#orasforlife

[theabcsofjustice]

Awww, that’s really sweet of you to say! Thank you, I’m glad you feel that way. :)

[echoeternally]

Echo, I have a writing question. Do you still feel “in control” of your stories? I mean there’s no way you had chapter forty-freakin’-six planned when you posted chapter one, right? There must have been some stuff you made up as you went along, right? How do you do that without feeling like your story is drifting aimlessly or that you’ve lost control of it?

Honestly, both of my strongest ongoing stories started out as aimless spitballs to the wall, and somehow they stuck on not only in concept, but in grabbing attention from readers. I actually created and established control after expanding on them both.

ENY was originally a one-shot for Bowser pining over Mario in a “eat this, I can reshape canon on all your brains” kind of way. One person was like, “hey, how would Mario respond?” I shrugged, gave that a shot for a write-up, and then readers wanted more. So, I was like, “ha, how about I turn this into a story?” And then by Chapter 5, I realized, “oh. oh this is a story, huh? ok, let’s really go for this then.”

From there, I created structure for it, because I asked myself, “Well, what’s going to happen from here? Do Bowser and Mario just get together and church bells just ring out? Or should we play this how could actually unfold?” Guess which thought won out.

(Probably going to be long, so let’s add a cut here.)

After I had a good amount of story arc planned out, probably after I had Luigi and Peach join forces, I started planning out the rest of the fanfic from there. Peach and Luigi were going to reclaim the territories that Bowser conquered, while Bowser and Mario would clash over their romance and work out a relationship and happy ending between them and Mario’s friends. The seven kingdoms getting reclaimed was simple, since it was just following how the games usually go. Mario and Bowser have enough material to go at one another for ages. 

Originally, I was going to keep it isolated to just these four and those immediately involved with their affairs (Toads, Koopalings, Yoshi, Junior, etc.) for all that happened. But, I thought of characters that people would want to see included, Daisy being the number one option to hit my mind, and wound up tying them to Peach’s adventure. And my Paper Mario stuffed brain was like, “Ooh, what if Bowser had companions like Mario usually gets?” Hence the original clods that journeyed with him to Star Hill by the late 20s to mid 30s chapters.

Star Hill was always going to be a location that they’d visit, though that got expanded upon as I continued writing. I was like, “Hey, what if people were living out there? How is it that no one really ever builds a fortress here, why don’t these locations appear outside of RPGs?” So, I added that in, and I’ve gotten used to checking in on Mario canon for things.

I especially love using old school material, because it’s stuff that most people probably never touch. Prior to her return, I had literally requested the creation of the Pauline tag on the Mario archive for fanfiction.net, which hadn’t existed prior to 2014. So, adding her, elements from old RPGs, and some bits of Mario history along the way, with some shout-outs to other Nintendo games as well, just worked out.

Tone was something that I was originally concerned with keeping as a very Mario-like story, trying to keep the characters as in-character as I could while putting them in a very unlikely situation. As I continued, I figured it wasn’t going to work out like the usual Mario stuff, so I gradually introduced some darker elements as I went forward: played up the fact that Bowser and Peach are at war, killed a snowman, made a bunch of flirts across the board, toyed with betrayal & conspiracies as plot devices, gave Mario horrific/gruesome nightmares, Peach is a bit unhinged, and Bowser having family drama in the past and present, etc.

The more that I’ve worked on it, the more control I feel that I’ve gained. I feel like, if I had the time to keep the everything in my life at bay and could write without interruption, I’d probably have finished this story by 60 to 75 chapters and would’ve worked on a 10 to 20 chapter sequel, given my pace for it back in 2015. However, I probably would’ve missed out on small stuff, such as Pauline’s comeback being addressed before the 40th chapter and her establishment as mayor, so maybe it’s good that I’ve slogged down.

There are still so many ideas that I’m waiting to get to, and now it’s stuff that I’ve had planned for years. I’m tired of sitting on them, but I also can’t wait to finally build up to them and have them finally happen.

Ha, this turned out a lot longer than I meant it to be, my apologies. I was originally going to talk about my Pokemon fanfic too, but I’ll save that for another post, if you or anyone else is interested. But yeah, that’s some ENY dev process for everybody.

Thank you for asking!

[chromsai]

20 for the Predadorks

things you said that i wasn’t meant to hear

“Hmm, what makes you say that?” Serena breathed out gently, pursing her lips and pausing to stare bewilderingly at the ceiling. It was a small moment of silence before she spoke up again, but this time with a sharper tone.

“I know what he did! You don’t have to remind me every time!” Her eyes were rather ablaze now and her brow furrowed in annoyance. She exhaled loudly as if to drown out whatever voices in her head pestered her about that, which she quite clearly had had enough of already. “I get it. I. Get. It. But I thought you were the ones who suggested to give him a chance more than anyone! I told you guys at first that he—” 

More stark silence once again subdued her rebuttal but, after a minute, she eased her expression and listened carefully this time. 

Another two or three inaudible minutes of discussion passed, and then Serena’s voice lifted slowly back into the ardent conversation, seemingly holding back one of those chuckles of hers that she never wants to expose.

“See, Yuzu agrees with me,” she asserted, releasing the tension from her shoulders. “And besides, he’s the same as me, so…”

Serena let her voice ease to a halt, as if she were expecting another interruption, something the short gap in between her responses quickly confirmed. 

“Well,” she exhaled briefly before gathering her voice up again to explain, unwavering. “I didn’t know the world until just a few years ago, and yet I don’t feel I’ve really changed.”

This time, she allowed merely a second of silence to go by uninterrupted.

“No, I haven’t,” she corrected, allowing the intensity to flush back into her eyes and face. “I’ve grown. But I’m still the same me.”

…

Even for him, this last, long, dead moment of silence was almost too uncomfortable to bear. Through the reflection off his sleeping duel disk, Yuri saw Serena’s disgruntled face struggle to find her next words. She breathed in deep one more time, fiddling with her duel disk as she finally exhaled the words she wanted for them to consider before making any judgements.

“I don’t think Yuri can change, but,” Serena finished up with her duel disk, and moved closer to glance out the room window, letting the intruding moonlight illuminate her eyes somewhat magically, but equally blinding to how close Yuri had positioned himself on the other side. “I want to be there to see him grow. For people like us who were forced into our lives, maybe that’s the best we can do…”

…

The light from his duel disk shone too bright, annoying even, it was a good thing he had made a move to head back before the notification showed up. He made a mental note to tell Yuya to stop leaving it on the highest brightness lest they ended up needing glasses sometime soon. Reading these tiny-ass texts would really get bothersome then.

meet up tmrw @ u sho again? i’ll kick ur ass

What an eloquently put text, he thought, but unmistakably meant just for him.

pffft u promise?

It wasn’t until Yuri had gotten back to Yuya’s house and finished settling up in bed for the night that he finally got a reply. 

i guarantee it.

[timahina]

APPLE 22

22. in a rush of adrenaline

“Ok, on your mark-”

“Rin, you tested this completely?”

“-get set...”

“No, seriously - you did fix the breaks and-”

“Fucking go, Yugo!” Rin yelled at the top of her lungs and pressed herself against tightly him, her arms squeezing around his waist and shocking him to hit the acceleration.

He screamed when the d-wheel whipped forward and his head nearly flung back from the speed. But Rin’s body and her weight somehow kept him in touch with reality and not to let go from the sudden shock.

Though the shock of the speed, the wind in his face, the roaring sound of the engine and the vibrations under him - Rin’s excited laughter had managed to drown it all out.

“Sixty! Go to sixty, Yugo!”

Yugo grinned, leaning forward as the speedometer rose and the whiplash of the wind knocked against their suits. 

Their official first test of the d-wheel and Yugo barely noticed the empty roads and dim streetlights in the dead of night - even when on-lookers up at the late hour cheered behind them or yelled for all the racing they were causing.

None of that really mattered - not when Rin had her arms around him and laughing and screaming in joy. His heart raced, pounding against his chest but all was drowned out.

All by Rin.

He pulled up under a flickering street light, not even bothering to slow to a stop but came to a complete halt - nearly throwing him and Rin off the bike. The rush was incredible, both of them jumping off the bike and removing their helmets, screaming with enthusiasm and excitement.

“Oh my god!” Yugo was screaming at the top of his lungs, his hands grasping at her shoulders. The red on her face from the rush and the cold and the breath she let out... Rin leaned forward and pressed her hips against his.

A chaste kiss.

His eyes were wide at the sudden touch and she pulled back almost immediately. Rin covered her mouth, giggling. “Sorry, sorry!” Her words were slightly muffled. “I just got excited that-!”

His hands grasped her shoulders tighter and pulled her back, wanting to kiss her again.Wanting to recapture the rush.

But instead, his lips and his tongue knocked against her hand, still clasped over mouth.

It hurt his pride more than her but she still giggled and Yugo could feel her smile and that was the best rush of all.

Even more so than the d-wheel being a complete success.

[monotype-on-phantom]

I wonder what Clockwork and the Observants were up to during Memory Blank. Come to think of it, I wonder if Clockwork and Desiree have ever clashed, considering all the "I wish I never x" wishes Desiree must have granted at some point. Like, if Masters of All Time had resulted from Desiree granting a wish to undo Vlad's accident instead of Danny actively going back in time, would Clockwork still have to step in? Would he have authority to do so?

Honestly, I don’t think Desiree’s all that much of a threat. Sam was unaffected by her spells simply by wearing the Specter Deflector, while anti-ghost equipment doesn’t really protect you from Clockwork’s time manipulation or the Reality Gauntlet.

Memory Blank also repeatedly emphasizes that what’s changed are the characters’ memories rather than the actual time stream. She also was able to remove Danny’s powers, but still, it’s not anything that would permanently alter reality.

The biggest factor that makes me believe this is that Danny could’ve easily gone to the ghost zone in TUE, found Desiree, and wished that his family and friends hadn’t died. I seriously doubt he wouldn’t have searched around in there in the first place to see if they came back as ghosts. If he came across Desiree, of course he’d try to make a wish like that.

Even though we don’t see any of this, just the fact that it’s an option and yet the future in TUE still happens makes me believe that Desiree isn’t actually capable of something like that. If Desiree’s only capable of altering physical matter, memories, and people in general, she’s actually no more a threat to the time stream than any other ghost.

Clockwork apparently knows everything, and he only gets involved when he absolutely has to. He didn’t even show up in Infinite Realms, which had Danny and Vlad traveling through time like crazy. If he didn’t feel like he needed to get involved then, things were probably going to sort themselves out. I imagine he feels the same way about Desiree, especially considering she’s not actually a threat to the flow of time.

Doesn’t mean Desiree’s not still powerful af, but she’s way below someone like Clockwork.

[sage-nebula]

So there's a scene in Duel Links of Yuugi and Jounouchi together and honestly I don't know whether to be elated that Konami is letting my boys interact or furious because the dialogue is buried beneath so many layers of anime and dub interpretations of their characters that it's not even remotely wishshippy.

I mean, what’s particularly difficult about this is the fact that their interactions aren’t even remotely Wishshippy means that they were being written OoC (which I know you pretty much said yourself by saying it’s layered under Studio Gallop characterizations, but still). 

I say that because the thing about Yuugi and Jounouchi’s relationship is that—yes, there are plenty of moments that come across as straight up romantic. I can name numerous instances right off the top of my head, for while the pier duel certainly tops the list (we had a straight up “I love you” there, and Yuugi used daisuki, which—given the context, as well as Japanese cultural norms surrounding conveying love verbally to another—is a pretty big deal), there are others as well. We have plenty of moments between them that the fandom at large would absolutely see as romantic if said moments happened with a more preferred ship (or happened between a boy and a girl as opposed to two boys).

But that said, aside from blatantly romantic moments, the thing about Yuugi and Jounouchi’s relationship is that the fact that they see each other as the sun and stars comes across even in their every day, casual interactions. Yuugi and Jounouchi find comfort and happiness with each other, regardless of what they’re doing. This is something that builds up over time; they do take time getting to know each other, feeling each other out, getting used to what it’s like to have a relationship that reaches levels of emotional intimacy that theirs ends up reaching. It was new territory for them, and we witness that, but through that process we see them coming to understand their relationship and how they feel about each other, and we see them grow and cement their bond into something that could never, ever break, under any circumstances.

And this is something that, again, doesn’t just come across in the more dramatic, passionate moments where speeches are given and tears are shed. We see this in their every day interactions. We see it in the brighter than the sun smiles Jounouchi gives Yuugi when he greets him in the morning, and the way Yuugi enthusiastically cheers on Jounouchi’s goal to beat Kaiba’s score in the arcade. We see it in the way Jounouchi smiles at Yuugi when Yuugi’s not even looking at him (e.g. when he goes to get their drinks at the arcade and Yuugi is playing the fighting game), and in the way Yuugi wonders what Jounouchi’s doing when they’re apart in Battle City. We see it in the way Jounouchi spins Yuugi around out of sheer happiness after Death-T, and the way Yuugi frets about Jounouchi being late to buy Dungeon Dice Monsters, but then gets super freaking excited when Jounouchi shows up. So many of their little, casual interactions are filled with unbridled comfort and joy caused simply by one another’s presence. Yuugi and Jounouchi find light, happiness, support, encouragement, comfort, stability, and emotional intimacy with each other. Yes, they have moments that come across as pretty overtly romantic, but what makes them work, what makes them such a beautiful and lasting relationship, is the fact that they have plenty of ordinary interactions as well that show just how much they love each other. Love, after all, isn’t just about passionate speeches and attempts to sacrifice oneself to save the life of your beloved (seriously, they could do with less of the attempted self-sacrifice, tbh); it’s also comfort and happiness found in ordinary things, simply because you share them with someone you love. Yuugi and Jounouchi are best friends, and we know this not just because they’ve told us so, but because we see it every time they interact with one another in the manga.

So the fact that you say that their interactions don’t have that is … really, incredibly disappointing. Not surprising, necessarily, given that Studio Gallop took whatever chances they could to reduce their relationship (the fact that we got those Wishship moments, brief as they were, in the Noa Arc still amazes me), but it’s still disappointing all the same.

[theabcsofjustice]

orasforlife replied to your photoset “HAFHIUAFHUFAHAFFJL;DFJ;DFK;JADFJK AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH ...”

I was SO HAPPY when I saw this! And guess what? Yuzu, Gongenzaka, Serena, Yugo, Tsukikage, Yuri, and even Yusho’s cards are in the game too! We get closer to ARC-V World with every passing day! :D

Oh wow, that many of them? That’s pretty awesome! I know that I’ve seen Chojiro’s Cardians in there before but I didn’t know about the others. I know they’ll probably be putting Zexal in next but I definitely can’t wait for the Arc V world! :D

[theabcsofjustice]

Ohhh, that’s right! I think I do remember him now! Lol, he got his butt beat in both of his appearances then. XD