#Or I'll invent a new island

[pyrepostings]

Prodigal Son

Free Birds and Fiddlers

cw: referenced past events of the story, including character death and abuse. Polite discussion of Christianity (specifically the story referenced by this chapter's title), mild implied homophobia that gets checked

~~~

Kevin settled himself on the starboard side deck, bringing his knees as close to his chin as he could without losing his balance to the waves, and holding his staff in hand for further aid in not tipping over. He tugged at his hair with his free hand.

The others were port side as far as he knew, likely going below now they were surrounded by water, and would be for some time. While he had agreed to come back to Paradis, he wasn't going to voluntarily be be brought below deck again for anything.

It wasn't long before Julian came around the corner, with two bowls of food in hand. Kevin smirked slightly as the otherwise very dignified man had not quite the sea legs of a sailor, at least Kevin had an excuse for poor balance.

"Do you mind if I join you? I brought lunch."

Kevin nodded, forcing out a "yeah" and re-positioned himself so he could wedge his staff between himself and the wall and took the offered bowl.

Lunch was some kind of cured ham, sauced and seasoned, with bread on the side. They ate in silence, washing it down with a thermos-full of tea. It was an uncomfortable silence, Kevin knowing there was much that still needed to be said, and knowing there was much Julian wanted to say but was afraid of Kevin reacting poorly so soon after the tentative peace was struck.

Kevin figured there were things for him to say too, sooner or later, and so broke it himself.

"I want you to know, Julian, that I'm sorry for hurting you. I shouldn't have. I just... I just didn't know what else to do at the time."

Kevin didn't look at the other man, but he felt him shift to look at him.

"I also want you to know. When we get back, I'll accept whatever punishment you decide for me. Just. Please don't tie me up again. Please." Kevin hid his head in his arms, breathing heavier than he was expecting to at that confession.

Julian was silent for a moment. "I meant what I said, when I told you there wouldn't be a punishment. You have to follow the terms of parole you agreed to, but I'm not going to hurt you. I promise."

"I know that's what you said but you couldn't have meant it. I know you were just saying that so I wouldn't hurt you more."

"Kevin, I meant it completely. All you have to do is ask to come back and you would be welcomed back with open arms. And you have asked. And so you will be welcomed back. I don't punish for the sake of punishment."

"But I hurt you. I killed Minstrel."

"And I really wish you hadn't. But- you've been punished enough. You weren't in your right mind. Hurting you more wouldn't bring him back, and you choosing to come back is like reviving you from the dead anyhow. I just want you to feel safe again. Why would I push you away now?"

Kevin stared off at the waves before replying. "Is everyone else going to feel that way?"

"I specifically ordered him not to go after you. Both times, in fact. But it was his choice to defy them. And you had made your intentions clear to him after the first. I won't say you were in the right either, but he knew what you were prepared to do, and he went of his own free will anyway. That is the truth, and that is what I will say to anyone who gives you trouble."

"Are you going to make me swear loyalty to you, commander?"

"Mm, I would like it if you did. But I can hardly force you. Either way you would be under my protection. Besides, you already swore loyalty to Elsa all those years ago. No one could argue you haven't served at least a few good years to us. Earned the right to still wear our crest, if you chose to."

"hm. And technically I swore first to Ezran anyway. I renewed my vows to Elsa."

"Exactly, see? You're one of the old guard."

Kevin did feel relaxed by his words, if only slightly. He seemed sincere. He leaned back against the wall behind him and closed his eyes against the sun.

"But I've been gone for so long. Will anyone actually remember that? Or just the crimes I've done?"

"I'll make sure to remind them if they ever forget."

"Thank you, Julian."

The time and silence stretched between them, gently rocked by the waves until Julian spoke again.

"There's something I wanted to ask you, if it's alright?"

"What is it?"

Julian pulled out a file of papers. "I'm sure you know, but part of the agreement to have you released back to us included giving me a copy of your file. Every conversation you had in custody, every note of your actions and whereabouts, of the trial."

"Alright?"

"Would it be ok with you if I read it?"

Kevin huffed. "As if anything in there is a secret?"

"I know, I just wanted to be clear with you. If you don't want me to read it, or any specific part, I won't. I'll throw the whole file overboard right now if you sincerely ask me to."

Kevin arched an eyebrow. "I don't think you'd actually do that. But if you wish to read it, and would truly follow my wishes, you may. I just want you to know... a lot of that- I'm not proud of what you'll find in there."

"I know. That's why I asked."

A particularly turbulent wave sent Kevin off balance, forcing him to extend a hand, and sending a slight shock of pain from where he instinctively extended and put pressure on his wounded leg. He felt a touch at his shoulder which quickly retreated.

"Sorry."

"It's fine. Thanks."

Kevin adjusted slightly, not wishing to fall off balance again but also trying to wrap himself against the cold sea wind as much as possible without the thick woolen cloak he had stubbornly refused. He could feel Julian's eyes on him.

"What?"

"It's just- do you want help?"

Was there an air of smug amusement in that voice?

"No I'm fine."

"You look cold, is all. We can go below deck to get out of the wind-"

"No! No. I'm fine, I don't need to go below deck." Even as he spoke, he could feel the chill setting into his bones in a way he knew he would soon regret not finding a way to ward off the wind.

Julian hummed, clearly not convinced but also having learned his lesson about pressing Kevin about things that weren't an immediate danger to his life. Kevin did notice how Julian let his own cloak open. An invite? It was clearly intentional, from the way he shifted to allow more of the fabric to the side where Kevin sat. He wasn't being slick at all.

Kevin rolled his eyes. "What are you doing?"

"You know, we have these lovely cloaks, handcrafted and specifically designed to protect against the cold which comes with being outside, and not up to much strenuous activity."

Kevin suppressed a smirk, suddenly enjoying the game they were now playing. "I know, I used to wear one. Yours seems to have fallen, right- ah right there."

"Hm, so it has. I barely noticed. That probably means I don't really need it right now. Would you like to borrow it?"

Oh, he thinks he's so cool. Unfortunately Kevin had already decided he wasn't going to wear one of those anymore. "I don't need the whole thing, just a corner, I think." He slid a bit closer to Julian, letting their shoulders touch. "If that's ok."

Julian nodded. "I didn't think you'd want to be this close to me."

"Don't get me wrong. We're not there yet. But- I do miss you. I miss what we used to have. And I am cold."

"Mhm. Alright." Julian threw the side of the cloak over Kevin's opposite shoulder as he snuggled in, pressing his entire side of his body up to Julian's, and tucked a few fingers under his flight harness for security against the rolling waves. He felt Julian shift in a way that seemed to be checking to make sure Kevin wasn't snatching anything off of said harness, but then relaxed back into him.

He was warm. And the way Julian stroked his hair, like he used to, sent a different kind of shiver down his spine.

It was comfortable. Sans the hard wooden floor, and the rocking of the boat, and the gulls cawing-

Kevin pressed his face into Julian's shoulder and neck, just above the collarbone. Why did he ever leave? He could have had this the whole time.

With Julian's hand in his hair, and his own fingers entwined in the other man's harness, mooring him in place, he let himself drift off.

~

Julian couldn't be 100% sure Kevin wasn't trying to play him, but if he really did still hate him for what happened, he never had to agree to come back.

Kevin had a long way to go. It was true many of his old comrades turned against him when he had initially lashed out, and most of the rest when news was brought that Minstrel was dead by his hands. And that wasn't to speak of Kevin's personal journey in his own head. Julian knew by now what false peace looks like, how quickly a riptide can pull one under.

But he was hanging on, now. He would have more people than just Julian looking out for him specifically, a whole net this time. People that Kevin helped many years ago. People who were hurt in very similar ways, and maybe that would help more than Julian ever could have done the first try.

For now he smiled at the barely audible snores that started from Kevin. He opened the file still on his lap.

~

Eventually, Quinn came around the corner.

"Oh, sorry, I don't mean to intrude. I just wanted some air."

"It's fine. I was just doing some reading." Julian was suddenly very aware of his hand still in Kevin's hair at his shoulder. Aware because Quinn made no secret with the way he looked at him that was what he was referring to.

"He was cold."

"It's warmer, and dryer, inside you know."

"And stuffier, so you've mentioned."

"Eh, true." Quinn leaned against the guardrail. "I guess I just didn't realize, how involved you two were."

Julian quirked an eyebrow. "And what do you mean by that?"

"Nothing! Just that you didn't let on. You've been awfully reserved with that information, before last night I never would have suspected-"

"Allow me to interject, officer. Neither you, nor your crown, is entitled to know every last detail of our relationship. I will state plainly that I plan to uphold the deal I made with your government for his relative freedom, and any involvement with him will not hinder that.

"In addition, while you are coming along to keep his parole, the laws of Paradis are slightly different to those of your home. Not everything outlawed there is outlawed here. Not everything you know to be a sin is considered as such here."

His tone was hard, but diplomatic.

"Right, right, I'm sorry. Commander, I didn't mean it like that."

"Mhm, of course."

Kevin stirred beside him but made no indication he heard anything. Julian rubbed his head softly to coax him back to sleep.

"I guess I just didn't realize until now why you intervened for him."

"I didn't pull him out of a life of incarceration because I'm romantically involved with him, if that's the point you're trying to make."

"So why did you? You broke the policy of isolationism to fight the courts for extradition. For one man."

Julian watched Kevin's face as he rubbed his thumb gently along his scalp. "I've never been Christian, but a long time ago, he taught me some of the stories from the bible. I imagine you're Anglican?"

"Yes, why?"

"Do the stories change much between denominations?"

"Depends. Exact wordings change depending on the exact translation, but the overall stories and messages should stay the same between, say, the king James version and the catholic one."

"Then you should know the one about the son who goes off into the world, squandering all of his father's money. When the famine comes and the son has nowhere to go lest he starve and perish to the elements, he returns home, groveling to his father's feet, not believing he would ever be worthy of forgiveness.

"Instead, he is immediately forgiven. A feast is held in his honor. The father is just glad his son came home.

"Are there truly no obvious parallels here? He asked for help, to return to my side, so of course I would fight for him."

"Well I suppose, when you put it like that."

And at Julian's side, Kevin curled almost imperceptibly closer.

Masterlist

[fictional-orphan-smackdown]

ROUND 4, MATCH 1!

All propaganda and what each competitor is from under the cut

The Baudelaire Orphans (A Series of Unfortunate Events)

The epitome of orphans, they’re the best

“I’m having a very terrible childhood right now”-Klaus

The story deadass begins with them being told that their parents died in a fire and that they're orphans now. They then bounce from guardian to guardian who tend to always meet a gruesome fate at the hands of Count Olaf. Not only have they been orphaned once, but have been orphaned multiple times and are called "The Baudelaire Orphans" by not only characters in the book but by the narrator himself. They're called "The Baudelaire Orphans" so many times that it might as well be a defining character trait of theirs, and honestly it sort've is. The series doesn't even end with them finding a home or guardians of any kind, it ends with the Baudelaires fate being completely ambiguous with them literally sailing away from the island they were stranded on in the final book (yeah this series is quite the journey, I highly suggest it). These poor three kids are probably the most orphaned kids of all time since their orphaned in a new way almost every book and they deserve at least one win in their unfortunate tale.

These guys are like the poster-child of orphaning, we open the series with them finding out that they're orphans and also have no access to their money so now they hop around from place to place from weirdo caretaker to another weird/crazy/murderous caretaker and it's all fun and games and murder and decieving and surviving and thriving and---my point is, these three are a wonderful trio of siblings who love and rely on one another through all their trials and tribulations.

Literally every single one of their problems come from being orphans. They’re continually referred to as orphans and the plot of the first half of the series is them being shuffled around to guardians.

These kids are so orphaned they never even get a found family outside themselves. At least most stories featuring orphaned kids see them fulfill some sorta epic destiny or have them find a new home or set of loved ones of sorts. The Baudelaires? They're thrown from one fucking failure of a home into the next, ignored, hunted, etc.. It's been years but like, even in the end, they still have to set sail alone. As individual characters, they aren't bad either. Violet's the dependable big sister who's knack for inventions comes in handy, Klaus is a well-read chap and Sunny is a lovely gremlin. They make a good trio.

Every single guardian they try to obtain throughout the series turns out to be someone who wants the large inheritance left for them and is willing to do whatever it takes to get it.

They basically fend for themselves the whole series when no adult will listern to them. The whole series is them being resourceful and clever the whole series despite the misfortune. Violet is a brilliant inventor, Klaus reads and collects knowledge, and Sunny learns to be a good cook over the series

their parents die tragically in a fire and then everything awful proceeds to happen to them

I haven't read these books in years but if any orphans deserve to win a smackdown it's these fools, they are constantly in the trenches in those books goddamn. Also that baby is like a shredder they have that on their side, I think that beast literally solo'd a snake?

(This one was specifically for Klaus, but I'll put it here still) He and his sisters being orphans is kinda the point. As in many books, it's the trigger for them to change lives and navigating hardships. The thing is, their hardships just grow worse and "unfortunate" (read "dreadful") events keep happening to them as they stick together instead of the story getting better. Klaus and Violet become Sunny's subtitute parents and get through their more and more miserable lives together keeping hope things would eventually get better

Arguably more famously orphaned than Bruce Wayne, if not for how their story happens while they’re orphaned children versus an orphaned adult. Definitely have the most famously tragic post-orphaning story. All three are incredibly brilliant in their own way, including the literal baby. Pursued relentlessly by the leader of a maniacal theater troupe and letdown by a slew of adults, so it’s all the more impressive how amazing they each turned out to be. Book series was so good it got turned into a pretty great movie and then a successful TV show years later. Also can’t forget how these three are orphaned repeatedly as the distant relatives who take them in get killed off in increasingly inventive manners. Let’s be honest, ain’t no characters out here orphaning like the Baudelaire orphans.

this series taught me so many cool words and phrases and I love each of the 3 main characters so much

Violet, Klaus, and Sunny are peddled from caretaker to caretaker over the course of 13 books, always being chased by the evil Count Olaf who wants to steal the Baudelaire fortune that the children are meant to inherit once they reach a certain age.

Spoilers ahead, the Baudelaires siblings story starts with them going from being the Baudelaire kids to the Baudelaire orphans, after their parents pass away in a mysterious fire. But they arent the only paternal figures that they lost, they go from tutor to tutor, almost all the good ones dying in front of them, and even the ones that survive at first their future is uncertain since the last time the kids see them they are blindfolded in a burnind building, and we never found out who make it out alive and who didnt. Even the main villian, Count Olaf their first tutor, and the only constant adult in their life after their parents death ends up dying in front of them. These three are orphans ten times over.

They are THE orphans. They have lost not only their parents but multiple guardians that they went to live with as well.

They're THE Orphans. The childhood book orphans we all read, Orphans Prime if you will. They lose their parents, every caregiver who's ever kind to them, then say fuck it and live on a deserted island on their own to raise themselves abd fully embrace their orphan status. On the island, they learn their parents survived the shipwreck then died again - double orphaning even.

OH MY SWEET LITTLE CHILDREN THAT FUELED MY LOVE FOR READING AND THE MACABRE Violet- Won her first of many invention competitions when she was five with an automatic rolling pin (comprised of a window shade and six pairs of roller skates). Extremely innovative and genius, foiled by her kindness to others. And she knows how to make a Molotov cocktail. Klaus- Absolute monster of a bibliophile, conducts research for fun, and has a photographic memory. He is known to want nothing more than "a good book, a comfy chair, and the warm glow of a reading lamp". He also is a Herman Melville fan, which is points for him in my book. Sunny- Most people know her only for her penchant for biting, but Sunny is a distinctly distinguished character. She has sharp wit (as long as you can read it through her babbles), her poker skills are phenomenal for a baby, and she has quite the knack for cooking! Also yeah, the teeth. She climbed an elevator shaft with them once.

They are constantly going through it, give these kids a break for real

Mina Murray/Harker (Dracula)

IIIIIIII Loveeeeeeee Herrrrrr, she's learning shorthand, she's the group scribe, she writes in her diary about her and lucy seeing cows on a walk, AND she's a train fiend. She's everything to me fr

[humbledragon669]

Book to screen comparison P1 – new elements and confirmed information

Whilst reading the book, it became clear that the notes I was making fell into three loose categories:

Things that were new information, or only disclosed in the book (but would still fit into the canon of the show).

Information that is confirmed in the book, or possibly explicitly stated (rather than being implicitly stated in the show). This blog post will cover these and new information only (for brevity) – differences will be covered separately.

Things that are fundamentally different between the book and the show.

Not all of the notes fit neatly into one category or the other (there are shades of grey...). The first two of the categories will be presented within bullet lists, with a description. The last of the categories will be presented in a table. I'll make comments about anything I find particularly notable after each category.

N.B. I have made the comparisons between the book and the finished episodes that were released, NOT the Script Book. Some of the elements I have commented on can be found within the Script Book, but never made it to the finished episodes – I will point these out on their individual list/table entries.

New information

Crowley’s “real name” cannot be represented in words, only a “complex, wiggly sigil”.

The bullet holes in the Bentley’s window are a James Bond-themed window transfer from 1967, the only time Crowley has even bought petrol.

It is necessary for Crowley to use the lavatory.

The “Arrangement” was put in place “somewhere around” 1020.

Newt is three and a half years older that Anathema.

Crowley is responsible for the establishment of Manchester.

Aziraphale is responsible for the development of Shropshire.

Crowley is responsible for the establishment of Glasgow.

Aziraphale is responsible for the establishment of Edinburgh.

Aziraphale has a soft spot for regency silver snuffboxes.

There is an edition of the Bible that contains an account of the conversation between Aziraphale and God, where she asks him where the flaming sword is. It is suggested that the additional verses containing this information were written by Aziraphale himself.

There were three Shakespeare plays whose contents have been lost:

The Comedie of Robin Hoode, or, The Forest of Sherwoode.

The Trapping of the Mouse.

Golde Diggers of 1589.

One of War’s other names is Scarlett.

Pollution’s other names include Blanc, Albus, Weiss, and Snowy.

Pollution was responsible for the disasters at Chernobyl, Windscale, and Three Mile Island.

Crowley is responsible for the invention of the TV game show format.

Both Crowley and Aziraphale have considered asking the other side for asylum under the threat of impending Armageddon.

Crowley isn’t very good with animals.

Anathema assumes that Crowley and Aziraphale are a couple when they drop her off at Jasmine Cottage.

Demons can see in the dark.

Crowley’s favourite shape to be in is the human form.

Aziraphale buys his clothes.

Crowley wills his clothes into being.

Newt wanted to join the Territorial Army before signing up to the Witchfinder Army.

Aziraphale has a list of agencies that he can call upon to help with his Heavenly duties.

Shadwell’s cellmate in prison was Witchfinder Captain Ffolkes, imprisoned for 10 years for arson (trying to burn a coven in Wimbledon).

One of Anathema’s ancestors, Joshua Device, invented something small but crucially important for the operation of mechanical clocks. His name is (supposedly) the source for the current day word, “device”.

Anathema has met the Tibetan people digging the tunnel – she gives them tea when they dig their tunnel up into her garden.

The rainforest starts to reclaim the built-up areas when Adam starts to come into his powers, destroying entire buildings with new lush and leafy growth.

Crowley does read books.

Crowley’s CDs and bookcase have been sorted alphabetically.

Crowley has an impressive collection of soul music.

The Bentley can drive itself.

Madame Tracy’s real name is Marjorie Potts.

A rain of fish takes place as part of the lead up to Armageddon.

Crowley’s apartment is in Mayfair.

Agnes predicted the Crowley’s flaming drive in the Bentley.

The Them have their own rival gang – The Johnsonites, headed by Greasy Johnson (or Baby B).

Two people have opened the box delivered to Newt and Anathema before it is delivered to Jasmine Cottage.

Warlock and his family return to the USA after Armageddon fails.

There are some really lovely little bits of information to have here. Lots of them don’t necessarily hold any great meaning, they’re just nice to have (like Madame Tracy’s real name). And there’s no guarantee that any of these morsels will ever make it into the canon of the show, but I don’t think that anything that we’ve seen so far that would directly contradict them either, so let’s treat them as if they are part of the show’s storyline for the purposes of this post. With that said, there two bits of information that feel important to me – the year that the Arrangement was established, and the Bentley being able to drive itself. It is possible that the author decided the latter of these two points was something he consciously didn’t want to be included as part of the show’s storyline, although I’m not sure why that would be as it would confirm the car’s sentience that’s hinted heavily at throughout the show. The date for the establishment of the Arrangement though, even if it was changed between the book and the show, why we’re never given that piece of trivia is something I can’t really understand. Based on what we see in episode 3, we know that the idea of some sort of mutual agreement is levied in 537 AD, and that the Arrangement is in place by 1601 (and has been implemented “dozens of times”), but that’s a period of over 1000 years, which I would think would qualify as a long time even by immortal standards. I think I just struggle with the idea that, despite the fact that so much work went into giving us a history of the relationship between Crowley and Aziraphale, this fairly vital bit of information (the time period that the two of them actually recognised their inclination to work together instead of against each other) wasn’t given to us. It makes me feel like their history isn’t complete. Perhaps it’s been done on purpose (for a revelation later on) but given that season 1 was the only confirmed season at the time, that feels unlikely.

I’ve already discussed the concept of Crowley and Aziraphale discussing the possibility of claiming asylum from the other’s side in the script-to-screen comparison for episode 2, so I won’t go into it here, but there is one more point I want to touch upon: the missing Shakespeare plays. I haven’t had a chance to discuss them yet as I haven’t made it to the season 2 write-ups (I’m getting there!), but two of these actually turn up in Aziraphale’s bookshop, carelessly sorted into the empty box that Gabriel shows up with:

Interestingly, the mention of these books is made in a section that hints at Aziraphale being something of an underhand and self-serving individual – inserting his own history into the Bible and stealing important works of literature. It’s not something I can see our version of the angel doing (at least not without having a huge guilty conscience), but it’s a nice little demonstration of some of the subtle differences between book-Aziraphale and show-Aziraphale.

Confirmed/explicitly stated information

Any CD left in the Bentley eventually morphs into Queen albums.

Crowley likes to sleep.

Crowley does eat.

Crowley likes people.

The terms of the “Arrangement” – a “non-interference in certain of the other’s activities” and to “hold the fort for one another whenever common sense dictated”.

Nanny Ashtoreth is based on Mary Poppins.

Types of venues considered safe for Crowley and Aziraphale to meet:

The tops of buses.

Art galleries.

Concerts.

The events leading up to Armageddon take place in August.

Neither Aziraphale nor Crowley need to sleep.

The double yellow lines outside the bookshop miraculously disappear when the Bentley requires a parking space.

The third baby from the baby switch, Baby B, did survive, and grew up to become Greasy Johnson, the Tadfield bully.

The prophecies in Agnes’s book aren’t in chronological order.

Aziraphale definitely does not understand the concept of an answerphone.

Crowley holds no authority in Hell.

Angels could dance if they wanted to, they just “don’t feel the urge to”.

Demons don’t need sound to communicate.

Aziraphale has never had any dealings with any demons other than Crowley.

Crowley is an optimist.

The fact that everybody starts to forget what happened on Armageddon day is Adam’s doing.

Again, plenty of bits of information that are nice to have confirmed (if we’re going on the basis that what is canon in the book is also canon in the show), particularly the clarifications around sleeping and, in Crowley’s case, eating. There are two pieces of information on the list that I consider important, one of which I was so excited about reading, I put a red Post-it note on the page it was written on. Let’s start with the first one – the fate of the third baby in the baby swap. As a reminder of the ambiguity of Baby B’s outcome, here’s what we ended up with in the finished episode:

GOD: It would be nice to think that the nuns had the surplus baby – Baby B – discreetly adopted. That he grew to be a happy, normal child, and, then, grew further to become a normal, fairly contented adult. And perhaps that is what happened. He probably wins prizes for tropical fish.

On paper, it’s very open-ended. In the show however, with the ominous music and the way the speech is delivered, we as the audience are led down a much darker imaginative path. That speech actually originates from the book, almost word-for-word, with the original text going further down the suggestive route that something sinister happens to the “surplus” baby. The difference is that the book resolves that tension. There isn’t even a hint of the child that will become Greasy Johnson in the show, despite the fact that he and his gang actually form an important sub-textual point about rival groups and their ingrained need to best their enemies, for no other reason that to prove that they’re the best. I can live with it, seeing as it would have required a number of extra child actors and all the other necessities that they come with, I just feel a bit slighted that we don’t find out that the nuns weren’t so deplorably evil that they would dispose of an hours-old baby like unwanted trash.

Now I’m off my high horse about that particular point, let’s have a look at the one that caused me to dig out my special labels.

[…]demons don’t necessarily need sound to communicate.

I have seen a lot of fandom-generated content speculating on the whole non-verbal communication concept, and I’m down with a lot of it. Mostly I was thinking that the times that Crowley and Aziraphale apparently speak to one another without using actual words was more to do with their knowledge of one another and the intricacies of their relationship. But actually it’s here, in black and white, just over halfway through the book. No speculation, no theorising. An actual statement. If this is canon for the show as well as the book, this would both answer and pose a SHITLOAD of questions. And if demons can communicate without sound, does that mean angels can too? They are “from the same stock” after all. With that little piece of information, there are a lot of opportunities that suddenly become very possible. As with the idea of the Bentley driving itself, I find myself wondering if this has been left out on purpose – perhaps it was something that wasn’t wanted or needed for the first season, but maybe (just maybe) it’s being kept as a trump card for later. I guess we’ll have to wait and see…

[jordosprout]

I Need To Know TBB Headcanons (S3 SPOILERS POSSIBLE PLEASE BE WARRY)

What do you think the batch spends their time doing on Pabu? What occupies their time now that they are retired? I have only pieces of ideas but I have been tryna find some other folks thoughts. But to get er' rollin' I'll share my ideas.

Wrecker

• He's definitely a community man from what we saw so

- Maybe he babysits

-Maybe he helps fish like we saw in the past

- Or perhaps he carries heavy equipment for repairs/building

Hunter

- Maybe he helps figure out the best fishing spot for every passing day

- Maybe he builds boats or surfboards? Definitely got old surfer vibes from him at the end of Bad Batch (I am so sorry but I could not get Barbie's dad(?) from that one surfer movie out of my head)

Crosshair

• Cross was the hardest to figure out for me due to how little of what he is skilled at outside of being a soldier. But once I thought about it I couldn't stop LMAO

- I think for a long time he struggles with figuring out what he wants to do now that he's free to be whoever he wants to be. He's used being told what to do, and now that he doesn't have someone controlling him he's having a difficult time adjusting. He probably asks Hunter to give him tasks frequently, and after a while he's given the task of taking care of himself. Learning what he wants.

- I definitely imagine him trying multiple things such as: fishing, farming, all the good stuff

- I see him landing on something creatively driven like tattoos and painting. But I do think it takes a lot of time and soul searching before he gets to that point.

- Probably really distant for awhile, he wants to be around the others but feels he doesn't deserve it

- Reluctant on getting a prosthetic, I can see him choosing not to have one

Omega

• Omega wasn't too difficult for me, seeing what she ends up going off to do at the end of the last episode.

- After using pieces of the Marauder to fix up her own ship with Phee (and Tech depending on your thoughts on it), I see her convincing Phee (again, and Tech depending on your opinion) to give her flight lessons.

- She practices the Tech Turn often, doing her best to perfect it. (If you think Tech should stay dead then let's say she does this late at night on her own and has gotten in trouble for it a plethora of times. She can never quite do it as he does. But if you're like me and he lives, then of course he'll help teach her.)

- Omega probably sneaks off a lot, wanting to explore her new home

- Then I think she eventually gets into contact with Herra, and that she's the one who convinces her to become a rebel pilot

Tech

• In my perfect Bad Batch, Tech is alive. He will always be here in my mind; even if I'll have to mourn him as a character in canon alive and well.

- Tech spends much of his time recording and noting down the things he learns about the new island he lives on. Likely going off with Omega.

- I think Tech and Phee try a relationship at one point or another, maybe they decide to break up, maybe they're together for the long run. His calm nature mixing with her unpredictable one perhaps. She helps him feel more comfortable with himself, and he reminds her she doesn't need to change her stories to make them enjoyable. I think he'd love hearing about the artifacts she brings to Pabu. But it's possible their personalities don't mix well. We didn't get to see as much of their relationship on screen as I would have liked. (Came to rewrite this a bit. Was worried with how I wrote it didn't come across as I wanted)

- Tech probably has his own repair shop, or maybe he creates his own inventions.

More Group Stuff

- Definitely live together at least for a long while

- I think Hunter would get into a relationship before anyone else, then Wrecker getting into one kinda on accident? He'd be super oblivious and go on dates without realizing that's what they are. I think Cross n Tech would be last if they were to get into relationships (personally I see them on the aromantic spectrum, specifically Tech being demi and Cross being recip-romantic or Grey-romantic)

- They do a lot of stuff together, swimming, getting tattoos from Cross, therapy, family dinner all the lovely stuff

And I Think That's All I Got

Thanks for letting me ramble in your feed :)

[the-ninjago-historian]

Post Series Jaya Doodles and Headcanons!🌊⚡🌊⚡🌊⚡🌊⚡🌊⚡🌊⚡🌊⚡🌊⚡ (Bonus Next Gen Headcannons!👀)

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! 😁💖 I worked really hard on this. So I hope you all enjoy! Headcanons are below the cut! - ✒️🐉

1) They have a HUGE wedding. Many friends and Family come. And I headcannon that Jay has a very big extended family so that's a lot!🤣

2) They move into the old lighthouse and fix it up/fortify it. It eventually becomes a small rest stop for ships.

3) Nya runs a mechanics shop for boats and water craft there. And Jay has a shop to sell salvage, drift wood, and knickknacks. He also does a little inventing on the side. Although it doesn't usually end well. Lol. Name ideas for their shops would be appreciated!

4) They have a LOT of kids. Five to be exact. Ray, Maya, Ed, and Edna are very proud grandparents. The kids are, in order from youngest to oldest, Piper, Ren, Wynn, Raine, and Poe. Currently I only have a design for Poe. (Seen above.) But the rest are coming. I can assure you. I'll provide some descriptions in the meantime!

Poe: Pictured above! He's very calm and charismatic. And while he's a good fighter and pirate hunter, he enjoys quieter hobbies such as painting. His main weapon is a harpoon.

Raine: Very light skinned. With curly silver hair. (Her hair color is caused by her unique elemental power, Storm!⛈️) She's a little in the small side. But still sturdy and a real fighter. She's a tough cookie! Raine eventually becomes part of the Next Gen Ninjas.

Wynn: Light skinned, with black curly hair. Always wearing a pair of flight goggles. (He's an inventor like Ed and Edna.) Eternally curious and questioning.

Ren: He's got red hair like Jay, and tan complexion like his mom. Ren's got an explorer streak and loves charting new islands. He plans to sail to the other side of Ninjago's oceans someday. He's almost never seen without Wynn. The two are inseparable.

Piper: The baby of the family! She has blonde hair like Libber. She may be little. But she's brave. Not too much on her currently. But she will have a bigger role to play in the future.

5) Cole LOVES their kids. And is very protective of them. (Like "would give his life for them" kind of protective.) He practically treats them as though they were his own. He's their bestest uncle, besides Kai.

6) Raine has a mix of both Nya and Jay's element. She's the master of Storm. She's the first case of a merged element in Ninjago history. And when she was young, it was VERY unstable. Raising a super powered baby was NOT easy.

7) They are pirate hunters. For reasons...🧞‍♂️ Anyway! Their family is known for keeping the coasts of Ninjago safe and sound. Especially their oldest boy Poe, who's shaping up to be a great pirate hunter.

8) They own a flying ship! They needed a way to get to shore fast and since they didn't have the Bounty, Nya and Jay just built one of their own. It's smaller but just the right size for them. And it's called the Storm Rider. It's even got cannons for taking down pirate ships!

(P.S. Two quick things! One, these headcanons are related to a fanseason I'm working on called Ninjago: New Genesis. So that's why they don't line up with Dragons Rising. And two, yes. I noticed Poe's eyes are miscolored in one pic. They're supposed to be brown. I didn't notice until after I finished.😂)

(Tag List: @only-lonely-stars @hydroelectricjaya😁👋)

[twothpaste]

m3 post-canon worldbuilding thoughts

🌏🐉🌞👷👇

🐲 the dark dragon is a real flesh and blood island-sized beast, but also a symbolic embodiment of the earth's love. she cherishes all living things, including humanity. she wept in her sleep when humans destroyed the world. once awakened, she circles the globe, slowly bleeding love and life and magic back into the soil.

🌱 the dark dragon's powers were overstated. though the message of sheer hope saving the earth works beautifully in the context of a video game ending - if we're breakin into post-canon fanworks, "magic will instantly solve the climate crisis & systemic political rot & grant us a clean slate" doesn't cut it for me. though the dragon grants them a second chance, humanity's still gotta spend the next several generations helping her restore the world. planting seeds, rebuilding from the wreckage of old cities, inventing sustainable tech and systems of self-governance, the whole nine yards.

🌊 when she came outta the ground, the dragon broke nowhere into pieces. it's now a sprawling archipelago of at least 100 islands. a lot of familiar locations remain mostly intact, but some places close to the needles (like osohe castle and the chimera lab) have been submerged and destroyed. much of the first few years postgame are spent mapping out the new landscape, and discovering new ways to navigate it. (kinda like how coming out of a traumatic living situation & grappling with ptsd involves re-contextualizing old memories & spaces, learning to navigate the world all over again, etc 🥲)

🏠 tazmily's got a big cliffside carved down the middle of town square, and a few broken chunks severed off, with steep ocean drops between 'em. the community comes together to restore their town with a web of stairways and bridges. though it looks like a shabby disaster zone at first, it takes on a charming and well-loved vibe over the years. maybe one day i'll find the time to sketch some scenes.

🚣‍♀️ the best way to get around the new nowhere is by boat. kayaks, canoes, and sailboats become quite popular. incidentally, most tazmilians had experience with ship-building & seafaring (that's naturally how they made it to nowhere on a big white ship). they'd locked this knowledge away with their memories, fearing what'd happen if they took to the sea again and discovered their dark history. as they gradually regain their traumatic memories, they also regain their capacity to engage with the present world.

🫠 without porky's influence, the folks he brought to nowhere are also slowly regaining memories & coming to their senses. these people find themselves stranded in a distant future, utterly misled, with no hope of returning home. most of 'em settle initially into tazmily, helping the villagers rebuild the only settlement left on planet fucking earth, whether out of the goodness of their hearts or sheer need to survive. it's an awkward adjustment. most everyone understands the state of mutual dependence they're all stuck in, and some folks (perhaps inspired by lucas) offer tremendous kindness to strangers. but others are reluctant to trust ex-pigmasks, and vice versa. others still lash out or self-isolate in vain frustration at the hopelessness of their situation, separated irrevocably from their homes and families. it takes several years for the last humans alive to really come to terms, and truly come together.

🐽 there's a splinter branch of ex-pigmasks who fuck off to the ruined highway islets where thunder tower used to be, declaring their ongoing loyalty to porky. they build a new settlement called "the pigpen." their poorly-organized isolationist stint lasts less than a decade, caving to a lack of supplies & the utmost generosity from tazmilians offering aid. the pigpen ultimately becomes a wholly benign settlement. some folks even move there for a change of pace. the vibe of the place starts leanin' toward punk culture, with post-apocalyptic garage rock bands and outcasts helpin' each other get by. (i think kuma & her wife live here. it's probably dcmc's home base too.)

🌫️ porky himself resides in the crumbled wreckage of new pork city, slowly sinking into the ocean over the course of 20 years. sometimes tazmilians come to salvage technology & supplies, but they learn to steer clear of the king's capsule. he's got nothing worthwhile left to offer humanity, and vice versa… (i've written 2 fics set here. i'm very normal and not at all sick in the head about the symbolic weight of this concept.)

🌲 lucas & isaac start a "ranger service" organization that preserves natural wildlife and manages chimeras. much of their work involves relocating troublesome chimeras to more suitable environments, dismantling their excessive weaponry, providing veterinary care & mechanical repairs. after some initial debate, it's accepted as a law of the land that all things have a right to live - even the most inconvenient of porky's lab experiments.

☀️ dr andonuts leads the charge in developing new sustainable technology, starting with a foundation of green energy tech that exists today. tazmily's powered by wind & solar farms (built mostly by ex-pigmasks, as an earnest show of repentance and solidarity). i think there's some carbon capture tech going on, tryin to reverse the lingering effects of climate change. i have a crystal clear image in my head of these funny clunky solar powered trucks they use for moving equipment, and i swear one of these days i'm gonna draw claus with one, trucker hat n' all, lookin' peak redneck in the driver's seat.

🚢 a few years postgame, a "world ship" is constructed - a vessel that can carry brave travelers to the old world's abandoned continents. they find no survivors out there. just lifeless ruins, and swaths of parched wilderness. lucas & pals take annual trips to salvage for precious scraps of history, survey the state of natural environemnts across the world, and help restore said environments through ecological work. i've written little snippets of this in a few fics… would love to write somethin wholly set within one of these expeditions one day, if i can come up with a solid story premise.

🏝️ another settlement crops up on the japanese island of kyushu (the nearest major landmass to nowhere). it's plainly dubbed "kyushu-two." much of the island's been submerged due to rising sea levels, but nowhere-folk are by this point used to a waterlogged seafaring lifestyle. a lotta non-tazmilians eagerly move here, itching to be "anywhere but nowhere." it develops a laidback and kinda artsy culture.

🤝 with only a few hundred people left on earth, a necessity to share resources, and a damning lesson learned from traditional systems of government, tazmily & other settlements become more or less anarcho-communist. though there are leadership roles, no one person is in charge of anything, and major decisions are made collectively by community members. i don't think they keep using currency, at least not for long. unlearning systems of hierarchy & authority is a challenge for many - even including some tazmilians, once they've regained their memories. call it a utopian fantasy, but they make the effort willingly, humbled by all that's transpired.

✨ new psychics are born at a higher rate than usual on postgame nowhere. (whatever "usual" is. i assume it's always been pretty exceptionally rare.) kumatora takes up the mantle of teachin' 'em how to use their powers, and passing down history the magifolk taught her. her worldly expeditions often involve seeking evidence of PSI in ancient societies - she's bringin' back stuff like PSI teleport and lore from dalaam & scaraba. she sees it as her duty to keep this knowledge alive, cuz she's the only one who can. (and to ensure future psychics don't have to feel lost & alone like lucas did, or like she did when her family disappeared 🥲)

🥼 claus has their eco-lab in the mothafuckin' arizona desert wasteland, developing new chimeras to repair ecosystems, y'all know the deal. it's kinda sad to think they probably won't live to see the full impact of their efforts - but then again, no one else will in this world, it's all a multi-generational effort. sweet to imagine in the long run there'll be lotsa silly & wonderful new organisms out there making the earth a greener, livelier place. i think they might even do some projects to revive species that went extinct when the world was destroyed. or at least, creating chimeras that can fulfill their likenesses and ecological niches.

🏃 a bunch of the characters travel around constantly i think. like lucas' home is tazmily, but he probably spends like 75% of his time elsewhere - expeditions, visiting loved ones, ranger work & odd jobs, etc. likewise for claus, kuma, duster, nana probably. dcmc tours on a big sailboat. flint might be one of the only major characters who mostly stays put. he gets sad if he leaves hinawa by her lonesome for too long.....

[gwydpolls]

Time Travel Question 37: Ancient History XVII and Earlier

These Questions are the result of suggestions from the previous iteration.

This category may include suggestions made too late to fall into the correct earlier time grouping. Basically, I'd already moved on to human history, but I'd periodically get a pre-homin suggestion, hence the occasional random item waaay out of it's time period, rather than reopen the category.

In some cases a culture lasted a really long time and I grouped them by whether it was likely the later or earlier grouping made the most sense with the information I had. (Invention ofs tend to fall in an earlier grouping if it's still open. Ones that imply height of or just before something tend to get grouped later, but not always. Sometimes I'll split two different things from the same culture into different polls because they involve separate research goals or the like).

Please add new suggestions below if you have them for future consideration. All cultures and time periods welcome.

[queen-of-boops]

Meet The Cast

Age: 28

Hometown: Chelsea, England

Occupation: Real Estate Agent

Bio: Paradise Island isn't ready for the Ham-Man to hit the villa. Once I hit them with a wink and a smile, I'll have them all eating out of the palm of my hand. You know what they say, the Ham-Man hits the spot every time!

Age: 27

Hometown: New York City, New York

Occupation: Hairdresser

Bio: My favorite hobby is inventing sex positions, so I guess you could say my sex drive is pretty high. I'm a confident girl who knows what she wants and I usually get it.

[slugtranslation-hypmic]

Hi Slug! If you've listened to the full songs in the new EP, have your opinions of the trailers changed? Also, the new dramas are HEAVY, so if you've listened to them, I'm curious to know what you thought of them. As always, thanks for the translations!

I like listening to Hypmic music on shuffle during workouts, so I've most of the new songs in full by now. I don't think my opinions have changed majorly. I really enjoy Black and White, and Move Your Body Till You Die is a phenomenal work of art.

As for the drama tracks... truth be told, I haven't even listened to the one that came out in April, so I'll read through some TLs now and record thoughts below the cut:

No One Lives Forever, translation courtesy of shinseimcd on Twitter

"Anti-Party of Words faction" Huh, like a government faction? I'm surprised the PoW allows other political parties or at the very least open dissenters. There was talk in some chapters of the manga of them punishing protesters, not to mention the way they crushed the TDD rebellion in its primacy. Either way, interesting, and I hope we learn more about this as time goes on.

Ichijiku and Nemu baking together is really cute lol

I love the way Ichijiku's whole personality shifts around Otome. Gap moe (????)

It's a cool tidbit that Nemu tends to prefer plainer outfits, as that tracks with how she dresses in TDD. Also, Nemu and Ichijiku shopping together is kind of bittersweet, since Ichijiku is clearly using Nemu as a replacement figure for her deceased sister...

Ichijiku secretly wanting to fall on the cute side of the cute/elegant spectrum is a pretty classic trope but a fun detail that's been hinted at already, since we've seen that she keeps a bow collection.

??? Rei's lab is on Battleship Island? Ohhhhhhhhh this is why Twitter was blowing up with controversy right after this track released... The IRL Battleship Island was home to forced labor of Korean and Chinese citizens during the twentieth-century push of Japanese imperialism which was later, iirc, denied in part or totally by the Japanese government to immense international backlash. Using this as a setpiece for Hypmic is oddly provocative, and I can't think why the writers would want to do that. On a much lighter note, this is also a headscratcher to me because isn't this a UNESCO World Heritage Site? The whole point of that is conservation, and I don't think building a clone lab counts as conservation... Unless they're implying the clone lab was built prior to the 1950s? Hm. Let's not go down this rabbit hole.

"I would like all of the True Hypnosis Mics. As well as all the Amemura clones." Oh? Are there more still alive? I thought Honobono ordered the death of the last remaining three... Well, that scraps a piece of writing I was working on LOL

"Your biometric data is required to access the mic storage facility" So how did the PoW get in?

Her? Heart stop beating? Oh for fuck's sake, is Rei's wife also in a coma? How many fucking characters are in a coma in this series... Whichever mfer invents a device that restores people from comas with no significant brain damage will make a fortune in this universe

"And I won't try anything funny." I do not believe this for one instant

Hmm, the framing of Otome planning this and the way she brushed past talk of countermeasures for the anti-PoW faction implies that Rei is heading this faction.

Oh, so they couldn't get past the biometric locks after all, I see.

I strongly dislike the idea of thirty clones for thirty mics and the nonchalance in which Rei goes, "Yeah, I'll ship them off to Chuuouku" like they're a parcel and not human beings, but that's my personal bone to pick w/ this character and setting.

I was intrigued by the notion of the PoW holding caucuses, implying there's some sort of democratic process in terms of choosing their own party members or positions, but the JPN audio doesn't specify that exactly.

"We no longer require the cooperation of Jakurai Jinguji." I know that this took like four years in real time, but in terms of the Hypmic universe... I mean, Jakurai didn't even do anything for them, did he? He went through all that moral dilemma for nothing, as far as I can tell. (I get that it sets up the reconciliation with Ramuda, but that's it? Seriously?) That's disappointing to roll it back so quickly.

"During the Division Rap Battle, the people of our nation will be focused on the tournament, giving us the opportunity to use the True Hypnosis Mics to mind hack the Anti-Party of Words faction who stand in our way, ultimately pulling them over to our side." Otome always has the most batshit plans. God bless. A consequence of her needing to drive the plot forward is that she'll say some of the truly silliest things I've ever heard. What a complete misappropriation of government funds lol. Also... is this stating there are only 30 dissidents (????), or can the True Hypmics brainwash more than one person at a time?

"Once that is complete, we will move on to other countries. And when we have taken over the world, then, in the true sense of the word, peace through the power of words will be achieved." LMAO? I'm sorry, this isn't very considerate of me, but in my initial impressions of this, I am well and truly gobsmacked. What in the actual fuck. How many clones will die for this? How much money will it cost? How does she think she stands any chance at governing so many people across such an area, even with a downsized population after WWIII? Homie... Never change, Hypmic, you are the wildest.

I can't believe Ichijiku is so whipped she's willing to go along with an absolutely nonsensical plan for world domination. Ma'am, Otome is not going to fuck you, and even if she is, it's not worth it! Ma'am!!! I'm sorry, I'm being petty and not giving this a lot of in-depth thought but LORD this is a trip on first read.

A FUCKING CLONE UPRISING AT THE HANDS OF REI? HAHAHAHAHA.

"World domination, huh, what a joke." Man after my own heart.

I'm actually quite interested in how this "mics are disabled forever" thing works. I guess the mics have a kill switch in them? I vaguely recall someone saying that in the manga years and years ago... Oh yeah, it was Ramuda in TDD 12. Huh, interesting if that was intentional foreshadowing (I'm not sure if I want to be that charitable). At any rate, can't everyone in the room just get new mics? Or does it affect their speakers and such too? I'm curious how that works, like if you build an affinity with a certain mic or some nonsense.

"looks like we won't be having any Division Rap Battles from here on out." Ah, and this is why the other half of Twitter was up in arms like "No more DRB??? End of Hypmic??" I guess.

The Block Party tracks are quite long, and since it's getting rather late for me, I'm going to leave off here for the moment. I'd like to continue this at my next available opportunity... WHAT a ride. Not sure when that will be, but I will add to this with a reblog when I can. And I know it's been months since this track came out, but I would love to hear other people's thoughts. I wasn't around much when it first launched, so I missed most of the commentary on it.

[bfpnola]

Hey. It's @reaux07. If you remember my last angry history rant on Paul Robeson, I'm back for Part 2. This time? King Leopold II and his relationship to the Congo. I just finished writing a 5-page, single-spaced essay on this for class, so I'll do my best to summarize in bullet points this time rather than chunky paragraphs. This will still be long though, as a warning, but it's a necessary read. Please let me get through this, because y'all know this hurts to write.

Trigger warnings for... just about everything typically associated with mass colonization (e.g. rape, murder, torture, etc.). Tiktok below as a brief introduction first:

King Leopold II of Belgium, due to his personal unpopularity and lack of love from his parents, had low self-esteem. As his father had already made 50 attempts to colonize foreign lands to no avail, Leopold felt the only way to uplift both himself and his country was to take take control of his own colony.

He checked Sarawak, the New Hebrides, the Fiji Islands, and the Philippines. Nothing. But what was left? The Congo.

How did he learn of the Congo? Leopold hired Henry Morton Stanley, a famous Welsh explorer of the time, to cross Africa from east to west, walking and canoeing 7,000 miles.

Upon the Congo's discovery, Leopold turned his palace into a luxury hotel for the delegates of a new conference to discuss Africa's colonization, supervising every detail. He successfully lied to the major powers of Europe, making claims of charitable and philanthropic aims, and that there would be free trade amongst the African colonies. (And yes, he did give every single attendee a painting of his face... Because he could.)

Meanwhile, back in the Congo, Stanley (the explorer I just mentioned) used bribes and trickery to provide official treaties with the various chiefs of the land in case Leopold ever needed legal proof of land ownership. (Ex of said trickery: One report noted that a village assumed "the white man controlled the sun.")

In 1891 and 1892, Leopold released decrees stating that both vacant land and produce of the forests exclusively belonged to Belgium and that natives could only harvest for the state.

Enforcing Leopold’s rule were 16,000 Africans equipped with modern Belgian-made automatic rifles.

Outing Attempt #1: One African American man, George Washington Williams, during his trip compiled a report to be sent to the American secretary of state. In this letter, Williams remembers bets being taken on who could shoot the native people in the head first, among other instances of vile treatment. While the document never made it back to Williams’ home country, it was eventually found in Europe where he later died.

By this point, the Congo was actually ruining Leopold’s finances and he was growing desperate. But to his surprise, he happened to pick the one spot where rubber grew in abundance, just as the demand for cars and bicycles rose internationally, John Dunlop, a Scottish veteran, having just invented the first pneumatic tire.

Because of this, rubber-prominent areas were the targets of mass exploitation and punishment if daily and weekly rubber quotas were not met.

Missionaries began to write not just to one another, but back home in disgust of these aforementioned “punishments,” one man’s writings put in missionary magazines and national newspapers in Europe. These punishments included rape, tying people up to trees, cutting off men's heads and genitals to be displayed along the fences of Congolese villages, cutting women’s breasts off, and most notably...

Attempt #2: The world, if only momentarily, saw BASKETS after BASKETS of right hands that had been cut off as proof that each of the cartridges given to the Africans had been fired and killed one of their own people. These hands were then smoked for preservation and brought back to their officers.

What did Leopold do once this information came out alongside photos of child mutilation? Acknowledge the abuses and moved on almost immediately.

In Europe, the rubber was processed in a city called Antwerp, ironically named after a mythological giant who also cut off hands. To this day, the connection between such a name and Belgian history has not been made by the general public as countless documents by the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs are kept secret to maintain an image of untouched royalty.

One commissioner in charge of a district in Congo, Leon Fievez, produced one ton of rubber a day, boasting of 1,000 people killed, 162 villages destroyed, burning gardens and plantations so people would starve, and having “only” used 3,000 cartridges. He was nicknamed the “Devil of the Equator” and rightly so.

Attempt #3: One day, a man named Charles Stokes, a British trader working for the Germans, entered the picture. Stokes was arrested for trading in state territory, despite those former claims of free trade, and sentenced to death. Leopold was forced to pay compensation to both Britain and Germany for his death, both countries now increasingly aware of the Congo’s dark reality.

To cover it up, Leopold made claims of the Congo opening up to new companies. Let's be real: His men were on the boards of all these new companies and he took 50% of the profits.

In particular were these "concession companies" where the "hostage system" was set up. Agencies, with official hostage licenses authorizing such, would take the wives of rubber collectors for up to 15 days until the quota was met.

On the 15th day, the men of the Congo either got their wives back or faced further punishment, often death. For the agents, the 15th day meant it was time to calculate commissions, and for the king? It was proof that this new hostage system worked.

These abusive concession companies lasted over 10 years until formal competition arose in South America and Asia.

Attempt #4: Then came Edmund Dene Morel, a half-French, self-taught shipping clerk turned investigative journalist who wrote in The Speaker of the abuses faced by the Congolese, backed up by evidence, not just speculations.

Due to Morel’s growing specialization in West African affairs, he was able to not only send out 15,000 brochures and 3,700 letters in six months after his move to Wales, but start his own newspaper, West African Mail.

By 1903, Roger Casement, an ally to Morel’s cause, spent two months traveling the upper Congo, recording African testimonies. He, too, realized that missionaries were key witnesses and went to visit Joseph Clark (a missionary of 20 years) for 17 days.

Through these reports, which grew to 50 pages in length, Casement and Morel were able to solidify Belgium as perpetuating the worst colonial system Africa had ever known. Punishments included Africans performing public incest for the colonists' entertainment, decapitation, women being stabbed with wooden spikes up their vaginas, and one woman tied up to a tree and slashed straight in half from her left shoulder through her abdomen and out the other side.

The West African Mail even reported on a part of Congo no one knew existed, private property within private property called the “Crown Domain” on the other side of Lake Tumba, which gained 231 million euros alone, all sent directly to King Leopold II. Crown Domain was 10x 5)3 size of Belgium.

Founded by Morel, Liverpool became the headquarters of a coalition called the Congo Reform Association. He also published a book called Red Rubber (1906). I think you’ll find the cover particularly striking! Check out the hand in the bottom right corner being weighed against King Leopold II on the left.

Leopold obviously not having this, commissioned a number of books and monthly magazines to clear up the mess. This didn't work. Obviously.

He even tried to send his own international commission to control what the Congolese said in 1904, to no avail. This was due to a missionary named John Harris who had taken the accounts of various people in the area and sent them back to Morel.

In one particularly heartbreaking moment, a chief brought to Leopold’s judges 110 twigs for each of the entire villages, not just people, killed by the Belgian state, naming every last one.

By the time they returned to Europe, the governor-general committed suicide and, upon being asked, Harris suggested Leopold should be sent to the gallows by the relatively new International Court of Justice.

The commission's report vindicated Casement and Morel. Leopold had tricked no one. EVERYONE in Belgium was calling him out.

Leopold ordered all of the Congo State Records to be burned.

In 1908, the Congo became a Belgian colony, not longer Leopold’s personal property. The state still made claims of "civilizing" the Africans after Leopold's death though, utilizing the leftover mineral exploitation industry with no guilt.

At least during his funeral, which he was denied of having privately, the entire city booed his body <3 well deserved. By this point, he had become Europe’s most hated man of the time.

And in case you were wondering, Casement and Morel were both accused to pro-German sympathies during WWI and executed.

I would like to add more detail but I think I’ve hit a character limit. Just know that Congo’s population was cut in HALF, in some places as much as 60-90%. Villages after villages were burned, as shown through so many soldiers’ and missionaries’ journals. This was a genocide of over 10 MILLION PEOPLE y’all. Hearing this story was truly SICKENING, but here’s the BBC 4 documentary we watched for class for more: Congo: White King, Red Rubber, and Black Death.

What truly gets me is just how OTHER colonizers were calling this man out after finding out the full truth… For me, that feels like extra proof of how truly messed up this was if THEY were disturbed too.

And what feels truly insidious was how Leopold made sure to institutionalize all of his wrongdoings and was so… obviously knowing about every wrongdoing, I mean writing in letters to make sure no one else found out. Please…

Linking my angry history rant on Paul Robeson from last semester here.

Happy Black History Month.

[the-furthest-city-light]

Question just for funzies I do not ship them, but do you ship mishanks?😂

I’ve just seen a variety of people who shipped zolu, ship also those two together. (Your fics are the ones that really sold zolu for me tho so thank you 🙏)

Shanks is one of the few characters I ship with basically all his major ships. Benn Beckman? I'm a sucker for the captain/first mate dynamics obviously. Buggy? Childhood not-so-unrequited lovers. Tragic. Gorgeous. Actually hilarious how pathetic they both are.

Mihawk and Shanks are interesting to me as individual characters so far with a potentially really interesting history. I really like the interactions we've gotten with them in canon. I like the theory that Shanks used to be Mihawk's only real rival for the title of "greatest swordsman" until Shanks lost his arm (which tbh just makes Zoro's willingness to cut his own feet off even funnier if true). It's not something that's really been explored in canon or elaborated on but they clearly have some kind of history there. Mihawk met Shanks's boy and booked it to whatever island he was hiding out on (in the new world??? How???) Immediately. It's an interesting reaction if nothing else.

Also, spoilers for egghead and Wano flashbacks below the cut.

My personal pet theory is that mihawk may be the one who inspired Shanks to get back into piracy in the first place. Mihawk was at Roger's execution and witnessed the birth of the great pirate Era. We know from the flashbacks that this invention inspired despair in Shanks, and he took a break from piracy for a while after.

We don't know what got him back into pirating, but imo, Mihawk seems like a likely option. Shanks never really saw Buggy as a rival (which isn't to say Shanks doesn't like or respect buggy, just that he never saw himself in competition with him the way it seems Buggy did with him). Mihawk calling Shanks out on his apathy when he clearly cares so much about the world and Roger's legacy (and whatever it was that had him crying when Roger and Co. Returned from Laughtale) would be a really interesting situation to witness Shanks in, and it would actually kind of mirror both Mihawk's initial meeting with Zoro ("don't despair kid, you've got a ways to go before you should think about giving up") and Shanks' role in Luffy's life as someone who inspired him to go to sea in the first place.

A lot of this is speculation obviously and I'll be interested to see how Oda characterizes Shanks and Mihawk's relationship and/or past going forward. But I can see something like this making for a really interesting foundation for a romantic relationship. We just don't have a ton of context!

[electricfied-wolf]

Y'know what, fuck it. Welcome to-

✨DO YOU KNOW THIS THOMAS & FRIENDS CHARACTER?✨

A brand new game I invented because I'm bored and also curious. The name of the game is I'll be making polls (as long as I remember to) with a TTTE character that might not have been seen by people other than fans of the media due to the main characters overshadowing them in most fanworks and in the situation of a lot of merchandise, as most folks associate the series with just Thomas and barely go beyond that. So, for the first poll of the season...

DO YOU KNOW THIS THOMAS & FRIENDS CHARACTER:

Emily, the emerald engine

Her biography according to the wiki: Emily is an emerald tender engine who lives and works on the Island of Sodor, and is the North Western Railway's number 12 engine. She is the Island's official "safety engine" and has her own set of passenger coaches.

(Reblogs are greatly encouraged and appreciated for a larger sample size! I am trying my hardest to push this poll towards non fans of the series!)

[fictional-orphan-smackdown]

PENULTIMATE ROUND, MATCH 1!

All propaganda and what each competitor is from under the cut

The Baudelaire Orphans (A Series of Unfortunate Events)

The epitome of orphans, they’re the best

“I’m having a very terrible childhood right now”-Klaus

The story deadass begins with them being told that their parents died in a fire and that they're orphans now. They then bounce from guardian to guardian who tend to always meet a gruesome fate at the hands of Count Olaf. Not only have they been orphaned once, but have been orphaned multiple times and are called "The Baudelaire Orphans" by not only characters in the book but by the narrator himself. They're called "The Baudelaire Orphans" so many times that it might as well be a defining character trait of theirs, and honestly it sort've is. The series doesn't even end with them finding a home or guardians of any kind, it ends with the Baudelaires fate being completely ambiguous with them literally sailing away from the island they were stranded on in the final book (yeah this series is quite the journey, I highly suggest it). These poor three kids are probably the most orphaned kids of all time since their orphaned in a new way almost every book and they deserve at least one win in their unfortunate tale.

These guys are like the poster-child of orphaning, we open the series with them finding out that they're orphans and also have no access to their money so now they hop around from place to place from weirdo caretaker to another weird/crazy/murderous caretaker and it's all fun and games and murder and decieving and surviving and thriving and---my point is, these three are a wonderful trio of siblings who love and rely on one another through all their trials and tribulations.

Literally every single one of their problems come from being orphans. They’re continually referred to as orphans and the plot of the first half of the series is them being shuffled around to guardians.

These kids are so orphaned they never even get a found family outside themselves. At least most stories featuring orphaned kids see them fulfill some sorta epic destiny or have them find a new home or set of loved ones of sorts. The Baudelaires? They're thrown from one fucking failure of a home into the next, ignored, hunted, etc.. It's been years but like, even in the end, they still have to set sail alone. As individual characters, they aren't bad either. Violet's the dependable big sister who's knack for inventions comes in handy, Klaus is a well-read chap and Sunny is a lovely gremlin. They make a good trio.

Every single guardian they try to obtain throughout the series turns out to be someone who wants the large inheritance left for them and is willing to do whatever it takes to get it.

They basically fend for themselves the whole series when no adult will listern to them. The whole series is them being resourceful and clever the whole series despite the misfortune. Violet is a brilliant inventor, Klaus reads and collects knowledge, and Sunny learns to be a good cook over the series

their parents die tragically in a fire and then everything awful proceeds to happen to them

I haven't read these books in years but if any orphans deserve to win a smackdown it's these fools, they are constantly in the trenches in those books goddamn. Also that baby is like a shredder they have that on their side, I think that beast literally solo'd a snake?

(This one was specifically for Klaus, but I'll put it here still) He and his sisters being orphans is kinda the point. As in many books, it's the trigger for them to change lives and navigating hardships. The thing is, their hardships just grow worse and "unfortunate" (read "dreadful") events keep happening to them as they stick together instead of the story getting better. Klaus and Violet become Sunny's subtitute parents and get through their more and more miserable lives together keeping hope things would eventually get better

Arguably more famously orphaned than Bruce Wayne, if not for how their story happens while they’re orphaned children versus an orphaned adult. Definitely have the most famously tragic post-orphaning story. All three are incredibly brilliant in their own way, including the literal baby. Pursued relentlessly by the leader of a maniacal theater troupe and letdown by a slew of adults, so it’s all the more impressive how amazing they each turned out to be. Book series was so good it got turned into a pretty great movie and then a successful TV show years later. Also can’t forget how these three are orphaned repeatedly as the distant relatives who take them in get killed off in increasingly inventive manners. Let’s be honest, ain’t no characters out here orphaning like the Baudelaire orphans.

this series taught me so many cool words and phrases and I love each of the 3 main characters so much

Violet, Klaus, and Sunny are peddled from caretaker to caretaker over the course of 13 books, always being chased by the evil Count Olaf who wants to steal the Baudelaire fortune that the children are meant to inherit once they reach a certain age.

Spoilers ahead, the Baudelaires siblings story starts with them going from being the Baudelaire kids to the Baudelaire orphans, after their parents pass away in a mysterious fire. But they arent the only paternal figures that they lost, they go from tutor to tutor, almost all the good ones dying in front of them, and even the ones that survive at first their future is uncertain since the last time the kids see them they are blindfolded in a burnind building, and we never found out who make it out alive and who didnt. Even the main villian, Count Olaf their first tutor, and the only constant adult in their life after their parents death ends up dying in front of them. These three are orphans ten times over.

They are THE orphans. They have lost not only their parents but multiple guardians that they went to live with as well.

They're THE Orphans. The childhood book orphans we all read, Orphans Prime if you will. They lose their parents, every caregiver who's ever kind to them, then say fuck it and live on a deserted island on their own to raise themselves abd fully embrace their orphan status. On the island, they learn their parents survived the shipwreck then died again - double orphaning even.

OH MY SWEET LITTLE CHILDREN THAT FUELED MY LOVE FOR READING AND THE MACABRE Violet- Won her first of many invention competitions when she was five with an automatic rolling pin (comprised of a window shade and six pairs of roller skates). Extremely innovative and genius, foiled by her kindness to others. And she knows how to make a Molotov cocktail. Klaus- Absolute monster of a bibliophile, conducts research for fun, and has a photographic memory. He is known to want nothing more than "a good book, a comfy chair, and the warm glow of a reading lamp". He also is a Herman Melville fan, which is points for him in my book. Sunny- Most people know her only for her penchant for biting, but Sunny is a distinctly distinguished character. She has sharp wit (as long as you can read it through her babbles), her poker skills are phenomenal for a baby, and she has quite the knack for cooking! Also yeah, the teeth. She climbed an elevator shaft with them once.

They are constantly going through it, give these kids a break for real

Chuck e' Cheese (Restaurant/family entertainment center chain)

Charles Entertainment Cheese grew up in St. Marinara orphanage and he loved singing, especially happy birthday. But he didn't know his own birthday (because he is an orphan) so all he could do was celebrate other kids' birthdays. His favourite part was the pizza. He also loved playing Pong and he went to New York City after winning $50 in a Pong tournament.

[bugswapau]

Interview Chandlo!

Time to ask the inventor a few questions.

“Have time for an interview?”

Are you out of your mind?! I can't have my secrets spread all over the front page news!

“But don’t you want to find Eggabell?”

Of course I do! But at the same time, I don't want THEM finding ME!

“What if your name wasn't attached?”

Hm... I suppose I can reveal a little so long as I’m left anonymous.

“Who are you?”

I am... Cha[CENSORED]bun. I have devoted my life to inventing devices that foil the machinations of the Grumpmasons.

“Why come to Snaktooth island?”

My dear friend Snor-[CENSORED] dragged me out here. He thought I needed some 'fresh air' or something. As much as I hate nature, I just couldn’t say no to him.

“How long have you and [CENSORED] been in a relationship?”

W-w-w-well! Aha! I-I-I mean, we've been friends since kindergarten. It would make perfect sense if we were — more than friends. He's never... said we are. Has he?

“Thoughts on Bugsnax?”

My guess is they are some sort of synthetic life form designed to seduce our taste buds.

“If Bugsnax are artificial, where do they come from?”

I'm glad you asked! I think there's a factory hidden somewhere underground on this island. I have the schematics! I'll have to show you my charts to you later.

“Why did you leave town?”

I was too exposed. Professor Woolbag was trying to drag me into her experiments, now that Eggabell and Lizbert couldn't keep her busy anymore. I realized this was the next step in the Grumpmasons' scheme against me.

“Grumpmasons plot?”

Eggabell disappears, we're hit by an earthquake, we suffer from a snak shortage… All in the same day? Do you REALLY think these are coincidences? I have a timeline of it all. They’re on my charts.

“Any info on Lizbert?”

Eggabell Batternugget was an curious sort who didn't possess a single bone of stupidity. She could compete with me in wits and [CENSORED] Sodie chugging contests. We occasionally exchanged secrets. Terrible, awful secrets…

“What ‘awful secrets’?”

Hahaha, well, I can’t TELL you the terrible secrets because they are AWFUL and SECRET!

“…yeah, I think we're done here.”

Excellent interrogation, Chum! So great that you deserve another hugging experience!

Hahaha, ha- This can NOT go on the record. I was contacted by Eggabell Batternugget after she found something on the island… a locked tunnel entrance protected by an odd object. I assisted her in discovering its mysteries, and soon after, she vanished. Be very cautious at all times! I can tell you where to find her, but the rest is up to you.

[anerol152]

Rating Sky: cotl seasons by how scary they are:

(that I have experienced)

Abyss: 10/10 - when I tell you the trauma; I was in beta for this yk, I got the black screen in original 4th task area bug plus got separated from bestie, I was legit so scared I closed the game, not to mention the end part (nah but that sheer empty space gave me flashback to the aforementioned quest and then the Leviathan, just, no); oh also the manta tanks implications, that's scary on a moral level

Prophecy: 7/10 - mf fire trial this is why I have trust issues in games when there's a completely dark room. fun season otherwise tho, loved the lore

Passage: 6/10 - another fun season for beta testers! I'll just come out and say it, the masks were creepy. the eyes and shadows in the forest were creepy. the other masks were even more creepy. it was just bad vibes idk man the masks felt evil

Shattering: 3/10 - this is another for the rage chart; like despite the premise of apocalypse event every now and then as well as King lore this really wasn't that scary; it made Eden very frustrating tho; like haven't forgiven them for that until this day frustrating

Revival: 2/10 - only reason for this rating is bc I know eden quest will spook the moths

Enchantment: 1/10 - was first season I experienced (for a week lol), going to a new sekrit place and seeing the mountain Krill before finding out it's harmless

Nesting: 1/10 - capitalism is very scary, so was the math for all possible furniture items geeeeeez

Little Prince: 1/10 - scary for my emotions; first child that made you go to Eden for funsies, love that for him, seeing him face the Krill was a bit scary (for him) I guess

Aurora: 1/10 - this was mostly sad, like very cool, very fun, but also sad, good tie to next season; absolutely horrifying in implications for animal exploitation and history of sky tho

Sanctuary: 1/10 - vacay Island! literally nothing to be afraid of besides maybe not being able to fly back up to rest of Prairie; crab cave ig? triggering the bugged belly rub spirit was terrifying for group runs tho

Flight: 1/10 - while this may top a rage chart also another chill season; scariest thing there is getting lost in the wind tunnels, or just that whole map part ig

Deer: 1/10 - just for that Krill moment at the start and a bit at the end ig, moth nightmare ig

Remembrance: 0/10 - nothing scary really, just sad, very very sad; loved the vault lore but man, especially w irl timing

Assembly: 0/10 - yeah dunno what could be scary there, besides maybe melting in the rain for moths

Performance: 0/10 - this was very fun! loved the lost twin lore bit

Dreams: 0/10 - another very cosy season, lots of feels but none of the scary

Moments: 0/10 - tourists at a nice valley the season, so nice they invented selfies

[fruitdaze]

2023 books wrapped!

i read 75 books this year, which is more than any other previous GR challenge and mostly a consequence of my need/desire to be distracted from my own thoughts at all times :') and overall it has been my best reading year in memory! i discovered so many new favorites and books that i know i'll return to again and again.

every book i rated five stars (* denotes reread from previous year):

YOUR EMERGENCY CONTACT HAS EXPERIENCED AN EMERGENCY by chen chen

SIX OF CROWS by leigh bardugo

LIU YAO: THE REVITALIZATION OF FUYAO SECT by priest

*IF NOT, WINTER: FRAGMENTS OF SAPPHO by sappho, tl anne carson

CAN CI PIN: THE DEFECTIVE by priest

*REMNANTS OF FILTH: YUWU by meatbun (7S version)

BABEL by rf kuang

THE ISLAND OF MISSING TREES by elif shafak

PAPYRUS: THE INVENTION OF BOOKS IN THE ANCIENT WORLD by irene vallejo

THE ART OF PROPHECY by wesley chu

THE LOCKED TOMB SERIES (GIDEON THE NINTH, HARROW THE NINTH, and NONA THE NINTH) by tamsyn muir

CANTORAS by carolina de robertis

*A FATAL THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM by emma southon

A POWER UNBOUND by freya marske

EMPEROR OF ROME by mary beard

THE WINTERNIGHT TRILOGY (THE BEAR AND THE NIGHTINGALE, THE GIRL IN THE TOWER, and THE WINTER OF THE WITCH) by katherine arden

A ROME OF ONE'S OWN by emma southon

honorable mentions:

THE GOVERNOR IS ILL by yang su

THE HURTING KIND by ada limón

TIAN YA KE: FARAWAY WANDERERS by priest

DEATH VALLEY by melissa broder

THE ROMAN REPUBLIC OF LETTERS by katherina volk