othernaut

[othernaut]

Oh, what the fuck is wrong with me.

Staying up to 4 AM with other people is like, well, here are the secret parts of me, here are all the folds and ridges, here is the texture of shadow and longing that describes so perfectly this unseen self. Here is where I am completely; none other have seen it so readily. You can destroy me with a word, you can destroy me with a look. You can destroy me with a minute absence of love. Here is my shame and sweat and self, and if you do not love it, I will cease to be.

Staying up to 4 AM alone is just how it is. I am a monolith. I am the state between states. I am eating fries. I am.

staying up until 1am with your friends is like. wow we’re so fucking cool we’re so fucking badass we should go on a road trip or become famous or maybe hang out here forever because i dont wanna be anywhere that isnt with you guys im so full of love and joy and a live fast die young mentality. and staying up until 1am by yourself is like. for the third time this year i am genuinely contemplating suicide. good thing i dont have the executive function to clean up my room

[othernaut]

Dryad who has lived for 4,000 years and seen Nature Red in Tooth and Claw daily, who is grown in soil rich in bone chips and blood. Who praises life, who loves it and understands it, and understands more than most how numerous and fragile living things are - that perhaps it is not the field mouse's place to be eaten, but still, almost every little life ends in a predator's jaws. You can love it all, if you want; you cannot mourn it all. And if you look, all this blood and pain and cancer has its own logic - and you can love that, too.

Robot designed from the frame up as a sexbot, and who accepts and is okay with this. Sure, she could go through the grinding process of change - swap out her soft curves for hard armour, delete the parts of her code that want to empathize and comfort and give pleasure - but, frankly, she loves who she is. Her short life has given her the irreplaceable benefit of seeing people not only as who they are, but inherently worthy of joy. Joy is transformative, is universal, is available to anyone - no one needs be worthy, you can just have it, by virtue of being alive.

They're GFs, of course, and poly. Our dryad doesn't love our robot the same way a person loves a person, of course, but that fascination, that comfort in her presence - that's undeniable, isn't it? That's something. And our robot, too, loves our dryad with everything she's got, loves in a kaleidoscope of emotion and sensation. She sits at her roots and chatters on for hours about the people she's met and enjoyed, all the little lessons inherent in all those little moments of bliss.

Our dryad unearths a clean bobcat's skull, wordless communication - and the robot summons the bobkitten whose mother this skull once was, because at least, this way, they'll know. Corporate property reclaimers trudge through the jungle to repossess the robot's body-property, and without a second of hesitation, the dryad turns the sun into a laser and renders them down to nutritious ash.

Shortly joining their polycule: a fat athlete (Greek themed, a literal Olympian, who loves to run and lift and eat and drink and enjoy everything their body can do), a soft and kindly male mermaid (loves cooking, caring for kids, singing, wearing nice things, all while very happily a dude), and a priest of the God of Light who just quietly practices love and forgiveness and gratitude on the daily.

Plot twist: The nature-themed character is very reserved and logical. The robot-themed character is very emotional.

[othernaut]

realest thing I’ve ever heard recently

[othernaut]

Which one is closest to yours? Mine is like 6ish-7ish.

[othernaut]

Sure, fine.

Chaos Dust

Wondrous item, rare

This multicolored, sparkling dust is often found loose, or sometimes in a cut-off pocket or tied up in a handkerchief. One handful is enough for one use. While holding a handful of Chaos Dust, you can use a Magic action to toss it in front of you, filling a 10-foot cube immediately adjacent to you with swirling, multicolored grit. Any creature within the 10-foot cube must make a DC 15 Charisma saving throw or be immediately subject to one effect determined by rolling on the Chaos Dust table.

Chaos Dust Table

1d100 / Effect

1-15 / The subject immediately transforms into a Beast, as per the Polymorph spell, for 1d10 hours. Roll 1d6 to determine the resultant form. 1: Frog. 2: Bat. 3: Dolphin. 4: Mule. 5: Boar. 6: Crocodile.

16-20 / The subject is blasted backwards 60 feet, as if shoved by a pair of very strong hands. If the subject impacts anything before the end of their movement, they take 1d6 bludgeoning damage for each 10 feet travelled this way.

21-25 / The target's size is altered, as per the Enlarge/Reduce spell, for one minute. Roll one die. On an even roll, the subject is enlarged. On an odd roll, the subject is reduced.

26-30 / The subject perceives all creatures around them to be capering clowns, and all speech as jovial honking noises. This effect lasts for 10 minutes.

31-35 / Any weapons wielded or carried by the subject gain the texture and viscosity of gelatin. This does not affect their damage or abilities (somehow), but may confer Disadvantage on attacks with that weapon until its new, jiggly consistency is gotten used to. Permanent until dispelled.

35-45 / Subject begins hearing a voice which no one else can perceive. Effect lasts for 24 hours, at the end of which the subject can re-roll their initial DC 15 Charisma save, ending the effect on a success and repeating every 24 hours if failed. Roll 1d6 to determine the name and nature of the voice. 1: Herbert, belligerent, self-indulgent, and gluttonous. 2: Mattah, jealous, preening, and complimentary of the subject. 3: Goregrinder, controlling, bloodthirsty, and protective of the subject. 4: Ansel, cowardly, comfort-seeking, and impossible to please. 5: Muck-Muck, chaotic, chipper, and cannot take anything seriously. 6: Xorlyxia, megalomaniacal, sadistic, and full of sweeping grand plans.

46-50 / Subject's emotions deaden, as per both effects of the Calm Emotions spell. Subject cannot benefit from any emotion-affecting ability, including a Barbarian's Rage or Bardic Inspiration. This effect lasts for 1 hour.

51-55 / The creature gains uncontrolled telepathy. Their thoughts are broadcast to everyone in a 60-foot sphere, and they can read the surface thoughts of anyone who meets their gaze. If the creature already has telepathy, the range of their telepathy expands by 30 feet and becomes uncontrolled, as above. This effect lasts for 1d6 hours.

56-60 / The subject transforms into a cloud of swirling, multicolored vapour, as per Gaseous Form, though they cannot use a Magic action to end the effect on themselves. Once per round, the subject may make an Attack action (with a bonus equal to their Dexterity score plus their Proficiency bonus) to touch another creature; a successful attack forces the touched creature to make a DC 15 Charisma saving throw or be subject to one effect on the Chaos Dust table. This effect lasts for 10 minutes.

61-69 / The subject's body immediately sprouts a covering of leafy vines, which grow 1d4+1 fruits. Roll 1d6 to determine the nature of the fruit. 1: Hard white berries, glows with bright light when crushed. 2: Weeping purplish fruit, deals 1d10 poison damage if eaten, and requires a DC 12 Constitution saving throw or the eater is Poisoned for 1d6 minutes. 3: Hard miniature pinecones, functions as a Quaal's Feather Token, Tree. 4: Juicy pears, no magical effect, overwhelmingly delicious. 5: Bitter red cherries, the eater does not need to sleep and is immune to sleep-related effects for 1 day. 6: Heavy, sloshing gourds, each containing a single gemstone worth 2d10 gp, Disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks for the subject until all the gourds are picked from their body.

70-75 / Subject perceives a figure only they can see. This figure appears 100 feet away and moves slowly towards the subject, at a rate of 10 feet per round. If the figure touches the subject, they immediately fall Unconscious and fall to 0 HP. Subject can see this figure through any intervening object, including walls and earth. This effect lasts for 1d10 hours. Roll 1d6 to determine the nature of the figure. 1: Shiny, glowing, welcoming. 2: Hypnotic, dreamlike, beckoning. 3: Horrible, rotted, rancid. 4: Vast, amorphous, horizon-blotting. 5: Familiar, as of one loved and long gone. 6: Minuscule, inconsequential, barely worth noticing.

76-80 / Three of the subject's possessions, as determined by the DM, grow legs and try to run away. They have a movement speed of 20 feet and no desires except to run and be chased. This effect lasts for 2d10 minutes.

81-85 / A cloned copy of the subject, having the exact same statistics, appears next to them. This copy has the exact opposite viewpoint and alignment to the subject and behaves appropriately. This effect lasts for 1 hour.

86-91 / The subject feels something unpleasant roiling in their stomach. They gained the Poisoned condition, which persists until they take an action to vomit. Roll 1d6 to determine what comes up. 1: A kidney (animated as per Animate Objects). 2: 2d6 fresh bananas. 3: 300 marbles, which spread in a 20-foot circle, making it difficult terrain. 4: A small, rattling machine of unknown purpose. 5: 1d4+1 angry crabs. 6: 1d4 amused pixies.

92-99 / The subject is affected as Flesh to Stone, immediately gaining the Restrained condition. Roll 1d6 to determine what substance the subject is being petrified into. 1: Never-melting ice. 2: Porcelain. 3: Stained glass. 4: Copper. 5: Incense. 6: Never-burning wood.

100 / The subject blinks out of existence, reappearing on another plane. This effect lasts for 24 hours, after which the subject can choose whether to return or remain. Roll 1d6 to determine the plane on which they appear. 1: Carceri. 2: The Beastlands. 3: Mechanus. 4: Pandemonium. 5: Ysgard. 6: Plane of Fire (City of Brass).

A wizard that regularly breaks into the gem shop where magical gemstones are cut from rough stone into their more commonly known sparkly faceted shapes - but he doesn't steal any of them. He sweeps the floor. Bags the stone crumbs and shards and dust he sweeps up. Breaks out again. The goblins who run the gem shop never bother to investigate why the floor just cleans up on its own, they assume that they've got a house elf or something.

So the wizard takes the shards and all, and grinds them all into evenly sized teeny tiny crumbs, and mixes them all together. The magic gemstone chips and crumbs become something new: magic pocket sand. Nobody knows what it'll do to you if he throws it at you. Least of all him.

[othernaut]

[othernaut]

Things you can do with a 35 year old protagonist that you can't do with a 16 year old one:

Reference The Incident.

Have other characters reference The Incident constantly just to watch them die by degrees.

Regrets that take a decade to assemble.

Want a biological rite of passage? Okay. Early menopause.

Been running from the Call for a decade and a a half but the fucker just bought rocket skates.

Thought the Call would never happen and quietly built a life around the expectation of peace, only to have all those deferred dreams barrel into them with momentum.

Really fiddly little hobbies that took them 20 years to get right.

Really fiddly little hobbies that cross-specialize into plot relevance (20 years idly making soapstone carvings suddenly comes in real handy when trying to restore the magic pictographs on that skeleton king's tomb).

Sell that injury. Lob an 18 year old down a hill, they're going to pour vodka on the scrapes and climb back up for their shoes. A 35 year old won't be okay for a long while, and you can milk that long while for tone.

No childhood home to lose, but a built one instead. Something personal and unique, an immediate stake - an immediate sense of place.

Abandoning that home now has a wholly different flavour.

Old friends that they knew forever, but who've changed with their different collection of life choices.

The real, long-term consequences of all those experiences they thought were life-destroying when they were teenagers. Which ones turned out to be nothing; which ones turned out to be everything?

The love story, when they've already had three full-on love stories under their belt and know exactly what those rapidly growing affections feel like, what they're going to become.

A wholly different context to that "take up this crown of darkness and you shall become immortal!" kind of temptation.

General tonal admixture of loss and becoming.

Filled their spellbooks with spells for summoning cooked meals, cleaning clothes, teleporting between home and work, and banishing biting insects; has to figure out how to defeat the Bloodwraiths with this particular loadout.

i love when fantasy novels are about 35 year olds…why is everyone in books 20 or 16 all the time

[othernaut]

It's funny.

I play a whole bunch of tabletop role-playing games, and while I most frequently play characters that match my gender, sometimes I don't, because it's shared fiction and sometimes the best character to insert into a growing story is someone who's more unlike myself. I've played a Terrestrial Exalted who was meant as an examination of how outcast/misfit men trend to historical performances of masculinity when they can't attain the modern one. My current character in Fate of Cthulhu goes by they/them because I, the player, waffled for so long on deciding their gender that I also figure it was perfectly appropriate for the character to do so - so probably agender, but functionally in drag all the time.

The only time I've gotten any confusion or, heck, even pushback when filling in the pronoun section on a character sheet was when I played Rep. This was a Fallout game, and Rep was a Mr. Handy designed for customer service. My goal when playing Rep was to express the kind of unfathomable, gut-chewing rage that anyone who's worked a customer service position longer than three months knows deep in their bones. Rep was literally incapable of expressing itself in anything other than a perma-chipper, helpful manner; it was hardwired never to say a bad thing about its employer and to take every opportunity to upsell, on every interaction. The only way it could express how this made it feel was by drilling super mutants in half with a giant cartoon drill arm and then hovering over the gore, repeatedly asking the fresh giblets to complete a customer satisfaction survey. The gender was the least interesting thing.

And nevertheless, it came up. Never in a mean way, more, I think, in a real way. Rep got addressed as male a lot due to the fact that its pre-loaded, focus-tested customer satisfaction voice was a kind of smiley male-presenting mishmash of every ad voice-over that had ever sparked a scintilla of anger in me. When it insisted that it was it, that was met almost with pity - the assertion that no, Rep, you're a person just like everyone else, not an object. When it was an object, when the object-ness of its persona was probably the only part it was actually happy about. It was a machine, it was built by people to do a job. Now that those people are environmental storytelling skeletons and the job is over, it gets to define its object-ness for itself. Also it has a vast library of interactions with people it very much wants not to be, and it liked the distance that it/its pronouns provided from that infuriating mass.

Playing these weird little guys is such an interesting thing for me, part of why tabletop role-playing is one of the closest things we've got to modern magic. When you embody a character through roleplay, there's always some kind of unexpected flowback, some element of being that you're never going to get any other way. If you're any kind of writer or artist, I think you kind of owe it to yourself to see how these stories feel when you settle inside them. I can't write stories solely about my own gender, and I very vocally miss the time of experimental, "what if there was... no gender?" sci-fi, so eh - natural point of continuation.

Somewhere out there in the borderless realm of imagination, a shiny, laminated robot hovers over a mountain of corpses, incandescent with rage, something akin only to itself - and happy.

LOVE AND PEACE FOR IT/ITS PRONOUNS

[othernaut]

The Nice Texture behind the screen is a good suggestion. I've got very intricate, shiny art literally everywhere in my environment except my typing eyeline, and I did have a very fruitful partnership with the Desk Plant, before I killed it.

Hydration actually isn't a problem, or rather age has solved it for me. Now that I'm at the point in my life where my legs will simultaneously fall asleep and cramp if I remain in the same position for too long, I find I have to stand up every now and again to walk around. This is where I tend to get a drink of water, look at a few leaves, perform the Writer's Yoga. This is good in summer, but in winter, I find myself staring grimly out of grey, frosty windows, contemplating the immateriality of life. And sometimes my circulation actually behaves correctly, and I diffuse into greasy vapour.

I think this is why writers' houses get like that. You know, filled with a grab bag of random novelties, usually antiques. When I'm de-cramping my legs in winter, I find I most often want to fiddle with a device or hold a strange little treasure. I want carnival machinery: Zoltar machines, penny squashers, big fanciful gumball machines that roll fist-sized jawbreakers down Rube Goldberg raceways. I want outdated medical equipment, pinball, a chunk of amethyst the size of my torso. I look at Guillermo del Toro's house, with his gramophones and immense person-squashing bust of Frankenstein, and dream.

I admit I mostly want to watch a floor loom in action, spend half an hour pinning down the exact onomatopoeia.

They say when all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. This may be true, however once you have a hammer, a chainsaw, a crowbar, a blowtorch, a pickaxe, a pair of bolt cutters, a double barreled shotgun, a machete, a flamethrower, a backhoe, and an ample supply of plastic explosives, you've got a suitable tool to recklessly apply brute force to pretty much any situation, and really, what more do you need?

[othernaut]

This is my unspoken lament as a writer.

There are grammar checkers, thesaurus apps, timed writing sprint reminder apps, collaboration spaces, neat pens, fancy notebooks and none of it is essential to the task; none of it beats the stark simplicity of an unseasoned word document. My tool, singular, is the digital equivalent of blank printer paper - and if even that fails, I extract the paper from the printer and have at it with a dollar store ballpoint I got 12 for a buck.

Where are my Things. Where are my Treasures. Why must this elemental act of creation spring forth from a practically monastic level of tactile deprivation. Is this why I dissociate when I'm in the flow, forget to eat? Even a body feels extraneous. I want to lift something heavy and cold.

... oh hell, floor looms look cool. And like they make a cool noise. The kchunk-kchunk of a good mechanical keyboard produces the exact same prose as the tup-tup-tup of a sticky silicon rollable. I am no more permanent than the weather, no more real than lamplight reflected off the surface of the fog. Argh. Argh.

They say when all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. This may be true, however once you have a hammer, a chainsaw, a crowbar, a blowtorch, a pickaxe, a pair of bolt cutters, a double barreled shotgun, a machete, a flamethrower, a backhoe, and an ample supply of plastic explosives, you've got a suitable tool to recklessly apply brute force to pretty much any situation, and really, what more do you need?

[othernaut]

As we note this day the passing of celebrated wrestler and asshole Hulk Hogan, I ask you to spare a thought for my best friend in all the world, who is as we speak moderating the combat sports forum on Something Awful Dot Com.

[othernaut]

There's also how powerful and independent and adult you feel when you do everything yourself, until one relatively minor roadblock stops you in your tracks and your entire life derails because of it.

the thing about being alone is that it’s so peaceful and freeing and cool apart from the evenings you descend into literal hell

[othernaut]

Canadian Fae.

If you aren't paying attention, we look like everyone else and have similarly complex societies, just kind of... off. The more information you get, the weirder both our differences and similarities seem.

Like, okay, they have elections up there, but also a King apparently? They speak English, but also some kind of gutturally beautiful ancient tongue that they mostly use to swear at us, and those fae sigils are inscribed on all their signs and trade goods ("Quebecois French"). It is said that they pour the blood of trees on the snow and eat it at their revels, and if you taste it, you won't want to leave. It is said that with the aid of their Canadian magicks, they live forever up there, only dying when they choose.

Just when you think you've got a handle on them, you learn that you've been interacting with a small subsection of an impossibly vast society, and trying to bring the social literacy of a Toronto darkrave into a Maritime kitchen party is going to get you punched.

Idea: setting with your “Standard Fantasy Races” (human, elf, dwarf, orc, etc) but with American, as opposed to English, cultural codes.

Midwestern Dwarves with that sing-song Wisconsin accent; still forge-heads who don’t understand trees, but now they’re going “ope” and having arguments over which cheese is best.

New Yorker Elves; “my family, see, we been watching this here grove for 6, no, 7 centuries, see, and no one’s evah cut down no trees. So tell me, wise guy, what makes you Mr Lucky?”

Texan Giants, complete with the accents, the hats and boots, and the insane lack of ability to anticipate failure. Because. Also I want to draw a giantess cowgirl and just throw her in the general direction of the lesbians.

Mexican Gnomes; big families, fancy customized vehicles; fast-talking and fixing things in 5 seconds. Maybe make their food notoriously good too or something.

A lot of settings will have some sort of animistic race with some animal traits; usually that’ll be vaguely native-coded. In the interest of breaking out of ruts, I propose sea-otter furry-bait with a California coast culture, complete with chakras and crystals and such. I haven’t seen that done yet.

Our version of Orcs can be Florida Man, Fantasy Edition. Actually a fun loving, friendly group, the trouble is that their notions of “fun” can be deeply dangerous and definitely illegal. Crocodile pets. Just because.

Hmm… any other ideas or refinements are definitely welcome.

[othernaut]

A Little Advice

Try yoga; try therapy; try daily affirmations; try daily meditation; try running; try rock climbing; try keto; try this supplement; try this podcast; try going vegan; try going for a walk; try loving yourself; try losing a little weight; try journaling; try crafting; try gardening; try being more active in your community; try reading more; try touching grass; try not to care so much; try being a little more present; try to speak up; try to listen; try surrounding yourself with positivity; try gratitude; try a little harder next time; you're

too sensitive; you're too cold; you're not putting in the effort; you're not putting in the time; you're more important than you think; you're not the protagonist; you're too much; you're making yourself sad for no reason; you're probably enjoying this; you're too much in your own head; you're putting too much weight in others' opinions; you're not listening to the right people; you're always on that phone; you're always off in another world; you're always needing an answer for everything; you're never going to get anywhere if your standards are that high; don't

be so hard on yourself; don't think too much about it; don't let the world pass you by; don't worry; don't make light of it; don't eat that donut; don't make yourself small; don't let perfect be the enemy of good; don't let your standards slip; don't set yourself on fire to keep others warm; don't think you have to go through this alone; don't think you can monopolize other peoples' time; don't ignore the problem; don't think about it and it'll go away; don't think about the past; don't think about the future; don't give them the attention they want; don't ignore me; why

can't you just be happy?

[othernaut]

FffffffffffffffFFFFUCKING STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND.

Half the book is great. Half the book is a genuinely engaging piece of outsider fiction with an interesting central premise (human foundling raised by aliens returns to Earth with learned psychic powers and a different group of taboos, both of which are normal in his adopted society). It works to humanize the inhuman and examine calcified social mores, things which I find good and laudable anywhere, especially in fiction.

Then, at the halfway point, the book is struck by Penis Lightning and flung right the fuck off the rails.

The second half of the book involves the protagonist establishing an objectively true nudist psychic alien sex religion, one that somehow does absolutely no work examining the calcified social mores of the time it was written and, instead, lionizes the author-insert character as a kind of reluctant harem isekai Jesus. All the nuance it spent half the book carefully constructing is eradicated with the literary equivalent of an unsolicited dick pic.

I hate this goddamn book so much that disposing of it has become a problem. I don't want to donate it anywhere or even throw it out, as that risks some innocent bystander accidentally reading it. I can't destroy it, because I have a moral distaste for book destruction out of preference, even if that book is a cultural hemorrhoid. I settled for writing a dire warning on the inside cover, surrounded by frowny faces, so that if this thing ever escapes containment, its unsuspecting discoverer stands a chance of avoiding psychic damage.

It also pioneered the word "grok", which the ever-churning progress of history has recontextualized into a blighted thing.

Heinlein, I wish you only the toothiest of blowjobs in hell.

Enough about favorite books. What’s a book you read and absolutely hated? The book you’ve got a bone to pick with.

[othernaut]

Channel 1, surface: We're going to the park.

Channel 2, temporospatial: Park, the place, will occur in the future. The future is decreasing in size until it is the now. Time to park diminishes depending on speed at which we approach the park, adjustable by preference.

Channel 3, which is sometimes Channel 2 or even Channel 1 depending on loudness, social: What separates "I" and "we"? How can I assume to be we? Does the other half of we want to go to the park? Is there another place they want to go that, having not perceived and previewed, I have failed failed failed FAILED FAILED to anticipate? Does the weness of the Iness require awareness of this unspoken preference, or am I being weird? Will I be weird if I just want to go to the park because it is nice and I want to see green things?

Channel 4, emotive: leef.

Channel 5, WTF/horrible narrative curse: Maintain continuity with the historical imperative of all "people' who wanted to go the "park". You, who are woman: dress in hoop-skirts, waterproof. Swim with bread-hungry ducks. The story builds, you promenade along the fresh-cut boardwalk in your demure brown skirt and puffy sleeves while simultaneously embodying a hungover millennial, you saw the millennium, and what does that have to do with the park? Does the willow care? Does the human warmth at your elbow? Will they be proud of you? What narrative is building here, is already built? My god, my god, what is its meter?

Channel 6, perceptive/sensory: so hot, halep.

Okay so some people can’t see objects in their imagination and some people don’t think in words and some people hear their thoughts like a voice and others don’t. I get that

But how many distinct channels do most folks have playing at once? cause my normal range is 2-4 and I though that was just what thinking was LIKE but CBD brings that down to just 1

[othernaut]

This moment of unwanted depression brought to you by trying to karaoke-practice Steambreather by Mastodon and choking up at the "I'm afraid of myself" part for the actual rest of the song.

I don't know what element of trauma makes the self an object of fear, but it's probably the worst one. To fully succumb is to be fully ridiculous; the exact thing that makes all others laudable. I love you for who you are, but what the fuck am I? Some dipshit, probably.