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"Or what?" I couldn't help asking. "Or what some of us have suspected for some time is true: There are humans who can morph." p. 39

It makes sense that this is still something suspected. While Ax has demorph in front of Visser Three several times by this point there is probably another detail that has been seen by the other Yeerks: This Andalite only started making appearances after the Dome ship mission in the ocean. There were five and then there were six.

The Andalite that Visser Three saw that confirmed to him that they all were Andalites can easily just be the Andalite that was rescued from the Dome ship.

There's also the time constants that the Animorphs work with: They have to go to school. To the Yeerks it appears that for whatever reason the Andalite Bandits are doing missions around a 9 to 5 schedule. Which doesn't make sense if they are Andalite warriors. Maybe they have a human morph to blend in, but why would pretending to be a human that take priority over the war with the Yeerks? Its not like Andalites would need human money for food or water. So it makes more sense that they are humans trying to maintain their lives and fight the Yeerks.

But no one is going to bring that up to Visser Three without evidence. What they have is circumstantial evidence. They need concrete evidence.

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Currently reading The Departure and it makes sense that this book is here. That this is the point that Cassie decides to try to leave the team.

The Secret is right after The Alien where Ax tried to assassinate Visser Three. Visser Three wanted to capture/kill the Andalite Bandits before, but there was now a direct attempt on his life. Of course he is going to try to tear up the local woods trying to find their hiding spots: There was a direct attack on HIS life.

So while Cassie spirals downward after killing the termite queen during that book there is actually help provided by the others. They all take turns looking after the baby skunks since that appears to be what Cassie needed at the time: Keeping something alive. Jake and Cassie talk directly about the issue.

And it wouldn't have made since to put The Departure right after The Change because everyone got a little morale boost at the end of that one. They saved two Hork-Bajir! And Tobias regained his ability to morph with a few caveats. Cassie leaving the team after that book wouldn't actually make sense.

But then after The Unknown the team gets hit with new trauma after new trauma. The Escape the rest of the team finds out that Marco's mom is the host body of Visser One and that they may or may not have killed her by the end of that book. The Warning had not only Jake nearly dying which was also traumatic for the rest of the team not just Jake, we also had Cassie realizing that she probably crossed a line she never thought she would cross: Wanting to murder someone and asking Jake to murder someone for her. There is a reason that at the end of that book she took a risk to try to warn Gump about not trusting his father. And she felt terrible about that because she comes from a healthy family. She thought it was evil to tell a child to not trust his own father for his safety. Then we had The Underground where Cassie admits that she doesn't know where the moral lines are anymore. The war has made everything hazy in terms of what is right and wrong. The Decision was hard on everyone. And then there was In the Time of Dinosaurs where we had all of that. She thought Rachel and Tobias were killed. She lost herself to the Tyrannosaurus morph.

With everything that hit in there, it makes sense that this is when Cassie decides that she needs to leave. That this is when the war has gotten to be too much for her.

And I think its nice to have a character arc that zig-zags a bit instead of following a clear straight line. Because sometimes that is what happens.

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Warriors, smiths, armorers — aw, heck, anyone who just needs a little bit of sanctioned brawling time, Warrior's Way is back! Prove your metal and your mettle!

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well SOMEONE had to ask

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for anyone in the UK, needing to access discord and unable or unwilling to provide an ID:

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if you’re reading this, i’m wishing for the universe to be kind to you

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writing tip #3895:

"but but but i have ideas for these two scenes but don't know how to connect them" just write them and find out. dweeb

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Yesterday, more than 50 Texas House Democrats left the state to block Texas House Republicans’ gerrymandered map. Texas lawmakers returned to the legislature on July 21st, with flood relief at the top of their legislative priorities. But since then, they've held one single hearing on flood relief. Instead, they rammed through a heavily gerrymandered map personally demanded by Trump, with the express goal of creating five new Republican seats so his party won’t get wiped out in next year’s midterms. The map guts the voting power of Black and Latino Texans and entrenches Republicans’ rule even more. Redrawing maps usually only happens at the beginning of the decade after the Census is conducted – but when Trump says jump, Texas Republicans say how high. As long as Texas Democrats remain out of the state, the Texas House cannot conduct any business, including voting on Trump’s map. Let’s be clear: they aren’t running away from anything. They’re fighting, with every tool at their disposal, to save our democracy. And their courage is rattling Republicans: Governor Greg Abbott says he will attempt to remove them from office if they don’t return today and threatened them with felony charges. Kudos to Texas Democrats for taking this stand. We must all support them however we can in their battle against Trump’s authoritarianism. Their courage is a potent reminder that tyranny is only possible if we submit to it.

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So, the other day, when I was discussing AO3's policy on solicitation, a tumblr user came at me saying that AO3's "no monetization/solicitation" rules were "bullshit" because nexus mods allows fan created mods to get paid.

Look at me.

Look at me right now.

AO3 protects you.

AO3 protects you and your works. 

It protects your works from copyright strikes and DCMA takedowns.

It protects your work from advertisers.

It protects your work from overzealous legal challenges.

It protects your right to post adult content.

AO3 is non-profit and AO3 will never try to use you or your work to make a profit for themselves and AO3 will go to bat for you if someone tries to legally challenge you or your works.

Please respect AO3 and its mission.

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Brain just wasn't in the right space to read for most of the day. I don't know why. Brain, I want to read. Brain: No.

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While it's true that mandatory identity verification will inevitably be leaked on a massive scale, the thing you need to understand when framing these arguments is that a lot of the folks in favour of such measures don't see that as a bad thing. Full de-anonymisation of the Internet is their explicit goal. Like, the actual objective here is for everyone to have a public record of everything they say and do – online or otherwise – linked to their government ID. The universal panopticon is the good ending as far as these people are concerned.

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down we go!