LeaJoy & Fandoms

Okay! Time for a new pinned post. The old one is here. I'll keep this brief — a couple of housekeeping notes, then a taglist under a read more.

I'm LeaJoyWrites on ao3, btw.

Please let me know if I miss something on any of the following. I may forget to tag, misinterpret a post I reblog, or fail to check my internal biases. I do want to be told, and I will make an effort to correct my mistake.

I try to tag warnings thoroughly.

This blog should be a safe space for sex-repulsed people.

I have no tolerance for bigotry, and exclusionism is bigotry.

I write, write about, and analyze texts containing sensitive topics. I try to approach this in a sensitive manner, and again, I try to tag accordingly.

I do not discuss real-world events in my blog much, but I'm not strict about it.

My approach to fandom moralism is "live and let live." I do actually have a complex moral philosophy, but its application in online spaces is just "if it's not intrinsically harmful to an actually existing person, there is no moral issue with it."

Related to the above, I am very much so against censorship.

Fandoms and taglist below the cut! Fair warning that I do not format it as just a list, and I do ramble.

that would be so cute honestly. she doesn't understand this Earth tradition at all, of course (at least the first few times), but it's colorful and it's a parade and these people are more chill about aliens than most large groups of humans she's encountered, so she's having a blast. also she heard that it originated with a "riot" which is the human word for a really good time, so of course she's intrigued!

the second anyone poses a threat to this wonderful party, she's dogpiling their ass with her duplicates (and very nearly baking them to death like that one species of bees).

thank you so much! that's a compliment I honestly did not expect to be receiving, wow

okay, so, short answer to the question: yes, I am!

longer answer:

I am going to add more, but I don't know exactly when. I have a couple of vignettes in the same 'verse, which are basically just scenes/snippets during the bedridden phase of Ben's recovery, but I frankly haven't fully decided on how I'm gonna do the ending/resolution.

part of me really wants to make it a long-form fic, like, with a bunch of character study-type chapters at the forefront and the recovery plotline as a sort of... background through-line? I guess? my muse takes me where it wants to, and while I definitely like both "bury the blade" and my undisclosed ben 10 fic from hell, the inspiration for specific scenes just... isn't really happening right now, so I'm doing some writing in other fics bc that's where my muse is actually cooperating.

buuuuuut........ since you asked, and since I've already shared a couple of lines from this little scene for an ask game, I'll go ahead and share a scene here! whenever I actually post it on ao3, it'll be as part of a series of vignettes that either functions as an interlude chapter or a companion piece to "bury the blade." this scene is mostly fluff and comedy with just a tiny bit of whump, but I digress.

enjoy!

maybe. there are kind of three ways this can go though

Option One:

In this scenario, Exextra was originally attracted to Albedo (in part) because she was attracted to Ben. I think Albedo would be... a little bit possessive in that scenario, and she'd have some mixed feelings about that past attraction. She probably wouldn't flirt with Ben for any reason in that timeline, but I don't think we've talked much about that possibility.

Like, I’m sorry, but what do you mean the species that famously took over its planet and outcompeted the other sapient life there by exhausting things to death can now turn into anything between a Vulpimancer and a goddamn Celestial Sapien?? What do you mean it can hunt me for days on end as an Ectonurite because his transformation doesn’t burn in sunlight? What do you mean he has a one of its kind species that’s barely visible to the naked eye because of its size (Nanomech) that shoots lasers and flies around?

Worse still if he uses an Echo Echo or Ditto strategy because humans are also terrifying in packs and Ben can be one all his own.

yessss this exactly! The Omnitrix would be formidable in the hands of many lifeforms, but humans? Who drink poison for fun? And put holes in their bodies for style? And rearrange their mouths with metal anchors and wire??? Like????

Humans in the Omniverse aren’t noted as being particularly strong, fast, agile, or smart. But it is heavily implied that humans are uniquely creative, given Azmuth says Ben used the Omnitrix in ways he himself had never considered. It’s also generally shown that particularly strong beings lack some agility, particularly fast ones lack strength, etc.. They tend to rely on whatever trait they have the most of, which makes sense, since that trait probably evolved for a very good reason.

But Ben? He makes good use of all the abilities he works with, not just because the abilities are powerful but because he knows how to use things like leverage, friction, momentum, etc. to his advantage. Humans, due to not having super abilities, are better equipped to use their environments in physical altercations.

And also, since humans are more prone to injury than, say, tetramands, things like recovery time and pain tolerance will be way higher!

Humans are also used to traveling in a way that requires reaction time much higher than what we would need while running (see: riding a bike, driving, etc.). So it also stands to reason that someone used to having slower reaction time than their vehicle would, when their reaction time is proportionate to their vehicle (as in, any species with superspeed Ben can become), they would make better use of that reaction time! Not because a human would be better at being a kinecelaran, but because a kinecelaran wouldn’t have the experience of compensating for a lack of speed. If that makes any sense.

Anyway. There’s this narrative of “humans suck and are super weak” that shows up a lot in sci-fi, which is part of the reason I like “humans are space orcs” in general, but even in a universe where humans aren’t considered particularly tough (like the Omniverse), the ways humans adapt to lacking certain things gives them an advantage whenever they have those things.

And that’s why Ben is, in the form of any given alien, capable of beating that type of alien in combat.

(And also the “peak physical condition” thing, but I’ll point out that he beat a female tetramand of royal ranking in OV, explicitly stated to be naturally stronger, so clearly he can work around a disadvantage).

I think Exextra would be incapable of customer service long-term, but she could manage the back of house work if she learned enough about food prep, cooking, baking, etc.

If she ever tried serving, hosting, or bussing… yeah, no. She’s prideful, so she’d piss some people off really quickly by being a smartass, and when they asked for the manager, she’d show up and back herself, and the restaurant would accumulate terrible reviews for customer service.

She also probably wouldn’t be interested in working at a restaurant in any capacity, unless it was a front for some sort of over-the-top heist setup.

I never know if I'm answering the same Anon, but I try not to assume what anyone remembers, so sorry if I mention something you knew about!

Oh, absolutely. She's a hopeless romantic, and by headcanoning Splixsons as majority aromantic, I hit her with the aro angst beam and made her reverse aro. somehow. because that's a thing.

(in all seriousness though I think it's conceptually interesting to think of alien lifeforms for whom queerness has a very different form — like in a species that mates for reproduction but not partnership, wanting romance would be uncommon; in a species that can change sexes based on environment/preference, not being fluid in gender identity would be uncommon; etc. etc.. like. queerness is culturally informed, and culture is biologically informed, so queerness looking very very different on different planets is something that makes perfect sense for the omniverse. I digress)

So I think, in the same way that us aro folks sometimes emphasize how much we love our friends or like alone time (as a way of reinforcing our identities and distancing ourselves from the expected/majority perspective, strengthening our connections to other aro folks, etc.), a rare amato Splixson like Exextra would really emphasize her romantic relationship, not because she devalues friendship but because it means so much to her that she was able to find what she was looking for in the first place.

(this is me hitting her with the aro joy beam by making her reverse aro. in case you were wondering)

Also, marriage has come up before! I think the general idea was her being the one to propose, and also them probably getting married in prison so that they could get it legally recognized. She's the one to initiate most milestones in their relationship, but Albedo never minds because he's totally gone for her (and terrible at hiding it).

ngl this made me cackle a little. I'm bumping this ask up in my list bc it's related to a post I just made responding to another ask, for anyone who's wondering.

I agree that she would be, but again, I don't think she'd consider it weird, and I don't think any other Splixsons would, either. Also, I know it's implied in OV that Galvans are monogamous, but a) that's lame and b) they're basically frogs so that makes no sense. So I don't think Albedo would find it too weird, either.

Honestly, I think she'd consider "group stuff" a default, rather than a kink.

(slightly nsfw reason under the cut — not really explicit, just slightly nsfw)