Hi hi! I'm Cal (she/him) and this is my sideblog for writing/whump! And Teen Wolf meta now I guess!
Main blog: @feelsandbooksandshit
Fandom sideblog: @calista24
Here is my Ao3 (same name as my main) if you're curious. Any writing I post on tumblr will be under the tag #cal creates !
I'm an adult and have been a writer forever, but I got more serious about it a few years ago. I've also been a whump enjoyer for many years by now <3
Regarding my taste/preferences, I used this tier list!
I don't know how much I'll personally be posting but I will reblog things I enjoy <3 My ask-box is open for asks, requests, etc, but beware of my potentially long response time!
I feel like weāre not utilizing enough the fact that Theo can walk past wolfsbane barriersā¦
like imagine him running in to go do something or whatever while thereās danger and Liam canāt run after him because of a barrier and he purposely doesnāt break it because he doesnāt want Liam to get hurt
Thinking about post-war puppy pack era where Mason quietly asks Liam why he still lets Theo hang around and Liam replies, āHeās helpful,ā because he doesnāt know how else to explain it. Thinking about Theo leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, able to hear the conversation, internalizing it as further proof that he has to be useful to be worth anything.
Basically, "more skilled person just beats the person they're training at sparring until the person they're training improves without doing any fundamentals or teaching them the right way to do things" is a cruel and useless form of "training" and only makes sense if you're trying to show that the "teacher" is being cruel or doesn't know how to teach. Showing it as a legitimate and useful form of training indicates to me that the author didn't bother to do any real research.
There are sort of two ways to look at it as a trope.
Itās either one of those tropes that has no real world basis, but looks/sounds cool in storytelling and is useful for moving the plot along (see: torture, knocking someone unconscious, a lot of medieval fantasy government stuff)
Or itās one of those things where the overlap between people who write books and people who practice martial arts is so small that most writers trust the trope blindly and never think past it.
Just a few tips from someone who's been doing HEMA fighting (and training) for about a year
-Drills. So many drills. Just doing the same motion, or set of motions, over and over and over until it's muscle memory. And then do it some more. These can be done with another person, so you can get a feel for hitting someone (else's sword), or they might be done to a dummy, or just to the air as part of a series of steps
-there is a surprising amount of reading! A lot of what we do is based on styles that originated in the 11th-15th centuries, and were literally written in manuals for future people to use. Sometimes the explanations and diagrams are very clear. Sometimes they are not.
- There is sparring, with variations on goals. Sometimes the goal is just 'hit each other'. Sometimes you will have specific caveats, like if you both deliver a 'killing blow' at the same time you have to run to opposite ends of the room and back
- Footwork drills
- lots of wrist and arm stretches, both with and without swords
- Moving through different blocks/base positions, and practicing different cuts from each position
- More drills, wearing armor or other appropriate gear
- Weights and cardio training! Both are extremely important for making sure you can 1. Swing your sword and 2. Keep swinging your sword when you're wearing 15 lbs of armor and have been hacking at people for a full 20 minutes
- Learning how to maintain your gear
- Practicing control of the blade- this is usually done by having a dummy target (or sometimes a real person), and swinging with full power but stopping before you actually make contact. Master swordsman can bring their blade within half an inch of their target.
- Even more drills
Obviously some of this is pretty modern, but I can't imagine that it would be incredibly novel even to people from 600 years ago. And if you have any questions, please feel free to ask!
Adding onto this with even more things, now that I'm nearly 2 years in and have done a couple of tournaments!
Footwork drills are really important! Learning how and when to move, and shift your weight on your feet, is crucial
When practicing solo I often do so in front of a full-length mirror so that I can actually see what I'm doing
There is also just a lot of sparring. Unfortunately you can't really get good at sword fighting without getting your butt kicked. A lot.
However! A good teacher will give you tips either during or after the fight, or both! A lot of the time it's things like 'you need to improve your footwork more, here are 10 different drills. Go do them.' However, there is also a fair bit of going back over certain 'plays' in slower motion, where they'll tell you exactly what you did wrong and how to fix it in the context of the fight.
Also, just as a side note, unless your character is the progeny of a wealthy lord, they are probably going to use borrowed equipment. It will not fit right. And it will reek with the stench of 1000 sweaty people. And if you train in it enough, when you do get your own gear that actually fits properly and only smells like your sweat, I swear you get 5x better overnight
At some point, everyone develops their own style. I've fought people who love to just make huge stabby lunges, people who make wild flourishes, big guys who just brute force it, guys who look like they'd blow away in a light breeze but are the fastest people you've ever met. It comes over time, and from learning as many different techniques as you can
Not sure how much they did this in Ye Olden Days but almost everyone I've met in HEMA now fights in at least two different styles (usually longsword and Sabre or rapier). As I said above, the more styles you learn, the better you get at all of them; many techniques that you learn from one style are applicable in some way to the other
Thats all I can think of for now, but if anyone has any questions feel free to reach out!
If youāre writing about a character whoās rich and has a big house, and youāre writing in any sort of historical setting, I canāt help but feel that youāre missing an opportunity if you never talk about the Guests.
In a modern context, big houses rarely serve any narrative purpose beyond jokes about rooms nobody has ever been in, but historically, all that extra space had an important function. Apart from families generally being larger and multi-generational households being the norm, hospitality was a major part of a wealthy householdās basic social obligations. Travel was time-consuming and expensive, and obviously your rich buddies couldnāt just rent a room while they were in town (how gauche!), so youād be expected to put them up for as long as they cared to stay. Indeed, being able to put up lots and lots of guests was one of the basic ways you demonstrated your high status.
This expectation of hospitality extended beyond your immediate social circle, as well. If you were the big name around town, you could expect to have government officials, artists and philosophers, travelling nobility, and the like hitting you up for a spare room on very little notice, and you had to be very careful about sayingĀ ānoā because refusal might be construed as a snub ā or worse, an admission that you canāt afford it! The upshot is that, at any given time, a large household might be playing host to a bewildering assortment of friends, relatives, friends of relatives, relatives of friends, celebrities both far-ranging and local, dignitaries, con artists, miscellaneous weirdos, and that one guy who nobody can quite place, but whose presence everyone is too polite to question.
(The miscellaneous weirdos are a big part of it, in fact. If youāve ever wondered how someone makes a career out of something like ābeing Franceās most famous loverā, thatās basically how it worked: youād use your outlandish reputation to prevail on some random wealthy jerkās hospitality, hang around their house as an āhonoured guestā for a couple of months, then discreetly move on before you wore out your welcome and repeat the whole process somewhere else. There was a whole class of people who made lifelong careers out of being entertainingly weird guests.)
Like, sure, thereās no obligation to get into any of that if domestic affairs arenāt the focus of your story. However, if you are keeping the plot close to home, itās something where a little bit of extra thought can pay large dividends. Keep it in mind when youāre plotting out that Pride and Prejudice Batman AU next time!
omggg can i break into the top secret lab where youāre being held and sneak into your test chamber and unhook you from the machines and carefully pull the needles from your body and carry you out and try not to think about how much weight youāve lost even though youāre sooo light in my arms. can i smuggle you into a crappy pay-by-month motel room with the last bit of cash i can track down and wash you up in the chipped shower stall and tuck you into the cheap motel blankets as your body starts to flush with fever. can i stay with you as your body burns off the last of what they did to you. can i steal from vending machines and the continental breakfast and bring food home to you and coax you just to eat a little, a little more. watered down tea kept warm at the kitchenette. can i sleep next to you every night to keep you from going cold again, wait breathlessly for your eyes to open again. can i be there when they do
š How to Build a Culture Without Just Inventing Spices and Necklaces
(a worldbuilding roast. with love.)
So. Youāre building a fantasy world, and youāve just invented:
ā Three types of ceremonial jewelry
ā A spice that tastes like cinnamon if it were bitter and cursed
ā A holiday where everyone wears gold and screams at dawn
Cute. But thatās not culture. Thatās aesthetics.
And if your worldbuilding is all outfits, dances, and spice blends with vaguely mystical names, your storyās probably going to feel like a cosplay convention held inside a Pinterest board.
Hereās how to fix thatāaka: how to build a real, functioning culture that shapes your story, not just its vibes.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
š Culture Is Built on Power, Not Just Style
Ask yourself:
ā Whoās in charge, and why?
ā Who has land? Who doesnāt?
ā Whatās considered taboo, sacred, or punishable by death?
Culture is shaped by who gets to make the rules and who gets crushed by them. Thatās where things like religion, family structure, class divisions, gender roles, and social expectations actually come from.
Start there. Not at the embroidery.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
2.šŖ Culture Comes From Conflict
Did this society evolve peacefully? Was it colonized? Did it colonize? Was it rebuilt after a war? Is it still in one?
ā What was destroyed and mythologized?
ā What do the survivors still whisper about?
ā What do children get taught in school thatāsā¦ suspiciously sanitized?
No culture is neutral. Every tradition has a history, and that history should taste like blood, loss, or propaganda.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
3.š§ Belief Systems > Customs Lists
Sure, rituals and holidays are cool. But what do people believe about:
ā Death?
ā Love?
ā Time?
ā The natural world?
ā Justice?
Example: A society that believes time is cyclical vs. one that sees time as linear will approach everythingāfrom prison sentences to griefācompletely differently.
You donāt need to invent 80 gods. You need to know what those gods mean to the people who pray to them.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
4.š« Culture Controls Behavior (Quietly)
Culture shows up in:
ā What people apologize for
ā What insults cut deepest
ā What people are embarrassed about
ā Whatās praised publicly vs. whatās hidden privately
For instance:
ā A culture obsessed with stoicism wonāt say āI love you.ā Theyāll say āHave you eaten?ā
ā A culture built on legacy might prioritize ancestor veneration, archival writing, name inheritance.
This stuff? Way more immersive than giving everyone matching earrings.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
5. š Culture = Daily Life, Not Just Festivals
Sure, your MC might attend a funeral where people paint their faces blue. But what about:
ā Breakfast routines?
ā How people greet each other on the street?
ā Who cooks, and who eats first?
ā Whatās considered ācleanā or āproperā?
ā How is parenting handled? Divorce?
Culture is what happens between plot points. It should shape your characterās assumptions, language, fears, and habitsāwhether or not a festival is going on.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
6. š¬ Let Your Characters Disagree With Their Own Culture
A culture isnāt a monolith.
Even in deeply traditional societies, people:
ā Rebel
ā Question
ā Break rules
ā Misinterpret laws
ā Mock sacred things
ā Act hypocritically
ā Weaponize or resist whatās expected
Let your characters wrestle with the culture around them. Thatās where realism (and tension) lives.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
7.š§¼ Beware the āPretty = Goodā Trap
Worldbuilding gets boring fast when:
ā The protagonistās homeland is beautiful and pure
ā The enemyās culture is dark and ābarbaricā
ā Every detail just reinforces who the reader should like
You canāand shouldāchallenge the aesthetic hierarchy.
ā Let ugly things be beloved.
ā Let beautiful things be corrupt.
ā Let your MC romanticize their culture and then get disillusioned by it later.
āāāāāāā ā¦ āāāāāāā
š TL;DR (but like, spicy):
ā Culture is not food and jewelry.
ā Culture is power, fear, memory, contradiction.
ā Stop inventing spices until you know who starved last winter.
ā Let your world feel lived in, not curated.
The best cultural worldbuilding doesnāt look like a list.
It feels like a system. A pressure. A presence your characters canāt escapeāeven if they try.
Now go. Build something real. (You can add spices later.)
ārin t.
// writing advice for worldbuilders with rage and range
// thewriteadviceforwriters
Sometimes the problem isnāt your plot. Itās your first 5 pages. Fix it here ā š¤ Free eBook: 5 Opening Pages Mistakes to Stop Making:
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A gothic prompt pack for writers who love cursed universities, secret societies, and scholarly rot.ā Write the Darkness āA 75-prompt horror
Goddddddd thinking about that narrative moment when something horrible is happening and the character who has been frantically trying to come up with a way to fix it and getting more and more frantic and panicky justāstops. Because. Oh. Thereās the solution. Theyāre not getting out of this alive but like. Itās a solution for everyone else. Okay. Okay.
and!!!! like!!!! obviously this is delicious when you hit your Self Sacrifice Archetype with it, but honestly I think it's even chewier when you give it to, like. someone with a selfish streak. The one with some arrogance who's maybe not quite a team player. leans more towards loner. Give this moment to the one party member who has been shown to prioritize their own survival over everything else.
And then the eye-of-the-storm realization of "Oh. Huh. I am not making it to the end of the story. but everyone else is going to. Isn't it strange, that I'm not more upset?"
can we talk about how easy theo accepts being a prisoner? because, after he got back from the ground, he haven't even considered running. trying to escape. stealing the sword and get the hell out of BH.
no, he just did what he's told, no hint of rebellion, and followed liam and hayden to the house. sat there, healing from malia's punches, listening to everything that was being said and no once did he try to defend himself. sure, he doesn't have many arguments. but still. he only spoke to remind them that liam's the one making the decision to put him back or not, because liam's the only one defending him. he hung up to that. it wasn't a jab, or him trying to be cocky and annoying. it was pure, undeluted fear.
and what does that say about the seemingly confident, put together boy we met in season 5? exactly! that that was a farce. we see his mask break when the Doctors call him a failure. he's just as terrified of them as the others are.
imagine being a kid and the monsters from under your bed being real. not only that, but now you live with them in their creepy Operating Theatres home. and they don't talk, don't smile, don't offer you anything but pain. and you don't even know when to expect it, because their minds don't work on a clock. and you don't know what you did to earn it. you don't even know which is a punishment and which is part of your lab rat life.
so you learn. you adapt. they want theo to be evil? evil doesn't know fear. so he hides it. evil doesn't know compassion, love or emptahy. so he hides it. evil doesn't know pain, it brings it forth. so he hides it and works his way as a killing machine.
but after they're dead, theo can't unlearn a lifetime of habbits. he can't unlearn how to submit and adapt. to survive. the pack is the threat now and if he listens, if he's useful, if he keeps them from forgetting he's a real person (making them feel something for him, a connection, even if it's based on annoyance "oh, it's always awkward when mom and dad are fighting"), then maybe, hopefully ā though he doesn't remember what that word's supposed to mean ā they'll let him live.
Man, Scott's murder just gets to me. It's the cruelty of it. Theo tears away all his friends and manipulates him and betrays him and humiliates him and poisons him and leaves him to bang on the bars of his cage for hours, knowing his murder is coming. He makes one of Scott's best friends try to kill him, makes Scott pick between dying and killing this kid. And Scott takes a violent beating and the only reprieve comes from another loss--that someone else has died, someone Scott has tried so hard to save, someone else he's failed. And Mason is so scared and needs answers Scott doesn't have, help he can't give. And all of that's over in seconds because Theo's gonna kill him even when it gets him nothing.
It's the smallness of it. Scott dies for nothing except Theo's desire to kill him! He won't get any power out of it, the Doctors don't care. Theo wants to kill him because he's "perfect," something that has to be so bitterly laughable to Scott right now. He's gonna kill Scott because he's a werewolf--because he was attacked in the woods one night and has been a target ever since. He's gonna die for that! He's gonna die because Theo is so obsessed with things that don't matter, being a real werewolf doesn't matter. It's so small and Theo's killing him so violently over it.
It's how desperately Scott clings to whatever little he has left. He's ground down so relentlessly into his own powerlessness. He can't save anyone, he can't escape, he can't fight, he can't breathe. By the time Theo kills him, he can't even stand--Theo is holding him up by the claws he's got buried inside him. Mason's lying unconscious beside him and Theo could kill him so easily if he wanted and Scott can't stop him and he's got to spend his final moments facing that. He's fought so desperately to have any control over his body and his life and to make things better for others, to make meaning of the violence that was done to him, and this is where it's gotten him and everyone he cares about. He's got a few final breaths before this person he thought was his friend--whom he tried to help--silences him forever and the only thing he's got is man, at least I know what matters. And does it really matter when all it gets him is those final tortured breaths before he dies alone and in pain.
can't help but deeply appreciate the thiam/theo raeken centric fanfics that put theo through a series of unfortunate events and traumatize him more,,, basically whump theo fanfics (thank you fanfic writers for providing the stories that break my heart and then repair it with thiam)
In the scene with Theoās fake parents, I think the way he speaks to them is really interesting. Heās not playing the normal, kind boy trying to help the pack, but heās still playing a role; he seems to be imitating the Dread Doctors.
He uses passive voice (āYou were toldā instead of āI told youā) to put distance between himself and the situation like the Doctors do. It also puts all of the onus on the āyou.ā It makes them seem more like an inevitable force instead of people choosing their actions. In an interview, Cody talked about how villains donāt think theyāre the villain and how Theo does what he thinks is necessary, which goes along with that. The man didnāt follow orders, so Theo is just giving him the natural consequence of his actions. Failed perfection.
His general vibe can come off as a bit sadistic in this scene, especially upon first watch, but I donāt think thatās the truth of it. Heās cold and not open to mercy; his voice is flat and leaves no room for argument. Heās expectant. Itās not really enjoyment. That flatness comes naturally for the Dread Doctors, who are genuinely apathetic and already covered with their suits and masks. Itās less natural on Theo. Thereās almost certainly frustration beneath it, because Theo hates to lose, but thatās not the focus. This is just the process of things that the Doctors had ingrained in him for 8 years: you fail, you get fixed.
i'm keeping you in the time loop. it's the only way i know how to keep you safe. trapping you here, in the last day that you're alive, ignorant of what's to come as the sun sets. i dread each minute, a countdown to the end, but live in relief as all the blood washes away, all the would-be scars fade, and the tears dry before they have a chance to fall. but the memory of you dying in my arms remains, and so i'm keeping you in the time loop
THAT FIRST SITE IS EVERY WRITERāS DREAM DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY TIMES IāVE TRIED WRITING SOMETHING AND THOUGHT GOD DAMNĀ IS THERE A SPECIFIC WORD FOR WHAT IāM USING TWO SENTENCES TO DESCRIBE AND JUST GETTING A BUNCH OF SHIT GOOGLE RESULTS
After the gunshots, the smashed radio, and relieved hugs in the empty hospital, Liam had said, āLetās go,ā and Theo followed wordlessly.
The wetness in his eyes stuck around. He didnāt care to wipe them; the dam could crumble if he did. There was some kind of fragility to Theo in that moment despite his strength, endurance, history, and everything else. Despite, despite, despite. He couldnāt even be frustrated at himself because of it. Something heavy covered his mind, threads of sorrow and grief sewn into a blanket of numbness. It almost scared him, feeling like that. Distress tied a knot against his sternum. Instinctual maskingāa skill ingrained too strongly to abandon nowākept his hands from shaking, kept his heart from racing, but it didnāt feel like enough. Echoes of phantom pain crept up his forearms as if the black veins were still there. They werenāt. He kept glancing at the skin anyway, following the stretch down from his hands which somehow sat relaxed against his steering wheel.
Theo didnāt remember the drive to the school; he parked his truck mechanically, auto-pilot keeping his body moving when his mind wasnāt following along. It was concerning. There was safety in awareness, and yet he started missing everything.
He didnāt notice Liamās gaze until a moment too late for it to seem natural. A foot already over the blacktop, Liam paused halfway in his attempt to climb out.
āLetās go,ā he repeated, and Theo didnāt follow. Instead, his eyes flicked away.
When he found his voice, it still sounded as stilted as it had when he spoke to Gabe. āYou go ahead.ā Liamās packāScottās packāwere surely waiting inside, and Theo had enough sense to know that the pardon theyād briefly granted him for the sake of a war wouldnāt last. It would be a pack reunion, a celebration, and Theo already felt disconnected enough without standing on the sidelines for their touching moment.
Liam stayed silent for a few beats. In the quiet, Theo glanced over to be met with an unreadable expression. Maybe he couldāve figured it out if he tried harder. He didnāt, instead waiting until Liam spoke. Almost abrasive, almost cold, but not quite there: āAre you leaving?ā
Whether he meant the parking lot or Beacon Hills in general, Theo wasnāt sure. Either way, he answered honestly. āI donāt know.ā Why would he stay, yet where would he go? The internal back-and-forth wasnāt unfamiliar.
Liam pressed his lips into a line then, looking at the school before turning to him again. After seeming to debate himself for a moment, he asked, āAre you okay?ā
It caught Theo a little off-guard. Before he could try to think of any real answer to give, though, a response came out automatically. āIām fine.ā His steady heart concealed the lie, of course, but his low tone betrayed it. Still, he vaguely remembered digging the bullet out of his own shoulder at the hospital; physically, he was fine. That was what really mattered anyway. āAre you?ā
With a slow nod backāeven though Liam didnāt see itāTheo said, āMakes sense. You went through a lot.ā Too soft. There was a hum in response. āā¦you should get in there before they think something bad happened.ā
That seemed to wake Liam up, as if heād forgotten where he was. āRightāā He finished climbing out of the passengerās seat, holding onto the edge of the door instead of closing it. A moment of hesitation followed before, āI need a ride home.ā
A family full of people able to drive Liam home stood in that building and they both knew that. Part of Theo didnāt want to see any of them, including Liam, ever again. Another part couldnāt say no to their requests, as if that would ever mean anything. The same part always won out. āYeah, Iāll drive you, Liam,ā he said, quiet and knowing.
