#roci by book

[souldagger]

a couple quick expanse character sketches from this week :]

[battlestarbones]

goddddddd expanse books 7-9 hurt me sooooo bad every time I think about them or read snippets from them!!! they contain some of my fave plot bits (Amos alien resurrection!! Teresa!!) but also the lowest lows (Bobbie and Peaches!! Naomi and Holden being separated for years and never really getting back what they had before the End because of his PTSD!!) and just AAAHHHHHHHHHHHH

[doolallymagpie]

feel like, especially since part of me is saying "do an ilclan-era house arano-allied roci company force", it would be worth it to get the custom decals done, and have a lot of 'em (plus house arano decals; i need them not only for house arano itself but the aurigan avengers)

my current timeline of BTAU!holden and co.'s little merc outfit born from the ashes of the canterbury company supports that notion anyway

[rocicrew]

there were so many last times that passed unrecognized. knowing it in the moment what was ending and wouldn't come again was precious.

"you and me are the only ones left now. so. yeah. i'm sorry. i didn't mean to let bobbie go." "don't apologize to me," naomi said to the screen. her tears made lenses over her eyes. "oh, sweet man, don't apologize for this."

[0ystercatcher]

its funny how the expanse show rly gets the drummer x nagata dynamic of camina being so in love w naomi but naomi doesnt reciprocate but Does occasionally take advantage of it while staying w her annoying loser bf so right. we love to see it. everyone involved in it is so good (except holden, who is just, fine, i guess). but in the books i fully buy into nagata x holden bc they are just truly :'-) sweet for each other

[sen-ya]

So Rosi has to be 100% OP but her father's still see her as their daughter. I can see a scenario where Roci finds herself in a crazy battle and Luffy and Law rushing to try and help her but when they get to her she has completely dominated the battlefield.

damn u rite tho!!

[Sen's Digital Comic Book] || [see comics early on ko-fi]

[andordean]

tag game: pick stuff from your room and have people vote on which one they want to take home.

Tagged by @softest-punk from whom I stole empty Fortnum and Mason chamomile tea tin (tell me more about the biohazard bit!)

Let's see what I have around me... (Many things are Troll's collectables like PipBoy and Roci model, so won't enrage him by offering those.)

Tagging (no pressure as always): @traumschwinge @kuwdora @bittersweetbark @itsnotzka @keyrousse @valandhirwriter @justanotherdmdammit @dclcq @disdaidal @ginstermoff @jikanet-tanaka @sar-kalu

[oswaldthatendswald]

For the fruit emoji ask game!!

🍈 and 🍇

Rad questions! I'll answer them in the order I think flows best.

🍇 Is there a particular scene/episode/book/etc that you want to just write a million fics about, over and over? Which one?

I mean, the obvious answer is Minion Island. That kind of haunts my Cora Lives AU (Then Somebody Out There Loves You). It's kind of the perfect tragedy, in that if one thing had gone differently, Cora might have survived-- or Law might have died. Plus, sacrifice is just so tasty. Absolutely ideal writing fodder. The secret bonus answer is Marineford, because you have no idea how many Marineford AUs I've plotted out but not written.

The rest of this is going to get SO long, so I'll put it under the cut.

🍒 What’s your favorite character dynamic to write? (Can be romantic or platonic, specific or general!)

I really enjoy writing about familial relationships, whether biological or found. More specifically (and I think this is pretty clear from my works on AO3) I'm compelled by dysfunctional sibling relationships. There's a famous bit from the play Antigone (by Sophocles) that I think about a lot (I am sorry I need to be pretentious just for a second). She says that if her husband died, she could marry another, if her child dies, she could bear another, but it is her brother that has died, and she can never have another. She's saying that sibling relationships are irreplaceable (I could go into details on this quote and why it sticks with me, but that'll get so long). I'm interested in what happens when those relationships sour. What do you do when the person you've grown up with, who should have known you best, becomes a stranger-- or worse, an enemy?

I also really like writing parent and child relationships, but that's because I saw X-Men with Hugh Jackman at a very formative age and it convinced me that the accidental father figure trope was incomparably sexy.

🍈 Who’s your blorbo and what are some of your favorite headcanons/ideas about them that repeatedly show up in your fics? Free pass to rant about blorbo opinions.

I mean. It's Cora. Rocinante is my favorite character in One Piece and also maybe anything ever? He's just so goddamn interesting. I could talk about him literally for hours. At this point I have written some 100 000 words of Cora-centric fic (or published words, I should say. There's a lot more in wips and fics I decided not to post). There's a lot of random headcanons I have for him that really only make sense in the context of my AU. I suppose I shall simply reveal my thought processes behind some of what's going on there!

This is going to be so long. I'm not sorry, you asked for this.

I tend to write Cora as suffering from a lot of guilt, and fairly self-destructive as a result. My favorite example is the long-standing coffee thing in my AU: he drinks his coffee sweet when he's in a good mood and bitter when he's feeling bad. The implication is that it's a very quiet self-harm behaviour (though that's meant to be very subtle in the fics-- but note that Law will add sugar to Cora's coffee on a bad day. He knows what's up). I also really... enjoy? Is that the right word? Anyway, writing self-sacrifice as a form of self-destruction. That's, uh. Foreshadowing for some of the themes in Cry Havoc. It might also give you some context for things that have already happened in the AU though!

I also really love playing with Cora's name. Different characters call him different things, and that's meant to reveal parts of how they see him. He calls himself Rocinante, and so does Sengoku. Law is the only character to call him Cora-san, of course. Penguin, Shachi, and Bepo (as well as the rest of the Hearts) call him Cora. Doflamingo calls him Roci in his internal perspective (as do their parents), even when he calls him Corazon in dialogue. Another bit of foreshadowing: we're coming up on the perspectives of some characters that will be calling him Corazon (and perhaps other names? Who knows!) (me. I know).

The hill upon which I will die is that Cora is not just competent, but a little bit scary (or terrifying, if you're on the wrong side). He might be a silly goofy guy, but he also spent six months burning down hospitals. The bit where he steals the Ope-Ope is SO good in the anime; it really struck me how powerful his Devil Fruit could be in the right hands (his). That weaponized silence is an idea that's only hinted at in canon, but the more I thought about it, the more I was like Oh Shit That's A Nightmare Actually. Besides that, he was undercover in a pirate crew for at least three years! He knows what he's doing! He's exceptionally good at his job. I do think sometimes I overcompensate; he is supposed to be goofy as well, and I don't always remember to incorporate that part. But it's not my fault! I just think he's so goddamn cool.

Thank you very much for the questions! I had a lot of fun answering them (obviously-- I think I went a little over the top)!

[gunkreads]

Probably the most cogent thought I have on The Expanse as of right now (beginning of Persepolis Rising) is that I feel that the series would've benefited from a much wider temporal scope. I actually think it would be quite a lot better if it'd pulled focus away from the crew of the Rocinante after Abbadon's Gate. I know they're the main characters, but like... hell, Alex gets almost zero characterization until Cibola Burn. They could have been abandoned in favor of other, newer characters.

I understand that carrying the same cast of characters through an entire series is a pretty tried-and-true way to show worldwide change on a long time-scale, since it allows you to use the characters' own changing or unchanging perspectives to demonstrate that worldwide change. Really, the problem is that The Expanse does a great job showing the world's changes irrespective of the characters; it's got that A Song of Ice and Fire flair (for obvious reasons) of presenting the same world from different angles through different characters without challenging the objective reality of the situation. (I mean.... yeah WoT does it too, but for aptness' sake...) This means that the series doesn't really need that through-line cast to demonstrate its strengths properly.

I would've loved it if Cibola Burn would've fully cut Holden's perspective in favor of a few scatterings of Amos chapters and leaning more heavily on Elvi, then phased the Roci out altogether. Look, I love the crew. They're a fantastic main cast. But I started to have difficulty suspending my disbelief in Nemesis Games; how the hell are these people this insanely exceptional? Wasn't the point at the start that they could've been anyone?

I'm still enjoying the series immensely, but... I'm hitting the point where I feel like the timeline is getting unnaturally condensed purely to keep the same characters around. This does fit with the authors' stated intent to "show the part in the middle" between first contact and galactic colonization, but I guess I'd say I don't understand what point the authors are making anymore. I thought I understood it about a book and a half ago, but I'm starting to lose the plot--literally.

This may be reader error, and I'm hoping it is, because I'm staring down the barrel of Act 3 not even knowing why it's pointing a gun at me. Oh well, plenty of pages left to be proven wrong.

[souldagger]

trans rights amos moment. 2 me

[scribeofred]

Hello!

I just finished watching The Expanse. I remember how you used to rave about it (and the books), so I'm here to say:

OMG! It was amazing! You were so right, and tbh I should have watched it sooner.

Chrisjen Avasarala and Bobby Draper are such brilliant characters (and Holden himself, ofc, but I feel as Main Character that's to be expected).

As you've read the books, do they end in the same manner as the TV show, or is there more story there?

Now I've finished, there is an Expanse-shaped hole in my life. Since you are a person of impeccable taste, do you have any fanfic recommendations so I can keep flying with the crew of the Roci?

HI HELLO I AM UNREASONABLY EXCITED BY THIS MESSAGE!! The show is definitely not everyone's cup of tea, ditto the books, so it's always delightful to hear one of my friends has fallen down into this hole with me :D

<3 it's an investment! starting new shows is hard! I get it! but also yes everyone should watch the show ASAP because it's great and people are missing out

AREN'T THEY THE BEST. the women of the Expanse, both books and show, are genuinely some of the best characters I've ever encountered. season four was a bit rough on Bobbie imo, but that's kind of what happens when your cast is so far flung, quite literally. Avasarala is just a queen with no equal, and let me tell you, she's just as brilliant in the novels

the books do NOT end where the show ends! the show covers the first six books' worth of story, but there are three more novels that take the story through to its conclusion, and hooooooo boy WHAT a conclusion. I shan't say a word of spoilers, but there's a reason they stopped the show at six seasons, and I think they made the right decision tbh. I absolutely recommend starting the series from the beginning and not just jumping in at book seven because the show doesn't quite hit all the same points at the books do. also there's an anthology of short stories that also pad out the world and characters' backstories, very good stuff therein

oh man, I know that hole far, far too well 😂 although for me, the fanfic craving–shaped hole doesn't exist for the Expanse because the novels actually fill that specific craving perfectly! so I've actually never read any Expanse fanfics??? thus I have no quality recommendations. (it's also just really really hard to top a ballparked 1.5 million words' worth of canonical Expanse story that have been professionally edited ^^:) that said, I will point you toward @rocicrew, who both writes fics and creates some of the most stunning gifsets in the fandom (<3), as a place to start. sorry I can't be more help in this area! at a glance, it looks like there's less than 1.2K works on AO3 between the show and the book series, so it probably won't take you terribly long to dredge it for gold and then possibly you'll find yourself contributing to the number of works yourself >:)

that said, mmmmmmmmaybe start with the actual novels first? because the fics are undoubtedly going to contain spoilers, if that's a thing you're worried about. if not, go wild!

[battlestarbones]

just went to rewatch a bit from the expanse TV finale and I was like "why is Holden piloting the ship?? bitch can't fly for shit!!" BECAUSE I FORGOT THEY FUCKING KILLED ALEX MY BABYGIRL MY BELOVED

[rocicrew]

my mood bc tw will be delivered to me in two days:

[boreal-sea]

I didn't hang out much in The Expanse fandom on Tumblr back when the books were being published, but I wanted to talk about Amos and one of the reasons I love him so much.

It's because he's got ASPD - or at the very least, to me as an outside observer, he's got a lot of similarities to ASPD. Despite this, he's not treated like he's evil or a danger. He's valued not just for his skills, but is genuinely liked by everyone on the Roci. He has friends who care about him

I dunno. I could go into depth on this, but I just really like him.

[sen-ya]

Sen's Important Info Post

Post & links last updated 8/30/24

Hey I'm Sen and I draw One Piece literally every day! I try to update this post & my databases at least twice a month. Between updates, I recommend using the tags "my art" or "life after" on my blog depending on what you're looking for. Below the cut is information on the different AUs & serializations I've got going on right now :^)

Important Links

[How to use Airtable]

[Sen's Digital Comic Book] - a comprehensive database of every comic I've made!

[Life After Digital Comic Book] - a database of every page of Life After

[See Comics Early on Ko-Fi!]

[Life After Info Post]

Posting Schedule

Sunday - Misc/asks

Monday - Life After

Tuesday - Band AU

Wednesday - Life After

Thursday - Serialized Comics (current: Family AU//Forgetful)

Friday - Life After

Saturday - Misc/asks

Universe: Main Timeline

Comics that belong to this timeline are meant to follow through the events of canon, many of them were written while I was actively reading and didn't know what would happen next! Every comic that receives this tag happens in the same universe, so they may refer to each other in both plot-important and not important ways. These comics are largely LuLaw but include sprinkles of Heart Pirates (in general and as family), ZoSan, and general shenanigans.

Serializations:

Getting Together - Will they/won't they? They will, but they're gonna be stupid about it. Anything tagged into this series you can assume they haven't established that they're romantically interested in each other.

Established LuLaw - Two idiots in love. Anything tagged with this series you can assume they're together. They may not refer to each other as "boyfriend" or "partner" but whatever it is that's going on is clear to the two of them and that's what matters.

Law Loses - Most comics in this series deal with the aftermath of Winner Island. Law feels like a curse.

Goofs Only - These comics don't require serialization. They're just some good fun. If they include LawLu/LuLaw, they'll also be tagged as either "Getting Together" or "Established" so you have context for their reactions.

The Heart Bros - Law, Bepo, Penguin, and Shachi found each other as kids. Comics in this series act as glimpses into their time growing up and other brotherly interactions. This is noncompliant with the Law novel. Once they form the Heart Pirates, they consider each other brothers.

ZoSan - I don't draw these two a lot anymore, so this series is just a general ZoSan category!

Heart Pirate Shenanigans - I went all in on Heart Pirates Week 2024 and wrote a bunch of comics about the various crew members! Leaving this as an open series for when I inevitably fall down another Heart Pirate rabbit hole.

Universe: Older/Family AU

Comics that belong to this timeline are meant to follow through the events of canon, many of them were written while I was actively reading and didn't know what would happen next! Every comic that receives this tag happens in the same universe, so they may refer to each other in both plot-importanComics in this universe take place anywhere from 7 - 30 years post canon. Mostly LuLaw with sprinkles of other shenanigans. You can assume events from the main timeline are canon in this AU.

Serializations:

Accidents Happen - Law gets a cold and stops running a few effects that he'd taken for granted.

Getting Married - Did you know if two pirate captains want to get married, they can just say they're married?

Extras - This series is for posts that offer context/additional information about what's going on in the AU

Family Fluff - These are a series of comics where the focus is on Law and/or Luffy as a parent.

Forgetful - Law gets hit by a devil fruit that makes him forget everything that's happened since just before Marineford.

Get back to it - After spending some time on Zou in Rocy's first 18 months, it's time for Luffy & Law to get back to pirating.

Universe: The Worst Timeline

Comics in this universe branch off of the main timeline around Whole Cake/early Wano. These comics may refer to earlier 'main timeline' events, but what happens in them is so terrible I've refused to make them part of my own personal canon. Sometimes it's just too temping to make them suffer :^)

Serializations:

Rightfully Worried - This series is an AU in which Luffy gets the absolute shit kicked out of him in Whole Cake and when he arrives on Wano Law has to save his life. It's not the first time he's performed surgery on him, but it is the first time he's had to since he's cared so much about his patient.

The Worst Wake-Up Call - During an intense battle, Law makes a decision. The ones who love him deal with the aftermath.

[ladycauthon]

So I'm on season 5 of The Expanse now and it may be one of my favourite shows of all time tbh. I will say I am missing the Roci crew being together but the overall story is interesting and I'm looking forward to the last two episodes of the season immensely. Like, I'm brimming with anticipation.

508 was crazy though. Firstly, Naomi is a goddamn badass. I had no idea what she was doing for half the episode, but when they played the spliced message on Drummer's ship I was gobsmacked. Holy shit. I hope Drummer finds out soon and kicks off Marcos' person on the ship she's so smarmy and annoying.

Secondly, I love Drummer but her entire crew are not 'family' and I don't like them. I want her to join the Roci crew pls.

Filip needs to leave Marcos and Marcos needs to die, ugh he's such an abusive arsehole I can't stand him.

I hope Earth does not retaliate by blowing up Palis/Palace station whatever it's called. I do not think that'll go down well; hopefully new dude will listen to Avasarala.

Peaches and Amos need to get to the Roci too. In fact, every damn character I like needs to be on the Roci in the final episode headed to one of them cowboy bars that Alex was on about. Thank you.

I'm gonna have to read these books, I'm hooked on this lol