#i think its one of my first posts that like. officially blew up too wow this is so awesome

[kaogens]

redraw!!!

old version here ^_^

#splatoon #marina splatoon #splatoon marina #splatoon 2 #splatoon fanart #i still see ppl reblogging the old one from time to time to this day and i eeughh awww … aw shucks #i think its one of my first posts that like. officially blew up too wow this is so awesome

[gusu-emilu]

Wangxian: The Autumn Chrysanthemum

Post-Canon, Rated G, 1.5k - read on AO3

Background Info: The Chongyang Festival, or the Double Ninth Festival, is a lucky date for longevity, celebrated with customs such as climbing mountains and drinking chrysanthemum wine. The word for 'nine,' jiu, sounds like the word for 'long (time),' creating a link between the meanings.

* * *

Wei Ying raised the jar of liquor to his lips. The sweet, floral liquid swirled inside him, sending a rush of heat, then coolness through his chest. A small, sticky dribble slid down to his chin. He wiped it off.

“The chrysanthemum wine is good,” Wei Ying said. “Very rich.”

He turned to the man beside him. The sight of the gentle curves of his face, his tall, steady frame draped with light blue robes—this image filled Wei Ying with warmth that met the unique coolness of the flower’s liquor, the currents flowing into each other and relaxing his entire body.

He smiled. “Lan Zhan, do you remember the first time we shared a drink?”

Lan Zhan stirred a bit. His lashes lowered as he glanced toward Wei Ying’s feet, raised as their eyes met for a brief moment. Then he looked back out to the landscape stretching before them, a vast green valley beneath the mountain they had climbed, dots of the autumn’s scarlet and golden colors reflecting in his eyes.

“I remember that you used a talisman to coerce me.”

Wei Ying choked on the wine a bit, until his coughing melted into a syrupy chuckle. “Of all things you could’ve chosen to reminisce about, you had to pick that.” He drew in a breath of crisp air and sighed. “Why must you incriminate me so? Tell me that you secretly felt exhilarated by breaking the rules, or that you wished you had let me play with your headband, or that you liked calling me Wei-gege. Don’t leave me to say all the sappy memories myself.”

A flock of geese flew overhead, their wings stroking the morning sun and blending with the sound of the mountain breeze.

“All these things, I remember fondly,” Lan Zhan said.

“So do I.” Wei Ying swirled the jar of liquor, watched the pale, honey-colored liquid encircle itself. “You know, the Chongyang Festival is the only time I would drink chrysanthemum wine over Emperor’s Smile.” He shot a grin at Lan Zhan. “Otherwise, I would always prefer this one splendor I know from Gusu.”

The corners of Lan Zhan’s mouth crept upward. “Flattery will not bring you more to drink.”

“Aiya, you see right through me.” In one swift movement, he locked arms with Lan Zhan and nuzzled his cheek into Lan Zhan’s shoulder. Lan Zhan’s breath slowed, a comfortable swell against him. “I already have too much of one certain splendor from Gusu. Better not to have more.”

Lil’ Apple hummed quietly behind them. The donkey was tired after long months of wandering with Wei Ying, until finally meeting with Lan Zhan at the halfway point to Gusu. And actually, Wei Ying was tired too, for they had only returned from their travels a few days ago.

He sank deeper into Lan Zhan’s side.

“When I was traveling with Lil’ Apple, I kept dreaming about our days in the Cloud Recesses. I…I miss it. Back then. How we were all so young. Not even as old as A-Yuan is now.” He lifted the jar up to eye level and shook his head at it. “You know, I think this wine is making me a little too nostalgic.”

Lan Zhan’s arm softened in Wei Ying’s hold. “Chrysanthemum blooms in autumn when other blossoms are fading.” He tilted his chin up slightly, looking out over the trees changing colors in the valley. “Naturally, upon drinking, one would remember moments passed.”

“Mm, you’re right.” Wei Ying lifted his head from Lan Zhan’s shoulder to join him in admiring the scenery. “I shouldn’t forget the meaning of Chongyang, should I?”

“Jiu yue, jiu ri,” Lan Zhan said.

“The ninth day of the ninth month.” Wei Ying waved the jar farther out in front of them, lifting it higher, as if offering it to the valley. He called out loudly like a proclamation. “Two nines—two jiu’s—two long times—just like the two long lives we will share together!”

He smiled, his eyelids feeling heavier as he lowered the jar and leaned against Lan Zhan once more.

“I am happy you have returned,” Lan Zhan said, his voice quivering a bit, like a pond suddenly overcome with ripples at the final entrance of a skipping stone. “Wherever your future takes you, I am happy for it.”

Lan Zhan had never been one to repeat himself. But this sentiment, he had said more than once in the days since Wei Ying returned from his travels, always with that slight tone of turbulence. Listening to these words might have done more to move the soul than drinking chrysanthemum wine.

“Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying chided. “My future takes me to you, and nowhere else.”

A warm stillness spread through them, passing from one man to the other through their intertwined arms.

“You’ll have to help me with that, though,” Wei Ying added. “I need to build up Mo Xuanyu’s golden core so I can cultivate to immortality with you.” He chuckled. “Who would’ve thought that after everything, I’d wind up as a student at the Cloud Recesses yet again?”

Lan Zhan’s bangs blew in the breeze, waving gently over his cheeks. “At last, you come back to Gusu with me.”

Comfort bubbled inside Wei Ying at those words. He let it fill the cavern of longing that time had dug deeper and deeper into him.

“I am. I am so, so glad to come back to Gusu with you.”

They watched the morning sun rise higher over the valley. A splotch of golden color from a small field of chrysanthemums lay below them, glowing brighter, almost caramelizing, as the sun’s rays strengthened.

“Have you heard of the poet Tao Yuanming?” Wei Ying asked.

“Tell me.”

Wei Ying paused, suspicious that Lan Zhan knew of the poet already and was just pretending. But perhaps he would be content to listen anyway.

“Well, he wrote a lot about the beauty of chrysanthemums. He appreciated their noble nature, their power for healing.” Wei Ying swirled the jar of wine again. “He was a lot like me, really.”

“You have written chrysanthemum poetry?” Lan Zhan said with a small smirk.

Wei Ying laughed sheepishly. “Ah, no, no, I haven’t. Sorry to disappoint.”

Lan Zhan gave him a fond look that said, I know. Continue.

“Okay, let’s see.” Wei Ying stroked his chin, making a show of thoughtfulness. “As Tao Yuanming was growing up, he was surrounded by hardship. Clans were fighting with each other, overthrowing each other, wreaking violence and betrayal at every turn.

“He joined the civil service to help his people, but all he met was hypocrisy. Scheming, thievery, wars.

“Then, his sister died.”

Lan Zhan’s frame grew tense, as did Wei Ying’s own body.

“The death of his sister was too much for him, and the government officials had only ever abused his good intentions, so he decided to flee public life. He went to the countryside to become a meager farmer, and started a new family.

“Generals came by and asked him to rejoin the civil service, but he refused. He could not compromise his principles by returning to that world. Instead, he lived in poverty, for the single richness in his life was the ability to admire nature and write of its beauties.

“Sometimes he felt lonely.”

Wei Ying breathed in the mountain air, along with the calming scent of tea leaves and pine. This scent usually filled the Cloud Recesses, but now it hung from Lan Zhan beside him, steadying him.

“However, there was a visitor who would come to Tao Yuanming’s farm. This visitor would bring him liquor, and simply sit with him, enjoying his company.”

The faint surface of a low wooden table seemed to grow in the space between them, the chatter of guests at a restaurant, the sting of spicy peppers on soft tongues, the crinkling sound of A-Yuan playing with a toy butterfly.

“So Tao Yuanming grew fond of liquor, and he drank it in front of the chrysanthemum blossoms. He found peace and gratitude where one would have thought he had nothing.”

Having concluded the story, Wei Ying looked to his side.

After a long silence, Lan Zhan said, “In these things there lies a deep meaning. Yet when we would express it, words suddenly fail us.”

“Wow!” Wei Ying’s eyes widened, and a grin spread across his face. “So profound! You should be a poet like Tao Yuanming, Lan Zhan.”

A terse, barely-audible huff escaped Lan Zhan. “You speak highly of the artist, yet do not recognize his words.”

“That’s Tao Yuanming’s poetry?”

Lan Zhan’s only answer was to gaze back onto the sunny valley, an air of amusement floating in the breeze around him.

“Oh, well. I suppose that’s what I get for trying to impress you.” Wei Ying took another sip of liquor, felt its heat and coolness rush through him.

“Here, you can have the last bit.” He held the jar up to Lan Zhan’s lips. “Hanguang-Jun should drink the chrysanthemum wine of the Chongyang Festival, so he has a long life with me.”

Lan Zhan’s eyes twinkled, the same golden color as the wine.

Wei Ying tipped the jar of wine between Lan Zhan’s lips. Then he placed his own lips on Lan Zhan’s to savor the chrysanthemums a little longer.

* * *

What is there I can do to assuage this mood? Only enjoy myself drinking my unstrained wine. I do not know about a thousand years, Rather let me make this morning last forever.

-Tao Yuanming, "Written on the Ninth Day of the Ninth Month"

* * *

If you enjoyed this story, you can be a supportive sibling like Jiang Yanli by visiting me on AO3!

I am not of Chinese descent, so feel free to inform me of any cultural missteps.

#i wrote this so long ago and forgot to post it. here it is #my writing feels so different looking back lol #mdzsnet #mdzs #cql #the untamed #wangxian #wei wuxian #lan wangji #mdzs fanfic #the untamed fanfic #cql fanfic #mdzs fanfiction #the untamed fanfiction #cql fanfiction #wangxian fanfic #wangxian fanfiction #emilu fics #emilu creations

[tradgicworks]

Heartfelt:P-1 A World of Sorrow

When a student of a private school disappears during stormy night, three strangers come together to look for her and end up discovering the dark secrets of the world around them. WORD COUNT - 3134

The light of the setting sun peered into the old diner. Black clouds dotted the sky. Sophie took a long sip from her milkshake and stared wistfully at the horizon. Her golden bangle bracelet slid down her arm as she did.

“What’s wrong?” Gwyneth asked as she noticed her gaze.

Gwyneth brushed her bangs aside. Her dark brown colored eyes were filled with concern. She had voluminous long black hair that covered her shoulders like a fluffy mane. She wore a uniform which consisted of a long skirt, a simple tucked in blouse, and a blazer- all in different shades of purple.

“Nothing’s wrong, I’m just thinking about some stuff,” Sophie said with a meek smile.

"What kinda stuff?" Gwyneth asked.

"Midterms, winter vacation, piano practice. The usual," Sophie replied.

“Wow, not even trying to hide the fact that you weren’t paying attention to my story, huh?" Gwyneth gave an exaggerated sigh.

"I'm sorry," Sophie awkwardly smiled.

 “It's okay, I forgive you. Anyways, remember that girl that went missing a couple months ago, she was a freshman, um, vice president of the chess club or something. Well some of the older students have been talking about how this isn’t the first time that it has happened,” Gwyneth ate one of her few remaining fries. “Near the end of last year’s spring semester a different freshman suddenly moved away. This normally wouldn't have been seen as strange except for the fact that it was right in the middle of finals. Supposedly, one of her friends decided to call her parents to ask about what happened only to be told that the phone number had been out of service for weeks.”

“Spooky,” Sophie commented simply.

“Mhm. So, the older girls started talking and it turned out that a lot of students went missing over the years. They say that it's been about fifteen students in total that have suddenly disappeared. For every single one of them there was a convenient excuse for why, but all of it just seems too coincidental,” Gwyneth leaned in for dramatic effect. “Me thinks there’s a conspiracy afoot.”

“Really? I suppose it is strange, but it could just be that the seniors get overactive imaginations with how much free time they have during finals,” Sophie sighed.

“Aw come on, humor me at least," Gwyneth leaned back. “Don’t you think it’s weird that the academy has a dedicated security team that answers directly to Capital City’s police department? We even have a creepy name for them- Wardens- that’s not normal!”

“Well, given the kind of students that attend it’s not that strange,” Sophie said.

“You really are playing devil's advocate today, huh?” Gwyneth gave a friendly smile.

“Sorry,” Sophie lowered her gaze.

Gwyneth’s smile turned to a face of concern. 

“Hey, are you sure you’re okay-'' Gwyneth started before she was interrupted by the chimes of their phones.

“Curfew,” Sophie swiped at her smartphone. “It’s time to head back.”

“Right...” Gwyneth gazed at her for a few seconds as she packed up her things and got ready to leave before following suit.

The two left a tip for the waiter and headed out into the cold air of the coming winter. The sleepy sky matched the energy of the few students that remained outside, all of them in a quiet hurry to get back to the main campus of Dorothy Elaine Atham's Private Academy for Young Women, or “the academy” as the students plainly referred to it. It was originally constructed in the early 1940s, yet it managed to remain one of the most prestigious high schools in Capital City. This was mostly due to the academy having the support of the Capital City Police Department. They would employ off-duty officers to act as the academy’s security team, or ‘Wardens’ as they were officially referred to. As a result the academy set itself apart as one of the safest private high schools in the entirety of the United States. Strict curfews, no relationships, mandatory dorms, quarterly inspections by the Wardens, uniforms and an arduous curriculum were some of the measures taken to keep the students safe. Wealthy families from all over the country enrolled their children with peace of mind that they would be safe, allowing the school to afford top of the line facilities, staff, and to further its reputation even more. It was said that the academy was so stern with its policies that even the lightest violation could lead to expulsion. Of course that was just a rumor.

Sophie and Gwyneth eventually found themselves back at the main entrance of the academy. Tall walls made of brick and black fencing led to two large half open gates. A flower bed filled with wilting violet roses that matched the student’s outfits sat underneath them. A tall Warden stood at the side of the entrance. Her bright green eyes filled with overwhelming sternness locked with Sophie’s. Sophie averted her gaze and made her way in alongside Gwyneth.

“W-Well, see you tomorrow,” Sophie said to Gwyneth as she took out a pair of wireless earbuds.

“Wait,” Gwyneth gently grabbed her arm before she left. “How about we walk back to your dorm together? I got some more spooky stories I want to tell you about.”

“You won’t make it back to your dorm in time if we do that, you’re on the other side of campus.” Sophie replied.

“I could just stay at your place, y’know like a sleepover,” Gwyneth doubled down as she let go of her arm.

“We both know you can’t do that,” Sophie let out a long breath and held Gwyneth’s shoulders. “I’m fine, really. I know you’re worried about me but I just haven't been getting a lot of sleep. That’s all.”

“Are you sure?” Gwyneth asked.

“I’m sure,” Sophie looked her in the eyes. “I promise that I’m okay.

“Breakfast?” Gwyneth asked dejectedly.

“Of course, breakfast sounds great,” Sophie gave a convincing enough smile. “Now let’s hurry, before the dorm doors lock.” She said as she let go of her.

“Yeah, goodnight,” Gwyneth smiled slightly.

“Goodnight,” Sophie replied before putting in her earbuds and selecting a classical music playlist.

The sun was halfway nestled into the horizon by the time they split. Night was rapidly approaching. The pitch black clouds moved as a mound, thunder rumbled in the distance. The academy resembled a small college more than a high school. Four buildings took up the majority of the campus, each housing their respective grade. A well decorated plaza rested in the middle of the four buildings, where the freshmen, sophomores, juniors, and seniors could interact with each other during lunch or after classes. The dorms sat a few hundred feet from their respective buildings. Wilting but mostly green grass took the majority of the empty space in the campus. Trees and flower beds stood beside the lamp posts that lit up the sprawling walkways. The campus barely had enough room for everything that was built on it, but it was efficient nonetheless.

Sophie’s brows furrowed as the freshmen dorm came into view. It was tucked away in the farthest corner of the campus. While the other dorms enjoyed a nice view of the academy, the freshmen dorms were greeted with the old auditorium. It was by far the oldest building on campus and in a desperate need for renovation. Unfortunately, the construction was inexplicably postponed until the end of the semester- leaving the freshmen with the sight of an ugly, half finished, and decaying building.

Sophie glanced at the front doors. A girl leaned against the doors as she chewed gum. Sophie overlapped the ends of her blazer together and averted her eyes. The girl stopped chewing as Sophie walked to the entrance. Sophie quickly took out her ID card and pressed it against the door’s scanner. The girl swatted her ID to the ground as it finished scanning.

“Whoops,” The girl, Eva, leered in a pretentious tone as she put her arm around her shoulder. “Didn’t see you there princess.”

Eva blew a bubble with her gum and popped it with a sharp snap. Her dyed ash blonde hair was tied into a messy bun. Her hazel colored eyes were flecked with dull orange blemishes. She wore a thick black hoodie and a short skirt which barely fell within the academy’s dress code. A faint but irritatingly smug smirk stretched across her face.

“What do you want, Eva?” Sophie said meekly.

“Nothing much, nothing much at all. I just wanted to talk to my dear friend for uh,” Eva glanced at her wrist watch. “Five minutes.”

“We’re not friends,” Sophie kept her gaze glued to the floor.

“It hurts me to hear you say that,” Eva squeezed her shoulder until she winced from the pain. “Listen, I need a little favor. As you know, winter break is in a week and I’m running low on funds, so I was wondering if you can help me. It’ll run you about five thousand dollars, but of course that’s nothing compared to all the allowance money your mommy and daddy are giving you, right?”

“No,” Sophie muttered.

“Excuse me?,” Eva tilted her head until she met her gaze. “You need to speak up, I can’t hear you through your teeth.”

“I’m not giving you anything,” Sophie pushed her off of herself. “Leave me alone or I’ll report you to the Wardens!”

“Oh, really now?” Eva chuckled dryly. “I think you and I both know you can’t follow up on such a threat, not without putting that friend of yours in a whole lot of trouble…Well you do have a point, I can’t take what’s not in my hands after all…” She glanced at her watch and gave a sadistic smirk.

“But neither can you,” Eva said before sweeping Sophie’s legs and causing her to trip backwards.

Sophie yelped in pain as she just managed to catch herself. By the time she got up Eva was already inside of the dorm with her ID in hand. She rushed to the doors only to find that they were already locked. The sound of a grandfather clock chimed through the PA system signaling the start of the curfew. 

“It’s a good thing you managed to scan the door before you dropped your ID, huh? That way it's on record that you got in here before curfew. Your perfect attendance is not in danger, though it was a real shame you lost your ID. Don’t worry though I’ll turn it in to the lost and found in the morning. Have a nice night, princess! I hear it's going to be a dark and stormy one,” Eva laughed while waving Sophie’s ID in the air. 

“Wait!” Sophie pleaded as she desperately tried to open the door, but no matter how much she pushed against them, the doors refused to budge.

She froze as she felt a cold drop of rain fall down her neck. She looked up at the rumbling dark sky. It began to pour. Sophie clung to what little shelter could find at the side of the building. She took out her phone and tried to call Gwyneth, only to find that her screen had shattered completely from when she tripped. She looked around for a Warden but found none. She yanked out her earbuds and angrily threw them into her bag in frustration. Pathetically faint music leaked out of them. She leaned against the wall and sunk until she was sitting with her knees to her chest.

Despite its claims to security, the reality is that the school can’t keep everyone safe. With the majority of students coming from wealthy backgrounds, treating one too harshly could lead to the parents withdrawing their donations. Without those funds, the school would cease to function- something the academy avoided at all costs. As such, there was an unwritten rule that the wealthier the family, the more lenient the punishment. Though many students did not take advantage of this reality, after all attending the academy was a privilege. All except for Eva. Nobody really knows why, but the school would turn a blind eye to her many misdeeds. Some speculated that it was due to her role as one of the academy’s star athletes, others thought that she was secretly related to the headmaster. Regardless of the rumors, the reality was that she was cruel, spiteful, and above all, manipulative. She made a habit of harassing students that had unfortunately drawn her attention. Whether it be through blackmail, harassment, or slander, she would abuse her victim until they were forced to do whatever she wanted. No matter how much students tried to retaliate she always seemed to have the upper hand and the academy would turn the other way. As a result she had gained an infamous reputation amongst the freshmen and sophomores as someone to be avoided at all costs. Unfortunately for Sophie, Eva seemed to be obsessed with making her time at the academy as miserable as possible. Eva’s persistence was so overwhelming that Sophie ended up being isolated from the rest of her class out of fear of Eva alone. The only person brave enough to still talk to her was her closest friend Gwyneth. She did her best to make sure that Sophie was rarely alone and felt safe. However, even that backfired. Eva had somehow managed to take a photo of Gwyneth that would lead to her expulsion if revealed to the public. Ever since then, Eva has hung that threat over Sophie’s head and she couldn’t let anything happen to her best friend. As such, Sophie felt so alone. She felt as if she was left to fend for herself against the clutches of a monster.

Sophie pressed her face against her knees, frustration weighing at her heart, and began to cry. Harsh winds began to pick up and slam waves of rain against her. Sophie took a shaky deep breath and slowly rose to her feet. She looked at her surroundings to try to find better shelter. Her gaze eventually lingered on the auditorium. She choked down a cough before grabbing her bag and heading towards the unfinished building.

. . .

The outside of the auditorium was a mix of moldy wood and peeling paint. Its towering size gave it the imposing essence of a Victorian mansion. Overgrown vines and unkept leaves dressed the entirety it’s walls. Sophie steeled herself as she approached the entrance. She stopped under a small awning that hung over the front doors where no rain seemed to fall. Lightning followed by thunder struck as she gripped her rain soaked skirt and wrung out the excess water. She shivered from the cold as she dried herself the best she could. When she finished, she leaned against the door. 

“The dorms open up at 6 am, I’ll be able to get my ID back then,” She thought to herself as she stared at the hole riddled awning. “Maybe father will buy me a new phone, it was pretty old anyways.”

She grabbed her wrist and felt for her bracelet, her only reminder of warmth. A wave of sadness surged through her.

“Mom, Dad, I want to go back home,” She whispered to herself.

Chills spread out through her entire body as the door she braced herself against suddenly flung open with a sharp clang. She regained her balance and turned around. The door’s handle laid on the floor completely broken. The darkness of the auditorium greeted her with a gust of musty, but warm, air. She took a step back only to have the freezing rain fall on the back of her neck. Sophie looked at the entrance with an uneasy face. After a few moments she hesitantly walked in.

The building was much larger than it appeared. A few work-lights left turned on lit the auditorium with sheets of inconsistent light. Door frames to rooms that were used for the construction’s storage lined the walkways. The long hallways on either side of Sophie curved out of view. In front of her sat two large doors. She pushed the heavy doors open and stepped inside. She found herself in the academy’s theater. Rows of weathered red fabric seats stepped down into the center stage. The stage’s walnut flooring was scuffed from years of use and subsequent neglect. Two large maroon curtains blocked the view to the backstage.  A small podium sat at the front of it, its paint flaking off to the bare wood. She climbed onto the stage, its visage faintly lit by the work-lights that peered through the half opened doors.

Sophie stared at the seats in a silent awe. She imagined what the theater would look like if it were full of people and wondered why the academy refused to finish renovations. As she pondered, her gaze lowered to the podium. Her eyes narrowed. Faint scratches lined the bottom of it. She wiped a layer of dust off with her hand and revealed a string of faintly recognizable letters.

“Save me?” Sophie slowly read out loud.

“Heard.” A breathy and raspy voice that stretched out every syllable echoed through the theater. “You.”

The doors slammed shut, snuffing out the work-lights and leaving her in complete darkness.

“W-Who’s there?” Sophie stammered.

A bittersweet melody of hums snaked through the dark and into Sophie’s ears in reply.

“Show y-yourself,” Fear gripped at her heart, she clutched her school bag ready to swing it whatever was lurking in the darkness.

“Heard,” The voice repeated, this time more strained. “You.”

“T-This isn’t f-funny, please stop!” She said with a slight whimper.

“Save. You. You. Want. Me. To. Save...” The voice called from behind her causing her to jump in fear.

She swung her schoolbag wildly but it collided against nothing.

“Go. Somewhere. Safe. You. Want. To. Go. Somewhere. Safe. Somewhere. Home...” The voice grew louder.

“Stay away…” She said silently.

Her breaths grew frantic. An overwhelming dread welled in her gut. Panic coursed through her entire body.

“I. Can. Help.” The voice whispered.

A raspy strand of flesh wrapped around her feet before she could react. Her horrified scream was cut short as another strand that gagged her mouth shut. More and more threads wrapped around her body until she was stuck in an airtight cage. She shrieked in muffled terror as she was yanked behind the curtains. Lightning flashed illuminating the theater in a pang of white before decaying back into darkness. Silence followed. The night continued as normal as a stormy night could. Though a few freshmen swore that they heard strange noises coming from the old auditorium that night. Screams of struggles, pleads for help, and a blood curdling shriek to name a few. Of course nobody took it too seriously. It was just a rumor after all.

#oc #ow #writing #mystery #thriller #horror #anime inspired #female protagonist #heartfelt #cw bullying #First time using tumblr and writing online please be patient C:

[masonscig]

first line tag game

thank you for the tag @crackerdumortain !!!!! yours were so much fun to read omg !!!!

Rules: List the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20, just list them all!). See if there are any patterns. Choose your favourite opening line. Then tag some of your favourite authors!

[disclaimer: i write for the choices fandom and some for litg so you’ll see a mix of those fandoms on this list LMAO]

1. stay [twc – mason x sofía]

The first time was casual. She had a knack for musing her thoughts aloud, tossing her harmless opinions out for anyone who’d catch them.

She was good at starting conversations in that way – while he’d never been one for talking.

She never did it with heavy topics, though.

2. thieves in the shadows [choices – blades au – mal x zilyana]

bullets pelted the crates they were crouched behind, wood splintering in every direction. bodies were strewn across the warehouse, the unmistakable pools of blood streaking across the stone.

“raine! to your left!” immy yelled her way, barely sparing her a glance before unloading her clip, shell casings clinking against the ground.

the gun trembled in yana’s hands. she’d shot one before – practice at the gun range, glass bottles in a back alley – but never a live target.

3. if we meet again [choices – open heart au – bryce x spencer] 18+

year one

The ride from the airport to her parents’ home was long and grueling, the slushy ice pelting the windshield barely passing for snow.

It was practically sub-zero outside, a stark difference between the mid seventies weather she’d just left.

4. clandestine [twc – mason x sofía] 18+

“hey. hey wake up –”

she stirred at the greeting, but jumped when he kicked the desk. her face contorted into a grimace, the imprint of her tweed jacket on her cheek outlined in pink. “hmm?”

“you fell asleep again,” he said, plopping a bag in front of her.

5. undying [choices – blades – mal x zilyana]

Zilyana stirred, resituating herself against Mal’s bare chest, feeling his arm instinctively tighten around her shoulders. When she realized she was missing the sound of his deep breathing, accompanied with an occasional soft snore, she cracked an eye open to see his chin tipped upwards, his gaze trained on the ceiling.

6. talent show [choices – platinum – shane x dom]

There wasn’t a day that went by where she didn’t cross his mind. Even since they were kids.

He admired so much about her – her fiery spirit, her drive, her unwavering tenacity.

And he’d been in love with Dom for as long as he could remember.

7. redeemed [choices – platinum – raleigh x dom]

As soon as he stepped off stage, he was shuffled to his tour bus, Fiona on his heels. She looked like the human embodiment of rage in a grey blazer, a look in her eye that made him thankful he wasn’t the one it was directed at – or at least he hoped he wasn’t the reason she was two seconds away from a murderous rampage.

8. hidden [choices – foreign affairs – blaine x carina] 18+

Her cheek slipped out of the palm of her hand, forehead smacking the desk, nearly jumping out of her skin at the abrupt awakening.

“Ow.”

She prodded the tender spot on her face, thankful her foundation was thick.

A soft snore caught her attention – next to her, Blaine was passed out. Leaning back in his chair, his head was thrown back, arms crossed against his chest, the textbook on its face in his lap.

9. is this fate? [litg au – bobby x mc] 18+

The peroxide was cold when it hit her skin, the liquid bubbling on her knee, relentlessly stinging. She sucked in a breath through gritted teeth.

“Sorry… should be over soon,” he murmured, wiping up the stray liquid that streamed down her leg with a small rag.

The heaviness of the atmosphere between them was almost too much to bear – they’d barely spoken since he helped her onto the counter in his small office, leg propped up between his own, where he sat in his desk chair.

10. asvista cove [litg college au – bobby x elena]

Bobby’s thumb flicked the lighter repeatedly until he got a consistent flame, moving slowly from left to right over the edge of the blunt. His cheeks hollowed out as he sucked in, the tip of it an auburn ember. He pulled it out of his mouth and sucked in an even deeper breath, holding it.

When he blew out the thick cloud of smoke, he passed it to her, coughing under his breath. “Whew. Your turn.”

She followed suit, the thick smoke coating the inside of her lungs, bitter and heavy. She exhaled, the shroud smoke enveloping her view of the sealine.

11. reticent [twc – mason x sofía] 18+

She was bare.

Bare in the way that one is when they’ve been stripped down and torn apart with a trained gaze just calculating enough for them to feel seen – parts of her she didn’t know she’d hidden splayed out like withered pages of a book, dog-eared and marked up like a frequently reread novel.

One he’d reread because it was familiar, because it had fallen into his lap (he hadn’t searched for it), not so much because it was his favorite.

12. more [twc – mason x sofía] 18+

He laced his fingers through her thick hair, reveling in the way his skin looked contrasted against the midnight of her hair.

[the way i can’t post more than this bc it’s....... very nsfw right out the bat LMFAO]

13. calm before the storm [choices – open heart – bryce x spencer]

Since the moment his hands trembled amidst one of the most important surgeries of his life, Bryce was holding on by a thread.

With each half-assed joke he cracked, each wavering smile, each time he tried convincing others – including himself – that he was coping, he fell apart more and more.

The first night he went home after Spencer was quarantined, he trudged through the halls of Edenbrook, like he was dragging his legs through wet concrete. He was nearly magnetized to her bedside, not wanting to leave, but he needed to rest – he’d been awake for nearly a day and a half by the time he clocked out.

14. envy | part two of the attached series [twc – mason x sofía x felix]

He strode down the hallway, hands in his pockets to give the illusion that he didn’t give a shit, when he was most definitely on edge. His fingers flicked his lighter open and closed against the twill lining of his pockets, trying to focus on the soft clicking noise it made instead of the swarm of thoughts clouding his conscience.

He still couldn’t figure out why he cared so much.

15. comfort | part one of the attached series [twc – mason x sofía x felix]

He noticed it before she did.

Her pulse didn’t jump the same way it did the first dozen times he walked into the room. The blood didn’t rush to her cheeks, or creep up her neck, the crimson flush absent even when he tried his hardest to fluster her. And it normally took next to nothing to get her to turn into a bumbling mess.

16. out of time [choices – open heart – sienna x danny]

She sprinted down the hallway, pager still beeping erratically on her hip, the weight of the numbers enough to make her feel like she was slugging through wet concrete.

No, no, not him, please, not him, she chanted to herself, vision blurring with tears before she had the chance to let the negative possibilities set in.

17. unrequited part three [choices – open heart – bryce x spencer]

She slumped into the seat in the deserted waiting room, her joints popping as she stretched, her deep sigh echoing off of the tile. She was exhausted.

She could usually push through the worst of her shifts, but fatigue settled into her bones, a lethargy she’d never experienced entrapping her like a net, and she couldn’t fight her way out of it this time.

18. signs [choices – ride or die – logan x raquel]

“A final in sign language? Couldn’t you just have a conversation with the teacher or some shit?” Logan sat across from her on the couch, watching as her fingers bent and flexed, transfixed.

She stopped abruptly, screwing her mouth to the side in concentration. She repeated the same few moves, getting more and more frustrated with each sequence.

19. mementos [choices – ride or die – logan x raquel]

The sound of his boots slapping against the damp pavement reverberated off of the brick of the alleyways, his gasping breaths adding to the symphony that was his escape.

20. warmth [twc – mason x sofía]

“You’re going the wrong way,” Mason grunted, looking particularly stiff in her passenger seat.

“I thought we could take the scenic route,” she shrugged, flicking her high beams on as she turned off of the main road leading downtown, easing on the brakes when the tires hit the gravel.

okay so....... i didn’t really realize just HOW MUCH i’ve written since the summer? i’ve fallen into a pattern where i think i’m a failure bc of how slow i am to write because i have so many series i’ve started and dropped off and wips i’ve abandoned but.... i’ve managed to write for most appreciation weeks i’ve both hosted/participated in and i’ve written for THREE fandoms.... i don’t normally gas myself up but? i’m really? proud of myself? KSJDJKSD if you read this far thank you and you’re prob watching me have a breakdown over how much i’ve managed to write oh my GOD ok i need to lie down KLSDFKASFJD i didn’t even think i could hit 20 but i did???? alright i’m officially gonna treat myself at some point bc i did all this in less than a year.... these are from the end of july 2020 to now..... wow ok im done i promise SKDFJKSDF

tagging: @raleighcarrera and @pixeljazzy !!! <3 

#tag games #my fic #long post

[jamielea81]

Conversations

Chapter 2

Description: You accompany your friends on a day trip to Animal Kingdom Theme Park where you meet Scott Evans by chance. This one afternoon leads to a year long friendship with both Chris and Scott over text messages and phone calls.

Pairing: Chris Evans x Reader

Warning: Cursing

A/N: Here is chapter two! Cast members are what Disney calls its employees. Italics are internal thoughts. Tag list is open, please send an ask if you would like to be added. Likes, comments, and reblogs are wonderful.

Chapter 1

When he added you on Twitter, that was strange enough. You could reason it out that he saw your name spread through the tagged post and he did it on a whim. Or maybe he followed a lot of people. But that one was easily debunked after a quick glance at his profile showed he only followed about three hundred people. Maybe he was just friendly in that way. A quick add here and you’d be unfollowed by Thanksgiving. There was no chance he actually liked you as a person. Right?

You hit reply before you could overthink it more than you already had.

Y/N: I’m not always grumpy, I’ll have you know.

Y/N: Are you guys still on vacation or back home?

When he didn’t immediately reply, you decided to put your phone away and actually go to sleep. You’d be bringing Jana coffee in the morning which meant you actually had to get up before noon.

Your alarm sounded at eight which it hadn’t done in at least a year. Since you worked mainly on assignment, you rarely went into the office until well past noon. Some days you didn’t even go in. You were a night owl, so unless there was a morning meeting you slept in. Living alone also brought less interruptions to your schedule. You’d been in your sleepy vacation style home for the last two years. Your father regularly lectured you on the importance of homeowner ship. Paying rent wasn’t doing anything to build equity. Blah. Blah. Blah. He was only looking out for your future, but between lectures about settling down and having a family, the house stuff pushed you over the top. You still weren’t sure where you wanted to end up, so buying wasn’t on the top of your priority list.

Florida really was a mixed bag. Between the retires that lived in Florida during the winter months, the tourists, the general crazies that you heard about on the national and local news each night, and those like yourself that were just trying to live your life, you never officially settled in. The ocean called to you, but the pricey lifestyle and fear of evacuating each year due to a hurricane did not. Being fifteen minutes from both the Disney and Universal parks would also be nice, but the traffic and long lines at Target were not appealing. You were currently living in a cute two-bedroom home fifteen minutes outside the parks bubble where life was a little more affordable and groceries weren’t inflated. It was still technically a vacation rental, but the owner liked the idea of having a long-term leaser. The fact that it had its own pool that you didn’t have to maintain was just an added bonus. Driving into Orlando wasn’t great, but at least you missed the bulk of rush hour by sleeping in.

You texted Jana to let her know you just pulled in to the parking lot. Balancing your laptop bag, oversized purse, and two coffees through a busy office rotunda wasn’t easy. Thank goodness for stylish flats. If you had to navigate in heels every day, you’d probably never get out of bed. God bless Jana. How she handled it, you had no idea.

The security desk knew you by name, but due to protocol, Jana actually had to sign you in. After exchanging a few good mornings, you set both cups on the desk and waited. Most of the time she was already in the lobby when you walked through the double doors. No doubt this was a form of punishment for not telling her about meeting the two boys from Boston. Not that you looked that up or anything. You totally didn’t Google anything that night when you got home. And she calls you the brat. Ten minutes later her smiling face walks out of the elevator and up to the security desk. She signs you in while you stare her down.

“Let’s go pokey,” she says before turning away from you, leaving you to carry your bags and both of your coffees.

You huff but manage anyway, making it to the waiting elevator she holds open with her hand.

“Did you know Phil’s wife just had another baby?” She shakes her head no. “Yeah, it’s their third. These are things I wouldn’t know if you didn’t take your sweet time signing me in. Coffee’s cold by the way,” you add for good measure.

“I already had some, that’s fine,” she said, one eyebrow pointed daring you to complain.

When the elevator stops on the twelfth floor, Jana gracefully exits on three inch heels, swaying her hips in the tight and posh pencil skirt with matching blazer. You get it. It’s a well-established law firm full of sharks all trying to get ahead. She exudes confidence. There are whispers of her making partner in the next year. At least that’s what Brooks has told you. Jana’s mum on the subject, not wanting to jinx or tempt fate or whatever.

You drop her coffee in the trash bin just outside the elevator doors and hurry after.

“Y/N! Nice to see you gracing us with your presence.”

Jana turns around to see Ethan’s predatory stare. You don’t mind it. Ethan’s a sheep in wolf’s clothing and has been coming on to you for the better part of a year. He’s good looking with his sandy brown hair coiffed in the front and bright green eyes. He’s up for partner as well. You know this because he tells you this at least once a week. He’s harmless and always has a kind word for you.

“Well, good morning to you too. Any word on getting partner yet?” you practically whisper. You have to give him something.

“Soon. It’ll happen.” He looks behind you and then meets your eyes again. “Here by yourself? Come to see me?” he asked.

You gesture behind him. “Nope. Just here to see my bestie.” You move past him, but turn your head to him as you do. “Have a good day, Ethan,” you reply.

Jana enters her office and closes the door after you enter. You take a seat in front of her desk as she walks around to sit behind it.

“Are you ever going to throw him a bone? Not that I want to see you with him, but it’s hard to watch sometimes,” she says picking up her phone, fingers moving quickly before setting it back down.

“Am I here to talk about Ethan? I thought I was here to beg for your forgiveness and tell you what happened,” you asked.

“Grovel first. Ethan next week,” Jana says with a smile. She taps her desk in a ‘speak now’ fashion.

Taking a quick sip of your coffee before setting it on her desk, you take a deep breath and lick your lips.

“Okay, so I found a table at Nomad, which was packed by the way. The sever was apparently pulling double duty as Mickey as she just never showed up. You know me, I was impatient and probably drew attention to myself with excessive eyerolls or whatever.”

Jana mouths “no way.”

“Anyway. Scott Evans was sitting at a couch across the aisle from my table. I didn’t know it was him until later. Apparently, I caught his attention, so he bought us both a drink and sat at my table. We chatted for a while, did a shot, no big deal.” You smirk and shrug a shoulder. Jana’s mouth is hanging open. “He somehow drags me to Everest and because they had a cast member with them, we got ushered right to the front of the line where I end up sitting next to Chris. That’s when I knew who I was with. Had no idea before that because I hadn’t talked to Chris at the bar. I thought that was the end of it until you mentioned the photo of me last night. I still hate that ride by the way.”

You down the rest of your coffee because it’s cold, but damnit if you don’t need the caffeine.

“Well, fuck. Who would ever see that coming? It’s a fun story you can tell at parties or I don’t know, to your best friend,” she said.

“Oh, I planned to tell Brooks at work,” you said with a grin.

“Wow. I’m really hurt,” Jana said while clutching her chest.

“You love me.”

“Hmph. Maybe,” Jana added.

You don’t check your Twitter account again until you get home from work. You don’t even want to utter the word Twitter or have it on your screen in case someone sees it and starts asking how you were able to sit next to a celebrity on a ride. You didn’t think anyone would have seen it anyway. No one outwardly admitted to being a die-hard Chris Evans fan at the Sentinel. At least not in the circles you ran in.

Grabbing yourself a beer from the fridge, you made your way onto your lanai. The weather had just started to become reasonable at night with temps dropping into the mid seventies after dark. Still warm, but comfortable.

Opening your Twitter app, you did indeed have a message from Scott.

Scott: I’m pretty sure you’re always sassy.

Scott: Nope, in Boston for the next week. Left the other night.

Y/N: I Hope you all had a good trip.

I mean really, what do you say to someone you just met?

You took the time to go through your follow requests, deleting every one of them as you had no idea who they were. Most likely they were only adding your because they saw that you were tagged in the picture. On the positive, Jana was smart enough to tag your personal account rather than your work account. Your personal account was one you made up in college and did not include your actual name. As hard as it is to keep your anonymity in this day and age, some things you could still keep private.

Your mail notification lit up on the app again so you clicked into.

Scott: Oh my god she’s alive. That was like a full day for you to respond to me.

Oh boy.

Y/N: Sorry. I’m trying to lay low after my Twitter kind of blew up.

Scott: Yeah, sorry about that. Didn’t see that coming.

Y/N: Not like you released the picture. If anyone is to blame, it’s the tequila.

Scott: It’s always the tequila.

 Your new formed friendship continued like that. The two of you messaging each other at odd times of the day and taking several hours to respond to one another. Scott was back in LA, putting a three hour time difference between the two of you. It wasn’t uncommon for you to wake up to see you had a message that came in at three in the morning.

It was just before midnight when you noticed you had a message from Scott.

Scott: It’s been a shit day.

It was only sent about twenty minutes earlier, which was pretty much a record for the two of you in seeing the other’s messages.

Y/N: Do you want to call me?

Crap! Why did I type that? He probably doesn’t want me to have his number. Twitter is one thing. A telephone number is too personal.

You wanted to close the app and get ready for bed, but you were worried that you’d miss a message from Scott in case he did want to talk. Not necessarily on the phone, but in direct messages. You did the only thing that made since, you walked around your house with the phone in your hand and direct messages open. This was your life now. Apparently. If it ever got out that you spent thirty minutes with your phone in your hand while brushing your teeth, combing your hair, removing your makeup, changing into pajama shorts and a tee, and prepping the coffee maker for the morning, you’d blame it on lack of sleep and the neighbor’s dog. When you were about to call it quits and crawl into bed, a message came through.

Scott: What’s your number?

So, we’re doing this.

You replied back with your number and waited. Deciding to crawl into bed in case he didn’t actually call you tonight seemed like a wise choice. The air conditioning was blasting as it always was because you needed to sleep cold, so you pulled your warm flower comforter up to your elbows and waited for a call from your acquaintance that was maybe becoming a friend.

To your surprise your phone did ring with an out of state area code. Answering it on the second ring you heard him sigh when you answered with “Hello, this is Grumpy.”

“Really? I’m the grumpy one tonight, we both can’t be,” he whined out.

“Fine. Fine. Hello, this is Sassy,” you said.

“Better,” he muttered.

“You know, I’m just going to enter you as Grumpy in my phone contacts now,” you said.

“I expect nothing less. You’ll just have to wait to see what I’m adding you as.”

“Why? Are you making a return trip to Florida so soon?” you asked.

“Nah. Maybe Miami, but I’m good on Orlando for a while. Just don’t tell my brother that.”

“And here I was going to invite you to my wedding. One less mouth to feed,” you said, him chuckling at your response. “Was even going to let you get the steak.”

“Wait. Are you really getting married?” He sounded surprised which you weren’t sure how to take.

“Do I not seem the marrying type? I know this friendship is new, but dude.”

“No. No. No. Don’t start that. I just meant that you didn’t mention anyone while we chatted. Just that you were there with friends,” he explained.

“Single as a bird. Wait, that’s not right. Free as a bird?” you laughed out.

“Got it,” he chuckled. “When you do get married, I will be attending.”

“Perfect. You’re back on the short list for steak as your entrée. Now, tell my why you’re having a shit day,” you asked.

 Two weeks had passed with you and Scott exchanging short text conversations each day. You took to calling him before you went to bed once or twice a week if you had a funny story to tell him. Eleven at night your time seemed to be the right time to catch each other. Besides, it was nice to head to dreamland with a smile on your face because Scott always had a joke.

Jana picked up on your happier mood after a week.

“What’s going on with you? And don’t say it’s nothing,” she demanded.

Picking up your pint of beer, you took a mouthful of the amber liquid before addressing her.

“So, don’t get mad.” She shook her head, resting one palm on her forehead. “Scott and I have been chatting. He’s become a real friend.”

You knew she wouldn’t be upset about you having a new friend, but you were worried she would be because you hadn’t told her right away. First you didn’t mention meeting the Evans brothers, now you were corresponding with one on the regular.

“Just like that? You meet the guy one time and now you’re friends?” she questioned.

“He DM’d me on Twitter when that ride photo came out and we just started chatting. It’s like how you and I text every day. It’s similar except I don’t see him because he doesn’t live here. It’s just nice to have a new friend,” you said shrugging your shoulders.

She laid her slender arms on the table, resting her chin on her down facing palms. “Does this mean you are replacing me?” she says with her bottom lip jutting out.

“Of course not. Did you not catch that he doesn’t live here?” Some days you couldn’t help but be a huge smartass at the expense of your friends.

Her head slumped forward even more as she let of a groan.

“Babe. You know you’re my one and only. I lub you,” you said with your lips puckering out.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

“Cah’mon, that’s it. Can you put the damn phone down for two minutes?” Chris asked.

Scott shushed him, placing his fingers in front of his lips, but eyes still locked on the phone screen in his other hand. “Give me a second,” he said.

Chris sighed and sat further back against the couch cushion in his living room. His wide stretched legs kicked out further in front of him, hitting the coffee table before pulling his feet back a bit. “Fuck. Ouch,” he muttered to himself.

Scott chuckled to himself as he typed out something before setting the phone on the cushion beside him. “Now, what do you need big brother?”

“I don’t need anything. You just seem to be more involved with your phone than the person your visiting,” he spits out, hand wildly gesturing in front of his chest.

Scott puffs out a laugh and shakes his head. He straightens up a bit and turns his phone face down. “Sorry. Truly. How’ve you been?” he asks.

“How’ve I been? Pfft. Really?” Chris asks.

Scott shakes his head in all seriousness.

“I’m fine. Just bored out of my fahckin’ mind, but fine.” Chris says, running a hand through his hair before brushing it back down. “Look, I know I said I wanted a break before starting up another project, but I just thought I’d have more goin’ on. Seems like everyone’s so busy all of a sudden. I can only get drinks with Frankie so many times before I want to check into rehab,” he said.

Scott laughed at his brother’s tantrum. “I get it. Wish I was around more. Maybe go back to Mass. Or go to Disney! M’sure I could get Y/N to meet you at Magic Kingdom,” he said.

Chris tilted his head to the side and raised an eyebrow. “Who?” he asked.

“Y/N,” Scott said matter-of-factly. When the confusion didn’t wipe off Chris’ face, he closed his eyes and shook his head. “Y/N! The woman that you sat next to on Everest. The one in the ride photo.”

Realization struck Chris. “Excuse me. I didn’t remember her name,” he said.

“Ouch. I’ll have to remember not to tell her that,” he said picking up his phone to see a new message from you.

“What do you mean?” Chris asked.

Scott set his phone back down, turning his body to face Chris head on. “Huh?”

“You said you wouldn’t tell her that I didn’t remember her name,” Chris said.

Scott shrugged one shoulder, lifting up one hand in the process before plopping it back on his knee. “Yeah?”

“Wait a minute. Are you still talkin’ to her? How?” Chris asked, eyebrows furrowed.

“That picture. She got tagged in it and I happened to see it. Messaged her on there and now we talk. She’s frickin’ hilarious.”

Scott grabbed his phone again, scrolling a bit before flashing the screen to Chris. It was a picture of you with a woman next to you who had one of the overly large lollipops in her hand. Your mouth is wide open and your pretending to bite the large candy right out of her hand while she laughs in the picture.

A small smile curls up on Chris’ face but he shakes it away immediately. “Dude, you don’t know her. Ever think she’s just nice to you because of who you are?”

Scott rolls his eyes. “First off punk, she’s not like that. She’s pretty private. She didn’t know who any of us were until after you said your name on the ride. Secondly, she didn’t even ask for a photo nor did she try to keep hanging out with us after riding Everest.” Chris rolled his eyes this time. “Thirdly, I contacted her, not the other way around. And lastly, she’s a friend now, so just deal with it.”

Scott was right. You hadn’t behaved like most others would have.

“Fine. Whatever,” Chris said. “You can be friends with whoever you like.”

“Thanks, dad,” Scott said lamely. “Anyway, like I said, she’s great. Her Twitter blew up after that picture. She did a good job of locking her account down and ignoring comments. It’s hard to be pictured with the likes of you.” Chris chuckled and shook his head. “Smart that her handle isn’t actually her name. Crappy that her friend tagged her, but at least she didn’t tag her work one. Like I said, she’s a pretty private person, so she didn’t like the attention.”

Chris nodded his head. “Yeah. Glad it wasn’t worse for her. Think I should apologize?”

It was Scott’s turn to be shocked. His head whipping back and forth a couple of times eyeing his brother. “Okaaay. Not your fault, but maybe don’t add her on Twitter. That’ll just draw more attention. If you’re serious, I’ll give you her number,” Scott said.

“You know what? Never mind. Just tell her sorry for me.” Chris slapped his hands down on his jean clad legs before getting up and walking into the kitchen.

“Too late,” Scott called out. “I just texted you her number. Do what you want.”

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

The Jonas Brothers’ concert was tomorrow night, so you were doing your best to get stuff done at the paper before heading home. You planned to sleep in extra late and get some errands done before heading to the venue. Your press pass got you into some reserved places at concerts, but it didn’t get you an interview. While you had been writing and covering entertainment for years, you were mostly known for theme park and tourism coverage in Florida. So, yes you could always land an interview with a Disney Parks or Universal Studios park executive, but other doors in entertainment weren’t flying open.

Grabbing your purse and zip file, you shut down your computer and pushed in your chair. Your phone dinged with a text message. It was probably Jana asking you to get her a t-shirt at the concert tomorrow. Fancy attorney or not, your friend loved a concert tee.

Once you arrived home, you put a frozen meal in the microwave and changed into a pair of sweats and a comfy t-shirt. Grabbing your phone out of your bag, you took a seat sat at your kitchen bar top to wait for your meal to be done. Opening your texts, you saw a new one from an unknown number.

Unknown Number: Hey Y/N, this is Chris. Scott gave me your number.

Unknown Number: Evans

Unknow Number: Should have typed that the first time. Just wanted to say I’m sorry that ride photo got out.

You dropped your phone out of your hand. It hit the quartz countertop hard which jolted you out of your daze.

“What?!” you yelled into your empty home.

It was crazy enough when Scott messaged you, but the fact that the two of you had drank together made this whole friendship make a tiny bit of sense. But Chris now? This was just not real. And it made you feel weird. On one hand it was nice that he reached out even though it wasn’t his fault at all. One the other hand, was this it? The one text and then you move on?

The microwave beeped at your harshly indicating your meal was done. Leaving your phone on the countertop, you moved to grab your food, picking up the hot plate with a potholder. You made your way into the living room, setting the potholder and plate on your lap. You picked up the remote for the TV, flipping through the channels and settling on The Golden Girls. Maybe a little Rose and Dorothy banter could settle your mind.

This was silly. You were going to text him back. Of course, you were going to text him back. You weren’t a rude person. This whole exchange didn’t have to mean anything. This would be a one and done conversation and to Chris you would go on being nothing more than Scott’s friend.

After scarfing down your cheese ravioli, you made your way back to the kitchen to clean up. You eyed the phone on the counter where you left it. You quickly scooped it up and plopped yourself back on the couch, opening Chris’ text again before you could change your mind.

Y/N: Thank you for reaching out, but that photo getting released was not your fault at all. I appreciate the gesture though.

You threw your head back against your couch cushion and groaned. Why am I responding like it’s a work e-mail?

You shot Jana a text to get your mind off of the message you just sent Chris.

Y/N: What size Jonas Brothers shirt am I picking up for you?

Your phone buzzed in your hand before you even had the chance to set it down, but it wasn’t Jana responding. Clicking the back arrow, you saw that Chris had responded.

Wait, he responded? Already? And at all?

Chris: I still feel bad that you were dragged into it.

Chris: Hope I’m not interrupting a Friday night out.

You chewed your bottom lip, trying to think of how to respond. Should you tell the truth that your life is pretty lame and you’re watching The Golden Girls? Did Scott talk about you to Chris? Maybe it was best not to lie.

Y/N: Just hanging out with my friends Dorothy, Blanche, and Rose.

Y/N: You’re actually saving me from another long drawn out story about Rose’s hometown of St. Olaf Minnesota.

Chris: I’m surprised your friend Blanche is home on a Friday night.

Y/N: Oh, you know Blanche? Is this going to become awkward?

Chris: 😂😂😂

Chapter 3

Tag list: @mustangshelby04 @bellaireland1981 @carolina-thiell @sullyosully @straightforwardly​ @torntaltos​ @denise1605​ @mcuclintasha​ @southerngracela​ @iam-cj @trynnabemultifandom​ @chrisevansforever-blog​ @kelbabyblue​ @broadwayandnetflix​ @kyjey​ @thevelvetseries​ @i-just-feel-like​ @daddieslittlefangirl​ @stankface​ @denisemarieangelina​ @im-not-an-armrest-im-short​ @whymalu​ @the-doctors-fallen-angel​ @mariswritingforfun​ @tessabb7​ @hista-girl​ @tanelle83​ @pinknerdpanda​ @allaboutthebooz​ @estillion14​ @panicfob​ @patzammit​ @heartislubbingdubbing​ @collinsstanharbour​ @twittytelly​ @thefandomzoneisdangerous​ @linki-locks11​ @mywinterwolf​ @ab-baybay​ @rda1989​ @impalaimages​ @jesseswartzwelder​ @rainbowkisses31​

#chris evans #chris evans x reader #chris evans fan fiction #chris evans fanfiction #chris evans imagine #chris evans au #chris evans x you #chris evans x y/n #conversations

[iamrealbuilder]

Bill Buchalter interview

Bill Buchalter was a level designer for Sunstorm Interactive. He’s worked on 3 official add-on of Build Engine games: Cryptic Passage for Blood, Suckin’ Grits On Route 66 for Redneck Rampage, Caribbean Life for Duke Nukem 3D. Interview, November 2020: Corentin: Can you introduce yourself?

Bill Buchalter: My name is Bill Buchalter. I’m an avid gamer of all kinds – video games, board games, and especially tabletop RPGs. I’m currently a freelance writer for AAW Games (Adventure A Week Games) writing mini adventures for Dungeons & Dragons 5E. I live outside Indianapolis, IN with my wife Jane, our three kids, and our dog Roxi. When I’m not gaming, I also enjoy music, playing guitar, hiking, and camping.

C: With Sunstorm Interactive, you're credited for level design on Cryptic Passage, Caribbean Life and Route 66. How did you start working with Sunstorm and what do you remember from that time?

BB: In the mid 90’s, maybe around 1995 or 96, I was very into playing Duke Nukem 3D. Like most PC gamers at the time, I had played Castle Wolfenstein and Doom, and Duke Nukem just blew me away. Back in those days, when we played online, we would use a 3rd party program called KALI. You dialed up on your modem, logged onto the internet, and then used KALI as a portal to chat with other gamers and find someone to play with. The KALI software would then allow you to network together over the internet and play PVP matches. It was crude, and the lag could be horrible, but we didn’t know any better at the time and we loved it!

I remember I was in a B. Dalton bookstore in the mall one day (another relic of the 90’s that is long gone!) when I found a book called the “Duke Nukem 3D Level Design Handbook”. I was intrigued, and as I flipped through the pages it talked about a program on the Duke Nukem CD called Build, which allowed you to create your own levels. I had no idea Build existed, let alone how to use it. I bought the book and spent the next couple weeks diving into learning how to use Build. I was hooked!

Making my own maps quickly became an obsession. I would share them with my friends on KALI and I quickly earned a reputation for making user maps. I remember there was a map building competition, but I don’t recall who sponsored it. A guy named Robert Travis won the competition. When I saw his maps, I was blown away! His designs were so much more advanced than mine. He was using tricks I had never thought of to get lighting effects and set moods. I had to reach out to him to pick his brain.

Robert responded and we began talking and quickly figured out that we both lived in Indianapolis. He was working for Sunstorm at the time and invited me to come to their office to discuss level design. I met him there one evening, and he showed me some of the stuff he was working on. We ended up playing Duke all night on Sunstorm’s network with some of the other guys in the office. I was in heaven!

Robert introduced me to Anthony Campiti, the lead producer on Sunstorm’s next project – Cryptic Passage, an add-on for a Build engine game called Blood. They invited me to design some levels for the game and I jumped at the chance. Robert assigned me to design an opera house level and immediately I got pictures in my head of the theater scenes from Interview with a Vampire. I went home and worked furiously on designing the level. I was still rough, but with Robert’s help I tweaked things here and there and slowly learned his techniques. In the end I was really pleased with the level I’d designed. Robert and Anthony were happy too and asked me to design a second map specifically for deathmatch.

The next project Sunstorm was working on was Suckin’ Grits on Route 66, an add-on for another Build engine game called Redneck Rampage. Robert again asked if I’d like to be a part of that team and assigned me to build a truck stop level. Using a lot of the things I’d learned on Cryptic Passage, and the campy feel of the Redneck Rampage game, I had a lot of fun designing that level.

The last project I worked on for Sunstorm was Duke Nukem Caribbean Vacation. By this time Duke’s popularity was beginning to wane, and Quake was taking over. Robert was already starting to experiment and learn how to use the Quake engine. I was a new dad at the time (my first daughter had just been born) so unfortunately, I didn’t have the spare time to devote to learning a new engine. I barely had the time to design my level for Duke Caribbean, but I did manage to finish the casino level for that project. I do recall that Robert ended up going through in the end and changing a lot of the aspects of my level to fit the theme they had in mind. I remember being a bit disappointed and not really feeling like the level was “mine” because of so many of the changes. It was the last project I worked on for Sunstorm.

I kept in touch with Robert and Anthony for a while after that. They were branching out, working on other projects, and even trying to develop their own FPS game that I don’t think ever really got off the ground. Sunstorm was having the most success with their Deer Hunter line of games that at the time were selling well in Wal-Mart. Sadly, I eventually just lost touch with those guys.

I’m sure this is WAY more information than you were wanting (I’m a writer… I can’t help but go off the deep end!) but you dusted off some fond, old memories for me, so I apologize for walking so far down memory lane!

C: I see that you're still making maps, different kind of maps! This makes me wonder if maybe you were involved with W!Zone (a pack of maps for Warcraft 2 released by Sunstorm). Can you tell us a bit about that if possible?

BB: I didn’t have any hand in the W!Zone project for Sunstorm, but I loved the Warcraft series. As was common for many video gamers like me, who had roots in fantasy games like D&D, I played a lot of Warcraft and eventually got sucked into the world of MMOs with Ultima Online, Everquest, and World of Warcraft! If only I had back the time I sunk into those games!

These days I’m exclusively writing and designing for Dungeons and Dragons. I started about ten years ago writing for D&D Organized Play in a campaign called Living Forgotten Realms. I co-authored two adventures for that with my good friend, Michael Pearman, and authored a third adventure on my own. As you know from tracking me down via AAW Games, I’ve now authored six adventures for them, five of which are already published and one that is still in the works but should be released soon.

When I do manage to find time for video games, Diablo III is my game of choice these days. I’m looking forward to Season 22 starting here shortly, and like many others, I’m really hoping for something great with Diablo IV. I’ve been a huge fan of the series since the beginning, and even wrote an entire campaign for D&D 5E that translated the story of Diablo III into Dungeons and Dragons for the players in my home game! Thanks again for the opportunity to share some of this history. It was fun putting it all down and reliving those days!

C: There are two signatures in the Truck Stop level for Route 66. Do you remember anything about that ? There also several levels with no known credit : Fun Park, House of ill Repute, Mystery Dino Cave, Bigfoot Convention.

The signature on the truck stop is Route 66 was a joke! I was the only designer on that one. I just signed it "Billy Joe Jim Bob Buchalter" as a joke for bad redneck name. I wasn't the kind of guy that had to sign my maps the EXACT same way every time. :)

Other than the truck stop, I don't recall designing any other maps for Route 66. I pretty sure none of those you listed below were mine, but I don't recall whose they were.

Finally, here are some final comments Bill made after reading through some forum posts:

Wow, I am really quite humbled that you guys looked so deeply into my work! The fact that you could recognize my build style is pretty cool - I didn't even know I had a style! LOL. The truth be told, the reason you probably had so much trouble telling my levels from Robert's is because he was a big influence on me. I learned a lot from him and incorporated a lot of that into the stuff I built.

Its funny how reading through that thread you linked brought back memories... I remember now that my biggest disappointment from Duke Caribbean was that my only level in the game ended up being a secret level - that some people wouldn't even find it or ever play it. I was actually pretty excited about that level. I was the one that suggested a casino because my folks had retired to Vegas, so I'd been in a lot of the casinos there and had some great ideas for the map. I'd forgotten all about the restaurant I worked into it, and the big fish tanks.

There seems to be some debate about Robert. From what I remember, he was a really good guy. Maybe a bit tough to work for, but only because he really strived for our designs to be the best they could be, and he demanded that of both himself and the other designers. As I said before, I learned early on to accept criticism and critique and not take it personally. It was just Robert doing his job. I'll be the first to admit that I designed better levels thanks to the stuff I learned from Robert.

Someone on the message board made a very astute comment, basically to the effect that "Bill had to have other work out there. Sunstorm wouldn't hire an unproven guy off the street." But truth be told, that's exactly what they did! I hadn't done a single thing before working there. But I think a few things played in my favor. First, I lived in Indy, just 15 minutes from their office, so it was easy for me to go in and work directly with Robert. Second, while I didn't have anything officially published, I did have a disk full of the maps I'd designed on my own, and Robert thought I showed promise. I would design at home a lot, then go into the office a couple times a week and sit with Robert while he critiqued my work and offered advice on how to improve it.

I'll be honest - I'm blown away at the number of people STILL playing these old maps we made so many years ago. I watched a couple YouTube videos of a guy playing and reviewing Duke Caribbean and Blood Cryptic Passage. His high praise of both Full House and the Opera House really made my day. It's nice to know that people enjoyed my work.

_____________________________

Thanks a lot to Bill Buchalter for taking the time to answer these questions! Thanks also for sharing... “Big City” !

A Duke Nukem 3D map he created back in the day before joining with Sunstorm Interactive which was never released before! Screenshot:

Map download:

https://msdn.duke4.net/bigcity.zip

______

External link: Duke4 forum blog megathread: https://forums.duke4.net/topic/11471-blog-interviews-of-build-engine-video-games-developers/page__pid__353013#entry353013 The forum posts Bill read, mentionned above, can be found here: https://forums.duke4.net/topic/9418-duke-caribbean-multiplayer-levels/

#build #build-engine #blood #duke nukem #redneck-rampage #duke #nukem #duke nukem 3D #video games #route 66 #caribbean life #cryptic passage

[willow-salix]

This Isolation Island update idea was dreamt up after a conversation with @the-lady-razorsharp and @olliepig. I also feel like it's calling out a lot of us, especially @gumnut-logic. This is Isolation after dark, we've left the pg13 world a little.

Day 51 of Isolation on Tracy island and I’d grown so bored that I'd resorted to desperate measures. I spent the entire morning, and part of the afternoon catching up on the fan mail posts that the boys didn't know they had, on a forum they didn't know existed. Well, it wasn't like they were going to do it. 

“Virgil's favourite colour?” I asked myself, tapping away on my laptop. "Gotta be green, I mean…" I lifted my head to seek him out. "Virg! What's your favourite colour?" 

“Green,” he answered instantly. That's one thing i love about that boy, he hardly ever questions my random outbursts.

I nodded and moved on to the next. "Alan's favourite food…does anything count?" I mumbled under my breath. "He's not hard to please...no, they want a real answer from him…Allie? What would you say is your favourite food?”

“Mac and Cheese,” he answered. "Why?" 

I ignored him as I typed out my answer and hit send before moving on to the next. “Scott, what aftershave do you wear?”

“That one you got me for christmas, why?”

I typed out ‘Only The Brave: Wild’ in answer and hit send. I was on a roll now! Next! 

“Gordon, boxers or briefs?”

“Briefs.”

I nodded and typed again.

“What are you doing?”John popped up like a ninja meerkat, his face right next to mine, nosing at my laptop screen. "Fan forum?" 

"I decided to be your press secretary, because the fan mail is piling up and none of you are bothering to answer it. It's not like I've got anything else to do right now."

"We have fan mail?" 

I rolled my eyes. "Of course you do, you have very dedicated fans you know."

"We do?" Gordon asked, suddenly interested in what I was doing. 

"Have you guys seriously not paid any attention to this?" 

They all shook their heads in unison, each looking as bewildered as the other. 

"Oh lawd you're all useless." I hit the back button a few times and scrolled through the posts then turned the screen so they could see it . "This is your official fan page, set up by the president of your fan club and none of you knew about it?" 

Again with the head shakes. 

"Men," I snorted, going back to my work. I was left in peace for all of two seconds before the questions started. 

"What kind of fan mail?" 

"Who's their favourite?" 

"Is it weird on there?" 

"Fan mail from your fans, there is no one favorite and it can be, " I answered. 

"No favourite?" Alan confirmed. 

"Nope, you all have your own teams." 

"Teams?" Scott's eyebrows rose in question. 

"Yep, Virgil's Virtuosos, Alan's Angels, Gordon's Sirens, Scott's Spitfires and John's Stars."

They all looked quite pleased with their little fan gangs, chatting quietly amongst themselves, leaving me in peace which was fine by me as I was trying to concentrate dammit. 

I was tapping away, doing my thing, answering questions on practically everything when I realised that something felt off about the scene before me. 

Over the course of an hour the boys had been randomly getting up and wandering off, but that in itself wasn't that weird, they often got bored and vanished to parts unknown, they would come back eventually. No, the weird thing was when I asked Virgil a question and Scott answered. 

"Virg, what's the longest you've ever spent on your hair?" 

"Six hours," Scott replied. I frowned at my screen, that didn't sound right. 

"Is your name Virgil?" I asked sarcastically, finally looking up…"Why are you wearing plaid?" Those jeans looked a little baggy too. 

Come to think of it, why was John wearing Gordon's hawaian shirt? That was just…wow, not good. 

"OK, that's disturbing…" those rolled up, ripped jeans were not a good look on him, especially since they were almost to his knees. And his hair. "What happened to your hair?" I wailed. Oh the humanity! 

Scott was apparently on a roll, because he was on his feet and posing like Arnold Schwarzenegger and his hair, gods his hair! Instead of his nearly slicked back (if a little long now) look, he had attempted Virgil's trademark cockscomb. He looked like he'd been electrocuted. 

My eyes slid to Alan who was drowning in Scott's favourite blue shirt that he had been wearing not half an hour before, and I couldn't see his feet, the pants were so long. Allie's hair was neat for once and smoothed to perfection (he had to have had help with that). 

Gordon was wearing Alan's T-shirt and his cargo pants and…well he didn't actually look too bad, he was passable.

 But Virgil… 

"Oh my lawd, Chonky what did you do?" 

The big guy was squeezed into John's shirt and when I say squeezed, I mean bulging at the seams, how were those buttons even connecting, he could barely move, his arms were sticking out at right angles, tight. I wouldn't dare let my eyes stray. Don't look down, don't look down, I chanted to myself, because I know my boy can pull off tight pants (have you seen that spacesuit?) but John does not have the thunder thighs that Virgil does and…my eyes dropped lower without my say so. 

"Eeep," I camped my hands over my eyes and counted to ten before I opened them again. Virgil's hair was safe to look at…no it wasn't! 

I immediately started laughing, I couldn't help it. He'd attempted to replicate John's style (I think) but had ended up with something more like a 1940's victory roll going on up front. I leant closer, what was that? 

"Is that a toilet paper tube?" 

He nodded, looking rather proud of his efforts. 

I shook my head in utter disbelief at what I was witnessing. 

"Ask us more questions," Gordon said once Scott finally stopped doing his muscle man impression and sat down. 

For lack of anything else to do in the situation, I did as I was told. 

"Gordon, what is your favourite time of day?" 

"Bedtime," John answered for him. "Because then I get to sleep and dream of how awesome I am."

I raised an eyebrow at this but dutifully wrote it down anyway. 

"Scott, why are you always frowning?" 

"Because I'm the one that has to deal with idiots all day long," Alan answered. 

"No, that's me," I muttered as I typed out the answer. "John, why do we never see you?" 

"Because people make my big brain hurt," Virgil answered for him. "And I'd rather hide away than deal with them."

"I actually can't argue with that one," John admitted. 

"Alan, if you could meet anyone, who would it be?" 

"An alien," Gordon responded. 

And so it went on, each of them trying to outdo the other, turning my simple question and answer session into a Tracy family roast. 

Finally I ran out of questions, mostly because I was laughing too much to actually think. 

"Oh Gods, if the people in this forum could see you all now," I laughed, wiping tears from my eyes. "That would be some high quality fan fiction fodder right there." 

"Some what now?" Scott asked. 

"Fan fiction, you know, stories people write?" 

"Wait a second, are you saying there's stories out there about us?" Virgil asked. 

I nodded slowly, like they were too dumb to understand otherwise. 

Their faces were a mixture of utter horror and morbid fascination. 

John plonked down next to me and stole my tablet to have a look. He skimmed through a few, his nose creasing, eyebrows furrowing.

"Gordon," he announced, "I hate to tell you this but you just died."

"I died?" the poor squid looked horrified by the idea. 

"So did Scott, and Virgil's just lost a leg."

"So you came out of it fine?" Scott grumbled. 

"No, my craft just blew up and I'm currently floating through space. Might I request that someone go and retrieve my body?" 

Scott took my tablet from him and did some scrolling of his own. "Why is this version of me having a lot more fun and action?" he grumbled. 

Virgil leant over his shoulder to look, and we heard a loud ripping noise as John's shirt lost its battle with Virgil's shoulders. 

"Yes!" I cheered. "Can you wear his dressing gown next?" 

OK…so I might have earned that glare. 

"I'm very dashing and romantic," Virgil grinned. "The ladies must love me."

"What am I doing?" Alan demanded to know. 

"Pouting and complaining," Gordon answered, snatching the tablet from Scott and flicking through until he found his own name mentioned. His face morphed from a cheeky grin to utter disbelief. 

"What…what am I doing? Why am I doing that? Stop me doing that!" Gordon yelpled, flinging the tablet back in my direction like I was mistress of the Internet and could fix all his problems. I just about caught it before it hit the edge of the table and checked the screen. 

"Gordon, I'm sorry, but you are indeed trying to have…relations with that shark," I informed him solemnly. "I also advise that you don't let it bite you there, it might be a little delicate."

Scott burst out laughing, closely followed by Virgil and Alan.

"And unfortunately, I can't stop it," I finished.

"Why does that even exist?" Gordon groaned, hiding his face on his hands.

John took the tablet from me and kept flicking. "Huh, I've got a really cute boyfriend here," he turned the screen to show me.

"Oooh, he is cute, can we share him?"

"Sure," he read a little bit more. "He actually does remind me of my first crush."

"Is he still single?"

"What, I'm not enough for you?" he nudged me with an elbow but had that little half smile on his face that told me he was teasing.

"Of course you are, plus I do already have Scott as my backup."

"Yeah, don't forget about me."

"Never," I blew him a kiss.

"Gordon has a boyfriend too," John pointed out, "and I don't mean the shark," he passed the tablet over.

"That's better," Gordon agreed, reading ahead. "Uh oh! Someone crashed Two."

"What?" Virgil dragged the tablet away to check. "Why would they do this to me?"

"It's called whump, and you appear to be one of their favourite victims," I lifted John's arm to snuggle into his side, lacing my fingers with his where they rested on my shoulder.

"Whump?" Virgil confirmed.

"Yep," I nodded. "Basically, if they can hurt you, kill you, make you cry, break a limb or your heart, it'll be there."

Poor guy looked devastated. "I thought they loved us?"

"They do. That's why."

"That makes no sense!" Alan wailed, finally breaking his silence. Somehow he'd gotten hold of the tablet and he was reading through some of the offerings. "I have a concussion, a broken arm and a punctured lung."

"Sucks to be you," Gordon patted his shoulder, taking the tablet back.

He settled back on the couch to search out more of his starring roles. "Hey, this one has me and Virgil in description!"

"You might want to be careful with one's like th-" I started, but I was drowned out by his horrified scream.

"I tried to warn you," I sighed.

"What's wrong?" Scott demanded to know.

Gordon shuddered, gagging on nothing.

"I think he found the Tracy pairings," I whispered to John, who shuddered in revulsion.

Gordon whimpered pathetically. I shook my head sadly and took the tablet away, tucking it into my bag.

"No more fanfic for you."

They were quiet for around five minutes, digesting the horror of what they had just learnt about their fictional selves.

"I liked the one where we got to go to the zoo," Alan finally broke the silence, trying valiantly to make things better.

"I liked when we got a puppy," Gordon grinned.

"I need a beer," Virgil announced, heaving himself to his feet. "And I need to get out of these pants before I ruin all chances of ever fathering the children those writers want me to have."

Well, that had been an interesting and educational evening, although I'm not sure they liked what they learnt. And I can tell you one thing, John's hair is not staying like that.

#Isolation Island #Thunderbirds #thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds fanfiction #thunderbirds 2015

[lykegenia]

I think it’s time for a hype post! Inspired by hype posts by @tortuosity-writes and @fine-tevinter-wines​ - banner by me!

Are you:

New to Avatar: The Last Airbender and looking to expand your experience with compelling fic?

Redisovering your love for the show and wanting something a little bit different?

Wishing the chemistry between Zuko and Katara had been explored in more depth in the show?

Looking for a story that adds to the world of Avatar and its themes?

Are you fond of:

Detailed worldbilding wrapped in an action-packed story full of political machinations, mistaken identities, and a quest to save the world?

Themes of choice, destiny, justice, and revenge?

Slow burn romances with lots of mutual pining?

AUs that ask the question of what would the world be like if only one thing were different?

Do you think it’s neat when A:tLA fanfiction features:

Zuko and Katara treating each other as equals as they grow closer and develop feelings for each other?

Katara being shown as compassionate, but also as a powerful waterbender?

Zuko struggling with morality and finding his sense of honour?

Found family dynamics where trust is earned?

Nuanced portrayals of secondary characters that doesn’t leave them sidelined?

Explorations of bending and what benders are capable of?

Conversations about how the war has affected the characters emotionally, and how they grow from that?

THEN DO I HAVE A FIC FOR YOU!

If you have answered yes to at least some of these questions, you might want to take a look at The Things We Hide

A 120k enemies-to-lovers AU asking what might have been different if The Southern Water Tribe han’t been wiped out in the early years of the Hundred Years War, featuring a more jaded Katara and a Zuko who just wants to do what is right, caught in a gripping tale of vengeance, forgiveness, and love as they struggle to do what is best for their people.

But don’t take my word for it, here is what others have to say:

I remember being fairly new to this fandom and pairing and it was this fic with its intricate storytelling and captivating characters ... that convinced me to stay and I love it so much!

Oh my GOSH IT WAS SO GOOD!!!! I adored the characterization of everyone, the way you took elements of the plot and twisted them just so. The whole story was so tight and concise and well paced, and your writing a joy to read. The thematic elements were *chefs kiss*—the recurring theme of the painted lady  and the blue spirit, yin and yang... This is one of those fanfic stories you read where you go, wow, this legit could have been a book I picked up at B&N. I loved it, it’s officially going in my bookmarked favs and on my kindle.

I just couldn't stop reading the whole thing at once. So much creativity, but still a wink here and there to the original, this is the optimal state of a fanfiction!

This was nothing short of utterly beautiful! I loved every single piece of Southern culture that you included in this story, it felt so careful and respected, I really appreciate the emotions you used. Don’t get me started on the breathtaking battles either!? This was so cleverly written that I’ve had to pause multiple times just to truly appreciate what you’ve created. Thank you so much for sticking with this ... this story has helped me get through one of the most stressful weeks I’ve faced in a long time. I can’t wait to read it over and over again.

B IT CH IM SO IN LOVE HOLY S HIT GOOD WRITING SUCH GOOD WRITING IM DFHBBJJJJBVVCCV H O HGFHBV

I want you to know this story blew me away and the political world that you've built was so fascinating and complex and well thought out! I think the relationships the characters have to each other and i think zuko and katara were each really well fleshed out, interesting characters (and i loved that they had such rich lives outside of each other too!!!!). like, your writing is amazing and characterization is so good and the budding romance between zutara in the first half was very sweet! and i loved all of it! but i am legit IN AWE of the wider world building here, the intricacies of the politics, etc. like, i think it's the best i've read in the entire fandom.

This fic is a literal masterpiece. Your prose is so smooth and reads so well, you can really feel the scene. Your imagery is amazing and I wish I could write half as well as you lol. All the characterizations were spot on. I absolutely loved bamf Katara. She was indeed a bamf. She was just so cool. And I really enjoyed the Gaang banter. This fic had me on the edge of my seat the whole time and I had to stop myself from staying up all night reading it.

I'm actually going to cry. WOW.

#zutara #zuko #katara #katara x zuko #zuko x katara #avatar #avatar: tla #a:tla au #a:tla #zutara fanfiction #avatar au #hype post

[sg-fuzzy-bear26]

In My Dreams

In My Dreams

Chapter One

 Clarke

The first thing Clark notices about her cell was how cold it is. Yes, of course the Ark is constantly cold, but her cell has a particular that chill isn’t the same as compared to the rest. She feels shivers travel down her spine and rubs her arms, trying to regain some warmth.

“This will be your cell Prisoner 319, until you turn 18 and your case is reviewed by the council. Until that time, you will have meals delivered here. Breakfast will be delivered at seven, lunch at twelve, and the final meal at seven pm. You will be allowed out to…” Clarke doesn’t really bother listening to what the guard is saying. He looks vaguely familiar; where has she seen him? With her mother, yes. His daughter was one of her mother’s patients, a sickly 7 year old girl. She remembers brown mischievous eyes, a small smile. Claire? No. Cara Harlow. The guards name is Gerald Harlow.

Once Gerald finishes his monologue, he turns to the side and comes back with some blankets folded in his hands. He looks to his left before stepping into the cell, a small smile (not unlike Cara’s) on his face.

“Hey Clarke. Sorry about long speech; Shumway was watching.” He hands the blankets over to Clarke, and they feel heavier (and lumpier) that the usual standard-issue Ark blankets. She unfolds the one on top and a white piece of chalk falls out. Harlow’s smile grows a bit more.

“Clarke, you’re a good person, so is your mother. I really hope you make it out of here once you hit 18… ” yet even as he says it, Clarke knows it’s not true. Yes, her mother might be a council member, and that on its own is more than many would hope for, but, if she’s realistic, she knows that won’t happen. Now more than ever, she knows her 18th birthday means her death.

“Thank you Mr Harlow. I hope so too…” she lies to him. If only he knew, by her 18th birthday, they might all be dead…

_____

She Knows

-J.Cole ft. Amber Coffman Cults

Clarke                                                                                                              

And so her life in juvenile lock-up (or The Skybox) began. It was pretty much constant most of the time. Her days fell into a pattern; she would wake up at 6:45, eat at 7, 7:30 she’d go to the bathroom for her daily ablutions, and then back to her cell. Food arrived at 12 on the dot, plates cleared out thirty minutes later, and then her last meal at 7, bathroom at 7:45, and the official lights-out at 9.

But for those long hours in-between, she had nothing to do (oh, the joys of solitary confinement). Well, at least that’s what they thought. Guardsman Harlow would bring her books and chalk and any other little things to keep herself busy, and every few days he would take the books back and bring new ones. But Clarke never read them. All she did was draw. All day and sometimes -when her dreams were worse than her reality- all night. She wished she had her sketch book and a few of her short, worn pencils. But of course, she couldn’t be given anything that she could use to harm herself (like short, very blunt pencils). She wanted to at least ask for coal, but she knew that was a scarce resource, expensive and difficult to acquire.

So she settled for her chalk and the walls of her cell. She drew anything she could think of; of pictures of pyramids she’d seen, of scorpions, of flowers and trees and earth. The ultimate dream. God, she just wished to see it once, to smell real air and swim and float in still water. She dreamed of the feel of a meadow of wildflowers between her fingertips, and seeing a sunset from Earth. To see the delicate contours of a dandelion as it blew in the wind. To hear the rushing gushes of seawater bashing on a shore, and smell the salty tang of the water. To feel simple rain touching her face.

But wish as she might, she never would see it. In a matter of months, she, and probably everyone she knew, would be dead. Honestly, she was surprised that she (and the Ark) had made it this long. But unfortunately, she knows that it’s only a matter of time before both became a memory with no one left to remember.

_____

Maybe We Can Be Each Other’s Company

-Justin Bieber

Bellamy

In all honesty, Bellamy didn’t want to be a guard. He would much rather spend his days in his room with Octavia, reading her stories of Ancient Empires, forgotten princes and magical myths. But being a guard was one of few better paying jobs on the Ark, and much as Bellamy aced Earth History, other subjects were not so good, making his options limited. He wished to read all day, but knew that reading alone wouldn’t help support his family, and his mother had done things he most likely didn’t want to know about in order to get him that recommendation, so he wasn’t about to waste all that sacrifice.

He made his way to his post, thinking about everything yet nothing in particular. He almost walked into Shumway, the man too absorbed in his conversation to see Bellamy, and backed out of the way just in time, murmuring an apology.

“Watch it, Blake,” (yet he was the one in the wrong), “but now that I’ve found you, there’s been a change; you’ve been moved from the mess hall, and your new post is in the Skybox, solitary.” Bellamy nearly groaned out loud, but stopped himself; no need to get on Shumway’s bad side (even if he was a dick that deserved to be floated more than half the kids in lock-up).

“Yes sir.”

“Your shift starts in 10. You better hurry Blake, I don’t like slackers….” Shumway started laughing and walked in the opposite direction. Bellamy looked at the time, and knew that, if he ran like a mad man through the Ark, he could make it to lock-up without staining his record and giving Shumway any reason to fire him. As he raced through Mecha Station and passing Alpha, he wanted to personally push the button that floated Shumway.

In the end he made in less than 8 minutes, taking a few seconds to catch his breath before logging in that he was at his post. What he was to guard in solitary was beyond him? Solitary wasn’t that big compared to the other section, just 25 to 30 small cells with a bed and a small sink, one communal bathroom that was rarely used since very few people(no, teenagers) ever ended up being arrested for something so big that it would warrant solitary confinement. But whatever it was, someone must be here for them to apply a guard detail to the section. Bellamy actually felt sorry for the sucker; even when they turned 18, they wouldn’t be even be actually ‘reviewed’, just floated.

As Bellamy passed another empty cell, he wondered what that person had done. Maybe some boy or girl saw or heard something they weren’t supposed to, and now the council needed to keep them quite, hence solitary. That’s the only logical explanation; if they had stolen something or assaulted an officer, they would be in the common area with the rest of the delinquents. Well, there was another explanation; maybe the criminal was a violent offender, perhaps killed someone maybe? If that was the case, he wished to bust the poor bastard out just so they could kill Shumway for him and may-

Words froze in Bellamy’s mind as he finally found the one occupant of solitary confinement, and he would be lying if it was what he had expected. First of all, ‘it’ was a she, and, secondly, from what Bellamy could she, she was beautiful. She was standing on her tiptoes, left hand stretching out, holding what seemed to be a piece of chalk, scratching and scaring the wall with swift strong strokes of white, her right hand was gently resting on the wall, giving her balance. As Bellamy’s eyes wondered further south, he felt the need to swallow. Her blonde tresses were tied into a braid going down her back. The long sleeve knit shirt she was wearing clung to her body, perhaps being a size too small, but it did wonders for her curves. The pants she wore were long, dull and frayed at the edges as all clothes on the Ark were, and it emphasized her thighs and ass and dammit, Bellamy was tempted. He must have made a sound, because the artist paused a little before carrying on with her work. A dandelion?

“Gerald, you’re late…” her voice sounded somehow familiar, not light and sweet, but something with warmth and essence. Bellamy swore he could hear her smile. He hadn’t seen her face, but he really wanted to right now, “but I understand, your daughter comes first. How is…” she trailed off when she finally turned around and found Bellamy standing there, arms slacked at the side, mouth open “…Cara.”

Bellamy’s brain short-circuited like everything on the Ark these days. What? He knew those blue eyes and red lips with a beauty spot above them. What was her name?

“Griffin?” he said when he remembered her surname.

“You’re not Ger… Guardsman Harlow” she stammered out, a bit in shock herself.

“And you’re here? You? Alpha Station Princess, Dr Abby Griffin’s apprentice and daughter, in LOCKUP? Daughter of a council member, in SOLITARY?” Bellamy was confused as hell, in complete awe as to how the Perfect Princess of the Ark had landed herself in lockup.

“And you are?” she asked, a little more annoyance in her voice. What was her name?

“You’re…Kate…Claire, no, something like a guy’s name... K….K...CLARKE! CLARKE GRIFFIN!” Bellamy finally exclaimed when he got her name.

“You through?” Clarke asked, folding her arms and eyeing him bitterly.

“Oh wow. Okay, Blake, Guardsman Blake…” but Bellamy could barely believe it. How did this happen? “Okay, Princess, I have to know; what did you do?”

“You’re gonna keep calling me princess?” Clarke’s expression didn’t change, and Bellamy couldn’t help the smirk on his face.

“You bet, Princess…” he said with a wink in her direction. She just rolled her and turned back to her drawing.

His smirk got a little wider. “Well, whatever you did, it got you in here, so, damn, you’re a brave princess…” he said with more admiration than he wanted in his voice. Clarke paused; her one hand poised over her dandelion in the wind, and turned her head to look at him.

“Guardsman Blake, are you condoning such behaviour that puts a person with her whole life ahead of her in solitary?” she asked slyly, her voice dripping with sarcasm, her own smirk covering her face.

“Why, Princess, I would never…” he said, placing his hand over his heart, deadpan.

Clarke rolled her eyes and returned to her work, and Bellamy carried on walking down the short hallway, humming to himself. Hey, maybe Shumway shouldn’t die just yet…

_____

Every Little Thing Is Gonna Be Alright

-Bob Marley (not Morley)

Clarke

Just like that, they fell into a calm routine of constant bickering and arguing and generally not getting along. She had discovered some facts about him in the weeks they had spent together, all alone, the only two people in solitary: his name was Bellamy, he was from Mecha Station and his mother’s name was Aurora Blake. She would have told him just as much, but well, being the ‘Princess’ and all, he already knew.

On one particular Thursday day, he didn’t come in for his shift as normal; instead, she got the kind face of Gerald Harlow. Not that she was disappointed, no, that would signify some sort of emotional attachment to Bellamy Blake, and for her, there was none. It was just that…well; she didn’t not want to see Gerald, but well, just…

She carried on with her routine, thankful for the replenishment of her chalk supplies and went through her day. On one of the spots on her wall, she found herself drawing a chess set. She didn’t mean to, but her hand just seemed to move by its own accord, her stokes getting heavier for the white pieces, and lighter for the dark. After a few hours, she stood back and looked at her work; a chess board, on the sides littered with knights and castles, and one hand, mid-air, moving a dark knight for the winning move.

She could almost hear Wells’ voice saying ‘check mate…’ with his easy smile. God, Wells Jaha, her best friend. Almost every memory in her entire life held Wells Jaha in some way. She remembered him when she was just a toddler, chasing him around with a chess piece in her hand. She remembered when she was 7 and his father, Thelonious, had taught them to play. She remembered when she was 9, and she finally beat him, her first ever victory in chess. When she was 11 and had a crush on some stupid guy named Caspian Adams and confided in only Wells. And how he was there for her when Caspian broke her heart (well, not broke necessarily, but she was 11, what did she know?). The football games and lunches together and every other little thing in-between. Which is why his betrayal cut her so deeply.

She’s suddenly in the mess hall again, whispering to Wells about the secret that could literally destroy their lives. Oh, how much trust she had in him back then. And then he gotten her father floated. Her hand reached for the frozen watch on her left wrist, clutching it close. The last thing she had of her fathers. Clarke felt tears welling up in her eyes. Still, she could see her father, his face fading from light as the vacuum of space stole his life. Her heart broke all over again. Damn you Wells, Clarke though bitterly. But he was gone because of her, because she couldn’t keep her mouth shut, because she placed her trust in the wrong person.

Clarke found herself leaning on the bed, tears sliding down her cheeks. His death would be pointless anyway, because in a matter of months, everyone will realize what he was trying to bring to light. But by then it will be too late, and no one will be left to vindicate his actions, to somehow undo his death. She hated this, living with this secret, feeling like there was a ticking bomb only she (save a few others) knew existed. Watching people go on with their lives, planning for the future, knowing that in roughly a year, there would be no lives left. The end of the human race. Millions of years of evolution, of trial and error, of innumerable deaths, had led to this; the last of the humans, living in a piece of metal that was dying, looking down onto an Earth that they would never reach again. So close, yet so far away. Yeah, the universe had a twisted sense of humour.

_____

Clarke

At nine exactly lights out hit, and she crawled into her bed. Even with two blankets, the unnatural chillness of the room engulfed her, feeling like it sank into her bones. But she was tired, tired than she usually was. Thinking about Wells Jaha and Jake Griffin took its toll on her. She suddenly remembered her father’s smiling face as if he was right before her, his warm hands and soft words…

The thoughts lingered on in her fatigued mind, and soon enough, she found herself falling into a dream, smiling, unaware that it would later become a nightmare…

_____

Bellamy

A yawn escaped Bellamy’s mouth as he walked into solitary. Today, he had been reassigned back into solitary, but a night shift this time. He walked the hall, his footsteps echoing in the empty halls, and stopped by Clarke’s door. Through the glass, he could see her there, sleeping peacefully, and eyes glued shut, her lashes forming shadows on her cheeks. He saw the calm rhythmic rise and fall of her chest, and her light pink lips slightly parted, her beauty spot bright against her light skin

Bellamy knew Clarke was beautiful, objectively speaking. Half the guys on the Ark wanted her, but Bellamy had never heard that she was interested in any of them, always off in the med bay helping her mother or with her books studying. The closest thing she had to a relationship (that he was aware of) was with the chancellor’s son, Wells Jaha. But on the few occasions he’d seen them in the mess hall, they seemed like friends. Well, he was sure for Clarke it seemed that way. Wells always looked at her…differently. A sad and common case of unrequited love. None-the-less Clarke was beautiful (objectively speaking, of course).

Bellamy considered walking around the cell block, but it wasn’t like there were other people he was rushing to check on, just Clarke. So he decided to stand there and watch her for a few moments, and then he would walk around stretch his legs. Yeah, just a few moments…

He didn’t know how long he stood there, just looking at her, taking in every curve and line and inch of her body that he could see, feeling like he had her memorised by heart, greedily taking what little she was giving. He just stood there and looked at this girl, who he simultaneously hated and missed in equal passion. Damn you Clarke Griffin. He really should move and stretch. He could bet that if Princess woke up and found him staring, she would have some quick witted response that would provoke a reaction out of him. Yeah, that seemed about right…

He turned, his neck cracking in protest, the only giveaway of the amount of time he spent there. As he was massaging the knots there, moving to walk away, something caught his eye. It was Clarke. She moved, and not like she had been in the past –he looked down at the clock on the wall- hour?! Had he honestly been standing there and staring at her for an hour? He looked up again and saw her muscles twitch. He eyes suddenly squeezed tighter, and her faced morphed from one of peace to the face of a person in extreme pain. A bad dream, this was it was, nothing to worry about.

He was about halfway through trying to begin to convince himself that maybe he should leave when he heard her start screaming, “NO!NO!” she kept shouting over and over again, her hands flying around her like she was fighting some intangible force only seen to her.

Bellamy didn’t think, he just found his fingers going to his key card, scanning it on the machine, and feeling like it was a million years before it finally slid open. He rushed to her bed, ducking from her hands as her fingers curled around her demons, and held her close, trying to wake her.

“Clarke, wake up. CLARKE. CLARKE!!Wake up please!” he said, gently shaking her. At the third call, she finally woke her eyes wild as she tried to find the imaginary monster she was fighting. Her eyes finally locked onto his, and confusion overtook her face.

“Bellamy?” her voice was still a bit horse, but he heard the small break when she said his name.

“Hey, it’s okay…just a bad dream…”  he said softly, pushing stray strands of her hair behind her ear as her breathing returned to normal.

“A dream…” she whispered, and then her eyes glossed over and seconds later, silent tears slid down her cheeks. Bellamy was at bit of a loss, not sure what to do. Instinct told him to comfort her, and he didn’t fight it, wrapping his arms around her body and holding her close as the sobs shook her body, whispering into her ears that it was okay, that she was fine again, that she was safe, hoping she believed it.

_____

Bellamy

He looked down at her sleeping figure, back to the calm state she was in before her dreams turned into nightmares. Her eyes were a bit puffer, and obviously more red than before, which was noticeably obvious on her pale skin, but at least she wasn’t crying like her heart was breaking anymore.

Try as he might to resist the urge, he finally gave up and pressed a kiss to her forehead, hoping that it was enough to keep the monsters at bay, and walked out of cell, forcing himself not to turn back and steal a glance at her.

He walked back to his cabin on auto-pilot, not noticing anything around him as he made his way through the Ark. Once he entered Mecha, his feet followed the familiar route, with him having to negotiate the ever present crowds of his station. He opened the door to the cabin that he shared with his mother and sister.

His sister, the one who, according to Ark records, didn’t exist. The Ark had a strict one-child policy, which was understandable: they lived on a spaceship floating in space, and without the ability to expand (or the resources for such an undertaking), population control was a priority. Octavia Blake was born when Bellamy himself was just seven years old. She was a child that shouldn’t exist, and yet she did, and there she was, 17 years later, and Bellamy couldn’t imagine his life without her. Yes, he had moments whereby he resented Aurora Blake for having Octavia, and thereby sentencing her to a life limited to the walls of their cabin and below the floor, where she would never be able to go out and drink awful moonshine and be late for curfew and live life like he never did.

Somehow, by Aurora having Octavia, Bellamy lost his life. He never did anything wrong or illegal that might cause the guard to pay attention to the Blake’s. He couldn’t risk going to the Skybox and leaving her mother alone to protect Octavia. ‘My sister, my responsibility’ was what he always said, was what he was told, and although it might have cost him some fun here and there, he’d do it all over again in a heartbeat if it meant he’d see her smile at him like he was her hero.

“Hy Bell…” Octavia said from the table in their cabin. She was sewing what looked like a guard uniform, and smiled up at him when he entered. There, right there, that was the reason he never regretted a single choice.

“How was solitary?” she asked, carrying on with her work while he made his way to the kitchen to get some water. How could he answer that? Well, the only person in there had one of the worst nightmares I’d ever seen, and I had to go in there and comfort her and spent the entire night holding her and looking at her sleep and hoping she didn’t have another because I couldn’t stand to see the pained look on her face…

“Long.” Was what he settled on. They spent a few minutes talking, mostly just Octavia telling him about the different things she had patched up and telling him that mom left early and wouldn’t be back until around lunch.

Before finally going to get some much needed rest, he kissed his sisters forehead (not unlike the way he kissed Clarke’s) and went to bed.

He dreamt of a woman with long golden hair, and blue eyes looking at him fearfully. What was going on? All of a sudden they’re at an airlock chamber, and the blond woman is on the other side, screaming, shouting and begging, “NO!!” She’s banging on the door, and Bellamy is suddenly there, banging against it too. There’s a countdown, a loud booming voice ‘Five. Four,’ Bellamy moves to the buttons and switches on the side of the door, pressing anything and everything, trying to open the doors. ‘Three. Two.’ He’s frozen; he can’t move anything, he can only watch helplessly and listen as the voice echoes ‘One’. The woman isn’t shouting anymore, she’s standing in the middle of the chamber, tears sliding down her face. He wants to scream and move and jump to pull her to his side, but he’s frozen still. The door behind her opens and she’s sucked into the darkness, and he can hear her voice saying his name, ‘Bellamy!’

He wakes up with a start, his heart racing. Octavia is standing over him with concerned eyes.

“Bellamy, what’s wrong? What’s going on?” Bellamy can’t think for a moment. A dream? It was all a dream.

“I’m fine Octavia. I am, it was just a bad dream” he says, and without giving her a chance to say anything, turns around facing the wall. He can still feel her there, hovering behind him, before he hears her sigh and move away, going back to whatever she was doing.

He’s had that dream before. After a few close calls with Octavia nearly being discovered, he’s dreamt of her being in that chamber, watching helplessly as she was sucked out into the never-ending blackness of space. Every time, try as he might, he isn’t able to save her, and can only watch –just as he did- as her dark hair faded from light. His absolute worst fear.

How is it that this time, he dreamt of Clarke...?

#bellarke #fanfiction #ao3 #somesmutt #chapter1 #archive of our own #sg_fuzzy_bear #the100 #princess #bellamy x clarke

[jeremiahwasajoker]

5x03: Penguin, Our Hero (A Review)

Hey there everybody! It’s time for another Gotham review, this time on the third episode of the season, “Penguin, Our Hero”. I had been waiting for this episode for a long time now for many reasons, and I have to say that this one has to be my favorite of the season so far. There were so many iconic lines and scenes, and I can honestly say that next week is probably going to be even better! 

WARNING: This includes spoilers. If you have not seen the episode yet and want to avoid seeing any information about it, I would advise you to not look at this until you have done so. Without further ado, let’s get started!

First, I would like to thank Andrew Sellon for being fantastic throughout the seasons as Mr. Penn. He added a wonderful character to the show, and was going to be in this season even more if it hadn’t been the last. (He was supposed to be the Ventriloquist.) I personally loved Mr. Penn, he really seemed like such a nice character that kind of kept the show balanced in a way. Thank you, RIP Mr. Penn! He will be missed!

Next, I would like to review what I thought about some of the arcs of major characters and scenes that were incredible throughout Trespassers. They are in no particular order! Here we go!

Penguin’s Grand Entrance

What an iconic way to open up an episode! I freaking loved the choir singing as he walked down the stairs, and how the cinematography captured it perfectly. Then, there was Edward the Dog, who was adorable as ever this episode! (I think I said “awwww” every time he came on screen.) The atmosphere of the scene drastically changed when Penguin went from conducting his choir to the Street Demons breaking in, and to me, it was just the perfect opening for the episode!

Batcat vs. #Mutantgang

This scene was just as awesome in its own ways as it was hyped to be. First of all, Selina was so ready to take them down, and I really loved that she was back to being her old self as she cracked a few jokes. I got scared for the leader as she was slashing his face really quickly, and I will admit that, besides the fact that he’s a weird looking killing machine, the Leader seemed kind of innocent and soft (to a degree, of course. He seemed like the type of guy to be all tough on the outside but fluffy on the inside.) Bruce admiring Selina will always be one of my favorite things about Batcat, and this scene really captured it in the moment. I’m so ready to see what other tricks they have up their sleeve in the next few episodes!

The Church of Jeremiah Valeska

Honest to God, WHY IS JEREMIAH LIKE THIS? The boy has a cult now, and his face is on all these candles/stained glass windows. I’m not really surprised at this, as I saw in that one Entertainment Weekly Review that there was a death cult idolizing him. When I found that out, I was laughing because I was in so much shock! Ecco was mysterious as ever in this scene, and I loved the way she was moving around, it really gave the scene that much more creepiness. Why anyone would bother to join this is besides me, I mean, I guess there’s the possibility of meeting Jeremiah? But still. Russian Roulette is a HUGE price for a meet and greet. Then again, this is Gotham. I loved these scenes, though! I wonder if we’ll see any more of the “church” in the future!

👏ECCO👏

FRANCESCA ROOT-DODSON!!! Wow. As most of you probably know, I’ve always loved Ecco’s character. The fact that she was heavily featured in this episode made me so happy! Not only this, but Francesca’s acting skills are truly amazing. Whether it was the fight against Selina, the scene that so perfectly paralleled Jerome’s in 2x02, or her personality, she perfectly encapsulated this psycho character who was different than the average Harley Quinn interpretation. I like how she was much darker than the original Harley, and her unique origin story really explained why she went nuts all of the sudden. I noticed that she also used innuendos a lot during her scenes, I’m guessing Jeremiah has been treating her well? All in all, I was absolutely floored by her performance this episode. I’m ecstatic to see her in the rest of the season! 

Jim and Oswald Team Up / Penguin being an actual Hero!

When Jim and Oswald realized they had to work together, it was very humorous to me, as we saw Jim roll his eyes and the two of them turn back to back and shimmy down. I like it how the two of them had to put aside their differences to work together, as it provided to have wholesome results for the ending of the episode. After Penguin killed the bad guys and started cheering “PENGUIN!” the episode really came full circle as it started out with his own people singing this song to him, to the citizens of Haven cheering for him as he became a hero to not only himself, but to the others this time around. Edward walking back to him and his little smile really made me happy, as Oswald was doing something to help the people he once turned his back on. I loved it!

Since there were too many scenes for me to have the time to cover, I’ll have some honorable mentions! The Batcat kiss, Selina doing some acrobatics on the cars as they were walking to the Church of Jeremiah, the plot twist of what happened to Haven at the end, Barbara’s “Hi Pengy! BYE PENGY!”, Will Thomas being a good kid, and Mr. Penn all really put the icing on the cake.

Now is the time for a few questions I have about the latest episode!

Who blew up Haven? Honestly, I hope everyone who was inside the Haven is alright, I know they’re just TV characters, but still! It could be anyone. I don’t think it’s Jeremiah, because his I feel like he wouldn‘t really have a true motive in doing that. It could be Zsaz, as we know he’s in the next episode. If this is the case, I wonder why he did it!

What happened to the other Ecco and Selina scenes? I remember a while ago, when the first official season 5 picture of Ecco came out, and Tze Chun said that it was from his first episode, AKA Penguin, Our Hero. The photo Francesca posted the day of wasn’t in the episode either. In that one, you can see Selina’s hair to the very left. Are they in the next one? I’m not really sure, but most likely. Here are the pictures I’m talking about for reference: 

If I had to sum up the episode with one Jeremiah Valeska mood, it would be:

I was so shook. What an incredible episode!

I can’t even describe how excited I am for the rest of the season. If it’s going to be this iconic, I think it will be the best season of a TV show in history. Maybe I’m a bit biased because I’m such a huge fan of this show, but you can’t deny that this one is crazy. Also, we get Jeremiah next week! NEXT WEEK! I’m too excited.

Thank you for reading this! I hope you all had a wonderful time watching, too! I think I’m going to do one of these for each one that comes out. I’m so excited for the rest of the season! I hope you enjoyed!

#Gotham #season 5 #5x03 #Penguin Our Hero #The Penguin #Oswald Cobblepot #batman #Bruce Wayne #David Mazous #robin lord taylor #Selina Kyle #catwoman #Batcat #Camren bicondova #jeremiah valeska #Cameron Monaghan #ecco #ecco gotham #francesca root dodson #ben mckenzie #jim gordon

[marshaeb]

"P.S: I'm Mated With The Cursed Alpha!"

Chapter One

Hey guy! Don’t forget to Like, Comment, Review, and Follow for more updates! My apologies in advance for all the grammatical errors. Book will be professionally edited when completed.

Pulling me closer in his arm, Jackson hungrily nibbled on my ear as I rest tiredly onto his firm bicep. We both were breathing at an unevenly fast pace.

“Wow! Three rounds and you’re still ready for more? You should be tired, baby.” I whispered as I brushed my lips against his, biting down on them softly.

“You say that like it’s a lot...for me, it’s not. I can’t get enough of you, Jo’.” He replied in a low, soft voice, rubbing my shoulders with his hand. “That’s what happens when you keep a warrior grey wolf waiting until after graduation to finally take you.”

A warm smile stretch on my face as I rubbed my hand across his taut, muscular chest. I gazed across his manly sculpted face and watched as the bright moonlight shined upon his light-brown eyes. He was so perfect, so beautiful.

Though being my third time sneaking out for the week after being verbally chastised by my strict, conservative alpha of a mother for it, I couldn’t help not being in these arms. Yes, I know I’m an unruly teen with a broken past, but my rebellious spirit was the only thing that frees me, mentally, from those depressing shackles.

There we stared up at the stary night sky, laying on top of his father’s old Chevrolet truck he gifted to him for his sixteenth birthday. We parked in a nice, hidden spot, near a still creek. Cloth in nothing but the thick blanket wrapped around us.

I’ve always dreamt about this same night. When I would finally become one with the young man I’ve fallen desperately in love with. I thanked the Moon Goddess above and lightly rested my head onto his chest. The rhythmic sound of his heartbeat was like sweet music to my ear. I could listen to it all night long.

“I confess!” I blurted out. “We could have done it a long time ago, you know.”

An exhausting, irritated sigh blew out of his nostrils hearing the words that were coming out of my mouth.

“Don’t start me up, Joel.” He grunted. “How many times I’ve tried to bribe you out of this ‘waiting thing’. And for so bloody long, too! Those past fourteen months were the hardest period in my life! You were literally torturing me.”

I lifted my head and stared intensely into his eyes, “I just wanted... to test you. You know, to see your loyalty and that you really loved me. Besides, we’re not sure if we’re truly selected, mates.”

“Joel?” He said with passion in his voice. ” First off, I love you with all my heart. I would never do anything to break your heart. Second, we are mates. From the moment I saw you, my instincts told me right away that you were mine. Why did you think we bounded so quickly. That only happens when two wolves are true mates. And thirdly, do you think I would have waited an entire fourteen months for you if I didn’t sense you were my mate?”

“You’re right... I don’t know what’s getting into me, thinking this way.” I chocked.

A sudden tight feeling crossed my chest, just by the thought of me bringing up that sort of question. Jackson is my true mate... there’s no doubt about it. Everyone has told us that. From our friends, even up to the senior tribal elders.

Though there were still several months left until we both turn eighteen to officially make us mates, there was this slight doubt that keeps resurfacing in my mind. I hated myself for letting it get such a hold of me and our true happiness.

Jackson is mine and I am his. We were made for each other from the day we were born, and nothing in this world could keep us apart.

“Hey,” he said placing his hand on the back of my head, massaging it gently. “You know I love you right, Jo’?”

All my thoughts and worries quickly faded away.

“Oh baby, I love you too!” I smiled, crawling onto him, saddling his waist.

I rest both of my hands on top of his chest and grind my hips against his. I could feel him hardening underneath me as I rode him slowly, yet firmly.

“Looks like I’m not the only one who wants another round.” he groaned under me, gripping the side of my hips with his hands, spreading ass cheeks and everything in between.

Effortlessly, he picked me up just enough and rammed me onto his hard shaft, piercing my insides. Just like that, I came instantly. My breathing became jittery and my legs jerked uncontrollably as I ride out an intense eye-rolling orgasm.

I was on cloud nine. So many emotions were flowing through me. I never wanted this feeling to go away. All that was crossing my mind was the bright future that awaits us. Despite never knowing my true background and always feeling misplaced in my adopted family, starting a life with the man I love was all that mattered to me now. Marrying him and start a beautiful family together.

I couldn’t ask for anything more. I was happy and he was happy...but as always when good things start to happen in your life, it always finds its way to turn for the worse.

Read Chapter Two (Click link below)

[usaghinanami99]

Answering some unasked Sera Myu questions

…I know, no one actually tagged me or asked to do this meme, but @sailorzakuro invited anyone who wants to take part in this challenge and I’m very eager to, so let’s start!

1) You are a Myu fan since…? Short answer: since 2012, aged 13. Long answer (beware, when I say long, I mean very long): you can find a fully detailed axplanation of how I got into Myu somewhere in this post, in the second reblog https://usaghinanami99.tumblr.com/post/170867407508/myucornerorg-usaghinanami99-myucornerorg

2) The first musical you saw? I always watch and read things in strict chronological order, so that was Gaiden. I think you can see how I went on.

3) Your favourite musical? OMG Eien Densetsu Kaiteban is the best musical ever, it’s got such a great soundtrack and the Senshuraku recording is especially touching!

4) Your favourite Sailor Moon actress? QUEEN ANZA FOR LIFE!!!!111!!1

5) Say one positive thing about every Moon actress. Anza: OMG QUEEN I mean: best singer, best actress, best everything… Should I really go on? Fumina: A nice singer and perfectly in-character for a post-manga Usaghi, very calm and compassed compared to others. Miyuki: If there is a queen in Myu (see before), then Miyuki is the princess, she’s so good at everything she does and I love her dearly… and of course I miss her so much! ;( She’s just so skilled that I think of her as a performer who would definitely deserve to be #1, if only there weren’t someone who is even better… this is without diminishing Miyuki’s ability at all! Plus, she’s the one who made me undestand that nasal voices aren’t necessarily terrible, quite the contrary with her case. Marina: WOW like was she really 12 when she started? I could think of many ways to praise her singing, but the most important thing I think about Marina is just “too good for her age” XD Satomi: I respect her very much because I think she’s the one Myu actress who improved awesomely during the course of time. I mean, I have to admit I’m not a fan of her singing and acting from LR through UNV, but when she returned in LMF she literally blew me away and I couldn’t believe she was the same person considering how much she improved. Hotaru: I can really see how she put her whole heart into her performance and that she loved it to death. I find her very relatable because she’s so fangirly she low-key reminds me of myself!

6) Is Sera Myu your favourite version of Sailor Moon? Er… actually, not at all ‘XD While I am absolutely convinced that the manga is the best version of the franchise and the first anime is the worst one, I’m much more torn apart among the other version… It is very hard for me to do a ranking, because I just can’t decide which I love more amongst Crystal, PGSM and Myu!

7) Who is your favourite cast member? ANZAANZAANZAANZAANZAANZAAAA…

8) Are your first favourites your actual favourites? Oh, yes! Anza, Ayako and Yuta have always been my Top 3 and will forever be. I have changed my mind over many actors, in the sense that I’ve come to like many whom I really didn’t care about at first view, but my best favourites will always stay the same

9) If you could say one sentence to your Myu favourite, what do you want to say to him/her? Nothing in particular, really. I’d rather have her sing Usaghi’s lines from Tabidachi for me to enjoy and worship!

10) Which Sailor Moon story do you want on stage? The manga stories which didn’t make it to the stage so far! I get that the short stories would be almost impossible to adapt, but between the Shining Princess’ Lover and the whole of Sailor V there is enough material to go on for at least three years! After that, they could start with some original material… maybe some story set during the Silver Millennium era?

11) Tell me your Top 3 underrated actors. 1: Tomoko Inami 2: Akiko Miyazawa 3: Miki Kawasaki

12) Give 3 actors new roles. Er… Does Anza as Cosmos count? Because, apart from that, I can’t really think of anything else: it’s because the actors I like have always been cast perfectly spot-on, while the ones I don’t… I’d rather have them have no parts at all XD

13) Combine classic and revival Myu: what does it look like? YES YES YES this is actually my greatest fantasy, I would kill to have a musical which combined the strong plotting and characterization of New Myu with the awesome soundtrack and casting of Old Myu

14) Revival Myu song you want in classic myu? Er… None? I’d rather have the exact opposite XD I mean, there are New Myu songs I do like, but they couldn’t ever even dream to compare to the work of goddess Akiko Kosaka.

15) Tell me an unpopular opinion you have about Myu. (Lightly whispering): I actually dislike Yuka Asami both in terms of singing and acting… I have tried to make myself like her to no avail. Now please don’t kill me! Apart from that, there are also some typical fan-favourites like Nao, Yuka and Chieko whom I love but are just number 2 for me because I think there’s someone even better than them… does this count as unpopular?

16) Ai no Starshine or Music of the Spheres? We hear the music of the spheeeeres… Speaking of New Myu songs I enjoy, this is definitely one of the best for me!

17) The Last Change or its XXI Century version? …Can I answer “both”? Lol, this is still another case of two things that are both so good it’s difficult to choose between them… I love both arrangements, Miyuki is QUEEN in both (yes, Marina is also good, but nowhere near her level IMO) and I am both into slow songs and upbeat ones. Actually, this reminds me very much of the issue I’ve got with Dolce Melodia (a song from the Italian dub of Mermaid Melody which you have to listen to NOW), where, after 11 long years, I still can’t understand if I prefer the original upbeat version or the more emotional carillon arrangement… But, while I am a sucker for both genres, slow love songs are definitely my cup of tea - in fact, my best favourite song in the whole freaking world is the main ballad theme from Beauty and the Beast. And while The Last Change is no love song, the original version has go tthis kind of feel to me, so that’s the one I’ll peek… but that’s been a very hard choice! XD

18) Cho Bi Uranus to Neptune or Harsh Saint Cry? Oh, this is much easier? While I do like both very much, the thing is that First Stage >>> everything else IMO ‘XD So it must be Cho Bi.

19) Is that something about Myu that annoys you? THE FREAKING UNRELEASED MATERIAL       I freaking want to have tapes of the four unreleased musicals so much that I’d die for them! Not to mention the reunion concert that Anza & Akiko made in 2015… Also yes, the speaking over the fankans. That’s pretty common, but there’s a reason if everyone is deeply pissed off by it. And the fact that some of the performances were only shown in snippets

20) What do you expect from the 2019 musical? A lot of things, lol. Actually this is getting pretty long, so if you’re really dying to read my opinion about this (I doubt it’s the case, but still), I’ve already made a complete list of my hopes on the purpose which you can find following the link up there.

21)  How important are dancing abilities of the actors for you? …I actually don’t even pay attention to them, and even if I did, I’m far too uncompetent for it to matter much for me. Sorry for the horrible answer ‘XD

22) Which Myu merchandise do you want? FREAKING VIDEOTAPES OF THE UNRELEASED MATERIAL Also official soundtracks for the New Myu and a more complete collection of the instrumental versions of all Myu songs

23) Are you sad that Luna and Artemis disappeared after Gaiden? You can bet on it! I’m also bitter for this because I was sure they would include them when La Reconquista was announced XD

24) An interesting (non-existing) HaruMichi couple? San’ae x Tomoko is my dream, what with them being the best Uranus and best Neptune for me? As for actually existing ones, my favourite is Shu x Sayaka.

25) Your favourite Moon x Tux couple? Anza x Yuta for eveeeer And I’ve also got this forbidden dream of seeing some Miyuki x Yu, I think they would be perfect together for some reason… sadly that’s not possible :(

26) Your favourite musical-only character? Kyaosu. You can beat me now. Also Space Knight, I wonder how it is possible that it didn’t come to my mind first. And yes, I have that sense of humour.

27) Which character would you play in a musical? …No one. I’m definitely not qualified enough to even dream of something like that XD But if I had to choose, than it would surely be my queen Usaghi

28) Something else you want to say about Sera Myu? Sera Myu is awesome, okay? I love it so much and it’s such an important part of my life and it gives me happiness when I’m feeling down and all those things… I sould probably stop now!

Now that this challenge is officially over for me, I tag @myucornerorg into doing it! :)

#sera myu #sailor moon #pretty guardian sailor moon #sailor moon musical #old myu #new myu

[heungtanbts]

my personal highlights from bts wings chicago

warning: LONG POST AHEAD + SPOILER ALERT

not today was LIIIT

taehyung was seriously born to wear a headband wow

it’s obvious the boys worked so hard on their english and they’ve gotteN SO GOOD?! 

their pronunciation is so much more accurate and impressive 

so during the opening greeting ppl screamed so loudly for each member

but ESPECIALLY FOR JIN?? LIKE IM SO HAPPY?!

then yoongi did his whole “i can’t heaaaaar you” gesture that pUNK

i never knew i needed to hear hobi’s “I’M YOUR HOPE, YOU'RE MY ANGEL” irl but BOY DID THAT CHANGE MY LIFE

jungkook’s footwork for Begin - I’M SPEECHLESS. THAT BOY IS SO TALENTED WTF

then we have jimin performing Lie

oh my goodness

slap me across the face and call me dummy bc THAT LITERALLY MURDERED ME

his voice is so sweet and beautiful in person like imma need that honey for my sore throat from screaming like a mad woman for him

yoongi’s performance of First Love had me so emotional

like i didn’t even scream or cheer during his performance

there was just so much emotion in his voice and eyes and you could really tell he was giving his all

and that the song meant so much to him

idk it was just one of those times that i just silently appreciated instead of losing my ish

it was seriously spine chilling

THEN LOST BY VOCAL LINE

I WISH THEY’D PUT OUT AN OFFICIAL DANCE VER OF IT MAN

but hold up- then SAVE ME all of a sudden comes on and we’re like

OHHHHH SHHHHH-

but wait, it gets better

freakin I NEED U comes on and we’re seriously all dying at this point

talk about a THROWBACK

then namjoon performs Reflection

and when he says “I wish I could love myself” we all shouted back “WE LOVE YOU”

and i can’t even describe how beautiful this interaction was b/t us and him

i really really hope he heard us loud and clear <3

then he freakin steps into this telephone booth covered in enigmatic words and phrases

tO MAKE A PHONE CALL TO GUESS WHO

that’s right

tae freakin shows up all gorgeous being filmed in a b&w filter and

LEMME TELL YOU

THE HONEY VOCALS ARE SOSO REAL 

HE KILLED THOSE HIGH NOTES ALONG WITH MY POOR BROKEN SOUL

plus it was hilarious hearing all 847289 of us trying to hit the note with him

then on the screen there are these bursts of color

like LOTS of psychedelic rorschach blobs of color

and suddenly BEAUTIFUL BEAUTIFUL HOBI comes on the screen

and the video cuts and he shows up on stage sitting in a chair

the best part of him performing MAMA is the fact that this sunshine boy was grinning during his ENTIRE performance

i was literally squealing like

HE LOOKED SO GENUINELY HAPPY TO BE PERFORMING HIS SONG AND HEARING US SING ALONG AND JAM WITH HIM

HE WAS SO SUNSHINE GUYS I THINK I WENT BLIND FROM IT ALL

and at one point the music cut and he grabbed the mic stand

and sang the bridge with no music and WE DIED

JUNG HOSEOK NEEDS TO SING MORE OFTEN PERIOD.

then things slow down with jinnie peforming Awake

which BTW

HIS VOCALS LIVE ARE SO AMAZING TOO DON’T SLEEP ON THIS MAN HE’S SO TALENTED

and apparently there was a plan to scream “YOU CAN FLY” after he’d sing “Maybe I-I can never fly”

but @infireation and i were the only ones to scream it

OH WELL I HOPE HE HEARD US AND OUR UNDYING LOVE

ok and freakin when they performed Fire

I THOUGHT WE WERE GONNA BURN THE ENTIRE STADIUM DOWN

like 3:33 is the most outrageous thing to see live 

then this guy behind me was like

“damn how are all these fans so good at following along to every word of the song”

and im like THAT’S RIGHT SON

FI-YUHHHHHHH HAH HAH HA HA

then we got super emosh because they decided to have us go on a feel trip with a BTS HISTORY MEDLEY

with N.O, No More Dream, Boy in Luv, Run, and others

guys my memory’s already fading i’m definitely forgetting other songs as;dlkfaf but anywho

then hobi KILLS Intro: Boy Meets Evil

only to pull a plot twist as it bleeds into BLOOD SWEAT TEARS

and again we’re like OH SHHHIIII DID NOT SEE THAT COMING

okay and although Outro: Wings is one of my fave jams

i didn’t think it was that popular or that they’d sing it

BUT MAN

IM SORRY I EVER DOUBTED ARMY OR THIS SONG BC WE WERE JUMPING AND SCREAMIN AND LOSING OUR MINDS

SPREAD SPREAD SPREAD MY WIIIIIIINGS

and hobi’s wearing his little whale hat he bought at the Shedd Aquarium during the song

and even says in english that he bought it when namjoon teased him about it and it was so cute omg

then they do an closing ment and everyone says one comment each

and jimin starts and shoots an arrow into my heart with his english

and in korean he’s like “thank you so much, we hope to come back soon”

and im all YOU BETTER COME BACK TO ME HUBBY IMMA DIE WITHOUT YOU

yoongi’s starts off in english but then is like “uh, can i speak in korean?”

and ofc bc he could obviously hear me, i scream back “NEHHHH”

but then he’s just like “chicago, saranghaeyo.” and im crackin up like

brehh everyone knows at least that

jin freakin says he feels like he was born again during this concert

and then he’s kissing his palm over and over again saying to us “this is you and me" 

tHIS GUY ASD;LKFJAF

then namjoons talking about how they really enjoyed their time in chicago

THEY WENT TO THE WATER TOWER PLACE AND BASICALLY WERE JUST MILES AWAY FROM ME THESE PAST FEW DAYS IM NOT OK

and then he ends me and @infireation when he says

"yeah if i were to live in america, i’d live in chicago”

THAT JUST DID IT FOR US WE DIED

then tae goes and he pulls his cap down and his voice starts to crack

and we think hes crying only for him to start smiling 

THAT FAKER WAS FAKING IT THAT LITTLE A;SLDFJAFJL HE’S SO CUTE

and he’s all “i love you. no, i really love you." 

*dies for the 75284th time*

hobi’s all smiles and when the cheering dies down a little 

my body acts on its own and all of a sudden im screaming

JHOOOOOOOOOOPE (for you @hobisoo) 

no regrets

then he says "you are our wings. let’s all fly higher together” with the most beautiful pronunciation

then jungkook’s like “i hope to see you guys again soon. even though we’re far away, we’re always together” in his amazing english

and namjoon butts in and is like

“i saw him memorizing his ment a thousand times backstage before this”

HOW FRUCKIN CUTE IS THAT THIS GOLDEN BOY WORKS SO HARD

then with the gorgeous rainbow sea of ARMY Bombs

they sing the fan song 2,3 and at this point if i wasn’t so dehydrated i would’ve started crying

it was just so beautiful and surreal for me to be in that moment, singing that song, reminiscing how long i’ve been their fan and journeying with them from the start to here

and how i was actually seeing them in the flesh, finally

i can’t even explain the feeling. i’m just so stinkin proud and filled to the brim with emotions

then they perform spring day and i capture that yoonmin moment during yoongi’s rap

and i will keep that picture forever MY LIFE HAS BEEN MADE

WHERE MY YOONMIN SHIPPERS AT

then the spring day bgm keeps rolling in the back as they’re bowing and what not

and yes, at the very end, i did wave my arms like a crazy person at namjoon who came to our side

and since we were at the edge he saw us 

@infireation ​ blew a ksis at him

and he blew one back

literally

dead

but then they leave and it hits me that it’s actually over

it seriously went by in the blink of an eye but now i really see what people mean when they say bts really knows how to put on a show

it was seriously so much fun, with so much dancing and uninhibited enjoyment

and they looked so genuinely happy to just be there and perform for us

i will never ever forget this night and how lucky i am to be a fan of one of the greatest, most humble, hardworking and down to earth groups known to man

thank you for being OUR wings, bts

let’s fly together <3

#bts #bts wings chicago #jungkook #jimin #taehyung #jhope #namjoon #yoongi #jin #i will be posting short clips and other pics later! #i feel like this post is more for my own memory's sake #but enjoy nonetheless hehe <3

[vocatharsis]

Cogs’ TS2 Apocalypse Run (XI)

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Out of intense nostalgia, I started revisiting The Sims 2 early this year. I got the online Ultimate Edition with all DLC via Origin -- after making my case to support -- and had a lot of fun with it! After stumbling across a variety of old challenge runs, I decided that I would try out an apocalypse challenge (specifically Phaenoh’s tiered, mod-enforced version on Mod The Sims, check it out, it’s great). On my first attempt, I failed quite badly. But this time, things are going much better. 

I’ve resolved to see this attempt all the way through, and document it in post form. If you like any games from the Sims series, nostalgic videogame reflections and/or challenge run blogging, feel free to read on!

THE SMITHS’ FREE STATE, PART 11 -- SIMS FALLING OVER

Teenage romcoms are back, baby -- boot camp: fun? -- grow old, stop wearing smart clothes to work -- another tragic fashion victim of the apocalypse.

Welcome! It’s my first one of these in about a month, ‘cos I’ve been on uni holidays and with the advent of the dreaded Steam summer sale this year I’ve been romping my way through a bunch of delicious indie titles (including Frostpunk, A Hat In Time, Subnautica, and now Darkest Dungeon - all great). It occurs to me that I have a bit of an image backlog, so I’ll use this post as an opportunity to refresh my memory as I’ll get back into the Apocalypse once I’ve finished the last little bit of Darkest. 

So, quick recap: Aaron & Forseti, the aspiring law and order twins, have made it to teenhood. Juan, spouse to Panoptica (heir of the household’s second generation), made it to the top of the Architecture career track, which means I’m finally allowed to extend the house beyond its initial 8x8 square and put down John’s military obstacle course. This thing builds Body skill wayyy faster than Yoga, so it’ll be great for Aaron, who needs to work out to top Law Enforcement. 

Oh, and Amanda Carlson -- Forseti’s intended future spouse -- came over to build up the relationship meter, only to get scared by Sake’s ghost and wet herself.

Sake doesn’t seem to ever spook members of the household... perhaps ghost pets don’t harass Sims they were friends with in life? If this is the case, then I’ll have to be very careful with future generations...

Aaron’s hitting it off with Tosha Go, a teen townie who walked down the street at some point. They’ve been flirting for a while, so it’s about time for the first ever teen romance of the apocalypse!

N’awww. 

(Odd observation: Whenever another Sim uses the bathroom, everyone always seems to get a thought bubble over their head with a cross superimposed on that person’s portrait. I mean, it’s not like you need those facilities right now?)

The adults are getting themselves some handy extra aspiration points by grinding Body skill points on the obstacle course (thank you, Knowledge), and I’ve definitely taken way too many pictures of people using it, because it just gives so many good photo opps:

But while they were doing this, I noticed something unexpected. According to the career rewards panel I accessed this object from, the course doesn’t raise Fun. Which I guess would make sense to me; fallin’ on yer arse trying to climb a wall made of wood doesn’t seem like my idea of a good time. Then... why is Juan’s maxed-out fun meter not going down while he spends hours crawling around in the dirt...?

You know what this means? The obstacle course, for whatever reason, is Fun. This means I can start training Aaron up while he’s still a teen. (Showbiz Pet rules - which I can’t lift for a while - prevent children and teens from skilling with any object that doesn’t increase the Fun need at the same time.) And that means more adorable pictures of People Falling Over.

John’s getting on in his old age, and wants to max out all of his skills. I figure I might as well oblige; he can’t sleep in anymore now that he’s an Elder, and he needs something to pass his remaining time.

The two brothers have slightly different attitudes to all the exercise they’re now doing:

Panoptica and Juan are drawing ever closer to Elderhood, so I took a few romantic pictures of the two of them in their top-rank work uniforms. (There’ll be more romantic diversity, definitely, once adoption becomes a valid method for lifting restrictions - I think Law is the thing for that? So -- next generation, basically.)

I love this goddamn power couple, just look at them

Here’s hoping they get decent clothes to die in when their hair turns grey!

Forseti is the first of the two twins to max out the Body skill, no doubt due to his ultra-Active personality...

He’s not even gonna be using those Body skill points for anything, yet look how triumphant he is. (He mastered the skill almost immediately after I took that image.)

Well, Panoptica and Juan’re gonna grey up, so let’s get Juan to go first. 

Whatever clothes he gets as an elder, I don’t really think they’ll be better than what he’s currently got. (If he’s lucky, he’ll get something John-tier. But there are many, many outfits in this game.)

Swoon all you want, girl; this is the last time his thought bubble’s gonna look like that good.

The whole family are here to celebrate. And Jessica Picaso is here, because she followed John home from work

And now: will Juan’s clothes age gracefully?

No! They won’t! :)

Looks like boxer shorts and a polo shirt, more or less. I think this is better than poor Kent’s obnoxious orange suspenders, though? (The suspenders which, coupled with those old world blues, drove the poor man to red aspiration levels?)

Now, much as I love Juan, I took way more pictures of Panoptica’s ghost-clothes presentation aging-up ceremony, for the simple reason that Panoptica is all-round awesome.

(The best picture from this scene is hands-down the one I used as a preview above the cut. She did the little ‘pretend boxing’ animation, and it was just a great last bit of magic.)

I’m thinking, will she at least get better death clothes than her spouse? 

She does.

Not bad, not bad!! Certainly more apropos than what Shelmerdine got stuck with.

Juan’s happy with it too, it seems.

just make your wife’s sixtieth birthday awkward by making raunchy remarks in front of yer two kids, just do it

Buuuut those two are both good now. In fact, since they had their kids pretty early on, we’re actually one day off Aaron & Forseti reaching adulthood. I’m thinking I’ll invite Tosha over, so I can use that ‘select NPCs to age up’ feature. Give them some adulthood sweetheart time while I wait for Forseti to unlock the ability to move Sims out. (That way, I can actually marry off both twins, and have their children count as able to lift restrictions.)

The twins’ll be aging up within the same 24 hours, so I invited Amanda Carlson as well. 

Amanda will (ideally) lift Business restrictions, since she starts off as a President (rank 8). Tosha, meanwhile, I’m thinking Journalism (doesn’t lift much, but I can get it out of the way with a married-in character, yeah?)

Hm! Ok, he was in his athletic outfit when he blew out the candles - I don’t know what his everyday apparel looks like yet.

Everyone’s celebrati-- wait

What. The hell is that. 

I’m terrified. But intrigued at the same time. I’ll get him to have a shower and thus change into his daywear so I can see the full extent of the damage shortly, but first, we need to age up his girlf...

Cute!

Ubercute!

(I mean-- since Townies tend to be at green aspiration by default, I did get a notification in the top right-hand corner of her going wow that part of my life was shit to go along with this dashing smile. But I suppose being a Townie means only half-existing, and becoming playable is like being selected to receive a soul, so, comparatively, her adulthood will be infinity times better.)

While I’m getting Forseti set up to blow out his birthday candles, Aaron goes to take a shower. Let us now take a moment to lament how the apocalyse has claimed another helpless fashion victim. 

A suit made out of what might be fake snakeskin, and a wreath made out of what the remaining restrictions dictate must be some scavenged AstroTurf. Law and order will be returned to the Free State, perhaps, but taste will remain a site of anarchy for some time.

Now for Forseti to make the transition. I have so many awesome shots of everyone posing for this birthday:

A staple of this Apoc Run is getting excited for new outfits! 

Or, in this case, an alternate palette of the exact same outfit. 

Still -- here we are! Both twins have made it to adulthood, and are ready to start bringing Law and Enforcement back to society. 

I’ll need to do one more post to get through my current batch of snapshots, but after that, I’m officially back to doing this. If you’ve been reading these updates, thanks for reading this one; hope it was enjoyable! 

#my posts #ts2 #the sims 2 #the sims

[steviehaich]

I have returned. With news.

“What are you doing here?” my imaginary blogging community ask. Well, with cap in hand and tail between my legs I’d like to post a blog, for I have some news. BIG NEWS.

This is an ultrasound image of something Shelley and I have made. She will be incubating it within herself for approximately seven and a half more months as it’s seven weeks old. And It really is an ‘It’ because at its current size of 9.7mm the genitalia is far too microscopic to indicate It’s sex (Cue”just like it’s Dad” joke). Either that or the sex organs simply haven’t formed yet and I understand that the latter is a more accurate hypothesis.

We’ve been trying officially since the honeymoon in November (more on that later) so after eight months was beginning to worry that perhaps I didn’t have the weetabix to conceive – I’d even gone to the docs who made me a hospital appointment for jizz examination. While the appeal of a knocking one out into a tub in an unfamiliar setting was growing on me I was glad to have avoided the result-anxiety by receiving the good news the old fashioned way.

Shell had performed her precautionary monthly pregnancy test on the morning of Monday 19th June. Now, I didn’t know she took these precautionary tests, but I did know she used what we call ‘piss sticks’ (classy) to determine whether or not she was ovulating – this led to some confusion. In the haste of the morning rush Shell had left the test on the side of the bath and got dressed for work. Needless to say she forgot it was there and rushed out the door to catch her lift to work. I was off work due to the loss of my Uncle Ken on the weekend and got up a little later. I used the loo and spotted the plastic conception contraption loitering on the side, but being bleary eyed I dismissed any hygiene concerns and simply ignored it. Later that night I lay in bed reading while Shell brushed her teeth, then I hear,

“Steve, have you seen this?” “What?” I enquired. “The pregnancy test on the bath?” “Oh yeah, I saw it this morning actually.”

Shell enters the bedroom holding it by its slender neck. “Did you not think to look at it?” “No, I thought it was a just piss stick”

She then held the urine tainted stick up to my eyes, “Look.” There was a feint dark line running horizontally across the the small grey window.

“What does this mean?’ I asked, although I had an idea. “Well this is saying I’m pregnant.” “Wow…woah, no. Surely not. Has that been there all day?” “That’s what it says. It’s been there all day though so maybe the heat (we were in the middle of a heat wave) could have effected it? It is feint.” I agreed. The line was barely visible and we’d been trying for so long that I’d pretty much accepted my impotence. We shook it off and settled into bed vocally dismissing the result. Although I definitely went to sleep thinking, this could be it.

The next day Shell acquired another pregnancy test (from a handy stash I was unaware of) and I stood with her while she did the business, just to make sure there was no jiggery-pokery going on. We both stood looking at it holding it to the light. A minute passed – nothing.

“Nope, see.” Shell shrugged, handed me the stick and turned to wash her hands. “Ah man.” I sighed and held it closer to my face. “There is a little something there, I think.” Shell turned to look at it again. “It’s just the way you’re holding it to the light.” “No way, that’s getting darker.” The pregnancy indicator line I mean. “hmmmmm?” “Shell, that IS a line.” Shell took a step back. “I’m pregnant.” “You’re fucking pregnant!” We looked at each other, eyes stained with excitement and fear. Then my heart took over – I took Shells face in my hands, planted a smackeroo on her lips and began dancing. I hopped down the stairs and jigged up and down the front room singing “We’re pregnant, we’re pregnant!”. With a huge daunted grin on her face Shell told me not to get too excited, it was stupidly early day and anything could happen. My brother and sister-in-law were in the last stages of their pregnancy and had had an extremely rough ride, it had taken them three times to get this far so I was more than aware of how fragile that teeny little life was. But I thought ‘Sod it! This means we CAN have babies. My winky works! For now it’s just a matter of time.’

This is the second pregnancy test placed beautifully on top of one of our favourite wedding photos.

So, we paid to have an early scan. For £60 it seemed ridiculous not put our minds to rest – we just needed evidence that there was actually something in there. So on Saturday morning we headed to the imaging centre, a name which paints the picture of a plush photo studio not a room full of computer screens and leg stirrups (to be honest it was a nice little place, very private and it was just a bed – no stirrups). We had no reason to think there was anything wrong so right up until the moment we went in for the scan I was excited. But then I began shitting myself. I realised I’d be heartbroken if it wasn’t to be. Shell laid down and I pulled up a seat next to her. I took her hand and squeezed it so tightly she screamed. I was told to calm down before the process began.

We watched the screen in front and my heart sank. ‘There’s nothing there,’ I thought.

‘Yup, all looks fine,’ says the nurse with such flippancy I laughed. ‘Really? How?’

Nothing on that screen resembled anything like any other baby scan I’d ever seen, which is quite a few as of late. Then the nurse pointed to a little black orb and closed in on it’s teeny tiny heartbeat. I was made up. Then she played the audio of its heartbeat and it completely blew my mind. My legs went to jelly. It’s real. YES! IT’S FUCKING REAL! Shelley watched the screen like a do-eyed Cheshire cat as I asked question after question, mainly, ‘What’s that then?’ Followed by, ‘So what’s that then?’.

The bubba was just 9.7mm long and is due between 1st-3rd March 2018. Holy smokes. The second we left the building we looked at the pictures and jumped for joy. Granted, not much to see but that was ours, it IS ours – part of me and part of my wife in one heartbeat. We dutifully called our parents with the smashing news and treated ourselves to lunch in West Malling.

Ooh and here’s a fun fact about West Malling, turns out that in 1967 The Beatles began filming their movie Magical Mystery Tour in what is now a vacated kebab shop. It was was the icing on the cake.

I just want to clarify that I realise it’s still very early days (we’ve not even had the 12 week scan yet for Gods sake!) and obviously I’m nervous but I in all honesty just want to enjoy this moment. If this is the one, then I want It’s life from the very first moment. Positivity is key I tells ya!

Finally, and I don’t know how Shell will feel about me putting this out in to a public forum (although currently nobody reads this) but, we have worked out the conception date. Great huh? Now I know there’s no such thing as too much information so I’ll let you in the details. It’s highly likely to have occurred during and unusual and somewhat risky outdoor soirée that took place in the Kentish countryside – like a soldier on leave in the summer of 42′ having a fumble with a dishy Doris amongst the hay bales then sharing a post-cohetal cigarette. Be it with added anxiety, sweltering heat and nettles! It must of been that clean country that gave my little wrigglers a spring in their step. That egg was getting fertilised whether it liked it or not!

Time for a quick catch up

Right then, now let me quickly fill you in on what’s been going on this last year. Ok so, this time last year I was 10 days away from marrying my gorgeous wife Shelley. I had survived an awesome stag do arranged by my best man and brother Micky (we have the tattoos to prove it) and would be finalising plans for the big day – from table plans and table decor to speeches and payments.

The wedding day was monumental, the best day of my life and it went off without a hitch – with the exception of the ice cream man not turning up! We didn’t care though, the weather was perfect, Shell looked stunning (us boys looked pretty good too) the service was gorgeous and the barn looked better than anyone could have imagined. The food, the speeches, the band, the entertainment, the guests, the cars, everyone who helped…it was all just PERFECT. It was a celebration to end all celebrations, and we felt it in the morning. Clearing up was not a fun task and if I’m honest I was pretty useless. Thank God we had a mini moon to Menorca booked for the next day. That week abroad couldn’t have been more needed. Exploring a new area of Menorca as husband and wife felt great and we discovered some great places for next time – we drank, ate, chilled and spent frivolously. Coming back to reality hit me pretty hard. Harder than I ever actually imagined. I got depressed and anxious.

So, then we booked the REAL honeymoon – 3 weeks travelling across South Africa in November. We done it in style too. Cape Town, Robben Island, plush vineyards, whale spotting (humpbacks don’t ya know!) shark diving (yes, we got face to face with numerous great whites!), garden route, cave diving, Safari (what didn’t we see!), hospital in Durban thanks to food poisoning (although the food everywhere was awesome) and finishing with leatherback turtle spotting in the most luxurious resort I’ve ever seen let alone stay at. It was a trip of a lifetime and we can’t put into words how amazing it was. We felt free, it was so vast and ever changing and we had not a care in the world. We obviously plan to go back because there’s so much to see and do but I suppose, in reality it might never happen. Like I mentioned earlier, it was in South Africa that we officially began trying for a baby, although back then we cared less about ovulation times and stuff – if we got lucky, we got lucky.

I worried (makes a change) that returning from SA would hit me even harder than after the wedding but to be honest I was fine, it was just weeks until Christmas, work was going well and I just felt stupidly grateful for everything. And I still bloody do.

While all this was going on it was revealed that my bro and my sis-in-law were expecting. We, the whole family were obviously ecstatic but didn’t want to get too carried away as they’d gone through the torment of losing two previously in the early stages. We were all sickeningly upset but they’d been left completely heartbroken. Lauren was even pregnant at our wedding, they had an early scan which looked really positive but lost it just a week later while we were on our mini moon. It’s such a wake up call to how fragile life is at those early stages and how much love you can throw at it. Anyhow, that’s in the past and this pregnancy has run it’s course, oh and guess what? IT’S TWINS although it’s hasn’t been plain sailing for them. The two boys have caused their mum and dad (and all of us obviously) no end of worry – first, the bigger one was was taking all the nutrients resulting with Lauren needing a quite dangerous corrective procedure. Then, just weeks later all hell broke loose with the smaller having a bleed on the brain and Lauren needing another corrective procedure and blood transfusion which this time was very risky. For weeks it was touch and go and we all prepared ourselves for the worst. I was scared to answer my phone for such a long time. If my mum called me my heart sank and I’d try gauge by her tone what was coming. But thank god, the weeks past and the boys got stronger and stronger. Their due date was pushed back further and further, to 37 weeks! A miracle.

So on Thursday 29th June 2017 I became an Uncle. I’M A BLEEDING UNCLE!!! An uncle to two gorgeous little boys, Harry and George Holbrook. It was all a bit unexpected. After a procedural scan they kept Lauren over night and said it was on! We all went mad with excitement and about 24 hours later they were born. It’s genuinely mental, seeing the love those little boys have created but they aren’t out of the woods yet. They were born at 32 weeks And put straight into incubators, there’s been good days and bad days but they’re getting stronger by the day. Only mum and dad have had the honour of touching them and giving them a cuddle but they should be home before the end of the month – that’s when fun uncle Steve kicks into action. My bro and Lauren have been like rocks throughout, Lozza just incredible and, as his brother I’m so insanely proud of how Mick has dealt with it all. He’s an inspiration to me as a new dad and a husband – I just hope I’d be as strong he’s been. But please God let us have a smoother ride than they’ve had. The fun begins now for them, they’ll soon have two little rotters ruling the roost.

The magic moment

Harry

George

Lastly, some fucking shit news. My Uncle Ken died of lung cancer on Sat 17th June. He was something of a hero to me and it was all pretty sudden. We had a family get together on 30th March and he was fine and dandy, was a great day. Fast forward to Sat April 29th; We went round their house for brunch to say farewell to my cousin and her fella Jak as they were leaving for a long awaited trip away, travelling the world for 4 months. Ken was sick as a dog, thin and breathless. He’d been diagnosed with lung disease COPD and pneumonia, was on antibiotics and sure that he would get better. COPD is obviously a serious disease but not the death sentence that cancer can be..and was. Jo and Jak left on the Monday. My aunt took them to the airport and on her return found Ken blue and gasping for breath. He was rushed to hospital and it went downhill from there. After about a week it became clear just how serious it was, he needed a very risky op to put stents into his lungs. Up until then no one had told Jo and Jak , Kens choice as he didn’t want to ruin their trip for something he could beat but now they had to know. They flew back from Tokyo fearing Ken might be dead when they arrive. Luckily the op was a success and he improved greatly over the next few weeks. He also became strong enough for the docs to properly establish the extent of his condition, he hadn’t even been diagnosed as having cancer at this point – although it was apparently obvious. He was finally diagnosed with Jo and my aunts Sue finding out through a disgusting admin error. With his condition changing daily he spent the rest of his life in Barts hospital looked after by a superb team. After a short period of radiation treatment it became clear there was nothing that could be done. He was put into palliative care on the Tuesday and died on the Saturday evening. I was going to visit on the Sat morning but he’s lost consciousness in the early hours. I visited his a couple of times in hospital and he was full of spirit both times, cracking jokes and telling stories although weak and struggling for breath. I’ve never seen anything like it. I have so much to thank my uncle for and he left the world with dignity. My aunt, cousin and her now fiancée Jak (he proposed while Ken was in hospital, he’s a great bloke and bought some joy during a mental time) are doing as well as can be expected and I’ll do my best to be there if ever they need me. I gave a reading at the funeral and they send off was fantastically personal and messy – a celebration Ken would be proud of. Click the link at the bottom to read my reading.

So yes, the last few months have been a roller coaster and a half. Sadness and joy doing combat, but I’m assured that joy will always prevail. Hey, we found out Shell was pregnant just 2 days after Ken died, did he give us a helping hand? I’ll always wonder. I’ll do my best to make him/her an Arsenal fan in his honour, just wonder what my West Brom wife will have to say about it.

I’m an Uncle and as things stand going to be a Dad. Fuck, I’m turning into an adult.

For Ken

I have returned. With news. "What are you doing here?" my imaginary blogging community ask. Well, with cap in hand and tail between my legs I'd like to post a blog, for I have some news.