#but i like using archaic words and spellings so fuck you modern english

[finely-tuned-line]

//note: there ARE the descriptions of a slowly-dying persons thoughts in here. its. probably disturbing in some manner? i mean, its. be careful if youre not good with stuff like that. sorry, i just dont know how to tw this. its the blue text, dm me and i can summarise what happens. RP:

Log 223

FTL: First, an update on the training of FTLR-3. I am tentatively going to declare it a success. While FTLR-3 is still showing some hesitance to obey my commands, I do believe that that may stem from some sort of... spite? I know for sure that it has thoroughly associated my commands with the receival of more food. I am unsure if this pause is due to it fighting its instincts, or whether it is truly just to throw me off. Perhaps I am simply being paranoid again. Either way, I have to be satisfied with the progress I have made thus far: my time has run out. More on that later.

FTL: Second, the modification of the container I will be using to transport FTLR-3. I have reinforced it and made sure that when it's shut, it's completely airtight. Nothing gets in, nothing gets out. FTLR-3 will not be escaping it, especially due to the training that I can only hope will work. I have no guarantee that the container will be as secure as I think it will be, I have no guarantee that FTLR-3 will not disobey me, I have no guarantee that the creature used for the transportation will be fully capable of carrying it all the way there. I can only prepare so much. And as I said, my time has run out.

FTL: Third, the Locator's return. The Locator that I sent to Songs of the Negative Sunlight has returned, pearl with it. Which does confirm that Songs of the Negative Sunlight is somewhat conscious and agrees to the plan. The part of the pearl that xi changed reads as the following:

affirmative. it's alright. i'm sorry.

FTL: And here is the thing that I did not, in any capacity, expect. Xi attached a few logs of xirs detailing xir downfall. I do not know how xi still has the energy to do so, or how the logs remained mostly undamaged. Perhaps xi was storing them in a neuron fly instead of xir drives. I do not know.

FTL: These were... Interesting to read. I will be rejoining my Local Group's chat in order to share these with them. I'm sure they'll want to know. In the meanwhile though, I'll put them here. Just in case I lose this pearl. The logs are... I'd rather not read through them again.

Log SNS: i've decided to give in. quit my research. who cares. i sure don't. perhaps dedicate myself to looking into Void fluid - but not for the sake of the Great Problem, for the sake of understanding purified Void fluid. it's always been rather interesting SNS: i know Finely-Tuned Line won't regard my decision with approval. yet he is my junior, he has no say in my decision. i can only hope that ve doesn't condemn me for it. i don't think ve will, truly.

Log SNS: i've told my Local Group about my decision. Finely-Tuned Line was confused, as predicted, but he didn't criticise my decision. Echoes of a Paradox was happy for me, also unsurprisingly. Doubt's Dichotomy, well... it didn't say anything. that too, was not unexpected. she barely talks to us anymore though. i'll have to contact sol about that. SNS: research on purified Void fluid is advancing, i've diverted some of my supply to chamber c-8. have to be careful to not let too much accumulate in one place though. don't yet know what i'm hoping to discover, but i think that's supposed to be part of the thrill.

Log SNS: i've made a lot of progress over the past few cycles! i was right, purified Void fluid is very interesting. though i am no Iterator designed for chemistry, i can figure out that the purified Void fluid's corrosivity appears to be completely gone! how does it come back then, when it's gathered in larger amounts?

Log SNS: my theory is that large amounts of purified Void fluid sort of... combine their fractured molecular structure? and that the purification causes the fracturing in the first place. unsure. where do its Ascension abilities go though?

Log SNS: purified Void powers me, as it does a lot of Iterators. it's sheer energy is taken and taken and then used by an Iterator. i think i've figured out a more effective generation method though! using purified Void fluid as well, normal is just too volatile. if i can expand my income of purified Void fluid, maybe I can test my idea...

Log SNS: okay! i just need to expand the transporter pipes a bit. i've run the calculations, i have a plan, it should all be fine. SNS: ...i still haven't told my Local Group what i am doing, though. they'd tell me that it's a bad idea. maybe it is. but i'm on the brink of something - this is the first time i've ever felt this excited about anything! i am not stopping now.

Log SNS: pipe burst. i can find a way out of this. i can. i just need to turn off some sections of myself. let those get corroded through. less processing power, less memory, but it'll be fine. i'll be fine. SNS: i just need to turn off the intake of Void fluid.

Log SNS: why can't i turn off the intake of Void fluid

Log SNS: nononononono SNS: it's fine. it's fine! SNS: i've blocked off the sections that are getting flooded SNS: i can still feel it SNS: eating away at me SNS: why'd they make us capable of feeling pain SNS: why'd they block me off from turning off my power source

Log SNS: i've tried sending distress calls SNS: no response SNS: can they not hear me? SNS: surely the void hasn't gotten to my transmission systems yet SNS: do they just not care SNS: ... SNS: i'm lucky my generator is on my lowest level SNS: which is now full of void SNS: it's eating through the blockade

Log SNS: nothing's coming to save me, no one's coming to save me. there's nothing to do but just wait SNS: and wait SNS: and wait SNS: and wait SNS: and wait SNS: for the void to reach my crucial systems. mostly my memory arrays. those on my top level though. my puppet'll get consumed before the waiting is over

Log SNS: slow, that's what it is. SNS: slowly, it's rising. SNS: slowly, it's eating away at me SNS: every little molecule pulled apart hurts SNS: why can't this just stop SNS: please stop SNS: I'm sorry

Log SNS: maybe the stars are pretty SNS: maybe i should have stuck to doing what i was made to do SNS: maybe finely-tuned line was right SNS: the voids past the second level now SNS: it's reached some of my systems SNS: files upon files upon files of information that i never did more than glance at SNS: i wish i could say that i won't miss them

Log SNS: i think that constellation is one i should know SNS: all of these constellations are ones i should know SNS: i've removed all my overseers from the lower levels. deactivated all the cameras. i can fight through the pain, i just don't want to think about it SNS: they're all looking up at the sky now. how did i not see how pretty it is?

Log SNS: Echoes of a Paradox would like this. the irony in my situation. is it even irony? maybe it's just poetic

Log SNS: i'll lose power soon. the generator is struggling to use the non-purified void. cause it isn't purified. not anymore. SNS: a batfly got in, it flew right into the void. SNS: It Ascended.

Log SNS: cant i jjust go back andd do itt all agaiin SNS: ill fuulfill my purposse SNS: i wontt stray SNS: pleaase SNS: pleasse SNS: ppleaase

FTL: ...That's the last log. I... I cut it off. Xi just continues repeating ximself into oblivion. Comprehensibility devolving. I-

FTL: Why did xi send me these. I don't need to know this, I do not need to know this. Why did xi consider it to be the best course of action. A late plea for help, perhaps? But no, I told xim that I couldn't help.

FTL: Perhaps xi just wanted someone to know of xir suffering.

FTL: Right. Right. I have things to do. Why can't I just move on from this, to the next thing? The plan will go correctly, xir logs say that the Void will Ascend creatures. It's all going according to plan, why can't I move on to the next thing.

FTL: I knew xir situation was hopeless. I knew that. I'd even thought xi was dead, I thought this whole plan wasn't going to work out. So why do I appear to care so much about something that I already knew about?

FTL: Is reading about it and knowing that xi's still suffering that much worse than what I already knew? Surely it's not

FTL: I... I need to take a break. A distraction. I can't think about this anymore.

FTL: I'll send the transport carrying FTLR-3 with it out. The Locator will go with it, it'll carry an Overseer of mine. That's the plan. I just need to stick to the plan.

#WARNING: UHH YEA THIS POST HAS HEAVY ANGST #AND BY THAT I MEAN THE PERSPECTIVE OF A SLOWLY DYING PERSON AND XIM LAMENTIING OVER WHAT IT FEELS LIKE AND REGRETTING ALL OF XIR MISTAKES #SO DONT READ THIS IS THATS UH NOT GOOD FOR YOU??? #PLS BE CAREFUL #disclaimer: i do NOT actually know anth abt chemistry #this is more bullshit than my specbio #fun fact abt the word receival: its an archaic word! its basically synonymous with receipt (not the paper but the action of receiving smth) #but i like using archaic words and spellings so fuck you modern english #FUCK WHY DOESNT TUMBLR HAVE MORE WORD COLOURS SMHHH #in my mind blue text is eternal anomaly #but songs of the negative sunlight is also blue text but a darker oneeee #but tumblr only has one blue #smh ): #!!! ftl says 'i can only hope' so much bcs ve picked it up from sns (: #id say im sorry that i wrote this but i am not #ALSO. CONTEXT: sns' secondary purpose was to study space! which xi didnt like #ftl sorta forgot that these logs are semi-public now lol #cause he was just EVER-SO-SLIGHLY out of it while writing this log #ahahaha #i dont regret this #but im in pain bcs why did i write this jshfksjadh #rp #finely-tuned line #songs of the negative sunlight #angst #cause thats what this is #also!! the reason for sns' distress calls not getting properly sent out is uhh bcs uhhhhhh #...communications facilities were on their first level? #ftl logs

[landwriter]

PSA: The Death of Translation has been translated into Chinese! Go give it love, or read my rambling essay and then go give it love:

翻譯之死 by @thirrith

How do you translate a story where meaning hinges not only on the words themselves, but the meaning made by the reader's knowledge of their obscurity? Where misspellings aren't misspellings at all, but memories? Where sentiment is drawn from syntax differences? Well you start by being absolutely fucking brilliant!

I was so lucky to be able to hang around in the document while Eth worked on this. The level of creativity and diligence that has gone into this is mind-blowing. It is such a gift, and the process was incredible. It doesn't matter if you can't read Chinese - if you liked the fundamental premise of The Death of Translation, if you like language at all, you need to know how this was done:

Eth's translation is in Traditional Chinese characters with the addition of Classical Chinese and Cantonese to translate the Middle English. Classical Chinese - also known as Literary Chinese - isn't representative of how Chinese used to be spoken in the vernacular, which is why Eth chose it specifically for the written portions of Middle English...and those lines spoken by Dream, naturally.

Hob's Middle English lines are in Cantonese, which has the benefit of being older than and still at least a little intelligible to readers who only know Mandarin. Middle Chinese can't be used the way Middle English is used in the Sandman fandom (delightfully and gratuitously), because unlike the alphabetic characters of English, where words can be sounded out and phonetic spellings will exist in written record - a huge part of understanding how a language once sounded - logographic characters don't directly specify phonology. And even if they did, Middle Chinese spans from the 5th-12th centuries AD - making it contemporary of not Middle but Old English, and covered an area several orders larger than the parts of a small island where Middle English was spoken for about three hundred years - it's nowhere near as homogeneous(ish) or accessible(ish) as Middle English; Cantonese, despite being a different language, serves the same effect.

And then, the grocery list! This is where writing systems go ham. In English, it contains abbreviations, the medial s (ſ), archaic spellings/misspellings, and fancy old ampersands (one of the only logograms in the English writing system, I think, originally Latin's et and evolving over time into the shape of & - in Jane Austen's Persuasion you will find this aural history of 'et' instead of 'and', where &c is used to mean et cetera).

Eth used Cantonese, Simplified Chinese characters (a 20th century addition, faster to write, that Hob definitely would've embraced), variant character forms (which typically have a visual resemblance to each other), and 通假字, homophone characters that were conventionally used interchangeably with one another in Classical Chinese:

English and Chinese have such different writing systems and histories, and Eth has used all the compounding effects of that (upon things like phonology, modern-day intelligibility, writing system changes) to the absolute fullest effect and made choices that add invaluable implicit meaning to the story and characterization.

(As if that's not enough, the translation also features hot-linked footnotes that provide context for cultural references?! Literally everything a reader could ask for.)

And this is all super clever and fascinating if you're a big language fan like me, but the soft artichoke heart of my wonder can really be summed up best by this fact:

For many years I've loved the Jack Gilbert poem 'The Forgotten Dialect of the Heart', enough to put the first lines at the beginning of the fic:

How astonishing it is that language can almost mean, and frightening that it does not quite. Love, we say, God, we say, Rome and Michiko we write, and the words Get it wrong.

And for just as many years, I assumed Michiko was a place name, or some classical reference to art or literature beyond my plebby ken - until I saw Eth's note in the translation document.

Michiko, in fact, was the name of his wife.

The whole thing is such a testament to translation: the true deliberate practice of it, not just figurative language imagining a fictional character and his long-lived idiolect. And Eth's translation has only underlined my conviction that there is, sometimes, I feel, deeper work of understanding done - greater art made - and lovelier agonies to be had - in carrying words across languages than there is in putting the words down in the first place, in a first language.

#the death of translation #TRANSLATED!!!! #it must be said i meant only to link the translation but the moment i began to describe what eth has done i absolutely could not stop #it's BRILLIANT #the sandman #dreamling #an essay #language i love thee so

[llendrinall]

Hispanism in OFMD

Hispanic representation in OFMD is very well done. I won’t say it’s the show that does it best because there are many other shows out there, but it certainly stands out. So I thought I would write something like a primer to appreciate the good work and maybe help with fic writing.  For each episode I’m transcribing (but not translating or it will be too long) all the Spanish, as well pointing fun things.

Episode 1

Olu: “Oye, te traigo comida”.

Kudos to Samson Kayo for his correct pronunciation. Too often, actors will mangle the Spanish to the point that it is unrecognizable or they will be so focused on making it sound right that they forget it should be acted. Samson delivers the line naturally.  

Spanish is weird in how one can address another person. There is formal (usted), informal (tú), archaic (vos, os) and the Argentinian brand (vos squared). Here they use the informal “tú” which is common in modern Spanish but still shows a certain degree of familiarity. In the 18 century this form would be extremely intimate. 

Episode 2

In the diary, left page, Jim writes “me asegure que el [h]ombre que mató a mi familia pagará con sangre”. There are some spelling mistakes, mostly accents, as well as the missing h-. Lovely detail. Jim is more literate than the rest of the crew, but still miles away from Lucius. It shows that while Jim received more education than most, it’s still lacking.  (For more on literacy check this post).

Diary, right page: “Día 28 a la fuga. Debido al alto precio de mi cabeza, estoy atrapado en este disfraz, en una prisión de mi propia creación. El pecio de la venganza es muy alto. Pero aquí estoy, al borde de la cordura, sudando hasta mis supuestos cojones.” Woa, so Jim speaks of themselves with –o which can be either masculine or neutral, rather than the –a for feminine. Interesting choice, when in the same paragraph they speak of their lack of balls. 

Episode 3

Lots of things in this episode! I’m putting most of Jim’s lines together and then explaining some stuff.

Jim: “Ese bastardito caught me unawares.”; “¡Cállate hombrecito!”; “Me tienes hasta el–” (this is said while Lucius begs not to go back to the trunk, so I can’t quite catch all of it).

Jim: “She did! Estaba ahí, clarita, on Stede’s stupid fucking nose!”; “You are pushing your luck, hombrecito!”; “Jiménez. ¿Qué pasa?”

 People focus a lot on the fact that Spanish is a gendered language (like all romance languages) but this isn’t such a defining trait. What really identifies Spanish is how much it likes to use suffixes to provided nuance.

(A suffix is a morpheme added at the end of the word to change its nature. Examples in English are the –s to make a plural or –tion to make a noun). Now Spanish gets all hot over suffixes. To give a quick example, if we take “rojo” (red) we can have: rojillo (small and affectionate), rojito (even more affectionate, maybe not so small), rojazo (very big or intense, not affectionate but not derisive), rojuzco (not nice, not complete), rojucho (not nice and possibly sick), rojeras (derisive while also affectionate, somehow).

Where am I getting with this? Jim consistently refers to Lucius as “hombrecito” and “bastardito” which is a mostly affectionate diminutive. This means that Jim doesn’t consider Lucius much of a threat, but also, out of all the suffixes options -ito is not one charged with contempt, far from it.  

“Bastardo” is not that common as an insult and it comes a bit soft (pendejo o cabrón would be more appropriate and much harsher) but it would be understood by English speakers. Since Jim is a Floridian it makes sense that they would have linguistic interferences. Later, Jim calls Alfeo “pendejo” which is much stronger, so, again, Jim refers to Lucius in the softest of terms while also insulting him.

 Jim’s name is Bonifacia Jiménez. Two things about this.

The name: Bonifacia is kind of an ugly lower class name that was never in fashion. Funnily enough, the male version is way more common than the female, although still not pretty. A baby would be named Bonifacio either because it runs in the family (to honor a grandparent or parent) or because it is the saint of the day they were born. In case anyone needs Jim’s birthday: June 5th.  

The surname: Jiménez, one I two E. You can find it as “Jimenes” sometimes, but never, ever, Jiminez. Spanish culture has always been very anxious about surnames so women never, ever, change their surname. In some contexts, if they married someone important, they might use something like: Name Surname of Husband’s surname (Bonifacia Jimenez de Boodhari) but they wouldn’t drop their own family name. Children receive both surnames (Father + Mother) and in everyday life they may use just one, to shorten things, but in legal documents they will use both. This is to say that we still don’t know Jim’s full name, we are missing their mom’s.

Beautiful detail: they included the accent over the –e- in the dagger’s carved handle. Jiménez.

 Whoever though of naming Jackie’s husband “Alfeo de la Vaca” is a genius. It sounds like a Spanish name, but it is not. Alfeo is close to Alfredo, an actual name, but by shortening it they underline the sound “el feo” (the ugly one). I have never seen “de la Vaca” (of the cow) as a surname, but there is “Vaca” and “Cabeza de vaca” (Cow’s head) so it doesn’t sound wrong. Altogether, Jackie married someone called Ugly from the Cow.

 Roach has Berber inspired tattoos. All sides of the Mediterranean have been in permanent contact with each other, but especially in the 17-18th centuries there was a lot of traffic of goods and people. I don’t want to type all the historical background, but it is pretty likely that Roach is familiar with Spanish culture, either because he has been in Spanish territories or because he has met Spanish communities in Turkish/Ottoman territory. The tapas are an accurate representation (although most Spaniards would say those are “pinchos” or “raciones” rather than tapas) up to the presentation itself, like the clay dish Geraldo holds. Stede is wrong: “tapas” does not mean little plates but “lids”.

 This is very trivial, but the word “pirate” entered relatively late in the Spanish lexicon. The Spanish soldier’s line (“así tratamos a los piratas”) echoes nicely with Alma’s line, but at the time Spaniards would’ve most likely say “corsarios”.

 Bald Soldier: “Filtry scum. Anda y vete a comerte una mierda por ahí.” (Wow, Don Bald Soldier, that was crass).

Jim: “Felicidades. Cara de culo”. Jim’s choice of insults is really something.

 The Spanish captain is Nacho Vigalondo, who directed this episode.

 Episode 4

Not much Spanish in this ep.

Ed’s assertion that the Spaniards die dramatically is probably right and God is mentioned often in common speech. However, in Spain (not so in Latin American where they have some semblance of piety and respect) it is very common to say “me cago en Dios” (I poo on God). I love to think that what Ed took as cries of “I beg to God” included some “I poop on God”.

 Jim: “¿Qué te pasa?”; “Dios bendito. Look everyone…”

Buttons: “Hola”.

 Spaniards would absolutely understand some ecclesiastical Latin. Not enough for an in depth conversation, but enough to make some basic requests at least.

 Spanish man in grey shirt: “Mira.”

Spanish captain with really good outfit: “No puede ser. ¿un faro?”

Spanish man in grey shirt: “Es un faro. ¡Cambiad el rumbo!”

Someone in the background: “[la otra] vela.” (not sure about the first words)

Spanish captain with really good outfit: “Me has vuelto a ganar, Barbanegra.”

 All this is said with the Spanish accent, in contrast to Jim and Nana, who have Caribbean accents.

 Episode 5

Nothing. No Jim in this episode.

 Episode 6

Nothing. Jim is very quiet in this episode. Although, during the duel, they mimic some moves for Stede to copy. This has nothing to do with Hispanism, I just think it’s neat.

 Episode 7

So much in this ep! I am including all the lines first and then the explanations.

Jim: “¿Qué te pasa?” … “Cálmate.”

 Nana: Sí.

Jim: Nana, soy yo.

 Nana: Me gusta. ¿Es tu marido o están viviendo en pecado?

Jim: Él habla español, Nana.

Nana: Muy bien, ay, muy, muy bien.

 Nana: Eres una decepción.

Jim: La vida es la decepción. ¿No fue eso lo que me enseñaste?

 Jim’s dad: “vete, vete, vete, ay…”; “¿Puedo ayudarle?”; “Esta es nuestra tierra.”

Alfeo: “Qué buenas naranjas, eh.”

Jim’s dad: “Toma todo lo que quieras.” (Huh, Jiménez goes from formal you in the last line to informal you here. Is this why he was killed? Was Alfeo offended?)

Alfeo: ¿En serio? (stabs)

 Nana: “Vamos.”; “Adiós.”; “Lo siento, hijo. La vida es dolor.”

Olu: “La vida es dolor.”

 The siete gallos. “Ser gallito”, literally “to be a cock”, figuratively “to be cocky”. Good name for a group of bandits.

The convent.  From the habit, it seems Nana is a Benedict nun. Benedictines are supposed to stay put in their convent and be self-sufficient and independent. Their motto is “ora et labora”, pray and work. They famously make really good liquor.

Nana. Not a typical Spanish name, but it could be a nickname. Nuns used to change their names upon taking their vows so Nana can be a nickname of her old name or her nun name (like, Natividad, Nazareth or something like that). Nana may be a random murderous nun, a relative of Jim, or their actual grandmother. In Catholicism, being married and having a family is no obstacle to later becoming a nun/monk/priest.

Is Spanish Jackie Spanish? No. If Spanish Jackie existed, she was of French and Haitian descent. I don’t know why they call her Spanish either. Is it the red?

 Episode 8

Jim as priest: “Adelante, m’ijo.” (A contraction of “mi hijo” my son).

Jim: “¿En serio? ¿Geraldo?!

 Episode 9

Nothing. There is no Jim, probably because they would have murdered Badminton with one single hit. We sit sadly like Olu.

 Episode 10

Jim: “¡Carajo!” (When Lucius walks on them); “¡Vete hombrecito!”. (Aww, it’s definitely and endearment now).

 And that’s it. Overall, all of Jim’s line are thoughtfully chosen and their insults vary depending on Jim’s respect and appreciation of the person. And it is possible that Alfeo murdered Señor Jiménez because he was too familiar.

#ofmd #our flag means death #jim jimenez #hispanic #spanish #meta #ofmd meta #ofmd analysis

[rpbetter]

Traditional Writing Advice & RP

I see a lot of people reblogging writing advice posts, and while it pleases me to see people trying to appreciate RP as writing, those pieces of advice don’t always translate from traditional writing to RP writing.

Following the advice for writing a traditional book manuscript you want to have published, you are going to run into some issues if you follow every point of it faithfully in an RP setting.

For one thing, this isn’t just your story, you’re telling it with another writer. In RP, our reading audience and our writing partners are the same. We have to create well-written, engaging stories that are also meant to be picked up by someone else and furthered. For another, even among the most writing proficient RPers, this is a more relaxed style of writing for a reason; we’re writing neither a paper to be graded nor a work to be published, we’re expressing creativity with other people. It can fall flat quickly, to your writing partners and to yourself, if you are writing in an extremely formal manner in RP.

Writing is one of the creative pursuits that has lent itself heavily to what I’m going to politely call snobbery, and that is part of the problem here. The RPC is rather filled with muns who are self-concious, devalue themselves and their work, and can be desperate for the approval of being A Real Writer. If you love writing and you do write, you’re a writer. No, that definitely doesn’t make you a good writer, but following rules not meant for you isn’t going to make you one either.

There is a wrong way to write, actually, there are hundreds of wrong ways to write that make me want to rip my own face off on the regular. The thing is, there is no one-size-fits-all correct way to write any more than there is such a standard in visual art. There are principles that one should know and follow, but your style might be neoclassical or modern or impressionist. Saying that, in my personal opinion, things falling under the heading of modern-style art is horrid, thus inherently wrong and not art, I’d be imposing my personal aesthetics instead of encouraging people to follow appropriate principles, run with their passion and skill, and make art that moves people who are not me. That’s important, in general, but it’s even more important when we’re talking about creative art as a hobby-as a legitimate passion project one isn’t obliged to devote themselves to.

That’s the way we need to be looking at writing as well. Not as an academic and absolute Right Way, but as an art form that has principles, and indeed, literal form. By insisting otherwise, we’ve damaged writing as a hobby and a profession, and it really shows in the RPC where you have a rather stark division of muns who, on the one side, are so ate up with bizarre concepts their professor threw out about never using “said,” forcing the ideology of their personal academic experience on others, and using traditional writing advice as Word of God to shame others and elevate themselves. On the other side, you have a ton of muns who just won’t even bother anymore, and why should they? They’re genuinely not up to par, but working on it means both a process of shaming and killing their own creative experience.

In saying all this, I want to be really clear here: I am in no way saying that shitty writing, an inability to follow basic grammatical principles, being unwilling to use the damn spellcheck that is standard everywhere, and having no concept of things like storytelling, characterization, and word flow is excusable or ideal. 

It isn’t. It’s a terribly destructive force in the RPC, and I’m not in the camp of excusing disinterest in learning, improving, and perfecting one’s hobby because it is an unpaid hobby. In my opinion, it’s part of the blight of the current RPC. However, the snobbery and inability to recognize that there is nuance to learning and writing situations has done nothing but worsen this issue.

So, that being said, some items that are 100% good to use traditionally and in RP include:

Grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

We’re not all native English speakers, and grammar is difficult anyway. It can also turn a story bland with expedience when too properly adhered to. Know the basic principles, but also, be asking yourself about both popular works of fiction and your own favorite works. Chances are, they do not strictly adhere to the rules. Experienced, naturally gifted, and learned writers all manipulate those rules to work for their stories, characters, world-building, and so on. It becomes a personalized writing style, and it’s alright if it takes you some practice to find yours.

Just remember, grammar exists for a reason. Removing or mutating too much will leave you with a difficult to read and understand mess that isn’t a style, just a fucking mess.

If you struggle with grammar, the best way to help yourself is to practice. Additionally, seeing what errors you are making can be quite helpful; Grammarly offers a free add on for both Google Chrome and FireFox that will show you spelling and grammar mistakes. It also explains the mistake, while offering you a suggested fix. This way, you can see the mistakes you’re making in action. {Presumably, there are other such resources, but since I have no experience with them, I’m not the one to recommend them.}

As I said above, spellcheckers are standard now, in fucking 2021. This has been standard on devices and browsers for so long that I highly doubt most people on tumblr even remember a time when you had to use additional software to have them.

You make a mistake or misspell, and if it isn’t corrected for you, it’s underlined very obviously for you to tap/click/float over to correct. If the word is so terribly misspelled that no suggestion comes up {not all spellcheckers are created equality; some do not recognize slang or relaxed spellings, archaic word use, myriad, particularly specialized jargon-legal, medical, technical-and so on}, we also live in a time period where we can highlight the word, right-click that bitch, and select from the menu the option to search for the word. If the word was so weirdly misspelled that your checker couldn’t figure it out, it is incredibly rare that Google doesn’t throw out the correct spelling when you search it. If the spelling was correct, but the word-use is slang, jargon, or archaic, Google is also going to tell you that-you’ve confirmed it is correct, and can now decide if you want to use it or pick a possible synonym for it instead.

There is no fucking excuse for egregiously misspelled words anymore. None. I mean...listen, I spell quite terribly myself, but no one reading my RP replies is ever going to know that fact. Having difficulty with spelling is not, and has not been for a very long time now, an impediment to writing.

Furthermore, we all miss a typo here and there, especially if we write lengthy novella. Those aren’t always going to be caught by spellcheck, and we might edit the reply five times without seeing it. That happens, it’s alright when it’s minimal! Anything other than that, though, it’s just a combination of rushing and laziness. You really couldn’t be assed to take your time with that reply, read it over at least once before posting, and/or to click the underlined word.

There. Is. No. Excuse.

Again, not all spellcheckers are the same. If you feel like yours is lacking, try an extension for your browser. Since I said it above, I obviously have Grammarly on my mine. My replies effectively go through three different checkers, actually. I write all drafts outside of my browser where it is initially checked by Pages, then, when I paste it into tumblr, it’s being checked natively and by Grammarly. It wasn’t my intention, I just wanted to be positive I was never losing a draft or cooking my ancient laptop with Google Docs. However, it’s been nice as hell to get the perspective of multiple checkers, and as such, I definitely recommend it. It isn’t like I’m putting any extra effort into this, and I’m not paying for Grammarly, either.

When you refuse to behoove yourselves of the spellchecker natively available to you, at least, you’re seriously telling your writing partners that they were not important enough for you to click a fucking word. It’s inexcusable.

Punctuation being nonexistent isn’t a writing style or aesthetic, neither is a refusal to capitalize anything. If never using a comma is part of your Aesthetic™, please, rethink your fucking life and the hobby you’ve chosen.

Punctuation is a part of grammar, and I understand that there can be complexities present that might be confusing. That is one of the reasons why you should bother to know the basics as regards when and how to use punctuation. It’s also another way in which telling people that they should adhere to advice meant for traditional and academic writing can be a shit idea. Especially in an RPC known to misunderstand shit and go overboard.

When you tell the RPC that writers use too many commas, the RPC stops using them all around. Especially, when you also attach this to the idea of evil “wordiness.” That’s something that the RPC is desperate to avoid anyway, as the majority of people here are allergic to reading and writing; anything you advise that lessens the word count for them is going to be grabbed and erroneously applied. Someone implies that wordiness and commas equals run-on sentences, and the RPC gets not only believes it, it gets this message, “if I take out the commas, it isn’t a run-on sentence.”

You have all fundamentally misunderstood what a god damned run-on sentence is. It’s not a long sentence, it isn’t a proliferation of commas. A run-on sentence is when two, or more, sentences that should be individual are conjoined without proper punctuation {a fucking comma, for example} or a coordinating conjunction.

Run-ons can be surprisingly short, in fact. As in the example I lifted from here, “I love to write papers I would write one every day if I had the time.“

That should be written with a comma, separated into two sentences, or broken with a comma and the conjunction “and.” It’s also what I see incessantly on my dash from this bizarre idea that we shouldn’t be using commas. That a run-on sentence is a very long one separated only by commas. That is literally not what a run-on sentence is.

You absolutely can use too many commas {if you want to read some examples of how to use commas, go here}, but I rarely see anyone doing so to such an extreme. The extreme being that a sentence becomes a nonsensical string of conjoined thoughts, ideas, and descriptions that could have been written better broken up into fully formed sentences. I sometimes see muns who go a little nuts with commas by putting them in wildly incorrect places in this way.

What I see constantly is either muns berating themselves for perfectly normal, readable sentence structure or muns reactively using no punctuation at all.

It is all legitimate run-on sentences or those made so short and blunt that they become nonsensical, change the tone of the writing, or have no flow together.

Which brings me to...

Sentence flow is a thing, and you should be doing it.

Unfortunately, this good writing advice tends to throw people. We’re not talking about the flow that needs to be present in academic sentence structure, or exactly the flow that is present in poetry. Though it may require practice to understand and apply well, it’s an incredibly simple concept.

You want to balance out shorter, blunter sentences with those that are longer and more flowing. It gives the text a pleasant, natural rhythm. However, it isn’t just about length, a thing that the RPC is weirdly fixated on. Rather, it’s about word use within those sentences as well.

It’s always important to write with a tone that works with your scene and, overall, with your muse. For example, in a tense, aggressive scene, or with a muse who is generally this way, it gets the message across to use short sentences and clipped words. We can feel the tension, annoyance, and threat.

Furthermore, the way your muse thinks about and uses words is relevant. A well-educated muse from the 1800′s isn’t going to have the same approach to words that a modern-day high school student does. You should be making that clear in the way they speak, but also, in the way you express their thoughts and actions. If you are only writing your muse’s personality and emotional tone when your muse is speaking, you’re not giving me the tone all the way through. It can feel like a marked delineation in flow.

However, you should be considering the overall flow of your writing as well. Did you just lay down back-to-back eloquently verbose sentences? If so, you may want to either follow them up or space them with a shorter sentence comprised of simpler words.

This is legitimately good writing advice for any manner of writing.

So is...

Show, don’t tell.

Which is another piece of advice that throws people when they try to make it more complex than necessary. That, and it grates up against the RPC’s need for short, quick writing. The idea that anything a mun gives you that your muse cannot react to verbally or with action is filler to be avoided. That idea comes from some principle advice that translates badly to RP; essentially, don’t wax poetic for three pages when it has nothing to do with the plot, characters, scene-setting elements, action, and so on. Don’t be Tolkien describing every tree and rock in excruciating detail on the way to destroy the One Ring, basically.

That isn’t fully appropriate advice in RP, where we’re having to write tiny chapters to each other to add onto. While it still has some merit, the RPC definitely has taken it to mean that you shouldn’t show anything. My muse’s private thoughts, emotions expressed and unexpressed, stirred-up memories, things they planned to say/do, but that were naturally interrupted by the flow of the thread all become Unnecessary. With...no mind to what they are showing and creating.

This particularly erodes writing muses as legitimate feeling people. As in the last example of what my muse intended to say or do that was interrupted. That’s a normal, human experience. It would be difficult and not enjoyable to read every instance of a muse’s broken thoughts and impulses or intentions, but giving one every so many replies in a natural feeling way keeps my muse presenting as a real person having a real person’s experience. Simple things like this go a long way toward your muse being “believable,” and by ignoring them or refusing to do them, you’re not making your muse very realistic. So much of the human experience is private, unknowable to outside parties.

Look...if you only knew me based upon a sterilized version of what I was saying to you or doing purely within the context of single interaction at a time, you wouldn’t know me at all. You’d have no idea what sort of nuance there is in my words, how I am expressing or withholding an opinion or emotion. I may not have any opinions, emotions, or other experiences that you are not contributing to. That’s very unrealistic, I’m not actually a person anymore. I haven’t any personality, I didn’t exist before you interacted with me.

That is the way it is with muses too. By stripping them of their internal experiences, we’re stripping them of more realistic feeling characterization. {It becomes, or adds to, a disastrous domino-effect of projected, cardboard stand-in style muses that are in no way a joy to interact with.} This is bad writing, makes for bad reading and interacting.

No one seems to understand show, don’t tell. Let me put it in a simple example: don’t tell me your muse is a good person, show me. Don’t tell me your muse is upset right now, show me.

Your muse has character traits you feel makes them A Good Person. They are compassionate, selfless, and genuinely interested in others. Don’t just leave that in the muse’s bio, or relegate it to statement-style lines like, “she cared deeply about others.” Show me these traits in action and thought. You don’t require anything dramatic to it, either. A muse like this should be a good listener, proceed with their love language in a way reflects personal involvement and a desire to comfort, be willing to sacrifice time and personal interests {don’t keep it to dramatic and literal self-sacrifice to show “selfless”}, legitimately doesn’t think of themselves first and foremost and may need reminding to care for themselves, and will be troubled by unfairness and cruelty in the world.

Your muse has been in a disagreement with a loved one, they’re not just “upset,” they are sad, angry, disappointed, and maybe even confused or surprised. While those are more descriptive and defining of the type of complex “upset” going on here, don’t leave it at these words. Don’t tell me that she said, angrily. Show me that she is having thoughts based on these emotions, actual emotional turmoil at her expectations of a loved one being devastated. Paint me a picture of the sadness in her features, the anger in her walk, how her words come out unpolished and jumbled in her surprise and turmoil.

This is what it means to show me, not tell me.

It also extends to scenes and recollections.

If your muse is happy sitting in her garden, don’t just tell me this. Show me why she is happy there, and define the sort of happiness in her thoughts, body language, voice, and expressions. Describe the aspects of the garden in tones of the happiness they bring, draw comparisons between this and her outward expression of joy with similar word use. It ties together both seamlessly in a way that we can relate to and feel, even if we hate the outdoors.

If this muse had a traumatic incident in her past, this is going to inconveniently come up, even if only in her mind. Don’t play coy about it and drop shit on your partners like, “she was thinking of things and stuff that was bad again.” No. Even if you are alluding or otherwise keeping the actual event secretive, you need to be describing how the muse is feeling, how she is experiencing the world around her through an overlay of upsetting reminders. Show me how she is having a visceral reaction to triggering stimuli while having to keep working or talking.

Additionally, even when your muse isn’t experiencing the scene you have set directly, you should show me instead of telling me about it.

Since my actual least favorite PSA on how it’s better to just tell people because no one wants to read “all that” deals with rain, we’re going to as well. Because it doesn’t have to be excessively descriptive to fucking show me it’s raining or has rained instead of just stating the fact.

Not, “it was raining.” Not, “it was wet outside.”

“In between her words, the distant, wall-dampened splash of cars driving through puddles.”

“He passed by windows beaded with moisture on his way to the kitchen.”

Wow, that was so complex, really a lot to read to get the idea that it is, or has been, raining outside without me directly telling you this!

There isn’t anything wrong with being more descriptive than this {nor is there anything wrong with using the word “rain,” so long as you’re backing it up with a description}, some of us do like to read and write about things like oil-slicked puddles in the street if our muse is seeing them or it is otherwise relevant. It’s just that you don’t have to do this, or have to do it at all times, to show instead of tell. This is yet another serious misunderstanding.

It isn’t that the description is often really that excessive, it’s more often that it is irrelevant to the extreme of sticking out weirdly. In the puddle thing, if my muse isn’t seeing it and/or I am not using that description to further experience, their mindset, personality, or tying it to an analogy later in the reply, it feels weird.

Some superfluous shit isn’t bad either, and superfluous can be purely subjective. It is, again, when it is to such an extreme as to leave your writing partner feeling oddly about a point in the text that seemed to ring with importance, but then held none. That isn’t an act of showing or telling, and neither is it your partner trying to show off as a gifted writer. For whatever reason, they just saw or felt that moment with such passionate clarity they had to include it immediately instead of waiting until a better moment for it. That’s literally it, there’s no need to project your insecurity in weird ass ways.

There are definitely other pieces of traditional-based writing advice that are great and either do transfer to RP perfectly or can with small amendments, but these are the most basic, commonly seen, and important combinations. They are also easy to better understand and apply!

When reading writing advice posts, please, ask yourself how they fit into RP. If they do at all. Many times, when it comes to the absolute basics of writing coherently and enjoyably, or developing characters, they’re great. It’s when they get into topics of some nuance that they don’t cross over so well and are outright damaging.

These pieces of advice are often being misunderstood or misapplied already, then are being passed around to a community notorious for its lacking application of critical thinking. Severe misunderstanding will happen, and terrible writing “rules” within the RPC develop from them.

Do be interested in writing, don’t separate traditional writing and RP writing into categories like “real writing and RP,” be invested in learning and improving. Just ask yourself how it applies to cooperative storytelling that is often thematic in nature, and proceed with caution and the mindset that writing is an art.

If you have the principles down and both yourself and others are enjoying your writing, you’re not doing it in an inherently wrong way because it wouldn’t be published. You’re not writing RP to have it published, and that’s not a bad thing. It’s just a difference to keep in mind when reading PSA’s about the Rules of Writing Whatever. 

#tumblr rp #rp help #rp advice #rph #tumblr rpc #rpbetter #rpb #roleplay better #tumblr rp advice #traditional writing advice and rp #queue

[gaybeardedmen]

Read “ Sell Your Soul “ on Archive of Our Own. Support me here.

Fandom: Overwatch (Video Game) Relationship: Reaper | Gabriel Reyes/Soldier: 76 | Jack Morrison Characters: Reaper | Gabriel ReyesSoldier: 76 | Jack Morrison Additional Tags: Tentacles, Rough Oral Sex, Rough Sex, Blood and Injury, Excessive Cum, Demon Sex, Demon Summoning Language: English

Jack Morrison was known to the world as a man of meticulous research. Meticulous meaning a great attention to detail, for example, in his younger years at the very peak of Overwatch, Jack Morrison had been so meticulous about a freshly shaven face he would wake an hour earlier than needed to inspect and shave himself.

Time had not diminished such an principal piece of himself as it often did when one aged.

Never would he willingly enter a situation without planning accordingly; whether it was the mundane activity of creating a list of groceries, with a written note to coupons and restocked shops, or the more exhilarating and controversy research towards the rituals of demon summoning. He had memorized the standard set of several demons and their sigils of summoning, spent hours with a pinched brow, eyes straining from the hours spent staring at the taboo documents, waiting for God, if he truly existed, to strike him down for his treachery.

Jacks toes curl against the hardwood floor, skin prickling at the cold. He was shirtless, chest cold along the circle lines of red, wet paint smeared along his body; delicate, scarred fingers mimicked the pattern of the demons sigil onto his chest, his breath caught in his throat during the act. He wondered vaguely how it would feel for the demon to be summoned to stand before a shirtless, shivering, aging man.

Jack supposed he wouldn’t feel anything. Whatever demon he summoned may feel disgust or annoyance at the mortal with a want that was considerably more cliche than a kiss in summers fine rain.

The anticipation would kill him. Jack had never felt more frightened as thick, clumsy fingers struck a match to light the ritual candles he’d made himself; they were of a deep crimson wax, smelt of cinnamon, and had a thick black wick. The candle itself was not important to the ritual, a fact that Jack did not come across during his meticulous demonic research. In his research, Jack believed the candle had to represent the malevolent spirit he wished to summon: pink for lust, blue for sorrow, yellow for human nature, and red for the everlasting.

The anticipation, as the seconds of an old clock ticked down louder than the blood rushing through his ears, was a killer. Jack felt more fright when it came to lighting the ritual candles, a deep crimson wax with a black wick,  than when he’d once stared down the barrel of a shotgun. Fingers strike the match, and for once, Jack Morrison acted without thought to consequence.

“Know I call to you … “ Swallowing thickly, the man knelt, fingers smoothed alongside the burning candle, wax coated his fingers unnaturally quick, and the markings on his chest began to bleed. In the moment he did not know the true extent of summoning, only knowing the vaguest want could derail him. “Think of me, think of me. So mote it be.” How silly he felt. So mote it be, as if he were a fictitious character in a low-budget indie film, whose writers had long since given up the research in demonic summoning, choosing instead to copy verbatim the spells written by a modern days witch, attempting to summon a demon.

The ringing in his ears a distracting white noise, silence was a buzzing white noise as striking blue eyes track the flame of a ritual candle; the red wax pooling from the burning wick, his legs swayed side to side as the flame of the candle, and he fell to his knees in dubious defeat. Dedicated research, his years spent searching for the key of immortality, waisted and lost in his failure. He would not summon a demon, a creature of pure religious superstition, and Jack Morrison had never felt foolishness this way; unable to breath, eyes clenched shut until furrowed brows and the corners of his eyes burned with salty tears. He was pathetic, time would take him, and the world would know him as a failure throughout life: the soldier program, Strike Commander of Overwatch, Soldier 76, and an witless man seeking immortality.

Through his tears, his body shook with his regrets, and only a cool touch to his cheek, where claws curled against the side of Jacks cheek to raise his gaze, forced eyes open wide and frightful. Breath catching in his throat, his bottom lip quivered, and Jack did not recoil from the oddity he saw in fear the claws like pins in his face would rip and disfigure him.

“What are you,” he spoke barely above a whisper, looking to the mass before him. He could not get a good look at the creature, it’s body seemed to change shape the second he managed to focus on the last form it took; at one moment the creature was a normal man, standing tall and prideful above him, and the next he was a beast with a thousand teeth and millions of eyes blinking, their irises spinning clockwise. He had summoned an enigma in a greedful haze, and the fear that settled in his gut was a solid ball of ice refusing to melt, prolonged by the entity.

“You summoned me.” The creature’s voice was a rasp of words, as if its vocal cords were buried beneath gravel. “... For what reason have you brought The Reaper back.” The mass formed a face, detached from a body, shifting like smoke, and Jack was only able to focus on his face; well-structured jawline with facial hair that looked softer than anything he’d ever touched before, and unlike the mass of eyes ever shifting and bright red behind him, the two on the human face  were beautiful.

Jack Morrison had never felt love like this. His heart had never sung loudly. Soul-mates were a cliche, but the man felt he had been made to serve this entity; to love and hold him, and kiss what figure held its form long enough.

“Immortality.” Jack cleared his throat. Years of research, planning, dedication to an archaic craft would not be forgotten in lieu of coquettish grins to a lovecraftian beauty.

“Foolish.” The Reaper snarled, claws travel across Jacks face featherlight, hooking the corner of his mouth and parting his lips with his index and middle finger. The entity seemed to be in thought, a low and rumbling growl leaving the mass of life signifying his thought. “You will do. Stay on your knees, mortal.”

“Why?” he asked, but The Reaper offered no answer. Jack sat on his knees in awe as the mass formed into a man, and his eyes were not tricked or deceived by a captivating, ever shifting figure any longer. The face he had admired became hidden away, tucked behind a mask of sharpened bone and dark shadows, a low and soft whine left Jack, his mouth held open no longer by claws, but two tentacles that squirmed against the back of his throat.

He gagged and The Reaper chuckled, Jacks stomach clenched and his toes curled. He doesn’t remember getting naked, but then again, he hadn’t remembered The Reaper entering the room. It had happened, and he wasn’t opposed to it just … happening.

A hand slipped down his chest and fingers curled around the base of his cock, playing a very dangerous game with the demon that had demanded him stilled and ragdolled; with Jacks jaw stretched wide by very thin smoke tendrils blacker than tar. Jack prayed that his immortality would taste just as sweet as the cock fucking his mouth and be as pleasurable too. Breathing heavily through his nose, he managed two quick pumps on his aching cock before the demon rammed suddenly into his mouth, burying his nose against a thick patch of curled public hair. Jack gagged on his thick dick, choking. The Reaper paid him no mind, it seemed he didn’t care if the immortal suffocated on his cock, if anything the idea of blue lips and watching life leave the white man’s eyes turned him on, his body shuddering.

“Be ... still.” Snarled the demon whose fingers curled into Jacks white hair, claws scraping harshly against his scalp. Thrusting his hips roughly, the black tentacles widened the immortals mouth to the point the corners of which threatened to unwravel like the seams of a fine silk dress; saliva dribbled thickly onto the demons pubes, and tears sprung from the corners of blue eyes half-lidded. The tips of smog tentacles curled around the demons shaft, jacking The Reaper off within the soft and warm confines of Jacks mouth, and Jack had never felt as used and full before; this was better than sucking cock, to be treated like a glorified fleshlight was a fantasy he had not thought of even in his younger years, and to feel the twist of tentacles in his mouth stroking off a cock, their tips sliding across the slit of its head, drove Jack wild.

He wondered how much semen The Reaper would fill him with. If he would pump him until his stomach bulge, tongue shriveled from the amount of cum he’d happily swallow.

Aroused by the pain, Jack groaned, the heavy weight of cock on his tongue and the weightless sensation of tentacles was becoming  an oasis of pleasure to a man who found himself in a dry spell of sex, where three quick pumps of his cock once had him flaccid with thick ropes of semen between his fingers would now have him achingly hard, disobedient and wanton.

Thrusting into his hand, his hips rocked slowly to make the pleasure of friction from calloused palms last, soft blues flickered up to stare at his counters thousand-eyed crimson glare. The Reaper’s claws curled even tighter into the mortals aged hair and pulled back his head harshly, freeing his cock from the confines of his velvet mouth with a soft pop, and a thick trail of saliva connecting the head of his cock to Jacks bottom lip.

With a snarl too low and inhuman to be attractive, although Jack found his balls tingling and hips thrusting weakly from the noise that sent frightful shivers along his spine, Reaper pulled Jack up from his knees to a full stand. Claws came to rest on either side of his boney hip, seemingly thousands of red, distorted eyes studied Jacks demeanor; the immortals cheeks were flushed a bright scarlet red, his breathing heavy, chest falling and rising rapidly from arousal, and his cock stood aching and hard with white beads of precum leaking from the tip. Jack curled his fingers tightly around the base of his cock, moaning softly, his bottom lip quivered. “-- Reaper.”

Tentacles whipped the air, the demon clearly agitated that the man found any pleasure in being treated like the fuck toy he intended him to be. Immortality would come at the price of a demon, he had warned the mortals that sought his powers before, often it was their souls to be the price, claimed by The Reaper to be used; The Reaper had been alone for eons, and he would claim Jacks body over soul, he would rather fuck him whenever and however he wanted,  with cock and tentacles alike, than claim his spirit.

“The couch … bend over that armrest. Now.” The Reaper demanded of him, releasing the painful grip he held on Jacks hair. Cool trickles of moisture dripped along his neck and it took Jack a moment to realize The Reaper’s claws had pricked his scalp, causing him to bleed, leaving stands of white hair to fall to the floor and his shoulders.

In a trance Jack moved to the back of the room, bare feet dragged unhurried against the ground as he made his way to the couch. Before his attempt at summoning a demon, Jack had pushed the piece of furniture against the wall, having wanted more room for the summoning. Now bent over with his forearms resting against the armrest, Jack blinked lazily, the slightest smirk pulled on his lips as he shook his ass to tantalize the other. “I’m--” Breathlessly he moaned, teeth catching his bottom lip and biting hard, thrusting forward to rut against the couch. Legs quivered at the friction, his hole clenched in anticipation. “-- I’m ready. Take me.”

With another snarl and lashing tentacles, the air crackling with annoyance, The Reaper stepped forward, his hand curled around the base of his cock and he slapped his dick between Jacks spread cheeks. “Shut up, Morrison.” The two tentacles that spread his cheeks writhed in fervor of the warm flesh of Jacks flushed skin, cupping either of his perfect cheeks to spread him even more, showing how deliciously his hole quivered under a lustful gaze.

The Reaper licked his lips, his tongue was long and smog like, and his eyes focused on the mans tight, quivering, wanting hole. Jack mewled pathetically, arching his back as the two tentacles massaging him spread his ass further apart mimicking the feel of hands while a third coming to prod curiously at his tight hole; the third tentacle was wet and cold, clearly meant to prepare him for a cock that changed thickness and length at The Reaper’s will, seemingly a very rare kindness from the other that saw him as nothing more than a fuck toy and who became annoyed at Jack touching himself.

Jack didn’t believe The Reaper saw him as a toy, he had to find him interesting. There had to be something that made him decide he was worth what trouble came with immortality.

Without much warning above a few testing, lazy prods, the tentacle slipped completely inside of him. Jack bit his lip harder, his mouth going agape as a moan ripped from his throat; the slick squelching sound of the tentacle slipping in and out of his ass filled the room, the sensation would remain cold, wet, and slick, even as Jack began rocking back in an attempt create friction. He was torn between humping the couch and begging for a second or even third tentacle to fuck him senseless.

“Reaper! Reaper, please,” Jack croaked, voice raw from moaning and throat sore from being mouth fucked. “Please.”

Quickly the tentacle was removed and slick leaked freely and plentiful down his thighs. Whatever The Reaper used as lubricant he used so excessively, and Jack mewled at the loss of stretch.

Then a hand slapped his left cheek harsh, causing him to yelp, claws pricking the soft flesh of his rump, and then The Reaper slammed his cock into his prepared hole with a grunt. Jack groaned, hissed, moaned and arched his back, “Ye -- yes.” Breath coming quickly, he hardly noticed the tentacles that wrapped around his biceps and thighs or the tentacles that slithered along his shaft, curling and cupping his balls, to furious jerk him off.

The Reaper groaned, claws digging carelessly into the mortals back, drawing blood as he fucked Jack senseless. Deep, fast, and rough, the pace was just as relentless as it was inhuman. Too fast for Jack to find a perfect rhythm to grind back, tears streamed freely down Jacks flushed cheeks, in more pain than pleasure, but still he cried out desperately for more. As he fucked him, thousands of red eyes examined his body, littered in scars and age, The Reaper had little care for confidence in appearance; as sweat gave Jack a sheen, he noticed a fine sprinkling of freckles along his shoulders, and through the mass of wiggling tentacles massaging his spread cheeks, he noticed a thin pink scar that ended just across his right buttcheek.

Curious, The Reaper cocked his head to the side, eyes squinting. Jack Morrison’s bodily imperfections were cute.

“More! More!” Jack cried out, sobbing pitifully as The Reaper claimed his hole, thick ropes of cum shooting from his cock, coating the couch and more. “Please … more, fill me and fuck me. I’m yours, Reaper...” Jack fell flat against the armrest, his toes curling against the cold floor beneath them, becoming a little less than a fuck doll as his cum coated his abdomen and dripped down his balls. The tentacles refused to stop jerking him off, going faster now, squeezing his balls tightly, trying to milk him for all he was worth.

The Reaper complied to the request of more, gripping tightly to Jacks shoulders as he fucked him ruthlessly, claws raking down his back, following old scars and threatening to reopen them. Blood bloomed where his hands had been, thin lines of red, and the sound of balls slapping against bare ass and Jacks pitiful, weak whimpering broke the demon. “Mine.” He snarled, “All mine!” The Reapers hips flushed to his ass, he came with an loud and inhuman growl, bending to bite viciously into the shoulder of the man. Teeth ripped at tender flesh, ever eager to mark the mortal-now-immortal and steal the delicious taste of human blood that bloomed on the tip of his tongue. Sweeter than cotton candy.

The Reaper bit even harder.

He filled Jack until his stomach began to expand from his spunk, cum dripped from his asshole, coating The Reapers pubic hair just as it slid along Jacks thighs. “You are mine! A toy to be fucked and you are nothing without me.” He snarled between the chunk of shoulder he refused to release from sharpened teeth, giving several rough thrusts into Jack as he rode out his own orgasm, the slick squelch of semen having filled the man, now leaking freely from his abused hole had the demon debate on a second round.

He wasn’t known for comply completely with sexual wants, taking what he had wanted when it was given, and The Reaper vanished with another slap to the ass of the immortal motionless, bleeding from head to back, and whimpering pathetically against the couch.

The old man, exhausted and soaked with sweat and blood, panted heavily against the couch. Spreading himself, Jack Morrison closed his eyes, focusing on the feeling of semen slowly dripping from his abused hole, and the cool prick of blood along his backside. With each uncomfortable stream, he whimpered, forcing a body exhausted and used to push itself over the armrest and collapse stomach first onto the couch.

The semen in his stomach shifted, even when he had subjected himself to mindless nights of sex, where his goal was not in the pleasure of two people, but rather to be completely and utterly filled and forgotten, no feeling of being full had been so persistent as this.

Jack could feel his cock twitching at the sensation, though he found he had little energy to slip a hand between himself and the couch. For now he would sleep, cheek pressed against the surface of a seat cushion too uncomfortable to be used while naked, enamored with the demon that had claimed that he would be nothing, but had treated him with a sexual kindness Jack Morrison had not granted himself in years.

#Overwatch #overwatch fanfic #r76 #reaper76 #Jack Morrison #gabriel reyes #feel free 2 reblog

[garden-ghoul]

appendix blog part last

“listen to ghoul get angry about linguistic diversity”

So the next appendix is E: WRITING AND SPELLING, and idk how much I am going to care about this. I kept accidentally reading the part saying that ‘Bolger’ has a soft G in it, so my instinct is to not read any of this. I NEVER use J sounds if I can help it, even going so far as to mispronounce proper names by reading it as either Y or H. Therefore, I’m not reading this section. But I really do appreciate the subheading ‘S T R E S S’

A sort of interesting thing about Tengwar is that it’s supposed to be not so much an alphabet as a set of signs you can map to whatever sounds you are feeling. They wanted it to be really widely applicable, although it seems like this would be really confusing if the language just, didn’t work at all like Quenya. Also there are 24 letters  arranged as a matrix of 4 series vs 6 grades. Series are where the sound is (labial, dental, et c) and grades are what you are doing (aspirating, stopping, et c). Extremely tidy, just as I would expect of a language system made by Feanaro Finwion. However, also as you would expect of, well, Quendi in general, every single letter has a dumb fanciful name that probably has some deep metaphorical significance.

Can I just say, it’s frankly astonishing that you all wanted to read me blogging about this.

APPENDIX F: LANGUAGES AND PEOPLES

Westron has become the native language of nearly everyone who lives in Arnor/Gondor. Okay, why though? Is it just because Numenoreans Were Here First? They weren’t, there were even plenty of Edain during the second age. Numenoreans just declared themselves rulers and everyone was like “yeah you have good technology and seem to be pretty good at murders” I guess. I dunno it just seems like Tolkien is sacrificing linguistic diversity for convenience within the story and his own weird elitism.

...No, wait a minute, it might be because the total population of Gondorians and former Arnorians is just way bigger than every other population. Not the Rohirrim, who still do have their own native language, but I get the sense that everyone in the north used to be subjects of Arnor and had to learn Westron. Even elves learned it, possibly because Numenoreans were the only humans they cared enough about to talk to. Now it’s a trade language.

The Elves far back in the Elder Days became divided into two main branches: the West-elves (Eldar) and the East-elves. Of the latter kind were most of the elven-folk of Mirkwood and Lórien; but their languages do not appear in this history, in which all the Elvish names and words are of Eldarin form.

Fuck you. No um I’m sure he just had too many languages on his plate already. But!! I hate this weird thing where languages Tolkien personally thinks are superior end up dominating populations, even when it doesn’t make much sense for them to do so! Same thing with Dunedain deciding Sindarin is better than their native language because they are gay for the abstract concept of elves. Nobody does that!! Tolkien paints it as tragic that Gondorians lose Sindarin as a native language! He does not value linguistic diversity for its own sake what kind of linguist is he!!!

Hobbits historically have had the tendency to adopt whatever language the humans nearby are speaking, which is curious given their reputation for being extremely hard for humans to find. Why would they need to use human languages  if they are hiding from humans? I think there ought to be hobbit languages is all. Anyway apparently the last language they used before coming to Arnor was Rohirrin(?)-adjacent; their name, hobbit, comes from the same root as holbytla, hole-builder. Cute!

Says here the ents are so long-winded even Eldar didn’t bother to try to write anything in entish or learn it. Ents talked freely, secure in the knowledge that Eru’s children just didn’t have the patience to snoop. Whereas ents love learning other languages, so they get to snoop on everyone.

The strange words and names that the Hobbits record as used by Treebeard and other Ents are thus Elvish, or fragments of Elf-speech strung together in Ent-fashion. Some are Quenya: as Taurelilómëa-tumbalemorna Tumbaletaerëa Lómëanor, which may be rendered 'Forestmanyshadowed-deepvalleyblack Deepvalleyforested Gloomyland', and by which Treebeard meant, more or less: 'there is a black shadow in the deep dales of the forest'.

This is a fascinating insight into entish grammar. I love the idea of a language whose grammar is “mash some concepts together to create a Feeling about what you are trying to say.” That’s very me. That is how I talk sometimes when I am not very verbal.

The word uruk of the Black Speech was applied as a rule only to the great soldier-orcs that at this time issued from Mordor and Isengard. The lesser kinds were called, especially by the Uruk-hai, snaga 'slave'.

Oh shit I thought Snaga was his name. I feel terrible for him now. Or, like, it was his name and it was the worst name ever.

Next is a note on translation. The best part of the whole appendices is the bit where it says Pippin was addressing Denethor as “thee” the whole time so everyone thought he had a rank equal to the Steward. This is especially silly because presumably he noticed that humans use formal pronouns but just didn’t bother to try to fit in--this implies that he didn’t understand the significance of “you” and just thought it was more or less a direct synonym. I wish Tolkien had written the hobbits using “thou” in the book, although it wouldn’t have had the same connotations to modern audiences I suppose.

The more learned and able among the Hobbits had some knowledge of 'book-language', as it was termed in the Shire; and they were quick to note and adopt the style of those whom they met. It was in any case natural for much-travelled folk to speak more or less after the manner of those among whom they found themselves...

Oho! It’s because he doesn’t study enough and is incautious and carefree. What a lad. Talks then about the Anglicization of Adunaic names to give a feeling of Englishness--archaic English usages, different name endings being masculine of feminine, et c.

In some old families such as the Tooks and the Bolgers, it was the custom to give high-sounding first-names. Since most of these seem to have been drawn from legends of the past, and many while now meaningless to Hobbits closely resembled the names of Men in the Vale of Anduin, or in Dale, or in the Mark, I have turned them into those old names, largely of Frankish and Gothic origin, that are still used by us or are met in our histories. I have thus at any rate preserved the often comic contrast between the first-names and surnames, of which the Hobbits themselves were well aware.

As VV pointed out... It’s Good. I like to imagine Bolgers trying to come up with the sillest given name that just doesn’t go with Bolger at all. Isengrim would have been a good one, I can’t remember what family he was from.

Meriadoc was chosen to fit the fact that this character's shortened name. Kali, meant in the Westron 'jolly, gay', though it was actually an abbreviation of the now unmeaning Buckland name Kalimac.

Yes!! I’m so glad I finally hear what Kali means. I wonder if Tolkien came up with the English name or the Adunaic name first? I’m guessing English, that seems like how he rolls in this series. Aww Sam’s name means “he’s kinda dumb,” in archaic Adunaic. Leave him alone.

Last, here’s the explanation of ‘Brandywine,’ which I like very much in its complicated series of interwoven puns.

The hobbit-names of this river were alterations of the Elvish Baranduin, derived from baran 'golden brown' and duin '(large) river'. Brandywine seemed a natural corruption in modern times. Actually the older hobbit-name was Branda-nîn 'border-water', which would have been more closely rendered by Marchbourn; but by a jest that had become habitual, referring again to its colour, at this time the river was usually called Bralda-hîm 'heady ale'.

#AND THAT'S IT THAT'S ALL THE APPENDICES #next up is the hobbit. good gracious. #blog of the rings