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neutral-emerald · 3 years

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SILVER THE COSMIC TIME-JANITOR (or: dude, what's with all the alternate futures)

silver the hedgehog has a very simple backstory. he's a kindhearted, sorta-naive but altogether very driven psychic hedgehog here to save the world by time-traveling to the past (also known as present-day) to prevent the apocalyptic future he was born into from coming to pass!

[ID: A screenshot of Silver from Sonic 06. He’s glowing with cyan energy as he flies over a dark, post-apocalyptic city.]

...wait, if he's time traveling 200 years into the past to completely change the shape of the timeline, how do the stars manage to align such that he manages to be born at the exact same point in the new timeline with the exact same genetics? how are his parents born? does silver have parents?? and how does he do this no less than THREE SEPARATE TIMES??!

hey everyone, i'm tumblr user neutral-emerald here to make good on the idea i vaguely gestured at yesterday and point out silver's wildly inconsistent backstory(s) and then explain to you how this isn't just sega playing hopscotch with the concept of time travel, but actually TOTALLY EXPLAINABLE if you don't mind a whole lot of conjecture and "fuck dude i just think it'd be cool."

LET'S GO.

before i get started, a few things to establish.

first, this is about… half serious, tops. it’s less of a theory and more of an observation of something that’s weird and then throwing some possible explanations at it because i am a massive sucker for time-based nonsense. if you wanna take my observations and build your own conclusions, go for it. i’m not your boss.

second, i'm basing my conclusions off of both the games and the idw comics. the conclusions i draw are applicable to either continuity, but the logic does rest a decent amount on the comics, so just a heads-up in case you were expecting pure game canon from this.

and third, i'm working off like half a brain and very intermittent checks of the wiki and cutscene compilations, so there's probably many things i'm missing! if you notice something i said was wildly off-base, go ahead and correct me in the replies and i'll either edit the post or explain to you just how that detail doesn't actually matter, depending on whether it. y'know. matters.

with that out of the way, let's get into the first topic of discussion!

part 1: the future is inconsistent, y'all

now, i'm not sure if you've heard, but in the year 2006 sonic team released this little indie game creatively entitled Sonic the Hedgehog. it was a smash hit, won countless awards, and for some reason went down in history as a messy, incomplete bugfest. but that's not what matters. what matters is that it introduced Silver the Hedgehog.

silver hails from 200 years in the future. the world is a bleak, fiery place, and has been since the monster iblis was unleashed after princess elise's death. silver was born into this world, which we know since it's literally the first thing he says in his story.

[ID: A cropped line from Silver's story in Sonic 06. "This world was devastated before I was born."]

i'm not going to drag you through a beat-by-beat summary of the entire plot of sonic 06, you should know it already. silver meets mephiles, gets lied to about who caused the apocalypse, mephiles yeets him and blaze into the past, he tries to murder Sonic the Hedgehog™, and so on. eventually he helps kill god, and then sonic and elise travel further back in time to kill god even deader so that none of the game ever happened, and the bad future into which silver was born never happened, thus thoroughly scrubbing silver's existence from the timeline!

...until.

sonic rivals.

i'm not going to speak much on sonic rivals, mostly because i'm not super familiar with it. but what matters is that silver is back! he's still from the future, he's still here to change the past, and most importantly he wasn't deleted from existence by the destruction of solaris, unlike everything else from sonic 06 including everyone's memories of it. and obviously, whatever state his future is in, it's not the same as it was in sonic 06.

now, i don't have a single clue what is going on in rivals 2, so do inform me if there's some big information i'm missing from that one. all i know is he's fixing yet another possible apocalyptic future, like always. correct me if i’m wrong, i don’t have the patience to trawl through it myself.

then we've got sonic colors, in which silver is again from the future. notably, he’s definitely not from an apocalypse!

[ID: Some screenshots from the DS version of Sonic Colors, again cropped to just the text. Tails and Silver are talking to each other.

Tails: What's the future you came from like, Silver? Silver: A lot brighter than this. Silver: The sky is blue, and everybody's got a smile.]

sonic generations doesn't add much. again, correct me if i'm wrong, but i don't think we learn anything about what kind of future silver is from, and he's definitely not here to fix it this time. that's sonic's job! he's just hanging out like everyone else.

now, up until this point the future has been reasonably consistent, setting aside my somewhat abstract understanding of the rivals games. there's nothing to say that silver's not coming back in time from the same point in a single timeline, which is the one and only version of the future ever since the destruction of sonic 06.

UNTIL.

[ID: Two panels from the comic Sonic Forces: Stress Test. In the first panel, Silver looks worried as he lands in front of Knuckles, who looks skeptical.

Silver: We've got big trouble! Eggman— Knuckles: How can you be here? I thought you returned to the future?

In the second panel, Knuckles looks away with a self-assured grin, while Silver looks more panicked.

Knuckles: Oh wait— I must be dreaming! Silver: What? No! I've come back with a dire warning from the future!]

i have a lot of issues with sonic forces, especially with how its story is written. something i do NOT take issue with is the supplemental comics, mainly because they are WONDERFUL evidence for my crackpot time travel theory.

like i said, up until this point we don't really know whether silver has been experiencing separate instances of the future, or simply traveling back in time to prevent an also-time-traveling eggman nega from messing things up in the past. but here, we get some very juicy information:

[ID: Knuckles and Silver again. Knuckles has his arms crossed and is looking at Silver, who has a nervous look on his face as he slams a fist on the palm of his other hand.

Knuckles: Come again? Silver: Something happens that brings the world to ruin! But the historical records are sparse or make no sense. I came back to hopefully head off whatever's about to happen and save the future.]

silver travels back in time to prevent a terrible apocalypse. this is not the beautiful future silver came from in sonic colors— but this is the same silver. everyone recognizes him. he recognizes everyone. and yet, the future he came from is different.

part 2: silver is a walking paradox

allow me to remind you of what i pointed out when i was talking about sonic 06. silver was born into the iblis-apocalypse. considering no elaborate timeline nonsense happened to him before the events of the game (by his reckoning) i think we can safely assume he was born like a regular person with parents.

in the first post-06 timeline, silver was probably also born. let's be charitable, acknowledge that sonic team doesn't overthink the butterfly effect like i do, and say that silver was born to the same parents, because the universe likes to keep things nice and simple and contrive itself to make this particular character exist in this time period.

so, it's entirely fair that silver comes to exist in a post-06 timeline at the equivalent point in time, aka 200 years in the future. it's also fair that he travels back in time to prevent some kind of apocalypse, because that's his narrative role! it's what he does. when it's time for him to exist in the story, that's what he's there to do.

what isn't fair is the fact that it keeps happening.

[ID: A panel from the IDW comics. Sonic is stretching his legs while looking faintly exasperated at Silver, who is nervously holding his arm.

Silver: Er… No. I came back because defeating Eggman didn't save the future. Sonic: Couldn't even play along. Had to bring the mood down. Sonic: *sigh* Okay, what happened this time?]

[ID: The following panel, cropped to just Silver's text bubbles narrating over a starry sky.

Silver: When I left, my time had been conquered by the Eggman Empire. Everyone lived in fear, choking on polluted air. Silver: When I went back, the Eggman Empire was gone— but so was everyone else. Silver: There was nothing left. No people, no animals, no machinery. Only water and sparse, metallic plant life.]

allow me to summarize my understanding of all this: silver is from the future. normally, the future is good. sometimes it isn't. when it isn't good, he goes back in time and fixes things, then returns to the future to check if that fixed things.

the least conjecture-y interpretation i can come up with is that sometimes silver will go into the past, then go back to the future but end up in a Bad Timeline and thus go into the past again to fix things. there's no weird warping directly between bad timelines, he only gets there by way of the past.

but that's boring, so here's my PREFERRED interpretation.

silver hails from a good future, but sometimes it just changes. he's unstuck from time— if something weird happens in the past, he's the only one to know that the passage of fate was changed, because he went to bed in one timeline and woke up somewhere categorically worse, and the only way he can fix it is by figuring out just what caused this and going back in time to fix it.

or, to say it in a meme:

[ID: A picture of someone lying in a hospital bed with a nurse standing next to them, edited so that Silver is in the bed.

nurse: sir… you've been asleep for 2 hours silver: oh boy i can't wait to wake up in the same timeline i went to sleep in]

part 3: how did this happen?

it's one thing to point out that silver doesn't experience time like a normal hedgehog, and another thing to explain how and why this happens.

fyi, this is the part where i go wildly off the rails and start saying whatever i want. there's a ton of explanations one could come up with, most probably stemming back to sonic 06. i'm just going to go with my own, and probably not come up with a whole lot of concrete evidence because i'm just spitballing. this is me having a fun time. going "heeheehoohoo time traveling hedgehog go brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr"

so. something i haven't touched upon is that in all games after sonic 06, silver can time travel. we never see him do it, it's never explained how he does it. all we know is that he's doing it under his own power.

which is kinda odd, don't you think? should he be able to do that?

in sonic 06, we see three mechanisms for time travel. first is the chaos emeralds. if two people perform Chaos Control with a chaos emerald apiece, they open up a swirling rift in the air which can send them to different points in time and space. silver can't be doing that, for obvious reasons— he's only one hedgehog, and he's not exactly running around with a chaos emerald at all times. that can't be how he does it.

second is a time machine eggman built. that obviously can't be it; the machine doesn't exist at all after the timeline gets wiped, and again, silver is doing this on his own. he's actively antagonistic towards eggman, even. absolutely not this one.

third and finally is mephiles, who can make big purple orbs to take himself and passengers to different points in time. this obviously can't be it either, for similar reasons to number 2, right? after all, mephiles is one half of solaris, who was destroyed before he could be split off. he doesn't exist to be silver's time-traveling uber driver.

...right?

well, obviously. i'm not going to try and tell you that mephiles is secretly alive and shepherding silver back and forth between timelines for no reason. that's ridiculous. no, i'm going to try and tell you that silver is mephiles.

or rather, he's solaris. or RATHER, he's the new solaris, sorta-ascended to the role of Time God after the old one got blown out like a birthday candle.

like i said, i'm going wildly off the rails and as such don't have any concrete evidence to explain why it's this instead of something else, but hear me out. after elise blew out the flame of hope, the universe was left in an interesting situation. someone needs to be in charge of the flow of time, but the previous time-god was just unceremoniously destroyed. but all the power and energy of a time-god has to go somewhere, in some form, in some time.

with nothing else to go off of, the role of time-god starts flipping through every notable being it had interacted with. they're all solidly accounted for in the timeline, except for one. silver the hedgehog was born into a timeline that cannot exist. silver the hedgehog does not, and cannot exist. silver the hedgehog interacted quite a bit with both sides of solaris— he spent a substantial amount of time fighting back iblis, and associated with mephiles, even being one of the few people to directly experience his time travel abilities. silver the hedgehog tried and failed to absorb iblis into himself.

here's my theory: after sonic 06, the universe reasserted itself such that silver was the new Solaris. silver is not consciously aware that this is what he is, but he knows that he can time travel. sometimes the timeline will rearrange itself around silver. he is unaffected by this because he is a higher being unaffected by such petty trifles as "an origin" or "paradoxes".

silver the hedgehog probably doesn't have parents. he sprang into existence one day and everyone just kind of went with it, himself included.

oh also something i thought was neat but couldn't think of where to put:

[ID: More cropped dialogue, this time from Team Sonic Racing.

Silver: I'm fine. It's just, something bad is gonna happen. I can't explain it. I just feel it. Blaze: Have your travels through time given you precognition? Silver: I don't know. Maybe they have. Or maybe I'm just thinking too much.]

silver might be becoming psychic in a future-vision kinda way. that, or he’s riddled with anxiety. possibly both.

TL;DR

silver hails from no less than three separate timelines, his existence is a tangled web of who-knows-how-many grandfather paradoxes, and i choose to believe that he's god.

if anyone who cares more about evidence wants to gather up like, little one-off clues that support or conflict with my conclusions, go right ahead. or just throw your own arbitrary headcanons for what's going on with this at me. or incorporate these ideas into an au or something! i just want more people thinking about what the Fuck is up with silver post-06, because by god there is a WHOLE lot of potential packed in there

anyway thanks for reading make sure to like comment and subscribe—

#hey guys check out how hard i can gesture at a corkboard #is it remotely coherent? not a clue! i cannot process my own writing #sonic theory #silver the hedgehog #text #dot txt

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mwolf0epsilon · 4 years

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First off, before everyone comes after my butt with their "No Fun Allowed" and "Cringe" signs, this is in no way something to be taken as gospel or insightful. It's not a prophetic enforcement of canon. It's literally a theory done for fun, and to try to piece the Bendy Crack up Comics into the general and messy lore of the BatIM franchise.

Most of you get this and don't need a big wordy warning about fanon interpretation, but a lot of peculiar people tend to show up in my ask box hoping to start a fuss over my headcanons and AU ideas, so I thought to be nice and leave a polite and diplomatic "Kindly Fuck Off" sign at the door for them.

With that said, there will be mild spoilers, carry on of your own volition, down below under the cut that will definitely show up because Tumblr mobile is a functional app that's never given me trouble!!!

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[[MORE]]

The Bendy Franchise has an established issue with cohesion in its lore. We all know what I'm talking about, we all have reservations about canonical character discrepancies (game vs novel vs guidebook) and we all have been racking our brains with a few holes in the timeline, as well as how BatDR (which is neither prequel nor sequel) will fit into this, since it's connected to BatDS and that's an established prequel to BatIM.

Granted I myself am missing a lot of pieces, having to scrounge around for info since I can't really get any of the reading material myself and rely heavily on @british-hero (who owns the novel plus got her copy of the comics yesterday), a very incomplete wikie, and analysis and theories from SuperHorrorBro's Bendy videos.

Heck, I also rely on a lot of gameplay footage, because BatIM has a bit of subtle storytelling through visual design of its levels, and hints of how certain characters work through a few game mechanics.

Through this mishmash of collecting puzzle pieces for the greater picture I even have a few notes on my phone to piece together certain events in established dates, something which comes very in handy for this theory since it talks about two particular characters, the Projectionist and Brute Boris (and I guess Twisted Alice to some extent but it's more of a note on some interesting thoughts I have of her).

Without further ado, here's what this theory is all about: Why did Norman become the Projectionist, and why did Twisted Alice turn Buddy Boris into Brute Boris?

If you think about it, there's only two creatures in the studio that really seem out of place in the world of BatIM, and that's Prophet Sammy and the Projectionist. Neither are inherently similar to any of the cartoon characters, nor are they considered to be Lost Ones. They're certainly not Searchers, but while we know Sammy is unique because his method of transformation was different, we never got an explanation for Norman's. It could be that it's a process similar to BatDR's new enemy type that's larger and seems to have bits and bobs stuck to it, but then those big guys seem like the equivalent to Swollen Searchers for the Lost Ones. The Projectionist doesn't really fit the puzzle.

Or at least he didn't.

With the introduction of the Crack up Comics collection, we get three new characters that were definitely designed in the same manner that the Butcher Gang was. Beginning with a corrupt monster forms and then giving way to perfect and pristine rubberhose toon forms.

I'm talking about Miss Twisted, the Brute, and Cameraman.

The villainous trio from the Souper Boris comic strip.

To us it's obvious the artists created them in parallel to Twisted Alice, Brute Boris and the Projectionist, but to the actual canon this actually has a bit of an impact on the Projectionist's existence.

Why, you ask? Because those characters were introduced between 1936 and 1940.

Bendy Crack up Comics table of contents, showcasing the publishing dates of the strips.

For anyone who doesn't know (either from not paying attention to the Joey Drew Studios channel audio logs, or from not owning the books) the Ink Machine wasn't conceptualized or installed until 1942/1943. Putting that into perspective, the only other thing that happened in Joey Drew Studios in 1940, was the conceptualization of Bendyland (which is likely the origin of the idea for the Ink Machine itself).

This means that Cameraman existed well before the Projectionist ever came to be, and that made me think about another thing: The Ink's apparent sentience.

I'll be frank, the Ink is very hard nut to crack. I consider it a form of alchemized entity, others consider it pure black magic, and I'm pretty sure Joey Drew himself had no idea what he was dealing with when he began using it. The fact of the matter is that the Ink is alive and that it has its own agenda. One that coincides with Joey's, out of mutual interest.

In the novels it seems to want to be free, but it can't exactly do that as a formless liquid, so it tries to body-snatch people (ex: Sammy and Buddy's grandpa).

When Joey tries to use it to give life to Bendy through nothing more than using the Ink and a template (likely a character model sheet) the Ink tries to follow the model but immediately becomes a distorted humanoid version of it (which honestly rings so many fucking alarm bells on its own). Things… Escalate there on out, with Joey trying to perfect the method and only managing to succeed through Daniel Lewek (and many other nameless Boris Clones), Allison Pendle and Thomas Connor.

An important thing to take from this, however, is that by trying to perfect this method Joey not only taught the Ink to reshape things into viable referenced material, but that he had to have lost control of just how many souls were being pumped through the Ink Machine for him to monitor and keep up.

Sammy started killing people when he completely turned, and it didn't seem to take long for him to cut down people in likely both the music and art departments. At this point he had no self-restraint and was completely wrapped around inky fingers and Joey's lies.

Norman is one such potential victim, and Dot and Buddy even passed by his ink-wrapped body while fleeing.

Now, the thing about trying to follow a specific guide and not having the actual means to make it exactly the same thing, is an easy enough notion to get (as shows like "Nailed It", and years of trying to perfect visual style mimicry, have taught me).

The Ink likely had the template it needed (maybe a printed copy of Souper Boris that got thrown around in the chaos), the insight of what Norman's role in the studio was, the amount of mass it needed to consume and transform his dead body, but not exactly the right sort of… Centerpiece for it...

Cameraman using his lens to light up his path.

But what's a projector besides a bigger fancier camera? Both blink, both take film, same thing right? The ink doesn't see the difference and just stitches together this humanoid bootleg cameraman with the pieces it finds that are similar enough.

Mechanical blinky head? Check.

Strange round disc near the belly? There's a speaker. That's round! Check.

Film? There we go, a nice big round reel full of film in it, let's put it near the head, that's how it works right? Check.

Lastly, no Joey to actually direct this artistic recreation of a one-off character. The Ink did it all by itself while he was off getting his hand broken by a rightfully upset Buddy Boris.

If you look at it objectively it makes sense that being the projectionist tasked with not only recording and maintaining the projectors themselves, that the entity in the Ink would pick Cameraman as a template for Norman's transformed self.

It also makes sense that the Projectionist is so off-putting in the studio. He's almost perfect, but not quite because there just weren't the right materials. He's stuck in between Twisted Alice and the Butcher Gang clones as another failed recreation.

Moving on to the next question on why Twisted Alice turn Buddy Boris into Brute Boris, when she hadn't done the same to any of the other Boris Clones.

It's hard to say really, but I think it all comes down to who Twisted Alice really is. It's very likely that, as Susie Campbell, she would have knowledge of the comic strips. A few were most likely made into cartoon shorts even (which isn't an unusual assumption to make), and maybe Susie voiced a few background characters for said shorts.

Susie may have lost her role as Alice, but before Joey came to her with his proposition for the "special project" it's very likely that she remained in the studio, forced to do the voices of characters that weren't noteworthy or that she felt completely disconnected from (talking chairs and singing hens really don't become beloved fan-favourites) . Maybe if the Souper Boris story was made into a short, she might have voiced Miss Twisted (which honestly would be personally insulting considering she once had the role of the main heroine).

Point is, Susie knows her lore, and that translates to Twisted Alice's repertoire of insightful knowledge on the abominations lurking around the studio.

She never did turn other Boris clones into brutish lackeys because at the time she didn't need to. But it doesn't mean she hadn't considered it. Henry's disruptive behaviour is just what she needed to put that plan into motion.

There was already a "Cameraman" walking about, one that could easily rip apart anything it came across, so acquiring the means to recreate the "Brute" would have been benefiting from her point of view. The Projectionist doesn't take orders and can't be reasoned with, so if she could make something just as strong that took her orders she could, theoretically, be safe from most terrors in the studio. If that didn't work, she would still likely send others to their death by simply sending them down to Level 14, or maybe lure the Projectionist to them herself (just because he doesn't take orders doesn't mean she can't use him to achieve her end goals).

Miss Twisted, the Brute and Cameraman in their evil swamp lair.

But why Buddy Boris specifically? Why couldn't she have used any of the bodies laying around? Freshness most likely. Rigor mortis is probably still a thing, even for living cartoons. Easier to work a fresh dead body than a bunch of stiff wolves.

That's at least why I think Brute Boris is a thing. Susie's knowledge of most Bendy cartoon/comic strip characters, taking inspiration from the Projectionist's presence, and honestly a very twisted sense of humor and irony. In her quest to become a Perfect Alice, the heroine of the show, she ended up becoming just as antagonistic (although more sadistic) as Miss Twisted, a Bendy comic strip villainess.

#bendy and the ink machine #batim #bendy crack up comics #bendy spoilers #spoilers #theory #headcanons #speculation #twisted alice #the projectionist #brute boris #long post

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joshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh · 4 years

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Been playing X all day again, it literally just passed midnight, let’s update again.

So I got Boze to 4 hearts and did his affinity mission, and yeah wow I guess he technically got a redemption, which I’m fine with, but it was done really boringly and I still hate his guts and his sensei obsession. Oh well.

And then outside of that, I’ve been doing the Water Torture support mission over and over, and I just now finally got everyone to 5 hearts and saw all their heart-to-hearts. So yeah, I’ve done every single affinity mission and every single heart to heart in the entire game, which is really epic.

Also, I was checking my achievements, and apparently somebody scouted me yesterday. Kinda cringe honestly, I’m a super not optimised character, but I guess I am a cute girl with nice fashion that’s level 59 which is close enough, so maybe they were happy with that. Also the AI’s probably not good enough to where being optimised is even important, my character probably is just good enough.

My immediate to-do list is I still haven’t beaten Unbreakable Sword - even with 3 level 50 skells the cunt’s so fucking durable and whenever he destroys our skells it’s really hard getting him into attack range, so uh, we’re still stuck on that.

Off the Record archaeological has the same problem - enemy’s too durable for my skells to win the war of attrition, and then he won’t approach the one foothold we have in his pool of lava. Bit of a toughie, and it’s especially annoying since I know I’ll be needing the field skill to clean up regional surveys and unlock the few remaining quests I have.

Speaking of, I got the Divine Nopopon quest, and I’ve not actually attempted to do anything in it yet because from a cursory glance at the wiki, it seems like it’ll be really hard. Fun.

Not really sure how to go about solving these issues honestly. With every main story and affinity mission done, plus every heart to heart, and a huge amount of the regular missions too, I’ve done more than enough to be satisfied with the game, but like, more exists, so I want to do it.

Maybe the strat is just to throw Lin and Elma in my party since they’re both like level 55, throw whoever’s closest to level 50 in the party as well, and then just have that full party try our best to rock everything in the game.

Or maybe I should be doing all the various forms of grinding that’ll give me the mats for an Ares 90 and like Ultra Infinite armours or whatever. Unfortunately I’m pretty sure the best way to grind for lots of these things involves being active in the game’s online community, but uh, that’s mostly dead. Not impossible to do all this stuff still, but we’re at a point where I should be questioning if what little of the game I do actually have left is worth the grinding I’ll need to do. Maybe if I got properly good at Overdrive or switched to longsword I wouldn’t even be asking these questions. Oh well.

Also I think it’s fun to mention that at this point I have 131 hours in the game and I really couldn’t tell you how much of that was spent idling. My revenue’s above 200k though so it’s more bearable now than it was before.

Anyway yeah I’ve got Elma and Lin in my party again. Who should I have for number 4? Tell me in the replies and I’ll do it, bet.

#xenoblade #27.8.20

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neriad13 · 4 years

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for the fic ask game: 13 and 16?

13. Do you outline your fics? How much of a headache would someone get if they just looked at an outline of yours without reading the fic?

Oh yes. I usually end up planning a fic around one or two key scenes that I reeeeeally want to do, which the entire rest of the story is written to build up to. I also tend to know what the ending is before I know the rest of the story. A large amount of the time, that key scene is the ending. So, outlining is immensely helpful to me in working out the logistics of reaching those later points before diving in full throttle.

I also like being able to see the ‘shape’ of a story at a glance. It makes it easier to figure out how to make it stronger.

My outlines can have some weird notes, but generally, they’re just summaries of events. Sometimes they can get so detailed that they’re almost first drafts. What is weird is looking back on old outlines and seeing how much has changed over the course of writing the story. Sometimes the characters had different names or were referred to by strange nicknames or I’d planned to do something totally ridiculous that didn’t end up working out in reality at all.

16. Do you research for your fics? If so, how deep of a rabbit hole have you gone down by accident when researching?

YES. The difficulty with me is figuring out when to stop researching. There’s a literal ton of research that never makes it into the fic itself (though I do think that knowing the background of a thing, even if it is not directly mentioned, does help in writing the rest of the thing with more authenticity). I am in the habit of rereading entire game wikis. The first thing I do when I’m tackling a subject I don’t know a whole lot about is check out every single book in the library about that topic (well, almost every book. I’m sure there’s more than the 15 zombie books I requested yesterday in the local library system). I am the person who has tabs open for weeks on articles and videos I find useful.

I fall deepest down the rabbit hole when I’m researching something historical. If I learn one new, crazy thing, I want to know what it means about the people who lived in this time period, how it connects to the present world and what that means about people today. I read a lot of nonfiction when I’m not actively researching a topic and am constantly going off on self-propelled research tangents there too.

The most bonkers such tangent that led to the most bonkers fic: The Whale Cure, for In the Belly of the Beast. I happened upon a video about that and I had to, man, I just had to.

There’s also kind of an interesting story behind the research I did for Sensēto, which says more about what I leave out than what I leave in. I immersed myself in research about medieval Japan for several months before I felt comfortable enough to write a story set in it.

But, as I discover in all my historical research, there’s some pretty messed up things in history. Choosing whether to write about them or pretend they didn’t happen is one of the most difficult decisions I make. Sometimes they’re discoveries that totally change the nature of a story (in high school, I was writing a fantasy story about a family that had been cursed by a witch, but once I’d learned about all the horrors of real-life witch hunting, I could not in good faith write the story the way I had been). Sometimes they’re the things that become the basis of the story (there’s a yet-unfinished Dishonored fic of mine which is very much about 19th century homophobia). And sometimes, they’re things that are too painful to write or read about and thus, I choose to ignore them (unless a story is explicitly about racism, I tend to leave the racism out. is this the right call? i’m never entirely sure).

Anyway, in Sensēto’s case, it was the discovery of the prevalence of (not always consensual) pederasty in Buddhist monasteries of the both the medieval time period and later. In The Great Mirror of Male Love, a collection of short stories written during the Edo period, there are multiple stories about unwilling minors trying to get away from the monks who are relentless in their romantic pursuit of them. My story’s got a minor who is overwintering in a Buddhist monastery, as a key part of the plot. >.< It was a concerning discovery.

I think it’s important to be as true to reality as possible when writing any story - historical or otherwise, whether you’re writing high fantasy or a coffeeshop au. Ignoring the painful parts of it feels dishonest to me. I generally like diving into those topics and exploring them, but there, I just couldn’t see any benefit in doing so.

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pidgezero-one · 4 years

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Repost from facebook, in case anyone cares about Canadian sports TV

I usually try to take one or two days to think about a hot-button issue and avoid making kneejerk emotional reaction statements in response to it, so a little late to the party: Don Cherry, eh?

There's a lot to talk about here. I'm not going to tell you whether or not he deserved to get fired, because frankly I don't work for Sportsnet or have any first-hand exposure to anything he may have said in the past that led up to this decision. I can't tell you if it was this comment in particular that sent his employers from 0 to 100, or if it was just the latest in a series of flack-catching events that they're tired of doing damage control. I don't particularly care either way, that matter is between him and his former employer. I will tell you, however, that the Government of Canada was not involved in this decision, and his firing was not a violation of his (albeit limited by Canadian laws) freedom of expression, as a television network is well within their rights to dismiss a representative who is delivering content to viewers that is incongruous with what the network wants delivered on their behalf. Moving on.

I have seen some people argue that Cherry was addressing everyone in Canada, and not only immigrants, so since apparently some short-term memories are not so great, I took the liberty of transcribing his comments:

"...Downtown Toronto, forget it! Downtown Toronto, no poppy... How bout [running?] it for the people that buy them? Now you go to the small cities, and you know... you know, those p--... the [rows and rows?] ... You people love, you that you come here, whatever it is, you love our way of life, you love our milk and honey, at least you could pay a couple of bucks for poppies or something like that. These guys pay for your way of life that you enjoy in canada, these guys paid the biggest price..."

So, if you only heard every word past "you love our way of life", then I could understand the opinion that he was addressing all Canadians. But that isn't what he said, he used the words "you people ... you come here". Where is "here"? There were three places listed in this rant:

-small cities

-downtown Toronto

-Canada

He's clearly not talking about small cities, since he implies that poppies are everywhere in small cities.

Is he talking about downtown Toronto or Canada? In that case, who "comes here"? It's not Canadian citizens from downtown Toronto (since they did not "come to" a place they were already living), it's not Canadian citizens from outside downtown Toronto (since as mentioned, those people tend to wear poppies proudly in large numbers), so who's left? You already know the answer, it's immigrants.

So, some of you may now be wondering, "so what, what's wrong with that? Should people who move here not be expected to respect our military?" I would say, sure, if moving to another country means adopting some of their ways of life, and you believe patriotism in support of donating to the Legion falls under that, you could make that argument. But why single out immigrants to Canada, when just a few seconds ago people agreeing with him were entirely convinced he was addressing all Canadians? What purpose does it serve to single out immigrants?

Furthermore: why are we pointing fingers at new arrivals to Canada to blame for a decline in poppy sales? Full disclosure: I did not buy a poppy this year. That wasn't on purpose. The part of town I work in has been plagued with construction reducing major arterials to a single lane, so lately I've been resorting to "creative" suburban bus routes to get home.

Did you know that the Legion maintains a list (https://legion.ca/remembrance/the-poppy-campaign) of places where you can get a poppy? I didn't, and I also have not been passing by the listed businesses on my way home lately. It didn't enter my mind, as pretty much the only way I really remember what time of year it is on a day-to-day basis is "is my rent due today?" and "is there snow on the ground?" and I did not enter any of these businesses for any reason as of late, and just forgot to get one. There are countless other adults like me -- what changed over the years?

Compare Remembrance Day to other national days of importance like New Year's. Everyone knows when New Year's is coming up, because its presence is ubiquitous. Everyone talks about their plans, their resolutions, their parties. Remembrance Day is much less culturally ubiquitous in the days before it, meaning there are less frequent "oh yeah, I should do something" reminders entering your field of vision. 15-20 years ago, I would see commercials on TV frequently, and that was a good reminder. Today, I don't subscribe to any cable or streaming services, and I browse the internet with an ad blocker. A lowered frequency of passive reminders is a real factor in your day-to-day decision-making, and perhaps there's room for people much more knowledgeable about marketing than I am to discuss targeting demographics who weaned off TV in the information age. That's not for me to propose any solutions to, just pointing out a cultural source of decline that isn't pre-existing bias against immigrants.

Going back to the immigrants point -- not only is it creating a scapegoat, but it's also just plain wrong. "World War I" and "World War II" are aptly named, check out this table: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#Human_losses_by_country

World War II killed military members from literally all over the world. Indonesia, Brazil, Iraq, Ethiopia, China, India, Thailand, just to name a couple. Countries like Mexico who suffered no military losses also suffered civilian losses. World War II ended over 70 years ago, but generationally, 70 years is not a long time. Children growing up without their parents and siblings lost to war, they have to live with that forever. Survivors living with PTSD, that is a condition that affects your entire life and those around you. Economically, that much loss in life and prosperity affects the entire world, and always hits the poorest the hardest. The effects of war on a person and their family last for generations, and this is true around the world. People immigrating to Canada, statistically, are probably already well acquainted with this fact first-hand. They do not need to be lectured on the importance of military service any more than a born Canadian citizen does, chances are they already know.

World War II also ended, like I said, a very long time ago, but as we are all already aware, it certainly wasn't the last military effort Canada participated in. While we honour the sacrifices made by veterans in wartime, the CAF and the Legion still need funding for things like supporting veterans living with PTSD (https://www.legion.ca/support-for-veterans/mental-health-ptsd), such as services like the Family Information Line (https://www.cafconnection.ca/National/Stay-Connected/Family-Information-Line/Connect-With-Us.aspx). If you didn't know those services existed, what separates you from a new immigrant who also didn't know about them?

There is a separate discussion to be had by people much more knowledgeable than me about the morality of the CAF intervening in some foreign regions or being involved with cracking down on illegal marijuana, but that's a discussion I won't open up here and am not confident in discussing. However, some of the existing services offered to veterans that are funded in part by poppy sales are what I would consider altruistic and good to know about no matter how long you've lived in Canada, especially if you know somebody who served in wartime.

So how does all of this relate to Don Cherry? Ultimately, it's disappointing that he chose to single out immigrants in this way, when immigrants have no less understanding than born Canadian citizens about what exactly wartime sacrifice means. Interestingly, I was browsing some discussions about this yesterday, and came across some comments from people who do not understand a word of Punjabi, but enjoy watching the Punjabi broadcasting of Hockey Night In Canada because of the genuine unbridled enthusiasm of the commentators for the game. A broadcast program like that exists to do an example of exactly what Cherry and his supporters are critical of "immigrants" for supposedly -not- doing, and that's integrating with and participating in Canadian culture. There is no widespread attitude from new arrivals to Canada to reject Canadian values and culture. Nobody goes to a new country with the intention of having nothing to do with the country around them, that's a miserable way to live and is not something anyone wants to do by choice.* Look at Sweden, the vast majority of people learning Swedish on Duolingo are refugees living in Sweden. His comments were unfairly targeting certain Canadians in a way that singles them out as "others", and that's really unfair for them to have to hear coming from someone who is a Canadian cultural icon commentating a game that countless people from all walks of life, from any part of the world, take great joy in watching as part of being in Canada. All he had to do was apologize, and he didn't, and that's really unfortunate and has made a lot of Canadians who grew up with him as a household name very sad.

* (This is not even getting into the unspeakably horrific sacrifices imposed on our Indigenous populations, which make the whole judgmental comments about "immigrants" an entirely different and gross flavour of ironic.)

It's even worse that it comes at a time of heightened political "us vs them" tensions. We don't need more of that. The line between left and right is getting wider and wider every day. You can even see a visual representation of this courtesy of our neighbours to the South in this video: https://youtu.be/tEczkhfLwqM -- not that you need to, really, just look at our election 3 weeks ago where suddenly a bunch of provinces threatened to leave the country because they didn't get their way. (Speaking of, the election was three weeks ago, holy. Your negative comments about immigrants in the wake of Don Cherry's firing contrasted with your faux-concern about Trudeau's racist makeup has been duly noted. Maybe note that Trudeau's damnable actions happened 20 years ago, aka what some of you consider to be "the good old days" when people were "not so easily offended", as in, a time when Cherry likely would not have been fired for his comments, like Trudeau wasn't fired for his racist makeup. Think about that for a second before sharing that nonsense meme.)

Cherry's words and a refusal to think outside the box or apologize to Canadians just trying to live in Canada and enjoy a hockey game were ultimately promoting political tensions that don't need any further promotion, and that's unfortunate. Ultimately, whether you were born in Canada or not, both you and your neighbours just want to provide the best life you can for yourselves and your loved ones, and some of you actively chose Canada as the best option to achieve that goal in. And that's a pretty special thing to reflect on and unite over in the face of tension and division.

#don cherry #hockey #canada #remembrance day #poppy

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tjp5 · 4 years

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Week 5 Weekend

Happy Valentines Day to you and yours! Yup, I’m late… No, I don’t really care. It’s the thought that counts…. Maybe. Idk Hakuna Matata that shit.

So, Saturday is the off day of off days. I literally don’t have anything going on, it drags a little bit, but it is nice to not have anything on the radar for the day. Plus, I got to dog sit, fuck yea dogs. I dipped a little Saturday, I’ve gotten a lot of bad new in the last two weeks, and unfortunately it is all starting to catch up. I don’t feel like getting into that shit storm on here, I just don’t think it would be beneficial to write about it when its still bothering me three days later.

Anyway, the apartment got cleaned, I had my cheat meal, which was Taco Bell… Do you remember the taco bell dog from the 90s? Maybe I’ll insert a gif here, maybe I won’t. Look at that, I did it, just for you.

Anyway, I loved those commercials. Along with moving around to clean up the apartment, there were of course walks for the pupper, so I wasn’t totally a lazy ass Saturday. I tried to get my mind off things and play some games, but when the shit storm ensues, there isn’t much out there that will really take my mind off it, unless I just keep myself crazy busy. Which I did at work. It is kind of comical that when things are worse for me, I am a better worker. I don’t know, I guess it is just my way of ignoring all the heavy stuff.

Yesterday was another day that was a little darker, unfortunately, and fortunately, things are coming to a head quicker than usual. I don’t know why this is, but who knows, maybe this rut won’t last as long. I need to invest in a scale. I don’t trust the scale at the gym, mainly because it moves like it was stuck in the molasses flood in Boston. Yes, that was a thing, check out this cool link (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Molasses_Flood) So I just don’t trust it. Plus, I am around the same weight I was, and my clothes are fitting way better than they were before. Literally, I don’t know what I would have ended up doing yesterday if it wasn’t for this program. It is getting me out of the problems that I am dealing with, even if it is only for about two hours.

With the workout main workout was barbell press, funny story real quick. I stole someone’s phone…. Because I thought it belonged to someone else and was trying to be a good gym bro. Literally thought I was going to have to fight two dudes. But, they understood, and even apologized for putting their stuff on a machine they weren’t using. Some gym bros aren’t total douches. Anyway, Barbell press was easy this week. I was dragging ass, so I had one of the Reign energy drinks before the workout. I think that might have something to do with it, but it makes you feel good inside. The only thing that was bad about the workout was the fact that my shoulder seems to be acting up. So, when I had to do Cable Lat raises, my shoulder was literally not cooperating. I had to change the workout a little bit there so I could get the reps in. Although it is frustrating at this point, I am okay with getting the reps in, even if they aren’t exactly right. The Arnold press is a lot more difficult than I thought it would be, I don’t think that it is difficult because of the weight, but the motion causes my shoulder to tire out rather quickly. I don’t think this happened last week, but I can’t remember. The cardio for the day was good, I tossed out the burpees because I didn’t think I would be able to do the pushup motion along with everything else that I had to do. 18-minute AMRAP, I love that shit. Partly because its not running, I’m not a runner at the moment. Maybe I will learn to be, but let’s work on one thing at a time, eh? Also, make sure you read the workout before you start the workout, because my warmup was supposed to be four rounds, I did seven, at an 8 min AMRAP.

CHICKEN. Chicken and eggs have become a large part of my diet in the last two weeks. I don’t know if it is bad for me or not, but I enjoy it. A few months ago, I did a whole month without eating meat. I think I need to incorporate more plant-based meals into what I am eating. It’s a balance. I need to take a picture to see the progress that I have made, maybe tomorrow morning. Probably not.

Cheers

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commentaryvorg · 5 years

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Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Part 4.5

Be aware that this is not a blind playthrough! This will contain spoilers for the entire game, regardless of the part of the game I’m commenting on. A major focus of this commentary is to talk about all of the hints and foreshadowing of events that are going to happen and facts that are going to be revealed in the future of the story. It is emphatically not intended for someone experiencing the game for their first time.

Last time in chapter 4, Maki opened up about her past, she and Shuichi and Kaito were ADORABLE FRIENDS, Kaito was a huge hypocrite on the topic of burdens, twice, Kokichi helpfully suggested some improvements to Monokuma’s script like an absolute moron, and Kaito’s bonus training for his sidekicks was totally not him desperately trying to prove that they still need him or anything.

Now for the last of chapter 4’s free time!

Shuichi: (What can *I* do? The only thing I’m good at is solving mysteries, but I can’t figure out this academy.)

That’s not the only thing you’re good at, Shuichi! Your detective’s brain also makes you pretty good at coming up with plans. That plan with the cameras in chapter 1 was really not a bad plan if you ignore the fact that the entire premise of it (that the mastermind wouldn’t have a way of knowing about it) was flawed. But of course Shuichi wouldn’t think that or want to attempt something like that again since it indirectly got Kaede killed.

Keebo: “What can we each do to make sure that we all survive…? We all possess Ultimate talents. There *must* be something we can do.”

YES IT’S ALMOST LIKE THE ULTIMATE ROBOT COULD GET US OUT OF HERE OR SOMETHING.

Geez. I was mostly not being too mad at Keebo because I figured he was largely oblivious to the difference his weapons could have made anyway, but this makes it a whole lot less excusable. (And again, there is no indication given that he’s not doing so because of his inner voice, which is the only truly justifiable reason that would make sense within the story.)

So that’s even more reason for me to not hang out with Keebo here like I wasn’t going to anyway, because that should by all rights lead to Shuichi persuading him to use his weapons and get everyone out of here today. And that’s obviously not in line with canon.

Gonta: “Hi, Shuichi! How can Gonta help you today?”

Heh, this mostly just sounds like a polite, gentlemanly greeting, but in this chapter’s context, it definitely has undertones of “please tell Gonta he can help you today, Gonta really wants to be able to help you today”. Sorry, Gonta, I’d love to, but we’re already best friends; Shuichi needs to spread his friendship around others too.

Miu is in the computer room as she was all day yesterday as well, but interestingly, right now Kokichi’s hanging around in the corridor not too far from it too. He does apparently help her set things up for their Virtual World trip, so maybe that’s what he’s doing right now.

Despite Kaito not showing up anywhere on the Monopad’s map due to what is presumably a programming oversight (even characters who aren’t available should have their locations shown, with the understandable exception of Kokichi in chapter 5), he does exist during this free time slot and is perfectly available to hang out. The wiki says he is unavailable right now; the wiki is wrong. He’s in the warehouse. You’re welcome.

(The first time I played through this game myself, during which one of my missions was to find every piece of optional dialogue I might not have seen from Youtube playthroughs, I was determined not to give up on finding Kaito here and resolved to manually check EVERY SINGLE ROOM IN THE SCHOOL IF I HAD TO. Thankfully I started from the bottom up and the warehouse is on the first floor.)

Kaito’s reason for being in the warehouse probably has something to do with the fact that it apparently contains medicine. Like, you know, painkillers and stuff.

Kaito: “I can see my training is already having results for you and Maki Roll.”

It is, and Kaito has every right to be proud of himself for that!

But it’s also interesting that while a lot of the characters are focusing on thinking about what they can do, since that’s what they discussed at breakfast, Kaito is instead focusing on what he already has done. Almost as if thinking about what he can do in future is painful and discouraging because there’s almost nothing he can do (short of suggesting even more bonus training for his sidekicks, which still isn’t going to help them escape), and so he doesn’t want to dwell on that.

Kaito: “But don’t slow down here! It’s important to keep up your training every day.”

It is! Shuichi and Maki (with the addition of Himiko) are absolutely going to keep up their training every day when they get out of here.

(Also, remember back in chapter 2 when I mentioned that I’d started doing exercise myself thanks to Kaito? I’ve been doing that every single day for a little bit over a year now, and it’ll be several months more than that by the time this part I’m writing actually gets posted. Kaito is the best.)

Anyway, we’ve been on a roll with Maki lately in the rest of the story (pun totally intended), so let’s continue that by hanging out with her, shall we?

She happens to be in the dining hall, which is just across the corridor from the warehouse and therefore tantalisingly close to where Kaito is. They could all hang out as a trio again! Kaito would also want to hear more of Maki’s heartbreaking backstory! No? No. Silly game mechanics.

Maki: “Something only I can do… I can think of just one thing. …I know what you’re about to say. But… that’s the reality.”

Oh, Maki. That’s not the only thing you can do!

Maki: “Of course, I’ll think about… other things I can do.”

Exactly! You can fight and protect us!

Shuichi: “I didn’t know that assassins were scouted.”

As the event proper begins, Shuichi just straight-up continues the conversation they were having last night. This is why I had to save Maki’s third FTE until now at the earliest – because having this before that scene just does not make sense.

Maki: “It’s better if you didn’t know. Also, there’s no need for you to know.”

I dunno, Maki, if more people knew that there were child-slave assassins out there then maybe some people would be able to do something about it and this horrendous practice might stop. She just can’t see it that way, because she’s had to accept this as her reality in order to cope.

Maki: “The orphanage I was raised at was run for that reason.”

Shuichi: “…What do you mean?”

Maki: “To raise potential candidates for assassins.”

Yup, that’s the truth of her orphanage. That’s not remotely fucked up at all.

Shuichi: (How much is Maki carrying on her shoulders…? Such small shoulders…)

Heh. You sound like Kaito, Shuichi.

Maki: “The basic training forces your body to go beyond its human limitations. They physically beat us to help us withstand torture, and taught us how to die when needed…”

Happy fun Free Time with upbeat music as our friend casually tells us about how she was tortured.

(It really is a shame Kaito couldn’t be here to hear this too. He would 1000% want to help her carry this awful burden just like Shuichi is doing, even though all they can do is listen.)

Maki: “The only option left when you fail a mission is to die, right? Dying sooner is the nicer way out. It’s much better than being tortured alive.”

…I mean, she failed that one mission with the katana and didn’t have to die for it. I guess what she’s really talking about is if she were to get captured by an enemy of the assassin cult that would use her for information.

At least this means that when they’re all considering group suicide in chapter 5, Maki would know how to also kill herself painlessly at the end of it. You know. Reassuring thoughts.

Shuichi: (I can’t bear to think of what Maki had to go through…)

I know, Shuichi. It may have never really happened to her, but she’s still having to live now with the memory of it, believing that it really happened to her, and that’s not fucking fair at all.

Maki: “They tried to drag my dignity and tear it… To make me feel empty…”

They were trying to turn her into an empty, cold-blooded killer without a heart. And they didn’t succeed.

Maki: “I wouldn’t have accepted the job in the first place if I knew I couldn’t do it… But most importantly… If I broke, then *that girl* would replace me…”

We’ll hear more about this next time, but she’s talking about her best friend from the orphanage. She put herself through what she knew would be literal torture and refused to break under it because if she did, then her best friend would go through that instead. God, Maki is amazing.

(Again, technically none of that really happened to her, but thanks to those fake memories, the person standing here is someone who really would do that kind of thing.)

Shuichi: “That girl?”

Maki: “… Sorry… Pretend you didn’t hear any of that just now.”

But it seems like, at least for right now, she’s not quite ready to open up that much. She’ll get there, though.

Kokichi: “I bumped into Kaito, and he ended up giving me a lecture. He told me to think of a way to escape…”

Kaito has still been trying to get through to Kokichi! He still hasn’t given up on Kokichi and believes there’s some semblance of a decent person inside him who actually wants them all to escape! Kaito is so good.

(It also seems that, despite his earlier declarations, Kaito realised that punching him again might give off the wrong impression and decided to just stick to words this time.)

Kokichi: “But the only idea I can think of is becoming the blackened myself.”

And… Kaito’s not wrong about Kokichi, but he is underestimating how massively, completely inconceivable it is to Kokichi to actually acknowledge that buried part of himself and start being co-operative. What’s about to happen tonight isn’t going to be for lack of Kaito trying to stop it, but even Kaito isn’t enough here.

Kokichi: “That’d entertain everyone.”

Which is exactly what Monokuma wants, you are playing right into his hands and you should know this, you goddamn idiot.

Gonta: “Nrgh… Gonta tired… Gonta think too much…”

Awww, Gonta. He’s been trying so hard.

Gonta: “Rest is important, too… Gonta have to make sure he not useless when everyone need him!”

“When”. He’s still managing to stay so optimistic that that time will come. (Which it will. Sooner and far more tragically than you think, Gonta. Gaaaaah.)

Anyway, this time, in the very last chance we have for it, we’re hanging out with Kaito. Come on, now – you didn’t really think for a second I was going to go through the story without maxing out his FTEs, did you?

Kaito: “O-Oh, Shuichi… What’s the matter?”

Just like he did a day ago, Kaito doesn’t seem super-thrilled to suddenly encounter Shuichi wanting to talk to him.

Kaito: “Yeah, I don’t mind talking, but… My stomach hurts a little. Can we talk somewhere I can rest?”

But this time, he’s actually being somewhat honest about what the problem is. That’s pretty remarkable. Sure, for Kaito to be admitting to Shuichi that his stomach hurts a little, it must really be hurting one hell of a lot, but still. Kaito being willing to show even just a tiny bit of vulnerability in front of his sidekick is such a big deal and warms my heart. It’s okay, Kaito. Shuichi isn’t going to be any less inspired by you just because you’re struggling with a lot of things yourself, you absolute wonderful moron.

Shuichi: (I spent some time with Kaito… Didn’t he say his stomach hurt last night too? I hope he’s okay…)

I’m sure Kaito hates the fact that his tiny nugget of honesty is making Shuichi worry about him and doesn’t want him to do so at all… but Shuichi absolutely should be worried about his friend.

Kaito: “Hey, you got a minute? I got something to talk about.”

Shuichi: “Ah, okay…” (He seems upset…)

Shuichi’s already getting the sense that there’s something more forceful about Kaito than usual as we start the event proper, and boy is there a reason for that.

Shuichi: (Did I do something to make him angry?)

This, however, is not that reason. But of course Shuichi is lacking enough in self-assurance that he would immediately think this is somehow his fault. Of course it wouldn’t ever occur to him that maybe Kaito has issues and problems of his own and that might be what’s at the root of this rather than Shuichi having done anything wrong. (And this won’t be the only time Shuichi misunderstands Kaito in literally exactly this way.)

Kaito: “I’m just gonna say it! What are you moping around for!?”

Shuichi: “What?”

Kaito: “When my sidekick is moping, it really ticks me off!”

Shuichi: (I’m… moping?)

Shuichi isn’t moping. He’s still not a shining paragon of confidence or anything, but he’s been able to be a lot stronger and more positive lately. His own reaction to Kaito’s accusation just now shows that even he didn’t really think there was anything he was being particularly negative about, even though Shuichi is usually his own biggest critic.

Kaito disapproves of moping because it’s just wallowing in your negative feelings without making an effort to make it better. But in this context, the effort to make it better that Shuichi is supposedly avoiding would be asking Kaito for help. Right now, “Why are you moping?” really translates to “Why aren’t you letting me help you?”

Kaito: “I told you, man! Don’t hesitate to talk to me if something’s wrong. But you’re still keeping stuff from me! Am I not reliable enough!? Spit it out! If you bottle everything up, it can’t get fixed!”

What this whole thing really is is Kaito projecting weakness and worries onto Shuichi in another desperate attempt to show that Shuichi still needs his help. His “Am I not reliable enough!?” in particular shows what’s really going on. Kaito is terrified that he really isn’t reliable enough, not now that he’s dying and Shuichi solved the previous trial entirely without him and is seemingly strong enough that maybe he doesn’t really need Kaito’s support any more.

(It could also perhaps seem like Kaito is projecting his own behaviour of hiding his illness from his friends, but like last time, I don’t think the fact that he is incidentally being hypocritical here is the point. If the point was Kaito deflecting, that’d mean that acting like he wants to help Shuichi would just be an excuse to distract from his own problems. But of course Kaito wanting to help Shuichi could never be an excuse – Kaito always wants to help Shuichi, and that’s the real problem.)

Shuichi: “I’m sorry, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not looking for advice…”

Kaito: “You’ve got some guts trying to lie to me.”

Shuichi: “…”

He’s not lying! Shuichi wouldn’t lie to Kaito, not about his own weaknesses and struggles, nor about wanting Kaito’s advice for his problems. He may sometimes hesitate to talk about what’s bothering him until Kaito prods him a little, but he has never and would never outright lie about it once prodded if something really was wrong. And if that wasn’t proof enough, Shuichi’s staring at Kaito here with a sceptical face like he’s wondering why Kaito even thinks this.

Kaito should know perfectly well that Shuichi isn’t lying here. So it’s really quite delightfully messed up that he would rather tell himself Shuichi is lying to him than face the idea that Shuichi doesn’t need him.

(Even though the only way in which that’s really true is that Shuichi happens to not particularly need his help right now. That’s a completely different thing from not needing him at all… but Kaito doesn’t seem to realise that.)

A couple of times previously, Kaito did a similar thing of starting off a conversation with someone by trying to make it about him listening to their troubles and helping them – once with Kaede in an invitation dialogue, and once in his first FTE with Shuichi. Both those times, though, when they didn’t need to talk to him about anything, he accepted that and was happy to start talking about something else. But not this time.

Kaito: “Fine then! Listen up…”

Shuichi: (Kaito encouraged me, complimenting me about my talent.)

If Shuichi isn’t going to ask for Kaito’s help despite Kaito insisting that he totally should be doing so, Kaito’s going to help him anyway, aggressively complimenting him and telling him he’s awesome so that Shuichi can see how inspiring and encouraging and important Kaito still definitely is. (Really, Shuichi had no reason to have ever stopped thinking that about Kaito in the first place, but apparently Kaito doesn’t see it that way.)

You may have noticed from the way I’ve been talking about this event that I’ve been casually assuming despite the flexibility of FTEs that this is definitely taking place during chapter 4, and that all of this is a part of Kaito’s canonical arc that I’ve been talking about the rest of the time. And the thing is, this event really does have to take place in chapter 4, going by the keeping-FTEs-in-line-with-canon logic I’ve been using. Kaito’s fourth FTE mentioned Shuichi being his sidekick, putting that in chapter 3 at the earliest, and while there are two slots in which Kaito is available in chapter 3, the second of those has him already feeling too unwell for it to be believable that a proper FTE would have canonically happened then. So this fifth and final one has to happen, not necessarily this late, but definitely during this chapter.

But even if that weren’t the case, I’d still consider this event practically a canonical part of this chapter. While nothing in it explicitly mentions chapter 4-specific details, this is so clearly written for Kaito’s chapter 4 state of mind as he desperately tries to compensate for the fact that he’s dying by being as helpful as he can to his sidekicks. It fits in beautifully with the rest of the hints toward that we’ve had so far up to this point – in fact, this event is significantly less subtle about it than anything else has been, which is why I’m happy I saved it until the end like this.

Shuichi: (I should tell him… Then he’d understand why. I told him all about the case that got me the title of Ultimate Detective. I told him everything… so that he would know how untalented I really am.)

However, it seems like all of Kaito’s aggressive compliments just made Shuichi feel like he doesn’t deserve them and actually start to feel bad about himself. Now, at least, he has something to talk about that Kaito might be able to help him with, even though he genuinely didn’t need to talk about this when this conversation began.

(I don’t think Kaito was deliberately intending to bring Shuichi’s issues out by complimenting him, though. That’s far too underhanded and manipulative for Kaito to do no matter what state of mind he’s in. Plus, I’m not sure he’s even that consciously aware of the reasons he’s been acting this way, which he’d have to be for this to be deliberate.)

Kaito: “I see… So you were chosen after you solved a case.”

Shuichi: “Yes, and the most important part… I just happened to find some evidence that was missed. I accidentally solved the puzzle. It was all coincidence, happenstance…”

As soon as Kaito says something that puts things in a vaguely positive-sounding light, Shuichi’s immediately jumping to insist that no, that’s not the point, he barely even deserved to solve that case. It’s hard to know how true it is that it was all just a coincidence, but I’m inclined to think it wasn’t. Even if it is just a matter of Shuichi noticing something everyone else missed, that’s still him having better observation skills than anyone else on that case, which is something that’s important for a detective to have. Shuichi’s just likely to not want to give himself enough credit what with how much the outcome of the case traumatised him.

Kaito: “Geez… You worry about the most trivial stuff, man.”

Kaito, you’re the one who was fishing for Shuichi to be worrying about even the tiniest thing so that you’d have an excuse to help him.

Shuichi: “You have no right to say that! You don’t know what I’ve been through!”

Kaito: “Hah! Nice! It’s good to see you actually have some bite to you.”

Shuichi’s response is a dialogue option that I picked, but I like this one, because I enjoy Kaito being proud of him for being able to stand by his own feelings, not even caring that Shuichi doing so involved snapping at him.

(Mind you, Shuichi was also standing by his own feelings earlier when he was asserting that he didn’t need any advice from Kaito right now, and Kaito was much less on board with that, but, you know.)

Regardless, when Kaito said “trivial”, he was really talking about the culprit’s feelings.

Kaito: “He killed someone and was trying to get away with it! He’s a bad guy!”

This is an instance of Kaito’s often fairly black-and-white way of thinking, but even so, him putting things this simplistically helps Shuichi move away from worrying about how the culprit felt. Even if the guy wanted revenge, that still doesn’t justify murder, so Shuichi was right to expose him for it. Kaede and Kirumi’s crimes so far during this killing game were much less black-and-white, such that Shuichi has a decent reason to feel at least a little bad about cornering them, but that one guy? Screw him, he’s nothing like them.

Kaito: “If he’d gotten away with it, he’d be crushed by the weight of his guilt. But you got him before that happened! He should be thanking you!”

It’s also very appropriately Kaito of him to see Shuichi’s job of catching criminals as important because it forces the criminals to take responsibility instead of running away from their own actions and the pain they caused. I especially love that Kaito even sees this as a good thing for the culprit himself. This will be a very relevant idea during this upcoming case in particular, in terms of a certain someone Kaito has already been trying to get through to a lot.

Kaito: “I’ll support you all the way! I know you did the right thing!”

This might still be Kaito overzealously trying to compensate for his own feelings of inferiority, but it’s adorable all the same. This is all Shuichi really needs from him at this point – not necessarily major advice on specific problems, but just knowing that Kaito’s there for him and on his side no matter what. You’re already doing enough, Kaito. Just keep being you.

Kaito: “And not just with that guy! From now on, if anyone holds a grudge against you… I’ll kick their ass!”

This is not ironic foreshadowing to the extent that one might think, because Kaito is never going to hold a grudge against Shuichi, however much it might seem that way. Of course, Kaito would also definitely want to kick the ass of anyone who even seems to hold a grudge against Shuichi, even briefly, just because doing so would hurt him. So… that’s a thing.

Kaito: “So you just gotta follow the path you believe in! You’re my sidekick. So don’t hold back, and rely on me whenever you need to!”

These are Kaito’s voiced lines for his final event, and they couldn’t be more appropriate. They’re adorably full of him believing in and supporting Shuichi, with just a dash of that delightful undertone of him desperately wanting Shuichi to still rely on him even if maybe Shuichi doesn’t need to quite as much any more.

Shuichi: “Kaito… thank you.” (Alright, so he’s foolhardy. But he supports me and expects nothing in return… He does so much for me… I could never turn my back on that. I will never betray his support and trust. I will never break my bond with Kaito!)

While Shuichi is completely oblivious to what’s going on with Kaito and why he’s being so aggressively supportive right now, it’s still just absolutely heartmelting how grateful he is for everything Kaito does for him and trusts him so wholeheartedly in return. For all of Kaito’s issues that this event has been subtly full of, they’re still incredible, adorable friends, which comes across so strongly here. Most FTEs, when they end on emphasising how much the protagonist has become friends with the subject, are kind of dampened by the knowledge that this is just an optional side thing that isn’t really there in the canon storyline. But here, this just serves to highlight the canon adorable friendship between these two even more and I love it.

And if only Kaito could hear everything Shuichi is thinking here. He would never turn his back on you, Kaito! No matter what weaknesses you might have and no matter what mistakes you might make! You have so much less to be afraid of than you think.

Shuichi: “…I understand, Kaito.”

…Shuichi doesn’t really understand. He only understands the fact that Kaito will always be there for him, and while that’s true (or at least, Kaito has no intention of ever making it untrue), that’s not remotely the full picture here.

Shuichi: “I will always depend on you.”

This sounds adorable on the surface, but is potentially pretty messed up if you think about it too hard. Ideally, what Shuichi means is, “I will always depend on you when I need to”, which is the healthy way of looking at it – everyone needs to depend on other people sometimes, and it’s great that Kaito will always be there for him during those times.

But… that might not actually be what Shuichi means. I’ve mentioned multiple times that Shuichi is pretty overly dependent, hence him latching onto Kaede and Kaito so easily… so he might be okay with the idea of always needing to depend on on Kaito. Which he shouldn’t! Nobody should want to be constantly dependent on someone else their entire life, and it’s especially unhealthy if it’s on one single person, no matter how reliable and genuinely well-meaning that person may be. Shuichi should want to become someone who doesn’t need to depend on someone else most of the time, even if that someone else is Kaito.

Kaito: “Yeah! Just leave it to me!”

Under normal circumstances, Kaito would probably be able to pick up on this and recognise that it’s unhealthy and assert that Shuichi should be striving to become more independent. After all, his former sidekicks he mentioned last FTE no longer need him any more, and he seemed perfectly happy with that.

But in the state of mind Kaito’s in by this chapter, he’s not about to do that. Kaito may be a little bit like this even at the best of times, but right now especially he has become incredibly co-dependent – meaning, he’s pathologically dependent on the idea that someone else depends on him. He needs to be needed. And that’s pretty messed up of him too. There is definitely a large part of Kaito that’s worried Shuichi already doesn’t really need him any more – but he’s not letting that part have a say and continuing to insist that of course Shuichi should be constantly depending on him.

Shuichi’s dependency and Kaito’s co-dependency make them a perfect match for each other in a wonderfully messed-up kind of way, and that dysfunctionality lurking beneath the surface is another of the many reasons I enjoy their friendship so much. If it weren’t for this, things wouldn’t be about to fall apart like they do, and this chapter and the beginning of the next wouldn’t be nearly as delightfully heartwrenching.

Shuichi: (Kaito’s smile was as bright as starlight. I couldn’t help but smile back.)

Bright like he’s a luminary or something! Space imagery! FRIENDS.

Shuichi: (…Everything is going to be okay. As long as we have this, we can move forward.)

Oh boy, it sure—

isn’t going to be even remotely okay barely twenty-four hours from now.

Shuichi: (Sometimes I feel as though I’m dragging him down, but I know I’ll catch up one day.)

You’re not, though, Shuichi! This could not be more completely opposite of how Kaito sees things! Kaito feels like he’s the one dragging Shuichi down, which is precisely why we just had this whole event of him desperately trying to show that he isn’t and that Shuichi can still benefit from his support! But Kaito has apparently managed to successfully convince Shuichi that he’s completely invincible and doesn’t have any problems of his own, so Shuichi has no goddamn clue.

Shuichi: (I bet he’d laugh and tell me I have a lot of nerve for a sidekick.)

He wouldn’t, though. The entire point of Kaito’s sidekicks is supposed to be that one day they’ll reach even greater heights than him – we went over that in his previous FTE. Kaito should laugh and then tell Shuichi how proud he is of him for coming this far. I guess Shuichi genuinely never did realise that most of the reason Kaito was telling him about his former sidekicks was to imply that the same thing applies to him.

Or, at least… Kaito should show pride in Shuichi if Shuichi ever overtook him. But that’s Kaito at the best of times, and those are not the times he’s in right now.

In the report card summary for this event, there’s also a very similar line to the one from before:

“Kaito, I know it seems as though you’re dragging me along, but I’ll be right there beside you.”

This is such a delightfully ironic line, and the writers clearly knew exactly how important it is since they essentially included it twice. Oh, Shuichi, if only you had any idea just how completely backwards you have it. If only Kaito would tell you what’s really going on in his head, and then you could support him in return and help him figure things out. But then, this is Kaito we’re talking about here.

All of Kaito’s previous FTEs featured him talking about himself, like FTEs are supposed to. And in general, the final event in particular is meant to involve the subject talking about their biggest issues now that they feel comfortable doing so because of their growing friendship with the protagonist, and maybe having the protagonist help them a little with that. But in Kaito’s final one, he doesn’t talk about himself at all. Because of course Kaito would never talk about his issues, especially not to Shuichi, who needs to see him as strong and invincible in order to be able to rely on him, or so Kaito is irrationally convinced. (And if he somehow miraculously did talk about his issues and Shuichi helped him with them, that’d probably mean that what’s about to happen in the main storyline shouldn’t happen the way it does any more, which we absolutely can’t have.)

Yet this final free time event of Kaito’s still manages to be thoroughly about his issues, not even despite the fact that he doesn’t talk about himself and makes it all about Shuichi’s issues instead, but precisely because of it. It is so appropriate for Kaito that things should be this way, and I love it.

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#danganronpa #danganronpa v3 #drv3 #ndrv3 #chapter 4 #daily life #free time events #commentary

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surveys-at-your-service · 5 years

Text

Survey #214

“if you are dead or still alive, i don’t care.”

Do you wear perfume or cologne? Very very rarely. Typically if I have to go somewhere formal or something. What was your favorite grade in elementary school? Probably 5th. Do you own a debit card? No. A credit card? No. Are you in debt? I don't pay for anything that could cause me to be in debt. When is your birthday? February 5th. What song are you listening to now? "I Don't Care" by Apocalyptica. What was the most traumatic experience of your life? The breakup with Jason. Have you ever lost a friend to drugs or alcohol? Kinda. Who was your childhood best friend? Her name was Brianna. Are you still friends now? We just drifted apart. If not, why? ^ Do you believe in Karma? Nope. What do you thinks happens to us when we die? I don't pretend to know. I hope some sort of eternal peace for those deserving, but who the hell knows. What age do you think you’ll die? Idk. 70s/80s? My grandparents lived pretty long. About how long was the last book you read? I haven't a clue. Have you ever read a play before? Yeah, in school. A play not written by Shakespeare? I don't think so. Have you ever read a play outside of school? No. Have you ever edited Wikipedia? No. Have you ever edited any other wiki? A lot... I'm one of the admins at the Silent Hill wiki, a content mod or something I don't remember on the SotC one, and I occasionally edit the meerkats wiki, which is an atrocious mess that I try to clean up where I can. Is there a website [besides social networking] that you check almost daily? A lot. Do you use your phone as an alarm? Yep. Do you listen to music while you sleep? No. Do you get scared when you know some virus or sickness is being passed? I don't get "scared," just very paranoid of germs. Are you realistic? In some ways. Do you own a romper? No. What popular social media platforms AREN’T you on? Snapchat, and then I have a Twitter solely to like Mark's shit lmao. What does your computer’s slow-loading cursor look like? It's a spinning light blue ring. Do you prefer Microsoft Word or Pages? I've never heard of the latter, so. Would you rather have a trampoline or swimming pool? A pool, please. Do you have the same favorite colors you had when you were a kid? Pink, yes. What do you like to put in your tea? N/A What do you like to put in smoothies? I don't really drink them. Do your stuffed animals have names? Some. What was the name of the first porcelain doll you got? Bitch miss me with that haunted doll shit. Do you sell any products? If so, what? No. Do you know how to knit? No. Do you have an inspiration board? I have one on Pinterest of hair colors I like. Do you have a colored teddy bear? Maybe up in the attic somewhere. On what day is your local grocery store the busiest? I'm sure it's the weekend. What day do you usually go grocery shopping? Mom doesn't have a designated "day." Do you own a bobblehead? No. What do you make wishes on? Nothing. Wishes aren't magic. Well, I do on birthday candles, but that's only as a tradition sorta thing. What’s the best natural pain reliever? It depends; sometimes nothing natural works. What’s your favorite Paramore song? "That's What You Get," probably. Do you like scrambled eggs? Yes. Have you ever made a recipe you found in a magazine? No. Have you ever done a craft that you saw in a magazine? I don't believe so. Are you bitter about anything? I am permanently and inexplicably bitter towards my former primary doctor that fucked up my entire body thanks to keeping me on a medication and her being an ignorant fuck to the side effects, apparently. What is your favorite color for cars? Burnt orange. What is your favorite color for bridesmaid dresses? *shrugs* If applicable, what’s your favorite dance costume that you’ve had? It was some sort of black dress-ish thing. I can't remember clearly. What’s your favorite flavor of mouthwash? Minty? Just ffs don't have alcohol in it. Do you drink CapriSuns? If there's nothing else to drink, sure. Do you prefer caramel or peanut butter? Peanut butter, I think. Do you like strawberry shortcake? No. Do you like butterflies? Yeah, they're my fave insect. Do you know any dances? Only the ones that literally tell you what simple move to do lmao. Did you go anywhere yesterday? No. Do you like yellow or blue more? Blue. Do you wear rings? Only one. What’s the last you got out of the freezer? French toast sticks for lunch yesterday. How often do you go for walks? Never, sadly. Walking along my road is scary with how busy it is, I CANNOT handle the heat, and for the time being, I can't walk far at all with my knee problem. Do you go on the computer or watch TV more? I say enough I don't watch TV, but I'm always on my laptop. What is something you’ll never eat again? Why? Brussel sprouts. 'Cuz they're fucking disgusting. What is currently happening that is scaring you? Abortion rights being taken away/wrongly modified is pretty scary, honestly. What would be your personal hell? The Christian Hell because fuck that heat lmao. What made the ‘weird kid’ at your school weird? He, I shit you not, would not say a word, but if he absolutely had to speak, he kept it very very short and quiet. He was always looking down and isolated himself. I felt really bad for him; he was so obviously depressed, but I was always too unsure of how to approach him and try to be a friend. What is a word you personally find offensive? "Retarded" when used incorrectly. What instantly puts you to sleep? Instantly go to sleep??? Please teach me how. What song is in a language you don’t speak, but you love it anyway? Well, I don't speak German fluently, so like, a shitload of Rammstein songs. What is something you would like to do if you weren’t judged for doing it? Tbh cosplay sounds so fun. What’s a movie you think everyone should watch? Why that one? Johnny Got His Gun. It shows just how fucking disgusting war is. What was the most unexpected good thing that’s ever happened to you? Senpai Noticed Me. What is the funniest fact you know? Idk. Oh, I might be mistaken, but I think the guy who invented the segway died via driving off a cliff on a segway. Big 'ole oof. What’s the kindest way a stranger has treated you? I remember as a little kid, the people in front of us in line at McDonald's paid for our meal. What is the biggest design flaw of your body? I have this random, deep dimple on my right ass cheek like what the fuck. What is the strangest thing you have ever felt? OKAY SO when I was in the process of having my ears cleaned back when I had that wax adhered to my eardrums, one step was having warm water like pounded into my ears, and it somewhat tickled but also felt oddly good, and it was just really weird. What makes someone immediately unlikable? Acting like they're above everyone else. Who’s a villain you sympathize with and why? Darkiplier hunny my poor husband. I won't answer "why" because yeah spoilers. What is something you regret to NOT have done? Fuck it, I wish I'd had *complete* sex w/ Jason. I was in love with him, and I'll probably never experience genuine sex again so like- What’s the weirdest thing you put in a microwave? Idk? What movie changed your life for the better? I'm not sure. Oh, wait, I remember when I was still Christian, God's Not Dead really touched me, but we know how I am religiously now. What’s something your relatives don’t know about you? Many probably don't know I'm bi. What’s something your parents did, which you have sworn never to do? Have children before marriage. Back when I wanted kids. What’s the most annoying thing your pet does? My cat is obsessed with trying to lie on me as he'd done as a kitten, but then I can't see over him to see the laptop. Teddy scratches a lot and won't listen to "stop" for anything. What’s the biggest sum of money you’ve won? Uhhhh. I have no clue. Have I ever? Idk. Have you ever smoked weed on April 20? No. Tell me about the last event that made you really, truly happy? Oh boy. Can you name three good things about your most recent ex? He's funny as fuck, super intelligent, and hard-working. Have you ever thought about how the world will end? Yeah. What object do you own that has the most sentimental value to you? The pebble I got from my partial hospitalization program. What’s the best memory you have of your father? Him teaching me to ride a bike. What was on the last sandwich you ate? Ham, cheese, and mustard. Do you prefer gold or silver jewelry? Silver matches more things, but I'm allergic to it. I find gold in general prettier, too. Have you ever gotten back together with an ex? No. What is your favorite Thai dish? Never tried Thai food. When was the last time you made out with somebody? February. Are there any candles in your bedroom, and what scent are they? No. When was the last time you went to a birthday party? Last month for my niece. What pet names do you use with your significant other? A whole lot. What brand is your toaster, if you have one? We don't have a toaster, but a toaster oven. I don't have the slightest clue what brand it is; it's ancient. Have you ever dated a smoker? If not, would you? No and nope. What’s the name of the store you usually get your groceries? Wal-Mart or Harris Teeter. Would you rather travel to Japan or Scotland? Oh man, I don't know! I guess Scotland. Does your house have a porch/balcony? We have a decently-sized back porch. There's a front one as well, but it's tiny. What was the last movie you saw and who did you watch it with? I watched The Shining by myself. What’s your favorite type of bread? Pumpernickel. Do you share a middle name with any of your siblings? Yes. Can you cry on command? If so, have you ever used it to your advantage? No. What time does the sun go down where you live at this time of the year? Like, 8:30-ish. Would you rather pay to get your nails done or do them yourself? If I literally had to get them done for whatever reason, I guess I'd pay. Me doing them myself would be a nightmare, especially with tremors. Did you ever fail your learners/drivers test? I haven't taken it yet. Do you have any stickers on your car? I don't have my own car. Blackberry, Droid, or iPhone? iPhones. Do you like diet soda? NO. I don't just not like the taste, but the artificial sweetener gives me crazy headaches. Do you watch Pretty Little Liars? No. Have you ever gotten a speeding ticket? No. How old were you the first time you drank alcohol? I don't remember. WAIT shit dude, I was young. I grew up going to a Catholic church, and during that "eating the blood and body of Christ" thing (I forgot what it's called), we sipped real wine. Yes, even the kids. That shit was NOT grape juice. Name someone you’ve become a lot closer to recently: No one. What was the last fight you had with your parents about? Dad, I've got no clue. Mom, about her constantly shit-talking my dad and I no longer wanted to hear any of it in my presence. Does your car have a sunroof? N/A Did you ever have braces? Yes. Are you from the South? Yes. What does your last status on Facebook say? It was something about the bullshit Alabama abortion law, I believe. I barely ever ever make my own statuses. Do you tip your server when you go to a restaurant? I never can because yeah, no money, so I can't even pay for the meal. If I could, of course I would. Have you ever snuck out of your house? No. Are you friends with people on Facebook that you actually hate? No? Name your favorite Ke$ha song: I guess "Take It Off." What’s your favorite place? Ah man, the tattoo/piercing parlor I go to. What was the last comic book you read? It was one of the Silent Hill ones on the app years ago. What’s the worst trouble you’ve ever gotten into? Probably when I ran away from home in like middle school. Do you know anyone your age who has a child? A good number, but I mean I'm 23 so that's not exactly strange. Ever had a friend online for a long time without seeing a photo of them? A few. The last time you threw up, what caused it? Medicine that was known for nausea. Did you have any foreign exchange students at your high school? I don't think so? Any foods from other countries you would like to try but haven’t yet? Not off the top of my head. Do you think the world would be more peaceful without any religion? Maybe. Probably. Idk. Have you kept the same icon here for a long time? Yeah. I don't really take pictures of myself, so. Why did you choose your icon, anyway? It's the most accurate representation of how I look on the daily. And it's not horrendous. Does it hurt your feelings when people talk shit about things you love? Sometimes. It doesn't hurt my feelings, but rather it makes me deathly embarrassed because I feel stupid for liking it and like they're making fun of a part of me. Can you be friends with people with opposing political views? Yes. Are there any fandoms you used to be in, but left? I don't think I exactly "left" them, just lost big interest, like Rhett & Link/GMM. I still love the guys, but I don't watch them anymore. Warriors is another example. Do you prefer ruffly or regular potato chips? Ruffled. Do you write down your own recipes, or just commit them to memory? I don't cook. Can you do any impressions? No. What color do you want to dye your hair? Currently I want to dye it lilac, but I can't afford a professional to do that. What is a food you enjoy, but don’t have very often? Shrimp. Favorite fictional world? Wonderland. Do you carry pepper spray? No, but I want to. Have you ever had to use it? N/A Have you ever been kicked out of a public place? Why? No. Do you donate to any associations that care for animals? I don't have my own money. Have you ever worn those Drunk Goggles? Yes, in D.A.R.E. Can you agree to disagree, or usually get upset over conflicting views? It depends on the topic, but it's generally very easy for me to agree to disagree. Rodeos – entertaining, or cruel? Animal abuse. Who is the best female rocker? Why? Ohhhh good question. I like Lita Ford, for one; great singer and she fucking slays the guitar. She seems cool, too. Do you care what kind of toilet paper you use? Not really, no. Do you still have any decent arcades nearby? No. Bullfighters who get gored kind of had it coming, right? Yes. They fucking deserve it. Have you ever accidentally found porn when looking for something else? Thank God no. What do you like on your burger? Cheese, ketchup, mustard, a little bit of mayo is fine but not mandatory, pickles, and very little onion is okay. What do you NOT like on your burger? Lettuce and tomato. Do you like 'loose meat’ sandwiches? Like sloppy joes? Yeah. Have you ever seen an unwrapped mummy in person? No, but that'd be pretty fucking cool. What things have people shamed you for? Besides the obvious disagreements like political subjects, I don't know. Do you always reply to private messages? (On any website) Yes, unless it's spam or advertisement. Are there any 'adult stores’ in your area? I wouldn't know. Have you been inside of them/shopped there before? No. Who was your favorite actress to play Morticia Addams? Anjelica Huston. What is the next film you want to rewatch? Idk. I don't really watch TV or movies to begin with. What is the next film you want to see for the first time? I've been wanting to see Jacob's Ladder for a very long time, but I have to find a time I actually *really* feel like it to possibly enjoy it. A movie you love even though it’s cheesy? I'm sure there's something, but idk. Share any song lyrics you misheard? When I heard "Purple Haze" by Jimi Hendrix for the first time, I swore the lyrics were "excuse me while I kiss this guy" instead of "kiss the sky." What was the last song you heard for the first time and enjoyed? I both enjoy "Bad Girl" by Avril Lavigne and see it cringy as fuck at the same time. Who are some of your favorite female fictional characters, and why? Heather Mason from Silent Hill 3 is up high 'cuz she's a badass, CYNDER FROM THE LEGEND OF SPYRO SERIES BECAUSE SHE'S COOL AS ALL HECKIN' HECK AND ALSO #AESTHETIC, and I've fallen more and more in love with Tyrande Whisperwind from World of Warcraft now that she's become vengeance-crazed and more interesting than she already was. Oh, and then there's Bayonetta. Why? You know why. A character (in anything) you wish hadn’t been killed off? In recent news, BRING BACK STAN THE MOTHERFUCKING WATER MAN, MARK. Have you ever had to hit up several stores in search of one item? What was it? I'm sure I have at some point. Do you have any calluses on your feet? From when I used to walk outside for hours, you have no idea- What was your last big purchase? A plane ticket. Have you ever eaten grits? I HATE THEM SO MUCH. Do you always dress right after a shower, or do you like to chill in your towel/robe for a while? I put clothes on right away. Have you ever looked up your state’s laws and read them? I don't think so. Have you ever had to talk to a lawyer? I feel like I did have to once for something...? Have you ever been in pain so bad you passed out? No. I sincerely don't know how I didn't when I had to get that cyst drained, though. I have no words for that pain. Can you have kids? Well, physically, yeah. Doesn't mean I ever will or even want to. If you could get rid of one of your allergies, which one would it be? POLLEN. Do you have any cousins that look like you? No. Who do you know who is dating someone that looks way too old for them? Idk. Have you ever gone on a Facebook deleting spree? Yeah. What's a good example of "don’t knock it till you try it"? Waffles with peanut butter spread over them with syrup. What is surprisingly painful? Hm. "Surprisingly." OH, something I say as well as many others: Getting your nose pierced is more painful than you'd think compared to other piercings. Which person shaped you the most? Probably Jason. Or Mom. Have you ever been 4-wheeling? Yes. Do you live anywhere near the woods? There's a wooded area beyond the field. Do you have any important anniversaries you celebrate? Mine and Sara's. Can you rap? I don't even have to try to say no. Do you know how to use a DSLR camera? Yes. Tell me about the sickest you’ve ever felt. Oh man... I remember in elementary school, 3rd grade I think, I had the weirdest 3-day "sickness" where I felt every single moment like I was right on the very verge of vomiting. I went to the ER on the third night, but they couldn't detect what was wrong. Next day, I woke up miraculously fine. Those days were horrifying for someone who is terrified of vomiting. Any important birthdays coming up? My nephew's isn't far off. If you could play one instrument flawlessly, what would it be? Electric guitar. Have you ever heard of Hollywood Undead? Do you like them? I love some songs, like others, don't enjoy or care about a handful, and then truly haven't heard most. Have your friends ever told you something really personal? Was it weird? Well yeah, close friends do that often. It's not weird. Has anyone ever called you a coward before? Who called you that? No. Have you ever written a whole song before? What was the title to it? No. Are you a Jeffree Star fan? Or no? Do you think he’s awesome/dumb? I loooove that funky alien man. I find his work ethic incredibly inspiring and he seems so super accepting and is just very radiant and positive. Has your grandmother ever made you anything? Not including cookies. I don't think so.

#survey #quiz #questions #bored #random

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janiedean · 7 years

Note

(part 1) ur gonna roast me for this but im legit curious why mafia AUs are so bad? im asking in a non confrontational way, i get it romanticizing mafia is wrong, but i also believe that 1)most mafia AUs are a really toned down type of mafia;2)they do make for some interesting kinds of dynamics with fanart and with fics; 3)in a fic specifically u can create your own world and call something mafia and still make it so they don't kill innocent people but only idk members of other gangs or sth

(part 2) plus theyre a way to put ur charas in a completely diff context and see what theyll do. i mean i dont believe that writing ships in a certain context (like mafia) equals romanticizing that context. mafia AUs arent even my fav things to read (in fact i almost never do), im sure many ppl romanticize it and i obvs dont agree with that but im just trying to udnerstand bc i believe fandoms are a way to explore things that we normally wouldnt.

I’m not gonna roast you don’t worry xD okay wait let me check if I replied to this already if yes I’m gonna c/p because it’s half past midnight otherwise I’ll just go at it again wait *checks tags* fff obviously I don’t have a general post but anyway pls read this after you’ve done with my post and then this which is also choke-full of links. plus for a (not nice) laugh: here. AH WAIT I FOUND THE POST.

okay, so, let’s have it out of the way: I have nothing against mob aus or crime aus. I have a problem against calling them mafia AUs because in the US mafia = organized crime at large, in Italy mafia = ACTUAL EXISTING ORGANIZATIONS THAT ARE ACTIVELY HARMFUL. now that I introduced the topic I’ll c/p you the reply I gave to another anon who while discussing the issue pointed out that most writers don’t even know Italian mafia is a thing, which is pretty much on the same discourse so...

*The thing is - in the US it might not be enough of a deal anymore and I honestly do get why people make the mafia = regular mobsters, since the mafia was the first foreign organized crime being exported to the US via italian immigrants (sorry if this sounds horrible in English but I just woke up and I still didn’t have coffee) so I understand that mafia became the umbrella term.But the thing is that - as you said, these people don’t even know that there’s a mafia in Italy anymore or where the word comes from.

I’m going to link to italiansreclaimingitaly’s tag about the mafia and its perception outside Italy because they posted about this extensively and it’s an excellent resource, but meanwhile I’m gonna do a very short bullet point list and about the topic:

Mafia might not be a big deal in the US, but it still is here. We have the beauty of four different mafias (Cosa Nostra - the Sicilian one, camorra which is the one in Campania but has tendrils spread everywhere, the 'ndrangheta which is in Calabria and the Sacra Corona Unita in Puglia) which are all active [especially camorra and 'ndrangheta] and whose actions have direct impact (negative) on our economy and on our society. Actually mafias are one of the main reasons we’re currently economically fucked up, and if I start talking about how mafia culture keeps some areas literally backwards I could talk about it for three months.

There are still people who are killed for standing up against them. These days the most prominent personality is Roberto Saviano who is a writer who dared to put together a book documenting minutely the way camorra works and he’s been living under protection for years by this point. Like, they want him dead because he wrote a book. And I’m sorta sure that he was talking about leaving Italy and going to the US after years of sticking with it here because he can’t take it anymore but I don’t know if it was a taken decision or if it’s still debating it.

It wasn’t even thirty years ago that we had the stragi di mafia - in english it’d be something like the mafia slaughters, basically around the beginning of the nineties there were a number of bombs planted by the mafia targeting people who were trying to oppose it including judges Falcone and Borsellino, actually the anniversary of Falcone’s death is like... tomorrow. And they’ve killed people for way longer than that. Here is a list of only Cosa Nostra victims including the ones from the eighties/nineties. And people are still dying because of it. The slaughters I’m referring to are just the ones in the nineties which are enough of a number.

They also perpetuate a culture where if you testify against your mafia-employed relatives you’ll be shunned forever. There are women who testified against their families and couldn’t see their children anymore never mind that they weren’t automatically considered a relative anymore the moment they sided against the mafia. Some people have committed suicide after becoming witnesses also because our police force/justice system can be terribly non-supportive in this kind of situation so they got left on their own. Never mind that back in the day - it was the beginning of the nineties? - I recall at least a particular story of - I think, correct me if I remember wrong but I can’t remember the names for the life of me - where this guy testified against the local mafia when he either used to work for them or was forced to pay them the pizzo and in retaliation his six-year old (or five? Anyway he had a son younger than ten for sure) got kidnapped, killed and thrown into acid to dispose of the body. That happened in what, 1993? 1994? It’s pretty much yesterday. And now the camorra is doing the same - there’s a list here of camorra victims among which accidental passerbys that got killed because they were in the way which I can tell just by glancing is not complete. And I’m not even going into the 'ndrangheta. That is to say, here mafia still kills people and cripples our country.

Now, I get that it’s a word, but the point was: let’s say that instead of the Italians the Japanese came to the US first and the umbrella word for organized crime was yakuza rather than mafia and let’s say yakuza was still what it was originally in Japan while in the US it stopped being a big deal and people write yakuza!AU instead of mafia AU. Let’s say someone Japanese gets angry at that and goes like 'listen the yakuza is a real deal it does this this this and that and it’s a plague in our country so can you please at least look it up before writing your fanfic’, which is what had happened way back then when this whole mafia and fanfic thing blew up. A bunch of people told us to get over it because it’s just a word and if it’s a problem in Italy it’s not in the US so why should they care? Now, if we had been Japanese (or Chinese or Russian or Mexican) would they have said the same thing? Considering the general tumblr attitude I’m pretty sure they would have received either an apology or 'this is an important deal let’s keep that in mind’ with signal boost reblogs and stuff.

It’s the fact that we should get over people not knowing that it’s still a real problem for us and that they can’t take five seconds to google it that is the problem imo. Especially when instead of mafia au you can just say mobsters au or tag it as organized crime and everyone is a lot happier, mostly because as the tag above explains romanticising the mafia is a good thing for them because it means they can act outside Italy with less stigma because everyone thinks that the mafia is dead or not relevant anymore, if I’m explaining myself. (And it’s active outside Italy - like, there was a mafia kill in Germany in 2007 where six people died (sorry the link is in Italian but there isn’t an English wiki page, if you look the city up you’ll find something probably) and it was because of the 'ndrangheta.

I’d really like to not get worked over it because it meant it was a thing of the past y'know, but the problem is that it isn’t and I’d rather spread some awareness in hope some of these writers look it up (because it’s a good thing that people know what mafia is since as stated they have tendrils everywhere - if you read Saviano’s book the entire first chapter is about how camorra regularly deals with Chinese import/export in Italy for one) than shrug and figure that since they’ll think everything is good for fanfic then it’s not even worth my time.*

Now, ^^^ that was the c/p-ed reply that should answer most of your doubts. What I didn’t address was:

im sure many ppl romanticize it and i obvs dont agree with that but im just trying to udnerstand bc i believe fandoms are a way to explore things that we normally wouldnt.

aaaand as we say here in Italy, this is where the donkey falls (sorry we have weird sayings), because in theory there’s nothing wrong with that... except that in 99% of the mafia aus I’ve seen around the thing is that they’re supposed to be cute.

like, I see a lot of shit with TINY MAFIA BOSS STEVE ROGERS with RUSSIAN ENFORCER BUCKY (????? bucky isn’t even russian???) and the yoi thing I saw before had the japanese character being the leader of a russian mafia gang which is... like... guys it doesn’t happen it really doesn’t, and a lot of them re-use wrongly terminology taken from the godfather without context or knowing what the hell it means, and it’s always from the criminals’ pov and they’re somehow seen as criminals doing justice where the police can’t (???) and like... no. mafia bosses/enforcers/employees are bad people period, and at least here if you try to leave or repent they kill your family in retribution. like, not even ten years ago there’s been a woman who used to belong to a mafia family (or one colluded with the mafia) who testified and her entire town/family shunned her and she couldn’t take it anymore and... killed herself drinking acid if I don’t recall wrong. it’s not even special cases. this shit is not funny, it’s not cute, it’s not adorable and it’s not good fodder for your imagine your otp scenario (srsly I saw one like.. let me find it,

LIKE. just look at this shit. in a regular context, the enforcer goes to the show owner to force them to pay a monthly sum to their boss lest they destroy their shop and their lives and their family’s life never mind that mafia culture is deeply homophobic so the mafia enforcer flirting with the shopkeeper is like completely fucking out of the question. I mean, people here like to shit on the sopranos but that show was actually excellent representation of Horrid Criminals Who Were Never Supposed To Be Good People and the small arc that happened when one of tony’s friends turned out to be gay (closeted) was REALLY well done. btw, it ended that when they found out he was gay most of the crowd rejected him and thought badly of him until I think they killed him also for other reasons, but that spiraled from finding out he liked dick. and that’s american mafia that they actually based on well-done research of the culture in Italy it came from, I assure you that here it doesn’t work that differently. like. the shit above is so inaccurate and frankly offensive, it’s like... I get people romanticizing problematic stuff but the thing is that when you tell them that it’s actually offensive you get brushed off as ‘ah well you’re being too sensitive it’s just a word u__u’. now, I’m all for exploring shit we wouldn’t be into, but not like THAT, because that’s like mafia romantic comedy and that’s not how it works. now, you wanna do a fic where the mafia characters are deeply flawed and bad people and the police tries to catch them? fine, great, go ahead. you wanna do a fic where the enforcer above deals with dunno an entire life of internalized homophobia when he finds the shopkeeper attractive and feels conflicted over having to con money out of him and doing horrible shit for a living and maybe understanding that crime isn’t worth it and then he actually collaborates with the police and gets shit from about everyone he knows and loves for that? okay, awesome, go ahead. nothing bad in that.

but the shit above is not exploring things we wouldn’t/writing darkfic, it’s THINKING THAT A CRIMINAL ORGANIZATION WHICH IS STILL A THING IN OUR PART OF THE WORLD IS CUTE AND ADORABLE. and that only plays in their favor because it takes the bad aura out of the word and we really should not let that happen. like. that is what is bad about mafia aus and mafia discourse, that people don’t realize the mafia is alive and well and thriving and not a thing that doesn’t exist or a generic word for organized crime.

you wanna write the shit above? okay, CALL IT CRIME AU or mob au, not mafia au.

btw, add-on: idk if I mentioned it in the above post or not, but in case I didn’t, I said that people would balk at the idea of a mexican cartel au. sadly since then I’ve found out a fandom where not only there is one but it’s also extra cutesy and people apparently love it and it has a bunch of kudos/comments and idek I’m not even touching that with a ten foot pole but like... I’ve avoided it and everything that author wrote because to me it’s just... nope. like, nope. if you do mafia aus don’t make them fucking cute. (also: in the same fandom I had to mute a v. famous fanartist whose art I actually liked but did cutesy mafia aus and.. like... haahahhaahahahahaha nah sorry. can’t go there. nope.)

#mafia #mafia for ts #Anonymous #ask post

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thebootybitchdragon · 7 years

Note

So, first of all, I am super excited to have found somebody as excited about the clone as I am. I've been thinking about it a lot since Butch posted his video. But, I'm confused, because I thought this was ten years into the future? Wouldn't original Danny be older? Like 24 I think? Aside from that, you guys got some really good ideas about this character, and I've been laughing at some of the comments for a good few minutes.

AHHHH someone else who likes the clone!Welcome friend!!! 8) lmao, I was browsing the Phantom tag yesterday waswas so disheartened by how many people were irritable at all of thedesigns or downright kicking them to the curb. Which, isunderstandable, everyone has their tastes, and I agree that most ofthem are just…..Put Them Back embodiments, but it was still sad tosee so little interest in the Clone.

Because its such a good idea ripe withpotential, both for TUE levels of darkness and for hilariousscenarios. For once (ONCE) Butch has done okay by me.

And now to actually answer yourquestion, lmao: Yes, you are correct, the original concept was Vladfor ten years into the future, with a teenage Danny clone (I do admitthat’s super squick, like Vlad do you have no other hobbies besidesbeing fucking creepy? Go outside and play some tennis my dude.) sincethe video was a part 2 to the original Phantom concepts for the tenyear anniversary. However, at least in the ideas and concepts I’vebeen talking about and personally throwing around, I’ve gotten rid ofthe ten year span.

Because it literally doesn’t makesense.

I have contempt for the officialPhantom timeline bc its so inconsistent, but a majority of peoplehave it taking place over a two year time span, based on the twosummer episodes. (This is something I personally don’t agree with,but I have no evidence to argue it so I’m stuck like a petulantchild grumbling in the corner) and Vlad gives Valerie her gear in S1Ep10, Shades of Grey. I cannot recall if it was specifically statedin canon Vlad was using her to get Danny’s DNA, but I’m trustingthe wiki bc I really don’t want to endure re-watching Kindred Spiritsand D-Stabalized. If we assume that this had been Vlad’s goal fromthe start (something I disagree with and will touch more aboutbelow), that means that he’s been gathering Danny’s DNA for about ayear to two years if we estimate heavily with the nonsense timebetween the episodes.

In that time span, he figured out howto do the cloning, built the equipment, went through countlessprototypes to figure out all the bumps and snags, made severaldecently “functional” clones (Dani and the one he fucking murdersas a display), made the “perfect” one, and figured out exactlywhat he needed to stabilize an artificial hybrid of ghost and humanorigin.

In two years max.

It would not take him ten fuckin yearsto recreate a successful perfect clone. Even if everything wasdestroyed twice and he lost Valerie’s “assistance”. And thereason for that is because he already knows how. The hard part isdone. Once you know how to do something through so much trial anderror, you know what not to do and what you should do the nexttime around. Vlad doesn’t need to re-figure out how to make astable, perfect clone again, he can just get the equipment, the DNA,whatever and just do it.

Which he was most likely attemptingto already do in D-stabilized.

[Edit: I neglected to look on thewiki before writing this entire thing bc I was confident I know thematerial and apparently I need to get a reality check on my ego bc Iwas completely misremembering D-Stabalized. The fallowing should betaken with gratuitous lumps of salt bc I’m salty at this discoveryand also I haven’t changed anything in it.]

Why do you think hewas going after Dani? Why would he want that information of “Whyare you so stable?” if he wasn’t trying again? If he wasn’t at thepoint that he NEEDED to stabilize something? For future knowledge?Please. If Vlad was truly going to make another perfect clone, hewould not wait several months after loosing the first doing literallynothing but tormenting Danny and being an ass, nor until after he’sfigured out Dani. He was working on the Clone project for a long timeunder everyone’s noses in the first place, so who’s to say he wasn’tagain?

I’m saying Vlad wasliterally within inches of succeeding in D-stabalized. That healready had a second Clone ready to stabilize.

[Edit: I was incorrect in thinkingVlad only wanted Dani to learn why she’s stable, he wanted to use herto make another perfect clone. I was close, but not close enough. Iam still standing by my theory, however, canon can suck it. It’sstill at least feasible.]

Hartman suggestedin the video, as I’m sure you know, that the Clone (I call himDaniel bc there’s literally no way he’s not namedDaniel.) has some of Vlad in him. And this, my friend, melds so well with where canon dropped off.

Vlad wanted andattempted to stabilize the clones with Danny’s full DNA, probably soit would be 100% Danny, enough to the point he was willing to murderDani to figure her out/use her. However, after failing to get themid-morph from Danny (failure 1) and failing to get anything fromDani (failure 2), Vlad would be unlikely to try the same thingsagain. I would also like to think he’d also be unlikely to continuing to announce “OI I’M CLONEING YOU” to Danny, but it’sVlad so you never know.

He would be forcedto think of something else.

There is nothing incanon suggesting that Vlad couldn’t use his own mid-morph tostabalize a clone. He never brings it up, never explains why themid-morph is the critical link aside from the fact that it just is.There’s very little info about just how these clones are made, sothere’s no known rules to what could work and what wouldn’t. A possible reason this might not work is that it could function likebody parts or blood types, where you need a match in order for it tobe properly accepted. In that case, however, its just figuring outwhat you need to tweak in order to force an acceptance, somethingprobably made easier to do when you’re in control of the entiregenetic sequence you’re fiddling with.

This would not taketen years to do. None of it would. It would take at most, I think ayear. Maybe two, but that’s pushing it. I also have a theorythat Vlad was being so obtuse in Season 3 was to purposefullydistract Danny, but take that as you will.

This is all of myfancy way of explaining why my personal ideas are set so close to theactual canon and kicking that gross ten years to the curb.

As for my forgotten notion about why Idon’t think Vlad started cloning from Valerie’s beginning was becauseVlad was still mostly focused on Maddie up until Maternal Instincts,which occurs 6 episodes after Shades of Grey. Shades of Greyis only three episodes from Bitter Reunions as well.That’s a pretty small amount of time for someone still (reasonably)sane to go “I liked that kid, I want him to be my son. I shouldclone him.”

I’d also like to state that in the fourepisodes Vlad appears in before Kindred Spirits (not including TUE)but after Maternal Instincts, not once is his main goal Danny.Nor is it ever Maddie, either. Danny becomes a factor in MillionDollar Ghost, however his main goal is still stealing the portal. InReign Storm, he’s more inclined to use Danny than to try to make himhis son, bc again: his goal is the artifacts. In Secret Weapons, Vladisn’t even interested in Danny when he’s dropped in the middleof his lab. Tbh, I can’t for the life of me figure out what Vlad’sgoal was in the whole sibling battle thing, he really just fucked hisplans up himself in that one. In Masters of All Time, his goal wasthe cure, and again, had no problems using Danny as a pawn.

Kindred Spirits is the first place inthe entire series where we see the extent of how far he’s willing togo to get Danny to be his son. The first episode where it’s his maingoal.

I just realized how close MaoT andKinSpirits are, I wonder if Vlad triggered the Ectoacne flare workingwith the ectoplasm for the clones? Hmmm, interesting.

Anyway, the point is: Vlad kept hiscloning stuff a secret, but for how long remains a mystery. Mostlybecause there’s no point in time where it becomes obvious just howdesperate he is to have Danny. Is it when he saw an opportunity withValerie? Or is it after Danny ruins his attempts to get the Ring ofRage back from Pariah by blowing up the ectosuit so he was just like“Well fuck, now what do I do to keep myself busy?”

Getting back onto the topic of Cloneand Original Danny, there’s a second, lesser reason I’ve personallybumped the time skip, and that’s because there would be literallyZero conflict between a 14 year old and a 24 year old.

OlderDanny would kick his ass, trainingfrom Vlad be damned.

OlderDanny would also not be fazed asmuch as a younger Danny as his identity being perverted by a clone.This is because the age gap would automatically render them as beingtwo different people. OlderDanny would not see the clone as himself,at least not fully, because he’s already a mature adult. The clonecould not torment Danny with the fact that he’s him, that he’sstealing anything, that he’s threatening his notion of being andsense of self. Because OlderDanny has nothing to fear about a youngerversion of himself; he’s stronger, wiser, and different enough. Thedynamic simply doesn’t work. This is why Danny could be okay withDani: he doesn’t see himself in her. He doesn’t think of her as aclone, as the doppelganger. Because she’s a girl, she’s younger,she’s different. She isn’t him in his eyes.

With an identical copy, that’s notsomething you can avoid or ignore. Can’t deny that its not your facetwisting into that evil smirk that looks so wrong because itsfamiliar but not. Its you, but its not, and its uncomfortable,its an invasion of privacy, the ultimate identity theft. Its a personthat wears your face, sees with your eyes, speaks with your voice,thinks with your brain, and bleeds with your blood. And yet its notyou.

The closest thing Danny had to this wasDan. But Dan could be defeated. Dan could be made so that he neverexisted in the first place, completely avoided.

Daniel could not.

Daniel’s creation is out of Danny’scontrol, his existence never takes into account what Danny wants orcares, because its done at Vlad’s whims. And that’s the worstpart: the lack of control. To know that an identical yet completelywrong version of yourself exists against your will and you haveabsolutely no control over it is torture, especially for someone whoalready had cause to fear himself once before. Sure, Danny can fightDaniel, suck him up into a thermos, and maybe kick it into the ghostzone to try to be rid of him forever, but he would still existand he could always come back. Unlike Dan. And there’snothing Danny could do about it.

What even could be do? Try todestabilize him? Ask clockwork to erase him from existence? Lock himin a thermos and bury him deep in the ice caps? Kill him?

Would Danny truly be the person to tryany of those?

In other words, the closer Daniel is tobeing like Danny, the worse effect it would have. So its all aboutmaximizing that to get the full potential of the conflict. Dannyneeds a reason to see Daniel’s creation as the ultimate line crossed,the “This has gone too far” moment. Danny needs a reasonto not only despise, but fear his clone.

There are some….problems, with this,and I’ve already used them in my argument: the fact that it another you is too different, you stop seeing it as yourself. AndDaniel is not an identical copy. He has aspects of Vlad in him.There’s a very fine line to be walked, between Daniel being similarenough that it hurts Danny while being different enough to count as adifferent character. The design alone might already doom it. But fuckit, you people can pry my inverted skunk haired baby from my colddead hands.

I realize that this is a very longresponse, and very little of it pertains to what you asked. However,I hope you enjoyed my analysis and my explanation of my personalreasoning. This was a lot of fun to talk about (I can’t remember if Igot into some of the things in other asks or if I’m recalling themfrom a thing I was gonna post but hasn’t gotten to yet. If thereare repeat things, I’m sorry! My memory is v bad.) and I thank youfor the ask!

I also realize that a majority of thisask talks about making Daniel Danny’s worst enemy, which goes againstthe “They slowly become bed buds” ask I got earlier. I receivedthat ask before I really had any ideas of what to do with Daniel, andsince I’m loving this worst enemy idea, the conflict isunderstandable. The friend idea is still on the table tho! All itneeds now is a climax, a trigger, a turning point. Something thatchanges the dynamic to start that “I hate you, but not as much as Idid, and I kinda sorta enjoy your company a little bit.” ball a’rollin.

Fuck if I know what that is tho lmao

#Danny Phantom #Vlad Masters #Daniel Masters #Clone Danny #Long Post

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fellowhuman-being · 7 years

Text

Relationship OCD

Hi, everyone. I might not be as famous as the other blogs. I don’t even have a lot of followers. But, I hope this information is helpful for whoever out there (either you need it or not).

This type of OCD might not be as famous as other more common OCDs, like contamination OCD, orderliness, etc. Sometimes, even people don’t really pay attention much to this type of OCD. In this post, I’m gonna share a little bit about myself, so I’m exposing myself right now with my story.

I had a girl I fell in love back then. We were really close back then, but I never realized I actually fell for her. In 2012, we had a major fall out and she ended up our friendship and cut out our communication. It took me around 1.5 - 2 years later that it dawned on me that I actually loved her as more than a friend.

Along the time, I consulted with her ex-boyfriend who became our mutual and who is a psychologist. His degree is doctoral and he is an experienced psychologist in the UK. He kept mentioning about me being obsessed with this girl. I agreed with him, but I never actually did a research on it. Until one day, I think it was in late 2015 that I did a research on it (if you look at the year, yeah it’s been a while, and I hadn’t moved on). So, it was the year when I found about Relationship OCD. I was so stupid back then that I didn’t copy and paste the article in Ms. Word so that I have a record and I can read it back when I want to. Knowing that fact, I became so depressed. So that was when my depression started to eat me out until I found Fifth Harmony. Finally I found something new I could obsessed to and it wasn’t someone near me.

So what is relationship OCD actually? Hearing the name, you may guess “Oh, it’s when someone is obsessed with their partner or girlfriend/boyfriend” or “Oh, it’s when someone becomes possessive with their partner or girlfriend/boyfriend”. Well, it’s kind of true but not necessarily true. A possessive partner does not always have relationship OCD. But, someone with ROCD could be possessive towards their partner. So, ROCD is far more complicated than that. Let me explain.

Relationship Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (ROCD) is an obsessive compulsive symptoms that focus on intimate relationships (whether romantic or non-romantic). This form of OCD often leads to severe personal and relationship distress and often impairs functioning in other areas of life, such as work, study, or family functioning.

There are 2 common types of ROCD:

1. Relationship-centered symptoms

People with relationship-centered obsessions often feel overwhelmed by doubts and worries focused on their feelings towards their partner, their partner’s feelings towards them, and the “rightness” of the relationship experience. They may repeatedly find themselves thinking “Is this the right relationship for me?”, “This is not real love!”, “Do I feel ‘right’?”, and “Does my partner really love me?”

When they know they love someone or that someone loves them, they constantly check and reassure themselves that it is the right feeling. When they attempt to end the relationship, they are overwhelmed with anxiety. By staying in the relationship, however, they are haunted by continuous doubts regarding the relationship

2. Partner-focused symptoms

Peoplewith partner-focused obsessions may focus on their partner’s physical features (e.g., “Her nose is too big.”), social qualities (e.g., “He is not social enough”; “She does not have what it takes to succeed in life.”), or personality attributes, such as morality, intelligence, or emotional stability (e.g., “She is not intelligent enough”, “He is not emotionally stable”).

Instead of finding good in their partner, they are constantly focused on their shortcomings. They often exaggerate these flaws and use them to prove the relationship is fundamentally bad. The fact that they are unable to concentrate on anything but their partner’s flaws causes the sufferer great anxiety, and often leads to a strained relationship.

People with ROCD may give great importance to romantic relationships. Negative events relating to their relationships may, therefore, cause them significant distress and make them doubt their own worth. People with partner-focused obsessions may be particularly sensitive to the way their partner compares with others and the way their partner is looked upon by the rest of the world.

The dyadic context provides abundant triggers of relationship-centered and partner-focused OC phenomena. Nevertheless, for some individuals, ROCD symptoms may be activated by the termination of a romantic relationship. In this case, people may report being obsessively preoccupied with their previous partner “being the right one” and “missing the ONE”. Such cases are frequently associated with extreme fear of anticipated regret and are commonly accompanied by self-reassuring behaviors (e.g., recalling the reasons for relationship termination), compulsive comparisons (i.e., with current partners), and compulsive recollection of previous experiences (e.g., relationship conflicts). Other people report avoiding romantic relationships altogether for dread of hurting others (e.g., “I will drive her crazy”; “It will be a lie”) or fear of re-experiencing ROCD symptoms. For instance, clients may report avoiding second dates for years for fear of obsessing about the flaws of their partners or their partners becoming overly attached to them.

You can read more about them here:

https://iocdf.org/expert-opinions/relationship-ocd/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relationship_obsessive%E2%80%93compulsive_disorder

http://rocd.net/

In another source I found, these are some effects of the obsessional thoughts:

Constantly analysing the depth of feelings for one’s partner, placing the partner and the relationship under a microscope and finding fault.

Constantly needing to seek reassurance and approval from one’s partner.

Doubts that one’s partner is being faithful.

Doubts that one may cheat on their partner.

Questioning one’s own sexuality, and having feelings, thoughts and impulses about being attracted to members of the same sex.

The constant analysing and questioning of the relationship and partner often places immense strain on the relationship and the result is a person with OCD will often end the relationship to rid themselves of the doubt and anxiety, which is usually often repeated with any subsequent relationship.

Needless to say, the obsessions and compulsions experienced by those with ROCD can take a devastating toll on both the sufferer and their partner. Relationships in which one partner has ROCD are often chaotic, and unstable due to seemingly endless misunderstandings, conflict, and break-ups. Even the most compassionate and understanding partner may struggle with repeatedly hearing all the ways that the person they love doubts their feelings for them. One of the cruel and ironic twists of ROCD is that the fear of hurting one’s partner often results in the sufferer doing just that – by repeatedly expressing their doubts about their partner and the relationship, those with ROCD often cause significant emotional suffering for the very person they most love.

Source:

https://www.ocduk.org/types-ocd

https://ocdla.com/rocd-relationship-ocd-myth-of-the-one-3665

What I wanna stress here is the one I put in italic on the definition of ROCD.

“ Relationship Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (ROCD) is an obsessive compulsive symptoms that focus on intimate relationships (whether romantic or non-romantic). “

So yeah, it can happen to non-romantic relationship as well. However, this happens mostly to romantic relationships. That’s why I used romantic relationship in the explanation to make it easier to understand.

Relationship-related obsessive-compulsive symptoms may occur in various types of relationships including people’s relationship with their parents, children, mentors, or even their God

Source: http://rocd.net/

In my case, I am completely the first type: relationship-centered symptoms. This OCD affects my relationship especially with the people who are close with me or even my partner. For the case of my past, I became really anxious for example, when she didn’t reply my text. I became questioning, “Am I not that important to her?”, “Does she actually care about me?”, “Is she ignoring me?”. FYI, we were really really close. So, her not texting at all for 1 day could make me anxious until I couldn’t even concentrate at school, all day, all the time.

Unfortunately, this happened again when I jumped into a relationship before I was ready. My ex gf was depressed (just like me). She’s a Harmonizer as well. When her depression kicked in, she ignored me. She read my text but didn’t reply, leaving me hanging until a few days later, she texted back replying to my message 2 days ago. Me having a ROCD makes it even worse, cause I start to doubt about her love to me, my importance to her, whether I make her happy, whether I was enough for her, and so on. And things have been proven to be a deadly vicious cycle. We broke up 4 months later on our 4th anniversary. But it wasn’t me who broke it up though, it was her. However still, my ROCD became an issue cause we had a big argument 2 months after we made it official because of her keep ignoring me and not replying to my text.

Yesterday, I have a big fall out as well with someone close to me. She’s here on Tumblr as well. We knew each other not from Tumblr though. As you read earlier, someone with ROCD tends to end their relationship with their partner (in this case, if it’s a romantic relationship). So, I wanted to cut out our communication at least for now since I can feel my OCD kicking in. As you read, ROCD can make the sufferer have a lot of anxiety. The anxiety keeps attacking me these days. I can feel it’s getting worse and worse day by day. I cry, my heart beats really fast, I get hyperventilating. It literally affects me at work and my daily activities. I can’t concentrate with the things I do anymore just because of a simple problem like: someone close to me or someone I care about not replying to my text. It seems petty, but the effect is once again, I lost someone I’m close with cause she blocked my contact now.

For romantic relationship, well someone might have experienced this, but I constantly doubt their loves to me. I keep asking questions about why would they love me, and I keep questioning whether this is the right kind of love I’m looking for. Maybe that’s why I’m single now! Lol.. 😂 But in all seriousness though, now with my experience, I’m currently so afraid to get too close to someone, let alone…… to love somebody 😩. First, my heart can’t handle more heartbreaks if the relationship doesn’t work. Second, I’m afraid I can’t give the same capacity of love that the other gives me. Third, my relationship OCD keeps kicking in whenever I get close to someone and it always ends up with….. me broken-hearted (again).

Well, anyway, the reason why I post this article is because I wanna educate you on well…. my issue (I’m not gonna lie). But, if you experience this issue as well, then you’re not alone. I haven’t tried to seek help because:

1. Indonesia doesn’t really support LGBTQ

I told you earlier I fell for a girl and all of the stories I told you are with girls. If I go to a therapist here, I would definitely be sent to a rehab or something like that as here, LGBTQ is considered as a mental disease.

So for you who don’t know, heeeeyy.. welcome to Indonesia!

2. Paying an international therapist would be expensive

I prefer to seek help to a therapist from outside Indonesia, preferably from Europe or US where LGBTQ have been widely accepted, and where they have handled similar issue.

The 2nd reason why I posted this is…. well, I wanna keep it on my own directory as I didn’t really do a recap or summary about what I researched. To be honest, my research in 2015 is gone. I can’t find it anywhere in my laptop, my hardisk, or my flashdisk. Thus, since yesterday I had a major fallout for the same issue, I tried to do a research again about it. So instead of just keeping it on my draft, why not sharing it with others? I’m also trying to get to know myself here. So, if you think I might have another OCD that I need to pay attention to, please let me now. Because…

ROCD often occurs simultaneously with other variants of OCD.

Read more: https://ocdla.com/rocd-relationship-ocd-myth-of-the-one-3665

Lastly, (this is only for my friends here who always reblog or like my post, fellow Harmonizers, and fellow CS), for now, I wanna stay away from Tumblr and maybe some people in my life who I’m close with. As my ROCD is kicking in and it made me lost someone important to my life, I wanna stay away from people for a while. Idk until when….. This is my counteract method to control my OCD. Otherwise, there are gonna be more people getting the receiving short end of the stick (again).

My anxiety and depression makes everything worse as well. I know I’m self-deprecating right now, but I do feel like I couldn’t make my ex-girlfriend happy. The girl I fell in love with and my ex-girlfriend are now happy with someone else. The fact that these 2 people I love self-harmed by being a cutter makes me regret for NOT being able to help them when I was so close with them. I feel like I’m so useless, helpless, and powerless. There is just…. a lot of anxiety and depression right now.

I will keep updating about the girls, but maybe not here. I will focus on Twitter and Instagram where I use my platform for a different purpose. But, I will just use those platform to update as well as support the girls endlessly. I might come here once in a while, but not often. I know Tumblr is a safe place and there are a lot of arts and quotes that can help me, but there are just so many feelings here in Tumblr. Even I always find #relatable quotes that makes me think deeply about life. I’ve ever posted something about me using writing for healing, so let’s see if I can write something. But for now, I’ll stay away from people and from Tumblr. I don’t have people I’m close with on Instagram and Twitter. Besides, I don’t really share personal stuff there, NOT EVEN ABOUT THE FACT THAT I AM A CAMREN SHIPPER LOL 😂 Now, I’m gonna post this. It’s 4 AM and I haven’t slept at all so maybe I’ll go to work instead because I have insomnia whenever depression hits me. My Tumblr is still active. You can send me stuff as well if you know about ROCD and if you have more links about it or if you have an argument about it. I still have a feeling I might have another OCD that combines with ROCD though (I’m also still trying to figure out what’s wrong with me as well). You can send asks and inbox me, but I’m gonna reply selectively and not regularly 😊.

#ocd #rocd #relationship ocd #obsessive compulsive disorder #ocd problems #depression #anxiety #harmonizers #camilizers #ot5stan

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roswellroamer · 7 years

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Perito Moreno to El Chaltén, Argentina. 2/13/17.

[still no wifi sufficient for pictures so continued words only today…] The above itinerary was at least the original plan… Most riders were ready to go by 7 AM today since we have a 589 km day slated. A simple breakfast and we headed out of the small town under crystal blue skies. We have been ever so fortunate in the weather department and I expected rain at least half our days. We’ve only had one wet day so far. There is a lot of mining around here. Yesterday we stopped to look over a big coal mining operation in Chile. Now on the Argentinian side they are mining gold. The lush green we had in Chile and forests are now replaced by endless scrub. Amazingly this Argentinian “pampa” covers a huge portion of Argentina. It is not desert as it has steady vegetation, but hardly anything taller than 12-18" high. Andrés says much of the 4000 kilometers towards Buenos Aires is this type of terrain. Rain is uncommon but there is some and there are some lakes and creeks. Due to the very consistent strong winds and extreme cold in winter there are basically no trees at all. Occasionally in a protected dip we have seen a tree grow naturally while all others were nurtured through their fragile youth by an attentive rancher so as to later provide a wind break and shade for the few and far between houses out here. Mostly there is just scrub, popping up like warts defiantly from the earth, endlessly to the rolling scrub covered hills in the distance. What is new today is wildlife. Within 20 minutes of leaving Perito Moreno we encountered our first groups of guanaco. Pronounced with the accent on the second syllable. These lama like animals bound with ease over the sheep/cow fencing and graze wantonly along the road and in the pampa. We all must be careful as they can jump in front of a bike or the Jeep with little warning. They seem to congregate in family groups and are on the lookout for eagles who prey on the babies. We saw our first few pink flamingos today, just wading in a small pond on a ranch by the road. We also came across our first ñandu. The ñandu is some sort of close cousin to the ostrich, but only slightly smaller. One valley we crossed before Bajo Caracoles was so wide, it was like “Big Sky” country south! At the gas station/hotel/souvenir shop in Bajo Caracoles (which means low snail 🐌) we all stopped for a coffee and to admire the gas pumps plastered in stickers from around the world. The roads are in great shape and we hardly saw any cars all day long. We are told that from here southward traffic will be sparse except in the towns. We saw many more guanaco today than vehicles.

About 30 miles past the coffee break, we passed a lot more guanacos and a few families of ñandus when Andrés noticed the Jeep was steaming. The temperature gauge showed normal in the middle of the gauge but steam was bellowing out the drivers side of the hood. (Bonnet for those of you reading in Australia as I understand there are a few! 🇦🇺) I had watched him add water this morning to the radiator reserve tank. It turns out that this plastic tank had a leak two years ago and was patched on the outside with epoxy or J-B weld. Apparently that patch has given way under the barrage of chassis jolts we have encountered. As I am writing this (unusually) in real time we have been here for a bit over 2 ½ hours and gone through 3 different “welding” attempts with JB weld. Four motorists have stopped and donated water to the cause. After the second repair, it was much worse with water literally spraying all over Andrés face in second checking out the leak. Our mechanic, Rodrigo is very busy and we are hoping that this next patch will help. The steam which is escaping from about a 2" seam around the equatorial circumference of where this plastic tank was once joined in a factory is a difficult animal to cage. I suggested after the first failure to run a bead along the inside of the weld. An internal, oversized plug has a much better chance of success in a high pressure situation than a patch does on the outside of resisting steam that has already gained momentum and escaped the tank. I think that both have been done on this last repair effort but I now see the satellite phone in our leaders hands and the mention of a restaurant being 20 km’s away… The support vehicle has never failed this somewhat new outfit before (in its 7th year) and the backup plan is to get a replacement truck somewhere somehow if the tank isn’t able to be repaired… we’ll see and hopefully this patch holds! OK, so we made it about 8 km’s maybe (Cheryl says 6) and the oil light came on. Interestingly, the water gauge shows normal but a quick perusal under the bonnet shows continued water leak (oil is fine go figure) and now Andrés says we have big trouble. Murphy’s law is in full effect as this happens on our biggest day and about as far from anywhere as we could be. We are now on the satellite phone seeking assistance… I usually jot down the day’s highlights here as I am heading to la-la land, I have chosen an interesting day to “live blog”. Of course we are a hundred miles from any cell service but I can at least write down in real time what is happening. As of now (3PM, 4 ½ hrs.) we are awaiting the arrival of a flatbed tow truck coming 100+ miles from Perito Moreno arranged by the hotel Americano. The Ride Adventure team is attempting repair #4 in the meantime having completely removed the radiator’s reserve tank and effected more “inside” epoxy work. It seems weird that the Jeep’s design includes a high pressure water tank as a reserve which is strangely (read cheaply) manufactured from two pieces of plastic instead of a one step molding. 😐 A few more folks have stopped and it seems we have garnered enough water to attempt to refill and test the latest repair effort. We are about 15 km’s from a parador/restaurant and I hear clamps tightening… We have had some chips and Cheryl has delved into the “bickies” and cheese. It seems I am picking up all sorts of Aussie terms. Bickies are biscuits down under.

Repair #4 did not work. 😐. It will be about 3 ½ hours since we called for a truck and nearly six since we first got stuck in 10 minutes time. Cheryl and I are planning to hitchhike to the parador where we can get food and baños and await the tow truck. It will be a first for her and some time since I have hitched. Much more emphasis on the Adventure then the Ride today. We tried once again to make it down the road by jumping the now near dead battery with my jumper (POD) battery I brought for just such an occasion. Didn’t get but a few more km’s and things started smoking and we pulled over again. No hitchhiking today for us since the tow truck pulled up just as we were still spraying water and steam out into the parched pampa. Now we are in the cab of a flatbed truck on the way about 130 km’s to Gobernador Gregores. We believe there is someone there who has the capability to fix the leaky water tank. 🙏 The adventure continues. So we have now arrived in Gobernador Gregores about 8 hours behind schedule. We found our way to a nice Hosteria and are currently awaiting the plan for the rest of the trip. If the radiator reserve is repairable we continue with the Jeep but it seems Andrés is working on a replacement vehicle for the remaining legs to Ushuaia. Not much except a few snacks today so we are anxiously awaiting the kitchen’s opening for dinner (cena)! Hopefully everyone ahead of us has had an uneventful day on their bikes. Nice to be inside and out of the constant wind here. Buenos noches.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Chalt%C3%A9n As a postscript to yesterday we found one bike on the road. It had a flat tire and we loaded it up onto the trailer, now towed by a new truck (Toyota Hilux) driven by a new guy Fernando who joins us for a few days? We then stopped in Tres Lagos to see if Martin was OK. Turns out he was OK and had eventually left the bike as darkness fell and the support truck was nowhere to be found. In town (still no phone signal) the police let Andrés use their wifi and we found that one of the other guys (George) had fallen off and broke his clavicle and a rib. Apparently they had hidden the bike and gotten him to a hospital at the next day’s destination, El Calafate as there was a hospital there. So it ended up being quite the day, with Murphy’s law in effect as the riders needed the support truck which itself is now history. The Jeep engine is blown. What we thought was high pressure in the reserve water tank was only due to a “buggered” engine and the engine’s compression was being delivered through the water system due to blown seals and gaskets. Ugh. Andrés is working on a third vehicle to rent in a few days time for now we have the trailer hitched up to the Toyota. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitz_Roy

#argentina #motoadventure

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