drawing a character and then absentmindedly adding a couple animal features just to see what it would look like and realizing it looks better than the original drawing

code july day 1 - future

au where jeremie's anti-xana program didn't work, taking place half a year after.

“Do’ya think we should start future-proofing our whole situation?” Odd was the first one to speak out loud in at least a half an hour, his voice echoing around the computer lab.

It was late. Not just “it’s a school night, we should turn off the Playstation” late, but “sunrise is in an hour” late. Ulrich, Jeremie, and Aelita were crowded on the couch – a fairly new addition to the lab that William and Odd had dragged over a mile to the factory after finding it on the street, a several-hour long affair that left them both sore for a week – blearily staring at chunky school-loaned laptop screens with piles of overdue library books on the floor in front of them. Odd and William were across the room, hunched over an oversized posterboard, surrounded by an accoutrement of Odd’s art supplies and printed out sheets of paper. What was keeping them up was potentially world-ending, but not in the usual way; instead of an evil AI, it was a history project due at 10 AM.

It wasn’t entirely their fault they didn’t start earlier – saving the world was a full-time job, afterall – but it’s not like they could give an excuse to Mr. Fumet that he would have believed. As the clock ticked over to 4, the prospect of having to pull the trigger on a return trip to finish loomed over them. They had already done it once, blearily uploading PowerPoint slides to the supercomputer to save them, giving Yumi an apologetic phone call in the morning. She was used to the disorienting resets at this point, having done them for half a year after graduating and moving across the country, but they usually texted ahead of time to warn her. She was sympathetic over the phone – she always was – but she was definitely irritated about having to retake an exam. They didn’t want to put her through that again and, besides, they couldn’t exactly keep the poster board from getting erased to time.

“Future-proofing the fact half of us might fail history?” Ulrich grumbled in response from across the room, leaning against the armrest of the couch. His eyes were glazed over in a stupor as he clicked idly around on the screen.

“Ulrich, are you done with your slides yet?” Aelita spat at him, now that the silent spell was broken, “I want to start stitching them together.”

“Uh… no.” Ulrich glanced at her, subtly turning his screen away from her piercing gaze, “Gimme ten more minutes? I’m almost there.”

Aelita clicked her tongue, probably remembering the last promise of the slides “in ten minutes.” She turned to her left and nudged Jeremie, “How about you – oh my god, Jeremie, can you focus?”

“Huh?” He looked up, and guiltly alt-tabbed back to a blank PowerPoint slide. “Sorry, I was just… I had a breakthrough about the bug in the Skid and I was…” He trailed off under her glare, “Sorry.”

Aelita clutched the side of her head, groaning. “Is it too late to go back to living on Lyoko where I don’t have to care about World War I and don’t need sleep?”

“Me too, thanks.” William muttered at Odd’s side, aggressively erasing a sentence on the poster, “Being XANA’s slave was less painful than this.”

He let out a bitter laugh, then raised his head, half smirk fading at the frozen-in-terror looks on his friend’s faces, “Sorry. Too soon?”

Odd, as he so often did, interrupted the awkward silence before people could make it worse, “Future-proofing us, is what I meant. Thanks for asking!” Nobody humored him as the typing across the room started back up and William started writing again, “Look, I’m just saying; we’re not getting any younger.” He brandished a red marker, filling in bubble letters on the top of the poster, “Yumi graduated. We’ve only got a semester left at Kadic –,”

“Could just all repeat a year like I did.” William grimaced. “And might again.”

Ulrich snorted, “Odd and I are probably on track for that.”

“Cheers,” William said, raising his pencil like a glass, without looking up, “Join the failure club.”

“BUT,” Odd interrupted, “Assuming we don’t! Because this presentation is going to be incredible,” That one earned a snort from everyone in the room (which was fair), “We’ll need someone who can do our jobs if we have to leave the good fight. Lyoko Warriors, the Next Generation! Kadic’s Next Top Lyoko Warriors!” He chuckled at himself, standing up, “We should put an ad in the paper: ‘Want a challenging, world-altering job? Come down to the abandoned factory!’” He hummed to himself, tapping his chin, “Our criteria would have to be strict. Can you imagine getting someone like, I dunno, Johnny? So, Johnny. Please, tell me: what’s your greatest fear? Giant crabs, you say? Why yes, that’s both oddly specific and also a dealbreaker. Next!”

Odd looked up, laughing, waiting for his friends to join in – Ulrich telling him he was being dumb, Aelita offering some other students and joking with him about their interviews, William making a snide remark about how he didn’t get an interview, a silent, but appreciative smirk from Jeremie – but got nothing. Jeremie’s head was buried in his laptop, and Aelita was – Aelita was glaring at him?

“What?” He asked her, but she said nothing, just raised an eyebrow in a you know what’s wrong look. Odd clearly didn’t, and turned to Ulrich for a clue, but Ulrich wasn’t giving him anything; he was just back to sulking, staring at his laptop. Odd ran through what he said again in his head, trying to find the offending phrase, when William punched him in the leg. “Hey –,” Odd started, ready to give a snappy retort, before seeing William was urgently tapping at the poster, where he’d just written something. Odd crouched down to read it.

you’re upsetting jeremie.

Odd glanced back at Einstein across the room, whose face was impassive, just typing away. Looking closer, though, he could see Jeremie had all the appearances of someone trying valiantly to pretend they weren’t upset – hunched shoulders, scrunched up face, not a single glance away from the screen. Aelita had stopped glaring to put a hand on Jeremie’s shoulder, but he shrugged it off.

Ugh. Odd sighed, wondering if he would have to apologize for just trying to lighten the mood. How was anything he said upsetting to Jeremie? He reached over for a pencil to respond to William, scribbling down on the poster.

Can’t he take a joke?

idk. Guess he thinks you’re blaming him.

Blaming him?? For what???? bro when did I even say anything like that??

you didn’t. don’t bro me bro. not my fault

Odd underlined his first bro, giving William a smile. William rolled his eyes before rubbing out their conversation with an eraser. Odd turned back to his coloring job and took a breath, surprised to see it come in shaky. It’s not your fault he’s upset, he thought to himself, pulling the cap off his marker. It’s fine. He leaned over to finish his coloring before noticing his hands were shaking. He clenched them, angrily. It wasn’t his fault Jeremie was upset. He was fine. Not his fault if Jeremie wanted to over-react. He’ll get over it and… where were the scissors?

He dug around their supplies for them, then, picking up a pile of pictures of historic figures, streaked from the bad library printer, took a pair of trembling scissors to extracting them. They were nearly done. One more section and they’d be done. One more and they could go to bed and Jeremie would get over whatever he was upset about and it was fine and it would all go away and it was fine it wasn’t his fault and –

“I’m working as hard as I can,” Odd felt a bit in his stomach open up as Jeremie spoke in a quiet, bitter voice. Odd stared pointedly down at the poster, blinking rapidly to try and assuage the pressure building behind his eyes, “I know we screwed up by not finishing before Yumi graduated, okay? I’m just… It’s a lot to figure out and I’m trying?! Is that not enough for – No. No, I know it’s not enough – I know I’m keeping us from having a normal life and it’s my fault William had to repeat a year and… and I –,” Jeremie’s breath caught, and Odd finally dared to turn his eyes to him, seeing his friend aggressively rubbing his eyes under his glasses, “I – I don’t mean to – look! It’s hard, alright?! It’s hard and I – I’m just so tired all the time and I’m sorry that we’re still awake for this too and that I –,” His voice finally broke as he started crying in earnest, his fist coming down on the side of the couch. Odd wanted to turn back to his work and brush it off, but the guilt clenching his stomach wasn’t letting go.

Hesitantly, Aelita put her hand on his shoulder again, “Jeremie…” but he shook it off again, turning away from her. She persisted. “It’s not your fault. We know you’re working –,”

“And it’s not enough! I’ve been working at this for years and I just I can’t come up with anything to defeat XANA –,”

“You had a lot of other things you needed to do first.”

He didn’t mean to, Odd was sure, but Ulrich’s eyes flickered to William for just a moment, and William’s eyes narrowed.

“Oh, are we doing this now?” William grumbled, dropping his pencil. “Jeremie, you’re fine. Look, I’m sorry. Again. You don’t think I don’t regret every moment that I didn’t listen like a fucking idiot –” Jeremie, despite being wracked with tears, winced at the swear, earning a brief hint of a smile from Odd, “ – and got myself captured? Who then was a thorn in your asses for months? No. I get it. You’d probably be rid of XANA already if it wasn’t for me; you’ve made that crystal clear.”

“That’s not what I –,” Aelita glared at him, “You of all people should understand that I would never blame you for being trapped on Lyoko.”

“It’s not you that is. It’s him.” He jerked his thumb at Ulrich, who glared back at him.

“I’m not,” Ulrich muttered, “Cut it out.”

“Oh yeah? What did that look mean then, huh?”

“I didn’t –,”

“You blame me, and we all know it. You’re just butt-hurt over Yumi still, even though you had plenty of chances –,”

“Okay, that’s it.” Ulrich sat up straighter, “Maybe you’re still using Yumi as a scapegoat in all our arguments, but I’m done with that. Maybe I was an ass to you before because of her, but I don’t blame you for XANA, William. I never have. I was over it before you even joined,” He scowled at the ground, Jeremie’s crying filling the brief silence. “It was probably my fault you got captured in the first place. I wasn’t there because I had to talk to my stupid Dad and it was my job to tell Odd and I didn’t make sure – hell, even before that! Who was it that couldn’t protect Aelita back when XANA escaped from the supercomputer in the first place? If she hadn’t been alone, the Scyphozoa wouldn’t have gotten her, and XANA wouldn’t have escaped, and we would have been done.”

“Come on,” Aelita crossed her arms, turning away from Jeremie to the boy on her other side, “You’re being ridiculous. Half of that isn’t your fault.”

Odd wanted to chime in that it was Sam’s fault she didn’t listen to Ulrich, but his voice was still missing in action, his throat tight and unresponsive.

“I should have been able to protect myself,” Aelita continued, “It wasn’t your responsibility –,”

Jeremie laughed suddenly, hurt and bitter, “Protect yourself how? You couldn’t protect yourself because I was dragging my feet on giving you a proper weapon –,”

“We’ve talked about this!” She said, “We agreed it was more worth your time to work on an antivirus!”

“For a virus that didn’t exist! If I had just double checked –,”

“Double checked what? The faulty data you were being fed? There was nothing you could have done! If you want to blame anyone, blame me. Maybe it – maybe helping me made sense at first, when things were able to be stopped at a moment’s notice. But then even when you got me to Earth it wasn’t over, and things got worse, things got more dangerous – when we realized XANA could escape? That we couldn’t just turn it off with a switch? That – that should have been it.” Her voice dropped as she took a shaky breath, “You should have just let me turn the supercomputer off.”

“You were ALWAYS worth the risk, Aelita!” Odd finally snapped, terror shooting through his heart at the broken look on her face, the implications of her words, “You… you matter to us more than anything! Look, I’m sorry for bringing this all up, alright? I thought we could just joke around about running Lyoko Warrior interviews! I didn’t mean to get everyone upset. And speaking of! Jeez! All of you are such downers on yourselves! There’s like, a billion different things that could have happened!” He held out a hand, ticking them off, “Maybe William might not have gotten captured and instead XANA got Yumi or anyone else! Maybe, I dunno, Ulrich saved Aelita temporarily but then XANA tossed him in the digital sea! Maybe Jeremie could have noticed that Aelita didn’t have a virus sooner, and XANA just made a move sooner! Maybe – maybe – maybe if you had just let Kiwi be virtualized normally and not fuse with me he would have been a great Lyoko Warrior and would have bit the Scyphozoa and killed XANA! We don’t know, alright? I’m just trying to say that – ugh, forget it! Sorry! Jeez!”

Odd rubbed at his eyes, surrendering to the frustrated and exhausted stream of tears that leaked out of them. All of them, all of this – he kept trying to play superhero, to pretend that everything was going to be alright like in the movies, but in his heart he had to admit that this was starting to feel futile. Aelita’s virus, XANA’s escape from the supercomputer, William’s capture, Jeremie’s first botched attempt at his anti-XANA program, Franz Hopper’s sacrifice, Yumi’s graduation, their failure to stop space station from falling, Jeremie’s second anti-XANA program getting stolen by the AI, and now the looming threat of their own graduation… he wanted to be joking about needing to interview new Lyoko Warriors, really, but if graduation took them away from the factory… away from each other…

A hand landed on his shoulder, he realized he didn’t need to know who it was to press his own on top of it, to squeeze it and feel loved, as more hands, more friends, found their way to his other shoulder, to his back.

“I’m sorry, Jeremie,” he said, “And everyone else. I didn’t mean to –,”

“Don’t,” came a muttered reply from Jeremie, “We’re all acting tired and stupid. I shouldn’t have yelled. I knew you didn’t mean it.”

Odd let out an exhausted laugh, rubbing his eyes of the last of the tears, looking up and seeing his friends around him, “How late is it?”

“Too late,” Ulrich replied, pulling his phone out of his pocket, “We’ve got… three hours until classes start.”

A collective groan broke the spell over the room. Odd looked under his feet to the almost-finished-poster. Silently, all of them returned to their working positions. Odd kneeled down to finish gluing down the last of the faces to the poster. As the lull of busy work started taking over his mind, William nudged him.

“Sorry, I, uh…” William looked uncharacteristically bewildered, “This must have happened while I was – did you say Kiwi fused with you?”

like to watch you suffer

Dream Team roomates x gn!reader Summary: Youre playing a scary game and your roommates come in to laugh at you support you. Warnings: swearing, shitty description of bloody/creepy things. lmk when you find any! A/N: just watched Tommy’s fnaf stream and i died. If you have any tips, requests or ideas, feel free to send them in :)

Starting up Twitch with hesitation as you check your subscriber count one last time to be sure. You reached your subgoal on your last stream and promised the chat to play a spooky game. Playing mostly family friendly games and usually with a group of friends, you weren’t exactly excited to be playing 2017′s Resident Evil 7. Clips from Jack and Felix only made you dread this moment even more. Appearantly your chat loves seeing you scared shitless.

You start your stream as you normally would: greating the chat, answering some dono’s. “I actually hate you guys for making me do this. But we’re gonna try it anyways. I have a slight idea what’s coming and am mentally not prepared, so let’s see how long I will last before crapping my pants.” You force a smile at your camera and start the game.

The first hour was doable, a couple of jumpscares and some bloody stuff. A few of the jumpscares made you squeal, while the disgusting cutscenes made you want to throw up. Losing your focus on the game as you read some of the dono’s. A lot of them were about the game and people wishing you a good stream. A couple of questions about the Dream Team popped up. “What is George up to? I think he might be streaming as well I’m not -” The loud noise in your headphones, accompanied by a bloody faces canabal with a chainsaw made you shriek, followed by a ton of swear words and you taking of your headphones, rolling your chair away from your desk.

As you sit a couple of feet away from your desk you hear a door closing and footsteps in the hallway. You open your door and call out. “Gogy?” Your chat can’t hear the boy answering you. “You busy? No? Want to join my suffering? Yeah ofcourse you do, bring a chair!” The dark haired boy walks into your room rolling his chair in, a tad too excited. Your chat went insane, seeing him come through the door.

“You already died? Damn, N/N.” He teased, sitting down next to you. His legs propped up on his chair, face popping in and out of the frame.

“Would you like to try, Gogy?” You mimicked his accent, causing George to lean back into his chair. “Alright, goodluck not dying.” He said in the saltiest voice he could. You put your headphones back on, plugging in a second pair for George and handing him the headphones. You continue playing the game, almost getting used to the disgustingness of the house.

“N/N, I have to agree with chat, seeing you being a scaredy cat is hilarious.” In the meantime you’re turning into Y/N “I am going to shit myself” Y/L/N. George just laughs at you while hanging out with the chat. Yet he too flinches at the jumpscares. “Guys, the reason you can’t see George right now is because he is a big pussy.” You laugh, recieving a soft punch to your arm in return.

Another half hour of you and George sitting on the edges of your chairs until Nick decides to have some fun. After hearing you yell a couple of times he’d tune into your stream. He waited for the right moment; you had just finished a cut scene and was wandering though the dark house that felt like a maze. The squeaky sound of the door opening made you lean back in your chair a bit more, as if something or someone would jump out of the room behind it.

The door behind you flew open with a loud bang, causing you and George to yielp. Followed by another jumpscare in the game. “Fuck you Sapnap, you little shit cunt fuck you-” You utter under your breath as you try your best not to die in game.

“Sapnap!” George whined. “What? I heard there was a party.” The boy stood in your doorframe, a cheeky grin covering his face. “Can I join?” He somewhat asked, already pulling out a chair to sit down besides you.

“Fine, but no more messing around or I’ll end the fucking stream guys.” Your chat excitedly greated him. Spamming you there will be a savepoint in a bit. “Alright guys I’m just gonna go for one more savepoint, if i don’t die from adrenaline overdose by then.”

The boys on your sides bickered while you were trying to find the way out. “Go left.” Nick hinted. “Don’t listen to him, N/N.” George told you. They were like some twisted kind of devil/angel pair on your shoulders. “Have you played this before Gogy?” Nick spat, looking over to the boy on the other side of you. “No, but they came from-” He tried to defend himself, before getting cut off. “That’s what I thought, leave it to the pro then.” 

Trusting Nick’s gut you followed his instruction and went left. The sound of your footsteps are accompanied by heavy breathing, you look around with the little light you have. When you don’t immediatly die and thank Nick for the advice. A loud noice makes you turn around as you watch some creepy dolls fall down. “The sounds are honestly the creepiest thing about this game.” You say, continuing to walk around the room, looking for clues. Nick watches you, unbothered by the scary sounds as he doesn’t have any headphones on. “Chat why do you keep spamming ‘DEATH’? I’m not dying, I am clearly a pro.” You say proudly, not being as scared and jumpy as you had been. Yet the grin appearing on Nick’s face is telling you you should be. Moments later it became clear why. A loud screech, followed by one of the residents running towards you holding an axe and piercing the weapon through your chest.

The boy next to you dies of laughter, panting as he tries to catch his breath. “Your face- oh my god you face.” You shake your head at the boy. “Why did I even trust you in the first place. I thought you knew where the exit was.” You say, a tiny bit dissapointed in yourself for falling for it, but also laughing as George almost falls out of his chair from laughter. “Oh, but I do know where the exit is.” Nick teases. You look the boy dead in the eye and start debating whether or not to continue the game.

“100 subs and they’ll continue.” George tells your chat. “Guys, no-” It only took a couple of seconds until the counter was halfway there.

dreamwastaken has gifted 50 subs: go until the next savepoint

"Let’s go, N/N, you heard the big man.” You look straight into your camera and sigh. Alt-tabbing to swearword at Clay on Discord before going back to the game. “I hate every single one of those 50 subs and Dream. One more savepoint and that’s it!” 

George nudges your arm, asking if Clay can join your little scary party. “Do I really need more critisism? What do we think chat? Spam 1 if you want Dream here, 2 if you don’t.” The chats start pouring in. “No, you’re supposed to spam 2 guys! Why aren’t you on my side. Argh, fine.” You shut your camera off and wait for Clay to come in. “No face reveal today guys.” George comments on your chat going crazy.

“You can sit on my lap Dream.” Nick said jokingly, tapping his lap. “I’d rather sit on George’s.” “No way.” The boys bicker back and forth. 

“Dream, get out of the frame I’m turning my camera back on.” The tall guy settles on your bed, being able to see your monitor and the two guys next to you.

“Why do you keep dying, N/N?” He teases as you respawn in game.

“Think you can do better?” You ask, taking a right this time.

“I know I can.” You hear him mutter from the bed behind you.

You press pause, taking your hand of the controller. “Alright guys, you're all talk, why don’t you give it a try huh.”

“Cause we like watching you suffer.” Clay answers. You look over to your roommates, each and every one of them grinning at you.

With a loud sigh you continue playing the game, causing a lot of giggles and teasing as you almost have a heart attack. Nick and Clay keep their commentary coming as George mainly focusses on your chat. You get to the savepoint and finally end the stream.

Turning around in your chair so you face Clay. “I really hate you guys, that was the scariest shit I’ve ever played.”

George rests his arm on your shoulder. “No you don’t.”

“You love us.” Nick adds.

Two times Sakunosuke understood Dazai, and one time it was goddamn impossible [PT. 1/3]

Rating: T

Pairing: Oda Sakunosuke / Dazai Osamu Tags: Dark Era, fluff, the good stuff i promise  Alt. Summary: Three times he’s wrong on all counts- Dazai can only accept so much obliviousness. Sakunosuke thinks he deserves a little more credit. AO3 Link:

“Hey, pretty face. Come here often?”

This, Sakunosuke ignores. They both have lots of work tonight and they both actually need to get it done. Hell, the only reason he’s even here is routine. It’s almost tradition to get whisky in his veins before chasing it with adrenaline.

In another world though, Dazai would make a good drinking buddy. Maybe he’d insist you get shitfaced together and you’d think he was a lightweight from the look in his eye after the second, third beer. Maybe you’d even be stupid enough to think Dazai was finally off guard. Maybe he’d pretend he was, because he wanted to be.

“Can I buy you a drink, sweetheart?”

“You can’t tell but I’m terrified right now.” Sakunosuke says, finally giving in. The bartender has his back turned, leaning over preparations, probably suppressing laughter. Traitor. “Are you aware your brain-to-mouth filter isn’t working?”

That world would be nice. In this world, they’re just two bad men hurtling towards self-destruction.

“Ah, the things the devil’s work does to you,” Dazai hums, hopping back onto his own seat. “Still. Don’t take too many to admit who’s got a nice ass-”

Whiskey’s supposed to burn your throat, isn’t it? Turns out it burns your nostrils as well, when your friend tries casual homicide. “Dazai. Can you identify all of the problems in this situation?” He says, eyes streaming. “I’ll start us off. The brat in this room is-”

“18, 21, same thing really. And I don’t think the jury plans on focusing on that charge.” He grins, and it’s not his i’ll carve your heart out and give it to you grin, it’s the charming little thing he has in his back pocket, bringing it out for special occasions...special peop-

He closes his eyes as the headache closes in on him. “How many beers have you had.” He’s going to feel oddly guilty if Dazai’s had too much but he’s also certain he hasn’t. He’s been busy with his case, but he’d have noticed this at least.

Dazai smiles, sweet, saccharine. It’s been ages since Dazai’s been able to get a rise out of him but he’d forgotten what exactly that’d looked like.

“Dazai.”

“Odasaku~ you’re overreacting a little, aren’t you?” Dazai says, eyes wide, mock-shocked. Like he isn’t the one making a fool out of Sakunosuke.

And. He is, he realizes. He realizes something else as well. “Yeah.” He says aloud. A small sigh escapes him. “Sorry. Nijimura sent me a rocky case. Was thinking about it, forgot who I was dealing with.” The thing is, they both have work to do, but whereas he prefers to contemplate his in bits, Dazai likes to tackle his problems after he’s had something to put him in a good mood. Usually, that means anything between telling Sakunosuke his latest revelation on living or asking Sakunosuke what cheeses he thinks are tasty and not smelly. This is probably a new thing he’s decided to try.

“Oh?” Dazai says.

“Yeah.” He throws back the last of his drink, thinks for a second, and then leaves his stool, leaning towards Dazai and his.

Dazai’s eyes flick towards him. Dazai’s fingers twitch giving away a spurt of anticipation, excitement.

Sakunosuke doesn’t contemplate that any further, too busy swiping Dazai’s glass. The low counter digs into the base of his spine when he leans into it.

“Hey-”

He tips the contents into his mouth. It a standard drink but he thinks it’s been watered out. He makes a note to tip the bartender extra when he picks up his tab.

“That was mine. Asshole.” Dazai huffs.

”My mistake. I’ll but you another.” He rumbles. “When you turn twenty-one.”

“Odasaku, you’re not funny!”

He raises his hand in a little lazy wave that doesn’t need him to look back. The night’s cold outside the bar so he buttons up. He’s got dirty work ahead of him and his targets don’t need to know what his smile looks like.

NOTES: if you reblog it i will die for you dude. thank you!

Off Day: Seventeen

Bucky stared at his phone and felt a little light-headed from the speed at which blood had poured into his erection when he opened your message. It was a picture, one that he had asked for on his “To-Do List” that he made.

He knew you liked to torment him, however sweetly. You’d embraced flirting with him quickly and had just as quickly embraced sending him flirty pictures. This one though. It was filthy. One of the things he had put on there that would take you some prep time if you decided to take it for him. A way for you to stay distracted if you got overwhelmed. Or sad. Or any of the other feelings that tended to exacerbate your symptoms.

It made his mouth go dry and his fingers trembled as he tried to type a response. It was a pin-up photo. Artful but undeniably sexy. You were kneeling in front of a mirror in the middle of putting makeup on. Nude but for a pair of heels and the choker he’d bought you. The one with the blue jewel set in gold on a piece of black velvet ribbon. You’d fallen in love with it and protested him buying it. But, it was worth it. You’d changed the jewelry in your nipple piercings to match it. Your thighs were slightly parted and he could just barely see the pink of your folds. But the thing that made him throb was when his eye was drawn down to your plush bottom. He could see the wink of a jewel. Of a toy he’d told you to use. It was beautiful. It made him feel like he was standing behind you, waiting for you to get ready. Watching you. Admiring you from afar.

“Barnes,” Clint said snatching his phone, “Quit lookin’ at porn. You’ll be home tomorrow.”

Clint glanced down at his phone and recoiled, “Oh shit,” he tossed the phone back at Bucky like he’d been shocked, “God. What? Fuck. How do you get a girl to do that?”

“Ask nicely,” Bucky said blushing a little. 

“Do you think Nat would do that for me?” Clint asked

“Do what? Nat asked sitting across from them.

“Take dirty pictures and send them to me,” Clint said.

Nat shot Bucky a look, “Bucky!”

“I didn’t show him,” Bucky protested, “Clint took my fucking phone.”

“Was it at least pretty?” Nat asked clint, smirking.

“Very artistic. She put some effort in. I mean. In another life she woulda made a good alt model.” he said, cheeks coloring a little. 

Bucky can’t look at either one of them right now. He feels a little like he might have betrayed your trust by Clint getting a peek at you. He promised they’d only be for him. 

“I’m not tellin’ her I saw shit though,” Clint said, “I just thought Bucky was watching porn hub. I didn’t know he was doing some freaky shit with his girl.”

Nat snorted, “Oh,” she said, “So you did make a list.”

Bucky nodded, smiling a little, “Yeah,” he said, “thanks for putting that idea in her head.”

Nat grinned, “You’re welcome... We were talking about her doing makeup to distract herself... I was kinda kidding when I suggested dirty pictures but it worked. She likes making you happy. Or teasing you. I’m not sure which.”

“Yes,” Bucky answered nodding. Still blushing. But, it was nice knowing that you and Nat did girl things. Nat didn’t spend much time around women. They irritated her. At least. Most of the women in the bar did. They were pretend tough girls. Bitches. They might ride bikes and drink but they were really boring to her. She liked women that were smart and individual. Not mean girls. She had enough of those in High School. 

Nat snorted, “Nice,” she said, “I knew she was a keeper.”

Bucky picked up his phone to message you back, saving the picture for later in the secret file on his phone

He lavishes praise on you. You’re beautiful and perfect. That picture is hot. It’s so sexy he doesn’t know how he’s gonna sleep tonight looking at it. And thank you so much for showing him.

_______

Bucky is glad to be home. It’s chilly outside but it’s warm inside the clubhouse. He’s missed you and he wanted to go straight to White Rabbit to see you but you made him promise not to. You had something you were working on for him, apparently in a back room and didn’t want him to see it. He was itching to see you. It had been three days and he hadn’t slept well the whole time. He’d not realized how used to you he’d gotten. How much better he slept next to you. He sipped his beer and watched the clock, counting seconds until you’d wander through the door. 

You were always welcome, even when Bucky wasn’t there just by virtue of being a sweetheart who always paid her tab in full. And by being friendly to Nat and generally patient when waiting for a drink. They all liked you. Even the ones that didn’t remember you from school. If only because you did what they couldn’t do and got Bucky out of a bad relationship. He finished his beer and ordered his second, going to join Steve and Sam at the pool table, trying to kill time until you would be there. It worked. He’d hardly looked at the clock.

He was honestly surprised when you burst through the door, wearing a green pleated skirt and white blouse. Hair up in a bun behind your head and pretty red lips. Knee socks and cute little heeled oxfords. You look like a librarian. Out of place in the bar. Still, when you bolt into his arms and wrap your legs around his waist easily, he chuckles against your lips as you tangle your hands in his hair. He can’t stop you and he doesn’t want to. He hefts you up and ignores the jeers and whoops. There’s nothing but you. Your perfume. The feel of your eager, hungry lips against his. When you come up for air he grins, “Miss me?” he asked, teasing.

“So much,” you say smiling, a little breathless.

“Is this outfit for me?” he asks, kissing your nose.

“Do you like it? I did some shopping when I was up in Red Key.” you look uncertain and he smiles. You have an aesthetic. One you never had enough money to dress for. He really likes watching you build your dream closet a little at a time. Even if he has to threaten to punish you if you don’t buy whatever you’re drooling over occasionally. You deserve it and he likes knowing you feel pretty. He also likes wrapping his leather jacket around you when you’re chilly. He likes how big it is on you and the way it clashes with your neat, pretty style. 

“I love it,” he rumbles, “You look real good baby girl. I’m a lucky man, coming home to such a beautiful girl.”

You flush at the praise and he kisses your nose again, “Did you buy yourself anything else?”

“Some pretties and I got my nails done,” you tell him. 

He whistles softly and smiles, “Good to know the money I gave you to run around with went to good use, Princess,” he praised. You hadn’t asked but he’d made sure to give you a little something just to entertain yourself with. He’d left it on your dresser in the jar you kept to save up for this or that. 

You tilt your head, “Oh no. I used that to get you something,” you say smiling, kissing his cheek. “I had a ton of money in my Princess fund so I used what you left me for something else.”

“Y/N,” he scolded, “You were supposed to use that on something for you.”

“I did. It made me happy buying you something,” you murmur, cheeks coloring. 

He swatted your backside affectionately, “Why’re you so sweet, huh?”

“I dunno,” you answer, wiggling to be put down.

“Nuh-uh,” he said, shifting you onto his shoulder and carrying you over to the bar to sit with you on his lap, “Have a glass of wine with me?” he asked. 

You sigh, “Not today,,” you say shaking your head. Bucky kisses your head and signals to Nat to put it on his tab as she pours a coke for you. She kept a four-pack of Mini bottles and one wine glass. You were the only one that drank wine, when you did drink and it tickled her.

“Thank you,” you tell her, smiling and raising your glass in toast. “I still don’t understand how the fuck you walked into a biker bar and ordered wine,” she teased.

“Well, you stock it now don’t you?” you answer.

“Only because it’s you and we feel bad making fun of you.”

You shrug, “Much like the sloth, my plan for survival seems to be being as pathetic as possible so that bigger badder people leave me alone.”

Natasha snorted. She could appreciate that you were yourself. You didn’t like beer and wouldn’t pretend to fit in. You’d sip your glass of wine and crack quiet jokes.

“Pathetic?” Sam gasped scandalized, teaching across the bar to grab another bottle, “You’ve successfully whipped the most unrepentant man whore I have ever met AND you get to talk back to Natasha and live.”

“He wasn’t a man whore,” you say leaning against Bucky’s side, “He just didn’t know better.”

“And I’m pretty sure she’s the one that’s whipped,” Steve snickered.

Your cheeks burn and Natasha winces sympathetically, “Steve,” she says, spraying him with seltzer, “You’re fucking Stark so you should probably let the two of them just have their French vanilla sex and enjoy it.”

Bucky tilts your chin up and kisses you softly, cuddling you close and casually flipping off the guys that are D’aww-ing loudly. He’s never understood why guys act like assholes to their girls in public. You deserved soft all the time. You deserved to be able to look to him to feel safe whether or not his friends could see him.

“Shut up, ya animals,” Nat sighed. 

______________________

Bucky walked into the house and set his bag down by the door then set you down on the table, standing between your legs and putting his chilled hands on your thighs, rubbing tenderly to warm them up. You shiver and he chuckles, “I missed you, Princess,” he murmurs, kissing your nose.

“I missed you too, daddy,” you answer, hiding your face in his abs.

“You were a handful while I was gone,” he chuckles, “I loved all the pretty pictures you sent me.”

“You did?”

“I did,” he praised, “Lost a lot of sleep wishing I was here to admire how perfect you are in person.”

You beam up at him and he takes the pins out of your hair carefully, letting it fall down to your shoulders. “You’re so perfect,” he hummed, kissing your nose.

Your cheeks color and you nuzzle his abs again, “Can I give you your present now?” 

He chucks you under the chin, “You mean the present I told you not to buy?”

“But-” Your face falls and he tickles your side, making you giggle.

“No, no being sad,” he tuts, “Of course you can Princess.” He helps you off the table and listens to your shoes hit the floor outside the door and then listens to you scamper up the stairs. You’re excited. Thrilled about whatever this is and Bucky braces himself. Even if he hates whatever it is, he’s not gonna tell you. Not ever. You’re too sweet and he knows that whatever it is you saw it and thought it was perfect for him. That’s enough.

He helps himself to a beer and waits, listening to the rustling coming from upstairs. He shakes his head and settles into a kitchen chair waiting. When you come back downstairs with a black gift bag in your hand he smirks. You always tried so hard not to make things too feminine for him. He appreciated it but honestly, he wasn’t phased. He’d carry your purse and not even blink. He was a big scary biker. Ain’t no one saying shit. 

“What’s this, huh?” he said pulling you onto his knee and taking tissue paper out of the bag and tossing it aside.

You’re practically vibrating with excitement and he pulls the gift out of the bag. It’s a leather jacket. A tiny leather jacket. Like baby-sized. Bucky stops and looks at you. Your hands are over your mouth and you’re watching him waiting on his reaction. “Princess,” he said, not quite able to breathe, “I don’t think this is my size.”

He definitely can’t breathe. He can’t think. If you’re telling him what he thinks you’re saying he has to protect you. He has to keep you safe. 

“Bucky I-” you start and he can hear the anxiety in your voice and that hurts. He forces himself to smile and wipes a stray happy tear off your cheek. 

“I thought you were on birth control,” he said, feeling like his lips are numb.

“And they put me on antibiotics for my sinus infection- I- I’m sorry. I didn’t- I’m sorry.” You’re starting to cry in earnest now, springing off of his lap and covering your face with your hands. 

“Sweetheart,” he soothed, holding his hands out for you to take, “I just- I’m surprised. I think- I think I might have gone into shock for a second.” It’s breaking his heart to see you cry. He hates it. He can’t. It makes him think about all the times you cried and he wasn’t there to dry your tears. “Please, baby girl,” he coaxes, “Please don’t cry. Not like this. I’m sorry. I’m happy I promise.”

“No, you’re not,” you sniffle, wiping your eyes on the back of your hand and wrapping your arms around yourself.

He crosses the floor to you and passes you a clean handkerchief from the inside pocket of his jacket. You take it and he kisses your head while you bow your head and try to rein in all your emotions. Something Bucky still appreciates about your crying. It’s always real. He gives you the time you need before he starts talking again. Taking just a second to decide what to say. And rein in his own panic. His own irrational fear. His dad left. He didn’t know how to be a dad. He could barely take care of himself. How would he teach his son? And oh god, what if it was a girl? What would he do? 

When you look up at him though, he can’t think about that. All he knows is he has to fix this for you. You’re his. This baby is his. And this isn’t about him. Not really. You’re trusting him. Giving him this. You could have had an abortion and not told him and he’d never know. You’re looking up at him, uncertain and scared and he realizes with a jolt that he wasn’t the only one that was scared, you’d just had some time to adjust to it. Some time to decide you could do this. With him. 

“You’re right,” he says softly, “I’m not happy. I’m terrified.” He kneels in front of you and nuzzles your belly, kissing gently. You pet his hair, waiting. “I don’t- I don’t really know what to do with kids ya know? My dad left- a bunch of times. I don’t really know how to be a dad. I mean. Until recently I was drunk every night and fucking a bunch of different girls.” He looks up at you and smiles a little, “But if I can do this with anyone, Y/N, I can do it with you.”

“Really?” you whimper,  tucking hair behind his ear.

“Really.” 

“Promise?” you hold out your pinky and he links his pinky through yours, pressing his lips to your thumb and pressing his thumb against it to lock it. 

“I promise, Princess,” he said getting to his feet slowly and wrapping his arms around you, “I only get one chance. I’m not gonna fuck this up. Not now that I fooled you into thinking I’m a nice guy.”

You roll your eyes but giggle, making him swat your bottom affectionately. “When did you find out?” he asks softly, setting you on the counter and taking a cool cloth to your face gently.

“About 15 minutes before the girls showed up with pizza for our sleepover,” you murmur. 

He kisses your nose, “Have you seen a doctor?”

“Not yet but. Three tests on three different days seemed pretty definitive... I wanted to tell you first before I did anything.”

“We need to get you an appointment, Princess,” he murmured, kissing you softly, “We just got you healthy. I wanna keep you that way. Both of you.” He swipes at your nose gently with the cloth and you smile.

“You’re gonna keep me?”

“Of course I am,” he murmured, “You’re my Princess, and this is for both of us to handle, okay? Just give me some time to process it all. I promise. I’m okay. It was just a shock, baby.”

“Can we have a cuddle?” you ask, needing some comfort.

Bucky nods and helps you gently off the counter, “And snacks. I’m hungry.”

You nod and bucky Listens to your little white socked feet on the wood floors as he glances towards the tiny jacket on the table, “Ma is gonna kill me,” he murmurs rubbing the back of his neck.

Tags: @lancsnerd @etherealwaifgoddess @stevieang @blameitonthecauseway @wellfucksorrymum

The Canary

A short fic as Chris and Piers discusses more mundane matters as Piers settles in his team. One shot. Early days Nivanfield.

It was 1358. The new lieutenant to Alpha team had planned it to the minute. He had his lunch early, went over the notes he had made, reviewed the things he had on file and mentally went through every last conversation he’s had with the team and of course, his Captain. He checked over himself at the mirror too. Captain is relaxed on grooming standards, but his first lesson from meeting Chris was ‘Do as I say, not as I do.’

He took the longer route to the Captain’s office, not out of habit, but because there’s less chance he’ll be interrupted or run into someone. He wanted to be on time, and have his thoughts where he needed them.

He set off on a purposeful, brisk pace, folder of reports in hand, taking long, measured strides that pass off as confident and looking busy and important enough. Hazel eyes scanned around the perimeters for any unplanned incursions, but he knows deep down he needn’t worry. Staying hidden is his specialty he had mastered, in plain sight, if needed. That said though, he hadn’t been fully able to dodge the spotlight since his time at the BSAA. Being second to the legendary Chris Redfield, afterall, is a high profile role, and the Captain himself isn’t quite a man of subtlety.

He knew as he arrived that the clock had just ticked over to 1400. Captain’s door would usually be open, but he would give four unhurried but confident taps should it be closed. Has he got anything? Should he have brought a treat? Food can be an icebreaker, though the Captain must have a pretty strict diet regime to maintain his bulk…

Focus Piers. He told himself as he banished all irrelevant thoughts.

He could see now that the door was open, letting some rays of the afternoon sun into the otherwise slightly gloomy office. The captain sat at his desk, clawing his mouse, his thick brows furrowed just a little to bring out a few creases. This could be bad.

“Capt-“

“Ah Piers.” Relief fell off the Captain’s face, the five o’clock shadow that usually forms by lunchtime had made him look slightly broody, but the smile was genuine. “Come. Pull up a chair.” He cocked his head to the guest chair beside him.

Piers nodded lightly. All his others commanders usually sat him across the table where they’d have feet up and arms back, as if to silently scream how important they are. Their desks though, usually afforded such luxuries, and the space for it.

Captain Chris Redfield’s desk would be, as his mother would call it, ‘a perennially rueful mess’ bereft of military rigour, but Piers had learnt by day two on base that Captain Redfield sets the rules. Or rather, breaks them at convenience for himself. Piers may never have to worry about an inspection, but also means he’s in that uncomfortable position managing what the enlisted men would consider ‘double standards’.

Regardless, he sat, back straight and attentive, being more than a little pleased that he’s so close to the Captain he could feel the heat radiating off his body.

“It’s our catch up isn’t it. Sorry, I didn’t prepare anything. Uh, did you send- no you must have, I know you would, sorry I didn’t read it, I just…”

Piers nodded and shrugged. Yes, he’d written a short one-page update just in case and emailed through but yet again Chris hasn’t read it, but that’s OK because he’d practiced the verbal brief anyway and knew he preferred that.

“Did you want the two-minute version?”

“Yep, go on- uh wait, oh, that’s right, I was looking at this when you came in. Can I get your thoughts on this first?”

Chris pulled up the email. As he did Piers glanced at the (8709) unread tag and flinched, but told himself to focus.

It was one of those reports, cc’ed for comment by all the team leaders. There must be thousands of those going around.

“Hmm. May I skim the report?” Piers asked.

Chris alt-tabbed and Piers glanced at the page count. Less than fifty. He let out the breath he held in. Trying not to lean in too close to Chris, he scrolled through with the keyboard, looked at the summary and the body, and then the conclusion.

“I think it’s bad, but not quite sure how bad.” Chris said, scratching his head.

“This got drafted by some ivory tower academic who never had a semblance of normal life.”

“How did it get that far then, command can’t actually be that serious about this shit?”

“Well you see when you brand yourself a ‘consultant’, whatever BS they sprout will suddenly became great gems of transformative wisdom that’s it a crime against the state to realise such theoretical gains and crafted rhetoric into action. The good thing is, however, at least it doesn’t read like there’s someone’s self interests in the way…”

“You got a plan of attack?”

“Whatever you do don’t let it be a recommendation. I’m sure every commander out there is fuming about this stuff. I’ll work up some comments on the template in uh, your style and let you review them, but you should go chew the fat with others and draw out their views, and put in a coordinate effort.”

“Mmmh, I like that approach. I can chat to Crosby and K-face. It’s the same crap that keeps going round.”

“So, that brief of yours. Anything important? Do you need me to get money again?”

“No. Nothing of the sort. We could use all kinds of upgrades, but we can’t ask for them willy-nilly, it must be thought out, strategic, have the whole cost, risk benefit balance neatly summed up—”

Chris threw his hands up in defence. “OK, OK, I’m just asking. You work out the details and brief me on what to tell our accounts man. How’s the team?”

“Overall we’re going to be fine. Our teams are much smaller than we used to manage, I’m still getting to know them of course, but they’re willing, have a good attitude and there’s a lot we can cover.”

“I mean, they’re no special forces but miles above army grunts fresh from boot. They’re here because they want to be, and that counts more than anyone realises.”

“Just what I wanted to hear. And how are you?”

“Me? Oh, uh. I’m doing alright. I guess.”

Piers was caught off guard. He’d prepared the brief about everything Chris could ask him about and left out himself. He never thought about himself. As in what Chris would want him to say about himself. Is it like a job interview? Does he stay professional or let out snippets of truth and emotion? No. He never thought about the fact that Chris would ask him about himself. This is the military. No one is your care bear. They want you to get the job done and not cause any problems. Don’t be smart and don’t be stupid. Conform.

“Well you’re doing a damn fine job.” Chris said, clapping a big hand to Piers’ shoulder. “Knew I’d pick the right man.” He grinned a somewhat boyish grin and gave the shoulder a squeeze.

Pier grinned to himself. Chris was a touchy man and he’d be damned if he ever forgot a moment where they connected physically.

“Oh. Another thing.” The squeeze turned to a slap on his shoulder. “What is this writing comments in ‘my style’ that you spoke of?”

Piers blinked. Oops.

“Uh, have you ever hear of ghost writers, Captain?”

“Uh, like the movie with the team with gear battling paranormal lifeforms?” Chris said with a twinkle in his eyes. “Sounds a bit like us, really.”

“Almost, except they fight with words. A ghost writer is like someone who writes for someone else. Like a speech writer, official emails and all.”

Piers feels nervous as Chris stroked his 5’o clock shadow and appraised him intently with his warm brown eyes. He thought about the 8000 unread emails and swallowed.

“Uh, I’m kinda terrible at it, but given the timeframes of the response I might just jot some notes and you can review them so it sounds like it comes from a seasoned… captain and not some fresh-faced rookie from West Point?”

“Seasoned huh?” Chris chuckled. “Medium with a hint of garlic, salt and pepper.”

Piers licked his lips.

“Well, I’ll leave it to you. Forget the style. The key thing is to shoot this thing down before it ever gets off the ground.”

“Yes Sir!” Piers was already plotting in his head. He still needs to write like Chris would, but not as Chris would, but how command would want Chris to, striking that fine balance between authority, reason and a hint of the non-conformant leanings the Captain is known for.

“I know who I picked. You’re not a spring chicken Nivans, even if you look like you belong on a recruitment poster. I see a bright future in you, ghostbusting or zombie busting or writing or whatever else. You’ve got a good package. Of skills and, uh that word…. Aptitude, attitude? Those things. Keep it up.”

“I will, Captain. Thank you, Captain.”

“I’ll send you the docs, no hurry, but if you get it in before 1700 I know there’s a steakhouse you might like.”

Piers raised his eyebrows. Chris is more than his match.

“Right away sir.”

Chris’s eyes followed Piers out of his office, with the golden rays of the sun on his back. He sighed in relief, pressing send on the email. He looked at the other 8000 unread emails, and the pile of reports awaiting read through, and he grinned like a cat who ate the canary.

Lost and Found

Orlaux Voss, once dee Dzemael, has spent the past twenty years searching high and low through dangerous lands looking for his hope. After the fall of Ala Mhigo, and the death of his wife Maerwynn, his missing Daughter (and unknown to him, Warrior of Light) Danica in hopes that even with the two of them, family and home can be found again.

AKA Welcome to My Adventure in making my Main's Dad first a retainer and then an Alt and now he's demanding fiction explaining how he found his Daughter that I'm too willing to write. For the most part is just Noir Lancer Dad.

Archive Link

Chapter One:  Hope Thine Name is Wyrmblood

It started simple enough. A strange lancer much like myself, so very far from home, half swallowed by his cup in a bar seedier than a pomegranate. White hair, grey eyes, exhaustion of something greater than war written across his face, I had half the mind to try to get his story but what he said damped curiosity's flame.  

“You’re eyes. Familiar.” He murmured more into his ale than to me. I tensed, normally such declarations are punctuated by blades to my gut. My mask of indifference, honed from years in Ishgard and once again in use since the fall of my dearest Ala Mhigo, gave no outward sign of my fear, only raising a single eyebrow in query. When he didn’t continue, I cautiously goaded my foe.

“Oh? Strange.” I laughed, my cup to my lips, thankful my hands didn’t betray the thoughts in my mind by shaking. God’s it had been years since I had dealt with any of my families assassins, I had hoped they had finally left me to my own devices. “Most of the time I’ve been told they’re freakishly unique. Gold and Green as they are.” 

The stranger dropped his eyes from me to his glass, his fingers tightening around it, twisting it aimlessly as the bartender did everything he could to avoid both of us. For good reason, I imagine. We both look the part of the angry loner, he more than I honestly. I leaned back, my glass empty, and slide gil across the counter, hoping eventually the bartender will risk serving us for the glinting gold on the table. 

“What’s familiar about them?” I probed once again. “I don’t recall ever meeting you before ser...” I let the words hang in the air, and attempted to give a reassuring smile. He didn’t look up to see it, but he did shake his head. 

“Estinien. Estinien Wyrmblood.”  He looked back at me, finally, but pointedly avoids looking me in the eye. Uncomfortable. Cornered. A state I’ve been in before, but I needed to know where he’s seen these strange mismatched eyes before. I needed to know if this twenty year vigil was at an end, without a body to bury on the other side. Did dare I hope? Yes. Hopes all that's kept me going over the years. 

“Well then Ser Wyrmblood, I’m Orlaux. Lovely to make your acquaintances, but that still doesn’t answer my question.” I cracked a smile, the one that wins me jobs and pays my tabs, and prevents people from asking for my surname. He seemed to relax a bit. The gears in his mind turning slowly. Figuring how much he wanted to tell a stranger, smart boy really, tired and more world weary than he should be but smart all the same. I would have been lying if I said I wasn’t trying to figure out the exact amount myself. Dangerous to overshare. Dangerous to undershare. 

“I’ve seen them before, but on someone else.” Words fell from his lips like slow melting ice, setting me on edge even as I was grateful for the progress. He ran a nervous hand through his hair, and grimaced as it caught on some knot. “A friend of mine. Better than I deserve. Defended me. Saved my life.”

Saved his life ey? My mind tried to connect the last image I had of my daughter with an older, wiser, and kinder woman. Perhaps a healer, or guard, or perhaps she’d follow after her mother and pick up a rapier and venture. Someone out there helping the world.  I could not help but crack a smile, and my mask, at such a thought. “Oh? What’s her name? Perhaps I have some heroic cousin I should be bragging to my family about.” 

He tensed, and I immediately knew I’ve overstepped something, slipped up somehow. This time it was he who got defensive, snapping his eyes towards mine and squinting with all the rage he can muster, or at least that he can contain in his moderately inebriated state. I could smell the booze coming off of him even before I sat next to him and heard his murmuring about my eyes. He went to open his mouth, but was stopped by the approach of the bartender, who sweeps up my gil and goes to refill us both. 

“Or their name, or his name, though from memory most of my venturing’ cousins prefer feminine pronouns.” I covered my own ass with a half hearted lie. I doubt a sober companion would have bought them, but hopefully a drunken one did. It’s hard to tell with the permanent scowl on this Estinien’s face.  He didn’t look at me again, instead, turning his gaze to his own reflection in his cup, colored gold by the liquor inside. I could have counted this out as a failed lead, nothing more than the drunken ramblings of a lonely Dragoon, when he spoke again.

“She doesn’t have any family,” His words once more to himself more than to me, “Hasn’t for a long time.” He shakes his head hair falling in front of his eyes, blocking his own reflection, and exhales audibly. I watched him carefully, while attempting not to appear as if I was doing so. Failing terrible honestly, but thankfully he was too enthralled by his drink to notice. “Plus, you don’t strike me as a Mhigan, not with a spear like that. What took you out of Ishgard?” 

He looked up, and I caught him taking a glance at a black scarf tied around the neck of his own spear, instead of mine, as he tried to redirect the questions away from himself. A ragged little thing, more grey than truly black anymore, with a time worn symbol of the Destroyer embroidered onto it. I gritted my teeth and think, deciding to leave my answer up to fate and down my drink instead of replying.

“Ala Mhigo did.” Honesty, I always told her to be Honest, best practice what I preach. “A Wanderer in Red stole something from, not something I wanted back, but something I was willing to follow her for.” The thought of my stolen love, my dearest Maerwynn, stalls my tongue for but a second. I blinked, even though I know I’ve no more tears to hold, and feel naught but the hollow ache in my chest. 

“Wanderer in Red...” He repeated after me, sitting up right, making his own choices, hearing some familiar in my words. “They tend to do that, don’t they?”  He faced me and gave me a once over I’m too busy wishing away my memories to notice. I traced the scar on my face absently, cursing its very existence. Perhaps, perhaps if it wasn’t there and I had been at home the Garleans would have never gotten to her. To either of them. 

“Her name is Danica,” His words snap me from my self pity, and I can’t stop my eyes from going wide. I feel my heart skip a beat and hope course through my veins like oxygen. A breath of fresh air in my face after years, nay, decades of stagnation. My rational mind tried to will this away, at least to a reasonable level, but my heart is so overcome with joy I cannot help but show it on my face. I fear the smile may unsettle, but in fact it seemed to relax him. A curiosity for another day, another night of pondering. He looked away, back to his drink, sadly finding it empty. 

I need to know more. This name, this dearest matching name. Eyes like mine. A Hero, a friend. My mind moved faster than it could possibly make coherent sentences, in the end I blurted out my next question with such force Estinien jumps a bit. 

“Where is she?” 

Startled, he blinked, and I once again fear I had faltered. I glanced to the bartender, though I know fate isn’t keen on giving second chances, let alone thirds, and then to him. Finding the red face of someone who truly three sheets to the wind. “Last I saw her she was in Ishgard. Tired, Happy that the Dragonsong war didn’t claim another of her friends.” 

And what once was boiling blood, filled with hope and joy and images of being reunited with a daughter I’ve searched so damn long for freezes in my veins. 

Ishgard.

Of course she had to be in fucking Ishgard. She had to be within stabbing distance of my family, she had to be in danger. She had to be where if I was seen, I’d be chased out with pitchforks and torches bought with nobles money or worse. Branded a heretic and executed in some fun and brutal way where accepting my death would prove my innocence. A land even more dangeorus for me than fucking Garlemald. 

Yet. I would still go. 

Even for the chance, the hope, that his Danica and my Dani were one in the same. That I’d walk into the Forgotten Knight decades after I last left it and see my daughter enjoying a fine evening surrounded by friends and those who care for her and see her smile up at me again like when she was small and asking for bedtime stories about heroes and dragons. Even if she wasn’t with friends, even if she was alone, even if she didn’t recognize me in the slightest. 

Alive. Just Alive would do.

I stood from the bar and tapped the newest of Ishgards expatriots on the shoulder in thanks. Though I doubt he knew the weight his words had had on me. He barely looked over his shoulder to me as I departed without so much as a word. A rudeness, but one I felt was needed when my own words could not be trusted to hide my truths in such a state or joy and fear. 

I had much to consider and plan, in the relative safety of my inn room, but found no such purchase as I laid my head down. The wine and memories overtaking me into a realm of sleep that for once, seemed not so dark. 

So we start off Homestuck 2 with a picture of space. Got some green space clouds. So far nothing I would not expect. Though I see there also appears to be a spaceship of some kind, zooming through all this space. Would this be Dirk’s ship?

. . . Yep. That’s defiantly Dirk’s ship. I’m sure Theseus has some really deep, literary meaning, but the reference flies right over my head. As does most of Dirk’s references. He’s too smart for me.

I find it funny that Jake continues the tradition of emblazoning his face on his things. We saw his alt-self of Grandpa Harley doing at all the time. Dirk, of course, has to scribble out the face of his ex.

Dirk. Dirk, are you wearing a villain cape right now? Is that what you’re doing in this moment? Dirk, please.

He is totally wearing a villain cape, complete with tattered edges. He is also wearing a Heart gi, because Dirk is nothing if not anime.

Jesus Christ, I already see the paragraphs of orange under this. You’re gonna make me read all this, aren’t you. Dirk?

Dirk proves to be as verbose as ever.

So did Dirk really write out all his narration on physical pieces of paper and scatter them over his desk? Did he do that just to be Extra, or is that something he has to do as an Author now? Do they only count in the narrative text if they are actual text and not just his own thoughts?

Whatever the case may be, Rose interrupts his soliloquy.

I have it on authority that decanting is sometimes necessary to ensure a wine is at its best. I like to think that the same was ultimately true of her.

Decanting of a person’s soul sounds particularly ominous, thought I can’t express the exact reason why.

ROSEBOT: I just imagined you wearing an apron over your god tier outfit and almost felt my facial fuselage buckle in such a way as to approximate a fleeting smile.

Glad to see being a robot and also assimilating all her possible selves Rose remains a sass queen.

DIRK: Alright we get it you are literally a robot.

DIRK: No need to keep pointing it out every chance you can get. I got enough of this with the Auto Responder.

ROSEBOT: I'm just playing along.

ROSEBOT: One of the fundamentals of bad science fiction is that any artificial beings must make their inorganic nature known at every juncture they can.

DIRK: Do overly precise and completely meaningless statistics that you pull out of your ass on the fly also count?

ROSEBOT: Oh absolutely.

ROSEBOT: That's one of the first things you just sort of spontaneously learn when being booted up.

ROSEBOT: For example, I've calculated that by making these remarks I have raised the base level of amusement in all my conversations by 36%.

DIRK: Well I don't personally find them very funny.

Dirk has some trauma with robots pulling out bullshit statics. Which makes it all the more fascinating he continues to build robots that can have free thought.

Jesus Christ, it wasn’t just the lighting, Dirk’s shades really are orange now. Hussie may not have known about Kamina when he designed Bro, but Dirk always wearing Kamina glasses has just become a part of his character. So much so that they are even colored like Kamina’s instead of black now. I have to wonder, had Kamina not been a character that already existed or if people hadn’t kept pointing out that Dirk/Bro wore shades similar to an anime character, would Dirk be so anime? Is being anime just a character trait that Hussie gave him because of a funny coincidence and he wanted to play up the joke, or was he always intended to be so anime?

Also is that trashcan literally an inferno?

ROSEBOT: I just thought you might like to know that we're getting pretty close to your chosen crash site.

Do they not know how to land the ship? Does the ship not have landing gear? Do they need to crash for narrative reasons and otherwise would be perfectly capable of landing normally? Is Rose just making a joke?

DIRK: Wait, crash site??

Oh, good, Dirk is as confused as I am. So that rules out narrative reasons.

ROSEBOT: A landing gear appears to have fallen just a little outside the realm of vital.

So lacking landing gear it is! God damn it, Jake.

DIRK: (God DAMN it English.)

Ha!

ROSEBOT: Don't be such a chud, Dirk.

I am afraid to ask what a chud is. Is that like a cuck? I don’t know what a cuck is either. I am also afraid to ask what a cuck is.

ROSEBOT: She's functionally mortal, remember?

Yeah, that really sucks that Karkat, Terezi, and Kanaya all lack godtier. Karkat would complain about his lack of flight abilities, but I’m surprised Terezi or Kanaya never brought up this fact. Especially Kanaya, what with her marriage to Rose. Kanaya would eventually grow old and die, leaving Rose to keep on living. Of course, Rosebot has decided to leave her loving wife behind so in this particular case that point doesn’t matter.

DIRK: You mean to say that you don't think we'd be in peril if it came to it?

DIRK: There's nothing about our situation that strikes you as falling within the bounds of precarity, as far as the rules are concerned?

ROSEBOT: Oh. You're right. I suppose I hadn't thought of that.

ROSEBOT: But I think we can remain calm in the knowledge that nothing particularly heroic is going on right now. At least, not that I'm aware of.

DIRK: ... Right.

Not sure if Dirk’s meaning flew over Rose’s head, or if she’s just choosing to ignore the possibility of Just deaths as a joke.

That doesn't mean this (*gestures to the narrative*) isn't still going to be a thing, though.

I don’t know why, but this tickles my funny bone.

All in all I think you'll find, as far as narrators go, I'm an excellent... hm. On second thought, maybe that's a bit of a problematic phrase. Yeah, yikes, that one's got a sordid history. Best we steer clear of it. We're all lucky I'm around to make those kinds of sensitivity judgements on everyone's behalf.

I’m glad you can recognize that Homestuck fans all have a fight or flight response that that memetic phrase, but I don’t appreciate you patting yourself on the back for being sensitive when you, as a narrator, could not use Roxy’s correct pronouns once they came to light.

It's time to get this story back on the rails, back to what it was always supposed to be. I know it, and you've somehow always known it too. There was something else, some other route that Homestuck was meant to take but then didn't, a way that wouldn't've spent so much time dicking around with stuff nobody cares about. Like seriously, why did we all have to sit through talking about everyone's most intimate and private feelings for two hundred thousand fucking words. That would never have happened in Act 1. Where did it all go wrong?

So Dirk’s grand plan is to go back to the asinine tomfoolery of Act 1? To do away with character relations and feelings and have people messing around with their sylladexes? I must say, I never would have expected this from the likes of Dirk. I thought he was all about the complex thought processes and inner turmoil.

Thank you for returning the narration to classic black, Dirk. It’s so much easier on the eyes.

Channelling my full potential as an ascended player of Heart, I expand my consciousness to commune with the boundless force of collective willpower that is the internet.

Wow, who knew Heart players could become the internet. I mean, I guess it makes sense. The internet is just a collection of people, and Heart is all about the soul. 

I was really hoping the command box he made would be an actual command box. I missed out on the Homestuck days of old where the command box was a real thing. It would have been fun to be a part of that myself, but I understand the fandom is just too big for that ever to be feasible again. That’s why it was done away with in the first place, and that was when the fandom was smaller.

The writers came up with e good command, though.

Yeah, I have a feeling Dirk is going to decide to ignore this command and stop taking suggestions. Either that, or he’s going to inform us that he is not making Homestuck, he’s making Homestuck 2.

But I should have known better. People think you can run a story like this? This must be just about the stupidest idea anyone has ever come up with. I'll just have to make up the commands myself from here on out. Seemed to work ok for the other guy.

Yep, pretty much what I expected.

Oh Jesus Christ, what even is this room?

O.K., let’s take things from the top. Looks like we got the beta kids’ entry items, as well as their Aspect flags from Prospit and Derse. Why does Dirk have these things? There also appear to be some cruxite dowels next to them, but they are any of the colors we’ve seen before.

WOAH, HOLD UP, Are those Dave’s copies of SBURB? Or are they Bro’s? Clearly Dirk has just collected a bunch of items from various points in Homestuck’s timeline like some sort of museum. For what purpose, though?

Oh my god, there’s a Tab watering can. I assume it was alchemized, since Dirk mentioned earlier using alchemy to make his rad new shades. I wonder why Dirk has that Skaianet poster on his wall. I would have thought he’d want nothing to do with anything Jake had his fingers in. Then again, there also appears to be a kotatsu with Jake’s bedspread in the middle of the room.

I can’t tell what the green thing is next to the mutated kitten. Or what that other green thing next to the robot horse is either.

OH FUCK ME THERE’S A ROBOT CAL IN THE PROCESS OF BEING MADE. DIRK, NO. WHY. YOU HAVE THE NARRATIVE CONTROL NOW, YOU SHOULD KNOW CAL IN ANY FORM IS BAD NEWS.

Is that... Is that an anime body pillow there at the bottom?

I also keep my FLORA OF THE SUCCULENT PERSUASION in here, so's I can keep an eye on them.

Dirk grows succulents... That is not a character trait I expected of him.

> Continue

Beyond the Opulence

A/N: While I’m briefly taking a breather from Laws of Motion, I saw it fit to go back to some self-indulgent reader-inserts, so here we are. This new series of one-shots features FFXV men (older!bros in particular) in varying AUs. First up is Noctis.

Tagging some pals! @raspberryandechinacea @noboomoon @emmydots @gowithme @valkyrieofardyn @blindedstarlight @lazarustrashpit @bleucommelhiver @hanatsuki89 @animakupo (lmk if y’all want to get tagged on the succeeding ones!)

(Links in AO3) Alternate Universes in Which You and I Belong Together: Noctis | Gladio | Prompto | Ignis | Nyx | Cor | Ravus | Ardyn

The draft of your resignation letter on your computer screen is staring right at you with serious judgment, and you immediately think how Noctis is going to take this.

You have thoroughly considered Weskham Armaugh’s promising job offer in Altissia Works. Higher pay, better benefits. The title of VP for Communications definitely has a nice ring to it. But you know that quitting your current job is the last thing you ever want to do. As executive assistant to the CEO, dealing with the hustle that came along with your responsibilities is what you enjoy best: procurement requests, internal communications, meeting arrangements, public affairs, game launches and conventions, and pretty much overseeing Noctis’s day-to-day schedule have all become a steady ritual that you can probably do even in your sleep. You are severely fond with your work, so much so that you do not mind how taxing it could get on most months; the benefits and compensation that comes with your job even helps you in more ways to sustain a decent living. Besides, it’s not like you are not getting any support; if Ignis had not come along and taken the wheel behind all financial and strategic side of things, you would have easily lost your mind to stress. His sharp wit equates to his even sharper mind, and with all the years of working together, both you and Noctis have acknowledged that neither of you will survive without Ignis’s thoughtful counsel. In fact, Noctis claims he couldn’t find a better tandem to work with; for someone who is occasionally quiet and reclusive, he is pretty outspoken to always let you know one certain truth: that he wouldn’t survive a day without you and Ignis at all if he wanted to keep a robust video game company running at its finest.

So you didn’t mind the overtime hours. You didn’t mind the workload.

But as much as you love working for Noctis, you really don’t love the idea that you are recklessly falling in love with him.

Years of being around him, and you cannot really recall how this feeling unraveled itself. Was it because he is always checking up on you whenever you are spending too many late nights in the office? Was it whenever he brings you your favourite takeout food when you scarcely move from your seat even on lunch breaks? Or was it that time when he showed up in the middle of a Tinder date gone wrong after you texted him a simple ‘fuck this guy is a nutjob send help’? He always has your back, as you always have his. But how long have you felt this aching weakness for him? You know Noctis is always kind, if not a little too generous for his own good. He always goes out of his way to help others, treats everyone as equals. No hierarchy or class ever prevented him from reaching out to people. Even with someone like you, who had to claw your way out of the slums into this better life you have designed for yourself.

This, you thought, is what makes Noctis such a perfect guy: he is caring and selfless, even if he has a strange affinity with cats, or if he gets way too enthusiastic about fishing and video games. Sure, some people may think that the only notable things that qualify Noctis in the hall of perfection is because of how he is a handsome and dashing bachelor in his thirties who owns one of the most successful startup companies in all of Eos—a bold and impressive feat, considering he is already heir to a billion gil Lucian conglomerate. But he is more than his family name, more than his net worth, more than his pretty face.

And yet, perfect guy Noctis may be, he certainly is not perfect for you. He may still be in the market, but he is most surely way out of your league.

You minimize the word document and squeeze your eyes shut for a moment. The looming tower of files on your desk is already giving you a head-splitting migraine. The shrill sound of the printer right beside your cubicle is only making it worse. Not to mention, the group of game devs and quality analysts loudly debating their ideas in the conference room right across from your workstation. Interns are milling busily through the halls—some on skateboard, some on rollerblades. The background noise is starting to become insufferable. Even your favourite pop album blasting on repeat from your earphones is not helping. You return to your draft, and begin editing a couple of sentences:

After careful consideration, it is with deepest regret that I should inform you of my decision to leave the company. This is because...

You are tempted to end the sentence with a more blatant truth that says I am in love with you and could no longer stand being around you than saying that you are to pursue a better career opportunity. Which is downright nuts. Absolutely batshit crazy. It is true that you are never one to mix work with pleasure, and you are not that shallow to leave something behind for a petty reason...

But this rotten one-sided feeling with Noctis is a torment you cannot stand any longer.

Why do I always fall for the ones I could never have?

You are so close to murdering anyone who dares to step within the close perimeter of your workstation when a knock against your desk startles your fiercely undivided attention away from your screen.

“You seem like you’re about to massacre the whole floor. You good?”

You look up to see Noctis standing in front of you—extremely dapper clad in a white dress shirt and jeans—studying you with extreme concern. With much speed and dexterity and without even looking at your monitor, you quickly replace the word document on your computer and pull up the presentation deck with a subtle alt tab on the keyboard. The slide on display is that of the organizational chart that shows a couple of the functional units paired with the names of its respective leads. Cor Leonis, Risk and Control. Prompto Argentum, Creatives. Cindy Aurum, Product Engineering. Nyx Ulric, Game Development. You smile at him and say, “Yup, all good. Just reviewing my slides for the town hall later.”

“Really?” He raises an eyebrow, rubs a hand over his stubble-crusted jaw. A playful smile tugs on the corners of his mouth. “But you already know our monthly demographics like the back of your hand.”

“That’s Iggy, not me.”

“You keep selling yourself short,” he says, a little bit sternly. Then, he glances at his watch and all of a sudden, he narrows his eyes at you. “You haven’t eaten yet, have you?”

“Why, thank you very much for asking, sir, but I already have,” you lie with an awfully pleasant smile.

As expected, Noctis is not buying it. The scowl on his face clearly says so. “Don’t make me ask Pelna to terminate your access.”

You laugh. “Wow, you’re going to ask our best programmer to go on this extreme measure just to get me out to lunch? I couldn’t even imagine how your Cybersecurity Director is going to take that breach of protocol.”

“I think Gladio’s gonna let that one pass.”

"HR, then?"

"Nah, Monica and Holly would probably support this."

“Oh really? How so?”

“Yes, ‘cause they know I’ll do everything for you to go out with me.” Noctis pauses, and you stare at him.

“I’m sorry, what—“

“I mean, for lunch—“ Noctis reaches for the back of his neck, and he swiftly backpedals in a flustered stutter— “like go out with me for lunch is what I mean—uh, you know. ‘Cause we know you rarely go out to lunch. Or even outside, for breaks. And ‘cause pulling the plug of your workstation clearly isn’t going to work with you.”

“Oh. Right.” You nod and you can feel the pinprick of needles on your chest. Either from the way he seemed to vehemently deny his way out of his misspoken invitation or the fact that you almost thought he felt the same way about you, you cannot tell at this point. Maybe it’s both.

The silence that follows is close to unbearable.

Noctis awkwardly starts, “So, you mind if—“

“Hey there, you two.” Nyx suddenly saunters in front of your desk, all swagger in his black leather jacket, and you almost thank the gods out loud for his casual intervention. He greets Noctis with a clap on the shoulder, and he looks at the both of you with a cheeky lopsided grin. “Am I interrupting—“

“No,” you and Noctis both say all at once, and way too defensively.

“Okay, cool.” Nyx flashes one of his devilish smirks, all the while still warily eyeing both you and Noctis. “Anyway—“ Nyx turns to you, sliding one hand through his hair and pushing the other on the pocket of his jeans— “you wanna grab some lunch at Yamachang’s, chief? I owe you big time for sending me the stats I needed on the mobile app I’m working with Crowe and Libertus. I’m a Lannister and I always pay my debts—“

“Yeah, sure,” you immediately tell Nyx as you briskly rise from your seat. You don’t know what made you agree with Nyx’s invitation so easily, that when you glance at Noctis, he is looking at you with an expression that you cannot seem to figure out.

“Glad someone’s finally successful in getting you out of your cubicle for a change,” Noctis says with an odd smile. “I’ll see you both in the town hall, alright?”

As Noctis walks away and starts to mingle with the game devs in the conference room, you see Nyx is watching you curiously.

“What?” You try not to sound annoyed, but the question spills snappily out of your mouth.

Nyx clicks his tongue and shakes his head. “You two are really something, huh.”

“What does that even mean?”

“It means…” Nyx sighs, leaning against your desk. “Never mind. C’mon, let’s get going.”

Nyx offers you his hand and you take it. He whisks you out of your desk, and you laugh at his weird display of chivalry. As the two of you make your way out of the office, you pass the conference room and your eyes land on Noctis. His eyes meet yours, and he gives you a small smile. Nyx’s hand on yours suddenly feel terribly out of place. The thought of your resignation begins to settle heavily at the pit of your stomach. The job offer in Altissia has never been so appealing.

The town hall concluded without a hitch. By end of the day, you are pretty much exhausted, but relieved all the same. Everyone left early for the long weekend, and you are glad to have the whole floor all by yourself.

Well, almost.

Noctis is still in his office, his door wide open. You double-check his calendar to see if he has anything lined up on his schedule. He’s free for the rest of the night, and you take a deep breath.

This is it. You have already made up your mind, following your better judgment. It’s now or never, you think to yourself as you march your way to his office, letter in hand.

You knock at the door. “Hey,” you say, and Noctis looks up at you. A wide smile brightens his face.

“Hi, come in,” he says, gesturing to the couch in front of him. He eyes you nervously. “Have I missed any urgent meeting? Or anything that needs my approval?”

“No. Actually, you’re already free from this time onwards. Checked your calendar before I came here.” You couldn’t help but laugh. Of course, most of the time you have ever entered Noctis’s office is to remind him whenever he’s running late for a meeting or to follow him up on matters that require his immediate attention.

But this time around, it pains you that you’re here in front him for an entirely different reason.

“Oh, by the way—great job earlier, as usual,” Noctis says rather proudly. “Not that I’m surprised.”

“Um, thanks.” You wince another smile. His genuine kindness is a rock in your mouth that is slowly grating you with guilt.

“So…” Noctis trails off, his fingers drumming against his desk, and he is still looking at you with searching eyes. “I hope you’re not planning on staying here in the office for a few more hours.”

“Nope.” You shake your head. Your insides are twisted into knots when you say, “Actually, I’m already planning on leaving.”

You slide the letter on his desk. He unfolds it, and you watch how his smiling face shifts into something else. At first, he is surprised, then the second, he is completely crushed.

Noctis lets out a shuddery sigh. “I don’t understand—“

“I don’t need you to,” you swiftly say. “I got an offer. In Altissia. I’m sorry if this had been so sudden. Not to worry, I have all of my tasks and responsibilities properly documented for transition—“

“No, I don’t care about any of that,” he says, his voice deeply strained. “I just want to know why.” He pushes himself off his desk, circling over to you. “You said you love working here.”

“Yes, I do.” You cannot bear looking at him. Tears are starting to well under your eyes. “But I…”

“But what?” Noctis is now standing so close to you, his eyes casting you a searching look. “Tell me, please.” He moves in another inch. You could already smell his perfume, and you swear if he moves any closer you are going to shatter.

“Noct, it’s just...“ you say, and his name almost breaks along with the sound of your voice. “I don’t think I can work here if I—“

A solid knock on the door traps the remaining words in your mouth. You wipe your eyes before you turn to see Ignis standing by the doorway. He looks at you, then at Noctis. If he had caught on any of the conversation, Ignis is doing an excellent job not showing it on his face.

“My apologies,” Ignis says. His tone is urgent. “Aranea from the Niflheim Studios’ Business Division just called. Says it’s about Ardyn’s offer for a collaboration. Should I ask her to call back—“

“It should be okay, Iggy,” you tell him, waving a hand. “I was just about to go.” To Noctis, you say, “I think you should probably take that. You know how your uncle can get so utterly relentless.”

Before Ignis or Noctis could breathe another word, you hastily take your leave. Ignis gingerly closes the door behind you, and his discussion with Noctis is reduced into hushed whispers. You walk back to your workstation, and as quietly and quickly as you could, you take the opportunity to pack all your personal effects while no one is around. You have so many memories here in Lucis Labs that as you stuff each frame and trinket into the cardboard box, there‘s no use holding back your tears. The annual trips with the whole team, the late night dinners with the game devs, the caffeinated days of tireless convention weeks…

It’s slowly dawning on you that not only you are leaving Noctis behind, you are also leaving a ragtag bunch of geniuses you have come to consider as family.

Unsteadily, you carry your belongings, weaving your way past the dimly lit hallways, past the glass boards and collaboration spaces, past the array of black-and-white cubicles, and onto the lifts. Downstairs at the Citadel’s lobby, your footsteps echo against the mosaic floors that one of the guards turn to look at your direction. It happens to be Dave, whom you already consider a pal after all the help he has extended to you on occasions you have missed bringing your ID to work. He takes a glimpse on the box you have wrapped around your arms. He cast you a stunned look.

“How? Why?” Dave asks in disbelief. His graying hair and beard looks just as lonely as this evening.

“Found a new job,” you say with a small smile. You hope he doesn’t notice how your eyes are still wet with tears. Kindly enough, he says nothing. He only offers you a polite nod and a sad smile as he ushers you out of the turnstile.

Just when you’re only a few steps away from leaving the premises, you hear your name echo all over the vastness of the almost empty foyer from a very familiar voice.

You turn and you see Noctis running after you.

“Wait,” he says, and he’s panting like he’s taken all twelve flight of stairs in a hurry just to get to you. Or has he?

“Noct, please. If you’re here—“

“I’m not here to stop you from taking the offer,” Noctis cuts you off. He exhales loudly, catches another lungful of air, before he goes on, “If you think it’s best for your career, then I’ll support you. No matter what. I’ve always believed that you’re off to do great things, and I’m sorry if how I acted earlier made you think otherwise. I just… it’s hard for me to accept that I’m about to lose the best assistant one could ever ask for.”

“Please don’t say that. You still have Ignis.”

“But Ignis is not you. And he knows that, too.” Noctis steps closer to you, smiling. He takes the box off your hands and sets it on the floor. “So, now that you’re effectively no longer working for me, I guess I have to do one more thing.”

“What thing—”

Noctis does not let you finish the sentence when he crushes his lips with yours. He kisses you fiercely, in a way that loudly proclaims I’ve been feeling the same way about you, and I just don’t know how to show it.

Despite wanting to believe that this is all happening, your disbelief pulls you away from Noctis. Breathlessly, you say, “Wait, I just want to be clear—you… you like me?”

Noctis laughs. “Goodness. I don’t just like you—I’ve been in love with you for as long as I can remember. It’s just—” he bites his lip, reaches for the back of his head the same way he always does whenever he is at a loss for words, but he shakes his head and pushes through— ”it’s, uh, well… I know how you don’t like being involved with romantic affairs at work. I know how you keep your private life completely separate from your job, and I respect that. I didn’t want to complicate things for you, so I kept my distance, in a way. So… by the time I realized how strongly I feel about you, and after learning from the people in the office that it’s obvious that our feelings are mutual, let’s just say it felt like I am fucked.” He pauses, and the blush on his handsome face is in full bloom. Then, as if by some realization, the pleasant expression on his face wilts into a mild panic. “Shit, am I wrong? You don’t feel the same way, too, do you—“

“No, no!” You say quickly, catching him by his arms. “I… That’s not it. I do feel the same way, Noct. I’m just surprised, that’s all. I didn’t realize that it was so obvious for people to know. I never heard about it from anyone.”

“That’s because everyone is terrified of you.” Noctis smiles, and he playfully pinches your chin.

You frown. “You make me sound like I’m Cor.”

“Hey, don’t worry—he’s of a different calibre.”

You quirk an eyebrow. “So you’re not terrified of me? Is that it?”

“Well, I will always be terrified of you,” Noctis says teasingly. “Because it's one of the many reasons why I love you.”

This time, you yank him by the collar of shirt and pull him for another kiss. There exists a fraction of a moment in that kiss where time is in a standstill; your mind freezes, your heart stops beating, and there is only that rush of electricity racing down your spine. And then, all at once, the knots in your stomach have untangled. Your hands finally move on its own accord, and so does your lips.

He presses his forehead against yours. In a breathy whisper, he says, “I’m yours. I want to be yours. Will you be mine?”

“Yes,” you say, and you cannot help the smile tugging on the corners of your mouth. “I’m all yours.”

Bughead, 9

9. meeting online au

(also had an anon send me this one so y’all really wanted it!) (also, this one got long, whoops)

.

.

.

He never set out to be a Reddit guy. The connotations there were just too fraught—maybe five years ago, the description could just bring to mind shitposts and recycled memes, but it’s 2017 and he’s trying his actual, genuine hardest to not be an edgelord. 

Unfortunately, he thinks he has the predisposition for it, so he has to be careful. Especially considering what a snowflake standard he held himself to in high school. But in the same way undergrad taught him he’d never fully be a woke white dude and to fight his instincts to alt-control-delete his emotions, he’s avoided being an Internet Guy. 

There’s a sense of irony with the fact that most of his interests lie in the nostalgic, anyway. He likes Kubrick films. He dresses like he personally raided Kurt Cobain’s closet. He listens to a lot of David Byrne. 

But he still came of age in the aughts, so there’s a level of inevitability about his dependency to technology—particularly during the month he inherits his father’s motorcycle. 

“I’m getting to old for this thing, Jug, and you’ve gotta get around town,” his father had said, tugging a plastic blue tarp off. He supposes what was underneath it could be construed as a motorcycle, but only in that it had two wheels. 

“I think I’m better off with the bus,” Jughead said gloomily, his eyebrows knotted in the general direction of the bike. 

“Come on, son. It just needs a little elbow grease. I’ll help you fix it up,” his father had offered, though Jughead knew better than to rely on that. 

His dad has come a long way with his rehabilitation and was there when he really needed to be, but it was the times that things weren’t a life-or-death necessity that he didn’t always show up. 

Still, while Providence, Rhode Island is technically a city, it’s also got a bus system designed by a four year old with a crayon. 

And he’s far too principled for ride-shares, so it might not be so bad to have an alternate form of transportation. So he says fine, Dad and he takes the bike, and on second thought, takes another helmet too, though he has no idea why. What, is he going to wear one on top of the other? 

Still. The thing looks like it’ll dismantle itself at a slight breeze.

However, a couple hours into the manual he’s checked out from the Brown University Library, he realizes he’s in way over his head. The only part of the book he understands is the chapter that makes him realize they’re not even describing the type of motorcycle he has. Great.

From across the living room, Archie says he should google it, to which he replies, golly, no one’s ever suggested that before, and in response gets a pencil thrown at his head, followed by a request to throw the pencil back so he can finish his work. 

Rolling his eyes and tossing the pencil back—he doesn’t aim for it to land a foot away from Archie, but is pleased when it does—Jughead pulls his computer forward. His fingers hesitate over the keys, realizing he actually has no idea what kind of bike it is. It’s small, that’s all he knows. 

He shoots his dad a text asking him, but a glance at the time tells him his father is halfway through a shift at the construction site, and he’ll be lucky to hear back by nightfall. 

He peruses the internet with a half-hearted attempt to figure it out, but unsurprisingly, google searches titled small motorcycle and small bike with one headlight and what the fuck is this thing do not help. 

He has a few photos on his phone of the motorcycle, so the only things he knows about it is that it’s got a slight build and the brand is Honda.

Eventually, he finds himself on a Reddit thread for mechanics and classic car enthusiasts, and decides that’s a good place to start, because the only other thing he knows about the bike is that it’s old. 

Jughead makes an account and uploads his photos with the caption - uh, i know this sounds pretty stupid, but i inherited this bike and i’m trying to get it up and running but realized i have no idea what it is or where to start. any tips would be greatly appreciated. 

He closes his laptop, deciding he’ll use the interim time to work on this thesis. Between his work as a TA, the overall sufferings of being a grad student, now this stupid motorcycle which was supposed to help more than hinder, and the fact that he’s caught himself spacing out over the pretty blonde in his writing seminar twice—which is just—he isn’t thirteen, he should be beyond this—well, he’s a bit behind. 

After a couple hours, he checks the thread. There’s a response underneath his post, from a one MiniCoop59, informing him that they’re not totally sure, but thinks he owns a Honda GB500 cafe racer. 

He googles it, and that appears to be exactly the one sitting in the garage, so he goes back to the Reddit tab. 

yeah, this is it! thanks! now i just need to find the right manual this time lol, he comments back. 

And he expects that to be the end of it. But when he checks his email fifteen minutes later, there’s a notification from Reddit, and MiniCoop59. 

No problem! They’ve typed back. I wasn’t sure, my area of interest is more old cars. But glad I could help. 

He clicks on their username, curious to see what else they’ve posted, for no real reason other than utter and complete procrastination from his thesis. 

As he expected, Jughead finds a couple posts about engines, advice about fixing up an old Volkswagen van with a wry additional comment asking if they’re planning on following around the Grateful Dead for a while. It makes him snort. There’s also, more surprisingly, a post on a thread about anxiety where they talk about the pressures of deciding if graduate school is worth it or a waste of money. 

He raises his eyebrows, not only because he admires their response to dealing with anxiety and being frank about the way it manifests so that it doesn’t control you—and also because of the part about grad school. That’s definitely a question he’s asked himself, even halfway through his own second degree. 

Jughead returns to the original thread. 

it was, he writes. thanks again. also, hey, i’m bored and procrastinating, so i looked at your profile. ever figure out if grad school was a waste of money? been asking myself that and have no real answer. 

The response doesn’t take long. 

Haha! No, never figured it out. But too late now, I’m already enrolled. 

same. guess that’s how they get us.

Big time. Especially the Ivies, they trick you into thinking it’s so worth it! Like, if you got in *there*, you have to take that opportunity!

same again. Brown should be called Green for all the cash they’ve sapped from me. 

After that, MiniCoop59 stops answering. Jughead considers this reasonable, given that it’s almost dinner time, and if they’re at an Ivy league school like him, they’re somewhere on the east coast and thus in the same time zone.

However, they also don’t reply the next day, or the day after. It doesn’t matter, because his dad has gotten back to him, with a voicemail that confirms MiniCoop59′s answer. (His dad is still terrible at texting.)

Eventually, Jughead forgets all about Reddit, including the bike in the garage, especially the deeper into the semester he gets. He’s too busy, and he’s not going to ride the thing around in the dead of New England winter, anyway, so he stops trying to rush it. 

However, as leaves start to appear on trees and he’s no longer wearing all five of his layers at once to stave off the cold, Jughead thinks about the motorcycle again, and decides it’s finally time to fix up the thing. 

He checks the thread once more for the brand MiniCoop59 has given him, and heads to the campus library, his eyes flicking over the snow drop flowers peeking out of the soil. Spring is almost here. 

He recognizes the woman behind the circulation desk as the pretty blonde from his fall semester writing seminar, and his throat runs a little dry. He’s done his best not to create a fantasy around someone he doesn’t know, but he hasn’t been able to get past the one time they were in a group together and she critiqued his essay so perfectly that he actually almost got turned on. 

He’s pretty sure he remembers her name is Betty, because it’s such an odd name for a millennial he doubts he’d make that up. But the class was so big and they were only in the same group that one time, that he can’t be positive. 

But. Well, he’s always had a thing for nostalgia, so it’s just the kind of name he’d accidentally think was the name of his crush.  

“Hey,” he says, his fingers around the edge of the circulation counter. “Looking for some help finding a book.” 

She glances up from her novel, her big green eyes roving over him. “Sure,” she says, her neck tilted slightly, as if perhaps trying to decide if she remembers him too, or if that’s just his imagination. She closes the book and pushes it aside, rolling slightly in her chair to face the library computer. “Do you know the author?”

“Uh, I’m actually looking for a manual,” he says, scratching behind his ear. “On motorcycles? I have the model and make, if that helps.”

She smiles, though her head is fully angled now, looking at him curiously. “It will. Let’s head over to the section and see if we can find what you’re looking for. I’m Betty, by the way.”

“I know,” he says, and immediately squeezes his eyes shut with a cringe. “I mean, we were in a writing seminar together.”

“Oh!” Betty says, standing from her chair. “I thought that was you! You’re…Jughead, right? Hard to forget that name.”

He snorts, shaking his head. “Yeah. I get that a lot. It’s still better than the alternative, though.”

As she leads him across the library, the look she passes him is a little wry. They pull to a stop in front of a shelf that has been categorized by the label MANUALS and the further sublabel of MOTORCYCLES. 

Jughead pulls out his phone and finds MiniCoop59′s description. “So I was told I have a Honda GB500. Oh, cafe racer,” he says, and when he lowers his phone from his face, Betty is gaping at him.

“Oh my god, wait, are you HotDogHotDogHotDog?” 

His face burns bright red as the gears turn in his head, and he stares at her right back. “I…what? You’re MiniCoop?” 

She giggles, hiding her snickering behind a polite hand. “Don’t give me that look, when your username had the word hot dog in it three times.”

“That was…my dog’s name,” he says lamely, still too shocked and embarrassed to say anything else. He huffs. “Look, okay, I was not planning on using that profile ever again. It was the first thing that came to mind.”

“Obviously,” she replies, still giggling. 

He groans, scrubbing a hand down his face. When he looks at her again, her expression has turned slightly rueful as she nibbles on her lip. “Um—listen, I didn’t reply because when you said you went to Brown too, and you’d read my post about anxiety, I just…I didn’t want you to be someone who knew me. Didn’t want to be judged.”

He’d honestly forgotten she’d stopped replying, and is surprised that she has any guilt over it. But at the wide look in her eye, he’s realizing that just might be her personality; perennially worried she’s upset anyone. 

“It’s really okay,” he says. “I get that. I mean, I didn’t know who you were. But even if I did, I definitely wouldn’t judge you. I actually…admired it. What you talked about.”

It’s true; if anything, this just endears her to him more, her honesty and the self-care she talked about. Her lips press together thoughtfully, but she pivots quickly, her attention moving to scan the bookshelf. “Well. I think this is what you’re looking for,” she says, offering him a weathered manual. 

“Thanks,” he says, after a moment. He swallows, trying to gather his courage, because this is the girl he’s been thinking about since October, and she looks especially beautiful against the light filtered through the stacks. “Uh, listen. “Would you want to…um. Hang out sometime? I mean, like, while I work on the bike?” He rushes to add. “Since I know you have an interest in mechanics, and, well—”

“You have no idea what you’re doing, do you?” She interrupts, her lips tipped up in amusement. 

He blows out a breath, not sure if she means about his haphazard attempt to ask her out, or the motorcycle. “No. None.” 

Betty’s grin is nearly shy as she nods. “In that case, I would love to,” she replies, and Jughead decides he’ll have to thank his dad for the motorcycle one more time.

.

.

.

To people complaining about Blood Elf RP.

**MOD NOTE: Placing this under a cut because jesus christ dude this shit was fucking long**

Dear players who continually complain about Blood Elves,

I came to Wyrmrest Accord from a dead server, completely alone, no contacts, no friends. I was elated to find a Silvermoon that actually had people in it, I moved my priest over before my main and sat on the edge of the fountain in Silvermoon while alt tabbed finishing my last night of raiding with a guild before transferring my main.

I tabbed back in to jump and noticed there were people roleplaying at me. My first roleplay experience on Wyrmrest Accord. It was a pair of Orcs who had come to Silvermoon specifically to antagonize and hate on Blood Elves. So here my dude was, sitting there minding his own business, gazing at the fountain, and being the recipient of hostility. What made so little sense about it was that they were antagonizing my character because there are too many Blood Elves in Silvermoon. I think my character gave them a look as if they were wearing their pants on their head because that’s like going to France and complaining that too many people are speaking French.

Over the years I’ve witnessed a non-stop bombardment, mostly from Orcs, Trolls, and Undead, but from everyone to a lesser extent, hating me despite not even knowing me simply because when I made a Blood Elf Paladin in Burning Crusade I found I like playing Blood Elves. I like their animations, I like their jokes, I like their voice actor who was also responsible for playing many characters I enjoyed on television when growing up. I liked their background story, being a zombie apocalypse survivor for whom the ends justify the means is really cool. What kind of pain, what kind of suffering must this character have gone through? How has he coped? How does he think, how does his experiences shape him? Who has he lost? How has he survived? That’s some nifty lore.

But this hate has come from all sides and is constant. I see it on Forums, Tumblr, Facebook when I bothered, Discord, OOC in chat channels, IC by people who have decided to come to Silvermoon just to pick on the elves. It’s everywhere and it’s inescapable. I watch as almost daily RPer bashes people for playing elves. Every. Day.

I’ve begun to just see images of indignant children shouting in shrill voices, “STOP LIKING WHAT I DON’T LIKE” and “STOP NOT LIKING WHAT I LIKE” when I read complaints about Blood Elves. And no, it doesn’t matter how you frame it, it’s still complaining.

You can try to frame it as a “diversity” issue but when push comes to shove you aren’t paying for anyone else’s subscription so you don’t really have a say in what they play. You could go to Blizzard and demand that they put a limit on the number of one class you can play but I can tell you right now that they will never enact such a limit. In reality we will probably see further relaxation on race/class choices as time goes on. When Blood Elves can be shamans and druids my Horde roster will consist entirely of Blood Elves.

And before you start questioning why I play Horde if I just want to be pretty, I’m going to point out that I’ve been playing Horde for a long time, probably longer than you, since November of 2003. I remember what it was like before Blood Elves, I remember the massive faction imbalance that Blood Elves helped solve. I remember how much harder it was to do things like Blackwing Lair with Shamans instead of Paladins, how we were stuck with Resto Shamans having to heal while not having the best class set allocations while having priests dispel on Baron Geddon while Alliance had their Paladins cleanse and their priests heal. I remember having to learn to stance dance to get out of fears while tanking Magmadar while Alliance had fear ward. Blood Elves and Paladins coming to the Horde was the absolute best game balancing step Blizzard has EVER taken.

I remember after Majordomo, we’d all kill our characters and corpse run back to the raid to go kill Ragnaros. Everyone would get naked and hop on domo’s hotplate. Everyone but me. I couldn’t stand the look of my main naked, so I ate a repair bill so I didn’t have to look at the shriveled hunched body of a male troll as I ran naked across the Searing Gorge. The shape of the male troll reminded me of haunting photos I had seen of emaciated people (“Muselmänner”, living corpses) rescued from Auschwitz. Even though trolls are buff, their mass compred to their length and their posture was just too uncomfortabe. Have you ever stopped to think that maybe non-blood Elves aren’t everyone’s RP style, and sometimes for very good reasons?

I’ve seen a lot of complaints about Blood Elves that are homophobia driven. The males are too gay. Why yes, their voice actor is an openly gay voice acting legend, problem? Blizard actually made them ‘buffer’ than elves should be because of homophobia. To this day I think that having mildly pretty men by contrast to other men in the game triggers homophobia. Perhaps Blood Elves weren’t made for the straight male eye, perhaps they were made for the female eye. They were made for the queer eye. They were made because the Horde races lacked mass appeal, and their designs made it very hard for the average player to empathize or immerse themselves into these characters.

Do you have any idea how uncomfortable it is being made to think that everyone who doesn’t play a Blood Elf hates you just because you happen to play one? Can you imagine being the recipient of hate being your very first experience on this server? Oh I know you’re going to say, “It’s just IC” except for, it isn’t really. This hatred is a constant bombardment across mediums, this is self-insertion of the author’s opinion into characters in a way that makes no sense. Stop it.

Now here’s my point: You blame Blood Elf roleplayers for there not being enough of other things, you blame Blood Elves for the dearth of good guilds or communities that center around other Horde races. What race people choose to RP on WOW is not zero sum.

If this site had the ability to do pull quotes (where you take a sentence, separate it out with horizontal rules and make the text very big) I’d totally pull quote that. But I can’t so I’m going to repeat it a few times for emphasis.

What race people choose to RP on WOW is not zero sum.

What race people choose to RP on WOW is not zero sum.

What race people choose to RP on WOW is not zero sum.

What race people choose to RP on WOW is not zero sum.

The popularity of Blood Elves is not taking away from the creation of other guilds, groups, and communities. The popularity of Blood Elves is not taking players away from other guilds, groups, and communities.

Blood Elves are not the problem. Would you like to know what the problem is? Take those crooked little fingers you’re pointing and rotate them 180 degrees on the horizontal axis. Where are those fingers pointing? Why they’re pointing at you. YOU are the problem.

There. I said it. You are the problem. Every single person who is blaming people who RP Blood Elves for their problems, every person passive-aggressively screaming “STOP LIKING WHAT I DON’T LIKE,” every person denigrating people who RP Blood Elves as shallow, uncreative, unskilled, bland, superficial, in it for the ERP, boring, or whatever. You are the problem.

One more time. You are the problem. Yes you. If you yourself haven’t engaged in this behavior, then the behavior of others around you. When was the last time you told your Belf bashing friends to shut the fuck up? I bet you don’t like blanket statements being made about you but you sit by quietly while your friends do the same damn thing.

Players of non Blood Elves are to blame for the dearth of non Blood Elf RP, not Blood Elf Roleplayers. All y'all’s actions, your behavior, and your choices are the poison that has stunted your community growth.

When you people sit there and denigtate people who RP Blood Elves, you need to understand that other people are doing it too, and that if we’re listening we find a symphony of hate from theother side. I know why you do it, you’re hoping to discourage, to pressure, to force, to make Blood Elf RPers feel bad so they will decide to stop liking what you don’t like and start liking what you like so you can have more RP partners.

Except it doesn’t actually work that way. What you’re actually doing is painting yourselves as hostile and it makes people who main Blood Elves. It makes us think that if we decide to make an alt and go play with you, that you’re going to be hostile to us the moment you find out we main a Belf. This deters us from wanting to play with you. Why would we subject ourselves to such hostility?

I had a male orc prot warrior that I played as an argent aligned male orc prot paladin, a character with all of the ferocity and strength of an orc combined with a stalwart defender who may or may not actually be able to use the light. It was a fun character. I deleted it because I realized that I could never RP it among other orcs because I main a belf. I made a pair of male blood elf hunters intended to be dark ranger bards. 80s metal wailing manshees in undead elf bodies with red eyes, big hair, and sun lutes. But I realized that while the idea is cool and fun that undead RPers would likely hate my characters for having belf models let alone being male instead of female, even though manshees were added in Legion. I repurposed the characters into something else. While these things are weird and quirky, they’re examples of some of the ideas, possibly fun ideas, that non-Belf RPers lose out on when they constantly bombard other creative people with endless hostility.

The only non-Belf groups that I’ve ever seen try to reach out and engage others has been a group of really nice Tauren. If I was going to RP something other than a Bloof, I’d probably RP a Tauren because I’ve seen that there’s at least some circles of Tauren who likely won’t shit at me for maining a Belf. They’re doing it right. Learn from them.

No one will listen to the Blood Elf RPers’ critiques of what you all need to do and change. Change must come from the inside.

If you want to see things get better you need to start being excellent to each other, you need to be the change you want to see, and you need to quit yer bitchin’. Then you need to tell the people who are being passive aggressive, or outright aggressive, to people playing Blood Elves just because they’re playing Blood Elves, to have a nice glass of shut the fuck up.

Change comes from making a stand. Let me tell you that when these people start getting bombarded by a couple dozen scoldings from their peers for being a jackass they’re going to learn that it’s uncool and stop being a jackass. Then the community healing process can start. 

When hating on players for playing Blood Elves becomes uncool, then players who have decided that all y'all are hostile may consider trying to interact with you, put alts in communities, and help you grow and nurture your own communities.

Would You Just... Clean the Grill?

I am about to do something unconventional, radical, perhaps even heroic. I am about to clean the grill.

I know.

I hate cleaning the grill. I have always hated cleaning the grill. I remember childhood as one long uninterrupted stretch of wonder and joy, pretty much because I spent it never having to clean any grills.

At 15 I could be found in the kitchen of my family home, staring at the grill with tilted head, silently, like that dinosaur trying to comprehend existence in Tree of Life. Cleaning that grill must be a nightmare, I began to think. I’m glad that has nothing whatsoever to do with me.

At university I was appropriately adequate in many ways. I finished my assignments on time and washed my pots and only occasionally maxed-out my overdraft. But the grill was just not my domain. I found if I left it long enough someone else would get angry and clean it for me – and that person’s anger was always infinitely preferable to actually doing the grill myself.

But then university was over and I was living back at home, pretending I didn’t need a job because I was going to be the next Jack Kerouac, and suddenly my mother had decided the rules had changed.

She would return from work and I would hastily tab out of World of Warcraft, back to the Word document in which had been scrawled the same lousy four paragraphs for weeks, and my mother would come upstairs and ask how the writing was going, and I would squint at my lousy four paragraphs and say, Yes, good thanks, yes. And my mother would put her arm on my chair, and I wouldn’t say anything. And she would peer out of the window, and I wouldn’t say anything. And she would walk back towards the door, and my fingers would be hovering over the alt and tab keys, and she would be at the door, through it, gone – and then she would turn around, like fucking Colombo, and offhandedly ask if I would mind quickly cleaning the grill.

And I would stomp downstairs, muttering how the grill wasn’t even dirty, I hadn’t even used it, that Jack Kerouac never would have finished On the Road if he had been perpetually forced to clean grills like this, and I would get to the grill, and in fairness it would look like the back seat of the car in that scene in Pulp Fiction when John Travolta accidentally shoots Marvin in the face.

But I had meandering poetic romans-à-clef to be writing – or at least night elf druids to be levelling up – so I would do with that grill what Harvey Keitel had the mobsters do with that car in Pulp Fiction: I would gather up all the sodden old tin foil and throw it away, and then basically ensconce the grill pan and all the crumbs and congealed fat and bits of crisped bacon in new foil, so that if someone peered close the subterfuge would not hold, but from a distance any mum-cops in the area might be fooled. And then I would make cheese on toast and go back to World of Warcraft.

***

Of course now, a decade later, I’m a proper adult, which means I don’t even change the foil in the grill. I just leave it all and hope that, like hair, it will eventually start regulating itself.

Except the roguishly deprecating tone I’ve engendered here belies the truth of the situation, which is that I am miserable. My girlfriend will come in from her exhausting job as a pub manager – which job provides the flat in which we both reside – and I’ll hastily tab away from, I don’t know, a Wikipedia page detailing Captain America’s role in the 1982 Marvel comic book cross-over event Contest of Champions, say, back to the Blogger draft in which has been scrawled the same lousy four paragraphs for an eternity, and she, my girlfriend, will ask how the writing is going, and I will squint at my lousy four paragraphs and mutter, Yes, good thanks, yes.

And it’s all fucked. I don’t know what to write. If I’m not up for work or something that will let anyone but myself down then I’ll just stay in bed all day, and the flat is a tip, and I’ve got no clean socks, and I keep reading the first page of books and then throwing them aside, and there’s this weight pressing down on my chest that has been pressing down in some form or another for as long as I can remember, and it’s like everything is too heavy, I can’t lift any of it off, it’s all fucked…

And then here I am in the kitchen one day looking at all the dishes feeling the weight pressing down, and sort of slowly yet all at once it strikes me that although I can’t lift off the heavier weights, the ones about my career and my future and the apparent inexorability of my failure, there are smaller, more manageable weights that I could lift off, if I actually so desired, and one of these, perhaps the smallest, so small that it would almost be more ridiculous to not do it, is cleaning the grill.

So I am going to clean the grill.

***

And immediately I find I can breathe easier. Although, yes, only a minuscule weight, it is the first time anything has been lifted off rather than added in aeons, and it fills me with hope. Life is not so bad. You do little bits and they add up to big bits, and eventually you are free. The trick is to go slowly, and go easy on yourself. The grill today, then later I will watch Netflix, maybe have a beer, and I’ll be prepared to tackle more tomorrow.

But what will I watch on Netflix? Do they have Aliens on Netflix? I love Aliens so much. It’s not got the majesty of the original Alien, of course – what does? – but it is basically schlocky 80s B-movie as apotheosis. I tell you what, when you’re having a beer, a few beers, and watching Aliens – when those marines are running around in their bandanas, and Bill Paxton is shouting “Game over man, whoah man, we’re toast man,” and Michael Biehn is being Michael Biehn – when the alien queen detaches from her flaming egg sack – when that reveal comes of Ripley in her mech suit…

… Or is it Bill Pullman? Bill Paxton and Bill Pullman are similar, no? Is this a thing? Do people know about this?

I continue with such thoughts for about half an hour, until I realise I’ve spent all the reward from cleaning the grill but have as of yet not actually cleaned the grill, and that there is nothing left to do but go and clean the grill, and I instantly start feeling miserable again.

I motivate myself all over again, and head into the kitchen. To the cupboard where we keep the tin foil. There is no tin foil.

What the Paxton?

I swear, every time I try to drag myself out of this pit, God comes and puts some insurmountable obstacle in my way, like he doesn’t want me to succeed, like he wants me to stay suffering here forever. How are you supposed to fight against God?

No, Rob. Stop inventing deities to blame for your inability to complete basic household chores. Just go to the shop for more tin foil.

I go to the shop. Outside it is balmy, warm, wonderful, and everything feels great. I’m moving, life is happening, we can do this.

My cheeriness lasts for two and a half minutes, until I arrive at the shop and the lady points me to the wrong aisle for tin foil, and I decide the best course of action is to stand there pretending to choose from what is actually a selection of tinned goods until she disappears and I can go looking myself – except then the lady realises her mistake and comes jogging back, and I have to yell at her that It’s fine, it’s absolutely fine, I wanted butter beans anyway. Which I definitely didn’t.

Then at the counter I put my basket down before the woman in front has finished paying, and I don’t know what to do, whether to draw attention to the awkwardness by picking the basket up again, so I just hover there too close while the woman buys lottery tickets and chats to the cashier. I’m invading this chat, I think. My arms hang at my side like repugnant flippers. I can’t for the life of me remember how people are supposed to stand.

Finally, eight years later, it is my turn. I act too northern with the cashier to mask my embarrassment, but it comes off weird and I know she can tell I’m from the posh end of Sheffield, that I don’t belong here. All walk home I am distressed, gloomy. I think of others my age, struggling with promotions and babies and marriages, and here I am struggling to buy tin foil from a shop. I am wretched.

But the only thing more wretched, I decide as I return, would be to use my self-pity as an excuse to not clean the grill. I really am going to have to clean this grill.

So I get started – by planning out what I’ll do. First the dishes in the sink will need washing to make room. Which means actually first I’ll have to put the dry dishes away. I hate that this is a thing. Why don’t we just build kitchens with huge draining boards instead of cupboards, and then we could store dishes where they dry, thus removing a pointless and mundane job from existence? The same with clothes. Replace wardrobes with massive clothes horses, then we’d never again have to stress over folding t-shirts and the sides not being even and having to shake them out and try again, and finding pairs for all the socks, and staring at the wall as the light fades and the evening draws in, wondering whether it’s even worth being alive in such a bourgeois existence that apparently consists of nothing but putting possessions in drawers and then taking them out again, over and over, until death comes for us hunched and–

–Oh, that’s the dishes put away. Wasn’t so bad.

I wash the dishes in the sink. I wash the big roasting pan that we inexplicably store on top of the grill where it gets covered in dust and grease. I bet that was my girlfriend’s idea, I think. I find a better home for the roasting pan, on top of the highest cupboard where neither of us can reach.

Finally it is the grill’s turn. The old tin foil wilts in my hands. Underneath is a fatty pool of despair. I scrape out the pool with a spatula. I attack the grill pan with wire wool, green scourer, sponge. I attack the grill rack with same. I put it to dry.

I rinse out the empty wine bottles, the empty milk carton. I clean the hobs, the front of the oven, the kitchen tiles. I look around, panting. I do inside the sink, the back of the sink, wash out the cutlery tub with all the pond water in the bottom. I take out the recycling. I empty the cat’s litter tray, take the bins out, sweep the floor. I get it all done, do it all.

***

It is later. We’re watching Netflix. I tell my girlfriend I’m making a brew. I go to the kitchen, stand in the middle of the room, look around. The grill is gleaming. Everything is gleaming.

This will be easy, I think. All I have to do is apply today’s technique to every issue in my life that I’ve allowed to get on top of me over the past decade, and continue applying it every day for the rest of my life. Yes, I think. Easy.

Jan 11 Blurr’s Horror Stream - I Am Not a Serial Killer

Drift helped zip-tie people together.

Also, he finally gave Blurr the coordinates to his alternate and Ratchet, so Blurr can pass them on to Tarn to kill.

Welcome to the 'speedxstealer' room. The chat room has been cleared by the moderator. Drift: *drift has arrived Early As Hell tonight* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave and the group nod to Drift from his couch.* B l u r r: / here he comes, stumbling in and hopping on a mangled leg / Whirl: *trotting right behind him, keeping a close eye on Blurr in case he topples* Drift: ... Good mission? Whirl: *also, he looks next to nothing like himself. Also there is just a straight up hole punched in his side. Just right through him* Drift: *so, REALLY good mission* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave leans back slightly at the sight of you two.* ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Why are you not both in the medbay?]] B l u r r: / hops a little and tries to step on his pede / It wasn't even a mission Drift: Heroic rescue trip. Whirl: Hell yeah it went well! B l u r r: Not a hero /hisses and yanks some wiring out of his leg / Drift: *starts rummaging around in his pockets. He's got a hole punch and zip ties somewhere.* Whirl: And we're fine, we're fine. We're on the ship, that's good enough. Drift: Don't, don't—leave that in there. It's supposed to be on the inside. B l u r r: *it's B l u r r: It's hurting. So, t's coming out. Whirl: Oh, no, don't let him fool you. He's a hero. He's a COMPLETE hero. One undred percent. B l u r r: .. /hisses at Whirl / Drift: It'll hurt more if you tug on it. B l u r r: ... /sulks / ItsyBitsySpyers: \\HEY! YOU LISTEN TO 'IM. DON'T BE PULLIN' THAT SCRAP OUT.\\ Whirl: *rattles his long new rotors in reply. He isn't even slighlty admonished* B l u r r: / rolls optic and moves to sit down. Flops. / ItsyBitsySpyers: \\THEY AIN'T HURT YA BAD ENOUGH FOR RIPPIN' IT OUT THEIR OWN SELVES, THEY DON'T GET YA DOIN' IT FOR 'EM.\\ Whirl: Listen to Frenzy, Teach. Besides, the less you rip up now, the more HE gets to step on. Whirl: *sly look* If you know what I mean. Drift: Frenzy, you wanna come help patch him up? I can close the holes up. *holds up zip ties* B l u r r: ... /gets an odd expression/ Pits I just want him to crush my throat with his servo... Drift: *looks at Whirl* You're not getting out of getting patched up too. Whirl: *SNICKERS and pats Blurr's shoulder with one huge claw* I know, Teach. I know. B l u r r: / grumbles / We have yet to find him... ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy "mutters" something about crushing something else if these two get filled with rust and goes to help Drift* Airachnid: [sneaks in] Whirl: *waves Drift off, turning to approach his hammock dubiously. He's still not 100% adjusted to all this new armor and doesn't trust his balance* I'll be fine. Just get me a sock or something. Shockbox: /he arrives at last. anyone who knew him well enough could tell from the way he moved that he was exhausted, but damn if he wasn't going to get his weekly dose of human media enrichment. Whirl: *bobs his head to Airachnid--though she might not present recognize Whirl, as he looks Extremely Different* B l u r r: / waves a claw at Airachnid / Drift: Oh no. I'm patching you up. You've got a gaping hole. B l u r r: /snickers at Whirl / Drift: ((it's still spinning for me. why..... ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave bobs his helm at the small Shockwave.* B l u r r: [[ it might be LS. Apparently LS is, as always, experiencing problems ]] Airachnid: [waves in return and takes her normal position in the back] Drift: ((is it for anyone else?)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((how many tabs you got open? it's workin fine here...)) Airachnid: yeah same)) Drift: ((less than usual)) Airachnid: yeah same)) Drift: ((then I'm the lucky duck. SIGH)) Shockbox: /he registers the nod after a few seconds, and nods back. on his way to his usual seat, he grabs a small bowl of energon goods. ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Long project?]] Whirl: *sloowly testing the hammock, pushing on it, leaning on it, etc* It's not GAPING. And it's not bleeding any more, it's fine. ItsyBitsySpyers: ((try incognito???)) Drift: ((there it goes)) Whirl: ((brb, i must clean up a spill, assume Wghirl is like. Hilariously slowly getting into this hammock* Drift: ((i refreshed)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((aaaaaay)) B l u r r: [[ yaaay ]] B l u r r: [[ lemme know when yall are back / ready ]] ItsyBitsySpyers: ((ready when y'all are)) Shockbox: (( my body may be exhausted, but it is still ready. )) Airachnid: my head's stuffed up but I'll be fine. Eventually)) Shockbox: So, I presume the protagonist of this series is, in fact, not a serial killer? B l u r r: / anyway. Will watch Drift and Frenzy work on Whirl with an amused expression / B l u r r: I'm not sure. I've never seen this one. Being on Earth again has updated my horror library. Shockbox: ((*film, not series )) Shockbox: I suppose we shall find out for ourselves, then. Whirl: ((OK BACK)) B l u r r: Mm yes, I think so. /twisting wiring around his digits from his leg / I'm thrilled. Drift: You never know, he might be lying. Whirl: *HE IS IN THE HAMMOCK, success. He can't lounge though because his new rotor array is on his back, so he just sits up* B l u r r: [[ OKAY is everyone here / ready?? ]] Whirl: ((ye!)) Shockbox: (( like 9000 ready. )) B l u r r: [[ Puff, is it working for you okay now? ]] Whirl: *looks to Airachnid* Didn't see you at the movie night on Monday. Drift: ((ye)) Airachnid: I just hope there's a decent amount of human blood. Airachnid: I was otherwise engaged. Airachnid: aka MY F*CKING INTERNET WENT OUT)) B l u r r: [[ rUDE ]] Shockbox: (( awh....you missed shockwave night...)) Whirl: Ohh, if you wanna see some human blood, you should get some footage from Teach later! *pulls out a half cube of The Good Stuff and toasts the memory of carnage* Shockbox: (( a tragedy. )) B l u r r: [[ okay i shall start now ]] Whirl: Nobody does bloodshed quite like Blurr. Drift: Okay. Whirl. Look. You've got a hole in your side. *holds up a hole punch and zip ties* You're gonna at least let me close it up. Airachnid: for the whole damn night. no reason either)) B l u r r: / snort / No one knows how to murder like I do. Airachnid: I just want to see human blood and not get in trouble for it. B l u r r: / eyeing Whirl. Vents. The Good Stuff better not be anything not allowed on the ship / FakeProwl: *appears! and just in time* Whirl: *watches Drift with a deadpal expression and just takes a long pull* Shh. Movie's starting. Whirl: @Drift: It's not as bad as it looks, I promise. Take care of Teach first. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Makes room next to himself and the minis. Prowl is welcome to it.* Whirl: *HE FORGOT AGAIN, TELL HIM AND HE'LL STOP* ItsyBitsySpyers: \\AIN'T WE OR AIN'T WE NOT ZIPPIN' SOMEONE?\\ Whirl: *HE JUST WANTED TO TASTE A THING* B l u r r: / HOW DO YOU FORGET THE ONLY ' NO ' RULE HE HAS / Drift: @Whirl «I can't help with that kind of damage. I can close holes and that's about it. Frenzy's gotta look at him first.» Whirl: *BECAUSE I DID TOO* B l u r r: / he doesn't have to tell Whirl. Someone else will / Airachnid: [she's not even going to question what happened to Whirl] Whirl: ((omfg chistopher lloyd.....)) Drift: We're zipping someone. Can you look at Blurr while I close Whirl up? Piston: [ leans over the couch. Taps the cube ] This is an illegal substance, Whirl. FakeProwl: *sits with* Whirl: (9BEST *** INTO HAHA)) Piston: [ as a silent, terrifying mortician, he has snuck in without a word or sound ] ItsyBitsySpyers: \\YEAH, GUESS SO. C'MERE, SPEEDY ONE.\\ B l u r r: / grumbles/ My medic will fix it. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\YEAH? 'N WHOZAT?\\ Whirl: A zip tie isn't gonna fix this, mech, it'll be fine. *AND THEN IMMEDIATELY JUMPS AND LOOKS OVER HIS SHOULDER* Where the frag did YOU come from!? Whirl: ...But. oh. Damn. Sorry, Teach. *subspaces it, and then pulls out a cube of regular old midgrade* Whirl: I got excited. Wanted to delebrate. Piston: I live here. [ dull stare ] Drift: ... Then I'm zip tying you after Frenzy's done with you. Shockbox: /he sprawls out on his lonely couch. though he would usually have no problem resisting the urge to nod off, getting the chance to sit still after bustling about all day might just entice him into -* Shockbox: *-rechage.* B l u r r: / vents and leans back. / Whirl: *turns and takes a long drink of his canister while returning Piston's dull stare* Rght. B l u r r: I say help patch up Whirl. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\Y'AIN'T MY BOSS.\\ Piston: [ props an elbow on the couch. Looks at Drift and Frenzy ] Hello again, Drift. Drift: ... Frenzy, who needs to be patched first? Whirl: Again--sorry. Forgot. Hey, Frenzy, d9o you know if they make a non-high-grade verison of... *pauses* ItsyBitsySpyers: *He's gonna start peeking at that mangled leg* Drift: *nods at Piston* Hey. Whirl: *something feels weird. Whirl shifts and looks down. His hammock is getting wet. Because the ful he just tried to drink is leaking out of his side-hole* Whirl: ... ItsyBitsySpyers: *Laserbeak, sensing semi-unattended treats, joins SHockwave on his lonely couch and starts sneaking treats from the bowl* B l u r r: / grumbles and shifts leg away / It's just missing plating. All the mechanisms work. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Company missed before. Prowl safe since last meeting? New news? Whirl: Okay. So. ...okay, fine. *side-eyes Piston* Drift can patch me up. DRIFT. Piston: [ moves from the couch and wanders around the hammock. Stares at Whirl] Frame can be modified, then? ItsyBitsySpyers: \\UH-HUH. I'MMA BELIEVE THAT CAUSE WHY?\\ Piston: This is not what I catalogued. No, no. Something much more complex. Blending into Tyran... [ monotone ] How fascinating. Whirl: *slowly swivels his helm to keep Piston in his sights* Yep. This is a pretty minor one: changed my alt-mode. Shockbox: *he jumps a bit at a sudden shifting sensation, attempting to identify the source of movement.* B l u r r: / glances at Frenzy and scowls/ My legs are complex... Airachnid: Ah, brings back memories. Drift: I'm waiting for Frenzy's call. Whirl: *antenna slowly pins back* ... I spent most of my life looking like this. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Oh yeah. He was, wasn't he? Frenzy looks over and - is Whirl leaking.* FakeProwl: *ugh. serial killer fanboy.* Shockbox: *ah, it's lazerbeak. he gives a slight nod, pushing the bowl a little in her direction and returns his dazed attention back to the screen.* Piston: Yes. [ leans forward just a little more ] I like it. Whirl: *now looks to Frenzy. Don't u dare stick himwith Piston* ItsyBitsySpyers: \\BOTHA BUNCHA... I OUGHTA POP ANOTHER HOLE INTO YA.\\ Whirl: Well. *leans back a LITTLE. Just a little* Well. ...good? Piston: ... Yes. [moves to walk away and settles in his own seat ] ItsyBitsySpyers: \\IN MY LEARNIN' OPINION, THE DUMBAFT LEAKIN' HIS FUEL PROBABLY GOTTA GO GET SURGERIED FIRST.\\ ItsyBitsySpyers: \\I AIN'T LEARNED TANKS YET.\\ Whirl: ((THERE HE BEEEE)) FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Yes, safe. Tarantulas has been bugging me. Nothing else has changed.» B l u r r: [[ there he iiiiisss ]] Whirl: *relaxes a bit, watching Piston walk away, puzzled* Airachnid: Would you like me to use some webbing to temporarily patch the wound? Whirl: ...*tilts his head* Would that work? ItsyBitsySpyers: \\...IT CLEAN?\\ Airachnid: Yes. FakeProwl: @Soundwave «And Chromedome called me, but had nothing of worth to say.» Airachnid: To both questions. Whirl: Well. Sure, mech. Give it a shot. Come on over. *he's gonna sit up a bit straighter to give her a better view and shot* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy chews on a thumb claw.* \\GUESS SO. BETTER'N PASSIN' OUT.\\ Drift: I was gonna suggest duct tape, but it gets greasy and falls off. So yeah, web sounds good. Airachnid: [she's going to get up and walk over to where Whirl is] Whirl: *bobs his head cordially; he seems quite pleased with this solution* Just gob it right up in there. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Tarantulas attention wanted? Iacon progress? Soundwave can of-- ItsyBitsySpyers: *HOLD ON NOW* B l u r r: ... /twitches finials. Ignoring all this medical talk. Watching this movie / Airachnid: [she gives a nod and webs up the wound for now] Of course it'll need to be changed eventually. B l u r r: [[ guys lemme know if it starts tanking stream wise ]] Drift: ((fine so far)) Whirl: Yeah, I'll need to get everything, y'know, FIXED fixed before we go into a battle again. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): What wanted, this Chromedome. Prowl all right? Which alternate? Whirl: *gonna lean a  little and scoot to the side. Airachnid is welcome to share the hammock, if she deigns to* ItsyBitsySpyers: \\DUCT TAPE AIN'T SO BAD IF YA STICK IT ON MOUTHS. ANYWAY.\\ Grabs for Blurr's leg again. \\GIMME, NERD.\\ Airachnid: ... [eh. might as well. She gets into the hammock as well] Airachnid: [copter hammock] FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Fine, I'm fine. He tried to tell me lies about what memory he took from me in an attempt to manipulate me into agreeing to a verbal conversation.» Whirl: *SCORE* B l u r r: / tries to pull his leg away / Whirl: Hey now, Teach. I took my medicine, time fo you to take yours. B l u r r: / waves claw. / Whirl: I'll hold him down if you want, Frenzy. *TOTAL TRAITOR* ItsyBitsySpyers: \\GOOD. HURRY UP. HE'S FAST.\\ B l u r r: Don't touch me... Whirl: You gonna make me do it, Teach? Or you gonna behave? B l u r r: / scoffs and sticks his leg out / Do not touch anything inside. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\FINALLY.\\ Gonna get peeping inside. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): What lies told? Expected conversation purpose? B l u r r: Just shove the wiring inside and wrap my leg up. Don't go poking around. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Squint.* \\Y'BETTER SEE THAT MEDIC AFTER.\\ B l u r r: ... /smirks wider / Whirl: Yeah, Piston. Why don't you make yourself useful? Go see to your captain? B l u r r: K-Kyeheheheh... /props chin on claw/ ItsyBitsySpyers: *Gets shoving. He's gonna start charging for all this doctorin' stuff, he swears.* Airachnid: [so many memories of academy. Fun] Piston: I will. Right now, we are constructing an outer armor casing for his leg back in medical. B l u r r: I knew someone like her... /vents / FakeProwl: @Soundwave «He tried to tell me that he deleted my memory because I blackmailed him. Last time, he told me he deleted my memory because I was in love with him and embarrassed him.» Whirl: *he is not gonna even comment or think about this too much. He doesn't need anyone to know about is corpse-cave* B l u r r: Now I know someone like that, but he's much more cheery! Ain't yah, Piston? K-Kyeheheheh. Piston: ... Ha. Ha. [ dull laugh. Literally as it is read. ha. ha. ] FakeProwl: @Soundwave «The story changes every time. He's trying out stories until he finds one that sticks. None are logically plausible.» ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy whistles to Drift. Got more zip ties?* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Not gonna leave room for Blurr to be picking wires back out* Drift: *got 'em.* Want me to put them in? I'm a pro. Whirl: Taking bets now--it's the therapist. Airachnid: Now that would be a plot twist. Drift: That'd make sense. He's trying to frame the kid by telling people he's a sociopath. B l u r r: / tilts helm/ What if the kid doesn't need framing? Whirl: *points at Drift* Yep. Whirl: Like that movie with the monsters--Nightbreed. Drift: Therapists aren't supposed to share stuff like that. Whirl: You groom your patient and put ideas in their head. Airachnid: This reminds me of my younger years, only I didn't have a therapist. Whirl: But, I could be wrong. *looks to Airachnid* Yeah? Count yourself lucky. B l u r r: They tried to give me one once... ItsyBitsySpyers: \\YA MIND?\\ He scoots out of the way. \\HE PROBABLY AIN'T GONNA PUNCH -YOU- IF IT HURTS.\\ Whirl: ...*pauses, and then relents* Well. Okkay. To be fair, Rung's... noit a bad sort. He's all right. B l u r r: He didn't taste very good. B l u r r: A little bland with awful ideas. B l u r r: Stale. That's how he tasted. Stale. Whirl: Heh. Was his name Froid? FakeProwl: *did have a therapist. a diagnosis of sociopathy was batted around. absolutely not contributing that to the conversation.* Airachnid: Never really wanted one. And when everyone is dying to psychoanalyze you, it gets annoying. B l u r r: ... No, I don't remember his name. Whirl: That guy's a real... He's. I mean, what a jerk. ItsyBitsySpyers: *None of Soundwave's group have been to a therapist. Primus only knows what one would do with them.* B l u r r: Eugh, I hate when mechs do that. They act like they know everything based on one tiny interaction. Airachnid: Medical school was quite irritating. B l u r r: ... !!! FakeProwl: *ugh now they're talking about froid. quick. what was soundwave's other question.* Airachnid: Well then. Shockbox: (( isn't that how the terminator kills people? )) Whirl: *pauses; momentary blank look* ... Yeah. But, anyway, unfortunately, mine's mandated. Shockbox: (( /has not watched terminator. )) ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): More information needed. Chromedome not familiar mech yet. What not plausible about presented stories? Whirl: O-HO. Count me wrong, then. ItsyBitsySpyers: ((it's how the one in the sequel does)) Whirl: ((i have not seen term 2)) B l u r r: ... wow. He's like us! B l u r r: / points/ That's what we do !!! B l u r r: / excited leg kick / Whirl: *now looks to Airachnid* You went to medic school? Shockbox: (( interesting. i remember seeing that sort of thing in a review once. )) ItsyBitsySpyers: \\YOU WAS IN MEDICAL SCHOOL, AIRACHNID?\\ Whirl: ((PFFT, HIVEMIND, FRENZY)) Airachnid: Arachnicons, like myself, are often medics as we can produce webbing and that functions as bandages. FakeProwl: @Soundwave «I lost interest in him very shortly after we broke up, long before he became an expert in mnemosurgeon.» B l u r r: ... /makes a slight face/ A lot of people in this... remind me of people I knew once. Airachnid: [gestures to Whirl's now bandaged wound] Whirl: Hmm. I see. *examines his own* Whirl: So far no leaks, so, not bad, mech. Airachnid: But, unfortunately, I was not CREATED to be a medic, so it did not work out. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\HUH. Y'EVER MEET... FRAG. WHATSERFACE. COG SOMETHIN'. REMEDY TALKS 'BOUT 'ER SOMETIMES.\\ FakeProwl: @Soundwave «And I wouldn't have blackmailed him because I've never needed to, he's always been eager to get more work.» Whirl: ...yeah. Sucks when you have different ideas as to what you wanna be. ItsyBitsySpyers: *He has no idea how old Airachnid is or isn't, so he's just throwing darts here* Whirl: *he feels ya* Airachnid: I mean, if I had just passed one more class, I could have been a medic, but my teacher failed me because I wasn't made to be one. Airachnid: So I killed him. Whirl: *LAUGHS* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Ravage snorts.* Airachnid: Not all arachnicons know each other. B l u r r: / makes a face/ He should have failed you for more logical reasons. B l u r r: Failing someone just because they don't seem to be part of the function means that the teacher was lazy. Whirl: On behalf of all teachers everywhere--and I'm sure Blurr can agree with me--I say, good job. Airachnid: No, he was a functionalist. FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Of course—if he modified my memories extensively and thoroughly enough, EITHER of those stories could be true. I have no way to know.» B l u r r: Why would I agree with you? FakeProwl: @Soundwave «But neither lines up with what I DO know.» Whirl: Because a lazy teacher deserves to be murdered by his students. Especially a FUNCITONIST one. B l u r r: / he spaced out / Killing him? Yes, he sounded lazy. A terrible teacher. By all means. Is that what I'm agreeing on? Whirl: Yes. ...you ste you're all right? Airachnid: He was insufferable too. So he deserved it. B l u r r: Hm? B l u r r: [[ his handwriting is so weird wtf ]] ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave glances up at the ceiling, thinking.* Airachnid: After that, of course, I couldn't get my medical degree so I became a bounty hunter in Kaon. Amazing how things can change. Whirl: Like, you're still with us, right, Teach? Not lsot too much fuel? Whirl: *looks to Airachnid; he seems genuinely interested* Bounty hunting before the war, eh? How well did THAT go? ItsyBitsySpyers: \\IF HE'S DYIN', I DIDN'T DO IT.\\ B l u r r: ... / twitches finials/ Ah. Yes. / settles. He's not all there but he's okay / FakeProwl: @Soundwave «He's been talking about trying to make amends and talk to me again. I suspects he wants to persuade me to meet in person. He probably wants to go after my memories again. Don't know why.» Airachnid: It paid well and there were plenty of mecha hiring. Whirl: *dryly* I hereby absolve you of all guilt, Frenzy. Whirl: ...THIS time. Whirl: For THIS specific instance. Whirl: ((pfft, emmett. I see what u did there)) ItsyBitsySpyers: *Prowl doesn't have -no- way to know. Soundwave could dig into Chromedome and find out himself. He's been wanting to do it since he found out about Chromedome in the first place. But he also said he-- ItsyBitsySpyers: wouldn't become a pet mnemosurgeon. And Prowl hated the idea so much with Tarantulas...* B l u r r: ... Is he going to take his spine? That would just make my day.../muttering/ ItsyBitsySpyers: *Stops staring at the ceiling and looks back to Prowl.* Whirl: It's absolutely NOT ethical. Whirl: *antenna pins back* FakeProwl: That's extremely unethical. Whirl: ...*shakes his head and returns his attention to more pleasant things* Did you mostly run jobs for the Functionists, or for the 'Cons? Or what? Airachnid: Well, yes. Airachnid: The Decepticons were not formed at the time B l u r r: ... /slouches a little / Drift: ... *nudges blurr* Airachnid: Mostly criminals trying to get other criminals. B l u r r: /shifts a bit / Hm? Whirl: Ever take a hit on the establishment? Drift: Sup? *blurr's slouchin* B l u r r: ... /thinking/ Nothing, it's just that this reminds me of a lt. B l u r r: *lot Airachnid: I went after anyone. Some happened to be under that kind of label as well. Whirl: ...*looks over* Hey, Teach. Don't let he memories get to ya. Becaus we're HERE, now. Whirl: Kicking aft, taking names, getting shot--all the good things in life! Whirl: *adds, with another sly, sidelong look* Getting stepped on. Maybe. B l u r r: ... oh stop /snort / Whirl: *shrugs* Fair enough. If I'd been out and about around that time, I might've done the same. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Prowl under Soundwave, deployer protection if Chromedome visit helps uncover truth. Avatar also possible.-- Whirl: I'm telling you, mech. It's gonna happen. I'm not gonna let you down. B l u r r: Hnnn.. ItsyBitsySpyers: Would put Chromedome down, provide recorded evidence if second attack attempted. Shockbox: (( this reminds me of an old story written by lovecraft. )) ItsyBitsySpyers: *He says 'attempted' because there's no way he'd let it actually happen.* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «... I can't.» B l u r r: /vents and sets his leg out straight in front of him/ It reminds me of things I'm fond of. Harvesting for parts. Drift: ((which story? i don't remember one like this)) B l u r r: It's the people around him that strike familiar . Whirl: ((this is based on a book actually!)) ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): ...Arrest restriction? Personal comfort? Whirl: *nods to Blurr* Gotcha, Teach. ...*now swivels his helm about to regard Frenzy. Is he done with medic duty? Does he need  aseat?* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «I can't be near him.» *absent-mindedly rubs the back of his neck* B l u r r: [[ good news: whatever I ate today that messed me up is done messing me up. Bad news: I'm hungry but afeared to eat ]] ItsyBitsySpyers: *Small ping. You're doing the thing.* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy's good on the floor, he's watching all this weird killers who are and aren't.* Whirl: ((LMAO I WENT TO THE imdb to look up brooke's actress cos the girl seems familiar and C/ LLoyd's character name is Crowley)) FakeProwl: *quickly laces hands in lap* Whirl: *then that is quite fine* FakeProwl: Don't taunt the monster, you idiot. Now he has an opportunity to get his guard up. B l u r r: Not if he needs constant harvesting B l u r r: if you scare him to stay inside, his parts rot and he can't get to a new source. B l u r r: In a way, he's actually quite smart. ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Understood. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Believe him, he gets it.* Drift: *... comm ping to blurr* B l u r r: / twitches finial. Pings back/ @Drift: :: Hm? :: Whirl: ((WILLIAM BLAKE)) Whirl: ((AND WHAT HAND, AND WHAT ART, COULD TWIST THE SINEWS OF THY HERAT)) Whirl: ((william blake man. lovim. me and him have the sam bday y'all)) B l u r r: [[[ nice ]] Drift: @Blurr «This is where my alternate is landed right now.» *a set of coordinates.* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): ... Could assign Soundwave intercept duty. Make Soundwave Prowl's 'voice'. Chromedome, Trepan appearing; multiple contact attempts... disliked, distrusted. Should hunt truth. B l u r r: @Drift: :: Hnn? I thought you changed your mind? :: Whirl: Hmm. Drift: @Blurr «I had to think about it. But, I want to go through with it.» B l u r r: @Drift: ::Well, if you're sure. Once I give them, I can't stop it. :: Drift: @Blurr «I know. I'm sure.» B l u r r: / vents and slides over to lean on. Comfy / Whirl: *has been very twitchy since he arrived. Small little movements, rotor shuffles, etc. Constant fidgeting. Sorry Airachnid* Shockbox: (( hahahahahahah i saw that coming )) FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Right now, the Constructicons are intercepting. Chromedome knows I want nothing to do with him so long as he has my memory and I don't.» Airachnid: [she's fine, she hardly notices] B l u r r: @Drift: :: Well, if you're sure. :: ItsyBitsySpyers: (AHA i was sitting here wondering why i knew the lead)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((they were in that wild things movie a while back)) B l u r r: @Drift: :: I'll have to tell you when it's done, if you want to know? :: Drift: @Blurr «Yeah. Wait until I'm over for movie night to tell me. I don't want any long-range comms that might be tracked.» B l u r r: @Drift: :: Naturally. I'll be here every time, you know. :: Whirl: ((christopher lloyd is so *** good in this)) B l u r r: [[ yeeessss ]] Drift: @Blurr «I know. ... Thanks.» B l u r r: @Drift: :: Oh, you know me. Hero to all, apparently. :: /rolls optic / Whirl: So is she still dating the therapist? ItsyBitsySpyers: *Wants nothing more than to offer to rip it out and put it back.* FakeProwl: *can't ask that* Whirl: Tiger. That comes back again. Hmmm. Whirl: *clicks claws clowly, contemplatively* Whirl: Wonder if that's significant. B l u r r: [[ the beanie ]] Airachnid: the pandie)) Whirl: ((The Beanie)) Shockbox: (( such a serious moment )) B l u r r: [[ the music. the pandiie ]] Shockbox: (( you can see the pain in his eyes as he slips on the adorable panda mask )) B l u r r: ... / sinks down more / Whirl: *tilts his head to an even further degree* Shockbox: (( this is some very LoZ: TP music. )) B l u r r: / going to stick his apparently zip tied leg out / B l u r r: / hurts at the moment / Drift: *wraps arm around blurr* Airachnid: [she's very focused on this. she's even starting to blep] Whirl: ((oh my ufccing god)) Whirl: ((the mental image of an airachnid blep has killed me. goodbye curle worl)) Airachnid: glad I could help)) Shockbox: (( goodbye curle whirl )) Shockbox: (( but yeah that's hella cute )) B l u r r: / leans on Drift / Whirl: ((is similarly engrossed so has not noticed the blep* Whirl: Oh, COME ON, you big baby. At least he told you the truth! Airachnid: Indeed. He has no right to complain. FakeProwl: *... mildly empathizes with main character.* FakeProwl: *isn't a sociopath. doesn't fantasize about killing people. but.* Shockbox: If the human had simply communicated the amount of danger he was really in, his friend might have considered him mad enough to let his words slide. FakeProwl: *the rules, to try to appear normal? the fear of being abnormal?* B l u r r: If the world didn't make it so hard to be abnormal, maybe people wouldn't have to worry about being normal. B l u r r: / holds out claws like duh / Whirl: ((i have that same cup...)) B l u r r: [[ same ]] Airachnid: we used to)) B l u r r: / sinks down more / Whirl: Well, the world's not gonna change. It's kind of amusing how similar it is across multiversal boundaries. Whirl: The thing is, you just gotta be ready to FIGHT the world. B l u r r: ...How endearing. /mumbling/ B l u r r: He dropped the knife. B l u r r: /muttering to self. full slouch on couch / ItsyBitsySpyers: *To the Pit with it.* Drift: *slowly slouches down with blurr* B l u r r: / glances at Drift . pokes his arm / Drift: *pokes back* Yeah? B l u r r: /flicks finials/ What're you slouched for? Drift: Cuz you are. B l u r r: / smirks/ Oh, yeah? Dodge is, too. Whirl: *glances to Drift and Blurr, watching; for once he's not sort of low-key jealous. He's just curiously watching them* Shockbox: *at this point it's seriously hard to tell whether or not he's awake.* Whirl: ((here lies shockwave)) B l u r r: ... /making a face / Shockbox: (( bested by exhaustion, for once. )) Whirl: *once again engrossed* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): If Chromedome: feared, Prowl: controlled. If goal: escape, what tools needed? ... Give legal options. FakeProwl: @Soundwave «... Legal options?» *he'd reported it to Ultra Magnus, who had done nothing. what was left? Who else would do anything?* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Folds his servos in his lap. Takes a moment to notice the half-asleep Shockwave. He'll send them home later if they pass out.* Whirl: That's the therapist, right? Pfft. Good. Shockbox: (( how many funerals has this been at this point? )) Airachnid: a lot)) B l u r r: ... What a good person. /dims optic/ B l u r r: She's the only person that's nice to him. FakeProwl: @Soundwave «... If you're willing, you could—monitor him. See what you can find out.» ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Legal options. Solutions not outside Starscream's laws. ItsyBitsySpyers: *...Nod.* ItsyBitsySpyers: *He's not going to ask Prowl for the illegal ones. Must leave his ally some room to deny knowledge of anything he might do.* ItsyBitsySpyers: anything terrible* Whirl: *snickers* Shockbox: (( how did this man even manage to /get/ a wife. )) Whirl: *snickers again* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Conversations? Monitoring only? FakeProwl: @Soundwave «... Be cautious if you have conversations. You know what he is. Don't let him know you have ties to me. I disappear when he arrives, he probably doesn't know yet.» Whirl: *click click click in anticipation* FakeProwl: @Soundwave «I will not ask you to converse with him. Don't endanger yourself and don't endanger me.» ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Acknowledged. Whirl: nICE! Airachnid: Ah, nothing like bonding over an autopsy. Drift: ... If his hand hadn't been out like that, his mom might not have believed him. He's lucky. Whirl: *snorts* Shockbox: (( some top notch vivisection going on right here. )) Whirl: Or, a living dissection. Shockbox: (( yes, that is what a vivisection is. a living dissection. )) Airachnid: Or vivisection. Drift: They're pumping out his blood. Whirl: Yep! *tips his canister in mock-toast and drinks* Whirl: I think they're pumping out his HIM. Drift: ... What if it pollutes the water? Airachnid: That is nor normal organic blood. Whirl: The black stuff---whatever he's made of. Drift: If he's made of the black stuff, then it could travel to someone else if it's pumped out, right? Whirl: Maybe... ItsyBitsySpyers: *Sudden small plating flare* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Quickly puts it back down* FakeProwl: *that's a new one* B l u r r: / monster!!! / B l u r r: / excited leg kick / Whirl: *leans forward* Whirl: Is he gonna like... take true fo--ohhhh. FakeProwl: *not sure what plating flare means. brushes hand?* ItsyBitsySpyers: \\GROSS, HAHA.\\ Whirl: Neat! Shockbox: *goddamnit he would be so intrigued by this right now if he weren't ASLEEP.* B l u r r: ... /oh no. Oh god it's gonna end sad isn't it / Whirl: *i mean he won't admit it but it's kind of compelling that this murderous vicious monster's primary motivation is its love for someon* Whirl: *a good story* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Hand twitches slightly; he hadn't expected the contact. But he'll take it.* Drift: *AW. WHY THIS. 8(* Airachnid: [it is sickingly sweet] B l u r r: / this is hitting his fEELINGS that he thought he bURIED / Whirl: *tips his canister again& B l u r r: / ow. ow. ow ow pain. Picking at zip ties / Whirl: *well fucc that's. Compelling* Drift: *oh nooo. clings to blurr* Whirl: *but he's got a VERY good poker face* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy absently swats Blurr's hand.* Shockbox: (( ***, mang. )) Whirl: *it's the specific line: "i've never got it before" that got him. You've got company, Blurr* B l u r r: / swats at Frenzy. / Shockbox: ((didn't expect this to get feelsy. )) B l u r r: / is clinged to. Still picking at his zipties / Whirl: Ha. The therapist died. Good. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Turns.* \\CUT IT OUT.\\ B l u r r: / wheeze. He's having an emotional moment let him have it / B l u r r: / actually wait don't, hell rip the ties / Whirl: ((I REALLY LIKED THIS MOVIE. The pacing could;ve been better but it was good)) B l u r r: [[ IT WAS NICE? ?? I liked it ]] Drift: ... His therapist died because he was trying to help him. I think he was an okay one. Airachnid: and explained what the f*ck the old guy was)) Whirl: I don't like him. B l u r r: / rubbing his optic. / Drift: Questionable ethics, dated his mom, yeah... but died trying to help him. B l u r r: WELL At least humans died. That was great /rub rub / Whirl: Eh. Still don't like him. His motives were tainted. How can you trust someone knowing they're playing you for their own benefit? You CAN'T. Shockbox: *he is motionless. one could mistake him for dead in his recharge.* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Apologies. Soundwave: fine. Unexpected recollection. Airachnid: I think Shockwave died. Whirl: Well. Ravage. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\I DIDN'T DO THAT NEITHER.\\ Whirl: You know what to do. ItsyBitsySpyers: [[No, Ravage.]] ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy gets up to poke Shockwave.* Shockbox: *he shifts a little at the prodding.* Piston: [ pops up right behind Whirl ] What an endearing movie. I rather like that method. I use a system similar... on bodies I deem... worthy. [ stare ] FakeProwl: *small nod* Shockbox: *might need a little more to get him up and out.* Whirl: *swivels his helm around, DAMN YOU PISTON YOU STARTLED HIM AGAIN* is that so. Piston: [ stare back ] Yes. Piston: I look forward to the Tyran bodies you will bring me. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\\I GOT THIS. YER ALL GONNA WANNA CUT AUDIOS.\\ Shockbox: *oh no. * ItsyBitsySpyers: *So, Shockwave. You know how loud Frenzy is normally. Do you know how loud he can ACTUALLY be?* Drift: *covers audials* Airachnid: [covers audials] Whirl: Well, I'm not bringing you any. FakeProwl: ... Don't do that. FakeProwl: He's sensitive to noises. Whirl: You'll hafta ask Blurr for that. I usually don't leave ENOUGH of a body for any kind of preservation, mech. FakeProwl: *look who managed to notice a thing* Shockbox: * something tells me this is going to be the last time he attempts to fall asleep in a social gathering if this goes on.* Whirl: ...*pointedly does not, he wants to hear Frenzy scream* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy opens his mouth - then stops and looks at Prowl. Since when does he care?* Piston: What a shame. [ looks Whirl over ] I was told that you would be helpful to avoid your own ... ritual. Whirl: Ritual? Shockbox: *prowl, have we...bonded over a mutual sensitivity to sound?* ItsyBitsySpyers: \\...I GUESS.\\ He gets up and dusts his knees off, walking to the other corner of the room. ItsyBitsySpyers: *THEN TAKES A RUNNING LEAP AND BELLY FLOPS ON SHOCKWAVE'S MIDDLE* Piston: ... [just stares at Whirl ] I really do wish to know how a spark works... FakeProwl: *...... he's mildly protective of people with hypersensitivity, don't read into it* Airachnid: [uncovers audials. Or that could work too] Whirl: Well. That's a damn shame, isn;'t it? not having one to experiment. *pokes him roughly in the chest& Whirl: *...okay well he was gonna call you a wimp for not screeching but a belly flop is acceptable* Piston: [ reaches out and pokes Whirl's shoulder ] Good luck out there. What I do to bodies would make the humans feel shame. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Congrats, Prowl. In case you were wondering about how far ally privilege goes, you've just discovered a small (but not always reliable) perk.* Whirl: *swats at Piston's hand* Oh, I'm SURE. FakeProwl: *the occasional power to stop Frenzy from screaming?* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Something like that.* FakeProwl: *he'll use it wisely* Whirl: *The Poer to Instintill Discretion in Frenzy?* Piston: [ chuckles. It sounds like a doll tbh ] Shockbox: *WHEEZES and suddenly has his blaster raised in the air. he had attempted to trigger the alarms to his base, not realizing that he was, in fact, not home.* Whirl: Or I get thrown into the trash, or an incinerator. Whirl: Anyway, hate to disappoint you, but I've promised my corpse to Buzzsaw, Laserbeak, and Ravage. They're probably gonna devour me. Piston: Accidents happen. Whirl: Or, if anyone else is nearby and wants to eat me, that's fine. B l u r r: / moves a leg out. Going to try and stand / Right. I have... an announcement to make! Whirl: I'm sure they do, Piston. It'd be a damn shame if one of them happened to YOU. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\HEH HEH HEH.\\ Rolls off Shockwave. \\DROP THE GUN, MECH. JUS' ME.\\ Whirl: *swivels his helm to regard Blurr* ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Announcement?]] Airachnid: [that got her attention] Airachnid: [she never tries to miss out on the opprotunity for free food] Piston: [ quiet for things ] Piston: It would be. But my Captain has a strong belief in our driving spirit. Whirl: *well Airachnid. You are welcome to devour his corpse if you ask* Shockbox: *His helm flicks every which way as he slowly sets his arm down. He looks to Frenzy.* ....What did I miss? Airachnid: Most of the movie. B l u r r: I, that is me. /presses claw to his chassis / Have decided that my Skeleton Crew will... will be liberating... /trailing off./ ItsyBitsySpyers: \\SOME KINDA MONSTER THING CRAWLED OUTTA THE KILLER GUY 'N HIS BLOOD 'N STUFF. REAL MUSHY STUFF 'BOUT HIS WIFE.\\ B l u r r: / flicking finials. Turns to his left and mumbles. / ItsyBitsySpyers: [[He's never heard of]] [][][]mumble[][][]. [[Where is that?]] Whirl: Yeah. Believe it or not, an ACTUALLY compelling romance, as compred to last week's movie's Garbage Romance. B l u r r: / vents and points to Whirl and hisses in another dialect / Drift: Are you rescuing the Autobots? 8) Whirl: *tilts his head as he is pointed at, his long rotors rattling questioningly* B l u r r: Oh, fine. After much conference, we've decided that ...we will, indeed. Help the Autobots. Shockbox: Hm. The last thing I recall was that the human adolescent attempted to murder the old woman. B l u r r: Only because it will have Optimus Prime of Tyran in my debt. Drift: *hugs Blurr's waist. ... since he's still sitting and all.* Whirl: And so he'll step on you. Whirl: But sexy-like. Shockbox: Was....the monster, interesting? B l u r r: / pats Drift's helm/ AND. Whirl: And also because... *sly look* Blurr's got a hero's streak in him. Airachnid: Made up of mostly blood that came from the old human. B l u r r: I will.../ gritting denta/ I. Will. Release. The. Wreckers. To their rightful... home. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\YO, BOSS. MONSTER IMAGE?\\ And now Shockwave can see it. Airachnid: So, I would say so. B l u r r: / that was hard to say / Whirl: You're damn right you will. Whirl: If you decided not to then we'd have us a PROBLEM, Teach. ItsyBitsySpyers: [[...Will they not be endangered by the humans?]] Shockbox: *He considers the monster.* Whirl: But, I had faith you'd come around. Real..........................................heroic of ya. B l u r r: ... Shut up, Whirl. B l u r r: I'm doing this because I get to slaughter humans for free. Free buffet. Whirl: I will not shut up. Whirl: Nobody has ever figured out how to do that yet. Whirl: And neither will you. *beams cheerfully* B l u r r: / crosses arms / Optimus Prime of Tyran will owe me. ItsyBitsySpyers: ((omg is this the rock)) Whirl: ((IT IIIS)) Whirl: ((HIS VOICE IS SO GREAT)) B l u r r: [[ it is ]] Airachnid: I do not know Whirl very well, but I don't think "shut up" and "Whirl" really go together. ItsyBitsySpyers: ((adoration <3)) B l u r r: Absolutely. Anything. B l u r r: And Optimus Prime of Tyran in my debt means that I can request anything... Whirl: *nudges her* You got me! B l u r r: So if I die, know that he tore me in half and it was glorious... Shockbox: (( such a  good song...)) Whirl: And also, Optimus Prime of Tyran will step on you. Sexily. Whirl: Hey, if you gotta die, I'll make sure, Teach, as your friend, to make sure it';s at his hands. At his FURIOUS hands. Whirl: *salutes; whirl is 100% your wingman Blurr* ItsyBitsySpyers: [[...A debt from Optimus Prime should be used on something more... useful.]] ItsyBitsySpyers: [[Than your libido.]] B l u r r: ... Look, you just don't understand. Whirl: Uhh, you're understimating the amount of enjoyment Blurr will get out of that. Don't judge. Whirl: People like us need to tke whateve joy from life we can. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Looks at the both of them.* B l u r r: You have no idea what it is like to see an angry Optimus charging at you like he broke through the flames of hell. /claws to chassis / Whirl: I mean, obviously, you got no problem serving YOUR libido, *ndos at Soundwave and Prwl* Whirl: Let the rest of us do what we need to. B l u r r: With that gun charging and that angry snarl. The HATE in those optics. ItsyBitsySpyers: *And then Soundwave transformed into an iceberg.* B l u r r: The way it feels to have limbs torn from attachments... Whirl: ((i am very sorry fo my sh it typing lmao)) FakeProwl: I wouldn't trade in a highly useful debt for a fifteen-second session with an unwilling dom. Whirl: Yeah, well, you're not Blurr. B l u r r: Besides... he has a soft spot. Whirl: Like I said--don;t judge. Shockbox: *he is confused by the implication of soundwave and prowl having...a relationship?* FakeProwl: *is judging. is judging hard.* B l u r r: And. /deep vent / Roadbuster and I are. Whirl: *no regrets; Whirl got u Blurr. U fam* B l u r r: Figuring out. B l u r r: Friends. Whirl: *LOOKS TO BLURR* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Well, that's going to speed up certain conversations with the alternate Shockwave, isn't it.* B l u r r: I think we've figured that out. Whirl: Mech! That's great! Shockbox: *observing this conversation, even if he didn't hear the very beginning of it.* Whirl: You did it! FakeProwl: *whirl didn't say "serving your libido WITH EACH OTHER" so prowl missed the implication* B l u r r: Basically... do you guys want anything from Earth while I'm there? Shockbox: *thanks whirl you're helping us talk to eachother. * B l u r r: Oh, and Whirl is helping me. I'll make sure he comes home. Whirl: They might pay you NOT to, teach. *laughs* Whirl: Pfft. Whirl: But heck yeah, you guys want souvenirs? FakeProwl: *considers asking for a red crayon.* FakeProwl: *no—they'd kill somebody to get it.* B l u r r: [[ blurr has those omfg ]] Whirl: *i mean you're not wrong* Airachnid: [goes to Earth all the time so she's fine] ItsyBitsySpyers: *Prowl, you are approximately six feet away from an artist.* B l u r r: [[ blurr and whirl break into Crayola ]] ItsyBitsySpyers: //Ooh! Ooh! I want - uh. They been doin' this whole - this whole thing 'bout some Ham human.// Shockbox: *unsure about what level of quality specimens they would return with if their goal for the trip doesn't involve preserving them.* Whirl: ((whirl gets a cybertronian-sized crayon, somehow)) Whirl: ((Prowl. Don't ask. But look how awesome this is.) B l u r r: ... Ham human? Whirl: ...ham. Whirl: *You're not included in Whirl's offer, Shockwave; you're an active con* FakeProwl: *why would buzzsaw use Earth wax sticks designed for children* ItsyBitsySpyers: //Yeah. Some Hamtown guy. The Boss got the music but they got a... the frag do humans call datapads.// B l u r r: / blurr will bring u gifts, shockwave / Whirl: *but Soundwave, his team, Drift, prowl, and Airachnid are all being offered souvenirs* Shockbox: *to be fair he nor i were paying attention to the beginning of this exchange.* Whirl: Music. Hamtown. FakeProwl: *he's approximately six feet away from an artist IRL too, but he wouldn't ask Bonecrusher for crayons either.* Whirl: Ham... burg? Drift: *shrugs* Surprise me. Whirl: I need a little more to go on, mech. Whirl: ...*gl;ances to Drift* Got it. Shockbox: *shockwave would appreciate gifts.* Drift: Human datapads? Books. B l u r r: Oh, I already know what I'm getting you, Drift. ItsyBitsySpyers: *He likes the way the blue ones can be melted and reshaped into energon.* Airachnid: How about some crystals? ItsyBitsySpyers: *Good spattering, too.* Whirl: *he might not have had a lot of time to talk to Drift but Drift has wormed his way into Wgirl's Relatively Good Graces* Whirl: Crystals? What kind? ItsyBitsySpyers: //Books! Yeah.// Wait. He just. Admitted to wanting a book out loud. Any minute now-- ItsyBitsySpyers: \\HAHA. NERRRRRD.\\ Drift: And get repaired before you come home! I don't want Rodimus asking questions about your "vacation." Whirl: *throws his canister at Frenzy's head* Whirl: PIPE DOWN I'm trying to hear your brother. Airachnid: Quartz is always fine. B l u r r: ... you didn't tell him you were coming ? ItsyBitsySpyers: //Frag off, I jus' want the pictures.// Whirl: ...weee-ell. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Frenzy yelps and ducks.* Whirl: I might have neglected to mention... certain aspects of my vacation. But yeah. Got it. *Dift is gonna cover for him? he's getting TWO souvenirs* Whirl: So. Rumble. ...what are youeven asking me. Whirl: Ham City? Whirl: *he is lost* Drift: Honestly? I think you would have gotten a free pass from him if you said you were gonna go rescue Autobots in that universe where they got chewed up. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Rumble grits his dentae together. Incoming file, Whirl.* Shockbox: (( as much as i would enjoy staying up until around two in the morning....)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((get some rest!!)) Whirl: *but he got your message Airahnid, he is deffo bringing some quartz for YOU. You are Interesting and Whirl is not gonna forget YOU* Whirl: ((IS IT HAMILTON xd)) Shockbox: (( i need to shower. and sleep. )) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((Yes. Yes it is.)) Whirl: ((REST WELL SHOCKBOX)) Shockbox: ((slendy should i link the fic to this group before i jet out. )) Whirl: ((exclelent)) Airachnid: [thank you Whirl] Drift: But if you're calling it a "vacation," fine. Just... don't come home beaten up. Then one of us is gonna HAVE to explain what happened. ItsyBitsySpyers: ((up to you!)) Whirl: *tilts his head, and then nods; as one mech with bioth kick-*** and nerdy tendencies, he got u, Rumble* Got it. Shockbox: (( hmmmmm. welp. yolo. )) B l u r r: In any case. B l u r r: Do you guys wanna see how much humans wanna pay for us? Shockbox: (( http://shocktrooper-redstreaker.tumblr.com/post/155750914201/intentionally-bad-fic-stuck-tiddy )) Shockbox: (( my friend wrote this, it's great, g'night. )) B l u r r: well, me. I'm on their list. ItsyBitsySpyers: ((night!)) Airachnid: goodnight!)) ItsyBitsySpyers: [[He would like to know what the humans ask for our kind, yes.]] Drift: ((gnight~)) ItsyBitsySpyers: [[If only to know how far to stay away from them.]] Whirl: ((i see te phrase "massive uniboob" and i am pleased)) Whirl: You mean, the sorts of things they wat from us? From our bodies? B l u r r: It depends on the mech. B l u r r: See, me? They want my legs, apparently. /motions to his leg / B l u r r: They think the speed is in the legs. Morons. Drift: Don't correct them. Whirl: A s far as I've been able to determine, they mostly want me dead, or me to stop killing all of them. *this is spoken matter-of-factly; he's not bragging. He's telling the truth* ItsyBitsySpyers: //Pffft. They ain't seen Velocitronians, huh.// Whirl: But, you got it. *nods cordially to Soundwave* B l u r r: / vents/ Regardless, Cemetery Wind knows there are more of us. This might ruin Lockdown's plans. B l u r r: / rubs claws together / B l u r r: Imagine me getting on that big ship... Whirl: Ohh, yeah. Snuffing LOCKDOWN. Whirl: That sounds like FUN. B l u r r: So, I just want you all to know... Airachnid: [that designation sounds familiar] B l u r r: / points to everyone./ I am not a hero. I am doing this for my own benefit. /sits down/ Airachnid: Suuure you are. ItsyBitsySpyers: //Sure. 'N I ain't really Ultra Magnus.// Whirl: *gently disengages fro the hammock so it doesn't dump his Distinguished Company, which is Airachnid* Whirl: And I would like the room to know... Whirl: *hand over his cockpit* That Blurr one hundred percent IS a hero. I seen it. I was HERE. Whirl: *There Airachnid: [she might as well leave it as well. She gently leaves the hammock] B l u r r: I am not-! Whirl: He's a good deal more good than he wants all of you to believe. *regards Blurr with an expression that seems to mingle cheekiness with something like affectiion* Whirl: Despite everything, he is... a Autobot. Whirl: *an B l u r r: / rolls optic/ B l u r r: / buries face in claws / Whirl: And you know what? I only knew his former commande from one... really. Uh. WEIRD conversation. But I will say this, in case we both die i a fiery inferno tomorrow: I bet he'd be pretty proud. B l u r r: ... /peeks through his claws/ Whirl: Sluahgteing uppity humans for the greater good? He'd be chuffed. I guarantee it. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave can hear Laserbeak about to ask what's good about Autobots. He quiets her.* B l u r r: ... /oh no that makes him feel things / Whirl: *he means it, you big turd* B l u r r: / and he's doing a sort of good thing for bestie / B l u r r: / emoTIONS / Whirl: *continues to regard Blurr with that cheeky/maybe, if u squint, affectionate expression* Drift: *that was a nice speech, Whirl. nice words for Blurr. pats Blurr's back.* Whirl: *And Whirl will tell u, Laserbeak, if u ask: what's good about us? The way we DECIMATE THE OPPOSITION* B l u r r: / clamps digits together and just face in claws / ItsyBitsySpyers: *She IS the opposition. Was. Something. CLOSE ENOUGH.* B l u r r: / vents and finally lowers claws. Trying to look fINE / B l u r r: ... People will still be scared of me, right? / looks at Drift / Whirl: *nah, you're almost in the same boat Drift is. Anyone who comes against yo u IS the oppostion* Drift: Of course they will. Whirl: *he got u Laserbeak; you're a spot of all right* Whirl: Pfft. How could they not be, teach. Whirl: I mean, LOOK at you. Whirl: You're a monster. *this is said as a compliment* B l u r r: ... /looks at self and smirks / I'm gonna give that Prime something to fear, aren't I? Whirl: You gonna give him something to fear, but most importantly...... a place to rest his feet. *sly look* B l u r r: ... /vents/ Oh stop. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave shakes his helm a little. Can't believe they're still on that.* FakeProwl: *these past couple weeks Prowl has been learning far too much about other people's kinks, and 100% of it has come from Whirl* Whirl: *what ca he say? he's a fount of knowledge. who shows he cares for his pals by embarrassing them* B l u r r: Maybe I should keep the favor... ItsyBitsySpyers: *Haha. A couple of weeks. Boy, that must be nice.* Whirl: *snickers and shrugs* You gotta stop making it so easy for me, then, mech. Airachnid: [going to sneak off now] B l u r r: Regardless... Airachnid: akak mun needs sleep because of classes in the morning)) ItsyBitsySpyers: *Ravage huffs a tired goodbye to Airachnid on her way out* Whirl: ((night!)) ItsyBitsySpyers: ((NO HOW DARE)) B l u r r: The point is. I think we can get things done with a week or so. Whirl: But know you've got yourself a ready and willing windmech. ...despite the fact U don;t have wings. Airachnid: goodnight!)) B l u r r: [[ ni ni ]] Whirl: *will swuvel and bob his helm to her; Whirl is pleased with the night's arrangements* ItsyBitsySpyers: *Soundwave sits up slightly and tilts his helm just so to catch this song.* Whirl: ((oh my god my typing iso bad. it's the rum. es tut mir leid)) Whirl: ((i am sorry)) Whirl: ((and that was fuccin german)) FakeProwl: ((see I just assumed it was a row of extreme typos)) B l u r r: / vents and smirks at Drift / @D: :: And I'll get your thing taken care of. :: Whirl: (( would say i'm cutting myself off now but the bottle is empty)) Drift: @Blurr «Thanks. I appreciate it.» B l u r r: ... and I get to be the fastest mech in their ugly group! /stands up and immediately falls down / ItsyBitsySpyers: *A good piece to end the post-movie music on.* B l u r r: ... Well. When I get my leg fixed. Whirl: And I get to be the ugliest in their fast group! *snickers* Drift: You're getting fixed before you go, right? Whirl: Yes. He is. Whirl: Don;t worry. ItsyBitsySpyers: \\THEY BETTER. I AIN'T MISSIN' MOVIE STUFF FOR NOTHIN'.\\ B l u r r: ... Yes, I am. Drift: Good. Drift: That goes for you too, Whirl. B l u r r: Both of us. Drift: We all just put you back together, you're not allowed to fall apart. Whirl: I'm tough! B l u r r: I've stitched myself together through worse. Whirl: I can take a lot of damage. As if I'd let some HUMANS do me in! Drift: You've also got a hole in your side. Whirl: Yeah, it's no big. I've had a lot worse than this hole. Recently. I've been injured worse during a THERAPY SESSION than this. Whirl: *it's 100% true; Fort Max ripped one of is arms off AND impaled him* Drift: It stopped counting as a therapy session when it turned into a hostage situation. Whirl: Really? I didn't. B l u r r: / he's on his datapad, sending a message/ Oh, Drift!! /yanks him over and holds the datapad up/ Smile!! ItsyBitsySpyers: *That's a new story to ask about later.* Drift: *smiles on cue* Drift: *why's he smiling, he doesn't know* B l u r r: / snaps pictures!! Selfies / Whirl: *we'll see how much you get told* Whirl: *will return to his hammock and settle in; he's staying here, so he doesn't hafta leave* B l u r r: See? /shows Drift / Drift: *looks at* Who's the picture for? B l u r r: I just got in contact with an old... acuaintance. B l u r r: *acquaintance B l u r r: I don't know if we're friends because I can't really remembering us establishing that. Drift: Roadbuster? B l u r r: ... no no. He's a Tyran mech, though. Drift: Who? B l u r r: Ratchet. Whirl: *settles in, after another extended "can i balance this" session; he's ebginning to finally look a little tred* Drift: Oh. B l u r r: ... And Roadbuster. B l u r r: And Topspin. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Ratchet???* Drift: ... And you're gonna save them all. *sly grin* You hero. ItsyBitsySpyers: *No. Wait. He said Tyran. It's okay.* Whirl: *perks his helm up* Yep! Hero! B l u r r: ... /vents and pushes his claw in Drift's face/ B l u r r: Sshhhh... not a hero. Whirl: *before carefully lying himself back, settling in and getting comfortable* Absolutely one. B l u r r: Doing one good thing in a sea of bad won't make me a hero. Whirl: You've not lived long enough to do enough abd to make yourself irredeemable. Whirl: Take it from someone who HAS. *wiggles in; ahh, yes. Nice and comfy. He is sleeping here tonight* Drift: *pushes claw back* Totally a hero. B l u r r: Perhaps, for the moment. B l u r r: It will pass, like many have before. Whirl: So you saaaay. Whirl: Let's see. Get back with me in five milion years. *snorts as he nuzzles his helm into the fabric* B l u r r: Oh go to sleep. /vents and rubs his optic/ I've got to sort out where we're going tomorrow. B l u r r: Keep track of the Autobots. Find where Prime is... Yeager human.. /yawn/ B l u r r: / sharp tooth yawn / Drift: *stands* I'll let you get to your preparations, then. I've gotta get back home. Whirl: *rattles his rotors* Seeya, Drift. B l u r r: / smirks and wiggles claws at Drift. His turn to hug ur waist / Whirl: ..and hanks. For covering for me. ItsyBitsySpyers: *Well, if they're all settling in and going home. Looks at Prowl.* ItsyBitsySpyers: @Prowl: (txt): Also returning? Whirl: *shoots Blurr another cheeky look before relaxing; there's hope for you YET, Blurr. he ain't about to let u forget it* Drift: Sure. I didn't really do anything, I just didn't tell Rodimus what your vacation is for. Drift: Don't get in too much trouble, okay? I can only cover so much. B l u r r: I'll keep him safe. FakeProwl: @Soundwave «Yes.» Whirl: *snorts, but refrains from making a self-depreciatig comment about how everyone would be happier if he WASN'T safe. For once. progress??? progress* FakeProwl: *flickers out* ItsyBitsySpyers: *That was unusually quick. All right. He gets up and gathers his minicons, then makes his way out* Whirl: *raises his helm to bob it good-night at Soundwave & Co* B l u r r: / waves claw at everyone. Wiggles for Drift. Will lay on the couch and work on his datapad / Drift: *wiggles fingers at Blurr. and he's out.* Whirl: *will now sleep; it's been Quite a Day and he is tired* B l u r r: / will probably also sleep in here /

Clone Wars    Episode 17

       Blue Shadow Virus

Inter-      sting

[Title   Scene]

[Quote: Fear    is the   disease,        Hope       is      the     only    cure

Acc    oun     tab-    Okay

Battle   Droids

Narrator         is      on      point      again

   Uhm

   Wasn’t        This       Estab     -lished

     I’ve      already       given        my     thoughts        on        the     ‘peaceful     planets’        thing

   Need        to        be       more     accountable

    Neat           Looks.     Cool

    High          Alert.

    When            is          it         not?

     What’s         with          the         look?

       It      wouldn’t      matter        so      much...

    Nvm

    Just       weirds         me         out           a         little  

     Also,       yeah,     she        is        a     senator      now

   Aha

  That    makes        A       Lot         Of       Sense

  Mean-   while

  Even     graver      threat

   Aight

  Okay

   This        is      what      we’re      doing

    My      lady

   That’s         a      different       look

    [Was           is       expecting        her      normal      uniform           or        her    handmaidens      thing;          It works;      just confused         About          the      protocol

If it’s a separate planet   do you wear the     handmaiden     (robe)     thing?

But then   the     senator...

[i’m just really curious    about    clothing]

  Only      the       three

  Okay,

  That     makes     sense

    I     was     about        to       say...

  ‘Amidala        kicks         ass         but           I        don’t        think        she’s         the        one        you     wanna      have      fighting        in       the       war,’

     I      really       like       this    character,         they        got        her        tone        more         so        right

    Clearly      knowing        she      could            fix        the      problem        but     deciding         to      blame     someone       else

    In        a       ‘make       someone       else       deal       with           it’     gesture          (Even         if         it         is         a       little    wobbled)

  Liking        it          a      lot      better

   Then       the       Pho-    quasi-              Adult         Thing

    Amidala         unfortunately         Borders         Close             To

      With           the            I’m          -an-             adult-           but-            not-       accountable

       Which                No                if             she’s               an             adult;                    She                is         accountable              and           therefore                  an              enabler

              Not                  Cute

               A                 few               battle                 droids                  won’t                    be                 enough

Yeah,        no,       duh,          it’s         a         war            Queen         saw            a           few          battle          droids              and          flipped                out

          That’s                 a                scouts              sighted                      in                   the                   area                   report                     and                    that’s                       it

                 Also                     this                       is                     what                       I’m                      talking                        about 

                       Right                             there                            was                               an                                  up                                  swell                                   in                                  music

                                 To                                  portray                                    innocence

                                  When                                        in                                       reality                                          it                                          should                                        probably         ��                                  be                                        something                                              a                                             bit                                            more                                            somber,                                               bit                                               more                                              struggling                                                  ‘do                                                    I                                                     want                                                     to                                             conscientiously,                                                  enable                                                    this?’                                                   Instead                                                       of                                                        ‘this                                                         is                                                        new                                                         and                                                       surprising                                                    information!’                                                                  Generally speaking,                                                                       her                                                                     tone                                                                        and                                                                       the                                                                     music                                                                        are                                                                        bit                                                                        too                                                                        light

                                                                      Could                                                                            use                                                                            more                                                                            base

                                                                         Can’t                                                                            make                                                                                 me                                                                            feel                                                                               for                                                                         Enabler                                                                           Amidala                                                                                (if                                                                            she                                                                                  is                                                                         supposed                                                                                  to be                                                                                an                                                                              adult)

                                                                            (If                                                                                they                                                                              were                                                                              going                                                                                for                                                                               child                                                                               soldier                                                                                then                                                                                 the                                                                              opposite                                                                                   is                                                                                 true;                                                                                    it                                                                                   needs                                                                                    to                                                                                    be                                                                                     a                                                                                    lot                                                                                       lighter,                                                                                         to                                                                                   denote                                                                                    innocence

                                                                                  And                                                                                         the                                                                                   dialogue                                                                                     really                                                                                     needs                                                                                        to                                                                                        be                                                                                      altered

(Sorry I went on a       rant       there      About      her    chara        cter      it’s     just     been    bothering          Me         for      quite      some       time)

    Just...     don’t        do    quasi-adult;         it’s      creepy

  On with    the story;

   Captain        Ty -phoo

    Also     Jar Jar      Binks            is      here

   Who     knows

   Well I didn’t really cover the last        review       he was              in

      It       wasn’t      character          saving

      But        they        did       show         pro-

   Aight,        This      doctor       bot        is     everywhere

    Must        be      always          on       call

  [I know.        there      might        be     millions        of      copies        of       him       But      this        one      seems    relatively      sentient        and       the          model           looks       relatively    ineffectual)

    (Not to mention        grievous’s         medical           droid..)

        The personality is at least       very convincingly.       programmed

     Retrieve            any      information

     Why is the      Med droid here?

Like...   I know     he’s a droid        ....

  Does no one have a     different      model      droid?

  Some thing        a little less        clanky?

    ....

    They did a       relatively       good job

    Like a pod for maybe the        venting system armor,  being off        (Possibly)

     I     don’t     know     what        I’m     looking       at

    He looks completely fine

    (Looks like he should be standing about     now)

    I mean         maybe          it       was         a     headshot

   But        I     haven’t      seen      that      yet

   But all the date       isn’t stored in the       head,     right?

   Robots aren’t    human beings

   (Except     for      general      grievous)

     He’s a      noticeable       outlier

    Aight

    Ha, he is acting more accountable

 Like an actual sentient   creature

 Whelp

 Also,      see there’s not even a scratch on him!

  Queenie          Here     

was   over   reacting!

   I don’t think they could’ve     brought him       back

(In better shape)

 Like   seriously     what did they use?

Electric?     

water?

(Did she want them to read them their   rights?)

Also, that’s     fair

I mean that’s like an apple sitting on the table

Still acting like a   relatively accountable     character

(I still have no idea   what   generation       he falls in,        But that’s a   constantly   reoccurring.  problem,         Not limited     to his   character?)

   ....

  You brought a bot       to witness a bot       autopsy

    Cruel

(Treat your     roombas     with   respect)

  Permission      denied

    Dick

   Well

   Also that bug is going to be the one that carries the        virus       isn’t it?

  Like, I held my tongue   earlier

   But there is a lot of focus     being        put      on that bug

   So what          Jar-Jar          is        the       cure?

    Also shouldn’t the others   leave?

   Emotional     Manipulation

   (Yeah I know these are robots and they technically     signed up           for        War)

   But...geez

 If...this scene doesn’t wanna make you hug you nearby       roomba

 Medical     Heroics

Whelp

 That      Sucks..

   Off

  Secret

   Geez

    Ow

   Dick

   Off

   Also,        That does     kinda sense for a        child           To             Do

   Whelp  

    Dick

     Also you just got back from the     dead but now he’s dead, for good?

....

Yeah if you killed me multiple     times...

Sorry,

Wow   well he really does act like a child

They got the download eye-movement,       ‘ Feel bad      gesture         Really        Well

   (Shame they can’t do it for the rest of the        characters)

   After

   ...

  It does really make   sense

  Including his awkward     reflection

I really like what they’re doing with    Jar-Jar this episode

Though it begs to differ for   how old is he compared to the Senator?      I thought he Padme and Anakin were somewhere around the same age       group

 (And you can say this is stupid because he was clearly older than Anakin in the movie, but things get   ret-conn       ed            And      he     wasn’t    acting      like        a      child)

     And     Ahsoka’s      generation           was       another       entirely            Where        that           puts         him,             I  don’t know

     Since I’m going with them going with adults for         Anakin and Padme          (Given the initiative)                 Despite this means that the         chancellor can’t              groom him

       If he’s an      adult 

       He can make his own      decisions

      And while it is a         very weird decision     to skip over the 22nd birthday

     It’s not forbidden

    Just         Weird

    (Hope they don’t try to play it off as Anakin being victim of circumstance,  after all the initiative and       free will he            Shows)

       Oof

    [generally speaking I really liked what they did with Jar-Jar’s character, I felt that what they did with the beetle and the bot transition was very smooth, [even if there is no mud on that bot], I just really think they did a good job using Jar-Jar’s character for plot importance, making his character more consistent, And that the writing team for this episode was just very good]

“ I think Jar-jar just figured out where that lab,”

      I mean he did help providing,       information

          But               you were the one that put it together

         Still          seems             to            be               a          child           and       therefore          can’t           do            that

[otherwise        I      have        to      break       out      the    unchildlike]

“They’re planning an attack on Naboo,”

  No shit

   Seriously

   Do you think the   scouting    droids      were just for the scout for     real         estate?     [Not       to     conquer]           We         will      send       two      Jedi,”

    Oh-     so...

   Seriously         is         it       never       not         them?

   Like is there      ever a time he says      I’ll send      two Jedi

   And it’s just like      Mace Windu               and         Luminara?

   Like you know     you’re getting           those         assholes 

      Especially           Obi-wan             Who seems to be esteemed           bitch of the council

         Like he always gets           thrown at the problems           and he never ever             does anything

         And they just seem to do it for                    shits and giggles        Like, “are you going to do anything         interesting this time will         Obi-wan?”

[Not questioning        core conventions]

   Oh gosh,        please no love triangle

   [or I guess maybe it’s ok     since they’re both      adults,  but      please no         Quasi tone]

    Please  

    For the life        of me...

  “ General Kenobi                   and     General Skywalker,”

      Like seriously is it ever          someone else?

    [Alt. ‘No, sorry we can only interest you in a Windu,”]

     [ Seriously           when  ever...

       Relations with a Gungans are a little tense right now

   Okay,          that makes a little sense

   Also       Shouldn’t the Queen be doing some thing?

   Like I know Amidala is from around here

  But She seems to be able to date on the most   recent news

  The thing with the Gungans could’ve calmed down by now by the time they got there

Send them     we will

  I want as much information            as possible

      ‘You didn’t ask this before’

   You just started calling shots

Which is fine

It’s just a little weird with      Queenie sitting        right there

   Maybe get them some virus gear

   That seems pretty    important

[Like...

  I don’t think     they said anything about the virus..]

  Which is kind of a big   deal

 Download any of the   other.  battle droids   memory

Oh yeah     you only checked   one

Also,   you should go to the   Senate?

Wasn’t that     the whole   purpose?

Also - to keep people up-to-date  in case       shit    happens?

   Are       you       sure       that’s       wise?

     He’s right      it is a       stupid        plan

 If you want to be a scout    - sure

     But you’re not really made for     hard-to-hard combat

     [and should probably bring some kind of   virus     protection         gear]

     Because          you        know some bullshit     could go down

  [though I acknowledged it is a bit complete of a    jump given that most of the warfare we’ve seen so far has been combat-to-combat, ship-to-ship,       hand-to-hand,            In biological warfare     [against your own species]      Is a horrific     escalation           We need to bring this man down before he kills our entire species

         [Which he has proven               wanton to do]

 And their reaction is completely     understandable

    Given that the species has likely never heard (/seen biological warfare)

     And might not even know that you can     engineer a       virus

 (Or illness)

 Depending       how     idealistic        this       little      village       was      before      this

 Come      on       Jar-Jar

   Oh     neat

  Also     yeah     bring      the      child      along       with       you

 “Enabling       power         of           love,”      Doesn’t      excuse      actually     enabling         child      soldiers

   Weird        Out          fit

     The tick bugs       are also a bit kind of            weird

         But,            alright

     Inventive

     Whelp 

     Okay

     WTF

    Illnesses

    Then again      it has been leaked for quite a      while

  Don’t think just     rubbing your hands off     will help

  Also,          so the     Gungans       are definitely dead      ,right?

   They live in water      presumably where this stream is going...

   Water...

   It’s not a pretty picture

   Poor      Here

   Also,  so that the whole river is polluted   right?

 Aight,      Go tell someone...

  Oh, hey        they     were       smart

   Off

  Came across the exact same      area?

     I thought...

   I thought they were just going to see like a bunch of angry farmers and put together the pieces

    Like, ok, time to head back to the Senate and get bigger reinforcements,          * didn’t like only two of them drink?

       Not that many

        Or cut off the           pollution         Plague

     Wait         you        knew        there        was         a      plague??

    We’re        not       just      gonna       skip       over       that...

    Like, I would’ve gone with some asshole dumped pollutants in the water and now we got to kick his ass

    Like we went from a parenthetical virus

   To...  

    The plague

    That shit takes time       and a lot of       enabling...?

 And, also we went        to murder       real quick

    Like that farmer has a pitchfork and      is ready to kill

    In like...  five minutes

   Shouldn’t you        be        petitioning a council         right now?

    Or deciding to      nope right out        of society

   Like;          That’s what I would do

     Bullshit’s happening outside          you stay inside

      Whelp

     What the heck,      Lady?!

     You literally attacked someone         for wearing a different color        shirt!

    (Because remember they live right next to       air walkers,  and they been their neighbors for like ever]

    Whelp,           Shit

   “Whatcha thinking,”

     Exactly

    That’s my thoughts

   Like regardless     of what situation you’re      into

   That kind of thinking is never       first to rational thoughts

   She was just down to body someone         regardless of who they are

    And you can’t make me       believe her the victim

  Like...    Tox lady   

    Tox

  Whelp

  Okay      ‘Day

   Lady      you     pounced       on    someone     wearing         a      helmet

   Might’ve       been         a      fashion     statement

  Might’ve their        life      support     system

(Because,  remember, this is a galaxy with multiple different ways is that regularly visit each other on different basis,)

   Like I’m not gonna right   First Contact      rules here

    But if that was Plo        he’d be dead

    Because not all species           are adapted       to other environments

    And you can’t colonizers place and make it hospitable because there’s like  other life

    So, yeah you could’ve       murdered       someone!

     Just dick move lady

    That was just a generally   dick move

   Water

   Why     didn’t      you      just        say      that    instead        of    attempting       to       body       them?

    Like         I           will       never        get      over       how      much        of         a       dick        move      that      was

  (Like that episode with Kid Fisto)

 (Such a dick     !)

  What

   You’re just believing a random person...

   Like she could be a separatist      spy

   Trying to kill     you

   (Like we know she isn’t but seriously)

  Wtf

  Peppe       Bow

  Well, Peppe you just attempted to body a      senator...

How do you even know that they’re her animals?

 You just got here

All you know that she tried to   body you

[i’ll get over the     bodying thing]   

but seriously     not cool

   Ok

 “Mesa Take you,”

   “No,”

Yeah like that’s a bad idea

  Like should’ve send a warning up to the whole colony   and world idea

Like, seriously, Amidala,     shouldn’t you call someone about    that?

“Peppe, you’ll be going home soon,”

 Wait she can’t even go      home?

  Like,      seriously,       how bad is the situation?

  How Tox     is it?

   Theed

   Dude...

   What if she doesn’t live in    Theed?

    Like, does Amidala just have a photographic memory of everyone’s names and facial structure, including the       Gungans?

    Because          she’s        making            a lot           of      assumptions

       And is why     assumed authority       doesn’t work

Aka

   Amidala          being        pretty       tox

     Like that’s a presumed adult      you’re taking authority of it Amidala

       I’m pretty sure she knows not to run towards the    tox...

     Nodded

 Well this got   dark...

 Anything out of the   ordinary

  Whelp

 Lel-lants

  Levilance?

  Leverance (leverage?)

   And seriously what was with that     camera        zoom

  Escort our guests inside

   Why?

   [like I know he’s the Mad science      archetype, and where this is headed, but     like that is a really stupid move

  Like   she has no idea where your hideout is     So just,       invite her in,

   Weird            Not          Of         The       Question        Weird

  Seriously         the     Separtist are just a bunch of     war crimes

  Aight

 Jar-Jar is just the lord of all   conveniences

  Okay, new plan, you got the entrance, grab some guards, come back, beat the shit out of them

      * I know I’m doing the all for accountability and beat the shit out of the asshole yourself but A) Amidala hasn’t an experience any of this bullshit and there’s crossed into severity ‘I’m going to kill all humanity’ territory

       I don’t blame Amidala for her innocence

       Because this is becoming one of those         ‘immediate accountability situations’

     Good job

      I really have no idea how to react to a       virus situation to be      quite honest

 Like how   tox...

  Ha

  Seriously how did you      not hear that?

  Play the victim

   Then       possibly fecking shoot him      (Thinking smart,        not accountably)

   Nope

   ...

  Dude      (Not to   shame,)       But I think       he is        a swamp      creature

    I mean -        we don’t see       anyone else        that looks         like him

    He’s out          Of nowhere

   He doesn’t seem         Kamooin           (Long neck)            But he          doesn’t             seem              quite                ....            Human

         Life

         Aight

         How

          Oh,             He’s a      polite creatin of mass destruction planning to destroy all life, and literally the most toxic

       A demonstration is in order

      Uhm, no

      No thank          you

Dude, you just removed the whole force field for one    vial?

 That is a disaster   waiting to happen?

  Like you obviously shouldn’t fuck around     with things like         that

 - the past

 - what’s beneath the earth’s core

- Earth’s waste products

- human body

- Toxicity     (in general)

“The return of the infamous blue...”

  Wait, infamous...?

  This      shit      has    happened      before??

  “Blue shadow virus,”

   Well if it’s happened before     then you can easily kick it’s ass

   *like I know the        implication is that         he modified it

    But only in a toxic     society would that      work...

   Extinct

  So you use     accountable      practices         to       kill it

   So it isn’t a threat

    Ago

I have given it life

           Tox    

         (The actions  

       not the storytelling)

Like you literally enable    this just because he wanted to screw over            humanity       (Sentience?)

   Humanity on       Naboo?

   It’s a bit weird because I don’t think         Earth is ever brought up

    (Which is good for suspension)

    Taking life

  He’s.... trying

  But... Again

  If.....everything had separate water and food and       General    Accountability          Practices...

 “Poison         The        Gun-gan          Water...”

    So, we’re just going to acknowledge that    right?

  Like       they’re screwed?

 “Yeahyeahyeahyeah”

    Wtf..?

Am I having a     stroke...?

What...      the..      fuck...?

(It sounds like a SpongeBob laugh)

     Heck....?

     Yes...?

   Un-fortunately           What?

     ....

   Improved

    Dude

 Are you trying to get everyone      .. dead?

  (Like I know      that’s the point...)

   But....    ....

  Don’t

Okay, going full mad scientist with the     lightning

  Nice

 Air-born     strain

  Oh, my god there were    multiple problems with that

 But, mainly don’t play      god

 Like lightning can cause    shit

 But...it shouldn’t

 Like, just don’t commit   war crimes  

Specifically against   your fellow man

 Because shit tends to happen     when you do

(Unpredictable]

 Bombs

 Last

Geez that bot reacts worse than general grievous     ’s

  Who is actually quite nice to his bots when      the episode doesn’t demand it

WtF, did you do to the    roomba?

Seriously, we went from 1 to 10 on the   scale

From Yoda and Sidious throwing airplanes at each other

To intentional   biological   warfare

[Break up was rough]

 [Sidious is tox]

 [Yoda isn’t helping]

“ are you insane?”

   No he’s malicious

  ... and you’re an enabler

    Come on kick his ass

   Like, not innocent       here       If he can make it,        you can destroy it.       (Pretty         Much)

      Immediate        accountability                is         hecking            up            my            vibe

         But you’ve seen the shit  kill

         And know that he   caused it

        (Like no one gets brought into a secret lab and thinks ‘oh yeah this is a good situation’)

         So, like it is accountability,          on sight

          And you’re failing

   “ no life forms are immune to it,”

     Then it would’ve killed everyone

    Like this           this is a little bullshit

     Like not only do you live on     the planet

     Having some degree of        compatibility with it

      But...      

   Also wildly different compatibilities and biology

    Secondly, eradicated

   If there’s a problem,          there’s likely a solution right over the corner

    Also       hey      there’s a cure so no problem

   Murdered

      No, she’s right, eradicating

A life form that  can’t produce positivity         (Or has the structure to produce productivity         without the assistance of others)

      Aka; difference between Toxic and non-sentient     /Affable Evil sentient

       And the difference between nonsentient and affable evil

     It’s some kind of non-essential logic

    Meaning it is capable of thought processes that don’t involve eating and or doing (basic maintenance        Survival)

   That shit isn’t alive

      Tox

    Okay

     Poor         Guy

  Bunny      eared        bot

  Superior         Life        Forms           Are        Spreading            Their            Disease

     Dude...         Who seriously gets hit with this shit and doesn’t think I’m going to go take a bath?

    Or you know behave cautiously

(Seriously as noted this requires everyone to be an        idiot)

 And a dick

 (More        Specifically]

   Wipe out the galaxy

     As awful as it   seems,   he is doing this    maliciously

  So I try to (avoid)     using the word          “Idiot,”             Because            a           better       description            is          Unaccountable,             Toxic,             Or         Malicious

    (I don’t let people out of      accountability that easily)

     Like;             no        one         is      innocent         in        the     circumstance

  (Even though he’s the most       toxic)

   Amidala       should          be         snarking        while        doing           it

    Because if everyone is     accountable and          doesn’t          enable this bullshit,                   It             can’t              go                that               far

          What?

        Beautiful

       Beautiful            shot

        Sun         composition

       And         texture

        Very              Nice

  They        really       did         a       good          job

                        Also hey there’s now

                        Also I’ll say what I do                                with Ahsoka -

                                    Please   let her be good

                                     *with everyone else there’s room     for doubt 

                                                                    But with her they specifically call her youngling

                                                                      *and I’m just gonna have to assume everyone else is badly written

 *Excluding       Jar-jar       because        that was very clearly          Operated            And          Managed -          Not to -         Just     have  him be          a       walking disaster pile

    Aight

 Where’s    Senator         Amidala?

   .....?

   And you let her go....?

   He has a point....

Not really...

Assumed   authority      is     bullshit

   But   in   terms     of     the      story

 And Amidala position as    just a senator      Enabler

   And Anakin it is    either being really tox...

   Or...

   Peppe           Bow

   She still     here?

  Are you keeping the girl    hostage?

  Also yeah  ‘I tried to    attack-

*slice*

 I don’t   see   this conversation   going well

Specifically     When      Tox

 ‘They’

 Seriously, no one is questioning the sick   maker?

Like, I don’t think they mentioned that in their report?

 Also yeah she brought the child with    her

 [Amidala-         Enabler-]

  “ You         got        it      master!”

   Again with the    enthusiasm

    They’ve        clearly       never        seen          a       child         in         a     classroom 

  (Or     bothered       to      use      the     memory        of      being           a        child)

    Why didn’t you send someone to look for them?

              Again, Toxic?

             Or, replication of tox orders                  (with too heavy a tone?)

               I don’t know

              And neither                 does the music

              Here’s the thing;           you can’t make me feel for           enablers       

              Here’s the thing I like about      grievous;   

          Particularly my favor                     ite episode;

   Notice how they never betray him as a good     guy?

  Like there was any validity to him turning over?

   And the theme well it had updrifts, never     completely lightened up, with        this            flow              -ery              Non              Sense?         Yeah he got        shit thrown           at him

      And I admit           To “Aww          -ing              A few           Times-     -      But I never questioned        the validity           of the            fact             Or had            any doubts             that               it            was                  of                  his             own            making

          Here                 I’m          constantly          doubting              my         emotions                 to               the           circumstance

            Which                  is                 not                   a                 good                   thing

                When                   writing                      a                    good                      and                 consistent                      story                        ....                         For me to be wondering the                           age of the characters                           .....                    Because                       context                         clues                          should                              key                              me                                  in                                  .....                               Meanwhile we’ve been through (almost) Monotone                                Anakin to voiced-by an adult, acting

                            Acting like what                                 I don’t know

                              Remaining (squarely) in the                                   realm of I-don’t-know                                       What the fuck                                       they’re doing

                                                            Hoping that they aren’t going for the pho- “Teenager”

                                                                     “This is how they talk like”

When no      child       or adult          Has ever             talked         like that             ever

                                Which is disturbing                         when this is supposed to be a                                       “love story”                            (No I won’t touch that with                                 a 50 foot pole)

                               And leaves me questioning                                how I should feel about scenes                                            like this

As     a     possible      allegory        for        the       over   sexualization        of     children

                                                                                                 Or a show or                                                                                                        Anakin                                                                                                        becoming                                                                                                              a                                                                                                             toxic                                                                                                         individual                                                                                                              and                                                                                                             a toxic                                                                                                             adult (partner)

                              I don’t know                                 (Possibly                                   bad                                    writing)                                                            Back to the story

                          “What latest developments?”

      You seriously                    Didn’t            tell them                    about               The               Virus??

          Dude Obi-wan’s bringing his       (possible) child        And Anakin’s          Definite         Child      Apprentice     -        Those    Don’t          have         a        lot           of       defenses       against         tox

  Seriously           Dude

    (Dick          Move)

       On Everyone’s part

     “Robo anatomy,”

   Is that      seriously        what        you’re        calling              it

        Like       they literally       brought him        back to life?

      To kill him            again

          That’s              rough                      Also              who’s            managing             coms                with                 Padme?

            Like she clearly made a sound when she was kidnapped   right?

   Who        is       that?

    Dude, seriously the command droid didn’t see this shit but the basic clanker  got it           When all that’s left of him is a head

       Do you know this could’ve been a really good call back to the previous episode and an improvement on that   Intel bit I     mocked       Un-miercilessly           (Stairs)           But it’s just nonsensical   here      

       What is a shame               because                 it               would                make                  so                 much                 more                 sense             (emotionally)                  and                (physically                     For the lower ranked Clanker on the emergency table to be a bit stunned, about giving a speech

  - And   showing        us         a         sur-prise         amount            of      intelligence

              While  the severed head       Would hold more intelligence      as the commander

                      I just....      have a lot of feelings

And,      am     a little...    disappointed

I like the Roombas...

  On    with      the      story...

     “Nerro Vindi, the senior medic for the para-families,”

     Oof

     “Ten years ago,”

   Any more specifics?

Or did he just wandered into the woods        On his own     free will?

    Wait,         Where         are         you        getting           the       transmission

       And why aren’t you sending a rescue party?

       Or going to remove the bombs

         Or going to inform someone?

        Or going to fix the clearly broken architectural of your entire place if this is a threat to you?

        Like, seriously captain of guard

        Do something!

        You   could’ve           had             an              intel            guy             tell             this           information

       “Plague,”

         Oh so having terrible architecture     that allows this to go any father isn’t just       -is a galaxy wide problem

     Great

      Good             to           know              I           never             have              to              worry            about              those               fuckers

   “There is some good news”

  You fixed your arch-

   (I’ll stop roasting their architecture-        For now-)

   Found the      Lab

  Dude      Just     completely-

   “Disappeared,”

     Hold up

Let    me   rewind

 Yep

   That’s Amidala with a com       device

      [if anyone was wondering where the      bullshitery lands;

         It’s the fact that she could literally be transmitting this all straight to the base and her superiors (she put it in her pocket)

       [Presumably still has it]

      If there was an a questions about      accountability

      “Here, here and here,”

     How?

    Never mind-       she did ask them to do that

   That’s-

   fair logic

   ....

   Okay

   ......         .....

  “If,”

 Seriously      what         is       that      voice?

   Killed....     ....

     ....

    Better to have one planet infected in the entire galaxy...

    Aight

    .....

   Here

   Whelp

    Also yeah they didn’t give Ahsoka a map or       any kind of instruction?

    Great       freakin      mentors              (They           all           shit           but         Especially)

    Seriously-            Just  

       Well            she          did             help          her         down      eventually

      Also        does it not have sound?

      Okay

    I would normally        commentate       about how           they       don’t report       that back

       But when it’s Ahsoka I just let my brain go       numb

     There’s no risk          so why bother

    “They’ll be here in a moment,”

      Again, there was an insane maniac out there - who possibly kidnapped your “girlfriend” (Possibly) - and you’re just     sitting here doing nothing?

   [This could be a good saying about Aniken showing toxic      traits but his tone is too light,         I cannot tell,]

   You aren’t even worried about        Ahsoka?

    You seem a bit on edge

    Like un-childlike so 

   Or adult being toxic        so?

    Because         the scene          is holding him accountable to nothing

       [if it was just plain toxicity            He should be knowingly         so....

       And more on          edge

       .....

       Hmmm

        You know

      Wish that had some weight

      I’m better at hiding it

      Anakin needs less snark and Obi-Wan needs more

      [or they both need       more]

      I don’t know what they were going for     in this scene

     [or anything else with          this character or tone]

  Lab

 Seriously,       You      waited       for      that

   Do not attempt to get inside

  ‘We haven’t for the last     hour,’

 Like, seriously this is supposed to be intense,      right?

   ‘Bunker Bomb,’

     Whoa, movie        I need you to differente         The bombs               -             A little              Better

 What-       Does this thing do?     -       Hatchet      - -        -          “Rex and his men,”

    Oh        yeah

     Where are they?            C’mon

  Oh,  they’re here

   “Anakin, Padme         may be lost,”

    A child...   

       Would not react               (Would react                      With                        The                    Emotion-less                         Response                         Taught)

    An             Adult....  

        Wouldn’t worry          Because another                   adult                      Could                    Handle                        It

A (Toxic)      Adult;  

   Smug bastard that knows another adult could handle it but choses to be toxic anyway

 Anakin;  

    Reactionary             No confidence

      ?????

   WHAT AM I-

      .......

      Ha

    Anakin decide to go on the     carrier

    (For, no apparent reason)

    And...

   Aight,         There         Still        There

   Okay

    Good          for            Her... ?

     Right          How

   What?

  Good for her

    Was that a Bunker bomb?

     [I’m confused]

     Woah

   Also that alarm is a lot more destructive       than the actual explosion

    Whelp

     Breach

     ....

    - -

   He’s creepy

   - -

  Oh now he puts on the mask

After... all this bullshit

  You’re       still in the air?

    Thought you would’ve been on the ground

     In Case,  he tried to escape

       And Rex was supposed to be backing Ahsoka up

       ?????

    [what is this    plan?]     .....

 No

Why...didn’t you arrange an escort....

  Like, She’s almost definitely going to get   involved in the action now

     Or is more likely to get caught in the cross-

     Never-mind she’s an adult, she knows how to take care of herself

  Aight,         O’kday

   Peppy is ready to put her skills of      bodying people to use

The most   terrif     -ying

 Whelp-     Wait,     Fighting’s     already     happening...

   You got there  five seconds ago...

   HOW?!

 What?!

   Okay...

   There            are     BOMBS        in      there

  Obi-wan            is          overdramatic

    And should have     broken      knees

    From not slowing down the        fall

    Whelp

   Skywalker             Is             Down             For            Death

    [I    wouldn’t recommend        watching            the               scene             if you have a fear of heights or          falling!]

     And        he ends       up with       a spr-

   Rex;       Show          Off         [Intern-ally]

   “it’s quiet in here,”

   “looks like a Ahsoka,”

  I love how he starts with    Ahsoka          Like Obi-Wan        doesn’t matter

    “’s,           Distraction is working,”

      Not a word to Obi-Wan

      -we all know      Obi-Wan didn’t do shit

   The fact that the child soldier is more likely

   How?

  Alright

  Bunny      eared     bullshit

   Okay

   The child soldiers are kicking more ass than     Obi-wan

    This         is a problem in      writing

   Okay

   “Padme”

    Great  to shot your     weakness?

    Die!

     No!          Not      Jar-Jar!

     His character has surprisingly        grown on me

    And he’s the only innocent party          in this cir        -cum-stance    

    Being chara-      cter-    ized         As         A        Child

     Padme           can         get            out         of        that      situation-

     He        can’t

    Aww

   Also - Obi-Wan is nowhere to be seen

  Great        Job

 Anakin,      Stall

   Enablers

    Room full         of enablers

    Okay...           Whatever

    What’s            Obi-wan             Up             To

  Ahsoka’s       being        an    abomination        of         nature

   Good...

   Obi-Wan...     actually       decided          to         do       something

   Greaaat,           Isn’t there a virus you’re supposed to be destroying?

    Yeah,            Okay

    Also,          Better         Snark

    Your child       character         shouldn’t           be       capable           of                the              same          amount          of      emotion          as        your       adult      character          ....       Great          ......           He’s a smart      Villain

   Then again        literally all the adults are fine

   The only two characters we have to worry about are          Jar-Jar              And           (Tech-           nic            ally)                 Ahsoka             Who logically          shouldn’t be able to get out of the situation 

       But she has broken that wall so many times it might as well be a free space on a bingo board a cardinal sins (of writing) the writers have committed

        So  I’m only worried about Jar-jar            in this scene

          A surprising turn,              for some

         Choice

   “Killing you,”

    HOW!

   Seriously that should be an actually threatening moment,     But it’s like if a kicked a puppy dog said it

 Either Anakin should know those words and that’s the tragedy of the situation     (Not the emotion of the situation which he shouldn’t have)

  Adult;

   That should be an actually terrifying situation        ....

  Going back to the General     Grievous       example;

  Remember      how I said       I aw- that it       elicited       emotion         Out          of         me?

       It wasn’t because     he was vulnerable           (Though           Chil-dren         Circum-stance               Can             Elicit                Said           (Emotional)            Response)

      It was because the situation was bad                  And no one deserves                   bad              Even though I acknowledge is one of his own                 making                     (And                  Liverance)

               Here-                    I just shrug

             If he’s an                 adult, that’s tox                   If he’s                      Child, then it’s un-childlike.                   (Un-adultlike                        Too)

                 But the narrative doesn’t commit to either

               So, I don’t have any                 emotion

            .....

    Dude, seriously         flatter him

   He’s      clearly          the       type        of      villain       that       gets       distracted        by      flattery

 Damn it Jar-      Jar

 He is the only one that big dramatic music    better be playing for

 Whelp-heck

 .....

 Ahahhhahaha

That clone...

  Just...

  Lightly.

  TAPPED         ....

[Re:watched; I don’t know why but for some reason the animation made it look like, dude, here just lightly tapped this droid’s shoulder and it [just] fell down and this other dude just fucking bodied both of them]

       I don’t know why that just                cracked me up

            Good on whoever                animated that

                                        Made                                             me                                            laugh

              On with it

             Are you okay

            [Of course she’s OK                 is Jar Jar, alright?]

         [Romance                  Music]

       Hmmmm,               Ha

          No-              Just no-

        If you can’t put in the effort to write accountable adult      characters, movie,

       You don’t get to have a             romance scene

                  *You didn’t earn it

[accountably       write       adult     characters,          you          can          still     portray       toxic      relationships,*           If        you        do         so    accountably]

    *Without          narrative         rom             antici                  zation

     [Cuts          Away]

       Thank              You

         Okay

           Oh yeah     she can definitely handle a             tank

        Ahsoka’s                     A                Mary Sue

                             [I’ve already called                                         Anakin             this before I have no        hesitation

        Continuing                 on

             Grab                 your                 blasters

   Oh yeah screw getting the important       person away from danger!

They   wouldn’t       be       on           the        floor        in           the       first          place...

   Also,         hey        where is      Jar-jar?

  (He       was          the        only    innocent        party        in             this.)

   S’up         Aight

    Also I’m surprise that        Obi-Wan’s guys are     orange             I thought        this theme         would be blue

       Blue eyes

       Blue            Temperament      

       (Chill)

        Etc

        Yes

Don’t speak-

  Heck

   There        they       went

  “ Spoke too you soon,”

     No shit -              Sherlock

    “Anakin,”

    I guess -      you didn’t-       capture  the doctor

   “No Obi-Wan I rescued the very important prisoner which was ne   -cessary,”

     They could send her with the clones

 But she        could also take care of    herself

   So          I was never really worried about                                                           her

     * do you have the bombs*

    His lips-         Didn’t move

 -The lip-synch

  - [ The animation- Re-Watch,-]

     Just didn’t work- 

       For that scene!

       Bombs

       Missing

      There’s Jar-Jar

   [“Master?”]

     [Stops, in the hallway,]

    DON’T stop in the hallway...!

     ....

    Missing bomb

    Yeah        you should go upstairs and look for it

     Or WARN your people!

      [at least          get the kids away from it!]

      Vindi, bomb

       Great

   [that’s a good thing      I wasn’t really paying attention to that]

    Also great         it’s an egg hunt for a bomb

     Fun             Times

       Droid

       Let’s move

  [I was about to say           who gave Ahsoka her own command?”           But that’s Rex,]

     Okay,            Get              It

        Also,              Wait-

       Never-mind             Amidala’s                 An               Adult

      [I was about to bring up a point that she should get her- clearance quarantine thing back, because the       Jedi (adult) might    have shields, but     it doesn’t matter        Either way

 Also; that thing         looks bigger     than it looked      in other scenes

    Never- mind              Might be the same

   Oh

     Good reaction

    Put it somewhere safe

   Then go beat the ever - loving    crud         out of him

 [for the story,        not for accountability]

  Okay,         Aight

 Can someone not screw      with the power to his ship

    Aight

   That     works      too...

   Okay...

    That’s wood      Right

   Okay,         Poor    Drones    Clones

    Hope        they’re        good          at        their        jobs

    Then again they do have helmets

    ....

   There’s        the       thing

   [Again           Why       would        you        follow]

     Damn!

     That’s toothless    

     but         scary

     Got             It

      Oh          No

    How did you not have a bomb diffuser on your team??.

    What were-

   There was no risk-

   But still-

   The logic

  * Obi-wan does a Leap*

   Drops vials

   Well, crud

   Don’t they have masks tho-

   Also- no

   Crud

   So why can’t one Force dude just play catch?

         - while the other-

       -was it because Obi-wan wanted to show off?

        - I think it was

           Never mind

          Crud

          Body                Him               Peepe

           How

           Yes

           Get                Him

          Whelp

           Her             skill              came                in             use

         Okay

          His             voice           actor           must             be          having             a         fucking          day

(It     sounds     like       a        fun      role)

   ...

  Whelp

   Good         For         Him

  “Deactivated             as            well,”

         That’s actually            pretty funny

        “ i’m ok              too,”

           Yeah he really didn’t care about you

           Then, again, neither do I                   abomination

            Cool                       Neat

     Cool, so that episode

      It’s very like the last one

       “Hidden enemy”?

      With a very clear gimmick

That one - spies

 This one;     the plague plot

    Not with a lot of logic- (or the best set up) - if you focus on the main “gimmick,”, it works

    - with minor animation issues that bug me

   Unfortunately, unlike the other, This one doesn’t have the basis of a compelling character

        - This             one’s                tone                is               too              light

     While            the       other’s        tone         was       perfect,       and     matched       the   seriousness       of      the    subject

 And     showed      the     tragedy       of    enabling       a       bad    situation

      (And elicit an emotional reaction          from           me)

   While       this       one      can’t      even      take   himself   seriously

  And   neither     can       I

New top story from Time: Vivica A. Fox: How Uma Thurman Helped Me Through ‘Kill Bill’ With Quentin Tarantino

They told me I had 15 minutes with Quentin Tarantino.

“Quentin’s going to meet with you in a coffee shop,” my agent said.

“A coffee shop?”

“It’s to see whether or not he likes you,” she said. “Then he’ll let you know if he wants to see you for the part.”

I thought, That’s some sh-t, but okay. He’d written a role for a black woman in Kill Bill, a script that was already getting so much buzz. Vernita Green was a cold-blooded assassin hiding out in the suburbs of Pasadena — until Uma Thurman comes to get her.

I was so anxious when I got to that coffee shop. It was like an audition for an audition. The first thing he told me was that he was in a video store and saw my name on the cover of the Two Can Play That Game DVD.

“I was like, ‘Vivica Fox!’” he said, shouting my name like I already was an action hero. “I am going to take this home, and if she moves me on the screen, that’s who’s gonna play my Vernita Green.”

Quentin loves telling stories, and if he likes you, oh, he is going to talk. At like Mach 5. We discussed favorite movies, of course. I talked about Pam Grier and how much I loved her, and Richard Roundtree, who’d played my dad on Generations. “Yeah, I’m Shaft’s daughter,” I joked.

The 15-minute meeting stretched to an hour and a half, until he said, “I’m going to send you a scene and I’m going to come to your house and we’ll work through it together.”

“My house?”

“Yeah.”

“Promise me you won’t hold my house against me?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Just promise me, Quentin.” He did, and I’m sure he suspected I was a hoarder or some crazy person living in a tiny house. The truth was that I was living in a huge 8,000-square-foot mansion in Tarzana. I’d invested in real estate, was doing very well, thank you, and this place frankly looked like a diva lived there. It was straight out of Dynasty, with a double staircase and huge chandelier right when you walked in.

It could easily be mistaken for the home of a spoiled brat who would never follow direction. This was a time in film when studios were not playing. They were tired of problem actors and had dealt with their spoiled stars shutting down productions because of heroin problems. They wanted workers on the straight and narrow, and any red flags could put me out of the running.

I was afraid he would take one look at the place and say, “Here I thought Vivica was hungry.” I still was.

So when I answered the door, his greeting was: “Holy shit, this is your house.”

“You promised me you wouldn’t hold it against me.”

“Holy shit,” he said again. “I’m not. Let me see this place.”

Before I could say anything, he helped himself to a tour like he was scouting a location. When he was done, he said he wanted to do the scene in the kitchen. Just like in the film.

He made me read it twice. And then, like he was making an idle remark, he said, “Very good. You are my Vernita Green. I’m hungry, do you want sushi?”

Mark Mainz—2004 Getty ImagesVivica A. Fox and Quentin Tarantino attend the “Kill Bill Vol. 1 Video Release Party” on April 12, 2004.

We went out to Kushiyu on Ventura in Tarzana. At dinner, he told me his plan for the film: There would be no quick cuts or getting away with special effects to make us look like real warriors. I had to commit to six months of training, and all of the actors needed to become experts in martial arts to make his vision real on the screen.

“No problem,” I said, thinking back to my high school athlete days. Piece of cake.

Ha.

For three months, Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, Daryl Hannah, David Carradine, and I spent eight hours a day studying martial arts at a gym they put together in Culver City. It was nine to five, Monday through Friday. If you didn’t walk in the door between 8:55 and 8:59, you were in trouble at 9:01. I thought I was in the damn Olympics or something.

Uma was three months out after having her gorgeous baby boy, Roan, and she also brought her equally beautiful four-year-old, Maya, along. Of all the girls on set, I think Uma liked me best because of her kids. I used to play with them all the time. That baby boy would stare into my eyes. “Vivica,” she said one day, “I think he’s in love.” She and I were on strict diets, and we had a ritual of spending our one cheat day a week hanging out at this bowling alley Maya loved. We’d eat slice after slice of cheap pizza, loving every bit of it.

At first, Uma was frustrated because all the other women on the film were dropping weight so quickly with the intense training. I mean, the woman had just had a child. “Don’t worry,” I said, “it’ll come off.” She went to China to film for a month, and when I saw her again, I walked right past her. She yelled, “Yay! I got skinny!”

Uma needed all the support she could get — the movie rested on her shoulders. She was so busy, and then her and Daryl had that blonde competition thing going on. And I was like, I’m gonna be cool with you and I’m gonna be cool with everybody. I’m not in a pissing contest.

I have to tell you — whether you’re on a movie set or working at a law firm, some people will try to pull you into their drama and make you pick sides. Don’t fall for it. Think for yourself and stay above the fray.

BEI/REX/Shutterstock&Daryl Hannah, Uma Thurman and Vivica A. Fox at the film premiere of ‘Kill Bill: Volume 1’ in Los Angeles on Sept. 29, 2003.

Drama aside, the training itself was brutal. We’d do fight choreography, knife throwing, samurai lessons and hit the treadmill and weights in between. They liked me because I could do them high kicks from being a cheerleader. And every Friday, at the end of the day, Quentin would gather us around and give us a review. He called it his “State of the Union.” We all had to sit and listen.

The first week Quentin cut into us, telling us we had to work harder. Okay, I can work harder.

Second week, we got the same thing after we busted our asses. He said we weren’t giving it our all.

Third Friday, I was so proud of all that our team had accomplished. I was sitting between cute little Lucy and sweet Uma, and I was ready for a high five for all of us.

Instead, Quentin tore into us. Something about us lollygagging in the morning, taking too long to suit up and gabbing over coffee. He said we should get here at 8:30, a half hour early, if we wanted to do all that.

I raised my hand. “Hold up.”

And I lost it on him. “Is this a ‘beat us up’ contest?” I asked. “Are we f-cking doing anything right? Goddamn.” Everyone gasped. I felt Uma draw back. Lucy grabbed my hand and was trying to do a kind of acupressure on me, whispering, “Calm down. Calm down.”

I couldn’t. I kept sputtering, thinking I was taking a stand for everyone. And finally Quentin sort of said he appreciated the work but he wanted us all to do our best and to trust him.

Uma came up to me after. “Come here,” she said. She put her arm on my shoulder and those beautiful eyes of hers locked on mine.

“You know, Uma, it’s bullsh-t,” I said.

She repeated in her calm, meditative voice, “I’ve worked with him. I’ve worked with him. I’ve worked with him. And . . . it’s how he does things. He doesn’t mean anything by it, it’s just how he gets down.”

“Well, God,” I sputtered, “I mean, we’re working our f-cking asses off. And it’s like, you know, we’re not doing anything right.”

“What you need to do is learn how to manipulate the situation better. Then you can get what you want.”

I was all righteous. “I don’t have to manipulate nobody,” I said. “That’s not me. I don’t have to kiss his ass.”

She cocked her head. “No, I don’t mean like that,” she said, still speaking in that calm, soothing voice. “You have to learn to be quiet, speak less. He’s tough, but he’s not stupid. He’ll concede you something if it’s to make the film better. Learn to attack intelligently, Vivica. Because he’s got the power to fire you.”

And she told me she didn’t want that to happen. “But thank you for speaking up,” she said.

That moment was pure sisterhood. She was honestly looking out for me. She wanted me to advocate for myself, but to do it in a way that was more constructive. I’ll admit, it still took me a minute to figure out what she was talking about.

A Band Apart/Miramax/Kobal/REXDaryl Hannah, Vivica A. Fox, Michael Madsen, Lucy Liu in ‘Kill Bill: Volume 1’

I was driving home from Culver City when I realized why she had touched me so deeply. I thought about my dad, and when he would tell me not to just go off on the basketball court when all my energy had me spazzing out. “Attack intelligently,” he would tell me, the exact same words Uma used. “Don’t blow it by blowing up.”

When it came time for real rehearsals and filming, I got to see Uma give a master class in being a movie star and leader on the set.

I watched her argue with Quentin, intelligently and successfully, for wardrobe changes and even dialogue rewrites. She made it a true collaboration, pushing him away from simply making an ode to the samurai films he made us all watch with him, toward something new. Kill Bill is an astonishing work because of their shared efforts, and it’s because they each approached it not as a job, but as a cornerstone of their careers.

I know it’s the work that I am most proud of in my career. It took four days to film our fight scene, and on the last day I took a long bath when it was over. I sat in the tub and counted all the bruises on my arms and legs. I got up to 30. And I did so with gratitude. I was proud of my battle scars. I had done a Tarantino film, and nobody could take that accomplishment from me. Quentin is a fabulous director and I’d love to work with him again. I appreciate those endless hours in the Culver City torture chamber. It was his way of breaking us down to build us back up.

I had no idea about the car crash Uma recently made public, as that scene was shot after I completed my filming. But when I saw it I was shocked. Even at the premiere and on press tours in Los Angeles and New York, it wasn’t even mentioned. I commend Uma for her courage and grace, and hopefully Quentin learned that no shot is worth risking an actor’s safety.

From Uma, I learned so much about sharing power. She wanted me to do my best. That hasn’t always been the case for black women actors in film. I think the dirty secret of why African-American women are only now getting more opportunities is that directors were afraid to put a sister against a white woman actor. Because they knew the sister, who’d had to work her ass off to get to that moment, was always going to shine like the brightest light and blow the white actor off the screen. I say put me with the best. Because if she’s bringing her A-game, I’m bringing my A-plus game. And we gonna turn this mother out.

From Every Day I’m Hustling by Vivica A. Fox. Copyright © 2018 by the author and reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Press.

via https://cutslicedanddiced.wordpress.com/2018/01/24/how-to-prevent-food-from-going-to-waste