#also tangentially related side note

[contagious-watermelon]

do people on here think that personal identification is completely in a vacuum and 100% free of societal implications, making it of no consequence whatsoever which words you decide to use for yourself, any more than what color shirt you wear to bed?

[grunckle]

Void Worms as the Demiurge and Iterator Inverses (And also clearing up some things about the Qualia post)

So, I'm going to be going a bit more in depth on the Yaldaboath-Void Worm comparison I brought up in my previous post. Here's the post for anyone who didn't see it already:

I also just wanted to expand upon some things and maybe clear up some confusing parts that I didn't cover in the original post.

But first I'll give a quick explanation on what Yaldaboath (who I'll just be calling the Demiurge from now on) is before drawing the comparisons. The Demiurge is a being in Gnostic belief that created the material world. He is often identified as the god of the Old Testament, and is malicious and inferior to the True God called the Monad, who is above all else.

Of course this is very simplified and I'm leaving a lot out, but what you should take out of this is that he created the material world.

So back to void worms, they heavily resemble the Demiurge in a few ways. Visually, they both share a long, serpent-like body, and glowing "halos".

But beyond that, they indirectly share a few celestial motifs. The Demiurge gave birth to Archons who ruled over different, "celestial spheres." Celestial spheres are a concept in Rain World cosmology, as it's mentioned in the Deep Pink pearl.

"On regards of the (by spiritual splendor eternally graced) people of the Congregation of Never Dwindling Righteousness, we Wish to congratulate (o so thankfully) this Facility on its Loyal and Relished services, and to Offer our Hopes and Aspirations that the Fruitful and Mutually Satisfactory Cooperation may continue, for as long as the Stars stay fixed on their Celestial Spheres and/or the Cooperation continues to be Fruitful and Mutually Satisfactory."

But, even beyond that, they straight up appear visually in the depths through Guardian Halos.

And then Gnostic celestial spheres for comparison.

Void Worms are also described as "stars" within ancient dreams and our own.

Now, this is only a tangential relation to the Guardians who also reside in the Depths, but there is one more thing that I believe cement the Void Worm Demiurge theory that is much, much bigger in the context of Rain Worlds narrative.

Void Worms have a lot of iterator parallels, which lead me and others to believe that they act as a direct inverse to Iterators. Iterators usher beings to ascend past their mortal confines, and Void Worms trap beings in the material world like the Demiurge.

The first of which are just some design similarities between the two. They both have round heads with bug-like eyes, and they both have halos.

Next, the scenes in which we see iterators and the void sea are very reminiscent of each other. There are thousands of iterators above, and thousands of void worms below.

Void worms have 8 arms/tentacles, iterators cans have 8 legs.

But probably the most striking piece of evidence for this parallel is the music that plays atop the Wall and in the Void Sea. They share the same musical motif.

And, as a quick fun side note:

It's pretty common knowledge at this point that Void Worm skin is corn, but whats less common knowledge is that it's also made of fractal patterns and neurons.

Basically I think all this points to Void Worms being iterator inverses and working like the Demiurge, manifesting the material world and trapping beings within it.

Now, just to clear up some things about my previous post. I don't think the rot itself is made from the ancients' mutated brain matter, but rather the method in which both cabinet beasts and the rot are made are similar. They're both made by taking neural matter, (Five Pebbles's brain in the case of the rot and the Ancients' in the case of cabinet beasts) and mutating it into something else. Its more just a conceptual comparison than evidence the two are related.

Second is more about personal interpretation, but I don't really think that each Void Worm we see is manifesting it's own world. All together they act as the concept of the Demiurge, manifesting one universe. Perhaps they're not even conscious about it, and experience a divine realm similar to us while they swim around aimlessly in the Void Sea.

And finally, adding onto my last point, that's why I don't think the parallels give a lot of insight into how the cycles work, other than that by entrapping creatures in the physical world those creatures are also subjected to the cycle. I have my own cycle theory that I believe works a bit better that I might post later. But yeah I just wanted to clear that stuff up.

[lestowell]

Finally watched the vid and idk why anybody would be mad about it. Like was it boring and half assed? Yeah obviously but also it was a spon vid and they're in the middle of tour rehearsals and shit they're allowed lmao

Also as a side note I love how hard they were trying in this vid to make the game seem not boring. It was so obvious to me that they couldn't give less of a shit. They were Grasping at straws to come up with shit to talk about that were even tangentially related to the game

[cripplecharacters]

Hi, I want to write a blind character (with only a residual central vision left) and I would like any input on how I write his son's relation with him, and how someone that's close to the character may act around him/to help him.

Hi! So it’s a good sign that you have an idea of what his vision capabilities looks like, and of course if you can get more specific with a condition that is very helpful, but that is only tangentially related to your question, just a side note!

As for specific ways of acting:

He likely will rely more on auditory cues. Announcing things that other people may not think to say aloud can be very common in domestic settings (ıe: “I’m in the kitchen” “Xyz is at the door”, etc) In my own home just verbally describing things is so commonplace that it barely even feels like something ‘extra’ — its a natural part of how my husband acts around me. Reading mail, cooking instructions, or other domestic “papers” aloud is also a way the son could help his father around the house.

Tactile cues can be equally as important, especially if your character is DeafBlind in any capacity. Touching shoulders, tapping the table, or otherwise signifying a presence can be helpful. You can get creative with these — what specific tactile rituals might the father and son develop together that reveal things about their culture, personality, etc?

If the father is older/has shaky hands, or otherwise might struggle with any personal grooming, would he want his son to help with that? For instance, I am not fully comfortable shaving by myself because I don’t want to cut myself. Note that this is not a given — plenty of blind people are capable of doing these things, it's just something to consider in character development and can provide a background for some emotional / bonding scenes.

Beyond what the son in specific does, there are considerations for the house itself that the son lives in and interacts with. I’m not sure if your work is from the son’s, father’s or both POVs but blind households may differ in a few ways.

Does the father have lights in the house or his room?

Bump dots! If he does use lights, or microwaves, machines, etc how might he mark them up to make them accessible to him?

Cooking tools like liquid level detectors, etc. There are plenty of these but looking around at shops like the Braille Superstore can give an idea of the types of tools that may be attractive to people who need them

Does he use braille or whatever equivalent a fantasy story may have if that’s your genre? If so, consider reading and writing materials, whether they are old school slate and stylus or a more advanced brailler machine.

Note that unless the family has recently moved to a new house or they have recently made interior changes or he is recently blinded, the father should be very comfortable navigating the space since it is his home he spends lots of time in. He likely would not use a cane in his own home, he would not frequently bump into major things like furniture, etc. However if the house is messy and there are hazards on the floor, or they got a new appliance, his vision got suddenly worse, or otherwise made an adjustment, then there is a greater chance of difficulties. Maybe he is more strict about cleanliness with his son so that’s another opportunity for developing their relationship.

This is barely just scratching the surface though. Feel free to follow up with more questions if desired. :)

Mod Zohar

[incorrectmahabharatquotes]

This is not as coherent as my usual posts and I'm sorry about that in advance. This is tangentially related to our last post about women in Mahabharat. I saw this post by @nushkiespeaks. I have a lot of thoughts about it but what matters the most in the context of our previous post is that I do not like the use of the phrase "her dharma saves her" in this scenario. I will explain.

TW: violence against women, sexual assault. Please proceed with caution.

(I want to clarify that this is not meant as a call out post or anything. These are just my thoughts about what some feminist analysis of the epic lack sometimes. You can feel free to agree or disagree with me but please be kind and respectful about it and not call people names or harass anyone.)

I love Draupadi as a character so I say the following with all the love in my heart for her:

People usually either praise Draupadi for being a perfect victim. Or denigrate her for not being one. To them, she's either the pure hearted goddess who believed in her personal god and fulfilled her dharma of being a perfect wife. Or she's the cunning woman who didn't perform her dharma properly and deserved what she got.

What gets left behind is that the fact no one should have to go through any of that regardless of whether you believe they performed their dharma correctly. What also gets left behind are: all the other women mentioned in the scene, if only in passing. The slaves.

If you're strictly talking about the BORI CE version of the story(as the post clearly is), while reading it, it's almost impossible to miss the repeated mentions of the normalised and legally sanctioned sexual abuse/harrassment and rape of slaves. (Side note: Yes, slavery was a thing back then. It's horrible. People just don't like to acknowledge the instances in the Mahabharat where slavery is mentioned because it's just not a good look for sacred books to be chill with and actively encouraging buying and selling of actual people like objects. Trust me, if you have a favourite character in the epic, they were probably involved in the practice of slavery somehow, even Krishna, I'm very sorry to tell you this.)

To me, it's odious to mention dharma whenever we talk about Draupadi's vastraharan because it leads the obvious conclusion that those other women mentioned in text suffer at the hands of their "masters", in part because maybe they weren't performing their dharma correctly.

Maybe that's not what people mean when they praise Draupadi for her dharmic perfection. But every time those people, I cannot help but think of those women. The ones that are forgotten.

The ones who were not allowed to save themselves.

I guess, I'm ultimately just trying to say that this post is just my humble request to people to not talk about topics such as sexual assault in terms of the moral character of the victim. The people may mean well, but it does unfortunately perpetuate the idea of a perfect victim.

-Mod S

[dipperdesperado]

Get Organized!

I recently made a post about how to get started in doing radical stuff. Said otherwise, that post was meant to answer the question, “Where do I go, when I know the world is fucked?” This post covers similar ground, but is more interested in the theoretical side of things. Not to say it won’t be practical. It’s just saying that if you’re not the kind of person that can read a little bit and feel confident to act, or you like having a little bit more scaffolding, that you also deserve a resource. I’m hoping to contribute to that today. As the title says, we’re going to be focusing on organizing. This is one of those things that is said a lot, but is actually defined much less often. Tangentially, you should be aware and ready for this for literally everything relating to politics. Any word that you hear used, you should always ask for a definition. Many a movement would have gone differently if folks spent more time trying to find semantic alignment. Anyway.

When I say organizing, I mean catalyzing the energy of folks, acting from a specific theory of change. A theory of change is a thought process or method to create some kind of social impact in a particular context. When the world sucks in some particular way, and you want it to stop sucking, the answer is to organize, in the way defined above. By organizing, we lean on the idea of collective power to create changes that are currently only afforded to those with authoritarian power. It’s a game of evening the odds.

I will also note that this assumes that you are going to be framing your work around broad-based movements, that have (mostly) aboveground (as in “legal”) tactics. This is not necessarily a statement of what is correct; small groups that are in concert with larger movements are also able to be successful, even when doing more confrontational tactics.

So, to organize, I’d say it would be useful to be involved in movements already. You can look at my radicalism 100 post to see how that could look. Either way you have to know what your where your niche(s) lie. In other words, what sits in the middle of the intersection between what you like to do, what you are good (or can become good/have a willingness to become good) at, and what is needed in your context. I tend to center the local level, because that is the area where influence is more tangible, and fits into how I see a resilient world coming to fruition. So, you have to ask yourself, “What can I do, that I would enjoy doing, in my community?” Then, you should find some other people who are in that same vibe. Depending on your approach, this may take no time at all, or a lot of time. I listed some ideas for finding folks in radicalism 100, but to reiterate: look for social medias and IRL presences of people who are into the same topics, and connect with them. See where you can plug in, and see where the contours of organizing in your local contexts are. Ideally you can see places where gaps can be filled.

Once you find an issue that you think has potential, and you have a couple of people to do some organizing with, you have what I think of as a catalyst group. This group is meant to start (or assist) in a certain kind of reaction, but not lead it. Trying to control movements is both futile and antithetical to liberation. So, to ground us, we have two very important ingredients: a topic/issue/area of focus to organize around, and a group of folks to work with. Once this is in place, you can co-create a strategy with your organizing team. I’d recommend employing an encircling strategy as your long-term or meta strategy, where multiple sub-strategies and campaigns happen within this frame. Essentially, this allows you to employ campaigns across a matrix of tactics. Within the encircling frame, you can create a campaign (what I consider a “short-term” strategy). Campaigns are a series of actions over time. Strategies are a series of campaigns over time.

A useful way to think of strategic planning is by separating the process into stages, grouped by movement size.

Small: Organize small actions/protests, figuring out ways to build movement visibility and interest

Medium: Focus on scaling up the participation, through mobilizing efforts. Promote your actions, get people involved, and encourage meaningful action.

Large: Create a movement. The kind of thing people hear about.

To organize on the smallest level, the easiest thing might be to just do plan actions that are well within your team’s capacity, organize those actions, and execute. If you can swing it, I’d really recommend to not lean too much into symbolic actions. There are risks with every action, no matter what legal frameworks your locality has. If you’re going to do something, you have to be very intentional with:

what you hope to accomplish through the action

a high likelihood of success for the action

doomsday planning in case something goes wrong

If you’re able to do this, then you will be leagues ahead of a lot of other folks. This is not to make it a race or a competition, but it is moreso to say you can symbolically represent and catalyze action without becoming a martyr.

As you’re doing actions, you should be refining your idea of who’s impacted by the issues more and more. As that picture gets clearer, you should spend more and more time understanding and listening to those folks. Ideally, you get to a point of co-creation, where you are enabling people to fight for themselves and build their autonomy. That is the kind of thing that prevents movements from dying. Organizers should be trying to put themselves out of business, in a sense. Catalysts should be able to come from anywhere.

To scale up, I’d recommend a focus on meeting folks. Take the ideas of deep canvassing, where you empathetically have conversations with whoever is impacted by the issue you’re responding to, through the lens of giving power to those people. Rather than asking them to feed into some established system of power, encourage them to take action into their own hands, as a collective.

I’d also recommend that as capacity grows, build a “positive” or “constructive” power. This can look like a lot of things. Whether it is a block club, neighborhood pod, community council, or community assembly, dedicate energy into creating spaces where people can start building their democratic and consensus muscles. These can simultaneously act as the training ground and alternative governance structure that allows folks to start making decisions for themselves in a very specific way.

This will ideally allow the movement to really start to be intersectional. It should be intersection minded from the outset, but that can be difficult to meaningfully actualize in the early stages of the movement. since single-issue movements are inherently brittle (if your movement revolves around getting something on a ballot, winning or losing just ends the movement)—there are throughlines that connect all movements, and those lines should be made visible and traveled. Environmentalists should fight for housing rights, LandBack, Reparations, and a host of other things. The more developed our networks, the stronger our movements will be.

[lu-is-not-ok]

o mighty hong lu master, the autism i have of him bowing down to you in your honor, i must ask a question relating to his family...

so when dante is overheating in the yield flesh intervallo and they start saying things about the ego and such, hong lu says "they're starting to sound like my grandfather!"

see i dont think hong lu's the type to compare anybody rambling to unrelated rambling so i was wondering if like. there could be any potential meaning in What his grandpa was saying relating to ego or other more crazy stuff!!

since the jia family has had super huge connections ive had maybe the idea of like. i dunno they had some insider knowledge in the past and they sent hong lu out specifically to find out more about what the more unnatural parts of the city entail since limbus as a company is secretive about that stuff. so they want to understand it proper... but that does feel a Bit out there. what do you think :3c

There is some interesting things in this ask that I wanna discuss. However, you might find some of my answers... a little bit disappointing in places. I'm gonna try to take these things point by point.

Canto 7 spoilers onward.

Hong Lu's Grandfather

There are exactly two mentions of Hong Lu's Grandfather in the game as of now iirc. The scene you mention, where Hong Lu compares Dante's ramblings to his grandfather, and another mention in the Observation Logs for Pink Shoes, where Hong Lu brings up the fact that his Grandfather would scold him and pester him into keeping a diary, something he claims he used to hate but is now not so averse to.

The most interesting thing about Hong Lu's Grandfather is that there is no living grandfather figure in Dream of The Red Chamber. Baoyu is only ever mentioned to have a grandmother. This already puts some intrigue on him, as he's a complete wildcard adaptation-wise. There is no real way for us to predict what his deal is based on DOTRC.

That means that the fact that Hong Lu compares Dante's ramblings about ego and sin to how his Grandfather talks is something to note for sure. However... well, I'll get to it.

The Knowledge the Jia Family has

Canto 7 came with some major reveals about the Jia Family due to Xichun's presence and her interactions with Hong Lu. More specifically, we know roughly what kind of esoteric knowlege the Jia Family possesses, and what they're looking for.

Xichun, and by extension the rest of the Family, are aware of the existence of the Rivers - one of which being the River of Oblivion that was introduced in Canto 7, as well as, very likely, the very same River that Lobcorp would draw from using Cogito. So yes, it's not unlikely for the Jia Family to have some awareness of the more supernatural side that the human subconscious possesses. Hell, Xichun herself outright states she, in some way, can sense Bari's past presence, who need I remind you is also the Bookhunter from one of the bad endings in Library of Ruina.

However, that's not all! Xichun also reveals what exactly the Family is looking for, and what they sent out the current candidates for becoming the next Family Head for - a River that can grant immortality. Specifically, "the immortality of the mind", which Hong Lu himself describes as "to be free from aging and death".

So, hey, case closed right? We know exactly why Hong Lu was sent out now, don't we?

Well... it's not that simple. Because, unfortunately, there's some things I want to correct you on before I conclude this.

Hong Lu's Comparisons

Here's the thing with Hong Lu. Unlike what you say, he is absolutely the type to compare different unrelated things with each other. In fact, one of his major MOs during conversations is using tangentially related anecdotes to steer conversations - see how he brought up his sibling cheating at a game in response to Heathcliff doing a jab at rich people in Canto 2, or how on the empty party ship in Canto 5 he goes off on a tangent about a spooky story that's barely related to the situation at hand.

Deflection and distraction is something Hong Lu does a lot, especially right after he says things that are concerning or otherwise don't get a positive reaction out of others. His comparisons of things going on to his home is one of those kinds of deflections/distractions. In fact, I'd say it's a lot more common for him to compare things that aren't That related rather than compare things that are Actually related.

So while I do think it is something to note that Hong Lu compares Dante's ramblings to those of his Grandfather, I really don't think the connection here is nearly as strong as you posit.

Yes, we know the Jias have knowledge that most common folk in the City don't have access to, among which is the knowledge of the Rivers. It's also very likely that this is the kind of thing Hong Lu's Grandfather could go on tangents on, especially with how many of the Rivers we currently know of having effects that affect specifically the mind.

That being said, since this is Hong Lu we're talking about, I doubt the connection is as direct as his Grandfather literally rambling about the exact same topic. Again, we're talking about the guy who, upon hearing the mention of shareholders, shares an anecdote about a sibling trying to get a specific color of passport as justification for asking about whether Vergilius specifically knows the shareholder of H Corp. The connections he makes aren't usually all that strong, and that's kind of the point.

Which is where I have to talk about the elephant in the room.

Hong Lu almost definitely lied about why he left the Jia Household

See, in TKT Hong Lu shares that he was sent out by his elders to "see and experience as much of the world as possible before he returns", but... isn't it kind of strange?

That doesn't match what Xichun said about what the Family Head Candiates were sent out into the worl for. They're meant to be looking for immortality specifically, not fucking around and learning as much as they can.

And, in fact, this isn't the only thing Xichun says that clashes with Hong Lu's version of events. In fact, I'd argue it outright proves that he lied about it - she shares that the Jias are actively looking for him. If Hong Lu was really sent out to gather as many experiences and knowledge as possible, why would they want to cut that short by finding him and bringing him back by force?

That's not all in fact. This exact same story is what Hong Lu tells in his Wing IDs, the ones where it's confirmed he directly got the positions because of nepotism. But, again, that's strange. If he's meant to be experiencing the world and learning new things, why would the Jias put him in jobs that require he stays in a single specific place most of the time? K Corp Hong Lu's Uptie story outright draws attention to this, pointing out how odd it is for someone whose job involves being put in stasis in some vat for extended periods of time until they need to do some killing to have been given that job to "experience more of the world".

So, if Hong Lu is lying about why he left his home... what actually happened? Do we have any hints?

Turns out... yes. A very, very major hint in fact. Because you see, this is the Corrosion line Hong Lu says in his newly released Lasso E.G.O.

This is the only time anything Rose Hunter related calls the subject avoiding their fate a fugitive and makes a direct reference to running away. I don't think it's a coincidence.

Because if this line is a direct reference to Hong Lu, to him literally running away from his fate and escaping the Jia household, it would certainly explain some things.

Why would the Jias be out actively looking for him? Because he's not actually supposed to be out like this.

Why would his Wing Identities be put in environments where Hong Lu is primarily confined to specific locations? Because the Jias don't want him out of their sight.

Why would his claim that he's looking forward to going back home be so contradictory to how he acts and tries to prolong his time outside of the household? Because he's lying, either to himself or others, and doesn't actually want to go back.

Hell, it would even provide some context to certain other oddities about him.

Why would he know not just how effective a rich household's security system is at killing people, but also how to safely get past it (based on what he says about Wuthering Heights in Canto 6)? Because he might have had to do so himself to escape.

Why would his ID picture, likely taken right after he was found by Limbus Company, have him in a very plain tracksuit, completely unlike the traditional and fancy clothing the rest of his Family is seen wearing? Because dressing plainly would help him blend in once he got out of there.

So, yes, the Jia Family is sending out its young members to search for something supernatural within the City. However, I believe Hong Lu is an exception and wasn't supposed to be out at all.

[hotpinkstaples]

didnt wanna hijack someone's post with the Disk Horse, but I just wanna note that bernard being tim's love interest in 2023 is VERY different from him being a side-side-side character in the early 2000s. i think there's definitely a generational divide on how the relationship's perceived bc there's absolutely a difference between how bernard and tim's relationship is portrayed during their time in school versus in adulthood.

part of reading tim's coming out story in the 2020s with relation to bernard is finally acknowledging that we finally broke tim out of his amber glass. this is also, i will note, a SPECIFIC kind of coming-out-story that won't resonate with folks who weren't living through that specific era of homophobia where the fallout of the AIDS crisis overlapped with the rise of mass surveillance and that post-9/11 grimdark take on superheroes across ALL media. it was a weird fucking time. it also won't resonate with anyone who wasn't "growing up" with tim during his time as robin. now, do you HAVE to know every little thing about tim to accept this piece of character development? no, you don't, but you DO have to take into consideration that tim was locked in the time vault for a veryyy long time and a lot of things, including his on-and-off with stephanie, were part of the status quo for his character long before dc decided to pull the trigger with tim's bisexuality.

but what happens when the forever-sixteen isn't sixteen anymore? he grows up! he gets to reflect! he gets to try new things without being held back by the amber glass. time is the key factor here! if you look at tim and bernard's relationship through the eyes of the robin run of that era, of course it's gonna feel weird! that tim could only really take bernard in doses, bc that tim was as much of an asshole teen as bernard was. with the breaking-of-the-amber, we now learn that tim had to do some serious reflection to get to the point where he could say that this guy he used to know COULD be someone special. if you follow tim's story through the lens of a closeted queer raised in the era of when that robin run was being published, tim's just another queer guy who's finally come to terms with the fact that, that dude he went to high school with who he just ran into at the target might not be so bad after all. he's kinda cute, actually. did he think he was cute back in the tenth grade? probably not, but he's not in tenth grade anymore, now is he?

could DC comics have created an entirely new character to serve the narrative purpose of tim's coming out special? sure. then we woulda had ten years worth of criticism from fandom about how tim magically found a guy superhot and thus dumped stephanie over it, and we would circle back to the same argument about whether tim was a douchebag for dumping stephanie for some rando, and that his bisexuality is an asspull versus 'relevant character development'. either way, it would have upset the status quo. now, is that to say timsteph was never real? no! tim and stephanie talking about his erratic behavior and him coming out to her was to SPECIFICALLY address how him being bisexual isn't meant to downgrade their relationship, or that their love wasn't real. for anyone who's still whining about timsteph not being real anymore bc bernbear entered the chat, i've long stopped seeing it as legitimate criticism bc there are YEARS worth of content with them to indulge in. shitting on a coming-out story and a romance that hasn't even had five real-time years to be explored is just straight up crass and highlights much more insidious problems in the fandom aka the rampant homophobia, quick-to-anger behavior of fans who never learned media or litcrit, and motherfuckers who ride or die for status quo like it'll kill them to enjoy something tangential.

long story short, timbern real and so is timsteph, and one of these days, inshallah bartkon will be real too.

[biocrafthero]

An analysis of WKTD and HWBM in relation to psychology, Christianity, and oppression.

Spoilers for almost all of We Know The Devil and parts of Heaven Will Be Mine (only stuff from when you play as Saturn tho that’s the only character I’ve played as so far)

This post is very much off the cuff so it is quite messy but I really needed to put my thoughts into words, I guess. Hopefully it makes sense, and sorry if there’s any errors!

vvv Analysis under the cut because this post is LONG vvv

Okay because when WKTD said “the devil is the shadow of man cast from the light of god” and when HWBM said that the Existential Threat was just a byproduct of the shadow of humanity cast from gravity (via humanity’s Culture) its like the enemy that humans want to fight is just themselves. The concept of the “shadow self” (also called the id, but I’ll be using shadow instead) in psychology refers to the parts of oneself that does not fully fit in with what society expects of them (Super-ego) and sometimes separately from the true self (Ego), typically leading to rejection of those aspects and self-conflict.

Now, please note that I haven’t 100%’d HWBM but I have 100%’d WKTD, and in that game the true ending results in the main trio all becoming devils and embracing those sides of themselves they’ve been running from for the entire game. The thing I quoted earlier is an actual line from the game said by god, the line following it being “the meaning of this phrase is that there is no devil.” Only through self-acceptance and helping each other alongside ourselves do we really reach the true ending to these stores.

While WKTD leans more towards individuals, HWBM puts more emphasis on the idea of the collective shadow; the story still focuses on individuals, yes, but is very much about the conflict between a humanity that is tearing itself apart over the things that don’t fit the collective image. The main conflicts of the story focuses a lot on that general unrest, and was initially the Existential Threat, but after that dissipated humanity still saw its own shadow, this time in itself. An email you can find in the game even says that “In abandoning Existential Threats to address the threats of our home, it will inevitably result in us turning to conflict between humans one more. And in turn, the Existential Threat will thrive.” The Existential Threat literally feeds on unrest and trauma, manifesting as paranoia and leading humanity to fight it, only for them to find that they were just fighting their own literal shadow.

It’s also important to note that HWBM briefly mentions that the Existential Threat is tangentially related to “their cousins on Earth, and even those are so weak kids with radios can take them out”. This, while it can easily be seen as a nod to WKTD for those who played it, the fact that the reference is super blatant (along with the mention of the Scout programs, likely referring to groups like the Summer Scouts from WKTD) leads me to believe that these two stories exist in roughly the same universe (or at least their worlds do, maybe not the characters present in the stories themselves existing at the same time*). This is for a very specific reason, and it has to do with the themes both of these games are tackling, regarding acceptance of the self, both on an individual and societal level, symbolized by the apple.

Both games reference the apple when talking about the idea of becoming something new, sometimes even beyond humanity. It’s about the embracing of the shadow and all the parts of yourself, seeing yourself as a whole being and accepting all of it. The joy and contentment brought upon yourself by finally letting go of all that repression and division, even if the world around you is going to perceive those parts as scary or ugly. Bad endings in these games are brought about by rejection of the self, which makes sense considering all the themes around queerness and transcending one’s humanity, so obviously and fittingly the true endings focus on healing oneself by accepting all of their aspects as part of the greater whole.

The apple in these stories, especially noticeable in its original thematic incarnation in WKTD, is in reference to the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden from the Bible. Man was forbidden from eating the fruit, but Eve (VERY important to note that the dev studio is named Worst Girls Games btw) is tempted by the serpent (was not originally the devil, but came to be in the New Testament) to eat the fruit, which they do and become aware of themselves. God banishes them from the garden for breaking this rule he set out for them, also punishing the snake in the process due to how it tempted Adam and Eve. This incident is referred to as the “original sin.”

What is interesting about this part of the Bible though is what God says at the end of Genesis 3, right before the banishment actually occurs: “And the Lord God said, ‘The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.’” The specific wording of “become like one of us” in the context of the apple metaphors from the games from Worst Girls Games is super intriguing to me, mostly due to how the idea of becoming something new is super common throughout these stories—becoming the devil in WKTD, and becoming one’s Ship-Self in HWBM.

There’s also the framing of the serpent in these stories, as well. The serpent in modern Christianity is almost always depicted as the devil, tempting humanity away from God throughout almost the entire scripture. In the book of Revelation, the devil is said to have gone to direct war against God and fighting against his angels; “Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fight back. But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.” These verses can easily be seen in parallel to WKTD, with how the devil forms are said to be unstable and her world more fickle than god’s, and how in HWBM the Ship-Selves are delicately maintained by the Lunar Gravity Well.

But here’s the thing: the framing of the devil in these stories puts it in the position of being correct, with humanity making the right choice to follow it. This may sound strange, almost like villain behavior, until you remember these games deal with themes regarding repression of the self under an oppressive society, which is why these societies tend to be characterized by Evangelical conservative Christianity. Under this lens, alongside the themes of queerness and transcending humanity (rising to the throne of god, in a way), everything begins to click into place. The idea of being forced to live a certain way by a society that hates parts of your very being is killing our main characters, and they want a way out. The personification of the Collective Unconscious (ex: the devil) gives them this out—even if it’s less concrete and stable than the known world (the light), the unknown world (the darkness) is what truly gives our characters the freedom they desire.

They cannot do this alone, however, as we see in the Bible further into the book of Revelation, when the devil is aided by a beast from the sea and a beast from the earth, all three of them holding one another up and emphasizing one another’s’ powers and authorities. This, of course, most likely is reflected in the games in the main trios we play as. While I am still unsure about specifics, I trust you guys enough to understand what I’m getting at here, even if my speculations are likely flimsy at best. Either way, the idea gets across—the true endings for the games can only be obtained if everyone supports one another properly.

The scripture states that the devil does not have long on earth to do what he wishes (“… [The devil] is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short.”), but that doesn’t stop him from trying at all. When it comes to the games, in WKTD the main trio stay in the cabin only for the night (player choices start at 7pm and the final one is at 1am, 2am onward being the ending you got, so choices go on for 6-7 in-universe hours), and in HWBM they have eight days to get back to earth before humanity declares them to be a threat. In both stories, our protagonists are all under strict time limits to do what they can in order to get the outcome they desire. As it’s said in WKTD, “the devil only ever gets one chance.”

Even though in the Bible the devil is ultimately defeated, in these games it’s the opposite. This is less about the theology they draw from and more having to do with undoing oppressive power structures through solidarity and community support while doing what you can to avoid infighting. Systems of hate and oppression are easily undone, which is why they put in so much work to scare you away from even trying to undo it and make you fall in line; resistance scares oppressors. Of course, resisting is not an easy task, but that’s just part of the work—they don’t call it a fight for no reason, after all.

Accepting all aspects of yourself and embracing that is the first small, yet very important step, to rejecting oppressive systems as a whole, and when society as a whole accepts what the system rejects, that system will inevitably fall, freeing those who are under it. Even though the world that comes after may be more uncertain and unstable that the last one, we still have each other to rely on and a foundation to build something greater and healthier than before.

So, roughly and basically…

Super-ego = God = Culture

Ego = Humanity (consistent throughout both games)

Projection = Light = Gravity

Resistance = Radio = Ship-Self

Shadow (personified by Collective Unconscious) = The Devil = Existential Threat

Acceptance (of the Shadow) = Apple (consistent throughout both games), characterized by devil possession forms and Ship-Selves (Ship-Selves are dual natured like that, I think)

… Or something like that. I dunno, I’m not a psychologist.

Once again, I have seen all of WKTD, so I can say these things concretely about that story. However, I have not seen all of HWBM, so it more so feels like I’m making guesses as to what happens in that one, so just bear with me. I’ll be super hype if I’m correct in my theory/analysis.

*On this note, it is very amusing to me to imagine the WKTD trio as space mech pilots. The idea of the main cast of HWBM having to deal with devil possessions is also very fun :3

Sources for information + screenshots I’m referencing

Wikipedia: Shadow (psychology) (links throughout the article lead to other things I’ve mentioned like the Collective Unconscious)

Bible Gateway: Genesis 3, Revelation 12, Revelation 13 (New International Version)

(from WKTD) (not my screenshot, stole this from my friend) (hi Ash <3) (platonic)

(I don’t have a screenshot of the line that comes afterwards or the line talking about the metaphorical apple in the epilogue of the true ending but I know they’re there. I have it in my brain. I’m too lazy to get a picture of it just trust me I know what I’m talking about trust)

(from HWBM) (screenshots taken by me)

(I don’t have absolutely everything either just work with me here sorry)

[bestworstcase]

If the Silver Eyes are more aligned with Death/The Void than Light, then is it possible that what they affect could be substantially broader than just Grimm? Death/The Void comes for all, Human, Grimm, Faunus and in a sense Gods alike, and the power of the Silver Eyes might relate to that.

In that sense, Cinder isn't just getting hurt because she's part-Grimm, it's because Ruby explicitly wants to use the Silver Eyes to HARM her, and the Silver Eyes' power is tied to this desire to harm or protect, and how much it damages the target is affected as a result. Thus, any subsequent uses after V3 have been less effective because Cinder is not only getting more resilient/more guarded against it, but also because Ruby's motives have changed from harming Cinder to trying to keep Cinder away from her loved ones.

The reason why Ruby can't figure this out yet is because she's still struggling with her own faulty understanding of the Silver Eyes due to messy information and her own inner psychological issues screwing up her ability to master them.

ough i talk about this periodically so here is some background reading: pattern theory (tangential, this is about death in remnant generally) + some observations on the beacon tower glare. i have some older posts pertaining specifically to cinder and the glare too but i don’t have have the energy to go looking for them rn. anyway!

my theory is that it isn’t related to anything ruby thinks or feels or wants – but rather, cinder’s vulnerability to the glare is directly connected to her killing people.

first observation: cinder uses her right hand to summon the grimm beetle, and if any residual grimm remains inside her body afterward, it makes the most sense for it to stay in her right arm, yes? or at least her right side. but the first glare destroys her left arm and her left eye.

second observation: while ice queendom is an ancillary text, not necessarily canonical, i think it is worth noting that ruby’s glare destroys one of the nightmares infesting weiss, while both she and the grimm are literally inside weiss’s head, and weiss of course does not come to any harm. this tracks with maria’s assertion that the glare only harms grimm. the actual question with regard to cinder is why did the glare burn her human flesh?, because ‘she had parts of a grimm inside her’ isn’t actually an explanation.

we have never, ever seen a glare harm somebody who happened to be touching, or close to, a grimm in any other context. if cinder had something grimm inside her body and the glare destroyed that, there is no reason to think that this would hurt cinder. it would just remove the grimm, leaving her unharmed.

(sidebar: this is why nobody in salem’s inner circle, including cinder, has brought up “grimm” as a possible explanation. the fanon that cinder either 1. doesn’t know the glare hurts grimm even though the rest of her colleagues are clearly informed about silver eyes and openly discuss it in front of her, or 2. somehow hasn’t put two and two together to work out that her grimm parts are vulnerable to the magical power that destroys grimm, is nonsense. nobody in salem’s employ is confused about the glare hurting grimm, the question is how and why it hurt cinder.)

third observation: when cinder killed amber, claiming the other half of the fall maiden, her left eye is the one that ‘received’ the flames (her right eye having lit up when she took the first half). minutes later, she uses her left hand to kill pyrrha. symbolically, at least, the glare takes from her 1. her victory in killing amber (the eye) and 2. the hand with which she murdered pyrrha, ruby’s friend.

i think that this goes beyond mere symbolism – i think this is also what happens in the literal sense at the top of beacon tower. the glare taps into the liminal boundary between life and death, and in that moment cinder was (as pyrrha’s killer, and amber’s killer, and all three of them having been linked through this tug-of-war over the fall maiden) entangled with that boundary, so the glare burned her.

(i think this is also why salem – working with very limited information about what happened – believes that becoming the maiden is what left cinder vulnerable: she’s not referring to the magic but rather to the act of killing necessary to become the maiden. salem is unlikely to know the exact sequence of events leading up to the glare and cinder frankly may not have even mentioned killing pyrrha at all; we know that cinder was cagey about whether she did or didn’t kill ozpin, so there is every possibility that salem said “it’s because of the maiden” while under the impression that the girl cinder killed right before ruby struck her was the maiden.)

this also tracks, i think, with what we see with subsequent glares. the partial one at haven causes what seems to be a lot of pain in cinder’s grimm arm, but doesn’t harm cinder herself. (also jaune, who is openly death-seeking at that point in time, flinches from the light—he’s the only one who does, aside from cinder.)

in 7.13 cinder mows through a lot of soldiers to get to fria’s room, but it isn’t clear that she kills any of them (as combatants these people would be aura-trained, and cinder was in a hurry; it’s probable that she just plowed through and left them dazed / injured / aura-broken behind her, bowling pins style) – and then she doesn’t kill winter or penny or fria before ruby blasts her, and again we see that it causes pain in her grimm arm without harming cinder herself.

i think there is some grounds for thinking that the glare itself can also be resisted – the fact that cinder’s grimm arm hurts but isn’t destroyed is suggestive. given the nature of the glare itself, empowered by “the desire to preserve life,” my thinking here is that the defense against it is self-preservation – cinder (i believe) chose that arm and has embraced it as part of herself, and so whenever she’s hit by one of ruby’s glares what happens to the arm is a contest between ruby’s desire to protect her friends from cinder vs cinder’s desire to protect herself (including her arm) from ruby.

[kyouka-supremacy]

Tangentially related to the last Beast sskk post, just something that has been going through my mind A LOT in the last period:

There's this tendency I see of characterizing post-Beast sskk as being on very bad terms with each other, keeping on hating each other even after Dazai's death, and I personally can't relate with that interpretation. To me the canon Beast sskk development is, more or less, a warming up to each other speedrun. All the issues they used to have, about being on opposites sides, about having contrasting ethics, were already sorted up in canon, violently and unmercifully, but most importantly thoroughly and definitely. I find it very easy to believe they'd get along post canon, because everything they had to sort out between them, they already did fully.

When I say that Beast sskk is more or less a warming up to each other speedrun, it's also in the perspective of Beast sskk being a general speedrun to what sskk are in the canon timeline: because I do believe sskk's is a progression towards warming up to each other¹, and in a lot of ways it's already visible in canon, through Atsushi helping Akutagawa in the cannibalism arc despite allegedly hating to work with him, through Akutagawa dying so that Atsushi could escape, through Atsushi wearing Rashomon and Akutagawa letting him wear it and everything that entails. The thing is, when it comes to them, Beast sskk have already seen each other bare; they HAVE seen each other at their lowest point already. If there ever was a peak of hate between them, they've already reached it, and that means the tension is only going to plummet from there. There's nothing left for hate anymore, only for understanding and compassion and love.

“More or less” of a speedrun, that is, because honestly? Beast sskk never needed to warm up to each other, because they didn't start from hating, wholly and sincerely, each other like their canon counterparts did. Beast sskk started from a place of common ground, of genuine sympathy and liking for each other. When they started fighting, I think they were both pained from having to fight each other, who shortly beforehand they had found so easy to relate to and most importantly who they felt understood from. If they hated each other at some point - which, everything accounted, is still realistic, especially given the threat they both posed to their little sisters and more generally to their weaknesses and insecurities -, all accounted it was still brief (literally. didn't last more than half a day), and likely easy to leave behind. In the end I just think for Beast sskk it's going to be easy - spontaneous, even -, to go back to the warm acceptance and understanding they shared on their first meeting; because, differently from their canon counterparts, they know that in normal circumstances they get along, and that's something they can't lie about to themselves and pretend it's not true. They can't lie to themselves about hating each other like canon sskk do; so really, Beast sskk is left no other choice than to get along.

As a final note, I think it would also be easier for Beast sskk to get along because Beast Atsushi doesn't feel to be on an higher moral pedestal like his canon counterpart does, so a lot of moral conflict between Atsushi and Akutagawa simply doesn't happen in Beast.

¹ In a way that, for comparison, skk aren't, who remained more or less frozen on the stance of “hating you (that is also loving you)”. Regarding that, I agree with the interpretation of canon some people offered that the manga is the story of sskk's progression, while skk's relationship is already fully developed.

[theplatypusblue]

I don’t really know what I’m talking about but I think with Lloyd it all comes back to control, or like, the lack thereof in his life.

Cuz there’s the obvious bit with the whole destiny thing, where he doesn’t have control over the direction his life is going. Him wanting to relax with his family or spend time with his dad doesn’t matter; that’s not his decision to make. It’s all up to fate in the end. Then there’s the other thing with Morro’s possession, in which he loses basic control over his own body. I don’t even think I need to explain this one too deeply, it’s easily the most traumatic thing that’s happened to him (Splinter in the Blind Man’s Eyes says that pretty explicitly, even if it’s only like half canon)

And I think it all comes out in how he tries to deal with his visions in dr season 2. Cuz he can’t control when they come, and he tries so hard to make them go away but he can’t. Even beyond the distressing nature of the visions themselves, the whole situation must have been awful, just because he couldn’t really do anything about it.

(Also just a brief side note abt a thought I had that’s like, tangentially related to all this: there’s that nightmare he mentions in dr season 1, when Dorama’s freaky puppet thing comes to life. It’s a funny throwaway line but also. If you would allow me to get psychoanalytical for a sec. Maybe he’s having dreams abt puppets cuz like, subconsciously or whatever he feels like he’s been manipulated or “puppeteered” throughout his life.)

[necrotic-nephilim]

ok so sending my question here bc this is more marvel comics than mcu related so im like. sliding you a note in class about an somewhat related but mostly tangential topic here 😂

so i've been wanting to get into bucky comics (and winter soldier comics) recently but as a dc fan now whose only marvel comics background is reading matt fractions hawkeye (the best ever, currently rereading it to feel something again actually) and part of wilsons ms marvel run back when i was in high school i have no idea where to start. you said that you have read comics for bucky; do you have any recommendations?

hello i love being slid notes this is so sweet <3 bc luckily Bucky is one of a small handful of characters i can *actually* give good recs for on the Marvel side of the fence! so i'm MORE than happy to give recs bc i actually already have a list i'm happy to share. also, BIG agree on Fraction's Hawkeye run, oh my god. that comic means *so* much to me and though i haven't really read Hawkeye comics outside of it, i love it a lot. 10/10 taste <3

so when it comes to Bucky, he has a *lot* of Golden and Silver Age comics as Captain America's teen sidekick and all. skip them. they're not worth it and they're not the version of the character you want to read. honestly, you should just start with his return as Winter Soldier, and go from there so

Captain America (2005) - this is Ed Brubaker's run, it's fantastic and it's the run that brings back Bucky as the Winter Soldier. i will warn you if you're used to DC comics, Marvel does this really confusing thing called legacy numbering. (DC sometimes does it but not as much) so you're gonna notice it'll jump from issue #50 to #600. you did not somehow miss hundreds of comics, it's just numbered that way bc it's the 600th Captain America comic overall. this run is super good though.

Captain America & Bucky by Ed Brubaker - once again numbering is weird just don't mind it. but this will give you a primer on Bucky's backstory as Cap's sidekick without you having to read all the Silver Age stuff and it's a great comic.

Captain America: Forever Allies (2010) - if you want to read where Bucky was Captain America for a bit, this comic is good for that. it also briefly touches on Secret Allies, a team he was on as a teen during the war. i'm not the biggest Cap!Bucky fun, but this is decent.

Winter Soldier (2012) - by *far* the best Winter Soldier solo run. Ed Brubaker my beloved. this is just amazing. this was where i started with Bucky and tbh if you vaguely understand his comics backstory and don't want to read all the Captain America stuff, i think you can start here. you get to see his relationship with Natasha, his spy work it's just. everything <3

Winter Soldier: The Bitter March - if you want to see a story that takes place during Bucky's time brainwashed under Hydra, that's what this one is and it's pretty solid

Thunderbolts (2016) - this comic is most known for the relationship between Bucky and a young girl who's a cosmic cube named Kobik and it's just so delightful. the whole team is really fun and explores moral greyness in superhero work, but mostly i love this one for Kobik.

Winter Soldier (2018) - i really enjoy this mini-series, it has Bucky trying to save a young boy who's forced to be a weapon and there's just a lot of good stuff. always have a soft spot for Bucky trying to do right by kids.

Falcon & Winter Soldier (2020) - a good team up mini-series. also Bucky has a cat so yk, that's delightful. <3

there are other Winter Soldier comics and comics he's in but Marvel's comic world is big and fucking confusing (to me as a DC fan, anyway) so these will be the easiest to start with. my top recs are probably Captain America & Bucky and Winter Soldier (2012), though i'm incredibly biased to any comic written by Brubaker for Bucky. i love Bucky so dearly. he is everything to me. i hope you enjoy!

[sideblog-usernametaken]

Something I haven't seen anyone talk about with the most recent chapter of Undead Unluck (Chapter 196) is Fuuko's eyes.

So at the beginning of the chapter her eyes are drawn normally with normal shading as you can see in the compilation below:

Then she sees Beast eating the soul of the octopus, and her eyes are still fairly normal

But shortly after this panel her eyes gain shading motif used for souls.

You can even see it in the panel that's zoomed out, this isn't a one time thing either it continues to the end of the chapter.

Now the question here is what does this mean? At first I assumed it was just a visual representation of Fuuko's ability to see souls, but then I remembered that being able to see souls is supposedly a default Negator ability. Back when Ichio was learning how to astral project she basically says as much (i.e. "Oh! [Nico] can't see me because he's not a negator!") and on top of that everyone at the Round Table was able to see Fuuko's ghost in the previous loop, and Rip was able to see Andy when he was astral projecting in the previous loop.

(Tangential side note here: Everything about Negation abilities makes so much more sense with this chapter's explanation that every Rule is using Soul has a starting point for their abilities. It was already estabilished that Negation abilities are tied to the soul of a Negator, but it's never explained how or why this is the case. But with this chapter it shows that it's basically impossible to negate a Rule without the use of a soul because any given Rule's ability is based on the effects of its soul, and we know from the previous loop that the only thing that can directly affect a soul is another soul. So why can all Negators see souls? Why can seemingly any Negator astral project if they try hard enough? Why can Negators manipulate their own souls with ease [Changing appearance subconsciously, Fuuko just imbuing a sword with her soul like it's no big deal, etc]? Because what separates Negators from non-Negators is their soul has effects that they're constantly using subconsciously, so any other soul related ability becomes a matter of if they are aware of their own soul or not. This kind of also extends to the whole thing with UMAs and altering memories, since cannonically memories are stored in the soul [Andy can think without his brain and in this chapter they explicitly say that souls contain memories]. So protecting their memories is likely a subconscious soul ability for negators, like how they can change their appearance in soul form. It's one of those revelations that retroactively explains a lot that you don't even really think about)

I think what the significance the eye change is supposed to show here is that Fuuko can now see the effects of a soul and not just the soul itself. Remember her eyes were normal when the octopus soul was getting eaten, but once she started channeling her own soul into a sword and cutting soul chains with it her eyes changed. What's really interesting here is that cutting those soul chains effectively negates part of Beast's abilities, he can't really have allies now and in theory this is how Unbeast would work if anyone had that Negation ability.

Even more interesting is the amount of Unluck that got loaded into that whale at the end of the chapter. It (presumably) got hit with a meteorite and that kind of unluck has only happened to people Fuuko deeply cares about in the past. So it seems by using her soul she can bypass the most restrictive part of Unluck by removing likability from the equation, which is going to be huge in their fight against Sun. This also begs the question. If Fuuko can now consciously use her soul to increase the amount of unluck imparted into a target regardless of amount of physical contact or likeability, can she decrease it? Does she now have full control over her soul's effects? Will she be able to touch people without hitting them with Unluck? Will she be able to teach other Negators how to have full control over the effects of their souls too?

To be honest, that last part does feel a bit reaching, and all in all this entire post might be rendered useless with whatever else we see in the next chapter. But this is all really exciting.

[steelblaidd]

The Plays the Thing...

So I've seen some talk about Kagami and Felix doing the whole show and tell interpretive dance instead of just talking to Marinette like normal people thing in episode 24 Representation, and i have a few thoughts.

General consensus is that Felix is just like the rest of his family with extra "extra" being a side effect of being in any way tangentially related to Gabriel or the Graham de Vanilies.

However I think there is an actual practical reason for their method beyond Felix having congenital Theater Kid Disease and Kagami fulfilling her life long dream of directing the shadow puppets from Revolutionary Girl Utena.

Uncertainty.

It goes by really fast but they are approaching Marinette based on Kagami over hearing her talk about being ladybug with Alya. Kagami suspects with High Confidence that Marinette is Ladybug, but she doesn't know with 100% certainty and Felix is even more unsure.

By presenting their story in this fantastical dreamy way, if they are wrong about Marinette being Ladybug then they have cover. She probably won't understand what's going on with the sentibeing stuff because a civilian wouldn't know about the peacock. The whole thing can be written off as a dream induced by Monarch Akumatizing someone again.

However, If she is ladybug than they have given her enough pieces to put the puzzle of who her enemy is together and an idea of the stakes.

As a side note it doesn't appear to me that Kagami has had an opportunity to talk to Adrien un observed since learning that they are all sentibeings. She may or may not know that he doesn't know. Marinette certainly doesn't know if he has been told and already has evidence that he has trouble telling people about hard things. Like being sent away to London for example. And she has enough knowledge about how sentibeings work to know they can be ordered not to tell things.

I also note that the way they presented Felix's deal elides the transfer of his amok. Also something that Kagami may not be aware of.

She has always held her own so she may not grasp the horror of how they work on a sufficiently deep level even if she does know.

In any case, no one knows, or has cause to suspect, that Adrien is Chat Noir so he is locked out of the loop for the time being, because telling him doesn't get them anything.

[maplesyrupptarmigan]

Summary:

Energy cannot be created, nor can it be destroyed; it may only change form.

Being at the Garrison was strange to Hunk. He thought he'd be more anxious in such a new environment. Instead, he just traded old anxieties for new ones.

- - -

this is the last fully-written thing i have. i have plans for the next installment (pilots), and i have a roadmap that covers season 1 of VLD (or, at least, the points I want to get to), although i do need to rewatch it because some things definitely need to be axed or moved around (i'm obviously not just gonna rewrite it verbatim). to be honest i'm more interested in writing the interludes (i have three more planned out) than the main stories, but i still think it's important to show the characters before/during kerberos and during voltron

side note: i tried to "beef up" my writing this time around, aiming to have less lines of just dialogue and instead actually showing what's going on (i mean, i really like writing dialogue, but i also realize that readers are not necessarily going to conceptualize the story the way i do as the author). i'm fairly satisfied with it, despite taught that editing should take away instead of adding

i do have some other, half-baked stories that are not (directly) related to this series (although they might eventually become part of it (the signals'verse canon diverges from the main canon in a few ways that i'm not 100% committed to for these tangentially-related stories, but i can't eat my cake and have it too))