Next verse same as the first. Ie: Free-for-all ask box prompt in which I will respond to all asks by filling them as best I can or, at the very least, explain why I can’t.
Any prompt, any question (personal or headcanon), or even just a single word–you can also reuse one of the other ask box event formats.
I know it’s way before midnight and probably too early to call a missed post–I can always contradict myself later–but I am feeling so accomplished because I fixed our broken shower cartridge all by myself and I’m just like. Oh my god, I’m so butch. Very adult. So accomplished. Power tools and everything.
As such, I’m just going to do some relaxing sewing on that denim witch hat. Unlikely to be done tonight, hence my prediction of a missed post, but maybe there’ll be enough progress that I’ll post a picture? Hm, we’ll see.
“It’s not a storm,” she says, trying to cut through all the arguing. The council members are far too busy trying to outsmart each other to focus on the reason why this emergency meeting was called in the first place, the actual problem.
“It’s a ship. A flying ship, the size of a mountain,” she says, lips pressed together in a tight frown. She knows what she sounds like. Madness. A flying ship the size of mountain, so dark and swift as to look like an oncoming storm.
Most of the councilors that do hear her scoff at the idea, and she would too if it were any less serious.
Storms are forces of nature, they happen and humans must endure then rebuild. But this monstrosity encroaching on their nation is worse than that. The damage will be deliberate and devastating.
“It’s an invasion.”
—
“I’m sorry it’s you,” Thomas says, voice weak, grip weaker.
Darren grunts in response, tries not to let it get to him, keeps his own grip firm as if something in their clasped hands will improve the situation. As if some of Darren’s own strength will flow from himself into Thomas by sheer force of will.
“I’m sorry you’re here,” Thomas says again, tweaked slightly but essentially the same.
Darren understands. He’s no one’s first choice for comfort, clearly. He can barely muster any kindness for the one he loves at the end of his life. He understands, but that doesn’t mean it hurts any less.
“I’m sorry you have to see this,” Thomas says a third time, but it doesn’t seem to match, “But I’m too selfish to tell you to go.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Darren assures him quickly, raising their joint hands to press Thomas’ cold hand to his face. He wants to hope, he wants Thomas to mean something else than what Darren has been dreading.
“I don’t want this to be how you remember me, okay? Don’t remember me like this, Darren.” Thomas’ voice has started to slur, a whispery whoosh of dying breath.
“Thomas. Thomas?”
~
A/N: Get those prompts ready–clearly I need the help!–because it’s gonna be December soon which means the free-for-all Ask Box Advent Calendar 😀
I’m Casey Fiesler, a longtime fandom community member and also a professor in the Department of Information Science at University of Colorado Boulder. This semester I am teaching a research-based class in online fandom, and we are conducting a survey that covers many different questions of interest to information science or fan studies researchers about fanfiction! We do ask that you are at least 18 years old to participate; though this is mostly for a class project, we have gone through typical ethics review at our university and this study includes a consent form.
The survey is a mix of multiple choice and open answer questions, and you can answer as much or as little as you like. On average, the survey takes about 15 or 20 minutes to complete.
We will ask for some basic demographic information (any of which you can skip), but won’t require any identifying information – unless you want to give us your email address so that you can be updated about any results from the survey.
Because of some of the research questions that groups in my class want to answer it would be particularly great to get participants who write or read in the following fandoms: Sports RPF, Overwatch, Star Wars, Game of Thrones, and Marvel Cinematic Universe. There are also questions that relate to things like fandom lifecycles, videogame fanfic, identity in fanfiction, and ethics and privacy in fandom. Many of the questions in this survey were drafted by first-time student researchers!
Whether you participate or not, please consider sharing this survey with your social networks! And if you’d like to find out more about Casey’s previous research about fandom, see these Tumblr posts: Fan Platform Use Over Time and design of Archive of Our Own.
Reblogs are appreciated, and thank you! You can email me at casey.fiesler@colorado.edu if you have any questions or comments.
I’m purchasing some things because I’m going to do some DIY nonsense and like… I’VE ALREADY PURCHASED THEM SO THERE’S NO GOING BACK… but also, is this an incredibly dumb thing to be doing at this time and with my current financial situation? O_O
Also, I haven’t even finished my dang witch’s hat yet
Edmundo leans back, away from their kiss. It is reluctant, yes, but still a retreat. Their faces are still close enough that they can share breaths, but the distance means no contact. No heat.
“You’re one of those heroes now,” he says in the scant space between them, near to a whisper, though it’s hardly needed. Beyond the thin walls of the office space, the garage is in operation, the sounds of machines and their mechanics echoing back and forth.
She shrugs in response, tips her hand back and forth. Hero-adjacent would be a pithy, but accurate, response; she’s just not sure it would come out right.
“It’s different than what you were doing before,” he says, leaning even further back which isn’t what she wants at all! But he takes her hands in his and that’s an okay consolation prize, she supposes. “Protecting your block from pendejos is one thing, but you’re on the news now. You’re in bright spandex and everything.”
She crinkles her nose in protest: she doesn’t wear spandex. She just wears normal clothes. It’s not her fault her powers manifests as flowing green lights.
“No, no, you’re right. I’m getting off track,” he says, smoothing his thumbs over the back of her hands. It’s rough and a patch of black smears across her skin, but it’s warm. She likes it.
From the way she thinks this conversation is going, she’s going to miss it.
“You’ll always have a home here,” Edmundo says, and when he leans in, he presses his forehead to hers in a deliberately chaste way, “But you’re outgrowing us, and I can’t keep you chained down.”
She can’t say he’s wrong.
She doesn’t try to kiss him again–they’ve already had their final goodbye kiss, even if she didn’t know it for what it was at the time. But if she tightens her return grip, hoping to press the shape of her hands into his, well. He doesn’t say anything about that, at least.
—
She kisses Maya because she loves her and, also, Tetsuki might very well never see her again–either because they will be separated on opposite sides of an inter planar barrier or Tetsuki will be dead.
Maya kisses back because she loves Tetsuki, too… but perhaps isn’t sure in what way she loves Tetsuki and thinks that kissing might help her figure it out. And also because, even though Tetsuki isn’t saying it out loud, Maya is more than aware that her best friend may very well die and she doesn’t want to be a last regret in any way.
It is a lot of emotions and concepts for their first, hesitant kiss to convey.
Luckily, it is not also a last and only kiss, and they greatly improve their communication via kisses in the future.
—
There is no kissing between them. For many reasons, really.
Mainly because intimacy and vulnerability are not luxuries either of them can afford.
Tetsuki has been experimenting with wearing hound-snake venom atop wax coated lips. Azula can literally breathe fire.
And depending on which timeline they’re in, they may be trying to kill each other.
So, no. No kissing for them.
—
The first kiss of Team Two actually happens between Naruto and Komadori.
Tetsuki does’t understand what’s so embarrassing about it but, then again, as mentioned, she wasn’t actually involved so…
She promises to talk about that mission only once a year at most.
—
Tetsuki is dripping with river water, mildly concussed, and high off the wave of endorphins that is surviving an apocalyptic, dystopian future when she kisses Kusakabe-senpai for the first time.
She began cold, drawing blankets and coats to herself, scarves and spare scraps of cloth tucked into any openings left. She began cold, in a stone cave damp and miserable, the night air harsh and haunting.
She began cold, waiting to heal enough to move–though whether she meant to retreat or proceed, survival by cowardice or honor in action, she could not decide. Could barely consider, really, as she was mourning and in shock and scavenging through the caravan for anything that might help.
She began cold and woke up on fire, feverish and burning alive. No doubt cooking herself by accident, a horrific death on an already horrible day. Her muscles could barely move, she had nested too well, and it took her an excruciating while before she could claw her way out, press her face to the now soothing stone of the cave, lip idly at the trickles of water, cool and sweet.
It took her another half day to find an equilibrium, head muddled as it was, protected but not roasting, and another slow, plodding two days after that to gather and prioritize supplies for a lone girl miles and miles from the nearest civilization.
She does not know what fate may befall her ahead, only that to remain here would be certain death.
—
“Shh, shh, it will all be okay” she murmurs, hushing soothing sounds, clutching the both of them to her sides. She tries to be confident, to put up a brave front so that her cousins do not catch on, but there is no concealing the trembling of her arms, the hitching of her breath.
They are braver than her, it seems, for they do not respond with anything but solemn nods and a tighter embraces.
Outside their chosen hiding place, the hound paces, its snout peeking in and sniffing deeply. It barks to its fellows, the harsh sound echoed in multiple, the percussion of horse hoofbeats and the voices of men following all the more fearsome.
“Shh, shh,” she can only dumbly repeated, her voice cracking and tears beginning to fall.
“Can we pray to the Moon Mother?” asks Takay, sweet and petal soft.
“Of course,” she replies, as steadily as she can. It might be little comfort at the end of their lives, but for such a gruesome demise as this, surely any comfort is worth it.
Bulan, silent but no less sweet on her other side, helps her shaking hands reach for her beads.
“Moon Mother,” she begins, her cousins parroting the prayer as best as they can remember, “Who watches over us in the sky, casting light upon our dark nights. We pray to thee.”
There are now multiple hounds sniffing at the crevasse, barking madly with bloodlust.
“Moon Mother,” she continues, even as Takay and Bulan cannot, their faces shoved into her ribs, seeking whatever cover or comfort she has left to give, “Who sits amongst the stars, guiding us forever forward to our peace. We pray to–”
A high pitched yelp interrupts the chorus of barking outside, and soon the hounds sound less enraged and more confused. Scared.
She realizes that the hoofbeats and sounds of men have not come any closer. Have ceased entirely. Another high pitched yelp and soon the dogs are retreating, no longer harrying the opening of their hiding place.
Soon after, the forest is deafening in its silence.
Takay and Bulan pull away from her. Their hands still cling to her clothes, but they lean forward now, curiosity outweighing their fear.
A single boot steps into the visible triangle of the forest that they can see. Filthy and worn, but hardy it seems. Beside it drops the end of a staff, which taps twice against their hiding spot.
“I will not stay,” says the figure who has saved them, the voice gruff with what might be disuse. Their savior crouches down, body swathed and obscured by fabric, but unmistakeable as a human woman. “But you are safe for now.”
There were an odd number of candidates at the trials.
Normally, this mattered not. Quantity of candidates were less important than quality, and only the best and brightest could join the Premier Witch Council.
But for this particular set of trials, the fact that there were an odd number of candidates was not just surprising but also worrying:
On the full moon after the Premier Gemini Witches died, trials were held to find a new pair of luminaries to replace them.
One candidate had come alone.
—
“I know what they think of me,” Candidate Chacone says during the final trial, “I know what they said.”
The eleven luminaries remain silent, observing. Judging.
“They think I’ve done something to her, a diabolical thing. Then mutilated myself for more power. An abomination of a Gemini witch.”
Still the luminaries say nothing.
“But she was the one that slammed a wall between us. She’s the one that left me alone, screaming!"
Some of the younger luminaries at the ends flinch at her tone, but the Premier Taurus Witch at her place in the center merely holds up her hand, settles them.
"My magic wants desperately to harmonize and all I had were the shrieking echoes of myself.”
~
~
For seven hours and thirty one minutes, Luminary Chacone headed the largest, most successful coven in history.
If the knowledge had stayed within their secret half world of magic and marvels, then it would have been a triumph.
As it is, Luminary Chacone’s actions have brought unwanted attention from the shadowy government organization known as SHIELD.
—
The magician doesn’t look like anything special, Maria thinks on the opposite side of the glass. Nothing like Loki–grand robes and staff and regal demeanor–but perhaps that had more to do with his alien heritage than his magic.
If Maria had passed by this magician on the street, she wouldn’t even turn around. The magician looks absolutely normal. Absolutely human.
The magician waits, patiently, silently, as she has done since agents escorted her here. No demands for explanations. No pleads to go back. No questions.
How alarming.
This should Coulson’s job. For all that SHIELD is still cleaning up the literal alien invasion, this feels like a peace time interview, or even a recruitment.
But Coulson is dead, and Fury can only trust Maria to do this, never mind that she’s a battle commander and not the deft touch of whatever Coulson was.
Enough.
Maria steels herself and enters, posture impeccable, and the magician reacts by blinking slow and sleepily at her.
“You did something,” Maria begins, a shaky start but not inaccurate, “During the invasion.”
The magician nods, open, “I protected those that I could.”
“More than that,” Maria responds, unable to find words for what she means to say.
SHIELD had experienced losses that day, of course, Coulson one of many. But only from the direct attack on the helicarrier. When the rift was open, monsters from across the universe raining chaos down, SHIELD stood firm. Agents stood back up from hits that should have taken them down, were able to do things that should have been beyond them. For several hours, SHIELD was undefeatable.
The magician huffed a soft but honestly amused sort of laugh, smile curling her mouth though her eyes continued to droop in exhaustion. “A matter of convenient coincidence,” she answers, though Maria hardly had a question formed. “My priority was to ensure that the building would be safe.” Again she laughs, or tries to, “I told everyone to believe that the shield would hold.”
~
A/N: The later bits are related to this long ago Avengers crossover. Just doing some “spring” cleaning of little ficlets and such on my computer.
This is the un-formatted script I wrote for Bindlestiff’s 2019 Love Edition show. Unsurprisingly, especially since I wrote 7/10 pages three hours before the deadline, it didn’t make the cut. Also, this particular script was like pulling teeth and I didn’t stumble on the plot until five pages in so…
I figured part of the problem was that I didn’t have the opportunity to do the workshopping and feedback process (literally the draft I turned in was 1.2, when usually I get to at least the 3rd version by deadline). I don’t know when or if ever I’ll use this script, but I thought it would be fun to share. And while the script itself isn’t the best I’ve done, I quite like the concept even if I didn’t hammer it out fully.
ANYWAY, with all that wishy washy rambling as an intro, how could you resist? 😛
JackSGreyson Says 