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chromatic-lamina · 8 months

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Get to know your fic writer-ask game!

6 Do you have your work beta'd? How important is this to your process?

9 Do you comment on stories you read?

23 Best writing advice for other writers?

24 Worst writing advice anyone ever gave you?

29 What’s your revision or editing process like?

40 You’ve posted a fic anonymously. How would someone be able to guess that you’d written it?

70 When asked, are you embarrassed or enthusiastic to tell people that you write?

74 You’ve posted a fic anonymously. How would someone be able to guess that you’d written it?

Ah, you are the best! I think I'll have to answer these under a cut after the first one. It's my only mail, so I'll answer all :D

Asks are from this link

6, 9, 23, 24, 29, 40, 70 and 74 finished (74 & 40 are the same above, but 40 is different on the ask). Asks still open if anyone wants to play!

6 Do you have your work beta'd? How important is this to your process?

No, except if it's a piece I really want to get right. For example, a story based on artwork, or for a gift exchange, etc. Sometimes I get friend sto beta fics for zines, etc., even if there is a writing mod. For anything submitted professionally anywhere, creative or non-fiction, I highly recommend getting a second pair of eyes on the work.

9 Do you comment on stories you read?

Not all, but a fair number, yes.

23 Best writing advice for other writers?

You can't edit anything if you don't have anything on the page. Write out of order. Write through your blocks. There is no such thing as a filler chapter. If the chapter is boring for you, it's boring for others. If you work on why you think that particular passage, etc., is boring, you'll figure it out, and have a passage that you'll probably end up loving. Your first draft is a draft, so don't treat it as if it should be a finished piece of work or you'll get nowhere.

24 Worst writing advice anyone ever gave you?

I don't think I've ever received any. Everything in moderation. Take note that guides are talking generally, not specifically.

29 What’s your revision or editing process like?

Time-consuming. I write down whatever's burning at the back of my brain, even if it doesn't make much sense. It will find its place eventually. I try to get the whole fic out (if it's a one shot) as much as I can, and then go back and edit. Because time is a thing, this means that I can be editing the fic before it's a whole draft, though, thereby contradicting my advice above.

If it's a multi-chapter and there's an idea and notion that you love but it's out of sequence, write it. I feel that you'll lose your passion for that scene if you don't, although not everyone will agree with me. There comes a point in your editing process with a multi-chap where you need an outline. Even if it's very vague, it lets you know where you're going and what you have and haven't done.

Write placeholders where there are obvious weaknesses or you don't have the time to write the piece out yet. For example:

"Blah, blah, blah," he said. [insert action] <<-- being the placeholder.

I do regret fics that I put out before they're ready cos I spend all my time getting them up to speed on AO3 instead of in my documents. But even if I'm happy, there's still stuff to edit!

40 If someone were to make fanart of your work, what fic or scene would you hope to see? (I know it says differently above, but 74 & 40 are the same on this Ask, but not in the original).

A friend said they were really trying to get a scene from screen/shiki-e where Law, Marco and Chopper are by the river, and Chopper is fishing cherry blossom petals out of the water with Law's hat. I think that was the scene they were mentioning. They said it was difficult to draw, but it'd be great to see that come to life. Possibly from Bioluminescence where Hakugan is floating in the deep, and Ikkaku's photograph floats by him, and a very colourful jellyfish.

Any art is a blessing, really! Whatever tickles the artist's fancy.

74 You’ve posted a fic anonymously. How would someone be able to guess that you’d written it?

I don't really hide my writing style or the darker themes that I write, so it's pretty easy to guess my anon fics. They're anon maybe cos' I think a lot of subscribers subscribe to me for the G-T rated work now, perhaps. Or perhaps the themes are a bit too rough for me at times too.

70 When asked, are you embarrassed or enthusiastic to tell people that you write? Fanfiction? No-one really knows other than tumblrites and other fandom folk. I'm happy to tell them, cos we're all doing the same kind of thing.

#one piece #get to know your fic writer meme #ninhaomaya #chromasks #chromanswers #shoot some your way once i go for a walk #writing meta #writing questions #fanfiction #chromafic #chromafics #ask meme

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xenobladetravelzine · 1 year

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Hello to the wonderful folks behind the Xenoblade zine! I have a quick question if you don't mind!

I've already placed my pre-order a couple of weeks ago with my current shipping address, but I actually intend to move within the next week. I was wondering if it's still possible to change the address or would I have to rely on the mail getting forwarded? Would that affect the amount of time my order takes at all? It'll be within the same county.

Let me know if you need any additional information like an email, order number, or anything like that. I'll be happy to provide!

Thank you all so much for making this zine. The art looks incredible, everything looks amazing, As a long time Xenoblade fan I'm very excited to see it all come through!

Very best wishes,

Anon

Hello! We will be releasing an address change form before we start shipping out orders so that everyone has a chance to change their address!

If you'd like, you can email us with your order number & new address so we can make those changes on our end as well!

#ask #answer

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destiny-islanders · 3 years

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Sora is my favorite. Interests change, fandoms come and go, but Sora will always be... my favorite. ;u; From the bottom of my heart, thank you so much to the mods, contributors, and supporters of the @sorazine for showing our dear sunshine dorkupine the love he deserves.

Like I'm getting super sappy but this project means so much to me. I feel so lucky to have been a part of it, joined by so many wonderful creators who lent their amazing talents to us-- all for Sora ;u; I just have the biggest, dopiest grin on my face looking at everything.

#sora zine #sora #kingdom hearts #my heart all laid out ;___;#everything's out in the mail!! if you ordered a zine-- it's coming!!!!!!!!!

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prismatic-bell · 3 years

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Just took delivery of a new item for the Fandom Museum. First impressions:

1) this is not what I thought it was.

2) it’s better.

3) how far we have come.

I thought this was a standard zine. It is actually A SINGLE LONGFIC AMATEUR BOOK. As far as I can tell, the only mark on it (other than a tiny bit of rust on a staple) is from the price sticker that would originally have been on it either at a convention or during a secondhand reselling.

Check it out, guys. In 1978, this is what longfic looked like:

(Yes, I should be wearing gloves. I need to get another box.)

There’s always a bit of awe when I open something like this. It’s 44 years old. 44 years ago, this woman decided she loved Star Trek so much she was going to write an entire fucking novel (three of them, actually, this is the first book in a trilogy), pay to have it printed, and then it would only be available to a small number of people who had to order it from her directly (that’s the blacked-out bit, you had to get it by mail from her home) or get it at a convention, for her own legal safety.

I’m about 99% sure I found her, via some Googling. If I’m correct, she’s 81 years old today. If I didn’t think it’d be super-weird and possibly frightening from her perspective for some random person to approach her for an interview, I’d contact her to ask what the process of writing and publishing it was like.

This is our history. AO3 exists in part because of this woman. FF.net exists in part because of this woman. Everything we have today exists in part because in 1978, she loved a thing so much she just had to write about it. She, and others like her.

Wow.

This is why I get so excited about the fandom museum. And why I love it so much.

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rrczine · 2 years

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PRODUCTION UPDATE #10

This is hopefully the second-to-last production update we’ll have to give before we begin shipping. As long as there are no further issues with the physical copy of the zine, anyway!

To start, Mod Fen is ordering the zines on Monday, 24 Jan. 2022. They want to be able to speak to the production team at Steuben Press about the cover to ensure that it comes out as a wrap design instead of split images with a black spine, and have a few minor adjustments to make to the PDF. Second, as an apology for the long delay, we will be emailing out the digital zines tomorrow, 23 Jan. 2022! We know that this comes with a bit of risk, but we want to do whatever we can to make up for how long you all have waited for your zines and merchandise.

Finally, once the zines are ordered on Monday, we’re looking to begin shipping in late February (early March at the absolute latest). Mod Fen is stocking up on envelopes, mailing labels, and other little odds and ends for the shipping process. Tracking numbers will go out as soon as Mod Fen returns from the post office, and we’ll post an announcement once shipping begins.

Thank you all for your patience. We know it’s been a long, frustrating wait, and we’re doing the best we can to get everything in Mod Fen’s hands so they can send it to you.

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coffee-and-connections-zine · 3 years

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THANK YOU for the amazing start of this project! Your feedback was amazing and we are so happy you guys are as excited as we are! There have been quite a few questions so make sure to check out our FAQ!

FAQ

💙 What’s a Zine?

It's a short for the word "fanzine" (fan+magazine), which is an unofficial non-profit publication made by fans - for fans.

💙 Relevant information about the “Coffee and Connections” Zine?

Size: A5

Page count: (yet to be decided)

Format: softcover

💙 How much will it cost?

The team is still working hard to determine the final price of the finished zine and we want to make it as affordable as possible. As soon as we are done wrangling the numbers, you will be the first to know! You can still sign up on our Interest Survey to let us know that you are interested!

💙 What kind of content will be in the Zine?

The “Coffee and Connections” Zine will contain both artwork and short stories, revolving around our favorite detective and android duo. We are aiming for the 2/3 art and 1/3 fic ratio.

💙 Will the Zine have a theme?

Yes, the theme of the Zine is “together-forever”! We are as excited as you to see what everyone will come up with!

💙 Wait, so the theme is not "coffee shop"?

No, coffee-related tropes and ideas are welcome but not obligatory.

💙 Will the Zine contain adult content or triggering content?

No. We want to make sure that it can be enjoyed by as many fans as possible, so we decided on the PG rating. (Which doesn't mean we won't consider a possible R18 Zine in the future, if you guys would be interested!)

💙 Which Creators will be featured in the Zine?

Creator Sign-ups will open on July 15th! Which means we don't know yet either, but are very excited to find out!

💙 Who is organizing the Zine?

An introduction post about our Team will be shared soon, so stay tuned!

💙 What goodies will be included?

We already have a long list of ideas for possible goodies but before we set on any, we would like to know your opinion! In a few weeks you will have a chance to vote in a pool for which goodies you would love to have the most, so we can prioritize.

💙 When will Pre-Orders start?

We want to make sure that the Zine is as perfect as possible, so Pre-Orders are still a few months away from now. We are going to keep you informed about our progress.

You can also sign up your e-mail address in the Interest-Survey to be directly notified about the start of the Pre-Orders.

💙 Will there be another way to get the Zine other than Kickstarter?

No, our Kickstarter campaign, once it launches, will be the only place where you will be able to pre-order one (or several) copies of the "Coffee and Connections" Zine.

Good to know for Contributors:

💙 Where can I sign up as a Creator?

Sign-Ups will open on July 15th and close on July 31st, so make sure you don't miss it!

💙 What happens to any profit?

After paying for all expenses of printing the Zine, making the goodies and shipping everything, all remaining profit will be donated.

💙 Will I be automatically accepted as a Creator once I sign up?

Unfortunately, no. Depending on how many artists and writers will sign up, we might have to make a selection. There’s a multitude of factors that go into selecting participants. The skill-level, dependability and how well their style fits into the Zine are just a few of them.

Once Sign-Ups are closed we will send out e-mails with further information.

💙 Can I use already existing art or fanfiction?

No. Every piece of art and writing has to be made specifically for the Zine and never before shared on any platform or in other publications.

💙 How can I help to make the goodies?

You will be able to offer to help with creating the designs for our goodies in the upcoming Creator Sign Up Form. You won't have to make or order anything yourself, The Team will take care of that later on.

💙 We hope you are as excited as we are! 💙

Feel free to send us asks with any further questions!

And don’t miss to fill out the Interest-Survey!

#Reed900 #DBH #detroid become human #DBHzine #g9

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publiccollectors · 3 years

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From the discussion “Towards A Self Sustaining Publishing Model” hosted by Printed Matter.

Some things I have learned in over 30 years of publishing since my teenage days as a zine maker, administrating my project Public Collectors, and from working in the group Temporary Services and our publishing imprint Half Letter Press.

I have just ten minutes to speak. If only one or two things that I share are useful, that’s plenty! It took me decades to understand some of this stuff.

Use every exhibition invitation with a budget to print something. Use the whole budget to print something. Make something in a large enough print run so that you have something to give away and surplus that you can sell. Your publication can be a folded sheet of paper, a booklet, a newspaper, a poster, a book, or anything in between.

Be able to print at least something at home. Buy a cheap laser printer or inkjet printer, find a used copy machine, buy a RISO or some other duplicator, carve something into a potato or a piece of foam and print it. Being able to do at least some of the printing and production at home—even if it’s on a tiny scale—will compel you to print things that you might have convinced yourself not to send out or bring to a professional printer. Hopefully the ability to print impulsively and compulsively will result in good work. Figure out how to keep making things on every scale. Look for cheap used printing equipment on Craigslist. Team up with friends and buy equipment together that you can share. Start a printing collective in your basement.

Ideally your publication should cost 1/5th or 1/6th of the retail price to make. If you sell a $10.00 publication through a store, you are probably only going to make $6.00 or less after the store takes its cut. So ideally your $10.00 book costs $2.00 or less to make. Don’t aim to just break even. Aim to make a profit so you can keep making more publications and pay for your life. Publishing will probably never be your sole income but don’t lose money on purpose. Make things that are priced fairly and look like they justify what they cost to buy. The fact that you didn’t find a more affordable way to print something is not an excuse to sell something that feels cheap and shitty for a ridiculous sum of money. Good cheap printing is easier to find than ever before. Do your homework.

Figure out the cheapest and least wasteful ways to do everything. Ask other publishers where they get their work printed. Look for local printers so you can avoid shipping fees. Ask local printers if you can pay in cash for a discount. Ask printers if there is a cheaper way to do what you want to do by adjusting the size of your paper or the paper stock or some other small shift in form. If you print things yourself, buy the paper that is on sale. Design a publication around the paper that you found for cheap. Discount warehouses sometimes have good paper. Even dollar stores sometimes have good paper. I’ve even bought paper at flea markets. Costco sells an 800 sheet ream of 24 lb paper for $6.99. I use it all the time. It rules. I also recommend getting your jugs of organic olive oil there, but you can’t print with that.

Free printing is good printing. If you have access to free printing, use it. Free printing is like free food at art openings and conference receptions. It is one of those pleasures in life that never gets old. Come up with an idea that is based around the aesthetics of whatever free printing you have access to and make the publication that way. Eat the cheese and bread. Drink the wine. Make the copies at work.

Buy bulk shipping mailers on eBay. Find bubble wrap and other packing materials in the trash. Look out for neighbors who just bought new furniture—it’s usually wrapped in miles of packing material you can use for shipping books. Boycott terrible right wing fuckers like ULINE. Seriously, they give money to everyone horrible. Trump? Check. Ted Cruz? Check. Scott Walker? Check. ROY FUCKING MOORE? CHECK FUCKING CHECK! Tear up their catalogs and use them as packing material to protect your books. Make publications that have a consistent size so you can purchase cardboard mailers in bulk and get a discount on them. Buy packing tape in bulk. Buy everything in bulk. You can store your extra reams of paper under your bed or on top of your kitchen cabinets if necessary. Be like a wacko survivalist prepper, but for office supplies. Go to estate sales and look for the home office in the house. Buy the dead person’s extra tape and staples and rulers and scissors. I’ve been using some random dead person’s staples for years because I bought their staple hoard. Staples aren’t like meat and milk. They don’t expire.

I’m against competition. Try to avoid competing with other artists for resources. If you don’t truly need the money, don’t ask for it. Artists should have a section on their CV where they list grants they could have easily gotten but didn’t apply for because they are privileged enough that they don’t need the money as much as someone else. I almost never apply for anything but the one thing I do apply for and get every year is a part-time faculty development grant from Columbia College Chicago where I teach. It pays adjuncts up to $2,500 a year to fund their projects and seems to be completely non-competitive. My union negotiated to get us more money. I have used that grant to make over a dozen publications. The value of the publications I make and sell with each grant is about three or four times the value of the grant itself. Some years I make more from the grant than I do from the limited number of classes I teach. But I don’t depend on this grant to be a publisher and I’d still be able to make things without it.

Make things in different price ranges so everyone can afford your work, but also so that you can sustain your practice. Make a publication that costs $2.00, that costs $6.00, that costs $20.00, and make something special for the fancy ass institutional libraries that have a lot of money to spare and can buy something that costs $300.00. Likewise, make things in all different size print runs. Is there something you can print 1,000 of that you can keep selling and giving away for years, to enjoy that quantity discount that comes with offset printing a large number of publications?

Collaborate with people and pay them with publications (if they are cool with that) that they can sell on their own. Sometimes this ends up being better pay and more useful than an honorarium, and it helps justify a larger print run. But see what they need—don’t assume. Barter with other publishers and sell each other’s work and let each other keep the money. This helps with distribution. Sometimes it’s easier to sell their work than it is to sell your own. Help others expand the audience for their publications.

Fund your publishing practice by asking your friends who teach to invite you to talk to their college classes about your work. Use those guest speaker fees to print something. I sometimes tell people on social media: If three or four people will invite me to speak to their class, it could fund the entire next issue of X booklet series that you like so much. This has often worked. Also, sometimes their students end up ordering publications. Sometimes lectures about publications generate more income than the publications themselves.

Have an emailing list and write newsletters to announce new publications. Stay in touch with people who like what you do. Expect to spend a ton of time corresponding with people. Have some cheap things and cool ephemera on hand that you can send people for free when they mail order your publications. Reward people who support you directly with something nice that they didn’t expect. People like handwritten notes. It’s okay if they are very short but sign the packing slip and at least write “Thank you!”

Above all, know that publishing is a life journey and not a get rich quick scheme, or even a make very much money scheme. Enjoy the experience of meeting and working with others, trade your publications with other publishers and build up an amazing library of small press, hard to find artist books. Get vaccinated and travel and sleep on each other’s couches. Be generous with your time, knowledge, resources, and work. Tell Jeff Bezos to fuck off by never selling anything you make through Amazon. Find the bookstores that you love and work with them forever. It’s nicer to have deeper relationships with fewer bookstores than surface level interactions with dozens of shops run by people you don’t know.

Think about your publishing family. Bookstore people are your family. People that organize book fairs and zine fests are your publishing family. Other publishers are your family. People who follow your work for years on end are your family. Printers and binderies are your family. The postal workers that know you by name and that you know by name are your family. The person who doesn’t care if you make the free copies at work is your family. Over thirty years later, I’m still in contact with people I exchanged zines with through the mail when I was a teenager. In some cases I still haven’t met them in person. It’s fine! They are my family. Your students are your family—particularly once they graduate or drop out, as long as they continue making books and zines. Your family is your family, particularly if they value and support your publishing practice. And for this reason, this talk is dedicated to my late father Bruce Fischer, who let me use the company copier and postage meter when I was in high school, and to my mom who sat on the floor with me and helped me hand collate and staple my zines.

That’s what I’ve got for now. Stay in touch and with luck, and enough vaccines and masks and hand sanitizer, maybe I’ll see you at a book fair. – Marc Fischer • Thank you to Be Oakley of GenderFail for the invitation to present, to the other presenters Vivian Sming, Yuri Ogita, and Devin Troy Strother, and to the wonderful people at Printed Matter for hosting this! You should be able to find the video archived on Printed Matter’s YouTube Channel. Presented on April 2, 2021

#Public Collectors #Publishing #Printed Matter #Be Oakley #Sming Sming #Coloured Publishing #GenderFail

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aifastic · 3 years

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Winning Lines

The @talesofteufort zine has been shipped, and the PDFs sent! Thank you very much to everyone who contributed. I’m very glad to have been able to participate in this project; it was a wonderful experience and it’s been great working with everyone aaaa ♥

I’m really happy to share my piece for the zine! I really hope you all like it ♥ (Read it below the cut)

Title: Winning Lines Words: 1845 Warnings: None Summary: BLU has a drawing contest. Demo just wants his magazine back.

-----

“ARE YOU MANN ENOUGH TO DRAW THIS BETTER THAN US?”

The header caught BLU’s Demoman’s attention. He’d been reading the latest issue of Hat-Wearing Man when he found the ad at the bottom of one of the pages. There was a somewhat simple drawing of a monkey in a spacesuit. “If you draw Poopy Joe better than our extremely talented artist, we’ll give him the boot—and kick his ass in the process! And your picture will be the new image of our project and you, our lucky friend, will win nothing less than $700 dollars!”

“Huh, it doesn’t look that hard…” he said, pensive. Suddenly, the magazine was snatched from his hands. “Hey!”

“Ohohoh, what’s this?” Scout said, grinning at the magazine. “Hey, I’d win this in the blink of an eye!”

“Oi! Get your own!” Demo took the magazine back. “I’m gonna try this. Mum will love the extra money,” he added to himself.

“Pffft, no way, it’s a waste of mail money, pally. If someone should participate, that’s someone who actually has a chance.”

“Heh.”

They turned around to see Sniper in a corner, grinning.

“What’s your deal, Long Legs?”

“Shut up, ya scoundrel. If anyone has a chance here, it’s me.”

“Oh, yeah?” Demo asked. “Where’s your credentials, mate?”

“Don’t need any,” he said. “Quiet kid, hours at the back of the classroom sketching the teacher being eaten by a croc.” He grinned. “It should be easy as cake.”

“Oi, do ya remember the magazine is mine?”

“I agree, though—the chance should be for whoever’s got the talent.”

Demo sighed. “Aye, alright. But I’m not gonna just give it away.” His face lit up, an idea coming to his mind. “You’ll have to beat me for it.”

“Huh?” Both mercenaries stared at him quizzically.

Demo grinned, eye glinting.

“Let’s have a drawing contest.”

-----

They emptied the kitchen table in order to make room for their sheets of paper, pencils and pens. In the meantime, they threw evaluative gazes at each other, competitive strike flaring up.

The rest of the team slowly wandered to the room to find out what was going on.

“What is noise?” asked Heavy, scratching his chest. Medic, who was right behind him, had just closed it, having found himself too distracted by the ruckus to continue his surgery.

“We’re about to find out who’s gonna win 700 dollars!”

Medic perked up. “I am in. What is the bet?”

“We’re not betting, mate.” Sniper showed him the magazine’s ad. “It’s a contest.”

Medic’s smile turned dangerous. “Even better.”

“Heavy is in, too.”

“Aw, come on, guys! It’s not as if you’re gonna beat me!”

Heavy threw Scout an unimpressed look. “It is fun. I want extra money. I am in.”

“Alright, alright, mate. Sure.” Demo handed them both some extra sheets of paper they'd brought just in case.

Medic excused himself to go search for a couple of pens. On his way out, he almost crashed onto Soldier.

“Ach, watch where you’re going!”

“I need sustenance, maggot! And you’re on my way!” He shoved Medic away, making him stumble on the way out. A couple of German swears could be heard from the corridor. “Hello, everyone!”

“Oh, don’t tell me you’re gonna get in too,” Scout groaned.

“In what?” Soldier inquired, tilting his head. Demo showed him the magazine’s ad.

Engineer peeked over his shoulder.

“Oh, a drawing contest?” he said, looking at it with a fond smile. “Heh. It’s been a while since I tried my hand at one o’ those. But I thought they allowed only one entry per ad?”

“That is point,” Heavy said. “We are fighting to get chance to earn money.”

“Oh…” Soldier grinned. “I’m in, maggots! I actually studied art with Kickasso.”

Everyone stared at him.

“Sure, mate,” Demo said, patting his back and attempting to lead him into the kitchen.

“You don’t believe me!” Soldier looked at everyone. Engie shrugged. Scout picked at his nails, and Sniper scratched the table distractedly. Heavy’s eyes said it all. “I will prove it to all of you!” And he headed to the table, snatching a paper sheet from the pile.

Demo brushed a hand across his own face. “I hope Medic brings enough pens.”

“I’ll go for mine,” Engie said. He added, “And I’ll go look for Pyro; they’ll love this.”

Scout groaned. “Anyone else? Maybe Saxton Hale?”

Spy’s laughter can be heard from a corner of the room.

“Oh, this is priceless. I wasn’t going to butt in, but this looks like too much fun to pass on the opportunity.”

“The opportunity to what?” Scout said, miffed.

“You’ll see,” he said with a glint in his eyes. “Besides, you need a referee, don’t you?”

“Ugh,” Scout said, bonking his head on the table.

-----

Everyone looked at each other from their respective places. Scout’s leg bounced nonstop; Sniper picked unconsciously at his pencil. Heavy’s grip on his pen was strong enough for Medic to worry about it breaking.

“Alright,” said Spy. “You have to draw…” He squinted. “Poopy Joe, following the ad’s instructions; the best artist wins. The rules are: no interfering with anyone’s drawing. No kicking under the table. No destroying anyone’s drawing. No rising up from the table until all this is over. No showing your drawing until everyone is finished. Understood?”

Everyone nodded. Pyro hummed happily.

“Excellent. So, on the count of three: One, two… Three!”

Scout’s pen tore onto the paper. “Shit! Do you have a spare?” Spy handed him one. “Thanks,” he muttered.

The truth was, Scout wasn’t that confident of the fact he was going to win. When it was just him and Demo, he’d been sure he’d win to the unsteady hand of a drunk man. And Sniper was all bragging anyways. But Medic? He’d probably drawn lots of skeletons and stuff at college. And Engineer’s schematics always look exactly like the finished product. Shit. And—did Soldier really paint with Kickasso? Nah, he shook his head. He didn’t think so. Heavy was a wild card, though.

But he had to try anyway! He couldn’t back off now. So he put his all into it.

Engineer turned his sheet of paper down. Hell! That was fast. He tried to concentrate in the lines that formed Poopy Joe, and emulated them the best he could. Damn, his hand was sweaty… He hated drawing. His cousin had always been better at it, and it pissed him off even now, far from home.

He slapped his drawing on the table, face down. “Done!” He looked up to see everyone had finished. Crap.

“Alright, then,” said Spy. “Let’s see what you came up with.”

“Come up with?” That had many meanings, but the way Spy said it… “What do you mean?”

“The challenge was to improve on the design of Poopy Joe drawn by the artist, not to copy it.”

“Oh, darn,” Engineer said, showing a perfect copy of the Poopy Joe logo. Holy shit. “Guess I got a bit carried away. I’m more used to copying stuff, ya know.”

Soldier snickered.

“Let’s see what you did, Soldier boy.”

“Alright! Look at it and weep!”

He showed them all a mess of lines with dots in seemingly random places.

“Soldier, that’s…” Scout got elbowed by Demo. “That’s cool. What are… those?”

“Those are his eyes!” Oh, God.

“Let’s see Demo’s!” grinned Soldier, confidently.

“Ach, you know I’m no artist, mate,” he said, showing his drawing. It was… Actually, it was pretty decent. His drawing had a cartoonish style that drew everyone’s eyes in.

“Interesting,” said Spy, nodding approvingly.

“Demo did great job,” Heavy said, crossing his arms.

“Aw, thanks, mate.” Demo shrugged it off, somewhat flustered. “What about yours?”

Heavy showed his drawing. It was simple, a single line delineating the silhouette of the monkey astronaut. It was stylish, though it was difficult to guess what it was at times.

“Wonderful, mein freund!” Medic clapped, and revealed his. It was… Oh, my god. “I might have put a bit too much emphasis on his organs.”

“Next!” yelled Scout, tearing his eyes away from the gory drawing. Shit. Now he had to show his. Alright. You can do this, he told himself.

He turned the page face up.

“Mate,” Sniper said.

“Oh, buddy, we made the same mistake.”

“Y’know? I saw RED’s Scout draw once and I secretly thought we were doomed.”

“Oh, shut up!” Scout said, face beet red. It was true, he’d tried to copy the drawing, like Engineer did. And his lines weren’t as sure as Demo’s or Heavy’s. Shit. He screwed up big time.

“It’s good overall, mate,” Sniper said. “You just need more confidence.”

Scout flushed. “What about yours, Mister Expert?”

Sniper grunted, and showed his drawing. Oh, wow. It was really good! The monkey looked like it’d come out of the page and tear them apart. He felt as if he would be able to touch its fur.

“Wow, Slim! That’s one helluva good drawing!”

“Thanks,” he said, grinning. “I told ya: quiet kid.”

“Where is his spacesuit, though?”

His face dropped. “Aw, hell.”

“Hmmmph!” Pyro yelled, pointing at their sheet of paper.

“Alright,” Spy said, grinning along with Engineer. “The moment of truth has come.”

“What do you mean—?”

Holy shit.

The drawing was astounding. The monkey looked cartoonish enough not to look real, but in a way that made the drawing look alive. Everything was there, and in wonderful detail: The space-suit, the stars… Even an additional full moon in the background that was a perfect circle.

“Holy shit, Py!” Scout said. “How did you do that?”

“Hhmph?” Pyro asked, pointing at the moon. Everyone nodded. Pyro mumbled happily, grabbing another sheet of paper, and drew a classical Greek style face, then erased the rest of its features little by little until they got a perfect circle.

Oh, for the love of—

“Well, it seems we have our winner,” said Spy, handing Pyro the magazine. Pyro clapped with glee, running off with it.

“Aw, man. That was totally unfair. You knew this would happen!” Scout pointed to Spy accusingly.

“I had my suspicions,” he said, grinning.

“Hey, maggots,” Soldier said, sniffing. “Is that smoke?”

They all turned around to watch Pyro as they set the magazine on fire.

“Ach! My magazine!” Demo ran and stomped on it. However, many of the pages, including the drawing contest ad, didn’t make it. “Hell. Why, mate?”

“Hmmphmmphmmph!” they said, pointing at everyone in the room, then at their drawings. Then they clapped.

Everyone looked at each other, and found a common understanding. Who knew what Pyro said? But they had the feeling they meant they were all winners today.

“So it was a huge waste of everyone’s time. Fantastic,” Spy said. “Entertaining, though.”

“Shut up, Spy, we were having a moment,” Scout said.

And yes, indeed. Because even though Demo lost his magazine, he left the room with a good feeling inside. And he was sure that the rest felt the same way.

Poopy Joe’s artist could keep his job for another day.

#Team Fortress 2 #fanfiction #BLU Team #Tales of Teufort #Tales of Teufort zine #[♥]

12 notes · View notes

scifrey · 3 years

Photo

WORDS FOR WRITERS: The Value of Fanfiction

There’s been a lot of chatter on social media these last few weeks, recycling that trashy, self-aggrandizing, tired old “hot take” that reading and writing fanfiction is somehow bad for you as a writer.

Before we go any further, let me give a clear and definitive answer to this take:

No, reading and writing fanfiction will not make you and does not make you a bad reader or writer.

Period.

Why? Here’s the TL;DR version:

1) Reading and Writing, any kind of reading and writing, will make you a better reader and writer. And it’s enjoyable, to boot.

2) Fanfiction has been around as long as Original Fiction, so we’d know if there was any negative impact by now (spoiler alert: there isn’t.)

3) Practice is Practice, so matter what medium you get that practice in.

4) Comprehending and writing fanfiction is harder than writing original fiction because you have to hold the Source Media Text in your head at the same time as you’re reading/writing a different story. It improves your understanding of storytelling.

5) No hobby, no matter what it is, so long as it doesn’t harm anyone else or yourself, is bad. And that goes double for if you decide to keep it a hobby. Not every fanfic writer wants to write original fiction, and that’s just fine. Not every hobby has to be monetized.

Okay. But what do they mean by “fanfiction”?

“Fanfiction is fictional writing written by fans, commonly of an existing work of fiction. The author uses copyrighted characters, settings, or other intellectual properties from the original creator as a basis for their writing.”-- Wikipedia

Basically – it’s when you take elements (setting, characters, major themes or ideas) of a Media Text (a novel, a movie, a podcast, a comic, etc.) and create a different story with those elements. You can write a missing scene, or an extended episode, or a whole new adventure for the characters of the Media Text. You can even crossover or fuse multiple Media Texts, or specific elements, to create a whole new understanding of the characters or their worlds.

Similar to fanfic, you can also create fanart, fancomics, or fansongs (“filk”), fancostumes (“cosplay”), and fanfilms. These are called Fanworks or Fancrafts.

Fanfiction is usually posted to online forums, journals, blogs, or story archives and shared for free among the public. Before the advent of the internet, fanfiction was often printed or typed, and hand-copied using photocopiers or ditto machines, and distributed for free (or for a small administration fee to cover materials) among fans at conventions, or through mail-order booklets (“zines”).

Fanfiction has existed pretty much since the beginning of storytelling (A Thousand and One Nights, Robin Hood, and King Arthur all have different elements attributed to them by different authors retelling, twisting, adding to, or changing the stories; there’s no single-origin author of those tales.)

There are billions on billions of fanfics out there in the world—and while a majority of them are romance stories, there are also adventures, comedies, dramas, thrillers, stories based on case files, stories about the emotional connection between characters when one is hurt and the other must care for them, historical retellings, etc. There are also stories for every age range and taste, though be sure to take heed of the tags, trigger warnings, and age range warnings as your browse the archives and digital libraries.

As a reader, it’s your responsibility to curate your experience online.

So why are people so afraid or derisive of fanfic?

People who are hard on fanfic say that…

· It sucks.

o Well of course it sucks! As it’s a low-stakes and easy way to try out creative writing for the first time, the majority of fanfiction is overwhelmingly written by new and young writers. Everything you do when you first try it sucks a little bit.

I’m sure no figure skater was able to immediately land perfect triple axels ten minutes after they strap on the skates for the first time in their lives. No knitter has ever made a flawlessly perfect jumper on their first try. No mathematician has ever broken the code to send a rocket into space after having just been taught elementary-school multiplication. So why on earth do people think that new writers don’t need to practice? I can promise you that Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first rap was probably pretty shaky.

· It’s lazy or it’s cheating.

o Listen, anyone who tells you that writing anything is lazy clearly has not sat down and tried to write anything. Writing is tedious. It is boring. It takes hours, and hours, and hours to get anything on the page, and then once it’s on the page you have to go back and edit it. UGH. There is nothing about being a writer—even a fanfic writer—that is lazy.

o And anyone who tells you that trying to tell a fresh, new story within the limits and confines of a pre-existing world and have it make sense is cheating, then they have no freaking clue how hard it is to be creative with that kind of limitation placed on you. It’s harder when you have a set of rules you need to follow. What you do come up with is often extremely interesting and creative because of those limitations, not in spite of them.

o The argument that using pre-made characters, settings, tropes, and worlds to make up a new story is cheating is also complete bunk. Do those same people also expect hockey players to whittle and plane themselves a whole new hockey stick from scratch before each game? No, of course not. And yeah, a baker can grow all their own wheat, grind the flour, raise the chickens and cows so they can get eggs and milk, distill the vanilla, etc. Or a baker can buy a box mix. Either way, you get a cake at the end of the process. Whether you write fanfic or original fiction, you still get a story at the end of the process.

· It makes you a worse writer.

o * annoying buzzer noise * Practicing anything does not make you worse at it. And reading stories that are not edited, expertly crafted, or “high art” will also not indoctrinate you into being a bad writer. If anything, figuring out why you don’t like a specific story, trope, or writing style is actually a great way to learn what kind of writer you want to be, and to learn different methods of constructing sentences, creating images, and telling tales. Or you know, just how much spelling and grammar matter.

· It’s not highbrow or thoughtful enough.

o Sometimes stories are allowed to be just comfort food. Not every book or story you read has to be haute cuisine or boringly nutritious. You are allowed to read stories because they’re exciting, or swoony, or funny, or just because you like them. Anyone who says differently is a snob and worth ignoring. (Besides, fun silly stories can also be packed with meaning and lessons—I mean, hello, Terry Pratchett, anyone?)

· It makes you waste all your time on writing that can’t be monetized.

o No time is wasted if you spend it doing something that brings you joy. Not every hobby needs to be a money-maker and not everyone wants to be a professional writer. You are allowed to write, and read, fanfic just for the fun of it.

· It’s theft.

o According to Fair Use Law, it’s not. As long as the fanfic writer (or artist, cosplayer, etc.) is not making money on their creation that directly impacts or cuts into the original creator’s profit, or is not repackaging/plagiarizing the original Media Text and profiting off it’s resale, then Fan Works are completely legal. So there.

How, exactly, does fanfic make you a better writer?

Fanfiction…

· teaches you to finish what you start.

o The joy of being able to share your fic, either as you’re writing it, or afterward, is a big motivating factor for a lot of people. They finish because they get immediate feedback on it from their readers and followers. Lots of people have ideas for books, but how many of them do you know have actually sat down and written the whole thing?

o Fanfic is also low-stakes; there’s nothing riding on whether you finish something or not, so you have to inspire yourself to get there without the outside (potentially negative) motivation of deadline or a failing grade if you don’t get the story finished. You end up learning how to motivate yourself.

o Fanfic has no rules, so you write as much or as little as you want, stop wherever you think is a good place to end the story, write it out of order, or go back and write as many sequels or prequels as you like. Again, it’s totally low-stakes and is meant to be for fun, so you can noodle around with what it means to write a “whole” story and “complete” it, which teaches you how you like to write, and how you like to find your way to the finish line.

· teaches you story structure.

o Before you can sit down and write a story based on one of your favorite Media Texts, you’re likely to spend a lot of time consuming that text passively, or studying it actively. Either way, you’re absorbing how and why Media Text structures the stories it tells, and are learning how to structure your own from that.

o Once you’re comfortable with the story structure the Media Text you’re working in is told, you’ll probably start experimenting with different ways stories can be told, and find the versions you like to work with best.

· teaches you how to write characters consistently.

o Fanfic is really hard because not only do you have to write your fave characters in a way that moves the story along, but they have to be recognizable as those fave characters.

o This means you have to figure out their body language, verbal and physical tics, their motivations and they way the handle a crisis (fight, flight, or fawn?), and then make up the details you may need for your story that you may never see on screen/the page, like how they take their eggs or what their fave shampoo is, based on what you already know about them. That takes some top-notch detective work and character understanding to pull off.

o Once you know how to do that, just making up a whole person yourself for original fiction is a breeze.

· Teaches you how to hear and mimic a character/narrator voice.

o You have to pay close attention to how an actor speaks, or how a character’s speech patterns, dialect, work choice, etc. is reflected on the page in order to be consistent in your story.

o And all of this, in turn, teaches you how to build one for yourself.

o I have a whole series of articles here about building a narrative voice, if you want to read more on constructing an original voice for your narrator.

· Teaches you how to create or recreate a setting.

o Again, like achieving character consistency, or mimicking a character or narrative voice, it takes work and paying attention in order to re-create a setting, time period, or geographical region in a fanfic—and if you’re taking your characters somewhere new, your readers will expect that setting to be equally rich as the one the Media Text is based in.

o Which, again, teaches you how to then go and build an original one for yourself.

· teaches how to take critique.

o Professional writing is not a solitary pursuit. In fact, most writing is not entirely the work of an author alone. Like professional authors work with editors, critique partners, and proofreaders, some fanfiction writers will sometimes work with beta-readers or editors as well. This are friends or fanfic colleagues who offer to read your fanfic and point out plot, character, consistency, or story structure errors, or who offer to correct spelling and grammar errors. This is a great way to practice working with editors if you decide to pursue a professional career, and also a great way to make friends and strengthen your community and skill set if you don’t.

o Many fanfic sites offer readers the opportunity to leave a comment on a fic, rather like a reviewer can leave a review on GoodReads or Amazon, or any other online store or blog, for a novel they’ve read. Sometimes these comments/reviews are 5 star and enthusiastic! Sometimes they are… not. The exact opposite in fact. As you get comments on your fanfic, and learn to ignore the ones that are just mean rather than usefully critical, you gain the Very Important Skill of learning to resist firing back at bad comments or reviews, while enjoying the good ones. It also teaches you how to ignore drama or haters.

· Teaches you how to exist within a like-minded community.

o While the actual writing part of writing is solitary and sometimes tedious, nothing is ever published into a vacuum, whether it be fanfiction or original. Besides your editing/critique/beta reader group, you will also likely develop friendships, a support network, and mutuals. It’s always great to uplift, support, cheer on, and celebrate one another’s accomplishments and victories, whether the writing is fanfic or original.

· Teaches you that it’s okay to write about things important to you, or your own identity.

o You can change a characters ethnicity, cultural background, sexuality, religion, or disabilities to match yours, and talk about your lived life through the megaphone of that character. Or, you can insert original characters based on you, your desires, and experiences.

o Once you’re comfortable writing in your #ownvoice in fanfic, you can approach it in original fiction, if you like.

o See my article titled Your Voice Is Valid for more on this.

What if I want to be a professional writer?

Notice how I didn’t say “real writer”. Any writer who writes any kind of story is a ‘real’ writer. I mean, pinch yourself—you’re real, right? The difference is actually between being an “amateur” writer (a hobbyist who does not write for pay), and a “professional” (who is paid for their writing). Just because you only play shinny on the street with your friends, or in a house league on the weekends, it’s doesn’t mean you’re not still as much of a hockey player as someone who plays in the NHL.

Writing fanfiction before or at the same time as writing original fiction that you intend to sell is a great way to learn, or practice, everything I’ve mentioned above. If you read it widely, it will also expose you to different story telling styles, voices, and tropes than your reading of published fiction.

· Can I sell my fanfic?

o No. For fanfiction to remain under the umbrella of Fair Use Law, you cannot profit off your fanfiction. There’s some grey-area wiggle room around things like charging a small amount for a ‘zine or a PDF to cover administrative costs, but zero wiggleability around, say, selfpublishing your fanfic and charging heaps for it.

· Can I “file off the serial numbers”?

o “Filing of the series numbers” is when you take a fanfic you’ve written and essentially pull it apart, remove everything that’s clearly someone else’s Media Text, and reassembling the story so that it’s pretty much a completely original piece of creative writing.

o Yes, you can sell these, provided your filing is rigorous enough that you aren’t likely to be dinged for plagiarism. It’s widely known that Cassandra Claire’s Shadowhunters was once Harry Potter fanfic, and that Fifty Shades of Gray was once Twilight fanfic. But did you know that my Triptych started life as an idea for a Stargate Atlantis fic? There’s lots of stories out there that were once full fics, or the idea for the novel was originally conceived for a fandom, but written as original instead.

o So long as you’re careful to really rework the text so that it’s not just a find-name-replace-name rewrite, you should be fine.

o Be aware, though, that the agents and editors you might pitch this novel to know how to Google. They may discover that this is a filed-off story, and depending on their backgrounds and biases, might be concerned about it. There’s no need to inform them of the novel’s origin straight off in your pitch/query letter, but you may want to have a frank discussion with them about it after it’s been signed so they can help you make sure that any lingering copywrited concepts or characters are thoroughly changed before publication.

o Should you take down the original fic-version of the novel while you’re querying/shopping it? Well, that’s up to you, and whether you’re comfortable with an editor/agent potentially finding it.

· Should I be ashamed of my fic, or take it down, or pretend I never wrote fic?

o What? Why? No! I mean, I have hidden some of my most immature work, but I’ve left pretty much my whole catalogue of fanfic online and I don’t deny that I was/am a ficcer. Why? Because it’s a great repository of free stories that people can read before they buy one of my books, so they can get a taste of how and what I write. Also, you will be in good company. Lots and lots of writers who are published now-a-days started in fandom, including:

Steven Moffat

Seanan McGuire

Rainbow Rowell

Claudia Gray

Cory Doctorow

Marissa Meyer

Meg Cabot.

Naomi Novik

Neil Gaiman

Lev Grossman

S.E. Hinton

John Scalzi

The Bronte Sisters

Andy Weir

Sarah Rees Brennan

Marjorie M. Liu

Anna Todd

...and me, J.M. Frey

How fanfic can harm.

Like with anything else, there are ways that reading and writing fanfiction can actually harm you, or others, but it has nothing to do with the reading or writing of fanfiction in and of itself.

· Some creators may prefer that you don’t (and may or may not follow up with legal action).

o Anne Rice famously went after fanficcers in the 90s who wrote fanfic of her work, handing out Cease & Desist notices like confetti.

o 99% of creators don’t care. Those who do will generally have a notice on their websites or social media politely asking fancreators to refrain. Mostly this is due to their general discomfort over the idea of anyone else getting to play in their worlds. The best thing to do is respect that request, and find a different fandom to write in.

· Flamewars and fandom fights leading to bullying and doxing.

o Regrettably, just like any other community filled with people who have different favorites, opinions, and preferences, there will inevitably be clashes. It’s up to you to decide how to react to negative interactions, and how to model positive ones.

o Don’t forget, you curate your online experience, so don’t be afraid of that block button.

o Also, don’t be the jerk who goes after people for liking different aspects of the fandom. Everyone is entitled to interact and like a Media Text their own way. “Don’t yuck my yum,” as they say.

· Trying to make money on other people’s IP/Media Text (law suits, etc.)

o It doesn’t belong to you, so don’t try to make money on it.

o There’s a grey area here in terms of selling prints/plushies/jewelry/etc. and there’s no hard line about where one copyright owner will draw the line, and another won’t. Warner Bros. owns the film rights for both Harry Potter and Hunger Games, but I’ve seen Harry Potter-themed bars spring up while fans wanting to make Hunger Game fanfilms have been shut down. A friend of mine sells hand-made fandom-inspired items at cons—there is no rhyme or reason to what she gets told to stop making and what she’s left alone on.

o Best thing to do if you’re told to stop is just so stop, move on, and find a different fandom to be active in.

· Writing Real Person Fanfic (“RPF”) can be considered a violation of consent.

o This article sums it up pretty well, but basically… if you decide to write RPF, be aware that they person you are writing about is a real person, with real thoughts, and emotions, and they may feel violated by RPF. If you decide to write it, never send it to the people it’s about, and always clearly tag it so other can choose to engage with it, or avoid it.

o Also be aware that it could ruin their love for what they do. For example: the friendships between the members of 1Direciton became strained and the band eventually disintegrated because people wouldn’t stop sending band members smutty stories or art of them having sex with one another, and it made them too uncomfortable to continue in the band.

· Showing/sharing fanfic & fanart outside of its intended context. Fanworks are for fans, and there are definitely issues if…

o It’s shown to celebrities/actors/creators.

Shoving your fantasies onto the people who create or portray your fave characters is rude, and wrong, and also kinda gross. If they seek it out themselves, that’s one thing, but the same way you wouldn’t throw it at a complete stranger, don’t throw it at them. You may love the characters these people play, but they are not their characters, and they are not your friends.

It may also really weird them out and ruin their love for what they do.

o it’s shown to writers working on the series.

There was a famous case where a fanficcer sent a story to a novelist, and the novelist was accused of plagiarism by the ficcer when their next novel in the series resembled the plot of that fanfic. There was a whole court case and everything.

Because of this, writers of TV shows, books, etc. don’t want to (and often times, legally can’t) read your fanfic. They don’t want to get accidentally inspired by what you’ve written, or worse, have to throw out something because it resembles your fic too closely. Just let them write their stories the way they want, and if they choose to seek out fic, they will.

o it’s mocked by celebrities.

I’m not letting Alan Carr and Graham Norton off the hook. If it’s super rude and gross to shove fanworks at actors/writers/creators when you’re a creator, then it’s doubly rude for anyone to take a story or art made for a specific audience (the fans), by a specific community (the fans), lift it out of it’s context, and invite the public to mock it while also shoving it at the actor/celebrity in a place where they are literally cornered and can’t leave (i.e. the chat-show sofa). Man, it really steams me up when they do that. It’s rude and it’s tone-deaf, and it’s not fair.

And most of the time they do it, they don’t even ask the artist or writer for permission, first, which is just…. Uuuuugggghhhh. It may be fanfic, but it was still created by someone, and you should always ask permission before publicly sharing something created by someone else.

Grrrrrrr.

In Conclusion

If someone tells you that reading or writing fanfic is bad for you as a creator, tell them to get bent.

Famous Fanfic

· Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda

· Wicked by Gregory Maguire

· Wicked: the Musical by Stephen Schwartz

· The Phantom of Manhattan by Fredrick Forsyth

· A Study in Emerald by Neil Gaiman

· Sherlock by Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat

· The Dracula Tape, by Fred Saberhaugen

· Paradise Lost, John Milton

· Inferno, by Dante

· The Aeneid, by Virgil

· Ulysses, by James Joyce

· Romeo & Juliet, by William Shakespeare

· The Once and Future King by T.H. White

· A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, by Mark Twain

· The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas

· Pride & Prejudice & Zombies, by Seth Grahame-Smith

· Phantom, a novel of his life by Susan Kaye

· …and so many more.

#words for writers #fanfiction #fan fiction #fan fiction is good for you #writing #am writing #writing community #writing fanfiction #writing fanfic

14 notes · View notes

caiminnent · 4 years

Text

please, be golden [kylux, rated T]

PROMPT: worked themselves to exhaustion (@badthingshappenbingo, 12/25) & @kyluxzineproject

SUMMARY: After Snoke's death, Supreme Leader Ren and General Hux try to keep the First Order from falling apart—each in their own way.

FANDOM: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy

TAGS: Bad Things Happen Bingo, First Order Politics (Star Wars), Diplomacy, Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, Established Relationship, Courting, Idiots in Love, Overworked Armitage Hux, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Stimulants

NOTES: Here is my Kylux Standard Zine work to pair with @mi-caw-ber‘s amazing art! Find the art here on Tumblr and weep with me.

Below is only a 1.4k of snippet of the fic; because posting 11k on Tumblr in one go is just... no.

11K || ALSO ON AO3

Ren barges in at 0225.

Rather, Ren bangs his massive paw on the door and waits just long enough to make it technically not barging in before the access panel beeps. He storms past the office space without a stray glance in. The refresher door slams closed a moment later.

Well. That answers how it went.

Hux sighs, slumping in his chair. Figures that Ren would choose now to leave his lair. He couldn’t have shown himself when Hux could use his intimidating presence yesterday, of course not. Couldn’t have defended the Order he’s supposed to be leading against that boar Kratkitki at the holo-conference earlier. No, Hux had to face all that, alone—like he always does.

He ought to cite reports to write and turn Ren away—better yet, let him stay. Would serve Ren well to toss and turn alone while Hux sits in the next room, nearby but unreachable. No help at all.

If only.

Double-checking that the documents are synched, he disconnects his datapad and switches off the monitor, leaving the empty cups lying on his desk. It’s going to be a seven-minute shower, if Ren’s eerie silence is any indication; tidying up can wait.

He’s wrong, for once. It’s full ten minutes before Ren steps out of the refresher in a cloud of humidity and honey soap—long enough for Hux to change and leave a clean set out for Ren, for hygiene’s sake. Ren might be fine with wearing the same clothes for a standard week straight; but he’s not coming anywhere near Hux’s bed in them.

At least Ren stopped taking offence at the gesture.

Ren undresses swiftly, not a care for modesty—his or Hux’s. Keeping his eyes on the clothes he’s folding and putting away, “Your quarters come with a ‘fresher attached as well, surely,” Hux says. A nice one, too, what with having been Snoke’s star pupil back in the day. Ren has no reason to keep coming to Hux’s quarters for a shower. “Unless you destroyed yours.”

The bundle of black fabric floating past halts above the hamper.

Hux’s stomach sinks.

A muscle in his cheek twitching, “Ren,” he sighs, the word sour in his mouth. He was jesting, for stars’ sake. They are—he thought they were beyond meaningless destruction by now, that it had become one of those things: things from their shared past that they could gingerly jest about now, to be openly laughed at one day. Isn’t that why they’re doing this? What’s the point of this if it’s not helping Ren keep his head?

Nothing, obviously.

Hands clenching and unclenching at his sides, “I didn’t destroy my refresher,” Ren says, his voice only slightly raspy with disuse instead of the regular post-tantrum hoarseness.

Then again, if Ren had had a tantrum and gone through his quarters, someone would have heard and reported it to Hux, too. His datapad has been mercifully—mercilessly—quiet the entire delta shift.

A twinge of guilt passes through his chest.

“All right,” he says, because sorry doesn’t belong between the two of them. If they started to apologise for every hurtful word and assumption they have ever thrown at each other’s face, they would be here all month.

Not that the word is likely to exist in Ren’s vocabulary.

“I didn’t!” Ren snaps, the corners of his lips turning down at the perceived insult, body growing stiffer in indignation—on the verge of that tantrum, now. The hovering bundle starts quivering violently.

Stars, it is far too late into the delta shift to deal with Ren’s moods.

Resisting the urge to dig the heels of his palms into his eyes until white sparks in his vision—satisfying as it would have been—Hux forces the lines of his body to relax instead, an invitation for Ren to mirror him. The simplest way to defuse Ren is to give him a lead to follow.

Meeting his gaze, “I believe you, Ren,” he says, mild but clear, honest—at least, honest-sounding enough to give Ren’s building agitation a pause. He doesn’t give Ren time to size up his sincerity before heading to the refresher himself, unlatching Ren’s dirty bundle from empty air along the way.

He doesn’t linger long, still not comfortable going about his full routine while not alone in his quarters. A hot shower to wash away the cycle’s—hells, week’s—troubles would be blissful; but the cubicle is still wet from Ren’s turn and anyway, the idea of undressing again and standing under the spray doesn’t hold much appeal at this hour, even if he already won’t be able to fall asleep soon with the amount of caf in his system.

Besides, the Supreme Leader is waiting.

He half-expects to find Ren still standing there and fidgeting when he walks in; but Ren has already settled in the middle of the bed, a dark lump against the white bedding, the plush duvet pushed to his waist. Ren has done him the courtesy of letting him choose his side, although it matters little when he pulls Hux close as soon as Hux slides under the covers. Hux puts up only the token fight before getting comfortable between Ren’s arms, kicking the rest of the duvet out of the way. Ren runs hot enough to make any extra coverage unbearable within minutes.

They lie in… not peace, but an acceptable approximation of it. His head is buzzing with everything he’ll need to take care of after his first cup of caf later in the cycle; Ren distracts him by nosing at his neck, his ear, his hair before it can latch onto anything specific. For his own sake. When they are—when Ren is being this way, affectionate and indulgent, Hux is foolishly, dangerously willing to dismiss that Ren is the reason his task list is so long. That he wouldn’t even be in Hux’s bed right now had Ren not failed again.

He is too tired to muster up the disappointment.

“Tell me something,” Ren whispers.

“Yes?”

Ren shifts behind him. “No, I mean—talk to me. Tell me about your week.”

He snorts. “You don’t want to hear about my week.” Nor does Hux want to talk about his week, giant waste of time that it has been. Following-up on holo-mails that go nowhere, trying to prioritise the plethora of critical issues they must allocate for in their budget, status reports that show nothing but how the High Command is sitting with their thumbs up their arses while the First Order’s funds dwindle and glory slips further out of their reach. If he were the Supreme Leader—

—but of course, he isn’t the Supreme Leader. Is that not the root of their predicament? Nothing he can offer to potential allies and benefactors will ever be enough to sway them to their cause while the Supreme Leader of the First Order hides away and seeks guidance from ghosts.

A breeze brushes against his mind; mild, warm wind over chilled skin, caked scent of suns over damp ground, raw dough and—

His jaw locks with a click, a lungful of recycled air and faux-honey shattering the deception easily enough. That storm is developing across his forehead again, the spot above his brow pulsing in time with his heart hammering in his throat. “Ren.”

“I’m not in your head,” Ren amends. “I just sensed your… grievances.”

“You are the biggest,” Hux grits out, shifting away—Ren’s arm snaked across his entire middle holds him in place. When did that happen? “Ren. Let go of me.”

“Talk to me,” Ren repeats, chapped lips catching on Hux’s hair. “I can’t ease your mind if you don’t.”

It will take more than half-remembered pillow talk to ease Hux’s mind. It will take more than talking, if they are to solve anything. However, Ren has got a point. Division of work is a key principle in a functional organisation so long as all parties are aware of the big picture—which Ren might not be, having operated outside of the Order for the longest time. Perhaps it’s time for an alternate approach.

When Hux isn’t hurting to sink his teeth at Ren’s bared throat and Ren can be reasonably expected not to fling himself into that temper tantrum they’ve narrowly missed at the slightest provocation.

“Tomorrow,” he promises. Tomorrow, they talk.

#Bad Things Happen Bingo #kyluxfanzine #kylux #Kylo Ren #Armitage Hux #Star Wars #Cai does words #finished fics #please be golden #I can't believe it's finally out

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clanoftwozine · 3 years

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INTEREST CHECK Q&A #1

We’ve gotten a ton of responses to the interest check already! Below, find answers to a number of questions people submitted through the form.

Please also see our FAQ, Mod Team, and Schedule pages for answers to frequently asked questions!

Q: Will this this be available physically as well as online?

A: Yes! We will be selling both a physical and digital copy. More information on zine bundles will be available later down the road.

Q: can I participate even living outside of the us?

A: Absolutely you can! We encourage everyone to apply.

Q: Would there be international shipping??

A: Yes there will be! Details on shipping and production will be available later down the road.

Q: Is there like a mailing list to be notified if this becomes a thing? I don’t wanna miss out!

A: The best way to stay up to date with the zine is to follow this blog (we recommend turning on notifications for the blog so you are notified whenever we post an update) and the instagram page.

Q: I was just wondering what dates this would be countered around? + When do we have to turn in our Zine art work? + When would work begin on this?

A: Zine contributor apps open January 25th, and accepted applications are expected to begin late March/early April, with the expectation that the zine will be finished mid-July. For more details, please see our Schedule page. Further scheduling details will be released once we are further along in the project.

Q: Would the zine include other characters from the mandalorian or would it just be centered around Din and Grogu? + Will we be showing the entire story of the Mandalorian, or is this just for drawing the two?

A: Canon characters (Cara Dune, Greef Karga, Boba Fett, Fennec Shand, Peli Motto, etc) are allowed to be present as long as they are not the focus of the piece. Very minor background OCs (a shopkeeper, bartender, etc) are also fine.

Q: Will you be in need of a graphic designer?

A: Nope! We have a full mod team assembled already. @cranity is our very talented and wonderful graphic designer mod!

Q: How will be the preproduction, production and post production of this zine? Is there a problem if I have never post something about Mando but actually I really like the series?

A: From mod @cranity:

After we have a solid list of our contributors and what merch we’ll need, we’ll be figuring out manufacturers and place orders accordingly to the number of preorders, and then once everything has been gathered together it will be shipped out.

If that didn’t answer the production portion of your question, feel free to send us an ask!

Additionally, if you are an artist you don’t need experience drawing for The Mandalorian before. For writers, we are asking that you have written fic for the show before applying. If you haven’t, you still have lots of time to post fic before the contributor apps open!

Q: If submitting art, can it be traditional, as opposed to digital?

A: You can submit traditional art! Just make sure that it is submitted as a high-quality scan.

We will be periodically posting more Q&A posts throughout the coming days and weeks. If you have a more specific question you want answered sooner, please send us an ask. Additionally, the best way to stay up to date is to follow this blog (turn on notifications for it) and the IG page!

#mod post #mod roxy #Q&A #mod nick

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pantyafrica2 · 3 years

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enddeal08 · 3 years

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It Really Is Our Responsibility To Teach Yourself On Online Marketing

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