#they at least credited the animators who cleaned everything up
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Not Linkin Park making their new music video with AI art. First Mike with the NFTs and now this 😭
#linkin park#I started watching and KNEW something was off#they at least credited the animators who cleaned everything up#but 0 credit for all of the artists used to fuel the generator on either the video or the generator itself or the sagan person#and it feels even worse since they’re using Chester’s voice#no one can say what his opinion of ai art would be#but it really isn’t a good look to use a dead man’s voice for something already so controversial in the art world#can I please just be able to enjoy my childhood music without constantly feeling guilty abt it#I was already dissapointed with Mike when he started producing fucking music nfts#I wanna say this has to be the bottom of the barrel and things can’t get worse#but they always somehow do when I say anything like that#so I’m not saying a thing in that regard and will just prepare for more disappointment ;-;
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it’s 2015 and i am
sitting on my mattress on the floor in the spare bedroom of the chicago condo my friend’s parents bought for them with oil company money. both of us have undiagnosed and unmedicated adhd. neither of us clean. the wide, shallow bathroom sink grows a yellow-black film of residue and shaved hair.
i am trying to come to terms with being dead. the year prior was a cascade of horror, a chain of a hundred different sudden sickenings in the gut, and as far as the world and most people in it are concerned, i no longer exist - which would have been more than fine with me, except that time continues to pass.
until recently, porpentine had been writing a column for rock paper shotgun called live free play hard, reviewing free indie games. itch.io is in its infancy, but unity is ten years old now and really starting to come into its own, and this is the heyday of the so-called walking simulator - Dear Esther in 2012 to Firewatch in 2016. i never played most of the big names, the ones that attracted all that sneering gamergate hatred (Gone Home excepted) - after all, they cost money, and in 2015, i didn’t have any of that. so every porpentine article was a damp, fertile patch of sometimes-delicious always-free mushrooms. i play a LOT of itch.io games that year, and i’ve been missing them lately, so i wanted to talk about them here.
live free play hard is a decade old, at this point. links are dead. games don’t quite run the same on modern computers. twine games which once had music are now silent. these are some of the survivors.
their angelical understanding by porpentine, herself.
***STROBE WARNING*** and also for a text-based game this is an intense PTSD simulator. i considered linking others of her games here: neon haze (link appears to be broken), CYBERQUEEN (about which i’ve already said a lot) or howling dogs (which is arguably still her best), but i went with t.a.u. because, well, in 2015 a PTSD simulator was what i needed.
CHYRZA by kitty horrorshow
kh has probably Made It as an indie artist more than anyone else on this list? my metric for this is that there are two whole jacob geller video essays about her games. CHYRZA is pure tone: jittery unity platforming up desert monuments collecting audiologs. trust me, it’s really effective.
Bernband by Tom van den Boogaart
this one still runs, but there’s a bit of slowdown in some areas. this is pure exploration through a very pixelly alien city: nightclubs, power stations, overpasses, late-night noodle bars. an empty chapel. a trumpet recital. the empty corridors and stairwells between everything. it’s stuck with me for all these years.
SABBAT by oh no problems
this is the least subtle it is possible for a text game to be. it starts with animal sacrifice and gets really fucking explicit from there. as someone who had at the time cut a picture of baphomet out of the liner notes from a random black metal cd found in a des moine record store and taped it to my bedroom doorpost like a mezuzah, all i really wanted from SABBAT was the ability to have snakes for dicks, and buddy, it delivers. i remember there used to be a sort of sludgey doom metal soundtrack, but it doesn’t seem to exist anymore, and the credits link to a nonexistent soundcloud. so it goes.
HEARTWOOD by Kerry Turner
hahaha man i’d completely forgotten about this game until i went back through the archives but fuck, it rules. it’s so simple. it’s pure sensation. i loved it then and i love it now.
Off-Peak by Cosmo D
i think Cosmo D is still going strong these days! actually, i’m pretty sure i have unplayed games by them in my steam library, i should fix that. Off-Peak is a jazz exploration of the world’s most colorful train station. people are playing bespoke 2015 eurogames. a vendor is selling a bunch of sheet music that musicians have had to pawn, what with the way the economy is going. you understand. triplets stalk you. a man strokes a cow, menacingly. i would say it’s peak itch.io, but in point of fact it is, of course, off-peak itch.io.
anyway i lived, eventually, and went on to make art of my own, but it’s my belief - it’s my hope - that all my writing carries the spores these games and games like them put in me when i was dead and decaying and fertile ground for such things. i hope you play some of them. i hope you enjoy them. thanks for reading <3
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The House of Usher and the cardinal virtues
I thought to myself it's no good to whine about slotting characters into boring reductive categories without a good rebutal, so here's a dose of slightly more interesting archetypes.
Prospero reflects the cardinal virtue of Diligence and its mirror the sin of Sloth ("But he has an orgy so it has to be lust," by god you're so boring) He is the only Usher who tries to make anything of value. When Camille goes on her little spiel about how Ushers don't make stuff, she's not wrong. Perry got pretty ruthlessly shot down when he was presenting his ideas for trying to make value and start a night club chain, rather than just taking credit for someone else's work like all of his siblings and his dad. But he was at least trying. His drive to prove himself and gain respect is how he gets himself into the whole mess. However, it is the act of not doing his due diligence that kills him.
Camille has an interesting one because while breaking into a lab facility to expose mistreatment of animals would seem like the cardinal virtue of kindness, she's only there to get one over on her sister. The inverse of Kindness is Envy, and for as important as her role is as the family spin doctor, Camille is valued the least. Everyone suspects Perry when they hear about an informant, but that's because he's an idiot baby. Victurine is useful with her heart mesh implant, Napoleon took the role of the "chill fun sibling", and the other two are original Ushers, so Camille is left as the unfavored child.
Napoleon tried to buy his way out of his problem with Charity. He could have come home with a different cat entirely and told his boyfriend he was looking in shelters for Pluto and accidentally fell in love. Name it Mars, let the boyfriend chalk it up to a weird grief response. Bummer Pluto never came home. Verna would have had him trip over the thing on the stairs in the middle of the night and that would have been that. Instead, everything was transactional as he maximized what he could get out of his relationships for the least amount of effort. The boyfriend can live with him, the boyfriends cat can move in too, but as soon as that becomes even the slightest bit more effort (like when boyfriend wants to meet the family, or curb the drug use, or the cat brings home a dead thing) Napoleon wants it gone from his life.
Victurine likewise could have had a painless clean death had she mustered up the Humility to say that the device didn't work. Her demise, unlike her younger siblings, was a compilation of smaller shitty decisions and white lies. She could even recognize that each choice was morally wrong, but it was little choices that were easier to brush off. A dead monkey, a foraged signature, a rightfully concerned patient reassured with platitudes. Even before she was scrubbing blood off the floor to Bonnie Tyler, her inability to admit her choices were flawed was getting her in trouble.
Tamralane with her perfectly manicured curated life, is the one to take Temperance to its furthest extreme. I think it was Atwood who wrote about women and the internal voyeur to preform for, but I'm not going to Google it for a post about horror characters losing their minds and dying horribly. She lives under a personal panopticon of her own expectations and can never allow herself to experience her own life lest she fall short. Her wealth rather than mitigating this exacerbates the issue, giving her access to any and every distance she could possibly want. Death by mirrors isn't so much her going insane as it is the culmination of the life shes built for herself.
(Plus, I know her lonely evening was meant to be ~spooky~ but babe, that is literally just ADHD. Can't remember where you put the thing? Can't remember doing the thing? CAN'T SLEEP?! DOES EVERYONE HATE YOU AND THINK YOU'RE AN INSANE BITCH FOR PERFECTLY VALID REASONS?! Looks like Adderall for you).
Fraudrick. You dickwad. No Patience to allow your very injured and traumatized wife explain herself. The inverse of Patience is Wrath. Demonstrated that one in spades. I'm on Verna's side on this one. Pliers, really?
(His wife's name is fucking Mori. As in momento mori.)
Which leaves Madeline and Rodrick. What's a Gothic horror story without some really fucking weird and unsettling sibling dynamic? Dull, that's what. Anyway, never letting anything touch them or impede them in their lust for power and wealth offers a strange sort of Chastity. There's no love, not for the kids or Annabelle Lee that could touch them, no moral they wouldn't overturn, no value they wouldn't abandon. Madeline values her freedom above all else but she spent her life bound to her brother. They wouldn't even spare each other in ruthless pursuit of just a little more power.
So yeah, bummer for August Dupain that he wound up against the most supernaturally fucked up family that ever lived.
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Chapter 1: pov you've been adopted by a strange bird man who put you in a barely functioning house during a typhoon and now you find yourself rooming with a giant bat and his fox son what a great start to this story
TW: none. i think.
chatters: Wild panicked on what to call this chapter please bear with him and be nice pls. also everything this is subject to change
Lilia: vampire bat (obviously)
Silver: arctic fox
The floorboards creaked as you walked through the door. Dust and cobwebs covering everything in sight as if trying to swallow the furniture. There was a lot of cleaning to be done, and you were not looking forward to it.
Covering your nose with your sleeve, you walk into the living room thinking about what your newly adopted uncle had said.
“I have so graciously cleaned the master bed, bath, and kitchen for you so you can rest as soon as you arrive. Everything is in working condition. However the water only works in your bathroom, and all other maintenance won’t be able to come until the storm is over. Don’t forget to light the fireplace to keep warm at night. Your neighbors have agreed to allow you to come over and charge any electronic devices as needed. Here’s a credit card, use it to only buy the essentials! There’s plenty of premade meals that you can just eat straight away or heat up real quick. Just call me if you need anything! I’ll be off then, see you!”
Then he’d driven off. At least he left you food and a lantern.
You followed footsteps on the dust covered floor, assuming they’d lead you to the bedroom. If not you might be looking for a while, this place was huge. You remember he’d mentioned it used to be some kind of dorm.
Finding your room, you went to one of the windows to peer out. You grimace seeing the state of the yard, you were not looking forward to cleaning it either.
A scuffling sound caught your attention. Head whipping around, you notice the blankets on the bed were messy. Did your uncle not bother to fold them? The answer came a second later as a snout poked out from under the bed.
A white fox kit peeked out at you, quickly popping back into hiding seeing you had spotted it.
Slowly you set down your bags and get on your knees to take a look at the little animal. It had backed into a corner, trying to make itself look small. It stared back with pretty blue purplish eyes, ears flat against its head.
The little guy must have found its way in here to hide from the storm that was forecasted to start tonight. The clouds had been forming all day, and the rain should start any minute now.
Sitting back up, you open a backpack to fish out one of those premade sandwich boxes found at grocery stores. Opening it up you tore the sandwich in two, placing the bigger half on the lid, and slid it towards the little fur baby. Its ears perked, raising its head. Its nose twitched, the smell of turkey making its tummy growl.
“It needs it more than I do.” you thought watching the fox kit creep closer, unable to resist the temptation of food. What happened next was unexpected.
The fox poofed into a young boy with cute fox ears, below his torso was replaced with a fox body instead of legs. He reached out, pulling his meal under the bed for him to enjoy.
“Huh. He’s a centaur.” you thought, watching the silver hair boy gobbling up his half with gusto. Was he abandoned? He knew how to use his hands well for his age. Or maybe he picked it up from watching humans.
Once finished he licked mustard off his fingers. Ew, good thing you waited for him to eat first. Mustard was gross. His eyes turned back to you, unabashedly staring at the other half. You almost laughed at the stare, he was adorable.
“You can have it,” his eyes lit up, yep definitely abandoned he could understand you, “but you have to come get it yourself.” he didn’t hesitate. Crawling out he got up and walked perfectly towards you without wobbling from the difference in upper and lower body, further setting in stone that he was abandoned and hadn’t just picked up things he knew about society by simply watching.
He sat in front of you, holding out his hands politely. You hand over the rest, smiling when he thanked you. Unable to resist, you give his hand a pat. His tail wags, ears drooping slightly as he munched happily.
~~~~~~
Why was this bed so big. There was a name for this kind of bed, alaskan emperor or something? Well, whatever the name was, it was massive. You take a seat on it. This was the most comfortable bed you had ever felt in your life. Flopping back, you feel your body sink into the cloudy mattress. The fox centaur you’d befriended hopped on next to you. He rolled around, suddenly energetic. You smile, watching him go about his zoomies.
He jumped on your belly. You grunted at the sudden weight on you.
He’s grinning down at you, tail a tornado of white behind him. He wants to play. And you want to play, but the energy just isn’t there. So you try to calm him down. Reaching up you massage his ears, hoping he’d calm down with some petting. However this doesn’t help in the slightest. Instead he turns his head and playfully bites your fingers.
Being a child he doesn’t always realize how easy it is to hurt others. He hasn’t lost all of his baby teeth yet and were still very sharp. You let out an “ah!” feeling the pointy teeth nick your finger, leaving you with a tiny cut.
“Silver, you need to be careful. Humans don’t have skin as tough as mine.” a voice chuckled overhead. You freeze. Gazing slowly turning upward, you see bright red eyes gazing down from the ceiling. You’re frozen in place until the huge creature drops down. You sat up so fast your new friend was nearly sent flying.
It stood up, the humanoid half resting it’s forearms on its big leathery black wings. It was so big it wasn’t able to stand at full height, and its hair so long it pooled to the ground. A grin showing off sharp fangs morphed across its face seeing your shocked pikachu face.
“Good evening,” the creature greeted, walking forward on its wings to stand in front of you “are you the new owner?”
~~~~~~
The fae’s name was Lilia, he was a vampire bat centaur. The little foxboy was his adopted son Silver, an arctic fox centaur. According to Lilia they’d settled down here to use this place as a temporary home until the stormy weather went away. Lilia didn’t want his son to get sick from the coming rain so he’d found this place for them to hide away. He had thought it was abandoned until your uncle had suddenly come to clean up. They were originally going to just stay hidden in a different room but he hadn’t expected you to arrive so soon.
The whole time Lilia was explaining their situation Silver was still hyper. He had popped back into his fox form, having reached his limit, and was currently playing footsies with your hand, occasionally hopping around on the huge ass bed behind you. You still weren’t over how big it was.
“If it isn’t too much trouble, I hope you’ll allow us to stay for the time being. We’ll be gone as soon as the weather clears up.” The fae smiled as Silver climbed into your lap a final time, curling up. It was time for bed, he was all tuckered out. “Silver seems to really like you too, he’ll keep you company if you’ll allow it.”
“Stay as long as you want.” you say, gently moving Silver off your lap, “this place is too big for me. I’m only here because I got lucky. I don’t care what you do so long you don’t cause trouble.” Lilia tilts his head at you, eyes gleaming as he watches you get up and walk to the large fireplace on the other side of the room.
Taking a match out of the box left by your uncle, you lit and tossed it onto the wood. To your surprise the fire was a dirty white instead of the usual red and orange. Your uncle had enchanted the wood to never burn away. That explained why there weren't any other logs nearby.
You hear the floorboards creak. Lilia had returned to hanging from the ceiling. Now that you knew he was up there, you had a feeling of uneasiness. Fae centaur were known to be very aggressive if not handled properly, and it was a huge risk to bring in any wild born ones into a household. You constantly glanced up at him. His eyes never left you, unblinking as he observed you undress and prepare for bed. He grinned whenever he noticed you looking at him, waving at you with a wing.
Crawling into your enormous bed, you realize you won’t be able to sleep. The fireplace was too far for the warmth to reach you. The rain had started by now so even if you bundled yourself up as much as possible you would still be cold. With a sigh you grab a pillow and the blankets, leaving the warmest for Silver. You did your best to make a nest next to the fire. The wooden floor would definitely make your body sore come morning. You curl up in your makeshift bed, trying to get comfy.
~~~~~~
From the ceiling the fae observed you, watching you leave his son the warmest blanket despite him not having any need for it. He watched you toss and turn for a couple hours before finally drifting off to sleep.
He shook his head, silly human. Centaurs are much more equipped to survive in the wild than humans. Quietly dropping down, he gathered you in his arms and used his magic to levitate the blankets back to the bed.
“Hm, this won’t do…” he thought, he was much too big for the bed. The frame would break under his weight. Setting you down, he uses his magic to become smaller.
“It’s been awhile since I’ve taken this form.” Lilia thinks, picking up Silver in his arms. Carefully he envelopes you in both his wings. Your head ends up on his furry belly, Silver snuggled under your chin.
Lilia strokes your head, smiling when you bury your face further into his second stomach. You poor child, thrown away for simply being magicless. There was no need to worry, he’ll make sure you’re watched over from now on.
#twisted wonderland#twst#wild's writing#twst silver#twst lilia#lilia vanrouge#twst centaur au#crowley is lucky mc didn't call cps on him#next chapter introduces two more friends
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They did Orihime so dirty in the anime. They left everything out and turned her into the damsel in distress trope and that is just not what happened at all. Like, yes she had almost no offensive power in the beginning, and she is the defacto healer, but her character development in the manga is so good and so glaringly obvious and in your face. I literally dont know how people dislike her. Orihime is actually one of the best and most multifaceted nuanced characters ever, and she doesnt get enough love or credit for everything she did for Ichigo (and by extension soul society and their friends) without question. Unwavering loyalty, even when they questioned if she had gone to Hueco Mundo of her own volition, after the soul society arc wanting to get stronger so she can protect everyone too, so she doesnt have to look at Ichigo's back while he protects her, so they can fight shoulder to shoulder, even though she cant fathom the enemy that they're going up against, even though Tatsuki gets her soul damn near sucked out, even though Chad's arm gets ripped off right in front of her eyes and all she does is immediately step forward to use her powers to reject and reverse his injury. She watches Chad get his arm ripped clean off and then tries to fight against a monster 8 times her size, because she doesnt want to buy time until Ichigo arrives anymore, she wants to fight too! We dont acknowledge that she is a 15 year old girl being threatened with the lives of all the people she cares about if she doesnt accompany Ulquiorra to Hueco Mundo, and this girl has no family left, her friends are her family. Her absolute unshakable faith that at least Ichigo, if not all of their friends would come for her no matter the risk. (Six hearts will beat as one) WHY DOES NO ONE FUCKING TALK ABOUT THE MOMENT SHE IS HAVING HER OWN POWER SPECULATED ON BY AIZEN, SHE REALIZES IF HER POWER IS THE ABILITY TO REJECT PHENOMENA, THAT SHE IS GOING TO TRY AND DESTROY THE HOGYOKU BY REJECTING ITS VERY EXISTENCE? THAT IS ONE OF THE MOST GIRLBOSS MOVES IN ALL EXISTING MEDIA. We dont talk about how fucking down for Ichigo she is in that moment in his fight with Grimmjow, when she is afraid of him, afraid of the hollow inside him, afraid that he will be lost to it like her big brother was and have his soul consumed, about how the second she decided he was still Ichigo, and he always would be that Ichigo was able to pull out the win. We dont talk about how the boy she loved got murdered right in front of her eyes by her kidnapper and manipulator, and in that moment calling out for him to protect her was more powerful than death. Ichigo was only able to use his hollow powers like that without losing himself (and he almost did) to them BECAUSE it was at Orihime's explicit request. Orihime deserves everything, she is the ultimate ride or die and not just for Ichigo, for everyone she cares about, and even for the people who dont deserve it. She healed those two arrancar women who were beating her to a pulp after Grimmjow busted in and ripped them apart, one even called her a monster as she was healing her because she didnt understand how Orihime could be so selfless in the face of such violence directed at her. She calls Orihime a monster because she herself is a monster and cant understand someone like Orihime that will help anyone with no bias just because it's the right thing to do. Orihime is literally the best fucking character and you cannot change my mind. So much of BLEACH is about the words, the feeling, the symbolism, and Orihime brings something to BLEACH that despite all the amazing dialogue and intense feelings and amazing battles, other characters at their best just don't bring to the series for me. She was the most underpowered, uninformed character just thrown into the middle of a literal supernatural war all because she wanted to do the right thing and help her friends and the boy she loved.
#wow#i am sorry#rant over#but seriously#orihime is such a bad bitch#she is everything to me#her character development in the manga compared to the anime is just#bleach#bleach manga#orihime inoe#ichigo kurosaki#manga vs anime#aizen sousuke#ulquiorra#tite kubo knew what he was doing#studio perriot didnt know shit#inoue orihime
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keldabe kisses are the windows to the soul (pt.2)
(tech x reader)
pt. 1 here! pt. 3 here!
hello, lovely humans! i hope you’re doing well! here is part two! i thought this would only be two parts, but it will probably end up being three. it is a slower burn than i originally intended, but i am having a blast writing the Pining™️.
author’s rec: red giant by stellardrone is a gorgeous spacey vibe of a song and fits this part really well :D
________
You really weren’t that surprised Cid let you go with the boys. She’d taken one look at your suddenly watery eyes when Echo told you they were leaving, huffed, and started digging credits out of her pockets.
“Advance pay,” she’d croaked at you. “Don’t be gone too long.”
It had been two months of jobs, sleeping on the Marauder and eating rations, and you’d never been happier. Wrecker and Omega had taken to including you during their game nights, and Hunter had shown you a few basic moves with his hunting knife. You’d had at least two holofilm nights with Echo and he always cried at the sad parts and always pretended he didn’t. It was, despite some hairy missions and sleepless nights, a quiet sort of existence. So you’d had a lot of time to think.
They’d told you Tech’s thing was his smarts–the Kaminoans had blessed him with increased mental capacity and a photographic memory that made him wicked brilliant and a total nerd to boot. He still hadn’t stopped ranting about the beetles you’d found on Kashyyyk three weeks ago to anyone who would listen (you).
But you swore his real talent was in perceptiveness–he noticed everything.
Which was not helpful when you were prone to staring at him.
He was captivating, and it was horrible. You told yourself it was because of how intent he got on his work, his rare smiles, his gentle hands.
But you knew it was his eyes.
Omega and Kix–God, you missed Kix–were the only clones you knew who ever came close to the particular shade of gold in Tech’s eyes, but Omega’s were too auburn, Kix’s too brown. It was a sharp contrast to the almost greyish-brown of Hunter’s eyes and the bluish tint of Wrecker’s one good eye.
But he noticed every time you started to stare, and you could almost swear he’d started staring back–and that was not something you were prepared to handle. Kix used to do the same, meeting your eyes over trays of meds and bacta, noticing when you got too exhausted or overwhelmed.
But your feelings for Kix were a pretty scar on your healing heart. You mourned him, and loved him, but you knew moving on was what he would have wanted for you, selfless as he was.
And now there was Tech.
You told yourself it was a silly crush. You were lonely, and he was a weird sort of lovely. Gentle with you and Omega, patient, and quietly kind. He’d been the one to let you sit up with him when you needed a night to think, and the one to regale you with the oddest facts about his favorite monsters and animals from adventures to make you laugh and wonder. So you resigned yourself to quiet loving, the kind that didn’t scare people away, the kind that didn’t hurt too much when you had to move on.
And then you hurt yourself during a stargazing trip.
It was the perfect definition of trip, really; nothing more cartoonish could have happened to you than the way you caught your toe on a twisty root and flailed all the way to the ground, making a noise that sounded like a sick Wookie. A nasty flare of pain went up your wrist when it caught the brunt of your fall.
Wrecker laughed first, because it was funny, but he was the first to pick you up and set you gently upright on the ground when he heard you groan. You did your best not to sniffle. They’d all had worse than some stupid scrapes and a tweaked wrist, and you weren’t about to complain.
Hunter assured you your wrist wasn’t broken and took the bandages from Echo’s pack to wrap it while Omega cleaned the scrapes on your chin and palms and knees with something that stung. It was sweet, the way they all gathered around you, a pack of worried siblings.
“I can carry her to the outcropping.”
Tech’s voice was a surprise. He’d silently watched as his sister and brothers tended to you, eyes on your face the whole time.
“That’s sweet, Tech, but I can walk.” You waggled your feet. “Still in tip-top shape.” Your left ankle twinged in protest, and you winced.
____
It made sense that Tech would be able to carry you effortlessly. He was just as fast and strong as his brothers, and one of the tallest in the crew. It was just—he held you like it was nothing. You couldn’t feel him straining, and any shifting he did only brought you closer into his embrace. He’d encouraged you to wrap your arms around his neck to make transporting you a bit easier, and he didn’t seem to mind that you’d rested your head on his chest, eyes closed. There wasn’t much to see until the outcropping anyway.
He had his own scent underneath the regulation soap you all used and it was driving you crazy.
And thinking about it was driving you crazier. You were glad Echo couldn’t see your face because you wouldn’t be able to stand the knowing look he’d give you. Echo’s antics would reveal your feelings faster than you’d ever want.
Faint pink light made you open your eyes just as Tech shifted your weight, setting you down on a flat rock and making sure your legs weren’t folded uncomfortably. He settled next to you and placed a hand over your eyes.
“Tech. What?” You almost pried his hand away but then that would mean touching his hand and suddenly you were overthinking it and twisting your fingers in your lap.
“Wait until everyone gets settled. In approximately seven ticks it will be the optimal viewing time.”
So you sat, trying not to think about how warm his gloved hand was, and breathed out a sigh, focusing on the gentle warmth of the light seeping through Tech’s fingers.
When he drew his hand away everything was new.
Most planets you visited had sunrises in similar colors, buttery yellows and oranges and the sort of pink you loved as a little girl, but this sky was purple, and so clear.
There was faint pink light on the horizon where the sun was starting to come up, lining the few flat clouds with scarlet, but the main attraction was the sky above it, a rich, smooth violet expanse, filled with stars and galaxies like gems on a gown. Even Wrecker went silent after his first delighted shout, and you watched the planets dance in a glassy sky, reflected in the smooth water below the outcropping. You forgot about your aching body during the minutes before the sun broke the bonds of the sea and cast pale, pretty light into your eyes.
There was a glint to your right. You turned just in time to catch Tech shift towards the sun, turning his face into the light.
Where had he been looking before?
It gave you something to think about, for sure, as he carried you back to the Marauder, and you leaned your head against him and prayed that maybe everything was changing.
#the bad batch#the bad batch tech#tbb#tech tbb#tech is adorable#tech x reader#tech x you#star wars#vera writes things
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tsun tell me abt the wings but like how they work in UR writing
OH BOY.... THE WINGS META..... i mean i've mostly been winging it (lol) myself so i don't think i'll end up with huge paras upon paras of info (lying, i know how i can get,) but sure lets go!! before i lay anything of my own out i'll do canon the favor of itself; in canon usually wiz serves as dark's wings and carries him or daisuke around, but dark also has his own set that can appear/disappear (furl/unfurl) at will as long as dark himself isn't low on (magical) power. (why else would he even be called the black wings right-) there's also the matter of daisuke manifesting dark's wings from his own body all on his own, which, when using the 'wrong emotion,' (negative ones such as hate, fury or sorrow,) becomes actively detrimental to him. within dnangel, magic (and likewise, the case of dark's wings,) will always be a) something within a realm that ordinary human beings should not be capable of (aka "something that should not exist") as well as b) something that, at least in regards to hikari artworks, manifests from powerful human emotions. the wings, if not krad and dark for the hikari and niwa, are both proofs of their respective 'sins' - the hikari for playing god as artists, the niwa for being thieves.
that all being said, i don't usually bring wiz in as an npc to threads just because i don't want them to get too long. in canon wiz is aaaaaalways with or around daisuke. ALWAYS. that's his pet, his best friend, his cute lil obligatory magical girl mascot, wiz who hates water but braves it anyways over and over for daisuke's sake, wiz who always saves him and gets him out of all sorts of pinches!! i'll bring wiz in often for heist situations because it's there he's often truly a necessity, but dark having his own wings means wiz's involvement isn't always necessary for everything. dark/daisuke's own wings > wiz in regards to rate of appearance when i write to save myself and my partners some sanity.
frequency aside, the wings are also Actual Limbs. like. those are Physically Attached, sensations can be felt through them, and they can be cut, wounded, or torn off- hence dark's feathers shedding everywhere all the time and needing to be cleaned up. sugisaki messes around with the wings' physicality a lot because the back of daisuke's shirt isn't usually blown wide open, (more often than not they just kind of magically manifest out of thin air) but she's also had hiwatari's shirt rip and tear from manifesting his wings + daisuke outright bleed from trying to manifest his during argentine arc, and i think the process of Actually Gaining Limbs and growing feathers adds a fun dash of body horror that the series does pretty well with sometimes. when you really stop and think about it, the wings, or rather the process of a 15 yr old's body straight up Changing Like That (alongside, yknow, the other inhuman/monster-y bits like the eyes/teeth/claws,) is genuinely Pretty Horrifying if not at the very least bizarre, but it suits dark well as a (gothic) curse and brings him and daisuke closer overall to the beauty and beast thematic. it's freaky. it's weird. it's fun. normal ppl would be screaming.
daisuke also usually has no usual visible evidence of dark's wings; there aren't any thin slits hiding feathers (so even if you're like riku and scan or run your hand along his back, nothing in particular beyond a lot of faint, assorted scars show up,) but those spaces are there on dark's body when his wings aren't unfurled. (i'll give the anime credit for one thing and that's giving dark's shirts open holes for his wings to go through in concept art. i also think an outfit that has zippers on the back like this is awesome LMAOO) daisuke's also clumsier with his wings than dark is!! which means they'll often flap or flail around in response to his emotions on instinct compared to the way they might normally just smoothly lift, lower, or puff (angy) with dark --- when dai's unfocused and/or panicking that ditziness of his very often translates to Things Breaking all over the place because he can't help but run around and accidentally slap things everywhere. bird stuck in a closed room behavior. he's a danger and a menace indoors to all things fragile but it's all completely unintentional 😂
despite this daisuke also gets phantom limb syndrome very often!!! going from all that wing-weight to suddenly being without it makes him feel strange and overly light/floaty sometimes, which is why when he's particularly restless but doesn't have a heist scheduled, he'll often go on a night flight with dark to calm himself down. he does like flying. he does love his freedom, the moon and the stars and a quiet night. he does, at the bottom line, like being dark and the elation a nighttime flight brings him- he just needs a space like that where his intense social anxiety (or dark's own easily recognized fame/infamy) won't get in the way of his own existence, and it doesn't matter 'who' he is.
using jurassic park logic here (lmao) but assuming he flies as fast as a pterodactyl, (aka a rough equivalent body measure for human beings,) then he's around a steady 60 mph in the air - dark can go from azumano to tokyo in maybe an hour, which he can and will do if he's bored and/or just feels like visiting someone. dark's feathers have a rough and coarse look to them and are more or less pitch black, but when you feel them, they're actually pillowy soft and smooth (even the feathers are tsundere,) and give off a really nice reflective shimmer. given the magic that courses through daisuke's blood, it's possible to imbue some of dark's own power into them, (this is only really useful in verses where dark can actually readily do this without worry over detriment to daisuke's body,) but even if left alone to naturally shed, there'll still be very, very faint traces of the tiniest fraction of the kokuyoku's magic left on them. i figure i should also say that while you can brush/pet/touch his wings or something, dark/dai won't really feel it, or if they do it might just tickle or bother them, so it might not be as intimate as anyone imagines. stick to petting dark gently on the head like a bird he loves that.
i have no idea if i'm missing anything atp?? things i take from canon are daisuke hurting himself if he tries to force dark's wings out and if he ever connects to dark through negative emotion; also too much transforming exhausts him and his body, his heart can only pound for so much / he can only fly for so long before he just straight up gets tired and needs a nap regardless of what appearance he's stuck with. anyways what rlly matters is his wings are pretty af. free my boy let him do all the crime he wants, because hes special and got them gorgeous black fallen angel wings. he deserves it. its his right
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Marvel Spooktober #6
Title: Marvel Spooktober #6
Fandom: Marvel
Pairing: Matt Murdock x OFC!
Author: @sheerfreesia007
Prompt: Transformation
Words: 1,049
Warnings: Violence, mention of death
Permanent Tag List: @paintballkid711, @fioccodineveautunnale, @phoenixhalliwell, @linkpk88, @weirdowithnobeardo, @athalien
Gif Credit: @daredevilcentral
The moon was full as it hung in the dark midnight sky, you blearily rubbed your eyes as you parked your vehicle and stepped out of it. It was another eventful night in Hell’s Kitchen as you nodded your head tiredly at the patrol officer who was in charge of the perimeter. You noticed Officer Crawford standing by the door to the little bodega and walked over to him.
“What do we got Crawford?” you asked softly knowing that it wasn’t going to be good.
“Evenin’ Detective.” he greeted as he began to lead you into the crime scene. “We’ve got three dead from what look like animal attacks. Slashed from shoulder to hip across their fronts, they bled out within minutes. The store is a mess and the bodega clerk is pretty much catatonic. Keeps mumbling about a monster of some sort. No one can get anything out of him.” he explained grimly and you nodded your head along to his words.
“Cameras?” you asked as your eyes darted around the bodega knowing that there’d be at least something.
“All operating except for one in the money room. Haven’t had a chance to view the footage yet though. Figured we’d let you get a feel for the scene and then view the video.” he responded and you nodded your head again.
You turned to the scene and nearly vomited on the floor, blood was spilled everywhere. The floor was coated in at least a half inch layer of blood and it was starting to congeal quickly as you tried not to step in it as the crime scene clean up crew moved about cleaning it up. Three bodies were being bagged by the medical examiner and CSI was already gathering evidence and photographing everything. Your eyes darted around the store and began to jot down anything that stood out to you as Crawford led you further into the store.
“Any connection between the victims?” you asked curiously and Crawford nodded his head at your question.
“All gang members from the local drive-by shootings in Hell’s Kitchen.” he responded and you looked at him surprised which made him nod his head grimly.
“What a coincidence.” you said derisively and Crawford chuckled darkly at your words. “Alright let me go about the scene for a little bit. Do me a favor and set up the video and just leave it for me.” you told Crawford who nodded and walked back to the back room of the store before leaving the store all together. You moved to the back of the store and began taking note of the whole scene, making sure to jot down any little details that stood out to you. You heard the back door of the bodega open slightly and you looked over your shoulder at the now familiar red Devil. “Right on time Devil I’m about to view the footage of the crime. Care to join me?” you ask him before moving to the back room of the bodega not waiting for an answer that will never come.
You had met Hell’s Kitchen Devil on one of your very first crime scenes, he had fallen right in the middle of it due to a fight he had nearly lost on the roof above you. After having the biggest scare of your life you had helped the Devil get situated and cleaned up before going back to your scene and finding more clues that he had unearthed. He had helped you a lot during that first scene and every scene he showed up to after that, he was a great asset to have since he wasn’t limited by protocol and policy like your career was. Plus he was able to get more information on things happening in the city at a quicker rate.
Walking into the back room of the bodega you took a seat at the little table that had the computer monitors on it where the video would be able to be viewed. You felt the man walk in after you and crowd behind you as you began to click on the play button of the video. The two of you watched as the store came into view through two camera angles, one from the back of the store and one from the front of the store. The shop owner was manning the register while there was a hooded man at the back of the store looking at the soda through the refrigerator glass door. About five minutes later the three gang members entered the store and you noticed the hooded man tense in his stance. The three gang members then crowded near the man at the back of the store and looked as if they were having a one sided conversation with him, most likely taunting him as that gang was wont to do.
The man didn’t seem to react until one of the gang members leaned closer to him and said something in his ear. That was when the man flinched back and snapped something back at the gang members who all jerked back at his outburst. You watched the hooded man avidly as he began to breathe heavily as he took a step back away from the gang members. The members all gathered close and pulled out their weapons, a mix between lethal and non lethal weapons to defend themselves. The hooded man seemed to pulse with his heaving breaths and right before your eyes you watched in horror as he grew in size almost like the hulk but his body sprouted hair and his face elongated into a wolf’s snout.
“Oh my god!? He’s a werewolf? Is that a thing?!” you asked bewildered as your eyes widened and continued to watch as the man fully transformed into a werewolf and howled loudly enough to shake the camera on the wall. He then turned and attacked the gang members, his long claws swiping effortlessly across their chests and opening the wounds that they ultimately succumbed to. You gasped softly as you watched the werewolf turn and glare at the camera before howling loudly once more causing the camera to glitch and go dark. “Holy shit.” you said softly into the quiet room and the Devil at your back nodded his head silently.
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Arcane starters
note: feel free to tweak details to fit the muses.
do not add to this list.
other meme blogs, please don’t reblog.
content/trigger warning: death, violence, swearing, vomiting
ACT 3
episode 07
"I knew it was a mistake trusting you."
"You've been a real picnic yourself."
"Hey, stop! Get your hands off of me."
"You shy? Or just ugly?"
"You look good for a dead girl."
"That was a long time ago. People change."
"You were following us? Why didn't you say something?"
"You still punch like a little boy."
"I remember when you wouldn't stand up to me."
"Perhaps the error resides not with your calculations, but with your subjects."
"Nature has made us intolerant to change. But fortunately, we have the capacity to change our nature."
"I know the look of a doomed man."
"If you take this path, they will despise you."
"Love and legacy are the sacrifices we make for progress."
"I tried taking it apart and it nearly killed me."
"Everything you said about him was true."
"My family cast me out and yet, part of me still loves them."
"He disappeared. He does that sometimes."
"It didn't sound like a request."
"Let's just say I didn't always see eye-to-eye with my old man."
"I didn't lose her. They took her!"
"Why would I remember her name?"
"They needed somewhere safe to start again."
"She's still in there. I can reach her."
"I order a blockade and my own partner violates it?"
"Have you forgotten where we came from?"
"Listen, let her go."
"I brought her here."
"It's me you want."
"I thought they were hurting you!"
"Don't move, silly. I might hurt you."
"Have you forgotten how she left you?"
"I am your family. Everyone else betrays us."
"Your people hunt us like animals."
"Your people aren't dying all around you."
"The peace is already broken."
"Shut up. It's just a goodbye hug."
"Oh, look who it is. The boy savior."
episode 08
"He wanted me to know death."
"Your brother thinks he can talk his way out of anything."
"I will give you the world, child, if you prove you can take it."
"Kill her now, and only one must die."
"You understand you've broken several laws?"
"Sometimes death is a mercy."
"You're a scary lady."
"War isn't our first and every recourse."
"Weapons can't be unmade, and they are always used."
"What happened to her, it's not your fault."
"I understand this must be painful. I'm afraif it will only get worse."
"I have to get home. It isn't safe for me here."
"We're no strangers to failure."
"They're still cleaning the blood off the bridge."
"I remember where your fancy damn door is."
"Go back to that big, shiny house of yours and just… forget me, okay?"
"Everything you do inspires me."
"You said you were tired of doing nothing."
"That's the only sensible thing that came out of anyone's mouth tonight."
"Of everyone up here, you're the one she trusted to do something."
"We got a deal, pretty boy?"
episode 09
"He knew what he was signing up for."
"Do you not understand? I am part of this now."
"You won't make it alone."
"You gonna do anything about that piece of shit who murdered my boy?"
"At least we have the solace of knowing he died fighting for our cause, instead of some petty personal dispute, as so often occurs here."
"You're one to talk about sacrificing for the cause."
"March back to your ship and get the hell out of my city."
"Get a hold of yourself. I taught you better."
"I wanted to protect the city from people like you."
"I would set the world ablaze to protect our family."
"At least you didn't throw up."
"Everything made sense then."
"What about your disease?"
"We lost ourselves. Lost our dream."
"In the pursuit of great, we failed to do good."
"You know what bore us through those times? Loyalty."
"Now I'm forced to share the air with parasites like you who leech off their legacies."
"I still believe in loyalty."
"Perfect place for an ambush."
"I was reminded recently of what brought us together in the first place."
"I give you credit for your stunt."
"They weren't her crimes, she was working for me."
"We both have our shitty parts to play."
"You'd be surprised what you can pull off when your life depends on it."
"It's not enough to give people what they need to survive, you have to give them what they need to live."
"And what do I lose but problems?"
"Is there anything so undoing as a daughter?"
"She still needs you. They all do."
"They're right not to trust us."
"With respect, I don't give a shit what any of you think of me anymore."
"Nothing ever stays dead."
"I always heard you. Shadows in the streets, prickles on the back of my neck."
"The only thing that kept me going was the thought of getting back to you."
"I paid your girlfriend a visit this morning."
"Make her go away, please."
"You wouldn't lie to me. Not again."
"You're my daughter. I'll never forsake you."
"I never would have given you to them. Not for anything."
"I thought maybe you could love me like you used to."
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1/16/24
hey if i ever die can you guys promise to make sure somebody goes through my "She-Ra Shit" folder and just like. mass uploads everything? like obviously i'd prefer it be tagged and transcribed and maybe annotated and color-corrected, i'm working on it, but sometimes i'm like oh fuck what if i get hit by a car truck bus* and i'm the only idiot crazy enough to have downloaded this poorly photographed lineart for a Fantastic Fashion outfit that was never released from a website section which technically went down like at least five years ago, you know?
they never made her. who was she
*nobody's hit me with a bus yet, maybe it's the only vehicle i'm not impervious to. we just don't know
EDIT: addenda. the folder named "Z" is just shit i already uploaded, i named it that so it'd come last in alphabetical order. and "personal art" isn't my personal art it's from the crew so like, make sure they're credited appropriately or i'll haunt you, i guess. their names are in the file names it's not rocket science. and there is some she-ra stuff in the MOTU folder but it's only like, the 2016 SDCC one and Adora's cameo in Origins (ugh) except for the Vintage POP folder. god i really have a folder problem huh. um. the commercials in the Filmation materials folder were actually animated by Duck Soup i just put them in there bc animation shit yk? i feel like a parent going on their first post-child outing leaving instructions for a babysitter. ummmm the 'manip catra concept' isn't finished yet i was trying to clean up some of the jpeg artifacts by hand but like that's a matter of interpretation and i keep getting distracted by googling art restoration shit like some kind of nerd or something, the raw image is in that same folder. look it's 1:50 i gotta go to sleep. promise me you guys
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Day 5 - Tales of the Unexpected
Part 5 of @cursebreakerfarrier‘s Back to school challenge. Hazel Wolfe belongs to the fantastic @kc-and-co
Hazel cursed to herself, which in her current wolf form really came out as more of a snarl. She had been on the tail of a potentially big story for the local gossip at Hogwarts. It could have had everything, star crossed lovers from different quidditch teams, the pining of a fellow team member, the inevitable fight that would boil over onto the quidditch pitch when the drama reached a boiling point.
Then just as she was on the tail of one of her leads, trying to be a bit more discrete in her wolf form, a gnome had leapt from the undergrowth and bitten her. Thankfully it had cowardly burrowed back into its hole with a snap of her jaws but the audacity alone was infuriating. However that was second to the pain of the bite itself, to say nothing of whatever nasty diseases it could have had.
It was not something she liked admitting, but this time she needed help as she limped along, giving a pained whimper involuntarily. Thankfully, there was a place someone with the knowledge to treat an animal… or in this case animagus would be, the Care of Magical Creatures classroom.
She caught a scent on the wind, just the briefest tinge of wood smoke and a slightly damp smell, like a clear morning after a heavy rain. It was… odd but not unpleasant.
Taking care not to stumble over tree roots, the clearing that was home to the classroom finally came into view. It was abandoned except for one person. A tall, lean boy about her age. From her place mostly hidden by hanging branches of leaves, she scrutinised him. He looked so familiar, the realisation struck her like a bolt of lightning.
She did know who this person was. It was Nick Willows, son of the Charms professor, David Willows. At one point a member of the Ravenclaw quidditch team as the keeper, but rumours were now circulating he was thinking of leaving his position.
Still he was also his house’s resident creature lover, if anyone could help her, it was him.
Nick hoisted the heavy barrel upwards with a grunt, it may have been full of sileage but that didn’t stop it being nearly immovable. Yet as he was doing so, he caught the faintest glimpse of movement out of the corner of his eye. Odd, there were not other students scheduled for extra credit work or detention today…
“Hi, are you here for…” Nick began before trailing off. Of all things he was expecting to see, a grey wolf was not it. A mix of fear and awe quickly took hold of him, his heart hammering in his chest. On one hand, it was a fascinating, beautiful creature. On the other it was also a dangerous apex predator.
He slowly raised his arms high above his head, backing up as he did so, and began to vocalise, making non-descript shouts. He’d have expected the wolf to at least growl at him or in the best case turn tail and run. He didn’t expect the wolf to tilt its head as if confused with what he was doing.
As if annoyed with his performance, it began stalking towards him, with a slight limp. Yet, it showed no other signs of aggression, it’s ears were pricked up and alert but not smoothed back as if giving the final warning before an attack. Even more surprisingly, it sat down. He lowered his arms, this was extremely abnormal behaviour for a wolf.
Cautiously, he took a step forward, taking in every detail before noticing the one blemish on an otherwise pristine coat. It was a splotch of red.
“Let’s take a look at that, shall I?” He said tentatively, exactly what the beast seemed to want him to do, “Yeah, that looks like a gnome bite. Not too deep, shouldn’t need stitches but best clean it just to make sure. I’ll get you patched up, you’re a clever boy aren’t you?” It growled at him at that, as if slightly offended, “…Clever girl?” He asked, not sure why he needed to clarify things to the canine, it seemed satisfied with his correction.
He backed off from it again, still facing it, unsure if the beast would still attack him. He went to gather the supplies he needed to treat the wound. There was the gauze, the bandage, the antiseptic. The only thing he was missing was a cone to put on it so it wouldn’t scratch at the dressing but he really didn’t want to push his luck no matter how friendly the seemingly wild creature had been.
The wolf was still sat in its spot, completely unmoving, finally causing Nick to relax just a bit. Though as he applied the antiseptic, it gave a whine, startling him just a bit. After a pregnant pause he continued, “Sorry about that girl, it’s not nice when you get hurt like that, is it?” He asked rhetorically, yet a slight grumble from it appeared to mean it agreed with him.
“You’re very strange for a wolf you know?” He asked, not expecting a response, “First of all, wolves were up until now supposedly extinct in the United Kingdom. I suppose communities hidden away from the muggles could have caused some populations to survive but now I have you acting very strangely. Might be something to do with being around wizards for so long?” He shrugged at his last point, finally finishing up with dressing her wound.
“You know what? I’m going to sketch you, wait right there.” He said, confidently turning his back on the wolf, he needed to find his sketchbook and supplies but that was it. Finding the bag he’d brought with him, Nick began rummaging through it. If this wolf was so willing to listen and wait, there could have been an entire pack out there. There was even potential to expand the population back into muggle areas for all he knew, it was so exciting. Finally grasping his supplies, he turned.
And there was no wolf.
There was however a pretty blonde girl who found vaguely familiar in a thick fur coat and cashmere jumper.
Nick was positively dumbfounded, the answer was surely right in front of him but at the same time he didn’t know if he could believe it.
“You know, I can turn back into a wolf for you, if you want?” She asked, an American twang to her voice.
Nick blushed a bit, slightly embarrassed of how he’d been speaking as he realised what had just happened, “No that’s okay, you’re Hazel Wolfe aren’t you?” She smirked at that, she was known to have quite a tendency for the latest gossip around Hogwarts as well as apparently being an aspiring journalist, “And you’re a wolf animagus?”
“Yep!” She answered cheerily.
He had to chuckle at the slight irony, “Is your dressing okay?” He asked, just to be sure, gnome bites were still nasty.
She briefly lifted up the sleeve of the jumper, miraculously, it had changed to fit around her arm rather than her wolf form’s foreleg. “Seems good, thank you for that.” They were both silent for a moment, both unsure of how to respond.
“Do you need any help, around here I mean?” Hazel finally asked, “Just give me a chance to get to know my knight in shining armour who came to my aid.” She said teasingly.
“Oh… yeah, sure. I have some flobberworms to feed, they’re not the most exciting things but we still need to keep them alive. This isn’t going in the school paper is it?”
Hazel thought for a moment, “Well, I’ll have to change some things, can’t have people knowing my greatest secret now can I? But… seriously, thank you for what you did.”
Nick felt just a slight flutter in his chest at that, “You’re very welcome… you made a good wolf by the way…” And immediately he wanted to kick himself for saying something so silly.
Hazel first started to giggle, then laugh as she realised Nick’s embarrassment, “It’s okay, that was cute. Anyway… flobberworms…”
The pause including the unenthused way she had said it caused them both to laugh, something to break the ice as they began the task at hand and Hazel began to ask her many questions.
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Annnnnnnd now Origin has magically decided to work. I don’t know why. I didn’t do anything that I hadn’t done yesterday while trying to get it to load. Maybe EA pushed an update to the update. Whatever.
Buuuuuuut I’m now invested in this RimWorld colony anyway, so that’s what I wanna play. There’s an update about it behind the cut, if anyone cares. I do still want to build some shit in TS3, though, so I’m sure I’ll do that in the next day or two. Assuming that Origin continues to behave, that is.
Anyway, my silly RimWorld colony.
I’m up to five colonists now, all female except for one of the originals, who’s a man that’s married to the original woman colonist (who’s now pregnant). This is thanks to the prisoner recruitment that I was working on plus a shuttle crash that gave me two pawns with skills relevant to my interests. So, with that, I’m able to get the actual drug operation that I had originally intended to have up and running a bit more, since now I have two animal-and-construction-focused pawns, two plant-and-crafting-focused pawns, and one to cook and do all the little miscellaneous tasks like cleaning and refueling, though I could definitely use another pawn for the miscellaneous tasks so that the other can just be a cook. I could also use a dedicated fisherman. And a researcher. We’ll see what Randy deigns to give me.
Mother Nature to the Rescue: My boomrat and (for the moment, at least) bear problem was solved by...a heat wave. Two-and-a-half days of temperatures above 130F/55C drove all the wild animals off the map. My colonists were fine (albeit a little hot and sweaty) because of devilstrand + bearskin clothing (which has good heat and cold insulation) plus having some rooms dug into rock (and further cooled with passive coolers) thanks to one of the new colonists (the cook) being an Undergrounder with awesome mining skill. I was worried about my animals, who couldn’t all fit in the cave rooms, but they all pulled through OK. So yay! No more boomrat horde. (There were 44 of them when the heat wave hit!) I stopped playing not too long after the heat wave ended, and at that point all that was on the map were a few small prey animals and a garter snake. (SNEK! ❤️) We’ll see if the bears come back. Or if they’ll be replaced by wargs or some other monstrosities I have via animal-adding mods. (Ancient giant spiders, anyone?)
If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Join ‘Em: Or have them join you, as the case may be. My two animal-focused pawns each got an inspired taming, one right after the other. So I said “fuck it” and tamed two of the grizzly bears, a young male and a female who is pretty old but is pregnant, so hopefully she’ll have a female cub or three before she dies. They both have good melee damage and speed genes, and both will be trained in everything: guarding, attacking, rescuing, hauling, and hunting, the latter via another mod. So...supersoldier grizzly bears AND supersoldier boars. Raiders be fuuuuuucked, man. LOL
My New Colonists Are Rad, Part 1: The prisoner recruitment, the only survivor of a three-person primitive cannibal raid who seemed to think they could take on my selectively-bred boar army. (This was before I had bears, too.) They were dead wrong. I didn’t even have to get colonists involved. Two of the three were almost instantly eviscerated while only managing to lightly bruise their attackers with their clubs. The third, my recruit, was merely downed. By a baby boar with excellent melee damage genes (152%, the best of the bunch so far), though to her credit she did manage to cut off one of the boar’s ears with the very crappy knife she was carrying before it downed her. (Perhaps that was foreshadowing...)
So, she’s 14 years old and has the really skinny body type. Fortunately for her, she has good plants skill, so I didn’t just leave her for the boars to eat like her compatriots. As it turned out, she also has the trigger-happy trait. So, once converted (just to get rid of her cannibalism; I don’t usually bother otherwise unless I’m playing bigoted proselytizers) and recruited, I gave her a small, light machine pistol that I had acquired from raiding a pirate farming settlement, and she is fucking lethal with the thing. The gun is short-range but, being a machine gun, it fires many bullets very quickly, and combined with the trigger-happy trait’s increased firing rate, she’s a killing machine. It doesn’t even matter that the trigger-happy trait also decreases accuracy, given the weapon she has. And at the moment she only has 3 shooting points. Can’t imagine what she’ll be like when she has 10+ and is armed with a better machine gun. I kinda wanna rename her “Joanna Rambo,” though I don’t know if it’s possible to rename pawns. Anyway, a tiny, skinny, 14-year-old killing machine...who also enjoys growing things and has the kind trait, so she regularly gives other pawns positive buffs by saying nice things to them. Like a little ray of sunshine toting a machine gun. LOL
My New Colonists Are Rad, Part 2: One of the shuttle crash victims. A 37-year-old woman who has excellent animal and medical skills because of a veterinarian backstory...and is also fucking lethal. I gave her a masterwork recurve bow made by Original Colonist Dude, even though she has better melee skill. (Because the ideology of the colony reveres ranged weaponry and despises melee weaponry, Original Colonist Dude is a master craftsman who makes amazing bows now and who will no doubt make amazing guns once there’s time to research machining.) Anyway, during one of the bear attacks when the bear was coming for a newborn boar, the first shot from one of the other colonists hit its foot and turned it into a manhunter, but since this colonist was closest, it went after her first, not the colonist who shot it. It wasn’t far from her, so I thought she was a goner. At best I hoped I could get someone to her to save her if I could distract the bear away from her and her rescuer.
That wasn’t necessary. She fired a single arrow at it and destroyed its brain. Dropped dead instantly. It usually takes 8-10 bullets from a colonist with 10+ shooting skills and a rifle to bring down one of these things, but she did it with one fucking arrow. I thought it was a fluke. It wasn’t. She subsequently went on a raid (which her ideology likes, so raiding and killing people gives her positive mood buffs) and killed two defenders with single shots to their brains from her bow. From across a river, no less. I don’t know what it is about her, but she is fucking scary and is now, unofficially, named Wonder Woman. And she only has 4 shooting points! Can’t wait to see what she’ll be like with more shooting skill and a masterwork/legendary greatbow. Gotta do the research for that first, though.
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Demolition ranch cameraman
Demolition ranch cameraman series#
Demolition ranch cameraman windows#
Videotaped on early VHS equipment, the quality of the tape is not up to today's standards, and the camerawork is poor, to say the least. And it was Helen who also kept alive the family histories - including that saloon owner's poor opinion of her marital future.Īround 1980, Helen Comstock sat in her garden on a summer's day and made a 110-minute oral history that is presented here exactly as it was recorded, but divided into seventeen parts. It was Helen who saved the house after the 1969 earthquakes toppled the south chimney and shook plaster off the walls, despite Santa Rosa's subsequent redevelopment fever that led to the demolition of so many other old and beautiful buildings.
Demolition ranch cameraman windows#
Helen resisted the advice of "experts" over the decades who tried to convince her that the woodwork should be painted a nice clean white, and that the old place would be made brighter if the cathedral windows were replaced with clear glass. Comstock, who made it her home for about 51 years, all told. The preservation of the 1905 Comstock House is mainly thanks to Mrs. "A great mistake, Wilson, they'll never make it - his family's too damn aristocratic." The 1918 marriage of the farmer's daugher and the man who became a Superior Court judge did indeed "make it " Hilliard and Helen were wed for almost fifty years, and raised five children. It’s a busy life for the 30-year-old married father of three, but the chance to play with awesome firearms and get creative seems to be paying off."Wilson, I hear your daughter's gonna marry Hilliard Comstock," the barkeep of Santa Rosa's fabled Senate saloon said to farmer Wilson Finley, according to family legend. He generally does one or two videos each week for Demolition Ranch, and another for Vet Ranch, a veterinary channel that uses viewer donations to provide animals with lifesaving surgeries and veterinary care. Once he’s done shooting, Matt goes home and edits everything into a finished video. It can be a slow process moving the camera to different spots on the ranch or just setting up targets, but Matt almost always does it by himself. Matt shoots the videos himself using a simple handheld camera and a GoPro. You might think that with a channel this popular, Matt would have some help putting the videos together, but it is almost entirely a solo effort. Matt shot everything from razor blades and spark plugs to glow sticks and Mentos out of his shotgun and YouTube viewers ate it up.
Demolition ranch cameraman series#
One of the things that really helped Demolition Ranch reach more viewers was a series of videos featuring custom shotgun shells. He is willing to make fun of himself and try goofy things. While there are no shortage of firearm channels, what sets Matt apart is he is likable and doesn’t take himself too seriously. That ranks right up there with the biggest gun channels on YouTube and it’s showing no signs of slowing down.Īll the credit for the growth of Demolition Ranch goes to Matt. It took Demolition Ranch a little while to find an audience, but it has been growing rapidly and now boasts more than 1.7 million subscribers. He is a huge gun enthusiast and he likes making videos, so YouTube gave him an outlet. As the editor of TFB sister site ATV.com, I was able to borrow a tricked out UTV and secured a couple of 3D zombie targets from Delta McKenzie for use in a Demolition Ranch video.Īccording to Matt, Demolition Ranch came about while he was in veterinary school around five years ago. Some weeks later I made my way to south-central Texas with a video producer to talk to Matt in person and learn how and why he makes the videos he does. As luck would have it, he was happy to oblige. A couple months back I reached out to Matt Carriker, the man behind the wildly successful Demolition Ranch YouTube channel, to see if he’d be interested in working together on a project.
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Chapter 1 of my book has been published!!!
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! The alarm sounded rudely, awakening me from the deepest sleep of my life. I reached across the white sheets towards my side table to silence it. My head pounded. I was hungover. Again.
My mouth was dry, and my vision was blurred. That's the last time I get into a tequila drinking competition with the whole of my boyfriend's fraternity. I chuckled to myself, "Oh, for fuck's sake, I can't believe I did that," I reminisced on jumping into the pool fully clothed. It was only supposed to be a small gathering; I said I'd only stop for a few drinks. My Boyfriend – Dylan, is a part of the Xi Alpha Upsilon fraternity as well as the lacrosse captain. They throw some of the best parties on campus. Almost everyone on campus has been in the Xi Alpha house at some point, and I had a season pass to enter whenever I wanted. It's like an investment. Apart from, you know, being in love. I date a member of one of the most popular frats on campus, and I get access to any party on campus. And dating Dylan had granted me the honour of being crowned the Xi Alpha Upsilon party princess. Not a real title that carried any responsibility other than status and a plastic party crown, but it felt nice being beloved.
It's not like i'm some massive party animal or something. I don't get drunk at every party, but I'm in college, and I've just turned 21. I'm going to party while I can. And I'm good at it. I'm really good at partying. And it's not just the drinking. It's the music, dancing, everyone's having fun, and the deep nonsense conversations you get into while drinking are unmatched. I've made some of my best friends in the club's bathroom. And I have a person for everything. Need a locksmith? I know a guy. You need a bundle of horsehair? I know a guy. Or I know a guy who knows a guy. And I met them all at the club or in someone's living room at 4am. So, I guess it's like networking? I think that makes sense, seeming that I'm a communications major. A major I took as it seemed the easiest and required the least amount of work, but actually, as it turns out, I'm a natural.
I manage to peel myself out of bed without making my headache worse. No time to shower. I throw on the leggings and sweatshirt that are thrown over my desk chair. They've been worn too often to mix with the clean clothes in my overstuffed drawer, yet they still need to be dirty enough to put into my laundry pile. Doing my laundry takes a lot of mental strength, so I put it off as long as possible. Usually, till I run out of underwear.
...
As class ended and I slipped out of my seat I went to go over to Professor Donaldsons desk to hand over the extra credit he'd asked me to complete so I could recover my GPA. Still in my daydream I walked into something hard.
"Ouch, watch it neanderthal! You could have broken my nose".
The giant was stood at Professor Donaldsons desk, handing over some sheets of paper with a wide smile on his face. I'd never seen him before. What a kiss ass. The words internship had barely left Donaldsons lips, and this guy was already first in line to hand over an application. He thanked Donaldson for his consideration and finally turned to answer me.
"Maybe watch where you're going princess, and you wouldn't walk into people who were standing here first."
I barely even looked up at him, I rolled my eyes and walked around his gigantic frame to handover my work. I went to parties almost evert night, I was the most popular girl on campus. The Xi Alpha Party Princess. Who did he think he was talking to me like this. I turned round to give him a piece of my mind but by the time I'd placed the paper on the desk and turned around he was gone.
Who the hell was that guy?
#wattpad recommendations#wattpad#enemies to lovers#workplace romance#romance#lovestory#lovers#college romance#college#comedy#new writter#new author#explore page
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Vinyl Privacy Fence Panels in New Mexico: A Comprehensive Guide
Vinyl privacy fence panels have a wide variety of applications these days. Whether you need to prevent wild animals from entering your property, deter potential thieves, or keep your pets and kits contained within your property, thereby preventing them from wandering out, vinyl privacy fence panels come to your rescue every time. With so many different options for fencing materials available in New Mexico, it might get rather confusing as to which one to choose. Well, truth be told, vinyl privacy fences are the most cost-effective and effortless choice available out there.
Why vinyl?
Vinyl is five times stronger than wood, thereby taking durability to the moon. Accidental collisions or impacts due to harsh weather conditions would not cause any damage to vinyl fences, making them an ideal choice for places like New Mexico. All credit goes to the exceptional flexibility of these fences. Vinyl privacy fence panels do not have any nails, screws, or splinters peeping out, which could pose a serious injury threat. There are no chances of fence yellowing or fading, and they can last for a really long time. So, choose from a wide plethora of different fence colors and styles, and enjoy a pristine look over the years.
Installation: Wood vs Vinyl. Who wins the battle?
The effortless installation process of vinyl privacy fence panels makes them the one to go, surpassing their contemporaries by a huge margin. Once you have decided where to install the fences, follow the simple steps below, and you would be good to go.
Figure out the exact positions where the fence posts will be installed.
Ensure the posts are even and the fences are at a particular level.
Now dig the post holes, fasten the posts, and allow them to get stabilized.
Install the fence panels, and with the help of the top rails and bottom, snap the fence panels in place.
Install the fence gate.
Install and secure embellishing post tops.
Check the laws of fencing applicable in New Mexico.
Get a permit if your fence has a height above 6 feet.
While vinyl fences are quick and easy to install, on the flip side, with wooden fences, you need to screw or nail the individual pieces together. A vinyl fence has a sturdy routing and interlocking system and the panels are snapped together for the perfect installation. However, wooden fences have unsightly screws and brackets, and it goes without saying that this will eat up your time significantly. The worst part is that wooden fences are not available as pre-assembled panels. So, you need to practically build wooden fences from the ground up, making the process tedious and time-consuming, to say the least.
Vinyl privacy fences: Maintenance
It’s true that the up-front cost of vinyl privacy fence panels is higher than wooden fences. But the fact that vinyl fences require much less maintenance, the cost balances out in the long term. Vinyl privacy fences do not need to be sealed, sanded, painted, or stained, things which are an absolute must for wooden fences. These are mildew resistant as well. Even if mildew covers them, it can be easily removed with standard household cleaners. Cleaning the vinyl fence with a garden hose makes the maintenance much simpler, which again makes vinyl fences a sought-after choice for fencing.
Final Take:
A quick search online would reveal many reputed vinyl privacy fence panels suppliers near New Mexico. They offer a wide array of designs and colors, allowing you to choose one that suits your property in the best way possible. Whether you are on the hunt for a classic picket fence or a sleek traditional design, you can get everything from them at affordable rates. We suggest you go through the online reviews before committing to a particular seller. Get in touch with reputed sellers in New Mexico and bring home the entire world of security paramount for your property yard. A good supplier and manufacturer of vinyl fences in New Mexico will be willing to offer you a free consultation. Connect now to get a free estimate.
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I Clean Houses and Write Stuff (sometimes)
Blog Post #2 1/9/2023
I'm not writing right now, and I'm not okay with it.
Technically you could argue that I haven't written regularly in a long time. It wouldn't be much of an argument, given that it's absolutely true.
Sometime in that 2018-2019 pre-pandemic era I wrote what would be the final draft of the book I've been working on since I was 12 years old. And when I say final I don't mean "complete;" I mean final as in it would finally leave my head so that something new could take its place.
Because 15 years is a long-ass time to be working on a book. Especially when it isn't very good.
And something new did take its place, once my those guys were free of the gothic feary world my angsty teen brain concocted. The Something New would be drafted three times, many hours spent pouring over laptop and notebooks, doing the thing I'd loved doing for so long it was beyond a hobby, it was part of who I was, like being right-handed or strawberry blonde. The third draft of this Somethibf was even something that would be one step closer to "finished," maybe even publishable...
But then, it was March of 2020. The weird "Chinese virus" we'd kept hearing rumbles about in the news would reach the shores of the US. Suddenly you could die by breathing the air outside your front door, and every media outlet had a field day with headlines listing death tolls, hospitalozation numbers, and repeating the phrase "nothing will ever be the same again" over and over and over.
I didn't sleep for three months.
I cried -sobbed- and screamed for several weeks straight.
I suffered a back spasm that was so painful I physically couldn't lay flat on the floor, my spine seemingly permanently arched. I was able to get that to let go after hours of yoga videos, but then it moved to my foot and I could barely walk. I stopped being able to eat real food because everything made me sick, and would in turn get dangerously close to becoming pre-diabetic because you aren't actually supposed to live off of cheap protein bars.
And during it all, all I could do was read the news.
And read the news.
And read the news.
That story that I spent so much time with was gone, dead and buried with the first 100,000 people in the US to die of COVID-19 no thanks to our screaming lunatic of a 45th president who was elected into office the year I graduated from college. (Talk about a slap to the face to those looking to enter the world and make something of themselves, especially if you were a woman, queer, Black, an immigrant, trans, pretty much anyone not a straight white male.)
I could barely focus on the books in front of me - I read entire novels that I'd forget the second I closed the back cover. Soon I stopped reading books all together.
A small bright spot emerged when a story idea came me, one that had been rolling about the back of my head for some time. I hammered out a draft in record time in the Fall of 2020 and then... That was gone, too, regardless of how I tried to go back to it, how I tried to work on it, edit it, turn it into something for the world.
"Maybe making more money will help," I thought as I picked up more hours at my then-job.
"Maybe having my own space will help," I thought as we emptied our savings account and liquidated every asset we had so we could buy the house of a dreams in September of 2021, big enough for all our animals and for me and my husband Tim to have our own office spaces. Mine was even painted a delightful shade of purple, complete with overflowing bookshelves and a massive window overlooking the street below behind which my mint green sauder desk sits, waiting.
I don't think I've spent more than 24 hours in here, my office, this space that we purchased with everything we had so it could be mine. We've been here for 16 months now.
Mind you, buying the house was not the plan. At least not yet. Ever since the credit cards got taken care of from pandemic aid (the one good thing that came out of those dark months of death, tears, fear and grief), we'd been planning to move out west, somewhere in Colorado where we could see the mountains and be in a not-red state (news flash: Ohio sucks). But then we found our now house, a beautiful thing that's a hundred-and-some years old with real wood trim, badly finished rooms and generations of stories right in what's become our favorite, artsy district of Cleveland. Lots of mental creative energy has been spent planning: how do we make this ancient place that's been through so much ours? How do we heal it, fix it, honor it's history while bringing it to our modern era?
It's stressful as all hell, not to mention expensive and time consuming, but I've loved it. We have it all planned out; wooden countertops in the kitchen, black tile in the bathrooms, an attic library, a basement game room, a second shower.
I try to tell myself that I haven't been writing because that part of my brain that longs to make things has been making our house our house. Constantly working, picking, problem solving the way it does when I'm drafting.
Part of me believes me.
Part of me wonders if I will ever write again.
After all, writing up until the pandemic was such a part of who I am, it was hard to call it a hobby.
But, is it still?
I don't know.
I don't like not knowing.
***
Flash forward to now, 2023. I've stepped away from the ever demanding customer service desk I've been chained to since I was 17 and am now working for myself, quietly cleaning houses, alone with my music, my thoughts, and the home owner's pets.
It's good work; I'm making more money, and have a lot more time now.
But do I have Grass is Always Greener Syndrome, too?
Am I just thinking, "maybe this atmospheric change will fix my internal problems, because I don't even know where to begin on those?"
It makes me sigh heavily. Perhaps that's why I spend my free time sitting in the living room under a blanket watching true crime docs on Hulu.
#writeblr#writing#writing community#blog post#personal#post-pandemic life#not writing#bloggers of tumblr#blogs of tumblr#pandemic#2023#mental health#I Clean Houses and Write Stuff Blog
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