#️⃣What's the most oddly specific AO3 tag you could use for this story?

My first thought was "William Brandt is a little bitch," but honestly I feel like that's a tag that could be used in a lot of fics. So more specific would be "Ethan Hunt's voyeuristic tendencies" or "when you'd rather be a total sex pervert than address your feelings in any reasonable manner." Or maybe "William Brandt has the highest body count in the IMF...in bed." Slut!Will my beloved.

🕰️What's the timeline of the story?

The timeline starts in the nebulous area fandom has established between "Ghost Protocol" and "Rogue Nation," where most Ethan, Will, Jane and Benji mission fics are set. It briefly touches on RN and some bad feelings from that, then has a scene between RN and "Fallout," and the body of it all takes places after FO - which was the last movie when I started writing this back in 2021 (hahahaaaaaaaah). Since I hated DR beyond time, I saw no reason to add it/involve it in any way, so now it's a canon-divergent story. And Ilsa is still alive (and will remain that way).

🃏Wildcard: Answer the question you wish someone would ask you, or share a background detail, or a snippet or line!

I guess the question I wish someone would ask is "Do you want to talk about Hollis "Hal" Watney?" And the answer is yes, I do, but I recognize she's an OC and technically one of the villains of the situation, so not a lot of people would necessarily want to engage with her.

But I love her. Which is honestly strange for me, because I make OCs extremely rarely and even rarer still is me feeling like I haven't just xeroxed too much of myself onto them in some way. I'm really proud of Hal, though. She's named after my fascination with the name "Hollis," and Mark Watney from "The Martian," one of my favorite movies. I didn't even go in intending for her to be nicknamed "Hal," it just kind of happened and worked out great since she loves malicious computers. I like that she's more than a little crazy but she's also incredibly intelligent, forward, and willing to get her hands dirty. She kind of ended up writing herself that way, which was a lot of fun.

She was a great way to indulge my fixation with Prague's "Astronomical Clock," too, which was a lot of fun:

Hal's faceclaim is Amy Adams, who I've adored on since "Junebug" and "Catch Me If You Can."

Maybe that's where I got into trouble, because I ended up liking Hal and her interactions with Will SO MUCH that she's come very close to becoming Ms. Steal-yo-fic-and-yo-man.

Let's be honest, though, Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner are amazing in "Arrival" and just beautiful together; I can only blame myself.

@genfilst drew me fanart of her, and honestly it's one of the most amazing things I've ever gotten, because before she did it, no one (not even me) had ever drawn Hal, or even loved her enough to try. I'm so grateful for that. Whatever happens with her and Will in the end of the story, I really love what I was able to do with her and what she's brought to the story (even if she's Ethan's least favorite person in it).

And if I ever finish this damn thing, I want to get a necklace that matches Hal's. :)

This idea is based on an rp my partner and I did, which was us playing with the questions "what if they'd met when they were young, would they have gotten along?"

I grew up and still live in Ethan's hometown of Madison, WI (although I agree with @vcollies that his farm was in Middleton). Both my parents worked at UW-Madison, and I had (and still have) friends who went there. Ethan's Wisconsin heritage is deeply important to me, and I have this fantasy of writing something about it, the rare occasion where I actually know what I'm talking about.

There's also this:

This is from the first MI movie, and I do not give a good goddamn if they changed it three films later, McQ they can pry drama student Ethan out of my dry, crinkled hands. I'll never let go.

One of my most precious headcanons is that Will is a shy, self-contained, studious person... and also the campus slut. So throw that against overdramatic young Ethan who probably needs to run 10 laps around his dorm every night to fall asleep, my god, do you see the situations they could be put in?

The first situation would be Ethan waking up in Will's bed after a one night stand, and being like "Oh, wow, uh, that was weird, not gay, bye!" and Will being like "....you're welcome for the prostate orgasm, bye" and both of them deciding they'll probably never see each other again. Spoiler alert: now that they know the other exists, they will not be able to stop seeing each other, even if they wanted to.

It's supposed to be lighter and sillier than some of my other fics, but since even my attempt at simple smut turned into "character abandoned by god" fic, I'm not allowed to play with it until I actually finish something.

You're too kind, sob. I'm constantly letting myself down I've been having a lot of trouble with my fics for several months now, and I'm quite discouraged. For Work on "I Want Something That I Want" I... made it all of two new sentences? I've been struggling with this connecting chapter between the Worst Heat Ever (TM) and A Very Crucial Event. I didn't like what I wrote the other day, but I looked back at it and decided it'll do, then managed to close that scene. There's still one more thing I need to address before I can move on though.

Here is what I did:

But right now, in spite of his strengthened resolve, his Omega is bitter and helpless, knowing that the comfort he craves is being given to someone else –even if she deserves it just as much.

He’ll visit Jane tomorrow. For now, Ethan needs to get started on making sure this is the last time he finishes a heat empty inside. 

For Bitch on "Too Busy..." Oh my god. What can't I bitch about about this fic? I have worked on this fic for longer than everything else I've ever written combined. I got stuck on one scene for 3 years. I've gone months without adding stuff and literal years between updates. I felt like I was hitting my stride for a bit over the summer and then the stupidest thing that always happens to me happened: I got in my own way, tripped myself up, and haven't been able to find my feet.

My beta, who is incredible and amazing and doing exactly what I asked of her, made a suggestion about a scene. And it was so good that I was like "how did I not see that? Oh my god. Who let me write this fic when I clearly don't know what I'm doing?" And I crumbled.

Again this was not her intention, this is exactly what I needed a beta for. But combined with the busyness of my job in the summer, stresses of life and obligations in general, and my own mental illnesses and insecurities, I just...

A cool thing about me is that I have OCD and my brain will latch onto a negative thought and turn it around and around and around and around, and I don't like it but I can't let go.

So I started writing the ABO fic to take my mind off it (and to shamelessly write about Will railing Ethan) and then that accidentally found a plot... and it's so tonally different and a different vision of them than "Too Busy," that I feel like I have to finish it before I can go back to "Too Busy," but I can't seem to do that, and I'm scared to go back to "Too Busy" because I shouldn't have had this breakdown and I feel so awful, my beta is so good and talented and comforting and supportive and I don't know how to tell her how guilty and assholeish I feel for not just being able to say "thank you" and adapt, which I should have done, instead losing my shit because I can't get something right on the first try and lying on the ground because I decided I've failed her and everyone aaaahhhhhh (And if you're reading this (you know who you are), I'm sorry, and that's why I haven't emailed you in an age, because I have so much to say about how much I love your writing and support and I'm so terrified of losing you so I'm losing you anyway and I'm sorry I started writing something you don't want to read instead. I mean, I'm not sorry I'm writing it, but I feel like I let you down and I don't know how to come back from that.)

Or maybe it's just that I don't know how to forgive me for what I decided I've done wrong, so I've been hiding from the fic, from my beta, until I can come to terms with the idea that maybe I'm not actually the worst person in the world, which is really weirdly hard!

I DID THIS TO ME. AND I KNOW IT. THIS IS NO ONE'S FAULT BUT MY OWN. THE ONLY WAY OUT IS THROUGH ETC. ETC. BUT IT'S REALLY DARK IN THERE AND... I make a lot of excuses.

...I'm not sure if that was actually bitching or just me exploding feelings at the screen, but ta-daaahh!

All right, let's do it! I was thinking I should probably switch it up a bit or I'm pretty sure I can nail everything with "Too Busy," and that didn't seem totally fair.

That being said...

Too Busy Being Yours To Fall - Y

“You say one thing, then do another! You’re always jumping from place to thing to person to whatever and you expect me to just understand and follow along! I told you, I’m not doing that anymore, Ethan!”

Ethan vs Cats - E (I'm sorry, this one is totally kind of a cheat given... well Ethan)

Ethan seethes as he realizes he was wrong: Will hasn’t been sleeping alone at all, it’s just that his bedmates of late have been much smaller and fuzzier, and they’ve trained him to accommodate them.

Levi & Gabi - S

She can see how Falco’s eyes follow it, knowing what she looks like when she’s about to throw a punch, knowing where it hurts because he knows her better than anyone, knows that she is a violent, angry little girl –no, she’s not a little girl, she’s a warrior –no she’s not a warrior, she’s– 

What is she?

Thank you @coffeeandbowtieswrites, this is always a highlight of my week.

OKAY SO!

The good news: I did manage to spend 5 minutes on something WIP-related that I'd been putting off, which was to actually do some writing. Which I did! Hooray!

The bad news: It's the story literally no one cares about, and not anything that people are hoping for me to update! :D

So uhhh... whoops? It's kind of a mess anyway, I'm still trying to figure things out, but the last time I thought I'd be hopelessly stuck with writing forever an out of the blue AOT idea saved me, so I thought maybe lightning could strike twice. And even if it's just a roll of thunder in the distance, I'm hoping it'll make me less afraid to face my other stuff.

Yay questions!

What is your blog title from?

I assume this is referring to "Congratulations, I'm 100 Years Old," which is a line from the 2009 Ryan Reynolds and Sandra Bullock banger "The Proposal." I've actually only seen it once, but for whatever reason, the dry, absolutely done delivery on that line just killed me. I've used it many times myself when referring to someone or something taking a long time, or when I'm reminded that I'm starting to reach a point where I'm 15-20 years older than most of my employees and I have no idea what's going on with the kids these days.

When I came back to tumblr last year, my blog title had been the same for about 10 years, and I wanted a change. Considering that I'm a fandom old at this point, it seemed to fit.

2. If you could give a TED talk on anything, what would you talk about?

The answer to this is kind of the same as to what I want people to ask me! I would very happily give a TED talk (or several) about various themes in AOT, or Levi himself. I'm always happy to present my TED talk on "Why I Love William Brandt," and I'd even do a supplementary one about Willthan. And you know, guinea pigs. I always want to talk about guinea pigs.

Hello hello! :D

12. A trope you're really into right now

So technically I've already answered this for @yoshifan456, but I can come up with more! I'm interested in "showing an under-loved character just how much he means to someone," which was part of the impetus in writing my ABO fic. I am always a sucker for anything with daemons, and soulmark stuff, although I've yet to write either. Especially if the soulmark stuff is difficult and they don't want to be soulmates? Sign me up for that.

19. The most interesting topic you've researched for a fic

Huh. That's kind of difficult, because a lot of my research is based on locations? I look up hotels in various cities and restaurants characters might go to, even if I never use the actual names of the places. I guess the Astronomical Clock in Prague, because that's key point of my big fic, and I think it's really beautiful and mysterious. I was going to start looking up specifics about stunt driving for a fic several years ago, then I got sidetracked by this action spy movie series, so that never happened... Oh, I did look up stats on disassembling/reassembling a firearm times, and what is the average accuracy in target shooting, that was different for me.