#I drew more than one drawing on some of them and technically 2/50 had the same texture but different canvas size

[doctorsiren]

Last round of textured canvases :D

[facets-and-rainbows]

Blue Exorcist 10th anniversary book Q&A session

The 10th anniversary book has a section where Katoh answers 100 questions submitted by fans on Twitter, so here they are translated/paraphrased! May contain manga spoilers up to the recent flashback arc, so be warned.

(Note that I’m playing it very fast and loose here because there are A HUNDRED OF THEM, so not exact wordings, but it should capture the gist. Lemme know if there are any you want elaborated on)

1. Katoh likes the feel of traditional drawing more than digital but is impressed with how far digital has come

2. Meph THOROUGHLY ABUSES spacetime to watch all his shows and ensure that he gets all the merch he wants

3. Did the girls take all of Yukio’s school uniform buttons in middle school? Yes, they did (apparently it’s like A Thing for girls to ask for a button from their crush at middle school graduation, based on some sad movie from the 60s where a guy who got drafted as a kamikaze pilot gave a girl one of his uniform buttons to remember him by)

4. Rin's tail is about a meter long

5. There are tons of servants working at Mephisto's mansion. Belial is in charge of them

6. Katoh borrows from all sorts of neat real locations when making settings

7. Katoh identifies with pretty much all the characters the most! Except Lucifer.

8. Demon designs she's proud of include the impure king and hachirou, pretty much anything that was the main one in an arc

9. Katoh lists a bunch of her favorite musical artists/music she’s listening to recently: King Gnu, Official Hige Dandism, Kenshi Yonezu, BAD HOP, Sakanaction, Keyakizaka 46, Hypnosis Mic, Aimer, B’Z, Queen Bee.

10. Awww the rabbit manga that characters are often reading isn't just Robo to Usakichi, it's an even older one that she drew as a little kid

11. She likes industrial style interior designs

12. Rin and Yukio alternated who got the top bunk growing up, because they couldn't agree on it lol

13. Katoh cares a whole lot about panel layouts and speech bubble positions, might even be her favorite part of the process (it shows!)

4. Katoh does NOT have a mashou, lol

15. Rin has probably been practicing in secret so he can learn to carry stuff with his tail

16. Izumo probably got into shojo manga around 1st grade, her mom had some around the house

17. Specialty dishes: Rin - lots of stuff but especially nabe Yuri - stuff you can throw together quickly Shiro - stuff he learned from Yuri and/or cookbooks, alongside teaching Rin Yukio - Does. Not. Cook.

18. Can't pick a favorite place she's been on research, but there's no place like Japan

19. Kinzou's band isn't currently meeting because demons, but he's probably still thinking of new songs

20. Hardest characters to draw: anyone with detailed flowing hair. Hardest to write for: Lightning and Gedouin. She had to go read books about serial killers specifically for material for Gedouin, lol 

21. Suguro actually gets a dorm room to himself, though allegedly Yukio is technically assigned as his roommate, lol. Didn't end up that way what with Yukio being a teacher and also Rin’s whole...situation

22. Shiemi makes some of her own hair accessories! Cute

23. Katoh doesn't mind if you include stuff with fan letters but check with the editor first

24. Time for making each chapter: Planning/storyboarding: 1-5 days. Sketching: 3-5 days. Drawing/inking: the rest. Just...the rest of the time

25. Neither Suguro nor Izumo have dated before and neither is currently dating. But that's probably just because things were hectic for them! It could happen

26. Yukio breaks 5 or 6 pairs of glasses a year, someone get this kid a strap or something

27. How many spare glasses does Yukio have? Check the fanbook lol it's in there (dang it Katoh)

28. The demon she wants us to pay the most attention to is Lucifer. Because plot.

29. What's under the Order's big meeting table? It's a BOTTOMLESS PIT and if you fall in it you DIE that's what makes it COOL (laughs)

30. What are the job requirements for the angelic legion? Literally just Arthur liking you and inviting you to join

31. She WANTS to do more character profiles but just hasn't gotten to it

32. Rin's tail feels like a cat tail, texture wise

33. The "red Assiah fire" is literally just actual fire nothing special

34. Rin's current hair color is light blue fading to white at the ends

35. Thoughts on Rin's growth: she likes that he stays positive in awful situations and she also thinks it's very main character of him to face the past instead of avoiding it

36. Mephisto didn't purposely surround Rin with stuffed animals when he woke up after going crispy. Mephisto's bed is just Like That

37. Kurikara was based on a cool sword she found in a sword book, but that one was technically just a ceremonial sword. The symbol on it us a Sanskrit letter kaan (sp?) associated with Fudou Myouou

38. Kuro can communicate with normal cats and hangs out with them often

39. Sometimes Shiemi's skirt is extra fancy around the hem what's up with that? Apparently it's an optional accessory that comes with the skirts help I haven't noticed this and don't know any fashion terms in any language

40. When coloring, Katoh always tries to have an overall theme in mind ("emphasis on blue" etc) so it comes together in the end

41. Yes the twins are genetically related to Shiro because of Goro (she says they're like his nephews but I say GENETICALLY at least they'd be indistinguishable from his children)

42. Strongest mom of all the strong moms around here? Yuri! Did you SEE her give birth??

43. Are you careful about your own health Katoh-sensei? Not particularly! Her mom has had to bring her food at work sometimes! Don't do this at home kids

44. At the dating events Shura goes to, does she drink cocktails in moderation? Yeah, she probably downplays her normal drinking habits at these things. But normally she's down for just about any kind of drink

45. Lucifer just really likes oysters okay

46. How many pages of manga does Katoh draw in a day? If she's being good about self-care: three. Maximum number ever: TEN

47. Mephisto is one of those folks who can eat like a garbage compactor and never gain weight. Possibly because his body resists that sort of change the same way it resists aging etc

48. First food Rin cooked: fish burger type patty. Yukio's favorite things Rin cooks: fish simmered in soy sauce, yellowtail with daikon radish. It's fish all the way down

49: Did Rin ever get more monthly allowance from Mephisto? It doubled! He gets TWO 2000 yen bills now (rip) [T/N: That's uh, that's USD $37.26 a month or 33.10 euro]

50. Why isn't Rin more popular with the girls? He gets nervous talking to them, plus he's too oblivious to notice even if he DID have some fans

51. Why change Suguro's hair? She gets bored with keeping everything the same, and she wanted a visual representation that he was getting serious and going into kind of a training arc

52. Things Katoh pays extra attention to when drawing: trying to capture the feel of whatever she's drawing (like "that looks warm and soft" or "I bet that guy stinks" cough Lightning cough)

53: Does Rin take after Yuri more? (He's got her eyes!) Katoh tried to draw Yuri so she looks like both twins. Personality, too - Yukio has her smarts and Rin has her optimism

54: Do you ever wanna be like Mephisto? Well she'd like to be able to get away with just ANYTHING EVER, but no, let's not be like Mephisto

55. Konekomaru not only carries around a cat toy in case he meets any cats, he MAKES cat toys to carry around based on what he thinks the cats would like

56. How'd you come up with Shima? Go read the fan book!

57. Do the kids have Twitter/Instagram accounts? Rin - probably not. Konekomaru might be on some social media. Paku and Izumo are totally on instagram

58. Is there something Rin makes that you wish you could try? All of it! That's the whole idea! He's good at cooking!

59. Will we ever have a (G-rated) reveal of what ALL of Mamushi and her family's tattoos look like? Maybe! She'll think about it

60. Does Arthur have a repertoire of different hairstyles? Not really, he just puts some of it up on the top. Heck he might even have people to do that for him

61. If you wrote a shojo manga what would it be about? She'd have to do a lot of research before even coming up with a story, since there are so many style differences between the genres aside from just the subject

62. The other two of Mephisto's top 3 favorite foods: Cup ramen and....f-fried bubblegum?? Is that a THING???

63. Where do you start when drawing a character? Usually the outline of their face but if it's a complex pose/composition she'll start with whatever's in the foreground (like hands)

64. If Katoh could have a familiar, what demon would she choose? Mephisto. As the all-powerful author, she might actually be able to command him as a familiar!

66. If you swapped Yukio and Rin's relationship around what would change? not much, you'd pretty much have Rin going to the Illuminati and Yukio going to the past

67. Top 3 foods/souvenirs to try in Kyushu? Well she doesn't know what’s good CURRENTLY but when she was there she always used to like burdock tempura udon, hakata torimon (a kind of manju with white bean paste inside), and Chikae style cod roe. today I learned Katoh went to high school in Kyushu

68. Katoh listens to music a lot while she's storyboarding, then when she and the assistants are all drawing and inking they put various videos/movies and stuff on in the background

69. For all his hitting on girls, is Shima actually popular with the ladies at all? He's got enough girls in his life that he probably COULD find a girlfriend if he really wanted, but the double agent thing tends to get in the way. He still wouldn't be as popular as Yukio though (side thought/translator’s note: Shima would be proud of being number 69.)

70. Katoh has the ending planned out in a big-picture way, but there are still a few details here and there that she's fretting over

71. It's cute when the boys put their ties over their shoulders when they're working on something! Where'd that come from? She just figured a tie might get in the way and that seemed like a realistic way to get it out of the way

72. Looks like Yukio is getting some facial hair! What about Rin? They're both about the age for it, but maybe Rin can't grow a beard yet. Maybe a little peach fuzz here and there

73. Katoh's favorite blue exorcist merch? There were some exorcist licenses a while back, and the exorcist pins. Basically it's really cool that these little accessories she drew ACTUALLY EXIST NOW, LIKE YOU CAN HOLD THEM IN YOUR HANDS

74. Okay realtalk how long do we have left, I don't want the series to end yet? We're solidly in the second half by now but it's not, like, ABOUT to end yet

75. Katoh would be a Knight meister, based on what characters she likes to play in games and such

76. How many people in the whole exorcism cram school? More than you think! She doesn't give a number but apparently licensed exorcists also attend classes for new meisters, etc, so there's a wide age range attending

77. How's Arthur feel about, like, studying Taming on the way to becoming Paladin? He's at least mostly accepted that you have to use demons to fight demons effectively

78. Konekomaru started wearing glasses in his first year of middle school, so like 7th grade (more recent than I thought!) He has one spare pair, in contrast to Yukio lol

79. Katoh's current obsessions? Ghost/scary stories! She's even been going to live readings of them recently

80. Media Katoh consumes for inspiration? A wide range of foreign teen drama, horror/suspense, shojo manga, light novels, anime, etc. Special focus on things where two boys are in conflict or there are brothers involved

81. If they weren't exorcists what jobs would they have? Rin - chef. Yukio - doctor. Shiemi - uh, florist?

82. Inspiration for the design of True Cross Town? Katoh and her assistants gathered up a bunch of references, picked out stuff they felt matched the tone, and mashed them all up together

83. Did you use any references etc for the school/exorcist uniforms? She says she probably should have but she just kind of made them up before publication

84. Favorite part of drawing? For color pages, picking out a color scheme. For black and white, drawing in all the little details (though she doesn't always get time to lately)

85. Once again confirms the demon kings' weird hair is a representation of their horns. ADDS THAT PEOPLE WHO CAN'T SEE DEMONS CAN'T SEE THE WEIRD HAIR

86. Now that Yukio's at the Illuminati, where's he gonna get his Jump SQ and spare glasses? Well he probably never planned to stay for long, but hey it's a big ship and they might have an optometrist and/or newsstand there

87. Do you base the demon characters on any references etc? Not really, she just gets a general idea of popular demon designs and then makes up her own in her own style

88. Merchandise Katoh personally wants to have made: stuff that an adult could just use in their day to day life. Also, it's not gonna happen, but if her favorite figure brand made AoEx figures she could die happy

89. If Beelzebub's host body was a beautiful woman, how would Shima react? Would the womanizing win out over the bug phobia? Katoh replies that Shima would probably just faint from being near a girl that pretty, before the bugs even got involved

90. Will the twins ever get to smile and eat dinner together again?? We'll just have to wait and see!

91. What do you check at a "scenario check"? what's a scenario check man I dunno They check for people being out of character or the setting feeling off. They had a lot of these checks for the anime, but they also do them for the drama CD, games, and all that other stuff where multiple authors are involved

92. Why does Shura use baldy as an insult for people who are clearly not bald? She feels like they have some kind of metaphorical, mental kind of "baldness" and she's calling them out on it. Whatever that means

93. After Blue Exorcist ends, what do you want to draw next? She has SO MANY IDEAS, SO MANY

94. Did Katoh make up the Shinto chants that, for example, Izumo used against Gedouin? They're assembled from bits of actual Shinto prayers according to what feels right in the scene

95. Yukio reads the Jump SQ, right, and, just hear me out here, he likes gag manga, right? Does this mean he reads Salaryman Yukio? It's something he would read, but let's say that in the AoEx universe there's just a very similar manga that he finds oddly relatable

96. What do Yukio and Shima do in their free time on the Dominus Liminus? oh my god you guys this ship has so many amenities.  Yukio probably spends time reading in the library, which they totally have. There's also, like, a gym, and a movie theater, and a THEATER theater, all of which are free. Shima probably hangs out at the pool (!) and goes to the movies, and hits on illuminati girls, lol

97. Easiest character to draw? The ones with boring simple hair, lol. Lightning gets an honorable mention for ALSO not having eyes in most shots, but Rin wins--he was specifically designed to be easy for Katoh to draw because that's what you want in your main character

98. How do demons understand gender? They just possess whatever feels like the best match to how they feel in Gehenna, whether that's a man, or a woman, or a rat, or whatever

99. Where do you start when you're coming up with a story? She starts with character design and how the characters relate to each other. Currently she's just continuing an existing story, so she works on splitting up the overall plot into episodes and fleshing it out with scenes and information about characters

100. When do you feel most happy? She honestly feels like she lives a very happy life overall. Mentions noticing a lot of little things, like how nice her cats' heads smell when she cuddles them or taking a nice cold refreshing drink of water. There's happiness in everything. aww.

[lightns881]

DTeam Tumblr Demographics Survey Results (Part 2):

What does DTeamblr look like, what does it have to do with MCYT history, and why does it look like a rainbow?

I’ll make an educated guess here and say y'all enjoyed my last post (totally unrelated to the way I gained almost 50 followers overnight). Anyhow, thank you so much for the overwhelming support! I’m so glad a lot of you felt you could relate to my deep-dive into the leading personality type on DTeam Tumblr. It took me so many hours to write and research, and as a math major and honors student, it’s no easy feat, so I’m so grateful for the attention it got!

Today we’re discussing the general demographics of DTeam Tumblr and why they might look the way they do. Number 8 will blow your mind! So make sure to keep reading and hit that little grey heart and arrow at the bottom if you like it, so more people get to see it! Thanks for your support! Now, let’s jump straight into the post!

Your Daily Dose of Data

From the 449 responses we received, these are some pie charts displaying the gender, age, and sexuality of all respondents.

Image Description: Female (52.8%), Non-Binary (37.4%), Male (9.8%)

Image Description: 16-17 (37%), 13-15 (31.4%), 18 and over (29.4%), 12 and under (2.2%)

Image Description: Bisexual/Pansexual (54.1%), Homosexual (16%), Asexual (14.7%), Other (7.8%), Heterosexual (7.3%)

Mmhm, delicious! Y'all ready to dig into these stats? Because I don’t know about you, but they certainly don’t strike me as what the general population looks like!

Welcome to Tumblr, the Only Community Where Straight Men are the Minority

So these statistics certainly didn’t take me by surprise. Mostly because the DNF Shipper Survey I took some time ago revealed a similar trend. Not to mention, Tumblr is probably the QUEEREST internet community on the planet. 

Funny enough, the survey revealed a shocking number of ZERO heterosexual males respondents. I’ll say it louder for the people in the back. ZERO straight males were recorded out of 449 respondents for this survey!

Now, this isn’t surprising for the Tumblr community by itself, but I can say I’m somewhat surprised in terms of the MCYT Tumblr community. (Obviously, the survey specified DTeam Tumblr, but there is a big overlap between both communities, so I will be using them interchengably when it seems relevant.)

Let’s break this down. The survey reveals the largest age population is 16-17, though it’s not by a great margin in comparison to 13-15 and 18 and older, which doesn’t surprise me either. Some of the major critics of the DTeam Fandom and other MCYT Fandoms love to claim the fanbase’s majority age range lies with children and pre-teens. While it’s an undeniable fact children are drawn to Minecraft, it’s also a misconception to paint it as solely a community for younger viewers.

In the MCYT Tumblr and DTeam Tumblr communities, specifically, we see this is not the case. Only 1/3 of the respondents of this survey are under the age of 16 (you could attribute part of it to the fact younger people might be less inclined to participate in this survey, but it is still a notable difference). I can’t say these age ranges are similar in other parts of the community like DTeam Twitter, Tik Tok, or Reddit, but if I had to make a guess, I’d say Tumblr lies toward the older of the bunch, with Reddit being the oldest and Tik Tok being the youngest (I do hope to perform this survey on some of the other communities, so please stay until the end if you want to help with that).

One of the likely explanations to why the ages for DTeam Tumblr look this way is the fact a big chunk of the community has likely been watching MCYT for a long time (even with breaks in between). I, myself, used to watch channels like PopularMMOs, Aphmau, and PrestonPlayz as a kid, and I presume many of you are familiar with them as well. With the resurgence of MCYT in the past year, it likely drew a lot of the older viewers in addition to the new ones.

But enough about age. What I really want to highlight on this post is the attraction of queer individuals to DTeam Tumblr and MCYT as a whole.

Why is the current MCYT Fandom so queer in comparison to the previous generations?

This is a huge open-ended question and considering I can only capture so much of the DTeam and MCYT community, the rest of this post should be taken solely as a theoretical analysis as opposed to fact.

With that out of the way, let’s start by discussing the shift MCYT has undergone over the years (I promise this will circle back to the question of queerness in the MCYT fandom, but we need some background before we can come up with a decent theory).

When Minecraft was first released, it proved to be a monumental change in the gaming industry. This simple little indie game took the world by storm. It was so vastly different from what the general population generally viewed gaming as (first-person shooters, story-driven games, action games, etc.) Not to mention, it didn’t exactly solely appeal to only a small margin of gamers, those being white cis males.

The gaming industry has notoriously been known in the past for its heteronormative community and general prejudice toward minorities. Though it has gone through a significant change over the decades, we certainly can’t say it’s fully gone.

Yet for whatever reason, the recent MCYT has taken the interest of so many queer people in comparison to other gaming YouTube communities. Why? Why are queer people so drawn to this community? And, more precisely, why does it feel so different than the old MCYT? Lastly, how does this relate to the conclusion about the leading personalities of this fandom we made in the last post?

The Niche Communities of MCYT Over the Years

MCYT has always been a huge, over-saturated genre of YouTube with content appealing to a variety of audiences. It’s dominated gaming content for years, and I think we can all safely say it’s never been bigger than it is today.

So why is it that just now it feels like the queerness of the fandom is popping off? Why now as opposed to say five years ago when MCYT was at another one of it’s strongest stages?

It seems like the community has made a tremendous shift in relation to breaking gender norms and LGBTQ+ subjects, not only in the fans but within the creators themselves. Was flirting and calling a pretty-boy streamer pet names as normal in the past as it is today? Were straight gamer guys putting on dresses and a full-face of make-up as supported back then? Were “marriages” and “pregnancies” within Minecraft boys an everyday occurrence like they are now? How is it that MCYT has dominated a Twitch dating show where flirting with the gay host and among straight contestants themselves is just another bit of entertainment? Where is this all coming from?

Recently, I watched a 2 hour documentary depicting all of the stages of Minecraft YouTube and how it has changed over the years. If you haven’t seen it and you have some time to spare, I HIGHLY recommend it! It’s very informative, and it honestly gave me such a strong sense of nostalgia that makes me choke up every time I think about it. I’ll link it below.

The documentary does a great job at exploring the different niche communities that dominated MCYT since it first took off. Some of such communities include the basic Let’s Players, the team-based Let’s Play channels like How2Minecraft, the roleplay story-centric ones like Aphmau and Samgladiator, the tutorial, building and technical side like Mumbo and Grian, the PVP-centric Bedwars or Hypixel channels, the Machinima community, the comedy side like ExplosiveTNT, the parody music videos, and so many more. All of the mentioned communities have dominated Minecraft at one point or another, many of them still having a rippling effect and/or a loyal community today. All of these communities have certain aspects that define them, some of which parallel the current overtaking content in the present.

How can we compare MyStreet to the Dream SMP?

Taking Aphmau as an example, her MyStreet series had a TREMENDOUS success a few years ago, racking in millions of views and bringing in a lot of money that eventually allowed her to hire voice actors and increase the production of mentioned episodes. The roleplay series was so successful it ran for six seasons!

Now, let’s compare that to the Dream SMP. It seems like a big comparison to be making considering they appear so different at first glance. For once, Aphmau is just one channel whose audience caters toward girls and younger people who enjoy romance. The series is set-up in an episodic-format that resembles more of a TV series than actual Minecraft videos.

Meanwhile, the Dream SMP is a collection of content creators with a mix of improvised storylines and the occasional regular video that resembles more of a Let’s Play series than a RP series.

You could say the only true comparisons to draw out of these two are the popularity they had/have and the profit they brought to their respective creators. 

However, there’s two other key similarities that you’ll find not only within these two specific examples, but many other channels and communities as well. Story and characters.

MyStreet’s story aspect is fairly obvious seeing as it’s a episodic series that focuses on a fictional story. The Dream SMP’s story aspect isn’t as clear, but it’s evident there is a story playing out in the foreground and background, whether intentional or unintentional, or improvised or not.

Character is where some of you might start to question me. It’s obvious MyStreet has characters. I mean, it is a fictional story, after all. But the Dream SMP? Light, they’re obviously people!

Well, my answer to that is yes and no--sort of. The Dream SMP’s story heavily relies on roleplay, bits as you might call them. Events that aren’t necessarily planned out as a fictional plot like the typical MyStreet episode is, but they aren’t exactly real. Schlatt is obviously not a villain in real life, he just likes to impersonate as one for the narrative. Wilbur isn’t crazy, but it’s a way to spice up the heroic story surrounding Tommy and him.

It’s video-game improv. Except the actors behind the content just so happen to be real people playing off the personalities and “brands” they have obtained. 

Brands. It all boils down to this. In the entertainment business, without a clear vision of your project and a clear way to brand what your consumer intakes, your project will likely not find a lot of success.

There’s a reason why Tommy plays off his loudness, using an overexaggerated laugh that although may not be completely fake, it is likely not the laugh he uses everyday. Or why BadBoyHalo is this supposed innocent muffin who doesn’t understand the crafting table meme and other references that are fairly easy to google and find the meaning of. Or why Sapnap is this chaotic being who loves starting pet wars and we love to paint as an arsonist in the Dream SMP. While all of these personality traits may be a part of their true selves, they’re played up for the camera--for the story. They act as the personas that define their characters in the narrative.

They have a clear brand and vision that appeals to the audience and makes them tune in on the daily to see how they all come together. It’s like roleplaying a more extreme version of yourself, one that brings home the money.

Story and characters run across every entertainment outlet. They define their brand. Aphmau has her characters and series. Hermitcraft has a set of memorable personalities and episodic videos that formulate its own story that is less like a narrative and more of a history of the server. ExplodingTNT has his recurring cast and comedic sketches. Most of these niche communities have a form of story and character defining them. It’s how they achieve a clear sense of branding and cater to a specific audience.

Queer Theory in MCYT

Having said all that, why does the MCYT of today draw in so many queer viewers?

Let’s think about this. In my last post, I ended by mentioning DTeam Tumblr is a sort of safe haven for INFP and INxx types who might be placed in the “other” category by society. INFPs, specially, are predisposed for escapism--one common form of it being fiction and entertainment. Not to mention, INFPs are feeling types who, as introverts, seek a personable connection. It’s why it’s so easy for them to obsess over book characters or fall in love with content creators.

Now, let’s imagine a whole community of LGBTQ+ INFP and INxx types. Actually, scratch that, we don’t even have to imagine it.

It’s what our community looks like today.

And why are so many so drawn to the DTeam and Dream SMP of all things? It’s a personable storyline that essentially forms a direct tie to the viewer. Unlike pre-recorded fictional TV series you tune into on your device, the Dream SMP is a whole load of chaos that blurs the lines between reality and fiction where fans can directly connect to creators and get to know them as people through a storyline that features sub-textual queer themes and non-conforming behaviors.

The MCYT content creator community of today is more non-conforming than ever before, and knowing this whole fact, knowing that many of them might place themselves in the “other” category or at the very least aren’t afraid to break the norms and be seen in that light, is a comfort in itself for LGBTQ+ INFP types. Once again, it’s a safe space that helps you escape from the troubles of real life, one you relate to.

Okay. So although this does answer why the fans look like they do, what about the creators themselves? Are we really supposed to believe this all came through naturally? That a bunch of straight guys suddenly decided wearing dresses was something they wanted to do?

I don’t mean to sound cynical here, and I’m in no way trying to insinuate creators have solely some sort of corrupt ulterior motive. Things are never as simple as they look. However, the truth is, a part of it lies on the attention it’s gotten.

I’ve talked a lot about DreamNotFound and the way Dream uses it as a marketing ploy. I stand by my point. However, he’s not the only one who does this in the MCYT community. Why did Finn suddenly go from wearing a dress to cross-dressing as a girl for a whole week? Why are so many creators suddenly deciding wearing dresses is fun? Why does every freaking straight MCYT actively want to flirt with George nowadays?

Let’s just let Techno’s favorite word answer this for us: clout.

It gets attention from one of the largest historically underserved minority community in the entertainment business. We might not be able to see gay flirting in every Netflix TV show or guys not minding dresses and getting fake marriages, but you are certainly going to get at least one of those in every Dream SMP stream and video you tune into. It gets attention. It brings home the money. And do I blame them? Not really.

Interestingly enough, there’s a lot of analytical posts on the MCYT Tumblr community that discuss the dangers of these tactics and why gay jokes and the way queer subtext is treated by MCYT creators is harmful. Despite this, it still attracts such a huge community of queers. So why exactly would queer people actively watch something that’s offensive or harmful to us?

I have a lot more to say about this topic and the morality behind Dream’s tactics, but I’m out of breath for today, so I’ll talk about it in my next post. What better way to start the conversation about the DNF and Karlnap questions of the survey than a good ol’ discussion on the morality of queerbaiting and the likes?

If you got this far, I’d appreciate it if you liked and reblogged this post if you enjoyed it and/or learned something new! Also, important news, I would really like to perform a similar study on the DTeam Twitter Community to measure the differences in demographics across platforms. I would REALLY appreciate it if you guys could go like, retweet and share the link I posted on my Twitter about it (tweet will be linked in the reblog below) so it reaches more of the DTeam Twitter community!

However, if you filled out the survey yourself here or you associate more with DTeam Tumblr than DTeam Twitter please DO NOT fill out the survey again! I’m trying to make sure it reaches the audience that mains on Twitter, but I need a little help with that since I don’t have as big of an influence on Twitter than on here for obvious reasons.

Anyhow, thank you so much for all your support! I really appreciate y’all and make sure to hit the follow if you want to lookout for the next demographics post! <3

(Pssst, I’m releasing a MCYT DNF superpower AU longfic next month... You should totally go check out the post on that if you’re interested in it...)

[forcebook]

Venji has always been endgame: Benji’s attraction to Victor

the first thing I really need people to understand is that Benji is not watching the show, he’s not seeing things through Victor’s point of view, and for the most part of the season he has no idea Victor is struggling with his sexuality. from Benji’s point of view, Victor is straight and into Mia. that’s how I’m going to be analyzing his thoughts and actions (well, guessing mostly because he does lack screen time and insight moments. hopefully we’ll get more of him in season two!!)

btw I’m gonna break it down episode by episode because I’m insane (and I also feel strangely connected to Benji so don’t @ me)

Episode 1 - Welcome to Creekwood

as I’ve mentioned before, you can interpret Benji’s “nice shoes!” line as interest. but even if you’re not willing to do that, I still think it’s valid to consider that he might’ve felt some kind of immediate connection to Victor (if episodes 2 and 3 are any indication of that. and the Call Me Maybe lyrics).

Episode 2 - Stoplight Party

the “Benji attempts to teach Victor how to make a espresso” scene is very much about Victor’s attraction to Benji so I don’t wanna look too much into it. also Benji comes off as (at least for me!) a very attentive and loving person, so his dedication to teaching Victor felt very genuine. but still like...... he did get lost in Victor’s eyes for a moment before the milk spilled akdjksdjjs

then at the end of the episode Benji calls Victor late at night (he even apologizes for that) when he could’ve called Victor at any other time or could’ve just told him at school. and well, (I may be reaching here but headcanons are always good!!) I like to believe Benji couldn’t stop thinking about Victor, which is why he decided to call. for some unknown reason he already feels connected to Victor and wanted to hear his voice and—

let me stop here before I write a whole fanfic because that’s not the purpose of this post.

Episode 3 - Battle of the Bands

oh boy, I’m gonna try to unpack this episode, hopefully I’ll make some sense. I’m very sorry if I fail!

so, Victor and Benji have the Call Me Maybe (cutest) moment, in which Victor tells Benji that he’s going on a date with Mia the next day.

Now. I need you to remember that Victor explicitly told Benji that he and Mia wouldn’t go to the Battle of the Bands and that Benji had already performed when Victor got there and only performed again because his band won the battle (so I’m pretty sure Victor wasn’t supposed to hear the Call Me Maybe cover). therefore this wasn’t Benji confessing his feelings to Victor. if anything, I believe it was his way of dealing with the intense and ever-growing feelings that he has for Victor through his biggest passion (music), pretty much like making a reference to something that you know no one else will understand (since for everyone else it’s just a Carly Rae Jepsen bop).

but then Victor eventually shows up and hears Benji singing Call Me Maybe and for him it’s definitely not just a Carly Rae Jepsen bop anymore. it’s their song

after the performance, it looks like Benji is going to talk to him about it, maybe to try and make it seem like it’s no big deal (since he thinks Victor is into Mia, and he himself is in a long term relationship) but Derek appears and we’re all left heartbroken (Simon & his friends included).

what I’m trying to say is: they are two halves of the same idiot. while Victor is in denial of his sexuality and attraction to Benji, Benji is in denial of his growing feelings for Victor. we love this denial duo

Episode 4 - The Truth Hurts

not much to say about this one BUT. at the beginning of the episode you can see how Victor and Benji are working totally in sync, to the point where they barely need words like the freaking soulmates that they are. honestly, I’m done pretending they aren’t soulmates because this show just kept shoving that into our faces over and over and if you failed to see it then it’s not my problem (or maybe it is since I’m literally spending my time trying to explain exactly that. but I just care too much about these two and I want people to understand why).

then Derek calls and Benji picks up lovingly because he’s a loving person and a caring boyfriend and even though he might be struggling with his feelings for Victor, he’s not about to neglect his boyfriend (shame we can’t say the same thing about Derek) (no I will not stop throwing shade at him).

Episode 5 - Sweet Sixteen

I could try and say several things about this one but for real, BENJI DREW VICTOR AND GAVE HIM THE DRAWING AS A BIRTHDAY GIFT. like! this stupidly artistic boy!!!!!!!!! this stupidly caring boy!!!!!!!!! he could’ve bought Victor literally anything or not even bothered to think of a gift At All, but he took the time to DRAW VICTOR LIKE ONE OF HIS FRENCH BOYS!!!!! what am I supposed to do with this knowledge!!!!

now I’m imagining Benji observing Victor. the way the light hits his face, how his shoulders move, the shape of his hands....... all the while telling himself it’s just to draw Victor!!!!! but that’s still beautiful and frankly thirsty nonetheless.

p.s I was robbed of a scene like that.

Episode 6 - Creekwood Nights

not much to say about this one except the show blatantly telling us that Derek can be real shitty sometimes. also, I wanna talk about Venji’s dynamics throughout the show so bad but it deserves a post of its own so I’m gonna hold my tongue.

Episode 7 - What Happens In Willacoochee

(stays in Willacoochee or maybe it will haunt your gay ass all the way to New York).

oh boy, this is where shit starts going down for real.

so Victor kisses Benji. I’m not going to defend Victor because what he did was reckless and dumb and frankly disrespectful. but I need to say that it was going to happen sooner or later because when you repress something too hard and for too long, it’s bound to come back with full force and explode in your face. I really wish it was in a different circumstance, of course, but also life isn’t always made of perfect situations and shit happens. (and nope, that does not excuse Victor’s actions).

now think about Benji. he’s been struggling with his feelings for Victor, who as far as he knows is straight and in a relationship, and then suddenly Victor kisses him. my best guess (due to his reaction to Victor’s speech in episode 10) is that he thinks Victor isn’t being serious about it, that in no moment that kiss meant anything but curiosity and recklessness, when they both have people to lose (again, he doesn’t know that Victor struggles with his sexuality, much less that Victor has feelings for him).

so yeah, I believe Benji was upset, not only with Victor though, but with himself.

(I’ll come back to this in a second)

no Benji in episode 8 so.......

Episode 9 - Who The Hell Is B

Benji decides to leave the coffee shop. Victor tells him that the kiss wasn’t his fault and Benji says that being around Victor makes him feel guilty, now why is that?

firstly because he’s not a psychopath and the fact that he cheated on Derek makes him feel guilty. but I do believe that that’s not the only thing that makes him feel guilty. deep down he liked kissing Victor. he likes Victor, he’s been doing his best to keep that buried but Victor had to go and complicate things, so now the only way to avoid making a bigger mess is staying as far away as possible from each other. so he runs back to the safety of his relationship with Derek.

(listen, I know the show makes it seem like Benji is super angry and wants nothing to do with Victor but I don’t believe that’s the case. he’s upset and feeling guilty for liking someone else, denial does make you act very hostile sometimes).

Episode 10 - Spring Fling

Benji’s denial continues but (thankfully) it won’t last much longer.

he goes to the bathroom and tells Victor that he’s read his letter and that he does forgive him for kissing him but that that doesn’t change anything, that it’s best for them to stay away from each other.

that’s until he hears Victor’s speech to Derek (which was more to Benji than Derek so). that’s the moment he realizes that Victor actually likes him, that the kiss as cursed as it was had meant something, that they both feel exactly the same thing. that’s what gives him courage to finally accept that he can’t be with Derek anymore because his heart belongs to someone else. (has belonged to Victor from the moment they met) akdjskdjsj someone please tell me to shut up

which leads us to the bench kiss(es) scene. now, these boys are a whole mess because Victor was still technically dating Mia (he did try to come out to her before, couldn’t do it so he decided to come out after the Spring Fling) (good intention, poor execution).

But I also believe this was just lazy writing and they wanted to have a scene where Mia catches Victor and Benji together. it could’ve been done better, they could’ve been just touching foreheads or something but they wanted the full drama so the kiss(es) happened. I’m taking 50 points away from the writers for this. (also does not excuse Victor or Benji since they literally met halfway. these idiots are so in love wtf!)

(I still love them though, and hope they do better in the future, for themselves and for each other).

anyway, I think that’s it! if you read up until this point: thank you so much!!!! I tried my best to understand and explain Benji since the show said fuck Benji stans. hope this helps!

— love, MJ

[lunasilvermorny]

I realized that it’s been a while since I drew or wrote anything related to Penny, but that’s because JC were too busy making her character as annoying and unlikable as possible.

So I’ve decided to turn to my favorite Penny: Headcanon-Penny! (Not bias at all.)

Also, it’s the first time I’ve ever drawn a background... I like how the lake-one turned out, but I’m still very self-conscious about it.

Also #2 - my first try at a comic-ish drawing/style/thing (?) - I don’t know how to define it exactly... But it’s new.

Anyway...

More about Headcanon-Penny:

You don’t get to be this popular and know every gossip possible by being a Mary Sue. Headcanon-Penny is meaner, but not because she’s a bad person - she just knows how to get what she wants... Confidence can make her look “bitchy” for some, but I think it makes her more interesting. Also, remember that she’s very popular, which means that she has a certain echo-chamber that validates her (almost) every action, which makes her even more confident and less likely to notice when she’s crossing a line.

Game-Penny was able to get booze and met Bill at a party (when she was only 12!)... So in my head, she’s a party girl. I don’t care what any other dialogue says in the game. Headcanon-Penny likes to party, which makes her even more popular, and that is a huge part of her personality.

Now, it doesn’t invalidate the fact that she’s good with potions. I don’t know about other people, but when I was in school, most of the smart kids were also the popular kids, so... That’s where I’m getting my inspiration for her.

Luna gradually finds her more and more annoying (JC got inside my head!), but they are still close enough to hang-out regularly.

They mostly talk about social-related things and even though Luna doesn’t like to gossip, sometimes Penny might come with something so interesting, that even Luna can’t ignore it. Headcanon-Penny hangs-out with older students, mostly guys, and although she helps Luna with the search for the vaults, she does have a life beyond Luna’s world.

So here's a dialogue I wrote a while back, with Penny in it:

Year 4:

*On the train to Hogwarts*

Rowan: You really like being a bird more than a witch, huh?

Luna: What can I say? It's freeing.

*Door opens*

Penny: Hey, I was looking for you.

Rowan: *not pleased* Hi.

Luna: Hey Penny, how was your-?

Penny: Oh, I'm so happy you got rid of that awful hat! The ants in your hair were disgusting.

Luna: *froze for a second and then forced herself to smile, unsuccessfully* Yeah.

Penny: Are you all right?

Rowan: She doesn't want to talk about it.

Luna: Really, mate-?

Penny: Why, what happened?

Luna: Nothing. How was your summer?

Penny: Pretty good. By the way, Evans’ party was amazing, you really missed out.

Rowan: What party?

Luna: Some Hufflepuff bloke had a party-

Penny: Not “some Hufflepuff bloke” - Evans. He has the best parties! You know there was enough liquor to fill a pool, right?

Luna: It can't be better than my father's Scotch.

Penny: Scotch? What are you, 50?

Rowan: *looks at Luna* Since when are you drinking? You’re not even technically 14!

*Penny and Luna exchanged looks*

Penny: How was your summer, Rowan?

Rowan: It was fine. You know that alcohol can damage your natural growth, right?

Luna: That might be a good thing, though, since I'm already a giant.

Rowan: …

Luna: *sighs* That's why I didn't tell you.

Penny: Don’t worry, Rowan, She’s just acting like a hot shot – she can barely down two shots before she gets pissed.

Luna: Oh, you're the one to talk – pissed after one pint?

Penny: It had very high alcohol levels, just so you know.

Luna: For you? So... 2%?

Penny: Oh, we’re doing it?

Luna: Bring it on.

Rowan: I’m right here!

Luna: Right... Look, it’s nothing, trust me. Like Penny said, I barely drink.

Rowan: It's still stupid.

*A while later - Bill joined them*

Penny: Hi, Bill! *she hugged him*

Bill: Hi, Penny. Hi, Rowan.

Rowan: *blushing and excited* Hi, Bill. I wasn't expecting you here.

Bill: Well, surprise.

Rowan: *giggled*

*Penny raised an eyebrow and looked at Luna with a grin. Luna mouthed her- “be nice!” *

Bill: So how was your summer?

*Penny told him about the party*

Bill: Yeah, I was planning to go there, but Luna didn't want to.

*Penny and Rowan turned to look at her*

Rowan: I thought you haven’t met with anyone this summer.

Penny: You both could have come together and you still bailed?

*Luna and Bill exchanged looks*

Bill: Nope, you’re not getting me in the middle of this.

*He left the booth*

Penny: Well?

Luna: I… It’s not like I went to his house. We've met at Diagon Alley.

Rowan: Why didn't you just say that earlier?

Luna: Because! I didn't want you to jump to conclusions.

Penny: *gasps* No!

Luna: Of course not, you perv. What did I just say?

Rowan: *laughs nervously* And why would they? You said you two are just friends.

Luna: We are just friends.

Rowan: So why would Penny think-?

Luna: Look, it was nothing. We've met, talked and that's about it.

Penny: That's what you did instead of coming to the party, really?

Luna: I don't know, we just lost track of time. We'll go next year.

Penny: But Evans graduates this year!

Luna: So, I don't know, we'll find another party.

Penny: *crossed her arms* You can be so boring sometimes.

Rowan: So what did you talk about?

Luna: Who-? Oh, Bill and I? I don't remember.

Penny: Because you weren't talking-!

Luna: Can you cut it out? We're not like that.

Penny: Are you sure?

Luna: What's with the…? Can you get off my back, you gossip.

Penny: Fine, tell me later.

Rowan: What-? No, I'm the best friend - tell me.

Penny: *rolled her eyes*

Luna: There’s nothing to tell-! Oh, forget it.

[thearkhound]

Drama CD Metal Gear Solid interviews

The following is a series of interviews that were published in the booklets for the Drama CD Metal Gear Solid series. The booklet for Vol. 1 contains an interview with Hideo Kojima himself, while Vol. 2 contains interview with Motosada Mori (the series’s military advisor, who served as the audio drama’s screenwriter as well) and illustrator Yoji Shinkawa. The scripts for the Metal Gear Solid radio drama has been translated for quite a long time now, but the interviews have not until now.

The Metal Gear Solid radio drama is a non-canonical continuation of the game in which Solid Snake, Meryl Silverburgh, Roy Campbell and Mei-Ling continue working for the U.S. military following the events of the Shadow Moses island takeover as they become involved in new missions set in various conflict zones. You can read a translated transcripts on the following links: Vol. 1 and Vol. 2.

Hideo Kojima

It seems that the story for the Drama CD is set after the events of the game itself.

Don’t think about it too deeply. (laughs) That was my biggest concern when it came to discuss the radio drama. There are quite a few inconsistencies if you think about it seriously. More importantly, I don’t think they [the main characters] would be willing to return to the battlefield after the ending of the game. You’re better off thinking of this audio drama as an alternate story using the same characters.

Mr. Motosada Mori, who worked on the game as a military advisor, seems to had been in charge of writing the script this time...

Originally I was told to write it myself but I wasn’t able to due to various circumstances. So when it came on deciding a writer, it had to be someone who was not only be knowledgeable of the Metal Gear universe, but also be familiar with military and world affairs, as well as firearms... I was wondering if there was such a worthy candidate. Not only does Mr. Mori has the expertise and experience, but he is also a published author. On top of that, he provided entertainment advice on the game itself, so I was confident to assign the job to him. At first I wanted Mr. Mori to employ his own unique gimmick and we thought a lot of what he could add to the script. But then the amount of technical terms he added to the script became too much for the average listener to understand, so we ended up reducing them. (laughs)

By the way, the character of Allen Iishiba was based on someone we knew... When we went to the United States for research, we were able to observe a tank in person thanks to a friend of Mr. Mori in the U.S. Army, so he became the inspiration for that character. [Translator’s note: The person in particular is Tomoaki Iishiba, who is credited as one of the military advisors alongside a Michael Allen.]

Were there any difficulties when it came to the difference in expression between a videogame and an audio-only CD?

Perhaps this is the fate of videogames as a medium, but there is a chance that if you only hear a line of dialogue once, you might not understand it the first time, so we have to repeat things like a parrot during conversations. [Translator’s note: This is why most conversations in the MGS series end with Snake repeating what the other person said in the form of a question] As a result, we end up writing dialogue that would seem out of place in a normal conversation. We had no choice but to write like that in order to make the game easier to understand, but because this is purely an audio drama this time, it covers more acoustics than the game itself. Therefore, the difference between the mediums was not a problem at all.

Finally, can you give us any last words?

I think that the Drama CD will depict a lot of things that could not be done in a videogame. Give Mr. Mori my regards. (laughs)

Motosada Mori

You worked as a military advisor in the original Metal Gear Solid game, but this time you’re writing the screenplay...

I actually played Policenauts when it was first released, so my feelings are rather complicated. I became a fan of Kojima because of Policenauts. While observing the game’s development process, I thought many times about how it would be like to be one of the players anticipating its release. Putting it in another way, I might be wondering if it was going to be a good game and I would wish to play it without knowing anything about it... (laughs) If there is ever a next game, I want to be just a player.

This time you’re working on an audio drama. Did that present any difficulties?

How to depict the world of Metal Gear without the use of visuals? That was the biggest challenge. Moreover, whether you’re listening to just one episode or the one that comes after, you have to write them like a single storyline. On top of that, I intended to write a drama that would appeal to both, people who played the original game and those that didn’t. Nonetheless, it was difficult. Writing the screenplay was an everyday hell. Basically, the story takes place after the events of the game, but like Mr. Kojima said, writing a story that follows the ending of that game was the best opportunity to show off my skills. To what extend can you demonstrate a unique worldview? The results is a kind of progression that proceeds from the video game to the audio drama and vice-versa.

Were there any instances where you based the story or characters on your experience?

Most of the incidents, including the characters who appear in it, are fictional, but some of it is partly based on my own experiences. For example, is it possible to distinguish between good and evil on the battlefield? The characters in this story, like Schultz, Cortez and Ivanovich, all act in their own interests, believe in themselves and try to justify their means. It’s a rule that doesn’t work at all on a normal society, but somehow you can get away with on the battlefield. Those with power seize everything. This is a drama about tragic men who were drunk on a power struggle and were conversely swallowed into it.

Finally, can you give us a few last words?

Enjoy this audio drama and let us know what you think! I want to make the best use [of your feedback] next time... Will there be even be a next time, Mr. Kojima?

Yoji Shinkawa

There are many characters being drawn for the first time for the Drama CD. What kind of mood do you usually have when you design a character?

My creation method varies depending on the character. For Allen Iishiba... well, he was modeled after a real person. (laughs) He was actually a gentle guy, but he became a bit scary in the artwork that I drew. 

For Sergei Ivanovich, I originally drew him as an older man in his 50s or 60s, but then Mr. Kojima requested him to be “a younger and cooler type.” When I asked him what kind of feeling he wanted from the character, he answered “someone like Tony Redwood [a character from Policenauts].” I then drew him younger, but he still didn’t stand out, so I wanted him to hold a small arm. I asked Mr. Mori if it was alright if he was holding a knife and he answered that was fine. It’s the same feeling I had when working with Mr. Kojima.

The image of Marc Cortez was that of a brave soldier with a decisive military history. However, since he is a character of questionable allegiance, I gave him a hat that obscured his eyes in order to make him look very suspicious. Maybe it’s just like Roy Campbell and his beret or Master Miller and his sunglasses. Can you recognize a character with just that [an accessory] alone?

The familiar characters from the original game all appear in new outfits here too. Especially Meryl Silverburgh, who looks cool in her sneaking suit!

After the Metal Gear Solid game finished development, I wanted to have [Meryl wear the sneaking suit] and did a drawing. It felt quite right, so I asked Mr. Mori about it. She’s armed with just a single Desert Eagle pistol, so she would need the infinite ammo bandanna to match Solid Snake... (laughs). Just kidding about that. I wanted Meryl to be depicted much closer to her namesake from Policenauts.

Speaking of weapons, there’s seems to be quite an elaboration on them in this Drama CD...

That’s right! Even the AKM assault rifles wielded by the bad guys was chosen by Mr. Mori. I’m pretty sure it was his choice. I always think of the visuals first in my case. We had a few meetings before producing the Drama CD and I was surprised when they brought in an AKM without any prior announcement, as it was very different from how I was imagining it. But it was fun to collect reference materials. I was grinning while drawing them.

[the-canine-king]

i answered all 50 questions in that oc question post

note: i'm only talking about the ones i made lol i was gonna link them all the character’s names to their profiles but that shit’s way too much work so: https://toyhou.se/CanineKing/characters/folder:all/tags:1/tagged:Original

1. Your first OC ever? hmm, there's probably two answers 1) an unnamed character who was basically a fantasy dressed fox kemono boy. do you remember playing a game as a kid where you look out the window in a car and you imagine someone doing sick parkour beside your car? he was the character i imagined (there was also a whole other story i dreamt up where i was some long lost princess from other world and he was gonna save me from this one but that's a whole other thing) he's technically a character i thought of but never thought of anything beyond that, i don't think i ever drew him either 2) 4 (maybe 5) characters i made in middle school where it was about these characters that come from families that can bend one particular element, and they're all friends on school trying to get used to their passed down powers and also be basically kid superheroes. i drew them out and gave them names, but i never wrote anything beyond that, but they were definitely ones that i would call my first actual written ocs 2. Do you have a personal favourite among your OCs? -looks at ace, eliott, and mel- no 3. Have you ever adopted a character or gotten a character from someone else? yup! before i wasn't so big on the adopt thing, but i turned into a fan w/ collecting designs and writing a lil story for them! i adopted 38 characters, and one other that's currently still in the process of trade :P (and unfortunately trying to purge some away) 4. A character you rarely talk about? unfortunately that'd be a lot of characters bc i'm super focused on drawing ace/ mel smooching for the 548787th time 5. If you could make only one of your OCs popular/known, who would it be? i'd probably make it eliott bc who else doesn't love a cute, shy, goat boy on the internet 6. Two OCs of yours that look alike despite not being related? ...... i can't think of any lmao 7. Are your OCs part of any story or stories? i literally only make ocs to make stories so 8. Do you RP as any of your OCs? If you do, introduce one of your RP OCs here! nah i can't do rp stuff :'D 9. Would you ever be willing to give any of your OCs to someone else? honestly, not really if i made them lol but i guess i can if i'm not attatched to them and such, so if i just made a design and offered them up then yeah i can trade them (unless i love their design lol) 10. Introduce an OC with a complicated design? even thought i haven't fully drawn my plans for his outfit, azazel would be the most complicated in my standards 11. Is there any OC of yours you could describe as a “sunshine”? me personally, i'd say eliott bc that baby boy is trying his best story wise, either thorne or lucas (but totally lucas since thorne is a liar at heart) 12. Name an OC that isn’t yours but who you like a lot TOO MANY AUGH the very first oc i fell in love with but was forever homes was like a fantasy setting character that was an adventurer and had eagle legs/ other features w/ banging colours but other than that too many others 13. Do you have any troublemaker OCs? again, a lot, i guess. bc they mostly fall into that trope? aiden (even though he's trying to be a better person), damien, eve, hugh (in a way), jack, ollie, ricky, roman, and wyatt 14. Introduce an OC with a tragic backstory uhhhh, hard to choose, i don't have any more bc i haven't written their backstories yet lol - growing up as a theif his whole life to support him and his mother, accidentally kills someone after an awakening of powers and is had to run from his hometown - growing up being shadowed over and forced to be someone that they're not, only to get their hubris get to them, causing themselves and others get hurt and can't even remember the person they loved - growing up w/ betrayal after betrayal she closed herself off, but they met someone and slowly opened up and accidentally fell in love w/ them, only later getting caught and fell from grce, then only to find the person they trusted before not remember them - after being caught on what seemed to be a fatal accident, gets rescured from a miraculous surgery, but he's slowly forgetting what he looks like and who he was every passing second - two people close to each other, only to end up w/ betrayal and lies 15. Do you like to talk about your OCs with other people? absolutely but if they ask me something i haven't planned yet i'm just "UHHH" 16. Which one of your OCs would be the best at biology (school subject)? 17. Any OC OTPs? nah ace/ mel is my notp :/ anyways if it's couples in general then: - ace/ mel - lucas/ darla - kaiko/ caspian - + a bunch of the parents in the monster family story - damon/ ollie (okay i'm really not planning for them to be together, but they cute u.u) - jebediah/ demon boyfriend - gunther/ harem - nadiya/ her girlfriend which i still haven't decided if i want her to be like a princess or a traveling swordsman of sorts) - the chimera girl i designed/ her human girlfriend - the fallen god/ mercenary 18. Any OC crackships? uhh i actually don't know :V anyone of the people listed  being w/ someone else would be a crackship? idk every other pairing i know i wouldn't like lol 19. Introduce an OC that means a lot to you (and explain why) i guess eliott! i guess also catherine, ricky, comet, and/ or captain since they were my fist group of ocs i wrote a bit about, but i think eliott means a lot more bc he was the one that got me thinking more about ocs  :> 20. Do any of your OCs sing? If they sing, care to share more details (headcanon voice, what kind of songs they like etc)? for some reason i feel like rosa would be a singer? va hc would be someone w/ a strong husky voice and she would probably sing really well in kind of old slow songs you hear in old bars i also thought maybe lillie could sing too, but they’d usually be softer songs or lullabies to calm herself down it’d be nice/ cool to write for fallen god to be able to sing as well, and maybe the mercenary too so they can have nights signing together. maybe fallen god can sing songs that are in their own god language or whatever, and mercenary can watch in awe there may be others but i can’t think of them rn/ they might be charas i haven’t fully made yet 21. Your most artistic OC lmao it’s a bunch of ocs that i haven’t developed my ocs enough for me to know so let’s skip i guess 22. Is there any OC of yours people tend to mischaracterize? If yes, how? i mean, people get some stuff wrong about my ocs sometimes but they’re usually so small that i really don’t care about it lol 23. Introduce OC that has changed from your first idea concerning what the character would be like? hmm they relatively stayed the same personality wise but i assure you everyone’s changed from their initial drawing of them 24. If you could meet one OC of yours, who would it be and why? that's. a really hard choice actually lol bc i wanna be hugged by one of the parents in the monster family story i made, but i also wanna hang out w/ the characters that i can comfortably hang out w/ lol 25. The OC that resembles you the most (same hobby, height, shared like/dislike for something etc?) everyone’s got a bit of shared piece of themselves w/ their ocs don’t they? 26. Have you ever had to change your OC’s design or something else about them against your will? against my will? i can’t think of anything that i changed against my will so no :V 27. Any OCs that were inspired by a certain song? the only two i can come up rn are: alistair (devil wears a suit and tie) and rosa (o, raven) 28. Your most dangerous OC? i guess the chimera girl i made since she’s trying to fit in the modern life? i mean i still haven’t thought of her story yet but i know she Angery 29. Which one of your OCs would go investigate an abandoned house at night without telling anyone they’re going? ace, aiden, maybe keaton 30. Which one of your OCs would most likely have a secret stuffed animal collection? mel, eva, roy 31. Pick one OC of yours and explain what their tumblr blog would be like (what they reblog, layout, anything really) eliott: landscape stuff, muted colours, mystical content here and there ace: default theme, memes, probably has a side blog that’s more of an aesthetic blog mel: super aesthetic blog, romance themed 32. Which one of your OCs would be the most suitable horror game protagonist and why? literally anyone in the renegade group i could’ve said anyone in the hunters group but they’re all fucking idiots (lee would be more closer to the renegade’s level tho) 33. Your shyest OC? eliott, roy, audrey, fallen god 34. Do you have any twin characters? i literally want to design twin ocs just to have twin ocs jdshfkjsdf 35. Any sibling characters? audrey, dylan, and elle + eve and juno + ace and jack 36. Do you have OC pairs where the other part belongs to someone else (siblings, lovers, friends etc)? nah not really lol 37. Introduce an OC who is not quite human ?? i barely have human characters in the first place, unless this one means humanoid :V 38. Which one of your OCs would be the best dancer? iiiii can’t think of anyone other than the two parents i thought of that i’m planning to be dance teachers lmao 39. Introduce any character you want i haven’t drawn them yet but fallen god and mercenary are two unnamed characters that i recently started thinking of where fallen god falls from the heavens and looses their sight, and the merc runs from their past meet and they team up together w/ the merc being fallen god’s eyes and the fallen go being their protector 40. Any fond memories linked to your characters? Feel free to share! i guess it;s just sentimental ones like, first ocs, first compliments, first art/ fic of them, etc. 41. Has anyone drawn fanart of your OCs? If yes, maybe show a picture or two here (remember sources & permissions!) YEAH AND EVERYONE DRAWS THEM CUTER THAN I DO (well i mean these were from freebies, art trades/ games, and gifts but still) please check out ace’s other’s art gallery and eliott’s other’s art gallery, bc they have the most of them (bc i ask for them a lot lol) 42. Which one of your OCs would be the most interested in Greek gods? whoever in middle school age i guess 43. Do you have any certain type when you create your OCs? Do you tend to favour some certain traits or looks? It’s time to confess big n beefy, jokesters, heart of gold 44. Something you like about your OCs in general that i made them all (well of course not the adopted kids) 45. A character you no longer use? everyone every time i don’t focus on their story anymore than i used to ;;;; 46. Has anyone ever told you that you treat your OCs badly? fortunately no, and i hope no one does and it’d stop to others bc wow that’s rude as hell 47. Has anyone ever (friendly) claimed any of your OCs as their child? okay literally the first time i made eliott, everyone i knew wanted to adopt him as their kid lol 48. OC who is a perfect cinnamon roll, too good for this world, too pure eliott, parker, elle (i love all of them tho :’D) 49. Which one of your OCs would most likely enjoy memes ace, roman, ricky, aiden, dylan, eva, ollie 50. Give me the good ol’ OC talk here. Talk about anything you want i love all of my babes okay good night

[rockmiyabideusexmachina]

2019 Megaman Valentine’s Day (Talent) Contest Results!

Part two of results day, even though I always label the Talent category as Cat. 1, these results are in reverse. Oh well.  Again, raffle prize winners will be contained in both posts, so keep an eye out after my commentary on your art. Not all raffle prize winner are contained in this post. I’ll be contacting all winners soon enough, so sit tight!

To see the Humor category results, please head to THIS POST.

Will any of our Iron Chef contestants be able to create an artsy meal with these ingredients?:

To find out, along with your Talent category winners and full gallery of entries, click here after the break:

Category 1 (Talent) - The Way To A Mega Man’s Heart Is Through His Stomach

This category had the larger amount of participants, and was honestly a lot harder to judge. I really was going back and forth on where to place people, because I love so much about all of them! Your delicious culinary character combos were all delectable in their own right, whether they were actually edible pieces of art or not. I did leave this category up to interpretation a bit more, despite the initial description wording it as a food-themed pinup. As long as it contained some sort of food with a character, it technically fit the theme. 

Thank you once again to all who participated. You all make holding these events fun year after year!

I know imgbox gallery gave people some issues before, so as always, let me know if images or links appear broken. Crossing my fingers this works smoothly this year! XD

After each entrant’s name, there will be a link in the character description to the entry, too, just in case the external inserted images don’t load for you.

[Full Talent Gallery]

1.) @prar-draws​ - Zero and Ciel

While most entries focused on sugary sweets, such as pastries or candies, prar thought outside of the box just enough to stand out against the rest. Taking Zero and Ciel’s already long hair and turning it into ramen and soba noodles, the pair are relaxing together in an overflowing hot tub bowl of their pasta-y strands, broth, veggies and then some, while they enjoy their own bowls of noodles. Despite being heavily layered in clothing, *warning* this is one steamy, saucy pic! XD

*For coming in 1st (in back-to-back years, no doubt), prar has won $100 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value.*

2.) @digitallyfanged​ - Tron Bonne and Megaman Volnutt

Ever the tease, Tabby’s Tron is wooing Volnutt with a sugary-sweet sensory overload at the hands of both her, and her Servbots. Or maybe at the head, too, based on that 2-tier strawberry cake that doubles as a hat on happy Servbot. While including so many treats were definitely eye candy in this piece, so too is Tron in that dress, causing Volnutt to deeply blush. 

The soft glow of the lighter transparency background, along with the usual shine of your lighting on the pair in the foreground, help them stand out. Even if my mouth is watering more at all the Servbot’s treats. Hahaha.

*For coming in 2nd, Tabby has won $50 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value.*

3.) @irischroma​ - Nana

Nana is ready to split her banana split sundae with you. I see what you did there. Your mission is to follow her every command as she feeds you, in her bonus rpg/sim screencap. I really liked the use of multiple halftones to accent the shading on both her and the background of the full image. The background itself is really cool, to incorporate the ice cream mounds, syrup and sprinkles, which also actually align nicely with the sprinkles on her apron. Truly adorbs.

*For coming in 3rd, Iris has won $25 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value*

And the remaining wonderful entries, in alphabetical order by alias:

@bracedshark​ - Marino

The first entry to embrace food-themed clothing, Marino is the living embodiment of the chocolate peppermint sundae she is holding. I love mint chocolate chip ice cream, so Marino’s green hair and clothing accents fit that ice cream color perfectly. Also while tying in your traditional peppermints as accessories on her, as well as the sort of melty pinkish mascara dripping down the side of her cheeks. 

*Bracedshark is the winner of Raffle Prize #1 - The cel of Duo*

@drewblossom​ - Ice Man and Roll

Another great use of food-styled clothing, Drew made a precious cinnamon roll dress for Roll, and an ice cream cone vest with a more whipped topping trim for Ice Man. Ice’s hair also adds to that whipped cream feel, yet despite dancing around, does a good job keeping that cherry from falling off the top of his head. XD This is a super cute scene, and has even better apparel style. 

*Drew is also the winner of Raffle Prize #4 - The Tamashii Nations Zero figure and Zero emblem wristband*

@hyperbole1729​ - Tundra Man, Top Man, Snow Robbit and Eye Ice

The first of two yummy cookie entries, which I’ll assume were baked around the same time, feature both real world treats, and 2D ones. I give Hyperbole big props for making the Snow Robbit and Eye Ice enemies into cookie shape form. They look super delicious, and I’m a guy who loves cookies with tons of frosting. XD Taking the pic on a wintry snowflake plate makes them stand out even more, so I totally loved your creativity with that. 

That baking didn’t only take place in Hyperbole’s kitchen, as Tundra and Top also spent the day making the same treats. I think their cookie cutter shapes have given me a clue to how you made yours. LOL Very cute!

*Hyperbole is the winner of Raffle Prize #3 - The Zero plush and framed X 3D sprite art*

@larytello​ - Zero and Ciel

Strawberry cake seemed to be the most popular choice of romantic treats, and here lary has Zero feeding Ciel her slice. Your digital airbrush shading has really improved, and it shows in this piece! It really gives a nice depth and definition to their arms and legs, not to mention the folds in Ciel’s dress, or the shine off of their helmets. Even with the heavily pink background, with all the hearts, they both still stand out nicely against it, despite their color schemes. Super cute!

@papillonthepirate​ - Roll.EXE

Our other real world food entry is a sugar frosted Roll.EXE cookie, complete with rosy cheek sprinkles and lemon-flavored ribbon candy antennae attached to her. Again, like Hyperbole’s submission, Papillon had the perfect heart decal plate design to help accentuate her creation, along with the doily it’s sitting on. I’m sure she was delicious! I appreciate the extra creativity taking the theme of the contest literally and making an actual tasty Mega Man character treat!

@peach35​ - X and Zero

A very cute scene of X and Zero sharing desert and a drink with swirly-shape sippy straws at a quaint little bistro off the shores of Dopple Town. And I’d imagine the pair of strawberries left snuggling on the table also sort of symbolize the hunter couple cuddling up after their cake and conversation, too. Pardon the pun, but I like the slice of life feel to the scene, that sort of gives it this Norman Rockwell-styled feel. The detail on your strawberries and lemon slices really turned out quite great; they look pretty real!

SockMonkii - Ashe

Ashe is so busy devouring that chocolate/strawberry filled cake slice, I don’t know if she fully realizes how much she has missed on her face. XD In fact, I think she’s likely eyeing the rest of the whole cake as the booty she’s after, rather than of any admirer. LOL The ribbon and bow background, along with all the hearts, help emphasize the cake as a romantic gift. Again, I see a lot of growth and improvement in your art style after a year’s time, and I think this pic turned out great!

@star-crossed-swords​ - Blues and Tempo

While definitely a sweet and romantic drawing, this entry felt like it fit in more with last year’s humor category theme, Beauty and the Beastman.EXE, that I almost wondered if you got mixed up with an older contest post. ^^; So I decided to go with the assumption that Quake Woman/Tempo had something delicious leftover on her hand that Blues was kissing off of her, to fit it within the content requirements. :D Their formalwear looks very nice on both of them. I like the sparkles on her dress coordinating with the starry sky outside the window. 

SubZeroIceSkater - Tundra Man

I totally read that tagline in Tundra Man’s voice. And the more bittersweet, the more pure chocolate, so it sounds good to me! Containing most of his stage enemies in cacao form, this box of chocolates is like a your chances at an extra life in item roulette. You never know what you’re gonna get. That’s sort of reverse Forrest Gump logic...right? I love how the box is designed just like his helmet’s rupee with icicles protruding, along with all the beautiful sparkling snowflakes and hearts in the background. I want a box, badly!

[leifandthorn]

Webcomic Buffers And You, for #WeHeartComics

I keep turning up new webcomic-related Twitter discussions. This one was an (irregular?) offering from WeHeartComics, a product of the SpiderForest collective. (Think “Hiveworks for artists who aren’t into bees.”)

Last Friday was a chat about buffers. Which was a striking thing to jump into, because I’d just been listening to the ComicLab episode where the hosts go “ahh, regular updates are so 10 years ago! Just update whenever you draw something. Readers will be into it.”

And that works great if you’re Kate Beaton (of Hark! A Vagrant) or Sarah Andersen (of Sarah’s Scribbles), where your whole thing is random self-contained standalone bits. (It also helps if they’re Really Good standalones.) But, listen, it’s all wrong for a comic with any kind of continuity. If you slack on the updates there, readers will forget where they are in the story, and end up losing interest.

I don’t know if if strict update times are necessary in the social-media age. Nobody knows when Webcomic Woes is going to update, and it doesn’t matter, because as long as you stay on top of your Patreon/Deviantart/Tumblr feed, it’ll be served up to you.

But for those story-based comics, you’ve got to keep a regular update rate (e.g. “twice a week”). So you may as well keep the posting dates and times consistent too. Keeps your life simple, makes it easier to track your to-do list.

And with that, on to the questions…

Q1. Do you try to keep a buffer of comic pages? Why or why not? #WeHeartComics pic.twitter.com/aYgkNRoD9W

— WeHeartComics (@WeHeartComics) April 6, 2018

For Leif & Thorn, yes. I like titling strips in the format of “This Storyline 1/24” (a tic picked up from Bruno The Bandit)…and that only works if my buffer reaches the end of This Storyline.

The current arc is getting broken up into sub-acts — starting with “The Show Must Grow On: Overture” — mostly because I’m not far enough to have the numbers otherwise. Did the same thing splitting off the 14-strip An Incredibly Platonic Shopping Day, even though it leads straight (hah) into the next storyline, because Summer Sunshine clocked in at a full 84 strips. I could manage to be 84 strips ahead, but not 98.

As of this writing, I’ve drawn 18 strips into The Show Must Grow On: Act I. Which is…not bad, but there’s gonna need to be a crackdown of work this weekend. And the next one. And probably the next.

For But I’m A Cat Person — eheh, it used to have a buffer. Now I’m almost always working one page ahead. Talked a lot about the effects of that in an earlier WebcomicChat about pacing.

And then there’s Webcomic Woes, which is bufferless by nature. It gets made on a “whenever I have an idea” basis, and I don’t have more than one relevant idea per day.

A1 YES!

I'm working on getting a buffer of at least 52 pages because I have a crazy day job and I want enough buffer for a year of weekly updates.#WeHeartComics

— TeJay is Drawing (@TeJay_the_Mad) April 6, 2018

This here is a heroic effort. I’ve never had a full-page buffer that long.

(Technically, I’m 50-ish updates ahead with Leif & Thorn right now — but since it’s a daily strip, that only comes out to a month and a half’s worth of lead time.)

Q1 #WeHeartComics I prefer to always work on solid ground so right now I have a hefty buffer of 800 pages. (even more if I include book 2)

— 🐀Kristen🐉Kiomall-Evans🐒 (@BatichiKristen) April 6, 2018

…and here we have the winner of this thread.

Q2. What drawbacks or advantages does your current buffer (or lack of) give you?#WeHeartComics pic.twitter.com/wmju0giUTm

— WeHeartComics (@WeHeartComics) April 6, 2018

Low buffer gives you a quick turnaround on “whoops, readers didn’t understand that reference, I’ll have a character explain it on the next page.” High buffer gives you security in case you fall out of a tree and have to put your drawing arm in a cast for three months.

A2: The advantage is if something happens, I won't have to miss an update. Since I post on Webtoons, this kicks me down in rankings, which potentially loses me subs/PVs. Drawbacks, are that I can't make any changes to the story arc or I'll have to redo portions #WeHeartComics

— Lisa ⭐️ リサ (@asilris) April 6, 2018

…and then there’s algorithms. Or, on a site like mine, the Webcomic plugin is configured to send cranky emails if the buffer runs low.

Although I find that having a large buffer, so you can redo something while it’s in the buffer, is much easier than redoing it after it’s posted! If you realize on page 10 that you need a Chekhov’s gun that should’ve been on the wall on page 1, you really want page 1 to be unposted. I’ve resorted to post-posting edits, but only in the case of serious continuity errors.

(If you’re really bored some afternoon, go through the BICP archives page-by-page and see how many errors you can spot compared to the originals — which are all preserved on the SmackJeeves mirror.)

Q3. Life sometimes eats away at buffers. What techniques do you use to get around that?#WeHeartComics pic.twitter.com/qKtmCWYUDA

— WeHeartComics (@WeHeartComics) April 6, 2018

With Leif & Thorn: hasn’t been a problem. (Knock wood.)

With BICP: uh, mostly posting stuff late with apologies. The comic was originally 3 pages a week, and I couldn’t keep that up full-time, so I took it down to 2 (it goes back up sometimes for special events, like the second Christmas special), and that helped.

I do a week or two of filler between chapters, and I’ve given myself a couple longer hiatuses…but do not have the discipline to use them for buffering, heh. I just use them to recharge before jumping back into the “whoops, gotta draw tomorrow’s page now” rollercoaster.

Waaaay back in the day (2003!), And Shine Heaven Now had 6-strips-a-week updates. When my Dell died and the buffer ran out, I drew a week of filler at the library in MSPaint rather than go updateless.

In retrospect, under the circumstances, I’m sure readers would’ve forgiven a mini-hiatus! But for some reason it honestly didn’t occur to me as an option.

Q4. Do you have advice to those wanting to create buffers?#WeHeartComics pic.twitter.com/S1v4ndaZVI

— WeHeartComics (@WeHeartComics) April 6, 2018

Work up a big one before your comic actually launches. I had several months of Leif & Thorn drawn before I started posting, and the buffer has been healthy ever since.

After that, just pace yourself. Figure out what your workflow is, and adapt your schedule to work with it! Some authors like writing out a script beforehand, others like working it out as they draw. Some artists need strict and well-planned schedules, others (*cough*) get revved up by looming deadlines. In the immortal words of Jan Valentine: whatever works is cool.

Q5. If a buffer can’t be made, what advice would you give others seeking to reduce the stress of regular updates?#WeHeartComics pic.twitter.com/5ipyS6qiOh

— WeHeartComics (@WeHeartComics) April 6, 2018

…I mean, if your comic is suited to irregular updates, you can always just do that.

If not, you’re allowed to take breaks. Just give your readers accurate information about your plans, and then stick to them. Don’t be the person whose site still says “after this short hiatus, My Awesome Comic will return in May 2017!” when it’s April 2018.

If you can’t do irregular updates, and you can’t make a buffer, and it’s too stressful to keep up regular updates, and you can’t even get back from hiatus…then maybe this isn’t the comic you should be doing, and it’s time to gracefully bow out. (More on that next post.)

(Original post.)

[spiffysixxsense]

Pssst, do 1-65 of the questions you’re not used to 🖤

1. Do you ever doubt the existence of others than you?I doubt my own existence, not so much others. (I exist?)2. On a scale of 1-5, how afraid of the dark are you?Where am I? In my own room? 0. An abandoned asylum? Probably a good 4. Deep in an unknown forest with lots of noises? 53. The person you would never want to meet?Trump. I wouldn't be able to hold my tongue.4. What is your favorite word?I used the word Psychopharmacology alot today.5. If you were a type of tree, what would you be?A weeping willow6. When you looked in the mirror this morning what was the first thing you thought?I'm tired. Ugh I have to get ready. 7. What shirt are you wearing?A green v neck that has the X pattern thing across the chest.8. What do you label yourself as?Worthless9. Bright room or dark room?DARK ROOM get me the hell away from the light.10. What were you doing at midnight last night?Working on a project 11. Favorite age you’ve been so far?Anything from like 4-1012. Who told you they loved you last?Alex13. Your worst enemy?Nobody comes to mind of someone who actually truly hates me, @ me if you wanna be my enemy 14. What is your current desktop picture?A teal and black swirly pattern 15. Do you like someone?If my SO counts16. The last song you listened to?SHINEDOWN'S NEW SINGLE 'DEVIL' AND OOH MY GOD IT'S SO GOOD AND I CANT WAIT FOR THE REST OF THE ALBUM17. You can press a button that will make any one person explode. Who would you blow up?The person I never wanna meet probably.18. Who would you really like to just punch in the face?Oh my god these are all the same question TRUMP I HATE TRUMP I NEVER WANT TO MEET HIM I WANT TO BLOW HIM UP AND PUNCH HIM. 19. If anyone could be your slave for a day, who would it be and what would they have to do?I have no idea who it would be but I would definitely make them write some essays and annotated bibliographies for me20. What is your best physical attribute? (showing said attribute is optional)I don't really have one, but I don't hate my lips. They have a nice shape for lipstick21. If you were the opposite sex for one day, what would you look like and what would you do?I'd probably look like my dad and I'm playing with my dick all day. 22. Do you have a secret talent? If yes, what is it?I don't even have a known talent much less a secret one 23. What is one unique thing you’re afraid of?Driving terrifies me, and it somehow gets worse each time I do it. 24. You can only have one kind of sandwich. Every sandwich ingredient known to humankind is at your disposal.Waldorf chicken salad came to mind, with spinach and whole wheat bread. I'm boring 25. You just found $100! How are you going to spend it?Like, one grocery trip. 26. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, but you have to leave immediately. Where are you going to go?Honestly. Nowhere. I hate sudden plans. But to play along, I'll say Greece. 27. An angel appears out of Heaven and offers you a lifetime supply of the alcoholic beverage of your choice. “Be brand-specific” it says. Man! What are you gonna say about that? Even if you don’t drink booze there’s something you can figure out… so what’s it gonna be?"Even if you don't drink booze there's something you can figure out" what am I figuring out? I don't want any alcoholic beverages.28. You discover a beautiful island upon which you may build your own society. You make the rules. What is the first rule you put into place? No hate/ prejudice/ discrimination 29. What is your favorite expletive?I say fuck alot.30. Your house is on fire, holy shit! You have just enough time to run in there and grab ONE inanimate object. Don’t worry, your loved ones and pets have already made it out safely. So what’s the one thing you’re going to save from that blazing inferno?Probably my computer, but something more meaningful is my childhood stuffed dog, Kipper.31. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?Oh baby I like this one. Does it have to be ONE memory? Like I want to erase the times I was in the car as a child with a drunk driver that made me terrified to drive, but it happened more than once, can I erase them all?32. You got kicked out of the country for being a time-traveling heathen who sleeps with celebrities and has super-powers. But check out this cool shit… you can move to anywhere else in the world!That wasn't really a question, but I get it. In actuality, probably Canada. It's not America but more similar than other places so I'm not culture shocked.33. The Celestial Gates Of Beyond have opened, much to your surprise because you didn’t think such a thing existed. Death appears. As it turns out, Death is actually a pretty cool entity, and happens to be in a fantastic mood. Death offers to return the friend/family-member/person/etc. of your choice to the living world. Who will you bring back?My Aunt Patricia 34. What was your last dream about?I can't remember, but I think school. Ugh35. Are you a good….[insert anything you’d like here]?So I'm making the question? Am I a good anything? The answer is no regardless. 36. Have you ever been admitted to the hospital?Not since infancy 37. Have you ever built a snowman?Yes38. What is the color of your socks?Burgundy with little brown foxes39. What type of music do you like?Rock/alternative/metal40. Do you prefer sunrises or sunsets?Sunsets. I only see sunrises because I'm sleep deprived 41. What is your favorite milkshake flavor?Banana 42. What football team do you support? (I will answer in terms of American football as well as soccer)I can't name a single soccer team but I'm a Lions fan no matter what.43. Do you have any scars?Not really anymore, they have faded.44. What do you want to be when you graduate?Employed.45. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?My anxiety 46. Are you reliable?Yes. Too much sometimes 47. If you could ask your future self one question, what would it be?Am I ever okay? Am I ever happy? Am I ever a capable adult?48. Do you hold grudges?A little bit yeah. 49. If you could breed two animals together to defy the laws of nature, what new animal would you create?When I was in like 4th grade we had to do this and then draw it, and I made a Larkigator, a lion shark alligator 😂50. What is the most unusual conversation you’ve ever had?Something with @x-i-a-t in a tent at 4 am, or just a way too personal conversation with @reddragon800051. Are you a good liar?Yes. Most of the time.52. How long could you go without talking?Weeks honestly. 53. What has been you worst haircut/style?I guess bangs, but I don't even think they looked that awful. I did however get chunky blonde highlights I did not like. 54. Have you ever baked your own cake?From scratch, no55. Can you do any accents other than your own?Well? No. 56. What do you like on your toast?Butter and apple jelly57. What is the last thing you drew a picture of?I mean technically just little random doodles of shapes when I was bored in class.58. What would be you dream car?I joke about a model GT because that's my initials, but honestly one that will drive itself. 59. Do you sing in the shower? Or do anything unusual in the shower? Explain?If no-one is home I will play music and dance, I don't usually sing just because I fear someone will come home and hear me lol. If there isn't music i talk to myself, either venting to nobody or just saying all the things I have to do when I get out 60. Do you believe in aliens?Yes 61. Do you often read your horoscope?Never 62. What is your favorite letter of the alphabet?The two most important people's names in my life begin with A. 63. Which is cooler: dinosaurs or dragons?Shit. I want to say dragons but i think I'm gonna say dinosaurs just because they actually existed.64. What do you think about babies?Keep them away from me.65. Freebie! Ask anything interesting you can think of.Am I procrastinating by answering these? Yes.

[bountyofbeads]

Regulations for ocean mining have never been formally established. The United Nations has given that task to an obscure organization known as the International Seabed Authority, which is housed in a pair of drab gray office buildings at the edge of Kingston Harbour, in Jamaica. Unlike most UN bodies, the ISA receives little oversight.

"Mining companies want access to the seabed beneath international waters, which contain more valuable minerals than all the continents combined."

History’s Largest Mining Operation Is About to Begin.... It’s underwater—and the consequences are unimaginable.

Story by Wil S. Hylton | Published January/February 2020 Issue | The Atlantic | Posted December 26, 2019 |

Unless you are given to chronic anxiety or suffer from nihilistic despair, you probably haven’t spent much time contemplating the bottom of the ocean. Many people imagine the seabed to be a vast expanse of sand, but it’s a jagged and dynamic landscape with as much variation as any place onshore. Mountains surge from underwater plains, canyons slice miles deep, hot springs billow through fissures in rock, and streams of heavy brine ooze down hillsides, pooling into undersea lakes.

These peaks and valleys are laced with most of the same minerals found on land. Scientists have documented their deposits since at least 1868, when a dredging ship pulled a chunk of iron ore from the seabed north of Russia. Five years later, another ship found similar nuggets at the bottom of the Atlantic, and two years after that, it discovered a field of the same objects in the Pacific. For more than a century, oceanographers continued to identify new minerals on the seafloor—copper, nickel, silver, platinum, gold, and even gemstones—while mining companies searched for a practical way to dig them up.

Today, many of the largest mineral corporations in the world have launched underwater mining programs. On the west coast of Africa, the De Beers Group is using a fleet of specialized ships to drag machinery across the seabed in search of diamonds. In 2018, those ships extracted 1.4 million carats from the coastal waters of Namibia; in 2019, De Beers commissioned a new ship that will scrape the bottom twice as quickly as any other vessel. Another company, Nautilus Minerals, is working in the territorial waters of Papua New Guinea to shatter a field of underwater hot springs lined with precious metals, while Japan and South Korea have embarked on national projects to exploit their own offshore deposits. But the biggest prize for mining companies will be access to international waters, which cover more than half of the global seafloor and contain more valuable minerals than all the continents combined.

Regulations for ocean mining have never been formally established. The United Nations has given that task to an obscure organization known as the International Seabed Authority, which is housed in a pair of drab gray office buildings at the edge of Kingston Harbour, in Jamaica. Unlike most UN bodies, the ISA receives little oversight. It is classified as “autonomous” and falls under the direction of its own secretary general, who convenes his own general assembly once a year, at the ISA headquarters. For about a week, delegates from 168 member states pour into Kingston from around the world, gathering at a broad semicircle of desks in the auditorium of the Jamaica Conference Centre. Their assignment is not to prevent mining on the seafloor but to mitigate its damage—selecting locations where extraction will be permitted, issuing licenses to mining companies, and drafting the technical and environmental standards of an underwater Mining Code.

Writing the code has been difficult. ISA members have struggled to agree on a regulatory framework. While they debate the minutiae of waste disposal and ecological preservation, the ISA has granted “exploratory” permits around the world. Some 30 mineral contractors already hold licenses to work in sweeping regions of the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans. One site, about 2,300 miles east of Florida, contains the largest system of underwater hot springs ever discovered, a ghostly landscape of towering white spires that scientists call the “Lost City.” Another extends across 4,500 miles of the Pacific, or roughly a fifth of the circumference of the planet. The companies with permits to explore these regions have raised breathtaking sums of venture capital. They have designed and built experimental vehicles, lowered them to the bottom, and begun testing methods of dredging and extraction while they wait for the ISA to complete the Mining Code and open the floodgates to commercial extraction.

At full capacity, these companies expect to dredge thousands of square miles a year. Their collection vehicles will creep across the bottom in systematic rows, scraping through the top five inches of the ocean floor. Ships above will draw thousands of pounds of sediment through a hose to the surface, remove the metallic objects, known as polymetallic nodules, and then flush the rest back into the water. Some of that slurry will contain toxins such as mercury and lead, which could poison the surrounding ocean for hundreds of miles. The rest will drift in the current until it settles in nearby ecosystems. An early study by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences predicted that each mining ship will release about 2 million cubic feet of discharge every day, enough to fill a freight train that is 16 miles long. The authors called this “a conservative estimate,” since other projections had been three times as high. By any measure, they concluded, “a very large area will be blanketed by sediment to such an extent that many animals will not be able to cope with the impact and whole communities will be severely affected by the loss of individuals and species.”

At the ISA meeting in 2019, delegates gathered to review a draft of the code. Officials hoped the document would be ratified for implementation in 2020. I flew down to observe the proceedings on a balmy morning and found the conference center teeming with delegates. A staff member ushered me through a maze of corridors to meet the secretary general, Michael Lodge, a lean British man in his 50s with cropped hair and a genial smile. He waved me toward a pair of armchairs beside a bank of windows overlooking the harbor, and we sat down to discuss the Mining Code, what it will permit and prohibit, and why the United Nations is preparing to mobilize the largest mining operation in the history of the world.

Until recently, marine biologists paid little attention to the deep sea. They believed its craggy knolls and bluffs were essentially barren. The traditional model of life on Earth relies on photosynthesis: plants on land and in shallow water harness sunlight to grow biomass, which is devoured by creatures small and large, up the food chain to Sunday dinner. By this account, every animal on the planet would depend on plants to capture solar energy. Since plants disappear a few hundred feet below sea level, and everything goes dark a little farther down, there was no reason to expect a thriving ecosystem in the deep. Maybe a light snow of organic debris would trickle from the surface, but it would be enough to sustain only a few wayward aquatic drifters.

That theory capsized in 1977, when a pair of oceanographers began poking around the Pacific in a submersible vehicle. While exploring a range of underwater mountains near the Galápagos Islands, they spotted a hydrothermal vent about 8,000 feet deep. No one had ever seen an underwater hot spring before, though geologists suspected they might exist. As the oceanographers drew close to the vent, they made an even more startling discovery: A large congregation of animals was camped around the vent opening. These were not the feeble scavengers that one expected so far down. They were giant clams, purple octopuses, white crabs, and 10-foot tube worms, whose food chain began not with plants but with organic chemicals floating in the warm vent water.

For biologists, this was more than curious. It shook the foundation of their field. If a complex ecosystem could emerge in a landscape devoid of plants, evolution must be more than a heliological affair. Life could appear in perfect darkness, in blistering heat and a broth of noxious compounds—an environment that would extinguish every known creature on Earth. “That was the discovery event,” an evolutionary biologist named Timothy Shank told me. “It changed our view about the boundaries of life. Now we know that the methane lakes on one of Jupiter’s moons are probably laden with species, and there is no doubt life on other planetary bodies.”

Shank was 12 years old that winter, a bookish kid in North Carolina. The early romance of the space age was already beginning to fade, but the discovery of life near hydrothermal vents would inspire a blossoming of oceanography that captured his imagination. As he completed a degree in marine biology, then a doctorate in ecology and evolution, he consumed reports from scientists around the world who found new vents brimming with unknown species. They appeared far below the surface—the deepest known vent is about three miles down—while another geologic feature, known as a “cold seep,” gives rise to life in chemical pools even deeper on the seafloor. No one knew how far down the vents and seeps might be found, but Shank decided to focus his research on the deepest waters of the Earth.

Scientists divide the ocean into five layers of depth. Closest to the surface is the “sunlight zone,” where plants thrive; then comes the “twilight zone,” where darkness falls; next is the “midnight zone,” where some creatures generate their own light; and then there’s a frozen flatland known simply as “the abyss.” Oceanographers have visited these layers in submersible vehicles for half a century, but the final layer is difficult to reach. It is known as the “hadal zone,” in reference to Hades, the ancient Greek god of the underworld, and it includes any water that is at least 6,000 meters below the surface—or, in a more Vernian formulation, that is 20,000 feet under the sea. Because the hadal zone is so deep, it is usually associated with ocean trenches, but several deepwater plains have sections that cross into hadal depth.

Deepwater plains are also home to the polymetallic nodules that explorers first discovered a century and a half ago. Mineral companies believe that nodules will be easier to mine than other seabed deposits. To remove the metal from a hydrothermal vent or an underwater mountain, they will have to shatter rock in a manner similar to land-based extraction. Nodules are isolated chunks of rocks on the seabed that typically range from the size of a golf ball to that of a grapefruit, so they can be lifted from the sediment with relative ease. Nodules also contain a distinct combination of minerals. While vents and ridges are flecked with precious metal, such as silver and gold, the primary metals in nodules are copper, manganese, nickel, and cobalt—crucial materials in modern batteries. As iPhones and laptops and electric vehicles spike demand for those metals, many people believe that nodules are the best way to migrate from fossil fuels to battery power.

The ISA has issued more mining licenses for nodules than for any other seabed deposit. Most of these licenses authorize contractors to exploit a single deepwater plain. Known as the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, or CCZ, it extends across 1.7 million square miles between Hawaii and Mexico—wider than the continental United States. When the Mining Code is approved, more than a dozen companies will accelerate their explorations in the CCZ to industrial-scale extraction. Their ships and robots will use vacuum hoses to suck nodules and sediment from the seafloor, extracting the metal and dumping the rest into the water. How many ecosystems will be covered by that sediment is impossible to predict. Ocean currents fluctuate regularly in speed and direction, so identical plumes of slurry will travel different distances, in different directions, on different days. The impact of a sediment plume also depends on how it is released. Slurry that is dumped near the surface will drift farther than slurry pumped back to the bottom. The circulating draft of the Mining Code does not specify a depth of discharge. The ISA has adopted an estimate that sediment dumped near the surface will travel no more than 62 miles from the point of release, but many experts believe the slurry could travel farther. A recent survey of academic research compiled by Greenpeace concluded that mining waste “could travel hundreds or even thousands of kilometers.”

Like many deepwater plains, the CCZ has sections that lie at hadal depth. Its eastern boundary is marked by a hadal trench. No one knows whether mining sediment will drift into the hadal zone. As the director of a hadal-research program at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, in Massachusetts, Timothy Shank has been studying the deep sea for almost 30 years. In 2014, he led an international mission to complete the first systematic study of the hadal ecosystem—but even Shank has no idea how mining could affect the hadal zone, because he still has no idea what it contains. If you want a sense of how little we know about the deep ocean, how difficult it is to study, and what’s at stake when industry leaps before science, Shank’s research is a good place to start.

I first met Shank about seven years ago, when he was organizing the international mission to survey the hadal zone. He had put together a three-year plan to visit every ocean trench: sending a robotic vehicle to explore their features, record every contour of topography, and collect specimens from each. The idea was either dazzling or delusional; I wasn’t sure which. Scientists have enough trouble measuring the seabed in shallower waters. They have used ropes and chains and acoustic instruments to record depth for more than a century, yet 85 percent of the global seabed remains unmapped—and the hadal is far more difficult to map than other regions, since it’s nearly impossible to see.

If it strikes you as peculiar that modern vehicles cannot penetrate the deepest ocean, take a moment to imagine what it means to navigate six or seven miles below the surface. Every 33 feet of depth exerts as much pressure as the atmosphere of the Earth, so when you are just 66 feet down, you are under three times as much pressure as a person on land, and when you are 300 feet down, you’re subjected to 10 atmospheres of pressure. Tube worms living beside hydrothermal vents near the Galápagos are compressed by about 250 atmospheres, and mining vehicles in the CCZ have to endure twice as much—but they are still just half as far down as the deepest trenches.

Building a vehicle to function at 36,000 feet, under 2 million pounds of pressure per square foot, is a task of interstellar-type engineering. It’s a good deal more rigorous than, say, bolting together a rover to skitter across Mars. Picture the schematic of an iPhone case that can be smashed with a sledgehammer more or less constantly, from every angle at once, without a trace of damage, and you’re in the ballpark—or just consider the fact that more people have walked on the moon than have reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench, the deepest place on Earth.

The first two people descended in 1960, using a contraption owned by the U.S. Navy. It seized and shuddered on the descent. Its window cracked as the pressure mounted, and it landed with so much force that it kicked up a cloud of silt that obscured the view for the entire 20 minutes the pair remained on the bottom. Half a century passed before the film director James Cameron repeated their journey, in 2012. Unlike the swaggering billionaire Richard Branson, who was planning to dive the Mariana in a cartoonish vehicle shaped like a fighter jet, Cameron is well versed in ocean science and engineering. He was closely involved in the design of his submarine, and sacrificed stylistic flourishes for genuine innovations, including a new type of foam that maintains buoyancy at full ocean depth. Even so, his vessel lurched and bucked on the way down. He finally managed to land, and spent a couple of hours collecting sediment samples before he noticed that hydraulic fluid was leaking onto the window. The vehicle’s mechanical arm began to fail, and all of the thrusters on its right side went out—so he returned to the surface early, canceled his plan for additional dives, and donated the broken sub to Woods Hole.

The most recent descent of the Mariana Trench was completed last spring by a private-equity investor named Victor Vescovo, who spent $48 million on a submarine that was even more sophisticated than Cameron’s. Vescovo was on a personal quest to reach the bottom of the five deepest trenches in the world, a project he called “Five Deeps.” He was able to complete the project, making multiple dives of the Mariana—but if his achievement represents a leap forward in hadal exploration, it also serves as a reminder of how impenetrable the trenches remain: a region that can be visited only by the most committed multimillionaire, Hollywood celebrity, or special military program, and only in isolated dives to specific locations that reveal little about the rest of the hadal environment. That environment is composed of 33 trenches and 13 shallower formations called troughs. Its total geographic area is about two-thirds the size of Australia. It is the least examined ecosystem of its size on Earth.

Without a vehicle to explore the hadal zone, scientists have been forced to use primitive methods. The most common technique has scarcely changed in more than a century: Expedition ships chug across hundreds of miles to reach a precise location, then lower a trap, wait a few hours, and reel it up to see what’s inside. The limitations of this approach are self-evident, if not comic. It’s like dangling a birdcage out the door of an airplane crossing Africa at 36,000 feet, and then trying to divine, from the mangled bodies of insects, what sort of animals roam the savanna.

All of which is to say that Shank’s plan to explore every trench in the world was somewhere between audacious and absurd, but he had assembled a team of the world’s leading experts, secured ship time for extensive missions, and spent 10 years supervising the design of the most advanced robotic vehicle ever developed for deepwater navigation. Called Nereus, after a mythological sea god, it could dive alone—charting a course amid rocky cliffs, measuring their contours with a doppler scanner, recording video with high-definition cameras, and collecting samples—or it could be linked to the deck of a ship with fiber-optic cable, allowing Shank to monitor its movement on a computer in the ship’s control room, boosting the thrusters to steer this way and that, piercing the darkness with its headlamps, and maneuvering a mechanical claw to gather samples in the deep.

I reached out to Shank in 2013, a few months before the expedition began. I wanted to write about the project, and he agreed to let me join him on a later leg. When his ship departed, in the spring of 2014, I followed online as it pursued a course to the Kermadec Trench, in the Pacific, and Shank began sending Nereus on a series of dives. On the first, it descended to 6,000 meters, a modest target on the boundary of the hadal zone. On the second, Shank pushed it to 7,000 meters; on the third to 8,000; and on the fourth to 9,000. He knew that diving to 10,000 meters would be a crucial threshold. It is the last full kilometer of depth on Earth: No trench is believed to be deeper than 11,000 meters. To commemorate this final increment and the successful beginning of his project, he attached a pair of silver bracelets to the frame of Nereus, planning to give them to his daughters when he returned home. Then he dropped the robot in the water and retreated to the control room to monitor its movements.

On-screen, blue water gave way to darkness as Nereus descended, its headlamps illuminating specks of debris suspended in the water. It was 10 meters shy of the 10,000-meter mark when suddenly the screen went dark. There was an audible gasp in the control room, but no one panicked. Losing the video feed on a dive was relatively common. Maybe the fiber-optic tether had snapped, or the software had hit a glitch. Whatever it was, Nereus had been programmed to respond with emergency measures. It could back out of a jam, shed expendable weight, guide itself to the surface, and send a homing beacon to help Shank’s team retrieve it.

As the minutes ticked by, Shank waited for those measures to activate, but none did. “There’s no sound, no implosion, no chime,” he told me afterward. “Just … black.” He paced the deck through the night, staring across the Stygian void for signs of Nereus. The following day he finally saw debris surface, and as he watched it rise, he felt his project sinking. Ten years of planning, a $14 million robot, and an international team of experts—it had all collapsed under the crushing pressure of hadal depths.

“I think we’ll be looking at hundreds or thousands of species we haven’t seen before, and some of them are going to be huge.”

“I’m not over it yet,” he told me two years later. We were standing on the deck of another ship, 100 miles off the coast of Massachusetts, where Shank was preparing to launch a new robot. The vehicle was no replacement for Nereus. It was a rectilinear hunk of metal and plastic, about five feet high, three feet wide, and nine feet long. Red on top, with a silvery bottom and three fans mounted at the rear, it could have been mistaken for a child’s backyard spaceship. Shank had no illusion that it was capable of hadal exploration. Since the loss of Nereus, there was no vehicle on Earth that could navigate the deepest trenches—Cameron’s was no longer in service, Branson’s didn’t work, and Vescovo’s hadn’t yet been built.

Shank’s new robot did have a few impressive features. Its navigational system was even more advanced than the one in Nereus, and he hoped it would be able to maneuver in a trenchlike environment with even greater precision—but its body was not designed to withstand hadal pressure. In fact, it had never descended more than a few dozen feet below the surface, and Shank knew that it would take years to build something that could survive at the bottom of a trench. What had seemed, just two years earlier, like the beginning of a new era in hadal science was developing a quixotic aspect, and, at 50, Shank could not help wondering if it was madness to spend another decade of his life on a dream that seemed to be drifting further from his reach. But he was driven by a lifelong intuition that he still couldn’t shake. Shank believes that access to the trenches will reveal one of the greatest discoveries in history: a secret ecosystem bursting with creatures that have been cloistered for eternity in the deep.

“I would be shocked if there aren’t vents and seeps in the trenches,” he told me as we bobbed on the water that day in 2016. “They’ll be there, and they will be teeming with life. I think we’ll be looking at hundreds or thousands of species we haven’t seen before, and some of them are going to be huge.” He pictured the hadal as an alien world that followed its own evolutionary course, the unimaginable pressure creating a menagerie of inconceivable beasts. “My time is running out to find them,” he said. “Maybe my legacy will be to push things forward so that somebody else can. We have a third of our ocean that we still can’t explore. It’s embarrassing. It’s pathetic.”

While scientists struggle to reach the deep ocean, human impact has already gotten there. Most of us are familiar with the menu of damages to coastal water: overfishing, oil spills, and pollution, to name a few. What can be lost in the discussion of these issues is how they reverberate far beneath.

Take fishing. The relentless pursuit of cod in the early 20th century decimated its population from Newfoundland to New England, sending hungry shoppers in search of other options. As shallow-water fish such as haddock, grouper, and sturgeon joined the cod’s decline, commercial fleets around the world pushed into deeper water. Until the 1970s, the slimehead fish lived in relative obscurity, patrolling the slopes of underwater mountains in water up to 6,000 feet deep. Then a consortium of fishermen pushed the Food and Drug Administration to change its name, and the craze for “orange roughy” began—only to fade again in the early 2000s, when the fish was on a path toward extinction itself.

Environmental damage from oil production is also migrating into deeper water. Disturbing photographs of oil-drenched beaches have captured public attention since at least 1989, when the Exxon Valdez tanker crashed into a reef and leaked 11 million gallons into an Alaskan sound. It would remain the largest spill in U.S. water until 2010, when the Deepwater Horizon explosion spewed 210 million gallons into the Gulf of Mexico. But a recent study revealed that the release of chemicals to disperse the spill was twice as toxic as the oil to animals living 3,000 feet below the surface.

Maybe the greatest alarm in recent years has followed the discovery of plastic floating in the ocean. Scientists estimate that 17 billion pounds of polymer are flushed into the ocean each year, and substantially more of it collects on the bottom than on the surface. Just as a bottle that falls from a picnic table will roll downhill to a gulch, trash on the seafloor gradually makes its way toward deepwater plains and hadal trenches. After his expedition to the trenches, Victor Vescovo returned with the news that garbage had beaten him there. He found a plastic bag at the bottom of one trench, a beverage can in another, and when he reached the deepest point in the Mariana, he watched an object with a large S on the side float past his window. Trash of all sorts is collecting in the hadal—Spam tins, Budweiser cans, rubber gloves, even a mannequin head.

Scientists are just beginning to understand the impact of trash on aquatic life. Fish and seabirds that mistake grocery bags for prey will glut their stomachs with debris that their digestive system can’t expel. When a young whale drifted ashore and died in the Philippines in 2019, an autopsy revealed that its belly was packed with 88 pounds of plastic bags, nylon rope, and netting. Two weeks later, another whale beached in Sardinia, its stomach crammed with 48 pounds of plastic dishes and tubing. Certain types of coral like to eat plastic more than food. They will gorge themselves like a kid on Twinkies instead of eating what they need to survive. Microbes that flourish on plastic have ballooned in number, replacing other species as their population explodes in a polymer ocean.

If it seems trivial to worry about the population statistics of bacteria in the ocean, you may be interested to know that ocean microbes are essential to human and planetary health. About a third of the carbon dioxide generated on land is absorbed by underwater organisms, including one species that was just discovered in the CCZ in 2018. The researchers who found that bacterium have no idea how it removes carbon from the environment, but their findings show that it may account for up to 10 percent of the volume that is sequestered by oceans every year.

Many of the things we do know about ocean microbes, we know thanks to Craig Venter, the genetic scientist most famous for starting a small company in the 1990s to compete with the Human Genome Project. The two-year race between his company and the international collaboration generated endless headlines and culminated in a joint announcement at the White House to declare a tie. But Venter’s interest wasn’t limited to human DNA. He wanted to learn the language of genetics in order to create synthetic microbes with practical features. After his work on the human genome, he spent two years sailing around the world, lowering bottles into the ocean to collect bacteria and viruses from the water. By the time he returned, he had discovered hundreds of thousands of new species, and his lab in Maryland proceeded to sequence their DNA—identifying more than 60 million unique genes, which is about 2,500 times the number in humans. Then he and his team began to scour those genes for properties they could use to make custom bugs.

Venter now lives in a hypermodern house on a bluff in Southern California. Chatting one evening on the sofa beside the door to his walk-in humidor and wine cellar, he described how saltwater microbes could help solve the most urgent problems of modern life. One of the bacteria he pulled from the ocean consumes carbon and excretes methane. Venter would like to integrate its genes into organisms designed to live in smokestacks and recycle emissions. “They could scrub the plant’s CO2 and convert it to methane that can be burned as fuel in the same plant,” he said.

Venter was also studying bacteria that could be useful in medicine. Microbes produce a variety of antibiotic compounds, which they deploy as weapons against their rivals. Many of those compounds can also be used to kill the pathogens that infect humans. Nearly all of the antibiotic drugs on the market were initially derived from microorganisms, but they are losing efficacy as pathogens evolve to resist them. “We have new drugs in development,” Matt McCarthy, an infectious-disease specialist at Weill Cornell Medical College, told me, “but most of them are slight variations on the ones we already had. The problem with that is, they’re easy for bacteria to resist, because they’re similar to something bacteria have developed resistance to in the past. What we need is an arsenal of new compounds.”

Venter pointed out that ocean microbes produce radically different compounds from those on land. “There are more than a million microbes per milliliter of seawater,” he said, “so the chance of finding new antibiotics in the marine environment is high.” McCarthy agreed. “The next great drug may be hidden somewhere deep in the water,” he said. “We need to get to the deep-sea organisms, because they’re making compounds that we’ve never seen before. We may find drugs that could be used to treat gout, or rheumatoid arthritis, or all kinds of other conditions.”

Marine biologists have never conducted a comprehensive survey of microbes in the hadal trenches. The conventional tools of water sampling cannot function at extreme depth, and engineers are just beginning to develop tools that can. Microbial studies of the deepwater plains are slightly further along—and scientists have recently discovered that the CCZ is unusually flush with life. “It’s one of the most biodiverse areas that we’ve ever sampled on the abyssal plains,” a University of Hawaii oceanographer named Jeff Drazen told me. Most of those microbes, he said, live on the very same nodules that miners are planning to extract. “When you lift them off the seafloor, you’re removing a habitat that took 10 million years to grow.” Whether or not those microbes can be found in other parts of the ocean is unknown. “A lot of the less mobile organisms,” Drazen said, “may not be anywhere else.”

Drazen is an academic ecologist; Venter is not. Venter has been accused of trying to privatize the human genome, and many of his critics believe his effort to create new organisms is akin to playing God. He clearly doesn’t have an aversion to profit-driven science, and he’s not afraid to mess with nature—yet when I asked him about the prospect of mining in deep water, he flared with alarm. “We should be very careful about mining in the ocean,” he said. “These companies should be doing rigorous microbial surveys before they do anything else. We only know a fraction of the microbes down there, and it’s a terrible idea to screw with them before we know what they are and what they do.”

Mining executives insist that their work in the ocean is misunderstood. Some adopt a swaggering bravado and portray the industry as a romantic frontier adventure. As the manager of exploration at Nautilus Minerals, John Parianos, told me recently, “This is about every man and his dog filled with the excitement of the moon landing. It’s like Scott going to the South Pole, or the British expeditions who got entombed by ice.”

Nautilus occupies a curious place in the mining industry. It is one of the oldest companies at work on the seafloor, but also the most precarious. Although it has a permit from the government of Papua New Guinea to extract metal from offshore vents, many people on the nearby island of New Ireland oppose the project, which will destroy part of their marine habitat. Local and international activists have whipped up negative publicity, driving investors away and sending the company into financial ruin. Nautilus stock once traded for $4.45. It is now less than a penny per share.

Parianos acknowledged that Nautilus was in crisis, but he dismissed the criticism as naive. Seabed minerals are no different from any other natural resource, he said, and the use of natural resources is fundamental to human progress. “Look around you: Everything that’s not grown is mined,” he told me. “That’s why they called it the Stone Age—because it’s when they started mining! And mining is what made our lives better than what they had before the Stone Age.” Parianos emphasized that the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which created the International Seabed Authority, promised “to ensure effective protection for the marine environment” from the effects of mining. “It’s not like the Law of the Sea says: Go out and ravage the marine environment,” he said. “But it also doesn’t say that you can only explore the ocean for science, and not to make money.”

The CEO of a company called DeepGreen spoke in loftier terms. DeepGreen is both a product of Nautilus Minerals and a reaction to it. The company was founded in 2011 by David Heydon, who had founded Nautilus a decade earlier, and its leadership is full of former Nautilus executives and investors. As a group, they have sought to position DeepGreen as a company whose primary interest in mining the ocean is saving the planet. They have produced a series of lavish brochures to explain the need for a new source of battery metals, and Gerard Barron, the CEO, speaks with animated fervor about the virtues of nodule extraction.

His case for seabed mining is straightforward. Barron believes that the world will not survive if we continue burning fossil fuels, and the transition to other forms of power will require a massive increase in battery production. He points to electric cars: the batteries for a single vehicle require 187 pounds of copper, 123 pounds of nickel, and 15 pounds each of manganese and cobalt. On a planet with 1 billion cars, the conversion to electric vehicles would require several times more metal than all existing land-based supplies—and harvesting that metal from existing sources already takes a human toll. Most of the world’s cobalt, for example, is mined in the southeastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo, where tens of thousands of young children work in labor camps, inhaling clouds of toxic dust during shifts up to 24 hours long. Terrestrial mines for nickel and copper have their own litany of environmental harms. Because the ISA is required to allocate some of the profits from seabed mining to developing countries, the industry will provide nations that rely on conventional mining with revenue that doesn’t inflict damage on their landscapes and people.

Whether DeepGreen represents a shift in the values of mining companies or merely a shift in marketing rhetoric is a valid question—but the company has done things that are difficult to dismiss. It has developed technology that returns sediment discharge to the seafloor with minimal disruption, and Barron is a regular presence at ISA meetings, where he advocates for regulations to mandate low-impact discharge. DeepGreen has also limited its operations to nodule mining, and Barron openly criticizes the effort by his friends at Nautilus to demolish a vent that is still partially active. “The guys at Nautilus, they’re doing their thing, but I don’t think it’s the right thing for the planet,” he told me. “We need to be doing things that have a low impact environmentally.”

By the time I sat down with Michael Lodge, the secretary general of the ISA, I had spent a lot of time thinking about the argument that executives like Barron are making. It seemed to me that seabed mining presents an epistemological problem. The harms of burning fossil fuels and the impact of land-based mining are beyond dispute, but the cost of plundering the ocean is impossible to know. What creatures are yet to be found on the seafloor? How many indispensable cures? Is there any way to calculate the value of a landscape we know virtually nothing about? The world is full of uncertain choices, of course, but the contrast between options is rarely so stark: the crisis of climate change and immiserated labor on the one hand, immeasurable risk and potential on the other.

I thought of the hadal zone. It may never be harmed by mining. Sediment from dredging on the abyssal plains could settle long before it reaches the edge of a trench—but the total obscurity of the hadal should remind us of how little we know. It extends from 20,000 feet below sea level to roughly 36,000 feet, leaving nearly half of the ocean’s depths beyond our reach. When I visited Timothy Shank at Woods Hole a few months ago, he showed me a prototype of his latest robot. He and his lead engineer, Casey Machado, had built it with foam donated by James Cameron and with support from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, whose engineers are hoping to send a vehicle to explore the aqueous moon of Jupiter. It was a tiny machine, known as Orpheus, that could steer through trenches, recording topography and taking samples, but little else. He would have no way to direct its movements or monitor its progress via a video feed. It occurred to me that if Shank had given up the dream of true exploration in the trenches, decades could pass before we know what the hadal zone contains.

Mining companies may promise to extract seabed metal with minimal damage to the surrounding environment, but to believe this requires faith. It collides with the force of human history, the law of unintended consequences, and the inevitability of mistakes. I wanted to understand from Michael Lodge how a UN agency had made the choice to accept that risk.

“Why is it necessary to mine the ocean?” I asked him.

He paused for a moment, furrowing his brow. “I don’t know why you use the word necessary,” he said. “Why is it ‘necessary’ to mine anywhere? You mine where you find metal.”

I reminded him that centuries of mining on land have exacted a devastating price: tropical islands denuded, mountaintops sheared off, groundwater contaminated, and species eradicated. Given the devastation of land-based mining, I asked, shouldn’t we hesitate to mine the sea?

“I don’t believe people should worry that much,” he said with a shrug. “There’s certainly an impact in the area that’s mined, because you are creating an environmental disturbance, but we can find ways to manage that.” I pointed out that the impact from sediment could travel far beyond the mining zone, and he responded, “Sure, that’s the other major environmental concern. There is a sediment plume, and we need to manage it. We need to understand how the plume operates, and there are experiments being done right now that will help us.” As he spoke, I realized that for Lodge, none of these questions warranted reflection—or anyway, he didn’t see reflection as part of his job. He was there to facilitate mining, not to question the wisdom of doing so.

We chatted for another 20 minutes, then I thanked him for his time and wandered back to the assembly room, where delegates were delivering canned speeches about marine conservation and the promise of battery technology. There was still some debate about certain details of the Mining Code—technical requirements, oversight procedures, the profit-sharing model—so the vote to ratify it would have to wait another year. I noticed a group of scientists watching from the back. They were members of the Deep-Ocean Stewardship Initiative, which formed in 2013 to confront threats to the deepwater environment. One was Jeff Drazen. He’d flown in from Hawaii and looked tired. I sent him a text, and we stepped outside.

A few tables and chairs were scattered in the courtyard, and we sat down to talk. I asked how he felt about the delay of the Mining Code—delegates are planning to review it again this summer, and large-scale mining could begin after that.

Drazen rolled his eyes and sighed. “There’s a Belgian team in the CCZ doing a component test right now,” he said. “They’re going to drive a vehicle around on the seafloor and spew a bunch of mud up. So these things are already happening. We’re about to make one of the biggest transformations that humans have ever made to the surface of the planet. We’re going to strip-mine a massive habitat, and once it’s gone, it isn’t coming back.”

[philthevaliant-stuff]

Giant!Danny Phantom x Reader Short Story: “Passing Storm, Lingering First Encounter”

Here’s that story I’ve promised you. I know that some of you might be interested in this, though I’ve been surprised before and no doubt I’ll be surprised again. Nevertheless, enjoy yourself!

The first few drops of rain began to fall as you hurried to the abandoned hangar on the outskirts of town. Reaching the awning of the small door to the office built-in to the massive building, you panted and brushed the sweat off your forehead as you studied the text on your phone again:

If u know about us as much as our friend thinks u do, plz come 2 the hangar. Our friend saw u last night. He knows u can help him.

Placing your hand on the doorknob, you recalled what had happened to you last night...

That was when the solar eclipse took place. You had chosen a good spot to see it, and you were wearing special eclipse shades. As you felt the eclipse creep in behind you and the unnatural darkness enveloping everything around you, you could swear you saw the flickering of green light several miles away and heard two light booming noises, one after another, like a giant taking two steps forward.

If only you weren't safety-conscious, you would have seen a portal open up in the heart of the eclipse. You would have seen three figures emerge from that portal. You would recognize one to be Sam Manson, her eyes closed to prevent the light from hurting her eyes; the other to be Tucker Foley, his PDA in one hand, his eyes closed too. Both of them were wearing futuristic space gear.

But through that flicker of green light, you at least saw the outline of ... him. The one you've had a crush on the longest. Danny Phantom. But there was something different about him. Despite being completely invisible to everyone around him, he was at least 50ft tall. Technically. You didn't really know his real height for sure to make the necessary calculations.

And little did you know, until you got the text half an hour ago, that Danny sensed your spirit among all those taking part in the eclipse, and while you were tracing the shape of the solar eclipse on a piece of paper, he gained a sense of the world you lived in, of how he and his friends were fictional characters here; how pleasantly modern and up-to-date everything was here; how dark and foreboding the future of this world is...

"(y/n)!"

Sam's voice jolted you to your senses and back to the present day. The drops of rain from before were now joined by several more as a light drizzle now fell from the heavens.

"You're gonna get soaked if you stand around outside like this! Come inside, quickly, before anyone else sees us. And don't tell the supermarket about the theft!"

'Don't tell the supermarket about the theft'!? As if talking to a real life cartoon character was enough to pose a lot of questions...! But you followed Sam through the door nevertheless, and into the office, pleasantly lit since it was out of town so no one could notice. You saw Tucker working on both his PDA and a laptop, a noticeboard on the wall in front of you covered with notes and drawings of planets. To the left of you was a pair of double-doors leading into the hangar itself.

"Hey, Tucker! (y/n) is here." instructed Sam to her friend. "Best give (y/gen) the info on how we got here."

Tucker looked up and noticed you. Smiling, he waved before picking up his PDA and directing your gaze to the noticeboard.

"Danny told us everything about you and your world as soon as we came here." he primarily said. "How?" you asked. "He has ghost powers, remember? He gazed into your spirit and got the 411 instantly. We've dealt with stuff like your species before, so we know you can keep Danny's secret safe. But something happened a while back that jeopardizes it to the extreme!" "The whole '50 foot Danny' thing, right?" "Yeah. We were on a mission, catching ghosts, saving people, cracking jokes... the usual. But then Danny's pituitary gland started up a growth spurt, and the next thing we knew, Danny kept growing... and growing... and growing!" began Tucker. "He was becoming a danger to everyone around him." Sam added. "Not even 'going ghost' could stop the growing. We decided to take Danny under our wing and figure out how to stop the growth process. I mean, his parents were freaking out, we had to do something!" "Eventually, after we acquired these space suits for just such a situation, he outgrew our universe and wound up 50ft tall again in the Ghost Zone. Our enemies were ... less than pleased to say the least of our arrival, but we found that his growing was now limited to growth spurts of about 50ft each time. At least at first. But when he reached the 500ft mark, those spurts increased to 100ft each time. Then they went to war with us, but Danny outgrew the Ghost Zone as well." "Tucker thinks that if we find an atmosphere with the right ingredients, Danny's growth spurts could be controlled better, and from there we can find an antidote and return him back to normal. But so far he's outgrown 3 additional universes to the last two!"

You looked at the planets on the Post-It Notes stuck on the noticeboard. They had been arranged in the order that Danny's journey had progressed up to now. The first one had a drawing of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, but with an additional female member joining their ranks ("They had a bit of SHELLSHOCK when Danny became mega-sized!" exclaimed Tucker); the second planet had a drawing of what looked like Power Rangers, but with the year '1985' marked on it ("They're called the Lightning Rangers, and it turns out that Ghost Powers and Aura Power don't mix." stated Sam); the last had a picture of a blue hedgehog and a group of animals labelled 'Freedom Fighters' on it. ("Yeah, I'm sure your universe has a different explanation for how that one ended." Tucker said nervously. "Let's just say that Chaos Emeralds are definitely NOT edible!")

"Wow!" you exclaimed. "You've been to so many worlds already." "Yeah," Sam sympathized, "and we'll keep going for as long as it takes. We'll find a solution some day. How, I don't know. Though for now, it's you that we need, (y/n)." "Me? How can I help?" "Danny knows how much you admire him and how you value the importance of friendship." Tucker explained. "As you probably can figure out from my crude drawings, we have made lots of friends who helped us try and keep Danny's growth spurts under control. But no matter how many power sources we found and used, all of a sudden they became afraid of us and Danny and wanted him destroyed. So those friends we made became enemies just like that."

(He snapped his fingers to emphasize the point.)

"But when Danny gazed into your soul to see what sort of world you lived in," Sam chimed in, "he saw a level of love and kindness that wasn't really present in those groups before. We think you can help look after him and keep him a secret from the authorities, at least until we've done our research on your planet. (y/n), can you help us?"

Brushing the euphoric tears away from your eyes, your mind analyzed the situation: two of your favourite cartoon characters have stumbled onto the Real World, and not only have they gone through more trouble than they encountered back in their world, but they need you, yes you, to help Danny out, because of how much you cared for them when watching the show at home. Considering how charming and handsome he was in his normal size, it would be a heavenly sight to meet him in the black-outlined flesh for the first time.

"I'll do all I can to help you." you said eventually. "But trust me when I say this: you've come at an awkward time. Society as a whole is being divided; wars are being fought; the world could go up in flames any second! If we fail and Danny becomes mega- or even giga-sized, he could become part of World War III, and I don't think even his ghost powers could save all of us this time. We mustn't waste a second. How is he at the moment?"

Tucker looked at his PDA, scrolling through the screen with the stylus.

"By my calculations, since we came here last night, he grew another 50ft at midday, so that's 100ft... and considering the time of day... he's about 120ft tall. He's got enough food and water for the evening, though we might need to make another raid tonight. The hangar's height is sufficient enough for us to camp out here for tonight and quite possibly the next night. After that, we need to find a shelter in America big enough for us to make a new base..."

Sam drew your attention to the double-doors. (At last!) "Tucker's gonna be a while coming back down to Earth." she apologized. "But if you can make Danny feel welcome here to your planet, I can keep an eye on things at the office. Just be careful where you step, in case he doesn't see you. If you need us for anything, there's a call box thingy on the wall. Press the button and we'll be able to hear you from here. By the way, is this planet haunted?" "If you mean 'have we got ghosts?', then yeah. Though they seem content to moan and wail and knock things to the floors. As far as I'm aware, they aren't as deadly as the ones in your world. Why?" "Just monitoring his ghost powers. If your world had really bad ghosts, then we need to make sure he doesn't cause any collateral damage. I swear, if I see another angry mob wielding pitchforks and torches...!"

By now, the rain outside was coming down in bucket-falls, and you could hear thunder and lightning brewing some miles away.

Drawing a deep breath, you push through the double-doors and allow yourself to behold the wondrous sight before you.  Sitting down on the floor, the length of his legs covering almost the entire length of the hangar, was Danny Fenton himself, his shoes gently leaning on the wall to the far right. He was in his normal persona, the bottom of his giant white shirt billowing peacefully against the breeze of the fans in the ceiling, which also gently blew on the forest of black hair on his head. As your common sense battled against the volcanic build-up of pure romantic glee in your body, you noticed that he was sucking on the back of a juggernaut held between his fingers, like eating tubed yogurt, while next to him was a huge milk tanker with a makeshift giant straw poking out of the hole on its back. You notice the logo of your local supermarket festooned on the sides of the truck. If you were able to run round to Danny's other side, you would have noticed an empty Cadbury truck and two other juggernauts advertising the supermarket, one carelessly tossed onto its side like a discarded carton.

So THAT'S what they meant by 'raids' and 'thefts' earlier! It was quite obvious to you now that, because of Danny's new size, his appetite had grown as big as his body. Thus, the trio had to 'borrow' a couple of juggernauts from the supermarket's stores just to keep him well-fed and watered. You realize with a touch of sadness what they now have to go through just to keep everyone alive and Danny safe from harm.

"Hello." you squeaked, though you didn't intend to start off your conversation that way. Had you five more minutes to prepare, you would've gone for something better and perhaps more lively. Something to lighten the mood, perhaps? No matter...

The giant Danny's gaze shifted from his food supply to the tiny person below him. Giving out a contented (but loud) burp in the direction of the wall his feet were now resting on, he gently shifted part of himself towards you. A wave of uncertainty washed over you like a cool tidal wave made by the beach's waters on a mild summer's day.

"Hey there." he said, the volume of his voice echoing in your ears as his eyes now scanned your body over. WOOSH! Another wave of uneasiness splashed over your spine. You walked closer to him as you tried to come up with a word describing the reaction of seeing your beloved cartoon character interacting with real world objects like that film with the rabbit in, only this time he was bigger than nearly all of them (and you) there. A LOT bigger...

"Listen, my name is love and I've been a (y/n) of your show and I really Danny you, fan." you blurt out loud, the handsome sight of the giant before you obscuring your mind’s processing power for just a few seconds. "No, no, let me start again...."

"It's OK." Danny said gently. "I was like that when I met those turtle guys. They went into space once and met the Lost Galaxy Rangers! Isn't that cool or what?" "No, I think you mean the 'In Space' Rangers." you corrected him. You started to relax. It's OK! He's a bigger nerd than you, you think. Ooops, wrong choice of words.... "I've been into space 5 times already, and it's a totally amazing sight! Though I wish it was in a much better position." he sighed, a warm wave of air scattering through the atmosphere around you. A mixture of foody smells hit your nostrils. "You miss your parents and sister, huh?" you asked, the potential of you debating TV shows and other geeky things with your secret crush put on hold for the moment. Danny nodded. "Look, Tucker and Sam have told me everything about what had happened. They have entrusted me with the task of seeing to it that you get treated right here, on my world. No more ghosts, no more Zords, no more Shredders, no more nuclear weapons aimed at you, no more angry mobs wielding pitchforks and torches!" you announced. "And no more emerald-flavored rock?" Danny raised the smallest of smiles for such a huge hero. "Wait, what? You thought the Chaos Emeralds were crystal-shaped pieces of candy rock?!" you exclaimed, peels of giggling fits emanating between words. "Well, Sonic didn't really say HOW to use them. Plus chili-dogs were kinda giving me gas." Danny admitted.

Danny placed a four-fingered hand down gently next to you, so gentlemanly was the gesture that it didn't make a sound.

"(y/n), why not get a better view from above?" asked Danny. (Was that his best quip for such a moment, you wondered? Wouldn’t “Would you like a lift?” be better-suited?)

You carefully made your way to the hand and scrambled up onto the fingers, then slowly-but-surely made your way to his palm. Danny tried his best not to giggle too much. The contrast between two-and-a-half-dimensional skin and your three-dimensional figure was still unfathomable to describe, but as Danny gently lifted his hand to his face, you got a sense of how much he had grown. Your heart began to palpitate wildly as you saw Danny's cute, angelic face looking down at you with his ocean-blue eyes. No doubt he too was trying to figure out the best word to describe your appearance.

Five, maybe ten, minutes passed. And then...

"They start out like this," began Danny, trying not to raise his voice in case he accidentally busted your eardrums, "all those friends I've made. They've been on my hand before, looking up at me, like you're doing now. And then... then I grow bigger and bigger... and they then look up at me in rage. Then they either attack me with ninja weapons, or giant robots, or by curling up into a ball and launching themselves at me. They fear me. Do you fear me, (y/n)?"

A huge tear formed in the corner of his eye. Not a watery tear like you were accustomed to, but a bright blue cartoony tear. It slid down his face and then fell onto the thrown-away truck with an audible splosh, wetting it. Sam, who had seen Danny saddened by his thoughts from the office window, had come out through the double-doors, just in case you needed back-up. Tucker was still making calculations on his PDA and laptop.

"No." you said softly, gazing up at the forlorn titan. "In all honesty, I could never fear such a gentle and kind giant as you, Danny."

Reaching a hand out, you aimed towards a patch of Danny's face. Instinctively, Danny lowered his face closer. The tiniest touch registered in the half-teen, half-ghost's brain. That was the level of kindness and sincerity he felt when studying your spirit last night! It wasn't just the effects of the eclipse after all!

As for you, brushing the giant's tear-soaked face just felt like brushing the tear-soaked face of any normal human being, but there was something special to it. Something you couldn't describe...

A flash of light interrupted your thoughts, and then...

KAAAABOOOOMMM!!

A roar of thunder surprised you at the last second, sounding like an angry, godly beast. The weather had gotten worse by now. Mist filled the summer's evening as raindrops fell like hissing needles from the sky. You screamed in unpreparedness.

Danny cupped his other hand over you instinctively, letting the shade comfort you.

"Ssh, ssh." he said, gently. "I got you, (y/n), you’re safe; you'll be A-OK." "Thanks." you sighed softly. "I completely forgot about the storm outside." "Sometimes I do that too." Danny admitted. "Though that's not when I'm facing the military or giant robots, or ghosts or talking hedgehogs, or ninja turtles or badly-made mutants, or even...." "Angry mobs wielding pitchforks and torches!" you both exclaimed, laughing at how often that had been brought up over the time you had spent here. "We're not so different, are we?" Danny smiled, now his usual self again. "(y/n), will you come back and stay the night with us? I want to know a little bit more about you and your world, and I know for certain Tucker would, too! Maybe bring some tunes along?" "Yeah, sure." you smiled up at him. (For a while, the heat emitting from Danny's hands was making you drowsy, and you were about to nod off.) "You're welcome to bring a friend along," said Danny, "so long as they promise to keep all this a secret. (y/n), please keep my growth spurts a secret too. Until I can't hide in any more structures, that is. Man, that keeps happening to me lately!" "I know for certain (fellow DP fan's name) would honor your secret as much as I do." you said back as Danny gently lowered you down onto the floor. "Just wait until (fellow DP fan's gender) gets here and sees you!"

Now in the happiest of moods as a life goal had been crossed off your mental list, you happily walked to Sam and Tucker (the latter had finally been aroused from his carefully-worked-out research and scheduling, and had brought coffee for him and Sam). "I'll be back in a few hours with (fellow DP fan's name)." you told them. "We're bound to have the adventure of a lifetime with you guys!"

As you made your way back home, the storm had passed, and a bright blue sky now filled the outside world. Raindrops fell from the awning's corners, and both the atmosphere and your heart told you that, for now at least, a bright personal future lay in store for you and Danny.

The End. (Unless you want me to go on...?)

[kookienomster3]

I Want The Headline (Pt. 6)

Written By: suga-of-daegu BTS Fanfiction Angst WARNING: MATURE CONTENT Mafia/Gang

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

Taehyung gripped the padlock, rattling it a bit to see if it was loose. Unfortunately, it was tightly locked as expected. He lifted his eyes to scan the warehouse walls for any scouts or windows. There were no windows to climb through, so it looked like this was his only way in. Looking to his left and to his right, he made sure no one was in sight before picking the lock. After a few seconds of fiddling with the lock, there was the satisfying click and it opened. Yoongi really did need to invest in better locks, Taehyung mused.

Somewhere outside in the distance, people yelling could be heard. He ignored it, dismissing it as some drunken bar fight. It was too far away to have anything to do with the lock he just picked. Stepping into the darkened room he hissed a curse under his breath as his phone began to vibrate in his pocket, the sound seemingly echoing throughout the wide expanse of the warehouse. He'd been dawdling outside for over two hours and now someone decided it was the perfect time to give him a ring?

Deep in the warehouse, something shifted. There was the sound of clothes rustling and shoes stepping across the concrete. "Who's there?" A gruff voice called out. It was too dark for Taehyung to make out a figure, but he heard a soft click. Belatedly, he wondered if it was a bad idea to just break in here without a gun. It seemed that he had to improvise.

Taehyung stepped into the warehouse and inched to the side, crouching by a crate. Digging in his pocket for anything that could be used as a decoy. All he had was the lockpick, which he still needed, and a lollipop. He frowned softly at the candy, that was his favorite flavor. Gripping it with both hands, he snapped off the lollipop stem, dropping it on the ground beside him. That part was utterly useless unless he had plans of poking the other guy in the eye. Tae peeked over the crate, seeing the head of the man. He was trying to peer into the darkness, looking for whoever had just entered. Squinting in the dark didn't seem very effective, though. Why didn't he have a flashlight?

Shrugging the man's stupidity off, Taehyung crouched back down and tossed the lock pick off to his left a few feet away. The metal piece clattered against the hard ground and the man turned towards the sound immediately. He stalked over quickly, "I said who's there!?"

A bit too quickly, Tae thought.

As soon as he cleared the crate and was in Taehyung's direct line of sight, he threw the lollipop at the back of his head. It bounced rather comically off and Tae couldn't help but grin. The man jumped, whirling around just as Taehyung lunged at him, still laughing quietly.

"Boo."

"Do it again," Yoongi ordered, intent expression still focused on Jungkook's hardened glare. Jimin's brows furrowed slightly, but he didn't verbally object. He pressed his lips firmly against your shoulder, not technically a kiss; it didn't feel like one. It was just a touch, like touching someone's arm with your hand, but to a person watching it looked just like a kiss.

Jungkook looked away, glancing at Jin. Who was that guy again? Jin was mumbling to himself, his eyes shut tightly. Jungkook couldn't make out what he was saying, but the guy seemed pretty freaked out. Jungkook relaxed in his seat, jaw still clenched tightly. His eyes drifted away from Jin back to you and Jimin tentatively. Yoongi smirked. He was getting a reaction. It was small.. a lot smaller than when he jerked against the restraints, but it was something.

"Again, but higher."

Jimin looked confused, but obeyed, his lips pressing a bit higher up on your shoulder. You flinched away from his touch and he let you move away a bit. Not too much that Yoongi would notice and say something, though. Jungkook looked away again, hands gripping chair tightly. It was just kiss, he reminded himself, and Jimin looked fairly reluctant to do it anyway. Yoongi frowned,

"Higher."

Jimin's eyes passed over the smooth expanse of your neck and up to your quivering lips. He faltered, looking away, "Hyung, that's her neck.." Yeah, him touching you was the only thing that had gotten a real reaction out of Jungkook, but you were still innocent. You hadn't done anything to them. Even with all this mess with Jin and Jungkook,

Jimin hadn't forgotten that you had done nothing to deserve any of this. Yoongi was using you to get to someone else again. And Jin was still in the room! He had fessed up everything, why was Yoongi having him still sit here and have to see this happen to his little sister? Jimin wanted to stop Namjoon's raid as much as Yoongi, but not like this. He was sure there was something else they could do.

"Then put her on her knees." Yoongi snapped, looking over at him. "Which one do you want? You're acting like you've never done this before. This whole tactic started with you." He stepped closer, "You want me to do it? Is that what you're trying to say?" He held his hand out as if he wanted Jimin to pass you over to him, but Jimin knew that was a bluff. Things like that weren't Yoongi's style. Jimin tugged you closer to himself,

"I'll do it." He relented, pulling the blindfold from your eyes. It wouldn't be too bad, he reasoned, you liked him, right? Jimin shifted, moving to stand in front of you. Jungkook frowned when his hands rose up gently grasp your face. What exactly was he doing? He looked to Yoongi, who was staring in you and Jimin's direction, but not directly at you both. Jimin quietly observed you, eyes lingering on the tears built up in your eyes. You really were scared, huh? Jimin hoped that Jungkook would cave quickly, he didn't feel right doing this. With your brother right there nonetheless. Jin had curled in on himself as best as he could, one ear pressed tightly to his shoulder and eyes screwed shut, he hummed to himself, trying to cancel out any noise.

Jimin's thumb swiped over your cheek and he sighed. "Jimin..."You begged softly, "I don't wan.." His thumb smoothed over your lips,

"It's alright, baby. I'm gonna take good care of you." He promised softly. As Jimin leaned in closer to you, Yoongi looked away hands clenching into fists. Jungkook's expression slackened in disbelief and he blankly stared at Jimin's hands drawing your face in towards his. When Jimin's lips pressed against yours the first time, Jungkook's hands twitched.

What was he doing?

The second time was a bit more forceful and Jungkook's toes curled in his shoes. Jungkook knew what he was doing. It happened often and he had thought the men who repeatedly asked, 'what are you doing?' were idiots. He never understood their groveling and crying and begging.

But he understood now. He knew what was happening. He knew what was going to happen if he didn't say something or do something. Despite all that knowledge, his mind was still denying the inevitable and obvious and all he could think was,

What are you doing?!

By the third kiss, Yoongi was screaming at Jungkook to say something. Dazed, Jungkook was confused as to why Yoongi was so high strung all of a sudden. Wasn't he the one who ordered this.

The fourth kiss ended with an audible smack and frightened whimper from you and Jungkook suddenly understood why Jin was humming. Yoongi's eyes were darting everywhere but Jimin, his wrist hitting against his ear. He too was trying to block out the noise. Jungkook wished he could do the same. He didn't want to hear this. He was counting on Yoongi calling it off himself since it was making him so obviously uncomfortable. But Jungkook felt like he'd bow before the other man did.

It wasn't until Jimin's head tilted and his lips slanted over yours that Jungkook reacted.

"Don't fucking touch her!" He suddenly lurched to the side, slamming into Jin and knocking them both over. He stretched out his legs, managing to slip the rope tied around his ankles off the legs of the chair. More mobile now, he rolled onto his knees, bracing himself to be tackled by someone. Jungkook froze, why hadn't anyone attempted to restrain him yet?

Yoongi was just staring at Jimin, an unreadable expression on his face. And Jimin was staring at Jungkook as if he'd never seen him before. His wide-eyed expression scanned over Jungkook's heaving form. Jimin nudged you in Jungkook's direction, encouraging you to go to him. Confused, but relieved, you scrambled over to Jungkook, dropping to your knees and leaning your head against his chest and crying into his shirt. Hands still restricted, he could only rest his head atop yours. "It's okay.." he murmured, "I'm right here."

Lips still swollen, Jimin's breathless voice piped up, "You..." A wide grin stretched across his lips and he let out a bark of laughter, "You love her.." He held a hand to his face, doubling over in laughter, " You love her!" Yoongi's brows drew down tensely, one hand slowly reaching behind his back to the gun tucked in his waistband.

What the fuck was wrong with Jimin?

Taehyung drug the body back towards the center of the room. "Man, you're heavy." he murmured. His phone started to vibrate once more in his pocket, but Taehyung didn't bother answering it until he had propped the man's body into a chair. "What?"

"Where the hell are you?" Namjoon pestered. "You were supposed to be leading the Operation. Why was I told you were sneaking off into other warehouses? You're on Yoongi's turf you know."

Taehyung frisked the man's body, only coming up with some keys, a lighter, and a pack of gum. He unwrapped every piece, shoving it all into his mouth, "Are you worried?" He directed to Namjoon. Leaned up against another crate, he held his phone to his ear with his shoulder while he slowly melted the keys with the lighter. Tae giggled softly, he felt like those silly housewives on TV chatting with the friends while painting their nails.

"You're supposed to be leading the group." Namjoon reminded him. Taehyung pouted,

"That's Jungkook's job."

There was a heavy sigh from the leader. Tae was good at his job, but sometimes he was a handful. It seemed Taehyung only followed orders when it was convenient for him. He had been ordered to lead an operation into Yoongi's turf since the green haired man would be too preoccupied with Jungkook. The Head of Operations abduction was both a bad thing and a good thing.

It gave them the perfect opportunity to scope things out and see how much Yoongi had changed his operations. However, Jungkook was the only one who thoroughly understood Yoongi's original operations, so even if his scouting team found anything, they wouldn't know if it was new or old intel. Which was where Tae came in. He was good with specific details and would be able to give Jungkook the most accurate descriptions of what they found so he could determine whether it was relevant or irrelevant information. Tae's job was to get into Yoongi's records but for some unknown reason, Taehyung had led his group to the records and then ventured off. "Jungkook got himself abducted by Yoongi. It's your job until he gets back." Namjoon whined. Tae knew this already. What he didn't understand was why they were wasting this golden opportunity shuffling through papers and databases.

"Instead of taking his records," Taehyung suggested,"Why don't we take his weapons?"

"We don't have time for that."

"Uh, we do." Tae deadpanned, "I'm in the weapons warehouse now."

Namjoon shouldn't have been as surprised as he was. This sounded completely like something Taehyung would do. "Is that where you went off to?"

Taehyung tossed the melted keys into the man's lap and lifted up the lock and chains he had picked up from the door. "Well, I wasn't looking for the bathroom." He teased. He wrapped the chains around the man and the chair, locking it together with the padlock. "Ahh, he's gonna be bored for a while." He hummed.

Namjoon coughed,"What?"

"Nothing." Taehyung chirped, heading back to where he had been hiding. Dropping into a crouch, he patted along the ground. "Where is..? Ah." Returning back to the man, he popped the lollipop into his mouth, "Now you'll have something to do when you wake up." he grinned. "So about those weapons?"

"Jimin." Yoongi had stepped closer to you and Jungkook and grabbed onto your upper arm, pulling you up to your feet. He tucked you behind himself, unsettled at Jimin's impromptu laughing fit. "What the hell are you going on about?"

"He loves her!" Jimin giggled, "Jungkookie loves her, look at him!" From his spot on the ground, Jungkook glared,

"No, I don't."

Jimin brushed it aside. He had adamantly chanted the same thing once too. Even Yoongi had played the 'I don't love her' game. "Of course you say that, but I saw the way you looked at her. And pretty soon you're gonna realize it too and then there will be no going back. You're going to feel exactly what Yoongi hyung and I felt." Jimin sighed, shifting his attention to Yoongi, "Let them go, hyung."

Yoongi furrowed his brows,"Why?" Jimin's eyes dropped down to you,

"You'll see."

[rockmiyabideusexmachina]

2019 Megaman Valentine’s Day (Humor) Contest Results!

Apologize for the delay on this once again. Didn’t expect to be posting these results nearly a month after Valentine’s Day, but the extended deadline did help make sure we got a healthy competition this year. Thank you to all for your patience!

I’m going to start out this year’s results thread with a totally appropriate callout 4-Koma that is not technically an official humor entry from SubzeroIceSkater, even though it fit the rules. But it’s worth posting, to publicly humiliate myself anyways:

I'll take my token Akane-in-an-entry bribery any way I can get it, since nobody felt inclined to draw Mrs. Stelar’s fresh, piping hot, iced cinnabuns for their talent entry this year...Did I just type that? I mean, um...

Play me off, Johnny!

I kid, I kid! After all, these contests aren’t about me, it’s about the characters you love and want to draw. And that’s what makes everyone’s entries unique and helps motivate you to create time after time. And I am grateful for it, whether you are a long-time participant, or the yearly new contestant.

I’ll be doing things a little different this year, because the post would be way too long if I kept everything in one. So this first post will just contain the Humor category, and I will have a second, separate post for the Talent category. Raffle prize winners will be contained in both posts, so keep an eye out after my commentary on your art, for some possible winners here. The rest will follow soon. I’ll be contacting all winners soon enough, so sit tight!

Here are your humor winners and full gallery of entries, after the break!

Category 2 (Humor) -  Princess Sigmia Returns

A much smaller group of entries for this category, but the zany mergers were great, all the same. I thank you all for getting as creative as you could with this concept, as it was a little more than just a mere gender swap you had to consider, when designing your combined character. Whether you won or not, know I truly enjoyed seeing all of these pics. 

I know imgbox gallery gave people some issues before, so as always, let me know if images or links appear broken. Crossing my fingers this works smoothly this year! XD

After each entrant’s name, there will be a link in the character description to the entry, too, just in case the inserted external images don’t load for you. 

[Full humor gallery]

1.) SubzeroIceSkater - Arc Weldy Falls In Love (featuring Tundroll.EXE the Arc Weldy, plus ‘Master Albert’)

[Page 1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21]

Comics with length and substance always seem to steal the show, and this year was no different. Joining the ranks of fenril-huayra, wintesm and so many others in recent years, I believe SubzeroIceSkater’s wonderful tale will stick with many of you, as much as it did me. As a humor piece, sure there are great sight gags and comedic lines all around, but it also has a lot of heart. You feel really bad for Arc Weldy to start out, but also feel so many emotions of compassion, friendship and love throughout. Wonderful work, and thank you for all the effort you put into this massive entry!

Also, are 21 pages not enough for you all? Well, SubzeroIceSkater also had ANOTHER 15 pages worth of ideas, alternates, and outtakes to go with this comic. And, while I won’t upload each link or image here, because this one entry is long enough, you can see them in THIS GALLERY LINK. They are also really great.

*For coming in 1st, SubzeroIceSkater has won $100 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value.*

2.) @drewblossom​ - Geminette 

Nearly equally deserving in length, Drew’s comic more closely followed the Bowsette-style transformation gimmick to give Snake Man his comeuppance. The classic bait-and-switch kiss, turned on it’s head with a ‘lil Search Snake rather than a gross Toad Man, was a funny end. 

Design-wise, I really liked what you did to create Geminette’s look. Splitting his helmet crystals to the side as like dual hair broaches, and keeping the motif with the choker, armband, garter straps and chestplate, worked out nice. I can see why Snake was so easily charmed. 

*For coming in 2nd, Drew has won $50 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value.*

3.) @wimzik​ - Rollbble.EXE

If dominatrix Devil Roll wasn’t enough of a pain in Rockman’s side, I shudder to think how bad a Bubble Roll would be, puku! Or, would her devotion to him be as great (or clingy) as Bubs was with Shademan-sama? 

Taking Bubbleman’s yellow flipper feet motif, and turning it into a fish fin design, both on her feet, legs, and hair ribbon, turned out pretty neat. If anything, I’m sure this transformation gives her very kissable lips, though! XD I have to wonder what her plan is with that Roll Navi Data chip, now that the chocolate is all gone, and what it will do to Rockman?

*For coming in 3rd, wimzik has won $25 via Paypal, or a prize of their choice up to that value.*

And the remaining wonderful entries, in alphabetical order by alias:

@3-oclock-blues​ - Dr. Willis 

What you talkin’ ‘bout, Wil-lis? Or Dr. WHY?!-ris, if you prefer. With that absolutely awesome wide-eyed grin, she’s hellbent on living together with Zero in a world where only Reploids exist. Being that they both have spent time piloting flying machine bodies, and have sorta possessed some form of an evil energy, it’s a rather fitting combo. Unless you are Zero, and it’s your dad and girlfriend merged into one being. Awk~waaaarrrd. 

The skull motif and spikes are subtle on Iris’ design, but fit in really well. Her bangs are just wild enough on both sides now, that it gives that Wily hair vibe, without having to give her a horrible, bushy mustache. XD

*3-OClock-Blues is the winner of Raffle Prize #2 - The X OCW artbook and Zero keychain*

@bracedshark​ - Mettayer

This might be a terrible concept, but I’m going to type it. When a Met pops out from under it’s helmet, especially in sprite form, usually all you can see is the whites of it’s dark, beady eyes under that helmet, on it’s dark grey/black blobby round body form. With Layer, you don’t get to see her eyes under her bangs, hardly ever. So staring at Mettayer’s underboob for too long, due to her chest armor mimicking a Met helmet, all I see is a Met’s pair of closed bottom eyelids, and I’m seriously waiting for those eyes to open up and start staring back at me. Would that not be the most wrong way for Mettayer’s eyes to work?! But I can’t unsee it! Her belly button even feels like a snoring, sleeping Met’s mouth. I’ll spare everyone of me editing this art to make my point. But it’s in your head now, isn’t it?

OK, despite that awful paragraph, this is one hot Metall Mommy. Sorry, I’m starting this paragraph off pretty badly, too, I guess. ^^; Despite my interpretation of the combination, the design elements do stand out in a unique way. The fiery reddish-pink hair seems like a different choice considering the characters merged, but it plays off the red of a Met’s mouth and earpiece, and, well, fitting for Valentine’s, too! And instead, you get the Layer color scheme in the pickaxe, so it still connects visually.

@drewblossom​’s 2nd entry - Roll n’ Rock

This bonus entry from Drew flips the genders of both DLN-001 and 002. I liked Roll’s hair bow converting into more of a bow tie, and Rock getting her version of Roll’s hoodie, in a Blue Bomber color scheme. The V-Day card concept, complete with crayon-ish name writing, made for a cute entry. Hearts all around!

@supernovabee​ - Bayer

No, there won’t be any paragraph about underboob eyes for this version of a Layer transformation, as supernovabee has merged her with Bass. Bayer loves belting out her hard and heavy siren song to woo prospective love interests during karaoke night. 

Keeping Layer’s purple hair here actually kinda still keeps a Treble Boost feel, that the color scheme fits seamlessly, to go along with the more obvious Layer armor design pieces.

[manabingu]

ManaTagged! Heyoo~

tagged by the sweet ♥ @rainbow-galaxy-supernova  (sorry its overdue)

The last:

1.) Drink: Raspberry Milk Tea w/Lychee Popping Pearls

2.) Phone call: to @tyrestgwa earlier today via skype

3.) Text message: to @crystalwoodsart

4.) Song you listened to: Phoenix Ash’s Cover of JAP by Abingdon Boys School & Fome’s Cover of Count Zero by T.M. Revolution (SO FCKN GOOD)

5.) Time you cried: yesterday 8D during Wonder Woman ;U;o

6.) Dated someone twice: Tyrest is the first & only official dating. But me and @crystalwoodsart have been married practically since 6th grade. She is mY WAIFU!

7.) Been Cheated on: Thank Ra No!

8.) Kissed someone and regretted it: Nah.BUT I mean- iN DREAMS YES.

9.) Lost someone special: It’s a universal thing. Namely pets for me

10.) Been depressed: 8) Story of my LIFE! But I’ve been makin progress

11.) Gotten drunk and thrown up: I REFUSE to consume alcohol/drugs

12-14.) LIST 3 FAVORITE COLORS: Turquoise,Galaxy Print,Pastels/Silver tie

IN THE LAST YEAR HAVE YOU…

15.) Made new friends: I’ve been blessed thanks to YT Idol w/new singer pals!

16.) Fallen out of love: Yeah...in  high school I had so many talent crushes. Which I think is normal for theater kids. But I think I ended up with the correct person. He truly understands me. And though I sometimes wonder what would my life be if I had confessed my love to those others, I’m happy I waited for the person who accepted me just the way I am ;w;o

17.) Laughed until you cried: AS AN ABRIDGER, I am privileged to be surrounded by INCREDIBLY hilarious people & I love it!♥

18.) Found out someone was talking about you: YES. And BOY is it a trip when I find people are horrible trolls. I find out about sweet people who say super kind things about me or my work all the time. But when I get a heads up about backstabbers or people who get close for the wrong reasons, I put my guard up around them & just do my own thing. Because a path of jealousy, hatred & vengeance isn’t for me. Bullies can talk, but I’ll always ignore them.

19.) Met someone who changed you: Namely Tyrest,Crystal,Panda,Wraith10, @cozymochi (bows to her greatness), LordMoonstone, @kittykatsandbox, (FAB SENPAI) @ahsimwithsake & @laurathia who are 1 of 2 sets of adoptive internet parents I have XD and MOST RECENT OF ALL CEONN. If I hadn’t met Ceonn, my singing career journey wouldn’t have taken off.THANX

20.) Found out who your true friends are: YEP 8)! Sadly, just recently too...

21.) Kissed someone on your Facebook list: Well, hispanic people greet each other by cheek kisses so  I will say yes.

22.) How many of your Facebook friends do you know in real life: Everyone cuz my FB is family & IRL friends only ^^; BUT my ZEXAL Abridged has a FB 

23.) Do you have any pets: My pet cockatiel Patchos 8D

24.) Do you want to change your name: No, but don’t mind having a stage name to be honest. I love stage names ^_^

25.) What did you do for your last birthday: Probably sang,drew & other stuff 

26.) What time did you wake up: 9 or 10ish? I had to meet some friends today

27.) What were you doing at midnight last night: GAWKING at Gal Gadot

28.) Name something you cannot wait for:Anime Idol @ Metrocon, finally getting out more song covers/abridged stuff. And being stable again.

29.) When was the last time you saw your mother?: a few seconds ago

30.) What is one thing you wish you could change about your life: I wish that ONE thing didn’t happen & my family had the same wealth we shoulda had if luck was on our side. That & I wish I wasn’t afraid of certain things so I could progress faster.

31.) What are you listening to right now: Fome’s Covers,& MY own covers

32.) Have you ever talked to a person named Tom: yeS?

33.) Something that is getting on your nerves: Hypocrites lately 8)

34.) Most visited website: Tumblr,Instagram,Twitter & YT are tied tbh

35-37.) Finished all of school: yeppers

38.) Hair color: Dark Chocolate Brown (I used swatches at Sally’s XD)

39.) Long or short hair: I enjoy having long princess hair, but I cut it recently QuQ woops. Mostly cuz I wanted to try a T.M. Revolution hairdo XD

40.) Do you have a crush on someone: I HAVE ANIMAY HUSbANDs/WAifUS

41.) What do you like about yourself: My voice range! I used to be SO self conscious as a kid, but eventually it became my greatest strength because it’s SO versatile it honestly I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for my unique voice QuQ

42.) Piercings: My ears have been pierced since birth. Mom wanted it

43.) Blood type: O? I think was what it was? It’s been years lol

44.) Nickname: Mana & Ginga (to my singer friends)

45.) Relationship status: Taken by Tyrest (with Crystal on the side ;D heh)

46.) Zodiac sign: I am a proud Sagittarius ♐

47.) Pronouns: Her is fine, but I don’t mind He if I’m crossplaying (mostly Ginga). It’s kind of a weird thing for me cuz I’m genderfluid ;w; but if anything to avoid confusion, just go with feminine one XD cuz whatvs???

48.) Favorite TV show: ITS HARD. I like too many things.Non-Anime TV Show wise I watch mostly Trail & Error & Fresh Off the Boat. But Anime-wise: ZEXAL (but YGO in general), Darker Than Black, One Punch Man/Mob Psycho 100, Uta no Prince-sama, Saint Seiya/Omega, Tokyo Mew Mew, Kaleido Star, anything by CLAMP, Kamen Rider Gaim/Fourze, Death Note, Attack on Titan, Tokyo Magnitude 8.0, FMA...too many...I know I have more...

49.) Tattoos: NoPe

50.) Right or left hand: Righty

FIRST…

51.) Surgery: In 8th grade I almost died 8D! Ruptured appendix, 3 consecutive operations & all because the first time I went to the emrgency they sent me home & misdiagnosed me with stomach flu 8D HAH.HAH.HAAAA ;~~~;...

52.) Piercing: Ears only as mentioned previously

54.) Sport:I don’t do any.My fave is figure skating tho. I love Yuzuru Hanyu♥

55.) Vacation: Technically me comin to the U.S for the first time counts

56.) Pair of trainers: Is that slang for shoes???...uhh??

MORE GENERAL…

57.) Eating: I ate sushi at a Chinese Buffet called Giant Panda today

58.) Drinking: finished all the boba tea ;w;

59.) I’m about to: Sleep cuz it’s 1am xD

61.) Waiting for: Good news, & replies from a few emails I sent this week

62.) Want: To make my YT Channel flourish & master my voice

63.) Get married: With luck but I think a paper doesn’t dictate if you love a person or not. BECAUSE i wanna pursue singing/acting, I know I’ll always be traveling ;w; so that decision is hard. I mean we can be OFFICIAL via the paper thingy but like, I already know we’re together XD ffff lol

64.) Career: Singer/Actor/Voice Actor & Internet Personality maybe

65.) Hugs or kisses: Both ^o^...cuz honestly I’m a fluffy person ;w;o

66.) Lips or eyes: Both again...I Can’T HElP IT (deep down my thoughts are as swirly with flirtatious things...proly explains Ginga’s mannerisms)

67.) Shorter or taller: I’m short ;w; sniffs 5′1. Everyone else is a tree

68.) Older or younger: Depends on relationship type? Like I think having a partner at a relatively older age because I am anxious af & need someone older to guide me when I’m struggling, but don’t mind younger (but MATURE) person by 2 years max. But when it comes to friends, I befriend anyone who is kind-hearted. Because we can learn a lot from elders/ our youth

70.) Nice arms or nice stomach: I don’t mind either or but TMR is @U@

71.) Sensitive or loud: I’m drawn more to sensitive people because they have higher levels of compassion & kinder hearts.

72.) Hook up or relationship: Relationship cuz I’m loyal AF

73.) Troublemaker or hesitant: Egh...both have downfalls. Hesitant is safer tho

HAVE YOU EVER…

74.) Kissed a stranger?: Nope BUT if I become an actor, that is a thought that keeps me up at night XD cuz ...again...I’m loyal af ;-;

75.) Drank hard liquor?: EWW >_>

76.) Lost glasses contact/lenses?: YES. During a musical in 10th grade (Suessical I was Cat in the Hat) I was on a trampoline and THEY FLEW OFF MY FACE! And ....we never found em O_O...they vanished....

77.) Turned someone down?: Yeah...a bunch of creepy fanboys throughout the years... 8) unfortunately the downfall of being an internet person

78.) Sex on first date?: DEPENDS. I’m demisexual, so I’m attracted to personality/emotional bonds not physical appearances. So IF my emotions towards them is high enough, I dunno if things could happen? But usually I stay reserved cuz I need to feel like I honestly love the person THAT much.

79.) Broken someone’s heart?: Probably ;w;...2 old buddies. I knew they had crushes on me...but I just didn’t feel the same way towards them -actually someone ELSE admitted they had a crush on me last month so the count is now up to 3...AGH. I WISH they can find someone who will make em happy because I think they deserve it tbh. They’re good dudes.

80.) Had your heart broken?: Once yeah, an old childhood crush was honestly insensitive when I asked him if he ever felt something for me &  he said “ehhh not really?” in a way that came off as insensitive XD?....yeah. But the MORE I thought about why I liked him, the more I realized I could NEVER be in a relationship with them cuz they were immature & didn’t know how to be serious.They don’t balance goofiness & sensitivity & I need a balanced person

81.) Been arrested?: NO

82.) Cried when someone died?: waterfalls of tears cuz I’m an emotional wreck

83.) Fallen for a friend?: yeah =w= a bunch of abridgers/singers hah. I get talent crushes ALL the time, but don’t act on it cuz I’m shy AND taken XD

DO YOU BELIEVE IN…

84.) Yourself?: Usually...but I have many moments where I question if I’m good enough or worthy enough to be here ;w; gotta work on my Kattobingu

85.) Miracles?: Shining Draws should be real. But yeah miracles CAN happen

86.) Love at first sight?: FUYA OKUDAIRA 8D...and Takanori Nishikawa...and Mahiro Takasugi and Aoi Shouta tbh

87.) Santa Claus?: Elf is my favorite Christmas movie

88.) Kiss on the first date?: IT DEPENDS. But if it happens? AIGHT????

89.) Angels?: Yes \QwQ/! angels are real. @rosey-ballerina is one

OTHER….

90.) Current best friend’s name: Crystal is my bff & waifu but Tyrest too but honestly Kimmy, Panda & Ceonn are also tied with those 2

91.) Eye color: Brownies eUe

92.) Favorite movie: Finding Nemo, Big Hero 6,Lion King (all 3), All 3 Yu-Gi-Oh! Movies,The Emperor’s New Groove,Mrs. Doubtfire, Moana, Wonder Woman, Mary Poppins, Arrival, The Mummy, Matilda, Harry Potter, Pokemon 3,Hercules, Grave of the Fireflies, Antman, The Producers....and a few others

I tag: @t-chan @sylphwriter @eleanorose123 @ivmysterynumbers @zexalfangirl @shybunny @galaxyeyedphoton 

[itsafoolmoon]

celestiyale here~ all of the oc questions because I'm an ass like that

I can’t believe you’ve done this to me 

1. Your first OC ever?

Technically my sonic oc I made when I was like what, 8?  

In all seriousness, I think it’s Kara. She’s can shapeshift into a wolf. 

2. Do you have a personal favourite among your OCs?

I’d gotta say it’s probably Chase. He’s pretty upbeat and I think about what stupid things he’d get into. 

3. Have you ever adopted a character or gotten a character from someone else?

Nah

4. A character you rarely talk about?

I barley talk about most of my OCs, you’ll just have to ask to see them 

(｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

5. If you could make only one of your OCs popular/known, who would it be?

Kara. She’s apart of a story i’m trying to make and therefore if she’s popular than my other characters would be by association. 

6. Two OCs of yours that look alike despite not being related?

Chase and Mike. When I first did their designs freshman year of highschool they looked almost the same, thankfully I’ve fixed that a bit. Just in case though it gave me an excuse to pretend they’re brothers of sorts.

7. Are your OCs part of any story or stories?

Kara, Jasper, Bellona, and a couple others i’ve yet to name. They’re the ones that actually have a kind of story going on. still working on the others

8. Do you RP as any of your OCs? If you do, introduce one of your RP OCs here!

I haven’t RP’ed since elementary school @whimsicalsnail can vouch for me

9. Would you ever be willing to give any of your OCs to someone else?

No, they’re all my children and I love them.

10. Introduce an OC with a complicated design?

None of them are very complicated actually...a bit too simple if you ask me...

11. Is there any OC of yours you could describe as a “sunshine”?

Chase or Kara

12. Name an OC that isn’t yours but who you like a lot

There are too many webcomics I’ve read for me to pick one

13. Do you have any troublemaker OCs?

Elliot, he’s in college and he’s a punk

14. Introduce an OC with a tragic backstory

Kara and Jasper. Their family and possibly clan were wiped out by a witch and wizard. Jasper takes care of Kara like a little sister and feels responsible for both their families fallen because he could have given a better warning. Since the attack, Kara has nightmares and if she get’s too emotional (anger, fear, sadness) something else takes over.... talk about cliche 

15. Do you like to talk about your OCs with other people?

Only ones that promise not to judge how terrible they all are 

16. Which one of your OCs would be the best at biology (school subject)?

Mia

17. Any OC OTPs?

I don’t really ship any of my OCs together. I’ve tried making someone for Chase and Mike but...relationships are complicated and so is OC making

18. Any OC crackships?

Nah

19. Introduce an OC that means a lot to you (and explain why)

I can’t say there’s one that “means a lot” to me...guess I don’t bond with them enough hehe

20. Do any of your OCs sing? If they sing, care to share more details (headcanon voice, what kind of songs they like etc)?

Chase is a singer. He’s the lead singer of a little rock band he make called Rising Phoenixes (It’s a work in progress people). I made him when I first heard the song The Phoenix by Fall Out Boy. So his voice would be something like Patrick Stump with maybe a bit of Chester Bennington from Linkin Park and Michael Barnes from Red.  Obviously he’s really into rock music and he likes rap as well as some pop. 

21. Your most artistic OC

Technically Chase. The rest of em are goons. Elliot doodles somewhat but that’d when he’s not paying attention in class or procrastinating

22. Is there any OC of yours people tend to mischaracterize? If yes, how?

I wouldn’t know since not many people know about them 

23. Introduce OC that has changed from your first idea concerning what the character would be like?

With complete honesty, none of my OCs have really changes much since I’ve made them. Design, yeah, but they have the same personality and goals and stuff. 

24. If you could meet one OC of yours, who would it be and why?

Elliot or Chase. They’re both dumb and I love them. 

25. The OC that resembles you the most (same hobby, height, shared like/dislike for something etc?)

Kara. When I made her in elementary I was basically trying to make myself seem more interesting...

26. Have you ever had to change your OC’s design or something else about them against your will?

Nope. All the changes I’ve done are my own choices.

27. Any OCs that were inspired by a certain song?

Buddy, a lot of my OCs are based on songs. My problem is that I don’t remember most of them...

Mike - Basketcase by Green Day

Chase - The Phoenix by Fall Out Boy

Mia - Titanium by David Guetta ft. Sia

Bonnie - Cake by Melanie Martinez

28. Your most dangerous OC?

Realistically, Mia. She’s a spy and analyzes all situations with caution. 

Fantasy wise, Bellona and her brother. They use their magic with little to no regard for other life. 

29. Which one of your OCs would go investigate an abandoned house at night without telling anyone they’re going?

I would say Elliot but he’s a little turd so he’d tell everyone just to act like a tough guy.

30. Which one of your OCs would most likely have a secret stuffed animal collection?

Mia. The semi stoic ones always have a soft side.

31. Pick one OC of yours and explain what their tumblr blog would be like (what they reblog, layout, anything really)

Chase would have a social blog that probably promotes his band and there’s a bunch of selfies with him and his bandmates along with audio posts of their songs. Some grumpy Mike pictures are included.

32. Which one of your OCs would be the most suitable horror game protagonist and why?

Mia. Since she’s a spy she’s got all the training to survive and she’s been trained mentally to adapt to situations. There’s a chance she’ll scream at some point though. 

33. Your shyest OC?

Elliot. He’s very socially awkward.

34. Do you have any twin characters?

Debating wether to give Kara a twin brother. I dabbled in wether I wanted a girl or boy and I can have both if they’re siblings. Still indecisive about it though. 

Might be repetitive though since Bellona and her brother are twins as well.

35. Any sibling characters?

Mike and Chase aren’t related by blood, but they have a sort of bond like siblings.

36. Do you have OC pairs where the other part belongs to someone else (siblings, lovers, friends etc)?

I’m not sure I understand the question. 

37. Introduce an OC who is not quite human

Kara and Jasper are both shapeshifters. Kara originally turned into a black wolf but after the attack on her family, her fur is black and white. Jasper can turn into a red wolf. Bellona and her brother know magic and are able to turn into dragons. 

38. Which one of your OCs would be the best dancer?

I’m thinking that Mike was sent to ballet or some sort of fancy dance classes. Meanwhile I have another OC that GETS DOWN AT THE CLUB. 

39. Introduce any character you want

Jasper isn’t talked about much so uh. Yeah he’s a shapeshifter and acts much like a protective older brother towards Kara. He’s got a hint of Jakob from Fire Emblem Fates to his personality when it comes to Kara. He’s a typically polite young man and he tried to hide his emotions a lot of the time. He can be very caring and kind depending on the person though. 

40. Any fond memories linked to your characters? Feel free to share!

When I first drew Mike, my friend said he was hot. It was during theatre my freshman year. 

41. Has anyone drawn fanart of your OCs? If yes, maybe show a picture or two here (remember sources & permissions!)

@whimsicalsnail has, but they’re buried deep in our tumblr convo

42. Which one of your OCs would be the most interested in Greek gods?

hmm probably Chase

43. Do you have any certain type when you create your OCs? Do you tend to favour some certain traits or looks? It’s time to confess

I’m gonna be honest, I consider all of my OCs attractive and I would probably date the dudes. I’m guily of same face syndrome too probably. 

44. Something you like about your OCs in general

I like that i’m able to make them and that I don’t always have to draw fanart to feel satisfied

45. A character you no longer use?

I use all of them...in due time...some more than others...

46. Has anyone ever told you that you treat your OCs badly?

I DON’T TELL PEOPLE ABOUT MY OCS SO NO....

47. Has anyone ever (friendly) claimed any of your OCs as their child?

I don’t tell people enough...@whimsicalsnail probably has

48. OC who is a perfect cinnamon roll, too good for this world, too pure

Either Chase or Kara

49. Which one of your OCs would most likely enjoy memes

Elliot. He’s a college student, of course he’d be too into memes.

50. Give me the good ol’ OC talk here. Talk about anything you want

I usually create OCs based on songs, even if I can’t remember them all. There are a few songs that i’d relate to my OCs and think of them when listening to them. Kara is basically my self insert into the fiction world and I am ashamed but it’s too late now. I hope they all don’t have the same kind of personality too....

If you’re interested in any of my OCs, I’ll gladly do some doodles of them to show you what they look like!

@axioms-sassiest this took me almost an hour to do....why.....