#what do I do. in the interim. to get there

[play-now-my-lord]

hi, i'm trans/nb netfreak frog k, the writer. you might know me for my shitposts about... idk, the library of alexandria or dogs knowing how steel works or whatever? i don't really know what people know anymore.

i need help. i'm in recovery from a period of at least three years of b12/b9 deficiency, maybe longer. it struck in a big way after a nasty bout of covid in early 2020 and i only knew it was a major problem last month. after a month of 40,000x strength capsules i can just now feel my legs well enough to reliably walk unassisted. in the context of that, i've been wrestling with housing scarcity, one of those fun moving-target disabilities where some days i'm fully capable of feeding myself and some days i can barely stand upright, and a sort of soul-shattering paranoid depression that's made it incredibly hard to reach out to people and ask for help, or really maintain social relationships at all.

i'm due to consult further with a doctor and make sure there's nothing worse wrong with me than any of that this week. in the interim i have about ten dollars to my name and have been subsisting on frozen waffles and corn chips for days; the car i rely on to get frozen food i can cook myself at the store is on its last legs, creaking and groaning at stops and flashing an ABS light intermittently.

i think raising $500 or so would offer some degree of stability while i figure this shit out. i really want to get back to working but it's kind of hard to imagine anything my diseased dropout ass can do right now. reblogs always appreciated, and feel free to link to this or w/e on whatever platform.

cashapp - $asimplefrog ko-fi (for paypal users) - frogk

thank you all again; i promise i'll be around again as soon as i can. <3

[carmenized-onions]

Ad Interim. | No Service

logline; The days and doubts and desires; the air, underneath the shoe.

[!!!] series history, this is the ninth; the amount of links are getting nauseating just go to the landing LMAO.

Spotify Playlist, if you like to listen while you read. I listen to it when I write :) Constantly gettin’ added to. I listen to this playlist too much in my day to day now, fr.

portion; 3k+

possible allergies; you're almost ten chapters in, you know very well by now that these two are rife with anxiety and insecurity.

pairing; Carmen ‘Carmy’ Berzatto & Fem Reader (gets she/her'd mb)

fun fact: i finished this one 19 hours after the last chapter, whoops, but let it sit in my drafts to give some breathing room and do some rework

It is t-minus three days, until the worst Friday of your life.

But today’s Tuesday, and though you feel a touch uneasy, you figure it’s probably just the breakfast from yesterday at La Mattina settling in your stomach— Or, at least, hope it is.

You’re at home, sitting on your couch, pensive, haggard, leaned over. Elbows to knees, prayer hands to face, staring at your phone on the coffee table in front of you.

Just send it. Just send the text. Don’t be a fucking wuss. You’ve re-written it in your notes app like five fucking times— He does not care this much, he doesn’t even have basic reading comprehension— Okay, that’s mean— But it’s just not that deep. Just fucking! Send it!

Actually no, no, upon sixth review, the paragraph you had written out was way too intense, way too presumptive. Backspace, backspace, backspace—Just say hi. Let’s just start with Hi.

‘Yooooooooo’

Are you fucking possessed? Good Lord. How is he already typing he never used to reply this fast, what the fuck—

‘Are u fucking haunted?’

‘Fuck is yooooooo’

‘Yooo to you too, cousin’

Faster texter now, but Richie is still the same guy, at the end of the day.

‘this is a loaded fucking question’

‘but do you think you’ll be free any time this week?’

‘not unless ur dead or dying’

‘are you dead or dying?’

‘not that I’ve heard’

‘but I was thinking maybe we could like, get food or smth’

‘chat one on one. Been a minute, yknow’

That was too much. You didn’t need to do all that. Now he’s gonna go well who’s fault is that? And it’s yours. You know it’s yours. And then you’re gonna have that fucking conversation— Which is what this whole meet up thing was supposed to be about in the first place—

‘heard’

‘can’t get time off but fak needs to have his training wheels ripped’

‘could have dinner at the bear this week? Like 2 hours. Then I can watch him and keep him from shitting the bed’

‘and still get to do a fucking one on one, you corporate speak ass’

‘I didn’t know how else to fucking say it alright!!!!!!’

‘Dinner @ bear sounds good to me’

‘but probably ask carm/syd first if it’s cool’

‘yea yea I’ll fuckin check in with daddy don’t worry’

‘that sucked for me. That sucked to read. Go to jail.’

‘already have.’

‘I’ll let u know a time when I know. See u chip’

You heart it. The classic signal that it’s the end of a conversation. Holy shit. You did it. You actually texted someone that you miss that you miss them— Not directly, but you know Rich knows. And specifically, to book a dinner, to talk about what happened, to apologize for it. That’s pretty fucking huge. Which means—

It’s time to eat a whole freezer cake and lay in your pyjamas all day and interact with not a single soul on this entire planet. You’re absolutely at your social limit, for the day. Maybe you’ll talk it through with Mikey, actually. To the air, more accurately, but, y’know, same thing.

You’re gonna get dinner with Richie. You’re gonna get dinner, with Richie, this Friday. And it’s not gonna be awkward or weird, at all.

It is t-minus two days, until the worst Friday of Carmen’s life, so far, at least. There’s always next year.

But today’s Wednesday, and though he feels a little nerve-wracked, he’s pretty sure it’s just because the kitchen was so fucking dysfunctional this morning, and now that their prep’s off, the tempo of the whole fucking day is off, and they're behind on two tables. And fucking seriously this time, can someone get him a fucking marker that fucking works.

Okay, maybe it’s a little more, than nerve wracked.

Sydney is ever the intuitive, and always correct, at the station next to him— Because yes, they’re still down a hire since the meth guy, so now Carmen is on line.

She can tell, that somethings wrong with him, something’s always wrong with him. “Take your ten, Chef.”

Carmen shakes his head, obviously, there’s still prep to catch up on. And if he doesn't do it, it's not gonna get done, and even if it does get done, it's not gonna get done right. He’s pressing the dead sharpie down on the tape, like if he just brute forces it, it’ll start to work. “M’good, Chef.”

“Carmen.” She turns to him fully, stopping her work. And so, he does too. “Take your fucking ten.” She deadpans, she’s not taking no for an answer. She rubs her fist over her heart.

Carmen takes a beat, before nodding, doing the same. “Heard, Chef.”

He needs to look over expense reports that he can’t quite comprehend, anyways.

He really needs his sister. He steps into his office. Despite the fact that they re-constructed just about everything in the restaurant, this musty office remains the same. Untouched. After caving down walls, they had to cut the budget somewhere. He’s glad though, that it's untouched. It might be crowded, poorly organized, have an off smell (probably because of the birth in here, just a few weeks back), but it’s exactly as his brother left it, and that helps him feel… Connected, somehow.

What the hell is Var vs Budget? He’s googling every other word, here. He’s more than grateful, that before going home on mat leave, Sug set up a good enough automated Excel sheet that he could just plug in numbers and it did all the calculating for him. Doesn’t mean he knows what any of the numbers mean, but, they’re there.

He knows that red equals bad. Natalie told him that very specifically. Which did seem like she was calling him fucking stupid, but he let it go. There’s a lot of red. That’s a lot of bad. Well, not a lot, but like, a third of this is red. That’s probably more than it should be. How many months do they have again? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

He is never gonna get to pay himself, he’s never gonna be able to pay Syd, he's never gonna get her a star, she’s gonna live with her dad for the rest of her life, you are never gonna get to work here, you’re gonna work as a bottle girl for the rest of your life, he’s never gonna get his shit together so he’s never gonna get to call you his, he’s gonna have to hand the deed to Cicero and then fucking everyone is gonna to lose their jobs and he’s still gonna be him. He’s still gonna be him. Carmy Berzatto, the chef that lost everything, little brother to everyone's hero who blew his brains out. Starless in Chicago, unable to feel anything more than sorry for himself. Carmen’s gonna die as Carmen, and nothing more. At the end of the day.

Take a deep breath, Bear. Relax.

He’s catastrophizing. You told him that. He forgot to look into it. He googles that, instead of another business term he doesn’t understand.

‘Fixates on the worst possible outcome and treats it as likely, even when it is not.’

Well, it does seem pretty fucking likely that he’s doomed to fail and fall into a Sisyphean nightmare of opening restaurants and falling on his fucking face, dragging everyone he loves down with him with his stupid failed pipe dreams. He's no better than his brother.

He tries his best to think of whatever level-headed bullshit you'd give to him, right now, tries to taste the hot chocolate, the lavender and cardamom coffee. He smells your shampoo, in his hair, that helps.

Maybe, maybe it’s just been a bad week. Maybe there will be a lot of bad weeks, maybe there won’t be. Maybe things will be fine, maybe they won’t. You and Syd will still succeed, even if he fails. Everyone will, even if he fails. He has a very capable crew. And while he cannot escape the thought that failure is around the corner, at the very least, he is comforted by the idea that at least he will be the only one sinking with the ship he commands.

The thought of drowning alone is still impossible to rid of. Though.

But you’ve sent a text. And isn’t that a wonderful distraction?

Your connection results in response to his, from this morning, of course. You actually got it today. He swells with what feels like pride, and despite the fact that no one's looking at him, he has to hide his smile with his hand, embarrassed by how happy he is, when he sees the photo you’ve sent, just now. A selfie, sitting next to an oven, Other Tony’s oven. You’re holding a fried wire in your hand.

The text below it is a wonderful salve, ‘If you ever fuck up your ovens, I’ve got like, 10 thermocouples in my personal stock now :))’

So good to him, too good to him. Too good to anyone. ‘Heard.’

Carmen so, so fucking desperately wants to ask you to come to The Bear, right now. You’re only two blocks away, at La Mattina. You’d come, if he asked. He knows that. But he also knows that even if you calm him down, in the long run, it’ll set his day even further off tempo, he’ll be distracted the rest of his shift, and that’s the last thing he needs. He can handle this himself.

‘:)’ For levity. Or something. He’s trying. You give it a heart, so that means he’s done something good, he’s pretty sure.

There’s a knock at his door. Richie does not wait for an answer before coming in. His knocks are more like warnings, really. Carmen’s quick to tuck his phone away, he knows it’d be perfect cannon fodder to be teased into oblivion.

“Aye, cous—”

Carmen does not let the man get a word in inch wise, “Who’s on expo?”

Richie grimaces, this fucking song and dance, again. “Syd.”

“Who’s on her station, then?”

“T.”

“And hers?”

“She’s doin’ fuckin’ both Carmy— And—” Richie pulls a sharpie out of his breast pocket, throwing it at him. Carmen catches it. “Fuckin’ works. Alright?”

Marker works, and the system works. He catches the double meaning, too. Carmen nods, “Heard.”

“Christ.” Richie looks to high heaven, looks to his best friend, really, to give him strength. “Can I take my fuckin’ turn now?”

“Yeah, yeah, go ‘head.” Carmen turns to his desk, looking over the excel sheet, again. He can’t imagine Richie needing all of his undivided attention, right now, he’s not you.

Speaking of you, he can’t find your repair expenses anywhere on here. He needs to text Sug, about that. No, she’s got a fucking baby, he’ll at least look for a physical copy, first.

“I need to take two hours, on Friday.”

“Huh?” Carm’s head snaps up. Okay, maybe he does need to give his full attention to Richie, right now. “Eva got a fuckin’ recital, or somethin’?”

“No, no, uh— Chip wants to get dinner.” Rich scratches his nose with his thumb. “Thought since Fak's been training to host f'like, the whole fuckin’ month, could do dinner 'ere, let him do a run on us. Two birds, one bullet, y’know.”

“It’s stone.”

“I’m not fuckin’ high, cousin—” “No, it’s— Alright.” Carmen closes his eyes, hand over his face, deciding this is not the fight he wants to choose. “Tony’s getting dinner with you?”

“If I’m allowed, your fuckin’ Majesty.”

If it were up to Carmen? He wouldn’t be. But you specifically asked. Why, he has no idea. Carmen crosses his arms. “Yeah, yeah, s’fine. Just start at like, a not peak time. Like 4:30? Then when rush starts after 5 Fak’ll have a lil' momentum.”

“Heard. I’ll tell ‘em.” Richie nods, turning to make his way out.

Carm’s leg bounces, a tick that he’s pretty sure he’ll never get rid of. “… Ey Rich?”

He stops, turning back to Carmy, “Yeah, cousin?”

Carmen taps the end of the sharpie on the table, not looking at Richie, “What’s uh— Why d’you call Tony ‘Chip’?”

Ever so slightly, Richie’s brows furrow. “Did'j'ya ask her?”

Carm shakes his head, “S’why I’m asking you.”

Richie takes a beat, head rocking to the side, “Y'should ask her, she’ll tell you.”

Carmy squints, at that, “Is it fuckin’ dark or somethin’, cousin?”

What’s so secretive about Chip? He figured it would be some stupid inside joke with chocolate chips, like Sug with the salt mix up. Richie swallows, frowning just a bit. He clearly does not know how to answer this question, which just makes Carmen even more curious.

“S’ not dark, kinda, it’s just, y’know. Personal.” Since when the fuck did Richie have respect for personal? Probably since he sent him to stage. Goddammit.

“Did you not coin it?”

“Mikey did.”

Oh.

Huh.

Mikey got to do that first, too, eh?

“But, y’know, ask her, she likes you well enough to tell you, I think.” Richie shrugs, palms out. “Kinda tells stories like that better than me, anyways.” That's high praise— Not in the sense that Richie's a great storyteller, but that he's willing to admit it, for you.

“Oh, she doesn’t bury the fuckin’ lead?”

“Oh, fuck you.” But it’s true, so Richie’s amused. There’s something nice, about being known. Even if it’s to tease.

There’s a lull of silence. Quite frankly, Carmen’s hoping that Richie’s general disdain of silence will force him to confess your nickname backstory, just to fill the void. It doesn’t. Instead, it just gears him up, in the worst way, able to read the look on Carmen’s face.

“You really wanna fuckin know, huh?” Richie tilts down his head, teasing. Carmen groans. Oh dear god, why him. “Oh, fuck, you fuckin’ like her, don’t’chu, cousin? You fuckin’ dog.”

“Shut the fuck up, Rich—”

“Aye, Chip’s a real catch, I gettit— Works hard, plays nice, cleans up good— Y’have my blessing.”

“Didn’t ask for it.”

“Aye,” Richie snaps his fingers, pointing at Carmen like he could smite him. “Don’t gimme no talk back, she was my boy first, a’right? One bad word from me, n’ your lil’ fantasy—” He gestures an explosion with his hand, making a ‘pop’ sound with his lips.

“Gone, cousin.”

Carmen leans back in his seat, playing with the sharpie in his hand. He’s essentially Kubrick staring down Richie, but the guy is unaffected. “Friday, 4:30, two hours. If Fak fucks up, you’re on deck.”

“Heard.”

“Jeff, can I please get an all day, baby?” Baby is Tina’s new HR approved version of ‘for the love of fucking god’ She’s definitely at her limit, meaning Syd’s definitely at her limit on expo. Richie starts to step out, walking backwards.

“You comin’ cousin?”

Carm scratches his nose, straightening up back to his desk. He wishes he could go back to the kitchen, where he knows he’s good, instead of in here, with some goddamn spreadsheets that he cannot comprehend beyond bad. “Uh, one sec, I just need to finish this fuckin’—” He shakes his hand in the air, “Whatever the fuck this is.”

Richie nods, tapping the doorway on his way out. “Heard… g’luck.”

Carmen does not look at the spreadsheets. No. He thinks. He doesn't think about business.

That wasn’t true, was it? A phone call from Richie wouldn’t be the end of him, end of you, would it? Carmen is on the losing playing field here, practically everyone here has more history with you than he does. If he had a… lapse in behaviour, and it got back to you, would that ruin him? God, even his work family ruins things for him. Or could. Which means they will. Catastrophizing.

Whatever. What the fuck ever. He needs to find your invoice. After some flipping through last month’s file, he finds a sticky note from Sug between loose pages.

‘reminder: ask carmy 4 tony invoice’

He squints. You said Nat took care of it. Maybe it’s an old sticky note, he’ll text her about it, it’ll be a solid forty hours before he’ll get a response, anyways. Mom stuff. He really needs to go visit his niece again, soon. Maybe this weekend. Take Richie’s car. But then he'll probably will be forced to take Richie, too. Maybe he should just ask you, instead. Let Nat thank you for the heating pad she’s been loving, properly. Have dinner, all together, in an actual family home, instead of just each other's apartments. That'd be nice.

Yeah. Yeah. He’ll ask you on Friday, when you come for dinner. He grabs a pad of paper, biting the cap off his sharpie. He’ll make you something off menu, on Friday. You’re coming before the rush, anyways, he’ll have time to play, on Friday.

He’s gonna do right by you, this Friday.

Tomorrow, you’ll be getting dinner with Richie, and it’ll be the worst Friday of your life.

But right now, it’s Thursday night, and you’ve finally finished Carmen’s piece for The Bear. You know you told him if he didn’t like it, he didn’t have to put it up, but admittedly, if he doesn’t like it, you will be crushed.

One big white canvas.

Nine perfect squares, perfectly equidistant from each other at all angles.

Each square a snippet, a photo transfer. The squares themselves are messy, sun damaged, bleach stained, light flared. All twinged blue and yellowish. But so perfectly cut and curated.

Each image, something new. Starting at the top left, it’s The Original Beef. Then, the inside. Then the booths.

Then the second row, the sandwiches, held in hands.

The center photo. You've taken almost all of these photos on a disposable from yesteryear, but this is the one you like the most.

Mikey. The only transfer completely unbleached, unaltered, unruined. He’s holding two cut outs. One, Food & Wine and the other, a small section in the off off off pages of the New York Times.

Both specifically the one’s that mentioned Carmen, winning Best Chef and the James Beard.

Mikey was so proud. So so proud, silently, just with you— Couldn't look soft. Carmen does not know this photo exists. No one does. You hope this piece will act as the catalyst for you to be able to talk about the elephant in the room you’ve yet to open for him.

Right next to Mikey, is a balloon on a pipe— A photo you grabbed from Sydney and printed. You can only imagine the stress you could’ve eased, during their fire safety test. C’est la vie. Fak got to prove himself.

And on the last row, the new, ritzy, booths. The Seven Fishes dish— Also a photo you stole from Sydney. And finally, The Bear’s sign. Taken at night, lit up in all its neon glory.

Though the images are disconnected, starting from Mikey in the center— Clean, the flaring and staining grows more intense at the pictures in the corner. Just bordering on illegible. It all feels interconnected, woven.

It’s Carmen. Or, at least, you think it is. That’s what you were trying to achieve. You took inspiration from the way his brain works, the way he cooks messy but produces orderly, the way he’s grown something out of what was barely more than nothing. The way love and grief is at the center of everything. He’s awfully inspiring.

You’re excited, to show this to him tomorrow, on Friday. Hopefully all goes well, on Friday. You’re coming before the rush, you’ll probably have a little time to talk, on Friday. You won’t be able to get into everything, no, you’ve promised most of your bandwidth to Richie, but you’ll make a good start, on Friday.

You’re gonna do right, by Carmen, on Friday.

Tomorrow.

HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE

i've still got 2k of beats to cover for the next chapter, and have 7.9k already written out, for it. This is going to be fun. lmao. I'm genuinely very very excited for you to see it, when it comes out. Cannot believe I thought like 4 chapters ago that'd this next chapter would be the one to be released next. I almost briefed over all of these past few chapters to be nothing more than snippets in a chapter, I would never forgive myself if i went through with that plan, fr.

Anyways, no time for the future, this is NOW!! I hope I described Tony's paintin' good. I think it'd be nice. MBMBAM reference in the intro, are you fucking HAUNTED? ARE YOU FUCKING POSESSED? Love griffy, had to. Carmen CANNOT stop having anxiety attacks, someone get him on prozac frfr.

Tell me your thoughts or I'll eat my hat, I'm gonna need some words to chew on while I write, anyways. Hitting a wall choreographing this back half of chapter ten my GOD. Also oh yeah, silly aesthetic thing. I dunno if anyone noticed or cared, but i do a different ombre banner when it's carmen's perspec-- Did it last chapter too, aint that cute?

Also, I must finally give in, I was lazy to do taglists, but have folded, so here u are mfs. If you'd like to be added, you gotta leave me an essay somewhere. It's the RULES! Well, leave an essay and also ask to be added to the taglist that is but IT'S THE RULES!!

@anytim3youwant @navs-bhat @whoknowswhoiamtoday @gills-lounge @slut4supersoldiers @sinceweremutual @itsallacotar @catsrdabestsocks101

fully added people that never asked to be on here, you're just like, top fans, so i thought it would be nice, but if you WANT TO BE TAKEN OFF LET ME KNOW I'LL DO IT IMMEDIATELY ALSO IF I'M FORGETTING ANYONE WHO ASKED PLEASE DO REMIND ME

[cooking-with-hailstones]

The Legend of Zelda: stats of the kingdom

A Statistical Analysis of Popular Fanfiction in the Legend of Zelda Fandom on AO3

I like numbers and stats and for some unfathomable reason I find it calming. So over the past couple weeks, I’ve been making this spreadsheet!

DISCLAIMER: This is not a judgement of the quality, value, or merits of any of the fics on this list. It's just me being curious about what's popular with the Legend of Zelda fandom on AO3.

Feel free to go explore the spreadsheet. My own observations and analysis under the cut.

TL:DR, Link has a lot of kinky sex. Sidlink and Zelink are vying for who’s the most popular ship. Also, this fandom has a shit ton of sub categories that are truly islands unto themselves and have their own conventions.

Methodology: I'm including all fics from the first page of AO3 results (20 fics per page) sorted by:

Hits

Kudos

Comments

Bookmarks

Anything tagged under the Legend of Zelda and Related Fandoms tag that was in the top 20 most hits, kudos, comments, or bookmarks made it into the spreadsheet. This ended up including 51 fics in total.

I put all the fics into one single spreadsheet in order to compare the differences between fics that are really high on the kudos count but not the hit count, or what has a lot of comments but fewer hits. Basically, I'm throwing a lot of things together to observe what gets engagement and looking at patterns that emerge!

Popular fandom subcategories:

Botw (41 fics tagged as such)

Linked Universe (9, including one mostly set in the world of BOTW)

OoT (2)

(I do wonder what it would be like to run these numbers on other fanfic sites, given the popularity boom of ao3 over the last 15 years or so. But also, Botw was an insanely popular game even by Zelda standards, so… who knows?)

Zelda

Tags:

Character tags: Obviously, Link was by far the most popular character, but here are the characters that had a minimum of 3 appearances per category. Yay champions!

Sidon

Mipha

Urbosa

Revali

Daruk

Story tags: Again, just going by sheer numbers, here are the story tags that appeared at least 3 times in every category:

Slowburn

AU – canon divergence

With honorable mentions to fluff, angst, double penetration, anal sex, amnesia/memory loss, and mute or selectively mute Link, who all cracked above 3 instances in 2 separate categories.

Relationships:

This was a tight race, but shoutout to Sidlink for eking out the win for the most highly rated ship in the Zelda fandom with 13 fics qualifying in my ranking. Zelink is close behind at 10 fics. (That being said, Zelink takes it by volume: 7,797 fics tagged as Zelink vs Sidlink’s 2,193)

Other popular ships:

Revalink (8) (this one surprised me! I didn’t realize my beloved birb was so popular)

Miphlink (3)

Link/Monsters (2)

Sidon/Reader (2)

Ganzelink, Ganlink, Malink, Miphzelink, and Miphzel all made single appearances.

(Pls don’t start ship war discourse in the notes kthanx)

All right, let’s deep dive into the numbers!

Fics in all 4 categories:

Interim - starkraving

Sands of time -tirsynni

Congrats you are officially the most popular Loz fics across all of ao3! at least according to my particular scope of analysis.

Fics in 3 categories:

Displaced - socksock

Drown In Me - bacchanalia

Alone We Fight - SilvermistAnimeLover

Blood Moon Rising - MarquesGillette

Popular authors (people who show up more than once in multiple categories sorry comments georg)

MarquesGillette

MaryDragon

SilvermistAnimeLover

ObakeAri

Hits:

Top 5 most popular fics by hit count:

Displaced - socksock

Interim - starkraving

To Save Hyrule - orphan_account

Sands of time - tirsynni

Drown In Me - bacchanalia

Min: 117,917 – Sidon’s Epic Pining Adventure (ObakeAri)  

First page by hits:

Max:  189,622 – Displaced (socksock)

Average: 145,385

Average wordcount for fics with the most hits:

140,909

Kudos:

Top 5 most popular fics by kudos count:

Excuse Me While I Kiss This Guy - Icka M Chif

Interim - starkraving

To My Dearest Friend - surveycorpsjean

26 Minutes and 42 Seconds - T_5Seconds

Blood Moon Rising - MarquesGillette

First page by kudos:

Min: 4917 – Finding Link (Umbreonix)

Max:  10321 – Excuse Me While I Kiss This Guy (Icka M Chif)

Average: 6981

Average wordcount for fics with the most kudos:

41,136

Comments:

Top 5 most popular fics by comment count:

Carlos from MarvelandZeldaFan's Children of the Heroes - KR5

This is an Adjuration - notfreyja

My Art - KR5

Sidon's Epic Pining Adventure - ObakeAri

Priestess of War - KR5

Woohoo! You all get to meet KR5 aka Comments Georg. Comments Georg has long conversations and RPs in the comments of their ao3 posts, which are usually fanart. TO BE CLEAR, THIS IS TOTALLY FINE AND COOL! I think it’s quite delightful! However, it does completely bork my ranking system because outside of comments, these posts do not have a lot of engagement (like, less than 100 hits and less than 20 kudos) and I don’t think they count towards my analysis of “what is popular in the Zelda fandom writ large”. But they qualified based on my criteria. Which I think speaks to the weakness of my criteria more than anything else tbh…

Anyways, shoutout to Comments Georg for truly showing off what it means to be a statistical outlier.

First page by comments:

Min: 1568 – The Quiet River Rages (MaryDragon)

Max:  43808 - Carlos from MarvelandZeldaFan's Children of the Heroes (KR5)

Average: 4131 (which goes down to 2042 if we exclude KR5’s impressive max, which is a full order of magnitude more than notfreyja in second place with 3470 comments. Very much demonstrating the power of a statistical outlier!)

Average wordcount for fics with the most comments:

275,593

Bookmarks:

Top 5 most popular fics by bookmarks count:

Interim - starkraving

Excuse Me While I Kiss This Guy - Icka M Chif

Sands of time - tirsynni

To My Dearest Friend - surveycorpsjean

Alone We Fight - SilvermistAnimeLover

First page by bookmarks:

Min: 973 – Expatriate (thehoyden)

Max:  2984 – Interim (starkraving)

Average: 1468

Average wordcount for fics with the most bookmarks:

70,027

Fic Ratings:

Observations:

G: 3 (literally all fanart from KR5)

T: 22

M: 8

E: 17

Unrated: 1

I ran this twice. Once including crossovers, and once excluding crossovers. This filtered out a lot of large drabbles and things like “flash fiction fuckings” which, no judgment, you do you, they just weren’t super relevant for what I was looking for. If you wanna see these stats including all the multifandom stuff that shows up, here’s the link for that:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1DXDKXutIzVC-Iac93fFSDohAkphrn67yV-DmRt9xXmU/edit?usp=sharing

(I’m going to break academic professional analysis here and get on my soapbox for a sec – please don’t post big multifandom drabbles where you tag like 20 different fandoms and every single kink that gets written about across 103 different chapters. This is literally what series are for. These kinds of things just clog up the tags, and it also makes it harder for people to find the things you’ve written that they want to read! I know this was a convention on ff.net, but this is not ff.net! We can make authors' lives and readers' lives easier!)

There were 38,427 fics in the tag “Legend of Zelda and Related Fandoms” (including crossovers, that goes up to 41,634). I manually added one back in though because it was entirely a botw story, just loosely inspired by another game.

Linked Universe fans comment a LOT. Strong correlation between high comment and Linked Universe fandom subsection. Y’all are very involved and active, and you show support to your authors. I salute you!

Sidlinkers, y'all are horny and I respect it.

Zelinkers, dear god we do love a slowburn.

All the most highly kudos’d fics are very low in the comment count. It’s almost an inverse correlation.

Excluding crossovers increased the correlation between hits and kudos quite dramatically.

There were not very many au’s other than canon divergence. Only one modern au as far as I could tell from a cursory examination of tags.

Lots more clustering, far less disparity between min and max numbers than when I ran this with A:TLA numbers.

Far less consensus on a vibe. Way fewer big writers, but lots of little writers doing their own thing.

Truly a lot of E fics. We are horny bastards.

We need more stuff written for games other than BOTW!!

There aren’t as many fics that are like “oh everyone in the fandom has read these fics”. There are probably those fics in each subcategory of the fandom, or within the specific ships, but there aren’t as many general fics that have entire fandom-wide appeal.

If you want more of this kind of egregious nerdiness, I did this with the top fics in the A:TLA fandom a couple weeks ago: https://www.tumblr.com/cooking-with-hailstones/751749202663669760/statistical-analysis-of-the-most-popular-atla

Thank you for reading! This was a lot of fun, and I hope you found it interesting. Shoutout to the Hateno Hangout discord for helping me refine this mess :P

Further shoutout to my partner who helped with writing some SQL to help with tag analysis. Truly partner of the year.

[solarpunkani]

Ok actually

Solarpunks/embroiderers of Tumblr

Howmst does one Start

Like I have a little kit but I have no idea how one would do a project after I finish with this Kit nor do I know what’s considered good for a Beginner to start on

[harbingermotel]

okay. reblog this post and say in the tags how long a train ride has to be for you to consider it a "long" train ride. bc i consider 2 hours short and my roommate just called 34 minutes long

[bookshelf-in-progress]

It's so nice to have this tiny little selection of WIPs to prioritize. Really helps me to keep my focus where it should be.

Wait, what's this?

IT'S A LONG-ABANDONED WIP WITH A STEEL CHAIR!!

[sysig]

[suncaptor]

Perhaps it's good to acknowledge how much at a breaking point I am at. That I cannot be this trapped. That something has to change. In theory, I would have already changed it, since the problem is the helplessness. Like I need to stop living with this amount of financial deprivation and unsustainability. I need help and support. I need rest and distance from crisis. I need to feel safe.

[pondscummy]

the "also sick" comment isn't like "btw I'm SICK, how dare you not know" it's me saying I'm sick like how 2/3 of my roommates are

but like I'm so;;;; it feels so rich that L is like wtf do you want from me about me not replying for 45 minutes when I had to beg his gf over hours and hours of texts every so often to not force me to sit in unwiped shit after my surgery bc she had openly told me she just didn't rly feel like setting up the attachable bidet after telling me for weeks she would, and I never ever got a reply from her or L ever acknowledging that they were wide awake hanging out and laughing while I was like stuck in bed barely able to move begging for follow through on a commitment they made in advance and i eventually had to spend over $100 to hire someone to come out the next day and do it for me and I had to hold my shit for hours lmfao

like L is sooooo great at couching things in flawless tumblr wellness speak but only to talk about how valid they are for not showing up for you and how fucked up it is that you MIGHT ever have a moment where you can't be 100% there w them. like idk what to tell you I've been laying in bed with a sore throat and cough and fever passing out and waking up to roll over in buckets of sweat like the rest of the house. I do genuinely get being annoyed by a lack of response but it's also right back to this whole thing about Always assuming I'm mad at them which is legit one of the only things that actually makes me mad fjdkddhk like bro I do not THINK about you when you're not acting like I'm a bomb about to blow (also, as an aside -- we all take turns buying TP and it's usually me who does it like it's not out of pocket for me to say hey you are the One person who is out of the house already rn, can you get this on your way bc None of the bathrooms have back up rolls and one is totally out and I had to text our sickest roommate telling her to use the bidet and drip dry like.... "am I the first person you asked" yes bc you are the person who makes the most sense dumbfuck. I'm not being "overly needy" toward you or whatever jfc)

they literally told me at one point that the reason they're so scared of me is that my face is "triggering" for them when I'm angry or not feeling good and puts them "back in a really bad place" they have seen my face angry literally 3 times and each time it was on my way back to my room to decompress and each time I said nothing to them other than that I was in a bad mood and I was going to go to my room. I didn't yell either I just said it normal. like I genuinely feel gaslit here like I'm this horrifying monster of a man when it's like dude sometimes people are mad I don't know what YOU want from ME!! I do all my venting here where they can't ever see it even tho we've blocked each other, I censor their name like anyone even knows who they are, I isolate to chill out and it's literally been less than a handful of times like should I fling myself from the roof??????? would that fix it???

I literally know it's bc I'm a man too. none of this was like this until my facial hair came in more and it got crazy worse after I got top surgery and they're so so vocal about how much they despise men and think men should all fuck off and die and there's only a handful of acceptable men that they've personally vetted. despite them pretty clearly having a trans woman fetish bc they only date or look at porn of trans women and they do the whole step on me mommy thing about it even tho their gf has complained like. lmfao you're just a baby te//rf even tho you ID as trans masc yourself. like that's all this even is. I'm a big (5'3") scary (spent the whole weekend w my coworkers asking if I was 12) man who's obviously going to snap and kill you all bc sometimes I *checks writing on hand* get frustrated and go lay down about it

[chronicillnesscaneffoffplease]

Tell me you have gastroparesis without telling me you have gastroparesis: I am eating salted lime jelly while cooking my soup of the week. Semi-liquids ftw.

[jasonsmirrorball]

once again feeling gross about jason tonight...

[dxppercxdxver]

in which medic returns from sick leave and is suspicious of the fate of his interim replacement (this is a fic i wrote purely because i and @chiropteracupola thought it would be extremely funny)

contracts being as they were with tf industries, vacations weren't so much requested as they were foisted upon oneself after grievous injury. in medic's unfortunate case, a sudden and nasty bout of pneumonia the medigun simply wasn't cut out to handle had whacked him upside the head one otherwise average week in july, and after passing out from the exertion—drenched in sweat beneath his coat, genuinely slick with the stuff—on the battlefield, a menacingly plain envelope stamped with the seal of the administrator landed itself on his desk, requesting in a way that was really demanding that he make himself scarce until he was fit for duty again.

medic had no argument, and packed his bags as soon as he was able to pry his burning face off the cool metal table.

he had been gone for longer than he wanted. what he had anticipated to be a few days' absence at most stretched into almost a month, bedridden and aching in a cheap hostel a few towns over (teufort, obviously, was hardly an option, what with the entire infrastructure operating almost exclusively on flagrant osha violations and the townspeople's penchant for hangings). it was hardly the most ideal of circumstances, but he recovered all the same, slowly but surely, chomping at the bit to return to the dustbowl and his most loyal patients. medic hoped his teammates missed him; he liked to think he provided a valuable service to RED and that the men around him agreed. after all, his skills were unparalleled. the poor fellows must have been miserable without him.

the day he was set to return to the quarry, he phoned ahead to miss pauling's private number he'd stolen from one of spy's personnel files to let her know he was coming—ignoring her sputtering disbelief in the process—and threw his belongings into a small deerskin suitcase, saluting the hostel owner with his fingers crossed behind his back.

during his unintended sick leave, little had changed. of course, it had only been a month or so, but after residing in the quarry almost four years with no interruption, a month felt like an eternity. he half expected the place to be burned to the ground, and to see it still standing was some sort of miracle, to be sure. straightening his back, medic buttoned his coat and strode inside.

miss pauling was there to greet him at the door, smile the widest he'd ever seen it. just beyond the foyer, the rest of the team stood in perfect alignment, similarly amiable expressions on their faces. while medic was glad to be appreciated, such behavior was wildly unsettling from a group of men whose primary off-shift occupation was ignoring each other or shouting. even sniper was looking at him with a strange fondness.

with a hesitant wave, medic greeted them quietly. "hello?"

"medic, hi!" miss pauling cried, rushing forward. "so glad to see you, can i take your bag? to your lab, right?"

"i— okay." in but an instant, medic's suitcase was snatched out of his hand and miss pauling was marching him down the corridor toward the medbay, gleeful demeanor never wavering. her knuckles were nearly white around the handle. their teammates followed like a silent parade, a welcoming entourage medic was beginning to grow incredibly suspicious of.

"quite the reception here today," he said lightly, peering through the cracked doors that lined the hall. "is everything alright?"

"yeah, 'course, everything's good, why would you even say something like that?" scout piped up from behind him, gesticulating wildly. "we're all super here, doc, absolutely nothin' to see, i can tell ya that."

so something was absolutely wrong.

trying to lighten the mood, medic did his best to crack a joke. "did someone die while i was gone?"

rather pointedly, no one responded. miss pauling simply looped her arm under his elbow and steered him off toward the lab, flinging the door open for him like an enthusiastic chauffeur.

medic was delighted to see that, even with an interim replacement having taken up residence in his quarters, the medbay was just as he had left it, in all its chaotic organization that really only he could understand properly. piles of papers were strewn about on every available surface, his pens tossed into a cup on his desk, and archimedes fluttered down from his rafter perch to settle upon his shoulder.

idly scratching at his beloved bird's chest, medic looked around the office, noting one unusual item out of place.

a metal carrying case sat upon one of the stacks of documents like a paperweight, clean and shining under the fluorescent light. medic was certain this case was not his, and pointed at it with a questioning cock of the head.

"go on, open it," miss pauling said, and the others nodded in vigorous agreement.

he approached the case with some level of consternation, bordering on dread. it was a high quality thing, with well-oiled hinges and a nicely sprung lock. simple etchings decorated the lid, with faint initials scrawled into the center. under the glare, medic couldn't quite make them out, but he reached for the clasp all the same.

inside, pristine medical tools reflected his illness-haggard face back at him; scalpels, syringes, a small saw, scissors, and pins of all sizes were arrayed on a deep red velvet backing, beautiful as any he had ever seen. the blades were sharpened to a wicked edge, and medic could only imagine the ease with which they would cut through skin and tissue and... whatever else he needed them to cut through.

they were lovely, and presumably worth a small fortune, and absolutely, fantastically out of place.

turning to his team, medic fought with equally strong emotions of gratitude and confusion.

"what... how... where did you get these?"

"happy birthday, fella," sniper said, by way of what he probably meant to be an explanation that didn't actually answer anything at all.

medic frowned. "my birthday isn't for several months."

"yeah, well, we just wanted to let ya know how much we appreciated ya. for all the work you do. cutting us open, sticking birds in our chests—" as he spoke, scout counted off items on his bandaged fingers, and medic noted a faint spattering of blood on the gauze, "—and really just bein' an all around pal."

"...really."

"yup!" miss pauling interjected, sidling over to the rest of the team. "really, you've just been such an excellent addition to RED's roster, we wanted to show you how much you meant to us and the administrator."

pursing his lips, medic gently shooed archimedes from his shoulder, closing the lid of the case. "i... see. and you are sure everything is fine?"

"fine and dandy." from near the back of the small hoard crowding his doorway, engineer piped up with a double thumbs-up for emphasis. "right as rain, and all that."

"of course." medic paused, considering the oddly untouched state of his office. "how was my replacement?"

"oh, him? he was— he was good," miss pauling said a little too loudly, waving her hand in what was almost certainly meant to be a dismissive gesture that instead nearly succeeded in clocking pyro across the jaw. "a real gentleman, that one, barely made any trouble for us. and, just, like. reeeeally good at medicine." the grin that stretched across her face was so full of perfectly white teeth medic swore he would go blind.

everything about this situation was suspect, medic knew this, but he also wasn't sure how to get to the bottom of it without discovering more than he actually wanted to know. so instead, he flashed a smile of his own, flashing a loose wave.

"well. thank you all for this gift," he said, eyeing the case warily, "and this... warm return, but i really must get to unpacking. science to be done, and all of that."

"sure, sure, gotcha." ushering everyone out of the room, miss pauling was nodding so hard medic half thought her head was liable to snap off. "great having you back, medic. love ya."

and with that, the team was gone, and medic was left alone.

the first thing he did was inspect the contents of his desk. much of it was just how he remembered it, but hidden amongst his stacks of medical histories and experimental notes, he found a fabric binder stuffed to the brim with papers. the binder, much like the case, was definitely not his, and...

was that blood?

the corner of the binder, though the cloth was a deep green to begin with, was suspiciously darker, soaked through with something that smelled vaguely of copper. upon opening it, the papers contained within boasted the same smears of blood. large passages of text were haphazardly blocked out with what appeared to be a permanent marker. as he flipped through, medic marveled at the thoroughness of the covering up; he could make out very little, aside from the barely-there presence of a name typed up on a page of letterhead.

plucking the page out of its place, medic held it up against the case, tipping it away from the bulbs.

g.h. was etched into the case, and the paper, where it was legible, read "gre—" before it dissolved into inky blood.

well, medic thought, gingerly placing the letterhead into his trashcan, that answered a great many questions.

all that was left was to find where the carnage ended.

medic peeked through the glass in the lab's door, ensuring the halls were empty, before slinking across the tile floor to the one of the rooms they had passed on the way in.

it was a storage room that frequently doubled as a secondary site for engineer's less than high priority experiments, and droplets of blood were clearly visible on the linoleum just outside. when he pushed the door inward, yet more appeared, in streams and smears across the floor. medic followed the trail with his eyes, all the way up to a monstrous machine the size of a small bus. silver and aluminum and copper twinkled in the darkness, lit only where the light from the hall bypassed medic's silhouette and touched the metal. the plating gleamed, obviously freshly cleaned.

as medic examined the nature of the contraption, his gaze was drawn to all manner of pistons and conveyor belts and rotating drums covered in vicious looking spikes. it was, all in all, designed to kill a person extremely efficiently and impersonally, which meant it could only have been engineer's work.

the dissonance between the gore-streaked floor and the spotless machinery was almost poetic, medic supposed.

"ah well. auf wiedersehn," he murmured, resting a gloved hand on one of the plates with an air of solemnity, before exiting the storeroom and pulling the door closed behind him. whoever his replacement was, it was obvious he was lost to the ages now.

but hey, at least he got some sweet new medical equipment out of the deal.

[quaranmine]

it's fun when you're asked at work to make a really detailed list of your accomplishments. like yeah okay here's 3 pages written about how good i am, sure. yall are HAPPY to have me and i'll make sure of it!!

[dollsome-does-tumblr]

okay, i have to make a vow to not let myself work on my wip fic until i've gotten through my irl to-do list this weekend

this is my vow!!!! ✨

[samglyph]

Ok I’m caught up on red valley where the FUCK is my BOY

[theinfinitedivides]

my f*cking God he's done it again!!!!!!