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thebirdandhersong · 3 years

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Fairy tale retellings! because I couldn’t help myself (under the cut because I got carried away and remembered my fairy tale retelling phase from middle school........ oh boy)

Cinderella

Cinderella (2015 Disney live action): beautiful beautiful BEAUTIFUL (the music! the script!! the Hope! the costumes! the dress! the gentleness at its heart! the overall design and the colours!) (I still believe it’s the best live action re-adaptation they’ve come up with so far) (then again they DID have one of the Rogue One writers and Kenneth Branagh--both of whom understand story AND fairy tales--on the team, and possibly the best combination of actors and costume designers)

Cinderella (Disney animated movie): like a dream. Can’t remember it that well because I haven’t watched it in over ten years, but I remember that I loved it

Cinderella, the Rodgers & Hammerstein musical featuring Laura Osnes and Santino Fontana: Laura’s Cinderella is so lively and hopeful and bright and affectionate and I Love Her!!! The script is also surprisingly funny, and the little changes they made (like the fairy godmother being an old beggar woman in the village, the subplot with her stepsister, the scene at the ball where she suggests that they should all be kind to one another, the fact that the prince is called His Royal Highness Christopher Rupert Windemere Vladimir Karl Alexander Francois Reginald Lancelot Herman (HERMAN!) Gregory James....... iconic) added rather than detracted from the themes they chose to emphasize

A Cinderella Story: possibly one of my favourite films. I loved the fact that they knew each other before the ‘ball’. Loved the way the fairy tale was ‘translated’ into the 2000s. The friendship was strong with this one. I had the best time watching this movie. (Dress-wise, Hilary Duff’s dress is my least favourite, but that’s a minor quibble, and is also due to the fact that it has Lily and Laura’s gorgeous fluffy ballgowns to contend with, and that’s not fair competition)

Persuasion, by Jane Austen: does it count?? The way I see it, Persuasion is like Cinderella gone wrong (we discussed this in class, and my prof called Lady Russell a fairy godmother who means well but fails her protege before the story even begins. We talked about Anne’s ‘Cinderella’/makeover moment taking place over a longer period of time, about the ‘evil’ stepsisters, etc. etc. I’m not entirely sure I agree with every single comparison he made, but he made some Very interesting points).... at least the first time :)

Cinder, by Marissa Meyer. Oh, the images!!!!! Marissa Meyer is WONDERFUL at them. You wouldn’t think they’d translate well into a futuristic sci-fi (almost steampunk) world, but she did it SO brilliantly (the slipper! the ‘dress’! the whole family situation!)

Rapunzel

Tangled (Disney animated movie): an absolute joy. Rapunzel is an Ariel-like character who has hopes and dreams of her own, and I love how warm and vivacious and endearingly transparent she is. The dance scene is so, so lovely. (I stand by my opinion that very few little went right with Disney’s fairy tale retellings after Tangled.)

Cress, by Marissa Meyer: once again. Images. I can’t believe she managed to pull Rapunzel-in-space off so well. (Plus she’s a hacker, and such a sweetheart!!)

Beauty and the Beast

Beauty and the Beast (Disney animated movie): Amazing. Gorgeous. Brilliant. The buildings and the music and Belle (Belle, my darling!!) and the darker, more Gothic feel to the art and the design...... Yes

Beauty, by Robin McKinley: knocked it right out of the ball park, right through the atmosphere, right into outer space... The language is so lush and atmospheric, and even though I knew roughly what was going to happen, I loved every moment of it. She puts a special emphasis on family and on human connection and I Loved that so much.

Rose Daughter, by Robin McKinley: also gorgeous!!!!! Beauty is still my favourite of the two, but this one was also a gem. (Again: the emphasis on family and sisterhood!!!)

Beauty and the Beast (the Broadway musical): Susan Egan’s voice is SO lovely. And Home deserved more than just an instrumental reference in the 2017 version.

The Twelve Dancing Princesses

Princess of the Midnight Ball, by Jessica Day George: the Best. The sisters are easier to distinguish, the changes/things she added (the war, the queen’s past, etc.) make the story even more interesting, and Galen is fantastic (courteous, kind, brave, AND likes to knit?? NICE)

The Barbie movie: I loved it when I was a little girl (it is also Muffin-approved!)

The Princess and the Pea

@fictionadventurer‘s Wodehousian one :) which is an absolute delight. Every once in a while I remember it and then can’t stop smiling

The Goose Girl

The Goose Girl, by Shannon Hale: the Best. And by the Best, I mean the absolute Best. Her writing is so beautiful and her characters are so real and distinctive. The worldbuilding is fascinating. It’s so simple and so beautiful, and is near-perfect as a retelling and as a novel. The rest of the Bayern series is also wonderful!!

The Little Mermaid

The Little Mermaid (Disney movie): can’t remember it very well, except for the chef who wanted to cook Sebastian and also Ariel’s very cool sisters.... the music and Ariel’s character are lovely :)

The Little Android, by Marissa Meyer: genius. The first time I read it, I cried furiously. What does it mean to be human?? Marissa Meyer loves to talk about this in her other books (through malfunctioning robots, androids, werewolves, etc.). And the conclusion she comes to is always the same (and always done so beautifully): it’s about love and sacrifice (and tbh even though she’s talking about this through robots and werewolves, she’s got a point!!! When you act with love and self-sacrifice, you reflect the character of the Maker and His love and self-sacrifice, which is what makes us in that moment the most human--or at least human in the sense that that’s what we were made to be and to do towards our neighbours and enemies)

Ponyo (Studio Ghibli movie): this counts, doesn’t it?? A film that is an absolute joy through and through. It doesn’t completely stick to the original fairy tale but it also talks about compassion, kindness, and love as a choice

The Princess and the Frog

The Princess and the Frog (Disney animated movie): can’t remember it very well, but Anika Noni Rose has a fantastic voice, and I loved Tiana’s practicality, optimism, and kindness

The Prince of the Pond, by Donna Jo Napoli: can’t remember it either (read it in third grade) but basically it’s about how the prince turns into a frog and starts a family with another frog (the story is told from her perspective). I do remember that the ending made me so sad, though

Sleeping Beauty

Sleeping Beauty (Disney movie): can’t remember it at all either, except for: 1) Once Upon a Dream (a brilliant song) and 2) forget pink or blue. I liked her grey dress the most

Spindle’s End, by Robin McKinley: the story was told in such an interesting way (the animals! the way she wrote about love and protecting the people you love and self-sacrifice in familial and platonic relationships!) with Robin McKinley’s beautiful style

East of the Sun, West of the Moon

East, by Edith Pattou: I was obsessed with this book in elementary school. Obsessed. I kept rereading it over and over again because I just loved it so much. It’s been a few years since I’ve read it, but I can remember certain scenes (Rose entering the ballroom for the first time, the white bear’s hulking figure in the doorway, the architecture of the hall where she washes the shirt, her fingers running over the wax, the reunion scene) so vividly as if it had been a movie instead of a book, or if I’d actually been there, experiencing what Rose was experiencing

Orpheus and Eurydice (which kind of counts)

Hadestown (the Broadway musical, the original cast, AND Anais Mitchell’s original concept album): I’ve talked about it so much I probably shouldn’t even start slkfjsdl;kfjlk; I just wanted an excuse to mention it again

Tam Lin

Fire and Hemlock, by Diana Wynne Jones: I loved it when I first read it but I was so confused and so fascinated by it.

The Snow Queen

Frozen (Disney animated movie): no (insert heart emoji)

And contemporary(?) books that are considered modern classics, if not modern fairy tales (depends on how you look at it, really):

Peter Pan

Peter Pan (Disney animated movie): a childhood favourite!!!

Peter and the Starcatchers, by Dave Barry: the whole series is so much fun (and they’re among some of the funniest books I’ve read). This one serves as a sort of prequel to Peter Pan, but it’s safer to say that Dave Barry reimagined the whole story.

Peter and the Starcatcher (Broadway play adaptation of the book, which is a reimagining of the original Peter Pan..... yeah): the source material is incredibly funny, so naturally the play adaptation makes you laugh until your sides feel ready to split (I mean!! You have Christian Borle as Black Stache, Adam Chanler Berat as Peter, Celia Keenan-Bolger as Molly..... they’re all brilliant) The script, the way the cast makes use of the set and props, the perfect comic delivery....... love it

Finding Neverland, a musical adaptation of the movie (the A.R.T. production with Jeremy Jordan as James Barrie): the music is so good, and the way they write about the value of looking at the world through the eyes of a child?? of seeing the beauty in everything?? of hope and imagination and wonder?? If it weren’t for the way it handles adultery (even emotionally cheating!) and divorce :( but Laura Michelle Kelly is absolutely enchanting, and the script is also incredibly funny and heartwarming

Tiger Lily, by Jodi Lynn Anderson: a twisted fairy tale... it was quite disturbing at times, but it was also beautiful and heartbreaking. It’s a darker take on the story, which I tend not to like (at all), but the way it explored Tiger Lily and Peter was quite interestng

The Wizard of Oz

WIcked, the Stephen Schwartz musical--I haven’t read the book: as far as retellings-about-the-villain-of-the-original-story goes this one is my favourite. It is another twisted fairy tale, though, and there’s a constant undercurrent of doom and dread, even in the motifs Stephen Schwartz uses... the ending is not completely happy, but the music is FANTASTIC (Mr. Schwartz also did The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Prince of Egypt!!)

Alice in Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland (Disney movie): another childhood favourite... I also haven’t seen this one in over ten years, but I can still remember specific scenes very clearly in my head

Alice by Heart: a musical about a girl called Alice Spencer whose coping mechanism (quite literally) is Alice in Wonderland. She knows it by heart (again. Literally) and she dives into the world as a form of escapism (LITERALLY. There’s even a song at the end where the characters acknowledge how unhealthy this is). There’s a lot about growing up, losing a loved one, learning to let go... about self-deception and grief and the control one has over one’s life (unfortunately it IS subtly antagonistic towards Christianity at times)..... i do wish that writers didn’t have to treat sexual maturity as the most prominent/interesting part of coming-of-age stories, though. The characters, the set and lighting and costume design (BRILLIANT, by the way!!!!)... all wonderful. But the strangely sexual references can be a bit uncomfortable. (Really!! You can tell a coming-of-age story WITHOUT that stuff, you know!!!!!)

That Disney Movie directed by Tim Burton: wouldn’t recommend. Alice doesn’t need to be a warrior. (At ALL.)

Would also like to mention: Princess Tutu :)

#i am sorry but i am very emphatically not a frozen fan #especially since we read snow queen at jellicoe lodge?? it's such a beautiful story #and the IMAGES #but hollywood is more into self-actualisation/self-discovery/self-acceptance/self-centric stories these days #i guess they just didn't want to tell a story about self-sacrifice and selfless acts of love ? i don't know #anyway i get irrationally worked up about frozen sorry #the second one nearly made steam pour out of my ears #i GET they want to focus on the Self (and all the selfishness and self-importance that comes with our world's idea of self love)#but ELSA as an oldest sister HOW could you make all these decisions #fairy tales #i need to finish princess tutu sometime (sigh)#songbird again #my posts

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mst3kproject · 4 years

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Magic Christmas Tree

I thought I’d try something different this year and find a bad Hannukah movie, but everybody I asked had the same recommendation: Adam Sandler’s Eight Crazy Nights. I know for a fact that is a prohibitively awful film, because I know people who’ve watched parts of it (I have not to date met anyone who could sit through the whole thing), but it just doesn’t feel like an MST3K feature to me. Anyway, I have standards. My conclusion is that people need to make more Hannukah movies… and until that happens, I’m watching Magic Christmas Tree, which comes specially recommended by RiffTrax.

This is the only Christmas movie I’ve ever seen which starts with cheerful holiday music over footage of… Hallowe’en decorations. Obnoxious bully Mark and his two pushover friends decide to go investigate a supposedly-haunted house. Naturally the old lady who lives there is a witch, and in exchange for Mark rescuing her cat, she gives him a seed for a magical tree that will grant him three wishes. Two months later, with the tree fully grown, his first wish is to have magical powers for one hour – he uses them to torment unfortunate people who were already having to work on Christmas Eve. His second wish is to kidnap Santa Claus and extort unlimited presents from him, but that attracts the attention of the spirit of Greed, who intends to keep Mark as a slave forever! Good thing he’s still got that third wish.

God, I hate this movie. I’d say it’s the worst Christmas movie I’ve ever seen, but Elves exists, so instead I have to say it’s the worst Christmas movie that didn’t have any Nazis in it. It reminds me more than anything else of Ghost of Dragstrip Hollow, in that it’s an absolute mess that seems to have been put together by people who have no idea what they’re doing. It spends most of its time on boring, annoying irrelevant bullshit, and then when it gets to the plot, that’s boring and annoying, too!

Magic Christmas Tree is only an hour long, but that’s twice as long as it needed to be. A plot summary makes it sound like most of the film will be dealing with Mark’s three wishes and how he uses them, but it’s half-over before we even get to that point. The time leading up to it is spent watching Mark follow the witch’s complicated instructions on how to grow and activate the tree, and his parents dealing with this unwanted thing appearing in the middle of their back yard. All of this is presented in excruciating detail. We watch Mark dig the entire hole to plant the seed in. We see his Dad struggle with the lawnmower at unbelievable length, while the Mom yacks about nothing on the phone with her friend Betty. The Dad tries to cut the tree down with no success. Mark has to say a set of magic words over and over and over.

It goes on so long, it passes the are you fucking kidding me? point and wanders into territory where you wonder if there’s something wrong with the disk and you’re playing the scene over and over. It actually starts to feel like it’s on purpose – especially when the slowness is repeatedly emphasized by shots of Mark’s pet tortoise, Ichabod, who seems to be eating his patch of clover far faster than anybody else is accomplishing anything. You’ll swear the movie is making fun of you.

The sound that accompanies all this is sometimes very peculiar. The old lady has exactly the voice you’d expect from a witch in a cheap kid’s movie, but Mark’s Mom sounds like she’s being dubbed by a twelve-year-old boy, possibly the same one who provided the voice for Mark himself. The tree speaks (oh, yes, it does) in the voice of a smarmy stereotypical gay man. Santa Claus sounds like he’s half-senile and wondering what’s for lunch.

The lawnmower makes some very strange noises indeed. I guess they’re meant to be cartoonish and funny. They’re definitely the former but they’re never the latter, possibly because they never sound remotely like a lawnmower. When Mark’s Dad is trying to get it started it sounds like the ghost of a consumptive horse, and three hours later when it actually gets going, it makes noises like a traffic jam in Whoville.

Besides sounding weird, the actors are just plain bad. The guy playing Santa Claus is half-asleep. We’re told that the tree’s magic means he’s trapped in the chair he’s sitting in, and I honestly do believe that actor could not have gotten up if he tried, no wishes necessary. The woman playing Mark’s Mom looks like she’s high as a kite and only barely keeping her grip on reality. Maybe that’s why they had to dub her. Mark’s Dad recites his lines like a guy on a game show reading his own life story off a teleprompter, and does his yard chores in a way that’s probably supposed to be pantomimey but is the opposite of entertaining. The Dad gets an inordinate amount of screen time, which I can only chalk up to the fact that he’s played by director Dick Parish.

The worst of the lot are, of course, the kids, who are predictably terrible 60’s child actors. They yell all their lines, with the volume and exaggerated emphasis you expect from a school play. It wears thin very, very quickly. The kid playing Mark is the worst of the lot, although I might just think that because he’s the one we spend the most time with. He’s a huge part of why this movie makes me so mad.

I think the best way to describe Mark as a character is to say that the first time I watched this movie I assumed his name was ‘Billy’, despite the fact that everybody kept calling him ‘Mark’. He just seems like the type of nasty little brat who’d be named ‘Billy’ in a bad 60’s Christmas movie. We meet him having lunch with his two friends by the playground, and learn that he’s a greedy little shit when he drives a hard bargain in a sandwich trade. Greedy-little-shit-itude continues to be his primary character trait and is, of course, the core of the movie’s lesson. His attempt to monopolize Santa Claus makes him such a greedy little shit that Greed himself takes an interest in him.

Greed is a huge hairy man who takes delight in kidnapping little boys. I think he’s supposed to look like a fairy tale giant. Watching him manhandle a child is an intensely uncomfortable experience.

I guess ‘don’t be greedy’ is a standard message for a children’s movie, and it seems like a particularly appropriate one for Christmas, which presents children with a great opportunity for avarice. What seems a little odd is that Mark never actually suffers any consequences for his selfishness, only the vague threat of them. There was a perfect opportunity for some of this when Mark kidnaps Santa Claus. Santa, after all, brings toys to good girls and boys… surely by this point, after his brief reign of terror with his magical powers, Mark has been naughty enough to deserve only coal. Apparently that’s not how it works, though. Mark just wanders off into the woods in search of small animals to shoot with his new rifle, runs into the giant, and immediately repents even though Greed is offering him all the toys and candy he wants.

What supposedly prompts Mark to become a better person is seeing how the world has responded to Santa Claus going missing. Curiously, there is very little emphasis on the children who are sad because they didn’t get any presents. Maybe somebody thought that would have made them seem greedy? Instead, the vision Greed presents to Mark is of the United States military mobilizing to locate Santa and bring him home, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians-style! So… I guess Mark becomes a better person because he’s afraid of what’s going to happen if the army finds Santa trapped in a chair in his house? I guess that is pretty terrifying.

Another thing that blunts the lesson is the fact that Mark is given his three wishes as a reward for a good deed. He got the witch’s cat down from the tree, so she offers him the magical seed and doesn’t let him refuse. What then was he supposed to use his three wishes for, if not to get stuff for himself? Was this intentionally a poisoned gift, because you shouldn’t accept things from witches? The witch insists that there are good witches as well as wicked ones, but she’s not exactly an unbiased source. The movie never tries to blame her, though. The situation is presented as Mark’s fault, and Mark’s alone.

Finally, at the end Mark wakes up and finds that of course the whole thing was a dream – there was no witch, no magic tree, and no Santa Claus. This is less annoying than it could have been because at least it’s not a surprise. Mark did hit his head when he fell out of the tree the cat was in, and the movie changed from black and white to colour. We’ve seen this before in The Wizard of Oz and we can guess where it’s going. The audience might assume that Mark will wake up and immediately take the opportunity to be generous instead of greedy, perhaps by giving his friend something to make up for the lunch trade. Instead, the woman who owns the cat (who is not actually a witch, but looks even more like one in this part of the film than she does wearing the Hallowe’en witch costume in Mark’s dream) offers him milk and cookies, and he delightedly accepts. This just gives the impression that he’s learned nothing.

Is there anything in this movie I didn’t hate? Well… among Mark’s school friends is a token black kid, who is not differentiated in any way from his peers. He talks like them, he dresses like them, and the writers did not use either his lunch or his Hallowe’en plans as a way to demarcate a class difference between him and the others. So yeah, the movie sucks, but the writers tried really hard not to be racist.

Happy fucking holidays. I want to say hooray for surviving 2020, but we’ve still got a week to go. That’s plenty of time for oh, I don’t know, an alien invasion, or a giant meteor, or the Yellowstone supervolcano, or zombies, or whatever. At this point, if most of us aren’t dead by this time next year, I’ll count that as a win.

#mst3k #reviews #episodes that never were #magic christmas tree #fuck this movie #holiday reviews #60s

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shining-red-diamond · 4 years

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Over the Rainbow (ACT I)

Genre: Fluff, angst in some parts, Wizard of Oz!AU

Word count: 7.1k

Warnings: Angst, mentions of violence, kidnapping, illness, and death; fluff, some peril

Rating: PG-13

Pairing: Reader x TBZ English line (Jacob, Kevin, and Eric) (feat. Sangyeon and Kim Chungha)

DISCLAIMER: I’ve changed a few elements to make this story have my own spin on it. It still follows the same basic storyline of the 1939 film.

Dust from the dirt path kicked up from Y/N’s shoes as she ran with her dog away from Mrs. Gulch’s garden. The old grouch had nearly put Toto out of his misery with her rake. Y/N she was going to be in trouble for allowing her precious dog to chase Mrs. Gulch’s cat, but all she worried about now was if her dog was hurt.

“I’m calling the sheriff, young lady!” Mrs. Gulch had threatened the second the two had escaped the garden. “And you better had put that mutt away!”

As soon as she felt far away enough from the old woman’s house, Y/N knelt down by her dog.

“Did she hurt you, boy?” she asked the small, black, wiry-haired dog as she checked his back. Toto just wagged his tail as if nothing was wrong, which told Y/N that he was fine. “She tried to, didn’t she?” –She snuggled him to her chest- “Come on. We’ll go tell Auntie Em and Uncle Henry what happened.”

It was only another half mile before Y/N spotted her family’s farm just about a football field in the distance, and within a few seconds she had reached the gate camouflaged in the white picket fence. Y/N found her aunt and uncle busying themselves in the chicken coop counting baby chicks as the little birds peeped.

Emily (Em for short) was about mid-fifties, her golden-washed hair pulled back into a low bun, revealing the wrinkles on her careworn face. She was a kind and gracious woman in town, but when she was working on the farm or busy in the kitchen, there was no stopping her. When she wanted something done, she made sure to get it done. Her husband Henry was her age, maybe a couple years her senior. He had a few more wrinkles than Em and was balding at the top of his head. Like his wife, Henry was kind and caring, but he was a little more laid back when it came to busy work. However, he was still a hard-worker and had established the farm from scratch.

Y/N had come to live with them after her parents passed when she was ten years old. It was an adjustment from the city into life in the country, but Em and Henry were gracious to let Y/N to come live with them.

“Auntie Em!” Y/N called as she rushed in, Toto following close behind her. “Auntie Em! Uncle Henry!”

“22, 23, 24,” Em counted each chick.

“Auntie Em,” Y/N was now right next her aunt, “you’ll never believe what Mrs. Gulch did to Toto. She-“

“Now, Y/N,” Em sighed, “can’t you see we’re busy? We’re trying to count.”

Y/N didn’t listen as she ran over to her uncle. “Uncle Henry, I was on my way home-“

“Did you not hear, your Aunt, dear?” Henry interrupted. “The incubator’s broke, so we’re trying to make sure we didn’t lose any babies.”

“Oh, the poor little things.” She managed to stroke one of the chicks’ fuzzy, yellow head with her fingertip. “But Aunt Em, Mrs. Gulch hit Toto right over the back with her rake, because she says he gets in her garden and chases her nasty, old cat every day.”

Em took that chick and said, “Why don’t you run along, and we’ll talk at supper?”

Y/N ignored her. “But he doesn’t do it every day,” she continued her rant. “Just once or twice a week. And he can’t catch her old cat, anyway. Now, she says she’s gonna get the sheriff-“

“Y/N, please!” her aunt begged.

With a defeated sigh, Y/N knew she wasn’t going to get her aunt and uncle’s attention right now. Instead of trying again, she decided to try to console to the farmhands, Toto trotting behind her.

All three of them were friends to Y/N. Kevin was the comedian of the group. He always got his work done, but he also new how to make others laugh while doing so. He was once caught dancing with a pitchfork when Uncle Henry played his record player to pass the time. Jacob was the gentle father figure; maybe it was because he was a dad himself. He and his wife had moved into to town about a year earlier, and Auntie Em had helped her deliver their daughter. As a farmhand, he always made sure to work hard at whatever task he was assigned. The youngest of the bunch, Eric, was Y/N’s best friend, but he always tended to act like it was something more. He was a sweetheart, but like the other two, he was a hard worker.

Most days, Eric always had a smile on his face, but now, with a smashed finger, he was not in the best mood.

“There goes my finger,” he groaned.

“Better your finger than your head,” Kevin said as he started carrying food to the pigs’ feeding trough.

“Kevin,” Y/N went up to him, “what am I gonna about do Mrs. Gulch? Just because Toto chases her old cat-“

“Listen, honey,” he interrupted her, “I’ve got the hogs to feed.”

“Now, listen, Y/N,” Eric chimed in, “you’re not using your head about Mrs. Gulch. Think you didn’t have any brains at all.”

“I have brains.”

“Then, why don’t you use them? When you come home, don’t go by Mrs. Gulch’s place, then Toto won’t get in her garden, and you won’t get in no trouble. See?”

“Oh, Eric,” Y/N scoffed. “You just won’t listen, that’s all.”

Eric began on another task before replying, “Well, you’re head’s not made of straw, you know?”

Y/N rolled her eyes and walked away from him. She wandered over to where Kevin was rounding up the pigs into their pen.

“Come on,” he commanded them. “Get in there before I make a dime bank out of you.”

Out of boredom, Y/N climbed onto the wide fence and started to walk across them, keeping her arms out to maintain her balance.

“Listen, kid,” Kevin said before filling the pigs’ trough. “Are you gonna let that old heffer mess with you? She’s nothing to be afraid of. Have a little courage, is all.”

“I’m not afraid of her,” Y/N justified as she continued her walk.

“Then, the next time she squawks, walk right up to her and spit in her eye. That’s what I’d do.”

Kevin was also the most reliable to talk to when you had a problem. Even the smallest of issues you would be facing would be met with advice from Kevin, even if it came of as a joke or a bit of sarcasm.

Y/N started to laugh, but it ended up making her lose her balance. She flew down into the pigpen as they began running around in fear of what just dropped into their living area.

Afraid of getting trampled, Y/N cried for help.

“Kevin, help!” she screamed. “Get me out of here! Help!”

Within a split second, Kevin had booked it over to her, scooped her out of the pen, and carried her to safety. Eric and Jacob helped her stand, and poor Kevin sat down with his hat off and a hand over his heart.

“Are you alright, Y/N?” Jacob asked with concern laced in his voice.

“Yes, I’m okay,” she assured, her voice trembling a little. “I fell in, and Kevin-“ She noticed the farmhand shaking; sweat beginning to run from his dark hairline. “Why Kevin, you’re just as scared as I am.”

“What’s the matter?” Eric teased. “A little pig make a coward out of you?”

“What’s all of the jabber-whopping when there’s work to be done?” Auntie Em’s voice disrupted the laughter. The other four immediately went silent. “I know three farmhands who’ll be out of a job before they know it.”

“Well, Y/N was walking along-,” Jacob chuckled as he tried to explain, but was interrupted by Aunt Em.

“I saw you tinkering with that contraption, Jacob,” she shut him up quickly. “Now, you and Eric get back to that wagon.”

“Alright, Mrs. Gale,” Jacob sighed as he began to walk away, be he almost immediately turned back around. “But someday they’re gonna build a statue of me in this town, and-“

“Well, don’t start posing for it now.”

Eric laughed, and then Aunt Em gave them some dill pickles to snack on.

Kevin took one and tried to explain what had happened, but Em put her foot down.

“It’s no place for Y/N around a pigsty,” she informed. “Now you go mind those hogs before they worry themselves into anemia.”

“Yes, Mrs. Gale,” Kevin nodded.

Em and Y/N began walking away, and Y/N took the opportunity to try to talk to her aunt again.

“Auntie Em, really,” she whined again, “you know what Mrs. Gulch said she’s gonna do to Toto? She said she was gonna-“

Em just shook her had and told, “Now, Y/N, you must stop imagining things. You always get yourself into a fuss over nothing. You just help us out today, and find yourself where you won’t get yourself into any trouble.”

She scurried off, leaving Y/N standing in shock. Her aunt was always there to help her when she needed it, but Y/N had a tendency to exaggerate things at times. She guessed that her aunt thought this was one of those times, but she understood. Maybe Mrs. Gulch was just threatening her and Toto out of spite as usual, but the look on the old grouch’s face said otherwise.

“Someplace where there isn’t any trouble,” Y/N sighed. She looked at her furry friend, who was sitting on the ground and looking up at her as if taking in her every word.

“You think there is such a place, Toto?” Y/N asked, her mind wandering as she strolled over by the old tractor. “There must be. It’s not a place you can get to by a boat or a train. It’s far, far away. Behind the moon, beyond the rain.”

She then remembered a song Aunt Em would sing to her whenever she felt sad and began to sing.

“Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high

There’s a land that I’ve heard of

Once in a lullaby

Somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue

And the dreams that you’ve dared to dream

Really do come true

Someday I’ll wish upon a star

And wake up where the clouds are far behind me

Where troubles melt like lemon drops

Away above the chimney tops

That’s where you’ll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow, blue birds fly

Birds fly over the rainbow

Why then, of why can’t I?”

Toto jumped up on the seat of the tractor, and Y/N snuggled him for a second before listening to a few birds chirp. She looked up and gazed up some rays of sun pouring into a tear in the clouds, lighting up the gloominess of the farm just a little bit, almost giving a sense of hope.

Y/N then finished her song.

“If happy little blue birds fly beyond the rainbow,

Why oh why can’t I?”

“That dog is a menace to the community!” Mrs. Gulch barked. “I’m taking him to the sheriff to have him destroyed.”

The forty-something year old woman sat up straight in the chair across from Em. Her raven locks were pulled into a tight bun, and her hat was perched on top of her head as if it would fly off at any given moment. Mrs. Gulch had dressed in her Sunday best, but she wasn’t here for a church sermon. She had come for something sinister.

Her words were like punch in the stomach to Y/N. “D-Destroyed? Toto?”

Mrs. Gulch gave a slight nod.

“Oh no, you can’t,” Y/N begged. “You mustn’t! Auntie Em, Uncle Henry, you won’t let her take him, will you?”

Uncle Henry gave her a reassuring smile. “Of course we won’t, dear,” he promised. “Will we, Em?”

Y/N turned to her aunt, who now had a conflicted look on her face.

“Please, Auntie Em,” she begged. “Toto didn’t mean to. He didn’t know he was doing anything wrong. I’m the one who should be punished. I let him go in her garden. You can send me to bed without dinner.”

“If you don’t hand over that beast,” Mrs. Gulch threatened. “I’ll bring a damage suit that’ll take your whole farm. There’s a law protecting folks against dogs that bite.”

“How about if she keeps him tied up?” Em suggested. “He’s really gentle, with gentle people, that is.”

Mrs. Gulch was taken aback at her neighbor’s words. “Well, “ she huffed, “that’s for the sheriff to decide.” –she reached into her pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper- “Here’s his orders allowing me to take him, unless you want to go against the law.”

Auntie Em took the sheet and read it, and Uncle Henry came over to take a look at the order as well.

“We can’t go against the law, Y/N,” Em shook her head as her voice began to shake. “I’m afraid poor Toto had to go.”

“Now you’re seeing reason,” Mrs. Gulch scoffed as she opened her basket. “Here’s what I’m taking him in, so he can’t attack me again. Just put the little rat into the basket.”

This triggered Y/N’s anger even more. “NO, I WON’T LET YOU TAKE HIM!!!” she screamed as she forcefully pushed the basket away. “YOU GO AWAY, OR I’LL BITE YOU MYSELF!”

“Y/N!” Em snapped.

Y/N didn’t take her angry eyes off of their grouchy neighbor. She could feel her tears start to push through.

“You wicked old witch!” she spat as her tears started to fall. “Uncle Henry, Auntie Em, don’t let her take Toto.”

Mrs. Gulch tried to grab Toto out of Y/N’s arms, but she fought against her.

“Henry, just put Toto in the basket,” Em sighed as she massaged one of her temples.

As much as Y/N wanted to resist, she wouldn’t fight her beloved uncle. He was a gentle man, not a fighter. Unless matters got too out of hand, then he would take the appropriate action to settle a dispute. This being why Y/N froze the moment he gently pulled Toto from her arms. The same man who had given her a best friend when she was fourteen was now the one taking him away from her. Sorrow even began to grow on her uncle’s face.

The water works flowed as she watched her best friend being put into the wooden basket. Toto even started to whine a little. Y/N’s heart felt heavy, her head dizzy, and she felt sick. Her feet ran her to her bedroom. She slammed the door and threw herself on the floor and sobbed. She was heartbroken.

For about ten minutes, Y/N cried on the floor, not caring who heard. Toto. Her sweet little dog. Y/N had only tried to let Toto run around to exercise, but why the old grouch’s garden of all places, she’ll never figure it out.

Once she was calm, she sat up and leaned against her bed, beginning to accept that Toto was gone for good.

Two little barks interrupted her thoughts. She looked up and Toto jumped through her open window and onto her bed. He licked her face as if to say, “I’m never leaving you.”

“Toto!” she cried before embracing her pet. “Oh my gosh! You came back!”

Y/N held Toto for about a minute before she realized, “They’ll probably be looking for you once they discover you’re gone.”

Although he was only a dog, Y/N always knew he was smarter than the average canine. If he somehow escaped Mrs. Gulch’s basket, he could possibly escape bigger situations than that.

However, Y/N wasn’t about to let anyone take Toto away from her again. She pulled back, looked at Toto in the eye, and said, “We’ve got to run away.”

As soon as she had packed all that she would need and could carry such as some clothes, shoes, and some of her own money stash from under her bed, she and Toto escaped out of her bedroom window. The two of them took the back roads and headed south. Y/N didn’t know where she was going, but she wanted to be as far away from all of her troubles as much as possible.

After a few minutes of walking, Y/N and Toto came across a large caravan painted in blue with gold and red lettering declaring, “Professor Lee! Acclaimed by the Crowned Heads of Asia.” The closer Y/N got, she could hear a man’s voice singing random tunes.

The owner of the voice then rounded the corner of the caravan and immediately spotted Y/N. He was fairly tall, young man of Asian decent and wore a dark green suit and chocolate brown dress shoes.

“Well, a house guest,” he greeted her with a smile before crossing over to sit by a fire pit that Y/N just now noticed was burning. “Now, may I ask who you are? No, don’t tell me. Let’s see.” –He scanned Y/N up and down- “You’re…going on a visit.”

Y/N shook her head.

“No, that’s not it.” The professor thought again. “You’re traveling in disguise. Nope, wait, you’re running away.”

“How did you guess?” Y/N asked with a smile.

“Professor Lee Sangyeon never guesses,” he claimed with a chuckle. “He knows. Now, why are you running away? No, don’t tell me. Uh…They don’t understand you, or appreciate you. You want to see the world. Cities, oceans, mountains, everything.”

Y/N nearly jumped out of her shoes. “It’s like you could read what was in my head! Oh, please, professor, could Toto and I join you and see all of the crowned heads of Asia?”

“You know any?” Professor Lee asked, then realized what she was talking about. “Oh! Well, I don’t do anything without consulting my crystal first. How about we head inside and I’ll show you?”

Sangyeon guided Y/N to the entrance of his caravan, allowing her to step in first. The inside of the caravan was full of all sorts of treasures. A skull sat on top of the doorframe, colorful paper lanterns lined the ceiling, small jade figurines of various gods lined the walls, and suede furniture sat in the center of all of his collection of treasures. Wax candles sat on each side of the chairs. The furniture surrounded a small wooden table with the most sparkling crystal sphere Y/N had ever seen perched in its holder.

“Have a seat,” Sangyeon motioned towards one of the chairs. When she did so, he began lighting each candle. “This is the same magic crystal used by the priests of Isis and Osiris in the days of the Pharaohs of Egypt in which Cleopatra saw the approach of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony and so on and so forth.”

Y/N watched in awe as the professor prepped the room for his reading. She knew it was probably all an act for a circus somewhere, but she still wanted to see what he was doing.

“Now, you’d better close your eyes, my dear,” the professor instructed. “Just for a moment to be better in tune with the infinite.”

With a nod, she did as she was told. What she didn’t realize was Professor Lee was looking through her basket to find some sort of picture of her and her family to better set up his act. He found one of her, Uncle Henry, and Aunt Em taken in front of the farm the previous summer.

“We can’t do these things without reaching out into the unknown,” he continued before putting the picture back in the basket. “Alright, you can open your eyes now, and we’ll gaze into the crystal.”

Y/N opened her eyes again and watched as the professor stared the crystal ball as if he were studying it very closely. She couldn’t see anything happening, but the act displayed in front of her was making her believe it was real.

“What’s this I see?” he asked to no one in particular, his eyes glued to the crystal. “A house with a picket fence, and a barn with a weathervane. And also, a running horse.”

“That’s our farm,” Y/N pointed out.

“And there’s a woman with graying hair at the temples, a striped dress, and she has a careworn face.”

“That’s Aunt Em.” Is he really seeing everything? She thought.

“Short for Emily?”

“That’s right. What’s she doing?”

Professor Lee’s face twisted into a confused expression. “I can’t quite see. Oh, she’s crying. Someone has hurt her. Someone has just about broken her heart.”

Y/N’s own heart was about to break just hearing this. Of course she was angry that Toto had to be taken away, but was running away the best option?

“Me?” she asked.

“Well, it’s someone she loves very much,” Professor Lee shrugged. “Someone she’s been very kind to and cared for in times of sickness.”

Y/N was getting anxious. “I had really bad pneumonia once. But she stayed right by me every minute. What’s she doing now?”

He had figured she was running away out of some sort of anger, and just from the picture he could tell she was close to her family. Y/N was the first young person to come to him in hopes of finding something better, however, he knew he should at least try to help them make amends with their families. Y/N was no different.

Seeing how upset Y/N was getting, Professor Lee had one last trick up his sleeve. Glancing at his crystal again, the professor’s face displayed a look of shock. “What’s this? She’s placing her hand on her heart, and dropping down on her bed.”

“No,” Y/N began to sob.

“I’m sorry, my dear, but the crystal’s gone dark.”

She couldn’t stay any longer. If her beloved aunt was having a heart attack or stroke, then she needed to go home and try to help her or call a doctor.

“You don’t think she could really be sick, do you?” Y/N suggested as she hastily stood from her chair. “Oh, I’ve got to go home right away!”

“What’s this? I thought you were going to travel with me.”

“Oh, no, I have to get to her right away. Come on, Toto.”

The dog immediately followed Y/N out of the caravan. Professor Lee also followed her out and waved good-bye to her.

“Good-bye, Professor,” Y/N called back to him. “And thank you!”

Professor Lee noticed the drastic change in the weather. What began as a sunny autumn day quickly turned into a mighty windstorm. A tornado was approaching, and he needed to get himself and his horse to the nearest shelter possible.

“Woah, there, boy!” he instructed his horse, Gold Foot, as he caught hold of his reigns. “Better get undercover. There’s a storm brewing up. Poor kid. I hope she gets home alright.”

Back at the farm, chickens were running around panicked, horses were neighing in fright, the cows didn’t seem to care, but the pigs squealed in terror. Kevin and Eric were busy getting the animals to safety as much as possible. Jacob had rushed home to join his wife and baby daughter in their tornado shelter. He helped as much as he could, but Em and Henry told him to go home and protect his family. However, it was still chaos.

“Hurry up and get them horses loose!” Kevin shouted orders to Eric over the loud and wailing winds. “Where’s Jacob?!”

“He has a wife and child to protect!” the younger farmhand reminded him. “So he’s gone into shelter with them!”

Kevin looked up at the sky as Eric went to release the horses from the barn. No longer was it just a partly cloudy day. The sky was covered in a thick black, blanket as a cylinder of wind and dust violently pirouetted though neighboring fields.

“It’s a twister! A twister!” Kevin cried.

Em and Henry gathered everything they needed for the shelter such as food, lanterns, and a few blankets, and Em had gone to get Y/N. To her horror, her niece was missing. She thought Y/N had been in her room, but it was empty. Panicked, she ran around the house and farm, calling out for her every few seconds.

“Y/N! Y/N!” she screamed her nieces name over the tornado.

“Come on, everybody!” Henry rounded everyone up. “In the storm cellar!”

“Help me, Henry! Y/N’s somewhere out in the storm!”

“We can’t look for her now! We have to get in the cellar!”

Em was terrified she wouldn’t see her precious niece again. All she had to do was hope she would be okay once everything calmed.

The wind used all of its might to knock Y/N down as she and Toto made their way back to the farm. The dog began to bark, not wanting to brave it by standing on his own two feet. Y/N was quick to scoop him up and carry him back; leaning forward as she marched to she wouldn’t be knocked over.

“Auntie Em!” she called out. No answer.

The gate was jammed as she fought it open, breaking the lock as she did so. She had some leverage as the house blocked some of the winds force, but Y/N still had to fight her way in. She got the screen door open, but it immediately broke off and was carried off into the storm. However, Y/N was able to get herself and Toto into the house and shut the main door.

“Auntie Em! Uncle Henry!” she called again.

When she went out back to try to open the shelter, it was too late. It was closed and locked. She kicked and screamed for her relatives, but there was no chance of her getting in. She would have to brave the storm alone with her dog and hope for survival.

Y/N retreated to her bedroom, told Toto to hide, and she set her basket down.

“Auntie Em!” she called again just before her bedroom window broke off and knocked her in the back of her head. The impact knocked her out, the darkness consuming her as she fell.

When Y/N opened her eyes, she had no idea of how much time had passed. Toto was licking her face as to wake her up, and Y/N pet his furry head. However, the house was…moving? The wind was blowing, but it wasn’t violent. It was more like a windy day right before it rains. Wind howled much louder until a rooster’s crow broke the silence.

Looking out the window, Y/N couldn’t see anything but a dark gray wall. However, she spotted what she guessed was the roof of the farm’s chicken coop with the rooster standing on top of it. A cow floated around in the air, mooing without a care in the world. A wooden rocking chair floated up, and Old Mrs. Ahn was sitting in it and knitting a quilt. She looked up and waved hello. Confused, Y/N waved back before the old woman floated away again. Two fishermen in a rowboat were next to be in Y/N’s line of sight. They made eye contact with her, tipped their hats, and she waved.

Out of curiosity, Y/N looked down and nearly lost her balance.

“We must be up inside the cyclone!” she shouted over the wind so Toto could hear her.

When she looked back, she saw a familiar face riding her bicycle in the tornado.

“Oh!” Y/N cried out in disgust. “Mrs. Gulch!”

Then, without warning, the grouchy neighbor morphed into something horrible. She now had an ugly, green face, and was dressed in all black with a pointed hat. A large broom was now her choice of transportation. It was a witch. Frightened by the sight, Y/N retreated back to her bed and covered her eyes as the witch released an ear-piercing cackle.

The wind began to pick up. Toto jumped into Y/N’s arms and started to whimper. The house spun more times than Y/N could count. She screamed out of fright and sobbed as she didn’t know what was happening. Was she about to go out like this? She began to regret everything she had done earlier that day from the time she allowed her dog to run around in the neighbor’s garden to running away.

Then, everything stopped. The house seemed to land, and everything went silent. Her room was a mess, but that could be taken care of later. All Y/N cared about was if her family was okay. Some thick trees blocked her outdoor view, so she couldn’t see what was going on outside. She figured the house landed in the nearby woods.

“Are you okay Toto?” Y/N asked her dog. He licked her chin as if to reassure her that he was fine. She then picked him up, gathered her still intact basket, and exited her room.

The house was dark, but Y/N could make out the outlines of the furniture with the help of some light peaking through the curtains. Everything was either broken or knocked over, and a few family pictures were smashed. The important thing was that Y/N was alive, and so was Toto.

Holding Toto close to her, Y/N carefully opened her front door and almost fainted. On the other side of her front door was not her farm, but rather a new world on display in front of her eyes. Colorful plants and flowers surrounded a small duck pond and a stream leading away from it and under a bridge. Next to it was a spiral imprinted in the ground made from yellow and red bricks. In the surrounding area, small, white cylindrical houses with straw and burlap roofs populated around the pound and brick paths, but there seemed to be no one in sight. The sky above was the most gorgeous shade of blue Y/N had ever seen. It was as if she had jumped into a storybook.

“Toto, I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore,” Y/N said to her dog as she wandered around. “We must be over the rainbow.”

After setting Toto down, Y/N glanced up at the sky and noticed a spherical object floating towards her. Was it a bubble? It looked like one, but it wasn’t your average bubble. As it got closer, Y/N noticed it was changing colors and getting bigger. Stepping out of the way, the bubble, now the size of a horse, turned a bright shade of pink as it landed on the brick path.

The bubble dissolved away, revealing a beautiful woman with velvet red, shoulder-length hair and an extravagant silver crown resting on top of it. She was dressed in a sparkling periwinkle dress with glittering butterflies decorating various spots. The skirt part of her gown was almost as wide as a dinner table towards the bottom, and her sleeves were puffed as large as egg crates. In her hand, she carried a long wand with a diamond star at the top.

“Now, I definitely know we’re not in Kansas.” Y/N was speechless. It was the first sign of human life, and all she witnessed was a woman with a wand fly in inside a bubble.

The woman makes eye contact with Y/N and approaches her, her skirt flowing behind her.

“Are you a good witch, or a bad witch?” she asked.

Y/N was taken aback by her question.

“Me?” she asked, and the woman nodded. “I’m not a witch at all. My name is Y/N, and I’m from Kansas.”

“Oh,” the woman replied, and then motioned towards Toto. “Well, is that the witch?”

Y/N just giggled. “Toto’s my dog.”

“Well, I’m a little muddled. I was informed by the munchkins that a new witch has just dropped a house on the Wicked Witch of the East.” She turned towards the slightly damaged house. “There’s the house, and here you are,” –she pointed towards a pair of dark burgundy legs with opalescent shoes on the feet sticking out from underneath the house- “and that’s all that’s left of the Wicked Witch of the East.”

Y/N was in shock. She had accidentally killed someone. She felt bad, but from the tone of the woman’s voice it sounded like it was a good thing.

“And so,” she continued, “what the munchkins what to know is, are you a good witch or a bad witch?”

“But I’ve already told you I’m not a witch at all,” Y/N reassured. “Witches are old and ugly.” A plethora of giggles sounded from behind her. “What was that?”

The woman chuckled. “The munchkins. They are laughing because I am a witch. I am Chungha, Witch of the North.”

Y/N eyes nearly popped out of her head. “You are? My apologies if I’ve offended you, but I’ve never heard of a beautiful witch before.”

“Only bad witches are ugly. The munchkins are happy because you have freed them form the Wicked Witch of the East.”

“Well, if you don’t me asking, what are munchkins?” The laughter sounded again.

“They’re the little people who live here in Muchkinland, and you are their national heroine, my dear. It’s alright, now.” Her attention was on someone else. “You can all come out and thank her. Come out, come out! Wherever you are, and meet the young lady who fell from a star.”

From everywhere in the greenery and behind the small houses, small people no taller than about three feet high began to come into the light of the circle. Their clothing was just as bright as the flowers. The men wore colors of blues, greens, and reds, while the woman wore lighter shades of greens and blues with purples and pinks. Most of them wore hats, their curls sticking out from underneath, and a few of the women’s’ bonnets were decorated with various kinds of flowers such as roses, marigolds, and daisies.

“She fell from the from the sky,” Chungha sang, “she fell very far, and Kansas she says is the name of the star.”

“Kansas she says is the name of the star,” the munchkins repeated as more of them began to appear and surround the new faces in town.

“She brings you good news, or haven’t you heard? When she fell out of Kansas a miracle occurred.”

Y/N was lead to the center of the town, and she began her story. “It really was no miracle. What happened was just this: this wind began to switch, the house to pitch, and suddenly the hinges started to unhitch. Just then the witch, to satisfy and itch, went flying on her broomstick, thumbing for a hitch.”

“And oh, what happened then was rich,” a man in a tall gray hat hopped out.

A few of the woman munchkins joined in on finishing the story. “The house began to pitch, the kitchen took a slitch. It landed on the Wicked Witch in the middle of a ditch, which was not a healthy situation for the Wicked Witch, who began to twitch and was reduced to just a stitch of what was once the Wicked Witch.”

The citizens of Munchkinland performed a small celebratory dance in their freedom from the witch’s clutches, and a horse drawn carriage pulled up. Y/N was guided into it before two citizens approached her with some candy a bouquet of yellow and blue roses.

“We thank you very sweetly,” the first one said with a smile, “for doing it so neatly.”

“You’ve killed her so completely,” the second one said, “thank we thank you very sweetly.”

“Let the joyous news be spread,” Chungha declared, “the Wicked old Witch at last is dead!”

As the carriage began to move, the munchkins cheered wildly and chanted their victory:

“Ding dong, the Witch is dead

Which old Witch? The Wicked Witch!

Ding dong, the Wicked Witch is dead

Wake up, you sleepyhead

Rub your eyes, get out of bed

Wake up, the Wicked Witch is dead

She’s gone where the goblins go

Below, below, below

Yo ho! Let’s open up and sing

And ring the bells out

Ding dong, the merry-o

Sing it high

Sing it low

Let them know the Wicked Witch is dead.”

The carriage stopped in front of a larger homestead, where three trumpeters came out and blew a fanfare as a large-bellied munchkin in a bright blue suit approached Y/N with seven council like people followed behind him.

“As mayor of the munchkin city,” he announced, “in the county of the land of Oz, I welcome you most regally.”

“But we’ve got to verify it regally,” and officially stepped in. “To see…”

“To see.”

“If she…”

“Is morally, ethically, spiritually, physically, positively, absolutely, undeniably and reliably dead.”

Y/N wasn’t sure what was happening at first, but she realized that the council wanted proof that the witch was, in fact, dead. She hadn’t heard anyone scream in fear or seen a dead corpse try to squeeze itself out from under her house, so they must be in the clear.

A munchkin in dark purple robes and holding a scroll approached the council and gave his two cents. “As coroner, I must aver, I thoroughly examined her, and she’s not only merely dead, she’s really most sincerely dead.” He then unraveled the scroll, revealing a certificate of death.

“Then this is a day of independence,” the mayor stated happily, “for all the munchkins and their decendents. Let the joyous news be spread, the Wicked old Witch at last is dead!”

With another wild cheer, the citizens sang their chant in celebration. Y/N was then given thanks from three girls in pink tutus and three boys in colorful suits, both presenting her with candy and a song. Chungha then guided Y/N back to the square where the rest of the people continued their welcome.

Everything then came to halt, when a cloud of bright red smoke exploded from out of nowhere. Munchkins screamed in fright and began to either hide or drop down in fear, and Toto began to bark at who or whatever was unwelcome. Y/N was quick to pick up her dog, but he still growled in protecting her. As the smoke dissolved, the witch Y/N had seen earlier was revealed to be the uninvited guest to the party. Upon seeing her in person, she was more horrid in face as she wore all black clothing and held a broomstick.

“I-I thought you said s-she was dead,” Y/N whispered to Chungha, confused.

“That was her sister, the Wicked Witch of the East,” the Good Witch explained. “This is the Wicked Witch of the West, and she’s worse than the other one was.”

The ugly hag examined the two legs sticking out from underneath the house, and a look of pure wrath shadowed her green face.

“Who killed my sister?” she growled, her voice an unsatisfying pitch. “Who killed the Witch of the East? Was it you?”

“No,” Y/N answered immediately as the witch approached her. “No, I didn’t mean to kill anyone. I promise it was an accident.”

“Well, my little pretty, I can cause accidents, too!”

“Aren’t you forgetting the Opal Slippers?” Chungha asked, unfazed by the witch’s anger.

“The slippers. Yes!” An unsettling smile had appeared on her face as she began to go back to her dead sister’s feet. However, the shoes in question disappeared, and the legs and feet curled up and snaked underneath the house.

“They’re gone!” the witch cried before returning the pair. “The Opal Slippers. What have you done with them? Give them back to me or I’ll-“

“It’s too late,” Chunga stopped her. “There they are, and there they’ll stay.”

Y/N looked down to where the Good Witch was pointing to and realized the slippers were now on her feet, matching beautifully with her pink socks. When did they slip onto her feet? Not that she was complaining about having beautiful shoes on her feet instead of the plain red converse she wore, but the slippers didn’t belong to her.

“Give me back my slippers,” the Wicked Witch demanded. “I’m the only one that knows how to use them. They’re no use to you. Give them back to me. Give them back!”

“Keep a hold of them,” Chungha whispered to Y/N. “Their magic must be very powerful, or she wouldn’t want them so badly.”

“You stay out of this, Chungha, or I’ll break you, as well!”

Chungha just laughed and told her, “Rubbish! You have no power here. Be gone, before somebody drops a house on you, too.”

The witch glanced up at the sky before announcing her departure. “Very well. I’ll bide my time.” Her attention went back to Y/N. “And as for you, young lady, it’s true, I can’t attend to you here and now as I’d like, but just stay out of my way. I’ll get you, my pretty, and you’re little dog, too!” With a cackle, she dashed into the square and disappeared in a thunderous cloud of red smoke followed by a small explosion of fire.

“It’s all right,” Chungha reassured the munchkins. “She’s gone.”

“What just happened?” Y/N asked.

“I’m afraid you’ve made rather a bad enemy of the Wicked Witch of the West. The sooner you get out of Oz altogether, the safer you’ll sleep, my dear.”

“I’d give anything to get out of Oz,” Y/N sighed. “But which way is Kansas? I can’t go the way I came.”

As beautiful as the land was, Y/N just wanted to be back home with her family and friends and bring Toto back with her. She didn’t know if her Aunt was still alive, or even if everyone else was looking for her. It didn’t help that a wicked witch had basically threatened her life over a pair of magical shoes.

“No, that’s true,” Chungha agreed. “The only person who might know would be the great and wonderful Wizard of OZ himself.”

The munchkins immediately bowed at the mention of the man’s name.

“The Wizard of Oz? Is he good, or is he wicked?”

“Very good, but very mysterious. He lives in the Sapphire City, and that’s a long journey from here. Did you bring your broomstick with you?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Then, you’ll have to walk, I’m afraid.”

Thanks, Captain Obvious, Y/N thought.

“The munchkins will see you safely to the border of Munchkinland,” Chungha reassured her. “And remember, never let those slippers off your feet for a moment, or you will be at the mercy of the Wicked Witch of the West.”

“But how do I start for the Sapphire City?” Y/N asked.

“It’s always best to start at the beginning, and all you do is follow the yellow brick road.”

Tagging: @barsformars @barnesbabee @daybreakx @juyeonzz @cosmixity @philosopher-of-fandoms

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surveys-at-your-service · 3 years

Text

Survey #414

“mirror, mirror, tell me who you see / am i you or me? / i can never remember”

How many people have you kissed? Four. Ever kissed someone you weren’t dating at the time? No. Of the people you’ve kissed, how many do you regret kissing? Two. Ever been kissed by a legal adult when you were a minor (or vise-versa)? Yeah, with Jason, but it was only a two-year difference. Ever kissed someone on a dare/as part of a game? No. Where’s the most public place you’ve ever made out with someone? Nowhere public. I wouldn't do that. Can you snowboard? Never tried. Have you ever made a mixed cd for someone? No. Do you use recycle bins at your house? Yes. Do you own more than one bathing suit? No. Have you ever kissed someone who smokes weed? Jason did occasionally with his best friend, but he stopped for me. How are you right this second? I'm all right. Last night was pretty rough, so I'm just glad that's over. My body is just tired. Is there anything you disliked about your last birthday? Honestly, I barely remember what I did on my last birthday. I just remember it was fine. Oh wait, actually, on the way home from going out to eat, we had to call the cops while behind a car whose driver was obviously drunk or high OFF. HIS. ASS. He was swerving like crazy and almost hit SO many cars. I was having an absolute panic attack. I pray to God that guy was more than just found and fined. Do you keep a diary or journal (offline or online)? No, unless you count surveys, I guess. What were you like a year ago? I was the unhappily the same. Is someone on your mind right now? Fucking always. Having a warm dream about him last night didn't help. Who was the last person you sat next to? My mom. What do you currently hear right now? My screen is split so I can watch John Wolfe play some indie horror games. What’s something you need to go shopping for? I need to get new bras baaaadly because I'm tired of none fitting properly. What’s the last thing you ate? I had a donut 'cuz Mom stopped at Dunkin' for coffee. Do/did you do good in school? I did up to college. Then I just... sucked. Do you always get along with your siblings? I mean I don't see/talk to them every day or anything, not even very regularly even, but we generally get along fine now as adults. We disagree about shit for sure, but keep our mouths shut. Or probably talk to Mom about it while I'm not present. I don't even think they like me half of the time. Are you frustrated with anything? So much. Why did you fall for the last person romantically? There were/are a lot of factors. Just she as a person is phenomenal. What’s your younger sibling’s name? Nicole. Can you speak in a different language conversationally; if so, which language? A tiny bit of German. Do you ever fear of falling asleep? With my nightmares, I used to dread it. Now, thankfully, my APAP mask has prevented them from happening, mostly; I've only had two in the month that I've had it, and I ordinarily had them every single night. Do you have an idea of what kind of profession you’d like to have? I do, but I honestly doubt I'm going to succeed in even making it a part-time job by this damn point. Which beach would you say is your favorite? I don't have a favorite. I don't even like the beach very much. What kind of cookie is your favorite? Chocolate chip. Have you ever had a churro? Yes. Too crunchy and ridiculously sweet, not a fan. Truth be told, are you more into looks or personalities the most? A good personality beats good looks any day. How is/was your chemistry class in high school? I actually didn't take chemistry; my graduating year, physical science was offered as the alternative, which I took. How does alcohol affect you? I get hot, and my face flushes badly. It'll make me more talkative. Have you ever tried lemon brownies? No, and I don't want to. I don't like lemon-flavored stuff like that. What was the last type of meat you ate? Beef. Have you taken any medication today? I have prescriptions I take every day. Have you ever watched Parks and Recreation? I've seen some of it at Sara's house. What is your favourite kind of pasta? Just spaghetti with tomato sauce and meatballs, really. I've been on a major chicken pesto kick lately, though. Have you set an alarm today? No. Think of a random person, and give them a message here, no names: Literally just the chance to say "I'm sorry" would be fucking amazing. Just two fucking words. What if there were two of you? Would the world be in trouble? No. That'd be a waste of space, though. Not like I'm contributing much to society. Would you prefer an ice cream sundae or an ice cream cone? I dunno man, it depends on my mood and what I want in the moment. Do you watch movies with the subtitles on? No; I find it to be distracting. Is the last person you kissed yours? I hate this saying. She's her own person that belongs to nobody but herself. But to just go along with it and answer the question, no, we're not together. Do you think you will be married by the time you are 25? Welp, I'm halfway through 25, so. Do you have siblings over the age of 21? All of my siblings are. Do you have a hard time admitting you’re wrong? No. Especially as I've aged, I'd say I'm pretty quick to accept if I've fucked up. Who has the ability to hurt you the most emotionally? Jason will probably always have that power, even if he's not in my life. Would you ever be a stripper? God no, nobody wants to see that. What are your plans for tomorrow? Just get through the day, man. Do you owe anybody money? No. How would your parents describe you? Reserved, shy, a deep thinker, animal lover, uhhhh... What is the most you have ever weighed? Let's not. Would you ever work at McDonald's? No. I'm never working in food service. If you aren't already, would you go vegetarian or vegan? I want to be a vegetarian and being a vegan would be perfectly ideal for me, but I really don't think I can healthily accomplish either. I am FAR too picky to where I'd almost definitely become malnourished. To make it even worse I absolutely cannot "suck it up" if I don't like a food, so it's not like I could choke down stuff I don't like. Not to mention I'd be pretty sad without any yummy food to look forward to, aha. Coolest person you've ever met? Uhhhh I don't know. Do you wear boxers? No. Girls, how old were you when you first learned how to put in a tampon? I don't remember. Would you ever attend a gay pride parade or festival? I would absolutely love to. Did you see Paranormal Activity 2? I think I've seen all of the movies. I liked them, given paranormal horror films are probably my fave. What would you do if an old man grabbed your ass? Kick him in the fucking balls so goddamn fast and probably slap him across the face at the same time. Probably cry later from feeling violated and having my fear of men aggravated. Do you like moustaches? It depends on the person, but I'd say I generally prefer an attached beard and a mustache versus JUST a mustache. Could you hack into someone's computer if you tried hard enough? No. I have no idea how to do that. Have you ever smoked a cigar? No. Do you go out on Black Friday? Hell no. NOT worth fighting people for deals. Do you have curtains in your bedroom? No; I have those blinds that you can close upwards or downwards. Did you like the Spice Girls when you were little? Yeah, I did. Can you sing the entire Fresh Prince of Bel-Air theme song? I think I can. Do you get heartburn? I'm literally on an antacid prescription, or else I get insane heartburn every day. Are you scared of elevators? To a moderate degree, yes. I'm terrified of it getting stuck. Have you ever seen a dead body in person? Yes, at an open-casket wake. Have you ever seen The Goonies? I have. If you're white, do you ever wish you were black? Or vice versa? I'm fine being Caucasian, but ultimately don't care. Do you bake cookies all the time around Christmas? I don't bake. Do you like your hair pulled? Uhhh... I'm assuming you mean this in a suggestive context, in which case no. Never pull my hair, actually. What kind of jeans do you like? Ripped skinny jeans. What do you think is overrated? Who really cares. Let people enjoy what they enjoy. And what are your goals for the remainder of this year? Lose lots of weight, find a job, get back into old hobbies and develop new ones... Name a city that starts with A in your state/province etc. Asheboro. Name a landmark that starts with M in your state/province etc. I'm blanking right now. When was the last time you gave a horse a carrot? Been years. I think I've only done that once, and I can't even remember where it was. Have you ever had to shovel snow? No. How many seasons is your favorite TV show in so far? MM was just revived for its fifth season! :') Where would you most like to go in your state, etc. that you haven’t been? NC actually has this really old Wizard of Oz theme park! It's on the other end of the state, though, and NC is one wiiiiiide state. What was the last bird you saw? A robin, I think. What color was the last thing you drank? Green. Has a wild animal ever been loose in your house? Besides insects, no. Well wait, scratch that, once or twice we had a small mice problem when we lived in the woods. What’s the name of the bookstores in your city? The only one I know off the top of my head is Books-a-Million. Where do your parents live? I live with my mom, and Dad lives in the same city as us. Have you ever seen or touched an iceberg? No, but that would be cool. What colour are your father’s eyes? Brown. If your ex turned up on your doorstep now, with nowhere else to go, would you let him/her stay? Well one, this isn't my house, so I can't make that decision. My mom being who she is though, she'd let pretty much anyone stay the night. If it was Sara, Mom would let her stay as long as she needed. The last time you cried, was it connected with someone of the opposite sex? Ugh, yes. My PTSD was BAD last night. Delicious warm brownies or a giant cookie? I'll take the brownie. Have you visited a haunted building or area before? No, but damn I'd love to. Have you been to North Carolina? Ayyyyeeeee that's my home.

#survey #surveys #random questions #lyrics: ''disguise'' by motionless in white

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emdythewriter · 4 years

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a new light | chapter fourteen (Elriel)

Elain woke up the next morning to the smell of coffee and what could only be homemade waffles. Stretching herself out she threw herself out of bed and headed for the kitchen. The kitchen she now officially owned with Azriel.

After they had unpacked some last night once their friends and her sisters had left Az had gone down to turn in the papers he had previously signed. Technically he was supposed to sign them this morning but he hadn’t wanted to wait so he went down to their landlord after they moved all of Elain’s stuff into his place.

Heading down the hallway that leads to their now shared bedroom Elain finds Az holding a bowl of batter that he’s pouring into the griddle. Smiling at her boyfriend she leans against the wall, arms folded and relaxed. It’s hard to believe that just within a week their lives have taken a complete turn for the better.

There was a time when Elain believed she would never get to feel this happiness with her best friend let alone anyone else. Yet here she stands watching Azriel as he makes them breakfast and there’s no doubt in her mind that he’s as much hers as she is his.

“You just want to stare at me all morning?” Azriel askss, smirking at her as he closes the waffle maker and let’s it cook. “I mean I don’t blame I’m a very attractive view.”

“And a very cocky one as well it seems,” Elain responds with a smile that Az returns. Pushing off the wall she makes her way around the counter and to his side where he tucks her in under his arm.

“How was your first night in our apartment?” Azriel asks as he plays with a strand of her messy hair.

“Very restful,” Elain responds, her fingers trailing the band of his grey sweatpants.

“I see you’ve also found my side of the closet,” Az says as he tugs on the shirt Elain had pulled on in the middle of the night when she got up to use the bathroom. It’s one of her favorites he notices as well. Most of his closet is made up of dark and plain t-shirts but this is one of the few graphic shirts he owns. It’s also the one Elain had talked him into buying when they went to a music festival last summer with a few friends.

“Well it is our closet,” Elain smirks, looking up at him with her innocent little face.

“So does that mean I can wear your dresses?” Azriel asks, teasing her. Elain laughs, still smiling up at him. The look fills him with warmth and happiness, something he hasn’t felt since before his mom passed.

“If you really want to,” Elain says just before the timer dings. She moves to the other side of the island as Az takes the waffle out and sets it on a plate. He pushes the plate in front of her along with the syrup, a fork, and a glass of fruit punch because it’s the only type of juice she will drink.

With a smile Elain starts cutting up her waffle as Azriel pours more batter to make his own. Once it’s done he sits next to his girlfriend and they enjoy a peaceful breakfast together. Elain cleans up breakfast once the waffles are consumed and Az goes to get dressed.

They’re planning on having dinner with some friends tonight but until then they have the day to themselves. Azriel pulls up the website for the local drive-in theater to see what they might be showing this afternoon.

Turns out today is a flashback theater today where there’s a showing of Gone with the Wind, which Elain hates. Then there’s The Wizard of Oz which is a favorite of his, and lastly Dirty Dancing.

“Feel like going to the drive-in theater for a showing of The Wizard of Oz?” Azriel asks, taking a seat on a barstool and watching his girlfriend in the kitchen. He can’t get enough of calling her that even if it’s only in his head.

“That sounds like fun,” Elain says as she hangs the towel she used to dry her hands once again. “You grab snacks and drinks while I go get dressed.”

“Deal,” Azriel says. With a bright smile on her face Elain runs off into their bedroom while Az grabs a couple of bags for snacks and drinks. Starting with the cooler bag he grabs some water and a few of the lemonade flavored sparkling waters that he knows Elain loves. He also adds some fruit from the fridge and an energy drink or two for himself.

Zipping that bag up Azriel heads for the small pantry in the corner of the kitchen. He tends to keep the pantry fairly stocked with a variety of snacks considering how Cassian is always radding his food supply. There’s a few snack sized caramel corn popcorn bags which Az grabs because how could they go to a movie without popcorn.

There’s also sour gummy worms that he adds to the bag. It’s a big bag but Azriel always finds himself craving the candy in the middle of the night. Lastly, he adds a couple big bags of unopened chips from a party he had gone to a couple weeks ago.

“Got everything?” Elain asks, walking out of the bedroom in one of her many sundresses. This one is yellow and white in a plaid pattern, which is her second favorite right after floral. She’s pulling her hair back into a ponytail as she walks back into the kitchen.

“Yeah, ready?” Azriel asks, shouldering both the bags onto his shoulders. Elain smiles with a nod before heading to the small entrance hall where a pair of brown sandals wait for her to slip on her feet. Elain then grabs her purse off the hook Az had installed on the back of the front door.

Opening the door they head out and down to the parking garage where they decide to take Azriel’s truck, having more room for them to lay out the blankets and pillows they had grabbed from Elain’s car beforehand.

It’s quiet for a bit as Azriel drives. The theater is on the outskirts of the city in the more rural area of Velaris. It’s a place he knows Elain is very familiar with as she gets antsy when she’s in the city too long.

“So I’ve been thinking,” Elain says, breaking the silence. Az turns down the music he had put on so he can hear her better. “Since I know longer have to pay full rent and with the bonus I’m expecting soon it might be time to start my business.”

“Really?” Az asked, a little surprised. Elain had been saying that she wanted to wait another year before looking into renting out a space in downtown Velaris for her floral arrangements shop. “You don’t want to wait any longer?”

“Some events have taken place recently in my life that are causing me to rethink things,” Elain says, smiling over at him. He knows she’s talking about their recent relationship status. “I don’t want to wait any longer and I plan on starting small.”

“What do you mean?” Azriel asked. He’s smiling, feeling the joy and happiness along with her at finally being able to kickstart her dream.

“I’ll start as an assistant with a local floral shop in order to learn everything else I don’t already know,” Elain says. “The owner wants to help me so she’ll help create my website and even let me start independent orders as I learn.”

“That sounds amazing,” Azriel says, taking the exit ramp that’ll lead to the drive-in theater. “What about after that?”

“Well I’m thinking I’ll do this through the winter and look for my own space to rent and hopefully by spring I’ll be set up in said space and ready for the summer season,” Elain explains.

“Also known as wedding season,” Elain smiles at him, loving that he knows that little tidbit.

“It’ll be the perfect time to start,” she says.

“Well I can’t wait to watch you succeed.” They’re both smiling as Azriel pulls into the drive-in and pays for the movie. Pulling into the lot where the movie is set up he finds a space right in the center of the lot.

Elain sets up the bed of his truck with the pillows and blankets while he unpacks the snacks and drinks. Settling down together Az kisses the top of her head as he tucks her into his side.

The movie starts and Elain’s focus is on the black and white opening scene while Az watches her intently. A part of him still doesn’t believe that she is his and yet here they are finally in each other’s arms. And all he can think is that he can’t wait for more moments like this throughout the rest of his life.

Tag list:

@thephilosophyofblank @roseteaofficial @sleeping-and-books @court-of-fuck-me-daddy @azriels-forgotten-shadow @tintinnabulary @jemma-nessian-and-elriel @psmarra @chemicha @but-she-was-aelin-galathynius @ttakeitbacknoww @azrielismycinnamonrollprimary @mis-lil-red @poisonous00 @julesherondalex @hail-doodles @strangely-constructed-soul @rapunzel1523 @l0sts0uls1128 @lord-douglas-the-third @musicalfae @sezkins79 @eloeloeheheh @caldelray @abimomeopectore @tswaney17 @illyriangarbage @loysydark @imheretooa @illyrianbeauty @emmejo26 @amitynotpity @alingelina @hav-illi-ard @amylindle @ellenoftroy @hizqueen4life @rheapendragon

(Let me know if you want to be tagged!)

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adamsdoyle · 5 years

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My girlfriend asked me to make her a list of works of fantasy and science fiction so should could feel keyed into references when they come up in conversation. She wanted to feel more grounded in these genres, which she likes, but hasnt made the effort to be on top of everything.

I was happy to compile the most important names, but told her it couldn’t be a short list because recognizing the works of today means honoring their origins, which goes way back into our past.

What’s below is my best effort to include what I assess to be the most culturally relevant becoming, tempering my favorites, and trying to keep it from being totally overwhelming. I’ve left off works from the past five to ten years because it can take a span of time before we're aware the effects new ideas may have. Felt like sharing here in case you or your friends want a crash course on the bedrock of our imagined landscape. I do try to be globally aware, however this list will reflect my bias as a white, straight, male who grew up in the States. And as this is an ongoing conversation between her and myself, I wanted to be able to vouch for the contents.

-Key-

(Wiki) Read up for cultural significance * Personal Favorite + Hugely influential ^ Non-Essential but worth listing

-Literature-

8,000 BC Aboriginal mythology (pre written language)

2,300 BC Egyptian & Chinese myths+

1,000 BC The Old Testament+

900 BC Greek myths, fables, and all the rest

300 BC - 1800 AD Folk and fairy tales+

1000 AD Beowulf (Wiki)

1100s Legend of King Arthur+ 1200s Norse mythology+

1300s The Inferno - Dante Alighieri+

1500s A Midsummer Night’s Dream - Shakespeare

1600s Paradise Lost*

1700s Gulliver’s Travels The Arabian Nights (Wiki)

1800s Faust Frankenstein* - Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly+ Grimm’s fairy tales+ (Wiki brothers, who collected folktales) The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde* Dracula - Bram Stoker+ Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll+ Flatland The Time Machine & War of the Worlds - HG Wells+ (godfather of SF) Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea - Jules Verne+ The Tell-Tale Heart - Edgar Allan Poe+

1900s Peter Pan - JM Barry The Comet - WEB Dubois Little Nemo in Slumberland - Winsor McCay The Book of Wonder - Lord Dunsany (less known now, he was highly influential in his time for fantasy & mythos) The Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka+ (Einstein’s Theory of Relativity) The Wizard of Oz - L. Frank Baum+ John Carter of Mars - (Wiki) Call of Cthulhu or The Outsider - HP Lovecraft+ Brave New World - Aldous Huxley (Teacher of Orwell https://bit.ly/2xayA23) 1984 - George Orwell+ Amazing Stories magazine - John Campbell+ (writer & editor)

After 1950 Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien+ Chronicles of Narnia* - CS Lewis I Am Legend - Richard Matheson (The first real zombie story. Also wrote for Twilight Zone) Childhood’s End - Arthur C Clarke+ I, Robot - Isaac Asimov+ Farenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury Funes the Memorious or The Garden of Forking Paths - Borges+ Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut Wizard of Earthsea or The Lathe of Heaven - Ursula LeGuin Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert Heinlein Dune Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak The Neverending Story* ^The Man in the High Castle Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - (inspired Bladerunner) Philip K Dick+ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy A Wrinkle in Time The Stand - Stephen King+

After 1980 Invisible Cities - Italo Calvino Xanth series* Communion - (True account of alien abduction) Neuromancer - William Gibson+ Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood Jurassic Park - Michael Crichton+ Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson Ender’s Game* - Orson Scott Card Parable of the Sower - Octavia Butler A Song of Ice & Fire - George RR Martin ^Hunger Games Harry Potter - JK Rowling+ Who Fears Death

-Comics/Superheroes-

-DC Comics- Superman (Wiki how he came to be) Wonder Woman (Wiki how she came to be or watch Professor Marston and the Wonder Women. Very interesting) Batman (and Joker) The Sandman - Neil Gaiman Watchmen* - Alan Moore+

-Marvel Comics- Spiderman* (Wiki how he came to be) X Men* Avengers (the hugely popular films all started with decades of comics) Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles* Hellboy*

-Games- Dungeons & Dragons+ Magic the Gathering Netrunner

-Artists & Illustrators-

1100-1200 Anonymous monk’s illuminated manuscript creatures - https://bit.ly/2Ynytf7

1400s Hieronomous Bosch+ Leonardo DaVinci Michelangelo+ 1500s Arcimboldo

1800s Gustav Doré+ Howard Pyle JW Waterhouse

1900s Maxfield Parish NC Wyeth+ Sir John Tenniel Windsor McCay+ Arthur Rackham - fairy tales Jack Kirby - superhero comics Margaret Brundage - Weird Tales covers Picasso - Cubism Chesley Bonestell - space travel, integral to NASA Frank Frazetta MC Escher Heinrich Kley Sun Ra - Afrofuturist musician

After 1980 Jeff Easley - D&D Jim Lee - X Men Michael Whelan H.R. Giger - Alien films Brian Froud Syd Mead - design of Bladerunner & other films Roger Dean - album covers Jean Giraud aka Moebius Bill Waterson - Calvin & Hobbes Leo Dillon and Diane Dillon James Gurney - Dinotopia Alan Lee - Lord of the Rings Alex Ross - superheroes Chris Van Allsburg Mike Mignola - Hellboy Mary GrandPré - Harry Potter

-Radio-

1930s -1950s Flash Gordon War of the Worlds (Wiki Orson Welles’ radio hoax) Buck Rogers The Shadow and much more in the ensuing years, including adaptations of The Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and The Hitchhiker’s Guide

-TV Shows-

After 1950s Twilight Zone - Rod Serling Lost in Space Star Trek - (Wiki) Gene Roddenberry Dr Who (Wiki) The Jetsons (Wiki) Cosmos - Carl Sagan+ (Science fact)

After 1980s Transformers Quantum Leap Twin Peaks - David Lynch (not really either genre but impact has been undeniable) Buffy the Vampire Slayer* - Joss Whedon X Files* Neon Genesis Evangelion

After 2000 Firefly - Joss Whedon Lost* - JJ Abrams Battlestar Galactica Black Mirror* Game of Thrones Westworld* - reboot of Michael Crichton 1970s film

-Films-

1900s King Kong (Wiki) The Wizard of Oz+ Fantasia- Disney+ Monster movies- Dracula, The Mummy, The Wolfman, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Frankenstein (Wiki)

After 1950 Godzilla+ (Wiki) Seven Samurai or Hidden Fortress - Akira Kurosawa+ (Not SF or fantasy but influential) The 7th Voyage of Sinbad - Special effects by Ray Harryhausen (Wiki) Invasion of the Body Snatchers 2001 A Space Odyssey - Stanley Kubrick+ (Wiki) Planet of the Apes Night of the Living Dead+ (Wiki) Superman #Star Wars Trilogy - George Lucas (owing to Joseph Campbell’s monomyth)+

After 1980 Bladerunner* - Ridley Scott ^Legend Mad Max series Alien or sequel Aliens Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind - Steven Spielberg+ ET Star Trek series Back to the Future Brazil - Terry Gilliam+ Tron+ Ghostbusters* Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure* The Princess Bride* Labyrinth* The Terminator & Terminator 2* - James Cameron+ Akira The Fifth Element Robocop Beetlejuice ^Nightmare Before Xmas* Jurassic Park - Steven Spielberg+ The City of Lost Children* The Iron Giant* 12 Monkeys Groundhog Day* The Sixth Sense Ghost in the Shell (1995 anime) Gattaca* Donnie Darko* Starship Troopers (tongue in cheek adaptation of Heinlein’s classic) The Matrix*

After 2000 Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon My Neighbor Totoro or Spirited Away - Hayao Miyazaki ^Underworld Minority Report Lord of the Rings Primer ^The Incredibles Shaun of the Dead* Pan’s Labyrinth - Guillermo del Toro Moon* Marvel Cinematic Universe ^Idiocracy Inception* &/or Interseller - Christopher Nolan+

#scifi #fantasy #essential #list #stories #collection #visionary #narratives #homework #crashcourse #genre #bestof

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littleangel4996 · 6 years

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My Fate Pt 3

Summary: After (Y/n) takes care of Michael,he wakes up in the morning confused as hell and wants answers same as her.

Warning: reader undressing Michael but keeps her eyes on his face, Michael wrapped in a towel, cursing, mentions of virginity.

Michael faints in my lap after he told me who he is. Thank my fucking ancestors that I'm a witch because this man weighs a ton for a skinny.

I use transmutation to teleport to the bathroom and get him clean. This is going to be very difficult for me because how am I supposed to bathe him while he's out ? Again he's heavy.

I'm going to have to wake him a little bit, but he's so peacefully asleep I don't want to wake him up. Let me look up online on how to bathe someone unconscious.

I look it up and nothing except either bathing with him (which I rather avoid) or bathe him in bed (now that's a good idea) or even better, let him sit on the tub while I bathe him so I could avoid getting my clothes wet and not be naked with a stranger. I set the shower for warm temperature. As I wait for the water to be warm I start to take off his jean jacket, yellow dirty shirt and start to unbuckle his khaki pants throwing them in the hamper behind me. The last article is his briefs. Holy crap oh God. I've never seen a actual penis except on a porn website that I accidentally saw when I had to borrow Madison's laptop. I've actually never even done it with a man.

I have to suck it up, I have to suck it up.

I keep saying it like a mantra. I take a deep breath and remove his underpants. I just kept my eyes on him not his “thing”.

-----

This was the hardest task for me than performing the seven wonders.

I had a little strength to help him to the guest room is as he lands perfectly on the bed. I made sure a towel is wrapped around his waist and I finally tuck him in the covers removing the bangs from his face. He looked so much like an angel. The fire alarm goes off in the kitchen as I go downstairs I see smoke coming from the oven. I quickly open up the windows then quickly opened up the oven to be greeted with black smoke in my face. I ran the near drawer to find a rag as I fanned out it out the best I can.

As for the pizza, well there is no point in eating it unless I enjoy burnt pizza then I'm probably crazy.

Instead of a warm meal for dinner I thought a nice (f/f) ice cream was a good way to cool things down after one crazy night. Especially when you just moved in to your new home. Selene, now soundly asleep in bed while watching a little bit of TV as myself start to go into a deep slumber and deal with the situation tomorrow.

Next this is Michael's POV

Michael's P.O.V

After grandma threw me out and not caring or worrying about where to go. She basically doesn't care if I sleep on a fucking bench. None other less I still love her, maybe if I go to the park for a little bit and then maybe I can return home so we can forgive each other. That happy thought was soon cut off as I was struck by someone's car. I laid on the ground hurt. I can barely move. The car stops probably going to check on me. The person behind the wheel backs up their vehicle and runs me over again

Again.

And again.

I wake up gasping for air. I'm back in my old room.

"It was only a dream. Ha it was just a bad dream" I chuckled as I laid back down rubbing my eyes. Or is it my room. Looked around closely to see that I'm laying in a king size bed, instead of my dresser being white they were mahogany and a flat screen TV ? Where is my video game system and my desk along with my shelf with my other stuff. Well I guess there is a shelf that's stacked with books and bored games. I decide to climb out of bed and look down at myself with only a towel wrapped around me and surprisingly clean. I remember a girl, the one who hit me in the face.

Could she be the one who cleaned me. Probably that's why I'm naked. I hope she cleaned my clothes, maybe there are clothes in the dresser.

I walked over to the dresser as I open to find it empty. Figures. Okay, as long as I'm wearing the towel around my waist I'll still be covered.

As I come to open the door there she appeared in pink pajamas with mices printed on them and about to reach the knob. It was the girl who cleaned me. Wow, I've never seen anyone that looks so beautiful. Her (h/l) (h/c) so healthy I bet it never has split ends, her skin looks so soft, her (e/c) eyes can hypnotize anyone and...she is holding my clothes.

“Good morning Michael”

“Good morning umm” She hands me my clean clothes.

“(Y/n) (/l/n) but please call me by my first name” she says nervously. “Oh when you are dressed you may come down for breakfast with me and Selene”.

“Selene?” I gave her a questioning look.

“Oh my cat, she's friendly of course. But enough with me talking you must be dressed you won't be naked. okay I'll be gone.” The girl name (y/n) leaves down stairs heading to the kitchen I believe.

(Y/n) P.O.V

I just got done with pancakes and bacon placing them each on the plate. 2 pancakes and 5 strips of bacon. I don't know if he prefers orange juice, milk or coffee. I'll just ask him when he comes down. He may actually fit into my ex-boyfriend's clothes and shoes. I heard the padded footsteps coming from the stairs to see Michael dressed in his old clean clothes.

“Hey, you're just in time for breakfast. Would you like coffee, orange juice or milk “ I've asked him.

“ Umm I've never tried coffee before, how is it ? “ He asked.

“Well to me it's good, would you like to try mine” he nodded his head. I pass him my cup as he takes small sips of mine until he almost drinks the whole thing. I start to giggle and say “ You can keep it, I'll pour myself another cup”.

I take a cup from the cabinet, adding stuff to my coffee and take a seat across from Michael. He looks at me as if he's waiting for me to give him the go ahead to eat.

“ Please, eat. You've been underground for since God knows when.” He doesn't wait for me to tell him twice as he eats like he's never ate before, like literally. I began to eat as well. This is so fucking weird. I've never thought I would be having someone from the grave to eat breakfast with me.

“Hey, Michael. May I ask you some questions?” I asked. He pauses before putting another pancake in his mouth, dropping the fork.

“I as well would like to ask some questions to Ms. (Y/n)” .

“ just (y/n) please” I say to him and he nodded.

For a little bit of awkward silence until I broke it.

“So Michael, if you don't mind me asking what happened to you like how did you die.”

Michael was hesitant at first but he answered.

“ Well first of all, this used to be my home until you moved in. Actually is this year 2015 still” he asked.

“ Wait no, this is 2020. You've been dead for 6 years.” His blue eyes widened, shocked that he been dead for 6 years. Damn Id be in the same position as Michael. Michael explains what happened to him.

“And second off, My grandma and I had a fight and she told me she never wanted me nor see me again then-”

“Oh my god she killed you ?”

“No” he retorted. “But she did left me on road for dead after she told me to go to hell”. Wait what? He tells me his grandmother didn't kill him but left her grandson on the road for dead after telling him to go to hell.

“Did you get a good look at who killed you” he shook his head. “All I know is that a black car hit me. I don't know what kind of car it was, I'm sorry.” He looked like he wanted to cry.

“I probably deserved it, after I killed the animals and the priest I should have stayed dead. I'm a monster” he cried. So the dead animals were his doing...and a priest, what priest? But I'm not the kind of person to judge, a wise woman once taught me ‘

‘those who judge will never understand and those who understand will never judge.’

I rubbed my hand on top of his as he looked up at me with his teary blue eyes.

“Listen Michael,what you did was in the past. People can change and deserve a second chance” I finished.

“Why do you want to help me” he wipes his tears away.

“I just told you, everyone deserves a second chance in life. Even if you done plenty dirty deeds. You probably have questions for me too, don't you.” He nodded his head.

I take a deep breath and “ Michael I was the one who brought you back to life. My cat Selene found dead animals from yours and grandmother's backyard and I guess when I brought them back from the dead I also brought you.” He's getting confused, oh dear.

“ Michael what I'm trying to say is that I'm….well... a witch” I admitted. “ And no not like wizard of Oz, Sabrina the teenage witch or any sort. I'm talking from the old age witch. I came from a private school in New Orleans, Louisiana called Miss Robichaux's Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies where young witches are automatically enrolled once their powers have been uncovered.we've been taught the history of our kind on how to practice witchcraft, to discover and control our abilities” I finished. I was waiting for Michael to laugh at me or be scared of me but he crossed his arms cocking his head.

“Prove it”.

“What ?” I tried to replay what he just said but I thought he just told me to prove it to him that I'm a witch.

“It's the only way that I'm going to believe you” he said. I took a big sigh using one of my powers, pyrokinesis. I concentrate on the coffee cup as it boils then flames erupted from the cup making Michael jump out of his chair. Then I transmuted behind him poking his shoulder turning around so fast that he's seen a ghost.

“That-that”

“Michael please relax I'm not going to hurt you” I reassured him.

“Was awesome!” He exclaimed having a smile on his face.

“Wait really, you ain't scared of me” I asked, I'm very shocked because if I show these abilities to normal people then they'll run away screaming monster. Well not really but still

“Not at all, I think you would have killed me again if you were a bad evil witch but you are a good awesome witch” he finishes. Selene rubs up against me as I picked her up, rubbing her face against mine. Michael tries to pet her but Selene immediately hisses at Michael. He steps away from her.

“Selene will get used to you Michael don't take it offensive” I said. Michael tucks both his hands in his pockets and nods.

This is going to be one hell of a strange adventure.

-Now as you can see this was a long ass fucking chapter 😂. But I'm glad I took my time with this chapter and thank you for the people were patient ❤️.

@barbie-solecism

@sodanova

@yourkingcodyfern

@kylolangdon

@theghostoflangdon

@miskwaadesiwag

@whysosadmcfly

@creativedogs

@kaccatus

@lxngdonscoven

@captainskyline

@gracethegeek9902

@castiel-saved-me-from-myself

@let-me-try-mom

@edward-nygma-is-my-addiction

@amortentiaxo

@langdonsdemon

@poisedphantom

#michael langdon x reader #michael langdon fluff #ahs coven #ahs apocalypse #ahs murder house #love #comedy #drama #horror #witch!reader #witchcraft #fanfiction #my fate fanfic #fallenangel4996 #myfate pt3 #fallenangel4996 masterlist

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gadgetgirl71 · 4 years

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Top Ten Tuesday 2 March 2021

Welcome to this weeks Top Ten Tuesday. Originally created by The Broke & The Bookish, which is now hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl. Each week it features a book or literary themed category. This weeks prompt is:

Characters Whose Job I Wish I Had

(maybe not even because the job sounds fun, but maybe the co-workers are cool or the boss is hot?)

Daisy’s Run (The Clockwork Chimera #1)

I’d like to be Daisy I think she is a cool character and she has an interesting job on a spaceship that’s heading back to earth.

Synopsis: Life in deep space could be a drag sometimes, but Daisy supposed things could have been worse. They were still alive, after all, which was always a plus in her book. Now if only she could figure out who, or what, was endangering her return home, things would be just peachy.

It had been one hell of a way to start the day––being rudely snapped from a deep cryo-sleep, and in the middle of a ship-wide crisis to boot––but Daisy was pleased to note that the ship had not decompressed, the crew hadn’t been blasted into space, and, most importantly, they hadn’t simply blown up. At least not yet. So, they had that going for them, but being stuck on a damaged ship in the inky depths of space as it limped toward Earth was not exactly the relaxing trip home she’d imagined.

With the powerful AI supercomputer guiding the craft beginning to show some disconcerting quirks of its own, and its unsettling cyborg assistant nosing into her affairs, Daisy’s unease was rapidly growing. Add to the mix a crew of mechanically-enhanced humans, any one of whom she suspected might not be what they seemed, and Daisy found herself with a sense of pending dread tickling the periphery of her mind.

Something was very much not right––she could feel it in her bones. The tricky part now was going to be figuring out what the threat was, before it could manifest from a mere sinking feeling in her gut into a potentially deadly reality.

Dark Lover (Black Dagger Brotherhood #1)

I think it would be really exciting to be Beth Randall as she eventually becomes the Queen and is surrounded by sexy elite vampire warriors.

Synopsis: The only purebred vampire left on the planet and the leader of the Black Dagger Brotherhood, Wrath has a score to settle with the slayers who killed his parents centuries ago.

But when his most trusted fighter is killed — orphaning a half-breed daughter unaware of her heritage or her fate — Wrath must put down his dagger and usher the beautiful female into another world.

Racked by a restlessness in her body that wasn’t there before, Beth Randall is helpless against the dangerously sexy man who comes to her at night with shadows in his eyes. His tales of the Brotherhood and blood frighten her. Yet his touch ignites a dawning new hunger one that threatens to consume them both…

Dead Witch Walking (The Hollows #1)

I’d like to be Rachel Morgan a witch that apprehends criminal creatures from vampires to werewolves and any other magical creature that breaks the law.

Synopsis: Forty years ago a genetically engineered virus killed half of the world’s human population and exposed creatures of dreams and nightmares that had, until then, lived in secret alongside humanity.

Rachel Morgan is a runner with the Inderland Runner Services, apprehending criminals through out modern-day Cincinnati. She is also a witch.

Used to confronting criminal vampires, dark witches and homicidal werewolves, Rachel’s latest assignments – apprehending cable-stealing magic students and tax-evading leprechauns – have prompted her to break her thirty-year contract with the I.S. and start her own runner agency.

But no one quits the I.S.

Marked for death, Rachel is a dead witch walking unless she can appease her former employers and pay off her contract by exposing the city’s most prominent citizen as a drug lord. But making an enemy of the ambiguous Trent Kalamack proves even more deadly than leaving the I.S.

Dead Witch Walking (The Hollow #1)

I think Ivy Rachel’s friend and colleague would be a really cool person to work with along with Jinks. Who couldn’t love Jinks?

Rachel Morgan is a runner with the Inderland Runner Services, apprehending criminals through out modern-day Cincinnati. She is also a witch.

But no one quits the I.S.

Flatlines (Medicine & Magic #1)

I think Kate has an interesting job being an ER Doctor who sometimes uses a bit of her magic to help people recover. Not that I’d be any good at her job as I can’t stand the sight of blood!

Synopsis: I hide from death trying to save lives, but I can’t hide from my magic forever.

I’ve avoided the magic on the this side of the Veil, staying within the realm of the nonmagical while training as an ER doctor. It’s a way of hiding my dark magic from the mage council. If they discover my type of magic, the chances are good they’ll burn it out of me, and in doing so, destroy my mind.

Everything changes when I make the mistake of saving a sexy knight of the mage council from a magical attack. Not only am I revealed to the council, but when a high-ranking member of the council is poisoned, and no magical treatment is effective, I’m called upon to figure out what happened—and how to save him.

Now I’m caught up in a magical plot beyond my abilities. Survival requires I use the dark magic flowing within me, but can I do it and avoid detection? And can I learn why my magic is so different than others with dark magic?

I’m used to living on the edge of the magical world, but when I’m thrust into the heart of it, I need to use my training to protect me, or I’ll lose everything I’ve worked for.

Flatline is a fast-paced fantasy mystery with a mixture of medicine and magic that will leave you breathless.

Full Moon Rising (Riley Jenson Guardian #1)

To be Riley Jenson a hybrid Vampire/Werewolf and to be able to kick ass while protecting humans from supernatural races would be a great job.

Synopsis: A rare hybrid of vampire and werewolf, Riley Jenson and her twin brother, Rhoan, work for Melbourne’s Directorate of Other Races, an organization created to police the supernatural races–and protect humans from their depredations. While Rhoan is an exalted guardian, a.k.a. assassin, Riley is merely an office worker–until her brother goes missing on one of his missions. The timing couldn’t be worse. More werewolf than vampire, Riley is vulnerable to the moon heat, the weeklong period before the full moon, when her need to mate becomes all-consuming.…

Luckily Riley has two willing partners to satisfy her every need. But she will have to control her urges if she’s going to find her brother….Easier said than done as the city pulses with frenzied desire, and Riley is confronted with a very powerful–and delectably naked–vamp who raises her temperature like never before.

In matters carnal, Riley has met her match. But in matters criminal, she must follow her instincts not only to find her brother but to stop an unholy harvest. For someone is doing some shifty cloning in an attempt to produce the ultimate warrior–by tapping into the genome of nonhumans like Rhoan. Now Riley knows just how dangerous the world is for her kind–and just how much it needs her.

Glinda of Oz

Who wouldn’t want to be like the good witch Glinda, with her kindness, beauty and magic?

Synopsis: Peace, prosperity, and happiness are the rule in the marvelous Land of Oz, but in a faraway corner of this magical domain dwell two tribes–the Flatheads and the Skeezers–who have declared war on each other. Determined to keep her subjects from fighting, the Ruler of Oz, Princess Ozma, along with her dearest friend, Princess Dorothy Gale (formerly of Kansas), embarks on a quest to restore peace.When the Supreme Dictator of the Flatheads refuses to cooperate with Ozma, she and Dorothy seek out Queen Coo-ee-oh of the Skeezers, hoping she will be more reasonable. But the queen imprisons Ozma and Dorothy in her grand city and then traps them by submerging the whole city under water. Now it is up to Glinda the Good to save the day. She assembles all of Ozma’s counsellors–including such beloved Oz friends as the Scarecrow, Tin Woodman, Cowardly Lion, Patchwork Girl, Shaggy Man, Tik-Tok, and Wizard of Oz–and they set out to rescue their friends. Will the magic powers of Glinda and the Wizard combined be enough to free Ozma and Dorothy? A rousing tale of suspense, magic, and adventure, Glinda of Oz is the fourteenth and final Oz book by L. Frank Baum. It’s a grand conclusion to his chronicles of America’s favorite fairyland. This deluxe gift edition features all twelve of Oz artist John R. Neill’s beautiful color plates, along with his nearly one hundred black-and-white pictures, making it a perfect gift for all Oz fans, new and old.

The Billionaire Needs a Bodyguard

Well to start of Lex (Alexandra) has a really cool name! But to be a kick ass private undercover security consultant protecting a sexy billionaire must be an interesting and challenging job.

Synopsis: Alexandra “Lex” Granger is a private security consultant who has to go undercover to protect billionaire businessman Michael Thornton, pretending to be an escort. Michael does not think he needs a bodyguard, despite the death threats he has received from protesters against his takeover of a Danish company, but he does need protection against the predatory wife of the Danish ambassador. Lex knows that this assignment is dangerous, made more so because her client does not even know that he is being protected.

She doesn’t know that he thinks she is a con-artist a gold-digger who takes rich men for everything that she can get. As sparks fly, and the attraction between the two go stronger, they face a deadly danger from an unknown assailant. Lex and Mike embark on a turbulent affair in the beautiful city of Copenhagen, with Mike realising that there is much more to the sexy seductress, her bewildering vulnerability evoking unfettered passion and feelings that he has never experienced before. Lex realises that she has committed the ultimate folly, that of falling in love with a man who despises her. Will she overcome the dangers to Michael to her breaking heart?

The Black Widow Agency (Case #1)

Another one with a cool name Alexandria who is a cyber geek and can uncover anyone’s secrets. I’d love to be able to do that job.

Synopsis: The misfit ladies at the Black Widow Agency aim to bring justice to wronged women like themselves using a lethal blend of technology, surveillance, and women’s intuition.

Katie, the ex-cop, appears sexy, strong and tough as nails, but is battling her own demons from the past. Alexandria, the mysterious cyber geek, can uncover just about anyone’s secrets, but has her own. Margot can cook up a storm in the kitchen, or cook up trouble with her lethal tongue. Jane crunches numbers and avoids confrontation whenever possible, but can’t avoid the incessant hot flashes that plague her.

This raucously funny group of women search for justice, but often find trouble instead.

Join them for their first adventure as they come to the aid of a woman who got set up by her ex, causing her to lose custody of her child.

Watch the ladies serve up justice Black Widow-style!

Wrong Number Right Guy (The Bourbon Street Boys #1)

Being May Wexler who ends up working with the sexy Bourbon street boys has my dream job. Who wouldn’t like to be able to surrounded with eye candy as well as being protected by them. Yes Please!!

Synopsis: When a mysterious text message summons May Wexler to a biker bar in downtown New Orleans, she knows something is very wrong. Her sister has sent out an SOS, but when May gets there, she’s nowhere to be found and May is the one in trouble—she’s wearing pink espadrilles, she’s got a Chihuahua in her purse, and she’s in the middle of a shootout.

After tall, muscular Ozzie comes to her rescue, May has no choice but to follow him to safety. At the headquarters of his private security firm, the Bourbon Street Boys, she finds a refuge for the night—and the offer of a job. But it’s not long before a gun-toting stalker isn’t the only complication in May’s life: the more time she spends with Ozzie, the less she can deny that they’ve got some serious chemistry. A wrong number got her into this mess…Will it also get her the right guy?

Until next week.

#JustForFun, #Top Ten Tuesday, #TopTenTuesday, #TTT

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aj-allen97 · 4 years

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Why Rewriting Fairy Tales is Important:

To me when rewriting fairy tales the sky is your limit.

There are scores of ways to rewrite a fairy tale, you could rewrite it as a poem, a short story or a full length novel. You could base it around the idea that the protagonist was a victim of gaslighting (or whatever interpretation you feel best reflects the fairy tale), a victim that does not find happiness ever after and is not afraid to tell you exactly what is happening.

Or you could make the antagonist as a victim and play it out like that, make the reader feel for the villain, put a spin on the fairy tales and start a new trend. You can make fairy tales sci-fi or even make it into a horror story. The sky is your limit, and you can mix and match genres and themes until you come up with the best formula to tell your story. Because that is the beauty of rewriting a fairy tale for a modern audience.

It is also your chance to make it more diverse, to write the story with the type of representations you always wanted to see growing up. Sure you can do what everyone else does and keep the characters implied white like all the other authors on the argument that the fairytales were European and thus you're just keeping with tradition. Or you can be bold and creative and write your own retelling with your the type of story you always wanted to read.

I know that's probably too political for today's time, but in my defense I have read some great retelling that’s full of diversity that in my opinion helps further shake the fairy tale up. I’m not reading a retelling for something I have already seen or read but for something new.

Like, can you imagine all the unwritten stories, all the elements that can spice up a retelling if you were to go outside the box? Japanese Snow White during the era where girls were considered most beautiful the paler their skin was, or before (or after civil war) African American Cinderella with her passable light skin and how she uses her complexion to gain freedom and happily ever after, it’s just the possibilitys and creativity is endless if you go against the box and strive for something new.

I have seen the Wiz, an African American retelling of the Wizard of the Oz, and the songs were catchy, the costumes gorgeous and imagive. I have read Cinderella retellings where she is either lesbian or bi-sexual and they are amazing. They are not only diverse but imaginative. But, they are hard to find. Sure there starting to become socially acceptable but not mainstream. And I say this because today is the modern era, times are changing whether you like it or not and most people want to see themselves represented in today’s media, and what little representation there is are normally crude stereotypes that hurt more than they help. Fairy Tales are not just black and white or innocent stories to ignore, they started off as moral lessons meant to scare young maidens into staying pure and virtuous before marriage. They then evolved into stories for children, giving hope and dreams to a whole new generation, now they are being readapted for a teen to young adult crowd spicing up old stories and coming up with new and bold ideas to explore, and like how they have been adapted countless times to fit a new audience they will keep being adapted to continue resonating with a new audience. There are so many stories that can be told, so many ways for these fairy tales to reach a new demographics. Fairy tales have a way of uniting people, because who doesn’t want to escape from reality and be a princess in a fairy tale land? But most people no longer want the docile princess story line, they want princesses to be in control of their own destiny. Or a change of point of view, or anything really that they have not read a thousand times already. Fairy Tales are important because they keep being adapted and they keep telling new stories to a new audience. They keep inspiring people to go against the status quo and re-imagine what has already been written. And that’s the beauty of creative writing. Having the freedom to write your own story, the type of story you wished you could have had growing up with. Not just the type if story you wished already existed but the type of fairy tale you wish already existed.

#fairy tales #thoughts #opinions #keep the imagination going #keep reaching for the stars #there’s all ways something new to explore

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redantsunderneath · 7 years

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An explanation of the end of Twin Peaks that provides closure

Short version, unpacked below: The story in the World of Twin Peaks has its end mid part 17 when the lights go out in the sheriff's station (with a farewell coda at the boiler room door). Coop’s face superimposed on the screen indicates a dissociative episode, one foot on the denouement of the TP story and one in the temptation of solving the only unresolved issue: Laura. The remainder of the show is a “last temptation of Cooper” fantasy/nightmare where the lesson metaphorically learned through his 25 years in the lodge is played out in the real world and demonstrates the horrific consequences of wasting your life in an obsession with solving other’s problems without facing your own. After Coop’s nightmare climax winks out, leaving us in the real world as pre-season Coop returns to the lodge. As farewell, we get the lingering lesson of the whisper, “you can never save me,” which brings us around to the fact that this has been learned before Coop leaves the Lodge – we end at the beginning, and this 1.5 episodes really belong before the first (holla, Infinite Jest fans) and is placed here as a remembered lesson, a real world version of 25 years in the lodge.

So, biases on the table – I needed an explanation that accomplished 3 things:

1. Provides closure – it has to work as a series finale without all the “there has to be a fourth season now”

2. Allows for Coop to not have to have, after the last 25 years, not learned his lesson – no cycle of “never learn” purgatory allowed

3. Saving Laura is bad because it robs her of agency and redemption and Coop’s desire to do it is damaging and reflects his deepest flaw

I bring a couple of preconceptions to the table that are, for certain, not universal.

1 Coop lost his confrontation with his shadow self (s2e22) because of his tainted savior complex. This is due to the nature of white knight-ism itself (reducing women to grail objects), his repeating pattern of his relationships being structured this way (he tried to break this pattern with Annie, but Windom Earle placed her back in this context, setting him up for a fall), and a general fascination with the dark/morbid aspects of humanity/sexuality (grinning inappropriately at Fleshworld, desiring to see dead bodies at a young age, job enabled obsession with victims of sexual violence after it is too late). But also, the problem to be solved is that of a system that he has internalized, a kind of “bad” pattern of the way males and females relate, and he has not really taken a look at himself (or the FBI for that matter). Going back to save Laura is the direct but wrong way to deal with his deepest desires and the problem with the world and not only would rob her of her own salvation but has the same cosmic wrongness that is demonstrated by the zombie Kahl Drogo sequence in GoT (has anyone compared that yet?). This is bad Coop – ends justify the means, playing with dark forces, trucking in life and death. Mr C, another words.

2 In the World of Twin Peaks, things work like TV (the OS like nighttime soaps the Return like prestige drama) but with the symbolic aspects manifested as a psychological space of archetypes spilling in to the ground reality. Thus, conflicts are played out metaphorically, but one can imagine the real world analogue to any of these. Coop’s confrontation in the (s2 last episode) Lodge becomes him losing himself to his darker impulses given the situation (Annie possibly being killed like Caroline), killing Earle in rage, and this changing him, his demons taking over. The current season does a lot to define the TP world against our world, both in implicating a dreamer (not just Lynch and Frost, but the audience which includes “real world” Coop/Richard, see below), placing Audrey/Sherlyn Fenn there (this only makes sense but is too much to broach here), including a real world city limits sign to contrast with the TP sign, and casting the owner of the house as the owner of the house.

3 The ring represents responsibility for your actions. Choosing to put the ring on is an act of radical self-determination, taking responsibility who you are and what you have done, enabling a choice whether to succumb to your demons, and dangerously stepping into the unknown world where the will meets the real (as opposed to the self-imagined or the civilized-symbolic). Having the ring put on you is forcing responsibility and exposing someone to judgement. I’d love to see a Green Lantern that took this view of the “ring of will,” the unworthy burning themselves out. Cooper telling Laura “don’t take the ring” is a mistake of someone who has yet to learn the lesson (see savior complex above). She and maybe some element of the world is saved by her sacrifice which is enacted by owning her actions.

4 I haven’t seen mentioned that, with everybody noting the Wizard of Oz nature of the “last scene in the world of TP,” the superimposed face is an element of going from Kansas to Oz. Dorothy’s face doubles and the double hangs superimposed over the cyclone. This is that in reverse, going from the “dream” to the real world.

5 Remember when Laura not only screamed at Cooper in FWWM (in black and white, Oz dudes) but then every line she says after that works as if addressed to him? “Your Laura is gone, there’s only me now” “you want to take me home now.” That was awesome

6 Naido is only revealed to be Diane in the dissociative space while Coop’s real analogue views the dream, starting (seeing Naido is the first “split off” moment). Until then she is the injured, unaware, incoherent feminine who makes monkey noises, firmly in the symbolic space, rescue bait for old Cooper, the agency-less victim. Coop maps her to Diane but also to the red room (face, Diane’s nail and hair choices). The red room is a feminine space – vaginal red curtains, Venuses (note the replacement of the Venus DeMilo with no arms with the Venus of Arles with the arms ripped off, a change of nature, Naido to Judy), and the fact that the trial of the masculine entails facing the feminine. Naido is a figment of the male imagination and being turned into the 3d Diane is the moment Coop shows he has learned.

7 Judy is tough to talk about, but we are gonna. The FBI men have clearly been on a search for something wrong with women (OK, the feminine) they can fix. Being less charitable, the function of the FBI in Twin Peaks the Return is to investigate what went wrong with women since WWII… what with the acting like men, gaining subjectivity, being less nurturing, and all. Charitably, something is wrong in every generation with the masculine and the feminine and the wish to try to find a solution. Judy as the goddess of negative feminine energy makes sense, but Coop seems to be looking for something more like “the daughter” (Naido identifies Judy as mother just as Sarah is Laura’s mother), the woman in trouble to be saved from her Judy-bred impulses. This is kind of hard to articulate but this goes to my “TP is about Boomers” theory where there is a post war problem with the feminine associated with inattentiveness (Judy and Naido have no eyes), a replacement of the maternal succor with aggression, and a putting a part of its nature asleep. Naido is the vulnerable, underdeveloped, defanged product of this.

8 Coop’s 25 year period is a metaphor for the problems of America but, more importantly, is a metaphorical story of a man at war with himself. Cooper’s fireman nature (strong, silent, problem solving, scrupulous, doing what needs to be done, productive of joy – in the lodge) has been suppressed in favor of his Bob nature (a taker, end justifies the means, all goal - doing what he wants, leaving destruction – Mr C) but it is Dougie (the original) that is the “real” Cooper in that this is the identity that has been manufactured to cover the deeper faces, the one he shows the world. When the “mid-life crisis” hits, the good starts to reassert, there is a fight, the return of the good fixed the world, and the identity is recreated as a better person. Note this is the metaphor I’m not claiming this is what “actually happened,” whatever the hell that means.

9 I think Mr C was on a mission to do what the Blue Rose task force set out to do - find Judy – he just didn’t care who died in the process and was an adversary of anything that would get in the way. He had the same goal as OG Coop did. He needed the coordinates because he wanted Naido who, as above, is a sort of contrapositive of Judy. The giant flips between the location of the TP embodiment of Judy (Sarah) and that of Naido. The white lodge was another trap.

10 Diane has, this season, lined up to represent the relationship Coop really needs. He realizes Mr C has raped her, and the seeing her in Naido is a demonstration in mastery, by making her her in his mind, not a victim. All the stuff at the end is the failure of this mastery previously in the lodge which maybe “flits through" Coop's mind while the face is up (though the face disappears during the true healing/win moment of the kiss, real recognition, and affirmation of memory).

So away we go. It works like this: In the “world of TP” Coop has gotten right with his identity (Mr C and Bob gone) and relation to the world (Dougie) has been restored. Mr C has been brought down by an avatar of weaponized innocence (Lucy) and Coop has faced Bob who has been brought down by an avatar of, well, gumption (determination, enthusiasm, taking a leap of faith). Then he sees Naido, an avatar of the helpless traumatized woman, the thing his trial is based on.

This brings about the superimposed face – this is a diffracted reality: “Coop” as a real world manifestation as part of the audience (see below) witnessing the end of the show he and all of us are dreaming. From a TP plot perspective, they have rescued Diane from Mr C’s victimization (rape) and contact with the good Coop brings her back to herself. He demonstrates that he has learned his lesson by making her a human in his mind. He sees in her the red room - in Naido/Diane is the nature of his trial, the ugly thing in the room that has a distorted, covered Diane and Judy as part of it emblematic of the taint he has to banish. He has triumphed, they are both whole.

The dreamer turns away just long enough to miss the real reconciliation and affirmation that they remember what happened. Everyting is finalized, everyone has arrived, Coop says hope to see you again, and the lights of the world of the show go out – the end.

Lynch and his two lead actors of his career go to the Great Northern boiler room door, Kyle says he must go alone, and goes through. This is Lynch, finished with his film career, saying goodbye as Lynch’s representative in the world of the show must go it alone. The face is gone, the dream is over, see you at the curtain call. One could stop here as the show world is over. Note that the idea of going to get Laura or going to get Judy has never even been broached (it seems like it, but it hasn’t - there is no indication that that's why he is going through the door).

We go back to the past (and I mean Dale in the lodge past), to the fantasy that will haunt everything retroactively. Dale is allowed to experience his rescue Laura but loses her to the ratcheting sound of the compulsive attempt (the B&W slipping into color, the white lodge being lost). He should not be doing this and he needs to become the guy who doesn’t. This is happening again and again while Dale is in the lodge – he is tested, and fails. This failure causes the loss of Laura (to a similar “woosh”) in the red room. Dale has to ignore Leland (the clear eyed one that killed his daughter, not the dopple white eyed one that never killed anybody) and leave Laura’s redemptive act intact. We witness one such failure in the fantasy space followed by the same in the room itself (shown extended in episode 1, again Dark Tower and IJ). But there is a version we haven’t seen, the “real world” one that the others have been analogies of.

OK, we’ve reached a part that has multiple layers going on at once. The rest of the episode shows a “real” version of Coop living the fact that he will never be the savior, a demonstration of how his obsession drove away the real love of his life, a representation of the time in the lodge as really just 25 years wasted on a tainted dream, a presentation of what the complete un-metaphorically split Coop would have been like those 25 years, and a symbolic depiction of (and middle finger to) fandom. You could read it as a coda which goes back to dramatize the lodge or a moment of Cooper in Twin Peaks (when the face is up) having the “lesson” flashed through his mind.

It begins. After a third repeat of the red room stuff with Leland, etc., the room appears to let him out into the world, our world. He gets to live the life he would have lived, beginning with a symbolic marriage to Diane - they say are you sure you want to do this, kiss, and cross the threshold, risk be damned. The “honeymoon” sex really represents their entire marriage/relationship… he commands, she obeys, their closeness slips into alienation, she loses who he is, as the Mr C part of him is dominant. There is no rape per se, he violates her spirit. There is no tulpa, just a person she becomes as a result of the general trauma of being with him. This is what being married to old Dougie was like for Diane’s “sister,” except she was the fantasy version that could tough it out with resilience, spunk, and good spirit. After 25 years, she leaves (the hotel is the same one 25 years later, but that’s just shorthand for he’s stuck, never "home" the whole time). They are literally different people, now.

Coop is going to finish this. He shows off how he’s Coop, Mr C, and Dougie at once in the Judy’s diner scene. Finding Laura is the one thing that gives his life meaning (fandom alert). He finds her, still trapped in the life/cycle her resolve and death freed her from, takes her “home” where the RR is closed (or is it the real diner -Norma's place never closes) and the Laura’s house is owned by the real house owner. He lets out a wail of wasted time “what year is it?” as she suddenly wakes up to the vast degree of her (and everyone like her)’s pain. He has done nothing but create more suffering. The lights go out, simulation over, and he returns to the red room.

The cycle starts again. Laura whispers “Jackass, you cannot save me/women in trouble because the problem is in you” and he makes the face of horrifying recognition. Start the season over, this is just the setup.

Hope this helps.

#twin peaks #david lynch #lynch #mark frost

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dasha-nova · 7 years

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David Wong ‘John Dies at the End’ Quotes – P. I

“Hello?” “Dave? This is John. Your pimp says bring the heroin shipment tonight, or he’ll be forced to stick you. Meet him where we buried the Korean whore. The one without the goatee.” That was code. It meant “Come to my place as soon as you can, it’s important.” Code, you know, in case the phone was bugged. “John, it’s three in the—” “Oh, and don’t forget, tomorrow is the day we kill the president.” Click. He was gone. That last part was code for, “Stop and pick me up some cigarettes on the way.” Actually, the phone probably was bugged, but I was confident the people doing it could just as easily do some kind of remote intercept of our brain waves if they wanted, so it was moot.

Shelly lived in a simple two-story farmhouse, black shutters on white siding. It sat on an island of turf in a sea of harvest-flattened cornfields. We walked past a mailbox shaped like a cow and saw a hand-painted sign on the front door that read THE MORRISON’S—ESTABLISHED 1962. John and I had a long debate at the door about whether or not that apostrophe belonged there.

“You see, because John and I have this thing where we’re both seeing completely different versions of you. Now, John has eyesight problems because of his constant masturbation, but I don’t think—” She burst into snakes.

I heard Molly plop down on the floor below. I reached down to pet her and she licked my hand the way dogs do. I wondered why in the world they felt the need to do that. I’ve often thought about trying it the next time somebody got their fingers close to my mouth, like at the dentist. John came back twenty minutes later, wearing what must have been the smallest towel he could find.

The man-shaped arrangement of meat rose up, as if functioning as one body. It pushed itself up on two arms made of game hens and country bacon, planting two hands with sausage-link fingers on the floor. The phrase “sodomized by a bratwurst poltergeist” suddenly flew through my mind. Finally it stood fully upright, looking like the mascot for a butcher shop whose profits went entirely to support the owner’s acid habit.

Molly came by just then, trotting along like everything was just A-OK in Dogland. Then she noticed some meat standing nearby and started happily chewing on a six-inch-wide tube of bologna serving as the thing’s ankle.

They say Los Angeles is like The Wizard of Oz. One minute it’s small-town monochrome neighborhoods and then boom—all of a sudden you’re in a sprawling Technicolor freak show, dense with midgets. Unfortunately, this story does not take place in Los Angeles. The place I was sitting was a small city in the Midwest which will remain undisclosed for reasons that will become obvious later. I was at a restaurant called “They China Food!” which was owned by a couple of brothers from the Czech Republic who, as far as I could tell, didn’t know a whole lot about China or food.

“Hey,” I mumbled. “Are you Arnie?” “Yeah. Did you doze off there?” He shook my hand. “Uh, no. I was just tryin’ to rub somethin’ off the back of my eyelid. I’m David Wong. Good to meet ya”.

He said, “Okay. Your family live around here?” Getting right to it, then. “I was adopted. Never knew my real dad. You could be my dad, for all I know. Are you my dad?” “Eh, I don’t think so."

It squatted and peed on the grass, ran over to another spot and peed there, too. Marking this whole new world as its territory. It came toward me at a trot, the chain hissing through the grass behind it. It sniffed around my shoes, decided I was dead, I guess, and began snuffling around my pockets to see if I had died with any beef jerky on me.

A brass tag, on its collar. Etched with a message. I’M MOLLY. PLEASE RETURN ME TO . . . . . . with an address in Undisclosed listed below. At least seven miles from home. I wondered how long it had taken the animal to etch that tag.

The Jamaican turned his gaze on me, trying to pull off the piercing stare of the exotic voodoo priest. It was an expression that was supposed to make me hear theremin music in my head. “You gotta love the skeptic, mon,” the guy said in a rubber accent that was part Jamaican, part Irish and part pirate.

His gaze froze on me. I had a familiar, nervous sensation, one that goes all the way back to elementary school. It’s the simultaneous realization that I may have talked my way into another fistfight, and that I had not spent any time learning to fight since the last one.

“Do you dream, mon? I interpret dreams for beer.” That’s the town of Undisclosed in a nutshell. This run-down half city with more weirdos per capita than you’ll find anywhere outside of San Francisco. We should have that printed on the green population sign coming into town: WELCOME TO [UNDISCLOSED]. DREAMS INTERPRETED FOR BEER.

I almost launched myself at the guy. But, once again a probable trip to the hospital was avoided by physical cowardice. This guy could probably kick my ass even without magical powers. I was so wired at this point I had the insane urge to punch one of those girls instead. Probably lose that fight, too.

“You know what, mon, why don’t you take your fake Jamaican accent and get back on the boat to Fake Jamaica,” is another thing it would have been cool to say, had I thought of it. Instead I sort of mumbled and made a dismissive motion with my hand as I stumbled into the crowd, acting like the conversation failed to hold my interest.

“You like so few people, Dave. He’s cool. He bet me a beer he could guess my weight. Got it on the first try. Amazing stuff.” “Do you even know how much you weigh?” “Not exactly. But he couldn’t have been off by more than a few pounds.”

TELLING THE STORY now, I’m tempted to say something like, “Who would have thought that John would help bring about the end of the world?” I won’t say that, though, because most of us who grew up with John thought he would help end the world somehow.

But I told him if he ever got into that kind of trouble again without telling me I would not only kick his ass, but would in fact beat him until he died, then pursue him into the afterlife and beat his eternal soul. So John being spaced out on crank or crack or skank tonight wasn’t reason to declare a national holiday, but at least he came to me this time.

From day one it was like society was this violent, complicated dance and everybody had taken lessons but me. Knocked to the floor again and again, climbing to my feet each time, bloody and humiliated. Always met with disapproving faces, waiting for me to leave so I’d stop fucking up the party. They wanted to push me outside, where the freaks huddled in the cold. Out there with the misfits, the broken, glazed-eye types who can only watch as the normals enjoy their shiny new cars and careers and marriages and vacations with the kids. The freaks spend their lives shambling around, wondering how they got left out, mumbling about conspiracy theories and Bigfoot sightings. Their encounters with the world are marked by awkward conversations and stifled laughter, hidden smirks and rolled eyes. And worst of all, pity. Sitting there on that night in April, I pictured myself getting shoved out there with them, the sound of doors locking behind me. Welcome to freakdom, Dave. It’ll be time to start a Web site soon, where you’ll type out everything in one huge paragraph. It was like dying.

“Woof!” “Shut up!” “WOOF!” “Hey! I said shut up! Get your feet off my car!” “WOOF! WOOF! WOOF!” “Shut up! Shut up! Shut! Up!” This went on for longer than I care to admit, and it ended with me getting out and leaning my seat forward so Molly could jump into the back. Yes, the entire spiraling trajectory my life took since that night was because I lost a debate with a dog.

John was always bitching about “Wally” and how greedy “Wally” was and how he should have given me a raise by now. He didn’t realize that there was no person named “Wally” in the Wally’s organization. That was the name of the DVD-shaped mascot on the store’s sign. I never had the heart to tell him.

“That bratwurst was three bucks? Holy crap. Okay. Give me a second. All right. Check between the sausage and the bun. You’ll find a hundred dollar bill folded up in there.” Encouraged that maybe all this black magic could actually produce something positive, I fingered around under the sausage for a few seconds. “Nothing here, John.” “Okay. I guess I can’t do that. Do you have your ATM card?"

A round, frosty lump the size of a coffee can tumbled out of the freezer, fell to the floor, rolled to a stop two feet away from me. I stared at it, stared into the open, empty freezer. I steeled my courage— —then turned and ran my ass off.

#david wong #john dies at the end #quotes #book

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surveys-at-your-service · 6 years

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Survey #200

tw for abuse.

If you’re pale, do you get made fun of for it? No. Are you white/black/asian/mexican/etc? White. Ever been to Washington D.C.? Did you get to meet the president of the time? I've driven very close to it, but no. Ever been to NYC Or LA? If so, how were your experiences there? No. Were you adopted? If so, have you met your biological parents? How about biological siblings or grandparents? N/A Ever had an abusive parent or other family member? If so, what’s the worst they did? No, thank Christ. Are either of your parents engaged but not married yet? No. Do you like older or younger siblings better? I have both, but. Hypothetically, if I had to choose one in general (not picking between my real sisters), probably younger. Ever had to take care of a baby sibling? If do, did you feel responsible, or were you just annoyed? No. We're 2-3 years apart, so there's never been a situation like that. Have you ever had a close friend get knocked up early? Can we not say "knocked up." No. Do you prefer baby boys or baby girls? I mean it depends on the kid, but I believe boys have less of an attitude. Are you one of those losers that buys things with the letter of your name? Well they're not "losers?" But whatever, no. I don't see the appeal at all. Have you done any form of martial arts? If so, what? If not and you want to, which one(s)? No, but I'd like to learn some form of self-defense. Would you be willing to let someone you know die if it means you can save an entire village? Lol this is such a Life Is Strange question, don't do this to my emotions. It depends on the person. If you were to write a letter to your future self, what would you say? Something about absolutely never giving up, regardless of the struggle. What are your thoughts on cults? Do you know anyone who has joined one? To my understanding, not all cults are bad... I think. If there are harmless ones, go for it, dude. Whatever you wanna believe. I knew a guy back in school who created one. What is a character trope that you really dislike? (For example, the Manic Pixie Dream Girl) The bitchy, germaphobe priss. Are you a fan of steampunk? If you don’t know what it is, would it be something you’d be interested in looking into? Hell yeah. What was the first job that you ever held? Do you remember how much you were paid (if you’re comfortable sharing)? Sales associate at GameStop. Idr. Would you say that you’re good at understanding people with accents (especially those who don’t have standard Anglo ones)? Most, save for severely southern. And I live where that accent is commonplace. How do you feel about anarchy? Let's not. Society would crumble in days. If you have any, who’s your favorite music artist from the 1970s? Probably Van Halen, but ugh, I love SO MANY metal/rock bands from that era. Do you think travelling is something that every young person should do to gain life experience? I'd say so. See that the world is more complex and varied than you'd think. When was the last time you listened to new music? I've been listening to new In This Moment songs periodically. Listened to "Blood" a few days ago. What word spelled out looks weird to you? Oh, I'm sure there's plenty. Do you require “closure” after things like break-ups or do you move on easily? I've only had one serious break-up, and I didn't even begin recovery until we had our final conversation over a year later that helped me reach closure. Is there a genre of movie that you just can’t watch? Musicals. Do they count as a genre? What was the last song to give you nostalgia? Hm... I"m blanking. But I know something did pretty recently. Have you ever had a conversation with a cab driver? Never been in a cab. Do you have any shirts from vacation/tourist locations? From beaches, which I never wear. I've only received them as gifts. What is one place you would like to go back and revisit? Chicago. Which would you prefer: a homemade gift, or a store-bought one? Homemade mean more to me usually, but as a gift, it obviously depends on what it is. When was the last time you were “under the influence?” I last drank uhhhh. I think at Sara's when her dad almost made me an alcoholic because holy FUCK bartending skills Jesus fucking Christ. How regular of an occurrence is this? Very rare. Have you ever had a relationship last for a year or longer? Twice now. What ended it, or are you still involved? We know the Jason story; Sara and I are still together. What’s the best time you’ve had at a high school sports game? Ugh, I never had a good time. I was just forced to go because Ashley was a cheerleader. If you’re out late, where are you likely to be? I couldn't even try to tell you the last time I was out late. Do you ever visit your mall’s arcade (if it has one)? Ours doesn't have one. Shirts with sarcastic sayings: yay, or boo? Yay. If “yay,” do you have a favorite? Bring Happy Bunny BACK TO THE FOREFRONT OF SOCIETY. If you lost the use of your limbs, would you still want to live? Eh, if it was just one leg, sure. What’s your absolute favorite topic to discuss? Weeps Markimoo. What is your least favorite topic to discuss? Politics and economics. When was the last time you played hide-and-go-seek? I played with my niece and nephew a few months back. They always hid in the same spots, lmao, but of course you gotta go along with kids, so I could "never find them." Where was your favorite place to hide? As a kid, I aaalways climbed into the toy box. Do you have a library card? Do you use it? No. Do you cuddle with your pet (if you have one)? Yup. What college did you want to attend as a kid? NC State. Was that still your choice when you grew up? Well, it didn't have the major I chose back then, but now that it does, that's probably where I'm transferring too after I get my pre-requisites. What sports star or athlete did you aspire to be like as a kid? None. How many colleges did you attend? Two so far. Going to a new one when I get my goddamn transcript from my cesspit that is my last school. Why did you choose the shirt you have on now? It's just a plain, gray tank. I wear tank tops to bed. Is marriage overrated? No? At this point in your life would you want to start a new career? I haven't even begun a career yet. Growing up what were your favorite cartoon characters? OKAY SO EMBARRASSING SECRET I'VE LITERALLY NEVER REVEALED. I was crazy for Ash Ketchum, and when I was young, I added daily to a story I wrote about being a Pokemon trainer; I didn't have Pokemon games because I was too embarrassed to ask back then, so I resorted to making it up. I filled up literally 3+ journals. Back to the main topic, far into that story, Ash became my boyfriend lmfao. Oh man, just answering this brings back such cute memories. Charmander-Charizard was my best friend and look it was just cute okay. What do you think has changed about you since you were a teenager? I'm way shyer. Looking back at high school were they the best years of your life? No. Were you the type of kid you’d want your children to hang out with? Yeah sure, I was genuinely a good kid. Do you look like your mom? Some say. When was the last time you overslept? I can't oversleep when I never have shit to do. What would you do if you could do anything without failing? Skydive, maybe? Do you use your phone as an alarm? If I need an alarm for whatever reason. What country do you live in? The United States. What is your native language? English. If you could meet any famous person (dead or alive) who would you meet? Take a guess. Do you have any piercings? Eight. Do you judge people that have multiple piercings? Fuck off. Do you dress up on Halloween? I WISH I could. I can't afford to buy shit to throw together as an outfit, nor do I do anything special that day, so. It's just a waste of time, save for taking a picture. Do you watch the Olympics? No. Do you like orange juice? So long there's not pulp in it. Have you read the Bible? Very little of it. Do you have a pet gecko? No. Are you scared of reptiles? Not at all. Have you ever seen the show 16 and Pregnant? Take that shit off television. No. Do you like cinnamon on your apple pie? I hate pie. Do you clap or cheer when at a concert? Well duh. Do you use a comb or brush? A comb. Do you eat the crust of your sandwiches? That's what I eat first since with food, I'm always the type that saves the best for last, and while I don't mind it at all, crust is the "worst" part. When you were younger, did you ever do that exclamation point that looked like an upside down triangle and had a really big dot? No. What are you listening to right now? "Whore" by In This Moment. Honestly, have you ever eaten raw cookie dough? Hell yeah I have, don't even @ me, salmonella. Name a city that starts with A in your state/province etc. Asheville. Name a landmark that starts with M in your state/province etc. Idk. When was the last time you gave a horse a carrot? Boy, I have no clue. Have you ever had to shovel snow? No. What mountain ranges have you seen? Appalachian. Where would you most like to go in your state, etc that you haven’t been? THE ABANDONED WIZARD OF OZ-THEMED PARK. Deadass might get married there, jc. Has a wild animal ever been loose in your house? Mice. What do you like the songs you listen to to be about? I'm big on things dark-themed, especially in like some fantasy or hypothetical situation, or covering sensitive topics in a beautiful way. When was the last time you said ‘yay’? Yesterday when Sara updated me on her weight ahhhHHHHHHH she's getting closer and closer to a healthy one. Would you be a newscaster and speak to everyone in a hurricane? Hell no. Have you ever seen or touched an iceberg? No. Do you use a toaster or toaster oven? Oven. Who was the last member of the opposite sex you laid in a bed with? I think Girt when we were watching TV one day in Nicole's room. Would you rather have a poodle or a rottweiler? Rottweiler! Have you ever had a best friend who was of the opposite sex? Yeah. Where was the last place you stayed over? Sara's. Do you know anyone that owns horses? Not well. Think back to the last time (or a time) when you were in a fight with someone and just blurted out exactly what was on your mind. Did you somewhat regret saying what you said? What happened? When Mom hit me for a completely uncalled-for reason (I can't actually remember what it was, other than it was stupid as hell) last year, I said, "Oh, I can't wait to tell Alyssa (therapist) about this one," and she didn't reply or say another word to me for like hours, maybe not even that night. No, honestly, I don't regret it. You don't slap your fucking kid. Towards the end of your last relationship, how did you know it was over? How did you and your significant other change towards each other? (ex. not calling each other babe, baby, etc.) I wasn't opening up to him any further after four months, and I just didn't feel a romantic connection. I wasn't comfortable. We didn't change much, really, just that we no longer hold hands and he doesn't kiss me obviously. We went back to exactly how we were before, thankfully. Have you ever had a significant other NOT believe you when you said “i love you” to them? Why was that? How did you react? No. Do opposites really attract? Have you ever experienced this? Explain. Sure, for some people. I've never been too attracted to someone too different from me. Has anyone close to you ever drifted away because they started hanging out with a new crowd? Did you try talking to them about it? What eventually happened? Story. Of my goddamn. Life. And only one, my former best friend. Just last year I finally reached out to her, and I guess we're "friends," buuut she only talks to me on her watch. I won't get into that. Have you ever found yourself heading on the wrong path? What happened? Probably, but idr. When did you last not feel accepted? Why did you feel that way? Ha, I'm sure recently. I just about always feel like that. Has anyone had to take your drink from you because you were drinking too much? How did you react? No. What’s your opinion on the world relying on technology too much and not paying enough attention to natural resources? Eek, there're positives and negatives. I totally believe it's possible someday for the singularity to happen, yet at the same time, technology is an almost perfect approach to many tasks, menial or complicated. Have you ever felt like it was just pointless to cry? Did you hold yourself back from crying or did you let it out? Sure, probably. I usually hold it back, typically far more frequently than I should, although on most occasions, crying just doesn't come. I just get a tight jaw and everything. Have you ever had a love/hate relationship with someone? Tell me about it. Meh, Colleen many times. I'm not delving into that story again. Has your pride ever gotten in the way of admitting that you felt weak or were in pain? How so? No. Whose lies have affected you the most? Jason's, although I'll give him enough credit that at the time of making them, he probably meant most/all of them. But they were still lies and broken promises. Have you ever dreamt in another language? No. Who was the last person you met and instantly liked? What about the last person you met who you immediately disliked or got bad vibes from? Hm. Oh, the girl who was in VR class with me. She loved my tattoo, so that sparked a brief convo, and she had awesome ones too. In class, she was funny and relatable and just in general had a very approachable personality. I wanted to talk more to her, but. Shyness and anxiety. ;_; For the other half of the question, I'm uncertain. I'm sure it was some man with my paranoia and distrust. What’s the most interesting news you read or received recently? What about the most depressing? I don't pay much attention to the news unless I just scroll past something on Facebook... and nothing's really coming to me. Ah, checked my FB real quick and I recently shared something about this crow couple that have been together for 12 years; the female has a broken beak, and her mate always feeds her. The most depressing was certainly a dog that was left out in the snow up north, and he was found dead and pretty much frozen in his doghouse. Pretty sure the owner was arrested. Thank fuck for the new law regarding pets being out in the cold. Would you let politics get in the way of a relationship? It would have to be a SERIOUS difference on a major matter that revealed deep, core beliefs. What is one thing someone could say that would automatically make you distrustful of them? I wouldn't mention you have a criminal record around me. I don't care what for unless it was seriously bullshit. What is one way in which you need to learn to control yourself? I need to STOP jumping to conclusions and becoming super defensive when I feel I'm in serious danger of being hurt emotionally. Do you have any friends who are on and off with bfs/gfs all the time? No. When was the last time you almost cried out of exhaustion? It was that and embarrassment. When I was at the airport to go home after visiting Sara, I fucked up in understanding the gate shit, carried my heavy bag ALL the way to the end, ALL the way back to the beginning, and then ALL THE FUCKING WAY BACK when I found the screen that told me my gate. At this same time, my knees were in awful condition and of course the sweating situation was goddamn humiliating. I'm very, very surprised no one asked if I was okay; I can only imagine how contorted and pained my face was, aaaand yay excessive sweating, I was literally soaked. I was very close to crying that day. What's a TV show you hate missing? None. The only situation where I'd be like that is if Meerkat Manor returned. What's a movie/book/TV show/band/whatever you highly recommend? Movie: Forrest Gump; book: Johnny Got His Gun; TV show: The Good Doctor; band: Otep is too underrated. Who taught you to tie your shoelaces? Dad first taught me the "wrong" way, then Mom corrected me in how you should properly do it. What's your favorite picture of yourself as a child? *shrugs* What is something people are surprised to hear about you? I've been told by many people that they're surprised to learn I have just about debilitating social anxiety. I always think I cover it awfully, but apparently I've adapted well enough to it that I can fake comfort decently, I suppose. What was the last bug you saw? Probably a fly, idk. Are there any people you know in real life that you only talk to online? Not off the top of my head... Is it cruel to keep a dog in a cage or tied up most of the time? No shit. About what things are you most selfish? Alone time. I need it. Are you camera shy? Why/why not? Yes, because odds are I will look like a blobfish out of water trying to smile but only succeeding in looking seriously high. What is the worst thing a former boyfriend/girlfriend has done to you? Dropped me like a boulder into a canyon and dashed off with zero intent of breaking up even nearly appropriately. Was anyone rude to you today (or yesterday, if you’re taking this early)? No. What was your favorite sleepover game? *shrugs* Have you ever swore in church? Possibly? Do you have memories from preschool? Some, yeah. Particularly of Christopher and some boy whose name I can't remember being pretty much obsessed with me and always chasing me in recess to hug the fuck out of me and apparently the other boy got in trouble all the time for trying to kiss me. Kinda recently in therapy we dug into my extreme fear of men, people being behind me, and rape (it's too a seriously unrealistic degree), and we think this mighta just been what sparked those fears so early. I also remember I was talkative at nap time, I brought the movie Antz for us to watch and everyone hated it, and I once brought my Snorlax plushy for show-and-tell. I remember making a gingerbread man tree ornament, too. Do you celebrate Earth Day? No, I never really know what to do. :/ I'd love to do even little things like pick up litter, but walking here is pretty dangerous, and we're also in a spot where you' seldom see anything. What is your least favorite thing about your full name? I hate my last name. What’s your favorite kind of Poptart? The chocolate sundae one or whatever it's called? What was the last thing you used sliced bread to make? A sandwich. What does your room look like when you sleep? Still kinda bright with Venus' and Kaiju's lights, Roman is usually in here with me, and Teddy is sometimes. Are your fingers long, or short? Mom always tells me I have Grammy's "long piano fingers." *shrug Do you like your grandparents? She reeeaaally gets under my skin a lot of times, but yeah. Do you like to fly on planes? If I'm at the window seat. What brand name do you think is just way over the top expensive? I'unno, lots. PLENTY of designer clothes shit, though. Like the fuck, most of those things I see are hideous. Do you find it hard to concentrate in really loud places? Yup. Do you tend to get more sleep on the weekends the during the week? They're the same for me. Are you comfortable talking to strangers? No. What’s the most boring game to exist? Why do you dislike it so much? I mean idk. Do you mean board games, card games, video games? I can tell you right off the bat I'm not a card game fan, almost ever. Do you lie about not having extra pens, so you don’t have to lend them? I don't believe I ever did. What’s your favorite YouTube video? What’s it about? Oh boy, I couldn't tell you. Do you get nervous when you’re about to get a haircut? No. What do you do to pass the time when you’re waiting for something? Mess around on my phone. Whenever you take pictures, do they always end up posted on Facebook? No. Can you name something that makes you feel nostalgic from each of the following: a scent, a sight, a sound, a taste, and a feeling? Breakfast cooking (scent), tobacco fields (sight), whippoorwills (sound), those smiley face french fries (taste), excitement (feeling). What is one small thing your significant other does that makes you happy? If you are single, what is one small thing a friend does to make you happy? I love seeing her spaz over something cute lmao. If you could have a dollar for every time something happened, what would it be? Someone pointing out how many meds I'm on. What is something that you wish more people in your life were interested in (a topic, a hobby, etc.)? Ummm idk? What is a feel-good song that you’ve been listening to lately? Well, Epica's "Sacred & Wild" cover always pumps me up a bit. What are some things you enjoy seeing pictures of? m a r k, meerkats, Pyramid Head, Mom legitimately smiling/laughing, Sara with her babies... lots more. Who is somebody from your past that had a big positive impact on you? What would you say if you could speak to them right now? Two of my previous teachers. They always had life lessons to teach and not just English. Have you ever bought something recommended by an ad before? What was it, and were you happy with your purchase? I'm not sure. What is a website that you visit frequently that isn’t a form of social media? Wikis I help edit. Do you watch The Big Bang Theory? I don't watch TV, but if it's on, yeah, I enjoy it. Do you ever listen to country music? No. From inside of your house, how many doors lead outside? Two. Who is the most complicated person in your life right now? Me. Do you still wear armbands or rubber rings in the pool? No. Are you one of those people who talks to everyone when you’re out? Definitely not. What would be your ideal pet? Something very affectionate, calm, and in tuned with my emotions. Are there any websites you just don’t see the point in? I'm sure there's something. Have you got anything you’ve had since you were a baby? Stuffed animals. Mom maybe has my pacifier somewhere. Is there anyone you’re really jealous of? Envious, rather. Do you hit electronics when they don’t work? No. Do you dislike any certain group of people? Well yeah, like rapists and pedophiles. But "hate" is far more suiting. Have you ever bought anything you really wanted, only to never use it? Maybe? I never really have my own money to buy things myself. Are you scared of fireworks? No. What was the last flyer someone gave you for? No clue. Do movies/books inspire you to change your life in any way? Johnny Got His Gun furthered my will to be a pacifist. Do you read movie quotes even when you haven’t seen the movie? No? What does your favorite bag look like? It has a macabre owl/spider design. Do you customize your possessions? Not usually. What’s a smell that makes you feel ill? (besides the obvious) Gasoline will usually give me a headache if I'm dealing with it long enough. Do you get lonely easily? Yeah. Is your car older than a 2000? I don't have my own car. Where was the last place you wrote a check to/used your debit card? I don't have a debit card. Nor have I written a check. What was your favorite board game as a child? I loved Mall Madness believe that shit or not, there was a Cranium fair thing I adored, I loved Clue a lot when I was old enough to understand it, and I was crazy about this The Crocodile Hunter game too, which I've kept for nostalgia purposes, even though it's been broken for a long time. Who was the last person to give you flowers? I think Tyler. If a stranger asked you to take a picture with them what would you do? That's a big 'ole spooky nope. What do you think would be the hardest thing for you to give up? Absolutely Internet. .-. How many times have you been to a museum? A handful, I guess. Would you rather be a panda or grizzly bear? A panda. Do you like BBQ sauce? Omg NO. Have you had sex in the past 3 weeks? Well, lesbian intimacy. Do you regularly experience pain in any part of your body? My knees. Did the last person you kissed ever give you a hickey? No. Do you have to see something to really believe it? No. Do you believe everyone is gifted with something? Eh, I dunno. Have you ever been busted for under age drinking? No. Tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. What is it called? What does it look like? I have a stuffed moose on my dresser named Brownie. He's all brown and lying down. What’s the most dramatic thing you’ve ever done to prove a point? Who knows. What’s your favorite myth? The one of the Jersey Devil. Have you ever used a Ouija board? I am. SO curious. But too afraid to fuck with them lmao. Are you planning on getting tattoos? Which ones? Oh, hunny. I can at least say my next one is most likely to be the Shadow of the Colossus sigil designed as if it's stamped into the ground on my left hand. Do you read comics? What are your faves? No. Do you have any apple devices? If so what have you got? An ancient iPod nano and my old iPhone. Have you ever said something that you instantly regretted? Very likely. Do you get upset when a pet fish dies? I haven't had a fish in forever, but I never really bonded with any I did have as a little kid. Are you a soprano, alto, tenor or bass? A tenor probably, or alto? Do you bruise easily? Extremely. One reason I got tested for anemia (which came back negative). Do you know anybody who is afraid of clowns? Lots of people. Have you ever seen a zebra? At a zoo. Have you ever had a rolling backpack? Yup. Then we couldn't have them in high school for whatever reason. If you could do magic, what is the first spell you would learn? Healing. Do you hang toilet paper over or under? Whichever way it just happens to be positioned in my hands when I pick it up. When do you feel the most confident? If a situation arises where my meerkat knowledge needs to be spilled lol. What makes you laugh? Unexpected but funny things destroy me the most. Then of course there're actually good jokes and/or sarcasm. What movie quotes do you use of a regular bases? None. What’s the craziest conversation you have ever eaves-dropped on? No clue. What’s the coolest animal you’ve seen in the wild? I saw a perched owl in the woods while fishing years ago; don't remember what kind, though. It was so cool though, it stared right at us while we rowed past. Also quite sure I got a quick glimpse of a mink along the distant bank while also fishing. What do you wish you knew more about? Politics, so I could actually play a knowledgeable role in it by voting in confidence and such. Do you carry hand sanitizer every where you go? Yes. Do you use your fingers to do simple math problems? Yuuuup. Do you wear foundation? Literally only if I'm trying to look my absolute best. Otherwise, god no, I hate how it feels. Do you get self conscious when wearing a bathing suit? Don't even get me started. What makes you distracted? Music, TV, talking... basically dynamic sound. Do you wear really dark eye liner? I only ever wear black. Are you a fan of Justin Bieber? No. Does your hometown have bad memories attached to it? Yeah, some. How many subscribers do you have on your YouTube channel? Idk. Does snow and ice ever got on the inside of you window panes? I don't think so? What do you do for pain? Soldier through it, take meds, use a heating pad or cold washcloth/bag of ice depending on the type of pain, try to sleep to let it hopefully pass or alleviate. What type of lotion do you use? One for dry skin. What were your favorite clothing stores in high school? Hot Topic and rue 21. Name a YouTuber whom you think acts shallow and superficial. I'm sure there's plenty, like say, the Paul brothers. Do you know anyone who has twin babies or toddlers? A woman I vaguely know through dance has twins. If so, what are their names? Idr. Would you ever want to have twins? JESUS FUCKING CHRIST NO If you could have a car in any color you wanted, which color? Burnt orange. What is your favorite Avril Lavigne song? "Nobody's Home" is still incredible. Have you ever done something and been afraid of getting caught? Yeah. Have you ever had a bedroom that had wallpaper on the walls? I think the house I grew up in had it... Would you ever hitchhike? Why or why not? No, because I don't trust strangers for shit. What color is your stapler? Black. Do you have a desk that you sit at in your room? No. Have you ever completed a weight loss program? No. What was the last thing you were mad at a doctor about? OHHHHH, THAT STORY AGAIN?????????????? Where you live, is it possible to get sunburned&frostbitten in same week? Pretty much. Is your mother a lesbian? No. Are you part Swedish? No. Are you planning to travel outside of your country in the next 6 months? I doubt in six months. Do your parents live in the same city as you? Dad doesn't, but I live with Mom. What genre of books interest you the most? Fantasy. Do any of your close friends NOT have a Facebook account? Yeah, I think. German type foods: delicious or disgusting? I don't really know their cuisine. If you had your way, what color(s) would you dye your hair? I've seen a gorgeous pastel rainbow design on short hair before, and I my GOD I want. Do you like seafood? If so, what is your favorite? If not, what is your favorite type of food? UGH no. I do, however, like shrimp. But that's it. Have you ever eaten a veggie burger? Yeah, it wasn't that bad. I had Burger King's during my vegetarian juncture. If you could master any sport, which one would you choose? Dance. If you could meet any major political figure, who would it be? What would you say to him/her? Meh. Do you play any unique instruments? No. In school, did you take any classes to learn how to play any instruments? Flute, yes. Then after I got my lip pierced, I was moved to the percussion section to learn shit in like two days. Basically, I was useless 'til I realized I could position my lip on the mouthpiece where the ring didn't affect the flow of air much. I later got to a point of taking it out for every band class, though. Idr why; instructor probably wanted me to. Did you actually pay attention in Spanish class? I didn't take Spanish. If you drink Monster, what is your favorite flavor? If you don’t drink Monster, why not? None, because it tastes like literal poison. If you had/have a Club Penguin account, how old were you when you got it? No clue. What religion/spiritual path intrigues you the most, if any? Wiccan. What ancient culture intrigues you the most, if any? I don't remember any well enough to answer here. Are/were your parents hippies? I don't believe so? Would you ever consider getting dreadlocks? Oh lort no. If you had a baby boy right now, what would his middle name(s) be? Victor or Vincent, probably. What heritage does your last name imply? Scottish. How about your middle name? French. And first? English. What is your heritage, anyway? That I know of, Irish, German, and Polish. Were your parents born in the United States? Most importantly, were you? If not, what country? Yes to both. “Happy Holidays,” “Merry Christmas,” or “Merry X-Mas?" I couldn't care less.

#survey #quiz #questions #random

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lily-onher-grave · 8 years

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Safe and Sound epilogue

@eggosandxmen and anyone else who wants post-safe and sound drabbles

Nessarose watches with Nanny at her side. She studies the screen with a fierce, unwavering expression. Not moving. Barely breathing. She has a running list of things she should have said at the reaping. Some are better than others. She watches as Elphaba runs through the valley, biting her lip when she’s being followed, when she’s in danger. She watches her sister befriend the girl who tried to kill her, and she wonders if the Games have caused Elphaba to lose her mind.

When she watches them cornered at the cliff, outnumbered, she mutters an endless, urgent prayer. And when she sees Elphaba scream, sees her cradle the other girl in her arms, she knows what has happened. She knows how it will end. Viewings of the Hunger Games are mandatory, but in a place as large as the Colwen Grounds, it can be avoided. Nessa doesn’t watch after that.

---

Ama Clutch pretends not to watch. She plans meals according to the viewing schedule and disappears into the kitchen each time the television clicks on. But she is paying attention.

When Glinda hesitates after that first night, the Uplands clasp hands and hold their breath, watching with delight. Ama Clutch pauses, a dirty bowl and rag in her hand, and waits. Make the right decision, she pleads. Glinda doesn’t make her move that night, and the Uplands say she’s buying her time. She’s smart that way. But Ama Clutch knows that she’s smart in different ways, too, and maybe those ways will come through.

It changes after the rock slide. Ama Clutch finds herself glued to the screen, watching how it all plays out. She would be amused if she weren’t so terrified. The Uplands, on the other hand, grow more furious every day. They demand Ama Clutch to stop watching because she’s late making meals now, so she brings her old black and white television into the kitchen and watches from there.

By the finale, the Uplands have stopped watching entirely. Ama Clutch feels more than guilty, but she also likes to believe that even without their last moment together, Glinda would have chosen her humanity over the Games. She’s smart that way.

The storm makes it hard to see in black and white, so she sneaks into the living room and watches from there. Her handkerchief is clasped in her shaky hands, but for the most part she’s stoic. It’s easier to accept the end when you’ve been watching it happen all along.

The cameras cut to the girls on the edge of the Cornucopia. Glinda can’t stand up straight, she’s in so much pain, and they’re both weaponless and so, so exhausted. This is the end. All three of them know it. Ama Clutch closes her eyes, takes a trembling breath, and when she looks again Elphaba is holding Glinda, Glinda is holding Elphaba, and for a moment nothing else exists but them.

She steps forward, reaching a hand out. Static hums around her fingers as she touches the screen by Glinda’s face.

“I’m so proud of you, duckie,” she whispers.

After the Games, the Uplands are interviewed over and over again. They become something of celebrities in Frottica, though not necessarily in a good way. They take to blaming the Thropp girl for their daughter’s corruption in the Games. If they grieve, they do it behind closed doors.

Ama Clutch doesn’t know. She disappears from the house before the finale even ends, and she is never heard from again.

---

Dina attends party after party, all of them with overdressed people, overflowing drinks, and television screens covering every moment from every possible angle.

People pick their favorites: the Career pack, that dashing Vinkan boy, a Quadling underdog. Glinda’s screen always has a crowd, and many of them are delighted when they spot Dina.

It’s interesting to see the fans fluctuate as the Games go on. Tributes lose and gain sponsors. Romances are always a favorite, if only for the tragedy of it all. Really, this year isn’t any different. The more time Glinda spends with that green girl, the more people are glued to her screen. Completely normal. It could happen any year.

But it feels different—to Dina, at least. She stares long and hard at the beautiful, clever, deadly, sweet girl on that screen—she stares at her, and she wonders who she’s seeing. Because this isn’t the Glinda who arrived at her room in the Remake Center. This isn’t the girl who glowed in her dresses, who held those glittering shoes to her chest like they were something priceless, who looked up at Dina as if she was just as valuable.

Dina doesn’t know what to think of the green girl. She wants to despise her, blames her wholeheartedly for destroying Glinda’s chances. But as angry as she is, there’s something between them that Dina can only vaguely imagine. She feels as though she’s watching something from a dream: it doesn’t seem real—even if it is, it isn’t within her reach.

The days and the parties go on. Bets continue, stakes grow higher. Dina realizes that, from the moment she met her, she has been fully confident that Glinda would come home. She knows better now, and it leaves a bitter taste in her mouth.

At almost every party there is a corner, darker than the rest of the room, where people are downing drink after drink and staring at screens with something different in their eyes. Most of the others pay them no attention—Dina never has—but now she joins them. She’s not old, but she feels like she’s been doing this for far too long. Maybe she’ll take next year off, let the head of her prep team take over.

One night, the worst night so far (“You happened to me,” Glinda says, and Elphaba kisses her, and the city swoons, and Dina downs a triple shot and prays that she’ll blackout by the end of the night), she sees two familiar faces in the party’s dark, miserable corner.

Crope nods solemnly at her, his arm wrapped tightly around Tibbett.

“It’s a good story,” Tibbett says later that night, when they take her outside for some fresh air. “It’s gotten them a lot of attention.”

“It’s killed her,” Dina whispers.

“She’s not the first one,” mutters Crope.

“She was supposed to come back.”

“I think she’s happy,” Crope says. “I think it’s real. She has that, at least.”

“Is it our fault?” Dina asks. “Did we do this to her?”

Tibbett shakes his head. “Don’t ask yourself that. Once you do, you’ll never stop.”

Dina sinks onto the curb and buries her head in her hands. In the morning she’ll avoid reruns of the footage, and she’ll remember the despair she felt the night before, but she won’t remember why.

---

There’s a group in Munchkinland who watches the Games from deep within their homes, beyond any town lines. Some have worked at Colwen Grounds. Many are families of past tributes. Boq’s father is there, sitting silently in a corner. Some of the people he gathered. Others just came. Nest Hardings has been an uneasy district for years, too insignificant to do damage, too distracted to fight anyway. But revolution happens in many ways, for many reasons. Boq was on every television screen, eyes closed, calm, serene. Now he is painted on the side of every building, the corner of every street. He caused more than one explosion when he stepped off that platform.

At first it was just outrage. One small step, and the people are suddenly united, chanting and rioting until the few Gale Force soldiers that patrol out on the farms are driven away. They know it won’t last long, but they fortify anyway. And, always, they watch the Games.

They take hope in Elphaba, in the family that has never laid down for the Wizard. She’s a rally flag—one they know will fall eventually, but take heart in nonetheless. Then, suddenly, she’s not alone, and they are further justified, revitalized. In an unlikely alliance, a brilliant, doomed relationship, they see a glimpse of what their Oz could be.

Still, like their tributes, they will not last. Their defenses are crumbling, their days numbered. When the Gale Force finally break through, they will be slaughtered. Their farms will burn. This home of generations past will be utterly destroyed. But they will not let hope die with them. With nothing to lose, they gather their resources, pool their measly wealth, and send a child out to slip through the guards and into town. Don’t return, they say. Go and live, and tell our story.

They do not know if it works until three days later, when a silver parachute drops from the sky. This is for both of us, Elphaba says, and they know their message has come across. Two worlds united, a glimpse of the Oz that could be. Boq’s father watches Elphaba brush a tear from Glinda’s cheek. His eyes are red when he turns, but his voice is steady as he grabs a pitchfork and torch.

“Let’s go,” he says, and they cheer, voices ringing through the air as they make their last charge, running toward their death, their revolution, their Oz that could be.

---

The train practically flies over the dark countryside, smooth as still water, and still Avaric can’t sleep.

He’s been enjoying the Victory Tour—no, that’s an understatement. It’s been the highlight of his life. His mentor, escort, the entire prep team, and half a dozen other Emerald City citizens have been tripping over themselves the entire trip, obeying his every whim before he can even voice it. They gush over his hair, his outfits, his posture, his best moments in the Games. The people in the districts they visit are less enthusiastic, but it’s obvious that they all fear him, so he doesn’t particularly care.

But he’s glad it’s almost over. They left Pertha Hills this afternoon, which means just one more district, the Emerald City, and then home for the last celebration.

He wasn’t really tired until today. He tries to convince himself that the weary, nagging feeling that came over him today is nothing more than exhaustion from all the parties and traveling. It has nothing to do with the tension that’s starting to build in Frottica, the look in the Upland’s eyes.

“I’ve been hearing things,” his escort had whispered over dinner. The entire table leaned in. “That Glinda Upland was practically a celebrity. Remember her reaping? No one challenged her when she volunteered. Supposedly most of them were afraid of her.”

“She was fierce,” someone had said, raising his glass in respect. “If she wasn’t up against a Tenmeadows, I would’ve bet on her.”

His eyes met Avaric’s, who gave a small smirk.

“She was a favorite,” the escort agreed. “That’s why everyone was so shocked when she…” He drifted off for a moment, then cleared his throat. “Anyway, apparently there’s a lot of anger in the district. A lot of girls are bitter that their chance was given to someone who just threw it away. The Uplands have all but renounced their daughter—you saw how ashamed they were today—but they’re still facing a lot of resentment.”

Avaric had excused himself shortly after that. Now he sits on his bed, staring at the Gillikin country side zipping by.

He’s just tired. Even if it’s something more, he’ll get over it. He’s been soaking up the attention just like always, and he’ll continue to do so for the rest of his life. He smiles a little, thinking of the mansion that’s waiting for him in the Victor’s Village. He’ll become a mentor, just like his father, his aunt, his cousin, and both of his grandparents. He’ll get to visit the Emerald City anytime he wants.

In a few years—no, probably sooner than that—he’ll marry any girl he wants and it’ll be broadcast across the Emerald City, maybe across all of Oz. And one day his kid, the next Tenmeadows, will volunteer as tribute.

The last thought troubles him, and he notices his brow furrowing in his reflection. His kid will volunteer as tribute, just like he did. And he’ll make it out a victor, just like he did.

But, he almost didn’t.

He remembers that last fight, grappling hand to hand with Fiyero, the wound in his side burning, his arms and legs trembling, the snow swirling bitterly around them, blinding him to everything but the enemy in front of him. He remembers letting fear show—he couldn’t help it.

He remembers other things, too. That green girl, that Elphaba, who for all her scowls and fireballs was only truly terrifying when she stood near Glinda. And Glinda. He remembers her too well. He remembers thinking that he might just lose to her. There was a moment, near the end, when he thought that if there was anyone to lose to, it should be her.

In truth, he doesn’t remember much about those final moments. The snow, he’s been telling reporters, and that’s the story he’ll stick to for the rest of his life. It was so cold, the wind was so fierce, everything was a blur. He doesn’t tell them that he’s repressed the memories, or that the things he does remember burn into his mind each time he sits alone with his eyes closed.

Elphaba’s face in the torch light, the shadows dancing over her features until she looks more demon than human. Lions snarling on the wind, chasing him to the edge of the trees, to the place where the entire world seems to be ending. A moment, he doesn’t know how or when, with all four of them together. And then, vividly, he sees Glinda, kneeling in the snow, screaming something that isn’t words, isn’t cries, is nothing but pure fury and terror and despair.

He doesn’t know what happens after that. He only knows that he won in the end, just like he was supposed to.

#safe and sound #gelphie #wicked fanfiction #eggosandxmen #this has been like. months in the making.#i'm so glad i finally get to post it

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myaekingheart · 7 years

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More weird dreams last night.

The first involved some sort of massive family visit. It was my parents, my grandmother, my boyfriend's mom, and this unfamiliar blonde woman who my boyfriend told me was his "real" mother. We were in what was supposed to be our apartment even though it looked nothing like our actual apartment and the entire thing was honestly a massive disaster. My boyfriend's mother (his mother in real life) was the only one who wasn't out of her mind, though I think my dad was probably pretty chill, too, so long as he didn't find any marijuana in the house. My mom and grandmother, however, were the ones who were the most out of control, though. This was all probably because I was talking to my parents last night and my mom was pretty much out of her mind with how much she said she misses me, and they were telling me of how my grandmother isn't in the best of moods now knowing that my parents are probably moving far away and I already moved far away and she feels like she's being abandoned or whatever. But anyways, in the dream they were both fucking crazy. If I remember correctly, my mom was hysterical crying and clinging to me and my grandmother was being outrageously nitpicky and a total pain in the ass getting on my case about every little thing. It was wild.

The second dream was much more palatable, if not still strange as fuck. I had a dream that I was on this road trip with Audrey Hepburn. We were in this giant tank of a dark green van, kind of like this one my dad used to own. I don't remember why were on this road trip or how we got started but I remember driving down a long and desolate road with her that was lined with brush. I also remember she was wearing this orange tweed skirt suit with yellow trim??? And had a little purse with her. She was basically 1960s-era Audrey, like her hair was the same way it was in How to Steal a Million. I remember we drove out to this patch of land that was kind of in the middle of nowhere on the side of the street. It was basically just a rectangular parking lot with a scrap of land in the middle that housed this giant tree. Apparently the tree had some sort of significance because it was named Teal or something and was huge and had these vines skating down the side that looked like hair and these two beady little knots that looked like eyes. There was a group of other people, most if not all of them men, hanging out around the tree as if they were preparing for some sort of strange ritual. I think there was only one girl there who introduced herself as Audrey Hepburn, even though she didn't look much like Audrey but if she did, she looked more like 1950s Audrey than 1960s Audrey. It was basically like her past self. The girl introduced herself as Audrey to which the real Audrey who I was with didn't say anything but was polite and whatnot to her face. After we were done with the tree, as Audrey and I were walking back to the van, I asked her about the other Audrey and if she had ever met another version of herself before, but then instantly regretted it feeling rather stupid for asking such a strange question in the first place. I forget her exact response but I know it was something along the lines of knowing she wasn't really Audrey but going along with it anyways. Then we got back in the van and the next stop was this hotel, the one my boyfriend and I stayed at during the hurricane, or at least a version of it. I forget what we were doing there but I remember a scene of us walking down this outdoor corridor toward the pool and Audrey whipped out her mirror and her lipstick, I think, but either way she wasn't paying attention. I told her to watch out just as she walked straight into the deep end of the pool with a massive splash. She surfaced quickly, a little flustered but overall fine, and I ran over to the edge. I extended a hand to help her out of the pool, saying something like "So long as you don't just pull me in there with you" or something, but when she grabbed my hand that's exactly what she did. I remember tumbling straight into the pool, being underwater for a few seconds, and then kicking off the bottom and somehow leaping right back up onto the side of the pool where I started as if I was a video played backwards. I also remember thinking something about my clothes being waterproof, which is probably because I watched this video last night of a former Jasmine from the Disney Parks talking about her costume in detail and saying the top layer was waterproof as water would just bead up and roll right off of it if anything ever spilled on it. I forget what happened after this, but I do remember that there was metal fencing around said pool, or at least the one side of it, and you could see the Teal tree and it's parking lot right next door so I guess Audrey and I didn't go very far. Also, the hotel was yellow. It's yellow in real life, too, but I thought it was funny that it was also yellow in my dream since everything seemed to be varying shades of orange and yellow, almost like the coloring of an old movie or something. The more I think about it now, actually, the more I think I remember that before the pool incident, Audrey and I were escaping from someone. Maybe we were being chased and we snuck away from them? I don't know. It was all a blur.

There was also a dream about Walmart, which maybe Audrey was involved in?? I just remember being in a Walmart and hearing someone explain how there were two different store locations duelling for something. We were in the technology section and I remember scoping through to see if I could find any more Audrey DVDs like I did last time (I got Charade for, like, $6) but instead, the DVDs kind of passed by in a blur and then there were old records??? And then collections of vintage books like Bambi, another book all about Faline from Bambi, Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, Pollyanna, etc. They were all hardcover with these white paper dust jackets that had these very black and white pen drawing covers. I remember seeing the Wizard of Oz one at the front of a stack and filtering through to see what other titles were behind it, but I think it was Audrey who I turned around to see waiting for me slightly impatiently like I was wasting time or something. I don't know, it was all really weird. I like that Audrey was a very active part of my dream, though. I've never had a dream about her before (that I can remember) so this was a welcome first.

#weird dreams #ramblings

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jixiani · 4 years

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In defense of fanfiction

I’ve been thinking about fanfiction lately, (really I’ve been thinking that I should really be taking some of this time to write more, but that’s another post) AO3 just had their yearly fundraiser so of course the old discourse over the site and its history was dragged up again and then Sarah had brought it up this morning and well, I have a lot of strong feelings on the subject. Let’s start with a little personal background: I have been reading and writing fanfic since the late 90’s. It started out as something silly my best friend introduced me to and we would sit in her mother’s computer room and giggle over ‘speculative fan fictions’ and participate on months-long roleplay scenarios on chat boards and take turns passing notebooks full of handwritten stories back and forth which were every bit as terrible as you’d think two 14-year-old girls could come up with. Unfortunately, we were in the Vampire Chronicles fandom so we had a front-row seat for the Anne Rice and her lawyer's debacle that will from here on out be referred to as “The Dark Times”. We watched our friends’ work get pulled, our RP sites close down, we feared that we’d get a cease and desist letter, we hid our notebooks and dreamed up our stories exclusively verbally. I was deeply ashamed of my secret love of fanfic for years. I kept writing, but I kept it secret, I kept reading it but would never admit to it. Fanfiction was something shameful, taboo, some terrible sin akin to watching porn, and not the good socially acceptable kind of porn. But time moved on and fandom moved on and fanfiction started to be more acceptable. I joined Fanfiction.net, I wrote some stuff on Livejournal (although I still kept it set to private). I read A LOT of fanfiction, jumping fandoms, and leaving reviews. People I admired came out as liking and writing fanfiction. Of course, then the purges hit. Strikethrough and the like. I’m not going to get into that here, because that’s a rant all its own. Anyway, those were also some dark days as fandom searched for somewhere to land. I stumbled over Archive of our own a few years ago and I aggressively support them whenever I can because they fight for the fandom. Now I speak out in defense of fanfiction whenever possible. I’ve attended panels at conventions about fanfiction, I support and share posts about it from my favorite authors, I let everyone know that I’m proud of my fanfic (although I still don’t post it, that’s because I tend not to finish things and I don't’ want to get someone excited for something I know I’m going to abandon in a month, not because I’m ashamed.). So let’s talk over some points because Sarah brought up a good point today. Why is fanfiction such a shameful thing in the fandom community, and in the writing community? One of the people on my friends list who I admire and is a professional, published author once rolled their eyes and scoffed when I said that I wanted to go to the fanfiction panel at a convention. Yet, no other facet of fandom is treated this way. I brought this up on Sarah’s post and I’m going to reiterate it here. Fan artists are not scoffed at, people flock to their tables in artist’s alley. Fan-made comics and doujinshi have led to careers writing and drawing comics and scripts for the same series their fanwork was based on. No professional costumer or prop maker sneers at cosplayers, in fact, there are now professional cosplayers. Fans wait in line for hours to watch masquerade skits at conventions. Fan-dubs like Dragonball Z Abridged and Nescaflowne are hugely popular and have led to professional voice acting gigs and production studios. But if an author dares to mention that they got their start in fanfiction? The horror, the outrage, the hate mail. Yet so much of our media could arguably be called fanfiction. Dante’s Inferno? John Milton’s Paradise Lost? The Aeneid? Classics? Yes. Fanfiction? Also yes. Joyce’s Ulysses is just an AU of the Odyssey. Anything written about or based on myths? Anything involving King Arthur? Sherlock Holmes? Shakespear...Oh you can cry adaptation all you want. Let’s face it if it’s written by some old white guy it’s literature and a classic and an innovative reimagining but really it’s just fanfic and it’s everywhere. West Side Story is a fanfic of a fanfic since Shakespeare based Romeo and Juliet off a poem by a similar name. My Fair Lady? Pygmalion AU. Hamilton? Real Person Song Fic! 50 Shades series, Mortal Instruments, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea, hell there are literally hundreds of published Jane Austen fanfictions. John Gardner’s Grendel is a retelling of Beowolf. The Wiz, Wicked and the rest of Gregory Maguire’s books? The Wizard of Oz doesn’t enter public domain until 2035. The Magnificent Seven? Kurosawa called and he wants his seven samurai back, he’d also like to reclaim Yojimbo from A Fist Full of Dollars. Speaking of tv, how about Black Sails? It’s a fanfiction prequel to Treasure Island. Any comic book not written by the original creator. Any book series based on Star Wars, Star Trek, Dungeons and Dragons, World of Warcraft, etc. I could go on all day. So why is it, when so much of our popular culture consists of what basically boils down to fanfiction, that fanfiction is seen as a shameful indulgence, as “cheating”, as trash?Part of it boils down to sex. Read any article that brings up fanfiction and there will invariably be a line where the author distances themself by saying something along the lines of they don’t personally read it, or how slash fic isn’t their thing but to each their own. (Both quotes from some of the sites I pulled the above list from) A lot of people seem to think that fanfiction is just porn, and while yes there is some fanfiction that is porn and some of it is very good, the same can be said for regular fiction as well. People don’t blush and giggle over Lord of the Rings, yet when I say that I’ve read fanfic that’s longer than Tolkien’s trilogy I may as well be talking about how I read Aragorn/Boromir slash fic regardless of what the actual subject matter was. Yes, there’s sex in fanfiction. A lot of it is gay sex. You can read Lolita in school but Harry Potter fanfic? Gasp, think of the children! Even if that fanfic happens to be about what if Petunia loved Harry like a son instead of pushing him away and neglecting him. There is some really fantastic fan fiction out there. Some of it has sex, some of it doesn't. Some of it deals with queer characters and experiences, some of it doesn’t. There’s nothing inherently wrong with erotica and it’s an entirely separate issue. Not every fanfiction is a 50 Shades-eque erotic rewrite of Twilight, and even if they were, so what? A lot of fanfiction has to do with wish fulfillment. You want to know what happens next, or what would happen if this had happened instead, or if there was this character. You want to see someone like you in your favorite fandom. I had wanted to adventure with Bilbo when I was a kid. I wanted to go on adventures and fight and ride dinosaurs. These desires don’t go away just because we grow up. I got into roleplay and larp and gaming because I still enjoy make-believe. I write for a lot of the same reasons. Everyone wants to be the main character. Fanfiction gives you that chance. You can write yourself into a story, you can write someone that’s like you, you can write someone that’s nothing like you but what you want to be. So, let’s discuss our old friend Mary Sue. She gets trotted out as an example every time someone brings up fanfiction (or any uppity female character ever). Mary Sue was born in the 60’s. She is an actual character from a Star Trek Original Series fanfiction. Yes, fanfiction existed in the 60’s. Mary Sue was the brightest and prettiest girl to come out of Starfleet, she managed to be in all the right places at the right times to save the ship and capture the heart of Spock. Self insert fics and Mary Sues are at the heart of why we should be terribly ashamed of our fanfiction habit. Except, what was Luke Skywalker if not George Lucas’ self insert Marty Stu? There are countless male characters that are as bad or worse than your typical Mary sue and they are never called out for it. Seanan brought this up in a post once about her character October Daye, her editor had said that the character was too competent, too cool, and that it was unrealistic and she should tone it down. She had him replace the character’s name with “Harry Dresden” and reread the story and suddenly it was fine. There are a great many articles and essays about our friend Mary Sue and I implore you to read some of them. She is not the enemy we make her out to be. Fanfiction, on the rare occasion that it is accepted, is seen as some sort of training wheels, or baby’s first writing. It’s amateurish, it’s juvenile, it’s just not very good. If we are not ashamed of it, then it’s expected that we are only using it as a starting point to hone our writing and move on to professional published works. It’s either that or something terribly self-indulgent that should be kept to ourselves. Some fanfic writers do go on to become “real” writers. Seanan McGuire has always been very open about how her agent first approached her after reading some of her Buffy/Faith fanfiction. Some “real” writers also write fanfiction. Neil Gaiman won a Hugo for his Chronicles of Narnia Fanfic. Ursula Vernon and Mercedes Lackey write fanfiction in their spare time. Some fanfiction writers never become published authors, not everyone wants to. Some are happy to have a dozen 150k fics about their favorite fandom, or maybe just one 500k epic, some, myself included, may only have one short fic posted somewhere. There is nothing that says that you have to use your hobby to turn a profit. (By the way, for reference, War and Peace is 561,304 words, Dune is 187,240 words, you cannot make the argument that fanfic writers don’t put time into their craft when they have more words than Tolstoy under their belt.)Some of the ‘training wheels’ analogy is true. Fanfic is a terrific gateway to writing. It teaches pacing, plot, character development, how to take criticism. If I ever do write something professionally I will not be nearly as afraid of the red pen as I am of bad reviews. Anonymous readers are the most ruthless critics. May the literary gods preserve you from ever having your fanfic read aloud as an example of how terrible and ‘cringy’ fanfiction can be. There is a lot of fanfiction out there that is written by teenage girls, and it reads like it was written by a teenage girl, but the only way to get better at something is to practice. Fanfiction allows budding writers to do that. There are no rules, no one standing at the gates to bar entry, and entire communities of people willing to give advice and commentary. Sometimes it’s less helpful than harmful, but there is something about posting a new fic and waiting for that first ‘like’ or ‘kudos’ or a review. There’s something to be said for instant gratification. I have read a lot of really terrible fanfic. I have slogged through stuff that would make Mary Sue herself cringe. I have read about the ½ vampire, ½ werewolf, ½ fairy long lost princess. I have read grammar that would make your eyes bleed. Not all of it has been confined to fan works. I have read fanwork that has had me convulsing with silent laughter to the point that I wondered if I would die. Dialog that was ten times better than anything I had read in a professional novel. Fanfiction should not be judged by its worst offenders. We don’t hold Dune to the same standard as Twilight. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is not terrible and cringy because 50 Shades of Grey overuses the phrase “Oh my.” There is some absolutely terrible fanfic out there and there is some pretty terrible published fic as well, but we don’t hold that against most novelists, so why do we hold it against fanfiction writers?I guess that brings us to the elephant in the fandom. Sexism. Fanfiction has historically been something written by and for young women and there is nothing more shameful than something liked by a young woman. Boybands? The color pink? Horse Girl books and Sparkly Vampires? Society hates them. We mock them. It is not acceptable to enjoy them. Sound familiar? How many times is something considered cool until a woman decides that she likes it? We as a society hate women and hate the things they enjoy and we hate teenage girls the most. Think of how much people hated selfies and duckface and instagram. How much hate was directed at Britney Spears, One Direction, Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber? Whether it has a basis in something or not, we hate them, we make jokes, we share the memes. We write them off as having no substance, as being stupid, not worth our time. Belittling of teenage girls for their interests and fandoms isn't a new phenomenon. Remember Mary Sue? Not only that, but a lot of fanfiction is gay. Women and gays are still the punchline to a lot of jokes and we can’t ignore that that plays a big part in people’s hatred of fanfiction, even if it’s not on purpose. Fanfiction has always been a bastion for people that couldn’t find stories about them in popular fiction. A lot of mainstream main characters are straight guys. A lot of fanfiction main characters are young women or gay men. Now, I admit that I’m oversimplifying this, and especially in recent years as it is becoming safer for people to come out as other genders and queer and as having mental illness or not being neurotypical, you are seeing more of that reflected in the fanfiction community. I don’t want anyone to think that I am purposefully leaving anyone out of this. The fanfiction community has not always been so great at being inclusive of people of color or transgender, it’s getting better, but I’m not going to stand here and pretend we’ve always been perfect. In the last several years I’ve seen a lot more inclusion. As I said, fanfiction has always been a home to the “Other”, as that expands to include more individuals so too does the community. Fanfics provide us with a place to work through issues and present perspectives that we don’t get to see anywhere else, without having to create an entire world from scratch. It’s accessible to everyone. I’ve spent the better part of an afternoon researching and writing this. I hope that I was at least partially coherent and I got you to at least take a look at why you feel the way you feel about fanfiction. I’m not sure if I exactly got across the points I was trying for, there’s a lot more eloquent, well thought out arguments out there from more knowledgeable people. Check out Seanan McGuire, she’s got a lot to say on the subject.

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