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maxwell-grant · 6 months

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So is Worm good from what you have read

"Yes" doesn't begin to cover it but yes. Worm is a brain-rewiring mobius strip disguised as a bible disguised as a superhero web serial that either cured your cancer or shot your dog or both depending on who you ask, and it has many extremely dedicated, brilliant scholar priest surgeons publicly dissecting it on this platform on the regular to the point I don't think I have much to add to the conversations surrounding it, even if I do have some The Thoughts about it. I had never even really seriously thought about superhero prose before and Worm isn't a thing I go back and reread frequently but it did a complete and total 180 on the way I think about superheroes and even fiction, and I've never stopped thinking about it since I've read it.

It is a monumentally impressive story with completely absolutely incredible characters that I cannot stop thinking about. No matter where it was going, even past stretches that were less interesting or more of a slog to read or worse, I could not put the story of Taylor Hebert down for one minute. Tattletale fascinated me every step of the way, I had to keep up with her. Rachel Lindt was a character I feel like I'd been waiting my whole life for. What was I gonna do, not see them through? I feel like Worm easily loses you if you don't particularly connect with the characters enough to justify to yourself the amount of time you'll spend with them, but man, I could not unglue my eyeballs from these people enough (I love all the core Undersiders, to be clear, I'd say it's Rachel > Taylor > Tattletale > Aisha and Alec and Brian, there are very small gaps between these, I just don't go berserk for the last three like I do for the first three, I'm taking Bitch and Skitter to the grave I'm dead serious)

Worm irreparably destroys your ability to engage with superhero fiction the same way ever again, as evidenced by the fact that it destroyed the author's own ability to engage with his own superhero fiction ever again. And everybody who read it has one or several gripes with it with some major dealbreakers in the mix. Tumblr's kinda the only place online where you can really talk about them at length without the spectre of John Wildbow hanging over the discussion, which enables discussion to the point where yes, maybe it does look like to outsiders that nobody can agree on whether Worm is good or what is it even about or whether it even has worms in it (it has at least one, although it's a very big one).

And it is good, it has the Undersiders in it and the Undersiders are one of the greatest groups of characters ever put together, but everyone has at least one major point of contention with Worm whether it's the timeskip or the length or the racism or the gross fatphobia or aspects surrounding the Dallon-Pelham Torment Nexus and etc. I'd say it has maybe the most racist vision of Latin America I've ever seen in a superhero text a hair short of pro-colonial tracts in Golden Age comics and that is a tall fucking order by any metric (part of why I started WEON4 as a project was motivated by spite, to try and make my own stories about non-American superheroes even if just as practice). It is Complicated, and that winds up making it so fascinating to talk about.

Worm has self-sustaining ecological systems of posts up here, far away from the Spacebattles and Reddit battlegrounds where it has different ones and that's not getting into Weaverdice or the sequel or Wildbow's larger body of work, which I haven't gotten to and probably will not any time soon because Worm was enough of a commitment as is. Do I recommend Worm to everyone? It is certainly not to everyone's tastes and I personally find it difficult to describe it simply enough to make it sound appealing or not like a pyramid scheme. But yes I do think it's good, in fact great, in fact, amazing, except when it isn't, and except it Plainly Sucks, but then something like Taylor vs Mannequin or Kevin Norton's interlude or "You needed worthy opponents" happens and it fucks harder than anything has ever fucked before and you don't walk away from it the same, so yes I guess "good" will have to do now.

It's certainly a lot but I definitely found it worth my time to read and then read the texts written about it here. You'll have to take my endorsement of Worm as proof of it's quality and proof of how deranged it makes it's readerbase, they're not mutually exclusive. If you can make it, Worm and the wormosphere has layers and layers to wade through and talk about and enjoy, despite how we're all so very small in the end *gunshot*.

#replies tag #worm #worm spoilers #wormblr #wildbow #superheroes #web serial

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shivunin · 1 year

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OOOOH for the NPC ask...

I'd say Sandal for Arianwen, the Viscount for Maria, and Fiona for whomever (or how many) of your Lavellans you feel like would have the most to say about her! :3

OOOH thanks for asking, Arja!

(NPC ask game)

Arianwen loves Sandal. She likes Sandal and Bodahn first of all the people in Origins, initially because she doesn't really want to hang around with any of the humans and later because they make more sense to her than the others. Wen doesn't really want to talk, so the pair of them are great company, and there's a certain straightforwardness element to discussions with Sandal that she finds comforting (the more complex and layered conversation gets, the more likely Wen is to pull a knife in general; in Orzammar, for example, she can never quite shake the idea that everyone there is laughing at her). She never has to worry if there are hidden layers to what he's saying or wonder if he's trying to trick her into something (which is half the reason she keeps her guard up with everyone else). Wen brings Sandal magically interesting substances to tinker with, not expecting anything in return, and he never asks her any prying questions about why she's strange or unhappy. When she's upset and wants company, she still sits by their fire sometimes even late in the events of the game and the others know better than to bother her. So: in short, they are good friends.

Maria has never been a huge fan of authority in general and she has a very low opinion of the Viscount's ability to actually govern Kirkwall. Though she has a lot of sympathy for Saemus's death, the Viscount's dogged insistence on her dragging his son back did not endear him to her immediately previous. Obviously, she wasn't a fan of his head being bowled at her with velocity, but (aside from the resulting power vacuum) she didn't shed any tears over his death.

Oooh, so. I don't think we get a ton of information about Fiona exclusively within the context of Inquisition (I know she appears in one of the side novels or comics?) so based entirely on the interactions with her as the representative of the rebel mages:

Emma kept it professional, but had a lot of private thoughts about how someone could ever trust a Tevene force to help their people with no strings attached, even before the magical coercion. I think she treated with Fiona as a fellow leader and didn't delve very deeply into her personality or past.

Salshira would talk with Fiona somewhat frequently about the Wardens and to ask how the mages at Skyhold were keeping. Salshira loves a good story and Fiona has plenty.

Elowen talked to Fiona maybe an unhealthy amount. Her greatest fear is that she is a bad leader, so I think there was sort of a morbid fascination to understanding how Fiona ended up where she did and why. After every single one, she would wander the library level trying to decide if she did the right thing by allying with the mages and weighing her choices over and over to try to determine whether she was walking down the same path. Eventually, Fiona gently refused to answer any more questions about it and (after avoiding the library for a week, to Dorian's consternation) Elowen finally decided to talk to her about something else. So I think a lot of her feelings about Fiona are tied up in her own fears about herself, but she ultimately winds up having a lot more compassion for Fiona's choices than the others.

#thanks for asking! i had to think a bit for that last one #arianwen tabris #maria hawke #elowen lavellan #emmaera lavellan #salshira lavellan #oc ask game #oc ask response #i have heard that fiona is actually really cool when you get more information about her but aside from knowing she's actually alistair's ma #i don't know any of it :c #ask response

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randomsnakesimp · 3 years

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Day 4: Fire

As the differences in powers between cartoon and comics are basically the same for all elements, I will point you to my post for day 3 for a general overview and assume, for the rest of this and the next posts, that you read that one.

As for the power of fire specifically, I think the best way to look at it is via Taranee's connection to it in both instances.

In the cartoon, Taranee has "always been afraid of fire", as Yan Lin states. She only slowly starts trusting it, and in doing so gaining control of it, with her setting things on fire accidentally during the pilot episodes. Once she controls fire, she uses it to wield (?) metal, create powerful protective walls and equally impressive attacks. Which, on one hand, does give the battles a great bit of awesome, but also does make me wish that there had been a little more realism involved. While I get that she can control the fire right in front of her, like when she creates a shield or sets something next to her on fire, she also never has to watch where she throws her fireballs, despite the first episode showcasing that Phobos has massive amounts of gunpowder just laying around waiting for the day he instructs Cedric to build a fucking doomsday canon.

All in all, she appears to use fire like a multipurpose (combat) tool and seems to enjoy its power once she gets to know it.

Comic Taranee on the other hand has a connection to fire that I would describe as one would have to a huge but fluffy guard dog one grew up with. She knows she can rely on it in combat, and she knows it can be dangerous, but she is also confident that she can handle it and seems to draw a great deal of comfort from it, seeing a soft, gentle side many others might not. She even looks adorably proud of the fire when she creates small flames to light up Will's living room.

In addition to this lovely connection, she also embodies fire herself, being shown to be calm, soothing and warm as well as passionate, impulsive and dangerous. Oftentimes, flames are seen dancing in her eyes or glasses when her patience is wearing thin, and she even compares herself to fire when Elyon fucks up her attempt at being a brilliant puppet master villain and just pisses Taranee off enough to make her melt through the plasma cage.

I personally feel Taranee has the most intimate relationship to her element, or at least one different from the others. As this is just a feeling, I'd love to hear your impression of that!

In both cartoon and comic, she has telepathic abilities, which in the cartoon are hers exclusively while in the comic they become a thing everyone can do. Instead, Taranee later gains - and then loses - the ability to also read other minds.

This was only used shortly, and, as with Irma's mind control in the cartoon, there was no addressing the moral responsibility this would place on someone. I also feel the argument with Nigel that came from her accidentally reading his mind and finding that he was annoyed with her dance obsession was handled poorly, as I feel it would have been important for the comic to somehow, whether that be via Taranee or via another way, that one cannot be blamed for their thoughts, and that many of those are involuntary.

As with Irma - and all the others - Taranee is later given a dull magical item to strengthen her elemental powers (a volley ball) and gradually looses the charming, deep connection to her element that made this series so unique to me.

For some reason, and I will address this here as I felt it was the worst for Taranee, I feel that this decline in quality was tightly linked to the overall loss of character the girls experienced. I feel that as the comics progress there are more and more moments where it would not have been noticeable if the girls had been interchanged, sometimes throughout whole comics. Speech, gestures, clothing, dreams, attitude, actions...everything seemed to become a murky, undefined pool where the girls had to be bent to meet the plot. And I bring this up here because I still feel it is criminal that strong, adorable Taranee with her complex, captivating character that perfectly united her maturity and strength with her vulnerability and insecurities, who dated Nigel against all odds and her mother's will, who challenged the almighty oracle because of her convictions and then put that aside to help her friends, turned into a bland, often childish drama queen whose every other b-plot was crushing on some guy to be forgotten the very next issue.

I loved her at the start and hated her at the end.

#30dayswitchversary #w.i.t.c.h.#w.i.t.c.h taranee #Taranee deserved better writing

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straydawg-writing · 3 years

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𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞'𝐬 𝐚 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦.

- 𝓚. 𝙯𝙤𝙡𝙙𝙮𝙘𝙠

• hunter x hunter series

⋯✰⋯

Chapter 2–

You knew that if anyone outside of this car saw you right now, you might just pass away. To put it simply: You were sitting on Killua's lap.

All because Kite's truck only fit seven people.

The way this predicament came about would have been comical if it weren't for your burning embarrassment. Unfortunately, you could remember very clearly how it all unfolded:

"Hmm, it seems that there aren't enough seats for all eight of us, so one person will have to squish in," Kite said, opening the car door to check the seats.

"Who's the smallest one here?" Gon asked. All seven pairs of eyes turned to look at you.

Great. The benefits of never having had your growth spurt.

Killua was the one to open his mouth, snickering, "Obviously it's Y/N. She's like a midget!"

"Killua, you are literally an entire 2 ½ feet shorter than Kite over there," you defended yourself.

From a distance, you had guessed Kite was around 6'3. Once you got a closer look at him, you discovered that he towered over you like a skyscraper. Your curiosity got the best of you and naturally, you had asked him what his height was. The man was a whopping 7 foot 10.

"It's okay Y/N, you can squish with me," Gon offered.

Killua shook his head. "No way. Squishing will just make everyone uncomfortable. It's better if only one person suffers. Y/N, you can sit on my lap."

He had left no room for argument. Sighing, you knew that even if you tried, you had no say in this anymore. You would just have to suck it up for the next 4 hours.

Now you were here, sitting on him, worrying about whether you were cutting the circulation off to his legs or not. Or perhaps you were too bony and it was hurting him.

You could feel his warm breath on your neck, and it sent goosebumps across your entire body. This was beyond awkward.

"Stop it," Killua muttered, right in your ear.

Oh, you'd done it now, hadn't you? Killua was gonna push you off onto Gon instead.

"Stop what?"

"You're so stiff, just...relax," he paused, "I don't mind sitting this way."

Hearing his voice so close to you sent butterflies fluttering in your stomach.

Maybe this was okay.

You untensed, trying to adjust yourself to a more comfortable position, but the bumpy car ride wasn't making it very easy. Kite ran over a rock, and without a seatbelt it sent you jerking upwards. Thanks to his fast reflexes, Killua gripped your waist, holding you tightly to his body.

"The seatbelt won't reach over the both of us, but this'll keep you from flying."

"Heh, thanks Killua. I think we should reach the beach in a bit..." you said, hoping that the thought of it being over soon might offer him some relief.

It doesn't matter who it is, being this close to someone could send anyone into a frenzy. You were hyper-aware of every one of his fingers grasping onto your waist. He wasn't lying. He was keeping you right there.

You'd just have to stop thinking about it, you told yourself. Or else you'd go crazy.

Trying to relax back into Killua like he had asked, you let your mind wander to the reason you were driving in the first place. The day before, the three of you had decided to stick with Kite and help him investigate the Chimera ants. The beach you were headed to now is supposed to have a clue about where the ant queen is located, so you could bring an end to the destruction before it starts. During the car ride, you had learned they were a truly deadly species. One bite of an innocent passerby, and they had the means to bring the entire human race to extinction.

You felt like something was starting. And your intuition was rarely wrong.

Gazing at Gon who had been talking with Kite for a while now, you noticed how his eyes crinkle into little smiles whenever he talks. You knew that having Kite around, his father's best friend, surely excited him to the bone. Gon was just oozing with optimism, without even trying. You could tell that just by being himself, he was keeping the spirits up of all eight in the group, not allowing any room for doubt or fear to creep into anyone's minds.

At that moment, you swore that whatever happened, you would be there to protect Gon and Killua. Even if it costs you everything.

Hopefully, this wasn't one of your friends' last few moments of tranquility. But if it was, you were determined to spend it well.

Resting your head against Killua, you hoped that he wouldn't mind if you indulged in this for just a moment. You were tired, having not gotten much rest since completing Greed Island and meeting Kite.

It didn't take much time for you to fall asleep to the rise and fall of Killua's steady breathing and his sweet vanilla scent. If you'd been awake, you might have even heard his heartbeat racing beneath you.

⋯✰⋯

You had finally reached the beach.

Killua had nudged you awake once you'd gotten there. You remembered how his blue eyes stared back at you as he poked your face, calling you an idiot for falling asleep, and you chuckled.

There was one thing you were clueless about; Killua had made sure not to move even once the whole rest of the car ride. He was nervous that he might disturb your peacefully sleeping form.

You were still pretty groggy as you looked out at the sea, the bright sun reflecting on the ocean's surface. You wanted to wiggle your toes in the sand, but you were there for a reason. To find anything that might lead to the Queen.

You searched in bushes, behind rocks, under seashells, and even used your nen to sift through as much sand as you could. So far, the group had ruled out the forest and deemed it difficult to know if the ant even ended up on the same island. That's when they decided to release the hellhound. Well- it wasn't a hellhound. It was the little dog you played with yesterday. Along with Gon.

Gon was following behind the dog on all floors, sniffing the ground as he went.

"He can do that?" You asked no one in particular.

"His nose is as sharp as a dog's," Killua responded, watching Gon with an amused look in his eye.

A couple minutes went by with no luck. The only thing the dog had found was a tree to pee on. It looked like the ant wasn't going to be on this island, though Kite had an idea.

"It may have washed ashore somewhere else. Which direction do the currents flow here?" Kite asked the two that had brought us down to the beach. One was short with brown skin and grey hair that sprouted up like hay, while the other had large glasses and two front teeth poking out from his mouth.

"The direction is reversed between day and night. And it also changes with the seasons. I've even heard it's different on certain days. So it'll be tough to pinpoint a location..." said Chipmunk Teeth. That's what you'd call him, since you hadn't gotten his name.

So basically, no one had any idea on how to find the Chimera Ant Queen.

"Continuing to search blindly is pointless. We should return to YorkNew and see if we can find any new leads there."

You heard the group around you agreeing with Kite. He and his friends began walking back to the truck already, but you stayed put. You would catch up to them later.

The ocean reminded you of your home. You thought you should say goodbye to it first.

Ripples of water lapped gently at your feet. You always had a connection with nature. Having lived in a small village located in the middle of a jungle most of your life, the earth had become your dearest friend. One of your earliest memories was from exploring the coves back at home. You stretched out your arm across the water, and watched the liquid softly rise to your hand as you called it.

That's why you chose this nen ability. It tied you to the elements. When you fought with it, together you were one body.

"Y/N, come on! Kite's threatening to leave without you," Gon waved you over. Taking one last look at the sea, you turned away.

The sun was already setting by the time you left for the city.

⋯✰⋯

Going back to YorkNew was the right decision. Now you all knew where to look.

Kite had discovered that the possibilities of the Chimera Ant landing in NGL were the highest. Apparently, NGL was a country populated with people who wanted to get away from machine civilization and live in nature.

You loved nature too, but you thought that was a little extreme. There was a reason you had to leave your beloved jungle behind.

"There may very well be a giant swarm of Chimera Ants already hunting humans down. If that's the case, my top priority will be saving them. You must be able to protect yourselves," Kite warned us.

"And if I am the one in trouble, you should escape without me."

At that, Gon and Killua looked unsettled. But backing down now was not an option.

"Got it," you said, breaking the silence and offering a kind nod to Kite, "and until the very last moment, the three of us will have your back."

"Yeah!" The other two boys concurred.

Now, you sat with Gon and Killua on an airship to NGL. The three of you were sitting on a bench, looking out of a window that framed velvet-peach clouds displaying brilliant silver linings.

Gon was reflecting on their last conversation with Kite.

"You said that Ging had a reason for bringing me and Kite together," he rested his arms and head on the window-frame.

Killua broke his sight from the clouds and looked at Gon.

"Yeah, I did."

"You're probably right. I don't know the reason, but I can't give up halfway, no matter what's going on. Otherwise, I'll disappoint Ging... And I'd never be able to forgive myself either. So I won't run away," Gon continued, resolved with his decision.

There was a moment of silence as the three of you let his words sink in.

You admired Gon's determination, but you hated that Ging had a son risking his life just to avoid disappointing a dad he's never met.

"Man, you had this totally serious expression, so I was expecting something big. But it's just business as usual," Killua smiled.

"Huh?" Gon's mouth hung open. "I thought about this a lot, I even ran a bunch of mental simulations! And I liked what Y/N said earlier, about having Kite's back until the very end."

"Think all you want, but you'll still be Gon. If someone said to abandon them, you'd never do it," You lightly punched his shoulder.

He pouted, cradling where you hit him, and you rolled your eyes.

"Drama queen."

Gon chose to ignore that and turned back to Killua. "Then what would you do?'"

"I'm a spontaneous guy, so I'd think about it once the time comes."

"So, you'd run away?" Gon questioned.

"Depends. I can't say until it actually happens."

"Say for instance..."

Killua threw his hands up, beat, "I can't tell you what I'd do in a hypothetical situation!"

"Then, what about you Y/N?"

"Gon!" You whined.

Truth be told, you hadn't thought about what you would do. It depended like Killua said. But you did know one thing...

"I would never leave you two behind. Even if that meant I'd have to die."

⋯✰⋯

#hunter x hunter #killua x reader #killua zoldyck x reader #hunterxhunter fanfiction #hxh #self insert #y/n #hxh fanfic #chimera ant arc #kite #angst #fluff

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ink-splotch · 7 years

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Okay, so, I'd love to read a little something by you set in a world where Lavender made it out of the Battle of Hogwarts. Maybe not okay, but alive?

Once upon a time, Lavender had wanted everyone to look at her. She had been the kind of kid who put on dramatic plays for her stuffed animals, for any visitors to the house, and for any neighbor or passersby she could snag from the front yard.

Dating Ron in sixth year had been fun, most of all because everyone had kept sneaking glances at her. She had heard her name in curious whispers and she had grinned and giggled into Parvati’s shoulder.

Everyone was looking now, or pretending not to. She heard the whispers– oh it’s that poor Brown girl. Can you imagine, if it was your daughter, if it was you? Oh and she was so pretty before, too–what a pity–almost makes it worse, doesn’t it?

–

“You know Professor Lupin was a werewolf?” Hermione said, ten minutes into a very awkward lunch she had asked for in an equally awkward letter.

Lavender pushed a sauteed carrot through a little puddle of pasta sauce. “I think everyone heard about that one. Someone told the papers, or something, right?”

“Er, yes,” said Hermione. “Snape did. Which is what I– I mean, it’s related. Oh, I wish you’d gotten to talk to Remus about this. He was a lovely man.”

“Not as lovely as Lockhart,” Lavender said and she and Hermione spent a moment in wistful remembrance. “God, I feel old,” Lavender said.

“Anyway, Snape,” said Hermione. “Snape and Lupin. When Lupin was at school, Snape would make him a potion that would… tame him, on full moons. He could just curl up in his office and sleep by the fire. If you’re interested, I’m trying to learn how to brew it myself.”

Lavender shook her head. “We’re not friends,” she said. “Never have been. So why are you doing all this?”

Hermione looked like she was trying to say “we’re friends,” but she couldn’t get it out. “I was there, once, when Lupin turned without the potion. I was so scared. I thought we were going to die.”

“Afraid I’ll sniff you out on a dark night?” Lavender said, face twisting as she sank back into her wicker chair.

“No, I–” Hermione squeezed her eyes shut, and all the hesitation was making Lavender more and more uncomfortable. Even at eleven, Hermione had bulldozed through things. She didn’t waver. “I was so scared, but I think it was even worse for him. It hurt, but he looked so scared, too, I–”

“I know how it feels,” said Lavender, very quietly, and Hermione snapped her mouth shut. Lavender took a big sip from her tea. It was still steaming– it had not taken long to exhaust small talk, between the two of them.

Hermione cleared her throat and tried again. “I’m trying to do the right thing. I’m trying to make amends. I’m trying to– make things better. Do you want this?”

Lavender put her mug back down, shaking out scalded fingers, and said, “Yes.” Then, because her mother had raised her right, she said, “Thank you.”

“That sounds like a weird conversation,” said Parvati, whose door Lavender went and knocked on after she and Hermione had split the bill with the precise-to-the-Knut math of the vaguely acquainted and recently employed.

Lavender kicked through the fall of autumn leaves that had collected in front of the porch swing. “She was trying to be nice, I think.”

“She’s not very good at it,” said Parvati.

Her father wept. He tried not to but he was a crier, always had been.

“You were so brave,” said Lavender’s mother, cupping her cheeks in her warm hands and not even flinching at the scar tissue under her palms. “We are so proud.”

Lavender’s mother was a Muggleborn, daughter of a math teacher and a door-to-door salesman (“now there is a profession that requires some magic,” her grandfather used to tell her).

Her father was a wizard and he was trying hard not to cry, bending down to pet the dogs weaving between all their ankles. Lavender bent down, too, scratching behind Fiddlestick’s floppy ears while Mopsy cleaned her cheek forcefully. “Hey,” she said, and her father looked up, trying to firm his wobbly chin.

“You know I’m proud of you, too,” he said, trying not to tremble on it. “I just…” He reached out to squeeze her knee gently. “You did everything right. You did everything good. I’m so proud of you, chickadee.”

“I know,” she said, and she did. He was a Gryffindor, too.

It took Hermione more than a month to figure out the potion sufficiently well enough that she’d let Lavender try it. She was founding a non-profit for nonhuman rights, too, after all, as well as doing a fair few local speaking gigs, petitioning the Wizenagamot on a half dozen issues, getting an advanced degree, and supposedly, at some point, sleeping.

It took more than a month, so Lavender spent another night locked in her parents’ newly fortified cellar. She didn’t remember much, but she woke up with her throat sore and her nails ragged. The door was gouged from the inside. She wondered if she had been screaming. She wondered if that’s what the howls were. She felt like screaming, maybe, a little.

The door cracked open the moment the moon had dropped down below the horizon, outside. Her mother came in with a tray of her favorite breakfast foods– danishes and boiled eggs, steaming hot cocoa with the barest splash of bitter coffee in it.

Parvati came stomping down the stairs after her. “Graceful,” said Lavender. She winced at the roughness of her voice.

“Look who’s talking,” said Parvati. “Up, c'mon, eat your breakfast. We’re doing midnight manicures. Your dad says he’ll let us doll up his nails, too.”

The next full moon night, Lavender locked herself in the cellar again. “It should be safe,” Hermione had said. “It should. I mean, I’ve done all the tests. I followed all the instructions. It should work.”

Lavender didn’t remember, because she never remembered– she didn’t recall the cellar door unlocking and opening after ten minutes of post-moonrise silence. She didn’t recall Parvati Wingardium Leviosa-ing a comfy chair down the stairs, or her sitting down and pulling out a stack of Witch Weeklys, nor did she remember curling up on Parvati’s fuzzy button slippers and going to sleep.

But she did remember waking up in the morning, her cheek pressed into a soft pillow. She was tattered under a thick blanket, but she was human and looking upward at Parvati’s slack, sleeping face. Her dark plaits tumbled, curling, over the soft pink polka dots of her pajamas.

Lavender pulled herself up to sitting, stole the open Witch Weekly, and waited for Parvati to wake up.

“You’re going to be alright,” Professor Trelawney said and she wasn’t even looking at Lavender’s palm, just holding her hand tight in her cold fingers. “You’re going to be happy. You’re going to be fine. People are going to love you and stand by you and we will be there.”

The tower room was just the same as Lavender remembered it, down to the spicy-sweet tea and Trelawney’s big blinking eyes. Lavender squeezed her hands back. “I love you, too, professor.”

“You know, I think you can call me Sybil. It seems the time for it.”

–

Dean and Seamas’s housewarming for their ugly little first flat was a crowded mess, but the afterparty wasn’t. Lavender and Parvati came by with paint swatches, opinions, and hangover remedies. They ate greasy Chinese food on the floor, because it was about as comfortable as the couch.

They came back the next week, and the next. Parvati conjured a crackling fire in a big fruit bowl Dean’s mother had given him and they all sat around it like they were back at Gryffindor Tower’s hearths, procrastinating on homework.

On nights like that they sometimes talked about Hogwarts, but most of the time they didn’t. Dean had started drawing again and he walked them through his notebooks– his sisters, caricatures of the customers he dealt with in Ollivander’s wand shop, the snarky little comics he’d always scrawled in the edges of his notes. Parvati told them about the Auror trainees’ antics, going ut on their first field missions with their mentors. “All bravado and caffeine,” she said. “Bunch of show-offs.”

“So you fit in well, then?” Dean said.

“Nah, that’s Lav,” Parvati said. Dean and Seamas glanced warily at Lavender, but she just giggled and reached for another potsticker.

Seamas was considering going back to school. “Hermione’s been badgering me about it,” he said. “Says I have a talent for pyrotechnics, and there’s a whole major for fire magics at Brinxley.”

“What about you, Lav?” said Dean. “You still thinking about vet school?”

“What?”

“Oh, uh, that’s the Muggle word. Veterinarian– a medimagizoologist?”

“The schools aren’t too interested in a werewolf as a student,” Lavender said, shrugging.

“Not that that stops Hermione from showing up on the doorstep with half-penned anti-discrimination lawsuits she wants Lav to star in,” Parvati said.

“When does she sleep?” said Dean.

–

Little children asked about it in the street sometimes. “Mum, why’s her face like that?” “How come she’s walking all funny?”

Sometimes their parents turned to Lavender with eager bright eyes in the grocery store line, expecting her to answer. (“I got hurt, but I’m okay now.”) Sometimes they shushed their kids and gave her little apologetic half-smiles, glancing away from the raised lines of scar tissue. Sometimes they pulled their children closer to them and crossed to the other side of the street.

Harry Potter had a godson. Teddy Lupin was four the first time Lavender met him, just outside Gringotts. Teddy clung to Harry’s pants leg, peeking past his godfather’s hanging robe. “Why’d her face do that?” he said and Harry dropped a hand down into Teddy’s hair, which was bright green.

“She’s just like your dad,” said Harry.

“Puppy,” Teddy whispered, eyes wide with joy, and his skin shifted until scars stood out stark on his smiling chubby cheeks.

Lavender bit her lip and sank down to her knees in the street, holding out a hand. “Why aren’t you handsome, chickadee. What’s your name?”

–

Once, Lavender had wanted everyone to look at her.

She hated stories that told you to be careful what you wished for. Were you not supposed to want things? Was that the answer? She was nearly twenty two and she could make things fly with a few whispered words. She had lived through her seventh year at Hogwarts, had stepped out into that battle with her wand out and her eyes open. She had woken up–hurting, wounds tended, poison in her veins–to Parvati sleeping on Sybil’s shoulder at her bedside.

She had cried when they told her about the lycanthropy. She had cried over her bunny because a fox had gotten to it. Both times it had been with her face buried in Parvati’s shoulder and Parvati’s hands stroking her hair. She wished and she wanted– animals that never left you, bodies that never betrayed you.

Once, Lavender had wished that everyone would look at her, and now they were. Everyone was looking– so Lavender held Parvati’s hand in the grocery store at midnight, because they had both been craving green apples. Everyone was looking– so Lavender curled her hair and pinned it up, wore tank tops and little skirts on any day hot enough that she could get away with it, laughed aloud in public spaces. Everyone was looking– so Lavender knocked on Hermione Granger’s door one evening and asked, “What would it take to get me into magical vet school?”

Hermione had her bushy hair all tied back and a quill behind each ear. “A lot. There’s some statutes we’ve got to fight, and even if we can handle that you’ll still be under intense scrutiny for years.”

“I can work with that,” said Lavender, and Hermione grinned.

–

When Teddy marched down the aisle with the rings, his hair was a shimmering swirl of pink and purple to match the flowers woven into Parvati’s braids and Lavender’s curls.

The honeymoon would be short–a week in magical Paris in the townhouse of a Beauxbaton girl they’d befriended fourth year. Lavender had more medical textbooks packed into her luggage than anything else. Parvati’s bags were lined with half-finished reports that she’d owl to Auror headquarters from a rumpled Parisian morning, getting croissant crumbs in the bedsheets.

But for now the hall was filled with pink and purple blooms, white candles, familiar faces. Hermione stood in a violet bridesmaid’s dress, and Dean and Seamus in matching ties at Parvati and Lavender’s respective backs. Padma was luminescent with joy over Parvati’s shoulder. She had taken Lavender aside that morning for a short quiet walk in the mist and told her, “I know tonight’s what makes it official, but I’ve thought of you as my sister for years.”

When Lavender leaned forward and kissed her wife, her father burst into proud tears in the front row. He was a crier, always had been. Lavender buried her face in Parvati’s shoulder, smiling so hard she thought she might come apart. Her scars creased and puckered in her dimples, and she was beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.

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drawkill · 7 years

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I've been wondering for way too long just what it is that I want to be doing with my time. I know everyone is different and has different experiences, but I'd like to know: At what point did you decide to focus on drawing, and how did you choose art over everything else (were you just better at art than other things, or did you just love it enough to push through)? How long would you estimate it took in practice to get to the point where you thought "This is something I can do for real!" ?

Well I’ve been into art pretty much all my life. I fricken loved animals when I was a child so I often drew comics of my dog going on adventures with my friends or other family’s dogs, I even wrote stories about them for writing parts of class too (i remember having the longest stories in grade 4, lel). At first I was like “I wanna be a vet!” that quickly changed though once I got more into gaming and wanted to be a video game designer, which is actually something I still want to do someday. I never really had anything else that I was interested in? I was never really good at maths or sciences and stuff, I also didn’t really have anyone forcing me to choose something right away either cause my moms pretty chill. I graded, still didn’t really know what I wanted to do with my life (even tho I knew in the back of my mind it was gonna be art anyway) so I ended up working at walmart for awhile and then finally decided to go to art school cause I didn’t want to work the retail life anymore.

I don’t know if there was any real point where I was like “Art is something I can do!” because I knew it was always something I could do so I just did it cause that’s when I enjoy and am capable of. If you’re confused with what it is you want to do just take some time to explore, there’s no rush. You’ve got all your life after all, just make sure it’s something that you’re happy with. No one wants to work a 8 - 5 job they’re miserable with for the rest of their life.

#whatsideareyouon #ask

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arorocanada · 7 years

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ohhhh i'd love to hear more about your ruins caretaker papyrus AU!

Oh, you’re so sweet??? Thank you so much for being interested, and sorry for not answering earlier, I was busy with college ;-;

Also, hm, I know we haven’t actually had a conversation, like, ever, but I know you’re the Queen of Papyrus fics and ideas, so I thought maybe you’d be interested in this @zefive??? (sorry if you aren’t feel free to ignore me)

I haven’t actually thought about that AU in a loooong time. I haven’t even played Undertale in a long time, so I may not remember some things very well. Basically, it all starts as a Genocide Route, where Frisk is in the Ruins and meets Toriel. Frisk kills everyone, then kills Toriel, and then they get out of the Ruins.

Everything keeps happening like in a Genocide Route, until they have to fight Papyrus. And then the miracle happens, they decide to stop killing. Papyrus’s words get to them, and they break down crying, a bit like in this comic.

So now Papyrus has a child who is probably the biggest murderer in the entire Underground but seems to be in shock at the moment, a best friend who will try to kill the child no matter what, a deserted town that will not stay deserted for very long now that the kid has stopped killing, and a brother who doesn’t know anything about this yet.

But! Papyrus doesn’t give up! He can see Frisk suffering for what they did, and he sincerely thinks even the “worst person” can change. So he hides Frisk in the forest (maybe in one of the Sentrty Stations??? The cave??? I’m not sure), with the promise that he’ll visit them every day with food and stuff.

Eventually the habitants of Snowdin come back, really curious about what happened to the murderous human. Papyrus simply lies and says he never met the human, they just didn’t get to Snowdin. Sans doesn’t suspect anything, but is really curious about where the determined human could have gone.

Papyrus tries to act normally, which is… hard. Everyone in Snowdin is mourning the deaths of their friends. The dogs are especially missed, and Papyrus feels extra bad for Doggo (if you kill Papyrus in the Neutral Route Doggo asks for him, so I like to headcanon them as friends). The fact that he’s hiding their murderer makes him feel… weird, but he knows Frisk really regrets it.

Meanwhile Undyne has gone insane. There isn’t a better way of saying it, more than half of his Royal Guard is dead and suddenly the killer disappears??? NO WAY. So she gets obsessed with searching every place in the Underground, and she gets especially obsessed with the Forest.

Papyrus knows the Forest isn’t a safe place for Frisk, but he doesn’t really have any other place. But then Frisk (who is still shaken over everything they have done, and can’t really sleep because of how guilty they feel), guides him to a door. Now, I don’t actually remember this part of the AU very well (????), but Frisk has a way to open the door (a key??? no idea), and they get inside. The fact that there’s a pile of dust in front of the door and that it leads to a house kinda shakes Papyrus, but he keeps going. Frisk tells him everything, how they fell, how they killed everyone, how they killed the nice lady who was going to take care of them, and how hateful her last words were.

Soooo. Now the Ruins are empty (well, there’s a certain ghost, and spiders, but Paps doesn’t know that yet). There’s a big big house, with food, and fire, and a bed, and it is decided that Frisk will stay there, while Papyrus goes back to his routine, occasionally visiting Frisk to bring food and things. Great, right?

No.

Going back to routine when half of the guard is dead (all of which were your friends) sucks. Not being able to help a child who can’t hardly live because of their mistakes sucks. Having your best friend obsess over finding someone to the point that they don’t sleep or eat sucks. Realizing that, after everything that happened, your best friend is still trying to shield you from the world because she thinks you won’t be able to survive sucks. Lying to your brother sucks. And realizing that your brother doesn’t even worry about any of your sudden disappearances sucks even more.

So Papyrus starts spending more time with Frisk in the Ruins, trying to help them, and also because he wants to get away from Sans, from Undyne, and from Snowdin in general. His schedule quickly adapts to this, and Sans doesn’t even seem to notice, which makes him furious. Spending time with Undyne is more and more uncomfortable, and he tries to help, he really does, but nothing he says will cheer her up, and only thing that could help would be finding the killer and he can’t help her with that.

His relationship with both Sans and Undyne starts to deteriorate. At first it isn’t visible, he’s just… distancing himself. But suddenly everything seems to get super fast and he’s fighting with Undyne because she just won’t quit, maybe it would be better if she stopped, maybe if that’s what being a Royal Guard is like he shouldn’t be one.

And now Undyne is saying that he has changed, that he acts like he doesn’t care about the deaths of their friends, and tells him what Papyrus has always known but didn’t want to accept: that Undyne didn’t want to make him a Royal Guard, that he wasn’t cut out for the job.

(I gotta say Undyne is EXHAUSTED mentally and physically at the moment, she just doesn’t have the energy to be delicate anymore)

Honestly? I don’t remember much more. I mean, I remember Sans and Papyrus had a reeeeeally bad fight that had been building up during the AU (because Sans didn’t seem to notice anything wrong with Paps, and more stuff I don’t remember), but nothing else.

So Papyrus gets fed up. Done. His more important relationships are with Sans and Undyne (since Doggo is dead), and he’s fighting with both of them. He doesn’t have a purpose anymore, and neither Sans or Undyne seem to actually think he can handle the real world, they’re always treating him like a child.

And then, he remembers that, over all his problems, there’s something more important. He has someone to take care of. Someone who depends on him, someone who respects him, someone he can help. Someone who had opened up to him, who had told him about Toriel, about her mission to save the humans who fell to the Underground. And, in that moment, he knows what to do.

He packs all his things, and leaves a detailed note explaining how he feels to Sans. He may be fighting with him, but he doesn’t want his brother to suffer, thinking his lil bro could be dead somewhere. So he just tells him he can’t do it anymore, and he has decided to move somewhere else. At the very last moment, he adds “at least for some time” to the note, because he still loves Sans, and with that, he leaves.

He moves to the Ruins. He cleans the house as much as he can, but he isn’t sure about moving Toriel’s stuff, because, even is she isn’t coming back, that’s still her house. But he cleans everything, throws away any food they can’t eat (why are there so many snails?), and Papyrus and Frisk live there. Papyrus, who has found a new purpose but isn’t sure he can do it, and Frisk, who wants to atone for everything they have done, even if it’s impossible. Together, they walk through the Ruins together, looking for anyone to save.

Aaaand, that’s it???? I mean, I don’t have anything else. Now that I think about it, there are lots of things that could happen:

- Napstablook (who, canonically, knows Undyne) meeting Papyrus and Frisk (I’m probably the only Papyrus/Napstablook shipper in Tumblr, okay???)

- Does Papyrus figure out Toriel is the Queen??? Who knows

- The spiders returning to the Ruins and telling Muffet about those two

- Undyne getting even more obsessed about finding the human, thinking they’ve done something to Papyrus

- Sans slowly being less and less able to function (because let’s face it, Papyrus is the one who takes care of the house, and kinda takes care of Sans), going to the gate to talk to the nice lady who laughs at his jokes, only to find out she doesn’t answer anymore

- The possibility of Papyrus coming back sometime, bc tbh I think it would be very difficult for him to stay in the Ruins forever

- Anything about Chara and Frisk

- And honestly, anything about Chara, Frisk, Flowey and Papyrus. I mean, the people Flowey finds most interesting in the Underground??? Together??? Why????

And this whole idea started because I thought “hey, why do people portray Sans as caring over his brother? Papyrus is real caretaker of the family”, and resurfaced because of this post. Honestly, don’t question my imagination.

Aaaaand, that’s it, I finished. THIS is the whole story, or what I planned. If you ever want to talk about this AU with me you’re very welcome ^-^

#Aroa talks #Caretaker Papyrus AU #Fic idea #in case i ever want to write it #which I doubt tbh XD #i haven't even written an undertale fic in my entire life #Anonymous

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