#so y'know. yeah. fuck it. maybe this whole thing will be for nothing and i'll be back in just a few days

[fstbmp-a]

This is probably the 20th time I've written this out (one for every day really) but. I know I said that by the end of the month I'd probably remake the blog, however

I think I'm putting the blog on an indefinite hiatus.

I know, that's the sentence that's said right before a blog ceases to exist forever, but something here just isn't clicking anymore. I'm not enjoying my time, despite my absolute best efforts. That something that made me enjoy my time here is gone and I can't replicate it just by brute forcing it anymore.

Maybe someday I'll be back, I do love this place, my characters, y'all's characters, etc. Though, for now, I think I need to stop lying to myself that I can just keep doing new things to suddenly bring back my interest for this place. It's not going to happen.

Thank y'all for all the fun we've had and, hey, maybe I'll be back sooner rather than later, maybe in a month, a week, etc. I could back down from this before the end of the week even. I just needed to put it out there that I think I'm burnt out here.

[genericpuff]

Was the Hera×Echo thing for real?! Was it like planned??? It doesn't feel like it was planned! It feels like Rachel just wanted to queerbait to gather more new readers wtf

yeah it's exactly that tbh

FASTPASS SPOILERS AHEAD !!!

like what more realistically happened is she saw people headcanon'ing Echo and Hera and went "yeah sure I'll do that!" without actually writing the fucking relationship.

This was even a problem back in S2 with Echo's character as a whole, she's introduced as this mysterious 'double agent' character who's almost definitely working for Zeus-

-but then aside from two scenes involving Echo accompanying Hera to the motel to retrieve Persephone's things and Echo warning Daphne that Apollo clearly isn't 'over Persephone' (because he had, y'know, barged into Hera's office demanding Hera's blessing) the whole "Echo is a double agent for Zeus" thing was only confirmed after Daphne was turned into a tree and Echo said "FUCK YOU ZEUS, I'M NOT GONNA DO YOUR DIRTY WORK ANYMORE!" which ... huh? Where's the plot? It feels like there was an entire story there that just got dumped entirely so that Hades and Persephone could play golf with diamonds.

Like this was presumably where Echo ditched her obligation to Zeus, but it had nothing to do with Hera, it was because she heard (I'm assuming from Thanatos) what happened to Daphne.

After that we only ever see Echo again when it's implied that her and Hera had some kind of falling out. No idea what over, maybe it was Hera finding out that Echo was a double agent, maybe Hera called her a slur, we have no clue what. But it's sorta just tacked on during an ongoing monologue about how Kronos has affected her.

The only other 'hint' we got towards it was Ares calling Echo Hera's 'girlfriend' but that doesn't mean a whole lot when we've literally never seen these two have more than two scenes together.

So now Rachel making them kiss feels more like her taking credit for writing a plotline that doesn't exist and was fabricated entirely in the audience's headcanon. And this is something Rachel does a lot, she basically relies entirely on her audience filling in the blanks for her nothingburger plot and then of course gets to take all the credit for being a "smart and inclusive writer". Where? Literally where the fuck is the actual writing?

Imagine if we had gotten a proper B-plot showcasing the relationship between Echo and Hera. Echo is working for Hera as a double agent and doesn't want to blow her cover, while Hera is suspicious because she worries her husband is up to something. Over time they work together, grow closer, Hera realizes that Echo makes her feel a kind of happiness that Zeus hasn't made her feel in a long time, Echo realizes that she can't keep lying to Hera about why she was hired and decides she values Hera's loyalty and respect over Zeus' because she has feelings for Hera now. Maybe Hera finds out about Echo being a double agent, either by overhearing a conversation between Echo and Zeus or because Echo outright tells her, and eventually it resolves with them finally admitting their feelings towards one another and Hera realizing that she's felt trapped in a loveless marriage that's essentially serving the same purpose as her union with Kronos, sacrificing her well-being for the good of a King. They kiss and Hera confronts the original perpetrator of her trauma, Kronos, ready to end the cycle of her abuse once and for all.

Like, the plot is right fucking there but Rachel keeps dumping it in favor of focusing on the boring ass heterocis nightmares that are Hades and Persephone, who get SO MUCH FUCKING SCREENTIME of just telling each other how amazing they are and how much they're in love (meanwhile we didn't even actually get to see or hear what Hera wrote in the letter to Echo, we have to just assume) but still tries to take credit for writing queer stories by just vaguely hinting at a queer relationship that has had zero development or actual screentime. It's Hestia and Athena all fucking over again.

It also doesn't bode well for LO passing the whole "bury your gays" test because Hera is literally marching to what she's expecting to be her death. So she's established as a bisexual character, just for her to be sent to her death, while Echo will undoubtedly get shoved out of the plot again.

And, I shouldn't even have to remind y'all of this, but Hera has been racist to nymphs in the past and Echo was her direct subordinate, her personal assistant.

It just makes zero sense to me why Rachel would suddenly force in a queer relationship between two characters who weren't traditionally gay in the original myths (once again removing the queer aspects of CANONICALLY LGBTQ+ GODS AND GIVING THEM TO THE STRAIGHTS INSTEAD) when Hera's story had more than enough to work with through her trauma from both Kronos and Zeus and her loyalty as the goddess of marriage that's kept her trapped in a loveless and abusive relationship. So now instead of having a subplot that could have been about the goddess of marriage realizing that no one should have to stay in a marriage that's robbing them of joy and the "sanctity of marriage" isn't worth being miserable for life, we have a subplot where the goddess of marriage who is racist to nymphs routinely cheats on her husband and now confesses her love to a nymph who we never even saw her interact with outside of two instances where it was simply a working relationship.

[charmikarma]

Breath as Influence and John in the Epilogues

Breath is probably one of the better understood aspects. “What is it?” someone asks – and the whole fandom is like, “Oh, Breath is about freedom and wind and detachment.” Which I don't disagree with. But I think most people miss a key piece of it – Breath as influence.

I'm no seasoned classpector, but I am a Mage of Breath, so I feel like I have a deep and personal understanding of Breath, particularly because of how it has manifested in my life. Yeah, I know, claiming I'm an authority on the subject because of my self-imposed alignment within a fake typology system makes me sound like an asshole. But I'll have to ask you to trust me, because if I start talking about my own experiences, I'll sound like even more of an asshole.

Anyway, let's kick this off with the official description of Breath, per the Extended Zodiac:

In summary: the Breath-bound are flexible, driven, detached, and maybe a little self-centered. Also, other people tend to get caught up in their personal development, which tends to make them good leaders. But the most important thing here for the point I'm making is this:

others ... feel inspired by them.

This word, inspired, has been rolling around in my brain for the past few weeks, because of its connection to Breath. Hey, did you know that “inspire” comes from Latin spirare, meaning "breathe"? And if we include the Latin prefix in-, it becomes "breathe into."

The Breath-bound have an ability to breathe into, or inspire others. They're not aware of it – after all, they are just living their lives for themselves. But wherever they go, they are inspiring people. Or, more accurately, they are influencing people. Actually, the influence of Breath goes beyond just people. I could even get meta with it (and I will. I apologize in advance). But let's start small for now.

Tavros Nitram

So, Tavros. Page of Breath. Pretty much all of Tavros's contributions to Homestuck as a story happen as a result of someone doing something to him. Vriska paralyzes him, which kickstarts the whole FLARP cycle of revenge arc. And again when the truce is broken in Act 5 Act 2, it is because Vriska kills Tavros. If this doesn't sound like influence to you, you're right. Tavros has very little influence. He's a Page, after all, and if there's one thing I know about Pages, it's that they're weak as shit until they reach their "true potential," which is pretty much always something stupidly overpowered. Y'know, like Jake overpowering Jade's first guardian powers. That was pretty batshit, I'd say.

But Tavros's contributions don't end there. He actually does reach his true Page-y potential right at the very end of Homestuck, when he gathers an army of ghosts – honestly, probably every single ghost in the furthest ring – by just talking to them. Was this something of a punchline to a very long joke? Probably. But it is also a pretty good example of the kinds of things Breath players typically do.

On a meta level, though, this argument kind of falls apart, because... As far as I can tell, the army of ghosts doesn't really do anything. Nothing important, anyway. Lord English's defeat is pretty much entirely at the hands of John, Dave, Davepetasprite^2, and alt!Calliope in the body of Jade, as described in the Epilogues. The ghost army just isn't relevant, in the end.

But you know what is relevant? Vriska.

Half the people reading this just groaned, I can feel it. Why are we talking about Vriska, a Light player, on a post about Breath?? I hear your question and I raise you this: Why the fuck is Vriska so obsessed with Breath players???? Personally, I think it's because she has an innate sense for their passive ability to decide what's relevant.

But before we get into Vriska, let's talk about John.

John Egbert

John, Heir of Breath. The protagonist of the story. In the context of my thesis of "Breath as influence," isn't it interesting that the protagonist is a hero of Breath? And even beyond that, he's an Heir, a class typically interpreted as "becoming" their Aspect, or "inheriting" it. If you find my argument compelling, you could even say John is the influence that drives the story. Which is exactly what a protagonist does - after all, what is a story without a protagonist?

This question is actually addressed in Homestuck, kind of. At some point in Act 4, Terezi manipulates John into visiting his denizen early, which gets him killed. The story is left without its protagonist, and progress grinds to a screeching halt. Jade doesn't enter the Medium and presumably dies. The reckoning never happens. Dave and Rose are trapped in a doomed timeline. They lose contact with the trolls. For what is a world without the breeze, without air, but a place of complete standstill? The story needs John to continue. Okay, it needs Rose and Dave and Jade just as much. But it's interesting that the story makes a point of John's death being the turning point that makes this particular timeline doomed.

Okay, sorry for the wait. It’s Vriska time. Vriska's driving motivation is to be relevant. She does everything in her power to steal the spotlight, which may or may not be related to the fact that she's a Thief of Light. Again, I'm not an experienced classpecter. I only really have a surface level understanding of Light. But I'm getting off topic here.

In Act 5 Act 2, Vriska starts talking to John. Why? Well, partially because she wants to compete with Terezi, who is talking to Dave. But there's also the fact that she wants to be the force responsible for Bec Noir. And also for John reaching god tier. And everything relevant really??? She's really fucking good at being relevant, I'll give her that. Or at least presenting the illusion of relevance, but that's a big topic that I think I should save for another day. Another essay, maybe. The point here is, John has a tremendous amount of influence over Things That Happen just by existing, and Vriska knows it. Maybe she torments Tavros because she senses the same sort of potential in him, but that's probably a stretch.

In any case, this is baby shit. There's better evidence than this. Let’s talk retcon powers.

You could argue that the retcon powers are separate from John's abilities related to his classpect, and on some level you'd be right. But in a game that "knows" everything that is going to happen, I have to question if extraneous powers like this are taken into consideration when Sburb "decides" what classpect it gives a player. I feel similarly about Jade's First Guardian powers. Teleportation is a pretty space-y power, in my opinion. And definitely one that... "breaks rules," I guess. Among all the other things First Guardians get to do. Once again, I'm no classpector. But Jade getting access to First Guardian powers upon reaching God Tier strikes me as very Witch of Space-y. I feel similarly about John's retcon powers - they strike me as very Heir of Breath-y.

And not just because I view Breath as influence, though that is definitely the most obvious way the retcon powers could be interpreted as Breath-y. Even on a surface level, they're pretty Breath-y. When John first talks to Roxy, he gives a whole spiel about everything he's been to up until this point, most of which is obscured by "blah blah blah." But little phrases come through occasionally, and when he starts talking about his brand new retcon powers, he uses the phrase "UNSTUCK FROM CANON." Which sounds a lot to me like "freedom from the narrative." But maybe more telling is the fact that John's quest as an Heir of Breath requires that he use his retcon powers. Getting rid of the oil, freeing the fireflies - his quest as established at the very beginning was always intended (in universe at least; I can't speak for Hussie's intentions) to be solved by his retcon powers.

So retcon powers are at the very least Breath-adjacent. What’s that got to do with Breath as influence? I’m sure you see where I’m going with this. Retcon powers are basically the ability to do whatever the fuck you want to any point of any timeline. I’d call this influence but I’d sound silly, actually. It goes way beyond influence. It’s way less subtle. I guess you could call direct intervention like this influence at its most powerful. Well, almost. There’s one step above this that John never really taps into. Which brings us to...

The Epilogues

For better or for worse, I fucking love the Epilogues. I think Candy, on its own, is a fantastic and surreal deep dive into a mind high on depression. And as for Meat, I’m an absolute sucker for metafiction and narrative fuckery. I eat that shit right up. My favorite anime is Princess Tutu, etc., etc. This is your warning: Yes, this section will contain evidence toward my claim that Breath is influence. It also doubles as an Epilogues analysis. It kind of turns into one at the end. Sorry, but I needed to get it out of my system.

So, in case you missed it, the step above retcon powers that John never taps into is direct narrative control, like we see Dirk engaging in throughout the Meat side of the Epilogues. The fact that Dirk is revealed to be the narrator of Meat begs the question: who is narrating Candy? It’s never outright stated, but it’s probably alt!Calliope. Unlike Dirk, alt!Calliope doesn’t have an agenda, as far as we’re aware. So why is Candy so fucked up and weird? Why is everyone out of character? I know this comes as a shock, but: it’s probably John’s passive influence over the narrative.

Before the Epilogues even begin, John’s been wasting away in his house all day, every day. He’s depressed as hell. Sort of dissatisfied with how artificial and "perfect" Earth C is. Some have suggested he also feels disconnected from the post-retcon versions of his friends, and I think this holds some merit. It would explain why he feels disconnected from reality in Candy.

(Candy, 11)

Depression colors your view of reality. It darkens some parts, brightens others. People who look happy will appear so to an unsettling degree. Fucked up things will appear even more fucked up. Depression ups the contrast, if you will. And that’s pretty much what happens in Candy. Jane’s pretty bad in Meat, but she’s like a billion times worse in Candy. Jade causes some awkward moments in Meat, but she is pretty much a sex pest in Candy. The positive parallels are a bit harder to find, since Meat pretty much sucks too, but you could speculate that John perceives Rosemary to be happier together than they actually are, so they’re, like, uber happy together in Candy and raising a daughter and shit. It is John’s warped perception of reality that in turn warps it beyond recognition.

This isn’t just me theorizing, by the way. There’s pretty compelling evidence to suggest that this idea is accurate to what is happening. It’s pretty clear in a conversation between (Vriska), who has just arrived on Earth C via the black hole in the furthest ring and her descendant/clone Vriska (aka Vrissy in HS:BC). The two of them stare up at the sky, pointing out clouds and what they are shaped like, when (Vriska) has a realization.

(Candy, 37)

John’s influence over the reality is so absolute, even the clouds bend to his will. I think Vriska only notices it because she’s a new arrival to Johntown. It isn’t long before she’s absorbed into the John-ness of the timeline. And then, she goes on to say exactly what I’ve been saying this whole time. Remember earlier, when I said Vriska knew that John had an incredible amount of influence over Things That Happen?

(Candy, 37)

Yeah. That wasn’t speculation.

The last thing she says, though, that he’d be relevant even if he was dead, is actually a reference to Meat. So let’s talk about it!

As we know, Meat is narrated by Dirk. Dirk’s narrative style is a lot of fun for me, personally. He’s sassy, kind of an asshole, and has no time for bullshit. The second John puts that meat in his mouth, he gets to work, pulling the strings of his little puppet show.

(Meat, 1)

He wastes no time putting words in John’s mouth, writing him out of the story of Earth C as quickly as possible. It’s almost with a sense of urgency that he pushes John to complete his mission. Which is probably necessary, seeing as the sanctity of canon relies on him going back to tie up the loose end that is Lord English. But I think Dirk has ulterior motives. I don’t think Dirk has the ability to impose his will so overbearingly with John around, because for some reason, John’s power of passive influence prevents him from doing so. Is John more powerful than Dirk, even after his ascension to Ultimate Selfhood? Maybe. I certainly think so.

But John’s pretty gullible. He’s easily influenced. He doesn’t have the same safeguard around his own mind, for some reason. Or maybe he does, and it’s just taken Dirk this long to crack him? This is speculation at this point. Not important.

So Dirk eventually kills John. Why? Well, first of all, it’s harder to control the narrative with him around. Though I speculate that’s not very important to Dirk anymore since he fucks off to who knows where around when John comes back. I think, more likely, Dirk finds John’s influence on the narrative unsavory. I mean, just look at Candy. What an absolute disaster of a timeline. Maybe his awareness is such that he knows that letting John live will result in a similar degradation of his friends’ personalities as he knows them. I can’t really say one way or another. It’d explain why he wants John’s body on the ship with him, though. Y’know, to make sure he never gets revived. And yes, he wants him on that ship. He pretty much tells Terezi outright to captchalogue his body before convincing her to join him.

(Meat, 35)

There’s one problem, though. I don’t think John being dead even erased his influence on the narrative?

(Meat, 36)

Right there at the end:

The gentle breeze is all she can hear. It’s louder than my voice, and in some understated way, makes my case for me more persuasively.

I don’t think there’s any other way to read this than the breeze representing John. This is a literal manifestation of John’s influence. I guess it could be symbolic – like Terezi doing a “what would John do?” kind of thought process. But I dunno, Dirk doesn’t strike me as that kind of narrator. Besides... It’s a little too on the nose. Say what you will about the Epilogues, but I believe a great amount of care went into them. This certainly isn’t a throwaway line.

Conclusion

Okay, sorry. I really went off the deep end into Epilogues Analysis Land there. You may have noticed that I didn’t talk about Homestuck: Beyond Canon. That’s partly because I haven’t gotten there in my reread, but mostly because I’m not yet convinced that it has – or will have – nearly the level of plot consistency of its predecessors. We’ll see, I guess.

In any case... Breath as influence, huh? There’s probably more evidence for this hidden away somewhere. I probably could have talked about Rufioh. I didn’t want to though. I also probably could have pointed out the word inspire from the Extended Zodiac thing and called it a day, but instead I blacked out and wrote this. Weird!

If you read all, uh... *checks word count* 2.7k words of this??? Jesus fuck. If you read all this, thank you for reading. I’m open to feedback! I’d love to discuss some of this more! Especially the Epilogues stuff. I have a million thoughts. Bye!

[crivalsduo]

idk if you enjoy writing about him so it's totally fine if you don't, but how does c!wilbur react to c!dnb in any AU of your choosing? does he have any kind of influence on either c!dream or c!techno?

OH good question. it definitely really depends on the au so i'll touch on what i consider just '''canon''' c!dnb (based on my 'dandelions and roses' fic) and then horrible/happy.

but in all circumstances, he definitely is confused about the pairing and maybe a little jealous? i mean. just think about the vassal scene and you'll get what i mean by that.

with canon c!dnb, i think c!wilbur absolutely tries to influence them both. he probably paints it as some kind of betrayal to c!techno and brings up c!tommy to which techno is like '.....bruh i was there in pogtopia, i've seen you and tommy and also you encouraged me to beat him up and you were gonna kill me sooooooo'.

if wilbur attempts to go to c!phil about it, all phil is going to say is, yeah, he thought it was weird to him at first but techno is happy and people can change and also everyone involved is a grown ass adult, wil, find a damn hobby that doesn't involve scamming people or meddling. he's not getting involved further than this. love you son but no thanks mate.

with dream.... dream has always been thrown off around wilbur. we've seen it a bunch in canon. i don't know how it would go exactly, but i can see wilbur asking prying and leading questions designed to make dream doubt himself and techno. luckily, techno is aware of wilbur's bs and dream trusts techno so it doesn't get much further than that.

as for horrible/happy....

wilbur is one of the people that c!quackity invited to the club. so there's an added layer of. yeah. that.

when they play their game of 'this is daisy and she was mistreated and forced into working at the club/sex trafficked' to get sam and quackity to back down, wilbur doesn't know daisy is dream. he's actually really apologetic and wants to be supportive. he's not a terrible person, y'know? this is a stranger who means nothing to him, really, so he has no ulterior motive to act any other way.

the problem starts when it's revealed that daisy is dream. because now there's a history. and sure, dream is not the same person anymore, not really, but he's still dream and there's plenty of moments when he's dream if you get what i mean.

and that's when some of the comments from wilbur begin. it's up in the air whether they're truly malicious or they're wilbur's way of coping with the whole thing but yeah. he makes ''jokes'' about having slept with dream as if he doesn't know what the context of that was. which as you can imagine is pretty messed up for dream to hear. he's also way more insistent on 'making up' for it which is probably about 90% genuine but again. pretty fucking traumatic for dream who is struggling with the entire server knowing what happened to him.

it's not good and techno definitely has to take him aside and basically be like 'wilbur, phil is my best friend and that's the only reason we're havin' this conversation instead of me poundin' your face in but stop makin' this all about you, man. leave dream alone.'

[pullingyourstrings]

dominant Gareth x reader😍

Like at a drive in theatre and he’s tryna keep you quiet like oof-

Thanks for requesting! I find it pretty hard to write dom!gareth but I hope you like this ❣️

Pairing: Gareth Emerson x gn!reader

Summary: Dom!Gareth has to keep you quiet at a drive in theatre.

Warnings: smut, rubbing, oral (m receiving), no gender specific things are mentioned for reader.

Word count: 678

You and Gareth have been on a few dates and your relationship was still pretty new, but you were already at the point were you had to be creative, so you suggested a drive in movie. Gareth picked the movie, a random horror one everyone was talking about.

"Gare... I'm scared" you complained after a jumpscare.

"Really? The CGI on that monster is terrible" he tried to reason, watching as you bit the inside of your lips nervously. "C'mere. I'll make you feel safe" he opened his arms and you snuggled close to him. You felt the way he's body was pressed against yours, how good he smelled and only a few minutes went by when you decide to turn your attention to his neck, pressing gentle kisses wherever you could reach.

"Watcha doing there?" he asked laughing a little and placing a gentle kiss to the top of your head. You didn't answer, just kept doing it. He held you close by your hips but still watched the movie, way too focused on it for your liking. You wanted him to focus on you. Your hand traveled to his crotch, just resting there on top of his jeans when he sighed.

"Babe... Y'know there's other people here, right?" his warning nothing but a whisper behind you.

"Don't care" you shrugged, palming him and he inhaled a sharp breath, holding your wrist forcefully to move you away.

"Oh you don't? That's interesting" his other hand moved from your hips to your front and the moan you let out the second he touched you could probably be heard outside the drive in, since it was silent so everyone could hear the movie.

"Shh baby, you gotta be quiet. Think you can do that for me?" he slapped a hand over your mouth and you nodded, knowing full well you absolutely couldn't. But you could try, if that meant he would keep touching you. And so he did, so slow you felt tears forming at the corner of your eyes. It wasn't enough.

"Please..." you moaned against his hand and he somehow understood.

"Please what, sweetheart? I'm already touching you" he cooed, placing his hand on your neck instead to hear your pleads.

"Want your cock" you answered simply.

"Yeah? Aw, it's a shame that we can't. They could see us" still, he moved his hand faster and you let out a sob.

"Please, want you so so bad"

"Alright, since you asked so nicely" he let go of you, opening his jeans and your eyes lit up, thinking it would finally happen.

"My way though." he moved the seat back "Sit down here." he pointed to the space in front of him and helped as you kneeled on the car floor. "Open your mouth and keep your head still, okay?"

you nodded and obeyed again. He placed the tip of his cock on your tongue and gently moved forward, making you swallow him whole.

"Maybe that will keep you quiet" he kept going, in and out of your mouth and you moaned around him as you felt it brush against the back of your throat, eyes rolling back.

"How do you manage to still be loud even with your mouth full of me? God, you're that desperate, huh?" you try to nod but there's no need to, your face says it all. "Yeah? Fuck, you're so good to me baby" he grabs a handful of your hair and presses you down, cursing as he came.

You whipped your mouth, sitting on the passenger seat again.

"C'mon, put your seatbealt on, let's go" he fixed himself, turning the car on and already putting it on reverse.

"T-the movie is not over yet...?" you half asked, voice hoarse after being used.

"You think I care about this movie right now? First, it's bad. And second, I wanna go home and fuck you the way you deserve, that's what I wanna do" he smiled at you and you smiled back, clicking your seatbealt and knowing that when he gets excited like this, it's gonna be a long night for you.

[thedancingclowns]

Venting under cut because I feel bad at the moment.

(Understatement of the fucking century right there, bitch.)

I'm tired.

I'm lonely.

I feel like shit.

I want to talk to people.

But at the same time don't want to deal with conversations.

Being in a state of contradictory existence fucking sucks.

My mental health has been absolute bullshit for the past like... almost two full weeks.

(I've had like 7 or so breakdowns/episodes in the course of 8 days, with some days having MULTIPLE. I got VIOLENT in some of them. I BRUISED MYSELF because I started slamming my fist into my forearm because I felt like I was bullshit and deserved to feel pain. It barely fucking hurt, and I was hitting full force... I was LAUGHING, CRYING, SMILING, and SCREAMING all at once as I did that. I was ecstatic, and sad, and happy and enraged all at fucking once on rapid fucking shuffle with no breaks or warnings. In another case I had in depth plans to TRACK DOWN AND HURT people who were annoying me. They've been so much worse than they've ever been and it's just EPISODE after EPISODE and I don't get a fucking break and I'm so fucking tired afterwards. I hate it. I fucking hate it. I feel disgusting. I feel like I'm becoming a monster and I don't know how to stop it. I NORMALLY ONLY HAVE AT MOST 5 OR SO MAJOR EPISODES LIKE THIS A YEAR. AND INSTEAD NOW I'M JUST HAVING THEM OVER AND OVER AND OVER, AND OVER TINY BULLSHIT THAT I SHOULDN'T BE??? Like- YEAH, sometimes I'd get into one WITHOUT provocation, but those are RARER. They shouldn't be happening SEVERAL TIMES A WEEK???)

No one in my irl life seems to give a shit about trying to help me feel better.

(No one is an exaggeration, but VERY, VERY FEW)

Instead they do shit that makes me feel worse.

But I can't fucking say that because they're "good people" most of the fucking time.

They're just not helpful right now.

And it's not like I could be 100% open to them either!

I'd fucking scare them off!

I'd be alone ALL OVER AGAIN for the SAME REASON AS LAST TIME.

THE SIMPLE REASON OF "my mental health got bad again and I SCARE them now"

I CAN'T FUCKING EXPLAIN HOW MANY TIMES I'VE LOST EVERYONE BECAUSE OF THAT!

IT'S BULLSHIT.

But I also don't blame them??? I'd be scared of me too at times.

Jesus christ, I mean I fucking am. I'm always scared that I'm gonna go too far one time.

I can't handle people.

I can't handle friendships.

Maybe at this point I shouldn't have them.

I don't know how to properly reach out to professionals.

I don't want to because I don't want things to be more "wrong" with me than they already fucking are.

I don't want to reach out because then I'll be alone again.

But if I don't reach out I could end up alone again.

No matter what there's no good outcome.

This place is my only escape from it but now it's falling silent too.

I'm being drowned in silence again.

I'm getting to that point again where not even my fixes can give me joy and I don't see the point in TRYING to enjoy anything.

But, y'know. I'm not fucking depressed so I should be fine, right???

That whole "this too shall pass" bullshit???

Fun fact, it NEVER passes for me.

It's just always waiting to COME BACK.

I'm a fucking monster. And they're right.

They're all fucking right.

And I fucking hate it.

Nothing I have been diagnosed with explains this.

People always blame it on my executive dysfunction.

Even I did.

But at this point I'm not fucking sure.

At this point I'm starting to think I'm just a bad person.

At this point I'm willing to believe I'm the monster they think I am.

But oh fucking well. I have a new blog theme. So... yay...!

[nerdycrusadecomputer]

Guess who's back??? Back again! 😎

Hello beautiful cutie,first of all,i know,you write my request not to much time ago (that i already read it and it's just *chef kiss*) but,my mind is goin crazy with some new ideas and y'know,sharing is caring right?

I'm not gonna drop all of them,just one for now. Ok ok,Rise!Leo (yeah,he is my favorite,how do you know???) x reader (female or neutral your choise) in they first make out. Little suggestive? Maybe but,in my mind this would be so goofy in the begin like,no one knowing what to do just trying to see if it's work and then, finally in the end they get it lol.

The next one will be another bet,just you wait! 😏♥️

YESSIR!!! Imma write this as soon as i can xD

Key words: Y/n - your name

Leo x gn!reader

Warnings: maybe some suggestive content, but nothing other than ass grabbing-

Leo would not know what to do

My man wouldn't even know where to put his hands 😂

I just imagine the first time you actually started to make out, you had to ask

And the whole time you two are laughing your asses off, not knowing what to do

Like Leo as soon as it starts to get heated just start laughing out of nowhere

Which leads to you laughing

"LEO STOP FUCKING LAUGHING-"

"I can't, it's just funny!"

But he'll get the hang of it really quick, trust me

Like as soon as his laughs die down, he would be grabbing Your waist or ass as you intensely make out

Maybe his two walked in on you once or twice, but we'll never know!

Here is how I think their first make out session would go:

Leo and Y/n were sitting on his bed, just reading a comic together, when Y/n suddenly had n idea

She smirked as she looked towards Leo

"Hey Leo?" She started, receiving a hum from Leo, as to say the he was listening

Y/n pulled out a price of paper and handed it to Leo, he grabbed it as he playfully rolled his eyes and read the paper

'Free make out session' it read

"You know you could he just asked, not hand this out like it's some sort of secret code." Leo said as he turned towards his partner, putting his comic to the side

Y/n quickly sat in his lap as they wrapped their arms around his neck

"Just wanted to be extra." They said s they Leones closer to his face

He rested his arms on her waist as he pressed his lips against hers

His hands slowly lowered as he squeezed their ass, earning a squeak from his partner

He giggled at their squeak as Y/n just rolled their eyes

"Stop squeezing my ass, you fuckin' horny ass bitch." They said as Leo bursted out laughing, Y/n tried to contain their laughter as they gently slapped his face

"Stop laughing! This is supposed to be hot!" They whisper yelled, but his laughter only increased

"I swear to God, I am going to kill myself because of you." They whispered

"No- *laugh* no no no, here I'll- I'll stop-" he giggled as he tried to stop his laughter as he connected their lips again

They slowly got in to it when Leo licked Y/n's bottom lip, they opened their mouth as Leo out his tongue in and explored every crevice

Just as things were getting heated a certain someone interrupted

"Hey Nardo, do you see my favori- OH MY FREAKING GOD-"

Y/n quickly jumped from Leo's lap as they sat down criss cross applesauce

"Oh hey Donnie- good to see ya, how've you been?" Leo said, trying not to make things awkward

"Nardo- *sigh* Listen, if you just tell me where my favorite screwdriver is, i will pretend... That, didn't happen, okay?" Donatello said as he covered his eyes

"It's in your pocket, now forget about this, and if you tell anyone i will eat you alive-"

"Okay thanks Nardo and Y/n, totallydidn'tseeyoumakeoutoranything- bye!" Donnie quickly scurried off

"Well... Where were we again?"

That is all, hope you liked it :)

[shebeafancyflapjack]

Ten Questions For Silver

(Transcript of Alison interviewing my ghost oc for the Button House Archives)

Alison, recording/writing: Ten Questions For Silver. Okay, this isn't officially the first one but, I gotta ask it anyway, why the name change?

Silver: Two reasons. One, I always hated the name Louise. Bullies at school used to call me Louis or Lewis or, my favourite, Loo Face.

Alison: Fair enough.

Silver: Second reason, when I got into Wicca all the books said it was common to choose a more 'witchy name'. Silver is my favourite metal and corresponds with the moon. Robyn - with a y - because Robin Hood was always my favourite Disney hero as a kid.

Alison: Did you fancy the fox?

Silver: I might have fancied the fox, I think we can all admit to that.

Alison: No comment.

Silver: Plus the birds are pretty. No relation to a certain annoying caveman, just a coincidence. And Ravenstar because...it honestly just sounded cool.

Alison: Gotcha. Okay, onto the real questions. Where were you born?

Silver: Under the sign of Pisces, on a waxing moon evening-

Alison: I meant, like, geographically.

Silver: Oh. Colchester General, Essex.

Alison: And how did you die?

Silver: Julian keeps telling everyone I O.D'd on magic mushrooms, which is obviously a lie! It was a brain aneurism. Honestly, I just think he likes to make it clear he wasn't the only ghost who was high as a kite when he croaked.

Alison: *snigger*

Alison: Favourite food?

Silver: I was a bit of a chocoholic in life. Galaxy, Thorntons, Milky Bars, Munchies! Thank the gods my uncle was a dentist.

Alison: Hmm.

Silver: Ooh, if I had to pick one, it would be Echo bars!

Alison: I remember them. They got discontinued!

Silver: Noooooo! That's the saddest thing I've ever heard!

Alison: Sorry! Moving on then, favourite drink?

Silver: White Russian vodka. It was my first proper cocktail on my sweet sixteenth.

Alison: Nice. Favourite song?

Silver: Bring Me To Life by Evanescence. Which is kinda ironic, the more I think about it. Do you remember them?

Alison: Yeah, I was more a Girls Aloud sort of kid.

Silver: Oh. Plastic.

Alison: Sorry?

Silver: Nothing!

Alison: Uh huh. Favourite sport?

Silver: *long, drawn out groan* I guess...telling my teacher I was on my period to get out of P.E.

Alison: *snigger* I did that too.

Silver: Unless it was trampolining! That was pretty cool. And really hard to lose at.

Alison: Biggest regret?

Silver: Never getting to kiss a girl.

Alison: Aww, you died before your first kiss?

Silver: Oh no, I kissed loads, but they were all boys and...it was like 'meh'? I started realising I was more into girls but...never got the chance to 'test drive' if you get me. Fuck, that sounded misogynistic. I need to spend less time with Julian.

Alison: Well, you never know. It could still happen in your afterlife.

Silver: That's what Mary said. Don't suppose you happen to know any fit queer girls you could bring here and...?

Alison: What? Murder?

Silver: In a nice way! Painless and all that.

Alison: Is that not against your whole Wiccan code of not harming anyone?

Silver: Not if you do it.

Alison: Right. Well let's just stick in a pin that idea for now and I'll think about it, okay.

Alison: Fondest memory?

Silver: Oh, that's hard. There's a few from when I was alive, visiting Stone Henge with my dad, the first time we brought home my dog Jess when she was a puppy. But I guess I'd have to go with Winter Solstice 2009.

Alison: What happened there?

Silver: Well because of the whole, y'know, sleeping curse thing, I often miss out on major events, including holidays. Even the Sabbats, my pagan festivals. But that Yule fell on a full moon so I got to be awake. Even better, the guys all joined in with me and Robin to do our ritual! Even Mary got involved. She made herself to penance for weeks after but she joined in that night for me and...shit, I'm getting a bit teary now. I just never imagined I'd have friends like this, you know?

Alison: Aww! That is really sweet. Maybe I can join you guys on the next one?

Silver: That'd be cool. Fanny did the math and said the next full moon on the Solstice is...I think she said, 2038?

Alison: ....I'll set a reminder. And until then we can just have a little mini Christmas when you wake up around that time.

Silver: Yule. Not Christmas. Though it's basically the same, the Christians stole everything that's fun from pagan traditions. The tree, the wreath, even Father Christmas, they're all from Norse and Celtic culture, did you know that?

Alison: Yes, both you and Robin went on a very long rant about it when I was putting up the mistletoe.

Silver: That was mainly to keep Thomas away from you.

Alison: Oh! Then thanks for that.

Alison: Worst Trait?

Silver: I've been told that I can be too opinionated and that I also 'infodump' my interests to people when they're not interested, but I honestly think people just need to try to have more of an open mind, if they just tried to look outside their own bubble they'd be surprised what they could learn, I mean look at Mary, when she first met me she had all these preconceived judgements and misinformation about witchcraft but when she took the time to listen I went into all the history-

Alison: (Author's Note: my wrist began to cramp from attempting to write this answer down so I let Silver continue talking while I quickly washed the dishes, did the ironing and sorted mine and Mike's dinner for the evening before sitting back down with her).

Silver: -and now she understands that the devil of her religion and the Horned God of my practice are two separate entities, and that was just another lie spread by the church to make us seem evil when we're not.

Silver: Sorry, what was the question?

Alison: Oh you already answered it, it's fine.

Alison: Final question. Do you have any words of advice?

Silver: Don't do drugs.

Alison: That....makes sense.

Silver: Nah, I'm just kidding. Uh, to quote my favourite other dead person; speak as you find and don't let any man take away your voice.

Alison: Wow. She really was special, wasn't she.

Silver: (a/n: she nods, suddenly quiet and staring at her hands)

Alison: You okay?

Silver, smiling: Yeah, I'm just...still really bummed about those Echo bars, you know?

Alison: Yeah, I miss them too. Thank you, Silver.

Silver: Thank you. Blessed Be and Merry Part.

Alison: ....Indeed.

[mythvoiced]

-. wenzhe-core (pt. 1 oh god)

in response to the question 'you'd love your kids unconditionally no?': i don't even know those people yet. they just came out. they could be dicks for all i know

in response to a cis-straight white friend saying some awkward ignorant shit: your qi's all fucked bro, maybe we should kiss about it

in response to the WARRANTED question if he's bi, while visibly nervous: of course i'm a biped, is this about plato

in a conversation that had NOTHING to do with drag queens: on that note, i've been thinking, if a drag queen mugged me, i'd probably let her get away with it

wu zetian did nothing wrong by the way

i'm so glad it's your ben ming nian next year, like, fuck

uber? more like uberMENSCH, haha, nietzsche, amiright? ha....... no, i... uh. never went to oovoo javier, no

epic rap battles of history is NOT a good source just copy from wikipedia like everybody else does, like-

right after the previous one, in response to the question of how he recognized it was erb so fast, visibly sweating: what? i don't know what that is, sit down

in a lull in a group conversation after several moments of silence: y'know, i was thinking, if i wanted to kill my grandma, like, if i had to for some reason, i'd probably just have to cuss at her once, actually, but then my mother would kill me, so it's not worth it

aah~... i get it: the autistic swagger

people get way too worked up about c*nnibalism me thinks

a few moments before forgetting to salt a dish: recipes who go 'add salt' are stupid, of course i'll add salt, what would i not put salt into, BUT, then again, if a recipe doesn't say it, i will get confused, actually, so it's this whole thing, you know?

i wish getting upset would make me spit out blood the way it happens in wuxia's, it would add so much flair to my seasonal depression

apartment "complex"... really? i find it quite simple

"based"? based on what?

you're telling me a shrimp fried this rice?

road work ahead? uh, yeah, i sure hope it does

you're gonna look at me and you're gonna tell me that i'm wrong?!

odysseus is the biggest fucking-- plays 3d chess concocting up that whole 'nobody' ploy and then at first opportunity he just-- 'oh, and by the way? fuck you, signed, odysseus of ithaca' who does that

yeah, no, it was awful. yeah, yeah it killed 502 people, yeah... yeah, no it was... yeah it was awful... wanna hear more about it?

drinking a slushie: i just realized i don't like slushies- no, stop, i'm not throwing it away, are you insane? it cost Money

fuck pineapples, they eat you back

you know, the only reason we're apex predators is because we figured out how to make things that make killing others easier, that's all, really, our success in history, in the world, our supremacy over other species, it all comes down to us killing our way to the top, which is probably why we're killing each other now, we have no other beings to bury beneath us... are you gonna finish that, by the way?

[moondragon618]

So uh. I think I've decided that I want to be a little bit more open about some things on here bc honestly trying not to acknowledge it is just causing me a ton of unnecessary stress (and I'm sure as fuck not acknowledging it irl lmaooo) so yeah. So I'll start with this: I'm currently unemployed and living with my parents (mom and stepdad) and my younger but also adult brother (they all have some form of income but it's only just barely enough to get by). Now on its own the whole all of us living together thing should not be that big of a deal apparently according to what I've learned from hearing other ppl's experiences in similar situations. Unfortunately my parents do not think like this. My mom especially is convinced that we are literally ruining her life so y'know that's fun (:

Okay but seriously. I'm about to sound like I'm trying to downplay this (and maybe I am bc. Yk.) but like a good 80% or so of the time it's. Fine. We get along okay. But I know that's only bc we never acknowledge The Problems outside of the few bad days and we always just go on like those never even happened. And here's what I mean by bad days btw: ""Family Meetings"". Yeah that phrase is literally a fucking trigger for me now it's fucking bullshit. When I was younger it meant "me getting screamed at about how fucked up I am and how fucked I'll be in the "real world" and how I'm just "a soft spoiled little bitch bc I never got my ass beat" (like my brother. bc he's definitely fine and has no issues at all lmaooo) (and usually without the bitch part aside from once when I was a teenager) and now it's more "me getting screamed at by my mom abt how I'm ruining her life and her marriage" etc. etc. So yeah. My stepdad is a little better in that he only yelled at me one time when I was like 12 I think? And then never again. And he seems to at least understand that if screaming at still hasn't "fixed" me after 25 fucking years then it's probably not going to so yeah. And he did actually kind of stand up for me during the last one (in late September-ish) which I know isn't much but it's still way more than anyone else has done so I do appreciate it.

Anyway the last one was really fun (terrible) I got the usual + being told I being disrespectful for not coming out to the living room bc I was having a panic attack and quite literally frozen and unable to move 👍👍👍 And I've also been limited to just my phone since then bc my mom took my computer (bc god forbid we consider there might be a reason I'm on it so much) and still hasn't given it back and tbh I think I'd rather kms than ask for it back so that's fun too (:

I am aware that this is abusive behavior and that screaming at your child for any reason is in fact child abuse btw. It took me until very recently to come to terms with that even while knowing that (and I'm probably still not fully there tbh) but I know. It's that fucking generational trauma bullshit yk. My mom's side of the family is Fucked Up like her parents were terrible and their (mostly her dad's idk the other ones lol) parents. Yeah I'm not even comfortable talking about them right now that's like a whole other thing lmao. But yeah I know that doesn't even remotely make it okay.

And yeah like the day after shit like that happens we just never acknowledge it again until everyone's losing their shit again because nothing ever changes. Believe it or not being screamed at does not help me figure out how to navigate getting a source of income or how I'm supposed to do anything when we sure as fuck can't afford another vehicle or how I'm ever going to be able to afford my own place to live lmaooo. And I also literally cannot even talk to them about any of this without losing my ability to speak so that really doesn't help either (: I sure as fuck haven't tried calling out the bullshit either bc fuck that there's no fucking way that's going over well and I couldn't even if I wanted to (: (: (:

So I'm just kinda stuck here ig. It's really not too bad (most of the time). I'm not saying that to minimize or invalidate anything either I just want you all to know that it's not like super urgent or anything, I'm not in danger, my mental health isn't great obviously but I'm not at risk of hurting myself or suicide or anything. Promise <3 I'm a tenacious bastard sticking around out of pure spite and a desire to keep creating things if nothing else lmao :)

God this is kind of a trauma dump lmao but that about sums it up ig? I'm also very much open to advice if anyone has any <3

[thessalian]

Thess vs the Kulrut

I got woken up way before I wanted to by a large transit van (badly parked right outside my bedroom window) kept fucking beeping as it was driven by apparently a really shitty driver. Or something; there was beeping and now the badly-parked van is not there anymore. So I decided to just stay woken up and did the whole deal with the Kulrut. With ... the occasional detour.

I think I'm going to get those last couple of campfires before I do much else. Off I go.

Ooh, Scorcher site. Lemme just hide in this bush here aaaaaaaaand ... POONK.

Okay, something's alerted but I don't actually see any machines. What the fuck?

Maybe they were up on that cliff over there and got alerted by the boom, because there is nothing on the ground. I'll stealth over and scavenge. Quietly. Just in case.

Well. Whatever machine I spooked clearly does not give a shit about me. Okay.

And it's ... starting to get dark. Wonder if I could get me an Apex Tremortusk if I go back to that campfire I just found and fast travel back to that Tremortusk site.

.........Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees.

You. Are. Definitely a little harder to kill, Mr Apex Tremortusk.

But ... not that much harder to kill. GIVE ME YOUR MECHANICAL INNARDS.

Okay. Enough messing around. Back to the Memorial Grove.

Yes, I will go and help your defenses. Lemme just pick up some data points first.

Right. Off to the north with me--

Oh, hi, Tekotteh. Showed your smug little face, huh? Yeah, yeah, are you really threatening the one who pulled a fucking mountain down around your ears? Just because she won't listen to your bullshit? Ha. No. Didn't think so. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll go actually work while you lounge like an asshole.

This game reeeeeeally wants me to use a cannon, doesn't it. Alright, fine. JUST THIS ONCE.

YES DEKKA I KNOW YOU HAVE ANOTHER CANNON FOR ME BUT YOU CAN HAVE IT, THANKS.

Okay, field clear, but that is not going to be it.

ALOY YOU HAVE SEEN THIS BEFORE SHUT UP.

Yeeeeeeeep. Hello, Slitherfang.

NO I WILL NOT LEAD THE SLITHERFANG INTO BALISTA RANGE I AM GOOD ON THIS SNIPER PERCH THANK YOU.

See? I've killed nastier. I'm good.

And ... you really don't want to give me earthgrinders, do you, Slitherfang asshole. Well, fine, I'll go hunt some more of you later. FINE.

Okay, over to help Hekarro and Kotallo--

LOOK I CAN SPARE TEN SECONDS TO POONK SOME OF YOUR ENEMIES IN THE FACE FUCK OFF.

Welp. It's a really impressive set piece of a cutscene, but damnit, why can I not just shoot Regalla in the face? She is right there.

...Oh, come on. Really? I have to let her get away? My draw arm isn't even tired! Also, throwing "everything you have" at us is not that much a threat when I have systematically taken down every. Single. Rebel camp in most if not all territories. And the Sons of Prometheus are basically scrapped, so ... good luck, Regalla.

So now's when Hekarro declares everyone who helped defend him to be Marshals-- yep.

HUZZAH. But you can say you'll let me go about my task all you want, Hekarro, but Regalla's going to make damn sure that it's my job to kick her ass. I know the type.

Hi, AETHER. Hop aboard! Destination: GAIA.

Oh. When I saw a holovid data point called "Unity", I didn't think it'd be ... this. There are some moments in this game, lemme tell you.

AHAHAHA THE LOOK KOTALLO GAVE TEKOTTEH IS SENDING ME OMG.

...waitwut.

Awwwwwww Kotallo OMG. "Unity" takes on a whole new meaning at this point, doesn't it. Outcast - so of all clans and none at the same time - with Nora, Oseram, Carja if you count Talanah (need to look for her in Barren Light, I think), Utaru, and Tenakth. And even Zenith, more or less, given Beta. It's a nice message. We need more of it. Just ... y'know. In general.

Hi, Dekka. What's the what?

...How did I know that we were going to have to try to talk a rebel Tenakth around eventually? Yeah, I'll see what I can do but I want to check a few things first.

So you want some bits to help you rebuild your balista. Okay, I have the tusks you need, at least, but ... y'know, if you'd all given me five seconds to loot the machines that attacked the Kulrut, you'd have your sinew--

No? Okay, fine, I will hunt a fucking Rollerback. But I hate Rollerbacks. And the idea of hunting them in your training / entertainment arena doesn't really appeal but maybe you'll have something spiffy for me later.

...Oooooooh, so that's what the tags are for. Yeah, I have plenty, and I could just give them to you-- Oh. You insist on rewarding me for them so in order to be able to get rid of the jingly tags, I need to fix your balista. Okay. Fine.

Okay, so before I solve everybody's problems, I need a break.

No, seriously. I'm trying to be better about the whole "food" thing. Just my appetite's been shit lately, so my food intake has been minimal. Even with relatively minimal activity, that shit's not good for me. So I'm going to try to eat something resembling lunch. Then I will go help Dekka's grandson and hunt a fucking Rollerback because I guess that's what we're doing now. And then it probably gets ... spicy.

[reallydumbdannyphantomaus]

Switch

Spectra sucks. Dunno what else to tell you. (ao3) (masterpost)

Part 3: Chapter 1

“So,” Danny said as they approached Casper High, “today's the first day with the shrink?”

Kwan groaned, then clutched at his side as his rib ached. He’d been cleared to return to school, but was supposed to limit his activity. No gym, or stairs, and Danny was carrying his backpack for now. It was more annoying than regular school. “Don't remind me,” he said. “Let's talk about your creepy half-ghost uncle again instead.”

“Low blow, dude. Also, definitely not my uncle.”

“That's right, he's your future stepdad!”

Danny shoved lightly at him, careful to avoid his bad side. “How did you manage to go even lower?”

“It's a talent,” he said. “Besides, there is at least some good news from the whole Vlad-thing.”

“Oh yeah? What?”

“You probably aren't going to destabilize and dissolve any time soon!”

“Well, gee, thanks for reminding me of that possibility.”

“Always happy to help.”

They lapsed into silence as they crested the hill. Kwan's appointment was scheduled for immediately after school; his detentions with Lancer had been postponed on account of both the other teacher's continued hospital stay and Tyson dying. Thus, Principal Ishiyama had said he could use that time instead for his therapy.

Ugh. Therapy.

“So how long are you gonna see her for?”

“Who?”

“The shrink.”

“Right,” Kwan said. “I convinced my mom to let me have just a thirty minute appointment to start.”

“Cool,” Danny said. “I'll be waiting? At the big oak?”

Something warm bloomed in Kwan's chest. Dash would never have waited for him, even if he'd asked. Danny always waited, after detention and now with this stupid counseling. Maybe it was because they were both each other's only friends, but still. It was... nice. “Yeah,” he said, voice breaking in a way that he could only hope Danny hadn't noticed. “I'll find you after.”

Walking into first period gym with a doctor’s note, Kwan still couldn’t help but smile.

-----

“You're in a good mood,” Valerie said at their lab table, measuring out the baking soda.

Kwan startled, twinging his still-healing rib, then looked around to see who she was talking to.

“I'm talking to you, dumbass.”

“Since when?”

“I can always stop.”

Kwan raised an eyebrow. “Then why start at all?”

“Well, with... recent events—I don't know.” Valerie stared at her hands and dropped her voice. “Paulina lost it on Dash. For crying at Tyson's thing.”

“Yeah,” Kwan said with a wince. “I kinda figured.”

“Yeah, me too. But then, I started thinking... what the fuck kind of relationship do we have where that was expected?” Valerie sniffed. “She wouldn't even let me talk, y'know? I had a lot to say.”

“Val...” Kwan reached for her hand.

She jerked it back. “I'm not saying you're right or anything. Just—you knew him. And her. And you're not dating her. So.”

“So I was your best option to complain to?”

“I guess. I'm not gonna abandon her. Them.” The like you did was blessedly unspoken. “But, I don't know. Maybe—maybe I don't really blame you anymore.”

“Okay,” Kwan said. “But you can't talk to me if you want to stay her friend. You know that, right?”

“Obviously.” Valerie rolled her eyes. “But we're lab partners. We have to talk sometimes. For class.”

Kwan hid a grin. “Of course.”

“Of course.”

Valerie finished measuring out the materials and passed them to Kwan. “So,” she said, “what’s got you in a good mood?”

“Nothing!” Kwan squeaked. He could feel the heat rising to his face.

“Oh?” Valerie leaned toward him, a teasing smile dancing around her lips. “Did you finally boink Fenton?”

“Boink?”

“So you did.”

“No!” Kwan waved his hands around desperately. “We’re just friends.”

Valerie gave him a calculating stare. “Hm,” she said. “Too bad.”

“You want us to—”

“Me? I don’t care. You, however, clearly do.”

Somehow, his face got even hotter. “I don’t!”

“Kwan,” Valerie said, “you are somehow even more obvious about this than you were about your crush on Dash, and I watched you give him a massage once just because he mentioned his shoulders were a little stiff.”

“What—I didn’t—”

“Kwan. Kwan, look at me.” Valerie leaned down and made sure that she was looking Kwan in the eyes. “Did you… not know you had a crush on Dash?”

“I—” Kwan stopped himself and thought back to the way his eyes had always sought out Dash first and foremost whenever he entered a room. The way he reached for Dash’s hands and his arms whenever he could get away with it. The beating of his heart when Dash smiled.

“Fuck,” he said. “I liked Dash?”

Valerie bent over with laughter. “Congratulations!” she said, gasping for breath. “You’re officially the last to know. Well, aside from Dash.”

Kwan buried his head in his hands. “Oh my god. I had a crush on Dash.”

He felt an awkward patting on his back. “Yeah. You sure did.”

“And… you think I have one on Danny?”

“Dude. You should see your face when you look at him. Or think about him. It’s disgusting.” She fished out her phone and turned on the front facing camera, shoving it in his face. “You’re literally making it right now, look.”

The Kwan on the camera mostly looked confused at having a camera shoved in his face.

“Okay, so you look constipated now,” Valerie said. “Whatever. Just trust me. You looked soft as hell like two seconds ago.”

Kwan thought about it. He thought about long nights, staying up and trying to finish homework except they kept getting distracted by trying to one-up each other’s jokes. He thought about how Danny watched football with him even though he didn’t understand it, how he tried to play Doomed even though he sucked because it made Danny happy. He thought about Danny, saving his life from the ectopus, from the Lunch Lady, from the shapeshifting gorilla ghost.

He thought about Danny smiling. He thought about Danny laughing. He thought about the warmth in his chest whenever he saw Danny.

Well. Shit.

“There it is again!” Valerie pulled back out her phone just as Kwan buried his face back in his hands. “Dammit, are you conspiring against me getting a picture of your smitten face?”

“Valerie,” Kwan said through his hands, “I’ve got a crush on Danny.”

“Once again,” Valerie said, “congrats on being the last to know.”

“As glad as I am to see you two talking again,” Ms. Okorafor said, startling Kwan and Valerie, who had both missed her approach, “I do need you to do the lab today.”

“Right,” Kwan said.

“Yeah, sure,” Valerie said.

Like a spell had been broken, they went back to doing their lab in silence. Still, Kwan caught Valerie’s eye from across the table and she smiled, just a little.

It felt like progress.

-----

Kwan hadn’t expected to wait to see Dr. Spectra, but the student before him had still been inside when he arrived in her office. So he was stuck in one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs right outside, with an odd little man with gray hair and green eyes staring him down.

Kwan shifted in his seat, then groaned as his rib ached again. Right. Keep his torso steady.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the door opened and out stepped… Dash.

Dash spotted Kwan, then turned his nose up. Dash wasn’t having doubts like Valerie, then.

Still, with Dash pointedly ignoring him, Kwan had the opportunity to study his face. He’d had most of the day to come to terms with his old crush on Dash, but now he wanted to see if those feelings were still there or not. He didn’t think they were, but he hadn’t known about them to begin with, so his judgment was clearly not the best.

But instead of renewed feelings, he found tear tracks on Dash’s cheek.

Right. Of course. Dash was here to talk about Tyson. That made sense, because the two were still friends. Unlike Kwan and Tyson, who hadn’t spoken in over a month.

Kwan bit back a sigh of frustration. Why had Mom insisted he be here, instead of letting someone else who actually needed it take this time slot? He didn’t really understand why she was so insistent that something had to be wrong.

Whatever. He was here, and he’d promised, so he’d do it. He just didn’t have to be happy about it, was all.

He stood up as Dash walked out, waved on by the odd secretary. He knocked on the door twice and a voice called out, “Come in, please!”

The room itself looked like any other office. He’d half-expected to see one of those long couches designed for lying down like he’d seen in movies, but this was a public school. They would never be able to afford that. Instead, there were two more of those uncomfortable plastic chairs right in front of Dr. Spectra’s desk, which was scrupulously clean. The walls were covered in generic motivational posters. The one right behind Dr. Spectra’s head had a picture of a young oak tree with BELEAF IN YOURSELF written on the bottom.

And, of course, Dr. Spectra herself sat at the desk in a high-backed office chair. Her hair was bright red and her eyes the same shade of green as her assistant. Maybe they were related somehow?

“Hi there,” Dr. Spectra said, gesturing for Kwan to sit down. “You’re Kwan, right?”

Kwan dropped in the chair in front of her desk, barely restraining from rolling his eyes. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s my name.”

“Lovely to meet you, honey.” Dr. Spectra looked at him from over her glasses. “Now, why are you here today?”

“Because my mom thinks I have problems.”

“Do you?”

Kwan shrugged. “Doesn’t everyone? Mine aren’t any worse than anyone else’s though, so I don’t get the point of this.”

Dr. Spectra hummed. “Well, therapy doesn’t have to be just about feeling better. It can be about being better, too.”

“What do you—”

“I mean, I’ve heard from your classmates who’ve come to see me that you recently lost all your friends? Had a fight with them?”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“Including the poor student that passed recently?”

Kwan flinched. “I guess you could say that.”

“Oh, sweetie,” Dr. Spectra cooed. “I don’t mean anything by it. Just mentioning it because I thought you might have some… regrets.”

Regrets? Sure, he had plenty. Mostly about being a dick since the start of middle school. But he didn’t regret dumping his old friends. They deserved it, and he needed to be better.

“My friends sucked,” he said after a long moment. “I wanted to be better. They were the ones who chose not to change. That’s on them, not me.”

“Of course, of course,” Dr. Spectra said. “You’re on a journey of self-discovery! Very commendable.” Her smile stretched across her teeth.

Kwan bit his lip to keep from sighing. So far, this grief counselor wasn’t impressing him much.

“I just thought that maybe,” she said, “you felt like you could have done something to stop this tragedy from happening.”

Kwan stiffened. “Why—what makes you say that?”

“Oh, it’s very common. Survivor’s guilt. I thought you might feel like since you stopped being friends with poor Tyson, you weren’t there with him the day he died. Maybe you could’ve saved him if you were.”

“Why would I think that?!” Kwan’s fingers dug into his arms. If possible, Dr. Spectra’s smile stretched even wider.

“Oh dear, of course it isn’t true. I just thought it would be a reasonable response to a horrible situation. That’s all.”

Could Kwan have done more? He was at the mall that day, after all. He had advance warning. He’d gone along with his mom, and let her take Danny away, instead of letting Danny help. He hadn’t just not saved Tyson, he’d helped prevent the only person who could have saved Tyson. Mom hadn’t seen for herself how useless the Fentons were, but Kwan had. Kwan knew that Danny was their best chance, and Kwan had packed him away in the car anyway.

Acid burbled from his stomach into his throat. He lurched forward and vomited into the trash can at the side of Dr. Spectra’s desk. His rib burned.

A hand rubbed at his back. “That’s it, dear,” Dr. Spectra said. “You’re okay.”

Kwan coughed and spat out the remnants of bile. The taste was almost bad enough to make him barf again, so he poured some water in his mouth and swished it around before spitting it into the trash along with his vomit.

“Oh,” Dr. Spectra said. “I wish you hadn't—I mean, I feel bad for the janitor who has to clean that up.” She laughed and waved her hand as though waving that idea off. “Of course, not your fault, dearie.”

Mom was so stressed now, because he'd brought this whole thing upon them. Him, not Danny. He'd dared Danny to go into the portal and all of this had happened. Danny kept getting hurt. Mom was about to collapse under the pressure of keeping them both safe. Even now, he was making Danny wait on him while he worked on his own problems.

How selfish could he be?

No, no, he'd done nice things for Danny, too. Comforted him. Helped keep his secret. Destroyed his only other friendships.

Fuck.

“Am I—am I ruining people's lives?”

“Of course not, sweetie. What on earth makes you think that?”

“I just—I was a jerk before, and I'm trying to be better, but maybe I'm not as good as I think I am. Maybe I'm only being better because it gets me what I want.”

He did have a crush on Danny, after all. Being nice to Danny was a way to get him to like Kwan more. This whole time, he'd probably been trying to get Danny's attention. He was taking up his time because he craved it, just like he'd craved whatever Dash had been willing to give him. If he really wanted what was best for Danny, he'd try to fix his actual friendships, with Manson and Foley, not hoard him all to himself.

Dr. Spectra hummed. “Well, I suppose that's possible, but it's nothing we can't fix!”

“Really?” If this was all his fault... well, of course it was. How stupid of him to think that just dumping his friends was enough to make up for anything. Instead, here he was focusing on his own happiness and making everything worse.

“Of course. I'm here to help.”

“You said, at the beginning...”

“Yes?”

“You said this didn't have to be about feeling better.” Maybe he didn't deserve to feel better. Not yet. He thought he'd gotten better, but here he was making everything worse for everyone around him. “You said it could be about being better.”

“Of course!” Dr. Spectra's smile stretched impossibly wider. “Is that something you'd like? A self-improvement focus?”

“I—yeah. Yeah, I'd like that.” He couldn't be a problem for his mom or for Danny anymore. He needed to start being a solution. If Dr. Spectra could help...

“Excellent!” She tied off the garbage bag, but Kwan could still smell the sour stench of his vomit. “Let's get started, then, shall we?”

[schismusic]

Ripping it up and starting again with Depeche Mode

A version of this post existed a month ago already. It was supposed to be a piece more in the vein of the Lou X one, but I decided not to post it because it was really bad from a moral standpoint. So back to the drawing board we go. Which is very funny to me because Depeche Mode's career seems entirely based on that, trial-and-error, or more exactly successive approximations. Vince Clarke leaves them, they start from square one again with Martin Gore as lead songwriter. Alan Wilder leaves them, they start kind-of-sort-of where they left off. Andy Fletcher dies, they finish up the record and it's actually good, which surprises many, myself included. Andy Fletcher's death, as terrible as it is to say out loud, was that extra push I needed to actually get my ass onto Depeche Mode for real and not just as vestigial remains of something my mom told me once when I was like five.

Rationally, I kind of just thought Depeche Mode were some run-of-the-mill synthpop band who nailed a couple songs here and there, and depending who you ask that might even be the case, so when I was 16 my initial reaction was something along the lines of "okay so aesthetically they're slightly edgier than Talk Talk, aka the renowned and incontestable pinnacle of '80s synthpop, that's cute, anyway back to The Colour of Spring" which in retrospect makes me want to slap myself across the face. And it's definitely not Talk Talk's fault, believe me, not one bad record except maybe The Party's Over but y'know, growing pains! The one thing I'll allow artists, but not myself. Until at one point my mom goes "hey, can you make me a CD for the car? I want Stairway to Heaven in it." For reference, my mom basically had no clue who the fuck Led Zeppelin were until my old band decided we actually were crazy enough to try playing Stairway to Heaven to an actual human audience — and for some reason my mom liked our version better. Damn, being sixteen and vaguely cute really lets you get away with some crazy shit. But yeah, I had seven minutes filled, alright - what do I fill the CD with? I knew that my mom is, usually, more aligned to my music tastes than my dad is (I think I actually showed my mom '90s Swans and System of a Down on two separate occasions, somehow not getting consequently, uh, retroactively aborted) and I knew my mom liked bands like Duran Duran and Depeche Mode back in the '80s, so what the fuck, let's google "depeche mode" and see what pulls up.

Take a wild guess what pulled up.

And ironically, even that didn't entirely stick the landing. I had this whole ass conversation with my friend R. about how Depeche Mode's production decisions were dated "but like in an iconic way and unintrusive" or some backwards ass shit, I don't even know, I guess I was trying to justify myself for not liking a fucking record as much as I expected (????) and into the mnemonic toilet it went. Until March 2023 rolls along and at A.'s birthday, on the Bluetooth boombox that A. never separates from, this plays:

And it was, again, cute, right. It's dated in a very endearing way that makes it somewhat compelling. And so was Strangelove, which for some reason felt like a natural next step to take from there, but nothing else came of it. I never went out and listened to the singles, minus some of the ones I'd known as a kid: in case you're wondering, they were Peace and Blasphemous Rumours, which are definitely not babby's first Depeche Mode songs. For some reason I still couldn't cut the same slack I'd been cutting for — again — Talk Talk, whom I still love dearly. Maybe it was just a question of time, or simply of just learning to get along with the fact that things age. For some reason it took me a good five to seven years to actually realize that, god damn!, I'd never listened to a full Depeche Mode album before. So since I'm a smartass and it has an edgy title, I started out on Black Celebration and it's good, don't get me wrong, but definitely not the best possible starting point for Depeche Mode I think? If you're looking for veritable bangers front-to-back maybe go for Violator, or Songs of Faith and Devotion if you're feeling like some extra zest. But whatever, I don't know what the fuck happened that day in the car. Anyway that's how I came across my favourite Depeche Mode song, which on my worst days still gets me if it catches me off guard.

And that's what made it click, for some fucking reason. Real talk — it barely gets any more stereotypically '80s than the single mix of this song, and yet here I am bopping my shit to the beat, genuinely rocked to my socks and in a frenzy. Add to that this interesting conversation I had with this friend of A.'s, a Russian girl who immediately charmed me with her wits and unique makeup game (on a different occasion she referred to a Soviet-era children's TV show called Приключения Буратино — "priklyucheniya Buratino", which translates to "The adventures of Buratino" — as a major inspiration point for her aesthetic choices). For a very peculiar coincidence, it turned out that most of the people at the party were of Eastern European descent to some degree, and when A Question of Time played literally every single one of these people popped up saying "damn, my mom loved Depeche Mode" and this here girl I was talking about told me that back in the '90s, I'm talking immediate post-USSR years, her mom once got detention because on a school trip to Belarus she skipped class to go buy Depeche Mode posters at a newspaper stand. So since I'm very normal about this kinda stuff, I obviously went back home and googled "depeche mode russia", which led me to this here Dazed article which in turn led me to depeche.ru, a small miracle of a Web 2.0 time capsule where a treasure trove of pictures taken by Russian and Eastern European fans of Depeche Mode from the mid-'80s all the way to 2006 — last update of the site so far.

The beautiful thing about Depeche Mode is exactly this: the fact that they aren't afraid of being endearing and even vulnerable to an extent. It's hard to think of a rock act as big as Depeche Mode are that's able to pull that stuff with aplomb: Springsteen, maybe? I'm not expecting Metallica, Green Day or Kid Rock to ever put out anything that competes with Nebraska — or even Born to Run, just to be fair to everyone involved. And it cracks me the fuck up that someone would think that Springsteen is anywhere close to the hard-rock-minded hard-headed bastard that his fans on average are: which admittedly is a very wooden and unfortunate way of tying together Depeche Mode and Springsteen, but they were for me. Nebraska and Songs of Faith and Devotion came to me almost simultaneously, as the result of a musical discovery that saw me navigating a moment of true crisis, a moment where once again the answer was: ignore the noise. Rip it up and start again. And that third verse on Atlantic City very gracefully paired up with a track like Walking in My Shoes because they are unapologetic in their presentation, direct and deceptively raw — all qualities that all rockers like to pretend they have, but that very few people are able to properly handle, let alone effectively weaponise. They hide nothing, and yet find a specific, unique perspective on feelings that at some point bite any and everyone of us. It's insane to me that the most blue-collar of all the classic rockers, the one guy who never really lost touch with what he represents and stands for, and what some people still derogatorily refer to as "a synthpop band" managed to stumble upon such similarly expressive aesthetic markers at similarly crucial moments in their respective careers. And both things mean the world to all fans involved, because they remain in touch, they know themselves and who's coming to the shows — which warrants a constant stream of new people. "What you see is what you get" is not about repetitiveness: like it was meant to be for Sonic the Hedgehog, it may be a statement of intent and transparency, something simultaneously simpler and deeper than shallowness can ever allow for.

(On an unrelated note, I would literally kill for Springsteen's Butterscotch Blonde Telecaster, and while I perfectly know that's the most basic possible Telecaster color and literally any other American-made Butterscotch Blonde Fender Telecaster would potentially have the same aesthetic and practical functions as Springsteen's, it's a bit like that Borges story where he meets himself but forty years younger: sure, it's the same, but ever so slightly different in a way that feels a bit uncomfortable or counterfeit. Telecasters are great guitars. Rationally speaking if I had the money I would probably go with something with humbuckers on, but fuck me, that twang is something else.)

Necessarily, this entails the ability to pick up the pieces no matter what gets thrown your way, and rearrange them at the best of your abilities. And it's hard. Legitimately speaking, I don't think neither of the parties involved (including, possibly as the biggest offender, Sonic the Hedgehog) really did it every single time. But putting away our necessarily partial perspective as listeners who are not in the band, does it ultimately matter? Martin Gore's divorce produced a track like Precious, which in the context of any other band would probably have been met with some backlash of the "they've-gone-soft" variety; and yet Playing the Angel is widely regarded as one of their late-era records, because the ability to honestly process emotion was always part of Depeche Mode's vocabulary and tricks of the trade. It's what makes a song like The Things You Said fly, especially in the 101 concert movie. During the film, there's an extreme close-up on a kid with puffy cheeks, messy bangs, clear eyes and a tooth gap singing the most teenaged fucking bullshit ever and still, it flies, because Martin Gore's lyricism — while maybe not as elaborate as Tom Waits*', sure — hits the spot. It's not its simplicity as much as it is some form of universality, perhaps.

Case in point: the latest Depeche Mode record, which came out in March 2023, is called Memento Mori, and apparently the title was chosen before Andy Fletcher's untimely passing. There's a song on it called Always You and it's a very passionate and heartfelt elegy to passing time, and a paean to things that stay. It's easy to think it's a love song of sorts: it literally says "my love" as a constant refrain in verses, so I guess it is, what the fuck can I say guys?, but there are many things that you can love, and many ways that you can love. It doesn't try to be "hip" and "cool", it doesn't sound old-man-yells-at-cloud contrived, it does its thing and gives no fucks and as such it sticks the landing. A little honesty and conviction go a really long way.

*If there had to be a third act with irremovable cred, that's absolutely my man Tom Waits, but that gets a bit more on the intellectual side of things and requires a little bit of irony and suspension of disbelief I'd argue. He deserves his own post, in short.

[hotdadlicense]

hmmm top 5 shows, top 5 animals aaaaand top 5 scenes from any show/movie

loren please..... i lve you.

top five SHOWS.

the walking dead - ................. like it has to be said. i'm so sorry. it didn't even really go 'bad' for me like it did lose me for a hot minute or two there originally but like. when i rewatched i was like no actually i love it here. i love this hot mess. and i tragically fucking do. could really do with bringing certain characters back etc or just dissappearing some storylines but like. i do fucking love it.

breaking bad - i didnt even KNOW what i was in for i was just like this'll be fine this'll be chill. and then my life changed forever y'know.

it's always sunny in philadelphia - my go-to show to have on in the background, to have on when im sick, to have on when i need a laugh, to have on when im feeling miserable, to have on when i just wanna feel like Myself. can probably quote like. every episode by this point.

black sails - literally don't even need to explain this one. bs is already tumblr critically acclaimed. if i could go back in time and watch the season two last two episodes for the first time all over again, i would in a heartbeat. the girl that existed in my bedroom when watching those eps? never seen her before and i'll never be her again.

911 - listen. it TRULY is tv show of all time. u KNOW this i know you know this. u can't put eddie diaz in a tv show and not have it change the lives of millions.

top fIVE animals.

SHARKS. sharks sharks sharks sharks sharks all types all kinds theyre all my children

foxes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! please the fennec fox my BABY

long maned wolf.

dogs!

snakes. also HOW is your snake btw i miss them

top 5 scenes!

lets revisit black sails again and say season two finale as a whole? but also the 'in the light there is discovery' forest speech in the series finale............................i get chills like every time. WAIT ALSO 'my name is John Silver. and i've got a Long Fucking Memory.' INSANE acting also idk if this is really technically 'top five scenes' worthy but uknow that line where flints like 'where else would you wake up in the morning and matter?' @ silver??? yeah it ingrained itself into my brain and now whenever my brains having a bad day and being a bitch, it just repeats that line over and over to myself. again i dont know if that makes it a top five thing but boy oh bOY it sure made an impact !

iasip mac finds his pride when mac does the dance and franks crying and is like 'i get it. i get it now.' maybe its cos i feel like there is just a 00.01% chance of my parents ever accepting me and im projecting or whatever but that scene? every fucking time im like........ crying lol

my brain is one big jumble for the walking dead and i just can't pin down one scene? so i'm just gonna take a cop out and say that part where daryl and merle are in the woods huntin when they split off in s3 or whatever after they reunite and daryls got his crossbow simply becos i still remember watching it with my mum and her being like 'oh look at daryls Arms. he's really got Muscles.' and i was like. scandalised. in a Good way. and now everytime i see him in that scene i'm like justin beiber tweet i love Arm.

that scene in breaking bad where jesses in hospital after hank beats the shit outta him in the rv and walt visits him in hospital and jesse has that breakdown in 3.07? jesse pinkman crying in a hospital bed bruised and beaten saying 'i am not turning down the money, i am turning down you.' when he's yelling 'i have NOTHING. NO ONE.' ??????????????? scene of all scenes. wait also the peek-a-boo kid scene in s2

stuggling to think of a last one uh maybe in the seventh fast and furious movie when see you again plays at the end and they're all on the beach and then dom and brian are racing except you know its not paul walker and u know its CGI or whatever and ???? i still cry over that sorry

[wheat-angel]

Questions 1-5 from the Casual Ask Game for Wheatley if he doesn't mind (@dzvagabond)

(Thank you for the ask @dzvagabond ! You're also giving me the chance to answer this with the two different Wheatley's that I F/O. >:3c)

1. Well, go on, introduce yourself!

Oh bloody- THAT'S what I was forgetting to do yesterday! Sorry sorry, I'll get on with that now.

'Ello there! I'm Wheatley Merchant. Here's a picture of me Ry drew.

(Ignore the date that's wrong now whoops)

Uhhh I'm not sure what else to tell you other than what's on that reference, honestly, kinda already covers a lot, yeah? I mean, obviously I'm the one on the left right now. But that's a given. I suppose th@t'S mE-

...uH, 'eLl0?

'Ello?

Oh! Hi there. Sorry had to connect in to see the question- Oh I thought I forgot something! Well, let me do that now: My name is Wyatt Lee. Sector- Nope, not the MCA, Lee.

Uh, 'scuse me. Force of habit, MCA is where I work y'see. J-Just call me Lee. Anyways, I have a drawing of me and Rylan that she drew... Ah! Found it!

Uh, let's see, I'm 7'0- Yes I'm serious and yes the weather is good up here- and as you can see I'm an android. I'm pansexual and use He/Him pronouns. Uh, I think that's all the basics? Let's see, what's next?

(The rest of Lee's responses will be Purple for the sake of ease.)

2. So, how have you and (Rylan) been? What have you two been up to recently?

Been good! Not really much of note being honest. Except Halloween recently, but we just kinda cuddled and ate candy.

Great! The only thing I can think of is we went to a work party for Halloween with some co-workers/friends. Ry's been going out more and more so I can go to a few parties which I appreciate. I personally love em, but I promise I pay it back in full by equally spending time inside with her. And even if they don't wanna go that's OK too!

3. How did you and (Rylan) meet anyways? What was that first encounter like?

...Back in Aperture. Yeahhh that's uh. I don't think I really need to describe the first encounter besides we were in a bad situation and trying to get out of it. So uh. Skip.

It was when Rylan first started working for the MCA. They got scared shitless when they heard my voice for the first time. Nearly jumped a full foot off the ground... Then apologized when they saw me and said "Sorry, you just sounded like a friend I had." Uh, I kinda didn't get it then, but looking back, they were talking about their Wheatley from their world.

4. So, like, how is (Rylan) as a person?

Ohhh where to begin? She's just- They're so amazing y'know? I mean, they're the whole package of kind, generous, steadfast in her morals, loyal, funny... And she is... So beautiful to me. In like- A She AND gender-neutral way? Anyways, honestly, couldn't ask for more.

Well, I mean, what's not to love? She's smarter than she gives herself credit for, they'll be patient with me, well except for when I'm taking my time heheh. That's- That's a joke. Just teasing. Anywho- honestly I love them for the kindness they got, and the moral compass... Plus their laugh is EVERYTHING to me.

...Also, bonus points for being damn pretty. Like my god- They are a fucking knockout.

5. Any upcoming plans with (Rylan)? Like in the next coming week or even month maybe?

Christmas! And uh- otherwise that's kinda it. Nothing really planned.

Oh, just Christmas. And since we went to a Christmas work party last year, and we didn't go to the Halloween one that year... Yeah you can imagine where I'm heading with this one- doing vice versa this year. Though before holidays come to give us our off days, Ry is trying to figure out presents for our close group friends from work. I mean, I am too. One of them is really hard to shop for- *cough cough* Emmerson *cough* -but we'll get through it and then we're scot free to cuddle up during the holidays.

[sparatus]

for the choose violence ask game: 10, 12, 17, 22 and 23 please!!

choose violence asks

yesss YESSSSS

10. worst part of fanon

answered here

12. the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

okay listen this place is sparatus and desolas propaganda central so let's do somebody else. have i explained why we should all be fucking nicer to my dad han'gerrel vas neema recently

like nothing pisses me off more than how people talk about gerrel because it always comes down to that stupid dreadnought and the ren interrupt to punch him in the gut (WHICH SHOULD GET YOU FUCKING SHOT BTW) but like. there's more to his character than that?? the gerrel we meet in me3 is RADICALLY different from the one we talk to in me2 and everyone just kinda seems to forget that cause they're too busy peacocking about how cool they are for telling the admiralty board to leave tali alone and punching a superior officer in the stomach

in me2 he's actually the admiral who's SYMPATHETIC and doesn't want to exile tali, he likes her, she's one of his own (they're both neema crew!! he's her commanding officer!!), and she's the daughter of his best fucking friend, you and tali can get him to talk about his pilgrimage with rael and what the two of them were like as dumb impulsive teenagers and it actually seems to help him cheer up a bit. he's soft-voiced and just seems really sad in 2, probably because, y'know, his best friend since before pilgrimage is presumed dead. yeah he and rael went to different ships but it's likely a career thing, and obviously they've stayed close if rael's daughter who he didn't spend much time with knows they're besties. he was probably visiting the rayya frequently to come say hi to his best friend. tali should have referred to him as uncle gerrel just like raan is auntie raan and he should have recused himself from the trial i'll die on this hill

and yes i can absolutely defend his actions in me3 i'll fight tooth and nail about it but i've already written those essays before, and i'll posit: his best friend died researching geth and trying to find a way to retake the homeworld. now they're fighting geth for the survival of their race. deep-rooted emotional tie and investment in winning the battle for his best friend who didn't get to see the day come anybody. me3 starts 6 months after the arrival dlc he hasn't had a lot of time to adjust to his best friend being dead i know i'm reading way more into it than bioware did but listen. i'm right.

also i have him as gay and married to an oc aerazl'xala and also he's raan's son but headcanon isn't relevant in discussions of canon reasons we should appreciate a character

17. there should be more of this type of fic/art

any character that's not normandy crew yes i know i, Professional Niche Character Propagandist, am biased but like there's a whole universe outside the normandy guys. also fic that actually explores the consequences of shepard's actions instead of just rolling with the power fantasy

22. your favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores

hmmm is it too obvious to say the comics?? cause it's the comics. and not just evolution either, tho obv the captain of the desabrudas raft has an inherent bias, redemption is also a personal favorite outing, tazzik is actually one of my favorite niche characters who gets no attention. giant bastard

23. ship you've unwillingly come around to

i mean obviously AviTis you bastard. but also honestly aria/tevos for the sheer political juiciness of it, no romance just manipulation and ambition and maybe some old bad feelings