#Team Free Wil

[prince-geo]

Uh Oh! The human you created specifically to be Earth’s prophesied vessel for evil incarnate just wants to be good. How do you proceed?

may 2nd means celebrating sam’s 40th birthday, like a true sam enjoyer, with misery :) 

[ylw-soldier]

are you scared of your nurse?

If you'd like complete honesty.... yes.

I don't know why I'm scared. It's not like I'm in any danger, really – I have fallbacks, after all. But the way he holds himself, so sweet and yet so–

*he shudders*

It's.... it hasn't been great, so far, on YLW. It feels like everyone's hostile even though they're supposed to be my allies.

Maybe I'm not surrounding myself with the right people? I knew someone who'd always tell me that it does the trick, talking to others.

[420technoblazeit]

the thing is, right. the thing is i can't think of a single show that wouldn't greatly benefit from having a bitchy middle aged demon who occasionally features in episodes to make fun of/flirt with the protagonists and make morally questionable decisions to help them. which is what elevates late show supernatural from a trashy tv show to a GREAT trashy tv show

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Just uploaded the first ten minutes of our recording session for the audiobook of Red Team Blues with @wilwheaton reading and Gabrielle de Cuir directing at the amazing Skyboat studios!

[rennerator]

Look at THEM!!!!! LOOK AT THEM!!!!! S2 LOVE LOVE LOVE I LOVE THIS!!!!! I LOVE THEM SOO MUCH!!!! :D BAMF!TFW2.0 ALL THE WAY!!!!! Thank YOU!!!! Thank YOU SOOO MUCH for this!!! You are WONDERFUL!!!! :) <3

@winchester-reload

[rottenbrainstuff]

So as that lengthy Neil Gaiman article is passed around, I want to give you all a gentle reminder….

I’m not saying that it’s not valid to feel crushed when you hear about shitty things like this, but we all need to keep in mind there are no safe celebrities. There is absolutely not a single celebrity on the planet that you can trust to not learn some terrible secret about. This is because we don’t know these people personally. What we know is a curated public persona that they present.

It’s fun to be a fan of celebrities and to be enthusiastic about their work, but…. Just never forget, they’re not a mascot or a character, they’re a human. Don’t put them on a pedestal. The fact that someone can make funny tumblr posts says nothing about their personal life.

I just… I just see some people who are SO heartbroken about all of this, and I feel bad for you, I don’t know. It’s disappointing to me as well, but I never assume for an instant that anyone I fangirl over is safe. I think it’s healthy to keep some emotional perspective, keep some emotional distance, with our parasocial relationships. Maybe?

I think about meeting Neil Newbon at the Calgary expo last year and what a nice person he was to meet, the nicest celebrity I’ve ever seen at one of these cons, the nicest celebrity I’ve ever seen interacting with his fans. Even he, I would not put on a pedestal. As he said himself at his panel, what the public sees, this is a persona he presents and his personal stuff stays personal. You really do not know these people, at all.

Just… keep that in mind. And not just for celebrities. People in general are not either good and beyond reproach, or obviously bad and cancelled and discardable. If you view things this way, you will set yourself up for a world of hurt, because you will assume the people who don’t look obviously bad therefore can’t hurt you, until they do. (This is also where the “how could they have actually done that? They seem so nice, so I don’t believe you” comes from too)

I dunno. You know? This whole situation just gives me a lot of thoughts.

On a related note: I’m also sad to see some people say well this means they can’t be a fan of good omens anymore, or whatever…… look, that’s a decision that only you can make, but consider this. As I saw Wil Wheaton say, movies and tv shows are the work of a large team, so many different people all working together to make something they believe in: a producer, a writer, a director, an editor, the actors, the costumers, the numerous other crew I can’t even list here, all working hard and proud of their work. Learning that one person in that team is a piece of shit is not a nice thing to learn, but it doesn’t automatically invalidate the work that everyone else has put in. And thinking about this further, I’m going to guess that if you think one bad person contaminates an entire thing, you’re never going to find anything that is pure and free from contamination, because every large group of people is going to include some bad people in the bunch. (Please don’t come at me with JK Rowling stuff, transpanic georg is an outlier and should not have been included)

I dunno. I’ve been watching all of this shit unfold and thinking some thoughts for a while. Just take it away and think about it. It’s very disappointing no matter how you look at it, but I think we need to change how we view celebrities.

[ebbyhell]

So i been busy with work and personal stuff, so i have not yet UPDATED That Lucifer doc we shall not speak the name of, i did ask an friend of mine about this legally (Yes they work on Korea) and they said that text while appearing very straghtfored is actually very blurred due the context of PB actions.

First about sharing the previous story events since PB already shared the story with us for free before and then only after put in paywall an person who share they (in case if they paid) cannot be legally held acountable cause (there is no infrigiment of protection rights since the story was acessibale before to public and the person has purchase legalily), what PB CAN DO is try to report the account but CAN NOT SEND AN SUE INVOICE (if their legal team does that is will be very shaddy).

Second the Special pass characthers, they tend to be on an more hard line since their story acess is not free to the public yet (the fact the only manner of access is real money that plays an major in it) so they not acesseble to the public yet, so he recomend holding on that ones (the case would still very blurry in court so PB should be aware of that)

Third PB can sue IF THEY DO NOT MAKE ACESSABLE TO FREE POR GENERAL PLAYERS TO GET, So characthers that can be get with solomon keys, solomon seals even go into an blury line, the reason been this are stuff the normal players can get if they do montaly task so if they wish to sue they have to prove the player obtained in ilegal or monatary means (Very hard on court). So they probaly report the account and try to get shut down insted (not an very good look to an company even an small one).

Fourth with all that said even if they now inform of they terms of notice, they as an company need to be aware that

No charcthers stories that were posted before can abied to this due to the company not giving notice when they relase, so the company is held responsiable and not the buyer/individual (The company commited an careless action of informing their terms of service and can not sue the person due to their own neglict),

2. They can not simple go sending sue to everybody due to this especial cases that require an lawyer to look at (i know turns out the legal world is way more complex than just sending an sue), they also need to be aware in even an 99% chance of lawful stealing of their content they may only be able to sue 2% (even if they manage to prove everybody hacked to obten content they still have more laws to look at).

3. trying to sue someboy that shared an story of an card obtened by Solomons sels wil be very hard since the seals can be abtained by doing general taks and not only by buying, the rights of protections will also not help because even if they did not post on tehy public accounts the fact the person OBTNED ON THE OWN GAME IN N MANNER WERE THE PUBLIC CAN OBTAIN, makes so they did not commit an crime (unless the person share for profit or cause direct warm to PB sales what is very difficult to prove it, PB can not just show this annoucement as terms of service as an sue warrent deal, only as an warning there before can not sue only repport the account, welcome to copyright laws the laws more blurry than an fucking mist seriuous just google when was the last update).

With all been send the conclusion was CAN THEY SAY THEY WILL SUE? YES, BUT CAN THEY ACTUALLY DO IT? HARDLY, if you have doubt you see what happening to other companies that tried to do that with the copyrigt laws you see most of their sues end on settled or loss for the company (excet if you are shady Nintendo then is like very shady sue). They will probaly report the account and try to get they blocked (Shitty look if they do it but leagaly allowed).

What alll that been said i wait till the new King Event to see what they do. (got so see if gonna need to lawyer or to do something different to post the content).

Sorry if it was to much, English not my first language.

[the-bjd-community-confess]

Hello, folks. This is your Oldie Chinese Diaspora Anon™️. I am starting to feel like I sound like bad news bears, so I would like to make my stance clear here. I have nothing against blind box dolls – heaven knows, I have a couple of them, too. It’s just unfortunate that I keep on encountering troubling news when it comes to blind box dolls, it seems. Please bear with me, would you?

Now, I need to introduce you to an... old friend. While we all know the resin recaster and his myriad of companies, I think I have brought up the vinyl recaster, DBS, a few times before as well. As a refresher, DBS is a toy company that specializes in vinyl and ABS toys. They bill themselves as the creators of “proudly MiC” toys for the next generation. However, their dolls have been found to be “recasted” from resin into vinyl and they have been plagiarising from several different companies, from Koreans to down-home Chinese. The MäyTrëë line of blind boxes were rejected by the BJD community because while the original designer was independent, the dolls were made by one of the DBS companies and was thought to be one of their subsidiaries. (more information here: https://the-bjd-community-confess.tumblr.com/post/727751969206304768/hello-anon-this-is-your-oldie-chinese-diaspora )

With that as a preamble, let me introduce you to the “Inedible Rabbits” dolls (Well, these ones: https://www.kikagoods.com/products/moon-jumping-time-bunny-series-1-12-action-figure-bjd-blind-box?variant=44766128931050 ). Similar to the “Escape Plan” dolls, they were created by a team of newbies who first 3D-printed their designs and pitched them to what’s akin to a Chinese-version of a Kickstarter called Modian. During the crowdfunding period, people can pre-order these dolls while the team running the KS maintain regular updates, chase goals, changes to the designs, etc. The final production is usually outsourced to a factory. The team is, in theory, working with the team all the way until delivery. I still vaguely remember someone asking “why aren’t there KS campaigns for dolls?” Well, you’re about to find out why… it wasn’t the price or the long production time, There’s a lot more to it.

As with the “Escape Plan” team, there’s a gap between the final products when compared to the samples (https://the-bjd-community-confess.tumblr.com/post/756541155738615808/一万次出逃计划开箱-避雷快跑哔哩哔哩bilibili ). One of the problems that was encountered by the buyers from the Escape Plan Team was that they have gone AWOL when people started to receive their dolls and started complaining. With the Inedible Rabbit Team however, my sources reported worse issues with communication. The creative team was not only unresponsive most of the time but they would block anyone who even asked benign questions. We also found out that the creative team behind the Inedible Rabbits did not apply to become a company prior to establishing their KS. It means that all of the transactions are considered personal (think F&F). With their frequent and wilful blocking of people, there are a lot of donors who are worried about how shady their behaviour is.

This is the latest expose from a Chinese source: https://www.xiaohongshu.com/explore/66e00cce000000001e01903f?app_platform=ios&app_version=8.52&share_from_user_hidden=true&xsec_source=app_share&type=normal&xsec_token=CBUsqAi70IwpfK_-OZEZS28zESD2e88FIMRgVnkEaN3D8=&author_share=1&xhsshare=CopyLink&shareRedId=ODlFNzlGND02NzUyOTgwNjg5OTc7Szk8&apptime=1725972303&share_id=49435c4b26604cbe8cd6fd49fc41db11 And this is a summary by a Taiwanese proxy: https://www.plurk.com/p/3gac0e1qck (please feel free to use a Google Translator to help you)

The Taiwanese Plurk mentioned that the clothes of the dolls were made by the infamous DBS. This was discovered from a video that the Inedible Rabbit Team posted on their social media showing the interior of their outsourced factory that made clothes for them. (can be seen here: https://www.xiaohongshu.com/explore/66e26d2a000000001e0193cc?app_platform=ios&app_version=8.53&share_from_user_hidden=true&xsec_source=app_share&type=video&xsec_token=CBaBewvBjppksg843In6KcCKwy5e3Tbv8rN-f9ARvjXks=&author_share=1&xhsshare=CopyLink&shareRedId=ODYzRUU9PTw2NzUyOTgwNjY0OThISEtL&apptime=1726233161&share_id=189d6a99974941f899342c780b0e8890 ) At the 0:12 timestamp, a box with the DBS logo was shown very briefly in a pan-over shot. (seen here: https://www.xiaohongshu.com/explore/66e283db0000000027002ca0?app_platform=ios&app_version=8.53&share_from_user_hidden=true&xsec_source=app_share&type=normal&xsec_token=CBaBewvBjppksg843In6KcCK1D4UzhNUD8Fm5_7tph_yA=&author_share=1&xhsshare=CopyLink&shareRedId=ODYzRUU9PTw2NzUyOTgwNjY0OThISEtL&apptime=1726233089&share_id=9de63adea9b14bd191309c996ed2bc29 ) Thanks to this discovery, a lot of the collectors and donators who also own resin BJDs are asking for refunds because they do not want to be associated with DBS in the fear of being seen as pro-recast. Thanks to people pulling out of the KS, the proxy has informed me that some of the unlocked stretch goals would most likely be rescinded. She is afraid that if too much of the funds get pulled out, the creative team may just pack up and do a rug pull with the money. Thanks to the fact that they never registered as a company, if they run, there’s basically no way to get that money back.

I do not want to be seen as someone who stands in others’ way of having a good time and earning money. But I also cannot stay quiet when I know that blind box dolls are a lot of new collectors’ gateway into resin BJD. This is akin to me knowing that something is a recast but fail to warn the new comers ahead of time. If anyone gets looked down upon or rejected from a group due to association with a doll that uses DBS clothes, I don’t think I can quite live with myself. So… thank you very much for lending your ears to me once more. I know full well that I do not have the ability to change anyone’s mind, but at least I can sleep better knowing that I have tried my best to tell you what I know.

Post Script: On September 14th, the creative team behind Indedible Rabbits posted their first public apology: https://www.modian.com/project/update/detail/161340 They promised to create a business account and becoming more accountable. They also stated that despite the factory video they are not in collaboration with DBS. It's up to you to decide if you want to believe the team. end!)

~Anonymous

[bennett-ametyst]

For the meme, I present:

The self indulgent tf armada AU where everyone lives in Rome, the Daje AU (part 1)

(Translations under the cut)

🟥🟨🟥🟨🟥🟨🟥🟨🟥

Optimus Prime (25 yo)

-Follows the literature course in Sapienza (the BIGgest uni in Rome)

-Popular among this peers for his "Boy Next Door" charm, his idealism, and the lecture notes which offers for free (most of the time students sell their notes), and his good looks

-"Education is the right of all sentient beings"

-Politically engaged, organize protests and events for the faculty

-Despite this, he is extremely shy

-Has a backpack with an embarassing amount of pockets and useful things

-He did judo, but stopped at blue belt

-He's a tutor to high school students for classical subjects

-Few know this, but he attended the ITIS in Tor Sapienza (a zone in east Rome, unrelated to the university) with Megatron, when they often fought (people in ITIS fight a lot)

-Now he moved to Tufello (a chill zone in north Rome)

Red Alert (24 yo)

-He follows and does medicine at Policlinico (famed hospital and also were Sapienza's medicine courses are)

-Childhood friend of Optimus and Jetfire

-No one ever saw him sleep (medicine students have the most insane schedules, even if the degree course lasts 7 years)

-He doesn't accept less than 27/30 (exam votes)

-Miraculously on time with the exams schedule

-"Imagine how cool it must be living near Uni" (he took an apartment, dormitories aren't really a thing here)

-Since he lives near, they always assign him night shifts

-Consuming inhuman amounts of coffee has made him nearly immune to caffeine, so he purposely invented a more powerful distillate to stay awake

-Sometimes he tells about his special internship at Tivoli's hospital, he remembers it like a Vietnam flashback

-Always pissed off 24/7, but under all of that he cares a lot about his friends

-During the exam period, he smokes like a chimney ("I'll stop when I get that degree")

Jetfire (24 yo) (I think I'm in love with this drawing)

-He follows the philosophy course in Sapienza (literature's same faculty, the name is literally called "literature and philosophy")

-Optimus' best friend since forever

-He lives in Tufello since he was born

-Part of the Young Communist Front and the Congregation of Stoners at Uni

-Once he starts talking about the fight against capitalism, no one can stop him

-He always has a few grams of weed hidden somewere, (where the police will never find it)

-Every situation is a good situation to start stadium choirs (stadium choirs don't always have to do with football)

-On campus he dresses colorfully, but he has a battle outfit specific for protests (he's the one who brings fumogens)

-He's always seen on the Pratone (big ass lawn at the campus were students rest) smoking weed or playing SOAD on his acoustic guitar, nobody knows if he actually goes to class.

-Was an AS Roma die-hard fan before the Captain Totti left, now he pretends he doesn't care about the team (holding back tears)

-He attended the Liceo Artistico at Ripetta (art high school in the center), he wanted to do the painter, however the fact that in Italy this work sector it is not taken seriously or protected at all in which you can't do what you want or studied for a living or else you'll end up under a bridge, the other option it's taking orders from a company to make deceptive graphics, was enough to radicalize him.

-He had an accident with his scooter, breaking both his left leg and the muretto* of his house (for some obscure reason the scooter remained intact and I cant find an english word for *low walls we use with fences)

Smokescreen (26 yo)

-He follows engineering in Roma 3 (another big university in Rome but they forgot to change from the default name)

-Always doing internships at construction sites, "It's to gain experience" he says

-He lives in Rione Testaccio, here he spends Saturday evenings in the movida with his friends or the other workers

-"What are those idiots doing? The next rains will destroy everything" (looking at workers trying to fix something the wrong way)

-He did the professional high school, probably the only one in class that was committed to learning

-Gymbro with a almost infinite set of skills as mason, mechanic, and nutritionist

-"How much do you bench press?"

-Despite his rough appearance, he's a cinnamon roll ready for everything for his friends, expressing it in small jobs in his field, personalized training plans and telling them they should have a healthier lifestyle over every single problem they have (especially Red Alert and Jetfire)

-When Jetfire crashed with his scooter, he fixed his muretto, in exchange Jet would quit smoking for at least 6 months (he didn't succeed)

-His daily routine: 5:30 wake up; 6:00 breakfast with an apple and cappuccino; 6:30 jogging around Mount Testaccio; 7:07 bus up to the construction site; 7:45 coffee with the other workers; 8:00 to 12:00 internship work; 12:15 square pizza for lunch from Pinuccio; 13:00-16:00 course lessons at San Paolo; 18:30 gym; 20:00 dinner with 200g of pasta and rotisserie chicken; 21:00 herbal tea and then sleep.

-Bonus: he doesn't have a car, he always prefers public transport, it's "less stressful" (if course, he lives in the center)

[drinkyourvillainjuice]

Secretary's DYVJ OC

Or, a study in character design by the secretary.

Hello my audience of fools and creatives, this is how me, the Secretary, designed past characters for Drink Your Villain Juice. I've designed a couple of the beloved gamers such as random one-off heroes (hello, Portrait, my beloved), and the one and only Wil (which some of you really love).

The background:

We have a free spot on the SCUM team, which is essentially a super-violent villain team doing very atrocious team for what appears to be no reason in particular. While this isn't entirely true since tragically people have motivations to hurt others (even if it's just fun!), SCUM attracts, well, scummy people and also people who may or may have no other choice than to choose these sorts of groups. They may be groomed into a role, forced to rely on violence to keep certain people at bay, or might just have been repeatedly failed by the systems than they were supposed to be protected by.

With this free spot in mind and the other characters already having fixed roles, we need a character to fit a specific niche.

The niche is secret for the audience, but essentially, we need a female character that counterbalances the other female characters within the team + illustrates a typical trope of villain characters. As you might have noticed, many of the characters within the story kinda play on tropes: Surpass is super(wo)man but a jerk, MC is a trope on the chosen hero being a villain, etc.

I'm pretty interested in making a character who might unironically have some sort of sex appeal going on. So let's brainstorm:

The base concept:

I think female characters within superhero fiction often have to rely on sex appeal to keep an audience engaged. It's rare to find a character like this within TV or comics or books that has any sort of depth to them - but the thing is, this is a one-off villain so how do I give the audiences the tool to discern the character's backstory. I have a couple of ideas:

Lack of armor and mask: This is a reckless character. She lacks foresight in protecting herself. Maybe she doesn't view herself in a good light, and maybe she doesn't even care if her face is shown to the world. Maybe she lost too much to care about her body being hurt and her face being plastered on every wall - or maybe that's exactly what she wants to punish herself.

Collected jewelry from her victims: A means to intimidate, really. If this is someone who has lost it all, gaining these small possessions mean that she holds controls over somebody. It might be tied to her power - or not! - but it is obviously tied to her psyche. Maybe she was riding the high life and it came crashing down, or maybe it's a physical manifestation of all the lives she had taken in the past as a physical mark on her body.

Trashy expensive clothes: To really solidifies the concept of someone who has lost it, maybe anchor the physical manifestation of the character by trashed wealth. Clothes that are too expensive or reserved for special occasions are being torn apart. They are mish-mashed because the character is holding down to past wealth despite the lack of coordination. What if she is also taking the clothes of the female victims? Could she be green with envy that someone is living the life she wanted to life or had lived?

With these three characters point, let's move to appearance.

The physical manifestation of her psyche, and what it means to be her:

She is an attractive woman down on her luck. She fits the specific standard of beauty within the region. She wears clothes and jewelry that are expensive, but obviously aren't hers by the way they don't fit. Her clothes are poorly mended clothes, showing that she tries to put forward a tidy image, with blood that doesn't seem to wash out, implying not everybody gave their clothes willingly. She also has too many necklaces, bracelets, and rings, especially wedding rings. If someone shone a light on her, people would be blinded by the dazzling. She wears too much makeup, caking her features, and it hides her real emotions from the cracks and drip of sweat that she is obviously exerting. Her lack of armour reveals a body that isn't honed for combat or physical exertion, implying that whatever makes her able to keep going is more psychological than physical. She may be a tad overweight, and "letting herself go" would most likely be what she would say about herself, but someone with a keen eye might be able to grasp that she is comfortable in this new life. She carries herself with a lack of confidence that makes herself appear as arrogant. She doesn't flinch, she doesn't get scared, she doesn't run - but she is clearly despondent at whatever her fate might be.

It would take a miracle to fix her, but by that point, she might have killed too much to go back.

Tying it all together with a knot:

I opted for the name Spring Breaker. Spring Break is a time for young people to go out somewhere sunny and get tanned - or at least, that's what I've learned from Jersey Shore. I think this character might be a past college student, having ignited during her spring break, and losing what was making herself. Her power should also be based on water. It would make sense with the theme of womanhood being a failed state for her since water is often seen as a feminine and passive element. But she isn't passive, she only has an image of it to probably protect what she holds on to - which is her appearance. Maybe, her power could involve drowning people which a lot of sirens, which one could say that she is, are known to do to take the riches of sailors.

So what about a young woman who was on spring break and was involved in someone's death by drowning. She might have pushed them into the ocean, or maybe have forced them underwater, due to her envy for their wealth. She ignited with the ability to constantly relive that trauma that ruined her life. In a way to punish herself, she names herself Spring Breaker, lacks a real civilian or mask identity, and puts herself in situations where she finds herself forced to drown people. She also wants to go back to before, when she was able to buy expensive clothes and have the jewelry she liked, but every time she grabs someone's chain and puts it on her neck, she finds herself back in the pool causing her downfall.

Her place as a villain:

Spring Breaker is an infiltrator in SCUM. She is what one could be best described as an assassin, taking out targets in the surroundings of the fight, and slowing going toward the fight. She takes out people from the back and makes her way forward. Her power is simple: she coats anything she touches in a thin film of water, dry drowning those with the misfortune to be grappled by her. Her ignition gave her the compulsion to steal valuables - or maybe she had it all along but now has a very good excuse - which enables her ability to rob people. Her costume changes based on what happened last time. She might wear a two-piece swimsuit with a feathered boa one time, or a see-through babydoll dress with lace underwear, or maybe a full-length gown with three bullet holes she couldn't mend around the abdomen. In every case, she leaves behind her drowned and drowning bodies, stripped of valuables.

She is obviously a bad person, but it's hard not to pity her by the way she sulks around. Some may say she should be put down for her own good, but others think she should taken out for the bodies left in her wake. Spring Breaker thinks it's a bit of column A and column B.

Final notes:

i think i can fix her

[f1-primers]

check out the main post with suggestions for f1 primers here! [please note: this post is a work in progress & will get added to as more intros, 101s, primers etc are either sent to me or written!] there's a 'submit' button on the profile - please feel free to submit posts :) there's also an ask box, so if you're searching for something in particular send an ask & we'll see if the good people of f1blr can find it for you! FIC WRITERS: check driver tags for plenty of lore posts!

glossaries masterlists intros to f1 essays

f1 primers: technical - overall tag - for anything relating to the cars, how a race works, race weekends, etc - anything non-drivers, pretty much! at some point i wil alphabetise this...

tracks

the cars

race weekends

testing

flags

tyres

corners

physics - a silly tag name but anything to do with aerodynamics, towing, slipstreams, drs, etc etc etc - not specifically relating to bodywork on the car

regulations

strategy

pit stops

driving styles

helmets

media

FIA

business - i.e. anything regarding the commercial aspect of F1

feeder series

medical / training - stuff relating to either the physical training for F1 that drivers do, or relating to medical issues (including - potentially - injuries)

safety

points system

teams: team roles, how they work, etc

mclaren

mercedes

ferrari

haas

alfa romeo

alpha tauri

red bull racing

williams

aston martin

alpine

team roles

f1 primers: fandom - overall tag drivers (listed are 2023 grid) - these tags will have lore, info about etc

lewis hamilton

george russell

max verstappen

sergio perez

charles leclerc

carlos sainz

esteban ocon

pierre gasly

alex albon

logan sargeant

nico hulkenberg

kevin magnussen

yuki tsunoda

daniel ricciardo

valtteri bottas

zhou guanyu

fernando alonso

lance stroll

lando norris

oscar piastri

ex-drivers (will add to this as i go - let me know if you spot any i haven't added but have posted!)

kimi raikkonen

sebastian vettel

nico rosberg

michael schumacher

alain prost

ayrton senna

jenson button

other fandom stuff:

ships - general tag (see below for more specific tags)

rivalries - general tag (see below for more specific tags)

fic help (i.e. details that might be useful when writing about drivers in fic)

ships & rivalries (will add to this as i go - let know if you spot any i haven't added but have posted):

lewis hamilton & nico rosberg - brocedes/the silver war

alain prost & ayrton senna - prosenna

lewis hamilton & sebastian vettel - sewis

max verstappen & charles leclerc - lestappen

max verstappen & daniel ricciardo - maxiel

george russell & alex albon - galex

carloz sainz & oscar piastri - carcar

sebastian vettel & mark webber - sebmark

f1 primers: history - overall tag

controversies

past races - including good ones to watch, etc

f1 primers: resources - overall tag

books or articles to read

tv shows/movies/videos to watch

podcasts

[class1akids]

Do you think bnha's story is entirely done for or that we wil get something else with the time? ( movies, spin offs, etc) if you asked me this yesterday i would TOTALLY said that it wasnt bcs of the secret announcment and bcs of what hori says in the last page abt mha's manga being finished but deku and his friends stories just starting. But after seeing what the announcement i cant stop thinking its done for even tho i FEEL like something else will come but i wanted to know your thoughts on this

Just because they didn't announce a sequel, it doesn't mean nothing will happen. For now, they have for sure:

Movie 4 (just released, first weekend was similar to WHM success, but not as big as Mugen Train, JJK 0 or the Haikyuu movie) - lets see how much money it makes in Japan and worldwide

S7 anime - still ongoing - maybe HK will do more Twitter sketches now

Decision of how to do S8 - try to make some movies, AoT style, round it out into a full season with anime only content? - tbd.

Worldwide poll + Fanbook to occupy fans / keep up hype until December

Volume 42 in December

Team Up mission still monthly chapter

Art Book next March

new Art Exhibition next year

What I would expect for now is WSJ gauging how much the fandom enthusiasm keeps going to decide whether to try to do some kind of sequel (whether Boruto style next gen with eri and kota, or a straight-up sequel of Class A as adults) and who would be able to do it (I think it's a fair bet it wouldn't be Hori). But I think it will also depend if WSJ will find new manga that can take the place of their last big hit trio of BNHA, OP and JJK.

BONES for the next 2 years or so are going to be occupied with the anime and maybe decide to do some OVA as well.

I think we can expect some drama CDs with the DVD release.

I wouldn't be surprise to get a new School Briefs announcement to cover the 2nd and 3rd years of Class A.

And then whether there will be future movies? I think there will be. Franchises like Free! getting movies years after it ended, to me means that as long as there is a healthy fandom, the franchise will pump out content to feed them and keep up merch sales. It's just business sense.

As someone who has experienced the recent Haikyuu!! renaissance, there were a lot of content - lots of new sketches, 2 new bonus chapters, re-release of manga, new light novel covers, lots of collab with Japanese league - so I am expecting a steady stream of things to try to keep momentum and enthusiasm. Obviously, it's not like getting weekly manga chapters, but I don't think the fandom will just die in the next month either.

[artbyfinnbrown]

Hey Dave, what’s it like managing the Larks? What are your opinions on each of them?

Ah, the Larks.

As a team, they’re quite easy to manage. Despite several of them joining the Gracers through less than ordinary means, this hasn’t negatively impacted their relations as a team or their ability to cooperate. And I have yet to receive any reports of them mishandling a mission that was given to them.  As individuals however…. I wil admit to having some concerns.

I’ve seen records of Calypso’s education, and they tell me she’s quite smart, with a no small talent for magic. If she dedicated a few more years of her life to study, she could easily get a stable, well paying job as a researchers, librarian, or interrogator.  But instead she chooses to join the Gracers. I shouldn’t be complaining. More willing volunteers is always a good thing. But I also have records of the accident she caused. I just hope she’s joined our ranks because she wants to help others more than she wants to punish herself. 

Pearl is tricky.  Nothing against the girl herself, she seems like a wonderful young woman with a strong sense of responsibility and justice. However, the position she exists in is a complicated one. I was against the idea of the Prince ever being allowed to join the Gracers. And with Pearl acting as his replacement, my opinion now applies to her. Even if they aren’t the next head of state, no child should be a member of the Gracers. Pearl is young, and with her strong sense of justice, and being connected to a position of authority, it gives her the ability to make certain decisions. Decisions with a good heart behind them, but desicions that ultimately cause more harm than good in the long run. But she hasn’t done anything like that yet. Maybe my worries are for nothing. I still think she’s to young to be a Gracer though.

I’m worried about Fleance. He has been exposed to an… unfortunate side of our organization. Our religion dictates that we be accepting of as many people as possible, but that tragically causes some people to take advantage of our acceptance, and then use the authority our acceptance gives them to make the lives of other people worse.  And Fleance had to experience that first hand. I wouldn’t blame him for having a poor opinion of the Church after that. But instead now that he is free, he now wants to keep working for us. Much like Calypso, I really shouldn’t be complaining for the extra help, but I worry he isn’t doing this for the right reasons.  Is his patron the one making him stay? I need to find out exactly who he is working for. Even if they aren’t directly responsible, they must play some part in why Fleance is choosing to stay.

Angelica’s story should be a simple one. A conscripted criminal searching for redemption, with little interest in actually achieving that redemption. But now their family’s gotten involved, and how they where handled wasn’t as… efficient as it could have been. And now I feel it’s worsened Angelica’s opinion of our organization as a whole.  Which is tragic, because we do truly want to help. I hope that they get a happy ending. I hope Angelica can find redemption, and she can be with all three of her siblings again.  But I also know what happens to most people who get infected by Leiris. 

I’ve been told to expect great things from Elle. Everyone I’ve talked to has only had positive things to say about them. How her faith in Ioun is second to none, how she’s a natural when it comes to close quarters combat, and how she has the trappings of a great leader.  And from what I’ve seen from my own interactions with her, I’m inclined to agree. I think they have bright future ahead of them.  So why does she keep lying to me during her mission reports? 

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Kickstarting the Red Team Blues audiobook, which Amazon won't sell (read by Wil Wheaton!)

Red Team Blues is my next novel, a post-cyberpunk anti-finance finance thriller; it’s a major title for my publishers Tor Books and Head of Zeus, and it’s swept the trade press with starred reviews all ‘round. Despite all that, Audible will not sell the audiobook. In fact, Audible won’t sell any of my audiobooks. Instead, I have to independently produce them and sell them through Kickstarter:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/red-team-blues-another-audiobook-that-amazon-wont-sell

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/21/anti-finance-finance-thriller/#marty-hench

Audible is Amazon’s monopoly audiobook platform. It has a death-grip on the audiobook market, commanding more than 90% of genre audiobook sales, and every single one of those audiobooks is sold with Amazon’s DRM on it. That means that you can’t break up with Amazon without throwing away those audiobooks. Under the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, I can’t give you a tool to convert my own copyrighted audiobooks to a non-Amazon format. Doing so is a felony carrying a five year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine for an act that in no way infringes anyone’s copyright! Indeed, merely infringing copyright is much less illegal than removing Amazon’s mandatory DRM from my own books!

I’ve got amazing publishers who support my crusade against DRM, but they’re not charities. If they can’t sell my audiobooks on the platform that represents 90% of the market, they’re not going to make audio editions at all. Instead, I make my own audiobooks, using brilliant voice actors like Amber Benson and @neil-gaiman​, and I sell them everywhere except Audible.

Doing this isn’t cheap: I’m paying for an incredible studio (Skyboat Media), a world-class director (Gabrielle de Cuir), top-notch sound editing and mastering, and, of course, killer narrators. And while indie audiobook platforms like Libro.fm and downpour.com are amazing, the brutal fees extracted by Apple and Google on app sales means that users have to jump through a thousand hoops to shop with indie stores. Most audiobook listeners don’t even know that these stores exist: if a title isn’t available on Audible, they assume no audiobook exists.

That’s where Kickstarter comes in: twice now, I’ve crowdfunded presales of my audiobooks through KS, and these campaigns were astoundingly successful, smashing records and selling thousands of audiobooks. These campaigns didn’t just pay my bills (especially during lockdown, when our household income plunged), but they also showed other authors that it was possible to evade Amazon’s monopoly chokepoint and sell books that aren’t sticky-traps for Audible’s walled garden/prison:

https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/columns-and-blogs/cory-doctorow/article/90282-we-wrote-a-book-about-why-audible-won-t-sell-our-book-and-snuck-it-onto-audible.html

And today, I’m launching the Kickstarter for Red Team Blues, and even by the standards of my previous efforts, I think this one’s gonna be incredible.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/red-team-blues-another-audiobook-that-amazon-wont-sell

For starters, there’s the narrator: @wilwheaton​, whose work on my previous books is outstanding, hands-down my favorite (don’t tell my other narrators! They’re great too!):

https://wilwheaton.net/

Beyond Wil’s narration, there’s the subject matter. The hero of Red Team Blues is a hard-charging forensic accountant who’s untangled every Silicon Valley finance scam since he fell in love with spreadsheets as as a MIT freshman, dropped out, got his CPA ticket, and moved west. Now, at the age of 67, Marty Hench is ready to retire, but a dear old friend — a legendary cryptographer — drags him back for one last job — locating the stolen keys to the backdoor he foolishly hid in a cryptocurrency that’s worth more than a billion dollars.

That’s the starting gun for a “grabby next-Tuesday thriller” that sees Marty in between three-letter agencies and international crime syndicates, all of whom view digital technology as a carrier medium for scams, violence and predation. Marty’s final adventure involves dodgy banks, crooked crypto, and complicit officials in a fallen paradise where computers’ libertory promise has been sucked dry by billionaire vampires.

It’s a pretty contemporary story, in other words.

I wrote this one before SVB, before Sam Bankman0Fried and FTX — just like I wrote Little Brother before Snowden’s revelations. It’s not that I’m prescient — fortune-telling is a fatalist’s delusion — it’s that these phenomena are just the most spectacular, most recent examples in a long string of ghastly and increasingly dire scandals.

Red Team Blues blasted out of my fingertips in six weeks flat, during lockdown, when technology was simultaneously a lifeline, connecting us to one another during our enforced isolation; and a tool of predatory control, as bossware turned our “work from home” into “live at work.”

The last time I wrote a book that quickly, it was Little Brother, and, as with Little Brother, Red Team Blues is a way of working out my own anxieties and hopes for technology on the page, in story.

These books tap into a nerve. I knew I had something special in my hands when, the night after I finished the first draft, I rolled over at 2AM to find my wife sitting up in bed, reading.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I had to find out how it ended,” she answered.

The next day, my editor sent me a four-line email:

That. Was. A! Fucking! Ride! Whoa!

Within a week, he’d bought Red Team Blues…and two sequels. I finished writing the second of these on Monday, and all three are coming out in the next 22 months. It’s gonna be a wild ride.

Kickstarter backers can get the usual goodies: DRM-free audiobooks and ebooks, hardcovers (including signed and personalized copies), and three very special, very limited-run goodies.

First, there’s naming rights for characters in the sequels — I’m selling three of these; they’re a form of cheap (or at least, reasonably priced) literary immortality for you or a loved one. The sequels are a lot of fun — they go in reverse chronology, and the next one is The Bezzle, out in Feb 2024, a book about prison-tech scams, crooked LA County Sheriff’s Deputy gangs, and real-estate scumbags turned techbros.

The third book is Picks and Shovels (Jan 2025), and it’s Marty’s first adventure after he comes west to San Francisco and ends up working for the bad guys, an affinity scam PC company called “Three Wise Men” that’s run by a Mormon bishop, a Catholic priest and an orthodox rabbi who fleece their faithful with proprietary, underpowered computers and peripherals, and front for some very bad, very violent money-men.

Next, there’s three Marty Hench short story commissions: the Hench stories are machines for turning opaque finance scams into technothrillers. While finance bros use MEGO (“my eyes glaze over”) as a weapon to bore their marks into submission, I use the same performative complexity as the engines of taut detective stories. Commissioning a Hench story lets you turn your favorite MEGO scam into a science fiction story, which I’ll then shop to fiction websites (every story I’ve written for the past 20 years has sold, though in the event that one of these doesn’t, I’ll put it up under a CC license).

Finally, there’s a super-ultra-limited deluxe hardcover edition — and I do mean limited, just four copies! These leather-bound editions have Will Staehle’s fantastic graphic motif embossed in their covers, and the type design legend John D Berry is laying out the pages so that there’s space for a hidden cavity. Nestled in that cavity is a hand-bound early draft edition of The Bezzle, the sequel to Red Team Blues. The binding is being done by the fantastic book-artist John DeMerritt. Each copy’s endpapers will feature a custom cryptographic puzzle created especially for it by the cryptographer Bruce Schneier.

I often hear from readers who want to thank me for the work I do, from the free podcast I’ve put out since 2006 to the free, CC BY columns I’ve written for Pluralistic for the past three years. There is no better way to thank me than to back this Kickstarter and encourage your friends to do the same:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/red-team-blues-another-audiobook-that-amazon-wont-sell

Preselling a ton of audiobooks, ebooks, and print books is a huge boost to the book on its launch — incomparable, really. Invaluable.

What’s more, helping me find a viable way to produce popular, widely heard audiobooks without submitting to Amazon’s DRM lock-in sets an example for other creators and publishers: we have a hell of a collective action problem to solve, but if we could coordinate a response to Audible demanding the right to decide whether our work should have their DRM, it would force Audible to treat all of us — creators, publishers and listeners — more fairly.

I’ll be heading out on tour to the US, Canada, the UK and Germany once the book is out. I’m really looking forward to as many backers in person as I can! Thank you for your support over these many long years — and for your support on this Kickstarter.

Today (Mar 22), I’m doing a remote talk for the Institute for the Future’s “Changing the Register” series.

[Image ID: A graphic showing a phone playing the Red Team Blues audiobok, along with a quote from Booklist, 'Jam-packed with cutting-edge ideas about cybersecurity and crypto. Another winner from an sf wizard.']

[noxexistant]

ai-less whumptober; day fourteen

@ailesswhumptober 14 — seizures, concussion, “See if you can follow my finger with your eyes.” ↳ boarding school au, modern word count; 2.3k

cw; severe bullying, violence, head trauma, mentions of abuse and death

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

Morris just wants to get to the library. He's had a full day of classes — actually attended them all for once, since his last run-in with Mr. Snyder regarding his truancy — and it's been miserable. Moreso than usual. Winter's coming in, so it's freezing in every classroom and colder in the hallways, and out of the huge windows he tries to gaze out of for solace he can only see grey and drizzle and mist.

It'd be romantic, perhaps, if it weren't for everything else.

It's the perfect backdrop for a movie, Dead Poets Society or an older noir, would look beautiful as the environment for a beautiful '40s actress in black-and-white, but even the fantasy doesn't much help with Morris' usual feelings of listlessness. He's always lonely — having no friends has that effect, but weather like this makes him feel somehow lonelier. He'd been stung worst of all when he'd been sat beneath the covered alcoves towards the back of the school at lunchtime, neglecting to eat atop a stone wall a hundred years old or so, and seen Oscar run past with the rest of the rugby team, all in their rugby uniforms. All of them muddy and wet from the rain, hair slick to their heads, but grinning, laughing, shoving at each other the way groups of boys do.

Morris misses his brother often, but especially in the winter.

A season they'd used to spend glued even closer than usual. A silent understanding between them of the seasonal melancholy that always seems to hit Morris the hardest, but also the weight of each bit of grief contained in these months. Lonely birthdays — Oscar's October, Morris' December — and Ma's death nestled neatly between. Oscar used to spend this time looking after Morris. Checking in on him a hundred times a day, taking the time before they left the house to ensure Morris was dressed properly for the cold weather, used to always make sure he had Morris' inhaler on him.

Nowadays, he doesn't often look Morris' way. They share a dorm room, but even then Oscar is around sporadically. Often up and gone by the time Morris wakes up — rugby practice. Or not there when Morris settles down for bed — parties. Oscar had taken like a duck to the water of the school their Da scored them free attendance to, meanwhile Morris is sure he's still drowning, no matter how long they've already been here.

Things have been somewhat better, at least, since Katherine transferred. A generous exchange of the title of new kids — a title that doesn't get passed often in a school like this — and an offer of Morris' first friendship. Sure as he still is that Katherine liking him will soon run its course, she's nice. And has asked him on more than one occasion to spend time together even after school, which is. Also nice.

Nice enough that he'd accepted again today, despite knowing full well the risks. The provocation of him walking the hallways alone once classes have ended and there's infinitely less risk of anyone coming across anything, not that it makes any difference when they do. Teachers turn wilful blind eyes, students don't want to make themselves a target. Everyone is comfortable with Morris being the school's pariah, scrawny and queer in both senses of the word.

There would've been a time Oscar would've defended him. Would've spilled blood to protect him.

But now, he's one of the group that surrounds Morris in one of the lonely stone hallways leading down to the library.

"I don' want trouble," Morris says, to none of them in particular.

To Oscar, really.

It doesn't work regardless.

One of the boy's shoves his shoulder hard, and in an instant Morris finds himself with his back pressed to the cold stone wall, staring up at one of the rugby players. Tall and broad. Already having fun.

"Who says we want trouble?" he says. "Jus' saw you all by yourself again. Thought you was prob'ly feelin' lonely."

"I'm meetin' Kath," Morris forces out. A few of the boys laugh.

"She can wait." His chest is shoved again, hard and pointless when he's already up against the wall, but it's a power play. "Dunno why you're meetin' her anyway. She don't know you're a queer yet? Weren't around at lunch when you was enjoyin' the view."

Oh, Christ.

"Weren't lookin' at anythin'," he says. "You was jus' passin' while I was there."

"He was starin'!" a boy jeers.

"Bet he took photos."

"Show us your camera, Delancey."

One makes a grab for his bag slung over his shoulder, lopsided from how he's pressed to the wall, and Morris desperately grabs the strap and clutches onto it. There's no photos of the boys on the film, obviously, but there is schoolwork he needs — and a $20 roll of film that he can't afford to lose. Can't afford to lose the camera. Da would beat the shit out of him.

"Stop!" he spits, trying to wrench his bag back. Immediately, the bag is released and he gets a punch to the stomach for his troubles instead. Doubles over wheezing, and his bag hits the ground anyway.

He hears Oscar laughing along with the group. Recognises the footsteps approaching him then the way he'd recognise his own. The worn black leather shoes that enter his bleary line of sight, still ducked to the floor.

His brother's hand seizes him by the necktie, and when that same hand forces his chin back up, Morris glares at him as fiercely as he can.

"Jus' leave me alone," he pleads quietly. "Os."

His vision bursts with stars as his brother simply slams him into the wall again, more brutal than the boy before had dared to be. They all laugh, the sort of breathless amusement of being impressed.

"Christ, Os, gonna knock somethin' loose like that."

"Would do him some good. He's queer an' retarded, surely you can fix one of 'em."

Morris hates them. A violent, hopeless, impossible amount. He just wants to leave, just wants to sit in the library with Katherine and pretend to read or maybe get some drawing done, but he's trapped. Eyes on him from every direction, sharks in the water, waiting for what's next. More blood. More to feed on.

"Wish you weren't such a freak," Oscar tells him.

And then the rest of it is a blur.

~

Oscar really doesn't mean for it to go so far.

It's easy to enter a sort of fugue state with violence. It does something to him, something therapeutic, something for him to get lost in, even in the worst circumstances. It's why he'd been so attracted to rugby, why it had come so naturally to him — and it's what had earned him the first bit of status he's ever had in his life. A popular member of a respected school's star sports team, finally clawed his way up far enough that nobody even cares anymore that he was the late-enrolled new kid, only got in because his Da works here so he gets free tuition.

And he's even proven himself against his freak of a little brother.

Morris has been an easy target all his life. He'd been one in public school, in foster care, and Lord knows he's one here. The student body is wealthy and mean, and Oscar had given Morris the chance to toughen up or lose it — and lost it he had. The boys Oscar befriended went after Morris like sharks, and Oscar will not sacrifice himself to the same fate. He'll follow them and keep his fins, keep his teeth. Even if it costs him Morris.

But, God, he didn't mean for it to go this far.

It's standard fare for what they do to Morris mostly. Corner him and shove him around, shots to the abdomen where they won't be seen, a few to the face if they get the chance because it's always fun to see his eyes bruise, his nose bleed. He's a mess already, blood beaded between pale lips, one side of his face blooming red that'll be black by tomorrow.

But then Morris tries to run.

It's a natural instinct. They're not that far from the library, where Morris had been trying to get to anyway, and even if there isn't a staff member there, Katherine will be. It's a shot at safety.

It doesn't work.

One of the boys grabs at Morris to wrench him back, in the same moment his ankle gets caught in the strap of his bag on the ground, and Oscar doesn't process the sight of what happens next. It happens so fast. He just processes the sound of it, the awful crack.

And then everything is very still. Morris is on the floor.

Oscar's friends are gone in an instant. All of them bolting, fleeing the scene of the crime before the risk of being caught can even be considered, but Oscar is rooted in place. Heart pounding in his chest.

"Mo," he says, real quiet. Terrified. "Mo?"

He steps shakily closer from where he'd backed away, happy to let his friends have their fill of violence. Crouches, reaching out with a shaky hand — bruising knuckles — to rest it on his brother.

Morris twitches hard like he's been woken up.

"Fuck," Oscar sobs. "Oh, fuck. C'mon. C'mon, Mo, get up."

He's desperate to destroy this scene before anyone comes across them. Gets considerably more frantic when he hears footsteps approaching from down the hall.

"Mo. Mo, c'mon, you gotta get up. We're gonna be in trouble."

Oscar lifts him, ignoring how utterly stiff he is, and all in a moment notices the stream of blood from where Morris' temple had split against the stone. There's a small pool of it, still dripping, getting all over Morris' uniform shirt, and Oscar is wondering if he could mop it up with his own rugby jumper when—

"Oh my God, Morris?"

It's Katherine. Of course it's Katherine.

Her footsteps are deafening as she runs over, clicks of her heeled shoes echoing around the hallway. Morris twitches in Oscar's arms, making a vague, croaked noise that Oscar recognises as a protest against the noise.

"What happened," Katherine demands. Her eyes are wide, pale face drawn tight into horror. "Oh my God. What happened?"

"He's fine."

"We have to get him to Matron—"

"He's fine. He jus' he had a wee fall, okay? Fuckin'. Tripped over his bag. He's fine. He's fine."

"Oscar, he hit his head."

Oscar can't breathe right. He's helpless to do much but watch as Katherine rounds him to crouch in front of Morris, wild ginger curls falling into her face with her haste, stricken with fear like Oscar's never seen — but Morris is fine. He's fine. Of course he's fine. Da's cracked his head against stuff countless times and Morris has always been fine.

"Morris," Katherine says, very gently. "Morris, here, see if you can follow my finger with your eyes."

Oscar watches her do it, draws a line across in the air. Morris has his back to his chest, so Oscar can't see what he's doing — but he must've done it.

"He did it, right? He did it," Oscar says, a little desperate.

Katherine ignores him. That look on her face is getting worse.

"Morris," she repeats, and there's something awful in her tone now. "Morris, please."

"What?" Oscar croaks. "What, what?"

"His—his pupils are uneven, so he must have a concussion. But. He. He's completely unresponsive. Like—he's just staring straight through me, like he can't even see me."

Oscar feels utterly sick. People can go blind from head trauma, right? That's a thing, he swears he remembers being told that. He's frantically trying to remember all the things he was taught when he started rugby, all those lectures on injuries and concussions and TBIs that he hadn't paid attention to — had rarely even attended — when suddenly what little colour had been in Katherine's face drains. Morris jerks again.

"Oh my God, he's having a seizure," she croaks.

Oscar's throat convulses like he's going to throw up.

"What? No. No, he ain't. This ain't—" he's seen seizures on TV. All that jerking and shaking all over, dancing about the floor. Morris isn't doing that. "This ain't what seizures are like."

"Yes, it is, Oscar. Holy shit. Oh my God."

Hands shaking, she starts digging in her blazer pockets, desperate.

"What're you doin'?" he croaks.

"I'm calling 9-1-1."

Oscar is hit with a flash of terror as she puts her phone to her ear and begins speaking, asking for an ambulance with a tone that no longer belies her childlike terror.

Oscar knows that, if an ambulance comes, they're going to ask questions — and it's his friends who will be in trouble. Big trouble. Fuck, what if they get charged? He knows what charges like this are like, it's the type of shit Da has been to court and then jail for after fucking people up in fights. Battery and GBH and—all that shit.

But then Morris jerks hard in his arms again. Lets out a croaked little noise that sounds so vividly like when he was a kid, deathly sick or beaten to shit by Da, in Oscar's arms because Oscar was the only person on the planet to look after him.

Oscar leans over and looks down at him. Just manages to catch a glimpse of his pale, colourless face and dazed, empty eyes and the blood drying against his skin, bloomed into his shirt that Oscar used to iron for him.

He doesn't say a word as Katherine talks to the operator on the phone, on her feet and pacing the hallway beside them. He just holds his brother closer to cradle him. Can't even begin to pull together an apology, so goes for the next best thing.

"'S'gonna be okay, Mo," he says softly.

Morris slumps against him. Oscar feels the twitching melt to trembling as Morris cries.

It's going to be okay, he tells himself.

[poraphia]

hello! Idk if you’re still doing siren requests but could you do a siren x reader where reader is a hero but a more captain puffy type hero than dream team hero and they were best friends at school, but completely oblivious to each others’ identities? I’m not sure, this is a more vague one. But just an idea, you don’t have to do it if you don’t want :)

"Just A Hero and a Villain Catching Up"

pairing • siren x hero!reader 1967 words • 9.25.23 containing • reader and wilbur are long term besties, reader doesn't really like being a hero, tommy teasing wilbs and reader my masterlist ~! ღ mrs. mania ღ on Tumblr

"You're my best friend, but I've been keeping a secret from you. Little did I know, you've been keeping a secret from me."

♡♡♡

“Alright, team, I think we did amazing work here!” Dream exclaimed as he held the once stolen artifact in his hand with pride. I breathed a sigh of exhaustion as the other heroes cheered. Dream looked at me, held tilted with his beady stare through his mask. As the other heroes congratulated and supported one another, he approached me, placing a hand on my shoulder.

“We’re doing a good thing here, Nymph. We protected an ancient piece of art, and we should be proud of the work we did.” He reassured, rubbing my shoulder. I let out a small grumble as I fiddled with my sleeves.

“Yeah, but didn’t Eastside’s museum get robbed too last week? Only two heroes showed up, and that was including me who volunteered to go.” I questioned. I looked up at him, staring at his smiling mask. He returned the gaze blankly without saying a word.

Dream broke the silence before letting a loud sigh that sounded almost annoyed. My eyebrows furrowed under my mask. “We both know that the headquarters aren’t exactly on our side sometimes,” He said. “but that isn’t necessarily in our control.” I didn’t say anything in response. Instead I brushed his hand off of my shoulder and checked my watch.

“Oh, shit,” I mumbled. Dream tilted his head curiously. I turned to him, pointing at my watch. “I have to go, but I’ll check in at HQ before midnight. See you, Dream.” Before I could hear or see his farewell goodbye, I formed a cloud so that I could fly away from the scene. As I glided through the city from West End to Eastside, I stared at the sky, thinking to myself.

I feel like I haven’t been the best friend to Wil.

And it’s not because we’ve been barely seeing each other, or we don’t joke around like how we used to when we were in high school, but it’s because I’ve been keeping this huge secret.

It’s not something I can just confess and get over with. No, no. I trust and love Wil with all my heart, but if he ever figured out my identity, that would put him in grave danger. I could never live with myself if I knew something happened to him all because I couldn’t keep one little detail about me.

So I kept my mouth shut.

It’s been months since we sat down and talked to each other because of how busy we were. The moment I’m free is the moment he has to go to an important meeting. The moment he’s free I’m searching through the whole city looking for runaway villains. But after months of planning in advance, we were finally able to schedule a whole afternoon to ourselves at the local cafe in Eastside.

I go to the Cloudy Cafe every so often to catch up with my past mentor, Puffy. She taught me in her final years of being a hero before retiring. My cloud slowly evaporated away as I landed safely behind the cafe building. Using a spare key she gave me, I unlocked the door and retrieved my backpack that was hidden into some storage shelves. I changed into some casual fitted clothes before stuffing my mask and costume into my bag , leaving the backroom, and locking the door behind me. Before I turned the corner, I noticed a familiar bright yellow sweater and mess of brown hair running into the cafe, followed by a blonde boy wearing a red and white shirt. With a raised eyebrow, I let them run into the cafe first before following in a minute later.

I was welcomed to the smell of freshly brewed coffee and baked goods. The blonde boy I saw run in earlier was talking to Puffy, who was sat at a circular table in the corner of the cafe. Deciding that I’ll just talk to her later, I scanned the cafe, finally finding Wilbur sitting at a two person table with his laptop out. He was panting with his face a little red from exhaustion. Pushing my curiousity aside, I walked up to his table while smiling.

“Wilbur!” I exclaimed. Immediately his head perked up and a huge smile formed on his face.

“(y/n)!” He beamed. Wilbur stumbled up. His tall figure nearly towered over mine as he engulfed me in his long, lengthy limbs. Giggling, I wrapped my arms around his torso and buried myself into his chest. after a moment of us snuggled into each other’s warmth, I pulled away, looking at his face.

“I haven’t seen your face in literally so long! Did you get handsomer?” I joked. Wilbur flushed, nervously rubbing the back of his neck.

“Eh, you could say that.” He said bashfully. We both took our seats at our table. Wil closed his laptop and placed it in his bag. I placed my backpack under the table to leave us with more room on the table. He sat across from me with his hands folded onto the surface. “Seriously, how have you been, (y/n)? Has work been treating you well?” He asked.

I bit my tongue from letting out a tired huff. A bit of me wanted to unravel all my stress onto him, raving about how tiring this workforce is and how I feel as if this system isn’t as innocent as we’re made to believe. But instead, I just shook my head.

“It’s… Alright.” I managed out. Instantly, Wil saw right through me.

“Oh? I know that tone, y’know. C’mon, spit it out.” He teased. His hand trailed around to where my hands were sprawled out. I sighed, a little annoyed that he still knows how to decipher pieces of me.

“It’s just… It’s not exactly what I signed up for, y’know? I thought it would be about doing good for the world, but if anything, I think we’re doing worse.” I ranted, using my hands a little to convey my words. He sat and stared at me; eyebrows furrowed as he concentrated. “I don’t know. Sometimes I want to leave, but the other times I feel like I could make a change. Lately, it’s been feeling hopeless though, y’know?”

My fingers quickly pressed against my lips, realizing that I was probably saying too much. Wil, in turn, nodded, as if understanding my words. “Yeah, I know what you’re talking about. Where did you say you work at again?” He asked.

“I— Uh— Just some human services organization that helps aid people and things like that.” I said, waving my hand off. I watched his expression soften, as if he was relieved to hear my words. I smiled reassuringly at him.

“Order for Wilby and his lovely, oh so loved partner!” The blonde barista called out from behind the counter. With an audible groan, Wilbur got up from his seat and trotted over to the counter. He quietly lectured the blonde boy as he just smiled cheekily. Once he was finished, he returned to our table with one iced coffee and one hot coffee.

“Sorry about that,” he chuckled. He slid the ice coffee order to me, in which I happily took a sip from. He took his seat in front of me, placing his cup on the table. “That’s my brother, Tom. He’s an odd one honestly.” I titled my head curiously.

“You have another brother? I thought it was just you, Techno, and Phil.” I noted.

“Ah, well,” he took a sip of his coffee before speaking again. “He was a new addition only like a couple months ago. It’s been a crazy year honestly.” He laughed. “Speaking of family, you should come by our house sometime soon to say hi.”

“Oh, absolutely!” I grinned. “I would love to spar with Techno again, or even just hearing stories from Phil.”

“Great!” He replied. “Oh, you just came from West End, right?”

I hummed in response, curious as to where this was going. “Yeah, why?” I asked.

He hesitated a bit, his lips briefly thinning before speaking. “I was wondering if you caught a glimpse of the fight near the museum. I heard it was kinda big.”

Oh, you mean the fight I was just in fifteen minutes ago that nearly led to some building collapsing and dozens of people injured?

“Oh, yeah!” I fiddled with the ends of my sleeve. “I saw a glimpse of it, but not much. If anything it was just the cause of my traffic.” I chuckled. My leg rapidly shook from under the table. Wilbur I beg, please be oblivious just this once.

Wil smiled before looking out the window. “Yeah, I caught a little bit of it too as we were headed here. Nymph really was causing a huge storm! Nearly scared the crap out of me from all that thunder.” My heart stopped at the mere mention of my superhero name. The identity I didn’t want him knowing.

“Ah, yeah, it was a giant.” I smiled. “I heard she was causing such a storm to muffle out Siren’s commands.” I commented, which wasn’t a lie. Siren was about to unleash a load of commands to brainwash all of the heroes fighting, so in an act of quick thinking, I summoned a huge storm with thunder so that no one could hear his voice.

“Well, Siren is pretty cool like that,” Wil laughed. Though something about it seemed… Fake in a way. His shoulders were tensed up and he refused to make eye contact. But maybe I was just looking too into it. “What do you think of the Syndicate? If you don’t mind me asking.” He turned to me now with his head resting in his palm. I leaned back in my chair, thinking about what to say.

“I think the Syndicate gets more exaggerated than they really are on media.” I said blankly. Wil raised an eyebrow, as if asking me to continue on. I took a sip from my drink before speaking again. My eyes glued onto my hands as I rubbed my own knuckles. “Well, nobody really stops and interviews the Syndicate about why they do their crimes, now do they? Maybe it’s just the little conspiracy theorist in me, but I feel like media hides the truth behind the rivalry of the Syndicate and Heroes Society.” I shrugged. When I looked up, Wil had the expression of a sweet puppy tilting his head out of curiosity. If I didn’t have any self-control, I would’ve expressed my admiration for such an adorable sight. Instead, I returned the tilted head gesture.

“Pff, what?” I chuckled as my hair cascaded down my shoulder. Wil hummed before returning his head posture back to normal.

“Nothing. It’s just you don’t really hear about people trying to understand the Syndicate. It’s really interesting.” He smiled. He has this glossy look in his eyes that almost sparkled.

“Ah, well,” I reached over the table, shaking my near empty drink. “it looks like my coffee is almost done. Let’s say we get out of here and walk along the pier or something?” I suggested.

Wil looked at me before turning his gaze to the blonde boy behind the counter. In the least subtle way possible, the barista was pointing at the back of his throat while making gagging noises. He scoffed at the sight before returning that beautiful gaze of his to me.

“I would love to, but first, let me go beat up Tom over there.

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a / n ~ sleepy mania over here. hope you guys enjoyed. thank you sososo much for the support! sorry i havent updated my masterlists though. trying to get more organized. reblogs, replies, even likes are super duper appreciated!