#MOLECULAR BIOLOGY MY BELOVED!!!

[prophetkristy]

As a biochemist, I was nodding and laughing at the OP, and nodding some more at the more detailed (and stunningly gorgeous) illustration, and then WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT’S INTERACTIVE AND PROTEIN MODIFICATIONS

I am going to lose so much time diving into this! Too bad about that lab manual I’m supposed to be writing!

(Who can I throw money at to make a fulldome version for our 4K planetarium? Asking for a friend me. It’s me. I am making grabby hands.)

biologists will be like this is a very simplified diagram of a mammalian cell

chemists will be like this is a molecule

[catboybiologist]

Hi! I'm Sierra. Time for a pinned post refresh.

Otherwise known as CatboyBiologist, or @hi-sierra (my SFW blog [this one is SFW too, but less so]). This page is remaining active, but if you want to find me somewhere else, I use the same username on reddit, Instagram, co-host, and tech.lgbt. This is me:

Trans woman, PhD student in molecular biology, boymoder, shitposter, freediver, hot girl on your phone, hiker, rambler (this post included), tgirl tummy tuesday supplier and enjoyer, former femboy, bane of bioessentialist fuckwads who try to use biology to validate biogotry, flaming bisexual, 196 nanocelebrity… whatever was the first thing that brought you to my blog, I hope it’s enough to get you to stay! I post selfies, hornyposts (minors and people who are averse to that be warned), stuff about the ocean, posts about my growing sense of wanderlust, my adorable lil tortoise, tutorials for transfemmes and GNC people, rambles about science, documentation of my own transition, rambles about transness, rambles about the eroticism of programming a machine to feel arousal, rambles about nature, and random shitposts. Please send me pictures of cute animals in your life!

If you wanna support my science career and my transition, consider dropping a tip here! PhD salaries are notorious for being negotiated to be exactly the cost of living…. And then forgotten about for years as inflation drops that below minimum wage. So I’m always a little strapped for cash. Anything helps!

Links to some of my tutorials and relevant resources under the cut:

I'm tracking my transition, and some people have said they found this helpful! This spreadsheet is generally updated monthly:

Usually, I write a little journal to go with it when it updates- you can find that under the #trans journal on my blog.

If you're interested in checking out some of the things I'm trying to write, here's a post with links to individual stories I'm making:

https://www.tumblr.com/catboybiologist/741010247774306304/writing-consolidation-post?source=share

My femboy guide, written well before I started HRT, but still has relevant info:

A "boyboob" tutorial, aka how to make it look like you have cleavage in an outfit that looks better with it:

A quick and dirty guide to taking better selfies, with a specific emphasis on people who may have stopped hating their body recently due to transition:

And here's a few of my personal favorite little rambles and posts about my transness, in no particular order:

CW for transphobia on this one:

A massive shoutout to @foldingfittedsheets for this amazing art of the lil borgir holding a trans flag:

I adore this so much <3 if you want to support their art, her commissions are open and really sweet!!!!

And of course, a massive shoutout to @whalesharkcat for this lovely pixel art of my tortoise:

I still love this so much, and will continue to into the future <3

For preHRT selfies, search the femboy tag. For post HRT selfies, use the "trans selfie" tag. I've been on HRT since August of 2023, so I'm still very early in the process! Day to day, I present male, but I plan to change that around the 1 year mark.

I guess that's about it! One final note is that I've been alluding to video/podcast style things for a while now. With my aderrall prescription, I've actually put in a lot of research work that might lead to 1-4 of those, so that might actually happen in the near future! No promises of course, life always catches up to you.

And if you liked my previous pinned post better, here it is:

Anyways, if you read this far, thanks for sticking around and bbyyyyeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[katz-chow]

deranged reader my beloved, my daughter, me. back again in the spools of my brain.

warnings: exactly what the title is. fem! reader, pwp, blood, gore, manipulation (?), toxic reader (?), reverse harem w/ soap & ghost eventually the others, pnv, fingering, overstim (fem)

🏷️ | @warenai @reese-is-right

part 1

you came from a normal life before joining the military. your parents love you and so does your younger brother, he's a pain in the ass but aren't all siblings? cookie cutter houses lines the suburban streets, grasses cut, and christmas decorations find themselves on the houses as soon as december hits, no sooner to avoid hoa fines.

It's actually silly how you turned out this way, a small malicious brain in a body of a well cared for girl. in many ways it was like taming a wild animal; your nails were manicured on the regular, hair neat and put together, strands never where you hadn't meant for it to be, and your uniform was pristine, never stained, never wrinkled. on the outside, you truly where just the sweetest young lady that was meant to sing christmas carols at nursing homes and gain pinches on your cheeks as tips.

but you can't fully tame a wild animal though. in many cases, tigers eat their owners, monkeys maul them, and raccoons abandon home after trashing it. you, were simple. you don't bare your teeth to your owners or unsheathe your claws, you pin them. you pin them in a way that artists pin beetles and butterflies, perfect and spayed out for display and enjoyment.

and that's what you did to the 141. you made them yours. it came easy, natural- almost instinctive. everyone wants to be liked, right? so what if you're extra, extra good at that? you're just charming!

it started with soap. he was an easy target knowing how friendly he is. after finding out he's a demolitions expert, you stepped in asking him rather complex questions on the molecular composition of the explosives he found himself building. and he gladly explained it to you, not having a lot of people who know chemistry on such a level outside of an academic space.

the two of you spend lunches together relating his chemistry knowledge to your biology knowledge as an ex-medic. together you were Biochemistry, what a bunch of nerdy POS'.

quickly that lead to more chemistry in the comfort of your bed as well, having the two of you wrapped up in the sheets as he fucked you hard and fast, his name spilling out of your lips like an echo in the void that is your thoughts.

his dick rammed into, your ankles on his shoulders and his grip on the back of your knees as he bends you in half.

after that night, it became many more. soap was now just johnny. the two of you shared loving glances and plenty of playful touches, a slap on each other's ass when the other passed by, a ruffle of hair, and arms wrapped around the other's waist, cheek to the muscle of their back.

ghost, observant as ever, found this quite aggravating as he thought you were his to hold. while you and johnny fumbled with carbons and phosphorus, ghost had picked up more paperwork than normal, training more recruits than he normally would, just to go and ask you for help. which, being the nice person you were, happily agreed to help him empty his plate.

silence filled the air besides the occasional sound of paper shifting and being flipped, or tossed to the side. some pens scribbling on the paper and against the hardness of the wood also found its way into the comfortable silence and the absence of words. ghost's eyes dashed up to look at you, chewing on the flesh of your lip as you focus on the paperwork that he had asked for your help on. he sees the blankness of your face, how nothing else seems to move or show any signs of emotion besides the gnawing of your teeth.

he quirked an eyebrow at this, how unusual you are...how fascinating. almost as if in a trance, a stupor, a daze as your aura pulls him onto his feet and over to you. he hovers over you, only your wooden desk in between.

"you and soap..." he started and as quickly as the daze came, it left him to fumble for the right words. you look up at him, the same bored expression on your face before you wide your eyes just a tiny bit in surprise and realization.

your head tilts to the side, deciding on letting him grumble with his own choked words. and he, in fear of such situation, opted to shut his mouth and walk back to his desk, picking up from what he left off.

a giggle escapes your mouth, "you can ask him." you say playfully, going back to your own sentence to write and finish up.

the two of them were a pair, always have been- and easy to hook both with the same, sweet bait of your kindness. sooner or later, you got what you wanted, two playful dogs that tend to your every need, whether to pick up some food for you, run to your room to get a file you forgot, knock someone's teeth out for your collection, or to pull orgasm after orgasm out of you until you’re a panting mess. that last one was your favorite.

you sat in simon's lap, knee bent with your leg thrown over it, spreading and keeping your thighs from closing. johnny's fingers thrust into your sweet heat as your sharp nails continue to dig into the back of simon's hand, holding onto the flesh of your waist tightly. behind you, you could feel simon's dick twitched as more of your slick dribble down onto his own trousers. his hot breathe against your ear grounded you just a bit as johnny's thumb grazed over your swollen clit. "that's it lovie...one more for us yeah?" johnny snickers from his place, crouched right in front of your pussy, all wet and puffy from the many orgasms that the two of them have taken from you. you whined as he continue to tease you, fingers languidly pulling in and out of your cunt as his thumb swipes over the top edge of your bud. you cry out. even his feather-light touches on your wet clit draws you closer to the edge until your mind goes numb, your pleasure boiling over the edge once again. your body convulses as simon's grasp on you tighten. "good girl, come on now. i kent you could do it..." johnny praises as his fingers pumps in and out of you quicker, pulling every last drop of your pleasure into his palm.

now two of them were playful with you, you were theirs and they knew how to share. their sweet little play thing that was always too good to them, so obedient.

simon now wishes that you were as obedient in the field as you were in bed as he sweeps through the building in search of you. he curses to himself for letting you slip past his field of vision and his attention, going off on your own with a simple "be right back".

he believed it but that was almost an hour ago, and this building is not big. however, the concrete walls and fluorescent lights rendered this place a labyrinth. rifle in his hand, held close and alert, he quickly tip toes up the stairs, observing the twisting quiet hallways, its greenish lights making him feel sick.

he continued on, careful in the thickness of the silence, making his heart thunder and his steps heavy, like forcing through gelatinous air. a wail rung through the concrete walls, not yours, but a shriek of agony, the only sound being made in the longest minutes in his life.

he jogged on, gun tight in his grip, ready to shoot the poor bastard that stood in between his darling and him.

your voice got louder as he got closer, he turned the corner, meeting you and a man in an empty room, door swung open. the man knelt on your feet in front of you. crimson pipes and frayed pieces of his bicep dripped down thick, molten blood onto a pile of rumble from the collapsed wall. simon froze, his own blood flowed thunderously in his ears as he felt his chest shook.

your face showed the same picture as it did when he made you take over his paperwork all those weeks ago. a plain, empty, broken face stared back down at the man on his knees. he mumbles something in russian quickly, petrified in his spot as you held the saw onto the top of his head. his pleas faded into nothing as his voice grew raw from overuse. a simple, broken, "please" breathed out of his exhausted lungs.

simon saw the way his unsteady back raised as he took a quick breath and how it shakily exited his body. blood continued to drip from his exposed bone and muscle. the man's body swayed, weakened from the lack of such plasma flowing through him. a man on the brink of death didn't scare simon, he has been where you are now. he has seen death like an old friend from school, bumping into it every so often.

the dread that filled his body and weighed on his shoulders was your reaction- or lack thereof. you didn't care about his pleas, or how the light in his dull eyes extinguished from tight-lining in between life and death. you didn't care that his arm was discarded behind you. you didn't care about the severed arm, laying in a dark pool, drenched in blackness, just a foot away from your backside. you didn't care.

the man's hand grabs onto your leg, begging, pleading for mercy, even as death was eager to take him. simon sees his breathing becoming staggered, shallow, knowing death is standing over your shoulder, staring on, waiting for you to make the final blow, to end his life.

but you don't. a satiated hum of approval rumbled out of your throat as you dug the jagged blade of the hand saw into his skull. the man pulled from the well of his energy, enough to let out a sluggish, hoarse sob. he bent over more, trying to escape the digging of the steel into his scalp, failing.

you pull back the blade, making you cut deeper and the man choked on his anguished cries. satisfied, you yanked the blade out, leaving the man to hiccup one last plea as you kicked him off your leg. he falls to the ground on his side, his chest rising ever so slightly. you step over him, throwing the saw to the other side of the room, it's weight hits the concrete with a 'thump'. simon doesn't speak, and neither do you. he walks behind you, rifle still drawn. and you know why.

[cnestus]

If you don't mind me asking, what exactly is your job and degree? Getting into the field of entomology is a bit intimidating and I would appreciate any any advice.

i tend to be a little cagey about my exact job since my field is quite small and there's enough people following me that the chances of someone deciding to take offense to something and Get Weird at me are nonzero, but that's probably excessive paranoia on my part. then again beloved internet bug person mossworm got recently sacked from their job on account of weirdo online tattletales so maybe not.

anyway i can say i work for a government agency identifying insects from a pretty wide geographic range, looking for new exotic species and potential pests. during the busy season i spend most of my time processing huge volumes of raw trap samples, pulling out insect groups of interest, mostly woodboring beetles, for myself or one of the other entomologists in the lab to identify to species. during the off-season when we're not getting tons of new samples i get a little more free reign to work on other projects of my own design, so for example lately i've been working on my bee identification skills and am slowly putting together a large reference collection of native bee species that i reserved from years of insect trap by-catch.

i got my PHD in entomology without a specific career in mind but knowing i wanted to do something that wasn't just about developing products and methods for killing unwanted insects which seem like the main entomology jobs anyone wants to fund anymore. in a perfect world i'd love a entomological curation job in a museum but those positions are rare and in-demand and i didn't have the mental fortitude to do the kind of academic work in grad school to make me competitive for that field. but then i went ahead and got a job that lets me do some curatorial work anyway so i sort of won? my position is still at least on paper about controlling unwanted insects but in practice i rarely have to do much of that work, at least directly.

i get semi-regular requests for advice on getting a job as an entomologist and i often feel like i don't have much constructive or encouraging to say, since it's hard not to feel like it's one of the many disciplines being squeezed to death by the iron hand of capitalism. more and more positions in the government and academia are being cut or downsized by bureaucrats who don't see the benefit of taxonomy or any other research that doesn't directly result in their department or some corporation making a bunch of money. whole subdisciplines are dying out as the elder entomologists who were the sole sources of knowledge about them die off. there are entire groups of insects and other arthropods that are effectively impossible to identify to species now because the one taxonomic wizard who specialized on them died without having anyone to pass that knowledge onto. Donald Bright, the only living expert on bark beetles in the preposterously diverse and morphologically subtle genus Pityophthorus, died a few months ago without an heir that i'm aware of.

also most of the taxonomic research that is being done these days is all molecular systematics which i have Opinions about but this post is way too long already.

sorry. that was a bummer. i guess i'm proof that it is still possible to get a job like this today, even if i can't help but feel like it was mostly luck that got me here. plenty of the others in my academic cohort (that didn't burn out from grad school stress) also went on to get degrees in their field of study or at least adjacent to them. and again there are still plenty of entomology jobs in other sectors like agriculture, public health, nonprofits and NGOs and stuff like that. you also don't necessarily need an advanced degree in entomology for a lot of these, and a lot of people in the entomology field came in sideways through related disciplines like ecology, evolutionary science, general biology, or even things like viticulture and forensic science to name a couple examples from my own cohort.

looking back, that was mostly a lot of vague grumbling and not much concrete advice, but to be fair asking for "any advice" is a hard prompt to go off of so i tend to default to the kinds of grim thoughts that are usually rattling round in my brain. i may also be in an especially dour mood at the moment because even though my job isn't to my knowledge at any risk of being eliminated, my lab is currently being passively if not outright antagonized by higher-level bureaucrats for genuinely mysterious reasons and i will not elaborate on that any further for reasons i mentioned at the beginning. anyway! i am always happy to at least attempt to give more specific advice but i can't promise there won't be at least a little grumbling in that as well.

[saintshigaraki]

molecular biology my most greatly beloved......

[streamlineatrocity]

Play any instruments?

How many countries have you visited?

What made you get into molecular biology?

I grew up poor & with a hearing disability so I never really had access to instruments or much of anything else tbh. After getting my ears fixed I learned to play a few simple songs on the piano but that's about it. In school, I excelled at sculpture, paint, and dabbled in wood carving. I think I've always enjoyed working with my hands more.

As for traveling, Ive never been outside the US. One day I'd like to travel abroad but for now you catch me stomping around the southeast for the most part.

Okay, this is a fun one. When I was 11 I bought a $5 game out the blue light special bin at the K-Mart (can you tell I'm Southern???). Anyhoot, that game was BioShock I & II for Xbox 360. It blew my eleven year old mind in several ways but most of all they got me curious about science & the possibilities of gene splicing. Eventually that introduced me to molecular biology (my beloved). To put it simply, that $5 game lit a fire in me that I've cradled ever since. BioShock will always hold a special place in my heart for that

Thank you for the ask!

[meraisun]

MARS' STUDYBLR. ╰— y12. uk. seventeen.

about me!

names: mars or merai

age: seventeen

pronouns: she/xe

sexuality: pansexual

hobbies: video games (fallout series, my beloved), crochet, writing, reading, linguistics, history, herpetology, gardening, watching old movies, tennis, fashion

goals: planning on studying molecular biology at university

my a-levels!

biology (aqa)

chemistry (aqa)

classical civilization (ocr)

what to expect!

short daily "blogs" (i.e. ramblings), accountability posts, random study tips, a-level resources, gcse resources.

reblog/like/follow to be mutuals!

[littledreamling]

About Me (part 2!)

Thank you so much for the tag @mathomhouse-e!! I did this back when it was circulating before but I'm excited to see if my answers have changed since then!

Nickname: Kai or Crow, though I'll respond to anything

Sign: Sagittarius sun, libra moon, scorpio rising (yeah I know)

Height: 5'5" (I've grown an inch! In reality, though, I went to the doctor and got measured for the first time in years, giving me an extra inch to lord over all of my friends who are still 5'4" *cough, cough* @levi1088 and @birdbraintm)

Last thing I googled: oh this could be very embarrassing... oh thank god it's Tom Burke, the reason being that I saw his name in the credits of Mank and recognized it from The Musketeers (fantastic show, everyone should watch it, Tom Burke did an amazing job with Athos' complex character)

Song stuck in my head: Thankfully, I do not have one, probably because it's difficult to have a song stuck in your head when you're actively listening to music... (for anyone wondering, I'm listening to Lightning Crashes by Live, which is a childhood favorite handed down from my parents). I also had Voulez-Vous by ABBA stuck in my head earlier this week because I watched Mamma Mia over the weekend

Number of followers: 429 (I've gained about 40 since the last time I answered this, half of which are from the discord server lmao, I love you all my beloveds <3)

Amount of sleep: Time spent actually asleep? roughly 7 hours, give or take. Time spent laying in bed scrolling through my phone before falling asleep/after wakign up? Far longer, but I refuse to admit how much longer... I'm on break, sue me lmao

Dream job: this hasn't changed: university professor. It's been my dream job every since starting university (with a brief stint where I wanted to be a pilot, though that didn't last long when I realized how expensive getting a pilot's license is and that the only way to get one for free is to join the military...) because it's largely my only career path. As a cellular and molecular biology major, my two paths lie in pharmaceutical labs doing quality control or doing research funded by a university. Of the two, I'll always prefer the latter.

Wearing: This always feels like a main character describing herself in a badly written fanfiction, but here goes: black sweat pants, a grey long-sleeved t-shirt, black socks, and my hair is tied back with a hair tie in the world's smallest ponytail. Nothing fancy to see here. I don't even have my dangly earring in, though I do have my other earrings in (because they never get removed) which consist of a pair of small gauges, a septum ring being used as an earring, and a black industrial bar. I also have my rings and signature necklace, so I guess that counts for something. Idk

Movies/books that summarize you: Last time, I asked my roommate to answer this because she knows me best, but I don't have her here at the moment, so I'll take a stab at it. Where Hope Comes From by Nikita Gill is definitely a strong contender, simply because of the non-toxic positive messages it contains. I particularly enjoyed the book The Genome Odyssey by Euan Angus Ashley as well as Genome by Matt Ridley. Both vastly expanded my horizons in my chosen career path and have pushed me to better understand everything that can be done through the field of genomics. Antigone by... well, Sophocles is my favorite play (sorry Shakespeare, I have to agree with Hob on this one) because everyone talks about loving the way men love, but Antigone shows what it is to love the way women love. I adored it when I first read it at the ripe age of fourteen and I still love it today.

Favorite song: Too many to list. I have a playlist on spotify called Absolute Favorites that is over 7hrs long... If I had to pick, though, I'd say (right now) it's Saviour by George Ezra or Michigan Cherry by River Whyless. I'm not sure they'll stand the test of time to be included in my Absolute Favorites, but they're currently scratching specific itches in my brain and that's enough for now

Favorite instrument: My answer 100% has not changed: church organ, bagpipes, and the harmonica. I have religious trauma, blood that sings for Scotland, and I was raised in the American South. I'm not sure what else you could ever expect of me... I have to add to it, though, for sheer hilarity: the hurdy-gurdy. Tangentially, I love the fiddle and always wanted to learn how to play but never had the time/money to do so.

Aesthetic: I could copy/paste my answer from last time because it hasn't changed. As @the-cloudy-dreamer and I were talking about earlier, roughly 90% of my clothes are black, 7% are grey, and the rest are some variation of other neutral tones. Color and I do not oft get along, so I don't try. My skin is so pale that I could be an Endless sibling and I dress the part lmao

Favorite authors: Neil Gaiman, obviously. My literary tastes, however, rarely fall neatly along the lines of one author; I tend to pick up books as they interest me, not because I know or like the author, which leads to me reading books by wildly various authors and not having any particular favorites.

Random fun fact: I'm never quite sure what to put for questions like this... reading back over my answers from last time (I can lick my elbow, I rode horses for 10+ years, I own far too many tarot decks, and I have blue hair), they seem so surface-level, but they're also deeply intrinsic pieces of me that add up to the greater whole, and I'm not sure if I could fit anything deeper or more meaningful into a tumblr text box. I'm a photographer (or used to be), I'm a trans man (though I'm not out socially), I'm in a sorority (part of the reason why I'm not out socially, though not the entire reason), I have over 700 hours in Animal Crossing... if you want to know anything about me, just ask I guess, I'm an open book!

And because our whole server was tagged in one fell swoop, I have to exit our little bubble so I'm tagging @birdbraintm @levi1088 (my two IRL friends on tumblr), @landwriter @avelera @softest-punk @staroftheendless and @fishfingersandscarves (because it was surprisingly fun to revisit these questions to see how much, or how little, has changed) As always, feel free to ignore a tag! I'm also leaving an open tag: if you see this and want to do it, do it! I'd love to be tagged in it so I can be nosy!

[grison-in-space]

Well, and also, as you age your special interests open footholds to you that may lead to new special interests. Over the decades, my first—"Dogs"—has led me to population and molecular genetics, history, neuroscience, psychology, art, culture, biophysics and biochemistry, anthropology, journalism, religion, disability theory, storytelling, statistics...

"Horses" and "Cats" offer nearly as many opportunities ; so do other species of animal that children take a fancy to. I was best friends with one kid when we were seven whose special interest at the time was turtles. Turtles offer so many paths to potential topics of fascination: history and art and religion again, culinary discussion, conservation biology, law, biogeography, sailors, seabirds, coral, poetry, geography, commerce. The third member of our little triumvirate liked tigers, which open up onto many of the same topics in vastly different entry points.

Both my friends were boys, right? But still our interests really weren't that different. (Yes, all three of us were diagnosed as autistic as teenagers.) We spent a lot of time telling each other about our interests and things we were learning about. There's just not that much difference, in terms of how it can open the world up to you, between dinosaurs and dogs.

I think what I'm trying to say is that in our haste to offer and describe a form of autism special interest that is distinct from the fact-hoarding collection oriented special interests associated with boys, we should remember that the old boy-focused assessments are similarly approaches from an external perspective. That is, descriptions of special interests revolve around the things that strike the clinician as notable signs of rigidity or narrowness in the interest, right? But refusal to leave a beloved subject behind entirely doesn't mean that a child is trapped in repetition and factoid curation unless that's the only response made by the people around that child. And without the lived experience of tracing a special interest through life's trajectory, how do you know how to trace the throughlines hiding in the trails of knowledge and interest?

I can't emphasize enough how weird the value judgements of some of these clinicians can get when it comes to distinguishing interests that are universal or common versus those which are deemed pathological. I'm not always sure that the old "masculine" depictions of autism were paying attention as closely to little boys as they claimed. After all, they failed to pay any to little girls.

Women and Girls with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Life Experiences from Early Childhood to Old Age (Sarah Hendrickx, 2015)

“Interestingly, one of the findings from research into sex differences in children with autism was that girls with autism do not have the same stereotypical, rigid interests as boys.

My research certainly found that repetitive and restricted behaviours were completely the norm for the girls studied but that topic type differed.

A small number of activities came up time and time again as being favourites for repetition: watching the same TV/video/DVD programme (e.g., Mary Poppins, Postman Pat, Peppa Pig), reading the same book (e.g., an Enid Blyton book, Jane Eyre), listening to the same song/tape.

The scripts and lyrics of their favourite shows, books and songs were all known verbatim by the children. Collecting and sorting specific objects were also mentioned.  (…)

Boys’ interests tend to be object-based – trains, dinosaurs, space – while girls’ interests tend to be people- or animal-based – soap operas, fictional characters, animals and celebrities.

This qualitative difference can explain why girls’ behaviour may not be noted as being unusual, due to the ‘typical girl’ nature of their interests.

Whereas a boy who quotes endless facts about ancient history, rather than playing football with his peers, may be flagged as atypical, a girl who obsesses about a pop star would not necessarily be seen in the same way.

The difference between the interests of a girl with autism and a typical child is the narrowness of the topic and the intensity of the interest.

These girls with ASD have single-track focus; they do not think or speak of anything other than their passion for an extended period.

They may have extensive knowledge of their subject but have more of a factual interest than a desire to live it out.

A child who speaks of nothing but horses may not actually want a horse, but just enjoys the facts about horses.

I believe that the interest provides the same outcomes for both girls and boys on the autism spectrum; once immersed in your subject of interest, there is a predictability and escape from the chaotic real world.

Knowing everything about a subject makes it known and provides a sanctuary from the anxiety and stress of a feeling of not knowing what’s going to happen most of the time.

Animals in general are a popular interest as they are far easier to deal with than people for many females with autism: their intentions are clear (no hidden agendas), their non-verbal language is minimal (cats don’t pull too many facial expressions), their needs are easily identified and their attachment and affection are unconditional and unchanging.

Some girls identify so strongly with animals that they imagine or wish themselves to be one.”

[longitudinalwaveme]

Arkham Files: Dr. Alchemy/Alvin Desmond

Hugo Strange: From the patient files of Dr. Hugo Strange, director of Arkham Asylum. Patient: Alvin Desmond, also known as (sigh) - as the second Dr. Alchemy. (Pause) And no, as far as I can tell, this one has no relationship to Dr. Albert Desmond, in spite of the shared last name. Patient suffers from Antisocial Personality Disorder and a delusional belief that he has some sort of supernatural connection with Dr. Desmond. Session One. So, how are you feeling today, Mr. Desmond? 

Alvin: (With a voice identical to that of Albert Desmond’s) Well, I don’t plan on giving this place any five-star recommendations. It’s much too drafty here. Although the lack of regular beatings is a definite plus. 

Hugo Strange: (Concerned) Regular beatings? Are you alleging that Iron Heights Penitentiary engages in routine abuse of its prisoners? 

Alvin: Basically only in the metahuman wing, and only since the new warden took over, but yeah. Anyone with superpowers gets a one-way ticket to the Pipeline.  

Hugo Strange: The Pipeline? 

Alvin: Oh, that’s what our beloved Warden Wolfe calls the metahuman wing. Or the metahuman basement, depending on which way you look at it.

Hugo Strange: How exactly are metahumans classified at Iron Heights, Mr. Desmond? 

Alvin: I’m not sure. I’ve always had a fascination with chemistry, but brother Albert is the one with the degrees in biochemistry and molecular biology. The scientific basis for the classification system goes over my head. So far as I can tell, anybody with natural powers is considered a metahuman and gets sent to the Pipeline. No exceptions. The only metahuman I can think of who isn’t sent straight down there is that freak the Top, and that’s only because he has a record of crazy spells and attempted suicides as long as my arm. (Pause) What does the Golden Glider see in that lunatic, anyhow? Sure, they say power is an aphrodisiac, but I have even more power than he does, and she wouldn’t look twice at me, even when she thought he was dead! And I went through the effort of turning her underwear into gold and everything! 

Hugo Strange: Perhaps she finds the idea of a man who does not think that she should fall for him simply because he is powerful to be more attractive than the idea of a man who transmutes her undergarments without permission? 

Alvin: (Skeptical) Maybe so. (Pause) But I guess we’re not here to talk about my unrequited crushes. You’re interested in the Pipeline, right? 

Hugo Strange: I am interested in your mental well-being, Mr. Desmond. Your descriptions of the Pipeline simply make me concerned that it is affecting your mental health. 

Alvin: Personally, I’d think it’s affecting my physical health more than anything. The beatings the Pipeline guards give you hurt like the dickens...and sessions with Warden Wolfe are even worse. I don’t know how he does it, but every time I have a ‘conversation’ with him, I come out of it feeling like I’ve just run a marathon. The muscle cramps are just awful, and I swear they last for days. (Pause) But all things considered, it’s not much more than a minor inconvenience. 

Hugo Strange: How so? 

Alvin: You’ve met Brother Albert, haven’t you? 

Hugo Strange: If you’re referring to the unfortunate Dr. Desmond, yes, I have. 

Alvin: Then you should know about how hard we are to contain. 

Hugo Strange: (Alarmed) You have a resistance to the metahuman power dampeners as well? 

Alvin: Brother Albert and I share all of the rest of our powers in common. Why would that one be any different? 

Hugo Strange: Would I be correct to assume that the reason you see the beatings you receive in the Pipeline as a minor inconvenience is because you are never in Iron Heights for more than a few days? 

Alvin: Yes, you would. You see, it usually only takes a few days at most for the power dampeners they put on me to fail. Brother Albert and I simply have too much power. In effect, our bodies overload the dampeners. And once they fail, it’s easy for me to escape, what with the vast powers I have at my disposal. In fact, I’ve never been locked away for more than a week. (Pause) In speaking of Brother Albert, how is he doing? I know he’s locked up here, too, and I do worry about my beloved astral twin. 

Hugo Strange: I’m afraid Dr. Desmond is not doing especially well at present. When he learned that one of his alters came to the front and turned an entire baseball stadium’s worth of people into tungsten, he was devastated, and I haven’t been able to make contact with him since.

Alvin: (Laughs) They arrested Brother Albert for that? 

Hugo Strange: Yes. Dr. Alchemy was seen attacking a baseball stadium, and when your city’s costume vigilante subsequently tracked down Dr. Desmond, his unpleasant alter was indeed at the fore. The logical assumption was that he had committed the crime, so he was arrested and sent to Arkham, pending his trial. 

Alvin: (Obviously amused) Oh, this is priceless! They got the wrong Dr. Alchemy again! 

Hugo Strange: What do you mean, Mr. Desmond? 

Alvin: I mean that I was the Dr. Alchemy who turned the baseball stadium into tungsten! (Pause) It really is convenient that Brother Albert is so much more well known than I am. You have no idea how many of my crimes his alters take the blame for. 

Hugo Strange: Are you saying that Dr. Desmond is completely innocent of the crime he was arrested for? 

Alvin: Yes. Brother Albert’s Dr. Alchemy may be dangerous, but all he really cares about is knowledge. Doing something showy like turning a stadium to tungsten isn’t really his style. It’s mine. I’m surprised the Flash didn’t catch onto that, really. (Pause) Although I had been laying low for a while before I pulled that particular crime. Having godlike power can be so exhausting sometimes. 

Hugo Strange: How long have you been letting Dr. Desmond take the fall for your crimes, Mr. Desmond?

Alvin: Since I first became Dr. Alchemy, of course. Why have an astral twin with a criminal record and a known history of mental problems if you aren’t going to use him to cover up your crimes? 

Hugo Strange: Mr. Desmond, you must be aware that you and Dr. Desmond are not relatives, let alone twins. The idea is patently absurd. Why, the two of you don’t look a thing alike! 

Alvin: We aren’t physical twins, Doctor. We’re astral twins. We were born at exactly the same time, to parents with very similar names, and because of this, we’ve shared a psychic connection to one another since we were children. Whenever Brother Albert is good, I am evil, and whenever Brother Albert is evil, I am...well, not good, necessarily, but not actively criminal. 

Hugo Strange: Mr. Desmond, you are not the brother of Dr. Desmond. The fact that you share the same last name and some other superficial similarities does not mean that you are his “astral twin”. It is simply a coincidence. 

Alvin: Then how do you explain the fact that we both have exactly the same powerset? Or the fact that the Philosopher’s Stone follows us, and only us, around? Or the fact that our voices are identical? 

Hugo Strange: There are many villains who have super strength or the ability to fly. Do you propose that all of them are astrally related to one another? 

Alvin: No. Astral twins are remarkably rare, Doctor. In fact, Brother Albert and I may be the only pair on Earth. (Pause) Perhaps it is a reflection of our godlike powers. If we were to team up, we could easily conquer the world. It could be that we were astrally linked simply to prevent us from ever being able to work together. After all, if only one of us could truly be a criminal at a time, then we could never become a team. 

Hugo Strange: An interesting theory, Mr. Desmond. (Pause) I do have a question for you, though. 

Alvin: Oh, really? What is it? 

Hugo Strange: Why is it that all of the records state that there are no records of your existing prior to seven years ago, shortly before you first appeared as Dr. Alchemy? 

Alvin: (Laughs) You’ve got a good sense of humor, Doc. 

Hugo Strange: I am not joking, Mr. Desmond. There are simply no records of an Alvin Desmond existing at any point before you became Dr. Alchemy. People reported seeing you for a few months before that, but until you were arrested, there was no record of a man with your name, appearance, and fingerprints anywhere. 

Alvin: (Uncomfortable) What are you talking about? Of course there are records of me! Alvin Desmond, born in Tampa, Florida, to Mr. and Mrs. Herbert Desmond? 

Hugo Strange: If you don’t believe me, see for yourself. (Hugo Strange hands file to Alvin, who flips through it) 

Alvin: (In a small voice) Why aren’t there any records of me? 

Hugo Strange: (Surprised)  You didn’t know?

Alvin: Of course I didn’t know! I have memories of living a full life! I remember my parents; I remember going to school! There have to be records of that somewhere! 

Hugo Strange: Mr. Desmond, do you mean to tell me that you didn’t have someone erase your records? 

Alvin: No! No, I didn’t! (Pause) Doctor...what’s going on? How can there be no records of me before I became Dr. Alchemy? I know I had a life before that! I remember it perfectly! 

Hugo Strange: I’m afraid that I don’t know what’s going on, either, Mr. Desmond. I have had other patients whose records have been partially erased, but I’ve never had a patient whose records were erased entirely without their knowledge. 

Alvin: Doctor, you...you’ve gotta help me! How can I have memories of things that aren’t in my files? I’m not crazy! I’m not! Brother Albert is the crazy one! 

Hugo Strange: Mr. Desmond, you must calm down! 

Alvin: Calm down? Calm down? My entire life apparently doesn’t exist, and you’re telling me to calm down? 

Hugo Strange: Mr. Desmond, I promise that I can help you...but only if you cooperate with me. Please calm down! 

(Long pause) 

Alvin: All right. I’ll cooperate. I think it’s time the two of us had a chat with Brother Albert. If anyone knows what’s going on here, it’ll be him. (Pause) Assuming we can get him to come out, that is.

Hugo Strange: Something that would be much easier to do if you hadn’t framed him for the crime you committed, Mr. Desmond. 

Alvin: You can’t blame me for that, Doctor. I’m an evil twin! Messing with Brother Albert is simply in my nature. 

Hugo Strange: And how would you know that, Mr. Desmond? You’re no longer even sure what your nature is.

[lovelyirony]

stealing caltech’s cannon sounds like such a rhodeytony thing. i can 100% picture them pulling that off

Tony hates Caltech. He hates them a lot. Mainly because they’ve been trying to get him to go there through a series of thousands of emails, letters, and phone calls. 

They haven’t left him alone since he was around eight, and so he applied to MIT because of them. (Not that he would’ve gone to Caltech anyways, but spiting them certainly felt better.) 

And they’re still sending people to MIT like some sort of Jehovah’s Witness program, and Tony hates trying to avoid them. 

“Come on, you fit the California vibe so much better!” One of the students says. 

“Did they genuinely pay for your flight here?” Tony asks. “Is that why you’re trying to get me to be late to my molecular biology class? My professor used to be a professional kickboxer, I don’t think you’d like being hit near as much as your university is advocating for it.” 

“Come on, just visit the campus. Whoever gets you to visit first gets tuition off next year,” he whines. 

Tony stills. 

“Are they...they’re wasting funding on that?” 

“Yes!” 

“Buddy, I’ll pay for the rest of your college career if you transfer to MIT.” 

“Wait, seriously?” 

“Seriously. Even the flight here. Just tell them you need another flight back and don’t take ‘no’ for an answer.” 

The student scurries off, and Tony sighs, writing down a note to write to Howard and write off the sum of the money off...he’ll probably write it off as something like gambling debts or something. 

(Tony never loses in gambling. Ever.) 

This is just one student, and while Tony would love to put Caltech out of business, he can write approximately one gambling debt of that nature off. Sure Howard wouldn’t pay attention to him probably, but that’s a big “probably.” 

He goes to Rhodey, who also hates Caltech because they’ve been trying to get him to go over there. 

“We need a permanent solution.” 

“Like...not arson, right?” 

“No!” Tony scowls. “Although if Caltech did burn, technically it probably wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen to it...” 

So they brainstorm. 

And they come up with an idea that will make Caltech only come back to MIT once: 

Stealing their beloved cannon. Caltech has this cannon that they restored (to shoot spaghetti out of it or something of the sort...the university wouldn’t allow actual fire) and it’s their pride and joy. 

Well. Rhodey and Tony are always willing to go the extra mile. 

Or three thousand miles. 

There’s a new moving company with at least forty five-star reviews and three one-star just for good measure. (Rhodey’s idea.) Howe and Ser Moving Co. 

It’s their job to move the cannon to a “secure” location for a newly leveled concrete panel. 

They get polo shirts and everything. Rhodey is very surprised at the anonymity that affords a polo shirt. 

“I should invest in this for my wardrobe.” 

“I’ll never talk to you again if you do that,” Tony warns. 

“You love me too much for that,” Rhodey grins. “I’ll wear a kelly green polo shirt and you’ll still love me.” 

“No,” Tony says, ignoring how his heart speeds up. “Now come on, Jamie and Olivia are gonna greet us at Caltech. They’ve been posing as student tour guides and I think I owe Jamie some sort of illicit substance as recompense.” 

“They want a Hobby Lobby giftcard.” 

“That’s the illicit substance?!” 

“To be fair, they are homophobic and very weirdly Christian.” 

Tony pauses. 

“...makes sense. Okay. Let’s go steal a cannon.” 

-

They almost get caught. Almost. Some stupid freshman stops them and talks about how Harvey Mudd stole the cannon and how others have tried but they can’t. 

“Yeah, sure would suck if someone did,” Tony says with a shrug. “Don’t you have something to do, like fail physics?” 

“If I wanted to do that I’d go to MIT,” the freshman says with a sniff. “They wouldn’t know how to calculate movement if the equations were laid out. They’re so dense.” 

“Uh huh,” Rhodey says. “Right.” 

-

The cannon makes it about halfway with a broken hitch, and they have to drive about twenty under the speed limit to make it to a place where the next team can take over with a new hitch, and Tony can negotiate with the actual moving company that they hired to cut the price by half because it’s just ridiculous at this point. 

The cannon makes it to MIT in the dead of night, Rhodey slides on the Brass Rat, and they point it towards Pasadena. 

“Can I kiss you?” Rhodey asks, grinning. “You just...this was incredible.” 

“We are not kissing in front of a Caltech artifact are you kidding me?” Tony says. “We will never do that. I’d hurl rather than do that.” 

Rhodey laughs, swooping Tony into his arms and carrying him off. 

“See our work on the front page tomorrow?” 

“As long as our faces aren’t on it, I don’t care what we see tomorrow.” 

[catboybiologist]

Hi! I’m CatboyBiologist.

Formerly a femboy, now a trans woman just starting HRT, and a PhD student in molecular biology. I started using this online persona as a fun, shitposty way to explore gender a few years ago. I post selfies (generally sfw, but somewhat sexy, so minors and ppl who don’t like that have been warned), rambles about science, tutorials and advice from the stuff I’ve learned by being a femboy in the past, nature pictures, stuff about the ocean, my adorable grumpy little tortoise, and unsolicited opinions on random nerdy topics. Any pronouns are fine. I don’t plan to socially transition for a while, and still present as a man most of the time, so I’m used to whatever you wanna use for me (for now, I’ll update this if that changes). Please send me pictures of your pets or other cute animals in your life!

As a scientist, I’m also documenting my transition! This google sheet will be updated at least monthly. I also have additional metrics I’m keeping to myself, and pictures that go with this, but I’m not sharing them publicly yet. Keep in mind that this is just one person’s experience with HRT, and may not represent universal trends!

Adding a little something here, bc I think it was an interesting bit a writing: if you want to see me respond to a transphobe about what "biologically female" means, here's a thing I wrote about it. CW for transphobia and discussion, obviously.

Also, if any of my measurements look weird, its entirely possible I fucked up. Let me know if anything looks off!

Here’s some of my favorite pre-HRT pictures:

If you want to see more of my pre-HRT selfies, browse the “femboy” tag on my blog!

And as of this writing, I’m only 2 days after the start of HRT, so here’s a picture with my tortoise that’s technically post-HRT (but with 0 time for actual changes):

If you want to see my future post-HRT selfies, browse the “trans selfie” tag on my blog!

Also here's another really cute picture and fanart of my tortoise by @whalesharkcat:

I have affectionately given my tortoise the title of The Grumpus.

I also wrote a couple of tutorials and general vibes about being a femboy before I started HRT:

Sometimes I make shitposts of myself, I don’t take myself too seriously:

This includes the way I came out on tumblr:

And here’s an overly serious, long ramble about trans thoughts and things that I wrote shortly afterwards:

Later addition: Someone asked how I take selfies, so I wrote a quick and dirty guide with some tips on how I do so in response to their ask:

Oh yeah and apparently I was a 196 microcelebrity? I never to thought I was popular enough for that but apparently some people do 🤷‍♀️. So uh, hi 196 tags, I'm abusing you for my pinned post LOL

As for terminology, I personally do think of myself as a “man who is becoming a woman” as opposed to having always been a woman. If that doesn’t resonate with your experience, I totally get that! But that’s why I freely call pre-HRT me a femboy, while still calling post-HRT me a trans woman. I’m also keeping the blog name as CatboyBiologist for the forseeable future, because at this point, Catboy just seems like a gender neutral term to me.

I’m also trying to put together a script for a podcast regarding how studying biology influenced my perspective on sex and gender- lmk if there’s any interest in that! It’s probably gonna be way too long and indulgent but oh well.

So uh. Yeah. I don’t end these types of things well. Byeeeeee

[zelkam]

Top 5 classes you've taken in university? Now that you're done and can look back on them all

Huh, let's see! [not rlly in order tho]

1. Forensic Medicine - so this was an extra class during my Master's and since it was not a field that most of us would go into anyways, they added a lot of the juicy criminal-related medical stuff aside from regular lectures. So we had stuff like "guess what happened judging by the blood splatters", one of out profs casually bringing us old skulls that he was currently working with and making us "diagnose" them and so on. Also we were joining the staff in forensic autopsies and we went from standing scared by the wall to actually helping out. Also the staff there was so fun and friendly.

2. Molecular Embryology - my beloved. So this was a course on my last year of Bachelor's and everyone remembers it as "super difficult but fun". The practical classes were super fun because we were working with zebrafish and chicken embryos and I actually ended up going into this direction because of that course!

3. Molecular Biology - another "difficult but fun". One of my first courses at uni and I'm glad that they ended up being tough on us because I feel like we would really crumble later if we didn't know the fundamentals really well. Also the lecturers were awesome. Also ended up going into this direction (my department for my Master’s was ‘Biochemistry and Molecular Biology’ and I’m still doing stuff there)

4. Immunobiology - for some time I was actually really hyped about it. I just like the blood/immune-related stuff a lot.

5. Practical Scientific Communication - so basically a course on how to talk about science to other people, give presentations and deal with public speaking. It was super helpful to get rid of the fear of talking in front of people.

But honestly there were so many others as well!!

[send me "top 5 anything"!!]

[onlymollygibson]

Netflix’s Avatar: The Last Airbender and the Perils of a Too-Faithful Adaptation

“The book was better than the movie.”  You and I have heard it a thousand times.  Your favorite character’s arc was cut.  The lead actor’s hair was the wrong color.  HARRY DID YOU PUT YOUR NAME IN THE GOBLET OF FIRE??!?!?!

I get it.  Some adaptations are downright terrible.  Others are decent but have a few cringe-worthy moments. 

As I’ve grown older, I’ve realized how important it is for adaptations to, well, adapt, whether to fit the demands of the medium they choose to use or adapt to a different audience than the original.  The entertainment industry has churned out some absolutely amazing book-to-movie adaptations over the years.  The Princess Bride.  Freaking James Bond.  The Lord of the Rings.  The adaptations that have succeeded have done so when creators loved the original story and respected their audience, but weren’t afraid to change things. 

Take Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs for example.  It was based on a children’s book about a grandpa’s silly bedtime stories. The original book didn’t even have a protagonist.  But the Lord and Miller wrote and directed a feature-length film full of hilarious characters and a satisfying plot.  It also featured the best moments from the book and some truly terrible wonderful food puns.  The took the whimsical feel of the book and turned it up to 11.   The creators recognized that an audience has entirely different expectations for a movie vs a children’s book, and they adapted accordingly.  And honestly, teenage me was pissed the first time I saw it.  Mostly because I couldn’t get over their explanations of now the FLRSALPHABETSOUP worked on a molecular level.  As my younger brothers forced me to watch it again and again, I got over my pretentious angst about incorrect biology and just enjoyed watching an animated version of Mr. T talk say things like, “My chest hairs are tingling.”

Often, the anger over book-to-movie adaptations comes when the creators can’t keep every beloved line, scene, or character from a well-loved book.  Unless they’re doing a BBC miniseries and can bless the world with a certain six-hour version of Pride and Prejudice.  Other times, they need to adapt to their storytelling medium of choice.  Can you imagine if the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice kept every line from the book?  They’d have to talk like auctioneers just to fit it all in.  Besides, a completely faithful adaptation had already been done.  To make a memorable, beloved movie in it’s own right, the creators had to adapt.  

Of course, adaptational choices aren’t all good.  Just ask anyone who had the misfortune of watching M Night Sh**m*l*n’s The Last Airbender movie.  Or Eragon.  The dragons had feathers.  Feathers!  Or Percy Jackson.  

But not all change is bad.  The Princess Bride book is hilarious.  But also very wordy.  And the running joke about it being an abridgment of a long, boring history book (Goldman says things like, “This scene was followed by fourteen pages on Florin’s trade and exports, but I cut that.”) was hilarious. BUT a joke like that doesn’t translate well to the big screen, so they didn’t really go into that when they made the movie. Instead, the beloved adaptation is famous for its snappy, witty dialogue.  

Making a good adaptation comes down to recognizing the strengths and limitations of each medium. 

Books: - Great for showing what a character is thinking - Plenty of time for exposition or extensive backstory - Action sequences can be hard to visualize - They don’t have a soundtrack Movies: - They can create a mood instantly with a combination of music and visual cues - There is something absurdly powerful about watching actors deliver really emotionally intense lines.   Or funny lines if they have good comedic timing.  -Action scenes! - The chance to watch characters kiss! - Introspection and exposition can be more difficult, especially with the pressure to make every second count in a movie. 

TL:DR We like to complain about adaptations, but sometimes the adaptational choices are actually necessary and good.  

This brings me to Avatar: The Last Airbender. The TV show was absolutely amazing!  Which is why I’m so worried about this new adaptation.  There’s a lot of pressure to live up to the original, and I’m worried the creators will play it safe.  We fans have had, what? a decade? to watch and re-watch every single scene.  Every character has been analysed to pieces and nearly every possible ship has been shipped.  There’s no way a play-by-play adaptation will be as beloved as the original.  If they try to make an exact adaptation, we’ll spend the entire time cataloging its flaws.  Someone will complain that the actor playing Sokka wasn’t the right kind of goofy or Ty Lee isn’t as flexible, or Zuko’s scar doesn’t look right.  

Here’s what Bryke should do instead: change something.  Make this adaptation an AU.  We’ve spent ten-ish years with canon.  Give us a new canon to work with.  The Season Two finale was so wonderful the first time because we legitimately didn’t know what decision Zuko would make.  It’s still enjoyable to re-watch because we have that agony of what-if he made the right choice in the catacombs and it hurts every single time.   But we’re going into the Netflix series knowing exactly what happened the first time.  If they don’t make any major changes it will be like reading those fanfictions that are like, “What if Toph had an older brother? How would that change things?” and then they completely repeat the canon line-by-line with a few added snarky asides delivered by Toph’s older brother Rocky.  (Sorry if fics like that are your thing.  You do you, and don’t let my complaining about them make you feel bad.) Now imagine that the first episode of the Netflix adaptation introduces some minor changes that are sure to have rippling effects throughout the series: - What if Azula was the heir and Zuko was the spare? - What if Lu Ten survived the siege of Ba Sing Se and Iroh became Fire Lord?  (Suddenly we have villains who aren’t as overtly evil as Zhao.  The Fire Nation people going after the Gaang would be more like Jeong Jeong.) - What if Aang actually saw some of the Sozin’s comet airbender massacre?   - What if Sokka was a bender? - What if Azula wasn’t? - What if the Fire Nation had conquered the North Pole before tried to get Ba Sing Se?  Or what if the Northern Water Tribe allied themselves with the Fire Nation years ago? The point is, introduce a few permutations and see how they effect the story down the line.  Keep the spirit of the series the same by giving us the same level of suspense and agony over the what-ifs and narrative parallels, but change the story so we are one the edge of our seats the entire time.  

And, dare I say, change the ships.  The shipping wars in ATLA were legendary, largely because of the chemistry fans saw between Katara and Zuko. And while there were negative aspects of the shipping wars, some absolutely amazing fics were written as a result.  If the creators change enough that fans think anything is possible, it will create so much buzz and take the Netflix adapatation from, I’m-watching-this-because-I-loved-the-original-and-well-at-least-its-visually-stunning to Holy-Crap-you-have-to-watch-this-OMG!!!  I’m not saying they have to do Zutara (even though 2020 is going to be the year of the reformed-villian/hero romance), but they should do something different.  They have a chance to have us on the edge of our seats.  Not taking that chance would be stupid. 

[saintshigaraki]

lab was nearly 6 hours today and i enjoyed it a lot actually......molecular biology my beloved....

[iffeelscouldkill]

say what we wanna do, make it all come true (chapter 2)

A/N: In my original notes for this fic I had written that Chapter 3 might be rolled into Chapter 2 depending on length because I thought that Chapter 2 was going to be super short. *laughs wildly in 7.1k-long chapter* But this is my favourite chapter of the fic, so it's nice that we get to spend extra time with it!

No particular content warnings for this; everything’s pretty chill. Enjoy! <3

Link to Chapter One | Read on AO3

“That, dear listeners, was ‘Landers Never Stand Down’, the hit single – or should that be anthem? – by beloved indie band Rumor, from their debut album, ‘Ghost Squid’. If you’re just joining us, I’m Piper Tanaka, and this is Radio Indie, Folk and Techno. With us in the studio are Rumor frontwoman Sana Tripathi-”

“Hello again.”

“-and bassist Arkady Patel. We’ve just been hearing the stunning true story of how the band added a new member to its line-up, drummer Violet Liu, after she was discovered trying to obtain confidential files in order to blow the whistle on her employer, the notorious IGR Corp, and its development of an unethical surveillance device.”

“Isn’t that, really, the only logical way to join a band?” Kestrel quipped.

“It sure worked out well for the Rumor crew!” said Piper. “On a more musical note, though – and yes, that pun was intended – that was a great track we just heard. I’m curious about the name you picked for your debut album; is there a story there?”

Sana glanced at Arkady, amused. “Call it an in joke,” she said. “We were originally going to go with ‘In the Deep’, since there’s kind of a loose space theme to the first album, and then… after rehearsal one day, we were just riffing on what kind of creatures might live out in the depths of outer space-” They had also been pretty drunk at the time, but she didn’t need to mention that live on air. “-and Arkady suggested that maybe there’d be giant squid, like in the depths of the ocean.”

“Space squid!” Piper enthused. “Now there’s a concept I can get behind.”

“Right, but Violet, who is our resident science expert – she has a Masters in Molecular Biology–”

“Fancy. Love a woman of science.”

“-pointed out that a squid could never propel itself in a vacuum. Unless it was, you know, a ghost squid.”

“How much had you guys been drinking?” Kestrel asked shrewdly. Arkady coughed.

“It was a dumb joke, but we thought it would make a pretty unique name for a first album,” she finished.

“You were right there!” said Piper brightly. “Then, of course, there’s your upcoming second album, which we’ve heard will be titled ‘More Than a Rumor’.”

“That’s right,” Sana confirmed. “We’ve been working on some really cool material for this one, and we’re excited to bring it to you all.”

“We’ve been hearing some interesting talk about what exactly that material might be,” said Piper. “The discussion boards online are buzzing about one track, ‘The Saga of the House of Zravshen’, which is said to be a thirteen-minute-long “epic space opera ballad” written by Brian Jeeter.”

Arkady made a derisive noise. “It’ll be a thirteen-minute-long something, all right.”

“Arkady, maybe you could tell us about ‘Nanoswarm’,” said Kestrel slyly. “I’ve heard that you and Violet Liu collaborated closely on that track.”

“I – we didn’t – what I mean is, uh, it really wasn’t a formal – collaboration–”

Arkady’s transformation from self-assured to completely flustered was delightful to behold, even though Sana felt like she should maybe step in and save her best friend from herself.

“It was more of a, uh, sort of a side project – we just worked on it and it sounded pretty cool, so it, uh – went onto the album.”

“What I think is really great about ‘More Than a Rumor’,” Sana intervened smoothly, and Arkady let out a breath, sitting back in her chair, “is that there are various tracks where different band members get a chance to shine. Building on ‘Ghost Squid’, which was the introduction to the band as a whole, we really delve into different members’ specialisms in our second album, which has made the material really varied as a result. But at the same time, we’ve worked hard to give it a cohesive flow…”

---

Not everything about adding a new member to the band had been as seamless as that first set. They’d improvised together well over the course of a performance, sure, but there was a different quality to rehearsals now that there were five of them instead of four; they were still figuring out how to navigate each other, adapting routines and in-jokes to accommodate a new person.

A lot of their original material sounded different now with the addition of a keytar and a new drummer; Liu was more technically capable than Jeeter had been, and she also wasn’t content with just falling into a role that had been laid down for her. She had ideas, things she wanted to change, and they weren’t bad ideas, but they still bugged Arkady anyway. She was just attached to a lot of their old songs, that was all.

And okay, maybe she’d pushed back on a few suggestions during rehearsals in a way that had Sana raising an amused eyebrow at her and Krejjh pretending to duck and cover. To her credit, Liu didn’t just roll over and give up on her ideas at the first sign of resistance, sticking to her guns in a way that Arkady respected even if it was also annoying. Things never deteriorated too far, mainly because Sana was quick to play peacemaker, but there always seemed to be some kind of friction between the two of them. It was like an itch under Arkady’s skin whenever she was around Liu, quick to flare up.

Then there was the time that Liu had made an offhanded comment that, “Everyone here went to an underground concert or two in college, right?” in the context of discussing the kinds of set-ups that they’d performed with in the past. Arkady had said nothing, but could feel her teeth grinding as she played an overly loud riff on her bass. It was an innocuous enough comment on its own, but the easy presumptions behind it – the idea that everyone had had access to the same educational opportunities that Liu had had – were what pissed Arkady off.

But contradicting her would have meant talking about something that was personal to Arkady, something that cut way too close to the bone, and she didn’t want to do that. Liu hadn’t earned that from her. Instead, Jeeter made a joke about having been way too immersed in books to find time for concerts, and Sana tactfully steered the conversation out of dangerous waters.

After the rehearsal, she’d pulled Arkady aside. “If you want me to talk to her about—”

Arkady shook her head. “It’s not a big deal. Really,” she added at Sana’s unconvinced look. “It was a stupid assumption, but I can let it go. I’d rather just… let it go.”

They were in a band together, but that didn’t mean they had to be best friends. Arkady could maintain a civil working relationship. It didn’t matter what she’d… thought when she first met Liu, or what Liu might have been about to say to her in the bar. All of that was in the past, so there was no point dwelling on it. All Arkady needed to do was work with Liu within the context of the band; she could do that.

Until one afternoon when Arkady arrived early for rehearsal without really meaning to, and found that the only other person in the warehouse was Liu, who was setting up her drumkit. Before Arkady could turn around and pretend she’d never been there, Liu looked up and spotted her.

“Oh… hey. I was just planning to run through a few drum lines before the rehearsal… try some stuff out,” she said.

“Right,” Arkady said, casting about for an excuse that would get her out of the warehouse until the others arrived. “Uh, I’m gonna go get some coffee from the-”

“Arkady, listen, can we, uh… Can we clear the air between us?” Liu asked, the last few words coming out all in a rush.

Arkady froze. “Clear… what air?” she asked, hoping to god that Liu would say something innocuous about why she thought the drum line on Fear for the Storm needed work.

No such luck. “Look, I get that you’re not… thrilled with having me in the band,” Liu said, quietly, though her voice still carried in the echoey space. “I’ve been in a lot of workplace environments where I’m not welcome, so I… know how to spot the signs. And maybe I’m being hypersensitive, or looking for things to worry about, but something still feels off between us, so whatever it is, can we just talk about it and deal with it? Please?”

Arkady’s chest clenched at Liu’s mention of not being welcome in ‘workplace environments’. Damn it, she didn’t want to make Liu feel the same way she’d felt in whatever white dudebro-filled tech companies she’d worked for. But she also didn’t want to go into the reasons why she wasn’t always a ray of sunshine when they interacted. There was no way that that conversation was going to make anything better.

“I don’t have a problem with you being in the band. Really,” she said instead. “If it comes off that way, it’s just because… Sana and I worked on a lot of those early songs together, and I’m… attached to how they sound. That’s all.”

“So… this is really just a musical disagreement?” said Liu, sounding unconvinced. “Because it feels like there’s… something else. I know you’re not the biggest fan of my former employer – and I mean, me neither – but I figure if it bothered you that much, you wouldn’t have come to help me when Seiders was threatening me-”

“I wasn’t going to just let you die,” Arkady said, nettled. “And no, I’m not in the habit of judging people for where they work. I’ve worked my fair share of jobs for shitty employers just to get by.” She shrugged. Then, almost without meaning to, she added, “Of course, I didn’t have the choice that you probably had…”

Liu frowned, but more like she was confused than like she was annoyed by Arkady’s comment. “What do you mean?”

Arkady sighed. “Not everyone went to college, Liu,” she said. “I’m a high school dropout. So no, I didn’t go to any underground concerts. Or any kind of gigs in college.”

Liu’s eyes widened as her comment from earlier came back to her. “Oh my god,” she groaned, putting her hand to her head. “I am so sorry, Arkady – I should know better than to make assumptions like that. I was just – I’d been talking to Brian about his studies and how he met Krejjh doing fieldwork, and I guess I assumed you guys had all met in college-”

Arkady barked out a laugh, too startled to even really be annoyed. “What, you thought that I could’ve been studying alongside Jeeter? You know he went to Brightwell, right? That elite college that’s supposed to be harder than Harvard to get into?”

Liu shrugged like the idea was actually plausible and not something that sounded like part of a bizarre alternate reality. “Yeah, I don’t see why not.” Then, quickly, as if she was afraid that this might have offended Arkady even more, she added, “But like I said – I really shouldn’t have assumed, and I’m sorry – I know better than that. I was only able to go to the college I did because I won a scholarship.”

Keen to move away from the topic of Arkady possibly having gone to Brightwell – because really, what – Arkady said, “You went to uh, that all-girls college, right? Harmony?” She vaguely remembered overhearing a conversation between Liu and Jeeter where Liu had talked about there being a Latin motto. “It sounded… interesting.”

Liu pulled a face. “Yeah, that’s one word for it.” She went on almost shyly, like she was confessing to a deeply-held secret, “I would have liked to study something more artistic – music, maybe – or at least do more extra-curriculars, but… I got that scholarship, and I was under a lot of pressure from my parents to do something ‘worthwhile’. Plus, I really wanted to show the kids who said I only got that scholarship because I was ‘a minority’.” There was an anger and a bitterness and a tiredness underlying those last two words that Arkady knew far too well.

“They what,” she spat out. God, was she glad she’d never been to college. Then again, she’d worked at places where she’d come up against the exact same attitude.

“Yeah,” Liu said wearily, fiddling with the drumsticks she was holding. “It wasn’t all bad, though. Being away at college was the first time I was really able to be myself – play the drums, be out. I got this haircut in my freshman year that was just – wild, it was awful.” She laughed, though Arkady barely heard her, her heartbeat suddenly pounding in her ears at the word ‘out’. God, Patel, get a grip. “My parents never liked the drums, they thought they were too – un-feminine,” she pulled a face again. “I play the flute, too, but I’m bad at it.”

“We should add that into the line-up,” said Arkady, to distract herself from thinking about Violet’s – Liu’s – flushed cheeks and her smile as she talked about her old haircut. “Sana can write a flute part.”

“Oh god, no,” Liu said, laughing again. “I don’t even have my flute any more, I sold it in grad school.”

“So… if you went to grad school… you can’t have hated it that much, right?” Arkady asked. “Uh – the biology, not the – flute playing.”

“Oh, no, I love biology,” Liu enthused. “It’s the study of living things – what’s not to love? Grad school itself, though, was…” She pulled a face. “I came close to quitting, a few times.”

“What happened?” Arkady asked. They were pretty far off their original subject by now, and Arkady was willing to admit to herself (and only herself) that maybe she was enjoying the conversation. It was all in the name of building better inter-band relationships, of course. Sana would be thrilled that they were bonding like this.

Liu sighed. “Let’s just say there were a few people on my course who were determined to let me know I didn’t belong. We had a lab work module where we were supposed to carry out an experiment as a group, and… I got put in charge of our group of six. My teammates would do things like pretend not to understand my instructions, or move things I needed to shelves I couldn’t reach… make comments they knew I could overhear… Growing up with an anxiety disorder, everyone’s always telling you not to worry – you learn to doubt your own thoughts. And my advisor just dismissed my concerns as ‘over-sensitivity’, so…” Arkady’s eyes narrowed further with every word that Liu spoke. “It was too late for me to transfer to another module. In the end I wound up carrying the whole project basically by myself.”

Liu gave Arkady a weak smile. “So, y’know, you didn’t miss out on much. I interned for a pharmaceutical company for a couple of years after college, did some work as a research assistant. When I got the job offer from IGR Corp, I felt like I’d finally made it – and look how that turned out.”

“Hey, it’s not your fault that IGR Corp turned out to be a special brand of greedy, soul-sucking and unethical,” said Arkady bluntly – even though she’d previously thought that maybe Liu could have had less awful taste in employers. “That’s on them. Look… I know a thing or two about soul-sucking workplaces myself.”

Arkady hadn’t intended this to turn into Personal Story Hour, but at the same time she felt like she should at least offer something after Liu had opened up about her time in college. She hadn’t needed to justify herself; she could just have apologised and left it at that. Instead, she’d shared something that Arkady suspected she didn’t talk about to a lot of people.

“The last job I worked before Sana and I started Rumor was for Telemachus Enterprises,” Arkady said, and Liu’s eyes widened in recognition.

“The global consulting firm? That’s very… well…”

“Capitalist? Soullessly corporate?” Arkady finished for her.

“I was going to say stable,” Liu said diplomatically.

“Sure, as long as you also like ladder-climbing, backstabbing and toxic work environments,” said Arkady. “I was an assistant, doing all the crap work like photocopying, fetching coffee, making calls, scheduling appointments and dealing with angry clients. It was the kind of job you get to get a ‘foothold’ in the world of business, and all of the other assistants were recent college grads who were way younger than me. I hated it.”

Liu nodded, listening intently, not offering any kind of commentary or judgement.

“Playing the bass was kind of the only thing that kept me sane, so… I used to go down to these shitty clubs at night and play, sometimes straight from work because the overtime was ridiculous. I’d join up with a couple of other musicians and do jam sessions, or sometimes play solo stuff. I’d sing, sometimes, too,” she added, a little self-consciously, even though she sang backing vocals on most of Rumor’s songs, and everyone in the band had heard her sing.

“I moved around a lot, never performed at the same place two nights in a row, so that no-one got to know me too well. I used to use different stage names – my favourite was Duchess Calpurnia Higginsworth-Cobb.”

Liu burst out laughing. “You didn’t really tell people that was your name?”

“Drunk people will believe anything,” Arkady told her. “I’m still known as ‘Duchess’ in a few places. It was a precaution, in case anything got back to my work, but in the end… the person who recognised me was someone I hadn’t seen in over a decade. Sana.”

Liu’s eyes widened. “You guys go back that far?”

“Kind of,” Arkady said. “It’s a long story–” delving into the tale of The Landing and her and Sana’s shared history definitely felt like it would be going a step too far – “but uh, I used to do work at a tattoo parlour that Sana came to a few times. I didn’t think she’d really noticed me at the time, but she remembered me well enough that when I played at a club near her workplace, she recognised me. She managed to catch a few more of my performances, figure out where I’d be, and one night she showed up with her guitar, and… we played together.”

Arkady smiled a little, remembering that night, the spark she’d felt as soon as they started to play. The drummer had been awful, some white asshole named Ricky who thought he was God’s gift to music – and wasn’t – but they’d sounded like magic anyway.

“Somehow she managed to figure out where I worked, showed up one day, invited me to get lunch, and after she found out how much I hated it there, she told me I should quit so that we could start a band,” Arkady said.

“And you did?” Liu asked, sounding half impressed, half scandalised.

“I really hated that job,” Arkady said. “Besides, the Capt- Sana can be really persuasive. We joke about her motivational speeches, but she’s…” Arkady hated to admit this, because it sounded so goddamn cheesy, but there wasn’t another word to describe it. “…inspirational.”

Liu smiled. “Yeah, I can tell. She seems like that kind of person.”

“We wrote a lot of our early songs together during that time,” Arkady said. “‘Landers Never Stand Down’, ‘Fear for the Storm’… they kind of – ugh, this is going to sound so corny, but they were about our hope for something better. So… that’s why I’m weird about changing them.”

Liu’s expression softened. “I completely get it. Look, I know that all of this has been pretty sudden – me joining the band, us trying to put together an album – and I’d understand if you wanted me to… back off a little. I was throwing out ideas for things that I thought would sound good with our new line-up, but I should have appreciated that these aren’t just songs to you and Sana.”

“No, it’s – you’re – okay,” Arkady said awkwardly. “You’re fine. They’re… they’re uh, really…” God, Arkady, just spit it out. People pay each other compliments all the time – it doesn’t have to mean anything. (Even if you might want it to mean something). “They’re really good. Ideas, I mean. And the others seem to like them! So… don’t stop on my account.”

Arkady’s urge to just leave the building after finally stumbling through that awkward admission was pretty strong, but she managed to resist. Which turned out to be worth it to see the small, pleased smile unfolding on Liu’s face. It was a different kind of smile to the one that she wore when the Captain paid her a compliment, though Arkady couldn’t have said exactly how. It just felt… personal to her.

“Well, in that case,” said Liu. “I had this idea I really wanted to try out on ‘Landers’, and… I’d love to get your thoughts? On how it sounds?”

Which was how, when Sana showed up for the start of the rehearsal fifteen minutes later, Arkady and Violet came to be mid-debate about the merits of speeding up the tempo of the drum line in the first half of the second verse, Arkady singing Sana’s part of the vocals to illustrate her point.

“Am I late?” Sana joked, throwing Arkady an amused glance. “Sorry, I didn’t realise practice was starting early.”

“The cool kids show up to practice a half hour early to go over new drum lines,” Arkady deadpanned, and Liu laughed. Sana smiled as she brought out her guitar.

“What you were playing just then sounded really good – can you go over it again?”

The conversation with Liu didn’t magically fix everything between them, but the tension eased up significantly after that, and it became easier for Arkady and Liu to come to a compromise whenever they disagreed. The album started to come together much more quickly, and when Red Gregor stopped by (which he did a lot more than he strictly needed to as the head of their record label, and Arkady suspected he was mostly there to see Sana), he was full of praise for the new arrangements.

It also somehow became a habit for Arkady to start showing up early to rehearsal. She told herself it was because the line in the coffee shop was easier to deal with at that time, and it was true that at some point she’d bought enough coffee for both her and Violet to have Violet’s regular order memorised; but it also had something to do with the fact that more often than not, Violet would arrive while she was setting up, or vice versa, and they’d run through the parts that had been bugging them, each lending the other an honest and unjudgemental ear. Sometimes they’d play around with something new, or improvise, trying on new techniques and styles for size.

Arkady honestly hadn’t had this much fun experimenting with music since those first early, heady days with Sana, when they started to lay down exactly what kind of performers they wanted to be. It was different with Violet – they had a different relationship, a different vibe – but there was still something about their sessions that felt similar, like they were breaking new ground.

One day, Arkady had been messing around with a bass line that she couldn’t get out of her head – she’d been thinking of adding it to ‘The Carmen Gambit’, one of the band’s originals that Jeeter had helped write, but it didn’t really fit. She liked how it sounded on its own, though. Liu had been listening, head tilted to one side, which Arkady didn’t really think anything of until quietly, underneath the bass line, Violet started to add a drum part.

Arkady was startled, mostly by how well the two fit together; after a slight fumble, she carried on playing, improvising and adding a couple of variations to the bass line when she ran out of material. Liu smoothly changed up the rhythm of the drum line to match just a second later, and Arkady realised that they had something that almost sounded like… a real piece of music. Something organic, something that flowed and moved and changed with-

Crap. Arkady came to a stop at the end of a section as she realised she didn’t have any idea what to play next. “Uh…” She threw an apologetic glance in Violet’s direction. “I haven’t really figured out what comes after that.”

Violet nodded, not seeming put out by this. “What about…” She hummed the end section of the melody that Arkady had been playing, and then another phrase that almost mirrored it. “Actually, that part could come before the-”

“Right, right-” Arkady understood Violet’s meaning, and quickly picked up the tune on her bass.

The song (well, technically it was an instrumental) they were writing didn’t have a name for the first few days. Arkady and Violet would pick up where they left off each time they came to rehearsal, and would throw around ideas for additions and changes, discussing the overall sound and vibe, but it didn’t feel like there was a need to put a name to it.

Then in the middle of one of these discussions, Violet started scribbling something in a notebook, and Arkady realised she was writing down their song. She peered curiously at the letters and notes, and Violet grimaced self-consciously.

“I’m not sure if I’ve got all of the bass chords right,” she admitted, tilting the notebook so Arkady could see it better. “Feel free to correct any bits that are wrong, I was mostly trying to get the drum part down for my own benefit. My memory’s not as good as yours is.”

Arkady hesitated. She was tempted to lie and say the notation was fine; Violet would accept it, and it probably wouldn’t come up again. There was a time when she would have done it without a second’s thought. But Violet already knew that Arkady had dropped out of high school; knew bits and pieces of her background, if not the whole story; and Arkady had to admit that she’d been enjoying being herself more around Violet. She didn’t want to backtrack on that.

“I never really learned to read sheet music,” she admitted. “I can recognise a few chords, but… I mostly learned how to play from YouTube videos, so it always seemed easier to just watch someone else play the chords, and learn which ones went with which songs, and… for performances I always had to memorise stuff anyway, so, um.” Arkady was rambling, and Violet was staring at her, which was possibly not good. “There didn’t seem much point in having it written down.”

“So… you never had a bass teacher?” Violet said slowly. “All of your playing, your singing – it’s all self-taught?”

“Uh,” Arkady cringed. “Yes?”

“Wow,” Violet said, and Arkady suddenly realised that she was dumbfounded because she was impressed, not because she’d just realised she was playing with an amateur. “That’s… really impressive.”

Arkady fidgeted, uncomfortable with the pure admiration in Violet’s gaze. “It’s not really – I mean sure, I put in a lot of hours, but so does every musician,” she hedged. “It wasn’t anything special, I just – couldn’t afford to pay for classes.”

She braced herself for an awkward silence to follow, but instead Violet nodded. “No, you’re right, everyone has to put in the work if they want to improve,” she agreed. “But I imagine that it would be harder to motivate yourself when it’s just you and the instrument.”

Arkady shrugged her shoulder slightly. “It wasn’t so bad. It helped that I enjoyed it, I guess.” After the disaster that was her high school education, it had been a relief to find something she’d felt like she was good at – and wasn’t being assessed on.

Violet smiled, and mercifully changed the topic by looking down at the notation she’d scribbled and saying lightly, “Well, now that it’s been written down, it feels like we should give it a name.”

Arkady thought about it. “Anything that’s shorter than whatever the hell it is Jeeter and Krejjh are working on,” she said, because Jeeter had been waxing lyrical about the ‘epic space opera ballad’ that he’d been composing with his fiancé. Apparently it was about a race of fictional aliens, and some of the lyrics were in a made-up alien language that Jeeter had invented. Arkady had no idea why Jeeter had such a dedicated following among their fans for the weird shit that he came up with, but there you were.

Violet grinned, tapping her pen against the space above the lines and notations. “So, one word, then. It’s got a pretty futuristic sound… What about ‘Cyberpunk’?”

Arkady couldn’t help grimacing a little bit. “Yeah, too clichéd,” Violet agreed. “Maybe something themed around space… ‘Supernova’?”

They tossed around a few other ideas, but none of them quite seemed to fit the mood of the song. Violet frowned down at the music she’d written, and Arkady was about to suggest they come back to it later when she said, “This might sound like a weird association for a piece of music, but I was reading a paper the other day on nanotechnology, you know, technology used at the atomic and molecular level?”

“Sounds kind of dry for bedtime reading, but I’m with you,” Arkady said.

Violet laughed, blushing a little. “Yeah, a friend from my Masters sent it to me; I still like to keep up with new developments in the field, and there are fascinating implications for biology. But I’m thinking, what if none of the space names fit because they’re too big, too grand? What if instead we went really small, like… ‘Nanobot’?”

“Nanobot…” Arkady turned the name over in her mind, thinking about the quick, intricate rhythms of the song they were creating together. It was a surprisingly good fit, but something about it felt off. Something about the ‘bot’ part was too… lonely. “What about ‘Nanoswarm’?”

Violet’s eyes widened slightly and a smile spread across her face. “Nanoswarm,” she said, and wrote the song title in blocky capitals above their music. “I like it.”

Both Red Gregor and Campbell came to rehearsal that night, which Arkady took as a sign that they were there to discuss something Important. Their album, ‘Ghost Squid’, was selling more copies than any of them had expected, and had actually got them some interview requests from indie music blogs and magazines. This seemed to be partly down to Red Gregor, who apparently had enough of a reputation as a business investor that his decision to start up a record label had attracted a lot of interest, and consequently a lot of interest in the first band he’d signed to it. But they’d also had some great reviews, including from Radio, Indie, Folk and Techno (also known as RIFT), the go-to station for all things indie music, who had covered it on their ‘Rave Review Hour’.

There’d also been a noticeably bigger audience at most of their gigs. They’d had a modest but dedicated following before Violet had joined the band, and were regulars at a couple of underground venues where they pulled decent crowds, plus one bar where Arkady had managed not to piss off the owner (the other four were… long stories); a bunch of people also streamed their music from various parts of the world. But since Ghost Squid came out, they’d started playing at (and filling) much bigger venues across a much wider area. It was fun, but also a little surreal.

“What’s the good word, Campbell?” Krejjh asked, leaning on their keyboard. “Are you here to tell us how much the people love us?”

Campbell’s lips twitched in amusement. “They love you a whole lot,” he said. “More every day.”

Krejjh fist-pumped, and Arkady asked, “So, what are you guys here for? Is this about ‘Ghost Squid 2: Electric Boogaloo’?”

They’d had a discussion with Red Gregor about beginning work on a second album; this one would take longer, since they’d had plenty of existing songs to draw on for ‘Ghost Squid’, and hadn’t needed to put together any new material. But, as Gregor had pointed out, it was better to start thinking about that sooner rather than later, and they’d been working on a few new songs anyway. So far, the second album was still nameless, but they’d taken to calling it by a range of joke nicknames.

Red Gregor grinned. “Sort of, in the sense that it’ll be good promo,” he said. Spreading his hands out to either side like a showman introducing his next act, he said grandly, “I’ve landed you a gig at the CUI Stadium.”

Jeeter’s mouth dropped open, Krejjh flailed and exclaimed, “Holy moley!”, and Violet repeated, “Stadium?!” in an almost horrified tone. Even Sana seemed surprised by the news.

“You actually got it?” she asked Red Gregor, who nodded.

Arkady’s eyes narrowed. “Okay, what’s the catch?” she asked. “They don’t let just anyone play the CUI Stadium.”

“No catch,” Campbell promised them. “Red has some contacts who tipped him off that the CUI is looking for some new, lesser-known talent to put on its billing. Once upon a time, the CUI had a reputation for scouting the best undiscovered bands and giving them a bigger stage – literally – and they feel they’ve been losing their touch.”

Put like that, it did make a kind of sense. “Cool, so who are we supporting?” Jeeter asked. “Oooh, maybe it’s Hremreh.”

Hremreh was a weird electronic band that Jeeter and Krejjh were completely obsessed with. Arkady rolled her eyes. “I hope the CUI has more taste than that.”

��Excuse you, Hremreh is an underrated gem of a band,” Krejjh retorted.

“The Destroyer?” Violet suggested jokingly. “They’re local.”

Arkady knew from having spent time with Violet that The Destroyer was one of her favourite bands from college, whose gigs she’d religiously attended during her freshman year. Everyone else looked interested but bemused, and Violet hurriedly added, “Uh, that was a bit of a niche joke. I used to go to their gigs a lot in college.”

“All great guesses,” Red Gregor said, “but you’re all missing one important piece of information. You’ll be the headline act.”

“What?” said Arkady.

“Heck yeah!” Krejjh exclaimed, and high-fived Jeeter.

“So, someone will be supporting us?” Violet said a little faintly.

“Red, exactly how many strings did you pull?” Sana asked, sounding halfway between amused and disapproving. Red Gregor held up his hands.

“I just talked to my contacts, I promise,” he said. “It gave me a chance to put your name forward, but that was all I needed to do. You guys have a great sound; they’re excited to have you on.”

Everything dissolved into a flurry of noise and celebration. Jeeter played a celebratory tune on his keytar that Arkady was fairly sure was from some video game, Krejjh whooped and slid their hands up the keys of their keyboard, and Campbell picked up Sana and spun her around, both of them and Red Gregor laughing. Violet caught Arkady’s eye, grinned, and did a little roll on one of her cymbals. Arkady huffed and rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t fight the smile that was trying to emerge.

“So, when is the gig?” Sana asked, flushed and catching her breath, after Campbell had put her down.

“A month from today,” Red told them. Sana straightened up.

“Wow, okay, we need to get rehearsing! Everyone—”

They quickly got into position, picking up instruments and drumsticks and plugging in amplifiers. Sana beamed around at the assembled band members.

“I just want to say how proud I am of all of you for what we’ve accomplished so far, and everything that lies ahead of us. I-”

“Not to head you off at the pass,” Arkady interrupted, sensing a long Sana Monologue was coming, “but didn’t you say we needed to get rehearsing? Maybe save the speech for after?”

Most people would have taken offence at being interrupted, but Sana, being Sana, smiled at Arkady. “Thank you for the reminder, Arkady. I am proud of you all, but I’ll tell you exactly how proud once we’re done.”

Rehearsal went well, everyone energetic and buoyed up from the good news. As they were packing down afterwards, under the noise of Sana, Krejjh, Jeeter, Campbell and Gregor eagerly discussing where they could go out for drinks to celebrate, Violet said to Arkady,

“I forgot to tell you earlier, but I heard back from the journalist. Emily Craddock.”

Arkady fumbled the wire that she was looping around itself. “Yeah? What did she say?”

“She said that she thinks we have enough for a story. Even with the missing data,” Violet said.

She looked happy, but something in Arkady’s chest still clenched. It had been nearly four weeks since the fateful gig at IGR Corp, and so far, everything had been quiet. The band had been on high alert at all of their performances at first, not spending any more time than was necessary setting up or lingering on the stage, but there’d been no attempts at sabotage, no suspicious ‘fans’ trying to approach them after a set. (There had been a few real fans whom Arkady had cross-examined a bit too aggressively when they tried to get close to the band, but people seemed to actually find it funny and no-one got offended).

They figured that IGR Corp must not know about the files that Violet had managed to copy across; Seiders had been unconscious, after all, and it was possible that they hadn’t realised that Violet had made off with anything, or had downplayed the severity of the incident to the higher-ups. Arkady had, in spite of her misgivings, broken the encryption on the files for Violet, but she’d been secretly hoping that the data wouldn’t turn out to be useful, or that there wouldn’t be enough of it to do anything with.

She’d hoped that even after Violet told her that she’d found a tech journalist who was interested in taking a look at the files and potentially investigate the story. Of course Arkady was a fan of doing whatever they could to stick it to the corporates; she just wished there was a way to do it that wouldn’t involve Violet painting a huge target on her back.

“That’s… good,” Arkady managed, and even she could hear how unconvincing it sounded. Violet looked at her questioningly. “It’s just…” She tried to find a way to word things that wasn’t, ‘I’m afraid that you won’t be safe’. “Once the information is out there, IGR Corp is going to know who leaked it. What happens if they come after you?”

“By that point, they should have bigger things to worry about, if the evidence that Emily Craddock has found is as damning as she says it is,” Violet pointed out. “She’s been looking into that engineer that Seiders mentioned, Alvy Connors. It’s not really clear whether something… happened to him, or whether he just made a run for it, but he definitely disappeared. And it wasn’t that long after he started work on Project ADVANCE.”

As they talked, the other band members had been clearing equipment away and loading it into the van, until Violet and Arkady were the only ones left in the warehouse.

“I know there’s risk involved,” Violet said. “But I can’t just forget everything I’ve learned. And this is bigger than me – I have to do it for Alvy, too, and his family and friends, and everyone else who could be affected by Project ADVANCE. What IGR Corp is doing-”

“I know, I know,” Arkady said. “Don’t get me wrong, I think they deserve to have the cover blown right off their shitty, awful surveillance plan.”

“I’m going to talk to the Captain before I do anything,” Violet assured her. “I know this could affect the band, too. I just wanted to tell you first.”

Why? Arkady wanted to ask, but that would have taken the conversation down a road that Arkady was not prepared to go down. Either Violet would say something like, ‘Because we’re friends’, or ‘Because you’re my bandmate’, and Arkady would feel like a moron for having hoped for anything different. Or she wouldn’t, and that would be worse, because Arkady had no idea how to respond to Violet saying… Well, it didn’t matter, because it would never happen, anyway.

“Sana will tell you to go for it,” she said. “If it’s what you think is right, she’ll be behind you all the way.”

“And… you?” Violet asked quietly.

“I…”

Why was it so hard for Arkady to just say that she approved? Violet was a grown woman who could make her own decisions; she didn’t need Arkady second-guessing her. Violet didn’t even need Arkady to agree with what she was doing – she could just go and do it anyway. But the fact that she’d asked Arkady meant that she cared what Arkady thought… and that made Arkady want to be honest with her.

And honesty was terrifying.

The moment stretched out; Arkady composed and drafted half a dozen different versions of what she wanted to say in her head. ‘I just need you to be careful’ – ugh, that sounded like something Sana would say. Also, of course Violet was going to be careful; that didn’t mean there was no risk involved. ‘I trust you to make the right choice’ – vague, and it also made Arkady feel weird. ‘If they hurt you, they’ll wish they’d never been born’ – alarming, and probably too honest.

Arkady took a breath in, gathering her nerve – and then both of them jumped as the van horn beeped loudly from outside.

“Paging bandmates Liu and Patel!” Krejjh shouted. “Bandmates Liu and Patel to the Rumormobile, please!”

Violet laughed a little, as Arkady huffed, inwardly cursing her own goddamn indecision. She’d spent so long trying to figure out what to say that she’d lost the chance to say anything.

“I guess we shouldn’t keep them waiting,” Violet said, slanting a small smile in Arkady’s direction.

“I trust you,” Arkady found herself saying, almost without meaning to. Violet looked puzzled, and Arkady scrambled to clarify. “Uh, that is – if you think this is the right thing to do. Then, you should… do it. Just…”

She still couldn’t say it, but Violet’s smile widened, her eyes softening like she knew what Arkady was trying (and failing) to tell her. “I’ll be careful,” she promised.