#Augh. Idk. Robot ages are WEIRD

[softichill]

My two cents on the mephone age thing (some ii16 spoilers below)

I think mephone4 is a kid in the sense that he's still kind of learning about the world around him and gaining life experience as he goes. Along with this, Brian Koch at some point said that they have mephone make typos sometimes bc they see it as him still being young. So calling mephone not an adult is still a fairly accurate claim

HOWEVER. I don't think it's meant to be a one-to-one comparison. Being a robot made by a creator and being a child with a parent are not exactly the same, even if there is a sort of parent-child dynamic. Mephone is inexperienced, yes, but he was pre-programmed with a good handle on language, motor control, and an adult voice. We do see Cobs constantly referring to him as a kid during his monologue, but cmon, it's Cobs. He's told half-truths before and often tries to twist words against mephone. He could easily be trying to play it up to turn the final 2 against him.

I think the big thing that's causing a lot of confusion here is knowledge vs. life experience. Mephone certainly wasn't a toddler when he started II, even if he was only a year old chronologically. He had the KNOWLEDGE he was made with help him with successfully run challenges. However, he still has the LIFE EXPERIENCE of a 14-year-old. I.e. you can read about camping all you want before trying it for the first time, but when you actually go out camping you realize it's completely different to actually experience it yourself.

Idk I'm not good at these kinds of posts. In short, I don't see mephone4 as someone fitting for the title 'minor', but he's definitely young + immature and saying he's strictly an adult doesn't feel quite right either.

[dxppercxdxver]

tagged by @chiropteracupola!! we will See how many books i can for real remember

rules: list ten books that have stayed with you in some way, don’t take but a few minutes, and don’t think too hard - they don’t have to be the “right” or “great” works, just the ones that have touched you.

1. The Rook - Daniel O’Malley: OUGHHH favorite book of all time and i’m not at All exaggerating. it is the pinnacle of literature to me, with a great balance of humor and drama and mystery and the supernatural and also the main character is sooooooooo. i cannot describe how insane in the head she makes me

2. Feel the Fear - Lauren Child: technically the Entire ruby redfort series lives in my brain rent free but the fourth one in particular ticks Every box to me. vintage cinema. circus performers. poetry. actual Lasting Consequences Of Trauma in a main character. skateboarding? idk it’s so fucking good and i think about it constantly

3. There, There - Tommy Orange: we had to read this for ap lit my senior year and i genuinely think about it So often its prose is so evocative and good to the brain and it Evokes such physicality and the turns of phrase are so cool and also it’s a really well structured story that’s clever and complicated (fun) and makes your heart hurt and i genuinely recommend it all the time

4. A Study in Scarlet - Arthur Conan Doyle: i feel like this one iiiiis self explanatory but also!! the platonic ideal of holmes and watson To Me!!! exuberant and young and jittery and two steps from shaking themselves apart and so full of love and adoration for each other!!!!! AUGH!!!!!

(and here is when i start forgetting books)

5. The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys: California - Gerard Way, Shaun Simon, & Becky Cloonan: comics of break your brain forever n ever n ever. full of sadness and beautiful art and lesbian robots and a Kitty (big kitty baby kitty evil kitty <3)

6. Animorphs - K. A. Applegate: books that i think about aaaaaall the time in some way because i love Meat in my sci-fi (y’all remember the allergic reaction to crocodile dna? because I DO)

7. The Wolf and the Watchman - Niklas Natt Och Dag: y’know what fuck it cecil winge and mickel cardell got real in my brain earlier this year so they get to join the list. due to there’s MEAT and DETECTIVES and PALPABLE HOMOEROTICISM (my best friends weird detective guys ough augh)

8. It Devours! - Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor: noticing a theme here in that there is also Meat in this one. but also the story of something far bigger than you could ever comprehend Coming For You and the quiet dread of keeping something from your partner and carrying the burden alone and also sometimes relationships Don’t Work and that’s Fine (and also there is a massive worm)

9. Lord of the Flies - William Golding: another school read! me n my friends went Real Weird about this book at the ripe old age of thirteen. don’t remember much of it now other than Jack The Chorus Boy but i do remember having big feelings about it then

10. Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson: for a Wildly different reason than em, because i don’t remember. anything? about it? read it for school when i was eleven or twelve and promptly lost all memory of the entire story BUT. i built a model ship for it for my final project and i think that jumpstarted the current Big Boat Feelings that i have some eight or nine years ago

tagging: @nico-demons, @firstmatedville, @wilhelmina-murray-harker, @natdrinkstea, and @haijinks :)

[fates-theysband]

2, 3, 9, & 16 ~ rebeccaselfships

@rebeccaselfships thank you!! i'm gonna answer this for my neoscum s/i rigoletto bc i need to flesh them out some more.

2. when in canon does your self insert come in? do you have a scene in mind for your entrance?

i am actually not sure of the "when" part of their appearance, like i'm constantly waffling between like "i think it'd make the most sense for them to join up during the denver arc but i don't want them to come off as some sort of replacement goldfish for max in terms of skills since they're a technomancer like he is and also i want them to be able to meet max and rhon and lala in person but any earlier than denver feels like it wouldn't offer many organic chances for the scum to meet them but AUGH"

so the "when" is undecided but everything else i've kind of figured out. basically their decker alias and mmo username are the same name (realistically a terrible idea but i never said they were smart) and it comes up on a matrix perception check z does on something (what exactly that thing is depends on when i want to write them in) and he's like "Is That My Fucking Dragonstorm Guildmate. because if it is they're in trouble and also have information" so he reaches out to them through game chat and finds out they actually live in the area so the team makes arrangements to meet them. and the five of them pass a very pleasant visit until, this series being what it is, shit gets real and rig has to flee with the scum and is like "shit i don't have anywhere else to go here, i have family in [City That's Nearby But Not Too Nearby], can I stick with you until we get there?" and they agree and by the time they get to that city rig doesn't want to leave and the rest of the scum don't want them to leave either.

3. how do the other characters generally feel about your self insert?

rig did not get out much during the events of the series and kind of has to fight not to clam up in social situations (especially awkward or tense ones, which with the neoscum around is every social situation) so a lot of less plot relevant npcs think they're weird. like if you interviewed an npc that spoke to the neoscum after rigoletto joined the party they'd be like "yeah there was some big burly guy with cat eyes who wouldn't shut up about his truck, some dude in a wizard costume drinking out of a huge fast food drink cup full of neo-raising cane's sauce, a guy with a fucked-up eye who kept trying to convince me he was a robot, a girl who asked me for candy and then tried to steal my wallet, and also some weirdo with a stitched-up face petting this fuzzy purple worm thing wrapped around their shoulders and looking at me like a fuckin tbh creature" (all of those canon character descriptions are based on things the party has actually done, albeit not at the same time usually)

people they have not majorly clammed up around (so either guest characters or friends of the scum) see them as being more of a very friendly person who is several years out of practice interacting with other people.

9. who are your self insert’s closest friends?

they were really Close Good Friends with the neoscum after they joined the party, even before they officially Got With dak, tech, and z. pox is like the little sister they never had, and idk if max is actually going to rejoin the party but i feel like they'd be close to him in sort of a mentorly way because he's like. only very recently realized that his abilities are actually rare and not everyone has "brain internet" so i feel like they immediately try to be the role model to him they wish they'd had at his age. also due to them and lala being metamours the two of them have some opportunities to interact with each other and they become good friends too.

16. freebie! name a fact about your self insert you want everyone to know.

they would like to build more robotic animals that look like large living versions of Funny Meme Toys.