#Not Everything is Flammable

[cheebuss]

[click for details] The council (poll) has spoken with a clear winner! and here they are! Pyro warrior cat >:D!!

Probably the most difficult one yet, but I had a lot of fun trying to problem solve how to design them in a way that still maintained their anonymity

Image text below cut:

Always have flowers in their pelts!

Covered in thick mud constantly (they like it :] dries a bit near rear.)

"Mask" is a trash bag and plastic bottle with a wet rag inside (made by their respective Engineers.)

"Flamethrower" is an ignited stick covered in pine resin.

In battle, either Pyro will take a mouthful of a mixture made from prey's fatty oils and tree sap and spray it on their breath onto the ignited stick while aiming with their tail (think a fire breather.)

[randomshenaniganery]

Mairon to Finrod (info dump time)

I am going to draw Oleander when im not busy but I did want to show why it took me three days to finish up everything

Me diving into the outfit design and slso Finrod's opinion on the boys its in the bottom tho skksks

ALSO ALSO if u make vespersonas i will be friends pls let us lore dump together

real name: ??? I haven't picked one akskkaskskaskas

Age: 29 (they pretend they're older as Vigil)

Height: 5'7 cm

Gender: enby

Sexuality: Asexual biromantic

Weight: 73 kg

Traits: Street smart, scrappy, observant, liar liar pants on fire

Skills: Swimming, sewing, sword fighting (shield user), puzzle solving, running,

Weaknesses: when they don't want to do something they'll be stubborn about it, can't jump very high,

Backstory timeline:

Has had Fractum Anima for at least 2 months now (same as all Vespers)

In the surface their job was being part of a group of private guards, they mainly escorted people or goods

Ran away from home due to domestic abuse at the age of 12 before joining the guard for training

Worked there for 17 yrs before they got diagnosed and went under

Met Cirrus they were like okay weird but whatever if there's a lunar ichor alternative we gotta try that, saw Cirrus punishing that dude went nope try again later, they did try again later and got the Cirrus grew bored of you route with Ark

Set the pleasure den on fire by using the lotions and oils that were left in the room. Fun fact if you dry lotion on fabric it's VERY flammable and since they don't have synthetic fibers in this game, plus considering what kind of ingredients they'd be using for lubrication, lotions and oil; it's really easy to set things on fire.

After running away and grabbing a new face, they broke into their old room and left their medallion before returning as 'Finrod'

met Oleander while avoiding the guards because they were feeling antsy

became Vigil and is balancing new work, how do I kill Cirrus thoughts and I might need to steal lunar ichor when it pops up in the market.

Habits & hobbies:

Whenever Finrod gets too overwhelmed they use pain to calm their mind, to them pain is clarity. So, sometimes when Finrod stews on bad memories they'll end up harming themselves in some way to force themselves to calm down

Really, really quiet when it comes to pain, crying or having a crisis, high pain tolerance basically which is good because of their flare ups

Sometimes Finrod doesn't really laugh even though something is funny so they learned to fake laugh as a way to show they find something funny

Whenever something is really funny to them they have the habit of covering their mouth

When they're unsure, nervous or feeling awkward they'll scratch their nose

Doesn't have a tell when they're lying cause they do it so much

Finrod has the habit of bringing everything they think they need with them at all times (matchsticks/lighter/strike-a-light/flint, knife, scissors, needle and thread, bandages, map, a magnifying glass, paper and ink) this is because of having to live on the go for their job. scouting behavior etc.

When Finrod is happy/relaxed/calm they'll start humming or singing this applies to games, when they have their plan all finished and they're confident they'll start singing to themselves

In a fight Finrod will throw themselves at people like a battering ram if needed, not that they're big but that they're good at knowing how to use their momentum and weight.

Likes massaging/caressing/tracing their friends' hands as a way to soothe themselves

Can finish dressing up and arranging all their things in under 4 minutes (habit from being a private guard on the go)

Name stuff:

Chose Mairon for their first half because I thought it would be appropriate since this is their first go at the mountain. Finrod is their second go because of how Finrod died and the betrayal stuff that happened to him.

Outfit Design:

Mairon's Clothes

Wanted it to come off as simple and formal more reminiscent of their time as a private guard. The most color you'll get from them is their belt and matching cuffs. Very neat appearance more npc looking since they want to blend in. They use the standard black mask in the game as well.

Finrod's Clothes

I gave it more color because Finrod had to ditch their old clothes due to the fire, it's a mix of things they grabbed or bought after the fire. They kept their belt and cuff because it's sentimental and also just useful to them. Although they wear more colors It's mostly dark shades so that they don't stand out in shadows. A lot of their body is bandaged and when they met Oleander half their face was bandaged under the mask too.

Opinions on the boys:

REaLLy wants Cirrus dead doesn't care if they get hurt in the process

Slowly growing an obsession over Oleander but they're very good at hiding it, their banter helps calm them down

Likes to mess with Kier otherwise neutral but i think storywise they haven't met

Francesco reminds them of a friend from the surface they bump into each other time to time

[solradguy]

I downloaded a bunch of 19th century public domain vampire books today but I didn't have the strength to download Varney The Vampire because it's 876 pages and over 600,000 words and I lack the constitution. Varney would kill me

[nitw]

finally in act 3 this is tjhe longest i've ever made it in an honor mode attempt so far

[thedaughterofkings]

There she is!!!

[shizzle-alphalegionnaire]

MFW the front-line melee guy is inflamable but everyone else isn't....

[pinoruno]

spn poetry month - day 6 - shadows: blood in the backseat

a tribute to anna for today's "shadows" prompt! wanted to explore the angels'-deaths-as-wing-shadows sort of idea, & this odd dissociative-grace thing sort of just. Sprung Forth.

@spnpoetryrenaissance

[tovaicas]

not me importing my anti-air defense worldbuilding h/cs into ishgard bc I can

[evilweasel-cosplay]

I got this warning on my computer and I felt like Sherbert should prepare for the oncoming fire weather

Also here's them just with the umbrella

[bellshazes]

the crastle still really gets me because like. it is perfectly proportioned. this is not a small joke i mean that. nearly every single window can be crouched through. all the floors are at the perfect height to do so. the stairs follow a precise pattern to accommodate both the height of the windows and the trapdoor railings that surround them. the outside towers are staggered to match the floors. the crenelations are more or less functional, and can be walked between. like running around inside of my replica of it is just like... man. this is a good fortress, genuinely. except for how fucking FLAMMABLE the interior is but whatever. you can't win them all especially if you're not trying to.

[doctor-fancy-pants]

High Maintenance Holothurians and Why I Live On This Beanbag Now

I have filled MANY buckets with seawater (and seawater ice slushies) and put them in the fridge for the next shot (ie the next collection operation, be it beam trawl, scampi net, or McKenna trawl). That will come up on the next shift, but I like to make sure they have cold seawater available.

This is because we have an ice machine in the lab, and while it sounds like the 80dB tortured shrieks of the hopeless damned (yes, I'm glad I packed my Loop earplugs), it does make ice fairly quickly.

What we cannot make quickly is a 20L bucket of cold seawater for creatures that are used to living at 1000m or more depths, because we might be in the tropics and all, but trust me, at that depth, it's fucking cold.

And if I try to put my holothurians in warm seawater, they will freak out and explode (and shed their intestines). If I put them on ice, without seawater, they will desiccate. That's true of many marine organisms, but while hard-shelled molluscs and hard-carapaced crustaceans can keep their internal environments more damp, echinoderms don't do so well.

(the same goes for jellies, soft corals, and less robust crusties like the little shrimp and prawns.)

Since I want my sea cucumbers to live long enough to be sorted into species (or at least what I think are species, an assessment that comes with error bars, particularly as I am not a holothurian taxonomist), and also counted, weighed, photographed, documented and finally pickled (or blast frozen) with the relevant DNA intact (it starts to degrade upon cell death), that means I spend a not insignificant amount of time lugging 20L buckets from the seawater tap to the fridge and back again.

That was a derail. Where was I? Ah, yes.

I have also done all the ethanol transfers for the current batch of sea cucumbers.

Sea cucumbers have SO MUCH water in their bodies that you can't just stash them in high-grade ethanol and call it a day, because as they absorb the ethanol, the water leaves their tissues and dilutes the surrounding ethanol, and if you were so foolhardy as to pack your holothurians tightly - surely you would not do such a thing, though! - you'll be lucky to have 40% ethanol at the end of that process.

What you will have is a bag (because if you're packing your sea cucumbers tightly in ethanol, probably you've put them in a bag. TSK TSK) of rotting sea cucumbers, which is super-fun to open later on.

What you need to do is try to get your cukes into a jar where they will occupy about 10% of the total volume. Not the one third, two thirds rule that many picklers of critters live by - nope, this is one part in ten.

(I am so bad at estimating the volume of anything that I literally stare at the cuke in the jar and try to mentally superimpose it another 9 times in that space.)

Then you leave them there - preferably in the fridge, to slow down any deterioration (a.k.a. "rotting") - give them a little swirl maybe, and maybe also give them 24 hours. After that, if you can, you should probably change out the ethanol (a full change if you have enough on hand).

After the initial fixing, you can downsize their jar pretty well. It basically depends on how much water is hanging around in those tissues.

Essentially: the holothurians are amazing, but wow, they are high maintenance as hell.

That was a derail. Where was I? Oh yeah.

I have ALSO stashed all the small starfish and brittle stars in the appropriate jars. I put them in little ziploc bags, poke holes in the bags to allow flow through, and then put them all in a large jar full of ethanol.

It's all about surface area to volume ratios (and, yeah, also water content, but that's way less of an issue with the small starfish and brittle stars), and making sure nothing has an air bubble which could allow it to dry out. Sometimes it's a bit fiddly, and I spend a bit more time than I'd like leaning over a jar full of ethanol making sure everything is properly pickled, but overall it works, preserves things very well, and saves ethanol.

(As we can see, my "be thrifty with the ethanol" policy comes to a screeching halt when it hits the "sea cucumbers need HOW much?!" issue.)

That was a derail. Where was I?

Oh, yeah. I have ALSO grabbed a drum liner and prepared a new 60L drum for the specimens, labelled it appropriately and then I have carefully stacked all my stashed specimens from the last day or so into it, thus clearing out almost the entirety of my flammables cabinet.

If this is confusing, fear not: echinoderms are not especially flammable. In fact, as an obligately marine phylum, they are perhaps less flammable than many animal groups! At least, in their natural element.

When they've been pickled in 98-100% ethanol, they become quite flammable indeed, so that's where they live when they're not in the drum (which is a dangerous goods container).

This process did involve me putting a sea cucumber into a Clip Fresh food storage box, which I then sealed with duct tape, because I am an untrusting individual and I have been hurt before, dammit. I also sealed up some plastic bags of very large starfish with duct tape, because it doesn't matter what you do, the bags will leak, even if you double bag, and probably even if you seal them with duct tape, but you know what, you can't say I didn't give it a fair shot.

(I hate, hate, hate putting specimens into bags of ethanol without then putting that bag in a jar. This is how you open a drum of specimens and get greeted by the smell of rotting tissue and ethanol, which is somehow worse than just the smell of rotting tissue. It's like when someone has terrible body odour and doesn't shower for three days and then sprays fucking Norsca all over themselves. The odour is somehow worse than if they hadn't bothered with the belated deodorant.)

(anyways: big starfish mostly do not bend, and they do not fit in jars, and often they do not even fit in off-brand Tupperware, so we make do and hope for the best. Sometimes we fortify that hope through the application of duct tape.)

That was a derail. Where was I?

Look, those were all the things I did AFTER we finished sorting and processing the last trawl... which was extremely light for everyone else, but I got a veritable FIELD of holothurians - over 20kgs of cukes all told - multiple species, including the one known colloquially as the "purple loaf". We got eleven of those.

(Chief Scientist was measuring the purple loaves and said "are we sure we don't have any more purple loaves to measure?" and I looked at my tray of long sea-serpent-esque critters and said, "no, but if you're interested, I have about six magenta baguettes...?")

For some reason, the vast majority of sea cucumbers we have seen on this voyage have been pink, purple, or somewhere on that end of the visible light spectrum. I'm well aware of why red pigment is a popular evolutionary choice for those in the lightless depths, so the pink is entirely reasonable, but the various shades of purple across some extremely different groups of holothurians is new to me.

The 1000m scampi trawl came in with more cukes than anything else, but they were all familiar customers by this point. The 400m beam trawl earlier in the shift had many less sea cucumbers but was more complex in terms of sorting across all the different groups (mostly our Crustacean Expert got hammered there, though that's usually the case. Crusties be *everywhere*, in large numbers, in many many many many different kinds).

What I meant to say, when I first started writing this post, is that... I have done many things and I am very tired and the last week in particular has been bonkers with chaos and I am not moving from this beanbag until the science meeting is finished, unless it's to go get a biscuit from the mess.

The science meeting does not start for another twenty minutes, so I am doing well. And then we do shift handover straight after that.

I was thinking I might go and organise some of the photos we've been taking - to help sort and categorise and link up our records, for groups like holothurians where we don't have a specialist on board to ID them confidently, but I'm wiped, and my feet are angry with me.

Beanbag. I live here now.

...

(I plan to add photos to this post later - I haven't done that because this started out as a Facebook post and then I realised I was writing the blog post I'd been sort of meaning to write for ages, so it was somewhat spontaneous.)

[drelldreams]

reblog and post in the tags what you love most about mordin solus

[angeart]

@wren-kitchens us when we play mc

[a-yarn-of-purple-prose]

Maybe the reason for that stereotype of the painter as someone that sits around smoking and looking out the window of the atelier is that oils take so fucking long to dry

[grimweaver]

So, even the ROCK chair is flammable! Is this EA running an old Sims joke into the ground?

[threebea]

I have started to think of the Jedi being blamed for the Fall of the Republic like blaming firefighters for wildfires.

They have been fighting fires (corruption) for years, but the fire is getting bigger and hotter and spreading farther. They're doing their best but there aren't enough of them to go everywhere there are fires. The Senate points them to where really big fires are, but sometimes it turns out they just want their property saved and there weren't that many people in the building. The Jedi still save lives but they have to look at the bigger picture and hope volunteers will put out the little fires because they simply don't have the people for every little fire even though they wish they did. The Senate starts restricting their use of water. Then an arsonist, Palpatine, is made mayor and takes control of their budget.

Dooku and the CIS start lighting fires on purpose. Palpatine let's Dooku know where the most flammable places are.

And the firefighters (Jedi) keep fighting the fire. They can't not fight the fire. People will die if they don't fight the fire. Then the government is like: there are not enough firefighters to fight the fire, but here is a large population of people we will force to fight the fire with you. You shouldn't have qualms, apparently an individual that used to work for you is the one that paid for their training so really they're your responsibility. You'll be in charge of them on the field and get to watch them die, but we control their lives and have decided they're not people so we don't have to pay them. Good deal. We are good at fighting fires.

And the Jedi can't say no because they need to stop the fire and they can't do it alone at this point. Many of the Jedi are killed in their attempts to stop the gasoline fire Dooku lights and it shows how badly they need these new people.

Luckily, the people drafted to fight with them, the clones are also good at fighting fires! It's dangerous many clones will die, but despite having no choice they stand beside the Jedi bravely. The Jedi do everything in their power to protect them. They fight alongside them and try to minimize loss.

There are a few Jedi that get overwhelmed by anger or trauma. They become arsonists themselves, but the number of those that do can be counted on one hand compared to the thousands of Jedi that continue to fight fires.

Sadly, the clones have explosives inside them that Palpatine, the mayor, has the trigger for. Just when it feels like the fire is under control and the people lighting the fires have been stopped, Palpatine sets them off.

Most of the clones are never the same. They think the Jedi had to have set off the bombs inside them, even though they would have never thought them capable of it before. Most never learn the truth. They hate the Jedi for being traitors.

Most of the firefighters die. And their families too. Their children and uncles and aunts and grandparents, and cousins even if they weren't capable of fighting fires they all get burned to death.

The mayor declares it was the firefighters lighting fires and outlaws being a firefighter.

Some of the Jedi survive. Some of them can't bring themselves to fight fires anymore. Some of them keep doing it because it's what they were trained to do. A lot of them are novices who didn't know all the best techniques, but they find their own methods to put out fires and teach others how to do it as well.

And the rebellion begins because when you see fire the logical thing to do is put it out, but all the firefighters are dead or in hiding and being a firefighter is illegal. There's no one to call so the town's people start doing it themselves, inspired by the Jedi.

This becomes extremely important when the mayor makes a device that can light entire cities on fire at the push of a button.

Anyway that's my metaphor and maybe explains my point of view when it comes to the Jedi.