#swift retribution

[spiralsonpaper]

i... posted new chapter of swift retribution... ppl should read it

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

[spiralsonpaper]

writing long chapters for a fic really is terrible because then you go oohh i can't wait for their reactions to the nika statue scene

and then 15k words in i casually mention something to a friend and they go what nika statue scene?

and i go wait what. ...*oh* (realising i havent posted the chapter yet) don't worry about it

[spiralsonpaper]

There's something about this—the hissing rush of wind through leaves, constant and constantly changing. The far more intimate feeling of the wind whooshing in your ears, catching on the shell and twisting itself into a message meant only for you, whatever it happens to say.

Maybe it says, I love you.

[spiralsonpaper]

What am i trying to do with the chicali arc? hmm. something something art connecting people. art is supposed to make you feel, any kind of emotion works but it has to touch something in you. that's the spark!

sashi was- well he didn't quite get it but he was starting to. he would have.

but then caro and jun were sent away.

and the thing about what i'm trying to say is that it's about connecting with people. that's it, really. emotions connect people, art makes their feelings into something shared, and it's really about reaching out to other people.

and sashi can! he made friends in the art class! even with az he was making friends, he's introverted and shy but that's more where he was raised and cut off from others, when given the chance he can.

buth then with what his parents did, sashi can't reach out to others. his not making art is a symbol of that. eh can't reach out, not if he wants them to be safe, he's too scared to try, and so he pushes Az away. and later, when he's living on his own, he's too scared/depressed/just-straight-up-repressing-everything to paint/reach out.

but back to the bit where he pushes az away. that's important.

because that's very twisty. you see, Az and Sashi are like foils for each other, mirrored reflections, two sides of a coin. sashi can't reach out to others, for many reasons, but az? she can. her art has the spark. she reaches out and connects and makes people feel things-

but the thing is, people also have to reach back. to connect, i mean. and while az can make others feel thing with her art- it tends to be the wrong kind of feeling. fear. unease. she came back from the mountain changed, and when she tried to convey that feeling to others, they don't react well. and they don't reach out. they shy away from the connection she's trying to make. her art speaks but people don't listen.

sashi can't reach out. az doesn't have anyone reaching back.

but then, when erin comes, i realised i apparently wrote a perfect line up for this idea, though i hadn't even thought about it then:

sashi reaches out to erin. erin reaches out to az.

the scene in chapter seven, i think it's that, when sashi calls out to erin-! he's reaching out!

and later, erin is the one who reaches out to az. not just after sashi's backstory reveal, when they try to befriend here, but also when he saw the griffin painting and didn't dismiss it, didn't wilfully ignore or misinterpret the feeling it invoked, but liked it, said it was his favorite! he reached out.

[spiralsonpaper]

why wHy WHY is this happening again

jfc christ im nearly 8k into the chapter and. there's so much left

it's going to be so fucking long why does this keep HAPPENING TO ME

i am just barely keeping myelf sane by telling myself to focus on one scene at a time but holy shit i need to write the rebellion and the revolution and the sunset massacre and then the big battle-

and i was GOING to wrap up the flashback in just two chapters but it's too long so i might as well just end it on mair's death and then add in the aftermath of the war, that idea for sashi's situation my beta gave me, uhhh and also some RA shenanigans why not

[spiralsonpaper]

I think I'm getting better at drawing people. anyways here's a sashi on paper. is this anything

ahh his original design was too fucking bland and boring so I scrapped it. and also i realised why it was boring was because I'm a coward who just draws single lines for eyebrows. So I redid the eyebrow shape and then altered the eye shape to fit with that and now look he's got a distinct design. Lovely.

I'm working on Az but the problem there is her face is kinda generic rn. If I can figure out an actual eye shape for her it'll go better

[spiralsonpaper]

muahahaha sashi's going through such a bad time right now i swear

i'm having so much fun. suddenly i know why angst writers take so much glee in writing what they write, it's absolutely incredible

*cackles in chaotic evil*

[spiralsonpaper]

one problem with me is that i cannot fucking write a scene without expanding and adding little details to flesh out and justify the scene itself so that's why i started out writing a fortunetelling scene for swift retribution and it's spiralled into YET MORE WORLDBUILDING. i keep doing this. it's like i HAVE to justify what i write and- bleh. Whatever. this one's going into the extras