#willow words

[willowwyrd]

Sorry i've been holding back the demons but some of y'all need to watch the fucking movie I just saw someone say "Simon probably never learned to read :("

Brother there is a Whole Scene and joke. Dedicated to the fact that Simon can, in fact, read.

[willowbird]

You are like such an amazing writer asdfghjkl congrats on 100! 🎉🎉🎉 You deserve all of those supporters! (And more obv...). Was legit a lil curious, no need to make this into a drabble if you don’t desire to <333, but I was wondering what are your thoughts on aftg time-travel aus? Especially the more famous Andrew and/or Neil get transported back???

;//w//; ilysm friend <3 <3

On the topic of time travel aus I’ll say this:

If you had asked me about them BEFORE I had read one I’d have said ‘thanks but no thanks’. I don’t head drop myself into anything that looks like it’s gonna be doomed/end sad and time-travel aus just seem like they’re gonna end sad. Plus there’s so much wobbliness with the timey-wimey of it all. Are there alternate timestreams? Will they go back to their own time? If they do will it be changed or is there now a split timeline? It’s just a lot to worry about and I’m a natural worrier and it’s something that would distract me the ENTIRE TIME I was reading it. 

THAT BEING SAID. I have read two time-travel AUs that I’ve really enjoyed. I like the mechanism for a fix-it fic. One I read was Neil being shot back in time after he died in a car crash after he and Andrew had graduated, and he sorta gradually lost his memory of the previous timeline as he fixed stuff. The other one is ongoing though hasn’t been updated in a while and is where BOTH Andrew and Neil got sent back, which I like. 

Now if I were to write a time-travel AU, I would send Aaron back in time. Aaron POV, going back in time to fix things with his brother sooner and then like, begrudgingly helping everyone else along the way. Him getting to look at Andrew and see not a monster but a very very traumatized kid just doing his best to protect what he still has and not get hurt again. Him seeing the Andrew/Neil thing happening and going OMG ITS SO OBVIOUS HOW DID WE MISS THIS THE FIRST TIME AROUND ~ etc. 

If you’d like to see what that might look like, hit me up and I’ll poke at the idea a lil more! <3 <3

[willowwyrd]

Hot take but I think Eva Stratt would despise Ava.

Eva visibly struggles with the decision to send Grace to die (in the movie, it's all in the facial acting; in the book, Eva has a whole conversation with Grace post-kidnapping to try to justify herself) whereas Ava seems to relish in the opportunity.

Up until the moment she dies, Ava doesn't care about "The Convict" at all: she cares about the SM-8's black box information. Yes, she's weepy and she's scared and tired about it by the end, but...I don't think she ever had the intention to free Simon, no matter how much he did.

And yes, Grace and Simon are very different people with very different histories. Simon may deserve to die. But I don't think that means Eva and Ava would bond well...because for Eva it was a sacrifice. For Ava? It's another day in the program. Another—what was his name, again? Doesn't matter—another fucking Eden cultist to torture, another near-hopeless mission.

In sending Grace to die, Eva bears the guilt of sacrificing an innocent. In sending Simon to die, Ava is simply enacting justice, at least in her own mind.

And I think Eva would resent her for that.

She would resent the fact that Ava could simply pull the trigger and slide the next person into the crosshairs without a second thought...without even asking their names.

[willowwyrd]

I love it when people write young Arthur to be a fully unapologetic smartass dick of a person

like yeah Hosea would accurately describe this individual as "a degenerate" and Dutch would see the same untamed chaff of a false america and go "we're adopting"

[willowwyrd]

Snippet from the sixth chapter of my IL/PHM crossover fic, Death in the Business of Whaling:

"Grace will be alone," Rocky warns, climbing through his xenonite tunnels as he follows Grace from the breeder tank room to the lab. "Rocky paralyzed when sleep. Cannot help if Bad Human attack Grace again."

Grace shoots his friend a wry look as he places a Taumoeba tank on the lab's central island, unlatching a few drawers as he looks around for the set of tools he needs. "I thought we were done calling him that."

"Grace."

"Rocky. I'll be fine. Armando will be there—"

"Armando is dumb."

"—and he can intervene if first contact goes sideways." Grace huffs as he opens the top drawer yet again—he must have missed what he's looking for in his first search. "He may be dumb but he's got sedatives on-hand."

Or on-hands, ha.

"Grace promise not do anything stupid while Rocky sleep."

Grace sighs. "Yes, Rock. I'll do my best not to get murdered by the very sick man in the infirmary."

"Sarcasm."

"Yep," Grace pops the "p", nudging aside some loose pencils in what has quickly become the lab's designated "junk" drawer and hoping that it's hiding somewhere between them...Nope.

"Not funny."

"Well, I think it's funny how incapable you think I am."

He straightens to shove the junk drawer shut and gives the lab a final cursory glance. Every surface is pretty bare, barring the Taumoeba breeder tank.

"Have you seen the screwdriver anywhere?"

"No." Rocky's tone is flat and tense, his body completely still even though he's free-hanging from a few of the spokes in his passageway.

Grace frowns. "You're really worried about me, huh?"

"Yes." The word is firm. "Rocky hear Grace always. Obvious hear voice, but also breathing, heartbeat. Blood sometimes."

Rocky starts to click one of his claws open and closed in a familiar, fidgeting movement as he speaks.

"Everything sound bad bad bad when Grace hurt. Scary."

Grace's heart twinges, a tiny bit of guilt needling behind his sternum. Maybe he does need to be a little more mindful about this…he does still have fingerprint-shaped bruises lining his throat, after all.

"Okay, I hear you." He raises a closed fist to Rocky's tunnel, resting his knuckles against the glass. "I'll be very careful. I promise."

[willowwyrd]

Snippet from the second chapter of my IL/PHM crossover fic, Death in the Business of Whaling:

When Simon finally looks into the window, his breath is instantly stolen again, heart stilling in his chest.

It's not a window between infirmary rooms or even prison cells.

It's a porthole to space, and what he sees beyond simply isn't possible.

Stars.

Hundreds and thousands and millions and billions of tiny white pinholes in the vast expanse of space, glowing and glittering and violently—deceptively—alive, mingling with swirling space dust and crowned with rich, colorful light.

Simon can't clearly remember a time when the universe looked so full.

It's staggeringly beautiful.

Simon blinks.

The stars wink back, but refuse to disappear, all screaming:

"I WAS HERE."

Simon's hands are moving of their own accord, reaching out to touch the porthole glass. It's slick and cool, like everything else in this place, but different. It grounds him.

The stars are moving, Simon realizes. Slowly drifting, as if each one is being pulled along by a invisible string. He cranes his neck to follow them, watching in awestruck silence as a few stars shift out of view only to be replaced by thousands more.

His heart desperately wants to hope that somewhere in the universe, the ghostlight is still this strong. That somewhere, thousands of light years from the known systems...the universe looks this misleadingly intact.

But then, Simon sees it, and his tentative joy crumples. The sun.

A brilliantly golden star fills the porthole, eclipsing it almost in its entirety, flicking solar flares into the void like tongues of flame. Its light is so bright, it's almost painful to look at, but Simon doesn't care; a handful of angry tears carve stinging lines through the grime, drawing down somewhere into his beard.

His eyes burn as reality comes crashing down.

No star would appear falsely lit at this short distance. So, the "porthole" can't be a window by any stretch of definition. It has to be some kind of electronic monitor, programmed to display an old sun-cycle time lapse.

"'It's a screen, you fuckin' dumbass," Simon hisses, scrubbing at the waste of water on his cheekbones.

He should have known better.

Whatever.

[willowwyrd]

CHAPTER 13 OF DITBOW IS OUT

Final Stratt & Hatch chapter <3

the science of this one has been brewing for a while, and matters a ton for our present (future?) Quiet Rapture problem so PAY ATTENTION LMFAO

[willowwyrd]

Lottttt of Simon flashbacking this upcoming chapter I fear