tryingahandinholdingapen

[tryingahandinholdingapen]

Shout out to Characters who are shells of their former selves! You died and you’re not coming back! You don’t recognize yourself and neither does anyone else, and it’s anyone’s guess what the fuck you’re supposed to be now!

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WARNING do NOT start reading books and comics or watching movies or looking at art!!! you will start wanting to create art yourself. or god forbid. writing.

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Been reading some original works on Ao3 recently

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I need to learn more anatomy so I can write a more detailed and descriptive vivisection fic to appeal to not only myself but also my friend who is in med school

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Laughing Dove (Spilopelia Senegalensis), from a banding. Jerusalem bird observatory (JBO). 25.11.24

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new favorite AO3 comment dropped. short, simple, to the point. made me laugh so hard my stomach hurt.

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"Rejected." "But, Milord, he has been specifically chosen to..." "Rejected. Goodbye."

Wally, tied down to a stone table and about to be sacrificed, feels more than offended.

This particular cult is trying to gift him to some minor god of protection or something, he wasn't particularly paying attention to the specifics, saying that the god needs a new member of his harem.

"But we chose this one because of his qualifications!"

"Indeed, we sense the eldritch within him!"

The god or whatever raises one white eyebrow.

"Re. Jec. Ted. Rejected. That? That whole thing?" The being asks, waving a hand generally at Wally's everything. "That is not going anywhere near my Fraid or my Haunt."

"Hey!" Wally says incredulously, "The hell did I do to you, man?"

"No no, that's the beauty of it!" A cultist interrupts him, also motioning at Wally's everything. "As a member of your harem and also one already tainted by the unknowable, he can stay out of your personal lair and stay in the Eternal Void, and you can just make sure he pleases you in wherever way you desi-"

"That thing is also not getting anywhere near my dick. In fact? This? This is done. I am done."

The being snaps his fingers into fingerguns, points at the shackles on Wally, and breaks them with green beams of light.

"Run free and far away frommmmmmmholy fuck get away from me!"

"So what, am I not good enough for you?" Wally asks, now in the beings face and ignoring the cultists.

Fuck those guys, but this just got personal.

~~~~~~

Danny is being hounded by one of Clockwork's worst nightmares, thanks to a stupid cult that thinks he's A, a god, and B, has a harem.

Great.

He's supposed to be at his 21st birthday party, getting legally wasted, and now he's getting hit on the man responsible for a not one, not two, but three week adventure through the time stream he just got back from.

This man and his ilk are responsible for nearly all of Danny's Clockwork Assignments, specifically to fix the timestream and reality, and he has the balls to ask why Danny doesn't like him?!

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As someone in a discord I'm in lost access to their Google Doc, a reminder to all writers that:

Google does not allow adult content on/in Drive and will lock the item OR even lock your whole account. DO NOT use Google Drive/Docs to share smut you are writing.

For nsfw stuff, or, hell, with Google AI all of your writing, maybe I suggest https://write.ellipsus.com.

[tryingahandinholdingapen]

two drawings i did yesterdaaay<3

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I was re-watching the little mermaid and it got me thinking: it would have been so cool to be a guest to eric's weddings tbh

this guy's been raving about this mystery girl he says saved him and left him on the beach but nobody believes him, then he found a different girl in the same beach, proceeded to date her for a couple of days in front of the whole town, but then turns up with a different one (allegedly the first one) and decides he's marrying her on the spot

and you're like, sure, I need to see this mess

so you go to the wedding and it's WILD: there's some sort of animal riot, every creature is attacking the bride (including the prince's dog), town date redhead is being carried into the wedding ship in a barrel by a small fish, you're like 'I need to see how this turns out' and then mystery redhead, who was supposedly unable to talk, starts singing???? and talking??? and they're about to kiss???? but then the bride turns into sexy cthulhu???? and the redhead grows a fish tail???? and sexy cthulhu bride drags redhead into the water??????

you are taken ashore while the groom goes to fetch one of the brides, unsure which but all signs point to the redhead that was carried in the barrel, and then there's a storm, and sexy cthulhu becomes gigantic and is wearing a crown and you're like 'work, bitch' while eating snacks and then it's all over and sexy cthulhu disappears

but then there's another wedding announced and you're like 'I'm sure it can't top the first one' but you attend and TRITON shows up too????? myth and legend lord of the sea king triton from the stories????? with a white beard and an 8 pack and the same crown sexy cthulhu was wearing??? turns out he's the FATHER OF THE BRIDE??????? and there are mermaids everywhere, all around the ship, kind of unnerving tbh really really scary situation, but it's fine because triton is making rainbows in the sky and hugging the bride and manipulating water and you're also pretty sure the chef just got decimated by a crab?????

royal weddings should all be like these tbh this prince sure knows how to throw them like nobody else in the disney pantheon

[tryingahandinholdingapen]

High School Time Travelers, Part 2

It's finally here! Follow up to this story.

***

“So. Spill. What the fuck is going on with you and Angelique?”

Raph fidgeted uncomfortably, and something within Erin roared out in protest at that. They were in her room, surrounded by her clutter and band posters and the stuff he kept at her house to keep his mom from throwing it away. He wasn’t supposed to be uncomfortable here.

Eventually, he took a deep breath. “I time-traveled last night.”

“I’m serious—”

“So am I,” he said wearily. “I woke up in a house I haven’t set foot in for years, across the hall from someone I promised myself I’d never talk to again. It happened, and if you’re stuck on that part then this conversation can’t continue.”

Erin got up and paced her room, kicking aside her backpack, nearly knocking over the guitar stand in the corner. “What the fuck.”

“That’s what I said.”

“What the fuck, Raph.”

“I didn’t mean to!”

The absurdity hit her instantly—he didn’t mean to time travel, as if they were talking about him forgetting his homework or getting in Monica Dillon’s way during passing period. She wanted to laugh.

But then she remembered some of the weird things Angelique had said—about friendships imploding, about college, about shit not mattering in high school, all with the easy certainty of experience.

“Prove it,” she said. “Can you do that thing where you predict what I’m about to say?”

“I’m not stuck in a time loop, dumbass, yesterday I was thirty-three!” Raph snapped. “I had to go through math class trying to pretend I still remembered my teacher’s name!”

“Okay, okay, Jesus.” Erin held up her hands placatingly. “There’s gotta be something.”

Raph sighed, rubbing his forehead. “I dunno. Anything meaningful and unchangeable I can remember won’t happen for a while, so if you’re willing to wait for the Trump presidency or the global pandemic, there’s that.”

“The what.”

“Wait, who’s president right now? It’s still Bush, right?”

Erin pulled a face.

“Next one’s Barack Obama, he’s gonna do two terms,” Raph informed her. “First black president.”

“Oh, huh. Cool,” Erin said faintly.

“Let’s see, what else, um… Balloon Boy? Has Balloon Boy happened yet?”

“No, what the fuck is Balloon Boy?”

Raph brightened. “Yeah, so at some point this family is gonna release like, a homemade weather balloon? Or something? And there’s gonna be this huge panic because they think their son is stuck inside it, but then it turns out he was fine and hiding in the basement the whole time and it was a hoax.”

“Okay, I’ll keep an eye out for that I guess?” Erin sat down again. “You’re seriously not fucking with me right now?”

“I mean, if you want, we could forget this conversation ever happened,” Raph offered. “Continue with our normal lives, while I keep under-reacting to devastating world events.”

“Christ, I don’t know.” Erin pressed her palms into her eyes. After a moment, she lifted her head again. “Wait a minute, we’re getting off track. What does this have to do with Angelique?”

Raph’s silence could not have been louder.

“Raph,” Erin said, a little desperately.

“First you have to promise you won’t be mad,” said Raph.

“Did you sleep with her in the—” Erin paused to do some arithmetic in her head. “—eighteen years between then and now?!”

“She’s my wife,” Raph blurted out.

Moments later, Erin’s mother knocked politely on the bedroom door. “Everything okay in there?” she asked. “That’s an awful lot of screaming for a Tuesday night.”

Erin continued howling into her pillow. “She’s fine, Mrs. Yokota!” Raph called. “We’re looking at—uh—creepypastas!”

“Creepy what?”

“Uh—crap, are they still called that?—like, ghost stories and stuff!”

Placated, she left them to it. Eventually Erin recovered enough to lie back and stare listlessly at the ceiling.

“Dude.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“What the fuck is your life?” Erin demanded. “How did that even happen?”

“We ran into each other at—so my friend Hazel got roped into being in their college roommate’s bridal party and dragged me along for moral support, and Angelique was in the same friend group but with like six degrees of separation from us,” Raph explained. “It took half the reception for her to recognize me because at that point I’d been on T for a few years, but the second she realized we went to the same high school she turned fishbelly-white, pulled me aside, and apologized for how much of a bitch she was back then. It was really awkward.”

Back then, he called it, even though for Erin it was still right now. “And you married her?”

“Like eight years later, yeah.” Raph ran his hand through his hair, not quite hiding the small smile that stole over his face. “She really turned over a new leaf.”

Erin was silent for a while, mulling over this new information, combining it with what she already had from that afternoon.

“Is your name still Raphael?” she asked. “She sounded really surprised about it. And I know you said you were just taking the name on a trial run, but you really seemed to like it. Not that there’s—you know,” she added. “I know that—just because I picked it, I knew you might not… you know. It’s fine, I was just wondering. If I should call you something else.”

“I did—I do like it,” Raph assured her. “But, uh, some stuff happened. My dad found me.”

Erin’s eyebrows shot upward. “Wait, really? What’d he have to say for himself?”

“That Mom ghosted him when she got pregnant because her side guy had more money.”

“Dude, fuck your mom.”

“Don’t fuck my mom, she’ll ghost you for money, weren’t you listening?”

Erin burst out snickering. “Fuck, sorry, this isn’t funny.”

“It will be in eighteen years,” Raph said with a wry smile. “Hindsight. Anyway, he found me in—he’s gonna find me in two years unless I reach out first. He’s a good guy. My stepmom’s pretty cool, too. And I have sisters? So that’s awesome. And yeah, he had this friend who passed away when he was younger, and he always wanted to name his son after him, but then Mom disappeared and he only ended up having daughters, so when he found me, it kind of worked out.” He hesitated. “I’m Damian. Damian Raphael Harker.”

“That’s such a cool name,” Erin sighed.

Raph—Damian—tilted his head back to grin at her. “Yours is cool, too.”

“Shut up,” she said fondly.

“No, seriously,” he said emphatically. “Your name is unspeakably cool.”

There was something odd in his tone, sticking up and catching like a loose nail. It bothered her, the same way something Angelique said earlier had bothered her.

“Hey, Ra—Damian?” Erin said cautiously. “Earlier, when Angelique sat down with us, she didn’t recognize me.”

“She does, don’t worry.”

“No, she didn’t,” Erin pressed. “It took her a second to realize who I was, and she stopped herself from saying why.”

Suddenly Damian looked deeply uncomfortable. “I, uh.”

She took a deep breath. “Was I dead in your time?”

“Wh-no! No no no no, of course not!” Damian looked horrified. “We played Pathfinder like last week, you’re not dead.”

“What’s Path—no, never mind. Something’s clearly up. If we just played whatever-that-is last week, and Angelique is your wife, then why didn’t she know who I was?”

“Uh…” Damian’s hands had worked their way deep into his sleeves. “You look different, that’s all. You kind of reinvented yourself in college.”

“Oh,” Erin said, momentarily relieved. Then— “Wait.”

“What?’

“Damian. You’d—” She hesitated. “If I was a guy, you’d tell me, right?’

“Oh my God,” Damian mumbled into his be-sweatered hands.

“Damian.”

“You’re... not...”

“You’d tell me, right?”

“See, I don’t know if I would!” Damian answered, in a strained high-pitched tone. “That’s—look. If you were a guy, that’s something you’d have to work out for yourself!”

“Damian, I swear to God.”

“I can’t crack your egg for you, that’s like violating the Prime Directive!”

Erin seized a pillow and started to buffet him with it. “You are such a nerd!”

“It’s your personal journey, you can’t use me to cheat!” Damian cackled, fending her off with a plush horse.

***

“Yeah I’ll get the banana split.” Angie bounced on the balls of her feet, eyes raking over the array of toppings. “Can you put caramel and chocolate sauce on it? And Heath bar pieces, chopped strawberries, and M&Ms.”

“Yeah, sure thing.”

It took all of her self-control not to press her nose against the glass as she watched them make it. Some small part of her balked at the sight of three huge scoops of ice cream and all the toppings, but she quieted it. She had a second shot at being a teenager, and that meant never taking her garbage disposal stomach and body made of rubber bands for granted ever again.

She hummed absently to herself, only to pause halfway through the tune. How did it go again? She tried repeating the first half, only to get stuck at the same spot. Oh, this was going to bug the crap out of her. It wasn’t like she could look it up, not when the song wouldn’t come out for almost ten years—

Her phone vibrated in her purse, and she checked it absentmindedly, zeroing in for a moment on the DAD displayed on the screen. After a moment, she put it back without answering. If it was that important, he could text.

Sure enough, her phone gave a short buzz. New text message—he hadn’t even bothered to leave a voicemail.

DAD I need you to talk to your brother.

Angie checked her banana split’s progress with a glance, and replied.

lol why

DAD He’s not listening to me. We both know the courts favor the mother so if we’re going to beat her I need both of you on your A game.

Angie ground her teeth until her jaw creaked.

what do you need me to do

DAD Just coach him on how to talk about her. You’re a smart lady, I know you can do it. He’s always getting scuffed up at practice, just have him say the bruises came from her. Throw in a drinking problem if you have to, just keep your stories straight.

why father dearest i’m surprised at you you want me to lie under oath?

DAD Just talk to him, will you? Keep your stories straight, don’t get too outlandish, and we’ll get out of this with everything we want. You’ll never have to hear the word no again, I promise.

ok daddy ill do my best!

DAD Good girl. You’re the smartest girl I know. Smarter than your mom, smarter than her bitch lawyer. Love you!

“Order up!”

Angie brought her banana split to the table with the clearest view of the door. It took her a moment to decide how to begin, then nearly a full minute balancing equal parts ice cream, banana, and toppings in a single spoonful. She managed it in the end.

Mood lifted, she unlocked her phone again and made a call. “Heeeey, Anika.”

“Need I remind you that phone calls are billable,” her mother’s lawyer said dryly.

“Yeah, I’ll be quick, I have some incriminating text messages I think you’ll be interested in?”

The sound of rustling papers paused. “Go on…?”

“Dad just told me to lie to the judge,” Angie explained, twirling a thin ribbon of caramel around her spoon. “And to coach Eric to lie to the judge. I took screenshots.”

Anika cursed softly under her breath. “Thank you for telling me. Send them to your mom, okay? Thank you.”

“Yeah, no problem.”

The bell above the ice cream parlor door jingled, and Angie perked up as both Damian (Raph?) and Erin walked in. She waved them over, grinning when both pairs of eyes widened at her treat.

“That thing’s half the size of your head,” Erin pointed out.

“Sure is, you guys came just in time.” Angie nudged it across the table, along with the two extra spoons. “If we split it, I’ll have enough room for a milkshake chaser.”

“You’re a monster,” Damian said delightedly. “Oh shit, are those Heath bars?” He dug in without waiting for an answer.

“They’re peanut butter cups,” she said solemnly, once he’d taken a bite and could probably tell they weren’t. “I added them just to hurt you.” Damian rolled his eyes and dug his spoon back in.

Erin stared at her, probably still baffled by the gentle banter, but at least she looked more curious than infuriated, like instead of being suspicious she simply didn’t know what to make of Angie.

“So, you guys talked?” Angie asked carefully. “Are we… all good?”

“I think so,” Damian replied, shooting a cautious glance at Erin.

“You’re on thin ice,” Erin informed her as she helped herself to the chocolate scoop.

“Fair.” Angie didn’t remember Erin putting up quite as much of a fight, but then, it had been years when they’d reconnected before. This time around, it was still fresh.

“The ice cream helps,” Erin added, slightly muffled by the spoon in her mouth.

“Noted.” Angie paused, weighed her options, and shrugged. No harm no foul, probably. “Hey, you’re a musician, right?”

Erin swallowed. “Yeah, why?”

“And not just a performer, but you write music too, right?”

“Yeeaaah?” Erin squinted suspiciously. Beside her, Damian shot Angie a warning glare.

“If I give you half a tune, could you resolve it?”

Erin was staring at her like she’d grown a second head. “Probably.”

“Great!” Angie hummed the earworm from earlier. “How would the next part go?”

Erin repeated it to herself, nodding along. After a moment, she said, “Probably like—”

And sure enough, there it was. The rest of the chorus’s tune came rushing back to Angie’s memory, and she breathed a sigh of relief. 

“Thanks! That was driving me nuts.” Angie returned to her banana split, ignoring Damian’s growing scowl.

Later, when Erin was in the bathroom and  Angelique was standing in line to order her promised milkshake, Damian dug his elbow into her side. “You’re not as slick as you think you are,” he muttered.

“What?” Angie said innocently. “I didn’t give anything away.”

“You just taught her half the chorus of a song she’s eight years away from writing!”

“I’ve planted a seed,” Angie insisted. “I’ve created a stable time loop.”

“That is not what you did and you know it.” Damian pursed his lips, clearly trying to stay annoyed with her. “I barely avoided spoiling her transition, and that’s after she asked me to my face.”

Angie grinned. “So you haven’t told her she’s a genderfluid punk rocker yet?”

“No. Because she’s not a genderfluid punk rocker yet.”

“And now, when she becomes one,” Angie said with a smile, “she’s going to look back on this day and laugh.”

[tryingahandinholdingapen]

i had a thought of "do people not know what AUs are anymore?" and then i remembered nobody explains fandom stuff to new people anymore so it is entirely plausible people genuinely don't know what AUs are and nobody has explained it to them, so for today's lucky 10,000:

"AU" stands for "Alternate Universe" or "Alternative Universe" (same difference) and is basically any thought scenario for a fandom that isn't canon and can't fit within the canon universe. If it takes place in the canon universe but something is notably different, that is typically what's known as a "Canon divergent AU," because it diverges from canon.

an AU can be absolutely anything. There's a couple of widespread pan-fandom au scenarios that often get thrown around, like coffee shop aus, genderbend aus, hanahaki aus (hanahaki is a whole thing in itself i'd recommend researching on your own), etc. One you might hear sometimes is "crossover AU" which is when you have characters from one fandom interacting with characters from another.

You can have as many aus as you want. They can be whatever you want and you can do whatever you want in them. It's a sandbox for you to play around in and explore how things would be different or how the characters would act in those circumstances or environments. Maybe they have different relationships with each other. Maybe they behave slightly differently. Or you can just say "Okay, [x] is true. How did they get here? How would things have to be different for this to occur?" which can also be fun.

If you are ever confused about why people ship something that seems completely out of the blue or doesn't make sense to you in the canon setting, there's a good chance they like it in an AU setting! Not everything everybody is interacting with is necessarily the canon! Not everybody wants things to exist in canon and just want to explore playing dolls in a different sandbox and that's okay. And their sandbox might look a lot different than yours, and that's also okay. You have the freedom to make your sandbox whatever you please. Do whatever you want forever. Get funky with it. AUs are fun.

Okay that's my schpeal. everybody go have fun and play nice now.

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i actually never ever want AO3 to be censored bc nothing is more fun than reading the tags on a fic and going “huh. didn’t know there was a market for that.”

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I know I’m not the first person to say this but fandom’s seeming need to shove any character dynamic into some kind of familial role (siblings, father-son, mother-daughter etc) increasingly feels just as stifling and dismissive of platonic love as making every relationship romantic does.

I dunno man do you view all of your close friends as siblings cause I sure don’t. and I definitely don’t think of them as parents

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You once made a promise to yourself: if you ever met a time traveler, it wouldn't be a big deal. You’d tell them the date, the most important political conflict, a recent technology, and send them on their way. You now encounter a time traveler nearly every week.

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Nobody told me Madara was fun

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This came to me in a dream last night and it feels very fitting considering.

AU in which Shen Yuan transmigrates into PIDW, post abyss, as a regular unnamed npc. Could be either human or a demon. The important thing is he has minimal cultivation, just enough qi to know he has it. His health has not been blessed by its benefits; he's still blind as a bat without his glasses. And he doesn't have his glasses now. Fuck!

His system was NO fucking help, dropping him off with a cheery Good Luck User! ╰(￣ω￣ｏ) and immediately vanishing, the piece of shit.

So if he wants glasses, he needs money, probably. Glasses in this time are probably expensive, right? so he needs work. But what can he do when he can't see? all he has is his himself, the clothes on his back, and an extensive knowledge of the world he's been dropped into. And the lives of it's major players, to a degree.

(He'd know more if airplane hadn't skimped on the lore for more papapa. He isn't going to pretend he isn't bitter.)

But while contemplating what to do, he's run into by a girl who wasn't looking where she was going. After calming down her apologies with a head-pat and reassurances, he learns her name. And he remembers her! This is one of Bingge's future wives! He remembers that she's upset about her father being ill and not being able to afford the medicine he needs. In PIDW, she ends up marrying Binghe in exchange for his help finding the rare herb needed to cure him.

Shen Yuan remembers where that is too! And this poor dear is so upset, of course he tells her everything he knows about it. He'll even go there with her, it wasn't dangerous, only hard to find. Between his knowledge and her working eyes, they could do this!

She's so grateful for his help, she insist on giving him the money she'd been saving for this very thing. Shen Yuan barely did anything! If anything, he accidentally snatched an easy wife out of Binghe's hands! Oops! But this worked out so well, and theres so many chapters of PIDW that he can remember that it might be worth continuing to help the characters out of their troubles. It's less work for Binghe! He's just being helpful!

SO! He starts working as a seer and prophet, telling important figures that come to see him about the futures he foresees for them based on context clues and what he can remember from the book. For those he can't remember, he still remembers so much world building from the book that he offers advice without revealing what he did or didn't see. His approval rates rise rapidly with the accurate predictions and useful information.

The money he's offered for his service is more than enough to afford glasses, fortunately, but at this point people are expecting a blind prophet. So he saves his new wondrous glasses for reading horrible novels instead. he starts wearing a veil when he works, to keep his identity mysterious too. People like that kind of thing from their prophets, he thinks.

People just like to talk about how bewitching the seer is, with their gorgeous eyes. They're blunt but kind about the things they see, for the most part. Sometimes they'll smack you gently with the stick they use to see the floor when they walk, and several demons be having fantasties about it.

At first, he's merely working out of an old abandoned shack, but before long, he's got a small staff and a much nicer house. People, demons and humans alike, travel from all over the combined realms to hear from him. Both are welcome, he insists.

So you KNOW Bingge is gonna hear about this rising star of a seer who can read the future like a novel that's still being written before his eyes, and knows so much about the world that he could not feasibly have ever experienced. He's GOTTA check this guy out.

Maybe he can even help Bingge find that other Kind Shizun he'd been keeping an eye out for.