#verse somewhere but maybe not quite what I have written

[evilminji]

You know... >.>

My Dad always used to tell me, if I get a Genuine Genie(tm)? Get a lawyer first. Before I make my Wishes(tm), so they can help me word them correctly.

Obviously, a human lawyer would not be foolproof... BUT! What about a Ghost Lawyer?

Like? Obviously Desiree would be PISSED. How DARE you twist HER wish twisting! Her THING is "what you believe is your heart's desire always comes at a terrible cost" which is what she DIED to learn.

So obviously she would NEVER, willingly, bend her Obsession for ANYONE. And you'd have to make a DAMN good case to that Lawyer for why he ISNT breaking the law by helping you. Probably some "you can: save the life of an unconscious person against their will/shove an unobservant person OFF the train tracks, even if they get hurt, to save their life" clause.

Like? Using a ghosts Obsession against them? Bad. Illegal.

Using it against their will, to save OTHER ghosts, who are in immediate danger? Not illegal, but they will be PISSED. Still not great though, you will want to apologize and fast.

So like??? Reality Bending Power. Patrick Star Method of "what if we MOVED the city... somewhere else?" Considered at 1am. Team of Ghost Laywers, acquired.

Amity and all Limnals are REMOVED from the DP-verse.

Wish worded juuuuust so. Any ghost that forms there? Yoink! Instantly removed to the Zone. Natural Portals? Cut off. Let the whole Reality fade out at an accelerated rate, as no NEW energy is fed into the system. Entropy will do, what entropy does. Exactly as they wished it.

They hated Death so much, they speed up the heat death of their ENTIRE universe by Eons. Congratulations, you guys "Won". Enjoy the wildly more fragile flora, fauna, and general ecosystems. Now that none of you have that ambient Ectoplasm strengthening your bodies. Yeah, the things you used to shrug off? Those are gonna maim or kill you now.

Doesn't MATTER if you "learn your lesson" though! Cause this is WAY past that point! This is "cutting off the tumor before it kills us" territory, and buddy? Amity ISNT the tumor. Go forth a grow, just like you wanted.

They won't be here to fix your messes anymore.

Because Danny got himself a dictionary thick "I Wish..." contract. Which was worded, as it needs to be, in one loooooooong run on sentence. Shouted "I Wish what's written on THIS, as it is currently, and without any form of editing or negotiation!" As fast as he could. Yote the document in Desiree's direction. And Flew like an INCANDESCENTLY pissed off Genie was trying to set his everything of fire.

Which she was.

Thankfully, Paulina came in clutch with her History of all things Jewelry, world fashions, and Make-Up knowledge. That, coupled with the Power Of Rich Friends(tm)? (Sam. Her mother was THRILLED to take her Jewelry and clothing shopping for something other then blacks and dark purple. They went on a jet setting whurl-wind tour. Sam actually kinda liked a some of what she found.)

They have Apology Bribes.

They shamelessly HIDE behind the mountain of Apology Bribes, while they explain themselves. Is Desiree HAPPY? No. But those bracelets are magnificent and she DOES deserve nice things. Those silks will really bring out her eyes. And she... DOES... admit...

Maybe...

That things are not... SAFE. Any longer. Danny TRIES. Everyone else can see it. And he's made incredible strides! Even convinced his lunatic parents. Though they're still not quite POPULAR. (WAY too pushy and invasive with their questions, for most people.) But the fanatics in white?

They nearly killed Box Lunch. If her father hadn't BEEN there...

And the poor man will have that scar on his back for the rest of his afterlife. Desiree can see why Danny is pushing. Does she LIKE it? No. But...

She supposes she will content herself with the suffering of the Fanatics in White and all who support them. THEIR wishes, twisted. Their ugly heart's desires.

Fine.

"SO YOU WISH IT. SO IT SHALL BE!"

And? The ghost town of what WOULD of one day grown into Amity, had the witch's there not been found by those they had fled from, which sits in long rotted ruins, amongst the trees in nowhere Illinois? Poof! Two "Towns" are switched.

The roads out of town coming to a clean line stop, meeting not even goat paths. Just trees. Old growth.

But it's not ALL of Town, is it? Faces missing. New, confused, faces from every corner of the map, taking their place. No Limnal left behind. No supporter of the GIWs genocide, brought along. Family's kept together where they could be. But by the few, scared and upset, green flashing eyes of children in the crowd?

It seemed for some, it was easier to fear and hate, then love their children.

Already they were being gathered up by school teachers and PTA parents. As everyone tried to figure out what had happened. Concerned, quite muttering a dull roar as everyone tries to coordinate.

Red Huntress joins Danny and Dani in the Sky. She doesn't get a word in. Wanted to know what the HELL was going on. She was with her dad in Chicago! Dani was in Taiwan! Literally! As in, sitting in a SUBWAY station one second, the next? Outside!

But they don't get to demand those answers. Because there is a sonic boom on the horizon. And then? Floating... weird... not ghosts?

Uuuuuuhhhh?

Hi?

That much blue... sure is a Statement. Like the cape and... bloooomers? Shorts. Bikini bottoms? It.. it's a Cool Look, dude! No, really. They are being VERY supportive here! If YOU like it? That's the only thing that matters!

Red Huntress smacks the Danny/i's Repeated upside their heads and demans to know what the Not-Ghosts are doing in their airspace.

Oh YEAH. Good point! What she said! And can it WAIT? They're kinda going through A Thing right now...

Kon? Wants it on record he loves these guys. They're hilarious. The LOOK on Clark's FACE?? He wishes he could frame it. Preserve it for future generations. Thing is? There was NOT a town here a second ago.

Well, bout 30 minutes or so, but you get the idea. One moment? Tree noises. Bam! Thousands of people! Obviously the checked it out. Only to be met with two... three maybe? Heros who have NO IDEA who they are.

Clear Reality warping shenanigans. Might be time travel or multiverse. Question is... are they STAYING? And if SO? What now...

@hdgnj @ailithnight @the-witchhunter @nerdpoe @dcxdpdabbles @mutable-manifestation @hypewinter

#dpxdc #dp x dc #dc x dp #dcxdp #dc x dp prompt #danny phantom #minji's writing

[saltandburnheathens]

Low Places.

Prompt: Why do you think that you need to fix me? Who told you I was broken!?

Pairing: None.

Rating: Mature for implied/drug use.

Words: 1.6k

Warnings: Drug use. Implied suicide.

Summary:

He hadn’t meant for anyone to find him. It was the dead of the night and all Dean had been craving since coming down was to go back up. But in a place like Lebanon, Xanax was the best he could score, and he hadn’t had a proper hit since their last job took them to Austin. Then he’d remembered the methadone pills hidden beneath the driver’s seat of Baby.

Notes:

I saw this prompt and it spoke to me. I have an ongoing story I'm writing purely for self-indulgence and copium that has Dean suffering from addiction. Namely drugs. And this just spoke to me on another level. So I whipped on my playlist for that fic and fired this onto the page. Largely unedited, so excuse my flaws. I was also high when writing as I always am (Just weed, kids. Calm down.)

If you want to see this continued or written around, let me know. I'd love to add another Drug Addict! Dean to my verse.

Show A03 some love.

Curled inward on himself, his knees digging into the hard resin of the shower tray, Dean prayed for escape. He babbled and begged anyone- Chuck, Lucifer, fuckin’ Billie - to snap his God-damned neck in two. There was nothing he deserved more than death and he didn’t quite have the strength (or the balls) to do it himself. 

The water had long turned cold, leaving behind icepicks falling from the shower head and piercing his skin. Over and over and over. Again and again and again. Just like the bad decisions he’d made and the people he’d hurt; Relentless and never-ending. 

Sam was somewhere beyond the door, deep within the bunker and doing everything to avoid the older Winchester. They hadn’t spoken in days, nor crossed paths in the hallways. Dean would say he'd left if he didn’t know any better, didn’t know the fear burning in his brother’s gut. But there was no way he’d do that after catching Dean chasing little pink pills with whiskey. 

He hadn’t meant for anyone to find him. It was the dead of the night and all Dean had been craving since coming down was to go back up. But in a place like Lebanon, Xanax was the best he could score, and he hadn’t had a proper hit since their last job took them to Austin. Then he’d remembered the methadone pills hidden beneath the driver’s seat of Baby.

His first mistake was stopping by the kitchen for a bottle of whiskey. The second was giving into impatience and drowning thirty milligrams in smokey liquor. But it all ended when Dean failed to notice Sam standing on the threshold, atop the step, and watching his every move. Sober Dean wouldn’t have made that mistake, but he didn’t come around much anymore. 

“What is that?” 

Silence.

“Dean. What is that? 

“Whiskey.”

Sam moved closer. One step. Two. Then he was right at Dean’s shoulder and manoeuvring him so they were facing each other. 

“You promised. No more lies.” 

Dean desperately tried to avoid his brother's gaze. His stomach flipped, from the cocktail or fear, he couldn’t tell. Maybe both. 

“Dean!” 

“What?!” 

“What did you take?” The words slow, seething through Sam’s teeth. 

“Nothin’.” 

They went on like that for damn near thirty minutes. Dean denied anything other than liquor and his brother threatened to pat him down. In the end, Sam held firm on his promise and forcefully dug around in the pockets of Dean’s jeans, coming up with a small bag of pink and yellow pills. 

An argument erupted (“You fuckin’ promised me!” “Yeah? Well I lied!”) and Sam found himself on the wrong end of Dean’s fist. It was settled when the younger Winchester fled the kitchen in a horrid silence, his tail between his leg and a shiner developing below his left eye. 

“I can’t deal with you when you’re like this.” 

Dean was alone, fist bloody and bruised, begging the earth to swallow him whole. A gut-wrenching guilt bloomed in his stomach, but the buzz of the drugs overshadowed it. His mind was hazy and covered in heavy thickets of brambles and thorns. And had it not been for the throbbing in his fist, he would have written the whole thing off as some sort of fucked up high. 

But it wasn’t. The evidence was there in black and blue and shades of red. Peppered across his knuckles like crude clouds. 

He clenched his fist, whimpering through the pain, and shifted to cut the water off. Silence bloomed in the absence of thundering icicles. The emptiness left room for thought and Dean didn’t very much care for thought; especially not his. 

“Dean? Are you alright?” 

Somewhere above him, lingering by the door, he heard the fluttering of wings. Then the gentle squeak of the bathroom hinges. 

“What have I told you about personal space, buddy? This is a key example right here.” Dean allowed himself to fall back against the tiles, taking pressure off his knees.

“Because you’re naked? Or because you’re crying?” 

“‘ ‘not crying.” 

He wasn’t, not at that moment. But he had been. He’d practically had to shove his fist in his mouth to stop from screaming through the sobs wracking his body. 

Dean just wanted - needed - it to end. 

Castile moved closer and slid back the glass panel of the shower door. Dean didn’t even reach forward to stop him or try to shield his nakedness. The angel rebuilt him from nothing more than ash, bit by broken bit; Who cares if he saw his cock and balls? Or the bruises on his body from bar fights he couldn’t remember. Or the track marks from needles he vaguely felt? It was nothing to an angel of the lord. 

“You were praying for me.” 

“I wasn’t prayin’ for you. I was prayin’ for anyone who would fuckin’ listen an’ that just so happened to be you. Doesn’t mean I need you.” Dean snarled. 

Castiel came to his hunches, the tail of his coat dipping into the wetness pooled at the base of the shower tray. He cocked his head to the side and furrowed his brows, a look of caution on his countenance. Dean kept his head firmly in his hands. 

“Let me fix you.” 

“Why do ya’ think that you needa’ fix me? Who told you I was broken!?” Dean was looking now, boring holes through the angel's skull with eyes fogged by dope. 

Who the fuck said anything about a repair job? 

“You. You asked for help.” 

“Help can mean a lot of things. Don’t always have to mean I need ya to fix anythin’.” 

The angel seemed to contemplate this for a moment before reaching out and taking hold of Dean’s arm. The hunter jumped back, smacking his head against the tiles, desperately trying to pull himself free from Castiel’s grasp. But it was useless, he was already being whisked forward and up from the floor, his feet struggling for grip through the dampness. He stood shaking on legs made of lead. 

“Jeez. Warn a dude before you manhandle him like that.” Dean grumbled. 

“You’re shivering.”

“Yeah, well” Dean reached for a towel and began dragging it across his body, “I was happy where I was.”

“But you’re cold.”

With a roll of his eyes, Dean pushed past the angel and into his bedroom. As much as he loved the man, his tolerance was wavering. All he wanted was another hit to take the edge off. Then he could go into town in search of the next one. Again and again and again until finally, something killed him. 

Or someone. 

Castiel watched as the hunter pulled on a pair of sweatpants and an old Zeppelin shirt, the pallidness of his skin highlighted further by the darks in his clothing. 

“You’re sick.” It wasn’t a question, but a matter-of-fact observation. 

“I’m doing just fine, C- ” Dean sighed. He sat heavily on his mattress, the frame squeaking against his weight, and leaned forward, balancing his elbows on his knees. 

He wasn’t ready for this conversation. He hadn’t been ready when Sam cornered him in the kitchen all those nights ago, and he certainly wasn’t near ready now. 

“Sam’s prayers make more sense now.” Castiel took a few tentative steps forward, stopping a few feet shy of the hunter. 

Dean looked up to meet the angel's gaze. His brows were pulled up and knitted together in the middle, a regular expression for him, but it was his eyes that stopped Dean in his tracks. They were frightened, almost like he’d stumbled upon a haunted house when looking for a mansion.

“His - what? Sam’s been prayin’ to you? About me?” 

“He didn’t tell me that you’d relapsed in so many words, but I should have read between the lines. Maybe I didn’t want to believe it.” Castiel pursed his lips together and swallowed, “I rebuilt you from nothing. I know your past, and I assumed your present too.”

“Cas - “ 

“But somehow I missed it.”

“You didn’t miss anything, angel.” Dean spat, drawing his breath back and forth through gritted teeth, “I’m a very good liar.” 

“Yes. It would seem that way.” Castiel hung his head, releasing a trapped sigh. 

Silence stretched between them before Dean rose to his feet to find the remainder of the methadone. He hadn’t many left, maybe enough for another twenty-four hours if he rationed them. But relentless in his effort to chase after the high, he took two from the packet and began to crush them up with the hilt of his pocket knife. 

Castile watched on, astonished at the brashness of it all. 

“You can stand there with your mouth open like a fish, or you can fuck off. I’m gonna do what I’m gonna do whether you’re watching me or not.”

“Is this really how your story ends?” 

“With any luck.” Dean leaned forward, closing one nostril and inhaling through the other. He blinked several times and huffed out through his mouth. The burning disappeared, giving way to the rush of the drug. 

“You don’t mean that, Dean.” 

“Don’ I? What sort of ‘help’ do you think I was askin’ for, huh?” Dean stalked closer to the angel, pupils blown and a small trickle of blood smeared beneath his nose, “Did you think I wanted you to flutter down from your pedestal and throw me a hug? Let me cry on your shoulder and then check me into rehab?” He scoffed, “Been there, done that. The t-shirt just didn’t fit me.” 

“So what are you asking for?” 

“A way out.”

#dean winchester #addict!Dean Winchester #addict!Dean #supernatural #supernatural fanfiction #spn #castiel #sam winchester

[crackinthecup]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

@gardensofthemoon thank you so much for the tag! It was super interesting reading your responses :D <3

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 51

2. What’s your total AO3 word count? 465,678

3. What fandoms do you write for? Bold to assume I write at all I've always mainly just written for the Silm BUT I have recently become obsessed with The Locked Tomb series so miiiiiiight do some writing in that universe. At some point. Maybe.

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Yield to the Moment takes the cake here, which is not surprising given that it's a 300k Angbang modern AU slowburn beast of a fic.

Then we've got Strange New World, set in my Swords 'verse, which takes a look at Melkor and Mairon post-Dagor Dagorath through a mental health-y and relationship/character study lens.

Third up is A bond once called fealty, also in the Swords 'verse.

Then there's The Metal Cage, which is shameless Angbang PWP focused on chastity play.

And finally A quiet sort of introspection, also part of the Swords 'verse, a bit experimental in the sense of taking Melkor's POV in second person.

5. Do you respond to comments? Always! I feel it's only fair if someone's taken the time to share their thoughts with me. Plus it's often such a fun, creative space where you get to bounce around ideas with the commenter.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? Not entirely sure, actually. Don't think I tend to write particularly angsty endings. No Other Choice, maybe? It's about the Fëanorian attack on the Havens and the choice Elwing makes when she jumps into the sea.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? Probably YTTM. I'm pretty pleased with the ending actually; feels like it pulls together a bunch of narrative threads and highlights all the amazing growth the characters have done. Also, it's a wedding at the end of a very long, very bumpy slowburn.

8. Do you get hate on fics? I have, yeah, years and years ago, around an abusive take on Angbang; but generally I find that the Silm fandom is very lovely and very welcoming.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? I do! Quite a lot of it haha. I think, for me, the appeal isn't so much the physical act in and of itself, but what's going on for the characters behind the scenes as it were, emotionally/psychologically. Especially with a ship like Angbang where they spectacularly fail at talking to each other so a lot of juicy unspoken stuff gets acted out through physical intimacy.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written? Nope, never written a crossover, nor do they hold much appeal for me personally.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? I have. Sadly those fics had been written around 2015-16 and I deleted them a few years back at a time when my mental health was... spicy. I couldn't say whether the translations are still out there somewhere.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Yep! YTTM started out as a co-write.

14. What’s your all time favorite ship? Angbang. There's just a lot of layers to their dynamic that scratch an itch in my brain. Power imbalance. Fucked-up-ness. Possessiveness/protectiveness. Worship. Loyalty.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? I've got a WIP from almost ten years ago about Celebrimbor in Gondolin and I'm not sure if the interest/time/motivation is still there for me to ever pick it up again :')

16. What are your writing strengths? Hmm I tend to put a fair amount of thought into characters' emotional experiences and I also enjoy playing around with fun ways to describe things.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? I guess there's a flipside to focusing on emotional experiences in that sometimes I might humanise characters like the Ainur too much and lose some of their eldritchness. I also tend to be quite disorganised with my plotting, and by disorganised I mean that I just sit down and start writing without a plan or outline and sometimes I can end up scrambling to tie everything together and make it make sense and I'm not sure how effective that is. Also also, I don't find endings very easy to come up with.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? Sure, if done purposefully in a way that furthers the plot or tells me something about the characters.

19. First fandom you wrote for? Harry Potter, I think! Those fics are not on the internet anymore and that is probably for the best haha.

20. Favourite fic you’ve written? Ohhh see, I don't actually like my own writing very much (cheers, perfectionism) and I very very rarely re-read it. But I do think some bits in YTTM are fun, and my latest ficcy that I've written (Reason to Try) which is a ficcy of @tarmairons' ficcy kinda shifted something in my brain for the better and I revisit it sometimes on bad mental health days.

Let's see which lovely people to tag: @markedasinfernal, @elevenelvenswords, @undercat-overdog, @lvsifer, @foxindarkness and anyone else who sees this and would like to have a go (if you want to! zero pressure)

#meme things #thank you again for the tag! #this was fun :3

[angelselene]

I just had several Wreckage related thoughts (PTSD tw):

Ed and Roy are casually invited to a neighborhood BBQ, early in their time in the CM world, and they figure it's another phrase for a block party or something.

So, they get there a little early,.and then the dogs and burgers are put on.

Roy pales and his eyes unfocus and he starts to tremble. But he can't move. And he can't see the grill.

And their new neighbors turn to greet them, and *they* freeze, and Ed's like "i'm so sorry we have to go" and Ed drags Roy back to their place.

There are a handful of ways they can go from there, but I'm thinking Ed sticks Roy in the shower, because rain wasn't in Ishval, and even if it was, he's useless in the rain so he couldn't have been... working.

They so not go to bbqs after that.

Relatedly, Roy can't tolerate even the smell of meat for weeks afterwards, and they have to stay indoors for days.

But that's not to mention the fireworks that come that night, after the BBQ.

They... don't do well for quite some time.

(They at least know to expect fireworks on New Year's)

Ooooh, Ed and Roy taking a few days off on either side of July 4th to avoid going outside.

(And then fucking LABOR DAY why are they barbecuing today?!)

(Memorial Day is an issue too, but they miraculously miss it that first year)

Hmmm... I bet Roy can't eat most (maybe any) red meat...

Anywho. Had that thought and needed to share. C:

Okay, I have had this stuck in my inbox for like, almost six months at this point. Not because I didn't like the idea (I love the idea) but because I wanted to write it and surprise people and...

...I have tried. I tried to write it just as a one-off, to celebrate milestones on the series (1,000 public bookmarks, 5,000 kudos, both of which are amazing achievements I'd be happy to celebrate with), tried to write it for 10/3... and it's just... it won't come. I don't know if it's something about this particular emotional beat that I don't feel like I can write (I don't think it's that, because I've written similar to it), or if it's just that I marked the series as Complete and in my brain, the part of it that thought about the Wreckage-verse is just closed, but I've got like... 600 words of them buying their house, and nothing else.

And it is not a good 600 words. It is not a 600 words you'd want to be part of the Wreckage series. Usually, it's a sign I'd take to scrap it and start over, but after a still very recent irl upset, I just don't have the heart to push through and make myself write it. Writing anything right now is hard, and something I just couldn't make work before that upset is, unfortunately, not on the table right now. Sorry, Ryan, I really, really tried.

What I have been considering, if anyone is interested, is posting some of the original runs I did at an FMA/Criminal Minds crossover. I probably mentioned it in comment replies or maybe even in an author's note somewhere, but what became Wreckage is actually my third attempt at a FMA/CM crossover. One of them, I didn't get more than maybe a couple thousand words (I know, I know, only a couple thousand), but one, I got... quite a bit more done, and it's a pretty different angle because it has the BAU ending up in Amestris instead of the other way around.

That version required a lot more plotting, and when I realized that, I scrapped it (you all think I'm kidding when I tell you I hate writing plot), and moved on to a version where Ed and Roy ended up in CM 'verse instead. I have like... 16k of that. It's not all complete scenes, but if people would like, I can post what I have of it.

So... let me know.

#wreckagefic #royed #fma/criminal minds #crossover #angiewrote

[amrv-5]

20 Questions for Fic Authors

HELLO DELLA @fieryphrazes and thank you for the tag, this was fun!!!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

30! quite a number of anonymous 🤨

2. What is your AO3 wordcount?

689,182.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

MASH! experiencing a beejhawk lockdown. for life

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

If I am being fully honest?

- A Be More Chill fic I wrote at age 16 and don’t want to link (<3)

- Somewhere to Get To

- Anonymous Fic

- Anonymous Fic

- Aspirin or Sorrow. But for fics in my fandom with my name on ‘em:

- Somewhere to Get To

- Aspirin or Sorrow

- Crosswalks, Crossroads

- Nothing is Real

- Moved on Memory

5. Do you respond to comments?

I try to!! I was better about it prior to getting back into classes—not had a lot of time to respond thoughtfully lately but know that I DO see comments and love and appreciate everyone who took the time to read a fic of mine!!

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Probably Aspirin or Sorrow, depending on your definition of angst. I think that one’s a happy ending, kind of, but I can also see how it’s not.

7. What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Sailed Calmly On, I think. It’s more explicitly bright than Somewhere to Get To’s end, and (I hope) sort of affirming.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

A few vagueposts. Only maybe twice to my (digital) face! People are usually on the whole pretty nice :)

9. Do you write smut? If so, which kind?

Which kind… not quite sure how to Categorize Them? Anyway the answer is: Yes, absolutely! I guess I’d say the throughline of “kind” is a focus on mutuality, decadence of experience (indulging in a fantasy, in sensation, warmth / luxury / soft treatment), and togetherness heightening relaxation and comfort. Or maybe I have a brand of smut I’m not aware of. I’ll take genre feedback, pls chime in.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest crossover you’ve ever written?

Nope!

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Also no.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Before? No. But…👀 watch this space 🤨

14. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Newt/Hermann pacific rim close to my heart but I think BeejHawk is my forever ship now.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Golden age of radio beejhawk AU…

16. What are your writing strengths?

Maybe drawing out thematic or symbolic resonances? Otherwise I’d say I’m pretty comfortable with thoughts/internal narration (navel gazing?).

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Concision.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

Not good enough yet at another language to feel confident in it myself unless a character’s quoting a text or a few simple phrases I know well, but think it’s great when others do!

19. First fandom you wrote for?

RWBY kind of. Middle school friends would trade notebooks in the lunchroom and write fic of each other’s show OCs.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

Hard to pick. The S2G2 ‘verse is very special to me, and seems the obvious choice, but for one-and-done fav fic? I might go with End of All Octobers, which I’m still pretty happy with over five months later, and find occasionally comforting.

I’m tagging @machihunnicutt @catgrub @catgirladjacent @persianflaw @draftdodgerag @kejfeblintz (if you want!! no pressure :) ) and anybody who sees this and wants to!!!

#tag game #ty della!!! #long post

[tobobby]

music review #1 - the ballad of hollis brown

rating: 10/10 song: the ballad of hollis brown album: the times they are a-changin' (1964) artist: bob dylan

just pre-dating dylan's electric era, this track is haunting and certainly a predecessor to songs like "it's alright ma (i'm only bleeding)". with its repetitive acoustic guitar chords and harrowing lyrics, this song is certainly one of my favourite dylan tracks, and i love it so much that i renamed my socials after the song.

the lyrics tell the story of a man named hollis brown who lives in a broken-down cabin & farm outside of a south dakota town. he has a wife and five children and is incredibly poor & jobless, with no one to help his family out. his family is going hungry & so they scream & cry, but still, hollis brown feels hopeless as he cannot do anything. and so, he uses the last of his money to buy shotgun shels and murders his children and wife and then himself. the song ends with the ominous lyric, "somewheres in the distance there's seven new people born".

first, i'd like to talk about the interesting lyric & rhyming pattern dylan utilises here. it's certainly unique, as it has the pattern of:

line 1 [A] line 2 [B] line 1 [A] line 2 [B] line 3 [C] line 4 [B]

it is quite repetitive, but also very impactful. another interesting aspect of the lyrics is the point of view. very few writings in general are written in second person point of view, and here, this pov is used to make the song all the more visceral. you are hollis brown; you walk the floor and wonder why with every breath you breathe; your wife screams are stabbin' you like the dirty driving rain; your eyes fix on the shotgun that you're holdin' in your hand. this certainly allows for the listener to, at the very least, make more sense of what brown's thought process it is, no matter how fucked up it is. dylan places the listener in the position of brown, and by doing this forces the listener to wonder what they would do in this situation, if they would have any other option.

this technique is certainly effective and although seemingly small is quite important in what makes this such a good song. another detail is the descriptive lyrics, setting, & similes dylan uses. there's a lot of scene-setting, such as the lines "way out in the wilderness a cold coyote calls" and "seven shots ring out like the ocean's pounding roar". it's extremely important to the listener as it helps visualise the setting of the song and understanding exactly how brown feels / what he is experiencing.

one of my favourite lyrics of the song has to be the line:

you walk the floor and wonder why with every breath you breathe.

there are SO many interpretations to this line. brown could be wondering why his life is so terrible, why he's stuck in this cycle of poverty. this could also take to mean that he's wondering why he's even alive (explained more in this genius lyric annotation), hinting at his suicidal tendencies early on in the song. or, it could be about his baby, as the line before this mentions his baby tugging at his sleeve. maybe he's curious as to what the baby wants from him, after he's tried everything he can. and again, this line (like most of the song) is written in second person, meaning you're placed in the shoes of brown, left to decide for yourself.

another one of my favourite verses is:

your brain is a-bleedin’ and your legs can’t seem to stand your eyes fix on the shotgun that you’re holdin’ in your hand

i love this lyric because it's so explicit. the bleeding - metaphorical at this point, but affecting brown physically; the shotgun in brown's hand, the final moments before he murders his family. dylan slowly hints at this moment the entire song making this climax incredibly effective. i just adore the uneasiness of it all.

finally, the last lines of the song (likely the most important, summing up the moral) is ambiguous and fascinating.

there’s seven people dead on a south dakota farm somewhere in the distance there’s seven new people born

that last line. "there's seven new people born". again, this can be taken to mean multiple things; is he referring to the fleeting nature of human existence, how easy it is to murder seven human beings and them being replaced immediately? is he referring to the cycle of poverty, that these seven new people will also be born into poverty and repeat brown's cycle? that it's easier to replace seven people than it is to keep them from dying?

many questions arise when listening to this song, and rightfully so. this song makes me think a lot, and i love it. it's an incredibly underrated track and i hope you all listen to it and love it as much as i do.

#iris reviews #iris' picks #music review #music reviews #ballad of hollis brown #the ballad of hollis brown #bob dylan #song review #music #song reviews #album #albums #bob dylan review #60s music #the times they are a changin'

[samwpmarleau]

fic snippet: as foam upon the sea

meant for @fleurdelouvemonth but regrettably i don’t expect that the full fic will be done within the next two days and i’m already over a week behind the mermaid au prompt day this was supposed to be for (although elements of it apply to the days this week heyo), so i’m posting a piece from the middle of it to show that i participated. i haven’t written for either of these characters before so i really hope this isn’t trash, and if you notice logistical or geographical tomfoolery no you don’t

So abruptly she nearly knocks her head into his, Barnes stops. He searches the horizon — for what, she doesn’t know — his eyes narrowing beneath a growing frown. She treads water beside him, attempting to sense what he apparently does, but all she sees is what she doesn’t see. Just gently rippling blackness meeting an equally black sky broken up only by the pinpricks of starlight and the crescent moon high above.

“What is it?” she whispers.

He had said his arm could sense electro-whatever; maybe that’s happening now, maybe there’s a shark headed their way or something. Though, she doesn’t think Barnes would be quite so on edge if it were as mundane a thing as a shark. And that’s assuming a shark would even bother with them when it could have a much easier time finding different prey.

“I don’t know,” he murmurs. With a quiet shink, he withdraws a knife and hands it to her, then reaches for the boltgun strapped across his back.

She has about a dozen questions, but the tension and alertness rolling off him in waves keeps her from voicing any of them. She nervously adjusts and readjusts her grip on the knife, thoroughly unused to wielding such a utensil for any purpose besides cutting nets, cooking, or opening boxes.

Out of nowhere, Barnes snaps his head towards a specific point, no longer having a vague sense of danger. He shoves her roughly behind him, but not soon enough, and Sarah cries out as she feels a searing pain in her side. There’s still nothing above water that she can see; the shot had come from somewhere beneath. She feels another projectile whiz by, but it ricochets off Barnes’s metal arm before it can reach her. Which is where her perception of anything beneath her stops, for Barnes ducks beneath the water. There is nowhere nearby to retreat to, not even a piece of driftwood to use as a meager defense. All Sarah can do is float where she is, not draw further attention to herself, and try not to think about how much she’s bleeding from whatever laceration had been made.

She can’t tell whether it’s a minute or an hour that passes without a single indication of Barnes returning, which brings an entirely new fear to mind: whether he will return, and what it would mean for her if he doesn’t. If he’s been shot, if he’s been killed, if he’s been captured, at best she’ll be stranded in the middle of the ocean with an inventory of a single knife. Worse, HYDRA — and it must be them, of that she has no doubt — will kill her, too.

“You’re gonna be fine,” she tells herself, as if saying it aloud will make it true. “Everything is gonna be fine. This is just your typical aquatic assassination attempt, no problem.”

While it doesn’t lessen her pessimism much, it does at least help keep her focused on something other than sheer fear. She knows all too well how paralyzing fear can be, and that is the last thing she needs right now.

Shutting her eyes, she starts to hum a lullaby Titi used to sing. She can’t remember the words anymore, but she remembers the tune.

She gets a few verses in when she jerks back with a shriek, brandishing her knife at the movement she feels by her feet.

“Watch it!” hisses the movement, whose voice she identifies as Barnes. Wisely, he plucks the knife from her hand and returns it to its sheath.

“What happened?” she asks, hit with a waterfall of relief. She wishes she could see more than vague silhouettes. “That was HYDRA?”

“Yeah,” Barnes says, “They must’ve used some kind of heat signature tracking. Or maybe they caught sight of me back at the beach and dispatched divers to the area they thought I’d go. I don’t think they know exactly where, or they’d have sent more than a few guys armed with spearguns.”

That had to have been what she was grazed with, then, a speargun arrow. She can’t say she’s ever had that before, though she knows it happens back home every now and then, usually to stupid kids not paying attention to what they’re doing.

Of course, she’s fairly certain none of those stupid kids were shot by HYDRA spearguns. She gets the dubious honor of being the first.

“So what now? Are there going to be more where they came from? Do they have beacons or something they could’ve activated?”

“Likely,” Barnes says. He refastens her rope to himself. “We have to go. Once HYDRA notices their divers aren’t moving from this spot, they’ll come. With reinforcements.”

Great.

“So how are we supposed to get out of here?”

“I’ll have to dive.”

“Not all of us can hold their breath for as long as you can. How do you expect me to —”

“I don’t have time to explain.”

“Explain what?”

Barnes answers by cupping her face in his hands and kissing her full on the mouth. Before she can ask him what the hell he thinks he’s doing or push him off her, she feels an odd, though not unpleasant, tingling in her lips. A warm burn slides its way into her lungs, as though she’s taken a swig from high-shelf whiskey.

The burn lingers as Barnes drags her beneath the surface of the water. Only then does he pull away, leaving her to panic at the sensation of having no air left in her lungs. That is, until she realizes that she doesn’t need to breathe. As Barnes swims away, the rope connecting them keeping her at pace, Sarah does her best to get her bearings.

Regrettably, for all that she seems to have temporarily acquired Barnes’s breathing ability, that hasn’t affected her eyesight or cognitive processing — she can make out some shapes, but for the most part everything they pass is a complete blur.

Once she gets over the novelty of the breathing part, the unnerving part of being along for the ride settles in. She hadn’t thought much about mermaid locomotion, but if she had, she doesn’t think she’d have banked on them being able to swim this fast. Not that she has a speedometer, but she’s sat seatbelt-less in the bed of a truck barreling down the freeway plenty of times, and this feels much the same. Only more wet. Needless to say, she grips the harness like her life depends on it — which, really, it does.

She also wishes that that kiss — or whatever it was — from Barnes helped with temperature as well, for while it doesn’t seem like they’re going deeper anymore, she’s fucking cold. Solely the fear of being tracked by an evil organization keeps her from tapping Barnes on the shoulder and asking if they could possibly swim a few dozen meters higher.

She puts up with it, knowing the alternative is tempting lethal fate. After a while, she nearly manages to fall asleep, such is her adrenaline crash and the steady fluidity of Barnes’s movements. She’s groggy when finally they stop, some sort of partially enclosed outcrop whose features she can just make out in the burgeoning sunrise. Barnes sets her on the rock and triple-checks both the entrance and surroundings.

Unfortunately, she discovers, the end feels much like the beginning, complete with the sensation of having no air even though now there is plenty of it. Is it possible to suffocate when there’s air to be had? Did Barnes merely delay her death sentence?

Apparently hearing her distress, he approaches with mild concern in his expression amongst the usual cagey neutrality, but his voice is calm as he instructs, “Force it. The air, you have to force it.”

The thought feels impossible. “I — can’t —”

“You can.” He places his hands lightly on her shoulders. “Breathe, Sarah.”

It’s the first time he’s said her name, she realizes, which all by itself is nearly enough to startle her out of her predicament. The touching takes care of the rest; up until now, their only contact has been of necessity, not comfort or even friendliness.

It’s a shaky breath that she draws into her lungs but a breath nonetheless, and once she’s done it, she gulps down as much as she possibly can. The pain in her chest slowly dissipates.

“Are you okay?” Barnes asks.

“Yeah I — I think so. Did you know it was that awful to come out of it?”

“No. I’ve never been around for that part.”

Now that she no longer is suffocating and they’re out of imminent danger, she wonders about the mechanics of the whole thing. “How’d you do it?”

“Something to do with the regenerative properties of the serum, it slows hypoxia. That’s what I was told, anyway.”

“Then why did it feel like I couldn’t breathe?”

“Because,” he says, “if you hold it too long, your body wants to keep the air it has left. It doesn’t realize it doesn’t have to until you force it.”

“That was too long?” she asks. “How long did we swim?”

“Bit over two hours, I think.”

“Two —”

He’d told her he could dive for an hour and a half, two hours maybe. And while with his enhanced strength she must not weigh much, she still weighs something. She takes stock of him, seeing only now that he looks exhausted, his own breath coming in heavier than normal. Never mind the exertion from fighting the combatants and what looks like a nasty gash over his eye dripping blood down the side of his face. He doesn’t appear bothered by it, but she’s been around him enough by this point to know he’s not the kind of person to admit to injury. Who knows what else he might’ve sustained?

Ultimately, she supposes the specifics of it all don’t matter and, frankly, she doesn’t have the patience for any more of a science lesson at the moment. Barnes himself may not even know the full scope. Really, she should celebrate the fact that he’s spoken more to her in the last two minutes than he has the last few days combined.

“So, how’d you figure it out, this breath-sharing thing?” she asks instead. “Got a history of saving damsels in distress, do you?”

She’d meant it as a joke, but a shadow passes over Barnes’s face. “No.”

“Then how —”

“Let me see where you were hit,” he interrupts. “You’re bleeding pretty badly.”

She looks down to see a wide bloom of red is indeed staining her shirt. The pain has become more of a throbbing nuisance than the acute sharpness it was before, though she’s not sure whether that’s a good or bad thing.

Sarah lifts up the hem of her shirt, and immediately wishes she hadn’t. It looks much worse than she thought it would. It still counts as a graze, she’d say, in the grand scheme of things, but an inch further and she’d have a hole straight through her abdomen.

“Seawater is healing,” she says with feeble confidence. It is, but she’s fairly certain this is too big of a wound for that to apply to.

“Stay here,” Barnes directs. “I’ll be back soon.”

He’s gone before she can ask where he’s going, disappearing under the water as quietly as always. She lets out a sigh. One of these days she’s going to make him give her an explanation before darting off.

#the full fic is approaching 20K so there's that #my google search history is very very strange let me tell you #spoiler alert: she does get to call him bucky eventually #she's just currently in the 'we haven't yet had a Moment after which i tell you my Designated Friend nickname' category atm #sarah wilson #bucky barnes #sarahbucky #buckysarah #fleurdelouve month #marvel fic #(no idea if that's even the tag) #my fic #bucky x sarah

[gtunesmiff]

What is the single biggest mistake writers make?

They're ants when they should be spiders.

Let me explain... Here's how most people approach writing a song:

They write on a section;

Once they're happy with it, they move on to the next one;

They continue in this way until all sections are written

I call this the "ant approach", because it follows a clear path from A to B. You start somewhere, and you finish one thing after the other until you end up somewhere.

t seems plausible. We like clear-cut processes like this. There's something soothing in formulas like this.

Here's the problem: this process doesn't work

(or at least it makes your life a lot harder than it needs to be)

Why? Let me explain it from the lyrics perspective (most writers have an easier time seeing the issue here).

For decades, here's how I used to write my lyrics:

Verse I: I got this! Man, some of these lines sound so cool!

Pre-Chorus: Starting to run out of ideas here... I guess I'll have to lower my standards somewhat.

Chorus: Right, chorus time. Time for a summary of everything I already wrote... well, if I'm honest, I don't quite know what it means myself...

Verse II: Ugh, I hate this! Why does lyric writing have to be so hard? What haven't I said yet? And what else rhymes with "broken"? I wonder what ChatGPT would make of this.

Chorus: Gosh, this makes even less sense now, but I'm so used to this chorus that I don't want to change it anymore.

Bridge: Maybe I'll just do a "who-oh" type section or repeat the same phrase over and over.

Chorus: Please don't ask me what my song is about, because it has so many layers that even I don't know (and honestly, maybe it's about nothing).

Recognizable?

Well, this happens in music, too, it's just that most writers don't recognize it there (probably because they don't know it any other way).

What's the alternative?

I present: The Spider process.

Consider the spider web:

We don't care where the spider began crafting it.

We don't care that it didn't look like a web for the first few hours.

We don't even care that the spider had to undo some of its work.

All that matters is that all the right connections were made at some point during the process and that the spider ended up with a great, working web.

The Spider Process doesn't work from A to B like the ant, it starts with a rough version and iterates on it over many drafts.

(And if you're not slapping your forehead yelling "of course!" right now, let me elaborate because this makes a MASSIVE, MASSIVE difference.)

Instead of fabricating your song as you go (which makes it easy to lose focus, lyrically and musically), you start with a rough draft.

Your goal is NOT to write and finish a section - it's to write the ENTIRE song, and quickly.

And if you think your song's not going to be good at that point: You're right! Your first draft is going to suck!

But that's the beauty of it: You can write something that sucks! And you know how to make something terrible better.

Think about it, what's more fun, what's easier: writing perfectionism... or making something bad a little better?

The Ant Process sets you up for failure because every single thing you write needs to be great. You don't move on until your section (your line, your sound) is perfect.

The Spider Process on the other hand sets you up for success because with your first draft, you're not trying to change the world. You're just trying to write something. You're having fun, you're fooling around.

The quality comes from rewriting your draft and iterating on your ideas. You're approaching perfection step by step instead of having to write something perfect right off the bat!

So when I write lyrics now, I don't write them from start to finish and line by line, I write a few words here, a few words there. A little for the verse, a little for the chorus, get an idea for the pre-chorus, then jump to the bridge, and so on... that's how a spider works: little by little, weaving that web, until it all comes together.

Here's another way to look at it that might help:

Don't think of your song as a blank page or a void where you have to create everything from scratch. Not only is it unhelpful, it's also not true.

Instead, think of writing as shaping a statue out of a giant block of marble. As Michelangelo said: “The sculpture is already complete within the marble block before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.”

Fun fact: the word decide comes from latin "decidere", literally "to cut off". By writing down a line, by recording a riff, by picking a chord progression, you're getting rid of everything your song is NOT. You're cutting off your options. You're not "creating", you're deciding what your song is.

This is one of several basic principles that have shaped the process I use now, what I call the 24-Hour Song. I wrote my last album of 15 songs in 14 days (6 hour days), and it's the best music I've ever written. I wouldn't have been able to do that a few years ago (it used to take me MONTHS to finish a song).

If you want to be able to do this, too (maybe you're a dad like me or you have a full time job on the side), keep reading my emails. I'll show you how you can write your best songs at record speed, too.

Stay gefährlich,

Friedemann

Holistic Songwriting

[envihellbender]

Hunt!Sebastian paying John a visit

Characters: Sebastian Moran, John Sims

Verse: The Magnus Archives, TMA AU of Sebastian Moran / Moriarty (MorMor)

[CLICK]

THE ARCHIVIST

[HE SOUNDS A LITTLE SHAKEN, AS IF HE IS PACING UP AND DOWN AS HE IS TALKING.]

I found a tape on my desk. I have checked and double checked with security and with the CCTV coming into the building and everyone coming in or out of the building is accounted for. Was it posted here? It wasn’t in an envelope or anything. Maybe Ma- someone thought they were being helpful. But he- they wouldn’t open my mail, would they? Anyway. Here it is. Statement of Sebastian Moran. Regarding how he met James Moriarty.

[CLICK]

SEBASTIAN MORAN

I found one of your little tape recorders, Archivist, so thought I’d give you something to listen to. You know me. Basher Moran. Moriarty’s Tiger. The most feared sniper in Europe. Prince of London’s Underworld. That one is weird I think, if Moriarty’s the king, that would make me his son? Anyway. Yeah. It’s me, and I hear you’ve been tracking down me and Jimmy, listening to all our victim’s statements and all that. So I thought I’d give you something straight from the tiger’s mouth. There have been quite a few stories about how I met my Jimmy. Urban legends really. Is this one of them or is this a lie just to get under your skin? Only you’ll be able to tell, right Archivist?

Let’s quickly skip through the really boring stuff. Yeah, yeah, son of Augustus Moran and a servant he knocked up in his house in India. He actually had quite a few bastards you know, for some reason he took a shine to me and that’s not the compliment you think it is. He was a faggot, pretended not to be, and whether I killed the fat cunt or not is a little secret you already know the answer to, Archivist. Anyway, I’m the best shot you’ll ever find. Spent most of my teens at a shooting range and didn’t get sped through the army ranks cause of my surname. When your as brown as me and your dad dun’t wanna talk about you a name as common as Moran don’t help. So. I get quietly discharged cause if a nasty event that don’t have anything to do with this story, but you need to picture me as being out Army in my twenties and making a comfortable living selling my services. With a gun, by the way, not my dick sucking lips.

The thing about sniping, is it’s mostly waiting. You set yourself up somewhere high up and out of sight, if you’re good at it you can be low down and no one will find you. Sometimes it’s just you, snacks, drinks, your headphones, and that spare empty bottle you brought to piss in. Audiobooks are great for that. I got through all Chuck Palahniuk’s stories that way. Anyway. Got distracted. So. Most people assume Jimmy hired me, and nah, course he didn’t. He doesn’t do anything like a normal person. First, it was messages in my phone. A text message from a number that didn’t exist and any time I tried to call it instead all I got was a loud screeching noise. The text itself was just a set of coordinates and a time. I decided to ignore it, and five minutes after the deadline, I got left a voicemail without my phone ever had been rung. Weirdest thing about that? It was my voice.

Yeah. Apparently I had rang myself and left a message threatening me about what I would do to my eyeballs if I didn’t pay attention to the next text message. So that was fucking weird. But message received. The next time I got some coordinates I went straight there. First ones led me to a tube station. And when I looked at the train times screen, there was a message for me instead. No one else seemed to see it. But I swear to God it said “Moran. Go to the payphone I’ve marked.” Which is fucking annoying. God damn treasure trail without the treasure. Anyway, so I found it, and clever fuck had written “hi” with a heart drawn on it. Fucking fag. So when I got to it, it started ringing. I answered it and this soft lilting voice was in the other end.

He gave me a job. A good job. With a lot of money. And I said yeah, even though I asked why he didn’t just tell me instead that of playing some stupid game. He giggled and said it was fun. Now I get it. That’s just how he works. When you’re running around anxious and confused he’s feeding off you. That’s just a small way he gets a quick snack. So we went on like this for a while, giving me job after job. I got a bit sick of it, and whilst yeah the Web is really fucking powerful. But. Well, I’m the Hunt. And finding shit is what I do.

So I laid low for a while and between and during jobs I started tracking down my Jimmy. He knew, kept making jokes about how close I was. Maybe he thought I wouldn’t make it to him, maybe he wanted me to, or maybe he didn’t care. Honestly, Jimmy might not even know. Maybe he didn’t think about it. But. Eventually I found myself just outside of this big fancy flat building. One of the types in zone one where the front is fancy as fuck and the back is meeting the quota for affordable housing. I don’t care, if they live in the shithole they can’t pay me. I took the lift up to the top floor. The huge, massive, modern screen door greeted me when I got out. He has a penthouse you see, and the dramatic fuck has a spider web pattern all over it.

I was planning on being subtle, but the moment I got to the top floor, I heard a lilting giggle. I looked up to see a camera pointed directly at me. He didn’t say a word, just ended up with a click to show the door was open. I walked in. His house is pretty great but I’m not gonna tell you shit that might lead you to him. You know what’s funny? I hate spiders. I hate them. I hate them so much of course I noticed their was a lot hanging around my flat since this started. But I didn’t think they had anything to do with Jimmy. His penthouse though? Let’s just say he’s gone all out on the theme.

Anyway. I mostly came here to kill time because gotta shoot one of your librarians. Just some dickhead who stuck his nose where he shouldn’t. By the time you hear this, you might wanna make sure someone goes up to clean up. I knew this would be a great way to distract you. Once the statement started you wouldn’t be able to put it down. Hope you enjoyed my story, mate. There’s plenty more where that came from. My Jimmy? He’ll be in touch.

THE ARCHIVIST

[CLICK. HE SIGHS.]

Statement ends. Carson Throw was found with a very clean gunshot wound through his temples. The bullet was found lodged into a book about spider webs. Hardly subtle. There wasn’t much of a mess. Carson was very wrapped up in jobs for James Moriarty, nothing special just owed him a lot of money from card games and he was slowly trying to work off. It seems Carson tried to get out before his debt had been paid. As for what Moran and Moriarty want with me… Only time will tell.

[CLICK.]

#envi writes #the Magnus archives #tma au #Sebastian Moran #John sims

[scereplop]

sonnet 60, William Shakespeare

Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore, So do our minutes hasten to their end; Each changing place with that which goes before, In sequent toil all forwards do contend. Nativity, once in the main of light, Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crown’d, Crooked eclipses ‘gainst his glory fight And time that gave, doth now his gift confound. Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth, And delves the parallels in beauty’s brow, Feeds on the rarities of nature’s truths And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow. And yet to time in hope, my verse shall stand Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

One night around a week ago I stayed up till a little past 1 in the morning to memorise this sonnet. I always end up doing something along the lines of this, with some piece of work my brain won't let me stop thinking of, before a language exam of any sorts, and for some (strange, maybe) reason it works wonders each time. Maybe some of my teachers don't believe so, but what matters the most to me is how happy I am with my work. I know to an extent what I am capable of if I be honest with myself, and the way in which I often write my essays can be quite unconventional (and it gets me in trouble loads), so I don't take their words as gospel.

Of the few sonnets that Shakespeare wrote that I managed to read that night, this I would say is probably my favourite. I still have shy of a hundred left to go and my opinion is swayed easily so I don't believe it will remain so for long. But whilst it is, I'd like to relive the world I built around this sonnet during that exam, I'd like to write down what I created as something I can keep; something I can share. It is impossible to rewrite exactly what I had that day, given it has already been almost four days since, and my memory, though not half bad most definitely does not have the capacity to remember a story written in a flurry of ideas though it was I who wielded the pen. But it was I who wielded the pen, and it was I who saw the house the tale took place in, and it was I who lived it through in my mind. So then I am perfectly capable of rebuilding it, flaws and all, and so I will.

Maybe not now though, for there is much of it to speak of and it will take a long time to write it all out with the level of detail I require, and time I do not have at the moment. But I will, eventually. Thankfully stories are timeless and when I do have time for it (in a few days I assume), it will be done. For now I shall only name it, so I can keep this outline as organised as possible with the aid of a tag, but nice names are difficult to come up with. How do I name the road down which a house sat, a house beside the seashore with innards familiar to me, which housed people with familiar faces but not behaviour? I do not truly know this place yet though it feels like I do. I know it, somewhere within me.

I shall give it a codename instead, until I can truly decide. I do know that in my original essay, as I had written it as if I had tried to bring the sonnet to life, I described that road and that house and that seashore as a place 'where time stayed his scythe', and so that it shall remain.

#23rd october 2023 #where time stayed his scythe #its a bit long #i dont know if itll stick honestly #i dont care if it sounds cringe to anyone #cringe culture is dead #be free #do what you like #im happy and if youre happy then thats just swell #lets be happy togther #i have some major exams soon and im very afraid #but #life's too nice to be all worried all the time #right #i wish i could visit that house #really need time to stay his scythe #the clock is ruling me

[nocompromise-noregrets]

Writers' Month 2022 Masterpost

Here's everything I've written and posted for @writersmonth 2022! Big thank you as always to the mods, and to everyone who prompted me when I ran out of ideas! I've had a brilliant time, and have posted 19556 words in 31 stories as follows:

1 promise - I Promise - Tolkien, Elladan and Elrohir and the five promises they make each other over time (or maybe it's just one promise)

2. chance - Only By Chance - for @allegoriesinmediasres and @mihrsuri and set in mihrsuri's Tudors OT3-'verse, the archivist at Welles Hall makes an unsettling discovery about Lord Norwich and Thomas Cromwell

3. gold - No More Need For Gold - Tolkien, none of the Fellowship can quite stomach the idea of gold jewellery, after everything is over

4. melody - if your heart surrenders (you'll need me to hold) - Tolkien (my All I Want Is You modern AU), Thranduil catches Bard singing

5. heart - The Wave That Came Has Broken - Tolkien (My Heart Is An Empty Vessel-'verse), Thranduil thinks of how his heart was empty, once

6. popular - Observation - Top Gun: Maverick, Bob watches his new team-mates at the Hard Deck, quietly figuring out the dynamics between them, until he's sucked into the fray

7. flag - No Harm - for @lemurious, Tolkien, while scouting in Mordor after the end of the War of the Ring, Elladan and Elrohir have an encounter that makes them begin to think very hard about how they've spent the last few centuries

8. heat - Better Together - Tolkien (All I Want Is You-'verse), Sigrid and Tauriel take advantage of the unseasonably warm weather in the first few weeks of lockdown, and take themselves off for an afternoon by the lake in the gardens of Greenwood Hall

9. echo - A Presence On The Wind - for @lemurious, Tolkien (My Heart Is An Empty Vessel-'verse), Sigrid thinks about the echo of all her ancestors who lived here in Dale, and closer to home, her Mam

10. kiss - Metallic Red - for @allegoriesinmediasres and @scary-grace, Tolkien (scary-grace's seeking a friend for the end of the world modern AU-'verse), in a ruined, deserted mall somewhere east of Wyoming, Bard discovers that Thranduil is perfectly capable of walking in (very) high heels

11. swim - Unstoppable - Top Gun: Maverick, after the beach football game, Halo and Phoenix go for a swim and get to know each other a bit more

12. leak and roommates - Clockwise To Tighten - Tolkien (All I Want Is You-'verse), the kitchen tap is leaking in Sigrid and Tauriel's student flat. Sigrid isn't sure what to do, but Tauriel knows exactly what needs doing

13. knot - Until The End Of The World - Tolkien (My Heart Is An Empty Vessel-'verse), for a long time after he is alone again, Thranduil keeps the strip of leather Bard gave him on his first visit to the Woodland Realm tied around his wrist

14. wild and on a ship - Untrammelled - Tolkien, Elladan and Elrohir have always been wild

15. comfort - Between Breakfast and Second Breakfast - Tolkien, Legolas and Pippin talk a little about their fears during the Quest, and their relief now that it is over

16. shadows and ancient times - Lengthening Shadows - King Arthur (2004), the shadows are lengthening and the summer is sliding into autumn, but Gawain has Galahad to keep him on an even keel

17. ice and a tale told through generations - Abyss - Tolkien, the tales of ice and fire in their family's history have echoed down the generations, and perhaps they have shaped the twins' lives more than they have realised

18. bridge and secret garden - A Shimmer in the Air - Tolkien (My Heart Is An Empty Vessel-'verse), Tilda and Sam, exploring the gardens of Tirion, discover a secret garden across a bridge in a meadow

19. bubble and single parents - Here We Are - Tolkien (my a kiss in the cold and dark modern AU-'verse), a brief, quiet moment in Trafalgar Square, eight months or so after Bard and Thranduil found each other again

20. jealous - Self-Possessed - for @allegoriesinmediasres, @scary-grace, @verecunda and @palavapeite, Tolkien (a kiss in the cold and dark-'verse), Bard and Thranduil, just talking things over in Thranduil's incredibly nice back garden

21. pain and lost heir - Inheritance - Tolkien, briefly separated from their hunting companions, Legolas and Estel talk about what it means to be heir to a throne

22. forest - Deep In The Greenwood - Tolkien (My Heart Is An Empty Vessel-'verse), Bard is beginning a new life for the second time

23. it was all a dream - Vortex - Sandman, Barbie wakes up

24. bow - Renowned - for Reedemer46 on AO3, Tolkien, (All I Want Is You-'verse), The kids discover a longbow in the cellar of Greenwood Hall

25. lips - Deep Pink - for @scary-grace, Tolkien (her seeking a friend for the end of the world modern AU-'verse), in an abandoned motel, Thranduil tries on lipstick for the first time in a very long time

26. scream - Banana Split - for @starlightswitch, my original Two of a Kind-'verse, Jack is having a hell of a time with the tax service, and Natalie has a great idea to cheer him up

27. silk - Do You See Me? - for @palavapeite, Our Flag Means Death, Ed thought that letting the red silk go meant letting the pain go, but it didn't quite work out like that

28. sugar - Seven Sugars In His Tea - for @palavapeite, Our Flag Means Death, Ed takes seven sugars in his tea, Stede thinks as he rows across the sea, off to find his destiny once again

29. bond - Knock 'Em Dead - Top Gun: Maverick, Halo gives Phoenix a pep talk on the carrier deck

30. loud - Time To Let Go - for anon here on tumblr, Top Gun: Maverick, it's pretty raucous in the Hard Deck, the night the Dagger Squadron get back

31. rainbow - A New Beginning - Tolkien (My Heart Is An Empty Vessel-'verse), the morning after Bard and Thranduil's arrival in the Woodland Realm, a rainbow appears, arching over the forest from the Long Lake to the Lonely Mountain

Thank you again to all prompters, commenters and kudos-ers, I couldn't have done it without you! Next from me: a fic for Tolkien Reverse Summer Bang, revealed on 9 September!

*falls over*

#long post #my writing #writersmonth2022 #bard #thranduil #barduil #bard/thranduil #sigrid/tauriel #sigrid #tauriel #tilda #sam gamgee #yavanna #elladan #elrohir #halo #phoenix #bob #top gun: maverick #the hobbit #lord of the rings #king arthur (2004) #gawain/galahad #gawain #galahad #our flag means death #blackbeard #stede bonnet #ed/stede #sandman

[damoselcastel]

2022 Author’s Notes

 A yearly-sum-up of my personal thoughts for my written works in 2022 (ones with chapters updates count too), my own personal tradition. All of the fic I listed can be found on my AO3.

JANUARY Red Courage - a FE3H Claude/Edelgard AU fic My 2021 Nagamas gift fic, basically grabbing all the ideas I had for this ship pre-release but then had abandoned after playing the game (and seeing how non-interactive the lords are towards each other). These two getting married would be quite the political power couple, but I admit within this fic I also was explore a no-TWSitD AU focused on how 3H’s plot could’ve happened anyway, with just human greed...and well, Adrestia’s gross patriarchy. I’m rather pleased with the result and even and am casually working on a sidequel that follows what Dimitri and Dedue’s time in Alymra was like.

FEBRUARY

Human, Weapon - a FE14 Beruka backstory fic Written for the Les Revanants horror zine, one of my first outright horror attempts, Beruka’s past provided some good fodder to explore. I feel like FE has a lot of solid examples of disquieting ex-child-soldiers, usually children forced to act as assassins, ect, and it obviously having lost lasting negative impacts of their personal growth and expressiveness. Beruka is one, though her backstory is only hinted at in supports- we know she killed the master who’d trained her.

APRIL Chains We Forge - a FE14 post-Conquest bad end AU The hostage fic I wrote inspired by @flutterbatwrites‘ Bad End AU for Conquest in particular. The too long awaited update, wherein dad-tyrant!Xander makes his appearance. I had a LOT of fun depicting all the fankid princes and how they might get make mischief. Still a last update to make, I promise I will and hopefully soon-ish.

MAY Enlèvement - a FE3H Dimitri/Annette fic Ship fic cowritten with @mrmissmrsrandom, this verse spun out of  Fleckerl‘s continuity and we’ve got a whole bunch of ideas. This one’s mostly cutesy speculation on how Dimitri and the Annette’s crushes on each other might’ve gone.

Kitchen Box Step - a FE3H Dedue/Mercedes fic Cowritten with @mrmissmrsrandom with more speculation on post-war politics within a Dimitri ruled Faerghus- but this time with fankids! And not just Duecedes kiddos, but also some royal bastards left behind by Rufus (in our party-prince headcanon, cooked up before Hopes shattered these dreams). All the characters we’ll be feature more of in this verse, which is just very fun to sandbox in.

JUNE Hunger Pangs - a FE16 ABO childhood fic Prequel to Sense of Taste, where it’s mostly the Faerghus four being cute kids and sfw. I’ve notice the trope very rarely ever deals with questions of like, what it’s like pre-puberty with all that presentation weirdness. And then I’m once again wasting Faerghus headcanons by sticking it somewhere no one will read them. I think there’ll only be 3 more chapters, though I have more ideas for the verse- like Dedue’s claiming and a SoT sequel.

NOVEMBER Course de Danse - a FE3H Dimitri/Annette academy fic All our academy-set ideas for this ship, this collection will be pretty solidly G rated as a rule...aside from maybe an off-color joke or insinuation or two. As much as I don’t personally like Byleth-as-teacher or school as an FE game focus, it is fun imagining all the Fodlan kids interacting as students. Also co-authored with @mrmissmrsrandom

DECEMBER

Quartet’s Common Time - a FE3H Annie/Mercie/Dedue/Dimitri fic

This is the big polyam smutfic, with a very small nod to Faerghus politics. The first couple chapters will have more f/f and m/m action, but there will be a sweaty pile on. I suppose for any interested, look forward to when @mrmissmrsrandom and I post more next year!

Ongoing IRL stuff from last year INTENSIFIED this year, which REALLY threw off personal project free time. But with @mrmissmrsrandom‘s cooperation, we got a lot of fic we’d had on the shelf posted. Although with Engage right around the bend, don’t think we’ll get all out FE3H ideas up before that next FE entry is out. Silver lining, maybe the Fodlan fandom can chill out :v

#fanfiction #fire emblem #writing #for a year #2022 #author's notes #my fic #meme

[emcads]

/ahem/ Single: How would your muse feel about being a single parent? Would they be able to take care of a child on their own? How would that work?

STARTING A FAMILY   /    accepting !

wow i wonder what inspired this ask :^)   so, maybe surprisingly to some folks given all i’ve written about how she wouldn’t want a pregnancy unless she was in a stable partnership,  esmeralda actually quite likes being a single parent and isn’t opposed to the idea at all.  if she conceived a child by accident with jack or someone like him, being a single parent would actually be her first choice ; she would much much rather do it on her own than waste time and energy fighting for him to stay,  and constantly worrying about him abandoning them,  and,  really,  mothering him  alongside the child.  now, esmeralda being a single mom does impose some dangers,  since she would by necessity  have to raise them on a pirate ship while she remained captain  ––  that’s the only profession she knows,  and there’s not much employment opportunity for women ashore other than marriage.  but  this comes with some advantages as well, since they would be raised with the entire community of her crew as uncles,  and they would essentially learn their way into a trade just like a midshipman would. having a child aboard might actually make it easier for venganza to masquerade as a passenger ship and reduce the danger of battle so that they can take a ship by surprise,  or to gain access to otherwise hostile harbors.

now, if it was something she was setting out to do, like favor verse, she wouldn’t really want to conceive until she was more or less ready to retire from active piracy to somewhere quieter.  I don’t think this would mean she would lose all contact with her crew –– she would probably hold onto her brethren title, and if the crew agreed to it, receive a portion of prizes as a kind of pension.  perhaps in return for small services, like gathering intel, or as a kind of disability insurance –– pregnancy and childbearing is a uniquely feminine burden, so i don’t know that it would be written into the articles, but it would hinder her ability for service just like losing a leg or an eye would, so i don’t see why they wouldn’t extend the same worker protections to her. on top of their familial affection for esmeralda and the child, of course.  Luis, in particular, takes on a kind of fatherly role towards Esmeralda, so i think he would feel a special responsibility towards her and her child, and remain an advocate for her wellbeing.

all this to say,  she wouldn’t ever be raising them on her own  at all,  really,  just without a romantic partner to share the responsibility 50/50.  she would rely on her crew, and Luis ; if they weren’t an option,  she would turn to friends like Marie who are already raising families and would be able to lend her a helping hand;  working the Seymour tavern is something Esme could certainly do and wouldn’t be opposed to.  she’d do whatever necessary to ensure the child’s future and well-being at the end of the day,  and it just depends if that’s remaining in piracy, or retiring,  or becoming a tavern wench.

#tw childbirth #tw pregnancy #collectorofmuses #✘; LETTERS ( answered ) #✘; LOOSE，CATCH THE WIND ( meme response ) #✘; IN A WORLD WITHOUT GOLD，WE MIGHT HAVE BEEN HEROES ( headcanon ) #*clenches fist* i love communities raising children. i love alternatives to the nuclear family.

[vision-bound-muse]

Wanderer Head Canons and yet another long-winded fixing of a catastrophe I have been ignoring. Welcome to my content warnings, these are written in their headspace. Language… will be awful. My characters are rarely as watered down as hoyo makes them and this boy is a damn nightmare. Read at your own risk.

Moving forward I am going to be hyper selective here because I just don’t have it in me to watch him destroy other characters without explicit permission. Kaz aside, that is what he is going to do. With that being said the shit show is as follows:

First, this dick, not a puppet no ball joints or any of the other fantastical things that are applied to him. He exists somewhere between Albedo (sentient, can be considered human enough and EI & Kathryne. Human enough, but not quite enough. He does not need to eat, drink or sleep nor does he have a heartbeat. He exists like a vampire, not aging not anything, in perfect statis a beautiful little replica of that bitch. Vein, no? He thinks so and hates it. Body parts do work for the intended purpose and he does have away of using it in awful ways.

He is a malicious flirt. I am fucking sorry. I am I don’t mean to let him, but it just flows out and I cannot stop him. Especially, if you have given him the slightest inclination that a character likes him. He is going to use it just to cause damage. Really, I have sat here and watched this shit crumble many of Lumine’s to my amusement (with appropriate apologies).

He does not even care about himself. He does not care if he lives or dies. Nihilistic and empty… mostly. This is where we are currently sitting, and it is where he needs to be sitting for the moment.

Dottore. That, was torture and likely some other vague things I won’t touch on, but sadism being what it is you can probably hazard a guess. That snide face? It will be relieved from those ridiculous peacock shoulders of his. He has more than a few ideas for this. There are scars and plenty of them. I do not think that anesthesia would work on Scaramouche, blood does not flow thus he would have been AWAKE.THE.WHOLE.TIME. Think about that song for a bit.

Can he feel pain. Fuck yes he can.

And oh ho is he strong. BB is a divine puppet. To further this, that vision nothing more than mechanics. He used his entire body to fight when needed, and to me I don’t see him needing to rely on the vision it too much. At 400 years old, per canon, he is more than well versed with a sword and we will be using that with brutal painful efficiency. Stab him? Haha… he’s going to pull that out and use it for a toy.

College student: Nope. Never. Not going to happen. Not in a million years is this something I will take as canon no matter how bad it is wanted it to be. The parade of providence is my divergence point. It simply did not happen here. Instead, after the tree, he just LEFT. So no Nahida either. He will have to get better on his own or not at all. These things are just aggravation over taking someone that could have been a stellar antihero and turning them into a brat. Its.just.not.happening.

He is manipulative to a degree of stupid and he is going to do things to just be an asshole or simply because he is bored. He gets a great deal of joy from just lobbing goddamn grenades all over my dashboard. He will exploit weakness.

Ahhh. The tree the tree. Such a pain in the ass, but at the same time I love it. 2 branches can be requested, but even if it is the wanderer he’s still very much going to be scaramouche. The game itself goes to great lengths to let you know he hasn’t changed all that much. Maybe toned down a little, but all the same he still hates humanity.

Weak and useless.

He really is a narcissist. It is a promise. I don’t see it changing. I just really… don’t.

He has no morals. None. Zero. Zip. Zilch. Do something dumb, consider yourself lucky if he didn’t laugh and simply walk away. Oh? You need help with something that is cute. It doesn’t matter if your starving or dying. He does.not.care.

What amuses this fucker is causing pain. It just IS.  

Here, we don’t care about your dynamics and cute fandom fluff. To be honest it makes him sick on most occasions.

He is… a monster. The only person I can ever see changing that is Kazuha because it is the only thing I have ever seen him show any kind of remorse for.

#ooc: ❅ more bitter herbs ❅ #Bull shit canonized v2: wanderer

[respondedinkind]

🌾 = my opinion on OCs 🌵 = a disliked canon character in my fandom

Send me a symbol and I will tell you… || accepting

🌾 = my opinion on OCs

Love OCs. I just don't love OCs that do not have a rules page, an about page, and where I can see not much love has been put into them at all (and I haven't seen that around much but... I have. Where I can literally not find anything about them on their blog, just a quick written 'this is x and my OC likes peppers' and that's it.). I mean, everyone can handle their characters the way they want, I just say that I personally do not feel compatible with those and I am simply not the right partner to write with then. But if they are made with love, and if they have a rules page and an about section AND, the best of it all, if they somehow have something somewhere written that makes me think 'oh yes I can see how this OC and Khan could ever interact' (for example, a verse, a background story that fits, an experience they both had or whatever), then I love OCs as much as canons. I might be a bit picky but honestly when I am I am also picky with canons so there's that. I hope that makes sense? And isn't too harsh? I am definitely not one of those people who dislike OCs from the start. Hell, Khan has the most intense and loving relationship with an OC and I gush over them all the time.

🌵 = a disliked canon character in my fandom

That is... actually very hard. I don't think I have one character in the Trek Fandom where I am like 'man I really dislike them'. I mean yeah sure you like some more than others but it's not that I can immediately think of *the* one disliked character. Hm. I have that with other fandoms (lol) but for Trek that's actually quite hard. Maybe I'll think of one at some point but now I am not really *hating* one in a way that I can say *god I dislike them so---* ACTUALLY WAIT! I really dislike Alexander Marcus lol. But well, I dislike him bc of what he did. The portrayal itself I think is neat, like, as a character that is supposed to be disliked you know? But even when he was supposed to be an 'ok character' I already disliked him. But it's in a way of like... well, he was shit, did shit things, and I have very heavy feelings about the fact that he used Khan as a puppet and LITERALLY HELD HIM HOSTAGE and toyed with his family and Khan is still being put back in cryosleep while this guy came away with death (lol ok he died but honestly---). I think this is so rarely talked about that Khan has a character was literally used as a thing rather than a living being and had to constantly worry over his people I'm GOING FERAL ABOUT THAT---- ... Anyways. :'D This is not where I am going to go into the biggest detail because this question isn't about it but yes. (and yes despite my Khan being AU I still think of his canon self a lot and I also have it as a verse, so.)

#brooklynislandgirl #Out Of Character #Memes & Dash Games #(thank you so much for sending them in!!! :) )

[zoryany]

Flufftober Day 5

SPARKLE

The kid had dragged him up and up and up and up, seemingly forever, the corridors ahead of them twisting and turning and winding throughout buildings and bleeding into streets and then into other buildings. Han had long since lost track of where they’d begun and where they were going, but he trusted Luke. After all, there had been countless opportunities for the Imperial Prince to leave this lowly smuggler to the wolves. Given the drama of every royal he’d ever even fleetingly encountered, this seemed anti-climactic, so even if he didn’t know and trust Luke as he did, he still felt reassured, somewhat.

“Just a little bit farther!” That was another reason Han felt compelled to trust Luke; the kid was chattering away, a pure and genuine joy radiating off of him as he went. There were some scoundrels who were as good a liar as you could get, and Luke was no one of them. Sure, he’d managed to deceive Han and everyone around him for weeks when it came to his true identity, but everyone had always known something wasn’t quite right. That was the thing, though - everyone had a secret, and no one asked questions.

Smart kid.

But not a malevolent one.

So Han carried on after him, and as he did, he felt his heart grow light even as his lungs burned and his muscles ached. None of that mattered. The way Luke bounded forth was infectious, and it reminded him what had drawn the two together in the first place.

Luke skidded to a halt, suddenly, and Han barely caught himself in time so as not to crash into the kid. 

“Close your eyes.”

“Uhh...” Luke’s chipper, insistent tone caught Han off guard. “I donno about this, kid...”

“Just trust me!” 

He was just so earnest. Something in those bright blue eyes reminded Han of a lost Loth Cat or an eager Akk Dog; as stoic as he liked to act, there were times when he had to admit that he simply could not. “Okay, I trust ya, just don’t make me regret this.”

“Don’t you worry,” Luke chirped, grinning as he covered Han’s eyes and grabbed his wrist with his other hand, “you absolutely won’t.”

They stepped forward a few steps together, Luke guiding Han through a door, up a short set of stairs, through another door... “Okay. I’m gonna take my hand away in a couple of seconds, yeah? Now you can open your eyes as soon as I move my hand, that’s fine, but if you want the full experience... give it a moment. Just listen. Feel the atmosphere, let your intuition tell you when to open your eyes... Just. Whatever feels right, y’know?”

The pressure on his face disappeared and an orange glow replaced the obscuring darkness in front of his closed eyelids. Han had been certain his eyes would snap open immediately, but he found himself hesitating. The atmosphere grew thick, and his breath caught in his throat as he felt himself tense in anticipation. Everything around him was buzzing now, and then - 

As his eyes slowly fluttered open, he could sense Luke beaming next to him, but all he saw was the gleaming of the city sprawled out before him. Coruscant had always seemed almost obscene in its resplendence, the sort of world that would swallow you whole with one single misstep. But this... this seemed to radiate the same vibrant energy Luke himself did.

Each building appeared as an individual facet in an enormous jewel, making its own contribution to the sprawling metropolis below. The sun was sinking into the horizon, a select few rays peeking out through the buildings surrounding it, bathing everything in a warm glow.

“This is my favourite place in the city.” Luke’s gaze had shifted from enthusiastically observing Han’s reaction to staring out at the horizon for himself. “Well - I mean I know the whole planet is a city, but in the capital here... this one place seems to just make everything sparkle.” 

And it did. The ecumenopolis below them glittered incessantly. But Han found his gaze drawn elsewhere. “It is incredible to look at, I’ll admit,” he said now staring down at Luke, “but it’s not the best view around here by a long shot.”

“I - ” His face was beet red, and he was determinedly staring towards the setting sun. “Well, I brought you here to - I mean that’s not - Han...”

Chuckling, The Smuggler sidled up next to The Prince and draped his arm across his shoulders. “I like it when you get flustered.” Leaning against him, Luke sighed and leaned into Han. “This place is wonderful. Thank you for sharing it with me.”

 And, with the glittering lights laid out before them, Han and Luke sat in silence together, enjoying the peace that came with the still air around the two. Neither could say how long they stayed there, but it was pleasant, it was quiet, and it was for them.

#luke skywalker #han solo #luke and han #skysolo #royal imperial skywalker family #star wars fic #flufftober #flufftober2020 #my writing #this could very well slot into the main #loyalty and royalty #verse somewhere but maybe not quite what I have written #but I like having little #vignettes like this #little snippets within the characters' interactions #then again that's kinda all of what this verse is...