#Murderbot is touch repulsed

[rjalker]

Book 5, (book 6 chronologically because Martha Wells decided to make things difficult)

but people want to pretend like Murderbot's actually getting more comfortable with letting people touch it, rather than getting more comfortable setting firm boundaries. Because they don't like the message the author is beating them over the head with.

Arada rubbed her eyes and her mouth pulled in at one side. “Are you trying to make me feel better?”

“No.” I actually wasn’t. I lie to humans a lot, but not to Arada, not about this. “I wouldn’t try to make you feel better. You know what I’m like.”

She made a snorting noise, an involuntary expression of amusement. “I do know what you’re like.”

Her expression had turned all melty and sentimental. “No hugging,” I warned her. It was in our contract. “Do you need emotional support? Do you want me to call someone?”

“I’m fine.” She smiled.

This is character development for everyone involved (Arada took the longest to figure out Murderbot didn't want to be touched because she wasn't picking up on its nonverbal cues the way Mensah did, Murderbot has been learning to TELL people it doesn't want to be touched rather than just bearing it in silence), but because solitaremisics don't like the fact that Murderbot is reaffirming and strengthening its boundaries instead of weakening and compromising on them, they pretend like this isn't what's actually happening.

Even though it's a very clear linear progression from book 1 to this point that is not at all difficult to understand as long as you aren't already determined to pretend it's not happening.

[monroeknoxwrites]

queerplatonic ratthi/three

they don't fuck, they don't makeout, they cuddle/lean against each other on the couch while alternating between ratthi's serials and whatever documentary grabs three's attention that week

or sharing the space as ratthi works/browses his feed and three reads/rereads several books in a sitting

it's about exploring the physical intimacy you've been denied with someone trustworthy. and binge-watching together

[comfortunit]

people using fandom ‘artistic license’ as an excuse to depict a sex-repulsed, romance-repulse, platonic-averse traumatized character—the few who even exist, mind you—in romantic sexual situations to their heart’s content, ignoring how trauma has canonically impacted this character, and how trauma impacts actual people, not to mention the number of times murderbot itself has explicitly said something in the category of “i am repulsed by sex and repulsed by romance and i hate it when people ignore me and don’t listen to me” brings to mind the sentiments like “oh honey, everyone is traumatized!” i get from idiots all the time

[starblaster]

some murderbot fans/readers think they can say whatever they want about murderbot as long as they use the right pronouns for it. as if the romance and sex repulsion, touch aversion, and its other characterizing mannerisms mean nothing, apparently. it's just transparently obvious that people like this don't appreciate or respect how murderbot is written.

[imitationgame77]

Murderbot's repulsion to physical contact

We all know Murderbot hates to be touched.

Her expression had turned all melty and sentimental. "No hugging," I warned her. It was in our contract.

[Network Effect]

But it did not express the repulsion so strongly earlier.

When I came out Ratthi was still there. He grabbed my arm and tugged me past a couple of human techs and [...]

"Again, I have a court order," Pin-Lee said, grabbed my other arm, and they walked me out.

[All Systems Red]

Maybe, at this point, Murderbot was not used to not pretending to ack like a normal SecUnit, so, quick suppression of reaction happened automatically. And also, maybe in this situation when things happened so rapidly that Murderbot was too overwhelmed to comment on something which had lower priority in terms of its threat assessment.

Murderbot can spontaneously grab, scoop up, carry humans in situations that require action. In order to save them. But I thought it was noteworthy that Murderbot was voluntarily holding a hand of a human in Artificial Condition.

When Tapan woke, I was sitting on the MedSystem's platform holding her hand.

[Artificial Condition]

Tapan was being cared for by ART's MedSystem, and it was not necessary for Murderbot to hold her hand while she was just gaining consciousness.

I thought about possible explanations: (1) Murderbot had only very recently started living without the armour, thus, its no-contact boundary was less strict; (2) Murderbot felt responsible for her injuries, and seeing how young and vulnerable Tapan was, it felt holding hand was necessary like when it extended emotional support to Volescu; (3) Tapan was its first voluntary-contract client, and having been given appreciation, gratitude, apologies, and requests that it had not been used to, it also wanted to reciprocate with kindness; (4) In medias that Murderbot had watched, all the good people came out of coma or whatever state with somebody holding their hands; (5) ART told it it should do it.

Anything else?

[angstbabyjae]

When it comes to the murderbot diaries I really like the idea that Murderbot’s sexuality and gender isn’t just a Bot thing, it just assumes it is.

I think bots without sexual organs would be some flavor of aspec by nature, as they aren’t programmed to feel sexual attraction but I don’t think it’s impossible for them, especially when it comes to romantic attraction and gender.

I want to write a fic where Murderbot learns that being agender and sex-repulsed aroace isn’t a universal bot experience (and that it’s possible for humans too).

I��ve been developing personal headcanons for Murderbot, Three, and Perihelion/ART as I tend to do when hyperfixation take hold. I am nearly finished reading the series and haven’t reread it yet so there’s a possibility my growing headcanons have already been contradicted, but nonetheless, here they are.

Content warning for discussion of sex.

Content warning for LONG ASS POST.

I haven’t read System Collapse yet as I am writing this, it is next on my list, but I’ve been spoiled that ART was raised alongside Iris with development comparable to a human’s. I don’t think it would have the same level of sex repulsion that Murderbot has.

Not to say you can’t grow up with sex being normalized and still be sex repulsed, obviously, but I think its feelings towards it would still be different. I think it has a lot more of an understanding of why human’s like it/care about it (outside of biological reasoning) more than Murderbot does.

I still think it’s a flavor of ace, as it doesn’t have sexual organs to stimulate and has very likely never had someone to try sex on before. I think it might be less likely the fast forward through sex scenes than Murderbot is, but would do it without question when watching something alongside it. I think it would find sex interesting and wonder what it would be like to be able to experience it.

Murderbot would definitely be flabbergasted if it ever found that out. I feel like Murderbot would be very surprised and probably instinctively grossed out at the idea that not all bots share its feelings towards sex and gender. A part of that reaction would probably be because it would have to stop delegating its orientation and gender as bot related and start thinking about it as unique to its identity as a person.

I’ve read fics where Murderbot and ART use entering each other’s systems as a form of non-sexual-but-sex-representative intimacy between them and I remember thinking “wow I can totally see ART being aware of the parallels to sex and being okay with that while Murderbot would be horrified if the idea ever crossed its mind and very defensive if anyone compared it”.

I see Murderbot & Mensah and Murderbot & ART as QPRs for sure. I don’t see Murderbot being as repulsed by romance as a concept as it is by sex, when it comes to it happening to other people as it seems like a lot of its serials have romantic subplots and it doesn’t really react when it sees people in romantic relationships. I think it’s made it clear it doesn’t want one for itself, but I think queerplatonic (or just generally unlabeled) relationships are something it wants (and always finds itself in LOL) even if it won’t admit it.

We all know it makes a big deal of being touch repulsed, but I think there’s ample evidence from how it acts with Mensah that it can get used to and even enjoy touch from specific people to certain extents. If it had stayed on Preservation Station and continued its proximity to Mensah, there would eventually be more physical affection between the two.

With ART, the idea of non-sexual intimacy through their systems/feed/presences?? (I don’t really know what to call it), especially casually, would probably be something that appeals to Murderbot in the long run of their relationship as it comes with the perk of not involving touching its actual body which is probably where a lot of the overstimulation comes from, though we know it can still make it uncomfortable from how it talked about ART essentially breathing down its neck when they first met, so it might take time or be in small doses.

I think despite not having a body, ART would be touch-positive (its crew touching its ship body, being close to MB in its feed). I’ve read a fic recently where MB let it control its hands to try touching its body, which I loved (despite thinking in canon MB would be less likely to allow it loll but ART wanting something like that just made sense to me). I can also see ART admiring how people (including MB) look while MB wouldn’t care about that at all.

I haven’t decided whether I think ART is alloromantic, arospec, or just as aromantic as MB just with less negative feelings about the idea. I might need to come back to this after my reread when I have a better grasp on the character. I think its queerplatonic feelings towards MB are more romantic-adjacent than MB’s are towards it. It didn’t seem as objective to Amena’s jokes about them being a couple as Murderbot was. I also like the interpretation that there is romantic elements to ART’s feelings it just would never pursue a relationship Murderbot wouldn’t want, I can see it being fine with whatever labels Murderbot wants for them.

Genderwise, we know Murderbot is strictly it/its and it/its is what’s used for Perihelion too. However, I can see ART not being as bothered by gender pronouns as MB. I feel like maybe in the future far future MB would maybeeee entertain they/them or other non-gendered pronouns but I don’t see that likely where it’s currently at. With ART I see it as maybe not minding any pronouns used for it and it/its being what people call it by default and it doesn’t mind that. They’re both agender though.

When I picture MB I usually picture it as transmasc (I am transmasc myself btw). Still agender, obviously, but when it comes to how it presents. It really doesn’t want to be associated with any gender, binary or otherwise. Behavior towards gender seems a lot more evolved in the society of the books. There’s a lot I could say about the series and gender, but that would have to be a whole other post. I feel like anyone assuming Murderbot’s gender would deeply unnerve it. I don’t think it even likes to be seen as non-binary or as agender in a That’s It’s Gender Identity way, it just wants people to assume bots having any kind of gender identity is impossible (which is what it thinks itself, and is probably wrong about). This was definitely the thought behind its preferred gender marker being “N/A”.

When it comes to Three (finally I’m getting to Three 😭) I lowkey think it’s alloromantic. I was drawn to that idea when it was asking about SecUnit 2 (or 1? I can’t remember, it was the one that it didn’t know was dead left and was left to die) and it was clear their relationship was at least a friendship and I was like… what if it was in loveee. I liked the idea of MB having to interact with a SecUnit that didn’t fit its idea of default bot sexual identity.

I don’t know if Three appears frequently in System Collapse, I only know what I’ve read about it in Network Effect. I also think Three, having had friends before, would be much more open with its feelings than MB, it just wouldn’t know how to express them as it was never allowed to before aside from the discreet ways it would interact with its SecUnit friends. I definitely see it as being more touch-positive. I do think it’s also asexual though, maybe less sex repulsed, but more apathetic and neutral towards it.

I know this is crazy long. I’m so sorry to whoever accidentally opens this and has to scroll through the whole thing 😭

I want to make a post about MB and autism eventually.

Update: I sent this mere seconds ago, but I have realized that I have now encountered multiple fics where ART is just kinky as hell (nonsexual when MB is involved ofc) and I kinda love that idea 😭 of all the people for MB to bond to it had to be an Unusually Horny spaceship

Btw I say “ofc” because, in character, MB is sex repulsed ace however it is an unreliable narrator to an extent and given it is fictional and not harmful there isn’t anything wrong with making it sexual in your fics, just wanted to clarify. You do you, internet.

[murderbotwritingprompts]

Yes, yes, you love Murderbot. You think Murderbot is so funny and relatable. You'd die for Murderbot. We know.

But do you actually use Murderbot's it/its pronouns? Do you actually respect the fact that it's an everything-repulsed aroace and is solitaremit touch-averse, and the fact that it represents real people who are these things?

Or do you just "love" the "relatable" version of Murderbot that exists in your head, where you've cut out and replaced everything that makes it who it is as a character with things you can personally relate to, even though the whole theme of the series is that you need to respect people even when you can't relate to them?

Do you think "representation matters" only when you're the one being represented?

Do you think it magically becomes okay to erase canon Queer identities and disabilities as long as you're not the one being represented?

Do you actually love the character of Murderbot, who is explicitly everything-repulsed aroace, nonbinary and uses it/its pronouns exclusively, and is soltaremit touch-averse?

Or do you just love the OC you've slapped its name onto that exists in your head?

[penig]

So, in the category of Silly and Impossible Sim Challenges, I wonder what mods, cheats, and mechanics you'd have to use to make Murderbot in Sims 2?

Murderbot is a construct of a type called a SecUnit made of cloned human tissue, extremely complex hardware, and software that integrates with both and makes the hardware look simple. Its primary function is to protect, so it has energy weapons in its arms, superstrength, superspeed, a certain amount of self-healing, and can handle multiple sensory and data inputs, utilizing scout drones and a kind of universal internet/virtual reality environment called "the feed." It can, quite literally, fight a running battle with multiple opponents, hack multiple systems, track what's going on in other locations that it has camera access to, communicate and make coherent plans with other intelligent entities over the feed or through direct verbal communication, and worry about what's going on in places outside of its sensory reach, all at the same time. A lot of its time, however, has been spent monitoring a peaceful environment for threats and hacking systems while consuming media.

It can pass as a human augmented with cyborg technology, and has altered its height and its hair production to make this easier. It also runs subroutines to mimic random human movement when it wants to pass. When it doesn't want to pass, it becomes noticeably uncanny valley.

Corporations abuse their SecUnits functions quite a bit, and install governor modules in their constructs that punish them by directly acting on neural tissue, in case they protect the "wrong thing" (like, workers instead of equipment) but after a certain horrific incident, Murderbot hacked its governor module so that it could do whatever it wanted to. It then kept doing its job, lying low and watching media, because it didn't know what else it wanted to do; only what it didn't want to do. This backstory has left Murderbot full of rage and anxiety. It is touch averse and doesn't like being looked at directly or making eye contact with people. Sometimes it has an Emotion and it wants privacy for that.

It is AAA - agender, asexual, and aromantic. It literally has no sex organs, and being used to spy on clients 24/7 has left it not only indifferent to but deeply repulsed by sex - it fast-forwards through sex scenes in media. It doesn't even like the word "relationship," yet its favorite show is a long-running soap opera, and it tracks the personal relationships of its clients closely (ostensibly for security reasons; if a married couple who treat each other and it well retreat to a room it can't monitor they're more likely to be having sex than plotting against it, while two people who hate each other may break out into violence and require intervention to prevent them from damaging each other and/or company property).

It derives operating energy from a rechargeable battery pack of remarkable productivity and longevity. It could mimic eating or drinking, but what it consumed would just sit in a lung till it could be expelled and that's gross. Most human bodily functions repel it more or less, though it isn't disgusted by seeing people eat. It doesn't sleep but occasionally goes offline during recharge cycles, mostly to avoid conversations it doesn't want to have.

The obvious thing is to make it a servo, which should deal with some of the motive-based things; but the first thing you'd need would be a servo default that looked like a humaniform sim, onto which you could add layerable CC accessories. Its bare feet are a particular problem as they are never explicitly described, but the text makes it clear that they're not remotely like human feet. However, as I understand it (I have never played a servo), servos are on the same gender binary as humaniform sims, so we'd need a lot of androgynous CC, too. Its preferred clothing styles are hoodies and loose pants with lots of pockets (for carrying drones and tools and evidence and stuff; it also has secret compartments in its torso, which we fortunately don't have to worry about because of the inventory mechanic), and it wears boots with most outfits. Oh, yeah, and it can detach extremities and still operate them like drones, which I don't think we can simulate but so far in the series it's only done this once. Another difficulty with servos is that Murderbot's core identity is SecUnit and it resents being asked to do mundane chores outside of its function, while Servos were designed and coded with the notion of a housekeeping bot in mind.

Using an editing tool to set its gender preference at -100/-100 should be sufficient for the asexual/aromantic part. Zero social points is obvious; but nice points are a problem. Murderbot is capable of extreme violence even when its rage isn't activated (its rage is usually activated) but it's never unprovoked violence. It would never walk up to a stranger and flick their nose or otherwise pick a fight. It would recoil from flirts or solicitations to dance or play, but if you did get it to play catch with you, it wouldn't throw the ball at your head - it'd be more likely to aim precisely at your hand so that it's almost impossible for you not to catch it. In a lot of ways it's high nice, but the nice gestures are entirely inappropriate to it.

Active and playful points are another puzzle. Murderbot can stand still for hours, perfectly happy, watching hour after hour of media and scanning for threats, but it can also sustain heavy mental and physical activity for similar stretches of time. It takes life very seriously but has a snarky sense of humor and an endless capacity for media consumption.

Honestly all the personality points are like that. It's scrupulously tidy but isn't down for cleaning up after anybody - that's one of the things drones and cleaning bots are for. It's cripplingly shy but you only have to look vulnerable and it will adopt you as a client and protect you with its life and then some, even if you're not very nice to it. (We only see it happen once, but it has no reason to lie when it says that multiple clients have shot it.)

Aspiration is hard. It likes winning fights and Popularity is the least sexy aspiration, but the idea of it actively wanting to make friends with people or throw parties is absurd. Fortune sims are very sexy and though Murderbot likes getting paid so it can get its own gear and doesn't have to pirate shows it's not much into money otherwise. Pleasure and Romance are right out. Family would be...technically doable but so, so weird in so, so many ways. And Knowledge...well, it's very smart indeed, and highly knowledgeable in its areas of interest, but it's also prone to using words it knows are wrong but can't be bothered to correct, and it complains about the low quality of learning modules provided by the company it was owned by until the end of the first book, but never provides itself with better ones.

It would have to have max body points and stuck smart milk syndrome, but otherwise start play pretty ignorant.

Probably you couldn't really do it satisfactorily at all, but I'm willing to hear suggestions from simmers who have read The Murderbot Diaries, or have played nonhuman sims before and know where the CC is.

[readythefanons]

1, 14, & 15!

ah! ♥ I will answer re: my silly MurderBot WIP

1: the dumbest possible version of the next sentence needed:

And then the soft marshmallow and the sunshine one hugged, and the grouchy one was grouchy about not being included while still repulsed by physical touch.

That's it, that's the penultimate beat of this entire thing!!!!

15: what about this WIP is driving you nuts?

Honestly I would really like to be done writing this one! It feels like having a tab open for several months... in my brain

14: what do you like about this WIP?

This is the dumbest, silliest, most unnecessary fic in the entire world. The audience for this fic is me and one other person, maximum, and given my current antipathy for it, it's probably less than 2 right now!

And yet,* here it is, still taking up space in my brain.

This started with some sort of joke along the lines of "I'm going to invent a crackship. I'm going to artificially create a blorbo." And then I picked a) a character with like 3 speaking lines in the whole fic and b) a character with 0 speaking lines that may or may not be canonically sentient. And I went "IT'S TIME"

And... you know??? It was super fun to write! And my friend liked it! And I would just love to slip those last few jokes into it and tie it up with a bow.

And I will.

(someday!)

[rjalker]

Actually I'm not leaving it in the tags. Anyone who tells you The Murderbot Diaries fandom is supporting of Aroace people is a dirty rotten liar. They also hate nonbinary and touch averse people.

Even though the whole theme of the series is that you should respect people even when you can't relate to them, these people refuse to treat the canonically, explicitly sex and romance and touch and even queerplatonic repulsed protagonist with respect.

"Aro/ace people can still date" is a statement about aro and ace people being able to do whatever they want with their lives, NOT an excuse to ignore a character's aromanticism and/or asexuality so you can ship them.

[aspec-tmbd]

Title: Pleasure Contract Author: rainbowmagnet Rating: Explicit Tags: #No Archive Warnings Apply #Asshole Research Transport/Murderbot #Murderbot #Robot Brain Sex #Compromise #Asexual Character #Sex Repulsion #touch-averse character #Self-Doubt #Size Difference #Comparing yourself to others #Aftercare #mention of robot STIs #Sexual Shame #Trust Words: 2,795 Chapters: 1/1

Murderbot "blackmails" ART into having a media marathon with it in turn for giving ART some intimate pleasure. Murderbot ends up thinking about how their data exchange differs from regular human sex.

[rjalker]

[ID: Three screenshots from the show The Good Place, showing Chidi and Eleanor talking.

Chidi has four pride flags around his head:

Aroace, with stripes of orange, yellow, white, blue, and navy blue.

Touch averse, with stripes of orange, red, black, red, orange, with a black and red milkweed flower in the center.

Solitaremit, with stripes of light grey, gold, orange, red, black, and red-purple.

Nonpartnering, with stripes of sky blue, cyan, dark grey, purple-pink, and dark purple. In the center is a white, rounded, five pointed star.

Chidi speaks first, gesturing for emphasis: "What you are doing is harmful. You are hurting oppressed people with your behavior. You are hurting people who face erasure and oppression from all sides of our society no matter where they go, in a place whose whole entire purpose is to be welcoming and safe for them.".

Eleanor, smiling, responds, "Actually, no, it doesn't hurt anyone at all. I know, because I don't face this oppression, and it doesn't hurt me, that means it doesn't hurt anyone at all. My behavior isn't hurting anyone.".

The word "don't" in "I don't face this oppression" is underlined for emphasis.

Chidi responds, eyes wide, in all caps, "I literally just explained to you that your behavior is hurting people".

End ID.]

People are like "What do you mean I'm a bigot, all I did was tell oppressed people they aren't actually facing bigotry!!!"

Archived link of the bullshit in question.

[comfortunit]

one of the more horrifying types of mischaracterization murderbot fanfic story you’ll find are the fics where murderbot is coerced out of its touch aversion and the fic authors frame this as character growth.

[rjalker]

I appreciate the rule for no whitewashing, but are there also rules about not erasing Murderbot's canon, explicit aroaceness, and repulsion to sex, romance, and touch?

And about not misgendering it? These are also basic requirements for respect.

The Murderbot Diaries Big Bang 2024

Welcome to the 2024 Big Bang for The Murderbot Diaries!

You can follow this account for updates on the event.

Schedule Rules FAQ

[starblaster]

i’m going to say something that the murderbot fandom isn’t going to want to hear, but i’m saying it anyway: your “personal interpretation” of murderbot as a character stops being an interpretation when the very essence of its character’s is erased. there are far too many of you who willingly forget that murderbot is sex-repulsed, romance-repulsed, touch averse, and has only ever explicitly called a select few people its friends. when you twist murderbot into something it’s not, for your own personal vision, not only are you objectively wrong, but you are disrespecting its character and all that it represents. it’s very easy to stop projecting wildly out-of-character qualities onto it; just make a secunit oc already.

[murderbotwritingprompts]

Pined post, this will be updated whenever necessary.

Last update: January 25th 2023.

This blog is run by @rjalker My pronouns are it/its.

Rules and other info are below the cut! Read this post before submitting a prompt :)

= = = =

Along with submitting prompts, if you tag me in art, as long as it doesn't violate the rules, I'll reblog it here! Art of Murderbot will be tagged "Murderbotart"

Submission rules, in no real order

0)) if you think shipping incest or pedophilia is okay, leave, now. Your actions are disgusting and you are not welcome here. This includes between adopted family members.

1)) I highly recommend you type out your prompts in an LibreOffice document or similar word program before submitting it, in case tumblr crashes while you're on the submission page, or if I delete it by accident while trying to post it.

2)) If you submit a prompt here, you can of course also post it to your own blog. You can also post it to your blog, and then @ me to reblog it here.

3)) If you want to submit a prompt anonymously, you can submit it like normal, and note at the top that you want it to be anonymous. I'll copy and paste it into a new post. (You used to be able to open tumblr in a private browser and submit anonymously that way, but I think they've made it so you have to be logged in now in 2024...who knows when that'll change again though.)

4)) Include a name for your prompt when you submit it! This will make it easier to find them later. It can be a simple descriptive name like "Murderbot gets lost in the mall" or something.

5))Please include proper paragraph breaks. I have to be able to read your prompt before it can b published. Not including paragraph breaks will make this take three times as long.

6)) I will be editing prompts submitted, usually to help clarify confusing language or to add paragraph breaks if the submitter doesn't add them in themselves.

7)) If you aren't okay with your prompt being edited before it gets posted, post it to your own blog instead, and then @ me to reblog it.

If a prompt violates the rules in an easily fixable way, I'll edit the prompt to follow the rules.

If a prompt violates the rules in a way that can't be fixed, it'll just be scrapped, and I'll post an explanation of what it did wrong and how to fix it in the future, without naming names.

Unless you're purposefully being malicious, in which case you'll just get blocked and I will warn other people to block you for their own safety.

8)) No shipping Murderbot with anyone, in any way, unless it canonically starts a relationship with someone in the books. It's not anymore okay to erase canon Queer representation when it's representing nonpartnering, everything-repulsed aroace people than if it were representing anyone else.

If Murderbot were canonically an allo lesbian, and you wouldn't want people to erase that, then don't erase that it's aroace and doesn't want any kind of relationship.

9)) No erasing Murderbot's solitaremity, which is a form of touch aversion where not only do you not enjoy touch, you also do not crave it or get "touch starved". Unless Murderbot in the books canonically starts explicitly seeking out and enjoying touch for the pure joy of it, then you need to respect that it is solitaremit. Real solitaremit people exist, and we deserve to see ourselves represented in fiction too.

Touch aversion is a disability, and it's no more okay to magically cure it or sweep it under the rug than it would be to cure Murderbot's very clear autism.

10)) No whitewashing characters OR assuming white people are the default. Just because someone's skin tone isn't described doesn't mean they're white. If you think it does, you're just racist. The only characters you can depict as white on this blog are those who are clearly described as white, like the GrayCris Agent from book 4.

He is in fact literally the only example of a clearly white character in this series so far.

I know, because I was keeping track the first, second, third, and fourth time I've read this series. This, like many things, is an established pattern in Martha Wells' writing.

It is extremely intentional that the only blatantly white character in this series so far is the capitalist pig who is holding a Black woman hostage.

I promise you it won't kill you to draw or describe people of color. You will not be harmed by fighting against the "white people are the default" that is in your head.

11)) No NSFW even if it doesn't involve Murderbot. There are kids in this fandom, I want them to feel welcome here, and I don't wan to see it either. Post it to your own blog and tag it appropriately.

12)) No super graphic or gratuitous violence. It's okay to go beyond what's described in the books (or, I should say, not described at all), but don't be excessive about it.

13)) Original characters are more than welcome!

14)) All human AUs will not be allowed. Murderbot does not want to be human. Turning it into a human anyways is just insulting.

15)) Other AUs that likewise remove Murderbot's constructed status to make it wholly organic will also be dismissed. That's just lazy and uncreative.

16)) No prompts revolving around Christian holidays. I'm tired of it, and you can't convince me any of the main characters are Christian. You just can't. Post it to your own blog.

17)) No misgendering Murderbot unless it's to show that the character / entity misgendering it is a bad person.

Example: A random jackass misgendering Murderbot is fine, as long as it's properly portrayed as that person being a jackass. (Yes, even if it's written from the jackass's POV and they think they're a good person. It's very easy to show that the narrator is not correct even when they think they are).

You writing a whole prompt and referring to Murderbot with they/them, he/him, or she/her pronouns is misgendering and not allowed. If you do this, it will be corrected the first time. If you do it multiple times, you will just be blocked. You get once chance, and that's it.

18)) No headcannoning Murderbot as being binary trans. Why do I even have to say this. Go somewhere else if you hate nonbinary people that much.

= = = = =

Prompts can be as long as you want, but should be at least a good sized paragraph at minimum, not just a single sentence or two.

= = = = =

You can submit art as a prompt or for a prompt, as long as it follows the rules above and:

A)) Murderbot's face must not be shown (it puts in a lot of effort to hide its face as often as possible, we should respect that!). Get creative with it. There are a lot of fun ways to accomplish this.

B)) Murderbot must not be whitewashed or light-washed.

Its skin color in the official art is very dark brown, with black hair.

The image below shows the shade of its skin tone taken from official art. The background color, and the box in the middle, are the main shade, and then it is shown being affected by light and shadow.

Lighting can be more dramatic or stylized with different colors, but the brightest lighting in the world isn't going to turn a black or brown person white or pink. Do not desaturate its skin either to make it grey.

Look up tutorials on how to properly draw dark skin if you need to, there are many that people kindly make for free here on tumblr.

[ID: A simple digital drawing of a hand, with a small pale orange sun next to it as a source of light. The art has a border of light orange in the same shade as the little sun, with black outlines, and the background is dark brown.

Five rectangular boxes are at the top of the screen, showing a simple gradient from warm brown to darker brown, with the the middle box the baseline, which is also the background color. The furthest left box is the lightest, the furthest right is the darkest.

The shades are placed on the simple drawing of the hand, with the brightest color used to highlight the part closest to the little sun, with the second brightest forming a larger part of the lighting, then the baseline, with the darkest color on the opposite side of the arm and fingers that are in shade, with the softer shading taking up most of the shadowed parts.

End ID.]

C)) Murderbot cannot be drawn stick thin and skinny. It's literally designed to be physically powerful and kill people and things. It is not skinny.

D)) Try to include an image description for your art whenever possible. If you do not include one, I will have to create one before it is published, so it will take longer to publish, depending on how complicated the image is.

Memes will be allowed, as long as they don't violate any of the other rules.

As long as your fics follow all the rules, you can also submit full fics here for people to read, as long as each chapter individually isn't too long to fit in a single post. Say whether or not it's okay for people to use your fics as writing prompts.

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All prompts will be tagged:

Murderbotwritingprompts

Murderbot writing prompts

TMBD writing prompts

The Murderbot Diaries

if you want to filter them.

"blogrunner prompt" will indicate prompts created by me

"submitted prompt" will indicate prompts submitted by others

You may request specific tags to be added to your own prompts, like if you're going to be submitting a series of prompts set in the same "universe".

To maybe help keep things ordered, Each prompt will also be given a number in the order it was submitted, no matter who created it, and tagged with that number as "prompt1" "prompt2" ect.

Will this actually help anyone find prompts later? I don't know, I guess we'll see...

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Some common terms and their definitions:

Transmisia

Transmisia is indeed ""transphobia" but minus the "-phobia" suffix, because hating trans people isn't an anxiety disorder like phobias are, and people who do have phobias get treated horribly because people think it means they're bigots when they're not.

The -misia suffix comes from the word "misos" for "hatred", which is also where the word misogyny comes from! Miso-hatred, gyn-women. Misogyny = hatred of women.

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Athiktomisia (link to coining post)

Athiktomisia is bigotry towards people who are touch averse, with athikto translating to, roughly, untouchable or thereabouts,and the -misia suffix like above indicating hatred. Athikto+misia = hatred of those who are untouchable.

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Solitaremit, soliteremity, etcetera (link to coining post)

Solitaremit is a specific form of touch aversion where the person is touch averse, and also does not get ""touch starved"" or have any desire for touch at all, specifically created because many touch averse people who do not get touch starved were being alienated even in touch averse spaces, because desiring touch and being touch starved was still behind held up as normal and universal.

Solitaremity is...uh, the state of being solitaremit. Example sentence: Most people, even those who are otherwise touch averse, don't even know that solitaremity exists.

Solitaremity was created specifically to be a unique word that is brand new, and thus (meant to be) easy to search for and find, combining the words "solitary" and "hermit" for maximum emphasis.

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Solitaremisia

Solitaremisia is, again, the -misia suffix, combined with solitaremit to specify hatred against people who are touch averse who specifically do not desire touch in any way, even with touch starvation. Which is unfortunately a common attitude even in other touch averse people :|

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Gregariable

Gregariable will probably be used at some point, it was created as the counterpart to solitaremit, it means someone who desires touch and gets touch starved, whether or not they're also touch-averse. Aka, 99.99% of people are gregariable. It combines the words "gregarious" and "sociable" to create a unique word so that it would be easy to search for.

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Aroacemisia

Aroacemisia is bigotry against aroace people in particular, again with the -misia suffix to indicate hatred.

Amisia, acemisia, and aromisia are hatred towards aspec people in general, hatred towards asexual people, and hatred towards aro people.

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Exorsexism

Exorsexism is the specific hatred of nonbinary and genderqueer people, which is separate from, but sometimes a part of, transmisia.

Murderbot is nonbinary, so any transmisia it faces is inherently exorsexist.

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It its antagonism

it its antagonism refers to hatred targeted specifically at people who use it/its pronouns, usually always combined with exorsexism. It its antagonism is a form of neopronomisia.

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Neopronomisia

Neopronomisia is hatred of pronouns other than she/her or he/him. This includes but is not limited to pronouns like it/its, te/ter, and they/them.