#im just going through another hyperfocus <3 | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

threecrowsinatrenchcoat · 3 years

Text

Paint My Spirit Gold

Dukeceit Week Day 2: Green/Yellow

Fans of the YouTubers "Deceit" and Remus "The Duke" Sanders start to suspect that maybe, just maybe, the two of them are more than simple internet pals.

AO3 Link: [here]

Word Count: 2187

Warnings: n/a

@dukeceitweek <3

[ID: A screenshot of a Twitter post by user @CallMeDukie. It features a watercolor-style painting of a snake. The snake appears to be made of melting chocolate, and there is a large bite taken out of its tail. Cherries and jam are leaking out of the snake at the bite wound. The snake's expression of horror is overly-exaggerated to the point of comedy. The caption reads: "liked your snake boi, @SerpenThyme. thanks for the inspo." /end ID]

A notification ding cut Janus off mid-sentence.

“Wow, someone left their cell phone on, so professional,” he said, giving the camera a dramatic eye roll. That someone was him, of course, because he was the only one in the apartment- just him and the running livestream- but that was no excuse not to be a drama queen about it. He finished wiping flour off his hands and grabbed his phone to silence it; but the notification made him pause. He flicked his eyes up toward the camera and gave a slight smirk.

“My goodness, I’m famous,” he drawled. “The Duke himself has graced little old me with some fan art.”

Most of the comments in the chat wanted him to show it, so Janus opened up Twitter to see the full post he’d been tagged in. It was a watercolor painting of the coiled-snake chocolate sculpture- lovingly named Jake by his viewers- he’d made for his YouTube video last week; it was wearing an expression of such comedic horror that Janus had to stifle a laugh. He flicked his phone screen toward the close-up camera on his counter so his viewers could see.

“How kind of you, Remus,” he said. “All of you should go scold him for what he’s done to poor Jake here.”

Most of his viewers would know he was joking- after all, they were the ones to nickname him Deceit when he provided neither a real or fake name for his online persona. They knew full well what he was like by now.

The oven timer dinged. Janus silenced his phone and set it aside.

“And our first batch of cookies is done. You know, why don’t we show the Duke some appreciation?”

[ID: An Instagram post by user @SerpenThyme. The photo is an artistically-framed shot of a stack of sugar cookies with green, yellow, and pink icing. Propped up against the stack is another cookie, with an intricate icing-drawing of an octopus. The photo appears to have been color corrected to have high contrast, low saturation, and a dark vignette at the edges. The Instagram user @OctoDukie is tagged. No caption. /end ID]

“You know, I have often been accused of actually being a little old lady, what with my fondness for knitted jumpers, rocking chairs, and incredibly fucked up murder mystery books. Today I am doing nothing to dispel this accusation, by making soup.”

The studio was dark and empty aside from Remus' workspace. Everyone else had left long ago, even his own brother, which meant that it was officially ass-o'clock in the morning (or, as most people called it, somewhere between 1 and 2 a.m.) But Remus was stuck in hyperfocus, honed in on putting the last touches on a commission that he'd been putting off for weeks. It's not that it was a tough painting- once he'd gotten started, it was actually a very creatively satisfying piece- but man, executive dysfunction could go suck a dick

“French onion soup, specifically. Because while I do like to pretend I am a classy bitch, I am also, regrettably, a lazy bitch with a distaste for anything that takes longer than one bottle of wine to make.”

Remus hated working in silence. It was stifling, almost suffocating. His brain needed noise like his lungs needed air. So when the studio had grown still and silent, Remus had flipped open his laptop and queued up some YouTube videos.

“So we have here three pounds of onions that we need to slice up, pole to pole. You’re going to cry no matter what, so if you have any memories you’ve been repressing since middle school, now is an excellent time to dredge those up.”

And if it happened to be 90% SerpenThyme videos, well. Sue him.

“Now the first rule of caramelizing onions: fast and sloppy is always better than slow and thorough… at least, that’s what every man I’ve ever slept with tells me.”

Remus choked and glanced over to his laptop screen just in time to catch Deceit's trademark smirk directed at the audience just for a moment. It was the deadpan delivery that always got him. Remus could barely hold onto a joke long enough to get through it without cackling mid-punchline, but this fucker could say the funniest shit like an off-hand comment.

He wiped his hands off on his jeans (what use were clothes if you couldn't use them as paint rags?) and pulled his laptop across the table. He typed out a quick comment, citing the timestamp of the joke, and after it was posted, he shut his laptop.

'Cause ass-o'clock was short for "get-your-ass-home-or-I’ll-kick-it" o'clock.

[ID: A screenshot of a YouTube comments section. The first comment is by user TheDuke, and reads: "10:42 wow, rude." The second comment is a reply by user SerpenThyme, and simply reads ";)" /end ID]

Janus plopped down on the couch with a slight groan. He didn’t need to stream today, but he really hated missing days. Besides… he was fine. Really.

He adjusted the camera until he was happy with the framing, and then checked the settings on his streaming software. Satisfied, he started the stream, and watched as his usual viewers rolled in.

“What do you mean I’m not in my kitchen?” Janus drawled, addressing the chat. He glanced around with an expression of faux-shock on his face. “My goodness, when did that happen?”

He chuckled, and then gestured to his surroundings. “Yes, we are in my living room today. If you must know, my closest and most trusted friend tried to murder me today- yes, Virgil, it was attempted murder and nothing less- and I survived with nary a scratch… and a broken foot, but that is beside the point. Anyway, I’m not allowed to stand for long periods of time, and I may or may not be somewhat inebriated by pain pills and couldn’t stand even if I wanted to. So we are cooking from my couch today.”

Janus paused for a few moments to read the chat messages as they popped up. A few get well soon’s, a few theories about the “attempted murder,” Virgil- who moderated his chat for him- vehemently denying the “attempted murder” but otherwise refusing to clarify the event, and a large volume of wtf why are you streaming today, take care of yourself comments, which made him smile. But one particular comment caught his eye, almost lost amid the torrent of an active chat: wait this kinda looks like the Duke’s living room?

“Oh, VampSuga,” he said, addressing that commenter in particular with a slight smirk. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about. Anyway, since I can’t reach my oven from here, I thought some no-bake cookies were in order. For these you will need-”

[ID: A screenshot of a Discord conversation. The text reads:

“VampSuga: Ok ok hear me out. Dukeceit.

Starstruck96: who?

IneffableSnek: lmao

FeralBeauYasha: lol

VampSuga: Deceit and Remus Sanders! They’re totally dating. I will die on this hill.

FeralBeauYasha: Isn’t the duke w/ PatPat?

IneffableSnek: no thats his brothers bf

FeralBeauYasha: ohh

VampSuga: Did anyone see Deceit’s stream today? I swear that’s the Duke’s livingroom.

StarStruck96: idk that seems like a stretch

IneffableSnek: no wait i kno what u mean

IneffableSnek: im watching the duke’s old videos and that one where he shows off all his old weapons he’s in a living room kinda like deceit’s

FeralBeauYasha: They were acting all cute on twitter too

VampSuga: DUKECEIT” /end ID]

"Hey guys, been a while since you've seen my face and not just whatever my hands are busy with, when it's within YouTube's terms and conditions I mean. They used to be way more lenient…" Remus trailed off for a moment, then shook his head sharply and plastered on a grin.

"Anyway! In June me and a few other creators did a fundraiser for the Trevor Project, and y'all smashed the goal, so I let you decide what video I'd make this month." He paused, and gestured to the mountain of clothes piled behind him on the bed. "And you had so many juicy ideas to choose from, but you decided to dress me up like a Barbie instead."

Remus paused to scroll through his phone for a few moments. "Ah, ok, here we go. Twitter user YoonIsMyCat- oh, BTS, nice- sent in this first outfit. Uh… future Remus, put up the post here somewhere." He gestured vaguely to his right. "Y'all went with either a fuckton more clothes or a fuckton less clothes, which I respect. Apparently this outfit is called…” He squinted at his phone. “Amish chic? I take it back, no respect at all.”

Remus cycled through the outfits his viewers sent in, which ranged from the aforementioned “Amish chic” to “2008 rave attire” to “ok now you guys are just fucking with me” (which consisted of one of those big puffy snow coats, lime green in color; booty shorts with the shrug text emoji across the ass; fuzzy pink boots; and a yellow cowboy hat to top off the whole thing. It was awful. Remus loved it.) The mountain of clothes on the bed gradually became a mess of clothes spread across the floor instead, until there was just one outfit left.

“Ok so Twitter user VampSuga sent me this outfit that I’m gonna call ‘sexy librarian.’ I couldn’t find this exact sweater online, but-” he paused for dramatic effect, before brandishing a sweater toward the camera like a bullfighter. “My boyfriend had something that was close enough.”

Remus hopped up from the bed and switched off the camera so he could change.

“They’re going to lose their minds,” a voice drawled from the doorway. Remus threw his shirt at him.

“Shoo, I’m getting naked.”

[ID: A Twitter post by user @CallMeDukie. It features a selfie of YouTuber Remus “The Duke” Sanders, a Hispanic man with his hair dyed green and styled into a spiked mohawk. He is wearing a yellow knitted cardigan over a black button-up shirt. He is grinning widely at the camera. The caption reads: “my viewers pick my outfits! now live on youtube. go see what i look like as a sexy librarian!” /end ID]

DukeceitStan

first and only dukeceit shipper ig

DukeceitStan

wow there’s so many of you now! Hi!!

DukeceitStan

i want this to be canon so bad omg

DukeceitStan

i mean just look

[image]

how

[image]

cute

[image]

[ID: A series of three gifs featuring Youtubers SerpenThyme, aka Deceit, and TheDuke, aka Remus Sanders. Deceit is a black man with long, dreadlocked hair, and vitiligo patches along the left side of his face. Remus is a Hispanic man with green-dyed hair styled into a mohawk, many ear and facial piercings, and tattoos covering both arms. Each gif is edited so that the highlights are tinged yellow when Deceit is seen, and tinged green when Remus is seen.

The first gif depicts a close-up shot of Deceit’s hands as he carefully decorates a cookie with green and yellow icing. The cookie art he is working on appears to be a half-finished octopus. The gif then fades into a mid-shot of Remus, with his back to the camera, facing a canvas. The canvas is blank, and Remus appears to be laying out paints on a table to his left.

The second gif depicts Deceit seated at his couch, facing the camera. He has many ingredients spread across his coffee table (including oats, cocoa powder, and butter) and appears to be in the process of laying out several more. The gif fades to show Remus seated at a similar couch with a similar coffee table in front of him. The camera is angled slightly downward to better show the myriad of knives spread out across the table. Remus is gesturing wildly with a morning star held in his hand.

The third gif depicts Deceit in his kitchen. He is pulling on a bright, yellow knitted cardigan, and smirking toward the camera. The gif fades to show Remus in his bedroom, seated on his bed. He is holding up a similar-looking cardigan toward the camera and grinning. /end ID]

“Remus, it’s almost two in the morning. Come to bed.”

“I’m coming, sorry. Twitter distracted me.”

“Mm. I can’t believe the bird app is more distracting than I am.”

“You should try harder.”

“Come to bed and maybe I will.”

“Ok, ok, I’m coming. Hang on though, is it cool if I post this?”

“Sure. They figured it out anyway.”

“Sweet. Ok, Jannie, I’m coming.”

[ID: A screenshot of a Twitter post by user @CallMeDukie. It reads: “Dukeceit is canon.” /end ID]

#dukeceit #dukeceitweek #remus sanders #janus sanders #sanders sides fic #kye writes

18 notes · View notes

fairy-space · 3 years

Text

Man going through the add tags on this site kinda sucks bc...like...im trying to find people talking abt having add the same way i do but bc i don't have the same severity as i used to i feel like i dont "fit" even though i have it?? Like i don't show severe enough symptoms

It's weird. I definitely have OCD but my symptoms are manageable and i??? Still have that regardless??? AAAA

last night i LITERALLY was in my kitchen getting ready to eat dinner, unlocked my phone to track what i was going to eat, and sat there on social media for 20 minutes and forgot why i even had my phone in my hands in the first place. My bf walked out into the kitchen and was like "uhh...i thought you were gonna make food" and im like damn!!!! Yep!! Forgot!!!

Also with the whole hyperfocus thing...im just confused by some of the terminology. So like. The closest thing i can think of is when i did my Ember drawing. I made 3 different sketches and listened to her song for 4 HOURS STRAIGHT over and over and then dipped into the comments and discovered the whole Andrew Blaze thing and that was another Deep Dive AND THEN i finished the drawing and realized i hadn't had any food or water the entire time!!! That would happen a lot when i was a kid too - I'd get so into a drawing/recording that i wouldn't eat or i would stay up all hours of the night working on it

These last couple of years I've had big problem with my short term memory and completing adult tasks. If it wasn't for my bf helping me then i wouldn't be doing as well as i am. There have been multiple times where my bf and i agree to go get groceries after work on my day off and i show up not prepared to shop. Or i show up to shop on the wrong day. I've cried numerous times in frustration over my forgetfulness because i couldn't figure out why it had gotten so bad. It honestly has embarrassed me and hurt my self esteem because i can't control it. I've been trying to find a way to explain it. There is so much happening in my brain at any given moment that if you tell me something important, other important stuff gets deleted because my capacity is that of a peanut

Idk where im going with this or what im trying to prove...it just makes sense. I used to be in the gifted and talented program. Growing up i started failing classes when we all started having different teachers for everything. I excelled in art, music, and drama but everything else suffered and i would get punished for it. All the time in math and science it was "why can't i pay attention im not understanding this" but in American History my teacher banned me from raising my hand to answer questions about 80s/90s pop culture because i kept getting every one right. I couldn't write essays because they required us to use a certain organization formula to write - that didn't work for me either (fuck outlines and fuck common core for making me feel dumb)!!!!! Im so frustrated by this honestly. I've gone my whole life thinking im stupid when im not

ty for reading im Big Emotion rn I've got a lot going on in my head

#long post #text #add

12 notes · View notes

spooksdraws · 3 years

Note

Could you perhaps talk about your ocs maybe? :00000

Sure!!

the siblings are Marco, Nati and Skye! they kinda originated from a game and got turned into proper ocs afterwards :D

My friend and I are working on a Story set in their early adultlife rn but we've pretty much got their whole life charted up until that.

Nati is the oldest.

As a kid and teen shes usually really active and likes to skateboard. Later she actually drives a motorbike, tho thats usually only in summer when the weathers good. She grows up to be pretty active in the local music and culture scene. She works backstage on techstuff for concerts and learned to be a piercer and tattoo artist. Shes freespirited and headstrong but most importantly has a big heart.

Marco -the middlest child- is 4 years younger than Nati and kinda my fav (but dont tell the others that). He had it a bit rough growing up, having to deal with his best -and at the time only- friend Asahiro going to another school, and later going abroad, which left him a bit lonely and soon after a target for bullying. He went through a bit of a "if u wanna fight me, fight me" phase and got into a good few physical alterations.

That luckily calmed down with support from his family and the return of his friend. (of course it wasnt an overnight thing but they helped him change).

Marco now loves to dance, though he doesnt do it in any competitive way. He just enjoys the raw expression of it.

He hasnt really found his one and only place in the world yet but he does what he loves and (at the start of the story) works in a small café. He lives with his best friend -then boyfriend- and just enjoys life for what it is.

Skye is the youngest of the bunch but only by one year. She's really into makeup/fashion and an expression of self and a performance. she even starts her own blog, documenting her work.

Loves to hyperfocus on research for those interests and if you dare ask her, she will babble ur ear off about the newest technique she found for sewing or the best pigment for your buck.

She ends up designing the performance outfits for her friend Hirumi and her dance squad (friends OCs), who she goes to school with. Here she meets her future boyfriend Deen.

Also fun facts:

Marco comes out as Gay -later as Demi- and had a bit of a gender crisis but ended up settling on demiboy, having no problem dressing gnc af and indulging skye in dressing him up.

Skye comes out as Non-Binary after him breaking the ice of queerness in the family -uses she/her and a few neo pronouns over the span of her life. Shes pan and very happy with her boyfriend.

Nati got to think about her gender from a new perspective with tge help of her siblings but found shes perfectly happy with her agab. She'll threaten voilence on anyone who doesnt respect her lil siblings tho (and probably would go through with it too). Shes very familiar with queerculture just by proxy of her work and later finds outs the labels aro and ace fit her very well.

The sibs love and hate each other is all the right ways. Theres playful teasing, a bit of teen angst and drama, but overall a bond that ties them all together and makes them stronger. They care for each other and grow up to depend on and trust each other.

As for the story, i probably wont post anything bc its just me and my friend having fun, but im always happy to answer questions and maybe give small snippets.

Thank you for the ask!!! i was super excited to get to talk about them!!

<3 <3 <3

#oc ask #marco #nati #skye #lore dump #spookstalks #ask #less depresso more espresso

5 notes · View notes

mychemicalaromanticism · 3 years

Text

things ive already established r on this post

besties this got so fucking long but heres a giant ramble about cherri

okay so. there are huge differences betwn cherri as a hyperviolent drac hunter and cherri as a friend of the four and cherri as the girls mentor. with the first one he was 17 and desperate to distance himself from his upbringing so he went all in on Being A Killjoy. he was always one of the first ppl to rush into a fight and he fought hard. he blew up his fuckin hand with that attitude. and all the while he was just racking up more unaddressed trauma and eventually he ran away from that, too. giving himself radiation poisoning was more appealing than facing his problems.

so as a teenager/young adult hes kind of constantly in a panicked state. hes scared the people from his past are going to find him and drag him back with them. so he lashes out and he runs away over and over again.

i said in another post that he has some past life shit goin on which usually would give him a connection to the witch that manifests early in life, but with all the stuff hes gone through he has been Preoccupied. he can become oblivious to almost anything that doesnt apply to whatever hes focused on. not in a hyperfocus way its likeeeeee. when u live on survival mode during prolonged periods of stress. hes immune to magic bullshit bc hes too tired and scared.

anyways around his mid-20s he finally has a little more stability (as much as the average person living in the zones can have, that is) and he finally notices that Weird Stuff happens around him. basically: out of my list of Powers People Connected To The Witch Have he has the prophetic dreams/enhanced intuition as well as a form of sensing ghosts where he can see auras and kind of like, echoes of past events in ppls lives. that look like auras. itz complicated and not of utmost importance so im leaving it at that.

anyways thats what makes him start writing poetry. just 4 funsies he'll describe his weird experiences and embellish them to make em pretty. just as a casual hobby n all that.

he would forget fun ghoul in between the times they ran into each other but its pretty easy to be reminded of who fun ghoul is. the most insane 10 year old cherri has ever met. cherri isnt a brother figure to ghoul. hes just. his friend that happens to be more than twice his age. its whatever lmao

to cherri, ghoul is kinda like a stray animal he keeps seeing. which is hilarious. ghoul actually goes and finds him to introduce him to jet when they start running together, and cherri meets party and kobra (spark and birdie at the time) when he drives the four of them to a party. because he has a truck hell yeah. so now instead of one stray animal he has, like, a feral cat colony that he drives around occasionally. i have no real-life human relationship equivalent to them because irl if some guy that is not related to any of you and isnt even a childhood or family friend and theyre hanging out with you? they are usually not a safe person lmao. but this is my fantasy land and im too stubborn to change anyones birth years even though ghoul being born in 2004 makes everything really hard to make not creepy.

so yeah hes a casual somewhat friend of the fab four. hed probably get more and more concerned as they got famous. the beginnings of any sort of protective feelings, awww :) that sets him up for becoming the girls mentor.

OH FUCK. THE GIRL..... i think if i was in my late 20s and i heard that the gang of 13-17 year olds had adopted a 5 year old kid i would go bananas. what the fuck. it is a LONG while before cherri meets her. but he has the strongest affection for ghoul (if you could even call it that) and ghoul absolutely adores the girl and swings her around under her arms like a cat to show her off to cherri and its very endearing and the girl is sweet and funny so its easy to be around her. and (unfortunately) she is somewhat used to interacting with weird easily agitated people so she kinda gives him space. cherri isnt quite the uncle figure the fandom usually makes him (i luv uncle cherri sm but he simply cannot exist in the universe ive created, f), but hes a little similar.

and then the four had to go and pretend to die. lol.

when the girl was kidnapped, fucking everyone who knew her was ready to storm the city then and there. like regardless of how little you knew her, if you had ever met her you would fucking die for her. she is pure childish charisma and shes precious. i love the girl. so cherris immediately on board with whatever plan the four make to get her back. ive already talked abt how it fucked up the girl tho; there was no way to tell her that the four werent actually dead, she sees the building collapse and she shuts down. and cherri has to fight against his instinct to leave the radio station and never come back when he sees an eight year old girl sitting dissociated on the couch. that fucks everyone up.

i just realized i havent talked about literally anyone else at the radio station. i think cherri started lingering around the station bc it was safe and sheltered while also not being a popular spot. there are less kids there (people pass through but its not a hangout spot). he was kind of just hanging around to get away from the heat and noise and dr d took notice. because that man can see ur soul and no one knows if thats literal or not. so theyd chat a few times a day and show pony was the one 2 get him out of his shell a little and also was the first one he mentioned his poetry hobby to. im making this all up right now as im writing bc i dont know anything about LITERALLY any of the ppl associated w the radio like im not even going 2 try with chimp n newsie i do not have the willpower to tackle all that. justttt. cherri pony n D become bros and live 2gether there.

back 2 the regular timeline. the rescue mission happens in 2019. the girl lives at the station until 2023. during that time she is very much depressed and withdrawn and is only happy when the four come to visit. none of the Adults know how to help her so they just keep her safe and cared for and hope she'll open up to them.

she does not. she takes the weird cat thats been hanging around and she runs away.

cherri does not see her for three years. shes still worse for wear in the mental health department and he can see all kinds of visions of what shes been through since the last time he saw her and he fucking hates the ultra vs bc they remind him of his past. he does not want her going down that path but its obvious that she isnt crazy abt the ultraviolence thing either so thats a relief.

they have a kind of tense relationship throughout the comics. he feels like he failed her and that spirals into feeling like he failed the four for not being a good adult to them and fun ghoul for not helping enough when his commune was bombed and all kinds of shit and that irrational thinking mixed with plain old, yknow, caring about the girl, is what makes him take a bullet (laser. whatever) for her.

i was trying to figure out the timing of each of their ghost experiences, but i want both of them to talk to the witch and im just gonna make it like dreams where a whole buncha stuff happens but irl its been like seconds. so its like barely a second while the girl has her Witch Convo and cherri FINALLY gets a straight answer, yes there is weird shit going on with him having powers. he doesnt have any story-significant past lives because im lazy, hes just an old soul. like really fuckin old. the amount of latent life experience and stuff his soul/energy/whatever has picked up along the way makes him VERY noticeable to gods n stuff. he fuckin lights up all the alarms like what the FUCK is that over there. she wasnt rly able to get to him or even properly notice him while he was a kid and a young adult so shes happy to finally see him again. he has a STRONG sense of familiarity with her. they know each other on a wild ass level that he cant really comprehend.

welp thats some more lore I'll have 2 think abt. anywayz

post canon is when he and val get to have the most awkward spiderman meme moment of realizing that they have the same trauma SOOOOO thatz fun lol /s sorry kings i thought it would be fun to give u something fucked up to bond over <3

not much changes in his personality. he has a better understanding of Weird Magic and delights in freaking out the ultra vs but for the most part he returns to his life at the radio station. i love him

THIS GOT SO CRAZY LONG I DID NOT MEAN 2 GO THROUGH EVERY PART OF HIS LIFE LIKE SOME WEIRD CHARACTER STUDY but here we are. this is basically a first draft like almost all of this is subject to change but u gotta start somewhere. so heres my start i love this guy. its probably obvious but i have not read ANY twitterverse killjoys stuff </3 maybe i will someday idk

#cat talks #lore #ok2rb but what a mess this post is

3 notes · View notes

dragonstoravens · 3 years

Text

Babylon Vol. 1: I’m an Idiot but At Least I’m Fun

[ID: a blue patterned banner with text reading “BABYLON.” End ID.]

BIG CW for this one: Blood, mild body horror.

(Totally ran out of time to post this yesterday, so here we are a day late again! For the 2/3 people that actually see this on tumblr lol. Just one chapter, and not a mega long one, but be safe while reading and feel free to message me for a summary or sections to skip if you’re worried about the content warnings. Hope you enjoy!)

Taglist (ask to be added or removed!): @charlottedotexe @glitterandstarshine @rainbowcoloreddays @the-starlight-chills @erased-in-stone

General: @elywritesbydarkness @residentofthedisc @humour-and-hyperfocus @skyfirewrites @viawrites-andacts

16. I’m An Idiot But At Least I’m Fun

There was a steady dripping from the edge of the table she sat on. Azure sighed and then held her breath, digging the scalpel into her arm once more. She’d missed the intended node once already, and this was getting a little dicey. It crossed her mind that she really should consider an assistant for when she did her more complex updates, but then she’d have to deal with their concern for her wellbeing and that really only ever did more harm than good for her efficiency. A twinge of pain shot up from her elbow, and she reached behind her to carelessly flip a switch on a box wired to her ankle by about four yards of copper wire. The pain subsided, and she set the scalpel down in exchange for a pair of forceps. Time to dig. The dripping continued, blood running onto the ground and towards her workshop drain. She paid it no mind. She’d eat a cookie later.

But still, something burned at the back of her mind. She looked at the clock on her monitor, brow furrowed as she wiped a bloody gloved hand on her shirt. She was forgetting something. The faulty node was still blinking beneath all the blood, taunting her. Suddenly, a spurt of blood crossed the room, and some wiring escaped her arm, snaking slowly out of her open incision. She grit her teeth. That was never a fun feeling, blood-warmed metal exiting her body. “Fuck, oh, goddamn it-” Another spurt of blood, this one dripping down her arm and to the ground even though she had her free hand clamped around it. She grumbled low in her throat, words coming through the forceps she now held between her teeth. “Sonofabitch, I swear everytime I try-”

“Bluemom, You have a visitor.” Her floating personal assistant bot, Bean, hovered over to her, his front display reading out her current rate of blood loss and the time. “He had an appointment.”

“I don’t recall my brother or Turq or even Smalls needin’ appointments to see me. Just send ‘im in, whoever he is he’s seen worse I’m sure.” She waved the bot off and he hovered away, whistling his customary exit tune. She used the hand on her currently bleeding arm to open a drawer and rummage through its contents. “Gauze, gauze, gauze….”

The door slid open, and a voice, not that of any of her shipmates and yet all too familiar, said, “Jesus.”

“Your Three O’Clock is here!” Chirped Bean. “Trinity Jericho has arrived.”

She looked up to see Trinity standing in the doorway, hands on his hips. She could practically see the loading screen behind his eyes as his brain searched its databanks for an appropriate reaction or facial expression in response to the bizarre scene in front of him.

She was a mess, blood running down her arm and all over her white tank top, a spare coil of fine wire hanging around the shell of her ear. A strange contraption was slithering its way out of her wound, the inside of her elbow flayed open. She’d have blushed in embarrassment, but she couldn’t really spare the blood, so she settled on smiling sheepishly. “Oh, uh, hey?” More blood, this time escaping her fingers and splattering weakly at her feet. “...I’ve got gloves in that drawer right there behind you, would you mind helpin’ me for a quick sec? My hands are occupied right now.” Her tone was conversational, as though she was asking him to grab something from a fridge as opposed to putting on gloves to shove wires back up into her bicep. She continued using her lacerated arm to dig for gauze, blood dripping from her elbow and onto her bare feet.

Rather than figure out how to react, it looked like Trinity had decided not to react at all. His face was exceedingly casual, save for his slightly raised eyebrows, as he went over to the desk and removed the gloves, pulling them on. “Should I even ask?”

Something between a human laugh and a pig snort left her mouth. “Only if it’s necessary. I think I just nicked a vein. I’m more concerned with these connectors, they’re not supposed to be connected this loosely, which means they really shouldn’t be hangin’ out my arm like a hound dog out a pickup truck window.”

“Just nicked a vein,” Trinity mimicked, affecting a higher pitched southern drawl that combined with the slight disbelieving tone to his voice. “Ok. Ok, you’re completely insane, and probably only partially from blood loss. Now, tell me what to do.” He turned his attention to the wires, examining them closely with an expression that rivaled his focus when looking at a particularly interesting problem in one of his own production lines. “I think I see the basics of what’s going on here, but you’d know best.”

“It’s just the coolin’ lines, they kinda just gotta be-Oh!” She pulled a roll of gauze and some medigel from the drawer she’d been digging in. “Found ‘em.” She looked back up at him, arm stretched out, still applying pressure. “I’m not insane until I lose a full liter, by the way. We’re not even a quarter of the way there. They’re just coolin’ lines, you can just shove ‘em back in. I’d have done it already if I didn’t need to keep my blood in my body.” The cooling lines glowed a faint purple and continued to slowly snake their way out. She beheld her own mess with interest for a moment, puzzling something out. “Wonder if I could…”

“Let’s save that little curiosity journey for later, yes?” he interrupted, just the slightest hint of panic creeping into his tone that stopped short whatever she’d been about to come up with. “Maybe best to explore all the other experiments you could run on yourself when you’re not already bleeding all over the floor.” He started pushing the wires back into her arm, probably more gently than she would have done herself. “And, for the record, you’re insane with all your blood in your body. But I’m sure you know that already.”

“It’s what makes me fun!” Her irreverence for her own safety could almost be seen as endearing, if it wasn’t so dangerous. She grabbed a spray bottle marked ‘alcohol’ in big red letters, a roll of duct tape on her wrist. “Here, put pressure on it once it’s all in there, I’ll secure it back down later. Musculature will hold it for now.” She put the spray top of the bottle of alcohol between her teeth and bit down, twisting to remove it and dumping some of the contents over the open wound, no sign of a grimace. “Quickly dude, or we’re gonna be covered in blood. My heart’s still beatin’. God this would be so much easier if my limbs were detachable.”

Trinity almost said wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been covered in blood, or detachable limbs are another thing we don’t want to explore right now, but he was a little too busy to worry about snappy comebacks. He got some disinfectant a little more directly to the wound by covering a bandage in medigel, and set to work sealing the edges together temporarily with glue that he knew should work like stitches. The alcohol had luckily done the double job of cleaning away the excess blood, so all he had to do was swipe away the fresh blood that had just welled from it with a piece of gauze and apply the bandage. On top of it he folded a few more pieces of gauze for extra pressure, and he secured the whole thing with medical tape. It was quick, but rather well done for a rush job nonetheless. Azzy blinked at the result.

“Oh, I was gonna slam some gauze and medigel in there and throw some duct tape over it but that works too.”

“I know that’s what you were going to do, which is exactly why I didn’t do it. Might as well make use of an extra pair of hands.” Said hands, though gloved, were a bit of a bloody mess now, and he walked over to a sink with a bin for biohazard disposal to clean up. “Luckily I know something about cybernetics and first aid. I know you do too.” Unspoken was the implication that not everyone did-- that most people would probably freeze up or panic at such a sight. Beneath even that lay certainty that she did this often. Despite his jokes about her being insane, she’d been perfectly calm. This maybe wasn’t how all her repairs went, with the blood and all, but it wasn’t a surprise, either. He thought maybe that should scare him, but instead he simply accepted it as fact. What else could he do?

“Can’t see how it matters too much, can’t avoid the scarrin’ anyway. Thanks, though.” she looked up at him with that same lopsided smile before bending her arm a couple times. “I forgot you were comin’, lemme get this shit cleaned up and we’ll get that maintenance outta the way.”

He shrugged as he finished washing his own hands and disposing of the gloves, and started to help her clean up. “Scars, those don’t matter. Everyone has them, visible or not, you don’t make it far in life without them. But in this kind of world… I think you might as well save yourself a little pain and danger any time you have the chance.” There was an honesty in his voice that drew her attention, but he was facing away from her. He cleared his throat awkwardly and turned with a crooked grin. “So, what nefarious plans do you have for my eye today?”

She was already across the room in front of a pair of doors, arms crossed over her front to pull her shirt up and over her head. She was facing away from him, her back tan and striped with thin white scars all the way up her spine, ending in one final splintering burst at the base of her neck. Barely visible at this distance was the white ink tattooed across her back to make the whole mess look like a dandelion puff. The shirt fell to the ground with a wet flop as she hit a button to open a closet full of more white tank tops, these ones pristine. Her hands were clean already. “S’not like I feel it anyway, that’s what the ankle wire’s for.” She grabbed a shirt and tugged it over her head, fixing her beanie as she turned to face him again and grabbed a mop from the corner.

“Ankle wire?” He glanced down, mechanical pieces fitting together behind his eyes. “Of course. You electrocute your nerve endings to suppress pain. Makes perfect sense.” Was she imagining the tiny edge to his voice? “And to think you lectured me before about the external charging I was doing. Don’t you ever worry you’ll fry them, go numb permanently? Although…” He shook his head, the joking tone back to his voice. “Never mind, you could probably fix that if it happened, anyway.”

Azzy began cleaning, ignoring the edge to his voice. This was why she never let anyone assist with her cybernetic self experimentation. This, and the process of the reset. She let herself sound cocky. "Of course I could fix it. Anyway, I have an update for the cooler, so it'll adjust with your body temp, like a real eye. Good for if someone's lookin' atcha with thermal imagin'." She hit a button and hopped onto a counter, the edges of the floor beginning to flood slightly with water. "I also thought maybe I'd upload this real spicy book I read last week to it, in case you get bored. You’ll love it." She snorted, unable to keep a straight face.

He laughed quietly along as he lifted himself onto the counter next to her. It was odd-- even through genuine humor he was looking at her like he was considering something, searching her for the answer to some unspoken puzzle. He let his gaze wander again just before the point where consideration became outright staring. “Feel free. That thermal imaging sounds like a great idea.”

The floor was done flooding, washing the remaining blood down a drain in the center of the room. She hopped back down, crossing the room and grabbing her boots off a shelf. Can't mess with people's eyes with your bare feet just out and around. She looked up from her feet with a curious expression, like he'd given her a brain teaser. "What was that look? You were thinkin' about somethin', and it's almost definitely not the alien erotica I'm puttin' in your peeper as soon as the standard tune up is done."

He shrugged. “I’ll tell you later. There’s some research I want to do first.” He slid off the counter. “First things first, heat regulation and alien erotica.”

"Don't have to tell me twice. Get on the table, I'll get the hookups. Pop that sucker out too, I need to check the retina." She pulled a clean pair of gloves on, snapping the cuff against her wrist. The sensation ricocheted up her arm. Her elbow and wound sparked. Her freshly patched arm swung out of its own volition, landing squarely on Trinity’s backside. Azure blinked, tips of her ears turning bright scarlet as her mouth twitched. “Oops.”

Trinity turned to look at her and blinked bemusedly. “...Getting an early start on the erotica part?” he quipped, but his already pink cheeks flushed darker as he spoke.

Azure giggled in response, pulling her arm back the moment she realized she’d left it there in shock. “Sorry. The node’s been misfirin’, if I hadn’t missed the incision point I’d have replaced and calibrated it by now, my bad.” Her eyes flickered briefly downwards and then immediately to her desk, smirking as she rolled her shoulder and shook her hand to get out any further bursts. “...Glad to know you don’t skip your squats. It’s a nice ass, now that I’m lookin’ at it instead of the wires in my arm.”

“A misfire, sure.” Trinity smirked back. It was easy to tell she was being serious about the misfire-- a lie would have come with a lot more stammering and awkward pauses-- but it was a prime opportunity to tease his friend that he wasn’t about to miss. “Your powers of observation are astonishing. Here.” He popped out the cybernetic eye, deceptively simple looking detached from its complex inner workings. He grinned, and tossed it lightly in one hand, waiting for her to turn back to face him. “Catch.”

She held a jar of fluid for his eye in her hand already as she turned, brow raised. As she faced him, he smirked and tossed the eye towards her, an easy to intercept underhand throw. “Ohfuck-” Snatching it out of the air and setting it gently in the jar, she pouted at him. “Dude, I’m not makin’ you another one if that one breaks.”

“You didn’t make the first one.” He smiled. “It’s fine, I knew you’d catch my eye.”

She stared at him blankly for a moment, then set the jar down and cracked a smile, some small hint of a blush on her cheeks. “Very funny Hotshot, well done. Don’t throw your fuckin’ organs.” Digging out a small monitor and some wires, she glanced over her shoulder with a smirk. “I’m sure all the girls tell you that though, right?”

He scoffed, amused at the idea of the women at the events he attended saying anything about organs out loud. “Just you. It’s a bit of an honor, really.”

“Flatterer. Don’t think I don’t know about your eight illicit rendezvous with five women in the last two days. Sara Mitchell told me all about them last time.” She rolled her eyes and stood, handing him the bundle of tech and tugging at his shirt collar to plug something into his port. “They’re tryin’ harder every time, I swear. I can see why you wanted the backup more ‘n more, I can’t imagine how you got anythin’ done at those things.”

“Mostly by ignoring anyone I didn’t want something from,” Trinity replied casually, opening his shirt a few more buttons to let her access his port more easily. The motion revealed those tattoos she’d already noticed a few times before when doing repairs-- the birds in flight, the trinity knot, the wall, the crumbling tower. Again she considered that their placement, so close to bone in most places and with so many heavy black lines and detailed patterns, must’ve really hurt. A phantom pain shot down her own spine in sympathy at the thought.

“Well, I guess that explains it just fine.” She flipped a few switches, monitors whirring to life. “Not very nice, but then again neither is listenin’ to them gripin’ because I won’t tell ‘em your-” She stopped herself, face reddening as she dropped a heartbeat sensor in his lap. A nasal feminine voice replayed in her ear, begging the question how big is it, really? She picked her sentence back up with a rambling vigor, trying her absolute best to drown her own thoughts out. “-current plans. Nasty, all of ‘em. Super nosy. Can’t blame you for ignorin’ it. Wanna put that on your finger? Don’t matter which, any of ‘em are fine, I gotta make sure the readin’s are accurate.”

He gave her a look like he wanted to question her about the hesitation, though she was certain he had a pretty good idea what the ladies had actually been asking her about. However, he simply quirked an eyebrow in her direction as he slipped the sensor onto his pointer finger.

Face still red, she hooked the eye up to a different wire. Something hummed and buzzed, and she heaved a dramatic sigh. “Sorry, you don’t have enough space for the porn. You have all of it allocated for images and text files made by the unit itself.” She made a few keystrokes and turned, looking at everything but him. “Okay, that’s updatin’. Lemme see your empty eye socket, your nerve is registerin’ some weird readings.”

Trinity turned his face up to hers, exposing the scarred inner socket of his eye. He’d never said what had happened to it, but it didn’t look pleasant. “The optic nerve? It should be fine, it’s totally cybernetic. It’s not degrading again, is it?” There was a hint of nervousness in his voice at the thought.

“It’s probably just one busted cell. It’s still machinery, sometimes parts need to be replaced.” She grabbed a pair of foreceps and clicked them together where he could see with his good eye. “Tell me if you feel this, because you’re definitely not supposed to.” She poked around at the back of his socket. “Anythin’?”

“No. I think your mother poked around in there enough when she was installing it that it won’t feel much ever again.”

“Then your actual nerve past the cybernetic and into your brain is fine, its just a couple of cones tryin’ to be data transmitters.” She poked at something else and made a small noise of triumph. “I’ll have it replaced, shouldn’t be hard. I think I made a couple extras when I was up all night last week.” The foreceps went back to the table and her face reappeared in his line of sight, beaming. “Your whole business is just as busted, but it’s no worse than when you came the first time. Matter of fact, some of the burns from when your eye wasn’t cooled properly have healed pretty well, like they weren’t even there.”

“Oh,” Trinity responded, pleasantly surprised. “Yes, I tried to do some first aid to keep it from scarring the way my leg did when I used to charge my taser externally.” He didn’t meet her eyes, even though he’d only done it a half dozen times, and all long before he’d met her. The second reminder of his own carelessness with his remaining nerves made him feel a bit guilty for sniping at her about her own. “I took the eye out when I could, used some burn creams and medigel, that kind of thing. Anyway, I’m glad to hear that there’s nothing wrong with the organic nerves.”

“Yep, if nerves had feelin’s they’d be happy as hell. Strong impulses, not too much overtime. Whatever took ‘em out the first time, you’re recoverin’ pretty well given that you lost your whole ass eye.” She returned to her computers, hands flying deftly across the keys and screens as she looked for more anomalies.

“Well, it’s been a couple years at this point. I let it degrade for a while before I sought out your mom, but… it’s good to hear that damage didn’t last.” At least those nerves had recovered. Others hadn’t, but that was going to be the subject of his research for the next few days. Despite what he’d seen earlier when Azzy had been working on her own cybernetics, he trusted her implicitly with his. If anyone could fix his problem, she could.

“It makes sense, the brain doesn’t like leavin’ things so close to it busted. Optic nerve is pretty close.” Her tongue poked out at the corner of her mouth and she squinted at her screen. “....Hey, want a wider zoom on your sensor?”

“Why not? Whatever you think, I trust your judgement.” He leaned back slightly, relaxing, and let her work. She stood quietly for some minutes, occasionally humming a quiet tune that was almost familiar.

Eventually, she was satisfied with her work. She unhooked his eye from its wires, passing him the jar. “There you go, go ahead ‘n smack that back into its place and you’re all set. Recalibrated it’s temperature sensin’ and the coolin’ system to be a little more sensitive to ambient heat. Don’t go swimmin’ in super cold water, though. Might be a little too ambient for it for now.” She had that same smug look she always did when she was done doing maintenance, eyes bright.

“Of course. Thanks, doc.” He said the last bit with a slight smirk, and popped the eye back into place. It rolled around for a few seconds before settling. “See you at the next event?”

“Only if that guy with the braid’s there, I hear he’s kinda fun.” She took her gloves off and waved him off the table. “Get outta here, I gotta reset my arm.”

“Alright.” He stood, a quick pat on her non-injured shoulder his goodbye. “Be careful of that wound. I bandaged it so well, it would be a shame if you messed up my handiwork.”

“I have three doctorates, of course I’m gonna mess it up.” She gave him a quick pat as well, her smile genuine. “I’ll go easy on it. Bean’ll take you back, careful none of my scary vigilante’s eat ya on the way out.” The small bot hovered over his shoulder, beeping a hello tune.

He grinned, and nodded. “I’ll try to steer clear. Let’s go, Bean.” He followed the little bot from the lab, with one last wave towards Azzy, not looking back. She heaved a sigh and grabbed a wire, connecting it to one of her ports once the door closed behind him. She had a limb to test and reset.

#chapter update #wip: babylon #writeblr #writers on tumblr #spilled ink

4 notes · View notes

lesbeet · 4 years

Text

not to be a nerd but i accidentally just wrote a whole impromptu essay about editing ndjsdksksk im throwing it under a cut bc it's fucking inane and really long but honestly... i just want other people to become as passionate about editing as i am lmaooooo

i also recommend 2 books in the post so if anything at least check those out!

quality books about editing... *chef's kiss* a lot of the basic ones (including blog posts online n such) are geared towards beginners and end up repeating the same info/advice, much of it either oversimplified or misrepresented tbh. but i read one yesterday and i'm reading another one right now that really convey this passion for editing + consideration for it as its own sort of art and i just!!

it's such a weird thing to be passionate about lmao but i AM and i've spent a lot of time the past year or so consciously honing my craft (ik i mention this like 4 times a week i'm just really proud of how much i've learned and improved) and kind of like. solidifying my instincts into conscious choices i guess?

and these GOOD editing books have both a) taught me new information and/or presented familiar information through a new perspective that helped me understand something differently or in more depth, and b) validated or even just put into words certain preferences or techniques that i've developed on my own, that i don't normally see on those more basic lists i mentioned

btw the book i finished yesterday is self-editing for fiction writers: how to edit yourself into print by renni brown and dave king, and the one i'm reading currently is the artful edit: on the practice of editing yourself by susan bell.

the former was pretty sharp and straightforward. the authors demonstrated some of their points directly in the text, which was usually funny enough that i would show certain quotes to my sister without context

("Just think about how much power a single obscenity can have if it’s the only one in the whole fucking book." <- (it was)

"Frequent italics have come to signal weak writing. So you should never resort to them unless they are the only practical choice, as with the kind of self-conscious internal dialogue shown above or an occasional emphasis."

or, my favorite: "There are a few stylistic devices that are so “tacky” they should be used very sparingly, if at all. First on the list is emphasis quotes, as in the quotes around the word “tacky” in the preceding sentence. The only time you need to use them is to show you are referring to the word itself, as in the quotes around the word “tacky” in the preceding sentence. Read it again; it all makes sense.")

and like i said, i also learned some new ideas or techniques (or they articulated vague ideas i already had but struggled to put into practice), AND they mentioned some suggestions that ive literally never seen anyone else bring up (not to say no one has! just that ive never seen it, and ive seen a lot in terms of writing tips, advice, best practices, etc) that ive already sort of established in my own writing

for example they went into pretty fine detail about dialogue mechanics, more than i usually see, and in talking about the pacing and proportion of "beats" and dialogue in a given scene, they explicitly suggested that, if a character speaks more than a sentence or two and you plan on giving them some sort of dialogue tag or an action to perform as a beat, the tag or action should be placed at one of the earliest (if not the first) natural pauses in the dialogue, so as not to distance the character too far from the dialogue -- bc otherwise the reader ends up getting all of the dialogue information first, and then has to go back and retroactively insert the character, or what they're doing, or the way they look/sound while they're giving their little speech

and like this was something ive figured out on my own, mostly bc it jarred me out of something i was reading enough times (probably in fic tbh) that i started noticing it, and realized that it's something i do naturally, kind of to anchor the character to the dialogue mechanic to make sure it makes sense with the actual dialogue

so like. ok here's an example i just randomly pulled from the song of achilles (it was available on scribd so i just looked for a spot that worked to illustrate my point djsmsks)

the actual quote is written effectively, but here's a less effective version first:

“Perhaps I would, but I see no reason to kill him. He’s done nothing to me," Achilles answered coolly.

see and even with such a short snippet it's so much smoother and more vivid just by moving the dialogue tag, not adding or cutting a word:

“Perhaps I would, but I see no reason to kill him.” Achilles answered coolly. “He’s done nothing to me.”

the rhythm of it is better, and the beat that the dialogue tag creates functions as a natural dramatic pause before achilles delivers an incredibly poignant line, both within the immediate context of the scene and because we as the readers can recognize it as foreshadowing. plus, it flows smoothly because that beat was inserted where the dialogue already contained a natural pause, just bc that's how people speak. if you read both versions aloud, they both make sense, but the second version (the original used in the novel) accounts for the rhythm of dialogue, the way people tend to process information as they read, AND the greater context of the story, and as a result packs significantly more purpose, information, and effect into the same exact set of words

and THAT, folks, is the kind of editing minutia i can literally sit and hyperfocus on for hours without noticing. anyway it's a good book lmao

the one i'm reading now is a lot more about the cognitive process/es of editing, so there's less concrete and specific advice (so far, anyway) and more discussion about different mental approaches to editing, as well as tips and tools for making a firm distinction between your writer brain and your editor brain, which is something i struggle with

but there have been so many good quotes that ive highlighted! a lot of just like. reminders and things to think about, and also just lovely articulations of things id thought of or come to understand in much more vague ways.

scribd won't let me copy/paste this one bc it's a document copy and not an actual ebook, but this passage is talking about how the simple act of showing a piece of writing to someone else for the very first time can spark a sudden shift in perspective on the work, bc you'll (or at least i) frantically try to re-read it through their eyes and end up noticing a bunch of new errors -

or she talked about the perils of constant re-reading in the middle of writing a draft, which is something i struggle with a LOT, both bc i'm a perfectionist and bc i prefer editing to writing so i sit and edit when i'm procrastinating doing the actual hard work of writing lmao

it's just this side of fake deep tbh but i so rarely see editing discussed like this--as a mixture of art and science, a collaboration between instinct and technique, that really requires "both sides of the brain" to be done well.

and because of the way my own brain works, activities that require such a balanced concentration of creativity and logic really appeal to me. even though ive seen a lot of people (even professional writers) who frame it as the creative art of writing vs the logical discipline of editing. but i think that's such a misleading way of thinking about it, because writing and editing both require creativity and logic -- just different kinds! (not to mention that the line between writing and editing, while mostly clear, can get a little blurry from up close)

but like...all stories have an inner logic to them, even if the writer hasn't explicitly or consciously planned it, and even if the logic is faulty in places in the first couple of drafts. when you're sitting and daydreaming about your story, especially if you're trying to figure out how to bridge the gap between two points or scenes (or, how to write a sequence of events that presents as a logical, inevitable progression of cause and effect), the voice in your head that evaluates an idea and decides to 1) go with it, 2) scrap it, 3) tweak it until it works, or 4) hold onto it in case you want it later? that's your logic! if an idea feels wrong, or like it just doesn't work, it's probably because some part of you is detecting a conflict between some part of the idea and the overall logic of your story. every decision you make as you write is formed by and checked against your own experiential logic, and also by the internal logic of your story, which is far less developed (or at least, one would hope), and therefore more prone to the occasional laspe

but while ive seen a number of articles that discuss the logic of writing, i don't see people gushing as much about the art of editing and it's such a shame

the inner editor is so often characterized as the responsible parent to the writer's carefree child, or a relentless critic of the writer's unselfconscious, unpolished drivel

and it's like... maybe you just hate thinking critically about your work! maybe you view it that way because you're imposing external standards too fiercely onto your writing, and it's sucked the joy out of shaping and sculpting your words until they sing. maybe you prefer to conceive of your writing as divine communication, the process of which must remain unencumbered by lessons learned through experience or the vulnerability of self-reflection, until the buzzkill inner editor shows up with all those "rules" and "conventions" that only matter if you're trying to get published

and like obviously the market doesn't dictate which conventions are worth following, but the majority of widely-agreed-upon writing standards, especially those aimed at beginners, (and most especially those regarding style, as opposed to story structure) have to do with the effectiveness and efficiency of prose, and, in addition to often serving as a shorthand for distinguishing an amateur from a pro, overall help to increase poignancy and clarity, which is crucial no matter the genre or type of writing. and even if you personally believe otherwise, it's better to understand the conventions so you can break them with real purpose.

so editing shouldn't be about trying to shove your pristine artistic masterpiece into a conventional mold, it should be about using the creative instincts of your ear and your logic and experience-based understanding of writing as a craft to hone your words until you've told your story as effectively as possible

thank u for coming to my ted talk ✌️

#long post //#editing #wref #sefa rambles

17 notes · View notes

normal-thoughts-official · 4 years

Note

ok not to be That Magnus Stan but seeing your last ask... how do you think adhd/sensory issues might intersect with kink for Magnus? (You don't have to answer jkjljljljkllljlk)

i mean pls be That Magnus Stan tbh, and id be more than happy to answer it 👀👀👀

also the ask you’re referring to is no longer my last ask because it took me a while to finish this up, but anyway

ok so there's plenty of things that apply the same way to the both of them - like hyperfixating on their characters when planning roleplay, definitely the whole thing about how domspace (well, subspace for magnus, but u get it) feels a bit like hyperfocus? like his senses are just honed in and particularly for an adhd person that's just great news. like usually his head is all over the place but when he's in subspace he gets that quiet and he's just focusing on his own pleasure and everything else quiets down for a bit

in that sense i feel like it's the opposite of what anon said about being overwhelmed, like, i feel like the enhanced sensations are good for magnus because again adhd = brain desperately looking for stimuli at all times, so when he's engaging in like, orgasm delay/denial, gangbang and the like, he has a clear thing to focus on, sometimes even more than he can really process, and that kind of satisfies his brain?

udhdudndid that sounds stupid but i hope you understand what i mean, like, of course sensory issues could become bad and he might need to safeword but when he's in the proper headspace and he just allows himself to be washed over by the pleasure and let go, it feels like finally his mind is clear. i don't know if i have adhd, but it definitely feels that way for me. also, he might actually need the overstimulation in order to focus and feel pleasure, sometimes. like anything less he just.... wanders away jdhdudjdi i also feel that way

also, warning again just in case! im not saying "wow ppl with adhd are subs". im just conjecturing about how a person who happens to have adhd and be into subbing (and like, specifically the kind of adhd and kinks i hc for magnus) would feel in regards to how those things overlap and change their experience with their pleasure. or well, magnus specifically, not just any person with adhd. but anyway

also that thing i said about following orders and just letting go, like- usually his mind is going a mile a minute, and as a political leader and someone who's been on his own most of his life etc he just worries all the time. how to present, gesticulate, speak, what to say, what to do, he's always hyperaware of his own movements (because he has to) and worrying about others and their pleasure and comfort and shit, so to get to just lie back, not move - be unable to move, even - follow orders and be a good boy? that's some A+ shit right there

you know? he doesnt have to be anxious about anything or try to keep his thoughts and movements in check and guess ppl's reactions or even worry if he's just following orders - orders he knows he'll enjoy, that he's agreed to, planned for, with someone that he trusts - and feeling the pleasure that comes from that. a huge part of his usual thoughts is finally muted and that helps him feel relaxed and mellow and get into subspace. which again, he craves, because usually adhd brain is just aaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAA and so subspace is a very welcome and even needed break

even from a neurological standpoint, like... adhd is basically lack of norepinephrine in the brain, and orgasms, especially intense ones, release a lot of that, but I'll try not to nerd out too hard here. tho i might have to go back to that in a minute

isnt it performance art that i had a genius thought that i loved and halfway through finishing the last sentence i just forgot it

oh yeah! thinking specifically about rsd and how this comes into play for someone who's into humiliation kink. there are several psychological analyses that postulate that one of the things attractive about bdsm is that it allows you to explore fears and generally bad situations in a controlled environment. kinda like reading fiction or doing extreme sports. so in that sense bdsm is attractive because it allows you to act on those fears and turn them into something 1- safe, 2- under their control, instead of the other way around, and 3- pleasurable

and like... dont get me wrong it's not that magnus is into being told "ur ugly and no one loves you" or something lmao but in a way humiliation kink is enacting a fantasy of rejection/belittling, except turned inside out? like "you're my good little fucktoy, you were made to be fucked like this, you slut" is degrading and belittling and on the verge of calling someone worthless... except positive. because that's what makes them so great to fuck? so in a way this kind of play flips the tables on many concepts because being a "slut" or a "toy" feels like a compliment. and in this process of degradation you are taking the fear of being worthless and making a scenario where that being true is exactly what makes the person worthwhile

idk i might be reaching a bit here cuz i think im into humiliation that's way more hardcore than i think magnus would be like i straight up enjoy being called worthless lmao but i feel like that makes sense, the way that humiliation/degradation play takes your fear of rejection or shortcoming and is like "but if that were true.... that would make you good" like o shit can't argue with that

and again like.... obviously that's all a very careful line as you're dealing with some sensitive stuff, which is why doms need to go through training to be able to deal with the physical and mental implications of what they're doing. and none of this is conscious of course, i don't think magnus is out there thinking this through deeply or anything, im just saying it's a part of what makes bdsm subconsciously appealing to some ppl. but my point is, rsd might play a part in why magnus is into that mix of praise and humiliation. like i think he needs the praise for reassurance even during play, which alec is more than happy to provide ("you're so beautiful, look at you, so perfect like this, i love you,"), and that kind of play where rejection, praise, and pleasure are all kind of one and the same is appealing because it just makes it all the more overwhelming without actually being negative and your mind is just lost in the almost contradictory stimuli but the pleasure and the positive wins out and you just feel so relaxed and good? yeah

but there's also like, the way that impacts the negative possible outcomes of bdsm. namely, rsd and subdrop

rsd is kind of obvious so i'll try to be brief: it's a sensitive issue and if he's not in the proper headspace for it, it can have the opposite effect and go very wrong very fast, because his reaction to rejection is hyperamplified by it. so if it has the opposite of the desired effect - rejection overpowering praise and pleasure - it might go south so fast he doesnt have the time to yellow. like he can't prevent it before it happens, you know? which is also why i think he wouldn't go Super Deep into humiliation and why the mix with praise is key - which is another way in which they are compatible because alec sure does love praising him

as for subdrop: if you don't know what that is, basically BDSM play is very intense and releases a fuckton of endorphins all at once very fast, so, sometimes, the sub doesn't come down from their orgasm as much as falls facefirst back to earth. meaning, their brain empties itself of endorphins, which leaves them feeling hollow and depressed, sometimes also moody, hypersensitive/prone to crying, fatigued, and just generally bad

which is one of the many reasons aftercare is important! and also proper dom training! with proper aftercare, you can prevent that drop from happening, by keeping the sub feeling positively. reassurance, touch, and other forms to bring physical and/or psychological relief and/or pleasure helps keep their brain from just crashing once the rush of endorphins is over, so it lasts a little longer and they can come down from the high gently. work those neurotransmitters yall! keep them up and running!

so anyway i feel like subdrop is not only a bigger deal for ppl with adhd (because adhd is already a lack of neurotransmitters so fucking up your balance even further is Very Bad), but also more likely to happen if you're not careful, because the "regular" adhd brain already has a lack of neurotransmitters, which keep those endorphins running. so adhd ppl might "run out" of them even easier

NOTE: i'm not affirming that, this is a shot in the dark. i have no data or research to back that up and im nowhere near an expert in neuroscience, i just know the basics. so don't take this part too seriously and definitely don't quote me on it

but anyWAY yeah. my point is, subdrop can be a problem so it’s something that he tries to be prepared for, have some snacks before and after, do proper aftercare, etc. like i said, it’s mostly preventable, although sometimes stuff like this happens even if you do your best. but anyway

and there’s another thing too, which is that one possible sympton of subdrop is feeling rejected and alone. which is super fun when you have rsd! so yeah. subdrop can be very bad for magnus. and like, don’t get me wrong, i’m not saying it happens every time or super frequently or something, but it IS something he has to watch out for possibly more than others haha man thinking about how camille didn’t care about this at ALL. he knows it can be bad, but he’s also learnt how to prevent it for him, and as the healthy bastards that they are, magnus and alec talk about that in length. during alec’s Research™ he comes across that concept and he brings it up with magnus and makes sure that he knows everything there is to know about how and when magnus experiences subdrop and how to deal with that. he also makes magnus promise to let him know if he ever has it, because alec WILL drop everything to go and give him extra care. and it’s sweet

on a better note! BDSM has been shown to be associated with lower levels of rejection sensitivity among practitioners. so that’s nice? like obviously magnus won’t find the cure for his rsd with BDSM or anything, but i like the idea of magnus opening his eyes one day and realizing that hey, ever since alec and i have been doing play more often, i’ve been feeling a little less affected by rejection?

also like, BDSM as a whole helps enhance trust and communication in a relationship (obviously it needs to already be there for the BDSM activities to take place and like please everyone everything i’m saying here is on people who enjoy it. how you perceive these actions is heavily influenced by whether or not you enjoyed them so i’m not saying that BDSM is great for everyone, i’m saying that it’s great for people who are into it. so don’t go thinking BDSM will do your relationship good or something, k? k) for obvious reasons, so that also helps magnus feel more secure you know. so that’s a positive way that these things interact too

and okay, i think that’s all i have? not that this isn’t gigantic but like you know. i don’t know how to end this other than uh i had fun answering that ask! also, again, i’m not a psychologist or a neuroscientist and there is actually pretty little research on the psychological effects of BDSM as most of the discussion seems to be centered on “is kink a disease?” due to stigmatization, so like, please, i’m doing this for fun, alright? i tried to make it as accurate as possible and also i get Into It and dive deep into research sometimes so while this is a somewhat educated guess, don’t take everything i say here as face value

in short, thanks for asking!

#ask #anonymous #hooo boy this is long and i've been at it for a while but it's here at least #sh #shadowhunters #magnus bane #sub magnus bane #adhd magnus bane #malec #meta #magnus bane meta #dirty mention #long post #also this is officially my 41.000th post #yay!"

4 notes · View notes

shulto-masusdesus · 4 years

Text

The Cryptid Machine [BNHA AU: Chapter 1]

Time for the cryptid machine to go wild

(this is my writing sideblog btw)

i havent written anything else in days. i pushed for it so hard. 7k in three days and its just one chapter lol, fuck (i mean i wasnt writing anything else anyway so im glad i was productive at least thanks for giving me something to do lol)

But it was also fun

I accidentally really made them into the scooby-doo gang and honestly its the best thing ive ever done unintentionally. They just fit so well

@kawaiipotatuh @vango-bango and @sooske yo hi yall said you wanted to read it so i wrote it

sorry sooske i didnt get to shiga in this chapter but hes comin,,,,this is gonna be chaptered so he’ll definitely be in this soon. definitely plot relevant because i love shiggy.

anyway A/N over time for the story

Rating: T for language and fantasy violence (no nsfw this time this is group friend story)

tags in the tags. some body horror because cryptid-related creepiness yknow. and major character death later on so yknow

if i missed anything tell me, okay now time for the story <3

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Izuku, frankly, was stunned.

“I thought it was just a hobby!”

“A hobby?” Shouto threw back what looked to be his thirtieth Five-Hour Energy, pouring syrup on the pancakes Izuku brought without paying much attention. They were more syrup than pancake at this point, but that was hardly priority at the moment. “A hobby?”

The giant frog sitting on the table between them blinked its left eye, and then the right, after a little delay. Izuku shuddered. Too much frog, too close, too much detail. Very scaly and slimy and bumpy. Frogs were not supposed to be big. But it was easily bigger than his head, almost the size of his torso.

“How did you get it in here?”

“Thawed crickets.” Shouto raised an eyebrow, as if having frozen crickets stored for a time such as this was normal and expected. Like a madman consumed by his own craft, he picked up a syrup-coated pancake with his own two hands, and bit into it. Then he looked at the mess with mild surprise, a gaze that read “What the fuck is this? Where did all this syrup come from?” Izuku didn’t have the heart to answer him. “…You’re underestimating me.”

Izuku shut his eyes, sucked in a breath, rubbing his temples. “So. You found this frog in the woods behind your house. You just so happened to have a pack of frozen crickets-”

“No, that’s not what happened,” Shouto leaned forward, elbows on the table, the plate of pancakes Izuku brought ruined and pushed to the side, with that damned cursed light in his eyes he got when he was about to tell a story, dive head-first into a theory, or conjure up a new way to ditch work. “I’ve been hunting this frog for months. I learn about many creatures when researching,”

Scrolling r/cryptids, Izuku thought. And various other unspeakable 2chan threads and dark web sites. He sighed. Those pancakes were better than usual, too...he managed to remember to use less butter…he forgot that all the time…if he was going to make pancakes in the middle of the night, they may as well be good...what was Shouto talking about? Oh yeah, the frog.

“-and I encountered this post about a kappa sighting. It was confusing, and I almost wrote it off as another incident of someone just seeing something very mundane in the wrong light - until I recognized the location of the sighting.” There it was, Shouto’s rare grin, a look very reminiscent of the cat that finally caught the mouse. “…Heartstone Lake, on the park side of the woods.”

The giant frog grumbled. Loudly. Its chest puffed a little and Izuku felt a wild fear for what a real croak would sound like. This thing was huge. “Uhm, yeah? And?”

“So I went and checked it out.” He went over to his Wall, pointing to photo after photo, and Izuku hummed along, suddenly very, very worried about this frog in the Todoroki’s basement. This could end in many ways, and a very loud croak waking up his dad would be one of the worse ones. “Found tracks. Tracks, Izuku. You have to understand - nobody ever finds tracks.”

Izuku nodded. “Crazy.” He said, noticing how the frog’s eye was starting to slowly roll around, as if looking, scanning its surroundings. He was a little bit more than freaked out. He really had thought that this was just an interest of Shouto’s. Not something he was actually going to pursue, and that it produced a very crypid-like thing, a real result? A part of him wanted to go home and go back to bed, before Shouto decided to find a demon from hell or something. Or before the frog turned out to be a demon from hell. “…Did you do a steak-out?”

“Yes. Many steak-outs.” Shouto sighed, rubbing his face. “For…six weeks. Every night and every spare minute I could get. Along with a camera live feed setup. Only today did I actually see something, and once I did, I didn’t let it get away.” His smile was so wholesome, but the fruit of his labor was probably a harbinger of the void. Izuku was torn between supporting his friend and self-preservation.

Izuku decided to call the two people who would help back him up in whatever answer was the right one. The guardian angels, Tenya and Ochako. Because he needed help.

“I’m gonna call Tenya and Ochako.”

To Izuku’s bewilderment, Shouto deflated, smile dying, abruptly concerned. Izuku sputtered, pausing in pulling his phone out of his pocket. “What?! Do you not want them to know, or-?!”

With a sigh, Shouto grumbled, “Tenya…You know what he’d say.”

Izuku rolled his eyes. “It’s probably what you need to hear, really. Monster or not, this frog doesn’t belong indoors. We could get money for it, and what if it’s a new species or something-”

The other boy sighed. “Fine, whatever-”

The underside of the frog’s throat started expanding. Izuku watched in mute horror as it opened its mouth, and released a croak.

It was louder than Izuku expected. Very much so. His ears were left ringing from the rumbling warble, but that was hardly the biggest problem. There was a lot of thudding and yelling going on upstairs, in the upper levels of the Todoroki household; the family converging in on Shouto’s basement for whatever that definitely inhumane noise was.

Shouto’s dad was the strictest father around, and didn’t allow Shouto to have friends over on weeknights, nevermind late at night; since Izuku, an unapproved friend, basically snuck into the house on a weeknight at the unholy hour of three in the morning, he was breaking many, many rules.

And a giant fucking frog on the table in the middle of the room also would do more than raise a few eyebrows.

Shouto, however, was prepared. He pushed a mysterious white jar across the table to him, and pointed to the basement awning window. “I’ll help,” He said. “It’s actually not all that heavy.”

“Shouto! What was that?! What are you doing in there, it’s three in the morning on a school night-!”

There was his father. However, aside from the actual basement door lock, Shouto secretly installed about six extra locks, so he wasn’t getting in any time soon. “Studying, Dad,” Shouto said, heaving the massive, slimy frog off the table. He nailed he tired, annoyed, exasperated tone perfectly. Izuku opened the jar, and forced down a squeak - mushy, wet, dead crickets. “There’s a science tomorrow, I want to make sure I’m ready.”

His dad went quiet, which was his “you’re probably lying, but finding out the truth is more effort than I’m willing to put in at the moment” response. Izuku’s been witness to it a lot, as this is far from the first time he’s been a Master Lock away from getting caught. Shouto gave Izuku a look, frog in hand, as he opened the small window.

“Studying at such an…early hour is counter-productive. Get to bed, Shouto.”

“Alright.” Izuku shimmied out the window, onto the grass outside, and cringed as he opened the jar and gently picked up a soggy cricket corpse. With some difficulty, Shouto shoved the fat mass of jiggling skin through the awning, and Izuku pulled it the rest of the way out.

“Don’t let it out of your sight,” Shouto mouthed, scowling a little. Most likely because he was forced to get rid of his first find. Weird giant frog or not, it was really important to Shouto, so he couldn’t lose track of it-

The frog grumbled, and started hopping off.

“Get it!” Shouto hissed, and Izuku ran after it.

It wasn’t as fast as he thought. He caught up to it easily, and offered it a few crickets to bribe it into sitting still for a moment. Shouto’s window shut, and tense yelling ensued; Shouto buying time so he could hide incriminating evidence. His dad probably heard them.

An awkward ten minutes passed. Routinely, Izuku dropped a cricket or two, and the frog stayed put. Eventually, Shouto opened the window again, glaring.

“Take it to your house,” He said. “God knows I’m not gonna get away with hiding it here.” And he shut the window.

“So,” Izuku said, to the monster frog, dropping a couple more crickets. Its tongue flicked out to grab them, and honestly, Izuku feared for his safety. “I guess you’re coming to my place?”

_______________________________________________________________

Step one; get it onto his bike.

His basket was definitely big enough for the frog. He could probably stop every couple minutes to feed it a cricket so it wouldn’t struggle too much while he was on the road. It wouldn’t end well for either of them if it decided to upset the balance of the bike on the road.

He lugged the frog into the basket - it really wasn’t as heavy as it looked - and gave it a few crickets before locking the lid. Step two; get it home. That was the easy part.

The ride was mostly uneventful. The route was mostly muscle memory, so it wasn’t hard to hyperfocus on every odd rustle and bump on the back of his bike. He stopped to feed it about five times, and each time its tongue lashed out harder and faster. His fight-or-flight instinct begged him to run away from the very real monster frog on the back of his bike. He channeled the energy into maintaining cadence. If Shouto wasn’t his best friend, and wouldn’t probably murder him if he lost it, he would’ve let the frog hop into the woods when it tried to.

Finally, he reached his plain suburban neighborhood. He considered stopping at Kacchan’s house, but he’d probably kill the frog on sight, so he couldn’t rely on him for moral support. Time to call Ochako up for an early-morning napover. She said “anytime”, right?

Step three; get it to his room. His backyard didn’t have a fence, and he didn’t have a basement, and even if his mom didn’t have a panic attack when she saw the frog, she would definitely tell him to get it out of the house. Any rational person would, really. So. Hiding it in his bedroom was the only choice.

Mom never got out of bed past midnight, so it was easy to trudge inside, to his room, and to lock the door behind him. Then the frog leapt from his arms, and hopped its slimy body onto his bed. Ew. Time to call Ochako.

As promised, she answered by the fourth ring. “…Yaeah…Deku…?”

“Uhm, come to my house?” Izuku chuckled nervously. “Shouto found…uh, a giant frog, but he couldn’t keep it at his house, so I’m keeping it at mine. I need a little moral support?”

“...” Ochako sighed, a very, very long sigh. “...”

“Ochako?”

“What?”

“Shouto found a giant frog-”

“A WHAT?!”

It took Ochako all of fifteen minutes to get to his place, on foot. She took the short route to his room - through his window - and gawked at the frog for another five minutes, school backpack and sleeping bag falling from her hands.

“He - really?!”

“Yeah…”

She stared at it for a long, long time. It grumbled again. Izuku felt a sinking feeling.

“It’s - a giant frog.”

“...Yeah.”

“And…he just…?”

“No, he said he’d been looking for it for the past six weeks.”

“So that’s why he’s been passing out in class?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

Ochako stared at the frog. “I thought it was all…”

“He flipped out a little when I said I thought it was just a hobby.” He ran his fingers through his hair with a huff. “This is really important to him.”

“Well…” She mumbled, eyes wide. “We may as well…take good care of it. H…how do you get a frog to go to sleep? Don’t frogs need heat lamps? How do we take care of a frog - a giant frog-” She stomped her foot. “Did Shouto think about this at all?”

She looked at Izuku. He raised an eyebrow in return. And she fell into giggles. “Yeah,” She said. “Let’s get it in front of a heater?”

Izuku left the room, running down to the hall closet to get a heater; on his way back, Ochako suddenly screamed.

He ran to his room, and to his horror, the frog was, for lack of a better term, erupting. Blowing up like a balloon. Ochako shoved him out of the doorway, into the hall, and slammed the door shut.

“What is going on here?” Oh, his mom was up now, rushing down the hall with concern. “What happened? Ochako, very…nice to see you, but at this hour? What’s happening?”

The two teens were speechless. They looked to each other for answers, but found nothing there but shock and general horror. Tentatively, Ochako cracked the door back open.

The frog was splayed about thinly like a shed bag. Sitting on Izuku’s bed now, instead, was a girl with long green hair. And also very naked, the frog broke open and was now a naked girl-

Confusion ensued. Mom screamed a little, shocked by the frog flash bag, and Ochako and Deku screamed because the frog was gone and Shouto was now on the list of people who wanted them dead; then his mom ran in, bringing the blanket up around the girl with shaking hands and firing off questions one after another, and Izuku screamed louder because he realized that somehow the frog became the girl - Ochako screamed louder, because she realized that with Shouto’s internet skill and wide range of information sources, there was no way to hide from him.

“Izuku, who is this?! Why is she naked?!” Mom turned to him with an unfamiliar demanding tone. “Explain! Now!”

“I don’t…!” Izuku was, completely, lost. “I don’t know…! I think - she was-!?”

Ochako stopped screaming, and said, “We don’t know! She - the frog - it exploded and - it was a frog before-!”

“A frog!?” Mom shouted - his mom never shouted. Izuku felt like reality was fraying at the seams. “What-”

“RIBBIT.”

Everything stopped. Ochako stopped. His mom stopped. Izuku felt like he suddenly lost the ability to breathe, like someone clicked ‘end task’ on his lungs and his panicking head.

The girl’s eyes were very, very big, an expression of pure confusion and shock on her face. “RIBBIT!” She screeched, again.

“R…’ribbit’…?” Mom said, weakly. “What do you mean…?”

“...” The girl stared at Mom with a wild lack of recognition. Not just that she didn’t know who Mom was; she had no idea what she was seeing at all and was completely lost. Izuku was almost as lost, really. “Ribbit…”

Ochako swayed lightly, gripping Izuku’s arm. “S-so - the frog was there before - did she come out of the frog…?!”

Izuku looked at the frog flesh and slime splayed on his bed. “…P…probably…”

His mom’s expression faded from extreme shock and confusion, to general surprise. “Izuku, Ochako, please explain - what is this mess - who is she-”

“I don’t know!” Izuku burst, shaking a little. “I don’t know! It was a frog before and now its a girl and Shouto didn’t tell me and I don’t know-”

“Izuku-”

“Izuku, baby, calm down,” Mom quickly crossed the room to him, softly taking his hands. “It’s okay, I’m sorry I yelled. I’m sorry. Let’s have some tea, and we’ll talk about it, okay?”

“...O…okay.”

_______________________________________________________________

Tea with a splash of honey was always good. It warmed him down to his core. The girl seemed to also be enjoying it, if her regular sips were any indicator. Even if she was a bit tentative, slow, testing about it, each time.

His mom sighed heavily. “So, according to your story, she’s…”

Ochako hummed. “Yeah. I don’t believe it either. We should call Shouto.”

“He’d love this,” Izuku mumbled, staring into his tea. “He probably knows what…she is. I certainly don’t.”

“...Well,” Mom glanced at the girl. She had a permanent frown on her face. “We’ll deal with this tomorrow. Today, we’ll…well, It’s already five, isn’t it?”

Izuku dropped his head onto the table. “One hour. Please. I want sleep. I didn’t sleep at all.”

“Ditto,” Ochako also dropped her head, with a heavy thud. “No sleep. At all. I almost was asleep, but then Deku called…”

“Sorry…”

“’S alright….I wouldn’t wanna miss this.” She huffed a laugh. “Somehow, I’m glad I saw it live.”

Mom sighed again, sounding old. “Okay,” She said. “You only have about two hours, though. Remember, you both promised you would ride to school this year.”

Izuku groaned, muffling himself on the wood table. Ochako also whined. The girl watched the both of them curiously.

His mom agreed to watch the girl while they napped; Izuku was so not sleeping in his bed, so he took Mom’s bed instead. Ochako splayed out over one half of the king-sized bed while Izuku took up one third, sharing it because his mom’s bed was wonderful.

It was, without a doubt, the worst nap of his life. Because just as he was getting settled in and kind of almost sleeping, the six o’clock alarm on Mom’s bedside table buzzed loudly. Along with the knee Ochako unconsciously jammed halfway up his ass and her loud drool-snore-choke-drowning, he kind of wanted to die, to get some real sleep. The reason why he stopped sleeping in the same bed as Uraraka Ochako came back to him. Violently, in the form of a foot mysteriously journeying its way up his pants. She was just the weirdest sleeper.

He untangled himself from the covers and Ochako and trudged down the hall. He went to his room, intent on grabbing a shower before school.

He grabbed his clothes from his closet and was on his way to the bathroom before he suddenly recalled what happened last night. Where the fuck was that girl-

He ran around the house, looking for her and Mom - the car was gone from the driveway. His mom had work early in the day, so that was normal, but the girl was still nowhere to be seen. Where was she?!

He texted his mom urgently, and she responded, I left her at home. She should be there with you. Have a good day at school <3

One, was he really going to just leave her at home all day? And two, she was absolutely nowhere to be seen. He checked the kitchen, the living room, all the closets, both bedrooms, and their house was one floor and small as fuck, so there wasn’t many places to hide. She was gone.

And then Ochako screamed. Izuku could probably guess where frog girl was.

He ran to Mom’s room, and there she was, Ochako standing on the bed in a martial arts defensive position with frog girl sitting on the floor, blinking cluelessly, now dressed in spare clothes Ochako left here. But she still had such an alien air around her that it felt like the clothes didn’t quite fit her. She confounded Izuku on every level.

Izuku was cobbling together some way to react to the situation when his phone started ringing. He answered.

“H-hello?!”

“Is the frog okay?”

Shouto. Izuku felt a range of emotions, from relief to joy to murderous intent to numbness. “…It turned into a person, Shouto. A girl. Did you know this would happen!?”

A silence passed.

“Shouto?”

“...S-sorry, I…”

“Shouto, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine, I just…” He sniffed faintly. “I wanted to see it.”

“You knew it would happen?!”

“No, but I had a feeling. Part of the witness reports described a frog standing on two legs like a person, and even people with frog-like features, y’know, like a person, but a frog.” Shouto sighed. “So either it was just one creature that could shapeshift to varying levels of frog to humanoid, or it was many creatures that were all varying levels of frog to humanoid. Like kappas or something.” Something tapped rhythmically in the background. “I wished I could’ve seen the shift. Do you still have the shed skin?”

“For what, Shouto,” Izuku was, frankly, pretty fed up. The frog girl was now on top of Ochako and very closely watching her, scanning her features. “What are you going to do with a giant frog flesh bag, Shouto.”

“Research.”

“Shouto.”

“Testing.”

“Shouto! You’re missing the-”

“Fine!” The other boy huffed roughly. “I’m gonna call Mei and cash in a debt to use her research facilities.”

“Shouto, I love you, but you have a C in chemistry. But that’s beside the-”

“She’s going to examine the frog skin, okay?! That’s it! Sorry I don’t have a genetics lab in my fucking basement!”

Izuku tried to be exasperated, but he ended up fighting back a smile. “N-no, Shouto, that’s not - I - whatever Mei has to do with it, it’s a nasty sack of frog skin, Shouto. I was talking more as in, ‘it’s absurd that you would want it, so why’, not ‘you don’t have the means to do anything with it, so why’.”

Shouto went quiet. “…” It was a long, self-depreciating quiet.

“Look,” Izuku said, smile fading, because fuck, Shouto drove him crazy sometimes. “Get your ass over here and help me decide what we’re going to do about her. She can’t stay here while we’re at school all day, can she?”

“I don’t see why not,” Shouto mumbled. “Can’t take her to school. Can’t let her loose.”

“Shouto, you have the skin, basically, so you have a model of what the crypid frog looks like, right? And proof?”

“Yeah. That’s the best part.”

“So do we really need to keep her?” Izuku watched as the girl tried to lick Ochako with a freakishly long tongue. Being a reasonable human being, the brown-haired girl was scrambling away before she made contact. “She’s…well, I mean, endangered species preservation, right? And - I dunno, what’re we gonna keep her for? She looks like a person, kind of…it’d be weird. Morally.”

“...How human does she seem?”

“One hundred percent. She has big eyes, but that can be passed off as a feature, y’know?” Ochako ran to the doorway - the girl opened her mouth wide, tongue flicking out, and it reached all the way across the room, wrapping around Ochako’s waist and pulling her back in. Izuku flinched as his friend shrieked. “…But her tongue is super long and weird, like a frog’s, and she currently has captured Ochako with it.”

“...Well, human meat doesn’t sit well with frogs, so she isn’t going to try to eat her. Unless she’s an adventurous type or something. I mean, she is a monster, so she’s probably full of surprises. Don’t trust her.” Shouto laughed, like this was a joke. Izuku didn’t find it very funny...How did he know that human meat doesn’t sit well with frogs…?

Ochako was released once she was dragged close enough for the girl to grab her. “So we’re just gonna leave her in my house for the day.”

“Yeah.”

“There are hazards everywhere, Shouto.”

“She’ll probably be fine.”

“But what if my Xbox isn’t, Shouto? What if she burns my house down, Shouto? What if she breaks my Xbox Shouto-”

“Forget about your Xbox,” Shouto snapped. Izuku gasped loudly. “It’ll be fine. She won’t mess with anything. I think. And like you said, if she escapes, it isn’t that bad. As long as the skin is still there, she exists. That’s all I need. I have to take a shower before school, I smell like black coffee and steroids. Later.”

And there he went. Almost angrily, Izuku pocketed his phone and said, “H-hey!”

Frog girl looked at Izuku boredly. “Help me,” Ochako begged, held captive by the two arms around her waist. Izuku debated the pros and cons of tearing her away from the literally mutant creature. What was the likelihood of survival?

“We have an hour before we meet up with Shouto,” Izuku stated flatly. “I’m taking a shower first.”

“No!” In a flash, Ochako twisted free of her bindings and was out of the room, and zooming down the hall. “You take all the hot water!”

Izuku sighed. Frog girl, covered in her own hair like she was drowning in it, stared at him with wide green eyes. He averted his gaze, nervously.

“U-uh, hi,” He said. Wow, could he be any more awkward? Well, she wasn’t human, so it wasn’t like she’d pick up on any of human societal nuances-

“Hi.”

She said. She fucking said. She said?! She said. She talked. She said words. She said ‘hi’. Whoawhoawhoa - it had to be simple parroting, it had to be just-

“Where did she go.”

Izuku felt the inexplicable urge to cry. “Wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-”

Frog girl stared at Izuku, eyes peeking between strands of hair with a strange light. “Where is she.”

“I-I-I-I-I-d-d-d-d-on’t-”

She stood up, and walked past him with halting, almost jerking steps. She left the room, and looked one way, then the other. “…”

“O-O-Ochako?!” Izuku felt like curling up in a corner and sobbing wildly. He felt like he just looked into the void and it talked back to him. He felt a number of things, and all of them involved some level of existential terror. “Sh-she’s i-in the sh-shower…D-don’t-”

She was already on her way down the hallway. Izuku didn’t really think upsetting this being of mysterious and potentially reality-breaking power was a good idea. Technically, she was another girl, so it wouldn’t be that weird for her to walk in on Ochako, right? Uh.

Right on cue, Ochako screamed. Izuku groaned. By finding this cursed being, Shouto effectively turned his life upside down. For better or worse was yet to be seen. But from how Ochako was currently fighting frog girl out of her shower, it was probably for worse. Would his life ever go back to normal?

_______________________________________________________________

By some miracle, they managed to get on the road on time, meeting up with Shouto on the way. While he and Ochako rode very practical bikes, he rode a skateboard. Why, he refused to really tell. If he wasn’t wearing his school uniform, he’d look like he was in the wrong decade. And somehow the uniform made it look even tackier. But it was alright. It wasn’t like he was bad at it; in fact, he pulled many moves that were reminiscent of a certain famous skateboarder, but he was also from the wrong decade. Somehow, it suited him. He, to a concerning level, didn’t care what other people thought of him, so it was okay. Just weird.

“So,” Shouto said, cruising along with Ochako, keeping up easily despite having much smaller wheels. Also weird. “Show me a pic of her.”

“A what?” Izuku blinked.

“A picture.” Shouto raised an eyebrow. “Don’t tell me you didn’t take a picture.”

“...”

Ochako shrugged, rhythmically tapping her bell. “Didn’t think to.”

The boy huffed. “You guys are the worst,” He said. “How are we supposed to get proof that she shapeshifted if we didn’t get the after picture?”

“Shouto, I’m tired,” Izuku sighed. “I’m sorry. But this is way over my head. I’m not good at…this paranormal cryptid stuff. It’s fun when it’s just creepy stories, but - I dunno, this is too much.” He shuddered. “She talked. Just, started saying words. Like a normal person - super blunt and to the point, but it was like she said it like that on purpose. She knew. Just like that. And she was a frog before-”

“She talked?!” Shouto’s eyes lit up. “What did she say? What did her voice sound like? Ugh, I wish we got it on tape-”

“Shouto!” Izuku snapped. “Pay attention! Forget that stuff - I don’t want any part in it anymore! I’m scared! After school, we’re gonna let her go, and that’s gonna be the end of it! Okay!?” If there’s even a home to return to, Izuku thought bitterly.

Shouto stared at him, blankly. Then he looked away. “…Alright.”

Ochako whistled. “You guys fall out hard,” She said. “I give it…three days before one of you starts apologizing.”

Izuku’s face burned. He was the one apologizing, most of the time. But not this time, He thought resolutely. He wasn’t at fault here. Shouto was going to apologize to him, for dragging him into this mess in the first place.

_______________________________________________________________

[10:25 A.M.]

nessie: im dying. im actually dying

shouto: why

nessie: what the fuck is a lamange

nessie: mange is a disease

nessie: in french it means what??? food???? kill me

shouto: it means eat

shouto: pay attention in class and you might get it

nessie: fuck you

nessie: youre the last person i want to hear that from

shouto: ow

nessie: Rip Believe It Or Not

shouto: Ripley’s I Know This Stuff Is Real, But I Can’t Handle It, Dog

nessie: nibyguvtfcu

nessie: so you do get it

shouto: get what

shouto: what

nessie: oh my god

nessie: Oh My God

nessie: you are a national treasure

nessie: you know that

shouto: ??????

shouto: ?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!!what am I missing now

nessie: shut up for a minute teach coming

shouto: well I hope not thats a little inappropriate

---

[10:30 A.M.]

nessie: shouto holy shit what the fuck oh my god what the fuck

nessie: dude

shouto: yeah I sent that without thinking

shouto: and then I couldnt send a correction because

shouto: and yeah

nessie: dude

pppppppppppink: whats happening

pppppppppppink: oh wow what was that shouto hahahahha

shouto: oh my god look it was an accident

tenya: ochako its hardly fair to make fun of him for that

tenya: it was an honest mistake

nessie: tenya coughs, “unfortunately”

shouto: say that shit to my face deku

shouto: whos on the football team huh

nessie: surprised you caught that

nessie: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

shouto: i am going to kill you,

pppppppppppink: hey no death threats on my friendly christian minecraft server

nessie: deadmeme

tenya: yes, death threats are not the way to handle strife between friends

tenya: but neither were those insults, izuku

tenya: you know shouto’s skill does not warrant comments such as those

nessie: hes gonna get a coma i know it

tenya: what does that have to do with anything

nessie: football

nessie: caveman sport

tenya: that is inappropriate

shouto: dudedudedude look man

shouto: im sorry okay

nessie: FOR WHAT SHOUTO

shouto: I DONT KNOW

pppppppppppink: wow that was fast

tenya: please quiet teacher

------

[10:35 A.M.]

shouto: look man I dont know what youre so angry about

nessie: im not angry

pppppppppppink: izuku coughs, “im furious”

nessie: im n o t

tenya: izuku i believe you are, in fact, angry

nessie: im not angry

shouto: youre angry

nessie: SHOUTO WHAT THE FUCK MAN

nessie: EXCUSE ME IF IM A LITTLE SHAKEN UP ABOUT YOU DROPPING A FUCKING FROG DEMON ONTO ME

shouto: i wouldve kept it if i could

shouto: but i forced it onto you without asking

shouto: sorry

nessie: “sorry if i valued a mythical creature above my friends feelings”

shouto: well fuck

shouto: i tried

shouto: yeah fuck you

shouto: i wouldve loved to have it

shouto: you love it when i talk to you about it so what the fuck is the difference

nessie: THEYRE JUST STORIES

nessie: S T O R I E S

nessie: I DONT WANT THEM TO BE REAL

nessie: ITS TOO MUCH

nessie: ITS SCARY

shouto: dude theres always a chance of the stories being real

shouto: you didnt know that

nessie: dontdothat

nessie: i dont want to think of them like that

nessie: no one wants them to be real

shouto: i do

nessie: yeah but ur a weirdo

tenya: foul

pppppppppppink: yeah try again

pppppppppppink: stay within bounds

nessie: are you reffing our fight

tenya: yes

tenya: go on

shouto: dude if you dont want any part of it then ill take her okay

shouto: okay?

nessie: that isnt it

nessie: because ur gonna be all weird about it and be all offended

nessie: bullshit

nessie: were gonna straighten this out here

nessie: rn

tenya: as a distraction in class.

nessie: sure

shouto: im not gonna be offended

pppppppppppink: hahahahhahahhha

shouto: im not

tenya: you will be offended

nessie: you will be offended

nessie: you dont think my fear is valid

shouto: being scared of it and pushing it away isnt going to make it disappear

shouto: theres a monster under your bed whether you want it to be there or not

nessie: oh my FUCKING GOD SHOUTO

nessie: THIS IS WHAT IM TALKING ABOUT

nessie: YOU DONT LISTEN TO ME

shouto: i am

shouto: im doing nothing but listening to you

shouto: im getting on aizawas nerves

tenya: he means respect

tenya: you arent respecting him

tenya: as evidenced by you “twisting the knife”, for lack of a better term

tenya: you understand that stories of paranormal activities entertain him?

shouto: yes

tenya: the rift seems to lay in the fact that although he enjoys them as stories, he does not wish them to be real, intimate experiences

tenya: this is where you two seem to split

tenya: because you strive to live the stories

pppppppppppink: *is eating popcorn* marriage counseling :D

shouto: i mean who wouldnt

nessie: I DONT I DONT I DONT I DONT I DONT

nessie: NONONONONONONONO

nessie: UCK AMN DO YOU THIINK I WANNA FUCKING

nessie: THAT IS

nessie: NOOONONONONOONONO

shouto: shit man calm down

shouto: so it scares you

nessie: fuck yess??? you get it????finally????

shouto: why

[nessie has left the group chat.]

pppppppppppink: dude you messed up

shouto: .

tenya: i advise understanding

tenya: not everyone feels the same way you do

shouto: well duh

shouto: but it isnt scary

shouto: .

pppppppppppink: are you hearing yourself? finally?

pppppppppppink: not to be mean, ur just

pppppppppppink: really dense :D

tenya: to him, it is scary.

tenya: and thats just how he works

tenya: youll have to respect that

shouto: but its not scary

tenya: that is an opinion, shouto

tenya: not fact. it varies from person to person

tenya: you have to respect his opinion, shouto

shouto: .

shouto: god

shouto: fine

tenya: now what’s this about a “frog demon”?

pppppppppppink: ohohoohooho

shouto: first of all, it isnt a demon

pppppppppppink: do i have a story for you!

_______________________________________________________________

Izuku settled on giving Shouto the cold shoulder. It lasted out of school and on the way home, even as they pulled up to his house. Even as he kept pestering him with his constant, creepy, begging stare. Fuck him. Because if he talked first, he’d end up apologizing. And he couldn’t do that. He wasn’t the one at fault.

The frog girl was gone. They searched high and low, all over his house, but she was nowhere to be seen. Izuku found the frog skin wrapped up in the dumpster outside, and threw it at Shouto without a word. Shouto didn’t say anything, either.

“Hm,” Ochako popped a sucker into her mouth. “I changed my mind. Two days.”

Izuku grumbled, flushing bright red.

“I find this whole story a little hard to believe,” Tenya said, and Izuku felt a wild urge to punch him. “You mean to tell me that this so-called giant frog split open and turned out to be a young girl? Who is now missing?”

“Tenya, I wish it didn’t happen,” Izuku crossed the driveway, grabbing the taller boy by his quarterback shoulders. “I wish desperately that it didn’t happen. But it did.”

“Oh yeah,” Ochako said, nodding. “It was crazy. I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t been there.” With a shrug, she added, “Still kinda in doubt. It was super late.”

“Maybe it was a dream?”

“No,” Shouto said, coming up to show Tenya something on his phone. “Pictures. Video. It’s real. The frog, at least. I also have samples at home. I did some research - actually, there are some frogs that can grow up to about the size of our frog, but they can only live in equatorial Guinea. Without the girl, the skin only proves that a new species of giant frog lives in the area unless they map its genome or something.” He shrugged. “Not the story I was looking for, but cool nonetheless.”

“’Story’?” Izuku bristled. “What are you even looking for, Shouto? Why are you doing this at all?” Whoops. But he couldn’t help it. He’d been wondering it for a while, but this was the breaking point. Would he just hand the girl over to scientists for testing if he did have her? Would they take advantage of the fact that she isn’t human to do whatever they wanted? What was Shouto getting from this? Money? Fame? He wasn’t the type who would search out stuff like that, so what-?!

“Huh?” Shouto tilted his head. “...Why not? It’s fun.”

He could scream. Angrily, he stomped back to the porch, yanking open his door and ready to lock it behind him-

-and the kitchen was a mess, like a tornado whizzed around in the few moments they went outside. The dining table was on its side, chairs thrown around, cabinets raided and foodstuffs everywhere. The fridge was open, and judging from the aggressive clinking going on, someone was there. Izuku could probably guess who it was. But why now? She barely touched anything, earlier.

And then she peeked above the fridge door. Izuku screamed.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

if anyone knows how to color text please tell me because i spent a lot of time coloring the chat messages in the original doc and im sad it didnt carry so please and thank you tell me,

2 notes · View notes

ddonggeun · 5 years

Note

Hey! So I’m suspecting if I got adhd/add but is there any symptom idk. It’s really exp here to get it diagnosed

sorry it took me a while to get back to you because honestly i dont know whats a good alternative for you can be so i guess i can share my own experience?

first of all i think googling symptoms and types of adhd and reading peoples account on how adhd/add manifest is a good start? my doctor and the reddit /r/adhd REALLY help me to accept myself (which is the first step i think) but the way i get diagnosis (i am adhd with predominately inattentiveness - but at the same time i have depressions and dyslexia which is like a killer combo 10/10 would never rec) is that i came across with an article a couple months about how girls with adhd are more likely to be (mis)diagnosed with depression and it basically fucks up multiple generations because they cant get the help they need and i was like wait whats describe in it sounds kind of like me but at the same time i have always been very lethargic and rather well behaved in class growing up i am nothing like what you would typically associate with adhd (you know the hyper-activeness) so during my next visit to the doctor (im getting treatment for my depression) i mention to the article to her and she said wait you know what describe how you feel in a classroom setting growing up and is there anything you do that teachers complain about repeatedly and tell me how studying and doing homework is like to you and so i did (i can go further into details of my life since a lot contributes to why i only get diagnosis when im 21… let me know if you would like to know i guess?)

my doctor (who just so happens to be an adhd specialist and is quite active in the research area i didnt know before then we stan forever i love her really she is so encouraging and so good at her job) took some notes as i was talking and after im done she said you know what i think you might be onto something but i cant be sure yet (since i have depression and dyslexia which both overlaps quite a lot with adhd/add) why dont i first explain to you what adhd is and i’ll give you the set of official diagnosis questions you dont have to do it just take a look at it first do some research organize your thought talk to your parents about it and if you think getting a test on it is something you want we can set up another appointment and we can go from there - which is really really nice because adhd has always been a taboo at least with my upbringing it makes you a loser socially academically and you know just in general its not something you will want to have….

in hind sight there are SO MANY SIGNS even in early childhood how come no one notice i dont know prolly because i grew up in the 00s if you are different you need to kys lmao rip:

trouble paying attention in school or work,

the appearance of not listening - although im an audio learner funny enough

avoidance of activities that require sustained focus,

being easily distracted

restlessness

fidgeting and cant sit properly - i shake my legs or click my pen so much especially when im thinking or anxious lmao, i got into trouble a lot when i was younger because i only sit in my seat facnig the teacher 5 mins max at at ime then i move around or i move the chair around i think better when i cross my legs but i went to a uniform school and i always make my skirt too short so you know

interrupting - if i dont say what comes to mind when it comes to mind, the thought is gone forever

frequent talking and talking way too fast - i get the exact same comment every single report day class from when i was 4 till i graduated high school im not even kidding “she has excellent comprehension skill and reading speed. it would be great if parents can help her out a bit in maths or chemistry. she has a lot of potential if she applies herself, she seems distracted although when we ask her questions she can answer. very helpful and bubbly and yet she talks too much in class. she is not disruptive and her seatmate never complains but she just doesnt stop talking. we have been pairing her up with quiet students in class in the hopes that she will talk less in class but she just turn the quiet student talkative”

trying to do multiple things at once - i cant do one thing at a time, even when im say writing a paper i need to be listening to music or talking to someone if not switching between tabs or word files

mood swings

hyperfocus - oh boy oh boy oh boy

impulsiveness - i dont know if i get better as i age or is it getting worse i just know how to clean up my mess lmaooooo

poor time management - although i would say ever since i start listening to stuff 24/7 it really helps build a sense of the passage of time or whatever? its like now i know ok by the time i get to the third song in the shower i need to be washing out my conditioner; or say i need to go somewhere in 40 mins which is really abstract to me i set timers and put on a show thats 35ish mins even tho im not watching it just so im aware of time is actually happening if it makes sense

fail to follow through - i start things and once i have it figure out in my head i struggle to put it down in words or explain it to others i work well with other adhd peps tho

doesnt follow instruction and only do stuff their way

burnout - this is the worst especially if you are a perfectionist or a control freak and guess who is both

trouble coping with stress -

i luck out because im canadian and my doctor (in my schools clinic) just so happens to be a specialist who is very passionate about helping undergrads and grad school students to achieve as much as they can - so doctor and diagnosis for me is free. i do have to pay for my medications out of my pocket for a bit since im on vyvanse (to treat both my adhd and depression-lead anxiety its complicated but it makes sense when my doctor explained it to me lol) and this drug isnt covered by Pharmacare (CAD $130ish for 3 weeks worth of 30mg, im mostly on 30mg but on days when i dont have work on stuff or go to school i take 20mg just so my anxiety dont cause me to explode lmao) and very expensive but recently my doctor and i have agreed that vyvanse really work for me and it is something that i should be on daily for the foreseeable future we applied for special authorization which means i only gotta pay the tax… of course medicating isnt a must but it is what works for me and we figure out a way to make it affordable so i cant be more happy about that

at the same time i work with my psychiatrist to you know configure the whole adhd thing cause you know 21 years of repressing and forcing your feet into a shoes that not even your size frick you up thats something people dont tell you 🤷🏻‍♀️

what my doctor said to me then stuck with me - she told me adhd or add really is no monster or flaw in fact it is a very valuable set of traits we inherit from our ancestor - we hate it now because modern society render these skills useless well you see adhd isnt all about the hyperactiveness you see in the media people with adhd are extra sensitive to their surrounding and prefer hands on experiences (today we call them distracted) they are always aware of the change around them and is capable to attend to a couple things at a time and act fast because their brains are always making sense of things even when they arent consciously doing it. in todays society we dont want these kind of people why? because they ask questions they are curious people who notice trivial stuff that dont contribute to productivity they cant sit still which makes them not the ideal factor workers or pupils BUT! you have to remember that industrialization started like a century ish ago before that our ancestors live in predominately tribal society - adhd people then are the perfect caretakers and protectors, why? because they are always noticing things they adapt and react fast… so yeah it kinda suck for us growing up in a system thats designed to be everything we are and it is something that need to be changed but for those of us who “made it out alive” especially people who only get diagnosed in adulthood more often than not they look back and realize they have developed so many incredible ways to cope to make things work - are they always the perfect way? are they always health? no definitely no but at the same time it shows you how incredible these people are they make things work yes things are really hard sometimes but you got to give yourself a pet in the shoulder for not giving up… with the help of science and research we now know a little more about how adhd affect people we now have medication and programs developed to help people with adhd - they arent to dumb you down or numb you but instead it helps you to focus better so you can actually hear your entire thought and not just phrases or sentence fragments

#i rambled but i hope my personal experience give u a slight idea of how adhd/add manifest in others? but like i said medicating is not the #only way i think talking to people with similar experiences is helpful too even tho they might not be able to offer you professional medical #advices not feeling alone or that you are a weirdo is so important people talk a lot of about how poor self image among adhd ppls are common #and i think the social pressure is def one of the things that make it worse #i dont know where you are but if you are still in school #i guess talking to a trusted teacher or like social worker would be a good start they might be able to point you to more local and accessibl #resources.... and i mean you can always talk to me im very new to the whole actively combating adhd and not just cope with it but you know #sometimes you just need someone to hear you rant about stuff and im always here... i might not be able to reply fast since im in my last #semester 😳 and school is killing me lmao but ill try to response as soon as i see it :)))#ask #anon

3 notes · View notes

milkycig · 2 years

Text

Update: 1/21/22

Day 3 of my fast.

I honestly can’t believe it’s day 3 already, I feel like I just started this fast. Probably because I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had time to hyperfocus on my fast and how much weight I’m losing.

I forgot to update yesterday so I’m sorry for that. I was engrossed in a project. But I have been doing my daily weigh ins. And honestly they’ve been a little disappointing. This morning I was down another 0.8 of a lb. And the other day 0.4. I’m not sure what’s going on because I haven’t done anything to break the fast and I know I’m not holding onto water weight.

Oh well. That’s not really important. A loss is still a loss. I’m just so god damn impatient. I want to get back to where I was before I went through my depression spiral.

Ugh I did take some time to stare at the backs of my legs in the mirror this morning and I’m so disgusted I really just could not believe that that’s what people see from the back. Like ew. EW. How long have I looked like that?! 🤢

Anyway. This update is mostly boring lol. Im just a dull fuck you guys. 😂😂 At least at the moment

Stay safe 🖤

0 notes

ladyofpurple · 6 years

Note

GIRL ITS BEEN MONTHS SINCE YOU UPDATED TPOY!! please tell me you haven’t given up on it )-:

I KNOW IM REALLY SORRY OMG

This took a bit longer to answer than it should have because I was trying to figure out how to reply, I guess?? The short answer is basically that writing bits of fic during my exams when I didn’t actually have the time to was super productive, mainly because I Didn’t Want To Do The Thing but my entire future hinged on Doing The Thing and anxiety-driven avoidance is excellent creative fuel, apparently. The problem is, of course, that once I finished and started getting my results back and actually had time to breathe again my brain kinda fizzled out and I never wanted to look at a Word document ever again in my life. Writing is really hard right now, for some reason. And not just TPoy — everything I try to write either gives me a headache, makes every idea I’ve ever had go flying out the window like magic, or looks like absolute garbage to me. (I’ve been trying, though, I promise!!!) There is more TPoY, though!! I swear to God!! It’s just coming along a little slower than anticipated.

The long answer is... a little more complicated and probably more than you’re interested in, and the main reason is the short one anyway. But I’ll put a long answer under a cut just in case (aka the entire history of TPoY lol), since I’ve lowkey wanted to post about it for a while now but didn’t quite know how to? May get a little very personal, I suppose.

Basically, TPoY is and always has been a garbage fic. I don’t say that to disparage my own writing or attempt to elicit praise from anyone: I have always considered it a glorious dumpster fire of experimentation, a ridiculous Frankenstein’s monster of all my favorite ML tropes as a practice run, since it had been so long since attempting to write anything at all. I’m thrilled that people like it, of course! Whenever people send me asks about it my answers always involve a lot of exclamation points and variations on “I AM CURRENTLY SOBBING ON THE FLOOR IN GRATITUDE” because I honestly have no idea how to express how genuinely teary-eyed I get when someone tells me how much they like it, or post a comment. That being said, it was always intended for my own amusement and/or therapy, and that it’s gotten so many bookmarks and kudos and comments is incredibly surreal, even after a whole year.

When I started writing it, I was working through a lot of stuff. My first boyfriend had broken up with me, and as we lived together in his hometown I was stuck there on my own for another year before I could move back home. 2016 was filled with a lot of horrifying shit that kept happening one after the other and I eventually almost had to drop out of school because I couldn’t handle it all. The relationship was pretty toxic but all I knew at the time was that I was scared and alone and heartbroken.

When I started writing, it was after 8 months of the worst bout of depression I’ve ever experienced, and I still wasn’t well, but I functioned passably enough to start hyperfocusing on things. I had an idea about a fic I suddenly wanted to write, and it would have a happy ending and all, but I could work through my feelings in a way I hadn’t tried to since before my ex and I got together. I pulled a lot of the start of the fic (the rejection, the miscommunication, the avoidance) from my recent breakup, yes, but also from my first rejection, aka the only other boy I’d liked enough to confess my feelings to. We were 17, and he admitted that he knew, and then suddenly we weren’t friends anymore. A year and a half later, I got together with my ex, and suddenly after three years of dedicating my life to “us” on his whims he was ghosting me without explanation.

I see a lot of myself in Marinette at that age. The awkwardness, the enthusiasm, the incredibly obvious lovesick obsession with a cute boy who’s nice to you. I wondered if maybe she would react the same, if put into similar circumstances as I had been. Focus on the self-doubt that would follow, based on insecurities she’s already shown in the show — coupled with your standard teenage hormone-fest —and you’d have a fabulous starter for angstfic and a free therapy session all in one.

The problem with that is nobody knows this backstory but me. People focusing on Marinette’s insecurities is nothing new. Other people are annoyed it’s such a popular trope. And the fact that I’ve chosen to focus on certain aspects of the main characters’ identities for the purposes of a story I started on a whim has been making me insecure for a long time because people in the fandom are tired of those characterizations. I’ve never gotten hate comments —I don’t even remember ever getting constructive criticism on TPoY. But I’m well aware that the plot is far from original and definitely lacking in certain places, and as the comments roll in and the hits go up my anxiety mounts because oh my God I’m that guy in the fandom.

I always intended on focusing on different aspects of their characterizations in different fics to suit the plot, y’know? Not ignoring parts of their personalities, but just... emphasizing other parts. But TPoY is the one most people have read. I have a couple one-shots where I tried to do something like that, with different aspects of their characters, but short one-shots can’t really compare to a 100,000+ word WIP, even if they even slightly compared in popularity (they don’t). So my only notable contribution to the fandom is TPoY. And that makes me anxious.

Then there’s the Frankenstein-like obsession with adding every trope I’ve ever wanted to write in a fic like this. I’ve mentioned before that the original plan for this was, like, 10-15 chapters at most. But every chapter I write I’m like, “But what if I did this???” Like I said, I never intended it to be even remotely popular. The only other fandoms I’ve written for are microscopic in comparison. I had no frame of reference for a pairing this big — all my previous experience was from Fanfiction.net, for Christ’s sake. I assumed I wouldn’t finish it, and even getting to chapter 6 was a surprise. But that hyperfocus somehow held on for dear life and I was banging out chapters like nobody’s business. And people were responding to it. And I think that kind of went to my head a little? Not like in an “I deserve all this attention” kind of way, but more like a “People like?? This thing I’m doing??? I cannot squander this opportunity, I must give them m o r e” kind of way. It was the best I’d felt since the breakup and I didn’t really think I deserved it, so I kind of wanted to... prove I did, I guess, by writing everything I’d ever wanted in a lovesquare fic in hopes that people would keep liking it and me and I’d keep feeling nice. (I mean, I’d planned to add in a ridiculous amount of tropes anyway, I just ended up adding a lot more than I’d planned.)

On the one hand, people go nuts for that shit. On the other, it’s getting harder and harder to justify cramming all this shit into the same fic. This compulsion keeps fucking me over by giving me spur-of-the-moment ideas for sub-plots I never wanted and certainly didn’t properly think through before posting the foreshadowing or setup for — yet at the same time they’re usually thought of and integrated several chapters in advance so I can’t just... leave them out? And part of me kind of doesn’t want to?? And I’m trying with every fiber in my being not to rewrite just the first 3 chapters, let alone the entire fic. A side-effect of my FF.net history at 13 was Never Edit Anything. Yeah, I’ll do some spell-check. Maybe some rewording here and there. Sometimes I’ll post a chapter and come back sporadically over the next few days to change out some punctuation or whatever. But if I don’t like a section after writing for a while? Throw the Whole Ass Chapter out. After it’s posted? This Is Your Life Now.

let’s not talk about how everything after chapter 27 was supposed to go very differently

Never mind that, after writing a hundred thousand goddamn words in a year, one’s writing skill tends to evolve and increase over time. Not just in regards to vocabulary, but with consistency and pacing and structure. This means, of course, that I can’t ever reread my own writing without the Evil Writing Goblin in my brain telling me to start the whole thing over from scratch. It’s fine.

I suppose I could get a beta, but I’m very bad at taking critique and as I’m even worse at talking to people than I am at posting on time I don’t think that would work out very well.

The point of this goddamn novel is that TPoY means a lot to me, probably a lot more than people realize. It’s kinda dumb and very cheesy and absurdly long, but it was the first real thing I did for myself after my whole life fell apart. I will finish it!!

But it’s hard to write it right now. I��m trying— I’m writing four chapters at the same time right now (a bit less than 10,000 words combined at current count). I don’t want to try to rewrite the whole fic or keep “mischaracterizing” the characters or lose the suspense I’ve tried to build (or, God forbid, try to keep interest so hard it hurts the rest of the fic) and risk alienating readers. I can’t stress enough how much these supportive comments mean to me, even on something as silly as a fanfic. But I also don’t want to force myself to write it or write something just because other people might or might not like it and risk alienating me. So I’m stuck at a kind of anxiety-induced impasse with myself that’s just made worse by the fact that I’m having trouble writing anything at all at the moment.

Jesus Christ this was longer than I meant it to be. Please don’t take this as a pity-party or anything. I don’t want sympathy or, I don’t know, reassurance or anything, I just wanted everything to be Out There because it really is the most in-depth response I could give and y’all deserve an honest answer. Some of you guys have been reading since the beginning and I can’t express how much that means to me. I feel really bad when I haven’t updated in a long time, because I know my fic makes some people really happy!

And PLEASE don’t take this as a “STOP ASKING ME ABOUT TPOY GODDAMMIT” because this is the opposite of that. I FUCKING LOVE IT WHEN PEOPLE ASK ME ABOUT TPOY. I L I V E FOR IT. But it sucks when the only answer I have is “I don’t know when it’ll be up, sorry :( ”

I mean, that’ll probably still be the answer I give, unless I by some miraculous (heh) stroke of luck) start hyperfocusing on writing again.

But at least y’all kinda know why now.

#did someone call for Too Much Information??#BUT THANK YOU FOR YOUR MESSAGE I LOVE AND APPRECIATE YOU #I HOPE THAT ANSWERS YOUR QUESTION #[SEVERAL HEART EMOJIS]#tpoy fic #anon good nurse #Lady answers stuff

7 notes · View notes