I just got a 34% on my exam :)

YEEEE, IT'S FINALLY HERE!!!

My Hector and Astyanax double-faced key chain ❤️❤️❤️

Thanks so so much to the wonderful artist and creator @wolfythewitch !

not to sound like a marble statue pfp twitter acc but i wish prestige and richness were associated with ornate and intricate and flashy things again. like if you're gonna be a leech on society at least wear an obnoxiously huge lace collar with like a hunting scene design woven into it or a dress that is adorned with 200 fishies but the fishies are made of pearls. don't go around in a boring navy blue suit pretending to be a normal person

Hey, RTC community, can we get one thing straight? Mischa is from Ukraine. They have civilization there. He didn't spend the first sixteen or so years of his life at the bottom of a well.

"aww, he thinks the hard Rock Cafe is so impressive, it's so sad that he never experienced real culture, poor baby died before he got to really experience the modern world" I'm going to start biting

so hear me out

tim drake and danny fenton are twins

jack drake really did have a brother named eddie, once upon a time. eddie drake also had a wife, and she was expecting twins, but of course gotham is gotham. right before the twins would be born, eddie died, but his wife was brought to the hospital and lived long enough for the twins to be born.

jack and janet drake adopt the older twin, tim, because people knew that eddie and his wife were going to have a baby, and they had been considering having a kid themselves. but no one knew the drakes were expecting twins, and jack and janet don’t want two babies, so they arrange for the younger twin to be anonymously given up.

well, through some insane miscommunication, the other twin ends up in illinois, where he’s adopted a few months later by jack and maddie fenton. of course, because danny was given up anonymously, there’s no information whatsoever about his birth family

tim finds out he’s got a twin when he’s eleven or twelve by finding his birth certificate and an ultrasound print in his father’s safe. he starts looking for his twin, but doesn’t find a whole lot on his own.

(even when tim becomes robin, he never thinks of mentioning his twin to bruce.)

when they’re 14, tim meets sam manson at a gala in gotham. she’s originally from gotham as well, but moved to amity park as a kid, so this was her first time back in a long time. danny had just recently found out he was adopted, so of course when sam sees tim and he looks exactly like danny, she puts two and two together and approaches tim.

once sam gets back to amity, she puts danny and tim in contact. they agree that it sounds super unlikely on paper since danny was found in a hospital in chicago, while tim was born in gotham, and danny’s birthday is a couple days off from tim’s because no one knew exactly what day he was actually born, but they also look way too much alike for it to be coincidence.

of course, before they can get a dna test done, danny’s portal accident happens, and he gets super squirley about it after that whenever tim mentions it. plus they’re both minors and the drakes are never around to actually consent to it so it would be kinda weird for tim to insist on a dna test at that point.

but they stay in touch for the next few years, both expertly dodging any mention of their hero activities, and even manage to meet up for their sixteenth birthday. they hang out for a weekend in cleveland because it’s neutral ground, pretty much right smack in the middle between amity park and gotham. then, a few weeks after the events of d-stabilized, shit hits the fan.

valerie knows vlad is also plasmius, and after giving (dani) ellie a good head start, she starts going after him, outing him to the whole town in the process. of course, vlad assumes danny is the one who told valerie, so he outs danny as phantom as well. vlad manages to shake valerie, the fentons, and the giw, but danny isn’t so lucky, and gets captured by the giw.

of course, once they find out he’s been captured, sam, tucker, and jazz start planning to break him out and get him somewhere safe. obviously they can’t take danny to either the manson or foley houses, the giw would check there first, and they can’t take him to jazz’s college dorm either. gotham has a lot of ambient ectoplasm though, and the giw (probably) wouldn’t go anywhere near batman’s territory even with the anti-ecto acts, so sam calls tim and asks if they can take danny to him once they rescue him.

of course, tim had no idea about anything going on in amity park, not that team phantom knew that. turns out the giw have been covering things up forever, and the extremely high ectoplasm leaking from the fentons’ portal doesn’t help either. but of course sam assumes he knows because most of amity park is actively protesting against the giw and demanding danny’s release and it’s about to start getting violent any second now, and if it’s such big news in amity then of course tim knows danny is phantom by now, right?

but tim’s able to keep hold of himself long enough to let sam know that yes, danny can come to gotham, all of team phantom can come to gotham once they’ve rescued him, and once he’s let her go he immediately goes to the other bats and sounds the alarms

so queue the justice league showing up in amity park to deal with the giw, and inquiries about the legality of the anti-ecto acts and how they overlap with meta protection laws get raised, and danny gets rescued, and team phantom is evacuated to gotham.

once things have calmed down, tim tells danny about being red robin and they bond over hero stuff. danny fixes jason’s pit-induced anger problems because holy shit dude your ectoplasm is rancid. bruce of course takes on look at danny and decides to adopt him.

anyway, thanks for coming to my ted talk.

Batman Annual #25

Before Talia took him in, before he was dunked in the pit to have his memories restored, even when operating purely on survival instinct, he always split a meal with the other homeless people. It may not have been essential to his survival, but caring about and helping other people when he couldn’t even help himself was just always such an intrinsic part of Jason’s core.

[Image one: The first page of a digital comic about TommyInnit. It begins with a panel of Wilbur’s hand placing a card on the table, and then one of Tommy with his head in his arms, drenched in blood. He asks "what're you up to now?", to which Wilbur replies "seven of hearts. it's a card game... obviously." After this, Tommy says "hilarious. how do you play?". This is followed by an image of Wilbur sitting at the table, blood leaking from his smiling mouth. He's holding a card in one hand, and resting his chin on the other. He casts a shadow on the table, which has "it's like a game of life:" written in it, followed by three hearts. Below the shadow, he explains "you start with 500 points and 7 cards and whatever cards you have at the end... well, you lose accordingly."

Image two: The second page of a digital comic about TommyInnit and Wilbur Soot in limbo. Tommy lifts his head up and squints his eyes, asking "accordingly?? you sure you won't just make it up big dubs?". Underneath, there's a panel of Wilbur, grinning while he shrugs nonchalantly. He says "I'm a man of morals Tommy! And there's a precedent for these things:". Smoke billows behind this panel. Below this, Wilbur continues with "the 7 and ace of hearts subtract 150,", which is accompanied by two card-shaped panels depicting Dream and Tommy. They're both devoid of emotion. Next, Wilbur says "jacks take 50,", followed by the Cat disc and the Your Tubbo compass. Then, he says "8s and 2s deduct 25,", followed by a bloody diamond sword and a lit TNT stick. He continues "aces get 15,", which is next to a L'manberg flag, Tommy's red tie, and the tent from Logsteadshire. Finally, he says "the kings, queens and 10s take 10, and the leftovers are 5; nothing really (unless you're on death's door)." Above this, there's Mexican Dream's mask, Jack's melted glasses, and some of Ghostbur's blue.

Image three: The third page of a digital comic about TommyInnit and Wilbur Soot in limbo. Tommy says "Great - now I know how to lose. How exactly do I win?". The first line is above a panel showing a bloody prison wall, while the second is above a panel of Tommy carrying a L'manberg flag past some pine trees. Drawn on top of this is Tommy, annoyed. Wilbur tells him "you get rid of your hand before anyone else." Near this is a panel of Wilbur dirty hand holding a lit TNT stick, an explosion behind the panel. Next, Tommy questions "how exactly?", his face falling flat while Wilbur explains. He says "there's a card in the middle, and you take turns adding one.". There's a single card next to this. Finally, he adds "you can only put down the same suit or number as the previous number".

Image four: The fourth page of a digital comic about TommyInnit and Wilbur Soot in limbo. "Jacks change the suit." it begins, followed by "They can be the crux of your play, and ruin another's.". There's 4 card-shaped panels in the middle, positioned in a diagonal line. They each show Tommy in different stages of his life. The first shows him in Business Bay, his suit, tie, and sunglasses on. He's got a big grin and his arms stretched wide. Next, he's wearing his L'manberg uniform, with a slightly smaller smile. After is him in Pogtopia, smile turning to a grimace. Finally, there's him while living with Techno, mouth fully closed and barely a smile. He looks nervous. The panels are framed by two arrows. One is descending, a L'manberg coloured arrow that looks worse for wear. It has a green ribbon tied around it. The other one shares a colour palette with Dream, and has a bloody tip.

Image six: The sixth page of a digital comic about TommyInnit and Wilbur Soot in limbo. The first sentence is "twos force the person after to pick up 2". Then, there's Wilbur’s hands with four cards between them, seemingly in the midst of dropping them to his bottom palm. The first card has an explosion flying out of it, background the colour of fire. Next, there's a card which has an obsidian/blackstone wall, a bloody diamond sword laying on top of it. The third card shows a bloody arrow floating in water, while the fourth is simply a rectangle of fire. Then, there's a panel of Tommy weeping hard at the bottom, with the sentence "you can stack them until some unlucky bastard picks up 8 cards" accompanying it.

Image eight: The eighth page of a digital comic about TommyInnit and Wilbur Soot in limbo. "but why is it called seven of hearts?" Tommy asks, arms crossed. Wilbur puts a finger near his chin and replies "It's simple really... if someone plays the seven of hearts, the round stops.". Furthere down, there's a panel showing Tommy reaching towards Wilbur back. The next panel is similar, but it only shows a diamond sword in the place of Wilbur, and Tommy's hand is pulling back. These are accompanied by the sentences "there's no negotiation, no getting out of that one. it just stops.". Finally, there's two panels showing the pair's reactions. Tommy looks withdrawn while Wil is smiling, shrugging nonchalantly. "that's bullshit." Tommy says, while Wilbur retorts "that's how you win...". This is followed by a lit TNT stick, and Wilbur continuing "(or not).".

Image nine: The ninth page of a digital comic about TommyInnit and Wilbur Soot in limbo. There's a split panel of them, Tommy bored and resting his chin on his fist, while Wil looks giddy, leaning to the side. Tommy questions "lovely - any more stupid rules I need to know?", with Wilbur responding "yeah, but they'll make more sense during play. I'll teach you them as we go.". Underneath this, he continues "c'mon then - let's play:". There's panel of Wilbur and Tommy both sitting at a long table in a dark void, cards set out. You can't see either of their faces. Further down, Wilbur turns over a card while saying "first you turn over the card in the middle". The final panel shows that this card is the seven of hearts.

Image ten: The final page of a digital comic about TommyInnit and Wilbur Soot in limbo. There's a closeup of Wilbur’s mouth while he dejectedly tells Tommy "oh. game over.". Below this, there's a panel of a panicking Tommy who's just abruptly stood up from his seat, shoulders bunched up and expression shocked. "no, no, that doesn't make sense." he says. "that isn't fair! this isn't fair!" he continues, near two panels showing his death. One depicts Dream's bloody fist, while the other his bloody corpse. Next to this, he further continues "I didn't even get to play!". Finally, there's a long panel at the bottom. Tommy stands alone in the darkness of limbo, bright with blood and face expressionless. He repeats "I didnt even get to play...", and the comic ends.]

seven of hearts

floyd’s little record store: ECO OF EGO

Unimportant but slightly funny thing i just found and had never seen mentioned before: The variable used for displaying what chapter you started your deltarune save in on the light world’s stats screen (oddly not the dark world’s...?) is called “krispreservationsociety” (society for the preservation of krises)

i actually somehow never noticed this was a thing that displayed at all this whole time i suppose i just never looked at this screen in chapter 2...

controversial opinion but the change to big run scoring is really good and it should've been like this from the start. i love people being able to get the reward through effort instead of 95% of players being gated off of it arbitrarily in a gamemode that normally isn't competitive

Fun fact: The night I saw Grunch, Joey's actual and famously supportive father was sitting in the audience behind me. Which rather added a wild, additional level of humor to Joey's character's big song being the struggles of having an absentee Dad.

ocyonautsbwithoutbfijtect part47✌️7

chibueze ihuoma is currently orpheus on broadway and u guys better appreciate him while hes there because im saying this genuinely i think he is the best orpheus in the world

i am still thinking about how when Aelwyn tried to give a false name her pull was ‘Roma Childa’ as a play off Wanda Childa and they all shouted her down but I think we did not give enough credit to the pun… Roma + Wanda…. roam-a + wander…… @dimension20official brennan how long were you sitting on that and also i just wanted to assure you that I got it and I liked it even if it flew 100% under the radar of the rest of the shit

lava date

Would you ever consider writing about a different path Ice and Mav could take, one where they choose to leave the Navy and pursue a more open relationship and civilian life? Thinking it would be easier but maybe the sacrifice to their careers brings its own challenges?

(hi, jan 2024 me here, this was an ask that I answered when it was sent in in May 2023 & didn't post because I felt I actually answered it fictionally in the "icedad" one-shot the week after [and you can obviously see how these thoughts affected the writing of other pieces like "tremors & aftershocks"], but I still mostly agree with this take [though it's a little overgeneralizing] & I think it sums up a lot of my final "meta" modern-military-theory thoughts on ice & mav & their relationship, so im posting it now before I post the compacflt masterpoast)

see,… the thing is, i just… can’t see that happening!! i have no idea how to write that!!! Maybe i really do have a lack of imagination. But i can’t see that happening for a number of reasons. So short answer, no.

Long answer (and it’s long):

1. lame reason to start out, but it, uh, it’s canon that ice ends up at O-10 and mav ends up at O-6. not saying that im beholden to canon obviously (my mav ends up at O-7 and my ice ends up alive) but I do base my characterizations of them on the implications of the political struggles of both their careers so… taking away ice’s fourth star is basically starting from square one wrt my characterization of him. which is a lot of work. i could start from the beginning with a top gun 1986 ice who knows he’s gay—that would be a fun AU (i think other people than me have definitely done that better, though—I’m a one-trick pony). So if that’s what you mean then disregard the rest of this post. but if what you mean is a divergence from my existing work (i.e. homophobic/rank-climbing ice&mav) then… yeah, can’t see that happening, for further reasons below.

2. wrt my characterization of him: it’s based on a broad historical overview of armed service officers and the expectations of their careers. in my view, high-ranking officers aren’t after power—or maybe they started their careers wanting power, but somewhere down the line, it just becomes an expectation. if you do everything right and follow all the rules, you are expected by the institution to lead, whether you want to or not. That’s just the pipeline. at some point you start losing agency. which is what I mean when I keep saying ice doesn’t have a choice in advancing his career (besides the meta fact that this is fanfiction and canon demands that he have 4 stars lol)—high ranking military officers are continually and continually groomed for bigger and better positions; and the longer they spend in the military, the harder it is to leave that lifestyle for something else. And with ice’s canonical (and characteristically INTEGRAL, as I mentioned a week or so ago) refusal to rebel against the wishes of the navy as an institution, plus this historical expectation to lead placed upon the shoulders of excelling officers, I really do think ice is destined for four stars & nothing less, even if it gives him chronic depression. It’s his highest priority not because he wants it to be, but because…it just is. that’s how the institutionalized system of advancement in the military works. it just is. it has to be.

3. I mentioned in this post that I can’t ever see a foot in the door with them talking about their relationship unless maverick dies and is resurrected, and I feel the exact same way about them & their retirement plans. There’s a lot that ice and mav don’t talk about: the biggest one is obviously Goose’s death, the foundation of their relationship; but also their love for each other obv, what they did to rooster, AND their careers, which have to end at some point. Them talking about everything is totally inevitable, it was gonna have to happen eventually before they died, and I think one foot in the door MIGHT have been them eventually talking about retirement (someone sent in a prompt asking for this exactly & i am brainstorming it furiously) but before the Navy FORCES them to retire… i think they would studiously avoid talking about it. For a couple reasons: a) what does retiring with each other mean? living in the same house until they die together? hard to do if you’re just good friends. talking about retirement is tantamount to talking about Them. and b) what are they gonna do outside the navy? Ice has a lot of options, as I mentioned in the slider one-shot—general/flag officers are SUPER sought after in leadership/intelligentsia/management positions post service, so maybe if he were offered a crazy cool civilian position somewhere in San Diego in like the 2000s he would quit the navy for it… but what about maverick? I have no idea what a non-navy mav would do. Civilian airline pilot? Hoo boy. I think he’d hate that. I could maybe see emergency helicopter pilot, lol, or race car driver (i just watched days of thunder can you tell?) but none of the above offers the institutionalized honor the navy does (that, as a reminder, he *killed people* to obtain in the first place). I suggested his test piloting expertise would make him an attractive technical advising candidate to A&D companies like Boeing, LockMart, GD, etc. so that might be one option. But it might have been kind of a touchy subject for him before he racked up the expertise he’d need for those high-level civilian positions… the navy was kinda his only option. So they wouldn’t talk about it because it might hurt his feelings.

4. The biggest reason: again… open rebellion like rocking the boat by quitting the navy to be in an open long-term gay relationship, in upper mil brass ranks, and even retired upper mil brass ranks, just… isn’t done. And REALLY wasn’t done in the 2000s, when i think the scenario in this ask is positioned. And it’s not like “oh but whatever who cares about the navy, ice and mav are in love, they deserve to be happy no matter what, they should do what they want, fuck the navy…” no. Ice and Mav care about the navy. Clearly. Canonically. By necessity. The military requires cohesion and on some level repression of individuality & personal expression to FUNCTION, even when you’re retired. Yes, maverick certainly strains against that repression (which is why you Could spin top gun as an anti-military franchise if you were desperate enough), but he rebels through his ACTIONS (stupid plane maneuvers) not through his personal IDENTITY. his personal identity (headstrong overtly masculine white male pilot, whether gay or straight who cares) is NEVER challenged throughout the franchise (i.e. no one really challenges his masculinity specifically) & his personal identity does not POSE a challenge to the navy. Both he and ice in their outward-facing personal identities really fit in quite neatly to the navy’s overarching identity & contribute to the navy’s cohesion in a way that is favorable to both their careers and the establishment. Lack of imagination or not… i can’t see a universe in which Ice and mav would actively WANT to rock the boat and wreck the navy’s cohesion and their reputations for an open relationship and definitively rebellious personal identities, with the obvious caveat being Maverick’s death recontextualizing both their priorities (yes we’re in love AND we’ve finally proven ourselves to be ultra-capable officers regardless of our sexuality so no one has a license to judge us anymore etc.).

And also, they’re not enlisted seamen. Nor are they mediocre officers who have the luxury of fading into obscurity. Things are different when you’re that high in the ranks, and when your job publicly matters more. sorry, but even post DADT (probably until about biden’s election), an open relationship would end their careers. They might not be fired, but they’d never be promoted again. Too much of a liability getting subordinates to still respect them, from the higher-ups’ perspective, especially if there are other qualified candidates who fit the navy’s core identity better. Like—sorry. This is such a jaded oversimplification. But if you rock the boat like that (i.e. break the service’s united front to be individualistic in a way that does not match the service’s overarching identity), from the perspective of your officer peers, you simply are a bad officer. Being an open individual in a job where you are required to fit in and represent your service is not your job. You are not doing your job well. Straight-up. Even if you’re retired. I met US Army 4-star gen. David Petraeus (retired obv) in February—he led the successful-ish surge in iraq and Afghanistan in the mid-2000s—and he’s STILL a laughingstock for his disastrous affair with his biographer a decade ago, even after he retired from AD service. That’s what people remember him for, not the fact that he was one of our only successful commanders in any of our Middle East campaigns.

Something like that might be one of ice and mav’s worst fears—being known for their affair/scandal instead of the institutionalized honor they’ve fought and killed for. That kind of thing just Isn’t Done. It's bad taste. You have to keep it quiet. If you’re an officer representing the service, you have to represent it well & according to the service’s preconceived identity, even in retirement. (see, for another shitty example of "not fitting in" even in retirement, Lt. gen. Mike Flynn [his whole scandal is actually kinda geopolitically relevant to my fic if you squint lol] whom everyone fucking hates)

To summarize: i hope I’m not mischaracterizing your ask when i reframe it like this—would you ever write ice and mav without the institutionalized pressure to advance in rank and conform to institutional norms?

and yes, I would (and will if you ask—it looks like this: ice & mav meet & fall in love & it’s boring and fine. end of story), but I guarantee you someone else already has. I’m all about interrogation of institutional norms here. And i think until maverick dies & comes back from the dead, there is absolutely no *REALISTIC* incentive for ice & mav to leave the navy and/or have an open relationship. Like it’s just not possible. Idk how else to say it.