#all of entropy but specifically rescue me

[gay-simple-and-chaotic]

post full of things I'm obsessed with when it comes to Klair

Long post so it's under the cut but PLEASE come be obsessed with me

Okay so firstly I'll tell you who "Klair" are

They're these two, my OCs Korbyn Blakeway and Blair McKay

Secondly: Blair's playlist can be found here and as you'll notice it SCHMACKS of unrequited longing and adoration, as does this enclosed animatic I made

Lost Kitten is a MASSIVE influence in their dynamic, which will be explained--

Thirdly:

Lost Kitten and Musical Significance in Character Themes

Lost Kitten is a song that roughly, if you glance over the official lyric video, seems to be talking about a person who's either on the streets, a sex worker, or otherwise impoverished/vulnerable.

It's implied they're young ("Kitten on the catwalk, high heeled shoes" specifically being a double entendre to mean both a) a young person, implied as a woman, in the adult world too early, b) a youthful looking person on the "catwalk", slang for where prostitutes would usually hawk their services, as well as to evoke an actual kitten, something small, young, and helpless) and potentially involved in sex work as well ("I was looking for a hooker when I found you" can be read as "I was looking for a hooker, however I found you instead" which a) can be seen as them finding someone who would offer sex for free or b) can be seen as them finding the titular "lost kitten" and feeling more protective than aroused. However it can also be read as "I was looking for a hooker when I found you" to be interpreted as "I was looking for a hooker and found you, a hooker").

Potentially this person is a victim of the foster care system as well.

Now, you might be thinking, how does that tie in?

Korbyn.

Korbyn, despite coming from an affluent household, ended up on the streets when attempting to escape his abusive home, and shortly before actually doing so, ran into a situation that led to him sleeping around at a young age (15, namely) in an attempt to recapture a feeling of intimacy he'd "lost."

Blair meets Korbyn when Blair himself is around the same age--by this point, Korbyn is freshly 18 and Blair is going onto 16 on his upcoming December birthday. Korbyn's situation has changed, with his brother taking over the household/family name, but he's still doing sex work while also grappling with the mercenary work he's blackmailed into.

So the specific way that Lost Kitten ties into their story is literal and metaphorical; Korbyn, assigned as the trainer to a small shy boy who's quite evocative of a small shivering kitten on the street, as well as Blair finding Korbyn alone on the streets after jobs, emotionally distant and depressed.

The literal bit comes in when Blair rescues a young kitten who'd been in an accident, and in panic comes to Korbyn, the only person he can think of. (The kitten survives)

however that's the theme of kittens--there's also "you've got my eyes/you'll never be mine/but you've got my eyes"

I interpreted this line as "You've got my eyes (my attention, my devotion, my adoration)/You'll never be mine (I may not have yours)/but you've got my eyes (regardless I am content to love you this way)"

And that is Blair's whole arc.

Because he's in love with Korbyn, and it continues to be a point of grievance for him all the way into his twenties; because Korbyn, who is very intelligent and good at reading people despite his overwhelming autistic swagger, is as dense as a bag of bricks about Blair's feelings and just never catches on.

But the big kicker is Blair's clairvoyance; because as mentioned, he's not a very proactive person. No, he prefers to let things just happen.

Pandora's Metric, their story, has three main timelines; Entropy, Exile, and Exaltation. To quickly summarize;

Entropy: one of the last remaining original angels triggers the world's magical chaos metric to reach such levels that magical beings and systems begin to malfunction. The world ends. Bad End Timeline.

Exile: the same angel triggers the world's magical stagnation metric to reach levels that cause the slow degradation of the world. Nothing much happens dramatically; world eventually ends. Neutral End Timeline.

Exaltation: that angel decides they don't want to deal with the weight of being an angel, and passes on all their magic and angelic soul to Korbyn, leading to him becoming the new god of the world. "Good" End Timeline.

To paraphrase a certain popular movie,

In every universe Blair falls for Korbyn.

And in every universe, it doesn't go well.

In Entropy, Blair never really gets to tell him anything, because Blair bleeds out his soul in a back alley and basically deals with the whole agonizing transition that newly turned vampires and werewolves get, except he turns into an angelhound, angel-eating mimics created by an angel ages ago in a fit of severe rage.

Meanwhile, Korbyn's off trying to stop his godparent and brother from causing magical meltdown of the universe

And then the world ends.

So it's not optimal for confessing.

In Exile, they get married. They live peacefully. Korbyn comes into his angelic heritage and they make it to around their 40s/50s

And then Blair fucking dies.

So that's not great.

And in Exaltation, Korbyn's a bit too busy coming to terms with now being god to be confessed to, and then he outlives the entire universe anyway.

So that doesn't fucking vibe.

And Blair knows this.

Blair knows all of this, from the moment he first falls in love, thanks to a cursed gift he was born with.

And Blair has to choose for himself which route he will try for.

Let himself become something alien to his values, carelessly engaged in primal connections with someone he sees as a dear friend? Let himself die before his 60th year, just to feel the warmth of Korbyn's love, to be his? Let himself be seated at Korbyn's side to watch his walk to godhood, and then fade into obscurity?

He has to choose something that no 26 year old ever would think that they'd have to choose, and it weighs on him so so heavily.

But it's beautiful, the way he waits, waits to choose, watches Korbyn's beauty as it is, the way he puts off choosing so as to savor their present.

And I am fucking obsessed with them. I will never shut up about them. Their relationship is full of delightful, painful, heartwrenching unrequited love and doglike devotion to rival that of a worshiper and his god.

And it's between two men, two mercenaries who have been best friends since they were teenagers, two souls who are unfortunately doomed by the narrative to played fated roles.

It's between a god and his best friend.

It's between two incredibly autistic men who couldn't emotionally articulate their way out of a paper bag.

And god I'd kill for them.

[angelinthefire]

Meanstiel fic 👀👀

Thank you for asking!

I explain the vague premise of the Meanstiel fic here.

To talk about some of the more specific ideas I have for the fic:

How I'd have Cas behave is that, like, he's constantly making connections between things, and seeing how apparently unconnected phenomena relate to each other, so he's constantly talking about things either with two levels of abstraction and metaphor without explaining himself, or he's being painfully precise. Like, I'd have him talk in terms of physics a lot: Entropy, the arrow of time, relativity, gravity and gravitational lensing and all of that. Or biological stuff: that forest in Utah that's all one tree; how when caterpillars metamorphosize into butterflies they completely disintegrate into soup, but the mature organism still has all the memories of its old self. Stuff like that. He's never just rambling.

Eventually Dean really starts listening to him and making an effort to connect. But he has to overcome some personal barriers first. Like he thought he and Cas were on the upswing at the end of s7, but then Cas went off with Meg, and Dean is angry about it, without fully letting himself recognize why. And his feelings about Cas are very frustrating in general. Part of the reason for this fic is that I really want Dean to be hung up on "The very touch of you corrupts". And he does think he's to blame for "ruining" Cas on some level, but he also thinks the angels are awful in general and he was right to "corrupt" Cas, but it's also mixed up with a semi-awareness that he's attracted to Cas and he has feelings of shame around that and a fear that he "infected" him or something, and also it's just easier to be angry and blame Cas or blame Meg than to admit to any of this, and also he just really really misses Cas and the way that they used to be. So he has to get over all of that.

And then Meg is dealing with the novelty of having someone genuinely care about her, and she hates it and it terrifies her and she wants it, and she doesn't want to lose Cas, but it might be easier if she did, but she's also possessive over him, but she also doesn't want it to look like he's her weakness. I want there to be some kind of scene where there's a fight. And of course, Meg's whole excuse for having Cas around is that he protects her. But it's starting to really bother her how genuine he is about it. So there would be one instance where he saves her life, and then is being really soft with her, and she freaks out, like, "I don't need you to save me!" Like there's a difference between being physically rescued and how she feels like Cas is trying to "save" her. If that makes sense.

And guilt is a uniting theme for all of them.

I still don't have an actual plot, lol.

[gra-sonas]

How did Noah get out of his pod? Was he always out? We don’t know how he met isobel right

Eh, the details are a bit hazy, but he didn't actually "meet" Isobel. Not in person for many years at least.

Apparently he crawled into a broken pod (he'd dragged to an underground hiding place) after the crash in 1947, hoping someone would come and rescue him. Bc the pod was defective, he wasn't put in stasis, instead he was "alive" and conscious the whole time (which lead to his mind being warped, while his body slowly deteriorated). He couldn't get out of the pod on his own, though.

Fast forward to 2004 and the night the pod squad was out camping in the desert, when a drifter attacked Isobel (Max killed him for that, and Michael buried the body with his telekinesis).

Isobel's "psychic scream" (whatever that is) reached Noah in his pod and when Isobel blacked out after the attack, Noah was able to "slip into her mind/body" with his mind somehow (don't ask for the specifics bc the show never really explained that bit), and every blackout after that Noah used to slip in and do things as Isobel (like befriend Rosa unbeknownst to Isobel herself).

Killing Rosa (which wasn't his intention bc he "loved" her), gave Noah the final push of energy he needed to get out of the pod.

Noah (in 1x12): I'm sure you're wondering why I stopped borrowing your body after Rosa died. How I healed, how I got out of that pod, finally. I didn't want to kill Rosa, but there's the cruel irony: killing her, channeling her exquisite life force, it brought me back. I changed shape and my mind sharpened. Kills make us stronger, don't they, Max? Destruction makes us feel better. Physically, at least. Isobel: That's why the bodies piled up. You keep killing because it keeps you strong. That's why your powers are so much stronger than ours. Noah: It's simple practice. You could be strong if you weren't so afraid of yourself. I kill to keep my body alive. After all those years in that broken pod, it wants to disintegrate, and I won't let it. Max: You're a parasite. Noah: And you're an aberration. When you heal people, it nearly kills you because it's unnatural, downright freakish, but hell if you didn't feel like a force of nature after you killed the creep in the desert that night. You felt like a god. You got a tiny taste again this year, didn't you, blowing out all the power in town? Destruction is chaos is entropy is energy is power is victory.

Noah had to keep killing to keep his body alive and in the shape he took on, hence the 13 other murders over the course of the following years.

[cybernexus]

Pick five tropes for your character.

1. Determinator

A character — good or evil, regardless of gender, young or old — who never gives up. Ever. No matter what.

There is no stopping the Determinator. They do not understand tact. They do not Know When to Fold 'Em, and it's a waste of time to tell them the odds. No one can reason with them. They'll do whatever they have to without question. No price is too great to pay for success, up to and including their own life. Do not expect them to realize they might be better off letting it go, even if they can barely stand. If you're ever kidnapped or lost with no hope of rescue, they'll be the one who will find you. Their adversaries will shout, in exasperated rage, "Why Won't You Die?!". For them, there is no line between "perseverance" and "insanity."

// This got long so I’m stuffing the rest under a cut!

2. Entropy and Chaos Magic

Magic and powers with a "chaotic" theme. Often referred to as "chaos magic", "wild magic" (not to be confused with the Wild Magic trope) or, more fancifully, "entropic magic" or variants on that name. Sometimes appears in settings with an Order Versus Chaos cosmology, but can pop up anywhere.

It can function in many different ways, but frequent traits include: high randomness and uncontrollability, probability manipulation, and inducing accelerated decay and destruction, depending on how the writers interpret the concept of chaos and entropy.

In real life, "entropy" is a physical concept, roughly defined as a measure of disorder and chaos of a given system.note  Per the second law of thermodynamics, the entropy of an isolated system can only grow, never decrease; the only way to decrease the entropy is for some external force to do work on it.note  Since the universe itself (as far as we know) is an isolated system with no external forces that can affect it, this suggests that eventually it will succumb to "heat death of the universe": eventually all organized systems will break apart.note  Hence why chaos-based entities tend to have an Omnicidal Maniac vibe to them. Hence why Aihren is the foil to that, because they're trying to absorb the energy and save the universe by preventing (or at least prolonging) the heat death. If you find yourself asking “but wait, who was the foil of Aihren? You just mentioned Omnicidal Villain...”

All I have to say is ... Soon(TM)

3. Past-Life Memories -

Past-life memories are memories that a reincarnated character gains from previous incarnations of their soul.

When Reincarnation and past-life memories are presented as being real within the context of a story, it often works in a way similar to Genetic Memory, by giving the character knowledge and skills that they would otherwise be unlikely to gain for themselves. Past-life memories often manifest as Dreaming of Times Gone By.

In most works with Reincarnation, the majority of characters do not gain past-life memories, so having them is often a sign of being a particularly important soul, perhaps even The Chosen One.

4. Utility Magic - In many works, magic is something to blast things with and generally make stuff explode.

But not in this universe. In this universe, Mundane Utility isn't a secondary effect of all those awesome spells, but the primary one. The magic essentially has to do with things on the more mundane scale of the Inverse Law of Utility and Lethality, like Cleaning Magic, or Gardening Magic, or Paper-Filing Magic. Why modify that fireball spell to cook your hotdog, when you can just have a spell that does exactly that in the first place, and to your perfect specifications?

5. Gender Ambiguity Kind of like some other muns I saw, I didn't really like most of the definitions I saw on the site because they seem to be written from a very ... "there's only 2 genders" kind of view. Which is dumb in the year 2021. Anyways:

Aihren is androgynous. So androgynous in fact that they can "put on" a beard (via shapeshifting) and instantly have people think that they're AMAB. Aihren's assigned sex at birth is nobody's business, not even their lovers. It's something that to them, doesn't really matter. Aihren comes out different every reincarnation and then just shape-shifts themself into how they want to look anyway (they prefer to have no sex characteristics unless they plan on using them).

Their face just naturally is very sort of in between the lines of what society has arbitrarily decided is "male" or "female" (I shouldn’t have to clarify but just to touch on it anyway, there is nothing wrong with identifying with the binary). Even Aihren’s body has been described as androgynous. They regularly flip between having breasts or a flat chest, and they're quite curvy in the waist and hips, but also very square and athletic in the shoulders and legs.

Almost everyone seems to find them hot so that's pretty neat, lol. At the end of the day, androgyny is their personal gender goal. Being nonbinary is very personal to one's self and every individual defines it differently. Androgyny is not the goal of all nonbinary people so always remember to ask for people's pronouns and respect identities when people don't want you to call them something like "dude"! (As an example)

Tagged by: @magioffire​ Tagging: i’m heccin lazy if you see this and wanna do it tag me so i can read them!

[gottagobuycheese]

Tag Thingy

Thanks @silent--sonata for indulging my terrible sleeping habits XD

(fyi this will probably be unnecessarily long and rambly, so it’s going under a cut (EDIT: whelp the song list got a little out of hand, I’d apologize if I were even remotely sorry)) 

Rules: Answer 17 questions & tag 17 people you want to get to know better  

Nickname: Cheese (or Lactose Wedge, or Dairy Product of Unspecified Origin and Purpose)

Zodiac Sign: Gemini! 

Height: 160.5 cm/5′3″ (Bubbles I refuse to believe you’re actually that much taller than me) 

Hogwarts house: Somewhere between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff allegedly, both of which I’d be honored to get sorted into, but honestly I’d just be stoked to get sorted at all 

Last thing I googled: I think it was something along the lines of “how to speed up audio playback in GarageBand,” but but my train of thought was derailed before I actually looked at any of the results so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (and on a related note, thanks again for the magical audio editing @imperiousheiress!)

Song stuck in my head: The end credits to Legacy of the Wizard (which is SUCH a jam, thank you for enlightening me @jessicafish) Following and followers: 227 (goodness just looking at that number is stress-inducing) and...104?! When the HECK did you all get here??? I think just last summer I was happily floating about in the 50′s. Anyways, to anyone I have not said hello, hello! Hope you enjoy your stay, and I am sincerely sorry if you expected Quality Original Content, or even just regularly scheduled other people’s content. Sadly, neither of these things tend to happen here. 

Amount I sleep: During the school year it’s usually anywhere between 30 minutes and 6 hours (DON’T EVEN START BUBBLES YOU HAVE NO RIGHT), usually landing in the 3/4 hour ranges if I’m smart about it, but now that I am on Unofficial Break, it’s usually at least around 6 hours (except today was 3 because Avatar is an excellent show and the weirdos in this house have regularly scheduled breakfast at 9-something every morning). Sadly my sleep schedule can only be forced to tolerate normalcy for so long before careening back in the other direction, so we’ll see if this is just a blip or if we’re back to normal mid-Atlantic Ocean hours!

Lucky number(s): I wouldn’t say these are necessarily favorite numbers, but I do like 2 and 9. But come to think of it, second attempts at Official Things do tend to go better for me than first attempts, so maybe there’s some merit there after all! Dream Job: Don’t think I’m really cut out for dreaming anymore, haha (unless you are a theoretical future employer in which case I am Extremely Full of Ambition and Passion). The bed-adjacent metaphor has been made, and not to brag, but I can sleep on pretty much any surface. Currently studying my Not Favorite aspect of STEM (was there ever a favorite or did I just like being good at things sometimes) and learning how to People™ properly (and also learning a gazillion convoluted drug names like what the heck dude, did you just fall asleep on your typewriter coming up with these), so I’ll take whatever place hires me and pays me enough not to depend on my parents for everything, I suppose. In an ideal world, that would entail a job where I could make friends, and even more importantly, a job where my shortcomings would not cause Massive and Irreparable Harm, but I don’t think this line of work really meshes with that last one, so I guess I’ll either have to get my shit together™ extremely soon or fake my death, adopt an alias, and flee to a completely new place with no ties whatsoever before trying to get another, less high stakes job. 

(Though I guess, less cynically, I like helping people well enough? And stories are fun! Maybe there could’ve been something with that. Not that there still can’t be, mind, but there’s still a long way to go between Here and There)

Wearing: Black shorts. Navy t-shirt. Brown some-specific-kind-of-jacket-I-forgot-the-name-of jacket. Is it summer? Is it fall? Am I in middle school? Who can say, but they are COMFY so sadly I have no cares to give

Favourite song(s): way way WAY too many to list here, and I do not have them all organized in a handy playlist separately, but to name a few (and these are not necessarily the MOST favorite okay, it doesn’t mean I don’t love stuff not on this list, it means you can’t force me to pick between my children and I am going to find at least one quick thing from a few things I like before I need to hit post and go back to looking like I’m being studious, and also things I think you should listen to right now, but for everything I’ve linked assuming I mean the whole OST), here’s a spam of links in no particular order: 

LoZ Wind Waker - The Great Sea (aka the epitome of optimism) 

Undertale - NGAHHH!! (I was about to link more but then I realized it’d be the whole soundtrack lol) 

LoZ Breath of the Wild - Hateno Village (Night) 

A:tLA - Peace (bad call BAD CALL NOW I HAVE EMOTIONS) 

Legend of Korra - Final Scene/Ending Theme (MISTAKES WERE MADE MISTAKES WERE MADE) 

Kung Fu Panda - Oogway Ascends (I feel like I’m taking you on a whole little album journey now XD) 

PMD: Explorers of Sky - Dialga’s Fight to the Finish (aka the Gotta Shower Fast song) 

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Pursuit ~ Cornered (aka the HURRY UP AND PACK UR SHIT YOUR FLIGHT LEAVES IN THREE HOURS song) 

Apollo Justice: A New Trial Is In Session (very underrated soundtrack imo) and also Apollo Justice: Telling the Truth (because these two are very closely associated in my head and it’s getting harder and harder to narrow things down so maybe I should stop lol) 

Your Name: Katawaredoki (in which I am forcibly thrown heart first into the bedroom of my second apartment at approximately 12-something A.M.) 

Digimon Adventure 01: Butterfly (MASSIVE 90′s childhood anime feels, and also Last Summer Before Everything Went to Shit feels (on a general scale I mean, not personal)) 

Pokémon: Lugia’s Song multitrack cover by Jordan Moore (would that I could have a talent of that musical talent) 

Pokémon the First Movie: Tears of Life (great now I’m on a Pokémon music spiral GUESS IT’S CHILDHOOD NOSTALGIA HOURS NOW) 

PMD: Blue Rescue Team - Farewell and Run Away/Fugitives (you CANNOT make me choose between these guys okay, my brain WILL explode, and whoops now I want to link the whole ost) 

Palette by A Dear Friend (wink wonk) 

Pokémon: Alpha Sapphire - Fortree City (wow talk about mood whiplash)

Detective Conan: Main Theme (I can’t find the specific version since there are so many, but it’s a Good Theme) 

Super Smash Bros.: Brawl - Opening Theme 

Pokémon Colosseum - Relic Forest 

Song for Lindsay by Andrew Boysen Jr. (oh great now it’s time for marching band feelings I guess)

Mt. Everest by Rossano Galante 

Deltarune - Field of Hopes and Dreams and A Town Called Hometown (orchestrated) (aka the Lots of Work To Do song) and You Can Always Come Home and Don’t Forget (hey guess what I wrote a bunch of fake extra verses for) (also it looks my pathetic attempts at narrowing things down are getting even more pathetic so I’ll wrap up soon XD) 

 Guild Wars 2 - Fear Not This Night (never actually played this myself but my friend got me addicted to the music) 

Lord of the Rings - May It Be (Enya) (aaaand now I miss choir, THANKS BUBBLES) 

Lion King - Can You Feel the Love Tonight (Multilingual) by Travys Kim (aka how I remembered how fun these things are) 

Original Song by Anonymous  

(The urge to add all the other songs I’m not adding is so strong but I’ve got so much work to do so just assume I mean all Nintendo music from any game I’ve played, all Ghibli movie music, every musical I’ve ever heard, and even more) 

Random fact:

Apparently as early as the 17th century, you could guess that a child would have a shortened life span if their foreheads tasted salty. Yes, there is a specific reason, and yes, you may already know what it is, and thankfully no, that life span projection no longer holds true, assuming access to Modern Medicine! 

Favourite Authors: Okay I have not read enough various books of enough various authors to be able to answer this, so I’m just gonna go with a few books instead. They are not necessarily all-time favorites, but I enjoyed reading them very much at the time and more often than not go back to them for comfort reads: The Martian, any of first three Harry Potter books, and The Rise of Kiyoshi. (That last one’s not really a comfort read but I am drowning in Loving Kiyoshi juice so here we are)

Favourite Animal Noises: Certain kinds of birds (UNLESS it’s some ungodly hour of the morning and you’re trying to sleep)? Ooh, and crickets! 

Aesthetic: A slob, but like...a comfy slob. An incredibly disorganized hermit who is happy to mill about in the uncontrolled entropy. (Are we talking about what aesthetic I give off, or what I like to look at, visually? Because I like space, and water, and mountains, and forests, and forests ON mountains, OOH and forests on mountains at night where you can see space, perhaps reflected in a body of water. Or just water, idk. Different things are pretty to look at at different times)

WELL THAT ONLY TOOK FOREVER SORRY FOR THE OBSCENE LENGTH 

@pachelbelsheadcanon @averybritishbumblebee @shingeki-no-korra @sailorlock @yeswevegotavideo @soultheta @queenerdloser @ifeelbetterer @rogueofdragons @peppervl @amadness2method @mutalune and anybody else who wants to do this! This isn’t seventeen, and I don’t know if any of you have already done it/been tagged, but I hear people moving around upstairs so that means this break is over XD. And ABSOLUTELY no pressure to actually do this, this is pretty much just me wishing you well! (and YOU of course, my dear reader! I hope everything’s going all right, or if it’s not, that it does soon)

[anistarrose]

Dog is an Elf’s Best Friend (TAZ Graduation)

Summary: The summer before our series is set, two brothers search for the cure to a curse and are led to the Unknown Forest.

Word Count: 4100

Warnings: very brief eye horror

AO3: archiveofourown.org/works/21436063

I can’t be completely sure because I can’t read Travis’s mind and I don’t know what canon is going to do, but this is probably an AU. Some parts are based of a theory I think is pretty plausible, but other parts are bigger stretches.

***

Each year, when the hottest months arrive and the students leave their Wiggenstaff dorms to visit family or pursue summer employment, there are exactly four faculty members who remain on campus. One is Hernández, who stays to take care of the resident animals, and the second is of course Groundsy, whose true motivations remain an enigma to all but is ostensibly present to repair the tower and maintain the grounds as needed.

The third is Higglemas Wiggenstaff. They say you have a better chance of catching him outside of his office in the summer than you do during the school year, but it’s still a rare occurrence. Most rooms in Wiggenstaff’s, and in the Annex in particular, get so hot in the summer that they’re practically suffocating — but rumor has it that Higglemas can and will open a portal to the Plane of Air itself, if that’s what it takes to ventilate his office and keep it at a liveable temperature.

(Most students — especially the magic users themselves, who know just how much skill it requires to open such a portal — take this rumor with a grain of salt. Higglemas has been locking himself away like this for years, but has yet to emerge from his office with any grand innovation or discovery to show for it — how competent of a wizard can he really be?)

Unbeknownst to all but Higglemas himself, the fourth faculty member is Higglemas’s dog.

At first impression, and even second and third impression, nothing seems unusual about the collie that wanders the halls of the Annex — at least, nothing more unusual than what would be expected from a pet of Higglemas’s. He’s a well-trained dog, usually aloof but occasionally willing to accept bribes in the form of food, and he seems intelligent, but not uncannily so.

But this impression of mundanity, while incorrect, is a testament to the dog’s ability to keep a secret. And as luck would have it, this ability just so happens to run in the family.

***

Today, there are two deliveries for Higglemas waiting at the wrought-iron gate to the Annex. When the dog fetches them from the courier and brings them to his office, Higg immediately tears off the brown paper covering the larger of the two packages and begins leafing through the book in search of its section on polymorph spells. He hunches over the his desk, ignoring the second package, and presses his thumb to his middle finger to stem the flow of blood from a papercut he’s given himself in his haste.

“Hrm. Smoke from mahogany wood, that might be worth investigating…” he mutters, sloppily underlining a passage in the ancient tome with a ragged-looking quill pen. Then he cross-references his notes, and scowls. “No, what am I thinking? We’ve tried mahogany wood twice now!”

He slams the book closed. “We’ve tried every type of wood by now! We’ve tried every damn combination of components in all of Nua — and none of them have done a single thing!”

The dog whimpers, nudging the second package closer to Higg. It’s a small burlap sack, containing several loaves of bread and sugary pastries ordered from the bakery in Last Hope.

The dog cannot speak, but his message is clear: You’ll never find the right components if you forget to eat and collapse from starvation.

Higg reluctantly breaks off a tiny piece of crust from one of the loaves, popping it into his mouth as he pulls out another book. Unsatisfied, the dog leaps up onto the desk, trampling all over Higg’s notes and setting the bag of food down directly on top of the book, where Higg can’t possibly ignore it.

“Oh, fuck off, Hiero!” Higg snaps. “Do you want to be stuck like this forever?”

Hiero huffs and jumps down off the desk, storming off to disappear behind one of the office’s many bookshelves.

Higg sighs. “Okay, fine! I’ll eat — look!” He magically slices two pieces of bread off of the loaf and puts a piece of cheese between them, then takes a bite and makes exaggerated chewing motions. “See, there it goes! Down the pipe! You don’t need to get all sulky on me!”

Hiero doesn’t emerge from behind the bookshelf.

“I didn’t mean to snap at you like that, okay? I’m sorry.” Higg puts his head in his hands. “It’s just — it’s been five fucking years, and I haven’t come up with anything, Hiero. I don’t know how much longer I can do this. Someone’s bound to figure us out sooner or later…”

He swivels around in his chair, pulling open the curtains covering the office’s sole window and gazing outside towards the Unknown Forest with unfocused eyes.

“Everyone knows you would’ve saved me a long time ago, if I’d gotten cursed,” he whispers. “But I’ve tried every idea I can think of, every single spell component I know, and you’re still a dog…”

Hiero pokes his head out from his hiding place just in time to see his brother abruptly lean closer to the window, a smile suddenly spreading across his face.

“So that means the missing piece of the puzzle must be unknown to us, so to speak…” Higgs muses out loud.

Hiero barks so loud that it startles a bird flying by outside. You’d better not be planning what I think you’re planning! You’re just going to get yourself killed!

But Higg is already on his way to the door, throwing on a cloak and dusting off a longsword that hasn’t seen use in decades.

“Quit being such a worrywart, Hiero. I’m going to the Unknown Forest, I’m gonna burn some of the shit I find there, and then I’m going to get you back to normal.”

***

The smoke is the most vital component of a potent True Polymorph spell, on that much all sources agree. A cloud of smoke can change shape unlike any other substance, responding instantaneously to even the gentle guidance of a faint breeze. It represents impermanence and entropy, and the delicate act of channeling something fluid into a different, yet recognizable form.

But Higg has found all sorts of differing accounts on what type of smoke works best. Not all of them are contradictory — some recommend burnt driftwood specifically for a transformation into a sea creature, and others endorse candle smoke with a dash of copper sprinkled in for bats and other nocturnal creatures. Others still swear by a piece of parchment with writing on it, ideally a few words that evoke the creature one is trying to transform into.

But there is no recorded precedent, much less a scientific consensus, on how to reverse a curse and turn one’s brother from a dog back into an elf, so Higg has resorted to simply trying every possible combination of components he can think of. He still consults old texts from time to time, but neither research nor trial and error have resulted in even the faintest hint of a lead.

Hence his current plan: walking straight into the deadliest forest on Nua. Somewhere in between storming out of his office, and finding himself in the northeast corner of the campus green, he’s come to accept that it’s one of his worst plans ever — but it’s also the only plan he has left, and there’s no plan that’s worse than not trying anything.

He notices that Hiero is trotting after him, lagging behind by a few dozen feet. As much as Higg hates the idea of Hiero following him into the forest, his presence is oddly reassuring, because it tells Higg that even despite their earlier spat, his brother does still worry about him charging off to his death.

We really have flipped our old hero-sidekick dynamic on its head these past few years, haven’t we…

“You’re not heading to the Unknown Forest, are ya, Wiggs?”

Groundsy’s voice makes Higg jump — the groundskeeper, despite his impressive height and lumbering gait, always seems to appear out of nowhere even when Higg is completely expecting to run into him.

“I am heading in, but not so far that I lose sight of daylight. I’ll hurry back out at the first sign of trouble, I assure you.” Higg’s impression of Hiero’s voice is flawless, as is his disguise spell. (It has to be, in order for him to run the school in his brother’s place while he puzzles out the polymorph curse.)

“Well, what in the world for? You’re about to take quite a risk here, Wiggs — what reward are ya hoping to reap from this little expedition?”

Higg summons every ounce of elfin disdain he can muster as he replies: “Need I remind you, Groundsy, that you are in my employ — and so accordingly, I don’t have to justify myself to you? With my unmatched wisdom, I selected this particular site for my school out of nearly a hundred alternatives, and I have lived in the tower above this forest for over two centuries! If anyone knows what is or isn’t worth venturing into the Unknown Forest for, it would be me — the astute and frankly legendary Hieronymous Wiggenstaff! So put a bit more faith into your headmaster and let me go about my business uninterrupted, would you?”

Hiero’s ears twitch with a fair amount of elfin disdain of his own as he listens. This is no longer an “impression” of me. This is flat-out caricature.

Groundsy doesn’t seem too bothered by so-called-Hieronymous’s scathing rebuke. “Well, if ya find yourself in trouble, ya can always call for help!” he reminds Higg. “I won’t come in to rescue ya, but it’ll make the story more interesting when I tell everyone how the legendary Hieronymous Wiggenstaff met his match!”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Higg replies dryly. He puts his hand on the hilt of his sword, about to march into the forest, but Groundsy speaks up again:

“Oh, that’s a new sword, isn’t it?”

“My usual blade is out being resharpened by an expert smith,” Higg fibs. “I’m borrowing this one from Higglemas — since we have about the same build, and he certainly never uses it.”

“Borrowing his dog too, I see! Will you be using him to lead you through the forest by scent?”

“The dog goes where he pleases. I don’t have any say over it.” Higg turns around to give Hiero a glare. “Though I hope he has enough common sense not to follow me into the woods. He has no magic, no sword — he wouldn’t last a minute in there.”

“Oh, I’ll keep an eye on him for ya! Groundsy’s great with animals!” Groundsy kneels down to pet Hiero, who backs away and growls.

“Try and get along for just a few minutes, you two,” Higg tells them. “This shouldn’t take me very long.”

And if it does take longer than a minute or two, you’ll have more pressing concerns than each other’s company.

He casts Light on his sword as he steps closer to the woods, holding it out at arm’s length to illuminate the uneven terrain beneath his feet. He passes several jagged, half-buried boulders and treads across dead and gnarled old roots left behind by a long-gone tree, then warily comes to a halt a few feet away from the forest’s edge. Behind him, the sun is just as bright as one would expect from a cloudless summer day, but in front of him, it’s dark like midnight on the night of a new moon.

He hears Hiero whimper from a safe distance away, but he doesn’t turn back. There is a sapling at the edge of the tree line, bearing only a dozen or so leaves on each of its wiry branches, and he confidently strides towards it, gripping the thinnest-looking branch in a gloved hand and preparing to snap it off —

It doesn’t break. The branch is as rigid as steel, and feels deathly cold even through the insulation of his glove.

“Damn it, why didn’t I just bring a fucking axe?” Higg shivers, reluctantly raising his sword. He’d hate to damage it trying to chop down an unnaturally hardy tree, but collecting branches by hand wasn’t working, and he won’t let this perilous trip turn out to be for nothing.

Hiero barks as Higg swings his sword down, and Higg jumps, missing the sapling entirely.

“What the hell was that about? Don’t do that when I’m holding a bladed weapon —”

Hiero barks again, more urgently this time, and a realization dawns on Higg a second too late.

The tree roots he’d mistaken for dead have come very much alive — now they’re coiling around his feet, snaking up his boots, constricting his legs. As Hiero let’s out another frantic howl, they jerk violently, yanking Higgs off balance and dragging him backwards into the Unknown Forest.

“Fuck!” Higg swings his sword wildly, desperately trying to cut his feet loose, but it bounces straight off the bark of the roots. Its light dims as he’s carried further into the woods, and every other second he either gets a faceful of prickling branches or feels his head slam into the trunk of a tree, leaving his face bloodied and ears ringing.

Who’s going to save Hiero if I die in here? No one else even knows the truth —

He plunges his sword into the ground, miraculously finding a narrow chink between two immobile, iron-hard roots and piercing deep into the cold earth beneath them. The force at his feet keeps pulling, but his grip on the hilt of his weapon stays firm, and he doesn’t budge.

“Take that, you abducting arboreal bastards!” he spits, pulling his wand from his pocket and blindly aiming a freezing blast of wind towards his feet.

The roots immediately convulse, jerking upwards and hoisting Higg and his sword vertically out of the ground — only to stop moving a second later, leaving him suspended in the air. They glimmer in the light of his now-freed blade, and he realizes with a smile that he’s frozen every damn inch of them solid.

“Good riddance,” he growls, and strikes them once more with his sword — and this time, they shatter into thousands of icy crystals.

He feels less triumphant after tumbling to the ground and landing a bit less gracefully than he’d like — and what’s more, he realizes he’s somehow lost his grip on his wand.

“Shit, shit, shit…” He swings his sword in wide arcs, trying to illuminate as much of the surrounding forest as he can. None of the trees here seem to be as mobile as the roots that captured him, but he still flinches every time he feels something brush against his ankle. Once he finds his wand, though, he’ll be able to just levitate above the treetops and fly back to safety…

He glimpses a familiar polished marble rod atop a pile of ebony-dark leaves, but before he can pick it up, a chattering squirrel darts past and snatches it up beneath its teeth. Luckily, the creature doesn’t run far, instead opting to scamper up a tree and perch atop a low-hanging branch. It still holds the wand beneath its teeth as it stares at Higg with accusing eyes.

“I know I’m intruding on your territory, but I promise you, it wasn’t intentional,” Higg says softly, slowly stepping towards the squirrel and holding out an outstretched hand. “Now, I’d really appreciate it if you could just drop that wand you’re carrying…”

The squirrel’s tail erupts into purple flames and it snaps the solid stone wand between its teeth, chattering with delight as it stuffs the two halves into its mouth and gulps them down.

Higg hastily steps back, tightening his grip on his sword, but the squirrel darts away without another glance at him, and the forest falls eerily silent.

“Hiero?!” he shouts. “Groundsy? Can you hear me?!”

There’s no reply. And even worse, it dawns on him that he has no idea which way he came from — if he’d broken any branches or left any sort of trail while being dragged in, the plants have already regrown to cover it.

If he dies here and leaves Hiero stuck as a dog forever, all because he didn’t recognize Hiero’s own warnings in time, then… well, that sure would be an appropriate way to cap off his miserable, failure-wracked life, wouldn’t it? Really, he should’ve seen this result coming from the first moment the idea of entering the Unknown Forest popped into his head —

Think, Higglemas. Don’t give up, think. What would Hieronymous do to get his bearings?

He gazes up towards the blanket of pitch black leaves overhead, through which only a few tiny pinpricks of starlight reach through…

The stars, that’s it! Higg is no scholar of astronomy, but he does know the major constellations, as well as the approximate geographic layout of the Unknown Forest as a whole — with the stars in view, he can surely deduce the fastest route back to safety. Rather than sheathing his sword and blocking his only source of light, he ties it to his belt, and he selects a climbable looking tree — offering a sturdy trunk, ample branches for handholds and footholds, and most importantly, roots that don’t come alive even after giving them an experimental poke.

But almost as soon as he begins to scale the tree, things go wrong. The bark is unnaturally slick, and initially stable footholds melt away beneath his boots, sending him sliding back down the trunk to land on his rear in a pool of foul-smelling oil.

“Damn it!” Higg takes a running start at a different tree, leaping for the lowest-hanging branch, but it liquifies in his hand, and once again he tumbles to the ground.

So much for the stars saving me…

A bush a few feet away from him rustles, and Higg freezes.

But the forest goes quiet.

Concluding that his imagination had worked against him, Higg lets out a sigh of relief — then the bush rustles again.

(Is it the same bush? Or was the sound closer this time?)

He draws his ever-dimming sword, and from the bush there comes an eerie creak, like a footstep on a floorboard. But at least it isn’t advancing towards him anymore — he can work with this.

He’s about to take the first of what would hopefully be many slow steps backwards, away from the rustling creature, when he hears it. Somewhere behind the bush, a dog is barking, and though it’s distant and muffled, Higg recognizes it instantly.

“Hiero! I’m coming!!” he shouts, and charges towards the bushes.

Between the cover of the plants and the cover of darkness, the being that lurches forward to meet him is difficult to perceive, but Higg glimpses it in brief flashes as he swings his blade —

At least four spindly arms, probably more. Fingers whittled into points.

Ash-grey bark peeling away to reveal eyes, so many eyes. Pulsating black pupils, surrounded by spiderwebs of crimson veins.

A cavity between two forking branches, in which rows of fangs drip sickly-sweet sap.

Higg lets out a guttural roar and skewers the beast through its torso, casting its hollow body aside and sprinting onwards to the source of Hiero’s barks. But a stray vine trips him, and his heart skips a beat in his chest as he feels it ensnare his ankle in a familiar death grip —

Hiero springs out of the shadows, a terrifying bundle of momentum and determination in canine form, and barrels into the vine with so much force that even Higg gets jerked a few feet. The vine doesn’t release him, but it goes just limp enough for Higg to slip out of his trapped boot, and Hiero darts to his side as the two of them break into a run again without a single word exchanged.

If Higg didn’t know better, he would’ve sworn his brother had done this before. Hiero keeps his tail close to Higg’s legs and his nose close to the ground, barking and swinging his tail every few dozen feet to signal for Higg to turn. When they finally breach the tree line, they skid to a halt and whirl around to face the forest — Higg with his sword drawn, Hiero with haunches raised and teeth bared — and wait several terrifying seconds before finally collapsing to the ground, confident that no creatures will follow them out of the woods.

“Well, I’ll be a unicorn on the barn roof!” Groundsy begins to applaud, rushing to Higg’s side with a huge smile on his face. “Ya made it out in once piece, both you and your dog!”

“He’s my brother’s dog, not mine —” Higg begins, before looking down at his hands and clothes and realizing that his Disguise Self spell is, of course, long gone.

“Oh, don’t ya give me that schtick! Your secret is safe with me, Higgsy!” Groundsy tells him with a wink.

Higg breathes a temporary sigh of relief, mentally debating the ethics of looking into a memory-erasing spell later. Unless huts are involved, Groundsy’s secret-keeping abilities usually leave much to be desired.

“From the looks of things, ya almost did kick the bucket in there,” Groundsy goes on. “I hope ya at least got ahold of whatever it was ya went in for?”

Higg plucks a few pointed twigs from his cloak and pants, holding them gingerly and cupping his free hand beneath them to catch the oil that they drip.

“Well, not quite in the way I wanted to. But I’m thinking this’ll suit my purposes just fine.”

***

Hiero sits impatiently at the center of a room that has seen many explosive fires and failed rituals, waiting for Higg to finish his preparations. There are circles of chalk that must be drawn, dust from previous failures that must be swept up, and most importantly, oil from the Unknown Forest that must be burned.

Higg watches the flames turn an unnatural purple color, pointing a freshly obtained wand at the bowl of oil and concentrating on channeling the smoke. As he directs wisps of it past his face and towards Hiero, he’s somewhat put off by how normal it smells — it has a slightly more earthen scent than the usual flammable components he uses, but there’s nothing particularly otherworldly about it. Nothing to indicate that this might be the breakthrough he’s awaited for years.

“Ready?” he asks Hiero, pushing his doubts to the back of his mind, and Hiero nods, sitting up on his hind legs. They’ve always speculated that a bipedal posture might help reversing the polymorph — though of course, it’s not like they’ve had any success to show for it.

Hiero holds his breath as Higg surrounds him with a plume of smoke and begins to chant, carefully enunciating words in a long-dead language that even most elves don’t remember. The room quickly darkens in a way that it never has before, as the smoke absorbs the ambient light and begins to glow in an inconsistent shimmering pattern that evokes stars scattered across a deep indigo sky.

Higg, too, holds his breath as thin wisps of that smoke coil around Hiero one at a time, slowly blending together and changing in shape. The obscured silhouette of a collie transforms, snout shortening and legs elongating — and then it all disperses with a sudden clap of wind, leaving behind an elfin man who instantly collapses to the floor.

“Higglemas?” Hiero croaks, staring down at his trembling hands. “Did we —”

He coughs up a cloud of acrid red smog, convulsing and arching his back.

“NO! WAIT! Do something, Higg! I can’t —”

Higg dives after his brother, eyes stinging from the fumes as Hiero’s voice breaks and distorts back into a howl. Higg wraps his arms around a thrashing collie, and Hiero goes limp, red-tinged foam still dripping from his mouth as his younger brother whispers:

“We’re getting so close, Hiero. Don’t give up on me now, not when we’re so damn close.”

Hiero whimpers weakly, hanging his head.

“We have a lead now,” Higg continues, summoning all the optimism he can muster into his voice no matter how sick he felt watching Hiero revert. “And in just a few weeks, we’ll have a new class of students, too — odds are one of them will know their way around animals and shapeshifting.”

He gently pats Hiero on the back, running his hand over fur until he can feel that Hiero has stopped trembling. “We’ve got more to go on than ever before. We’re going to figure this out one way or another, I promise.”

Hiero’s eyes close as he rests his head on Higg’s knee. I hope so.

***

(End notes:

Thanks for reading, comments are always welcomed!

While I genuinely believe the Hiero Dog Theory as a whole has a lot of weight to it, certain parts of this are certainly going to get proven wrong sooner or later, but it was still extremely fun to write! I am historically a huge sucker for grumpy old men with hidden depths, so I got invested in Higglemas right away.)

[thedcdunce]

Voodoo

“My name's Priscilla, or you can call me by my stage name if you want. That's Voodoo.” - Voodoo

Real Name: Priscilla Kitaen

Gender: Female

Height: 5′ 10″

Weight: 130 lbs (59 kg)

Eyes: Brown

Hair: Black

Powers:

Kherubim Ancestry Physiology

The Sight

Voodoo Magic

Magnetic Manipulation

Daemonite Physiology

Abilities:

Expert Martial Artist

Occultism

Talented Dancer

Universe: Wildstorm Universe

Citizenship: American

Base of Operations: 

Skywatch

Halo Corporation

Mobile

Marital Status: Single

Occupation: 

Adventurer

Exotic Dancer

Student

Education: High School Graduate

First Appearance: WildC.A.T.s #1 (August, 1992)

Powers

Kherubim Ancestry Physiology: Kherubim resemble humans in appearance, but are physically far stronger and more durable and extremely long-lived, nearly immortal. However an evolutionary drawback to their near-immortality is that Kherans are almost infertile, only very rarely will a Kheran produce offspring. This effect is seen in real world natural environments, as longer living organisms will have fewer offspring than organisms with short lifespans. This is a natural check against overpopulation.

The Sight: Voodoo possess highly advanced telepathic abilities that were limited only by the fact that she had not received any formal training and mainly had naturally developed them. Named, 'The Sight' as most of these powers revolved around her ability to perceive things beyond ones normal sight, they are the focus of her prime abilities. The ones developed due to her status as a Kherubim/Human Crossbreed. The primary power in the Sight is the ability for her to perceive hidden truths. Shape-shifters have no solace from her. She can see a Daemonite possessing a human as it is. No disguise can hold up to this powerful ability, and it is exactly because of this, that the Daemonites wanted her so badly during the beginning and would occasionally target her specifically during later events. Hers are the eyes that cannot be fooled.

Telepathy: Voodoo is a neophyte telepath in that she is quite capable of perceiving the thoughts of others. Be it the thoughts in a crowd, or receiving specific thoughts from individuals. She can read and manipulate the thoughts and emotions of others, and even shut off people's minds. Her powers increase proportionate to physical intimacy, enabling her greater ability to psychically manipulate and read others.

Psi-Blast: Voodoo is powerful enough to focus her psionic energies into a very painful and direct attack. This, psi-blast was powerful enough to effect the Kherubim Lord Entropy. A non-psi would be temporarily crippled by such an assault as their mind flares with a feeling like acid being poured upon it.

True Sight: Voodoo is capable of seeing things as they are. She perceives things as the truth. No disguise holds up to her. No shape-shifter can hide from her powers and no Daemonite is safe when she is present. This power is infallible and so strong she need not be present with the person as she can apparently detect a Daemonite even over television and perhaps via photo's as well. She is capable of perceiving if someone is lying to her.

Mental Separation: Voodoo has the ability to separate psyche's and manipulate such psionic patterns that she may perform literal 'separations'. Be it forcing a Daemonite to leave it's host, or purging a willing individual of unwanted parts of their soul and psyche, or separating and restoring damaged and trapped psyche's within others. Usually she does this via touch, however she can do this from a distance as well. Regardless, whenever she does it she is usually left drained and very vulnerable. Usually very intense pain is involved for one or at times, both of the participants in a depossession and separation attempt. More often then not, the staggering and draining effect is shared by both Voodoo and her target as she, via her natural empathic abilities, seems to feel what they feel temporarily.

Mind Lock: Voodoo has the ability to literally seize control over someone's mind, temporarily freezing and mentally controlling them. The less psionically resistant someone is, the easier it is for her to do this obviously. Voodoo is also able to enter minds, and manipulate an individuals powers and abilities from the outside.

Mental Illusion: Voodoo is capable of very minor telepathic illusions, used to briefly distract and deter and opponent.

Empathy: Voodoo seemingly has slight empathic abilities that generate a magnetic attraction about her that members of the opposite sex can't help but notice her. If she's in a room chances are someone will pick her out or have their eyes drawn to her. She is naturally appealing, this power enhancing her already considerable beauty.

Voodoo Magic: Voodoo learned a limited amount of voodoo magic from a Voodoo Priestess. Wishing to return to her voodoo rituals she sought to learn more from her southern roots.

Necromancy: Voodoo has the ability to reanimate and control dead bodies.

Magnetic Manipulation

Daemonite Physiology

Accelerated Healing: If a Daemonite is ever harmed it can heal indefinitely while it's brain still survives. Daemonites have been seen losing their limbs, internal organs and portions of their brains while still surviving. It also seems that Daemonites heal more quickly while resting within a host body.

Chronokinesis Most Daemonites possess a degree of time manipulation however the exact limits of this ability are unknown.

Claws: Daemonites have long, dangerous claws on each hand and foot which they use within combat and to help break the mental barrier of their host bodies. They can also expose these claws while within their host body to allow for stronger attacks.

Fangs: Daemonites have long, dangerous fangs in their mouths which they use to rend and tear at targets. Their fangs can help them breach the mental barriers of their hosts. Some Daemonites use long tendrils instead of fangs for the same effects.

Immortality: Daemonites have survived for countless years within and without a host body. It is assumed by scientists and enemies of the Daemonites that they are immortal; however, this may only be the case in mental form. As such Daemonites can in fact live forever if only while within a host body. Without a body it can still survive at least a million years.

Metamorphosis: Only the strongest of Daemonites can shape-shift. Only the strongest of those Daemonites can change into inorganic material. A Daemonite can shape-shift even while possessing a host body but they'll normally revert quite quickly. Only one Daemonite has been seen shifting his body parts into inorganic material but the possibility remains for all Daemonites.

Phasing: Daemonites have a degree of intangibility allowing them to phase through solid objects as they do when they take possession of a host body. They can continue to phase even while within their host body. Their phasing isn't automatic and they must concentrate to hold their form.

Possession: Daemonites are parasitic beings that not only take complete control over another being's body but inhabits their mind as well. They feed on the nutrients and physiology of the host body until the body is destroyed or the Daemonite abandons it. Normally, possession causes no harm to the physical body but the process changes frequently. The stronger the Daemonite the easier the transition. Occasionally, the Daemonite can leave the host body violently and destroy the body.

Superhuman Durability: A Daemonite's body is more durable than that of a human while on Earth. While some Daemonites cannot survive a bullet to the head which removes their brain functions others can take multiple bullets to their body without harm. Physical training can increase a Daemonite's durability.

Superhuman Speed: A Daemonite's body is faster than that of a human while on Earth. Either while within a human host or not they exhibit incredible amounts of speed which can carry them to speeds that match that of most street cars while their physical capabilities of speed while in combat also increase past human levels.

Superhuman Agility

Superhuman Reflexes

Superhuman Strength: A Daemonite's body is stronger than that of a human while on Earth. When a Daemonite must they will resort to physical combat and exhibit their strength enough to roll over cars or rip off a door to a plane. A Daemonite's strength is determined by their physical capability and some Daemonites may not be as strong as others.

Telepathy: Daemonites are not only physical beings that take possession of host bodies but they manipulate the mental effects of the beings as well. Not limited to only understanding the thoughts of each other or their hosts they can extend this ability to a wide range and even track targets by their mental signature. Most Daemonites are connected by a central mind which they do not need to focus to maintain.

Abilities

Expert Martial Artist: Trained in the martial arts of The Coda.

Occultism: She was also mentored in the use of Voodoo magic by a High Voodoo Priestess.

Talented Dancer

Origin

Priscilla Kitaen was an exotic dancer before being rescued by the WildC.A.T.s from the Daemonites. Voodoo possessed a unique ability known as "The Sight", which allowed her to perceive a being possessed by a Daemonite and exorcise it from its host body. She was therefore important to both sides in the war. Upon joining the WildC.A.T.s she developed more significant and powerful psychic abilities as well as animalistic powers. She was taken in for training by Zealot in Coda fighting techniques. She also began a long-term relationship with team leader Spartan. Eventually Voodoo was shot and went into a coma. Void used a computer to enter Priscilla's mind and found out she was descended from a Kherubim possessed by a Daemonite making her a Kherubim/Daemonite/Human Hybrid.

Kheran Truth

When the WildC.A.T.s later traveled to Khera, the Kherubim homeworld, Voodoo was placed in a Daemonite ghetto because of her heritage. It was here that she discovered the long war between the two races had ended centuries ago and the Daemonites had lost. She also discovered that not all Daemonites were evil as she was led to believe. The ones she was use to combating were fanatic militants, the ones she met on Khera were citizens. When she finally found the WildC.A.T.s, she confronted Zealot about the treatment of the Daemonites, Zealot in turn told her she was of an inferior race in front of the Coda sisterhood. This put a great strain on their relationship, to the point Voodoo would have nothing more to do with her or Khera. She relented and helped the WildC.A.T.s stop the Coda from trying to assassinate Zealot, who then also turned away from Khera. When they returned to Earth, Voodoo couldn't forget what she experienced and left the team.

Voodoo

Now living in New Orleans, Priscilla returned to exotic dancing. She began working in a club called the Midnight Lounge, owned by a man named Christian Charles. She became good friends with a fellow dancer named Purity. A man she met while living there named Attibon found her a place to stay at the Royale hotel. There she met a former prostitute named Freeda and a former hitman named Saturday. They would then reveal themselves as Erzulie, Papa Legba and Baron Samedi. Priscilla's boss Christian was found to have been using his dancers in a voodoo blood ritual, killing them and bathing in their blood, in order to bring his dark magician father back from the dead. Priscilla along with police detective investigating the murders, lieutenant David Dove, came just in time to save Purity from Christian but he already absorbed enough blood to resurrect his father from the dead. Priscilla channeled Erzulie and fought Christian and his father, who were no match for her dance. Luring them back to the Royale, where Baron Samedi, Erzulie and Papa Legba forced them to bow to balance and walk through a door to face Damballa, which in turn blew up the Royale. The experience made Priscilla decide to learn more about voodoo magic and she became an apprentice to a mambo.

Priscilla & Jeremy

Several months later she rejoined the WildC.A.T.s briefly. She then left the team when it disbanded after the supposed death of Zealot. She moved in with Maul, but he became more introverted the more she tried to get closer to him, locking himself away in his lab. Jeremy in truth had fallen in love with her and was trying to come up with a method to remove her Daemonite genes. Unknown to her, she was being followed by a Daemonite possessing an old man.

Brutal Attack

Priscilla was later given a credit card from the Halo Corporation under the name Marlowe. She was then attacked by the serial killer Samuel Smith, the grandson of Slaughterhouse Smith. Samuel was trying to kill Jacob Marlowe and all his relatives. Jacob had defeated Slaughterhouse sometime in the past, and now Samuel wanted revenge. He surprise attacked her and used his powers to brutally injure her. Cutting off her legs and cutting open her throat. Spartan and Grifter were instrumental in Smith's demise. It was at this time that Grifter convinced Maul that trying to get rid of her Daemonite genes may not be what Voodoo wants.

Daemonite Training

Recuperating in the hospital, the medical staff was amazed at how fast her throat injury healed. It wasn't long that she discovered a Daemonite among the medical staff. Soon she was confronted by the Daemonite. He explained that he was a rare conscientious objector among the daemonite military fanatics of Earth, he also claimed to be her grandfather. He taught her how to use her daemonite powers: time manipulation, and regeneration in only a few hours, she had fully regrown her legs. He told her it would be in her best interest to start a relationship with Jeremy, then he left.

Mental States

The relationship became problematic, when Voodoo's telepathic powers started to increase with the amount of physical intimacy she had. Voodoo, wishing to further the development of this situation, was willing to even go as far as sleeping with other men. Jeremy couldn't handle the situation at all and they would constantly fight about it. Priscilla then intentionally angered him, causing him to grow in size and therefore decrease in intellect until he forgot the reason they were fighting. Giving her the opportunity to leave the relationship.

WildC.A.T.s Reborn

Priscilla once again became an exotic dancer for high end clients, such as oil shieks and billionaires. Hadrian would come and ask her to rejoin the team, and despite the amount of time that had passed between their relationship and superhero days, they still were very attracted to each other and they ended up sleeping together. She came back as an employee of the Halo Corporation, getting paid triple her former salary.

World's End

After Armageddon, Priscilla had become a more calm and understanding individual. Using her mental abilities to keep the peace in the horrible post-apocalypse the Wildcats now live in. She is seen comforting both Spartan and Maul alike creating jealously between the two she loves. Ultimately her relationship lied with Spartan, though Maul accepted it as he saw through that he himself and Priscilla wouldn't make a perfect couple. Priscilla proved herself of being a more capable leader even when she dealt with Paris of former Stormwatch P.H.D. in establishing an easy peace between him and the animals in the Nevada Garden with human survivors outside the garden's boundary, and settling a brief truce between her team and Lord Defile's Daemonites in Los Angeles.

After her team helped Team-7 in stopping Tao, Priscilla was gifted with a new and improved costume based on her original attire by Max Faraday. She and the Wildcats were later summoned to UnLondon by the Authority and notified of the chance to leave Earth on the Carrier. However, Voodoo chose to stay shortly before intervening in Earth's war against the militant Knights of Khera. During the pitch battle in UnLondon, Priscilla obligated in having Spartan resume his leadership and was given a mission of trying to locate the Garden of Ancestral Memory in gaining the Earth's help in stopping the Knights' terraforming machines. On a helpful note from Grunge, Priscilla revived the former English Doctor of the 19th century, Sir Edwin Makepeace, and communicates his spirit in the Garden for the Doctors' help. However, she learned from the spirit of Sir Edwin that the previous Doctors had already been trying to heal the Earth since the Number of the Beast incident, but came with no success. And neither do they know of the newest Doctor after Habib bin Hassan went insane. Despite this, the Knights were managed to be defeated.

Following the end of the invasion, Voodoo was tasked with the undead Sir Edwin in finding Earth's current Doctor.

Fun Facts

Described as the most gifted of gifted ones. Voodoo is perhaps one of the more powerful cross-breeds and SPB's around. She possess extreme potential and her powers when all added together, coupled with her coda training, and now potential training in the arts of voodoo magic. Make her one of the most fearsome individuals in Wildstorm, anyone would have to face. Her abilities cover a wide range and in the past she was limited only by her lack of experience and conviction. Now that she has both, she is a force to be reckoned with.

[vulpesastuti-a-blog]

.006

Log this privately. Yes I know. No I don’t care.

Received a message from Thara, maybe a day after I left to do some training. New Titan, love training new Titans because they fucking listen to me without arguing and I can’t emphasize how valuable that is. Anyway, Klatsch starts freaking out, getting tons of messages. From Thara, what she’s doing.

Apparently she got roped into ‘Robe Duty’, escorting a couple noodle eggheads to have their Ghosts scan a bunch of rocks and take the collected data (see; their rocks) back to the Tower (to verify their rockitude). Yes, I know I’m being silly. Yes, Klatsch I know the circumstances of what happened but humor is how I cope so absolutely fuck off with your chastising bullshit.

Anyway, one of the ‘locks is dead and the other has already ran out of bullets because why would you need ammo in hostile territory? No. That is stupid. It isn’t like Crota didn’t wipe out armies on his fucking own. She sounds pretty... Dreadful in the messages. She’s conveying to me she isn’t going to make it, about all her mistakes and how she regrets not getting to spend time with me and

I have this all on play so Lightfoot over here is just staring at me slack jawed and panicked while I have to HEAR THIS WHOLE GODDAMNED TRANSGRESSION and just. I asked where the messages came from. They’re close. Like, they’re miles off but they’re in a couple hours travel. Told me the situation; Caves and Space bugs. Not ‘bugmen’, not the fallen.

Hive.

I hate the Hive. I despise everything about the Hive. I can rationalize the cabal and fallen. I /get/ the vex. But Hive? Cabal are conquers, sure. Fallen are scavengers, sure. The vex even are just robots looking to robotize everything. But they’re different. They can spare, I’ve watched each of them do it. Stories of the fallen leaving children behind, the vex ignoring Guardians, the damn cabal choosing not to shoot at people.

But the Hive only kill. They only kill and sacrifice and murder. Torture, Their whole society, their whole culture is nothing but genocide. An entire species waiting to kill everything before they kill themselves. They’re just entropy given form and I hate them. And she’s being chased into the tunnels with a Warlock without ammo and she’s believing she’s going to die? New Titan learned something that day.

See lots of Hunters forget what we do, as Hunters; as Guardians. Spin and twirl their guns around and talk hot shit like they’re unstoppable. Titans thrust up their shoulders and flex muscles they think they have. Warlocks make up words to feel smarter than they actually are and I see it. All the time. The flexing and bragging and I hate it. I’d like to say ‘Titan learned what happens when you piss off a Hunter’ and be all Mister Macho, and he didn’t. He saw what happens when you truly scare this Hunter specifically.

We broke camp immediately. Alekos, was his name, didn’t even question it. His Ghost transmatted his armor and readied his guns and I think I’ve never broke a camp ground so fast in my lives. Minutes. Packed shit up and we left, didn’t think twice. Pretty sure we left utensils but fuck it, I can make more. Even make them unrusty this time. And we sped off. Kid didn’t talk, not a single question asked.

We’re Guardians.

I’ve spent the first two years of my life after revival wandering north and south America, spent days in battle with the fallen. Shit’s harsh. But I always repaid my debts. I collected water and firewood for settlements that took me in. Didn’t get asked, out of the free will I have. Killed raider parties, scumbags and fallen alike. Never once asked for anything in return. I tell you, that is what Guardians nowadays forget. Caught up in the Crucible and shady ass Gambit. Getting their jimmies off to worthless Awoken and their incompetent royal court. They forget their titles, their purpose. Their whole fucking point.

We finally stop about a mile outward, no engine roars or flashy lights, just some bulky ass kid and a moderately shaky Hunter. Alekos had never seen the Hive til now, but we got a good look. Thara said it felt like the Hive were corralling them further down into the cave system, and she was probably right. Been on two Hive rescue missions, and it is their MO, push things down until it can’t escape then attrition them out. It prolongs the mental panic and terror of what they do. Have kid post to the left, I go to the right. Hive like to rush left, dunno why, they just do. He can take a hit better, and they’ll be focused on me and trying to flank.

Outwardly, two Knights, three Thrall. Guess it’s a small clutch from a single Wizard with some Acolytes inside. Killing Crota and Oryx followed by the Red Legion running in did a number on the Hive on Earth, they were straggling pretty heard. Told the kid to broadcast the whereabouts to the City and nearby Guardians to their Ghosts, to not alert sounds. Likely wouldn’t get pings back, but they would know what was going on and if Thara were down there, she would know.

Knights have fat heads. They’re dropped at the same time. Piss off the Thrall, release them of my misery pretty fast. Hey, they didn’t suffer so it was a mercy kill.

The interior of the cave is crawling with that nasty infection the Hive ooze out. Arden and Melia both explained it to me once, didn’t care to listen. Told the kid it was Hive goop and he was happy to ignore me too. Small world. Lights gave away Hive locations but they knew we were there to begin with. Stalled time on Thara if she were alive. And she was.

I don’t do hopeful optimism. She’s strong and smart and the best Guardian I have ever seen and no zombie looking ass bug ass space fuckers would do her in. Lots of Thrall, some Acolytes, thought so. Told the kill to shoulder his gun and aim straight, Hive have no self preservation. Single shots, bam, bam, bam. Conserve ammo by simply straight shots. Thrall are easy. Get close, punch them.

Learned he was Arc, by the way. May not have had a knack for fishing, but he sure shot well. Damned well. Each room was a simple mix: Toss in a concussive grenade, toss in an incendiary grenade. Anything left alive was going to struggle with seeing, so post up, he took first point, I took second while he reloaded. Breach and clear, only Orges and Wizards are a problem. Encountered none, just foot troops. Figured, since she never mentioned the big guys.

We traveled what felt like an eternity. Killed some of those worm things Hive always have, stained my armor layers of green and black ichor couldn’t tell you much about, smelled through our filtering system but we still marched. Swear this was longer than the journey down. It was long. Painted the walls of this cave with the blood of the Hive the whole way down. Had to even stop and make Klatsch fix my gun, melted the barrel at one point.

No ‘supers’, kept it light. Guns matter when Light doesn’t, Red Legion taught us that much. Also fucks with the Hive, they’re pretty unintuitive. Finally start getting some messages outbound from a signal I recognize. Cairde, Thara’s Ghost. Klatsch starts freaking out about what direction to go, get there in a hurry. Kaito, the Warlock, is still alive but injured and panicked. Thara is also alive and I have never asserted such quick dominance as quickly as I did then. What I wanted, and what I know she wanted, was to rush up and hug and embrace and tell her she’s okay. But while we were there, no can do. We have to move. And move we did.

Screeching from the ass end of the cave, and I am certain that was the lair of a Wizard, probably luring Guardians in their to drain their Light and repopulate. We killed a good bunch of her brood, and likely now she was clambering up to take a reaping. Kaito could walk, Thara was in a daze but could walk. In a fight? Not so much. Alekos, Kaito, Thara, myself, that was the order. Big guy took point, Kaito and Thara could provide cover, I led the rear. If Wizard would catch up, we’d be able to handle it that way. But it never did. In fact, we never saw any more Hive after that. Like they stopped and just observed us all together. Don’t know. Don’t care.

We got out of their and had Ghosts transmat us far off as possible, even orbitting just to prove a point. Hung out for... An hour or so, probably? Alekos and Kaito ran back to the City to report what happened, that was maybe an hour ago?

Still have Thara on my ship. Still recording this message quietly. Privately. She could have died for no reason and I can feel my blood boiling. I’m mad, I’m mad and angry and hurt and I have no one to aim this pain at but she’ll live. She’ll live instead of dying alone in that cave and when she wakes up she’s going to say something stupid and I’m going to love her for it but she’s just laying there helpless. Helpless and alive is better than simply dead.

You can stop recording Klatsch, I think I’m done recanting the scariest thing in all my lives. Thanks for listening.

[syrupwit]

Letter for Trick or Treat Exchange 2020

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Hello there, and welcome to my letter for Trick or Treat Exchange 2020! I appreciate that you’ve taken the time to read this letter. I hope that it will provide you with clarification, inspiration, or at the very least a bit of entertainment.

Although I’ve written more for some sections and less for others, rest assured that I would be super excited to receive a gift for any of my requested fandoms, characters, or fanwork types.

Please see the table of contents below:

Likes

Do Not Want (DNW)

Fandom: The Bureau d'Echange de Maux - Lord Dunsany

Fandom: Carnacki the Ghost-Finder - William Hope Hodgson

Fandom: Invader Zim

Fandom: The Magnus Archives

Fandom: Stellar Firma

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LIKES

For Treats, some general things I like are:

Silly, clever, or situation-based humor

Surreality and weirdness

Lore and worldbuilding

Stories-within-a-story

Slice of life, especially light moments for darker canons

Unusual team-ups

Dramatic rescues

First times

Seasonal and holiday-related tropes -- autumn weather, changing leaves, spooky foods, candy, friendly ghosts, haunted houses, horror movies, costume parties

For Tricks, some general things I like are:

Dark comedy, gallows humor, horror comedy

Psychological, paranormal, and cosmic horror

Creepy lore and worldbuilding

Unreliable narrators

A lingering sense of unease

Examining darker aspects of canon

Obsessive, love-hate relationships between adversaries or people who are in conflict over something

Corruption

Dubcon where a third party or outside force is responsible for the situation, or where the dubconned party enjoys it

I have a very long list of fic likes here.

Please see my Multifandom Horror Exchange letter for more about my horror likes.

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DO NOT WANT (DNW)

Characters under age 16 involved in sexual situations

Sex without mutual attraction

Hate speech

Harm to animals (the existence of ghost animals is OK, but I don’t want to hear about injury, abuse, or death of animals)

Fandom-Specific DNW Exception for TMA: Mention of canonical, character-motivation-significant cat death is fine.

Bestiality

Scat

Necrophilia (sexual activity involving ghosts is OK, just not corpses or remains)

Sexual activity involving worms / spiders / insects

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THE BUREAU D’ECHANGE DE MAUX - LORD DUNSANY

Fanwork Types Requested: Treat - Fic, Trick - Fic 

Characters Requested: Shop Owner

This short story can be read online for free here. CW for brief antisemitism (it’s one line/mention, but it caught me off guard, so).

I actually hadn’t read this story before seeing it in the tagset, but what an intriguing premise! I’d love to hear more about the shop owner’s business and the bargains his customers make. The trades in the story seem intuitively equal -- life for death, troubling intelligence for happy ignorance, a phobia for a phobia -- but what more unusual types of trades might occur? Has anyone ever tried to rob the shop owner? What strange or ordinary-seeming locales has his shop traveled to, and how does he feel about them? I’m interested in Trick and Treat takes on all of these questions.

I really like Lord Dunsany’s style and would enjoy anything in that tone. If you wanted to bring in some of his other short story characters, like Nuth or the bad old woman in black, that would be great. I’m also open to crossovers for this fandom with all fandoms I’ve requested in this exchange or any previous one.

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CARNACKI THE GHOST-FINDER - WILLIAM HOPE HODGSON

Fanwork Types Requested: Treat - Fic, Trick - Fic 

Characters Requested: Thomas Carnacki

The original nine short stories about Carnacki can be read online for free here. Project Gutenberg also has the first six stories.

Among fictional occult detectives of the early twentieth century, Carnacki has a special place in my heart. He gets scared, he makes mistakes, he does weird things with colored lights and electricity, and sometimes he figures out that the haunting was a hoax. While the supernatural cases that Carnacki investigates are (in my opinion) genuinely scary, those occurrences that turn out to have a mundane explanation are just as suspenseful.

Hodgson’s cosmic horror worldbuilding, as well, is inventive and unusual. My favorite Carnacki story, “The Hog,” concerns a malevolent extra-dimensional pig that attempts to manifest in the world by tormenting a frightened dreamer. Other adversaries include a ghost horse, a cursed ancient dagger, and a giant pair of whistling lips.

For Treats, I’d like to see Carnacki tackle a lighter-hearted problem or deal with an antagonist that’s more silly than sinister. The stories’ conceit is that Carnacki calls his four closest friends to dinner every so often and makes them wait until the meal is finished to recount his latest case. I’d also enjoy something about his relationships with them, maybe a situation where his personal and professional lives clash or he acquires a new quirk after an odd case.

For Tricks, I want ghost pigs and ghost pigs only. Just kidding! I’d really like to hear more about the creatures and lore of this universe, as well as the beings, texts, and rituals that Carnacki references or uses in his work. More mistakes, near misses, and terrifying encounters are always welcome.

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INVADER ZIM

Fanwork Types Requested: Treat - Fic, Trick - Fic 

Characters Requested: Dib, Zim

Apparently one of my forever fandoms. To re-use my own words: There’s something irresistible to me about the blend of snappy comedy, unapologetic pessimism, and hints of a more complicated universe that we just get to see. I’m not up to date on the comics yet, but please feel free to include canon from comics, show, or movie.

Dib

I love Dib’s obsessiveness, his alienation, and his frantic pursuit of approval from a community and society that couldn’t care less about him. He wants to be the hero, but his actions are selfishly motivated and often result in catastrophe. I’m really endeared by his devotion to the paranormal and the ridiculous situations he’s drawn into. 

Dib/Zim is my OTP, but I also enjoy them interacting as enemies or frenemies. (I would prefer any sexual content be set when Dib is 16 or older.) For gen, I’m interested in Dib’s family relationship with Gaz, potential friendship with Tak, and encounters with aliens, cryptids, monsters, ghosts, and other paranormal investigator types.

Zim

Zim is a total disaster, and that’s what I love about him. Like Dib, he’s stuck in a futile quest for validation from leaders and peers who would prefer he not exist. I like that he’s gullible and easily scared -- cf. “Germs,” his meltdown over the VHS copyright notice in “FBI Warning of Doom” -- yet unusually chaotic and dangerous even among his species. He also has a subconscious layer of... neediness, I think? that could be really interesting to explore.

Again, Dib/Zim is my OTP. For gen interactions, I like Zim’s relationships with GIR, Ms. Bitters, the Tallest, and any other invaders, as well as random hapless humans and experiments and so on.

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THE MAGNUS ARCHIVES

Fanwork Types Requested: Treat - Fic, Trick - Fic  

Characters Requested: The Buried, The Vast, Adelard Dekker, Jurgen Leitner, Peter Lukas, Gertrude Robinson

My favorite horror podcast! I may be obsessed at the moment. I love the tone and worldbuilding of TMA -- the entropy and hopelessness, the way the monsters don’t play fair, the semi-religious devotion of avatars to their patrons.  I also love characters figuring out the magnitude of the awfulness they’re dealing with, and fighting against overwhelming odds.

The Buried

A fascinating fear! I’m really attracted to the Buried’s mix of attributes -- not just dirt, asphyxiation, and the subterranean, but also pressure, metaphysical weight, oppressive circumstances and hopeless struggle.

This entity’s particular aspects of denial, and of accepting increasingly adverse or strange conditions -- the pit, the statement giver from “Dig,” Karolina Górka considering a nap on the Underground -- both unsettle and delight me.

I feel that both the Buried and the Corruption have this compelling theme of like... suffocating, boundary-crushing love, that takes a person’s identity, will, and outside connections but leaves them a sense of belonging or importance. Then, on the other hand, the Buried can also belittle as it isolates. I thought Hezekiah Wakely’s identification of the Buried with rest and peace, and the Sunken Sky’s evocation as a mercy, were very interesting as well.

For prompts: I really love archaeology and ancient history, so I’d love anything about the Buried in connection to that. An anon on FFA brought up the Kola Superdeep Borehole as a potential hook for the Buried, and that idea is quite  interesting to me. I’d also love to hear about any of the statement givers from canon, the coffin’s other victims, or any main or original characters encountering this entity.

The Vast

Heights are one of my most visceral fears in real life, despite not being something I’m conceptually afraid of. I am requesting the Vast because I would like to be conceptually afraid of it!

Elements of this entity that intrigue me: the image of the Falling Titan, nihilism (and finding freedom in it), insignificance, call of the void, oceans / storms / cliffs, space, scales of size so large they’re not humanly comprehensible, Simon Fairchild’s love for the sky, delineation from the Lonely, opposition to the Buried, unusual manifestations.

As with the Buried, I really love the justifications that avatars give for their devotion to a power -- something exploring that, the choice to serve and the benefits that someone either gains or rationalizes after the fact, would be amazing. As stated above, unusual manifestations of fears are my jam, especially things that start out looking like one power but turn out to have a different affiliation.

I’d be interested in hearing about any canonical statement givers, avatars, main characters, or original characters encountering the Vast, or perhaps just a record of a past manifestation. I love stuff that’s grounded in a place, time, or feeling, so something super-specific or historical would be awesome. But, again, I really just want to be scared.

Adelard Dekker

Such an interesting character, and with depths yet to be explored! I enjoy his pragmatism, sense of humor, and relationship with his faith. I’m intrigued by the question of his allegiance and motivations, as well.

I’d love to hear more about Dekker’s pursuit of the Extinction -- perhaps the incident or incidents that first made him suspect its existence? accidental Extinction!Dekker? -- and his apparently far-flung contact network. I ship him both romantically and platonically with Gertrude, and I’d be interested to hear about their first meeting or other cases they collaborated on. Additionally, Dekker/Tim is a rarepair that intrigues me -- perhaps they meet in an AU where Tim becomes Dekker’s apprentice, and they take down Nikola together? I’d be open to seeing him interact with any character you think might be interesting, whether in a gen or shippy way.

Jurgen Leitner

I just want to know about the cataloging system he uses. Alternately, MORE LEITNERS. Alternately, ohh, the hubris! Leitner’s motivations for starting his library, vs. what he actually ends up effecting... aiii. I’m interested in what role the Eye played there, or how others may have manipulated him.

I don’t have any ships for Leitner, but for gen I would be interested to see him interact with Gertrude, his assistant, or Gerard Keay. Elias or Peter Lukas could also be interesting -- potentially funny, potentially sad or ominous.

Peter Lukas

On the one hand, a sinister sea captain and the heir of a frightening legacy; on the other, an annoying boss who refuses to learn basic computer skills and says things like “You and me, the dynamic duo!” I enjoy how petty and human Peter seems, at the same time that he’s this remote and gleeful monster.

I ship Peter/Martin super hard, but I also enjoy gen Peter & Martin and both gen and shippy interactions involving Elias. Additionally, I’m really interested in what happened for Peter to transport Gertrude to Sannikov Land, given their animosity. (Peter and Gertrude interacting seems like it could be hilarious.) For a fish-out-of-water scenario, I’d also like to see something where Peter feels out of control or threatened -- like, perhaps he’s caught in another avatar’s trap, or forced to be around other people for a bet or some strange purpose.

Re: Peter/Martin: I would prefer for Martin to gain the upper hand, even if it’s just in principle. I really like the idea of Peter going along thinking he’s in control, he’s seduced Martin to the Lonely, his plan is moving along -- and then he’s suddenly hit with all these feelings that he doesn’t know what to do with, because he’s never been in this situation before. On Martin’s part, I like it when he’s sort of reluctantly allured, but also contemptuous and focused on his own plan. And I would absolutely love some weird monster courting rituals -- Peter trying to impress Martin, but not quite pulling off “human” or “not disturbing.” I’m not married to these sorts of dynamics, though -- if there’s one you like better, please write it.

Gertrude Robinson

My favorite character! I love her practicality, dry wit, and self-control, but I also love stuff exploring her weaknesses, blind spots, regrets. I like that she can be smug and sometimes cruel, but not to the point where she violates her own principles (or, at least, not in her own opinion). I like that her backstory is so simple. I just really like Gertrude, in general.

For solo Gertrude, I’d like to learn more about her early days at the Institute -- maybe some of those heroic ideas she mentions she had, or their gradual dispelling. I’m also interested in seeing her solve problems, travel to unusual (or totally mundane) places, and face all kinds of supernatural nonsense. How did she get so unflappable? Is it mostly temperament, or was it a process?

For Gertrude ships, I could be convinced to ship her with pretty much anyone, but especially Agnes, Adelard Dekker, Emma Harvey, and Mary or Gerry Keay. For gen, I like her with everyone. I just want to see Gertrude interact with people!

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STELLAR FIRMA

Fanwork Types Requested: Treat - Fic, Trick - Fic 

Characters Requested: Hartro Piltz, Trexel Geistman, David 7, IMOGEN

I love this podcast so much it’s ridiculous. If I recall correctly, it’s been described as a cross between Brazil and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; this strikes me as accurate. I love how the tone is at once silly and exuberant, but also dark and messed-up, in an absurd way that doesn’t try to hammer listeners over the head with its irony. (Please feel free to explore that darkness in a Trick.) Also, it’s funny.

Hartro Piltz

I fell head over heels for Hartro’s character somewhere between her first appearance and the Executive Quarterly mini-episode where she reveals that her alarm clock launches her headfirst at the floor every morning (“I like to really smack awake”). She’s such a fun villain, and her attempts at team bonding with David and Trexel are oddly endearing. I like that it’s made clear that she’s as much at the mercy of Stellar Firma as everyone else, just with more perks.

For ships, I’m really into Hartro/Trexel, and I could get behind some Hartro/Trexel/David 7 as well. (If foot stuff is opt-in, consider me opted in.) For gen interactions, I like Hartro with anyone -- not just the other main three, but Standards, Sigmund Shankeray, and other members of her team or clients.

Trexel Geistman

Trexel is the worst, and I adore that about him. I love how thoroughly the show demonstrates his jackassery, and how it’s still possible to sympathize with him and see how he got where he is at the same time that you (I) just want to shake him.  His responsibility-abnegating, depression, and alcoholism seem weirdly realistic, or at least reality-informed, and they weight his character in a way that I find compelling. I love his songs and weird shticks (Detectives and Detonations <3), and lapses into grandiosity and fantasy.

For ships, I like Trexel with Hartro or David 7 or both. Bathin/Trexel and Percy/Trexel, as well. Broom/Trexel, ehh. For gen interactions, I’m interested in seeing him interact with just about anyone -- but I’m especially curious what he did to Space Gertrude’s space tug (from Episode 25, one of the character witnesses from the trial). For seasonal-themed prompts, I am amused by the idea of Trexel as a horror host -- thanks, FFA -- or something else along the lines of the TMA crossover mini-episode.

David 7

Poor, sweet, innocent, possibly-doomed David 7. I love his rage, his affinity for crafts, and the bits where he gets swept up in the excitement of planet-designing (or planet-selling, or problem-solving) and can’t contain his enthusiasm. And I love his progression, over the first two seasons, from timid and cautious to just plain fed up.

For ships, I like David/Trexel, David/Bathin, David/Bathin/Trexel, and David/Trexel/Hartro. David and IMOGEN are interesting to me both platonically and romantically. For gen, I am again interested in seeing him interact with just about anyone.

IMOGEN

How much power does IMOGEN have, exactly? At some point, I hope we find out. I love her chipper sarcasm and barely-hidden dark side, and I hope that she eventually gets a vacation.

I don’t really ship IMOGEN with anyone, though the idea of David/IMOGEN is interesting. Her dynamic with David seems to have an unusual tension built into it, where they get along well and he trusts her but she can’t stop herself from threatening him with gun walls and there’s some murkiness about everyone’s motivations. Oh! IMOGEN and the Board, IMOGEN and the senior executives -- what’s going on there? IMOGEN and the station, IMOGEN and near-omnipotence -- there are a lot of fascinating things to explore about her as an AI.

[poorquentyn]

Do you think it is thematically necessary for the villain to have a final comeuppance, or realization that they have lost, in order for a story to have a satisfying ending? In ASOIAF terms, for example, Roose Bolton will likely die thinking he has succeeded in removing the Starks from power in the North. In other media, Talia al Ghul died in DKR thinking that her plan to blow up Gotham had all but succeeded.

Depends on the villain, the hero’s relationship to them, and both of their places in the wider story. For example, it’s not possible that Rorge could have been removed from the story in a more fitting fashion than this: 

His headlong charge brought him right onto her point, and Oathkeeper punched through cloth and mail and leather and more cloth, deep into his bowels and out his back, rasping as it scraped along his spine. His axe fell from limp fingers, and the two of them slammed together, Brienne’s face mashed up against the dog’s head helm. She felt the cold wet metal against her cheek. Rain ran down the steel in rivers, and when the lightning flashed again she saw pain and fear and rank disbelief through the eye slits. “Sapphires,” she whispered at him, as she gave her blade a hard twist that made him shudder. His weight sagged heavily against her, and all at once it was a corpse that she embraced, there in the black rain.

“Rank disbelief” is my personal favorite part of that, because it’s the culmination of everyone from Renly to Roose to Randyll Tarly refusing to believe that Brienne of Tarth is a knight. Right before fighting Rorge, in deciding to fight Rorge, Brienne offered the definitive expression of knighthood in the series to date:

Seven, Brienne thought again, despairing. She had no chance against seven, she knew. No chance, and no choice.

Symbolically speaking, Brienne slaying the Hound is intimately connected to her stumbling across the Gravedigger on the Quiet Isle. Sandor is moving on from the mask, towards his own dream of true knighthood, and so it fits beautifully that Brienne then kills the Hound.

It’s also a vital moment in the context of AFFC, which is a really depressing book, arguably more so than the ones before it. AGOT ended with Ned dead, yes, but also Robb as King in the North and Dany as Mother of Dragons. ASOS ended with soul-shaking images of one Tully sister falling and another rising, but also with powerful notes of hope at the Wall, as “a king who still cared” rides to the rescue and our hero becomes Lord Commander. By contrast, the most hopeful thing that happens at the end of AFFC is that the book’s protagonist gets arrested. It’s a book about entropy, “squabbling over spoils,” personal/cultural flailing around in the wake of “mighty pillars” collapsing. The thesis is that if nothing else, the upheavals of ASOS opened windows for change…and these opportunities are being forsaken, sometimes for sympathetic reasons and sometimes not, even while the Oldtown bookends (connected less to the book between them than to the larger plot) demonstrate that the “age of wonder and terror, an age for gods and heroes” is fast approaching. The glass candles are burning, and Westeros is not ready, because it’s eating itself alive. 

“Crow’s Eye, you call me. Well, who has a keener eye than the crow? After every battle the crows come in their hundreds and their thousands to feast upon the fallen. A crow can espy death from afar. And I say that all of Westeros is dying. Those who follow me will feast until the end of their days.”

All of which is to say that there’s an immense catharsis in Rorge, as the Hound, a feasting crow if ever there was one, knowing in his final moments that it was Brienne specifically who killed him.

Roose, on the other hand…he’s drained of menace throughout ADWD, which I mean as a compliment. His mood at this point in the story, as I’ve said before, is essentially post-coital; the Red Wedding was his entire reason for being, and now he’s riding it out, happy to get laid and watch Ramsay murder the resulting kids. Unlike the ever-ambitious Freys, I don’t think there’s much catharsis to be found in killing Roose in revenge for the Red Wedding, because his investment was more in the event than the aftermath, so there’s nothing you’re taking away from him by killing him. If the Starks came for him, he’d die with a shrug. The comeuppance to be found in Roose’s death is if Ramsay kills him, because Ramsay is Roose’s blind spot; Roose knows that Ramsay is a threat to Roose’s children by Walda, but never realizes the threat to himself.

I think GRRM wanted to bring Ramsay to the forefront because the Bastard had spent most of ACOK in disguise, made one unforgettable appearance as himself near book’s end, and then vanished until ADWD, whereas we got an unshakable sense of Roose throughout ASOS. Theon’s POV, of course, lends itself to a focus on Ramsay. But there’s also a strong sense of GRRM pressing his thumb on the scales to set up Ramsay, rather than his father, as the final boss of the battle for Winterfell.

And there is a catharsis to be found in Ramsay knowing (Rorge-style) as he dies that his victims won, although in the book’s case, it’ll likely be Stannis doing the actual executing as Theon observes. 

So like I said, it varies.

[riting]

Johanna Hedva and Lucas Wrench on the durational performance of Machine Project

When Machine Project closed a year ago, on January 13, 2018, we wondered: what if what just ended was a show that was fifteen years long? Perhaps a bunch of artists had visited there as unwitting collaborators in, and audience to, an ongoing performance disguised as discrete events? We asked a couple Machine regulars to write about the show and reflect on how it might help them think about issues specific to performance.

Johanna Hedva: If Machine Project wasn’t a big ol’ performance, what was it?

Was it a science-fiction movie? It had (was) an imaginative concept that foregrounded innovation and exciting technologies, and was entirely populated by extraterrestrials.

Was it a catering service? When I worked there, every day we’d scoot the tables together and squinch our IKEA folding chairs in close and eat the takeout lunch Mark Allen had bought for us out of company funds, and this is the number one reason, of so many reasons, why it’s still the best job I’ve ever had, and I imagine I can speak for my fellow colleagues in saying that it’s one of the best jobs they’ve ever had, simply because eating together day in and day out for several years builds community and trust and friendship like nothing else.

Figure 1: Claire Kohne as Kalypso the vengeful sorceress who chases after Odysseus as he is being rescued in the VONS parking lot. From Odyssey Odyssey (2013).

Was it a really long Vine? ‘Twas a zany goofball slapstick premise exceptionally executed in an unfathomably pinched amount of time, and also served as a vessel for cultural criticism and commentary, while birthing a zillion trends.

Was it a tabletop role-playing game? Maybe not exactly, but in essence it was a bunch of people who could be called players rather than competitors, creating their own characters who participate in a collective narrative within an agreed-upon (fictional or non) setting, which follows guidelines and rules of that agreed-upon world, but which is not necessarily and probably quite different from the rest of the world, and which is great fun and probably addicting. Also, once they got that great website, they sort of became a MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game), because of those brilliant animated avatars (drawn by Tiffanie Tran) of an octopus (representing the artist), a cactus with a beret (poets), and a pineapple with a mustache (representing the public).

Was it a Hollywood blockbuster? Because it pretty much fits film critic Tom Shone’s definition of a blockbuster being “a fast-paced, exciting entertainment, inspiring interest and conversation beyond the theatre (which would later be called ‘buzz’), and repeated viewings,” and, for a nonprofit, it was pretty damn financially successful.

Was it a book of aphorisms? Fits the Online Etymology Dictionary’s definition for aphorism as “a concise, terse, laconic, and/or memorable expression of a general truth or principle,” and it would be more than just one aphorism, more like a book of them, a very long book, because there were way more than just a few.

Figure 2: Joe Seely as Clay, an old bitch who's been waiting in the desert for 100 years to see the symbol of her desire again. From Ancient Monuments to What (2015).

Speaking of books! Was it a cookbook? Chock full of recipes that simultaneously include careful measurements and room for error, for how to make various dishes, from soupy liquids to layered cakes to multi-plated entrees?

Was it an example of magical realism? Political critique folded into phantasmagorical otherworldly otherworlds, with intricate metaphors, animals, witches, forests, and shipwrecks, and strange objects and doorways that may or may not take you to another dimensional realm that may or may not be 100 years from now or in the past.

Was it a PhD thesis on how certain forms of sociality feel better than others, but strangely it’s hard to articulate why?

Was it an attempt at utopia? Isn’t utopia inherently a failure? Then, but, so, didn’t it succeed?

Was it a puzzle that refused to be solved?

Figure 3: Nickels Sunshine as Yama-uba, a crone with mouths under her hair who feeds on young girls. From Ancient Monuments to What (2015).

Was it a distant island that we tried to voyage to, but alas, our ship ran aground and our beards grew wildly and became entangled in the rigging and, thin with scurvy, we watched the sun go down as the skies roared with thunder and some of us howled at the future while others listened to the wind?

Was it a petition or a vow?

Was it a love letter? It loved me. I loved it. Am I the only one, I don’t think so.

Should these questions be answered? Can they? But why would we want to?

Was it a promise covered in tiny musical notes that when all played together made the big, resounding chord of curious joy?

Was it a dream? It was one of the best dreams.

Johanna Hedva is a fourth-generation Los Angelena on their mother’s side and, on their father’s side, the grandchild of a woman who escaped from North Korea. Hedva is the author of the novel, On Hell (2018, Sator Press). Their fiction, essays, and poems have appeared in Triple Canopy, The White Review, Black Warrior Review, Entropy, Mask, 3:AM, Asian American Literary Review, The Journal Petra, DREGINALD, and Two Serious Ladies. Their works of performance, design, and sound have been shown at Human Resources LA, PAM, the Getty’s 2013 Pacific Standard Time, the LA Architecture and Design Museum, and the Museum of Contemporary Art on the Moon. Most of their performances in Los Angeles were hosted by Machine Project, including The Cave series and Odyssey Odyssey, their adaptation of Homer's Odyssey, which was performed in a Honda Odyssey being driven down the freeway. 

Lucas Wrench: Notes on Vermin

The Machine Project Mystery Theater was originally built in 2013 for Chris Weisbart’s Alvarado Caverns project - which transformed Machine Project’s storefront into an amalgamation of a 99 cent store, gas station bathroom, hologram-laden indoor cave, and a faux-victorian seventeen seat basement theater, replete with velvet curtains, gold foam molding, and clamshell stage lights. Most importantly, Machine Project’s Mystery Theater featured a drop-tile foam ceiling, painted gold, leaving a ten inch gap between Machine Project’s rapidly deteriorating ground level floorboards and the precariously adhered foamcore below. Due to Machine Project’s penchant for spontaneous trapdoor construction, by the time I arrived in the summer of 2014, this once benign buffer zone had transformed into a kind of snack graveyard, home to pretzel crumbs, gummy bears, stray popcorn, spilled Tecate, and several bags of chips.

I’d like to examine the multi-year rat infestation that followed through the lens of what our founder refers to in donor presentations as “grass roots porosity”. It’s the philosophy that a small, nimble art space like Machine Project can be host, partner, and collaborator with a wide range of fellow art spaces, community groups, and institutions, creating a network that’s arguably more generative than those of better funded, but less porous institutions.

Figure 1: “Pro-Porosity / Grass Roots Culture”

Porosity is a liability for museums. While Machine Project’s vermin offerings were limited to Snyder’s pretzel rods and various gas station snacks, the sustenance provided by collecting institutions is far more valuable. Anthropological materials offer a protein rich food source, full of keratin, wood proteins, and plant matter. Works on paper can be considered simple sugars - easily digestible starches beloved by louse and silverfish. Painting offers a mixed diet - glues and varnish, wood and canvas. In anticipation of these threats, the borders of the institution are vigilantly policed. Giant freezers inoculate unseen intruders. Inspections and traps hunt for “visitors” like lady bugs and house flies, that can indicate a breach in security and become food for more malevolent vermin. Black lights scan for eggs and insect trails that warn of pending invasions.

Figure 2: Document Freezer at the Gilcrease Museum - Tulsa, OK

Figure 3: Insect trap collection at Gilcrease Museum - Tulsa, OK

To be clear, i’m not advocating for more rat-infested art spaces. Machine Project’s infestation was traumatizing. It demanded weekly visits from Karl The Exterminator to remove glue traps from the drop ceiling. I had a rat chew its way through the secret trapdoor in the upstairs apartment and fall some sixteen feet into the storefront. I saw rat tails dip low between the foamcore tiles, nearly brushing the heads of unsuspecting audience members below. Mice crawled over my feet as I attempted to run sound from the back of the theater. More traumatizing still was the constant, audible scurrying, the threat that at any moment the flimsy tiles would fall, unleashing the barely contained plague above.  

Figure 4: Diagram of Machine Project Rat Migration

But with a year and a half of distance between me and the rats, I recognize that the conditions that enabled this gnawing torment are the same conditions that made Machine Project such a valuable resource for artists. It was a space where you could cut a trapdoor in the ceiling without hesitance, and install gold foam tiling without concern for the ensuing trash accumulation. Where a temporary basement theater could stay up for a few more years so other artists can use it. Where the solution to a three year rat infestation was removing the floor of the storefront entirely, then reinstalling it at a 30 degree angle to present a play.

I’m now living in Tulsa, Oklahoma, working at a museum with a giant freezer and insect traps, in an office that requires key-cards to access, where no food is allowed, and the trash is dutifully removed every night.  I am protected here - a beneficiary of the museum’s commitment to preserve their collection in perpetuity, and a casualty of the fact that crumbs in my office could spell disaster for some Xth century manuscript stored a floor below. But from a public programming perspective, tasked with bringing the outside in, I can’t help wondering what it would look like to create some space here where a bit of infestation is tolerable. The only problem is how to keep it from spreading.

Lucas Wrench is a 2019 Tulsa Artist Fellow. He was Machine Project’s operations manager (2014-2017) and associate curator (2015-2017).

Machine Project was a place for artists to do fun experiments, together with the public, in ways that influenced culture. It happened at 1200 D North Alvarado, Los Angeles, CA 90026, and elsewhere, from 2003-2018.

Photos by Laure Joliet and provided by the artists.

[tanricksfanficks]

Void S

Dying is always the easiest part. It happens fast. It's not without sensation and yet formless in feeling. If your senses allow, feel your self stretched thin in every direction yet compressed unable  to grasp at anything. When it happens you probably wont know it even did, that is unless you are a capsuleer. Waking up. This is everything I fear. More than the entropy that will consume all those I love, more than facing the contents of my wallet, more than being stranded in space and dying of hunger. First comes the light, it is radiant beyond measure. All at once you become conscious of everything you have ever known downloaded from countless clones who all met the same fate. Ten million neurons firing all at once forming every emotional pattern, every muscle memory, and every single nerve connection simultaneously. No pain can compare to this, or so I thought.

I was stolen at some point, as it was customary for all capsuleers, and for the most part so were any memories of my youth. They insisted during pre-op that it was “necessary to make room”. The concept, as it was told to me at the academy, is that the conscious mind is anchored at a specific frequency and can be copied through several layers of scanning. A small tool that acts as a catalyst is implanted to transmit this information. During the time they have you under they upload what amounts to a collection of electrical impulses and variables that make up who you are to a database and erase what the deem “unnecessary”

Becoming a capsuleer is no accident.  The selection process is a combination of biological compatibility that is determined at birth and progress closely monitored by whatever corporation you happen to belong to. No one person is truly free, though agents and capsuleers are thought to be the most open ended professions. This is only true in part. While after your training is complete you are ultimately left to do what you would like, without our shared cooperation and influence in this vast waste it would slowly wilt away. These are things they look for during schooling and on your tests. They force you into situations with candidates doomed to fail and see how far you can take them. Despite definite hierarchies among the corporation we are all trained to be leaders. They test the boundaries of our resourcefulness constantly and stretch our creative focus.   

Your final test is a state of the art simulation. You are not given warning. This is the first time you understand the control they have over your consciousness. One moment you could be in class, or in a bed, or even on the toilet. The very next moment, the only thing you are aware of is an impending sense of urgency and the sounds of a commander hailing you. After finishing their menial tasks and showing you can operate under extreme duress they let you dock at home for the first time and the simulated scientist you rescue gives you some information regarding your results and provide you with a list of agents. While I have only heard stories, this test is rumored to be used in every system for its efficacy. For reasons not understood they cant seem to wipe out your demeanor. I'm still not sure how someone as lazy as I am made it here. My name is Nifahn and this is my story. 

1.Cash Flow For Capsoleer's

BROADCAST: WARP TO LUCIAN ENGLEWIND WITHIN 0 KM. Roaring into every com-channel the moment had finally come. I reacted instinctively and aligned to the last read coordinates with only a 10 second delay. '9.9 AU TILL BUBBLE COLLAPSE'  Aura read out in her familiar calming voice. Before my scanners and hull could compensate for the loss of momentum I felt the familiar shudder move through my hull my pod and my organs.  An Interdictor. Far too late for me to change course I frantically signaled the remaining fleet members coordinates outside of the Interdictor's bubble range before we all met the same fate. Interdictor's are built for one purpose; stopping you where you are and preventing you from warping at a much greater range and efficiency than traditional warp scramblers. I knew quickly after coughing up blood that this clone wouldn't last the day and if we were going to survive someone would take the fall. 'Inevitably' I thought as I flipped on my after burner and aligned for the Interdictor and readied my guns.

Just as I was confident in the necessity for sacrifice to save Lucian's MACH V- Thrasher, I felt an immense yet comforting shadow. Melkezedech's raven nearly eclipsed the small star behind me and without even glancing at my scanners I recognized the torpedoes flying past my own ship and crashing into our new friend. “ Now this is a party bois” I heard called over the Fleet-Com. Scopio in his usual fashion finally decided to join and warped directly into the interdiction bubble undoubtedly killing him instantly as his clone did not respond or even attempt to eject before he got caught in the crossfire and his ship was turned to ribbons. BROADCAST: TARGET: ENDER WIGGING. “YEAH IM ON IT” I yelled into Fleet-Com in response to Lucian's broadcast. My scanners finally compensating for the anomaly brought up details on all of the targets I was able to scan within range. “REMOTE REPS ON LUCIAN” I called out realizing how little time we really had when suddenly the worst happened. My scanner started to acknowledge the ever growing number of signatures in the surrounding area “AMBUSH!!!!!!” I bellowed into Fleet-Com. As if in response ships of varying sizes and quality started uncloaking as a unit and hell was upon us. “A Gallente naval fleet this deep in Caldari space?” Melkezedech said trembling. “This could only mean one thing Fleet Commander Lucian” I called out knowing what we all were afraid to say. The treaty was broken, and we were at war.

After an eternity that was only a matter of seconds a communication channel was broadcast to each of us “Hailing Fleet COACA This is Commander Hans of the Gallente Federation you are hereby ordered  to stand down your station and your clones have been destroyed your fleet and your commanders captive”. 'Mortality?' I thought mockingly 'this is turning out to be a better day than I anticipated' looking down and seeing the blood still fresh on my sleeve. “You have one chance to comply.” He said. “We have use for good pilots and I would hate to waste that for your pride”. 'Live to fight tomorrow' I saw on my personal com-channel with Lucian. I knew I was fading and despite embracing the final rest many times over today was not the day I would die. “Calling  Commander Hans, this is Squad-Leader  Nifahn requesting medical assistance. I caught the interdiction bubble at near maximum warp speed.” His response was well met. “ Having survived that you earned it. You may dock on our command ship where help will be on the way”. 'Wher-' I thought before the behemoth uncloaked and completely eclipsed any light coming from the nearby star dwarfing both fleets combined. Docking in my first command ship was everything I imagined. The help was already at the door and with my job done I closed my eyes and fell deep asleep.

Waking up. Any injury I sustained was brilliantly taken care of, or I just had the smoothest clone transfer in my life. Upon surveying the room I found my self in the company Melkezedech who looked very little like we had just lost our fleet. “ Welcome back. Do you want the good news or the bad news?” He asked. I glanced at my wrist and affirmed that this was the clone from the battle having been healed marked by the number one drawn on my wrist indicating how old my clone was. One being a week This was a considerable time for the life of a clone, at least for my self. My main source of contribution to our fleet was gate checking. Our station had a struggling market and in an effort to become more efficient started policing and removing anyone who made the the main trade routes unsafe. This became exhausting the more available cloning became. After taking some time to reflect on the events prior I chuckled, “If there is good news to be heard then it cannot wait”.  

Lucian walked in smirking like every other time I have encountered him. “We are all free men, so long as we maintain a channel with our would be captors and respond to distress calls from any Gallente relay. We are also jump locked to this system”. “Clones?”I asked.  “They are now compliments of the Federation. For the most part our job hasnt changed.” Lucian told me with a laugh. “The bad news.” Melkezedech said cutting Lucian's laugh short. “The war is already over. All reports say The Forge is the final stronghold and its folding fast”. My head began throbbing. “I couldn't have possibly been  out that long” I pleaded. “There was a betrayal at the capital. All of our commanders were given false information about a mass invasion force that ended up being a series of traps. General Nivek has taken command and as far as anyone can tell is the only remaining obstacle for the complete annihilation of the Caldari Council”. I took a deep breath and tried to find an answer. There was no scenario that they would succeed at escaping their captors and making it to our remaining forces. “I think its time we get you to your agent.” Lucian said breaking a long silence. “So that's it Fleet Commander Lucian?” I said mockingly. Lucian looked back for the first time his face reflecting the situation we were in. “Well we are alive anyway”.

[2e10e120]

Links #5

Eggs can be cooked with ultrasound (not terribly practical) and spinning magnets (slightly more practical, but still). Anyway, watching those videos made me realise any entropy increase should be considered a negative externality and taxed accordingly. Not even joking here.

Anybody can tell a red cube from a blue egg just by looking at it. Run the equivalent experiment for smell instead of sight and you and your best friend may find yourselves using completely different words to describe the same stimulus. Does this tell us something deep about how our brains are wired? Is there a universal hierarchy of the senses, with the ones at the top eliciting vivid qualia we can all agree on and the ones at the bottom being kind of vague and elusive? Maybe, but in any case it seems that this ordering is quite malleable, since different cultures have different hierarchies (paper, code and data). Two main takeaways and one comment:

Smell usually comes out towards the bottom, color and taste towards the top, so whatever���s going on doesn’t seem to be infinitely malleable by language/culture alone.

Societies with formal schooling tend to produce individuals who typically agree more with each other. Something something Michel Foucault.

In the main text, the authors use Simpson’s diversity index on the set of words used to describe a given stimulus as a measure of between-subject disagreement. I just happened to be skimming through this intro to information theory in which this metric is critisised as "just a second-order Taylor expansion of entropy”. Now, the authors do calculate Shannon entropy (and some other metrics) in their supporting information, showing that it correlates reasonably well with Simpson’s D. I would love to see Figure 3 for H instead of D but I’m too lazy to do it myself.

One of my favourite papers ever is just a bunch of anecdotes about how an AI may go wrong in a ridiculous, genie-like fashion. Since there are more lists like this scattered around the internet, somebody at DeepMind has decided to pool them together and keep the master list updated. Praise be upon her.

John Baez on “Biology as information dynamics”. Main things I learned watching the talk:

Free energy is just kT times the entropy relative to the canonical ensemble equilibrium if you know your math. This insight may come in handy if I ever get around to reading Karl Friston.

Natural selection is quite literally implementing a continuous-time version of Bayes' rule.

Lizards invented rock-paper-scissors long before humans.

Information geometry is the gift that keeps on giving.

Tired of randomly combining np.transpose, np.dot and np.sum until you stumble upon the transformation you wanted? Despair no more: np.einsum to the rescue! This function allows you to do arbitrary tensor contractions using Einstein notation. Also available in PyTorch and TensorFlow.

Leaky integrate-and-fire neurons can estimate the causal effect of their own spikes on the network by doing regression discontinuity design around the spiking threshold and then use this estimate to update their weights (preprint, code). Really nice idea, but they only show it works for a toy, two-neuron network. As they note in the discussion:

Depending on the way a network is constructed, the importance of each neuron may decrease as the size of the network is increased. As the influence of a neuron vanishes, it becomes hard to estimate this influence. While this general scaling behavior is shared with other algorithms (e.g. backpropagation with finite bit depth), it is more crucial for RDD where there will be some noise in the evaluation of the outcome.

A physician refers a patient to a surgeon. The patient undergoes a surgery and dies within a week. How likely is the physician to refer future patients to the same surgeon? Wait, did I mention the surgeon is a woman? Turns out that matters. Women are penalised for that kind of event; men, not really. Conversely, high-risk patients with unexpectedly smooth recoveries increase future referrals to their surgeon, but more so if the surgeon was male.

Ever felt insecure after learning that your lover is much more sexperienced than you? Worry not, for this is just how math works.

Fast fashion is shortening the lifespan of clothes, making its carbon footprint rise. I found this piece particularly depressing, because it basically says consumers cannot do much to lower their carbon footprint by turning to second-hand sotres, since most clothes are so shitty they won't last long anyway. Nevertheless, buying second-hand is still an improvement at the margin, so I'll keep doing it whenever possible.

What if Pacific islands are not sinking due to climate change after all? The contrarian in me loves this, but I have a few caveats. First, the claim comes from eyeballing aerial pictures and satellite images that are sometimes low-res and typically were not taken for this purpose; also they only cover 27 islands and atolls. Second, because the most recent images are from the mid-2000s and a lot may have changed since then. And third, because if there is even an infinitesimal chance that whole countries disappear into nothing, the expected utility calculation makes me want to err on the side of caution.

[jmtapio]

Narabu is a new intraframe video codec, from the Japanese verb narabu (並ぶ), which means to line up or be parallel.

Let me first state straight up that Narabu isn't where I hoped it would be at this stage; the encoder isn't fast enough, and I have to turn my attention to other projects for a while. Nevertheless, I think it is interesting as a research project in its own right, and I don't think it should stop me from trying to write up a small series. :-)

In the spirit of Leslie Lamport, I'll be starting off with describing what problem I was trying to solve, which will hopefully make the design decisions a lot clearer. Subsequent posts will dive into background information and then finally Narabu itself.

I want a codec to send signals between different instances of Nageru, my free software video mixer, and also longer-term between other software, such as recording or playout. The reason is pretty obvious for any sort of complex configuration; if you are doing e.g. both a stream mix and a bigscreen mix, they will naturally want to use many of the same sources, and sharing them over a single GigE connection might be easier than getting SDI repeaters/splitters, especially when you have a lot of them. (Also, in some cases, you might want to share synthetic signals, such as graphics, that never existed on SDI in the first place.)

This naturally leads to the following demands:

Intraframe-only; every frame must be compressed independently. (This isn't strictly needed for all use cases, but is much more flexible, and common in any kind of broadcast.)

Need to handle 4:2:2 color, since that's what most capture sources give out, and we want to transmit the raw signals as much as possible. Fairly flexible in input resolution (divisible by 16 is okay, limited to only a given set of resolutions is not).

720p60 video in less than one CPU core (ideally much less); the CPU can already pretty be busy with other work, like x264 encoding of the finished stream, and sharing four more inputs at the same time is pretty common. What matters is mostly a single encode+decode cycle, so fast decode doesn't help if the encoder is too slow.

Target bitrates around 100-150 Mbit/sec, at similar quality to MJPEG (ie. 45 dB PSNR for most content). Multiple signals should fit into a normal GigE link at the same time, although getting it to work over 802.11 isn't a big priority.

Both encoder and decoder robust to corrupted or malicious data; a dropped frame is fine, a crash is not.

Does not depend on uncommon or expensive hardware, or GPUs from a specific manufacturer.

GPLv3-compatible implementation. I already link to GPLv3 software, so I don't have a choice here; I cannot link to something non-free (and no antics with dlopen(), please).

There's a bunch of intraframe formats around. The most obvious thing to do would be to use Intel Quick Sync to produce H.264 (intraframe H.264 blows basically everything else out of the sky in terms of PSNR, and QSV hardly uses any power at all), but sadly, that's limited to 4:2:0. I thought about encoding the three color planes as three different monochrome streams, but monochrome is not supported either.

Then there's a host of software solutions. x264 can do 4:2:2, but even on ultrafast, it gobbles up an entire core or more at 720p60 at the target bitrates (mostly in entropy coding). FFmpeg has implementations of all kinds of other codecs, like DNxHD, CineForm, MJPEG and so on, but they all use much more CPU for encoding than the target. NDI would seem to fit the bill exactly, but fails the licensing check, and also isn't robust to corrupted or malicious data. (That, and their claims about video quality are dramatically overblown for any kinds of real video data I've tried.)

So, sadly, this leaves only really one choice, namely rolling my own. I quickly figured I couldn't beat the world on CPU video codec speed, and didn't really want to spend my life optimizing AVX2 DCTs anyway, so again, the GPU will come to our rescue in the form of compute shaders. (There are some other GPU codecs out there, but all that I've found depend on CUDA, so they are NVIDIA-only, which I'm not prepared to commit to.) Of course, the GPU is quite busy in Nageru, but if one can make an efficient enough codec that one stream can work at only 5% or so of the GPU (meaning 1200 fps or so), it wouldn't really make a dent. (As a spoiler, the current Narabu encoder isn't there for 720p60 on my GTX 950, but the decoder is.)

In the next post, we'll look a bit at the GPU programming model, and what it means for how our codec needs to look like on the design level.

via Planet Debian

[jesusvasser]

Giovanni Soldini, Master of the Sea

Giovanni Soldini turns his weathered face to the Pacific and squints at millions of square miles of cobalt water. What the 51-year-old Italian is pondering is anyone’s guess, but there’s a good chance he’s thinking about the upcoming Transpacific Yacht Race, the storied competition that challenges billionaires, thrill seekers, and bucket-list romantics to traverse 2,225 nautical miles from San Pedro, California’s Point Fermin buoy to the Diamond Head Lighthouse in Honolulu, Hawaii, relying solely on wind power. A legend in the world of long-distance sailing and a national hero in Italy, Soldini looks more like a puckish fisherman compared to the coiffed locals in Southern California’s tony coastal enclave of Marina del Rey. There may be buckets of seafaring adventures swimming in the memory banks behind his hazel eyes, but Soldini gives off a disarming aura of quietude before he gently returns to reality.

The Transpac, as it is commonly referred to, is a 111-year-old race that covers some of the largest, deepest, and most dangerous expanses of water on the planet. This year Soldini will be sailing the Maserati Multi70 trimaran, the first foiling ship of its type to compete in a major open-ocean race. Painstakingly constructed from carbon fiber and titanium, this multimillion-dollar craft was built for the sole purpose of open-water racing. From one-off daggers and cassettes to countless bespoke components, the hardware is dizzying in its specificity, applying Formula 1 levels of engineering to hydrodynamics and weight reduction. In addition to collaborating on the ship’s overall design, Soldini developed flexible solar panels that power the ship’s electronics.

But the Multi70’s X-factor is its ability to “fly,” thanks to a foil that lifts the hull several feet out of the water, thereby dramatically reducing drag and enabling speeds of up to 44 knots—just about 50 mph. The concept is so efficient that the ship can actually exceed the speed of the wind, a party trick that makes for fantastic spectacle at closed-water events like the America’s Cup. But flying ships are unproven on open water, especially along the stretch between California and Hawaii, where a massive vortex of aquatic garbage can threaten the ship’s delicate rudders and foils. Despite a lifetime of sailing experience, the meteorological vagaries of the vast geography and the black art of strategizing a course that capitalizes on the velocity-amplifying power of the wind mean Soldini has his work cut out for him.

Giovanni Soldini became drawn to the ocean in his early teens, but the bond was cemented at 17 when he convinced a 75-year-old American captain to take him sailing across the Atlantic. The route from Palma de Mallorca in the Mediterranean to Antigua in the Caribbean forged an extreme level of adaptability at an age when most kids were getting their kicks playing video games. Soldini didn’t speak English until he picked up the language from the captain. After several months in the Caribbean, he returned home on a Spanish boat, learning Spanish from the crew. “It was fantastic,” he says with a laugh, like a lover reminiscing on the fling that triggered an affair.

“Giovanni’s personality and way of getting his hands dirty and being involved 100 percent reminded John Elkann of the Maserati brothers.”

As his professional sailing career took off, Soldini developed a knack for dominating grueling long-distance ocean races, including the Transat Jacques Vabre (France to Brazil), the San Francisco to Shanghai Tea Clipper Route, the Original Singlehanded Transatlantic Race, and the Transat Québec to Saint-Malo (Canada to France). The relationship with Maserati developed when John Elkann, the Fiat scion who also happens to be the chairman of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, started sailing with Soldini in 2009. Although Soldini originally sought financial support to compete in the Volvo Ocean Race, the relationship with Maserati eventually led to the design and construction of the Multi70 as a way to showcase the brand on a different global stage. The ship also enables would-be Maserati buyers to experience an aspect of the brand’s nonautomotive ventures, acting as a sort of aquatic halo vehicle that could eventually convert sailing experiences into sales.

“By getting to know Giovanni’s personality and passion, somehow [Elkann’s] intuition associated him with Maserati, which a few years ago was still a smaller brand,” says Matteo Sardi, the brand’s North American rep. That plucky marketplace position gave Maserati a unique angle against more household nameplates. “We think of Maserati like a fancy popcorn. It’s not Ferrari. It’s not Lamborghini. Yes, it’s expensive and luxurious, but it’s also made by hand. The people are simpler there. Giovanni’s personality and way of getting his hands dirty and being involved 100 percent reminded [Elkann] a little bit of what he thought about the Maserati brothers.”

Soldini recalls epic oceangoing experiences with the casualness of someone describing a weekend in Napa. “It was a great trip with Maserati,” he says, reminiscing about the adventure when he broke the record from New York to San Francisco along the Gold Route course, a 13,225-mile route that circumnavigates Cape Horn. A previous record stood for 135 years, recorded by the Flying Cloud, a massive clipper ship that completed the journey in 89 days. That achievement was finally beat by a French team that completed the route in 57 days, 3 hours in 2008. Soldini and his crew obliterated that record five years later, finishing in 47 days, 42 minutes.

Then there was the notorious 1998/1999 Around Alone race, a global circumnavigation that requires competitors to sail solo. The leg across the South Pacific from Auckland, New Zealand, to Punta del Este, Uruguay, is particularly daunting because of its massive waves, freezing temperatures, and up to 4,000-mile isolation from landmass. At 59 degrees latitude south, some 2,000 miles west of Chile, friend and competitor Isabelle Autissier capsized. When her 60-foot sailboat flipped upside down in sub-40-degree water (surrounded by even colder ambient temperatures), Autissier donned a thick survival suit and huddled in an air pocket within the hull. Soldini, alerted of the capsizing, diverted his route more than 200 miles for the faint possibility of rescuing his competitor. But with only an emergency radio beacon and a single Comsat-C satellite-tracking signal, the margin of error for locating the distressed ship was approximately seven miles. The odds of contact were even lower because inclement weather visually blended the water into the sky and massive swells offered only fleeting glimpses of the distressed ship.

Then the improbable happened: Soldini spotted the bobbing hull of Autissier’s boat in the distance. He approached and made two passes, screaming her name in hopes of capturing her attention. When no one emerged, Soldini took a third pass and threw a hammer at the hull, triggering her to crawl out of a hatch. Autissier eventually climbed aboard his boat and joined him for 15 days until he reached Uruguay. “She ate all my food,” he jokes, “but it was OK because Isabelle is a very nice person.”

A race spokesman later told The New York Times, “He’s a very determined person. He’s also got one of the best boats in the fleet, and he knows how to sail it quickly to get where he wants to go.” Despite the diversion, Soldini completed the 26,000-mile journey in 116 days, 20 hours, a new world record that beat the previous title by almost five days.

Despite facing the hazards of a life racing on the open sea for three decades, Soldini remains unfazed, seeking ever-greater challenges both on water and on land.

Soldini’s racing recollections tend to follow a distinct format with two oppositional forces at play: the unrelenting rigor of science, logistics, and planning and the sting of nature’s entropy. The former includes his close working relationship with Guillaume Verdier, the renowned nautical designer known for authoring Team New Zealand’s America’s Cup ship. With Soldini’s countless hours at the helm in some of the most extreme oceangoing conditions and Verdier’s engineering problem solving, the two collaborate on the design of crucial components such as the rudders (the Multi70 has three) and the foil, which has a profile that resembles an airplane wing in order to create the lifting force that makes the ship “fly.” Another key collaborator is meteorological guru Pierre Lasnier, with whom Soldini has worked for more than two decades. His prerace ritual includes one or two full days discussing weather possibilities and contingency plans. “Obviously when you’ve [been doing that] for 20 years,” Soldini says, “you speak the same language and you understand. Each time you know a little bit more, [but] it’s not like mathematics. It’s never sure.”

When considering gut instincts versus scientific data, Soldini recalls his second round-the-world race. He had the instinct on the first leg (from Charleston, South Carolina, to Cape Town, South Africa) to stay on a northerly route before heading east because the Caribbean’s trade winds to the south would have slowed his progress. By remaining in the north’s low-pressure zone, he took the lead and felt confident about his route. However, ten days later, a tropical low-pressure system developed and inverted the conditions, completely reversing the standings. “[The competitors] just killed me,” he recalls. “But if I could do it again, I would do it the same because meteorology is not stable. You need to accept that. That’s life. You try, but you are not God.”

Acceptance might be an essential part of Soldini’s constitution, but it also comes from decades of battling some of nature’s mightiest forces. He has tasted the sweetest of victories, but he has also capsized and crashed. Despite some severe personal nadirs, the deepest cut might have been the loss of longtime friend Andrea Romanelli, a yacht designer who was swept into the ocean during a North Atlantic storm. Romanelli’s body was never recovered. The tragedy almost led Soldini to skip the Around Alone race where he rescued Isabelle Autissier.

“It’s like car racing. You have plenty of high and low moments,” he explains, “but one day you will have an accident. You can have 80-, 90-knot winds or 100-foot waves that can sink even a cargo ship. But it’s like anything, I think. The important thing is to have luck and be prepared, to be able to start again.” Not surprisingly, that element of danger doesn’t diminish much on the rare occasion he returns home to Sarzana, a small medieval town in Italy near Pisa. “I love driving cars and motorcycles,” he says, referring to his Alfa Romeo Giulietta and Honda Hornet 600. And, of course, he also keeps several boats on hand—a small multihull catamaran for local journeys, a cruising boat for family and friends, and a small racing boat he’s loaning out for a competition.

Soldini’s three decades of exposure to the world’s oceans have made him a firsthand witness to the realities of a changing planet. Whereas in 1995, during his first around-the-world circumnavigation, he was able to travel at a latitude of 62 degrees south, now he can’t make the journey below 45 degrees due to ice masses that have separated, or calved, from Antarctica. “It’s crazy,” he says. “It’s scary.”

During the 2017 Transpac race, Soldini and his seven-man crew were about 1,500 miles from Los Angeles when the ship struck an unidentified object at night, dislocating one of the rudders. “You cannot believe how many things are floating around this part of the sea,” he says, suspecting the object that was a propane tank. After assessing the extent of the damage, it appeared the carbon housing around the rudder (known as a cassette) disintegrated, and on-the-spot repairs were not possible. Although they were able to recover the rudder, a particularly expensive part, their inability to maintain full stability during the actual race resulted in a 3- to 4-knot speed reduction that led them to cross the finish line in third place.

In the aftermath of the loss, Soldini employs his usual problem-solving resolve. He is already collaborating with Verdier on a cassette design that would work as a fuse, bending along an axis so it can absorb impact without breaking.

When asked about his attraction to ocean racing, Soldini pauses in search of an explanation. “I don’t know,” he says. “What I really love is the fact that the boat is like a world. You never learn enough. You have everything, but you cannot be good at everything.”

In the years since Soldini started sailing, advances in shipbuilding and onboard electronics have changed the game. Now, his transocean ships contain three satellite-linked computers using 16 IP addresses that enable all the trappings of social-media capture required to compete on the global stage. Despite the technology creep, Soldini’s joy of sailing remains.

“It’s just my life,” he says simply. “I adore it.”

The post Giovanni Soldini, Master of the Sea appeared first on Automobile Magazine.

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[robertkstone]

Giovanni Soldini, Master of the Sea

Giovanni Soldini turns his weathered face to the Pacific and squints at millions of square miles of cobalt water. What the 51-year-old Italian is pondering is anyone’s guess, but there’s a good chance he’s thinking about the upcoming Transpacific Yacht Race, the storied competition that challenges billionaires, thrill seekers, and bucket-list romantics to traverse 2,225 nautical miles from San Pedro, California’s Point Fermin buoy to the Diamond Head Lighthouse in Honolulu, Hawaii, relying solely on wind power. A legend in the world of long-distance sailing and a national hero in Italy, Soldini looks more like a puckish fisherman compared to the coiffed locals in Southern California’s tony coastal enclave of Marina del Rey. There may be buckets of seafaring adventures swimming in the memory banks behind his hazel eyes, but Soldini gives off a disarming aura of quietude before he gently returns to reality.

The Transpac, as it is commonly referred to, is a 111-year-old race that covers some of the largest, deepest, and most dangerous expanses of water on the planet. This year Soldini will be sailing the Maserati Multi70 trimaran, the first foiling ship of its type to compete in a major open-ocean race. Painstakingly constructed from carbon fiber and titanium, this multimillion-dollar craft was built for the sole purpose of open-water racing. From one-off daggers and cassettes to countless bespoke components, the hardware is dizzying in its specificity, applying Formula 1 levels of engineering to hydrodynamics and weight reduction. In addition to collaborating on the ship’s overall design, Soldini developed flexible solar panels that power the ship’s electronics.

But the Multi70’s X-factor is its ability to “fly,” thanks to a foil that lifts the hull several feet out of the water, thereby dramatically reducing drag and enabling speeds of up to 44 knots—just about 50 mph. The concept is so efficient that the ship can actually exceed the speed of the wind, a party trick that makes for fantastic spectacle at closed-water events like the America’s Cup. But flying ships are unproven on open water, especially along the stretch between California and Hawaii, where a massive vortex of aquatic garbage can threaten the ship’s delicate rudders and foils. Despite a lifetime of sailing experience, the meteorological vagaries of the vast geography and the black art of strategizing a course that capitalizes on the velocity-amplifying power of the wind mean Soldini has his work cut out for him.

Giovanni Soldini became drawn to the ocean in his early teens, but the bond was cemented at 17 when he convinced a 75-year-old American captain to take him sailing across the Atlantic. The route from Palma de Mallorca in the Mediterranean to Antigua in the Caribbean forged an extreme level of adaptability at an age when most kids were getting their kicks playing video games. Soldini didn’t speak English until he picked up the language from the captain. After several months in the Caribbean, he returned home on a Spanish boat, learning Spanish from the crew. “It was fantastic,” he says with a laugh, like a lover reminiscing on the fling that triggered an affair.

“Giovanni’s personality and way of getting his hands dirty and being involved 100 percent reminded John Elkann of the Maserati brothers.”

As his professional sailing career took off, Soldini developed a knack for dominating grueling long-distance ocean races, including the Transat Jacques Vabre (France to Brazil), the San Francisco to Shanghai Tea Clipper Route, the Original Singlehanded Transatlantic Race, and the Transat Québec to Saint-Malo (Canada to France). The relationship with Maserati developed when John Elkann, the Fiat scion who also happens to be the chairman of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, started sailing with Soldini in 2009. Although Soldini originally sought financial support to compete in the Volvo Ocean Race, the relationship with Maserati eventually led to the design and construction of the Multi70 as a way to showcase the brand on a different global stage. The ship also enables would-be Maserati buyers to experience an aspect of the brand’s nonautomotive ventures, acting as a sort of aquatic halo vehicle that could eventually convert sailing experiences into sales.

“By getting to know Giovanni’s personality and passion, somehow [Elkann’s] intuition associated him with Maserati, which a few years ago was still a smaller brand,” says Matteo Sardi, the brand’s North American rep. That plucky marketplace position gave Maserati a unique angle against more household nameplates. “We think of Maserati like a fancy popcorn. It’s not Ferrari. It’s not Lamborghini. Yes, it’s expensive and luxurious, but it’s also made by hand. The people are simpler there. Giovanni’s personality and way of getting his hands dirty and being involved 100 percent reminded [Elkann] a little bit of what he thought about the Maserati brothers.”

Soldini recalls epic oceangoing experiences with the casualness of someone describing a weekend in Napa. “It was a great trip with Maserati,” he says, reminiscing about the adventure when he broke the record from New York to San Francisco along the Gold Route course, a 13,225-mile route that circumnavigates Cape Horn. A previous record stood for 135 years, recorded by the Flying Cloud, a massive clipper ship that completed the journey in 89 days. That achievement was finally beat by a French team that completed the route in 57 days, 3 hours in 2008. Soldini and his crew obliterated that record five years later, finishing in 47 days, 42 minutes.

Then there was the notorious 1998/1999 Around Alone race, a global circumnavigation that requires competitors to sail solo. The leg across the South Pacific from Auckland, New Zealand, to Punta del Este, Uruguay, is particularly daunting because of its massive waves, freezing temperatures, and up to 4,000-mile isolation from landmass. At 59 degrees latitude south, some 2,000 miles west of Chile, friend and competitor Isabelle Autissier capsized. When her 60-foot sailboat flipped upside down in sub-40-degree water (surrounded by even colder ambient temperatures), Autissier donned a thick survival suit and huddled in an air pocket within the hull. Soldini, alerted of the capsizing, diverted his route more than 200 miles for the faint possibility of rescuing his competitor. But with only an emergency radio beacon and a single Comsat-C satellite-tracking signal, the margin of error for locating the distressed ship was approximately seven miles. The odds of contact were even lower because inclement weather visually blended the water into the sky and massive swells offered only fleeting glimpses of the distressed ship.

Then the improbable happened: Soldini spotted the bobbing hull of Autissier’s boat in the distance. He approached and made two passes, screaming her name in hopes of capturing her attention. When no one emerged, Soldini took a third pass and threw a hammer at the hull, triggering her to crawl out of a hatch. Autissier eventually climbed aboard his boat and joined him for 15 days until he reached Uruguay. “She ate all my food,” he jokes, “but it was OK because Isabelle is a very nice person.”

A race spokesman later told The New York Times, “He’s a very determined person. He’s also got one of the best boats in the fleet, and he knows how to sail it quickly to get where he wants to go.” Despite the diversion, Soldini completed the 26,000-mile journey in 116 days, 20 hours, a new world record that beat the previous title by almost five days.

Despite facing the hazards of a life racing on the open sea for three decades, Soldini remains unfazed, seeking ever-greater challenges both on water and on land.

Soldini’s racing recollections tend to follow a distinct format with two oppositional forces at play: the unrelenting rigor of science, logistics, and planning and the sting of nature’s entropy. The former includes his close working relationship with Guillaume Verdier, the renowned nautical designer known for authoring Team New Zealand’s America’s Cup ship. With Soldini’s countless hours at the helm in some of the most extreme oceangoing conditions and Verdier’s engineering problem solving, the two collaborate on the design of crucial components such as the rudders (the Multi70 has three) and the foil, which has a profile that resembles an airplane wing in order to create the lifting force that makes the ship “fly.” Another key collaborator is meteorological guru Pierre Lasnier, with whom Soldini has worked for more than two decades. His prerace ritual includes one or two full days discussing weather possibilities and contingency plans. “Obviously when you’ve [been doing that] for 20 years,” Soldini says, “you speak the same language and you understand. Each time you know a little bit more, [but] it’s not like mathematics. It’s never sure.”

When considering gut instincts versus scientific data, Soldini recalls his second round-the-world race. He had the instinct on the first leg (from Charleston, South Carolina, to Cape Town, South Africa) to stay on a northerly route before heading east because the Caribbean’s trade winds to the south would have slowed his progress. By remaining in the north’s low-pressure zone, he took the lead and felt confident about his route. However, ten days later, a tropical low-pressure system developed and inverted the conditions, completely reversing the standings. “[The competitors] just killed me,” he recalls. “But if I could do it again, I would do it the same because meteorology is not stable. You need to accept that. That’s life. You try, but you are not God.”

Acceptance might be an essential part of Soldini’s constitution, but it also comes from decades of battling some of nature’s mightiest forces. He has tasted the sweetest of victories, but he has also capsized and crashed. Despite some severe personal nadirs, the deepest cut might have been the loss of longtime friend Andrea Romanelli, a yacht designer who was swept into the ocean during a North Atlantic storm. Romanelli’s body was never recovered. The tragedy almost led Soldini to skip the Around Alone race where he rescued Isabelle Autissier.

“It’s like car racing. You have plenty of high and low moments,” he explains, “but one day you will have an accident. You can have 80-, 90-knot winds or 100-foot waves that can sink even a cargo ship. But it’s like anything, I think. The important thing is to have luck and be prepared, to be able to start again.” Not surprisingly, that element of danger doesn’t diminish much on the rare occasion he returns home to Sarzana, a small medieval town in Italy near Pisa. “I love driving cars and motorcycles,” he says, referring to his Alfa Romeo Giulietta and Honda Hornet 600. And, of course, he also keeps several boats on hand—a small multihull catamaran for local journeys, a cruising boat for family and friends, and a small racing boat he’s loaning out for a competition.

Soldini’s three decades of exposure to the world’s oceans have made him a firsthand witness to the realities of a changing planet. Whereas in 1995, during his first around-the-world circumnavigation, he was able to travel at a latitude of 62 degrees south, now he can’t make the journey below 45 degrees due to ice masses that have separated, or calved, from Antarctica. “It’s crazy,” he says. “It’s scary.”

During the 2017 Transpac race, Soldini and his seven-man crew were about 1,500 miles from Los Angeles when the ship struck an unidentified object at night, dislocating one of the rudders. “You cannot believe how many things are floating around this part of the sea,” he says, suspecting the object that was a propane tank. After assessing the extent of the damage, it appeared the carbon housing around the rudder (known as a cassette) disintegrated, and on-the-spot repairs were not possible. Although they were able to recover the rudder, a particularly expensive part, their inability to maintain full stability during the actual race resulted in a 3- to 4-knot speed reduction that led them to cross the finish line in third place.

In the aftermath of the loss, Soldini employs his usual problem-solving resolve. He is already collaborating with Verdier on a cassette design that would work as a fuse, bending along an axis so it can absorb impact without breaking.

When asked about his attraction to ocean racing, Soldini pauses in search of an explanation. “I don’t know,” he says. “What I really love is the fact that the boat is like a world. You never learn enough. You have everything, but you cannot be good at everything.”

In the years since Soldini started sailing, advances in shipbuilding and onboard electronics have changed the game. Now, his transocean ships contain three satellite-linked computers using 16 IP addresses that enable all the trappings of social-media capture required to compete on the global stage. Despite the technology creep, Soldini’s joy of sailing remains.

“It’s just my life,” he says simply. “I adore it.”

The post Giovanni Soldini, Master of the Sea appeared first on Automobile Magazine.

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