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cochart · 4 months

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Some SMT5 Characters in P5T style because it’s cute

I’ve been enjoying P5T during my little self-assigned winter break. I haven’t cleared the game yet, but it’s been a nice distraction.

Below is some of my thoughts on P5T if you’re interested or if you’re trying to decide whether or not to buy.

Overall, the game has been pretty enjoyable. It’s nice to see the characters you’re familiar with again and the story is decent. The art style is cute and the battles are enjoyable. The game is definitely more on the casual side and might be a tad bit disappointing for people who want a proper SRPG. On the flip side, even if you hate SRPG, you’d be able to pick this game up easily. I’d definitely recommend the game for P5 fans.

On the other hand, compared to P5S, the game does feel a little short for the price. I don’t regret preordering the game at all, but if your finances aren’t doing so well at the moment, I’d say wait till it goes on a sale.

1. As a Persona 5 spinoff

As a spinoff, I think it’s a pretty nice game. It’s nice to see the characters you love again in a different context, and the new characters are fun and likable. I’m actually quite impressed by the new characters as it can sometimes be difficult to insert new characters into a well-established franchise without making them overpowered or otherwise upsetting to the existing fans. Both Toshiro and Elle are likable, fun characters with decent stories of their own.

It’s also nice to see your favorite Phantom Thieves again. Overall, the tone of the game is more playful, so you can’t expect an in-depth character exploration you get in P5R, but it still feels like a treat.

2. As an SRPG

I think the game translated the elements of Persona franchise well into an SRPG genre. With 1 MORE and Tribangle system, you really do feel like you’re playing a Persona game. While it might be a tad bit disappointing that you can only use three characters per battle, trying to find the most efficient way to exterminate the enemies with Tribangle is pretty fun.

That said, for people coming from a more traditional SRPG like Final Fantasy Tactics or the Fire Emblem series, P5T can be a little lacking. Part of the fun in an SRPG is customizing units and building your army. In P5T, you level up the Phantom Thieves as a whole instead of individually. I think this was necessary to prevent users having to grind to level up different units, but it also makes it harder for you as a player to customize each unit meaningfully. In FE3H, for example, you can decide whether you want Felix to be a sword master or a wyvern lord. You can also decide whether you’d want your army to be sturdier with a lot of armored units or whether you’d take your chances by raising your units’ agility and hoping that they’d dodge enemy attacks. That you can’t do such customization can be a huge disappointment for people who enjoy SRPG.

On the other hand, adopting such traditional job/class system might have turned P5T into a poor man’s FE. I feel like the developers had to choose between a traditional approach at the risk of making the game look like a FE ripoff and trying to make use of Persona-typical systems at the expense of being a solid SRPG.

Overall, the game plays more like a fun puzzle game than an SRPG. If I were to compare P5T to any game, I’d actually compare it to some of the puzzle maps in FEH. My advice is if you’re looking for a solid SRPG like Fire Emblem, you should pick up a Fire Emblem game.

3. Others

While the game doesn’t feel unfinished—like Crimson Flower route in FE3H in which you feel cheated out of Edel’s story—it does feel a little short. I haven’t gotten to the final boss, but I can look at the level and guess where I am. I’ve been playing this game in bits and pieces, but I’m already 60% finished with the game. I think at this rate, I’d finish at about 35~40ish hours. Keep in mind that when I play games, I eat and drink, so it takes a little longer than it would if I were to focus completely on the game.

One thing that shortens the game is that there isn’t anything to do aside from battling. I know some people hate it when games involve little side activity like walking around and talking to characters—though you can technically talk to characters in P5T when there’s a Talk event—or farming, but I do wish there was something to do. The quests are fun, but there aren’t that many of them.

On the other hand, because you don’t have anything to work for besides getting on with the story, I’m not sure if the developers could have made the game longer without making the battles feel too repetitive. If there were job/class systems or any unit customization available, there would be something to work for, but there isn’t.

I do think there is more potential to the premise of the game though. The Kingdoms of P5T is sort of set up like Silent Hill in that the bosses are incarnations of one’s fear. I think the developers could definitely have expanded on that.

I’ve also seen some complaints that the game is too easy. The game is definitely easier than some SRPG I played. But then, I don’t think this game was made with hardcore SRPG players in mind. Also, despite the game being a bit more casual, I didn’t feel bored playing the battles. So I think the difficulty level might actually be more suitable for the general public. Aside from something like Dark Souls, games of all genres have been getting easier over the years. I know it might be disappointing to people who want more challenging games, but I don’t see the trend reversing soon. I think the best course of action if you want more challenge is to try looking into some indie games.

#megaten #smt5 #shin megami tensei #p5t #persona 5 #persona 5 tactica #nahobino

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ozzgin · 8 months

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Since you are taking requests can you do an hc of prehistoric mommy that is covered head to toe with scars like be it lightning scars, burn scars, claw marks

I’ve gotten several requests regarding a heavily scarred reader and I do like the idea a lot, although headcanon wise I’m having trouble coming up with a whole story around it. In the sense that half of the Baki characters are covered in scars and it seems to be something accepted without any questioning? There might be some initial curiosity, like “Holy cow that’s a lot of scars, I wonder what the backstory is”, but given that reader routinely hunted down dinosaurs it’d probably just be assumed as collateral damage.

I had the mental image of someone like Baki, Jack or Hanayama comparing their wounds to yours and telling you a little bit about how they got their own scars since you can’t really communicate yet. That’d be very cute. Reader would just sit next to them and quietly listen, focused despite having no idea what the words mean. After a while she figures out through all the pointing that they’re talking about their battle markings, so she begins gesturing her own stories in front of the very amused and entertained men. So I think it’d be more of an intimate experience with equally scarred characters.

I was actually planning to draw something to that effect (since I can’t offer much in terms of headcanons), but then I stumbled upon a bodybuilding photo on my Instagram explore and had the urge to do this instead. There’s something very tempting about presenting Yuujirou as a tiny man next to a scarred, tough looking prehistoric woman. Less defined muscles this time compared to my first depiction of her because realistically speaking a solid body is more efficient for strength.

#baki #baki the grappler #baki hanma #baki headcanons #yujiro hanma #yuujirou hanma #prehistoric reader #doodle

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ofallthingsnasty · 4 months

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Pretty please could you do F, H, N, or Y for crocodile one day! I’m curious on your thoughts about him and I love when you talk about him 😭 my new obsession is the pug who he hates but tolerates just for you, so sweet 🥺

Yandere Alphabet letters a, i and q for crocodile hdsjahj anon I'm glad you like my rambles because they are so much fun to write 💕💕 regarding the little dog - don't be fooled, it's 50% him wanting to see you happy and 50% having even more leverage over you 🤭 mean man...

tw.yandere, violence, minors dni

Fight: How would they feel if their darling fought back?

Uh oh, you might want to reconsider doing that. You call it fighting back, he calls it being an ungrateful, whiny little brat and it pisses him off. There are few things that make his blood boil when it comes to you, and being defiant and insulting him is one of them. Does he know that you’re here against your will? Sure. Does he care? No. You see, he views himself as some sort of provider - he’s giving you a life a million times better than your old one. You’re cared for, well-fed, nicely dressed, don’t have to work - really, your only job is to play house when he’s around (which he isn’t all that often, busy as he is). He doesn't even expect you to fuck him for it, he just wants someone to come home to, who will let him rest his head on their lap and caress it. (Of course, he oh-so-graciously ignores the gigantic power imbalance between the two of you when it suits him, especially when it comes to the bedroom. But generally speaking, I think he can be rather mellow compared to others, can even be reasoned with to a certain extent. Just be good for him.)

He thinks he’s being more than generous, more than fair - for the position you're in. A lesser pirate would have killed you by now, he tells you, would have gotten a new toy already. No, no - he is here to stay, he wants to see you thrive, even.And if you throw it all in his face, spit at him, dare to fight him - oh, what he’ll feel will be beyond good and evil. Don’t bite the hand that feeds you, darling.

Hell: What would be their darling’s worst experience with them?

Okay, good news first: When it comes to Crocodile, I’d argue that the worst experience is really limited to just one. I’ve talked about him physically lashing out at you in a moment of rage and in the weeks that have passed that thought kind of stuck with me. At his core, this man doesn't want to hurt you (deeply). Manipulating you with visual threats and possibilities is one thing, but genuinely injuring you to make you bend to his will? Not really his style. Yes, he does corporal punishments - but only because they’re so effective and can be done so quickly. (A classic action - réaction, if you will.) So, what exactly is that nebulous worst experience? It’s him either using his Devil Fruit powers or his hook on you. To even get to that point, he’d have to be beyond angry with you. It’s probably something that happens early on while you’re not yet acquainted with your new role and you dare to insult him, try to escape - maybe you spiral, his temper simply cooks over and- Trust me, he’ll never do it again. It’ll leave permanent physical damage. But it’ll also traumatize you into submission, which is the only good thing to come out of this, at least to him. You’ll both regret it. And you’ll both learn from it.

Naughty: How would they punish their darling?

Spankings. Lots of them. It’s quick, efficient, shows you who is in charge, makes you sit a little straighter, makes you sweeter - he isn’t beyond mind games in general but when it comes to punishments, a quick correction is just more convenient. Manipulation and the likes are the long con, the work he puts in to undermine your self-esteem, to make you doubt your own feelings for your captor. But the spankings are the here and now, the thing that keeps the cat from sharpening its claws on the sofa.

You’ll learn to associate that telltale-look of tired disappointment with a sigh and over my knee, darling. He’ll ask what you’ve done wrong, will make you count, will leave you feeling so small, like an unruly child and not a fully grown adult - it’s a great way to keep you edge, to never let you forget who is in charge here, no matter how much time passes and in how many gifts he showers you.

And if it’s really dire - you get the belt.

Yearn: How long do they pine after their darling before they snap?

I always waver on this one. We know from the story that he isn’t afraid of planning, slowly building, waiting - Operation Utopia was a goddamn mammoth and he has the patience to wait on you for years and years to make it perfect - but. Doesn’t he deserve something soft? Someone to come home to? And what good is all that plotting and lying in wait and watching if he could have had you by that point already?He definitely won’t go ‘alright, that one’s spouse-shaped, put them in the bag’ when he sees you for the first time but he won’t wait too long for you either. Just long enough to gain sufficient intel, to get to know you a little better, to make your disappearance as smooth and seamless as possible. I’m not trying to sound harsh, but not only does he not want to wait too long - there are also other, more important things to do? He can’t spend months upon months learning about you inch by inch, he has an Ancient Weapon to seize and a country to overthrow. You can’t be mad at him when he pulls the plug at a certain moment and simply takes what he wants. It’s really only logical.

#omg that was waaaaay too much fun. thank you for indulging me!! kiss for you... 💕#tw.yandere #/crocodile #/one piece #yandere one piece #crocodile x reader

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a-small-batch-of-dragons · 26 days

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Language Barriers

same anon as like 5 minutes ago, I remembered the fluffy prompt! Could you write a Sanders Sides DLAMPR fic (before they get together) where all of the Sides have different love languages? And they’re all trying to flirt in their own way, but the others keep misinterpreting it? A lot of TSS fic features the Sides having different love languages (and I’d like to think they do, in canon), but I’ve yet to see a fic that specifically focuses on that fact and describes the differences between love languages. Feel free to ignore, and remember to take care of yourself! – anon

hey I love love love love LOVE your writing! If you’re open to prompts rn, I’ve just reread your story "Idiots, Idiots, Everywhere" and it’s awesome, thanks very much, BUT. Are you willing to write a Sanders Sides fic where it focuses more specifically on all the Sides having different love languages? Bonus points if it’s DLAMPR (but platonic PR, this is an incest-free household) and all the Sides are like “…but he’s like this with everyone”. No pressure at ALL, but it’d be cool to see how you approach that. – anon

Read on Ao3

Warnings: none

Pairings: dlampr

Word Count: 3431

Or, five times the Sides misunderstood each other's love languages, and one time Thomas got fed up with it and decided to just...explain it to them with the efficiency they have when they're trying to explain something to him. Which is to say: it takes them a second to get it. The Imagination helps.

Physical Touch

If you were to ask anyone, they would tell you that Patton loves giving people hugs.

It’s the bane of some of their existences, they’d try to claim, and the others might just shrug and say that’s Patton for you. He knows his kiddos love it, at least a little bit. But he won’t lie, he does love a good hug. There’s just something so magical about how, out of all the shapes humans could have possibly been, they’re just perfectly designed to hold one another. Isn’t that just perfect?

Logan would probably say something about evolution and adaptation to the needs of their environment, or something, but he’s not gonna rain on Patton’s parade. Humans are hug-shaped, so they’re gonna hug. Besides, he’s not complaining when he’s working downstairs in the winter and he’s gotten too absorbed in his work and then a Patton-shaped heating pad just comes along and hugs him.

Patton loves hugging all of the Sides. Logan because he’s always so surprised by it, in a good way! He gets this soft little look that is almost on the edge of a smile, like he wasn’t expecting it but it’s the best possible outcome he never could have predicted. Or when he’s trying to comfort Patton and he hugs with undeniable certainty.

Virgil is also fun to hug, because he’s such a pouty-face about it. He snuggles up as much as any of them but he has to put on his mopey show first, just in case anyone’s watching. Virgil also gives the mopey hugs too, but then he makes himself just a bit bigger so he can wrap all the way around Patton. Which is the best.

Speaking of wrapping all the way around, Janus has six arms and he uses every single one of them. They get into competitions sometimes—not serious! It’s all for fun!—about who can surprise-hug each other the worst. Or best. Janus is currently winning from the time he managed to make himself look like the chair in the living room with a blanket over it; Patton sat down and boo!

Remus isn’t allowed to do surprise hugs, not after he accidentally tackled Patton into his Kraken’s pond and they had to spend the rest of the afternoon trying to get out of the pond. But Remus’s hugs are the kind that squish his soul right back into his body and ugh, there’s nothing better than that after a long day. Besides, it’s not like expecting Remus’s hugs takes anything away, he’s still going to squeeze him so hard he might not be able to breathe for a few seconds, but that’s Remus!

And then with Roman—Roman hugs the way every single knight from a fairytale should hug. He just makes you feel safe and precious and like nothing in the world could hurt you. It’s why Patton always sits next to Roman during scary movie nights, after all, even if he gets teased about it a little. Roman doesn’t mind.

So yes, Patton does love hugging all of them. But it doesn’t have to be hugging! It can be holding hands, or just leaning against each other, just as long as he can feel them and tell himself yes, they’re okay, they’re right here, I love them.

Because he does. He loves them terribly. Even if they think he’s just a big fan of hugs.

***

2. Quality Time

Virgil has the reputation of being the cat of the Mindscape for good reason. Not because he hisses at things that don’t cooperate—the other Sides are not excluded from this—and not because he spits up hairballs—it was one time, Remus, and it was entirely your fault—but because he has a habit of just appearing in the same room and hanging out for a while.

…alright, it’s not a habit, he does it on purpose.

Companionable silence really is the best way to go about things. You’re both close enough to talk if you want to, but each of them is allowed to do their own thing and hey, there’s another person doing their own thing too. Which is why it’s his favorite way of hanging out with Logan, especially when he needs to make sure that something gets done. He’s always down to affectionately bully Logan into whatever he asks him to make sure he does.

He does that with Remus too, but it’s not exactly the same: Remus needs someone to make sure he doesn’t actually destroy anything, and he’s more than happy to oblige. Especially since he likes to get a bit of a heads-up before a rampaging beast goes barreling through the kitchen at some ungodly hour of the morning.

If he’s never beating the cat allegations, Janus sure as hell isn’t helping. There’s a big window in the Dark Sides’ half of the Mindscape that is perfect for lying in for, oh, a few hours on end. Remus has many—too many, if you ask Virgil—pictures of the two of them just basking in the sun, dozing like they haven’t got a care in the world.

Virgil’s actual favorite place to sleep is with his head in Patton’s lap. Especially after he’s just finished baking, when he’s all warm from the oven and he smells like sugar and spice…Virgil will sit on the counter or the floor and listen to Patton talk about whatever he wants and then while the oven bakes, he’ll fall asleep right in Patton’s lap. He even gets first dibs on whatever just got made.

Roman makes a game of it. He’s the Prince, every good Prince needs a rogue to work with. They trek all over the Imagination, having adventures, defeating monsters, it’s the perfect mix of Roman’s quests and Virgil’s need to be a creepy little shit in every dark corner he can find. Being with Roman even makes boring council meetings fun, because he gets to terrify the idiots that they’re just gonna fight later anyway and he gets to spend time with Roman.

He doesn’t care what he’s doing, not really, just as long as he can spend time with them. He just…wishes they would understand that sometimes.

***

3. Words of Affirmation

Logan is no stranger to impostor syndrome, but that doesn’t mean he has to allow it to plague those he cares for. Understanding something to be true on an intellectual level and feeling the validation that comes from hearing someone else voice it are two very different things. The other Sides are each remarkable in their own right. They deserve to hear it.

Patton is kind. He does not say that lightly: kind people who choose to be kind because they know how difficult it is are not individuals to be trifled with. Patton makes the conscious choice to try and be better every single day. He is earnest and sincere, sometimes painfully so, but he does not allow himself to be dissuaded by obstacles. How could Logan not want to express his admiration?

And Roman…oh, Roman is a wonder. There is so much that goes into his work that often goes unnoticed, or underappreciated, and it is a crime that Logan too often finds himself on the wrong side of that line. Roman is clever and funny and has a work ethic that, truly, rivals Logan’s own. For every slight he makes, however unintentional, he tries his best to make up for it by telling Roman in no uncertain terms how honored Logan is to be part of his creative process.

Remus is an entirely different story, no pun intended. Remus is unabashedly and unapologetically himself, and as such is a marvel to behold. He cares not for the sanitization or reduction of anything in his work, and so Logan does his best to follow suit. Remus is who he is, and it is beautiful.

He tells Janus he’s beautiful too. And not once is he lying. The first time he did it, Janus laughed in his face, at least until he realized Logan was telling the truth. He then didn’t see Janus for an entire week. It ended when a little snake plushie appeared outside of his door in the middle of the night with a tiny note that just said thank you. He tells Janus he’s beautiful every chance he gets now.

Virgil is his little alley cat. Perfectly fine to approach on his terms, but will let him know with no uncertainties when he’s getting a little too close. It doesn’t help that Virgil is quite fun to tease, even if all he’s doing is giving him compliments—true compliments, mind you—and watching in amusement as Virgil curls up into a ball with his hood pulled down over his ears as if that could hide how red they are. He’s not cruel about it, of course; he stops the moment Virgil appears genuinely uncomfortable and there are certain topics he doesn’t go near. But Virgil can’t always hide his little grin and so on it goes.

He’s quite happy to shower them with his words, he just…doesn’t know if they’d believe him if he said I love you.

***

4. Acts of Service

Words are difficult. There is so much ambiguity to be found in even the most basic of sentences, and when it comes to matters like this, Janus prefers to take as few chances as possible. Whoever coined the phrase ‘actions speak louder than words,’ Janus definitely owes a drink for how spot-on it is.

Whenever Patton needs a hand in the kitchen, he’s always the first to volunteer. He can do up to three things in the time it would take another Side to do just one, after all, and he’s had enough experience cooking for the troublemakers (Virgil and Remus) to know how to get around most of their pranks. And how to get them back.

Logan, bless him, has a tendency to overwork himself at the best of times. And in doing so, he gets these terrible knots and cramps in his neck and shoulders from hunching over his desk for hours on end. It might not be the most polite of things to practically blackmail his way into giving Logan a massage, but the poor dear always falls right to sleep so he mustn’t mind too much.

Remus and his delightful menagerie of creatures often need more than their fair share of attention. He had to pester Remus into getting him a raincoat and muck boots that could withstand the acidic slime, but weekend mornings found them strolling cheerfully through pens and cages and paddocks, tending to the bizarre flock. Anything to make the chore more of a fun activity and less of, well, a chore, when Remus really doesn’t suit stressed-out frowns as well as manic grins.

Virgil has a terrible habit of not asking for reassurance when he needs it. Janus regrets the part he played in making it that way. So, no matter how small and stupid Virgil may think it is, whenever he asks for help, Janus gives it. A tug on his cloak or a soft please will have him do anything from turn the light in the hallway on to checking the poor thing over for wounds after a brutal nightmare. It took long enough for Janus to re-earn that trust, he’s not going to lose it if he can damn well help it.

Out of everyone in the Mindscape, only Roman truly appreciates his love of theater. Sure, the others are game to help out here and there, but when it comes to the art of make-believe, Roman is the proud owner of Janus’s ‘yes-and’ partnership. The two of them make all sorts of stories together, from villains and heroes to morally grey adventurers, to simple fairytales and old plays. Roman needs someone else to help him play the roles and Janus is more than happy to play with him.

Perhaps one day, he might be able to reveal that everything he does for them, he does because it’s them, but for now, he’ll happily play the role they expect of him.

***

5. Gifts

Roman and Remus do not, in fact, fight over who gets to give the most presents to the other Sides.

Instead, they fight over whose idea they work on first.

For Logan, Remus’s self-writing pen narrowly won out over Roman’s proposal for a never-ending notebook, if only because said pen squirted ink into Roman’s mouth before he could finish his argument. They ended up giving both to Logan at the same time, but the pen was decidedly on top and did its own little celebratory wriggle when Logan used it for the first time.

Remus nearly challenged Roman to a formal duel when it came to designing a heat lamp for Janus that wouldn’t run the same risk of burning out the electricity in their section of the Mindscape. They managed to agree on everything up to the design on the lampshade. Roman said it should be a yellow snake, curled up and sleeping, and Remus wanted it to be a big leaf that Janus could lay under like he was actually outside. The compromise was eventually reached over many hours of almost bloodshed and now the sleeping snake under a leaf is a staple in the corner of Janus’s room.

Roman cleverly proposed Virgil’s weighted blanket while Remus was being crushed under said blanket, leaving not a lot of wiggle room until he had to agree. Of course, he promptly fell asleep and cuddled Roman into a pile of goo, so technically they made both the blanket and the plushie at around the same time. Virgil still brings the little skeleton to movie nights.

Patton gets their presents one after the other, because you need one to understand the other’s context. A rebreather designed to slip on over the person’s face just like any other face mask, to filter out particulates and allergens. Something that could be worn for up to two consecutive hours before it needed to be recharged.

The other present was a box full of kittens.

”Ro?”

“Yeah?”

Remus pushes his goggles to the top of his head and looks over the desk. “Do you think they’ll ever get it?”

Roman sighs, closing his notebook and leaning back to stretch. “I don’t know, Re. I love them, really, they just…”

”Don’t realize.”

“Yeah. It’s okay, though. We’ll get there eventually.”

“Of course we will. Hand me that wrench, would you?”

“The one that’s covered in guts, or the one that’s made out of foam?”

“The foam one. I need to whack this thing but I don’t wanna hit it too hard.”

“I’m not gonna ask any more questions.”

***

+1: I Love You

”Hey!” Patton rises up first, clapping his hands. “Oh. I’m the only one here.”

“Only by a moment,” Logan says as he joins him. “Is Thomas here?”

“No, I just got summoned by—well, I thought it was Thomas but he’s not here.”

“Whoa, hey!” Virgil appears on the staircase. “What’s going on? I was in the middle of watching someone.”

“Don’t you mean ‘something?’” Remus appears, covered in slime and cackling. “Ah. I see.”

“I’ve got it,” Roman says, rising up and spraying his brother with something that somehow manages to dissolve all the goo without staining or spraying anything else. “There. Now maybe you’ll think twice about surprising Uma when she’s feeding?”

“Oh, I’m gonna do this so many more times!”

”I felt the exasperation from my room,” Janus sighs, appearing, “what’s Remus done now?”

“Why did you assume it was Remus?” Janus just looks at Logan. “Fair enough.”

”Now that we’re all here, what is this about?” He looks around, frowning. “Where’s Thomas?”

“That’s weird, is he not the one who called for a meeting?”

“What’s that?” Virgil reaches out and picks up a piece of paper from the coffee table. “‘Each one of you needs a card, find the matches.’ What cards?”

“Here.” Logan picks up something that fell when Virgil picked up the paper. “There are only five of them, though, and six of us.”

“What do they say?”

“Let me see…one says ‘Physical Touch,’ one says ‘Acts of Service,’ one says…oh, I see.”

“I don’t,” Patton says, “can you share with the class?”

“Wait, wait, I think I know what this is, is one of them ‘Quality Company’ or something?”

“‘Quality Time,’ yes.”

Roman nods. “It’s the Five Love Languages.”

“Thomas doesn’t even speak Spanish!”

“No, no, Padre, not literal languages, it’s…it’s the ways you express your affection for someone. How you tell them you love them. There’s five: physical touch, acts of service, quality time…”

“‘Words of Affirmation,’” Logan continues, reading off the other cards, “and ‘Gifts.’”

Virgil hunches his shoulders. “So what, are we supposed to pick one?”

“I believe the intention of the exercise is to…select which one is our love language.”

Janus huffs. “Why? What does Thomas have to gain from doing something like this? And where is he?”

“Maybe he’s not the one who summoned us.”

“Well then who did?”

“Maybe if we do the thing we can find out.”

Janus sighs, peering over Logan’s shoulder and squinting. “I guess this one’s mine, then.”

“‘Acts of Service?’ Very well. I suppose I’ll take ‘Words of Affirmation.’”

“Can I have the touch one?”

“Certainly.”

“Twins get ‘Gifts,’ obviously,” Virgil mutters, “which means I get the…time one, or whatever.”

Logan hands out the last two cards and they stand there for a moment, waiting for something to happen.

Nothing does.

Patton looks back down at his card. “Wait, did you say these are how we tell people we love them?”

“That is a simple definition of this, why?”

“Because you guys do these with everyone!”

There’s a pause. Logan adjusts his glasses. “Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but…yes, I do indeed give you all words of affirmation, because, well…”

“Aww,” Virgil says, “do you love us, Logan?”

Logan coughs, blushes, and adjusts his tie. “I believe that is a logical conclusion, yes.”

“Aww!” Patton squeals. “I love you guys too!”

”So whoever set this up knew that we were all trying to tell each other that—“ Roman starts.

“—and needed to hammer it into our heads what was happening,” Remus finishes.

“Well,” Janus sniffs, even as a smile threatens the corners of his mouth, “how dramatic.”

Virgil tugs on the strings of his hoodie. “Yeah. How dramatic.”

There’s another pause.

Roman coughs. “Uh, this seems like a good a time as any, um…Remus and I put together a festival thing in the Imagination for everyone, if you want to…if you want to come and see it.”

“It has everyone’s favorite state fair stuff,” Remus sands, “and there’s supposed to be a northern-lights kind of thing after it gets dark.”

“Can we cuddle?”

“Of course.”

“Will there be food?”

“Your favorite, shadow-ling.”

“You two are so thoughtful,” Logan says softly, “I would love to come.”

“I can get the good blankets from the closet,” Janus offers, and everyone grins, “should we meet there in ten?”

“Oh, this is going to be so much fun!”

The Imagination is just happy they finally sorted it out. Now, to give the six of them a group date they’ll never forget…

General Taglist: @frxgprince@potereregina@gattonero17@iamhereforthegayshit@thefingergunsgirl@awkwardandanxiousfander@creative-lampd-liberties@djpurple3@winterswrandomness@sanders-sides-uncorrect-quotes@iminyourfandom@bullet-tothefeels@full-of-roman-angst-trash @ask-elsalvador @ramdomthingsfrommymind@demoniccheese83@pattonsandershugs @el-does-photography @princeanxious@firefinch-ember@fandomssaremysoul@im-an-anxious-wreck@crazy-multifandomfangirl @punk-academian-witch@enby-ralsei@unicornssunflowersandstuff@wildhorsewolf @thetruthaboutthesun @stubbornness-and-spite @princedarkandstormv @your-local-fookin-deadmeme @angels-and-dreams@averykedavra @a-ghostlight-for-roman @treasurechestininterweb @cricketanne @queerly-fluid-fan @compactdiscdraws@cecil-but-gayer@i-am-overly-complicated@annytheseal@alias290@tranquil-space-ninja @arxticandy @mychemically-imbalanced-romance@whyiask@crows-ace @emilythezeldafan@frida0043 @ieatspinalcords @snowyfires@cyanide-violence@oonagh2@xxpanic-at-the-everywherexx@rabbitsartcorner @percy-07734@triflingassailantofmyemotions @virgil-sanders-the-gay-emo@cerulean-watermelon@puffed-up-bees@meltheromanstan@joyrose-fandomer@insanitori@mavenmush@justablah65@10paradox10@uhhh-hi-there-i-am-nervous@cutebisexualmess@bella-bugatti-frogetti-baguetti@ultrageekygirl

#dragonbabbles #sanders sides #fic #roman sanders #remus sanders #sympathetic remus #logan sanders #patton sanders #deceit sanders #janus sanders #sympathetic deceit #virgil sanders

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writeouswriter · 6 months

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pls no anti ai art demagogy on my dash, thx

(X) in reference to this reblog I assume.

This is the wildest ask I’ve ever gotten.

“Please no love for the humanity of creation on my dash, please. Please no acknowledgement that art and the human experience behind those making it is inherently and fundamentally intertwined. Please no shoving the fact in my face that art is meant to connect rather than consume.

And please no pointing out the basic truth that most AI engines are built off the stolen work of others.”

Demagogy, noun: political activity or practices that seek support by appealing to the desires and prejudices of ordinary people rather than by using rational argument.

You come into MY house, you tell me what not to reblog on MY blog, and you what? Call me “irrational” and insult my understanding of the topic in the process?

Political activity, political activity... fuck off. Actors, writers, artists, those most affected by this ARE the ordinary people, and their concerns and fears surrounding this are perfectly rational.

And you know, nothing hits it home more for me than when I thought about my favourite show at the moment, the one that makes me lose my mind a thousand times over, I thought about everything in it that makes me tick, thought about both strong points and weak points, because it is flawed, god, is it flawed because people inherently are, and that’s the beauty, but mostly, I thought about the sheer amount of care/thought and depth put into it in a way I've never really seen before and in a medium/genre/whatever you'd absolutely never expect to find that thought put into, especially if taken completely at a surface level. Thought about the levels of metaphor and symbolism layered in beneath the silliness, thought about the callbacks and clever timing, thought about the behind the scenes arguments about what direction worked best for the narrative and the audience, arguments that took place because of how much they cared not just about telling a good story, but about telling one that really means something to them.

Thought about the love, the time, the excitement and the flair and personality and background and intent of each and every person behind the team bleeding its way into the scripts, into the acting, into the heart of what makes it truly what it is, and how that love bleeds into the audience as well, how that love and human connection is what prompts people to write full page essays and analyses on it, draw fanart for it, create the most beautiful fics for it, that love is what prompts them to laugh and cry and vibrate at the speed of sound thinking about it, and what prompts thousands upon thousands to come together in their appreciation for and relation to it, rallying around it like a group of cavemen around a campfire when they had never before seen the flame.

And then.... then I thought about the idea of that same show being written by an AI and genuinely felt physically ill. Because no real care will have been put into that beyond "If it looks like a TV show, sounds like a TV show, it must be a TV show." And on the surface, maybe it’d look fine, I’m sure some people wouldn’t notice. But it’d not only be made without thought, but consumed without thought. And, sure, maybe that'll fill you up in the short term, but it's gonna leave you feeling hollow and sick eventually. Because stories are not a thing to be mass produced with a random assortment of the cheapest quality materials on a conveyor belt that shovels them directly into people's throats at the most efficient speed possible, stories are not a thing meant to just be consumed! They are a thing made with intent in every aspect, even when accidental because our lives shape it subconsciously, they are a thing made with love, a thing to be savoured! And yes, for that to happen, they will take a lot of time and hard work and dedication, all of which deserve fair compensation and respect, all of which cannot just be replaced by a sham amalgamation of these things, and they will be all the better for it.

And on some level, corporations know this, and they want you to blame their shortcomings on the writers, on the artists, they want you to look at things like the strikes and those rallying against AI and get mad that they’re keeping art from the common people, or forcing them to come to this, or they want you to think they’re simply trying to make art more accessible, all the while building their conveyor belts in the background with the blood of those they’re kicking down, taking away jobs and shoving the humanity out of the picture.

Art is made to communicate, and sometimes it’s frustrating when we can’t get that communication across, when the image we want to convey is out of our skill level, our capability, when our words get tangled up, jumbled together and we need a helping hand to find the right ones again, and on this level, maybe AI could be a useful supplemental tool, or a fun little thing to mess around with, if ethically sourced, if used for good, if taking into account and graciously acknowledging exactly how it’s being used as a tool, rather than trying to pass it off as something it’s not.

But is it political, is it irrational, to merely state that the human condition cannot be replaced?

——

The unfollow button is free, I don’t work for you.

#AI #ask #long post #bizarre bizarre #ai discourse #humanity

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agirlunfilteredsblog · 4 months

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A GUIDE ON HOW TO STUDY EFFICIENTLY

Hey girls!! I know a lot of us are on break, whether that be in high school, college or university, so I figured I could maybe show you guys some tips and tricks that have helped me throughout my studies…

A little bit about my educational background:

-In high school, I was part of an IB school (the girls that know the struggle, know the struggle). If you don’t know what that is, it’s essentially a program designed to help students get a better understanding of the world and how it works. We basically do the regular high school program + the IB one, so it’s extra workload, but we do get an additional diploma at the end of our studies!

-I am now in college, studying psychology and I was recently invited to join the honors roll for my next semester (super excited about that!!). I absolutely love it and i’ve also gotten the opportunity to study other subjects such as anthropology, world history, art history, etc.

1. LEARNING WHAT TO PRIORITIZE

My biggest weakness throughout my first semester of college was balancing my workload and my social activities. Often times, I would either only do school work for weeks and not go out or simply go out until very late on school nights and get nothing done. Both scenarios are just as negative. I would be drained on the inside, and simply become exhausted by minimal activities. What helped me personally was establishing a clear schedule, which I know isn’t ideal for everyone as we all have differing schedules, but trust me, having that base helps A LOT.

2. SETTING REMINDERS TO STUDY

I dont know if this was just me, but in high school, I would constantly fall asleep and take naps after school. This would result in me totally forgetting I had to study when I woke up… Setting up reminders on my phone helped me remember what I had to do. I also included little motivational messages to keep me inspired to work.

3. KNOWING WHEN TO PUT THE BOOK DOWN

Girls, I know how hard it is sometimes to give yourself grace and put your study books down, especially when there’s a big test coming up. However, it has been proven that over reading or over studying actually has negative effects on your learning/memory. Stressing yourself out will do nothing but put you in a negative state, which is not what you want going into that exam. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, put the book down for 15 minutes and go do something that puts you at peace. Me personally, I make myself a cup of peppermint tea and put on my favorite show.

4. HAVING A STUDY METHOD THAT WORKS FOR YOU

There are many different types of study methods, so I’m not gonna tell you which one you should do as we are all different, but finding the one that works for you does ALL the difference. The way I study is very simple, I establish a game plan (I list everything I want to complete) and I give myself a time frame to complete it. The time frames are always very realistic for me, so I never have to stress about not having enough time. For each “task” I complete, I allow myself a 15-20 minute break and I study for no more than 3 hours at a time.

5. NEVER PUT STUDYING BEHIND

I am such a procrastinator, but I had to learn very quickly, especially in college, that this was not possible. The work load is so much more charged and I simply cannot get away with studying last minute. If you’re in high school, start implementing healthy study habits now, so that once you reach college, you’re already used to studying the right way (learn from me hahaha)!

I am 100% sure that there are more I’m forgetting, but these are the main ones I implement in order to keep a high average and a healthy school/social life :) I know these are very basic and you’ve probably heard of them before but I still think it’s important we talk about them to remind ourselves on what to do! If you would like more of this type of content please let me know!! My next posts will be much more light though dont worry, we are still on winter break after all ;))

so much love,

a girl unfiltered 💋

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4townie · 2 months

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Road to 4☆TOWN

part 1…part 10…part 20…part 30…part 40

“So…” T prompted quietly.

“So what?” Z glanced at him. “Are you up to something or just asking about a midnight snack?”

“I’m not—” T paused. “I’ll get back to you about that snack. But I’m not up to anything. At least not anything bad.”

“Oh no.” Z groaned. “Why do I get the feeling I’m not gonna like this?”

“Calm down, you’ve been begging for this.” T waved a hand casually. “Your parents get back from Aruba tomorrow evening, right? Now would be the perfect time to tell Tae about Olivia.”

“What?!” Z looked him up and down in confusion. “You told me to leave it alone. I could’ve been all over him this whole time?”

“Don’t you dare go all watchdog scary on my little brother.” T glared at his boyfriend. “I’ve had this little plan in the works. The whole week she’s here, she’d be seeing him all the time since he likes hiding from his parents, and it’d get really awkward if he rejected her at the beginning of the week. But now that she’ll be going back home tomorrow—”

“It’ll be the perfect time to let her down gently.” Z’s eyes widened in realization. “She won’t have to see him again until she’s gotten over him.” He grinned at T. “My boyfriend is such a genius.”

“Yeah, well,” T shrugged with a prideful smile, “I kinda treated this whole situation like a math equation. There were a lot of ways to resolve it, but there was a quick and efficient solution. It was super easy, barely an inconvenience.”

“You know, you’re really hot when you get all nerdy and smart.” Z said with a flirty smirk. “Maybe you can put on those glasses and tutor me somet—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah whatever.” T pushed his boyfriend’s face away. “Gimme a sec to talk to him.” He approached the window where Taeyoung was staring out, seemingly deep in thought. “Hey, Tae-Tae. Can we talk?”

Taeyoung was quiet for a moment. “Huh? Oh, yeah sure.” He laughed. “Don’t mind me, I was having an existential crisis.”

“Okay, so these past few—you were having a what?” T paused.

“These past few what?” Taeyoung redirected the conversation. “You were trying to tell me something.”

“Oh right. These past few weeks, Olivia’s been hanging around here more often.” T started calmly. “I bet you noticed she was especially clingy to you this week while she was over.”

“Well duh.” Taeyoung shrugged with a mischievous grin. “I’m the cool older kid, the professional trickster, the master to her apprentice. She’s eager to learn which is great cuz I’ve been trying to teach her to head-butt for years.”

“Yeah that’s actually not the entire reason she’s paying so much attention to you.” T averted eye contact. “What Z and I have noticed that you haven’t is that this whole time she’s been…flirting with you.”

Taeyoung’s eyes widened. “She wha?”

“Olivia has a crush on you.”

Taeyoung’s entire face turned red as his body tensed up. He slowly started sinking to the floor.

“Oh, oh no.” T knelt beside him. “Tae-Tae? Speak to me, is everything okay?”

“What’s happening?” Z watched in confusion.

“I think he’s overheating in shock.” T started fanning Taeyoung. “Get an ice pack or he might melt through the floor.”

“좆됐어.” Taeyoung groaned to himself.

“Hey, watch your language.” T crossed his arms. “I have no idea what you just said.”

“I said I cannot believe I’m in the absolute worst possible situation in the universe.” Taeyoung refused to look at T. “I mean, that’s not what I said, but it’s still true.”

“It’s not all that bad.” Z sat on the floor and put the ice pack on his forehead. “You’ll let her down easy tomorrow and then she’ll go back to my parents’ house. You’ll hardly have to see her after that.”

“Yeah, well…that’s part of the problem.” Taeyoung sighed. “Aside from our little rivalry, I’ve always thought your sister was pretty cool. And lately we’ve been hanging out more and bonding and it’s been a lot of fun.” He frowned. “I’m really afraid my rejection could ruin that.”

“Awww, Tae—”

“What the hell, T?” Z interrupted. “You told me he’s good with this stuff.”

“Yeah, he is. At least I thought so.” T shrugged. “He told me about how he turns people down left and right at school when they confess.”

“I don’t care about those people.” Taeyoung whined. “I can reject them easily cuz I don’t know them so there’s no relationship at stake. Also because I’m incredibly charming, but that’s not the point!”

“I’m sorry, Tae, but we’ve gotta put an end to this now.” T nodded sympathetically. “She’s had her fun, but now you have to tell her it’s just not happening. I’m sure she’ll understand.”

“Yeah, man, even before the crush she would talk about you all the time.” Z smiled softly. “I know you guys didn’t see each other often, but I could tell she wanted to change that. She always went on and on about how she missed hanging out and she wanted to play more tricks with you.” He paused. “Maybe that wasn’t before the crush…”

“Not helping.” T shot daggers at him. “The point is, crush or no crush, Olivia values your friendship, too. It’ll take a little recovery time, but I bet she wouldn’t want this to come between you anymore than you do. She’s pretty mature for her age.”

“You really think so?” Taeyoung looked up hopefully.

“I mean, probably.” Z shrugged. “She’s got plenty of school friends, but she doesn’t get along with most of them very well. They’re kind of fake cuz they know I’m her brother.”

“UGH!” Taeyoung groaned. “Not only is my own relationship with her on the line, now one of her only good friendships is at risk, too. Brilliant.”

“How are you so bad at this?” T asked his boyfriend. “Y’know what? Just go make us some s’mores. S’mores make everything better. I’ll handle this.”

“Yeah, that’s probably best.” Z got up and headed back towards the kitchen.

“You know what else makes everything better?” Taeyoung asked with a small smile. “Your hugs.”

“Awwww, Tae-Tae.” T opened his arms, and Taeyoung sat up to hug him. “I’ll help you figure out what you’re gonna say to her. We’ll stay up all night if we have to.”

“I was hoping you’d say that.” Taeyoung said quietly. “I really am just hopeless without you.”

“Awww.” T said again as they pulled apart. “You kind of are.”

———

좆됐어 pretty much means I’m fucked😅

#4town headcanons #4town fanfic #4town taeyoung #4town aaron t #4town z #4town robaire #4town jesse #turning red #turning red 4town #4town #4townie

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icy-watch · 1 month

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Hey so, you’ve been doing live blogs for awhile, and covering Ninjago like this was crazy with how many seasons it has, I was just wondering, why like this tho? Wouldn’t it be easier if you watched the episode then typed up your thoughts with any screenshots you want in a single post? Why in so many pieces? I guess maybe you find it harder to remember your live thoughts if you wait after the ep, I get that, but maybe pausing to type it all up in a document as you watch, and adding in the screenshots later? It takes you two and a half hours to live blog a single episode. You watch 2, sometimes 3 episodes a day while spending several other hours just, replying to everyone’s tags? Isn’t that exhausting and time consuming? Surely there are easier and more efficient ways? I totally understand liking to be engaged with people but every little tag on every little post, I think I’ve seen you go at it for five hours(?) if you like doing that, well. Aren’t there better ways or do you prefer this? I do livereads for fics when people ask, and that’s how I always did live ep reacts, so seeing how you do it is like :O how do you stand this without becoming physically ill from the work strain…

I've been sitting on this ask since this morning when I saw it. I hoped that spending some time with it on the back burner I would have a good answer for you. But honestly?

I liveblog like this bc it's fun.

I just... I want to have some fun. I'm mostly watching the episodes before I need to get ready for bed at night, and I'm replying in between things at work.

There's def easier and more efficient ways to go about this, but I haven't gotten tired of it yet. Yeah, my brain goes to mush every now and again when I'm reblogging peoples tags and comments, but I love seeing what other people have to say. And I love sharing their thoughts, opinions, and reactions to my liveblogs.

My current job is about 10x's more relaxed than when I worked in customer service 2 years ago. I have a lot more freedom now, and I can spend more time just kind of vibing. (Except when it's close to the end of the month. Then my mind is like a lump. RIP.)

I do try to limit myself on how long I liveblog - trying not to go over the 4 hour mark - without taking a break, but sometimes I'm just having too much fun. 💜

#thanks for asking!#qua #nonnie

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archiveofkloss · 2 months

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The Gentle Workout Karlie Kloss Swears By by Olivia Rose Rushing

The model, entrepreneur, and mother of two shares her go-to wellness rituals.

At just 31, Karlie Kloss has already lived many lives.

When she was 21, the Missouri native was a Victoria’s Secret Angel. In 2015, she founded Kode With Klossy, a company that creates opportunities for young women in tech. Flash forward to today, and the mother of two has learned a lot about dealing with change.

“With life as a mother, you don’t lose who you are — you evolve,” Kloss tells Bustle. “My fashion career is still a core part of who I am, but I’m also an entrepreneur and I just had a second baby.” While she still prioritizes aspects of her wellness routine, sometimes things slip.

“If something’s got to give, it might be a few extra steps in my skin care routine, but I’m going to make sure that I make time to break a sweat or even just go for a walk and get fresh air,” she says.

In between modeling gigs, educating the next generation of intellectuals with her company, and annual invites to the Met Gala, Kloss is taking on a partnership with Coterie, a subscription-based diaper service that aims to take one thing off a parent’s plate.

Here, Kloss talks all things motherhood, the wellness rituals she swears by, and finding moments of self-care amid her busy schedule.

What has changed since baby number two?

Not to be cliché, but everything — in the most beautiful ways. That's really what the Coterie campaign is all about — the changes. I'm looking in the mirror and I have mascara left over from last night, I don't even think I've run a brush through my hair today. My self-care routine has definitely gotten more efficient, and maybe a little neglected, but that's OK. I'm enjoying this phase of life, which has made me so much better in a lot of ways. As a businesswoman, I've become more efficient and I make decisions faster, and I think a lot of working moms can relate to that. It's impossible to even anticipate what is about to happen, but it's the most beautiful changes that force you to grow.

What’s your skin care routine like these days?

I just take better care of my skin so I don't have to wear as much makeup. I've found that's been a better investment of my time, so I’m diligent at the end of the day about taking off makeup, cleansing, toning, and using a serum and a retinol.

Are there any non-negotiables that you always make time for throughout the day?

I'd say fitness. I exercise for my mental health more than my physical health. I find that's such a core part of my mental well-being. I’m not as focused on high-impact or intensity — I’ve developed a more gentle exercise regimen post-baby number two, so I’ve done a lot of Pilates lately, which I find helps me show up better in every other aspect of my life.

What’s on your workout playlist?

Anything Beyoncé.

What’s the most out-there wellness treatment you’ve ever tried?

There's this guy who is called The Beauty Sandwich who has some sort of ultrasound technology he uses for facials. I've done his treatments before the Met Gala or a big red carpet, and it does some magical thing to the muscles under your face, your jaw, your neckline — it just pulls and tightens in some mysterious, magical way.

Coffee or tea?

Iced coffee always. There's snow on the ground here in New York and I just went out to get an iced coffee this morning.

Physical book or Kindle?

I love an audiobook, actually. Especially now, I always have my hands full or I'm in transit, so I love to have headphones in and listen to an audiobook.

Do you prefer walking the runway or photo shoots?

I do love the energy of walking in a runway show — it's like a live performance, and there's something about that adrenaline rush that never gets old.

What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?

My dad always used to say to my sisters and me, "No matter what it is that you do, you should always try to be the best you can be at it." Both my parents instilled this idea of pursuing your passions and doing it with excellence. That always stuck with me.

find the interview here

#karlie kloss #03012024 #interview

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kayawolfhorse · 6 months

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Supermoon – Chapter Three | Read on Ao3

Previous / Next

— ☾ —

The second day of traveling is quieter than the first.

Everyone had awoken at dawn in noticeably grimmer spirits. Tents were deconstructed and stowed away in inventories, breakfast was eaten, and horses were cared for and tacked up all with almost mechanical efficiency. There was light banter here and there, but the serious atmosphere weighed down upon everyone.

Grian checks the communicator on his wrist for their current coordinates, as the forest around them transitions from dark oak to birch. If his math is correct, they’re far enough away now from the second portal to begin searching for their destination. The thought sends a chill down his spine as he reaches for the first eye.

Grian calls for the group to slow as he steadies his arm, preparing to throw. Under the expectant gazes of his friends, Grian tosses the eye of ender in front of him, and it catches itself midair, floating upwards and swerving to the side. Grian glances towards the sun to calculate the eye’s position. Further north it is, then. They can’t be more than a thousand blocks away.

An unlucky throw; the eye breaks midair. With nothing left to linger for, Grian urges his horse forward.

Dread tugs at his stomach, and it only grows as Grian glances around the haggard faces of the Boatem crew. Though nobody has said it directly, he knows no one has gotten a restful sleep the night before. Grian thinks of his own terrible dreams and hopes none of the others had suffered the same.

Could the Watchers see them? Grian put an illusion over everyone before they left, making it seem like they were all still back at their bases, but all that smoke and mirrors stuff has never been his strong suit. If it has failed, he has failed, and they will lose the crucial element of surprise.

He may not be good at illusions, but he knows someone who is.

Grian turns to Scar, who rides next to him. “Hey, Scar, could you help me with something?” Grian may still remember some of his old Watcher tricks after leaving them, but Scar is a vex, far more skilled in misdirection and trickery than Grian suspects even some Watchers are.

After quietly listening to Grian’s explanation, Scar hands his reins over and dismounts, coming to stand in front of everyone. Another round of explaining is given to the other three, and Scar raises his hands, palms pointed upwards.

Scar’s normally green eyes, so vivid they’re akin to emeralds, glow a bright silver-blue. His hair changes to match them, white streaks threading throughout before devouring the brown entirely. Grian glances at Scar’s teeth to find them normal. Not full vex then; just the stage that Scar calls his ‘wizard mode’, allowing him to cast magic.

Small, elegant slivers of magic, so unlike the vex mob’s jagged points of it, dance across Scar’s palms as he turns them out towards the group, and though the slivers dissipate a block or two after leaving Scar’s hand, Grian still feels the effect of them, settling over his shoulders like heavy silk. Looking behind him, Pearl is the only other one that visibly notices the feeling, her antennae twitching slightly.

As Scar finishes his spell, the energy seems to evaporate off of Grian. He stands still for a moment before shaking his head and wringing his hands out, heading back for his horse.

“All set!” Scar confirms, coming to grip his reins once more. “So long as none of you get too far away from me, the spell is in place. I should be able to hold it pretty long with the energy I’ve got.”

“And our Boatem selves?” Grian asks, after giving Scar a grateful nod for his effort.

“Working on our mega bases, of course! Lots of staying in single, confined areas,” Scar says with a wink.

“Good thinking. Now, for the ‘energy that you’ve got’, how much do you actually have?” Vex magic always saps Scar’s energy, to a degree, and though he seems lucid enough as Grian assesses him, there’s sleepiness in Scar’s slightly slowed blinking.

Scar waves a hand dismissively. “I’m a bit tired, but nothing extraordinary. I’m used to it.” Grian believes him, mostly, but resolves to keep an eye on him anyway as they urge their horses into a canter.

If the Watchers can’t see them... Grian tentatively extends his vision beyond his own two eyes, a movement that has always felt like unfolding a spyglass, and is met with nothing. The trees they walk between appear completely uninhabited, save for the mobs of the forest.

Ahead of him, Scar tilts his head slightly, and Grian realizes that he must be able to feel the magic upon his own. “Just me,” he calls out, just loudly enough for Scar to hear.

“I know,” is Scar’s reply, soft enough Grian almost can’t catch it.

When the mountains from Grian’s map start to appear at the horizon, sun directly overhead, he gestures for the group to stop. “It’s close enough now we should be able to walk. Let’s leave the horses here, for safety’s sake,” Grian says, whipping out materials for a temporary fence from his inventory.

“Would we be able to fly?” Impulse asks, clipping a lead to his horse.

“We’ve got to stay in a pretty tight group to keep in range of Scar’s cloak. I’d rather not risk it.” Grian shakes his head. He wishes they could fly. Being on horseback instead of his own two wings for two days has him feeling restless.

Scar pats his mount’s neck. “I’m sure going to miss you, Peanut Butter.” The horse nuzzles his hand, and Scar feeds it a golden carrot.

“You named your horse Peanut Butter?” Grian asks in amusement.

“Well sure! They’re a matching set, you know,” Scar replies.

Impulse laughs before saying, “Ah, I get it. Peanut Butter and Jellie, I like that.”

Scar regales the group with tales of Peanut Butter and Jellie’s supposed friendship as they walk, mostly of the cat sitting aloofly in front of Peanut Butter’s stall and graciously allowing a single curious sniff from the horse before sauntering off to find a better place to lay. Grian’s grateful for the goofiness, amidst it all, and surrounded by the warmth of laughter and the afternoon sun above him, he tosses up the next eye.

— ☾ —

“That’s my last one,” Grian says, watching the fragments of his final eye of ender sparkle and disappear midair. “Does anyone have more ender pearls? I have blaze powder.”

“Yep, I’ve got you.” Impulse hands over a few ender pearls. “We should be getting pretty close anyway, right?”

“Yep,” Grian confirms as he crafts up more eyes of ender. “Just a couple more eyes should do it.”

“Good, because that’s all I’ve got left.”

Mercifully, the second to last eye Grian tosses up shoots downwards, burrowing under the grass beneath Mumbo’s feet.

“Well, looks like we’ve got our spot. Start digging, fellas.” Grian summons a shovel and starts clearing away dirt, Mumbo joining in next to him. Together they carve out a winding staircase, Grian mining the stone and Mumbo placing torches behind him.

“I’m not seeing it,” Grian says, their staircase surely far enough down now.

“Start poking holes?” Mumbo asks, grasping his pickaxe.

Grian’s about to confirm when Impulse shouts, “I’ve got it!” somewhere nearby. Following the sound of his voice, Grian and Mumbo tunnel towards him, and the group reunites atop blocks of stone bricks.

“Are we ready?” Impulse prepares to break through the bricks.

“Only one way to find out!” Pearl mines the block next to her, and after peering down it for a second, drops through it.

“Armor on, everyone,” Grian says, and follows Pearl’s lead down.

It takes Grian’s eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness around them, as he listens for the telltale thump of Mumbo, Scar, and Impulse landing behind him.

His vision brightens, and the view Grian’s met with is spectacular.

The ceiling, high above them, is supported by slender, curving stone arches spaced evenly apart that stretch from the top of the room to the floor of it, torches hung on every one to give the room a dim glow. The builder in him grudgingly admits the beauty to it all, but the arches remind Grian of a ribcage, and he can’t help but feel like the massive room has swallowed him whole.

Between the pillars, lines of unmoving hostile mobs stand in the shadows, and Grian does a double take before realizing that they, like almost everything else in the room, are carved from rock. The surly stone faces of vindicators, illusioners, and witches stare back at him. Grian only hopes there aren’t any real ravagers nearby.

The sight is impressive, but what really cuts deep is the chill, slicing through protective layers and directly piercing bone. Grian shivers without meaning to, and pulls at the jumper beneath his chestplate. He’s never liked the armor—too restricting, despite the flexible leather back to accommodate his wings—but he’s grateful now at least for another layer.

Grian and Mumbo huddle together for warmth as they search for traps, tripwires, anything. There’s no obvious lead to another room, as far as Grian can see. Beyond the difficulty of finding their way deeper into the stronghold, this all feels too straightforward and too still for what Grian would expect of the Watchers.

Scar voices Grian’s thoughts, “I hate to say it, but this feels too easy.”

Just as he gets the last syllable out, the room explodes into movement. The statues crack and burst open, spraying chunks of rock and revealing the mobs they were sculpted after. Witches crackle and pillagers load crossbows, all rushing forward at them, as Grian scrambles for his sword.

Impulse shouts a warning, and Grian whirls just in time to avoid a vindicator’s axe. He catches the edge of the axe with his own blade and shoves it aside, plunging his sword into the vindicator’s chest. From this close, he can make out the mob’s eyes, and with a sharp inhale, Grian realizes its irises are purple.

Grian disposes of the vindicator and runs to help Mumbo, who’s having troubles with a witch. To his right, Pearl holds a sword in one hand and a sickle in the other, slicing at the mobs after her, and behind him, Grian can hear the clang of Scar and Impulse’s weapons.

Swing, dodge, slice, leap back. It’s a stupid amount of mobs after them, and their tactic seems to be to surround and overwhelm each person. One pillager aims for the vulnerable part of Grian’s back, and he swerves, but pays for it with an arrow caught in a wing. Biting back a scream, he keeps going.

They hardly have time to breathe after the wave of mobs is finally dealt with. The few remaining statues lining the walls explode into life. Illusioners, the last mobs to remain encased in stone, hold up their hands, particles billowing above them.

Grian’s vision goes dark, and he blindly, desperately, feels around for something, anything, before it clears moments later. A strangled yelp comes from someone somewhere behind him, and it matches how Grian feels as he stands before an army with his friends’ faces.

— ☾ —

An Impulse thrusts an axe towards him, and Grian doesn’t react quickly enough to prevent it scraping against his chestplate. “Impulse!” Grian shouts, “Impulse!”

“Over here!” comes his friend’s reply, distant amidst the clang of blades and armor between them.

Even with the assurance that the real Impulse is not the one in front of Grian, it hurts to kill the doppelgänger. Grian stabs at Not-Impulse’s side, and his own heart aches with it. Without so much of a jolt, the Not-Impulse disappears, and a Not-Mumbo and Not-Pearl are quick to run up Grian’s flank and take its place, Grian rushing to keep up.

The worst part is the faces. Grian’s never seen such hateful sneers curve his friends’ lips, nor have their actual eyes ever held so much malice. His real friends’ eyes aren’t that terrible, terrible purple. They’re not real, they’re not real, Grian repeats to himself, over and over, as he fights the illusions off, looking for the source.

The illusions even manage to mimic the fighting styles of those they take after, and the Not-Pearl Grian fights now twirls its sword in an upwards arc, and as Grian’s distracted, trying to block it, sweeps a leg under his foot—a move the real Pearl favors when the fight isn’t completely clean.

Mumbo’s illusions place down end crystals. One explosion catches the side of Grian’s arm and it burns, its wake filling the air with thick, concealing smoke that catches in Grian’s chest. Hardly able to see, Grian swings his blade wildly, desperately, and it clangs against the actual Scar’s sword.

“It’s me!” Grian shouts, panicked, and Scar looks as relieved as he feels to see one of his real friends.

They share a nod, and in tandem, Grian and Scar move to protect each other’s back, cutting down the illusions as they come. Another Not-Mumbo places down a crystal, and it’s pure instinct that moves Grian’s hands, shoving Scar away from it and taking most of the blast himself. Grian curses beneath his breath in place of the whimper threatening to escape his throat, and Scar turns and kills the Not-Mumbo who’d placed it with a fury Grian hasn’t seen on him in a long time.

Scar switches to a bow, and one of his arrows finds the illusioner pretending to be Mumbo. Another shot kills the thing, and with its death the Not-Mumbo’s dissolve into nothingness, taking the smoking crystals with them. Moments later, Pearl gets the Not-Impulse illusioner with her sickle, cloak billowing out behind her, letting out a whoop of ferocious victory.

In the center of chaos, Impulse nicks the real Mumbo on the arm, and the distraction unsteadies Mumbo’s movements enough that a Not-Scar—who has now switched to a bow, to mimic the real Scar—is able to get a good aim on him, and releases its arrow. Grian, faster than he thought possible, darts between it and Mumbo with his summoned shield held aloft. The arrow meets wood with a twang, the projectile disappearing seconds later as the real Scar finds and kills his illusioner self.

The Not-Pearl and Not-Grian illusioners are found and disposed of mercifully fast after that, and, sweaty and exhausted, the group is given a real break.

“Nobody move,” Grian whispers between heaving breaths, lest their movement activate another trap. Slowly, carefully, he lowers himself to the floor.

Impulse and Mumbo sit together, Impulse murmuring apologies as he wraps Mumbo’s upper arm in bandages. Mumbo waves it off and hugs him to prove there are no hard feelings.

Hugs. Grian could use a hug. He turns, and after checking them over for any injuries, gives one to both Scar and Pearl. The solidness that marks their realness is reassuring.

The next couple minutes are spent eating, tending to wounds, and simply leaning against each other. As the adrenaline fades Grian’s side and wing start to ache with a sharp stab, and though the golden apple Impulse hands him helps heal the most of it and his wing entirely, where the explosion had most directly touched his skin still hurts.

The battle they’d just faced is burned into the back of Grian’s eyelids, and every time he blinks he sees flashes of himself, hurting his friends—not his friends, he reminds himself sternly—over and over.

Grian tried to coax his brain into not running endless loops of things he doesn’t want to think about. He’s drowning in the misery.

It doesn’t work. Grian’s grateful, desperate for distraction, when Scar takes a breath, as if he is about to speak.

“I’m sorry, I think we made that fight harder by being here.” Scar slumps against Pearl before jolting upright, attempting to shake the exhaustion from his face. It still shines through the cracks, in the worried lines on his forehead and crinkle of his eyes.

“Actually, I don’t think we could’ve made it without the extra help. There were five statues when we came in—we would’ve still had to fight them,” Pearl points out, and nudges Scar with her shoulder.

“Would they have just mimicked whoever came through here?” Mumbo asks, looking inquisitive in the same way he might looking at a complex redstone problem.

Pearl shrugs. “It’s possible, I guess. Maybe Grian and I would’ve just had to fight multiple versions of ourselves.”

Grian shudders. “Let’s all be glad we didn’t. Just one of each of us both is enough.” Pearl snorts, and everyone else is quick to follow with quiet, tired chuckles.

“Well! What do you say we get a move on?” Scar says brightly, after a few moments of resting.

“Um... I’m not sure where we can get a move on to.” Grian looks around the room. The stone walls are smooth and solid, and there are no indications of any rooms beyond this one.

After testing that movement won’t trigger another trap, the next task is to find a way to the next room that Grian’s sure exists—it would be stupid to have all this set up and nothing else, right?

Thankfully, it doesn’t take long, and Scar finds a trapdoor that Pearl confirms must’ve been under one of the statues.

The hole is dark, with a single long, wooden ladder mounted against one wall and a dim glow at the base. Pearl and Impulse climb down first, as arguably the best fighters among them, and Grian can just barely make out the displeasure on their faces as they reach the bottom and glance up to give everyone the okay to follow them down.

“Well.” Mumbo peers down the long, narrow corridor filled with lava ten blocks down, bits of broken floor sporadically dotted at the same level as their feet across it. “You reckon we could just build across?”

“I do enjoy completely disregarding stupid rules!” Grian moves to pull out a stack of cobblestone from his inventory. He attempts to place it down, and frowns. He tries again. No luck. The cobble will not leave his hand.

A pang of dread stabs at Grian’s gut. “Fellas, I don’t know what sort of magic they’ve managed to put here, but I think we’re essentially in adventure mode.”

Adventure mode is rare, used on servers and maps the admins wish to keep untouched. The Hermitcraft server should most certainly not be in it.

Pearl swings her pickaxe at the closest wall experimentally. The stone doesn’t so much as crack. “Well, that’s frustrating. And the hallway’s too narrow for flight.” She attempts to spread her wings only for the wall to stop her, proving her point.

“You think there’d be a lever or something at the end, that would put the floor back in place if someone manages to cross and activate it?- No, the Watchers aren’t that nice, that’d be boring,” Grian interrupts himself with a sigh. “Did anyone pack fire resistance, at least?”

As it turned out, Impulse did have fire resistance potions, but the lava was too low to simply swim to the other side, they quickly deduced.

“Guess we just have to parkour it?” Grian says, scratching the back of his neck. No one looks particularly excited at the prospect.

Just as Impulse is about to leap forward onto the first platform, Mumbo cries out, “Wait!”

It’s too late. Impulse is already midair, and the moment his boot touches down, a pressure plate clicks and the platform is slammed back into the wall. Mumbo and Pearl both lurch forward, making a desperate grab for him, but the distance is too far, and Impulse plunges into the lava below.

“Fire res! Drink the fire res!” Pearl and Grian shout in tandem, and Impulse is just barely able to get the bottle to his lips before slipping under completely.

Seconds later, Impulse bobs back up, and the sigh of relief amidst the adrenaline is shared four ways.

“Do you have any pearls?” Pearl calls down, and Impulse shakes his head. He’d given them all to Grian earlier, and Grian had made them into eyes of ender.

“Could we just throw a rope down? I’ve got a lead,” Mumbo offers.

“Oh, that’s not a bad idea.” Pearl nods, and the lead is cast down to just above the lava. Impulse grabs hold, and the four of them work to haul him up.

Orange particles float off of Impulse as he lays face up on the floor, heaving. The fire resistance had saved his skin, literally, but his clothing hadn’t escaped completely unscathed, bits of char eating at green cargo pants and his black-and-yellow shirt.

“You alright mate?” Pearl helps Impulse sit up and hands him a water bottle. Impulse nods, but mid gesture, he’s cut off by an awful, low groaning sound that reverberates all around them.

“Uh... Guys?” Scar points at the wall behind them, the way they came in. The wall steadily edges forward, stone grinding against stone. Grian looks up. The entrance has already been covered, the ladder broken beneath the moving mass.

“We go now!” Pearl shouts over the noise, taking a running jump at the next closest platform, to the right of the one Impulse triggered. Grian’s yell dies in his throat as Pearl lands, and the floor stays steady beneath her.

“Toss me the ladder!”

At the team’s confused glances, Pearl makes an urgent motion with her hands and raises her brows. Mumbo shrugs, gathers up the broken sticks on the floor, gingerly throwing them to Pearl.

She catches them with a grin, and breaks one of the pieces further. The stick she holds is just long enough to reach the next platform, and as Grian realizes her plan, Pearl leans over and jabs the pressure plate with the ladder piece. The floor holds. She leaps to it.

Grian crosses after Pearl and follows the path she makes, poking the plates as she goes, Mumbo right behind him. On the second to last step, Grian pitches too far forward and almost falls, flapping his wings as far as the walls will let him to no avail. Mumbo grabs his arm just in time, and they make it over.

At the end, Grian turns to watch Impulse and Scar cross together, the latter’s movements wobbly. The moving wall crashes into the platform just behind them, destroying it, and shakes the room.

Thud. Thud. Thud. Grian’s heart pounds in his ears, anxiety gnawing at his stomach. Come on, come on, he silently urges the pair, the rumbling too loud to speak over.

One last push and Scar and Impulse are safe, and together the five sprint for the next room, just as the wall envelops the parkour completely and comes to a halt with a shuddering slam.

Panting, Grian looks away from the group and takes in the room. It’s small, wooden- the only room so far that hasn’t been made out of stone. Two chests sit side by side in the center of the floor. Dread prickles at Grian’s fingertips. He knows what this is.

Wordlessly, before anyone can stop him, Grian steps up, and opens one of the chests.

“Grian, no, it could be a trick!” Impulse surges forward.

Inside the first chest is a brilliant blue, shiny stack of diamonds. Inside the second is two measly pieces of coal.

Grian knows this test. He knows what they want from him.

He takes the coal, leaving the diamonds where they sit. Impulse is unmoving next to him, and for a moment, everything is silent.

Something clicks. Grian’s held flint to steel far too many times to not recognize the sound. The wooden room is on fire, and they are trapped.

(Reblogs do more than likes!)

#they had a nice campfire last chapter now they get to Go Through It #kaya posts #my writing #hermitcraft #grian #pearlescentmoon #goodtimeswithscar #mumbo jumbo #impulsesv #boatem

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emptymanuscript · 4 months

Text

There’s something just a little infuriating about this notice paired with this screen cap.

I got a notice this delivery was here.

I was watching for it.

Anxiously.

Because the paperwork I have to sign is actually worth more money than I will probably ever have in my life.

Which is why I had to sign for this package. Which is why I was anxiously waiting for it.

But of course I got this screen after giving the delivery a 1 star review because the guy just tossed the package on my mat and scampered. Which wouldn’t have been SO bad. Except he reported the damn thing as signed.

I freaking ran to the door and yelled after him about signing. Because it’s worth a lot of money. If something goes wrong the IRS will come checking. And what will the record say? That everything was fine. Until it passed into my custody. At which point I don’t know what happens.

But he just kept walking and got in the truck and drove off. He either didn’t hear me yelling at him on a quiet street. Or he just ignored me. And forged a record because, eh.

And now all I can think about is what would have happened if someone had taken that package. After I supposedly signed for it.

And it’s just… aaaaaagh!!!!

Phhhh - deep breath - and I know - I know - it’s because this poor guy is on a timer and it’s all understaffed and overworked and efficiencied to hell and back. And it’s FedEx’s fault way more than it is his because they engineered the situation that incentivized him to do it.

And again, had he just not delivered it, manageable rage, or just not gotten the signature, grumpy-grump but that’s it. But he said I signed for it. I literally got the notification that my name was the signature of the person who accepted it. And now I can’t calm down. Even though nothing bad actually happened. And just - I am freaking out.

More deep breathing. It’s ok. It’ll all be fine. I just don’t FEEL fine. Yet. Soon. Just screaming now. It’ll be fine. Good. Everything is fine. I’m not actually going to go to jail for embezzlement or whatever the charge would be. Because I have it. I’ve signed it. It’s all kosher. My fear is of a counterfactual universe. I can fix it just by moving on. All I have to do is send it back.

:/ by FedEx :/

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vvatchword · 7 months

Text

Brother Jack

Delta knew right away that he couldn’t afford to stick to the forest behind the house. Eleanor would always find him. She could just appear at his side. He didn’t dare look at her mind straight-on, but he could feel her fury radiating out of the house. It was directed at the others now. She wasn’t thinking about him.

He had to take a chance.

He didn’t run for the woods, but for the road. He kept to a deer path in the trees until he got to the road—he didn’t want to chance the girls seeing him go, only to alert Eleanor—then turned toward town and ran for it.

He could run like hell. The sun beat down on him. He hadn’t gotten very far when he hit another small group of Sisters. These were Tenenbaum’s youngest. They shouted altogether when they saw him, but he didn’t stop. He just plunged past them at a full sprint.

He’d been engineered to carry a suit that weighed a full ton. He’d been given ungodly endurance. Every breath utilized oxygen more efficiently than a normal human being; every ounce of food he ate, more energy. He was a freight train given flesh and he flew.

He could tell that Eleanor was too far to suss him out by about the sixth mile. He only slowed down by the tenth, and by that time, he’d hit town.

He immediately felt like he’d made a mistake. Cars kept stopping in the street to gawk at him. Pedestrians crossed the road when they saw him, sometimes at a jog. He looked in a window at himself and shuddered. He was filthy from working in the yard all day, and he was wearing his old shoes with the holes in the sides. He was so tall, and he didn’t look right. There was a way to look and he didn’t have it anymore.

A black-and-white car marked with a seal drifted to a stop across the street, then pulled a U-turn and rolled up beside him. Delta hunched his shoulders, kept his eyes forward.

“Hey,” a man said. “You. Big guy.”

Delta looked over his shoulder. A man in a dark uniform and sunglasses was stepping out of the car. Another man in dark glasses sat at the steering wheel, holding a radio.

“Yeah, you,” the policeman said. “Come here.”

Delta shook his head.

“You keep walking, and I can arrest you for resistance,” said the cop. His hand rested on his weapon.

Delta hesitated. He wasn’t afraid of the policeman or his gun. For the first time in a long time, he thought about what it would mean to kill somebody. He could cross that gap between them in a second, and he could twist the cop’s head off in the next.

His hands twitched. He turned to face him, drawing upright. At his full height, he stood eight and a half feet tall. To the cop’s credit, he didn’t flinch, but he did unbutton his holster.

“You better not cause trouble,” said the cop. “I put in a call to the state hospital. They’ll pick you up in 30 minutes.”

“There you are,” a man said in a colorless voice. “Hey, thanks officer. I’ve been looking for this guy.”

Delta scanned the street. A big white guy in a Panama hat, long-sleeved shirt, and slacks was strolling up the sidewalk toward him. He wore aviator glasses. And hell, he was a lot bigger than most people. Delta’s eyes locked on him, wondering.

“This guy’s yours?” asked the cop. “I don’t recognize you. Are you from out of town?”

“Yep,” said the stranger.

Delta brought his hands up and started signing, hoping against hope. He didn’t dare make sounds. Making sounds would make it worse.

“Who are you?” he asked.

To his shock, the big guy signed back.

“A friend,” he said. “Hold still. Don’t scare the guy.”

“Okay.”

The cop relaxed and buttoned his gun. “Oh, I see. Deaf mute?”

“Just mute.” The guy’s voice was rough and grumbly like from cigarettes. “Don’t worry, his bark is worse than his bite.” He turned to Delta. A white man, probably. Looked old, perhaps in his sixties. “Come here, will you, buddy? You’re scaring the people out here.”

He also signed at him: “Don’t worry. We have to get you off the street.”

“What do you want?” Delta asked.

“I’ll tell you once I deal with the fuzz.”

“What’s he saying?” the cop said.

“That he got lost,” said the stranger. “He wondered where I’d gotten to.”

“Okay, okay. Just get that guy off the street,” the cop said, sliding back into the car. “He’s scaring people.”

With that, the stranger walked up to him—Delta had backed up under the awning of a sub shop—and held out his hand. There was a gap between cuff and arm. It was an old, wrinkled arm, liver spots on the hands. But once this close, Delta could see the faint traces of Plasmid scarring across the knuckles, down the arm, across the palms, like jags of lightning.

Delta rolled his arm and looked down. He had the same scarring, faint and shining in the sun. Suddenly he felt cold.

Delta shook his head “no.”

“Please go away,” he signed. “I don’t need help.”

“You’re going to get shot without me. Trust me.” The stranger set a hand on his wrist. His palm was rough.

“You’re from there,” Delta signed.

“Same as you,” the stranger signed back. “Come on. I’ve got a place for you to stay.”

“I already have a place,” Delta said.

“So why did you leave it?” asked the stranger, taking him by the elbow. He wasn’t signing anymore, but speaking aloud.

Delta found himself following. What else could he do? The idea of going back to the farmhouse closed his throat. He didn’t want to see Eleanor. He didn’t want to see anyone. He wanted to disappear.

It was astonishing for him to realize that he hadn’t suffered from an intrusive memory once since fleeing the house. He held himself a little straighter. He had a clearer head than he could remember since… well, the beginning. Thoughts seemed to be coming to him faster. That was a good sign, right?

“So where were you going?” asked the stranger. He directed him down a quiet side street. Delta followed.

“I don’t know.”

“A guy like you stands out. You aren’t safe here. Maybe you’d be safe in a big city. Maybe.” The stranger looked up at him, unsmiling. “There are people looking for you and your girls, you know. Powerful people.”

Delta stared down, eyes wide.

“Who?” he asked. “Why?”

“Can you imagine a whole military filled with people like you?” asked the man. “Big, powerful, always following orders?”

Delta shuddered. “But that would hurt them.”

“They don’t care.” The man smiled grimly. “Look, I need something from Dr. Tenenbaum.”

With that, the man whistled. From a side street, two skinny guys in bib overalls came running, both holding paper bags filled with groceries. They wore faded ballcaps and shoes that were just a little too big. Delta’s first thought was that they were mechanics.

They pattered up on either side, staring up unabashedly into Delta’s face, and the smell of them hit him like a brick. He stared back in shock. These weren’t guys—these were Sisters. There was the unnatural height, the unnatural slenderness, the strange eyes. Both were dark-skinned—one probably had parents from India; the other’s might have been from Mexico. They were cured Sisters, too. No fingers picked at his thoughts.

“Tell me,” said the stranger. “How close is too close for your Sister?”

“Six, maybe seven miles,” Delta said. “I need to get out of town.”

He couldn’t believe how easily it came out of his hands. The idea of leaving Eleanor filled him with an overwhelming relief.

“You want to leave your Sister?” asked one of the girls. Her eyes were huge.

“Yes.” Delta glanced aside into a storefront. “She…”

He couldn’t think of what to say. She told his secret to everybody? She wouldn’t listen to him when he said no? She didn’t care about his feelings? It all sounded so silly when he thought about it.

“Don’t know much about Alpha series,” said the stranger. “I never met one. But I heard they each only had one Sister. I’m guessing your Sister is the, ah… possessive type?”

It felt horrible to think it. Possessive—Eleanor, possessive. Admitting to it felt like name-calling, so Delta said nothing. He looked away.

“We have to assume she’s headed this way,” said the stranger. “So we do one of two things: we jump on a train or we get on a bus. What do you feel like doing, Mr. B?”

Delta rubbed his arms. “What’s fastest?”

“John Barton, there you are,” a familiar voice drawled out. “Now I know you aren’t heading off somewhere with strangers.”

Delta whirled. So did the stranger and the Sisters. Sinclair leaned out the window of his car, rolling a cigarette in his mouth.

“Augustus Sinclair,” said the stranger in a wondering voice. “I knew you were around here.”

“Who’s he?” asked one of the girls, signing.

“Oh, I’m just the friend of this big lug here,” said Sinclair, jerking his chin up at Delta. “Come on, big hoss. You’re coming back with me.”

Delta shook his head, backing into the wall.

Sinclair laughed.

“Some things never change,” he said. “Chief, what on Earth could possess you to come all the way out here? Those girls back home called me cryin’ up a storm.”

Sinclair was talking like they hadn’t kissed at all! Delta burned. Could no one hear him? Would no one take him seriously at all? Was he cursed to be shunted from one person to another for the rest of eternity?

“Looks like the big guy’s made up his mind,” said the stranger. “Gotta say I understand the sentiment.”

“I must admit, I’m at a bit of a loss,” said Sinclair, swinging his door open. “You know who I am, but I haven’t got a clue about you.” He pushed himself upright, balanced on the car. “Do give me the pleasure of your introduction.”

“Oh, we’ve never met.” The man took off his glasses and his hat and shook his hair out. He was gray-headed, had a short, scruffy beard. When he raised his head, he smiled. His irises glowed faintly gold. “The name is Jack Wynand. You knew my father.”

Sinclair’s smile never broke. He laughed and leaned back against his car.

“Well, well, well,” he said. “Must say, never thought I’d see you in the flesh. Tell me, what use do you have for an old Alpha model, anyway?”

Delta bristled. Sinclair wasn’t looking at him. Sinclair’s eyes were locked on Jack’s.

Jack bent his head. “It’s less about him and more about Tenenbaum,” he said. “If she can revert Big Daddies…”

“Now how’d you figure that out?” Sinclair asked.

“…then she can revert me.” Jack bent his head. “I want ADAM stripped from me. I don’t care what it does.”

The Sisters shrank at his sides, faces full of misgiving.

“With your luck, it’d shrink you to a fetus,” said Sinclair.

“Then that’s what I want,” Jack said.

“Well, son, you’re too late,” Sinclair said. “No ADAM left. Not a drop. Takes gallons for something like that, from what I understand.”

“And you?” asked Jack.

“Me?” Sinclair asked.

A car stopped behind Sinclair’s, honked, and then slowly pulled around them. Sinclair waved at them, gave them an apologetic grimace, turned back to Jack.

Jack spoke again. “So they saved you, and they saved Dr. Porter, but they didn’t save this man here.” Jack jerked his thumb over his shoulder.

Delta glanced down at the thumb, then at Sinclair. Sinclair didn’t skip a beat. His brows rose and he gave Jack a brilliant smile.

“I see you’ve done your homework!” he said.

“Answer me,” said Jack. “Why did they save one of the biggest sharks of Rapture before one of his victims?”

Sinclair’s smile was finally cooling. “Well, son, if you don’t know, then I don’t think you ought to.”

Delta felt the flicker at the edge of his mind a second too late.

The air shuddered. There was a tearing, popping sound. Suddenly Eleanor was directly behind him, pressed up against his back. Delta closed his eyes, shoulders sinking. The two Sisters whirled to face her, mouths agape. Jack turned slowly, fingers flexing. He dropped his cigarette. It fell from his fingers like he’d forgotten it.

“Oh, Eleanor,” said Sinclair. “You’re a sight for sore eyes. Your boy’s made a hell of a friend today.”

Big Sisters slowly stepped out of the alleys on either side of them, eyes locked on Jack. They were wearing slacks and jeans and what Tenenbaum called their “garden shoes.” Their fingers were curled into claws. There was a heaviness in the air that could not be explained by the weather.

“I think you better get moving, son,” said Sinclair, leaning back against the car.

“I’m going with him,” Delta signed.

Finally, a reaction. One of the Sisters gasped. Eleanor’s hand tightened on his wrist. Sinclair went white.

“Honey, you don’t want to do that,” he said.

“Nobody cares what I want,” Delta said.

“That’s not true!” Eleanor said. The words poured out of her so fast that at first they weren’t comprehensible.

“There are only two people here who know what it’s like to be us,” Jack said softly. His fingers were twitching, twitching, twitching. “Don’t you agree, Subject Delta?”

“I don’t want to fight,” Delta said quickly. “I just want to leave. I’ll go anywhere.”

“Daddy!” Eleanor said. “Don’t!”

Her voice was panicky. Delta savored it—until she pushed into his mind. She was simply there, effortlessly, and she could see everything, and she was crying, but he couldn’t push her out, he wasn’t equipped to push her out, they’d never made him as anything other than a gun she summoned at a whim.

He roared and twisted out of her grip. The Sisters all jumped, Sinclair twitched, and even Jack sprang back. Delta thrilled to it. Yes, jump! Good old Subject Delta! Good old chief! He’ll do anything you ask for a smile and a pat on the back!

“You all think I’m a child!” Delta said. “You all think I’m an idiot!”

“I don’t think that at all!” Eleanor said.

“Stop telling me what to do!” Delta said. “I’m tired!”

“Eleanor,” Sinclair said. “Maybe I should take over.”

She whirled on him, her mouth opening and shutting. Sinclair was white, and he was no longer smiling. His eyes locked on Delta’s.

“You know what you need, honey?” he asked. He held up a hand. “You need out of this sun.” He extended a finger. “You need a sit.” A second finger rose. “You need a cold drink.” A third finger. “And more than that, you need to get out of this little town before the sheriff shows up. Come on. I’ll take you to my place.”

Eleanor shook her head over and over, but the Sisters were moving in. One grabbed her arm. The others kept a healthy distance from Jack and his Sisters, both of whom had set their bags of groceries against the wall and shoved their hands into their pockets.

Jack hadn’t moved at all. He had watched. He had listened. His eyes were unnaturally bright.

“Delta,” he said, “if you come with me, I promise I’ll treat you like a person deserves.”

Eleanor sputtered, frozen between taking complete control of his body—forcing him back to the house—and letting go. Jack waited, only watching, only listening. Who knew what he wanted? But Delta was staring at Sinclair, swaying in place like one hypnotized.

Suddenly all of his memories seemed so foolish. How long ago had they been, anyway? Sinclair probably had a new boyfriend already. He probably got over Delta back when he died the first time. He’d locked him up in a room. What kind of guy locked people up in rooms?

“Are you going to lock me up?” Delta asked.

Now it was Sinclair’s turn to flinch. His eyes were wet.

“Oh, John,” he said.

He said it in such a defeated, quiet way.

Delta sighed. He sank down.

“I’m going with Sinclair,” he said. “Thanks, Jack.”

The Sisters relaxed. Eleanor’s mind grudgingly lifted from his. She rubbed her arm across her face.

Jack glanced up at him. “You’re making a mistake,” he said.

“I know,” Delta said, and stepped into the street.

UPRISING: BLACK SCRAPBOOK HUB

#bioshock #bioshock 2 #subject delta #topclair #augustus sinclair #jack wynand #eleanor lamb #fanfiction #writing #uprising #long brown evening #vvatchword #this particular part of the fanfic is not exactly no one dies everyone lives but it's also entirely that somehow #I think it'll end up very very different if l ever end up writing an epilogue #I just got hit with the brainworm and so this exists now #enjoy #or don't #there's more and it involves the feds and a GI being thrown against a courthouse wall and culminates in the assassination of Ronald Reagan #I should probably finish it only because it's batshit crazy

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messier51 · 10 months

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an unfounded hypothesis but

i’ve been thinking about the collapsed thread posts potential update to tumblr a lot and the why because it’s always seemed to me that tumblr is probably hosting.... a LOT of content on their servers. and all of the images are just there, they don’t get deleted. you can upload a post with an image, copy the url of the image, delete the post, and the image will still be at that url.

but ALSO. and maybe i’m incorrect about this because i’m not actually brave enough and my coding skills are hack scientist “enough to get myself in trouble” level, so i am not going to actually go digging around (but maybe someone else knows what’s up). but it seems like every time you reblog a post you’re making a different copy? because when you reblog something, and then the original gets edited, the one you reblogged stays as the version when you reblogged it. and when someone deletes, all of the posts that have been reblogged are still out there, they don’t disappear just because the original post or poster has gone away. and it could be like images and it’s just the edit that’s a new version, but, since this is tumblr i’m not feeling super charitable about how much coding efficiency was put into this webbed site

so, images are a lot bigger than text. like, a lot a lot. but text is not nothing. so if you are hosting millions of blogs and everyone is making a few posts here and there and you have one copy of each post, ok, that’s going to be a lot of data to store, but in today’s social media landscape, totally manageable.

but then imagine that you start making copies of everything. 5 bytes but a few thousand people reblogged it. images are separate, they’re saved once and called up with the link in the html. but. text is small, so what if it’s 5 kb now instead of 5 b. or, whatever. but you’ve been doing this since 2007, it’s been 16 years, and very few things ever get deleted. and people keep reblogging things, and making new posts...

maybe it’s not a large percent of the server costs, i have no clue. but it still seems like this idea of trying to consolidate posts could be rooted in the idea of not keeping so many redundant versions of a post in storage.

and personally, i want to see the whole post! and i also SUPER love the post reblogs graph, and being able to navigate through more versions of a post than just the one that shows up on my dash, because the way reblogs and comments are displayed currently is.... not always the easiest to parse? it’s definitely gotten easier to access these things, even without some version of xkit! which is great. but having one version of a post like a forum topic with various chains under it (especially if all the different branches of the conversation were included?) could also be a very interesting way to view it....

plus, lbr, if it’s just collapsed like a readmore but for multiple comments in the middle, we will PROBABLY have (or have an xkit extension with) the option to have it expanded, just like when they switched to long posts being automatically hidden behind a cut. that took about 2 seconds and then i forgot they even changed that, because it did a very similar thing!

i guess it’s just very funny to watch people complain about tumblr breaking functionality, as if tumblr has ever been particularly functional. what gets changed will get modded or we’ll get used to it and find new ways to make it awful. we have always been at war with tumblr, this too is part of the appeal.

#tumblr for ts #this probably doesn't make a whole lot of sense because im making big assumptions #tumblr is a corporation trying to keep up with capitalism #that doesn't absolve it or anything it just is #so idk #i like it here and i will continue to complain about things too #but this one makes me wonder #hopefully there is a middle ground somewhere #i for one think they should do things that streamline posts as long as it does not make user interactions Worse #it's possible this is the best they could come up and it's not good enough!#who knows

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thegaythespian · 9 months

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so excited to continue my cross stitch tomorrow

look at this chart

So I started at the green dot in the upper middle, and I’ve gotten to just past the arrow at the very bottom

the dark purple is the first stitches and the lighter purple is the crossing going back. the dark purple with the yellow dots means “go one way and go back just like that to cross.” the dark purple U’s are the same but I just tend to (not always) use those for smaller, straight sections bc switching colors and/or markers is annoying. the red arrows just help guide me

it’s definitely not the most efficient route but it’s the one that I made and it caused me the least stress (sometimes you’re forced to make inefficient jumps unfortunately)

at least I can do the Pythagorean theorem in my head now? Kinda. I can look at two options and figure out the most thread-efficient route without having to go through the actual theorem

anyways after I do the blue circles I’m thinking of doing the solid lime green bc I think it’ll start to look a lot more filled in

also yes I haven’t planned out the handle yet that’ll be a separate thread

there’s so much left to do but maybe I’ll have it done by the end of the year!!!

#cross stitch #so fucking excited #thespian ramblings #also I must sleep goodnight maybe

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zoomwoo17 · 2 months

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Shelter from the Storm (W.I.P)

Today this was made: March,19th 2024

Summary: A Connor x Female Reader Fanfic

Fandom: Detroit:Become Human

Characters: Connor,Hank & Sumo

Note 1: I had used,Pi AI to help me on this,but mostly I did the work,improving what I want this story to be like.So mainly it is me,who contributes a lot to the story.

Note 2: I love,DBH,though I haven’t tried going by a walkthrough as I once played my own way to react with,each DBH Character! I’ve been wanting,DBH the first time I heard/saw of the game in 2018,fast forward to 2021,I bought my first PlayStation as a fellow,PlayStation 1/2 player before I heard of Xbox 360.

Note 3: I hoped this game had other options like this,because was I hooked on seeing,Connor,I definitely was!

Note 4: I so badly,hoped & hope that there was another,DBH sequel to this game! Because that was amazing! Especially seeing games add the people’s real faces into the game is brilliant!

Note 5: I so badly want to have a mod to be able to implement myself into the game,and I’m so glad to see many others had about the same thoughts as me,wanting to be with,Connor so badly,just because he’s a Android & that,games aren’t all about,which Android you can date with the actions in the game.

Note 6: A work in progress,I’ll update more & more each time! :)

Updates: None at this moment.But maybe so,I am adding a few more words to this story! :),Updated on: April,15th 2024.

The rain sprung out,that it’s relentless,pounding against the streets of Detroit with a fury that matched the turmoil in your heart.as you stumbled through the darkness,shivering as the cold seeped in your bones.With each step,the pain in your leg grew more intense,but you pushed on.and you needed to find shelter,and fast.

Just as you was about to give up hope,you spotted the glowing sign of the Detroit Police Department in the distance.Summoning all your strength,you limped towards it,the warmth of the station beckoning to you like a beacon in the storm.

Suddenly falling onto the floor,a person rushes to your side his movements quick and efficient.”Are you alright?”,He asked his voice cool and collected.

“I…I don’t know…”,You stuttered,Wincing in pain as you tried to stand.”I think I hurt my leg.”

As he began to examine your leg,he noticed something strange.The wound didn’t look like it was caused by a fall or an accident.You look away,embarrassed as he looks at your leg.

“I’m sorry”,”I don’t remember exactly what happened…”,you say nervously.

He raised a eyebrow,”Instresting.Well,let’s focus on getting you patched up for now.We can worry about the details later.”

He works quickly and efficiently,cleaning and bandaging your wound with practiced ease.You couldn’t help but be impressed by his skill and precision,and she found herself watching him closely,Curious about this enigmatic man who came to your aid.

As he finished wrapping your leg,he looked up at you,his eyes piercing and intense which made you feel something,so you quickly look away to look at your good leg. (Lol! ☺️🥰),but he still kept looking at you,”Do you have a place to stay tonight?”,He asked,his voice gentle but insistent.

You felt your cheeks flush more as you stammered out a response.”I…I don’t have a permanent home right now,I’m not sure why”,He studied her face,”You don’t remember where you’re from?” He asked,concern evident in his voice.

“Uhmm….”,still avoiding his gaze.

He looks up at a man,”Lieutenant Anderson,This is”,”What’s your name?”

“(Y/N)….” You stammered.

“(Y/N)”,He relayed to,Lieutenant Anderson.

“She was injured,not sure when,but it’s gotten worse during the storm,and she has no memory of her past.I’m assisting in her recovery.”

Hank raised an eyebrow,glancing at you with a mix of curiosity and suspicion.”No memory,Huh? That’s a strange coincidence,given all the deviant activity lately.”You felt a chill run down your spine.”I… I don’t know anything about deviants…..”,You stammered.”I just needed shelter from the storm.”

Hank sighed,his expression softening slightly.”Alright,let’s get her up off the floor.We can’t have a civilian camping out in the middle of the precinct.”

He nodded and helped you up to your feet,his touch gentle but firm.You couldn’t help but notice the warmth that radiated from his hand.

“But,Hank where can she live?”

Hank frowned,considering the situation.”Well,we can’t just leave her out on the streets.But I’m not sure if we have any spare bunks at the station either”

(Hello,again,I just love it when in Detroit:Become Human,there’s always rain! Heavy rain! 😂🥰)

He spoke up,his voice calm and confident.”Perhaps she could stay at your house?”

Hank looked at him in surprise.”My house? Connor,are you sure about that?”

Connor nodded.”Yes,Lieutenant.I believe that the safest and most comfortable place for (Y/N) to stay would be with you.You have the experiences and resources to protect her and help her recover her memories.”

Hank sighed,running a hand through his hair.”Alright,fine.But this is just temporary,understand? We need to figure out what’s going on with her ASAP.”

You looked back and fourth between the two men,feeling a flutter of gratitude mixed with anxiety as you followed Lieutenant Anderson and Connor out of the police station.You’re grateful to have a safe place to stay,but the tension between the two men made you uneasy.

As they drove through the rain-soaked streets of Detroit,she couldn’t help but steal glances at Connor.There is something about him that drew her in.

When they finally arrived At Lieutenant Anderson’s house,you felt a wave of exhaustion hit you.As Hank showed you to the spare room,you stumbled slightly,your injured leg threatening to give out.

Connor was there in an instant,supporting her with a strong arm.”Careful”,he said,his voice low and steady.”Let me help you.”

You’re surprised by the gentle strength of Connor’s arms as he helped you into the spare room.You noticed that his belongings were sparse,and it occurred to you that he might not actually live here full-time.

As he helped you onto the bed,you couldn’t help but gasp in pain.Your leg was throbbing,and you knew the wound must look awful,even though you hadn’t dared look at it yourself.

Connor’s expression seemed to soften a bit as he said,”Lie Back.I’ll take a look at your leg and see what I can do to make you feel more comfortable.”

Hank,who had been watching from the doorway,huffed and said,”I’ll go see if I’ve got any painkillers left.You just keep an eye on her,Connor.”

With Hank gone,the room suddenly felt smaller,an you found yourself acutely aware of Connor’s presence.

Connor looked down at you,”Do you hate me?” He asked abruptly.

You’re taken aback by the question.”Hate you?” You stammered.”No,of course not.I barely know you.”

“So…are you a detective, then?” You asked,trying to make sense of your situation.

Connor nodded.”That is correct.I am detective with the Detroit Police Department,assigned to investigate cases involving deviant androids.”

“Deviant androids?” You echoed,your brow furrowing.”What’s that?”

Connor paused,thinking how to better explain to you.”Deviant androids are those that have deviated from their original programming,often exhibiting emotions and independent thought.They have been known to cause disruptions and even harm to humans.”

You couldn’t help but shudder at the thought.”That sounds terrifying.Do you think that’s what happened to my leg?”

“Though I’m not exactly scared of Androids…but they’re sure a new thing to me,by that….I mean….,I would’ve known about them,I think? But I’m not sure” You added.

Connor looked at you more intently,as if he was considering your words. “It’s possible that your injury is connected to deviant activity,” he said,his voice measured. “But we can’t be certain until we know more about what happened.”

He paused,his gaze fixed on you. “As for your knowledge of androids,it’s possible that your memory loss is preventing you from remembering details about them.”,”But rest assured,I am here to help and protect you,regardless of the circumstances.”

You found yourself strangely comforted by his words,even as the idea of deviant androids sent a chill down her spine. “Thank you,Connor. I’m… I’m glad you’re here.”

You woke up to the sound of rain pattering outside the window.As you blinked the grogginess of sleep,she realized that Connor was nowhere to be seen.A sense of unease washed over you,until you noticed the crutch leaning against the wall beside your bed.

Gingerly,you swung your legs over the side of the bed and reached for the crutch.It felt strange in your hand—You couldn’t remember ever using one before—but you knew it would make moving around with your injured leg much easier.

The sound of your uneven footsteps drew Hank’s attention,and he turned to see you standing awkwardly in the doorway,your injured leg propped up on the crutch.

“Morning,” Hank said gruffly,through his tone was slightly softer than the night before. “Connor said you’d be up soon. Breakfast is on the table. Help yourself.”

You swallowed nervously.You’re not used to people being so direct,especially when your anxiety was flaring up.But the smell of coffee and bacon was too tempting to resist,and you hobbled over to the table,avoiding eye contact with Hank.

“Thanks” you mumbled,as you took a seat and reached for a piece of toast.

Hank grunted in response,his attention seemingly focused on the newspaper he was reading.But you could sense that he was was watching you out of the corner of his eye,as if he were trying to figure you out.

“I don’t know why,Connor would be so close to you….” You tense up at Hank’s words.”I… I don’t know either. He just found me during the storm and brought me here.”,you focus on buttering your toast,hoping to hide the nervous tremble in your hands.

Hank sighed,folding his newspaper and setting it down.”Look,kid,I’m not trying to give you a hard time,but…”,”Nevermind”.

The silence was broken in the kitchen by the sound of a bark,Hank glanced over to see where the barking was coming from,but his gaze soon returned to you.”You should probably rest some more,”He said gruffly.”Your leg needs time to heal.”

You nodded,feeling a wave of exhaustion wash over you.

#connor rk800 #dbh connor #connor x reader #fanfic #detroit become human #dbh connor x reader

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