#Street Revolution Crew

[bidisastersanji]

Arcane One Piece AU (Fem!ZoSan centric)

Ok so this all started because of this post and galaxy braining with the amazing @anniilaugh can’t you just IMAGINE dyke Zoro circling and Kabedon-ing (pin against the wall) Sanji like “You’re hot, cook- so what’ll it be? Man or woman?” As they go into the brothel looking for information? SHE DREW THE BEST ART OF VI!ZORO RIGHT HERE BTW

Sanji is good with her legs so she would impress Zoro with her parkour skills

Sanji has a Taz British accent (like Caitlin has a British accent) but with lots of cursing (Zeff’s influence) “bollocks!” And some French cursing as well since he learned it as a kid (putain! Merde! Fait chier!)

Zoro wears the same hot dyke clothes Vi does- arms fully out, and pulls her hood on when she’s serious (like the bandana). She also has cool tattoos and the hand wrap things

She fights with hextech swords that look just like hilts until they’re turned on and the blades appear - she carries them looped in carabiners around her waist (seriously look at the art)

World-building wise: Underworld Zaun Kingpin Doflamingo (Silco) with the drug “SMILE” who has Piltover higher ups and police in his pocket (he has leverage like in one piece)

SMILE gives people strange powers but temporarily, like temporary devil fruits that leave you broken and drained

Powder is Luffy, Zoro’s adoptive little brother, they were raised by Kuma (Vander) after his failed revolution where their parents die, growing up with a small crew of misfit friends (including Kuina, who dies)

The tragedy happens and Zoro gets put into prison (on Doffy’s orders) while Luffy thinks Zoro abandoned him and is taken in by Doffy, becoming “Nika” (his unhinged alter ego is gear 5 like Jinkx is to Powder) , now growing up along kids like Law, Baby 5 etc . His hair went white from the stress of that fateful night/or he bleaches it

Caitlin!Sanji grows up in Piltover as a noble with the abusive Vinsmokes but runs away and gets taken in by a chef called Zeff (who lost his leg in the failed revolution but managed to start anew, tries to help Zaun how he can, sending food etc)

Zeff gets put in prison by the Vinsmokes to control Sanji and she’s forced to become an enforcer (Fem!Sanji in that little uniform oh god. Smoking her cigarettes with a stupid little hat and the gun she does her best to avoid using)

She still works after her enforcer shifts at the Baratie since shes always itching to cook, feed the hungry and to support party and carne and keep her adoptive dad’s restaurant alive (she knows of how bad people have it in Zaun, and before Zeff found her she was hungry and homeless)

Her weapon of choice is actually something she has strapped to her legs from her thighs to her calves (Zoro will be very distracted) some hextech steampunk looking thing that powers up her kicks and she can send her kicks energy forward to do mid range attacks

She uses her enforcer job to snoop around and try and figure out how to get her father out

Her lead takes her to Stilwater prison where Zoro has been beat and abused for several years

Cue scene where Sanji walks in to Zoro’s cell and sees her boxing like crazy and fuck she’s so hot wtf but also she feels terrible for her and her blood boils as she learns of the abuse she went through

Telling herself she must be going absolutely insane (but is she? She feels like this is the right thing. It’s fate) she forges release documents to get Zoro out, sure that her knowledge of the under-city will help her understand where the corruption lies and get Zeff back

Zoro immediately does not follow what she’s saying and goes on her own thing (PARKOUR!) and she impresses her by being able to keep up

Zoro still gets lost and turned around

Are you sure you know the under-city, mosshead?

Zoro stops at a street food stall and Sanji is annoyed at first- as well as disgusted by how she shovels it in her mouth, but softens and silently rages when Zoro shares that she’s been starved a couple of times in Stillwater

Cue the brothel scene omg

Circling Sanji and pushing her up against a wall “You’re hot, cook. So what’ll it be, man or woman?”

Zoro walking by Sanji talking up another woman in the brothel after her talk with Nami (head of the brothel) and smiling to herself

Jayce is Franky who is experimenting with the crystals to create hextech, Viktor could be iceburg, Vivi is the hot politician lady (Mel)

Firelight is “Sogeking” - zoro and Luffy’s childhood friend Usopp (Ekko)

Also Taller than Zoro Sanji aaaaa

Zoro calling Sanji “officer” to annoy her - only switching to “cook” and “curly” as an alternative nickname

[choolantanavt]

Have you heard about Dabloon Tiktok?

If not, allow me to help you. It all started with this cat.

This is Dabloon Cat. Originally, they give you 4 Dabloons and would also sell Soup for 4 dabloons.

Since this moment, the economy has exploded. Currently, I have 733 Dabloons, a small frog companion, a guard dog who is a Karate Master, and a pretty hefty inventory including my Travel Bag, Water Bottle, and Steel Sword.

I use my Steel Sword to protect myself and others from thieves; even though I have a Rune of Protection. I am also part of a secretive anti-capitalist revolution to attempt and properly redistribute Dabloons equally in society.

Many creators in the Dabloon space work increasingly hard to create random encounters that show up on your FYP. What was once simple meme images of cats has evolved into high production value clips full of art and editing. You night be robbed in the streets of the city, you might join a pirate crew, or you might cook a cake with a cat, or meet Bugs the Food Certified cat who will sell you French Fries.

Tiktok has somehow created an entire shared world, with an economy and political leaders and infrastructure (ACAB includes Dabloon Police). Some people speak of inflation but the news stations are suggesting any gifts of more than 10 Dabloons may be fraudulent.

I guess what I'm trying to say is...

Why can't Tumblr do something like this. I don't wanna be on tiktok anymore.

[october-writes]

Icarus sneak peek...

Okay, so I'm being super generous with this sneak peek because I have no idea when I'll be ready to post the whole fic. Pandora!Verse Leon has a long, bittersweet backstory and I love it, but it's a lot to get down especially when all I want to do is cry and hug him. 😫

Thank you for your patience. Any likes/comments here or on Pandora are the fuel that keeps the fic engine running.

‘Is this really where you grew up?’ she asked, her voice light with surprise.

He turned in time to see her cringe at the question. She’d been quiet since the drive away from the motel and the scene with Russ and his posse. No, scratch that. Ada had kept to herself because he’d asked her to and he’d been kicking himself for that ever since.

His stomach flipped whenever Ada asked him about himself; one part excitement, one part terror. He wanted to tell her everything and, in turn, he wanted to know her as well as he knew his deepest desires. But he was scared of the guy in those stories. Steadfast, optimistic, stable, responsible. He was sure that version of him had died on a forest floor. Now he was trying to live up to his own ghost.

Leon swallowed before replying glibly, ‘Nope! I grew up in a house.’

‘You know what I meant, Leon.’

God, he loved the way Ada said his name; like she owned the word, like no one had ever called him that but her.

‘Okay. I spent a lot of time here too,’ he conceded, nodding at the front facade of the church and the flawless circle of its Gothic stained glass window, ‘One Easter when I was fourteen, me and the chaplain’s son changed the sign out front to read: “Honk if you love Jesus”.’

She spluttered on a laugh, ‘You did what?’

‘You could barely hear mom’s sermon ‘cause of the car horns. I would’ve been grounded ‘til Christmas, but lucky for me she has a sense of humour! Damn. I was such a little asshole when I wanted to be.’

Ada bit her bottom lip until it shone pearlescent pink and he couldn’t look away from her mouth.

‘I could show you around,’ he offered suddenly, ‘If there was time.’

‘Really? And where would you take me?’

Her eyes glinted like a dare. He’d reignited her interest in him and they were back there again, at the edge of something beautiful and dangerous.

Go ahead. Impress me, rookie.

‘Well, um... there’s the Boott Cotton Mills Museum just across the canal,’ he suggested weakly, his throat suddenly dry, ‘I uh... I wrote an essay on it in High School.’

Her eyebrows twitched, ‘High School...?’

‘Yeah, it was on child labour reforms during the Industrial Revolution. I got an A minus.’

Oh for the love of- Shut up, shut up, shut up!

Ada blinked at him before turning away, ‘Interesting. Maybe some other time.’

Her eyes went dull, the glint of challenge extinguished. They were left beneath the cool light of the street lamp looking at everything but each other.

‘Come on. We should get going before I’m recognised,’ he said, leading her across the street, ‘We’ll check out the back lot.’

Leon remembered the first time Sarah had taken him to First Presbyterian to help out the day crew, officially as penance for his reckless escape attempt on his first night under her roof. He hadn’t been due to start school for another week and, while he’d been sincerely forgiven for his antics, he’d still been grounded.

The church ran a Day Centre from Monday to Friday, the doors opening at eight on the dot come rain or shine or biblical levels of snow. Refreshments, clean clothes and pastoral counselling were available no questions asked and, in the evenings, volunteers served hot meals alongside a rotating programme of art therapy, sign language classes, and addicts anonymous meetings.

Sarah had started the programme during her first few months in Lowell. The way some locals liked to tell it, Sarah had crashed into town on a wave of radical ideas. The Day Centre hadn’t been popular with everyone, bringing ‘undesirables’ and addicts from the fringes into the centre of town where they were harder to ignore.

‘I’ve brought the poor and the sick to Jesus’ doorstep, just like he instructed,’ she’d retorted, knowing the Bible was her home turf and she’d arrived ready to fight dirty, ‘If you’ve got a problem, take it up with him!’

‘I’m on a first name basis with the Mayor’s office,’ Sarah had boasted as they’d carried boxes of donated clothing through the back of the church, ‘Mayor Wiggins reminds me every time I stop by that I shouldn’t let it go to my head! I think he preferred the old pastor, Reverend Dawson. But Wiggy knows I’m better at getting things done. He’d rather boil his own head in lard than admit it though, so I’m not holding my breath for the key to the city!’

Young Leon had tipped his head back to take in the building’s decadent red brick and stained glass, its silver spire bouncing the sun towards every corner of Lowell.

‘Is all this yours?’ he’d asked.

He’d lingered at the threshold, a deep breath ballooning his stomach as he’d prepared himself to enter. The air had smelled apple-crisp, the pavement sun-dappled and warming the tops of his sneakers. It had stirred something familiar inside of him. But he hadn’t been inside a church since... since they’d buried his mom.

Sarah had chuckled, bumping the backdoor open with her behind, ‘Oh, no! Frannie belongs to everyone. But I am humbly responsible for her, like a sheepdog with her flock.’

She knew the church well enough that she could walk through it backwards without knocking into anything. All the better to keep her eye on Leon so she could read her new foster son’s lips.

‘What does that make me?’ he’d wondered as he’d followed her, ‘Like... a stray puppy or something?’

She’d hooted at that.

‘I don’t tell people who they are, Leon. But if I am to be completely honest, which under his roof is essential,’ she’d thrown the box of donated winter coats onto a nearby table and had turned to relieve him of the ones he’d carried, ‘I am sincerely looking forward to meeting the man you’ll become some day.’

Leon hadn’t known what to say to that.

Old foster parents, social workers, even a cop once; they’d all warned him that who he was becoming was someone he should be afraid of, ashamed of. But Sarah had greeted all sides of him like they’d known and loved each other for years.

The Day Centre had become a fixture of Leon’s teenage years from that day on. He’d never been much for the services, the singing, the prayer. But he’d helped out with the art classes and he’d learned how to cook in the community kitchen. He’d taken sign language classes after school and pulled weeds from the community garden across the street. He’d done his homework in Sarah’s study, her day sermons sailing in through the open window like a warm breeze.

When he’d turned fifteen and grown a foot taller in what had felt like a week, Leon had begun captaining one of the local street hockey teams. Their casual league had been run out of the back lot of the church.

He remembered long afternoons three times a week, two dozen kids howling like wild animals after sunset, and sweating even when it was so cold he could see his breath. Rhonda in the goal, as reliable as rain in September. She’d used the church to escape her alcoholic dad for a few hours a day. And Marty, a formerly homeless teen, playing offense and doing a backflip every time he scored. The slap of hockey sticks, rollerblades tearing up the tarmac, a puck smacking off a brick wall, his heart in his throat as a shot narrowly missed a car window.

There was still a dent in a lamp post from where one of Leon’s shots had gone wide. It had struck the post so hard the bulb had gone out. They’d played the rest of the night by the light of the church’s silver steeple and it had felt like an incredible dream.

It had been yesterday and forever ago. But as Leon walked the lot with Ada now, a part of him was convinced he’d be back here tomorrow, hockey stick in hand with his skates tied at the laces and slung over his shoulder.

‘The Day Centre closes early Thursdays,’ he told Ada as they lingered at the edge of the lot, ‘It shouldn’t be this busy.’

The lights were on and the church shimmered from every window. The front of the building was still bustling, so they’d given it a wide berth. Though Leon had his cap down, he’d grown up inside these walls. There was no way he’d make it to the rectory without being recognised.

Ada was getting restless. Her face was hidden by her hood, but Leon could see the tense line her shoulders made beneath her sweater.

‘Maybe things have changed,’ she muttered.

‘She’ll be here,’ he replied, ‘That much’ll be the same. I know it will.’

Minutes later the backdoor to the church opened and Pastor Sarah stepped into the warm summer night.

Her dark hair had regrown in gentle waves, softer and less curly than before her illness and now tinged with grey. She wore a thick cardigan, unbuttoned and showing off a baggy Guns and Roses tour t-shirt that Leon had stolen from her closet about a hundred times before it had stopped fitting him.

Leon muffled a quiet laugh into the collar of his jacket, but deep down he felt like sinking to his knees.

He knew Lowell’s streets. He knew there was a house a few blocks away where his old bed waited and his sketchbooks tumbled out of the wardrobe in an avalanche of memories. But ‘home’ was a complicated concept for a guy who’d had so many. A one bedroom in Chicago snuggled safe between his mom and dad, Buchanan with its dreams unfulfilled, in shady motels forever awake in front of a TV with the sound as low as it would go, and finally seven foster homes; a number that made ‘normal’ people from ‘normal’ families wince so he’d stopped repeating it until he could almost imagine that his early childhood had happened to someone else.

For Leon, ‘home’ had eventually come to mean Sarah reminding him to be back by ten. Home was the leftover casserole in the fridge with his name on it. It was about not being alone at the kitchen table because Sarah would always wait up and ask him how his game went. She’d even pretended to understand the rules.

Someone Leon didn’t recognise stepped out with Sarah. It was an older woman in a long cotton dress. She and Sarah shared a quick hug before the woman left for her car. Sarah stood in the doorway and waved goodbye. Then she slid back into the church, disappearing like a dream at sunrise.

Ada was watching Leon. Her gaze passed up and down his face, mapping the angle of his nose and the cleft of his chin like they’d just met. Leon knew what she was thinking.

He and Sarah sang off-key to the same songs, they ate their eggs over-easy with too much Tabasco sauce, and they both thought cilantro tasted like soap. But they didn’t look even a little bit alike.

‘I’m adopted,’ he explained.

She frowned, surprised, ‘Oh. I see. I’m sorry.’

‘I’m not.’

‘I didn’t mean... I just didn’t know.’

‘But you knew my mom was a pastor?’

‘It was in your obituary.’

Leon did a double-take, ‘My... what? I have a damned obituary?’

‘Of course you do! You died,’ Ada replied sardonically, ‘Your colleagues had some interesting things to say about you.’

‘Yeah, I bet,’ he winced, and his mind raced to suss out exactly what Ada knew about the old him as filtered through the eyes of his peers. They’d treated Leon like he was fresh out of school and an old man at the same time, ‘Come on. It’s now or never.’

The back of the church held Sarah’s office, a common room for the staff, and a library that smelled like cold coffee and chocolate. Leon opened the door quietly and checked it was empty before ushering Ada inside.

They heard voices echoing from the church hall beyond the big wooden doors:

‘Has anyone seen Pastor Sarah? We’re running low on baby formula!’

‘She’s in her study. Don’t trouble her. I’ll call the supplier first thing tomorrow.’

‘I’ve barely seen her all day, Lucille. Is this ‘cause of that silly protest outside the Governor’s office? I told her to take it easy!’

‘She’s tired, Frank. Let her be.’

Sarah’s office door was ajar. Leon could see her shadow spilling over the desk and onto the carpet. He could smell her hand lotion, its residue on the doorknob. His eyes drifted shut as his hands formed a tight claw around the knob like he’d forgotten how doors worked.

Maybe this was a mistake. A panicked sensation surged inside his chest. Ada was right. Umbrella could be monitoring Sarah. He could put her in danger just be showing his face around town. He should go, shouldn’t he? Right now, just go and leave her be. He could think of another way to track down Jill and Chris.

And what was he going to say to her? How could he explain what had happened to him? She’d thought he was dead for nearly two years, but at least her ignorance had kept her safe.

Leon tensed when he felt a pressure on his forearm. He looked back to find Ada gently peeling him away from the door.

‘I’ll go first,’ she whispered, her dark eyes trained on his face, ‘I’ll make sure she’s alone.’

He nodded but Ada was already slipping past. She opened the door just enough to squeeze through.

‘Pastor Morris?’

A chair scraped the floor as Sarah stood.

‘Yes?’ her voice sounded jittery like she’d just woken from a nap, ‘Hold on... Let me just...’

There was a long pause. Leon guessed Sarah was fumbling with her cochlear implant.

‘Could you come closer, honey?’ Sarah said breathlessly, ‘I can’t quite hear you all the way over there. Are you here about tomorrow’s charity drive?’

‘No. No, I’m...’

Leon swayed on his feet, his ears ringing. He’d been so nervous, he’d forgotten to warn Ada that Sarah was deaf. He mentally kicked himself.

Then Ada raised her voice and when she spoke, she filled all corners of the little study, her voice lifting its high ceiling and rustling the pages of every tome. Like a fair summer wind, she was the little lift he needed to make it home.

‘I’m a friend of your son.’

Then it was as if they were the only three people in the building. A silence enveloped them, as dense and safe as stone. Leon didn’t feel himself move, but he felt Ada’s hand, warm and insistent around his wrist as she pulled him through the doorway and into his mother’s study.

Sarah, to her credit, didn’t cry out. She didn’t seem to be breathing either.

‘Mom?’

Her hands flew to her mouth. Her eyes turned red to signal an oncoming wave of tears. But when her hand fell, Leon saw she was smiling like it was the first time he’d ever called her that. It wasn’t, not by a long shot.

Leon took a step towards her. Then he stopped, realising that Ada was still holding his wrist. Her grip was loose, almost reassuring. Not too much pressure, just enough; like a whispered phrase he felt all the way up his arm to straight to his heart: ‘I’m right here’.

When his hand slipped from hers, Leon still felt her warmth; that fair wind driving him forward.

Sarah whined softly. She rubbed at her throat like the words had gotten tangled up in there and she needed pry them away from each other. Her fingers were trembling and he realised she was too overwhelmed to sign to him.

He stepped towards her and raised his hands to tell her:

I’ll explain everything. I promise.

I’m so sorry, mom. I’m sorry...

He made a fist with his thumb extended and scored circles with it deep into the centre of his chest. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.

Sarah dove forward and latched both her hands over his fist. Then she tugged him forward and threw her arms around his shoulders. She clung to her son like the grave could snatch him back. She buried her wet nose into the crook of his neck. Then she keened against his shoulder, a wordless cry of grief and joy combined that shook his core.

‘I love you so much. Okay? I love you,’ Leon murmured into the crown of her head where his tears were already soaking her hair. He hoped she could feel the raw honesty in his voice even if she couldn’t make out the words, ‘I missed you. I did! I missed you, mom.’

Who knows how long they huddled in the centre of her study? Long enough that his face was still pink but finally dry when they parted. Long enough that Sarah could stand to let him go so she could snatch a tissue from the box on her desk while laughing at how terrifying and strange and wonderful this was.

And long enough that when Leon looked over his shoulder, he saw that Ada had disappeared.

🥲

To be continued...

[richincolor]

9 QTPoC books for your 2023 Pride Month TBR

Happy Pride Month! Every year, I do a little round-up of YA books starring LGBTQ and BIPOC characters that have come out so far this year. This year was particularly exciting -- there were so many books that I loved or have at the very top of my TBR! So, without further ado, here's 9 of them for your TBR!

The Wicked Bargain by Gabe Cole Novoa El Diablo is in the details in this Latinx pirate fantasy starring a transmasculine nonbinary teen with a mission of revenge, redemption, and revolution.

On Mar León-de la Rosa's 16th birthday, el Diablo comes calling. Mar is a transmasculine nonbinary teen pirate hiding a magical ability to manipulate fire and ice. But their magic isn't enough to reverse a wicked bargain made by their father and now el Diablo has come to collect his payment: the soul of Mar's father and the entire crew of their ship. When Mar is miraculously rescued by the sole remaining pirate crew in the Caribbean, el Diablo returns to give them a choice: give up your soul to save your father by the Harvest Moon or never see him again. The task is impossible--Mar refuses to make a bargain and there's no way their magic is any match for el Diablo. Then, Mar finds the most unlikely allies: Bas, an infuriatingly arrogant and handsome pirate -- and the captain's son; and Dami, a genderfluid demonio whose motives are never quite clear. For the first time in their life, Mar may have the courage to use their magic. It could be their only redemption -- or it could mean certain death.

Fake Dates and Mooncakes by Sher Lee Heartstopper meets Crazy Rich Asians in this heartfelt, joyful paperback original rom-com that follows an aspiring chef who discovers the recipe for love is more complicated than it seems when he starts fake-dating a handsome new customer.

Dylan Tang wants to win a Mid-Autumn Festival mooncake-making competition for teen chefs—in memory of his mom, and to bring much-needed publicity to his aunt’s struggling Chinese takeout in Brooklyn.

Enter Theo Somers: charming, wealthy, with a smile that makes Dylan’s stomach do backflips. AKA a distraction. Their worlds are sun-and-moon apart, but Theo keeps showing up. He even convinces Dylan to be his fake date at a family wedding in the Hamptons. In Theo’s glittering world of pomp, privilege, and crazy rich drama, their romance is supposed to be just pretend... but Dylan finds himself falling for Theo. For real. Then Theo’s relatives reveal their true colors—but with the mooncake contest looming, Dylan can’t risk being sidetracked by rich-people problems.Can Dylan save his family’s business and follow his heart—or will he fail to do both?

Ander & Santi Were Here by Jonny Garza Villa Aristotle and Dante meets The Hate U Give meets The Sun Is Also A Star: A stunning YA contemporary love story about a Mexican-American teen who falls in love with an undocumented Mexican boy.

Finding home. Falling in love. Fighting to belong. The Santos Vista neighborhood of San Antonio, Texas, is all Ander Martínez has ever known. The smell of pan dulce. The mixture of Spanish and English filling the streets. And, especially their job at their family's taquería. It's the place that has inspired Ander as a muralist, and, as they get ready to leave for art school, it's all of these things that give them hesitancy. That give them the thought, are they ready to leave it all behind?

To keep Ander from becoming complacent during their gap year, their family "fires" them so they can transition from restaurant life to focusing on their murals and prepare for college. That is, until they meet Santiago López Alvarado, the hot new waiter. Falling for each other becomes as natural as breathing. Through Santi's eyes, Ander starts to understand who they are and want to be as an artist, and Ander becomes Santi's first steps toward making Santos Vista and the United States feel like home. Until ICE agents come for Santi, and Ander realizes how fragile that sense of home is. How love can only hold on so long when the whole world is against them. And when, eventually, the world starts to win.

She Is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran A house with a terrifying appetite haunts a broken family in this atmospheric horror, perfect for fans of Mexican Gothic.

When Jade Nguyen arrives in Vietnam for a visit with her estranged father, she has one goal: survive five weeks pretending to be a happy family in the French colonial house Ba is restoring. She’s always lied to fit in, so if she’s straight enough, Vietnamese enough, American enough, she can get out with the college money he promised. But the house has other plans. Night after night, Jade wakes up paralyzed. The walls exude a thrumming sound, while bugs leave their legs and feelers in places they don’t belong. She finds curious traces of her ancestors in the gardens they once tended. And at night Jade can’t ignore the ghost of the beautiful bride who leaves her cryptic warnings: Don’t eat.

Neither Ba nor her sweet sister Lily believe that there is anything strange happening. With help from a delinquent girl, Jade will prove this house—the home her family has always wanted—will not rest until it destroys them. Maybe, this time, she can keep her family together. As she roots out the house’s rot, she must also face the truth of who she is and who she must become to save them all.

Venom & Vow by Anna-Marie McLemore, Elliott McLemore Keep your enemy closer.

Cade McKenna is a transgender prince who’s doubling for his brother. Valencia Palafox is a young dama attending the future queen of Eliana. Gael Palma is the infamous boy assassin Cade has vowed to protect. Patrick McKenna is the reluctant heir to a kingdom, and the prince Gael has vowed to destroy. Cade doesn’t know that Gael and Valencia are the same person. Valencia doesn’t know that every time she thinks she’s fighting Patrick, she’s fighting Cade. And when Cade and Valencia blame each other for a devastating enchantment that takes both their families, neither of them realizes that they have far more dangerous enemies.

Cowritten by married writing team Anna-Marie and Elliott McLemore, this is a lush and powerful YA novel about owning your power and becoming who you really are - no matter the cost.

You Don't Have a Shot by Racquel Marie A queer YA romance about rival soccer players from author Racquel Marie, perfect for fans of She Drives Me Crazy .

Valentina “Vale” Castillo-Green’s life revolves around soccer. Her friends, her future, and her father’s intense expectations are all wrapped up in the beautiful game. But after she incites a fight during playoffs with her long-time rival, Leticia Ortiz, everything she’s been working toward seems to disappear.

Embarrassed and desperate to be anywhere but home, Vale escapes to her beloved childhood soccer camp for a summer of relaxation and redemption…only to find out that she and the endlessly aggravating Leticia will be co-captaining a team that could play in front of college scouts. But the competition might be stiffer than expected, so unless they can get their rookie team’s act together, this second chance―and any hope of playing college soccer―will slip through Vale’s fingers. When the growing pressure, friendship friction, and her overbearing father push Vale to turn to Leticia for help, what starts off as a shaky alliance of necessity begins to blossom into something more through a shared love of soccer. . . and maybe each other.

The Dos and Donuts of Love by Adiba Jaigirdar A pun-filled YA contemporary romance, The Dos and Donuts of Love by Adiba Jaigirdar finds a teenage girl competing in a televised baking competition, with contestants including her ex-girlfriend and a potential new crush - perfect for fans of The Great British Bake Off and She Drives Me Crazy!

“Welcome to the first ever Junior Irish Baking Show!”

Shireen Malik is still reeling from the breakup with her ex-girlfriend, Chris, when she receives news that she’s been accepted as a contestant on a new televised baking competition show. This is Shireen’s dream come true! Because winning will not only mean prize money, but it will also bring some much-needed attention to You Drive Me Glazy, her parents’ beloved donut shop.

Things get complicated, though, because Chris is also a contestant on the show. Then there’s the very outgoing Niamh, a fellow contestant who is becoming fast friends with Shireen. Things are heating up between them, and not just in the kitchen. As the competition intensifies, Shireen will have to ignore all these factors and more― including potential sabotage―if she wants a sweet victory!

My Dear Henry by Kalynn Bayron In this gothic YA remix of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, a teen boy tries to discover the reason behind his best friend's disappearance—and the arrival of a mysterious and magnetic stranger—in misty Victorian London.

London, 1885. Gabriel Utterson, a 17-year-old law clerk, has returned to London for the first time since his life— and that of his dearest friend, Henry Jekyll—was derailed by a scandal that led to his and Henry's expuslion from the London Medical School. Whispers about the true nature of Gabriel and Henry's relationship have followed the boys for two years, and now Gabriel has a chance to start again. But Gabriel doesn't want to move on, not without Henry. His friend has become distant and cold since the disastrous events of the prior spring, and now his letters have stopped altogether. Desperate to discover what's become of him, Gabriel takes to watching the Jekyll house.

In doing so, Gabriel meets Hyde, a a strangely familiar young man with white hair and a magnetic charisma. He claims to be friends with Henry, and Gabriel can't help but begin to grow jealous at their apparent closeness, especially as Henry continues to act like Gabriel means nothing to him. But the secret behind Henry's apathy is only the first part of a deeper mystery that has begun to coalesce. Monsters of all kinds prowl within the London fog—and not all of them are out for blood...

As You Walk On By by Julian Winters The Breakfast Club meets Can't Hardly Wait with an unforgettable ensemble cast in another swoony YA contemporary from award-winning author Julian Winters!

Seventeen-year-old Theo Wright has it all figured out. His plan (well, more like his dad's plan) is a foolproof strategy that involves exceling at his magnet school, getting scouted by college recruiters, and going to Duke on athletic scholarship. But for now, all Theo wants is a perfect prom night. After his best friend Jay dares Theo to prompose to his crush at Chloe Campbell's party, Theo's ready to throw caution to the wind and take his chances.

But when the promposal goes epically wrong, Theo seeks refuge in an empty bedroom while the party rages on downstairs. Having an existential crisis about who he really is with and without his so-called best friend wasn't on tonight's agenda. Though, as the night goes on, Theo finds he's not as alone as he thinks when, one by one, new classmates join him to avoid who they're supposed be outside the bedroom door. Among them, a familiar acquaintance, a quiet outsider, an old friend, and a new flame . . .

[collapsedsquid]

I’ll conclude by returning to a theme I brought up earlier: the shrunken time horizon of the US ruling class. The current motley crew looks nothing like the set who planned the post-World War II order. They emerged from—or recruits were assimilated to—an ethnically and socially homogenous WASP aristocracy who felt themselves above quotidian distractions and rank commercial temptations. Of course, it was all in the interest of long-term accumulation under US guidance, but it was all successfully planned and executed (at least until things started slipping some in the 1970s). Now with the US in a long process of imperial decline, our planning elite seems fragmented and lost. You have Republicans criticizing Biden for not having shot down the Chinese balloon quickly enough, and Democrats acting as if it was an act of heroism. Our rulers don’t act like they have any good idea about coping with the rise of China, except with bellicose and one hopes ineffectual gestures, because God knows, we don’t want bellicose gestures to lead to an actual war.

And we have a capitalist class that has apparently given up on the future—incapable of dealing with the climate crisis, a truly dire threat, but also consuming capital rather than investing it. Net investment—net, that is, of depreciation—by both business and government—has been falling relative to GDP for decades. The vast flow of free money and 0% interest rates from the Federal Reserve has been channeled into an impressive set of bubbles: the most extended valuations of stocks in US history, crypto, unicorns, housing. It used to be normal to have one particular asset lead the way in a speculative orgy, whether it was stocks in the late 1990s or housing in the following decade. Now we’ve got multiple and serial bubbles that have only been partly deflated by the Fed’s tightening moves of the last year. And Wall Street is dearly hoping the central bank will reverse those moves in a few months and resume the cheap money flow. The bond vigilantes of the 1980s and 1990s, always on the lookout for an inflation that needs to be crushed, have largely disappeared.

I’ll give the last word to Etienne Balibar, who has diagnosed the affliction precisely. “We realize now that our ruling class is no longer a bourgeoisie in the historical sense of the word. It does not have a project of intellectual hegemony nor an artistic point of honor. It needs (or so it thinks) only cost-benefit analyses, “cognitive” educational programs, and committees of experts. That is why, with the help of the pandemic and the internet revolution, the same ruling class is preparing the demise of the social sciences, humanities and even the theoretical sciences.” The bourgeoisie no longer has any civilizational project, national or otherwise. Live for today, and if the water rises, they can just move inland. Or to their underground bunkers.

post-nationalism

[queereads-bracket]

Queer Fantasy Books Bracket: Round 1

Book summaries below (and bonus article by Sascha Stronach):

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

Greece in the age of heroes. Patroclus, an awkward young prince, has been exiled to the court of King Peleus and his perfect son Achilles. By all rights their paths should never cross, but Achilles takes the shamed prince as his friend, and as they grow into young men skilled in the arts of war and medicine their bond blossoms into something deeper - despite the displeasure of Achilles' mother Thetis, a cruel sea goddess. But then word comes that Helen of Sparta has been kidnapped. Torn between love and fear for his friend, Patroclus journeys with Achilles to Troy, little knowing that the years that follow will test everything they hold dear. Profoundly moving and breathtakingly original, this rendering of the epic Trojan War is a dazzling feat of the imagination, a devastating love story, and an almighty battle between gods and kings, peace and glory, immortal fame and the human heart. Fantasy, historical fiction, mythology, retelling, romance, adult

The Dawnhounds by Sascha Stronach (The Endsong series)

A police officer is murdered, brought back to life with a mysterious new power, and tasked with protecting her city from an insidious evil threatening to destroy it. The port city of Hainak is alive: its buildings, its fashion, even its weapons. But, after a devastating war and a sweeping biotech revolution, all its inhabitants want is peace, no one more so than Yat Jyn-Hok a reformed-thief-turned-cop who patrols the streets at night. Yat has recently been demoted on the force due to “lifestyle choices” after being caught at a gay club. She’s barely holding it together, haunted by memories of a lover who vanished and voices that float in and out of her head like radio signals. When she stumbles across a dead body on her patrol, two fellow officers gruesomely murder her and dump her into the harbor. Unfortunately for them, she wakes up. Resurrected by an ancient power, she finds herself with the new ability to manipulate life force. Quickly falling in with the pirate crew who has found her, she must race against time to stop a plague from being unleashed by the evil that has taken root in Hainak. Fantasy, science fiction, biopunk, adult, Māori-inspired*

*Additional context: I also want to share this article by Sascha Stronach that was posted earlier this week (literally perfect timing). Especially since I'm including words from the marketing copy like "Māori-inspired" on the polls in the hopes that it helps readers find their new thing, it felt important to add the author's own words on the difficulties of working with US-based publishers and the power they exert over the process

[mariacallous]

Russian women have, shockingly, embraced the Kremlin’s war in Ukraine despite the heavy toll it exerts on their men.

Though Russia doesn’t disclose casualties, they are mounting. Scores of new graves housing the remains of “heroes” are popping up across the country as the labor ministry requests certificates for families of the deceased by the hundreds of thousands. While the state heaps praise on these men in death, in life it seems to view them as disposable. Russian officials have made this abundantly clear, repetitive to the point of cliché: “Women will give birth to more.”

Despite standing to lose so much, the wives, mothers, sisters, and girlfriends of Russian soldiers have largely nodded along with the Kremlin’s moribund determination to grind down their men. They weep at makeshift memorials to Yevgeny Prigozhin, the late chief of the paramilitary Wagner Group. They show little gender allegiance to the women of their former sister republic. Some are actually proud of their “defenders,” egging them on to rape Ukrainian women should they get the chance. In packed concert halls across the country, girls sing along ecstatically to “Ya Russky” (“I am Russian”), the country’s new patriotic anthem. Their faces soften the song’s promises to “fight to the end” and “spite the whole world.” That seems to be the point.

Russian womanhood, routinely held up in the country’s lore as a paragon of strength, patience, and sacrifice, is now functionally a cover-up for the crimes of Russia’s men. Two of Russia’s most notorious propagandists, Margarita Simonyan of Russia Today and Olga Skabeyeva of the Russia-1 television channel, are women, as is Maria Zakharova, the boorish spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Beneath them lurk less prominent figures with important platforms. There’s Putin’s Brigades, a motley crew of activist grandmothers who have abandoned their communal yard benches to rally the masses for President Vladimir Putin and his war. They call on U.S. President Joe Biden to stop “NATO’s war against Russia” and on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to surrender. The Project in Red Dresses, which is supported by an organization run by one of Putin’s relatives, mobilizes women across Russian towns. Draped in red, they waltz through public spaces, seeking to both boost women’s confidence and unite Russians around their leader.

Women support the war effort in other ways, too. Back in my hometown, my mother’s acquaintances are knitting camouflaging nets for Russian troops and teaching children how to make trench candles to send to the battlefield. Schoolteachers—the majority of whom are women—are now responsible for children’s patriotic upbringing. In the state-mandated weekly class “Conversations about important things,” teachers disseminate Kremlin-approved talking points and rally support for the war among children as young as kindergarteners—lining them in Z-formations, organizing visits and weapons demonstrations from “defenders of the motherland,” and even engaging children to help produce those weapons. Teachers who disagree with the war or try to get out of this duty are denounced—often by other women—and subsequently fired or forced to quit.

Women haven’t always been so compliant with the state’s agenda. In 1917, they famously took to the streets to protest food shortages and the monarchy, sparking the strike that eventually triggered the Russian Revolution. More recently, the Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers of Russia was instrumental in pressuring then-President Boris Yeltsin to end his war on Chechnya in 1996.

Nearly two years of Russian carnage in Ukraine, however, have produced mostly acts of individual heroism. For instance, Channel One Russia employee Marina Ovsyannikova made an on-air appeal to viewers not to believe the state’s lies about the war. The artist Sasha Skochilenko swapped supermarket labels with messages about Russia’s crimes in Ukraine. These acts did not go unpunished: The former has since fled the country, while the latter was sentenced to seven years in prison.

Subversive performance art, once a tool of female dissent, is no more. After serving prison terms for their anti-Putin anthems, members of the feminist band Pussy Riot are now in exile, raising money to support the Ukrainian military. These days, the mere suspicion of “radical feminism” can land one in prison. Playwright Svetlana Petriychuk and theater director Yevgenia Berkovich, the duo behind an award-winning play about Russian women who married Islamic State fighters, were accused of “justifying terrorism” and were jailed in May 2023.

Women are now more likely to spend their energy on procuring fake medical certificates to excuse their sons and husbands from war than on resistance of any kind. Those who privately disagree with the war—their number is anyone’s guess—keep the sentiment to themselves. But their personal hesitations have sparked nothing remotely political, let alone a challenge to Putin’s willingness to wage war.

It is hard to say how much of the population’s 70 percent approval rate for the war is driven by fear, propaganda, or ignorance, but one thing is clear: Since the start of the invasion, the already-malfunctioning Russian moral compass has broken irrevocably. Designated to reproduce life, women now must participate in Putin’s show of death.

Seeing their men off to some kind of calamity has long been considered part of the bargain of Russian womanhood. The movies of my adolescence, which coincided with the last decade of the Soviet Union, featured countless examples of men marching off to fight our enemies—World War II, World War I, the civil war, the Napoleonic wars, the Mongol invasion, the Viking raids. In literature class, I memorized the monologues of wounded heroes; during choir lessons, I sang sad ballads with titles like “Goodbye, Boys,” begging soldiers sent to war “to come back alive.” This proposition wasn’t theoretical: My male classmates faced a real prospect of being drafted into the Soviet-Afghan War upon graduation. After that war, there were others; even during the post-totalitarian 1990s, war was never absent from the public’s mind. Someone, somewhere, was always waiting for “our boys”—the absolving way in which Russia routinely refers to its soldiers—to return.

While the boys were hailed as heroes, the options available for girls and women were less inspired. In a patriarchal society, like Russia and the Soviet Union before it, there are few acceptable female archetypes during times of war. Motherhood is one. In the Soviet era, it was epitomized in Mother Heroine, an honorary title awarded to women who bore and raised 10 or more children. Introduced under Joseph Stalin in 1944 to address the massive population loss during World War II, Mother Heroine codified the Soviet woman’s primary duty as the producer of manpower, a resource to be used at the state’s discretion.

After providing children for the state, the Soviet woman’s task was then to galvanize them into fighting for it. At the site of the Battle of Stalingrad, there is a colossal statue of a woman brandishing a sword, titled The Motherland Calls. At 279 feet, she is the tallest woman in the world, perpetually summoning her countrymen to battle. The Motherland Warrior, as we might call her, reminds citizens that their motherland is under threat and then assures them of the righteousness of any war fought in its defense.

Women under war were also encouraged to share its burden on the battlefield. In Soviet books and movies about World War II, women were often comrades-in-arms. Female sharpshooters killed Nazi officers, blew up German trains, and suffered Gestapo torture without shedding a tear. Though she fought alongside men, the Comrade-in-Arms still carried the emotional responsibilities of womanhood: She cared for the wounded and inspired them to commit more acts of heroism, just like their Mother Heroines did from the home front.

Between wars, women were equal partners in delivering on the state’s agenda, whether harvesting fields on collective farms or laying the bricks of the great construction projects of communism. In the iconic Moscow statue, Worker and Kolkhoz Woman, a man and woman put this partnership on display, holding up a hammer and sickle triumphantly as they labor together toward the building of the socialist state. This gender equality, however, was less the product of idealism than economic necessity: Soviet leaders had to conscript every resource available to compensate for the flaws of their planned economy.

These archetypes, defined and promoted by the state, were meant to carve out and assign value to women’s roles in Soviet society. The reality behind them, however, was far less glorious.

The equal partner’s experience, for instance, did not feel very equal. Though women were emancipated by the revolution and encouraged to labor alongside men, their contributions were not rewarded with political power. Only four women ever breached the ranks of the Politburo, the highest communist body of political power; their prospects at the local level were similarly bleak. Beyond poster cases like sending a woman to space, an average Soviet woman’s celebrated equality mostly amounted to the double burden of work and household duties.

Nor could those state-imposed archetypes override the informal but pervasive attitude that women were the “weak sex”; this sealed their inferior position in society. From childhood, girls were groomed to compete for men by looking pretty, excelling at housework, and guarding their fertility (“Don’t sit on cold surfaces—you’ll freeze your ovaries!” our mothers, schoolteachers, and concerned strangers instructed.). In the lighter Soviet movies, even imaginary women who held positions in high society pined for marriage and children. Female intelligence was viewed as a handicap. A smart woman was a woman who didn’t know her place, a criticism that dogged Mikhail Gorbachev’s obviously smart wife, Raisa Gorbacheva, throughout his political career. In marriage, patience and self-sacrifice were considered the highest virtues, as demonstrated by the wives of the Decembrists, the 19th-century aristocratic women who voluntarily followed their husbands to Siberian exile in the aftermath of the failed uprising.

In the provincial town where I grew up, little respect existed between genders. In divorce, which was common, men’s infidelities, drinking, and beatings were often sheltered under the legal euphemism of “irreconcilable differences.” In the street, catcalling women and grabbing their bodies were the norm. Three of my close friends had their first sexual encounter in the form of rape. All three assaulters were boys we knew: our boys. My friends never reported the crime, unwilling to add societal condemnation to the despair they suffered in private. There were only so many ways to be a woman in the Soviet Union, and a victim was not one of them.

Perestroika, the period of liberalization started by Gorbachev in the mid-1980s, brought real rather than proclaimed agency to Soviet women. Shaken by the unfolding collapse of the socialist economy, most women had to concentrate on pulling their families out of financial ruin and had little time to spare for politics. But not all. Though they were still exceptions in the male-dominated political scene, several female trailblazers rose up during this time. Political dissident Valeria Novodvorskaya, who lived through decades of arrests and forced psychiatric treatments for protesting the Soviet regime, created the country’s first non-communist party, Democratic Union, effectively breaking the one-party state system. Galina Starovoytova, a democratic politician and advocate of ethnic minorities’ right to independence, became one of the most recognizable faces of the Gorbachev-Yeltsin era, as did journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who rose to the top of the largely male profession with her human rights activism and fearless coverage of the Chechen wars.

The 1990s, a decade of relative freedom ushered in by perestroika and the collapse of the Soviet Union, proved insufficient to revert Russia’s bend toward patriarchy. Gender equality is an expression of freedom, and Putin liked control. It didn’t help that both Starovoytova and Politkovskaya were assassinated, or that Novodvorskaya, among the first to ring the alarm on Putin, was repeatedly labeled “dem-shiza,” or “democratic schizophrenic.”

As Putin gradually retooled the country into an autocracy, he hijacked the ever-present fear of war lingering in a nation that had seen its men mowed down by the millions and painted it not only as inevitable but honorable. In his endless military spectacles, women in period combat nurse costumes marched alongside Topol missiles, walking reincarnations of Soviet-era war film stereotypes. Their cheery presence lent an air of legitimacy to the state’s escalating violence.

Putin wrapped sexism in dated chivalry rituals, like flowers “for the beautiful sex” (as women are often referred to in Russia) sprung on female politicians. Crude sexual jokes and rape talk, previously taboo in public discourse, were now gamely dispensed by Russia’s man in charge, met with laughter and applause in return. The international community may have been aghast in 2022 when Putin quoted an obscene Soviet-era punk rock lyric about raping a sleeping woman to explain his demands for Ukraine: “Whether you like it or not, bear with it, my beauty.” But in Russia, this phrase is familiar, quoted by men and women. In a society built on violence, revolutionary or otherwise, a woman always loses.

There is no obvious end in sight to this regression. The war in Ukraine has hastened the post-perestroika narrowing of paths available to Russian women, and their value is once again defined by their compliance with the war effort.

Today, even mothers and wives demanding the return of their sons mobilized to fight in Ukraine often start by avowing their support for Putin’s war; many simply insist on replacing their men, who paid their dues, with others. The promise of the equal partner is also fading: In wartime, putting their careers first is not a viable option for most women. The longer the war goes on, the less funding will be available to health care and education, sectors that traditionally employ women, as money is redirected to industries that more tangibly support the war effort. The GDP boost from increased military spending will be offset by Western economic sanctions, so women planning business careers may have to reconsider how they spend their time.

As abortion restrictions expand, there are now few legal offramps available from the path of motherhood, and aspiring career women will instead have to make do with the task of raising and educating future soldiers—an occupation they are encouraged to start shortly after completing their secondary education.

The resurgent Russian Orthodox Church, Putin’s main ally in turning Russia into a conservative bulwark, has expanded its mother-forward offerings to help women bear with this reality. New rituals and holidays were introduced to celebrate “traditional family” and “traditional values,” code words for LGBTQ denialism, and the woman’s role as the “keeper of the hearth.” In squares and plazas across Russian towns, Vladimir Lenin’s statues have begun sharing public space with those of previously unknown saints designated as the patrons of family and marriage.

The Mother Heroine, Motherland Warrior, and Comrade-in-Arms are alive and well in Putin’s Russia. Joining the ranks of these surprisingly durable Soviet archetypes is the soldier’s wife-in-waiting. She supports the war from the rear, infuses children with pride, and doesn’t ask questions if her man is reported dead or missing. This last attribute, not asking questions, seems to be the defining feature of acceptable Russian women today.

What, then, is the Russian woman’s reward for her compliance? The short answer is: not much. Russian oligarchs, the country’s proxy for economic power, are almost exclusively men. Women make up roughly 18.3 percent of the Russian parliament. In terms of pay equality, women earn about 70 percent of what men do in similar jobs. Culturally, misogyny and sexism flourish. Russian comedy shows often portray women as too dumb to tell the steering wheel from the shifting gear.

A deadlier plague is domestic violence, a problem recycled from Soviet times and the times before them. One-fifth of all Russian women have been physically abused by their partners. Every year, some 14,000 women are killed by it—that’s nine times more than in the United States, which has twice the population. The actual number is likely much higher, since many women are afraid to report incidents of violence against them. In 2017, with the support of the Russian Orthodox Church, the Russian Duma decriminalized domestic violence that doesn’t require a hospital stay. It is as if the state itself has embraced the worn Russian saying, “If he beats you, it means he loves you.” Given the toughness of this love, it’s possible that for some women, seeing their abusers off to war becomes a path to liberation.

It’s certainly a path to economic improvement. The $2,535 monthly starting wage offered to those enlisting to serve in Ukraine is nearly 14 times higher than the median salary in Russia’s economically depressed regions, which deliver a disproportionally large number of recruits. If they die in combat, oh well. Better to go out a hero than, as one Russian priest said, the usual “choking on their vomit.” The families of fallen soldiers can also receive lucrative “coffin money” payments for their troubles, a rare glimmer of economic opportunity for working- and lower-class Russians. In July 2022, Russia-1 aired a story advertising the riches of enlisting to fight: The family of one deceased soldier sorrowfully recounted how they bought a previously unaffordable Lada car with the payout for the death of their son who dreamed about having a white car—“just like this one”—then drove it to his grave.

For many women, the price of resistance may be higher than they’re willing to pay. But if they continue to go along with all this, they’ll be doing so under increasingly dangerous conditions. Already-rampant domestic violence will only get worse as the war goes on and civilian men are maimed by battle and replaced back home with traumatized veterans and pardoned convicts. In the past year or so, returning “heroes” have raped teenage girls and burned their sisters alive. One convict-turned-Wagnerite stabbed to death an 85-year-old woman after terrorizing others with an ax and pitchfork in truly Dostoyevskian fashion.

For crimes against women, however, there are few punishments so long as they are committed by those willing to sacrifice for the Kremlin. A lieutenant colonel from Kuzbass was detained for the murder of an 18-year-old girl nearly two months after Putin made him a “Hero of Russia.” Following the arrest, he was defended by his superiors for having “brought invaluable benefit to the motherland in the fight against the Ukronazis.” Another man was pardoned from an 11-year prison term for murdering his girlfriend and putting her corpse through a meat grinder, after enlisting to serve in Ukraine.

A nation can be judged by how it treats its women and its girls, to paraphrase former U.S. President Barack Obama. Russia’s abuse of women, plastered over at different points of its history by the rhetoric of equal rights and traditionalism, underwrites the brutality of its war on Ukraine. If men can pillage and plunder their own, nothing stops them from exercising that right in a foreign land with a gun and a hero’s medal. Having abdicated their collective responsibility to call their men to answer, Russian women find themselves in an increasingly dehumanized society, where support for the war is not a guarantee against becoming its victims.

[marcusrobertobaq]

soo what kind of headcanons do you have about what happens after the successfull revolution + connor army? like what are all the characters doing? what will the world look like? will androids rule over the humans?

It's kinda difficult for me really thinking about a post-canon scenario itself but I think I got some basic stuff in mind.

[ALERT OF BIG ASS TEXT]

So first off all I think it's just the beginning of a quite turbulent period in US, both economically and legally. The androids start taking Detroit, like, the whole city after they took from Belle Isle to Downtown. I also must remember even if we got a sympathetic public opinion doesn't mean everybody is suddenly chill about androids, it's quite the opposite. The majority is either neutral or negative about it but now there's a big enough supportive crowd

Everything in the city is kinda "dead" for some months due to the androids not working anymore, the humans who stayed in Detroit are kinda worried but some folks think it's a good message to Cristina and CyberLife the androids taking Detroit

We got some looting and troublesome folks on the streets in the first days but after the android leadership reassure they won't bother patrol cops as long as they don't attack androids out of nothing there are few cops patrolling around

Yep, I do hc androids took HQs, including where the mayor (who ran away for safety) stays. After very few days the android leadership wanted her back so they can talk, very few people from the staff stayed during the event of Nov 11th

Some people in some major cities are trynna escalate hostility towards androids due to the whole "first they took our jobs, took a city now they wanna get paid for it?" sentiment. Anti-Android groups will always be Anti-Android groups. Difference is now there are Pro-Android groups to point out hypocritical discourses

[Kara Captured] Kara and her crew are in Detroit after being saved by the rebels. For now they're just walking from place to place to stay, maybe the androids are even turning the camps into bases and they stay there for some weeks. Alice discover other android kids and start developing ties with 'em even tho everybody is kinda shy, Luther is always there more closely

Kara and Luther managed to get in contact with Rose again somehow after few days

After the battle was over androids were finally able to decide what to do with the ones who fell in battle. There's no one to bother 'em bout looting CyberLife stores for supplies. They managed to bring some back to life, other ones weren't that lucky. I like thinking they managed to brought Josh back to life

[Kara Leaving Detroit] Kara and her crew are in Rose's family house in Canada, they stay mostly inside the house or in empty places they can't be recognized, but usually no one really recognize 'em or detect weird things on 'em ID, still they were recommended to not leave tracks

But they ain't the only ones that made across the border. I guess they stay there for some good weeks waiting what the Canadian suits will decide about the android situation, considering Detroit was taken by the androids. At the same time they're happy they escaped the confront Luther is worried they may be trapped in there for the moment, totally dependent on Rose's crew

The androids may have sent a "violent" message with the assaults on the camps but a considerably amount of people supports 'em. They usually leave the androids alone but some folks like helping androids getting fixed or even clothes - these people are usually people that dislike Cristina's acts

Markus finally got 3 days of peace waiting for the gov to seek dialogue while the internet is in total chaos, he realizes his rebellion started a political polarization "war". Simon and North ain't surprised

Markus broadcasts another message saying humans shouldn't see androids as the enemy cuz guess who started the whole problem? Exactly. It's part of a new tactic of trynna get more human support and put 'em against the gov and CyberLife, after all humans and androids share the planet, they WILL have to cooperate

Suits just don't know where to start, what the androids want and how modifying laws is something that people need to sit down and think about everything. Not to mention they're kinda desperate cuz androids got the economy hostage and lotta stuff in the country is just not working cuz androids refuse to work

First step was considering androids a new species on paper, and also the right of owning things related to 'em wellbeing and being able to refuse orders, just a temporary change (a first deal) - that's where the conflict starts as lotta people dislike the idea of androids receiving a relatively "good" compensation for labor. And also what's attached to the fact now androids are considered people (in the "rights" sense) as a non-human person

We got people divided, politicians wanting to farm votes, tech specialists worried suits don't know how to deal with things, especially without complicating things for humans as androids even if people they're still computers. There are riots, protests both pro-human and pro-android all over the world. Pro-humans are actually more pissed at the fact the top brass never listened to 'em own people but now they're moving everything as fast as possible for androids

Pressure was made in CyebrLife letting android related supplies in androids hands but there's this thing called capitalism and they kinda want androids to pay taxes and pay for 'em products if they really want to be considered people. They often use this narrative to manipulate androids against humans in a subtle way, ofc using politicians

Connor is alive and helping some new Jericho folks, the androids he converted got a positive image of him and often sees him as a leader or sorts. I dare saying some may develop a crush on him

He's now trynna figure out what CyberLife's next step and this is exactly what North got in mind

Thing is our friend here doesn't stop and stay in a specific place, he likes walking around alone analyzing just for fun and also cuz he thinks he may be a high value target, so it's more difficult catching a moving target. With this he kinda met lotta people (humans and androids) in the neighborhoods. But he usually stays with the androids in Downtown (up until they start going more north and northwest in more quite places) and sometimes talk to Hank to know how's he's doing (considering the events from LCC and CLT)

Connor explains his situation and everything he discovered bout CyberLife to Markus, North and Simon and they all agree they gotta be the ones making the moves first considering CL is powerful and got lotta corrupt politicians on 'em hands. But they still worried CyberLife may try something using Connor again

CyberLife is now in a tight situation considering they lost deviant Connor, and the fact everybody saw the android marching on TV makes more difficult for 'em to just send another Connor in uniform

Markus got a bit ? after Connor told him he was gifted to Carl...and that Kamski was the one doing it. Ain't a relevant topic in the moment as they're trynna deal with the politicians in the table of diplomatic negotiations but they're both curious about it

Jericho leadership starts getting in contact with other android rebel groups first in the state of Michigan and later other cities like NY and Chicago

Even with all the pressure I hc it took around a year to get some papers with basic things actually made, like, altering Android Act and some other constitution lines to add androids as a person

It was actually funny cuz there's the whole "are non-deviants considered people? Or they still just machines, products?" and Markus and North hated the idea of choosing who deserves rights based on what humans think a person should be. They tried forcing CyberLife to unlock all non-deviant androids from the handler system but faced quite a resistance at first

They had lotta reunions with the president, some secretaries and the mayor in Detroit and they often ended up without major progress due to the nature of what androids were asking and the consequences. I think divided people making noise outside was what made things go more slowly. Let's not forget about the elections factor here.

This New Year's Eve was def a different one, but I guess by december we already had more people on the streets, a decent number just having 'em business as usual after few months but still not the average movement at all

A deal was made where all androids that escaped to Canada are to return to US. If Kara escaped there I like thinking she returns. I honestly don't know what to think about it in a smaller picture cuz I just don't know how the Canadian gov would react and if they would start accepting androids there based on the events from Detroit

Markus didn't want get involved in all this political mess but he was the leader, the face and he wanted to be a present guy instead of just recording videos and making broadcasts like some sorta "I took your city hostage, pay this price and we let 'em go". North knew the country was in a fucked up way and that it could mean terror for humans (economically and politically) and that they should use it at 'em favor. They had all the time in the world, still they didn't want to make innocent people suffer and be equal to the same gov that forgot about 'em

Kara can't help but watch the news and Alice is also always curious about why things are so complicated, she feels kinda sad. If she's in Canada she can't help but want to explore this new world she's in with Kara and they know

Hank left/got fired from the DPD after everything that happened, he couldn't just work for an Anti-Android org like that anymore, he and Chris were the only ones that were positive about androids, all the other rest thought androids were make things difficult in the city.

[In the verse where Hank punch Perkins] the guy indeed pressed charges against Hank. I still don't know what he's doing after this whole thing, maybe just at his home or trynna help the androids with donations

Basically androids are still fighting for 'em things even after months, humans too. It'll be always be like that until people get used to androids fighting for something, I guess. Some places are more chill than others

Android psychology and physiology became a quite relevant theme and people wanting to make some studies about it, especially deviancy (CyberLife is alert on this one). Techies will be techies.

Androids didn't get the right to vote until 2040, the year the new Android Act was finalized and also... I think it's the presidential elections year? I don't remember. The country is still trynna recover from the 2038 events

There are still conflicts in the labor kinda thing as androids are computers and almost no one wanna pay former slaves but they also recognize paying a human can look more "expensive". I think a deal was forced to be made where androids receive very little money or worked the double and it created a whole ass conflict cuz what about android care and all this thing? All machines need care and shit, but at the same time what happens to humans? This conflict still a thing even after temporary measures

Markus also wanted humans to have jobs instead of everybody using androids, an equal balance but some suits probably didn't see this as something very positive but let's not forget the androids got the upper hand in the negotiation tables

Well, I guess that's all for now. I really ain't got a long term thing in mind as it's something I feel like sitting down and studying so u make better scenarios but I think u get the idea and where I'm going.

[cleopatrachampagne]

i know i’m far from an expert on history but it always bothers me to see bob marley’s portrait hanging in my local weed shop. like, i’ve loved reggae music since i was young, well before i ever smoked weed, i know listening to music is pretty rad when stoned, and i admit i understand that a lot of prominent figures and concepts idolized by the hippies and revolutionaries of the 60’s and 70’s in the usa eventually became synonymous with drug use, esp marijuana, due to smear campaigns against counterculture so maybe it is a kind of defiance to display it proudly? but while i understand the admiration a lot of disillusioned young people in the usa in the 60’s and 70’s would have felt for the people fighting the class war in jamaica and the reggae music emerging with lyrics about said war but still pushing for peace, for one love, as they worked to topple inequity and corrupt systems while redefining perspectives on race, oppression and intergenerational trauma but how did bob marley become “the weed man” in the cultural consciousness when he was a spokesperson for political change and class revolution? is it only that way in the us? do other countries and cultures see him as more than a stoner icon with his face on rasta memorabilia sold at jacked up prices to college kids who have never even heard of the rastafari revolution, the pan-african movement or the jamaican civil war, idk why but it really does bother me to see a strong voice for peace and change reduced to a face plastered on drug paraphernalia and stoner t-shirts. like… damn. that’s the death of a revolutionary in the capitalist tradition, i suppose. bob marley’s portrait hanging above the bud hut cash register, “grunge” clothing sold by fast fashion corporate hellholes, t-shirts with kurt cobain’s suicide note written on them being sold for 800 bucks a pop, eat the rich stickers for sale on amazon of all places, santa muerte being sold as a goth accessory or a “hardcore” generic tattoo in the us stripped of what she symbolizes to me and many other latina/o people who were raised with mexican neopaganism and folk catholic traditions, sanitized street art commissioned by some silicon valley suit that is purely aesthetics with no heart, no soul, nothing related to the authenticity of artistic vandalism, just imaginary street cred points for a rich dick. i get the same feeling in my stomach seeing the “aesthetic” whitewash of counterculture, the clownery of “alt” culture on apps like tiktok, the cashing in on the suffering of the oppressed for a quick buck and the tragic victory of cementing hippies and beatniks and freedom fighters in the minds of the following generations as degenerate druggies (thanks nixon and crew) that i get when i hear that pop remix of “the hanging tree” and it’s a lot to take in while i’m just trying to buy a box of strawberry cough prerolls.

[buffshipper8490]

Rating Mature

Chapter Summary

Led by Finn, the oppressed citizens of Coruscant revolt against the First Order. In an effort to put an end to the rebellion before it spreads, Chancellor Hux deploys the fearsome bloodtroopers, his elite Red Army. Meanwhile, Poe, Chewie, and BB-8 return to the Skywalker— the Eclipse class Star Destroyer the Resistance stole from the Kuat Drive Yards— where Poe must convince a downtrodden Leia to set a course for Coruscant to help Finn and his People's Resistance fight...

Excerpt

We’re doing this, we’re really doing this, Finn thought as he crouched in an abandoned building. There were hundreds of the people from the underground with him here, placed all over the street, watching and waiting for the First Order to spring the trap they’d set for them. They from all over the galaxy, from every walk of life. Some humanoid and others decidedly not. They had come to Coruscant in hope of a better life and ended up living in the sewers. But they were all here for the same reason, the same cause. Everything he and Rose had talked about was coming true. This was the revolution, this "People's Resistance", and he was leading it. Well, maybe it wasn’t exactly what they’d talked about. Rose was supposed to be here with him. But there was no time for him to fall apart, not when he noticed movement down below. Two small figures emerged from a side street, swallowed up by the desolate urban landscape. As they got closer, Finn could make out a familiar golden protocol droid and a blue and silver astromech by his side. Finn sighed to himself. “Come on, Threepio. Not now.” On the ground, the two droids went on, completely unaware of the trap they were walking into.  Artoo beeped nervously. “I agree,” said Threepio, looking at the charred tank Finn and the rest of the People's Resistance members had placed at the far end, practically right in front of them. “This certainly isn’t the Coruscant I remember.” Just then, a shadow fell over them both. A towering AT-MT walker entered the from one end of the boulevard, dwarfing the droids as they watched it pass. Threepio’s photoreceptors glowed in the gloom. “Oh dear.” Finn held his breath. Everything hinged on this moment, and of course the exact moment when the First Order found their bait, Artoo and Threepio would somehow find their way directly into the thick of it. It was almost pathological. The walker paused directly beneath their hideout, and Finn exhaled. It was working. Even with the droids in the mix, they had it exactly where they wanted it. Now he just needed Threepio to stay quiet for once. The comm he’d stolen crackled to life, set to the same frequency as the walker pilots. <Any life forms?> asked the walker pilot. <Nope.> replied his co-pilot. Finn tensed. It was now or never.  “Now!” he shouted, his crew firing grappling guns into the building opposite. The lines criss-crossed over top the walker, the two pilots too busy focusing on the droids and the burned out tank to notice what was going on overhead. Maybe Leia had a point. You should never underestimate a droid. “On my mark.” Finn checked to make sure everyone was ready. “Three... two ... one… go!”

New fanfic link! Likes ❤️ and Reblogs 🔁 are much appreciated!

[kaelleid]

Izzy Hands Fic Recs (July 1-31st)

My favorite of the Izzy fics that I read between July 1-31st 2023. See other recs here.

in the wake of tales by zythepsary (Ed/Stede/Izzy)

Izzy and Stede are seized off the street, handcuffed together, and held for ransom. Together, they must figure out how to escape before they can be used as bait for Blackbeard's capture.

when we fight about love by focusfixated (Stede/Izzy)

After brokering an uneasy peace, Izzy Hands, Stede Bonnet and the rest of the Revenge’s depleted crew are thrown together for a mission: find Edward, snap him out of his terrible madness, and then – and then.

Black tea and other revolutions by Mikaeru (Stede/Izzy)

It seemed like Stede and Izzy were in a constant state of fighting, both over menial and meaningful matters. Edward found their fights extremely funny, and he never weighed in on them; they were adults, they could work it out on their own. Problem was, they never really did. They just fucked about it. It didn’t solve anything, and the same problem came up the week after that, and the week after that, again and again and again, and all they did was fuck about it...

A Gentleman's Dueling Rules by Malikat22 (Stede/Izzy)

What if Izzy challenges Stede Fucking Bonnet to a duel and loses?

Say the Word by TheRosetteThief (Stede/Izzy)

In 1920s San Francisco, Izzy is in a committed relationship with drag artist Stede Bonnet. After Edward says some unfortunate things, Izzy starts thinking and that's a dangerous road to go down. He starts worrying about his role in his relationship with Stede and is forced to face some things about himself.

It Will Come Back by CyborgShepard (Izzy/Calico Jack)

Something’s been watching him for a while now. Not much Jack can do about it other than roll a smoke and sit by his window a bit, pull apart and put together his double barrel with one eye on what he’s doing and the other on what’s in the gloom. He’s not seen it, and whatever it is keeps itself scarce during the day. But in the night, he knows it’s there. Feels it, in the fine hairs on the back of his neck when the sun isn’t there to warm it.

[can-of-maple-beans]

Sonic underground really missed out considering that Silver was created like 7 years after the show was created.

He just seems like a perfect fit as the oracle, i mean silver is already a character who goes back in time to prevent the future from turning into chaos, that description could fit the oracle to a tea with only slight changes to the show.

Plus, just imagine the drama.

The hedgehog triplets are running down different streets, when they suddenly get a glance of what appears to be their helpful guide. They drop everything and rush to see what advice he could hold, but they're met with a rather confused hedgehog.

Like if you've seen sonic you'd know what was going on, but for a new viewer it could definitely add mystery and conflict. There's also the fact that it would be easy to introduce him in the main cast as his life now circles around this revolution.

I feel like sonic underground could've really benefitted from different members of the sonic crew in general. Like just add in shadow or tails and things would be so cool.

[antifainternational]

any reccomendations on how to get in touch with brisbane antifa? (if they exist). haven't been able to find anything. also i say a nazi at the train station the other day, so many dogwhistles. i didn't know what to do. he made smalltalk with me as we were boarding. any advice on what to do in a situation like that? (making this anon so people don't know where i live)

Why not hit up Antifa Australia and see if they know what's going in Brisbane? Or look for the next Permanent Revolution show in Brisbane and go!

It's hard to advise you on what to do when encountering a nazi one-on-one like that in ordinary life - too many variables we don't know of (what you're up for, who's around, etc.), all of which would factor in on "to confront or not to confront." The Baldies - who were the original anti-racist skinhead crew - had a policy in Minneapolis. If they ran into a nazi, they'd tell the nazi to lose all their nazi dogwhistles ASAP because the next time they were caught out in the street with them own, there was going to be a beating administered. So that's one option? One thing we would recommend is recording the information every time you spot a nazi in your area. Keep a note on your phone, or in the cloud, or somewhere, where you write down the date, time, location, description, and any other useful information (on their own or with others? What direction were they going? Do you know where they were heading to? Etc.). If you do that consistently - and if you coordinate doing that with friends (maybe via a shared doc in the cloud?), pretty soon you might start to see patterns of when nazis crawl out from under their rocks, when and where they're likely to be, etc. Suddenly, you have enough intel to plan some surprises for them! Maybe you go out the night before they're expected to turn up and plaster the area with anti-fascist posters and stickers.

Maybe you get some mates together and plan a little welcoming committee for them. The important thing is once you know their pattern of movement, you can start planning to fuck with them!

[saitama-division]

Generations of Divisions (Redux)

Basically this is just the original post I made a year ago but updated with all the new divisions that joined this year. These are based off when the blogs are created so please forgive me if I made a mistake.

Part 2

Generation Zero (October 2017 — August 2020)

Ikebukuro Division: Buster Bros!!! (Created October 24th, 2017)

Yokohama Division: MAD TRIGGER CREW (Created November 13th, 2017)

Shinjuku Division: Matenrou (Created December 4th, 2017)

Shibuya Division: Fling Posse (Created December 25th, 2017)

Osaka Division: Dotsuitare Hompo (Created October 28th, 2019)

Nagoya Division: Bad Ass Temple (Created November 25th, 2019)

Chuohku Ward: Party of Words (Created August 15th, 2020)

1st Generation (December 2020 — April 2021)

Harajuku Division: Alley Catz (Created December 7th, 2020) @harajukudivision (INACTIVE)

Kawasaki Division (formerly Akihabara): DayBreakers (Created January 16th, 2021) @kawasaki-division (INACTIVE)

Saitama Division: Femme Fatale (Created April 1st, 2021) @saitama-division

Shinagawa Division: CodeX (Created April 1st, 2021) @shinagawa-division

Ueno Division: Sakurai Clan (Created April 30th, 2021) @uenodivision

2nd Generation (May 2021 — September 2021)

Aoyama Division: Jet Set Trio (Created May 7th, 2021) @aoyama-division

Taitō Division: Blade Maiden (Created August 31st, 2021) @taito-division

Urayasu Division: Cherry Go Round (September 1st, 2021) @urayasu-division (INACTIVE)

Naha Division: Wild Shīnu (Created September 5th, 2021) @naha-division

Sapporo Division: Polar Knights (Created September 5th, 2021) @sapporo-division

Okinawa Division: Liberty Guild (September 27th, 2021) @okinawa-division

3rd Generation (October 2021 — December 2021)

Minato Division: Oculus (Created October 26th, 2021) @minatodivision

Chiyoda Division: Crimson Glow (Created October 28th, 2021) @chiyoda-divison (INACTIVE)

Sumida Division: Gilded Revolution (Created November 24th, 2021) @sumida-division (INACTIVE)

Akihabara Division: Otaku Corps (Created December 15th, 2021) @akihabaradivision

4th Generation (January 2022 — April 2022)

Fukuoka Division: MIHANASA (Created January 18th, 2022) @fukuokadivision1

Toyama Division: ECO BooN (Created February 12th, 2022) @toyama-division

Sendai Division: Kiya Kara (Created April 9th, 2022) @sendaidivision

Nagasaki Division: Thirteen (Created April 27th, 2022) @nagasakidivision (INACTIVE)

5th Generation (May 2022 — June 2022)

Edogawa Division: Wicked Requiem (Created May 3rd, 2022) @edogawa-division

Suginami Division: Sazanka Zombeez (Created May 17th, 2022) @suginami-division

Minato Division (2nd Team): R.I.P. Märchen (Created May 22nd, 2022) @minato-division03

Akihabara Division (2nd Team): Pixel Syndicate (Created May 22nd, 2022) @akihabara-division03

Meguro Division: DOG STREET CLUB (Created June 10th, 2022) @megurodivision (INACTIVE)

Toshima Division: Inner Circle (Created June 10th, 2022) @toshima-division (INACTIVE)

Shizuoka Division: Silent Tragedy (Created June 23rd, 2022) @shizuokadivision

6th Generation (July 2022 — August 2022)

Chiba Division: MAD LYNX (Created July 26th, 2022) @chiba-division (INACTIVE)

Nerima Division: Vivid Angels (Created July 27th, 2022) @nerima-division (INACTIVE)

Koto Division: Toxic Love (Created July 27th, 2022) @koto-division (INACTIVE)

Miyazaki Division: Beautiful Nightmare (Created August 4th, 2022) @miyazaki-division

Nagano Division: Han’nya no Tsumi (Created August 6th, 2022) @nagano-division (INACTIVE)

Kobe Division: Lovesick (Created August 7th, 2022) @kobedivision

Kanazawa Division: Justice Shield (Created August 7th, 2022) @kanazawa-division

7th Generation (September 2022 — December 2022)

Gion Division: Hana No Joō (Created September 6th, 2022) @gion-division

Enoshima Division: Solar Siren (Created September 6th, 2022) @enoshima-division

Odaiba Division: Artificial Heaven (Created September 26th, 2022) @odaibadivision (INACTIVE)

Ōta Division: Birds of Prey (Created October 22nd, 2022) @ota-division

Nakano Division: BittASweetZ (Created November 3rd, 2022) @nakanodivision

Ginza Division: Last Judgment (Created December 22nd, 2022) @ginza-division

Saga Division: Bloody Divas (Created December 31st, 2022) @sagadivision

8th Generation (January 2023 — May 2023)

Nara Division: Miraitabi (Created January 19th, 2023) @naradivision

Katsushika Division: Death Row Block (Created February 1st, 2023) @katsushika-division

Hakodate Division: Kuma no ie (Created May 3rd, 2023) @hakodate-division

Setagaya Division: ENIGMA (Created May 12th, 2023) @setagaya-division

Chuohku Ward: Party of Words Tertiary Team (Created May 23rd, 2023) @nug-chuohku

Kumamoto Division: Strange Magic (Created May 28th, 2023) @kumamoto-division

9th Generation (Part 1) (June 2023 — December 2023)

Echizen Division: Clockwork Lament (Created August 25th, 2023) @echizen-division (INACTIVE)

Chiyoda Division (2nd Team): KURUNE INC. (Created August 29th, 2023) @chiyoda-division2 (INACTIVE)

[legions-top-dog]

Freeside is looking slightly better after the purges, as the Eagles have been trying to roll civil service initiatives and humanitarian aid (mainly by threatening to withdraw support to the Legion if they refused)

Some Freesiders have been made construction workers, and are tasked with using jackhammers to destroy the cracked asphalt, shovel it into large containers on flatbed trucks, shovel new asphalt that was recently created using Eagles bitumen and Legion gravel on the road, and watch as a steamroller rolls it over and presses it flat, under the watchful eyes of some soldiers tasked with protecting them.

The newly reestablished Las- I meant New Vegas Police Department begins patrolling the street in nuclear-powered police cars recently refurbished, repainted and modified, with former Kings gangmembers being taught by police instructures from Alamogordo to purge crime from their streets and homes, with limited success (although police brutality is skyrocketing despite the instructors’ best attempts)

The divide between Freeside and the Strip is… brought down after some Patton tanks with rope attached to the gates yank them off their hinges and destroy the fortifications made for the securitrons by running them over.

Followers are finally allowed back into Old Mormon Fort and are slowly being trained to use or apply Eagles medical supplies and tactics (jury rigged defibrillators, antibiotics, a single X-Ray machine, chemotherapy drips, sample sendoff, CPR and aseptic technique just to name a few.) There are also talks about constructing a permanent hospital, but it apparently runs into temporarily relocating the Followers while it’s being rebuilt.

The 188 trading post is allowed to move inside New Vegas, and several new trading posts are constructed, and stores that weren’t destroyed given a stimulus and stores that were compensated, as part of an economic plan Vulpes, Caesar and some Eagles economists talked over.

Interestingly enough, these trading posts are built on the land of former brothels like the Gomorrah….

Camp McCarran, former NCR base is being hastily rebuilt and brought to the same condition as Nellis and Holloman AFB, thanks to Legionnaires and Eagles engineers working 16 hour shifts pushing planes, fixing hangars, blowing up unpushable planes, as it becomes a military base for the Legion and Eagles to remain indefinitely, and an airfield where airlifted supplies are funneled in.

Life expectancy seems to be increasing at least thanks to a medical revolution, and there are talks that the Eagles are planning to minimize military presence in the Strip, something about not antagonizing the locals.

Although, for the time being, tanks, jeeps and trucks filled with soldiers mainly enforce the law, construction crews fill the streets, Legionnaires beat the shit out of or commit sexual violence against prostitutes both male and female, there are apparently reports of hate crimes and protests against the Eagles and Legion for disrupting the status quo, or looking like Vulpes, which tend to be swiftly dealt with using tear gas, flashbangs, riot police, and firearms, but things are looking up…

[artemistorm]

@akchimp75 you sent me an ask a week or two ago asking about my steampunk story and I saved it until I had plenty of time to write about it and tonight I wrote up this whole big post but when I saved it to my drafts, tumblr ate it instead. So here is the rewritten version of it. (Ehehehe I hope you're ready cuz it's infodump time.)

My eldritch steampunk story is called Tenth Generation. Once upon a time on a recently terraformed planet called Arona, there lived in a steampunk civilization, a diverse people of many different species (humans, pixies, cyborgs, anthropomorphs, human-animal chimeras, etc.) and many different genders and sexualities.

There are three main story arcs to the series (of books or graphic novels):

Arona fighting for independence from the organization responsible for terraforming, colonizing, and protecting the planet and exploiting it's resources to supply a distant space war

The main characters seeking the jobs they want

Everyone trying to solve the mystery of why there's a bunch of eldritch beasts running around the dark corners of the city when no eldritch beasts were brought over on the colony ships...

The main characters are:

Tempest Shields: a 15 year old roguish genderfluid (defaults to girl) who is nonverbal autistic. She dreams of becoming an airship engineer or pilot but it isn't feasible at this time due to her disability.

Timothy Shields: an 18 year old human-canary chimera who has a burning interest in religion and the occult. His desire is to become a cleric or an exorcist. He and Tempest grew up together on the streets and in an orphanage and adopted each other as siblings.

Timber of the Skies: (age undecided) Tempest's biological sister. They were separated from each other when they were young and have led very different lives. Timber is an airship pirate and her goal is to become the Pirate Queen of the Skies. Timber isn't in the story in the beginning but comes in later; one of the main story arcs is about Timber and Tempest restoring their sibling relationship. She doesn't have autism but she does have some kind of behavioural issue.

Some side characters include:

Detective Rory Poofypants (actual last name undecided). A fully transitioned transmasc detective in the city of Stormcairn. He is investigating the strange eldritch beast sightings and the bizarre stories of hysterical people who claim that they were temporarily transported to a dark realm, the home of the monsters. Rory also ends up frequently wrangling Tempest back to their home or tutor as they get into mischief around the city.

Kestrel Wothen: the young adult enby who is fabulous and extra and loves all things shiny and colorful. They spend all their money to buy an old mansion which (once the gang puts the resident ghosts to rest) serves as the home base of the crew as they investigate the eldritch mystery of the city.

Zakiyah Lee: a rich and beautiful aroace young adult. She's as sharp as a whip and fascinated by all things dark. By day, she's a student at the university, and by night, an amateur detective. Slowed only by her dysautonomia, she eventually leads the revolution against the Exploration World and (spoilers) eventually becomes Queen of the World. (Her cat's name is Bastet and there's more to her than it seems.)

Unnamed Pixie girl (possibly not a girl) age 14. She is a street urchin and becomes good friends with Tempest and helps her get into mischief. She has alopecia and sometimes chooses to wear a headscarf and other times doesn't wear any sort of head covering. Her wings get stolen by an eldritch beast, but Timothy rescues the wings and returns them to her.

Tempest's unhinged tutor. She lost her last tutoring gig because her pupil got eaten by a tiger (no fault of her own). She is middle aged and actually has red hair but the picrew didn't have a red hair option. Is mainly concerned (at least initially) with helping Tempest learn to communicate better through a combo of sign language and AAC.

And last but not least, Dominic. He's a 12 or 13 year old boy and he's got magic hands. He's a child prodigy and the only known wielder of backwards magic AKA eldritch magic. A rich benefactor (not in this list) sponsors him and supplies his every need on the condition that he continues to practice and grow his magical ability so that it can be monetized. Dominic becomes good friends with Tempest and Pixie girl. His older brother is Kestrel's boyfriend.