because sometimes there are invisible tests and invisible rules and you're just supposed to ... know the rule. someone you thought of as a friend asks you for book recommendations, so you give her a list of like 30 books, each with a brief blurb and why you like it. later, you find out she screenshotted the list and send it out to a group chat with the note: what an absolute freak can you believe this. you saw the responses: emojis where people are rolling over laughing. too much and obsessive and actually kind of creepy in the comments. you thought you'd been doing the right thing. she'd asked, right? an invisible rule: this is what happens when you get too excited.
you aren't supposed to laugh at your own jokes, so you don't, but then you're too serious. you're not supposed to be too loud, but then people say you're too quiet. you aren't supposed to get passionate about things, but then you're shy, boring. you aren't supposed to talk too much, but then people are mad when you're not good at replying.
you fold yourself into a prettier paper crane. since you never know what is "selfish" and what is "charity," you give yourself over, fully. you'd rather be empty and over-generous - you'd rather eat your own boundaries than have even one person believe that you're mean. since you don't know what the thing is that will make them hate you, you simply scrub yourself clean of any form of roughness. if you are perfect and smiling and funny, they can love you. if you are always there for them and never admit what's happening and never mention your past and never make them uncomfortable - you can make up for it. you can earn it.
don't fuck up. they're all testing you, always. they're tolerating you. whatever secret club happened, over a summer somewhere - during some activity you didn't get to attend - everyone else just... figured it out. like they got some kind of award or examination that allowed them to know how-to-be-normal. how to fit. and for the rest of your life, you've been playing catch-up. you've been trying to prove that - haha! you get it! that the joke they're telling, the people they are, the manual they got- yeah, you've totally read it.
if you can just divide yourself in two - the lovable one, and the one that is you - you can do this. you can walk the line. they can laugh and accept you. if you are always-balanced, never burdensome, a delight to have in class, champagne and glittering and never gawky or florescent or god-forbid cringe: you can get away with it.
you stare at your therapist, whom you can make jokes with, and who laughs at your jokes, because you are so fucking good at people-pleasing. you smile at her, and she asks you how you're doing, and you automatically say i'm good, thanks, how are you? while the answer swims somewhere in your little lizard brain:
how long have you been doing this now? mastering the art of your body and mind like you're piloting a puppet. has it worked? what do you mean that all you feel is... just exhausted. pick yourself up, the tightrope has no net. after all, you're cheating, somehow, but nobody seems to know you actually flunked the test. it's working!
aren't you happy yet?
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I love how on Tumblr, "media literacy" has become "Um, just because someone writes about this doesn't mean they're endorsing this. I hate all these media puritans ruining everything."
I'm sad to inform you that knowing when and whether an author is endorsing something, implying something, saying something, is also part of media literacy. Knowing when they are doing this and when they're not is part of media literacy. Assuming that no author has ever endorsed a bad thing is how you fall for proper gander. It's not media literacy to always assume that nobody ever has agreed with the morally reprehensible ideas in their work.
Sometimes, authors are endorsing something, and you need to be aware when that happens, and you also need to be aware when you're doing it as an author. All media isn't horny dubcon fanfic where you and the author know it's problematic IRL but you get off to it in the privacy of your brain. Sometimes very smart people can convince you of something that'll hurt others in the real world. Sometimes very dumb people will romanticize something without realizing they're doing it and you'll be caught up in it without realizing that you are.
Being aware of this is also media literacy. Being aware of the narrative tools used to affect your thinking is media literacy. Deciding on your own whether you agree with an author or not is media literacy. Enjoying characters doing bad things and allowing authors to create flawed or cruel characters for the sake of a story is perfectly fine, but it is not the same as being media literate. Being smug about how you never think an author has bad intentions tells me you're edgy, not that you're media literate. You can't use one rule to apply to all media. That's not how media literacy works. Sorry! Sorry! Sorry! Aheem heem. Anyway.
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Prepare for the unexpected. (DPxDC)
Everyone knew about the reign of Pariah Dark. Even those who did not dabble in those realms have heard the tale of the tyrant. A power-hungry man who ruled over the dead with an iron fist.
Following the rise of Pariah Dark, his realm had been effectively cut off from communication. Many mystics and magic users knew better than to open the door of nightmares that could arise if Pariah Dark's reach went further than his own realm.
Except, the universe had plans to bring the realm of the dead back into the cards.
A new opponent, one that had all of Earth's heroes scrambling for options. A being with powers of a god over weather, destruction was on the horizon. A world ending threat.
It's the only reason the Justice League was doing this. In a deep bunker, far from close civilization as a precaution, the heroes looked on with grim expressions.
The world was already being threatened. It would be destroyed regardless of what the league did. So it only made sense to make the last ditch effort. To summon someone strong enough to defeat the threat.
No one wanted to do it. No one wanted to be the one to pull the realm of the dead back to the living. The consequences were untold if this succeeded. If Pariah Dark was freed and defeated the threat, whose to say he won't want control?
That was a problem for later. For the aftermath. For now, the league could only watch on with bated breath as Constantine completely the summon ritual.
They watched on as the shadows in the room seemed to darken and grow. As the sigil sputtered to life with a glow that was growing increasingly brighter. A sudden gust of wind rushed through the room, the temperature began to drop with eaching ticking second.
And then it was all gone.
The room stood perfectly still. Just as it had been moments before. Nothing changed. No giant king standing before them, no sign that the ritual worked.
The room stood deadly still for another beat before the murmurs started. The team trying to make sense of the situation, figure out what went wrong.
Constantine swore up and down that this was the correct ritual, taking offense that they would even think the problem was on his end. It only made it better when it finally happened.
A loud sound ripped through the room, pulling everyone's attention back to the summoning circle. Just in time to see a tear appear in the space above the circle.
A thin tear that ran the length of eight feet. The fabric of the dimension seems to curl at the edges, pulling back to reveal a deep glowing swirl of greens. A dark gloved hand reached through, fingers curling around the edge of the tear, stretching it even further.
A portal. The ritual had worked, but there had been a delay. A delay that had every hero nerves on edge. Each team member tensed, weapons at the ready as they watched the being stretch the portal to the right size.
Then, a foot stepped out with a heavy thud. A dark boot that looked otherworldly despite its similarity to mortal clothing. A deep black that seemed never-ending. A second foot quickly followed before a full body emerged from the portal.
Not many people in the room have ever seen Pariah Dark, let alone know what to expect. Based on what Constantine and Zatara had said, this wasn't Pariah Dark.
A man had stepped out of the portal, standing at almost seven feet tall, and built like a brick house. One glance at the glowing white hair, deadly red eyes, and shard teeth was enough to know this being was not to be messed with.
But there was no giant show of armor or royal garbs. There is no large crown at the top of his head or jewelry from the infinite realms laced around his neck.
Instead, the man stood before them in combat boots, worn-in ripped jeans, a graphic t-shirt, and a spiked leather jacket. Despite his almost normal clothing choice, the man's jacket seemed to be a never-ending depth of the dark night sky. If one was to look closely enough, the cosmos could almost be made out in the sea of darkness.
None of that would have prepared them for when the man spoke. His tone sounded more bored than anything as he took a step forward.
"Oh, so now you need the help of the dead." The man had spoken, running a hand through his hair. When Batman took a step forward to speak, the man raised a hand. Immediately commanding silence in the single gesture. "I'm on babysitting duty and have yet to have a cup of coffee. I'll be right back."
Just like that, both the man and portal vanished into thin air. Leaving behind a group of stunned heroes. Not only was the man not Pariah Dark, but he was also supposedly babysitting.
"Did that just-"
The Flash had been the first voice to speak up, his eyes trained on where the man had once stood. Except he had barely made it through the first few words before the man was suddenly back.
The man that now had a child hanging off his shoulders and another teen being held up by his scruff. Unlike the man, these kids looked human.
Too human for Bruce's liking. The dark black hair and bright blue eyes had every heroes eyes flickering to Batman for just the briefest moment.
"This isn't fair! I'm not even the king. Why do I have to be here!" The teenager had been complaining the moment the man had reappeared. Arms crossed tight over his chest and seemingly used to being held dangling. "Besides, who brings kids to a show down! Wait til I tell mom about this."
"Aw, come on, Danny. This is gonna be fun!!" The younger girl seemed in much better spirits than the teen, Danny. She had climbed up the large man, sitting on his shoulders and resting her arms on the mess of glowing hair. "It's like take your kids to work day! Ooo, Dan! Can we fight too!?"
Unlike the two kids, the man looked purely exhausted and annoyed. The man, Dan, dropped Danny like a sack of potatoes as he took a long drink from the travel cup in his hand.
It didn't take a genius to recognize the look of an exhausted parent in Dan's expression. A look many of the league members were well acquainted to. A look that even had Batman grimacing with sympathy.
"Can it, little shits. You two were grounded, remember." Dan had growled at the kids before shifting his focus back on the team of heroes before them. His glowing eyes set in a deadly glare. "Pariah Dark isn't coming, and he never will. He's been dethroned and banished. We're the best you've got."
A summoning that started with a group of on edge and scared heroes looking for the ghost king, ended in a way no one expected.
No one was even sure if it made any sense. They weren't sure if they should feel hopeful or in despair.
Because truly, what was a ghostly man with two seemingly human children against a godlike foe with the control over the weather?
The unspoken question of power and ability seemed to vanish following Dan downing the metal travel cup of coffee, and crushing it in his fist.
He tossed it to the side, straighting up his posture as he looked over the heroes. Dan might not be a hero, but he's been playing family for too long.
An almost feral, bloodhungry grin spread across the man's face, sharp fangs on full display. The look made the man suddenly look even less human. He looked closer to a demon from the pits of hell rather than the exhausted parent he looked just a few seconds ago.
"Point me in the direction of this bastard. It's been too long since I let loose and had some fun."
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Hmmm. A finger is a unit of volume, as in "two fingers of whiskey". A hand is a unit of length (most commonly the heights of horses).
So fingers per hand is actually a measure of area.
A beard-second is defined as the length a beard grows in one second (generally held to be 5 nanometers), which implies that a beard is a unit of velocity (5 nm/s).
Hands per beard is thus length per (length per time), i.e. a unit of time; conceptually one hand-over-beard is the amount of time it takes to grow a beard that is one hand long.
It follows that we can measure flow (which is change in volume over time) in fingers per hand/beard, or fingerbeards per hand (the number of fingers of fluid that pass through in the time it takes to grow a beard one hand in length).
Of course, fingers measure cubic hands, so we can cancel a hand and express flow in terms of square-hand beards - conceptually a flow of one square-hand beard means that a volume is increasing at the same rate as the volume of a one-hand by one-hand patch of beard.
Acceleration is length per time per time, so hands per square hand/beard, i.e. square beards per hand; this makes intuitive sense as the acceleration that will increase your speed by one beardspeed in the time it takes to grow one-hand beard.
There doesn't seem to be a unit of weight that's derived directly from a human body part, but we can take our cue from the ounce and use a unit of volume of a standardized substance (one ounce of water by weight is also one ounce of water by volume, modulo some details we don't care about). Using finger or hand would get confusing, though, so we should measure mass using a body-part unit we haven't used yet, the butt. One butt is therefore the mass of one butt (volume) of pure water.
Force is measured in mass * distance / square time, which for us means butt-hands per square handoverbeard, but we can cancel some hands to measure force in butt-squared-beards per hand.
The intuition for this is that one butt*square beard / hand is the amount of force necessary to accelerate a butt of water by one beardspeed over the duration of growing a handlong beard.
I think having units tied to approximations of actual human features will greatly help scientific literacy, so this units system should be adopted immediately.
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he can't be gentle. how could he possibly be something that was beaten out of him so cruelly at such a young age?
you don't get soft fingers dancing lightly along your hairline as you sleep on his lap, no, you get a large, calloused paw brushing back your hair so he can see your pretty, pretty features better cos it was annoying him. he can't hold your hand don't be daft he'll crack your smaller bones in half... is the reasoning that he hopes will convince himself to stop fucking thinking about playing with your pretty fingers and pressing soft kisses to them. he's not soft! he's a killing machine! he knows nothing but anger and rage and numbness. so what is this strange fuzzy sensation in the hollow hole in his chest that's bothering him? why does it feel good? why is it making him fucking smile?
when he curls his mass around your sleeping body, don't be mistaken. he doesn't want to feel the way you fit perfectly against him. he's just.. trying to swallow you whole. he's not trying to get closer to you no no he's actually attempting to steal your joy. it's not as if you lessen the, thus far, endless and overwhelming burden of his corporeal blight oh no he's just using you.
everytime he presses his mouth against you and doesn't suck your blood out, he reasons that he's practising self-control and instead forcing himself to leave featherlight kisses that make you giggle oh so sweetly even when he knows deep down that he'd pluck out every one of his own teeth if even one dared puncture your skin. simon's not a soft man. he's not a gentle man. he's killed countless with the very hands that you play with. he tells himself you mean nothing to him, that he could walk away and forget you whenever he felt like it but everytime he wishes that his fingers were softer so that they may be more pleasant upon your skin and everytime he wishes that his lips were less chapped so that you may kiss him more, he knows he's fighting a losing battle.
simon riley will become a soft and gentle man in your embrace and there's not one thing he can do to prevent it.
masterlist
pls comment i have so many thoughts about this man that need to be talked about xx
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