#Legitimately the best thing about winter

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

✨✨✨ (so I can id my post)

Aita for not wanting another color guard member to be in leadership when I’m technically not either?

I (m18) am a junior in high school and have been doing color guard since the winter of my freshman year (over 2 years at this point) and besides our seniors, (who, for obvious reasons, are not going to be there next year) I am the oldest and most experienced person in our guard. Our captain is a senior, and since July, people have been saying that they think I should replace her as captain next year. I’ve been wanting to be captain after her since before then. We aren’t doing winter guard this year, but the past couple of months, we’ve been meeting after school on Wednesdays to practice. Our current captain and only other squad leader are both seniors so they haven’t been coming, making us leaderless for the time being. I’m more likely than not going to be captain next year, given that I’m the only person who’s willing and qualified, and have been attempting to step up to the plate with these practices, but but am having some problems with a certain member that we’ll call K (nb14/15).

When I told K that we’d be doing the practices weekly and gave them some of the details, they said that they knew already and that they were the one to organise it with our band director. This confused me, because I was the one who talked to our BD about the practices and she said nothing about having already talked to K about it, but I figured that it was just a communication mess-up and moved on.

The next week, I reminded everyone that we’d have practice after school on Wednesday at a specific time and in a specific place. On Wednesday, I went to the assigned place, but nobody was there, which confused and worried me because I had seen everyone that was going to be there earlier. I was legitimately really worried because even when I called/texted everyone that was supposed to be there, I was not getting a response. I’m kind of freaking out at this point, so I go to the band room to ask our band director if she’s seen them, and she tells me that they were in the gym. I go to the gym, and everyone’s in there, already practicing. I was pretty upset, because I’d told multiple people multiple times that I’d be at practice, which was happening in another place and when that changed nobody came to get me, but I brushed this off as a miscommunication. At this point, I was starting to notice that K has been doing a lot of stuff without talking to me first, and sometimes was getting information about specific guard stuff before me.

The next day, I ask K if there was a way that we could meet up for lunch to talk about color guard next year, because they were taking on certain leadership roles lately and I didn’t want to undermine them, but wanted to be able to handle things myself. They said that they were busy that week and next because of an English assignment (which shouldn’t be taking up lunch time for a full week, but I digress) and I took it and told them to get in touch with me when they were available to meet. I reminded them the next week, but they said that they were still too busy.

A couple weeks later, a different guard member texted me and said that she, K, and a few others decided that it would be best to cancel practice for the next two weeks because we were all really busy with school work that week, and had a special school event the next week. I was a little annoyed that I hadn’t been involved in this conversation, but was ok with it because I needed the time anyway. Two weeks go by, it’s Wednesday, and I’m about to go home because I thought we wouldn’t have practice, but when I passed the place that we usually meet at, everyone was there and was practicing. This time I was legitimately upset and pulled K to the side and told them that if they’re going to make decisions like this, they’re going to have to make sure EVERYONE is told, because good leadership requires communication, they apologized and we tried to move on with practice, but I left early, because there wasn’t enough space for me and it didn’t really seem like anyone wanted me there. (And even though K apologized, I was still upset about the situation)

This week (at the time of submitting) I wasn’t able to go because I was sick, but it was also the first time that some new people would be practicing, so I texted K and told them to teach them drop spins and pull hits. They responded and said that they’d taught them before so they knew what they were doing. I had not heard of this happening before then and it threw me off, but I was too tired to do anything.

this makes me look really bad, but there are a few things to take into consideration:

Before this all went down, it was sort of mutually established between us that I would be taking over next year, so it’s not like K is just doing what needs to be done, because I’ve been doing it already.

K is a freshman, and has only done color guard for one season, so they’re under experienced for the role that they’re attempting to take on

I mean this as no offense to them, because they work really hard and legitimately love guard, but K isn’t very good at it. This wouldn’t usually bother me, but I’m scared that they’re going to teach the rookies the wrong technique and it’s going to slow them down at band camp next year

I have a plan for what next year could look like, that I’m pretty positive that K would like, but I need to talk to them about it first and they’ve sort of been avoiding me.

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

[matan4il]

Daily update post:

It's funny how the biggest news in Israel can change so fast. Throughout the day, everyone was talking about one thing. Then in the evening, all everyone could talk about was the news that Saleh al-Arouri was killed in Lebanon. He was the Hamas commander in the West Bank (meaning, every terrorist attack that happened there, fell under his responsibility. In 2014, for example, he took credit for being in charge of the kidnapping and murder of 3 Israeli teenagers, a terrorist attack which led to Operation Protective Edge, during which 76 people in Israel and roughly 2,000 Palestinians were killed). Al-Arouri was also responsible for the concept of "connecting the scenes" (meaning, the idea that it's legitimate for Hamas to fire rockets from Gaza at Israel, for whatever Hamas claims is happening in Jerusalem, rather than for what it claims is happening between Israel and Gaza), which led to Hamas firing rockets at Jerusalem on May 10, 2021 and thus leading to Operation Guardian of the Walls, lasting 11 days, and during which 13 people in Israel and roughly 280 Palestinians were killed.

The parents of one of the 3 teenagers murdered according to the orders of al-Arouri in 2014 said that they do feel relief, knowing that this murderer is no longer in this world. Security seniors said that his operational abilities in carrying out terrorist attacks were so extraordinary, that this is a real blow to Hamas' terrorist activities.

I saw an interview with al-Arouri's sister, who said she's not surprised, because "The Jews are capable of anything." Not Zionists. Not Israelis. Jews.

Despite the fact that this is a clear achievement for the fight against terrorism, the immediate reaction will likely be a painful one, so heads of councils from different Israeli communities along our northern border have said that they are getting ready to be targeted.

There was a terrorist attack today in Iran, on the anniversary of the American assassination of the IRGC commander Soleimani, next to his grave, at least 70 people were killed. I have no doubt some people will think this is Israel's doing, but the MO doesn't fit. The number of civilian casualties is huge, and there was no military target present to the best of our knowledge. We've also seen the US trying to lower the flames in the Middle East, so I don't think it's a CIA operation, either. IDK which one of the Islamist regime of Iran's enemies did this, but the fact that there are so many candidates says something.

It's been reported that 3 people of Syrian and Lebanese origin have been arrested in Argentina for planning a terrorist attack at the America Maccabiah games.

The Maccabiah is the "Jewish Olympic games," founded following the many Jewish athletes who participated in the 1912 Olympic games in Sweden, but were not recognized as Jews. The Maccabiah takes place in Israel every 3-4 years since 1932, when the first games commemorated 1,800 years since the Jewish revolt of Bar-Kokhva against the Romans. The idea was a continuation of a call from 1898, to renew Jewish sports education, which had been neglected in the diaspora, since it was seen as a threat by the non-Jewish environment. In addition to Jewish athletes from all over the world, there are also Israeli non-Jews who participate in the Maccabiah. In parallel, we were also supposed to have the Maccabiah winter games, which were meant to take place in different countries every 3 years since 1933, in Poland, but after the second one, in 1936, the third one only happened in 2023, and symbolically, it was held in Germany. Another thing we have is the Maccabiah continental tournaments, like the current one being held for America, and taking place in Argentina. Lastly, outstanding non-Jewish athletes have been invited along the years as guests, to participate outside the contests for medals, in the Maccabiah games. Here are the posters for the first and second Maccabiahs in Tel Aviv, in 1932 and 1935:

Harvard president Claudine Gay has resigned, after her testimony on the subject of antisemitism on campus included a reluctance to clearly say, that calling for the genocide of Jews is harassment. I wonder, if the new accusations regarding plagiarism hadn't surfaced, whether she would have resigned. The fact that in her resignation letter, she claimed the attacks on her were race-based (as if the pressure on Liz McGill wasn't even greater, causing her to resign a whole month earlier, when the UPenn president is completely white) proves she doesn't see Jewish people or their very real distress. I hope that she would have had to resign even without the plagiarism issue, because allowing antisemitism to thrive on campus is a HUGE problem, and should be treated as such. Firing the people currently responsible for it, or at least making it clear to them that they have to resign is the LEAST that needs to happen. I guess we'll never know whether the antisemitism issue alone would have been enough to have Claudine Gay resign her post. But don't be mistaken, the fight to make sure that antisemitism on college campuses is treated like the serious problem that it is, that's far from over. The resignation of these presidents is just the bare minimum of showing that people care about the safety and well being of Jewish students, there's still a lot that needs to happen for them to be actually safe.

In continuation of this, 7 Israeli Nobel prize winners have addressed a letter to US universities of Harvard, UPenn and MIT, in which they wrote (my loose translation, as I haven't been able to find this in English anywhere): "Tolerance for violent protests on your campuses, which support the most horrific crimes against humanity, hurts your basic mission, and contradicts an essential component for a climate that encourages study and research: emotional security."

Speaking of the fight against antisemitism, here's a shoutout to the French court that sentenced Youcef Atal to a suspended 8 months in prison sentence and a fine of 45,000 Euros (49,000 dollars). Atal is an Algerian soccer player, who has been playing in France, for the team of Nice, and has shared a post calling for "a black day for the Jews." Not Zionists. Not Israelis. Jews. As if Oct 7 wasn't a black day for the Jewish people already. As expected, anti-Israeli websites are claiming that he's being punished for "Gaza solidarity" or "Gaza post."

Compare that article, versus these headlines:

This is 31 years old Ben Shimoni:

On Oct 7, he was at the Nova music festival. He made it to his car, and drove himself and others he took with him away from the massacre, while he was being fired at by terrorists, and while overhead, Hamas rockets are targeting Israel's south. Then he drove back, and did that a second time. On his third drive, he was murdered by Hamas terrorists. He's believed to have saved at least 9 people. Now there's a song dedicated to his memory and the love between him, and his gf Jessica, by singer Ma'ayan Zar. It's one of many songs born out of the pain, grief, trauma of Oct 7, and the hope that exists even after it.

May his memory be a blessing.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

#israel #antisemitism #israeli #israel news #israel under attack #israel under fire #israelunderattack #terrorism #anti terrorism #hamas #antisemitic #antisemites #jews #jew #judaism #jumblr #frumblr #jewish

[thebadboyfanclub]

After You Little Pet (Aegon x Reader)

I think this has got to be one of my favourite ones that I have written, if anyone has a “semi evil seductress” imagine in their heads do not hesitate to send it my way, also I would advice “god is a woman” with this

“A beautiful healthy princess”

The wet nurse declared as she passed the babe to Rhaenyra who was already shedding tears of joy at the sight of her small child.

“(Y/n) Targaryen, you are destined for great things”

-

(Y/n) was often called, “the realms gift”, she was blessed with the Targaryen genes yet her characteristics were more sharp than usual, her nose resembled the one that princess Alyssa was known for and her eyes were dark blue like the winter ocean, of course the princess was spoiled since she came out the womb, she was the future of the Targaryen line. (Y/n) was her mothers daughter, her pride and courageous spirit meant that she aspired to be the best at everything and anything she could get her hands on, the unquenchable thirst for knowledge was strong.

(Y/n) was the only child of Rhaenyra that was a result of her beddings with her lord husbands Laenor, her existence strengthened her mothers claim for her sons parentage being legitimate. It kept the greens astray for some time since (y/n) was Rhaenyras heir it meant that there was no accusations of “bastard blood”.

However the family was aware that if the greens searched for an accusation to hold against them they could easily find it, first of all was the claim of Jacaerys being the heir of driftmark.

“What if I were to wed Aegon?”

“(Y/n) it is not time to jest”

“That is why I am not”

“Aegon would never wed someone from our family, his mother has poisoned his mind since a toddler”

“Who said anything about force?”

-

Aegon was one of the easiest targets, years of studying people and the obsession with strategy benefited her tremendously, what also helped her was that Aegon was rather handsome, his pouty lips and mischievous gaze intrigued her.

She had Aegons attention the second she waltzed in for dinner wearing a rather “scandalous” choice of clothing and chose to take a seat next to her uncle Aegon, when (y/n) sat down Aegon was hit with her intoxicating scent of caramel, the alluring smell combined with her the exposed skin was enough to set his crotch on fire as he shuffled in his seat to save himself from the embarrassment.

She talked his ear off all night along with allowing her hand to rest on his and even caressing his bicep when she gawked at him and threw a few compliments at him that Aegons fragile ego desperately needed to feed on, she was a delight and he had not seen anything yet.

Aegon was getting ready to sneak out his room and find a whore that somewhat resembled (y/n) with the lights off when he opened the door and was met with (y/n), the lady gasped at the “sudden swig on the door” and stared at Aegon with a guilty look written all over her face remaining silent for a minute.

“I-I got lost”

“Outside my doorstep?”

“I… thought it was my chamber”

“Interesting choice on nightwear princess (y/n), are you sure you were not looking for someone?”

(Y/n) knew exactly where she was she had spend most of her childhood running inside the castle but what good will that do if she admitted that? No, Aegon had to feel like he was the one corrupting her. (Y/n)s face turned red at the accusation as her eyes focused on the ground, in the meantime she clasped her hands together in front of her at a nervous manner.

“T-that is all my servants packed”

“Oh for Gods sake”

(Y/n) yelped at how Aegon grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her inside his chamber, she didn’t know he had it in him. Aegon pressed (y/n)s back against the wall as he collided his body with hers, the thin material of her nightgown did not protect her from the predatory eyes her uncle held as he scanned her, his breath hitting her face as it turned heavy from lust.

“Don’t be coy, you went out looking for something, what do you need little pet?”

He whispered in her ear seductively, (y/n) bit her lip to seem conflicted, if she was honest Aegon was arousing her, the sense of his hands slowly roamed her body earned him a hushed moan from the princess as he was waiting for her to give him what he desires

“I shouldn’t have come here”

“But you did little pet”

“Don’t call me that”

“Why? Does it excite you?”

“Y-yes”

Her stutter showed him her squeamishness, her morals fighting inside her mind as her body craved one thing while her head was telling her something else, it made Aegon think he is in control.

“Such pretty lips you have I wonder if the others match”

“I do not understand”

“Of course you don’t but do not fret, I will show you”

Aegon planted a kiss on her lips so intense that (y/n) was taken a back for a moment, he lifted her nightgown to brush his fingertips against her naked flesh and wrap one of her legs around him for easier access, (y/n) moaned at the feeling of his crotch grinding on hers, a foolish little boy that allowed her to so easily wrap strings around his limps, he was her puppet.

Once he pulled her undergarments and held his member in his hand (y/n) shoved him away with all her might, her hands covered her exposed breasts as she tried to catch her breath.

“No, no this is not right”

“Come on little pet”

“No I will not be able to wed Cregan if I… no”

And with that little slip up of absolutely fabricated information she put on her undergarment and rushed out of his chamber. Aegon stood dumbfounded, she was to wed Cregan Stark? No, that could not be she would have to move to the north, he would lose her forever.

The next morrow queen Alicent summoned Rhaenyra and her daughter, (y/n) sat next to her mother while she quickly took a few glances over at Aegon, blushing every time she did so. When queen Alicent announced (y/n)s betrothal to Aegon the young girl looked up at the prince with eyes full of joy, she bit her bottom lip to “hide her grin” before her eyes went back to staring at the floor.

“It would be an honour your grace”

She had mumbled in a humble manner. Everything went according to her and Rhaenyras plan, the event was one for the history books as Aegon was seen smiling at his radiant bride before they quickly disappeared from their own feast, Aegon could not wait any longer.

They had stayed in bed for a full week, learning each others bodies morrow, evening and night, Aegon was infatuated by his wife, such a “innocent” creature she was to him as she whimpered, she played her part better than anyone.

The act of a maiden gone mad was the best idea she ever had, allowing him to “corrupt” her while escorting her to the unbefitting road of silk, (y/n) had hid behind Aegon while entering, to coy to even peep at the whores, Aegon felt on top of the world as he bend her over behind taverns with a hand over her mouth to cover her moans.

A while later (y/n) assumed authority, making Aegon believe he was tasting the fruits of his hard labour, riding him while he held on to her dragon grey ghost up in the sky, spreading her legs while sitting at the stoned balcony, fucking at the stable, if Aegon could fulfil his fantasies and urges with his wife there was no need to for pleasure house.

“This sight will never get old”

“I hope so, we have the rest of our lives for me to ride you”

(Y/n) purred in her husbands ear, her hips moving in the motion of the ocean leaving Aegon a moaning mess

“Princess!”

“What?! What is it that cannot wait?!”

“My apologies princess for interrupting but it is urgent”

(Y/n) was with her exposed back against the door that the intruder had barged in from and put a halt in the coupling of Aegon and (y/n). Aegon chuckled at her frustration, Aegon did not care if his own father walked in during the act the only reason he stopped is because she has stopped.

(Y/n) huffed out a breath in between her hands gathering the white sheet to somewhat wrap it around herself leaving her husband bare, Aegon once again did not notice nor fussed about him being nude, he just sat up with his hair being a mess to follow (y/n) with his eyes as she walked to the servant girl whom passed a small piece of paper to (y/n), the princess carefully opened it to unravel the reason behind this abrupt end of their bedding.

“Thank you Talya, for your troubles”

She whispered to the woman before she passed a pouch of dragon coins to the girl that scurried away. As the servant girl disappeared Aegon expected to have his wife back on his bed, on the contrary the princess moved around the room to dress herself with her flying armour causing, aegon drew his bottom lip between his teeth as his clearly upset wife muttered to herself

“Would you like to share with your husband what has gotten into you? Well except me of course-“

“Your father is dead”

“What?”

“We must go, now”

Queen Alicent might have lord Larry’s, (y/n) had majority of the servants on her side, “you could learn anything if you can pay the price” her mother always said, (y/n) was known for her generosity in exchange of reports about what has been said around every corner of the castle.

The unfortunate news of the kings death first reached (y/n)s ears before it reached the queen, (y/n) was no fool her grandsires death was inevitable, she had made peace with losing her beloved Viserys who had protected her mother with his last breath, she would be damned if she let his hard work spoil over the begrudged hightowers, she wouldn’t go down without a fight

“Go where?”

“Dragon stone, if we fly we will be there before dawn my mother will grand us asylum”

“We cannot leave, what are you on about?”

“Aegon think about this, if we stay your mother will demand for you to be crowned king, a concept she has openly discussed with you since you could talk, we are not safe here anymore”

“You’ve planned this, haven’t you?”

It was the first time that Aegon saw through (y/n)s goals, (y/n) grew quiet for a couple of moments as Aegon scanned his wives face with his eyebrows furrowed, was she betraying him? What was her scheme? Is she trying to protect him.

“I love you Aegon and I want us to be happy, we cannot prevail here under your mothers and your grandfathers cloak as they parade around the castle like they own it, I am leaving, will you follow me?”

(y/n) had spoken the truth, she had grown to love Aegon, although his obsession with wine was something she despised Aegon was a good match that kept her youthful and she relished the flame that burned for one another, she also did not wish for a war to begin within the Targaryen family, it would be the beginning of the end for their bloodline as hundreds of lives would be lost, she did not want that blood in her hands.

Aegon had managed to shock her when he jumped out of their bed and squeezed (y/n) in a hug, Aegon always scoffed at the talk of being king, his father never wished for that and he had never seen himself being able to carry such responsibility, to be the face of the realm.

“I would follow you to ends of the world”

“Aegon I was hoping we could discuss this at a different time under better circumstances but… I do not want our child to come into our world in the midst of a war”

(Y/n)s words left Aegon speechless, (y/n) had never told him that ever since the wedding she had made sure to get her moontea served to her every morning, it was the reason she woke up before him, if they were to have kids it would be when (y/n) felt ready not when the small council asked for it.

One part of her withheld that information as a surprise, his nameday was approaching so she had thought what better gift than their first love child, the other part of her would rather skin herself alive than allow the greens to take her mothers birthright, with that announcement (y/n) had ensured nothing would stand in her mothers way.

Grey ghost and sunfyre were always saddled, the coupled had grown a habit of flying at odd hours of the night, searching for new places to visit and secluded areas they could lay naked and moan without fear.

“Gods be good, please tell you are not jesting”

“Aegon, we must go, now!”

“Lead the way princess”

(y/n) and Aegon ran with their hands intertwined down to the dragon pit,(y/n) prayed internally that they make it up in the sky before Alicent sends guards after them, naturally the knight sworn to (y/n) followed them close by to protect the princess, he had been chosen by Rhaenyra herself so they could be certain that when the time comes he would risk his life if it meant (y/n) made it to Dragonstone safely.

When they could finally see their dragons both of them puffed out a breath from the ease at their nerves this brought, (y/n) took only one step towards her dragon before Aegon pulled his princess by the waist to give one last kiss in her lips, he never wished to rule or be called a king.

“My precious wife, I must admit this is a thrill I never expected to experience”

“What running from your mother so she won’t get the chance to slaughter my family?”

“Precisely, it was about time someone else got to witness her cruelty besides me”

(Y/n) laughed at the slight jab Aegon landed on his mother, (y/n) had expected Aegon to go through some type of sadness when Viserys passed, she had left out the part that Aegon and Viserys were never close, the king was engulfed by grief that none of Alicents children could mend.

Aegon was never the smartest one still he was sharp enough to recognise that his wife belonged on the throne, he was perfectly content with being the king consort, besides having a crown on your head only means the world is on your shoulders and Aegon planned to be her safe haven, the shoulders (y/n) could lean on or put her legs on depending on how she craved to be assisted by him.

“As much as I would love for you to ride sunfyre while I ride you we do not have the time for that”

“correct me if I am wrong, we have yet to cross dragon stone out of the map”

“Such an eager little thing”

She joked before she ran away for his reach to go to her dragon at the same time Aegon mirrored her steps with Sunfyre, they gave each other one nod in unison before they commanded their dragons to fly, the thrill of that lift off from the ground would never burn out, to see the castle from a higher angle compels them to feel untouchable, mayhaps that is why the small folk say the Targaryens are closer to Gods than to men, it was their dragons that were gracious enough to let them get a sense of the clouds.

“Come along dear Aegon, it is time to go home”

“Your wish is my command, after you little pet

Requests are open!

#aegon ii x oc #aegon ii imagines #aegon targaryen x reader #aegon ii x reader #aegon fanfic #aegon imagine #aegon targaryen imagine #aegon targaryen x you #aegon targaryen #aegon ii imagine #aegon ii fanfic #aegon x reader #aegon x you #aegon x oc #aegon x y/n #aegon targaryen imagines #aegon ii targaryen #hotd #hotd fanfic #hotd fic #hotd imagine #hotd x reader #house of the dragon #house of the dragon imagine #house of the dragon x reader #hotd aegon #prince aegon #aegon the second #yandere aegon targaryen

[slayerchick303]

*SECRET INVASION FINALE SPOILERS*

I just finished Home, and I have some thoughts:

Rhodey was in a hospital gown when he got out of the pod! I swear to all that is holy, if they have him been replaced by a skrull after his injury in Civil War, I will march on Disney headquarters! That would cheapen Tony's death, funeral, and Rhodey's amazing conversation with Sam in Falcon and the Winter Soldier. I said I'd freak out if they made the swap previous to FATWS, and I meant it!

Gravik's human face was a man he killed, so I'm assuming the same is true for G'iah. If she is indeed going to be Abigail Brand as leaks have suggested (meaning Abigail Brand is dead), I'm going to be mad! Like legitimately disappointed. Brand is one of my favorite parts of the Astonishing X-Men comics run. I ship her and Beast so hard.

When was Everett Ross swapped? It has to have been after Black Panther because he would've reverted to his skrull form after being shot and/or Shuri would've noticed while healing him. Has a skrull infiltrated Wakandan leadership?! How many? For how long? Because that's BAD. Imagine the havoc skrulls could wreak with Wakanda's resources.

The CGI in this was pretty good. Especially compared to other recent Disney+ titles. That being said, I hate a lot of how they used it. Giving G'iah a huge Drax arm?! Bad choices in multiple ways: A.) the big Drax arm looked so weird as did other things. B.) do they think Marvel fans are too stupid to get what they were doing if they didn't make her arm huge? They should've kept Emilia's arm the same size, only given her Drax's tattoos and skin color at most. We would've understood. C.) the clothing changed too! How does that make sense?

Is Gravik really dead, though? Is Raava? We don't know if Raava has super skrull powers, but Gravik had like EVERYTHING. That seems like it should make him pretty invincible.

How did people not clock how off Rhodey was? There was like an enormous change in his personality. Raava was a jerk!

So, Fury and Sonya only tranqed those secret service members at the hospital. That wouldn't automatically make them revert, right, or every skrull would be outed when they fell asleep. If all those guards were humans, they were legitimately the worst security detail ever. That one guy literally listened to SkrullRhodey pretty much out herself and did nothing. He didn't even warn the president Rhodey was acting uncharacteristically. Every member of White House personale will have to be tested somehow. Maybe check for purple blood?

I really thought Ritson would die at the end. I guess he's just awful (which is unsurprising). I'm glad he won't be president much longer, as Harrison Ford is taking over the role of President Thaddeus Ross in Captain America: Brave New World. That being said, part of me worries that President Ross might be even worse than Ritson.

I kind of loved Varra and Fury's ending. It redeemed the awful, "I guess we'll never know moment."

****EDIT:**** I didn't think about this at the time, but I saw someone else bring it up. G'iah has Captain Marvel powers now! Doesn't that mean she should be caught up in the entanglement mess Captain Marvel, Photon, and Miss Marvel are dealing with in The Marvels?! That's an ENORMOUS plot hole. Not to mention, G'iah is ridiculously overpowered now. People complain about how powerful Superman is, and G'iah is so much worse.

I enjoyed Secret Invasion, even if it wasn't the best Disney+ show. The comics are still WAY better. Regardless, I'm looking forward to The Marvels even more now.

#secret invasion spoilers #secret invasion #disney marvel #disney plus #marvel mcu #marvel cinematic universe #marvelcomics #marvel comics #marvel #disney #nick fury #skrulls #the marvels #g'iah #abigail brand #emilia clarke #samuel l jackson #sonya falsworth #olivia colman #priscilla fury #varra #everett ross #martin freeman #mcu

[babyhatesreality]

I’m not sure if something like this ever happened to you: but when you are really really tried or just have something else in your mind… sometimes you forget things and go looking for them even though you have them literally by yourself 😂😅 (looking for you glasses while wearing them hapen to me so often 🥲)

Could something happend to Steve and Bucky to or even their little one? 😃

Darling!! Great question :D (PS thank you for your patience my angel)

So...sort of. It happens to Steve and Bucky, but not to you. And it drives them nuts. Because you never forget ANYTHING.

You have an almost supernatural gift for finding their stuff, mostly because (and you're not even consciously aware of this) you seem to have a radar as to where they are at all times if they're in proximity to you and you're awake.

Steve has a habit of setting down whatever is in his hands if something big grabs his attention. And, being Captain America, that could mean anything from hearing you squeal and he's not sure if it's a scared squeal, to his mission communicator going off, to a news story suddenly popping up about someone being in trouble, to a missing dog poster. If he senses a mission that needs him, he almost goes into autopilot to help. On good days, Bucky jokes that it's the Cap version of his Winter Soldier programming which often earns him a scathing glare. When the problem is solved, Steve'll try to go back to what he was doing before, but can't remember where he set stuff down.

You can basically retrace his steps from memory and find whatever it is. To you it's the best treasure hunt ever and you love it. While he's always grateful and rewards you for helping, and genuinely loves that it makes you so happy, it drives him bonkers that he can't remember where he put the thing down in the first place.

Bucky has a little more of an excuse- there are holes in his brain from Hydra that will never fully be gone. He's done a lot of work to deal with these issues, including finding coping mechanisms to help him remember little details. That's what drives him nuts. Sometimes when the big stuff slips, he can begrudgingly accept it. It's the little stuff, the innocuous and unimportant stuff, that drives him mad. And he legitimately tries not to get down on himself when something slips through the cracks...but he's never been self-forgiving.

You don't realize exactly what's going on with him- why he gets so gloomy when he can't remember where he put his book down when he just had it. You just know that when you play with him, he gets happy and isn't gloomy any more. So if he's all frowny trying to find something, you go into full-on Private Baby mode. It becomes a critical mission to find it, and you'll run to your room and put your doggie tags on and a bicycle helmet and Papa's big brown leather coat (which is about 4000 sizes too big for you) and come out barking orders like you're a drill sergeant, determined to find the missing object and not resting till you do. It always breaks Bucky out of his funk, and he'll usually join in the mission (which often includes getting bombarded by pillow bombs, having to belly crawl down the hallway, and spying on Papa to make sure he "hasn't gone rogue").

They like to privately joke (when they're not annoyed at themselves for losing stuff) that you're better than St. Anthony. After you find something, they lovingly tease each other that St. Katie Cat has won the day again.

#daddy!bucky #daddy bucky #daddy!bucky x little!reader #daddy bucky x little reader #daddy stucky #daddy!stucky #daddy stucky x little reader #daddy!stucky x little reader #daddy steve #daddy!steve #daddy!steve x little!reader #daddy steve rogers #daddy steve x little reader #daddy!steve rogers #daddy!steve rogers x little

[231s-prompts]

Wanji's Missing (or as I more affectionately call it, farm)

I was entirely going to just put the idea I had, but then I ended up writing it. It was in my drive for too long for me to not play with it. Find it on ao3 here, otherwise, enjoy!

//

After the events at Guanyin Temple, Wanji, himself, and the rest of the Lan went back to the Cloud Recesses together. A Discussion Conference would have to be planned earlier than usual, but Xichen wouldn’t be participating in it or the planning as Shufu had agreed that it was best for him currently to go into seclusion. Wanji seemed happy enough to pick up some of the work leading the Sect and Shufu would assist him.

Perhaps in hindsight seclusion really wasn’t the best idea.

Sizhui would send him regular letters about recent happenings, and he would read them with his midday meal, between meditation. It was mostly the same thing, sometimes Wei Wuxian would be mentioned, but not too much. It was mostly offhanded, using two sentences to describe the man, at most. “We bumped into Wei-qianbi on our most recent night hunt. He’s doing well and asked about how you were doing,” or sometimes just a “Wei-qianbi is doing well, we heard about him in a village we passed through.” Xichen didn’t feel hurt by it, Wei Wuxian wasn’t bothering Wanji and was doing his own thing now. Wanji couldn’t be hurt by him.

Wanji also sent him letters, mostly apologies for not making time to talk to him through the door. He wrote much more about Wei Wuxian. “Wei Ying is currently traveling just north of Lotus Pier, he sent a painting of a lake with his most recent letter to Sizhui. It was beautiful. I would like to go there with you,” or “Wei Ying wants to stay somewhere north during the winter because the south isn’t exciting enough. Shufu doesn’t want him to come, so Wei Ying might go to Qinghe instead.” Truthfully, Xichen thought that Wanji could write much longer about Wei Wuxian than he did, but just reading Wanji talk about him hurt. This is a man who hurt Wanji, who he took whip lashes for, who he sealed his core for, and he can just… talk so casually about him? Xichen… Xichen was- is- hurt by a-Yao. He killed a-Yao, but that wasn’t- he didn’t actually do anything. Xichen just… killed him. Like that. Like a-Yao did to da-ge and Jin-zhongzu but Xichen was still a good person?

Xichen could draw parallels between himself and Wanji, Wei Wuxian and a-Yao, even Nie Huaisang and the rest of the Jianghu for days. And he did. And he did. Both Wanji and himself saw the best in the other. A-Yao and Wei Wuxian hurt the other and committed actual, legitimate crimes. A-Yao and Wei Wuxian had the other commit crimes, Wanji attacking the elders, and Xichen killing someone. Nie Huaisang and the Jianghu put them in difficult positions.

Everyday was the same for Xichen. Wake up at Mao Shichen, eat morning meal, meditate on his actions and how to improve himself, eat midday meal, read letters if there are any, meditate on improving himself, eat evening meal, go to sleep at Hai Shichen. It was repetitive, there were no surprises, and no one he trusted that he could hurt again or be hurt by.

He had a lot to meditate on. A-Yao’s actions and exactly how he did them. His relationship with a-Yao and how he trusted him so much. If a-Yao ever trusted him. How he felt about Nie Huaisang.

The last part was hard. He still wanted to call Nie Huaisang a-Sang, but what Nie Huaisang was objectively wrong. He lied and manipulated and waved his fan while doing it. The rules said not to associate with evil, but Xichen wanted to associate with Nie Huaisang. Despite everything, they were technically brothers to some degree and they were likely the last of da-ge for each other. Da-ge would be sad to see them like this.

It was a day he had decided that he needed to understand how he felt about Nie Huaisang when someone knocked on his door. He hadn’t known what the weather was like until a voice reached him-

“I’d apologize for interrupting your seclusion, but it’s raining lakes out here and I’d like to come in first. There’s also a huge problem like- currently happening and we need some help.”

Lan Jingyi’s voice, panting from exhaustion. Xichen had known the boy since Sizhui brought him to have dinner with while Wanji was still in seclusion himself. But why was he knocking now? And what was the problem?

“Come in.”

With those words Lan Jingyi opened the door and quickly came in, closing it behind himself. “Oh man, I feel so happy to see you right now. First of all it’s not raining in here,” he said, taking off his outermost layer, a thicker layer for the rain, “which is great. And you’re not panicking yet,” he exchanged a quick bow, “which is also great because between Sizhui and Grandmaster Lan I think I’ve seen enough stress to go gray.”

“I’ll make some tea then, but please tell me what’s going on.” Xichen quickly got the tea out and ready while Jingyi sat himself down at the table, clearly taking the moment to rest and catch his breath.

It was only once the tea was done and Jingyi had nearly drank half his cup when he spoke next. “Hanguang-jun is like- fully missing. He didn’t show up for morning meal, which is totally normal because Sizhui says he sometimes takes it in his- err, your- office, but then one of the outer disciples who’s in charge of making sure he gets the paperwork said that he wasn’t in there, and some kitchen staff said that he wasn’t in the office so they thought that he was going to take it with everyone else-”

Xichen raised his hand, halting the boy. Hanguang-jun is like- fully missing. “Wanji’s missing?”

Jingyi quickly nodded, “I was gonna get to that. Sizhui was kinda the first one to realize he’s missing, so he told me to tell Grandmaster Lan while he checked the Jingshi, except while I’m in the middle of telling Grandmaster Lan everything, Sizhui comes in and is all ‘A-die’s missing,’ which is weird because Sizhui only calls Hanguang-jun ‘A-die’ when he’s stressed or not in public, and probably once in front of Grandmaster Lan ever. So now they both are worried and have people looking everywhere. Like- literally everywhere. Grandmaster Lan apparently looked in the Forbidden Library, had the storehouses checked- the ones where we keep stuff for safe keeping, like the more dangerous Wen weapons and stuff- Sizhui checked the rabbits with me and we both went to the Cold Ponds, but he’s just gone.

“So then the three of us looked in the Jingshi again because Sizhui realized that there could have been a note left, or signs that he was taken, but nope! Aside from Hanguang-jun, only some trinkets, books, paintings, and personal items are missing. So Grandmaster Lan is saying stuff like that he just left of his own choice and how he couldn’t have gotten far and has a bunch of disciples looking for him outside of Cloud Recesses and then he disappeared towards some of the other houses used for seclusion and I thought he was coming to tell you, but then he came back and just said that he didn’t find him and didn’t mention you, so I said that I was checking the office again for any more signs, but actually just found the house you are supposed to be in seclusion, here, and decided you needed to be told.”

Jingyi took a deep breath.

“I will obviously accept any punishment you feel fit, but that’s as far as we’ve gotten and Hanguang-jun is your brother.”

That… was a lot to take in. It certainly sounded like Wanji had decided to up and leave. But why? Nothing in any of the letters he’d sent seemed to point to anything weird happening to him. Or anything being wrong. Perhaps… perhaps Wei Wuxian had something to do with it.

“Go check the Jingshi for the most recent letter you can find that Wei Wuxian sent him. I need to get properly dressed, and will meet you in the office.”

Jingyi must have just noticed that Xichen was still in his sleep clothes, as he quickly stood, bowed, and rushed out, barely remembering his rain layer.

//

A year and a half. Efforts to find Wanji hadn’t decreased in that time, but he was very well gone. No one had heard from him, even Nie Huaisang- which was a complicated conversation that included lots of crying on both sides, a reconciliation, and a difficult, though thorough, explanation of Wanji’s disappearance. There was one other piece of news, that was only very worrying, and that was that no one knew exactly where Wei Wuxian was. Jiang Wanyin, Jiang-zhongzu, had seen him a month before Wanji disappeared, but nothing else. He had just been traveling through to get to Qinghe. The Juniors had stopped bumping into him and his donkey, a-Sang said that he never came to visit during the winter, and even Wen Ning said that he hadn’t heard anything from him, not even the slightest pull through resentful energy.

To get a break from the sudden work thrust upon himself, since he had to now do all the work his brother had been doing- really, how he managed so much was unknown to Xichen- and still follow possible leads. Another member of the inner members had been put in charge of running night hunts, as Wanji had still been in charge of them, and the Juniors were put in charge of caring for the rabbits -some of whom had disappeared, likely with Wanji- and even the other tasks Wanji was responsible for as heir were pushed to Sizhui, though Uncle was insistent on helping.

Xichen had his hands full with Sect Leader paperwork and decisions, limiting the amount of power the Elders had- apparently Wanji was insistent on doing this, for no apparent reason- and making sure the Sect didn’t fall to chaos. And this was just the in-Sect business. Making sure the image of the Lan didn’t fall in the eyes of the common people, or the other Sects was paramount. Wanji’s constant nighthunting for the past few years had greatly benefitted them, but it had really just created a standard for the rest of the Sect.

So the sudden stress, from previously being secluded in one of the seclusion houses and meditating to now being the face of the Sect again, culminated in Xichen taking a night hunt himself. He had taken a few short ones since Wanji disappeared and he was put back in his role as Sect Leader and they helped quite a bit, so he didn’t worry about taking a slightly longer one. This one was from one of the outer towns, who lived in a valley between a large lake south of Caiyi, and the great shore. Really, it should be Jiang territory with how far south it is, but Jiang Wanyin had never asked about it and the town itself never asked for much.

They typically didn’t ask for aid that often, since they were mostly just a large community that collectively farmed and lived together. They were large enough that workers would come during the growing season to help out, and when the harvest came around, their tourism would boom, but overall, they only needed a Sect to oversee them to help with their trade to Lotus Pier and Caiyi.

This time however, they had sent word about a particularly strong Gui haunting their docks, making them unable to send any trade across the lake to the small village on the other side, or any of the houses that were nearby. So Xichen went by himself, since it didn’t seem violent or feral, just incredibly protective of the docks.

The trip wasn’t difficult, just long. It was long enough that Xichen’s spiritual energy was running low when he finally landed near the town. Sheathing Shuoyue, it took a quarter incense time to get to the town and for the people to recognize him.

Running towards him and bowing, the man who ran the larger of the two taverns looked apologetic. “Ah, Lan-zhongzu, we really must apologize, but you’ve come for nothing!”

Xichen startled. “Nothing?”

In the letter the town had sent, the problem seemed quite major, since the village was largely dependent on the rich teas and materials from the town.

“Yes, the kind daozhangs helped her out! Why, it just took them an incense’s time to sort it out with her, and the issue was resolved!” The townsperson looked relieved at that, but obviously still felt bad for Xichen.

“And when was this?” Xichen asked, vaguely airily.

The man thought, putting his hand on his chin. “Ah, about a week ago? We had just sent the letter when they came in. They usually come to help around with repairs and to help the old man near the water tend to his lotus flowers every few weeks, but this time they helped everyone! We didn’t even know they could!”

The nearby women that were carrying laundry stopped by them. “Oh yes, those handsome men do help out much more than they need to, Cheng Song (pine tree) didn’t even need to ask, Hei-daozhang just saw them and asked to help! And then Lan-daozhang just followed like he usually does!”

Another one nodded, joining in, “And they’re so talented! They just asked about the house -oh this was about a year and a half ago now-, bought some seeds- Lan-daozhang is truly so rich- and the next time we saw them, they had mentioned that it was all fixed up!”

“Ah, and the kids love them,” the third chimed in, “the two of them spend time teaching the kids how to read and write, and Hei-daozhang shows us how to organize our planting to grow the most produce, and when you’re lucky Lan-daozhang will ask Hei-daozhang to show Fang Xiaofan (little ordinary) how to play the dizi some more- and then when they start to finish up, Hei-daozhang will needle Lan-daozhang to play with him, Lan-daozhang plays the qin, and they play such a pretty duet!” The other two women nod furiously.

“Yes! You would never think that two men would be so in tune with each other, but it really is magical!”

“Song Meili (beautiful and graceful)!” The first woman chided the second woman, “They are two men that live in a house together, farm together, and have traveled all over the place with each other! Of course they’re in tune with each other! And Wan Liu (the willow)! Don’t confuse Lan-zhongzu!” She turned towards Xichen, “They come every few days to take the kids in the afternoon to the great shore to teach them all sorts of things, reading and writing obviously, but also archery and mathematics. They were going to show them how to hunt, but the men wanted to!” The women laughed to each other, and bowed, taking their laundry wherever they were going.

Two men, one in white and one in black, came to town about a year and a half ago, bought a house and occasionally come to help the town and teach the children some of the noble arts, and play duets together. A dizi and a qin. The man in black helps tend lotus flowers.

There’s no way that they’ve been here this whole time. There’s no way that Wanji and Wei Wuxian have been in this little town, that regularly traded with Lotus Pier and Caiyi, unnoticed for a year and a half.

Xichen turned to the tavern owner. “Does Lan-daozhang happen to bear any resemblance to Hanguang-jun?” Xichen knew his face was pale. He was tired from the paperwork, tired from the sword flight here, tired from his worldview from turning. Most importantly, he was tired from missing his brother.

“Hanguang-jun? I suppose so, but doesn’t Hanguang-jun dress… oh, Hanguang-jun is your brother, right? You do look rather similar to Lan-daozhang he’s just… well I suppose that he looks more relaxed than you. And Lan-daozhang wears much rougher clothing than you do, Hei-daozhang manages to get the white much more green and brown than yours could probably handle…” Wanji… gets muddy? Willingly? Wanji, who as a three year old, would refuse to let the bottoms of his hems touch the ground in case they got dirty? Who cried himself to sleep after spilling water on himself?

Xichen could feel himself frowning. “And where is their house?”

“Just south of here, if you walk around the lake you should be able to see the clearing, it’s difficult to see from a boat, and they don’t have a dock, here I’ll show you.” He walked for an incense time, pointing out people the duo had helped, along with main businesses and the best inn. Eventually though, they came to the docks overlooking the lake. “Over there,” he pointed, “you can’t see them, but there’s two docks that the village uses, since they’re a bit more in-land, they don’t do much on the water.” He pointed slightly left, “and between us and them, there are two more docks, both of them are abandoned. Between those two docks, there’s a large patch of lotus flowers growing, and their boat should be tipped over on land nearby. Then you’ll see the clearing with their house. I wouldn’t suggest going to find it now though, it’s easily a quarter day’s walk to their house… though you can fly on your sword… hmm.”

“Thank you, I’ll stay here the night and find them in the morning then.” The man looked delighted, and they bowed, departing from each other.

//

Getting a room for the night was simple and quick -despite planting season being well underway, the ground had yet to fully thaw and some snow still lingered so the workers who would come to help during the growing season hadn’t yet fully arrived. Also, the town was not particularly warm recently, so there were no tourists.

Brushing his hair out to prepare to go to bed, Xichen took the moment to reflect on the events of the day. They seemed familiar, until Xichen took out the letters Wanji had written him just before he disappeared. The last one, “Wei Ying wants to stay somewhere north during the winter because the south isn’t exciting enough. Shufu doesn’t want him to come, so Wei Ying might go to Qinghe instead.” The one before, “Wei Ying is currently traveling just north of Lotus Pier, he sent a painting of a lake with his most recent letter to Sizhui. It was beautiful. I would like to go there with you.” Wei Wuxian had traveled north of where he had been previously, through Lotus Pier, to get to Qinghe. This lake was north of Lotus Pier, but a bit east. Wei Wuxian wanders, it's not improbable that he got off track. He saw the lake, painted it for Sizhui, and eventually bought a house and started a farm. Well, Wanji bought a house. But Wanji was also happy here. And Wanji didn’t write, to Uncle or to Xichen. Or even to Sizhui.

Wei Wuxian hurt Wanji though. That was unforgivable, as Wanji’s brother. His big brother. Xichen practically raised him, since Uncle was often busy with Sect matters. Why- How could Wanji do that?

But come morning, the answers will be revealed.

//

Xichen woke up as he usually did, at Mao Shichen, quickly getting ready for the day and eating a brief morning meal. His spiritual reserves had recovered, so he found himself packing up and pulling out Shuoyue. The tavern owner’s instructions were simple, but easy to follow, and he soon found the lotus flowers just halfway past Si Shichen.

He landed on the ground efficiently, dusting himself off before he trekked through some tall grass, soon getting to the clearing. A large house was in the middle, a field of sprouting flowers between him and the house. The house itself was expansive, though the roof was clearly mismatched. Laundry was hanging in the sun, and a small shed sat near a small farm that didn’t yet bear plants. Plant pots were sitting on the stairs leading up to the house, and he could tell that the stone pathway had been recently weeded. A larger shed sat near the far edge of the clearing, much larger than the one that must hold tools. While pieces of wood leaned against the smaller one, scraps of random materials were sloppily piled on top of each other outside the larger shed.

As he walked closer, a small table made itself clear in the middle of the small flowers. A voice soon followed, though it seemed to be on the other side of the house. As he approached, Wei Wuxian’s recognizable laugh made itself clear. Walking faster, and a wide curve around the house, he came across a rather… soft scene.

Wanji was pouring tea on a bench outside their house, while Wei Wuxian had evidently tumbled backwards, holding a rabbit above himself. Wanji was smiling, watching as Wei Wuxian pulled the rabbit to his chest and gently rubbed between its ears.

Their peace didn’t stay, as Wanji noticed Xichen almost immediately, his smile fading as he quickly stood.

Wei Wuxian quickly noticed and followed, “Zhan- oh, Lan-zhongzu.” he instantly looked uncomfortable. Wanji noticed, and signaled for him to go into the house. Wanji himself quickly lead Xichen back to the field of flowers, and they sat themselves down at the table.

The table of which, was poorly constructed, but did have intricate carvings on it.

Wanji… Wanji looked a little disgruntled, but was the first to speak.

“Wei Ying made this table. He wanted to surprise me for my birthday. I was just happy he remembered it. It’s broken five times since he built it, but he will not let me help fix it, because he wants it to be a gift, to me, that’s entirely from him.”

“Wanji…”

“Wei Ying and I spoke when I came. He wasn’t expecting me, but once we had time to settle down, we spoke. It took time, but he told me what you said to him.” Wanji looked up, meeting his eyes for the first time since before Guanyin Temple. “I love him very much, and I have for a very long time. I understand why you said what you did, but it hurt when I found out. And it still does.” He looked away again.

Tears grew from Xichen’s eyes, prickling as his vision blurred. “Wanji… I’m sorry.”

Wanji’s gaze went to his hands. “Then please apologize to Wei Ying. And stop assuming that he will hurt me. He worries about that enough.”

“...I will.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ve missed you, Wanji.”

Wanji froze, before he looked up at Xichen again, drawing his hands closer to Xichen’s. “And I, you.”

“The town’s people told me about what the two of you have been up to. Very enthusiastically.”

“Mn.” Wanji smiled, just the smallest bit.

“You’ve been doing good here. And you seem happier.”

“Mn. …I do not know if I want to return to the Sect. I have not left in any official capacity, but…” Xichen reached for his hands, resting his on top of Wanji’s.

“You do not want to, but you want to be distanced?” Wanji nodded. “The Elders won’t get any say over it, I can help on the official side.”

“Thank you.”

Quickly mapping out a plan, Xichen continued. “And… I’ll have to talk to you both about it, but you can likely still help out, if you want. We can send younger disciples to help during the harvest, so they can gain experience and have time away from the Sect. Jingyi and Sizhui’s group could have benefitted from the experience.”

“We could use the help, we plan to have more growing this year… Wei Ying would be happy for the company.” He glanced at the house. “But we should still ask.”

A comfortable silence rested upon the two, before Xichen broke it.

“Wanji… can I ask why you haven’t sent any letters? Everyone has been looking for the two of you.” His brother looked away again, his hands tensing for a moment before relaxing again.

“Mn, had asked Sizhui about how he would feel if I went to see Wei Ying. Sizhui knew that Wei Ying was getting closer before he passed for Qinghe. Sizhui had mentioned how easy it would be to see Wei Ying.” Wanji had very clearly met his maximum amount of words used for the day now, and seemed uncomfortable with saying more.

Thinking back, Sizhui had seemed to… accept that his… parents had disappeared together. He became complacent with the idea. He no longer looked as fervently for them, but still would spend extra time on his night hunts to look in the nearby area. “So Sizhui knew that the two of you would be together. Knowing him, he probably expected for us adults to catch onto that. Uncle had thought that Wuxian had kidnapped you, but we haven’t spoken on… any of this for a while now.”

Another peaceful silence covered them, but it seemed easier now. Xichen could easily deduce that by not sending a letter, the duo weren’t drawing more attention to themselves, and perhaps dealing with their first planting season and their first winters had taken up more energy than they had expected. During the silence, rabbits started to pop up, coming to take their pets and attention.

Eventually, midday came around, and Wanji silently led him to the house, where the entry room was in disarray. A few silent words in another room, and the two came out, hand in hand.

“Welcome to our humble abode, Lan-zhongzu. Lan Zhan mentioned the idea for disciples to help out during the harvest, and the town could certainly use the help. Old Man Fang’s back has been getting worse, so the lotus flowers will need help getting harvested.” Wanji visibly squeezed his hand, glancing at him meaningfully. “...And… we could use some help, probably.”

“Excellent.”

//

The lunch that passed was peaceful, Wuxian mostly spending the time gradually gaining more confidence and telling him more about the town as time went on. The brothers stayed quiet, but Wuxian took it in stride. He was collecting the plates and talking about their plans for their farm when they were finished. Xichen then found himself helping plant the first seeds, the plants that will take the longest to grow. Wuxian spoke about how he was working on making talismans that would let them grow year-round, mostly to help the town make more produce and avoid a surprise food shortage during the long winter. He had already developed talismans that help keep food good for longer, and he hoped to make ones that would alter the soil to help grow more variety.

Wuxian clearly didn’t realize how much this would impact the rest of everywhere else, and Wanji also clearly understood this when he shared a look with Xichen.

Apparently Wuxian had a head start on the talismans due to him trying to grow potatoes in the Burial Mounds.

Which, was actually quite depressing.

When they finished, Xichen was invited for dinner, and then invited to stay in a guest room for the night.

When he woke up at Mao Shichen, Wanji was already making tea.

He would leave soon after Wuxian appeared and everything was sorted out, taking Shuoyue and arriving back at Cloud Recesses just after curfew. The first thing he did was wake Sizhui and tell him where his parents were.

When he wakes up the next morning, a whole two incense times late, Sizhui is gone and Jingyi is panicking again.

But come fall, and the younger disciples are leaving to help Wei-gongzi and Hanguang-jun harvest their crops, and help the town harvest theirs, and when they come back, a few days before the first snowfall, they will tell Xichen and the rest of the Sect and the youngest disciples about the tasty lotus seeds and the rabbits that are just like the ones on the back hills and the new talismans that Wuxian has finished. But mostly, they will bring gossip like little children, and they will bring peace to the cultivation world, because Wanji and Wuxian are safe and sound.

Really though, if there’s any real benefit that Xichen will get from this, is the regular letters he gets from his brother, interspersed with bits from Wuxian, and the beautiful pressed lotus flowers.

#231 #mo dao zu shi #mdzs #lan xichen #lan wangji #wei wuxian #lan sizhui #farm #look! I actually wrote stuff!! I even touched this blog!! #fanfic

[mcl4r3n]

Dando shortsgate pwp 1.6k of pure disgusting FaceTime sex because i may be crazy but i am free

Lando smiles wider. "I got off this morning with your shorts pressed to my nose."

The call is predictable at this point.

Lando smiles to himself when he picks his phone up and sees the image of Daniel flipping him off. He's glad he's already in his hotel room.

"Hey," Lando says, screen morphing into Daniel's face. He leans back in bed, still dressed in his clothes from earlier.

"You're a menace," Daniel's rough voice filters in. He looks sleep-soft and a little tired, and that's when Lando realizes it's roughly three in the morning for Danny. "Do you know how many notifications I got because you wore those shorts?"

Lando can feel his smile curl into place, and presses back deeper into his pillows. "Yeah, well," he shrugs. "They're comfortable. What can I say?"

Daniel sighs and flicks the light on next to him, and Lando can see him better this way. He watches Danny sit up, make himself more visible. The blanket over him falls away and Lando can see that Daniel is shirtless, despite it being winter in Australia right now.

His mouth kind of fills with saliva. He's legitimately like Schroedinger's dog or whatever the fuck it's called. He loves seeing Daniel's body. Fucking sue him.

"I like seeing you in my clothes," Daniel says softly. "Gets me going, sorta."

Lando raises his eyebrow, and does a terrible job of hiding his triumphant little smirk. So it's that kind of call.

"Mmm, yeah?" Lando says, his voice dropping.

This thing with Daniel is tenuous at best. They first hooked up in Monaco, and it's only been a couple of months, a few messy blowjobs and one memorable night in Montreal before Media Day where Lando rode him until his leg cramped and they had to stop for a while because he started crying from the knotted muscle in his left calf.

He isn't quite sure whether they're anything more than ex-teammates who fuck sporadically, but he isn't about to pretend that he doesn't miss Daniel, especially since it's his birthday weekend.

"Yeah, especially since they're the literal clothes off my back," Daniel replies. He rubs his hand over his face, then runs his fingers through his hair that's gotten longer since Lando last saw him. He looks scruffy and unkempt, and Lando really wishes he could kiss Daniel right now.

Lando smiles a little, pulls his lower lip between his teeth. "I didn't wash them, you know," Lando says. "After I stole them from you. Just shoved them in my suitcase and took them with me here."

Daniel's eyebrows shoot up, stupid, smug grin on his face illuminated by the orange-yellow light beside him. "You're disgusting."

Lando smiles wider. "I got off this morning with your shorts pressed to my nose."

Lando knows he's delivered the killing blow as soon as the words leave his mouth.

"Jeeeesus, baby," Daniel groans, and then shifts the hold on his phone to what looks like his left hand. Lando's heart rate ticks up. They haven't done this yet, haven't actually had phone sex even if they're sexted a couple of times and sent each other raunchy photos that would be career-ending if they ever got leaked. "Tell—tell me. Walk me though it."

"You want me to tell you how I woke up hard this morning?" Lando asks. He pulls his blue shirt up, runs his palm flat over his abdomen. He's not quite hard yet, but his body does recognize that there's something here, something that it knows it wants.

"Yeah," Daniel replies. "Tell me about how you touched yourself. Tell me what you thought about."

Lando palms himself through the shorts and holds his phone above him so he can show Danny.

"I woke up horny, and I remembered I had the shorts you had on," Lando says. "So I pulled them out and—" He tugs the elastic over his dick, his semi filling out under his grey briefs.

"Show me," Daniel says, his voice lower and rougher now. "Show me exactly what you did."

Lando feels his body heat up all over, and he moves his phone to the little desk beside his bed, angling the camera so that he can move freely. He rolls off the bed and pulls his shirt off, tossing it to the floor, before hooking his thumbs into both his briefs and Daniel's soft, green shorts, to push them down his thighs.

His cock bobs freely, fully hard now. It's been years since he had phone sex with anyone, and it's especially exhilarating to do this with Daniel who keeps his phone on his face, his expression one of hunger, one of full focus. Focus on Lando.

Lando lies down and brings the shorts to his mouth. He turns to the camera.

"This morning, they still smelled like you," Lando says, and Daniel's frown deepens before he mutters, "Fuck, baby."

Lando spits in his hand, too horny and too impatient to get up to get his lube, and that makes Daniel moan again.

"God, you should—fuck, I wanna suck you off," Daniel says softly, with longing. Lando knows how he feels.

Lando brings his left foot up to the bed, the other leg still slung over the edge of the mattress, and starts stroking himself.

"I thought about you sucking me off," Lando admits, encircling his dick in a loose ring of his fingers. "Thought about how when we were in—fuck—in New York and you let me fuck your mouth—"

"I love sucking you off, baby," Daniel says, husky-voiced. "I love the way you taste. I love the way you feel in my mouth."

Lando bites down on the inside of his cheek.

"Are you touching yourself?"

"Of course I am, what do you take me for?" Daniel laughs softly.

"I wanna see, Danny," Lando replies.

So Daniel does show him, angles his phone so that Lando can see his sweats pushed down to mid-thigh, his thick cock nestled in his dark curls.

Lando moans, squeezing his dick tighter, thumbing on his slit where precum blurts out wet and hot. Daniel smells the best there, he thinks, when all the pungent odor of the day rests there mixed with his sweat, his sex.

He presses the shorts into his nose again, trying see if he can still somehow smell Daniel, can somehow parse the difference between him and Danny, but it's all gone now.

That doesn't take away from the show he's putting on though, from the way he's writhing in bed, using more of his spit to slick his way.

Daniel's running his mouth now, telling him how badly he wants to choke on Lando's dick, how much he kind of wishes that he'd decided to fly to Austria instead of home for his birthday and just spend the entire weekend with Lando on his cock, and Lando feels the pleasure taking hold of him, letting Daniel's words, even if untrue, even if all in the heat of the moment, wash over him.

The shorts fall to the side of his head as Lando cranes his neck to look at his phone, to watch the emotions play out over Daniel's face while they both chase their own orgasms.

He feels his thighs tense up, and he cries out, "Danny, I'm—fuck, fuck, fuck, I'm cl-close—"

Daniel's breathing has become ragged, but it's with a firmness and a finality that he says, "Come on the shorts—fuck, baby, come on them, don't wash them, save them for—for me," and it's a disgusting request, it really is, the thought of carrying around his soiled, cum-crusted shorts for god-knows-how long, but somehow even that sends Lando over the edge and he's grabbing the soft material in his hand and using the friction from the cloth to finish himself off, his spunk spilling hot all over it, soaking it through.

Lando's ears are ringing, his lips numb from the force of his second orgasm of the day, and it's while he's trying to catch his breath that he sees Daniel's eyes shutter closed, his mouth open in a scream that never quite leave his lips. He swears again, before he laughs a little, and angles his camera to show how his cum on his chest, and on his chin.

"Holy shit, baby," Daniel says through his laughter. "Haven't come that hard by myself in a long time."

Lando's still heaving lungfuls of breath in, but his body feels boneless and he's sated and tingly all over. He wipes off the rest of his mess on Daniel's shorts and pulls it up for inspection. The pink rose is drenched in white.

"Fuck, Danny, wish you were here," Lando says quietly. He means it, too. Kind of wishes that he could get a cuddle in, really.

Daniel's still chasing his breathing, but he does smile, fond and soft.

"I'll make love to you right and proper when I see you again, dontcha worry," Daniel says, and Lando wrinkles his nose at how fucking cringe it sounds, but he cannot deny that the thought of being made love to, by Daniel no less, has his insides doing a weird sort of jig that he doesn't have the energy to explore right this moment.

"Mmm, looking forward to it," Lando replies before his own yawn interrupts him.

"Off to bed now, yeah," Daniel says with an answering yawn of his own. His mouth curls into a little smile. Lando wishes he could taste it.

"Night, Danny," Lando says as he rises from the bed.

"I was serious about the shorts, by the way," Daniel says. There isn't any teasing in his expression or his tone.

"That's gross, mate," Lando says, wrinkling his nose.

Daniel just shrugs. "You don't even know the half of the gross shit I wanna get up to with you," but now he's smiling. It's a little ominous-sounding. But Lando's face still heats up anyway.

"Christ," is all Lando can say, because he's spent and absolutely cannot go another round right now. "Go to sleep, you pervert."

Daniel waggles his eyebrows at him and Lando wishes he was here so that he could kick him or something. "Only a pervert for you, baby. Good night."

"Night, Danny," Lando says, and ends the call.

His thigh makes contact with the part of the shorts where his jizz is still drying, and groans. God.

#dr3 #ln4 #dando #daniel ricciardo #lando norris #f1 rpf #THIS IS JUST LIKE PURE SMUT #AND KINDA GROSS #BUT THEYRE GROSS #SO IT IS OKAY #shortsgate #enchantégate #my fic

[cu-taibhseil]

i think a lot of people who are working on their grimoire / book of shadows or what have you forget is that it's supposed to be unique. your book of shadows isn't supposed to be filled with generalized information that just any witch can open up and use. you're not marketing your practice to the masses to consume. it's supposed to be unique, and weird, and messy, and filled with information so unique to your own practice that it's borderline gibberish to someone else.

here are some ideas on how to make your grimoire / book of shadows less accessible to other people and more accessible to yourself.

you can have as many books of shadows as your heart desires. you can have one for divination, one for spells, one for mushroom hunting, one you only use in the summer or the winter, etc. you don't have to shove all of your information into one notebook. separating the information will give you more room to go more in-depth for certain subjects. and it will make it harder for people to know exactly what you've got going on, if that's something you're into.

forget about aesthetics. forget about looking cool or legitimate or neat or organized. forget about how someone else would perceive your BoS/grimoire if they found it. if you're a new witch, and especially if you came from tiktok, you need to unlearn that witchcraft requires aesthetics and certain tools in order to be "legitimate." you can use a spiral bound notebook, you can use scraps of paper put in a manila folder, you can use a tumblr blog, you can print out pages from images on Google and put them in a 3 ring binder and call it day, you can use multiple bulletin boards hung up in your kitchen - ALL OF THOSE ARE LEGITIMATE MEDIUMS FOR A BOS! it's not about what looks the best, it's about what's the most functional for you - the term "book" is just a jumping off point.

come up with a written code that only you have the key to. get one from online, take one from history, or make up your own. write your grimoire or just the important pages, or even just the even or odd pages in code. make it so people cannot physically read your BoS. sigils and protections are great, but keeping people physically out is even better. mine is written partially in Scottish Gaelic and partially in a written code that i invented when i was 11. can anyone else read it? no. because that's the point.

go to the craft store and buy a journal lock. put a lock on it. wear the key around your neck. it'll make you feel so powerful, trust me.

include sketches and drawings of plants, animals, your altar, your house, you, your pets, stones, nature, etc. pretend like you're being paid to illustrate a children's book and go nuts. adding little drawings and sketches of the things you use in your practice, or things you see all of the time, or places you go is a great way to set the mood of your grimoire.

along the same lines, use crayons and colored pencils and markers not just black ink. use glitter. use ribbons. use bias tape. go to the craft store and get stickers. put those in there. whatever you think is cute or you like the best.

tape in more pages! if your notebook is only 100 pages long and you know you're going to need more pages, tape some more in! the limit is only how far the rubber band holding your grimoire closed will stretch before snapping (and even then you can just tie it with ribbon or twine or something)

you can also do taped in fold outs for maps, drawings, recipes, etc

why not add polaroid pictures or pictures you printed off google or pictures you got printed at walmart?

you can add stickers and sequins and glitter to the outside too. it doesnt need to look ancient and serious. we dont live in ancient and serious times. get funky with it.

if you've been struggling with your BoS or grimoire i hope this post helps you!

#personal #my craft #witchcraft #witchblr #book of shadows #grimoire #traditional witchcraft #nontraditional witchcraft

[pudding-parade]

@echoweaver

Figured I'd do this this way instead of adding to the comment pile. :) I should've made a separate post with my whining, but…meh. What's done is done.

But yeah, not so much "medical drama" as just…stuff. I had a liver transplant in September. I haven't specifically talked much about it here because...I don't know. I guess I thought if I didn't talk about it it would be less...I don't want to say "depressing," because I'm not depressed, and I don't want to conflate being temporarily down in the dumps with depression. Maybe "difficult" is the right word.

Anyway...I've needed a transplant for about 10 years, my original having been badly damaged by asymptomatic hepatitis C that I unknowingly had, until the damage started making me really sick. I probably originally contracted it from a blood transfusion I had in the 80s, before they tested donated blood for Hep C. Medication as well as a special diet and supplements helped with the symptoms of a failing liver for a while, but this past spring things started to go downhill more quickly and the meds, etc. weren't helping as much.

I had a matching living donor, a relative of my husband's, who wanted to do it and who was finally approved for it. (She'd been deemed too young before.) And I was at the point of, "Do it now or else you won't be healthy enough later to survive the surgery/recovery." So, I did it. And like I said, I know it will be good in the long run, but right now it just kind of sucks. (Though it is nice to be not quite so yellow. I actually have eye whites now, yay! And I look less like a character from The Simpsons. Also also, I can legitimately say that I'm part Mexican now. LOL )

I'll spare you/everyone the gorier details, but I spent almost three weeks (as opposed to the one-week-or-so that's normal for transplants) in the ICU due to rejection issues (which is why my immunosuppressant dose was very high), and then once finally released I was under a "no contact" rule. As in, no contact with anyone but my husband, who was also not allowed contact with other people or else he wouldn't be allowed contact with me. (Thank goodness DoorDash exists now or I don't know what we would have done for food.) The only time I could leave this place was to go directly to a car to be driven directly to a doctor's office where they have a special process/set-up for people in my situation, and it's just nuts. People who went batty during covid lockdowns had it easy compared to this.

So it's been….rough. I don't really care about not being able to see people so much, frankly, but I do not like being cooped up inside. My latent claustrophobia has become not-so-latent of late. At home, I can sit out on the deck or I can wander about or ride my horse for miles in the wilderness without seeing another soul, but not here in a city. Cities suck. If I'd had more time to arrange things I would've at least rented a place with a patio/balcony, but since it was very short-notice, what we have is the best we could get, and it's not very good.

The good news is it's getting better. My immunosuppressant dosages are being lowered and I have no signs of rejection yet, so… *fingers crossed* And I'm down to twice-a-week appointments instead of literally every weekday. So, as of this past Friday I'm now allowed incidental contact, which means I can walk the streets or be at outdoor venues if I stay away from people, especially children (because they go to day care/school and tend to carry all sorts of interesting illnesses), as much as possible, but I can't be indoors for long periods with lots of people, so no stores, movie theaters, restaurants, etc. But this is why we're considering a zoo trip tomorrow. My doctors probably would consider it more than "incidental contact," but at least it's outdoors, close by, and it shouldn't be too crowded since it's winter and the kids aren't out of school for Christmas yet. They also have wheelchair or scooter rentals, so I don't have to walk the whole thing, and I would just be happy to be out in an environment other than a doctor's office for a day. So, I'm pretty sure we're going to do it. Because fuck it.

But anyway. Yeah, I'm trying to be more active online. It was hard for a while because with a giant healing abdominal incision and bruised-up everything, sitting up for long periods of time was a no-go, but I'm doing much better on that front. I've actually been playing No Man's Sky more than Sims, just because it's a space exploration game that makes me feel more like I'm "out there" than Sims does. But, I'm also trying to get back into the simblr momentum. I want to get back to playing the Random Legacy I started, because I can post about that more easily than the weird-o saves I usually play. LOL It's just hard to feel motivated right now, I guess. But we'll get there.

And you know what? For a movie that's supposed to be a comedy, Lilo & Stitch makes me bawl my eyes out. And that scene that I quoted is the "worst" in that regard. But it's still one of my favorite movies. :)

#non sims #replies

[belethlegwen]

The Rescue - Chp 54 - That Dark Old Friend [+ Life Update]

Hey there everyone!

So sorry about the delay in updates since the Christmas season, there's a lot of shit to blame for it and I'll get into it in more detail, but in short this was a wildly busy Christmas season where I had 0 time to write between work and family stuff from like, November-end of December, and then a whole lot of house shit started happening and I've been unbelievably stressed since just before New Years.

Longer details and stuff below the cut for people who are interested, but in short the important details are:

Updates to works on AO3 may be at random times with long delays between for the coming year. Can't be sure, but for now that's how things are looking while I have way too much shit going on IRL.

Please enjoy this little chapter for now, and if you're up for a long winding journey about why it felt like all of my hair has been falling out for two weeks, meet me below <3

So the Christmas season at my job was wildly busy, on top of that there's some issues going on there between the business owner I rent space from and the person who owns the building. It's a mess, for a while it looked like/still kinda looks like we're going to have some major issues with the lot clearing what with winter being a major issue where I live in the Frozen Nor'Atlantic. That was all bad enough.

I had been told back in the fall by my landlord, who I've been renting from for 10 years now, that her mortgage was up for renewal in January and that it looked like it was going to go up a hot amount. Rates are super fucking high in Canada right now, shit's bad, the mortgage specialist at the bank I was talking to yesterday said that it's bad enough they legitimately expect the government to be stepping in soon to do something about it before it's a crisis (or more of a crisis because personally, it's already a fucking crisis and has been, but I digress). She warned me the rent was going to have to go up, I told her I expected it, I knew it was going to happen, she's been amazing to me for 10 years, if it's gotta go up it's gotta go up, I get it.

This past fall is when my partner Zip came to visit for 6 weeks and we got engaged, and when we started to plan to move them up here so we could start immigration and the like, which we were aiming to do for the beginning of this summer.

So as we're gearing up to New Year's and everything, I am expecting to deal with the start of immigration application readying, and expecting rent to increase. December 27th, I got a message from the landlord that uh, someone wants to buy the house (as an investment property and keep the renters) and despite her best efforts to try and bounce around and get a lower mortgage rate, it didn't work out and she's going to have to sell either way. So we suddenly had to get the house ready to be listed and viewed.

Viewings were fucking hell, by the way. While priority for accepting the offer was going to someone who wanted to take the property over and keep the renters in place, Real Estate agents just want the fucking sale, so being in my home while people are wandering around it scaring my cats and talking about how my bedroom was going to be the kid's room and my office was going to be turned into something else? Shit time, don't recommend. Not to mention the agents that were showing up half-hour not just away of their own scheduled appointment but a half hour outside of when viewings were actually permitted to happen.

I'm glad we have such high paying careers available for people who are, apparently, fucking illiterate, but I was getting extremely rude to agents and their desperation for a sale by the end of it. Someone tried to show up yesterday after a offer was accepted literally the night before and we sent them packing fine enough, but now anytime the rain hits the gutters too hard I think someone is walking into my home so that's fun.

We have signs all over the house about keeping doors closed to keep the cats inside, including one on the back door (where it isn't an enclosed porch) that says in extremely large lettering Access To Patio From Outside ONLY, and there were still at least two agents that opened the back door, so. Nightmares all around.

An offering has been accepted, the person who is hopefully going to buy wants to keep us as tenants, and I'm locked in a lease until later this year anyway. Things are at least, as of yesterday when I got the confirmation that an offer was in that stage, stable now that I didn't throw up this morning. Hooray! It's been hell. I can not stress enough that this has been hell.

It still leaves the later part of the year up in the air a lot, because new landlord may still want us out at the end of the lease of whathaveyou, and between now and then I am flying down to America to drive across that wild country with a car full of stuff to move my fiancee here, then we gonna get immigration rolling and the employment switchover and everything else. My Dad has been a massive rock for me during this time in terms of trying to keep me level, and as he says: "this is all just one-step-at-a-time things. You're just keeping ducks in a row".

And as I keep saying: "Yeah but I've got a lot of fuckin' ducks, man."

So that's the kind of thing that's in the air right now for me. Lots and lots of stuff going on. I'm still picking away at writing but to make things easier on myself, I'm going to not stress about any kind of schedule or the like right now and just play with whatever flows come when I have them and have the time/ability to focus on them in the few quiet moments I have between all of the other stuff.

Much love to all of you, thank you all again as always for the wonderful comments you've all left, the kudos, the people who reached out, all of it. You're wonderful <3

Take care of yourselves out there,

~ Belle

#The Rescue #AO3 Update #g/t #giant/tiny #giant tiny #gentle giantess #gt #g/t author #g/t writing #gtauthor #author thoughts #big little thoughts #IRL update #life nonsense #real estate agents have no fucking respect for your time #the one that lied to my face THREE TIMES IN A ROW in just a matter of minutes still fucking gets me #And she drove a fucking Tesla so #that says more than I'd want it to to me #'I have a written confirmation for the time' No you don't #'I wasn't expecting anyone to be home' you pulled up in front of my house while I shoveling and salting the driveway and saw me come inside #'I'm gonna step outside and call the listing agent to clear this up' she did no such thing #fucking hell man

[supersoakerfullofblood]

hi!!! hopefully you are having a good day!!! but a quick question-

how can i give insight to a character's backstory without it look liking a word-dump?? especially if the whole story have a diary entry format.

Very good question that honestly really depends on your personal style, but here's what's worked for me.

The best advice I can give is to stop thinking of your character's history as "backstory." That's one of the words that's become so loaded in popular writing discourse as to not mean anything solid anymore, like "worldbuilding," "theme," "protagonist," etc. Words like that are helpful once you've made your own definition for them, but with so many voices in Youtube tutorials and social media posts all saying similar but different things for what these mean, it's best to find a word that better suits how you view the concept. For me, that word is "history," because like how the present is founded on actual history, our characters are only the product of their history. Characters, like people, rarely if ever operate in the present tense.

So--revealing history without the dreaded expository dump. To answer this, we first have to look at why expository dumps are so uninviting. Here's an example of it done poorly (I'm writing this as an example, not taking someone's writing to like, diss on them hah):

Cheryl took the elevator up all five floors of the haunted house, which groaned as she went, the elevator left untouched since the house's last occupants moved out. When they arrived at the penthouse suite, Doctor Gastor explained that the last residents here thought they were wizards and practiced daily at arcana. Their names were Abigail and Horace--he had renamed himself after a demon had told him his true name, so he claimed--and they wintered in this remote, northern sphere to avoid Italian summers. Horace was wealthy, Abigail poor, but he had found her in poverty and saw something of the occult in her movements, so he stole her away one summer, and the two found more in common than they would've thought, for they married the next year. Cheryl paced the floor, picked up and dusted off a book titled in runic chicken scratch, and opened the cover."

This isn't the worst example I could think of, but it has the hallmarks I'm looking for. The first issue with this expository dump ("Doctor Gaston explained... next year") is that it shatters the flow of the passage. As a writer of narrative fiction, the goal of every sentence is to lead smoothly to the next sentence. To do this, we always have to be thinking of what the reader wants to read after a given sentence. If one sentence is about an elevator groaning in a haunted house, the reader probably wants to know how Cheryl reacts to it! Is she scared of ghosts? Does she believe in ghosts? Is she scared of elevators? If so, what does she do? Move to hit a button on the elevator to stop it? If scared of ghosts, how does she internalize this? If not scared, how does she internalize perhaps how Doctor Gaston is shivering? (Is he shivering?) These are all places the reader's mind wants to go to after that sentence. Instead, we get this history about some old wizards (if I had the patience, I would've made it longer to really make it intrude on the narrative, but I don't have the patience). If this is the first time the reader's hearing about the wizards, they probably won't care about them. This synopsis of their story interrupts what the reader actually cares about, which is whatever Cheryl cares about in the moment. To fix this interruption, Cheryl could find the book of runes maybe in the chapter before this, because that gets the reader invested. The reader, just like Cheryl, wants to know why there's a book of runes in the haunted house. So Cheryl asks Doctor Gaston about it, which legitimizes this exposition, because it's also what the reader wants to know.

Another major fault of info dumps is when they don't relate to the character at all. Cheryl's history (let's say she's a girl from the country who wandered into the house on accident) has nothing to do with wizards. Maybe in the narrative, she learns to cast some spells, which makes her care about wizards, but at this point, she doesn't. If Cheryl has nothing to do with wizards, or little to do with them, then why should the audience care? When writing a character's history, you should only include the parts that matter to the character. And this written history should never be too long, because you never want to stunt the flow of the piece (what "too long" means is up to debate and your discretion and style).

Also, exposition only works when it feels genuinely embodied by the character speaking. Is Doctor Gastor explaining the wizard history, or is that the author talking? Some of it sounds like Gastor (the bit between the em dashes sounds like what he would say), but the rest sounds like Gastor is only a mouthpiece for the information I want to put out.

So, solving it. One trick I like to do when giving exposition is to make the exposition into its own mini-scene. You don't want to write, "Carmen was friends with Piper, and they went to the dance once as friends." Instead, give it some space on the page:

She and Piper were the only girls in their group who had gone quiet at curfew. Beatrice’s only crime was in whispering comments in the early hours, short things to guide the group’s banter, never loud enough to warrant arrest. “Not really, no.” “That’s nice.” Carmen nodded and drew his eyes across the crowd. “Did she sleep well?” “Beatrice?” “Yeah.” “I guess.” The path turned up the steep hill on which the dining hall was built. “I don’t know. I don’t think anyone really slept well.” “Oh.” “It’s just uncomfortable, you know?” “The girls?” She raised an eyebrow. “And the boys aren’t?” “No, they are.” He laughed, and Piper was dragged to the same laugh at Homecoming three months ago. She had requested for the Melpomene band’s recent concert recording to be played after the next pop song, and surprisingly, her request was approved. Carmen laughed as their poor performance boomed from the speakers, laughed at the disruption of a dance, and Piper laughed too. But within the minute, the concert’s strident ballad was supplanted by another chart-topping pop song. But for those forty seconds, music was displaced, and the dancers stopped; city walls fell; Piper had broken something for forty seconds, held power for forty seconds. She said now, “It’s just weird, being here. It’s all too happy. Too clean.”

Exposition can work really well in brief flashbacks. And note how the exposition starts: a mirroring of "laugh" because the image is fresh in the reader's mind, so I take them on a sort of dream logic to the past. Note also that this is planting the seeds for some relevant character-building: Piper's growth into an independent woman--"Piper had broken something for forty seconds, held power for forty seconds." Here's another example from my current WIP:

He thought of Brynjar the day he had given him the knot. It was the spring of Óskar’s sixth year, and Brynjar had taken him to the docks one morning to watch sailing men fix fresh ropes on their karves and clip pulleys to sails to tie them to the boats’ sides. “Never doubt a weaver woman,” Brynjar said, annunciating each word. “They keep everything afloat.” “‘Floating,” repeated the young Óskar. “If the ropes aren’t strong, a boat’ll flip and spin. Like this!” He lifted Óskar above his head and spun on his heels, and Óskar cackled. The father set the son on his shoulders and smiled. “Yes, we need those ladies.” Óskar felt his father’s shoulders raise, and he knew the man forged something witty in his mind. “It means, Óssie, a man is only as good as his woman. And you can tell your mother I said that.” Eldrid, Óskar’s mother, would leave in her sleep later that year, and the witches would say she was sick, and Brynjar would spend some nights looking through the cracks in his home, remembering the gray wife he woke to that morning. In his memory, Óskar did not know whether this new recollection of his mother’s passing tainted his father’s speech or if he really did turn somber, but all the same, a short silence paused the scene at the dock, and Brynjar coughed to break it. His voice was low now. “Dangerous,” he said, looking with eyes like the beads of a raspberry at the men on the dock, looking through them. His jowls lowered like curtains, forced low with the hill of a frown, and in the memory, his skin blued and bloated. “It’s dangerous out there, Óssie. Be safe.” He sniffed. “Be well.” “Óskar?” Ingrid stole him. He breathed back into the world and saw now that the road had turned down and the rock wall had turned in, and they approached a strip of sea.

In addition to providing a character's history, this also fleshes out the world: the importance of women and boats, the dangers of the sea. Before the flashback, Oskar is thinking about a knot, so he thinks about the day he got the knot, which makes him think about sailing boats. At the end of the flashback, he thinks about the ocean ("looking through [the sailors]," so probably at the ocean), thinks about his father's skin if he drowned, and back in the present-tense, uh oh, Oskar is nearing the ocean. It all flows together; we're guiding our reader.

But these are only small exposition dumps, and sometimes, we need to convey much more information. You can subtly convey much more information than you realize through dialogue and description, because how a character talks and acts is guided by their histories. If a character is short-spoken, they may have had some interpersonal trauma that you can flesh out more when the time is right:

“No,” Sylvia whispered, trapping Chloe again with her stare, desperate. “I can’t sleep over.” “Why not?” Jane asked. “Mom says I have to be home by seven.” She looked down at her empty plate, at the crumbs from one slice of pizza. “But you haven’t asked her,” Jane prodded. She shook her head. “I did before.” Still in disbelief, Jane asked, “What did she say?” “She said I have to be home by seven.” She blushed. “And I can do whatever till then.” “Oh,” Jane said. She slunk back in her chair. Chloe turned back to her parents. “Can you call Jane’s mom?” “Sure thing.” “Thanks!” She swiveled back and, fingering the fruit Phoebe scrambled on her plate, decided to eat it later. She grabbed a second slice from the box. Moments passed as they ate in silence, Sylvia watching her plate, and the muffled television played something in the living room. Mom and dad laughed. “I should go,” Sylvia said. She bumped the table as she stood, reciting, “Thank you for having me.” Jane looked at the clock hovering above the front door. “It’s only six-twenty.” “I need to go home.” “Oh.” Jane stuttered. “I’ll see you next week!” Chloe said the same. “Thank you. See you.” She opened the door and slipped through. It clicked behind her. Chloe and Jane paused their gnawing and looked up at each other, sharing a thought. They hadn’t heard a car grumble on the gravel, didn’t hear anything drive by at all, and neither of them knew how close she lived. They scraped their chairs from the table and crept to the dining room window like characters in a Jones Bones movie, Jane thought. But when they pulled back the curtain, she was gone. No cars drove on the street, and the sidewalk was empty. A golden glare shrouded the street and surrounding houses as the sun lowered behind a roof.

Throughout this book (The Ghosts of Glass Lake, available now ;)), it's implied that Sylvia has a controlling and/or abusive mother. In this scene, Sylvia is curt and direct. You can almost feel the urgency behind her words, how she bumps the table as she stands, and how it almost sounds like she's rehearsed this exit. It's also implied that no one came to pick her up--she walked home, but neither Jane nor Chloe know where she lives, and neither does the reader. Maybe she walked home for miles because her mother didn't pick her up. You can get a lot of meat from implications!

But still, there are times when you just need a lot of dense exposition, usually near the beginning of a book when you need to describe the setting. My best advice, if you ever need to do this, is to keep it as brief as possible, and to pay extra attention to pacing/flow/tempo/whatever-you-want-to-call-it so it doesn't distract, doesn't feel like a chore:

The seventh and eighth graders of Carmen’s church spent one Saturday every winter at Camp Catechism. The campus set its roots in northern Michigan, breathed easterly winds from Lake Huron, and sparked to life as batches of middle schoolers arrived on midnight buses. Cabins formed a bivouac in a birch forest, and one mile to the east lay the lake and the curve of its horizon. It was frozen now, and the limbs of trees wavered slowly under snow, ice eating at chipped, white bark. The chapel the middle schoolers sang in now was a wide A-frame built and reeking of old wood. A low stage headed the room from which stood a pianist, a drummer, and a guitarist, a stage from which Roman Richards would soon discuss Ephesians. The dining hall was a short walk from everywhere and displayed from a wide window the canopy of the burdened forest, ossified waves, and the sun glinting unbearably against it all. Cups of hot chocolate were filled and refilled on a counter at the entrance of the dining hall, and campers drank these violently, abrading their throats as adolescent drunks. Boys and girls separated into two large halls subdivided into tight rooms for each youth group, everything barred entrance from the other sex. As a general rule, phones were banned, as were drugs, candles, and cursing, though the popular boys forged unique methods to circumvent these restrictions, and anyone caught with contraband was witnessed a martyr for a greater sense of vagrancy. Still, most campers lived within their rules, their obligations, just as they always had at church, and any rule breaking (“sin,” as Roman Richards claimed) was relegated quickly to myth, to rumors spread away from pious ears. As such, Carmen and his contemporaries were only loud ostensibly, never committing to a biblical criminal record. This was not to say that anyone at Camp Catechism was reserved—they spilled everything about their lives to their youth group leaders, but no one yet could articulate exactly what they meant, exactly what they felt, and scantily of dreams, ambitions, or desires.

And as all good exposition does, it flows well back into the narrative. The last paragraph above is a bridge between the camp description and a look into Carmen's inner life.

You may also find halfway through your narrative that you need to dump a bunch of character exposition, and you need to do it urgently. My trick for this is to make chapter A flow into the exposition, chapter B be an extended flashback scene, and chapter C to pick up where A left off. For example, if you need to talk about a character's relationship with his father but haven't done that yet in depth, find an easy way to transition into a flashback chapter that does just that. It's an enlarged version of the flashback tool I talked about above!

Now, all of this is what's worked for me, and I write third person distant POV narratives. It sounds like you're writing first person close POV haha. So I don't really have any examples to help with, but the general advice to 1. Keep the pacing/flow/tempo/etc. so exposition doesn't distract, and 2. Write exposition only about what matters to the character, preferably only what matters to the character in that moment, then you should be a-okay. Exposition is only as bad as it distracts, and these are the strategies I've found to distract as little as possible and to use the exposition to meaningfully build my characters as much as possible.

And again, this exposition dump problem doesn't have hard and fast solutions. Every author deals with it in their own way, and I'm sure with practice, you'll find what works best for you and what comes naturally to you, just as I'm always discovering and refining what works for me. The advice in this post is, I think, a solid place to start from :)

#writeblr #writing #writing advice #writing questions #creative writing #fanfic #writers on tumblr #writerscommunity #writer #writers of tumblr

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

was i the asshole for refusing to pay a private contractor what they claimed i owed?

preface: i rent a townhouse that has both a front and a back yard, and the lawn mower broke (landlord refuses to fix it), so i was forced to find a landscaping company locally who could mow the grass in spring and summertime. i hate mowing so no real loss, plus i get to support local small businesses! score!

everyone around here sucks at communication (as in they just don't show up or respond to any texts, calls, or emails even when Maureen From The HOA is breathing down your neck) except for one company i've been using religiously ever since i found them. love these guys. quality work, excellent communication, affordable, flexible, these guys are the best and i have referred my neighbors to them as well.

at the beginning of spring 2023, money was kinda tight so i asked if they could only mow every three weeks. they told me no dice, only in two-week increments because they have a rolling scheduling of which neighborhoods get hit up on certain weeks. fair enough. i ask for a mow every four weeks. sure, the grass will get a little tall, but the HOA can shut up.

they come every two weeks instead and text AFTER they've already done the work, so i have to pay for it. i pay them promptly, but ask if they can please honor my wishes for it to be every four weeks, as we discussed. they honor that... once. and then go back to every two weeks. by this time, the grass is shooting up faster than expected and i still hate the HOA, so i sigh and let it go. every two weeks it is.

fast forward to late autumn as winter's rolling in and i'm writing the check for the last mow of the season when the guy calls and says "oh btw you owe hundreds of dollars we never told you about until just now".

somehow, they got it in their heads that they mowed my lawn every single week, and should be paid for that. not once did that happen. not only was there no communication about them having been there OR needing payment (remember how i said they were so good about communication? i have texts going back the entire season where they message me "hey we mowed your lawn today" every two weeks exactly, and what sense does it make for them to forget to say anything every other week on the nose?), but i think i would have noticed grass getting shorter for no reason. also remember how i specifically told them i wanted a mow every four weeks and never actually rescinded that request? it's in writing. it's in the text log. at no point did i ever approve this "weekly" work, even if they'd actually done it (which they didn't).

thing is, these guys are prompt and reliable. they're the best option i've got around these parts. they really don't strike me as the types to pull a fast one on me or scam me. i think it was a genuine, honest mistake and they got my house mixed up with someone else's in the ledger, and now they're out the money for work they legitimately performed... just not for me. i recommended them to my neighbors, remember? not impossible they got the house numbers for my street mixed up. a 6 can look like an 8, or a 7 like a 1 if your handwriting smudges.

i got so caught up in my kneejerk response of "hey what the fuck do you mean i owe money for work i told you i didn't want and you didn't actually do" that i didn't work with them to try to figure out what actually happened here, and now a local business got screwed over. WITAH?

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

[heroofshield]

Whumpcember Day 10- Freezing (Dragon Age 2 FemHawke & Varric)

Takes place during Act 1 before the mission in the Deep Roads.

@whumpcember

--

Growing up in Ferelden, Marian Hawke had experienced her share of cold; especially in Lothering where during the winters the snow could pile up almost to the roof. Escaping to Kirkwall, she'd thought that the winters would be somewhat milder since the city was by the Waking Sea.

She was wrong.

"Maker, this wind is brutal." Marian groused as a gust of wind whistled through the streets, drawing the shawl she had closer around her. "How do you deal with it?"

"Layers. Lots of layer and furs if you can afford it." Varric replied, dodging a pile of near frozen horse droppings. "This isn't even the coldest it's gotten. I remember ten years ago when the harbor froze nearly two miles out. Ice was so thick that you could walk on it no worries. Another time there was a blizzard so bad that it took the city the rest of the winter to dig out."

Marian let out a groan, "Don't say such things, Varric. You're just going to jinx it."

Turning the corner and seeing the entrance to The Hanged Man, Varric just smiled, "It's your second winter in the city, you should be used to it by now."

Marian sighed as they walked into the tavern and the warmth surrounded her like a welcome embrace. Flexing her near frozen fingers, she threaded her way through the crowd towards the stairs and Varric's suite of rooms. Standing in front of the fireplace, she felt her muscles start to warm up and relax. "I don't think I'll ever get used to it."

--

They needed money for firewood.

The winter had been usually cold, at least that was according to those who'd grown up in the city, and they'd had to spend more than usual to keep Gamlen's house heated. So if Marian wouldn't have to dip into the funds she'd been setting aside for Varric's expedition, she needed to take a few jobs. Her reputation working for the smugglers meant that those that knew were approaching her with 'job opportunities' since she knew the best routes in and out of the city to avoid detection. And while Marian knew those guaranteed a payout, she was trying to find more legitimate jobs.

"But those are few and far between. Not everyone wants to work with a Ferelden still." Marian thought as she stared at the household accounts. She'd promised Bethany that she'd take care of Leandra and Carver, and over the past few years she'd realized that that meant she'd have to do things that her younger sister might not have approved of.

"Guess that it's the smuggling jobs until something else comes along." Marian thought as she memorized the details of the job that would get them the coin they needed to get them the firewood that they needed plus some in case the winter decided to stretch itself out.

--

Hawke was missing.

She'd asked Varric if he was up for a quick smuggling job, but he'd replied that he was knees deep in his latest novel and didn't want to stop mid-stream; if he did then who knows if he'd ever finish the draft before his editor started sending daily letters asking where it was.

Hawke had just let out a laugh and said she better get to read it first before he sent it off before bounding down the stairs towards the main floor of the tavern, calling over her shoulder that she'd be back the next day.

"That was yesterday and normally she'd at least stop by to see if she could get a few free drinks from me in exchange for telling me about it for my next serial." Varric thought as he idly tapped the end of his quill against the paper. "She could just be resting at Gamlen's, it snowed pretty awful last night; had to make the mountain pass difficult to get through."

But the feeling in his gut told Varric that something wasn't right.

So he cleaned up his drafts and hightailed it to see Carver, and somewhat discreetly see if Hawke wasn't just sleeping it off, but she wasn't at home so her brother agreed to help look for her. Then it was to the City Centre and the guard's quarters to ask Aveline if she'd seen the quick witted warrior. She hadn't either and reluctantly agreed to join their small party to go hunt down the woman. One last stop in Darktown for Blondie just in case they needed a healer and they were on their way.

In the interest of time, and hoping that Aveline would ignore the fact that they were traveling through smuggling tunnels, Varric decided to use the Merchant's Guild route he knew would get the to the highlands the quickest. Stepping out into the snow covered pass, the cold air slapped Varric's face and he wished he'd brought his fur lined jacket. "Or at the least my shirt that closes all the way up." he thought, trying to suppress a shiver.

Glad for the snowshoes so he wasn't head deep in the snow, Varric called out Hawke's name as loud as he dared without causing an avalanche, "Hawke!"

"If she's unconscious she won't hear us." Aveline said, drawing her cloak tighter around her.

Varric chose to ignore the statement and continued trudging forwards, "Hawke, you out here!?"

"Marian!" Carver called out, narrowing his eyes against the brightness of the snow.

"Hawke! You still owe for those fines last month!" Aveline called out, knowing that if the woman could hear her then she'd protest. But silence greeted them.

"Search the ground for any signs of footprints, there would not be many traveling through here this time of year." Fenris said, starting to scout ahead of the small party.

They fell silent after that, spread out and focused on the ground-hoping for some sign that Hawke was still alive.

After what felt like an eternity, Carver let out a whistle to draw everyone's attention and they made their way towards him. "Look, footprints." He pointed to the ground where an indentation could just be seen. "Looks like they go off in this direction."

Varric looked in the direction that Carver indicated and in the fading sun could just make out the outline of a cave. "Even if it's not her, we need to find shelter soon. Otherwise we'll be icicles when they find us."

"Maybe who ever made the footprints is still in there and can tell us what happened." Aveline said, unslinging her shield from her back and making sure that her sword wasn't hindered by her cloak.

Anders nodded in agreement and readied his staff while Varric got Biance out and Carver made sure that his sword was ready as well.

Inside the cave it was a touch warmer than outside, but not by much. Their breath still created white clouds in the air and Anders created some mage lights so they could see.

What Varric wasn't expecting was for Marian Hawke to be illuminated by said lights; propped up against the cave wall, eyes closed and slumped over herself.

"Maker's kickers." he cursed as Carver sheathed his sword and made a beeline towards his sister. "Blondie, you're up."

Anders nodded, setting his staff against the wall and kneeling opposite of Carver.

Marian was freezing. The snow had been heavier than she'd expected it to be and that had caused all sorts of problems until she'd realized that she'd be stuck in the mountains without any supplies to get her through the cold night. It had been luck that she'd found the cave and had hoped that Carver or someone would miss her enough to come looking.

Feeling warm for the first time since setting out, she opened her eyes expecting to be greeted to the damp of the cave-not the whitewashed walls of a room in Ander's clinic. Confused, she tried to sit up and discovered that she was nearly being held down by multiple blankets.

"You gave us quite a scare."

Marian looked over to see Varric in the doorway, a bowl of something in his hands. "Oh?" she asked in a rough voice. Clearing it, she tried again, "Did I get bitten by wolves and almost turn into a warewolf?"

"Not as dramatic. Nearly became a human icicle though." Varric carefully set the bowl of hot soup on the small nightstand by the cot. "Good thing we brought Blondie along, he said that a few more hours and it would have been off to see the Maker for you."

Marian carefully pushed back the blankets so she could sit up and brushed the stray hairs out of her vision, "At least you missed me enough to go looking for me."

"Y'know Chuckles, if you needed the coin I would've let you borrow it. Didn't have to be so dramatic and nearly freeze to death."

Marian huffed in amusement, "You know me, I have to make a statement. Besides, we'd just gotten out of the smuggling guild-what makes you think I wanted to go into debt right after that?"

"Could've called it an advance on our delving findings." Varric shrugged, knowing that the casual way they were talking was the way they communicated; through jokes and playing it off like it was no big deal. "Unlike the Merchant's Guild I have reasonable terms. At least you wouldn't lose a limb if you couldn't pay it back."

At that Marian let out a laugh and knew the words that they weren't saying. "At that, how can I say no?"

"Just promise next time you decided on a 'quick job' you at least take two other people."

"I promise to cut other people next time."

"Good. Now drink your soup so I can go back to my writing."

#whumpcember2023 #dragon age #da2 #marian hawke #varric tethras #fanfic #my writing

[the-ninja-legacy-whip]

how did you come up with the ideas for the guardians and the devourer/genesis both representing an uroboros and their connection to lloyd

I dunno if this is really all that coherent cuz I don't entirely remember the order of my process, just the general trains of thought I was on at some points in time. And boy are they a ride regardless!

I do know that the Ouroboros thing was definitely last, and definitely the best part <3

Buckle up, this one's good, I promise!

As may not be common knowledge, the upcoming Book 3 (based on Season 2) was originally the one and only story I was planning to write for the 10th Anniversary. But as we've well seen by now, there was so much worldbuilding and lore rewriting and character work that had to be built up first, hence two entire stories that had to come before it.

And of course, in the meantime, a lot of stuff got worked around and changed and added. There wasn't even an "Elemental Compass" until after I started work on Chapter 1 for Book 2, when it occurred to me that I needed a concise foundation for how these freaking elements work, especially if I was gonna jack things up when it came to Lloyd and how to factor in the Golden Power (and, y'know, toss in a Master of Surprise).

But, what was at the heart of everything from the very beginning was the idea that the Core Four's Animal Symbols had much more significance than what the show demonstrated, and that they followed a very specific order: Zane and the Wolf represented North and Winter, Jay and the Octopus represented East and Fall, Kai and the Lion represented South and Summer, and Cole and the Gorilla represented West and Spring (hence why I made such a big deal about their birthdays in the beginning times; it's not as important now, just a fun fact snksnksn).

And the first inspiration for that came from this:

The arrangements of symbols within the Temple of Light (called the 'Temple of Life' in Legacyverse) was the one and only time the Animal Symbols were ever significantly acknowledged, and while many things about it bugged me (Jay and Cole visibly going to the wrong symbols, the fact that it wasn't the opposites lined up with each other, etc.) it was still the coolest thing to my young mind and I really wish they could've done more with the concept. But then it never got mentioned again!

So, that's basically how the "Base Compass" got started, before it was even called that.

Then I got to thinking "Well, those symbols would have had come from somewhere", and I played around with the idea of those beasts actually being out in the world or realms somewhere. The only issue was slotting them somewhere in the story proper that would make sense and wouldn't be overly intrusive.

...combine this with the issue of the dragons: having them around would make the movie!mechs be pointless, and then if they were just going to leave, fuse together, and die anyway then what would be the point of having them around at all? So I reworked the role of the dragons for s9 if we ever get there and replaced them with the Guardians instead -> still powerful otherwordly beasts that help from time to time, but not to the point that they're a quick-fix for everything.

And then when I started legitimately developing the Compass as a whole, I got the idea that, while the FSM possessed the Essences of Creation and Destruction (unified as one in the for of Neutralization, the Golden Essence), he wouldn't have had an element to his name, and that these creatures could have been the ones to tech him how to harness the Core Elements (and then into the Golden Weapons). They became his friends, and he held them in such high regard that the symbols are one way he showed his gratitude towards them, especially after convincing them to help protect his realm after the Overlord first manifested. Putting them at the four extremes of the world is how I got the idea to divide the island into Provinces as well (matched up literally like a compass).

Now, onto Lloyd.

His Guardian was initially just going to be the Dragon, big whoop, and the Dragon (Genesis, though I was calling them Epsilon back then) was just going to be related to all things Green Element, end of story close the book one and done, nothing complicated. But then the Book of Elemental Powers releases, and do you know what they had as the symbol for the Green Element?

...A SNAKE?!!?!?!? (whiiiiiiiiich is actually on the back of Lloyd's Elemental Robe prior to him becoming the Ultimate Spinijtzu Master in the show. I didn't even spot it for years, but, y'know)

Anyway, so, do you know what they then had for the Golden Power????

Oh, there's the dragon.

But it gets BETTER

Before Lloyd even taps into any kind of power at all, do you know what his very first symbol was?

Another Snake? No, even better...an Ouroboros

And when we look up the base definition of an Ouroboros?

"A circular symbol depicting a snake, or less commonly a dragon, swallowing its tail as an emblem of wholeness or infinity"

Key words here being: SNAKE OR DRAGON

Leading to my conclusion of, as I had Pythor so nicely phrase it:

"…but the Ouroboros is the insignia of a serpent devouring its own tail. The symbol exists as a representation that endings are beginnings and beginnings are endings. For some, it’s a symbol of hope, proving the determination that persists within all life. But it could also be a hopeless symbol, as it represents no escape from the cycle either… A new loop is always created, just as one is always destroyed in the same breath. It is life and death, both at once, at the same time…it's infinite, and yet, what makes it infinite also sabotages its own existence…" 

(Infinity, you say? Something...infinite? Like....something that cannot be created or destroyed? Something unparalleled? Something...like energy???)

But also–

"The symbol for the Green Element is an Ouroboros, no matter how you look at it. And that's the kicker, isn't it: an Ouroboros is just a serpent…and a serpent can be a snake or a dragon."  

Pythor stares at his crude scribble of the compass with a frown.  

"…or for our purposes, perhaps it could be both. Two sides…of a single coin. Two sides of a single element."  

Thusly, in conclusion— Lloyd's overall symbol, and overall Guardian, is an Ouroboros. When divided into the two aspects of his Element, a green snake represents the Green Element, and a gold dragon represents the Golden Essence. Of course, his Guardians would exist to parallel these concepts.

Conveniently, there was a Golden Dragon within the Temple of Light that Lloyd's actions led to the release of.

(it's moreso a metaphorical release but roll with me here)

Also conveniently, there was a Green Snake that Lloyd's actions led to the release of.

So, it wasn't really too hard to pinpoint how to work Lloyd's Guardian(s) into the picture, ahahaha.

They represent the two side of Life Itself—the side that Creates, the side that Destroys, and when put together, it Neutralizes...

“To create is to destroy; to destroy is to create. To do both, is to be human.”

But everything just fit so insanely well: the Ouroboros symbol itself, the snake/dragon/serpent thing, endings being new beginnings, the whole philosophy of the Green Element matching that of symbolism of an Ouroboros, the fact that all these things were just sitting there in plain sight, unnoticed by the untrained eye?!?! Do you now see why I am obsessed with the untapped potential of this green-gold child?!

ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!?!?

Aaaaaaaand tying it aaaall back into Movie!verse -> small spoilers, but I've mentioned already, Lloyd's Element is an element of connection. His strength is derived from being surrounded by others, by being surrounded by life, and supported by others connections with him. It's why he requires a connection with the Core Four to unlock his True Potential (whatever that may mean <3).

"Green is the color of life. It flows through all living things... connecting them all. The way I connect the ninjas."

AND THE WAY YOU CONNECT THE ELEMENTS, KID.

#ninjago #the lego ninjago movie #tlnm #lloyd garmadon #legacyverse #the ninja legacy whip #legacy spoilers #info tag #long post #elemental compendium

[aberooski]

My friend is trying to get me to watch GX, and they really like stormshipping. I’m just barely starting the series, but I want to understand the appeal of these two. So… take this as a chance to ramble about why you love them, I guess?

OOOOOH!!! 👀👀👀👀

Okay first of all, yes! Totally watch it! It's so silly and fun but also filled with The Horrors. It's flawed and all as most things are, but it's my favorite!

BUT STORMSHIPPING TIIIIIME!!! Let's see if I can do this with as few spoilers as possible aksksk

Those two are everything to me 😭 my roman empire, if you will.

Stormshipping is your classic introvert/extrovert, golden retriever/black cat, emo kid/theater kid, summer/winter, sun/moon type of pairing, for one, which is delightful. They compliment each other so well, and with just how MUCH subtext and stuff, and literally so much to analyze about them like that that we get considering how little the amount of screen time they have together is, there's no heterosexual explanation for like 90% of their interactions. And there's the complimentary parallels and associations and things like that. For example, Light and Darkness, they do have that parallel in what they're corrupted by against their wills. (Also the fact that Chazz has Light and Darkness Dragon as his ace card in the manga and he and Atticus totally represent it in the anime but shhhhhhhhhhhhh 🤫) also can't really delve as deep into that without talking about some major plot shit so

And it kinda as always, comes down to what those two are to each other.

As a blanket sentiment, they're best friends. But Atticus is the only person Chazz is shown to be genuinely comfortable around and willingly vulnerable and open with. Chazz comes to him when he has problems, he confides in him, he seeks him out when he needs to be vulnerable for a moment. I think he also gravitates towards Atticus at first, obviously because he wants his help to try and get a date with Alexis seeing as he's her brother and all, but I think also because his own brothers were so awful and abusive and didn't truly care about him. Most people don't, actually. But Atticus takes a genuine vested interest in him and legitimately cares about him and that's not something Chazz is used to. Not to say the squad doesn't care about him, they do, but not in the same way Atticus does. I think he starts out as a sort of surrogate big brother figure for him in the way Jaden is for Syrus for kinda similar reasons seeing that Zane was an abusive and really bad brother to Syrus for many years as well. But this isn't about them 😜

Atticus is also a mentor figure for him, that goes into the Japanese version, where Chazz actually calls him "master" and I mean 🤨 there are other words you could use buddy but okay you do you 😏

Atticus takes care of Chazz. He looks after him and is a kind hand and a shoulder and a steady rock when he needs it. By the end Chazz is the person other than Alexis that Atticus is closest to and is the most important to him. But also Chazz's friendship is very healing for Atticus. Their friendship is significant and is healing for both of them.

They both have a lot of trauma and baggage to varying degrees, and like I said Chazz isn't used to having someone genuinely care about him because of his abusive brothers and having to put on a facade and hide his authentic self as a means of being able to meet their impossible expectations of him and being able to handle the pressure any way he can. Atticus is probably the only person who's ever truly seen the real, genuine, vulnerable Chazz. He's basically the only one who makes him genuinely smile too honestly and that hits. Atticus is the first person he genuinely accepts as his friend and accepts love and care from too. He's comfortable with him, he feels safe with him. He feels cared for and loved with him.

And for Atticus, Chazz is the closest friend he's had in a long time. He was good friends with Zane before his disappearance the year prior, but because he missed so much he doesn't graduate with Zane so he's not around and with what happens with Zane after graduation, yeah they're not nearly as close or as good of friends as they used to be. And when Atticus returns, well he suffers a lot. He's so physically and mentally affected by what happened to him that I personally believe his entire personality and his quirks and eccentricities, as genuine and authentic as they are, have become a coping mechanism. And Atticus takes care of anyone and everyone but himself. So when he realizes how Chazz has all this trauma and baggage like he does, albeit to an entirely different degree and of different circumstances, he takes him under his wing and devotes himself to looking after him and kinda coaching him through life in a way. He helps him try to get a date with Alexis when he asks him for help, but personally I think Atticus set him up to fail there but in a loving way. Alexis doesn't like him like that and I also think Chazz is honestly confused about the nature of his feelings about her. I think Atticus sets him up for failure in that situation and I think he does it to so she can reject him, which she does very kindly I might add, and he can move on and learn and grow as a person and develop more emotional intelligence from it because of how stifled he is in that way because of his brothers.

Also going back to how Chazz's friendship is significant and important for Atticus, another reason for that is because Chazz is the only person other than Alexis he's that close to now. He has a friend to confide in and share his own feelings and innermost thoughts with that isn't his now fiercely protective little sister. There are things he can't talk to her about and things he can't go to her for and confide in her with because she'll worry and he can't do that to her. He can't make her worry about him again. And Chazz is so easy for him to talk to. Atticus is a social butterfly and and extrovert unlike Chazz, he has no problems with talking to people and being open about things, but we only ever see him actually do that with Chazz. They have private moments and they confide in each other and they look out for one another. Atticus is also protective of Chazz in his own little ways too as he is with Alexis.

Atticus protects and cherishes everyone he cares for but none more so than Chazz and Alexis. They are his world. His everything. His reason. His.

Also the fact that when you looks into all the GX media, the dub, the sub, the manga, everything. Across it they each are associated with a weather phenomenon. One of Atticus's titles across the manga and the sub is Blizzard Prince. Which makes sense seeing as his Japanese name "Fubuki" literally means "blizzard". And as we all know, Manjoume Thunder. They are each associated with a type of storm which in my opinion, is why they are stormshipping. And long those lines, I associate each of them with a season. Atticus's season is summer, for obvious reasons, and Chazz's seas to me has always been winter. And I made these associations before I ever connected these two dots here. Atticus is associated with blizzards. A winter storm. And Chazz is associated with thunderstorms. Which generally speaking, are summer storms.

They are each associated with the storm that corresponds with the other's season.

That blew my mind when I finally connected those dots, literally destroyed my mind.

ALSO HERE HAVE SOME CONTEXTLESS VISUAL EVIDENCE

Leaning more on Chazz than Alexis when he's a little fucked up 👀

ONLY Atticus would picture him smiling like that. Only Atticus COULD picture him smiling like that because nobody else has ever SEEN it before.

LOOK AT CHAZZ. LOOK HOW ADORABLE HE IS WITH HIM.

CHAZZY'S AWKWARD B L U S H I N G !!

THE WAY HE SMILES AT HIIMMMMM

T H I S S H I T. THE WAY THEY LOOK AT EACH OTHERRRRRRR. HE'S BLUSHING AGAAAAAINNNN !!!

There is no heterosexual explanation for this shot being from Chazz's POV.

LOOK AT THIS ROMANTIC ASS PRIVATE CONVERSATION ON THE BEACH AT FUCKING SUNSET.

Also the 0 heterosexual explanation shot is like right before this and that scene happens in the dead ass middle of the day and there were tons of people around. They waited until sunset when people had left the beach for the day to have this private conversation. So Chazz and Atty were probably hanging out together for a while already before this. Like they could've just gone somewhere else and had this conversation right away, but no. They WAITED. Maybe for a few HOURS. To have this conversation ON THE BEACH. ALONE. AT S U N S E T. O K A Y 😭

ANYWAY STORMSHIPPING IS EVERYTHING TO ME AND I ACTUALLY HAVE SO MUCH MORE TO SAY BUT I CAN'T EVEN ARTICULATE IT RIGHT NOW I'M SO MENTALLY ILL OVER THEM SO I'LL SAVE IT FOR ANOTHER TIME AKSKSK

BUT THANK YOU FOR LETTING ME RANT AND RAVE AND GUSH ABOUT THEM MY ANON FRIEND !!!!

#GAH I LOVE THEMMMMMMMM #I really do have so much left unsaid about the light and darkness stuff but that gets into m a j o r plot stuff #and if you haven't seen the show yet I don’t wanna spoil that for you! 💕 #so I'll leave it for another time #I honestly could talk about them for gours and hours on end I hope I didn't ramble to incoherently akaksksk #or left too many thoughts unfinished or anything akaksk #BUT FR THANK YOU FOR LETTING ME SCREAM AT YOU ABOUT THEM #AND PLS WATCH GX IT'S EVERYTHING 😭 #yugioh gx #ygo gx #chazz princeton #jun manjoume #atticus rhodes #fubuki tenjoin #stormshipping #yugioh #ygo #alexis rhodes #asuka tenjoin #jaden yuki #judai yuki #syrus truesdale #sho marufuji #zane truesdale #ryo marufuji #abby's in her unhinged era #aberooski asks #answered

[feyhunter78]

Hey just came up with another apprentice fic. Helaena falls for the apprentice of sir criston whose a ‘legitimate’ son of Lord Strong. He likes birds the same as Helaena loves her bugs so they bond over that. Alicent even encourages the courting as it would get the strongs on the greens side.

Also since I have many more apprentice themed one shots for house of the dragon characters it’d be funny to have an apprentice master list. Do whatever you think is best I literally came up with this in the shower 😅

So this one is much shorter than the other ones!!! Sorry about that!!! I haven't written a reader insert from the male pov before, so I was a little nervous about it. XD Also, I went ahead and made a separate masterlist for these, so keep them coming! I'm enjoying the challenge of trying these different characters and scenarios!

Apprentice!reader masterlist

Doves and Spiders

Helaena notices the way Sir Criston’s apprentice looks at birds, the way they draw his warm brown eyes away from his sword. How he leans down and feeds them crumbles of bread from his pocket, the way they flock to him, singing sweetly as he sits in the gardens.

Sir y/n Strong, his name was, a son from Lord Strong’s current wife, only a year or so older than Helaena herself.

Sir y/n is kind, that is the first thing she notices. Not just to birds, but others as well. She often spots him helping his half-brother Lord Larys make his way around the Keep, and he speaks up against any whispers about him.

Y/n also defends his nephews, taking them under his wing, and challenging any who dare to speak about their parentage.

Helaena finds herself surprisingly entranced by his brown curls and bright smile, enough that she finds herself approaching him in the Godswood.

“Princess Helaena, good morn, I will take my leave if you wish to be alone.” You say, bowing to the silver haired princess.

She shakes her head. “Please, stay, I wish to ask you something.”

You incline your head, and remove your cape, placing it on the ground, so she does not have to sit in the dirt. “I am at your service.”

She sits and pats the spot beside her.

You sit, leaving enough space between you that no one would deign it improper.

“I have seen a little red bird outside my window, its song is quite sweet, and it often follows after a similar sized bird with soft gray coloring. Do you happen to know the name of my new companion?”

You think for a moment. “Perhaps it is a cardinal? Winter is approaching and, they will be settling in with their mate soon.” A flash of red catches your eye and you point to it. “Did it look similar to that?”

Helaena follows your pointing, and nods. “Yes.”

“Then, it is a cardinal, the males are red to attract their mates.” You say confidently, enjoying the opportunity to speak about your greatest interest.

“How interesting, one would think the females would be adorned in bright colors.” Helaena says, her voice dreamy and lilting.

“One would think, but the males must compete to attract a mate, much in the way that knights fight in tourneys, hoping perhaps their skills will attract a wife.”

“Will you participate in the upcoming tourney?” She asks, worry filling her voice.

You shake your head, and in a rush of courage place your hand upon hers. She doesn’t remove her hand, and you give her a small smile. “No, my eldest brother Harwin will be competing for our house.”

“That is good, then, I would not wish to see you harmed.” She says, lilac eyes meeting your brown ones.

“Princess Helaena, I must ask, and please do not hesitate to chastise me if my inquiry is inappropriate, but I have noticed your gaze upon me as of late. Have I done something to offend you?”

She shakes her head, pink tinting her cheeks. “No, not at all, Sir y/n.”

“Then may I ask why I have been honored so often with your gaze?”

Helaena’s heart was racing, and her eyes darted to the ground. “I apologize if it has made you uncomfortable.”

“No, it has not, in fact, if I may be so bold to admit, I find it rather flattering.”

Helaena’s stomach flips. “I find myself drawn to you, much as a moth is drawn to a flame.”

“I am pleased to hear that, Princess, as I often find myself caught in your gaze, similar to a fly in a spider web.” You lean down to whisper your next words in her ear. “Though unlike a fly, I would not struggle if you wished to devour me.”

Her face blooms bright red, and you sit back, a teasing smile on your face.

“What if I am a black widow and will be the reason you lose your life?” She asks, a far away look in her eyes.

“That is a risk I would be more than willing to take.” You reply honestly, eyes drifting to her perfectly formed lips.

Her hand finds its way to your tunic, and yours finds its way to her waist. The wind ruffles her hair, and in that moment you realize why Mourning Doves mate for life.

You cannot imagine anyone surpassing Helaena. She is a divine being, nature herself incarnate, and you lean forward brushing your lips ever so gently against hers, pulling back to see her expression.

It is one of the sweetest things you’ve ever seen, and the urge to kiss her senseless surges through you.

Helaena beats you to it, pulling you forward and reconnecting your lips. She tastes of sun warmed honey, and you pull her closer.

Helaena’s head is spinning, y/n’s soft lips take her under, making the butterflies in her stomach erupt, and she giggles when she pulls away.

You caress her cheek, about to say something, when you’re interrupted.

“Y/N.” You hear your master Sir Criston calling your name and look up, hands removing themselves from Helaena instantly. He is accompanied by the queen, who has an odd look on her face.

You stand and offer your hand to Helaena. She takes it gracefully and wanders over to her mother’s side.

“I have noticed you growing closer with the Princess Helaena.” Sir Criston says, as he swings his sword.

You block the blow. “The princess is kind and does not mind me filling her ears with knowledge of birds.”

“I assume she does the same to you with bugs?”

You smile. “Yes, it is all quite fascinating.”

Sir Criston stops, and you stop as well. He claps you on the shoulder and pulls you closer. “The queen wishes to betroth you and Princess Helaena, it would bring House Strong further within the fold, and Helaena would be happy. Will you accept her offer?”

You can’t believe the words, coming from his lips. “Of course, I would be honored.”

He releases your shoulder and resumes a fighting stance. “Good man.”

Tag list: @nyctophilic0vitnir, @svtansdaddyx, @fan-goddess, @dc-marvel-girl96, @shintax-error, @bellameshipper, @the141bandicoot

#helaena x reader #helaena x male!reader #apprentice!reader #thanks for the request! #meg's writing #helaena targaryen #helaena imagine #helaena fanfic #helaena x you #it was odd to write from a vauge male pov #but interesting #I hope you like it!!! #strong!reader #no targcest #anon request #mail from el