 answer: Oh, God. All of them, in the first three quarters of the year.] Oh, God. All of them, in the first three quarters of the year. "The End Is Where We Start" probably takes the cake, since I started it back in October of 2020.

Biggest surprise: [2018 answer: Monsterfucking!] My total failure to finish writing hardly any monsterfucking, given that I got into this year's Big Monsterfucking Pairing in September! Also, getting into this year's Big Monsterfucking Pairing in September.

This year’s theme and the story that demonstrates it most: Well, rope bondage made a surprisingly strong showing, but I think I wrote a lot of stories this year about people having their needs understood and accepted and getting what they need no matter how poor a job they do of asking for it, which is pretty on-brand for me, so I'll say that "Whomever You Call Out to in the Night" and "Held Now by This Love" kind of epitomize that (and are also the ones about rope bondage, and also the first and last one-shot stories I posted this year!)

Favorite opening line: Hob Gadling had a great deal to say about how much he had to live for, and no hesitation over saying it to Dream in a great rush of meandering detail. from "Rock Bottom of a Hallowed Ground"

Favorite closing line: It will be a nice problem to have. from "Lying in Wait"

[fantastic-rambles]

Fandom: Sk8 the Infinity

Characters: Ainosuke Shindo, Tadashi Kikuchi

Warnings: None

Word Count: 1.3k

Summary: If Tadashi had stood up for Ainosuke when his board was burned... how might things have been different? [Year of the OTP 2023. April: Canon Divergence] Part 1

- - - - - - - - - -

Maybe he'd made a mistake, all those years ago.

Tadashi quietly set a cup of tea down in front of Ainosuke, taking in the younger man's exhausted expression, one that would never be shown outside his private rooms. His hard work during his campaigning had finally paid off, but now he had even more work to do as he reviewed bills and tried to draft new ones that would eventually play to his family's advantage. In the eyes of the world, he was a political prodigy and unquestionably successful.

But he almost never smiled anymore.

At least, not genuinely. He smiled almost every day as he answered calls from his constituents and spoke at press conferences and appeared at other photo ops. His smiles then looked real enough, a dazzling grin that turned up the corners of his eyes or a more modest, bashful curve of his lips that heightened the charm of the young, inexperienced legislator. Tadashi was probably the only one who could see behind those charming masks, but that was only because he'd seen Ainosuke before, when he was younger… when he'd actually been happy. The last time Tadashi had seen that uninhibited joy on the other man's face had been before he'd been sent to America. Before the incinerator had turned his childhood and his happiness, along with his skateboard, to ash.

"Thank you, Tadashi." Ainosuke glanced up from his documents to give him a quick, weary smile before picking up a folder and offering it to the older man. "Can you help me double-check the sections I've marked on this one to make sure I haven't missed anything?"

"Of course, sir."

Tadashi accepted the folder, sitting down across from his master and starting to flip through the pages, scanning the indicated sections and reviewing Ainosuke's notes in the margins. Then, picking up a pencil from the cup on Ainosuke's desk, he lightly began to mark a few of his own thoughts and suggestions. The two of them worked in silence, interrupted only by the quiet scratch of their writing and the occasional sound of Ainosuke taking a sip of his tea.

After he'd finished with the first document, Tadashi neatened up the edges before slipping it back into the folder and taking the next without any prompting. In all honesty, Ainosuke was doing far more work than he needed to—most of his colleagues had their team of assistants review everything and give them summaries—but he insisted on it, so Tadashi would do whatever he could to support him. His own work would be easier if he'd accepted Ainosuke's proposal to hire a few more secretaries… but then his master wouldn't have anywhere that he could relax, out of the public eye. They had a political team for everything else, of course, but this work was only done by the two of them. A little discomfort of Tadashi's own was a small price to pay, especially when Ainosuke was working even harder on this than he was.

He'd nearly caught up when Ainosuke sighed, closing another folder before leaning back in his chair and stretching his arms over his head. Instantly, Tadashi looked up from his own file, his eyes flicking toward the empty teacup before fixing on Ainosuke's face.

"More tea, sir?" he asked politely, but Ainosuke shook his head.

"Not now. I'd like to take a short nap before the afternoon session, but I'll need a pillow."

Walking around his desk, he offered a hand to Tadashi. After a moment's hesitation, Tadashi took it, letting himself be pulled to his feet. Ainosuke tugged the half-finished documents out of his hands, laying them down on the desk, before leading him over to the couch. Obediently, Tadashi sat down on it, and then Ainosuke lay down, resting his head against the other man's thigh while still holding onto his hand. His thumb brushed slowly over the back of Tadashi's hand while his eyes closed. The gentle caress didn't stop, though, suggesting that he was having trouble falling asleep, and Tadashi's free hand reached up to comb through his hair. His own fingers pressed gently against Ainosuke's scalp with a soothing pressure, trying to help him relax, and Ainosuke sighed again.

"You've always been here for me," he murmured, and Tadashi made a soft sound of agreement. It was the least that he could do for the other man, though he wished that he could do more. Ainosuke deserved better than this, and more than once, Tadashi had wondered what his master's life would have been like if he'd been born to a different family. One whose "love" was expressed through more than sharp words and nearly impossible expectations. One where he could make his own choices, rather than follow a path that had been laid out for him. One that might not have been able to provide him with the same resources and opportunities… but someone as brilliant and talented as Ainosuke surely wouldn't have needed them, either.

The younger man was too dazzling to languish in this cage with clipped wings. Since his return from America, Tadashi had watched his passion gradually fade as he became perfect: the perfect politician, the perfect son, the perfect man. But in the process, he was forced to bury himself, reflecting only what others wanted to see.

"Do you…" Tadashi hesitated again, wondering if he was making another mistake. Would it be better to leave the past in the past? He didn't want to hurt Ainosuke… and he wasn't sure how they would react, either.

"What is it?"

Looking down at his lap, Tadashi saw that Ainosuke's eyes were open, staring up at him. The intense, scarlet gaze seemed to be piercing into Tadashi's very soul, and the older man swallowed hard.

"It's… it's nothing," he stammered, his heart jolting when Ainosuke frowned.

"What is it?" he repeated, starting to sit up. "Tadashi, what's wrong?"

"No, I'm sorry. Forget about it. You need to rest," Tadashi protested, trying to push Ainosuke back down. The spark of curiosity in ruby eyes suddenly blossomed into a fierce determination, and Ainosuke surged up, pressing their still-interlaced hands against Tadashi's chest to pin him to the couch.

"Tell me," he insisted. Tadashi was too frazzled to come up with a lie on the spot, and he licked his lips as he tried to arrange his thoughts into some sort of logical order.

"Do you… do you want to see Nanjo-san and Sakurayashiki-san again?" he asked softly. The light in Ainosuke's eyes immediately faded as he sat back, his sudden intensity just as quickly lost.

"I can't."

"If they were the same as they were seven years ago, maybe… but I've taken the liberty of looking them up," Tadashi explained carefully, still unsure of whether he was doing the right thing. "Nanjo-san owns his own restaurant, and Sakurayashiki-san is making a name for himself as a master calligrapher. If we were to organize, say, a fundraiser, we'd need catering and appropriate decorations… And, of course, that would involve detailed negotiations with each of the parties…"

He watched Ainosuke's face change as hope crept into it, lending it a slightly vulnerable cast that Tadashi hadn't seen in years. Not since they were children, playing together in the gardens.

"Do you think they'd agree to it?" Ainosuke asked, his voice just as quiet. Tadashi couldn't lie to him, not about something as important as this, so he shrugged slightly.

"I don't know," he admitted. "But if you'd like to try, I can start making inquiries and seeing if they are amenable to it. I promise you, I'll do my best—"

He was startled when Ainosuke suddenly threw himself at him, wrapping his arms around Tadashi's shoulders to hug him tightly.

"That would be incredible! Thank you, Tadashi!"

After a moment, Tadashi raised his own arms, supporting Ainosuke to make sure he wouldn't fall when he let go. His own heart felt lighter as his worries eased. There was still the chance that the other two men weren't interested in rekindling their relationship, but at least in this moment, Ainosuke was happy again.

"You're welcome."

[alteredphoenix]

The Mountain Wakes Chapter 1 (MKR Bad End AU) 2nd Snippet

It's been a long time since I worked on this, and mainly because my interest dwindled and, at the time, I was so focused on the "reader numbers means the story is good" line of thought (which, honestly, is neither a good nor healthy mindset to have, and I wish I'd known that back then).

But a couple weeks I got a very lovely review from someone who had never commented on a fic before, and it actually makes me want to get back to this again. I'm not sure when that will be, because my interests now lie in the Tales of fandom (as well as some of the big gacha games because GIRLS), but I thought I should post another snippet of the second chapter as compensation.

This one I did work on recently, about over a year ago (January 27, 2022, to which the last update before that had been July 19, 2019), but I remember stopping because I didn't want it to blow up into a 10-20k piece for just one chapter alone, so please forgive how clunky some of the writing comes off as. I think, once I can make the time for it and have the chance, I can figure something out.

This features an OC as the primary POV for the chapter, as a means of providing a glimpse into the world post-Crash (e.g. Zagato and Emeraude force the Pillar to keep running in spite of the emotional and psychological danger they represent to it and as a result cause a global cataclysm that opens up the Roads). I wouldn't get too attached to him; in more than one way, he's not in the story for very long.

This one's for you, SunburstSenshi.

-

At the moment he anticipated the sound of the third ring the rain came down in a stentorian burst that it drowned out the tinny static on the other end of the line. He swore out loud, banged his fist on the glass of the booth, and leaned in closer until his forehead was touching his arm draped over the top of the payphone. It was pointless even with the receiver jammed as hard as it would go against his ear, but like a fool he listened for the sign of the call to be answered mid-ring, the plastic knocking of a device on its charging station being removed, the static snow humming in the background.

A third ring.

A fourth ring.

“Come on,” he grumbled. “Come on….”

A fifth ring.

A sixth ring.

Silence. He held his breath.

A dull click, like a blocky light switch being flipped. Then came the automated voice message that gave him the same scripted rundown the past three attempts. “We’re sorry. The number you are trying to call cannot be reached at this time. Please insert the appropriate change to make a call and remain on the line or wait for an operator for further assistance.”

“Goddammit,” Phedra snarled under his breath. “Fucking asshole.” He drew away, nestled the phone within the crook of his neck, and dug around in the pockets of his poncho. He bent to the right as he pawed deeper within, bottom lip jutting in a pout, grit his teeth as he recognized the snag of fibers with each pull. He groused, moved his left hang to the spot on the outside of the fabric opposite his right hand on the bottom, jigged his fingers up and down until he felt the threads let go and the keyring give way.

He drew out the wallet, a simple bifold thing made out of leather. He undid the snap, flipped it open and peered inside the gap. His index finger prodded the three large coins resting one against the other like the walls on a house of cards. The handsome faces minted on them stared back at him, cool and unimpressed.

“Shit.” Phedra frowned. He scooped the coins up, dumped the wallet back into his pocket, and spread them out flat on the palm of his hand. He took one between his fingers and put it in the deposit slot; it fell inside with a loud, hollow thunk. He inserted the remaining two one at a time, jabbed the number in, and moved the strain off his neck and shoulder by keeping the phone glued to his ear.

First there was the electrical buzz of the landline. Then it stopped.

It dialed once.

It dialed a second time.

Phedra glanced out of the windowpane. The downpour was still going but the sheet that had come down moments before had let up. He could discern the distorted, fish-eye silhouettes of people scurrying back and forth across the platform, moving in and out of the awning’s shelter. Separated by several feet along the entranceways to the station the shapes of large, stone lions stood sentinel. Their blue and green eyes glowed in the gloom; even from here, he could taste the ozone of magic on the tip of his tongue, feel the cotton-soft sensation on the back of his nape. They were unmoving. Their gaze was forward, focused on the trains.

They did not look at him.

A third ring.

A fourth ring.

It cut out in the middle, replaced by a metallic shuffle on the other end, an intake of breath.

“Hello!” Phedra said. “It’s me! Phedrasos! I picked up the packages you wanted from the shop. The small, delicate ones, that have to be stuffed with newspaper and foam...no. No, I did not have too much trouble getting them...Yes, there was a line. A big line. But I showed them the card you gave me, the laminated one. I showed them and they let me go up to the front to get them.” He grinned. “You were right. It was that easy. Yes. Yes, they’re still with me. No, I won’t lose them; I know how long you’ve been waiting for them. It may be a few more days but I will bring them to you. I promise, they’ll be in one piece. Okay...okay. If anything happens, I’ll give you a call. Okay. Okay. I'll see you soon. Bye."

[potteresque-ire]

More ask answer about Word of Honour (山河令, WoH) and the so-called “Dangai 101 phenomenon” under the cut ~ with all the M/M relationships shown on screen, does it mean improved acceptance / safety for the c-queer community?

Due to its length (sorry!), I’ve divided the answer into 3 parts: 1) Background 2) Excerpts from the op-eds 3) Thoughts This post is PART 1 ❤️. As usual, please consider the opinions expressed as your local friendly fandomer sharing what they’ve learned, and should, in no ways, be viewed as necessarily true. :)

(TW: homophobic, hateful speech quoted)

After WoH had started airing, I had waited for one of China’s state-controlled media to publish opinion pieces about the show. Specifically, I’d like to know ~ what is the administration’s current take on Dangai  (耽改), as a genre? How does it characterise the closeness of the same-sex leads—the closeness that is suppressed when the original IP, of the genre Danmei (耽美) was converted for visual media presentation?

This is important, as China is a country where the government’s attitude becomes the official public attitude. The state opinion pieces will be quoted and parroted, especially if they come from heavy-weight sources (state-controlled media also have their importance/influence hierarchy). Production of the upcoming Dangai dramas will adjust their scripts accordingly. Marketing tactics will also adjust, make sure it doesn’t spread “the wrong message”; Dangai and Danmei dramas have both been pulled off shelves during or immediately after its airing before (Addicted 上癮 and Guardian 鎮魂, respectively), despite having already passing the censorship board.

If a heavy-weight state opinion piece pans the one-lead-fawning-over-the-other scenes in WoH (there are a few of them), for example, scenes / lines of such suggestive nature will likely disappear from the upcoming Dangai dramas for at least a year or two. If the critique spills over to a harsh stance against the presence of queers in Chinese media, all future Dangai dramas can become strict “socialist-brotherhood” stories, their “no homo” message reinforced by, for example, by inserting a female lead (or changing one of the leads to female).

Whether the official public opinion equates the true public opinion or not, public behaviour in China is quickly driven by the official public opinion. Example: the Xi regime’s conservative stance on queer issues has already translated to a quick deterioration of queer tolerance in China; open expressions that were tolerated, even welcomed, just several years ago are now met with significant hostility in the public.

This is a reflection of the nature of their government. A quick thought experiment may explain this. Take … jaywalking. It’s probably fair to say we’ve all committed this “crime” before?

Will you still jaywalk if your government declares it immoral to do so? Where I am, in the United States, the answer is definitely a no. The public will probably laugh at (and make memes about) the poor official who made the declaration, kindly ask the government to do something useful for once (f*** off), and keep jaywalking.

Now, what if the declaration comes with a law that includes a one-year prison term + lifelong criminal record for jaywalking? Let’s say this law is fully executable and irreversible, given this being a thought experiment—nothing you, or the public, can say or do can contest it.

Will you still jaywalk, even if you disagree with government’s stance that the act is immoral? You’ve got a neighbour who continues to defy the law. Will you think twice before letting your young loved ones go out with them?

Very soon, jaywalking becomes “bad”—even though such “badness” had little moral basis at its origin. It is bad because the government has “characterised” it to be so—an authoritarian government that doesn’t allow challenge of the characterisation.

The retention of queer elements in Dangai is the jaywalking in the example. The Chinese government stepping in to characterise (定性) an event, a phenomenon etc is common, and the people know the drill well that they fall in line quickly.  

If a powerful state-controlled media publish a negative opinion piece on the queer elements in Dangai / Danmei, therefore, those elements can disappear overnight.

My question had been: will the state do it? The Xi regime has made its distaste for LGBT+ representation in visual media abundantly clear with its NRTA directives. However, while the Chinese government typically puts ideology (意識型態) as its Guiding Principle, exceptions have always been made for one reason. One word.

Money.

TU is a legendary financial success story every production company (Tencent itself included) wants to replicate. As a result, there are ~ 60 Danmei IPs (book canon) with their copyright sold for Dangai dramas; this long line of Danmei dramas in the horizon has been nicknamed “Dangai 101”, after the name of the show “Produce 101” Dd was dance instructor in. These dramas are all competing to be the next TU by profit.

Adoration from fans is nice, but money is what matters.

C-ent is currently in a financial bleak winter. The anti-corruption, anti-tax-fraud campaign started by the Xi regime in 2018, which cumulated to a sudden (and unofficial) collection of 3 years of back-taxes from studios and stars, has drained a significant amount of its capital; the number of new TV dramas being filmed fell 45% between 2018 and 2019, and production companies have been closing by the tens of thousands. The tightening of censorship rules also means production is associated with more risk. The commercial sector outside c-ent is also eager for replications of TU’s success—they need more “top traffic” (頂流) idols like Gg and Dd whose fans are sufficiently devoted to drive the sales of their products. Such “fan economy” would benefit the government, even if it doesn’t have direct stakes in the companies in and outside c-ent. People’s Daily, the Official State Newspaper, previously published a positive opinion piece on fan economy in 2019, estimating its worth at 90 billion RMB (~13.7 billion USD) per year.

But if the state allows the queer elements in Dangai’s to pass the censorship board (NRTA) for profit, how can it do so with the current “No homo” directive in place? From previous experience (scarce as it may be), the queerness has to be sufficiently obvious for the shows to make the profit everyone is wishing for. Dangai dramas in which the leads’ romantic relationship remains subtle have not sold the way TU does, even if they are well-reviewed and feature famous, skilled actors (as Winter Begonia 鬓边不是海棠红 last year.)

NRTA, and the government behind it, can’t just say I’m turning a blind eye to the flirting and touching for the money. What can it say then?

Here’s what I’d thought—what it can say, or do, is to “characterise” these Dangai dramas in a way that leave out its queerness. It did so for TU. TU’s review by the overseas version of People’s Daily devoted a grand total of two characters to describe WWX and LWJ’s relationship—摯友 (“close friend”). The rest of the article was devoted to the drama’s aesthetics, its cultural roots. (The title of the article: 《陳情令》：書寫國風之美 Chen Qing Ling: Writing the Beauty of National Customs).

How could it do that? The State’s power ensuring few questioning voices aside, I’ve been also thinking about the history and definition of Danmei (耽美)—Dangai’s parent genre as the causes. Based on the history and definition, I can think of 3 ways the queer elements in Danmei (耽美) can be characterised by the state, 2 of which provide it with the wiggle room, the movable goalposts it needs should it choose to want to overlook the queerness in Dangai.

The 3 characterisations I’ve thought of, based on the history and definition of Danmei (耽美) are:

1) The queer characterisation, which focuses on its homoerotic element. * Summary of the characterization: Danmei is gay.

2) The “traditional BL” characterisation, which focuses on BL’s historic origin as a “by women, for women” genre. The M/M setup is viewed as an escapist protest against the patriarchy, a rejection of traditional gender roles; displays of M/M closeness are often “candies” for the female gaze. * Summary of the characterization: Danmei is women’s fantasy.

3) The aesthetic characterisation, which focuses on beauty—from the beauty of the characters, the beauty of a world without harm to the romance. * Summary for the characterization: Danmei is pretty.

The queer characterisation (1) is well-understood, and likely the default characterisation if it is to be made by the fraction of i-fandom I’m familiar with. Most i-fans I’ve met, myself included, would likely and automatically associate the M/M relationships in The Untamed  (TU) and WoH with queerness.

The “traditional BL” characterisation (2), meanwhile, equates Danmei with BL as the genre of homoerotic works developed in 1970’s Japan for women comic readers, and has been widely interpreted from a feminist point of view.

Under such interpretation of “traditional BL” works, the double male lead setup wasn’t meant to be an accurate depiction of homosexuality. It wasn’t about homosexuality at all. Rather, it was about the removal of women and along with it, the rage, the eye-rolling, the unease women readers had often felt when attempting to interact with mainstream romance novels of the time, in which the female leads had mostly been confined to traditional women roles, and their virtue, their traditional feminine traits.

The M/M setup therefore acted as a “shell” for a het relationship that allowed removal of such social constraints placed on women. The lead with whom the woman audience identified was no longer bound to the traditional role of women, such as being the caregiver of the family. The lead could instead chase their dreams and roam the world, as many contemporary women already did or aspired to do; they were no longer limited to playing the passive party in life and in the relationship—and they enjoyed such freedom without risking the love, the respect the other male protagonist felt for them.

BL, in this traditional sense, has therefore been interpreted as an answer for, and a protest against the heteropatriarchal gender norm still dominant in societies deeply influenced by Confucianism, including Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China. The M/M setup is, at heart, (het) women’s fantasy. The inclusion of two young-and-beautiful male leads also satisfy “the female gaze” ~ the popularity of BL among het women has therefore been compared to the popularity of lesbian porn among het men. In both cases, the audience is drawn not for the homosexual element but by the presence of double doses of sexual attraction.

(Please forgive me if any of my wording comes as disrespectful! I’m not used to talking about these topics.)

The availability of the “traditional BL” characterisation (2) is key to bypassing queerness as a topic in the discussions of Danmei (耽美).

The aesthetic characterisation (3) is very closely related to 2) in origin, but deserves its own point as a characterisation that can stand on its own, and may be more obscure to the English-speaking fandom given the common English translation of Danmei (耽美) as Boy’s Love.

Boy’s Love, as a name, amplifies the queer characterisation (1) and de-emphasises the aesthetic characterisation (3); Danmei (耽美), meanwhile, does the reverse.

Where does the name Danmei come from?

When BL was first developed in Japan, it used to have a now out-of-fashion genre name: Tanbi. Tanbi was borrowed from same name describing a late 19th century / early 20th century Japanese literary movement, known as Tanbi-ha and was inspired by Aestheticism in England. Aestheticism “centered around the doctrine that art exists for the sake of its beauty alone, and that it need serve no political, didactic, or other purpose”. Along the same line, the core belief of authors of Tanbi-ha was that art should celebrate beauty and reject the portrayal of ugliness in human nature, the darkness of reality:

…Tanbi writers argued that the ideas of naturalism writers such as “objectivism,” “truth is more important than beauty” and so on would “oppress human beings’ desire” so as to “lose beauty and human nature.” Accordingly, they insisted on “acute mental and emotional sensibility” [Ye, 2009].

(Source, with more details on Tanbi.)

Neither romance nor homosexuality were requirements for works in the original Tanbi-ha genre. BL borrowed the name Tanbi because its early authors saw their work created under the same principles: the emphasis on the beauty of their characters, their love (romantic and platonic), in a world that was also beautiful and untouched by ugliness such as sexism and homophobia.

The stubborn persistence on keeping one’s eyes trained on the beautiful, the willingness to turn a blind eye to reality for the sake of the beauty is built-in in the genre’s name. Tanbi  meant more than beauty, aesthetics; its kanji form was written as 耽美;  耽 = to sink, drown in, to  over-indulge in; 美 =  beauty.

Tanbi, therefore, literally means to drown in, to over-indulge in beauty.

Over time, as the genre expanded its writing style, Tanbi eventually fell out of favour as BL’s genre name in Japan. However, as it gained popularity in the Sinosphere in the 1990s, starting with Taiwan and Hong Kong, the kanji of Tanbi was retained as the Chinese name of the genre.

In Mandarin Chinese, 耽美 is pronounced Danmei. A hyperfocus on the aesthetics, the utopian aspects of traditional BL is therefore retained in Danmei by its name. People’s Daily could therefore devote its review of TU on its aesthetics. Realism, including politics and all discussions of social issues, can therefore be swept aside in the name of respecting the genre’s tradition.

I’ve mostly been reading about and observing c-fandom, and I believe these 3 characterisations have all attracted its own kind of fans. Fans who care and talk about queer issues even when it isn’t encouraged by their sociopolitical environment, who shine a light upon these issues in their fan works. Fans who treat the M/M leads as if they were a traditional cishet couple, such as calling one of the leads 老婆 (wife) and assigning him biologically female functions when needed (via, for example, the ABO trope). Fans who insist the works must meet their beauty standards, rejecting those that fail (for example, if the leads are not good looking enough) by claiming they’re there for Danmei, not Danchou (耽醜, “over-indulgence on ugliness”). Fans who are drawn to the genre by a combination of these characterisations.

By the history and definition of the genre, all the above reasons for fanning Danmei are as valid, as legitimate as one another.

I thought about this related question then: are c-fans of the second (traditional BL characterisation) and third (aesthetic characterisation) groups homophobic? When I first asked this question, I—a fan whose fandom experience had been entirely in English-speaking communities—assume the answer was yes. I thought, in particular, the insistence of treating Danmei’s M/M couples as cishet couples in a homosexual shell had to be conscious queer erasure. How can anyone ignore the same-sexness of the leads? How can anyone talk about Danmei without associating it with homosexuality?

However, as I read more—again, specifically about c-fandom, and in Chinese—I realised the answer may be a little more complex.

Previously, I had largely thought about homophobia in terms of individual attitudes. This has to do with my current environment (liberal parts of the United States), in which the choice to accept or reject the queer community has become a close to personal choice. Pride flags fly all over the city, including the city hall, every summer, and most churches welcome the LGBT+ community. I hadn’t considered how an environment in which queers have never enjoyed full social exposure, in which education of related topics is sorely lacking, would affect Danmei’s development as a genre.

In such an environment, it is difficult for Danmei to evolve and incorporate up-to-date understanding of RL queerness.

The consequence I can see is this: Danmei is more likely to be “stuck” in its historical characterisation as (het) women’s fantasy inside than outside the Great Firewall, with its queerness de-emphasised if not erased—and it draws fans who are attracted to this kind of characterisation accordingly. This is, perhaps, reflected by the fact that the (het) women-to-queer ratio of Danmei / BL fans is significantly higher in China than in the West (Table 1 in this article summarises how Danmei / BL fans have split between different genders and sexual orientation in the Sinosphere vs the West in different research studies).

Another driving force I can see for Danmei to retain BL’s traditional feminist and aesthetic characterisations: women in China are not free from the social pressure that led to the birth of BL in 1970’s Japan. While many of them have achieved financial freedom through work and have high education, the young and educated have been subjected to immense pressure to get married and have children especially in the past decade.

In 2007, the China’s state feminist agency, the All-China Women’s Federation (中華全國婦女聯合會), coined the term 剩女 (literally, “leftover women”) for unmarried, urban women over 27 years old. The government started a campaign that, among other things, associated women’s education level with ugliness, and their unmarried status with pickiness, moral degeneracy. The reason behind the campaign: birth rates are plummeting and the state wants educated women, in particular, to nurture a high quality, next generation workforce. More importantly, the government sees a threat in the M/F sex imbalance (high M, low F) that has commonly been attributed to the country’s “one child policy” between 1979-2015, which encouraged female infanticide / abortion of female foetuses in a culture that favours surname-carrying boys. The state fears the unmarried men will become violent and/or gay, leading to “social instability and insecurity”. Therefore, it wants all women, in particular those who are educated, to enter the “wife pool” for these unmarried men. (Source 1, Source 2: Source 2 is a short, recommended read).

For Chinese women, therefore, patriarchy and sexism is far from over. Escapist fantasies where sexism is removed—by removing women from the picture—are therefore here to stay.

Danmei is therefore not queer literature (同志文學). The difference between Danmei and queer literature is highlighted by this reportedly popular saying (and its similar variations) in some Danmei communities:

異性戀只是傳宗接代，同性戀才是真愛 Heterosexuality is only for reproduction. Only homosexuality is true love.

The attitude towards heterosexuality is one of distaste, viewed as a means to an end the speaker has no interest in. On the contrary, homosexuality is idealised, reflecting the disregard / lack of understanding of some Danmei fans have towards the RL hardships of c-queers. The ignorance may be further propagated by gate-keeping by some Danmei fans for safety reasons, keeping queer discussions away from their communities for fear that their favourite hangouts would meet the same uncertain fate of other communities that previously held open queer discussions, such as the Weibo gay and lesbian supertopics. Such gatekeeping can, again, be easily enforced using tradition as argument: the beauty 美 is Tanbi and Danmei (耽美), remember, includes the beauty of utopia, where ugly truths such as discrimination do not enter the picture. A Danmei that explores, for example, the difficulty of coming out of the closet is no longer Danmei, by its historical, aesthetic definition.

[I’ve therefore read about c-queers viewing Danmei with suspicion, if not downright hostility; they believe the genre, by ignoring their RL challenges and casting them as beautiful, even perfect individuals, and in some cases, by fetishising them and their relationships, only leads to more misconceptions about the queer community. Dangai, meanwhile, has been viewed with even more distaste as potential weapons by the state to keep gays in the closet; if the government can shove the Danmei characters into the “socialist brotherhood” closet, it can shove them as well.

I haven’t yet, however, been able to tease out the approximate fraction of c-queers whose views of Danmei and Dangai is negative. The opposing, positive view of the genres is this: they still provide LGBT+ visibility, which is better than none and it would’ve been close to none without Danmei and Dangai; while Danmei may skim over the hardships of being queer, fan works of Danmei are free to explore them—and they have.

This article provides insights on this issue. @peekbackstage’s conversation with a Chinese film/TV director in Clubhouse is also well worth a read.]

That said, Danmei can only be dissociated from the queer characterisation if there’s a way to talk about the genre without evoking words and phrases that suggest homosexuality—something that is difficult to do with English. Is there?

In Chinese, I’d venture to say … almost. There’s almost a way. Close enough to pass.

The fact that M/M in traditional BL has been developed and viewed not as queer but as a removal of F also means this: queerness isn’t “built-in” into the language of Danmei. The name Danmei itself already bypasses a major “queer checkpoint”: it’s impossible to refer to a genre called Boy’s Love and not think about homosexuality.

Here’s one more important example of such bypass. Please let me, as an excuse to put these beautiful smiles in my blog, show this classic moment from TU; this can be any gif in which the leads are performing such suggestive romantic gestures:

How can I describe this succinctly? In English?

Two men acting in love? Er. That’s… the definition of gay, almost.

Two men acting gay? Well. GAY.

Right. Fine. Let’s go negative. Queerbaiting? … Still gay, because the word “queer” is in there.

[Pie note: for the record, I don’t think TU or WoH is queer-baiting.]

Personally, I find it impossible to describe the GIF above in English that I do not automatically associate with RL romantic love between two men, with homosexuality. But can I do it in Chinese?

… Yes.

There’s a term, 賣腐 (pronounced “maifu”), literally, “selling 賣 the rot 腐”, derived from the term known among i-fans as fujoshi and written, in kanji, as 腐女. Fujoshi, or 腐 (“rot”) 女 (“women”), describes the largely (het) female audience of the Japanese BL genre (>80%, according to Wikipedia). Originated as a misogynistic insult towards female Japanese BL fans in the 2000s, fujoshi was later reclaimed by the same female BL fans who now use the self-depreciative term as acknowledgement of their interest being “rotten”, for BL’s disregard of the society’s traditional expectations on women.

賣腐 is therefore to “sell the rot” to the rotten women; ie. the suggestive romantic gestures, exemplified by the GIF above, between the M/M leads are catering, performing fan service to their target audience.

[賣腐 is also a term one will see in the state opinion pieces.]

There’s nothing gay about this term.

I’ve therefore found it possible to talk and think in Chinese about Danmei while giving little thought to queerness. The history and definition of Danmei allow that.

Again, I’m not saying any of this to excuse homophobia among in Danmei and Dangai fandoms. The point I’m trying to make is this — given that Danmei has three potential characterisations, two of which can be discussed without abundantly evoking queer concepts and vocabularies, given that history of Danmei, as a genre, already favoured characterisation 2 (traditional BL), the government addressing homosexuality in its opinions on Danmei and Dangai is far from a given.

By extension, the popularity of Dangai may mean a lot or little to c-queers; by extension, the state can approve / disapprove of Danmei and Dangai in a manner independent of its stance on homosexuality, which is itself inconsistent and at times, logic-deying (example to come…).

This is both good and bad, from the perspective of both the government and the c-queer community.

For the government: as discussed, the “triality” of Danmei allows the state to “move the goalpost” depending on what it tries to achieve. It has characterisations 2 (the traditional BL characterisation) and 3 (the aesthetic characterisation) as excuses to let Dangai dramas pass the censorship board should it want their profit and also, their promise of expanding the country’s soft power overseas by drawing an international audience. These characterisations also allow the state to throw cold water on the popularity of Danmei / Dangai should it desire, for reasons other than its queer suggestions—despite the Xi regime’s push against open expressions of queerness (including by activism, in media), it has also been careful about not demonising c-queers in words, and has countered other people’s attempts to do so.

Why may the government want to throw cold water on Danmei and Dangai? They are still subculture, which the state has also viewed with suspicion. In 2018, a NRTA directive explicitly requested that “c-ent programmes should not use entertainers with tattoos; (those associated with) hip-hop culture, sub-cultures (non-mainstream cultures), decadent cultures.” (”另外，总局明确要求节目中纹身艺人、嘻哈文化、亚文化（非主流文化）、丧文化（颓废文化）不用。”).

Subculture isn’t “core socialist values”. More importantly, it’s difficult to keep up with and control subculture. 環球網, the website co-owned by People’s Daily and Global Times (環球時報), ie, The State Newspaper and The State Tabloid, famously said this on its Weibo, on 2020/03/04, re: 227:

老了，没看懂为什么战。晚安。 Getting old. Can’t figure out what the war is about. Good night.

The State also cannot stop subculture from happening. It doesn’t have the resources to quell every single thing that become popular among its population of 1.4 billion. What it can do to make sure these subcultures stay subcultures, kept out of sight and mind of the general public.

Characterisation 1 (the queer characterisation), meanwhile, remains available to the state should it wish to drop the axe on Dangai for its queer elements. I’m including, as “queer elements”, presentation of men as too “feminine” for the state—which has remained a sore point for the government. This axe have a reason to drop in the upcoming months: July 23rd, 2021 will be the 100th birthday of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and the state may desire to have only uniformed forces and muscled, gun-toting “masculine” men gracing the screens.

What about for c-queers and their supporters (including group I fans)? What good and bad can the multiple characterisations of the genres do for them?

For c-queers and their supporters (including group I fans), their acceptance and safety are helped by the Dangai genre, by the Dangai 101 phenomenon, if and only if the state both characterises the queer elements in these dramas as queer (characterisation 1) AND their opinions of them are positive.

Personally, I had viewed this to be unlikely from the start, because a queer characterisation would mean the censorship board has failed to do its job, which is embarrassing for the Chinese government.

Characterisations 2) and 3) are not bad for c-queers and their supporters, however, and definitely not “enemies” of Characterisation 1);  they can not only serve as covers for the queer elements in Dangai to reach their audience, but also, they can act as protective padding for the LGBT+ community if the content or (very aggressive) marketing of the Dangai dramas displease the government — with the understanding, again, that the “traditional BL” arm of the Danmei community is itself also highly vulnerable by being a subculture, and so its padding effect is limited and it also deserves protection.

The downside to achieving LGBT+ visibility through Dangai is, of course and as mentioned, that these dramas are, ultimately, deeply unrealistic depictions of the c-queers. The promotion of these dramas, which has focused on physical interactions between the male leads for “candies”, can encourage even more fetishising of queers and queer relationships. The associated (character) CP culture that makes and breaks CPs based on the dramas’ airing cycle may also fuel negative perception of queer relationships as attention-seeking behaviour, something that can be initiated and terminated at will and for the right price.

Finally, with all this said, which characterisation(s) have the government taken re: Dangai and/or WOH? And what opinions has it given to its characterisations?

PART 1 <-- YOU ARE HERE PART 2 PART 3

[anncanta]

Male and female He created them

The fourth part of ‘The Matrix’ came out last week, and it's brilliant.

However, I must say that this is the rare case when familiar categories – even superlatives – do not work.

There are better films than ‘The Matrix resurrections’, there are films better written than it, there are films that are better thought out and better, as they say, worked out. But ‘The Matrix resurrections’ is still better than them.

And the point, of course, is not that this is a continuation of the old cult and beloved by many film, which, due to the love of fans in any form, would be appreciated, because – ‘well, guys, this is ‘The Matrix’!’

The point is, it's a miracle.

There are spoilers in the post, so if you haven`t watch the film yet, please, watch it and then return.

But let's go back to the past for a while.

I remember well my impressions of ‘The Matrix revolutions’. The ending of the story, which many people hated, at that time not only amazed me – it deprived me of peace and sleep. For the first time in my rather young life (I was twenty-two) I saw such a beautifully, fully, and clearly told story on the screen about finding yourself, accepting yourself, and being ready to choose – yourself again. For the first time, I saw a story in which it was said in plain text: ‘Choosing yourself, you choose others. It doesn't happen otherwise.’ And for the first time, I saw a text where artificial intelligence was shown with such love and care.

For me, the key scene of ‘The Matrix revolutions’ and the entire trilogy has always been the moment when blind Neo walks through the city of machines and the golden road stretches in front of him. It took years before I was able to formulate for myself what this road and this city of light means. Then I just saw how beautiful it was, and how vivid this moment was.

By that time, ‘The Matrix’ consisted of three parts, and here for the first time, it could be called vivid. At the moment when Neo gets out of the ship that has crashed into the city and moves among the bizarre metal thickets, and mechanical creatures are watching him from everywhere with curiosity.

Words cannot convey the catharsis that I experienced when I caught that message of theirs – the final chord of the Wachowskis at that time: ‘The living beings are always the living beings, and it doesn't matter what their body is made of.’

And this is not about how to overcome the human in us. This is about how to overcome the material. Not the human, but the literal, cadaveric. The stubborn belief that only your world is real, only your version of what is happening is correct and only your form of life is worthy of owning the world.

Twenty years have passed.

The Internet is littered with dozens of research and theories about what the real meaning of ‘The Matrix’ is, who is real in it and who is not, and what it all meant in general. Not that I read all the reviews, but among those that came across to me, no one is close to the Wachowskis interpretation, which, – it seems, in despair, – they spoke openly in an interview.

And it's not about that a person has no choice. But we will come back to this later.

For now, let's note this: in 2019, Lana Wachowski started a project that no one needed. The fans who loved the first part of the trilogy immediately rejected the second and the third ones, and did not even want to think about the fourth, fans of complex theories have already explained everything to themselves, and you cannot lure those indifferent to the film with a new part in the fandom.

So why? Why did she do it?

Because it was her choice, firstly. And, secondly...

Secondly, because not everything is so simple.

Let's start over.

Looking back now and rewatching ‘The Matrix’, you understand that this story is a whole young adult. A civilization that has gone underground, a gloomy future, ‘us’ against ‘them’. Such a film adaptation of the inner world of a fifteen-year-old who badly wrote the test. The world is unfair, outside the window is eternal chilly rain, school sucks, parents are brutes.

I must say that already in this story, starting from the second half, non-childish logic began to be seen and difficult questions were asked. ‘Who is the One and what makes him so?’, ‘Why do we choose to fight when the battle seems to be lost in advance?’, ‘Does identical mean equal?’, ‘Does the future mean stability?’. And so on and so forth. For me, the entire first film is about how those who have chosen you, including yourself, can get the One out of you. And that's the whole thing. But at the same time, the first part is still more or less ‘just’ a cool action movie.

The second and third parts are ambitious, smart, and do not drag out with the fascination of intrigue and interest in who will win in the end. Their task and logic, it seems to me, is different – and this is directly stated in the text, which shows and makes it clear to the viewer that the mere choice made is not a choice. The choice is what is lived and what you paid for.

It is easy to free others from the matrix, it is easy to strive for freedom, it is easy to seek and find a messiah – as incredibly ironic and subtle shown in the second film, this is just another form of control, another level of the same closed-loop game. And there is nothing wrong with this if you choose to play it and are ready to pay for your choice: pay with the monotonous daily life, with the loss of yourself in countless pleasures, with separation from your daughter, with eternal exile or oblivion.

Neo pays for his choice with his life – in every sense of the word. And therefore, unlike many other characters in the film, he becomes an adult.

The fourth part of ‘The Matrix’ story, which begins with confused and feverish attempts to find Neo, or at least understand whether such a person existed at all, is already an adult film. For those who, on their own living warm skin, experienced the realization that there are not only ‘them’ and ‘us’.

This film has so many meanings, so many ideas and so many dimensions that I don't think it is possible to list them all in one post. I will focus on just a few.

First. After watching the film, I made sure I got one of the plotlines right. In particular, what is happening with Neo. Actually, it was quite obvious, but here is a situation where obviousness, transparency, and simplicity are treasures of the highest standard.

Thomas Anderson at the beginning of the film is a hero who was given the life that all heroes dream of. Which is the usual normal life of a normal person. Without saving the world, without risking yourself every day, without fighting monsters, and having to walk on the edge. Harry Potter dreamed of such a life, he said this to his friend Ron more than once, ‘You have no idea what it is to be a hero.’ And now Neo got such a life.

And it kills him.

But that's not all. Reborn by artificial intelligence for the sake of his, intelligence (of course, selfish), goals, Neo is both an ordinary person, which there are millions in the world, and a demiurge, a deity, the creator of the Game, the whole world, which he wrote and into which he involved millions of other people.

In the first three parts, Neo freed people from the matrix, now he is pulling them into it. And this topic is not even developing – it is not necessary, it is so clear. This is to the question of the malicious and vile ‘them’ who created the matrix to hold people in it, right?

Second. Once in the real world, Neo discovers that everything has changed. There is no more unity among humans or machines. There are people who are obsessed with war and machines who want peace. Two robots risked themselves to get Neo out of the matrix, they – sentients – are working next to people, but most importantly, when Neo asks, ‘Are the machines on our side now?’ the answer is, ‘You have changed the very concept of our side.’

Those ten minutes of the third part. That passage through the city of machines, followed by thousands of prying eyes. The experience that they all had was the presence and influence of a person who is ready to open up totally, totally accept and surrender everything, and create the future out of himself, since it is no longer possible to create the future out of anything else.

So it turns out that he not only created a computer simulation? So he turns out to be not bad?

Third. Adults have slightly different problems than children do. It is important for a child to understand the world and separate from adults, a teenager needs to be in conflict with adults. And what does an adult need?

An adult needs to accept him- or herself. And here the psychoanalyst with glasses and pills will not help, fame and money will not help, even the status of a hero will not help – in order to accept yourself, you need to take yourself out of the shell of the false and unimportant, find your soul and not forget about the shadow.

By the way, the theme of agent Smith is amazingly played here. This is what an integrated shadow looks like, Lana Wachowski tells us. If it is a harmonious part of you, then why shouldn't it be a blue-eyed handsome guy?

And your world stands, as always, in a golden light. Which exists always and everywhere. Which shines even where the bottom is not visible, where it seems to be an eternal night, and only the red reflections of the batteries cut the cold darkness. Your world is in two parts, in two bodies, in two voices and one flight, in that which cannot be separated, because it has never been disconnected, although it has never been physically one. Which is true to the point that simulations twist and break under its weightless weight.

And it is so simple, so clear, transparent, and precise. There are films that are better formulated, films that are better shot, better written, and better played. But this one seems to have come entirely from the reality outside of Plato's cave, and therefore it is outside the categories of good and bad. It came with one purpose: to remind all of us something. And someone – to say for the first time.

How it all started.

‘Male and female He created them and God blessed them and He called their name Adam in the day that He created them.’

* Male and female He created them and God blessed them and He called their name Adam in the day that He created them. Genesis 5:2 (Aramaic Bible in Plain English)