#lol why did i write this in so much detail haha

[secretmellowblog]

The thing is, Jean Valjean’s “nineteen year prison sentence for stealing a loaf of bread” from Les Mis isn’t actually unusual….not even today! I see people talking about it as if it’s strange or unimaginable when it happens every day.

In modern America — often as a result of pointlessly cruel (and racist) habitual offender and mandatory minimum laws— people are routinely sentenced to life in prison for minor crimes like shoplifting or possession of drugs.

The ACLU did a report in 2013 detailing the lives of various people who were sentenced to life in prison without parole for nonviolent property crimes like:

•attempting to cash a stolen check

•a junk-dealer’s possession of stolen junk

metal (10 valves and one elbow pipe)

•possession of stolen wrenches

•siphoning gasoline from a truck

•stealing tools from a tool shed and a welding machine from a yard

•shoplifting three belts from a department store

•shoplifting several digital cameras

•shoplifting two jerseys from an athletic store

• taking a television, circular saw, and a power converter from a vacant house

• breaking into a closed liquor store in the middle of the night

And of course, so so so many people sentenced to life without parole for the possession of a few grams of drugs.

And we could go on and on!

Gregory Taylor was a homeless man in Los Angeles who, in 1997, was sentenced to “25 years to life” for attempting to steal food from a food kitchen. He was released after 13 years. The lawyers helping to release him even cited Les Miserables in their appeal, comparing Taylor’s sentence to Jean Valjean’s.

And there’s another specific bit of social commentary Hugo was making about Valjean’s trial that’s still depressingly relevant. He writes that Valjean was sentenced for the theft of loaf of bread, but also that the court managed to make that sentence stick by bringing up some of his past misdemeanors. For example, Valjean owned a gun and was known to occasionally poach wildlife (presumably for his starving family to eat.) . So the court exaggerates how harmful the bread theft was—he had to smash a windowpane to get the bread, which is basically Violence— then insist the fact that he owns a gun and occasionally poaches is proof that he is habitually and innately violent. Then when Valjean obviously becomes distressed traumatized and furious as a result of his nakedly unjust sentence and begins making desperate (and very unsuccessful/impulsive/ poorly thought through) attempts to escape…. the government indifferently tacks more years onto his sentence, labels him a “dangerous” felon, and insists that its initial read of him as an innately violent person was correct.

And it’s sad how a lot of the real life stories linked earlier are similar to the commentary Hugo wrote in 1863? Someone will commit a nonviolent property crime, and then the court insists that a bunch of other miscellaneous things they’ve done in the past (whether it’s other minor thefts or being addicted to drugs or w/e) are Proof they’re inherently violent and incapable of being around other people.

A small very petty fandom side note: This is also why I dislike all those common jokes you see everywhere along the lines of “lol it’s so unrealistic for the police to want to arrest Valjean over a loaf of bread, there must have been some other reason the police were pursuing him. Because the state would never punish someone that harshly and irrationally for no reason. so maybe javert was just gay haha”. (Ex: this tiktok— please don’t harass the creator or poster though, I don’t think they were intending to mean anything like that and its just a silly common type of joke you see made about Les mis all the time so it’s not unique in any way.) because like.

As much as I don’t think Les Mis is a flawless book or that its political messaging is perfect….the only way that insanely long unjust sentences for minor crimes is “unrealistic” is if you’re operating on the assumption that prisons are here to Keep You Safe by always only punishing bad criminals who do serious crimes. And that’s just, not true at all. Like I get that these are just goofy silly shallow jokes, and I’m not angry or going to harass anyone who makes them. but it feels like there’s an assumption underlying all those goofy jokes that “this is just not how prison works!” “Prisons don’t routinely sentence people to absurd laughably unjust pointless sentences!” “Prisons give people fair sentences for logical reasons!” When like…no

Valjean being relentlessly hounded and tortured for a minor crime in a way that is utterly ridiculous and arbitrary in its cruelty is not actually a plot hole in Les mis. It’s a plot hole in …..society ajsjkdkdkf. And the only way to fix that is to fight for prison abolition or at least reform, and (in America) stand up against the vicious naked cruelty of habitual offender and mandatory minimum laws.

But yeah :(. I hate how Les Mis opens with a prologue saying the novel will be obsolete the moment the social issues it describes have been resolved— but two hundred years later, the book is still more relevant than ever because we’re dealing with so many of the exact same injustices.

[temiizpalace]

☆┊”CAN I COPY YOUR HOMEWORK ?”

SUMMARY: you forgot to do the homework before your next class.. excellent job prefect. no problem. you can just copy off your classmate! what’s his response to “can I copy your homework?”

CHARACTERS: all dorms (+ grim)

GENRE: crackfic, but could be considered fluff

WARNINGS: cursing

reader gender is not mentioned, reader is yuu

“i’ll help you with it!”

i mean, you COULD copy.. but how will you understand the material? if you copy then you might not understand it later! that’s not good at all! instead of letting you copy it all together, he helps you and walks you through it like the angel he is. he’s explaining everything in detail but in a way you could comprehend it. totally should be your teacher. even if you already understood the subject, he still wants to lock it in and make sure you truly do get it. (after that you felt like albert einstein)

riddle, trey, jack, ortho, rook (he already knew you weren’t paying attention so he got ya covered), silver

“yeah, sure”

you wanna copy his homework? yeah, sure. why not? you’re the overworked prefect of ramshackle dorm, or some may say “crowleys assistant.” you deserve a break every once in awhile right? maybe they do care about your wellbeing and want you to rest as much as possible. you already work your ass off every day. you study, care for grim, do crowleys work, and deal with some random dorms shit almost 24/7. hell, why not let him write it for you?

it’s that or he just doesn’t give a shit. 🤷🤷

epel, lilia, malleus

“bold of you to assume i did the homework”

you’re both in the same boat. well sort of anyway. he’s a busy guy, he doesn’t have time for that. life is short, and he should be doing things he wants. not sit in a classroom all day and write, just to sit down in his dorm room and write for the rest of it. oh no. he probably has like 10 missing assignments right now. long story short: his ass did not do the homework cause he didn’t wanna.

ace, leona, floyd

“lol nope”

damn you didn’t do the homework? well good luck with that. listen, he did the homework. he’s on top of it. you on the other hand chose not to do it. what’s that? oh you were busy? that sounds rough. he wishes you the best and hopes that you’ll listen next time. alright? bye 🫶🫶

idia, jamil

“wait, we had homework????”

there was homework? THERE WAS HOMEWORK? oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit. he messed up. now he’s scrambling to get it done before his next period, panicking and triple checking his answers. poor baby was so caught up in his life he forgot all about class assignments. now you both are sitting at the cafeteria with pencils and eraser shavings everywhere. those sitting around you both were losing their appetites because for some reason their meal tastes like led or graphite. best of luck to you both 💔💔

grim, deuce, cater, kalim

“sure you can copy it! for a price of course.”

yeah he’ll let you copy it. one teensy weensy detail though, what’ll he get in return? well it was your fault for not working on it during your free time. it’s only fair right? he worked so hard to get these answers, why should he give them away for free? haha. that’s just how the world works, prefect. it’s nothing personal really, he just wants to benefit.

azul would definitely try to upsell you into getting one of his study guides. capitalist.

ruggie, azul, jade

he scolds you.

you didn’t do the homework? *sigh* perfect, oh, prefect. that’s a horrible habit to develop, really. why didn’t you do it? now you must scramble to finish it. you see not doing the homework once is alright, but if this happens again he will know about it. he’ll make sure this doesn’t happen again third time. now he’s giving you a long ass essay on why doing your homework ON TIME is the right thing to do, and why copying others homework is the road unsuccessful students go down.

but his lecture went on for hours. im sorry it won’t happen again just please let me copy it 🙏🙏

riddle (scolds then lets you copy), vil, sebek

A/N: I do all my homework stay safe guys 🙏

my second writing tada! lately I’ve just been going off of alignment charts and how I see them fit. hopefully this is good enough.

date written: 11/24/23

© temiizpalce — don’t steal or copy my work!

[starleska]

Hello again!! I'm the anon from before (and I'm glad to hear you had a nice time yesterday!!!), and here's what I wrote.. I've been thinking a lot about the 'Wally eats with his eyes' idea, as many have been !!! I'm not sure how to warn for what this exactly so feel free to tag it with whatever you deem necessary. Wally just. Likes you a lot lol. i guess this is a little silly but i had a good time writing it haha

You are having a staring contest with your friend Wally.

You can't quite remember who started this, or why. Just that Wally had wanted to draw somewhere outside and you tagged along with him, until you were sitting somewhere in a field of flowers around the Neighbourhood.

Wally simply returns your gaze, unblinking, his hands folded over on top of his sketchbook. You think this has lasted long enough. What you want to do is crack a smile or a joke, but you find that your muscles are frozen stiff, and your tongue is so, so heavy.

His pupils expand.

You're supposed to panic about being this frozen up. Moving shouldn't be so difficult. But it's like your body feels like even stressing out about this is too much effort. You feel warm. Your eyelids tremble with the effort to blink. There is no movement, though your eyes don't burn either. You've held them open for so long that the world starts to gray out around you.

His pupils expand.

Wally leans his head to the side, little by little. You mirror his movements without thinking. The tips of your fingers are tingling, your feet feel numb as if fallen asleep. He smiles at you even more than usual. You think that this makes you happy. His lips part slowly, as if to speak, and-

"Hiya, guys!" Eddie calls out from the path to your right.

Your body jolts in surprise, and the spell is broken. By the time you whip your head around to look, Eddie has already continued his delivery route without waiting for a response.

Your returned awareness feels like breaking the surface after almost drowning. A weight disappears from your body, and you practically double over, gasping for air. Your shoulders are shaking, your eyes wide. When you squeeze them shut, it burns. You feel tired like you never have before.

"That was good," Wally says. For a moment, you are hesitant to turn your head back and look at him. You want to hide from his eyes. But you snuff that thought out as soon as it pops up, because that's just silly. You must've eaten something wrong, or have caught a cold. What else could explain this.

You look at Wally. He looks normal, and his eyes upon

"W-what did you say?"

"I asked: Are you feeling good?" Wally speaks even slower than he otherwise would, but his smile is as wide as ever. "You don't look good, friend."

"I don't… I'm a little out of it," you force out a laugh. "I think I'm getting sick."

Wally leans forward.

"You'll be okay," he says, and puts a hand on your knee. "Let's sit here until you feel better."

!!!!!! anon!!!! anon do you know how good this is?!?! oh my gosh!!!! 😭😭😭😭😭 honey, i cannot express how much i adore this fic. it's such a wonderful blend of terror and intimacy, so frightening and claustrophobic yet warm and safe in a way you can't understand...ugh, i'm in love 🥴 your descriptions are so vivid - i could really feel Your panic and nausea. some real Lovecraftian horror stuff going on in here. and oh my God the little detail of him saying, 'That was good' and then switching to 'Are you feeling good?' absolute chills!!! 😱😱 if you feel comfortable enough, you should absolutely post your writing somewhere!! you've got such a talent for writing, Wally in particular, and i'd love to read more of your stuff should you be inclined. i'll definitely be taking some tips from this awesome little fic going forward 😉 thank you so much for sharing 🥰

[somewhereincairparavel]

🐚 Daughter of Neptune headcanons list... 🌊 part three

Note: ahhh finally done with this unexpected series. Also, this is twice as long as the previous two parts, I got soo carried away haha, well you can't blame me, writing is so fun! This is the last part of this headcanon series, I had so much fun writing this?? Even though I had like a mini writer's block at first, I swear I started typing this part out having no idea what I was doing, but it all turned out better than I expected. This part is not just Jason x reader but it also includes so much platonic stuff with the others of the seven + Reyna + Nico. It's just so fluffy omgg. Happy reading! Thank you sm for all the notes you guys have given me for the previous two parts! Tell me if you guys enjoyed it, do you think I should consider writing more of these headcanon stuff in the future?

Part one: https://www.tumblr.com/somewhereinhogsmeade/746404816602972160/daughter-of-neptune-headcanons?source=share

Part two: https://www.tumblr.com/somewhereinhogsmeade/746489087922520064/daughter-of-neptune-headcanons-list-part-two?source=share

•After Jason woke up on the bus, he'd actually remember your eyes and voice VERY clearly. Because those were his two favorite things about you. But Hera had whacked him on the head pretty badly, so he couldn't remember ALL the details about you in the beginning, like Percy did. (I honestly wanted to make him remember you fully even after Hera wiped his memory off, but that would be too similar to Percy and Annabeth lol so I didn't want it to be cliche sorry)

•Now you guys may be wondering, what about Piper and Jason? Okay Piper would admit her feelings for him, but Jason would turn her down, albeit politely though, because it felt utterly wrong. He knew about this special person in his forgotten life, even though her figure was wispy and blurry. He never had any attraction towards Piper, she was a good friend, sure, and it didn't matter how pretty people thought Piper was, because those black Obsidian eyes of the mystery girl he was so familiar with, was alone prettier by every means. (We all love a loyal whipped Jason who thinks that a pair of eyes are more beautiful than a daughter of Aphrodite)

•He knew you were special. He knew that he didn't belong there, in the wilderness school. He knew that he was miles away from home. His real home. But the name of that home never came to him. •the moment he looked at his SPQR tattoo, though, it would bring him vigorous flashes of you and him sparring in a training room.

•Aeolus the wind god, would remind Jason of the time you and him stayed at his palace to slay Trojan the sea monster. Well, of course you went, how can you go to slay a sea monster without taking a sea child with you? Right? That was the last quest you and Jason went on before he disappeared.

Aeolus would trigger that one memory in Jason. Thank the gods for Aeolus. That one memory trigger is what made everything gush back to Jason like a tide.

•He’d remember your name, finally. His Best friend. His crush. His maybe girlfriend. He'd remember his friends from his home. Camp Jupiter. Gosh. He felt such a burst of energy simply by saying that name. Now, he felt homesick.

So you could imagine the excitement he felt, when Leo was building the argo ii. He'd practically gush about you to Leo, and even Piper would be super cool with it. Over the course of the months, Piper realized that Jason and her were not romantically compatible at all, it was all Hera’s mist. She didn't even know what she was thinking, crushing on someone who was so different from her on every level. So now Piper and Jason were like homie coded.

You were super worried after Percy told you that the new, Greek ship, the argo ii would land today. Which was pretty weird, since it meant that Jason was coming back to you. Why were you worried?

•Well, for lots of reasons, what if Jason didn't remember you anymore, what if he lost his feelings for you, what if he found someone else? The stress was real.

•Without even realizing it, you poured your thoughts out to Percy, whom you initially refused to tell about your’s and Jason's.. er.. situationship.

•Percy, would surprisingly be chill about it?? Like you were expecting some panicking now that he knew his sister was romantically involved with someone.

•Percy would calmly tell you that Jason wouldn't stop loving you, proudly pointing to himself as an example, that he never stopped loving annabeth even after the Hera Fiasco. Well. He had a point. That boy was still whipped for his girl.

•So when you locked eyes with Jason, and saw the familiar gleam in his eyes, you knew, he didn't forget. You forgot how piercing his blue eyed gaze was,because it made you feel stuff erupting from your stomach lol (blud is the definition of 🧿👄🧿)

•Without even caring about what your fellow Romans thought, Jason and you would just lunge onto each other tbh. Its canon that Jason is the best hugger ever, so it would be a rib crushing kinda hug.

•You would be SO relieved that he'd remember you and he'd be so relieved that you didn't move on.

•You guys wouldn't kiss, not yet. You still haven't exactly acknowledged your relationship status, BUTTT you do the cheesy af forehead touch thing (you could have sworn percy fake-gagged LOL)That's when Jason noticed your praetor badge, he’d be stunned, and would ask you for details, you’d simply point to the golden eagle perched at the end of the senate house and tell him that you and percy got elected after you both returned the eagle together.

He’d fall in love all over again omgg the heart eyes he’d give youuu. He knew that you were downplaying your achievements tho, so he’d secretly ask Reyna for the full details lol. (Reyna was a proud mom, so she’d give Jason ALLL the deets)

•okay so when Annabeth judo flips percy, you'd be SO taken aback lol, you’d even get a lil uncomfortable bc well that's YOUR brother getting attacked by a random girl- so initially you’d be ready af to throw hands.But after Percy starts laughing you’d realize that THAT'S annabeth. Like Percy's Annabeth. Dam, your brother was with a fierce girl.ANYWAYS, Percy would introduce Annabeth to you proudly, like “THIS is MY sister” (so dramatic and for what reason)

Annabeth would initially be very nervous around you, because, one, she didn't know that Poseidon had ANOTHER kid, gods know what havoc you and percy would cause together, two, you meant a lot to percy and she could clearly see that, an idiot could deny how much love your brother had for you, so she was determined to not mess up her reputation around you, ESPECIALLY after she the look on your face when she flipped Percy (you had a hot temper, need i mention, so without even realizing it, you had directed a very fierce glare at her, oopsie).

Octavian would again, not give up in trying remove your’s and percy’s praetorship by going “Oh there cant be four praetors its against the rules” blah blah that's where percy intervenes with his legendary “we all outrank you loser” lol

So after the group’s lunch scene where they discuss the prophecies and stuff. You, Reyna and Jason would actually talk amongst yourselves, after you guys came to the conclusion that you will have to join the gang in the argo ii. Jason would secretly be overjoyed that he doesn't need to separate from you anymore but you guys would still be sad that Reyna wouldn't be able to come.

This also meant that you would have to give your praetorship up. Gosh your positions in camp Jupiter somehow never stuck permanently, you'd even joke about that. And Reyna would have to handle Camp Jupiter by herself now that all three of you left, But Reyna assured you that it wasn't your fault.

Okay enough with the plot yapping I did. Bc if I continue it would go on for ages. The main reason you're here is because of reader x jason and I'm kinda deviating from that a little.

It would actually take so long till you and Jason get alone time on the argo ii because of group discussions and coach Hedge lol But you both would meet at the deck at like 2 AM (this kinda reminded you both of the times you and he would sneak out to explore New Rome at night.) That's where you both could feel the tension in the air lol. So many unresolved and unrequited feelings on both ends, how would you approach that?

But thankfully, being best friends first gave you guys an upper hand to moving forward in the relationship very quickly. You'd just start off talking about each other's respective journeys in your respective camps. He'd tell you about the quest with Leo and Piper, and you'd tell him about what went on in Camp Jupiter while he was gone.

That's when you realize that Jason looked a little different than when he left. His hair was Messier, a little longer, no more neatly cropped, his azure eyes sparkled when he spoke of Camp half blood, and the war games they had, how different it was from Camp Jupiter, etc.

But instead of feeling upset about how much Jason enjoyed the other camp, you'd feel relief. Relieved that Jason no longer looked stressed anymore, he'd always held this fatigue in his eyes, while he was at camp Jupiter , it was no wonder, considering the politics he'd had to engage in to prove the worth of the twelfth legion, his leader duties + vigorous training had tired him out, but now, some of the fatigue his eyes held had vanished.

Camp half blood seemed to be the place for him. Now you were itching to go to this mystery camp your maybe boyfriend AND your brother seemed to love so much.

Jason would be super nervous to tell you that he liked it better at camp half blood, and that he secretly wanted you to come and stay with him there though. Because he felt like he was betraying his Roman life. He felt like he was betraying your past.

So when he'd tell you, he'd just yap and yap about it out of nervousness. That's when it happened. That's when you kissed him. You would just pull him in. Period.

He'd be super flustered at first, neck reddening and all, but he'd just lean in and be so into it (he's a neck grabber, fight me) You'd think that as a military dude, the guy would be a bad kisser. Hell no. His dad's the chief of getting all the bitches, he ain't letting his son embarrass him by having no charm lol

OH OH and speaking of the old man, The moment your's and Jason's lips met, you would hear a clasp of thunder and see huge steaks of lightning explode in the sky.

You had to admit, the thought of your dad's watching as you both kissed made you feel weird lol

But if Zeus had hated you so much, he would've zapped you to electrons by now, and if Poseidon had hated jason so much, he would've drowned him. But thankfully, neither happened.

After lots of long deep conversations (and kissing)You both would reach the decision that after the whole gaia situation is over, you'd both stay at Camp half blood, but, you'd both return to settle in New Rome as you grew up. I mean, it's Camp Jupiter that you both dislike staying in, not the city itself. The city is paradise for demigods.

But the fates ruined it, so despite gaia’s defeat (No leo is alive and well here okay) after Jason took up the responsibility of building shrines for minor gods, he had to go back and forth between both the camps.

But you, Reyna, Hazel and Frank would help Jason with the minor gods in Rome, While Jason took care of the Greeks. This made his job a tad easier.So the downside was that you kinda had to do long distance for a while AND you hadn't even visited camp half blood yet (Which got on Percy's nerves, the poor boy wanted to show you around his Camp and cabin SO badly, but the fates never left you or Jason alone. The Romans always had duties in front of them.)

But because you, Reyna, Frank, Hazel, Annabeth, and even Leo helped Jason with the shrine stuff. The job got done a lot quicker.

You both were finally at peace.So as a celebration to finishing the shrine project, Percy and Jason DRAGGED you to camp half blood and had the whole day spent with all of the 7 (including Reyna and Nico).

When I tell you, you've never had THIS much fun ALL your life omg.

You never got to bond with Leo, Piper or Annabeth properly because of the war, and stuff. But today? It was like you guys have been friends since forever.

You played capture the flag, You and Percy used up your water shenanigans to put on the most dramatic fountain show EVER (Annabeth was right in her judgment, you both were completely chaotic together) she realized how fun you actually were, not even half as grumpy as you looked. After you and Percy caused a huge avalanche that almost turned into a hail storm (which was prevented by wind boy Jason) Leo told you guys to stop flexing your fancy shmancy weather powers.

Piper taught you guys how to surf, which only ended in You and Percy somehow splattering water on each other and you aggressively tackling him into the bottom of the ocean, WHICH ended in a chaotic “who can swim faster?’’ competition between you both, You both were SO dedicated that you created a huge bubble to bring everyone into the bottom of the ocean to spectate (Frank turned into a sea urchin though lol)

You and Percy ended up in an argument over who won. Mind you, if you read part one, you'd know that Percy and you have this ability to telepathically converse with each other underwater, but only you both understand, so it would end up looking like you're making strangled fish noises to the others. Nico, Piper, and Leo were absolutely hysterical. Jason was amused but so clueless. Hazel was mortified, while Annabeth and Reyna hoped you and Percy didn't kill each other. And Frank? He was still an urchin.

Also, since You, Jason, Percy, Annabeth, Hazel and Frank would all go to New Rome College together, you guys would have SO many double dates together omgg.

I forgot to mention, you met Tyson and Percy's new little sister Estelle, so now your sibling group has expanded even more.

did i mention that percy and you would have matching dolphin plushies? yeah. he'd have the blue and you'd have the grey

Tyson would love you sm omg :( he'd keep making you stuff every time you showed up in camp half blood.

Also, Sometimes when Percy and Annabeth would be busy, You and jason would so babysit Estelle (which Sally would adore) Jason would so take Estelle flying.

can I just take this moment to emphasize how much Sally would care about Jason?? Like after hearing jason’s erm tragic past, Sally would get so protective of him and give him sm food and everything :( Jason would get a little emotional too. Like you can just see his eyes tearing up whenever Sally hugs him :(((

Even though Reyna joined the hunters, You and Jason would make it a point to see her at least Every two weeks. She'd be so proud of how far you and Jason had come, even after the long break that temporarily had your relationship on hold. Now Reyna could sleep peacefully lol since the poor girl had seen you both hopelessly pining for eachother since you were like 9 lol

She had listened to you telling her that you weren't good enough for Jason to like you back, AND him telling her that he wasn't good enough for you, after all.

Okay after you guys got older, because of the amount of services you and Jason had done for Camp Jupiter, you guys would end up receiving such a cool house in New Rome as a gift (it's like the least you deserved for all that you've been through lol) It would have a fancy Roman bath and everything. and even better, it was not far from where percy and Annabeth were living. So it was a win win.

You and Jason would totally iris message Nico at least once a week, you both were basically proud parents when you see Nico all lovey dovey in a relationship with Will. (Is this how Reyna felt seeing you and Jason? Maybe, yes)

Also, you and Thalia met not long after she came to Rome to check out the minor god's shrines. She loved you, like almost immediately, Jason iris messaged her atleast twice a week, so he told her all about you. So Thalia would be SO happy that someone was treating her lil bro right. He deserved that.

Speaking of family, Zeus had just grudgingly accepted that you were his son's girlfriend lol Poseidon would actually be a little chill about it. He wasn't as judgemental as his brother. But just because you and Jason were dating didn't mean that your dad's didn't stop having a go at each other lol

But you both would make it a point to start aggressively kissing eachother whenever you spot statues of your dad's placed next to eachother. Simply to piss them off. And it works. Every. Single. Time.

You would hear a clasp of thunder each time you do this. You and Jason would just look at eachother and burst into giggles. It was a tradition now between you both.

Sometimes Jason would still look at you like you were made of stardust, and vice versa.

In the end, you and Jason were what people called “Childhood Sweethearts”

[may0tuna]

I hate you more! Part 3

Pairing: Rodrick Heffley x fem!reader

Word count: 737

Warnings: angst

Summary: Reader sabotages Rodrick’s chances with Heather. A classic enemies to lovers!

Author's note: I'm trying to be more consistent in writing, and I'm trying to "plan out" the chapters more? As you may have noticed (or not), I have also updated my masterlist for better reading experience I guess haha I have also started to be more detailed as I can when posting fanfics including warnings and proper tagging lol I'm still new to all of this but yeah :) This chapter's a bit short but I just wanted to get this out so I can start "planning" the next few chapters? lol yeah

Tags: @tomhockstetter7-111 @vihtoriacorrea @sleepyb1txh

Part 1, Part 2, Part 4

"How do you read this again?" You asked Rodrick while pointing at the word "Sweaty" that's spelled out on a dog bowl.

"Uhh duh, it's sweetie!" Rodrick said confidently.

This is the second day of your tutoring session with Rodrick, and a day before your big test. You had arrived at the Heffleys a bit early so you decided to hang out with Greg and Rowley in the living room when Greg told you about how Rodrick pronounces "Sweetie." You decided to put it to the test when Rodrick came in through the front doors, and you held up the dog bowl and asked him what it says.

You, Greg, and Rowley failed miserably at trying to hide your laughter. It was too much that even Rodrick got embarassed. What's worse is that he doesn't know why you guys were laughing. He taunted Greg, and you decided to step in.

"Alright, come on, Rodrick, time to study," as you pull him by the waistband on his shirt.

"Don't tell me what to do," Rodrick snapped at you as he eyed you pulling him by his shirt.

"Oh? I think in this case, I can," you snapped back at him.

"Is that so?"

"Yes, because if you don't," you paused for a while and smirked at him. "Oh Mrs. Heffleyyyy," you said in an almost sing-song voice.

"Fine fine, you're a snitch!" Rodrick sighed in defeat as he headed upstairs into his room.

"She's awesome!" Greg told Rowley but you didn't hear it because you were already walking up the stairs with Rodrick.

When you arrived at Rodrick's room, it was still as messy as the first time you had set foot in there.

"Geez, would it kill you to clean up in here?"

"Why clean my own room when my mom will do it for me when she gets tired of calling me out on not cleaning my room?" Rodrick said as if he had figured out all the answers to the world. You just rolled your eyes.

"Let's just get this over with."

"What's the rush?" He asked.

"None of your business," you replied. The truth is that you're planning to sneak out later because you heard that there was this party where college students go to at the far-end of town. You always thought that you were too mature for your age so you casually enjoy hanging out with older people. Truth is, you always thought people can see right through your "too cool to be here" attitude and you're worried that people would hate you for it. Maybe Rodrick was right when he said you were only pretending in order to fit in. Did he just figure out your whole double life, the one you tried oh so hard to hide?

The good news is that no one can really tell how old you were when at events like college parties, and you still have your own set of fake IDs from when you were dating your ex. Rodrick didn't ask anymore questions but you can tell that he was curious about it.

"Anyway, let me be frank, you suck at spelling and your grammar is shitty. If I am getting this $100 a week, you need to really mean it."

"Why should I? You're the one getting paid, and if I recall correctly, you lied to me!"

"About what?"

"About Heather!"

"Please, you never had a chance with her!"

Rodrick became silent. His expression pained. You apologized and decided to reach your hand out to him, with the intention of giving him a light tap on the shoulder, but he dismissed it.

"Yeah okay," Rodrick's voice was low and soft. "Whatever," he said after some pause.

He was sitting on the bed and you were facing him, books and notes sprawled out in front of you two. Recently, you've noticed that there's this gnawing feeling whenever you see this side of him, like you want to take care of him. Then again, there is that other side that makes you want to punch him in the face.

"Rodrick," you said softly.

"What?" You detected a hint of annoyance in his voice.

"What if I split the $100? You get $40, I get $60, as long as you take this seriously. And if you take this seriously, we can end today's session a bit early," that last one was for your own benefit.

"Deal."

masterlist

[pinazee]

Zero to murder in sixty seconds

I think it says so much that despite constantly being compared to Gus as a kid, and, in fact, his dad praises Gus and we’ve yet to see him praise Shawn, that young Shawn still remained friends with him. I mean, young me would have been jealous and ditched him, or at the very least had a spat, but Shawn’s just like why can’t i be like you? (As seen in weekend warriors) I guess at that point shawn and gus had known each other for so long that he was more like a brother. It probably never even occurred to him that he could haha it cut me deep when Henry called his bike ridiculous cause i could feel it through the tv screen that little Shawn took that as his dad calling him ridiculous. Ugh henry’s criticisms hurt more this time. Probably because im an adult (technically) and i understand better how wrong he is to tell a child this shit. Shawn just wants to have fun damnit!

I will say though, at least Henry spends time with him. He’s not a great dad, but he wasn’t a deadbeat, even if that time was spent trying to sculpt his son into his own image, and someone he wasn’t.

Burton “i have two jobs” Guster over here twiddling his thumbs lol

Listen, if some guy comes up to me claiming to be psychic and then says anything personal about me, im going to assume hes a stalker. At no point does he make me believe they’re psychic.

(From the hip grossed over $9mil and Blue City grossed around $6mil so Shawn is right. This is the type of detailed research you get from a quality blog such as myself haha)

I loved Wally (Michael Barrett)! Psych’s one off characters are always so original and real. They have so much personality. Doesn’t matter if they’re the murderers either. They’ll make anyone likable.

I gotta talk about Buzz profiling Gus. This is another instance where it doesn’t settle right in our current climate, but, if im honest, the way it was handled wasn’t that bad. Because the show isn’t saying Buzz was right to profile, if anything it highlights how wrong he was to do so. And Buzz had no legitimate reason to stop them, so he was just being a bad cop. However, i do wish the show had called it out more. Like you can have the profiling (because that happens) but then make it a learning experience for Buzz and have someone point out to him how wrong it was. Like Shawn knows the law, and he knows Buzz isn’t a bad person, he could easily explain to him what he did was wrong. OR, they could even have had a small moment where we see Buzz contemplating his actions and the moral implications of such practice. Anything to show that he learned, because we as audience members want to root for him. I hate to say I’ll let it pass because of the time (because jesus fuck i was alive in that time and it doesn’t feel right to consider my past like it was part of some ancient society), so I’ll just say, it was bad for Buzz to do it and leave it at that.

This ep gave me further evidence that Gus has a secret spy life, because, why did he have to write “in the middle of a field” on a post it??? I thought for a second it had something to do with the drugged alien abduction guys from season 1 but why would he have to write that down?

Who is he selling these drugs to, the FBI??

P.S I LOVE HIS EXCITED LITTLE HOPS!

[thelazyhermits]

Book 7 has got me thinking about my Yuu's dynamic with Sebek and Silver, so I decided I wanna make a most about this trio like the one did with AYuuDeuce.

There are some Book 7 spoilers underneath the cut, and they're spoilers from some of the parts that are currently only available in the JPN server, so if y'all don't wanna see any form of spoilers, I'd recommend not reading this post.

Okay, so everyone knows that I adore Sebek and absolutely love writing fluffy moments with him and Yuu. That's why these two have such a close relationship my A Twisted Future series.

I've decided that all my current Sebek fics happen prior to Book 7, so they're both super close by the time Book 7 happens.

Silver, however, is someone I haven't talked a lot about which is a shame cause I love him a lot too.

Yuu treats Silver a lot like Kalim in that she really trusts him and is fond of him cause Silver is just such a sweetheart and is always a perfect gentleman around her, which is the kinda treatment she's a sucker for.

One idea related to the Silver/Yuu relationship that I came up which I really love is that Yuu is always able to wake up Silver when he falls asleep.

While others will often have difficulty waking Silver up when he's sleeping particularly deeply, Yuu doesn't really have that problem, and the reason for that is because she genuinely, platonically loves him.

I'm not quite sure about all the details about the sleeping curse that was placed on Silver when he was a baby. Like if it's only half broken thanks to the passage of time/Lilia or if it's completely broken but Silver just has sleep spells as an unfortunate side effect of being cursed for so long. If that's ever explained/confirmed, I totally missed that lol

Regardless, I love the idea of "love" still playing a crucial role when dealing with Silver's sleepiness, so someone with a pure love for him, whether it be romantic or platonic, can have an easier time waking him as compared to anyone else trying to wake him.

This kinda thing is perfect for Yuu who just loves so wholeheartedly without reservations due to having been unloved for all her life. She's desperate for that kinda love, which is why she doesn't hesitate to give it to those who are important to her since, to her, that's only fair.

Anyway, I just think it'd be super cute and wholesome if Yuu's always able to wake Silver up for a reason like that, and it's definitely an idea that matchmaker Lilia can get behind haha

Prior to Book 7, I'd say Yuu's relationship with Silver is a good one built on mutual trust and admiration for each others skills/good qualities, but I wouldn't say they're super close friends. They're definitely not as close as Yuu and Sebek are.

However, Book 7 is obviously gonna change things cause Yuu ends up spending so much time with Silver and Sebek, resulting in those three forming a really tight bond due to everything they've had to face and overcome together.

Rest assured, all the moments in Book 7 when Silver/Sebek need a hug, Yuu makes sure they get one. There are so many hug sessions that go on in this book.

When this madness is all over, I just want these kids all wrapped up in warm blankets and all cuddled up together somewhere safe where they can just rest and de-stress 😭

By the end of Book 7, the boys and Yuu are super comfortable with each other, like personal space is rarely considered, cause these kids went through hell and need that physical contact and a ton of it.

Anytime the boys are feeling unloved/are being weighed down by their insecurities, Yuu is showering them with as much love as she can and will keep at it for as long as they need her to.

She'll hug them close, card her fingers through their hair, and offer any kind of affection they want/need.

Sebek is the type who just loves being doted on by her, so Yuu always goes all out with that. Meanwhile, Silver just enjoys having someone close, someone he can hug and talk to if he has something he needs to get off his chest since he doesn't want to ask for too much. Of course, Yuu makes sure Silver gets that and so much more because it's what that sweet boy deserves.

Meanwhile, Sebek and Silver become very good at noticing when something's off with Yuu and are quick to offer comfort when they can tell she needs it, knowing it's better to act before she asks since she's not the type to ask for help until she's really bad off.

Silver will just quietly hold her hand or gently stroke her hair/back, or they'll just take a nap together if she just needs to a break from everything. He's always so gentle with her but never treats her like she's a piece of glass. That's just how he is since he possesses such a soft, gentle kindness that envelops you like a warm blanket fresh from the dryer.

While Sebek had already become quite good at expressing affection toward Yuu prior to Book 7, he's even better after the book since now he rarely ever hesitates to reach out to her when he thinks she needs him.

Sebek will often just wrap Yuu up in a tight, protective embrace that's always full of his love and care for her. Meanwhile, the kisses he places against her face and hair are always extremely tender, showcasing how much he treasures her.

By the end of Book 7, all three of them are more protective of each other because of everything they went through. Silver/Sebek are especially protective of Yuu cause there were times when her recklessness got the better of her during the book's events.

And I could see this book being when Yuu admits that her recklessness is the result of growing up her whole life never really caring about her own well-being since she was always treated like she was worthless. She never experienced love prior to NRC, so she didn't know how to love herself.

Fortunately, since coming to NRC, she has learned this valuable lesson, and she knows that now there are people who would be upset if she died, so she never wants to put the people she loves through that kinda pain. Plus, she truly wants to live now that she has a life she thinks is worth living.

Needless to say, Sebek gets really emotional when he hears that and hugs the hell out of her for a while.

Regrettably, old habits die hard, which is why Yuu can't just completely stop being reckless just cause she wants to, so that's why she will still have moments when she puts herself in danger in order to protect her loved ones.

Which is why Silver/Sebek will always watch her back because they want to protect her just as much.

Thanks to Book 7, I am now just so soft for the SilYuuSeb trio cause they're all such good kids who are always working so hard and doing their best. They care so much about each other and have so much mutual respect for one another.

Depending on how Book 7 ends, I might just have to write a fic with these three.

Just imagine, when it's all over and done and they're supposed to return to their rooms at the end of the day now that everything's back to normal, none of them can sleep, not even Silver, cause it's been what feels like forever since these three last slept on their own without the other two present and it just feels wrong to not know with complete certainty that they're all completely safe.

Fortunately, Lilia was smart enough to have Yuu stay over at Diasomnia for the night, out of concern for her mental state after such a stressful ordeal, so once the three have had enough of being alone, they all end up seeking each other out in the middle of the night.

Hence, the timeless classic cuddle pile cause that's exactly what these poor kids need.

And of course, the next morning, Lilia finds the three fast asleep all cuddled up together and is absolutely thrilled 😂

(There's also some worry, of course, but more than anything, he is just loving seeing his boys becoming even closer to his future daughter lol)

[slexenskee]

Re: wtf is going on with Gojo’s Six Eyes/A list of Gojo’s ridiculous powers

Tbh I had to write this up because I too have trouble keeping up with this man’s massively over-powered abilities lol. Y’all also I’m lowkey shook how many of you haven’t watched jjk and only know the shitposting dumpster fire that is Ru-kun 🤣 amazing

Six Eyes: Okay so in JJK the Six Eyes can see cursed energy in, like, super granular detail, up to great distances, and Gojo can tell a lot about a person from that alone. It’s also the reason he has like, infinite cursed energy, because it can use all the info to regulate his cursed energy to maximum efficiency so his output is almost zero. He’s also impossible to sneak up on (by everyone but Toji lol) because of it, and has some kind of eidetic visual memory? I imagine he just has an eidetic memory to begin with though haha. I honestly just kinda assume it’s like the Byakugan without the weird seeing right through people. In the BNHA verse this basically just means he can ‘see’ people’s quirks all around him, in a radius thats probably like 25m at rest (like has his blindfold on and isn’t actively using it) and up to 1km (.5 miles) in like ‘battle mode’, he’s paying attention doesn’t have a blindfold on etc, and like 5k+ in the ‘oh shit I’ve lost my kid’ panic mode. So from like an AoE standpoint it’s okay, BNHA has heroes with quirks that have a better radius than that, but the level of detail it has is pretty god-tier, like if he’s in a crowd of hundreds of people he can still pinpoint every single quirk and what it is. 

In this universe the Six Eyes can see Plus Alpha Energy, aka Quirk Energy. Gojo can see what a person’s quirk is and more or less how it works. As of the most recent JJK chapters, it was also revealed that the Six Eyes can see souls or something like it? It’s also unclear how much they see beyond just ‘energy’ as Gojo regularly walks around with a blindfold on and doesn’t bump into shit, and inanimate objects don’t have Cursed Energy in JJK canon, so idk how he does that if the Six Eyes only see Cursed Energy. 

They also tire him out to some extent, and can’t be ‘turned off’ like the Sharingan/Byakugan, which is why he normally covers them with a blindfold, sunglasses, or bandages as he did for whatever reason in JJK 0. I headcanon that it’s not debilitating for him to go a long time with them uncovered by any stretch, but it does exhaust him. And since he doesn’t like using his Reverse-Cursed Technique without reason, he’d rather just keep them covered. 

It’s also never stated why tf they’re called the Six Eyes. Why Six??? Whatever there’s a lot that is unexplained in JJK we just gotta roll with it. 

THEY ARE ALSO BEAUTIFUL??? What a vibe Akutami-sensei so glad we’re done with the whole creepy byakugan shit ✨

Limitless Techniques (blue, red, hollow purple): They work the exact same as they do in JJK, manipulating space using the concept of infinity, etc etc. The only real difference is that people can see them in BNHA even if they don’t have cursed energy (I think in JJK technically non-shamans can’t see cursed energy at all?) For readers who haven’t watched JJK, Limitless acts on the atomic level and more or less works like gravity. There’s Blue, which attracts, and Red, which repels. Hollow Purple is when Gojo combines positive infinity and negative infinity and makes a spatial anomaly in a very epic and unsubtle way. We’ve only ever seen Gojo use it as a beam of pure destruction, so we don’t really know much about its actual limitations. Since it’s more or less voiding reality though, I imagine it’s unstoppable and there’s just no way to block it, you either get out of the way or don’t exist anymore lol. In my fic, it’s main limitation is that it’s on the slower time (long activation) isn’t very precise and can’t be stopped once he starts it. 

Infinity: Again, exact same as in JJK. Gojo’s mastery of it + his Six Eyes + his reverse-cursed energy technique means he never has to turn it off ever. He has an impenetrable forcefield around him that theoretically can be activated 24/7. Is it good for him to have it on that long? Probably not because he has to use his reverse-cursed technique to constantly ‘refresh’ his brain and I am of the opinion there is nothing more curative in life than good sleep lol. What does Infinity keep out? Literally everything. Every. Fucking. Thing. Rewatching JJK ep8 is insane this thing even stops sound waves. At any rate in this fic it again stops everything, even quirk energy (or rather, the plus alpha energy waves emitted by quirk energy)  

^ Gojo being op asf in EP 8 stopping Jogo’s attack and his soundwave-attack bug things

Infinity is also automatic. JJK S2 ends with Gojo perfecting Infinity to the point it works without conscious thought on his part, and literally filters ‘dangerous’ things out by calculating their speed/matter/velocity. He can reconfigure what can/can’t pass through his barrier basically instantaneously, and as of JJK S2 was figuring out how to go even further and filter out things at the atomic level,  like parsing out certain molecular structures that are poisonous. Infinity in a nutshell runs like a computer program, or more specifically an if/then statement, and Gojo can program it however he likes. 

An explanation of how Infinity interacts with Quirks/what quirks work on Gojo vs. what quirks don’t can be found here 

Domain Expansion (Infinite Void): Forgot to include this one on the first go around but adding it since he does use this technique in this fic at least once. Domain Expansion in JJK is the ‘pinnacle of Jujutsu Sorcerery’ and in essence it envelops the user and nearby people in a certain radius (not sure what it is exactly but I’m assuming you have to at least see the person to be able to drag them into your domain) into a ‘domain’ controlled by the user. It’s the most OP of all cursed techniques and Gojo isn’t the only sorcerer who can use it, although his is like the most lethal of everyone’s. His is called Infinite Void and its this existential crazy ass world where all the information of the entire universe floods his opponent and basically renders them inert because its too much information for any mortal brain to process. 

Aaaaand the only way to combat it is to lay out an opposing domain, and since no one can do that in bnha it’s unbeatable lol. Gojo doesn’t use it often because it tires him out and it’s also just not useful unless he’s trying to render someone brain dead or other very specific occasions. 

Reverse-Cursed Technique: Using reverse-cursed energy to heal. Idk how this works it confuses me to this day, all I know is that it can heal crazy shit and Gojo used it on himself to bring himself back from the brink of death: spoiler alert, like knifed in the brain kind of ‘brink of death’. So even if someone ever manages to get past Infinity, they’d have to blow him up/cut off his head to have him stay dead lol. As of canon, he hasn’t ever used it on anyone else other than himself - apparently that’s harder to do than self-healing? 

Quirk - Blue Flames: His actual ‘quirk’ that he was born with as Todoroki Touya are his flames, and he basically never uses them on their own in this story. This is the exact same quirk as the OG Dabi, it just doesn’t hurt him because he can use Infinity to create a barrier between himself and his own flames, since I don’t believe they’re ‘emitted’ from inside his body. While he may no longer injure himself using his flames, they still tire him out way more than his cursed techniques (where he has his Six Eyes to precisely ration how much he uses to a negligible amount) just like over-using a quirk would any other quirk-user. 

Quirk + Cursed Energy - Cremation: This is a combo of using his quirk and his cursed techniques. He was already god level from his cursed energy, but cremation makes him like a double god or something 🤣 stupidly overpowered. Insta-death shit. He emits flames using his quirk, draws an imaginary barrier of ‘Infinity’ around a defined perimeter, and uses the pressure of his Limitless Blue (attraction) to condense the flames in that space into, like, supernova levels almost instantaneously. Like this is not fire anymore, this is legit plasma. Basically he’s using heat and pressure to cause nuclear fusion on the atomic level. It seemed very fitting, since his cursed techniques are all atomic based. It achieves the same end state as Hollow Purple using different methods. 

Pros - it doesn’t leave a trail of destruction like Hollow Purple; Gojo can be very granular on what area is effected by the technique; its much faster than Hollow Purple, being almost instantaneous. 

Cons - not as flashy (which would totally be a con for Gojo lol); leaves no trace behind; tires him out since it requires him to use his quirk, which is not refreshed by his reverse-cursed technique or regulated by his Six Eyes. 

Teleportation: had to come back to add this one too lol. This is still pretty unexplained in JJK, so I’m making it up. Mine is based on 2 things - time and proximity. Time as in - the last time Gojo was at the point he wants to teleport to (an hour ago, yesterday, two weeks ago, etc.). Proximity as in - how close the two points he’s traveling to are. To me, Teleportation and Hollow Purple are his two cursed techniques that require the most energy, but teleportation’s energy expenditure depends on the two factors I mentioned above. Like Gojo warping him AND Hawks back to his hotel in Tokyo from Palawan? That would put a noticeable dip in his reserves, even with his Six Eyes. Because it’s a long-ish distance, because it had been at least a few days since he’d last been to his hotel, and the real kicker - because he was teleporting another person, which I imagine to be 100x more taxing than teleporting himself. But him teleporting around the forest in the training camp? That’s nothing to him because the distance was so close. (Although him teleporting Izuku and Kota back to the camp cost him more in energy than erasing Muscular from existence LOL) In my fic he doesn’t need to know the exact destination of where he’s teleporting if he has a ‘lock’ on someone’s quirk and knows their exact GPS coordinates - i.e., how he found Yui. 

Also unrelated to gojo’s powers I bought the Mappa animation keyframe book for JJK and omggg look at it its stunning!! also Gojo 10/10 confirmed wears lipgloss 🤣 Mappa has it outlined and everything!! 

[icabrth]

Hello! I really love your stories, especially the ones about breaking bad 🤍. I would like to ask, do you write nsfw content?

Thanks for the answer! As for my request, it's about Gus Fring (I can't, I love him too much 😭😭). I've always headcanoned him as a rather jealous and possibly even overprotective partner. I mean, after everything that's happened to Max, he must be pretty caring about his partner. What do you think about this?

I don't have a very detailed plot, but lately I've been thinking about how he would come to the realization that he likes the reader? I don't think Gus is the kind of person who tends to lie to himself; he is a serious person, as are his intentions. How does he confess his feelings to the reader?

I would prefer a female reader, please? I don't think she related to crime either. Maybe she met Gus when she was working for him? The manager at his restaurant? His housekeeper? I don't know, haha.

Oh, and if you don't mind, I imagine her as a rather shy and soft person. I think that's what Gus liked about her: she's not like anyone else he knows, so spending time with her allows him to... distract and relax. Like a breath of fresh air.

Thank you so much for your stories again! I'm in love with them 🤍🤍🤍

quiet realization

pairings: gustavo fring x fem!reader

summary: the story of you and gus

warnings: slight mention of crime

masterlist

a/n: I should really be studying rn but I couldn’t get this request out of my head lol.. also tysm for requesting ur acc so sweet ♡

You met Gustavo Fring through work; being his housekeeper and nanny for his children, the two of you spent a lot more time together than either had anticipated.

“How are you liking the food, sir?” You asked your employer. A nervous smile grazing your face as sugarcoating laced your voice. You didn’t know wether it’d be best to keep eye contact, or to avoid it. He didn’t seem bothered by the thick tension (which was swallowing you whole) as he kept his eyes on you, searching for yours.

“Please, call me Gus. We are more than acquainted by now, don’t you think?” He straightened up as he flashed you a playful, yet somehow professional grin.

Gus confused you to no end; every move he made seemed so calculated, so thought out that it scared you. Your obvious attraction to him didn’t do much to relief your anxiety.

You weren’t like him. He could read you like a book, as you were. Your actions were pure hearted and executed with good intentions. This is why no one would’ve expected the two of you to match to perfectly. It seemed you were both exactly what the other needed.

As he awaited your answer, he secretly struggled keeping up his exterior wall. You were right about him – he did have a motive, and his every move was calculated. Right now, he was trying to gain your trust. Get on some reliance level in order to get closer to you.

Gus wasn’t sure about his feelings toward you and he struggled to put a label on his developing crush. Romantic relations came rare to him, and he wasn’t sure if what he’d felt for any of his past lovers could be classified as love. What he did know though, was that you made his heart flutter in a way so unfamiliar and great – it made him think he was dying.

One of his more significant memories of you as a housekeeper was one night when he’d arrived home late to see you tucking his youngest as you put them to sleep with your gentle, loving voice.

Seeing how close you’d gotten with his children just made him more and more impatient with figuring out his feelings for you. There you were – the perfect girl, right in front of him –and he was doing nothing to keep you.

You were so sweet, so genuine – it made him want to protect you. Keep you hidden and ignorant to his life of crime. So, this is around the time when he officially decided to himself that he was, indeed, in love with you.

It was a quiet realization, and he couldn’t just confess his undying love to you right then and there, without no preparation whatsoever. So, he decided he needed to get closer to you instead of just knowing you through small interactions and watching from afar.

So, he began treating you with personalized gifts once in a while, telling you how grateful he was for your patience and understanding with his children. He began insistent on helping you with your cooking, and would practically force you to eat with him. Although you did appreciate his acts of kindness, you didn’t understand where they were coming from. Your obviousness to his feelings lead you to believe he had some kind of bad intention. It wouldn’t be fair to blame you, though, as his terribly attempts at flirting were hard to read.

These little dinner dates all let up to this moment, this time he was going to make some progress with you. No, scratch that – this time he was going to confess to you.

“The food is quite tasty, ___! You are an except cook as well as an excellent company,” he praised you. Your cheeks began to heat up, and you felt your mouth twitch in unknowing response. “As are you, Gus. Thank you.” Your interactions would’ve been short and awkward to the eye, but neither of you seemed too bothered by the silence. In fact, what you had learned over the months of working for him, was that his actions said a lot more about his character than his words.

“___,” he stated as he put his larger hand on top of yours and your eyes met for the first time that day. “___, I am in love with you.” The words uttering from his mouth didn’t feel read, neither did the butterflies in your stomach as your breath hitched. You realized this had to be real, because you couldn’t physically feel a movie the same way you felt his warm fingers intertwine with yours. Or the soft, yet firm feel of his lips as he pulled you closer to him.

You realized that this was just as real as his hot breath against your ear, whispering: “you have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that”

[fayes-fics]

20 Questions for Fic Writers!

I was tagged by @suspendingtime. Thanks my dear. 🫶🫶 Apologies I'm a little tipsy right now haha. 🤪

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

155. Ahem, hush you. I started writing 18 months ago. When I get a new hobby, I REALLY lean into it.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

481,485. Yup, almost half a million. Again, shhhh.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Only Bridgerton. Look, I have my hyperfixations, ok?

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

On AO3:

In His Lap (Short Fic) 181 

Temptation 177 

The Lesson 155 

Insatiable 149 

Are We Friends? 148

Tumblr notes:

Second Son 3,436

Sonnet #29 2,199

Rescue & Ruin 1,841

Awakening 1,827

Temptation 1,788

Wattpad readers:

Innocence, 30,600

Benedict Bridgerton Regency One Shots 23,000

Kinktober 2022 collection 16,300

Anthony Bridgerton Regency One Shots 10,400

Moments 5,800

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

Yes. Always. It's just wonderful to get feedback. I read and respond to every single comment. They mean the world to me, truly.

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

Probably No Good Advice. I ended up writing Moments multi-chapter as I (and a friend) couldn't bear the idea they didn't end up together lolol.

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

All of them, tbh. I can't write an unhappy ending. Maybe the mushiest is Second Son, Moments, or It Had To Be You.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Luckily not much yet. I did get one hate anon early on. It wasn't about a specific fic, though. It said they didn't know why I had a 'please don't steal my work' disclaimer (the standard one that most writers here use) cos I was delusional that my work was worth stealing. 🤷‍♀️

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

Yes, it's my trademark. It's rare when I don't write smut. 😬 I'm not sure what is meant by kind of smut. I've written it all, from vanilla romantic sex to kink threesomes with harnesses and double penetration lol. I haven't had a request yet that I've turned down due to sexual content.

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

Not yet. The closest I've gotten is It Had To Be You, which is based on When Harry Met Sally.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yes, sadly, it has happened quite a few times now. I was so fed up with filing copyright takedown notices that I set up a Wattpad account to try to counter it.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No. I've been offered but have turned it down. I have no way to check that any translation would get across the nuance I aim for. So I know that may be anglo-centric, but its how I feel for now.

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

Not yet, but I am always threatening to lolol.

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

Hmm, tough one. I do love Kanthony tbh.

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

Benedict as a virgin. I just urghhh.... it's been a WIP for 17 months now. I just dunno why I won't finish it; I just get the feeling I won't.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I have no bloody idea. I'd prefer readers answer that tbh lol. My inclination is to say I don't have one, except perhaps a willingness to describe sex in ridiculous levels of detail? Is that a strength?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

World building. I will do anything to shortcut it. I'll find an economical way to describe a situation e.g. she's a widow; they're old friends. Got it? Good! Let's get down to business.

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

I've done a smidgeon of French as I studied it for ten years. But I doubt I'd do another language tbh.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Only Bridgerton so far.

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

Bloody hell, I have no fucking idea. It literally changes depending on my mood. But I don't really care for my own writing that much, all I see is flaws lol. I guess the universe I would most like to write more for one day is Mrs Bridgerton and its sequel. Does that count?

No Pressure Tagging: A couple of my talented writing moots were tagged along with me on this (the lovelies @colettebronte and @eleanor-bradstreet). So lets go: @thebabblingbrookenook @fiction-is-life @ferns-fics @silverhallow @mothdruid @queen-of-the-misfit-toys @urchintoast 😁🧡🧡

[teejaystumbles]

Talk to me about BtOM and/or its sequel? I've seen some of the webcomic and would love to know more

Hooo boy! Thank you so much for your interest! This is going to be a long post! BtoM is my original webcomic, set in the Aztec empire in the 15th century, before the arrival of the Spaniards. It's not trying to be historically accurate but I did quite a lot of research at the time to get cultural stuff and place settings right. It features, as main characters, Metztlitototl, a boy who fell from the sky; Mictlantecuhtli, god of death; Tezcatlipoca, god of, heh, a shitload of things LOL, and his highpriest Itztli, a human. They try to navigate their feelings for each other while finding out where Metz came from. It's a gay love fantasy drama. (while I and the characters often refer to Metz as a "boy", he is not underage) I came up with the basic story idea over twenty years ago and developed it over the years (with the help of a writer who is not part of it any more) into a fully fleshed out story. At the moment it spans six full chapters with about 30-40 pages each; the seventh and last chapter is still unfinished. I have taken huge breaks over the years, coming back to it again and again. I have always promised that I will one day finish it and I still intend to keep that promise. The shutdown of smackjeeves had me loose my main platform for hosting the comic and while I have plans to make my own website, at the moment it's hard to direct people to where to read it easily. That's why I set up a new tumblr for it, but editing all the pages and making the posts is also a huge effort I struggle with. (So sorry!!! I will try and be better!)

It's hard to share stuff because it's a comic script, not a novel, but I'd like to share something from chapter seven, Mic and Itztli trying to figure out who or what Metz actually is-

Itztli is sleepless, he roams the temple grounds restlessly, deep circles under his eyes. He coughs violently and spits but doesn't see the blood mixed with his spit. At dawn he comes upon a secluded area where a fire must have been burning not long ago, a qualming brazier and lots of footprints make him curious. He inspects the scene and finds almost but not completely erased drawings in the earth, depicting... Metztlitototl? What is the meaning of this? Is that... the boy? "It is as I thought." Itztli whirls around at the voice, and Mic stands before him (not the skeleton, but the "nice" Mic). Itztli squats down immediately, heart pounding. "Lord of Mictlan." Mic ignores him. He looks around, sees traces of burnt incense, and even a feather of a bird, hinting at a blood sacrifice. Without looking at Itztli, still studying the area, he says: "Tell me about the night you found him."

The sequel is a very indulgent PWP that has them figuring out their feelings even more and basically all four of them end up in a polyamorous relationship haha. It was my pleasure project to write when the mood struck and has reached the same length as the main story document (oops LOL)

My favourite is not the main character Metz but Itztli, my precious poor boy who'd do anything for his capricious master. He's probably the reason the sequel exists because they needed more space to flourish <3

The main characters, Metz and Mic, are soft and lovely and I love them to bits but they are also, well, easy. Also, Mic is obviously inspired by Dream. My teenage self had a type (and still has). xD

Feel free to ask me more detailed questions! I will endeavour to post more comic pages soon!

[branmer]

🧡💚🖤💖💕 for b5!

for this meme

sorry i took a wee bit to reply to these! but here we go! controversial opinions under cut >:)

🧡that the minbari soul stuff is real and should be taken at face value, which imo completely ignores several in-show details we get that indicate that the trilumanaries weren't detecting souls, but human dna. we even get this pretty much explained to us in atonement when it's explained that the triluminary glows for delenn because she's a child of valen and therefore descended from the jeffster himself. that's also why the triluminary glowed for other humans that were interrogated! not because it was picking up fragments of of valen's soul in them all, but because it was just picking up human dna! and ok, granted, i have no fucking clue how that works either re the triluminary somehow being an advanced scanner or the dna stuff lol, but b5 has plenty of examples of stuff where tech is simply so advanced it gets mistaken for or used as magic (the fucking technomages damn it). anyway i just. do not understand why people take the soul stuff at face value when the show itself LITERALLY DISPROVES IT. gOD

💚 i talked about neroon in my previous response so i will turn now to branmer. again this is a taking things at face value thing, but i really don't get it when people just assume delenn is totally correct that he didn't really want to be a warrior and was forced etc, especially since in that same convo she says stuff that contradict that! saying stuff like 'he believed in the rightness of the war' doesn't sound like a guy who felt bad about joining the fray, it sounds like he was very into it in fact! and then the fact that she gives that very uh, interestingly worded response when sinclair asks her how branmer felt about the surrender... anyway I just think that if branmer became a warrior it was because he wanted to and because he got some fulfillment in the role and i think a lot of what delenn says in that scene is her trying to assauge her guilt because she feels he wouldn't have become involved in the war if not for choices she made. i also like, really don't see what right she had to claim him for the religious caste when he had chosen the warrior caste. that sounds a lot like her attempting to invalidate a legit choice her friend made just because she didn't agree with it and is actually very uncool!

🖤same answer as before: delenn. i just think she is a much more morally complex and interesting character than she gets portrayed as by fandom and i think her characterisation from mid s4 onwards did her an immense diservice. i much prefer her more conflicted characterisation in earlier seasons, tho i will give s4 credit for rbl, an episode which straight up says 'delenn is actually very blinkered and prejudiced and lets this effect her perspective and her decisions in a not great way' but then concludes with lennier going 'and actually that's a good thing!' NO IT ISN'T LENNIER, and you need to have a proper talk with her about it!

💖i mean honestly i think it's probably that i have issues with the latter season's portrayal of delenn and sheridan as always righteous and correct and a total power couple girlbossing their way to glorious success. i think there are a lot of things that are quite effed up about the establishment of the interstellar alliance and how much power ends up consolidated in their hands with zero oversight. what's interesting is that i feel like s5 sort of attempted to criticise it with sheridan making many terrible decisions as president? but im not actually sure if that was deliberate and not just... bad writing on jms's part and him not realising he was making them do incredibly stupid things

💕i feel like all my ships are smaller ships that aren't super popular lol, probably the most popular is marcus/neroon. i put down neroon/sheridan last time for this one haha, but for the sake of a bit of change i will also say: any of my oc ships. i have many minbo ocs and i do love to ship them with each other haha

thank you for the ask <33333 sorry again i took a bit to reply

[nerdacious]

So now that the fic has been finished for a bit I have some questions about the making of Partners and Paper Trails. I'm just curious about what it was like to write it (and wondering whether my experiences writing for this fandom are universal). No pressure to answer!

Generally speaking, did you find Harry's chapters or Kim's chapters harder/easier to write?

Which parts of the fic (either POV) were your favorite to write? Alternatively, which parts were unexpectedly frustrating?

From what I understand, you wrote the entire fic ahead of time and then edited it as you went along, but didn't start publishing it until the first draft was entirely finished. Do you have any advice for someone who's attempting to write a long fic following a similar process?

(as a secret fourth question, if there's any hidden lore/details that people didn't seem to pick up on/something else fic related you want to share and haven't had the opportunity to, I'm all ears. love me some secret lore 👀)

Sorry it took me so long to respond, I was working on my response instead of working and then I was like crap, I should probably do work, and then I actually went out and did stuff with people irl for once lol. So now I'm back home and can answer this!

Generally speaking, did you find Harry's chapters or Kim's chapters harder/easier to write?

There were aspects of both that were difficult. I spent a whole other fic in Kim's head so I had more practice with him, but I think Harry ended up being a little easier or at least more fun. I could break up reactions and thoughts into each of his aspects vs the solid paragraphs of Kim's chapters. You also can just do more wacky stuff with Harry and his skills. However, it was hard to remember all of the skills. Like, I did Encyclopedia so dirty. After a point I kind of just forgot about him or didn't feel like thinking up facts for him to chime in about lol

Which parts of the fic (either POV) were your favorite to write? Alternatively, which parts were unexpectedly frustrating?

My favorite thing to write is dialogue, especially when Kim and Harry are really getting into the groove of the case and when they get their little banters going. I also really like competence porn so Harry wasn't nearly as much of a mess as he could be in game. It was a bit of a wish fulfillment fic in that I wanted to see Harry doing better for himself and not just for Kim. I think directly after Martinaise he probably was doing worse than the point he's at in the start of the fic.

The hardest part was writing the case and trying not to make it too obvious (but it definitely was so I had to hope people enjoyed it regardless haha). I'd never done a mystery before so coming up with what happened and how/what they discovered was challenging. So I guess that's not really unexpectedly difficult. Writing the actual porn was unexpectedly frustrating! A majority of what I write is smut so it was like "why is this so difficult???". I had to get that last chapter perfect (I still don't think it is, but what writer ever does) because I dragged it out long enough and I didn't want to let anyone down. It's very different from what I originally had. I also had never written d/s before, thankfully my editor has experience in that realm so he had really good pointers even though it's really light in the fic lol. I still don't know how successful I was with the smut for this one.

From what I understand, you wrote the entire fic ahead of time and then edited it as you went along, but didn't start publishing it until the first draft was entirely finished. Do you have any advice for someone who's attempting to write a long fic following a similar process?

Some people can just write and post as they go, but I have way too much anxiety to start posting something that isn't finished. I also have way too much ADHD to trust that once I started something I actually would finish it. I've also seen too many fics that don't know or don't want to quit so they just keep going past the point where it would have been a good/interesting ending (not really in this fandom, I just mean in general). So, yes, I finished it, had my editor do an initial read, made some general edits based on his feedback, and then he did a more in-depth edit of the first few chapters and then I started posting them. Some chapters I added a lot more to them during this stage and some chapters stayed pretty much the same. There are a few chapters that haven't been edited because he was unexpectedly unavailable for an extended period of time and I didn't want to stop the momentum. I didn't really have a beta reader for this one, but I asked a few people to beta specific chapters. It's not something I typically would want, I'd have preferred to have a beta for all of it, but it is what it is (or was rather). So all of that is to say, you don't have to do it that way lol, but I would at least have an outline and stopping point and stick to it. And if you want a beta reader, find someone who's opinion you trust and who you can trust will be honest with you. Also don't get rid of anything entirely. If you like something, but it doesn't work, cut it and paste it in a separate document because you might find a way to bring it back or parts of it back in other places. Also make copies for version control. Once I finished it, I made a copy so if I changed something too much in the final version but didn't like it, I could either refer back to or restore parts from the original.

As for secret lore/things no one mentioned:

In the first chapter, when Mollins first flips the siren on, Harry has an adverse reaction to the sound because of his encounter with The Pigs. Then there's an Esprit De Corps check about her listening to her police shows. (Hilarious fact: I couldn't remember her real name correctly at first and before I double checked the wiki I thought it was Marine Le Pen loool)

This goes back to the first fic, but Kim bought a book on how to support someone in addiction recovery and the receipt shows he bought it when he first started as a detective with Eyes. If you take the radiation drug in the game, there's mention of Kim possibly having had a partner with addiction. Also based on his many comments on seeing officers in much worse condition and having only one partner, I'm guessing he's talking about Eyes so I went with that. I still have no idea what exactly happened with Eyes in my story, though.

Shivers helps Kim open the door to the Linnea.

The reason Johnny's body was dropped off in the Harbor is because there had been a bank robbery in Jamrock at the time and there were cops everywhere looking for anything suspicious. That's a tidbit that didn't make it into the text.

The people in Harry's Shivers check in the first part of his final POV chapter are the people that would have been targeted next.

Thanks for asking these questions, they were fun to answer!

[guiltycorp]

Diluc event thoughts!! SPOILERS! This is far more than I expected tbh, simply because at least there’s some new info. Even if it’s not exactly integrated into gameplay well at all haha. At least it’s proof that mihoyo still cares about those specific characters and their relationship! What other duo in the game receives that much attention! Adelinde dialogue + Kaeya Kind of sad how she turned him away even if her phrasing implied that it was solely for the mission. Didn’t even give him any wine. Contrasted with how Diluc gave the Traveller super expensive grape juice... Ehh. Kinda harsh. 

But on to the good part. Kaeya’s letters (beautiful handwriting lol)

Some timeline info - Diluc didn’t leave the city straight away after the fight and his resignation from the Knights. Varka, Jean and Kaeya started unraveling Eroch’s dealings very soon after Crepus’s death.  

Kaeya is so............. Didn’t even wait for Diluc to leave to start writing to him with relevant news. This is getting sadder. 

I hope that everyone will check on the secret compartment since at least it confirms that Diluc did answer him on occasion. Plus it says something that he recently reread those letters and left them strewn across the room.

However it doesn’t seem like Diluc shared any info about his travels, and instead Kaeya sleuthed everything about him himself, like the information about the secret organization and that Diluc is the Darknight Hero.

Now more than ever I want to see more details of their fight, I kind of assumed that it wasn’t just Kaeya straightforwardly sharing his secrets and that instead he might have also said some meaner stuff about Diluc himself, but then again. According to this event, maybe not. Side-eying Diluc tbh, so far it doesn’t seem like whatever Kaeya told him was bad enough to warrant slashing at him with a claymore.

Oh yeah and we have confirmation that Diluc really went for it, enough to at least injure Kaeya. 

And it’s also still a bit unclear what was happening before the fight. Why didn’t Kaeya come along with Crepus and Diluc to the winery during Diluc’s 18th birthday, did he live and work separately back then too? That would explain at least why him staying in the winery is seen as a bit of an issue by the household.  

This bit... People seem to think that this means Kaeya and Diluc get along just fine and they’re simply too private for other people like Varka to notice. But idk. To me this reads like Kaeya quietly accepting that Diluc isn’t interested in any actual communication (after all, his answering letters are all brief, first one provoked by Kaeya’s ‘eye’ comments), and that he respects Diluc’s boundaries enough not to force the issue. 

Varka’s letter

So.... Varka really was away on an expedition during the incident of Crepus’s death? Since he says that Jean ‘wrote to him’ even though they would assumedly work in the same office. But in Kaeya’s second letter he writes that Varka ‘would have probably sat [Diluc] down for a talk’ if he learned of his plans to leave, so he was in the city after all? Unclear.

Interesting that Varka would go as far as to attribute Ursa’s death to Crepus, claiming that Eroch stole his credit, even though in the manhwa it was stated clearly that Dottore defeated the drake later, thus putting Mondstadt in the Fatui’s debt. 

So, apparently this is confirmation that Eroch was one of Dottore’s clones.

But like, this also means that Varka is a huge liar since he didn’t actually unveil the truth of the incident and Mond seemingly accepted the version of the story where Dottore saved the city lol.

In which case it’s also more understandable that Diluc still holds onto his grudge against the Knights. 

Also, Diluc’s answer... He’s a bit um. Obsequious? Daddy issues showing I guess. Wonder if he would slander Knights of Favonius as freely as he usually does to Varka’s face.

Alice’s letter

Small detail, but I find it funny how she mentions both Diluc’s ‘brother(s)’ AND his friends, while Diluc himself only mentioned ‘friends’ in his Cat Tail’s message. What’s even going on inside his head. 

Letter from the Winery

Just overall weird implications that the Winery’s staff is aware of Diluc’s fight with Kaeya and that their disagreement was severe and loud enough to almost warrant refusing to host him when he visits, but not really. 

Since Kaeya still visits often  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Having such an ambiguous status is not particularly good for Kaeya’s character though. 

Jean’s letter

Nothing of note except that she mentions Abyss Order as a known entity. Chronologically that’s when Diluc had just returned to Mond, so the Abyss Order was already around before the events of the game, although unclear for how long. 

Secret Compartment

I LOVE THAT KAEYA ISN’T 100% ROYALTY AFTER ALL like wow im just so happy about this!! His family might have stepped up as ‘regents’ in the wake of the cataclysm (or earlier, but the cataclysm seems to be the implication) but that is far more noble than being monarchs who failed to save their people!

With that, all the royalty hints still kind of make sense, but relieve him of the responsibility and unsavory implications. I think it’s 100% the correct decision for the writers to make, they wouldn’t be able to properly condemn monarchy lol.

And the fact that his family line is compared to fire, it’s just so poetic. Especially if my theories about owl stuff will get confirmed later and then Ragnvindrs will also be connected to Khaenri’ah’s people in that way.

And Irmin? In real life Irmin or Jǫrmun is theorized to be one of Odin’s avatars or a proto-version of ‘the main god’ in Norse/Germanic mythology, and Irminsul (one of the holy trees) gets its name from him, too. I wonder if in Genshin this is the only one-eyed king or one from the line of many.

I suppose no time travel is involved after all and Alberichs simply survived throughout the last 500 years. And Kaeya never saw Khaenri’ah as it was before Celestia struck it down!

This has cool implications for his motivations, as someone who didn’t have to live through the trauma of genocide and war himself but still inherited the grievances of his ancestors.

It’s also even a closer parallel to immigrant narratives than I previously thought. I wonder if that also means that Kaeya has more living relatives around.

*bangs pots* alive mom from teyvat

By the way, checked the chinese version and he uses 义父 to refer to Crepus, still a rather literary title used for a father figure, not necessarily ‘adopted’. But eng translators have clearly decided to stick to adoption, whatever.

And ah... So his hidden eye has a scar over it after the fight, but it’s still in working condition? Unclear why he was hiding it and continues to do so, magical eye probably still a possibility.

Despite their polite tone, this exchange still reads as a bit petty. Diluc didn’t apologize still, so... Even if Kaeya doesn’t blame him for anything, it’s a bit strange for Diluc to be this alright with maiming his closest friend.

THAT SAID it’s cute that Diluc starts every time with ‘thanks for the letter’. And that he told Kaeya to take better care of himself. 

But still... Kaeya involves himself in all of Diluc’s affairs, he always talks about him, he regularly writes letters to him, he’s lonely and he spends way too much effort on trying to get closer to him again. All of their interactions (except for the first on-screen one) have been started and maintained by Kaeya. What does he get in return? Hmm.

Just give us something mihoyo... Anything. Diluc going out of his way to help Kaeya or at least a phrase from him implying that there’s a reason for his reticence? Some guilt or perhaps a misguided attempt to let Kaeya build another new life without him, I don’t even know.

Also at this point the Traveller must be fully aware that Kaeya’s from Khaenri’ah if they had any doubts before. But considering that they don’t even try to question either Venti or Zhongli about the cataclysm, this is unlikely to be all that important for the main story.

[hikennosabo]

trimax volume 7 random thoughts

okay, after writing separate posts about tesla and knives, i think i can FINALLY put my more general thoughts about volume 7 in order. so much happens that i had to reread it several times. and even having moved my tesla and knives thoughts to separate posts, this got LONG. this volume is so dense, holy fuck.

chapter 1:

"happy days"... yeah everyone's made the joke by now but jesus christ. also i love the volume cover and the inner illustration with vash and ww... might redraw that actually.

people have addressed this already, but is rem really alone in there? who allowed this? is this the situation on the ship? only six people on the crew with one person awake at a time, but during emergencies they all get woken up?

...actually, is rem alone by her own choice? i don't know if she'd have the authority to make that kind of decision, but also i don't think she'd want to be around these people any more than she'd have to. ehhh. but if that's the case then conrad might've still been awake, so maybe not.

also thinking about the differences between trimax and tristamp... it's an interesting difference that here, tesla('s ghost(?)) leads the twins to where she is, but in stamp they find her because they're just being nosy LOL. not sure what to make of the lack of tesla('s ghost(??)) in stamp...

i just wanted to point out that while knives goes straight for the computer, vash is the one observing and noticing the little details in the room. also it gives me an excuse to post tiny hackerman knives for a third time

was the plant tesla was born from the same plant that birthed vash and knives? it was, right? it must have been, right? i'm... operating under this assumption, but i'm not actually sure...

HOW DO PLANTS WORK ACTUALLY. I'M DYING TO HAVE THIS EXPLAINED. HOW DID THIS HAPPEN. humans made plants, right? HOW? how did they make something like this?? and with all the angelic imagery wrt plants, it's giving... i don't know. "humans making god in their own image" or something like that. REALLY hoping we get deep into the plant lore in future volumes.

i said most of what i wanted to say about tesla in my other post, but i still must ask... why did it take them one hundred days to question the ethics of what was going on. like... did rem and conrad wait that long to bring up concerns, or is that just when the other crew members actually started listening to them? (i'm inclined to think the latter...)

the fact that they're on the medical abuse part of the report but still caught up in the shock that an independent plant was born before them. this is so much to take in for them (and us)...

haha damn they weren't kidding, those happy days can end!!

chapter 2:

haha wow they sure didn't show this in stampede

but also oh so this is where tristamp vash starving himself as self-harm came from. okay. haha. i'm fine. it's fine i'm fine

^ this panel is SO good. biblically accurate vibes, but instead of the biblically accurate plant imagery we've gotten from the manga so far, it's about the humans this time. it's SO effective in showing vash's breakdown and his fear. he saw the depths of human cruelty, and now EVERY human is a potential threat, even the ones sleeping peacefully in their chambers.

holy shit, he looks so much like (future) knives here and he's also talking like him. hold on let me pull up that one panel

THIS. IT'S THE SAME KIND OF LEAP IN LOGIC.

i'm sorry i just can't get over this. like, normally, even when they're drawn to emphasize how similar they look, i don't really like... think much of it? even when other people in book club have pointed out in previous chapters "vash looks like knives here"/"knives looks like vash here" it's not something i often notice myself, but here it's different. it's to the point where the first time i read through the chapter, even though it SAYS that knives passed out, i wasn't sure if this was actually vash or knives. it REALLY emphasizes how they were almost like each other. in the last chapter we learned that knives almost became like vash. in this chapter we learn that vash almost became like knives.

"there's nothing but humans here." he's talking like knives!!! (although there IS something in vash's fear making him want to die himself vs knives's fear making him want to kill everybody else...)

vash tries to stab himself and rem's instinct is to grab the blade. not vash's hands, wrists, or arms, the BLADE.

it doesn't really show clearly that he stabbed her in the stomach but she has bandages there later so i guess he did. and that snaps him out of it. vash unintentionally hurting the people he loves... yeah, that's a thing that's gonna keep happening.

and then we get the blank ticket story! i made it my blog title on a whim and i finally know the full context... i don't even know what to say about it except that it's a really nice story. genuinely.

there's so much catharsis in... well, there was catharsis in stabbing rem, in a manner of speaking, and also in their conversation afterwards. and that healed vash's heart a little. but knives slept through it all... :(

thinking about baby vash gaining his will to live back because of his conversation with rem but in the present day he has NO SELF PRESERVATION LIKE AT ALL. adult vash regards rem's words with such value but it's like he's forgotten something along the way.

chapter 3:

i've said everything i want to about chapter 3 in my knives post.

actually no just kidding there is something else i want to say.

picking this panel of his breakdown specifically because of how young he looks. he's just a kid. he was just a kid. HE WAS JUST A KID!!! A LITTLE KID!!! GOD my heart hurts.

chapter 4:

HOW IS THIS ONLY CHAPTER 4.

anyway thank GOD we get some much-needed comic relief from wolfwood. shooting a rubber band at vash and trying to tease him to help him feel better... they're so cute your honor

i can't help but remember that time when wolfwood pointed a gun at him for real... anyway

this whole setup once again feels like the early chapters - the rescue, the silly one-off characters, the camaraderie, the drinking... but, same as in 'colorless expression', things are different now. it's a relatively lighter chapter, which is nice, but there's an air of unease hanging over the whole thing. vash's smiles are so fake.

"time's yer savior," huh? ...put a pin in this.

there are probably about a million posts already about wolfwood being a grim reaper, but this exchange specifically is giving MAJOR psychopomp vibes and i'm kind of obsessed with it.

just. the way that they're both speaking kind of slowly. the word "guide." ww being in shadow. and the confirmation of what they both knew but has gone unsaid up until now. it's all so *chef's kiss*

with knives powering up and starting to take drastic action, ww acting as a grim reaper, and vash being fully prepared to die... there's such a sense of finality here. it hurts to see vash accepting his death so fully, but you can't fool me, i know there are seven volumes left. seriously, why does it feel we're building up to the final battle? reading this in real time must have been fun...

chapter 5:

nightow really popped off in this volume, there are SO many good spreads, holy crap. also once again: PSYCHOPOMP VIBES. "this is the end of the line... have ya made yer preparations?"

and we go right from wolfwood as death to... wolfwood death, but they CAN'T FOOL ME with all these ww death fakeouts. still, seeing him get RIPPED IN HALF had me like, how is he going to come back from this one?! ...OH, it's a hallucination. oh okay.

this is unrelated to what's going on but i love when ww has fangs :) but also what IS going on, actually?

i love that elendira is there to greet them :) i just love when she does anything, actually.

VW ARE SO CUTE. GENUINELY. they really care about each other so much. just. the way they both don't want the other to worry. ww pretending everything is fine, vash pretending not to notice ww is pretending, then revealing he did at the last second. idk it's just. cute. and indicative of what their entire relationship is, pretty much. and ww's little :x expression is SO cute. they're so cute.

aha, so this is livio and. the other guy. who is this again. was he in stampede. it's the other guy talking, right? livio hasn't said anything--WAIT, is THIS GUY chapel? i somehow just got that. THAT'S why he's so pissed at wolfwood lmao. i'm assuming he's in a wheelchair because of ww also. lol. so he's the one responsible for showing ww that vision, but... how did he do that exactly?

also i like how elendira is trying to deescalate, lol. she did NOT sign up for this.

and finally a better look at livio's face!!! they bishiefied him SO much in stampede lmaoooo. skull mask aside, he's pretty handsome! i like the masculine face with the long hair. it's a Look

they've been teasing me with livio for two volumes now, i want to learn about his manga counterpart already!! he only has like, an episode and a half(?) in stampede, i wanna know how differently they adapted him beyond making him a twink lmao. i've gotten the impression he gets more screentime in the manga...

AND THEN THEY JUST LEAVE? WHY WERE THEY EVEN HERE? TO INTIMIDATE WW AND THEN LEAVE?

she's so real for this. he is cute!!!

is this a wolfwood transphobia moment because he misgenders her or an ally moment because he immediately corrects himself. (/j) i'm taking it as an ally moment. but i just wanted to take a second to appreciate elendira's little expressions, they're soooo funny and cute. it took a second read to notice the little sparkle next to her face in the third panel LOL

also, elendira calling ww "honey" is cute. yeah. he is a honey.

chapter 6:

I'M SORRY. I'M SORRYYYYYY FOR LAUGHING

SHIT IS SO SERIOUS RIGHT NOW BUT WHY DOES THIS CHAPTER OPEN WITH LEGATO HANGING FROM THE CEILING. HOW LONG HAS HE BEEN HANGING THERE. i don't think he's supposed to be this unintentionally funny, but everything about legato just. tickles me. i'm so charmed by him. i love you my little bagworm.

OH, LEGATO CAN MOVE ON HIS OWN? with his little... contraption. so was he hanging from the ceiling by choice?? and i guess he doesn't have his assistant(?) anymore, since elendira nailed them through the head... we still don't know who they are or where they came from...

also, his expressions are so cute.

every elendira-legato interaction is sooooo fucking funny.

okay, enough about legato for a second, it's time to take that pin out!

there's the dialogue from stampede! the one-eyed man said "time's your savior," and that's pretty much what vash is hoping for. run away, wait it out, hope things get better. patience and caution.

of course knives doesn't take well to that, because he's angry and scared now, plants are suffering and being exploited now, both himself and vash are beginning to decay, there's no time to wait, he's going to act! ...that's his way of thinking, at least.

okay back to legato.

CLUNKING HIS WAY UP THE STAIRS...

he's so funny. and his desperate expression is weirdly cute. i love elendira and ww's exchange also, it feels like they've bonded a little lol. this is a very unlikely trio. i'm enjoying these brief scenes.

this man can fit SO much regret and self-loathing but also so much selflessness and love in him. i'm going to cry.

i love you legato! the star of this chapter!!

okay, what does "overpowered" mean here? is it like, if they merge, vash's will would overpower knives? like he would take over? is this like devilman-style demon fusion??

generally i haven't been making trigun-devilman comparisons, because aside from them both being bible fanfiction, they're not that similar... i don't really see any direct devilman influence in trigun. but this is giving me devilman vibes. if the will-overpowering thing is indeed the case.

i'm glad legato interrupted. even knives is like, damn maybe that wasn't the best idea, lol.

one last cute legato for the road. aww look at him, he's so happy knives breathed in his direction! idk he just activates my cuteness aggression for some reason.

aaaand that ends that volume. i DO wonder. knives merging with plants isn't what he was doing in stampede... are his actions in stampede gonna become relevant later or was that anime-original...

[tickly-trashcan]

hey guys haha i have a kind of announcement thingy... it is not sunshine and rainbows unfortunately orz

(there will be a tl;dr at the end if yall dont wanna read all my random thoughts lol)

i am going to just be completely honest. i don't really want to write anymore. at least not on this blog...

i know that i have requests but i really have been struggling with... everything!! i just graduated and that was like a punch in the face because everything that i've been feeling for months really became... real??? like i thought i had just been hallucinating all the really bad feelings but it was real!!!

i've been lacking motivation with writing, and every time ive sat down to write i feel bad and terrible and it really is an awful feeling and i'm sick of it... and even when im not writing my silly goof tickle fics those feelings somehow creep into my brain and it's been making it really hard for me to write anything that ive enjoyed.

so... i think what im trying to say... is that i'm going to stop writing for this blog. it isn't because of anyone, i think that its just because ive been doing it for so long that it's become a genuine stresser for me, and i think that by separating myself from this blog, it'll be much easier for me to... exist!

i could go into a LOT more details about how ive been feeling but i really dont want to go too crazy since i am... on the internet lolol but i think that it would be better for me to not write anymore.

so what does this mean for this blog???

i'm not going to be deactivating this blog, and i'll make sure that all my links and such are up to date before i officially leave. I'm not going to like... sign out, and i'll still be active every now and then, but if you'd like to get my discord for any contact, please let me know! i'm not super active on discord right now either though, so please be aware of that lol

this blog is essentially going to be an archive. i'll go through my masterlists and update all of my other important posts, but otherwise, there probably won't be any new content from me.

I probably won't be active on ao3 either, but if you'd like to give my old works a peek as well, you're more than welcome. the link is right here if you're interested!

there's still some stuff that i'm working out as well in my personal life and in cleaning up some loose ends on this blog, so if i take a little bit in responding to anyone, that's why. i'm sorry this is kind of a bleak little post, but i really can't do it anymore.

to everyone who sent in a request in the last round of prompts, thank you so much because it really did make me excited, but i'm not going to be able to complete them... i really appreciate every single one of you, and i hope you can forgive me orz

TL;DR

I'm really really tired and have had a lot of negative feelings for a really long time, and I think that leaving this blog in terms of writing will be best for me in the long run. There will be no more new content from me, but I might still remain active with communications if I can. I'll be updating my blog until it's good enough to leave, and then I will no longer be a content creator.

(sorry that tl;dr sounds more negative than the rest of my post LOL i'm really fine i just... i need to rip the bandaid off and just... be done)