I’ve been literally reeling cause wdym I predicted this yesterday in my drafts????

One wedding and three funerals

Background paintings under the cut

You do not deserve the pain that you are in. I am sorry that you are hurting. I am hurting too. I wish things were different. But I am glad that we are not alone in this.

i wanted to put Wally in my Barbie movie fit <3 he's gonna go watch it with his bestie

it backfired <3 poor thing's in a crisis

I think you've mentioned before that after Machete's passing, Vasco would eventually find another partner that he'd live out the rest of his days with. Do you think he'd tell them about Machete at some point? Or would he feel it's safer/easier to keep the stories and memories to himself? If he did tell his partner I'd also understand if he chose to leave out certain details, such as Machete's job, whether it be for general safety or a sense to protect Machete's privacy and reputation even though he's gone

I think the partner Vasco lives the rest of his days with is most likely his platonic wife Ludovica, the one he was already married to at the time he reunited with Machete in their early thirties. I can see him eventually starting to try to see other men again, and he might love them too, but the whole process of trying to open up to other people (after all those years and the way things ended) would be kind of lonely, frustrating and painful for the most part. Chances are none of his subsequent relationships would last very long. He'd probably grow closer to Ludovica and she would do her best to support him. I'm not sure how much of his 10+ years with Machete he'd be able to share with anyone to be honest.

Okay, my brain refuses to think about anything other than Murderbot, so I looked at every use of the word "friend[s]" in TMBD and... created some pie charts. Normal human activities.

Some Thoughts™ I had while putting this together (under the cut):

In All Systems Red, Murderbot notes that the PresAux crew are all close friends (twice! and goes on to explain their internal relationships which I think is very cute). This is pretty much the only use of 'friends' in ASR, except for when Murderbot says that SecUnits can't be friends with each other.

It seems that this may be one of the first times Murderbot has ever really been around a group of friends before? Murderbot notes that this is not the norm for its contracts and admits that the fact that they are all friends and the way they interact with each other make it actually enjoy that contract (before!!!! the hostile attack, so it already enjoys this contract before they start seeing it as a person etc ghghhhh). [Inference: Friendship seems enjoyable.]

The first character that calls Murderbot its friend is ART in Artificial Condition. Murderbot immediately refutes this (and then goes on to call ART its friend to its clients for the rest of the book). [Inference: Maybe ART is Murderbot's friend. And maybe that is... agreeable]

Rogue Protocol has more than twice as many instances of the word 'friend' as any of the other novellas. Why? Miki. Friendship and its implications for non-humans are a central theme because Miki is friends with everyone. Murderbot initially scoffs at the notion that Miki and Miki's humans are friends. At the end of the book, after witnessing how desperately Don Abene tried to stop Miki from trying to save them, and her grief after its death, Murderbot has to admit that she had in fact been Miki's friend. [Inference: Humans can be friends with bots and can sincerely care about them]

In Exit Strategy, Murderbot tentatively uses the word "friends" for its humans for the first time (several times actually). It questions whether it can actually call them its friends or not and later realizes that it had been afraid what admitting that the humans are its friends would do to it. At the end of the book, Mensah tells Murderbot the PresAux crew are its friends, which is the first time a human has directly said that to it (at least on-page). [Inference: Humans can and want to be Murderbot's friends]

In Network Effect, Murderbot seems to be more habituated to the word 'friend', confidently calling ART and Ratthi its friends, like it is no longer just trying the concept on unsure if it fits. There are many instances in which other characters refer to MB as ART's friend or the other way around and Murderbot's humans refer to Murderbot as their friend several times. Generally, there seems to be less hesitancy, because yes, all of them are Murderbot's friends, why wouldn't they be. [Inference: SecUnits can have friends. This SecUnit has friends. They care about it a lot.]

Conclusion: The Murderbot Diaries tell the story of a construct that does not seem to consider the possibility of friendship for itself and is fine with that - until it accidentally starts caring a little too much and suddenly more and more people annex it as a friend (ew) to the point where it can no longer deny that this is happening and has to begrudgingly admit that yes, it has friends now and maybe that is actually not a bad thing.

Pavitr when Gwen tells him that her spider sense lets her know whenever something bad is about to happen to Miles

on loneliness jenny slate / japanese breakfast, posing for cars / corinne von lebusa, big glow / dadushin / alejandra pizarnik, tr. me / fka twings, home with you / avocado_ibuprofen / fiona apple, left alone / anne carson, “the anthropology of water”, plainwater / kiki smith, free fall / alejandra pizarnik, diaries

Okay what if the winners got to meet previous versions of themselves through the life games.

Like grian meets no one. He didn't have any previous "versions".

Scott meets 3rd life Scott.

Pearl meets 3rd life and last life pearl.

Martyn meets 3rd life, last life and double life Martyn.

Scar meets 3rd life, last life, double life and lim life him-

This whole thing was an idea that I got just because I was thinking about ll and sl scar because they were both so lonely like wtf and I just though about a scene that would be so. Grips chair.

Ll: "We won?"

Sl: "Yeah"

Ll: "Did we have allies? Friends?"

Ll scar probably thinks sl scar won only because he had allies to support him. He knows what its like being lonely and he hopes no one has to go through that loneliness. And he wants to be optimistic for once that sl scar, future him, gets allies, gets friends.

He tries to hope and then he sees the look on sl scars face. Or maybe sl scar tries to lie- maybe he tries to say they had allies.

Ll scar sees right through him. He's him after all. Maybe he's always gonna he lonely anyway

So recently I made this poll, and in typical fashion, I didn't quite think it through. As a result, I made it way too easy to choose. 😅💦 That's my B. So in an attempt to make something a little bit less unbalanced, I'm redoing the poll with some changes.

Same scenario: Two job offers, can't have a second job or a side hustle.

The first offer is still your dream job, but this time you make enough to support yourself. And nothing else. Your bills are paid, and there's food on your table and gas in your car, but there is no room in your budget for anything beyond that. You are only making just enough money to keep your head above water. God help you if you have an emergency.

The second job is essentially the same as last time: Naked in an empty room for eight hours a day, Monday through Friday, with a lunch break, and you're allowed to bring your own entertainment. Whatever you bring in the room with you has to leave with you at the end of the day, you can't bring other people with you, and you are being recorded and livestreamed for the whole eight hours barring your lunch break. You're not allowed to cover yourself. The job pays six million a year.

I'm curious how much the answers will change compared to the first time around. And if you voted in the last poll, tell me if your answer changed and why. 😃

I'd rather be rescued than alone

You won…

saw someone on twitter calling Wyll a cop and I'm rapidly approaching their location

something i've been thinking about:

Wally is set up as a sort of "main character" by the whrp. he's said in the site's description of the show to have introduced the main theme/lesson of the day's episode, and then the rest of the neighbors join him on his escapades. but then we have our first glimpses of everyone's actual dynamics and characters through the audios and you look at Wally and its like

first of all, thats an npc. second, nearly everybody else has severe main character syndrome

but its fascinating how Wally is just kind of... There. he doesnt talk much. he doesnt contribute beyond a couple of lines. its more like he joins the others on their shenanigans. he fades into the background. he's off to the side while everyone else holds conversations & leads the moment

Wally, despite being described as Thee character, is borderline background.

& whats even more interesting, within his individual secret audio files and interactions - he's almost chatty. not only that but the way he talks is more confident and faster paced. he's taking initiative. he can be kinda pushy. when talking to the qa/whrp/Us, he acts more like the character his descriptions portray. he acts more like a person instead of a puppet waiting for his next cue

I cant tell if - when around the neighbors - his tepid milk behavior is a purposeful act or if he's masking. and if he's masking, is it deliberate or involuntary? and in regards to both, why is he acting so different? It could be tied to what he's trying to accomplish. if he's trying to "restore" Welcome Home, it would make sense for him to act as he does around the neighbors - he wouldnt want to clue them in that he knows so much more than he's letting on, would he?

but then that begs another train of thought - what if he isn't acting or masking? if there is a time discrepancy between Wally's interactions with the qa/whrp/Us & the more 'official' audios, that could explain the difference in behavior. we could be getting glimpses into "future" (read: current) Wally, who's had much more time to figure himself out since we can safely assume he started out as a blank slate. we could be seeing a more experienced Wally than the one seen with his friends.

of course that line of thinking loses some merit when considering the 14 "bug" audios. or it could lend to it... if we're seeing a more experienced Wally but his friends are only seeing what he allows them to. it's still him, just... a carefully curated version.

in general it could really tie into the themes of identity and change and being other, to me. when you're so different - or you feel so different - that you can't bring yourself to be your most authentic you around your friends. when you feel like you have to hold back and be who you think they expect you to be, or what would be most palatable. most normal. will they accept you as you really are? there's always the fear and terror that the people you consider closest to you won't. or when you're so scared of change that you'll shove down & lock away parts of yourself so that you can keep things as you are. because once they know you've changed, so will they. and really, do you want to even accept that you've changed? what if that's what scares you most of all - that you're different, you've metamorphosized, you can't go back to the way things were because you yourself are no longer the person you were before. there is no reversing this no matter how much you try or pretend

the hand that feeds

There is no comic... yet. But perhaps one day there could be.

This took me an entire week to finish. 😵