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maybe-boys-do-love · 21 days

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The Trainee, Episode 10: Direction

Take a break from the discourse around the couples to appreciate the references to directing in this episode! From the literal meanings to directions in life.

We open on Ryan's dad directing Jane's photoshoot. lol. You fix those clothes, Ryan ;) And Jane, give us a smile like your falling head over heels for someone.

2. Then we get Pah (making friends with every single person at the office, as usual) directing the front desk assistant (I haven't caught her name and she's not on the mydramalist or imdb cast and crew list) to a spot for lunch. Then we have the accounting manager come in and show us how her and Pah's relationship has grown. The scene reminds us that Pah, since early on in the show, has demonstrated incredible relationship building skills--a necessity for any director. And these relationships come to a beautiful fruition in this episode.

3. Tae, on the other hand, emerges as a directionless ghost, jump-scare appearance and all! Heartbroken and provided with downtime by his department for the first time during his internship, he has no idea what to do with himself.

4. Pi and Ryan are seemingly talking about the controversial Todd Haynes film, Joker, from 2019. If you're either knowledgeable about the Batman franchises or interested like me in trying to figure out why the writers chose this film to include as a conversation point, you'll realize that Harvey Dent was not in Joker. He was, however, in The Dark Knight in 2008, directed by Christopher Nolan. This mix-up between the movies seems intentional when we look at the theories of directing and humanity the show is exploring, which I'll expand on in number 5! In Joker, we get a depiction of a single misunderstood victim genius who takes out his suffering and any failures of his art on others and inspires other people who feel hurt and misunderstood to do the same. In Dark Knight, we have the day saved thanks to a collective group of people's refusal to harm others despite threats that others will be forced to harm them, and, as far as Harvey Dent, his reputation is preserved despite his failings because of the hope it can bring others. The comparison sets up a comparison between the individual heroes and villains versus the collective, which is a really important comparison to ideas the show explores about directors (and is just really important in general theories of direction like conversations about auteur theory, etc.). Note that Jane says in this ep that he doesn't like hero movies...

5. We then see Judy directing Ba Mhee on how to correct her typo on a document. She's checking over a draft before it goes out, like a good director ought to, but Judy's direction of Ba Mhee, of course, gets taken up as a motif and major sticking point for their dynamic in this episode as it encroaches into personal time rather than just work. We have witnessed that outside of work, Ba Mhee is actually quite capable and eager to play the directing role.

I want to point to the specific typo mistake that read "God Pick" instead of the company's name of "Good Pick," though, because it seems to refer to one view of a director's role. Alfred Hitchcock explained, "...in fiction film the director is god; he must create life. And in the process of that creation, there are lots of feelings, forms of expression, and viewpoints that have to be juxtaposed. We should have total freedom to do as we like." So this moment of direction gives us two references, for the price of one!

Even more, it presents us with the theory of auteur Directors, that the show has been actively engaging with through the whole series. Does the director have a god-like power to pick and choose what they want their work to be without any input from others? Do individuals, as directors of our lives, get to pick and choose what we create out of them without others' input? To both answers, the show has emphatically replied, no! The studio is not called God Pick, it's 'Good Pick.' The director, just like each of us, is working on communicating with a whole massive team of people to bring a certain vision of theirs' to life within quite constrained limits. From budgets to time, from client desires to our own insecurities, we do our best to be good knowing that mistakes will be made and we can pick up and keep on going.

6. Baimon, the director of the studio, instructs Pie on some of the grunt work of directing. He's been presented as so flighty in the series, so it was nice to see him getting down to business in this fashion. That business, however, was printed upon the backs of some big emotions, which I think, in addition to being a funny little gag about Jane and Ryan's hidden relationship, is a beautiful metaphor about the combination of emotional and logistic work that directors, especially, are tasked with performing. A vulnerability lies under each shot and camera angle.

7. Idk if this was intentional, but the choice to show sticky-notes as the art department's current medium for this scene reminded me of directors story-boarding with sticky notes. It's also the moment Tae is encouraged to make an attempt at directing himself and providing his direction to his relationship with BaMhee in a way that's considerate of her desires.

8. Baimon directs Jane and Ryan in another intimate scene lol. He's staging them, referencing the storyboard, checking the camera, doing all the director jobs! And, of course, instead of a perfect god, he makes a mistake with the very basics of left and right that his intern corrects for him, and this mistake is not used by the show to signal to us as the audience that he's incompetent. It's to show that the people with 'big' dreams, visions, careers, or awards are not more special than those who choose to do the small tasks in life. Directors are the first job Ryan lists to Jane when talking about adults with special talents that he feels like he's supposed to aspire towards. Jane asks Ryan "Why must people want to become something big?"

There's also a development in Ryan and Jane's performance here. They're playing and improvising in the scene. It's a nice development for them as character and a sweet commentary on directors allowing actors to perform with some flexibility. Based on what I've read about Gun and Off's development as actors and a pair, their characters' development in their different stand-in moments almost seems like a commentary on Gun and Off's growth as a performing pairing, but that's just a fun stretch. Really, I'd say it's more representative of the growing comfort of actors in film work.

9. How could I not discuss one of my favorite sequences in the show (right up there with BaMhee's chase scene)?! Pah has been amassing a crew of comrades at the studio throughout the series, and I knew it was building towards something. I stated during the first shoot when he was a part of Unit B that I could see his arc leading him to becoming a director because he was just so good at befriending and organizing people. And here's where he becomes the director! Not through his personal auteur vision, but through his communication with others!

I had been imagining this plot development in some fashion for a while. Getting it would've satisfied me. Great comedy for me, however, is about seeing a well-constructed set-up pay off for a better value than you could've expected. The Alfred Hitchcock quote above comes from a portion of an interview about plausibility in fiction and his films. He ends the quote by saying, "A critic who talks to me about plausibility is a dull fellow." The moment Pah slid off his sling, The Trainee leapt out of the realm of plausibility it had meticulously built to give us a stratospheric pay-off to the joke it had been building for 9 episodes. And it was a joke grounded in the deepest themes of the show, praising every creator and assistant working in the background of this show and all the shows we love. It made my heart so full. It presented a democratic vision of a director's role (in a country where people continue to need to fight for their democratic values). And, it did it all while making me laugh.

10. Despite all the people running this scene and Judy giving Ba Mhee so much direction in the workplace, it's Ba Mhee who finally gets to realize her direction in life here. Notably, she's let go of the big overly romantic dreams and visions. She's come to appreciate and understand the importance of the seemingly mundane aspects of her relationships, the day-to-day jobs of directing one's life, and she's directing Tae to commit to this direction, too. Directing involves paying attention to the small things, the communication, and the people who help make them meaningful.

There's a beautiful transition between Judy's conversation with BaMhee and Tae's where they fade into one another exactly, letting us know in some ways that Judy and BaMhee could've had a conversation and started growing and finding a direction together, too. The problem as BaMhee points out is not finding an exact right fit. She just still has feelings for Tae, which would make developing a relationship with Judy more challenging. It was mature and honest, and that precious little fade let us know the show saw the possibilities for BaMhee to love them both. Has a film cutting choice ever been so bisexually coded???

10. It's a cute little reversal that our final scene is one of the first steps in directing: the concept stage. We also get Jane's appreciation, not only for Ryan's ideas here, but for all the things Ryan does at his family's business that align with the same kind of work happening in a production house. It sets the two of them on equal footing, disrupting this fantasy of the film industry and the class systems that could divide them. And Ryan's other insecurity about feeling too immature and un-adult to compare to the people at the office, which is a another division that might separate Jane and Ryan (HOW OLD IS JANE!?!?!?!) also got a dressing down ;) during this episode. We're getting ever closer to Ryan feeling ready to direct his own life!!!

#the trainee #the trainee the series #gmmtv #offgun #janeryan #ba mhee #taebamhee #judybamhee

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jackfrombaskinrobbins · 10 months

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all fixed up (matt murdock x teen!adopted!reader)

type of writing: headcanons / scenario

word count: 967

request: yes / no

original request: "Matt Murdock patches up a teen reader, and there's just a lot of angst and hurt/comfort. PLEASE LET IT HAVE A HUG AND FOREHEAD KISSES :)) (I'm a sucker for fluff)"

warnings: slight mention of wounds, blood, not too much though i promise!!

dynamic: matt murdock x teen!adopted!reader

characters: reader, matt murdock, quick mention of foggy nelson & wilson fisk

a/n: ILYT!!! also erm hey guys🤓i've been gone for way too long i'm sorry :') but i've had this in my drafts for a whiiiiiiile so i figured it was time to post :0 anyways ya feel free to request i have a bunch to get to but i always like new ones!! esp daredevil oop tee hee

taglist: @nutellani @thecloudedmind @ayohitmanddaeng @fiadh-bell

(fill out this form to be on my taglist!)

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“stop it, y/n. just come here for a minute, alright?”

normally matt’s words would be answered with an exaggerated sigh and an eye roll, but tonight was different. tonight was off, and you knew it, he knew it, and he knew that you knew that he knew it. (ridiculous, but true.) it didn’t help that you had wounds to patch up, sore spots all over your body that wouldn’t be going away any time soon – a constant reminder of your mistake.

and yes, as much as matt would deny it, you had made a mistake. a damn big one at that. you should have known better. no matter how gifted you were at defending yourself, no matter how many times you had practiced, it wasn’t enough. nothing would ever be enough. and yet you had stupidly decided to go against a group of kingpin’s lackies, big huge guys who ate kids like you for breakfast. they didn’t hold back, and they beat you up until you were barely conscious, and that’s when stupid matt came and did his stupid thing and saved your stupid ass from stupid death or some stupid thing like that. and now you were here, in this stupid apartment wishing you had just stayed in and done your stupid homework and watched some stupid tv and just stayed out of things for once.

“i’m going to bed, matt.”

you spoke, too ashamed to face him. but stupid matt always knew, with his stupid heightened senses and the stupid way that he knew you inside and out, ever since he had taken you in a few years before.

“come on y/n. this isn’t something you can sleep off, and you know it.”

and you did know it. so that’s why you sat at the table, a hiss of air escaping you against your will as you lowered yourself down.

“i’ll get the kit from under the sink.”

“matt, really, it’s fine. it’s just little stuff, okay? i’m fi–”

“fine doesn’t smell like blood, y/n. i’m not stupid.”

that earned him an eye roll, which he never saw, but he always knew happened when he said things like that. you watched as he made his way to the sink, opening the cabinet underneath and rummaging around for the first aid bag. A while ago, you had put stickers on it so he could discern it from the other things in there. There were four flower stickers, and one that foggy had given you, with disney princesses that said “together we are strong”.

matt settled into the chair across from you, exhaling softly. the lights of a police car suddenly filled the dark apartment, screeching sirens accompanying it. you reached for the kit, but matt shook his head.

“no, y/n. i’ll do it.”

you opened your mouth, about to protest, but you could tell he wasn’t going to budge. his stubbornness was something you liked, sometimes. it sure helped when you both wanted pizza for dinner and foggy wanted wings. besides, you knew he would be able to patch you up right, with all the experience he got from helping his father. he had always told you that you were just like him, willing to give anything to protect your honor. but what matt never said was that he was just like his father too, and that if anything, you had just gotten those traits from him.

“did they get you in the head at all?” he asked, soaking a cotton pad in hydrogen peroxide and gesturing for you to guide it where your wounds were.

“yeah, a little bit. i tried to block ‘em. they just kept coming matt, i couldn’t do anything!” you grimaced as the pad touched the spot on your shoulder where you had been grazed by something sharp.

“i know, y/n. it’s not your fault.”

“see but that’s the issue. it IS my fault, matt!” you spoke, voice getting slightly strained, throat feeling tight. you squinted your eyes to prevent tears from falling, but it was too late. a few landed on his hand, and you turned away, trying to compose yourself. “there was no reason to go out there. i don’t know why the hell i thought it was a good idea. i was just … mad! mad about the way they’re treating everybody in this place, mad about the way they’re screwing over every person they deal with… mad about how they treat YOU, god damn it!”

a moment of silence as you tried to slow your breathing, and for a minute, you didn’t know how he was going to react. he reached into the kit, feeling around until he grabbed a bandage, unwrapping it. you helped his hand go to where it needed to be placed, and once it was, he sat back. only then did you see the furrow in his brow, the deep frown on his face.

“look, y/n. i need you to listen to me, and really hear me, alright? i’m proud of you.”

“come on matt, that’s –”

“no. i’m proud of you. really, really proud. i just … i just want you to be careful, alright? i worry about you. and for good reason, considering all this.” you could see his face start to crack ever so slightly, a quick break in his voice indicating that he really meant it. you moved your chair back, stood up, and hugged him tight, despite a slight lingering pain in your shoulder. after a little while, he kissed your forehead, then patted you on the back.

“i’d assume it’s pretty late now. how about you get to bed? we’ll figure out if you need to go to school tomorrow, alright?”

“sounds good. thanks matt. love you.”

“love you too, y/n.”

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#mcu headcanons #marvel headcanons #marvel #mcu #daredevil headcanons #nmcu daredevil #matt murdock x teen!adopted!reader #matt murdock x teen!reader #matt murdock headcanons #mae's requests

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rosiesramblings · 4 months

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My Mummy and My Simon

Fandom: Ted Lasso

W/C: 1.5k

A/N: Ok, I'm back with a fic, but fair warning it isn't a tickle fic. This has been rotting in my drafts for months and I just happened to be struck by the inspiration stick today. I hope you enjoy anyway!

“This is my Mummy and my Simon.”

It was how Jamie had introduced them for as long as he could remember. When he was a lad, he felt special when he said it - everybody and their Mummy had a Da, but Jamie was the only one with a Simon.

Jamie didn’t see them as often nowadays, with the distance between Richmond and Manchester, but he suspects that if he had anyone to introduce them to, that was still how he would do it.

He wasn’t sure why he was thinking about it, to be honest, while he stared at today’s post on his kitchen island. His housekeeper usually brings it in when she arrives and leaves it for Jamie to sort through. It’s rarely anything special - who uses the post anymore? - just the usual notices from the town and sometimes one of those circulars with coupons from the Tesco. Jamie wasn’t really sure why he felt so sick when he looked at it that day, until his brain processes what his eyes have already seen - the neatly typed James Tartt, Jr. across the front of one of the bills.

Jamie hated his full name with a passion - forever a reminder of the man who haunts his nightmares, the man who Jamie himself could become if he’s not careful. Jamie grimaced and turned away, forcing back the memories of what had happened when James overheard him telling someone that he lived with his Mummy and his Simon.

Simon was an odd duck, to be sure, but then again so was Jamie. He was a large man, still taller than grown-up Jamie, but he never made Jamie feel small or unsafe. Jamie was pretty sure it was impossible for Simon to make anyone feel that way, with his soft pastel jumpers and his obsession with that baking show and his job at the library. When it took Jamie so much longer than the other kids to learn to read, Simon never said a word about it, just gifted Jamie CD’s that Simon had recorded of himself reading Jamie’s favorite books for Jamie’s eighth birthday. He was pretty sure Simon didn’t know that after Jamie got his first Premiere League cheque, he had paid someone to put the recordings on his new phone. Jamie still listened to Simon’s voice read Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief when he came down with a cold.

Jamie fixed himself a post-training smoothie and sighed. Roy was bringing Phoebe over for Jamie to babysit since Roy had a coaches meeting and Ruth was busy saving lives at the hospital. Jamie idly washed out his blender, thinking of Simon and Mummy and how he really should give them a call soon. He was so lost in thought he didn’t hear Roy and Phoebe let themselves in before they were in his kitchen and Roy said, “Why the fuck do you get that wanker’s post sent to your house?”

Jamie whirled around, hand on his racing heart, before he processed what Roy was saying. “What?”

“Hi Jamie!” Phoebe waved cheerfully before going right over to the coffee table where he had gotten out the coloring books he kept specifically for Phoebe Days.

“Why is your arse of a father getting his post here?” Roy restated, gesturing to the pile of mail on the counter. “Thought you said you didn’t talk to him anymore?”

“I don’t,” Jamie said, confused. “That’s my post.”

Roy did a double take. “You’re named after that piece of shit?”

“Yeah.”

“Why didn’t you change it?”

“I did change it.” Jamie said. “Don’t go by James, now, do I?”

“I meant legally,” Roy explained. “So you don’t have to be fucking James Tartt Jr. in the fucking public record.”

“You can do that?” Jamie asked, incredulous, just as Phoebe called, “That’s five pounds so far, Uncle Roy!”

“Put it on my tab,” Roy called back. “And yeah, you can do that, you muppet. Costs like fifty pounds and might take a couple of weeks for the paperwork to come back, but you can do it. I still badger Ruth sometimes to change her name back to Kent, but she doesn’t want the fucking publicity.”

“Huh,” Jamie said, a whole new world of possibilities opening up before him. Roy kissed Phoebe goodbye and left for his meeting, and Jamie and Phoebe spent the afternoon coloring and playing kickabout in the yard.

***

A few days later, Jamie found himself on some government website, since you can do everything on the internet these days. He carefully typed Jamie into the form where it asked for what he wanted his new first name to be, cause it would be super embarrassing to have a typo and then have to do the whole thing all over again. The next box asked if he wanted to change his middle name, and Jamie paused. He hadn’t thought about that.

Jamie thought of James. He thought of Mummy, and he thought of Simon, and found he didn’t really need to think about it at all.

***

Simon’s birthday rolled along, and Jamie made the usual arrangements to donate to the library in Simon’s name. He’d done it every year since he could scrounge up the money, mowing lawns of council estates after Under-10’s training and looking after neighborhood kids until he had enough for a ten or fifteen pound donation. It never failed to bring a tear or two to Simon’s eyes, even now that Jamie had more money than he knew what to do with and made monthly donations to Simon’s library anyway, not that Simon knew that.

Jamie packed a bag to go and visit Manchester for Simon’s birthday, and as he printed his receipt showing the library donation to give to Simon, his eyes lingered on the email he’d received from the Royal Courts of Justice, notifying him that his change of name had been processed successfully. Before he could talk himself out of it, Jamie printed that off too, carefully folded it up with the donation receipt, and placed it in a small gift bag patterned with cheerful yellow ducks. It was made for kids, but Jamie knew Simon would appreciate it.

The drive to Manchester wasn’t too long, especially once Jamie put on Simon’s narration of the second Percy Jackson book. He’d made it through a good fifteen chapters by the time he was pulling his flashy car into the old familiar row of council estates.

Georgie shrieked, as she always did, when she flung open the door to her ‘sexy little baby!’ and Jamie picked her up and swung her around.

Simon’s familiar, “Oh, there they go!” sang in Jamie’s ears as he put Mummy down and turned to wish Simon a happy birthday.

The three of them migrated to the kitchen, Simon having made an impressive array of Jamie-friendly desserts. Georgie and Jamie sang an off-key rendition of Happy Birthday, and Simon pretended to conduct them with his candy thermometer. Soon enough, Jamie was pushing his be-ducked gift bag onto the table in front of Simon.

“Now, what could this be?” Simon grinned as he snagged the donation receipt from among the tissue paper. He unfolded it and, to no one’s surprise, unsuccessfully blinked back tears. “Oh, Duckie, thank you so much!” he said, and launched into an explanation of the new kids learn-to-read program that the donation would fund for the next year.

Not expecting anything else, Simon placed the receipt back in the bag and reached for Georgie’s gift. “Actually, there’s one more thing in there,” Jamie said sheepishly.

“More!” Simon mouthed amazedly to himself as he went back to the yellow bag. Jamie watched with anticipation as Simon drew out the email and carefully unfolded it, squinting his eyes a bit as he began to read.

Jamie watched as a dumbfounded look came over his stepfather, and he opened his mouth to start to say he could always change it back, but before he could Simon looked up at Jamie and burst into tears. Georgie startled, and Jamie leapt up in alarm, not sure whether to run away or try and comfort him. Simon made the decision for him when he stood and threw his arms around Jamie, still sobbing noisily.

Jamie, bewildered, gingerly patted Simon on the back, before swallowing and asking, “It’s alright then?”

Simon just sobbed louder, clumsily running his fingers through Jamie’s hair as Georgie muttered, “What on earth?” and snatched the paper from her husband’s hand. Before long, she too was sobbing, though still quite a bit more composedly than Simon. There, clearly written on the page, were the words: Official Change of Name - Jamie Simon Tartt.

Eventually everyone calmed down enough for Simon to say that it was more than alright, that he loved Jamie so much, that he was so honored by Jamie’s choice, and that was enough to get Jamie and Georgie with the waterworks again, Simon himself following not long after.

They sat on the sofa for the rest of the evening, watching old reruns of Simon’s baking show and eating too many of Simon’s desserts. Jamie sat between his Mummy and his Simon, who wouldn’t let go of his boy for anything, relishing in the evening spent with his family.

#non tickles #ted lasso fic #jamie tartt #georgie aka jamie tart's mummy #simon #does he get a last name?#unknown #family #not a tickle fic sorry

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wings-of-ink · 6 months

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First Devlog?

Hello everyone...boy, there are a lot of you already, still trying to digest that...

So, I gather that I should do these logs on occasion. I do not know how often, perhaps just when I have a few things to say. I will try not to ramble too much, but my fingies like to talk.

Anyway, I am working on chapter 3 right now. There’s some fun moments so far in it that I hope you’ll like, and we’ll get to meet Zahn, Duri'naan, and then Rundis. I’m trying not to rush because there are some exciting scenes that I’m eager to get to. I’ve outlined them to tide myself over until I get that far. There’s some quiet moments you’ll get to have as well, and right now I feel like that’s what I’m struggling with. Those areas of my story are like bridges to the next, more exciting, parts and sometimes I feel like they fall a little flat. But, I’m trying to keep in mind this is my first draft. I’ll go through it another time or two to perk things up. Those moments are still important for letting the MC get to know each RO.

My mind has been in a million directions lately too, and I’ve had a lot of ‘duh’ moments. I’ve done so much world building since I started this last year (around August/September I think), that I have pockets of important details that I kinda just forgot! So, I plan to re-read all the notes I’ve made and try to also put them into one place. I have some in my phone, in a notebook, and in no less than three folders on my laptop. It’s a wonder I have survived this many years…

What you can expect for coming updates…

-A couple fixes, of course – thank you to those who found some of those pesky buggy bois for me.

-A nicer front page, instead of being slapped with my ramblings, I’d like to actually have a nice start page. I’ll figure it out eventually, lol.

-I’ll be adding a name bank to the MC’s Nameday scene that will also show you what each name means, so if that is important to you, it’ll save you the internet search. If it tickles your fancy, the name selection will correspond in some way to the marks (names meaning "night" or "storm," etc.) so you can theme your MC a bit.

-Extra coding in case you decide to shorten MC’s given name to just “Ravi.” I did not once consider that anyone would do this, and my first play-tester – my own spouse – did….He told me about it since it made some dialog with Oswin make zero sense, and then I published the story without fixing it because I completely forgot about it.

-Different contrast color for dark mode links. I feel like I have drastically improved this with a new gold color. In retrospect, I don’t know why I didn’t use the gold before. I love it as an accent, I use it all over! The blue never felt 100% right, but my brain shut down after thinking about it too long. Here’s a sample and a (M) Zahn tease:

When can you expect an update?

I’d like to make my next update during the Amare Games Festival, ideally containing both chapters 3 and 4 since they go pretty tightly together. This will also insure that you meet the rest of the posse. It’s a tall order for both chapters to be submitted on time, and I don’t want to rush them either, but I’m going to try really really hard, lol. I will focus first on polishing chapter 3, so that no matter what, I can at least get it out in time.

Here’s a link to the post about it:

And this is the submission time frame: open from March 31st 2024 at 11:00 PM to May 1st 2024 at 12:00 AM

As a side message, should you want to read on…

I also wanted to give you all a big, like really big, heartfelt thank you. I have received so many kind messages and comments that I just can’t believe it. I am so happy (and honestly, genuinely shocked) that you’re enjoying my IF, and I’m motivated to work hard so you also enjoy each new chapter of your journey. There’s so many secrets I want to share with you about the world, and I am struggling to be patient myself, lol.

I am not usually a very open or social person, and I was scared for a long time to share anything I wrote. I reached a point in my personal life in the last few years where I just needed to embrace what I loved to do and share it with a community that shares in that love. I encourage you to do the same whether there is a story in your heart, music on your lips, or a paintbrush in your hands. Life is NOT about your 8-5. We may not be able to survive without it, but whatever moment you can, do what you actually love. Put away the those things that don’t matter, the things that stress you - including people, and make time for who you are.

Thank you all and take care!

~Lunan

#if wip #twine if #twine wip #interactive novel #god cursed if #if game #interactive fiction #gc if devlog #amare game #amare

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sophieswundergarten · 3 months

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I had this idea for an AU where Lovelace's Crew survived, only appearing to die because of a twisted psychological trick that Command was playing on Lovelace.

What happens to them, then, you ask?

Pryce and Cutter tested out the first brain bolts on them, which means that the technology doesn't exactly work right. Sometimes it gives out, so they serve as a personal retinue for the two.

Anyways, I've had this saved in my drafts for ages, and I thought I'd share it. I don't have context, I don't even have an apology. Y'all know why this is the only scene I've written. (Surprise, it's because it is about Lambert /s)

Captain Isabel Lovelace awoke to a strange humming.

Her eyes flew open and she sat up. Mr. Cutter was sitting nearby, smiling excitedly. He looked like a child on Christmas, if that child had cold, steely eyes and porcelain white skin.

But Lovelace couldn’t care less about Mr. Cutter and whatever ominous foreboding consequences his presence there promised. Because she had just spotted someone standing in the corner of the room, eyes straight ahead and arms rigidly at his sides.

“Sam,” She breathed.

He turned to face her, movements oddly robotic. “Captain Lovelace.” He answered in a serene, emotionless voice.

In an instant, she had crossed the room and was hugging the man. He probably wouldn’t like it, but she wasn’t about to let him stop her. As Fourier had said once, he so didn’t get a say in that right now. Lambert stood stiffly, which she was expecting, but he didn’t even flinch, which was odd.

Pulling back, she scrutinised his face. He gazed back blankly, not a hint of… anything behind his eyes. Something was wrong.

“Sam. Sam!” Lovelace shouted, tears pricking the corners of her eyes as she shook her communications officer.

“Hello, Captain Lovelace,” Lambert greeted, again, with that same, strange, flat tone, “Please unhand me. Everything is going to be okay.”

Lovelace whipped around to glare at Cutter, who was watching with a smug smirk just a hair away from turning into a full-on evil grin. “What did you do? I thought he was dead. I watched him die. How is he here?”

“Well, you know,” Cutter drawled, comfortable as he held all the power in the conversation in a tight fist, “We needed to see what you’d do if you were really pushed to your limits. No crew to speak of, excepting Dr. Selberg of course. No resources and no friends. But, we weren’t about to waste all those perfectly serviceable bodies! Even Dr. Hui and Officer Lambert were useful, once Hilbert managed to get their Decima symptoms under control again.”

“So— They survived. All of them? And you just let me think they were dead? You left me for dead?” Lovelace ground her teeth as she turned the information over in her mind. “Regardless, I ask again: What did you do to them?”

“Oh, nothing much. They were actually the first prototypes of Miranda’s brain bolt system. That’s why they tend to travel with us; it’s best to keep your most… buggy subjects close enough to fix when something goes wrong.” Cutter smiled lazily at her.

Lovelace turned away from him, looking back at Lambert. “Sam,” She whispered, “Sam, please. I have to know if you’re okay. If you’re still in there. I have to know so I know how much to hold back when I beat Cutter’s brains out, in case there’s anything important left in there.”

“He can’t hear you.” Cutter’s amicable pretence dropped, and he stepped forward to drape an arm around Lambert’s shoulders. Lovelace winced in sympathy; she knew how much Sam hated casual touch from strangers. But the man didn’t even twitch. Not so much as a flicker of discomfort passed over his features.

“None of them can hear you, Captain. And, by the way, they’ll only refer to you as such because we programmed them to. That can easily be taken away. Would it be easier for you if he didn’t speak like he recognises you? Because he doesn't.”

Lovelace seethed, unable to move, unable to think. She knew there was some course of action she should be taking, some plan she should be making, but her mind was utterly blank.

“Now,” Cutter clapped his hands together. “I have some things to attend to. I have requested that our dear Doug bring you a chai latte, since you seemed rather preoccupied with Sam, here. He should be up soon. I shall see you later. Toodle-loo, Isabel.” He smiled at her before spinning on his heel and exiting the room.

[Insert scene from Ep. 56, pg. 19-25]

Lovelace took a deep breath. The only thing left was to go for it.

“Hey, Sam,” She carefully sidled up to him. “I, uh, I wanted to show you something. Do you think you could look over there for a minute?”

“Of course, Captain Lovelace.” Lambert obligingly moved to look out the window.

Quickly, she injected him.

Then, she waited.

“Ow.” Lambert frowned, turning his head to look at her. “Captain Lovelace, I don’t think that’s something you ought to have done. I should go get Doctor Pryce–”

“No! No. Just– Just wait a minute.” Lovelace caught him by the arm, trying not to let the desperation leak through into her voice.

As the seconds wore on, her grip on his sleeve tightened, until eventually her knuckles were bone white and her hand was beginning to shake.

Pulling away from her, Lambert’s frown deepened. “I really think I should go get Doctor Pryce–” He began to walk towards the door, leaving Lovelace’s heart sinking as the last few fleeting whispers of hope escaped her.

“Oh.” Lambert paused, groaning. He faltered. “Oh no. I– I think something’s wrong–” Was all he was able to get out before he collapsed. Lovelace caught him, shaking him gently by the shoulders.

“Sam! Sam, are you okay? Are you… you?” She saw little drops of water spinning away from her into the air and realised she was crying. “Sam. Sam, please, I need you to be yourself. I need you to be okay, I–”

“Captain?” Lambert opened his eyes weakly. “What’s going on?” He looked surprised to see her crying; scared, even. “Are– Are you alright? What happened? Oh, and why does my head feel like mush?”

Lovelace laughed. It was quiet, and still a little wet, but it was her first genuine laugh in… she didn’t even know how many days.

“I’m– I’m alright, Sam. I’m more than alright, now that you’re here.”

“Don’t call me that,” Was the automatic grumbled response, but then he paused. “‘Now that I’m here’? What do you mean? Where was I?”

“You, um, you were here, I guess. But you weren’t you. There was someone else controlling you, and it— Okay, listen. There was something wrong, and you were— In a waking coma, so to speak. But you’re back to yourself now, and we have to figure out what to do before Cutter comes back. The station has been taken over.”

Lovelace knew she was rambling, and from the befuddled looks Lambert was giving her that she wasn’t making much sense, especially to his likely still-foggy mind, but she couldn’t stop herself.

She finally had someone on her side. Someone who she never thought she would see again. Someone she saw die.

“Captain. Captain!” Lambert’s voice called her back to the present. “What are you talking about? The station’s been taken over? Where are the others?”

Lovelace took a deep breath, pausing for a moment as she heaved in oxygen. “Okay. Yes, the station has been taken over. The others are here, but they’re… They’re prisoners. I have so much to tell you, but we have to be quick.”

She stood up, supporting Lambert as he attempted to rise. “First things first, can you stand?”

“I think so…”

“Good.” Lovelace looked around anxiously. “We don’t have long until Cutter comes back, and you need to be able to pretend that you’re still under their control. Come on, up you get.”

She helped him up, trying to figure out the best way to explain what had happened to her friend. Was he still her friend? He seemed to be. He appeared to be back to himself, but there was a part of her that was worried this was all a trick, somehow. Something extra cruel that Cutter had cooked up just to be awful.

Once Lambert was at least mostly stable, she backed up, looking deep into his eyes.

“Alright, tell me something only Sam would know. No, wait. What was the name of our AI on the Hephaestus?”

Lambert looked puzzled. “Rhea? But why would you ask that? Anyone could know what the name of our AI autopilot is; it’s a matter of public record.”

Lovelace released a sigh of relief. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re you. Now, Cutter could be back any moment. The thing is, the crew has been brainwashed. You were too, but I fixed you. There are other people here, other people who have been mind controlled. One of them, Eiffel, has already broken free and he’s trying to save the rest of them.”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Lambert shook his head, pulling at his hair. “The others are here? Selberg? Fourier? Hui?”

“Well,” she paused. “Not Selberg. We’ll have to talk about that. Later. But, yes, Hui, Fourier, even Fisher. Everyone’s alright. Well, not right now, but they will be.”

Lambert blinked rapidly, processing this new information. “Okay…” He began slowly. “So, to summarise, our crew, even Fisher, who was previously thought to be dead via meteor storm, are here, but brainwashed. Cutter, and, indeed, all of Command, are actually evil, and we now have to save everyone?”

#I don't know where this is going #I just needed to get it out #Sorry about it all #wolf 359 #isabel lovelace #samuel lambert

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tjemegames · 2 months

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HSR: 2.3.2 MoC, 2.3.1 AS, & 2.2.1 PF Recaps

I definitely forgot about drafting up the latter part of this post when it was more relevant so excuse my lateness. HSR has a lot of endgame content these days and keeping up with it across multiple different servers is a self-inflicted thorn in my side. So, without further ado, let's get into my yapping (under the cut because this post is long one)!

Apologies in advance for any image distortion: Tumblr doesn’t appear to like long photos.

2.3.2. Memory of Chaos

Dissipation of Dreams dropped yesterday morning and I had been impatiently waiting for it so I could get the Nameless Honor points for getting 15 stars; which, I was informed yesterday, can be earned off of stages that have already been completed. Do you know just how many times I missed out on those stupid xp points back in the early days because I couldn't even get 15 stars in the first place? Would've been great to know about back then, but I digress.

Anyway, as I said, DoD dropped yesterday, and I was fully expecting it to be a bit of a rough time because of how badly it was being dragged in one of the HSR discords I frequent. Much to my surprise, this was the easiest time I've ever had running MoC.

There were a few things that made this MoC easier for me:

The enemy lineup on stage 12 was almost the exact same as the 2.2.2 MoC; they swapped out the elite mob in the first wave of 12-1 for a different one, then flipped the challenge order of 12-1 (The Past, Present, and Eternal Show) and 12-2 (Argenti) so that they were inverted. This meant that I didn't have to think about who to run, and I could just refer to the previous challenge records for guidance. I was able to save myself about 18 wave resets because of this.

I got e5 Gallagher, giving myself a better Boothill team member and freeing up Aven as a secondary sustain for my opposing team lineup.

I've been farming relics like an absolute mad person for the past few weeks to fix some of my builds. Relics make up such a large part of character performance and I could truly feel the difference in the damage output for those I've been able to improve since the last MoC (see new builds below).

I'd rate my enjoyment of this MoC at 4/5 stars. Overall, it wasn't too terribly difficult and went by much faster than any of my previous attempts. This was both a positive/negative for me; while I was glad to have done well and efficiently so, it was very strange not to have to think too much or come back to retry the challenge over the course of a week. I’ve become so used to stopping my runs to farm relics/make team adjustments that it was a bit jarring to finish everything in one sitting. At the end of the day, I got my 800 jades for 36 stars so that's good enough for me.

2.3.1 Apocalyptic Shadow

Stormwind Knight was the integral AS stage, and this one took a bit of finagling to get the final star for 6600+ points. I can't give you an entire rundown on my thoughts as it's been a couple weeks since I finished the challenge, but I vaguely remember having to consult the discord for advice because my brain was not braining with team comps and I had been trying to beat the stage for multiple days.

However, I can tell you that super break Jing Yuan is a meme of a team that I've been using to fight "Harmonious Choir" The Great Septimus since 2.2 when the boss first came out. I don't know what compelled me to do that in the first place since lightning is one of the weaker break types, but here I was using it on stage 3 before having to switch it out for something more effective.

I should also note that, during this challenge, DHIL was on an absolutely trash 2pc/2pc atk% build, making it take far too many tries to get to 6600 points from all his missed crits. Gallagher was also freshly pulled and severely lacking in break effect. Additionally, Aventurine was still running 4-star planar ornaments and half of Tingyun's relics were still 4-star pieces as well. I briefly considered going back into the mode now that all of them have been improved to see how much better of a score I can get, but ultimately decided it wasn’t worth the effort.

2.2.1 Pure Fiction

The Lexical Enigma PF was interesting to say the least. I don’t usually play past the second stage of this mode due to my lack of useful units; I’m still Himeko-less and my duke farming hasn’t been going very well, meaning that Herta is still benched. Hopefully the Navigator will bless me with her presence via standard banner in the near future.

Fortunately for my lack of stellar jade savings, this patch I was feeling especially motivated to have a queen sweep of all the endgame modes; I spent way too much time and put in far more effort than I usually would to get all 12 stars. It was actually my very first time since PF released so yippee! We love progress.

I almost gave up a few times, my pride was hurt, and extreme sacrifices were made to get this finished. If you aren't aware, I have a special amount of spite reserved for Serval; I have nothing against her character (I actually loved playing through her companion mission and using her before version 1.4 came out) I'm just frustrated by the sheer number of times I've pulled both her and her signature light cone since the game came out. S15 Make the World Clamor is ten too many copies of that goddamn lc and I wish I could erase its existence from the game at this point.

That being said, finally releasing Serval from her lvl 70, 5/8/8/8 trace, 4-star relic wearing purgatory was what ultimately led to my success (see build below). Even though it wasn't the best build I could've given her, I'm hoping that it was enough to lift the Serval-based curse that had been placed upon me. And if not, y'all will be hearing about it.

Anyway, that's the extent of my yapping about the endgame modes for now. I'm going to try to put these out after every challenge cycle runs its course so that I'm not making an excessive number of posts about them. I apologize in advance for the impending long posts, but I'd rather not blow up y'all's feeds with separated iterations of my nonsense if I don't have to.

The schedule will still be a bit off for the next one of these recaps since I decided to include the current MoC but not the most recent PF. I'll do my best to get that sorted out asap.

Sheesh, I really rambled my way through this one, didn't I? Fun fact: a severe storm passed over my city while I was writing up this post, causing me to lose power, and I had to rewrite the entire second half of it because auto save wouldn't work without internet access. Don't you just love to see it?

Anyway, thanks for sticking around if you made it to this point! I'll catch y'all later.

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stygianpen · 2 years

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The Self Publisher’s Guide to Editing

Self Publishing is an amazing option for so many reasons. You have total control over every aspect of your publishing process and don’t have to rely on others for approval in many areas — such as deciding if your novel is marketable enough to publish in the first place.

One thing to keep in check when you’re self publishing however, is your budget. When a traditional publisher picks up your work they’ll handle much of the financial end of things and you’ll get a percentage of royalties for your end of the labor. But when self publishing, you’re covering everything, so it becomes even more important to pinch those pennies where you can.

Prior to self publishing OR traditionally publishing, you’re going to have to go through the editing process. But it’s a bit different depending on which direction you’re headed.

While traditionally published books will do best with an experienced editor who understands the current literary landscape and can help your book become publisher-ready, the self publishing writer can have a more personalized approach. And so, the question becomes…

Should you edit your own novel?

Well, right off the bat you are going to have to do some level of editing on your own. You should always proofread your novel and check for spelling and grammatical errors along with plot holes and really meditate on what needs to stay, what needs to go, and what needs to be added that you missed when you review your first draft.

But, after you feel you’ve done enough in those areas you’ll be looking to further content editing, copy editing, and line editing.

While you can do all of these things, the primary benefit of an editor is the outside opinion. It is rare that you will not overlook something in your own work because you are simply so close to it! But if you are alright with that sacrifice, then let’s chat about how to edit your own novel.

Content Editing your own novel

Content or developmental editing focuses on the big picture elements of your story and plays a large role in manuscript development. It addresses such things as plot holes, character arcs and pacing.

Plot holes

This is one of the areas in which an outside eye can help. If you do not want to hire an editor though and still have that outside eye, you can reach out to a beta reader or two to do their thing and give you some general feedback.

To find plot holes on your own, I recommend using the read aloud option in Word or getting a text to speech app on your phone so you can hear another voice dictating your story to you. This will allow you to detach a bit and view your novel from a reader’s point of view.

Plot holes can actually be quite the gift if you’re looking to expand your novel’s length — fixing them builds opportunity to explore your world even more!

Character arcs

Lucky for you, there are plenty of resources online about character arcs. While you don’t have to follow a pre-set pattern to a tee, these tried and true methods work for a reason and are likely to help your novel succeed through birthing relatable characters.

If your character is set to have a transformational act, make notes through your novel of when the following points occur:

Inciting incident

Call to action

Defining moment

Awakening

Moment of enlightenment

Death experience

Transformational moment

Climax

Resolution

If you are missing any of these points in your character’s arc, see if you can work it into your novel. You’ll be pleasantly surprised at the change it brings about to the novel as a whole!

Pacing

The percentages in this method have been especially useful to me personally as it makes the entire process of pacing quite mathematical. If your opening image and theme building up to the catalyst is 50% of your novel for example, you need to edit that down.

For even more connection with how to pace your novel, check out thesebeat sheets of familiar films where you can see Save the Cat in action.

Copy Editing your own novel

Where content editing may result in expansion of your novel (especially when fixing plot holes), copy editing is for tightening up your work.

Find your trouble words

Let’s start off right away with ‘trouble words’. As defined by Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing these are:

a lot/alot

affect/effect

can/may

further/farther

good/well

i.e./e.g.

into/in to

it’s/its

lay/lie

less/fewer

that/who

their/they’re/there

then/than

who/whom

your/you’re

If your eye catches on any of these, wondering “wait… I thought those meant the same thing” then you’re not alone. You’ve just found your trouble words!

Of course by no means does this include all trouble words, but it’s a good start. Personally my trouble word (as I’m reminded of regularly by my editor) is ‘led’. I just can’t stop writing ‘lead’! 😅

Find your crutch words

What words do you use over and over again? I’m constantly saying ‘a little’ in my writing. Once you listen your words read aloud you will REALLY pick up on these. Locate them, and do something about it. You don’t want your novel to sound clunky and repetitive. Another good tip is to make sure you’re not using the same word in the same sentence or even paragraph. This is called ‘tautology’ and is jarring to the reader.

Thesaurus.com is out there, and it exists purely for your use. So use it!

Check for consistency

Do you spell a particular term differently every time you use it? You’re going to want to make it uniform. Words such as daycare often wind up switching from day-care to Day Care to daycare all in the same novel!

Other words that are commonly inconsistent include:

Organise/organize

Centre/center

Focussed/focused

Recognise/recognize

Analyse/analyze

Pick one, and stick with it! And of course, make sure you’re sticking with one voice and tense as well. In some cases, a switch can be pertinent to the story, but make sure if you’re doing this it’s intentional and you don’t leave in any accidental switches.

Additional Tips

Before this becomes an entire course, I’d like to list in point form a few more suggestions for your copy editing process. If you’d like to see more blogging on copy editing, please leave a comment below saying so!

Remove adverbs that weaken your copy (When I finish writing I snap my laptop shut. I do not shut my laptop quietly.)

Choose positive over negative (After reading this I want you to keep each point in mind as you edit. Another blogger may not want you to make any editing mistakes as you revise.)

Check transitional phrasing to see if it’s necessary (in order to, begin to)

Line Editing your own novel

Working sentence by sentence, line editing takes a deep dive into your prose, focusing on how to use language and communicate with your reader. Sound similar to copy editing? Not quite.

Line editing is the most meticulous of your three major novel editing types as you are looking at small pieces of your writing rather than larger concepts and errors.

Before starting on any editing, it’s a good idea to let your book rest a bit as another way to detach from the words you’ve put down on the page. After a couple of weeks or a month you can get back in there and tear things up!

Check for passive voice

While this can be applied to copy editing, it’s perhaps an even more useful check to do as the first step in your line editing process. Best of all, there’s an app for that making this a minimally daunting way to ease into your detailed edit.

Grab that Thesaurus

This is it friends — if you were keeping an eye out for tautology and crutch words in your copy editing process you can get rid of every last one of them through line editing. Grab your thesaurus or head to Thesaurus.com and tighten on those lines. By the end of your line edit every paragraph should be wonderfully unique from the one before it.

Grab your Dictionary, too

Did you throw a word in thinking it would sound good, but if someone asked you to define it you’d mumble your way through? Make sure you know for sure what you’re saying in every sentence.

If you’ve done your job right, when you finish your line edit, your novel will be consistent and concise while retaining its creativity!

Invest your time or invest your money

When deciding whether or not to do the full edit of your self published novel, it comes down to what you’re able to invest: time, or money. Now that you’ve had a glimpse into the world of editing, you can see why editors charge for their services and how valid that charge is.

There are many things in the literary world that you can do yourself, and this is one of them. But you do risk sacrificing quality, experience, and that outside viewpoint especially if you’re new to the game.

Should you choose to edit your novel, all the power to you! It’s a commendable choice and I'm behind you 100%.

#writing #writing community #creative writing #new author #writing help #writing tips #writing advice #writing resources #writing tips and tricks #editing #self publishing

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nihilsimi · 7 months

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my lover, lover, lover (you shot me down 뱅뱅)

summary / the inspiration that mamma mia! can unexpectedly bring warnings / none

there’s one too many times when he really should hold his tongue back. once, when he spilled the whereabouts of julian's proposal plans in a late night escapade to erika's younger sister, the biggest tattletale of them all. two, when he mentioned his own desire to get married to a girl who shattered one too many pieces of his heart in the end — love blinds thee unfortunate ones, and seojoon isn't privvy to being saved. three, when he told his mom that he didn't want to watch mamma mia with her, despite knowing how much comfort it brings her.

to be fair, he's seen it, what? eight times in the past year with her? today will mark the first of 2024.

and then, there’s now, as he marches to the kitchen to replenish an empty takeya steel bottle he's left at home to rot in the past few months (nothing a good ol' scrubbing wont fix). "doesn't it seem too rash that they'd want to venture out on a year long's adventure while not really having a solid source of income?" a solo tirade, spilling out of his mouth filter-free that by the time his mind finally caught up, he reverts in complete silence, falling passive once more.

“love makes you do stupid things sometimes, joonie.." his mom's voice is wistful as it trails in the end, manicured nails scratching at the nape. he knows the tale well, a passion filled month with a useless man who would leave her in the end for the conception of seojoon - he knows how much she relates to amanda seyfried's character all too well.

love makes you do stupid things sometimes. he repeats this in his head. love makes you do stupid things all the time.

and that’s how he lands himself in the crevices of his room, scribbling and noting and playing around with any beat that comes. end of solo promotions and the beginnings of a next project, yet he fails to make time for any morsel of peace and solace when he’s slaving away one by one, skewing sounds here and there to make for a song with an impact.

at best, what he comes up with in the minutes of fatigue consist of nothing more than a johnny stimson's inspired harmony. lyrics that cater towards the risk one takes when they're falling in love. when they're deep in love. he starts with a strike of ‘my lover, lover, lover,' layer over the middle a bit, shoots it down (bang bang). it doesn't take long, in fact, it comes all naturally to him.

heavy synth, an electronic sound — and he wants to fall back to the limelight of the golden days, where the song standstills on its own. so, he pulls himself out of the box he’s trapped himself in of self-dwelling croons of trap beats and brings himself to face the mind of his emotions. he'll get to the languid croons of tenderness, aiming for something different — whimsical, something that feels like he’s spinning on his toes, magical and dreamy.

it’s plagued in various cues, the rap and rhyme. vague references to pop culture phenomenon — too many ad-libs that make his head dizzy when he’s running through the guide track.

but when he thinks of a lover, it's always back to the feeling of being down bad, so bad that you lose any sense of logic. like sophie, as she sends those three letters to her unknown father, the possibility of success terrifying. and there's sky, sky who puts her on a pedestal, as one should, catering to her needs, her needs, her needs.. it’s in the bridges of love, and this bridge that holds his attention for days. hours, minutes to the seconds when he runs through each idea of a rhythm before settling on what he thinks would fit him best.

an email drafted, he scrawls out “mamma mia.mp3 - check it out (draft)” as the subject before placing the mp3 file and hitting send to julian and ej.

#tales #( were gonna ignore all typos and errors and whatever else doesnt make sense yup yup)

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mareastrorum · 1 year

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The Fool and the Soldier: Chapter Commentary

Chapter 5: Gift & Debt

On off weeks, I’ll be posting some commentary on the prior week’s chapter. Since this is a longfic, I expect that it will be helpful for keeping track of stuff, plus I might mention something you missed. Of course, this will include spoilers, so continue with that in mind.

These aren’t meant to be comprehensive! There is so much more going on that I’m not saying. Feel free to ask questions too, either in replies or asks. If it’s too spoilery, I’ll let you know. I’ll add them to the body at the bottom as I receive them.

See the directory for other meta posts.

Gift & Debt

What’s this?! We haven’t seen this card! But no worries, Jester makes the card about halfway through the chapter.

There’s a lot of toxic fandom discourse on what characters “deserve” and that eventually culminated into an intent to explore that in the story. This chapter juxtaposes a lot of the characters’ worldviews on what must to be earned/paid versus what should be given freely.

Luctus

The first thing I came up with for Luctus was the sensory perception: pain. It immediately came to mind when I looked up the latin word luctus, which means grief or sorrow. I didn’t feel that I needed to iron it out further for the emotion, so this was an easy fit.

Next was the school of magic. She wasn’t encountered in the stream, but her ability during the Lucien fight was a Slow spell with a dexterity save instead of the usual wisdom save. This wasn’t the only eye that had slightly different effects than a normal spell—Vigilan’s anti-magic cone dispelled magic rather than suppressed it until it passed out of the field (at least, sometimes).

Slow is an interesting spell. It’s transmutation, which is all about changing reality (and I had already decided on another Somnovem for that school). It affects a specific number of targets in a space. According to the PHB, wisdom is about being in tune with the world, particularly with perceiving it. Thus, a wisdom save for avoiding a Slow effect makes sense if the point is to resist a change to one’s own perception of the world. After all, if it was actually changing the space itself, then there wouldn’t be a limit on the number of targets, and it would be avoided or exited by leaving the area. So it changes the target, not the world. Makes sense for a level 3 spell.

But Luctus’s Slow required a dexterity save, which is the score for agility, reflexes, and balance. Dexterity saves are usually for dodging an ability, but not all the Somnovem’s abilities used that save, so it wasn’t about avoiding an eye’s gaze. There’s a couple ways to interpret that, like maybe it’s a stronger transmutation of the same effect, but it affects everything in that area, so it has to be dodged. However, Matt didn’t pull out any AOE measuring props to see who else he could get; Luctus looked directly at Fjord in episode 139, then Veth in 140. Matt also didn’t describe a beam or any projectile. They both felt a wave of grief and sadness, which imparted the effect. So I don’t think it was about dodging so much as it was about the character’s general speed and agility.

So I chewed on that for a while, until it suddenly clicked: dunamancy. Dunamancy has both chronomancy and graviturgy specialties. It would totally track to have either of those require a dexterity save rather than any other stat to resist a slowing effect. Once I had that, I came up with Luctus’s role.

And as I thought that over, I also had my fix for why Molly survived at Glory Run Road: Luctus used Cognouza to alter the timeline.

You might wanna check out those first two scenes in chapter 1.

Pieces

The first draft of this scene didn’t have the funky kerning and formatting. It was going to be very brief, only giving the reader a vague sense of what had happened to Lucien.

However, once I got used to testing out different types of formatting quirks, I decided to use that here to emphasize how disorienting it was for Lucien. Since this was third-person limited perspective, and his perception of the world would have been shattered, the text was as well.

Gems

I wanted to do a check-in with Nott because she spent so long in the early campaign keeping her backstory to herself, and she’s in the background for a lot of Fjord’s arc. Much of her dialogue makes more sense in a second watch of the campaign. She projected a lot of her issues onto other people, and she used that lens to decide what she should do for herself.

The actual events of the scene weren’t that important though. I almost cut it entirely and added a scene for Nott elsewhere, but I wanted Nott’s canon dialogue about not being good yet, but trying to do good. It’s such a big part of who the Nein are at every point in their story. Thus, I kept it.

Debts

This scene was so long originally. I think it was nearly 9,000 words at one point. Then I cut it, then it bloated again, then I cut it more, etc. I think this is the 5th or 6th major version of it.

I chose Fjord’s POV for this because his arc is coming into focus next and I wanted to lay some ground work about where his head is at. There’s also a lot of parallels between him and Molly that will come into play.

Gustav’s bail was always going to be a big scene in the early chapters because Molly would have been there to realize that Gustav knew about Kylre. However, then the origin comic came out, and I was like, wait, was Kylre the reason Lestera died? She wasn’t that old—no gray hair, no signs of illness, no weak constitution, etc. There’s no way to confirm it, but considering that nergaliids can passively feed off people, then Molly would have thought that was a possibility. No reason to be extra upset about it… unless Gustav knew all along.

Molly’s only really gotten angry a few times in canon, typically when other people are getting hurt. He didn’t show anger if people disagreed with him over plans or anything. In the comic, he dealt with his anger through choir practice, and that was honestly more fun for him than anything else, with his anger showing before he came up with an idea of what to do. He wasn’t even that angry at Kylre when he chased him down with the Nein.

But Gustav was supposed to take care of the carnival, he brought Kylre in, and he knew what was happening the whole time. Kylre’s betrayal was more straightforward, and it didn’t really harm anyone at the carnival (other than possibly Toya). It’d be like being angry at a wolf for hunting a person instead of a sheep. Instead, it seemed like Gustav put people in danger for coin, after all the lessons and mannerisms that Molly picked up from him.

So, yeah, Molly was pissed.

I also wanted to explore the Nein’s various moral leanings and perspectives of the world. Fjord and Caleb are more on the end of earning what you have—there’s an expectation of behaving a certain way under threat of punishment. Fjord would have gotten that from his time at the orphanage and as a sailor. Caleb learned that from growing up poor in a totalitarian regime and then training as a Volstrucker. It took a long time for both of them to shake out of that mindset in their respective arcs.

In comparison, Jester and Caduceus have kinder outlooks. They didn’t let outrage override their sense of fairness. It wasn’t like Gustav or the carnival had been rolling in funds, so it couldn’t have been just about money. So they stood up to the others and asked questions to get at the heart of why Gustav had done it in the first place.

Nott and Beau struck me as somewhere in the middle. Beau rebels against authority and has a powerful curiosity, so she’d be wary of the idea of meting out justice without knowing all the facts. Thus, I had her stop Molly (to protect him from getting arrested for murder) at the start, then hold him back until they got answers. Nott backed up Caleb, of course, but after the scene she just had about trying to do good, she’d feel uncertain about it while she does it. After all, how many people did she help torture and kill because she was scared of what the goblin tribe would do to her?

Taliesin said in a Talks that his concept of Molly was an unaligned character that broke traditional D&D alignment. Thus, Molly is not a good person. That doesn’t mean he’s evil, lawful, chaotic, nor neutral. He’s unaligned. He thinks he’s a good person and tries to do good—when he feels like it. He has a code that no one actually understands, but it makes sense to him, so who knows if he follows it? He likes mischief and causing chaos, but also wants things to make sense. He does what he feels like when he thinks he should, sometimes. Unless he doesn’t. But there’s rules to it. Maybe.

In short, he’s a two-year-old adult. Two. Years. That is not a lot of time to come up with a comprehensive, consistent view of what the world is, what it should be, nor how he should handle discrepancies. That doesn’t mean Molly isn’t capable of acting rationally or being persuaded to do something he doesn’t initially want to do. He listens to people, and even if he talks back, he’ll go with the flow.

That resulted in this scene, with half the group wanting to kill Gustav, and ending with them letting him go.

Easter egg: I had Molly’s swords get caught on the coat because it was Lestera’s. As discussed in the next scene, she wouldn’t have wanted him to kill Gustav, so that was added here as a symbolic show of her interference.

Stories

Molly drank alone to panic after he first got his Rite of the Dawn unlocked in Alfield, so I figured he’d try to isolate after what happened. Maybe he would have sought some comfort with Yasha because she’d trusted Gustav too, but she’s unfortunately not there.

Jester to the rescue! This provided exposition about Molly’s thought process through the prior scene, and it showed just how much it rocked Molly’s view of a few things. Even so, he’s not angry at any of the Nein, nor did he hold what they did against them. His emotions were just running high and he’s having trouble keeping a grip.

I wanted to explore Molly’s and Jester’s relationship a bit. In all honesty, their personalities are very well suited to each other: they like having fun, they understand each other well, they’ve got each other’s backs, and they both prioritize helping people at their own expense. They also enable each other to their detriment, and their maturity is a bit stunted because of that. That said, Jester’s a romantic and Molly’s a hedonist. They have very different views of what relationships should be and what they’d want out of it, so the scene doesn’t stray from a platonic feel. Thus, I had them order different drinks, and neither would ever order the other’s for themselves. Despite that they showed some physical affection and even got caught on each other’s horns, it’s all in silly fun.

This scene also gives a lampshade to the naming convention to for the fanfic (which was discussed in a prior meta post): each of the chapters is named after one of the cards, and the reason is that they’re conveying a theme through a story rather than saying something outright. However, it’s not just for the readers. The characters also refuse to acknowledge certain truths, so they cope by telling stories (Caleb’s book, Molly’s cards, Cad asking Gustav for his story, etc.). Heck, even Molly does it, by telling stories about his time at the carnival instead of answering Jester’s questions outright—but it’s not Jester who doesn’t want to hear the answer.

Worries

Time for the terrible spellcasters to be terrible together. At this point in their arcs, Caleb and Fjord are also enablers for each other. The worst thing is, they rationalize their decisions as being best for the Nein or the world generally, not just themselves. Yes, they’re worried about Molly, but there’s also that tempting blood magic that might be useful somehow, plus whatever happens to Molly might affect their aspirations, etc.

I went with Caleb’s POV because he would be having a rough time with the events of the day. This was basically sandpaper on an old wound. He betrayed his parents and murdered them for the Empire. He betrayed Astrid and Eadwulf by attacking them and then by fleeing the Sanatorium without seeking them out to tell them the truth. Ikithon betrayed them by altering their memories and warping them into weapons for the Empire. Caleb’s only just started to truly grasp that he’s been fed Imperial propaganda his whole life. He’s been wrestling with the idea of whether his own judgment can be trusted and whether he can or should try to do anything about Ikithon or the Volstrucker. Then the group decided to let Gustav go when he wanted to kill Gustav, and it hit him fairly quickly that he’d made a rash decision that was rightfully overruled.

He’s a mess.

Then, along comes Molly (also a mess) to ask for a silly favor to borrow Frumpkin because he can’t sleep. That manages to pull Caleb’s head out of his own butt long enough so that he can get to sleep too.

It’s almost like they feel better about their own bullshit when they help other people…

Zoran Kluthidol

The first part of this scene about the hounds was in one of my earliest sets of notes from August 2022. It was one of the first scenes I wrote for the Tombtakers. I’ll discuss more of Zoran’s backstory in a separate meta post, but the key thing for this scene is that goliaths travel in herds and are fairly isolated from other communities. A lot of this scene came from my brainstorming about what sort of goliath would leave his tribe and wind up at the Claret Orders.

Once I came up with the basics for both backstories, I considered what Zoran would have thought about Lucien. Timing wise, I figured that Zoran would have already been at the Orders for a while when Lucien joined, and Zoran would have joined as an adult (because that’s when he would have left his tribe). Lucien would have joined as a pre-teen. Thus, Lucien would have been a tiny brat compared to Zoran, a fully-grown goliath.

Then I thought, what sort of person would Lucien need to be for Zoran to respect him enough to take up an offer to form a mercenary group and leave the Orders? (Reminder: Lucien died at 23, after the Tombtakers were active for at least 5 years—so he led them away when he was no older than 18!)

A fucking brawler, that’s what. Someone who could kick his ass when he had no right doing it. This scene helped me flesh out both of their personalities in that respect.

Thing is, an introductory scene can’t just be about the character getting his ass beat by a mostly-dead antagonist if the point is to show he’s not a pushover. Thus, there’s some bits to show that Zoran specifically enjoys hunts, not just fights, and he doesn’t care as much about the outcome as Lucien did. It also shows that he’s still someone to be feared and does as he pleases because of it.

(And captainsparklefingers nailed that Zoran snagged a bottle of Lionett wine from the storage room!)

Zoran is the other Ghostslayer of the Tombtakers, so his POV gives insight into that as well. He immediately clocked how fucked up it was for Cree to make Lucien an undead, and he’s intuitive enough to recognize several implications that stem from that. He also doesn’t take what Cree and Otis say at face value; he recognizes their biases and takes that into account. Finally, he’s got some reservations about the Somnovem and the Pattern, even if he enjoyed how it felt at the time.

But Zoran’s not the schemer. As fucked as the situation is, he’s more comfortable following the others’ leads. So, for now, he’s settling in for whatever insanity Lucien’s going to lead them into, and he’s well aware it’s going to be messy. That’s what’s fun, after all.

Senses

Another check-in with Lucien. There’s some subtle hints of what the Somnovem are up to. I also included a demonstration of Luctus’s ability to warp time. As she mentioned in her later scene, she had to “undo” some things, so the reader gets to see an example of that here.

Dream: Bait

The introductory poem is “To a Squirrel at Kyle-Na-No” by William Butler Yeats, an Irish poet and politician. He’s a fascinating historical figure that turned to some seriously questionable views about how the world should work in his later years, and I thought that was perfect for including here. I’m being vague about it because I think you should read it up yourself—and you’ll hopefully get a sense of why I thought, of all the poems I could have chosen, his poem about trying to pet a squirrel was appropriate here.

It’s fairly obvious that the overarching theme of this dream is bait. I had considered including scenes where Lucien hunted for small animals, but honestly, that would be a terrible idea for kids in the Savalirwood. Fishing would have been safer, and it gave an opportunity for some exposition from an adult.

Every other scene in the dream includes an example of using bait to lure someone to or from something. First was Cree distracting guards while Lucien snuck out of a house he robbed. (There’s a clue as to whose house it was…) Second was Lucien trying to bait the goliath into harassing Cree instead of him, but it’s too tempting to bother the tiefling that’s already so close to the water. Third was Lucien distracting vendors so Cree could nab wares at the market, plus acting as lookout for Greytraders that might have caught her otherwise.

Fourth was an unfortunate example of Lucien leading some thugs to his group when they were looking to snatch orphans and sell them off to the Mardoons or Jagentoths—slavers. The fisherman mentioned three sets of three are extra special: Lucien’s red eyes, purple skin, and horns (as noted when he spooked the baker); Cree’s a “half-beast” girl with gold eyes; and the half-orc is also a “half-beast” girl, but with blue eyes. Being good bait isn’t always a boon.

And now, look back at that poem. Hmmm. HMMMM…

The rhyme in the market scene is the last verse of a popular Irish song, “Molly Malone.” Cockles are a relatively easily-foraged shellfish that are a common street food in coastal towns, and they’re often used as bait for fishing. Mussels are another shellfish, found both at sea and in freshwater. While Shadycreek Run is a fair distance inland, it’s also a trade point between the rest of the Greying Wildlands and the Empire. While I doubt there would actually be hawkers wheeling barrows of shellfish to sell in the Run, there’s some obvious puns and references to prostitution in the song, which was also a thriving business in town. Plus it’s totally the kind of place that would have rumors of a ghost trying to sell wares.

Gifts

Then we go to Molly, who, as expected, is doing his best to not deal with what happened and is instead fixating on his name. Identity was a big thing for him, so it makes sense that he’d focus on that rather than process his feelings about Gustav or mourn Lestera a second time.

I figured Fjord would be optimal for that conversation because Fjord was the one who wavered about his last name, Stone. Vandran had argued to him that it was a good name, which tempered his distaste for it. However, once Fjord learned about Vandran in the stream, that threw it all into question again. Thus, of all the people in the Nein who would understand, Fjord’s best suited.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a heart to heart with Molly without a +0 to Charisma moment like him insinuating that Fjord should have seen Sabian’s betrayal coming. That said, Fjord is dense sometimes, and even then, he’d be used to Molly’s brand of arrogance to know better than to take it at face value.

I can’t recall the exact context (I’ll update this if I ever find the quote), but Taliesin once mentioned that he expected a party pet to “make an alligator so happy.” I immediately thought of that while outlining this stretch of time and saw that the pet vendor would be dealt with here. I planned to include it as Molly’s dialogue for one of Jester’s pets, then realized that she would probably goad him to buy the peacock, which he would definitely decline. Molly had also mentioned that the carnival had named a horse Winter’s Crest because that was when they planned to eat it if it lasted that long. That evolved into this section where Jester bought him the peacock and he suggested the Nein eat it instead.

Jester had more gold to spend at this point because Molly pitched in to buy Nott’s cloak and for Gustav’s bail. The Nein also had more coin overall because more guards had been killed at the Sour Nest. Thus, while Jester is still pretty broke, she’s doing a little better than she had been in the stream.

Bruises

Caduceus is still taking it easy, but he’s learning to enjoy the trip. I wanted to include a POV for him because I thought he would do a half-apology to Molly, and it’s fun to explore their relationship since it was a blank slate. We also got to see that Molly’s doing better after a few days.

More cards for Molly’s deck! These will absolutely be chapter titles in the future.

Tyffial Wase

Tyffial was the last of the Tombtakers that I fleshed out. It took a while to come up with her backstory, but once it clicked, everything fell into place rather easily.

In the Critical Role artbook “The Chronicles of Exandria - The Mighty Nein” there is a blurb about the Tombtakers based on Beau’s notes that were submitted to the Cobalt Soul, and Adon Zeenoth personally crossed out Tyffial’s name. I took that to mean that Zeenoth must have known Tyffial somehow. They’re both elves, but there was no indication about their ages in canon. But why would he personally censor records naming her? There had to be something he didn’t want people to know about her, but I had to come up with what that would be and why he would do it unprompted.

First, I tried to come up with what Tyffial would have been doing before she joined the Claret Orders. Nothing really came to mind, so I thought instead, why would an elf with a long lifespan join the Order of the Mutant and then defect to follow an 18-year-old (or so) to form a mercenary band? I had considered the route grayintogreen took where Tyffial was also from Shadycreek Run and grew up with Lucien and Cree, but I wanted to do something new. There’s not a lot of takes on the Tombtakers, so there’s a lot of possibilities that hadn’t been done yet.

Then I thought, well, what if she was bored? Elves live a long time. What if she joined the Orders out of boredom? Then she’d leave once she was bored of that, too. That would make sense, especially if Lucien comes up with exciting jobs, and we (the audience) knew that eventually took the Tombtakers to Molaesmyr. But a young elf wouldn’t get bored that quickly. Their sense of time passing would be about the same as a younger race until they started getting up there in years.

So Tyffial is fucking old. The Order of the Mutant makes sense because then she can adjust her abilities and her looks using mutagens. And that gave me a reason for her to know Zeenoth, an Archivist at the Soul: he’s covering up her tracks when she comes up with a new identity. He’s taken bribes before, so a bribe mixed with threat of violence would certainly keep him acting on Tyffial’s behalf.

Tyffial’s backstory will be explored over time in TF&TS, but there will be hints aplenty about just how long she’s been around. For example: what names does she use to refer to certain places?

I’ll note that I came up with this before it was revealed that Ludinus Da’leth was artificially extending his lifespan. I was so hyped when C3 started exploring that. More things to chew on.

Lucien & Luctus

Yet another look into Lucien’s relationship with the Somnovem. I don’t want to point out too many hints, but there were several. Is he needlessly paranoid or rightly distrustful? Time will tell.

Now Lucien has a body! Kind of. Curious that the Somnovem did that after he was defeated on the Material Plane…

#TF&TS #TF&TS meta #chapter commentary

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aohendo · 1 year

Note

Happy Blorbsday! (to be answered anytime on any day because every day is blorbsday)

How have you been? I have been missing you and dear Kiris on my dash.

What kind of horrors has he been facing lately? Please feel free to go off about any OC thoughts that have been plaguing you or any trauma you have been inflicting on our favorite sad boy.

Happy Blorbsday!!

Life is certainly life 😅 Good and busy and nothing bad, just a lot. Expecting to get even busier over the next few months, too, so that's gonna be.... fun.

(It will be it's just I also like sleep).

Kiris, oh Kiris. This poor guy.

About two weeks ago, went back and blocked out all my ideas on how to fix Prince's plot: there's a few scenes to add, a few to rearrange, and a handful to cut, but Disney princess necromancy has solved all the issues! Into the fourth draft of it, now, which after a SPAG pass will be the version I send out to a first round of beta readers. My guesstimate is I'll be searching for people for that starting mid-late July!

The current horror Kiris facing today is *gasp* tea with 'L Tuola the empress. Doesn't sound terrible on the surface, but there's casually another prince being eaten by a hawk in the background, Ta Ritasa the advisor is being generally creepy, and 'L Tuola makes it very clear what she'll do to find the Prophet (who may or may not be trying to casually sip his tea (which also isn't really tea and Kiris hates it) across from her) and that she knows about Kiris' magic. Also some more set up stuff for the 'L Tuola/necromancy plot line, which Kiris is beginning to steadily really not appreciate even though he's pretty sure said necromancy is the only way to save his mentor from... one of his own prophecies.

In the span of the next two chapters after this, poor guy's gonna have two separate murder attempts on him and he's going to fail to save his mentor--the only person who's ever really cared about him. Shortly thereafter, Ta Ritasa begins finding ways to force magic from Kiris (guy's about to get wrung like a sponge 😬), a principality gets destroyed (and it's mostly Kiris' fault), and we begin the 'there's a fraud among us!' plotline. Not to mention the Turre getting even creepier, or Duvutriok coming around with various princes' heads, or all Batar's blackmail, or Iiriok trying to be friendly and compassionate (but clearly, obviously, he must have some further angle to it...)

Kiris just wants to hide under his bed. I'm really just hitting him with a baseball bat at this point, poor dude. Does not deserve this treatment.

I promise, these are all necessary steps in getting him his hug, though!

The goal for this draft is no more than 110k. That should be a fairly easy 10k to shave off during line edits, and 100k is a really nice spot for fantasy right about now. If I really had to in those future line edits I could probably get it even shorter (looking at Reverberate, which I somehow knocked from 123k down to 111k, but I genuinely don't know how), but I don't want to. Once I get to the halfway mark in about 2.5 chapters, I'm gonna go ahead and rewrite the tentative query letter for this thing--I've learned my lesson from Reverberate: it's much easier to do the query letter before the final draft, so that'll be a nice pause to get my thoughts in order.

How's everything with you? Haven't been around much lately (which is a shame, because I do miss popping in and seeing where everyone else is at with their projects and OCs. Gotta get back on that...)

#princeforhire #pfh edits #blorbo blursday #pfh d4

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crazy56u · 2 years

Text

Tonight should be fun; not only can I actually see the episode live for the first time in weeks, but it’s a time loop episode, so my friend already hates it on principle!

Welcome to the Hellivator: 1962 Edition.

"Yeah, everything looks good, no explosions today."

Gotta give Ben props, though, he knew on sight he had to salute.

Why are you berating the janitor, Robert Picardo?

"You are now in our state of the art control room, if you needed proof this is 1962."

"Today isn't about me, Melanie." Robert Picardo set up the bomb, calling it.

Buttons and do-dads caused Chernobyl, Picardo.

Being in 1962 at ground zero of Not Chernobyl = Quantum Leap

JFK had a busy life in Quantum Leap. He gave his moon speech the day the experimental reactor exploded, he ended the Cuban Missile Crisis the same day a kid almost shot his neighbor during a blackout, and Sam almost shot him in Dallas.

"Gotta split", the rough draft for Jimmy Neutron's existence.

Robert Picardo has shitty luck: He dies the same day the reactor explodes.

Flying cars by 2000, good fucking luck.

I love how slowly they're realizing all those deaths were a cover-up.

Time to nuke this shit.

"Why is the coolant draining?" Why did the government cover up all your deaths? Think.

And show's over, roll credits!

"Why is Ben flatlining?" Why did the reactor explode? Think.

Addison, calm down, the episode just started, Ben ain't dead yet.

Take 2! Ben, you're the Glasses Man now.

"Eugene, you feeling okay?" "I just got exploded?!" "... ... ...kay."

"What kind of 'Groundhog Day' is this?" The kind involving nukes, keep up.

"Obviously, we are dealing with a time loop. Ben just said that."

I love how Ian immediately realizes what's going on after one recursion.

Welcome to the reactor, it's still blue.

"When this nuclear reactor reaches activation, you're gonna see some serious shit!"

"We think you're in a time loop." "That's impossible. I mean, I know I just said I'm in one, but, you know, fuck you!"

Magic just flat out summarizing the plot of the episode in case you didn't get it from the promo.

So, of course Janis is still being held prisoner.

Look, Janis, two birds, one stone: You fix the time loop, you tell Ben to trust no one. Everyone wins!

"Okay, how do I save everyone's lives this time as Eugene... Run in screaming like I detected a fire at a movie theater, got it!"

"Look, if I don't have a pen, we all die!"

"Look, I know Kennedy does a speech, do not fuck with me, we don't have the time!"

Ben, you are acting super fucking suspicious.

"I pulled everything I could on time loops. You ever hear of 'Source Code'?"

I am just waiting for the episode where Ben does a leap, and afterwards, time has been altered, and Janis has just been part of the Project from the start, and no one else notices.

"Hey, Ben, I found the bomb!"

"Okay, Ben, disarm the bomb!" "I STILL DON'T KNOW HOW TO DO THAT!"

"That's it?!" Ben, there's 44 minutes left.

There's death #2!

Take 3! Melanie, get banished into the Mirror Dimension!

Addison is about to murder Janis in cold blood.

Translation: This situation is so rare, they couldn't do it in OG Quantum Leap.

"Where was Ziggy two explosions ago?" "Jen, shut the fuck up about Ziggy, she's still trying to remember how to talk."

Ben, don't talk to ghosts in the elevator.

I still think Robert Picardo planted the bomb. I mean, one in five chance, I got good odds.

"Our facility is the safest! It won't ever explode more than five times!"

"You're not passionate about clean energy?" "It's 1962, what the fuck do you think?"

Eugene looks and sounds like he killed someone in Reno just to see them die.

Okay, so, theory: What if the person who planted the bomb wasn't on the elevator? There was a secret sixth person who got off after everyone else got on?

Okay, if this place is a front and Robert Picardo is a transparent holographic piece of shit, then yep, he did it. Watch me be wrong!

"There you are! How'd Ben explode the third time?"

"I'm glad Ben didn't die... but why does it feel like he did?" ...you answered your own question.

It would be awesome if somehow, during this heart-to-heart, Ben died five more times.

Ernie Hudson really wants Scott Bakula to come back to the show, and you can take that to the bank.

Take 4! Robert Picardo's taking a piss break, Ben, get in there!

"Look, I know you hate me, we need to speed through this, there's a 60% chance I didn't actually plant the bomb, we got NO TIME!"

Controversial Opinion: Coffee is poison no matter what you do to it.

"Look, I should be the one playing Addison! ME!"

Watch as Janis just fucks them over anyway.

"Ziggy doesn't think Ben can leap into the same person twice." Ziggy forgot Jimmy LaMotta exists.

Ben, why the fuck were you openly talking to her in the middle of the room?

Take 5! Janitor Time!

"Control, the janitor's acting suspicious."

And there goes Robert Picardo's lower back.

"Welcome to Quantum Leap, what you thought was Groundhog's Day was actually Rashomon, get fucked."

I love how Addison is now just openly pointing out the plot holes.

Also, Ben loved "Rashomon" more than Addison. Fact.

"How dare you talk about blowing up a nuclear reactor to a ghost!"

"Look, maybe if we just shut this down, we're fucked, pack it up and go home."

...so, Ben should've just opened that letter on the first go around.

"Kill the project or I will. Hugs and kisses, You Know Who."

"What's going on?" "Saving the fucking day!"

...I'm actually kind of sad Eugene was the bad guy. I was joking with that Reno comment.

"You're smarter than you look. I said it once, I'll say it again."

...so, because they were gonna take the Project away, Robert Picardo decided to sell out. Baby.

"Loo, I hate nuclear weapons, just let me blow us all up!"

...so, Ben accidentally caused the nuke in one go around, hot damn...

"Look, you think blowing up a nuclear reactor will change shit?! I'm from the future, bitch! LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT CHERNOBYL!"

Okay, to be fair, he aimed for the shoulder, that's what we in the business call an insurance policy.

"I will miss this song." Just Spotify it.

...Ben, don't compare yourself to Eugene. He wanted to cause Chernobyl, you want to save Addison's life. Calm down.

And cue Janis causing shit indirectly!

I'm calling it now: This technically proves my theory correct. Ben is gonna leap into Magic, and get Janis onto the Project.

"Look, I just wanna be friends, so here's a plot point- (EPISODE ENDS)"

[Next Week: Ben leaps into 2012, and has to do a Very Special Episode.]

Seriously, I think they just set up the plot of the season finale with Magic's talk with Jen...

[Also, this post is late because my internet conked out without me knowing.]

#leap die repeat #spoilers #quantum leap #source code #groundhog day #back to the future #robert picardo #rashomon

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storymaker14 · 1 year

Text

THOUGHTS WHILE REVIEWING MY FIRST DRAFT [FREQUENT UPDATES]

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Don't make my mistake, y'all.

If you're going to print off a first draft that you intend to write a bunch of notes on... Don't single space to save paper and printing costs. 😬

***

I was looking forward to a certain line. It was probably my favorite couple of sentences I've ever written.

Still love it.

***

I dig the irony that, despite this being the longest spicy thing I've written, it's also the least spicy thing I've written by percentage (except my SFW stuff). A little bit of spice coming up, the spicy mistake later on, and then The Big Spicy Scene. Should make sure the last one's worth the wait 😁

***

Uck, this part. I expect this to be in serious need of rewriting, but we shall see.

***

Hmm. Not a lot of notes. Sign it's good, or sign it's not engaging?

***

I do feel like I want to rewrite a lot of it. It's sometimes a little obvious it was written in dribs and drabs, which isn't a bad thing, but now that I know the flow of the story, I can make it flow better.

The choice at the end of Act 1 was absolutely correct, though, both for character reasons and story reasons. So that stays, even after rewrite.

***

Now the part that I had nineteen kinds of trouble writing, saved for last, yadda. Let's see how I did.

***

It works. Whew. Still in the "I am going to rewrite all of this" mode, but the scene gets done what it needs to. And I love the next bit.

***

Yup, love that bit. Unfortunately I've just realized the sequence of events doesn't quite make sense behind the scenes, so I might have to putz with it. But that scene stays, I don't care what I have to do to keep it.

***

TMW despite being written weeks or months apart, the phrasing used to describe something in two different parts resonates well.

***

Just finished reading a particularly intense part, and realized I kinda got wrapped up in it. Dude, you wrote this. You know how it turns out.

Still, though, feels like a good sign 😁

***

Y'all. Act 2 is good. Like, not perfect, needs work, but it's good.

Onto Act 3; let's see how that went.

***

Fuck. Just realized the timeline really doesn't work. It should be an easy fix -- in fact, might even make one conversation work even better -- but I'm a math nerd ffs. I should have realized.

***

I was actually starting to worry about how few notes I had. Am I just gliding over it because I know it so well? But then I did manage to notice something that might need to be made more clear, or at least questioned, so I feel better.

***

Aaaaand the thing I noticed was already touched on. Should make it a tad more clear, maybe, but... it's there.

***

Okay, I've finished it. It needs adjustments, it needs work, large amounts of it need rewrites.

But it's good. Like, I like it.

What a relief that I haven't spent that much time writing and worrying about something I don't like.

I'll probably do another pass, say, tomorrow, see if anything else stands out. Especially in those bits where I didn't have a lot of notes. But... I feel much better.

Wish me luck.

#the writing life #writing #writerslife #ntmt

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delphi-shield · 10 months

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push and pull // leon s. kennedy & jill valentine

Leon x Reader x Jill Smut wc: 2,860 mdni - 18+ read on ao3

the plumber at my house reading this over my shoulder: 😲 this has been in my drafts for like two months, i finally ripped the bandaid off and touched it up. i cant believe people want the jill/leon ship name to be jilleon when 'breakfast sandwich' is right there. ohh nooo i had to cut the scene where they high-five after you cum...... guess i'll have to write more jill and leon......what a tragedy.....

summary: Jill said she'd be home two hours ago. She's stood you up for dinner again. You're so upset, Leon's got to fuck you about it to make you feel better.

content: fem!reader, all porn no plot, piv (reader receiving), some praise from leon & some degradation from jill, spit, crying, hair-pulling, masturbation, blowjob, dom!jill, use of strap-on, established poly relationship, sorry yeah there's more religious imagery, stealing the jill & leon dynamic from this post, fucking your relationship problems away does not work and you should not attempt. very loosely proofread.

Jill's late.

She promised. You cooked, you cleaned, and she promised she would be here. Bought a special candle and everything, three wick, fresh linen scent. Not your kind of thing, but you know she likes those clean, bright smells.

The first half hour, you’d clung to the idea that her physical therapy appointment was just running late. Forty-five minutes in, three unanswered texts, your hope diminishes. An hour, and Leon’s helping you put the food up and clean the dishes.

Leon’s not exactly happy with Jill. This isn’t the first time she’s done this to you. He hates to see you pout. Even more than that, he hates to see the way you’re trying not to cry in front of him. He does everything he can think of to make you feel better. Watch one of your godawful shows with you, play with your hair for you, give you a nice bath if you wanted - none of his offers made much of a difference. He knows better than to take it personally. He’s not Jill. He can’t fix what she broke.

He can fuck you about it, though. That always seems to take your mind off things, at least for a little while.

He let you use him however you like, dealer’s choice. You wanted him in the dining room chair, wanted to ride him slow, grind down on that fat cock till you unwound and your pretty tears weren’t because your girlfriend stood you up, and that’s what you’d get. Not his first choice, but he’s not the one who looks so pretty with those big, wet eyes.

The only downside is that you can't hear Jill's key turning in the door when Leon's got his cock stuffed so deep in your pussy you can feel him in your ribs, when you’re too busy rocking yourself to a gradual, slow-built end. You'd missed your ringtone too - and Leon's for that matter. You weren't intentionally being petty, but intentions never did soothe Jill's moods.

"Nice," she drawls, dropping her bag with a thud. "Real nice."

Your head falls back just enough to get a look at her, pouting in the doorway. Maybe it's supposed to be intimidating. Really, she just looks like a dejected cat, all puffed up for attention. The hand splayed on Leon’s chest flops back uselessly, reaching for her.

“Jill -”

Leon’s hips jut up, reminding you he's here, reminding you who's inside you. Whatever you were going to say melts away into a whine so pathetic even you want to roll your eyes.

"Got started without you," Leon says, callous on your behalf. His hand cups the back of your neck, pulling you back to him. It doesn’t take much prompting for you to curl back into his chest, walls fluttering around his cock, gripping him like your life depends on it. "Saved you some dinner. It’s in the fridge."

How can he be so casual? Feels like you’ve got lava running through your blood. His hands settle on your hips again, push-pulling you back and forth to get you to grind again. You oblige, faster than before, mouthing open kisses against his neck. They ought to canonize him for his patience, crown him Patron Saint of Not Plowing You Into The Carpet.

Jill doesn't say a word. She marches off to the bedroom, leaving her boots behind as she goes. Her cardigan gets flung over the couch - poor thing. It didn't do anything wrong.

She’ll come out when she’s ready, you tell yourself. Ignoring the ingrained need to manage Jill’s emotions for her is hard, but not quite as hard as Leon’s dick. Makes it a little easier to forget. You press your moans into Leon’s skin, let him have them for safekeeping.

Her footsteps pound back into the room. You don't know what she's done that's so funny, but Leon shakes with a laugh. You move to look, and his palm pressing against your cheek stops you. Something clatters onto the dining room table, a heavy thunk and buckles. He presses a light kiss to the crown of your head, strokes your hair.

"Go ahead and finish up, baby. Doin' so good. All yours."

It's all the permission you really need. It doesn’t take long - you’re good for him, after all. So good, you don't even need his help. You just need him to hold you up when that slow heat finally expands, spreads like fire through your limbs and leaves you making a mess of his lap, baptizing his cock with your release and moaning hymns for him.

You slump against him, eyes heavy and limbs loose. Your head nestles against his chest, his heart hammering like crazy. Poor guy. So patient. So sweet. You want to offer to take care of that for him - he's still inside you, sitting so still and so good, the stretch all you need. It feels like a bomb went off in your skull, though, scattered all your thoughts around the apartment. You need a moment before you can be considerate, before you can formulate any kind of offer. You reach up, pat his cheek gently to tell him how good he made you feel, lazily kiss at the hollow of his throat.

Jill's got plenty of words, though. She's not the one who just fell apart.

"You so needy you can't wait forty-five minutes?"

"Closer to an hour," Leon counters, and for the first time you hear the strain in his voice. "More like two, actually."

Jill’s irritation boils over. "Shut up. Why don't you go jerk off in the corner?"

After all, he's supposed to be on her side. He's the one who knows what this life is like, the one who knows what their work entails and the stress of it all.

He's also the one who texts when he's running late. He's the one still on active deployment, the one who hadn't been dodging home like the plague. He got over himself a year ago, figured ways to deal with his emotions that didn’t include running as fast as he could, drinking until they drowned, or working himself to the bone.

Jill’s still working on that part. Again - saint-like patience.

“Maybe I will,” he says, casual as he can. He jostles you in his arms. He’d say it’s to keep you awake, but it’s mostly to keep his dick hard. You pulse around him, groan into his t-shirt and drool a little dark patch onto his shirt.

You’re all soft and pliable when her hands slide up your sides, fingers curling in the spaces between your ribs. You lean back to her, longing for the softness of her tits under your head, and you glide back through the air unsupported, like you’ve faded through the ghost of her. Your head lolls back, pretty, pathetic pout on your swollen lips.

“Gonna be good?” She asks, staring down her nose at you, eyes half lidded. You nod your head. Her eyes narrow. “Words.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Shifting you off of Leon's lap is a group effort, one that Leon doesn't particularly care to be too enthusiastic about. His poor dick is lonely, and fucking his fist is a poor substitute for the sticky warmth of your cunt. Jill cradles you in here arms - the first hint of tenderness you've had from her all night - and settles you on the floor in front of the couch. She kicks your legs into position, sways back to appraise your form, and gives you a long-suffering sigh that's a far cry from approval.

"Whatever," she mutters under her breath. "It'll do. Don't move."

She shuffles off to the side. You hear the rustle of fabric. You turn your head to look, and -

"I said don't fuckin' move."

Your head snaps to the front again, hands fisted against the tops of your thighs. No arguing with that tone. Your back is ramrod straight. There's movement to your right, and Leon finally comes into view, settling against the far side of the couch. He's at least kind enough to give you a show, stroking his cock for you in long, slow strokes, massaging his palm over that shiny red tip and sliding his own fluid down to squeeze at the base. Makes your mouth water just looking at him.

Not that you have to wait long for a treat. Jill finishes her prep work, drags herself back over to the couch and drops down in front of you, strap-on making you go crosseyed.

“Go on,” she sighs, waving her hand lazily. Like she’s doing you a favor.

And she is. It’s a privilege to suck her strap.

You rock onto your knees and take too much of her at once, gag yourself right off the bat in your eagerness. They both groan, Jill in exasperation, Leon because holy fuck, if he hears you make that noise again he's going to blow his load immediately. His hand shucks his t-shirt up. He's not trying to stain this shirt with cum. Not his cum, anyway.

"Your mouth is so perfect for this," Jill says, leaning forward and fisting a hand in your hair, "and you're still so bad at it. Do I have to show you how to do everything?"

You nod uselessly, tears pricking the corners of your eyes. Jill rolls her eyes, smothers the hint of a smile that threatens to twist her lips up. She guides your head back to the head of her silicone cock and sets an easy pace for you. Lets you take it nice and slow, get accustomed to the weight of her cock on your tongue as if you haven't done this a hundred times - as if she knows you went too hard right off the bat just to get her to guide you like this.

"There you go," she drones, the praise feeling like anything but. You bob your head freely, her hand in your hair just a suggestion now. "Finally figured it out. Not as dumb you look."

You push further, tucking your thumb tight in your fist and gagging only a little when the head of her cock prods at the back of your throat. Leon's hips buck into his fist, quick and rhythmless, swearing under his breath. His leg kicks out, nudges Jill's calf and you swear she's going to snap at him.

Your eyes cut from Jill to Leon, a tear rolling down your cheek, and that’s the final push that has him cumming all over his stomach, head tipped back into the arm of the couch, pretty moans so loud, so perfect that it makes you feel your heartbeat in your pussy.

You don’t have time to savor the way that he looks, paint him in your mind and hang it up on the walls around your skull like a pin-up. Jill lifts you off her cock, stuffing her hands under your armpits like you’re a stray kitten. You would be, for her, if she asked. Let her slip a pretty collar around your neck, hope you’re lucky enough that it’s got a bell.

She doesn’t wait for Leon to recover, just manhandles the pair of you so your back is pressed to his chest, his cum smearing against your skin. Leon’s got that loose limbed laziness that comes with a release that built-up.

“Hold her,” Jill growls. “Stop fucking around.”

Leon's hands curled around the back of your thighs, spreading you wide for Jill. A warm chuckle rumbles through his chest and pours into you. His head ducks down, mouth by your ear.

“She's mad ‘cause I had you first.”

You turn your head, stifle your giggles in his shoulder. The silicone head of Jill's cock slides through your sopping folds, nudging at your clit. Her hips rock agonizingly slow. It’s tough to tell whether she’s teasing you or herself at this point, but your sensitive body twitches and jerks with every pass of her spit-slick cock.

“Gonna make a mess?” Her hand grips your jaw tight, pulling your face from Leon's shoulder. It’s less a question and more a demand. You nod as best you can in her grip, remember too late to try and bumble out words. She taps your cheek twice, hard enough to sting, hard enough to make those pretty eyes water again.

Jill doesn’t wait for you to say it. She enters you in a quick, jerky thrust, no hint of warning, your breath stuttering and back tensing. She rabbits her dick into you, your moans falling as staccato as her pace. Her head bows to spit a fat glob of spit onto your clit. Her fingers rub you frantically, a pace so at odds with the slow push and grind of her hips that it makes you burn. You try to squirm back, the way your blood starts to singe a little too quick for your liking, but there's nowhere to go when you're pressed so tight against Leon's broad chest.

His hand slithers up and over the point of your hip, pressing down firmly just below your navel. Betrayal. You thought he was on your side. Your whining sharpens into a moan that has to have rattled the windows. Jill huffs a laugh, low and cruel. She pulls back just far enough to leave you wanting - and when you claw at her shoulders to drag her back home she's already moving, hard and slow, the light dancing in front of your eyes, her hips driving the breath out of your lungs, your chest caving in. It feels like you've imploded, blood on fire, singeing your bones and leaving the ash to remember it by.

She’s not done. You promised her a mess. Your voice is splintered, her hips still driving into you. You don’t feel yourself gushing around her until it’s already happening. You sniffle, your moans choppy and your tears falling quick, humiliation warming the embers in your stomach. Her pace slows and finally stills, finally lets you find yourself in the pile of ashes.

"Already?" Jill mocks, hands rubbing your quivering thighs soft and sweet despite the way she sneers.

You want to scoff, but you haven’t got the breath. Already, she says, like she hadn’t just ripped that orgasm out of you fast enough that you’ve got cartoon tweety-birds spinning around your head.

“My turn,” Leon pipes up.

“Fuck off. You’re not even hard. I'm just getting started.”

“Shoulda thought about that before you made her cum.”

God, they’re like lions fighting over a piece of meat. You push yourself up on shaky arms, give Jill your best gazelle-trying-not-to-get-eaten pout.

“M’tired,” you slur, your brains thoroughly fucked out. You form a T with your hands, calling for a time-out. “Need a break.”

Jill looks like she wants to bite anyway. But you were good, used your good girl hand signal and everything. She sighs, her shoulders slumping, and loosens the straps around her hips.

“C’mere, pumpkin.” Leon gathers you into his arms easily. “Gonna get you all cleaned up. Tuck your ass in.”

You ache when he moves you, in places you weren’t quite sure could ache. It’ll be worse later. Always is. They always have to fuck you at some weird angle. Can’t ever let your muscles get used to it, like you’re some kind of glorified exercise equipment. At least they wipe you down after they use you. Very polite of them.

Leon hands you your water bottle and settles in behind you, slotting up against your back. He’s got the both of you cleaned off even though he seems just as tired as you, bless him. Say a prayer to the patron saint of the bedroom.

Jill found dinner, apparently. You hear the microwave beeping distantly and share an amused look with Leon. Sure enough, she’s got a bowl of food in her hand when she settles at the end of the bed, legs crossed.

The silence lays somewhere in-between battlefields, landmines hidden all around your bedroom. Everything you want to ask is too loaded, too heavy. You’re not even sure you have the energy to stay up for a serious conversation, much less an argument. Jill looks so soft right now, the bags under her eyes seeming lighter in the warm lamplight of your bedroom. You don’t want to see her eyes sharpen. You don’t want to hear her teeth click together when she bites back her words. You search for some other topic, something that will make the tension evident in her shoulders melt away.

"We should do one of those clone-a-willy kits," you murmur, eyes shut, head tipped into the pillow. You open your eyes just enough to gauge her reaction. Warmth blooms in your chest when you see her eyes crinkle and her smile lines deepen.

"Why?" Jill laughs.

"You don't wanna fuck me with Leon’s dick?"

It’s the first time you’ve heard Jill laugh like that in a while. Pride spreads in your tired little grin. Leon's cock gives a tired twitch against your thigh. He groans, pressing his forehead to your shoulder blade.

“You two are gonna fuckin’ kill me.”

#leon kennedy x reader #jill valentine x reader #resident evil smut #resident evil imagine #leon kennedy smut #jill valentine smut #resident evil x reader #x reader #resident evil #jill valentine #leon kennedy

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