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matan4il · 3 days

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I've written before that the Iranian attack on Israel is pretty unprecedented, and I was thinking in terms of the history of this specific conflict, but it's actually true on a bigger scale as well.

They launched at least 331 airborne weapons that Israel has intercepted as well, more if you take into account what was intercepted by other countries. Most of the weapons were launched out of Iran itself, but some were launched by Iran's proxies from the territories of Yemen and Syria.

Now, the suicide drones? Take about 8 hours to make it from Iran to Israel. The cruise missiles? Around 4 hours. And the ballistic missiles? Those are the ones that would cause the most damage and would be the hardest to intercept, they actually leave the Earth's atmosphere, travel in outer space and re-enter right before they strike, and they move at such a speed that they make it from Iran to Israel within just 10 minutes. So imagine what it means, that Iran launched all of these weapons at different times, from different locations, but coordinated everything to make sure they'd all hit Israel at roughly the same time. That was done in order to tax our defence systems, to maximize how much would get through and succeed in hurting Israelis. Despite that, 100% of the drones were intercepted, as were 100% of the cruise missiles, and 99% of the ballistic missiles. Only one person (a 7 year old Muslim Bedouine girl, Amin al-Houssani, was injured, please keep her in your thoughts) was directly hurt (though over 60 more people were indirectly harmed).

Defence systems usually aim for a success rate of between 80 to 90% interceptions, so the fact that this MASSIVE and UNPRECEDENTED attack was launched, designed to penetrate all of the defence systems that could be employed against it for maximal damage, yet Israel and the coalition that came together (including Arab countries) to stop Iran's attack managed to make sure that less than 1% got in? Unbelievable. The attack was unprecedented, and so was the defence. I can tell you, even some of the Israelis who worked on developing our defence systems for years felt the success rate had actually exceeded their expectations. That said, the attack was bigger than anyone in Israel thought it would be, too.

Just to really drive home what a ballistic missile is like, this is just the engine carrying part of this ballistic missile, which was intercepted over the Dead Sea (Iran launched at least 110 at Israel, 99% of which were successfully intercepted):

But even intercepted airborne weapons cause damage. Little Amina was hit by debris from an interception. I'm sharing a vid, cut from the news (it's just for visuals, so I didn't translate it), which shows one of the few hits inside Israel (filmed by Israeli Muslim Arab Bedouins, you can hear one of them calling in panic to his friend, Ramadan), and then the debris that the IDF collected and removed by trucks, to give you an idea of the size of these pieces of weapons, falling from the sky, after they had flown across 1,600 kilometers (~1000 miles):

Bottom line, it's no surprise that the Israeli Chief of Staff made it clear that there will be an Israeli response. We don't know yet what kind of a response it would be, or when it will take place, but there will be one. This kind of attack from Iran just can't be met with silence. If it were, that would imply acceptance of the massive and unprecedented nature of the attack, which in themselves constitute evidence that Iran very much did intend to cause Israel real damage.

That means if Israel accepts the attack with a shrug of, "hey, we inetrcepted it, and it only cost us 5 billion shekels, so we can just look the other way," then next time? Iran will launch an even bigger attack, to try and get past this remarkable defence. And there will be a next Iranian attack, no matter what excuse they use in order to launch it.

In related news, the Iranian-funded terrorist organization Hezbollah has launched two attack drones at Israel today, which did not set off the warning alarms, crashed in Israeli territory, caused a fire, and wounded at least 3 people.

Meanwhile, this is a reminder that while the Islamist regime of Iran has had a lot of victims since its inception in 1979, no one has suffered at its hands more than the Iranian People. It's no wonder that there are signs of Israel support in Iran, even under that oppressive dictatorship. Here's a graffiti seen in Tehran:

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

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

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ollie-draws-things · 2 days

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Victor Grantz redesign to go with my other ones! His outfit is based on a 1850's postal uniform, as past 1862 the colour changed from red to blue.

Wick is an ashy ghost here, always following the one who attempted to save him but failed, sustaining burns on their hands in the process.

The near-silent victor vows to learn how to have friends, even if he's scared of them. Who knows if he'll be successful.

(also the background text is the script of his background trailer rewritten to make a bit more sense, and that'll be under the cut!)

I am a post man, just like the thousands of postmen running down the streets, delivering different stories and secrets.

I am not good with communicating with others, and I don't want to either.

But I am obsessed with all the different kinds of expressions on people's face when receiving letters:

surprise, joy, excitement, or even anger.

Face-to-face conversation is the most hypocritical thing.

People will look at your face, see your reaction and reflect it accordingly.

However, the feelings written between the lines are the most honest ones.

Though I might not be very convincing as I say that, because no one ever sends me letters back.

After all, my only friend , Wick, is just a dog.

But ever since I first received that letter addressed to me, I've never been so sure about the endlessly sincere words inside.

#identity v #idv #victor grantz #idv postman #identity v postman #idv redesigns

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ask-the-prose · 2 days

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Writing Mental Health With Compassion

I've gotten a few questions regarding depicting characters with mental health challenges and conditions and I wanted to expand a little more on how to depict these characters with compassion for the real communities represented by these characters.

A little about this guide: this is, as always, coming from a place of love and respect for the writing community and the groups affected by this topic at large. I'm also not coming at this from the outside, I have certain mental illnesses that affect my daily life. With that, I'll say that my perspective may be biased, and as with all writing advice, you should think critically about what is being told to you and how.

So let's get started!

Research

I'm sure we're all tired of hearing the phrase "do your research," but unfortunately it is incredibly important advice. I have a guide that touches on how to do research here, if you need a place to get started.

When researching a mental health condition that we do not experience, we need to do so critically, and most importantly, compassionately. While your characters are not people, they are assigned traits that real people do have, and so your depiction of these traits can have an impact on people who face these conditions themselves.

I've found that reddit is a decent resource for finding threads of people talking about their personal experiences with certain illnesses. For example, bipolar disorder has several subreddits that have very open and candid discussions about bipolar, how it impacts lives, and small things that people who don't have bipolar don't tend to think about.

It's important to note that these spaces are not for you. They are spaces for people to talk about their experiences in a place without judgment or fear or stigma. These are not places for people to give out writing advice. Do NOT flood subreddits for people seeking support with questions that may make others feel like an object to be studied. It's not cool or fair to them for writers to enter their space and start asking questions when they're focused on getting support. Be courteous of the people around you.

Diagnosis

I have the belief that for most stories, a diagnosis for your characters is unnecessary. I have a few reasons for thinking this way.

Firstly, mental health diagnoses are important for treatment, but they're also a giant sign written across your medical documents that says, “I'm crazy!” Doctors may try to remain unbiased when they see mental health diagnoses, but anybody with a diagnosis can say that doctors rarely succeed. This translates to a lot of people never getting diagnoses, never seeking treatment, or refusing to talk about their diagnosis if they do have one.

Secondly, I've seen posts discuss “therapy speak” in fiction, and this is one of those instances where a diagnosis and extensive research may make you vulnerable to it. People don't tend to discuss their diagnoses freely and they certainly don't tend to attribute their behaviors as symptoms.

Finally, this puts you, the writer, into a position where you treat your characters less like people and story devices and more like a list of symptoms and behavioral quirks. First and foremost, your characters serve your story. If they don't feel like people then your characters may fall flat. When it comes to mental illness in characters, the people aspect is the most important part. Mentally ill people are people, not symptoms.

Those are my top three reasons for believing that most characters will never need a specific diagnosis. You will likely never need to depict the difference between bipolar and borderline because the story itself does not need that distinction or to reveal a diagnosis at all. I feel that having a diagnosis in mind for a character has more pitfalls than advantages.

How does treatment work?

Treating mental health conditions may appear in your story. There are a number of ways treatments affect daily life and understanding the levels of care and what those levels treat will help you depict the appropriate settings for your characters.

The levels of care range from minimally restrictive and minimal care to intensive in-patient care in a secure hospital setting.

Regular or semi-regular therapy is considered outpatient care. This is generally the least restrictive. Your characters may or may not also take medications, in which case they may also see a psychiatrist to prescribe those medications. There is a difference between therapists, psychiatrists, and psychologists. Therapists do not prescribe medications, psychiatrists prescribe medications after an evaluation, and psychologists will (sometimes) do both. (I'm US, so this may work differently depending where you are. You should always research the specific setting of your story.) Generally, a person with a mental illness or mental health condition will see both an outpatient therapist and an outpatient psychiatrist for their general continuing care.

Therapists will see their patients anywhere from once in a while as-needed to twice weekly. Psychiatrists will see new patients every few weeks until they report stabilizing results, and then they will move to maintenance check-ins every 90-ish days.

If the patient reports severe symptoms, or worsening symptoms, they will be moved up to more intensive care, also known as IOP (Intensive Outpatient Program). This is usually a group-therapy setting for between 3-7 hours per day between 3-5 days a week. The group-therapy is led by a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) or Licensed Professional Social Worker (LPSW). Groups are structured sessions with multiple patients teaching coping mechanisms and focusing on treatment adjustment. IOP’s tend to expect patients to see their own outpatient psychiatrist, but I've encountered programs that have their own in-house psychiatrists.

If the patient still worsens, or is otherwise needing more intensive care, they'll move up to PHP (Partial Hospitalization Program). This can look different per facility, but I've seen them to be more intensive in hours and content than IOP. They also usually have in-house psychiatrists doing diagnostic psychological evaluations. It's very possible for characters with “mild” symptoms to go long periods of time, even most of their lives, without having had a diagnosis. PHP’s tend to need a diagnosis so that they can address specific concerns and help educate the patient on their condition and how it may manifest.

Next step up is residential care. Residential care is a boarding hospital setting. Patients live in the hospital and focus entirely on treatment. Individual programs may differ in what's allowed in, how much contact the patients are allowed to have, and what the treatment focus is. Residential programs are often utilized for addiction recovery. Good residential programs will care about the basis for the addiction, such as underlying mental health issues that the patient may be self-medicating for. Your character may come away with a diagnosis, or they may not. Residential programs aren't exclusively for addictions though, and can be useful for severe behavioral concerns in teenagers or any number of other concerns a patient may have that manifest chronically but do not require intensive inpatient restriction.

Inpatient hospital stays are the highest level of care, and this tends to be what people are talking about when they tell jokes about “grippy socks.” These programs are inside the hospital and patients are highly restricted on what they can and cannot have, they cannot leave unless approved by the hospital staff (the hospital's psychiatrist tends to have the final say), and contact with the outside world is highly regulated. During the days, there are group therapy sessions and activities structured very carefully to maintain routine. Staff will regulate patient hygiene, food and sleep routines, and alone time.

Inpatient hospital programs are controversial among people with mental illness and mental health concerns. I find that they have use, but they are also not an easy or first step to take when dealing with a mental health condition. Patients are not allowed sharp objects, metal objects, shoelaces, cutlery, and pens or pencils. Visitors are not allowed to bring these items in, staff are not allowed these items either. This is for the safety of the patients. Typically, if someone is involuntarily admitted into the inpatient hospital program, it is due to an authority (the hospital staff) deeming the patient as a danger to themselves or others. Whether they came in of their own will (voluntary) or not does not matter in how the program operates. Everyone is treated the same. If someone is an active danger to themselves, then they may be on 24-hour suicide watch. They are not allowed to have any time alone. No, not even for the bathroom, or while sleeping, or during group sessions.

Inpatient Hospital Programs

This is a place of high curiosity for those who have never been admitted into inpatient care, so I'd like to explain a little more in detail how these programs work, why they're controversial, but how they can be useful in certain situations. I do have personal experience in this area, but as always, your mileage may vary.

When admitting, hospital staff are the final say. Not the police. The police hold some sway, but most often, if someone is brought in by the police, they are likely to be admitted. They are only involuntarily admitted when the situation demands: the staff have determined the person to be an imminent danger to themselves or others. This is obviously subjective, and can easily be abused. A good program with decent staff will do everything they can to convince the patient to admit voluntarily if they feel it is necessary, but ultimately if the patient declines and the staff don't feel they can make the clinical argument that admittance is necessary, the patient is free to leave. It should be noted that doctors and clinicians have to worry about possibly losing their licenses to practice. They don't want to fuck around with involuntary admittance if they don't have to, and they don't want potentially dangerous people to walk away.

Once admitted, the patient will have to remove their clothing and put on a set of hospital scrubs. These are mostly made of paper, and most often do not have pockets, but I have seen sets that do have pockets (very handy, tbh). They are not allowed to take anything into the hospital wing except disability-required devices such as glasses, hearing aids, mobility aids, etc. Most programs will require removing piercings, but not all of them, in my experience.

The nurses will also do a physical examination, where they will make note of any open wounds, major scars, tattoos, and other skin abrasions that may be relevant.

The patient will then be led to their bed, where they will receive any approved clothing items from outside, a copy of their patient rights, and a copy of the floor code of conduct and rules, a schedule, and any other administrative information necessary for the program to run efficiently and legally.

Group sessions include group-therapy, activities, coping skills, anger management, anxiety management, and for some reason, karaoke. There is a lot of coloring involved, but only with crayons. A good program will focus heavily on skills and therapeutic activities. Bad programs will phone it in and focus on karaoke and activities. Most hospitals will have a chaplain, and some will include a religious group session. I've never attended these, so I can't speak for them.

Unspoken rules are the hidden pieces of the inpatient programs that patients tend to find out during their first visit. There is no leaving the program until the doctor agrees to it. The doctor will only agree to it if they deem you ready to leave, and you are only ready to leave if you have been compliant to treatment and have seen positive results in the most dangerous symptoms (homicidal or suicidal ideations). Noncompliance can look like: refusing your prescribed medications (which you have the right to do at any time for any reason. That does not mean that there won't be consequences. This is a particularly controversial point.), refusing to attend groups (chapel is not included in this point, but that doesn't mean it's actually discounted. Another controversial point.), violent or disruptive outbursts such as yelling or throwing things, and refusing to sleep or eat at the approved and appointed times. All of this may sound like the hospital is restricting your rights beyond reason, but I've seen the use, and I've seen the abuse. Medications are sometimes necessary, and often patients seriously prefer having medication. Groups are important to a person's treatment, and refusing to go can be a sign of noncompliance or worsening symptoms. If someone is too depressed or anxious to go to group, then they're probably not ready to leave the hospital where the structure is gone and they must self-regulate their treatment. Violent or disruptive outbursts tend to be a sign of worsening symptoms in general, but even the best of us lose our tempers from time to time when put into a highly stressful situation like an inpatient hospital stay. The hospital is supposed to be a place of healing, for many it is. But for many more, it is a place of systematic abuse and restriction.

Discharge processes can be long and arduous and INCREDIBLY stressful for the patient. Oftentimes, they won't know their discharge date until the day of, or perhaps the day before. Though the date can change at any time. The discharge process requires the supervising psychiatrist to meet with the treatment team and then the patient to determine if the patient had progressed enough to be safely discharged. Discharge also requires a set outpatient plan in place, such as a therapy appointment within a week, a psychiatrist visit, or admittance into a lower level of care. This is where social workers are involved. Patients are not allowed access to cell phones or the internet. They cannot make their own appointments with their outpatient care providers without a phone number and phone access. Some floors will have phone access for this reason, others will insist the social worker arrange appointments and discharge plans. Social workers are often incredibly overworked, with several patients on their caseload.

The patient cannot be discharged until the social worker has coordinated the discharge plan to the doctor's approval. Most often, unfortunately, the patient rarely receives regular communication regarding the progress of their discharge. I've been discharged with as much as a day's notice to two hours notice.

Part 2 Coming Soon

This guide got longer than expected! Out of respect for my followers dashboard, I will be cutting it here and adding a Part 2 later on.

If you find that there are more specific questions you'd like answered, or topics you'd like covered, send an ask or reply to this post with what you'd like to see in Part 2.

– Indy

#writing advice #writing tips #writing resources #writeblr #amwriting #asktheprose #ask the prose #writing mental health #mental health #writing with compassion #writing mental illness #writing compassionately

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lemotmo · 2 days

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I think yall are seeing it as him leaving, because that's what you want. They haven't written all the episodes, there is still a very real chance he'll be around.

Okay, nonny. I'm about to leave for work, but I really wanted to reply to your ask, before I leave.

First of all, goodmorning. Hope you'll have a great day today.

Second, I meant it when I said that I really like Lou. I'm sure he's a great guy and he seems happy to be part of this Buck storyline.

However, you're right. I don't really want him to stick around for very long. And that's my right, isn't it? We can't all like the same things. That would make fandom a boring place. See, for me, and mind you, this is only my humble opinion and I recognise that I could be wrong, he really is there to just be a plot device. Most plot devices don't stick around too long on 911. We've seen that in the past.

I've been honest that I really don't vibe with his character Tommy and the Buck/Tommy storyline. Do I want Buddie? Sure, of course I do. But I can appreciate other storylines if they serve the narrative. So I do actually don't mind Buck/Tommy for now because it has been clear from the beginning that Tommy is there to serve a purpose. He needed to be the strong confident guy to help Buck out of the closet. That was his purpose.

Buck is still on that hamster wheel at the moment, the only difference it... this time it's a guy he's dating. Tim has stated in an interview that he wants Buck off the hamster wheel. Well, up until now this hasn't happened.

So yes, I do think Lou won't be in that many more episodes. I guessed 7x07, but you're right, it could be a little longer. But in the end, he will leave. So, let me turn this around on you:

"I think y'all are seeing it as him staying longer, because that's what you want."

See what I did there? It's the same thing. None of us know what's going to happen on the show. So, we'll let ourselves be surprised. If you're right that he's staying on a few episodes longer, I will be a little disappointed, but I'll be fine because I'm a grown woman who has no time to hate or bash on characters or ships. If I'm right, I'm sure a lot of people who like Tommy and Buck/Tommy will be disappointed as well. And that's also fine, because, just like me, you'll move past it eventually.

Let's just wait and see for now. And remember, it's okay for people to speculate about characters, ships and story arcs, as long as they stay respectful towards them. And that is all I've been doing.

#911 asks #buddie #lou ferrigno jr #Tommy Kinard #911 abc #I'm getting too old for this sh*t #Bucktommy story arc

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anghraine · 1 day

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dontstandmedown replied to this post:

re:tags could you share the playwright you're talking about? :0

No problem! For others, the tags in question are this:

#thinking about this partly because the softer & gentler versions of fanfic discourse keep crossing my dash #and partly because i've written like 30 pages about a playwright i adore who was just not very good at 'original fiction' as we'd define it #both his major works are ... glorified rpf in our context but splendid tragedies in his #and the idea of categorizing /anything/ in that era by originality of conception rather than comedy/tragedy/etc would be buckwild

I am always delighted to share the good news of John Webster! If you're not familiar with him, he was an early seventeenth-century English playwright known for being a slow, painstaking, but reliable writer. He did various collaborations with other playwrights (and acknowledges a bunch of his peers in an author's note to The White Devil, including Jonson and Shakespeare) and wrote some middling plays in various genres that could be more or less termed "original fiction," but he's remembered for two brilliant, bloody tragedies.

The basic premises/plots of both of these were essentially ripped from the headlines of the previous century, and Webster makes zero attempt to conceal that fact.

I couldn't shut up about my guy so more under a cut!

The White Devil is based on the actual murder of Vittoria Accoramboni in the late sixteenth century and the characters in the play are generally given the same or similar names as the real life people in the story as known at the time, so there's no attempt to conceal the play's origins (the anti-heroine/villain???[debatable] is named Vittoria Corombona in the play, for instance).

The original production of The White Devil largely failed, which Webster blamed mainly on bad weather and an audience who just didn't get his ~vision and what he was trying to do. It would not be unsurprising for a contemporary audience to struggle with it given that it's a complicated play in which, among other things, Vittoria is put on trial and rhetorically shreds the underlying misogyny of the entire legal process.

The Duchess of Malfi, generally considered a still greater achievement, is based directly on the murder of Giovanna d'Aragona, Duchess of Amalfi by her brothers (it was presumed, likely correctly). Lope de Vega also wrote a play about this tragedy not long before Webster did, though the plays are very different and it's unlikely that Webster would have had the time or linguistic knowledge necessary to read Lope's version. Probably part of the reason for the differences between Lope's and Webster's takes is that Lope had to be careful about the reception by the Catholic Church given that one of the murderers was a cardinal, while obviously an English Protestant like Webster could say whatever he wanted about eeeeevil cardinals.

Webster takes a lot of artistic license, a normal approach at the time to adapting previously-established narratives, but the source material is very recognizable. One of the commendatory verses at the beginning of the play (blurbs in poetic form from other playwrights) is like "I'm sure the real duchess was cool but she couldn't be as cool as Webster's heroine, wow <3". (One of the other commendations is by another fave of mine, John Ford.)

Bosola, the historically mysterious minion of the Duchess's murderous brothers (=Bozolo in the historical narrative) gets an elaborate quasi-redemption arc in the play. And the play is extremely critical of various characters' obsession with and attempts to control the Duchess's sexual behavior (a fixation that is often extremely normalized in early modern British drama, but which comes off really badly here).

Ultimately this obsessiveness leads to her brothers, the Cardinal (=the historical Cardinal Luigi d'Aragona) and Ferdinand (=Carlo d'Aragona) orchestrating her torment and murder in which she emerges with her sanity and integrity intact and dies with dignity. Meanwhile, the Cardinal is exposed as a remorseless villain (he proceeds to murder his mistress with a Bible) and Ferdinand's already-shaky sanity snaps under the realization of what he's done.

Webster's Duchess is often considered the first real female tragic hero in British drama—the tragic is especially significant because tragedy was typically considered a higher art form than comedy and the truly great female characters from that era of drama are often restricted to comedies or secondary roles in tragedy (a marked trend in Shakespeare, for instance). The Duchess in the play is virtuous, strong-willed, witty, and fairly unabashedly sexual in the context of the time, a concept that several hundred years of critics have struggled with. (My favorite OTT complaint is from Martin Sampson, an early 20th century critic who lamented the conspicuous absence of a "strong active man, following righteous things" in Webster's work, to which I say l m a o.)

Anyway, among scholars of early modern British drama, Webster is often considered second only to Shakespeare as a tragedian, on the basis of those two plays. And the modern obsession w/ originality and novelty makes this kind of fascinating, given that his "original" work (in our sense—again, the original vs fanfic dichotomy was not a thing in that cultural context) is sort of meh but his work with pre-existing sources turns them into these staggering dramatic achievements.

#dontstandmedown #respuestas #renaissance blogging #john webster #the white devil #the duchess of malfi #anghraine's meta #ivory tower blogging #gender blogging #long post #i love vittoria and the duchess and also how pissy he is about people complaining about his slow writing #'yeah well that's what mediocre rapid content generators said to EURIPIDES and who do people remember now? THINK ABOUT IT'#okay okay i'll stop with My Guy but. he's pretty cool.

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lord-squiggletits · 1 month

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Between TF and my other fandoms like BG3 and TES, I keep finding myself making OCs that have some element of "battle hardened hero who is actually good and righteous, but so traumatized by the toll of war that even after the war ends they feel empty/wrecked and can't enjoy the fruits of victory" and I'm not sure if it's bc I gravitate to a certain type of media where such OCs fit in best, or bc I have a specific character archetype I like and gravitate towards media that contains those things.

#squiggposting #possibly a mix of both bc idk if i've gone into detail here but war stories are one of my favorite genre of stories #like for fun fictional reasons but also for real life political and moral and emotional implications #war stories are literally so fucking cool man i feel like they get a bad rap for just being propaganda tools #and obv a lot of them can be/are explicitly made to be but also like #(i feel like i'm stealing a quote from one such story) war stories are also a method for the soldiers of the war to tell their side #and usually the soldier's side of the story tells of the LESS glorious and propagandistic sides #maybe ive just had the pleasure of having really good teachers/professors but like #most of the war stories i've read are specifically ABOUT the bridge bt war propaganda and the actual experience of fighting in a war #and i think even the ones where the soldier in question supports the war (american sniper comes to mind)#it's very interesting and dare i say important to read it and understand when and why and how they came to support war #like idk i think it's one of those things where ppl shy away from war stories bc #'ew gross it's all pro war probably american imperialist propaganda written by oppressive killers trying to make us feel sorry for them'#without understanding... idk. the difference between an individual soldier's evil and the evil of an entire institution?#some sort of anti intellectualism regarding soldiers as being inherently evil ppl who aren't to be listened to or taken seriously?#it's not a matter of like. you don't need to like or sympathize with them per se. but i think part of understanding and criticizing #the institution of war is getting the ground level testimonies about it. and more of them are critical than some ppl believe #plus i mean FUCK usamerican imperialism it doesn't need to be about US wars! other countries lived thru other wars that are also important!#war stories may have their strongest association w american imperialism but that doesn't mean other war stories don't exist #idk sorry for rambling in the tags

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saintchaser · 1 year

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in remus' eyes, sirius was glowing. incandescent and of an unspoken brilliance, because no words can describe what sirius black is.

sirius is a god; sirius is gorgeous, long lashes and soft lips, black hair and mercury-gray eyes. there are no words that could encapsulate what sirius black was like, in remus' eyes.

sirius black was brash, and reckless, and never gave a shit about what everyone else had to say about him; he got into fights for those he loved, blood, crimson red, and bruises, purple and black, and remus would always be there to patch him up and gaze into his eyes, his heart thrumming in his chest, and sirius would just give him that sirius black grin.

sirius was witty, words always burning on his tongue, and he wasn't afraid to speak his mind and what he believed in. he seemed to wear his heart on his sleeve with those he loved, but he rarely let himself be truly vulnerable; remus knew that, james knew that, all of his friends knew that.

he kissed his friends goodbye and wore large t-shirts, and when he wore long sleeves they never were tight on his shoulders and arms, and his pants were always ripped. his nail polish was always chipped and the laces of his docs were always purple and yellow.

remus noticed the little things about sirius, someone who seemed to be known by everyone, yet few people knew what he really was like.

sirius black's kisses were remus lupin's little secret; teeth and tongue and lips and too much and too little, sirius' nails scraping against remus' back and his hand on remus' chest, his hand tangled in sirius' hair. sirius was angry and loud and reckless and loving him wasn't always pretty, but it was an explosion of feelings, spilling out of both of them, young and alive, two teenagers in love, their hearts out for the other to see, their bodies pressed together, remus and sirius, remus and sirius.

#this originally started as a post about sirius but then at the end it kind of is wolfstar #i have so many thoughts about remus and sirius as a young couple and i am sure that they weren't the prettiest couple out there because #<- they're very different people with big personalities and big personalities tend to clash and it's not always pretty to see that #i think that i was a pretty healthy relationship overall but there was definitely some toxicity to it especially after they were thrown in #<- the war. they didn't trust each other anymore etc etc and then my point with big personalities stands once again #also for the laces colors: back in the 70s in the punk community lace colors had different symbolism #yellow means anti racist and purple means gay pride #sirius black #remus lupin #wolfstar #(it's been a hot while ever since i've written wolfstar 😭)#my writing #also this was a prompt from an anon! anon writing prompt: glow brilliance incandescent. use all and any or none!

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meirimerens · 11 months

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i know the Willow Mellow lore gets worse the longer you dig inside of it + it reflects even Worse on the writers when you put the actual words on her situation but let's not forget Darlings she is a child. she is 15 to 17yo depending on what piece of documentation we refer to, too young to consent to sex and therefore does not fit the category of "sex worker", and instead falls under the definitions of "sexually exploited youth", more specifically "sexually exploited child", as UNICEF, UNESCO, Convention for the Rights of the Child, [...] and general common sense all define "child" as "person under the age of 18".

she is the victim of kidnapping by her """adoptive father""" and of sexual exploitation by her (presumably adult) "clients" (as she does not appear to have a pimp, and is instead written saying she loves what she does and such giddy teehee fun. [powerful side-eye through someone in the writing team.] [she's not a Real Person I have to stress, so someone wrote her like this, wrote this kid like this.] [it is all part of a narrative in which she is struggling to shake off her "father's" exploitation, an inherently tragic one, but she still was written that way, and could have been written any other way, with any other "rebellious" act]). calling her a sex worker as a child who is basically the same age as P2 Capella or Grace is putting her in a Grown-Up category especially harmful considering we are supposed to read her as an indigenous girl, member of the Kin (even if her lore is Mysterious and Hazy) and indigenous women and girls are sexualized in racialized ways which often paint them as more ~~~naturally~~~ sexually liberated, or docile, or submissive, or [insert racist x sexist stereotype promoted by colonizers to excuse the mistreatment of indigenous women and girls].

tldr yes it's worse when you actually call her what she actually is, and worse tenfold when you read what the writers make her say about it [even as an inherently tragic situation that we can recognize and put words on (hence this post), she could have been written any other way, with any other rebellious act, but you know.] but you know x2 (SIDE-EYES SOMEONE ON THE WRITING TEAM VERY HARD TIL ME EYES POP OUT ME SKULL)

#/!\ POST ABOUT SEMANTICS. POST ABOUT SEMANTICS ALERT. /!\#this is not pointed or written with wicked intents btw ^ i've seen it a few times from different people and it's just that if we want to be #able to talk about these things within the narrative and how the depictions of the Kin impact the around-game/critique this game in general #game (esp. p1 which is very much about. words and wording and navigating webs of words among so many other things)#we have to be able to name these things. especially in relation to. d*bowski do you mind coming to the mic and telling us #what was behind your head. no pressure sir #protecting this kid from the writing with my entire body like that one soldier meme #ooh d*bowski you are not making it out alive i'll tell you that much.#in the same way you wouldn't call mcdonalds hiring 14yo ''employment'' you'd call it. exploitative child labor.#but it's even worse because <3 aw the misogyny oozing through the pores of a lot of the patho narrative #because of maybe perhaps allegedly the head writer. allegedly!#how the fuck am i supposed to tag any of this #csa /#willow mellow #willow pathologic #pathologic #it'd be Less Worse if she was an adult bc at least she could consent [in a vacuum; if we ignore the fact that she's a kidnapping victim;#if we ignore the fact that the Kin who she merges with sees its women be sexualized and its ways of life crushed by the colonizers #and assimilated in ways they might not like; etc] but yknow. detailed herb brides bodies and whatnot.

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jacksintention · 11 months

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I'm thinking again on the fact that so often comments, criticism and readings on Jack dwell a lot on how he is barely human/a person/doesn't have a personality at the point of the story and, while I somewhat understand these points, I find them so lacking. I find them... ableist? I'm always doubtful to use the word here because I'm not sure if it's applied in this kind (mental health) of context, but something like that. And I find them extremely simplistic.

However, honestly, a big part of the reason for these readings being so popular is that the manga itself words it that way. But that's one of the problems I find in the manga. When I say P.andora Hear.ts is very good but unfortunately it is very manga-like at times, besides the 2000s homojokes and the like, I'm usually thinking about things like this. I feel like often characters and situations that are (potentially) very intricate instead of getting insightful deep overviews often get screwed by the writing itself, which falls into very manga tropes a lot in a bad way (not that every manga has to fall into them, or that every manga trope has to be bad or written badly).

I don't know... For instance, I'd argue R.askolnikov's capacity for love in Cr.ime and Punishmen.t is debatable, but it's never treated as if it made him less of a person, a human being or made him not have a personality. I'd say not even Svidrigailo.v, who is as much a Bad Guy™ as a character can be, gets that treatment by the writing. I'd say that even him or Mikol.ka are written as fully fleshed human beings with their intricate internal lives and feelings. Svidrig.ailov's last scene with D.unya is fascinating for both characters and spins the whole dynamic and makes you question the entire narrative and veracity of not only those two characters, but brings to mind several other conversations among different characters and throws light (and doubt!) on the main plot between R.askolnikov and Porf.iry.

In similar situations, Jack's humanity, personhood and personality are debated, doubted and even full on accepted as vanished. No one reads Crim.e and Punishmen.t and comes to the same conclusions about Raskolni.kov, Svidrig.ailov, Sony.a or Razu.mikhin. The writing doesn't allow it. The writing doesn't allow you to forget that humanity is diverse and multifaceted, that it can be sad and cruel and loving and monstrous, even all at the same time, or that a person may struggle with feeling at all; and one is still a person.

#This honestly is one of the things if not The Thing that frustrates me the most of P.H #I've seen this kind of 'that's not a person/human/doesn't have a personality anymore' readings with The S.tranger by Camu.s #And they were imo also simplistic (and that's coming from someone who didn't like the book)#They were also made by my Ethics professor in college who was from the O.pus De.i #Anyway this is a post because I imagined I wouldn't be able to fit everything in the tags #I should probably delete this later #but I wanted to get it out of my system first. I've been thinking about this a lot again after reading the guides and I got angry again #I don't think manga as a medium necessarily has to treat characters this way #but there's often a big simplification of characters in general in a particular flavour #And I think Jack (arguably Vincent too) suffers from this. The exact same thing happening with Jack could be written slightly differently #and cease to have that shonen manga for edgy teens flavour it gets in like two pages #that doesn't ruin but definitely stains a 104 chapters characterisation that was so well crafted #(especially given most fans take everything at face value without thinking much about anything like vacuum cleaners of text)#I don't know. Despite how this manga is a lot about humanity being able to exist or take place #beyond the conditions of one's existence being “fake” through our actions and relationships with others‚ ourselves and the world‚#I don't like how characters like Jack are treated in that context #I understand why it's done and what it's trying to say‚ the Jack/O.z foil is super interesting in that regard. I don't even think #the writing fully falls into the mistake of 'thinking' Jack is not human/a person. But I find very unfortunate some of the writing choices #when dwelling on this‚ and even so distasteful at times #And as a consequence many fans just take the slippery slope and make a cardboard mimicry out of some great characters #But the manga/writing concedes a bit with that angsty teen air. And it's frustrating #I talk too much #Trying to pseudocensor words for the first time #to see if this way my 4am soliloquies won't appear in the tags of people just living their lives #Tumblr please let me rant about nothingness that interests only me without disturbing anyone please #I'm already mad I can't tag these at all anymore in my own blog for organisational reasons without them appearing for everyone everywhere

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sysig · 27 days

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But would you tho (Patreon)

#Doodles #SCII #Helix #Schuldig #ZEX #And again the Captain implied from offscreen lol #Two little things ♪ One that Actually happened and one speculation lol #I really like Schuldig :D He's the likeable asshole type and his quirk is very well written :)#I love how he gets on Zelnick's case about his wishy-washy-ness in regards to xenophilia generally and ZEX specifically hehe #Zelnick has no good answer for him! It's so cute hehe <3 #But then he turns right around and is wishy-washy himself!! I get the feeling his frustration stems a bit from relating hahaha #Or maybe Zelnick's uncertainty influenced him! It's not such an easy decision to make when you're staring down the barrel is it now :)#Openly attracted to Max's body and flattered by ZEX's personality and outright attraction to him in turn but the alien aspect is too much pf #Sure right okay lol - I have no skin in this game so I'll have to take his word for it haha #Secondarily speculating around ZEX's attraction and standards lol it sounds like an oxymoron but no he is actually a bit picky!#Yes he loves humans generally but he is actually tempered by what mind inhabits what body! It's so interesting to me!#I think it's especially funny how his various desires are in conflict with each other haha #Like it makes sense that he controls himself around Fwiffo - poor thing would have a heart attack - but he genuinely seems less attracted!#Which makes sense to me as well ♪ Spathi and VUX share several traits and were on the same side during the War so he's familiar with them #And he's specifically attracted to differences and novelty - it all lines up!#And then there's also his pride lol he tries to make more friends than enemies of course but he still gets petty and patronizing <3 #If he's actually upset with someone /he's/ the one who would need convincing! It's all very interesting :3c #And then there's the matter of his own body vs. Max's body - he's so upset at the metaphysical implications of cloning his consciousness #I've never thought of ZEX in the context of the ''Would you fuck your clone'' questionnaire but I guess I know his answer now haha #Though I still wonder what his reaction would be to Max :0 He's probably not close enough to be ZEX but he is /a/ ZEX - of a sort #All his introspection about the body he's in has my mental ears perked haha - pity and worry for the potential life he's replacing #Discomfort at possibly being Max in some capacity including continuing to be in his body but also of overtaking his life entirely #And of being backed into a corner - Max is pitiful as well as pitiable! Neither of them want to be Max Vyer really #He loves humans but how far does that extend when push comes to shove ♪ It's been interesting watching him fumble through it :)

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despairforme · 2 months

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What kind of guy is your type

As if he was ever going to answer that. Shouldn't they ask her what type of GIRL he liked? Did he have a type though? He'd thought about it from time to time, at least recently, since he was thinking about finding someone to date again. Since he was bisexual, he was open to dating either a man or a woman. He'd never actually dated a female, so maybe that's why he always imagined himself finding another guy instead. But, who knew. Maybe he'd end up finding the perfect chick? He was open to the possibility, though it was easier to imagine himself dating a guy, since that's what he had experience with.

What kinda guy was his type?

It was easier to answer what he didn't like, rather than his preferences. He definitely didn't like femininity in men. He wasn't into soft dudes. Push-overs. Guys who didn't stand their ground, at least to some extent.

Physically, he was the most attracted to masculinity. Broad shoulders, muscles, height... When it came to a guy's appearance, that's what Nnoitra found the most attractive. But - he wasn't picky. He'd definitely fuck a guy who didn't have the masculine features Nnoitra preferred.

But your "type" was more about what kind of person you'd wanna date, right?

He'd like to date someone who brightened his days. Not a completely sunshine kind of dude, but someone who took gloomy things and made them okay. A funny guy. Someone who made him laugh ( Nnoitra found himself laughing way too rarely these days ). His type was the determined kind. Someone who had goals and knew how to get there. Nnoitra found confidence attractive. As long as it was grounded in reality. He disliked people who were high on themselves for no reason. He didn't want to date an insecure guy ( or, at least, not someone who stayed insecure ). He'd like someone who always got back up on their feet, no matter what happened.

He'd also --- maybe - like it if the guy he was dating could relate to him on some level. He sure didn't want him to be depressive like himself, but he wanted him to at least understand what it was like to always feel down like Nnoitra did. Being understood, but not coddled was important to him.

It was complicated, in the end, to be Nnoitra's "dream guy", or whatever. Of course he was NEVER going to find someone who fit perfectly into all of these descriptors.

If he fell in love with a guy, and was lucky enough to have him fall in love in return - then THAT would be his type.

#[ eyyyyyy good ask anon!! ]#[ nnoitra actually doesn't have a type ]#[ i've written him with three different muses on here ]#[ and they were all VERY different and yet he fell in love with them ]#[ i've also noticed his attraction to two other characters the past year-ish and they too were COMPLETELY different from each other ]#[ and then there are the crossover fanfics i write where he AGAIN falls in love with totally different characters ]#[ nnoitra is a very complex dude and there are MANY dynamics that work with him ]#[ it's just the chemistry yanno? i write him and then it clicks and i'm like ]#[ nnoitra you like that guy huh ]#[ fjfjfjf IT'S VERY SWEET WHEN IT HAPPENS ]#[ hopefully this will be the year nnoitra finds a ship uvu ]#[ thank you for sending anon!! petition to get nnoi a bf has been started ahaha ]#despair for me. ╱ in character.#talking shit. ╱ answers.#burn the city. ╱ main verse.

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transboykirito · 1 year

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okay so, i chose the name natsuko because lis and leafa have pink and blonde hair and they wear red and green outfits, like this ship from a different anime whose names are natsu and lucy and they have pink hair and blonde hair and wear red and green outfits. so like. natsuko, shortened to natsu. and i just adore the name

dwtmat!natsuko is suguha and rika's daughter (and kazuto's, technically) and she's obviously a twin (but i'm determined to not spoil his name too lol) - and she's like. tiny little ivf rainbow precious angel baby.

mtjaf!natsuko is a toddler who makes her mums and her uncles freak out every other day because she's just chaos (affectionate), and she's suguha and rika's daughter (mtjaf!rika is a trans woman)

fwbb!natsuko is suguha and shinichi's daughter, which means the entire reason i even chose that name is now irrelevant xD

but like. they aren't the same kid at all. dwtmat!natsu is a fetus but when she's born she's just such a chill baby, who's evenrually gonna be this super chill girly girl toddler. like. mtjaf!natsu is fun to write lol, she's loud and boisterous and so fun and she's such a tomboy. and the fwbb!natsu is super quiet and shy, she likes sitting and reading more than playing and she's her mum's shadow, like she just clings to her (or to midori or asuna or kazuto).

idk, i just find it funny that they all have the same name and mostly the same family and similar backstories but they're not the same character at all. i reverse engineered nana.

#fic stuff #dwtmat #mtjaf #i will add the other tag once shes introduced there #but tbf my versions of yui also differ a lot #mtjaf!yui is very different to like... fwbb!yui will be and dwtmat!yui #other shades of blue!yui is going to be vastly different from any other version of yui i've written too bc her backstory is so... crying #fwbb #< hi bb welcome to the transboykirito fanfic cinematic universe

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wizardnuke · 2 years

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what's funnier for a meet-ugly fic. if it's a meet-ugly from the start ("we first met each other in a holding cell") or if it starts cute ("my grocery bag tore open on the street and they helped me pick everything up, also I got their number") and then gets ugly ("I didn't call them because I was busy and five days later we met again, in a holding cell")

#warning. long tags that got wildly off topic real fast. there's caleb meta in here #I think it's the difference between them being like 'huh. who's this guy' and the spiderman pointing meme #fic im writing doesn't have this thru a ship lens but it has a similar thing except like. it's a meet ugly where they don't exactly meet #but they see each other #smash cut four years later spiderman pointing meme in a holding cell YOU. WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE #pov you're trying to convince everyone you're interacting with (while in the holding cell) (well. a dungeon) that you're an assassin from #another country but your mother in law is in the next cell over and she CLEARLY recognizes you and does NOT believe the show you're #putting on because context from the prev time you were around each other states you are not loyal to that country and that you are also a #lying liar who lies shamelessly at the first chance you get if you think it'll get you what you want. and it's making shit complicated #because she visibly wants to ask questions about why the hell you're here but you're under surveillance so she's just staring holes into #ur skull and she doesn't know she's your mother in law. this is the funniest thing I've ever written #it's a HARROWING experience for caleb in the fic. he is terrified out of his mind. but also. it's so so funny. my guy why did u do that #'caleb is a master manipulator' common misconception! he is a conman and scammer! he wishes he could operate on pure unfeeling logic and #intellect but sometimes and even oftentimes he is made of 80% panic minimum and then he commits to the bit #it's a very nuanced complicated situation etc etc but honestly a large part of it is also deirta being like what the fuck is this guy's #plan. why the fuck is he even here. and caleb's internal monologue is 'do NOT accidentally call her mother. do not do fucking not' which #is if anything making it more difficult to not call her mother. big fan of the way he refers to elders with titles I 100% think he would #call her that if he and essek were officially together. 'caleb has good social skills and awareness' common fucking misconception he is a #conman and scammer and knows vaguely what to say to get what he wants or more often how to direct attention away from what he's doing but #when he's just Being Caleb he gets to the fuckin point and that lady is his mother in law and he would refer to her as such even if #that's. a fascinating choice to make given everything about essek and also the lingering political situation between the empire and dynasty #I love caleb sooooo much I think he makes a good few snap decisions that are objectively DEEPLY unhinged and I think abt that a lot #calebs not a stable guy! I think it's rlly interesting how not stable he is even when he's doing well he has a few screws loose up there!#this is coming from someone who can relate to the irrational thinking that mental illness does I think he just sees point A to point B and #Does Shit. that's why he fireballs people when he knows it's going to trigger him. it's why he told essek to get it together instead of #killing him- he saw an ally. his morality and his decision making skills are removed from normal logic bc fuck normal logic he's caleb #widogast (sometimes- he goes by a fake name and considers himself entirely seperate from bren while he also holds himself accountable for #the crimes that bren was manipulated into committing) and its why he's Like That and I think he's neat.#I'm done now. what is this.

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hobbitunderthemountain · 1 year

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i got a comment the other day on a fic asking if they could make the fic into a comic and asked for permission 'to draw it' (in their words not mine) and post it on ao3

i'm ECSTATIC like any other fic writer is to be offered artwork inspired by their fic especially a comic??? so i said yes of course and i get the related works notification and it..'s....... another fic? and not even that it's like. rewritten the beginning of my fic so it starts differently and i mean I'm still like 'wow you liked my thing so much you wanted to write a fic based off of it!!!' but also

i was....expecting art....???

#perhaps is just a language barrier/difference #but i'm so confused #also the fact that it's not even really in sync w my fic it just is like #taking my fic and giving it a different beginning? and it almost feels like 'yes i like your fic but--'#'--i would have liked it a lot more if it had started this way'#which is weird #and i mean i've written fic for other peoples fics (and never posted it)#but it wasn't a retelling it was like a 'this is an interesting concept and if the story went further...'#so like I SEE where they're coming from #but i'm just. very. very confused.#and reading too much into it #so i'll take it how it's meant to be: as a compliment #kat writes #(i specifically didn't post this to the fandom sideblog that the fic is for)#in case they follow me there lol #but its not for my hobbit fic

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kadoodles-on-ao3 · 1 year

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Sickness update: Still coughing, but it's (mostly) dry coughing now, and my headache is gone! But I'm not at 100% back-to-normal mental capacity yet either :(

Writing update: I've been hard at work on my angsty longfic! I was going to work on something lighter (especially with my cold) but all of a sudden more and more ideas to add to my AU kept popping in my head and I just had to jot them down.

Before long I was finally organizing my outline by putting all my previous bullet-point came-to-me-at-random-times-of-the-night-and-put-in-an-equally-random-order concepts into plot-chronological order as they should be, and making headings/sections for the major location changes to find stuff easier, and getting down how exactly series-and-collection-wise I want to go about categorizing the fic and its sequels, and finalizing their titles (which are all names of songs on The Glitch Mob's Drink the Sea album, give it a listen with good headphones if you haven't before, it's great background music!!) and oh yeah I needed to go over the h2hs again better open that doc, and I definitely need to have the game's script and cutscenes on hand for reference as needed (which was very frequently) and now baby I've got a stew going

I'm having so much fun writing characters I haven't gotten to write before, and (minor/vague Xenoblade spoilers) digging into the details of the lore about Face Mechon and expanding on my take of what was happening on the Mechonis before the party got there, and fitting lots of little puzzle pieces that the game gives you but doesn't directly tell you they belong together which is why I love it so much, and getting into such a nice flow state with it all and gjshfhskfh I love Xenoblade 1 so muchhhhhh!!!

So all that is to say I will hopefully be posting the prologue tomorrow or the day after! :) No promises as it's gotten much longer/more-detailed than I planned for (although I really should have expected that, it's always how it goes with me when I'm having fun writing I just can't stop haha) but it is most definitely on the way to being published soon!

#aside #before i get into mild spoilers for my fic (as in no details about the plot itself but i mention #which characters i'm writing in the prologue so if you want to go in completely blind turn back now!)#i will fill space by reiterating that drink the sea is such a good album and you should listen to it #my favorite track is Starve The Ego Feed The Soul :) listening to it with really good headphones and no other background noise is so #mmmmmmm it tickles my brain in the best way #as for the fic though i am having SO. much. fun. writing egil and mumkhar #i don't mention egil much publicly but he's one of my absolute fav characters from xc top 5 for sure #finally getting into his headspace and delving into his subtleties like his arrogance and loss of empathy is very :)#quite different from anything i've written before but in a good way. hope you like it as much as i had fun writing it!#and writing mumkhar's enthusiastic and sarcastic dickishness is a blast lmao #he was only supposed to be a small feature and likely even just an offscreen mention or two from egil #but then i realized how much i had written with zero dialogue (i like to do that especially in the middle of a conversation lol) and #i thought ''hm let's fix that! in fact part of my reason for having mumkhar here is that #he talks way too fucking much and it annoys egil to the point where he literally stitches his mouth shut so yeah having him actually #talk with specific words is important to the point i'm trying to make!'' and then oops my draft is an extra page longer now #but i had fun writing it and if it serves the story and the points i want to get across then i can't find the heart to delete it #and hey it's been so long since i've published anything so more is better anyway right?

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