#that's just how google docs does it when i transfer it over to tumblr

[smokeys-house]

Robbery at the Hemulen Homestead!

(An installment in the Travel Log series)

Words turned to whispers and then to snores as the day spun down into evening at the house of two young hemulens. Their recent guest, Puukko, had a pleasant stay followed by an unpleasant discovery. She may be an old woman and an ex pirate, but that only makes the sting of being robbed all the more irritating. She'd planned a daring rescue for her purloined purse, and now that night had begun to fall it was time to take action.

The night air was cool and calm in the Italian countryside. It'd been a short trip and a dull one so far for Puukko, who much preferred the sea and its challenges. After finding she'd been stolen from, she spent much of her day planning the rest of her trip alongside planning a burglary. It wouldn't be the first time she'd broken into or out of a place, and certainly not the first time she'd taken back a score.

"The door's unlocked… that's odd fer a pair o' thieves." She thought to herself as she re-entered the farmhouse that had seemed so lovely and simple just the day before.

She twisted the knob gently, careful not to make any unnecessary noise. She pressed her paw against the door and braced it as she stepped into the living area. It only made a slight creak, just as quiet as the floorboards. Luckily most of the house had rugs in place atop the smooth wood flooring, and when combined with the soft fur on her paws, made for very quiet steps.

The living room was filled with no shortage of cupboards, cabinets, and curios. The eccentric and maximally decorated style was familiar to her, although it was far less enjoyable when searching for borrowed belongings. She'd long since gotten over the fear of being caught or being in places she shouldn't, but still she felt as though she was being watched. The fur on the back of her neck stood ever so slightly, and her ears had an itch she couldn't quite shake. They flicked and flitted about, listening for any signs that the sleeping residents had awoken.

She thought to herself on where she would hide a coinpurse filled with doubloons, eventually deciding on rifling through a few drawers first. The first few were filled with various home goods, sewing supplies, utensils, anything you'd find in your average home. Surely a house that made a habit of stealing from their guests would have at least a few damning bits of evidence. Her search eventually brought her to a large armoire with peeling gilded accents.

"Locked. Now this one ought to have at least something." She extended a claw, attempting to pop the lock. Much to her chagrin, it did not budge.

"Well that always works in the novels…" reaching into her capelet, she retrieved a pair of tools, and set to work on the lock. She was careful to maintain slow, quiet, and smooth movements. Dropping a pick onto the wood floor would make a clatter that would surely wake the homeowners. She stuck out her tongue and bit it, agonizing over every failed attempt and focusing all her attention upon the cabinet doors.

"That one's locked! I already tried it." A proud voice proclaimed from above in the rafters.

The large moomin woman fumbled her tools, very much surprised by the sudden and comparatively very loud interruption. She managed to catch them before they clattered to the ground.

"By my tail! Who goes there?" She maintained a hushed tone, although now it was much more a stage whisper than anything significantly quiet.

"I'm nibling!" The voice echoed from the rafters, tearing through the house. It wasn't particularly loud, practically around speaking volume, but the quiet that filled the house was easily disturbed.

"Avast, ye young nibling! I'll have ye scuppered if y' don't keep your voice down!"

"What'sa scuppers? Did you mean to say cupboards?" The nibling's curious nature overpowered the will to match volumes.

"Caulk. Yer. Bone box. I'll have yer guts fer garters!"

"But ma'am doesn't wear garters. Ma'am doesn't even seem to wear stockings nor pants."

"SHHHHHH!" The old moomin sputtered. Her ears turned to chase the sound of a stir from upstairs.

"What was that?" A muffled voice from above questioned.

"I'm sure whatever it is can wait til morning, love." The hemulens were awake, for the moment at least.

"Ma'am talks funny! Looks funny, too!" The nibling dangled from their legs across a rafter, allowing Puukko to snatch them deftly and cover their mouth.

"Not another word. And don't even think about biting me, y' little beast." She recalled the Snork's incident with Little My at the start of the journey.

The stirring from upstairs eventually came to be still, along with the nibling, who grew tired of resisting only moments after being hushed. The pair stood still within the dark and quiet living room, until tense waiting turned to patient boredom.

"Ifmcn bmb weyet hlil mm gm?" The nibling, quite aware that they could not annunciate with their mouth covered, attempted to bargain nonetheless.

"Not got a clue what yer sayin'. But if ye promise t'be quiet I'll put y' down." She returned to a normal whisper now that the silence had time to rebuild itself once more. The nibling simply rolled their eyes, as if to convey that was the exact question they had just asked. She set the nibling down on the couch very slowly, and freed her paw from their face. "Now what're you doin' here in the dead of night?"

"Looking for secrets!" They mimicked binoculars with their paws. They managed an excited tone at a whisper's volume. Puukko shot them a confused and exasperated look.

"Well, can y' do that quietly?"

"No! What are YOU doing here in the dead of night ma'am?" The nibling pointed their faux binoculars at her. "Are you a pirate? You sound like a pirate." The nibling put down their paws, then covered one eye like an eyepatch and pointed at Puukko with the other paw.

"I'm lookin' fer me gold. These two sneaks took it from me bag when I were sleeping. Tell you what, nibling. While yer pokin' about fer secrets, see if ye can't help me find a nice red drawstring pouch. It's got a gold letter P on the front." She ignored the second question.

"Aye aye, captain!"

"Don't." She rolled her eyes at them, and moved on to search other cabinets and drawers.

Puukko and the nibling searched high and low, for the nebulous goal of secrets and for a sack of old coins. The searching itself was slow, each cabinet and cupboard was filled with knick knacks and nonsense. It's a dreadful thing to search through every nook and cranny when each one is filled with enough noise to wake the world over.

"Miss pirate lady, I'm getting hungry. I've already seen what's inside all of the food in their pantry so I don't like it anymore."

"No one's saying you've got to stick around, nibling. I'm quite happy t' keep looking on my own." She didn't look up from her rummaging.

"Do you have any secrets ma'am?"

"I'm afraid that all my secrets are a long ways away from here."

"Secrets or food, Miss pirate lady. I need one or the other or I'm gonna go see if those hemulens have secrets in their room!"

"Now hold on a moment! Jus' keep quiet. Uhh.. secrets… what's secret?" She mumbled to herself a moment, recalling story after story. "As it turns out I'm a pretty open book. None too many folk know I sleep with a stuffed animal, though, how's that?"

"That's booooring, Miss pirate lady!" The nibling threw their head back in frustration, kicking their feet from their seat on the couch.

"Hang about a moment nibling, have you e'er had hardtack?" She pulled two ship's biscuits out from a pocket in her capelet. They were wrapped in waxed paper and tied off with twine. The nibling's eyes were briefly transfixed.

"Is it food, or secrets?"

"In a way, it's both." She began unwrapping the biscuits. "These'uns got me face on em. Yer s'posed t' have a seal or somethin' printed on it, never was sure why. But when it came to makin' my own I weren't sure what to put on 'em. It's not like I had a crew to feed or nothin' at the time, so no ships marks an' I ain't own a bakery so I don't got anything fancy to put on. Asked some folk I know what I ought t' do. They got to their usual antics and held a competition I guess." She clicked the biscuits together. They were unbelievably hard and made a sound like wood when struck.

"Winner was a young gal from the valley I live near. Her brother's the one what brought me t' Italy. Anyway, she said it ought to be my face on account of that's what she'd do!" She laughed, probably a little louder than was appropriate for the volume of a burglar.

For the moment, the nibling seemed placated with the story. Their paws eagerly awaiting what they assumed to be something tasty, or at the very least interesting.

"Help me find my money and they're yours, kid." She held them up, the side with her face stamped into it intentionally facing away from them.

"As ma'am pleases!" The nibling snatched the biscuits, they carefully examined the stamping before biting hard into one. "Ouch! These are horrid!" Barely a dent was made. "I love them!"

"Well usually yer s'posed t' break 'em up and put 'em in soup. Or mix with something else. It's rough goings on when all ye have's the biscuits themselves."

"Is that what you keep in that big leather bag?" The nibling continued to nibble on the biscuit.

"Not usua–" she stopped as she made a realization. "I'm not wearing a bag right now, young nibling. I didn't want to accidentally make any extra noise… how'd you know about it?" She squinted at them with suspicion.

"I saw it when I took those funny coins you're looking for. I wanted to check the rest of your bag, too, but you started snoring a lot and it was really annoying."

"When you what?!" She approached the nibling, paws balled into fists. "Why, you little wretch! If y' took them, why didn't ye tell me sooner!" She picked them up so they couldn't flee.

"You asked me to help you find them, not where I put them, that's all. I just wanted to count them but I got distracted with all the other stuff here. I like knowing what's in things and I love secrets."

"And how exactly have you 'helped' me at all tonight, young nibling…?" She set them back down, exasperated. The nibling seemed not to have any idea what was happening nor why she was so upset.

"I searched all the places I didn't hide your coin purse so that you'd only have the one place to look!" The nibling smiled, proud of themself. Puukko palmed her face, it would have made a 'slap' were she not covered in thick fur. Instead, it was more of a 'pomf'.

"Where is my coin purse, please and thank you?" She put on her best polite voice, clasping her paws together.

"On the rafter I was hanging from, I think."

"Would you be so kind and retrieve it for me?" She was choosing her words very carefully.

"Nope! I'm not so-kind, I'm nibling!" They shook their head. It was getting difficult to tell whether they were joking or not.

Puukko, who had enough shenanigans for one night, looked about for a step ladder of some kind. She was quite tall, especially for a moomin, but the living room itself was quite taller. She began stretching her arms and legs, squatting in place a few times. She forced her head around with her paws, her neck audibly cracking.

"What are you doing ma'am?"

"Stretching, nibling."

"Stretching what?"

"Stretching my muscles, nibling."

"You look quite silly."

"I know, nibling." There was a hint of defeat in her voice. She thought the whole situation was quite amusing, but she was also quite frustrated. The nibling nibbled on their biscuit as they watched the old woman clamber up the armoire.

"You're too big to climb like me!"

"Every finger's a fish hook." She extended her claws and wrapped her arms around the rafter above, sinking her claws into the wood. She lifted her legs off the armoire and wrapped them around the beam as well, now hanging from it as she shimmied her way over to where she first saw the nibling.

"I haven't climbed like this since I were aboard a proper ship!" She felt around above her for her bag. As she was searching, she was suddenly interrupted by a shriek from the top of the stairs. It was one of the hemulen homeowners who had come down to investigate, wielding a rug beating stick like a club.

"This isn't what it looks like, miss!" Puukko attempted to adjust her grip, knocking her bag to the floor off the rafter above. The coins immediately spread out from the bag and all over the living room. The woman began shouting in Italian, beckoning her partner and questioning the moomin in her rafters.

"Nibling, d' you speak Italian? Because I only got about half o' that."

"I do!" The nibling smiled again, proud but not elaborating nor assisting.

The hemulen woman ran down the stairs, jumping to swat at Puukko. She hit her over and over in the rear, jumping each time to reach the lowest hanging part of her. Puukko's arms had grown tired from climbing and holding, and she tucked her tail up as best she could against the hemulen's less than effective but still painful assault.

"Yeowch! Stop hitting me! This is a big misunderstanding! It's me! Puukko! I just stayed over the other night!" She cried out in mostly broken Spanish, hoping the carryover was enough to get her point across. The rug beating wand broke off against her as she clung to the rafter, claws beginning to slip. The woman stopped for a moment hearing the name, but being unable to see much in the dark, she threw the handle of the wand directly at Puukko's head.

She plummeted, and slammed atop a pile of her own money, landing square on her back with a loud grunt. She writhed a moment as the other hemulen came rushing down with a lantern, finally allowing them to see who their would-be burglar was.

"Bless me tail…" She whimpered weakly, recovering the wind that had been knocked out of her. "...Fergot most folks can't see in the dark…" She huffed. The couple repeatedly spoke, now out of concern for the woman that had been their guest not one night before.

"Nibling… please translate, I can't understand what they're saying." She spoke from the ground.

The night slowly rounded out into morning as Puukko attempted to explain the misunderstanding with translation help from the nibling. Coffee was made, and the coins were collected and put in their proper place. She learned that the nibling is the adopted child of a neighbor, and often sneaks about throughout the area in search of secrets. The people of the area leave them alone for the most part, since nothing is ever missing for long. Apologies were given across the room, save for nibling, who maintains that they did nothing wrong.

"Bye-bye, Miss pirate lady! Or, Puukko! If I find out what's in the armoire I'll let you know." The nibling shouted from the porch as the old moomin made her exit, to which one of the hemulens gently slapped them on the back of the head. Puukko left no worse for wear, but sore in the back and with a new story to tell. Though this one she might just keep to herself, having learned the value of a secret, even if only valued to a little creature like a nibling.

[heyitssashag]

Life Before Cancer

Warning: This is a long post. I apologize in advance for grammar but I’m journalling this for my own therapeutic benefit. Ergo, I don’t care about grammar. lol. (Although, I may come back and edit it later.)

I’ve written in dribs and drabs of what life was like for me before being diagnosed with cancer. It’s a bit hard to summarize something for a little Tumblr blog but I’m going to try. One day, I would like to write either a memoir or an autobiography for my kid so maybe the first step is writing an outline here…

Okay, maybe not an autobiography outline. I just started writing from childhood then re-read it and deleted it. It’s too long. It’ll be something I’ll do on Google Docs. Maybe I’ll post the links per chapter and if anyone wants to read about the boring life of yours truly, then it’ll be there. Anyway, moving on…

Life leading up to being diagnosed with stage 2b breast cancer.

I was diagnosed with early stage breast cancer July 13, 2018. A year and a half before that, my ex and I (of about 9 years) split up. We were never married. He proposed. There was a ring. I said yes. I wore the ring. I never planned to marry him, though. I loved him but I never felt safe or stable enough to actually take the plunge. What does that mean? It basically means I didn’t trust him. He was a bullshitter. The guy had a lot of issues (which I won’t get into because it’s irrelevant, now). That being said, he did have a great job, he was kind and did a lot of nice things for the kid and I. However, the last year and a bit of our relationship was the shits. He went to work. Came home. Drank. He was always a talker but ended up emotionally shutting down. He just seemed apathetic and bitter about everything. He turned mean.

He pretty much stopped wanting to do anything besides play video games and get high. In the end, all he did was mow the lawn and put out the garbage. That was the extent of his household contribution. He was in construction so he was “handy” but by that last year, he was emotionally “checked-out” and wasn’t into doing anything. He slept on the couch most of the time, too.

It mostly went downhill when he was transferred to a site that was pretty far away. He was up at 4:30am and out the door a little after 5am. Most of the time, he wasn’t home until 7pm or later. Every other Saturday he had to go into work, too. So I understood that he was stressed and burnt out. (Speaking of “burnt” out, he was also a heavy smoker. Which I despised.)

So the resentment was building - on both sides. I didn’t let him quit his job, either. He was there a long time and I kept talking him out of it as he would lose a lot of benefits and built up vacation time. This didn’t help with the resentment on his part.

I thought about leaving him but couldn’t afford it. At this point, I was a stay at home Mom and the cost of housing had skyrocketed overnight. The kid needed a lot of support as well and I didn’t know how I could juggle it all. I was at their school helping out a lot. Then I would do personal training to bring in extra cash.

I had to have a surgery during that time to remove a large dermoid cyst from my ovary. The incision apparently hit a nerve and I couldn’t walk. I was recommended to stay the night in hospital for pain control but he was the least compassionate partner you could have asked for. He told me I needed to come home. So, stupidly enough, I did. I was wheel-chaired out and throwing up as I was getting into the car to go home. I was left completely alone to fend for myself with the no support. I could barely make it to the bathroom and he wouldn’t help me. He would say I was being a wimp. That was the final straw of when I knew the relationship was over. Unfortunately, I never got my shit together to leave. I just ignored it.

The Break-Up

I found out a few months later that he was cheating with a labourer from his work site. Even though I knew our relationship was in the tank, I was still devastated. How he could lie like that was beyond me. I didn’t understand why he just didn’t leave. Apparently, a lot of the time he said he was staying at work, he was actually with her. I was livid. I found the texts on his phone. I wanted to message this woman back but there was no point. There was no reviving this relationship. The kid and I left. Him and his new girlfriend got married and pregnant within a few months after that. They’re still together. Living in the same crappy rental house but I think he’s changed jobs a half a dozen times since.

We officially split up in January 2017, and the kid and I moved in with my sister and family for 2 months so I could find a job and save enough to get a place. There was literally nothing to rent. At that point, I hadn’t had a traditional job for about 7 years, either. My self esteem was not exactly good. So the first place I applied to, they offered me a job and I took it. It was in retail - selling women’s clothing for minimum wage at the mall. I also worked for my parents in their office. (Luckily, they paid me above minimum wage.)

New Home & New Job

I got a 1 bedroom apartment on the 27th floor in a new tower with an amazing view across from the mall. It was in a busy area, central location with the skytrain around the corner. They tower itself had a lot of amenities that I barely had time to use. (ie Gym. Pool & hot tub. Recreation/party room, etc). It was very expensive and small but it was safe and close to work. Couldn’t find a home any closer to my job if I tried.

The kid’s school was 2 busses away. Many times, I had to call a cab and send them that way as I couldn’t be at 2 places at once. Even though I set up things for my kid to do after school (girls group, youth worker, behaviour intervention, etc) it wasn’t enough. My kid felt very abandoned by me during that time. I even tried doing split shifts so I was there to drop them off and pick them up from school but then I wouldn’t be walking in the door until nearly 10pm and my kid was already asleep. I initially tried finding a place close to their school but nothing was available.

Another New Job

Eventually, I knew working the way I was, wasn’t sustainable. I took a new job at another store where I was offered an assistant manager position. The problem was, we had no manager. She suddenly went on medical leave. So I was thrown into a management role making assistant manager wages for a number of months. The area supervisor eventually hired someone for the management role about 5 months later, which left me completely dumbfounded. I thought I would have been first pick …but that was my mistake. I didn’t ask or apply. However, I also didn’t know they were hiring a replacement or I would have. Apparently, the supervisor hired this person on a whim and pressured the previous manager to quit. It was all very weird and slimy.

Becoming Sick

During that time, I wasn’t feeling well, anyway. My energy levels were dropping substantially. I was spending hundreds at the supplement store trying to find something to help. I knew I was anemic but my energy levels were plummeting so fast - something didn’t feel “right”. Being on my feet all day with limited sleep didn’t help. I remember hanging some clothes back out on the floor and feeling so dizzy, I held onto the rack to hold me up. I felt like I could literally fall into the clothes and go to sleep at that moment. Over that past year, I had also dealt with walking pneumonia, 2 ear infections (resulting in them rupturing), a serious staph infection over a routine procedure at the hospital, then a horrible C. difficile infection. Followed by walking pneumonia - again. I was asked on numerous occasions by different doctors if I had a compromised immune system.

I turned into a giant ball of stress and started to get emotional at work.

Little did I know I had cancer lurking in my body. I did have a few palpable lumps for about 6 months but was told they were fibroadenomas (benign mass). Over a year prior, (before my ex and I split) I had an ultrasound which showed a few very tiny (less than half a cm) masses. I’ve had 5 large fibroadenoma’s removed over the past 25 years so I wasn’t concerned at all.

Taking a Break

Anyway, once my new manager came on board, I resigned as assistant and left for about 6 weeks. I had a bit of savings and was still working for my parents part-time but ended up having to subsidize my income with credit cards.

During that month and a half, I got a mammogram, a physical, spent time with my kid, ate much healthier and used the gym. I started to feel a bit better and returned to work as a shift manager. I had much less responsibility and way less stress. I was there for selling clothes and training newbies.

Diagnoses

Unfortunately, I was barely back at work for a month and found out I had breast cancer. My condo also sold and was taken over by a different property management company that was anal to the point of ridiculous. My calendar was chalk full of numerous appointments, tests, consults, lab work, surgery, chemo all in the space of 5 months. I fell into a massive depression. I felt horrible putting my family out. The guilt was overwhelming. My kid’s school completely let us down so I pulled them out and homeschooled them. There was so much stress. My oncologist stopped my chemotherapy treatment half way through - just before Christmas of 2018.

Returning to “Normal” Life

All I wanted to do was get my life back on track. I moved to my sister and brother in-law’s basement suite. I remember applying for jobs. I threw on a wig and immediately went in for interviews. Unfortunately, my body was still recuperating from treatment and the new hormone therapy was really hard to get used to at first. I was getting hot flashes constantly.

I decided that maybe I should look into retraining but I didn’t want to spend a pile of money when I wasn’t sure. I was already up to my eyeballs in debt. So, I volunteered at: the crisis line, the ER department at a hospital, assisted at the Salvation Army drop in centre in the downtown eastside, facilitated groups and health mentoring for Self Management BC and was a health mentor for the Interprofessional program at UBC. All while I was still homeschooling my kid and working part time for my parents.

Apparently, I didn’t learn my lesson about “over doing” things.

I did all of this for over a year until the pandemic hit in March 2020 and everything shut down. That time was a big blur. I still continued with a number of volunteer positions and homeschooled the kid. Being on the crisis line over the pandemic sucked. To this day, I have no idea why I kept up with it. I seriously dreaded it. I would have callers saying how much I helped them but the crisis line itself kept losing/hiring workers and man, talk about micromanagement. Nothing like giving your time and getting no positive feedback. It wasn’t just me - I overheard other workers getting their calls ripped apart. Over time, it was soul-sucking. I completed over 50 hours of training with an additional 196 of volunteering on the phones. I didn’t complete my last shift due to neck pain. My last shift was January 1st 2021.

Neck Pain

Mid-October 2020, I woke up with neck pain on my right side. I figured it was due to the weather changing. I waited a few weeks to tell my doctor and he said I should have a bone scan, anyway. Dec 4th, I had the scan. It came back with mild degeneration in the neck and was dismissed as arthritis. The pain obviously persisted and I ended up in hospital a few weeks later with diverticulitis caused by excessive Advil usage. I had returned to hospital multiple times for my severe neck pain and no one would give me a CT or an MRI. “Put Volataren on it” (which is a type of anti inflammatory cream) is what I was told. Then one day I lost feeling in my finger and thumb and my doctor sent me in for an urgent MRI. By that point, it was too late. The results came back that there was lesions on my C spine (but I wasn’t told it was cancer). I was immediately referred to a neurosurgeon. 4 days later I broke my neck (Apr 2nd 2021) by just turning my head coming out of the shower. The ambulance was called and I came home 2 weeks later a completely different person.

I complained for 5 months about my pain. I’m surprised it didn’t break sooner. However, it spread like wildfire during that time.

Financial Stuff

In the end, I had to claim bankruptcy which was hugely embarrassing for me. I wanted so bad to get myself out of debt but it became impossible. I initially wanted to consolidate but the trustees encouraged me to just go bankrupt as I could get a clean slate quicker and have one less thing to think about. They were wonderful and very caring. No judgement at all. My sister also did a GoFundMe which helped to get me equipment, ready made meals for the kid and me, home cleaning, transportation/taxi’s, items for the kid, easy, comfortable clothing for me to get in and out of. Just so much. We had a lot of help and support from the community.

A few weeks later, my sister and brother in-law announced they were divorcing. They have been dealing with issues for many years and were hanging on by a thread for a long time. The pandemic became the cherry on top. They insisted I didn’t have to move but I knew after a few months, the kid and I had to find somewhere else to go. My parents started to prepare their house for sale while I started to pack.

Anyway…

Let’s Wrap this Up

There’s two common questions I get asked since I got cancer:

1.) What do you think contributed/caused your cancer?

2.) What do you regret not doing in your life - or wished you did more of?

These are both heavy questions and I generally say “stress” for the 1st and “not travelling more” for the 2nd. It keeps the answers light and doesn’t invite more questions. Other than “Oh, where would you want to travel to?!” In which I would reply a random place in Europe and they would proceed to either tell me the time they went there or how a friend of theirs went there.

Honestly, there’s probably a lot of things that contributed to my cancer. Things like:

My ex smoked like a chimney.

In my late teens/early twenties I was on a lot of psychiatric medications.

Not taking care of myself more.

I was stressed out to the point where I woke up with what felt like butterflies in my stomach, every-single-day. The anxiety was always running high.

As for regrets, I regret staying in relationships that were long past their expiration date. I really did want to find a partner (a soul mate 💕) and get married. Now, it’s not happening. I have far too much baggage and would never want to burden another person with this full time. It makes me sad and it’s just one more thing I have to grieve. But, like everything else: “It is what it is”.

On that note, there have been a few good things that did come out of this shit-show. We live in a beautiful home in a gorgeous area (because my parents subsidize my rent). I’m not loaded down with drama because there’s a giant body of water between me and most people I know. For the most part, I can concentrate on my health and my kid.

So I’m wrapping up this excessively long post for now. It helped me unload some stuff out of my brain and I feel better for it. If you made it this far, congratulations and thank-you. lol. Have a wonderful weekend. 🌈

[yourturntosimp]

Hey there! I loved the Keiji x Reader x Alice so could I request some more? Yandere of course, just them finding out Reader snuck out in the middle of the night. Male or gn is fine!

Could I also claim Heart anon? He/It/They pronouns!

A/N: I'm sorry in advance if this one sucks bc i'm rusty as hell NBVCVBGNH-- glad to have you here, Heart anon! (Also, i’ve only noticed this js before i’m posting, but i’m sorry that this one is so short!! i write in google docs so i dont rlly think about how the hc length transfers over to tumblr formatting <///3)

TWs: paranoia mention, Keiji is mean, unnecessary amputation mention, mention of leg breaking

♡ Keiji is probably the first to notice when you leave ♡ i feel like he’s probably a light sleeper, and also chances are he was either in the middle of a nightmare or already awake– ♡ he’ll let you think you’re sneaky for a bit, waiting to get up until he hears the door, window, etc close, and then he’ll wake up Alice-

♡ which took a minute bc mans could probably sleep through a tornado–

♡ and ofc, once he figures out what’s happening, Alice starts freaking out ♡ bc you’re outside??? On your own??? In the middle of the night??? ♡ he’s hurt that you’d try to run away, but his main concern is your safety ♡ Alice strikes me as the “handyman who may not know what he’s doing but it works out in the end” type sooooo ♡ they decide that Keiji will go get you, and Alice will just stay at home and make sure that you wouldn’t be able to even dream of running away again ♡ if you left through the windows, good luck doing that again while he’s jamming them shut–

♡ have fun trying to leave through the door when he’s changed the locks, and now it locks from the outside as well ♡ don’t ask how he did this in a timely manner, im doing my best <///3

♡ Now, Keiji is more annoyed where Alice is scared ♡ like, seriously? They treat you so well, and you have the nerve to run away from them?? ♡ since he’s less panicked than Alice, he’s able to concentrate more on thinking about where you’d go

♡ and considering how none of his “friends” have contacted him to say you’re with them,,, ♡ he narrows it down to either your family (if they live nearby), or an actual friend that he’s let you keep ♡ and since he also hasn’t gotten any panicked texts from Alice about your family sending the police their way,,,

♡ you’re on your way to a friend’s place, 100%

♡ so of course, he does the only sane thing to do

♡ just when your friend’s front door comes into view, so does Keiji-

♡ and he doesn’t look very happy with you tbh

♡ you can’t even try to babble an excuse, turn to run, or do anything before he’s got you by the back of your shirt

♡ of course, he would never raise a hand against you in public! no, never

♡ but he will mock you for being such a dumbass ♡ did you honestly think that they wouldn’t notice? that’s a bit rude, isn’t it? ♡ the way i’m getting annoyed from my own writing fucking bye–

♡ you really thought you would be able to escape with no means of transport? You do realize that cars are quicker than,,,well, you, right?

♡ you realize how much trouble you’ve caused? Not only did he and Alice have to wake up in the middle of the night to come find you, but you’re not even thankful for it, are you?

♡ if you think he’s bad, Alice is arguably worse–

♡ he almost starts sobbing when you two get back <//3

♡ the way he’s worried about you would be sweet if the circumstances were different and you weren’t being taken back to being held captive in your own home–

♡ where were you???? Do you have any idea how worried he was???

♡ you could’ve gotten hurt, or kidnapped, or killed, or something worse, and how would they have helped you out of any dangerous situation if they hadn’t noticed that you were gone?

♡ but because he’s the nice one, he’ll forgive you, this once

♡ you must’ve been half-asleep, right? Or you just sleepwalked? Or you were just confused? Because surely you wouldn’t do anything so reckless on purpose, right? ♡ it’s alright, though, because now they’ve got new safety measures to make sure you don’t make the same mistake! ♡ don’t complain, because he initially proposed just chopping off or breaking your legs to stop it from happening again <333 ♡ the only reason this didn’t happen is bc Keiji deemed it as too harsh for a first-time offense and also cleanup would be alot of work this late into the night–

♡ mhm yep Alice is still the nice one idkwym--

♡ good luck leaving home ever again after this little stunt, btw

♡ bc that friend who you tried to run to? ♡ they’re either mysteriously too afraid to speak with you or whatever method you had to contact them is just cut off altogether

♡ on the bright side, at least your boyfriends are so willing to excuse your actions! And now they’re spending even more time with you, isn’t that nice? ♡ i’d advise against being inconsiderate of their generosity, though ♡ after all, if you even think to try something like this again, they’ll have to actually go through with Alice’s idea

♡ and i don’t think anyone wants that, so it’s best for you to just stay placid for now <333

[unordinary-analysis]

Episode 166

Honorable mentions:

I always love seeing a student with John’s old ‘loser’/helmet hair lmao it makes me happy

For the first time ever, when I say ‘Remi, pop off queen’ you know I actually mean it lol

Tldr: the high-tiers (can’t really call them “royals” anymore can we) establish themselves and prove their worths as paragons (perfect examples) of what royals should be and i applaud them for it

The amount of joker masks that the superhero posse brought in has to be representation of their power. Isen, the lowest-ranking of the superhero posse brought 1, Remi brought 3, and Blyke brought 3. You might be thinking ‘hey remi is more powerful than blyke’ but we know that he’s been working hard recently and because he only has one more mask than Remi, i think this idea is plausible. so let me believe that blyke is more powerful than remi please.

Nothing to really say about Isen except that he needs a hug

Going to ignore that remi listed cecile as someone she wanted to recruit help from because i would just get my hopes up

Only occured to me now that i could pull off a John and Rei comparison especially after reflecting over episode 150

Arlo and seraphina give off such close vibes and it’s obviously because they got close (or at least intensely familiar) when they were the king and queen and i just- i absolutely love when plots or characters go full circle and reflect (revisit?) the start of the story even though that sounds anti-development, it’s not im just bad at explanations.

WHAT I WOULD GIVE FOR CECILE TO BACKSTAB JOHN not that i don’t like john because i absolutely aDORE him because of his impact on the story, but i just want to see Cecile backstab someone and john is convient

just me talking for a bit, scroll if you want to skip to the actual content i understand ;( :

Okay: so.

I’ve figured out that instead of putting little talkative comments in the honorable mentions like I’ve been doing lately, I can put them here and not feel like total trash and that I’m downgrading the post so that’s fun.

Anyway, sorry if the massive ton of parentheses(?spelling) i'm using is confusing or hard to read. I mean, I won’t fix it, but I hope it’s not too bad ya know

Again: sorry for talking like im texting someone in 2017 it’s an issue, im aware. No one ever says anything, but yeah?? Im sorry???

Im panic-writing this an hour before the new episode drops so hopefully this is up before then, there’s no real hope though it takes me 10 minutes just to transfer this from my google doc to tumblr because i have to manually re-add all of the bold and italics and bullet points. Still not removing this bit tho even if (lmao “if”) it’s late ;)

Talking too much, but whenever you see (?”spelling/grammar/word choice/etc”), that just means that I messed up in that way, but I’m too distracted to fix it. Figured i should say that eventually seeing as i literally do that every post

Next post will not be written in first person at all because i think it makes these feel way too familiar and makes new readers uncomfortable which is stupid but is how i would feel so we’re experimenting. If you’ve never read one of my posts, i just act very informal with everything i do and i just want to say, i'm not in this tightly knit niche group that reads these and that ive been friends with for years. i just. Talk like this. So don’t feel like you’re eavesdropping by reading one of these. I really hope im not an outlier in feeling this way when reading other peoples post because if nobody actually feels this way, im bout to be real embarrased oops.

Im getting the talking out of my system because no talking next post.

Yeah this post is late. But: i stopped for pizza in the middle and my webtoon isn’t loading so im like sitting around waiting for it to

Remi:

    Now, in this episode particularly, it has occurred to me that I need to give Remi credit where credit is due. I made a post (AN: multiple posts but we’ll ignore that) over a year ago talking about her abilities as queen and- I did her pretty dirty. Not unfairly, but dirty. I basically dissed her a lot and said that she wasn’t a good queen in any sense. And I’ve done this multiple times (AN: ignore last AN) because I can remember at least 2 other times when I just berated Remi over and over for being shit queen.

    I’m not going to disagree with myself in this post (because I didn’t lie), but I want to give her some credit because I do believe she has changed recently and it has affected how I view her as a position of royalty. And, yes, while it is unclear if she is currently technically still a royal, what with John having somehow destroyed the entire concept of Wellston having royals (?), she has been taking the actions and responsibilities that a royal would. So-

    What made me want to write this out was in this episode, episode 166, I really realized/noticed her attitude and actions dealing with and revolving around this whole joker situation (currently more about the fake jokers) was?? Actually productive?? To explain: In this episode, we see Remi approaching a group of low-tiers who are worriedly talking about the joker situation and 1. Analyzes the conversation in reference to the measures she, Blyke, and Isen are taking to prevent the situation, 2. Reassures the low-tiers that qualified help (her, Blyke, and Isen [aka the superhero posse]) is doing the best they can, and 3. Asks if they have any suggestions or ideas that might help them attain their goal. Like?? Hello?? The Professionalism? And the way she didn’t let her disappointment that her previous efforts up until now affect her is a stark contrast from the Remi of the past. I’ve ripped her apart because of just how often her emotions would completely overwhelm any sense she had. So: that stood out. But, anyway, big picture again: This whole short little scene from her was so impressive?

    Honestly, the fact that Remi is going through all this effort to stop the fake jokers and make sure the low-tiers are safe is very different than what we would’ve seen from her in the past. One of the common reasons that I kept saying Remi was a bad queen was because she didn’t care about her responsibilities and didn’t take her authority seriously. There are even examples of Arlo, or others, telling her this (the example that came to my mind was when Remi was warning students about EMBER and Arlo stepped in [and the reason behind the events of this example helps to support my next point] {ALSO (sorry) afternote: I was reading through everything I’ve ever said about Remi’s leadership and I used this exact example in my post “Remi” from just over a year ago}). Another reason that I was against Remi as queen, which ties nicely with the previous reason (this sounds like repetition of like two seconds ago when I said that my last reason would support this point, but it’s not because words), was that she prioritized personal missions over things her school needed her to do. I remember being very pissed around episodes 110-120 because she ignored the big conflicts happening at Wellston in order to track down this separate crime organization (EMBER) and took Blyke and Isen with her (royals)(who were both against the idea). And I know that her reason for doing this is valid and I do respect her for attempting to avenge her brother, and I would have let this slide if she gave one thought or listened to Isen and Blyke at all about Wellston. I know this still sounds bad on my part, but it was many instances stacked on top of each other of Remi being, not just unconcerned, but unknowing, about Wellston’s current state as a school. At that time, Remi was the queen, she was one of the school’s royals, whose job was to maintain order and peace within the school. I couldn’t see any instances of Remi even attempting to do that. That was in the past though, because obviously, things are different now, like I said. Currently, Remi has gone out of her way to dedicate herself to the wellbeing of Wellston, that is obvious in the way she has been talking with low-tiers and unmasking fake Jokers. I only hope that her new motivation isn’t just a phase brought upon her due to her personal relationship/conflict with Joker, with John. I want to know if John ever happens to be dethroned or Remi somehow gets her technical authority back, will she still be dedicated to the school, or is her motive purely situational? I hope not? Because we’ve seen lots of change from her recently what with learning of the low-tiers mistreatment and all, so let’s cross our fingers.

    Regardless, there has been improvement in Remi. In her leadership and dedication. And that needs to be acknowledged. So I am doing it. Yeah. Here you go. Badge of honor for Remi.

    Obviously, most of what I’ve said also applies to Isen and Blyke, who are honestly going above and beyond (especially Blyke), just this section is a response to my previous statements of how Remi is not a good queen, not only for Wellston, just in general. And, again, while I still agree with my evaluation of Remi as a queen in reference to her past self and past episodes, This is a new development I felt obligated to talk about. :).

Blyke’s idea (?word choice confuses me):

Wowee this is a fun one. So: Blyke broke up a fake joker fight in a hallway this episode, and i just have to acknowledge this like I did for remi: props, but anyway, I was very intrigued by the way he handled the damage control like?? He refuses for the fake joker to be unmasked (?grammar) and gives the reason, “I’m not about to show his face so that you all can just gang up on him later!” And: applause. I think that this has occurred to me before, I just never dwelled on that idea, so I was taken off guard by this from Blyke. He was able to understand this and form a plan with how to deal with it? I don’t know about you, but that screams king behavior. Anyway, what Blyke does is take the fake joker to a separate room and unmasks him privately then talks with him as a way to both protect the fake joker’s safety and discourage him from any future stunts like the one he pulled a sec ago. And?? This is so great because, guys, this is liTERALLY the concept of like anger management and behavior therapy?? 

I especially liked how Blyke took the time to hear the low-tier out(something that the high-tiers are really starting to do [technically because of john because john became joker and caused all of this {and since john wanted to destroy the hierarchy because high-tiers didn’t give a shit about the low-tiers in a way he’s achieved his goal, albeit unknowingly}]). And, like i literally just said, by hearing him out, he’s creating yet another bubble of safety around the low-tier because immediately after (okay maybe not immediately, blyke did scold him a bit), Blyke says that whenever the low-tier is being picked on, he can come to Blyke. And NOT ONLY does this whole thing help with the fake jokers issue, but Blyke, along with Isen and Remi, are creating trust and respect between the low-tiers and high-tiers. This is them doing the hierarchy right! They are establishing themselves as leaders and as people that can be relied upon, which is exactly who the royals are supposed to be.

Just want to say: He also talked about how the guy who got attacked should also reflect on his actions, and yes, this deserves recognition, but this has been a common theme, so I didn’t think it was worth really discussing. Blyke got bonus points for this. Extra credit if you will.

    Remi’s idea:

    Back to Remi, but her idea about recruiting John to help get rid of the Jokers? Excuse me? The innovation, the growth, the potential. And, I know this was shut down pretty quickly by Blyke, but I still have to talk about it??? And this section is starting off horribly because there was absolutely no transition or introduction but hello?? 

    Anyway, obviously the fact that Remi would even suggest getting any help from John (Joker) is astonishing. 1. He literally beat up everyone present in the scene 2. Honestly from what john’s doing for all anyone knows, he likes that low-tiers are faking being joker (remi even points this out lmao) 3. Again, he beat everyone up? Not exactly looking good for any kind of compromise. And yet despite these obvious reasons, Remi still lists him as a possible ally. Why?

    Because when she met up with him before he completely dethroned the Wellston hierarchy, she noticed similarities in their goals and their beliefs. She says, and quotation marks mean quote, “When I spoke with him… I really thought both of us wanted the same thing… Just that our methods of approaching the situation were different.” !!!!!!! Remi knows that they really want the same thing: a safe environment for low-tiers. That was the one thing that John kept repeating over and over when they met up and talked (episode 150) (other than the fact that royals are shit but-): he wanted to create a school environment that was safe for the low-tiers. Whether or not that’s his goal now, or if he’s acting with that goal in mind, Remi obviously remembered this the most from their conversation because it seemed so similar to the way she was thinking. And Remi thinks that it would be possible that John would prioritize this over his dedication to his own personal project of destroying the school :).

    Anyway, this whole idea is scrapped by Isen and Blyke who give valid arguments as to why trying to ally with John is a really bad idea, but oh my god the way my heart stopped.

    This section is basically a summary and very quick, but this scene in the comic was riveting because of this. I just don’t know what else to say.

[once-upon-a-pirate-ship]

Laughter, Love, and Other Products of a Quarantine

Yay, I’ve gotten around to actually posting it on here! I’m so lazy and I can never figure out how to get the italics to transfer because I copy from google docs so I copied it from there to word and then copied it again and pasted it here but THEN it kept all the weird indents that look icky on Tumblr so if anyone knows how to get rid of all these annoying issues I’d really love to know

I’m absolutely interested in taking prompts if anyone has something Captain Swan they’d like to see...as I’m sure you could guess, I definitely have the time. For those of you reading Even If It’s A Lie (first of all, thank you, I love you), I’m hoping to update that soon too. If you haven’t read it but you’re interested, here’s a link to that.

@coffeenotess​ made this lovely moodboard for my fic:

summary: Emma Swan has been roommates with Liam Jones for years, but hates his brother. Okay, so she's met him once and it was a brief encounter, but still. But of course he's visiting for the week when the mandated quarantine happens. And of course Liam just happens to be out of town for the weekend when it does. 

word count: 8,716 (yes, it got a little out of hand)

rating: M, entirely because of language

also read it on: AO3 | FFN

Emma sighed at the knock on her door, pushing herself off the couch to open it. She knew who would be on the other side, and it made her blood boil to think about it.

“Swan!” The dark haired, broody, eyebrow wiggling man exclaimed as soon as the door was open.

“Jones,” she managed to grunt, turning to find her place on her comfy couch for her current Netflix binge. She so desperately wanted to ignore him for the entirety of his stay at her apartment.

 “Liam is so lucky to have such a charming roommate, love,”

“His bedroom is the second door on the left,” she said instead of making a snarky comment about his usage of the nickname ‘love.’

She really didn’t have any reason to truly hate him. In fact, she’d only met Liam’s brother once before, but there was just something about him that rubbed her the wrong way. Maybe it was the smirking, or the innuendos. Either way, she wasn’t exactly thrilled when Liam offered him lodging while he was in town for work. And of course Liam just had to have a weekend trip planned for him and his girlfriend. Emma absolutely adored Elsa, she even introduced the two, but she mildly resented her friend for taking her roommate away and leaving her with Killian Fucking Jones.

He left her alone for an hour or so, probably unpacking and making himself comfortable, and of course she could not care less about what that man was doing. Except when he decided to interrupt her show.

“Would you like some tea, Swan?”

Okay, so it was a polite interruption but still. This was an important part in her show. “No thanks,” her voice quick and rather icy.

But then she felt rude, so she tried to make up for it with conversation—he was Liam’s brother, after all, and she didn’t want to cause any unnecessary friction between the brothers. So she reluctantly got up from the couch and moved to lean against the kitchen counter in an attempt to be mildly civil. “So um, I’m surprised your work still has you traveling, you know, with the pandemic and all,”

He chuckled lightly, and she was glad her snark hadn’t wounded him permanently. “Me too, but it’s all about the money, of course.”

She struggled to recall the conversations Liam and she had about Killian and his life. “What is it you do again?”  

 “I’m a strategy consultant for publishing companies along the east coast,” when she couldn’t stop the raising of her eyebrows, he laughed. “What, expecting something more befitting of a scoundrel such as I?”

She rolled her eyes at his drama. “Well, Liam said you enjoyed sailing, maybe I thought you were a pirate,”

“Alas, such a profession is frowned upon by societal norms. Plus, I wouldn’t get benefits with just a ship and a crew.” He took a tea bag from the jar of Liam’s favorite Irish breakfast tea. He paused, “Are you sure you don’t want any, Swan?” He was way too considerate for her liking, but she tried not to let it fuel her bubbling hatred. He would be with them for a little while, and she didn’t want it to be awkward.

 “I’m good, I promise. I will, however, make some hot chocolate.” She went straight for the cinnamon, extracting it from its place in the cupboard before grabbing the mix and her favorite mug. She’d just finished stirring her drink when she was interrupted by her phone ringing. “Hey, Liam,” she greeted.

“Emma, where are you right now?” His voice was a little panicked, a little hurried.

“I’m at home with your brother, why? What’s going on?”

“Turn on the news. Now.” She rushed to change from her Netflix show to the local news channel.

“Breaking news for the Boston area: we are going into a mandated lockdown. The lockdown begins at midnight tonight, so I hope you have stocked up on all your essentials. There will be limited officials who will be able to deliver supplies upon request, but unfortunately it looks like we will be stuck for at least two weeks. Stay tuned for the latest—”

Emma stopped listening, trying to figure out how the fuck she was this unlucky. One more day, and Liam would have been home. But no, of course he couldn’t be. Now she was trapped with his smirk-happy, younger, more annoying (and more attractive, though she wasn’t quite ready to admit that yet) brother.

“Emma?” she’d forgotten that she was on the phone.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m here. I just heard,” she was trying very hard to remain calm. “Are you sure we’re not just being pranked right now? Like maybe this is some new reality TV show thing that they’re trying out and they’re trying to convince everyone the world is ending,” she knew it was far-fetched and absolutely ridiculous at this point to hope it wasn’t real, but it was easier to process than her present situation.

“I really don’t think that’s it, Emma,” he replied, and the way he said her name reminded her that she needed to relax.

“You’re right,” she took a deep breath. “I’m fine, look, I’m gonna go figure out how we stand on supplies. I’ll call you later, okay?”

“Call me anytime,” he replied, and she was struck by the fact that she had people now, but it was not the time for that brand of breakdown.

“Looks like we’re stuck together,” Killian joked once she was off the phone, but she could see that the smirk didn’t quite reach his eyes. There was a bit of fear behind them, and somehow it made her feel better.

Her panic was still fresh, and she needed to get away from that room and that man. “I’m gonna...go see how much toilet paper we have left,” and she left as fast as she could without actually running.

It wasn’t that she was worried about her health. She was fine, and David, Mary Margaret, Ruby, Liam, Elsa, Anna...her family was all in good health. A lot of the world would be okay, and a lot of the world would not be. But that part was surreal, far away. And also out of her control, which wasn’t exactly something that made her jump with joy. What she could control and worry about was her new roommate for the foreseeable future.

Killian was somehow simultaneously easy and hard to hate. Somehow. His tendency to flirt with anything that breathed and the fact that he could see right through her like he knew her...that made it easy to hate him. But she had also seen, not only in the last twenty minutes or so but also in Liam’s infinite stories of him, that he had that bad boy with a heart of gold thing that just so happened to be her fictional character ‘type.’

It didn’t help that her mind was at war. One side of her, the instinctual, foster kid side, told her to run. Avoid him like the plague. Ironic, really. She wanted to hide in her room for two weeks or a month or however long they’d be stuck in her now-too-small apartment.

But the other side, the side that came directly as a product of spending years in the company of her friends—no, her family—told her to open herself up to him, take advantage of the time she’d have with him and try to really get to know him, to see the man Liam had raved about for years.

Needless to say, Emma had a headache.

She spent ten minutes or so just pacing in her room, before deciding to actually check to see how much toilet paper she had in her personal bathroom. Once she’d calmed down enough, she returned to the kitchen, only to find Killian rifling through the pantry.

“What are you doing?” She hoped it didn’t sound like an accusation, but an innocent inquiry.

He didn’t seem fazed by it and simply replied, “I’m trying to determine how long we can survive without supplies,”

“And?” She’d succeeded this time in making her voice much more inquisitive than sharp.

He moved to face her, done with his assessment of the cabinet. “And, we have plenty of alcohol, a good amount of coffee as well as a few other beverages, and on the food front, I think we’ll be okay for about two weeks.”

“Good, good. I’m sure we’ll be able to get groceries before then,” she said, although there was no way she could be so certain.

 She cleared her throat anxiously, “Look, Jones, I think we should be friends.”

“Friends?” His stupid eyebrow was doing that thing again.

“Yes, friends. We’re stuck together, so we might as well make the most of it. I think if either of us would like to retain a single shred of sanity by the end of this, we have to get along.”

 “I wasn’t aware that we weren’t already friends, Swan,” his gaze made her stomach turn.

 “Oh really? You think I’m just this warm and bubbly to all my close pals?” She joked, then added, “Do you think we can just start over?”

 “Of course, love,”

 She held out her hand, and he took it. “I’m Emma Swan,”

“Killian Jones. It’s lovely to make your acquaintance, Swan,” he grinned.

 She rolled her eyes once more at his drama. “Now that that’s over with, what should we do now that we have all this time?”

“Well, I do have one idea…” his voice was so suggestive and seductive it should be a crime.

 “Woah, woah, woah,��� she held up a hand as if she could force his train of thought to come to a stop.

 “Come now, Swan, I was going to suggest a movie. I don’t know where your mind went, but my idea was entirely innocent,” he assured her, although the teasing in his voice made her positive of what he’d intended her to think.

 “Ah, yes, a movie. Of course,” she nodded, crossing the room to take her place on the couch. He joined her tentatively, taking Liam’s usual seat on the other end of the sofa. “Any suggestions?” She asked, and he looked thoughtfully for a moment.

“I’m not sure, do you have a genre preference?”

Her lips ticked up a little, “Well, lately I’ve been on a rom-com marathon, but I’m not sure how much you’d enjoy that,”

He feigned offense, “I am always in the mood for a romantic comedy, Swan. I’m insulted that you would assume otherwise,”

She put her hands up as if in surrender. “Okay, okay, I shouldn’t have assumed. But do you have any ideas?”

“Well, what do you have?”

After showing him her extensive movie collection that she was extremely proud of, he selected one of her favorites and they settled in.

What shocked her more than the fact that Killian Jones enjoyed romantic comedies was that he also got rather worked up when the characters did something he didn’t agree with. Maybe it shouldn’t have surprised her very much, given his tendency for drama in his life, but it was still jarring to have him yell at Jude Law.

“Come on, mate,” he muttered, exasperated. When she looked at him curiously, he exclaimed, “Well, he’s just letting her go!”

But all was well, of course, because Cameron Diaz decided not to leave, and as always, everyone lived happily ever after.

Once the credits rolled across the screen, Emma excused herself to go to bed.

“Sleep well, Swan,” his voice was unusually soft.

“You too, Jones,” she called over her shoulder as she headed towards her room.

It was annoying how often he crept into her mind as she went through her nightly routine. He was a baffling man, and it was getting harder to hate him. Especially after seeing him call Jack Black ‘blind.’

“He’s been in love with her since he laid eyes on her, Swan,” he’d said.

She looked forward to seeing more rom-coms with him in the coming weeks, and that kind of freaked her out. She’d never say it out loud.

Emma woke to the smell of bacon, and it startled her. But as soon as she remembered the night before, one Killian Jones, Mr. Would You Like Any Tea, she really should have known. She didn’t mind in the least, as her usual breakfast was just toast or cereal, or if she was going out, a good bearclaw.

“Good morning, love,” he greeted, just as cheery as his brother at that time in the morning.

“Is it a Jones family requirement to be a morning person?” Emma was famously grumpy before 11 o’clock, even more so if she didn’t have a warm beverage in her hand.

He just laughed, and placed a mug of something in her hand. When she stared at him questioningly, he told her, “some hot chocolate, Swan.” With an eye roll, he turned to flip a pancake.

She took a sip carefully, mostly because her brain was still trying to figure out what the hell was going on. She looked down at the drink she was holding. “This has cinnamon in it,”

“Aye, that’s how you like it, isn’t it?” Although he faced the stovetop, she knew that his eyebrow would be raised.

“Uh, yeah, I’m just trying to figure out how you knew that,”

“You made some for yourself last night, Swan. Remember?” He told her, as if it were the most obvious thing.

“Oh yeah,” she muttered. He noticed. And remembered.

At this point, to say that she hated Killian Jones would be an outright lie. This charming, annoying, thoughtful man was making her breakfast and he remembered how she liked a drink she made in front of him one time.

In fact, if she were a different person, she might even say that she liked him.

“It’s ready, Swan,” he said.

She watched him as he took two plates to an already set table. She would not let this freak her out, she promised herself. She knew how important it was that they both try to have fun and relax during this extremely confusing and anxiety-inducing time.

So instead of obeying that voice in her head that was yelling at her to run, Emma took a seat across from Killian at the table and smiled at him.

After breakfast, they brainstormed activities, then got to work. Although, it was much more like play.

Emma beat Killian at Wii bowling, but he kicked her butt at tennis.

“Oh, come on! How are you this good?” She cried after he scored on her yet again.

“I don’t know, love, I guess I’m just a very skilled man,” he told her with a wink.

They got a little too competitive once they started playing baseball, and they decided it was better to stop playing than to potentially cause permanent damage to any furniture.

“We could reorganize the kitchen,” Killian suggested.

“Are you kidding? That sounds terrible,” she grumbled.

He chuckled at her childish attitude. “It’ll be fun,”

She wasn’t sure how that worked, but somehow it did. They reorganized the pantry and all the cabinets before she started whining. “This is horrible,”

“Fine, Swan. What do you suggest we do?”

“I’ve been meaning to change the light bulbs in my bathroom for like six months,” she said.

He rolled his eyes. Maybe she should start counting. “Okay, and after those five minutes?”

“I’ll let you know when we get there,”

It did take five minutes, but then she decided to find a new mop on Amazon for the one she’d been thinking about replacing for a year. Killian very harshly judged her shopping methods, claiming that she shouldn’t buy it unless she is able see it and touch it herself, but she reminded him that they couldn’t exactly go out.

They ended up going back to the Wii, this time playing Wii Sports Resort. He complained that basketball was a stupid game when she won, and then proceeded to kick her ass at swordplay.

“Swordplay? Really?”

“Come on, Swan, you yourself called me a pirate,” he teased.

She shook her head, “I did not, I only said I thought you might be a pirate.”

“Same thing,”

She sighed, “do you think it’s lunchtime yet?”

He looked at his watch, groaning. “It’s only been an hour and a half,”

“What?” She almost screamed. “How is this even possible? I thought it had been like four,”

“Unfortunately not,” he sighed. “But don’t lose heart, Swan. I’m sure there’s lots more we can do,” he said, and thought for a moment. “Do you have any board games?”

“Oh hell yeah,” she led him to their game closet, and he immediately went for Monopoly. “That’s a dangerous game, Jones,” she warned.

“I’m well aware, Swan.” He met her wild eyes, “And I do so love a challenge.”

“You’re on,”

They played for three hours, and they were quite equal opponents. Neither let the other hoard all the railroads, and they were good at snatching up the last of a color before the other could have a monopoly.

But then Killian landed on Park Place. He already had Boardwalk.

“No!” Emma cried, but of course he purchased it, and began piling on the houses.

It was a long time before Emma landed on either property, but she did. It didn’t damage her bank too much, but she knew she wouldn’t survive a second payment.

Sure, in a typical game, Park Place and Boardwalk weren’t really the smartest investments. They take up so little space on the board, it’s complete luck to have a player land on it. But because they were both so strategic throughout the earlier game, neither even held a monopoly until Killian got ahold of Park Place. And in a game of just two players, trading wasn’t going to happen.

She cringed when he added a hotel, and just hoped she wouldn’t have to find out what the rent on that one was.

A few turns later, she landed on Boardwalk. “Pay up, love,” he was absolutely beaming, and instead of handing over the cash, she just started throwing hotels at his head.

They called it off after that.

 “Tell you what, Swan, I’ll think about forgiving you if you help me make lunch,”

She considered it for a moment, but decided it was for the best. “Fine, just don’t make me do anything difficult.”

They just had grilled cheese and tomato soup (unfortunately there were no onion rings on hand), but it was the best damn grilled cheese she’d ever had. She hoped it had more to do with a secret ingredient Killian had somehow added when her back was turned, rather than the person who made it.

They decided to try to do some work, but it was short lived. Emma studied the information she had on her current skip for a little bit, but there was no further she could go without actually tracking the guy down.

Killian was also unable to get very much done, because as he discovered shortly after opening his computer, the company he was working with at the moment had temporarily shut down. He couldn’t exactly strategize without a company to work with.

“Well, that’s unfortunate,” he declared once they both realized there was no work to be done.

Emma just stared out the window for a few minutes, never before wanting to go out more than in that moment. Wordlessly, she got up, searching in a drawer beneath the TV.

“Ah ha!” She held up the treasure she’d just located.

“Fuck yes,” Killian jumped to turn the Wii back on.

She laughed at his enthusiasm. “Just to warn you, I am a pro at Mario Kart.”

“Of course you are, Swan,” he smirked.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re a very talented woman, love, and I’d never claim otherwise.”

“But?”

“But, that’s what you said about Monopoly. And we saw how that turned out...” She smacked him playfully on the arm at the reminder of her painful loss.

“No, no, no, Jones. I never said I was a pro. If I remember correctly, I only implied that I was good.”

“Fine. We’ll just have to see who the true champion is, won’t we?”

She was good; ‘pro’ wasn’t an easily-earned term for Emma. Killian couldn’t deny that she was extremely skilled. They played for an hour, and Killian had only won twice. He admitted defeat, which was a difficult thing for him to do.

She bowed at his recognition, secretly very proud of herself at beating him after not playing for like three years.

Emma left after a little while to take a shower, surprisingly sweaty after Mario Kart. She used her time under the hot water to release her tight muscles in her back and shoulders. She was sure they were a product of her tensing over the remote, absolutely determined not to let him win.

She tried not to let her mind drift to him as she attempted to relax, but that was proving more and more difficult as she spent time with him. It certainly didn’t help that she was pretty much only spending time with him. But that was inevitable.

She took her time brushing her hair out and getting dressed, trying not to let her newfound sense of calm to slip away.

She was just considering returning to the living room when a Skype call came through on her computer.

“Emma! How are you? Are you okay there by yourself?” Mary Margaret asked, the worried mom-friend as usual.

“I’m fine, I’m great. And I’m not alone, Liam’s brother is here, remember?”

She cringed at David’s sudden appearance next to Mary Margaret. “Oh yeah? And how’s that going?” David asked, a hint of something with an edge in his voice. Accusation? She wasn’t sure.

“It’s great. I promise,” she hoped her words would calm him. It’s a good thing he was married to the mom of the friend group, because he was definitely the dad. “We’ve mostly just been playing Wii. I just destroyed him in Mario Kart,” she told them proudly.

Mary Margaret laughed, and David added, “Attagirl,” as if she were actually his child. Ridiculous, but it made her smile.

They chatted for a little while, catching up on all the personal life things they’d been missing the last few days in an attempt to do some social distancing.

“But I guess the party’s canceled now. I hope this is all better by the Fourth of July, or I’m going to be very grumpy,” Mary Margaret nearly pouted, and it made Emma laugh.

“I’ll let the authorities know that it’s gotta be finished before then, okay?” Emma teased.

“Swan?” Killian called, knocking on her door. “May I come in?”

“Yeah, what’s up?” She asked as he cracked open the door, just his head peeking in.

“I was wondering what you’d like for dinner, but I can come back later, I can see you’re occupied.” He moved to close the door, but she stopped him.

“No, no, it’s fine.” She gestured for him to come in, and then angled her computer a bit to introduce them. “Guys, this is Killian, Liam’s brother. Jones, this is Mary Margaret and David. They like to think they’re my parents,” she grinned at their objections.

“It’s nice to meet you, Killian,” Mary Margaret said once she was done reprimanding Emma.

He shifted nervously, and he had this look on his face that she couldn’t quite read. “It’s lovely to make your acquaintance.”

He was the pinnacle of manners, and she should’ve seen it coming with the way Liam was.

“I heard that Emma kicked your ass in Mario Kart Wii,” David said, pride dripping from his voice. It made heat rush to her cheeks.

“Aye, that she did. It was a well earned victory,”

Once again, Emma was surprised at Killian’s words. Although it was more the tone that confused her, the hint of pride that matched David’s. It was rather unexpected.

Dinner was an interesting affair to say the least. Emma tried to help, really, but she wasn’t one for cooking. Luckily, he’d noticed that from her attempt at assistance when they’d made lunch earlier, so he was prepared.

“All you have to do is stir,” he told her.

“Are you sure?”

This made him laugh, and she caught herself watching as his eyes squinted and his head was thrown back in the movement. “I’m positive, Swan.”

Killian put together the most gourmet spaghetti and meatballs she’d ever seen, and it was fascinating to watch him flit around her kitchen, adding this and that, completely focused and in his element.

The stirring he’d tasked her with was a homemade sauce, which she thought was a little crazy, considering you could just buy some in a jar at the store. When she mentioned this, he shook his head.

“Sure, you can buy the premade sauce, but why do that when it’s so easy to make your own, plus, it’s so much better,”

She bit back a laugh at his passion for anything homemade. It was adorable.

She froze for a split second. The thought had just appeared in her head without warning. She returned to her mechanical stirring, but she remained in her head, trying to find the root of the thought. Did she really think he was adorable? She must have, or else the thought wouldn’t have been so instant. But really, you’d have to be blind to miss the attractiveness in his features, and claiming otherwise was what they called denial. Maybe it wasn’t such an important thought after all.

“It’s ready,” he informed her as he opened the fridge and pulled out an unopened bottle of red wine.

“Good thing we reorganized the kitchen earlier, or else you wouldn’t know where the corkscrew is,” she grinned.

“You’re so right, Swan. A wonderful idea on my part,”

They enjoyed their meal in a comfortable, companionable silence. It was kind of funny, how completely opposite their relationship was from just the night before. She’d dreaded his arrival for hours, and now she was starting to think that perhaps she was trapped with just the right person.

She was surprised she didn’t choke on her food when the thought popped into her head. She hoped maybe some conversation would distract her from her head.

“You’re a wonderful cook,” she commented.

“Thank you, love. I learnt the importance of a well cooked meal from my mother,” he told her, fondness in his voice.

Liam never really talked about their mom, but she knew she’d died when they were young. “That’s what Liam usually says,”

“Aye, he was lucky enough to learn a lot from her before she passed, and I was lucky enough to have him to teach me when I was older,” he said, his smile much softer than before.

“He’s a good brother,”

“Aye, too good to have to put up with my shit,” he agreed, but she could hear the hidden meaning in his words.

“You know, Liam’s spent the last five years or so talking you up. Always telling me how great you are, how proud he is of you...it got pretty annoying after the first few times,” she tried to make it casual enough that he wouldn’t be uncomfortable with her confession.

His eyes got slightly bluer somehow, and his smile turned into a smirk. “Well, how could he not boast about me?”

She decided that her mission was successful, and it eased a weight around her heart to see him accept this new information.

After a second glass of wine, she helped him clean up. He washed, she dried, that was the system, and a good one at that. They made quite the team.

They chose another rom-com from her collection, and once again Emma enjoyed Killian’s comments, although this time most of his anger was directed towards Justin Long. “Does he really think he’s not completely in love with her? That’s ridiculous,” he huffed.

She grinned, “I don’t know what to tell you, Jones. Men are blind, I guess,”

He shook his head. “Not all men are that blind, love, I promise.”

She tried not to think about his words as she climbed into bed. She was exhausted after all that competition and emotional energy. There were so many little things she’d picked up on over the course of the day, it was no wonder she was so good at her job.

She didn’t hate him, and probably never did. He was far too thoughtful to be real, too considerate. He read her like a goddamn book and she had no idea how to deal with it. She just hoped their understanding of each other would be to her advantage and not cause her harm.

Over the next few days, the two of them fell into somewhat of a routine. Killian would make breakfast, then they would goof off and play games until lunch. After that, they tried to do something productive, but as the days passed that got a bit harder, especially after they’d deep cleaned the whole house. On day four, they prepared what Emma called ‘niche powerpoint presentations.’ It was a good way to kill an hour or two, especially when Killian created a literal Ted Talk about why Peter Pan is actually the villain. It made Emma laugh so hard her stomach hurt.

After their productive time, they’d give each other some privacy for whatever they needed or wanted to do. Emma usually just showered and Skyped her friends, although one day she took a nap.

Then it was dinner, which Killian would make, and then Emma would help him clean up. They finished off their days with a rom-com that usually had Killian annoyed at this character or another. It was funny (and adorable) every time.

On day five, Liam and Elsa Skyped her, and Emma brought her computer out to sit on the coffee table so they could both talk.

“So Emma, how are you getting along with my little brother. Is he giving you a lot of trouble?” Liam chuckled.

“Younger. Younger brother,” Killian muttered, arms crossing his chest like a four-year-old.

“No, he’s been feeding me, so that’s good,”

“I was a bit worried you might starve with me gone for so long,” Liam teased.

Killian rolled his eyes. “You know I’m perfectly capable of cooking, Liam,”

“Oh of course, of course,” he agreed too quickly. Emma was no expert at sibling relationships, but she was pretty sure that he was implying he was the superior cook. He wasn’t, but she was afraid she was beginning to become biased, so she didn’t trust herself to say it.

“Emma, have you been talking to David and Mary Margaret much?” Elsa asked.

“We Skype just about every day. They’re so parent-y, still,”

“That’s definitely not a word, Swan. ‘Parent-y,’ really, that’s not even creative,” Killian shook his head in feigned disappointment.

“I’m sorry, but I momentarily blacked out and forgot the word parental. Are you happy?”

“Overjoyed.”

“At least I don’t have to worry about you two destroying the apartment,” Liam said.

“What are you implying?” Emma raised her eyebrows.

“I figured that by now you would’ve murdered him, Emma, but you’re more tolerant than I thought,” he said.

“I can’t say I haven’t considered it once or twice,” she ignored his call of ‘hey!’ and added, “but I would’ve been left with the mess, plus it would’ve just been me for two weeks and that doesn’t sound fun,”

“That’s understandable,” Liam nodded seriously.

“We’re so proud of you, Emma,”

They ended the call a little while later, and all was well until Elsa called her just after she’d gotten out of the shower.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“I just wanted to talk to you, uh, alone,” Elsa said.

“Why? What’s wrong?”

“No, no, everything’s fine. Sorry, I realize how that sounded. No, I mean...you and Killian seem to be getting along really well,”

“Oh,” that made her pause. “What makes you say that?”

“I kind of thought you still hated him, but, well, you guys were very much flirting while we were on Skype, Emma,”

“Oh.”

She’d gotten so used to his company and their playful banter that she didn’t even realize what had been right in front of her. “Oh,” she repeated once it sunk in. “Well shit,”

“What are you going to do?”

“I have no idea. I’ll, um, I’ll call you later, okay?”

“Emma, are you sure—”

“Bye, Elsa,” she hung up before she could finish her sentence.

Over the course of the next few minutes, Emma’s brain became what she liked to refer to as a Shit Tornado. It was just...shit. Flying around, spinning, going one hundred and fifty miles per hour and destroying everything in its path.

She liked him, like liked him. Yes, the official middle school definition. She actually cared about him, and she had no idea how it happened. But did he also care? She should’ve figured that one out days ago, really. The hot chocolate that first morning? It was so obvious. There were so many looks she tried to ignore, on both ends, actually. Many comments she pretended never happened. God, she said that men were blind, but holy shit! She might as well donate her eyes, because she clearly hadn’t been using them.

She wasn’t sure how long she let the Shit Tornado ravage her brain as she sat on the floor of her bathroom, but there was a knock on the door.

“Swan?” His voice was soft and sweet and fuck.

“Go away,” she muttered, absolutely in no state to see him.

“Love, what’s going on?”

He was so goddamn nice it made her want to cry. “Nothing,” it was a blatant lie, they both knew it, but she didn’t care. There was silence on the other side of the door, and she wasn’t sure if she was more relieved or disappointed.

But after a moment, he said, “I have rum,”

She sighed, going against at least half of the cells in her body and reaching up to open the door.

He was extremely polite and didn’t mention the fact that she was just in a robe, and he moved to sit beside her on the floor. Wordlessly, he unscrewed the cap to his flask and passed it to her.

She took a few sips and returned it to him. He didn’t pressure her to speak, and at this point that didn’t shock her. He wanted to wait until she was comfortable.

“Do you remember when we first met?” She asked.

“Of course,”

“I was a little rude,” she said quietly. “Do you know why?” He just shook his head, letting her continue without interrupting. She smiled. It was a weak one, but it was still a smile. “Something you said really freaked me out,” she looked at him.

His eyes found hers, and she could see that he was searching his memory.

“You said, ‘try something new, darling. It’s called trust,’”

“I sounded like a jackass,” he mumbled.

She laughed, “That’s not what freaked me out. What freaked me out was that just before you’d said that, I wanted to trust you. I felt like I could, and I’d known you for like ten minutes. Everyday, when I’m working or whatever I’m doing, I listen to my gut. That day, it was telling me to trust you, to open myself up to you. But I couldn’t risk being wrong, and it was so startling to want to trust someone, and I just-I couldn’t handle it. So I pushed you away,”

“That makes perfect sense, love.”

She sighed. “But this funny thing has been happening. I don’t want to push you away anymore,”

A smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “I’d like to not be pushed away,” he told her. “But I also want you to be comfortable, and happy,”

“I know, but I realized today that I am comfortable. So comfortable it scared me,”

“Look, Emma, I know you’ve been hurt before. I know that it takes a lot to earn your trust, and I want you to know that it would be very much worth the effort, for me.” He shifted to face her properly. “I don’t do things part way, Swan. You should know that. If you’re willing to give this a shot, I’m ready to go all in,”

She stared at him for a moment, as if she were expecting to wake up from a dream or snap out of some sort of hallucination. “I’d like to try to give this a shot,” it was just a whisper, but the effect it had on his whole being was massive. His grin alone created a fire that warmed her heart.

Emma awoke with that childlike first-day-of-summer hopefulness, ready for all the joy and possibilities that lay in front of her.

But once she was out of her room and staring at him at the stove, she realized that she had absolutely no idea how she was supposed to act or even feel. She had a new tornado in her brain, but this one was the polar opposite of the Shit Tornado, this was a...Joy Tornado? It was definitely not something she’d experienced before.

 “Swan! I trust you slept well,” he said, handing her a mug. Her favorite mug, as usual, the yellow handmade-looking one that she used everyday, the one he discovered after that first day when she’d mentioned it offhand. Every day after that, that was the mug he would hand her as soon as she stumbled out of her room, hands rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

 “Your breakfast is on the table,” he informed her. He looked almost as excited as she felt, and it was really cute.

He joined her a minute later, his usual place at the table passed over for the seat beside her. She tried not to let it distract her, but unfortunately the Joy Tornado was picking up speed.

There was a different ease between them, something that had been a result of their conversation the night before. She caught herself watching him in a way she hadn’t allowed herself to just twenty-four hours earlier.

They made cupcakes for some reason, maybe because they discovered there was absolutely nothing else to do, and Emma couldn’t remember a time when she laughed more.

“Swan, try this!” He called, handing her a spoon with a bit of the chocolate batter.

It was heaven, and not just because she hadn’t had cupcake batter in years. When she gave him back the spoon, he tried it himself, and she couldn’t help but watch as the dark batter touched his lips.

Once he noticed she was staring, his eyebrow did that thing again, although this time the feeling in her chest wasn’t anything related to annoyance. In fact, she found it rather alluring. “See something you like, Swan?”

“Nope, not at all,” she said, a smirk creeping onto her lips.

“You’re a terrible liar, love,”

Emma caught herself far too many times thinking things that would make old Emma puke. Although ‘old’ more meant ‘a week ago.’ But she couldn’t find herself to care one bit.

They were crafting, yes crafting, with some random supplies they found hidden away in a box shoved into a corner in one of the many closets. It was pipe cleaners and stickers and children’s glue, but it was entertaining.

They’d made it a competition, of course. Whoever made the best picture in twenty minutes won, though there was no prize other than bragging rights. So naturally, the entire twenty minutes was spent throwing insults at each other, promising that their picture would be better than the other’s.

When the buzzer went off, Emma was embarrassingly proud of her creation. It was an extremely abstract landscape that reminded her of one of the places she’d lived as a foster kid. Sure, the forest was made up of pieces of green and blue pipe cleaners, but it was the best damn thing she’d ever made.

But Killian presented his masterpiece, and she almost lost it.

It was a swan. Aboard a pirate ship. Damn him.

“I think yours is brilliant, Swan,” he said, pride in his voice.  

She rolled her eyes, “You made a pirate ship, Jones. You win.”

“Well, if you insist. But I do plan on hanging both up on the fridge,” he said, and then actually got up and put them front and center, moving the magnets until they were sturdy. “There. Now, are you hungry?”

Emma spent their entire dinner trying to figure out how this man was even real. He was so considerate, and he always knew just what to say. He remembered all those little details and made her feel important. He never teased her in ways that actually inflicted any damage; it was like he knew which areas to avoid. All of this led her to one conclusion, one that she should have determined a long, long time ago: Killian wasn’t Neal.

In fact, the entire week she’d been pushing away thoughts of comparison before they could take form. When he made her hot chocolate, she’d tried not to remember how Neal could never get any of her orders right. Coffee, Chinese food, whatever, he could never get it right. Killian also never insulted the things she cared about, and took interest in the things she enjoyed. They were making the way through her rom-com collection, after all. Killian wasn’t pushy, he didn’t pry. He didn’t expect things from her that she wasn’t ready to give. It was a lot to process.

“We’re very pensive this evening, aren’t we?” Killian asked with a small smile. He too had been quiet.

“Sorry, I just have a lot on my mind,”

“No need to apologize, Swan,” he said, and it reminded her of another reason he wasn’t Neal. Perhaps she should start making a list.

“There’s something I’d like to tell you about,” Emma began once they’d finished eating, “but I think we’re going to need something a little stronger for this conversation,” she picked up her empty wine glass in show.

Killian nodded, moving immediately to take a bottle out of the cabinet. Rum, of course.

“Last night, there was something you said,” she told him, watching as he poured the alcohol for them. “You knew I’d been hurt before, and I think you should know about it,”

“You needn’t tell me if it makes you uncomfortable, love,”

Emma sighed, “That’s the thing, I know that I can share it with you. And I want to,” he didn’t reply, which she took as a cue to continue. “I met Neal when I was seventeen. I tried to steal a car that he had already stolen,” she laughed, and he raised an eyebrow. “I lived a much different life back then. Anyway, we fell in love, or so I thought, and we were together for a while, stealing what we needed to survive, planning to run away together after we’d had enough money. But Neal wanted to steal something bigger, some expensive watches, and when he got caught, he framed me. I went to jail for his crime,”

The silence that followed her story was deafening, and she shifted uncomfortably for a moment. “So that’s why I don’t do the whole ‘trust’ thing easily. I didn’t see it coming, and I should have.”

“Don’t blame yourself for that coward’s decisions, Emma,” his voice was quiet and restrained.

“I don’t. Or, I try not to. I know now that I was just a pawn, but it took me a long time to figure it out.”

“Thank you for sharing that with me, love,” he said, adding more alcohol to their glasses. “Well, while the rum is out, perhaps you’d like to hear my own depressing tale,” he joked, although his laugh wasn’t as hearty as she knew it to be.

“I met my first love, Milah, when I was a young lad. Twenty-three, actually. She was adventurous and a bit older, and I fell deeply in love. I didn’t know she had a husband and a son until almost a year later,”

“Shit,” Emma muttered, and he smiled.

“Aye, my sentiments exactly. But I was positively head over heels—young love and all that—so I stayed with her. We met in secret for a year after my little discovery, although it had really been secret the entire time. And then her husband forced her to move far away, I’m assuming he found out about me, and about six months after that, I’d heard that she had died in a car crash. I’m not sure if she ever truly loved me, or if she just saw me as some sort of rebellious freedom,” he finished.

“Aren’t we a pair,” she said after a few minutes.

“Aye, I believe we make quite the team, love,”

They ignored Emma’s movie collection and just spent the rest of the evening consuming the contents of the bottle on the table, bonding over shared (mostly heartbreaking) experiences. She knew she would regret the last few drinks in the morning, but that wasn’t important. What was important was that Emma now understood how Killian could know her so damn well.

And she couldn’t bring herself to mind at all.

As expected, a headache greeted Emma when she got up, and the light peeking in made the pounding against her skull much worse. She groaned as she pushed herself out of her bed, hoping very much that Killian wouldn’t be as chipper as he usually was in the morning.

A rather familiar green and disgusting-looking drink sat on the counter waiting for her. “Ah, the famous Jones hangover cure,” she mumbled, grabbing it and trying not to think about what she knew it contained.

“So you’ve heard of it,” Killian’s voice was much more subdued than usual.

“Yes, Liam has made it for me many times,” she explained, and he nodded thoughtfully. She downed the glass, holding her nose as she did so. “Gross,” she commented, placing the cup on the counter.

“True, but give it half an hour,” he said, turning off the stove. “I made us omelettes this morning,”

“I didn’t expect you to make breakfast...I don’t even think I could stand up for five minutes right now,”

“What can I say, I’m a creature of habit,” he grinned, handing her a plate full of food and moving towards the table to put down his own. “Besides, I very much enjoy cooking for you, Swan.”

“Why’s that?” She wondered, crossing the kitchen to place her plate directly beside his.

She looked up when he didn’t reply right away, just in time to see him reach up to scratch behind his ear, a nervous habit she’d noticed around day three. “Perhaps it’s because that was the first time I actually made you smile, that first morning,” he said quietly.

She stared at him for a moment, her brain processing his words much slower than its usual rate.

But then her lips were on his, and she couldn’t even remember actually closing the distance between them. One minute he was three feet away, the next minute, he wasn’t.

His body froze for just a fraction of a second before he responded, his hand coming up to tangle in her hair. Emma’s fingers played at the hair that rested at the nape of his neck as she stood on her toes just to be closer.

It was passionate and desperate and Emma could spend an eternity there, but before that could happen, Killian took one step to separate them. She looked at him for a moment, brow furrowed in a question.

“As much as I am enjoying this, love, and I am, I think we should stop before we take this elsewhere,”

She opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

“I’m not interested in a one-time thing, Emma. It’s important to me that you know that,”

“Oh,” was all she could say.

“Of course I want to, believe me, love. I just...I have a history of one night stands, and I don’t want you to think that’s what this is. One night with you would certainly not be enough,”

She blinked for a second. “I don’t want this to be a one night stand, Killian. That would be really difficult to pull off, too, because we’re kind of stuck here, remember?” She joked.

He chucked. “True, very true.” He scratched behind his ear again, “I wasn’t—I’m not rejecting you, love.”

“I know, and I understand. I also have been known to have a one night stand here or there, and I agree. Maybe jumping right in wouldn’t be the best course of action, here.”

In response, Killian bent down to place a much more chaste kiss on her lips.  

 Emma spent the next few hours reminding herself of his words, convincing herself that he wasn’t lying when he said he wasn’t rejecting her. She knew it, it made sense, yet that part of her, that annoying little voice that liked to tell her she wasn’t enough, told her that he didn’t want her. At least, the little voice had been trying to, until Killian’s actions spoke louder.

They watched a movie instead of being productive, and he very neatly tucked her into his side as soon as they sat down. She couldn’t even pay attention as Ryan Reynolds was being yelled at by Sandra Bullock, because Killian kept tracing the back of her hand with his thumb.

 And then when the movie was over, he pulled her up off the couch, dragging her to the kitchen where he made her a hot chocolate. Killian found casual, normal, everyday reasons to touch her, and she loved it. It was the casual intimacy that she’d never had before, and it made her heart so full that it hurt.

“David, will you relax? We are not going to run out of toilet paper. We’re fine!” Emma tried to convince him. They’d been Skyping for about ten minutes in the living room when Killian came out of his (Liam’s) bedroom.

“I can just order you some. Right now. I’m on the site already,” David said, holding up his phone.

 “We have plenty, right Killian?” She asked, and he came over to sit beside her on the couch.

“Yes, mate, we’ve got enough to last us three months if need be,” he told him.

“I told you, David. You’re so dramatic,” Mary Margaret said, but there was so much love in her voice that it was clearly not an insult.

“Yeah, you and Killian could start a club,” Emma nudged him playfully.

Killian just shook his head, grinning at her. She couldn’t help but grin back.

“Emma?” Mary Margaret called.

“Yeah?”

“This might sound crazy, but are you two…is something going on between you two?”

Emma’s eyes widened, and she looked at Killian, no idea how to reply. He just gave this little encouraging nod, and she sighed. “Fine. You caught us,”

“I knew it!” Mary Margaret exclaimed.

“Okay, what? You just...started dating in the midst of a global catastrophe?” David interjected.

“It’s not like we planned it!” Emma said indignantly.

Killian beamed, “No, this was definitely not planned. Although, I couldn’t have picked a better person to be in quarantine with than you, love,”

Emma ignored Mary Margaret’s loud ‘awe’ and replied, “Damn right. You could say that we make a great quaranTeam,”

Killian pretended to be deeply offended by her terrible pun, putting a hand over his chest. “Swan, I daresay that was the worst pun I’ve ever heard,”

“What are you gonna do? Break up with me?” She cocked an eyebrow.

“I would never,” he said seriously, and it made her heart stop.

She was glad that she had an indefinite amount of time to figure that one out.

[raes-writing-space]

UPDATE

So to make it easy, I’m going to put all the posts I’ve been making and what’s been going on in one post to make it easier.

I used to have SEVERAL writing/imagines blogs that I used different emails and accounts for. Listen, THESE ARE ALL MY WRITINGS. So if you’ve seen them elsewhere, don’t worry I’m not copying someone else’s work, they’re actually mine just from an old blog. I saved them in google docs which is typically how I like to write things before posting them. I’ve had a few over the years, including this one which I apparently hadn’t updated in 3 years.

I had another one that was a lot more chill about how I wrote things, didn’t do any requests, I just posted what I wanted. I really liked the freedom of that format so I didn’t have to feel pressured by trying to get writings done at a certain time or done in a certain way. So I decided that I will take what I did on that account, and move it here since this blog is attached to my main personal blog so I didn’t have to keep signing in and out of different tumblr accounts just to write. That blog no longer exists.

The imagines blog I used to run Fandemonium Imagines, also does not exist anymore, as soon as I found out what email I used, I transferred all the writings I did, and deleted that account. You might not find anything from there either.

I also specifically have a MHA/BNHA drabble account that I NO LONGER WRITE FOR, that is still up, but you can go ahead and go to that one if you do want to read. Careful, as I had smut themes on there and I don’t know how many survived after the tumblr purge. I will not be transferring any of those onto this account. So if you’re interested, go to @my-hero-drabbles and read all my old stuff.

This account will only occasionally take requests when I feel like it, and some may or may not be deleted if I can’t find any motivation to write them.

If I didn’t have such a busy schedule I would do a lot more with this blog, but I just don’t have the mentality to have this blog reach it’s full potential. That’s just the sad truth.

With that being said, if you ARE UNDER 18 please blacklist/block the tag “lemon” or “nsft” as that will have all and any smut themes. 

I will continue to try and put any warnings I may have in writings for people’s safety. If any warning come up that I might have missed, please message me and I will make sure to correctly label everything.

Thank you all for your patience at this time, go check out my updated About Me page if you want to learn about me a little more. And happy reading!

[spnfanficpond]

May 2020 Pond LiveChat Recap - User Friendly Tumblr Pt 2

@fictionalabyss (Mel) and @girl-with-a-fandom-fettish (Kay) yet again did a great job teaching us the magical ways of Tumblr! Thank you, girls, for helping out and sharing your wisdom!!

This was a continuation of last month’s chat, which you can read all about HERE. We also talked a little bit about this back in July 2019, and you can read all about that chat HERE. A rundown of this month’s chat is below the cut!

Keep Reading function via the app

We started off talking about the Keep Reading function, and how it works, and doesn’t work on the app. Back in July 2019, if you were using the app, you could add the text [ [ MORE ] ] (without the spaces) to a line, and it would create a Keep Reading cut in your post for you. We’ve heard recently that it wasn’t working, so we did some testing. This is what happened:

As viewed via the app on the blog:

As viewed via the app when looking at the desktop:

As viewed via desktop on the blog:

Long story short, It only works if you view the post on desktop. Mel noted that if she went onto desktop and edited the post from there, then the cut would work everywhere, but that defeats the purpose of posting using the app.

TD;DR - [ [ MORE ] ] no longer works effectively.

Keeping your formatting when copying from Google Docs into Tumblr

@flamencodiva​ (Vanessa) told us all about a workaround that she learned from @winchest09​. Anyone who was tried to copy and paste from Google Docs to Tumblr knows that you lose all of your formatting, including any italics. @mrswhozeewhatsis​ has not had a problem copying and pasting from Microsoft Word (as part of the Office 365 Suite) into Tumblr, but Kay has, so she needs to use this workaround. Basically, the trick is to post to AO3, first, and the copy and paste from there. Here’s the step-by-step per Vanessa:

1) make a new chapter on AO3, 2) set it to rich text, 3) paste your fick, 4) got to tumblr and click on pencil to add text, 5)  change setting to html, 6) go back to ao3 click on html, 7) copy and paste the html format of your fic and paste it to tumblr, 8) change the setting back to rich text and your format is the way you want it from google docs.

Submitting your fics to the Pond to be posted on the blog

Via the app:

Submitting via the app is a pain, but it is possible. 

[Side note: Posts submitted to the Pond via the app can not be edited by the admin. We don’t edit your posts often, but occasionally we will add or change tags, or try to make your post look more appealing. If you submit via the app, we can’t do that.]

Kay was gracious enough to go through thr process and make screenshots for us, explaining what was happening along the way.

First, click on the envelope at the top of the screen:

Nect, click “Submit Your Fics”:

Then you’ll see this screen:

The various options for the type of submission show up at the bottom just like when you compose a post in the app for your own blog. I would add that my “asks” seem to get eaten more often when my phone auto-corrects something. So, one post I did not use auto-correct (and that took way too many tries, honestly) and one post did use auto-correct (and I surprisingly had success).

All the tags available are already applied when submitting through the app (at least on my phone) so you would have to delete those that don’t apply, which is opposite of how you do it when submitting on desktop. 

To do this, tap on the #tags (you can see them starting to list in the middle of all the white or you can tap the # in the bottom right corner) and you will get this big list of all the tags available when submitting. 

Tap on the one that does NOT apply, and you will get this tiny little x.

Tap the x to remove that tag. Repeat for all the tags that do not apply. If you do not tap the x, it will go back to the darker blue color of a tag that will be applied to your submission.

Caution: if you remove a tag you wanted by accident, you will have to type it back in. My experience with this was my app generating popular tags related to what I was typing first, not tags that were previously there, so please read carefully to get the correct tags.

To change the type of post to link instead of text: click on the link icon along the bottom (there's the Aa for a text post, links, GIF, a camera, etc). However, I copy/pasted a link into the body on a Aa post and it still seemed to work.

A long time ago, THIS ANSWER was posted on the Pond blog about making your submitted post “prettier” and more attractive to readers. This was made based on using desktop (not the app), and just copying and pasting from one tab to another, like this:

On desktop, in Chrome, this works very well, for most people, most of the time. (Mel had some issues doing it for a couple of days, and then it magically started working for no apparent reason.) The gif will transfer over, along with the gif credit, too. This way, the submission to the Pond looks exactly like your original post, and will thus attract more readers.

In the app, though, the copy function doesn’t like to go through an image, and it seemed to be hit-or-miss if a gif copied and pasted would load properly. Basically, it’s a LOT of work to submit via the app, and it is not recommended. You can, but it’s a lot of work.

Why should I make my submissions “pretty” when just posting a link works just fine?

When you are submitting your story to the Pond to be posted on the blog, you’re doing it to attract readers who might otherwise not see your story. You want to sell your story on our blog the same way you sell it on your own blog. That means including all of the elements of a header that are suggested IN THIS POST (Suggested Format for Fics). If you don’t add this information, you could end up with a post that looks like this on the blog:

Readers might not even clock that as a story to be read! Some readers won’t even look at a story that doesn’t list a word count, warnings, or if there’s a pairing. Simply copying and pasting your header into the submission box gives potential readers everything they need to know. Also, here is a good list we came up with a while back of Warning Tags for Fics. 

I worked really hard to craft this “secret” (but possibly triggering) ending so I don’t want to spoil it in the warnings; any suggestions?

In your header, let your readers know that there is possibly triggering material in the story, direct them to your tags at the bottom of the post, and then use the “#tw:” format to list the spoilery triggers in your story. This way, people who have few or no triggers can read without being spoiled, and those with triggers they need to avoid can make sure they’re reading safely.

I’m bad at writing summaries. Do I really need one?

Yes. And don’t wimp out and say, “I’m bad at summaries.” That will turn readers off. Think of a summary like a movie trailer. Would you go see a movie is the trailer was just a guy saying, “It’s a good movie, I swear, but I suck at making trailers, so just go see it, yeah?” If a reader is at all unsure about reading your story, your summary can make their decision. Your summary doesn’t need to spoil the story, but just give the reader some idea of what they’re getting into. Set the table, as it were, before the meal. Is it canon-compliant, or an AU? When is it set? Who’s involved in the story? Bring your readers to the ball park before you start the game.

Should I use a specific tag for my writing? Why or why not?

After some discussion, we determined that you should if you don’t have a masterlist set up, yet, or if you don’t keep your masterlist updated. As long as you have a masterlist and keep it up-to-date, then the extra tag isn’t necessary.

That’s it for this month! Don’t forget to submit your stories and your Angel Fish nominations! Want to know what’s happening in the Pond? Check the Pond Calendar to see what’s coming up! And, as always, if you have questions or suggestions, let us know! You can send us an ask, or send a private message to @manawhaat​ (Mana) or @mrswhozeewhatsis​ (Michelle) anytime!

[trying-write-fanfics]

OverhaulXreader part 33

I’m caught up again but I’ll try and write out the ending soon. Due to tumblr’s limited line rule I bet there will be still a lot more parts. Thank you for your likes, I like seeing familiar blogs keeping up with every update and new blogs just starting to read this. I’m still shook this is over 100 pages on google docs,.

It was brutal going through the detachment of Y/n with her parents. She would go to work, sing in the choir, but would drink more, secretly. She wasn’t a driver so that eased Kai a bit, but her drinking did worry him. She would pass out at home and ignore calls. One night he got chills.

“I should have never been born.” She whispered to herself falling asleep.

She didn’t ask much of Kai. He didn’t know what he could do for her other than be there for her when he could. She was there, at the compound and his apartment, hating being alone. He didn’t know how to balance her again, until one day he decided to betray trust for the good of the yakuza. He took samples of her blood, enough to make her pass out. She had already been drinking and passed out so she didn’t notice too bad. He took that blood and experimented with it in rats. He chopped off their paws and saw her quirk manifest within them growing back their paws. It was the secret action he needed. However the bad thing was Y/n didn’t wake up that morning in the compound. Kai checked on her, she had a fever, but that was her only symptom. Then the morning turned to the afternoon. When he saw the others he pretended she had already left, but she wasn’t waking up.

“Y/n still here?” Pops asked.

“She’s under the weather.” Kai lied.

“So you sent her home?” Pops knew sick people were his son’s nightmare.

“It’s women stuff.” Kai lied.

“She here?”

“Yeah.”

“Weird she took the day off.” Pops said walking away.

Kai went to work. He had test subjects ready in a warehouse only Kai and a select few knew about. He put the compound in a needle and then in the blood stream of others. Taking hands and limbs off proved other quirks can be transferred into bodies for a short period of time.

He came home to his gentle girlfriend still asleep in the bed. It had been three days. More blood was drawn each day, experiments were tested and done. It was a short victory. He wasn’t stupid, he called her in saying she had strep throat, so of course no one would want her near food. Things were getting worrisome though. He took his glove off to feel her face, she was still warm. Her eyes woke to his touch.

“Kai…?” She tiredly rolled over to his lap.

“Feeling okay?” He asked her.

“How long have I been…” she yawned. “Sleeping?”

“It’s been awhile, you were sick? Don’t you remember?” He lied for her safety. “You were throwing up.”

Her eyes opened more.

“What?”

“You should eat some rice, I bet it’ll keep your stomach settled.”

Kai made her a light dinner and cared for her just as she did for him. She didn’t remember anything Kai told her, but she didn’t feel well so she didn’t question it. She leaned on him, glad she wasn’t feeling as bad as she thought she would be. She was tired and dizzy.

“You don’t think I’m pregnant?” She asked.

“Why would you think that?”

“I don’t think you would let a sick person near you, even if it is me.” She wrapped his arm more around her shoulder. “Throwing up and fainting doesn’t seem normal, but you’re calm.”

Even drained, she was still perceptive of Kai. If Y/n hadn’t known Kai as deeply as she does, anyone else would call him a monster for distancing himself if his partner was sick. He was a monster, but for a greater good. He knew later, one day Y/n would understand, but not tonight. She hasn’t even heard she’s been out for three days.

“I was worried.” He told her.

She played with his fingers.

“You really do love me...the good the bad the ugly.” She said intertwining her fingers with his. “Alright.”

“Alright?”

“I’m going to grow up.” She said after taking a deep breath. “I thought my parents would be the only ones to love me unconditionally and that’s why I always strived to be their perfect kid, but that doesn’t matter anymore, I have you, who chose to love me unconditionally despite everything you’re still here…” she began to tear up. “You’re comforting me.”

He hugged her into his chest and realize how this was going to lead him on thin ice. He had the girl of his dreams and she couldn’t see him doing any wrong.

Y/n grew out of her rough patch. She went out again, choir, and all. She bought herself a bike to ride to and from work. She was trying everything to be better. There was no void to fill because her boyfriend went against his own demons to show her he loves her. The least she could do was improve the quality of her own life. Kai even went on a brunch date with Y/n and her old lady friends. They gave them baby names and decided the couple should have five million babies.

She did find out about being gone for three days, but learned she was too sick to remember it all. The incident didn’t bother her too much to Kai’s relief.

From the blood samples Kai gathered, it was enough to make into pills. He had only a couple shots to make the pill perfect. Other quirks would work differently to transferring them into a pill, but he has to be able to see if he’s capable of the basics.

[alanshee-keeper-of-realms]

Human or Vulcan?

So due to a major glitch in Tumblrs Apps case my fanfiction which I posted on here was somehow deleted it shows it on my other device but not on this one so I have no clue if it's posted or not I am reposting it from Google Docs and hoping it works this time the title is the name of the story and it explained it in the description which all for some reason was deleted. Alanshee

I hope you like this AU, it’s a What if Jim was a Half Vulcan just like Spock, yes I dared to ask that question and put it into writing, never had seen this done before so I decided to take that as a challenge! More information will be added at the bottom for those who are confused

James Tiberius Kirk sat at the bar cradling a crystal glass full of whiskey he just did not believe that his mother would keep something this vital away from him, practically everybody else is knew but somehow he had missed it his Mother Winona had kept the vital information he was not fully human away from him why whenever his hands brushed against someone else or when somebody touched him he had to yank them back as emotions flowed through that simple touch,

Yes his mother was a cruel woman dumping him along with his brother with their Step Father and heading for space, but for her to withhold that he was a human and Vulcan hybrid that he was not even George Kirk’s son was appalling he carefully reached up to those pointed ears he had always been told was because of the radiation he had been exposed to in Space now he knew them to be because of his Vulcan half.

“Figured I would find you here” a familiar voice said from behind him

Without turning around, Jim responded

“Come to oggle at the freakshow?”

Pike sat down next to him

“No, and you’re not a freak, you know there is another like you I met him once he’s the son of the Vulcan Ambassador his mother however is human ”

Kirk raised an eyebrow at this.

“I thought Vulcans disliked us Humans because we are quote on quote too reliant on our emotions”

Pike nodded and smirked

“Most of them but there are those rare few who prefer the company of humans to the company of their cold compatriots, his names Spock his mother’s human named Amanda as well his father’s a Vulcan Ambassador named Sarek"

The Captain withdrew a PADD typing a few things into it he set it on the bar, Kirk looked at it curiously, the picture was the typical Picture that one had to take when joining a crew of a Starship so they could identify the person, the name at the bottom named him as Spock.

“He is my first Officer, joined a little over 10 years ago ”

Kirk sat there musing over this, when he felt Pikes hand on his shoulder

“Look kid I have to go but if you want there is a shuttle leaving in the morning to Starfleet Academy I would love to see you on it I think you would be perfect for Starfleet”

Kirk sighed downing the remaining contents of his glass he sat money on the bar and walked out

His mother had always warned him and Sam against going into Starfleet, just because she did not want to loose him and his brother the way she had lost their well Sam’s Dad, now he saw no reason to listen to her, after all maybe just maybe he would run into this Spock at least he could hope to anyways.

He stared up at the black starry sky, even in the 23rd Century space still managed to grab at the mind of everyone maybe it was because they no matter what the universe will always hold onto many mystery’s and it made one wonder what those mysteries were and make them think of the future as well it was under these stars that Jim Kirk decided to join Starfleet

Pike looked out of the shuttle as he heard a motorcycle approach he almost didn’t believe that Jim had decided to join after all he watched Jim hand the Keys and helmet over to an officer and strode up to him

“Figured why the hell not”

Pike chuckled and reached into his pockets.

“Here took some finagling, seeing as you’re not used to your Vulcan Abilities got you some special gloves to help protect those sensitive hands of yours “

Jim smiled at Pike as he accepted the gift

“Thanks really gonna come in handy for me against unwarranted emotional transference, at least that’s what the books I could find called it"

Jim raised an eyebrow as a blonde haired icy blue eyed person walked up this wasn’t the thing that made his eyebrow raise it was the large pair of white with speckled Grey wings protruding from her back.

“Ah Jim this is our first Friegevidian recruit she won’t be flying with you guys as you can clearly tell she’s got the flying thing down, she was visiting a friend nearby”

She chuckled

“Yes my kind is trained from a young age how to use their wings though some like me have the gift of being more agile and intelligent we are typically a lot like you humans but more prone to celebrate the elements instead of your Christianity “

Jim smiled and nodded

“Its nice that you could join us Miss?”

“Alanshee Valera Mador but I go by Valera “

“Valera I will remember that hopefully you’ll have a safe flight like us”

“Oh I will thanks to your personal shields and breathing apparatuses my people have been able to go higher and get around quicker than before “

“Well folks we better get this show on the road Valera you better put your Apparatus on and get ready to go ahead of us “ Pike said

Jim being himself couldn’t help but say

“George Kirk did it in 4 I will do it in 3”

Pike laughed and promptly entered the shuttlecraft, Jim looked at Valera and smiled she smiled back and put her helmet on he watched as she spread her wings and with one swift movement shot off high into the air

Jim turned and looked around and sat down in the nearest seat he saw empty, he had barely buckled in when he heard a commotion and looked up

“Damn it woman one crack in the hull of this craft and our blood boils in 13 seconds Solar Flare and we cook in our seats it’s safer in the bathroom!”

“Sit down sir please” the woman ordered the man sat next to him with a huff starting to buckle in

“You had to force me to sit next to a hobgoblin too very nice “ he grumbled along with something about how many diseases were in space

“Um excuse me I am half Vulcan my mother was Human“ Jim defended

“Wait only half thought there was only one like that?” the man questioned

“Nope, I just found out recently thought I was a Kirk till then names Jim by the way Jim Kirk “

“Damn well if we are gettin names out of the way I am Leonard McCoy “

“You know if you’re so frightened by the prospect of space Starfleet operates in space hate to break it to you “

Jim saw McCoy roll his eyes

“Yeah well wife took the whole damn planet in the divorce so this is the only thing I have left well except for my Bones” McCoy huffed in response

Jim is also an oddity because of the fact he appears human but for that his Mom paid off several doctors to have his looks altered as a toddler, the only thing they wouldn’t touch was the ears, he if he wished to could have this reversed as the surgeons made it easily reversible with the technology they had, they knew that his Mom was trying to hide her infidelity to everyone she wanted to appear as the grieving widow raising the only children of George Kirk and to have one  child looking clearly not human thus not George’s son was not okay in her eyes.

His mother cheated on shore leave with a banished Vulcan who was banished for accepting his Emotions and no it wasn’t Spocks half brother Sybok, just a random one floating around.

He does retain his blonde hair and blue eyes though, another rarity as usually black hair and brown eyes dominate the genetics, this story takes place right as the movie starts, he might’ve not have been raised on Vulcan but in this world he does have pretty much the same abilities as Spock does.

The only difference is Kirk was raised on Earth with his human half being dominant and his Vulcan half being the one subconsciously suppressed, unlike Spock who’s the complete opposite his Vulcan half is the dominant one while his human half is suppressed.

[sunsetnest]

What makes a Good Application?

When adopting from a spirit shop, be it paid, or free, or RA/CC or regular adoption, your application is incredibly important. This isn’t a writing competition, and your application is not the reason you weren’t chosen most of the time. We look at how well the spirit and you will get along. Too little information, or the wrong information, may not cut the bill.

So how do you write a good application? Here is an example of a good application using our Application Guidelines, but these ideas can be transferred to any app at any shop.

Getting an RA/CC? Look here!

What makes you feel drawn to them?   You don’t need a calling to apply to a spirit, but what about this spirit makes you want to apply? It’s perfectly okay to say something like, “I thought their species was really cool, and as I continued to read about them, I fell in love with their personality.” And then elaborate on their personality. Something like, “When I read about them, every word seems to pull on my heart, and I can’t stop thinking about them.” Even saying things that aren’t words or don’t really make sense work. For example: “I don’t know what makes me feel drawn to them, but when I see them in the discord I just internally go ‘hhhggghhhgh’ and can’t figure out why”. We expect one paragraph here, usually 5-7 sentences.

What is not acceptable is saying, “They seem super happy which will help my depression.” Or anything else along those lines. Unless it’s stated in their bio that they would like a companion so that they can help with something like this, then this isn’t an acceptable reason to apply. Spirits are usually looking for family and friend before all else. Spirit’s won’t heal you of depression or any other physical or mental illness and this shouldn’t be the end goal of companionship.

Why do you think you will be a good companion? Here we look for 1-2 paragraphs about why you could be a good companion. This has nothing to do with skill. This is “I have worked with spirits for sometime and can say with confidence that I will be able to communicate with you whenever.” Or “I’m new to spirit work, but I will do by best to astral travel and communicate with you.” Describe what you will do to not neglect your companion. It’s perfectly alright to say something like, “I don’t know how I will be a good companion, but I promise I’ll give my all in all I can.”

Level of experience (how many years/months?) Here, even though we ask for a time frame, we want more. We would like at least 1 paragraph about your experience. If you just got started, what have you researched? What have you done? If you learned about spirit work yesterday, let us know that too! We might reach out to you with references on how to get started and things to know before companionship, but your application will still be valid.  If you’ve been doing spirit work for a long time, tell us what you’ve done! Can you travel, can you project? Do you regularly work with a species? Do you do any research? What do you do?

A description of yourself(personality more than appearance) Any interesting things that may render the spirit uncomfortable? This appears to be the hardest part of an application. What do you write about yourself? I always start with overviews. Your zodiac signs, your hogwarts house, etc. But say more than, “I’m a leo.” How do you relate to being a leo? For example, I may say something like, “I’m a gemini through and through; I’m a very social person who loves communication. However, I really shine through with my capricorn moon when it comes to my emotions.” Elaborate. Then build off of that. What are your hobbies? What do you like doing? When you hang out with friends what do you do? Don’t forget to write about negative aspects about you. Mention them in passing and how they may affect your life, but then continue on. It’s important information, you are selling yourself. If you only talk about how horrible you are, and such, why should this spirit choose you? It’s okay to say “I think negatively of myself and think I have no redeeming qualities, but sometimes I art okay.” There should be 3-5 paragraphs about you, depending on length.

A description of your home life/lifestyle Here you should write about your day to day life. If you’re in school write about the classes that you take. Do you have a roommate? What are they like? If you live at home, write about your family, your pets. Write about what you do in your free time. What do you do when you’re bored, when you have free time. When you go out where do you go. Do you have a job? What’s work like? If you already have companions/do spirit work, how does that fit into your life? How does religion fit into your life? There should be 2-3 paragraphs here.

Information on current companions that you have/ones that you have had before. (Please make sure to ask them if they’re okay with another spirit being added to the family) First, do not apply at all if a spirit currently in your family is uncomfortable with adding to your family. Do not keep this from your current family. Just don’t. But when filling this section out, talk about more than “this is X, he’s a griffin.” You should write 1-2 paragraphs about them. If you can’t write that much about them, then maybe get to know them a little better before applying for another companion. Only include information they’re comfortable with, but if you’re at a loss for what to write, refer to the information you wrote down about yourself! If you have a large family, you need 1-2 paragraphs about every single member. Even if it turns a 2 page application into a 20 page application. The personality of your companions is just as important as you.

Do you know how to astral travel? Do you have wards set up? If you already talked about these two things, it’s okay to say “Yes and yes.” However if you haven’t already elaborated, then talk about what you do in the astral! Where do you go? What do you do? What wards do you have? How many? What do they do? We don’t need specifics, but saying “anti-malicious spirit” and “offensive wards for attackers” is enough.

Any other information about yourself that you deem fit This one seems pretty self explanatory and 100% optional. Write about whatever you want to include but haven’t written about yet.

Please provide a second mode of communication other than tumblr in case we need to reach you PLEASE!! Do this. If something goes wrong and we cannot reach you, then things will only go more south. We reach out at 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, and every year to check and see how well adoption is going, and we need to be able to reach you if you deactivate your tumblr, change URLS, or anything else of the sort. Emails work best, but any other social media that does not change easily, like twitter. Please don’t use discord because you can be 1 click away from changing your numbers and the word in your name. Do not give us your phone number. Even though I consider us trustworthy, and YOU may trust us, we are still strangers over the internet. Unless you know a mod in person, just don’t.

Have you applied for another spirit? PLEASE Let us know this as well. Include regular adoptions, and ra/cc. It’s important. And letting us know won’t nullify your application. We will reach out to the shop about what to do, if you are chosen. We talk things over to make sure things are best for the spirit and you. If you do not tell us, and we find out, then we will have a talk that may not be entirely pleasant. If you apply for a spirit after you apply for one with us, then you need to let us know. You can update your application at any time! Just shoot us an ask, or an email to let us know what needs to be changed!

Final notes Your entire application should be AT THE VERY LEAST 2 google doc pages long. Single spaced, times new roman. My application is currently 15 google doc pages. Shops always say, the longer the better! And we mean it! We want to know as much as you’re willing to give! While spelling should be important, don’t worry about it! Don’t worry about being professional. You’re trying to portray who YOU are. Please keep in mind, though, that you can still be chosen with a shorter app! It’s about how well you two may click, not length! It’s not a writing assignment. This is just a help and starting point! And I understand that I only filled this out to terms with Lorelei’s guidelines, but just use the tips given here to fill out any application! And if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask us, the shop you’re applying at, or at my personal blog @fox-sprt!

Best of luck!!

[disruptedvice]

2019 writing meme

i was tagged by @startofamoment​, no doubt because I’ve been talking up that b99 porn star au that I started writing in 2016 but never completed.

It looks like how this meme goes is two lists: Things I am definitely going to write (or things I am definitely most likely going to write from startofamoment’s post) Things I’d like to write, time (and creativity) permitting

But I’m gonna do mine a little different, cause the thing is, I’ve already started writing drafts for literally all of these, like years ago in some cases, so- I mean, I’ve already started writing every single one of these, and have 4+ pages on some, 16+ pages on others, and there’s no telling what year they’ll actually be posted, but here’s some things from my technically wip stuff

Basically, works that I’ve already started the process of writing but who knows when they’ll be completed and just damn, I’ve got so much

The starmora/thorkyrie one shot where Valkyrie reacts to meeting and finding out who Gamora was the way that everyone expected Thor to react to Gamora in IW (confrontational AF- cue Valkyrie harshly whispering “How can you trust them?” and Thor just deadpanning “You literally sold me into slavery when we first met”)

Starmora college AU + artist!Peter and kickboxer!Gamora

Peraltiago Contract killer!Amy and target!Jake AU

Peraltiago Conceptual photographer!Jake + Model!Amy (also, former Art Student!Amy)

Childhood friends starmora AU/both raised by ravagers

Post IW/Post Endgame thorkyrie reunion one shot

Flight attendent!Jake Peralta + hates flying passenger!Amy Santiago

Pornstar peraltiago AU + coworkers to friends to lovers trope

The married peraltiago pregnancy multichapter fic I’ve been planning for AGES

Peraltiago Actors AU (Jake and Amy are actors on a TV show called Brooklyn Legal)

More and previews/excerpts under the cut ~ 

(And because tumblr mobile is going wonky, if this post looks weird, you can just open this post in your phone’s browser and tada! It’s in a readable format and looks like how I actually posted it!)

Dude, so I’ve got some previews for some of these, but I literally just copied and pasted without editing the slightest, so you can see while I may have pages and pages written out for all these stories on microsoft word/google docs, they are still very clearly not ready to post

That multichapter peraltiago pregnancy fic that I’ve had planned since, oh, FOREVER and still haven’t gotten around to-

“I just realized I'm gonna have to stop making sex tape jokes and switch over to dad jokes.” ”Jake, you already make way too many puns to be healthy and tell soul crushingly lame jokes all the time. You already make dad jokes, but they were just called lame jokes before you had a kid. Now your lame jokes can be called dad jokes. But you always had them.”

[In baby fic Jake still tackles her and pulls her to the ground, but its a careful tackle and he always makes sure to catch her and break her fall. It's kinda amazing how quick he does it, how they'll be chasing each other and he'll pull her to the ground, pull her into him. It's almost strange, how quick and gentle he is with it. With her. At first she might have worried about his rough housing, but he was always delicate. Careful but still fun. And she never had to worry about losing her balance with him]

Jake tackles her and she's laughing and hitting him on the arm and saying ”The baby, the baby!” And he pulls back and says “You know, you can't keep using that excuse. It's not fair.” And Amy says “I've still got months and months of that excuse” and he says ”It’s like saying you have to pee during a tickle fight. Now I have to let you go.”

{When Jake says excuse not fair cause its like saying she has to pee during a tickle fight and she thinks that's a fair excuse too not just baby, Amy asks jokingly "do you want me to pee on you?" And he says "you don't know. I might be into that."}.

Contract killer!Amy and target!Jake AU-

where they used to be childhood friends but hadn’t seen each other since they were like 9 years old, and then Amy realizes she recognizes the person she was just hired to kill

She's been struggling with this dilemma in her head for the past few days and even though it's completely irrational she decides not to do it. She decides to help him. She decides to help keep him alive. She actually did a coin toss. Heads she goes through with it and shoots him, tails she helps him. She flipped the coin. It landed on heads. And that cemented her decision.

She was going to help him.

She breaks into his apartment that evening since she learned he would be out.

She wears gloves. Looks through any papers he had, trying to find financials, but there's nothing to suggest why someone wanted him dead.

She wouldn't be much use keeping him alive if she didn't know why someone wanted him dead in the first place. And all the wire transfers for who hired her were anonymous. She turns on his computer and it isn't even password protected. It was a desktop and not a laptop, but still.

He must be the most naive and trusting idiot in the world.

She looks through the files on his computer and nothing useful turns up. He's so normal it's pissing her off.

She looks through his emails and there isn't even a hint of one lousy affair.

And she doesn't feel an ounce of guilt invading his privacy because it was a whole lot nicer than killing him.

She deserved a thank you.

But she can't find anything on why anyone would want him dead.

His plans were dinner with friends or something and it's been an hour at this point and she knows he could walk through the door at any moment and catch her.

Catch her having broken into his apartment. And she still had nothing.

And she decided to fuck it and just ask him. Just sit down on the couch in his living room and ask him who would want to kill him when he gets home.

This whole operation was already fucked, why not fuck it up some more? ___

she hears him unlock and open the door when he gets home. She hears him enter, shut the door, lock it behind him.

He walks down the hallway, finally to his living room and sees her.

He just stares at her and she says "c'mon dude, why the hell is it so hard to find out who wants you dead?"

And Jake blinks a couple seconds and then he says "uh, are you okay? Do you need help or something? Do you know where you are?" He asks like she may have accidentally gotten into his locked apartment cause she had a concussion and didn't know who the hell she was.

And she says "seriously? Seriously, man? I broke into your apartment and you ask me if I'm /okay/?" She sounds frustrated.

And he says "I think that's a fair assumption unless you were the worst robber in the history of ever. I walk in and there's a stranger sitting on my couch. Not stealing my couch, sitting on my couch. Correct me if I'm wrong but professional robbers are A: supposed to take stuff and B: supposed to be gone by the time the home owner comes back. So an empty handed stranger sitting on my couch who just starts talking to me like it ain't no thang instead of trying to flee the first thing my mind jumped to was not a criminal mastermind. Though that actually might be a smart plan after all. If you would've gotten a bowl of cereal and kicked back with the TV on the only logical assumption would be that you just walked out of a hospital ward and and the homeowner would probably call an ambulance to take the obviously confused and concussed woman back to the hospital and you could just walk out the door with all their valuables while they're making that call. That would actually be a great plan."

And Amy's like "don't give me tips on how to rob you better! What the hell is wrong with you?"

And Jake says "but you're not actually robbing me, are you? Cause you're doing a pretty piss poor job of it. Since you're not actually stealing anything can tell me what the hell you are doing here?"

Pornstar peraltiago AU + coworkers to friends to lovers trope

After the confessing feelings for each other part and kissing the heck out of each other:

“Okay, this is really nice and I'm loving it, but I also wanna be with you, not whoever we're supposed to be at work. I want to be touched by Jake Peralta, you know?” Her voice tiltered out, almost wincing, but she was sure he got what she meant. “Fuck, that's all I've ever wanted. Amy Santiago. Who I watch movies with and laugh and who falls asleep on my couch and I have to resist kissing her on the forehead every time.”

Brooklyn Legal - Peraltiago TV show actors AU

Eliza was essentially the let loose wild card character in their cast ensemble, something that could not be more opposite of the actor playing the character, Amy Santiago. Jake's character was in the main cast too, Lucas, who was the awkward book type, preferring hard cover law books when he had to research any preferences for cases instead of just using a computer. Jake and Amy still end up falling for each other.

Starmora college AU + artist!Peter and kickboxer!Gamora

“Your drawings. They’re not bad,” she said simply. “And either you messed up on this one here, or that man was not showing proper form,” she pointed out, down at one of his figure drawings of a man kicking the open air.

“Would you like me to show you how it’s actually done?” Gamora offered with an air of disinterested professionalism, though he’s certain he can see a smirk that’s just begging to be brought out from her lips.

He stared at her, blinking like an idiot. Then he started nodding, still like an idiot.

She gave him a single, curt nod in return before heading back to the mat she was practicing on, this time with a specific move in mind.

Gamora moved into position, breathed out, and let it overtake her.

  "Would you like me to show you how it's actually done?" She offers with an air of disinterested professionalism, though he's certain he can see a smirk that's just begging to be brought out from her lips. Peter blinks once, twice. Like an idiot. Then he starts nodding, still like an idiot. Gamora nods at him once before walking away, walking back towards the mat, positioning herself right where she was practicing before. This time, though, with a specific movement in mind, putting on a show. She goes through her practice arsenal of moves, throwing in that one basically two or three moves, since his goal was to capture figures in motion, not figures in a pose. She kinda loses herself in the routine, and what he probably expected to be a 30 second demonstration turns into 5 minutes of her exercising and moving fluidly through her practice until she's breathing heavy and broken out into a sweat. When she decides to pause and take a break, she looks back over to her new friend/acquaintance, who is furiously scribbling in his sketchbook. Well, that's not quite true. His pencil is gliding across the page in a swift and fluid fashion, much like her movements were earlier. They're both getting their practice in of the art forms they've done a thousand times before, moving through the motions.

Conceptual photographer!Jake + Model!Amy (also, former Art Student!Amy)

When they're about to get started Amy says “I - I like your works.”

And he gives her a soft and polite smile with a “Thanks.”

And she realizes that everyone probably tells him that. Everyday. And they're probably all lying. And if they're not it was probably because they looked them up the night before and memorized all the facts so they could impress him.

That's why she got the polite smile. Because he hears that lie a million times a day by people trying to be polite or something.

And she recants immediately “No I don't. That was a total lie. I didn't even know your name until two weeks ago.” And she's totally flabbergasted but his smile is genuine now instead of polite and she doesn't know what to say or where she's going, but he has a really good smile and she just wants to keep talking so he'll keep smiling. “I like a work of yours. It was the only one I'd seen, and I didn't even know it was yours until two weeks ago when I looked you up and I saw it and I saw you made it, but I just recognized it by sight cause when I heard your name I didn't think I knew anything you ever did, but I was scrolling through it all and I realized that I'd seen it before. And I really liked it, I just didn't know who made it. I mean it's in a museum by my house and your name is on the plaque but all the times I looked at it I never even bothered to read the plaque. Not because I didn't like it, I just never read the plaques in art museums even on the stuff I really love. So I don't like you works or even really know any of them. I just really like the one.”

Childhood friends starmora AU

Later that night, after the eclector had left port, Gamora and Peter were sitting in Peter’s room, just talking.

“How come you didn’t tell me you could fix ships?” He asked, thinking that would have been something good for him to know to convince Yondu to let them take her aboard.

“I don’t,” Gamora said simply. At the confused look he gave her, she grinned something mischievous, like they were partners in crime. “I lied,” she admitted, laughing into her hand.

Peter in turn laughed that much harder.

“But I am a quick learner!” Gamora added quickly. She was pretty sure she could trust Peter, but she had still only met him today, and she had lied to his- captain? From the insolence he spoke to Yondu with, he seemed more like his father. Not in the way that Thanos insisted on calling himself Gamora’s father, but his actual father. She had come up with the lie spur of the moment, because her situation was urgent, and she needed to get off the planet as soon as possible. Anything was better than her siblings finding her and taking her back. Any repercussions from that fib paled to what would be in store if she was brought back to Sanctuary. “I’m good at memorizing stuff, so I can learn how to fix engines if the mechanic on board shows me how. I meant that, about earning my keep. I can be a- a apprentice or something. It wasn’t a total lie.”

“You’re not gonna tell him, are you?” She asked worriedly.

“What? No! I’m not a tattle tale!” Peter told her immediately, and even though she didn’t know what a tattle tale was, she could figure out what it meant from context clues. “He’ll probably figure it out on his own, though. But that’s okay-” he added quickly, when he saw the look of genuine fear in Gamora’s eyes. “Yondu says he values ‘ngenuity ‘‘n stuff. That just means if you manage to pull one over on him he’ll prolly laugh and give you a pat on the back and maybe a smack on the head for being a smart ass, but that’s it. I wouldn’t be here right now if Yondu wasn’t impressed by the few times I’ve managed to actually trick him. I mean- many times. I’ve tricked him oh so many times. Lots.”

Gamora laughed at that, because Peter was such a horrible liar. She didn’t think that was such a bad thing. No, it wasn’t bad at all.

Then flashforward like eight or so years and of Peter and Gamora fall in love because of course they do. So it’s really more of a raised by ravagers falling in love with your best friend starmora AU with a childhood friends prologue (plus some good ol fashion Peter whump with him almost dying on a solo mission they undertake cause yessss)

Post IW/post endgame Thor/Valkyrie reunion fic

“Hey! It’s me! It’s really me! I swear!” Thor held his hands up in a defensive posture, but that only seemed to anger her more.

“I know it’s you! That’s why I’m hitting you!”

She took another swing at him that he easily blocked- either she was too sleep deprived to at least hit him well, or she wasn’t trying as much as she wanted to seem.

They’d sparred before, and this definitely wasn’t even close to the full force of the Valkyrie. Still enough to hurt, though. Her movements were sloppy in a way she’d scolded him for when they had trained together following Ragnarok (“You’re too open, your majesty,” she informed him, with her trademark mocking tone at his title. Thor didn’t really mind. The teasing tone. He definitely minded the kick to the ribs he just got- it felt like they’d been punted into him. “When you swing, you swing wildly, and you make so much of yourself a target. You need to keep your hands up, when you punch, pull back, keep your shoulders tucked. It’s like you’re expecting your opponents not to hit back. Sure, you’re fine if you knock them out on the first punch, anything other than that, your technique leaves you wide open and your ribs prime for kicking,” she informed him, smirking while he was still struggling to breathe evenly again.)

It was the same too open critique she’d criticized him for months ago, the one that she said was fighting like he was expecting his opponents not to hit back. Her swings left her wide open, now.

Though, if she knew it was him, then she also knew he wouldn’t hit back. So maybe the too open fighting made sense right now.

“Aren’t you glad I’m alive?” He asked, blocking an elbow strike and deflecting the punch that followed. He caught her wrist, wrapped his hand around it before she could pull it back (“You’re too open”)

“Of course I’m glad you’re alive,” she growled, sounding much more mad than glad.

Starmora AU where they live in a seaside town and go to college together, and have a competitive rivalry going on as captains of the swimteam, then one day Gamora’s out on the ocean and a storm comes rolling in and she’s tossed overboard, only to be rescued from crashing waves by mermaid!Peter - like seriously, what the hell? This idiot that she’s known for years has a motherfucking mermaid tail???

Oh, and there’s a Sentinel/Guide AU with sentinel!Gamora and Guide!Peter

Plus, some lovely Elspeth Quill prompts that make my heart glow

Also, the B99/Peraltiago Daemon AU where Jake’s daemon is a badger named Jeremiah, and everyone’s like, how did the most cuddly person of a human being get something as scary and confrontational as an American Badger? They took on bears and wolves! On purpose!

Almost forgot about the multichapter Peraltiago space ark AU- it’s technically a series of one shots in the same universe, and a song fic, based on a concept album (so there’s 11 chapters, since the album has 11 songs in it) - I have the first chapter of this completely done, but nothing close to the other 10, and I feel bad about having so many multichapters open at the same time and updating them so slowly (hence why all this crap is in my unposted junk), but I might post chapter one of this soon just as a little ‘screw you (I say to myself and sense of obligation/anxiety), I’m having fun writing this, that’s the only mandatory thing about fic writing, if I’m enjoying myself and taking forever, that’s something to rejoice in, not feel bad about

So yeah, goodness knows when all this shit will be out. I think the closest things I have to done are the Peraltiago space ark ch 1 AU and the Thorkyrie reunion fic

Ima tag @peraltiagoisland, @nymphrea, @star-munches, @marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches, @thingssunspokenorotherwise, @interabangs, @perilinpeace @elsaclack

Please don’t feel obligated to participate if I tagged you, and if you’re looking for an example for the way you’re actually supposed to do this ask meme and not my weird way, startofamoment’s post here is good

(cough cough elsaclack i almost didn’t tag you cause i didn’t want you to be pressured cause i know how that be sometimes, but i love u, and your writing, and also wanted to wave some of my peraltiago stuff that i’m exctied about in your face and be like ‘look what I made!’/’haven’t made yet’)

But really, same goes for everyone here, you’re tagged because ily and i love your stuff, and don’t feel obligated to participate, don’t do this if it’ll stress you out/make you feel pressured in the long run, only do it if it sounds fun cause you’re all so freakin’ great and i want you to have fun

[esselley]

hi! so i just made an archive of our own account and i don't know what to post first. do you have any tips or advice for posting on ao3? do you have any tips for ao3 in general? thank you!

Hi there anon! Thank you for your question!

First things first: I think to a certain extent, what to post first is going to be entirely up to you. Whatever you feel like writing, whatever format it’s in, you should write it up and post it! Or, depending on how long you’ve been using the site as a guest, you can look through other people’s content to pay attention to tagging, author’s notes, formatting – that kind of thing. AO3 is user-friendly in most ways, and you’ll grasp it pretty quickly.

But, I do have a couple tips to help you out on your first run-through (and actually some helpful tricks I think some more familiar users may not know, as well)! 

BTW since we’re on the topic, if you use the subscribe function on AO3!!! Did you know about the different ways to subscribe to an author, a series, or an individual work?

You can only subscribe to an author from their dashboard or their profile page! If you are in the middle of reading a particular fic, and you hit the subscribe button at the top of the page, you will only subscribe to updates for that fic. Same deal if you want to subscribe to a series, you must be on the series page. Subscribing to a fic within that series will only subscribe you to that specific fic – you will get updates if that story is updated/chapters are added, but not if a new work is added to the series.

I suspect some people are unaware of this, due to the frequent amount of subscriptions I get on one-shots! (But, idk… maybe there’s just some really hopeful people out there laijefliajelsjf)

Anyway, now, onto the rest of this textbook (it got long)!

NEW WORK vs DRAFTINGWhen you go to post your very first work on AO3, you’ll go to Post > New Work at the very top to open up AO3′s drafting tool. From here, you can go through and copy over a work from Word or Google docs or whatever writing program you use, or just write up your fic in the post box itself! 

Either way you choose, you can then decide to post your work right then and there (Post Without Preview), or if you are still editing it, you can choose the Preview option. This will take you to the work as it will appear once posted; from there you can go back to the editing page, which will now have a Save Without Posting option. Use this if you would just like to save your work and come back to it later. Note: drafts are saved for one month only.

HTML vs RICH TEXTWhen you open your drafts/start a new work, the main field for your text has two options: HTML or Rich Text. HTML just shows you all HTML codes in your work. Rich Text is probably what you want to work in while editing, because you’ll only see this bar in that format:

However, sometimes you will want to use the HTML section in order to copy over text from another source that allows HTML format; for instance, Tumblr! I always copy the HTML from my tumblr fics over to AO3 when posting, because it is the easiest/fastest way to ensure the formatting stays intact. Here’s where to find that:

AVOID BACKDATED DRAFTSThis is a pitfall I encountered with my first fic I ever posted. When you create a draft, the date of posting defaults to the date you first saved the draft. So if you are like me and you draft fics way in advance of posting, you need to make sure to update the post date before you actually hit post, or it will backdate your fic – this happened with This Place in the Sky, and it was several hours before I realized it had backdated by a week, and no one was seeing it T.T Learn from my mistakes, younglings

(And if you want to backdate a draft, then you would go in here to alter the date.)

ITALICS ISSUESome people have noticed an issue with AO3 that causes fics to have odd spaces after punctuation (periods, quotation marks, dashes). This is a glitch related to italicizing when you transfer over fics from another source. To avoid having to search your entire fic for those spaces, always italicize the punctuation that precedes/follows your italicized words. For instance: 

“No!” – quotations/exclamation not italicized, glitch makes it show up as: 

“No!” – all punctuation italicized, now shows up as:

:D It’s just less of a headache to have to comb through and find all the random spaces, I find, when you just italicize beforehand! A preemptive strike. 

PARAGRAPH SPACINGLet’s look at the variations of line spacing in a posted fic: 

And here’s what this looks like in AO3′s Rich Text editor:

Sorry that is so tiny, but notice the clear difference in spaces between paragraphs while editing! There’s no actual correct way to do this, but! The “regular” option of spacing is the most common on AO3, and also the easiest to read. Avoid the no spacing option at all costs! It can be a huge headache to read, unless you are indenting paragraphs (less common on AO3, but acceptable). I tend to dislike the double spacing option as well because I feel like it breaks up the flow of wording, but that’s just personal preference.

HOW TO AVOID DOUBLE SPACING BETWEEN PARAGRAPHS

Frequent posters may also have noticed a thing AO3 does where it will insert double spaces at random intervals, often for large sections of the fic at a time, for no discernible reason. This happens often when you copy your work over from another source. But there’s an easy fix!

On MS Word and Google docs, find the “Add space after paragraph” option, and enable it for every fic you write. When you hit Enter (ONCE) to go to a new paragraph, it will autospace for you (meaning, you should not need to double tap the Enter key).

Now when you copy this over to AO3, it will read ONE SPACE reliably, giving you that regular spacing option up above. Cool news: if you copy your HTML from Tumblr to HTML on AO3, you don’t even need to worry about this. HTML be chill like that

QUICK HTML CODESAnother thing I see people asking is how to add hyperlinks! But also, did you know you can add links, bolded, and italicized text to your summary/notes as well? You just have to put them in HTML, and this:

ItalicsBoldHyperlink

will show up as:

You can easily bold/italicize/add links in the Rich Text editor, but summary/notes are HTML only and you will have to use the above. These are the most useful/common options you’ll need, I think. Try to preview before posting to make sure you got it right (and haven’t bolded your entire summary and the world with it on accident). 

LINK BACK TO TUMBLRThere’s an easy way to link your stories to Tumblr (or Twitter) that automatically includes your title, tags, summary, and all other relevant information right in the post! Just hit this button at the top of your fic, once it’s posted – it’ll take you to the Tumblr log-in screen, so log-in and from there you can edit the post. This is what I use to make all my AO3 fic posts on Tumblr \o/

TAGS/SYNOPSISFinally, more of a stylistic note! Be thoughtful when tagging your fic/writing a synopsis. In general, try to be clear and concise, so people can see what they’re getting into at a glance. Tag what’s important to the theme and tone of your fic. This really varies from person to person… maybe you want to tag every single thing your fic encompasses! I find really long tags to be overwhelming when browsing AO3, and prefer simple ones. I tend to overtag more for smut-heavy/PWP than I do for longer, plot driven fics.  

Your summary should also be clear and to the point, and describe the content of the fic. You can put any other thoughts in your beginning and end notes; if you are leaning towards saying anything like “sorry this sucks this is my first fic/I am bad at summaries/etc” just leave that out! If you don’t like summaries, use a quote from the fic. You don’t have to apologize for posting, even if you don’t think it’s a Shakespearean masterpiece. You still wrote a fic, and that’s awesome!

This is everything I could think of for the time being…I hope it’s helpful!!

[crispyflowerblaze]

school tips, because maybe i can give better advice than administration, who just loves to tell us to get involved 3000000000000 times a day

Find to have some fun each day. Okay, yeah, this is pretty hard. And sometimes impossible, but I think it’s pretty important to try, at least a few times a week or whenever the heck you want, to do something fun by yourself either outside or in your room. Something I’m gonna try to do every day is play a few songs from a musical (probably Book of Mormon) and like just completely PERFORM it, like jump on my bed, dance all over, and sing loudly and stuff like that, IT’S SO FUN and i recommend it!!!!! I just really hope you’re able to do something fun

Okay, spoiler alert, this is actually basically taken from an actual school recommended tip. I’m gonna try to summarize my day after school, I have a google doc called “summarizing what i did each day, or using memes to help me remember stuff” and I just do what the title says, but I also... use memes... which just memes it’s not completely serious, and then I have a “general stuff” section, which explains itself I guess, and then, the best part, is “today’s big mood” and that’s taking one funny or relatable thing I remember that happened. And I think this is gonna be helpful because I can look back on previous days and review, also I can remember funny things and I love doing that!

Use memes in your notes/other shit. This is probably the most important tip. Making “actual serious notes” is SO. BORING. And this is speaking as an A student who most of the time only capitalizes things in personal writing (not stories; like non-story google docs and tumblr posts) for THIS KIND OF STUFF and uses a whole fricking ton of wrong spelling for stuff. I wanted this to be at least a tiny “professional” so I’m capitalizing my “I”s blah blah blah. But when people tell you using text speech will destroy how you write, DON’T. LISTEN. Okay, I’m getting off topic, but anyways, MAKE NOTES AND STUFF FUN. I do this with memes and by shortening EVERYTHING. Do references and funny stuff and if you don’t have free time for fun things, try to make you study/homework time fun!!! Please!!!!! I want you to have fun!!!!!! FUN. IS. FUN. (also, unrelated, but doing things like CAPITALIZING EVERYTHING is really an amazing freedom if you’ve worried about it being annoying. please do things on personal writing and tumblr posts that you have worried about people judging you for! the freedom is amazing!)

USE GOOGLE DOCS. Another really important one for people whose school uses a lot of technology. Google Docs is just amazing, and it’s super convenient!!!!! If you know your email and password (if you’re not sure PLEASE WRITE IT DOWN) then you can always reach it if,,,,, like,,,, you have access to a computer. So if for some reason you have a school laptop that doesn’t connect to your home wifi and you have access to a computer at home, then you can go on that google account and access them; also, it doesn’t take long to get a doc shared and then to go on the account you shared it with. Then from there, or whenever, you can transfer things onto a word or pages document if you need to. So Google Docs should be your go-to thing!!

(adding onto/related to the memes section) Experiment with ways to remember homework/study. Everybody does these things differently, so yeah start with a generic one and make it your own! In 7th grade and most of 8th, I used a “homework chart” which is pretty self explanatory and I filled stuff out for each class. This year I think I’m gonna stick my homework in my summarizing doc. If doing something in a funner (i’m strangely attached to the non-word-but-should-be “funner”) way than the bare minimum of study techniques, FIND OUT WHAT WORKS FOR YOU! Adding onto that, make your own additions to my rules or ignore them completely! Make your own! Whatever! And back to the weird ways to study, last year, for my history EOC, I made possibly the best thing I’ve ever created. It was called “8th grade history in a nutshell” and was sprung from my love of “hamilton in a nutshell” videos and similar ones to other musicals, and the “-musical- in a nutshell” things I’ve done myself. I basically just used memes to describe what I’d learned in history class, using a bunch of Hamilton references, and also, my favorite section, where Andrew Jackson basically just says “FUCK YEAH -something-” or “FUCK NO -something-” because, as I explained, Andrew Jackson was more of a hothead than Alexander Hamilton. So like... I can’t say it enough,,,.. but USE MEMES! That’s what makes learning fun.

Use your knowledge for the True Real-Life Applications. Have you been badgered with that horrible phrase, “real-life applications”? Has it sucked your will to math or science completely? Then reclaim that sucky phrase! My adventures in Reclaiming The Sucky Phrase “Real-Life Applications” include finding out how many miles, feet, and inches there are in a light year, memorizing the number of miles in a light year (um... shoot, i DID have it memorized!), finding out how to pronounce these horribly long numbers, and finding out how many light years the whole human race has probably walked! (2.2 light years. So light travels more in 3 years than the whole human race has walked!) And that was just one day with my friend in science class last year. I also figured out if you could fit the moon in the Pacific Ocean (you can dip it in the center of the Pacific Ocean and it won’t touch continents, but it will touch the bottom, and it’s a LOT taller than the ocean!) and when my dad said (exaggerating, obviously) he got a random pain about every 15 minutes while he was awake, and that he slept about 6 hours a night, I calculated how many times a day, a month, a year, a decade with no leap years (which does not exist XD), a minute, a non-leap-year February, in August, and in a 30 day month he would get a pain. It’s hilarious XD. My point is, you can have fun by figuring things out using the stuff you’ve used and it’s a much better review than homework. (uh, do your homework)

Sometimes musicals can teach you stuff, so like,,,,, listen to musicals,,,,,, that’s all. (Hamilton act 1 for reviewing and Cabinet Battles for history reviews!!!!!!! Trust me)

Speed walking is great! And every time teachers/staff tell you that 5 minutes is completely enough time to CROSS A HUGE CAMPUS THAT YOU BARELY EVEN KNOW WITH A HORRIBLE AMOUNT OF TRAFFIC, I feel you. I am here for you. It’s stupid and unfair. But please, rant to me or somebody who understands how it’s STUPID too instead of teachers/staff. I don’t think it’s a good idea. But yes, please, I understand what you’re going through. It’s dumb as heck.

Judging by all of the “high school will just seem like a bad dream!!” I can assume it’s true. Of course everyone has different high school experiences and problems, but if you want to talk to me and we can rant together, that’d be great!! Ranting is completely fine, so I just hope things will get better. :D

[paintedrecs]

You're such a good author!! What are you thinking when you're writing? And what's your editing process? If you don't mind me asking!!

Ah, thank you!! I’m very often thinking “wow I am not a good author” while I’m writing, so it’s always nice to hear positive responses once the finished work is out there. :)

This ended up (unsurprisingly) long, so be aware there’s gonna be a Read More.

My editing process is very, very nitpicky. To begin with, I edit a LOT as I write, so those two questions share some answers. 

I considered posting a photo of a page I handwrote this week, but I don’t want to subject you to that. Suffice it to say that if I’m writing in pen, there’s a lot of scribbling and paragraphs that branch off into the margins and spiral around the edges of the page as I rework sentences and expand sections. Before I switched to writing almost exclusively on my computer, I used to use a mechanical pencil to make all that a little less messy. Still, though. Eraser shavings. Everywhere.

It seems like most of fandom swears by writing sprints, and I can’t do it. I either write in long, tireless stretches where I forget to move for hours, or I spend an hour writing a sentence, frowning thoughtfully at it, tweaking a few words, tilting my head to the side, changing it back, muttering, “No I don’t like that,” and shifting the structure until it fits with the rest of the story.

I spend a lot of time reading my own writing out loud, which is part of why I’m not usually that productive when I try to write in public. (Although once I’m in the zone, I’ll write on my phone as I walk to the grocery store, take the bus to work, etc. I probably still mutter to myself.) At this point, my poor neighbor has probably heard the entirety of all my fics in scattered bursts. I’ll read a single paragraph to myself six times in a row to make sure the pacing sounds right and the dialogue feels natural.

I’m a start-to-finish writer: if I write scenes out of order, they won’t work in the final version. With tide pulls, I wrote all this emotional, ultra angsty dialogue that I was expecting to stick into one of their final scenes, but by the time I got there, it didn’t fit. I initially tried to squeeze stuff around it to keep those lines intact, but it’s never a good idea to force your characters into something that they don’t naturally want to do over the course of the story. It rings false, and I think readers can generally tell.

That’s not to say that I don’t plan ahead or map out certain arcs or important scenes. I just don’t write them in their full form until I’ve reached that point. PDIW was much, much too long to plunge through without an outline; if I hadn’t marked down and organized all the emotional points I wanted to hit, I would’ve lost control over the scope of it. (Which is ridiculous to say when it’s over 200k, but it had the most detailed outline I’ve ever made for one of my stories.) 

Still, though, pieces moved around a lot. I’d push a scene into a later chapter when it turned out that Derek and Stiles needed to talk to each other more before getting to that exchange. Or a conversation that was meant to be between Derek and Laura ended up being between him and Cora instead, catching both of us by surprise. Laura was always Derek’s best friend and confidante, but he turned out to have a lot more in common with his younger sister than he’d ever realized. Of course I had to let that play out. 

There are a few sentences I desperately wanted to get into the final version, but they’re clumped at the bottom of my notes doc, along with all the other unused or deleted material. Sometimes you think a phrase sounds really, really pretty, but if your character doesn’t want to say it, that’s all there is to it. 

I don’t have a beta for my shorter fics, because by the time I’m done writing, I’ve probably spent more time editing than actually putting new words down on the page. (Unless they’re tumblr fics or notfics, in which case please forgive the fact that they’re wobbly; they’re just me having fun!) That doesn’t make the final product perfect by any means, but I don’t have a regular beta set up to read over my fics for me, and I don’t like bugging people unless it’s necessary.

For my longest fics, I tried to rope in at least 2-3 betas. It seems like most people in fandom just share their fic’s Google Drive link, sometimes while it’s still a WIP, and have their betas all work in the same doc. It may be annoying that I don’t do that…but I want to get separate, unbiased responses. If multiple people tell me to fix the same thing, it definitely needs more work. With that said, I’ve found that there actually doesn’t tend to be all that much overlap, because betas have different styles in much the same way that writers do.

The fandom dream (or any writer’s dream) is to have a set, longterm writer-beta relationship, because it really does involve a lot of trust and communication. One of my PDIW betas was the wonderful @bleep0bleep​ , who prodded tirelessly at all my pronouns and long paragraphs but also took the time to learn my style and where I most need/want help. (She also laughed at me when I had conversations with myself in the comments while figuring out how to fix passages that she’d told me weren’t working.) She and other betas found gaps that you simply can’t see for yourself after spending that long immersed in your own story. I ended up writing a few extra scenes and expanding some other areas, and the final version is absolutely better as a result.

If this was going to be a published work, I would’ve ideally set it aside for several months so I could come back to it with fresh eyes. My posting schedule for PDIW was already months behind what I’d originally planned, and I was super eager to share it, so I rushed right into the next stage. I also very much wanted to start posting on April 1, since that was Stiles’s birthday in the fic.

So I finished writing the final chapter, gave myself about a day to celebrate, then went right back to the first chapter and started editing. My betas got those pretty-much-completed chapters, and I took their edits and suggestions and transferred them back into my central doc. Then I started drafting the fic on AO3, editing each chapter one final time as I was posting. 

It was…tiring. I wrote the fic in about 7 months and edited the entire thing twice…almost three times?…in a little over a month. I’m going to give myself more leeway if I ever do that again. Thank goodness for my speed-reading betas, though.

I don’t know if any of that was the kind of information you were interested in hearing. Welcome to my writing world, I guess? It’s a little messy, but it has pretty intricate organization if you know what to look for.

As for what I’m thinking as I’m writing…that’s a complicated answer. Is it weird to say that I’m kind of not thinking anything? Writing is a craft, but it’s also a strangely instinctive part of myself that I tap into when it’s going well. I absolutely cannot write if I’m busy thinking about where a scene should go or whether anyone’s going to like reading it or if I even remember how to string words together. That’s the kind of thing that makes me slam right up against writer’s block. Or, if I do manage to get words down, they’re clunky and I’m never really satisfied with them.

When I sit down to write, I do my best to clear my mind out. I tap into my characters. If I’m writing from Derek’s POV, I’m seeing him - all his gestures, mannerisms, the actions he’s taking in a scene - but it’s more important to me that I’m feeling what he’s feeling. The same goes for Stiles, or anyone else whose eyes I’m trying to see through. I guess I’m an emotional writer? I want to feel things as I’m writing, and if I did it right, my readers should feel things, too. It doesn’t always work, but when it does, it’s incredibly rewarding.

Reading has always been an escape for me. When I’m wrapped up in a book, I lose touch with the world around me and slide into the pages, living alongside the characters. Writing’s the same way. It’s an indescribable, addictive feeling. 

When I finished PDIW, it almost felt like I’d lost a part of myself, because I was letting go of something I’d been living with and dreaming about and spending so much time getting to know.

I’m glad I got to share it, though. It’s a wrenching, terrifying process, but you all made it worthwhile. The final step of a story is its readers. Thank you for being amazing ones, and for letting me share my words with you.

[unordinary-analysis]

Episode 171

Honorable mentions:

Blyke smiling at the beginning was so endearing I love him

I have to admit to you guys, I did read this episode when it came out and at the time I still had yet to write the episode 170 thing. Didn't affect me though so it doesn’t really matter lol

I want Darren to bring up Blyke’s injuries to Isen because he obviously thinks that Blyke got his injuries while fighting Isen, but whenever I want things like this to happen, they never do :(

Isen’s reaction to confrontation is always to hide

I can’t see Sera’s eyebags in this one that's a good sign

Not a lot of actual things to say about Sera learning about John’s past because we already know it and she’s just repeating things that other people have said

Evie getting attacked by Joker? I’m torn between thinking this is some prank and thinking that we’re getting the Sera/John confrontation right now. The whole call was just presented in such a strange way, I have no clue what that’s about?

finally getting on track with updates, hopefully they won’t always be a week late now r.i.p.

is it analyse or analyze because google docs says 1, but tumblr says 2

Have low expectations for this one, friends. But there is 0.1% substance in this post, so still worth it ;)

Somehow this got kind of long? This isn’t read through or edited, I just typed and posted

The fucking bruise:

    I hope you don’t mind the obvious contrast in professionalism between this episode analysis and the one for 170, but the fuckkksufkhsk? Starting this off with Blyke’s confusion when he is significantly more healed than he was last night that it wouldn’t be possible for him to be so okay? You really gotta do me like that huh? Dropping a bomb like that so early on? But the thing about this is that I cannot think of a logical answer for this? I even considered that what he said just meant that doc got hella good at healing, especially because John has complimented doc on that a couple of times, but it was clear that that was not possible and not what was meant to be understood. 

    I’ve already apologized for lack of professionalism, so to hell with introductions and transitions: this implies one of two things:

Blyke has regenerative powers that are emerging from him now that he’s leveling up

Someone healed Blyke without him knowing

    Starting with #1, the possibility of Blyke having healing powers of some kind at first looks like the more likely answer until you realize that Blyke’s ability is deadass “energy beam” and that makes no contextual sense. But this is the first thing that I, and I’m positive most of you, thought. It’s the most logical reason as to why Blyke went to sleep with noticeably worse injuries than when he woke up. I’m kind of stupid regarding abilities in UnOrdinary, so I’m not sure if this blend of two totally different powers is something special or different, but could you imagine how overpowered Blyke would be? That would be insane. And would give him a total edge over John, or anyone for that matter, because he has both an offense and a defense. The thing about this though is that I’m almost positive that this is wrong purely because I do not think Blyke would have healing powers along with his laser powers. Like I cannot see that happening and that fact makes me sad. But there’s just no way. Right? ???

    But now #2: someone else did it. And, yes this looks a bit iffy at first, but that’s the second thing I thought of and I literally have nothing else so sit down. Anyway, this is also a very interesting option, so I’m hyped about that. Because if this is the case then that means it’s either Elaine, Tanner, John copying one of their abilities (this entire post is a bit of a stretch why can’t I include this huh), or an unknown character. But the thing is. However unlikely it is, I can’t help but wonder if this is Kuyo’s doing. We don’t actually know his ability yet and he was watching Blyke last night. I think this is probably the most possible thing I’ve said so far, and that’s saying something, but yeah. Otherwise, there’s really nothing I can think of because I can’t even imagine why someone would 1. Be able to find out Blyke was hurt and 2. Sneak into Isen’s room to heal him. Anyway, I’m just confused in general. Excited, but confused.

    Call me stupid in the comments if I missed something else that this could mean because sometimes I just forget things or don’t think of things lol. And right now I especially feel like I’m missing something?

Sera:

    Okay, it’s been weeks and I still get excited because Sera’s learning everything about John. For multiple reasons: one, because she’s known him since the beginning and everything she learns just hits that much harder and two, because she’s probably the character who is going the most in depth with her discovery. She’s for sure the character that has cared the most about knowing who John really is and I really think because of her investigation into John, we’re going to learn something new about him too, maybe if she goes online or something. Maybe she’ll remember something personal that John said and that Isen didn’t know about and she’s able to look online about it and finds something, wouldn’t that be heartbreaking because not only did John betray her, but he was very genuine about it if that makes sense (it doesn’t)? Ignore me, I like to imagine things though and I can really see just Sera’s whole process as a whole go somewhere emotional for both her and John.

    The thing about this, though, is that I do think she’s going to confront John really soon. Probably like in a few episodes or something based on how she’s talking in this one to Isen, so not really sure if what I just talked about is going to fit, but maybe that stuff can happen in their conversation. I don’t know. I just want a moment where Seraphina and John really realize that they’ve lost their friendship and both get sad about it, is that a bad thing to want? Probably. But who knows, John’s in a weird state right now, I don’t really think he’ll get all sad and stuff, he’ll likely get angry or something. Wait, now I want a build up when Sera confronts John where you think he’s going to blow up on her or something, but suddenly he breaks down, letting us see the person behind all of his decisions and actions because John knows he’s a monster (I’m using the fact that he pretended to be a cripple for literally a long ass time to prove this) and that he can’t hide from that. I want to see John confront himself with that and I want Sera to be there. And I know I sound like satan right now, but screw it, this is already very unprofessional. I'm not even analyzing I’m just typing anything that I think.

    On a genuine note, though, I was very happy with Sera explaining how she didn’t think that cripple John was ‘faking’ it. She said, “All the stuff he used to preach to me about… I don’t think he was faking it. He meant everything he said. He regretted his previous actions… and he tried to change.” This is probably the first time another character has really thought about John’s developing character over these events rather than just what he did. Sera is the only one who truly reflected on John and I’m grateful for that. I have to admit, when I first read this episode, I got excited because I thought it kind of supported the big and dramatic claims I’ve been making recently about John, but it doesn’t really. It, however, does nothing to harm it so that’s a win :).

    Anyway, something very interesting to me was Seraphina’s question regarding John’s decision to become a cripple. I don’t think I’ve considered this in depth before so this question was pretty surprising to me to see from Sera. She doesn’t understand why John enrolled as a cripple in Wellston as opposed to a mid-tier or someone who would have less chance of being singled out in general. And I’m going to answer this based on what fits with what I’ve been saying about John. If you haven’t read it, go to my page and either scroll or search for episode 167 because I really tried to be detailed there. Anyways, I think John decided to be a cripple just because he felt like the farther away from his bad self he was, the better off he’d be because what Sera doesn’t understand yet is that John wasn’t just trying to hide from other people when he transferred to Wellston, he was also trying to hide from himself. He probably felt distance was the best way to do that and I use the fact that he moved from a town relatively far away to Wellston (according to Isen’s early interrogation of John) as evidence. Anyway, Seraphina doesn’t think about this or maybe just doesn’t believe that and says that it was a bad idea for John to pose as a cripple purely because it forced him to place himself in a position similar to his before he gained his powers, and obviously it didn’t lead to the best place last time. 

    I do think Seraphina is wrong in one thing, however. She thinks that John doesn’t want to be put in the same situation as he was before New Bostin, she labels that as his downfall, but I personally believe that John might have done this on purpose to feel as least powerful as he could. But I don’t really have any reasoning behind that though so, dead end. But something else that I disagree with Seraphina on was how she said, “And just like before… He couldn’t handle the pain of being a cripple.” I read that for the first time and just thought damn. That was such a cold statement. And in response all I have to say is that John was handling the pain of being a cripple just fine, it was only when he was forced to shed that that he lost grip of his facade. Seraphina is completely wrong on this point, and I hope she learns that in the future. Like, I’m sorry, but that statement could literally not be more incorrect. I’m stunned at how much that contradicts reality.

[fitzonomy]

what *is* your writing process?

First, it always starts with something half-formed. “What-ifs?,” blurry memory of dreams, people watching, drawing. And then you get to play scientist. If you buy into dichotomies of “science vs art,” then think of a writer being the best of both skill sets.For any skill though, the first step is always, always, always observation. So my process relies on being able to observe the outside world, my internal states, the interactions between these two, and how they shape or change one another. This all seems super abstract, but this is good practice for think about how fictional, non-existent characters might be formed. Second, become familiar with different forms of writing and what type of literary genre is best suited to tell the type of story you want to tell. Some stories aren’t multi-chapter worthy (if they aren’t and you try to force it, it’ll show. Trust me). There are three types of things to know about writing: mechanics of language, story structure, and being a writer.Third, sit that booty down and write. THIS IS THE HARDEST PART. Wanna know why? Because those first two things get put to the test AND you gotta write. You can read a lot of guides on writing but you really won’t know what you don’t know until you do something. You can work with something; you can’t work with nothing. If it stays in your head, it’ll always be this flurry of blurry ideas that never quite come to fruition. Characters on life support. Events in current stasis. A scene that runs through your head constantly like “Call Me Maybe.” But this “paint-by-numbers” method is kind of canned bullshit, the Easy Mac of advice about writing that isn’t really helpful. What all writers need is practical and useful advice that is: actionable, goal-oriented, and produces tangible, deliverables (aka something you can deliver and there is a trail for it). So, you can know the difference between an em dash and an en dash (there’s a difference, pinky swear), but it’s gonna do you shit good if you want to write. It’s super easy to tell people, “Just write!” You wanna know something? I’ve not worked on any ongoing stories I post for free on AO3 (another good rule? Promote the hell out of the stuff you work hard on. Ain’t no shame in having pride in your work). Why?Eh, I guess I could blame it on all sorts of things but, honestly, I’ve not taken the time to open the fucking documents on my many portable computing devices. You want to know “Ash’s Super Official Pragmatic Guide to Writing a Shit Ton Based on Her own Experiences that May NOT produce 100% Quality Results You Wanna Share with the World but Damn if it Won’t Make You Write a LOT.”? Okay, here it is:1. Only hand-write for quick notes, sketching out ideas, and the like. Don’t write by hand and then think you’re gonna transfer it over digitally all nice like. It wastes time, energy, and you’ll spend way too much fucking time agonizing over drafts as they exist on paper. That shit is for quick and dirty work.2. Open a word processor document OR a Google Doc. Honestly, I’ve moved to working almost exclusively on Google Docs because I can share with people more easily for editing. Word of caution: Docs won’t have some functionality like most word processing software but it isn’t the end of the world. Just see what you can live with.2a. Yes. You will get frustrated with learning how to type and use hotkeys and deal with stupid computer issues (like when things start tabbing over for no fucking reason). Don’t let this stop you. If you can understand what’s going on (i.e. it does not affect cogency/intelligibility), figure that shit out later when you’ve got time.3. While we’re on the subject, if you can only muster the energy to do ONE thing for a story, open a new document/start a new doc and NAME THE FUCKER. Once a thing is named, it exists. Congrats! You’ve now begun.4. You know all those tidbits you got floating around? Okay, pick one. You’re gonna bleed that thing dry. DO NOT: focus on character description. DO NOT have 90% dialogue. Not yet, at least. DO NOT focus on scene description. There is a start, there is an end. You know what they are. Make ‘em meet up.5. Eh, they can’t all be 80 Chapter epics. I’ve got a literal ton of digital documents that consist of three pages that are short and sweet--simply based on an idea that couldn’t go anywhere OR that I realized I had no interest in pursuing once I started writing. Once you get that thing finished, save it and then say, “Eh, that’s it for that.”6. Set yourself some goals. I don’t find it’s super helpful to chart my progress in days or hours but rather in pages. For all my AO3 shit, approx. 16 pages per chapter is what I’ve hit. Is it ideal? Nah. But it was my goal when I first started writing. So if I know I’ve got 16 pages to do something, I break it up by big landmarks. For a lot of chapters, I know where it begins and I know what the ending will be. I know things I want to happen (whether it works out is a writing process thing) so I work to put together the dots.7. Things you should always be asking yourself: is this boring me? Are my characters bored? If they were real people and I kept telling them to do these things, would they tell me to fuck off? Like, I don’t know about other people, but I’ve got one character (obvs, it’s Rook) who I’ve been writing and thinking about forever in different incarnations and she is SUPER bossy and opinionated and I FEEL bad, like physically/mentally, if I realize I’ve mistreated her (e.g. made her do something she wouldn’t do). If you’re bored, I’m bored. The end. There ARE times where you’re writing will be less compelling then other parts of your story, but boredom is something quite different. Downtime/quiet moments are not synonymous with tedious, drawn-out, “please shoot me already” writing. A lot of this depends, again, on observation. I know I kinda shit on the “Three Things” thing I made up and outlined at the beginning, but it doesn’t make them any less true. You need to be able to observe yourself. You’ve got habits. Some need to be changed if you wanna write a lot. What you need to write is different than what I need to write. I love using tools like pomodoro, pomodroido, and toggl. There are a lot of tumblr posts that have links to sites where it forces you to write 500 words before it lets you access your browser again (HA, joke is on it because I can just open up Firefox--obvs, site-blocking apps do shit for me because I eventually change browsers or just end up disabling the app) or you write one word at a time and so on. Heck, there’s a whole wiki dedicated to NaNoWriMo with TONS of resources concerning software and the like.BUT, this is all gonna mean shit without some motivation and accountability. Motivation is easy to unpack (you gotta want to do it, whatever your reasons. It might be good to unpack those but that’s a personal thing). Accountability? Well, that’s trickier. You can make yourself accountable (e.g. “I will write three pages a day, single-spaced, 12 pt font every day without revisions.”). But I find having external motivators better. I surround myself with people who write, I have a lovely and wonderful beta, and I also do things like this where I bluntly ask people to make me talk about (AND THINK ABOUT!) what I’m doing. If you’ve got more specific questions, hit me up!(also, @nonsensicaldiary, you asked this).