#making colors that fit together for a whole illustration is hard :(

[saeiken]

-.-

#sk8 the infinity #renga #kyan reki #hasegawa langa #reki #langa #my art #pls click for better quality !! #struggled w the colors sm #but i think it turned out pretty good :> #making colors that fit together for a whole illustration is hard :( #ill post the timelapse later sometime :)

[darklinaforever]

This person is talking about this video :

For those who know this video, it's precisely a video analyzing tons of moments / events from the Atla series... And not just a girl talking about "vast misinterpretations" for two hours (for those who don't know it, I highly recommend it). There are literal scenes used to prove / support the point of view, exactly as this anti want.

But obviously, this anti will never bother to watch this video, while pretending to know what she is talking about. But, that's the whole principle when we talk about Zutara. We talk about their scenes in the series. No scenes from our imagination ! Wtf ?!

Let's be clear, if I generally post or send this video it is to prevent me from wasting my time unnecessarily sending messages to people who will not change their minds anyway. For what ? Because this video is essentially a summary of my opinion on the Zutara question with the arguments very well illustrated and supported by the scenes of the series and or its narration with the explanation of the character arcs, etc.

What I like the most is seeing people proud to affirm that they don't watch or read Zutara analyses, and then try to pretend they know what we're talking about in our analyzes dedicated to the Ship.

How everything we say is just fantasy, our imagination. That we are actually talking about events that never happened ! Or everything is misinterpretations because Zutara makes us horny. This ship is only based on thirst and the superficial pairing of the color blue and red in addition to their physical appearance ! Nothing deep ! (Thank you again for confirming that you have probably never read or watched Zutara analyses)

I don't understand why it's so hard for people to understand that canonical events aren't always good (especially for the characters) or well done in a story. We have to stop the bullshit. There are tons of examples of series with poor writing choices. Stop pretending that having a different opinion from canon is inherently wrong. (Or the show Atla is perfect)

Especially when your only arguments are to say that the opposing team's analyzes are like this or that, when in fact, you don't even look at them ! You have no credibility.

To say that we like a certain relationship because we are superficial / horny, and that if we like it is because we have understood nothing about the series, to see frankly that in fact we do not like it and that we do not like the characters, just because we don't accept certain choices of creators, is essentially admitting to not having any arguments in my opinion.

The anti Zutara piss me off with their fucking condescension.

Also... saying the Zutara fandom is dead ? Make me laugh.

Also, if you actually like Zutara for these reasons, namely the fire / water, red / blue pairing, the fact that these characters physically fit together and you find them sexy, well there is no does nothing wrong, because it's fictional. But the fact is that I've never seen Zutara fans like this ship for these things (except for the fire and water aspect, but generally in its context of Yin and Yang, therefore complementarity, which is in fact each time associated with the characters, their behaviors, relationships and arcs. So always in a deep and not superficial perspective). In fact they are never even named in the analyzes which I come across. Quite simply because generally, Zutara fans are very intelligent people with remarkable analytical skills regarding the Zutara relationship, canonically a friendship, but also clearly with a romantic connotation of very / too many times... But I won't dwell on that since the very video on this post already talks about it.

Kisses to all Zutara fans. And fuck anyone who comes and tells me, or even thinks, that I don't have a brain.

Merry Christmas to everyone.

#zutara #pro zutara #katara x zuko #zuko x katara #katara and zuko #zuko and katara #katara #pro katara #zuko #pro zuko #prince zuko #pro prince zuko #anti maiko #anti kataang #Youtube #atla #avatar the last airbender #avatar : the last airbender

[soleminisanction]

I’ve wanted to talk more about Steph’s run as Batgirl because I’m genuinely fascinated by it, but I keep starting and then abandoning posts because they inevitably spiral out of my control. In an attempt to illustrate my problem, allow me to wax poetic for a bit about a single line that has bugged me for years:

Context:

This page comes in the first issue. Steph is running around in Cass’s Batgirl costume and it keeps getting damaged, so she says…this.

And if you’re a more casual reader, you’re probably saying right now, “So what? It’s just a joke, a quip. It doesn’t mean anything. Why the hell is this post so long for something as small as that?”

In answer, I give you this:

Yeah. 

Stephanie Brown knows how to sew. Stephanie Brown specifically knows how to sew, fix and maintain superhero costumes. Because she makes her own. And it’s not like that’s some kind of deep cut; those panels are from a Secret Files and Origins story that Chuck Dixon (Steph’s creator) wrote, but all you really have to do is know Steph’s story and use some basic logic: she is literally a self-made superhero. Of course she makes her own costumes. Where else would she get them?

And I want to be clear here – this is a skill. One that Stephanie would have to cultivate and that she should be proud of. Costuming is hard enough when you’re trying to make something that’s just intended to be worn for a few hours at a convention a couple of times a year. Steph’s Spoiler gear is literally full-body, covering head-to-toe twice over, and built to stand up to regular rooftop parkour, motorcycling, fisticuffs, gunfights, knife fights, dips into Gotham Bay and the occasional fire. It’s almost certainly made out of thick, quality cloth and leather, both of which are hard to work with but vital if you’re creating something that’s designed to protect you.

She built that costume from scratch at least twice and maintained it, by herself, with no Bat support, financial or otherwise, for years. It is absolutely a skill and a credit to her as a character, not to mention foundational to her entire origin story and her whole independent “you can’t tell me what to do” attitude.

And this one line… takes that all away for the sake of a cheap, generic quip. 

What’s extra frustrating about this whole thing is that, in going with this lazy, cliche joke, they missed a golden opportunity to actually show her character.

Imagine if, instead of this page where we’re leering at her in the shower for no reason, we got a short scene in which Steph sits down at her sewing machine to fix the costume… and realizes that she only has purple cloth and thread. That would be a subtle symbolic moment for what's supposedly the central theme of this book, that Steph "just can't help" but be a bright and happy "burst of color" in contrast to the darkness of Gotham and the other Bats. 

She could then hesitate, wonder if maybe this is a sign, maybe she should just stop… and then persist anyway, filling in the gaps with “her” color (as if Babs and Helena didn’t wear it first but that’s another rant). That would establish her as stubborn, resourceful, tenacious, and someone who doesn’t let superficial appearances get in her way.

Plus, remember, this is Cass’s Batgirl costume, it already has a stitched-together aesthetic; she could make it work. And as a bonus, you’d get the interesting symbolism of it looking like her old Spoiler gear is trying to burst out from inside this costume that doesn’t quite fit her (because Cass is smaller than she is in a couple of different places) and, due to the placement of the cuts we see later on, it’d even be a neat visual transition between this temporary look and the one she wears as her permanent Batgirl gear.

But, no. All we got was a cliche quip and the implication that Stephanie cares more about Being Batgirl than she does her own safety, comfort or modesty.

But you know what really, really drives me nuts about this line? 

There is no way for us as readers to know whether it was an intentional change to Steph’s characterization or just a careless, thoughtless joke. 

The latter would be bad enough, as it implies that the people in charge of this character’s big spotlight starring role neither know nor care about the fundamental basics of who she is as a person and think that Batman handed her everything. But if it’s a deliberate change? That would imply a lot worse.

Because sewing, you see, is women’s work. In our dominant culture, it’s viewed as a feminine skill and a girly hobby. And our very special heroine simply can’t be shown to have girly interests or hobbies. That would make her… like other girls.

Even if that’s not a conscious mindset, I can see that being why the (entirely cisgender male) creativity team valued the skill so little they didn’t even think before tossing it aside for a joke. Frankly, given how the series goes on to treat both Steph and literally all of the women around her, I would not be surprised in the slightest.

But that’s a topic for another day. 

For now, I hope I've made my point. People are going to think I'm exaggerating when I say this but I really believe it’s true: the entire series is like this. If you read it in a vacuum and don't think about it, it seems perfectly functional, but the second you bring in outside context or start questioning things even a little, it all falls apart. And instead of drawing on Steph's established history and personality to make her a compelling and unique protagonist, it strips her down to nothing but shallow cliches to render her out as little more than a blank, generically quirky cipher for insecure people to project themselves onto.

It’s honestly depressing. 

#meta #batgirl #batgirl 2009 #stephanie brown #canon critical #critique of canon #long post #sorry #a lot of the topics I'm interested in talking about are interesting to me and possibly no one else #but they literally will not get out of my head so here I scream them into the void #so have a passionate defense of sewing as an artform from someone who couldn't sew a button

[enoblesarts102-03]

Week 3 and 4 of ARTS102 and every day has been such a great learning experience! In week 3, we were tasked with making three 5inx5in Typographic Abstraction pieces in Adobe illustrator. The words needed to be solid black and each piece had to have a different font. I noodled around for a bit and tossed around a bunch of different ideas, but I’m proud of the end results!

My first major inspiration was a word I experienced quite a lot last semester, ‘stress’.I wanted to pick a font that was very straight and slightly formal looking, maybe even a little unapproachable. Then, I wanted to create a picture that had meaning. The left starts off smaller and orderly and as it goes to the right the letters become larger and more chaotic. I also asked how to make the areas where the letters intersect disappear (I saw this in past projects and thought it was interesting). So that was the process for the ‘stress’ image you can see below. I liked the look of this image. You could read the word ‘stress’ very clearly and it has a deeper meaning behind it, but unfortunately, I had to eventually scrap the idea. My professor mentioned something like ‘how do we know where the line for abstraction is’ when I made the intersecting parts disappear. This made me re-think my whole approach as the image is very clear and too easy to read. I left it for a while because sometimes the best medicine is to sleep on an idea.

My next piece and one I kept till the end was my ‘cheese’ picture, I absolutely love cheese! Choosing the font for this happened fairly quick, it’s curved, thick and if the font did have color it looks orange (physically it’s black but in my head the font looks orange) just like cheese. I didn’t want to do anything special with this piece either, I just wanted a simple, generic looking piece since I was re-evaluating my whole thinking process towards abstraction. But, for all the pieces, I still really wanted the viewer to be able to read the words, so that was a constant lingering thought for my process from here on out. In summary, this piece was just an experiment to see what abstraction is like to make.

In my next piece, I used the word ‘frog’. They are one of my favorite animals! So, when choosing a font, I wanted it to look like hand writing or messy. There wasn’t anything too messy but I found a font that was round and scrappy enough. Then, I wanted to play around with the ‘O’ and ‘G’ because they are both round and I tried to fit everything in the ‘O’. After playing around with different options, trying to do a kaleidoscope effect, I just didn’t think it was abstract enough. The circles were too formal and I didn’t like how “put together” it looked. Just like the ‘stress’ piece, I decided to sleep on it.

…

The ‘stress’ piece was giving me such a hard time, I kept trying things but I didn’t want a piece anything like the others. So, ‘onomatopoeia’ popped into my head. Lots of letters and lots of ‘O’s to play around with. I chose the font just because it looked fun, and I wanted the text to take up space without taking up space. I think the lines in the letters do that quite well. I tried a lot of different things; making the letters touch, separating them, etc. Eventually, I found a corner and tried to bunch everything up, like the letters were blooming out of one corner. I arranged some things and found a good pattern, then I rotated the whole image unti I liked the orientation. For some reason… this picture reminds me of tacos, haha. Anyways, I liked this one the most.

My final piece ‘frog’, I really wanted to use the word frog, but I needed more letters, so I added a ‘S’ to make ‘frogs. I then had S,O and G to use, all round, I fit them inside each other and just randomly but G and F in the mix. At first the whole thing was sideways (corner to corner) but rotating and experimenting, I liked the blank space on the sides. It looked unique from many of the other previous examples I’ve seen that take up most of the space.

So then, I liked all my pieces and I was ready for the next step.

On the final day we had our 3 pieces printed and we cut them out with Exacto knives and as a class, made a whole composition together. At first, we put up our own pieces individually, but on the 3rd piece, everyone put their work up and we all talked together about where the pieces should go. This was a lot of fun! We ended up with a composition that has the denser pieces in the middle and the less-clustered pieces on the outside. We even explored moving some pieces out of the normal grid (see on the left of the final composition picture).

Overall, I really enjoyed this project and it really got me to use my brain differently! I had to stop thinking about what I wanted and start thinking what the project wanted (just like a client I guess) but still include creativity. I really enjoy this class!

We started our next project this past week, but I'll save all the details for next time!

Pictures:

1. STRESS composition (didn’t end up in final)

2. CHEESE composition

3. FROG composition (Later added S)

4. Cheese/onomatopoeia

5. Exacto knife

6. End result of class composition

[commajade]

lyricist hwang yubin talking about the writing process for atlantis by shinee with composer and lyricist checkmate. translations:

00:39

checkmate: i was very happy to hear we're talking about atlantis today, it's a song i personally love and have on my playlist. i loved it when it dropped and it's a song i keep listening to in my daily life.

hwang yubin: whenever i write a song u tell me u listen to it a lot...

cm: i do actually listen to this one a lot, i can show u my melon account as proof!

01:08

hyb: when i work with a group as vocally talented as shinee, the final result always feels like the lyrics i wrote have become more beautiful. while i try to focus on the lyrics, there is no way to express the flavor of this song without mentioning the vocal performances on this track.

02:15

cm: when u listen to the song, it fits perfectly with the concept of atlantis.

hyb: that's because the original demo's (vocal) topline was extremely "atlantis" it made me wonder if the topline was added on top of the track or if the topline and track were made at the same time with the concept already chosen. there's no way a song that fits the concept so well could have just existed on its own. usually the track is made first and the topline is written over it. but the topline and track fit so well together that i wondered if they were made simultaneously.

cm: when i first listened to it i noticed that the theme of underwater was expressed very well in the track instrumentally so the topline writer could have felt that when writing the melody, or the topline writer could have been inspired by the underwater sounds of the track to write the topline this way.

hyb: when i received the demo i thought, it's impossible to change the atlantis-ness of this song, could i use the korean language to create an atlantis that fits perfectly into these already beautifully combined 2 parts?

cm: when i was listening to this song it was like meeting an old friend because the song has all of the peaks of shinee's specialty sound. even things like the pretty thumbnail feel familiar but exciting, just overall enjoyable to the senses.

note: checkmate uses a lot of hard words and is very eloquent and knowledgable about shinee's history. key has also noted that shinee's music always has peaks in the same areas referring broadly to sound emotions and aesthetic, that shinee's work always returns to the same places. this was opposed to the idea that shinee deliberately refer to their past work and connect them together.

hyb: if u ask me what the best song of the last year was i would say shinee's don't call me, but that was a very different color.

cm: it was sort of chic/cold and sexy

hyb: people were saying that shinee came to make kpop pick up the slack, and as such, they dropped a song that felt disciplining.

cm: as if shinee was ashamed of kpop

hyb: when i received the demo for atlantis i thought "this is really shinee." a song that can show their signature cool, refreshing feeling but grown and mature.

04:25

hyb: i put a lot of effort into the beginning of the song. i thought the whole concept of atlantis had to be established right there. "the moment i reached uncharted territory, my dormant senses awakened by that place." i had to illustrate the whole concept in this line. taemin's opening lines are a contemplation of what atlantis must be like from above the water, and key's line pulls you into the water with a splash. the part of this song i'm most proud of is those last 3 syllables, "that place." the melody starts strong and loud then slightly unties in those 3 notes and then key's next line is as if you are being pulled in by the tide. the first line is speaking impersonally "it is this kind of place" and as soon as the words "that place" are over the speaker is being pulled into the water. and key's next line is "stronger than gravity, and very deeply, you pull me to the very end where i can't escape" because the melody there had the motion of being pulled down. i wanted to emphasize that downward melody. i went through a lot of edits on that section looking for the right words. i wanted the meaning of the line to be something along the lines of being pulled from the start into some unknown place all the way. if u listen to the song, u know taemin starts out the song at his full strength. he hits you hard and then key pulls you in. i thought "shinee's vocals are really something immense."

cm: a lot of people hear atlantis and think "this is really shinee's color". if u need a reason then it's that the song begins with a repeating guitar riff on a single chord while the melody goes down by half steps. shinee's representative songs sherlock and dream girl also have these traits, it's a similar formulation. and in onew's section "just like we're underwater", u can hear the use of 3 note sequences that would usually make minor chords, but shinee always uses major chords instead by having a note stick out of its usual chord, giving an unexpected feeling. "oh i'm curious" in sherlock has the melody go down by half steps with the 3 note sequences in the back. in dream girl it's the chorus leading up to "dream girl" that goes up in half steps. atlantis is another example of holding the song down with a riff or repeating instrumental and having the chords stick out in the back. and this is what generates the refreshing feeling of a representative shinee song. but they did it this time very well in a new way completely unlike sherlock or dream girl. so as a composer myself i thought this was very skillfully composed.

hyb: ah, so that was the secret of shinee's youthful, fresh sound. and why everyone can agree that this feeling is in their music even if you can't pick out why.

cm: the guitar at the beginning is very strong, sharp, and naturally resonant (까랑까랑), but as the song goes underwater and the pad and reese bass come in to distort it slightly, the high tone drains like how u can't hear high sounds well when ur underwater. it was so well expressed in the production i'm sure everyone felt it.

hyb: the demo itself was asking me to write the lyrics in a very specific way, i wrote them as if i was being pulled along by it and had no other choice but to do so.

cm: the metaphor comparing falling powerfully in love with being pulled into water was very well done.

hyb: the final product is slightly different from the demo in certain details. in the demo the section where it says "deep deep 깊어진 your ocean" had a vocal track in the back saying "deep! deep!" after the main vocal line said each words. and it was said in a way that sounded like they were out of breath. hearing that i decided to write about love that is so deep you feel like you're out of breath. so i wrote "take my breath away"

#shinee #i haven't watched the whole thing yet im gonna be editing this post as i go #Youtube

[teruthecreator]

sweet surprises

lord forgive me for the cringe i’m about to post. i fully blame this post and this post for planting the seeds of berdley having a crush on kris in my brain. also shouts out to izel for listening to me go insane at 3 AM about this. 

anyways, here’s a thing. 

______________________________________________________________

Excitement is in the air.

Unlike the usual calm monotony of life at school, things recently have been quite...electric. Not because of the portal to the Dark World hidden behind the door of the closet, or the adventures had by a select group of students through the portal in the Librarby a few days ago. No, this isn’t about that.

This is about the Sadie Hawkman’s Dance. The once-a-year phenomenon where the school puts on its best interpretation of a formal dance for the incredibly small number of students who attend class. Students buzz in excitement for the event, preparing their most formal outfits and getting ready to dazzle their friends and fellow classmates with their dramatic entrances into the auditorium.

And, of course, there’s the all important ritual of asking someone to the dance.

There’s already been a few proposals made this week. Jockington rolled into class like a hula hoop and asked Catti to be his “best bro” for the dance, to which she happily agreed. (And by that, I mean she looked up from her phone, smiled, said not a single word, and went back to typing.) Temmie loudly announced to the class that she would be taking her egg, which was somehow...embarrassed that she mentioned it. And, of course, Noelle finally managed to work up enough courage to ask Susie to the dance. It was done in an incredible display of candy canes that spelled out the phrase: “CAN(E) YOU BE MY DATE TO THE DANCE?” Unfortunately, Susie was about halfway through scarfing the display down before she realized what it said. She then began choking on one of the candy canes out of disbelief, which wound her in the nurse for the rest of the day. But, when she could speak again, she very quietly agreed to Noelle’s proposal (and, if you happened to be a fly on the wall in that room, you could hear a tail thump rhythmically against the doctor’s bench as she did so).

Kris was pleased with everything. They were happy to see their friends so happy together. A long time coming, if you asked them. And they’d be just as happy attending the dance solo, since they’ll undoubtedly be dragged along by Susie. They’d never gone to the dance before--never had a reason to, truth be told. But with their newfound friends, they may just enjoy being a wingman for the night.

...Speaking of wingmen, Berdly will probably be going solo as well. Unsurprising, but Kris makes a mental note to ensure the bird will be in attendance. As much as he is kind of a lot sometimes, he’s their friend. And Kris is going to make sure all of their friends are having fun at that dance!

They walk into class thinking of this (surprisingly early, for a change), which is why they almost miss the massive display sitting boldly atop their desk. They freeze the instant it catches their eye and, for a second, they almost believe it isn’t real. Like some leftover thoughts of the Dark World lingering in their vision. But, after wiping their eyes and seeing that it’s still there, they decide to approach and...investigate.

The display is expertly crafted by someone who clearly knows their way around a glue gun. It is a heart-shaped arch that is decorated with a myriad of printed illustrations of Super Smashing Fighters Melee characters, all having cut-outs to hold different bars of chocolate. There are also numerous origami hearts glued around the characters on the arch, in colors spanning across the rainbow. The arch is painted in swirls of blues, pinks, and reds and covered with a border of glitter that sprinkles onto the desk when Kris reaches out to pluck a chocolate bar from its perch. On the desk itself is a big origami heart that says “TO KRIS” in gold calligraphy. It is by far one of the coolest, nicest, cheesiest things Kris has ever seen.

They look up from the display to see if anyone else is seeing this shit, and that’s when it all clicks.

Because sitting at the front of the classroom, fidgeting way more than normal, is Berdly. He keeps interlocking his ankles underneath his desk before unlocking them and kicking the air, turning around every half-second or so to try and catch Kris’s reaction. From the brief moments Kris can see the front of him, they notice he’s not in his usual white collared shirt and black khaki shorts. Instead, his shirt is buttoned all the way up, with a nice blue bowtie tied around his neck. He also traded out his khaki shorts for a pair of dress pants that look to be a tad too long for his legs. He keeps reaching up to smooth out the feathers on his head, which immediately stick back up from stress.

Now, Kris may be a straight B student, but they’re not stupid. Context clues are a very good thing, and all signs point to Berdly as the culprit of this public display of...affection?

Beyond Berdly is Ms. Alphys at her desk, who shoots Kris a look of deep understanding and maybe...guilt? She looks at Berdly for a split second and shrugs her shoulders, indicating he was probably in here long before she was and so she had no way of stopping him from leaving it there.

Kris looks back down at the display and picks up the large origami heart. As they begin to unfold it, they see a sprawling letter written in the same flashy calligraphy. Kris squints at the letters--they’re dyslexic, so everything kind of just looks like spaghetti on paper. Still, they’re able to make out the largely printed question of “WILL YOU GO TO THE DANCE WITH ME?” with no issue.

Huh, guess they won’t be going to the dance alone after all…? It’s a little confusing as to why Berdly would want to go with them, though. Like, they’ve hung out a little bit--usually whenever Berdly wanted a “worthy rival” to play video games with, he would come over and Kris would whoop his ass for a few hours. And, of course, there were the recent events in the Cyber World; but Kris is pretty sure them and Susie had thoroughly convinced Noelle and Berdley that that was all a dream. So, why them?

They’re lost in this train of thought for so long that they don’t even notice the other kids enter the room until they suddenly hear:

“Yo, Kris???????? What the heck is this thing????” Susie’s voice doesn’t startle them, but it is loud enough to get them to look up. Susie is standing next to their desk, looking at the display with genuine amazement thinly masked by disgust. She’s also loud enough to basically stop the whole class (who were all muttering amongst themselves about it anyway), which gives Kris only a second to gaze around the room before--

SLAM!

The door to the classroom slams shut, leaving one seat unoccupied.

Berdley’s.

“This thing’s got chocolate on it????” Susie continues to marvel at the display while Kris looks at the door, frowning. They feel...bad. It isn’t Berdley’s fault for trying to fit in with the other kids' proposals; he admitted to feeling like he needs to do more just to stand out enough for people to acknowledge him back in the Dark World. And this thing is really...thoughtful! The characters are all ones Kris typically mains, or ones they know Berdley mains, which means he remembers things about Kris. And the chocolate is a given, but it is nice to be able to stock their personal snack stash with some fancy stuff. Ultimately, it’s very sweet, and Kris can’t help but feel a little guilty for not saying anything immediately.

They turn and lock eyes with Ms. Alphys, who looks extremely out-of-depth with this situation. She makes a number of gestures from them to the door in a flustered way of saying I have absolutely no idea what the hell is going on please help me Kris I know I’m asking a lot of you but I don’t know how to deal with teenage angst I’m like thirty-five. They sigh, standing up and walking past Susie (but not before giving her a stare that warns her if a single chocolate bar is gone that they will be holding that over her until the day she dies) and following Berdly out the door.

It doesn’t take Kris very long to follow the trail of labored breathing to where Berdley is--in the abandoned classroom, hyperventilating as he teeters on a breakdown. Luckily, when Kris opens the door, it seems to put a halt to his spiralling because he just kind of...freezes. Like a deer caught in headlights. Or a Berdley caught in Kris-lights. Kris takes this moment to let the door shut behind them, trapping the two in here. Together.

“U-Uhhhhh, hi--he--Um. H-Hello, K-Kris…” Berdly attempts to put on his usual bravado, but his voice betrays him brutally by squeaking and cracking on every syllable. Kris can’t help the smile that comes to their face.

“Uh, hey,” they reply with a wave. Berdley continues to stand there and stare (almost like he wasn’t expecting Kris to care enough to follow him) before the present circumstances return to his mind and he begins breathing hard again.

“I-I-I-I, uh...I was. Um. J-Just, uh. G-Getting some fresh air! Y-Yes! The classroom can be s-so stuffy sometimes, I’m sure y-you--you, uh...you agree?” Berdley makes a valiant attempt at hiding his panic, which Kris almost takes pity on. But they don’t think the monster will feel any better if they just pretend what happened back there never happened.

“Yeah. I liked the display.” Kris says simply. Berdley stands stock-straight at that, looking even worse for wear in the “being normal and completely cool” department.

“O-Oh??????? That ol’ thing????? I, um--well I just--y-you see, I--uh. Um,” You can really hear the gears in his head turning as he attempts to come up with an excuse. “I-I-I just thought you w-would appreciate the craftsmanship of!!! A t-true artisan, such as myself!!! So, I!!! M-Made it!!! COMPLETELY PLATONICALLY, OF COURSE!!!! I-I would never imply that my intentions w-were anything other than for bro-sies, i--You didn’t read that whole card, did you?”

“I can’t read,” They mean this as a joke, but they can see Berdley seriously consider this for a second too long. “Dude, I’m dsylexic. I can’t really read cursive…” Berdley freezes up once more, which makes Kris realize they haven’t really projected that as loudly as they might’ve thought.

“Oh! Right! How could I forget! That you’re! Dsylexic!” Berdley’s smile is stapled to his face as he begins to rhythmically knock on his head. “And I! Wrote! That! Entire! Note! In! Cursive! Which! You! Can’t! Read!!!” Kris steps forward in an attempt to keep Berdley from bashing his own skull in, but that only makes Berdley more tense, so they take a step back. “I-I just--The note isn’t important! None of it’s important actually can we forget this interaction ever happened okay? Okay yes that’s great have a wonderful day Kris I will be returning home to sitinmyroomandneverreturntothecorporealrealmalrightgoodbyeforeverKris--” He attempts to sidestep around Kris and out the door, but is very easily intercepted.

“Stop.” Kris grabs him by the shoulders, which seems to shut him up for a second. “Can you just tell me what’s wrong?” Berdley gapes at them as his face steadily grows redder, which makes Kris feel as if there’s something on their face. But he quickly shakes it off, going from completely neurotic to...dejected.

“I just…” He starts, trailing off immediately. “You deserve to have a big proposal, same as everyone else. I-I see you in the back of the class, just...watching. And I, uh, felt it was time to...give you the spotlight! But that was silly of me, wasn’t it?” He looks off to the side at the floor, smiling sadly. “After all, who’d want to go to the dance with me…? I-I’m alone every year, standing in the background. Just kind of...taking it all in...and th-thinking about how it’d be...nice to be a part of it. But that’s...not probable. It was just nice to think about taking you to the dance because you’re--well, you’re nice to me, and you’re funny, and you actually listen to me when I’m talking, an-and you’re a good person and an incredible gaming legend...but I shouldn’t have put it all on you in front of everyone...I’m. I’m sorry, Kris.” He won’t make eye contact with the human, but Kris can still see the tears collecting in his eyes.

“Berdley, that’s stupid.” Kris says, which Berdley cringes at, “Why wouldn’t I wanna go with you?” That part is...not what Berdley was expecting. He looks up at Kris, unsure of where to go from here.

“U-Um…? Because of all the previously stated things? Like me being a complete loser who nobody likes?”

“I like you,” Kris replies immediately, leaving Berdley’s feathers sticking straight up as he flusters. “And I like your display. It’s...really sweet.”

“E-Even if you can’t read the note?” Berdley’s voice cracks.

“I mean, I could read the: WILL YOU GO WITH ME TO THE DANCE part, so, like. Yeah.” Kris shrugs. “Plus, you got me chocolate. Nice chocolate. Nobody...gets me things like that.” They smile, a light dusting of blush across their face. “I’ll go with you.” Berdley’s entire body seizes up for the third time, eyes wide and mouth agape.

“W-W-w-W-w-w-w-w-W-W-W-w-w-w-Wh-Wha-wh-w-w-wha-wha-w-wh-Wh-Wha-wh-Wha-wha-w-w-W-W-W--” Berdley continues to struggle with the word “what” for a solid minute and a half before he’s finally about to manage a: “What?!” Kris can’t help but laugh.

“I said that, Berdley,” at this, they move their grip from his shoulders to his hands, “I will go to the Sadie Hawkman’s dance with you.”

The circuits in Berdley’s brain struggle with this frequency for an extended moment before his face erupts in the giddiest smile Kris has ever seen the bird monster sport. He even begins to jump up and down, taking Kris along with him, as he cackles. It is a surprisingly cute display that Kris finds themselves blushing a bit at. It’s nice to be this...cared about.

“I-I--We have to start thinking of outfits immediately!” Berdley blurts out, returning to their usual demeanor. “I was thinking of some complimentary color schemes on the way to school today which I will be happy to show you at lunchtime. I’m also a master with a sewing machine, so if you are unable to procure an outfit that meets the color requirements, I would be delighted to take your measurements and--w-wait, don’t read into that phrasing, I just m-meant that I could make an outfit for you! B-But I’d need your measurements, and--Oh, goodness, hasn’t class started already, Kris?! We should head back, but--” He looks from the door to Kris and back again a few times before finally settling on something.

“I’lltalktoyouaboutthislaterseeyouinclassKris!!!!!” He says this right before he gives Kris a solitary peck on the cheek before bolting out of the abandoned classroom, leaving Kris blinking at the Berdley-shaped cloud he left behind. Their hand gently grazes the spot on their cheek--luckily not actually pecked by his beak, but more of a quick-kiss kind of peck--and feel their heart skip a beat.

Huh.

That’s...different.

They elect to not dwell on that feeling any longer and head back to class. They have to make sure Susie hasn’t eaten all of the chocolate on that display.

They wouldn’t want to make Berdley go through the trouble of re-proposing  just so they could rightfully claim their other sweet surprise.

#deltarune #deltarune chapter 2 #kris/berdley #kris dreemurr #kris deltarune #berdley deltarune #ignorance cloud on #LORD FORGIVE ME FOR BEING CRINGE ON MAIN. I JUST LIKE THINKING THOUGHTS #LISTEN..........I JUST THINK ITD BE FUNNY. IF KRIS HAD THIS PATHETIC GAMER ALL HEART EYES OVER THEM #also the dance aspect is based on one of the posters you can see inside the school. i am Pretty sure that is what its called #if i was off by like a similar-sounding word i need everyone to do me a favor and pretend im right bc this is cringe enough already #i edited this ONCE at 3 AM last night. i am doing no more than that #anyways here u go izel enjoy ur food.

[primasveraas-writing]

As Family Does - SWR

In snippets, Hera experiences the ups and downs of motherhood, and all the wonderful relationships her son has with family near and so very far away.

WORD COUNT: 2206

XXX

Kanan

A sharp, desperate cry, and Hera’s world changed forever.

Jacen Syndulla was a testament to his parents’ strength long before he came into the world. He emerged bloodied, during battle and war, but the galaxy suddenly recentered itself around this tiny, helpless being.

Hera should have been used to this kind of change by now- in less than a year, her whole life had been broken and reformed in more ways than she could count.

And yet- so much of it was good, Hera thought, as the squirming baby was placed on her chest. This love she felt was so familiar, after carrying her son for 9 months, after loving his father, after being family and foster mother to Ezra and Sabine. She felt it in every cell of her body, so much that it was hard to breathe.

“You did it, Hera,” Zeb said, sounding rather choked up. Hera nodded, numb to the rest of the galaxy, save for her child in her arms, and realized that there were hot tears on her face. She sobbed, her whole body convulsing, and that hurt, but she didn’t care. She’d faced greater pain and been awarded less joy at the end of it all.

The baby wailed again, and Hera gasped- the boy’s eyes had flown open, revealing a clear, vibrant blue. His skin was tinted green and his features were already sharp, sure hallmarks of his mother’s identity but his eyes- they were Kanan’s eyes.

She never thought she’d see them again, and she sobbed harder. Even with the hormone changes that came with pregnancy, it had been a long time since Hera had cried this much. She felt Zeb’s hand on her shoulder and the love in the air. She cried tears of happiness, as new parents do, and tears of sorrow because Kanan wasn’t there to meet his son, nor Ezra to meet his baby brother.

But still- she knew Kanan loved her and he loved their son. She knew Ezra would too, when he came home. Their love was still with her, even if they were not.

That would be enough for now. Hera had her son and her beloved’s eyes, and the love needed to carry her through this and darker days.

Chopper

Hera knew- despite her avoidance of the fact- that Jacen couldn’t stay with her forever. She wasn’t the only one in the Rebellion with a young child, but she was the only general with a newborn. Somewhere in the galaxy, there had to be a safe place for her son, and she would find it. But for now, she kept him the best she could, even if it would only be for the first months of his life.

The fear and the exhaustion of war were heightened by bringing an infant into it. They threatened Hera in her lowest moments, but then there was Zeb, putting Jacen back to sleep in the middle of the night before she could get out of bed, or Kallus quietly filling out her rising piles of paperwork when she was too busy or too tired to do it herself.

It was okay- a new challenge, a new routine, and an ever-constant show of their resilience. She witnessed love and community in all parts of her life, from her kid pilots offering to babysit, to the Organas sharing some old baby toys and clothes. Even the most unlikely of figures rallied around her, and for that, Hera was grateful. Sometimes, she would even have time to herself.

One of these calm afternoons was spent completing mission reports while Jacen slept, which Hera boldly presumed would last long enough for her to catch up on everything she had to do. As soon as she dared to hope this, however, a mechanical whirr indicated the presence of Chopper- and serenity rarely, if ever, followed him.

Where is the new one? He asked, disregarding the fact that Hera was very clearly busy.

“The new one- you mean Jacen?”

He’s new. Her droid was very matter-of-fact about this statement.

“He’s a baby, Chop,” Hera amended, and the astromech beside her warbled in disagreement.

He has not been around very long. He has not done many things either. Therefore, he is new.

“Whatever you say.”

Chopper didn’t humor her further, only groaned in complaint, and waited for a response. Hera rolled her eyes, but obliged. “He’s down for his afternoon nap. Same as yesterday. Why?”

She received no reply, other than a broken lament that the little one took too long to recharge, then her oldest companion rolled off and out of sight. Hera sighed and turned back to her work.

Later, Hera glanced at the chrono and readied herself for her son’s cries, but the Ghost remained silent and lonely. She crept down the room towards the pilot’s quarters, the door still open so that she might reach Jacen faster. Perhaps she would find him still asleep, and she could clean or shower with the extra few minutes to herself.

She instead discovered her baby wriggling happy on his cot, Chopper looming over him. One of his mechanical arms was extended, dangling Jacen’s favorite tooka in front of him. Chopper made gentle sounds, and Jacen grinned up at him.

So Chopper had a heart, beyond the occasional moment of mercy. Hera hid her mouth with her hand, ignoring the wetness in her eyes, and watched the scene from the doorway.

Zeb

It might not have been fair to blame a baby for picking favorites before he could talk, but Hera still shook her head as Zeb passed back Jacen, who wailed the second he left the Lasat’s arms. Zeb chuckled at the reaction, scratching at the back of his neck, but shrunk instantly at Hera’s glare

“Aw, com’on,” Zeb tried while Jacen furiously kicked against Hera. “He doesn’t mean anything by it. Nobody holds a candle to ya, Hera.” He finished the statement rather ungracefully, as Hera relinquished Jacen, plopping him back in Zeb’s arms. As soon as she did, Jacen giggled, clutching at Zeb’s fur and gurgling happily, his woes entirely forgotten.

“You’d think he’d be a little more grateful to the one who feeds him,” Hera said dryly, regarding Jacen with her hands on her hips. Zeb shrugged, looking vaguely sheepish.

“I’m just softer than ya, that’s all,” Zeb assured her, snuggling Jacen against his chest. When Hera raised an eyebrow at him, he laughed in surprise.

“Lasat kits like to sleep on their parents,” he explained, “but some of us like to say that they prefer the Lasat with the longest and softest fur.”

“Well, you certainly have me beat there,” Hera conceded, and Zem hummed in agreement, rocking Jacen in his arms. He babbled cheerfully, and Zeb laughed again. “Maybe nobody holds a candle to Uncle Zeb, either,” she said, her tone hushed, and Zeb froze. “We’re both lucky to have you.”

Zeb didn’t say anything for a long moment, then he shifted Jacen to one side and slung his free arm around Hera’s shoulders. She leaned into the embrace, and Zeb pulled her closer.

“We’re family,” he said gruffly, his voice suspiciously thick. “Of course I’ll take care of you both.”

The admonition sent warmth flooding through Hera’s chest, and she sniffed. That was what she’d count on through it all- her family and their love, unfaltering.

Sabine

Each of Jacen’s milestones- his first smile and wave and babble of a word- came with the reminder that Kanan wasn’t there to witness them too. Her son had just started to lift his own head when the anniversary of his father’s death passed, and Hera realized with grief weighing on her heart that even the idea of Kanan would be unfamiliar to Jacen for the first years of his life.

Her sorrow at the fact that “Dada” wouldn’t be among Jacen’s collection of first words (which included “Mama,” “ship,” “no!” and “Chop”) was expressed to Sabine during an exhausted and teary conversation. Together, they concluded that Kanan would have made a great dad, if he didn’t collapse from the stress while doing it, and the two women held each other until the talk turned back to recollecting fond memories at laughter at what once was.

In one of the biggest shocks of Hera’s life, the grief became lighter and easier to carry. She knew it would never leave her, but at least she didn’t bear it alone.

When Jacen turned one, she declared it a happy occasion and resolved not to spend too long dwelling on those not present to celebrate with them. There were still wistful smiles and comforting hugs, but as luck would have it, she had Zeb, Alexsandr, Rex, and Sabine all with her to mark the occasion, and that was a happy blessing on its own.

Jacen destroyed the small cake Alexsandr had made for him with pudgy fists, smearing it all over his face and onesie. Hera laughed, trying not to think of the possibility of finding uneaten food in Jacen’s diaper again, and their small family celebrated, and it was good.

They exchanged presents before everyone had to return to their respective duties. Mother and son received a collection of toys and bigger clothes, and Hera was even gifted a nice bottle of wine for her to enjoy after surviving a year of motherhood.

At the end, when it was just her and Sabine sweeping crumbs off the floor of the galley, the young Mandalorian presented her a final gift. An intricately bound book, made from sketch flimsi and filled with page after page of illustrations. It told a story, in few words and in brilliant, dynamic colors, of a Jedi, a hero, on quests to make the galaxy a better place. The Jedi wielded a blue lightsaber, and although he could be grumpy, he was deeply loyal to his friends, and he always came in to save the day. His face was unmistakable, his demeanor kind and familiar.

“So Jacen can know his dad,” Sabine said, and her voice was carefully measured. “I never thought I’d illustrate a kid’s book.”

Hera had no words, so she threw her arms around Sabine instead, murmuring her thanks through her tears. Sabine accepted the hug, squeezing Hera just as tight, and they stayed that way for a long while.

Ezra

Jacen grew and grew until he no longer fit in her arms- or rather, he wiggled out of them every time Hera tried to pick him up. He started to beg to learn how to fly as the war drew to a close but it wasn’t until after the Battle of Endor that Hera felt the skies were safe enough for her son.

Sabine teased her that Jacen inherited his recklessness from both sides of the family. Hera couldn’t bring herself to disagree, but she looked around at her friends and family- Mandalorians and Lasats and spies and galactic heroes- and thought that her child’s thrill-seeking tendencies came more from his company rather than his blood.

The conclusion of the war didn’t mean the end of the fighting, but peace was at last on the horizon and her fellow rebels begun planning their lives in this new, free galaxy. Hera could be a mother full-time now, and not have to worry if each goodbye to her son would be her last.

She thought that this would mean fulfillment- and in many ways, it did. The galaxy was entering a new age, but there were too many things left behind for Hera to move on completely. Much of it, she would never get back- but for some, there remained hope of rescue.

She saw so much of Ezra in Jacen. His energy, for one, and his innocence. His optimism, too- Jacen was a happy baby and nothing short of an ebullient child. Hera and Kallus liked to joke that his smile could light up the galaxy. It was impossible, when gazing into Jacen’s blue eyes, not to see the hope and love of another boy who once looked to her as a mother. They had so much in common, these children of war, but their biggest similarity was those who loved them.

Sabine was the first one to teach her the bittersweet pride of a child leaving the nest, and she came to Hera again to tell her that she must go. Hera had fear and love and faith for her, but little surprise when Sabine promised to bring Ezra home. With a blessing and a plea to stay safe, she hugged Sabine tight and watched her set off into the galaxy again.

When evening fell, and Hera was alone again, Jacen approached his mother and snuggled into her arms. As much as she tried to protect her son, he always seemed to know when she was sad.

Hera didn’t think that she’d ever be complete without Kanan, without Ezra, without everyone she’d lost in a lifetime at war. But she was not alone, she knew- she had her son in her embrace and a family in every corner of the galaxy. That, for now, was enough, and she had hope that she would see them all again one day.

#hera syndulla #kanera #jacen syndulla #star wars rebels #swr #sw rebels #swr fanfic #kanera fanfic #sw rebels fanfic #star wars #star wars fanfic #sabine wren #zeb orrelios #rebels #rebels fanfic #star wars fanfiction #hera syndulla fanfic #fluff

[theloneliestshipper]

What about a Soulmate or red string of fate AU for Leia and Boba?

I actually had multiple requests for this one. I came up with a premise years ago for this and yet writing it out only made me realize how hard it would be to get these two stubborn, independent people to buy into it. I dragged them as far as I could, I swear. 

AO3 Link

“It’s Mandalorian.” Her father’s voice was hushed. He sounded worried. “I recognize the lettering.”

“Could we have it translated?”

Leia rubbed her leg just above her knee as she listened to her parents whispering outside her door. The darker patch of skin had always been there. Her mother said she always had. It was only after her tenth birthday that the color began to deepen and the foreign letters began to take shape.

“Yes, but should we?” Her father continued. “This whole business of soulmates, it’s a lot of pressure. Maybe it’s best if she doesn’t know.”

Her mother sounded uncertain. “There’s a lot she doesn’t know, Bail. What if this is one thing too many?”

---

“You have a soulmark?” Sabine Wren’s eyes went wide.

“You don’t think it’s crazy?”

“My parents have them...so, no. My dad’s says, “I’m looking” and my mom’s says, “look at this beautiful sight!” My dad was painting a picture of a lake when they met, and he wanted her to look at the view and she wanted to look at him.” Sabine shrugged. “And those were the first words they said to one another. My mom says she was just grateful that hers was in Mando’a.”

Leia fidgeted, keeping an eye out for anyone passing in the hall of the rebel base. “Mine is in Mando’a too.”

“It is? That means it’s your soulmate’s first language!”

“I looked it up, but the translation wasn’t exact. It’s just one word. Slana’pir.”

“Huh.” Sabine considered that for a few seconds. “That can mean ‘get lost’ or ‘go away’ depending on the context. It’s kind of a funny thing for someone to say as their first words to you. The first letter, does it angle at the bottom? This way?” She illustrated with her hand.

Leia had to think about it. “No. The other way.”

“That’s interesting. It means they’re probably Concordian, from Concordia or Concord Dawn.” She grinned. “A hick Mandalorian, you know? In some places they use slana’pir literally, from a Concordian it’s more likely to be a threat.”

“Great,” Leia replied dryly. “I’ll just keep my eyes peeled for a Mandalorian who instantly threatens me. Are your parents...it’s real for them?”

“Oh yeah. They’re really happy together. My dad always says he doesn’t mind dying at the same time as my mom, because he can’t imagine living without her.”

“Wait. You die if your soulmate does?”

“That’s part of the deal. Once you meet and exchange words, you literally can’t live without one another.”

“But what if it’s someone you pass on the street and never speak to?”

“Then I guess you do what you want like everyone else.”

---

Leia couldn’t understand the grunts of the Gamorrean guards who dragged her through the door. They tossed her in the direction of the bed and left, locking the door behind them. The room was simple, the only furniture was a bed.

Jabba had made the terms of her captivity clear with the scraps of metal and cloth she was forced to wear. She was a trophy for the Hutt to display. So why lock her in here?

She paced for a while. When she got tired of pacing she sat on the bed, her eyes fixed on the door. That quickly became boring and so she laid down, curled up on her side. At some point she fell asleep.

When she woke up there were voices outside the door. Bib Fortuna, the Twi’lek majordomo, and a second voice.

Boba Fett.

Leia bolted upright. Of course. Jabba was passing her on as a bonus to his pet hunter. Her hands curled into fists as the door opened and the Mandalorian bounty hunter strode in.

“Get out.”

She resisted the urge to cover her soulmark with her hand. “Congratulations,” she snarled instead. “You can read.”

He didn’t respond. He stood frozen in front of the door until it finally occurred to Leia that something had happened. “The fuck,” he whispered, the words barely audible through his helmet. Suddenly he was moving towards her, and before she could scramble away he was on his knees at her feet, his hand on her leg. His gloved fingers scrubbed across her soulmark as if he was trying to rub it off.

“Ow!” She pulled her leg up under her, shoving him away. “Get off me!”

He straightened, started to walk away and then turned back. And then away again, as if he had lost all sense of direction. “It can’t be,” he said to no one.

“Are you on spice?”

He laughed, a harsh, unexpected sound that caused a burst of static in his helmet. “I wish this were a spice dream, but neither of us is going to get that lucky.” He lifted off his helmet, setting it on a table before he removed his jetpack. He was in his thirties, with dark curly hair and tan skin. A handsome man, in spite of his grim expression. He looked as if he wanted to be doing anything other than what he was doing.

He stripped off his bracers and then worked open the flak vest his chest plates attached to. When he started opening the neck of his flight suit Leia realized that he was undressing.

“Let’s get one thing clear,” she said. “Lay a hand on me and one of us is going to die.”

“I’m not going to touch you.” He said it scornfully, as if the very idea was offensive. “I have to show you something.”

“Why?”

His anger faded a little. “I think you have a right to know.” He pulled his arms out of the sleeves of his flight suit and let the top half hang over his belt. He wore a white sleeveless undershirt beneath it, which he pulled over his head in one smooth motion. His back was all smooth skin and muscle, except for a few scattered scars and the line of aurebesh letters that ran vertically down along his spine.

Congratulations. You can read.

“Oh my gods.” Leia could scarcely breathe. “You...you didn’t read it. It was just...the first words you said.”

“Seems impossible that we haven’t spoken before. But even on Bespin we never talked. Not directly.”

“It’s you,” Leia said, still trying to process it. “You’re the hick Mandalorian. From...Concorda...or something.”

He blinked at her. “Concord Dawn. And I’m not. But my dad was.” He waited a moment, as if he was trying to decide something. “When did they show up for you? The actual words, I mean.”

“I was ten, I think.”

“Me too.” A smile appeared, fleeting but sincere. “My dad said they were funny. Like a joke.” He shook his head. “It’s a fucking joke, all right.”

“Tell me about it.” Leia rubbed her temple. “My soulmate is a bounty hunter.”

“And mine is in love with someone else.” Fett winced as if something had just occurred to him. “I’ve got to get you out of here.”

“What? Why?”

“Because if I don’t you’ll get yourself killed trying to rescue Solo. You know what happens now, right? Now that we’ve met? If you die, I die.”

“You could help me. Help me get Han out and-”

“And what? You’ll marry him, move to the outer rim and live a long, peaceful life?” His tone was rich with skepticism.

“Maybe I will,” she lied, trying not to think about the rebel forces gathering on Yavin IV.

He looked at her for a moment in silence and then dropped his gaze. “I’ll leave. Whatever plans you have, I’m not part of them. We’ll both just try to...stay alive.” His shoulders rose and fell in one sharp breath. “Since we probably won’t see each other again, is there anything you want to know?”

Leia plucked at the blanket on the bed. “I guess you’ve heard some of the same things I have.”

The bounty hunter shrugged. “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious.”

“I didn’t feel anything when you…” she gestured at her leg.

“Might have been blocked by the gloves.”

“Yeah. That makes sense, I guess.” It might be her only chance to test it. “If you want to try it again…”

He worked his glove off his right hand and approached her cautiously. His hand spread over her thigh, covering his words completely. Leia felt nothing. She gingerly placed her hand on his naked back, over her own words.

And then she felt everything.

It was...a connection. She could think of no other word to describe it. This person belonged to her. His life, his body, his mind and his soul. He fit her like home. She looked up into his eyes, eyes that reflected the same intense longing. “Oh no,” she breathed, overwhelmed and shaking.

“Yeah,” Fett gasped as he leaned in and kissed her and it was perfect the way no kiss between two strangers should be. Leia’s hand went to his chest and then up around his neck as the kiss deepened and then she was wrapped around him and they were both nearly horizontal on the bed.

And then suddenly he was pushing away, detangling himself from the embrace. He turned his back to her and clutched at his head as if he had a stabbing headache. “No,” he growled. “No fucking way.”

Leia couldn’t take her eyes off the words on his back. Her words. She wanted to touch him again. To hold him and comfort him. But clearly that wasn’t what he wanted. She swallowed the lump that was suddenly in her throat. “So I guess that’s real.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, still facing away. “No matter what some stupid magic tattoo says, that was out of line.”

“It wasn’t…” She didn’t know how to finish that. Was it better or worse if it truly wasn’t what he wanted? For that matter, how could she be sure that it was what she wanted? “No apology necessary,” she said finally.

“That’s gracious of you.” He reached for his undershirt and pulled it back on. “I think I have all the information I need.”

“Yes,” Leia agreed. “So what now?”

“Now I ask you for a favor.” He turned to face her and he put his arms through the sleeves of his flightsuit. “Be careful. Play along with Jabba and don’t do anything that might get you tossed in the rancor pit.”

She inhaled slowly, weighing her options. “I’ll try if you do one thing for me.”

“What?”

“Don’t leave.”

His hands stilled for a second, and then he looked away. “It’s going to be hell,” he said, almost casually. “Not knowing where you are or what you’re doing. Fine. I won’t leave. I’ll help you if I can, but don’t ask me to lift a finger for Solo.”

“Fine.”

---

Things had taken a turn. Leia could feel it in her bones as Jabba’s minions raced for the deck of the sail barge. Fett clearly knew it too.

Artoo bumped against her leg with a quiet beep, and Leia took advantage of the Hutt’s distraction. She crouched down beside the small droid and held the length of chain between her hands. One zap and it broke.

But when she straightened, the bounty hunter was gone.

She heard Jabba’s cry of outrage as she bolted for the deck, but she ignored it. All of his guards were busy fighting. She caught a quick glimpse of her friends on the skiff and then the bounty hunter at the rail. The engines on his jetpack were lit.

Leia seized a pike that had fallen to the deck in the mad rush and swung it as hard as she could. Her aim was too good. Not only did she smash it into his jetpack but the force of the blow sent him over the railing.

Into the sarlacc pit.

She raced to the railing. He’d managed to slow his fall by grasping at the side of the barge, but without a good handhold in reach he was slipping down the side. She reached down with the pike and he grabbed it. A blaster shot ricocheted off the barge inches from his head. Artoo appeared on the deck and whistled sharply. Leia looked over at the droid. “What do you mean ‘it’s going to blow?’”

She jumped barely a second before the explosion. She collided with Fett on the way down and they hit the sand, rolling towards the mouth of the pit until suddenly they jerked to a stop. Fett had one arm wrapped around her and when she looked up she saw his other arm stretched over his head, bent at an angle that screamed ‘broken’ but anchored by his fibercord grappling hook to the skiff above them.

“Leia!” She heard Han shout, but she was too busy trying to hold onto Fett and keep herself from sliding further into the pit.

“Blaster,” Fett rasped. “Sarlacc…”

A tentacle slapped at her ankle and she pulled her leg up as high as she could. She managed to pull the bounty hunter’s blaster pistol from it’s holster and fired at the beast, causing the ground to shudder beneath them.

Chewie appeared over the railing of the skiff and then suddenly the skiff lurched and began to move. Fett let out a muffled cry of pain as it dragged them to safety.

---

“Can you see this?” Leia waved a hand in front of his face and Han squinted.

“I can see the motion.”

“That’s a good sign. Try to get some sleep, okay?” She bent down to kiss his forehead before leaving the Millennium Falcon's crew quarters. Fett was sitting up on the cot, his back against the wall. His arm had been set and placed in a sling and at the insistence of everyone else, his other hand was cuffed to the cot. His helmet sat beside him, and his eyes were half-shut. Lando had given him a pretty big dose of painkillers.

“How are you feeling?”

“I’ve felt worse.” His mouth curved into a bitter smile. “You fucked up.”

Leia folded her arms over her chest. “I still saved your life, Fett.”

He shook his head as if the motion took effort. “The sarlacc keeps its victims alive. You could have lived your whole life while I was being digested.”

“I don’t think I could have.” Leia sat down beside him on the cot. “I don’t want you to suffer. That’s not the magic tattoo, that’s who I am.” She brushed a dark curl off his forehead and laid her palm on his cheek. The sense of connection and wholeness she felt at Jabba’s was just as strong now. He leaned into the touch and Leia leaned over and gave him a quick kiss, which led to a longer kiss. And then an even longer one.

“What are we doing?” Fett demanded as soon as they broke apart.

“Nothing. You’re drugged to the gills and Chewie would love to have an excuse to throw you out the airlock.” She sighed and leaned back against the wall beside him. “I don’t like being told what to do. Even by fate.”

“My dad used to say ‘fate is whatever you make of your life.’”

He’d spoken of his father before, and always in the past tense. “When did he die?”

“Years ago. When I was still a child.”

“What about your mother?”

“Never had one.”

“I’m sorry. I can tell by the way you talk about your dad that you were close.” Leia turned her head towards him. “I’m an orphan too, you know. Maybe if we’d met at a different time or in a different place…”

Fett nodded and gave her a quick, tired smile. “If fate is real, maybe it’ll bring us back together when we have an actual shot at it.”

She laughed softly. “I like that idea, actually. Put it to the test.”

He lifted his hand as far as the cuff would allow. “I’d shake on it, but…”

“Nice try.” Leia sat up and gave him one last kiss. “For fate.”

#boba fett/princess leia #random au #my fic #rebelbounty #prompt fic #soulmate au #boba/leia #Anonymous

[leemarkies]

If u wanna write a thinkpiece on noise music i would be v interested tbh

ok buckle up 🤠

so in this essay i'm going to only focus on and compare nct and skz because they're the forerunners on noise music. full disclaimer: i ult both groups and love the (majority) of their music and i adore the members. this thinkpiece is only to give my most objective opinion on their artistry and music.

what constitutes noise music? and what elements of noise music make it "good music"? to me, noise music has clashing instrumentals, that separated would not sound cohesive at all, but when put together have at least some semblance of musicality. this definition excludes sticker and thunderous from the category of "noise music". ik this might be a controversial opinion, but sticker simply does not have enough instruments in the song to be considered noise. i can practically count on one hand how many instruments are used. yes the weird synth base and flute clash, but there is too much empty space (for back of letter word). i think sticker is definitely experimental, but i would not classify it as noise music. nct noise music includes (but is not limited to) songs like kick it, limitless, chain, mad dog, and to an extent, punch and simon says. i would not classify thunderous as noise music because there is not enough clashing instruments. sure, the song has brass fanfare, but at no point when i'm listening to it do i think it is itching my brain. don't get me wrong, it's a great song, but it is not similar to their other songs like miroh, side effects, god's menu, go live, or cheese. that's why i think trying to compare nct and skz by their newest releases is kind of dumb. however, you can definitely compare and contrast their previous songs

NCT 127

now i'm going to focus on nct 127. although nct dream has some songs that are defined as "noise music" (see: go and hot sauce) it is primarily nct 127's "brand". the main element nct has that turns their music from "bad bad music" to "good bad music" is their vocals. their songs often have small breaks from the clashing instruments to give the listener a relief, and during that break, they showcase what sm is known for (amazing, industry-standard vocals). not only does it break the monotony of the noisy instruments, but it also creates hype for when it resumes! limitless is a great example of this! please do yourself a favor and listen to the instrumental ver of the song on youtube. i get legit goosebumps every time the beat drops all over again. i do have two complaints. 1) there are times were their raps are lacking, and it really kinda almost breaks the whole vibe of the song because it makes me cringe a little. see lemonade as an example, even though i would not classify lemonade as noise music. 2) this is off topic but i kinda rip apart skz a little bit so i feel like i need to be balanced and fair but i literally hate sticker so much and the album, although has good songs, is bland and has little variety

STRAY KIDS

stray kids are the younger cousins of nct. they too focus on noise music, but they have their own twist on it. skz comparitively have better rappers. not saying mark and ty are bad by any means, but there are some nct members that also rap that ... should not and instead be vocals. but skz continuously show hard, impactful raps that nct usually lacks to some extent. this is both a good and bad thing for noise music, depending on your baseline opinion on noise music to begin with. if you generally don't like noise music, raps add even more clashing. if you do like noise music, rap can be used as an additional "instrumental" element. i think a great example would be cb's rap in miroh and god's menu. it hypes up the song either right before the beat drop or at the beginning respectively. nct doesn't really have that, they rely on vocals for the lead up. skz definitely have their own spin on noise music and i'm glad they do, variety is the spice of life. i only have three complaints. 1) they do not use their vocalists to the best of their abilities. sm and in have lower toned voices, yet they are consistently forced to sing notes in a very high register, which can understandably sound strained. to combat this, skz use han for the really high lines. 2) when they do have vocal breaks, they should really utilize lino more. part of the reason why nct's vocal breaks are so good is because they are such a contrast to the rest of the song. have you ever watched judges on cooking network? they often say "i wish you used a spalsh of lemon to lighten up this dish". well in this scenario, light, airy voices are the lemon and the noise music beats are the heavy cream. nct has light voices (dy, hc, jw, and to an extent tl). look at kick it. the very first vocal break is jw and hc and it really elevates the entire rest of the song. now skz really only has lino as a light voice (bc and han also too an extent) yet they very rarely use him, which is disappointing. 3) this is kind of off topic but i'm disappointed that their lastest album, literally termed "noeasy" which is a spin-off of the word "noisy" has only one noise music song. like i said before i do not classify thunderous as noisy, but cheese fits the description. don't get me wrong, noeasy is literally one of my favorite kpop albums now but it does kind of fall short of its given name.

conclusion: i really enjoy nct and skz's music. i think the introduction of the noise genre is a great illustration of why kpop is so unique. kpop is MEANT to be experimental. it is meant to be in your face. it is meant to be loud and colorful. it is meant for you to initially think "wow that's weird" because in the end, 9/10 you'll fall in love with it. i think nct and skz can both improve on different aspects and i think it's interesting to compare the two, but in the end, they both have their own takes on noise music

#*looses followers* #ok disclaimer again bc i don't want angry people in my inbox: i literally run blogs for both of these groups #pls don't twist my words i never once said i hate this member or i hate this group i am just giving my objective musical opinion #you asked and i delivered <3 #asks #q 🌾

[emsartwork]

i forgot to add: how do design ????!?!??????

So I’m not expert but this is how I think of character design! (also sry if you were asking about clothing/outfit design thats a little different)

under the cut because this is long im so sorry

So in my opinion there are three really important aspects for character design!

AESTHETIC: obviously everybody’s aesthetic is different, but this is more about what vibe the character has, what makes them THEM design wise. 

INTENTION: who is the character supposed to be? this can range from their personality, their back story, their occupation, or their role in the story, but the design need to fit that intention.

COHESION: does the design go well together? or do certain aspects clash too much? obviously you can have disjointed parts of a character design, and if those serve a purpose then thats fine, but if its so disjointed its distracting from the character as a whole you might need to tweak things. 

AESTHETIC: the contrasting part of the design (white flowers in dark hair, dark trim on dress, and dark shoes) provide interest to the eye. The mixing of round and sharp shapes also keeps the design from feeling “boring” even though its relatively simple. 

INTENTION: so what role would this little doodle character have? according to her design elements, shes cute and friendly with her round shapes (bouncy balls, babies, etc), but could have a sharp/fast/active or even dangerous edge to her with the triangles (arrows, knives etc). of course the design doesn’t limit her possible roles. She could be a bubbly younger sister who teases the older protagonist, or maybe she’s the villain hiding in plain sight. the shape this character design doesn’t really have is squares(think bricks and rocks), which communicates that she might not be really strong, steady, or reliable. 

COHESION: repeating the curves across her whole design builds cohesion, it communicates that “yes, these are all part of the same character”, it also allows the eye to “rest” on a familiar shape or line. 

NOW LETS LOOK AT SOME DESIGNS

(Boku no Hero Academia) so both of these characters are super heroes, but have vastly different design elements. so lets analyze them.

OCHAKO(the pink one) is all rounds, with a few pointed shapes in hair mostly, but a little on her costume as well. Her personality is cute, bubbly, and friendly which perfectly suits her soft and bouncy design. Howevre she also has a very slight edge to her, which is seen her determination and drive to improve herself over the course of the anime. 

KIRISHIMA(the red one) at first glance, seems to be super pointy!! shapes that are usually seen on villains or really dangerous characters, but while he IS sharp(literally sometimes) and sometimes aggressive, he is also made of squares, which perfectly suits his loyal “i gotchu bro” attitude towards most of the other characters in the anime.  

ISSUE AREAS: so the only problems i have with Ochako and Kirishima’s designs is that their costumes each have one area that clashes a little too much for my taste. With Ochako, the belt over the color blocking stripes down her crotch are......questionable taste wise. I think the design would be better if the pink chest ended above the belt in a shallow v. not only would this mirror the triangle aspects of her hair, it would fit the belt outline, and continue the trend her costume has of being “grounded” or “heavy”. Kirishima has those.... gears??? around his shoulders??? and while the gear teeth are technically squares, the gear shape itself is a circle, which is a shape that isn’t present anywhere else in his design. I think changing the gears to something similar to his boots or his mask/headgear would create a more cohesive design(also the gears just look hard to move in)

These two characters are presented as individuals so their costumes don’t have to match at all even though they are still seen as “connected” because of the art style for the face, hair, and body. 

In a group giving the outfits cohesive motifs is an easy way to present a strong team image! In Yuki Yuna is a Hero, the girls all have colored lines(usually princess seam placement), armor or fabric hip accents, covered arms, and similar flower shapes in their hair. The Aesthetic of each girl is strong in a monochrome signature color, but not over whelming as the black+white connects them even in color so they aren’t out of place. 

Speaking of color! if your characters are all similar looking (like same body for all of them) you can communicate their personality and aesthetic just with color! (only gonna talk about a few of the ponies) Pinkie Pie (the really pink one) is energetic and playful, so her color scheme is a variation of the primary colors(happy, child like), and have one of the more saturated colors(high energy, intense) of these characters in a large quantity. Apple Jack (the orange one) is a down to earth farm girl, and her color palette is accordingly, mostly earth tones, its also warm analogous colors, which makes her appear un-complicated and warm personality wise. the pop of red is a nice touch to add interest, but notice that its uses sparingly in her cutie mark and tail accessory. Rarity on the other hand is elegant and fussy, her high contrast scheme of white and dark blue/purples gives her more visual interest and is something that makes her appear more “complex” in addition to the gradient thats included in her hair. the colors are also all cool colors, bringing to mind cool glass or water which both have connotations of grace and beauty.

however all the characters here are unified by their colors being on the pastel side, which is also important for a cohesive cast.

another, short, note on color; making the color/line/shading of your figure different from the background can help them stand out, this is used ESPECIALLY in children’s media, but can be applied to any illustration or animation as needed.

Color can also help your characters “read” quickly on screen, the powerpuff girls are a prime example, of having a distinct color blocking and silhouette. even the color blobs at the top and my crappy hand silhouettes STILL read as the characters despite being broken down into abstract elements. I also really enjoy the thick outline in the powerpuff girls, it really makes the characters pop to the foreground even though they have pretty simple designs and are often in a colorful setting.

Also, for a lot of animation, silhouette is INCREDIBLY important for your characters, some designers sketch silhouettes and then design the particulars its so important to nail the shape. These examples from Coraline are some of my favorites (though Laika wins in my heart every time no matter what lmao) because the simple shapes are SO CLEAR and indicative of the character, you literally don’t need to have watched the movie to know these are each different characters with different personalities and roles. 

silhouette can also help tell the story. In Kubo and the two strings (another Laika film) the above three characters are sisters. One has chosen to leave her home in the heavens to live on earth, and the other two stay in their roles as “heavenly” warriors. This is even shown through their designs, the two sisters are weighted on top and their cloaks don’t even touch the ground, while the first woman has trailing, heavy sleeves, hair, and robes all grounding her and emphasizing her connection with the earth.

another example of shape/silhouette reflecting the story, In The Croods, the family of cavemen are for the most part very top heavy, with large torsos and arms, usually in a more hunched over position, while the newcomer, Guy, is bottom heavy with thin arms and stands more upright. In the plot, the family represents the old ways, the strength and rules that have helped them survive, they look like very stereotypical “cavemen”, while Guy resembles the modern man, and appropriately is associated with new ideas and forward thinking.

MORE SHAPES, in DC super hero girls each girl has a distinct personality emulated by her shape language. Zatana is dramatic curves and edges, Super girl is hard, straight edges against curves, giving her a solid muscular shape. Wonder Woman, though also strong, is taller and leaner, lending to a confident leader type. Green Lantern is slim, her lines all flow into each other giving her a go with the flow look. Bumble Bee is, of course, tiny, but her boots and gauntlets add weight and strength to her otherwise small frame. Batgirl is lanky and has a lot of pointed style lines, reminding the viewer of a skinny cat (ironic what with cat woman i know) or weasel which mirrors her preferred “sneaky” crime fighting style.  (also yes this was just an excuse for me to gush abt how much i love the dcshg designs shut up)

so in my opinion, Cartoon Saloon’s The Secret of Kells is PERFECT in aesthetic, intention, and cohesion. Kells focuses very strongly on creating silhouette WITHIN the larger figure shape via color and line, most of the characters pictured here have no neck, the one who does, Brendan, is the main character and the use of negative space that cuts into his shape is used to draw attention to him. Kells is also very strongly inspired by Medieval Illuminated manuscripts (namely, the book of kells lmao). The characters still manage to stand out against outrageously detailed backgrounds via their simple shapes and strong color blocking. 

Aisling, a secondary but very important character, is not human, and has a totally different shape language from the rest of the characters. She is thin and pointy, while most of the others are round or square. Aisling also has the most negative space making up her silhouette, compare the triangles made by her arms and legs in the above picture to the figures in the first image where everybody’s body is self contained with no negative space. She is also very different color wise, very pale and cool colored, as opposed to the warm saturated colors of the human characters. (yes this was another excuse to gush abt one of my fave pieces of media deal with it)

hopefully that wasn’t too rambley and actually helps? if yall have more specific design questions lemma know lol

#askems #a-magical-human #design #art tutorial #tutorial #Character Design #boku no hero academia #yuki yuna is a hero #yuki yuna wa yusha de aru #my little pony friendship is magic #mlpfim #madeline #powerpuff girls #ppg #coraline #laika #kubo and the two strings #the croods #dc super hero girls #dcshg #the secret of kells #cartoon saloon

[onestowatch]

Elliot Lee Charts the Rise and Fall of the ‘Queen of Nothing’ [Q&A]

Elliot Lee is a mesmerizing talent who is effortlessly melding a ripping rock sound with animated pop sensibilities. Her new EP Queen of Nothing is a dark and daring five-track collection that explodes with colorful, quirky arrangements and bold, intense vocals. The release narrates the ups and downs of life in power and the materialistic tendencies birthed from wealth and status. Each track slays with a confident queen-like energy without ever sacrificing its vulnerable messages of loneliness and misjudgment.

Within the elevated EP, she cleverly showcases her many musical styles. From fierce lyrical flows to stunning emotive pop vocals, Lee demonstrates she is a true musical mastermind. Through her unique musicality and aesthetic, she has captured the attention of a devoted fanbase known as “the bubblegum army.” Lee’s offerings create a space of open expression where you can listen and feel less alone. 

Ones to Watch had the chance to talk with the Lee about the inspiration for her new concept EP, feelings of loneliness, and more.

Queen of Nothing beautifully illustrates the rise and fall of a queendom through the perspective of a harsh ruler. Can you explain this concept further?

Whenever I do interviews, and in many other aspects of my career, I always get the question “What’s next?” or “Where do you see yourself in the future?.” My mind is an unkind place, and it rarely lets me envision a future in which I’m at peace with where I am. I want to say that I see myself happy with a flourishing career because there are times when I can imagine that, but I also don’t like hiding my darker thoughts in spaces where my Bubblegum Soldiers can see what I’m saying. In reality, I have a fear that the darkness will take over one day, and I will make bad choices that lead me to losing everything. So I decided to give an honest answer to this question through the story of the Queen of Nothing.

The title track “Queen of Nothing” references the famous piano piece “Heart and Soul.”  What inspired you to use this popular song as the base for your track?

When I was young, my grandmother was a lot like a second mom to me. She taught me how to play piano; we would sit on her old piano bench together and play songs together for hours. One of the first ones she ever taught me was “Heart and Soul.” She would play the low part, and I would play the high part. When I decided to write this song for other kids like me, I wanted to include a part of myself in it, kind of like a drop of blood on a covenant. So I infused it with this familiar melody that helped me feel safe and grounded my whole life, and in doing so maybe I can turn it into something safe and grounding for my Bubblegum Soldiers too.

“Pink (Freak)” is an intense, hard-hitting offering that narrates not fitting into the boxes we are placed in. In what ways have others misjudged you?

People are often confused by the fact that I actually like to spend most of my time alone at home doing things like studying, drawing, or producing songs. I have a very hard time socializing, and I struggle with my social battery getting drained very easily. I think I tend to give off this bubbly energy that makes it seem like I love to be around people and am good at it, but in reality I feel lost when it comes to things like small talk and hanging out with other people. I really feel like an alien trying their best to seem human, and maybe I’ve gotten good enough at it to fool people.

“Rubies” also details the idea of being an outcast and boldly fuses rock and electronic sounds. How was the track crafted lyrically and sonically?

When I wrote “Rubies,” I watched some cool trailers for movies like Blade Runner to try to sync the energy of the song up to the general flow of an action movie trailer. I wanted it to sonically have a beginning, a climax, and a cathartic end, but at the same time I wanted the lyrics to feel like they were going in a circle without ever reaching a conclusion. In some ways, I wanted it to mirror the feeling of someone walking through a post-apocalyptic world and maniacally hoarding remnants of the world before. It would be ridiculous to hoard rubies in a failed society with no economy and no one to even show the rubies off to, but that irrational need to collect useless things in an attempt to fill the void is exactly what “Rubies” is about.

It is tough to feel like an outsider. What advice would you give to someone who is struggling to fit in?

Even if you don’t fit in with the people around you, there are people out there you can feel at home with. I never fit in until I found my Bubblegum Soldiers, but now I know that I was never truly alone in the world. I want you to know that you aren’t alone either. You can sit with us at the La La Land Lunch Table.

What is next for Elliot Lee?

I want to see my Bubblegum Soldiers in person as soon as possible!! I have so much I want to say to them. So I’m hoping to be able to tour once it’s safe and reasonable to do so.

Who are your Ones to Watch?

My Ones to Watch are Bibi, WHOKILLEDXIX, and GIRLI.

#elliot lee #queen of nothing #interview #album reviews #pop #alternative pop

[writethehousedown]

Slow hands (Crystal x Gigi) - a-tresia

“I’ve thought of a way to help you study,” Gigi says.

A/N: First time to join a challenge of course I’m a day late. But hey, I made it to makeup week! Here’s med student Crystal for you to enjoy. Also, there’s a lot of anatomical terms in here so if you find that it’s wrong… well, I’m happy that you studied (because I surely can’t remember anymore!) 💖

Gigi enters Crystal’s apartment as quietly as she could. She knows Crystal is busy studying and she doesn’t want to disturb her and make her regret giving her a key to her apartment.

It’s early on a Friday evening and she just wanted to quickly check in on her girlfriend before heading out with her friends. Gigi passes the threshold into the living room to see Crystal on the floor, back against the couch, legs outstretched under the coffee table, chunky black turtleneck over her chin, curly hair up in a very messy attempt on a bun on the top of her head, flashcards scattered all over, pencil behind her right ear, pink highlighter smear on her left cheek, eyebrows creased, fussing and almost crying over her annoying tangled earphones.

On a different day, this sight would have made Gigi laugh but she knows that it’s a stressful time for Crystal so she tries to be supportive. Crystal’s obviously in the middle of a mental breakdown in the middle of exam season.

Crystal doesn’t seem to notice she has company until Gigi sits on the floor beside her and takes the tangled wire off her hands without a word, just a comforting smile.

“Thank you,” Crystal whispers, rubbing at her very tired eyes as she rests her head on Gigi’s shoulder and tucks herself into her side, relaxing for the first time that day.

Untangling the earphones and setting it on the table, Gigi leans in to plant a kiss on the top of Crystal’s head. “Don’t stress the small stuff.”

“Honestly, I’m just over it,” she sighs. “Obviously, I don’t know shit. My whole brain right now is just soup.”

Gigi looks over the illustrations laid out on the table; she doesn’t understand it one bit. “I think you need a break,” she suggests.

Crystal groans. “I know I do, but I don’t deserve one.” Gigi raises a brow at her, doubting the fact that Crystal actually believes she doesn’t deserve a break from studying. “Gee, I seriously can’t. Nothing is sticking and I need all of this,” she wildly gestures to her flashcards, “memorized and inside my brain like yesterday.”

“Do you want me to stay and keep you company?” Gigi offers instead. “I can fix you dinner or run you a bath?”

It’s a tempting offer and Crystal wants to say yes. But she doesn’t want to be the boring one who makes her girlfriend stay in on a Friday night when she could be out having fun with her friends. “Thank you, it’s sweet of you to offer but I’m a grown-ass woman who doesn’t need mothering,” she says with a pout.

“Doesn’t need mothering?” Gigi asks incredulously as she looks under the coffee table. “Baby, I can see five Fruit by the Foot paper under here. And a half-eaten cinnamon sugar Pop-Tart.”

“There’s probably more junk scattered around the apartment.” Crystal laughs, slightly embarrassed at her trash eating habits, and secretly hoping Gigi doesn’t find the two packs of Most Stuf Oreos she demolished today. And she’s supposed to be the almost-doctor here.

Gigi just playfully rolls her eyes at Crystal. “Okay, tell me how I can help you study.”

“There’s no way. This is all me,” Crystal sighs. She thinks there’s really nothing Gigi can do at this point to help her remember all these things when her brain feels like an overflowing pot of boiling water. “You look great. Where’s Gigi going?” she asks trying to get Gigi off her back about taking a break, waving her hand over Gigi’s very put-together appearance – ginger hair down in loose waves, makeup as immaculate as ever, a loose white faux fur jacket over a black bike short bodysuit, teeny tiny waist accentuated by a wide white belt, all tied together by chunky gold jewelry (which confuses Crystal a little bit because Gigi rarely ever accessorizes like this).

“Thank you,” she smiles. “Gigi’s checking out that new place near Jaida’s apartment with the girls if she manages to get her girlfriend to take it easy.”

Crystal laughs. “I don’t like talking about Gigi like she’s not here.”

She tells Crystal of the mundane things that happened to her at school today. About the way she felt so excited when she found the little doodle of a cat Crystal left inside one of her planners. About how Nicky managed to convince her and Jaida to go out tonight even though no one was in the mood to dress up and get drunk. About her phone call with her mom about possibly inviting Crystal home for Thanksgiving break. She lets Crystal know it’s no pressure at all. But knowing Crystal, it’s already causing her some anxiety.

She tells her about how she wishes Crystal would come out with her but she totally understands she has to study. She wants to tell her to spend more time with her but doesn’t know how that won’t make her appear like the most selfish person in the whole entire world when Crystal is actually working towards her dream of becoming a doctor. Gigi holds back on the whining and the invitation to go out seeing it’s hard to convince Crystal to take a break, much so to convince her to come and party.

Crystal promises her all of Sunday to make it up to her. She promises brunch and dinner. And three snacks. Maybe four. She promises a walk in the park and a movie (at home, on the couch, because she also promises to make out).

Gigi eventually convinces Crystal to take a break and a shower while she’s at it. She manages to order dinner and tidy the mess Crystal leaves behind — wrappers and crumbs on the floor, a multitude of colorful open markers and pens that surprisingly haven’t stained her immaculate carpet, used socks (four pairs, what the hell?) under the couch. Gigi knows that the post-it notes with illegible scribbles and notepad paper with diagrams that make no sense to her are off-limits, so she leaves them where she finds them.

She’s rid herself of her jacket and is cozy on the couch when Crystal emerges from the bathroom in a fluffy robe. Gigi’s face breaks into a wide smile at how comfortable Crystal looks as she reaches out and makes grabby hands at Crystal who quickly settles herself straddling Gigi’s lap.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” Gigi chuckles and leans in to plant a small kiss on Crystal’s cheek.

Crystal plays with the strap of Gigi’s tank top. “Where’d your jacket go?”

“I wanted cuddles.”

“I do, too,” she says wrapping her arms around Gigi, quickly enveloping her in the scent of green tea that always seems to linger on Crystal’s skin even hours after a shower.

“Don’t you need to study?” Gigi playfully reminds her.

Crystal groans and holds onto Gigi tighter. “Cuddles first.”

She feels Gigi hold the back of her head, scraping her fingers through her scalp and still damp hair and she feels herself relax further.

“Can I kiss you?” Crystal whispers.

“You never have to ask,” Gigi says, leaning back to look at Crystal.

Crystal smiles sheepishly. “I don’t want to ruin your makeup, it’s so perfect.”

“It’s just makeup, Crys,” she says with a dismissive wave. “Now, how about that kiss?”

Crystal leans in, slips her hand up to cradle Gigi’s face, and fits their lips together. They move their mouths against each other, soft and warm, feeling like they’re both yielding exactly to the shape that would make them a perfect fit.

She opens her mouth to let Gigi lick into her mouth. Crystal moans quietly when their tongues meet, tasting the remnants of the ginger beer Gigi had before coming over. She knows Gigi’s lipstick is smearing across their faces but if Gigi doesn’t care, she doesn’t care either. Not when this kiss is too good to cut short.

But Gigi has other ideas.

“I’ve thought of a way to help you study,” Gigi says, pulling back from the heated kiss.

Crystal rests her forehead against Gigi’s, slightly out of breath. “I’m on a break.”

“No, no. You’ll want this, I promise.”

“No offense, Gee, but I don’t see how you can help. It’s not like you’ve studied this.” Yes, Gigi’s still in school. But she’s not pre-med. She’s not even close to the sciences. So Crystal cannot, for the life of her, figure out how Gigi is so confident she could help. Crystal leans in to catch Gigi’s lips in another kiss instead but she moves away.

“Crystal.”

“What?”

“You’re studying the hand,” she says stating the obvious. The colorful flashcards are staring at them.

“I know, and?” She tries to kiss Gigi again. But she’s denied. Again.

“I have hands.”

Crystal furrows her brows in confusion. On any other day, she’d quickly catch on to what Gigi is trying to say but with all the things she had to put in her brain today, her processing has definitely slowed down to a Pentium.

“I know, and?”

Gigi raises a brow. “I know what to do with my hands.”

Understanding dawns on Crystal slowly and the confusion on her face is replaced by a look Gigi is all too familiar with. “How is that going to help me memorize though?” she pouts.

Gigi squeezes Crystal’s cheeks together with one hand while the other tries to untie her robe. “Because you, my love, have pornographic memory.”

“No, I don’t,” Crystal snorts. That’s a lie and they both know it. Not to be a horndog but Crystal remembers anything and everything related to sex. That’s just how her brain works. And Gigi is smart to use it to her advantage.

“Crystal,” Gigi pulls down Crystal’s bralette to expose her breasts, “are you seriously going to argue with me right now at this very moment?” Crystal shakes her head. “Okay, good.” Gigi pulls Crystal down for a kiss. She holds up her right hand to Crystal’s face when she pulls away. “My hand.”

“Your hand, yes.”

“When I do this,” Gigi cups both of Crystal’s breasts in her hands, “what muscles am I using?”

“I like this game.”

“It’s not a game, Crys. I’m helping you study.”

“Okay, fine. The, uh, the distal and proximal interphalangeal joints are slightly flexed so, uh, flexor digitorum superficialis and profundus.”

Gigi pinches Crystal’s nipple between her thumb and forefinger. “How about now?”

Crystal feels herself melt, delicious warmth spreading to every single part of her body, turning her into a useless puddle with just that. Thanks to the oversensitivity of her nipples.

“The thumb interphalangeal joint is extended by extensor pollicis longus, abductor pollicis brevis, and adductor pollicis. The index,” Crystal moans when Gigi rolls her nipple between her fingers, “the index finger distal interphalangeal joint is also extended by the extensor indicis, the lumbricals, and both the dorsal and palmar interossei.”

Gigi honest to goodness doesn’t know what in the world Crystal is saying. She might as well be talking to her in a foreign language. But it seems like there isn’t a need for her to be stressed about it; she knows the material well enough. Leave it to Crystal to overthink.

“If this is how you’re going to help me study, I can’t wait ‘til I reach the pelvis and perineum,” Crystal breathes out as Gigi latches onto the nipple she isn’t pinching and sucks gently.

“Told you you’d like it,” she says, pulling Crystal down for another kiss. They stay like this for a while, kissing and breathing each other in. When the need for air becomes too much, Gigi moves to take Crystal’s nipple back into her mouth, licking and tugging it between her teeth. Crystal holds onto Gigi’s head closer to her chest as she arches her back, throwing her head back in pleasure and grinding down on Gigi’s thigh.

Gigi takes this as a sign to go further. She runs her hands up Crystal’s thighs before reaching in between to move her panties to the side. “Nice,” she says spreading the wetness around with her fingers. She pushes two fingers into Crystal. “What muscles am I using now?” she asks as she slowly pumps in and out, gently reminding Crystal that what they’re doing is actually studying.

“Th-those two fingers, uh, extensor digitorum,” she says, grinding down harder onto Gigi’s palm that’s barely resting on her clit. “But the other ones are, uh, are the lumbricals and flexor digiti minimi.”

Gigi scissors her fingers inside Crystal, feeling her become wetter and more pliant. “And now?”

Crystal moans at the stretch. “Palmar and dorsal interossei.”

“Good girl.” She lets Crystal fuck herself on her fingers, watching her face contort with pleasure, before curling her fingers upward. Crystal makes a noise, a sound she’s sure she’s never made in her entire life. It’s strangled and deep and guttural. “How about now?” she asks to distract Crystal from her building orgasm.

“Fuuuuck!” she moans. “Are we still studying?” Crystal’s a little bit frustrated. The student side of her brain has already closed up shop. All she wants now is to focus entirely on reaching an orgasm.

“We can stop,” Gigi chuckles, making a move to slip her fingers out of Crystal.

But Crystal’s reflexes have never been so fast in her life. She grabs a hold of Gigi’s wrist before she can fully take her fingers out. “No, no, let’s not do that,” she whines.

She grabs the back of Crystal’s neck with her free hand, pulling her in to connect their lips. “Okay, no need to beg,” Gigi says against her lips. She lets Crystal ride her fingers more before she curls her fingers upward and asks again, “What muscles am I using now?”

“Huh?”

“What’s the answer?”

“Answer to what?”

“My question, Crystal.”

Crystal slows down her movement to catch her breath. “F-flex-flexor digitorum superficialis and, and flexor digitorum profundus. But they’re more flexed now than they were a while ago when you were fondling my tits.”

“Mm, okay,” Gigi chuckles as Crystal speeds up again. “One last, I promise. Then you can come.” Crystal nods, eyes glazed. Gigi brushes her thumb back and forth over her now very sensitive clit. “How about now?”

“Feels good, Gee,” Crystal takes a breath between her teeth.

“I know but you still have to answer my question,” she says in a way like a mother would admonish her child.

She takes a moment to shift her focus back to the question at hand. “Th-the thenar muscles. Adductor poll-. No. Abductor pollicis brevis, flexor p-pollicis brevis, a-and op-opponens pollicis.”

“You did so well,” Gigi coos.

Crystal is so wet now that Gigi manages to slip in two more fingers. She pushes back on them before moving up and pushing down again. And again. And again. Eager and excited to go over the edge.

“Need to come,” Crystal practically pleads.

“No one’s stopping you.”

She lets Crystal use her fingers the way she wants and takes in the sight of her’s lips parted and eyes squeezed shut. Gigi feels Crystal tightening around her fingers, moving closer and closer towards her climax. She drapes her arms over Gigi’s shoulder and drops her head on to the crook of Gigi’s neck, leaving open-mouthed kisses up her neck to her jaw.

“So close,” she says.

Her body is beginning to tremble, a sure sign of her impending orgasm. Gigi angles her head to catch Crystal’s mouth in a sloppy kiss as she moves harder and faster against her clit.

Crystal rocks up and down to the movement of Gigi’s hand, eyes closed, lost in her own pleasure. Her face and chest are flushed, she’s panting so hard to catch her breath, her breasts having with every breath. Gigi bends her head to take one of Crystal’s nipples into her mouth and sucks hard. Crystal lets out a strangled moan and Gigi feels her muscles rhythmically clench around her fingers. She slows her movements helping Crystal, who is now slumped against Gigi’s chest, go through and come down from her orgasm.

Gigi wraps her arms around Crystal, holding her close as she regains her breath. Crystal lazily drops kisses against Gigi’s neck, up her jaw until their lips meet in a lazy kiss. Breaking away, Crystal smiles down at Gigi. She regards Gigi’s face, wondering how she ever brought that look of awe and wonder to her face. “Did I pass?” she asks, still basking in the afterglow of a great orgasm.

Gigi laughs. “I have no fucking idea. But I have a feeling I just got an A-plus in Girlfriend 101.”

#rpdr fanfiction #crygi #crystal methyd #gigi goode #slow hands #atresia #med school au #smut #back to school 2020 #day 7: memorize #submission

[manychocolatefactories]

CatCF: White Chocolate

And here is my White Chocolate retelling!

About this version: This version could take place in something between the 90s and the 2000s. It has been strongly inspired by both the world of cartoons in general, and "A Series of Unfortunate Events", as strange as it may seem. In this version, you have Seven Platinum Tickets.

Reinterpretation of Augustus Gloop:

Augustus Gloop, first Platinum Ticket winner. This Augustus, I imagined as a bully.

Physically, he is a very round boy. His belly is round, his torso is round, his face is round, his arms and legs are round, he basically looks like a bunch of balloons tied together, or a mass of spheres/globes. He has two great "beaver teeth". In terms of clothes, he eithers wears hoodies too small for him and of bright, vivid, flashy colors (orange, yellow, pink) or he wears striped shirts that are not slimming at all (such as the red and white stripes shirt of Augustus Gloop in the 2005 movie).

To all adults, Augustus plays the part of the cute, happy, innocent boy. But to all the other kids, he is a horrible, nasty, brutal and greedy bully. He likes to torture and dominate others - though he is not a sadist. He just seeks power and dominion, he loves to strike fear and submission in the heart of other children. A good exemple of his double-faced nature are his beaver teeth - he can actually speak perfectly fine with them, even though they gave him a slight lisp that is quite cute to adults. But with children, he worsens his lisp on purpose so that he would spit and splutter all over their faces, and when said children complain, the adults keep saying things like "He can't help it, he is just different, don't discriminate".

Augustus actually used to be a regular-sized kid (even though taller and bigger than his comrades, but not that fat). He regularly beat up, gave wedgies or other typical bully tortures on his peers to get their money or their toys. But it all changed when one day a boy had the idea to offer him his lunch instead of his money. Augustus was a big eater you see, and he seized the opportunity of having a free lunch. And since all the other kids preferred to give up their lunch rather than their money of their toys, they all started to "encourage" (as in, subtly manipulating him) so that he would racket lunch and food instead of money out of them. As a result, Augustus grew immensely fat on all the free food he got each day - and with his bigger size he could intimidate and crush other kids more easily. But at least, they didn't had to steal money from their parents anymore.

His demise will be with the Exploding Candies (remember those?). I think they would be going by a section of the Factory where some of Wonka's candies are stored, and Augustus would see another kid holding an Exploding Candy. Not knowing what it is, he would bully said kid (maybe Charlie?) into giving it to him. He would swallow it and then...

BOOM! HE EXPLODES INTO LITTLE PIECES!

No, I'm kidding Xp Actually I went with something much more cartoony (this Augustus himself being cartoony - in fact I based him in "fat Chuck with beaver teeth" from the cartoon "Chuck's Choices". It may sound weird but it makes kind of sense in the series Xp). He would  suddenly be all distended and inflated like a balloon, and then deflate completely (again, like a balloon), reduced to a flat, pancake-like boy, with smoke coming out of his mouth, nose and ears.

Reinterpretation of Violet Beauregarde:

The character is named Violet Strabismus, second Platinum Ticket winner. For her, I tried to think about what kind of people/archetype/stereotypes were seen chewing gum all day long, and I ended up finding this idea upon seeing a girl on a train that corresponded exactly to that.

This Violet is the typical embodiment of the cynic, "pseudo-edgy" teenager that seeks everything that is bleak and dark. She is a mix of goth, of emo, of punk and grunge. She only wears and surround herself with things dark, creepy, sinister or sad. She romanticizes notions such as despair, death, suicides, and the like. She is the kind of teenager that claims her whole life is just a series of pains and losses, that she seeks comfort in the darkness and the morbidity, and she disdains everything joyful, innocent or happy. Her two favorite hobbies are chewing gum, and trying to destroy other people's dreams and hopes with depressing talk.

The irony in all that, however, is that despite Violet's claims that she has a miserable and sad life, she actually has a very happy one. She has loving parents that support her in everything she does, and siblings that also love her. She comes from a wealthy background, which allows her to buy all the chains and piercings and extremely complicated goth/punk clothes she wants at specialized stores. She is quite a pretty and good-looking girl, even with her creepy clothes and dark makeup. She even has a huge house, and in fact despite her claims to adore death, never went to a funeral ever in her life, and never knew anyone that died. Still, she keeps repeating that she is a "misunderstood, bullied, rejected loner". And she is not suicidal herself, mind you, nor depressed. She is perfectly fine. She just wants to look like she is, to "fit her style".

Her demise, as with all the Violet variations in my stories, relies on the Three-Course Meal gum. But here, the dish used is the ice-cream. I had the idea that the gum would actually turn Violet's flesh into ice-cream. As a result she is immediately put inside Wonka's cold storage room and freezers, so she doesn't melt. And she is condemned to live her life alone, in dark, cold, locked up places, exactly as she pretended and wished to.

Reinterpretation of Veruca Salt:

Now, I am not much satisfied with this Veruca Salt, but well, it is still worth a shot, even though the idea itself may be not so original.

Veruca Salt, third Platinum Ticket winner. For this Veruca, I envisioned actually a character based on Darla Dimple from "Cats Don't Dance". She is a small, cute and child-like girl, that looks almost like a pretty little doll, but who is able to scream with an insanely powerful voice and can act like a total brat by throwing extremely destructive tantrums and breaking everything everywhere if she doesn't have what she wants.

Her demise was actually suggested by ArtMakerProductions - the Geese Room. The Geese Room from the 70s movie would return, with a full room having geese lay chocolate eggs for Easter (I also think Wonka would be disdainful of this silly idea according to which rabbits laid the Easter eggs). And when Veruca would throw one of her usual tantrum, one of the goose would believe her to be one of her children (due to Veruca's screams sounding like a goose' screams) and just sit on her, crushing the little girl. (Not to death of course, but that's one big goose Xp).

Reinterpretation of Mike Teavee:

This one was hard to think about, but I finally found something I'm quite proud of.

Mike's character is obsessed with television, right? And he wishes to be INSIDE television, right, that's the core of his demise. Well... what about a Mike Teavee that is obsessed with television not as a watcher but as an actor?

Henry Trout, fourth Platinum Ticket winner, is a former child actor who used to be the star of numerous teenager sitcoms and other televisions shows by Disney-like productions. All this fame turned him into a spoiled, arrogant and selfish brat, and when he was kicked off the shows, for both being too old AND being just too much of a jerk, he couldn't let go of the past. He believes that everyone knows him through his work as an actor, and that everyone is a fan of him. He spends a lot of his time looking at his old television shows, and television is his only topic when speaking with other people. He still dresses and acts like a star - and never once realizes that a good lot of people don't know or even remember him. As per ArtMakerProductions, his parents are also his agents, and they desperatly try to find back their son's former glory, by "overselling" him to get a lot of media exposure, and still doing a lot of advertisement and promotion despite him not getting any real work - the finding of a Platinum Ticket was another attempt at becoming famous once more.

Take the characters of "fallen stars" such as Norma Desmond in "Sunset Boulevard" and Jane Hudson from "Whatever happened to Baby Jane?". Mix them with the former Disney or Nickelodeon child and teenage stars, especially if they had a dark turn in their life (the Spouse twins, David Henrie, Cameron Boyce, Zac Efron...). And you get Henry Trout.

His demise is still the Television Room, like all the other Mikes. However his variation is that the television Wonka used was prepared to teleport and air objects, such as Wonka bars. It is still a technology in working, and they only focused on the material and visual parts. They haven't worked on the sounds. As a result, once Henry Trout gets on TV, he is insanely happy because now everyone will see him and nobody will kick him out... but then he realizes he can't speak, because there is no sound. And when rescues from the television, he discovers he turned completely mute.

Reinterpretation of Charlie Bucket :

Charlie Bucket, the seventh and last Platinum Ticket winner.

For this one... I actually don't know. I wanted to do a Charlie based on the "brown-haired Charlie" as illustrated for exemple by 2005's Charlie. But I hesitate. On one side, I haven't used yet the idea of "the too-saint Charlie", aka a Charlie Bucket so good and so perfect he becomes a male Mary Sue, unrealistic and annoying, an exaggerated caricature of a good boy. I thought I could potentially use this with the brown-haired Charlie, especially since 2005's Charlie was criticized for being a too-perfect child.

On the other side, I also liked the idea of a crippled Charlie, in the mind of "Tiny Tim" from A Christmas Carol, and I also thought it would be fitting for him...

So I'll let it float for now.

Reinterpretation of the deleted kids :

# Terence Roper. Since this one had barely any personnality in the original drafts, I decided to include him (especially since I already reinvented the two other kids part of his trio - Clarence Crump and Bertie Upside).

I think of Terence Roper as the typical "hot bad guy" archetype. He is a criminal kid, and a little delinquant, that drives despite not having a permit, that steals, that robs, that like to spread chaos and destroy shop windows and tag walls etc... I think he is the son of two famous criminals, and thus thinks of crime as the "family business". But he is also a very good-looking, very charming, and very popular boy, which resulted in him not only being leader of gangs and the like, but also having a sort of cult or worship around him - similarly to how "bad boys" in high schools can be idolized. I think something very similar appened with his parents - I want to explore with this character how people worship criminals, with very successful bandits, mafioso or drug dealers ending up as popular and romanticized and idolized as movie stars, singers or the like.

He is the blousons noirs of the 50s and 60s, the old-fashioned troublemakers pachucos, the greaser delinquants of the movie Grease, and all other fashionable kind-of-criminal groups you could think of.

But the irony here is that Terence actually got his Platinum Ticket by legal means, by buying a chocolate bar - and in fact, for him to have found the Golden Ticket and not stole it is a great disappointment and shame.

For his demise I thought of re-using the Fizzy Lifty Drink. He would stole it in an act of bravado, and drink it without realizing what it was - which would result in him getting a perpetual case of bad gazes (frequent burps, farts, and other stomach noises). This would completely ruin his cool and good looking image, as well as any kind of grace or discretion he may have.

# Miranda Mary Piker. Sixth Platinum Ticket Winner (Terence Roper was fifth). She is based on the character as most know her : a school-obsessed, fun-killing girl. The original incarnation was a stern, no-nonsense, very strict girl that basically acted like any cruel headmistress or teacher from those horrible British boarding schools. However, given that this character was alreayd beautifully reintepreted by Danguy96, I wanted to do something slightly different. This Miranda is more like an "annoying moral guardian". She is still obsessed with school, good work and being an obedient and good child, and she still disdains silly things such as games, entertainment or fun in general, but instead of being a stern and harsh girl, she would rather be a nagging and annoying pest, that keeps giving speeches and sermons to everyone about why you should act a certain way and not another, a walking moralization that keeps trying to teach "proper manners", "maturity" and "basic knowledge" to everyone in a very condescending way. I also thought she would try to dress up as an adult, and thus with adult clothes - but since she is just a cild, said clothes are much too big for her, resulting in her looking kind of ridiculous.

Her demise would, of course, be the Spotty Powder. I can't remember if this was an idea that was suggested to me, or one used by someone else in their reinterpretation, but I like the concept that instead of falling inside the machine and being crushed to death, Miranda (and possibly her school director father) would actually fall into a big pile of the Spotty Powder, and thus develop all the symptoms of a contagious disease and be forbidden from setting a foot in school for a very long period of time.

Reinterpretation of the rival chocolatiers :

This is the big defining feature of White Chocolate. In this version, the rivals of Wonka have a big part to play.

They don't appear in themselves - but they sent emissaeries, messengers and spoekpersons to contact each of the kids that won a Platinum Ticket, in a similar way to the 70s movie, and each chocolatier tempts the kid with a different "treat".

Slugworth seems to be a chocolatier involved in the criminal underworld - his emissaries at least seem to have some criminal undertones, and act through fear and violence rather than seduction. In fact, I think his chocolate and candy business may actually be a "cover" for darker criminal activites, and "washing" of dirty money.

Augustus Gloop receives the visit of a man with "icy blue eyes and nasty purple scars on his cheeks". He passes off as a waiter in the restaurant in which Augustus is celebrating, even though it is just a disguise. He tries to convince Augustus by both subtle threats, and the promise of a free pass and unlimited offer in all the restaurants and buffets of the town.

And Terence Roper, due to his criminal connections, actually is invited to the house of a wealthy man with ties to the criminal world, a creepy man in fancy, wealthy suits, but stuck in a wheelchair and with a fake eye shining like a silver dollar.

Slugworth's purpose seems to be the destruction of Wonka. He tries to convince the children to sabotage or put maybe bombs and things like that inside the Wonka factory, or to ruin batches of candy, stuff like that.

 Prodnose rather keeps sending women as emissaries. In fact  even thought of making Prodnose actually a female chocolatier, but I don't know yet... I thought of Prodnose as some sort of media mogul, that tries to spread their brand to everything (there are Prodnose television shows, book series, toys, sport equipment, gardening tools, etc...) including candy-making and chocolate-making.

One "messenger" contacts Veruca Salt. She is one of the journalists interviewinv the young girl after she found her Ticket. Based on Cherry from the musical, she is a happy, charmant, pleasant woman. But her face has something... weird to it, almost unnatural, as if she had a bad surgery job done to it. And she keeps smiling all the time - her smile seems completely stuck.

Henry Trout is the other one to receive a messenger from Prodnose. As Henry goes to have a new suit tailored for him (because of course Henry only had tailored suit perfectly to his size), the tailor reveals herself as a messenger of Prodnose, who could easily bring back Henry in Prodnose-made television series and shows. The tailor herself is a tall and thin lady all dressed in black, and with long, spindly fingers with long and pointy nails - her hands in fact look like creepy spiders.

I thought of probably Prodnose trying to cause a huge scandal inside the Wonka factory, and thus asking the kids to find out Wonka's dirty secrets, and if not, to invent some that they would "reveal" upon leaving the Factory. Where Slugworth tries to ruin physically and economically Wonka, Prodnose tries to ruin his reputation and to discredit him on moral ground.

 As for Fickelgrubber, he is actually envious of Wonka. I think he is a very young person hailing from a very wealthy and powerful family, and his dream was to become a candy-maker, but he was very bad at it. However he refused to give up - especially when seeing how Wonka was succesful. Fickelgrubber is an envious and jealous child-minded young person, and he refuses to admit Wonka can succeed where he fails. Fickelgrubber has tried to copy and steal Wonka's inventions for years now, but all his attempt ended up failing miserably - he copied the ice-cream that never melt of Wonka, but they had a tendency to turn into rock-hard material. He copied the gum that could create gigantic balloons of Wonka, but he mixed up the recipe, and the gum actually made kids inflate and pop like balloons. And when Fickelgrubber released glow-in-the-dark candies, it was later revealed they contained a huge dose of radioactive components.

Fickelgrubber's emisseries are creepy kids (I still don't know if they are "friends" of his or merely all sorts of cousins of his real family - as I said, Fickelgrubber is quite young, both in spirit and mind).

Violet, upon visiting her local cemetery, is contacted by a beautiful blond teenager standing on the wall of the cemetery. He acts flirtingly, seductively, playing the "good cop" (and he also actually acts like a cat, meowing, purring and sometimes even moving like a cat - I thought of him as a parody of Cat Noir from Miraculous). And when Violet is not receptive to this, the boy presents his sister, that is waiting behind Violet. A big, burly, muscular girl with a bulldog-like face.

Miranda is also contacted by Fickelgrubber emissaries - twin girls, identical, but "perfect", as in with perfectly clean and ordered clothes, identical beautiful hairstyle, and the like (I thought of them as inspired by the twins from The Shining). They are basically the kind of "perfect" and "proper" kids Miranda seeks to create in the world. And they try to convince her to join them (they even have prepared for Miranda clothes identical to their own so that they would become their new sister). I don't know however how would Miranda react to that - either she refuses, due to stealing secrets being perceived as cheating and she is against it  ; either the sisters actually convince her to go along with the plan by the simple argument that Wonka is an excentric, ridiculous man that gets success without hard work, and Miranda hates both goofy/clownish and not-hard-working people.

As for Charlie Bucket, he will actually be visited in turn by one messenger from each chocolatier (in fact, he may even escape them when they start fighting each other).

Slugworth's emissary... I actually don't know. Xp I thought of maybe a kind olf man, almost grandfather like, that acts all nice and doting, but then reveals that inside his cane, there is a blade.

Prodnose's emissary is a loud-talking woman with a lot of makeup and wearing a huge coat made out of crocodile (I thought of her as a mix of Cruella and Ursula).

As for Fickelgrubber's emissaries, Charlie meets at first a beautiful Japanese teenager (male or female?) dressed in a refined suit, something between a fashion model and a succesful business owner. And when their smooth talk fails, they present their brothers - because they are triplets. And appear from the darkness two huge sumos, teenagers yes, but the size of elephants. (This was again inspired by usual sumo appearances in cartoons, from JCA to the Simpsons passing by Shuriken School).

#catcf #charlie and the chocolate factory #white chocolate #augustus gloop #mike teavee #violet beauregarde #veruca salt #terence roper #miranda mary piker #fickelgrubber #prodnose #slugworth

[twitchesandstitches]

hypothetical idea i was working over for the ‘dial a superpower’ but for Tia; should probably not be taken as canon unless it’s interesting enough

---------------

Tia squirmed around, and it was a nice illustration that she didn't exactly have a conventional skeletal structure. It wasn't easy to say what was supporting her body, really; there was definitely some kind of rigid structure supporting her, but whatever it was, it was a lot more elastic than it really needed to be.

Her hips pivoted almost in a completely three-sixty-degree angle, like a chair rotating itself all the way around. Her plump belly and midsection twisted up like a spring, and her upper body whirled around, weighed a few different directions by her gigantic breasts swaying her all around. Her massive curtain of cotton candy colored hair flopped around in thick strands like masses of silky seaweed, and the whole thing just jiggled in every direction imaginable, going from sexy to silly to vaguely repulsive to watch, and all the way back the other direction.

And on a pair of legs like stilts. It was actually kind of funny, Chopstop mused, that her thighs were so thick, such splendidly massive hamhocks that anyone should be glad to slide their head between, and then her knees, and BOOM. Her legs slimmed down to... well, a pair of stilts. That was the best you could say about them. They narrowed significantly, coming down to slender points or perhaps a kind of pod, and several stubby toes poked out there.

A body like a mass of organic jello without actually being a slime-type; bundles of ever shifting organs structured more like a mechanical dungeon than an organic creature, and bending around so much that she was now able to look straight down at her butt. It was horrifyingly fun to watch.

She produced a small creaking noises as she abruptly snapped back into her normal shape, her elasticity finally reaching its limit. "Whee!" She said, and went straight back to squirming.

"Oh, come on," Chopstop said, one of the robotic armatures extending from a harness around her body inserting something into her body. "I've seen literal kids not be this whiny at a doctor visit!"

Tia crossed her arms and made a grumpy noise. "Hmph," she rumbled, scowling adorably. "Is it installed, yet?"

"You can't tell?" One of Chopstop's armatures inserted the last of a seemingly unrelated series of devices; a lengthy strip of psychically resonant fibers against what you had to call Tia's spine, several battery-shaped canisters to be placed throughout her body in a relay system, and so on. "You made the thing."

Tia rumbled again, and it sounded a deflective sort of noise; not exactly a laugh, or a cry, or anything inbetween. All of those at once; her gills flapped and swelled, so thickly she could have put her hand around them, and the deep black of her shimmering skin turned a faint green, just around the gills. It all faded, and the moment passed.

Chopstop wondered, not for the first time, if it had once been the body language of a forgotten species Tia had adopted, in her own formal way. If perhaps her weird mannerisms had once been typical of a species no one even remembered; she was so old, after all. Who knew how much of her was adapted to mirror creatures that had long since left any mortal world; speak their languages of body and gesture.

Or perhaps not. It might have simply been her way to mimic the way mortals showed those sort of feelings. Her own fumbling, grasping attempts to mirror mortals in general.

Asking her was pointless. She wouldn't understand the question.

"Hold still," Chopstop said, as her sensors indicated that the last of the devices had married into each other, merging with Tia's adaptable flesh. More than that; she felt it all coming together; her senses were linked to the cybernetics housed within her own body, and they did not speak to her, or something that reported to her. She felt the world through them. Another armature drifted down low, plunging a long rod into Tia's back. "This one is gonna hurt," she added, warningly.

"It's okay, I turned off mine ability to feel pain," Tia said brightly.

"I'd say 'lucky you', but I got one of them pain editors too." Chopstop stuck her tongue out, concentrating. "In one... two..."

Three.

The rod punched out. Tia flinched, more from the impact than actual sensation. She rolled her body around as the rod sunk deeper, the tiny manipulators at the end sinking into a cluster of controlling mechanisms at the core of her new cybernetic suite. It clicked them on, and depowered.

"Okay," Chopstop said, as the rod removed itself from Tia's body, the hole it made sealing up behind. "All set! Your new gear should be working okay."

Tia stood up straight, and examined her arm. Around where her wrist would have been, if her body was more carefully defined, there was a strange device poking up through her skin. It looked a lot like a dial.

"Hrm," she said. "It works?"

"Try it."

Tia twisted the dial back and forth; little holographic selections appeared, and she flipped through them.

As she did, her body transformed. An image of a muscular figure, and her body grew slightly larger, muscles swelling up into an imposing frame. Another figure, with extra arms; an energy field appeared around her body, solidifying into the shape of multiple arms that stuck out from her body, in different sizes and shapes.

Another; her body became living lava. Another; she turned drippy and liquid, more like an actual goo girl. Another, and she swelled up and bounced gently, her whole form growing elastic and rubbery.

Tia continued toying with it, and Chopstop remembered what she'd worked out over time:

Tia did not absorb or consume powers, exactly. She'd always assumed that, hadn't she? But she hadn't actually asked. And as it turned out, she didn't.

It made sense, she supposed. When you consumed, say, a big platter of meat, the meat didn't stay as some abstract idea of MEAT inside you. It just got broke down into its base components, which your body repurposed. So when Tia did the same thing... those powers didn't remain inside her, to be called on.

Instead, they were dissolved into components; aspects of power, that Tia could build back into entirely new abilities, recombining to fit her sense of identity. Exactly how that worked, and what those components actually were, had completely gone over Chopstop's head; the whole discussion had gotten too technical for her.

But the gist of it was that the process was actually kind of... random. Tia didn't actually sit down and think 'aha! Today, I will make big claws that shoot lasers!" Instead, her power naturally reworked itself, based on what she was feeling, and generated a new paradigm for her, using her absorbed powers as the building blocks for that.

And the theory had gone: couldn't it be artificially manipulated?

So they had created a system to do just that; a way to artificially alter her body by directly manipulating those components, forcing it into a new shape.

"Just be careful with that," Chopstop said, collapsing the armatures into a handy-dandy transportable canister; she caught it with a hip bump as it dropped offer her, her massive hips sending it flying into a nearby container marked 'GADGET CRAP AND STUFF'. "That'll probably tire you out and wait what the hell am I doing? You're just going to turn yourself into a puddle or a living bounce house or something like that, no matter what I say."

"Yeah, probably," Tia said. Massive plates appeared on her back, tail and arms, and she somehow contorted her body so that the plates wrapped around her, collapsing into a giant ball. "Whee! I can GO FAST now!"

"...Can I run on top of you? Like an exercise ball! Made of DOOM!"

"Ha hah, yeah!"

Chopstop climbed on top of her. "Just be careful not to push this during combat," she warned. "It's probably something we can work with when things aren't so serious, but your magic REALLY doesn't do well with things getting stressful. Doing this in a fight will probably tax you really hard."

The ball-plates parted slightly. Tia's face poked out. "Story of my life," she said mournfully.

#twitchy!ocs #twitchy!tiashar #twitchy!chopstop #my writing #fics #twitchy!verse

[thoseofgreatambition]

Ascent || FTB 7

description: George loves you to bits and pieces. He tries to mold himself to fit into your world even as he sees how much it’s changed the people he loves. You, and a few others warn him away. George wonders how much worse could it be than a couple of bribes. 

request by nonnie: how about a slightly jealous georgie 👀 nothing too extreme or threatening to your relationship, just him being a tad cautious. plenty of showing you how much he cares and that he fears losing you. maybe a little possessive? “you’re mine.” ugh i’m melting

for the birds

LIAR {PT 1} | 1.9 K

ROSE COLORED {PT 2} | 2.6K

LIAR LIAR {PT 3} | 3.3K

DUTY {PT 4} | 5.3K

FAMILY MATTERS {PT 5} 2.4K

TWO SIDED {PT 6} 3K

BONUS CHAPTER 1

BONUS CHAPTER 2

BONUS CHAPTER 3

taglist: @fainting-fancy @geeksareunique @insearchofnewdreams @notstandingstill-imlyinginwait @lumos-barnes @stillwater20-blog @thatfuckingliardavidtennant @slytherinqween @xinyourdreamsx @skiving-snackboxess @wildfire-whizbangs @dwarfwizard-from-panem @diary-of-an-onliner @answer-the-sirens @woakiees @black-widow-fangirl @theheirofnightandday @summerstardust @whysoseriouspadfoot @chocok22 @myhopesareanchoredinyou @siriusblackisme @illusivedaydreamer @zeeneee @writingwitchly @wolfpotter12 @obsessedwithrandomthings @carolinesbookworld @shadowsinger11 @pit-and-the-pen @summer-writes @peachesandpinks @ickle-ronniekins @gweaslvy @alpinewinchester 

George kept looking at you like you hung the moon in the sky. Like you were the one who kissed the sun to keep it alight. It was puzzling really. It put a dizzying pace in your pulse to see how adored you were, even after he found out about what you’d been doing.

You sat cross legged on your bed, silk pajamas cool against your skin as you stared at him while he dozed on and off next to you. A lazy smile on his face. “You’re amazing, you know.”

He chuckles a bit. “That’s nice to hear. Buttering me up?”

There’s a tight shake of your head, and you feel the same threat of tears you’d felt when you’d first made love to him. That being so happy was so dangerous. Feeling your feelings too much always got you in trouble as a child. “Next time there’s an event why don’t you hang back? It’s a nasty crowd George.”

You can see the seeds of self doubt being spread across his face, as tight together as his freckles. His voice is quiet, and full of hurt. “Don’t think I’ll do well enough for you?”

Something hot and wet was falling down your face. “Not that. You’re perfect and lovely. I’m not proud of myself at those. I want you to be proud of me. I don’t want you to see me and stop being proud.”

His large hand gently reached for you, tugging on your lapel until you were tucked in next to him on the bed, his arms holding you close. He felt so warm.

“I’ll always be proud of you, Y/N. You’re my girl. Can’t do anything to make me less proud of you. This all ends in a month or two right? When it’s all over you’ll feel better. Just need to make it through for a few more weeks, yeah?”

Doing your best not to cry further, you nodded your head.

Though you were sure he meant what he said, you doubted that George would keep that opinion after he’d been there for a while.

                               ___________________________________________

You felt a pair of curious eyes following you as you got ready for the day. As you put on makeup to get rid of your dark puffy eye circles. As you charmed your suit so it would be wrinkle free. As you worked on your hair to be perfectly done. 

“What’s so interesting about me today, Georgie?” Your feelings still were a little tender from the crying bout earlier in the day. 

“I didn’t know you did all this when you got ready for the day.” 

There was a dubious look shot his way, “You’ve watched me get ready before.”

He did look rather amazing in his suit. It set your heart in a series of little flutters. “Not for work, darling. This looks like a lot of work, do you ever get tired of it?” 

You stared at yourself in the mirror for a moment. “Not really. I take my time with it, get to drink my coffee. I like getting ready for casual days in England more, but this isn’t bad.” Holding George’s arm as you slipped into your heels, you gave him a bright smile. “Ready to go?” 

There was a nervous smile on George’s face, he’d be meeting your Aunt Alexandra for the first time in many years. She wanted him to be there to see the ‘family business’. You told him that it was okay to sit out on this, that you would stay behind with him but he’d insisted. There was a bit of damaged pride from him as well, the same thing that made him try so hard when it came to making his shop succeed. He wanted to prove himself. 

“Ready, darling.” 

Like that you apparated the pair of you to Aunt Alexandra’s home. Immediately a pair of tiny dachshunds began barking and yapping at two of you. Just like that your aunt swooped in from the wings and gave you a tight hug, quickly moving on to George. 

“Georgie! It’s been so long since I’ve seen you! You’ve gotten so much more tall. How are you doing darling? I heard you and Freddie got hurt in the war. Are you both doing better now?” 

Immediately he felt swept back to his childhood when she would breeze into the burrow and bring so much kindness into the home. 

It was easy to forget for a little bit that she didn’t approve of him dating you. 

“We’re doing a lot better. I lost my ear but Freddie got hit by a wall. He went through the worst of it, so I’m just glad he’s up and able to walk around.” 

As more pleasantries were exchanged you walked over to your father in the living room and gave him a kiss on the cheek before sitting on the loveseat and beckoning George over. He made his way over slowly, taking in his surroundings. 

Everything was so light and bright. With marble floors and gilded chandeliers. The loveseat you so casually sat on was clearly made from a dark blue dragonskin leather. He sat down next to you, and wondered how you were so easily able to relax in this setting. 

The answer was clear enough, you’d grown up in it. 

Your hand rested on his knee, and you ran your thumb back and forth across him. Immediately his pulse seemed to slow down. 

He’d expected that you all would get into business, but your siblings Marie and Alexander ran the show chatting about this or that. George felt himself relaxing more and more as time went on. Sipping on the coffee that your aunt brewed for him. 

He felt back in his element, making people laugh. 

That was until you sighed and leant back into the loveseat and looked at Aunt Alexandra with a wry smile. “So what’s the business today?” 

Your aunt immediately shot you a glowing smile. Her legs crossed as she leaned back in her armchair. George was reminded of an illustration he saw as a child of a king on a throne. 

“Well, we’re doing wonderfully! The fundraiser went great because of you, Y/N. And thank you George, I heard you did wonderfully with all of your stories.” George felt immediately relieved though for some reason you looked less than impressed. 

“The Graves want to bribe you.” 

“And I won’t be accepting that.” 

Ears around the room seemed to perk up. Still you seemed doubting. “You’ve had me blackmailing people throughout this. Other’s are finding out. Jack’s uncle was talking about what I said to Morris the other day.” 

“I need you to be more discreet then sweetie.” 

You chewed on the inside of your cheek as the family meeting went on. Another rally. Another speech. Another fundraising gala for just your extended family this time. The tapestry of your family’s crest that hung on the wall seemed to weigh on your with its presence. 

Your brother piped up next, “Who’s in charge of gathering the family?” 

Aunt Alexandra smiled at him, “I’ll need you to do that Alex. Since you don’t want to head up the family, you’ll be perfect for this. It’ll seem more casual. We’ll have a cookout or something, a little bit less formal. Y/N, how about we borrow your cabin and call it a vacation home or say we rented it? Then no one will know you live there.” 

“No.” you stood firm in your statement. “Absolutely not. There’s a reason I don’t let people over there. I want my privacy. And I think you’ll remember that you agreed to that after me needing to step back from working at the hospital.” 

Your aunt’s smile faltered for a moment. You weren’t usually this combative about it all. Her eyes flickered to a bewildered George and reckoned he had something to do with it. Before she could say anything your father chimed in. “Alexandra, we’ll do it at my house. We have a big enough yard.” 

A wave of relief came over you. You would forever be grateful for your father. 

                              ___________________________________________

It was after the meeting where you collapsed in on yourself a bit. You took George to a nice muggle restaurant, and gave a bland smile and nod when the hostess said the both of you look like CEO’s. 

You hadn’t the foggiest of what that meant, but it didn’t matter at the moment. 

He seemed just as tired as you did, though his curious eyes were on yours again. “Is it something I’m doing again?” 

“What else is she having you do?” 

“Huh?” 

“Your aunt. You said you’ve been blackmailing people. What else are you doing?” 

The cold feeling returned to your fingertips. You wondered if this was the part where he stopped being so proud of you. 

Your heart, selfish as always willed you to lie. Your brain told you he was smart enough to puzzle together the truth even if you did lie. 

“Morris is the man my aunt almost killed in the duel. She was the challenger, she is against anti-dueling now but he needs to be quiet about it all for her to win. I have a good amount of pull with the politicians.” you didn’t mention it was because you’d dated some of their children, “So I told him if he talked about it I’d see to it he lost his job.” 

“Is he a bad man?” 

A confused look was shot George’s way. Where would that idea come from? “No. He’s not great. He’s about as dirty as I am I suppose. So I can’t say much about him there.” 

You could see George staring at you in a whole new light. Your hands began to go numb. “I’ve bribed a few people. Nothing terribly expensive. Some nice clothes, a broomstick or two, mentioning a promotion... I think I gave someone a car but I can’t remember who.” 

George wondered in what world a car wasn’t ‘terribly expensive’. 

“I just... Aunt Alexandra gave me a lot of fresh starts when I was younger. You remember my temper. I got into plenty of duels myself-- and I lost every one of them. I think if that weren’t the case I wouldn’t have a future, or a shot at being a healer.” Again, you chewed the side of your cheek. “I love her to bits. Dad’s family is alright, but I don’t see them much. She stepped in a lot after Mum died... I want to help her.” 

“Helping her makes you feel bad though, doesn’t it?” 

You shot an odd look George’s way. “Of course. I’ve never been politically minded. I’m not good with the speeches or anything. I would have sat it all out if Marie hadn’t needed the help. But there’s only about six weeks left I believe until the voting starts. After that I’ll head back to England and hide away again. I’m just trying to remember that.” 

“You could go back to England now.” 

“No, I have things to do here.” 

George seemed to be saying quite a few silly things at the moment. You weren’t sure why. 

Your food came, though your appetite had left you. Quietly, as your confidence seemed to have left you, you spoke to George. “It’s alright if you want to leave you know. I’ll keep you out of things, but I know this goes against a lot of what you stand for.” 

“I missed you. And I’m staying. My flight back isn’t for another week.” 

He seemed to have misinterpreted you. “No, I mean leave me. I get it.” George was far too innocent for you, and you were quite aware of it. 

Now he looked at you like you were the foolish one. “I’m not leaving you. I love you.” His hands grasped your cold ones from across the table. “This will be over soon, you’ll come back to England, and I’ll hide you away with me. How does that sound? No more worrying about these things. You’ll get a job as a healer, do all the research you want, this will all be behind you.” 

Once again your eyes began to water, he seemed to have a way of doing that to you. “I don’t understand why you’re doing this for me.” 

He kissed the palm of your hand. Smiling into it. “Because I love you. And there’s not going to be a change in that. So stop your crying Y/N. Eat some food, you’ll feel a bit better.” 

                              ___________________________________________

George had always had a bit of a jealous streak in him. He had six siblings after all, and a twin to compete with to get any attention. Prior to dating you, he thought he’d outgrown that. Turned out he hadn’t. 

Now he’d learned the ways to calm himself down. Remind himself that he was a good man in his own right. Of his own accomplishments and how people loved him for himself. It helped a good bit. Until he found himself in the midst of your crowd of old friends in a bar, and had met a couple of your old lovers. 

You were very considerate really. The conversation was light, you held his hand and gave him kisses when no one was looking. It helped to soothe whatever ache he felt. Truly he’d expected that at least one of them would be a prat, based on what he’d read in those gossip magazines his mother loved so much, but all of them treated him rather kindly. 

One, Taylor, the quadpot player was especially kind. “It’s nice to meet you. She always talked about you growing up.” he’d approached when you’d stepped away to grab another round of drinks for the group. “I don’t want to make it awkward, I know it might be. I just wanted to let you know I’m happy for you. And I know it can be strange reading so much about your personal life in the gossip rags, but if you keep your head down and enjoy what you can it’ll all turn out alright.” 

It was like the wind had been taken out of his sails. He’d worked himself so much thinking that he’d need to prove himself he hadn’t thought about someone speaking to him with so much kindness. “Thank you, Taylor.” 

There was a grin from the other man, “Of course! It’s what I’m here for, isn’t it? Anyways, the only bad thing you’ve got going for you is the whole ‘Quidditch is better than quadpot” thing. That won’t fly in America.” Your friends who’d been listening in burst out into laughter and you chuckled as you walked over with your bottles of whisky and scotch for the table. 

“Be careful there Taylor, I think that’s one of the only fights he may pick with you about that. Quidditch is popular everywhere else but here.” 

As Taylor sat back down and began to regale the table with another story about his games you wrapped your arms around George’s waist and squeezed him tight. “Feeling okay Georgie?” 

His hand squeezed your hip tightly. For some reason, as kind as everyone else was he still felt the jealousy stir inside him. He let out a noncommittal hum. He placed a kiss on the shell of your ear. “As long as you’re mine.” 

There was a giggle from you. What a silly thing for him to say. “As long as you’ll have me, I’m yours.” 

#fic; for the birds #my writing #my imagines #george weasley x reader #george weasley imagine #george weasley smut #george weasley #george weasley headcanon #fred weasley #fred weasley x reader #fred weasley imagine #fred weasley smut

[toastedbuckwheat]

Hello! May I ask how you draw? I'm currently learning how to myself and would be highly interested into a step to step process by you! Like from sketch to the done thing (no color necessary)

Hello there!

I dunno how I feel about showing how I work/giving advice to someone who’s learning (and I say it as a pro artist who went through years of traditional art education) because when I do the illustrations you see here on my tumblr I BREAK THE RULES you’d learn though life drawing routine, and give in to bad habits, and my methods are rather unplanned and chaotic which makes it difficult to pinpoint significant stages. But I used my portable potato to take some photos during working on my last piece, so I’ll throw it here with a bit of an explanation of what’s going on.

Before I begin - and because you’re about to look at a mess of a WIP - I’d like to give you some general advice that generally makes life easier when you draw (again, things that I learned in traditional arts education - another artist might advise you the complete opposite, dunno!)

Work holistically. Forget them satisfying-to-look-at clips on instagram showing someone produce a hyperrealistic portrait starting from an eye, with each and every element emerging being finished before they proceed to another part. It takes a lot of talent, yes, but these are ppl redrawing a photo in a kind of a mechanical manner. Most artists don’t work this way. Especially if you’re working without a reference, or if you’re doing a life drawing - your process will be layering and changing and finding what works best to give an impression of what you’re drawing rather than reproduce the exact image, and your artwork is likely to look messy most of the time.That said: don’t start with the details. Don’t spend too much time on a particular part while neglecting others. Your goal is to keep the whole piece at the same level of ‘finished’ (even though it’s unfinished - do I make sense?) before you’re confident that everything is where it should be and proceed to the details. So sketch out the composition first. See how things fit, what’s the dynamics. You’ll save yourself from limbs sticking out from the frame, odd proportions etc etc.

Because it’s a game of relationships between different parts of the picture/scene. I ask you not to worry about finishing a single element before laying out the rest because you’ll find that said element will look different once the other part appears! For instance - you might think that the colour you picked for a character’s hair is already very dark. But once you’re done with the night sky background, you’ll find that it’s in fact too light, and doesn’t work well with the cold palette. You’ll have to revisit different parts of the image as you go to balance these relationships and make the picture work as a whole.

Give an impression of something being there without actually drawing it ‘properly’- because details are hard, mate. You’ll see that my lineart usually has hardly any, and my colouring is large unrefined stains, but the finished thing looks convincing. Like, fuck, I can never focus on how Crowley’s eyes are really shaped. So I just turn them into large glowing yellow ellipses crossed by a line, and heard no protests so far.

Don’t panic if you messed up (you probably didn’t anyway). It might turn out to be a completely unnoticeable mistake - because, remember, things work together to balance each other, so another finished off prominent element will probably drown that badly placed line that looked so visible and out of place a second ago. 

It might not look good before it’s finished. I’m mostly immune to it after years of drawing, and my recent illustrations all follow a specific method (ykno, my sunset glow effects and all that) so I can kinda predict the next stage. But I do my linearts on a specially picked crap paper, I don’t bother erasing the smudged graphite, and it looks messy af until I make the background white in Photoshop. Conclusion: you might have a moment of doubt as you work through a piece, but try to break through it - I often suddenly start to like what I cursed a minute before! - and try to finish it even if it’s meant to be bad. This way, looking through your past pieces, you’ll see the progress. And trust me, I can’t even look at my art from literally three months ago. It’s normal.

Now, pics! The sketches are paler in real life, but I increased the contrast a little so you can see something.

1. Laying out the composition! 

I wanted to just show them kissing, but I got carried away due to some Art Nouveau inspiration. As you might have noticed, most of my illustrations are quite self-contained (ykno - they look like a sticker on a plain background). So I wanted a tight swirl bordered by Aziraphale’s wings creating a sort of rounded, yin-yang like bubble around them. Consequently I made the whole composition revolve around their heads. 

2. Adding more details to the sketch. It’s messy af. It will be messy until I’m done. It’s fine.

3. These are the fineliners I use for the linearts! They are made by Uni-ball and come in light and dark grey. I also sometimes use the guy on the left - ‘Touch’ sign pen by Pentel, when I want more brush-like, wider strokes. I work in grey because when I scan it and do my usual boring trick with sunlight highlights - which is an Overlay mode layer in Photoshop - the highlights ‘burn out’ the lines too and make them vanish a little, and the lighting effect gets more striking. I also like to use the light grey ones to make something look pencil-y without actually using pencil, because pencil fucking smudges.

4. It smudges! So because I am right handed, I start inking from the right hand side, no matter how tempted I am to do their faces first.

5. You can see the composition directions here. I made it intuitively, but ofc some ppl actually use grids etc to lay out their drawings.

6. See how pale ans thin the lineart was at first? I kept adjusting it as new inked parts were appearing. It starts to look nice and consistent now! 

7. Finished lineart? There are some mistakes which I later corrected in PS. Notice that Aziraphale’s face has hardly any details on it - I tried to make the drawing suggest his expression rather than risk overdoing it. 

8. Photoshop time!! You can totally do what I did here even if you don’t have a graphic tablet. I used Curves tool to enhance the lineart, then Quick Selection Tool to select the background around around my sticker-like piece and filled it white (on a new layer ofc). I keep this white layer on top of the layer order so it works as a mask as I colour. I decided I did not like the hatching shading underneath Aziraphale’s halo, so I erased it with a Stamp tool (because I wanna keep the textured grey fill my crap paper naturally gives me!). It’s done roughly but won’t be visible once the thing is coloured. 

9. And the reason why I keep the grey shade instead of easily getting rid of it by using Curves/Levels is because when I set this layer to Multiply mode and colour underneath, it gives me this nice desaturated look like from an old cheap paper comic page. It works as a natural filter! But of course I can’t do bright colours this way, so all my glowing highlights happen ABOVE the lineart layer - on a separate layer in Overlay mode! 

Finished thing here!

_____

Commission infoBuy Me a Coffee - help me with my transitioning expenses!Prints and stickers and things on my Redbubble!

#ask the buckwheat #long post #tutorial #drawing advice #drawing tutorial #good omens #ineffable husbands #good omens fanart #good omens art #my illustrations #doodles #toastedbuckwheat