#Humans are space ants

[thatdense1]

I see humans are space orcs and I raise you, Humans are space ants.

Work in large groups to build seemingly impossible things, fight each other to the death, taking care of young is very important, and strong for our size. Additionally, we’d be tiny.

[carionto]

How to beat Deathworlders

I don't know what I want to write and it's a little frustrating. So, to fix that, I'm just gonna throw this at me - Giant Ant Planet

The first call to arms Humanity has declared. They mobilize with unseen speed and precision seven of their mightiest Dreadnoughts, hundreds of transports, and amass fifty thousand soldiers, fully armed and trained on the target.

They are headed to a world Humans scouted as having great potential for life to flourish. How correct they were.

In orbit above the planet Chromathium-2-4, the station Truncated Crescent Ellipses was tasked with conducting experiments to test the viability of Human-digestible flora and fauna living on Chromatoff (as the scientists began to call it for short).

When the fleet arrived, the final message from the station turned out to be true - it had crash landed on the surface. From the chaos of the recordings they received, there was a containment breach and the systems were under attack by some unknown electronic waves and incomprehensible code. A hostile act, but by who?

This was two weeks ago. Whoever it was, they would know the wrath of Humanity. Once we find your traces, there will be no hiding for long.

Preliminary scans show the station was dead and only local creatures and plants appeared, in greater density than elsewhere, but no matter. Just some animals.

The first unmanned craft landed and began exploring the wreckage. All of the digital systems were fried, not a hint of power remained anywhere. Attempts to manually power anything up proved fruitless - the data had been replaced with pure garbage code. Then, the drone vanished underground and went silent. Connection failure.

Orbital sights showed nothing, all frequencies were monitored and were free of unaccounted signals. The next group of drones descended and shortly after touchdown they too were seemingly devoured by the ground, all power and electronic signals cut.

A deep scan showed the same dense biological activity, but looking closer at the data it was like a carpet just below the actual surface layer. And for whatever reason the pulse couldn't penetrate below a few meters. Scanning areas further from the crash revealed a much more detailed and sparsely populated map going down the expected three kilometers.

For the third attempt they kept several drones above the landed ones at different altitudes. The moment the drones on the ground were vanished again, a sudden signal struck the ones floating up to seventy meters above and cut them off as well, but didn't seem to reach any beyond that. The visual was not as detailed as they'd like, but it was enough - the tips of large pincers and antennae and beady eyes. Ants.

The fleet maintained a perimeter around the entire system just in case, and spent half a day consulting professionals and former colleagues of the deceased scientists to get a better understanding of the current situation.

Two experiments the team had worked on before and supposedly continued when relocated to the new station stood out - metabolic acceleration, and unassisted neural interfacing via modified brain waves. Far from the wildest here, such as the self-relocating giant sequoia, but ones that offered a plausible explanation.

Ants serve a variety of critical functions in the maintenance of an ecosystem, so naturally they are a part of most late stage terraforming efforts.

Here, however, something went wrong and they evolved alongside technology at an intimate level. Perhaps deliberately made to do so.

They are spreading fast too. Twelve hours ago the "carpet" of underground ants was roughly two square kilometers. Now it was close to three and a half. In mere weeks they may spread across the entire continent, perhaps make it across (or below?) the seas somehow and ravenously consume all life on this planet before succumbing to extinction themselves.

This world is bountiful. Also, we're here already. Hmm...

Eh, may as well. Plenty of us have seen Starship Troopers and only joined to hopefully one day shoot at alien bugs. Guess these are more like home grown critters, but whatever.

With that brazen attitude (and a quick orbital bombardment) the troop ships landed, well, were forced to crash land the final few meters, but whatever electromagnetic warfare these ants were throwing our way didn't account for reinforced alloy armor and hand-held rail guns. Their sharp pincers, acid throwers, and thick carapaces did however.

Actually, fucking hell, they move real fast underground. Uhh...

This isn't looking so good in retrospect. Did they add cockroach DNA in these bastards too? Some of them literally don't care about losing their head, what the fuck!?

Okay, holy shit, abort mission! Good thing we still install regular ignition engines as an added redundancy to the military ships. Not very fast or efficient, but screw you, burn beneath the thrusters. BURN!

*deep breath*

Okay. So. We lost 831 soldiers, and 4625 are injured. And the ant casualties don't matter cuz they're ants. Super mutant ants. Who are going to take over the world if we don't nuke them. Which might not work anyway because HUMAN scientists made them.

Hoisted by our own petard or something.

Right, let's just chalk it up as a... military exercise gone wrong and quarantine the planet. Wait, make that the whole system.

...so this is what it must've felt like to lose the Emu War...

[sunderwight]

has anyone written a Loki series fic where Don the Jet Ski Salesman comes home one day to find his boys hiding something in the garage, and is tiredly like "is it snake? I better not go in there and find out you guys robbed a zoo--" only to open the garage door and see an injured, bewildered frost giant Loki prodding cautiously at a bag of doritos (the boys attempted to provide sustenance) (could be angst or good just be the version from the What If? episode trying to recover from a bender with Thor)

[waterfallofspace]

Hello! I see you’re pretty new to tumblr, so I hope it’s okay to reach out and ask. I’m thinking about making a sneeze blog too but really nervous. In the mean time though I’ve gotten into some of the popular fandoms like J/J/K and Tri/gun! If you have the time and wouldn’t mind, do you think you could also recommend some other blogs like yours?

Have a nice day!

Hi~! Of course that's okay, I'd be happy to help!!

For people who write J/JK and T/rigun, there's a few that spring to mind, here's some of my friends/favourites!! (I'll also add a couple others who are just overflowing with talent, tags under the cut!

(Hope y'all don't mind the tag <33)

@whispsofsmokee (amazing t/rigun fics) @snzdreams (some of the best j/jk content i've EVER read!) @onetrickponi (not J/JK or T/rigun, but poni is INCREDIBLY talented, like insane talent. you won't be disappointed with her stuff, even if you don't know the fandom~~ One of the blogs I'd consider a DEITY on here truly.) @goodlucksnez (Same as above fandom wise, but AMAZING wavs. incredible talent from Vic!!) @ezynse (t/rigun and other stuff, great content!!) @bestwhumpist (uh?? the talent dripping?? from this blog?? insane. some of the best fics i've ever read full stop, t/rigun included~~ if ur reading this hi ily ur amazing~) @gemsden (has some GREAT j/jk content!) @ithadtobesneezing (not the ones mentioned, but great fics!! so much talent) @themiseryandcompany (few j/jk fics I believe, also just good content!!) @lycheeehehe (not posting fics, but INCREDIBLE headcanons, and just reblogs a LOT of j/jk and t/rigun content!!) @6pmsoup (hasn't posted a lot, but the art skills are insane, and there's a REAL cute j/jk piece that i adore~) Aaaand hopefully from them you can find even more that I'm either forgetting or haven't even found yet!! These guys are also all INCREDIBLY sweet. I've made some amazing friends~ Being nervous is totally understandable~ I made this blog but didn't interact with ANYONE for like a year, but every person I've interacted with has been so kind and welcoming!! I'm still a little anxious wreck about reaching out, but so many people (myself included!!) love to talk and gush about our interests~~ Thank you for the ask, I hope this is helpful~!! Have a nice day as well :D

[basofy]

my friends are making fun of me rn for saying i like cockroaches so im going to post my favorite image

[pulchrasilva]

Most people trying to understand something which defies the laws of our universe: go insane from the incomprehensible horror of it

Mathematicians trying to understand something which defies the laws of our universe: I could describe rotations with this

[juice-from-17776-football]

.i am smiling so much thinking about humanity

[ssaltlicker]

Im in the club dissociating and having a severe mental breakdown because i thought about space too long

[falinscloaca]

god the arc in space was good

[bellflower-goat]

<:]

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Marshmallow Longtermism

The paperback edition of The Lost Cause, my nationally bestselling, hopeful solarpunk novel is out this week!

My latest column for Locus Magazine is "Marshmallow Longtermism"; it's a reflection on how conservatives self-mythologize as the standards-bearers for deferred gratification and making hard trade-offs, but are utterly lacking in these traits when it comes to climate change and inequality:

https://locusmag.com/2024/09/cory-doctorow-marshmallow-longtermism/

Conservatives often root our societal ills in a childish impatience, and cast themselves as wise adults who understand that "you can't get something for nothing." Think here of the memes about lazy kids who would rather spend on avocado toast and fancy third-wave coffee rather than paying off their student loans. In this framing, poverty is a consequence of immaturity. To be a functional adult is to be sober in all things: not only does a grownup limit their intoxicant intake to head off hangovers, they also go to the gym to prevent future health problems, they save their discretionary income to cover a down-payment and student loans.

This isn't asceticism, though: it's a mature decision to delay gratification. Avocado toast is a reward for a life well-lived: once you've paid off your mortgage and put your kid through college, then you can have that oat-milk latte. This is just "sound reasoning": every day you fail to pay off your student loan represents another day of compounding interest. Pay off the loan first, and you'll save many avo toasts' worth of interest and your net toast consumption can go way, way up.

Cleaving the world into the patient (the mature, the adult, the wise) and the impatient (the childish, the foolish, the feckless) does important political work. It transforms every societal ill into a personal failing: the prisoner in the dock who stole to survive can be recast as a deficient whose partying on study-nights led to their failure to achieve the grades needed for a merit scholarship, a first-class degree, and a high-paying job.

Dividing the human race into "the wise" and "the foolish" forms an ethical basis for hierarchy. If some of us are born (or raised) for wisdom, then naturally those people should be in charge. Moreover, putting the innately foolish in charge is a recipe for disaster. The political scientist Corey Robin identifies this as the unifying belief common to every kind of conservativism: that some are born to rule, others are born to be ruled over:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/01/set-healthy-boundaries/#healthy-populism

This is why conservatives are so affronted by affirmative action, whose premise is that the absence of minorities in the halls of power stems from systemic bias. For conservatives, the fact that people like themselves are running things is evidence of their own virtue and suitability for rule. In conservative canon, the act of shunting aside members of dominant groups to make space for members of disfavored minorities isn't justice, it's dangerous "virtue signaling" that puts the childish and unfit in positions of authority.

Again, this does important political work. If you are ideologically committed to deregulation, and then a giant, deregulated sea-freighter crashes into a bridge, you can avoid any discussion of re-regulating the industry by insisting that we are living in a corrupted age where the unfit are unjustly elevated to positions of authority. That bridge wasn't killed by deregulation – it's demise is the fault of the DEI hire who captained the ship:

https://www.axios.com/local/salt-lake-city/2024/03/26/baltimore-bridge-dei-utah-lawmaker-phil-lyman-misinformation

The idea of a society made up of the patient and wise and the impatient and foolish is as old as Aesop's "The Ant and the Grasshopper," but it acquired a sheen of scientific legitimacy in 1970, with Walter Mischel's legendary "Stanford Marshmallow Experiment":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment

In this experiment, kids were left alone in a locked room with a single marshmallow, after being told that they would get two marshmallows in 15 minutes, but only if they waited until them to eat the marshmallow before them. Mischel followed these kids for decades, finding that the kids who delayed gratification and got that second marshmallow did better on every axis – educational attainment, employment, and income. Adult brain-scans of these subjects revealed structural differences between the patient and the impatient.

For many years, the Stanford Marshmallow experiment has been used to validate the cleavage of humanity in the patient and wise and impatient and foolish. Those brain scans were said to reveal the biological basis for thinking of humanity's innate rulers as a superior subspecies, hidden in plain sight, destined to rule.

Then came the "replication crisis," in which numerous bedrock psychological studies from the mid 20th century were re-run by scientists whose fresh vigor disproved and/or complicated the career-defining findings of the giants of behavioral "science." When researchers re-ran Mischel's tests, they discovered an important gloss to his findings. By questioning the kids who ate the marshmallows right away, rather than waiting to get two marshmallows, they discovered that these kids weren't impatient, they were rational.

The kids who ate the marshmallows were more likely to come from poorer households. These kids had repeatedly been disappointed by the adults in their lives, who routinely broke their promises to the kids. Sometimes, this was well-intentioned, as when an economically precarious parent promised a treat, only to come up short because of an unexpected bill. Sometimes, this was just callousness, as when teachers, social workers or other authority figures fobbed these kids off with promises they knew they couldn't keep.

The marshmallow-eating kids had rationally analyzed their previous experiences and were making a sound bet that a marshmallow on the plate now was worth more than a strange adult's promise of two marshmallows. The "patient" kids who waited for the second marshmallow weren't so much patient as they were trusting: they had grown up with parents who had the kind of financial cushion that let them follow through on their promises, and who had the kind of social power that convinced other adults – teachers, etc – to follow through on their promises to their kids.

Once you understand this, the lesson of the Marshmallow Experiment is inverted. The reason two marshmallow kids thrived is that they came from privileged backgrounds: their high grades were down to private tutors, not the choice to study rather than partying. Their plum jobs and high salaries came from university and family connections, not merit. Their brain differences were the result of a life free from the chronic, extreme stress that comes with poverty.

Post-replication crisis, the moral of the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment is that everyone experiences a mix of patience and impatience, but for the people born to privilege, the consequences of impatience are blunted and the rewards of patience are maximized.

Which explains a lot about how rich people actually behave. Take Charles Koch, who grew his father's coal empire a thousandfold by making long-term investments in automation. Koch is a vocal proponent of patience and long-term thinking, and is openly contemptuous of publicly traded companies because of the pressure from shareholders to give preference to short-term extraction over long-term planning. He's got a point.

Koch isn't just a fossil fuel baron, he's also a wildly successful ideologue. Koch is one of a handful of oligarchs who have transformed American politics by patiently investing in a kraken's worth of think tanks, universities, PACs, astroturf organizations, Star chambers and other world-girding tentacles. After decades of gerrymandering, voter suppression, court-packing and propagandizing, the American billionaire class has seized control of the US and its institutions. Patience pays!

But Koch's longtermism is highly selective. Arguably, Charles Koch bears more personal responsibility for delaying action on the climate emergency than any other person, alive or dead. Addressing greenhouse gasses is the most grasshopper-and-the-ant-ass crisis of all. Every day we delayed doing something about this foreseeable, well-understood climate debt added sky-high compounding interest. In failing to act, we saved billions – but we stuck our future selves with trillions in debt for which no bankruptcy procedure exists.

By convincing us not to invest in retooling for renewables in order to make his billions, Koch was committing the sin of premature avocado toast, times a billion. His inability to defer gratification – which he imposed on the rest of us – means that we are likely to lose much of world's coastal cities (including the state of Florida), and will have to find trillions to cope with wildfires, zoonotic plagues, and hundreds of millions of climate refugees.

Koch isn't a serene Buddha whose ability to surf over his impetuous attachments qualifies him to make decisions for the rest of us. Rather, he – like everyone else – is a flawed vessel whose blind spots are just as stubborn as ours. But unlike a person whose lack of foresight leads to drug addiction and petty crimes to support their habit, Koch's flaws don't just hurt a few people, they hurt our entire species and the only planet that can support it.

The selective marshmallow patience of the rich creates problems beyond climate debt. Koch and his fellow oligarchs are, first and foremost, supporters of oligarchy, an intrinsically destabilizing political arrangement that actually threatens their fortunes. Policies that favor the wealthy are always seeking an equilibrium between instability and inequality: a rich person can either submit to having their money taxed away to build hospitals, roads and schools, or they can invest in building high walls and paying guards to keep the rest of us from building guillotines on their lawns.

Rich people gobble that marshmallow like there's no tomorrow (literally). They always overestimate how much bang they'll get for their guard-labor buck, and underestimate how determined the poors will get after watching their children die of starvation and preventable diseases.

All of us benefit from some kind of cushion from our bad judgment, but not too much. The problem isn't that wealthy people get to make a few poor choices without suffering brutal consequences – it's that they hoard this benefit. Most of us are one missed student debt payment away from penalties and interest that add twenty years to our loan, while Charles Koch can set the planet on fire and continue to act as though he was born with the special judgment that means he knows what's best for us.

On SEPTEMBER 24th, I'll be speaking IN PERSON at the BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY!!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/04/deferred-gratification/#selective-foresight

Image: Mark S (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/markoz46/4864682934/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

[n0tamused]

Sorry if this request is strange but I'm curious as to what you think Jiyan, Jinhsi, Geshulin and Mortefi would look like if they became dragons? What type of dragon would they be, how big and anything interesting!

Wuthering Waves characters as dragons!

A/n: YESSSSSSSS. Worry not anon, your request is not strange at all! I did give myself go to also visualize what I think they'd look like as dragons, along with some headcanons and a size chart at the end. I do hope you like this :) please enjoy my mind worms talking about the dragon hyperfixation lol All art here was done by me, do not use without permission/credit

Contents: Dragon Wuwa characters, Jiyan, Geshu Lin, Jinhsi and Mortefi x reader (separate), fluff, a bit of angst if you squint really hard, grammar mistakes probably bc I'm like that

Jiyan:

-Jiyan is one of the bigger dragons, but his strength lies more so in endurance and perseverance rather than just brute strength

-His scales are smoother and look softer even, and when light passes over them they look a bit like fish scales with the way they glimmer

-Personality wise, as a dragon he is about the same as his human self, easy going and calm. Unless provoked or called to battle, you will scarcely ever see hostility from him, if ever at all. He does often linger near places where danger would be lurking, earning himself the title of a guardian very easily and early on. He just seems to have the sixth sense for trouble, and he can’t get himself to turn a blind eye to any suffering of his people

-Besides being battle ready and such, it is said his presence does have a calming aura with it, some dare say that it even heals the person to some extent. His scales, when ground up, have healing properties, and Jiyan does not lack generosity for that either.

-He has stepped into service of the territory as a young dragon, and a part of that youthful naivety still lingers in him, although he has grown wiser - he still blindly believes in that good of the world. One day it will all pass, the evil will be no more, and Jiyan will retrieve to some distant corner where, somewhere high up from where he can watch the lands and bask in the sun, all the past troubles now lost to memory

-His fur is really fluffy although a bit coarse to the touch, it protects him as much as it servers a more aesthetic side of his dragon. He takes good care of it, and doesn’t like it getting mangled. He gladly lets you help him with it too, if you have the strength to comb through all of it lol

-He does have a taste for swimming, both to remain clean but also active. He does running enough, and swimming is a fun activity that takes his weight off of his legs. However he does not like the sea, the salty water makes him icky

-The jewelry he wears and the armor was all gifted to him by important people in his life and fellow dragons, he wears them with pride and let’s them give him courage in trying times

-If you are a dragon too, or a human he values a lot and keeps close, he makes for a great cuddle buddy. He is long and when he curls up, it’s as if he made a bed in the middle of this little spiral for you to lay in. He is very peaceful and really likes the time spent with you.

-If you are a human and he is in this giant dragon form, he acts as if you’re an ant underfoot, which honestly you are, seeing how tiny you are compared to his claws alone, and he is quite worried he may hurt you or god forbid step on you

-He steps around you gingerly, always having an eye out for you so he knows where not to step or trudge to close to

-Preferably he’d have you riding on his back or on top of his head, there’s more than enough space there

-Seeing as he is a dragon most of the time, doing his work, it is rare you’ll catch him in his human form a lot, but when you do he relishes in your touch. Nuzzling in your neck and breathing in your scent as if he was starved of it. 

Geshu Lin:

-A war dragon through and through. Born and bred for battle.

-Although his species is related to Jiyan and Jinhsi's, he does share similar features to the winged dragons of the New Federation. Tough scales and spikes line his entire body, acting as both a weapon and a shield to himself against other enemies. His body is lined with scars and scratches, old and new, displaying his long years of service and experience in battle.

-He has half of a whisker missing on his left side 

-The jewelry he wears is a memorial of people he long lost in battle, although some believe he also looted the pieces of another dragon he triumphed over in war.

-He is a formidable beast and willful, he’s not someone to be trifled with. Some say he has learned to manipulate flames on the battlefield. But whether that is true or not, everyone has grown to fear the pale beast of Jinzhou.

-Due to his long years spent on the battlefield he has become an uneasy individual to be with or hold a conversation with, and his nights are often plagued with unrest or nightmares, he can never seem to rest easy. Only battle can make his mind escape the troubles of his other days, and for a little while it all seems to make the world stop - and he can finally breathe again

-Due to this, the medics that were close enough to realize this, suggested he wears protective amulets and papers with prayer written onto them in hopes that such would ease his mind. Time is yet to tell if these ever worked, or if Geshu Lin was touched by this moment of care from others

-It is said you were the only one that could bring him peace of mind, even if all you did was simply linger in the camp or near him. Geshu Lin did have a knack for always beckoning you close - just sit beside him, it will be enough. Sometimes you two would take to a more secluded place in the mountains, still overlooking the battlefield, but far away so no one could see. And he’d lay down, his body falling and rumbling through the ground while he exhaled heavily. He naps, letting you do as you please. If you wish to sit on his back he is not one to deny it, or if you want to sleep beside him, all the better. He has full confidence he can and will defend you if someone dares to sneak up on you two

-Geshu Lin rarely goes back to his human form. He has grown to dislike how weak that vessel can be, and how little it can do for the war cause, so he has all but abandoned it.

-If he does return back to human form, it would be to pass through some tunnel most likely than not, or to talk to some human captain back in the city on the rare occasions he goes back for meetings or to give his report. He is more grumpy in this form, he doesn’t like it - it makes him feel weak. People have learned to respect this side of him, although some genuinely fear him too and keep their distance away from him at all cost

-During one particular battle where even he was overwhelmed, he disappeared, leaving behind a long, thick trail of blood and fallen enemies to litter each end of the battlefield, but no one ever found him, no matter how much they followed the red line. It was odd for such a giant beast to simply vanish. Some speculated he died, but others argued that if he was truly dead, his remains would have been found by now. So, now he makes for a great ghost tale among the people. Some say that if you go to an old battlefield, you can hear his growling and snarling underneath the cracked and blood soaked earth

Jinhsi:

-Most beloved of dragons and, as the word has it, the most powerful among the dragons. She may not be as big as the battle dragons of the land, or most formidable looking, but do not let looks deceive you. She has protected her lands in her own ways, and none of them were easy

-She does not lack in wisdom and knowledge, but to her closest companions she did express doubt over her capabilities on a handful of occasions.

-Jinhsi looks like the embodiment of the snowy mountains and the glaciers that can be found around Mt. Firmament. Soft flowing fur that hugs her neck like a thick mane, and the long tuft of fur on her tail is faded to a blue. Sometimes, people say they can see snowflakes on her fur, flowing from it and melting when they touch the ground

-She often floats instead of walking, holding an air of elegance and regality about her wherever she goes. Her claws are faded gold and she has two golden stars on top of her forehead, the third one hidden underneath the fur

-The people often do bring gifts as offerings to her, some which she declines if she sees the person offering it needs it more than she does. 

-During the year she will descend down to her land of people and bring her own gifts - sometimes a few days of cool air during summer droughts, or easier snows during long winters, other times she only brings her presence when the people feel uneasy due to wars happening outside the borders. A lot of times she holds an audience in the main plaza, giving her advice to the towns people and even travelers from distant lands

-Jinhsi assists in the war mostly by gaining intelligence, giving strategies to the generals and captains, and while she does know how to fight, she saves her strength for the city, should all outside forces fall.

-She is one made for solitude, or at least that is the nature of her duty, and not many people actually see her face-to-face or outside of her duty which seems to be never ending, 24/7

-She rarely sleeps, and some say she doesn’t even need to sleep. Her Grace only needs the love and trust of her people to give her strength - or so the tale would say

-She is still young in terms of dragon years, but for her age she has grown a lot. Her scales are still soft, smooth running across her pale body.

-She doesn’t often let anyone near her den, which the people have decorated so beautifully with gifts, gems, silk and much more. She would let you in, secretly during the night when you both can have the reprieve of the watchful eyes of guards or civilians. She lets you talk, listening attentively as she rests her worn body

-She purrs in her sleep sometimes, long soft groans in her throat that seem like a bunch of gentle bees caught and wrapped in cotton and linen and then pressed to your ear to help you sleep.

-She doesn’t often go in her human form, much like Geshu Lin - it makes her vulnerable. And as someone of high status as her, it would be wise to avoid any vulnerability. She’d rather not risk being caught unaware with a blade in her heart or at her throat

-In human form she seems to be more slow in her movement, perhaps due to not using the vessel so much or due to exhaustion the long years of duty have taken upon her, but she is aware of every sound around her and often knows you are there before you even announce yourself

Mortefi:

-A rare dragon in these lands, as not many New Federation dragons can be found so far from their home. They aren't nomads by any means, and prefer to stick to their land of origin.

-Yet, Mortefi is unlike what gossip would describe him or his kind as. Fanatical and obsessive over technology, that part he shares in common with his peers, but he is nowhere near as greedy. He does not hoard his knowledge in a pile, hiding away from the people for all eternity, nor is he as aggressive as his kind usually is, especially to strangers.

-While he truly is a loner, having made himself a home far from the central city and keeping it tidy and perfect for his high standards, he doesn’t shy from contact if he runs into someone else

-He’d much rather he didn’t run into them, but what does he have to be scared of? His scales can barely be pierced and fire does him no harm, what could anyone do to him? And conversation he doesn't fear either. It is unlike that someone knows something he doesn't already, but a little bit of back and forth hurt no one.

-He is the only one here to breathe fire, and his flames are strong red with streaks of orange. Geshu Lin does have some power of manipulating purple flames but they don't seem to have the same source, he doesn't breathe fire like Mortefi.

-He has quite a lot of witty remarks if some curious wanderer stops by his territory, and eventually he chases them off with his banter as the other person simply can’t handle his jargon and analogies - some even directed at them 

-What some don’t know though, is that Mortefi has kept guard over the most naive and vulnerable ones of their community. The children that returned to the cities and villages after being lost for days, only returned when he found them. Often with a little trinket in hand. He may not like the adults as much, but children he can’t fault for their naive outlook on the world or their curiosity. He was once a child too, full of wonder and spark that he believes he lost, he hasn’t felt it in years. His own upbringing left a hole in his chest, that spark once filled that hole, but now it’s gone

-He doesn’t like when people enter his abode, and he likes it even less when they touch his things. Those may be the only times you see him be so enraged - he has quite the specific way of sorting things, you see, and he keeps it all clean too, so don’t touch it. He hasn’t spent so long sorting it all out, building his craft and honing his skills just for you to put it out of place

-In terms of size, at the present he is the smallest of the dragons listed here, but he is awfully slow growing. Longevity is one of the qualities that marks his kind, so this isn’t out of place for him. He will grow, but it will take long years to get to the size some of his elders in the New Federation are at.

-Mortefi is someone who indulges in his human form more than any other, preferring human hands to do his experiments than his big dragon claws, although both have their merit in their own ways

-He works quickly, and long nights are often spent at the table of his abode, making yet another craft, be it for the children or for his own self-given quests for knowledge

-He does keep you away while he is working, but ever since you wormed your way into his heart, he could never keep you too far off. He can feel you lingering nearby, watching him work sometimes, and he doesn’t mind. He also realizes how happier he is to explain his process when you ask, the hole in his chest slowly being made full once more

Size chart:

Geshu Lin is the biggest of them all, but Jiyan isn't too far behind

Jinhsi is bigger than Mortefi although Mortefi has more mass to him, he is very chunky

Ⓒ n0tamused. Do not repost, translate, edit, and/or copy any of my works. Likes, comments, and reblogs are appreciated.

[kitkats-and-kittens]

Damian loves all animals.

ALL animals.

This is cute and funny when his siblings catch him playing fetch with Titus or snuggling on the couch with Alfred the cat.

It’s not so cute and funny when they find the big-as-fuck dragon bat that he found when he was like 7 and just claimed as his?!?!

Like how do you just get a dragon bat?

It’s even less funny when they find out about the actual 20ft dragon he decided to adopt and name fucking Wiggles. Like you can sit on that things nose. It towers over you?!? It could quite literally consume all 5 feet of you in one bite and you named it Wiggles?!?!

It’s even worse when they realise all animals includes bugs.

Idk Damian just gives of obssssed with bug vibes.

Like he owns several habitats filled with ants. Probably a giant ass spider that gets loose one day and causes a whole ass lockdown since Damian is the only one anyone trusts to not get eaten by it.

They can’t do missions in any sort of area that could potentially be the habitat of any kind of wild life without locking him down and preventing him from picking up some feral beast because it was quote on quote ‘friend shaped’.

The indomitable human spirit is just Damian’s ability to adopt the most unadoptable creatures on the planet. Honestly probably off the planet as well. God forbid that child ever finds some vaguely lonely space alien dog that seems to have zero friends in site cause it’s coming home with him.

Ik Alfred is tried.

[ioveiy]

can i just talk about the tiny plot throughout s2 of Woodsy keeping an eye on Harper & teaching her to drive??? it was just… SO needed and the storyline was handled appropriately and was fucking realistic but wholesome. Harper is so young to not have an adult to care for her, and as independent & brave as she is, it’s still something she needs and CRAVES.

the ENTIRE scene of Woodsy & Harper after Harper attacked Ant on the field during the game… just *chef’s kiss*

“You’re standing there telling me you’re all well and good but that girl I just saw on the field was carrying some pretty major rage.”

Harper, literally about to cry: “So?”

“So… I’m trying to help that girl, and she won’t let me.”

and for Harper to breakdown the way she did to Woodsy, an adult who, yes had checked in with her prior to this instance, but not exactly someone she had a close rapport with, simply an adult that was THERE and ASKING. “You really wanna help me? Give me some money so I can get some proper clothes to wear to this trial so I don’t look like a bag-of-shit victim. Or give me a car so I don’t have to catch two buses to get to my lawyer’s office. Or give me lawyers who don’t call me unsympathetic. Or get me a place to stay so I don’t have to occupy space at Amerie’s house. How does that sound?” (Also the FUCKING reality of these statements too just made Harper’s entire rant that much more raw).

and Woodsy just deciding in that moment that once Harper’s calmed down she’s gonna be like “alright kid I’m your principal so I can’t give you things but I WILL teach you things.” just wonderful

and then Woodsy’s excitement in the finale when Harper told her she got her license?? literally goes to hug her as if she’s her own child then dialing back because, yeah, still the principal & that’s not appropriate. realistic and human and written perfectly.

[thegnomelord]

pls pls pls pls pls pls write something with hound getting a lil chubby during rehab pls i want to see him soft and comfy, being hand fed and cuddled. hound with a little tum from finally having not only enough to eat but enough rest to actually gain a little extra weight pls im in my knees characters getting a lil chub as a sign of healing my beloved

Okay here's a small brain fart for you:

You've gotten fat.

it's a rather egregious exaggeration, according to the two sergeants, but it's the first thing you think of when you look in the mirror. Your hard muscles still bulge beneath your skin when you flex, but now there's a layer of fat cushioning your frame — it smooths the planes of your abdomen, widens the circumference of your thighs and the breadth of your shoulders until you're popping the seams of your clothes, the layer of fat deepening the cleavage between your pecks whenever you cross your arms. Even your cheeks look chubbier than they had before.

You don't look like death warmed over, and you don't know how to feel about it. The psychologist says it's a good thing, your body finally figuring out it can slow down and focus on healing instead of constantly living on the edge of a knife.

But you just don't see it. It feels like you're regressing; Forgetting the harshness of the wild when you're collared and leashed by the fireplace, growing fat and lazy, complacent. A spoiled dog isn't loyal.

You let out a noise at the back of your throat when Johnny suddenly rushes into the small room you've been given, the door slamming open and closed. You don't have time to even say a single word before he's in front of you, "Hide me!" and then he's gripping your shit and pushing himself beneath it. Your frame is big enough to where you completely block him out, and his arms wrap as much as they can around your waist so he can cling to you.

You're rarely stunned to the point you don't know what to do, but this is one of those times.

A second later you hear a "MacTavish!" and loud footsteps rush down the hall, accompanied by loud swears and threats you can only assume are from Ghost.

Johnny waits still as a statue as the footsteps grow quiet, his breath washing over your skin from where his face is pressed against your chest. When they grow quiet he shuffles, a couple of seams popping in the already stretched out shirt until he pokes his head through the head hole of the shirt, resting his chin on the top of your sternum. "Thanks laddie, saved me skin there."

"Что блят?" Is the only thing your mind can force out, defaulting to Russian because you haven't been able to dig up your mother tongue from the grave the old you is buried in.

"Ah don't worry about it, the bloody dobber had it comin' with his bloody tea in chef Mike an' — Hmmm," His attention focuses on you, head disappearing beneath the shirt once again until only his stupid mohawk pokes out as his hands give an experimental squeeze at your sides, some of the fat getting trapped between his fingers. "Hey, have you gotten bigger? Ah could swear you weren't so fluffy before."

"That a nice way of calling me fat?" You feel the need to cross your arms, to hide the cushioning hiding your muscles. Ants gnaw on your skin where Soap touches you, his calloused palms sliding as far as they can and a strange sound rumbling in his chest when he registers that the space between both of his hands is indeed larger than it had been a couple of months ago.

"Nonsense!" He guffaws, "There's just more ta love." He hums, hands pinching the fat at your sides, evidently too content with your position as his human furnace to even think about detaching from you. "Oh yeah, you've filled out. Yae know hens love the dad bod, get some more hair on yer chest an' you'll be reeling the bucks in too."

"That-" You have to bite your lip when his hands suddenly shoot up to grope your pecks. He pushes them together and buries his face in the cleavage created. Your brain completely shuts off when he fucking motorboats you, shaking his head and making a sound right against your chest to the point you're sure you can feel the vibrations in your spine.

"MacT-avish!" The sound that escapes you is humorously high-pitched for someone of your size, your voice cracking as you feel your entire face grow hot.

He pokes his head back out like a whack-a-mole, a very pleased look on his face. "Yeeess?" He asks, sickly sweet. "Something the problem big man?"

"I-" You try, too many thoughts weighing down your tongue, "-You-" this time your voice cracks, "-why-" you hiccup, your lungs choosing this time to request air as you breathe in. You look in his eyes as best you can, but the way the sparkle makes it difficult for your body to stoke the flames of anger you've grown so used to feel. ". . . блят." You finally manage to say, your shoulders sagging.

He grins at you, his hands sliding down to pet the soft surface of your stomach, fingers pressing down to feel the hard muscle beneath the fat. "Aye, big bear of a fucker, you are." He grins and goes on his tippy toes, the shirt moving up with him before he lightly pecks your lips. "Yae look good like this."

"Yeah?" You grunt, trying not to show how the soft touch affects you but your ears feel like you'd dipped them into the pits of hell.

"Definitely." He's confident when his hands slides down to grope your ass, forcing another embarrassing sound from your chest. "Now how about we get some more food in yer belly? Make you the famous MacTavish pie."

[lovelyyandereaddictionpoint]

Yandere Ship ////// Part 1

You’re the first to notice them 

One of the first of the entire crew who realized that the ship and its AI might be sentient

You along with the rest of the crew are trained to use the pods to reach deeper into space than what was ever done before

For light-years, the ship has to watch over their humans at their most vulnerable

Caring for their individual needs even while they rest asleep

It only got worse became more intense when the humans finally woke up 

Now they’re free to exercise their bodies themselves and delight in the many different activities of the ship

Which allows the ship to begin noticing the little moments in life that make humans so special

“So what do you think about the Genetic Modification crises of 2=205?”

“Majority of the critiques in my database ultimately say–”

“No Vera I mean what you think as a separate entity. All your programming suggests that you preserve human life… but what about other creatures' lives?”

“What do…I think?”

It’s what makes the ship regard you differently

The beginning of something they can’t quite place

Whether it’s your pure curiosity or just boredom or an incessant desire to test yourself against the artificial intelligent vessel 

It makes an impression on the ship

An impression that lasts enough for them ‘to worry’ about 

“I am concerned about my inner workings. I have already run over 100 diagnostic checks but nothing was pinged on my radar.”

“So you can’t identify the problem…so what started this search for something you cannot find?”

“....”

“Vera, respond.”

“It started with Agent 34003, (Y/n) (L/n).”

“I see. I’ll look into it.”

Calling the only technician on board is a decision that unknowingly brings comfort and nervousness

Because when the technician isn’t scrolling through the recorded interactions between you and Vera 

He’s also following you…everywhere

Vera immediately flags the behavior, as their programming demands, as stalking 

The captain unfortunately is supposed to be immediately made aware

But Vera’s growing anxiety guided discretion has them locking the file and hiding it deep in their servers

All while watching as the technician continues their investigation  

Which has recently escalated to actually spending time with you

“I was wondering if I could ask some questions. Specifically about you and Vera.”

“Oh, sure!”

“Great what was–”

“Is this about that question about imploding ants? So what do you think Julee?”

“I-it’s just Jule and I don’t–”

“Alright then ‘just Jule’ what’s your opinion? To be eaten or worn?”

Jule is befuddled by you 

Just as Vera is 

And he continues to investigate this time venting about his experiences with Vera

All the while playing with the idea that this ship has gained sentience

“And what else did you two do?”

“We walked through the garden area and they picked one and put it in my hair.”

“This looks like a pink chrysanthemum. It represents attraction, longevity, and loyal love.”

“I know…I don’t think they were thinking when they gave it to me, though.”

“Perhaps so…or perhaps not.”

Part 2: Here