#this was just a story i've had 2/3 finished on my laptop for months that i wanted to publish and finish

[thatgirliehan]

reflection: Her

Description: An idol who loves art and a museum curator who makes art. With their slightly crazy friends, a 9-week deadline , a world tour, and a big secret, what could possibly go wrong?

NOTE: This is a fanfiction. Any resemblance to actual people is a coincidence. This story is from my brain and not real life.

My phone dinged right as I got off the bus. I glanced down as I start walking, it was a calendar alert "BTS concert TOMORROW". My heart skipped a beat and I couldnt help but do a quick happy dance. It's finaly happening, the thing I had been waiting on for MONTHS was finally tomorrow! With that happy reminder in the back of my head I waltzed through the doors of the museum where I worked, ready to start another day, a little happier than normal. "Good morning y/n", said Bill the front door guard "you seem a lot more awake today than normal, finally get coffee before work?" "Ha. Ha. Ha Bill, you're hilarious! The concert I've been waiting absolute months for is finally tomorrow, I'm just super excited!" "Oh, those pretty boys you constantly listen to, right?" said Bill. "Theyre called BTS Bill" I mumbled under my breath. Bill is about 70 years old and is like my work Grandpa. I love him to death, but he doesnt really get the whole kpop thing, he's more of a Willy Nelson type.

"Well, I need to go!" I said as I started walking away. "With the head curator and the other junior curator off at a conference for the rest of the week, I was the one basically running the museum. I was freaking out at first when they told me that they were BOTH going, I mean, I've only been working here 2 years, and I am the junior, JUNIOR curator. That means I get the fun jobs of writing up the placks for the art, or at most dusting the art. I'm not even allowed to touch the art by myself yet, you have to be a junior curator for that.

I get to my desk, because junior JUNIOR curators dont have an office, just a desk in the supply room (closet) and set my purse down on my desk. It was 30 minutes to 10, which was when we opened. I still had time to dust the main exhibit and turn on all the lights before I had to open the doors. My art museum was a small one, but we had a few really good pieces from some very famous artists, so we drew a modest crowd every day. Honestly, I was really lucky to have this job. Not many people get their dream job right out of college. I popped in an airpod and turned on my favorite cleaning playlist. Mic drop shuffled on first so of course I danced the chorus as I dusted, dropping my duster at the end of the song like Suga.

I finish up all of my opening tasks and head back to the front desk, as I'm straightening some pamphlets in the front desk, I hear my phone chime. I look down at the screen and see an alert that says "Sorry y/n, I'm throwing up everywhere, I'm not gonna make it to work today. Xoxo Minha" "Greaaaatttttttttttttttttttttttt", I think, my good mood vanishing in a flash, I'm completely alone today. Minha is my friend and a year younger than me, she works the front desk. With her gone, I'm going to have to do her job...and then it hits me. I'm ALONE. And I'm supposed to be researching and writing the placks for the new exhibit thats coming next week. Greattttttttttttt. I check the time, 5 minutes before opening. "Shiitttttttttttttrake mushrooms" I mutter under my breath as I run to my office...ok desk....and frantically grab my laptop, planner, 3 enormous reference books and my pouch and run back to the front desk. Looks like I'm going to be doing both today. "Curse you Minha", I think to myself as I drop everything on the front desk. I check my phone and I still have 3 and a half minutes till opening. Which is good, because since I hadn't expected to be at the front desk, I had only done minimal makeups....and in my personal experience, people were nicer when I had a more girly makeup style. I grabbed my pouch and got out my favorite (fine, only) yves saint laurent lip tint, it was a beautiful shiny coral pink color and it made me feel like I was a member of twice. I popped it on my lips and went to unlock the door. If I was lucky, maybe it would be an extra slow day and I would be able to get the rest of the placks done.

I....was not lucky. It was a very busy morning. So busy that I didn't have a single minute to even look at my reference books until 12:30. There was finally a lull as the morning crowd left so I grabbed my reference books and laptop and got to work typing up those placks. I was so engrossed in my research that I didnt notice someone had walked up to the front desk until I heard "uh, excuse me". I was so startled that I let out a high pitched yelp, jumping out of my chair, knocking it over.

Standing at the front desk was a boy. Man? He was very tall, wearing fashionable street wear, a baseball cap that shieled his eyes and a mask covering the lower half of his face.

"Ohmygoodness, I'm so sorry, I didn't realize anyone was there!" I said quickly, closing my laptop and picking my chair up from the ground.

"Uh...sorry, I didn't mean to surprise you" the man said in a low, soft voice.

#kim namjoon #bts #bts rm #fanfic #bangtan #art #namjoon x reader #namjoon x y/n #bts rm fanfic #fluff #bts fluff #rm scenarios #bts x you #bts scenarios

[catboyrichardkarinsky]

favourite book

book i most recently read

favourite song/album

song/album im listening to rn

favourite tv show/movie

tv show/movie i most recently watched

favourite video game

video game i most recently played

video game i wish i could experience for the first time again

tv show/movie i wish i could experience for the first time again

song/album i wish i could experience for the first time again

book i wish i could experience for the first time again

musical artist i wish had more of a fandom

game i wish had more of a fandom

tv show/movie i wish had more of a fandom

book i wish had more of a fandom

go-to comfort album

go-to comfort book

go-to comfort tv show/movie

go-to chill game

tell me literally everything actually

bro that's literally everything

1. favorite book: ngl I've only really read fanfiction lately and i doubt that counts so I might just skip some of these questions sorry

2. book you most recently read: Uncle of the year by Andrew Rannells but I keep procrastinating on finishing it even though it's really good

3. favorite song/album: for song Our time from Merrily we roll along for album The journey home by Malcolm Gets

4. song/album im listening to rn: well right now I'm not listening to music but generally I listen to literally any merrily we roll along from 1994 and 2023 cast recordings all the time

5. favorite tv show/movie: for tv show without a doubt Caroline in the city and for movie it's a tie between Tick tick boom and Howard the duck which is a sentence no one other than me would say

6. tv show/movie you most recently watched: well technically if you count a merrily we roll along bootleg it's that but if you don't count it for tv show last i watched was Community and for movie i think last one I actively watched was West side story

7. favorite video game: I'm not much of a gamer but uhh i guess The sims 4? that's a game I actually have on my laptop that i haven't touched in months

8. video game most recently played: idk if mobile games count, if they do then. brick shooter game i have on my phone. if not then yeah ts4 several months ago i really don't touch my laptop too often lately

9. video game i wish i could experience for the first time again: Monkey island 🥺 it was such a big part of my childhood I miss it so much

10. tv show/movie i wish i could experience for the first time again: for tv show Caroline in the city but specifically I want to experience it watching it one episode at a time instead of getting addicted to it, and in movie uhh literally any musical pro shot/bootleg i literally need to experience musicals for the first time again. especially Falsettos and Into the woods

11. song/album i wish i could experience for the first time again: Unlikely lovers from Falsettos and Our time from Merrily. Songs that changed my life honestly

12. book i wish i could experience for the first time again: Felix does not read much, shocking information. i have no memory of any book i ever read and it's a problem

13. musical artist i wish had more of a fandom: does Malcolm Gets count? yes he does

14. game i wish had more of a fandom: once again, monkey island, my beloved

15. tv show/movie i wish had more of a fandom: CAROLINE IN THE CITY. PLEASE.

17. go-to comfort album: merrily we roll along cast recordings, what does this say about my mental health that i consider that comfort

19. go-to comfort tv show/movie: Caroline in the city and Howard the duck still. though with Caroline in the city I have to choose my episodes wisely because some of them do the opposite of comfort for me

20. go-to chill game: still not much of a gamer, still gonna say ts4 for the third time, it's all i have

[backjustforberena]

20 questions for fic writers

Thank you to @joycieillustrations for tagging me. And whomever reads this, if you want to consider this me tagging you then go for it! But here we go, here are my answers. Dear Lordy, I'd forgotten about some of these fics until I had to tot up the word count.

1. How many works do you have on Ao3?

I have 25. Some completed, some... not so much.

2. What's your total Ao3 word count?

Total word count is: 174,231 words.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

I'm only actively writing "House of the Dragon". And actively is a strong word. Sometimes I look fondly on my "Holby City" (specifically the ship 'Berena') unfinished fics and the notes I still have and half-finished chapters, but I leave them be for now. Unless someone decides to bug me (by which I mean, offer a hand and lend an ear).

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

- Me Before You AU - a Berena retelling of the book/film. - Run And Hit - a Berena AU. - Home Now - a Berena AU. - Losing Her Would Be Infinitely More Terrifying Than Loving Her - a Berena AU. - A Fresh Page - a Berena AU.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Generally, I don't, unless it's been a mean comment or they've asked me something specifically. Otherwise, I know I won't reply to all and so I get anxious about responding to any! And I'm British - you try giving a British person a compliment, you see how they find it!

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

From my completed works? Shoot. I'm not sure if I'm the best judge of that. Most of them do include angst. But if they're angsty multi-chapters, then they're going to end on a happier note. And if they're an angsty one-shot, then the angst isn't just contained to the ending, it starts from the first word!

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Looking at finished works... I have written some fluff.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I have done on one of my fics. That was "Deep Waters". That was not fun at all, but equally, I had some really lovely comments on that fic as well. Moral of the story - don't write Daemon Targaryen in anything but a good light and certainly don't have Rhaenys act independently and with emotion. Woe betide you if you do! ;)

9. Do you write smut?

Nope.

10. Do you write crossovers?

I haven't yet.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Not that I know of.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No. I bounce ideas off of people and get input but I've never strictly "co-written" a fic. I'd welcome it though. It might get something finished!

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

I enjoy many a ship but it's Corlys and Rhaenys that occupy my brain presently. I'm pretty sure though, if you pricked my interest again, that Berena would not be far away. They were a very, very good ship.

15. What's the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

How long do you have? In more seriousness, any and all of my Holby ones. But the most recent of those was "My Tears Richocet", which I did plan out quite a bit, but got derailed by the end of Holby City and the resolution of the plotline that I was re-writing. But I still love the idea; Bernie Wolfe was rescued three months after being declared dead, and returning to Holby, confronting everything she left behind and trying to not love the woman who rejected her and yet mourned for her. But the one most easily finished is probably another Holby fic; "Someone You Love" as it was a remix between two episodes, so it has a set ending, I know where the plot is going, it's outlined somewhere on my laptop and would only be a chapter more. Two at the most.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I have writing strengths?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Finishing things! Describing things! Overthinking things!

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I have used some High Valyrian. Very, very minimal High Valryian. I also have a very clever, wonderful friend, to whom I can go to for advice on High Valyrian. But that's it. No other languages. It's not something I seek out.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Doctor Who. Wayy back when, on fanfiction.net.

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

Oh, gosh! I really love some of the "House of the Dragon" stuff I've written, simply because I've adored looking at the political aspect of it all and just generally trying to think out the consequences of various changes. Others, from "Holby", I love but they are rarely finished so I will have to say "losing her would be infinitely more terrifying than loving her" - only because it's complete (woo hoo) but also because it was quite a turning point for me. I'd never written something so action-packed, that needed to have a specific tone and pace. I was rather chuffed I could pull it off and it was well received.

[kholran]

Twenty questions for fic writers

Tagged by @lucientelrunya Thank you friend!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

26

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

219,573

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Only DMBJ right now, but I have written for The Hobbit and Les Mis in the past.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

I Will Go Now To My Pyre (254)

And Here My Troubles Begin (246)

When the Stars Align (212)

I Get By (211)

Skin Deep (197)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I try to! Sometimes I am Very Bad at remembering to do it, and I end up replying like months later. But I value every single comment I get, and I want to let the commenter know that I'm grateful they took the time to not just read but say something.

6. What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Hmm... I always try to end on a hopeful note, if not an outright happy one. I did write a Barduil (The Hobbit) ficlet here on Tumblr where the reveal is angsty, so I guess that one.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Again, I usually try to end in a happy place. I guess I'll say Ordinary World, because (spoiler alert) the world is saved, the 'ships are all together, and everyone is content.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Not really. I did get one comment on an unfinished fic where the person made an (incorrect) assumption of where it was going, and then judged the fic based on that assumption. IDK if they actually made it to the end when it *was* finished. They never did comment again.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yep, I do. Usually as part of a larger plot/story. I don't really like writing smut just for smut's sake. But as long as there's some plot around it, then I don't shy away from it.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

In the traditional sense of the word (characters from one thing meeting characters from another thing) then no. I'm not a big fan of that, either writing or reading. But I LOVE me a good fusion fic, and I've written many of those. I'd say the Les Mis/Les Amis Titanic fic is the "craziest" but it's not a crackfic by any means.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I'm aware of.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Hmm I don't think so?

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I used to do a ton of forum-based RP, which is basically just collaborative writing. If you look closely, you can still see that influence. I tend to write from the POV of one character at a time, although now I'm writing all of the characters myself, and only switch when there's a natural break/need to change.

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

That I've written? RiSang, hands down. But I also have a ton of favourite ships that I've never written for. I think maybe Alucard/Integra (Hellsing/Ultimate) is at the top of that list? It's been one of my faves for a very long time, in any case. As has Zechs/Noin (Gundam Wing). And honourable mention to Weilan (Guardian) and Wenzhou (Word of Honour) for being more recent, but consuming my every brain wave ever since I watched those shows.

15. What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

The Weilan mermaid AU I still have sitting in my laptop's Docs folder. I had the whole thing planned out but then RiSang happened and that's all I've been able to focus on writing ever since.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I'm pretty good at setting scenes? Like the atmosphere and setting, and who the characters are in the particular universe I'm writing at the time.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Abuse of adverbs and em-dashes, but you can pry both of those out of my cold dead hands. Oh also natural dialogue. I am an awkward human person who can't carry on a conversation to save my life and it shows.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

Dialogue, not so much. I will occasionally use a word, phrase, or title (like Fuguan or Tianzhen or Heipaoshi) if it's something I'm sure is common knowledge of the fandom, but apart from French, I'm not fluent enough in any language to trust my ability to write realistic and grammatically correct dialogue in it.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

When I was in like fifth grade, I was obsessed with Baywatch (don't judge me). So me and my friend made original characters and wrote out like little stories about them and the show's characters hanging out.

20. Favorite fic you've written?

I think my favourite has to be Pyre. RiSang got me back into writing after I had a massive confidence crash and spent 5 years not writing anything. I'm also very proud of Ordinary World. It's my longest fic to date, and, in my own humble opinion, one of the tightest plots I've ever written. I can reread it and not be bored, even though I wrote it.

Tagging: @merinnan @hils79 @xantissa @eirenical @saxgoddess25 and uhhh @amidalogicdive (Only if you want to! No pressure!)

#things i'm tagged in #writer things

[idonthaveanyurlideas]

sorry if this has been asked before but i'd love to know your process for creating animatics. not only are they so incredibly fluid and perfect to the music but they're COLORED! absolutely inspiring. i'd love to know what you do for planning and editing, basically how to put an animatic together in general. i use procreate to make art but other than that i'm completely clueless on how to make animatics

ooooh okay i would LOVE to tell you!!!! So first things first I will say that my animatic process is probably not the most like. Efficient way to do it. I'm not an artistic expert and I'm very self-taught so this is just what I've come up with over the years with the resources I had.

This has ended up VERY long so I'm sticking a read more in

All that to say I have two main programs that I use, one to draw (Medibang Paint Pro) and one to put the frames together for my animatics (Davinci Resolve). These days, I have both of these programs on my laptop so I have everything on one device. Before I had my current laptop, I used Medibang Paint on my iPad and iMovie on my laptop, but the overall process is basically the same.

So. I have five main stages of making an animatic once I have a song and a character/narrative in mind.

Stage 0 is arguably the most important stage, which is deciding it's something I for real want to do. Making an animatic is a big commitment, so it has to be something im 100% on board with or I'll get bored before I finish it. So usually when I hear a song and I think "oh I can apply that to x character" I'll have to listen to that song on repeat for at least a few weeks just to iron out the story in my head, decide what moment I'm going to put with each lyric, basically plot out the narrative internally.

This stage is a bit different for every animatic. For some of them, like the Snackrifice as an example, I heard the song for the very first time and went: i know EXACTLY how this is going to go and then I went home and started planning it out immediately. Others, like Aequitas Aug, I had the song as a vague "oh this is Coin vibes" for months before Expansion Era ended and I finally knew I had all the material I would need for a full cohesive narrative. And then a bit longer to really decide "okay so the redactions are going to be at this point, the semicentennial will be at This moment" and so on.

I have a whole playlist full of songs that I COULD make into animatics that I vibe to on a regular basis, basically marinating them until I have enough content and ideas to start actually planning them out into an animatic.

Stage 1 is scripting it out: I write out all the lyrics of the song, count up how many beats correspond to each line, and plan out what I'm going to do with each section. As an example here's a portion of my script for Miguel's first animatic Autoignition. As you can see my script is often pretty loose and jokey at myself, because I already kinda know what I want it to look like by the time I start scripting it, this is just to get it down for pacing and to fill in any gaps.

[Image ID: Screenshot of white writing on a dark background. There are eight lines, alternating between bolded writing to signify planned action, and regular writing to signify the lyrics of the song Everybody Loves Me by OneRepublic. Line 1, in bold: Uh oh Zack is fallin into fire and hell and disintegrating ur gonna earn that content warning. Line 2, regular: And you don't have to make a Line 3: Miguel left alone at edge of Solarium :) fire everywhere :) big f Line 4: Sound 'Cause they got what you Line 5: Miguel falls to her knees for a moment, stunned. Line 6: Need. What you need Line 7: Then he runs away Line 8: Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh /end ID]

Stage 2 I do my actual draft. I do every frame as a very quick sketch. This stage is where I put all my frames into Divinci Resolve and match it all up to the beats of the song. I work out my timings, I figure out if I need to add/delete frames somewhere. The majority of the fiddly work happens here in terms of lining it all up to the music. All the frames look about as basic as this lmao the idea is Quick and To the point so i get can idea of what I'm working with. Very often I'll have figures in this draft stage where, as an example, I know I'll need to put players from the Flowers or the Dale from a certain point in time, but I haven't decided exactly who yet, so they're just vague humanoid blobs.

[Image ID: A very basic sketch with black lines on a white background, showing two figures facing away from the camera with loose lines showing the ground exploding in the distance. /end ID]

Stage 3 is Lineart, and this stage takes the longest because I'm actually doing the proper drawings for everything. I don't do colouring yet, because this stage takes so Long and I prefer to do my colouring all in one go so I can keep it consistent. it also allows me to catch any errors that I might make in my Lineart because I get to go over it again when I colour. This is where I make my final decisions on who all the extra characters are that show up that don't Really need to be there.

When it comes to deciding Who Gets To Appear in the Animatic, there are a few tiers.

Characters that NEED to be there for plot/emotional reasons (think like Nagomi Mcdaniel appearing in Alaynabella because Layna switched with her for the Shadows)

Characters that I want to put in there for theme reasons (think Luis Acevedo in Hall Stars, I included them as a cameo because they were later incinerated and the whole animatic was about incinerated players)

Characters that I like/my friends like (Esme and Howell making appearances at the start of Aequitas Aug)

Characters that are just easier to draw, depending on how many times I have to draw them and how tired I am at the time (when in doubt, I tend to default to humanoid characters with reasonably simple designs. If I'm like 400 frames in on Aequitas Aug and I have to choose between horse person Winnie Hess and regular human Eizabeth Guerra to help represent the Breath Mints getting got, I'm gonna go with Eizabeth even if Winnie is technically more iconic and recognisable.)

[Image ID: Lineart of a digital drawing showing Miguel James and Zack Sanders as humans, facing away from the camera and looking towards the ground exploding in the distance. Miguel is kneeling on the ground while Zack is standing. /end ID]

And so of course Stage 4 is Colour. I add in the colours, any lighting effects, all the extra fun bits.

My colouring is USUALLY pretty basic, to save time and effort. For colours that I tend to reuse a lot (typically sunbeams uniforms and the main colours for the various beams) I have them saved in my paint app so I can access them easily. For other players I've drawn before I usually have to bring up one of my previous drawings to reference the colours. Backgrounds are the bane of my existence and as thus are usually kept as simple as possible, and lighting is typically something I use sparingly. Basically, I take as many shortcuts as I possibly can to save my sanity.

[Image ID: The above picture but with basic colour. The background is a pale orange. There are some lighting effects on the explosion. /end ID]

And voila! Off to Youtube. Like I said above, I'm sure this isn't the quote unquote 'Best' way to do it. But it works for me, and doing it in these stages give me a fun little progress video to look back on when I'm slogging through the lineart stage.

It's definitely really tedious at times, and keeping up the motivation to do hundreds of frames three times in a row can be really difficult (especially with a full time job) but it's definitely sooooo exciting when I finally finish. I publish all the draft and lineart videos on youtube as well as unlisted videos, and its always fun to look back on them to see the difference between the draft and the final finished product.

Most of all though, it took me AGES to get to the point of animatic making where I am now. My very first animatics for Dimension 20 were SO different to what I do now, and I was very lucky for a while to have a lot of free time to focus on doing it a lot. My VERY first animatic wasn't even set to a song. It was from a Fantasy High clip, and i never got past the draft stage for it.

The other part of animatic making that I had to start taking really seriously was character design credit. For Quite a while, I did not include credits for designs of players that I did not create. It wasn't until Aequitas Aug (which had an OBSCENE number of players) that I realised what a massive oversight that was. Nowadays I have a big spreadsheet that lists every Blaseball player that has ever appeared in my animatics and the creator of the design that I used/riffed off of if I could narrow it down to one or two. For some players its trickier, often because their design was consistent over multiple artists or I couldn't be sure what the origin was, but I do my best to be as accurate as possible. If you're looking to make some blaseball animatics, I totally encourage you to do so, but I would advise getting on top of credits sooner rather than later! It's so much easier to add in new characters and their designers now as I find them rather than trying to backtrack and remember exactly which picture on the wiki I took inspiration from, along with it being a lot more respectful to all the other amazing artists in the fandom.

Overall, animatics are a lot of effort, but they're soooo worth it. If you have any more questions please feel free to ask me, I love to talk about my animatics and my process.

#ask #my art #animatics #long post #i hope this is helpful!!! #legitimately feel free to ask me more questions or send me a dm #i love to talk about myself and my work

[bryony-rebb]

15., 24., 35.

15. If you could choose one of your fics to be filmed, which would you choose?

Oh my gosh, this is a toughie! I'm not sure many of my fics would lend themselves to film very well, most of them are probably too short to be worth the bother honestly. Or incomplete! ^^; I reckon it'd have to be either Homecoming or Nowhere Land, and I will go with, mmm, Nowhere Land, phew, choice made.

24. Have you ever deleted one of your published fics?

Yes. Beyond the Walls. My first major effort in the GW fandom. I can't remember how old I was when I finished it but I posted the first chapter to the WuSal ML on my 14th birthday (ah, those golden ML days lol). Then pretty much the day after I posted the last chapter on fanfiction.net I got a comment that was like, this ending was not very strong and I was like, Reader! Yes! You are correct! I will immediately delete this story and make it better and re-post it when that is done.

I completed Step 1- delete the story, but in a shocking and completely unpredictable twist of events, just... somehow never got around to Step 2. Although up until about a month ago I still had the file saved on my old laptop so it could theoretically still be recoverable?

The saddest part is that it remains the longest thing I've ever written (it was, actually, too long tbh; the revisions I never got round to making would have mostly entailed cutting out all the guff). I also remain keenly aware that I'm crap at writing endings, but I'm pretty much just resigned to that now.

Anyway, I don't delete fanfics anymore, even when they're terrible.

35. Would you ever kill off a canon character?

Every. Damn. Day.

Thank you for the ask, friend! <3

#meme

[shazuiashan]

Hi everyone! My name is Shanly Rose Tiro Casuna; call me "Shan" for short. I am 18 years old. I live in Purok Beauty in the Sky, Timpolok Babag 2, and Lapu-Lapu City. Do you want to know what my life is like? (Chismosa! Char!)) 

So here's the story of my life! Throwback: When I was 6 months old, my papa died because he had leukemia stage 4. He never told anyone that he was sick, not until he always felt that his head was always aching and that all of his body had a lot of black dots, and that was the symptom of his illness. All of my uncle's brothers rushed him to the hospital. When they arrived at the hospital, the doctor checked him and found out that my father has leukemia cancer stage 4, and it is too late to make him heal because it is already stage 4 cancer. All of my uncle's and mama's children cried because of my father's situation. After a week, my father decides to go home because he doesn't want to die at the hospital because there's no chance to live long, he said.

My grandma didn't agree with my father's decisions, but that's what he wanted. My grandma told the doctor that they wanted to go home, and when they got home, my mama always cried because she didn't want to see that my father was suffering. My father loses hope because he says that he will no longer live. My father's situations became more difficult, and he said he wanted to rest because he was tired, but before he died, he told my mom and my uncle's to take care of me, never let anyone hurt me, and love me like their own daughter. After my father said that, he had already closed his eyes. Everyone is crying except me because I don't even know what's happening because I'm just a 6-month-old baby.

Fast forward: after 3 years, my mother found another guy, who is my mother's husband right now. When my mama and her husband lived together in the same house, my life became miserable. My mother's attention was always on her husband. Her husband doesn't want my mother to take care of me; he always says that my tita will take care of me because he wants my mother's attention.

When my mama's husband went abroad, I was very happy because my mama's attention was all mine, but I was wrong. Every time they always do "facetime," my mother's attention is always on her laptop, and mine? I'm just nothing. I always cry when mama and his husband are on "facetime." Every time my mama picks me up, his husband always says, "Put her down." My tita is always there for me, and she is very angry at my mother's new husband. Even though I'm just 3 years old, I already understand the situation.

When I was 6 years old, her husband got home from abroad on vacation for one month. My mama got pregnant for their first son, who is 15 years old now. When I was in 5th grade, I felt something wrong about my mother's husband—the way he stared at me—something was wrong, but I didn't mind it. Until I was in 6th grade, he harassed me. I've had trauma until now; anxiety has always attacked me. I don't want to communicate with others because I'm scared. I'm no longer going to explain this more because it's too complicated.

My childhood is not good; I don't have a lot of good memories of my childhood because I'm always at home, always do the housework, and at a very young age, a 5-year-old Shanly always does the dishes and cleans the house. They don't let me play outside if I can't finish the chores. I always think that it is unfair for me because other kids are playing outside while I'm just at the house. I don't have a lot of toys because they don't want to buy them for me, even Barbie. I always wanted to have a Barbie, but they always say that it's just a waste of money. They can afford to buy some remote controls and robots for my brother, but when it comes to me, it's just a waste of money.

Every time I see a kid like me who has a Barbie doll, I become jealous. How can they have a Barbie doll while I can't? How unfair is that? They have a lot of toys and can play outside, but I can't. But I always tell myself that it's okay; I can play with myself and make my own toys.

Now, I have two brothers, one 15 years old and one 7 years old. I am very grateful that I have them. And I am thankful that they never experienced what I did when I was a kid. Well, we all know that life is hard and challenging. Just always put your trust in Jesus Christ; everything will be alright, and everything will be fine in His name. He will always guide us.

Thank you for reading...

[01turnkill]

2024 Media Post Time - Master

3. Pokemon Violet (Replayed)

Last year my Nintendo Switch tragically broke while I was playing Splatoon 3... No idea what was wrong with it. I even learned how to take it apart and put it back together but it was really really lost and the bad thing about that is I lost all of my Pokemon save data that is stored on the console. Pokemon games are some of the only games that do not back up save data to the cloud so... it was lost. I am lucky Splatoon 3 backs up data because Splatoon 2 doesn't.

Since I know Violet will have about a year more raids and events before there's nothing more, I really wanted to play it and make a team again. I missed out on the Walking Wake and Iron Leaves raids. I also thought this would be the perfect time to get the DLC though I haven't played through it yet. When I do I'll make another media post about it.

I finished Violet on release and did a lot of shiny hunting and grinded raids for a couple months before going to do other things. Finished the dex and everything... so it was pretty troublesome to do it all again. Originally it took me about 120 hours before it was freeplay mode. What was lost.. 2 shiny Vaporeon, 2 shiny Veluza, 2 shiny Ceruledge, 2 shiny Iron Valiant, 1 shiny Slowbro, 1 shiny Magneton, 1 shiny Magnezone...and more I must have forgotten about. I even had 3 shiny Veluza at one point but decided to surprise trade one away. I love having multiple of my favourite things.

This time I wanted to play quickly while also finishing the dex, and managed to do it in 45 hours with the help of a couple friends and a lot of surprise trading. I skipped most of the dialogue and didn't explore like I did originally.

I really like this game! I have a few criticisms but I am going to be somewhat of a defender of it. Don't get me wrong it has the worst performance, the kind I expect from me playing anything on my laptop, and it was made for the console so there isn't an excuse. On the Switch Lite which I borrowed to play, the NPCs in all the towns don't even load in before their dialogue. I once waited 30 seconds for the Poke Center nurse to load in just so I could heal.

Regardless it's very fun. Lots of optimisations and quality of life changes that we saw in Legends Arceus. While it removes specialty NPCs I don't miss it....

Somewhat on that track, this game lacks a reason to go back to the towns and cities apart from sandwich ingredients. I wish there were special events or battles to participate in or something like that, more like the battle cafe or even a daily puzzle or a proper game... Lots could be done.

The story is something I really love in this game. Just like in Legends Arceus the character focus was really strong and it makes it feel a lot like PMD in those ways.. It's also a little harrowing just the implications of everything and very existential the way all time travelling stories tend to be. I've got a big sci fi bias so of course I liked that a lot. Pokemon does do sci fi but this was in a different way. The false professor and the genuine professor. I love mixed consciousness and robots like that. To make it better I'd want more quests to do with area zero investigating throughout Paldea outside of the occult books (which are cool though).

Anyway basically I hate the warriors of mid, Pokemon SV are good.

#ksh #my collection #ksh media post

[the-rogue-mockingjay]

2023 goals!! ✨️

Now that things are finally settling down, it's goal time!

We'll see how well I can balance my ambition with what's practical lol. I can't control what my brain hyperfixates on so I'm leaving myself wiggle room in regards to my goals, but as far as writing goes:

by the end of 2023, have made progress towards getting Going Over Jordan fully edited + posted at least, if something happens and I can't get it done and posted this year

polish + post what I can from NaNo

write at least a couple drabbles for my new and improved DAI canon!

write some notes, a drabble or two if I can about my secondary DA canon

finish DAO. Please. I've never done it. First the Fade, then the forest absolutely walloping me, and I lost a lot of progress (somehow not all) when my laptop died. Please I just wanna finish the game T^T so that I can mayhaps write about Revarien and Tamlen, or Revarien and Alistair

Finish Eden's DAI playthrough. All these years I've had the game, on PC AND CONSOLE, and I've only managed to play the dlcs ONCE. That's a crying shame!! Especially since I rushed through Trespasser the first time!! I want to slow down and enjoy them this time. Jaws of Hakkon in particular is a gorgeous place/quest, but good lord, getting there is a slog....I'm so tired of the Hinterlands, Crestwood, and the Western Approach, boss.......I just wanna get to the fun stuff T^T

I want to write about Eden again. Returning to her is like reuniting with an old friend. I've revamped her a bit, since I was 13 or 14 when I created her and I'm 20 now, and I want to find her new voice. Sharper, clearer, stronger now

come up with a plot for the original story I've got rolling around my brain. I haven't done original works since 2016ish, so I'm looking forward to getting back into it, even just a little bit

Finish a set of OC Microfic prompts. I've had them sitting around in a doc for months and I'd like to finally get em done

Write 1 (one) Fallout 4 piece. I love that game so much and I'd like to actually sit down and scribble a story about it

Finish the ME1 section of Marian's autobiography, and ME2 if possible

Figure out how to pace myself with FFXIV so that I can finish A Realm Reborn without giving myself weeks-long migraines again 🥴🥴🥴

Similarly, find some nice new books to read - I'm thinking 2 or 3 - and pace myself so that I don't get migraines. I guess that's the theme this year: get back to doing the things I love but in a way I don't hurt myself in the process

The new thing I'd like to try this year is writing something that has zero OCs. None. Just canon characters. I'm thinking Legend of Vox Machina or Devil May Cry. Even if my attempt doesn't turn out the way I wanted it to, it would be a huge milestone

Every year has its curveballs, some good, some bad...I'm looking forward to seeing what this year has in store :3

#rogue writes #yeah it took me like 2 weeks to figure out what i wanna do this year. i am indecisive lmao

[the-slow-arrow]

I posted 17,801 times in 2022

10 posts created (0%)

17,791 posts reblogged (100%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@mainly-dumbassery

@wrennette

@letsboldlygomotherfuckers

@robinasnyder

@hot-multifandom-mess

I tagged 1,602 of my posts in 2022

#dreamling - 197 posts

#obi wan kenobi spoilers - 192 posts

#mass effect - 33 posts

#q - 31 posts

#ofmd - 28 posts

#star wars - 22 posts

#fanart - 21 posts

#oh my god - 19 posts

#obi wan kenobi - 19 posts

#lmao - 18 posts

Longest Tag: 129 characters

#i don’t really read wips so if the author says it’s all already written i’ll be a lot more likely to read it than if they haven’t

I sent 1 gift in 2022

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

For the weird writing ask game :

19. Tell me a story about your writing journey. When did you start? Why did you start? Were there bumps along the way? Where are you now and where are you going?

21. Could you ever quit writing? Do you ever wish you could? Why or why not?

22. How organized are you with your writing? Describe to me your organization method, if it exists. What tools do you use? Notebooks? Binders? Apps? The Cloud?

Alrighty, you had to pick questions that required thought didn't you cat 😂

19. I started writing fic when I was like...12? 13? Me and my friend got into RPF and we'd write fic for each other and then gush over the people we were writing about. I remember her handwriting fic and giving it to me in an envelope in school and I'd have to wait until break to tear into it lmao. I'm sure I still have some of them somewhere actually...But then the obsession faded and the fic writing dropped away and I didn't pick it up again until I was 21. I read a lot of fic in between but didn't think I was any good at actually writing it, but then I was tryna get to sleep one night and a harry potter fic popped into my head and just would not leave me alone until I wrote the damn thing down. That was it though, until a few months later when I joined an amazing quiobi server and was tempted into writing for a prompt challenge they held, and voila! Here I am 2 years and 108 fics later! I wouldn't say I'm going anywhere with my writing except that I want to keep improving from where I started, and I just enjoy it so much (despite writer's block and the agonising over doing the actual, y'know, writing) and how it can be such a personal form of expression that I've never really had access to before. And I'll be forever glad I was tempted back into it because of the friends I've made along the way that are incredible people and have given me so much support

21. I want to say yes to this cos I don't need to write—like I know some people absolutely have to write to clear the clutter from their brain and that's so valid but it's not like that for me—but then I get stories or pieces of dialogue or introspection barreling its way into my head that won't leave me alone until I get it onto paper. So no, I don't think I could quit writing, and I'll never wish that I could so long as I enjoy it

22. Not. At. All. It's a chaotic mess, there is no rhyme or reason to when, where or what I write. I write on google docs and kinda use it as a conveyor belt kinda thing. So all my prompts and wips and random bits of dialogue or story ideas go in there and then when they're finished I download the finished fics to my laptop and then delete them from my google drive. It's very satisfying, like crossing something off a to-do list

2 notes - Posted June 7, 2022

#4

Hello lils! For the writer ask game : has a comment someone left on a fic of yours ever made you laugh out loud?

CAAAT! Very good question but I’d have to say your comments 😂 I love your outrage in my inbox when I’m mean to the boys, it’s addictive

2 notes - Posted April 17, 2022

#3

For the ask game : NEXT <3

Oh cat that's just cruel, making me write

Quiobi regency au just for you: "Qui-Gon grips the sketchbook with a shaky hand. “This is how you see me?”"

Ask game

3 notes - Posted June 7, 2022

#2

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: The Sandman (TV 2022) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Dream of the Endless | Morpheus/Hob Gadling Characters: Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, Hob Gadling Additional Tags: Post Episode: s01e06 The Sound of Her Wings, Developing Relationship, Pre-Slash, Drunkenness, Hob is drunk, Dream is fondly exasperated Summary:

Lesson number one: don’t try and keep pace with an immortal being when drinking.

Spoiler: Hob fails at lesson number one.

Inspired by @fulcrvm‘s post about Ferdinand Kingsley’s twitter bio

33 notes - Posted September 10, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: The Sandman (TV 2022) Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Dream of the Endless | Morpheus/Hob Gadling Characters: Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, Hob Gadling Additional Tags: Post Episode: s01e06 The Sound of Her Wings, Friends to Lovers, Hob demands compensation for Dream being 30 years late, Dream graciously obliges Summary:

In hindsight, pressing the King of Dreams, an endlessly immortal being of unfathomable power, against the wall of The New Inn is probably not one of Hob’s best ideas.

76 notes - Posted September 9, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#tumblr2022 #year in review #my 2022 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

[darkisrising]

do you have an update schedule for your fics or just whenever you feel like it? sorry trying not to be pushy but im just So Excited about all your fics and i check every day for an update for any of them!!!! youre a great writer and the queen of bobadinluke

Aw <3 thank you that's so sweet to say! I appreciate your enthusiasm so much! So.... short answer is no, there's no real schedule, just whenever I feel like. But if you want the longer, truer answer...

So it really comes down to what's going on in my life. I've got kids, so everything is written in the free time I can cobble together dealing with that hot mess scenario, first and foremost. Like, last month my kid's class had to quarantine cuz there was covid in the class. So then it was 2 weeks of virtual school and there was no free time with that. Or, like, if the toddler has a sleep regression? HA no, no writing will be done for some time. After that, the schedule goes as follows: In Other Words (or whatever The Big project is)... only if I've had enough sleep to think straight. Or haven't been drinking the night before. This is the fic I try to bring my A game to, so I only ever touch it if I trust myself to not fuck it up. I do work on it a lot, though. Like, the current chapter is 3/4ths done. I just need to have some clear-brained days to get it finished Drabbles... whenever my brain is mush from RL or not sleeping and I still have an itch to write. This is when I can only trust myself to write 100 words at a time. Also, that one time I murdered my laptop and could only write on my phone. Same goes for Tumblr prompts and ask games Sex Worker AU... if something happens to spark an idea. This story has absolutely no plan. I liken it to an ugly house that every new owner just adds a new wing to, it just keeps growing with no discernable shape or concern for aesthetics. Prison AU... probably never again. The sequel has been outsourced to a talented friend, so whenever I get to see it you get to see it, too! Exciting, no?? Meaner Than My Demons/ABO fic / other fic that has like 1 ch and is still a WIP... For sure on the back burner. I pick it up and tap some words every now and then, but it's not quite ready for anything. Probably should have held off posting it at all. MPreg Boba...really only when I'm massively depressed.

Random one shots/ a flurry of new activity... this usually means I just finished posting a chapter of something and I need to do a palate cleanse/ I'm anxious about whether or not ppl will like it enough to comment. OR I wrote something for the daily prompts at the BobaDinLuke server and it got out of control enough to be worth posting. So there you have it! That's my real, honest (probably too honest) posting schedule. I'm sorry it's not anything regular. As a reader of fic, I know how frustrating that is. I love fic writers that can bang stuff out and do it consistantly but sadly that just doesn't seem to be me. Some day I aspire to be like them. Until then the only suggestion I can really offer is for you to get an ao3 account, if you don't have one already, and subscribe to my account. That way you don't have to check every day; whenever there's a new fic/update an email will let you know about it. Thanks for writing in, anon! I truly and sincerely do appreciate how devoted you've been, and I hate that I can't give you better news.

#dark is thinking #ask box

[concerningwolves]

I'm really sorry for this question but I kinda need an opinion from a writer. Basically I've wrote this story and it's basically finished. I edited it, re-read it, polished it. Generally speaking it's finished: the story is consistent, the pacing is okay, the characters work. Everything should be fine, but I find lots of gripes with how it's written, with the style itself (except for a few scenes which I think are okay). So I want to ask: in a situation like this, would you rewrite the story?

Hey Nonny, there’s no need to be sorry! I am a writing blog, and I never mind giving advice :) 

WHEN A FINISHED STORY FEELS UNFINISHED

Rewriting it again is one option - and if that feels right, definitely go for it! But a very real problem with writing is that everything exists inside your own head, and it’s difficult to work out how it feels to approach it as a reader. When I find myself in this situation, I like to follow one or all of these three steps: 

rewrite or recreate your story in a different format

Take a break and work on something else 

Seek out beta-readers 

To expand on these points: 

1) REWRITE/RECREATE IN A DIFFERENT FORMAT 

Taking your story out of its original context helps you to get a new perspective on it, which is exactly what’s needed if you want to work out what doesn’t feel right. This can be anything from drawing a story-board to rewriting in a different medium. If I originally wrote the story by hand, I type it up; if I wrote it on a laptop, I rewrite it by hand. But that’s just how I like to do it. You could also try breaking down the scenes you’re unhappy with into a script or as a dialogue-only story. Since your gripes are more about style, this method might not appeal to you so much - but it gives you space to think about the story without worrying about your writing style, which is extremely liberating. Sometimes you just need to separate your storytelling from your writing style and that’s okay.

There’s also this idea that if you rewrite something, rewrite it entirely or not at all. This method has its uses, (I find it great for moving on to second drafts of longer pieces), but sometimes it’s only one section or one scene that you want to meddle with. Drafting several variations of the same scene is a totally valid way of rewriting - which is also why I like to use different formats when rewriting. Back when WDWW was just a collection of short stories, I re-drafted one of them as a flow-chart, because that was a versatile medium and let me work out what I wanted to change and what I wanted to keep without cutting into the story I had already written. 

This is also supposed to be a fun exercise: you don’t have to recreate your story perfectly, you just need to get it down so you can see how it all comes together. You might make a sketchy story-board with stick figures and realise that the order of events is wrong, or you might write out the dialogue and realise it doesn’t fit with the action. Try different approaches and find out what works for you. 

2) TAKE A BREAK AND DO SOMETHING ELSE 

The key to a successful rewrite is a clear head. Period. You can’t force yourself to keep working on a story when you’re completely saturated with it and expect good results. This is particularly true of the finer craft details like your writing style and word choices. Working on some other creative endeavour for a bit lets you come back to your story later on with a clear head. It also stops you getting burnt out, which kills a story faster than anything else. 

How long your break is is entirely up to you. Stephen King, in his book On Writing, says he leaves his novels for at least a month and does the first draft of something else. Granted, he was talking about how he wrote so many novels, (not just how to write them well), but it’s solid advice. I usually leave short stories for at least two weeks. If you come back to your story after a break and you still feel like you can’t get a good persective, then you may either want to 

a) repeat step one

b) try step three, or

c) extend your break. 

It’s also worth mentioning that printing out your story (if it isn’t already written by hand) and attacking all the bits you’re not sure about with a chunky black marker is very satisfying. Don’t think you like the word “that” in that sentence? Black it out! Feel like the simile you chose is too cliche or sounds wrong? Black it out! I use this method for rewriting my opening paragraph(s), but it’s fine for all sorts of writing.

3) GET BETA-READERS 

Asking people to read your brain-baby is a scary, but hugely worthwhile, experience. As I’ve already said, stories get stuck inside your head; you need to work out how to tell them to other people. An outside perspective is crucial.

“How” and “Why” are probably the most important questions you can ask: beta-readers will think critically about your story, and then you need to think critically about their answers. Ask them questions about HOW certain story aspects made them feel and WHY they felt that way. If their answers catch you by surprise, that could show you what isn’t working in your story. I’ve always found with beta-readers that when a beta’s comment makes me go “Wait, you thought WHAT??”, it’s like my eyes get blown wide open and I can see exactly why I was dissatisfied with a certain passage or scene. Sometimes it didn’t convey what I thought it conveyed, and sometimes it was extra information that added too much clutter to the narrative. 

Remember that a beta-reader’s comments will come from personal opinion. This isn’t a bad thing - you want their opinion. It just means that their comments aren’t going to magically fix your story. You need to weigh their opinion against yours, and decide what you want to do about it. Betas also shouldn’t get too critical of your writing style, but they can point out anything that makes little sense, or that reads confusingly.  

Once you’ve mulled over what your betas think, either use step one or plunge straight into a re-write, keeping their feedback in mind. Their fresh perspective’s might be just what you need to work out how to finish your story. 

Happy writing! 

[Ko-Fi | FAQ | Patreon]

#Anonymous #writing advice #writeblr #drafts and revisions #editing your stories

[guardianofjunmyeon]

Black Flowers (One-shot)

Pairing: Baekhyun x Reader

Genre: Angst

Description: Baekhyun sees black flowers when he hallucinates. You happen to show up at his mental hospital and look a lot like a girl he once liked in his Chemistry class.

Warning(s): Schizophrenia, Mental illness mentions

A/N: This was a Jongdae fic at first (I like writing Jongdae okay) and I changed it to Baek bc i wrote IGY and didn’t want sad Jongdae with happy Jongdae. So here is sad Baek. This isn’t even romantic, it’s actually just kind of fucked up with slight 2nd person tbh.

They say that you can tell that you’re dreaming or hallucinating when you’re able to pick out the one detail that just isn’t right. The one detail that is abnormal to your everyday life. Some people hear voices of loved ones who’ve died. Others see people casually walking in the street with shoeless feet.

For Baekhyun, it’s black flowers.

He doesn’t always see them, because they’re quite good at hiding themselves during the hallucinations, but when he sees them he knows that what he thinks is real is not.

The first time he had a hallucination he was in his Chemistry class. Everything was going fine until he saw birds flying into the classroom window and nearly breaking the glass entirely. He fell out of his seat and screamed outright, but no one else seemed to see the birds at all.

The black flowers found themselves on his professor’s desk.

He tried to explain to his friends what happened, but they assumed that he was just being his usual joking self. It took him a full 2 weeks to convince them that he wasn’t joking around this time.                                                

The rumors began to spread that Baekhyun was crazy.

Needless to say, after that incident people began to look at him differently and his 2nd year of university sucked.

The second time wasn’t long after the first. He was in the library studying when he saw a huge tarantula crawling up the arm of the girl next to him. He tried to subtly inch away from the beast slowly making its way up the girl’s body, but the girl didn’t seem bothered by it in the least.

He kept his mouth closed and stared at the pen in her hand topped with a black flower eraser. He blinked and the next thing he knew, both the spider and the eraser were gone.

Baekhyun kept this to himself.

For the rest of the year he would see things on and off, and more often than not, he would see some kind of black flower somewhere and then he could snap himself out of it. He just had to find the black flowers.

The visions would come to him at the worst times. While he was in the middle of taking his test, he would see his arm falling off. When he was driving his car, the roads would break apart and fire would erupt from the streets (he tries not to drive thanks to the car accident he got into after that one). If he managed to go on a date, their faces would contort into something gruesome and he’d begun to question whether or not his hallucinations were reality and what he once thought was real was just…one long dream or figment of his imagination.

He was beginning to think that he was genuinely in hell.

At that point, Baekhyun checked himself into a mental hospital.

He couldn’t trust his friends, and although he tried convince them, his family wouldn’t believe what he was saying. Telling everyone that he was taking a year off to travel, Baekhyun went to the one place he could think of where his delusions would be taken seriously.

The first day there he had way too many discussions with doctors for him to even keep up with. They all asked the same questions.

What do you think is wrong?

What are your symptoms?

When did it start?

How often do you get these “visions”?

Do you feel as though they are a threat to your safety?

Although he felt as though they were going to use all of the information against him, he answered as truthfully as he could because he wants to get better, and no one else was going to help him.

He was admitted a few hours after that.

“Byun Baekhyun.” Hearing his name, he looked up. He sees the nurse who comes in to deliver meds to all the other patients with the straight face that he always wears. For someone who is meant to be helping others, nurse Oh never seems very happy. Baekhyun raises his hand, not getting up from his spot near the window.

He knows the nurse hates when he has to do more work than the minimum, and watching the tall boy scowl in annoyance is just enough to entertain him for the day.

He’s handed a paper cup with 3 different pills. One to stop the visions and two to help fight the side effects of the first. They make him tired, and they only work half the time, but he knows that it’s better than nothing. He swallows down the large pills and opens his mouth for the nurse to see that he’s taken them like a non-problematic patient would.

With a grunt, nurse Oh leaves to hand out medication to the others.

It’s been maybe a few months since he got here, he isn’t sure. The routine is so strict that everyday feels the same and he can’t distinguish between the meal he ate yesterday and the meal he ate a week ago.

He gets called into his group session and listens in silence to everyone talk around him. The therapist facilitates the conversations, and Baekhyun tries his hardest to avoid speaking more than necessary. He doesn’t get the point of the sessions. They only make him feel more trapped here. He wonders if the doctors even plan on letting any of them go.

He’s seen plenty of people come in, in the months that he’s been here but he hasn’t seen a single person leave.

“Baekhyun?” he looks for the source of his name. The therapist looks at him from his spot lounged in his seat.

“Yes Mr. Kim?” the therapist sighs exasperatedly while the others in the circle laughs quietly.

“I told you to call me Minseok, Baekhyun,” he says with a tired smile. Baekhyun sets his lips in a line before nodding understandingly.

“Alright Mr. Kim.” The other patients chuckle even louder. Baekhyun fights off his winning grin. He thrives on laughter and stirring up issues. Since the hallucinations started he hadn’t been able to get the reactions he wants out of those at his university.

That’s one of the good things about this center.

His name is called and he grabs the cup with his daily pills from the nurse. He grabs his blanket tightly in his hand and wraps it around his shoulders before perching himself in front of the TV in the common room.

A rerun of some old show is playing, and he only half pays attention to it. His focus is interrupted by the girl sitting on the ground next to one of the windows. She’s got her legs crossed and she’s hunched over scribbling furiously on a page that looks a lot like a children’s coloring book, mumbling angrily under her breath.

He’s never seen her here before.

Her name is called out and she snaps up from her spot to look for who called her, Baekhyun quickly averts his eyes when she looks in his direction. He isn’t sure why he’s afraid to make eye contact with her. It wouldn’t be the weirdest thing that she’d encounter in this place.

One of the nicer nurses is the one she gets her medicine from, nurse Kim but everyone calls him by his name. Jongin. He wonders what must be her issue to be given the nicest of the staff assigned to her.

He tries to tune back in to the television, but finds it all too hard to not ease drop. He keeps his eyes on the TV but tunes into the conversation with his ears.

He hears Jongin say something about her schedule and her group therapy session. She asks what that is. Jongin explains it simply and he can almost hear the smile in his voice. He welcomes her the facility and then there is silence. Baekhyun strains to listen for more of the conversation and frowns annoyed.

“Were you listening in to my conversation?” startled, Baekhyun jumps away from the girl who had managed to sneak up to him.

“Wha- What? Of course not? What kind of person do you think I am?” he asks incredulously.

She tsks and looks at the television. “You were leaning so far towards us that you almost fell off the couch. Not to mention the TV is off and yet you’re focused on it as if you’re watching the news.” Baekhyun opens his mouth to rebut, but when he realizes that he has accidentally turned the television off when he started to lean in their direction, the words die on his tongue.

He settles for a weak, “Sorry.”

She settles on the cushion next to him silently. Swallowing nervously, Baekhyun turns the television back on. “So, what are you in here for?” she asks not even after 3 seconds of mutual silence with the TV on.

“Schizophrenia. Mainly with visual processing abnormalities,” he says as simply as if he was asked his name. He looks at her. “And you?”

“Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and occasional Minor Depressive Disorder,” she replies. She smiles too happily for her words. “Nothing major,” she adds. She snorts out a light laugh at her joke and focuses back on the television after having gotten the information she wanted from him.

He laughs awkwardly beside her and faces the TV as well. “So, what’s your name?”

“What?”

“Your name? You know, the thing people typically call you.”

“Oh, uh Baekhyun.”

“Nice to meet you Baekhyun,” she offers him a genuine smile. Before he can ask, she gives him her name.

And that’s how you and Baekhyun met.

Weeks passed and the two of you get closer and people in the hospital dwindling. You promised that you could help him escape, and he promised to believe you. You’d both seen various patients beginning to disappear with each day and it was setting you both on edge.

Baekhyun hadn’t figured out the pattern yet. He just knew that it was always Dr. Zhang that would come and meet the person, and then at some point they’d go to the back room and never come back. He didn’t know what happened back there, but he knew it wasn’t good. The only way out is through the front door. He’d snuck in and seen the map of the building when Minseok had left his office door open, so he knows.

When Dr. Zhang came to see him for the first time, he knew that he was doomed. No much was said. Dr. Zhang introduced himself with a dimpled smile and an air of fabricated aloofness. Once the doctor was gone, Baekhyun immediately ran to find you.

In whispered voices the two of you began to speculate the reasoning behind the unexplained disappearances. None of the staff seemed to care, and when either of you brought up the name of one of the missing patients, it was as if no one had ever heard of them. You both knew that there was a Park Chanyeol in the building 3 days ago.

It was then that you brought up escape once again. “I promise I know how to get us out of here.”

“You’re bullshitting me aren’t you?”

“I wouldn’t dare.” Your words were steady, and although Baekhyun was hesitant to believe them he believed in you. He knew it was slightly fucked, having a crush in a mental hospital. He was labeled crazy himself, there was no way he should be having gross romantic, and at times not-so-pure thoughts about another “crazy” person.

That didn’t mean he tried too hard to stop himself. It’s hard not falling for the one person that reminds you of normalcy. The one other person who makes you remember that you weren’t always here and labeled a lunatic by others. It’s even harder to not fall for the one other person around who was able to make him smile and dream of life outside of the hospital again.

He had begun to accept his fate as a permanent resident in the god forsaken place.

So, he listened to your plan. One involving the air ducts and distractions like the ones in the movies. He listened, and knew it was…well, crazy.

But he was desperate.

And you wanted to help.

The plan was to be put in action right before dawn. That way you both could get away and have time to gather distance before the sun was fully in the sky.

You left, and Baekhyun was left to his thoughts in his room. If he got out, where would he go? Would his family just take him back? Would the hospital come looking for him? Would he start to hallucinate again?

Could he convince you to stay with him?

Sleep came easily. It was waking up that was problematic. His mind had come to life, but he couldn’t get his body to follow its command. Through his closed lids he knew there were bright lights. He could hear the voices of people around him. Their words foreign to his ears. Until he could pick out 3 that sent a chill down his spine.

Lobotomy.

Serum.

Powers.

“He’s awake,” he hears a male voice say monotonously. “Tighten the restraints.”

His eyes struggled to open and when they finally peeled apart he was blinded by white light and masked faces. His eyes adjusted and he squinted trying to recognize the faces around him. He pulled against the thick belts around his wrist and legs, only realizing there was no way to get out on his own when he felt the restraint around his neck.

Tears sprang to his eyes as panic filled his veins like poison.

“He won’t take the surgery if he’s panicked, give me a minute with him.” You. That was your voice.

“10 minutes,” another male voice says. “This may be your procedure, but we’re still on a schedule.”

“I know Yixing.” Footsteps and mumbling fades as bodies leave the room. You untighten the restraint at his neck and his hands. “Look Baekhyun-”

“Your procedure? You’re a doctor?”

“I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you. You wouldn’t have…been as open with me if you’d know about what I do,” you explain softly. The first tear rolls down his face, slow and fat. Full of betrayal. He’d trusted you. Told you about himself. Told you things he hadn’t dared told his closest friends back home.

But it made sense. The way you were treated in the hospital. You were given liberties the others didn’t have. They were subtle, but they were there. You only talked to him, and he never once actually saw you go to any group sessions.

But it made sense. You were a doctor.

You were a doctor and you chose to dissect him. And he fell for it.“Why?”

“Why what Baekhyun?”

“Why me?”

You were quiet before answering, and the silence only led to a wave of hysteria hitting him. Tears flowed faster and he wanted to scream, but he couldn’t get the actions to come to the surface. “You’re special…your…your schizophrenia is special. Rare. If explored and unleashed properly then you could do great things.

“I do like you Baekhyun. Really. I...” you glance at the door and let out a heavy sigh. “I shouldn’t do this, but I want to give you a chance.” You make quick work of untying the rest of his restraints and removing all of the equipment attached to his body. Baekhyun lies in confusion as you hastily unplug things. “If you manage to get away then they won’t be able to bring you back legally. I’ll say you escaped. Just, hurry while there’s a bit of time. Don’t ask questions, I’m doing you a favor because I want to give you a chance. That’s it.”

He sits up on the metal table with furrowed brows. His clothes gone, nothing but an indecent hospital gown across his body. You motion to the opposite door of where the doctors vanished; he jumps down from the table. “Go,” you whisper nervously. Hesitant steps and an even more hesitant mind, he leaves the room. You smile at him, and he is almost tempted to stay.

But he doesn’t want to be a science experiment.

Metal doors in a dark hallway lead to a thick door at its narrow end. It takes all his energy to push it open, but he’s welcomed with sunlight as it creaks wide.

His steps quicken to a sprint, and Baekhyun runs towards the woods full of excited relief.

They say that you can tell that you’re dreaming or hallucinating when you’re able to pick out the one detail that just isn’t right. The one detail that is abnormal to your everyday life. Some people hear voices of loved ones who’ve died. Others see people casually walking in the street with shoeless feet.

For Baekhyun, it’s black flowers.

As he runs through the brush of the forest in escape, he fails to miss the trail of blackened flowers behind him. The mental fabrication staring the girl in his old chemistry class fades, along with the rest of the world around him.

#i'm still working on I've Got You #this was just a story i've had 2/3 finished on my laptop for months that i wanted to publish and finish #:))) #exo #exo scenarios #exo fanfiction #exo stories #exo story #exo angst #byun baekhyun #baekhyun #baekhyun angst #jongin #kai #sehun #yixing #minseok #xiumin