#I LOVE THESES ONES THEY'RE SO FUCKING COOL

[rjalker]

(Just a PSA if you are going to pick up bugs like this, make sure there's nothing on your hands that could hurt them!)

*ANGRY BEETLE NOISES*

context: I rolled a log over and found a group of passalids (Odontotaenius disjunctus) so i put them in my hand to take pics. Then I noticed another one on the other side of the log, but that one must’ve been from a different colony because they did not get along

(Virginia, 10/15/21)

[purpleturtle9000]

*rolls in on a segue with frog stickers and cookies*

The purple ones like to give gifts to show affection sometimes, right? How does that translate to each other? How do they bond are there hijinks are there Conversations™️? I assume they aren’t as affectionate as the blues but also I would love to be disproven via “unconventional affection” (gentle biting and the like) bc you showed that Tello at least does that to Leonardo (which was amazing and I keep going back to reread that specific post)

Anyways

Farewell for now friend(?) enjoy the stickers and cookies ✨

YES HI HELLO FRIEND

you are not prepared for the amount of purple nonsense I have to talk about I promise

Purple ones do like to give gifts! They're like reverse raccoons, where they show up in the middle of the night to give you things instead of steal them. (Usually. There's been some theft when something looks particularly cool and science-able. There's also been a lot of apology pizzas.)

The complication to this is that Donnie likes giving sciencey gifts, and his brothers are not what you might call 'appreciative of the finer things in life'. Donnie's the only one excited about Splinter bringing home an anemometer, y'know? So it's not like he can gift weather instruments to the dum-dums he lives with. Sadly.

And then Tello shows up, after sixteen MORE years of being a huge damn nerd (affectionate). They remember their home laboratory very fondly, even if they also remember it as being pretty rudimentary. Donnie objects to this descriptor until he sees what Tello can do and then promptly shuts his mouth.

Despite being much more advanced in their scientific knowledge and mystic abilities, Tello wants to see everything in Donnie's lab. It's been a while since they've had a place so well-stocked, what with the end of the world and all. And it's not like the rest of the family is going to be nearly as interested in what's going on, so there's maaaybe a little bit of Tello that wants to give Donnie some more of that sweet, sweet validation from a parent-aged adult.

The rest of the turtles just find it weird that the purples are over here getting each other scientific instruments and printed-out doctorate theses for their birthdays, but whatever. The purples have always been weird to them and that's never gonna change.

There's also fun things like LEGO sets. They spend three days putting together the ISS set and watching various horror movies like Alien. Donnie is allowed to keep all the sets and has a display case in his lab that is better protected than most bank vaults. The purples are the only ones allowed in there even though Leo keeps trying to get in to see what they've been working on.

Also Tello takes Donnie to museums at night! It's not hard for them to fix things with the security systems so nobody sees the turtles running around. They have a great time and Tello will never tell anyone that Donnie gets emotional over that one display with the fossilised turtle eggs.

Donnie is also the only one allowed to handle Tello's prosthetics. I mean, the others can touch them, but nobody else is allowed to work on them. Tello teaches Donnie a lot and Donnie is very careful with everything he does. He's also the one who comes up with the pattern that Tello eventually has on their arm! And he builds a new pair of goggles for Tello cause theirs is kinda busted up.

And I'm in charge of canon now so SHELLDON LIVED DAMN IT. He was never rebuilt before the apocalypse started, in the bad timeline, but Donnie rebuilds him in the good timeline. This is the one thing that Tello doesn't help with because they're too nervous about messing up. But when Shelldon is put back together again, and he and Donnie have had their reunion, Donnie brings him to Tello immediately. There's a lot of crying.

There are SO many hijinks. They get up to so much trouble together, truly they make each other worse. Leo starts a prank war once and the purples fucking finish it. Nobody else gets involved, as Leo is left to his fate even by Leonardo. He remembers The Great War Of 2028. Nobody will say exactly what happened but accusations are made.

And if anyone bothers Donnie, Tello will be there with a ridiculously sized knife in .02 seconds. Don't mess with little purple cause the big one is unhinged. They've threatened everyone but Casey Jr at some point, Jr just gets removed, usually picked up by the ankle by one of Tello's metal battle shell arms, with him giggling all the way.

The purples being bonded does make missions much more dangerous for the bad guys. Or rather, it did. Tello is officially banned from going on any missions that aren't life-or-death, because the second the young twins or Jr are in danger, Tello will make it life-or-death. Donnie doesn't see this as a problem, but everyone else does.

Conversations, on the other hand, don't happen much. At least not ones about emotions or the future. Tello's had enough of that shit and there's a lot of memories that they'd rather not revisit. Even apart from all their own trauma, what with losing two legs and an arm and a chunk of their shell, Red's death in particular hit them very hard.

Fortunately they always have Science! And Donnie's got a little bit of hero worship with how advanced Tello's stuff is. Sometimes they ask each other for advice on things. They're both unusually polite about it, in that they don't just jump in to fix the thing, and instead work together. Sometimes for 37 hours straight at a time.

Neither of the blues are very pleased with them for that. Neither of the purples care very much. Unfortunately Leo is too small to pick up either of them, and they all know from experience that Donnie will bitch him out if he tries while on crutches with a cracked shell. Tello does not yell. Tello is very quiet, while staring very intently, with a disappointed expression. Somehow that's much worse to the blues.

Tello scares Leonardo sometimes but that's not going to stop him from dropping by to kidnap Donnie to get him to sleep. Usually Tello is pretty good at realising when the two of them have been awake too long, and will get Donnie to bed. Sometimes the nerd things are just too important and Leonardo's gotta step in. Tello is nice enough to check what time it is before reacting, but if it hasn't been at least twelve hours, Leonardo is in danger. Nobody's helping him escape, he knew the risks.

Unconventional affection is so much a thing. There's been literally countless times where someone walks in on Donnie biting at Tello's arm cause Tello puts a wrap over their metal arm and Donnie can just. Chomp to his heart's content. They both think it's hilarious and they're right tbh I support them.

Headbutts are affection I said what I said. Usually it's like when a cat gently headbonks you to show affection, but also sometimes there's a lil bit of Violence in there. The others don't get involved in that, they've got enough bite marks from previous interferences in purple bonding.

Also, Tello reties Donnie's mask tails for him when one starts slipping loose. They don't let Donnie do that for them, something something shell trauma, something something if you surprise them from behind you're gonna have to go to the hospital. Donnie doesn't have all the details on that but he doesn't push them about it. He gets touchy enough about his brothers touching his uninjured shell.

Donnie is allowed to touch Tello's hair, however! They'll sit side by side and Donnie will braid it for them sometimes. Tello usually doesn't braid it themself because strands have a habit of getting wrapped in the joints of their metal fingers and that's just a hassle. But it's also calming for them to have someone working on their hair, so even though they never say they're stressed, Donnie knows the signs and always makes time for them when they need it.

This is something that originated in the bayrise fic and got carried over to wify cause I love it. When one or the both of them are having a no-touching day, they'll bow to each other in greeting! Only time they reliably use their manners, and the reds are lowkey tired of them not having manners any other time, but also the reds think it's adorable. They don't say that cause they don't wanna get hurt.

Hugs and cuddles are not so much a thing for them. Donnie is particular about when he lets people touch him, and Tello's ten times worse. They get a little better about it eventually, but it's not like they can synchronise the days when cuddling is okay. There's one thing that Tello always try to make an exception for, though.

When Donnie's stressed to the breaking point, Tello will haul him off to a remote blanket nest and curl completely around him so he can't see the outside world. Dark, quiet, alone, protected - they're the perfect conditions for Donnie to start coming down from the panic spiral. And if it's needed, Tello will hum the lullaby that Splinter used to calm them down when they were little.

Not even Jr or Leonardo will come near them when there's an emergency nest. He'd be better off throwing himself into the raptor pen at Jurassic Park and they all know it. They also all know where the emergency nest is, so they can make sure they avoid it. They call it the alligator nest because there's no doubt in anyone's mind that Tello would protect it with as much ferocity and nearly as many teeth as an angry mama alligator. They are quite correct.

[omaskit]

Challenge Log Session 2 A.k.a H'aanit Hell

Challenge Rules Here

Found creatures not weak to knife or axe; we're fucked.

Holy shit they're weak to fire thank god.

left for five days bc irl stuff lol

I feel bad for the girl trying to be Z'aanta's favorite. Girly pop he already has a favorite.

Into the box theri goes.

I love H'aanit and Z'aanta's interactions. It's so sweet and well written. You immidently see how important they are to each other. <3

Maybe it's just that H'aanit is made for breaking but her dungeon is surprisingly easy. My only problem is that she's not leveling fast enough.

Oops, went into H'annit's boss without grabbing a skill. Eh, it should be fine -Looks away for one second- and she's dead. Huh.

The boss difficulty increases with order... fuck.

YOU CAN GRIND ENEMIES FOR ITEMS???

take 2

NO MEEP YOU DON'T HEAL ALFYN!!!

Take three lets go

MY MEEP HAS BETRAYED ME YET AGAIN

WE LIVE THESES!!!

We don't live these.

Take 4: Pray to the rng gods

Bro one shots H'aanit with one attack

BACK TO THE GRIND!

Take 5: we level 8

SHE STILL GOT ONE SHOT DX

I miss shops

Take 6: okay

We gambling! We Gambling!

We gamble and we lose! We gamble and we lose!

Take 7: Please die this time

Take 8: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

That was the wrong move

Take 9: I was supposed to do Ophilia this session

5 seconds. H'annit died in 5 seconds.

Alfyn is level 12. We've done two bosses.

I've had sleep and meranign, lets go.

Take 10: level 10

Take 11: we at 600 health and still die

this feels like slow death

Take 12: Don't use rampage don't use rampage

FUCK!

Take 13: Did you know you can see the boss sprite in the overworld before entering the battle cutscene? cool

Take 14: Well okay

Fuck I healed Alfyn

Take 15: Y'all should listen to MILGRAM it's good.

Lowkey forgot the boy counters

Take 16: Let's not be dumb

I HATE RAMPAGE

Take 17: I already fucked it up

Take 18: XP

Take 19: Heavy sigh

Take 20: Might break my rules and buy some grapes

Take 21: 21st times the charm!

Take 22: If this doesn't work I'm buying grapes.

We're buying grapes

Take 23: We now have 20 grapes

Take 24: I forgot to buy the grapes

I am out of healing items

Take 25: don't forget the healing items

Take 26: I did not expect this boss to take this long

Take 27: I didn't pay attention

Take 28: T_T

Take 29: blep

Take 30: made a stupid mistake on my part

Take 31: I've been swapping from writing the flavor text before the fight and writing it after and I think it's pretty confusing.

Take 32: if we go to 35 i'm letting Alfyn fight.

Take 33: I used the wrong move.

Take 34: It's times like these were I remind myself the point of this challenge is to have fun. If I'm not having fun I need to change things up.

Take 35: Alfyn in play

Alfyn does less damage then h'aanit! I didn't expect that.

OLIVES OF LIFE!!!! HOW I MISS YOU!

How much damage does the boss have?

IT'S FINNALY DEAD!!

Session over. I'm enjoying my day. Enjoy yourselves.