AO3 Link | Dreams of Lost Chances (100 words) by Merfilly
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Essalieyan Universe -- Michelle West
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Gilliam of Elseth/Stephen of Elseth [Essalieyan Universe]
Characters: Gilliam of Elseth [Essalieyan Universe], Stephen of Elseth [Essalieyan Universe]
Additional Tags: Drabble, Present Tense, Implied/Referenced Canonical Character Death
Summary:

Gil, Stephen, a moment that can never be

Dreams of Lost Chances

"This is just a dream. You're not really here. You ... you left me."

"No."

"I lost you!"

"Even if I am only a dream, I am a part of you. Or ... do you still hold yourself back from all we could have been?"

The snarl is familiar, ripping out of Gil's throat moments before the Hunter is upon the Huntbrother. Lips, tongue, teeth move with fierce possession over skin, met with something not truly submissive but giving ground. What was denied by death finds voice and passion here, now, a stolen moment in effigy.

It is all Gil can have.

erinptah

Continued liveblog as I read Seven Seas’ new print edition of PSOH, and make sporadic comparisons to the original Tokyopop translation.

Chapters 1-3 were covered here. You can pick up the books with my affiliate links here. The rest of this post is the notes I microblogged in a Mastodon thread and a Bluesky thread.

( Dreizehn and Dragon and Dice, oh my... )

senmut

2016 - Okay this year is a rough one for me to think on. But let's see how the movies went.

oh my, only three?

Star Trek: Beyond -- I am never not gonna be pissed that the franchise for this set ended here. Because, you see, while Urban and Yelchin stole my hearts from day one, it was THIS MOVIE that felt like everyone had fully found a way to bring the roles to life with the spirit of their predecessors and their own takes merging BEAUTIFULLY. Then again, losing Yelchin... maybe it's best.

Hidden Figures - HISTORY! Dramatized! Could have done without the shift on the white guy getting the bathroom policy changed from real life, BUT! The whole film introduced me to fuller stories for names I'd only known in passing, as it made me dig in and find historic accounts! Also, hot damn that is one beautiful cast.

Star Wars: Rogue One - This? This was Star Wars in a way I had not felt Star Wars since RotJ. It was about hope, it was about quick-knitting hero teams, it was about giving your all, no matter the cost, to end the evil. To say Rogue One belongs with the OT for me is no hyperbole. I love everything it did to enhance the mythos.

muccamukk

Watch on YouTube

Lyrics in the description.

senmut

AO3 Link | Scheduling Time (312 words) by Merfilly
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: DC Comics (General)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Diana of Themyscira & Lois Lane
Characters: Diana of Themyscira, Lois Lane
Additional Tags: Epistolary, +Modern Age (1986-Present), Post-Crisis
Summary:

Lois and Diana have a back and forth email chain

Scheduling Time

To: Diana Prince@embassy.thm
From: Lois Lane@thedailyplanet.com
Subject: Reschedule?

I know it's short notice, but I'm sure you saw the small invasion of Mole Men from last week. Turns out their exodus turned over a few leads for me. Maybe Tuesday after next?

To: Lois Lane@thedailyplanet.com
From: Diana Prince@embassy.thm
Subject: Re: Reschedule

I look forward to the story you publish… and the other bits when we do meet up. However, can we shift that to the Thursday of that same week? I am giving a small talk at Bryn Mawr on the topic of holding out hope to others.

To: Diana Prince@embassy.thm
From: Lois Lane@thedailyplanet.com
Subject: Re: Reschedule?

Oh I hope they record it so I can download it after. Thursday of that week is great. I told Clark he could go hang out with the boys while I have a ladies' day to myself.

Okay, autocorrelate might be… no, that's not the word… ugh, Perry's yelling.

To: Lois Lane@thedailyplanet.com
From: Diana Prince@embassy.thm
Subject: Re: Reschedule

I can guess what you were going to say. I find the auto-correct function useful for highlighting the changes in spelling and grammar since my mother taught me English. As there have been shifts in the decades since she had learned it.

Following up to let you know that your co-worker, Miss Grant, could learn to be less inciting in her choices of words for interviews.

To: Diana Prince@embassy.thm
From: Lois Lane@thedailyplanet.com
Subject: UGH Cat

I'm sorry. I didn't even know that interview was happening or I would have put a stumbling block in place.

Did you read my exposé?

To: Lois Lane@thedailyplanet.com
From: Diana Prince@embassy.thm
Subject: Article

Very nice work. It seems the Mole Men had true reason.

See you on Thursday!

erinptah

Just got the first two volumes of Seven Seas’ new PSOH Collector’s Edition. (Here’s my list of the series on bookshop.org, for anyone who wants to buy them in a way that gives a kickback to (a) local bookstores, (b) me, and (c) not Amazon.)

I already had the whole series in the original Tokyopop edition, but wow, the print quality on this new release is such an upgrade. The lineart, the toning, it has so many fine details and subtle gradations that didn’t get to shine nearly this much in the first version.

It’s also a brand-new translation of the text. I’m resisting the urge to do a whole line-by-line comparison — I want to just read and enjoy the stories, without looking back-and-forth between two books on every single page — but I keep getting curious and spot-checking individual lines/panels…

Guess I’m liveblogging this now, huh.

(Thread on Mastodon, duplicate thread on Bluesky, I made those by copying this post as I wrote it, bit-by-bit.)

( Dream and Despair and Daughter, under the cut )

tropicsbear

Things You Can Make ChatGPT Write for You

Every warm human word
You could ever have said

senmut

kalloway! Thank you for the card and stickers!

senmut

AO3 Link | Useful Gathering (300 words) by Merfilly
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Partners in Crime [TV - 1984]
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Sydney Kovack & Carole Stanwyck [Partners in Crime]
Characters: Sydney Kovack [Partners in Crime], Carole Stanwyck [Partners in Crime]
Additional Tags: Triple Drabble, Event - Funeral, Community: ladiesbingo
Summary:

Sydney and Carole are holding a second funeral for their mutual ex, mostly to preserve their business.

Useful Gathering

Sydney carefully adjusted her skirt as she stood up, hand not holding the handkerchief going out to catch Carole's.

"Why did we agree to hold a wake for him?"

Carole gave a reserved smile to one of the businessmen here to pay respects.

"To help us keep the business running," Carole answered after she was certain no one else would be listening. "Besides, were you ever any good at saying 'no' to Jeanine?"

Sydney made an indelicate sound at that, and covered by bringing the handkerchief up to dab at her nose. "Were you?"

Carole had to bite back the unseemly laughter that came with it. "We need his contacts, to get the agency in the black, and start paying off that mortgage."

"Can't just ask some of your old polo pals to lend a hand, oh wait, you just take their pictures now."

That lit Carole's temper, but she gathered it back in check, and squeezed Sydney's hand. "One way or another, Sydney, we can make this work for us. Neither one of us is the woman he married any longer, but I think we can find a place for ourselves anyway."

Sydney took a deep breath, then smiled sadly at another pair of suits walking past them. "You're right, and I'm sorry for the dig. We'll get through the speeches, cut to the meat of promising to help them for standard fees going forward, and make the agency solvent.

"Just, don't leave me alone with any of them? I'll point out the fanny-patters and lewd ones as we mingle."

"And if they're the older ones, I'll tell you how Raymond got his hooks into them," Carole promised in turn, steeling her spine for the possibility of dealing with 'old friends' from the failed marriage.

"We have each other."

epeeblade

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has advised should be viewed with discretion. )

tropicsbear

I've finally finished this year's Saiyuki fic! Still has to go through a round or two of editing before I can post it, but I should have it up on the usual places before the end of the week.

The original plan was for the fic to be 100% lighthearted and/or funny. Some heavy backstory snuck in at the last minute, which shouldn't surprise me because it's happened multiple times before across different fandoms, and yet it did.

( Some thoughts about my writing style. )

All that to say, I almost took this year's Saiyuki fic in a completely different direction than I first wanted. But I decided to stick with the lighthearted vibe for this even if there is that one slightly heavier section. Personally, I think the slight deviation helps make everything else land better.

tropicsbear

⚠️ Discussions of complications related to childbirth, infant death, birth- and pregnancy-related medical issues

Influencers made millions pushing ‘wild’ births – now the Free Birth Society is linked to baby deaths around the world

By 2024, it was becoming increasingly hard to deny how many babies were dying to FBS mothers. Deaths followed a pattern. First-time mothers – whose pregnancies are known to be higher-risk – attempting freebirths over many days, even a week, after wild pregnancies. Some women went to more than 44 weeks of pregnancy.

Most women who freebirth will have positive outcomes, and for healthy mothers the risks are low. But the radical version of freebirth Saldaya and Norris-Clark pioneered caused alarm even among freebirth advocates.

senmut

AO3 Link | Cat and Bird (300 words) by Merfilly
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: DC Comics (General)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Selina Kyle & Dinah Lance
Characters: Selina Kyle, Dinah Lance
Additional Tags: Triple Drabble, Post-Crisis, +Modern Age (1986-Present)
Summary:

Selina's in the neighborhood

Cat and Bird

"Hey there, little birdie," came a voice from above Dinah, and she looked up to see her friend Selina on the roof. That made Dinah's mood much better, and she hastily made use of the fire-escapes — and walls — to get up there.

"Hey yourself, tabby cat," she said with a grin, barely breathing hard for that exercise. "A bit out of your territory, aren't you?" She plopped herself down on the roof-edge next to the other girl.

"Hmm, came to check on one of the ones that got adopted out, make sure it was on the up and up."

"This neighborhood? It better be, or word will get around. Bunch of nosy people around. And Dad hears all the rumors like that."

"Nice older couple, and the kid was from their faith. How he wound up in a Catholic orphanage is anyone's guess," Selina said, giving Dinah the clues to keep her own ears out for the kid.

"Glad you decided to stick around when you got done," Dinah admitted, leaning over against Selina.

"Knew you'd be out sooner rather than later. Make any money today?"

"No; this tutoring is a trade. I help the blockhead learn, Mom gets her bad cooler fixed for free."

"You seem to be the one giving up time and effort a lot for these trades," Selina said, disapproving.

"Family business, Selina. Have to support mom somehow, and Dad uses it as an excuse to keep her off my back when I go out in the evenings." She slung her arm around Selina's shoulders and squeezed. "I get what I need."

"If you say so." Selina shrugged. "C'mon. I know who's working the door at the Regal. We can catch a movie and be irresponsible teenagers for once."

Dinah considered, then grinned broadly. "Sounds fun!"

bradygirl_12

"Sunday, December 7, 1941, a day that will live in infamy..."

On a quiet Sunday morning, the bombs fell, and the United States entered World War II, 84 years ago today.

🇺🇲 🥺 🇺🇲

Cross-posts: https://bradygirl-12.livejournal.com/1601844.html

Current Location: U.S.A.

senmut

More Joy Day announced

Jane Siberry has a new song free to download - Very Political, called "bailout" and it hit hard

Scarpetta, the Patricia Cornwell series, is getting a TV Show.
Latest Doctor Who BluRay release short film
Sheriden/Delenn gif set with Tolkien words

A "Punny" photo
SarahSeeAndersen cartoon about cats and hot pads
Kermit the Assassin and further commentary

Sissy Spacek Photo set

The Restorer and the Butler - haunted house story
The Kents and the Pediatrician - DC Comics fanfic
Human and Alien - a story of Uncanny Valley
Iron Bull/Dorian Pavus in their later years - Fic and art

Good Wicked! meta
Mood board for the original Thrawn Trilogy

bradygirl_12

Well, I'm ready for Christmas: the tree is and the decorations are up, the presents are wrapped, and tweaking Christmas stories to post soon. Hope you're able to keep stress low and indulge in the Christmas spirit. Enjoy! 🎄 ☺️ 🎀

Cross-posted: https://bradygirl-12.livejournal.com/1601729.html

Current Mood: artistic
Current Location: Home

muccamukk

Thirty-six years ago today, a lone gunman murdered fourteen women at Polytechnique Montréal, before taking his own life.

The names of the women were:

Geneviève Bergeron
Hélène Colgan
Nathalie Croteau
Barbara Daigneault
Anne-Marie Edward
Maud Haviernick
Maryse Laganière
Maryse Leclair
Anne-Marie Lemay
Sonia Pelletier
Michèle Richard
Annie St-Arneault
Annie Turcotte
Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz

CBC: Montreal to honour 14 victims of Polytechnique massacre at ceremony.

Globe & Mail: Progress on combatting intimate-partner violence stalling under new government, advocates fear.

tropicsbear

This was also discussed over at anime_manga, but I wanted a link here for mirroring reasons as well.

Crunchyroll is destroying its subtitles for no good reason

There is only one conclusion that can be drawn from that: the Funimation-turned-Crunchyroll executives still do not have any respect for anime as a medium. In addition, they seem to be treating Crunchyroll and its ways of doing things as the ways of pirates – which isn’t entirely incorrect, as Crunchyroll’s use of Aegisub and ASS did originate from the ways of pirate fansubbers. But fansubbers deeply care about anime as medium (they wouldn’t be illegally subtitling it for free as a hobby otherwise), which in turn means that the ways fansubbers have developed to subtitle anime are in fact extremely efficient for the job – much better than basically any “industry standards” for subtitling, even.

Like the anime_manga OP says, I do remember a time when Crunchyroll was a piracy site. It's why I made an account over there in the first place 😂 (An account I promptly forgot about in favor of torrenting, only to log in again after so many years and be surprised to see that the site was now legit.)

If I were running Crunchyroll, I'd hire a bunch of fansubbers and have them use their preferred software to make high-quality subtitles then use that as my selling point versus other streaming platforms.

senmut

2015 - A decade ago! Oh right, I was dirt poor by the end of the year because I remember thinking I wasn't going to get to see the new Star Wars film in theater.

Furious 7 - So my late partner and I had fallen in love with this crew in the first movie. She LOVED Brian. And... well. Paul Walker died before completing this one. And then they released it on her anniversary with me. So Yeah. Saw it twice in theater.

Jurassic World - This looked interesting, was okay, but wife and I both had Issues with it. And then, of course, Pratt lived up to his name, and I let the franchise go away. Still kinda want to see the one with the original trio.

Carol - I don't do arthouse style films, I protest mightily. AND YET. I decided to see what the fuss was about, and FELL IN LOVE. Cate and Rooney sold the story. (and having read up about the author, wow it's toned down from the inspirations / she was a helluva bitch it looked like)

Star Wars: The Force Awakens - such characters! such potential! Shame they never made more after it to explore Finn and Rey and Poe in a way that highlighted EVERYTHING THAT MADE THEM INTERESTING! (It did however set me on the SW track of writing, so I can't complain too much)

senmut

AO3 link | Her Turn (300 words) by Merfilly
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer [TV]
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Relationships: Willow Rosenberg & Buffy Summers
Characters: Willow Rosenberg, Buffy Summers, Dawn Summers [Buffy & Angel Universe]
Additional Tags: Triple Drabble, Post-Canon
Summary:

Willow left a letter...

Her Turn

This one, it's not for you. You get that, right? This time, it's about me. It has to be me. You can't… you can't keep reaching. I know you love me. I know you would want to step up, to take my place. You've always been the one making the sacrifice. That's who you are, the One. You changed the game to begin with, and then when that wasn't enough, you changed the whole playing field.

Okay, maybe I had something to do with changing the gameboard up. But I was only able to do it because of you, because you had so much faith in me. I need you to have that faith in me now. I need you to be the stronger one, the one who has to live, to keep facing the evil.

Hopefully it won't be as bad, not once I do this.

All my love.

Dawn wasn't used to seeing her sister frail, not even after all the losses they had faced. She'd guessed, though, that this one might be the breaking point, and hurried to get to Buffy's side. She saw the paper crumpled in a fist, but ignored it, just turning her sister to hold her.

At first, Buffy was stiff. The grief broke to Dawn's coaxing, a howl of pain and denial. Dawn just held on, petting her hair, tears streaming on her own face.

"Maybe… maybe it didn't end her?" Dawn suggested once the crying gave way to the heavy silence.

Buffy pushed the crumpled paper to her sister, letting Dawn read Willow's own words. It made Dawn swallow hard, as the pain and finality gripped her all over again.

She couldn't give into it, though. Buffy needed her. Buffy had lost Willow, and Dawn needed to step up even more.

mithen

For my Wife

Erin Reads: Pet Shop of Horrors, Collector’s Edition, post 2 (volume 1, chapters 4-6)

Fandom Fifty: #42

Billy Bragg, keeping on keeping on

LadiesBingo: Epistolary fic: Emails, letters etc.

Erin Reads: Pet Shop of Horrors, Collector’s Edition, post 1 (volume 1, chapters 1-3)

(no subject)

Things You Can Make ChatGPT Write for You

Mail Call

LadiesBingo: Funerals and Wakes

I'm not back, but I wish I was

Damn, I really have missed writing fanfic

Linkage

Influencers made millions pushing ‘wild’ births – now the Free Birth Society is linked to baby deaths around the world

LadiesBingo: Teenagers

December 7, 1941

Various Links 11/30 - 12/6

'Tis The Season! 🎀

Thirty Six Years

(no subject)

Crunchyroll is destroying its subtitles for no good reason

Fandom Fifty: #41

LadiesBingo: Sacrifice / Letting Go

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