#elfwreck

[destinationtoast]

re AO3 Tag count being larger than work count - I can think of two main reasons. (1) If the tag count includes bookmarks, and (2) Tags removed from works, and those tags haven't been cleared from the system yet. Neither should create tag counts "much" higher than the work count, though. It's also possible that (3) some works are double-tagged - like someone tagging both Snape/Harry and Harry/Snape because they don't realize they'll search the same way. (I haven't checked the data.)

Oh, thanks for the ideas!!  It hadn’t occurred to me that bookmark uses might be included (or I missed that fact, if it was documented).  I was seeing roughly 2x the expected count for some of the tags I looked at (but not all).  Bookmarks and double-tagging might well account for a bunch of that (and deleted uses for some of it).

[olderthannetfic]

elfwreck replied to your post “Sure, fine”

You are not reading "nothing." You are reading ENDLESS DRAMA ON TUMBLR and this leaves you no time for non-drama works like "books" or "academic articles."

Why would you call me out this way. ;D

[caffeinewitchcraft]

How to use a semicolon: (1) Mark the border between two complete sentences but keep them attached - "She entered the room slowly; he watched the ice spread under her feet at each step." (2) Make a list of things that are too complex to be separated by commas, possibly because they include commas - "A potion of speed needs an action component, whether that's river water, to keep moving; a roadside pebble, to connect to distance; or a butterfly wing, to travel without boundaries."

1) I saw the notification go up for a new message and knew IMMEDIATELY it would be someone telling me how to use a semicolon because all of my followers are helpful and lovely.

2) Thank you so much! This is very sweet of you :)

3) Unfortunately, do you know when you’re at a party and someone introduces themselves but you forget their name three seconds later? Then you hear their name again and you’re like “for sure I’ll remember it this time”? But then you don’t, the name just slips away never to be seen or heard from again?

That’s what semicolons are to me. I want to know the name, I do, and I will try to remember the name but, inevitably, it’ll be gone by this time next week.

[jmtorres]

HI - could I have an invite to the Vidders comm? (I am not yet a vidder but I have hopes in that direction.) I'm a friend of meeedeee; she can vouch for me.

sent!

I'm not gatekeeping the fanvidder comm, if there was a way to open it so you don't need an invite, I would, but this is the way tumblr is rolling out the feature (and it makes sense for communities in the sense of like groups of people who know each other, versus interest-based groups). but anyway, yeah, literally anybody who asks me can get an invite at the moment. 

@meeedeee may have told you and you'll see when you join, there is a note up asking people not to start wank--only because I just got out of the hospital and I'm too tired to do any actual moderating, not because I think there is any high potential for wank

not like fanvidders have ever--no, you know what I'm gonna leave old wanks closed, no need to relitigate anything just for an eye roll.

hopefully, we will survive important issues such as "can two different people on the entire Internet use the same song in their vids" and "kids these days, what do they call it now, edits?"

[bizarrekitten]

elfwreck reblogged your post and added:

I miss threaded conversations SO MUCH. Mastodon...

IMO, Pillowfort definitely has the most potential for being built as a good fandom platform, with communities and threaded comments and support for visual artists. Though they still haven’t published a stance on more “problematic” content (I’ve emailed them recently, and got a reply that said they’re still working on it). That, and the current downtime has left me feeling twitchy and lost. Thus I’ve been trying to find other potential spaces to migrate to.

That said, if anyone else wants to start up a fan-run Mastodon instance, I would love to help where i can! I have moderate tech skills and can pay for hosting costs, but i don’t know much about being a sysadmin, a commmunity manager, nor how to run any sort of organization/business/whatever.

[vaspider]

Any chance of aromantic pride dancing skeleton mugs?

Not just a chance, a reality. :D 

https://nerdykeppie.com/products/aromantic-pride-ghosts-black-mug-15oz

[adenil-umano]

Story prompt: Clint and Bruce haven't figured out that they're dating, but everyone else knows.

Steve was at the bar when Bruce shuffled into the kitchen, rubbing the tired lines around his eyes. He made for the coffee pot and blinked in confusion when he saw the carafe was gone. 

“I think Clint has it,” Steve said. He pointed with his pencil at where Clint was slumped over the table, coffee carafe half full and clutched in his hands.

Bruce nodded mutely, still blinking like he was barely staying awake. 

Steve watched, smiling slightly, as Bruce shuffled the rest of the way to the table and gently nudged Clint. Although there were nine open chairs, Clint moved over so that Bruce could perch on the edge of his chair. They sat hip-to-hip, sharing the coffee carafe between them in companionable silence.

After a moment, Steve felt awkward watching, like he was intruding in their lives. It was such a private moment as their hands brushed over the black plastic of the carafe that Steve had to look away. He still couldn’t resist drawing it in his sketchbook–Bruce’s long fingers framed against Clint’s blunt ones, a snapshot of their relationship.

Natasha and Clint were practicing in Tony’s new parkour gym when Bruce wandered in, looking confused.

“…Did Tony remodel again?”

“He did it last night,” Clint said, sounding excited. He bounded off the wall and did a flip, landing next to Natasha with a little wobble. She smiled at him. “Isn’t it cool, Bruce?”

Bruce smiled faintly as well. “Yes, but I was hoping to do some yoga…I’ll just go to my room.”

Clint’s face fell, and so Natasha rushed to say, “You can still do your yoga. We’ll stay out of your way.”

“Oh, thank you.” Bruce looked nervous for a second, like he still wanted to pull away, but then he shored up and nodded. He picked a spot in the corner and drew his feet together and folded his hands in front of himself like he was praying. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before moving into the next pose.

Clint’s eyes were glued to Bruce as he shifted. Natasha smirked at him as he watched. She debated elbowing him and asking him to keep practicing with her, but decided against it. She went back to the parkour herself and let Clint stand at the edge of the gym, carefully spotting Bruce as he moved through his routine.

“On your six,” Clint said into Sam’s communicator.

“God it,” Sam acknowledged. He banked sharply left and the AIMbot couldn’t compensate. It shattered against a building. “Thanks, Hawkeye.”

“No problem. Birdbrains gotta stick together.” His awkward laugh trickled in through the comm. 

Sam rolled his eyes, but he was smiling. He scanned the terrain, pleased at how few AIMbots were left. He started to suggest they begin cleanup when the still-open comm sparked to life again.

“Whoa!” Clint gasped.

Sam whipped to the right and headed for Clint, he was about to ask if Clint was all right but then–

“What’s up big guy?”

Sam relaxed in mid air and drew up sharply, hovering. It was only Hulk, and everyone knew Hulk would never hurt Clint. Over the comm, Clint laughed again. This time it was softer, a gentle chuckle.

“Easy there. I’m not hurt, see?” There was the sound of snuffling and Hulk made a disbelieving sound. “No, it’s true. Hey! I need that. The uniform stays on.”

Blushing, Sam switched his comm to a different channel. He shook his head and flew towards the rendezvous. He’d never understand their relationship, but as long as they were happy he was happy for them.

“Bruuuuce,” Tony whined, flopping on the lab bench and pouting at his science bro. “How come we never hang out anymore?”

Bruce looked at him over the rims of his glasses. “What are you talking about? We’ve spent the last forty-eight hours in the lab together.”

“Yeah we do lab stuff, but we never hang out. When’s the last time we went joy riding? Suit or car, I don’t care, I just need joy rides in my life. I don’t say this often but there’s more to life than science and, okay, maybe Pepper’s been getting on my case about getting outside and into the sun more, but still. The point stands that ninety-nine percent of our interaction involves throwing equations at each other and shouting Eureka!”

“Seventy-five percent at max,” Bruce countered, but he was already looking in his microscope again. 

Tony opened his mouth to complain some more, but he was interrupted as Clint strolled in. He pulled his bow and quiver off his shoulder and set it down in front of Bruce. 

“Hey,” Clint said, shifting a little awkwardly.

“Um, hi,” Bruce said back, ducking his head and blushing.

Tony watched, fascinated.

“I’ve got some new bow specs for you to look at,” Clint said. He gazed at Bruce longingly. 

“I’d be happy to look at y–look at them for you.” Bruce blushed deeper and reached for the bow. A little dance ensued where Bruce tried to take the bow without touching Clint too much. Tony assumed that if they did touch he’d have to leave, because he didn’t want to see them make out on his shop floor no matter how hot that would have been.

“Thanks.” Clint scrubbed a hand through his hair, grinning broadly. “For, um, looking at those for me.”

“Of course,” Bruce breathed. He looked up and that was a mistake, because their eyes locked and they didn’t seem able to look away from one another.

“So, uh,” Clint said breathlessly. “I’ll see you at lunch?”

“Yes. I have to teach you how to make curry.”

“I can’t wait.” Clint took a step back, then another. He still seemed to have difficulty looking away from Bruce. 

Just as he started to turn, Tony piped up. “Hey, Clint.”

Clint looked startled. “Oh, hey Tony. How, how are you?”

Tony grinned. “Doing great.”

Clint gave him an awkward half wave and smiled at the once-again blushing Bruce before turning and leaving the lab. 

“That’s it.” Tony snapped his fingers. “A double date.”

“With who?” Bruce asked. “You and Pepper are the only couple. Unless you count Thor and Jane, but she’s all the way in New Mexico and he’s in Asgard until next week.”

“Oh, Bruce,” Tony said with a sad sigh. “What am I going to do with you?”

Thor strolled over to where Clint and Bruce were standing ridiculously close to one another, each staring into the other’s eyes and exchanging silly little grins.

“My friends!” Thor exclaimed, clapping Clint on the back. He would have clapped Bruce on the back as well, but Bruce always seemed to react poorly to that sort of thing. “When is the ceremony?”

“Ceremony?” Bruce asked quietly. He gently rubbed Clint’s back where Thor had patted him and Clint leaned into the touch with a relaxed sigh.

“Yes, the ceremony,” Thor said. “For your nuptials?”

They both stared at him for a second, blinking. Then it washed over them in a wave. Bruce gaped and turned to Clint, who gaped back. Bruce didn’t drop his hand from Clint’s shoulder.

“They think we’re–”

“That’s why Tony–”

“Because we’ve been spending–”

“Is that why you were looking–”

They both paused, blinking. Then Clint broke into a huge grin. Bruce pulled himself into a prim and proper pose and smiled at Thor.

“If you’ll excuse us, Thor,” Bruce said. “I believe Clint and I have something to discuss.”

“Certainly,” Thor said, pretending to be confused although he wasn’t. “I await your return.”

“Actually, don’t wait up,” Clint said as he slid his hand into Bruce’s back pocket. “We may be talking for a while.”

Thor grinned to himself as they walked away. Finally, his friends had realized what the rest of them had known for so long. 

[adenil-umano]

Hulkeye prompt: Bruce and Clint met years ago, when Clint was in the circus and Bruce was in college. Could be set back then, or more recently, when they reconnect after the Chitauri battle.

Bruce doesn’t have a lot of friends.

He doesn’t really have any friends, actually. There’s his advisor, and she’s nice enough but they have a professional distance to maintain. There’s his cousin who he loves dearly but hasn’t talked to since he went off to college two years ago. And, when he’s particularly desperate for friends to count, there’s the four football players who were in his Intro Physics course Freshman year. They’re sort of meatheads and frighteningly muscular, and he knows that they only talk to him because he does their physics homework, but still. They’re the closest thing he’s got. And when they invite him out—voluntarily talk to him outside of class—he can’t say no.

They take him to the circus of all places.

It’s Ernest—the de facto ring leader of the squad—who buys him a beer and even though Bruce is only twenty, he drinks it. He doesn’t want to look uncool in front of them even though it tastes terribly bitter. He catches the weird look the four of them exchange when he drinks it without comment, but he doesn’t think anything of it. Maybe, he hopes, they’re impressed.

They aren’t.

There’s one more beer and this one, this one tastes different. Affects him differently. He doesn’t notice until Earnest shoves him into the mirrored fun house and he realizes he’s tripping out. Something is very wrong. There’s, there’s copies of him, everywhere. Horrible mangled things and Earnest is laughing in his ear only, no that’s his father grinning cruelly with Bruce’s face. He feels hands on his shoulders, shoving him, and his reflection has long hair and bowed lips and falls with a splash of red on concrete. He bounces off something solid and then it breaks apart under his fingertips and he just stares at the way it falls, broken shards each the shape of a drop of blood.

He’s not breathing. He tries to focus on breathing as his friends run, but he can’t remember how to do it. Jesus, he’s going to die here. Kneeling in broken glass as a soft hand settles on his shoulder. It’s comforting. Grounding.

He doesn’t die; he just passes out.

There’s snippets here and there.

The color purple. He’s always liked that color. It’s signing to him now, even though he’s not supposed to hear colors.

The smell of hay that is so sharp it makes him bleed. There’s cuts on his hands and he stares at them. He looks up. Blue eyes, concerned.

“Are you alright?”

He remembers those words. They rattle around the inside of his head. Are you alright? No; his left side is still there. He clings to the blue-eyed man. Are you alright? No; definitely not alright. He’s talking out loud. Are you alright? No; he’s all alone.

He sleeps for quite a while.

“Hey.”

Bruce jumps. He opens sleep-gunked eyes and frowns into the dimly lit room. “…Where?”

“You’re in my room. Don’t worry, nuthin’ happened,” says a man in a—whoa—skintight purple costume. He’s wearing a hood and mask with a letter ‘H’ on it that hides everything but his mouth and blue, blue eyes. There’s even a weird little skirt flap and knee-high boots, also purple. Bruce blinks at him, wondering if he’s still on drugs.

“…Huh.”

The man glances down at himself and grins sheepishly, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Uh, yeah. I think you’re coming down from whatever that was. Sorry I don’t have better accommodations.”

Bruce manages to sit up a little and realizes he’s just lying on a sleeping bag spread out on some hay. It isn’t very comfortable, but he can’t feel his fingertips right now so it doesn’t bother him. “What happened?”

“Your loser friends ran off when you stumbled into the mirror. Don’t worry, though. Lorelei got them.”

“Lorelei?”

He grins toothily. “She swallows swords.”

Bruce nods as if that makes sense. “Okay.” He manages to sit up a little more even though he feels woozy. “And…I’m here, and you are?”

“I,” the man says with aplomb. “Am the amazing Hawkeye.” He stands and executes a little bow that ends with an airy twist of his wrist. “Archer, boy wonder, trapeze artist, great at fixing accidental drug trips.”

“Oh,” Bruce says, feeling like he’s missed something. “Well, um, thank you…Hawkeye.” 

“Nah, don’t worry about it.” He plops down on the ground with zero grace and grins crookedly at Bruce. “How are you feeling?”

“Sick,” Bruce says honestly. “But, um, I think I’m fine now. I’ll…get out of your hair.”

Hawkeye scratches at his hood. “It’s cool. I want to make sure the drugs are out of your system before you leave. I was, uh, gonna call the police, you know. Like, sort of like what normal people do. But you kept saying you’d lose your scholarship.”

Bruce winces. “Yes, I probably would have.”

Hawkeye looks serious for a second, but then it passes. “S’not like you did it on purpose. Right?”

Bruce feels sick and kind of used, and intellectually he knows he didn’t ask for this but it still feels like his fault. “I should have asked what was in the drink,” he says. “They probably just…didn’t think I would care.”

“Uh huh,” Hawkeye says, sounding far from convinced. “Look, Freckles, those guys are a bunch of jerks and trust me, I’ve known plenty of jerks. You should stay away from them.”

“Those are my friends,” Bruce says. He feels weirdly offended on their behalf. He struggles to sit up and kicks off the sleeping back. “Don’t talk about people you don’t know anything about.” He stands up but then feels woozy, so he can’t get very far before he has to stop and clutch at his head.

“Look, all I know is they left you tripping in a pile of broken glass without even trying to help. That’s not what friends do. Even circus freaks don’t do that.” Hawkeye frowns up at him.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Bruce gropes for the wall and finally finds it, realizing only then that he’s in a cage. That’s…weird. He tries not to think about it. “Look, I need to go.”

Hawkeye considers him for a long moment before slowly getting to his feet. “Let me walk you out.”

Bruce nods.

The sun is just starting to rise. Bruce is a little startled at that. It means he’s been there all night—at least twelve hours. It’s sort of hard to put one foot in front of the other, like he’s lost connection with what his body does, but he manages. Hawkeye affects a slow meander at his side, humming quietly to himself.

“…Where’s the nearest bus station?” Bruce asks when they reach the edge of the circus.

Hawkeye shrugs. “Um, left I think? Like three blocks? Hey, listen Freckles.” He reaches out and Bruce feels oddly disassociated as Hawkeye rests a hand on his shoulder. “You should come back tomorrow. It’s our last day, but I’m doing a show around eight. I think you’d like it and…” He scratches the back of his neck again. “I’d like to know you’re alright.”

Bruce hesitates. He really doesn’t want to come back here. He was lucky to get out without the circus demanding he pay for the broken mirror and all the trouble he caused. But Hawkeye is looking strangely hopeful, even though all Bruce can see are his eyes. So Bruce smiles a little, weakly.

“Sure,” he hears himself say. “I’d like that.”

“Awesome! I mean, cool.” Hawkeye leans back and gives him a very dorky thumbs-up. “I’ll, uh, see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah, tomorrow.” Bruce turns and gives him a wave, smiling as he walks away.

He looks back, once, about half a block away and sees that Hawkeye has climbed one of the flag poles at the entrance and is hanging off of it one-handed. His other hand raises in a self-conscious wave and Bruce laughs in disbelief and waves back. 

He can’t wait for tomorrow.